Latest Analysis and Commentary

What the Palestinian Authority Did Not Tell the UN Security Council

by Khaled Abu Toameh  •  December 29, 2014 at 5:00 am

What the Palestinians did not tell the Security Council is that the state they seek to establish is one that does not respect public freedoms, first and foremost freedom of expression. It will be a state where the president or any of his senior officials could order the arrest of anyone who dares to speak out against lack of democracy or reforms.

Nor does the Palestinian Authority want the international community to know that 2014 witnessed the worst assaults on freedoms since its establishment two decades ago.

The Palestinian Authority is trying to send a message that no one is immune to arrest or harassment, even if it is a woman.

Palestinian Authority riot police clash with protesting women in Hebron, October 2014.

Palestinian women have become the latest victims of the Palestinian Authority's assault on freedom of expression in the West Bank.

In the male-dominated Arab culture, an insult from a woman is considered far more offensive than one that comes from a man.

That is the main reason why the Palestinian Authority [PA] has been quick to take action against women who dare to speak out or make critical remarks.

The Palestinians also know that women are more vulnerable than men. By targeting women, the PA is not only trying to intimidate and silence them, but also deter others from speaking out. The PA is hoping to send a message that no one is immune to arrest or harassment, even if it is a woman.

The clampdown coincides with the Palestinian Authority's effort to seek a United Nations Security Council resolution that sets a timeline for an Israeli withdrawal to the pre-1967 lines and the establishment of an independent Palestinian state.

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Does Saudi Arabia Rule the World?

by Shoshana Bryen  •  December 29, 2014 at 4:00 am

Iran's nuclear program is not a bluff.

It would be foolish for the U.S. to assume budgetary constraints will rein in Russian -- or Iranian -- behavior.

The headquarters of the Saudi Aramco oil company in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia, behind the Al Mujamma Mosque. (Image source: Wikimedia Commons/Eagleamn)

Saudi Arabia does not control the price of oil, but it is trying to manipulate the current, temporary, price decline for its own purposes -- and it should be careful.

The price of oil, like any commodity, is subject to immutable laws of supply and demand. The addition of North American oil to the worldwide mix, plus the continuing weak demand, particularly from China, have acted to cut the price per barrel nearly in half. One way to raise the price would be for producing countries to cut supply -- but countries are so dependent on oil revenue that they are loathe to do it. The November OPEC meeting ended with no agreement on cutting production.

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The Palestinians' Real Enemy: Europe

by Bassam Tawil  •  December 28, 2014 at 5:00 am

To prevent this Palestinian State that Europeans seem determined to push down our throats, many people are discussing a "Palestinian Spring" revolution. They simply do not know what else to do to protect ourselves from these "Goodists" of Europe.

Do they honestly think we will have better lives in a "Palestinian State"?

What we talk about is how the Europeans and their diplomats are paying our leaders to kill the Jews for them -- with their money but with our lives -- so that they can finish the job without getting their hands dirty and still keep on feeling good about themselves.

ISIS operatives are already in Egypt, ready to take over the Sinai Peninsula, and with their eyes set on Libya. Is this what the Europeans really want?

PA President Mahmoud Abbas (r) meets with the Hamas political bureau chief Khaled Mashaal in Qatar, July 20, 2014. (Image source: Handout from the Palestinian Authority President's Office/Thaer Ghanem)

Listening, in both English and Arabic, to the latest speeches of Palestinian Authority [PA] President Mahmoud Abbas and his fellow Fatah Central Committee members, we get the uncomfortable feeling that the Palestinian State, now being promoted in Europe, will not only be a threat to the stability of the entire region, but to us who have to keep living here, as well to those countries in Europe who promote it.

As Palestinians discuss among themselves -- far from the diplomats in their five-star hotels -- rather than accept this "gift" that Europe seems determined to push down our throats, many people increasingly see no choice but to launch a "Palestinian Spring" revolution. It would not be, as you might think, to rid them of Israel but finally to rid us of our wretched leadership and corrupt system of government -- and to stop the European counties that are imposing this brutal system on us by financing it.

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A Brandeis Student Refuses to Show Sympathy for Assassinated Policemen -- and Her Critic Is Attacked

by Alan M. Dershowitz  •  December 28, 2014 at 1:30 am

As I watched, with tears in my eyes, the funeral of police officer Rafael Ramos who was ambushed along with fellow officer, Wenjian Liu, in revenge for the deaths of two black young men who were killed by policemen, I could not help thinking of the following horrible words tweeted by a bigoted young woman named Khadijah Lynch, on the day the police officers were murdered in cold blood, and the day after:

"i have no sympathy for the nypd officers who were murdered today." (December 20, 2014)

"lmao, all i just really dont have sympathy for the cops who were shot. i hate this racist f...ing country."(December 21, 2014)

Khadijah Lynch is a Brandeis University junior who at the time she wrote the tweet was the undergraduate representative in the Brandeis African and Afro-American studies department.

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Hard Leftists are as Guilty of Censorship as North Korea's Dictator

by Alan M. Dershowitz  •  December 27, 2014 at 11:00 pm

North Korea's actions emulate those of hard-left feminists, radical Muslims, university administrations, and others who seek to prevent the publication or distribution of material they deem offensive.

This alleged "right" to be free from being offended, is, of course, in direct conflict with the most basic of rights in any democracy: the right to express views deemed offensive by some, and the corollary right to hear or see such views.

Citizen A should not be able to prevent Citizen B from seeing or reading something that would offend Citizen A if he were required to read or see it.

We should begin at home by delegitimizing the efforts of our own citizens to censor material that they find offensive.

Nobody should be surprised that the dictatorial ruler of North Korea would want to censor a film that offended him, or even that he would feel entitled to break the law by threatening reprisals against the offenders. His actions emulate those of hard-left feminists, radical Muslims, university administrators, and others who seek to prevent the publication or distribution of material they deem offensive.

I recall an incident several years ago when radical feminists fired bullets through the windows of a Harvard Square bookstore to protest its sale of Playboy Magazine. I also recall being physically threatened by a group called "Dykes on Bikes" -- a feminist motorcycle gang -- for providing legal representation to alleged pornographers.

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The Destruction of the Middle East

by Denis MacEoin  •  December 27, 2014 at 5:00 am

The heritage of centuries has been wiped out in little more than a year.

Eventually the need to wipe out all traces of unbelief becomes obsessive. At one time, for instance, Egyptian law demanded that any house found to contain a copy of The Apology of al-Kindi (a book containing a polemical dialogue between a Muslim and a Christian) would be demolished along with 40 houses around it.

Ethics were defined by what Allah said was good or evil in Sharia law. The Islamic State's behaviour is solidly rooted in Islamic ideology, law and practice. It is only when this fundamental fact is grasped that we will be able to address what confronts us.

There are many wise and sensible Muslims who favour a shift to a more updated way of thinking. It is their mosques and shrines that are being crushed; it is their heritage. Today, such Muslims use the freedoms bestowed on them in the West to write, network and debate their opposition to fundamentalist interpretation of Islam by the Islamic State and other supporters of murder and destruction.

Locals survey the hill of rubble that resulted from the destruction of the Tomb of Yunus (Jonah), in Mosul, Iraq. The Islamic State blew up the tomb and mosque on July 24, 2014.

We are living through ferocious times. Stories about the self-proclaimed Islamic State [ISIS/ISIL/Da'esh] abound in the media, in what has now become a daily round of beheadings, suicide bombings, and general mayhem from Nigeria to Malaysia. It seems that wherever there is a Muslim country, there is extreme violence. But one part of the Islamic State narrative has received less attention than the gruesome rounds of killings: the continuing onslaughts on cities such as Mosul, Aleppo, Raqqa and Kobani. The Islamic State and related movements have rampaged across parts of Iraq and Syria, destroying the entire heritage of ancient regions, demolishing historic churches, synagogues, mosques, Sufi and Shi'i shrines, and major archaeological sites. All this vandalism is driven by a relentless passion to enforce religious purity on the regions they now control.

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Why Does Nobody Want to Play with Turkey?

by Burak Bekdil  •  December 26, 2014 at 5:00 am

Turkey is too big, too Islamist and too un-European for the EU; it is too little Islamist and a disliked former colonial power for most of the Arab street; a sectarian and regional rival for Iran, and a security threat to the bigwigs in the Shanghai Cooperation Organization.

Why won't anyone play with us? Pictured: Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan (left) and Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu.

Theoretically, Turkey is a NATO ally. In reality, it is a part-time NATO ally. It became the first member state that had military exercises with the Syrian army and the Chinese Air Force; awarded a NATO-sensitive air defense contract to a Chinese company; supported jihadists in Syria and the Muslim Brotherhood elsewhere in the Middle East; allied with what NATO nations view as a terrorist organization (Hamas); shared, until recently, an embarrassing list of potentially terrorist-sponsoring countries with seven others including Syria and Pakistan, and sported a population with the lowest support for the NATO alliance.

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Kurdistan: More Like Israel, Less Like Iraq

by Lawrence A. Franklin  •  December 25, 2014 at 5:00 am

It is a society that rejects religious zealotry. Most Kurds are Sunni Muslim and one can hear the five-times-a-day Muslim call to prayer, but it is muted and ignored by most.

Like Israel, Kurdistan is more democratic than any of its neighbors. Like Israel, Kurdistan is surrounded by enemies that wish it did not exist. Like Israel, Kurdistan looks West. And like Israel, Kurdistan has maintained an internal equilibrium though all the world betrays it.

An aerial view of Erbil, in Iraqi Kurdistan, featuring the ancient Erbil Citadel in the center. (Image source: Wikimedia Commons/Jan Kurdistani)

Iraqi Kurdistan is full of surprises. Probably, the most unexpected discovery is how normal life is in its capital city, Erbil. Despite a late summer scare by Islamic State [IS] military gains north of Mosul and the threat of suicide bomber attacks, the social discipline of Kurdistan's citizens is admirable. There is a relaxed state of tension. It is "business as usual."

There is also a sense of optimism, pervasive and infectious. Entrepreneurial spirit is alive and well. While there was an exodus of foreign businessmen after the initial territorial gains by the IS, foreign investors are filtering back. The Kurdistan Regional Government [KRG] has already drawn up plans for large-scale projects to improve the infrastructure. Heavy-duty construction vehicles are everywhere. The most visible project is the beltway being built around the city.

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Christians and Churches Attacked in the West
Muslim Persecution of Christians, September 2014

by Raymond Ibrahim  •  December 24, 2014 at 5:00 am

"You have a cross on… Do you know what we do to people like you?" — Muslim in Denmark.

Muslim Fulani gunmen forced their way into the church, cut [the pastor], his wife and a daughter with a machete, and then tied the hands and feet of the three of them before setting the building on fire... We only found the charred remains of the three of them in the morning. I heard them shouting at the top of their voices, saying they must obliterate any traces of Christianity in the town." — Eyewitness account, Nigeria.

Each year, approximately 1,000 women in Pakistan are forced to convert to Islam and marry Muslim men. Whenever a case of this nature reaches the law courts, those women, under threat and blackmail, often declare that their conversion and marriage were decisions freely made, and the case is closed.

People in a car bearing a jihadist flag verbally abused parishioners at the Our Lady of Lebanon Church in Sydney, Australia in September, threatening to "kill the Christians" and slaughter their children.

The Muslim persecution of Christians in September started making prominent appearances not just in the Islamic world, but also in the West—in America, Australia and Europe.

In the United States, in Columbus, Indiana, three churches were vandalized on the same night. The words most frequently sprayed were "Infidels!" and "Koran 3:151." The verse from the Koran states, "We will cast terror into the hearts of those who disbelieve [or "infidels"] for what they have associated with Allah [reference to Christian Trinity] of which He had not sent down [any] authority. And their refuge will be the Fire, and wretched is the residence of the wrongdoers."

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The Islamization of France in 2014

by Soeren Kern  •  December 23, 2014 at 5:00 am

According to a confidential French intelligence document leaked to Le Figaro, a form of Muslim ghettoization is gaining ground within the French school system. The report says that Muslim students are effectively establishing an Islamic parallel society completely cut off from non-Muslim students.

More than 1000 French supermarkets, including major chains such as Carrefour, have been selling Islamic books that openly call for jihad and the killing of non-Muslims.

A report estimates that 60% of the prison population in France, or 40,000 prisoners, are "culturally or originally" Muslim.

The Fresnes Penitentiary near Paris launched an experiment that involves isolating radical Muslim prisoners in a separate unit to prevent the radicalization of other prisoners. Muslim prisoners clashed with prison guards to protest the new measure.

An Ipsos survey found that 66% of French people believe there are too many foreigners in France, and 59% believe "immigrants do not try hard enough to integrate. According to the poll, 63% of French people think that Islam "is not compatible with French values."

Islamic radical Bertrand Nzohabonayo attacked three police officers with a knife, seriously wounding two, in the French town of Joué-lès-Tours on Dec. 20, before police shot him dead.

The Muslim population of France reached an estimated 6.5 million in 2014. Although French law prohibits the collection of official statistics about the race or religion of its citizens, this estimate is based on several recent studies that attempt to calculate the number of people in France whose origins are from Muslim majority countries.

This implies that the Muslim population of France is now roughly 10% of the country's total population of 66 million. In real terms, France has the largest Muslim population in the European Union.

Consequently, Islam was an ever-present topic in newspaper headlines during 2014. What follows is a chronological review of some of the main stories about the rise of Islam in France during 2014:

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Heading for a Jew-Free Turkey

by Burak Bekdil  •  December 23, 2014 at 4:00 am

"The imam in the neighbourhood has the habit of preaching to his congregation 'not to make friends with Jews or Christians.'" — Two shop-owners, Istanbul.

"The circle is closing in." — Moris Gabay, writer for Salom.

So, did your good friend Dink deserve to be murdered because he humiliated Muslims?

"There are laws against hate speech, but not a single person has ever been prosecuted [let alone sentenced] for insulting [Jews]." — Moris Gabay, writer for Salom.

Turkish Armenian intellectual Etyen Mahcupyan (left), an advisor to the prime minister, thinks that daily attacks on Turkey's Jews and other non-Muslims, including the murder of his "friend" Hrant Dink (right), happen because: Jews and Armenians humiliate Muslims; they are better-educated then Muslims and hence their superiority complex.

At the beginning of the 20th century, there were about 200,000 Jews in Turkish lands – when the entire population was barely 10 million. Today, the Turkish population has reached 77 million – and there are fewer than 17,000 Jews.

Moris Gabay, a Turkish Jewish writer for Salom, the Istanbul Jewish newspaper, recently wrote in his column, "Are Turkish Jews Leaving?:" "We face threats, attacks and harassment every day. Hope is fading. Is it necessary for a 'Hrant among us' to be shot in order for the government, the opposition, civil society, our neighbors and jurists to see this?" 'Hrant' whom he referred to is Hrant Dink, a Turkish Armenian journalist who was shot dead in 2007 by a gang of nationalist Turks.

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EU Gives Hamas Green Light to Attack Israel

by Khaled Abu Toameh  •  December 22, 2014 at 5:00 am

The EU court's decision represents a "severe blow to the Palestinian Authority and Egypt," according to Palestinian political analyst Raed Abu Dayer.

Any victory for Hamas, albeit a small and symbolic one, is a victory for the Islamic State, Al-Qaeda, Islamic Jihad, the Muslim Brotherhood and other fundamentalist groups, and causes tremendous damage to those Muslims who are opposed to radical Islam.

Hours before the EU court's decision was made public, Hamas leader Mahmoud Zahar announced that his movement would never recognize Israel, and that Hamas seeks to overthrow the Palestinian Authority and seize control of the West Bank.

The EU court's decision also coincided with a rapprochement between Hamas and Iran. Now, the Iranians and other countries, such as Turkey and Qatar, are likely to interpret the EU court's decision as a green light to resume financial and military aid, including rockets and missiles, to Hamas — not only to Gaza but to the West Bank as well — to support those Palestinians whose aim it is to eliminate Israel.

Thousands of armed Hamas troops showed off their military hardware at a Dec. 14, 2014 parade in Gaza, marking the organization's 27th anniversary. (Image source: PressTV video screenshot)

Less than 48 hours after a top European Union court ruled that Hamas should be removed from the bloc's list of terrorist groups, supporters of the Palestinian Islamist movement responded by firing a rocket at Israel. The attack, which did not cause any casualties or damage, did not come as a surprise.

Buoyed by the EU court's ruling, Hamas leaders and spokesmen see it as a "political and legal achievement" and a "big victory" for the "armed struggle" against Israel.

Musa Abu Marzouk, a top Hamas leader, issued a statement thanking the EU court for its decision. He hailed the decision to remove his movement from the terrorist list as a "victory for all those who support the Palestinian right to resistance."

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Sweden's Christmas Present: New Laws Curbing Free Speech

by Timon Dias  •  December 22, 2014 at 4:00 am

The problem is that within the extremely politically correct culture of Sweden, questions, insults and criticism are often viewed as one and the same.

"Swedes who disagree... risk being labeled racist, fascist, even Nazi." — Mikael Jalving, Author of Absolute Sweden.

One might well ask how Swedes would react if other countries decided to determine their borders.

Furthermore, no one seems to have asked what kind of place this new state of Palestine might be: a free, democratic and transparent society like Sweden, or another rogue state, or eventually even another Islamist state.

Apart from South Africa, Sweden now has the highest number of rapes (that are reported); based on unofficial accounts from policemen and social workers, about 75% of them are committed by Muslims.

The Swedish newspaper Expressen hacked databases of website commenters, targeted critics of immigration, and confronted them at home. The above screenshot is taken from a video on the Expressen website, published under the headline "Jim Olsson writes on hate sites."

Sweden, during its September 2014 parliamentary election, voted in a new government. But whom exactly did the people of Sweden elect to run their new government? In a recent (albeit un-sourced) blog, Ilya Meyer, the deputy chair of the Sweden-Israel Friendship Association, shed some light on the backgrounds and motivations of some of Sweden's new cabinet ministers. A few individuals stand out.

The Minister for Housing and Urban Development is the Turkish Swede Mehmet Kaplan, who was aboard the Turkish vessel Mavi Marmara, of the Turkish extremist Humanitarian Relief Foundation, when it tried to break through the legal Israeli naval blockade of the Gaza coastline. Israel had established the naval blockade in 2007 in response to the smuggling of weapons into Gaza to arm the terrorist group Hamas, which is outspokenly dedicated to exterminating Israel.

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Who Represents German Muslims?

by Veli Sirin  •  December 21, 2014 at 5:00 am

The most serious and crushing harm to those Muslims who respect their non-Muslim neighbors and detest the extremists is that many Western commentators appear utterly uninformed about the representatives of the moderate, non-extremist Muslims.

How long will it take before responsible Westerners perceive the struggle among Muslims between extremists and non-extremists, between the radicals and anti-radicals?

Who represents Muslims in Germany? An integrated German-Turkish woman such as Tuğçe Albayrak, who defends other women (left), or the small group of supporters of the "Islamic State?"

A Sunni Muslim funeral for the slain student Tuğçe Albayrak, a German-born 22-year old woman of Turkish descent, was attended on December 3 by 1,500 mourners in Wächtersbach, a town in the western German state of Hesse. Prayers for Albayrak began in the local mosque, which is controlled by the Turkish-Islamic Union for Religious Affairs [DİTİB], an official arm of the Turkish government that administers Sunni religious affairs in Germany. She was then buried in her hometown, Bad Soden-Salmünster, not far away.

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"Justice" in Turkey

by Burak Bekdil  •  December 20, 2014 at 5:00 am

The oppressors change, oppression does not.

The U.S. and EU expressed concern about media freedom and the independence of the judiciary in Turkey.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan (L), and Fethullah Gülen.

Turkey changes, and it does not. The oppressors change; oppression does not.

Every Turkish courtroom sports in big, bold letters the proud dictum: "Justice is the foundation of the state." Perhaps that explains why the Turkish state looks like a makeshift building without a proper foundation.

In Turkey, the ruling ideology has changed from one belief to another. The bête noire for the state also changed -- in line with what the dominant ideology has crowned, or what is perceived as threat.

Between 1923, when Ataturk built modern Turkey, and 2002, when the (Islamist) Justice and Development Party [AKP] came to power, the usual suspects were the liberals, Islamists, non-Muslim minorities, communists, Kurds and random dissidents.

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