Researchers say Putin’s vision of Russia amounts to a selective abuse of history to justify the ongoing war in Ukraine. (Credit: Reuters)
Russian President Vladimir Putin began his interview with US talk show host Tucker Carlson with a 30-minute lecture on Russian and Ukrainian history. But historians tell the BBC the Russian leader’s claims are nonsensical.
On the establishment of Russia and Ukraine
Mr. Putin claimed that 862 – when Scandinavian prince Rurik was invited to rule over the city of Novgorod, the capital of the Rus – was the year of the “establishment of the Russian state.” He contrasts this with Ukraine, which he insists was “created” as late as the 20th Century. But Sergey Radchenko, a historian at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, says the claim is “a complete falsehood.” “You could equally say that Ukraine as a state began its development in the ninth Century, exactly with the same kind of evidence and documents,” he said.
On Poland’s ‘collaboration with Hitler’
Mr. Putin claimed Poland – which was invaded by Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union in 1939 – “collaborated with Hitler.” Anita Prazmowska, a professor emerita at the LSE, says while it’s true the first treaty Hitler signed after coming to power was a non-aggression pact with Poland in 1934, Mr .Putin is conflating diplomatic outreach to a threatening neighbour with collaboration. “The accusation that the Poles were collaborating is nonsense,” she says. “It just so happened that the Soviet Union also signed treaties with Germany [at the same time].” (BBC, 2/9/2024)
—————————————————
TRUMP SENDS EUROPE INTO A PANIC
Speaking at a South Carolina rally on Saturday, Donald Trump said he would “encourage” Russia to attack NATO members that don’t meet their financial obligations. “No I would not protect you, in fact I would encourage them to do whatever they want,” the former president and likely GOP 2024 nominee thundered. “You gotta pay.” (Gzero Signal, 2/12/2024).
950 million people live within the NATO alliance. (Scripps News, 2/12/2024)
NATO CHIEF WARNS AGAINST TRUMP’S POSITION ON ALLIANCE
What happened The NATO chief, Jens Stoltenberg, has said that any assault on the Western military alliance would be met with a “collective and robust reaction” after Donald Trump threatened to encourage Russia to attack countries that have not contributed enough money.
Who said what “Any suggestion that allies will not defend each other undermines all of our security, including that of the US, and puts American and European soldiers at increased risk,” Stoltenberg said. His statement came in response to Trump’s comments at a rally in South Carolina that he would “encourage” Russia “to do whatever the hell they want” to any European countries he deemed to be in arrears.
The commentary This is “not the first time Trump has singled out NATO,” said The Times. Indeed, he spent much of his four-year presidency “undermining it while strong-arming members into keeping their commitments to spend more on their own militaries,” said the New York Times, with the threat that “he would not come to their aid otherwise.”
What next? Despite NATO’s alarm, further attacks by Moscow do not appear imminent. In his interview with Tucker Carlson last week, Vladimir Putin said that while Russia would fight for its interests “to the end” it had no desire to expand its war in Ukraine to other countries. Putin’s reticence is understandable, considering Russia’s military is already “overextended” in Ukraine, The Guardian said.
——————————————————
CHINA PREPARES FOR US TAKEOVER
China’s Communist Party is at this moment putting in place the infrastructure in America to attack America.
In Reedley, California, near Fresno, authorities found a secret Chinese biological weapons lab with at least 20 pathogens, including the one for Ebola, and almost a thousand mice that had been genetically engineered to spread disease.
Chinese agents, in addition to hobbling Americans with disease and gunning them down, could bomb power stations, attack military bases, start wildfires, poison reservoirs, or create terror in dozens of ways.
These tactics come straight out of Unrestricted Warfare, a 1999 book written by two Chinese air force colonels and first published by the PLA Literature and Arts Publishing House in Beijing. The colonels argued that China can and should employ any tactic in attacking a militarily superior United States. Now, Americans can see how Beijing is operationalizing the suggestions in this how-to manual. (Gordon Chang, Gatestone, 2/13/2024).
12 FEBRUARY 1912 — The last Qing Emperor of China, Puyi (aged six), abdicates after losing the support of the Chinese people. Modern day China often harks back to the Qing dynasty when making claims to lands including Taiwan, which it calls an inalienable part of its territory. Historians, in turn, recall that even under Qing rule there were more than 100 recorded rebellions in Taiwan, highlighting the island’s complex history. (The Week, 2/12/2024)
Chinese Influencer Zhou Zheng: Never Believe What The Jews Say; We Only Hear About The Holocaust, But Not About How The ‘Filthy Rich Jews’ Previously Betrayed ‘Kind’ Germany; The Jews’ Crimes Against China Are Even Worse Than Those Against Germany (MEMRI, 2/9/2024)
——————————————–
THE EXPLAINER
What are the Regency Acts?
As the nation absorbs the news of King Charles’s cancer diagnosis, what happens if he becomes unable to fulfil his constitutional duties is another concern.
“Much of his private work will continue,” according to the BBC’s political editor Chris Mason, and the monarch will still “receive his red boxes, the daily exchange of paperwork at the heart of his role.”
But if he were to become seriously ill, a piece of legislation called the Regency Act could come into play.
What is the Regency Act?
The Regency Act of 1937 was introduced during the reign of King Charles’s grandfather, King George VI. It states that if the monarch “by reason of infirmity of mind or body” is “incapable for the time being of performing the royal functions,” a “regent” would be appointed to take their place until they have recovered. (The Week, 2/12/2024)
———————————————————-
MEDIA BIAS
One can understand why Al-Jazeera and Arab media journalists are so anti-Israel that they do not want to provide a platform to any Palestinian to criticize Hamas. Yet, one cannot understand why the foreign media is turning a blind eye to the critical voices coming out from the Gaza Strip and Palestinians and Arabs living outside the Hamas-ruled coastal enclave. Why? These journalists are busy searching for stories that reflect badly only on Israel. (Bassam Tawil, Gatestone, 2/12/2024)
———————————————-
5 FEBRUARY 1944
The “Captain America” serial film premieres, starring Dick Purcell. The film was the first appearance of a Marvel superhero outside a comic. Today, Marvel movies loom large over the film industry. However, “superhero fatigue” is beginning to set in, Forbes said, with the last major Marvel Studios film, “The Marvels,” underperforming at the box office. (The Week, 2/5/2024)
—————————————————
Biden has opened the floodgates of Hell. Although nothing is inevitable, we are fast approaching the point where, as a practical matter, he will not be able to stop China and Russia, directly and through proxies, from merging existing conflicts and turning them into the next global war. (Gordon G. Chang, Gatestone, 6/6/2023)
———————————————–
A 13-year-old girl was allegedly sexually assaulted in a public toilet while the gang of thugs made her boyfriend watch. Police say that seven suspects were involved in the horrific attack that took place last Tuesday in Sicily, Italy, The Sun reports.
Cops have now arrested seven young Egyptian migrants – four adults and three minors, aged between 15 to 19. (The Sun, 2/6/2024)
——————————————————–
Scripture Reading —Revelation 1:9-16
I, John, your brother and companion in the suffering and kingdom and patient endurance that are ours in Jesus, was on the island of Patmos because of the word of God and the testimony of Jesus. (Revelation 1:9)
John explains to his first readers that he understands what it means to suffer for the cause of Christ. He is imprisoned on the island of Patmos “because of the word of God and the testimony of Jesus.” John confirms that anyone who follows Jesus is not excused from persecution. In fact, Jesus told his followers to expect it. As Jesus’ enemies did to him, they will do to his followers (John 15:18-20, 33). But Jesus also rose victorious from death and ascended to the Father’s right hand. And the church will follow. “Patient endurance” is needed through trials and suffering for God’s kingdom while his people live here on earth, but full life with God forever is promised for all who keep serving him. Next John notes that Jesus announces himself with a trumpet-like voice, telling him to write to the seven churches. John turns around to see who is speaking, and a man is standing there among seven lampstands, dressed in a royal robe, with hair and eyes reflecting images of the “Ancient of Days” in Daniel 7:9, and with a voice like the sound of rushing waters (see Ezekiel 43:2). This “son of man” can be trusted despite what his enemies might do, for this is Jesus, the Lord of his church! (Evan Heerema, Our Daily Bread, 2/6/2024)
[This was the week of our grandson Grayson’s treatment. Update #6 is on the GoFundMe website: https://www.gofundme.com/f/treatment-for-grayson. As time is rather limited, I’m sending you some urgent news clippings, with no “Final Thought.”]
President Volodymyr Zelenskyi spoke in a newspaper interview that Berlin “recently prevented us from receiving supplies of defense weapons systems within the framework of NATO cooperation”. Federal Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock, on the other hand, referred to “the imperative of de-escalation” and at the same time emphasized solidarity with Ukraine. (https://detv.us/2021/12/14/ukraine-insists-on-a-change-of-course-kiev-germany-blocked-arms-delivery/)
Pressure is mounting on the German government to authorize arms deliveries to Ukraine. This is prompted by the fact that Berlin vetoed the supply of US-made sniper rifles to Ukraine via the NATO Support and Procurement Agency (NSPA). The Ukrainian armed forces are already being upgraded by NATO and its member states. So far, the USA has provided military aid worth more than US $2.5 billion, including the delivery of hundreds of Javelin anti-tank missiles. Poland and the Czech Republic have delivered dozens of second-hand armored personnel carriers, Turkey is supplying Kiev with its infamous Bayraktar TB2 drones. Great Britain, in turn, has begun to upgrade Ukraine’s naval forces and wants to help Ukraine acquire new warships and construct new naval bases. Via the NSPA, NATO will supply Kiev with an anti-drone system – with Berlin’s explicit support. Kiev is demanding more and accuses Berlin of “blocking” further arms deliveries. (German Foreign Policy, 12/15/2021)
PUTIN MEETS XI JINPING
Vladimir Putin yesterday sought to present a united front with Xi Jinping after the Kremlin said Beijing supported Moscow’s demand for guarantees that would limit western influence in its backyard. At the start of a 90-minute video call between the pair, Putin told his “dear friend” Xi that “a new model of co-operation between our countries has formed on principles such as non-interference in internal affairs and respecting each other’s interests.” Putin also confirmed he will attend the opening of the Winter Olympics in China, an event Boris Johnson and other leaders have boycotted. (The Week, 12/16/2021)
Russia makes its demands. With 100,000 Russian troops at the Ukrainian border, Moscow released a bombshell list of demands for the “West” on Friday. Among other things, NATO must relinquish any right ever to expand further eastward and must stop sending its troops or ships anywhere that could conceivably threaten Russia. What’s more, the Russians are impatient: they want the US to discuss these proposals right now. The US is happy to talk but won’t give the Kremlin a veto over the choices that sovereign nations want to make about their own security alliances. The Ukrainians, naturally, agree, and on Monday President Volodymyr Zelenskiy will meet with his counterparts from Poland and Lithuania to emphasize the point. (Gzero Signal, 12/20/2021)
———————————————————-
No new friends — Putin and Xi
The leaders of Russia and China held a conspicuously chummy video conference on Wednesday at a time when both are getting an earful from “the West.” Putin told his “dear friend” Xi that he will absolutely attend the Beijing Winter Olympics next February despite a US-led diplomatic boycott over China’s human rights abuses, and that China is right to be worried about Western military maneuvering in the Pacific. Xi, meanwhile, told his “old friend” Putin that China supports Russia’s demands for security guarantees from NATO. Both men reportedly discussed developing alternative financial structures in order to evade Western sanctions — the US and EU have threatened to shut Russia out of SWIFT if the Kremlin invades Ukraine (again). Russia-China relations have always been tricky — they have clashed over borders in the past and Moscow is perennially worried about being dwarfed economically by its more populous neighbor. But as the US gears up for a push against authoritarian countries, the two most influential important ones are closing ranks. (Gzero Signal, 12/16/2021)
———————————————————————————
Fed gets serious about US inflation.
The US Federal Reserve has spent months telling Americans that persistently high inflation was “transitory.” Not anymore (in fact, that word is verboten for the Fed from now on). On Wednesday, the Fed announced it would cut back its monthly purchases of US government debt — which it started doing in March 2020 to bolster the COVID-battered economy — faster than it initially planned because prices are simply rising too much, too fast. What’s more, for the first time since the pandemic began, the Fed is ready to take the more drastic step of raising interest rates up to three times in 2022 if inflation keeps going up at this rate. Now that the US economy is in better shape than it was a year ago — despite ongoing supply-chain disruptions, that is — and unemployment is down, the Fed has become increasingly worried about inflation. Finally admitting you have a problem is a good first step, but fixing it won’t be easy — and interest rate hikes will likely be painful for many Americans. (Gzero Signal, 12/16/2021)
——————————————————————-
IRANIAN OIL ARRIVES IN LEBANON
In September 2021, 80 trucks carrying one million gallons of Iranian oil entered Lebanon amid a severe fuel crisis. There were no border checks and no customs duty was levied. The shipments were orchestrated by the pro-Iranian Hezbollah movement. Lebanon’s Prime Minister Najib Mikati, although a Hezbollah political ally, told CNN: “The violation of Lebanon’s sovereignty makes me sad.”
If the international community still had doubts, these recent events have clearly shown the extent of Hezbollah’s control over Lebanon. The Iranian oil shipments represent an impressive public relations success. In practical terms they are hollow: Lebanon needs more than 6.5 million gallons of oil per day. Iran sent much less than one day’s worth of consumption. Still, from Hezbollah’s viewpoint, the move was a victory. It highlighted Iranian generosity and flouted the United States embargo. And, since they sold the fuel at the inflated market price, the project also proved highly profitable. (Amatzia Baram, MEF, 12/16/2021)
European Neo-Nazis And White Supremacists Use Soccer As An Expression Of Antisemitism Across Social Media Platforms, Chant Slogans Including ‘Jews To The Gas,’ Wear Nazi Paraphernalia At Games, Violently Attack Jewish Supporters Of Rival Teams (MEMRI 12/16/2021)
———————————————————
EU POWER WANING
The global power potential of the EU and its member countries is eroding and cannot keep up with that of the United States and China, as confirmed by data in “Power Atlas,” recently published by the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR). Not only the German and the EU’s relative economic power is systematically declining, Germany is also losing ground in terms of its share of major corporations with global influence. China is leading in every sector. In the high-tech sectors such as artificial intelligence, quantum computing, robotics and the like, the USA and China dominate. The EU, ECFR notes, “fails to keep pace.” In the future, “geopolitics will be dominated by countries and firms” that excel in precisely these fields. Only in the military sector – in terms of the volume of military expenditures, the number of foreign military bases – are western powers, led by the United States far out front. The military could thus take on prime importance in the West’s attempt to maintain its dwindling global dominance against China. (German Foreign Policy, 12/19/2021)
———————————————————————-
JOE SINKS JOE
It looks like US President Joe Biden has come to the end of the road with his $1.75 trillion Build Back Better Plan, now that Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) has announced flatly he’ll vote “no.” With the Senate split 50-50, Biden needs every Democrat vote in the chamber. The White House haggled with Manchin for months — “dancin’ for Manchin”, you might say. Biden even cut the proposed spending in half. But the moderate Manchin said he still “couldn’t get there” because of concerns about the deficit, and further stoking already high inflation. Republicans, of course, are ecstatic, because passing BBB is Biden’s key pitch for Americans to vote for Democrats in next year’s midterms and re-elect him (or another Democrat in his place) in 2024. It’s not too late to reach a fresh compromise on the bill, but the longer the Dems keep squabbling, the longer their odds of retaining control of Congress next November. (Gzero Signal. 12/20/2021)
——————————————————————–
THUNDER DOWN UNDER
For Beijing, there is thunder Down Under. Tensions between Australia and China just keep rising. After China responded to Aussie requests for a COVID investigation by imposing devastating tariffs and unofficial bans on Australian exports in 2020, Oz is pushing back hard now. Canberra on Friday accused China of “economic coercion,” while cybersecurity officials publicly confirmed malicious attacks against Australia by Chinese spy services working with Chinese telecom giant Huawei. The Aussies also say Chinese intelligence vessels are snooping around in Australia’s Exclusive Economic Zone. These accompany several clearly pro-American moves this year: the Aussies have signed on to AUKUS, an exclusive military club with Washington and London that gives them access to unprecedented weapons tech, are allowing the buildup of US military infrastructure (read, bases) on its soil, and joined America in a diplomatic boycott of the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics. But the Australians are taking the tensions directly to China’s neighborhood, too. Canberra just signed a $770 million weapons deal with South Korea, including tech to build Howitzers — really, really big artillery guns. And even though the spat between the two continues, there is evidence that Australia, while heavily dependent on trade with China, is successfully pushing for diversity in trade partnerships. (Gzero Signal, 12/20/2021)
———————————————————————
TO THE POINT
Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orban says his government will defy an EU ruling and maintain its controversial immigration laws. The bloc’s top court has ruled that Hungary’s law, which criminalises lawyers and activists who help asylum seekers, was in breach of European legislation. Orban said the EU’s rules were “obsolete” in the face of “massive migration” since 2015. The row means Hungary could miss out on billions of euros in EU cash. (The Week, 12/23/2021)
Covid’s icy grip on Europe: Winter infections soar on the continent as Belgium rages with anti-lockdown riots, Holland enforces brutal new curbs and Germany bans tourists in desperate bid to slow the march of Omicron *Winter infections are soaring across Europe amid the rapid spread of the Omicron coronavirus variant *Denmark became first EU country to lift lockdown restrictions, but Europe now reintroducing tougher rules. Thousands of protestors marched through Brussels and clashed with police over tighter restrictions. Holland has announced that all non-essential stores, bars and restaurants will be closed until January 14. Germany has also confirmed Britain has been added to its list of high-risk countries as a ‘virus variant area’ by Jamie Phillips for MailOnline, 20 Dec 2021 (https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10326009/Covids-icy-grip-Europe-Winter-infections-soar-countries-bid-slow-march-Omicron.html)
Doctors have been told to stop handing out antidepressants after a study found no strong evidence that the drugs were effective. A trial failed to show a “clinically relevant” difference between the drugs and a placebo, with researchers finding that patients had “severe” side effects and withdrawal symptoms. An estimated 7.8m people in England — roughly one adult in six — were given at least one prescription for antidepressants in 2019-20. (The Week, 12/21/2021)
Police in India are investigating a charity started by the late Mother Teresa for alleged “forceful conversions”. Authorities in the state of Gujarat are investigating whether the Missionaries of Charity forced girls in its shelter home to wear a cross and read the Bible. The Telegraph said the probe comes as the Hindu nationalist government pursues a crackdown on the country’s Christian minority. (The Week, 12/14/2021)
What Americans believe when it comes to matters of faith has been shifting for decades, and the latest Pew Research Center seems to indicate that the pace of change is accelerating. Today, the percentage of Americans that identify as Christians is the lowest that it has ever been before, and the percentage of Americans that identify as “nones” is at a new all-time record high. (PNW, 12/16/2021)
The Queen is suffering “sleepless nights” over the Duke of Cambridge’s decision to fly with his wife and children in a helicopter, according to a royal source. The source told The Times that she is “terrified” about an accident. An unwritten rule preventing senior royals flying together was relaxed to allow Prince William to travel with his family between London and Norfolk, but an investigation has been launched after two near-misses. (The Week, 12/20/2021)
“At root, almost every globalist and transnational institution and summit has a common feature: the endless transfer of wealth from the First World, the historic oppressors, to their alleged Third World victims.” (Pat Buchanan 11/9/2021)
What would happen if a doomsday cult were to take over the world? Science fiction? No. It’s happened.
How else to explain the collective lunacy of the COP26 meeting in Glasgow, an absolute farce where world leaders made complete fools of themselves?
There’s been much criticism of the hypocrisy of the event, with hundreds of private jets flying into Glasgow to hector the world about reducing carbon emissions.
Far, far worse has been the total erasure of rationality in the hysterical chorus that this was the “last chance to save the planet” — and the fact that no-one in mainstream debate has challenged this as utter unscientific garbage. (Melanie Phillips, 11/3/2021)
Nelson Mandela Bay [Port Elizabeth & area] Day Zero: ‘We will run out of water before Christmas’
‘We are weeks away from the dams running dry, rather than months,’ says the expert sent by the National Treasury to help the metro deal with this imminent crisis. ‘We are cutting it really fine.’ Is anybody listening? by Estelle Ellis
Nelson Mandela Bay metro (NMBM) is hurtling towards the worst-case scenario.
With only weeks of water left in the metro’s dams, its Plan B is failing because of delays in the completion of the Nooitgedacht Water Scheme – and yet residents have not reduced their water consumption. “If it doesn’t rain and consumption is not drastically reduced, we will run out of water before Christmas,” said Dr Gisela Kaiser. Kaiser has been seconded by the National Treasury to Nelson Mandela Bay to try to steer the city through the water crisis.
Germany should “vigorously” promote “Taiwan’s greater representation in international organizations,” as demanded by the USA, and “in the long run” insist on its UN membership. This is a growing demand by representatives of foreign policy think tanks in Berlin and by commentators in leading German media organs in the context of a US campaign aimed at undermining the UN resolution recognizing the People’s Republic of China as the sole legitimate representative of China at the UN. The campaign, in turn, is part of Washington’s efforts to instrumentalize Taiwan more than before in its power struggle with Beijing. Washington is upgrading Taipei’s armaments – with arms export clearances worth US $18 billion under the Trump administration. With US warships crossing on a monthly basis through the Taiwan Straits, it is intensifying its gunboat diplomacy and is beginning to permanently station US troops on Taiwan, while planning to deploy medium-range missiles on the “first island chain” off China, including Taiwan. (German Foreign Policy, 11/4/2021)
Parallel to a US campaign to reinforce Taiwan in the joint power struggle against Beijing, the European Parliament is calling for a “comprehensive enhanced partnership” with Taipei. On Wednesday a parliamentary delegation arrived in Taiwan, for the first time, to hold talks with top-ranking politicians with the aim of further developing relations. The European Parliament also advocates taking additional steps, which would undermine the “One China Policy” and thereby chop at the roots of diplomatic relations to the People’s Republic of China. The EU’s representation in Taipei, for example, should be renamed the “European Union Office in Taiwan” – a linguistic detail, which of course, carries weight in the diplomatic world and signifies a step in the direction of Taiwan’s formal recognition. The latter is incompatible with diplomatic relations with Beijing. The new Taiwan campaign goes hand-in-hand with a campaign against the external cultural policy of the People’s Republic of China, in particular, its Confucius Institutes. Demands to shut them down are now being heard. (German Foreign Policy, 11/7/2021)
———————————————————
THE FOURTH REICH
‘The Fourth Reich’ – German Neo-Nazis And White Supremacists, Influenced By Founding Member Of The Red Army Faction (RAF) Horst Mahler, Advocate For Replacing German Government With State Modeled After Third Reich, Seek To Inspire Global Neo-Nazi Movement
German neo-Nazis and white supremacists have been using the term “Fourth Reich” to refer to an imagined establishment of a new German state, based largely on the national socialism of the Third Reich. The establishment of the imagined state would involve the retrieval of West and East Prussia, (territory that is currently Poland and Russia), Silesia (territory that is today Poland and Czech Republic), Pomerania and East Brandenburg, parts of which were made part of Poland after WWII. (MEMRI 11/5/2021)
———————————————–
AFGHANISTAN
British and Canadian troops were more than twice as likely to get killed in Afghanistan as their US counterparts, according to a study that looks at the scale of the sacrifice made by Nato allies over the course of the 20-year war.
The UK also gave more to Afghanistan than the US in the form of economic and humanitarian assistance as a percentage of GDP, the study published on Wednesday by the Costs of War project at Brown University in the US found.
Although the US suffered by far the greatest number of fatalities in absolute terms compared with other members of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) – 2,316 American troops were killed between 2001 and 2017, the period of the study – Canadians and British soldiers sent to Afghanistan were more likely to die. (The Guardian, 2021)
Taliban Orders: Western Hairstyles Are In Violation Of Shari’a; Women Forbidden From Carrying Phones, Taking Selfies; Shaving Beards Is Outlawed; Taliban Arabic Magazine: US Veteran Suicide Is A Prayer Answered By Allah (MEMRI, 11/7/2021)
——————————————————————–
JEWISH INVOLVEMENT IN CREATION OF MODERN IRAQ
On August 23, 2021, Iraq celebrated its centennial. There was little of the pomp and celebration that the occasion would have called for; the country was too heavily weighed down by political turmoil and economic hardships. Still, a few articles in the local newspapers were written celebrating the occasion, and some spent time praising the name of an Iraqi Jew, Heskell Sassoon, as one of the key architects in the creation of modern Iraq after four centuries of Ottoman rule.
As the Ottoman Empire begun to crumble toward the end of World War I, the Jews of Baghdad were victimized for supposedly causing the collapse of the government’s finances and some moneychangers faced degradation and torture. Not surprisingly, the Jews welcomed the British army when it entered Baghdad victoriously in 1917. Indeed, there is evidence that shortly after the British military government was established, the Jews of Baghdad, who constituted about 40 percent of the capital’s population, sent an appeal to the military governor of Iraq, General Stanley Maude, signed by 56 leading personalities of the community, expressing their objection to the creation of an Arab national government and requesting to be granted the status of British subjects.
The request was ignored, but Jews came to be important in the colonial government. With the language skills they had acquired at the Jewish schools and with what today would be termed a global outlook, Jews in large numbers were recruited by the British military government to fill many positions in the new administration. Other Jews used their trading skills and overseas contacts to import food supplies to meet the needs of the British army.
In 1920 a deadly revolt erupted in central and southern Iraq against the British rule which the British tried to suppress by force. The revolt claimed the lives of 6,000 Iraqi and 600 British soldiers (primarily Indians with their British officers.). After months of fighting, the key leaders of the revolt decided to seek an end to the violence. They selected a Jew by the name of Menashe Eliahu Ezra Khalaschi who, together with Sheikh Salman Al-‘Abtan, met with the British commanding officer in the city Kufa, and a ceasefire was achieved.
With the revolt coming to an end, Great Britain decided to relinquish some of the governing powers to a national government, although under British tutelage. A provisional government was established in 1920 with Abdul Rahman Al-Naqib as prime minister presiding over a government comprising six additional ministers, including Heskel Sassoon as minister of finance. Gertrude Bell, who was the Oriental Adviser to the British military government, who is considered by some to be the person most responsible for the creation of modern Iraq, was a big booster of Sassoon. She would later write that he was the most competent of the Iraqi ministers.
Haskell Sassoon was born in Baghdad in 1860 to a distinguished and wealthy Iraqi Jewish family. The son of a leading rabbi, he attended the Alliance School, and continued his education at the imperial school in Constantinople and then with law studies at St. Theresa College in Vienna. He returned to Baghdad after spending time in Berlin and London and, in 1908, he was designated as a member in the first Ottoman parliament where, incidentally, he befriended Prince Faisal, who was to become king of Iraq.
Al-Naqib readily welcomed Bell’s recommendation to appoint Heskell Sassoon as minister of finance, but Bell had difficulty persuading him to add a Shi’ite minister to the government. Throughout most of the history of Iraq under Muslim rule, from the advent of Islam in the seventh century to invasion of Iraq by the United States in 2003, the rulers of Iraq were primarily Sunni Muslims. The Shi’a branch of Islam has been viewed by the Sunnis, particularly those in Saudi Arabia, as rawafedh, meaning apostate. Gertrude Bell, herself believed that the Shi’as “were almost all subjects of Persia, and not eligible for office in a Metropolitan government,” but she believed it was important for national unity to include them. Al-Naqib reluctantly agreed to appoint a Shi’ite as minister of education. The new government, also known as the Provisional Council of State, reported to the British administration. (MEMRI 9/20/2021)
————————————————-
TO THE POINT
In Michigan, prosecutors said that a female Muslim doctor facing a charge of obstruction of justice performed female genital mutilation (FGM) procedures on nine 7-year-old girls. The doctor was “part of a secret network which traveled across the U.S. to perform the agonizing procedure,” the court was told. The network belongs to the Dawoodi Bohra cult, whose national presence was exposed by Clarion Intelligence Network. (Clarion Project, 9/23/2021)
Europe is at “critical point” in the Covid-19 pandemic after once again becoming the “epicentre” of the global outbreak, a World Health Organization boss has warned. On the current trajectory, Hans Kluge told a press conference yesterday, the continent may be facing another half a million coronavirus deaths by the beginning of February. Many countries are “in the midst of a virulent fourth wave,” said Politico. German authorities reported 34,000 new infections on Thursday, a record high, and hospitals there are “beginning to buckle under the pressure” as intensive care beds fill up, Deutsche Welle reported. (The Week, 11/5/2021)
France is returning 60 artefacts to the west African nation of Benin taken from there in 1896, when the country was first colonized. It all sounds really good. The problem is that Benin is not the most stable country in the world. During an upheaval, it’s quite likely the same items could be stolen, as they were in Iraq some years ago.
General Colin Powell died a couple of weeks ago. He is generally considered a great man. But he had at least one major flaw. In an interview I saw with him, he said how much he looked forward to America’s first Muslim president. He obviously lacked in perception!
The COP26 conference in Glasgow really is a farce. China’s president is missing. The US and India are there. They are the next two biggest polluters. Russia comes in at number 4. Again, Russia’s president is not there. Greta Thunberg is there and keeps making the headlines. The only question there is: who’s behind her? The biggest farce of all is all the private jets at Glasgow’s airport. The representatives are collectively the biggest polluters on the planet!
Apparently, President Biden on his visit to Britain for COP26, made a loud noise, with resultant smell, while next to Camilla, Prince Charles’ wife. This could, of course, happen to anyone. It particularly afflicts old men. It reminded me of a story the Queen told over dinner some years ago. She had been to the airport to welcome a visiting foreign head of state. They rode in an open carriage through the streets of London. Suddenly, one of the horses let out the same loud noise with resultant smell. It was so loud the queen felt she had to address it. She remarked “You see, Mr. President, there are some things even a queen has no control over.” To which the visiting president responded, “If you hadn’t said anything, your Majesty, I would have thought it was the horse!” The president was Nigeria’s General Gowon, though many thought it was the US president, George W. Bush.
—————————————————–
I Corinthians 13:8 Remember in these troubled times, “Love never fails!”
A tweet from the National Public Radio (NPR) Public Editor on Thursday — on the day of the presidential debate — explained why the taxpayer-funded news outlet has been ignoring the growing scandal surrounding former Vice President Joe Biden, his son Hunter Biden, and the family’s business dealings in China.
“Why haven’t you seen any stories from NPR about the NY Post’s Hunter Biden story,” the tweet said. “We don’t want to waste our time on stories that are not really stories, and we don’t want to waste listeners’ and readers’ time on that stories that are just pure distractions.”
“Major media are either denouncing the allegations as unproven or ignoring the story, the motive for which is apparent. Journalistic duty be damned. We have to get rid of Trump. And anything that jeopardizes that highest of goals should be buried until after Election Day.” (Pat Buchanan, 10/27/2020)
Texas prepares to send 1,000 troops to five major cities, DC boards up its stores and Washington state puts the National Guard on alert as the US braces for post-election violence. (Daily Mail, 10/26/2020)
————————————————–
One view on a Biden win:
If Joe Biden defeats Donald Trump next week, he will take office during a global pandemic and America’s most serious economic crisis for a century. And when he’s dealt with those, he will still have to rebuild US relationships abroad, grapple with the nation’s increasingly dysfunctional democratic institutions – and face the existential threat of climate change. (The Guardian 10/28/2020)
————————————————–
INTERNATIONAL AGREEMENT ASSERTING RIGHT TO LIFE
On Thursday, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Secretary of Health & Human Services Alex Azar co-hosted the virtual signing of the Geneva Consensus Declaration along with the governments of Brazil, Egypt, Hungary, Indonesia, and Uganda.
The declaration serves as a rebuke to the pro-abortion rights U.N. and World Health Organization (WHO).
It states the nations join to promote women’s health as well as the “strength of the family and of a successful and flourishing society.” The governments also affirm “the essential priority of protecting the right to life.”
The nations that signed onto the declaration, which represent 1.6 billion people, also “reaffirm ‘all are equal before the law,’” and that “human rights of women are an inalienable, integral, and indivisible part of all human rights and fundamental freedoms.”
The governments declare “the inherent ‘dignity and worth of the human person,’ that ‘every human being has the inherent right to life,’ and the commitment ‘to enable women to go safely through pregnancy and childbirth and provide couples with the best chance of having a healthy infant.’”
The declaration emphasizes that “in no case should abortion be promoted as a method of family planning,” and that “the family is the natural and fundamental group unit of society and is entitled to protection by society and the State.” (Dr. Susan Berry, Breitbart, 10/23/2020)
—————————————————–
THE US – AN INSPIRATIONAL LEADER IN MID EAST
By taking a robust approach to some of the region’s more intractable issues… such as relocating the American embassy to Jerusalem, the US has produced a number of profound changes to the regional landscape, the consequences of which are likely to be felt for many years to come.
The breakthrough in the peace process, moreover, has resulted in the region being clearly divided between moderate, peace-loving countries that are prepared to engage in the peace process, and rejectionist regimes, such as Turkey and Iran, that are only interested in causing further bloodshed.
It is these countries, as well as China, Russia, North Korea, Cuba and Venezuela that have most to fear in next month’s presidential election if a strong and successful America returns again. (Con Coughlin, Gatestone, 10/24/2020)
—————————————————–
THE END OF AMERICAN ILLUSION
Since the end of the Cold War, most U.S. policymakers have been beguiled by a set of illusions about the world order. On critical issues, they have seen the world as they wish it were and not how it really is. President Donald Trump, who is not a product of the American foreign policy community, does not labor under these illusions. Trump has been a disrupter, and his policies, informed by his heterodox perspective, have set in motion a series of long-overdue corrections. Many of these necessary adjustments have been misrepresented or misunderstood in today’s vitriolic, partisan debates. But the changes Trump has initiated will help ensure that the international order remains favorable to U.S. interests and values and to those of other free and open societies. (Nadia Schladlow, Sept-Oct issue, Foreign Affairs)
———————————————-
THE US NAVY IS SHORT ALMOST 100 FIGHTER PILOTS
The US Navy is battling to get its fighter pilot training program back on track. by David B Larter, Sept 17,2020
The Navy has seen a slew of issues, including problems with the oxygen flow to the pilots causing negative and unsafe physiological responses in pilots and trainees, as well as readiness and engine trouble with aircraft. All of this has extended the time it takes to create a fighter pilot from three to four years, and the issues have created a gap in the number of pilots in the fleet, naval air training chief Rear Adm. Robert Westendorff said at a virtual Tailhook symposium on Saturday. “We can’t just snap our fingers and produce those immediately. The time to train of a strike fighter pilot is about three years; due to the bottlenecks we’ve had, its getting closer to four years,” Westendorff said.
US & CHINA – INCREASED TENSIONS: Tang Hong, a Chinese expert for Middle Eastern affairs, said in a September 3, 2020 interview on CGTN Arabic TV (China) that tensions are increasing between China and the United States because some American politicians still hold on to a Cold War ideology and believe that America can be the only superpower in the world. He said that U.S. and China can either cooperate or engage in competition that may involve armed conflict, and he criticized the U.S. for choosing the “wrong” path. Hong said that today’s China is not the China of the past, that it has a clear position regarding how it would respond to any military provocations and that it does not fear escalation.
Tang Hong: “In my view, the main reason for the escalating tensions between [the U.S. and China] is that some American politicians hold on to the ideology of the Cold War. They delude themselves that they can maintain the status of being the single superpower in the world. They believe that competition is the only way to resolve this problem and to preserve their status as the world’s only superpower. But the truth is that they were wrong in thinking this. (MEMRI, 9/16/2020)
Official Chinese TV Criticizes U.S. Capitalism, Trump’s Economic Policies: The Government Should Redistribute Wealth; Fundamental Reforms Are The Only Solution; Trump Does Not Care About Making America Great Again (MEMRI 10/26/2020)
As Europe locks down again, there’s only one major country in the world that will fully recover from the pandemic. In his cover story, Rana Mitter looks at China’s incredible escape act and how the virus has reordered the world to Xi Jinping’s benefit. (The Spectator, 10/22/2020)
———————————————————
SOUTH ASIAN MUSLIM EXPERIENCE
The presence of South Asian Muslims in America began with a “trickle” of immigration in the early 1900s, but the “real flow” started after the independence of Pakistan and India in the 1940s. The South Asian Muslim diaspora grew rapidly in the U.S. during the 1970s and 1980s, when the U.S. sought to alleviate a shortage of doctors at home by opening its doors to foreigners with a medical degree. Attracted by the opportunity for greater income and freedom in America, these immigrants agreed to be placed in rural communities. Today there are some 52,800 American physicians from India and Pakistan, and 98% of the Pakistani doctors are Muslim. (“South Asian Muslims and the American Experience,” Marilyn Stern, MEF, 10/26/2020)
—————————————————
59% of American women with college degrees are trending toward Biden. (CBS Face the Nation, 10/25/2020)
“Record high campaign contributions from women helped Democrats take the House in 2016, and now women have their sights set on the Senate. In the 15 most competitive Senate races, an average 43% of the large dollar donors to Democratic candidates are women, compared to 28% of donors to Republicans.” (USA Today, 10/26/2020)
Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) told Axios in an interview that aired Monday that she expects a liberal turn if Democratic nominee Joe Biden is elected president, adding that she wants all Cabinet positions filled with progressives.
Biden’s transition team has reportedly vetted a handful of Republicans for potential Cabinet positions. While this may reinforce Biden’s image as a unity candidate, it has fueled a backlash among the Democratic Party’s leftmost wing.
“I would say all of the Cabinet positions should be filled by progressive Democrats,” Omar told Axios. “We know that the policies we advocate for are most popular with the American people,” she added. (Tom Ozimek, Epoch Times, 10/27/2020)
——————————————————————
GERMANY / EU
We are facing very, very difficult months ahead.” Chancellor Angela Merkel says German’s should brace themselves after a sharp spike in coronavirus cases. The country recorded its 10,000th Covid death on Saturday. (The Week, 10/26/2020)
Germany tries to forge a deal on who can play ball in Europe Defense News, 21 Sept 2020
COLOGNE, Germany — Time is ticking for Germany to find a compromise on letting American, British and other non-European Union countries tap into the bloc’s emerging defense cooperation scheme. The government of Chancellor Angela Merkel has taken on the task of sorting out the issue by the end of the year, when Germany’s six-month term at the helm of the European Council concludes. “It is an important issue to solve, particularly for close NATO partners,” Karl-Heinz Kamp, special envoy of the political director at the German Ministry of Defence, said during a panel discussion at the annual Defense News Conference this month. The challenge is to find common ground between two camps within the EU: member states seeking ties with outsiders, and those countries who prefer treating the nascent defense agenda as a members-only affair. Poland, Sweden and the Netherlands are leading a group of nations advocating for openness. But France, for example, is pursuing a more restrictive stance, especially toward Turkey and the United States.
From the beginning, the Trump administration has eyed the EU’s creation of a defense cooperation mechanism, dubbed PESCO, and the proposed multibillion-dollar European Defence Fund with a degree of mistrust. The efforts run the risk of undermining NATO if America and its powerful defense companies are kept out, Washington claims. The tone has softened more recently, however, as officials on both sides of the Atlantic try to broker a compromise. “One of the things that COVID-19 has really brought into sharp focus is the significance of our integrated defense industrial base,” said Gregory Kausner, executive director for international cooperation, who works in the Pentagon for acquisition chief Ellen Lord. (Defense News, 9/21/2020)
—————————————————-
Hungary’s PM Orbán: George Soros wants to create mixed-ethnic societies, dismantle nationalism, and hand power to the global elite (9/22/2020)
—————————————————–
ISLAM
DOUBLE STANDARD IN ISLAM
France recalled its ambassador to Turkey after Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said French President Emmanuel Macron needed a mental health evaluation amid a government crackdown on Islamic extremism.
“What is the problem of this person called Macron with Islam and Muslims?” Erdogan asked rhetorically during his Justice and Development Party meeting in the central Anatolian city of Kayseri.
“Macron needs treatment on a mental level,” he added, according to the BBC. “What else can be said to a head of state who does not understand freedom of belief and who behaves in this way to millions of people living in his country who are members of a different faith?”
The French crackdown comes in response to the beheading of a history teacher near Paris by an alleged extremist. (Danielle Wallace, Fox News 10/25/2020)
Grand Mufti Of Egypt Shawki Allam: According To Our Research, 50% Of Second- And Third-Generation Muslims In Europe Support ISIS (MEMRI, 10/25/2020)
———————————————
AUSTRALIA
QUEEN INNOCENT OVER DISMISSAL, KERR MISLED PALACE: KEATING
The architect of Australia’s push for a republic, Paul Keating, repudiates as “tilting at shadows” the revisionist history that claims the Queen was implicated in the 1975 dismissal of the Whitlam government.
Rejecting conspiracy theories about the Queen’s complicity that have attracted support in recent years, the former prime minister said the Queen had “never contrived, on this occasion or others, over the long course of her reign, to undermine governments.”
Mr. Keating said claims that she engaged with governor-general John Kerr to terminate the Whitlam government were “given the lie” by his own knowledge of the Queen, notably her immediate acceptance of his advice as prime minister that Australia should become a republic, delivered in 1993 during their meeting at Balmoral.
He said it was the governor-general who misled Buckingham Palace in 1975. “Kerr usurped the kingly powers reserved to a monarch, unused for centuries, and made the palace hostage to his plans,” Mr. Keating said.
While he is a committed republican, Mr. Keating made clear his respect for the Queen, saying she sought always to do her duty by Australia. He warned republicans that accusing the Queen of complicity in Whitlam’s dismissal would only undermine their cause. (The Australian, 10/26/2020)
AUSTRALIAN PROBLEM WITH JIHADISTS
In 2013, MEMRI reported on the activity at the Al-Risalah Islamic bookstore in Sydney, Australia, which also served as a community center for local Muslims. The report showed that the bookstore, located in the Bankstown area of West Sydney, was a hub from which radical Islamists spread extremist and militant Islamic views. The center was owned by Australian preacher and community leader Wissam Haddad, and many of the individuals who operated and preached there later joined Al-Qaeda (AQ) or the Islamic State (ISIS), or were involved terror activity inside Australia. Haddad closed the Al-Risalah center in September 2014 after media reports about the activity there aroused public outrage.
The present report, based on research conducted in 2019-2020, shows that, eight years later, despite arrests and the banning of their activity, Haddad and other members of the Bankstown jihadi network are still preaching extremist views and possibly also recruiting for terror organizations. (MEMRI 9/24/2020)
COULD JOHNSON MAKE UP WITH A PRESIDENT BIDEN?
As the self-styled “Mr. Brexit”, Donald Trump’s residence in the White House seemed perfectly aligned with Boris Johnson’s aims of striking a lucrative US trade deal as Britain quits the EU.
But Trump’s opponent in the imminent US presidential election is a different prospect entirely. Having vocally opposed the Brexit project, Joe Biden may prove less eager to strengthen ties with Downing Street if he secures the White House.
And with polls pointing towards victory at the polls for the Democrat, concerns are growing inside Downing Street about a changing of the guard in Washington that could “leave Johnson scrambling to rebuild the ‘special relationship,’” according to the Financial Times. (The Week, 10/26/2020)
———————————————-
TO THE POINT
BRITS FORCED TO PAY £4BILLION FOR IMMIGRANT 5-STAR HOTELS (BNP newsletter, 10/23/2020)
Pope Francis will elevate Washington DC archbishop Wilton Gregory to cardinal making him the first black prelate in the US to hold the rank. (Daily Mail, 10/25/2020)
ARRESTS AFTER SPECIAL FORCES END SUSPECTED TANKER HIJACKING — Seven stowaways have been arrested after the Special Boat Service stormed a tanker off the Isle of Wight. About 16 commandos boarded the Nave Andromeda last night, following a suspected hijacking. Two Royal Navy Merlin helicopters were involved, along with two Royal Navy Wildcat helicopters. “Initial reports confirm the crew are safe and well,” the Ministry of Defence said in a statement. (The Week, 10/26/2020)
TheEconomist provided sympathetic coverage of a Chinese tech giant widely considered a national security risk without disclosing the publication’s lucrative business relationship with the firm that spanned nearly a decade. (Washington Free Beacon, 10/26/2020)
While critics of President Trump’s redeployment of U.S. troops in Europe continue to bash the moves, Poland is showing how a real ally behaves. While already fulfilling its NATO required 2% of GDP for defense spending, it has now also agreed to pay the majority of costs associated with stationing 5,500 U.S. troops at bases in Poland. (American Defense News, 10/25/2020)
“The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other people’s money,” Margaret Thatcher.
Keep in mind on election day Daniel 2:21 — “And he changes the times and the seasons: he removes kings and sets up kings.”
This cartoon from Australia shows the great gulf between government workers (still fully employed) and workers in the private sector (in lifesavers, desperate to be rescued). The Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison is reminding all those in the water that “we’re all in this together,” with government workers safely on the boat.
———————————————————————————–
UAE / ISRAEL DEAL A ‘WIN WIN’ FOR PEACE
The United Arab Emirates will derive many benefits from closer relationships with the Middle East’s most stable and advanced country. These include economic and technological partnerships, military and intelligence sharing, mutual tourism and better relationships with the US and much of the rest of the world.
The deal also demonstrates how quickly changes occur in this volatile part of the globe. It was only a few decades ago when Israel’s strongest allies were Iran and Turkey, and its most intractable enemies were Egypt, Jordan and the Gulf states. Now the reverse is true. The only constant constructive element in the region is a democratic Israel, with its close ties to the United States.
The other constant – but a destructive one – has been the Palestinian leadership. They constantly say no to everything that involves normalization with Israel. This stance goes back to the 1930s when they rejected the Peel Commission recommendation that would have given them a state in the vast majority of the British Mandate. But because it would also have given the Jews a tiny, non-contiguous state, the Palestinians said no. They wanted there not to be a Jewish state more than they wanted there to be a Palestinian state. This naysaying . . . continues today with their refusal even to negotiate over the Trump peace plan. (Alan Dershowitz, Gatestone, 8/16/2020)
————————————————
IRANIAN OPPOSITION TO DEAL
Iran’s regime has led the charge in opposing bilateral peaceful relations between Israel and the United Arab Emirates. It has been joined by Turkey, which threatened to sever relations with Abu Dhabi, and a few other voices, such as former deputy national security advisor Ben Rhodes, who played a role in the Obama administration.
The paucity of voices opposing the agreement have brought together an increasingly small chorus that is obsessively critical of Israel or which is aligned with the increasing extremism of Ankara and the regime in Tehran.
Ebrahim Raisi, Iran’s head of the judiciary, slammed the UAE deal on Saturday. He said US influence in the region was weakening in the face of the power of Iran’s “Islamic system” and that “the UAE has got in touch with the child killers,” a reference to Israel. “We do not consider the link between UAE and Israel as a link with the people of the UAE, only the ignorant rulers of the country.” (Seth Frantzman, Middle East Forum, 8/15/2020)
—————————————————–
PALESTINIAN LEADERSHIP ANTI-AGREEMENT
By holding a political protest at the compound of the Al-Aqsa Mosque, Palestinians are not only desecrating the sanctity of the site, but also sending a warning to citizens of UAE not to visit Jerusalem or the mosque, as many apparently hoped to do.
The Joint Statement of the United States, Israel, and the UAE on August 13 points out that according to President Donald J. Trump’s Vision for Peace, “all Muslims who come in peace may visit and pray at the Al-Aqsa Mosque, and Jerusalem’s other holy sites should remain open for peaceful worshippers of all faiths.”
This warning shows that the Palestinians believe they have exclusive control over Islam’s third-holiest site and are free to decide who can visit the site and who cannot. It is therefore the right time for Arabs and Muslims to step in to demand an end to Palestinian hegemony over the Al-Aqsa Mosque and other holy sites in Jerusalem.
By declaring war on the UAE, the Palestinian leadership has chosen to align itself with those who seek the elimination of Israel: Iran, Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and Hezbollah. The Palestinian leadership has again demonstrated its determination to act against the interests of its own people, who could have benefited from the UAE-Israel deal by seeking financial aid from the Arab countries and jobs in the Gulf states. (Khaled Abu Toameh, Gatestone, 8/18/2020)
——————————————————–
RIVLIN INVITES UAE CROWN PRINCE TO JERUSALEM FOR OFFICIAL VISIT In letter to Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, president expresses hope diplomatic ties will ‘march region forward’; Netanyahu says direct flights over Saudi Arabia coming.
President Reuven Rivlin on Monday extended an invitation to the de facto leader of the United Arab Emirates to visit Israel, after the two countries agreed on normalization. Rivlin’s invitation to the crown prince of the Emirate of Abu Dhabi, Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, was sent in Arabic and came days after the announcement of a landmark deal between Israel and the UAE on forging diplomatic ties. The invitation was to visit “Israel and Jerusalem and be our honored guest.” Whereas Israel considers the entire city its capital, the Arab world sees East Jerusalem as the future capital of a Palestinian state. The president expressed hope that the new peace deal “will help build and strengthen the trust between us and the peoples of the region, a trust that will promote understanding between us all. Rivlin met with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu later in the day at the President’s Residence and praised the premier for the UAE normalization deal.
Netanyahu thanked him, saying: “I greatly appreciate your support. This is an historic agreement that will benefit not only Israelis and the UAE.”
Rivlin met with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu later in the day at the President’s Residence and praised the premier for the UAE normalization deal.
Netanyahu said, “I think it brings closer Arab-Israeli peace that will, in the end, advance peace in general.”
BELARUS — WHAT HAPPENS IN MINSK DOESN’T STAY IN MINSK
The political turmoil in Belarus continues. Popular protests against President Alexander Lukashenko are growing, but the longtime strongman refuses to budge, just a week after winning reelection — in a vote that the opposition and most international observers say was rigged. On Monday, Lukashenko grudgingly agreed to go the polls again . . . after a constitutional referendum process that he can draw out as long as he wants (and which will likely be rejected by the protesters).
Beyond its borders, the post-election drama in Belarus is being closely watched by outside players with a keen interest in the outcome of the crisis.
Who are they, and what do they want?
The European Union. Brussels is concerned about real political instability brewing on European borders, but the EU’s response has so far been mixed. While Eastern European member states have been leading the charge for EU sanctions, Europe in general is worried about chaos disrupting Belarus’ role as a transit nation for Russian oil exports. And of course, there’s the risk of tangling again with a Kremlin that has shown — as in 2014 in Ukraine — what it’s willing to do to preserve Russia’s sphere of influence.
As a whole, the EU would probably be delighted to see “Europe’s last dictator” fall but would want Belarus’ next leader to be friendlier towards European values and businesses.
Russia. Minsk is firmly within Moscow’s orbit, and it is (like Ukraine) a major strategic buffer between Russia and NATO. But relations between Lukashenko and Russian President Vladimir Putin have soured in recent years over economic issues and Lukashenko’s periodic (and largely fruitless) flirtations with the EU.
Putin is in a bind. He has offered to help restore order in Belarus but is wary of angering the many Belarusians who hate Lukashenko but have no axe to grind with Moscow. The ideal outcome for Russia would be for Lukashenko to be replaced with a more “democratic” yet solidly pro-Russia leader it can groom to keep Minsk on its side. The worst-case scenario is that popular uprising grows and spills over into Russia, threatening Putin’s own 20-year grip on power.
Other players. Belarus borders four NATO countries (Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland) that fear the current instability could trigger a potential Russian incursion similar to the one that in 2014 ended in Russia’s annexation of Crimea from Ukraine. NATO military planners are closely monitoring the situation, although the odds of Russian “little green men” creeping over the border are quite low.
Belarus doesn’t have a large ethnic Russian minority who wants to be annexed by Moscow, nor does the country hold the same cultural and historical importance for Russia as Ukraine always has. What’s more, Moscow has no territorial grudges there (as it did with Crimea), and Belarus is also not at risk of immediately falling into the “Western camp” as Ukraine was six years ago, when ethnic Ukrainians protesting against the pro-Russia government in Kiev were overwhelmingly in favor of closer ties with Europe and joining the EU.
Finally, the US and China (surprise!) also have a stake. Washington has been moving closer to Minsk in part to explore peeling the country away from Russia’s influence, while Beijing would ideally like Lukashenko to stay in power (even in a weakened state) to secure Chinese business interests. However, neither seems likely to take major action soon. (Carlos Santamaria, Gzero Signal, 8/18/2020)
—————————————————
US ELECTION
Everyone thinks Trump will lose – except the stock market The S&P 500 has a remarkable ability to predict the winner of US elections (Matthew Lynn, Telegraph UK, 15 August 2020)
The record shows that if the bull market stays as strong as it has been, Trump will pull off an unexpected victory. People might or might not like that – but there is no point in ignoring it. With the Covid-19 crisis getting worse and worse, with economies plunging into deep recessions, and with a wave of job losses on the horizon, the markets have not focused on November’s presidential election as much as they usually would. There is simply too much other stuff to worry about.
That said, as Nov 3 draws closer investors will start to focus on the contest for the White House and its likely impact on the global economy.
————————————————-
GERMANY-US RELATIONS
The following article is not complimentary toward the US president. However, it does reflect considerable European opinion, With a Growing rift between Europe and America, it’s important that Americans understand what’s happening. — Editor’s comment
Why Germany would be especially happy to see the back of Trump The competence embodied in Merkel provokes loathing from the US president by John Kampfner @johnkampfner, 15 Aug 2020
In a manner of speaking. Europe’s most important country, potentially America’s most valuable partner, has in the mind of the president become an adversary. Of all Trump’s many foreign policy disasters, this is perhaps his most significant.
From the outset, Trump loathed Merkel. She represents everything he is not. On the international stage, she respects interlocutors who do their preparation and don’t spring surprises. She disdains his visceral vulgarity. The leader who let in a million of the world’s most destitute in 2015 refuses to be cowed by a bigot and bully.
She couldn’t be accused of not trying to get along. In March 2017, two months into his administration, she flew to Washington for their first meeting. She prepped assiduously. She studied a 1990 Playboy interview that had become a set text on Trumpism for policymakers. She read his 1987 book, The Art of the Deal. She even watched episodes of his TV show, The Apprentice.
It started badly. She offered him a handshake in the Oval Office in front of the cameras. He didn’t take it. Her studied lack of emotion and her deeply analytical mind were anathema to him. Her aides say she learned to explain complicated problems to him by reducing them to bite-size chunks. He read this as high-handedness.
Trump has a track record of misogyny and some cite this as the reason for his dislike. Others put it down to a narcissistic resentment of praise conferred on others. When she was chosen as Time magazine’s person of the year in 2015, he said: “They picked the person who is ruining Germany.” What particularly upset him was the magazine calling her chancellor of the free world. “What Merkel did to Germany, it’s a sad, sad shame.”
Yet this same woman, who from a young age dreamed of driving across the American plains and adored Ronald Reagan for freeing the world (and her native GDR) from communism, is by instinct a staunch Atlanticist.
She has found the setbacks hard to take. Arguably the single worst incident came before Trump. It was the revelation in 2013, courtesy of Edward Snowden, that the National Security Agency had been bugging Merkel’s personal mobile phone for years. She was incandescent when told, for once losing her famous impulse control. In an angry phone exchange with President Barack Obama, deliberately shared with the media, she told him: “This is like the Stasi.”
This relationship has always been complicated. Germans remember with fondness the liberation of their country, the airlift that ended the Russians’ blockade of Berlin. They devoured American culture. They fell in love with John F Kennedy, his 1963 trip to divided Berlin indelibly etched in the history books. But the left fought tooth and nail against nuclear deployments under Reagan. George Bush’s Iraq misadventure drove a terrible wedge, not least his attempts to divide the continent into New and Old Europe. Even with the more centrist and amenable Bill Clinton and Obama there were bad moments.
Successive US administrations have expressed frustration. The Nord Stream gas pipeline, chaired by former chancellor Gerhard Schröder, has underlined Germany’s dangerous energy dependency on Russia. It contradicts Merkel’s otherwise consistently tough approach towards Vladimir Putin. She was instrumental in ensuring that the EU imposed sanctions after the annexation of Crimea and invasion of eastern Ukraine. Berlin no longer praises China as the gift that keeps on giving and belatedly sees it as a strategic competitor, but Merkel balks at strong criticism of it. As for defence, the failure of Germany to meet the agreed Nato target of spending 2% of GDP on defence has been a source of irritation.
But nothing comes close to the current situation.
The German foreign policy establishment is clinging to the hope that Trump will be defeated in November. A Biden presidency would not remove all the tensions, but it would signal that the US was moving back towards the diplomatic mainstream. The country that personifies the mainstream would have reason to celebrate.
John Kampfner’s latest book is Why The Germans Do It Better: Notes From a Grown-Up Country.
—————————————————————
GUN VIOLENCE UP IN US
While the US coronavirus pandemic is far from over, many American cities are also facing another major threat – a surge in violent crime.
According to new data from the Council on Criminal Justice (CCJ) think tank, recorded rates of aggravated assault and gun assault have rocketed in recent months. And “from May to June 2020, homicides in 20 major US cities increased by 37%” year-on-year, reports CNN.
Gun crime, in particular, has proved a major scourge across the country: according to NBC New York, shooting incidents in the city over the past four weeks have been nearly three times higher than during the same period last year. (The Week, 8/17/2020)
—————————————————–
CHRISTIANS PERSECUTED IN NIGERIA
Earlier this year . . . [Boko Haram] released a video of a masked Muslim child holding a pistol behind a bound and kneeling Christian hostage, a 22-year-old biology student who was earlier abducted while traveling to his university. After chanting in Arabic and launching into an anti-Christian diatribe, the Muslim child shot the Christian several times in the back of the head.
The reason formerly simple Fulani herdsmen have, since 2015, managed to kill nearly twice as many Christians as the “professional” terrorists of Boko Haram . . . is, to quote Nigerian bishop Matthew Ishaya Audu, “because President Buhari is also of the Fulani ethnic group.” (Raymond Ibrahim, Gatestone, 8/16/2020)
———————————————————
DISQUIET ABOUT PHILADELPHIA AIRPORT’S “QUIET ROOM”
Philadelphia International Airport (PHL) opened a heavily promoted “Quiet Room” in August 2018. Accessible 365/24/7, it’s an excellent addition to a frenetic travel hub. But it also presents a disquieting problem.
The 315-square-foot space with two chambers is located after security controls, between the D and E terminals. A PHL press release touts the room as “a place of silence which all passengers may use regardless of their worldview, culture and religious affiliation,” an area suitable for “those who desire a place for solitude or prayer.” What could be wrong with that?
Well, it’s the same problem that has turned up in schools, hospitals, at airport security, and more broadly: Islam enjoys a favored status. The Quiet Room privileges it in four ways:
First, the room’s name, announced in five languages, presents a problem:
Quiet Room (English)
Meditation Room (Spanish)
Quiet Room (Hebrew)
Prayer Room (Arabic)
Quiet Thought (Chinese)
For Arabic readers, ghurfat as-salat, غرفة الصلاة, turns the room from the airport’s ostensible “place of silence” into a place of religion for the Arabic name implies a place exclusively for Muslim prayer; no Christian prays in a room called ghurfat as-salat. The sign dog-whistles Arabophones about an Islamic prayer space at PHL.
Second, the room contains many Islamic artifacts, some with official-looking markings (e.g., prayer rugs marked with “PHL Airport”).
Third, the room contains exclusively built-in Islamic amenities. For starters, the airport announces that “The Quiet Room contains a footbath for those passengers who require cleansing before prayer.” The room’s designers, Roya Taheri and Massoud Mohadjeri of Taheri Architects, explicitly acknowledge that “A Foot Bath is provided mainly for Muslim users to perform ablution prior to prayer.” (Daniel Pipes, 8/17/2020)
—————————————————-
NEW ZEALAND CONTRADICTIONS
Jacinda Ardern, New Zealand’s prime minister, postponed the country’s general election, scheduled for September 19th, by four weeks. Auckland, New Zealand’s biggest city, is back in lockdown following a mini-resurgence of covid-19 infections. After three months without a new case, 78 have recently been recorded in the country. Ms. Ardern said she does not intend to allow a further postponement. (The Economist 8/17/2020)
COMMENT FROM FACEBOOK, SAME DAY —
“Just heard Jacinda Ardern say, “Covid is the new normal.” Assuming she is speaking about NZ only, what exactly is she saying? Intervention doesn’t work? Intervention does work to some degree, but only partially? Not sure exactly what she meant, but whatever it is, her comment amounts to an admission of the failure of her draconian lockdown measures to “keep everybody safe.” Whatever the benefits may be of her lockdown measures so far, can those measures be justified when you take into account the cost to the economy and mental health of the nation?
“It’s too early to be able to answer these questions with any confidence, but it’s not too early to ask the questions.” (ARM, Tasmania, 8/17/2020)
—————————————————
ANOTHER CHINESE-AMERICAN CHARGED WITH SPYING
The Justice Department charged a former CIA officer with selling top-secret information to the Chinese regime.
Alexander Yuk Chung Ma had worked for the CIA since 1982 but, according to the DOJ, changed his allegiance in 2001 when he met with officers of China’s Ministry of State Security.
Ma allegedly revealed national defense information as well as the identities of CIA officers and other assets. (Epoch Times, 8/18/2020)
————————————————–
KARL MARX, NOT A MAN TO FOLLOW
“In his own personal life, Marx was a total failure. He was a leech who lived off other people: it is doubtful if he ever did an honest day’s work in his life. His marriage resulted in six children. Marx, however, was so busy formulating theories to “uplift the downtrodden” that he never found time to support his own family. Three of his children died of starvation in infancy. Two others committed suicide. Only one lived to maturity. When he died in 1883, six people attended his funeral!” (Missing Dimension in World Affairs, Michael J. Goy, 1976, page 82)
————————————————–
IMPERIAL REDUX
Saturday saw commemorative events around the world for VJ Day, Victory over Japan, exactly 75 years ago. The “Forgotten Army” that fought the Japanese did so in conditions that were far worse than for those who fought in Europe. There were troops from India, Australia, New Zealand and west Africa, fighting as part of Britain’s imperial war forces. India alone contributed 2.5 million, the biggest volunteer army in history. — Editor’s comment.
From the Imperial War Museum, London (edited):
In 1941, Britain was an imperial power with colonies across south and south-east Asia. In December 1941, Japan attacked British territories in Hong Kong, Malaya (now Malaysia), Singapore and Burma (now also known as Myanmar).
Japanese forces invaded Malaya on 8 December 1941. Their commander, General Yamashita, launched an aggressive offensive that quickly demoralized and defeated Malaya’s garrison of British, Indian and Australian troops.
By February 1942, Japanese forces had occupied Malaya. They then launched a new attack against the strategic island of Singapore, at the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula. On 15 February 1942, British forces in Singapore surrendered to the Japanese. Prime Minister Winston Churchill would later call the surrender ‘the worst disaster . . . in British history.’
Japan’s invasion of Burma prompted many from Burma’s Indian, Anglo-Indian and British communities to flee to the safety of India. While some, particularly wealthier people, were able to leave by air or sea, hundreds of thousands were forced to make their way on foot across Burma’s mountainous border with India. Thousands died along the way from disease, exhaustion, malnutrition, or through drowning while trying to cross Burma’s many rivers.
By June 1942 the Japanese had driven British, Indian and Chinese forces out of Burma. In February 1943 3,000 British and Nepalese Gurkha troops mounted a long-distance raid behind Japanese lines. These troops, known as ‘Chindits’, were commanded by the deeply eccentric Brigadier Orde Wingate.
After the surrender of Singapore, thousands of Allied servicemen became prisoners of the Japanese. They were subjected to a brutal regime of violence, callous neglect and forced labour. From 1942 prisoners were forced to build the Burma-Thailand railway, which became known as the ‘Death Railway’ for its high mortality rate, among both prisoners of war and civilian forced laborers.
British troops fighting the Japanese were threatened by deadly and unfamiliar tropical diseases. In 1943, for every soldier evacuated due to battle wounds, 120 soldiers were evacuated due to sickness. Malaria was a key problem, but other diseases included dysentery, skin conditions and typhus.
In spring 1944 Japan launched an invasion of India. It aimed to capture Imphal, a garrison town in the Indian border province of Manipur, and so prevent a British return to Burma. In order to isolate Imphal from a large supply base at Dimapur, Japanese troops attacked the small village of Kohima, which became the scene of ferocious fighting.
The war in Burma drew in troops from across the British Empire. The (West Africa) division recruited from British colonies including Nigeria, Sierra Leone and Gambia, and fought mostly in the coastal Arakan region of southern Burma during 1944 and 1945.
In the days following the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, and later of Nagasaki, the Japanese government debated whether to surrender. American aircraft could destroy Japanese cities at will, the Soviet Union had invaded Japanese-occupied Manchuria, and the Japanese home islands were also threatened with invasion. On 15 August, Emperor Hirohito announced Japan’s surrender.
On 2 September 1945, a surrender document was signed aboard an American battleship moored in Tokyo Bay. A series of further surrender ceremonies followed in areas still occupied by the Japanese. This pen (shown) was used by Lord Louis Mountbatten, Supreme Allied Commander South East Asia, to countersign the Japanese surrender at Singapore on 12 September.
Though the war between Japan and the Allies ended in August 1945, other conflicts in Asia and the Pacific continued. Days after Japan’s surrender, Indonesian nationalists declared independence from the Netherlands. In September, British troops arrived in Java to take the surrender of Japanese forces and to recover prisoners of war and internees. Relations between British and Indonesian forces soon broke down, with a major battle erupting in Surabaya.
——————————————————-
WHITE LIVES DON’T MATTER
This section of my blog highlights murders of white people that do not receive much attention, if any, in the American media.
A five-year-old boy was shot dead while riding his bike in Wilson, North Carolina. The shooter was a 25-year-old African-American male neighbor. There was no motive for the killing. The boy’s father had the neighbor over for dinner the night before.
A news item on NPR’s All Things Considered discussed reparations for slavery. There was no mention of the million plus white slaves held at the same time. Nor was any mention made of the 400,000 white Americans who died to free the slaves. NPR is clearly one-sided on this issue, as on many issues.
————————————————————————————
TO THE POINT
The Battle of Britain air war known as “The Hardest Day” The Hardest Day is a Second World War air battle fought on 18 August 1940 during the Battle of Britain between the German Luftwaffe and British Royal Air Force (RAF) – On that day, the Luftwaffe made an all-out effort to destroy RAF Fighter Command. Luftwaffe lost approximately 69 aircraft. RAF lost 68 in one of the largest ever air battles.
NSW One Nation Leader Mark Latham has described Christianity as a punching bag for “sneering bigots” as long-promised religious freedom laws were shelved by the Australian parliament. In response to Canberra’s anti-religion posture, Mr. Latham has introduced similar legislation into the NSW Parliament and is working furiously with MPs across Party lines to ensure it passes. (Politicom 8/18/2020)
Putin Gung Ho On New Covid-19 Vaccine, His Countrymen Are More Skeptical (MEMRI, 8/18/2020)
Insurgents affiliated to Islamic State once again took control of the strategic port town of Mocimboa da Praia in northern Mozambique after heavy fighting this week, inflicting heavy casualties and forcing Mozambique government troops to flee the town by boat. (Peter Fabricius, 8/12/2020)
Presidential candidate Joe Biden promises to raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour, an increase of over 50%. At the same time, he would reverse President Trump’s decisions on limiting the number of immigrants. Biden would restore immigration to its Obama level — 1.3 million legals plus an unlimited number of illegals. This will inevitably put pressure on wages at the lower end, effectively cancelling out any gains Biden may propose on raising the minimum wage. It’s no surprise that immigration has not been raised during the Democratic convention.
Former First Lady Michelle Obama was described by one commentator of the convention as “the most popular politician in the country.” Aside from the fact that the ex-First Lady is not a politician, is she being built up for any reason? Joe Biden is kept hidden as much as possible. Rumor has it he’s in the early stages of dementia. Could Michelle be used to fill a gap?
Thanks to my eight-year-old grandson I’ve taken up railfanning. We regularly visit Durand railway station 46 miles from our home and sit and watch trains. He loves it and has made a lot of friends there. In England this is known as train spotting. I doubt there is anybody who reads this blog who knows as much about trains as Aubren.
The Royal Choral Society has performed Handel’s Messiah on Good Friday at the Royal Albert Hall every year since 1876.
The British-German composer George Friderich Handel wrote “The Messiah” almost three hundred years ago. It’s amazing how much scripture is found in the famous oratorio. It illustrates an impressive familiarity with the scriptures
The most well-known chorus in the 2½ hour masterpiece is the Hallelujah Chorus.
The Messiah was first performed at the Musick Hall in Dublin (then under British rule) on April 13th, 1742, to commemorate Easter. Eleven months later, it had its London premiere, attended by King George II. According to tradition, at the playing of the Hallelujah Chorus, the King rose from his feet, a tradition that continues, somewhat, to this day. (Secularists do not stand. Of course, there were no secularists in 1743!)
The entire 260-page oratorio was written by Handel in just 24 days.
“Handel composed Messiah without getting much sleep or even eating much food. When his assistants brought him his meals, they were often left uneaten. His servants would often find him in tears as he composed. When he completed “Hallelujah,” he reportedly told his servant, “I did think I did see all Heaven before me, and the great God Himself seated on His throne, with His company of Angels.” (The Tabernacle Choir)
Not only did Handel know his scriptures. So did the King. And this goes part of the way in explaining why the King stood for the chorus.
“The answer as to why the King stood there and then is rooted, I believe, in the political implications of the very specific lyrics of the chorus, particularly the words from Revelation 19, highlighted in bold, and their immediate context:
For the Lord God Omnipotent reigneth.
Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah!
For the Lord God omnipotent reigneth.
Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah!
Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah!
The kingdom of this world Is become the kingdom of our Lord, And of His Christ, and of His Christ;
And He shall reign for ever and ever,
For ever and ever, forever and ever,
King of kings, and Lord of lords, King of kings, and Lord of lords,
And Lord of lords,
And He shall reign,
And He shall reign forever and ever, King of kings, forever and ever,
And Lord of lords,
Hallelujah! Hallelujah!
And He shall reign forever and ever, King of kings! and Lord of lords!
And He shall reign forever and ever, King of kings! and Lord of lords!
Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah!
Hallelujah!
“King George was a Christian king, head of the English Church, and would have been knowledgeable of the Scriptures. He knew, from the moment the choir began singing that passage, that it was referring to his Lord, to a King greater than himself. The King of kings is the King of England’s superior. The King of England is a subject of the Greater King, the Creator and Sovereign of Heaven and Earth. As a Christian King who believed in the Divine Right of Kings, he would have acknowledged even at his own coronation that he rules England only by the grace of the Great King and no other.
“So when Handel’s music for this passage began, I believe King George made a political statement about divine and royal authority and honor in the political economy of England itself: the Christian King (or Queen) of England is a ruler under authority and must pay honor and show respect to his (her)Supreme Lord, the King of Kings, just as the people must pay honor and show respect to their English Lord.” (“Why the King stood for the Hallelujah Chorus,” by Dr. Roy Atwood)
Theirs was an age of faith.
Today, we live in what can best be described as the age of ignorance.
Whatever the issues of the day, Black Lives Matter, slavery, and abortion, to name but three, a great deal of ignorance abounds. Gone is the grounding people once had in the Christian scriptures. Now, people spout their opinions, whatever they may be, exposing their ignorance on all topics.
The secularists may still appreciate the Hallelujah Chorus, for the inspiring music, but gone is the faith of their ancestors. It has been replaced solely by ignorance.
—————————————————
LETTER FROM VICTORIA — from a friend
A state of disaster giving police stronger powers to enforce government-imposed lockdowns has been declared in Victoria, Australia’s second most populous state after New South Wales. Stage Four restrictions have been imposed on the capital, Melbourne, the southern city for many years rated as the world’s most liveable city. Close to five million people have been told to stay home except to shop for food (within a five-kilometre [three-mile] radius), go to essential work such as health care personnel, or for medical reasons. An 8pm to 5am curfew has been imposed, schools and childcare closed, funeral numbers restricted and weddings banned until at least September 13.
Victoria, like the rest of Australia, was doing well with very few infections or deaths from COVID-19 until recent weeks when an escape of the virus from lax quarantine measures of returning travelers started a new wave. In recent days, the total death toll for Victoria (population 6.5 million) has risen from a total 61 on July 26 to 123 on August 2. Most have been elderly but there have also been deaths of people in their 50s and 60s and some very young children including babies have caught the disease, though thankfully recovered.
Country Victoria had Stage Three restrictions reimposed, meaning pubs and restaurants can only serve takeaway food, sport has been cancelled, and visitors to homes banned. All Victorians are now required to wear a face mask when in public.
Most Victorians have accepted the restrictions as a vital step in keeping a lid on the spread of the virus, which has the potential to kill thousands more if it gets further out of control. Masks in towns and supermarkets are now a common sight with general acceptance. Saving lives is understood by most to be a common goal worth the minor inconvenience of mask wearing, but the damage to the state economy from the massive shutdown will have dire ramifications for years to come. (GBH, Victoria, Australia, 8/3/2020)
(Victoria’s border remains closed. Queensland announced earlier this week that it is closing its border with New South Wales.)
—————————————-
US economy in historic contraction as joblessness rises
The US economy shrank by an annual rate of 32.9% between April and June, government data has revealed. It was its sharpest contraction since the Second World War. In more bad news for the US economy, another 1.43 million Americans filed for unemployment benefits last week, a second week of rises after a four-month decline. (The Week, 7/31/2020)
America’sGDP shrank at an annualised rate of 32.9% in the three months to the end of June. It is the worst GDP growth figure since the second world war. New unemployment benefit claims also rose to 1.43m last week. Yesterday Jerome Powell, chairman of the Federal Reserve, said a surge in new covid-19 cases is beginning to weigh on economic activity again. (The Economist, 7/31/2020)
————————————————–
GERMANY “STEALING” MEDICAL PERSONNEL
Germany is among those countries, which are benefiting most from the influx of highly qualified workers from poorer European regions, according to a recent study of the Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies (WIIW). The number of professionals coming from Eastern and Southeastern Europe is rapidly increasing, particularly in the health sector. This brain drain is creating huge problems in their countries of origins – also in view of the Covid-19 pandemic. For example, in Poland, the ratio of medical doctors and nurses per 100,000 inhabitants is about half as high as that in Germany, in Albania it is even lower. The German government, denying that this is having a negative impact on the countries of origin, speaks of an alleged win-win situation. However, resistance is growing at the European level against the drain of professionals. The countries of origin usually had to invest large sums for their training – investments from which the wealthy western and northern EU countries, particularly Germany, are profiting. (German Foreign Policy, 7/31/2020)
——————————————
PRESSURE ON US OVER GIBRALTAR
A US congressional resolution backing British control of Gibraltar unleashed a “belligerent” Spanish campaign of diplomacy, insiders are claiming.
Seven current or former members of the US House of Representatives told The Telegraph that “the Spanish Embassy in Washington D.C. pushed back after they signed a resolution backing Gibraltar’s British status or visited the territory.”
According to the newspaper, Spain’s “secret lobbying drive” was intended to whip up support for “a plan to strip Britain of sole sovereignty over Gibraltar.”
The colony “has been a continuing source of friction between Madrid and London”, particularly since Britain voted to leave the EU, says Madrid-based newspaper El Pais.
From 1 January, both the UK and Gibraltar will be outside the bloc, along with its single market and customs union. “While London is facing the prospect with relative calm, alarm bells are going off in the British Overseas Territory,” the paper adds.
Some Spanish politicians had sought to use the prospect of a Brexit deal as leverage to extract concessions from the UK government.
“The centre-right People’s Party had called for Spain’s government to ‘take advantage of the historic opportunity of Brexit’ to snatch back the overseas territory from Britain,” the Daily Expressreported last month.
“But Pedro Sanchez, the country’s left-wing prime minister, has convinced his allies to drop the claim due to the importance of striking a trade deal with the UK.”
According to The Telegraph, Spain’s efforts to lobby US politicians were unusually energetic.
“Some congressmen said while diplomats should be allowed to argue their case the attitude of Spanish officials was perceived at times as ‘belligerent’, ‘forceful,’ ‘aggressive’ and ‘over the line’,” the paper reports.
“One commented: ‘The Spaniards went nuts.’” (The Week, 8/3/2020)
—————————————-
TO THE POINT
Spain lobbies the US for Gibraltar sovereignty – Spain has pursued a secret lobbying campaign to push US congressmen into supporting a plan to strip Britain of sole sovereignty over Gibraltar, The Daily Telegraph seven current and former members of the House of Representatives say the Spanish Embassy in the US protested after Washington signed a resolution backing Gibraltar’s British status. One congressman said: “The Spaniards went nuts.” (The Week, 8/3/2020)
Could Britain afford a second lockdown? — Boris Johnson has likened it to a “nuclear deterrent” while businesses have warned that the resulting cost could be unendurable – but few in government are willing to rule out another national lockdown. Although Britain’s Covid-19 infection rate is currently low, new cases have been on the rise in recent weeks. The average number of positive tests per day, which dipped to 546 in the week ending 5 July, now stands at 726 – triggering alarm at Downing Street. (The Week, 7/30/2020)
Lifestyle changes could delay or prevent dementia – Changes in lifestyle could delay or even prevent dementia, according to a new report. Experts say that excessive drinking, exposure to air pollution and head injuries all increase a person’s risk of dementia, adding that up to 40% of dementia cases could be delayed or prevented by addressing 12 lifestyle practices. “Dementia is potentially preventable,” said Gill Livingston, professor of psychiatry of older people at University College London. (The Week, 7/31/2020)
Israel’s army said it struck military targets in Syria, including anti-aircraft batteries and command-and-control facilities. The attack, using fighter planes and helicopters, was described as retaliation for an attempt to plant explosives in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights. Tensions have been running especially high since Israel killed a member of Hizbullah, a Lebanese militia backed by Iran, in Syria last month. (8/4/2020)
—————————————-
When the whole world is running towards a cliff, he who is running in the opposite direction appears to have lost his mind. (C.S. Lewis)
Flowers are left following Friday’s terror attack on London Bridge in London, Sunday, Dec. 1, 2019. A man wearing a fake suicide vest was subdued by bystanders as he went on a knife rampage killing two people and wounding others before being shot dead by police on Friday. (AP Photo/Alberto Pezzali) (ASSOCIATED PRESS)
Two young Cambridge University graduates are dead, murdered by a supposedly rehabilitated terrorist, in London last Friday. The Cambridge University students were part of “Learning Together,” a project that aims to bring rehabilitated terrorists back into mainstream society. This is liberalism gone mad!
A major weakness of western liberalism is the idea that we’re all the same, whatever culture or background we come from. We should know better. ISIS fighters are not going to repent – as they come back to western countries following the defeat of ISIS they will bring their ideology with them, and kill people. Anybody who thinks otherwise is a misguided fool.
The young male victim had written his dissertation on why minorities account for a disproportionate percentage of people in prison. The answer is simple – they commit more crimes.
It’s sad as more innocent lives are likely to be lost as we pursue rehab. Years ago, I remember reading in Psychology Today that 92% of sex offenders are never rehabilitated. When they leave prison, they commit the same acts again. Do we really think that terrorists will do better?
As Piers Morgan wrote in the Daily Mail, “Most terrorists don’t change their evil spots so it’s time Britain stopped going soft on hate-filled jihadis to please the PC hand-wringing brigade and does what Americans do – lock them up forever.” (12/2/2019 DailyMail)
Even this may not work. Terrorists in prison might encourage fellow terrorists to seize hostages until they are released.
What would be more appropriate (and final) is the death penalty.
————————————————————————————-
KING OF THE NORTH?
Following the opening, on September 30, 2019, of the Al-Bukamal-Al-Qaim border crossing between Syria and Iraq, which had been closed for five years due to the Syria war, Abu Al-Fazel Salehiniya, a culture advisor at the Iranian embassy in Damascus, published an article in the pro-regime Syrian daily Al-Watan, in which he presented the opening of the crossing as a step towards the realization of Iran’s vision of a new Middle East. He explained that Iran planned to establish a political, economic and cultural bloc consisting of Iran, Iraq, Syria and Lebanon, which will impact the power-balance in the region and world, and thwart what he called the American and Western plan to fragment the Middle East into tiny states under Western control. For many years, he said, the U.S. and Israel have been working in various ways to prevent the creation of this bloc, including by instigating protests in Iran, Iraq, Syria and Lebanon; however, they have failed thanks to the resistance axis, which is now stronger than ever and has attained impressive achievements. (MEMRI 12/4)
Editor’s note: The four countries were roughly the borders of the biblical king of the North, in the second century BC.
————————————————————————-
GERMAN MILITARY EXPANSION by Johannes Stern, 29 Nov 2019, World Socialist Web Site
(Extracts) . . . Kramp-Karrenbauer replied: “We know we have to do more, but we are on the way.” In 2031 the German army would “realistically” be able to take over ten percent of NATO’s military capacity. Until that date at the latest, Germany would also reach the NATO target of two percent of gross domestic product for military spending. In fact Germany will make substantial steps towards this goal as early as next year, as the pact to form the grand coalition laid out. According to a report by the German Press Agency, the German government has reported to the military alliance its intention to spend 50.25 billion euros [$US55.3 billion] in 2020. “We are complying with our international obligations. The NATO defense rate is 1.42 percent,” boasted Social Democratic Finance Minister Olaf Scholz at yesterday’s presentation of the budget for 2020 in the Bundestag . . . Five years after the German government announced the end of military restraint at the Munich Security Conference in 2014, the ruling class can no longer hide the fact that it is basing its foreign and great power politics on the militaristic traditions of the German Empire and the Nazis. In his major lecture on foreign policy at the end of October, the president of the German parliament, Wolfgang Schäuble (CDU), described 1945, i.e. the date of the downfall of the Third Reich and the defeat of Germany in World War II—as a “catastrophe” (https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2019/11/29/kram-n29.html)
BERLIN, Germany — The German army on Wednesday apologized for posting a photo on Instagram of a military uniform complete with two Iron Crosses bearing the Nazi swastika and appearing to celebrate it as “retro.” After media reports sparked outrage, the army removed the picture of the Nazi-era Wehrmacht uniform and explained that it was an “unacceptable mistake.” The Bundeswehr said it was seeking to do a photo-essay on the influence of military uniforms on fashion through the ages but failed to provide the correct historical context in its captions. The Bundeswehr has over the years repeatedly come under fire over embarrassing associations with Germany’s militaristic past (https://www.timesofisrael.com/german-army-sorry-for-retro-nazi-uniform-post/)
—————————————-
Global Survey of 18 Countries Finds Hardcore Anti-Semitic Attitudes Remain Pervasive One in four Europeans polled fall into most anti-Semitic category.
Among the 2019 ADL Global 100 Index’s key findings: Negative attitudes in Argentina, Brazil, Poland, Russia, South Africa and Ukraine have seen marked increases since the last ADL Global 100 survey. Anti-Semitic attitudes remain pervasive in Europe. Roughly one out of every four residents of the 14 European countries polled by ADL fall into the most anti-Semitic category, subscribing to a majority of the anti-Semitic stereotypes tested in the index.
Stereotypes about Jewish control of business and the financial markets are among the most pernicious and enduring anti-Semitic beliefs. These are especially widespread in the Central and Eastern European countries surveyed. Asked whether they agreed with the statement that “Jews have too much power in the business world,” a staggering 72 percent of Ukrainians agreed, as did 71 percent of Hungarians, 56 percent of Poles, and 50 percent of Russians.
Jewish “disloyalty” is a widespread anti-Semitic stereotype in the Western European countries surveyed. In Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, and Spain, more than 40 percent of the public believes that Jews are more loyal to the State of Israel than to their own country. This canard also scored high in Brazil (70 percent), South Africa (60 percent), and relatively high in Canada (25 percent) compared to its overall index score of 8 percent.
“Jews still talk too much about what happened to them in the Holocaust” was a statement supported by large segments of the populations of many of the European countries polled, even in Germany, where 42 percent of the population agreed. This sentiment was also prevalent in Austria (44 percent), Belgium (40 percent) Italy (38 percent) and Spain (37 percent).(https://www.adl.org/news/press-releases/adl-global-survey-of-18-countries-finds-hardcore-anti-semitic-attitudes-remain)
————————————–
Zimbabwe ‘on brink of man-made starvation’, UN warns(BBC, 28 Nov 2019)
More than 60% of the country’s 14 million people are considered food-insecure, according to the findings. Hyperinflation, poverty, natural disasters and economic sanctions were among the identified causes. Women and children were “bearing the brunt of the crisis” with 90% of children aged six months to two years not consuming enough food. Hilal Elver, the UN’s special rapporteur on the right to food, reported her findings following an 11-day visit to the country. “I cannot stress enough the urgency of the situation in Zimbabwe,” she said, adding that the crisis continues to worsen. She said many of the people she met could only afford one meal a day and that most of the children she met were stunted and underweight. “The harrowing stories I heard from resilient grandmothers, mothers or aunts desperately trying to save their children from starvation, in the midst of their daily hardships, will remain with me.”
To Christians, there are few issues more important than fighting against abortion. The millions of unborn children are made in the image of God, making it personal to Christians.
And millions of American might switch churches after what one denomination said about abortion.
If one were to ask virtually any Southern Baptist churchgoer, they would be strongly against abortion and supportive of the fight to end it.
But as it turns out, the Southern Baptist Convention doesn’t agree with that sentiment.
The Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission (ERLC), which is the public policy arm of the Southern Baptist Convention, just came out stating that Christians should not preach against abortion from the pulpit, on the street corner, or in bumper stickers or social media posts.
They claim that it is “hurtful to women.” (Culture wars, 11/19)
————————————-
LETTER FROM A UK FRIEND
“Channel 4 hosted a leaders debate on climate change yesterday. Boris Johnson. and Nigel Farage did not appear, and their vacant podiums sported ice sculptures instead. The problem is that Boris is not good responding to tough questioning. Boris is being shielded from scrutiny as much as possible, he may feel that he’s ‘Churchill like’ but in reality he’s no orator. In contrast Jeremy Corbyn is a rabble-rouser and whips an audience up to ‘cheers and chanting.’ Very popular with younger voters too. The Election is for Boris to lose. According to the opinion polls his lead is slipping back. I’m fearing another hung parliament.”
———————————————–
EU DECLARES “CLIMATE EMERGENCY”
The European Parliament declared a “climate emergency,” by a vote of 429 to 225. The decision is symbolic but important (the European Union is the world’s largest economy) ahead of the UN climate summit to be held in Madrid next week. The incoming head of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, has promised a package of ambitious green measures on December 11th. (The Economist, 11/29)
Britain’s ruling Conservative Party reacted furiously after Channel 4, a national broadcaster, replaced the prime minister with an ice sculpture during a debate on climate change. While most other leaders of Britain’s main political parties took part, Boris Johnson refused. The editor of Channel 4 News accused Mr. Johnson of trying to avoid scrutiny during the election campaign “like Donald Trump.” (Economist, 11/29)
Prosecutors in Sicily have announced 19 arrests, exposing a nationwide network of would-be fascist militants. Police have uncovered weapons, explosives, and extremist propaganda in a series of raids.
Italian police have arrested at least 19 people in connection with a militant neo-Nazi ring, national media reported on Thursday. Although the investigation was based in Sicily, several of the suspects hail from all over the country. One of the arrested included a 26-year-old Milan resident who had been the winner of an online beauty competition called “Miss Hitler.” She also spoke at an extreme-right conference in Portugal last August that attempted to unite the so-called “National Socialist movements” of Italy, Portugal, Spain, and France.
During the operation, led by prosecutors in Caltanissetta, Sicily, and dubbed “Black Shadows,” police undercovered troves of weapons, explosives, Nazi memorabilia and texts praising fascist dictators Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini, in a series of raids carried out across Italy. On top of possible weapons charges, promoting fascism is a crime in Italy. The supposed leader of the group is a 50-year-old public employee from the city of Padua, in the northeastern region of Veneto. She was not known to authorities prior to her detention, police have said, adding that they recovered anti-Semitic material at her home. Another suspect is an offender with multiple convictions and ties to the ‘Ndrangheta, the elusive Calabrian mafia, one of the richest organized crime syndicates in the world and by some estimates responsible for 3% of Italy’s GDP. The man, Italian media said, had turned informant for the police against the mafia but was apparently acting as the chief “trainer” for the violence the neo-Nazi group hoped to carry out. Specific center-left politicians were named as possible targets. The group used a Russian chat app to communicate and try to avoid detection, Italian daily Corriere della Sera reported. A Russian social media platform called VK was also used to host the “Miss Hitler” competition.(https://www.dw.com/en/italy-busts-neo-nazi-ring-miss-hitler-pageant-winner/a-51458025)
————————————————-
TO THE POINT
CHINA FINANCIAL WARNINGS From rural bank runs to surging consumer indebtedness and an unprecedented bond restructuring, mounting signs of financial stress in China are putting the nation’s policy makers to the test. Xi Jinping’s government faces an increasingly difficult balancing act as it tries to support the world’s second-largest economy without encouraging moral hazard and reckless spending. While authorities have so far been reluctant to rescue troubled borrowers and ramp up stimulus, the costs of maintaining that stance are rising as defaults increase and China’s slowdown deepens. (China financial warning; Bloomberg, 11/28/2019)
HONG KONG IN REVOLT “When Mao Zedong’s guerrillas seized power in China in 1949, they did not take over a clearly defined country, much less an entirely willing one. Hong Kong was ruled by the British, nearby Macau by the Portuguese. Taiwan was under the control of a Nationalist government Mao had just overthrown. The mountain terrain of Tibet was under a Buddhist theocracy that chafed at control from Beijing. Communist troops had yet to enter another immense region in the far west, Xinjiang, where Muslim ethnic groups did not want to be ruled from afar.” (“Hong Kong in revolt,” The Economist, 11/23/2019).
Applying pressure on China is the top priority for the newly elected German EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen. She announced that, on Sunday – her first day in office – she plans to call Beijing to discuss “human rights.” The People’s Republic of China is being accused of human rights violations in the context of its “war on terror” against jihadism in Xinjiang province. The German chairman of the Committee on Foreign Affairs, David McAllister (CDU) announced that the EU Parliament also plans to discuss the situation in Xinjiang, in its upcoming plenary session (December 16 – 19). In Berlin, the transatlantic-oriented opposition plans to call for sanctions to be imposed on either Chinese politicians or Chinese high-tech-companies, already affected by US sanctions. Commentators in the USA, as well as in Germany, are equating China with Nazi Germany. According to a former liberal-oriented German daily, “there can be no long-term peaceful coexistence” with the People’s Republic of China. (German Foreign Policy, 11/29/2019)
ZAMBIAN COUPLE GET 15 YEARS FOR SEXUAL ACT A homosexual couple has been given 15 years for a crime “against the natural order,” citing the fact that they are a very religious Christian country. They also happen to have one of the highest incidents of HIV in the world, reflecting widespread immorality. They should take a look at I Corinthians 6. Fornication, adultery and sodomy are all condemned equally, a fact that Zambian churches have failed to notice. In Africa, AIDS is invariably a heterosexual disease.
A video has emerged from the Nato summit in London, which appears to show Boris Johnson, Justin Trudeau, Emmanuel Macron, Princess Anne and the Dutch prime minister, Mark Rutte, laughing about the US president during a reception at Buckingham Palace. The meeting to mark the 70th anniversary of the Nato alliance began inauspiciously, with tensions on full display between Macron, Trump and Turkey’s president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. It seems that other countries are more likely to ridicule Mr Trump, expecting that he will be impeached next year.
PRINCE ANDREW As a former navy pilot, Prince Andrew would normally be present at a Nato shindig, but the disgraced duke has been stripped of his duties, leaving his mother to host the reception. Meanwhile, Trump’s claim not to know Andrew is contradicted by extensive photographic evidence. (Guardian, 12/4)
HALLE, Germany (AP) — A heavily armed assailant ranting about Jews tried to force his way into a synagogue in Germany on Yom Kippur, Judaism’s holiest day, then shot two people to death nearby in an attack Wednesday that was livestreamed on a popular gaming site.
BERLIN (AP) — Chancellor Angela Merkel’s Cabinet passed new measures Wednesday aimed at helping fight far-right extremism and anti-Semitism following an attack on a synagogue earlier this month.
The proposals include tightening gun laws, stepping up prosecution of online hate, and boosting financial support for projects fighting anti-Semitism and far-right extremism.
“The horrible attack on the Jewish community in Halle showed again what the unleashing of hatred online can lead to,” Justice Minister Christine Lambrecht said at a news conference in Berlin when she introduced the bundle of measures alongside Germany’s interior and family ministers.
“We will fight far-right terrorism and anti-Semitism with all the power of the law,” Lambrecht added.
Germany is still reeling from the attempted attack on a synagogue by a 27-year-old German in the eastern city of Halle on Oct. 9, who later killed two passers-by before being arrested. The man posted an anti-Semitic screed before the attack and broadcast the shooting live on a popular video game streaming site. (Kirsten Grieshaber, US News & World Report, 10/30)
—————————————————————
The Far Right Is Taking On Cultural Institutions
Theaters, museums, and other venues in Germany are facing pressure from the AfD, raising questions about the extent of artistic freedoms.
ELIZA APPERLY, OCT 28, 2019, The Atlantic
BERLIN – Protests against public artworks in Dresden and Kassel. A ban on political discussions at the city theater in Freiberg. And a criminal investigation against a performance art collective.
Germany’s far right is fighting a culture war—and at the forefront is the country’s largest opposition party, the Alternative for Germany (AfD). Founded only six years ago, the group has transitioned from a platform of opposing the euro to far-right nationalism. Fierce anti-immigrant rhetoric has helped the group gain sizable sway in regional parliaments, with significant victories in three regional elections this fall.
Yet beyond its focus on immigration, the issue for which it is best known, the AfD has another important target – culture. At both the federal and the regional level, the party devotes significant attention to cultural matters: Its main manifesto includes more pages on culture, language, and identity than on employment, national security and justice, and foreign policy. In Dresden, the AfD municipal program extends to suggested background music for a specific tram line.
“Culture is integral to the AfD’s strategy and ideology,” Julian Göpffarth, a researcher on the far right at the London School of Economics, told me. “The party is using its powers to curb cultural productions and spaces that ‘undermine national pride,’ and to impose instead a dominant German culture that celebrates, rather than critically engages with, German identity.” (https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2019/10/germany-far-right-culture-war/598978/)
——————————————————
FAR RIGHT AFD BEATS MERKEL IN GERMAN ELECTION
Voters in the eastern German state of Thuringia boosted the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) in regional elections on Sunday, according to preliminary results, but the Left party will remain the dominant political force in the state.
With all districts reporting, results showed the Left party winning 31% of votes in the state that was once part of the communist former East Germany. (DW, 10/28)
——————————————————–
GERMAN INTERVENTION IN LIBYA
Germany’s Foreign Minister Heiko Maas is intervening in Libya, calling for an “end to foreign intervention.” On the occasion of his trip to Turkey and North Africa he arrived last Sunday for a brief visit in the country, to prepare an international conference on Libya, which the German government intends to convene soon. With this conference the German government seeks to possibly pacify the country and distinguish itself as a “regulatory force” in North Africa. Maas then traveled on to Egypt, which also is involved in the Libyan war. While the German minister is declaring that the Egyptians should be able “to breathe the air of liberty,” Cairo is continuing its brutal repression. Since the military coup in July 2013, more than 1,500 people have disappeared from state custody. While seeking to pacify Libya, Berlin is increasing its “regulatory” activities in an “arch of crisis” extending from North Africa and the Middle East to Central Asia. However, until now, without success. (German Foreign Policy, 10/30)
——————————————————————-
VISEGRAD COUNTRIES GROWING
“Fifteen years after they joined the EU, the four “Visegrad” states of central Europe (the V4) can be prouder of their economic achievements than of their patchy record on political reform. The Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia have increased their levels of GDP per head dramatically, and are converging with their mighty neighbor Germany. The Czechs are the richest, with a GDP per head that is 73% of Germany’s, followed by Slovakia with 63% and Hungary and Poland with around 57% each – and the gap continues to close, as their growth outpaces that of the behemoth.” (The Economist, 10/26)
———————————————–
UK BECOMING MORE EUROPEAN
“Before the referendum in 2016 European Union flags were as rare as golden eagles in Britain. Today they are as common as sparrows. Parliament Square is permanently festooned with them. Activist Remainers flaunt flag-themed berets and T-shirts. On October 19th a million-strong army of People’s Vote supporters marched on Westminster beneath a sea of gold and blue standards . . .
“This is part of a bigger paradox: the more Britain struggles to leave the EU, the more it embraces European style politics. Since the dawn of the democratic era Britain has practiced two or two and a bit party politics compared with the continent’s multiparty system. That is changing, accelerated by Brexit.
The Scottish National Party controls Scotland. The ruling Conservative Party is 45 MPs short of a majority. The European Research Group of hard-line Brexiteers acts as a party within the Tory party. The Liberal Democrats could make big gains in the forthcoming general election, especially if Brexit seems reversible.” (The Economist, 10/26)
————————————————-
CATHOLIC SYNOD IN ROME RECOGNIZES DIVIDED CHURCH
“The synod represents the biggest step yet towards recognizing something many Catholics in the West, especially church leaders, have been reluctant to acknowledge: Just as economic and Diplomatic power in the secular world is sleeping away from the North Atlantic region, a similar process is taking place in Catholicism. In the secular world, the shift is to Asia. Within the Catholic church it is towards not only Asia, but Africa and Latin America, too. That is forcing the church to consider how far it is willing to adapt to the practices and beliefs of cultures with their own spiritual traditions. The synod has added to fears of a new schism within the church.” (The Economist, 10/26)
——————————————————————————
TO THE POINT
Warren not a socialist: “Some Republicans and Wall Street critics claim that Ms. Warren is a socialist. She is not. She does not support the public ownership of firms or political control of the flow of credit. Instead she favors regulations that force the private sector to pass her test of what it is to be fair.” (“A plan for American capitalism,” The Economist, 10/26)
Russia in Africa “… over the past decade, and especially after America and the EU imposed sanctions on Russia related to its annexation of Crimea in 2014, the Kremlin has viewed Africa as an increasingly important arena. Since 2015 a dozen African leaders have visited Russia. From 2006 to 2018 Russia’s total trade with sub-Saharan Africa increased by 336%. It is the largest arms exporter to the continent, accounting for 39% of deliveries in 2013-17 (many from Russia to Algeria”. (The Economist, 10/26)
Farage’s gamble — EU ministers are taking a breather from Brexit as the action moves firmly back to London, where MPs are preparing for a general election. In a possible game-changer for Boris Johnson, Nigel Farage’s Brexit party is considering whether to pull out of hundreds of seats. This would be a major boost to the UK prime minister, given the risks that the Brexit party could split the vote among leavers. (FT) As James Blitz writes, the prime minister is taking a massive gamble by engineering the vote before the UK is out of the EU. Farage’s Brexit party poses one possible risk. Another is that Labour will hammer home the message that a victorious Tory party would use Brexit as an opportunity to pursue a hard-right social and economic agenda. (Financial Times 10/31)
Refreshing view on Israel: Egyptian Coptic patriarch Pope Tawadros II of Alexandria said in an October 14, 2019 interview on France 24 Arabic TV that he encourages Copts to visit Jerusalem because getting closer to others increases mutual understanding. He said that Israel is a country like any other country and expressed support for an agreement that would make Jerusalem an international capital, though he said that this is not possible given the current reality. Pope Tawadros II expressed concern for Christian holy places in Jerusalem and said that many parties are collectively responsible for the complexity of the current realities of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. He praised efforts to resolve the conflict. (MEMRI, 10/30)
The worst patients in the world: “Americans are hypochondriacs, yet we skip our checkups. We demand drugs we don’t need, and fail to take the ones we do. No wonder the US leads the world in health spending.” (David H. Freedman, The Atlantic, July 2019).
CBS News reporter Mireya Villarreal appeared to be stunned when Arizona Border Patrol agent Fernando Grijalva told her that the crisis at the border was the worst that he has seen in decades. (From article by Carlos Garcia, The Hendersonville Tribune, January 25, 2019)
In its lead editorial Wednesday, The New York Times called upon Congress to amend the National Emergency Act to “erect a wall against any President, not just Mr. Trump, who insists on creating emergencies where none exist.”
Trump “took advantage” of a “loophole” in the NEA, said The Times, to declare “a crisis at the border, contrary to all evidence.”
The NY Times news desk, however, apparently failed to alert the editorial page on what the top story would be that day.
“Record Numbers Crossing to U.S., Deluging Agents” was the page-one headline. The NY Times quoted Kevin K. McAleenan, commissioner of Customs and Border Protection: “The system is well beyond capacity, and remains at the breaking point. … This is … a border security and a humanitarian crisis.”
Reporter Caitlin Dickerson explained what is behind CPB’s alarm: “The number of migrant families crossing the Southwest border has once again broken records, with unauthorized entries nearly double what they were a year ago.”
She continued, “More than 76,000 migrants crossed the border without authorization in February, an 11-year high … newcomers continue to arrive, sometimes by the busload, at the rate of 2,200 a day.”
Only if one believes in open borders is this not an emergency, not a crisis. Consider the budgetary impact alone of this invasion.
(“Can Trump stop the invasion?” by Pat Buchanan, 3/8/19)
———————————————————————————
A BETTER APPROACH TO NORTH KOREA
American leaders have been wrong. The best way to get what we want from North Korea, whether it be “denuclearization” or anything else, is to reverse decades of Washington thinking and raise the issue of human rights loudly and incessantly. The same is true with regard to North Korea’s sponsor and only formal ally, the People’s Republic of China.
Kim Jong Un knows how inhumane his rule is — he has, after all, had hundreds of people executed — so if we do not talk forcefully about, say, Otto Warmbier, Kim will think we are afraid of him. If he thinks we are afraid of him, he will see no reason to be accommodating. It is unfortunate, but outsiders cannot be polite or friendly.
It is time to let Kim know that America no longer cares about how he feels or even about maintaining a friendly relationship with him. That posture, a radical departure from Washington thinking, is both more consistent with American ideals and a step toward a policy that Kim will respect.
(Gatestone, Gordon Chang, 3/12/19)
———————————————————
IRAN: EXECUTIONS OF CHILDREN
The list of unspeakable human rights violations committed by Iran’s regime is lengthy; however, by far the most disturbing seems the cruelty enacted against children.
Now is the time for the EU to halt its appeasement policy with a regime that does not hesitate to flog people — publicly, as a message to others — torture any citizen they choose to target, enact cruel punishments such as amputation without a fair trial, and execute children just starting their lives. These are acts that should be condemned — not condoned through the pursuit of appeasement policies, moral depravity and raw greed.
(Majid Rafizadeh, Gatestone, 3/8)
————————————————————
NOT MY FAVORITE
More than three hundred years after Queen Anne’s death, it’s suddenly been revealed that she was a lesbian.
According to the movie “The Favourite.”
The movie does not make much of the fact that she must have had a close relationship with her husband, Prince George of Denmark and Norway, with whom she had seventeen children. Not one of the children survived her.
Queen Anne is generally considered a good monarch on both sides of the Atlantic. The movie revolves around her close friendship with Sarah Churchill, an ancestor of Winston Churchill. They had a falling out in 1711. Sarah was replaced by Abigail Masham, Sarah’s cousin, as the queen’s best friend.
The suggestion that she was a lesbian has no basis in fact. Whatever next? We’ve already “learned” that Abraham Lincoln was gay; are we about to find out that George Washington and Thomas Jefferson were more than just friends? Or that Winston Churchill, on his nights off from saving the world from fascism, doubled as a drag queen?
It’s time for us all to boycott Hollywood and switch to Bollywood movies, already seen around the world by far more people than anything out of Hollywood. The movie “Kashmir” was the first ever musical about terrorism, and was far more credible than “The Favourite!”
———————————————————-
ETHIOPIAN AIRLINES CRASH
I was deeply saddened to hear of the terrible accident Sunday, in which an Ethiopian Airlines flight crashed, killing all 157 people on board.
It brought back many memories of Ethiopian Airlines. For many years, it was the only reliable airline crossing east to west in Africa. We often used it when flying from Ghana to Cameroon and back.
It did, however, have a reputation for being late. This was typical of most African airlines at the time.
On one occasion, I remember arriving at the airport in Douala, Cameroon, with my wife and three children. As we approached the airport we could see a flight taking off. Inside the airport terminal building, we were proudly informed by an Ethiopian Airlines official that this time, instead of being late, the flight had departed two hours early!
We spent an extra three days in Cameroon!
—————————————————————————-
BREXIT UPDATE
It really couldn’t be a bigger mess!
The British parliament rejected Mrs. May’s second proposed “deal,” and followed it up with a vote to not leave the EU without a “deal.” By doing the latter, they have rejected the vote of the people who want to leave. This smacks of a deliberate last minute attempt to stop Britain from leaving the EU.
There are only two weeks to Brexit, which is written into law. However, if the law is altered to allow more time, Brexit may not happen. The EU has already said that Britain can delay departure as long as it likes. To do this, all 27 member countries would have to vote approval. Nigel Farage, the man behind Brexit, has already asked friends in Poland and the Czech Republic, to vote down the Extension, which would well and truly leave Britain trapped.
This would leave Britain in an even worse state than before the 2016 referendum. Still trading with the EU, with no voting rights and no freedom to maneuver. And no rebates, either – so membership will cost more.
Who would join this club?
President Trump this morning said that a second referendum on the issue would not be wise. America seems to be sending a clear signal that it wants Britain to leave; maybe to weaken the EU.
—————————————————————-
CHRISTIAN STREET PREACHING PUNISHED
Being a street preacher can be a thankless business. Since moving to Britain from Nigeria nine years ago, 64-year-old Oluwole Ilesanmi has toured the country reading aloud from the Bible, spending hours outside train stations, urging people to see the light. Sometimes he makes a convert; most of the time his preaching falls on deaf ears. Last month, it resulted in him being arrested.
Saturday 23 February began like a typical day for Ilesanmi. He went to Southgate tube station in north London and preached for a few hours. His spiel included a disobliging reference to Islam, which seemed to rile a passer-by. To Ilesanmi’s surprise he was then accosted by the man. A woman who filmed the incident says she feared Ilesanmi was about to be attacked: ‘The man had his forehead to the preacher’s forehead. He looked like he was about to knock him out.’
It seemed that Ilesanmi was the victim. But he was accused of Islamophobia, and then the police arrived. The video — since viewed millions of times online — shows what happened next. Ilesanmi was arrested, handcuffed and one of the officers snatched his Bible away. When Ilesanmi objected, the policeman responded by saying: ‘You should have thought about that before being racist.’
‘When they took the Bible off me I felt so enraged,’ Ilesanmi tells me. ‘They couldn’t do that to the Koran. They dare not do that to the Koran. The policeman wanted to even throw the Bible on the floor.’
That was just the beginning of his humiliation. He was then bundled into a police car and driven off. When he asked where he was being taken, he was told: ‘Somewhere where you can’t get back to preach.’ That turned out to be Wrotham Park, five miles away on the outskirts of London, where the cops let him out of their car. ‘De-arrested,’ the police later called it. Ilesanmi, without any cash, was at a loss as to how to get home until an elderly man took pity on him and paid for a bus ticket. (Tom Goodenough, Spectator, 3/16)
—————————————————–
A third of British billionaires have moved to a tax haven
by Paul Morgan-Bentley, Head of Investigations | Billy Kenber, Investigations Reporter | Louis Goddard, Data Team, March 7, 2019 * The Times, London
A third of British billionaires have moved to tax havens after an exodus over the past decade, a Times investigation has found.
They are among 6,800 Britons controlling 12,000 UK firms from low-tax jurisdictions. The Exchequer is denied billions a year but many of the bosses still reap the benefits of British assets.
Some have bankrolled political parties while living offshore as successive governments have failed to enact a law passed in 2009 that would have banned large donations from anyone resident abroad for tax purposes. Many have been awarded honors or hold titles, with at least one viscount, one baron, six knights and one dame among the billionaires.
(The Times, 3/7/19)
————————————————————-
FRANCE
“Macron hates the yellow vests and wants them to vanish. He wants to win European elections and needs the Muslim vote. He knows perfectly well who the anti-Semites are today, but will not attack them. He needs them. He attacks [only] those who are dangerous to him. ” — Éric Zemmour, French author, February 19, 2019.
————————————————————————————-
QUESTION
“You (and many COG’s) teach that Manassah separated from Ephraim. But doesn’t this assume everyone in the U.S. colonies came from an Ephraimite (British) background?”
No. It doesn’t assume that. The country was started by people of Ephraimite descent and has Anglo-Saxon institutions. They are still there, even though the majority of people may not be Ephraimites.
“Two cringeworthy viral video clips from Vice President Mike Pence’s recent trip to Europe illustrate how unpopular the Trump administration has become with the United States’ European allies.
“During a speech at a conference in Poland about Middle East policy last Thursday, Pence called on America’s allies to follow the Trump administration in withdrawing from the Iran nuclear deal.
“The time has come for our European partners to withdraw from the Iran nuclear deal, and join with us as we bring the economic and diplomatic pressure necessary to give the Iranian people, the region, and the world the peace, security, and freedom they deserve,” Pence said.
He paused, expecting his audience to applaud. Instead, he was met with total silence. Visibly surprised by the reception, the VP took a deep breath and shook his head before proceeding with his speech.
Pence traveled from Poland to Munich, where he gave a speech at another security conference that also quickly became uncomfortable. Pence began by saying he brought “greetings from the 45th president of the United States of America — President Donald Trump.” He paused for applause, but again was met with complete and utter silence.
————————————————–
“Pence wasn’t the only Trump administration official who had an awkward time in Munich. White House counselor and first daughter Ivanka Trump was one of the few people in attendance at German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s speech who didn’t applaud when Merkel pointed out the absurdity of Trump’s position that German cars present a national security threat.
“During her speech, Merkel criticized the Trump administration on a number of fronts, including the president’s recent decision to pull out of a treaty with Russia banning land-based intermediate-range missiles, and his announcement that American troops will be leaving Syria and Afghanistan.
“After the fall of the Berlin Wall, we certainly had the hope … that we could come to a better cooperation,” Merkel said. “Today, in 2019, that seems like a long time ago … [but] in a few years, it could look very different again.” (Vox and the New York Times)
At some point, there must be a split between Europe and the US, perhaps even this year, although the Europeans may hold out in the hope of a Democratic victory in 2020. Europe is in a state of flux. Bible prophecy shows that, eventually, we will have ten kings come together, to form a revival of the Roman Empire.
“The ten horns which you saw are ten kings who have received no kingdom as yet, but they receive authority for one hour as kings with the beast. These are of one mind, and they will give their power and authority to the beast. These will make war with the Lamb, and the Lamb will overcome them, for He is Lord of lords and King of kings; and those who are with Him are called, chosen, and faithful.” (Rev 17:12-14)
________________________________
A German viewpoint
Newsletter – Europe’s “Geopolitical Identity”
At the Munich Security Conference last weekend, the power struggle between Berlin and Washington openly escalated to an unprecedented level. US Vice President Mike Pence reiterated his ultimatum that Berlin and the EU immediately renounce their political and economic projects, which are not fully in accord with US policy, pertaining particularly to the Nord Stream 2 pipeline and the Iran nuclear deal. German Chancellor Angela Merkel rejected the US demands. In view of the dispute with Washington, German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas declared at the Security Conference that “Europe” faces the “crucial question” whether it will be “the subject or the object of global policy in the future.” It must, therefore, “transform geo-economic capital into geopolitical capital” to become “a cornerstone of the international order” and “develop its own geopolitical identity.” Maas is expressing his demands at a time when the EU’s Iran policy is about to fall apart and the European power base needed for Berlin’s ambitions is crumbling. (2/18)
————————————————————-
GERMANY INCREASES WEALTH AS CURRENT ACCOUNT SUPLUS LARGEST IN THE WORLD – FOR THIRD CONSECUTIVE YEAR
“Germany’s current account surplus was the world’s largest for the third year in a row in 2018, confirming deep imbalances in the global economy that have drawn ire from the Trump administration and helped justify US efforts to reset global trade rules.” (WSJ, 2/20/18)
—————————————————–
JEWISH GRAVES DESECRATED IN FRANCE
“Dozens of Jewish graves in eastern France were vandalized amid a rise in anti-Semitic acts and days after yellow vest protesters were filmed accosting a prominent Jewish academic.
“Nazi swastikas were daubed on more than 80 graves in Quatzenheim, a village near the city of Strasbourg, close to the border with Germany.” (WSJ. 2/20)
————————————–
SUNNI ARAB ALLIANCE A NON-STARTER
“American efforts to create a new alliance of Middle East nations to counter Iran are faltering amid regional divisions, the departure of key Trump administration officials leading the project, and discord over its mission, say US and Arab officials.
“Once touted as an Arab version of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, the so-called Middle East Strategic Alliance, or MESA, is no longer expected to bring countries together with a NATO style agreement holding that an attack on one member would be seen as an act of war by all the others.” (“Hopes dim for a new Arab NATO,” WSJ, 2/20).
———————————————————
TENSION MOUNTS BETWEEN TWO NUCLEAR POWERS
“As pressure builds on Prime Minister Narendra Modi to respond to the deadliest terrorist attack on security forces in a generation, the options available to him appear limited, according to analysts and former military officials.
“The bombing last week in disputed Kashmir – claimed by a Pakistan based group and carried out by a Kashmiri militant – killed 40 Indian paramilitary forces moving in a convoy through an India-controlled area. The group that claimed responsibility, known as Jaish-e-Mohammad, operates in Pakistan despite being officially banned there.
“Indians have reacted angrily to the attack, calling for a response to punish Pakistan amid daily media coverage of funerals and the families of the victims.
“With India heading into a general election soon, Mr. Modi has publicly promised a military response, though he has declined to describe the timing or means more specifically.” (“India-Pakistan tensions rise over Kashmir”, WSJ, 2/21).
THE GRAVEYARD OF EMPIRES
“… US withdrawal from Afghanistan throws a lifeline to severely weakened but not thoroughly vanquished terrorist groups such as the Taliban, al Qaeda and ISIS. These groups – and others ideologically aligned with them around the globe – are already interpreting suggestion of a US retreat as a victory and an invitation to grow and press their advantage.” (Letter from Rina Amiri, WSJ, 2/21).
There can be only one outcome to talks between the US and the Taliban. It means the Taliban will have total control in Afghanistan in time. Remember when the US had talks with the Communists in China? And the Vietcong in Vietnam? Both triumphed. The US lost.
——————————————————-
SOCIALISM IS BACK
“We’re entering a new political era. The issues are bigger, they are far outside the mainstream, and they’re reminiscent of an earlier time. And the stakes are higher.
“One of the first to recognize this was Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. “I can pretty safely say that this is the first time in my political career that I thought the essence of America was being debated,” he tells me in an interview.
“I never thought that we would be debating things that were debated in the thirties, both communism and socialism,” Mr. McConnell says. “Those ideologies were largely discredited at a time when Americans could have found these arguments pretty appealing in the middle of the Great Depression.”
Mr. McConnell thinks that socialism ought to be a tough sell today, given the prosperous economy and low unemployment. But maybe not. Polls show socialism has risen in stature, which Mr. McConnell sees as evidence of the new era. Last year, he notes, Gallup found for the first time that Democrats have a more “positive view” of socialism than of capitalism.
“Another poll – this one from 2016 – showed Democratic primary voters “in every age group, every gender, and every race view socialism favorably.” Among Democrats 45 and under, 45% preferred socialism to 19% for capitalism.” (“Ocasio-Cortez heralds a new political era,” by Fred Barnes, WSJ 2/19).
—————————————–
BREXIT EXPLAINED (HUMOR)
(Mr. David Davis is the former UK Chief Brexit negotiator; Mr. Barnier represents the EU. The UK is scheduled to leave the EU on March 29th.)
Mr. Dave Davis is at the golf club returning his locker key when Mr. Barnier, the membership secretary, sees him. “Hello Mr. Davis,” says Mr. Barnier. “I’m sorry to hear you are no longer renewing your club membership, if you would like to come to my office we can settle your account.”
“I have settled my bar bill,” says Mr. Davis.
“Ah yes Mr. Davis,” says Mr. Barnier, “but there are other matters that need settlement.”
In Mr. Barnier’s office . . .
Mr. Davis explains that he has settled his bar bill so wonders what else he can possibly owe the Golf Club? “Well, Mr. Davis,” begins Mr. Barnier, “you did agree to buy one of our Club Jackets.”
“Yes.” agrees Mr. Davis “I did agree to buy a jacket but I haven’t received it yet. As soon as you supply the jacket I will send you a cheque for the full amount.”
“That will not be possible,” explains Mr. Barnier. “As you are no longer a club member you will not be entitled to buy one of our jackets!”
“But you still want me to pay for it?!?” exclaims Mr. Davis.
“Yes” says Mr. Barnier, “That will be £500 for the jacket. “There is also your bar bill.”
“But I’ve already settled my bar bill,” says Mr. Davis. “Yes,” says Mr. Barnier, “but as you can appreciate, we need to place our orders from the Brewery in advance to ensure our bar is properly stocked. You regularly used to spend at least £50 a week in the bar so we have placed orders with the brewery accordingly for the coming year. You therefore owe us £2600 for the year.”
“Will you still allow me to have these drinks?” asks Mr. Davis. “No, of course not, Mr. Davis. You are no longer a club member!” says Mr. Barnier. “Next is your restaurant bill,” continues Mr. Barnier. “In the same manner we have to make arrangements in advance with our catering suppliers. Your average restaurant bill was in the order of £300 a month, so we’ll require payment of £3600 for the next year,”
“I don’t suppose you’ll be letting me have these meals, either?” asks Mr. Davis. “No, of course not,” says an irritated Mr. Barnier, “you are no longer a club member!”
“Then, of course,” Mr. Barnier continues, “there are repairs to the clubhouse roof.”
“Clubhouse roof??” exclaims Mr. Davis. “What’s that got to do with me?”
“Well it still needs to be repaired and the builders are coming in next week — your share of the bill is £2000,”
“I see,” says Mr. Davis, “anything else?”
“Now you mention it,” says Mr. Barnier, “there is Fred the Barman’s pension. We would like you to pay £5 a week towards Fred’s pension when he retires next month. He’s not well, you know, so I doubt we’ll need to ask you for payment for longer than about five years, so £1300 should do it. This brings your total bill to £10,000,” says Mr. Barnier.
“Let me get this straight,” says Mr. Davis, “you want me to pay £500 for a jacket you won’t let me have, £2600 for beverages you won’t let me drink and £3600 for food you won’t let me eat, all under a roof I won’t be allowed under and not served by a bloke who’s going to retire next month!”
“Yes, it’s all perfectly clear and quite reasonable,” says Mr. Barnier.
“Get lost !” says Mr. Davis
Now we understand what Brexit is all about!!!!!
"Once in a while you will stumble upon the truth but most of us manage to pick ourselves up and hurry along as if nothing had happened." — Sir Winston Churchill
MEL RHODES' PLACE . . . world news that matters 