As the Voice of America itself reported on January 23, Erdogan's plan was to resettle three million or more refugees from other parts of Syria in this "security zone" extending twenty miles deep into Syria. Twenty miles may not sound much, but – the VOA omitted to mention – almost all the Kurdish towns of northeastern Syria lie within that area. So Erdogan's intention to annihilate the Kurdish presence in that area and replace it with others has been manifest ever since the beginning of 2019.

A whole series of Trump's Republican supporters in the Senate expressed outrage over his decision, starting with Lindsey Graham ("Pray for our Kurdish allies who have been shamelessly abandoned by the Trump Administration") and continuing with Mitch McConnell, the Senate majority leader, who remarked: "As we learned the hard way during the Obama Administration, American interests are best served by American leadership, not by retreat or withdrawal."

The U.S. Congress is looking to push back against Erdogan's brazen foray into northeastern Syria. For months, there has been a bi-partisan effort on Capitol Hill to convince the Trump administration to implement sanctions on Turkey in the wake of its purchase of the Russian S-400 missile system. The events of this past week will likely only escalate pressure by Congress against the Erdogan regime.

"We defeated ISIS," a Peshmerga general said, "only to see Iran and its Shia militias become stronger. They are filling the vacuum."

Islamist-led Turkey has now joined those same Iranian-led forces in filling that vacuum — with the full acquiescence of the United States.

This latest attack also demonstrates how inadequately prepared France is to tackle the problem. The murderer was not just any civil servant: his security clearance allowed him to have access to sensitive files such as the personal details of police officers and individuals monitored by the department, including several individuals suspected of terrorism.

Beyond the political sphere, there is also a culture a denial of the Islamist threat in the French media. Journalists, academics and politicians, with a few exceptions, have consistently played down not only the risk of terrorist attacks but also the threat of growing Salafist radicalization in the country.

According to a study by the Montaigne Institute, 29% of Muslims in France believe that Sharia law is more important than French law. This means that almost one-third of French Muslims live according to values that are fundamentally incompatible with French or Western standards.

It is important to note that theses quotes are not from right-wing thinkers or activists. Both François Hollande and Gerard Collomb were long-time eminent figures of the Socialist Party.

These are typical examples of what some call "la démission des élites" (the abdication of the elites): refusing to act on a situation of which they are perfectly aware but afraid to mention because of the dominant ideology of political correctness.

In Syria, however, President Trump, like Obama earlier, seems not to have realized that when the U.S. withdraws, its enemies advance and fill the vacuum.

"I would describe myself as pro-American," Bolton said. "The greatest hope for freedom for mankind in history is the United States, and therefore protecting American national interest is the single best strategy for the world." He said that America has slowly constrained its range of action, through foolhardy entanglements with international institutions such as the United Nations, and naive bilateral agreements that promised too much to America's enemies in exchange for too little. — Graeme Wood, The Atlantic, March 8, 2019.

The American people do not necessarily elect candidates exclusively engaged in a search for peace. They were doubtless hoping that the new president would drain all the swamps. Bolton is correct: Americans support presidential candidates who are not appeasers, but defenders of American values, vital national interests and human rights.

So where is this "economic devastation" against Turkey? Or does that make two promises that the U.S. has not kept?

Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, has been threatening to flood Europe with more refugees. "We will open the gates and send 3.6 million refugees your way," he promised on October 10.

Meanwhile, obscenely, Erdoğan has been invited to the White House for November 13.

The real crime was for the US to betray the Kurds -- savory or not -- by making promises it did not keep... and leaving the world to wonder which Middle East ally the US will double-cross next. Take a guess?

Their "cause", right or wrong, seems to be what matters. Even as they are cheered along by doting parents, political agitators and junk science, the sad fact remains that solar flares -- apparently the leading cause of climate change -- do not award monetary research grants.

While it is undoubtedly better not to choke the world with plastic, the Israelis and others have fortunately invented several varieties of fibre as strong as plastic but as soluble as an orange peel -- and reportedly often safely edible.

Rather than shedding some light on a difficult, and complex problem, the climate protestors seem merely to be fuelling the increasingly divisive world in which we live. As the former chief of staff of US Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez admitted this summer, the Green New Deal was not conceived as an effort to deal with climate change, but instead a "how-do-you-change-the-entire economy thing".

What they seem to want to change it into, however, is socialism: governmental control of the economy, including the means of production and distribution. Historically, socialism has only led to lowered standards of living and rationing for everyone, to cut costs. Here in the UK, in the National Health Service, qualified people apparently do not want to work hard for less. Everyone ends up poorer and with services that are wanting... What is needed is growth: better education and the creation of more jobs... rather than attacking the "rich" [read: middle class] and blaming them for inequalities.

When the closest one has ever got to an occupation is by occupying other another person's place of work, the right to preach morality appears a dubious one.

Defending someone who is accused of being a "racist" implies the risk of being accused of being a "racist" too. Intellectual terror reigns in France.

France is moving from a "muzzled press to a muzzling press that destroys free speech". — Alain Finkielkraut, writer and philosopher.

Writers other than Éric Zemmour have been hauled into court and totally excluded from all media, simply for describing reality.

In a society where freedom of speech exists, it would be possible to discuss the use of these statements, but in France today, freedom of speech has been almost completely destroyed.

Soon in France, no one will dare to say that any attack openly inspired by Islam has any connection with Islam.

"In the middle of the night, you must go and listen to sermons. You're forbidden to criticize them. Women have to cover their heads. There's no talk of cigarettes, alcohol or music, no celebrations ... If you smoke, at first they just tell you not to. The third time, they kill you." — A resident of Burkina Faso, reported by Lindy Lowry, Open Doors, June 20, 2019.

"They've forbidden prostitution in the [gold] mines -- they slit their throats. They kill someone about once a month, I'd say, and it's always people they've warned. Except the prostitutes. They don't warn them. They just kill them." — A resident of Burkina Faso, reported by Lindy Lowry, Open Doors, June 20, 2019.

Terrorism -- committed by armed groups such as Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, Al-Mourabitoun, Ansar al-Dine, Ansar-ul-Islam lil-Ichad wal Jihad, Boko Haram, Islamic State in Greater Sahara and the Macina Liberation Front -- has resulted in the displacement of more than 135,000 people in Burkina Faso, two-thirds of them since the beginning of this year. Their violence also has led to the closure of many schools.

It is, therefore, the epitome of hypocrisy for Mr Erdogan to offer to take responsibility for the ISIS fighters being held in Kurdish-run detention camps... If that really were to happen, and the ISIS captives were repatriated to Turkey, it would, for some, be more like a homecoming.

The far more worrying prospect is that the captives may be able to escape, and return to the ranks of ISIS's terrorist infrastructure....

The ISIS caliphate might no longer exist, but the terrorist organisation itself still continues to operate. Indeed, the latest intelligence assessments are that ISIS is regrouping in countries such as Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and Yemen, with the aim of launching a fresh wave of terror attacks against Western targets.

President Trump's claim that the war against ISIS is over may prove to be short-lived.

French police investigating a woman for suspected ties to ISIS discovered a USB drive that contained personal details, including home addresses, of thousands of French police officials. Who provided that information?

"In the street, veiled women and men wearing jellabas are de facto propaganda, an Islamization of the street, just as the uniforms of an occupying army remind the defeated of their submission." – French journalist Eric Zemmour, September 28, 2019.

Le Monde, France's most prestigious newspaper, ran an op-ed after the recent attack, charging the country with "Islamophobic McCarthyism." Harpon, the terrorist who murdered his colleagues at police headquarters, would have agreed.

The problem is that France has, for years, been in a state of denial about the proliferation of radical Islam.

President Xi Jinping's doctrine includes rejecting as illegitimate any "unequal treaties" forced on China by Euro-Atlantic powers, such as Great Britain's imposition of the McMahon Line, which awarded to the British Crown Colony of India hundreds of thousands of square kilometers of Chinese territory.

Chinese military exercises, new weapons systems and the surreptitious militarization of several landfill and disputed islands in the South China Sea, all indicate that Beijing intends to become -- at the very least -- East Asia's dominant regional power, thereby supplanting the US as the pre-eminent authority in the Western Pacific Ocean.

According to one American analyst on Chinese military affairs, in 2018 alone, China conducted approximately 100 military exercises with 17 countries.

In recent years, the Chinese Navy has been demonstrating better precision targeting by its anti-ship missile system, the presumed target being US aircraft carriers.

The Greek government has said that Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan personally controls the migration flows to Greece and turns them on and off to extract more money and other political concessions from the European Union. In recent months, the Turkish government has repeatedly threatened to open the floodgates of mass migration to Greece, and, by extension, to the rest of Europe.

"If they [the European Union] do not give us the necessary support in this struggle, then we will not be able to stop the 3.5 million refugees from Syria and another two million people who will reach our borders from Idlib." — Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.

"If we open the floodgates, no European government will be able to survive for more than six months. We advise them not to try our patience." — Turkish Interior Minister Süleyman Soylu.

More than six million migrants are believed to be waiting in countries around the Mediterranean to cross into Europe, according to a classified German government report leaked to the newspaper Bild... More than three million others are waiting in Turkey.

It must be acknowledged that Johnson's proposal for a replacement Protocol on Ireland/Northern Ireland has evident merits. But if EU leaders do agree – even against expectations – that Johnson's proposal is the way forward, why rush to complete all the legal complexities of that agreement in a few days instead of gratefully accepting an extension of time in order to let a good job be done?

If Johnson's approach does not get off the ground, the UK could still fall back to one last attempt to leave without no-deal. It is to demand a change to Article 20 of the original Protocol, the so-called "Backstop," such that instead of enduring for ever unless both sides agree to terminate it, the Protocol will endure for only an initial year, but can be renewed annually if both sides agree to continue it. If the EU refuses even this minimal demand, then it will have made it clear to the UK government, Parliament and the public that no-deal is indeed the UK's only way of escape.

The second initiative in which the Iranian government is engaged is to increase tensions in the region, destabilize the region, target the global energy market, cause oil and gas prices to increase, and then blame all these problems on the Trump administration.

The threat Iran poses to US presidential elections is real and urgent -- for Iran to be stopped, it should finally be held accountable.

Policy Exchange's report on the leaked guidance gives rise for concern. In the words of the report, the guidance, "seems designed to bind the hands of UK newspapers when it comes to reporting on stories relating to Islam and Muslims – with potentially serious long-term consequences for the workings of a free and independent press". — Policy Exchange Report, "Eroding the Free Press," by Will Heaven and Sir John Jenkins.

As the Policy Exchange authors write, "In all of this, there seems to be a suggestion that journalists should take a different approach to covering Muslims than that employed towards other faith groups. This all seems remarkably ill-conceived. If we ruled out reporting on matters specific to Muslims not only would we miss some big issues – not least the threat from Islamist extremist terrorism, which continues to dwarf other global terrorist threats – but we would also be unable to report properly on discrimination against Muslims. More generally, we must ask: is it really the role of journalists to consider community cohesion before truth and accuracy? And what are the potential consequences of such an ethos?" — Policy Exchange Report, "Eroding the Free Press," by Will Heaven and Sir John Jenkins.

"As Policy Exchange has previously pointed out, one of the things that makes the APPG's attempts to institutionalise an illiberal definition of Islamophobia so unpalatable, is the fact that it resembles a form of blasphemy law, protecting Islam specifically, implemented by the back door". — Policy Exchange Report, "Eroding the Free Press," by Will Heaven and Sir John Jenkins.

"Taken as a whole, the IPSO guidance document seems to mark a decisive shift in the purpose of the regulator – which takes it beyond considerations of accuracy or discrimination, as per the Editor's Code. Instead, it is moving into the realm of 'insensitivities' and 'unbalanced coverage' – elastic and subjective terms". — Policy Exchange Report, "Eroding the Free Press," by Will Heaven and Sir John Jenkins.