WEDNESDAY’S “NEWS IN REVIEW” ROUND-UP

Contents: | Weekly Quotes |  Short Takes   |  On Topic Links

On Topic Links

A Step Toward Mideast Peace: Tell the Truth: Max Singer, Wall Street Journal, Feb. 14, 2017

U.S. Aid to Syrian Militia Strains Turkish Ties: Michael R. Gordon, New York Times, Feb. 24, 2017

Thinking Deeply, For a Change: David M. Weinberg, Israel Hayom, Feb. 24, 2017

The Battle for Mosul: A Frontline Report: Jonathan Spyer, Middle East Forum, Feb. 11, 2017

“If you think they’re going to give you your country back without a fight, you are sadly mistaken…Every day, it is going to be a fight.” — Steve Bannon, the chief strategist for President Donald Trump, at the Conservative Political Action Conference. Bannon blamed reports of internal rivalries and chaos in the administration on an intensifying feud with the media that he vowed would continue. Trump has condemned the press as the “enemy of the American people.” Bannon picked up that line, describing the president as an underdog and the reporters covering him as “the opposition party.” He added: “They’re corporatist, globalist media that are adamantly opposed to an economic nationalist agenda like Donald Trump has.” (Wall Street Journal, Feb. 23, 2017)

“McMaster, like Obama, is someone who was in positions of leadership and thought the United States should not play into the jihadist propaganda that this is a religious war…There is a deep hunger for McMaster’s view in the interagency (the process by which the State Department, Pentagon and other agencies funnel recommendations through the National Security Council)…The fact that he has made himself the champion of this view makes people realize they have an advocate to express dissenting opinions.” — William McCants, of the Brookings Institution. Trump’s newly appointed national security adviser has told his staff that Muslims who commit terrorist acts are perverting their religion, rejecting a key ideological view of other senior Trump advisers and signaling a potentially more moderate approach to the Islamic world. The adviser, Lt. Gen. H. R. McMaster, told the staff of the National Security Council that the label “radical Islamic terrorism” was not helpful because terrorists are “un-Islamic,” according to people who were in the meeting. (New York Times, Feb. 24, 2017)

“For people hoping that maybe he would remain a divisive cartoon, which he often finds a way to do, they should begin to become a little bit worried tonight. Because, that thing you just saw him do, if he finds way to do that over and over again, he'll be there for eight years. Now, there is a lot he said in that speech that was counter factual, that was not right and I oppose and will oppose but he did something tonight that you can't take away from him. He became president of the United States.” — CNN’s Van Jones. Van Jones infamously declared, on Election Night 2016, that Trump’s win over Hillary Clinton was “whitelash” to a black president. Van Jones had a vastly different tone Tuesday night. The President’s address to a joint session of Congress was applauded by many for the emotional tone struck while speaking to the wife of slain Navy SEAL Ryan Owens. He described that portion of the speech as “extraordinary” and said that for those who held out in their belief that Trump could be presidential and unifying, “they should be happy with that moment.” (Newsbusters, Mar. 1, 2017)

“They put their friends in the Assad regime ahead of our global security…They turned away from defenceless men, women and children who died gasping for breath when Assad’s forces dropped their poisonous gas.” —Nikki Haley, U.S. envoy to the UN. Russia and China vetoed new UN sanctions on Syria. Haley accused both countries of refusing to hold President al-Assad’s regime accountable for the use of chemical weapons. Referring to “my friends in Russia,” Haley added, “it is a sad day in the Security Council when members start making excuses for other member states killing their own people…The world is definitely a more dangerous place…Today, the international community can look no further than the Security Council for contributing to that.” (Globe & Mail, Feb. 28, 2017)

“The three main problems with which we have to deal are Iran, Iran, Iran. We must build a real and effective coalition that can deal with the terrorism that it is spreading around the world, with its development of missiles and with its nuclear arms race…North Korea and Iran are the two ends of the axis of evil in which Hezbollah and the Assad regime are also integrated, and Iran is the common thread.” — Israeli Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman.  Liberman recently met with U.S. Secretary of Defense James Mattis. Mattis and Liberman said they plan to engage in an open dialogue, and to cooperate in order to strengthen Israel's security and preserve U.S. interests in the region. During the meeting, the two ministers discussed a series of issues, led by Iran. (Arutz Sheva, Feb. 17, 2017)

“Islamic extremists continue to follow through on genocidal threats against Christians.”— Rev. Johnnie Moore. Moore notes that I.S. has just called for “the full elimination of Christianity in Egypt,” while less than 500,000 Christians remain in Syria, down 75 percent in five years. Yet “only 77 Syrian Christians were admitted into the United States between January and November 2016, compared to 13,210 Muslims.” In a less apoplectic time, he says, “the prioritization of threatened, religious minorities in President Trump’s executive order would have been applauded by Republicans and Democrats alike. It still should be.” (New York Post, Feb. 22, 2017)

“I was thunderstruck to see that Malmo, the city I know best, is beset today with raw ethnic tensions between what Quebecers might call “Old Stock Swedes” and newcomers, especially from Iraq and now Syria. The shift in mood and outlook in Malmo has been profound. Old friends there told me there are districts in the city where they now seldom venture. They feel uncomfortable and unwelcome because Arabic and Islamic dress and culture predominate. And the newcomers told me exactly the same thing about how they felt when they left their neighbourhoods. Malmo has in many ways become two cities, not one.” — Matthew Fisher. Though Trump invoked a terror attack that never happened, he was right about there being “problems they never thought possible” in Sweden since it “took in” large numbers of refugees from Muslim-majority countries. (National Post, Feb. 28, 2017)

“Over the years, I have watched a growing intolerance at universities in this country – not intolerance along racial or ethnic or gender lines – there, we have made laudable progress. Rather, a kind of intellectual intolerance, a political one-sidedness, that is the antithesis of what universities should stand for. . . . We need to encourage real diversity of thought in the professoriate, and that will be even harder to achieve. It is hard for anyone to acknowledge high-quality work when that work is at odds, perhaps opposed, to one’s own deeply held beliefs. But we all need worthy opponents to challenge us in our search for truth. It is absolutely essential to the quality of our enterprise.” — John Etchemendy, former-Provost of Stanford University. (Washington Post, Feb. 25, 2017)

“I think we’re seeing a pandemic in formation…We saw anti-Semitism in Britain, we saw it in France, and now we see it’s spreading everywhere…And now we see in America swastikas being painted, other expressions [such as phoned-in] threats or aggression against kids on campuses. So it spreads. It’s not isolated to one geographic locale. It’s like a virus that spreads. And you have to declare it for what it is…This is not our problem. It’s society’s problem. It’s Christianity’s problem. It’s everybody’s problem, when there’s hatred against Jews. We’re the victims, we’re not the cause of it. It’s not because we did something wrong. It’s because of who we are and our values.” — Malcolm Hoenlein, who heads the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations. (Times of Israel, Feb. 27, 2017)

Contents

JEWISH CEMETERY VANDALIZED, JCCS FACE BOMB THREATS (Philadelphia) — Jewish Community Centers and day schools in at least a dozen states received bomb threats this week. No bombs were found. It was the fifth round of bomb threats against Jewish institutions since January, prompting outrage and exasperation among Jewish leaders as well as calls for an aggressive federal response to put a stop to it. In Philadelphia, several hundred headstones were damaged during the weekend at Mount Carmel Cemetery, a Jewish cemetery dating to the late 1800s.  The vandalism comes less than a week after a Jewish cemetery in suburban St. Louis was targeted. More than 150 headstones there were damaged, many of them tipped over. (Huffington Post, Feb. 27, 2017)

ATTACKERS SAW OFF JEWISH MAN’S FINGER, BEAT HIS BROTHER NEAR PARIS (Paris) — Two Jewish brothers said they were abducted briefly and beaten by several men in suburban Paris in an incident that ended with one brother having his finger sawed off by an assailant. The brothers were hospitalized following the incident last week in Bondy. The kippah-wearing brothers were forced off the road by another vehicle on to a side street. The vehicle forced the brothers to stop their car, and they were surrounded by several men whom they described as having a Middle Eastern appearance. One of the alleged attackers then sawed off the finger of one of the brothers. (Jerusalem Post, Feb. 24, 2017)

EGYPT’S CHRISTIANS FLEE VIOLENCE (Cairo) — Dozens of Egyptian Christian families fled their homes in the Sinai Peninsula, driven by a targeted campaign of Islamist violence that has killed at least seven people in recent weeks. Their flight had been prompted by the release of an I.S. video that vowed to step up attacks on the Christian minority in Sinai. The video was followed by a series of attacks by gunmen in El Arish, the main town in northern Sinai. The killings represent an escalation of a campaign announced by I.S. in December, when a suicide bomber struck a prominent Cairo church during Sunday Mass, killing about 30 people. (New York Times, Feb. 24, 2017)

GENERAL SAYS U.S. WANTS TO RESUME MILITARY EXERCISE WITH EGYPT (Washington) —  The top commander of U.S. military operations in the Middle East said that the U.S. wanted to resume a major military exercise with Egypt that Obama canceled. “It is my goal to get that exercise back on track and try to re-establish that as another key part of our military relationship,” Gen. Joseph L. Votel, said. Even before Trump took office, Obama had agreed to resume the provision of major weapons systems, including F-16 fighter planes, M1A1 Abrams tanks and Harpoon missiles. The delivery of those systems was suspended in 2013 after the Egyptian military ousted Mohamed Morsi. But growing concern over the threat of I.S. in Sinai, as well as Egypt’s decision to buy weapons from Russia and France, led Obama to reverse course. (New York Times, Feb. 26, 2017)

CANADA STUDYING OPTIONS FOR SYRIAN OPERATION (Ottawa) — The Canadian military has begun to study options for an operation in Syria. What comes next for Canada and its allies is an obvious question, with I.S. holding only a sliver of land in Iraq and a much larger swathe of territory in Syria. It is not publicly known whether the Trump government has asked Ottawa to contribute troops or assist in other ways in the war against ISIL in Syria, or to take on other roles in the war on terror. Canada is one of 17 countries currently assisting Iraqi and Kurdish forces in Iraq. About Canadian 800 troops now involved in what the Canadian Forces calls Operation Impact. (National Post, Feb. 27, 2017) 

IRAQ TAKES THE FIGHT AGAINST I.S. TO SYRIA (Mosul) — Iraq’s air force carried out its first-ever strikes against I.S. in Syria, marking a dramatic escalation in its effort to roll back the insurgency by pounding a sanctuary across the border. The attack on foreign territory, even as Iraqi security forces at home slug it out with militants to retake western Mosul, shows how the Iraqi government is shifting its focus to an I.S. that no longer has a major stronghold within the country. Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi ordered the strikes across the border after Iraqi military and intelligence officials traced recent Baghdad car bombings to planners in villages in Syria. (Wall Street Journal, Feb. 24, 2017)

TURKEY JAILS GERMAN REPORTER (Istanbul) — Turkish authorities arrested a reporter for a prominent German newspaper on charges of propaganda in support of a terrorist organization and inciting the public to violence. Authorities initially detained Deniz Yucel, a correspondent for the Die Welt newspaper after he reported on emails that a leftist hacker collective had purportedly obtained from the private account of Berat Albayrak, Turkey's energy minister and the son-in-law of President Tayyip Erdogan. An Istanbul court ordered Yucel, a dual citizen of Turkey and Germany, jailed pending trial. More than 100,000 people have been fired or suspended from Turkey's police, military, civil service and private sector since the failed coup and tens of thousands arrested. (CBC, Feb. 27, 2017)

WELFARE BENEFITS HELP FUND I.S. FIGHTERS (Paris) — Governments across Europe have accidentally paid taxpayer-funded welfare benefits to I.S. members who have used the money to wage war in Iraq and Syria. Danish officials said this week that 29 citizens were given $100,000 in public pension benefits because they were considered too ill or disabled to work, and they then fled to Syria to fight for the radical group. Denmark has one of the world's most generous social-welfare systems, which provides eligible unemployed people up to $120 a day. Several of the plotters in the Brussels and Paris terror attacks that killed 162 people in 2015 and 2016 were also partly financed by Belgium's social welfare system while they planned their atrocities. (USA Today, Feb. 21, 2017)

SEIZED BANK FUNDS WILL GO TO TERROR VICTIMS (New York) — Victims of terror attacks against Americans in the 1970s, ’80s and ’90s will start receiving checks in coming weeks from a $1.1 billion compensation fund carved out of a settlement struck between the U.S. government and French bank BNP Paribas SA. The government last week began sending out letters notifying roughly 2,300 victims or their surviving relatives they were in line for money from the fund, which was established by Congress in 2015. The fund is designed to compensate people who were injured in terror attacks before 2001 as well as the families of those killed. Those include victims of the 1998 U.S. embassy bombings in Africa, the 1983 and 1984 attacks on the U.S. Embassy in Beirut, the families of the hostages taken at the U.S. Embassy in Iran in 1979. (Wall Street Journal, Feb. 23, 2017)

ISRAELI GOVERNMENT DENIED A WORK VISA FOR HRW (Jerusalem) —Israel has denied a work visa for an investigator for Human Rights Watch, accusing the group of engaging in “Palestinian propaganda.” On Feb. 20, the group received a notice that its application for a work visa for its investigator, Omar Shakir, had been turned down because the group had a pro-Palestinian bias. Last year, Israel passed a law imposing reporting requirements on groups that received more than half their funding from abroad. Advocacy groups said the legislation amounted to intimidation, while supporters of the move said it was meant to prevent foreign meddling in Israeli affairs. (New York Times, Feb. 24, 2017)  

GOP TO ELIMINATE DOJ SLUSH FUND BANKROLLING LEFTIST GROUPS (Washington) — The Obama administration funneled billions of dollars to activist organizations through a Department of Justice slush fund scheme. Findings spearheaded by the House Judiciary Committee point to a process shrouded in secrecy whereby monies were distributed to nonprofit organizations. When big banks are sued by the government for discrimination or mortgage abuse, they can settle the cases by donating to third-party non-victims. The settlements do not specify how these third-party groups could use the windfall. So far, investigators have accounted for $3 billion paid to “non-victim entities.” Critics say banks are incentivized to donate the funds to non-profits rather than giving it to consumers. (Fox, Mar. 1, 2017)

DERSHOWITZ: I WILL REMAIN IN DEMOCRATIC PARTY (Washington) — Alan Dershowitz said that he will not be leaving the Democratic Party, as he announced he would do in the event of a victory for Rep. Keith Ellison in the DNC elections. Instead, he said — in the wake of former Labor Secretary Tom Perez’s victory over Ellison — he will “remain and fight hard for it to move toward the center and away from the anti-Israel and far-Left trends” that have become dominant of late. Dershowitz, a long-time and fierce defender of the Jewish state — and member of the Democratic Party — called Ellison’s defeat “a good sign that we can win, though it will not be easy.” (Algemeiner, Feb. 26, 2017)

OTTAWA FACING ‘SERIOUS’ CYBER-ATTACKS: CSIS (Ottawa) — The federal government is facing “serious” cyber-attacks, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service said. Increasingly numerous, capable and aggressive state-sponsored hackers and terrorist groups are making regular attempts to penetrate government computer networks, it said. State-sponsored cyber-espionage and influence activities targeting the private sector are also taking place, especially in the advanced technology sector and critical infrastructure. The latest annual report from CSIS actually covers two years, 2014 to 2016, because no report was issued last year. While cyber-attacks were highlighted, it said terrorism remained Canada’s top security threat. (National Post, Feb. 28, 2017)

CUNY ADMIN ALLEGEDLY SAID ‘TOO MANY JEWS’ ON HIS STAFF (New York) — A high-ranking CUNY administrator secretly complained about “too many Jews” on the faculty at Kingsborough Community College. Stuart Suss, a former interim president of the school, allegedly made the remark to a Kingsborough professor, who then relayed it to a colleague while being secretly recorded. Business Department chairman Jeffrey Lax’s court suit accuses Suss — now vice president of academic affairs at CUNY’s Guttman Community College — of making antisemitic remarks and reducing the number of Jews on the Kingsborough faculty. (New York Post, Feb. 27, 2017)

CALLS FOR AMAZON TO STOP SELLING BOOKS DENYING THE HOLOCAUST (Jerusalem) — The Yad Vashem Holocaust museum has called on the online retailer Amazon to remove books that deny the Holocaust from its websites. Robert Rozett, director of the Yad Vashem Libraries, sent an email to Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, requesting that he immediately remove the books from the sites. Among the books still available on Amazon’s U.S. and U.K. online stores are “Did Six Million Really Die?” by Richard Harwood; “The Six Million: Fact or Fiction?,” and “The Myth of the Extermination of the Jews.” (JTA, Feb. 26, 2017)

PENCE JOINS CLEANUP AT VANDALIZED JEWISH CEMETERY (St. Louis) — Vice President Mike Pence and Missouri Gov. Eric Greitens added their voices — and cleanup skills — to those condemning the vandalizing of a Jewish cemetery in a St. Louis suburb. The two men visited the Chesed Shel Emeth Society cemetery, where at least 170 headstones were toppled and damaged. Pence thanked residents for their efforts to restore the toppled headstones and said, "There is no place in America for hatred or acts of prejudice or violence or anti-Semitism." (CNN, Feb. 22, 2017)

ISRAEL & AUSTRALIA PROMOTE CLOSER TIES IN NETANYAHU VISIT (Sydney) — Prime Minister Netanyahu was welcomed by his Australian counterpart, Malcolm Turnbull, with the Israeli leader promoting the two countries’ growing ties. Netanyahu said that he was Israel’s first prime minister to visit officially. Australia was one of a handful of countries to speak out against a UN Security Council resolution critical of recent moves to expand Israeli settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Australia called the resolution “one sided” and “deeply unsettling.” The two leaders highlighted the nations’ ties. Turnbull cited a new agreement on technology and innovation and work on a deal for direct air travel between the countries. (New York Times, Feb. 22, 2017)

DESTRUCTION OF TOMB REVEALS PALACE OF KING SENNACHERIB (Jerusalem) — The palace of the Biblical King Sennacherib, long buried underneath the tomb of the prophet Jonah in the Biblical city of Nineveh, has been discovered by Iraqi archaeologists as a result of efforts by the I.S. to destroy the site. The shrine is built on the burial site of Jonah. Located in the Iraqi city of Mosul, the structure was destroyed by I.S. in 2014. When the city was liberated by Iraqi troops, archaeologist were dismayed to find that not only had I.S. destroyed the shrine, but the terror group had tunneled underneath and carried away hundreds of artifacts to sell on the black market. However, the tunnels revealed the 2,300-year-old palace of King Sennacherib, mentioned in the Bible. (Breaking Israel News, Feb. 28, 2017)

Contents

On Topic Links

A Step Toward Mideast Peace: Tell the Truth: Max Singer, Wall Street Journal, Feb. 14, 2017—Donald Trump ran for president pledging to throw off political correctness and tell bold truths. That’s something to keep in mind this week.

U.S. Aid to Syrian Militia Strains Turkish Ties: Michael R. Gordon, New York Times, Feb. 24, 2017—A crowd of young Syrian fighters lined up behind a pickup truck to receive their equipment: an AK-47 and a load of ammunition. The battlefield gear was their reward for completing a 20-day course led by American Special Forces in northern Syria in how to fight the Islamic State.

Thinking Deeply, For a Change: David M. Weinberg, Israel Hayom, Feb. 24, 2017—Every once in a while, it's useful to take a step back from the breakneck flow of daily news, and instead read long-form essays that reflect on more substantial ideas.

The Battle for Mosul: A Frontline Report: Jonathan Spyer, Middle East Forum, Feb. 11, 2017—The neighbourhood of Hay al-Arabi in eastern Mosul city has the appearance of a place recently visited by apocalypse. This was one of the last areas east of the Tigris River vacated by the Islamic State organisation, before the advance of the Iraqi armed forces in late January.