Archive for the ‘Middle East’ Category

I am a Jew. As such, I have heard the refrain “Never Forget” my entire life in relation to the Holocaust. Like other Jews, I always took it as a caution to be aware that under the right conditions, it could happen again. To the Jews. But as I hear and see what is happening to Christians in the Middle East and particularly in Egypt, I fully understand that the admonition goes far beyond we Jews. It is a mantra that every compassionate human being must recite because we, as a species, remain capable of horrific persecution and devastating destruction.

Not all of us, of course. At least not in the moment.

In the moment that perverse banner is being carried by the Muslim Brotherhood as they seek to exploit the political unrest in Egypt by scapegoating Christians, burning their churches, looting their places of business, raping their women and executing them simply because they are seen carrying a bible.

There is not a Jew alive whose stomach should not turn and whose body should not feel a chill at the familiarity of these events. Been there. Done that.

So what is the issue? The issue is, “Do we as Jews have the courage to stand in solidarity with Christians of the Middle East?” “Do we as Americans retain yet enough of what has made us a beacon of light throughout our history to now shine that light on the atrocities being inflicted upon Christians?” “Are we as humans still able feel the pain of others who, though outwardly different from us, are inwardly the essence of who we truly are?”

There is only One of Us. Today, we are all Coptic Christians.

I have never understood how so much of the world sat silently by and turned a blind eye while Hitler and the disease called National Socialism embarked upon its campaign of annihilation. I am sad to say that I have begun to understand it.  Today, the silence of our media and paralysis of our Administration are eerie portents of what may follow.

We are each responsible not for the carnage being inflicted upon Christians in Egypt, but for our silence in the face of it. God help the Muslim Brotherhood extremists who are looting, burning raping and murdering.

But who will help the silent?

In Rose, Michigan, a 6th grade student is groomed for two years then raped by a 40-year-old pedofile teacher at the public school. The teacher is then tried and convicted by a court of law and sentenced to 15-30 years. The School Board, the local Lutheran Church and the faculty stand in support of the pedofile.

In Ontario, Canada, a mother with an autistic son moves into a new neighborhood and receives an anonymous letter in her mailbox suggesting she euthanize her son and donate “whatever non-retarded body parts he has” to science because the sounds the child makes when playing outside are “not normal” and disturbing. The letter further states that no one is ever going to employ or love him. The surrounding community is silent.

Al Jazeera, a purported “news” channel owned and operated by the nation of Qatar, began cable broadcast today into 49 million homes in the United States. Not only is this the network that promoted and broadcast tapes by Osama bin Laden, but Qatar is currently the outcast Arab nation that is supporting the Muslim Brotherhood’s agenda and atrocities in Egypt, much to the public dismay of its Arab neighbors who deem the Brotherhood a terrorist organization. What the Arab world deems terrorist, the United States welcome into its homes and families.

If Adolf Hitler knew one thing it was how reluctant people are to take a stand against what they know in their hearts to be wrong. Behavior can defy reason and decency and yet we humans, all too readily and in the end tragically, remain mute for fear of reprisal.

There is historical instruction on this issue. And its not WWII but rather the biblical Book of Esther. Esther, a Jew, is married to the King of Persia who is unaware of her heritage. When the King’s Ambassador and confidant Haman attempts to eliminate all the Jews, Esther’s uncle Mordechai tells her to go to the King and plead for intervention to reverse the decree. Esther, fearing for her own life should she reveal her Judaism to the King, at first declines Mordechai’s request. In reply, Mordechai tells her that if she seeks her own personal safety at the expense of her People, the Jews will die but inevitably so shall Esther. His admonition: Your silence will cost you the very thing you seek it to protect.

Whether the issue is a pedofile teacher, a cruel and cowardly neighbor lacking all compassion, or the media outlet of our sworn enemy being invited into our children’s minds, silence in opposition will cost you the protections and peace you hope it will bring.

I never understood the fascination with Oprah Winfrey. Not ever. I was always perplexed by why she became the go-to source for so many women (and a fair amount of men) on what to read, what to wear, whom to emulate, and the list goes on. She became a cultural icon… but for a culture that was dying from lack of standards, principles and values. Now, with the release of the movie “The Butler” and her marketing efforts to promote it, she has revealed herself to be devoid of decency and at ease with re-writing history to serve a political agenda.

By equating the horrific torture and murder of Emmett Till with Trayvon’s Martin’s death, I can only conclude she will say absolutely anything, regardless of its veracity, in order to get ratings and attention for herself and her commercial ventures.

We are living in tenuous times when up is down and deceit is deliberately sold us as truth. There is bad news and good news. Which do you prefer first?

Well, in the absence of your vote, allow me to choose.

The bad news is that any individual who does not think for themselves and verify, to whatever extent possible, the facts of what we are being told is abdicating their individuality and humanity in lieu of becoming one of the many in a national herd of sheep.

The good news is that there is still time, albeit ever decreasing, to take back the reins of personal power and responsibility in order to demand that those who have failed to uphold and protect the Nation as is their job, be removed and replaced by others who value integrity and liberty.

We must hurry. The Middle East is crumbling. Tensions with Russia are escalating. Our government oscillates between incompetence and full-blown deceit.

If we are to break the patterns of history which have repeatedly ended in enslavement of the many by the few under such preconditions, then those of us whose eyes are open and hearts are committed to a higher calling must now stand and be heard.

Are you following the herd or in search of the truth? If it be truth, what are you doing about it?

Who would have ever thought that the Egyptians would be teaching us anything about Civil Disobedience or “Hope and Change”? But as the Egyptian people take to the streets and raise their voices in opposition to deceit, oppression and incompetence…we here in American remain disturbingly silent in the face of the same issue: a President and Administration that is not, it turns out, what they purported to be when seeking office.

Tellingly, during the Arab Spring, President Obama was quick to support the “will of the Egyptian people” and equally ready to praise the Muslim Brotherhood’s Mohammed Morsi in replacing the ousted Hosni Mubarak. Now, as Morsi has been revealed to be the incompetent, radical Islamist that he is, President Obama’s silence is deafening, not to mention indicative of his true stance on “the will of the people.” For it seems that to President Obama, the will of the people is nothing more than a tool to be implemented when it aligns with his goals and an annoyance or obstacle to be ignored or circumvented when it does not.

But I digress.

I have to admire Egyptians for their unwillingness to allow Morsi any more time that he has already been given to right the country’s economic and social ills. While I do not condone violent revolution (deaths and rape are still a part of the unfolding “democracy” in Egypt) it is none-the-less admirable that those people are willing to take to the streets, raise their voices and risk their lives to bring down an Islamic dictatorship bent on, not democratic principles, but rather a global Caliphate. Their bravery and willingness to stand is something we Americans used to pride ourselves on before we became greedy, sated with materiality, and disconnected from our Creator.

While no one knows for certain the outcome in Egypt, I have a bit more certainty when it comes to the outcome here. If we don’ take heed of the Egyptians (a sentence I never thought I’d write) and read their signs (“Wake Up Americans…Barack Obama Backs Up A Fascist Regime in Egypt”) it is we who will soon be lugging stones to build a pyramid under the direction of a Pharaoh.

The most important aspect of the Benghazi terror attacks has yet to surface. It’s not about why there was insufficient security given advance knowledge of the dangers, or who gave the order to stand down, or even why President Obama and Secretary of State Hilary Clinton contrived to lie about both the cause and the decisions that followed in response.

Benghazi isn’t about them. It’s about us.

Just how much deception, manipulation and disrespect will we allow ourselves to be subjected to before we become indignant, demand accountability, pursue prosecution and replace those individuals with public servants who honor integrity and truth above expediency and power?

How many brave individuals, such as those who died in Benghazi and those who now testify to the truth of what occurred there have to risk their careers, or forfeit their lives, to do what is right in the face of evil?

How many of us will continue to choose self-imposed blindness and ignorance of leaders with an endgame that culminates in our enslavement and whose means of getting there knows no ethical, moral or legal bounds?

Benghazi isn’t about them.  It’s about us.

While our minds play intellectually disingenuous games based upon particular agendas and political predispositions, our hearts know with certainty that President Obama, Hilary Clinton, Jay Carney, Susan Rice, and a supporting cast of literally thousands are liars.

Benghazi isn’t about them. It’s about us.

So long as we acquiesce to allowing ourselves to be distracted from the truth and herded like sheep into a state of manageable containment, we have far more pressing concerns than Al Qaeda. We are on the brink of voluntarily relinquishing our birthright. Like Biblical Esau, who traded his birthright for a bowl of hot soup because he was more concerned with instant gratification than the long-range consequence of his choice, we are condemning ourselves and our children to a world where deception and slavery are the norm.

This isn’t a hypothetical. Nor is it hyperbole. This is the real danger, and now is the defining moment, each of us is facing. What will you accept?  What will you do?

Benghazi isn’t about them. It’s about us.

 

Few words in the English language make me as uncomfortable as the word “appeasement.” That’s because it conjures images of Neville Chamberlain, train tracks and ovens. So, when tonight I heard talk radio host Glenn Beck use the word appeasement in the context of the U.S. relationship with Saudi Arabia, I sat up and took notice. I reacted as I did because that one word instantly brought into focus all that is occurring around us.

Energy, finances and Wahhabism are the 21st century trinity. You probably know about the U.S.- Saudi oil dependent relationship. You may even know that Saudi investment and ownership in U.S. companies and enterprises includes such holdings as 60% of Citibank and $20 million gifts each to Georgetown and Harvard Universities to buy Departmental Chairs and influence curriculum. The list is endless and the sums of money (read “influence”) are staggering.

But did you know that Saudi Arabia is the largest source of funding for terrorism in the world? Or that Wahhabism is the dominant form of Islam in Saudi Arabia? Or that it’s “a religious movement among fundamentalist Islamic believers that seeks to return to the earliest fundamental sources of the Quran”? It teaches the worst kind of hatred and spawns terror against all non-Muslim people and beliefs. It has schools in the United States teaching, for example, that Muslims should not only “always oppose” infidels “in every way”, but “hate them for their religion … for Allah’s sake”, that “democracy” is responsible for all the horrible wars of the 20th century”, and that Shia and certain Sunni Muslims were infidels.”

We have turned a blind eye towards the destructive relationship that has evolved with Saudi Arabia. While this Administration is not the first to be complicit in this, it is the one history will charge with being most like the despised Neville Chamberlain who appeased the enemy.

Today we are not witness to the final destination of train tracks but rather to beheading and suicide bombers. And as with the most recent attack in Boston, we again hear voices from those in power who deny the truth (“there’s no such thing as Islamic terrorism”) and conspire with the enemy to conceal it (Janet Napolitano lying to Congress about the immanent “voluntary” deportation of Boston terror attack likely co-conspirator Abdul Rahman Ali Alharbi).

Appeasement.

Whether the Nazis or the Saudis, selling your soul to Evil in exchange for anything is but an illusion. Evil make no deals from which it does not emerge the victor having consumed the vanquished.

Our only hope is to courageously stand for what is right and true albeit it difficult.  My prayer is that there are enough of us willing to do just that before we find ourselves out of options.

I’m watching breaking news in the Boston area and I’m wondering how many people who previously thought otherwise are now rethinking the stance of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

“Bibi” Netanyahu was born in Israel, educated partly in the United States at the same high school I attended, wounded while serving in an elite unit of the Israeli Defense Forces, lost his brother Yoni who was later commander of the same Special Forces Unit, Sayeret Matkal (and who was killed in 1976 while commanding Operation Entebbe which successfully rescued kidnapped Americans and other European nationals). Netanyahu was the Israeli Ambassador to the United Nations from 1984-1988.  In summation Bibi has been on the front lines, figuratively and literally, in both negotiation with and combating Islamic extremism.

Now, Islamic extremism has indisputably arrived in America. Two Muslim trained and radicalized Chechen young men selected what is euphemistically termed “soft targets”…what you and I call “people”…and blew them to bits. On the run, they continue to seek maximum destruction and intend to themselves die in seeking that end.

The “hard line” Prime Minister Netanyahu formed in relation to terrorism over the life of his military and political careers as a citizen of a nation perpetually in survival mode is born of experience. It’s not founded in theory, philosophy, or some idyllic utopian vision of a world joined by either Socialism or a Caliphate. When you’ve experienced enough deceit, mayhem and murder in your past, you tend to make decisions about your well-being based upon the likely occurrence of such things in your present and future, absent a change of heart by those who have pledged themselves to your extinction.

The Obama Administration is headed by a community organizer who, as President, has repeatedly insulted our friends and embraced and emboldened our enemies. Yet, the American people continue to “like” him.

As with Netanyahu, Obama’s experiences have formed, and continue to form, his ideology and stance. His experience teaches him that the West, and in particular the United States and Great Britain, have committed great sins in colonizing and oppressing peoples of other nations. His experience is that it’s time for an American mea culpa and it’s his time to structure and lead it.

We are not leaderless.

We, as a Constitutional Republic, are on the road to extinction.

We are not leaderless.

We are asleep and acting as sheep.

We are not leaderless.

We are being led down the road of extinction by this President.

We are not leaderless.

We are voluntarily blind, deaf and frighteningly dumb.

 

I generally do not act as a breaking news blog. However, some things demand attention by nature of their content.

The Saudi National hospitalized following the Boston terror attack, who was at first was considered a suspect, then a person of interest, and finally merely a witness, is being deported next week. His visa has been revoked. The reasons for his deportation, as stated in his deportation file, are “acts of terrorism” or suspected involvement in possible “terrorist activities.” He is a member of a prominent Saudi Arabian family.

Co-incidentally, if you believe in such things and don’t see patterns, President Obama met with the Saudi Foreign Ambassador yesterday at the White House. The meeting was designated as a “walk by” which is the term used for meetings that are not on the White House schedule and for which the President wants no responsibility. It is set up to look like a chance meeting with someone who “happens to be” in the White House when the President “happens to walk by” and so gets to exchange conversation.

All of the above is directly from the Saudi National’s deportation file verified by credible third party sources who have read the file. However, as of yesterday, the file has been partially classified by the National Target Center. What was classified is the reason behind the deportation. As of today, the deportation order may also be classified, making obtaining this information only possible by a formal request under the Freedom of Information Act.

The Saudi National is allegedly going home because he is ill and wants to be home. In fact, he was hospitalized after the attack with burns, possibly connected to  the materials used in the terror attack. There is a photo released which might verify this conjecture.

The FBI has photos of two additional persons of interest. Those photos to be released today. There may be a connection between the Saudi National being deported and these two additional males.

It is likely the Saudi National is being sent home to spare embarrassment to our government, strain with the powerful Saudi family, and damage to the U.S. government – Saudi Arabian financial relationship.

I ask that you stay with this story.  I ask that you not allow yourself to be misled and manipulated. I ask that you take back the power that you have given others over your birthright to be free.

ALERT: As I write this blog, there is apparently breaking news that now the government may not deport this individual. If this is true, it is solely the result of The Blaze which broke this story about 1.5 hours ago.

The truth is powerful and CAN make a difference. Make sure you are on the right side of what can only be described as a war for the control of human consciousness.

It now seems the Obama Administration has decided upon a new, definitive and focused approach to Israel regarding the latest contention in the ongoing Israeli-Palestinian conflict. It goes something like this (and I paraphrase): “Remain silent and let the other guys do the dirty work.” This is, in essence, the approach the Administration will take towards Israel’s announcement to commence new settlement construction in Judea and Samaria (a/k/a/ the West Bank).

According to American Jewry liberal spokesman Peter Beinart, also considered one of Obama’s associates, the President and Secretary of State Clinton have decided that they will sit back and say nothing while allowing the EU members to put the pressure on Prime Minister Netanyahu and the Israeli’s to forego construction plans.  The Administration also hopes this strategy will put additional pressure on what they perceive to be a recalcitrant Netanyahu to make more concessions to “the peace process” as no Special Envoy will be sent to kick start peace talks.

Further, Daniel Levy, Middle East director at the European Council on Foreign Relations think-tank, has noted that in recent days the Administration has not been “investing diplomatic capital” in seeking to call off the escalating EU criticism of Israel.

This approach by the Administration is resulting in a progressive (no pun intended) isolation and alienation of Israel in relation to other world governments. Such a turn does not bode well for Israelis, Jews around the world, or free societies wherever they may exist.

To think that we in the United States can remain silent in the face of Israel’s escalating vulnerability and its condemnation by surrogates doing our bidding is foolhardy. It also flies in the face of history. The world, and the United States in particular, once before remained silent while Hitler sought to deliberately, methodically and without opposition marginalize and isolate Jews with the intention to destroy them. The inevitable outcome was disaster not only for the Jews but for the entire free world.

The Obama Administration may think it is being clever by its silence, providing itself a veneer of impartiality and distance from the unfolding Middle East scenario as it relates to Israel’s security and Islamic extremism. However, as German pastor and dissident anti-Nazi Deitrich Bonhoffer so succinctly stated in the face of this same emerging pattern of behavior 72 years ago, “Silence in the face of evil is itself evil: God will not hold us guiltless. Not to speak is to speak. Not to act is to act.”

I would add that silence will neither insulate the silent from the taint of evil nor will it exonerate them from being judged culpable co-conspirators. However, culpability is not limited to political leaders. It is incumbent upon each of us awake enough to comprehend the magnitude of this error to speak and act. One voice can change history. It has and will again.

Yours may be that voice.