Hillary Clinton Faints, Has Concussion

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton sustained a concussion after becoming dehydrated and fainting, and will no longer testify Thursday before the House Foreign Affairs Committee on the deadly attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya.
Clinton had been suffering from a stomach virus at the time, according to a statement on Saturday from Philippe Reines, deputy assistant secretary of state.
She is being monitored by doctors and is recovering at home. She was never hospitalized, Reines said.
“At their recommendation, she will continue to work from home next week, staying in regular contact with Department and other officials. She is looking forward to being back in the office soon,” Reines said.
A senior State Department official added that the fainting occurred earlier in the week and the concussion was “not severe.”
Secretary Clinton had been scheduled to testify on Capitol Hill Thursday about the deadly attack in Benghazi, Libya, in September that killed four Americans, including the U.S. ambassador.
Jodi Seth, spokeswoman for Democratic Sen. John Kerry, Senate Foreign Relations Committee chairman, said in a statement that Clinton would not testify before that committee Thursday.

“Secretary Clinton’s team contacted Senator Kerry this morning to inform them of the Secretary’s concussion. Senator Kerry was relieved to hear that the Secretary is on the mend, but he insisted that given her condition, she could not and should not appear on Thursday as previously planned, and that the nation’s best interests are served by the report and hearings proceeding as scheduled with senior officials appearing in her place,” Seth said.
Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, R-Florida, who chairs the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said in a statement it was “unfortunate” Clinton would not be testifying before her committee either on Thursday.
William Burns and Thomas Nides, both Deputy Secretaries of State, will testify before that committee instead.
“Although I respect Bill and Tom, we still don’t have information from the Obama administration on what went so tragically wrong in Benghazi,” Ros-Lehtinen said. “We have been combing classified and unclassified documents and have tough questions about State Department threat assessments and decision-making on Benghazi. This requires a public appearance by the Secretary of State herself.”
The September 11, 2012, attack resulted in the deaths of four Americans, including Ambassador Chris Stevens, and called into question the security of U.S. diplomatic personnel abroad.
Source: CNN
{Matzav.com Newscenter}

via matzav.com

Iran, Venezuela Plotting Attacks "Worse than 9/11"

(Livia Acosta Noguera, the Venezuelan consul in Miami)

Anna Mahjar-Barducci (stonegateinstitute.org) Tensions are mounting between the U.S. and Venezuela as the State Department decided to expel Livia Acosta Noguera, the Venezuelan consul in Miami, declaring her "persona non grata." The Venezuelan consul was implicated in an alleged plot to launch cyber attacks on U.S. nuclear power facilities. The decision was taken as a direct result of the revelations made by the documentary The Iranian Threat, aired by the U.S Spanish language channel Univision.
In the film, the Venezuelan consul was caught on camera backing Iranian-sponsored cyber-attack against U.S. targets in 2007, when she was vice-secretary in the Venezuelan Embassy in Mexico. According to the documentary, these cyber-attacks would be "worse than 9-11." The State Department did not want to comment on this decision. However, a U.S. high official stated that this expulsion is a serious issue, as "we do not take it lightly when we declare somebody persona non grata."
Before the expulsion, four members of the Congress -- Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (Republican), Mario Diaz-Balart (Republican), David Rivera (Republican) and Albio Sires (Democrat) -- wrote a letter to US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, expressing their "grave concern" over the "diplomatic credentials" of the Venezuelan Consul. "According to a documentary by Univision Network titled 'The Iranian Threat' […] [the Venezuelan consul] interacted with members from the Iranian and Cuban embassies and with students posing as extremists […] in order to coordinate a cyber attack against the United States Government and our critical infrastructure systems at the White House, FBI, and CIA. If true, these actions demonstrate [Venezuelan consul's] willingness to undermine U.S. interests and potential threat to our national security posed by [Venezuelan consul's] activities. With this is mind, we respectfully request the Department of State to investigate these allegations, and if found true, declare her a persona non grata and require her immediate departure from the United States," they wrote.
Congressman David Rivera also revealed that Washington has information that members of the Venezuelan diplomatic corps are also active officers of the Venezuelan intelligence services. This would mean that Venezuelan spies are allegedly acting freely in the U.S soil. Congressman Rivera warned that there should be an immediate investigation into further Venezuelan threats to the U.S. national security, especially given the cooperation between the Venezuela's intelligence and Iran's.
It seems clear that the State Department found these allegations to be true. According to Venezuelan media, the Venezuelan consul has been in Venezuela since December, having left the U.S. soon after the airing of the documentary. "We already knew that this was going to happen, and so she has been in Caracas in order to avoid situations, possibly even dangerous ones," said the Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez, during a press conference.
Chavez added that the expulsion is a demonstration of "the ridiculous empire's arrogance…..[The Venezuelan consul] is a very dignified professional, who was attacked, slandered and demonized by extremist groups and now by Barack Obama's government," he said, adding that - "She will continue working for our foreign service as she has done for many years." Venezuela's Foreign Minister Nicolas Maduro further stated that Venezuela is going to give a clear, firm and timely response about the issue.
The U.S. action against the Venezuelan Consul comes exactly at the time Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad visited Venezuela. It therefore seems a clear signal of disapproval that Washington wanted to send to Venezuela, given that the Venezuelan consul is accused of having backed an alleged Iranian plot to attack the U.S.
Ahmadinejad's visit indicates the further strengthening of relations between Venezuela and Iran. During the visit, Ahmadinejad and Chavez took the opportunity to laugh at the U.S.'s concern over Iran's nuclear program. "They accuse us of being warmongers," said Chavez. "They, the Americans, are the threat." Chavez also commented o being honored by Ahmadinejad's visit. "Now Washington's spokespersons are saying that it is not convenient for any country to get close to Iran. Well, the truth is that this makes us laugh,"Chavez said.
In a Univision interview, U.S. President Barack Obama declared that the Venezuelan government's relations with Iran did not serve the interests of the Venezuelan people. "Ultimately, it is up to the Venezuelan people to determine what they gain from a relationship with a country that violates universal human rights and is isolated from much of the world. The Iranian government has consistently supported international terrorism that has killed innocent men, women and children around the world – including in the Americas. It has brutally suppressed the Iranian people simply for demanding their universal rights. And Tehran continues to pursue a nuclear program that threatens the security of the Middle East. Here in the Americas, we take Iranian activities, including in Venezuela, very seriously and we will continue to monitor them closely," Obama said.
Chavez, however, seems not at all worried, and is evidently willing to keep on cooperating with Iran, even if this will lead to more U.S. sanctions. During the meeting with Ahmadinejad, the two heads of state agreed to expand cooperation in the fields of industry, science and nano-technology, as well as economy. They also called on the "imperialist and extremist powers to stop interfering in the internal affairs of other countries."
It is clear, that despite the expulsion of the Venezuelan Consul, the U.S. should keep high alert, as other threats against the U.S. can come from Venezuela, in cooperation with Iran.

The scourge of clientitis

(Caroline Glick) For many years, observers of the US State Department on both sides of the American political spectrum have agreed that State Department officials suffer from a malady referred to as "clientitis." Clientitis is generally defined as a state of mind in which representatives of an organization confuse their roles.
Rather than advance the cause of their organization to outside organizations, they represent the interests of outside organizations to their own organizations. In some cases, diplomats are simply corrupted by their host governments. For generations US diplomats to Saudi Arabia have received lucrative post-government service jobs at Saudi-owned or controlled companies, public relations firms and other institutions.
Often, the problem is myopia rather than corruption.
Diplomats who speak to foreign government officials on a daily basis often simply ignore the context in which these foreigners operate. They become friends with their interlocutors and forget that the latter are also agents of their governments tasked with promoting foreign interests in their dealings with US diplomats.
In Israel the situation is similar. Here, too, Foreign Ministry officials have a tendency to give preference to the positions of the governments or institutions to which they are assigned over the interests and positions of the Israeli government that sent them to their posts.
For instance, in September 2008, shortly after the UN allowed Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to use his speech at the UN General Assembly to accuse the Jews of controlling the world in a bid to poison and destroy it, then-Israeli ambassador to the UN Gabriela Shalev gave an interview to Army Radio in which she said her primary duty is "correcting the UN's image in the eyes of the people of Israel."
Since the scourge of clientitis among diplomats is widely recognized, governments are often able to consider its impact on diplomats when they weigh the credibility or wisdom of recommendations presented by their professional diplomats.
LESS WELL recognized and therefore largely unconsidered is how clientitis has negatively impacted the positions of military commanders.
Clientitis first became prevalent in the US Armed Forces and the IDF in the 1990s. In the immediate aftermath of the Cold War, the Clinton administration began transforming in earnest the US armed forces' role from war fighting to nation building. In Israel, with the onset of the peace process with the PLO in 1993, the IDF was ordered to change its operating guidelines. From then on, peacemaking was to take priority over war fighting and defeating terrorists.
Since September 11, 2011, the US military has vastly expanded its nation building roles around the world.US military commanders are promoted more for prowess in acting as diplomats-in-uniform than for their capacity to train and employ soldiers to kill and defeat the enemy. Commanders deployed to train the al-Qaida-infested Yemeni or Afghan militaries; liaise with the Hizbullah-dominated Lebanese Armed Forces; or train the Iranian-penetrated Iraqi military have little personal incentive to warn against these missions.
So, too, in working with their local counterparts on a daily basis, like their State Department colleagues, these US military officers have a marked tendency to ignore the broader context in which their local colleagues operate. And so, like their civilian colleagues at the US embassies in these countries, military commanders have a tendency to become the representatives of their foreign counterparts to the Pentagon and to Congress.
In the case of the IDF, in 1993 the entire General Staff was encouraged to embrace clientitis. Then prime minister and defense minister Yitzhak Rabin's decision in 1993 to appoint IDF commanders to lead negotiations with the PLO politicized the IDF to an unprecedented degree. Only generals who completely supported the peace process and forced their underlings to completely support it could expect promotion.
This political corruption of the IDF survived the destruction of the peace process in 2000. Due to successive governments' decisions to continue negotiating with the Palestinian Authority despite its refusal to make peace with Israel and its sponsorship of terrorism, the IDF has continued to participate in negotiations with the PA and lead liaison efforts with the Palestinian security forces.
As a consequence, whether due to the political views of officers on the ground, to institutional corrosion, or to officers' inability to view the statements of their Palestinian counterparts in the broader context of Palestinian and regional power politics, these IDF "peacemakers" act as the PA security services chief lobbyists to both the Israeli and US governments.
IN RECENT conversations with senior sources on Capitol Hill, it became apparent that American military trainers who work with the Lebanese Armed Forces were highly influential in convincing Congress to end its opposition to renewed US military assistance to the LAF.
Congress put a temporary hold on US military assistance to Lebanon in August 2010 after a Lebanese army sniper murdered IDF Lt.-Col. Dov Harari and critically wounded Capt. Ezra Lakia. Both officers were stationed on the Israeli side of the border.
In April, when Hizbullah gained control over the new Lebanese government, the Obama administration again temporarily froze military assistance to the LAF.
In September Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told the Hizbullah-controlled Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati that the US would renew its assistance. In October, the Pentagon hosted Lebanese Army Commander General Jean Kahwagi on an official visit.
According to Congressional sources, Congress has permitted continued military assistance to Lebanon, despite Hizbullah's control over both the government and the armed forces, because of the outspoken support of the US military for the military assistance program.
So too, according to Congressional sources. House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairwoman Ileana Ros- Lehtinen's decision to end her committee's block on US military assistance to the PA's security forces owed to IDF pressure to renew the assistance. That assistance was cut off in September following the PA's bid to achieve statehood at the UN.
Following the aid cut-off Palestinian commanders warned that if the US did not renew its financial support for the US trained Palestinian security services, its soldiers would seek funding from elsewhere - including from terror sponsoring governments like Iran and Syria, and from Hamas, and Hizbullah.
Obviously these warnings were nothing more than acts of extortion. And despite outcries from the Obama administration, Mrs. Ros-Lehtinen held firm.
However, according to senior Congressional sources, Mrs. Ros-Lehtinen was unable to brush off entreaties by IDF commanders asking that the US renew its funding of these forces. Two weeks ago - just as the PA renewed its unity talks with Hamas - she lifted her committee's block on military assistance to the PA.
THE IDEA that governments gain leverage over other governments by assisting them is not a new one. And it is certainly true. However, in all cases, the leverage gained by assisting foreign governments owes entirely to the other governments' understanding that such assistance can and will be ended if they fail to meet certain benchmarks of behavior that are dictated from the outset.
Once a government's threat of aid cut-off to another government is removed or is no longer credible, then the leverage the provision of aid afforded that government is lost. So long as the Palestinians believe that Israel will never cut off its support for Fatah and the PA security services, they will continue to sponsor terror and collaborate with Hamas and other terror groups without fear.
So long as LAF officers and soldiers believe that Hizbullah's threat to attack the LAF is more credible than the US's stated willingness to end its support for the Lebanese military, the LAF will continue to openly support war against Israel and collaborate with Hizbullah.
Proof that a state's ability to leverage its foreign aid owes entirely to the credibility of a threat to cut off that aid came earlier this month in the aftermath of UNESCO's decision to grant full state membership to "Palestine." Due to US law, the Obama administration had no choice but to cut off all US funding to UNESCO in response to the move. As a consequence, the PLO's bid to gain full membership in other UN institutions has floundered.
Not wishing to suffer UNESCO's fate, no other UN institutions are willing to repeat UNESCO's action And so the Palestinians' great victory at UNESCO has become a Pyrrhic one.
The Obama administration never sought this outcome. As his representatives have made abundantly clear, if US President Barack Obama had the power to maintain US budgetary support for UNESCO despite its conferral of membership on "Palestine," he would have done so.
But because the law is not subject to interpretation, US leverage over the UN actually increased in the aftermath of the UNESCO vote. Recognizing that actions have consequences, other UN agencies have buried plans of granting membership to "Palestine."
Governments must give due consideration to the positions of their professional diplomats and military commanders as well as to those of allied countries when they weigh various policy options. But while doing so, legislators and policymakers must also take into account the built-in biases influencing the judgment of these professionals. Clientitis is a serious impediment to good judgment. And it is found wherever professionals are charged with building relationships, rather than achieving concrete goals.
Originally published in The Jerusalem Post.

'Palestinians' drop UN agency bids

(Israel Matzav) For now, the 'Palestinian Authority' has suspended its bids to join 16 UN agencies as a full member.

The Palestinian foreign minister stressed that the PA's decision to shelve its general membership bids would enable it to focus its efforts on the UN Security Council bid and the drive to become a full member at the UN.
UNESCO's acceptance, he said, constitutes a positive push for the PA's diplomatic efforts in the UN. The PLO first applied to UNESCO in 1989.
Turning his attention to the nearing UN Security Council vote, al-Malki said that if the Palestinians fail to get the necessary votes, or in case the US vetoes a favorable vote – as it said it would do – the Palestinians would pursue other avenues of acceptance into the United Nations.
"An observer status is no longer enough," he explained.
The Palestinian foreign minister's statement followed an admonition by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, who said that the Palestinian efforts to join other United Nations agencies were "not beneficial for Palestine and not beneficial for anybody."

Representative Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fl) is onto something.

it's too late. Oslo has already been voided. Time to make Judea and Samaria part of Israel.

Cuba to drill six oil wells off Florida coast

Mark Tapscott Editorial Page Editor
President Obama and his Interior Secretary Ken Salazar have all but shut down the U.S. oil and natural gas industry drilling in the Gulf of Mexico, but foreign powers like China, Cuba and Venezuela aren't hesitating to move in to take advantage of America's bureaucratic paralysis.
Global Post reports preparations are moving forward for six wells in an area off the Florida coast in which U.S. experts have estimated could contain five billion barrels of oil. The Cubans are moving to tap into this potential energy bonanza with extensive aid from China, which built the massive drilling rig, and Hugo Chavez' Venezuela, which is providing drilling and production expertise.
A Spanish firm, Repsol, with partners in Norway's Statoil and Italy's Saipem, will oversee the operation. For more from Global Post, go here. Not by coincidence, the latest data on U.S. drilling activity shows a continuing decline in the number of rigs in operation. The Washington Post reports this morning that another 10 units stopped operating, leaving a total of 1,958. Most of the newly idled rigs are in Texas.HAVANA, Cuba — Somewhere between here and China, a hulking, hungry oil rig dubbed “Scarabeo 9” is making its way across the oceans, preparing to put a very controversial hole deep in the Gulf of Mexico.
To nervous Floridians, even its name suggests “scare,” or “scar.” It will puncture the sea floor in Cuban-controlled waters just 60 miles off the Florida Keys, not far from a protected coastline where offshore drilling is banned under U.S. law.
More from Cuba: Economic inequality on the rise
U.S. geologists believe there may be 5 billion barrels of oil down there. Cuban studies estimate the total at four times that, enough to put the island on par with mid-size energy exporters in the region like Ecuador and Colombia.
A major oil strike could rescue Cuba’s struggling socialist system from its financial woes, giving the Castro government access to new credit and a potentially lucrative industry.
More from Cuba: Venezuelan subsidies keep Cuba afloat
Having conducted test wells in the area before, Spanish energy company Repsol and its partners are now bringing the Chinese-built Scarabeo 9 to a site off Cuba’s northwest coast, where it aims to drill as soon as November at a depth of more than 5,500 feet, deeper than the blown-out well that spewed 5 million barrels of crude into the Gulf last summer.
That disaster has added to anxiety about Cuba’s exploration efforts, but it has also intensified calls for U.S. officials to engage the Castro government on spill prevention and contingency plans.
A high-level delegation of U.S. oil-spill experts traveled to Havana this week to meet with Cuban officials. It has urged the Obama administration to cooperate with the Castro government on a joint-response plan that could avert environmental catastrophe for both countries.
India and Pakistan are the powerhouses of South Asia as well as historic enemies. How do their military forces stack up today?
Last week's winner compares the military might of two continually feuding countries. Check the membership site in late-September for a link to completed piece.
The delegation included William Reilly, co-chair of the presidential commission that investigated last year’s spill at the Deepwater Horizon rig, at the well known as Macondo.
“The fact that Cuba is about to drill six wells in the next two years, some of them very deep, deeper than Macondo, in places we wouldn’t allow it if it were in our waters … you better believe that the United States has an important interest in that,” Reilly said.
“The Cubans have never regulated this industry, they don’t have familiarity with it, but they are doing things to get ready for it,” he added. “We want to make sure the Cubans have got the lessons we learned, and get a sense of what they do need — that the U.S., in its own interest — would help them get.”
Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fla.), a long-time Castro foe, criticized the delegation’s visit, saying it gave “credibility” to Cuba’s attempt to become “the oil tycoons of the Caribbean.” Other lawmakers have also urged retaliatory measures against Repsol.
But experts say with Cuba moving forward, the U.S. should help them do so as safely as possible. Some of the industry’s leading safety-equipment providers and cleanup contractors are nearby along the Gulf Coast, but the U.S. trade embargo bars them from doing business with the island.
In recent months, Cuban authorities have given minimal information about their drilling plans, but the U.S. delegation gave new details into the project.
The fact that the drilling rig was built in China should not raise concerns, said delegation member Lee Hunt, president of the Houston-based International Association of Drilling Contractors, a trade group. As many six other rigs already working safely in the Gulf of Mexico were built in the same Chinese shipyard, Hunt said.
“It has the latest generation of equipment,” said Hunt.
American trade sanctions against Cuba prohibited the use of more than 10 percent U.S. technology in the rig’s construction, but Hunt said the Norwegian-designed platform will have an American-made blowout-prevention system that is more advanced than the one which failed on the Deepwater Horizon.
While Cuban oil officials will manage and regulate the operations, the engineers and crews doing the actually drilling will be composed of experienced international oil workers, said Hunt. An Italian firm, Saipem, will be operating the rig, and Repsol’s partners include Statoil, a Norwegian company that he and others praise as a world leader in safe deepwater drilling.
When asked how closely U.S. oil companies were following Cuba’s drilling plans — and if they might be angling behind the scenes for access to its waters — members of the delegation said it would depend on the size of the find.
If the deposits hold close to 20 billion barrels, as Cuban geologists claim, that would probably attract some interest, said delegation member Richard Sears, a former vice president and deepwater drilling specialist at Royal Dutch Shell.
For now, though, Sears said, U.S. firms will likely prefer to work in parts of the world with proven hydrocarbon reserves and fewer political hurdles than Cuba. “The challenge for any company is how you allocate resources,” he said.
“Do I want to fight political and public-relations battles?” said Sears. “Or do I put my resources into other parts of the Gulf of Mexico where I have well-established leases?”

via docstalk.blogspot.com

Threatening the UN financially won't work if Obama and Clinton think the Jews will vote for them anyway.

Bush Sr. was no friend of Israel, and neither is Obama. In fact it was Bush's secretary of state Baker who said, "Fuck the Jews, they don't vote for us anyway"...and actually was kind of correct because the American Jews were for a welfare state for the most part. Little has changed now that the welfare state has cannibalized the Jewish community. Baker despite bigot barking then passed a financial bill that spooked the UN into turning down Palestine. The GOP didn't do it because they wanted to... the GOP looked a little like a Ron Paul party back then. The GOP did it because in the end they were worried that while the Jewish community was lost to the left, the Christian Zionist community would of been disenfranchised.

...And then there was Secretary of State James Baker's infamous "fuck the Jews" remark. In a private conversation with a colleague about Israel, Baker reportedly uttered the vulgarity, noting that Jews "didn't vote for us anyway." This was more or less true—Bush got 27 percent of the Jewish vote, compared with 73 percent for Dukakis, in 1988. And thanks in part to Baker, it was even truer in 1992, when Bill Clinton got 78 percent of the Jewish vote and Bush got only 15 percent—the poorest showing by a Republican candidate since Barry Goldwater in 1964. via slate.com

Baker's hand was forced... it wasn't like he actually wanted to do what he did... but it remains to be seen if Obama's hand can be forced... because unlike Baker... Obama thinks the Jews will vote for him rain or shine... and sadly Obama would be right on that analysis. The Jewish community really is ill from centuries of abuse and can not seem to let go of government mechanisms. Can anyone really see Obama NOT vetoing this bill? I suppose Congress can refuse to fund UN activities, but I doubt that will stop Obama and Clinton from continuing to do so .

House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairwoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen knows just how to deal with the 'Palestinian' bid for 'statehood' at the United Nations: Threaten their funding. In 1989, Yasser Arafat’s PLO also pushed for membership for a “Palestinian state” in UN entities. The PLO’s strategy looked unstoppable until the George H.W. Bush administration made clear that the U.S. would cut off funding to any UN entity that upgraded the status of the Palestinian observer mission in any way. The UN was forced to choose between isolating Israel and receiving U.S. contributions, and they chose the latter. The PLO’s unilateral campaign was stopped in its tracks. This example demonstrates a simple but needed lesson: At the UN, money talks, and smart withholding works. With Arafat’s successors up to the same tricks today, the U.S. response must be as strong. Unfortunately, the Obama administration has consistently refused to use our strongest leverage — our financial contributions — to advance U.S. interests at the UN. If the executive branch will not demonstrate leadership on this issue, Congress must fill the void. I will soon introduce the United Nations Transparency, Accountability, and Reform Act, which will reflect the executive branch’s previous successful policies by cutting off U.S. contributions to any UN entity that grants membership or any other upgraded status to the Palestinian observer mission. This legislation will also leverage U.S. taxpayer dollars to make sure they do not fund biased or wasteful UN activities, and to achieve other much-needed reforms that will make the UN more transparent, accountable, objective, and effective. It is time to use all our leverage to stop this unilateral Palestinian scheme — for the sake of our ally Israel and all free democracies, for the sake of peace and security, and for the sake of achieving a UN that upholds its founding principles.

Money talks - even at the UN - Carl

Sadly it remains to be seen if the Democrats have any incentive to do the right thing. Sometimes being on the other side is the best leverage an interested party can have.

Clinton wants Obama to veto foreign aid bill

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has asked President Obama to veto the foreign aid bill voted by the House Foreign Affairs Committee if it reaches him. In particular, she mentioned provisions cutting aid to the United Nations, and restricting aid to the 'Palestinians,' Egypt and Pakistan.

Clinton said in a letter Tuesday that she would urge President Barack Obama to veto the bill if it passes in both houses of Congress because the measure “would be debilitating to my efforts to carry out a considered foreign policy and diplomacy, and to use foreign assistance strategically to that end,” The Washington Post reported.

The bill cleared the House Foreign Affairs Committee last week in an effort to cut $6.4 billion from the president’s request for $51 billion in foreign aid for 2012. While it has the potential to pass the GOP-controlled House, it’s seen as unable to get through the Democrat-led Senate.

The bill would impose “onerous restrictions” on State Department operations and foreign aid, Clinton wrote, and the “severe curtailing” of dues payments to international groups including the UN and the Organization of American States would be damaging.

The legislation’s proposal to block funding to countries that don’t meet corruption standards “has the potential to affect a staggering number of needy aid recipients,” as do proposals to restrict aid to Egypt, Lebanon, Yemen and the Palestinian Authority. The bill would only allow the flow of money to those countries if the Obama administration was able to certify that no members of terror groups or their sympathizers were serving in their governments.

Brad Goehner, a spokesman for Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fla.), the chairwoman of the House committee, told the Post that the letter was “disappointing, particularly given the current debt crisis, that the Obama administration is fighting to keep sending taxpayer money to foreign organizations and governments that undermine U.S. interests.”

More here.

Nuclear Cooperation between Argentina and Iran?

an ineffective foreign policy... obviously! The Ladies are all smiles, but they bite and scratch when backs are turned.
Kirchner and Clinton... Ha ha ha ha ha.....

With the help of Venezuela, there is reason to believe that Argentina is cooperating with Iran on its the nuclear issue in a deal that involves Argentina's willingness to drop the accusations against Iran for the 1994 bombing in return for business.

In a confidential letter that was sent by Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, who chairs the House Foreign Relations Committee, to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Ros-Lehtinen sought to establish "status of any possible economic projects Argentina may be engaged in with Venezuela that may involve Iran." Ros-Lehtinen also sought to establish "the extent of any nuclear cooperation that may be at play between Argentina, Venezuela and Iran." The letter was co-signed by Florida's Republican Congressmen Connie Mack and David Rivera. "We are writing to express our concerns about information that our offices have received about potential efforts by Iran of nuclear cooperation with Argentina, using Venezuela as its intermediary," the three legislators wrote.
The existence of economic projects linking Iran, Venezuela and Argentina have long been known. Univision, a Spanish-language television network in the United States, mentions that, in the framework of this cooperation, Venezuela has launched a program for the development of at least 200 "socialist factories" through agreements with Iran and Argentina -- mainly food processing plants and industrial equipment factories. Although the funding involved about $300 million, most of these factories have not been built and, very likely, will never be built. The suspicion is that financial resources have been diverted for different purposes: in particular that the so-called agricultural program is a cover-up operation to hide payments that have nothing to do with food factories.
In the past, Argentina and Iran maintained a nuclear cooperation agreement that, under pressure from U.S. President George Bush, was suspended in the early 1990s by then-President Carlos Menem, But more recently, Iran has become interested in acquiring scientific know-how and technology from the Argentine nuclear program. The Miami Herald reports that in 2007 Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad had asked Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, on a personal basis, to to use his good relations with Argentine President Cristina Fernandez Kirchner to convince her to restart nuclear cooperation with Iran. Further, the website La Patilla published information about a meeting on February 6, 2010 between the Venezuelan vice President Elias Jaua and the Argentinean Planning Minister, Julio De Vido, close assistant to President Fernandez Kirchner, in which they discussed nuclear cooperation. Though the evidence implicating Argentina with Iran in nuclear development is yet not clear, last April the Argentinean paper Perfil reported that in a meeting last January with Iran's ally, Syrian President Bashar Assad, the Argentinean Foreign Minister, Hector Timerman, offered to drop investigations in Iran relating to the 1994 bombings in Buenos Aires against the Argentine Israelite Mutual Association (AMIA). In return, it seems, Timerman's desire was to deepen economic relations between Buenos Aires and Teheran.
According to Perfil, Syria then passed the Argentinean FM's offer to Iran. In a leaked cable quoted by the newspaper, Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi allegedly told the Iranian President that "Argentina is no longer interested in solving those two attacks, but in exchange prefers improving its economic relations with Iran."
The AMIA bombing
This year marks the 17^th anniversary of the AMIA bombing, which killed 87 people and injured more than 100, in 1994. Argentina was also hit by a terrorist attack in 1992; the bombing targeted the Israel Embassy in Buenos Aires, killed 29 people and wounded 242. In both events, Hezbollah and Iran are suspected of having perpetrated the terrorist attacks. To date, however, there has been no justice.. The person believed to be the bombings's planner is Ahmad Vahidi, the current Iranian Defense Minister, who recently visited Bolivia after a controversial official invitation by Bolivian President Evo Morales.
The Iranian government recently said that is offering its help to "uncover the truth" behind the AMIA bombing. The Iranian Foreign Ministry wrote in a statement that "the ministry denounces the fact that the truth about the criminal action has become the target of plots and political games and that Argentine officials at the time, whose illegal actions have been disclosed and convicted by the court in this regard, misled judicial investigation and set the stage for the escape of real culprits behind the atrocity from the hands of justice through pointing a finger of blame at a number of nationals of the Islamic Republic of Iran."
Despite these hypocritical remarks, and despite the fact that Iran says that the Argentinean justice leveled false allegations against Hezbollah and Iran, the current Argentinean government thanked Iran for offering its help. Argentine Foreign Minister Hector Timerman said that Iran's offer is "an unprecedented and very positive step." The Associated Press reported that Iran, which denies that Iranian citizens were involved, is even preparing its own report on the bombing and wants to begin a dialogue with the Argentines to help solve the case. Given the fact that in the past the Iranian government has accused the "Zionists" of perpetrating the 1994 bombing, the report will most likely bring paradoxical allegations that the "Jews" committed the attack against the Jewish center in Buenos Aires.
Still, the Argentinean FM Timerman said he is optimistic that Iran will help solve the case: "There is sufficient evidence to bring to trial various Iranian citizens, and we want to see if, through this dialogue, they will understand that we all have to submit ourselves to justice." As some Argentinean media recently put it, Buenos Aires is apparently more interested in pursuing a rapprochement with Tehran, with all the good business that will follow, than pursuing the cause of justice. It is clear from Timerman's words of appeasement that even a country such as Argentina, which suffered from terrorist attacks inspired by Iran, is willing to turn the page and open its doors to doing business with the Ayatollahs. What then are the chances for trade and military sanctions against Iran to succeed?
Iran looks to diversify allies in Latin America
The worries expressed by Ros-Lehtinen and her colleagues only add another tessera to the mosaic that Iran is preparing south of America's doorstep. In response, the U.S. State Department answered Ros-Lehtinen with the following statement: "We have no evidence to support the claim that Venezuela serves as an interlocutor between Iran and Argentina on nuclear issues, nor that Argentina is granting Iran access to its nuclear technology. Argentina has long maintained a constructive position at the International Atomic Energy Agency with respect to Iran's nuclear program". There is no reason, unfortunately, to be reassured by the words of the State Department.
Meir Javedanfar, an Iranian-Israeli political analyst, points out that, as Iran's staunchest ally in Latin America, Venezuela's President, Hugo Chavez, was diagnosed with a cancer, which means that the Venezuelan President might move further down in his alliance with Iran on its priority list. Chavez's illness may be why Iran could try to forge a strong alliance with another important Latin American country:: Argentina. Although it is not yet clear whether Argentina is sending nuclear technology to Iran with the help of Venezuela, it is a reality that Teheran wants to diversify its relations in Latin America away from Venezuela.
For now, the Argentinean government is responding exactly as Iran wishes, as can bee seen in the Argentinean FM's warm and friendly statements on Iran's cooperation in the case of AMIA. Argentina is not just helping the mullahs' regime by opening new doors in Latin America, it is also whitewashing Iran's terrorist record, would leave hundreds of victims and their families permanently deprived of justice.

via hudson-ny.org

What incentive could the United States give Argentina to keep her from working with Iran? Follow the money! Good foreign policy would be to engage with Argentina as opposed to directly with terrorist groups.
image via hillary.foreignpolicy.com

US to bar funding for UN agencies that recognize 'Palestine'?

Representative Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fl), the chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, plans to introduce legislation that would withhold funding from any UN agency that recognizes a state of 'Palestine' that does not come about as the result of a negotiated settlement with Israel.

Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, chairwoman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, is planning to include the measure in a comprehensive bill to reform the UN she is expected to file in the coming weeks, according to Capitol Hill aides.

via israelmatzav.blogspot.com

good luck with Obama

John Bolton: US Can Stop PA Initiative by Halting Funds for UN

As far back as 1988, the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) issued a "declaration of statehood” and changed the name of its observer delegation to the United Nations from the PLO to Palestine.

Secretary of State James Baker warned publicly, “I will recommend to the President that the United States make no further contributions, voluntary or assessed, to any international organization which makes any changes in the PLO's status as an observer organization."

The same James Baker that would later say the Jewish Lobby was too powerful.  My guess is was he was doing Reagan's bidding here and did not particularly feel strongly about this.  If I am wrong, Baker is still alive and he is welcome to correct this and make his feelings about Israel known.

Anne Bayefsky: Behind the story--U.S. Pulls Out Of Durban III

The Liberal Lynch Mob Comes for the Jews Again...

The United Nations and the Goldstone Report:
Where Does It Go From Here?

With President Obama’s anti-Israel hostility becoming an increasing liability for Democrats, the administration finally decided Wednesday to pull out of the U.N.’s upcoming Israel-bashing extravaganza known as “Durban III.” Believe it or not, the notorious U.N. world summit on racism is coming to New York City in September with the purpose of “commemorating” the ten-year anniversary of the racist “anti-racism” conference held in Durban, South Africa in 2001.
Mr. Obama's latest lead-from-behind foreign policy move comes seven months after Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper's government first declared “we will not be part of this event, which commemorates an agenda that promotes racism rather than combats it.”

The decision appears to be a clear reaction to the negative political fallout surrounding Mr. Obama's recent veiled attempt to shove indefensible borders down Israel’s throat.
During Obama’s speech to the pro-Israel lobby group AIPAC on May 22, he specifically referred to his decision not to attend the “Durban II” or “Durban review conference,” which was held in Geneva in 2009. But he made no mention of of U.S. participation in the 2011 Durban III event, though it would have been an ideal audience for such an announcement had he already reached a decision on it.
In 2009 President Obama decided -- just 36 hours before the meeting began -- that there was something wrong with a conference on xenophobia and intolerance headlined by Iranian President Ahmadinejad.
It was a costly delay, which saved the U.N. from even more embarrassment, as many other states would have acted in tandem with the United States and boycotted Durban II with sufficient planning.
Evidently, on May 22 the president still thought he could pull the same dawdling stunt again.
But with Democrats scrambling to recover from the president’s profound alienation of large numbers of voters deeply sympathetic to Israel, the June 1 announcement was made and dressed up as a response to a letter “from Democratic Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand.” The old letter from last December was actually signed by 9 Democrats, 8 Republicans, and 1 independent, and post-dated a boycott call of the racism summit made by Republican Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen in November.
The better-late-than-never decision is not as simple, however, as it seems.
First, the U.N. General Assembly is currently negotiating a resolution on the “modalities” of Durban III. In plain English, there has been a difficult and protracted debate behind-the-scenes about the organization of the summit. The European Union, in particular, is looking for procedural dodges that will help it avoid the split that occurred during Durban II, when some EU states boycotted and others did not.Unfortunately for EU pencil-pushers, there is no escaping that the substance of the meeting is irrevocably poisoned.
By virtue of a 2010 General Assembly resolution, the purpose of Durban III is to celebrate a world conference that reveled in anti-semitism and to adopt a final declaration that reaffirms the original Durban Declaration. That’s the Declaration supposedly to combat racism, xenophobia and related intolerance but that somehow manages to charge just one of the 192 UN members with racism, namely, Israel.
The Obama administration has given no indication that it will encourage EU allies to break ranks and boycott Durban III, by insisting on a vote on this resolution and voting against.
Second, the U.N. Human Rights Council is poised to hold an event in Geneva on June 15 also “in the context of the tenth anniversary of the Durban Declaration.” With the Obama administration on the Council it appears set to attend events over there hoping nobody will notice over here.
But the Council and U.N. High Commissioner Navi Pillay – a native of Durban and chief champion of the Durban Declaration – have planned a three-hour panel discussion featuring seven carefully-selected speakers. They include, for instance, extremist Mireille Fanon-Mendes. As recently as April 25 of this year, Fanon-Mendes told the “Electronic Intifada” that Israel was an apartheid state and she supported the first and second Palestinian intifadas as well as blockade-running flotillas and the international prosecution of Israelis as war criminals.
The Durban illness runs deep. The U.N. human rights system, led by the High Commissioner and Human Rights Council, has perverted the fight against racism into a fight against the Jewish state, a democratic freedom-loving home to more than a million Arabs and a bulwark against the ravages of anti-semitism for all Jews.
Remember that the streets of Durban pulsated with signs reading “for the liberation of Quds, machine guns based on FAITH and ISLAM must be used” and “the martyr’s blood irrigates the tree of revolution in Palestine,” while the gross intolerance inside the Durban meeting halls ended on September 8, 2001. Given the inextricable connection between hate and violence, shunning Durban III on September 22 in New York City just days after the tenth anniversary of 9/11 was a no-brainer.
Now comes the hard part. U.N. demonization of Israel serves to justify Palestinian rejection of negotiations and coexistence, which in turn fuels U.N. support of a unilateral declaration of Palestinian statehood.
The cycle will only be broken if Palestinians and their U.N. enablers are made to face real consequences for attempting to reap the rewards of hate-mongering.

For more United Nations coverage see www.EYEontheUN.org.
U.S. pulls out of Durban III: Behind the story: This article by Anne Bayefsky appears today on Fox News. via daledamos.blogspot.com

The role of “civil” society in Durban I is best remembered for producing out-of-control NGO mobs. These gangs broke into the one NGO session on combating anti-Semitism, forcing it to end. After threats of violence, they necessitated the closure of the Durban Jewish Community Center, which had been the meeting place for Jewish NGOs attending the conference. They disrupted a press conference of Jewish NGOs who were seeking to raise alarm bells. They required Jewish representatives from all over the world to flee the final session with a police escort because their safety couldn’t be guaranteed if they remained. In the end, the alleged “anti-racism” NGO community deleted from their declaration multiple references to combating anti-Semitism and added that the self-determination of the Jewish people, or Zionism, was a form of racism.

via weeklystandard.com

The United Nations is planning to hold “Durban III” in New York City in September 2011, marking the tenth anniversary of the 2001 Durban conference, and the non-governmental forum which preceded it, held in Durban, South Africa in 2001.

Durban I produced the infamous Durban Declaration and Programme of Action (DDPA), which charges Israel with racism but names no other state in the world. Durban II, held in Geneva in April 2009, was headlined by Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who saw the occasion as ideal for issuing another denial of the Holocaust and an endorsement of genocide against the Jewish state. Timing Durban III for the annual opening of the General Assembly is meant to guarantee the extensive involvement of presidents and prime ministers, most of whom eluded organizers of Durban I and II.
The U.N. will now be marking the 10th anniversary of Durban I at the same time and place as the 10^th anniversary of September 11, 2001. Durban I, the platform for violent, pro-terrorist, and anti-Semitic rhetoric that included such speakers as Yasser Arafat and Fidel Castro, ended just three days before 9/11.
The intergovernmental working group charged with preparing next year’s commemoration session just wrapped up its first planning meeting in Geneva. It adopted a series of “conclusions and recommendations” and indicated that Durban III is intended to “reaffirm that the DDPA provides the most comprehensive UN framework for combating racism.” The U.N. General Assembly is now occupied with the delicate matter of finalizing “the modalities” of Durban III, and New York-based diplomats are hard at work negotiating the details.

via weeklystandard.com

Liberalism's Rape Corps

The focus of Feminist Academics is in attacking Western Academia. Academia when accused will settle with the female activist in fear of a public relations disaster, even when the campus realizes the accusation is merely a scam. Feminists get away with this repeatedly, often with very little time between their campus haunts. Meanwhile in the third world the real horror show continues and the spotlight is in the wrong place.  It doesn't seem like this will get better any time soon.

Two years ago the left launched a major assault on Haliburton over its mishandling of two sexual assault cases by or against its civilian contractors. Al Franken successfully introduced a bill to bar defense contracts from going to companies who behave likewise. Left wing media boasted that they were the defenders of rape victims, while Republicans support rape.

Now for the 50th anniversary of the Peace Corps, it's been revealed that over a 1,000 female volunteers have been raped in the last decade. Numbers that are positively 9/11 in scope. And that the idealistic Peace Corps leadership acted like the evil Haliburton leadership, blaming the victims and discouraging them from seeking legal action. There are no cries that Democrats support rape. No bills to defund the Corps, that awkward legacy of New Frontierism. This time it's Republicans like Ileana Ros-Lehtinen stepping up to demand accountability. And it's the Democrats who are standing in the way.
Similar parallel stories involve female activists who head to the Palestinian Authority to combat Zionism, and the assault on Lara Logan in the middle of what was billed as a democracy celebration. Each time the assault was minimized, until the woman in question decided to speak out.
It's an old story about the naivete of Western liberals who imagine that the Third World is somehow better than because it is less materialistic, finding themselves in cultures where the inequality of women is a given, meeting a man's eyes is considered a sexual invitation, and the only justice system that matters is kinship based. Crimes are acted on depending on family influence. And Westerners in Africa or the Middle East have no family there. Which means crimes against them can go unpunished if no pressure is applied.

more via sultanknish.blogspot.com

...Veiled woman describes being raped by Syrian forces

Arlene Kushner On Gaza

A lot of people assume that Zionist Jews are Right Wing NUTS.

Linda Rhodes, Arlene Kushner, and Ellen Broidy, May 1970, photographed by Diana Davies.

via karaj.tumblr.com

I started looking into the person who wrote the post below who is defending Israel and I found this...

...is this the same Arlene Kushner?

Quiet
As in Gaza.
Right now it's looking more than a bit dubious. According to the PA news agency Ma'an, last night UN Special Coordinator for the Middle East Robert Serry had successfully negotiated a ceasefire -- in which the Palestinian Arab factions in Gaza would cease launching projectiles at Israel, and Israel would halt attacks on Hamas in Gaza.
But there's no evidence of it, as those projectiles -- mortars, kassams and Grads -- keep coming and our operations have not ceased. There's been no word on this officially from either side. The term used in English was "ceasefire," but I must point out that there are different gradations of what we would broadly see as covering this term. A hudna, in Arabic, is a mutually arrived at agreement-- but still temporary. It's not "peace," of course. A tahadiya is a mutual quiet that is informal.
In either event, the possibility for the Arabs to continue to build and strengthen themselves exists. There would be no commitment that prohibits this, and in fact it is taken for granted that this is what they would do. And this, precisely, is what makes it all so problematic.
~~~~~~~~~~
Among the issues complicating matters is a rift between the political arm of Hamas, which would like to revert to a situation of quiet, and the military arm, which wants to keep hitting us.
The Hamas political organization, headed by Ismail Haniyeh, is interested in consolidating its strength inside of Gaza right now; there is fear that the sort of unrest that has engulfed much of the region might reach Gaza as well. There is no desire to be distracted by hostilities with Israel. On the other hand, the military wing, Izz al-Din al- Qassam Brigades, won't listen to orders from the political wing to cease firing. Spokesman Abu Obeida -- who has taken responsibility for the school bus attack -- says they will not sit idle when faced with the Israeli "aggression." "The blood of our citizens will not be spilled for nothing." Among other hits, Obeida may have been referring to the Israeli air strike just over a week ago on a car in the Gaza strip that was carrying three Hamas operatives who were identified by Israel as a squad planning to kidnap Israelis over Pesach.
~~~~~~~~~~
Then there is the question of who stops first -- each side saying it will stop if the other does. From our side, the demand is that Hamas impose quiet on all other Islamist factions.
~~~~~~~~~~
And perhaps most insane is this: Israel National News reports that Hamas objects "to Israel being allowed to prevent 'ticking bomb' terrorist cells from firing rockets....According to a Hamas spokesman, a ceasefire specifically means that Israel cannot target terrorist cells preparing to launch rocket attacks on Israelis."
~~~~~~~~~~
Last night, Prime Minister Netanyahu -- who had returned just before Shabbat from a visit to Germany and the Czech Republic -- issued a statement that, "We won't let Hamas set the rules. Even if we are not interested in an escalation, the response will be determined, harsh and ongoing." The prime minister repeated this at the beginning of the weekly Cabinet session today. "If Israeli citizens continue to come under attack, the response will be much harsher."
Also at the Cabinet meeting today, Netanyahu praised the Iron Dome, which has now been utilized successfully for Israel's defense, deflecting missiles coming our way (but not, it must be admitted, in all cases). The prime minister himself acknowledged that this is not "a complete solution" to what Hamas is sending our way, and that an offensive action is also required. Word is, that the US has agreed to provide $205 million for the purchase and deployment of additional batteries of the Iron Dome.
They will be installed for the protection of major cities.
~~~~~~~~~~
Minister of Strategic Affairs, Moshe Ya'alon, in an Army Radio interview yesterday, warned that, while war is our last option, Hamas should not test our readiness to go that route if it is called for:"They have taken some hard hits and they will sustain even harsher ones [if they continue firing rockets and mortars at Israel]."We have a lot of options, and the IDF is prepared for them."
Certainly we've pummeled Gaza from the air in a punishing fashion in the last few days. In point of fact, more than 20 terrorists were killed over the weekend, and in the course of the last several days, 35 Hamas operatives have been killed. ~~~~~~~~~~
Not surprisingly, Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman is talking tough. The Yisrael Beiteinu coalition agreement with Likud (clause 11) designates the toppling of Hamas in the Gaza Strip as a strategic Israeli goal. But until now no Israeli government has specifically done this. Even when we were at war in Gaza in late 2008 and early 2009, that goal was not delineated. Lieberman wants his party to demand that this clause now be applied. ("the government will work determinedly and regularly against terror groups threatening Israel and do everything needed in order to eradicate them. A strategic target for the State of Israel would be the toppling of Hamas's rule in Gaza.") This is worlds away from saying that we'll be quiet if they are quiet.
~~~~~~~~~~
So where are we now? Monitoring the situation hour by hour, day by day.
Today Amr Mussa, head of the Arab League, announced that the League intended to appeal to the UN Security Council to impose a no-fly zone over Gaza, parallel to what had been imposed on Libya. Never mind that the two situations are not parallel and that the deliberate targeting of a school bus with an anti-tank missile constitutes a war crime. While Turkey on Sunday denounced what it termed Israel's "excessive and disproportionate" strikes.
So this war must be fought on two fronts, as might have been expected.
~~~~~~~~~~
Let's turn for a moment to the boy on the school bus who was critically wounded. Daniel Viflic is actually from Beit Shemesh. He was in the south to visit his grandmother, and was riding the bus only because he is friends with the driver. His father, sitting next to him in the hospital, said, "Who knew, that a visit to his grandmother could end with this."
The family is asking everyone to pray for him: Daniel Aryeh ben Tamar.
~~~~~~~~~~
Gideon Sa'ar, Minister of Education, said he intends to raise this issue with ministers of education in other nations, to highlight precisely what Palestinian Arab terrorism is like. Minister of Homefront Defense Matan Vilnai has ordered three armored buses for the region, to transport children to and from school.
~~~~~~~~~~
As far as I have been able to determine, this -- which has been making the rounds of the Internet -- is real: British Muslims for Israel. A real lift, a glimmer of hope.
See this video, which turns to English after only a few moments: http://www.youtube.com/watch? v=ppNPcNRIilI&feature=player_embedded
~~~~~~~~~~
And we've got more good news, as a Russian billionaire has announced that he wants to fund an Israeli Al-Jazeera.
Israeli Al-Jazeera. Dr. Alexander Mashkevich, who is president of Keren Hayesod's Jewish Leadership Conference, made the announcement at a conference at Bar Ilan University: He intends to found "a pro-Israel communication media, that will transmit, in the format of international news channels like Al Jazeera, and the BBC.
"Unfortunately, in the current situation, most of the channels just do not tell the truth about Israel … every day that passes, we are losing the war on the country's image."It is not possible that Israel should not have a television channel such as channels that operate in The establishment of such a channel is now imperative and necessary..." More power to him! How this could this change things. He is not interested in PR or hasbara, but in transmitting the truth 24 hours a day.
~~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~~~~
After the school bus was hit, I noted that I hadn't seen a condemnation from EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton. Well, for the record, now she's delivered it, and she can keep this repugnant bit of moral equivalency:"I strongly condemn yesterday’s mortar and rocket attacks out of the Gaza strip, which once again hit the innocent civilian population and which must stop immediately." However, she said, she was also "deeply concerned by the current escalation of violence." In fact, she said she also deplored "the loss of civilian life in Gaza and call on Israel to show restraint."
What a piece of work she is. She would deny us our right to self-defense.
~~~~~~~~~~
Former Israeli ambassador to the UN, Dore Gold, addressed the US House International Affairs Committee last Tuesday at the invitation of chair, Ileana Ros-Lehtinen. This was with an eye to the up-coming meeting of the Quartet.
He was joined by Maj.-Gen. (res.) Uzi Dayan and Brig.-Gen .(res.) Udi Dekel.
Said Gold:"The idea that the Quartet would dictate to Israel the 1967 lines and set the stage for an imposed solution serves this Palestinian interest, but not the interest of achieving real peace."European support for such initiatives would contravene the very peace agreements they signed in the past as witnesses. It would set the stage for further Palestinian unilateralist initiatives at the UN in September and deal a virtually fatal blow to any negotiations." Gold stated that traditional US policy -- dating back to UN Security Council Resolution 242 and reaffirmed in George W. Bush’s letter to then-prime minister Ariel Sharon in 200 -- recognized that Israel was not expected to withdraw from all the territories captured in the Six Day War. These demands on Israel, "problematic in any event," were being proposed "at the worst possible time – that is, precisely when the entire Middle East looks like it is engulfed in flames...degree of strategic uncertainty for Israel, given current political trends around it, has increased sharply."
Gold pointed out that a demand that Israel withdraw to the 1967 lines contravened the 1993 Oslo Agreements (which were signed by the US, and by European nations as witnesses) that envisioned a negotiated solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.“Borders were to be decided by the parties themselves and not be imposed by international coalitions."
~~~~~~~~~~
From Ros-Lehtinen came the observation: "America and Israel love and seek peace, but peace without security is no peace at all." Gold heads the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, which has put out considerable data on Israel's needs for secure borders. It is worth re-visiting this information here: http://www.defensibleborders.org/security/
~~~~~~~~~~
© Arlene Kushner. This material is produced by Arlene Kushner, functioning as an independent journalist. Permission is granted for it to be reproduced only with proper attribution.

via daledamos.blogspot.com

Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL): Obama wrong to give ‘blank check’ to PA

Incoming House Foreign Relations chair tells The Jerusalem Post that increased US funding for Palestinians is bailout with no incentive for reform.
Looks like the election is beginning to pay some dividends – Obama won't be getting a free pass to continue his policy of capitulation to Islam.

WASHINGTON – Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, incoming chairwoman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, blasted the Obama administration on Wednesday for giving the Palestinian Authority a “blank check” while pressuring Israel, signaling that a Republican-led House would complicate one of the major prongs of the White House’s emerging strategy for moving forward with the peace process.
With direct talks between the two sides stalled, the administration announced last week it planned to intensify Palestinian state-building as a means of making progress on the ground toward a peace agreement for a two-state solution. The US has supplied hundreds of millions of dollars toward this end, with the expectation that it would now, if anything, be increasing its assistance.
But Ros-Lehtinen, a Florida Republican who will become the chairwoman of the influential committee in January, criticized the current approach to US funding for the PA in an interview with The Jerusalem Post.
“It’s a bailout for them which provides no incentives for them to reform. So they know they don’t have to do a darn thing – with this administration they will get a blank check and they will always get helped out,” she said of over $200 million in American funds the Palestinians received this past year alone.
“I think that’s the wrong approach, when we’re forcing the Israelis to make concessions and we’re giving the Palestinians anything they want,” she said.
More...

via eye-on-the-world.blogspot.com

image via perezhilton.com

Posted via email from noahdavidsimon's posterous

US accelerates funding to PA with $150 million transfer - Ileana Ros-Lehtinen fights the tyranny!

if Representative Ileana Ros-Lehtinen gets her way, the 'Palestinians' won't get that $150 million. And they won't get any other American aid money either until they clean up their act and start fighting terror and corruption.

Representative Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, a Republican who stands to take over [the Chairmanship of the House Foreign Affairs Committee] in January after her party won the House of Representatives, said she was deeply concerned over what she called the bailout of the Palestinian leadership, which she claims has failed to live up to its commitment to dismantle the Palestinian terror infrastructure, eradicate corruption and recognize Israel's right to exist as a Jewish state.

via israelmatzav.blogspot.com

“This figure underscores strong determination of American people and this administration to stand with our Palestinian friends," Clinton says.

wrong!  and the people decided that in an election that Clinton ignores because she desperately wants money going to terrorists.

via jpost.com

again? why are we rewarding them for walking away from Piece Talks?

Posted via email from noahdavidsimon's posterous
image via borev.net 

Iran Liberation Act?

Going to war with Iran is not a Republican value,... it is an Islamic value that we inevitably have to deal with. Yesterday's radical leftist pacifist will become tomorrow's Neo Conservative again. Best to keep the paperwork ready for when the public wakes up and starts screaming.

Congresswoman Ros-Lehtinen
is opposing US support to
UNRWA and the Palestinian Authority.
She is a strong supporter of Israel.^[13]
As of 2010, she is the top Republican
on the House Foreign Affairs Committee.
After comments by State department
over Israeli settlements,
she demanded that the Obama administration
halt its condemnations of
"an indispensable ally and
friend of the United States."

via en.wikipedia.org

In 1998, Republicans pushed a bill through Congress called the Iraq Liberation Act, which made it the official policy of the United States to seek regime change in Iraq. The bill was even signed into law by then-President Bill Clinton. It took five years after that for the US invasion of Iraq under the Bush administration. Now, the 'progressives' fear that Republicans will employ the same treatment for Iran.

Supporters of the Obama administration's diplomatic approach say that advocates of an Iran invasion are pursuing the same long-term strategy now.:By putting the issue on the table right now, Iran hawks are hoping to limit the president's room to maneuver, and make it easier for a future president to launch a military strike. "Iraq didn't happen in two months," Rubin told The Upshot, noting that it took five years from the passage of the Iraq Liberation Act in 1998 until the 2003 invasion. "So this is the playbook."

Indeed, Marc Lynch of Foreign Policy magazine wrote recently that he's anticipating "some kind of Iran Liberation Act on the horizon" from the GOP Congress.

Duss agreed. "You see them running a very similar game as they ran in the '90s," he said. During that period, Republicans and their allies frustrated many of Clinton's political goals, "then offered [the Iraq Liberation Act] as a way to be bipartisan."

And last week's election results give the hawks more leverage. "After the election, they feel the broader Obama agenda has been rejected," Rubin said. "There's a feeling they may have Obama a bit more on the ropes." And that, in turn, may make the president more willing to move toward the GOP on Iran policy, observers say. "Graham is saying: If [Obama] wants Republican support and bipartisanship, being tougher on Iran would work," according to Rubin.

Starting in January, advocates of a tougher line on Iran will have powerful allies in Congress who could help advance that plan. Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fla.) [pictured. CiJ], a veteran Iran hawk who has downplayed the effectiveness of sanctions, will take over as chairwoman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee.

via israelmatzav.blogspot.com

I hope the next country we involve ourselves with will allow us to wise up and use less ground troops for occupation and more target bombing. There are ways to run these wars with less American casualties. We need to stop blaming ourselves and protect ourselves from these suicidal cultures. no more occupation thinking. this time we don't fix what we break.

Posted via email from noahdavidsimon's posterous

image via lynch.foreignpolicy.com