Free Republic

You will hear sufficient people lamenting, praising, critiquing, translating, interpreting and every other “ing” of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas’s United Nation speech. I will spare you the long winded explanations on what he said, what was true, and what was misdirection, and will concentrate on one simple paragraph, and only one small idea out of said paragraph. First, here is the translation of the paragraph from around the midpoint of Abbas’s speech, "Yet, because we believe in peace and because of our conviction in international legitimacy, and because we had the courage to make difficult decisions for our people,...

The recent murder of one Jewish worshiper and injuring of four other worshipers, one critically, in a hail of sustained gunfire initiated by the Palestinian Authority Police assigned to guard Joseph’s Tomb sends an ominous message of what sort of treatment to expect should Jewish holy sites in Judea and Samaria be turned over to Palestinian control. Taking this latest overt belligerence towards Jewish worshipers visiting a Jewish holy site, some of which include Joseph’s Tomb, the Cave of the Patriarchs, Rachel’s Tomb, the Peace on Israel Synagogue in Jericho, the Temple Mount, and the Kotel, reveals the unsuitability of...

The precedent of the imposition of a No Fly Zone over Libya to assert the “Right to Protect” (R2P) the civilian population from Gadhafi forces has led to its predictable end with the Arab League now demanding the United Nations to send member nations’ forces to impose a No Fly Zone under R2P the civilians in Gaza from Israeli air strikes. The Arab League has labeled the Israeli retaliatory strikes on terror targets as brutal. Color me shocked as who could have seen this coming down the pike from miles away. Does this mean the Arab League called for the...

There has been fluctuating levels changing with each news report or editorial last seen of the possibility that the Muslim countries where leaders are under siege or have already stepped down will soon be holding democratic elections to decide the makeup of their governing bodies and leaders. Much of the reaction to the already planned elections in Egypt and the tantalizing possibilities of elections in even more Muslim countries have been widely positive despite absolutely no indication that such elections will turn out to the advantage of the Western democratic based governments and peoples. One need only look back at...

We often hear, most often from those on the left, that in order to prevent terrorism we must address the root causes. When asked the obvious question, what are the root causes of terrorism, what drives people to become suicide bombing murderers or others to slice the throats of an entire family in their sleep, including even the youngest of children, they claim it is a complex issue with many and varied reasons driving terrorism. They point to poverty, lack of available employment, poor living conditions, lack of education, feelings of persecution, or any of a myriad of pet causes...

This morning Israel came under a barrage of fifty Mortars fired in a massive attack from the Gaza Strip. Hamas proudly took full credit for this escalation. Apparently Hamas does not have any apprehensions about being speedily restocked and fully supplied with the tools used in the continued terror campaign against Israel. They are fully confident that the necessary armaments will flow freely from Egypt with the new management (read Muslim Brotherhood and fellow sympathizers) since the overthrow of Mubarak. I would hope that those in power and commanding the intelligence networks had figured this would be the case just...

This past week had sufficient tragic and deadly news. Between the earthquakes and tsunamis striking Japan, destroying homes and lives with a still mounting death toll and damage assessments yet to be completed, and the horrific terror attack in the Israeli town of Itamar that brutally murdered both parents and three of their children using butchery beyond imagination and contrary to all things humanely civilized. What struck Japan with such ferocity and total devastation was an act of nature and thus unstoppable. What struck Israel was the act of human beings filled with a vile and violent hatred that was...

Almost everywhere you look, somebody is talking, writing, discussing, or editorializing about cutting spending responsibly or drastically or intelligently or across the board. The problem is that nobody is proposing cutting spending in a way that will reduce the national debt. Even the most austere proponents simply desire to pass a Constitutional Amendment that requires the Federal Government to have a balanced budget. Unfortunately, even a Balanced Budget Amendment would increase the debt as most proponents exempt interest on the debt and off budget spending from being included when balancing the budget. The Balanced Budget Amendment would only require the...

The world certainly seems overly determined to form a Palestinian State with at least part of Jerusalem as the Capital and borders as close as possible to the 1949 Armistice line, also known as the Green Line. One of the major problems with this concept is that when the Green Line was established, it was stated that it was not to be construed or used as an actual boundary which was to be decided through negotiations. By comparison, all of the other problems other than the claimed Arab “Right of Return” are dwarfed by the tactical vulnerability using the Green...

When many people think of Islam they tend to believe that which they have been told endlessly by politicians, journalists, academics, and other sources of presumed authority that Islam is simply a religion that, like most religions we know, values peace and shares many of our values in the West. Nothing could be further from the truth. If I was pressed to define Islam in terms that many in the West are far more familiar with, I would equate it with Communism with the difference being instead of the superiority of the State, the Laws of the State, and the...

Every time I try to write anything more about the calls for change and general unrest currently sweeping through the Muslim world, I hit a brick wall as my fears of where these revolts will lead is frightening. Unlike National Security Adviser James Clapper, a man who seems as clueless as is humanly possible, I understand the practice by Muslims of Taqiya to deceive and mislead non-Muslims of their true intentions. With this in mind, I have listened to what representatives of the Muslim Brotherhood and other dissident groups from Egypt have had to say in English and found much...

When writing about Lebanon I get a nervous feeling that but for the grace of G-d, this could happen to Israel. Lebanon has had one of the roughest histories among all the nations. The disintegration of order and sanity began with the arrival of Yasser Arafat and the PLO after they were cast out of Jordan after the events now called Black September where Yasser Arafat used his followers to overthrow the government in Jordan. Soon after being exiled to Lebanon everything boiled over. Yasser Arafat again made an attempt to take over the government in Lebanon while using southern...

There is a seemingly constant stream of news reports listing the newest and various misspeaks, gaffs, inaccuracies, and purported misuse of code words or special phrases such as the recent manufactured uproar over her using “blood libel’ in reference to the media placing blame for the Arizona shootings by a madman on her use of bullseyes on a campaign map to show seats considered competitive. Every week, sometimes daily, Mrs. Palin is dragged before the court of public opinion over something she said that somebody, anybody found distasteful, erroneous, or simply questionable, often on the flimsiest of grounds. But why...

The idea that United Nations or NATO troops be placed in the West Bank and Gaza to keep the peace, stop terrorist attacks, and enforce an Israeli-Palestinian Peace Agreement would be a hysterical joke if the results of such a ridiculous plan would produce such tragic ends. It is not like this half-baked idea has not been tried and proven to be worse than useless because such is the case currently with the UNIFIL troops farcical ineffectiveness at reigning in Hezballah from rebuilding and rearming without even a single reported action impeding their efforts. We saw exactly how effective international...

One of the pressing problems and consistent complaints concerning Israel is the near total lack of Press and News reports displaying Israel in a good light. The way most news coverage of the Israel Muslim/Arab confrontation skews each situation favoring the anti-Israeli agenda is absolutely beyond reason and simply revolting. Partly, a reason for this derives from the fact that Israel is an open and free society. This allows every internal argument, varied demonstrations, and every side represented within the Israeli society to be revealed, warts and all. The same openness does not exist in the areas under Palestinian control....

The Looming Iran Venezuela Crisis The knowledge of cooperation between Iran and Venezuela in turning much of Latin America against the international interests of the United States, Israel, and the West has been growing increasingly obvious for quite some time. Also glaringly obvious has been the complete lack of a plan to address this situation and preventing the coming cascade of opposition to American interests in our hemisphere. Not paying much mind to Iran in the Middle East is one thing, ignoring their infectious presence on our borders is completely different. We have sat complacently watching as Iran’s President Ahmadinejad...

We keep hearing the argument that we have to tax the rich. We hear how the rich have all this wealth and that because of their great amounts of wealth; they can afford to pay more taxes. But here is the problem; we tax income, not wealth. Here is an example that will hopefully clarify the situation. We have two families. The first family has five million dollars in savings accounts in numerous banks earning two per cent interest and no other income. This gives them an income of one hundred thousand dollars a year. Living on their family estate...

The Middle East is usually full of deception, duplicity, and backstabbing in its political both intra-country and inter-country. There is often a huge gap between actions and words. At times, it appears that nobody says what they mean and nobody means what they say. So, it comes as little surprise that the Israeli-Palestinian negotiations should go through an intermediary, the United States, and that there is deceit galore, at levels beyond anything I can remember. The Palestinian Authority in their dealings with the United States perpetrates the first deceit, and then there is the deceit in the approach and manipulation...

Between President Mahmoud Abbas, Prime Minister Salam Fayyad, and Head Negotiators Yasser Abed Rabbo and Saeb Erekat, the Palestinian spokespeople have threatened every conceivable position regarding the moribund talks with Israel over the past couple of weeks. These threats include but are not limited to, unilaterally declaring an independent Palestinian State along the border of the Green Line, taking the entire negotiations to the United Nations for a final dispensation, dissolving the Palestinian Authority and throwing the whole of the West Bank back on Israel to maintain, and cutting all relations and cooperation with Israel declaring the Roadmap and Oslo...

If the result of the current attempts to birth another Palestinian country in addition to Jordan was not a Middle East war, the whole situation might be considered comical. All one needs to recognize are the results of each stage of the path that has led to the current positions and then extrapolate on to the actual forming of this new state and you will quickly recognize the complete absurdity of the whole endeavor. What has been accomplished thus far? Before the great minds of the world cooked up this wondrous idea to bring back Yasser Arafat to lead the...