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Monokultur » Iran


Glædelig Hannukah til jøderne - I får brug for det

Jeg troede Julens absurditet var Prins Charles, der vil have at englænderne vil bruge Julen ikke til at tænke på “Lord our savior” men at tænke på Muhammed, fordi pædofeten var nødt til at emigrere til Medina for at finde sin frihed. Den frihed benyttede han, som bekendt for alle andre end Charles, til at etablere en intolerant stat, slagte de jøder han ikke solgte fra som slaver og alle sine kritikere, førend han vendte tilbage og erobrede Mekka. Ja, det er værd at tænke når man slipper hans følgere løs i Europa.

Men desværre er Charles afsindighed overgået af rigtig politik ved Obama, der har tilladt at FN definerer Tempelbjerget inklusiv Grædemuren som tilhørende araberne. Ben Shapiro skriver

Just in time for Chanukah, President Barack Obama has unleashed all the anti-Jewish fury of his administration on the state of Israel. According to a senior Israeli official, both Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry have been pushing a United Nations resolution behind the scenes that would essentially declare East Jerusalem, which includes the holiest site in Judaism, the Temple Mount, non-Jewish territory off limits to Israel, as well as labeling any Jew living outside the pre-1967 armistice lines illegitimate.

The draft resolution is an utter rejection of Judaism’s claims to Jerusalem – a historical absurdity, since the only reason anyone cares about the spot is because of Judaism’s claims to it, which predated any Muslim claims by well over a millennium. It rejects Israel’s ability to defend itself by maintaining territory outside the “Auschwitz borders” of pre-1967 Israel. It ignores international law – the resolution says that Israel is occupying “Palestinian territory,” which makes no historical sense given the fact that there was never any sovereign Palestine, that the Palestine Liberation Organization was founded prior to 1967 and called for the full destruction of the state of Israel (as indeed, the Palestinian governing organizations continue to do), and that Israel’s enemies never agreed to any international agreement granting them sovereignty over the territory. Essentially, the UN calls for all areas outside the pre-1967 lines, which would include East Jerusalem, to become Judenrein.

This isn’t a major shock from the Obama administration, which has a long, inglorious history of Jew-hating activity when it comes to Israel. This is the same administration that signed an Iran deal that puts Israel’s very existence in jeopardy, that forced Israel to apologize for attempting to blockade arms shipments to the terrorist group Hamas, that tried to stymie Israel’s ability to defend herself during a rocket war with Hamas, that pressures Israel consistently to make concessions to would-be Jew-murderers, that goes silent when American Jews are killed in Israel, that funds a terrorist unity government.

Mark Levin tweetedeIt appears anti-Semite Obama is working with the extremist Palestinians, and using the Israel-hating UN, to undermine our ally Israel“. Og i The Weely Standard skriver Elliot Abrams at Obama har tilladt FN at vedtage “a nasty and harmful anti-Israel resolution

Just weeks before leaving office, he could not resist the opportunity to take one more swipe at Israel—and to do real harm. So he will leave with his record on Israel in ruins, and he will leave Democrats even worse off.

It’s pretty clear that he does not care. Obama has gotten himself elected twice, the second time by a decreased margin (the only time a president has been reelected by fewer votes than in his first term), but he has laid waste to his party. In the House, the Senate, the state governorships, and the state legislatures, the Democrats have suffered loss after loss. Today’s anti-Israel action will further damage the Democratic party, by driving some Jews if not toward the Republicans then at least away from the Democrats and toward neutrality. Donald Trump’s clear statement on Thursday that he favored a veto, Netanyahu’s fervent pleas for one, and the Egyptian action in postponing the vote show where Obama stood: not with Israel, not even with Egypt, but with the Palestinians. Pleas for a veto from Democrats in Congress were ignored by the White House.

Does the resolution matter? It does. The text declares that “the establishment by Israel of settlements in the Palestinian territory occupied since 1967, including East Jerusalem, has no legal validity and constitutes a flagrant violation under international law.” This may turn both settlers—even those in major blocs like Maale Adumim, that everyone knows Israel will keep in any peace deal—and Israeli officials into criminals in some countries, subject to prosecution there or in the International Criminal Court. The text demands “that Israel immediately and completely cease all settlement activities in the occupied Palestinian territory, including East Jerusalem.” Now add this wording to the previous line and it means that even construction in the Jewish Quarter of the Old City is “a flagrant violation under international law.” The resolution also “calls upon all States, to distinguish, in their relevant dealings, between the territory of the State of Israel and the territories occupied since 1967.” This is a call to boycott products of the Golan, the West Bank, and parts of Jerusalem, and support for the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions movement.

Yet Barack Obama thought this was all fine and refused to veto.

National Review forsøger at forstå omfanget af resolutionen og spørger “If an Israeli lives in a suburb of Jerusalem, is he or she now a criminal? Can he be arrested and tried in activist courts in Europe or in international legal tribunals?“. Abrams spørger “The remaining question is whether Jewish leaders and Democratic politicians who vouched for Obama and defended him for eight years will now tell the truth”. Jonah Goldberg skriver i samme ånd at “Obama has just thrown [liberal Jews and other supporters of Israel] under the bus” med sit forræderi og blandt Obamas egne partikammerater er der også vrede, skriver The Tower. I det venstreorienterede jødiske Tablet Magazine skriver Lee Smith at “The lame-duck president is dismantling the alliance system that has kept America and much of the rest of the world secure

In a sense, the UN vote is a perfect bookend to Obama’s Presidency. A man who came to office promising to put “daylight” between the United States and Israel, has done exactly that by breaking with decades of American policy. It is also seeking—contrary to established tradition and practice, which strictly prohibit such lame-duck actions—to tie the hands of the next White House, which has already made its pro-Israel posture clear.

No doubt that many of those critical of the U.S.-Israel relationship will defend and applaud the administration’s action, even as the effects of the resolution are obscene. So what if it enshrines in international law the fact that Jews can’t build homes or have sovereign access to their holy sites in Jerusalem, the capital of the Jewish people for more than 3000 years? Israel, as Kerry said, is too prosperous to care about peace with the Palestinians. Maybe some hardship will shake some sense into the Jewish State—which after all, could easily have made a just and secure peace with the Palestinian leadership at any time over the past two decades, if that’s what it wanted to do. Accounts to the contrary, from Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, say, or left-wing Israeli politicians like former Prime Minister Ehud Barak and the late Shimon Peres, are simply propaganda generated by the pro-Israel Lobby, whose wings the President has thankfully clipped.

But the Obama Administration’s abstention isn’t just about Israel or bilateral relations with a vital partner in a key region. It’s also about the prestige of the United States and its power—the power, for instance, undergirding international institutions like the United Nations. Consider how the Obama Administration has used the UN the last several years—to legalize the nuclear program of Iran, a state sponsor of terror, and make it illegal for Jews to build in their historical homeland. In Turtle Bay, the White House partners with sclerotic socialist kleptocracies like Venezuela in order to punish allies, like Israel. Is this American moral leadership? For Sean Penn, maybe.

Det er Jul og der er håb. Om mindre end en måned træder en mand ind som ny amerikansk præsident

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Within a couple of hours, Egypt withdrew the resolution, at least temporarily, and its president, Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, called Mr. Trump to discuss how “to establish true peace in the Middle East,” according to an aide to the president-elect.

Skrev New York Times og selv Charles Krauthammer var imponeret. Resolution blev kørt igennem alligevel da alle, med Tom Lehrers ord, hader jøderne.

Alfa-hannerne skaber bekymring og stress

Det er svært for Politiken, der i lørdagens udgave af Debat sektionen leger med tanken om Trump som Hitler, i form af Chaplins Anton Hynkel.

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Og hans stab klar til krig

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Politiken har næsten ret. Alfahannerne er kommet igen. Breitbarts sikkerhedsredaktør Sebastian Gorka om Trumps udnævnelse af flere generaler i sin kommende regering

“I’d like to recognize the fact that after eight years of Pajama Boys, it’s time for the alpha males to come back,” he added. “How appropriate that we’ve got three Marines from the same division, legendary figures in uniform, to represent three of the key posts in the new administration! The fact is, having met Donald Trump a long time ago, and talking about national security issues, one of the first things that was clear to me from this businessman, this very special businessman, is that he understands we are at war, Raheem. He gets it. And he wants to win that war. He knows he’s not going to do it with limp-wristed Pajama Boys. Who better than a bunch of legendary Devil Dogs to do it? So yeah, it’s baloney, and it’s very cool in my opinion.”

Kassam turned to a discussion posted at The Gorka Briefing, in which Dr. Gorka argued that “Europe is collapsing.”

“I think it’s patently obvious that the Trump Train was the result, in part, a reflection of, the general rejection of centralized federative bureaucracy, and as a result, we have Brexit foreshadow the future of what used to be called Project Europe,” Gorka elucidated. “And the fact is, people are waking up. They’re rejecting faceless bureaucracy. We see it all across the continent. Brexit isn’t a uniquely British phenomena. As a result, we will see more and more people say, ‘Enough is enough. We want national sovereignty. We want national security most important of all.’ And as a result, I think Project Europe is on the ropes.”

Den mest markante alfahan er tidligere general i det amerikanske marinekorps James Matthis, en mand der selvfølgeligt erkender, at “there are some assholes in the world that just need to be shot”. National Reviews Tom Rogan kalder Matthis “at once a scholar and a warrior” og begynder sin beskrivelse med citatet “I don’t have worry and stress. I cause worry and stress!”, bl.a fordi sin “…annihilation upon al-Qaeda in Iraq”

Iran has particular reason for concern. Commanding CENTCOM, Mattis pushed for tough realism in constraining the Islamic Republic’s revolutionary expansionism. He recognizes that Iran’s leaders are rational actors, but he also knows that their revolutionary impulses must be checked. For this, he earned the ire of President Obama, who was so intent on kowtowing to the Iranian regime. But now he is set to take over the Pentagon, and Khamenei and the Qassem-crew have much to fear.

First, Mattis is likely to push Trump to focus on fixing the Iran nuclear deal. This will likely entail reducing Iranian cheating on inspections protocols and Iranian ballistic-missile research. If Trump and Mattis work with U.S. allies (notably the French) who are concerned about President Obama’s failure to enforce the deal, Iran could face rougher waters next year. Mattis has suggested blockading the country if the regime tries to play hard ball. It’s a good idea.

Second, a Mattis Pentagon will likely take tougher action against Iranian aggression in the Middle East. As I’ve noted, President Obama has largely ignored Iranian malevolence in states such as Lebanon and Iraq. That needs to be remedied, and quickly.

Third, Mattis will deter Iranian terrorism against America. That imperative is real. In 2011, the Iranian Revolutionary Guards — as Mattis himself explains — tried to murder the then-Saudi ambassador to the United States. The plan involved blowing up a Washington D.C. restaurant and everyone in it. He’s the incarnation of the First Marine Division motto, ‘No better friend, no worse enemy.’

Fourth, Mattis’s realism will be useful in helping the U.S. to confront Sunni extremism more effectively. As I’ve explained before, thanks to his supplication to Iran, President Obama has alienated America’s Sunni-Arab allies. Mattis, who is adored by the Sunni-Arab monarchies for his honest courage, offers the Trump administration a chance to renew those bonds. That means new potential for a Sunni-Arab crackdown on Sunni fundraising for groups such as ISIS and al-Qaeda. It also means we might see more special forces on the ground in Iraq and Syria.

“Who knows? American red lines might even make a comeback.” slutter Rogan.

Breitbart har samlet 15 Matthis citater, hvor mange er skønne. Jeg vil dog trække et andet citat frem, hvor kampen mod islam og anden fjendskab, ikke blot skal overlades til alfahannerne

I think it’s very clear that this enemy has decided that the war, the real war for them, will be fought in the narrative, in the media. This is not a place where we’re going to take the enemy’s capital and run up our flag and drink their coffee and that sort of thing.

Politiken er Hitler-forskrækket over generaler i regeringen Trump, fordi Alfahanner ikke hører til i fredstid - men det er Politiken ikke hører efter, hvad der foregår uden for deres bombesluse. Vi er ikke i en fredstid.

Det er min overbevisning, at demokratier ikke kan kæmpe for sin frihed uden konsensus om en nødvendighed og hvem der er fjenden. Vietnamkrigen blev tabt i de amerikanske hjerter og  ikke på slagmarken. Vi danskere, der anerkender vores nationalisme, Danmark først kunne man kalde det, kan ikke nedkæmpe truslen fra islam, uden et konsensus bag os.

Og det betyder at vi er forpligtet til at nedbryde det narrativ, den fortælling, der dominerer medierne. Sammen med venstrefløjen og bureakraterne enabler de islams angreb på vores frihed og kultur ved at fortrænge realiteterne for det stor tavse flertal. Det er en kamp for definitionsretten og den frie debat, som alle os betahanner og -hunner, kan tage på alle niveauer.

Og fordi vi i den kamp har brug for friheden til at ytre os, reagerer bureaukraterne og venstrefløjen og medierne med allehånde forsøg på at sikre kontrol med ytringer og nyheder. Racismeparagraffer ikke blot opretholdes, men søges udvidet til forbud mod hadtale, hadprædikanter bliver løst defineret som både de der spreder had som de der advarer og nægtet indrejse, sociale medier indskrænker rammerne og venstrefløjen og dens medier opfinder nye begreber, som post-faktualitet til fake news for at retfærdiggøre et offentligt meningsmonopol.

Vi kan skal alle sammen kæmpe for den frihed, der er blevet os skænket. Og der er lyspunkter i den kamp, fra store sejre som Brexit og Trump til små sprækker i mediernes selvfølgelige forståelse af ofre og skurke i det store og modige arbejde For Frihed bedriver. Og vi vil vinde - yyyuge!

Obama: “Just because Iranian hardliners chant Death to America does not mean that that’s what all Iranians believe”

Husker De det? Da Obama ikke lagde noget i at ledende kræfter i det iranske regime ønskede død over USA. Hans ræsonnement var at et flertal af iranere sikkert ikke ønskede, hvad lederne ønskede. Jo, og så slog han de, der advarede om truslen fra de dødstruende iranske hardlinere i hartkorn med de selv samme dødstruende iranske hardlinere. Derfor var det helt logisk at lade død-over-USA Iran starte deres eget atom-program og frigive de enorme summer, der havde været indefrosset i udenlandske banker siden Shahens fald.

Man kan håbe på at Hillary Clinton ikke vinder det amerikanske præsidentvalg i november. Og hvis den ulykke skulle være undgået, så kan man håbe at Trump holder noget af det han lover. I så fald vil USA, og det vil måske kunne trække det meste af Vesten med sig, skifte kurs fra Obamas farlige underdanighed overfor verdens tyranner i almindelighed og muslimer og deres månereligion i særdeleshed. Victor Davis Hansen, der altid er værd at læse, giver i Townhall på glimrende vis en forelæsning i konsekvenserne af eftergivenhed for bøller - at de tolker det som svaghed

When President Obama entered office, he dreamed that his hope-and-change messaging and his references to his familial Islamic roots would win over the Muslim world. The soon-to-be Nobel Peace Prize laureate would make the U.S. liked in the Middle East. Then, terrorism would decrease.

But, as with his approach to racial relations, Obama’s remedies proved worse than the original illness.

Obama gave his first presidential interview to Al Arabiya, noting that he has Muslims in his family. He implicitly blamed America’s strained relations with many Middle Eastern countries on his supposedly insensitive predecessor, George W. Bush.

The new message of the Obama administration was that the Islamic world was understandably hostile because of what America had done rather than what it represented.

Accordingly, all mention of radical Islam, and even the word “terrorism,” was airbrushed from the new administration’s vocabulary. Words to describe terrorism or the fight against it were replaced by embarrassing euphemisms like “overseas contingency operations,” “man-caused disaster” and “workplace violence.”

In apology tours and mythological speeches, Obama exaggerated Islamic history as often as he critiqued America. He backed the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt. He pushed America away from Israel, appeased Iran, and tried to piggyback on the Arab Spring by bombing Libya. He even lectured Christians on their past pathologies dating back to the Crusades.

Yet Obama’s outreach was still interpreted by Islamists as guilt and weakness to be exploited rather than magnanimity to be reciprocated. Terrorist attacks increased. Obama blamed them on a lack of gun control or generic “violent extremism.”

(…)

Radical Islam never had legitimate grievances against the West. America and Europe had welcomed in Muslim immigrants — even as Christians were persecuted and driven out of the Middle East.

Billions of dollars in American aid still flows to Islamic countries. The U.S. spent untold blood and treasure freeing Kuwait and later the Shiites of Iraq from Saddam Hussein. America tried to save Afghanistan from the Soviets and later from the Taliban.

For over a half-century, the West paid jacked-up prices for OPEC oil — even as the U.S. Navy protected Persian Gulf sea lanes to ensure lucrative oil profits for Gulf state monarchies.

Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri, the original architects of al-Qaida, were so desperate to find grievances against the West that in their written diatribes they had to invent fantasies of Jews walking in Mecca. In Michael Moore fashion, they laughably whined about America’s lack of campaign finance reform and Western culpability for global warming.

The real problem is that Islamic terrorism feeds off the self-induced failures of the Middle East.

Som Churchill sagde om tyskerne (I en anden tid! I en anden tid!) “They are either at your feet or at your throat!”

Fri Debat uden ideologisk dagsorden

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Fri Debats konference lørdag 6/2 stillede spørgsmålet, hvordan det er “kommet dertil, at blasfemi i dag betragtes som en sinister ideologi i kunst- og litteraturlivet, mens tavshed om den religiøse terror og tvang fremstår som progressiv blandt kunstnere og forfattere?” Til at besvare det spørgsmål havde man indbudt et panel bestående af færøske Heini i Skorini fra King’s College, Dennis Meyhoff Brink fra Københavns universitet og kunstnerne Lars Vilks fra Sverige og norske Thomas Knarvik til en næsten fyldt fællessal på Christiansborg.

I sin korte indledning sagde Henrik Dahl fra Liberal Alliance, at historien vil bedømme denne generation af politikere på hvor resolut de er i stand til at forsvare det liberale samfund. Som emnets alvor således blev placeret i historien var Niels Ivar Larsen manden for at motivere sin nylige afgang fra Lars Vilks Selskabet og positionere Fri Debat i “landskabet af ytringsfrihedsaktivister”. Fri debat var nemlig den mest principfaste forsvarer af ytringsfriheden uden ‘men’, blottet for ideologiske dagsordner og påstande om ytringsfrihed som noget kulturelt betinget.

Et principfast forsvar for ytringsfriheden kræver altså at man ikke lader sig præge af kulturalistiske dagsordner når man diskuterer blasfemi, censur og selvcensur blandt kunstnere. Men ikke nok med det, det kræver også et sikkerhedsapparat med snifferhunde og politifolk med maskinpistoler kunne man erfare og det er ikke fordi man frygter alle kulturelle repræsentanter lige meget. Mangel på proportioner giver åbenbart den bedste position i landskabet af ytringsfrihedsaktivister.

Dennis Meyhoff Brink, der er ekstern lektor ved institut for kunst og kulturvidenskab, foretog i sit oplæg en analogi mellem det kristne Europas udvikling fra Oplysningen og et tilsvarende perspektiv for den islamiske verden. Europa var kendetegnet ved at have den ubestrideligt højeste grad af religionskritik og satire i nogen civilisation og det var da også i Europa demokratiet opstod og trivedes. Årsagensforbindelsen var klar; Oplysningens blasfemiske satire udhulede, som dryp på en sten, med et Webersk udtryk, den fortryllede verden og tog frygten fra folk. Med frygtens fald fulgte også æresfrygten for præsten, der nu kunne latterliggøres, ikke blot som repræsentant for kirkens hykleri, men for religionen i sig selv.

Lars Vilks forklarede derefter hvorledes opfattelsen af geniet fordrede at kunstneren selv blev den skabende og gennemgik en række blasfemiske kunstværker; film af bl.a Lois Bunuel og Ken Russel og billeder som Piss Christ. Netop Piss Christ er trukket meget ind i debatten om religiøs krænkelse og islam for skønt nogle dybere lag i værket - at selve værket er et fotografi af en installation af et krucifiks nedsænket i glas urin - så blev der ikke taget hensyn til kristnes krænkede følelser, som man er vant til, når emnet er udfordring af islam.

Den norske kunstner Knarviks første forelæser på kunstakademiet var netop Lars Vilks. Knarvik viste endnu flere billeder end sin ‘læremester’ og mange han selv havde kreeret, som han fortalte om, hvorledes han var blevet engageret i kampen om ytringsfrihed og blasfemi, og hvorledes det havde påvirket hans kunstneriske retning. Knarvik er, som de øvrige panelister, ingen skimlet konservativ kulturkæmper. Han har f.eks blandt andet bygget et kulturcenter for massaikvinder og skabt en forfatterpersona, en muslimsk teenagepige under navnet Miss Supression Figther. For ham er mange muslimer de største ofre for de jihadister, der har taget deres religion som gidsel og gjort den største karikatur af Muhammed.

Men han har også overhørt skrigene fra en pige, der blev omskåret og bevidnet hvorledes kvinderne, der forestod omskæringen, kom ud af hytten og smed det omskårne ud til naturen. Og hans interesse for islam, som en trussel mod ytringsfriheden, blev vakt da han hørte den norske statsminister undskylde for alverden, at den norske avis Dagbladet havde trykt Muhammedtegninger.

Knarvik udgav på 10-årsdagen for offentliggørelsen af Jyllands-Postens Muhammedtegninger en mere end 100 sider lang samling af blasfemiske tegninger rettet mod alle religioner. Et norsk forlag havde i første omgang trykt den i 2.500 eksemplarer og den lå klar på en europalle, da forlaget blev ængsteligt ved udsigten til endnu en Muhammedkrise og makulerede hele oplaget. Bogen er i stedet udkommet på Kåre Bluitgens forlag.

Men det var den første oplægsholder, Heine i Skorini, der leverede det mest almeninteressante oplæg, da han perspektiverede den islamiske trussel historisk. Han fortalte først om en Muhammedkrise i 1925, der blev udløst da den engelske morgenavis The Star havde trykt en tegning, hvor den tids legendariske cricketspiller Jack Hobbs ragede op som en kæmpe blandt andre historiske skikkelser, som Julius Cæsar, Columbus og så selvfølgelig muslimernes profet Muhammed. Muslimske organisationer protesterede højlydt og der var demonstrationer i Calcutta. Ingen døde dog, men episoden demonstrerede at ideen om at en nyopfunden islamisme adskilt fra en ægte, om ikke tolerant, så afdæmpet, islam ikke holder.

i Skorini fortalte hvorledes OIC (organisationen af islamiske lande), gennem FN har arbejdet målrettet på at gøre blasfemi til en krænkelse af menneskerettighederne. OIC ser den islamiske verden være under pres både udefra, ikke mindst fra Vesten, og indefra. I Kairo deklarationen fra 1990 hedder det således at formålet bl.a er ”cleanse our societys of moral laxity deviation” og dens artikel 22 slår fast at ytringsfriheden (og alt andet i øvrigt) skal underlægges den muslimske sharia lovgivning.

Bastante religiøse krav til en sekulær organisation, som FN er ikke effektivt og i 1999 skiftede organisationen taktik til en sekulær argumentation. Nu brugte man i stedet FNs egne artikler, som artikel 29, der betoner ansvar over frihed og artikel 22 om hadtale, til at få ytringsfriheden underlagt sharia. For OIC var religionskrænkelse, som grundlæggende blot betød krænkelse af islam jvf sharia-kravet ovenfor, en krænkelse af menneskerettigheder på linje med racisme, intolerance, islamofobi og ekstremisme. OICs nye argumentation var derfor også på linje med den vestlige venstrefløjs tankegang og det skabte en naturlig alliance af parallelinteresser.

Netop det sidste punkt, at se blasfemi som ekstremisme, er forklaringen på, hvorfor muslimske landes fordømmelser af islamisk terror, som Saudiarabiens fordømmelse af angrebet på Charlie Hebdo, altid ledsages af fordømmelser af ekstremisme i al almindelighed. De myrdede, som redaktionen på Charlie Hebdo, er nemlig lige så ekstreme i deres brug af ytringsfriheden, som deres mordere. Og det er en retorik som man hører ikke blot fra venstrefløjen men fra vestlige ledere.

Det var en journalist fra information, der stillede det første spørgsmål til panelet, om forskellen på satirens antiklerikale, politiske angreb og kunstens ikonografiske behandling af det blasfemiske, førend to tilhørere ville vide, hvad Saudiarabiens betydning for FNs Råd for Menneskerettigheder og OICs fremtid som Saudiarabiens økonomiske situation ser drastisk anderledes ud med de faldende oliepriser. Saudiarabien sponserer OIC og organiserer dagsordenen på de indre linjer, mens det er Pakistan der tegner organisationen i FN.  Skorini svarede at det dels udstiller FN for hvad det er, en samling af de regimer og regeringer i verden, der nu engang er og at Saudiarabiens betydning for OIC ikke vil ændre sig de første mange år, dertil er rollerne for satte. Og så svarede Vilks og Knarvik meget pædagogisk at satire er meget bundet i en konkret debat i tid og sted, mens kunst ikke søger et konkret politisk budskab og kan værdsættes ud over tid.

Først herefter var der en tilhører, der ville have svar på konferencens spørgsmål, nemlig, hvorfor kunstnere, og alle os andre såmænd, var mere optaget af selvkritik end af religionskritik, selv når vi blev konfronteret med en trussel. Spørgsmålet kom næsten bag på panelet, der dog hver for sig svarede at det traditionelt var lettere og moralsk mere acceptabelt at levere angreb på værdier inden for egen kulturkreds end at kritisere, hvad man kunne opfatte som udsatte minoriteter med kulturelt betingede problemer. Det handlede, med udgangspunkt i eksemplet Carsten Jensens jævnlig tirader, om hvem der havde ret til at kritisere andre. Og det var en god pointe, for ingen vil jo mistænkes for at have en ideologisk dagsorden.

Og det var der også en tilhører der heller ikke ville og mindede Meyhoff Brink om at satire ikke kun var forbeholdt vesten og fortalte om en irakisk ateistisk bevægelse der bedrev en ganske giftig satire. Desværre blev denne bevægelse slået hårdt ned beklagede han og besvarede således sit eget spørgsmål, inden islameksperten Tina Magaard tog ordet og sagde at hun faktisk havde skrevet om blasfemisk satire i den muslimske verden ikke mindst Iran. Det var Magaards pointe at netop Muhammed satire var et inkluderende redskab i integrationen i vores selvkritiske kultur og at man skulle vise skolebørn muhammedtegninger fra den muslimske verden, der almindeligvis var langt grovere end de tegninger Jyllands-Posten udgav.

Og så var det, at det sidste spørgsmål kom fra en tilhører, der ville høre panelet, hvorledes det ville se ud med ytringsfriheden om føje tid i et stadigt mindre demokratisk Europa “og med en stadig mere islamisk indflydelse”. Det er svært at holde en hel konference om “religiøs terror og tvang” og “blasfemi” uden at komme ind på noget ‘kulturelt betinget’, ideologisk dagsorden eller ej. Inden det skulle besvares syntes Meyhoff Brink at det var på sin plads med et fejlcitat og sagde “Jeg synes også det er racistisk når Hedegaard siger at ‘alle muslimske mænd, onkler og fædre, voldtager deres døtre…”. Men ytringsfrihedens fremtidsudsigter i et mere et mindre demokratisk og mere islamificeret Europa var et svært spørgsmål at forholde sig til på falderebet af konferencen, sagde Ivar Larsen og gav ordet til i Skorini.

Forholdene i Danmark var ikke nær så dårlige som i England, forklarede i Skorini og sagde at han selv måtte forberede sig ganske anderledes når han holdt foredrag i London end i Danmark. Og det var ikke blot kønsopdelte arrangementer, men også sikkerhedsproblemer fordi så mange kunne blive stødt og emnets indhold. Men han mindede om at de islamistiske grupper udgjorde en meget lille og ikke repræsentativ minoritet blandt de muslimske studerende, men realiteterne var deusagtet at det var svært for ham at bevare en optisme. Og med den kedelige udsigt var konferencen slut.

Uagtet hvor urepræsentative og lille en minoritet islamister udgør på campus, kan man alligevel konkludere, hvad i Skorini og Fri Debat helst vil tøve med, at jo flere kulturelt betingede muslimer vi ser på campus og i vores land, jo mere vil det være islamisternes dagsorden vi vil leve under. Men dyster som fremtiden ser ud kan man glæde sig over at vi i Danmark har et levende landskab af ytringsfrihedsaktivister med hele tre virile selskaber i Fri Debat, Trykkefrihedsselskabet og Lars Vilks Komiteen. At det til tider bærer lidt præg af positionering og nok også en snert af intern personrivalisering er en lille detalje og måske blot et bidrag til at holde konkurrencen skarp og landskabet frodigt. Fri Debats arrangement var så velafholdt og oplysende, som man er kommet til at forvente det i Danmark - men desværre med et tilhørende sikkerhedsopbud, selv for de, der ikke vil vedkende sig en ideologisk dagsorden.

Artikel skrevet for Document.dk

Shia mod sunni

Saudi-arabien har til Irans store fortrydelse henrettet en shiamuslimsk imam. Diplomatiske forbindelser er sløjfet og truslerne om hævn hænger stadigt tykkere i luften. Sunni mod Shia med Saudiarabien og Iran hovedaktørerne i dette seneste kapitel i denne snart 1.400 år gamle islamiske krig ser ud til at blusse op igen. Charles Krauthammer koncentrerer sin analyse i National Review om Obamas udenrigspolitik

Commenting on Saudi Arabia executing an Iranian cleric, Krauthammer said, “I can’t say the Saudi execution of this Shiite cleric was very wise, but they did see it as in their national interest, and I think they are acting fairly desperately. Because they look around and their protector since the 1930s when King Saud met with FDR, and they essentially established this relationship — ‘you supply us oil, we protect you’ — is deeply in jeopardy.”

“They look at the way Obama has abandoned them,” Krauthammer continued. “The nuclear deal is just the culmination of the process. Abandoned them in Syria, abandoning the red line, has done nothing since the signing of the nuclear agreement.”

Krauthammer said the Saudis now worry about encirclement: “Iran has become increasingly aggressive in Syria. In Yemen, which is, remember, is right on the doorstep of Saudi Arabia – it’s not removed the way Syria is – and they see serious encirclement.”

Også i Wall Street Journal kan man læse om den amerikanske eftergivenhedspolitiks fallit

President Obama imagined he could end his second term with an arms-control detente with Iran the way Ronald Reagan did with the Soviet Union. It looks instead that his nuclear deal has inspired Iran toward new military aggression and greater anti-American hostility.

The U.S. and United Nations both say Iran is already violating U.N. resolutions that bar Iran from testing ballistic missiles. Iran has conducted two ballistic-missile tests since the nuclear deal was signed in July, most recently in November. The missiles seem capable of delivering nuclear weapons with relatively small design changes.

The White House initially downplayed the missile tests, but this week it did an odd flip-flop on whether to impose new sanctions in response. On Wednesday it informed Congress that it would target a handful of Iranian companies and individuals responsible for the ballistic-missile program. Then it later said it would delay announcing the sanctions, which are barely a diplomatic rebuke in any case, much less a serious response to an arms-control violation.

Under the nuclear accord, Iran will soon receive $100 billion in unfrozen assets as well as the ability to court investors who are already streaming to Tehran.

(…)

The White House’s media allies are blaming all of this on Iranian “hard-liners” who are supposedly trying to undermine President Rouhani for having negotiated the nuclear deal. Memo to these amateur Tehranologists: The hard-liners run Iran.

Og for at tvære pointen helt ud “The sages now blaming hard-liners for Iran’s nastiness are the same folks who told us that the nuclear accord would empower the “moderates” in Iran by showing America’s peaceful intentions”. “Change” var hvad folk ville have uden at vide hvad det rent faktisk indebar og så fik de forandring. En forandring til det værre fordi flertallet ikke kunne tænke.

Det hele er nu ikke Obamas skyld. Islam er en rådden verden og et kollaps eller endnu en krig er uundgåeligt uanset vestlig naivitet. Spengler tegner i Asia Times et dystert billede for Saudiarabien, som lider under faldende olipriser (hvilket Obama med sin anti-fracking politik ikke har hverken lod eller del i)

Worst of all, the collapse of Saudi oil revenues threatens to exhaust the kingdom’s $700 billion in financial reserves within five years, according to an October estimate by the International Monetary Fund (as I discussed here). The House of Saud relies on subsidies to buy the loyalty of the vast majority of its subjects, and its reduced spending power is the biggest threat to its rule. Last week Riyadh cut subsidies for water, electricity and gasoline. The timing of the executions may be more than coincidence: the royal family’s capacity to buy popular support is eroding just as its regional security policy has fallen apart.

For decades, Riyadh has presented itself as an ally of the West and a force for stability in the region, while providing financial support for Wahhabi fundamentalism around the world. China has been the kingdom’s largest customer as well as a provider of sophisticated weapons, including surface-to-surface missiles. But China also has lost patience with the monarchy’s support for Wahhabi Islamists in China and bordering countries.

According to a senior Chinese analyst, the Saudis are the main source of funding for Islamist madrassas in Western China, where the “East Turkistan Independence Movement” has launched several large-scale terror attacks. Although the Saudi government has reassured Beijing that it does not support the homegrown terrorists, it either can’t or won’t stop some members of the royal family from channeling funds to the local jihadis through informal financial channels. “Our biggest worry in the Middle East isn’t oil—it’s Saudi Arabia,” the analyst said.

China’s Muslims—mainly Uyghurs in Western China who speak a Turkish dialect—are Sunni rather than Shia.  Like Russia, China does not have to worry about Iranian agitation among Shia jihadis, and tends to prefer Iran to the Sunni powers. As a matter of form, Beijing wants to appear even-handed in its dealings with Iran and Saudi Arabia, for example in recent contacts between their respective navies. Chinese analysts emphasize that Beijing has sold weapons to both—more in absolute to terms to Iran but more sophisticated weapons to the Saudis.

More pertinent than public diplomacy, though, is where China is buying its oil.

Nonetheless, China’s oil import data show a significant shift away from Saudi Arabia towards Russia and Oman (which China considers part of the Iranian sphere of influence). Russia’s oil exports to China have grown fourfold since 2010 while Saudi exports have stagnated. Given the world oil glut, China can pick and choose its suppliers, and it is hard to avoid the inference that Beijing is buying more from Russia for strategic reasons.  According to Russian sources, China also has allowed Russian oil companies to delay physical delivery of oil due under existing contracts, permitting Russia to sell the oil on the open market for cash—the equivalent of a cash loan to Russia.

Det er alt sammen meget spændende og man kunne jo nyde sine popcorn til øllerne, hvis ikke det var således at den vestlige naivitet havde importeret nisserne. Ifølge BBC er der stigende bekymring for at “the sectarian divides so bitterly apparent in much of the Middle East” mellem sunnimuslimer og shiamuslimer udvikler sig yderligere i England. En shiamuslim fortæller

“Even at Soas, a university I love, Sunnis and Shias have big arguments all the time,” says Anahita.

“And elsewhere in London, we have the same problem - Sunni and Shia arguing. You can clearly see it when you walk in Edgware Road or Kilburn.

“If you have a green bracelet or anything that shows you are Shia, they look at you as if you are not even Muslim, or you don’t exist. It’s very disrespectful, and very sad.

“Islamic societies in general and especially in London are getting bigger all the time. But not in a good way.”

En tilflyttet shiamuslim mærker nu hvordan muslimer behandler ikke muslimer - og så er det lige pludselig ikke godt at der bliver flere af de andre muslimer i London. Hvor flygter muslimerne næste gang hen, når de bliver mange nok?

Tom Holland om muslimenernes forhold til pædofili i islam

Akademia, Arabere, Diverse, Forbrydelse og straf, Historie, Iran, Muslimer, Politiken, Sharia, islam — Drokles on September 6, 2015 at 1:52 am

Politikens læsere konfronteres med islamisk nomalitet

Beretningerne fra Islamisk Stat afslører ifølge New York Times, at småpiger ned til 11-årsalderen er blevet ofre for systematiske voldtægter, og at adgangen til kvinder og piger bruges til at lokke mænd fra andre muslimske samfund til området ved løfterne om, at de som belønning fik adgang til at misbruge ofrene.

»Det er tilladt at have samleje med en kvindelig slave, der ikke er kommet i puberteten, hvis det kan lade sig gøre«, hedder det i en af den sunnimuslimske organisations instrukser, der blev offentliggjort i december.

Det er bemærkelsesværdigt at Politiken ikke skriver islamistiske, men sunnimuslimske. De kunne roligt have skrevet ‘islams instrukser’ da 90% af verdens muslimer er sunnimuslimer. Men fordi islam er så herlig entydig, så er de resterende 10% shiamuslimer på bølgelængde med grusomheder og depravering af mennesker, også når det handler om pædofili. Dr. Majid Rafizadeh skriver i Frontpage Magazine om de stadigt flere børne-ægteskaber i Iran

Although Muslim scholars argue that marrying a 9-year-old girl was only completely acceptable more than 1000 years ago during the time of Prophet Muhammad, still tens of thousands of underage girls are being forced to get married in Iran and the number expands to hundreds of thousands in the entire Islamic world.

The Islamic Republic is only one country among dozens of other Islamic countries which have legalized and even encouraged under age marriages. This trend is reportedly on the rise instead of declining.  For example, there was a 59 percent increase in under-10 year old marriages in Iran in one year. Several parts of the Islamic Republic have experienced a dramatic growth in under-age marriages.

According to the Islamic Republic civil code, Iran’s constitution set the legal marriage age for girls at 13 and boys at 15. But the Iranian parliament’s legal affairs committee made several statements arguing that the Islamic Republic is attempting to lower the girl marriage age to 9. So, even though the above-mentioned marriage is illegal based on Iran’s civil code, the religious authorities allowed it.

Why is the government trying to lower the legal age of a girl to 9, rather than increase it? Isn’t age 9 even well before the child reaches puberty? All of these marriages are happening under the eyes of the so-called moderate president, Hassan Rouhani, whom President Obama seems to admire.

Even more abhorrent, the Islamic Republic previously passed a law that permitted men to marry their young adopted daughters.

Men, som Politikens læsere konfronteres drypvis, men stigende med krakkeleringen af deres idyliserede udsyn, så bliver det også stadigt sværere for muslimer at se deres religion i øjnene. Tom Holland forklarer her om pædofili i islam og muslimerne i vestens stigende problemer med kognitiv dissonans (starter ved 17:06

Peter Robinson taler med Charles Hill og General James Mattis om Iran-aftalen, demokrati og frihed

Hvis Obamas atom-aftale viser sig at være en Chamberlain 1938 så kan jeg nok tilgives for at hænge mig lidt i den

Recorded on July 16, 2015 - Hoover fellows Charles Hill and James Mattis discuss the Iran deal and the state of the world on Uncommon Knowledge with Hoover fellow Peter Robinson. In their view the United States has handed over its leading role to Iran and provided a dowry along with it. Iran will become the leading power in the region as the United States pulls back; as the sanctions are lifted Iran will start making a lot of money. No matter what Congress does at this point, the sanctions are gone. Furthermore, the president will veto anything Congress comes up with to move the deal forward. This de facto treaty circumvents the Constitution.
If we want better deals and a stronger presence in the international community, then the United States needs to compromise, and listen to one another other, and encourage other points of view, especially from the three branches of government. If the United States pulls back from the international community, we will need to relearn the lessons we learned after World War I. But if we engage more with the world and use solid strategies to protect and encourage democracy and freedom at home and abroad, then our military interventions will be fewer. The United States and the world will be in a better position to handle problems such as ISIS.

Islam i krise? II

Diverse, Forår?, Iran, Kristenforfølgelse, Ligestilling, Muslimer, islam — Drokles on August 5, 2015 at 1:34 am

Hvad er det helt præcist, at Obama-regeringen tror har ændret sig vedrørende Irans ledelse?” spurgte Douglas Murray på Gatestone Institute med reference til atom-aftalen. Måske ser han Change? Anden del af Ibn Warraqs artikelserie på Jihad Watch om et skrumpende islam har en længere passage om Iran

Iran is one of the most interesting of all the “rooms” that Garrison studied.

He observes that, “Of Iran’s population 64 percent were born after the 1979 Islamic Revolution, and have little affection for it. While Christianity is growing rapidly in the country, so too are many other worldviews as Muslim Iranians seek a respite from the state religion. It is common to find Iranian young adults walking away from Islam and turning to atheism, secularism, hedonism, drugs, and even ancient pathways such as Zoroastrianism and Buddhism.” [8]

I shall be discussing Iranian atheists in a later section, but I can personally vouch for Garrison’s latter conclusion. Over the last twenty years, I have given talks to Iranian groups in Paris, Stockholm, Chicago, Washington, D.C., Los Angeles, and New York; they have all been anti-Khomeini, and most have been atheists, and certainly secularists — thus, evidently, their flight from Iran. Garrison also points out, quoting journalist Scott Peterson, “‘hidden behind the mullah’s mask is the most unashamedly pro-American population in the Middle East’. The sentiment was expressed spontaneously after the 9/11 terrorist attacks in America, when 60,000 Iranians gathered on Tehran’s football stadium dressed in black to hold a candlelight vigil.” [9]

House churches are the most common place for Muslim converts to Christianity to worship. The House Church movement may have, as a conservative estimate, 100,000 followers, but “data from interviews with Iranian Christian refugees, and the number of correspondents to satellite Christian television programs give reason to believe that figure could be as high as a few million”. [10]

Garrison refers to Mark Bradley [11], who wrote, “If the figures from the survey carried out by Mohabbat TV were translated nationally, it would mean that 8 million people are interested in Christianity and nearly 3 million would actually want to become Christian”. The German online journal, Deutsche Welle [DW], cites other figures: “It is said that between 250,000 and 500,000 Iranians have converted, though the actual number is impossible to know.” [12]

DW then explains the reasons for conversions: “They are turning away from Islam primarily because they are disappointed in their government, which has tied politics and religion together so as to make them inseparable, and has curtailed many civil rights in the name of Islam.” [13]

Persecution of Iranian Muslim converts to Christianity has led many to flee to the West. The U.K. daily newspaper, The Guardian [14], describes the journey of these asylum seekers in Germany: mainly Iranian, and occasionally Afghan, émigrés who have given a new lease of life to the religious life of Germany. Many have paid as much as to $30,000 to be smuggled into the country with fake passports. Once in Germany they have usually adopted western names, and have added greatly to congregation numbers in several independent Lutheran, Evangelical and Presbyterian churches. They are now waiting for their baptism ceremonies as they rebuild their lives.

The last time Germany saw so many Iranians seeking entry was just after the 1979 revolution. The number of Iranian refugees has doubled every year for the last five years, from less than 1,000 in 2008 to 4,348 in 2012. Official figures from the federal office for migration and refugees confirm this trend. Over 3,500 Iranians were granted asylum last year, and Iran was one of the countries from which Germany saw a steep rise in asylum applications.

The Guardian gives the reasons for this exodus: “Spread across multiple churches and asylum camps, Muslim-to-Christian converts from Iran make up a noticeable population of asylum seekers who say a growing crackdown on Muslim-born Christian converts back home, and disillusion from decades of living under Islamic law, have led them to Germany. Though Iranian converts can be found in The Netherlands, Sweden and Austria, Germany’s economic stability and reputation as a major refugee hosting country has made the European country the most desirable destination.”

In the past, most of Iran’s Christians were ethnic Armenians and Assyrians who are allowed to practice their religion freely as long as they did not proselytize. Thanks to Christian satellite television broadcasts, in the last five to ten years, Iranian Diasporan Christian pastors have had an enormous influence over their fellow Iranians back home. Even ethnic Armenians and Assyrians have taken to spreading the gospel to their Muslim neighbours. The combined result is that the religion is taking hold throughout Iran. The Guardian tries to give estimates of the numbers involved, but notes: “The underground nature of the Christian conversion movement has made numbers impossible to determine accurately. Estimates range from 300,000 to 500,000 by various sources. Though these statistics cannot be independently verified, converts and pastors both in and out of Iran say the movement is strong and widely spread. Some converts have also been reported to travel to neighboring Armenia to become baptized.”

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Sidste år skrev jeg: “I  2009-10 oplevede Iran masseprotester, optøjer og en truende revolution eller måske endda borgerkrig i kølvandet på Mahmoud Ahmadinejads genvalg som præsident. Mens de protesterende råbte valgsvindel og død over diktatoren svarede styret igen med vold og mord ved styrets bølle arme, den såkaldte Basij og affærdigede opstandende som startet og koordineret af zionister og CIA. Selv om opstanden fik en martyr i  Neda Agha Soltan holdt styret fast og udnyttede det til at rydde ud i oppositionen ved en række anholdelser og attentater.

Selv om opstandende ikke handlede om for og imod islam er den iranske befolkning splittet i et skizofrent forhold mellem de herskende konsekvente muslimer og en veluddannet liberal vestliggjort ungdom. Det er svært at se det som andet end et symptom på en voldsom identitetskrise når Irans egne myndigheder anslår at ca. 5 mill. iranere er narkomaner og mange flere tager stoffer jævnligt. Samtidig er der tilsyneladende et sammenbrud i de seksuelle normer, hvis man skal tro The Date Reports .”

Iran-aftale

We’ll remember you’ve said that!“ Dennis Praeger skriver at ondskab ikke er mørk, men derimod så “painfully bright that people look away from it”

The Nazi regime’s great hatred was Jews. Iran’s great hatred is the Jewish state. The Nazis’ greatest aim was to exterminate the Jews of Europe. Iran’s greatest aim is to exterminate the Jewish state. Nazi Germany hated the West and its freedoms. The Islamic Republic of Iran hates the West and its freedoms. Germany sought to dominate Europe. Iran seeks to dominate the Middle East and the Muslim world.

And exactly as Britain and France appeased Nazi Germany, the same two countries along with the United States have chosen to appease Iran.

(…)

Iran is responsible for more American deaths in the last quarter century than any other group or country. Colonel Richard Kemp, the former commander of British troops in Afghanistan, and Major Chris Driver-Williams of British special forces, summarized it this way: “Iranian military action, often working through proxies using terrorist tactics, has led to the deaths of well over a thousand American soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan over the last decade and a half.”

The Neville Chamberlains of 2015 defend the agreement with Iran on two grounds — that the only alternative is war and that this agreement has the capacity to bring Iran into “the community of nations.”

The first is a falsehood. For three reasons.

First, the alternative to this agreement was continuing and tightening the sanctions that were weakening the Iranian regime and greatly diminishing its ability to fund terror groups around the world. Second, because the agreement so strengthens Iran, it makes war far more likely. When evil, expansionist regimes get richer, they don’t spend their wealth on building new hospitals. Third, because we have been at war with Iran for decades. But only one side has been fighting.

Mark Steyn mener at Obamas aftale er værre end Chamberlains (via Snaphanen)

Thomas Sowell endnu videre og sammenligner Iran aftalen med ‘den største historiske fejltagelse’, Yongle dynastiets opløsning af Zheng Hes ekspeditioner i 1433. Obama derimod sammenligner aftalen med Iran med atomaftalerne med Sovietunionen.

Hvad er det helt præcist, at Obama-regeringen tror har ændret sig vedrørende Irans ledelse?” spørger Douglas Murray på Gatestone Institute

Der må trods alt være noget, som en vestlig leder ser, når der gøres forsøg på at “normalisere” forholdet til et slyngelregime — noget Richard Nixon så i det kinesiske kommunistparti, som overbeviste ham om, at en optøning af forholdet var mulig, eller noget Margaret Thatcher så i Mikhail Gorbachevs øjne, som overbeviste hende om, at her var omsider en modpart, man kunne stole på.

De ydre tegn i forbindelse med Iran ser trods alt lidet lovende ud. Forleden fredag i Teheran, netop som P5+1 færdiggjorde deres aftale med iranerne, var Irans gader vært for “Al-Quds dag.” I den iranske kalender er dette dagen, indført af afdøde ayatollah Khomeini, hvor den anti-israelske og anti-amerikanske aktivitet træder i forgrunden i endnu højere grad end normalt. Opmuntrede af regimet, marcherede ti tusindvis af iranere i gaderne og råbte på udslettelse af Israel og “død over Amerika”. Der blev ikke blot afbrændt israelske og amerikanske flag – der blev også sat ild til britiske flag i en rørende påmindelse om, at Iran er det eneste land som stadig tror, at Storbritannien styrer verden.

Den seneste af en lang række af “moderate” iranske ledere, præsident Hassan Rouhani, dukkede selv op ved en af disse parader for at se de israelske og amerikanske flag blive brændt af. Greb han ind? Forklarede han folkemængden, at de havde fået fat i det forkerte notat – at Amerika nu er deres ven, og at de i det mindste burde koncentrere deres energi om masseafbrænding af davidsstjernerne? Nej, han deltog som han plejer, og mængden reagerede som den plejer.

Det var det samme for blot få uger siden, da det iranske parlament samledes for at drøfte Wienaftalen. Ved den lejlighed forlod det iranske parlament mødet, efter nogen bemyndiget debat, mens repræsentanterne råbte “død over Amerika.”

Et generøst menneske ville måske sige, at det ikke betyder noget – når man i Iran råber “død over Amerika,” svarer det til, at man klarer halsen. Det er netop, hvad vi får at vide – at disse budskaber “kun er til hjemligt brug” og ikke betyder noget.

(…)

Set udefra kan det virke, som om kun meget lidt har ændret sig i Irans retorik og at meget lidt har ændret sig i regimets adfærd. Det er grunden til, at mysteriet om, hvad det er for en forandring den amerikanske regering og dens partnere ser i ayatollahernes øjne, er ekstra gådefuldt.

Fordi aftalens karakter gør det ekstremt vigtigt, at der er en eller anden forandring. Inden for de næste ti år vil ayatollaherne, til gengæld for de formodet “gennemførte inspektioner” af et begrænset antal iranske kernekraftsteder, nyde godt af en handelseksplosion med en kontant guldgrube i størrelsesordenen 140 milliarder dollar i form af frigivne aktiver, blot for at sætte dem igang. I de samme ti år vil der ske en lempelse af restriktionerne på – blandt andet – iransk salg og køb af konventionelle våben og ammunition. Endelig vil Iran blive i stand til at købe det længe ventede anti-luftværnssystem, som russerne (der selvfølgelig også var til stede ved forhandlingsbordet i Wien) ønsker at sælge til dem. Dette system – som er blandt de mest avancerede jord-til-luft missilsystemer — vil være i stand til at skyde et hvilket som helst amerikansk, israelsk eller andet fly ned, skulle et sådant nogensinde dukke op for at ødelægge Irans atomprojekt.

Apropos det iranske regimes nye 100-150 mia dollars Ryan Mauro har på The Clarion Project samlet en liste over nuværende udgifter, her i uddrag, som kan komme Irans naboer til glæde og gavn

$6.5 Billion: Budget of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps

The Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps is the elite security force that keeps the Iranian regime in power by oppressing the population and sponsors terrorism around the world. It is responsible for providing advanced IEDs that killed at least 500 U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan.

“Moderate” President Rouhani increased the IRGC’s budget by almost half in 2015 at a time when Iran is strapped for money.

$6 Billion: Iran’s Yearly Donation to Syrian Dictator Bashar Assad

This figure was stated by the U.N.’s envoy to Syria. Other experts put it as high as $15 billion. Assad is a state sponsor of terrorism whose rule helps fuel Al-Qaeda and the Islamic State. His determination to cling onto power has resulted in 320,000 dead and over 4 million refugees in a population of only 23 million since 2011.

$4-5 Billion: Estimated Spending By Iran on Terrorist Proxies

This figure was calculated by the Israeli Defense Forces’ Chief of Staff, who emphasized that this support is limited only by the current “economic limitations” of Iran, which will be expanded under the deal.

$2 Billion: Iran’s Annual Assistance to Extremist Shiite militias in Iraq and Syria

These militias have killed U.S. servicemen in the past and may target the 3,500 troops in Iraq now. The 140,000 members get $300 per month salary and $900 per month for arms and accommodations. The militias are brutal towards innocent Sunnis, indirectly assisting the Islamic State and Al-Qaeda.

Obama har sagt at han ville være en god præsident, hvis han fik en tredie periode. Han skal prise sig lykkelig for at det ikke kan lade sig gøre.

Død over Amerika, same procedure…

Atomvåben, Diverse, Folkevandring, Iran, USA, islam — Drokles on July 31, 2015 at 9:11 pm

Herhjemme vånder erhvervslivet sig sammen med venstrefløjen over at regeringen og dansk Folkeparti leger med tanken om oplysningsvideoer, rettet mod folkevandringen. Man er grundlæggende bange for vores renomme i udlandet, at højtuddannede udlændinge ikke vil komme til Danmark under indtryk af at kampagnen er rettet imod dem. Men Bosse og co. kan ånde lettet op, så smålige er de ikke i det store udland. Her kan man rask væk ønske død over hinanden og stadig indgå endsidige tillidsøvelser med masseudslettelsesvåben fortæller Daniel Greenfield for Frontpage Magazine

Secretary of State John Kerry is still seeking a nuanced explanation for Iran’s government saying, “Death to America”. He called the Iranian government’s cries of “Death to America” “not helpful” and suggested that the Supreme Leader might not really mean it.

And now Kerry would like to emphasize that aside from the “Death to America” chants and the nuclear bombs and constant threats of war, at no time was he made aware of an Iranian plan to destroy America.

(…)

Well there are two options.

1. Iran’s leaders keep saying things they don’t mean… which means we probably shouldn’t trust them not to go nuclear despite the deal

2. They do mean what they say… in which case we know why they want the nukes

So does Iran have a “Death to America” policy? Here you go, John.

In response to a question by a parliamentarian on how long this battle will continue, Khamenei said,“Battle and jihad are endless because evil and its front continue to exist. … This battle will only end when the society can get rid of the oppressors’ front with America at the head of it, which has expanded its claws on human mind, body and thought. … This requires a difficult and lengthy struggle and need for great strides.”

Sounds like a policy.

The New Yorker prøvede at forklare at det er en gammel vane at ønske død over hinanden og i øvrigt er det ikke flertallet af iranerne, der råber med

Nasser Hadian got his doctorate at the University of Tennessee and taught at Columbia. He is now a Tehran University political scientist and influential voice in policy circles. His daughter is in graduate school at Tulane. “Saying ‘Death to America’ is meaningless,” he told me. “It’s actually not acceptable in our culture, because they’re saying death to a whole people. It’s said by only twenty per cent of the population. And only a teeny per cent of that twenty per cent believes in it. They think America crystallizes and stands for all bad things in the world—the same way some Americans think about Iran. America has killed more Iranians than Iranians have killed Americans. The U.S. supported Saddam Hussein during his war with Iran, when hundreds of thousands died.”

He went on, “For others, it’s part of a religious ritual. But the élite who use it exploit the term for political reasons. Poll after poll shows that Iranians are greater supporters of America than any other Muslim country in the region.

“So whom does America want to rely on to judge public opinion?” Hadian asked. “The twenty per cent who do shout ‘Death to America!’ or the eighty per cent who don’t?”

Mere relevant vil nok være at spørge: Hvem får kontrollen over atom-arsenalet? De tyve procent, der har magten i landet eller de firs procent hvis mening tæller hat? De tyve procent var hurtige med deres svar

Nyt fra Mordor

The war on terror, that campaign without end launched 14 years ago by George Bush, is tying itself up in ever more grotesque contortions.” skriver Seumas Milne for Guardian og konkluderer at stormagterne ikke kan nedkæmpe “Isis and its monstrosities” fordi det er “the same powers that brought it to Iraq and Syria in the first place, or whose open and covert war-making has fostered it in the years since”. Og han leverer et glimrende eksempel på de vestlige lederes fortvivlede ragen rundt i det muslimske ælte

On Monday the trial in London of a Swedish man, Bherlin Gildo, accused of terrorism in Syria, collapsed after it became clear British intelligence had been arming the same rebel groups the defendant was charged with supporting The prosecution abandoned the case, apparently to avoid embarrassing the intelligence services. The defence argued that going ahead withthe trial would have been an “affront to justice” when there was plenty of evidence the British state was itself providing “extensive support” to the armed Syrian opposition. That didn’t only include the “non-lethal assistance” boasted of by the government (including body armour and military vehicles), but training, logistical support and the secret supply of “arms on a massive scale”. Reports were cited that MI6 had cooperated with the CIA on a “rat line” of arms transfers from Libyan stockpiles to the Syrian rebels in 2012 after the fall of the Gaddafi regime. Clearly, the absurdity of sending someone to prison for doing what ministers and their security officials were up to themselves became too much.

At sende de små fisk i fængsel for den linje politikerne selv har lagt kender vi godt herhjemme. Men Milnes observationer er glimrende, de vestlige ledere ved ikke hvem, der er ven eller fjende og jo mere de engagerer os i de muslimske morrads jo mere selvmodsigende og kontraproduktivt bliver det. Men jeg citerer ikke fra Guardians selvretfærdige klummeisters paranoia uden at komme med en bemærkning. Halvdelen af de 14 års krig mod terror, som Bush startede er blevet ført af Barak Hussein Obama, men han nævnes ikke med et ord. I stedet bruges variationer af ‘amerikanerne’. Og det til trods for at hvor Bush måske kunne være naiv i hvad USA kunne opnå af mirakler i barberernes verden, så agerer Obama på baggrund af allerede opnåede erfaringer. Det er ikke blot denne “rat line” af våben fra Libyen til Syrien, der er sket på Obamas vagt

A revealing light on how we got here has now been shone by a recently declassified secret US intelligence report, written in August 2012, which uncannily predicts – and effectively welcomes – the prospect of a “Salafist principality” in eastern Syria and an al-Qaida-controlled Islamic state in Syria and Iraq. In stark contrast to western claims at the time, the Defense Intelligence Agency document identifies al-Qaida in Iraq (which became Isis) and fellow Salafists as the “major forces driving the insurgency in Syria” – and states that “western countries, the Gulf states and Turkey” were supporting the opposition’s efforts to take control of eastern Syria. Raising the “possibility of establishing a declared or undeclared Salafist principality”, the Pentagon report goes on, “this is exactly what the supporting powers to the opposition want, in order to isolate the Syrian regime, which is considered the strategic depth of the Shia expansion (Iraq and Iran)”. Which is pretty well exactly what happened two years later. The report isn’t a policy document. It’s heavily redacted and there are ambiguities in the language. But the implications are clear enough. A year into the Syrian rebellion, the US and its allies weren’t only supporting and arming an opposition they knew to be dominated by extreme sectarian groups; they were prepared to countenance the creation of some sort of “Islamic state” – despite the “grave danger” to Iraq’s unity – as a Sunni buffer to weaken Syria. That doesn’t mean the US created Isis, of course, though some of its Gulf allies certainly played a role in it – as the US vice-president, Joe Biden, acknowledged last year. But there was no al-Qaida in Iraq until the US and Britain invaded. And the US has certainly exploited the existence of Isis against other forces in the region as part of a wider drive to maintain western control.

Jack Kerwick konstaterer på Frontpage Magazine at på “Barack Hussein Obama’s watch, Islamic militancy has only increased in scope and intensity”. Daily Mail skriver at Tyrkiet er på randen af en borgerkrig efter voldsomme gadekampe er brudt ud mellem politi, PKK-aktivister og venstrefløjsgrupper. Men ikke nok med det, så er NATO-landet og EU-aspiranten også på vej ind i en direkte krig imod ISIS. Uzay Bulut skriver på Gatestone Institute

Turkey is evidently unsettled by the rapprochement the PKK seems to be establishing with the U.S. and Europe. Possibly alarmed by the PKK’s victories against ISIS, as well as its strengthening international standing, Ankara, in addition to targeting ISIS positions in Syria, has been bombing the PKK positions in the Qandil mountains of Iraqi Kurdistan, where the PKK headquarters are located. As expected, many Turkish media outlets were more enthusiastic about the Turkish air force’s bombing the Kurdish militia than about bombing ISIS. “The camps of the PKK,” they excitedly reported, “have been covered with fire.” It appears as if Turkey’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) is using ISIS as a pretext to attack the PKK. Ankara just announced that its air base at Incirlik will soon be open to coalition forces, presumably to fight ISIS, but the moment Turkey started bombing, it targeted Kurdish positions. Those attacks not only open a new era of death and destruction, but also bring an end to all possibilities of resolving Turkey’s Kurdish issue non-violently. (…) Sadly, Turkey has preferred not to form a “Turkish-Kurdish alliance” to destroy ISIS. First, Turkey has opened its borders to ISIS, enabling the growth of the terrorist group. And now, at the first opportunity, it is bombing the Kurds again. According to this strategy, “peace” will be possible only when Kurds submit to Turkish supremacism and abandon their goal of being an equal nation. In the meantime, Mevlut Cavusoglu, Turkish minister of foreign affairs, said that the Incirlik air base in Turkey has not yet been opened for use by the U.S. and other coalition forces, but that it will be opened in the upcoming period.

Så Bush udløste kaoset, Obama enablede ISIS, mens folk som Uffe Ellemann Jensen presser på for at få Tyrkiet med i EU. Man siges at have de ledere man har fortjent. Hvad har vi dog gjort?

Fred i vor tid, død over Amerika!

Atomaftalen med Iran er måske ikke en garanti for fred i vor tid, men måske i stedet “Fred i vor tid!”. I hvert fald ser den amerikanske udenrigsminister John Kerry ud til at have fået betænkeligheder ved at Irans indgroede had til Den Store Satan USA, der skal DØ! sammen med Israel oma. ikke forsvundetReuters skriver

DUBAI (Reuters) – U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said a speech by Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei on Saturday vowing to defy American policies in the region despite a deal with world powers over Tehran’s nuclear program was “very disturbing”.

“I don’t know how to interpret it at this point in time, except to take it at face value, that that’s his policy,” he said in the interview with Saudi-owned Al Arabiya television, parts of which the network quoted on Tuesday.

“But I do know that often comments are made publicly and things can evolve that are different. If it is the policy, it’s very disturbing, it’s very troubling,” he added.

Ayatollah Khamenei told supporters on Saturday that U.S. policies in the region were “180 degrees” opposed to Iran’s, at a speech in a Tehran mosque punctuated by chants of “Death to America” and “Death to Israel”.

“Even after this deal our policy toward the arrogant U.S. will not change,” Khamenei said….

Mere hos Memri. Bruce Thorntorn i Frontpage Magazine at atomatalen med Iran er en katastrofe

We also know who bears the responsibility for this fiasco––Barack Obama. Historically ignorant and terminally narcissistic, Obama has all the superstitions and delusions of the progressive elite. And one of the most persistent and hoary of those beliefs is the fetish of diplomacy as a means to resolve disputes without force.

We must remember that Obama pointedly ran on the promise to “reinvigorate” American diplomacy. This trope was in fact a way to run against George Bush, whom the Dems and the media had caricatured as a “cowboy” with an itchy trigger finger, a gunslinger scornful of diplomacy and multilateralism. That charge was a lie––Bush wasted several months on diplomacy in an unsuccessful attempt to get the U.N.’s sanction for the war, even though the U.S. Congress had approved it, Hussein was in gross violation of the first Gulf War cease-fire agreement, and the U.N. already has passed 17 Security Council resolutions, all of which Hussein had violated.

Yet the narrative that Bush had “failed so miserably at diplomacy that we are now forced to war,” as then Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle put it, lived on. For the progressives committed to crypto-pacifism and to the belief that America is a guilty aggressor, the story was too politically useful. Obama, one of the most programmatic progressives in the Senate, embodied all those superstitions. As senator he continually criticized the war in Iraq, scorned the ultimately successful “surge” of troops in 2007 as a “reckless escalation” and a “mistake,” and introduced legislation to remove all troops from Iraq by March 2008.

As a presidential candidate, his whole foreign policy was predicated on his being the “anti-Bush” who would “reinvigorate diplomacy” and initiate “engagement” with all our enemies in order to defuse conflict and create peace. As president, Obama has been true to his word. He has apologized, groveled, bowed to potentates, “reset” relations with our rivals, shaken hands with thugs, and now talked Iran into being a nuclear power. As for “peace,” it is nowhere to be found as violence and atrocities multiply from Ukraine to Yemen, Tunisia to Afghanistan.

(…)

The belief that words alone can transcend this eternal truth of human nature––a belief deeply engrained in the mentality of our leaders and foreign policy establishment–– led to the disaster of World War II, and will despite this lesson of history lead to a lesser, but still dangerous, disaster.

But there is yet another factor in this debacle that must be acknowledged: the tendency of democracies to privilege short-term comfort over long-term threats. In democracies the use of force must have the assent of the voters, who in the U.S. every 2 years hold leaders accountable at the ballot box. Setbacks, mistakes, atrocities, casualties, and all the other unfortunately eternal contingencies of mass violence try the patience of voters, and citizen control of the military gives them a means of expressing their impatience or anger. As de Tocqueville recognized more than 150 years ago, “The people are more apt to feel than to reason; and if their present sufferings are great, it is to be feared that the still greater sufferings attendant upon defeat will be forgotten.” That pretty much sums up America’s response so far to Obama’s agreement.

Charles Krauthammer har et glimrende indlæg i Telegraph

Who would have imagined we would be giving up the conventional arms and ballistic missile embargoes on Iran? In nuclear negotiations?

When asked at his Wednesday news conference why there is nothing in the deal about the four American hostages being held by Iran, President Obama explained that this is a separate issue, not part of nuclear talks.

Are conventional weapons not a separate issue? After all, conventional, by definition, means non-nuclear. Why are we giving up the embargoes?

(…)

The net effect of this capitulation will be not only to endanger our Middle East allies now under threat from Iran and its proxies, but to endanger our own naval forces in the Persian Gulf. Imagine how Iran’s acquisition of the most advanced anti-ship missiles would threaten our control over the Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz, waterways we have kept open for international commerce for a half-century.

The other major shock in the final deal is what happened to our insistence on “anytime, anywhere” inspections. Under the final agreement, Iran has the right to deny international inspectors access to any undeclared nuclear site. The denial is then adjudicated by a committee — on which Iran sits. It then goes through several other bodies, on all of which Iran sits. Even if the inspectors’ request prevails, the approval process can take 24 days.

And what do you think will be left to be found, left unscrubbed, after 24 days? The whole process is farcical.

Men det går fra farce til skandale. Obama underløber kongressen for at få sin aftale istand

Congress won’t get to vote on the deal until September. But Obama is taking the agreement to the U.N. Security Council for approval within days. Approval there will cancel all previous U.N. resolutions outlawing and sanctioning Iran’s nuclear activities.

Meaning: Whatever Congress ultimately does, it won’t matter because the legal underpinning for the entire international sanctions regime against Iran will have been dismantled at the Security Council. Ten years of painstakingly constructed international sanctions will vanish overnight, irretrievably.

Even if Congress rejects the agreement, do you think the Europeans, the Chinese or the Russians will reinstate sanctions? The result: The United States is left isolated while the rest of the world does thriving business with Iran.

“The astonishing thing, which no one has pointed out”, skriver den ægyptiske Imad Al-Din Adib, der sammenligner Iran-aftalen med Chamberlains München-aftale “is that even if Iran complies to the letter with the 85 sections of the agreement, the agreement itself, once its 10-year duration is up, allows [Iran] to produce a nuclear bomb in the 11th year.”

Den israelske venstrefløj i krise

Venstrefløjen drømmer om en verden efter deres idealer, mens højrefløjen minder om realiternes barske væsen. Den prisbelønnede israelske forfatter Amos Oz vånder sig over det israelske valgresultat i Information.

I fraværet af to stater og i erkendelsen af, at binational sameksistens er en fantasi, truer udsigten til én arabisk stat med at slå vores zionistiske drøm i stykker.

I et forsøg på at udskyde det uafvendelige vil landet, som strækker sig fra Jordan til Middelhavet, måske i en periode blive styret af et uforsonligt jødisk og racistisk diktatur, som vil sætte sin vilje igennem, både over for det arabiske flertal og over for sine jødiske modstandere. Men som andre mindretalsdiktaturer i moderne tid vil heller ikke dette kunne overleve. International boykot udefra og blodbad indefra – eller begge dele – vil til sidst tvinge det til at give efter: En arabisk stat fra havet til floden vil da være en realitet. Og tostatsløsningen? Mange i Israel støtter visionen herom, men hævder også, at en sådan løsning på konflikten for øjeblikket ikke er i syne. For dem var Yasser Arafat for stærk og havde ondsindede bagtanker, hvorimod hans mere fornuftige efterfølger, Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen) er for svag. Derfor taler de for i det mindste at holde tostatsløsningen i live igennem såkaldt ’konflikthåndtering’.

Ak, bare sidste sommer oplevede vi, hvad ’håndtering’ kan betyde. Konflikthåndtering dømmer os til nye Libanon-krige, til nye Gaza-krige og til en tredje, fjerde og femte intifada i Jerusalem og på Vestbredden, der alle vil brede sig til vores gader. Med den følgevirkning, at PA, De Palæstinensiske Selvstyremyndigheder, bryder sammen, og at Hamas eller mere ekstreme efterfølgere tager over. Det vil give store tab på begge sider. Og dette vil være den logiske konsekvens af ’konflikthåndteringen’.

Ja, det er hårdt at være venstrefløjen i Israel efter Benjamin Netanyahus valgsejr. Raymond Ibrahim fortæller spidende om venstrefløjens selvoptagede sværmerier

It dreamed of a country run by bureaucrats that worked only three days a week. It dreamed of unions running monopolies that worked whenever they liked and charged whatever they wanted. It dreamed of children raised on collective farms without parents and of government as a Socialist café debate.

Most of all it dreamed of a country without conservatives. It still hasn’t gotten that wish.

Netanyahu’s victory hit hardest in Tel Aviv where, as Haaretz, the paper of the left, reports, “Leftist, secular Tel Aviv went to sleep last night cautiously optimistic only to wake up this morning in a state of utter and absolute devastation.”

Tel Aviv is ground zero for any Iranian nuclear attack. Its population density makes it an obvious target and Iran threatened it just last month. A nuclear strike on Tel Aviv would not only kill a lot of Israelis, it would also wipe out the country’s left.

Haifa and Tel Aviv are the only major cities in Israel that the left won in this election. And it was a close thing in traditionally “Red Haifa” whose union dockworkers these days are Middle Eastern Jews who vote right. The left took a quarter of the vote in Haifa to a fifth for Netanyahu’s conservative Likud party.

In Tel Aviv however, the Labor coalition and Meretz, the two major leftist parties, took nearly half of the vote. Amos Oz’s daughter told Haaretz that everyone in the left had been upbeat because everyone they knew was voting for the left. Now the leftist elite is once again forced to come to terms with the tragedy that much of the country doesn’t want to hand over land to terrorists, live on a communal farm or turn over the country to Marc Rich’s lawyer and his American backers who make Slim-Fast and KIND bars.

There are however days when they think Israel might be better off without certain parts of Tel Aviv.

The left doesn’t want a country. It wants a Berkeley food co-op. It wants a city with some ugly modernist architecture. It wants a campus with courses on media studies and gender in geography. It wants an arcade where unwashed lefties can tunelessly strum John Lennon songs on their vintage guitars. It wants cafes with Russian Futurist prints on the walls. It wants to be excited about political change. Its only use for Israel was as a utopian theme park.

Its allegiance was not to Jewish history or democracy, but to its crackpot leftist fantasies. Now its fantasies are dead and it wants to kill Israel.

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Venstrefløjen hader dem, der hader ondskab

Den amerikanske præsident Barak Hussein Obama bruger ofte udtrykket “en bankerot ideologi” om ISIS, Kalifatet i Irak og Levanten. Det er helt sikkert en ond ideologi og den hedder islam, men den er ikke bankerot. Den er sine steder, som hos ISIS ganske levende og dyrkes med stor nidkærhed og med et formål.

Hvad der derimod er bankerot ideologi er venstrefløjens dogmatiske kompleks af værdier. Så bankerot at Obama og mange andre med ham, end ikke kan sætte ord på det der skræmmer dem af frygt for at indrømme, deres eminente fejl og svigt. Dennis Prager diagnosticerer i Townhall venstrefløjens fortrængning af ondskabens realitet med udgangspunkt i netop Obama

There is no question about whether President Obama — along with Secretary of State John Kerry and the editorial pages of many newspapers — has a particular dislike of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

But there is another question: Why?

And the answer is due to an important rule of life that too few people are aware of:

Those who do not confront evil resent those who do.

Take the case at hand. The prime minister of Israel is at the forefront of the greatest battle against evil in our time — the battle against violent Muslims. No country other than Israel is threatened with extinction, and it is Iran and the many Islamic terror organizations that pose that threat.

It only makes sense, then, that no other country feels the need to warn the world about Iran and Islamic terror as much as Israel. That’s why when Benjamin Netanyahu speaks to the United Nations about the threat Iran poses to his country’s survival and about the metastasizing cancer of Islamist violence, he, unfortunately, stands alone.

Virtually everyone listening knows he is telling the truth. And most dislike him for it.

Appeasers hate those who confront evil.

Haviv Rettig Gur giver i Times of Israel et fremragende portræt af Obama og hans foragt for Israels premierminister Benjamin Netanyahu

At a recent gathering of the Israel Council on Foreign Relations, the eminent former director general of the Foreign Ministry, Prof. Shlomo Avineri, called Obama’s foreign policy “provincial.” It was a strange choice of words to describe the policies of a president with such a cosmopolitan outlook and so much eagerness to engage the world.

But Avineri had a point.

Obama’s remarkable memoir, “Dreams from My Father,” includes a powerful account of how his experiences as a young, keenly observant social organizer in South Chicago instilled in him the sensibility that would come to define his presidency.

In the book, he describes his reaction upon hearing the children of a poor Chicago neighborhood divided into “good kids and bad kids – the distinction didn’t compute in my head.” If a particular child “ended up in a gang or in jail, would that prove his essence somehow, a wayward gene…or just the consequences of a malnourished world?”

“In every society, young men are going to have violent tendencies,” an educator in one majority-black Chicago high school told him in the late 1980s. “Either those tendencies are directed and disciplined in creative pursuits or those tendencies destroy the young men, or the society, or both.”

The book is full of such ruminations, and they echo throughout Obama’s rhetoric as president. In his last speech to the UN General Assembly, he asserted that “if young people live in places where the only option is between the dictates of a state or the lure of an extremist underground, no counterterrorism strategy can succeed.”

For Obama, terrorism is, at root, a product of social disintegration. War may be necessary to contain the spread of Islamic State, for example, but only social reform can really cure it.

Add to this social vision the experience of a consummate outsider – half-white and half-black, with a childhood and a family scattered around the world – and one begins to see the profile of a man with an automatic empathy for the marginalized and an almost instinctive sense that the most significant problems of the world are rooted not in ideology but in oppressive social and economic structures that reinforce marginalization. This sensibility is broader than any economic orthodoxy, and is rooted in the hard experience of South Chicago.

After taking the helm of the world’s preeminent superpower in January 2009, this social organizer set about constructing a foreign policy that translated this consciousness into geopolitical action.

“The imperative that he and his advisors felt was not only to introduce a post-Bush narrative but also a post-post-9/11 understanding of what needed to be done in the world,” James Traub noted in a recent Foreign Policy essay. “They believed that the great issues confronting the United States were not traditional state-to-state questions, but new ones that sought to advance global goods and required global cooperation — climate change, energy supply, weak and failing states, nuclear nonproliferation. It was precisely on such issues that one needed to enlist the support of citizens as well as leaders.”

The world was one large Chicago, its essential problems not categorically different from those of South Chicago’s blacks, and the solutions to those problems were rooted in the same essential human capacity for overcoming social divisions and inequities. This was Obama’s “provincialism” — his vision of the world that favored the disadvantaged and downtrodden, that saw the ideological and political clashes between governments as secondary to the more universal and ultimately social crises that troubled a tumultuous world.

Republikanerne erkender ondskaben og forærede Netanyahu en bronzebuste af Churchill.

Olien presser ondskaben

Olieprisen falder i disse tider “not by any action (or inaction) of the Saudis” skriver Peter Coy og Matthew PhilipsBusiness Week “but by the American shale producers, who are simply producing all the oil they can to maximize their profits”.

The world’s biggest oil companies faced ruin in the summer of 1931. Crude prices had plummeted. Wildcatters were selling oil from the bonanza East Texas field for a nickel a barrel, cheaper than a bowl of chili. On Aug. 17, Governor Ross Sterling declared a state of insurrection in four counties and sent 1,100 National Guard troops to shut down the fields and bring order to the market. A month later the Railroad Commission of Texas handed out strict production quotas.

That heavy-handed intervention in the free market was remarkable enough. Even more remarkable was who pulled it off. The person in charge of shutting down the wildcatters, National Guard Brigadier General Jacob Wolters, was the general counsel of Texas Co., an ancestor of Chevron (CVX). And the Texas governor who ordered Wolters in was a past president of Humble Oil and Refining, a forerunner of ExxonMobil (XOM). Big Oil played hardball in those days.

Russell Gold beskriver i Wall Street Journal hvad der “has set up a battle for market share that could reshape the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and fundamentally change the global market for oil”

Vikas Dwivedi, energy strategist with Macquarie Research, says a widespread deceleration of global economic growth sapped some demand. At the same time, several Asian currencies weakened against the U.S. dollar.

The cost of filling up a gas tank in Indonesia, Thailand, India and Malaysia rose, just as these countries were phasing out fuel subsidies. In Jakarta and Mumbai, drivers cut back.

“The fact that supply growth was strong shouldn’t have taken anybody by surprise,” Mr. Dwivedi says. But demand for oil “just fell off a cliff. And bear markets are fed by negative surprises.”

Rising supply and falling demand both put downward pressure on prices. Throughout the summer, however, fears of violence in Iraq kept oil prices high as traders worried Islamic State fighters could cut the countrys oil output.

Then two events tipped the market. In late June, The Wall Street Journal reported the U.S. government had given permission for the first exports of U.S. oil in a generation. While the ruling was limited in scope, the market saw it as the first crack in a long-standing ban on crude exports. Not only was the U.S. importing fewer barrels of oil, it could soon begin exporting some, too. This news jolted oil markets; prices began to edge down from their summer peaks.

On July 1, Libyan rebels agreed to open Es Sider and Ras Lanuf, two key oil-export terminals that had been closed for a year. Libyan oil sailed across the Mediterranean Sea into Europe. Already displaced from the U.S. Gulf Coast and eastern Canada, Nigerian oil was soon replaced in Europe, too. Increasingly, shipments of Nigerian crude headed toward China.

Oil prices began to decline.

Og det er dårligt nyt for mange fjendtlige regimer og ideologier, hvis magt bygger på høje oliepriser. De små fracking firmaer i Texas ændrer vilkårerne

The stressed-out giants of today are Saudi Arabia and its fellows in the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries. The descendants of the 1930s wildcatters are today’s producers of oil from shale, who are driving down the world price of crude by flooding the market with millions of barrels of new oil each day. At $64 a barrel, Brent crude is down 44 percent since June. The twist is that today’s upstarts aren’t draining oil from neighbors’ plots, as happened in the 1930s. And OPEC can’t call in the National Guard against them. All it can do is gape at the falling price of crude and contemplate the destruction of their cartel at the hands of the Americans, whom they thought they had supplanted for good 40 years ago. Energy economist Philip Verleger says shale is to OPEC what the Apple II (AAPL) was to the IBM(IBM) mainframe.

(….)

Collectively, their breakneck production is breaking OPEC’s neck. This is the remorseless, leaderless free market at work.

OPEC used to be something to reckon with. For a brief period in the 1970s its influence was so strong, it could set prices to the penny for scores of crudes, says Bhushan Bahree, senior director for OPEC Middle East research at market researcher IHS (IHS). Its power has waned considerably, but until this year Saudi Arabia could still be counted on to cut output for the good of the cartel when gluts emerged. The Saudis’ refusal last month to take one for the team is historic, says Michael Wittner, head of oil research at Société Générale (GLE:FP) in New York. “That is such a tremendous, dramatic change,” he says. “It’s hard to think of a way to exaggerate how fundamental it is.”

Men det er ikke blot Rusland og regimerne i OPEC, der mærkes af den økonomiske nedtur og amerikansk driftighed. Også den grønne mafia går svære tider i møde, skriver The Independent

A new “era of cheap oil” would be good news for consumers and motorists – but analysts say the consequences for politics, industry and the climate could be even more radical.

(…)

“Renewable energy subsidies have been mostly sold to the public on the basis of the economic benefits,” said Peter Atherton, an energy analyst with Liberum Capital. “But the economic arguments hinged on the idea that fossil fuel prices would get more expensive, while expensive renewable subsidies would be able to come down over time. That’s looking doubtful now.”

Anne Robinson, director of consumer policy at the uSwitch price comparison website, said: “More subsidies are likely to be needed [for green power] as the gap between the cost of fossil fuel power and renewable power gets bigger.” The extra subsidies would be borne by households in the form of higher energy bills.

Green energy technologies such as solar and wind had been banking on sharp increases in fossil fuel prices to make them increasingly competitive and help to attract the huge amount of investment required to build renewable power plants. But that “economic case” is now in danger of being lost, with the environmental argument seen by many as being insufficient to drive through high levels of green energy investment.

Så der er da andet end Julen at glæde sig over.

En tidligere Associated Press journalist beskriver mediernes anti-israelske fortælling

Matti Friedman arbejdede for det store nyhedsbureau Associated Press i Jerusalem mellem 2006 og 2011 og skønt han erklærer sig selv som venstredrejet (liberal i amerikansk terminologi) kan han ikke længere stå inde for, hvad han betegner som “a hostile obsession with Israel” i den almindelige nyhedsdækning. I en længere og højst anbefalelsesværdig artikel fra august i år i Tablet Magazine fortæller han om den overeksponering af Israel med sin tidligere arbejdsgiver som illustrativt eksempel. At de havde mere end 40 medarbejdere til at dække Israel-Palæstina, hvilket var mere end resten af Mellemøsten til sammen og kun ved særlige lejligheder vægtes andet end Israel højest.

To offer a sense of scale: Before the outbreak of the civil war in Syria, the permanent AP presence in that country consisted of a single regime-approved stringer. The AP’s editors believed, that is, that Syria’s importance was less than one-40th that of Israel. I don’t mean to pick on the AP—the agency is wholly average, which makes it useful as an example. The big players in the news business practice groupthink, and these staffing arrangements were reflected across the herd. Staffing levels in Israel have decreased somewhat since the Arab uprisings began, but remain high. And when Israel flares up, as it did this summer, reporters are often moved from deadlier conflicts. Israel still trumps nearly everything else.

The volume of press coverage that results, even when little is going on, gives this conflict a prominence compared to which its actual human toll is absurdly small. In all of 2013, for example, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict claimed 42 lives—that is, roughly the monthly homicide rate in the city of Chicago. Jerusalem, internationally renowned as a city of conflict, had slightly fewer violent deaths per capita last year than Portland, Ore., one of America’s safer cities. In contrast, in three years the Syrian conflict has claimed an estimated 190,000 lives, or about 70,000 more than the number of people who have ever died in the Arab-Israeli conflict since it began a century ago.

News organizations have nonetheless decided that this conflict is more important than, for example, the more than 1,600 women murdered in Pakistan last year (271 after being raped and 193 of them burned alive), the ongoing erasure of Tibet by the Chinese Communist Party, the carnage in Congo (more than 5 million dead as of 2012) or the Central African Republic, and the drug wars in Mexico (death toll between 2006 and 2012: 60,000), let alone conflicts no one has ever heard of in obscure corners of India or Thailand. They believe Israel to be the most important story on earth, or very close.

Det der er vigtigt i en Israel-Palæstina historie, argumenterer Friedman, er Israel. Palæstinenserne anerkendes ikke som selvstændige aktører  og eksisterer kun som passive ofre. Korruption er altid interessant, men kun israelsk. Friedman fortæller at han ikke kunne komme igennem med en artikel om palæstinensisk korruption fordi “that was not the story”. Således angribes enhver skævhed i det israelske samfund nidkært; Israelsks lovforslag til pressefrihed, antallet af ortodokse jøder, bosættelser, kønssegregering osv, mens der er meget få artikler om lignende palæstinensiske forhold.

Hamas formålserklæring, som handler om et udslette Israel og alle jøderne og deres graven terrortunneller ind under Israel er ikke vigtigt for medier og nyhedsbureauer, men det er derimod Israels angreb på Hamas. De fleste rapportere, siger Friedman, opfatter essensen af deres arbejde at rapportere om israelske overgreb: “That’s the essens of the Israel story”!

Og denne fortælling sættes ind i den ramme der hedder Israel-Palæstina konflikten eller variationer heraf. Her er det Israel, der er den store og dermed aggressoren hvor sandheden er at jøderne kun optager 0,2% af Mellemøsten og der er 5 millioner jøder overfor 300 mio. arabere. Det var den samlede arabiske verden, der ville udslette Israel fra begyndelsen og den palæstinensiske sag blev først interessant efter 1967 krigen, hvor Israel indtog de resterende områder fra delingsplanen fra Ægypten og Jordan, der ellers havde annekteret dem uden protester fra den arabiske verden.

For centuries, stateless Jews played the role of a lightning rod for ill will among the majority population. They were a symbol of things that were wrong. Did you want to make the point that greed was bad? Jews were greedy. Cowardice? Jews were cowardly. Were you a Communist? Jews were capitalists. Were you a capitalist? In that case, Jews were Communists. Moral failure was the essential trait of the Jew. It was their role in Christian tradition—the only reason European society knew or cared about them in the first place.

(…)

When the people responsible for explaining the world to the world, journalists, cover the Jews’ war as more worthy of attention than any other, when they portray the Jews of Israel as the party obviously in the wrong, when they omit all possible justifications for the Jews’ actions and obscure the true face of their enemies, what they are saying to their readers—whether they intend to or not—is that Jews are the worst people on earth. The Jews are a symbol of the evils that civilized people are taught from an early age to abhor. International press coverage has become a morality play starring a familiar villain.

(…)

You don’t need to be a history professor, or a psychiatrist, to understand what’s going on. Having rehabilitated themselves against considerable odds in a minute corner of the earth, the descendants of powerless people who were pushed out of Europe and the Islamic Middle East have become what their grandparents were—the pool into which the world spits. The Jews of Israel are the screen onto which it has become socially acceptable to project the things you hate about yourself and your own country. The tool through which this psychological projection is executed is the international press.

Men det er på alle måder den forkerte historie der fortælles, skriver Friedman. Reportere ser alt gennem en israelsk optik og ser derfor ikke islams undertrykkelse og forfølgelse af minoriteter, hvor der med ISIS nu er tale om folkemord

A knowledgeable observer of the Middle East cannot avoid the impression that the region is a volcano and that the lava is radical Islam, an ideology whose various incarnations are now shaping this part of the world. Israel is a tiny village on the slopes of the volcano. Hamas is the local representative of radical Islam and is openly dedicated to the eradication of the Jewish minority enclave in Israel, just as Hezbollah is the dominant representative of radical Islam in Lebanon, the Islamic State in Syria and Iraq, the Taliban in Afghanistan and Pakistan, and so forth.

Hamas is not, as it freely admits, party to the effort to create a Palestinian state alongside Israel. It has different goals about which it is quite open and that are similar to those of the groups listed above. Since the mid 1990s, more than any other player, Hamas has destroyed the Israeli left, swayed moderate Israelis against territorial withdrawals, and buried the chances of a two-state compromise. That’s one accurate way to frame the story.

Men i mediernes og nyhedsbureauernes fortælling er Israel vulkanen, en vulkan der ikke eksisterer i den sammen geopolitiske virkelighed som resten af Melleøsten. Historen om Israel er ikke om nyheder men om “something else”.

Victor Davies Hanson om Obamaæraen, der rinder ud

Hanson skrev forleden i National Review at den amerikanske vensfløj (liberalism) lå i ideologiske ruiner. “Barack Obama has accomplished, in the fashion of British prime minister Stanley Baldwin in the Twenties and Thirties, will be to avoid minor confrontations on his watch — if he is lucky — while ensuring catastrophic ones for his successors.” konkluderede han og pegede på de 11 mio. illegale indvandrere, som, hvis det står til Obama, skal have amerikansk pas. Hanson minder ikke blot om at prisen først og fremmest betales af den amerikanske middelklasse og de nye jobsøgende, men at de iblandt de illegale, hvis tilstedeværelse i USA i første omgang er gjort mulig at de har brudt amerikansk lov findes en stor minoritet, der ikke deltager aktivt eller lovlydigt i det amerikanske samfund.

Henover den sekulære dyrkelse af klimaet “that filled a deep psychological longing for some sort of transcendent meaning” til Obamas opdyrkelse af racestridigheder fra Trayvon Martin til Michael Brown, godt assisteret af mediernes memer

After the disastrous Obama tenure, the U.S. will either return to the melting pot and the idea that race and tribe are incidental, not essential, to our characters, or it will eventually go the way of all dysfunctional societies for which that was not true — Austria-Hungary, Yugoslavia, Rwanda, Iraq.

Og Hanson ender med følgende skudsmål

Obama will go down in history as presiding over the most corrupt administration of the last half-century, when historians finally collate the IRS, VA, GSA, and Secret Service scandals; the erosion of constitutional jurisprudence; the serial untruths about Benghazi, amnesty, and Obamacare; the harassment of journalists; the record shakedown of Wall Street lucre in 2008 and 2012; and the flood of lobbyists into and out of the Obama administration. Eric Holder – with his jet-setting to sporting events on the public dime, spouting inflammatory racialist rhetoric, politicizing the Justice Department, selectively enforcing settled law, and being held in contempt of Congress for withholding subpoenaed documents — managed what one might have thought impossible: He has made Nixon’s attorney general John Mitchell seem a minor rogue in comparison.

Men det er udenrigspolitikken der har lidt værst, midt i en periode med stigende udfordringer. Hanson skriv i går ligeledes i National Review at der er paralleller

We are entering a similarly dangerous interlude. Collapsing oil prices — a good thing for most of the world — will make troublemakers like oil-exporting Iran and Russia take even more risks.

Terrorist groups such as the Islamic State feel that conventional military power has no effect on their agendas. The West is seen as a tired culture of Black Friday shoppers and maxed-out credit-card holders.

NATO is underfunded and without strong American leadership. It can only hope that Vladimir Putin does not invade a NATO country such as Estonia, rather than prepare for the likelihood that he will, and soon.

The United States has slashed its defense budget to historic lows. It sends the message abroad that friendship with America brings few rewards while hostility toward the U.S. has even fewer consequences.

The bedrock American relationships with staunch allies such as Australia, Britain, Canada, Japan, and Israel are fading. Instead, we court new belligerents that don’t like the United States, such as Turkey and Iran.

Og

Under such conditions, history’s wars usually start when some opportunistic — but often relatively weaker — power does something unwise on the gamble that the perceived benefits outweigh the risks. That belligerence is only prevented when more powerful countries collectively make it clear to the aggressor that it would be suicidal to start a war that would end in the aggressor’s sure defeat.

What is scary in these unstable times is that a powerful United States either thinks that it is weak or believes that its past oversight of the postwar order was either wrong or too costly — or that after Afghanistan, Iraq, and Libya, America is no longer a force for positive change.

A large war is looming, one that will be far more costly than the preventive vigilance that might have stopped it.

“Vi vælger at rejse til Månen” proklamerede Kennedy på Rice University i 1962, “Ikke fordi det er let, men fordi det er svært!”.

[B]ecause that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win

For Kennedy æraen handlede det om at presse sig selv mod nye mål. “Yes we can” derimod sigter til det vi allerede kan. Det fornægter på sin vis ‘american exeptionalism’ i stedet for den teoretiske akademikers drøm om at kunne omdefinere verden væk fra dens iboende problemer. “Yes we can” siger ikke meget andet end at man vil gøre, hvad der er let, frem for, hvad der er rigtigt.

Martin Lidegaard beskyldes for uvidenhed

Bent Jensen har i Jyllands-Posten ikke tiltro til Martin Lidegaards basale viden om Mellemøsten og vil gerne vide, hvad Lidegaard egentlig mener Israel skal gøre

Hver gang jeg ser og hører ham tale så tilsyneladende forstandigt og overbevisende, spørger jeg mig selv: Ved manden i virkeligheden, hvad han taler om? Er han ordentligt inde i sagerne? Har han læst på lektien, og har hans embedsmænd forsynet ham med alle de nødvendige oplysninger om konfliktens rødder – og jeg understreger alle? Eller lader han blot munden løbe?

Det meste af Mellemøsten befinder sig i et omfattende kaos. Israels nabostat Syrien er hærget af en blodig borgerkrig, der foreløbig har kostet 200.000 mennesker livet og drevet millioner på flugt. Oprørsstyrkerne i Syrien har svoret at ville udslette Israel. Det samme har Assad-regimet i Damaskus. For nylig flygtede de udstationerede FN-styrker fra syrisk territorium. Hvorhen? Til Israel, hvor de fandt sikkerhed.

(…)

Jeg synes i fuld alvor, at Lidegaard skulle forholde sig seriøst til de reelle problemer, der her er omtalt. Og der er flere endnu. Hvorfor behandler han palæstinenserne som uansvarlige børn? Hvorfor stiller han ikke krav til dem, hvis de vil have egen stat? Hvorfor siger Lidegaard & Co ikke til både Hamas-lederne og til Abbas og hans mafia i Ramallah, at de skal standse myrderierne på jøder og indstille deres anti-jødiske hadkampagner i skolebøger og i palæstinensiske medier – inklusive de officielle trykte og elektroniske Hamas- og PS-medier.

Som ansvarlig minister ved Lidegaard naturligvis, at disse afskyelige hadkampagner kører hele tiden. Men hvordan forestiller han sig så, at der skal kunne blive fred og fordragelighed mellem jøder og arabere på det diminutive område, som Israel og selvstyreområdet udgør, når den ene part hele tiden dyrker hadet til den anden part, nægter dens ret til eksistens og vil have en jødefri zone?

Samtidig skrev en foruroliget Flemming Rose ligeledes i Jyllands-Posten om Lidegaards manglende viden om Rusland

I weekenden bragte Berlingske et interview med udenrigsminister Martin Lidegaard. Ministeren afslørede her en sjælden uvidenhed om russisk økonomis tilstand, effekten af sanktioner, og hvad der venter i den nærmeste fremtid. Interviewet var aftalt på forhånd, så der er ikke tale om, at Lidegaard uden varsel fik stukket en mikrofon i hovedet.

Det gør hans udtalelser foruroligende, for hvis kendskabet til Rusland, Danmarks største sikkerhedspolitiske udfordring, ikke er større, så er risikoen stor for at begå fatale fejl. En anden mulighed er selvfølgelig, at Lidegaard bevidst misinformerer, men det gør det ikke bedre. Om russisk økonomi siger han:

»Noget af det mest bekymrende er, at den russiske økonomi er i frit fald. Vi står over for en reel risiko for russisk økonomisk kollaps. Det skyldes vores sanktioner kombineret med en stærkt faldende oliepris. Underskuddet i staten stiger, inflationen stiger voldsomt. Den almindelige russers købekraft bliver udhulet dag for dag.«

I fredags, altså nogenlunde samtidig med at Lidegaard fremsatte sin dystre vurdering, noterede The Wall Street Journal, at Rusland med en vækst på 0,8 pct. i årets første ti måneder har klaret sig bedre end ventet, på niveau med eurozonen. Det får ikke én til at tænke på en økonomi i frit fald.

I virkeligheden passer Lidegaards udtalelser på et andet land i regionen, nemlig Ukraine, der befinder sig på randen af en finansiel nedsmeltning.

Lidegaard må lægge sig lidt mere i selen, hvis virkeligheden skal moraliseres væk. Begge indlæg bør læses i deres helhed, hvis man vil vide mere end Lidegaard.

Robert Spencer om hvorvidt Islamisk Stat er islamisk

Træt af at være forkælet

I Ekstra Bladet kunne man læse noget så fantastisk som hvad der gjorde en global meningsdanner træt. Svaret var det at være ung i Danmark. Bemærkelsesværdigt handlede det ikke om at drikke  mange øl, noget unge danskere er gode til og som gør een træt. Nej, den globale meningsdanner er træt af at Anders Fogh ladet ordet ’rundkredspædagogik’ så negativt, at Morten Østergaard har skåret i SUen, at Women against Feminism bliver større, træt af multinationale selskaber og PiaKjærsgaard.

Den globale meningsdanner er 18 år og hedder Sophie W og hun er global meningsdanner for Mellemfolkeligt Samvirke. Jeg ved ærligt talt ikke, hvad det betyder, men det er ironisk både at høre, hvad der gør unge mennesker trætte og at det globale er rent danske forhold. Vi kan trøste med at ungdom kun er en overgang. Om få år, og de går hurtigt min pige, vil du savne ungdommen og den ulidelige træthed når du som os andre ruiner kæmper med nedslidthed.

Men vi vil også komme med en lille advarsel, hvis Sophie W skulle bevæge sig uden for sit mellemfolkelige samvirke, for danske unge har det globalt set bedre end så mange andre. Et par eksempler fra samme dags rundtur på nettet viser at det også kan være trættende at være ung inder i England som Daily Mail skriver

This photo shows the horrific injuries a Sikh woman suffered after being attacked by her father-in-law because he thought she was having an affair with a Muslim man.

Jageer Mirgind was left blind and scarred for life after 51-year-old Manjit Mirgind slashed her wrists and stabbed her in the eyes screaming ‘I am going to kill you’.

Mrs Mirgind’s children, just three and six years old, watched the horrific attack at their mother’s home in Kensington Gardens, Ilford, East London, and pleaded with their grandfather to stop.

The mother has been left partially-sighted in both eyes while the children can no longer sleep alone and have recurring nightmares.

The crazed attacker wrongly believed his daughter-in-law was ’sleeping with a Paki’ and that she had ‘ruined his family’, Snaresbrook Crown Court heard.

article-2652927-1ea29d7f00000578-584_634x425

Det er også trættende at være ung fra negerland som The Express skriver

The mutilation, a traditional practice in the west African republic of Cameroon, aims to deter unwanted male attention, pregnancy and rape by delaying the signs that a girl is becoming a woman.

Experts believe the custom is being practised among the several thousand Cameroonians living in Britain. Schools are training staff to look out for signs of the barbaric practice. The move follows heightened awareness of female genital mutilation.

Campaigners want to see the same prominence given to other forms of cultural abuse, such as breast ironing. Margaret Nyuydzewira, co-founder of the charity CAME Women’s And Girl’s Development Organisation, says authorities need to take action faster than they have on stopping FGM in the UK.

Trættende at være ung i Iran

Trættende af være ung pige i Ægypten

Vi frygter at ikke danske unge ville møde Sophie Ws træthed med alt fra manglende empati henover dummeflade til en decideret dragt prygl.

batman

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