The current policy of the PA leadership is to avoid alienating the Trump administration by continuing to pretend that Abbas and his cronies are serious about achieving peace with Israel. This is why Abbas's representatives are careful not to criticize Trump or his envoys.

When Israel does not comply with their list of demands, the Palestinians will accuse it of "destroying" the peace process. Worse still, the Palestinians will use this charge as an excuse to redouble their terror against Israelis. The Palestinian claim, as always, will be that they are being forced to resort to terrorism in light of the failure of yet another US-sponsored peace process.

No doubt, Abbas cannot find it within himself to clarify to the American envoys that he lacks a mandate from his people to make any step toward peace with Israel. Abbas knows, even if the American representatives do not, that any move in that direction would end his career, and very possibly his life. Abbas also does not wish to go down in Palestinian history as the treacherous leader who "sold out to the Jews." Moreover, someone can come along later and say, quite correctly, that as Abbas has exceeded his legitimate term in office, any deal he makes is illegal and illegitimate.

The new "test" of our alliance will be whether the assembled nations will join in removing the hateful parts of such a doctrine from their communities.

What still has to be considered is the U.S. approach to stopping Iran from filling the vacuum created by ridding the region of the Islamic State (ISIS), as well as Iran's push for extending its path straight through to the Mediterranean.

If ISIS is retreating in Mosul, it is rapidly advancing in Manchester. The Caliphate is winning its war in Europe. Six months ago in Britain, the rise of Jeremy Corbyn, the ultra-pacifist Labour party leader who blamed the "war on terror" for the recent attacks in Manchester and London, would have been unthinkable.

As the Caliphate razed to the ground everything in its path, Europe reacted as if that were just the result of regrettable manners that should not concern her. The Islamists, however, had other plans.

"Why, in August 2015, did ISIS need to blow up and destroy that temple of Baalshamin? Because it was a temple where pagans before Islam came to adore mendacious idols? No, it was because that monument was venerated by contemporary Westerners, whose culture includes an educated love for 'historical monuments' and a great curiosity for the beliefs of other people and other times. And Islamists want to show that Muslims have a culture that is different from ours, a culture that is unique to them". — Paul Veyne, archeologist.

A definite gain of Israel's new settlement policy is that it seems to have taken the settlement issue off the boil not just with the Trump administration but also with other friendly foreign governments. Among the losses, thanks to the Judea and Samaria Settlement Regulation Law, is UN Security Council Resolution 2334 of December 23, 2016, which vehemently denounced all Israeli settlement activity.

"Corrupt motive" is an extraordinarily vague and open-ended term that can be expanded or contracted at the whim of zealous or politically motivated prosecutors. It is bad enough when this accordion-like term is used in the context of economic corruption, but it is far worse – and more dangerous to liberty – when used in the context of political disagreements.

In political cases – especially those not involving money – the act itself is constitutionally protected, and the motive, which is often mixed, is placed on trial. It becomes the sole criteria for turning a constitutionally authorized political act into a felony.

Corrupt motive is in the eye of the beholder, and the beholder's eyes are often more open to charges of corrupt motives on the part of their political enemies than their political allies.

The law already prohibits violence and threats of violence, and law enforcement authorities are supposed to prosecute those -- intimidation, destruction, damage, vandalism, simple and aggravated assault. What "hate crimes" are not already covered by the law?

Why would the House of Representatives find it necessary to make such redundant statements, if not in order to redefine the concept of a hate crime? Perhaps by including "hate speech"? The current resolution includes most of the major ethnic and religious minorities in the United States, so it will have a far better chance of passing, as it will more easily fool Representatives into thinking that the contents of the resolution are harmless.

Would it not be appropriate for the politicians sponsoring and voting for these resolutions first of all to find out what drives the organizations responsible for drafting them? The Investigative Project on Terrorism has authored a damning 88-page report about the Muslim Public Affairs Council. American politicians do not seem to have taken much interest in it.

"Bangladesh is a Muslim country, no culture of statue establishment would be allowed by the people here... all of them must be removed." — Nur Hossain Quashemi, president, Dhaka branch of Hefazat-e-Islam.

"The Quran says: You [women] should stay at your home... Your duty is to stay at the husband's house and safeguard property. Your primary duty is to stay home and look after your family and children only. Do not go out even for shopping." — Shah Ahmed Shafi, chief of Hefazat-e-Islam.

Millions of Bangladeshi youths are increasingly wearing Islamic attire; and freedom of speech and freedom of movement are fast becoming a luxury -- if not a threat to the safety -- of Bangladesh's more secular-minded people, already feeling themselves a minority of sorts.

President Mahmoud Abbas's Palestinian Authority (PA), which is funded by Americans and Europeans, has once again chosen to maintain silence following a terror attack perpetrated by Palestinians. This silence of Abbas and his PA leadership, specifically their refusal to condemn the terror attack, can only be interpreted as an endorsement of the killing of Jews.

This is the twisted logic of Abbas and his people: How dare Israeli police officers shoot terrorists armed with knives and a submachine gun and prevent them from killing more Jews?

One wonders: how does this public endorsement of the Jerusalem terror attack and the terrorists stand up to Abbas's promise to President Trump to stop anti-Israel incitement and "promote a culture of peace" among Palestinians?

Saudi Arabia is the second largest source of ISIS fighters from Muslim-majority countries, with an estimated 2,500, according to a working paper produced by the National Bureau of Economic Research. According to a report by the Institute for Gulf Affairs, a whopping 16% of these fighters were in the U.S. when they joined ISIS.

An equally disturbing finding of the report is that the Saudi government, which has been monitoring its nationals in the U.S., is fully aware of the fact that many of them are joining ISIS and not only has done little to stop it, but has kept information about it from American authorities.

Observers have surmised that the real reason for the judge's leniency was that he feared his family might be subjected to retribution from the clan.

"In their concept of masculinity, only power and force matter; if someone is humane and civil, this is considered a weakness. In clan structures, in tribal culture everywhere in the world, ethics are confined to the clan itself. Everything outside the clan is enemy territory." — Ralph Ghadban, Lebanese-German political scientist and leading expert on Middle Eastern clans in Germany.

"The state promotes organized crime with taxpayer money." — Tom Schreiber, a member of the Berlin House of Deputies.

The bad news about the Turkish justice system is that it is increasingly religiously ideological, reminiscent of the Ottoman justice system where non-Muslims were legally inferior to the Muslims and were constantly reminded of their inferiority to the dominant community through restrictions and markers.

The legislation reads that law enforcement officials cannot "intentionally marry a person who is known to be impure, or to stay in a marriage, or continue to live with such a person."

In addition, the decree covers stricter rules against drinking, gambling, the vague and emphatic "going to places that would ruin your reputation," as well as "excessive spending".

The "religious-freedom" plea unwittingly exposes the false claims made by prominent Muslims -- such as Iranian-American religion scholar/TV host Reza Aslan and Palestinian-American activist Linda Sarsour, who have insisted that female genital mutilation (FGM) is "not an Islamic practice."

According to National Health Service statistics, at least one girl each hour is subjected to this excruciating procedure in the United Kingdom alone -- and this is nearly 30 years after it was outlawed there.

FGM is no less appalling a crime than rape or slavery, yet self-described feminists in the West -- including Muslims such as Linda Sarsour and non-Muslim activists on a crusade against "Islamophobia" -- are either silent when it comes to barbaric practices or deny their connection to Islam. Does she also support slavery, another practice supported by Islam?

At the moment, the bar for taking extremists out of circulation is set ridiculously high. People known for their own extremism that reaches pre-terrorist levels should not be walking the streets when they have expressed support for Islamic State (ISIS) or tried to head to Syria or called for the destruction of Britain and other democracies or allied themselves to people already in prison. Their demand for free speech or freedom of belief must never be elevated above the rights of citizens to live safely in their own towns and cities. It is essential for parliament to lower the bar.

Is this to be the political landscape for the future, where groups of people demanding death and destruction are given the freedom of the streets whilst those wishing to hold a peaceful celebration are prevented from doing so?

To see extremist Islam as a "perversion" of Islam misses an important point. The politically correct insistence that radical versions of Islam somehow pervert an essentially peaceful and tolerant faith forces policy-makers and legislators, church leaders, rabbis, interfaith workers and the public at large to leave to one side an important reality. Flatly, Islam in its original and classic forms has everything to do with today's radicals and the violence they commit. The Qur'an is explicit in its hatred for pagans, Jews and Christians. It calls for the fighting of holy war (jihad) to conquer the non-Muslim world, subdue it, and gradually bring it into the fold of Islam. Islam has been at war with Europe since the seventh century.

Under the regimes of the Palestinian Authority (PA) and Hamas, Palestinians are free to criticize Israel and incite against it. But when it comes to criticizing the leaders of the PA and Hamas, the rules of the game are different. Such criticism is considered a "crime" and those responsible often find themselves behind bars or subjected to other forms of punishment.

This, of course, is not what the majority of Palestinians were expecting from their leaders. After the signing of the Oslo Accords and the establishment of the PA more than 20 years ago, Palestinians were hoping to see democracy and freedom of speech. However, the PA has proven to be not much different than most of the Arab dictatorships, where democracy and freedom of expression and the media are non-existent.

Given the current state of the Palestinians, it is hard to see how they could ever make any progress towards establishing a successful state with law and order and respect for public freedoms and democracy.

Qatar's extensive ties to terrorism and abetting of financiers to bolster it are well-documented.

Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Egypt and Bahrain issued a statement designating 59 individuals and 12 organizations as having terror ties to Qatar. According to the statement, Doha "announces fighting terrorism on one hand and finances and supports and hosts different terrorist organizations on the other hand," and harbors "terrorist and sectarian groups that aim to destabilize the region, including the Muslim Brotherhood, Daesh [ISIS] and Al Qaeda."

Ironically, pressure from this new anti-Iran Muslim bloc in the Middle East has done more to call the world's attention to Qatar's key role in the spread of Islamist terrorism than years of cajoling on the part of previous administrations in Washington to get Doha to live up to its signed commitments.