LCCC ENGLISH DAILY NEWS
BULLETIN
December 02/16
Compiled
& Prepared by: Elias Bejjani
The
Bulletin's Link on the lccc Site
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Bible Quotations For Today
But many who are first will be
last, and the last will be first
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Mark 10/28-31/:”Peter began to
say to Jesus, ‘Look, we have left everything and followed you.’Jesus said, ‘Truly I tell you, there is no one who
has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or
fields, for my sake and for the sake of the good news, who will not receive a
hundredfold now in this age houses, brothers and sisters, mothers and children,
and fields, with persecutions and in the age to come eternal life.
To everyone who conquers I will
give some of the hidden manna, and I will give a white stone
Book of Revelation 02/12-17/:”‘To the angel
of the church in
Titles For Latest
LCCC Bulletin analysis & editorials from miscellaneous sources published on
December 01-02/16
Iran’s uproar/Mshari Al Thaydi/Al
Arabiya/December 01/16
The Israeli-Palestinian Impasse After Trump/How Netanyahu needs to emulate
Trump in Israel./Mordechai Nisan/Frontpage/November
25, 2016
Germany Submits to Sharia Law/"A parallel
justice system has established itself in Germany"/ Soeren
Kern/Gatestone Institute//December 01/16
Keith Ellison - The Wrong Man at the Wrong Time/Alan M. Dershowitz/Gatestone
Institute/ /December 01/16
France: Islamists Target Transportation Companies/Yves Mamou/Gatestone
Institute /December 01/16
Syria in Crisis A Turning Point in Aleppo/Aron
Lund/Carnegie/ /December 01/16
Is Israel being pulled into Syrian war/Ben Caspit/Al
Monitor/December 01/16
The KGB’s Middle East Files: The fight against Zionism and world Jewry/ Ronen
Bergman/Ynetnews/Published: 01.12.16
Titles For Latest
Lebanese Related News published on on December
01-02/16
Lebanon: Government Formation Gets More Complicated
Jumblat: New Government Still in 'Quarantine'
Report: Imposing De-Facto Cabinet Faces No-Confidence Vote
Report: LF, Democratic Gathering Finish Deliberations over Shares in Cabinet
3.3 Earthquake Felt across Eastern Tyre
Lebanese Judge Orders Resumption of al-Manar
Broadcast via Arabsat
Australia PM Rejects Linking Lebanese Migration with Terrorism
Raad: National Consensus Cabinet Should be Formed, No
Need For Further Delay
ISF Member Shot Dead in Choueifat
Argentina First Lady unveils Khalil Gebran statue in Buenos Aires
Jawish Oglu, Steinmeier in Lebanon to congratulate Aoun,
meet officials
Qabalan receives Ambassador of Czech Republic
Araiji represents Salam at opening of 60th Arab Book
Fair
Sami Gemayel, Egyptian Ambassador dwell on current
juncture
Southerners sense quake, no damages reported
Fathali upon Iranian Embassy's blast commemoration:
Terrorism will not trounce our determination
Harb opens eAge2016 Conference at AUB
Titles For Latest LCCC Bulletin For
Miscellaneous Reports And News published on on December
01-02/16
UN: ‘No red lines left to cross in Syria’
Russia: No aim at stopping Aleppo air strikes
Lavrov Denies Russia, Syria Role in Turkish Deaths
Russia Proposes Four Humanitarian Corridors for East Aleppo
UN, Iranians: the nuclear deal has increased human rights violations in Iran
Report: Iranian arms sent to Yemen via Somalia
WSJ editorial: Focus on Iran’s 1988 massacre
Turning Blind Eye to the Crimes of the Iranian Regime Militants in Iraq
Nowhere on the Planet 'Land Looting' Is as Prevalent as in Iran
Francois Hollande will not seek re-election as
president of France
Human Rights Groups Condemn Persecution Of Iranian Christians
Iraqi Christian Family's Search For Three-Year-Old Daughter Taken By ISIS
Aleppo: As fighting rages, everything must be done to protect civilians
Saudi Rights Activist Jail Term Hiked to '11 Years'
Heavy Rain Piles Misery on Mosul Displaced
U.N. Envoy Meets Yemen's Hadi in New Peace Bid
Nearly 2,000 Members of Iraqi Forces Killed in November, Says U.N.
Abbas is Israel's Top 'Ideological' Foe, Says
Netanyahu Ally
Links From Jihad Watch Site for on December
01-02/16
Gitmo prisoner reveals: Saudi “deradicalization program” is really a jihad training
program
Saudi
woman goes outside without hijab, receives multiple
death threats
Congress
unanimously passes new Iran sanctions, ignoring Obama administration threats
Rep.
Peter King: “Real problem with the Somali community as far as having a large
number of Al-Shabaab supporters”
Robert
Spencer in PJ Media: Who Will Blink First: Iran, or Trump?
OSU’s
crackdown on “Islamophobia” proves ineffective in
stopping Muslim migrant’s jihad attack
San
Bernardino police chief: Jihad murderers motivated by Christmas decorations at
party
Pakistan:
Muslim murders his teenage daughter and her male cousin in Islamic honor killing
Iranian
vessel points weapon at U.S. helicopter
CIA’s
Brennan says tearing up the Iran deal would be “height of folly”
Vatican
buses promote trips to Jerusalem, “Palestine”
Links From Christian Today Site for on December 01-02/16
Ancient Lead Tablets Said To Contain Portrait Of Jesus Could Be
Genuine, Say Scientists
Iraqi
Christian Family's Search For Three-Year-Old Daughter Taken By ISIS
Wayne
Grudem Has Changed His Mind On The Trinity - Just Not
Enough, Say Critics
Growing
Number Of Muslim Children Being Sent To Catholic Schools
300,000
Mosul Children At Serious Risk After Water Supply Cut Off
Pope
Francis Pleads For An End To The Scandal Of Child Soldiering
Christian
Cemetery Vandalised In Israel
Theresa
May: Christians Are Free To Speak About Their Faith
Off
With Their Hats: Cardinals Who Queried Pope's Teaching Could Be Demoted
Should
Doctors Be Allowed To Euthanise An Alcoholic?
New
Photos Reveal Shocking Horrors Of Life In North
Korea's Brutal Prison Camps
Syria's
Children Are 'Trapped In A Living Nightmare' Says Aid Head
Human
Rights Groups Condemn Persecution Of Iranian Christians
Latest Lebanese Related News
published on December 01/16
Lebanon: Government
Formation Gets More Complicated
Youssef Diab/Asharq
Al Awsat/December 01/Beirut – Several obstacles are
still hampering the formation of a new Lebanese Cabinet, in the wake of
difficult conditions set by the major political forces, which are battling over
“sovereign portfolios” and other key ministries. Parliamentary and political
sources said that obstacles preventing Prime Minister-designate Saad Hariri from forming the government had regional
dimensions, as some regional forces were trying to exhaust the influence of
President Michel Aoun in the early phase of his
tenure. Meanwhile, Speaker Nabih Berri
stressed the need to speed up Cabinet formation, adding that he has offered all
facilitations to help the premier-designate assume his mission. “The problem is
not with me; it is somewhere else,” Berri said on
Wednesday during his weekly meeting with lawmakers. The Lebanese speaker has
been insisting on keeping the ministries of public works and finance for his
bloc, while the major obstacle lies in the share of MP Suleiman Franjieh, who said he would not participate in the
government unless he receives a key ministry, such as the public works, energy
or telecommunications. However, Franjieh’s demands
are being rejected by the two major Christian blocs represented by Aoun’s Free Patriotic Movement and the Lebanese Forces.
Liberation and Development Bloc MP Ayoub Hemayed said that Berri was
seeking to remove all obstacles hindering the new government’s formation. Hemayed told Asharq
Al-Awsat newspaper that once the FPM decides to give
the culture ministry to Franjieh, Berri’s
bloc would propose to exchange the public works ministry with the ministry of
culture to meet Franjieh’s demands. “It is clear that
the FPM is only committed to the Lebanese Forces’ demands, while it is trying
to throw the ball in others’ court,” he stated. For his part, FPM MP Hikmat Deeb said that the public
works ministry was the major obstacle to the government’s formation. He
stressed that Berri was insisting on keeping the
ministry for his bloc. Future Bloc MP Ammar Houri said that current obstacles had both internal and
regional dimensions.
Jumblat: New Government Still in 'Quarantine'
Naharnet/December 01/16/Progressive Socialist
party leader MP Walid Jumblat
made a sarcastic comment on Thursday about the delayed efforts to form a new
cabinet, following the election of a president and the designation of a PM,
saying that the new government is still insulated. “It seems that the virtual
government is still in the quarantine,” said Jumblat
via Twitter. Since his designation on October 3 to line-up a cabinet, Prime
Minister-designate Saad Hariri is still facing
obstacles to complete his mission and bring together a line-up that balances
Report: Imposing De-Facto Cabinet Faces No-Confidence
Vote
Naharnet/December 01/16/In line with the efforts to
form a cabinet 28 days after the designation of Prime Minister-designate Saad Hariri, reports published in al-Rai
daily on Thursday said that the parliament may not give its vote of confidence
shall a de-facto cabinet be formed. “Choosing to form a de-facto cabinet might,
in the worst case, make it face a no-confidence vote of the parliament,”
unnamed sources told the daily on condition of anonymity. On Wednesday, reports
said that President Michel Aoun is not pleased with
the stalled efforts to form a new government one month after his election and
is mulling the formation of a “realistic” cabinet shall the process witness
further stalemates. They added that the President will not accept the
repetition of bitter experiences that lingered during the previous term of
President Michel Suleiman when the formation process took months to complete,
and is therefore mulling the formation of a "realistic cabinet not a
de-facto cabinet" as one of the options. Wrangling between political
parties over the distribution of ministerial portfolios have
stalled the efforts of Prime Minister-designate Saad
Hariri to line-up a new cabinet. Last month, the parliament elected Aoun, a former general, as president ending a
two-and-half-year deadlock that left
Report: LF, Democratic Gathering Finish
Deliberations over Shares in Cabinet
Naharnet/December 01/16/The endeavors
to line-up a cabinet are focusing now on the share that will be allotted to the
Marada Movement after an agreement was reached with
regard to the portfolios that will be given to the Lebanese Forces and the
Democratic Gathering bloc, media reports said. The efforts exerted to overcome
the obstacles are focusing now on the portfolio that will be assigned to the Marada which will probably be the health ministry. Sources
said that the only two parties which fulfilled the requirements and are out of
the discussions now are the LF and the Democratic Gathering, An Nahar daily reported Thursday. The daily dubbed as
“baseless” reports claiming that a conflict over the public works ministry
lingers between the AMAL movement and the LF. As there is an agreement between
Prime Minister-designate Saad Hariri and Speaker Nabih Berri to compensate for the
Lebanese Forces and assign them with four portfolios --public works, social
affairs, media and the Deputy PM post-- instead of a sovereign portfolio. Head
of the LF Samir Geagea has
provided Hariri with the names to be assigned for the LF ministerial shares and
so did MP Walid Jumblat for
the shares allotted for the Democratic Gathering. In October, the parliament
elected Aoun, a former general, as president ending a
two-and-half-year deadlock that left
3.3 Earthquake Felt across Eastern Tyre
Naharnet/December 01/16/A minor 3.3-magnitude
earthquake was felt Thursday across the eastern
Lebanese Judge Orders Resumption of
al-Manar Broadcast via Arabsat
Naharnet/December 01/16/Urgent Matters Judge of
Baabda Hassan Hamdan issued
Thursday a ruling ordering the resumption of al-Manar
TV's broadcast via the Arabsat satellites, after the
broadcast was cut off by the company operating the satellites in December 2015.
“The Lebanese code of civil procedure allows the judge of urgent matters
to look into any lawsuit resulting from conflicts that occur in his district,”
the text of Hamdan's ruling says. “This ruling will
be provisional pending the exhaustion of the arbitration procedures mentioned
in the contract's terms, specifically Article 15,” the ruling adds. The judge
also described his ruling as “urgent,” calling for resuming the channel's
broadcast as soon as possible. The Arab League-affiliated Arab Satellite
Communications Organization blocked al-Manar's
broadcast last year after the company's offices were moved from
Australia PM Rejects Linking Lebanese Migration with Terrorism
Naharnet/December 01/16/Australian Prime
Minister Malcolm Turnbull has denied that Immigration Minister Peter Dutton had
recently linked Lebanese migration to terrorism. In an interview with
Raad: National Consensus Cabinet Should
be Formed, No Need For Further Delay
Naharnet/December 01/16/Hizbullah MP Mohammed Raad stressed the need to form a national consensus cabinet
and added that the party sees no need for further delay in the cabinet
formation, the National News Agency reported Thursday. “This tenure must
provide the needed opportunity to build a real State in
ISF Member Shot Dead in Choueifat
Naharnet/December 01/16/An Internal Security Forces
member was deadly shot in the Choueifat area
southeast of
Argentina
First Lady unveils Khalil Gebran
statue in Buenos Aires
Thu 01 Dec 2016/NNA - First Lady of Argentina, Juliana Awada, chaired a ceremony to unveil a statue depicting
renowned author Gebran Khalil
Gebran in Buenos Aires, a statement by the Lebanese
Embassy in Argentina indicated on Thursday.
Following the ceremony, Awada visited the
Lebanese Embassy, where she heaped praise on the energy of the Lebanese
Diaspora in
Jawish Oglu, Steinmeier
in Lebanon to congratulate Aoun, meet officials
Thu 01 Dec 2016/NNA - Turkish Foreign Minister Mouloud
Jawish Ihsanoglu, arrived
in Beirut on Thursday, coming from Turkey, accompanied by a delegation, to pay
a two-day private visit to Lebanon during which he will offer congratulations
to President of the Republic, Michel Aoun, for his
election. Oglu will also meet Prime Parliament
Speaker, Nabih Berri,
outgoing Prime Minister, Tammam Salam,
premier-designate, Saad Hariri, and Minister of
Foreign Affairs and Expatriates, Gebran Bassil, o discuss the current developments in
Qabalan receives Ambassador of Czech Republic
Thu 01 Dec 2016/NNA - Vice President of the Islamic Shiite Supreme Council,
Sheikh Abdul Amir Qabalan received on Thursday the
Ambassador of the Czech Republic to Lebanon, Michaela Vancova,
with whom he reviewed the relations between Lebanon and the Czech Republic and
ways of enhancing them. The pair also discussed the general situation in
Araiji represents Salam at opening of 60th Arab Book Fair
Thu 01 Dec 2016/NNA - The Arab Cultural Club inaugurated, in cooperation
with the Lebanese Publishers Association, the 60th Arab-International Book Fair
in
Sami Gemayel, Egyptian Ambassador dwell
on current juncture
Thu 01 Dec 2016/NNA - Kataeb party chief, MP Sami Gemayel, met on Thursday with Egyptian Ambassador to
Southerners sense quake, no damages
reported
Thu 01 Dec 2016/NNA - Locals of the eastern side of
Fathali upon Iranian Embassy's blast commemoration: Terrorism
will not trounce our determination
Thu 01 Dec 2016/NNA - The Iranian Embassy in Beirut commemorated
on Thursday the third anniversary of the explosion that had targeted it and
made a number of martyrs, in presence of a panel of officials and high-ranking
dignitaries. In his word, Iranian Ambassador to Lebanon Mohammad Fathali maintained that the Islamic Republic only became
stronger and more supportive for the downtrodden people of the region.
"The Islamic Republic of Iran is proud that all the sacrifices it
has made and the suffering it has endured were due to its standing by the axis
of the Resistance," he said.
"The culprit is known; it is no surprise that a regime with stale
ideas carries out such a terrorist act; [this regime] has already put its money
at the service of terrorism and created horrendous circumstances to the people
of Syria, Yemen, Iraq, Bahrain, and elsewhere," he added. "Terrorism
and its international sponsors with their regional tools will not trounce the
determination of the Islamic Republic of Iran and its wise leadership to
support and stand by the downtrodden people in the world, as well as by the
resistance of both the Lebanese and Palestinian people," he stressed.
"We, in the Islamic Republic of Iran, believe that unity is the secret of
victory," Fathali concluded.
Harb opens eAge2016 Conference at AUB
Thu 01 Dec 2016/NNA - Caretaker Telecom Minister, Boutros Harb, on Thursday opened the eAge2016 Conference at AUB,
whereupon he gave a speech saying that
Excellencies Ladies and Gentlemen,
We meet today in
We meet today in
The election of a new president marks the start of a new phase that
should be complemented with a quick formation of a new cabinet. We call upon
President Michel Aoun and Prime Minister-designate Saad Hariri to act according to the terms of the
constitution and form a new cabinet in the shortest time possible to put an end
to the extended political crisis in the country. The new Government will have a
determined major mission: To work closely with the parliament to draft a new
urgently-needed electoral law to replace the outdated voting system of the
1960s. Any further delay in the formation of the Government would imperils the electoral law and the parliamentary elections
next spring.
Ladies and gentlemen,
I am pleased to celebrate with you the opening of your three conferences,
eAge, AROQA, and OSSCOM, in our beloved city,
We have developed last year our telecom vision 2020; the Ministry's
strategic long-term national plan that addresses the shortcomings of the
telecom sector in Lebanon and aims to set the right framework for future
developments.
This challenging project requires ample time and a consistent stable
political environment to see the changes through. While the five-year timeline
of the project is considered a risky challenge given the enormity of the task,
good results started to emerge about the timely progress of the plan,
confirming the Ministry's dedication to the project's speedy implementation.
The telecom vision 2020 aims at improving the telecommunications
infrastructure by offering optical fiber services and
nation-wide wireless 4G coverage.
In the fixed network, the plan has a strategic objective aimed at
transitioning from copper wire technologies to fiber
optics, connecting homes, institutions, office buildings, and neighborhoods with the "FTTX" technology, which
has become standard in developed countries. Several large-scale pilot projects
have been already launched, and nation-wide deployment of FTTX is expected to
offer connectivity to up to 85% of citizens by end of the year 2017, and the
whole country by the end of the year 2020.
In the mobile sector, the plan adopted a project to deliver 4G and 4G
advanced services to all citizens. The implementation is expected to be
completed by end of 2016, and is already covering over 90% of inhabited
Lebanese territory.
This plan has significantly narrowed the telecommunications gap between
To date, and as confirmed by the International Telecommunications Union
(ITU), the policies implemented by the Ministry of Telecommunications since
2014 have resulted in substantial and tangible improvements affecting Lebanon's
network of fixed landlines, mobile coverage and reliability, as well as
Internet speed and penetration.
Lebanon was acknowledged to be among the first three most dynamic
countries in terms of the ICT development index; an achievement that was
reported by the World Economic Forum, which categorized Lebanon as the second
biggest mover in the year 2015 on the Network Readiness Index (NRI).
The policies adopted by the Ministry of Telecommunications have also been
reflected in the Ministry's balance sheet increasing its revenues while
reducing the price of telecom services by up to 70%.
In parallel with infrastructure development, the Ministry initiated a
project in partnership with the World Bank to strengthen innovation and
entrepreneurship in the Lebanese mobile Internet ecosystem. The project aimed
at enhancing the mobile internet enabling environment and development of skills
and attraction of talent. It is our conviction that
The Ministry of Telecommunications strongly supports your efforts to
empower the Lebanese institutions of higher education by providing the
necessary infrastructure to connect them through a national fast network, and
internationally to the world's best institutions. As a former Minister of
education, I feel the obligation to provide all the necessary support to keep
the standard of research and education in
As a law maker and member of the parliament, I also have an obligation to
propose new laws and legislations that stimulates cooperation among
universities and facilitates the establishment of a fast fiber
network for the research and education communities in Lebanon at a reasonable
and affordable cost, and providing its benefits at no cost to students and
researchers, with the ultimate goal of bringing the quality of education to the
highest international standard.
Ladies and gentlemen,
We live in an "eAge".
We live in an era where information and communication technology is no longer a
"nice-to-have" commodity, but a basic necessity to foster economic
development, improve levels of research, education and training. ICT
infrastructure development is seen vital for entrepreneurship and small
businesses that generate new ideas, new business models, and huge
opportunities.
I would like to wish you successful conferences and fruitful discussions.
I am confident that the outcome of your meetings would be of great value and
impact on the future of our youths and our economies, and I would be eager to
receive the recommendations that will come out at the end of the meetings.
Thank you.
Latest LCCC Bulletin For
Miscellaneous Reports And News published on on December
01-02/16
UN: ‘No red lines left to
cross in Syria’
Staff writer, Al Arabiya English Thursday, 1
December 2016/There are no “red lines left to cross in Syria,” the UN
humanitarian chief said Wednesday, accusing parties to the Syrian conflict who
have systematically disregarded the laws of war. Speaking via video-link from
London, Stephen O’Brien told an emergency meeting of the Security Council that
was nowhere more apparent than in the besieged city of eastern Aleppo with
nearly a quarter of million people trapped inside. “There are no limits or red
lines left to cross. The rules of war - sacrosanct notions borne out of
generations of costly and painful lessons and set more than 150 year ago in the
First Geneva Convention - have been systematically disregarded in
“For the sake of humanity we call on - we plead - with the parties and
those with influence to do everything in their power to protect civilians and
enable access to the besieged part of eastern
Six million children in need of aid
There are about six million Syrian children “in
need of humanitarian assistance,” UNICEF Regional Director Greet Cappelaere told the Security Council emergency meeting.
“Over 2 million of these children are in hard-to-reach areas, which
humanitarian agencies cannot access on a regular basis,” Cappelaere
said. “Nearly half a million [children] live under siege, cut off from
humanitarian aid and basic services.”She said that
some of these children have been living under siege for two years. Cappelaere warned that “schools have come under relentless
attack all over the country.” She described 2016 as “particularly devastating
for education.”“Since the beginning of 2016, the UN
has documented 84 attacks on schools across
Staff writer, Al Arabiya English Thursday, 1
December 2016/Russia will continue its operations in eastern
Speaking at a joint press conference after a meeting with his Turkish
counterpart Mevlut Cavusoglu
in the Mediterranean town of
Churkin said
Stephen O’Brien, the UN under-secretary-general for humanitarian affairs,
on Wednesday pleaded with the Security Council to help break the siege of
Lavrov Denies Russia, Syria Role in Turkish Deaths
Naharnet/Agence France Presse/December
01/16/Moscow and Damascus were not behind an air strike in Syria last week that
killed four Turkish soldiers, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Thursday, refuting Turkish claims.
"Neither
Humanitarian corridors in
Lavrov also defended
'Meetings with Syrian opposition'
Lavrov added now that "most of eastern
Lavrov:
Naharnet/Agence France Presse/December
01/16/Russia Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov called
Thursday for a fresh start in relations with the
Russia Proposes Four Humanitarian
Corridors for East Aleppo
Naharnet/Agence France Presse/December
01/16éRussia has proposed setting up four humanitarian corridors to battered
eastern Aleppo to allow in aid as well as hundreds of desperately needed
medical evacuations, the United Nation said Thursday. "The
UN, Iranians: the nuclear deal has
increased human rights violations in Iran
Thursday, 01 December 2016NCRI Iran News/In addition to last month’s report
from the UN Secretary-General detailing the increase in human rights violations
in Iran, two recently escaped dissidents narrated their personal histories of
abuse, and claimed the nuclear deal is only empowering the regime to be more
repressive and expansionist, said The Washington Times. The two dissidents, Shabnam
Madadzadeh, 29, and Arash Mohammadi, 25, told Rowan Scarborough of the brutality they
had faced in taking part in public protest. Both were smuggled out of
Madadzadeh’s various prisons included the notorious Evin prison and its Section 209 run by the Ministry of
Intelligence. She says she was beaten, threatened with rape, and subjected to
fake executions. Madadzadeh was told, “Speak out
against the Mujahedin.” She would not.
Mohammadi was imprisoned for two years, during which
time “intelligence interrogators beat and threatened him,” The Washington Times
reported. He was offered money to denounce the MEK and “become an accepted
reformist.” Mohammadi refused.
Both dissidents were speaking in
US Senate passes 10-year extension of
Iran sanctions
Reuters Thursday, 1 December 2016/The US Senate passed a 10-year extension of
existing sanctions against Iran on Thursday, sending the measure to the White
House for President Barack Obama to sign into law and delaying any potentially
tougher actions until next year.As the voting
continued, senators were backing the renewal of the Iran Sanctions Act by 89-0.
It passed the House of Representatives nearly unanimously in November, and
congressional aides said they expected Obama would sign it when it reached his
desk.
Last Update: Thursday, 1 December 2016 KSA 22:24 - GMT 19:24
Report: Iranian arms sent to Yemen via
Somalia
Staff writer, Al Arabiya English Thursday, 1 December
2016/A newly-released report by independent research group Conflict Armament
Research (CAR) “suggests” that there is an arms “pipeline” that extends from
Iran to Somalia and Yemen. The UK-based CAR released its analysis
Wednesday, after US officials claimed in October that they had seized five
shipments of Iranian weapons bound for
Meanwhile, the UAE ambassador to the UN, Lana Nusseibeh,
said CAR’s findings “would be a flagrant violation of
UN security council resolutions,” according to the Abu Dhabi-based The
National. “The UAE calls on the Security Council to take all measures necessary
to demand that
WSJ editorial: Focus on
NCRI Iran News/Thursday, 01 December 2016/The
following is an editorial published by the Wall Street Journal on Thursday,
December 1, 2016 on the 1988 massacre of political prisoners in
The Wall Street Journal
Iran’s Prisoner of the Revolution
A beloved son of the regime is jailed for disclosing its crimes.
December 1, 2016
An Iranian revolutionary court on Sunday sentenced Ahmad Montazeri
to 21 years in prison on a range of national-security charges. The 60-year-old
cleric will serve a mere six years by Iranian justice standards, owing to his
age and his family’s special status in Iranian revolutionary history. But his
sentence is a reminder that the regime remains as brutal as ever, even as it
reaps the economic benefits of its nuclear deal with the West. Mr. Montazeri’s crime was to release tapes that capture his
father, the Grand Ayatollah Hossein-Ali Montazeri, denouncing the regime’s repression during its
first decade in power. The elder Montazeri, who died
in 2009, was one of the regime’s founders with Ayatollah Khomeini. Tapped to
succeed Khomeini as supreme leader, Montazeri grew
increasingly disillusioned with the theocracy he had established. The final
break came in 1988 when the regime executed thousands of leftists and
supporters of the Mujahedeen-e-Khalq (MEK) opposition
group. The MEK had helped Khomeini topple the Shah in 1979. But after the
revolution the new supreme leader set out to consolidate power and liquidate
his erstwhile allies. Montazeri denounced the
executions at the time, accusing senior security apparatchiks in the 1988
recording of committing the “biggest crime in the Islamic Republic, for which
the history will condemn us.” He added: “Beware of 50 years from now, when
people will pass judgment on the leader [Khomeini] and will say he was a
bloodthirsty, brutal and murderous leader.” For his dissent, Montazeri was sidelined and spent much of the rest of his
life under house arrest. Among the men he addressed in the tape was Mostafa Pourmohammadi, who is now
Justice Minister in the “moderate” government that negotiated the nuclear deal.
Confronted with the recording this summer, Mr. Pourmohammadi
said, “We take pride in executing God’s commandment with respect to the
hypocrites,” using the regime’s epithet for the MEK. This episode about the
nature of the
Turning Blind Eye to the Crimes of the
Iranian Regime Militants in Iraq
Thursday, 01 December 2016/NCRI - Following recognition of mercenary group
called ‘Hashed al-Shaebi’ affiliated to the Iranian
regime in Iraq, what are the dangers that lie ahead in this country? On
November 29, Al Arabiya TV reported: “murders and
crimes of this group have been repeatedly condemned by human rights organizations.”Hashed al-Shaebi
militants are a mixture of elements affiliated to the regime in
Nowhere on the Planet 'Land Looting' Is as
Prevalent as in Iran
Thursday, 01 December 2016/NCRI - On November 29, in an article titled “land
looters” greed for those without titling,” the state-run Armaan
newspaper admitted the uniqueness of Land looting practice in Iran under the
mullahs’ regime compared with other countries in the world. “Land looting in
the past decade has become a familiar phenomenon; a bawdy phenomenon which in
recent years has made some people multi-billionaire overnight and in the
meantime natural resources have been looted,” the state-run newspaper then
admitted that the looting is carried out by government institutions and added:
“Over the past decade, Land looting has become a money-making activity in Iran.
There is no doubt that in
The writer then referred to the corrupt economic relations in this regard and
added: “Land looting is one of the few titles that is followed by huge money
pocketed by a few people who have even taken over natural resources... or the
land is in the name of an individual or at the disposal of the government, but
with unknown or known ties it goes to a (specific) person!”The
newspaper concluded that “
Francois Hollande
will not seek re-election as president of France
Reuters Thursday, 1 December 2016/French President Francois Hollande
said on Thursday he would not seek a second term in office in the presidential
election in 2017, an unprecedented move that leaves the way open for other
left-wing candidates.
It is the first time in decades that an incumbent French president has not
sought re-election. Hollande is the most unpopular
president on record. “I am aware today of the risk that going down a route that
would not gather sufficient support would entail, so I have decided not to be a
candidate in the presidential election,” a somber-looking
Hollande said in a televised address. All recent
polls have predicted that neither Hollande nor any
other Socialist candidate would make it past the first round of the election.
They predict a run-off battle between center-right candidate Francois Fillon and the leader of the far-right National Front,
Marine Le Pen. The Left is deeply divided as it approaches the election.
Several other Socialists, including former economy minister Arnaud Montebourg, have said they will take part in the party’s
primaries in January. Another of Hollande’s
ex-ministers, Emmanuel Macron, and leftist firebrand Jean-Luc Melenchon have said they will run in the presidential
election but without taking part in the primaries. There has been tension
between Hollande and his prime
minister Manuel Valls, who raised the
possibility in a weekend interview that he might run in the primaries against
his boss.
Human Rights Groups Condemn Persecution
Of Iranian Christians
Andy Walton/Christian Today/01 December 2016
http://www.christiantoday.com/article/human.rights.groups.condemn.persecution.of.iranian.christians/102604.htm
The treatment of Christians by the regime in
The groups say there are opportunities to rectify the situation presented by
the nuclear deal – which was opposed by conservative elements in the
They add that the opportunity for governments and companies to trade in
The statement issued by the human rights groups says that persecution of
believers has gone up recently. "In the summer of 2016, Iranian
authorities increased their persecution of Christians, honing in on converts
from a Muslim-background," it says.
Christians have a long history in
The groups who have released the statement suggest that the persecution of
Christians not only contravenes the country's legal obligations, but also its
own constitution. The statement is aimed to gain attention from international
bodies such as the European Union and the United Nations.
Iraqi Christian Family's Search For
Three-Year-Old Daughter Taken By ISIS
Reuters/ /December 01/16/In a camp near Mosul a picture of a three-year-old
girl, snatched from her mother's breast by Islamic State militants when they
overran her Christian town two years ago, is taped to a wall along with a
desperate plea from her parents. "Lost Girl", reads the poster in the
displaced people's camp, urging anyone with information about Christina Ezzo Abada to call the number
provided. Almost nothing is known about what happened to Christina since her
abduction, but her family assumes she was taken to
A picture of Christina hangs on the wall next to an image of Jesus.
"We hope she's alive," said her mother, Aida Nuh,
the dark circles around her eyes giving her a haunted expression. "Maybe
someone will bring her and look for us and make contact. God knows".
Christina's case is unusual. Although Islamic State is known for its brutality
and has kidnapped thousands of men, women and children from
Snatched
Twenty days went by in Qaraqosh with Christina and her
parents holed up at home, fearful of the black-clad militants, who came to them
demanding they convert to Islam, but also provided food and water when asked.
On August 22, 2014, the militants instructed all remaining Christians to gather
at a local hospital for medical tests, and Nuh and
her husband obeyed. But there were no tests, and after a short interval the
militants ordered them onto a minibus waiting outside, which had been smeared
with mud to prevent passengers looking out or anyone seeing in. The militants,
whom Nuh identified as local Arabs, searched the
group of around 30 Christians for valuables, which they took, and separated
four members of the group before corralling the rest onto the bus.
Nuh sat with Christina on her lap and was breast-feeding
her when one of the militants came up and wrenched the girl away.
"Who will look after her? She needs me," pleaded Nuh,
trailing the man as he got off the bus with her daughter. He said he was
following orders from his emir, or commander, before disappearing into the
hospital, barring her way. She continued to beg, and eventually the emir
emerged from the hospital carrying Christina, who was crying. "I told him
to give her back to me," recalled Nuh. "He
didn't speak. With his eyes he motioned at me to get back on the bus."When she resisted, the militants first threatened
and then forced her onto the bus, which drove to a wasteland on the edge of
Islamic State territory and dumped the entire group there.
That was the last time Nuh saw her daughter.
In the days after she was taken, Christina's parents called local Arabs with
links to Islamic State who told them she had been placed with a family and was
in safe hands. But then contact was lost. Further efforts to track the girl
down have yielded nothing, although some speculate she ended up in an Islamic
State orphanage. It is not clear why the militants kidnapped Christina, who
would now be five-years-old. Earlier this week, the family returned to Qaraqosh for the first time since leaving more than two years
ago. On the way there, the car stopped and Christina's father, who is blind,
got out and heard the voice of a young girl. "I heard 'papa! papa!'," he said. "I called 'Christina!
Christina!', but she didn't reply".
Aleppo: As fighting rages, everything
must be done to protect civilians
ICRC - News Release No. 16/126
01 December 2016
The head of the International Committee of the Red Cross in
“The people who’re fleeing take a lot of risks. There is shelling,
explosions and sniper fire. People have left behind virtually everything,” said
Ms Gasser, speaking in
“They must be guaranteed protection and safe passage. We appeal to all sides
to ensure this. We at the ICRC are ready to help, but it’s up to those who are
involved in the fighting to protect civilians.”
The ICRC and Syrian Arab Red Crescent (SARC) were granted access to Masaken Hanano, one of the
districts in
"The place is deserted and there is immense destruction all along
the road.
People who manage to flee either left by foot for the Government-held
areas in the West or crossed further north to Sheikh Maksood
and surrounding areas. Most of them came from Hanano
area, Haydaryee, Inzarat, Beedeen, Sakhour, Shaar, Katrji, Jabal Badro and other areas in
The SARC dispatched mobile medical teams to treat the sick, injured and
malnourished. The teams work 12 hours per day and, since 27
November, have treated over 2,500 people. As the shelters lack basic
amenities, the ICRC and SARC installed emergency water tanks and sanitation
facilities, and provided food, blankets and mattresses. As the situation
evolves, the organisations are scaling up their response to deal with new
arrivals.
“We saw buses arriving with people, more and more people. Hundreds were
arriving every hour while we were there. Conditions are very difficult. People
are in shock. They’re tired and cold, many of them are
still covered in dust and need medical help. It’s heart-breaking,” said
Marianne Gasser said.
“It’s all very basic. First of all, we need to ensure dignified
conditions for these people. One of the shelters is a cotton factory, a huge
hangar where some 15 thousand people will expect to be accommodated.”
*For further information, please contact:
Pawel Krzysiek, ICRC
Damascus, tel: +963 993 700 847
Ralph El Hage, ICRC Amman, +962 7 7845 4382
Krista Armstrong, ICRC Geneva, +41 79 447 37 26
Saudi Rights Activist Jail Term Hiked to
'11 Years'
Naharnet/Agence France Presse/December
01/16/A Saudi Arabian court on Thursday increased to 11 years the jail sentence
of a human rights activist, reflecting a continued crackdown, Amnesty
International said. Following an appeal, the "counter-terror court"
revised the sentence against Issa al-Hamid, a founding member of
Heavy Rain Piles Misery on Mosul Displaced
Naharnet/Agence France Presse/December
01/16/Abdelwahed Mahmud dug gullies around his tent in northern Iraq Thursday
after heavy overnight rain flooded Khazir camp, the
latest hardship to hit the thousands of families displaced around Mosul.
"This is to stop the rain, if we don't dig these, it will keep coming in,"
said the 35-year-old, using the back of his spade to shore up the sides of his
tent. Around 74,000 people have been forced to flee their homes since tens of
thousands of Iraqi forces launched a major offensive to retake
Water in the tents
Some wore plastic bags over their shoes to walk
through the puddles while a group of children embraced the situation and played
in the biggest pool of muddy water. "This is how we live," said Waddah Abdelhadi, from
U.N. Envoy Meets Yemen's Hadi in New Peace Bid
Naharnet/Agence France Presse/December
01/16/The U.N. envoy to Yemen and President Abedrabbo
Mansour Hadi met Thursday
in the southern city of Aden to discuss a new bid to end the country's
conflict, a government official said. Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed, who flew in from
Nearly 2,000 Members of Iraqi Forces
Killed in November, Says U.N.
Naharnet/Agence France Presse/December
01/16/Close to 2,000 members of the Iraqi security forces were killed in
November across the country, along with hundreds of civilians, the United
Nations said Thursday. The figure increased threefold from October, when tens
of thousands of forces launched a huge assault to retake the Islamic State
group's last major Iraqi bastion of
Abbas is Israel's Top 'Ideological' Foe, Says Netanyahu
Ally
Naharnet/Agence France Presse/December
01/16/A leading minister called Mahmoud Abbas Israel's top ideological enemy on Thursday after the
Palestinian president suggested he could withdraw recognition if progress was
not made towards peace. Energy Minister Yuval Steinitz, seen as close to Prime
Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, called the Palestinian leader's remarks at a Fatah
party congress in Ramallah on Wednesday "a sad joke." "Abu Mazen talks about stopping recognizing
Latest LCCC Bulletin analysis
& editorials from miscellaneous sources published on December 01/16
Iran’s uproar
Mshari Al Thaydi/Al Arabiya/December 01/16
The commanders of Khomeini’s guards are in a state of uproar which has reached
unprecedented levels on the political and military fronts. They are preparing
themselves to lead the world, inherit
Imagine that! Engulfing seas, leading the world, establishing
an Islamic government. What about the emergence of the Mahdi? What will his role be in all these Khomeini-style
military preparations?
We also do not know what the role of
While meeting with Iranian naval force officials last Sunday to discuss
enhancing Iranian influence in international waters, Khamenei
said: “The capacity of the Islamic Republic of Iran’s naval power must suit the
Islamic system and the nobility of this country.”
Meanwhile, Houthi militias and forces loyal to
deposed President Ali Abdullah Saleh formed a new
government all by themselves. They assigned the ministry of transportation to Houthi military figure Zakaria
al-Shami. Many think the aim is to coordinate
smuggling operations, via land and sea, to Saleh and
the Houthis, the agents of
The Israeli-Palestinian Impasse After Trump/How Netanyahu needs to emulate Trump in
Mordechai Nisan/Frontpage/November
25, 2016
http://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/264936/israeli-palestinian-impasse-after-trump-mordechai-nisan
Soon after the end of the June 1967 Six Day War, Israel's Foreign Minister Abba
Eban met in New York with U.S. Secretary of State
Dean Rusk. Eban was asked about
When Donald Trump will meet with Binyamin Netanyahu, it is reasonable to assume
that the President will ask the Israeli Prime Minister - fifty years after the
Rusk-Eban exchange - how he envisions a political
resolution of the conflict with the Palestinians.
After the liberation of Judea and
In May 1973 Minister of Defense Moshe Dayan said in a
BBC TV interview: "
Since the dramatic Likud victory in 1977,
In February 1945, toward the end of the Second World War, President Roosevelt
assured King Abdul Aziz al-Saud "that he would do nothing to assist the
Jews against the Arabs and would make no move hostile to the Arab people."
In 2017 President Trump can assure Prime Minister Netanyahu that he would do
nothing to assist the Arabs against the Jews and would make no move hostile to
the Israeli people.
This policy position will clear the political slate by burying the delusional
Oslo Accords which failed to elicit mutual trust and reconciliation, cancelling
the phony peace process which is all one-sided for the Palestinians, and
invalidating the two-state solution whose complexity far surpasses its simple
appellation. The Palestinians refuse to recognize the Jewish state, claiming
all of
Let us be clear on what we know about sociology, religion, and politics in
Palestinian culture. A Palestinian state in Judea and
There will likely be a dramatic shift in American Middle East foreign policy
free of Oriental enthusiasms, abstract paradigms of a new regional order, and
State Department 'Arabists' who consider Zionism the
root cause of the conflict. Donald Trump's hard-nosed political realism and
sympathetic attitude toward
Presidential candidate Donald Trump declared to a large and enthusiastic AIPAC
audience on March 21, 2016: 'the days of treating
Six components shape a political solution for the intractable conflict in the
Land. Let us transcend sloganeering – like "territories for peace" -
and scale the high ground for a new, radical, and sensible approach. With the
encouragement and resources of
Here is the six-point plan:
A/1: Jewish settlement in Judea and
A/2: Israeli sovereignty in Judea and
B/1: Arab autonomy – but not a Palestinian state - in Judea and
B/2: Arab migration eastward to
C/1: UNRWA, an international trough supplying resources for Palestinian
terrorism and hateful propaganda against
C/2: Palestinian refugees from 1948 – few of whom are still alive and whose
progeny incongruously fills the refugee rolls - should be freed from their
collective humiliation and squalor, as in
The broad ramifications of this ABC plan will redraw the political and
demographic map; out of the box, we can finally think again.
Trump launched a paradigm shift in
Donald Trump challenged, ridiculed, and vilified, the icons of Political
Correctness: regarding the environment, government, globalization, trade,
Islam, race and immigration.
Binyamin Netanyahu has made some inroads but should now demolish Political
Correctness in Israel, declaring: that the Israelis are the people of the land
and not occupiers; that the Palestinians are aggressors and not victims; that
Jewish settlement resonates with the rapturous music of homecoming and is not
land-thievery nor an obstacle to peace; that the Palestinians are the majority
in Jordan and not stateless; that a Palestinian state in Judea and Samaria
would be a base for insurrection and warfare, not a formula for peace; that the
Arabs in Israel enjoy liberty and education, and are not suffering
discrimination; that a Middle East peace conference is a wanton design for an
imposed solution, not a venue for rapprochement; that Israel should not
foolishly take 'risks for peace' – what an oxymoronic buzz phrase! – but only control its grand and fragile destiny, on the
ground, in its hands.
The march of political folly must end. The unfolding circumstances can now
sustain a historic paradigm shift on the century-old conflict between Arabs and
Jews in the
Germany Submits to Sharia
Law/"A parallel justice system has established itself in Germany"
Soeren Kern/Gatestone
Institute//December 01/16
https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/9461/germany-sharia-law
A German court has ruled that seven Islamists who formed a vigilante
patrol to enforce Sharia law on the streets of
Wuppertal did not break German law and were simply exercising their right to
free speech. The "politically correct" decision, which may be
appealed, effectively authorizes the Sharia Police to
continue enforcing Islamic law in
The self-appointed "Sharia Police"
distributed leaflets which established a "Sharia-controlled
zone" in
Critics say the cases — especially those in which German law has taken a
back seat to Sharia law — reflect a dangerous
encroachment of Islamic law into the German legal system.
In June 2013, a court in
A growing number of Muslims in
"If the rule of law fails to establish its authority and demand
respect for itself, then it can immediately declare its
bankruptcy." — Franz Solms-Laubach, Bild's parliamentary correspondent.
A German court has ruled that seven Islamists who formed a vigilante
patrol to enforce Sharia law on the streets of
The ruling, which effectively legitimizes Sharia
law in
The self-appointed "Sharia Police"
sparked public outrage in September 2014, when they distributed yellow leaflets
which established a "Sharia-controlled
zone" in the Elberfeld district of Wuppertal.
The men urged both Muslim and non-Muslim passersby to attend mosques and to
refrain from alcohol, cigarettes, drugs, gambling, music, pornography and
prostitution.
A German court has ruled that a group of Islamists who formed a vigilante
patrol to enforce Sharia law on the streets of
The vigilantes are followers of Salafism, a
virulently anti-Western ideology that openly seeks to replace democracy in
Salafist ideology posits that Sharia law is superior to secular, common law because it
emanates from Allah, the only legitimate lawgiver, and thus is legally binding
eternally for all of humanity. According to the Salafist
worldview, democracy is an effort to elevate the will of humans above the will
of Allah, and is therefore a form of idolatry that must be rejected. In other
words, Sharia law and democracy are incompatible.
Wuppertal Mayor Peter Jung said he hoped the police would take a hard
line against the Islamists: "The intention of these people is to provoke
and intimidate and force their ideology upon others. We will not allow
this."
Wuppertal Police Chief Birgitta Radermacher said the "pseudo police" represented
a threat to the rule of law and that only police appointed and employed by the
state have the legitimate right to act as police in
"The monopoly of power lies exclusively with the State. Behavior that intimidates, threatens or provokes will not
be tolerated. These 'Sharia Police' are not
legitimate. Call 110 [police] when you meet these people."
On November 21, 2016, however, the Wuppertal District Court ruled that
the vests technically were not uniforms, and in any event did not pose a
threat. The court said that witnesses and passersby could not possibly have
felt intimidated by the men, and that prosecuting them would infringe on their
freedom of expression. The "politically correct" decision, which may
be appealed, effectively authorizes the Sharia Police
to continue enforcing Islamic law in
German Courts and Sharia Law
German courts are increasingly deferring to Islamic law because either
the plaintiffs or the defendants are Muslim. Critics say the cases — especially
those in which German law has taken a back seat to Sharia
law — reflect a dangerous encroachment of Islamic law into the German legal
system.
In May 2016, for example, an appeals court in
The case came about after the couple arrived at a refugee shelter in
The court in
The ruling — which was described as a "crash course in Syrian Islamic
marriage law" — ignited a firestorm of criticism. Some accused the court
in
Critics of the ruling pointed to Article 6 of the Introductory Act to the
German Civil Code (Einführungsgesetz zum Bürgerlichen Gesetzbuche, EGBGB), which states:
"A legal standard of another State shall not be applied where its
application results in an outcome which is manifestly incompatible with the
essential principles of German law. In particular, it is not applicable if the
application is incompatible with fundamental rights."
This stipulation is routinely ignored, however, apparently in the
interests of political correctness and multiculturalism. Indeed, Sharia law has been encroaching into the German justice
system virtually unchecked for nearly two decades. Some examples include:
In August 2000, a court in
In March 2004, a court in
In March 2007, a judge in
In December 2008, a court in Düsseldorf ordered a Turkish man to pay a
€30,000 ($32,000) dowry to his former daughter-in-law, in accordance with Sharia law.
In October 2010, a court in
In December 2010, a court in
In November 2011, a court in Siegburg allowed
an Iranian couple to be divorced twice, first by a German judge according to
German law, and then by an Iranian cleric according to Sharia
law. The director of the Siegburg District Court,
Birgit Niepmann, said the Sharia
ceremony "was a service of the court."
In July 2012, a court in
In June 2013, a court in
In July 2016, a court in
In an interview with Spiegel Online, Islam expert Mathias Rohe said that the existence of parallel legal structures
in
Sharia Courts in
A growing number of Muslims in
A major reason for the growth in Sharia courts
is that
The German Interior Ministry, responding to a Freedom of Information Act
request, recently revealed that 1,475 married children are known to be living
in
Polygamy, although illegal under German law, is commonplace among Muslims
in all major German cities. In
According to an exposé broadcast by RTL, one of Germany's leading media
companies, Muslim men residing in Germany routinely take advantage of the
social welfare system by bringing two, three or four women from across the
Muslim world to Germany, and then marrying them in the presence of a Muslim
cleric. Once in
Although the welfare fraud committed by Muslim immigrants is an
"open secret" costing German taxpayers millions of euros each year, government agencies are reluctant to take
action due to political correctness, according to RTL.
Chancellor Angela Merkel once declared that Muslims must obey the
constitution and not Sharia law if they want to live
in
"No one who comes here has the right to put his cultural values or
religious beliefs above our law. Everyone must abide by the law, no matter
whether they have grown up here or have only just arrived."
In practice, however, German leaders have tolerated a parallel Islamic
justice system, one which allows Muslims to take the law into their own hands,
often with tragic consequences.
On November 20, 2016, for example, a 38-year-old German-Kurdish man in
The newsmagazine, Focus, reported that the man was a "strictly
religious Muslim who married and divorced the woman according to Sharia law." It added: "Under German law,
however, the two were not married." Bild
reported that the man was married "once under German law and four times
under Sharia law."
The crime, which has drawn renewed attention to the problem of Sharia justice in
Wolfgang Bosbach, of the ruling Christian
Democratic Union (CDU), said: "Even if some people refuse to admit it, a
parallel justice system has established itself in
On November 23, Bild, the largest-circulation
newspaper in
"The 2013 coalition agreement between the CDU and the Social
Democrats promised: 'We want to strengthen the state's legal monopoly. We will
not tolerate illegal parallel justice.' But nothing has happened."
In a commentary, Franz Solms-Laubach, Bild's parliamentary correspondent, wrote:
"Even if we still refuse to believe it: Parts of Germany are ruled
by Islamic law! Polygamy, child marriages, Sharia
judges — for far too long the German rule of law has not been enforced. Many
politicians dreamed of multiculturalism....
"This is not a question of folklore or foreign customs and
traditions. It is a question of law and order.
"If the rule of law fails to establish its authority and demand
respect for itself, then it can immediately declare
its bankruptcy."
Soeren Kern is a Senior Fellow at the New
York-based Gatestone Institute. He is also Senior Fellow
for European Politics at the Madrid-based Grupo de Estudios Estratégicos / Strategic
Studies Group. Follow him on Facebook and on Twitter.
© 2016 Gatestone Institute. All rights
reserved. The articles printed here do not necessarily reflect the views of the
Editors or of Gatestone Institute. No part of the Gatestone website or any of its contents may be reproduced,
copied or modified, without the prior written consent of Gatestone
Institute.
Keith Ellison - The Wrong Man at the
Wrong Time
Alan M. Dershowitz/Gatestone Institute/ /December
01/16
https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/9460/keith-ellison-the-wrong-man-at-the-wrong-time
What should a political party that has just lost its white working-class,
blue-collar base to a "make America great again" nationalist do to
try to regain these voters? Why not appoint as the new head of the party a
radical left-wing ideologue who has a long history of supporting an
anti-American, anti-white, anti-Semitic Nation of Islam racist? Such an
appointment will surely bring back rust-belt voters who have lost their jobs to
globalization and free trade! Is this really the thinking of those Democratic
leaders who are pushing for Keith Ellison to head the Democratic National
Committee?
Keith Ellison is, by all accounts, a decent guy, who is well liked by his
congressional colleagues. But it is hard to imagine a worse candidate to take
over the DNC at this time. Ellison represents the extreme left wing of the
Democratic Party, just when the party -- if it is to win again -- must move to
the center in order to bring back the voters it lost to Trump. The Democrats
didn't lose because their candidates weren't left enough. They won the votes of
liberals. The radical voters they lost to Jill Stein were small in number and
are not likely to be influenced by the appointment of Ellison. The centrist
voters they lost to Trump will only be further alienated by the appointment of
a left-wing ideologue, who seems to care more about
global issues than jobs in
Ellison's sordid past associations with Louis Farrakhan -- the long time
leader of the Nation of Islam -- will hurt him in
In addition to embracing American enemies abroad, Farrakhan has exhibited
a penchant for lacing his sermons with anti-Semitic hate speech. Around the
time that Ellison was working with the Nation of Islam, for example, Farrakhan
was delivering speeches attacking "the synagogue as Satan." He
described Jews as "wicked deceivers of the American people" that have
"wrapped [their] tentacles around the
Congressman Keith Ellison's (left) sordid past associations with Louis
Farrakhan (right) -- the long time leader of the Nation of Islam -- will hurt
him in Middle America, which has little appetite for Farrakhan's anti-American
ravings. (Image sources: Ellison/Center for American Progress;
Farrakhan/Smithsonian Institute)
Ellison has struggled to explain his association with Farrakhan and the
Nation of Islam. He has acknowledged working with the Nation of Islam for about
18 months to organize the
"He could only wax eloquent while scapegoating
other groups" and of the Nation of Islam "if you're not angry in
opposition to some group of people (whites, Jews, so-called 'sellout' blacks), you don't have religion."
Ellison's voting record also does not support his claim that he has
become a "friend" of
Even beyond Ellison's past associations with anti-American and
anti-Semitic bigotry and his troubling current voting record with regard to
© 2016 Gatestone Institute. All rights
reserved. The articles printed here do not necessarily reflect the views of the
Editors or of Gatestone Institute. No part of the Gatestone website or any of its contents may be reproduced,
copied or modified, without the prior written consent of Gatestone
Institute.
France: Islamists Target Transportation Companies
Yves Mamou/Gatestone Institute /December 01/16
https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/9182/france-islamists-transport
The affair at
At
In daily life, the company tries to cope with the fact that prayer comes first,
before serving the public. Trains can be delayed because of a driver's prayers,
changing rooms become prayer rooms, men refuse to shake the hand of female
colleagues, and intolerance of homosexuals is spreading.
French companies try to cope with Islamism in its two modes: the soft one --
veils spreading throughout every office, an increase in lawsuits against
employers on religious grounds; and the hard one -- terrorism and threats of
Islamic terrorism.
According to the French satirical weekly, Le Canard Enchaîné,
in October, 40 Air
This repeated sabotage of several planes was spotted thanks to standardized
safety checks. A quick police investigation identified an employee of Air
The Geovision system that allows Air
Of course, Air
It is not the first time that Air France and Aeroports
de Paris (AdP), the company
that manages Parisian airports, have been the target of Islamists threats. On
December 12, 2015, Philippe Martinez, head of the powerful CGT union, declared
on France Info public radio, that these "Islamist deviations" were
"unacceptable."
"At Air
"You know how things go... One [Islamist] leader comes, he takes his CGT
card, and then he makes all the others take their card."
"All the others" were 500 people in a CGT union with 2000
card-holders at Charles de Gaulle Airport. CGT for years remained the most
important union for Air
In 2011, Air
Ronald Noirot, general secretary of the CFE-CGC (a
union for managers), declared on December 2, 2015:
"for a long time, certain behavior was causing
trouble in Air
At the beginning of 2015, 50 Muslim employees at Roissy-Charles
de Gaulle, who were working in "sensitive zones" (with access to
planes and luggage) had their magnetic security passes
withheld. Four thousand cloakroom lockers were searched by police for security
reasons. The results of this investigation have not been released.
Air
On November 17, 2015 -- four days after the largest terrorist attack ever in
France -- Le Parisien revealed that Samy Amimour, one of the suicide
bombers who killed 89 people at the Bataclan Theater on November 13, had worked for 15 months as a bus
driver at the Autonomous Operator of Parisian Transport (RATP). The company
confirmed the information a few days later. RATP is a huge state-owned company
that operates all of
Because of Samy Aminour,
old facts, neglected by the mainstream media, were suddenly considered. In
December 2012 for example, around 20 bus drivers belonging to the CGT union had
denounced the chilling work environment created by Islamist bus drivers at the
bus depot of
On November 26, 2012, Ghislaine Duménil,
a female bus driver wrote a letter to Pierre Mongin,
CEO of RATP
You were notified in a July 16th letter, about the "difficulties" (a
weak word) we encounter in our work because of our colleagues fundamentalist
Islamists.
These "difficulties" are still not settled, and are worsening.
Apart from the fact that new beards have grown, and the contempt for women
continued... a driver refused to take the bus at the time of shift-change, on
the pretext that a woman machinist had driven the bus before him.
In the same period, Muslim machinists "watched" other Muslim
employees to be sure that each of them fasted during Ramadan. Thus we have
witnessed moral lessons on "recalcitrant" Muslim employees.
Clandestine prayers in the workplace are no longer just by the fundamentalists,
but by our Muslim colleagues whom we called moderates.
Letters of this type were sent to CEO on February 4, 2013, on June 29, 2015 and
on July 29, 2015.
After the terrorist attacks of November 2015 (129 killed, 354 wounded),
Christophe Salmon, head of CFDT union at RATP, said that RATP has let
Islamists' "behavior become trivialized,"
as in "the refusal to shake hands with female colleagues, or in the
refusal to take a bus that had been driven by a woman." But the
denunciation of Islamist deviations by CFDT came at a cost: the CFDT collapsed
in the last professional elections, with only 5.1% of the vote. The Secretary
General of CFDT, Laurent Gardoni, explained this poor
score by the "rise of a sectarian unionism" -- that is, Islamist
unionism.
The RATP affair is the story of failed integration. The state-owned
transportation company, tired of seeing its buses
stoned and burned regularly in some
When counterterrorism services identify a suspect inside the train company,
they do not give us the "S mark note" (people identified as threats
are marked "S" by intelligence services), but they give us the
information that a "specific action" must be taken against this or
this person. We do not fire the person, but depending to his position, he can
be transferred.
SNCF agents have therefore been excluded from jobs deemed sensitive. "No
signal box, or switching station, not in the armed security service, not as a
train driver," listed Guillaume Pepy. "You
transfer these people to other departments in the company."
At SNCF, as at RATP and Air France, similar problems are arising: mainstream
unions are losing ground to religion. Unions have to accept infiltration by
Islamists, or they lose elections. In daily life, the company tries to cope
with the fact that prayer comes first, before serving the public. Trains can be
delayed because of a driver's prayers, changing rooms become prayer rooms, men
refuse to shake the hand of female colleagues, and intolerance of homosexuals
is spreading.
**Yves Mamou is a journalist and author based in
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articles printed here do not necessarily reflect the views of the Editors or of
Gatestone Institute. No part of the Gatestone website or any of its contents may be reproduced,
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Aron
A defeat will leave
Within the past week entire neighborhoods in the
rebel-held enclave of eastern
As rebel control over eastern
With so much currently up in the air, a new U.S. president on his way into
office who has expressed doubts about the Syrian opposition, and the European
Union preparing to reorganize its Syria policy, developments in Aleppo could
well change the parameters of the Syrian conflict.
The Breakthrough in
Starting on November 27, the defenses of
The reasons for this sudden collapse remain obscure. Perhaps there were, as
some have speculated, backroom deals and betrayals, or perhaps the rebels were
in disarray after infighting earlier in November. In the end the truth may be
straightforward: With rebel resources having been depleted by a six-month
siege, the insurgents could not hold out against far superior forces.
Still, fighting in a place such as
Should this happen it would represent a dramatic defeat, with powerful
political repercussions for the Syrian opposition. Though many have sworn to
continue fighting, some are likely to conclude that without
Erdogan’s Mind is Elsewhere
A defeat in
The most interesting area is the rebel zone carved out thanks to Turkish
military intervention northeast of
First, the purpose of the Turkish intervention was to clear the area from
Islamic State jihadis and ensure that the vacuum was
not filled by Kurdish forces aligned with the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK.
For all of Erdogan’s loathing of Assad, it doesn’t
come close to his hatred of the PKK. Indeed, if Erdogan’s
primary concern had been to overthrow the Syrian president, he wouldn’t have
diverted thousands of Syrian rebel combatants to help him clean up the border
region when they were so desperately needed in
Second, the Turkish intervention was based on an understanding with
Third, if Erdogan had any intention of breaking the
siege of
After a long and telling silence, the Turkish president recently spoke out on
If Turkish intentions northeast of
The Idlib rebellion is strong and well implanted. It
is a real threat to Assad. But though it contains many different groups, it is
strategically dominated by hardline Islamists such as
Ahrar al-Sham and Jabhat
Fatah al-Sham, the new incarnation of Jabhat al-Nusra that has links to Al-Qaeda and is riddled with
international jihadis. These groups are formidable
enemies of the regime, but they are also too toxic to gain Western endorsement.
Policymakers in
In other words, while it will remain a thorn in Assad’s side, the Idlib region is unlikely to serve as the springboard for a
foreign-backed strategy to end Assad rule.
All Quiet on the Southern Front
The insurgency in southern
But being a proxy force has its disadvantages. The southern rebellion has been
virtually frozen for the past year. The battles petered out after Russia
negotiated some form of deal with Jordan on Bashar
al-Assad’s behalf, which was endorsed by opposition sponsors who worried about
chaos spreading to Jordan and Lebanon. Having once hitched their fortunes to
foreign funding, the Southern Front rebels do not have many other options.
It is possible, of course, that the
Indeed, around
The main remaining rebel stronghold is east of
The army is now putting pressure on the Islam Army-held city of
Poor Prospects for the Opposition
It would be foolish to predict events. The chaos in
But going by what we now know, things look bad for the opposition. With eastern
Of course, much depends on the regime’s own abilities, and it has real
weaknesses. It is exhausted economically and short on fighting men. Its failure
to engage in constructive compromises or to provide a political opening for
opponents ready to shift direction has further cemented its isolation. And yet,
at the end of the day, this is a war, and Assad’s military gains on the ground
will sooner or later translate into political advantage.
Is
Ben Caspit/Al Monitor/December 01/16
Since the outbreak of the civil war in
With growing tension in the
Every so often an errant mortar shell lands on the Israeli side, the IDF
responds with force and destroys a Syrian army position, and quiet returns.
That’s how it has been handled for more than five years. In the background, the
slander continues regarding
The only interface between the two sides so far took place at the field
hospital
This idyll ended Nov. 27. A force from the Golani
patrol battalion was on reconnaissance across the border fence near the Israeli
Late that same night the Israeli air force attacked and destroyed an abandoned
United Nations post in the sector where the fighting took place on Syrian
territory. According to military sources, the site has been used by rebels who
identify with IS, the group that attacked the Israel Defense
Forces (IDF) patrol a day earlier. The post was completely erased; several
bombs weighing a ton each were dropped on it. “It was a warning and a
demonstration of
Three rebel organizations recently united into one branch that has pledged
allegiance to IS and is called the Army of Khaled ibn al-Walid. They are Shuhada al-Yarmouk, the best
known of the three, which holds a narrow area on the southern Golan along the
Israeli border; the Jihad Army, composed of fighters who defected from Jabhat al-Nusra; and al-Muthanna, which is active near the Daraa
area.
Israeli Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Gadi Eizenkot, upon taking the position, instructed the IDF to
create a specialized commando unit composed of the military’s elite special
forces, which would be subject to command under a special framework and would
formulate a combat doctrine focused on terror organizations such as IS across
enemy lines.
In mid-October, the commando unit held a large training exercise that was
declared a big success. Now the IDF is considering establishing a second
commando unit, and it seems on the path to creating the first commando division
in the IDF. The move reflects the deep change the Israeli military is
undergoing, which is giving up more and more heavy armor divisions in favor of
light, flexible, airborne/parachuted commando forces, who can respond to the
mixed multitude of terror groups congregated around
The IDF does not want to be caught off guard in the next round of violence, as
happened with most of
At the same time, just to be safe, the Cabinet on Nov. 27 authorized the
acquisition of 17 additional F-35 stealth fighter jets for the air force, which
would increase the order of battle to 50 jets, or two full squadrons. Along
with the Dolphin submarines purchased from Germany — as was reported in a
previous article in Al-Monitor — Israel continues to build its strategic
strength, while it is busy responding to microtactical
threats along its borders.
The predawn Nov. 30 attack attributed to Israel — on a convoy of trucks
delivering arms from the Syrian army to Hezbollah in Lebanon as well as on an
arms warehouse on the outskirts of Damascus (so the Syrians claim, at least) —
can demonstrate Israel’s capability, if it is responsible for the attacks, to
focus on several fronts at the same time. Many such attacks have been
attributed to the Israeli air force in recent years, but they have decreased
since
The KGB’s Middle East Files: The fight
against Zionism and world Jewry
Ronen Bergman/Ynetnews/Published: 01.12.16
Break-ins, forgeries, creating front organizations and even planting
bombs – all means were justified in the battle that the Soviet intelligence
agency waged against the Zionist movement, the emigration of Jews from the USSR
and the world’s major Jewish organizations. Classified documents now reveal
that the agency’s leaders saw Zionism as a real threat to the Soviet empire,
and did everything in their power against it.
In January 1972, Operation Simon entered its final stage. A team from
Service A, a key department in the KGB’s First Chief Directorate (which was
responsible for collecting intelligence and special operations outside the
In the Soviet intelligence’s glossary, Operation Simon meets the
definition of “active measures.” Their practical meaning was “aimed at exerting
useful influence on aspects of interest in the political life of a target
country, including its foreign policy; the solution of international problems;
misleading the adversary; undermining and weakening the adversary’s positions.”
Operation Simon included secretly infiltrating the World Jewish Congress
(WJC) offices in
And so, on February 12, a KGB operative arrived in
Chub easily infiltrated the building through the main entrance. He worked
all night and photocopied a large number of documents. The loot was impressive:
A list of the WJC’s 20,000 supporters in
Chub quickly passed on the material to the Soviet Union’s embassy in
Operation Simon was merely a prelude to the real thing.
In the year that followed, KGB experts worked to analyze the material
Chub had stolen, leading to the planning of a wide-scale operation. On January
4, 1973, Kosov presented the planned cluster of
operations to his boss Andropov, who approved it the next day, and the
operation was underway shortly thereafter.
The KGB created an entire series of sophisticated forgeries based on the
stolen material and on the contact and member lists. The goal was to sow
internal dissent and create a rift between the Jewish organizations, occupying
them as much as possible with internal rows, while deepening the suspicion that
they were stealing money from one another.
Service A created a new fictitious Jewish organization, Union of Young
Zionists – a name which may have sounded familiar to some. The intelligence
gathering and research done ahead of the operation revealed that there really
was an organization by that name, which was active in
The fictitious organization sent completely fabricated documents to
addresses of members found in the documents that were stolen from the WJC
headquarters. The fabricated documents framed WJC members of embezzling huge
amounts of donations that were supposed to reach
The World Zionist Organization (WZO) and its operational arm, the Jewish
Agency, were also involved in the embezzlement, the fabricated documents
suggested.
They further revealed a link between the WJC and radical Jewish
organizations that at the time were seeking to spur anti-Semitic activity in
Western nations to encourage immigration to
A man who worked in an executive role in the WJC in
Did you file a complaint with the police?
“I was not involved in matters of security, but I don’t think we did. The
embarrassment caused by such a thing, that someone would put so much effort in
creating a web of lies about us, or the embarrassment that would be caused by
us even investigating the accusations in the letters, was so great that the
people in charge decided to shelve the matter.”In
October 1973, the KGB used information it obtained in Operation Simon to spread
another libel: It created another front organization, this time a French
pro-Israel organization, which was allegedly involved in the murder of a
relative of then-French President Valéry Giscard
d’Estaing. The murder, according to the non-existent organization, was in
retaliation for the French president’s persecution of a group of Jewish
financiers and because of his policy, which was hostile towards
A danger to world peace
Chapter one of “The KGB’s Middle East Files,” a special series of
articles which brings to light information mined from thousands of KGB
documents smuggled to the West in the early 1990s, recounted the story of how Vasili Mitrokhin used his senior
position as the spy agency’s deputy chief archivist to copy the top secret
documents—with the Soviets being none the wiser.
These documents helped expose some 1,000 KGB agents across the
world and uncover countless covert spy operations. In addition, two books were
published about them by Prof. Christopher Andrew in cooperation with Mitrokhin himself. Nevertheless, only part of the
information they contain actually made it to
The Mitrokhin documents have recently been
moved to
In the first part of the series, we published a list of agents who were
handled in
The second part of our series of articles about the Mitrokhin
documents revealed the secret ties between the KGB and the Palestinian terror
organizations.
In the third part of the series, the Mitrokhin
documents reveal that Operation Simon and the operations derived from it were
just one battle of the war waged by the KGB against the world Jewry and the
Zionist Movement. While domestically, the Second Chief Directorate, which was
in charge of internal security, fought against the “refuseniks”—the
movement of Jewish emigration from the
The KGB and politburo heads saw the Zionist and Jewish movements as a
clear, immediate and real danger to world peace and to the integrity of the
Soviet empire—“a danger which is only second to the main enemy, the
Beyond the historical interest in stories about the KGB’s war on world
Jewry, it’s important to note that
Yaakov Kedmi, who headed Nativ—an
Israeli intelligence organization that maintained secret contact with Jews
living in the Eastern Bloc during the Cold War and encouraged immigration to
Israel— and is considered one of the senior experts in understanding the Soviet
intelligence, told me that “the outlook of the leadership in the USSR and of
the KGB was based on the notion that world Jewry was an extremely serious
danger. They believed that its operations center was in the
In 1992, upon the Soviet empire’s downfall, Nativ
launched a secret operation to obtain access to contacts in the former
“We were able to learn just how well the KGB knew Israel and what was
happening there, as well as the importance the organization ascribed to the
Zionist movement and world Jewry,” says Kedmi. “The
agency saw them as a key enemy, if not the main enemy. The harsh anti-Jewish
approach was shaped by Andropov more than anyone. The first reason for this
approach was personal: Andropov was not one-quarter Jewish, one-third Jewish or
half Jewish. He was Jewish, period. I heard it from senior KGB people. Andropov
knew that the party’s leadership was well aware of that, and some of them were
infected with anti-Semitic racist attitudes. In order to prove that he was
uninfluenced by his Jewish descent, and that he was genuinely pure when it came
to that matter, he took the most radical line.”
KGB chief and later Soviet leader Andropov
KGB chief and later Soviet leader Andropov
“As far as the Russians were concerned, the US-Israel relationship was a
natural symbiosis in the Western imperialism, which was working against them.
One is a continuation of the other. The questions of who wags whose tail and
how the tail controls the dog were purely semantic in their eyes.”
Caution: Matzah delivery
True to his paranoid behavior, Andropov ordered
the KGB to put great efforts in monitoring the ties between Soviet Jews and
world Jewry. Even a matzah delivery from Jewish
organizations abroad to their brethren in the
The organization allotted technological resources and a lot of manpower
to monitoring phone calls between local Jews and Jews in the rest of the world.
When it the Soviet Jews started complaining about the discrimination against
them and presenting the USSR in a negative light, the KGB went to great lengths
to cut off the phone communications between the “nationalist Jews” in the USSR
and the “foreign elements supporting them”—in other words, Zionist
organizations in the world.
In June 1975, Andropov informed the politburo heads with great
satisfaction that the organization had succeeded in preventing or disconnecting
phone calls, although the Jews had tried to outsmart them by using non-Jewish
names, using public phones or dialing directly
instead of through switchboards. Andropov bragged that by clamping down on
Soviet Jews’ phone calls abroad, the agency had caused “significant damage to
Zionist organizations in the world.”
The KGB saw the
For example, the KGB chose the Jewish Defense
League (JDL), led by extreme right-wing activist Rabbi Meir Kahane,
to help them unknowingly with this “active measure.” The JDL has tried to carry
out attacks against Soviet targets, in protest of the
Kahane arrested during a 1979 protest in front
of the Soviet Embassy in the US against the USSR's treatment of Jews
Kahane arrested during a 1979 protest in
front of the Soviet Embassy in the US against the USSR’s treatment of Jews
According to the Mitrokhin documents, in
September 1969, and then again several months later, the KGB sent threatening
letters on behalf of the JDL to several representatives of Arab states in the
United Nations, threatening to carry out terror attacks against the Arab
diplomats in revenge for Palestinian acts of terror against Israel and Jews.
The objective was for the letters to spark a lot of anger, not just among
the Arabs, but also among UN leaders and the
But the highlight of this activity was an attempt to drive a wedge
between the Jews and the blacks in
Some say that the KGB’s operations against the JDL were the last straw as
far as Kahane was concerned and the pressure put on
him and his movement by the FBI became too much for him. So in September 1971
he left the
“The way the KGB saw it,” says Yaakov Kedmi,
“getting involved with the JDL and the black community in order to create
bloody conflicts was a very natural thing. The truth is that the Jews helped
the black leadership in the
“The JDL acted against the
Delaying Jews’ emigration
According to the Mitrokhin documents, in 1975
the KGB branch in New York was deeply involved in helping Russian and Arab
diplomats gather votes for the UN General Assembly resolution that determined
that “Zionism is racism.” In 1976, Andropov initiated a series of secret
measures, which the KGB would lead among the global diplomatic community, to
push for the appointment of a special committee to investigate Zionism, similar
to the UN committee against apartheid. The Arab states, led by then-Syrian
President Hafez Assad, eventually decided not to promote the committee. From
the mid-1970s, the
Secondly, in 1975, the American Congress approved an amendment to the
US-USSR trade act (the Jackson–Vanik amendment),
which stipulated improvements in the USSR’s policy on human rights issues as a
condition for a possible easing of American-imposed trade restrictions on the USSR.
Suspicious as always, KGS officials were certain that world Jewry was behind
the amendment, and so the
A third reason was the Soviet Jews’ struggle to immigrate to
“The KGB realized that there was one key element behind this
international campaign (to help Jews leave the
What did you do to make them so angry?
“Who did we not approach and who did we not turn against them—from famous
writers to intellectuals, politicians, ambassadors, and actors. They were
surprised to learn that a leader in one of the Central American countries, who
was actually one of the Communist leaders in that country, had shamelessly pressured
the Soviet ambassador to allow the Jews to leave. They suddenly discovered a
strong organization using their exact same methods against them, and it drove
them crazy.”
Former Nativ head Yaakov Kedmi
Former Nativ head Yaakov Kedmi
Andropov’s response was indeed powerful. Part of the KGB’s work plan for
1976 was dedicated to a series of operations aimed at creating a conflict
between Jewish government opponents who had left the
According to the Mitrokhin documents,
considerable efforts were made in 1977 to defame Nazi hunter Simon Wiesenthal,
allegedly on behalf of former Soviet Jews, after he had issued a series of
harsh declarations against the Kremlin’s policy.
In 1978, following a decision by the Central Committee of the Communist
Party of the
Through the KGB’s secret channels, the book was distributed in 32
countries, handed to the leaderships of the Communist parties in the
The book includes, for example, the story of a former Soviet citizen
named Abramov. On April 24, 1978, all shook up, she
knocked on the doors of the Soviet embassy in
Her son Oleg eventually received a passport, but was murdered a week
before the flight back home. “They wanted to murder me and my daughter as
well,” she said. “A day before we left, we were badly beaten by them. At
midnight, we escaped to the airport so that no one would see us. In the
morning, we flew to
KGB officials were convinced that this problematic reality, like almost
every other problem, could be changed through “active measures” that would
improve the
Lord Baron Immanuel Jakobovits
Lord Baron Immanuel Jakobovits
Jakobovits fought a lot for Soviet Jews and
demanded that the country’s authorities “not just ‘let my people go’ but ‘let
my people live’”—in other words, that they significantly improve Soviet Jewry’s
religious and human rights.
The rabbi had asked numerous times for permission to come and see for
himself how the Jews were living beyond the Iron Curtain, and he was surely
surprised when the approval finally came in November 1975. This unusual
development, which was perceived as a good sign as to the
The KGB put together a group of agents and operatives—the Mitrokhin documents detail the names and code names of 11
of them—who would be the ones to meet the rabbi and present him with an utterly
distorted picture of the Jews’ situation.
“Primarily, it’s important to get information about the plans of Rabbi Jakobovits and his delegation,” the Operation Order read.
In order to do so, the rabbi and his secretary were placed under close
surveillance, and one of the undercover operatives even befriended him. The
Jews that met with the rabbi were strictly filtered by the KGB. Some were
active agents and some were associated with the government one way or another.
The agents presented the delegation with the achievements of Jewish writers and
cultural figures in developing Jewish culture and art in the
KGB agents with senior positions in the religious Jewish community were
ordered to present community life in a positive light, “to talk about
celebrating holidays and observing Shabbat at the synagogue, and to show the
delegation a film about the birthday celebration for Rabbi Levin, the former
rabbi of the
There were other meetings with Jews who reported how good their life was
and how they had no intention, even if they were given the option, of
emigrating from the
The operation was deemed a great success. The rabbi returned from the
Jews under surveillance
According to the Mitrokhin documents, however,
not everyone in the Soviet leadership considered Zionism a great danger, or a
danger at all. There were those in the politburo who argued that Andropov’s
obsession “is making us look stupid.”In September
1978, when Soviet Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko visited the White House, he
was surprised to be reprimanded by President Jimmy Carter over a person whose
name he was unfamiliar with—Anatoly Sharansky. He
later changed his name to Natan Sharansky
and went on to become a minister in the Israeli government and in 2009 was
appointed the Chairman of the Executive of the Jewish Agency.
Natan Sharansky
(Photo: Gil Yohanan)
Natan Sharansky
(Photo: Gil Yohanan)
Andropov had ordered to arrest Sharansky and
was personally involved in hunting him down. The persecution continued until Sharansky was tried for treason, espionage and incitement
and sentenced to 13 years in prison.
After his meeting with the American president, in a conversation with
Soviet ambassador in Washington Anatoli Dobrynin, Gromyko referred to Andropov’s obsession with Sharansky as “absurd.”
But as far as Andropov was concerned, it was not absurd at all. In May
1979, he approved a special plan of operation against the international efforts
in support of Sharansky. Andropov was especially
concerned by a moratorium pledge for the protection of Yuri Orlov
(a human rights activist and scientist in
The Operation Order, which can be found in the Mitrokhin
archive, is long and complicated, and includes dozens of operation sections,
such as defaming the moratorium’s organizers in the Western press; bribing
American scientists to withdraw their support; creating a film named “Lie and
Hate,” which would present Sharansky as a CIA agent;
and distributing a proclamation on behalf of scientists, politicians and social
activists from West Germany, Italy and other European countries, which would
condemn the boycott of scientists and defend the scientific ties between the
West and the USSR.
In the first half of the 1980s, the refusenik
movement—the most prominent aliyah activists—and the aliyah movement from the
Since the early 1980s, as Soviet premier Leonid Brezhnev grew physically
and mentally weaker, Andropov’s influence grew stronger. He was appointed to
replace him upon his death in 1982, and served as the premier of the
During that period, the country’s relations with the
According to the Mitrokhin documents, on
December 25, 1981, the party ordered to “improve the intelligence activity
against the subversion of the world’s Zionist centers.”
Several months later, the heads of all arms of the KGB met in
The Jews in the
Following the conference, in the summer of 1982, they issued a “work plan
for fighting Zionism” until 1986. Vladimir Kryuchkov,
who was appointed head of the KGB in 1988, also stressed that “Zionism is the
main threat to the
The KGB’s work plans for the two following years were written in a
similar manner. The KGB heads saw the Freemasonry movement as “part of the
global Jewish conspiracy” as well, asserting that “the American
industrial-military network is still dominated by Jews.”
According to the Mitrokhin documents, protocols
of the first meetings chaired by Mikhail Gorbachev as the
Nevertheless, it was Gorbachev who released Sakharov from the house
arrest he had been placed under, and later even opened the gates of the USSR
for free Jewish emigration, which led to the arrival of about one million
immigrants in Israel in the 1990s.
Research and translation from Russian by Will Styles,
Alexander Tabachnik, Yana Sofovich
and Yael Sass.
***The writer would like to extend his gratitude and appreciation to
Prof. Christopher Andrew and Dr. Peter Martland of
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