Victims of Shooting at Jewish School in Toulouse, France Identified

 

Victims of Shooting at Jewish School in Toulouse, France Identified, Several Still Fighting for Their Lives

At least 4 are dead and others critically wounded after an unidentified attacker mowed down Jewish school children and teachers outside the Otzar HaTorah school in Toulouse, France. Included in the dead: a teacher and his two children. Principal’s daughter succumbs to her wounds. 

THE JEWISH PRESS

MARCH 19, 2012

Visiting school teacher Rabbi Yonatan Sandler and his sons Aryeh and Gavriel – all of the Kiryat Yovel neighborhood in Jerusalem – were identified as 3 of the victims of Monday’s shooting attack on the Ozar HaTorah Jewish school in Toulouse on Monday.  Another victim, 8 year-old Miriam Monsonego, was the daughter of school principal Rabbi Yaacov Monsonego.

Police continue to search for a shooter who mowed down a group of teachers and students at a student dropoff point outside the Ozar HaTorah Jewish school in Toulouse on Monday.

Reports currently list the deceased at 4, shot at approximately 8:10am by an unidentified attacker. Three children, ages 6-8, are fighting for their lives.  The French television network BFM said the dead included a school teacher, his two children, and a 17-year-old male student. The daughter of the school’s principal, who had been critically injured, has also succumbed to her wounds.

Photo Credit: screen shot, BBC 

A man opened fire on people waiting at a school drop-off point and then fled, according to observers at the scene. Video surveillance cameras in the southwestern French city show a man in a helmet traveling on a black scooter, appearing to know  the city well.  Some reports indicate the shooter may have had tattoos on his face.

The city of Toulouse is on “lockdown” according to France 24 news, with a team of 50-60 police officers and counter-terror specialists scouring the city for the shooter.  French President Nicholas Sarkozy, Interior Minister Claude Guéant, and Education Minister Luc Chatel are expected to arrive in Toulouse shortly to monitor the situation.  Jewish institutions throughout the country are being afforded additional security by law enforcement.

Chief Rabbi of France Gilles Bernheim, issued a statment, saying: ‘I am horrified by what happened outside a Jewish school in Toulouse today. It has bruised my body and my soul. I am deeply upset and am heading to Toulouse.’

This incident comes days after three soldiers were shot dead by a man on a scooter in the same region of France.

A 30-year-old paratrooper was shot dead in a residential area of Toulouse just over a week ago, while two soldiers were killed and a third wounded as they used a cashpoint in the town of Montauban, some 29 miles away, on Thursday.

All the soldiers appear to have been ethnic minorities.

A correspondent at the scene for BFM said that the Police see a connection between the three incidents, citing the same weapon – 9mm gun – and black scooter used in all three attacks.  President Sarkozy said it is too early to connect the three events.

People in the area are in “immense shock,” the correspondent said.

There are currently at least 20 Ozar HaTorah schools throughout France, educating children of primarily Sephardic, Middle Eastern and North African descent.

The Ozar HaTorah organization was established in 1945 in Jerusalem.  It opened 29 schools in the British Mandate of Palestine, educating children until the founding of the State of Israel in 1948.

It subsequently opened schools in the Middle East and North Africa, including Iran, Syria, Libya. and Morocco. Ozar HaTorah also opened schools in France, due to a large influx of immigrants from North Africa in the late 1960s and early 1970s.

NOTE:
SEE:   Four killed at Jewish school in France - THE TIMES OF ISRAEL

"Rabbi and his two young children shot dead, as well as 8-year-old girl. Sarkozy: ‘It’s a tragedy that there are insane people who can do such a thing’"

 The Israeli Foreign Ministry said it was horrified by the shooting.

@DannyAyalon

Danny Ayalon

Our condolences to the families of the victims and a speedy recovery to those injured in this murderous attack on... http://t.co/PrfwnWV8

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The Fear of Martial Law - By Alan Caruba

WARNING SIGNS

By Alan Caruba

The President of the United States of America, Barack Hussein Obama, has generated so much fear that the most common theme of posted comments and private communications is that he will refuse to relinquish power if defeated in November or that, under some pretext, he will declare a state of martial law.

Many, myself included, did not like the Patriot Act that was enacted following 9/11 but there is little evidence that this law has been abused to deprive Americans of their fundamental rights and freedom, though surely some suspected of being terrorists were detained.
An Executive Order posted on the White House website on Friday, March 16, 2012, has generated a wave of fear. It is officially about “National Defense Resources Preparedness” and its stated policy addresses “national defense resource policies and programs under the Defense Production Act of 1950.”

Its stated policy is that “The United States must have an industrial and technological base capable of meeting national defense requirements and capable of contributing to the technological superiority of its national defense equipment in peacetime and in times of national emergency.”  (Emphasis added)

In 1950 the nation was entering a new phase of history following World War II. It would be called the Cold War led by the then-Soviet Union, but 1950 is also important because on October 1, 1949, Mao Zedung had proclaimed the birth of the People’s Republic of China, instituting a Communist regime that continues to this day. With German and Japanese totalitarian threats vanquished, new ones were emerging.

The new EO evokes fear because it is occurring in peacetime and, more specifically, when the United States remains the strongest military power on Earth. There is no indication that an attack by any other nation is anticipated, so the implementation of the EO raises concerns that its purpose is not what it says.

In effect, the EO allows the federal government, directed by the President, to commandeer and control all aspects of the economy and the lives of all Americans. It centralizes control to an astonishing and frightening degree.

As just one example, it parcels out control to “ the Secretary of Agriculture with respect to food resources, food resource facilities, livestock resources, veterinary resources, plant health resources, and the domestic distribution of farm equipment and commercial fertilizer” and thereafter to:

The Secretary of Energy with respect to all forms of energy;

The Secretary of Health and Human Services with respect to health resources;

The Secretary of Transportation with respect to all forms of civil transportation;

The Secretary of Defense with respect to water resources; and

The Secretary of Commerce with respect to all other materials, services, and facilities, including construction materials.

The obvious question is why is this EO necessary in the absence of any threat of an invasion or even an attack?

The obvious question is why should the President of the United States, in the run-up to a national election, feel that this is the time to issue such an EO? 

I have frankly been dismissive of widely expressed fears that Obama would or could carry off a coup d’etat to establish himself as an American dictator. The problem, however, is that Obama has surrounded himself with Cabinet Secretaries and a shadow government of “czars” that would likely support him if he were to attempt such an audacious move.

The “legality” of such a move would be rubber-stamped by the Attorney General whose regard for the Constitution and laws of the nation is dubious at best, elastic at worst. The President’s views about the Constitution are well known and he resents the limits it puts on his powers.

Would Congress stand by and allow its powers be usurped? Imagine yourself a Senator or Representative fearful of arrest and detention. Rounding up all 435 members would not be a difficult task.

The nation’s media, with exceptions, has “covered” for this President regarding the legitimacy of his right to hold office, his absurd energy policies, and his takeover of various segments of the nation’s economic base; the auto industry, the insurance industry, and Obamacare’s attempt to takeover the healthcare sector.

That is why this EO has evoked such fear and concern and that is why Congress has to assert its Constitutional powers before this President is permitted to overthrow the legislative branch of government and seize control through an EO that is so broad that it is a breathtaking seizure of power that could only be considered if the nation was, in fact, under attack.

This EO is about “preparedness”, but for whom?

© Alan Caruba, 2012

NEWS FLASH!! Unprepared and 4 years too late, Obama signs a “Preparedness” Order

NOTE: The news over the weekend, ignored by the main stream media, is Obama's latest "Executive Order".  Call the American citizens a little skeptical, but we can't help but wonder exactly what this Obama Administration is up to ... hmm!  Since none of his policies and midnight signings have been for the benefit of Americans, or America and its allies, we have attempted to figure out how many years it would take to put all the pieces back together again!  
Those "pieces" include the United States Constitution.  Is Obama planning on having an "American Spring", like the one Egypt and other Muslim nations have been involved in this past year? 
 What I find interesting is the fact that while Obama hasn't been prepared to lead this nation; unprepared to handle the Office of President; he now signs a "preparedness" Executive Order! Another 4 years, 10 years, or 100 years, will not PREPARE Obama on how to lead this nation; nor will it prepare America for one more term with Obama as president.  There's more humor in this guy's day to day actions than a barrel of monkeys at a circus!


CANADA FREE PRESS
- Online Before it is news  Saturday, March 17, 2012 

National Defense Resources Preparedness

Obama Executive Order: Peacetime Martial Law!

Before It’s News 
This Executive Order was posted on the WhiteHouse.gov web site on Friday, March 16, 2012, under the name National Defense Resources Preparedness. In a nutshell, it’s the blueprint for Peacetime Martial Law and it gives the president the power to take just about anything deemed necessary for “National Defense”, whatever they decide that is. It’s peacetime, because as the title of the order says, it’s for “Preparedness”. A copy of the entire order follows the end of this story.
Under this order the heads of these cabinet level positions; Agriculture, Energy, Health and Human Services, Transportation, Defense and Commerce can take food, livestock, fertilizer, farm equipment, all forms of energy, water resources, all forms of civil transporation (meaning anyvehicles, boats, planes),  and any other materials, including construction materials from wherever they are available.  This is probably why the government has been visiting farms with GPS devices, so they know exactly where to go when they turn this one on. 

Specifically, the government is allowed to allocate materials, services, and facilities as deemed necessary or appropriate.  They decide what necessary or appropriate means.

UPDATE:  BIN reader Kent Welton writes:  This allows for the giving away of USA assets and subsidies to private companies:  “(b)  provide for the modification or expansion of privately owned facilities, including the modification or improvement of production processes, when taking actions under sections 301, 302, or 303 of the Act, 50 U.S.C.App. 2091, 2092, 2093; and (c)  sell or otherwise transfer equipment owned by the Federal Government and installed under section 303(e) of the Act, 50 U.S.C. App. 2093(e), to the owners of such plants, factories, or other industrial facilities.”

What happens if the government decides it needs all these things to be prepared, even if there is no war?  You likely won’t be able to walk into a store to purchase virtually anything because it will all be requisitioned, “rationed” and controlled by the government.  Construction materials, food like meat, butter and sugar, anything imported, parts, tires and fuel for vehicles, clothing, etc. will likely become unobtainable, or at least very scarce.  How many things are even made here in the USA any more?

A bit of history…  During WWII, price stabilization didn’t begin until May of 1942, which froze prices on nearly all every day goods and rationing started in 1943.  Why would the government want to control everything before a war?
Here’s what some gas ration cards looked like during WWII.  Will there be rationing under this kind of system?  What better way to control the movement and actions of the populace…
WWII era gas ration cards via Old Chester PA.  You couldn’t go on vacation without a “vacation pass”.
Under this new Executive Order, cabinet heads are authorized to loan money, offer loan guarantees and even subsidize payments at above market rates (no bid contracts?) for whatever they need.  This could make Solyndra or Halliburton look like Junior Achievement.  Nothing like a war will generate these kinds of huge profits for the corporate “partners” and you can bet the bankers and contractors are already lining up for this one—because under this order no war is even required!
In a crisis situation, the government will be able to take whatever they need, print money to get whatever they want and distribute it as they see fit….for the benefit of a “war effort” or the politically connected corporations and individuals.  All other contracts except those for employment are superseded by this executive order, it’s all here in black and white.
Specifically, it orders:
“to require acceptance and priority performance of contracts or orders (other than contracts of employment) to promote the national defense over performance of any other contracts or orders, and to allocate materials, services, and facilities as deemed necessary or appropriate to promote the national defense, is delegated to the following agency heads:

1. the Secretary of Agriculture with respect to food resources, food resource facilities, livestock resources, veterinary resources, plant health resources, and the domestic distribution of farm equipment and commercial fertilizer;
2. the Secretary of Energy with respect to all forms of energy;
3. the Secretary of Health and Human Services with respect to health resources;
4. the Secretary of Transportation with respect to all forms of civil transportation;
5. the Secretary of Defense with respect to water resources; and
6. the Secretary of Commerce with respect to all other materials, services, and facilities, including construction materials.

About all I can say is “Have a nice day!”


Link HERE

Obama Signs Executive Order Allowing for Control Over all US Resources

NOTE:  Diogenes Sarcastica's report on Obama's latest mid-night signing of another "Executive Order" is flying fast across the boards of Conservative bloggers; and I ask, why hasn't the main stream media picked up and reported any of this to the American public?!  Why the big "secret"?!  After all, the Obama administration has always been out in the open with its agenda .... 
well, as "open" as Iran is about its intentions to obtain nuclear capabilities!

 

Very Sneaky .....

Diogenes Sarcastica™ 

March 17, 2012

With last years military maneuvers on the west coast that look suspiciously like crowd control and intelligence gathering practice, along with recent drone overflights of U.S. cities, now quietly the White House announces to little fanfare this little jewel....

You can read the whole Executive Order for yourself Here.

In short, the 'National Defense Resources Preparedness' order gives the Executive Branch the power to control and allocate energy, production, transportation, food, and even water resources by decree under the auspices of national defense and national security.  The order is not limited to wartime implementation, as one of the order's functions includes the command and control of resources in peacetime determinations. 

Section 101. Purpose. This order delegates authorities and addresses national defense resource policies and programs under the Defense Production Act of 1950, as amended (the "Act").

(b) assess on an ongoing basis the capability of the domestic industrial and technological base to satisfy requirements in peacetime and times of national emergency, specifically evaluating the availability of the most critical resource and production sources, including subcontractors and suppliers, materials, skilled labor, and professional and technical personnel;

"Executive Orders created for national defense and national preparedness are not new in American history, but in each instance they brought about a Constitutional crisis that nearly led standing Presidents to hold dictatorial power over the citizenry......" 

"The Obama administration appears to be preparing for a long drawn out war in the Middle East, or at the very least, an expected crisis that will require the need to override Constitutional authority and claim dominion over all resources in the United States under the guise of national security...." - The Examiner 

[snip]

.......like violent OWS uprisings in major cities this summer that raise fears that could very well cost him the White House?

A Just War - by Sultan Knish

Saturday, March 17, 201 

With the War in Afghanistan dwindling in in the rear-view mirrors of an administration gunning for an exit in time for the election and a conflict in Syria cresting the hill just below the sunset, it may be time to revisit the just war.

Whether a war is just or not has nothing to do with multilateral approval. An unjust war can be approved of by a hundred nations. A just war may be entirely unilateral. International parliamentary procedures are a process and like all processes do not make a course of action just or unjust, they only make it legal under international law. Legal and just are not the same thing. 

Czechoslovakia was carved up by the Nazis with the assent of most of the civilized nations of the day who agreed that it was the best thing to do for world peace. That wasn't the last time such a thing happened and we keep witnessing repetitions of that horror over and over again.

International law is neither international nor law. It is not consistently applied, and therefore isn't law. It is not international as the majority of the world does not subscribe to it, despite signing agreements to the contrary. What we call international law is not a judicial process, but a political one, an extension of existing international and national power structures which is selectively used to justify their actions.

And even if all these were true, process does not make right, it only achieves a consistent result or a consensus. It cannot tell you whether a course of action is right, only whether it came through the same sausage factory as every other decision did. The sausage factory process achieves a certain amount of consistency which is the next best thing to fairness, it does not however make a thing just.

A just war has nothing to do with multi lateralism or getting a vote through the UN Security Council where the butchers of Beijing rub shoulders with the pet representatives of Vlad the Impaler.

The wars we fight may be roughly divided into three categories.

1. Defensive wars - These are wars fought in response to an attack or a planned attack. They may be fought preemptively to deny a known enemy an advantage, whether it is a weapon or territory so long as it occurs within the context of an existing conflict, whether overt or covert.

2. Moral wars - Wars of aggression fought to prevent another nation from carrying out some unspeakable act such as genocide.  

3. Interest wars - These are wars fought primarily to protect commercial interests, maintain regional stability, improve the position of an ally or otherwise alter the map in your favor.

Obviously there is a certain amount of overlap between these three types of conflict. Nations are run by people and people do things for complex reasons. Interest wars are often passed off as moral wars or defensive wars. Often wars have all three components with varying degrees of emphasis and sometimes one type of war turns into another type of war in the middle. 

Most wars are primarily interest wars, because few leaders will launch a war from which there is nothing to gain. These gains however are not necessarily national or corporate in the crude, "No Blood for Oil" type of way. If the modern West still fought wars as simple as that, the price of gas would be much lower and Saudi Arabia would be an American colony.

Interest wars are not only wars of national interest, but wars of ideological interest fought to fulfill a goal embedded in an ideology. International law itself is an aspect of ideology. Wars fought in the name of international law are ideological interest wars, but at the same time they also often disguise lesser personal and national interests.

Naked moral wars rarely exist. That is why we didn't send troops into Somalia or Sudan. Even the most seemingly selfless use of force has interests rooted deep within, even if it is only the hegemony of a particular moral creed. Moral wars are mostly subsets of interest wars and defensive wars.

Afghanistan began as a defensive war that mutated into an interest war when it became a nation building exercise. Like most modern interest wars, it was not in the interest of the United States, but of the towering framework of global stability and international order which was primarily concerned with the management of chaos and the progress toward global order.

The ideology of international law assigns legitimacy only to those conflicts between the international community and a rogue state. In two sided conflicts, the "international community" chooses a side, offers a prescription and the other side is given a choice between complying or being denounced as a rogue state. When the fighting is over, the rogue state, deemed a source of chaos, is reconstructed as a good faith member of the international community.

America's defensive war after September 11 was wedged into that narrow formula. We came as liberators, then we settled into the old task of winning hearts and minds, counterinsurgency and bringing stability. All wastes of time. To defeat a guerrilla group, you either need to tackle the civilian population that it draws its support from, and this is usually an ugly business, or you have to go after its state sponsors outside the borders. Unless you do one or the other, the war becomes a long bloody business. If the guerrillas have enough outside support and recruits, it can go on indefinitely.  You can win victories against them for decades without significantly changing the situation until you have wiped out or turned their leadership. And even that might not be enough.

The error began when our mission parameters demanded long term control of Afghanistan. Rather than inflicting as much damage on Al-Qaeda and its allies as we could, we began thinking in terms of denying them purchase in the region. Considering Pakistan's long history of support for Islamist terror, this was a clearly unworkable program. It was also meaningless. Al-Qaeda could set up shop in any number of places in the Muslim world. Afghanistan was ideal in some ways, but its members were not ethnically tied to Afghanistan. They weren't committed to it in an ethnic way, it was a base not a national identity.

That same error was once again repeated in Iraq, again operating on the same illusion that with enough commitment, we could stabilize a country and then a region. As in Vietnam, the local institutions failed us, forcing us to do all or most of the work until we were the only ones holding the country together. Perversely this worked against our goals of long term stability as the more we imposed an external structure, the less stable the internal structure became.

Had we not propped up Karzai so much, the post-Taliban Afghanistan might have evolved more naturally, instead it shaped itself around us, in a mostly negative way. Our money paid for it all and our troops provided the security. Those on the inside were not challenged, only those on the outside who learned, adapted and came back stronger than ever. 

When our objectives shifted from destroying the enemy to denying him control of the territory by creating and protecting alternative political and military structures, we fell back into the same errors and shifted from a defensive war to an interest war, and from being on the offense, we fell back on the defense acting as beat cops for the state that we hoped to create.

If the Afghans were less corrupt and more civilized, things might have been different, but if that were the case, the Taliban would have never ruled in Kabul to begin with. If the Taliban had been weaker, then we would have lost fewer men and the Karzai regime might have had a future. But if they had been weaker, we wouldn't have had to go in because they would have never sheltered a terrorist group at war with the United States.

The final outcome was mostly inevitable. Rather than reshaping the chaos, we became part of the chaos, we shaped the chaos, rather than imposed order.

What had begun as a just war became an unjust war, not to the Afghans to whom we had few obligations once an attack was launched on us from their soil and with the consent of their rulers. The war was unjust in relation to us. Once it had ceased to be a defensive war and became a war fought to maintain an Afghan state in fealty to international order, it was no longer properly a war fought to protect Americans. As the distance between the rationalization for the day to day elements of the conflict and its original purpose lengthened, the justification for the conflict weakened.

What had been primarily a defensive war, took a back seat to moral war and interest war elements which then became supreme. It was now a war fought to protect Afghans and the Afghan government and to assert the power of Muslim democracy and the ability of international intervention to heal sore spots, drain away the chaos and bring order. Even the term war hardly applied. Rather than a war it was more properly a guardianship, a long watch on the wall, not against Al-Qaeda, but against chaos.

American sacrifices to achieve these ends were out of proportion to the potential and actual gains making it an unjust conflict as it was operating against the interests of those fighting it. As a defensive war against an enemy, it had been just, but as a defense of an ideology and an enemy population, its pursuit had become unjust to Americans.

 

http://sultanknish.blogspot.com/ 

SURPRISE, SURPRISE! The New Egyptian Parliament Takes Aim at the Camp David Accords

SATURDAY, 17 MARCH 2012 02:51 NEWS FROM JERUSALEM
Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs

March 2012 by Jonathan D. Halevi

 

The new Egyptian Parliament recently issued a statement undermining the 1979 peace agreement by proclaiming it was Israel’s bitter enemy. On March 12, 2012, Dr. Mohamed Al-Saed Idris, Chairman of the Arab Affairs Committee in the Parliament, presented the committee’s official outline of Egypt’s regional policy, as approved by a parliamentary majority that included the Muslim Brotherhood, the Salafi party, and the Egyptian Left parties. Idris is one of the founders of the Kefaya protest movement and a member of the leftist al-Karama party, which has formed an alliance with the Muslim Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party.

The statement of the Arab Affairs Committee is important in its wording and content. The term “the State of Israel” is not mentioned and is replaced throughout by the terms “Zionist entity” and “the enemy.” The statement focused on recent tensions between Israel and Gaza (Israeli attacks against Palestinian terrorist organizations and the launching of hundreds of rockets into Israel). It celebrates Palestinian terrorism, which is called “resistance,” and denies the very existence of Israel, which it defines as “an imperialist settlement entity” which is of “an aggressive nature” and which “drove a nation from its land by force to establish a racist state.” The U.S. is also blamed by the Egyptian parliament for its unconditional support of Israel.

The committee’s statement included a list of operative recommendations to the political echelon, including:

An official definition of Israel as an enemy – “Post-revolutionary Egypt will never be a friend, partner or ally of the Zionist entity, which we see as the foremost enemy of Egypt and the Arab nation. Egypt will treat this entity as an enemy, and the Egyptian government should reconsider its entire relationship and agreements with this enemy and the threat it poses to the security and national interests of Egypt.”
Severance of diplomatic relations with Israel – “The expulsion of the Israeli ambassador from Egypt, returning the Egyptian ambassador from Tel Aviv, cessation of the export of Egyptian gas to that entity, freezing of activities under the QIZ agreement [the Qualified Industrial Zones trade agreement] whose terms violate the sovereignty and national interests of Egypt.”
Full support for the armed struggle against Israel – “Providing all means of support to the Palestinian people in Gaza and the West Bank, in order to allow this nation to stand firm against Israel’s policy of aggression. Adopting resistance in all its forms and manifestations, and referring to this path as the strategic path to the liberation of occupied land, after the leaders of the Zionist entity stressed that the so-called peace process is nothing but a track of lies and red tape in order to gain time to Judaize and annex all of what that entity wants to Judaize and annex in the land of Palestine.”
Re-adoption of the total boycott of Israel – “A return to the total Arab boycott policy that includes the Zionist entity and the international companies that maintain ties with it, and referring to the boycott as a factor which supports the struggle.”
Raising the issue of Jerusalem as a major issue in the international arena – “Demanding from the Arab states and the Al-Quds Committee [of the Organization of the Islamic Conference] to act against the Zionist entity’s plans to Judaize Al-Quds [the Arabic name of Jerusalem] and force it to become the eternally united capital of the entity, and to work diligently in all international organizations and channels in order to determine that the Zionist attacks which threaten the Al-Aqsa Mosque are crimes against humanity, history and culture.”
Support for a united Palestinian front for the liberation of Palestine – “A call to all Palestinian organizations and factions to unite, renounce their differences and divisions, and work for the restoration of the PLO to lead the Palestinian struggle to liberate the occupied land.”
Reviewing Egyptian nuclear policy – “A demand that the Egyptian government reopen the Israeli nuclear issue and discuss Israeli nuclear capabilities, as they can cause a direct threat to Egyptian national security and Arab national security. The U.S. and the international community…must act as seriously toward the Israeli nuclear threat as they act toward what they consider an Iranian nuclear threat. Egypt must be prepared to immediately examine the Egyptian nuclear policy which is opposed to nuclear proliferation and which demands to make the Middle East a zone free of weapons of mass destruction. Israel is the only country that refuses to sign a treaty against nuclear proliferation and to open its nuclear facilities, and particularly the reactor in Dimona, to inspectors of the International Atomic Energy Agency.”
An active and effective policy against Israel – “We demand action and not just words, serious actions are worthy of post-revolutionary Egypt, its government and its parliament. We swear that we will never be neglectful in protecting our homeland and our nation.”
The Arab Affairs Committee’s statement was unanimously accepted and applauded in Parliament and reflects the true perception of the Islamic elements in the Egyptian political leadership (which is also shared by the leftist organizations). In its eyes, Israel is the foremost enemy of Egypt and the Arab and Islamic world, and the peace agreement with it (the Camp David agreement) is considered a dead letter.

The new Egyptian tone indicates the beginning of the formation of an Egyptian policy of confrontation against Israel, first of all in the political and economic spheres and through direct support of the Palestinian armed struggle. Egypt is setting itself on a collision course with Israel, using the Palestinian issue in all its aspects – including Israeli military operations against Palestinian terrorism as well as Israeli policy in Jerusalem or the West Bank – as an excuse for direct Egyptian intervention. At the operational level, the new Egyptian leadership declares its commitment “to assist the Palestinian struggle/resistance in all its forms and manifestations,” which means providing direct assistance to Palestinian terrorism, which may be expressed through money, weapons, training, and transfer of intelligence.

Defining Israel as a “major enemy” which threatens national Egyptian and Arab security is of great importance, since its translation into action means building a military capability to deal with the “Israeli threat,” including an attempt to deny Israel any advantage in the nuclear field and/or the development of Egyptian nuclear weapons.

At present, the new Egyptian political leadership cannot translate these policies into actions. The Muslim Brotherhood and Salafi party attained an absolute majority in the Parliament and the Upper House, but the full transfer of powers from the military government to the elected civilian government has not yet been completed.

Today, Egyptian foreign policy is not directed by the Egyptian Parliament. For now, Egypt is still controlled by the military and the government leaders appointed by it. This situation is likely to change after the presidential elections on May 23-24 and the establishment of a new civilian government. The division of responsibility between the new government and the military in the future remains to be seen. But the Muslim Brotherhood’s victory in the presidential election could potentially complete its takeover of the political system in Egypt and allow the Islamic movement to accelerate its political consolidation, to purge the army of its old guard, and to recapture a leadership position in the Arab world, based in part on the struggle against Israel.

The Egyptian position, which is completely supportive of Hamas and the struggle against Israel, in practice, eliminates the ability of the Palestinian leadership in the West Bank, headed by Mahmoud Abbas, to lead political moves toward an historic compromise agreement with Israel. Moreover, it gradually prepares the ground for permanent political friction with Israel which, if not addressed, could even develop into military clashes (against an Israeli action in Gaza or along the border between Israel and Egypt).

* * *

Reference: Video of Dr. Idris in the Egyptian Parliament, March 12, 2012,
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ApadVvms-us

ELDER OF ZIYON: Arabs upset over - Oriental tourists at Al Aqsa

ELDER OF ZIYON
MARCH 18, 2012 - Sunday

In the middle of yet another article about Zionists "breaking into" the Temple Mount and "performing Talmudic rituals", Qudsmedia notes that some visitors were dancing at Al Aqsa Mosque, thereby desecrating it horribly:

Looking a little closer, you can see that the dancers aren't Jewish religious fanatics, but rather tourists from the Far East:

The Muslims' anger isn't only at them, of course. Here's another photo they took of another set of tourists:

How horrible!

At the very least, the tourists should have enough respect for the holy site to play the traditional Muslim game of soccer, which was decreed by Allah himself as being an appropriate form of veneration, as long as the players are Muslim.

The American Left: Does It Have the Freedom of Sedition and the Right to Tyranny?

CONSERVATIVE DAILY NEWS

By Kyle Becker on Mar 16, 2012

Free Speech, Sedition & Treason

The American Left has pushed the United States to the brink of Constitutional crisis. Whether or not the left agrees with conservatives regarding the unconstitutionality of its preferred laws, the perception of millions of Americans is that the country is in political crisis. This is the state of the nation because what have widely been agreed-upon as the “rules of the game,” as implied in liberal democracy, are being replaced in piecemeal fashion by progressives whose primary agenda is to unfetter the government. Whether or not some of the left’s methods of transforming the country should be considered illegal or unconstitutional is the subject of this essay.

The New Left rationalizes its “fundamental transformation” of the nation, with the tacit endorsement of using extra-constitutional or even unconstitutional means, by appealing to a crusader-like mission to remedy the supposed structural injustices of our legal system. Among the left’s devices of transformation are the linguistic redefinition of terms like “freedom” and “equality,” thereby impacting public law, and the opportunistic and pragmatic employment of power.

For the purposes of this article’s argument, the left’s motives will be assumed to be laudable and its ends moral. What will be focused on are the means of the left’s value-transmission and whether or not specific practices should be considered illegal or unconstitutional. The same moral framework intrinsically applies to the right. Although current issues like the proposed crackdown on pornography are not addressed, like reasoning applies to all ideological and political content. But the focus will specifically be upon the New Left, since its agenda is currently driving the dominant political party.

The New Left has undertaken a programme of utilizing culture as a method of ingraining its values into a public highly resistant to the temptations of socialism. The institutions that animate public discourse – the schools, universities, entertainment and news media, the courts – are indisputably dominated by intellectuals whose sympathies tend toward the political left.

Yet is it the power of the left’s ideas that has led to the fait accompli? Or has it been the abuse of the state’s apparatus to effect political change that is the explanation for the left’s success in certain institutions? Successively answering these two questions leads us to the distinction between a reasonable difference of opinion and active, ongoing sedition.

Ideas in and of themselves cannot legally be treasonous, but they can be seditious. As one dictionary points out, “Sedition is any act, writing, speech, etc., directed unlawfully against state authority, the government, or constitution, or calculated to bring it into contempt or to incite others to hostility, ill will or disaffection; it does not amount to treason and therefore is not a capital offense.” Yet the same dictionary points out that sedition is the “incitement of discontent or rebellion against a government.” There is a tension in the American public’s view of what constitutes sedition and treason and this can be explained by our nation’s ideologically charged history.

In American history, the Founders were considered by the British to be seditious or even treasonous. They thus staked “their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honors” when they rebelled against the Crown. But by the end of the eighteenth century, the U.S. government had already passed the Alien and Sedition Acts, which suppressed political speech deemed to be a threat to the interests of the state. The Wilson administration continued this dark legacy of speech repression with its passage of the Espionage and Sedition Acts, which anarchists and socialists particularly rued. The subsequent Red Scare and the McCarthy era are commonly pointed to by left-leaning academics as exemplars of free speech suppression of the worst type. But scratch the surface of these cries of foul-play and one finds that the hard left actively suppresses speech whenever it is politically expedient or the conditions are ideologically favorable.

Although the practice should not be commended, the suppression of speech should not be illegal so long as the institution is privately owned or operated. But what crosses the line of amorality into immorality is the practice of an institution that receives federal funds or subsidies suppressing free speech or engaging in speech with political implications (a broader definition than is currently accepted). The reason this practice is morally indefensible is because the fruits of a citizen’s labor should not be confiscated or purposely diminished in value in order to finance speech that may run against an individual’s freedom of conscience. This runs directly contrary to any “open society.”

Thus, it is immoral for public schools, universities, or state-financed media outlets to receive federal funding and to promote a political ideology that is not in accordance with the agreed-upon rules of the game. It is immoral to promote coercive means, as implied in the advocacy of the use of state force, in order to impose one’s ideology on others or to silence one’s intellectual opposition. Yet this is precisely what the progressive left does on a routine basis in our schools and universities, as countless testimonials online avouch.

The intolerance of the “tolerant” left when it comes to ideology is rapidly becoming infamous. But whether or not those on the radical left vehemently disagree with those on the so-called right is not the point. Communists, socialists, fascists, racists, homophobes, xenophobes, Islamophobes have that right.

Neither is it the point that the content of the left’s speech may sometimes be seditious by nature, in the sense that progressives occasionally support unconstitutional means for imposing their contrarian morality upon others. This is sometimes the case.

The point is that the radical left’s behavior of suppressing the speech of its ideological opponents, whether in our public schools, colleges, universities, or publicly funded media ought to be illegal. This brings us to the next dilemma, which cuts at the core of free speech rights. The conclusion is the ultimate solution to the problem of public funds being utilized to promote sedition.

The New Left: Institutionalizing Sedition

The modern struggle over freedom of speech can be traced to the post-McCarthyite era, when many radicals reacted by insisting on absolute freedom of speech on our college and university campuses. The BerkeleyFree Speech Movement (FSM) embodies such a movement. FSM leader Mario Savo put his aims such:

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