WORLD NEWS TREND

James Simpson
America waits with bated breath while Washington struggles to bring the U.S. economy back from the brink of disaster. But many of those same politicians caused the crisis, and if left to their own devices will do so again. Despite the mass media news blackout, a series of books, talk radio and the blogosphere have managed to expose Barack Obama’s connections to his radical mentors — Weather Underground bombers William Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn, Communist Party member Frank Marshall Davis and others. David Horowitz and his Discover the Networks.org have also contributed a wealth of information and have noted Obama’s radical connections since the beginning.

Yet, no one to my knowledge has yet connected all the dots between Barack Obama and the Radical Left. When seen together, the influences on Obama’s life comprise a who’s who of the radical leftist movement, and it becomes painfully apparent that not only is Obama a willing participant in that movement, he has spent most of his adult life deeply immersed in it.

But even this doesn’t fully describe the extreme nature of this candidate. He can be tied directly to a malevolent overarching strategy that has motivated many, if not all, of the most destructive radical leftist organizations in the United States since the 1960s.

The Cloward-Piven Strategy of Orchestrated Crisis

In an earlier post, I noted the liberal record of unmitigated legislative disasters, the latest of which is now being played out in the financial markets before our eyes. Before the 1994 Republican takeover, Democrats had sixty years of virtually unbroken power in Congress - with substantial majorities most of the time. Can a group of smart people, studying issue after issue for years on end, with virtually unlimited resources at their command, not come up with a single policy that works? Why are they chronically incapable?

Why?

One of two things must be true. Either the Democrats are unfathomable idiots, who ignorantly pursue ever more destructive policies despite decades of contrary evidence, or they understand the consequences of their actions and relentlessly carry on anyway because they somehow benefit.

I submit to you they understand the consequences. For many it is simply a practical matter of eliciting votes from a targeted constituency at taxpayer expense; we lose a little, they gain a lot, and the politician keeps his job. But for others, the goal is more malevolent - the failure is deliberate. Don’t laugh. This method not only has its proponents, it has a name: the Cloward-Piven Strategy. It describes their agenda, tactics, and long-term strategy.

The Strategy was first elucidated in the May 2, 1966 issue of The Nation magazine by a pair of radical socialist Columbia University professors, Richard Andrew Cloward and Frances Fox Piven. David Horowitz summarizes it as:

The strategy of forcing political change through orchestrated crisis. The “Cloward-Piven Strategy” seeks to hasten the fall of capitalism by overloading the government bureaucracy with a flood of impossible demands, thus pushing society into crisis and economic collapse.

Cloward and Piven were inspired by radical organizer [and Hillary Clinton mentor] Saul Alinsky:

“Make the enemy live up to their (sic) own book of rules,” Alinsky wrote in his 1989 book Rules for Radicals. When pressed to honor every word of every law and statute, every Judeo-Christian moral tenet, and every implicit promise of the liberal social contract, human agencies inevitably fall short. The system’s failure to “live up” to its rule book can then be used to discredit it altogether, and to replace the capitalist “rule book” with a socialist one. (Courtesy Discover the Networks.org)

Newsmax rounds out the picture:

Their strategy to create political, financial, and social chaos that would result in revolution blended Alinsky concepts with their more aggressive efforts at bringing about a change in U.S. government. To achieve their revolutionary change, Cloward and Piven sought to use a cadre of aggressive organizers assisted by friendly news media to force a re-distribution of the nation’s wealth.

In their Nation article, Cloward and Piven were specific about the kind of “crisis” they were trying to create:

By crisis, we mean a publicly visible disruption in some institutional sphere. Crisis can occur spontaneously (e.g., riots) or as the intended result of tactics of demonstration and protest which either generate institutional disruption or bring unrecognized disruption to public attention.

No matter where the strategy is implemented, it shares the following features:

1. The offensive organizes previously unorganized groups eligible for government benefits but not currently receiving all they can.
2. The offensive seeks to identify new beneficiaries and/or create new benefits.
3. The overarching aim is always to impose new stresses on target systems, with the ultimate goal of forcing their collapse.

Capitalizing on the racial unrest of the 1960s, Cloward and Piven saw the welfare system as their first target. They enlisted radical black activist George Wiley, who created the National Welfare Reform Organization (NWRO) to implement the strategy. Wiley hired militant foot soldiers to storm welfare offices around the country, violently demanding their “rights.” According to a City Journal article by Sol Stern, welfare rolls increased from 4.3 million to 10.8 million by the mid-1970s as a result, and in New York City, where the strategy had been particularly successful, “one person was on the welfare rolls… for every two working in the city’s private economy.”

According to another City Journal article titled “Compassion Gone Mad”:

The movement’s impact on New York City was jolting: welfare caseloads, already climbing 12 percent a year in the early sixties, rose by 50 percent during Lindsay’s first two years; spending doubled… The city had 150,000 welfare cases in 1960; a decade later it had 1.5 million.

The vast expansion of welfare in New York City that came of the NWRO’s Cloward-Piven tactics sent the city into bankruptcy in 1975. Rudy Giuliani cited Cloward and Piven by name as being responsible for “an effort at economic sabotage.” He also credited Cloward-Piven with changing the cultural attitude toward welfare from that of a temporary expedient to a lifetime entitlement, an attitude which in-and-of-itself has caused perhaps the greatest damage of all.

Cloward and Piven looked at this strategy as a gold mine of opportunity. Within the newly organized groups, each offensive would find an ample pool of foot soldier recruits willing to advance its radical agenda at little or no pay, and expand its base of reliable voters, legal or otherwise. The radicals’ threatening tactics also would accrue an intimidating reputation, providing a wealth of opportunities for extorting monetary and other concessions from the target organizations. In the meantime, successful offensives would create an ever increasing drag on society. As they gleefully observed:

Moreover, this kind of mass influence is cumulative because benefits are continuous. Once eligibility for basic food and rent grants is established, the drain on local resources persists indefinitely.

The next time you drive through one of the many blighted neighborhoods in our cities, or read of the astronomical crime, drug addiction, and out-of-wedlock birth rates, or consider the failed schools, strapped police and fire resources of every major city, remember Cloward and Piven’s thrill that “…the drain on local resources persists indefinitely.”

ACORN, the new tip of the Cloward-Piven spear

In 1970, one of George Wiley’s protégés, Wade Rathke — like Bill Ayers, a member of the radical Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) — was sent to found the Arkansas Community Organizations for Reform Now. While NWRO had made a good start, it alone couldn’t accomplish the Cloward-Piven goals. Rathke’s group broadened the offensive to include a wide array of low income “rights.” Shortly thereafter they changed “Arkansas” to “Association of” and ACORN went nationwide.

Today ACORN is involved in a wide array of activities, including housing, voting rights, illegal immigration and other issues. According to ACORN’s website: “ACORN is the nation’s largest grassroots community organization of low-and moderate-income people with over 400,000 member families organized into more than 1,200 neighborhood chapters in 110 cities across the country,” It is perhaps the largest radical group in the U.S. and has been cited for widespread criminal activity on many fronts.

Voting

On voting rights, ACORN and its voter mobilization subsidiary, Project Vote, have been involved nationwide in efforts to grant felons the vote and lobbied heavily for the Motor Voter Act of 1993, a law allowing people to register at motor vehicle departments, schools, libraries and other public places. That law had been sought by Cloward and Piven since the early1980s and they were present, standing behind President Clinton at the signing ceremony.

ACORN’s voter rights tactics follow the Cloward-Piven Strategy:

* 1. Register as many Democrat voters as possible, legal or otherwise and help them vote, multiple times if possible.
* 2. Overwhelm the system with fraudulent registrations using multiple entries of the same name, names of deceased, random names from the phone book, even contrived names.
* 3. Make the system difficult to police by lobbying for minimal identification standards.

In this effort, ACORN sets up registration sites all over the country and has been frequently cited for turning in fraudulent registrations, as well as destroying republican applications. In the 2004-2006 election cycles alone, ACORN was accused of widespread voter fraud in 12 states. It may have swung the election for one state governor.

ACORN’s website brags: “Since 2004, ACORN has helped more than 1.7 million low- and moderate-income and minority citizens apply to register to vote.” Project vote boasts 4 million. I wonder how many of them are dead? For the 2008 cycle, ACORN and Project Vote have pulled out all the stops. Given their furious nationwide effort, it is not inconceivable that this presidential race could be decided by fraudulent votes alone.

Barack Obama ran ACORN’s Project Vote in Chicago and his highly successful voter registration drive was credited with getting the disgraced former Senator Carol Moseley-Braun elected. Newsmax reiterates Cloward and Piven’s aspirations for ACORN’s voter registration efforts:

By advocating massive, no-holds-barred voter registration campaigns, they [Cloward & Piven] sought a Democratic administration in Washington, D.C. that would re-distribute the nation’s wealth and lead to a totalitarian socialist state.

Illegal Immigration

As I have written elsewhere, the Radical Left’s offensive to promote illegal immigration is “Cloward-Piven on steroids.” ACORN is at the forefront of this movement as well, and was a leading organization among a broad coalition of radical groups, including Soros’ Open Society Institute, the Service Employees International Union (ACORN founder Wade Rathke also runs a SEIU chapter), and others, that became the Coalition for Comprehensive Immigration Reform. CCIR fortunately failed to gain passage for the 2007 illegal immigrant amnesty bill, but its goals have not changed.

The burden of illegal immigration on our already overstressed welfare system has been widely documented. Some towns in California have even been taken over by illegal immigrant drug cartels. The disease, crime and overcrowding brought by illegal immigrants places a heavy burden on every segment of society and every level of government, threatening to split this country apart at the seams. In the meantime, radical leftist efforts to grant illegal immigrants citizenship guarantee a huge pool of new democrat voters. With little border control, terrorists can also filter in.

Obama aided ACORN as their lead attorney in a successful suit he brought against the Illinois state government to implement the Motor Voter law there. The law had been resisted by Republican Governor Jim Edgars, who feared the law was an opening to widespread vote fraud.

His fears were warranted as the Motor Voter law has since been cited as a major opportunity for vote fraud, especially for illegal immigrants, even terrorists. According to the Wall Street Journal: “After 9/11, the Justice Department found that eight of the 19 hijackers were registered to vote…”

ACORN’s dual offensives on voting and illegal immigration are handy complements. Both swell the voter rolls with reliable democrats while assaulting the country ACORN seeks to destroy with overwhelming new problems.

Mortgage Crisis

And now we have the mortgage crisis, which has sent a shock wave through Wall Street and panicked world financial markets like no other since the stock market crash of 1929. But this is a problem created in Washington long ago. It originated with the Community Reinvestment Act (CRA), signed into law in 1977 by President Jimmy Carter. The CRA was Carter’s answer to a grassroots activist movement started in Chicago, and forced banks to make loans to low income, high risk customers. PhD economist and former Texas Senator Phil Gramm has called it: “a vast extortion scheme against the nation’s banks.”

ACORN aggressively sought to expand loans to low income groups using the CRA as a whip. Economist Stan Leibowitz wrote in the New York Post:

In the 1980s, groups such as the activists at ACORN began pushing charges of “redlining”-claims that banks discriminated against minorities in mortgage lending. In 1989, sympathetic members of Congress got the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act amended to force banks to collect racial data on mortgage applicants; this allowed various studies to be ginned up that seemed to validate the original accusation.

In fact, minority mortgage applications were rejected more frequently than other applications-but the overwhelming reason wasn’t racial discrimination, but simply that minorities tend to have weaker finances.

ACORN showed its colors again in 1991, by taking over the House Banking Committee room for two days to protest efforts to scale back the CRA. Obama represented ACORN in the Buycks-Roberson v. Citibank Fed. Sav. Bank, 1994 suit against redlining. Most significant of all, ACORN was the driving force behind a 1995 regulatory revision pushed through by the Clinton Administration that greatly expanded the CRA and laid the groundwork for the Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac borne financial crisis we now confront. Barack Obama was the attorney representing ACORN in this effort. With this new authority, ACORN used its subsidiary, ACORN Housing, to promote subprime loans more aggressively.

As a New York Post article describes it:

A 1995 strengthening of the Community Reinvestment Act required banks to find ways to provide mortgages to their poorer communities. It also let community activists intervene at yearly bank reviews, shaking the banks down for large pots of money.

Banks that got poor reviews were punished; some saw their merger plans frustrated; others faced direct legal challenges by the Justice Department.

Flexible lending programs expanded even though they had higher default rates than loans with traditional standards. On the Web, you can still find CRA loans available via ACORN with “100 percent financing . . . no credit scores . . . undocumented income . . . even if you don’t report it on your tax returns.” Credit counseling is required, of course.

Ironically, an enthusiastic Fannie Mae Foundation report singled out one paragon of nondiscriminatory lending, which worked with community activists and followed “the most flexible underwriting criteria permitted.” That lender’s $1 billion commitment to low-income loans in 1992 had grown to $80 billion by 1999 and $600 billion by early 2003.

The lender they were speaking of was Countrywide, which specialized in subprime lending and had a working relationship with ACORN.

Investor’s Business Daily added:

The revisions also allowed for the first time the securitization of CRA-regulated loans containing subprime mortgages. The changes came as radical “housing rights” groups led by ACORN lobbied for such loans. ACORN at the time was represented by a young public-interest lawyer in Chicago by the name of Barack Obama. (Emphasis, mine.)

Since these loans were to be underwritten by the government sponsored Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the implicit government guarantee of those loans absolved lenders, mortgage bundlers and investors of any concern over the obvious risk. As Bloomberg reported: “It is a classic case of socializing the risk while privatizing the profit.”

And if you think Washington policy makers cared about ACORN’s negative influence, think again. Before this whole mess came down, a Democrat-sponsored bill on the table would have created an “Affordable Housing Trust Fund,” granting ACORN access to approximately $500 million in Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac revenues with little or no oversight.

Even now, unbelievably — on the brink of national disaster — Democrats have insisted ACORN benefit from bailout negotiations! Senator Lindsay Graham reported last night (9/25/08) in an interview with Greta Van Susteren of On the Record that Democrats want 20 percent of the bailout money to go to ACORN!

This entire fiasco represents perhaps the pinnacle of ACORN’s efforts to advance the Cloward-Piven Strategy and is a stark demonstration of the power they wield in Washington.

Enter Barack Obama

In attempting to capture the significance of Barack Obama’s Radical Left connections and his relation to the Cloward Piven strategy, I constructed following flow chart. It is by no means complete. There are simply too many radical individuals and organizations to include them all here. But these are perhaps the most significant.

Cloward Piven Strategy

The chart puts Barack Obama at the epicenter of an incestuous stew of American radical leftism. Not only are his connections significant, they practically define who he is. Taken together, they constitute a who’s who of the American radical left, and guiding all is the Cloward-Piven strategy.

Conspicuous in their absence are any connections at all with any other group, moderate, or even mildly leftist. They are all radicals, firmly bedded in the anti-American, communist, socialist, radical leftist mesh.

Saul Alinsky

Most people are unaware that Barack Obama received his training in “community organizing” from Saul Alinsky’s Industrial Areas Foundation. But he did. In and of itself that marks his heritage and training as that of a radical activist. One really needs go no further. But we have.

Bill Ayers

Obama objects to being associated with SDS bomber Bill Ayers, claiming he is being smeared with “guilt by association.” But they worked together at the Woods Fund. The Wall Street Journal added substantially to our knowledge by describing in great detail Obama’s work over five years with SDS bomber Bill Ayers on the board of a non-profit, the Chicago Annenberg Challenge, to push a radical agenda on public school children. As Stanley Kurtz states:

“…the issue here isn’t guilt by association; it’s guilt by participation. As CAC chairman, Mr. Obama was lending moral and financial support to Mr. Ayers and his radical circle. That is a story even if Mr. Ayers had never planted a single bomb 40 years ago.”

Also included in the mix is Theresa Heinz Kerry’s favorite charity, the Tides Foundation. A partial list of Tides grants tells you all you need to know: ACLU, ACORN, Center for American Progress, Center for Constitutional Rights (a communist front,) CAIR, Earth Justice, Institute for Policy Studies (KGB spy nest), National Lawyers Guild (oldest communist front in U.S.), People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), and practically every other radical group there is. ACORN’s Wade Rathke runs a Tides subsidiary, the Tides Center.

Carl Davidson and the New Party

We have heard about Bomber Bill, but we hear little about fellow SDS member Carl Davidson. According to Discover the Networks, Davidson was an early supporter of Barack Obama and a prominent member of Chicago’s New Party, a synthesis of CPUSA members, Socialists, ACORN veterans and other radicals. Obama sought and received the New Party’s endorsement, and they assisted with his campaign. The New Party also developed a strong relationship with ACORN. As an excellent article on the New Party observes: “Barack Obama knew what he was getting into and remains an ideal New Party candidate.”

George Soros

The chart also suggests the reason for George Soros’ fervent support of Obama. The President of his Open Society Institute is Aryeh Neier, founder of the radical Students for a Democratic Society (SDS). As mentioned above, three other former SDS members had extensive contact with Obama: Bill Ayers, Carl Davidson and Wade Rathke. Surely Aryeh Neier would have heard from his former colleagues of the promising new politician. More to the point, Neier is firmly committed to supporting the hugely successful radical organization, ACORN, and would be certain back their favored candidate, Barack Obama.

ACORN

Obama has spent a large portion of his professional life working for ACORN or its subsidiaries, representing ACORN as a lawyer on some of its most critical issues, and training ACORN leaders. Stanley Kurtz’s excellent National Review article, “Inside Obama’s Acorn.” also describes Obama’s ACORN connection in detail. But I can’t improve on Obama’s own words:

I’ve been fighting alongside ACORN on issues you care about my entire career (emphasis added). Even before I was an elected official, when I ran Project Vote voter registration drive in Illinois, ACORN was smack dab in the middle of it, and we appreciate your work. - Barack Obama, Speech to ACORN, November 2007 (Courtesy Newsmax.)

In another excellent article on Obama’s ACORN connections, Newsmax asks a nagging question:

It would be telling to know if Obama, during his years at Columbia, had occasion to meet Cloward and study the Cloward-Piven Strategy.

I ask you, is it possible ACORN would train Obama to take leadership positions within ACORN without telling him what he was training for? Is it possible ACORN would put Obama in leadership positions without clueing him into what his purpose was?? Is it possible that this most radical of organizations would put someone in charge of training its trainers, without him knowing what it was he was training them for?

As a community activist for ACORN; as a leadership trainer for ACORN; as a lead organizer for ACORN’s Project Vote; as an attorney representing ACORN’s successful efforts to impose Motor Voter regulations in Illinois; as ACORN’s representative in lobbying for the expansion of high risk housing loans through Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac that led to the current crisis; as a recipient of their assistance in his political campaigns — both with money and campaign workers; it is doubtful that he was unaware of ACORN’s true goals. It is doubtful he was unaware of the Cloward-Piven Strategy.

Fast-forward to 2005 when an obsequious, servile and scraping Daniel Mudd, CEO of Fannie Mae spoke at the Congressional Black Caucus swearing in ceremony for newly-elected Illinois Senator, Barack Obama. Mudd called, the Congressional Black Caucus “our family” and “the conscience of Fannie Mae.”

In 2005, Republicans sought to rein in Fannie and Freddie. Senator John McCain was at the forefront of that effort. But it failed due to an intense lobbying effort put forward by Fannie and Freddie.

In his few years as a U.S. senator, Obama has received campaign contributions of $126,349, from Fannie and Freddie, second only to the $165,400 received by Senator Chris Dodd, who has been getting donations from them since 1988. What makes Obama so special?

His closest advisers are a dirty laundry list of individuals at the heart of the financial crisis: former Fannie Mae CEO Jim Johnson; Former Fannie Mae CEO and former Clinton Budget Director Frank Raines; and billionaire failed Superior Bank of Chicago Board Chair Penny Pritzker.

Johnson had to step down as adviser on Obama’s V.P. search after this gem came out:

An Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight (OFHEO) report[1] from September 2004 found that, during Johnson’s tenure as CEO, Fannie Mae had improperly deferred $200 million in expenses. This enabled top executives, including Johnson and his successor, Franklin Raines, to receive substantial bonuses in 1998.[2] A 2006 OFHEO report[3] found that Fannie Mae had substantially under-reported Johnson’s compensation. Originally reported as $6-7 million, Johnson actually received approximately $21 million.

Obama denies ties to Raines but the Washington Post calls him a member of “Obama’s political circle.” Raines and Johnson were fined $3 million by the Office of Federal Housing Oversight for their manipulation of Fannie books. The fine is small change however, compared to the $50 million Raines was able to obtain in improper bonuses as a result of juggling the books.

Most significantly, Penny Pritzker, the current Finance Chairperson of Obama’s presidential campaign helped develop the complicated investment bundling of subprime securities at the heart of the meltdown. She did so in her position as shareholder and board chair of Superior Bank. The Bank failed in 2001, one of the largest in recent history, wiping out $50 million in uninsured life savings of approximately 1,400 customers. She was named in a RICO class action law suit but doesn’t seem to have come out of it too badly.

As a young attorney in the 1990s, Barack Obama represented ACORN in Washington in their successful efforts to expand Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) authority. In addition to making it easier for ACORN groups to force banks into making risky loans, this also paved the way for banks like Superior to package mortgages as investments, and for the Government Sponsored Enterprises Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to underwrite them. These changes created the conditions that ultimately lead to the current financial crisis.

Did they not know this would occur? Were these smart people, led by a Harvard graduate, unaware of the Econ 101 concept of moral hazard that would result from the government making implicit guarantees to underwrite private sector financial risk? They should have known that freeing the high-risk mortgage market of risk, calamity was sure to ensue. I think they did.

Barack Obama, the Cloward-Piven candidate, no matter how he describes himself, has been a radical activist for most of his political career. That activism has been in support of organizations and initiatives that at their heart seek to tear the pillars of this nation asunder in order to replace them with their demented socialist vision. Their influence has spread so far and so wide that despite their blatant culpability in the current financial crisis, they are able to manipulate Capital Hill politicians to cut them into $140 billion of the bailout pie!

God grant those few responsible yet remaining in Washington, DC the strength to prevent this massive fraud from occurring. God grant them the courage to stand up in the face of this Marxist tidal wave.

Jim Simpson is a former White House staff economist and budget analyst. His writings have been published in American Thinker, Washington Times, FrontPage Magazine, DefenseWatch, Soldier of Fortune and others. His blog is Truth and Consequences..

Page Printed from: http://www.americanthinker.com/2008/09

Hillel Fendel

(IsraelNN.com) Jewish residents of towns in Shomron (Samaria) and Yehuda (Judea) note a worrisome increase in terrorist incidents of late, and many of them say the government’s approach must be changed. Esther Karish of Kedumim, a member of the Shomron Residents Council, says, “The declarations by Prime Minister Olmert regarding Jews perpetrating pogroms on non-Jews, and his willingness to give away parts of the Land of Israel, cause the Arabs here to raise their heads and endanger the lives of the Jewish residents.”

She made the remarks on Thursday, shortly after the army completed what she called a “strong-armed” evacuation and destruction of the Shvut Ami outpost. While the destruction was taking place, just south of Kedumim, Arabs in the area set fire to the brush near the would-be neighborhood, endangering both the soldiers and the residents.

False Media Reports
The fire was falsely reported in the general Israeli media as having been set by Jews in an Arab olive grove.

On Wednesday night, prior to the demolition, Arabs from a nearby village stoned no fewer than six Jewish cars returning after the Rosh HaShanah holiday.
“If we don’t respond, then the army will always say that they are doing what they can and cannot do more.”

“There have been more stonings and more firebombs of late,” Karish said, “not to mention the recent arsons and stabbings in Yitzhar… It’s true that the army blocked the Arab village’s access road to the main road here, but the Arabs have found a way to detour it. If we don’t respond, then the army will always say that they are doing what they can and cannot do more. Therefore, if the residents stand up for their rights to safety and security, things will look different.”

Meanwhile, the Commander of the Central Region in the IDF, Gen. Gad Shamni, says the situation is largely the fault of the Jewish leadership in Judea and Samaria. “The rabbinic and public leadership in Judea and Samaria is responsible for the rise in settler violence,” Shamni was quoted as saying.

Rabbi Elyakim Levanon, rabbi of the veteran Shomron town Elon Moreh, is not having any of it: “I’ve been hearing these claims for 27 years. What violence is he talking about? The Jewish residents have been the victims of terrorist shooting, the stabbing of a boy and arson in Yitzhar, and daily rock-throwings. If I’m not mistaken, the only damage done [when the Yitzhar residents responded to the stabbing/arson attack]was that some windows were broken; not one Arab was hurt. But on our side, Jews are hurt.”

“In the past,” Rabbi Levanon said, “there were open channels of communication between the Central Commander and the rabbinic and public leadership in Yesha - but I know of no such thing with Shamni. He doesn’t know us, so how can he come out with these criticims? His remarks are irresponsible. First let him come and sit with us, and he’ll see what beautiful things are being done to connect between the IDF and the residents.”

“On the other hand, we expect to see the army respond more appropriately to the hostile and violent activity on the part of the Arabs in these areas, and not to be influenced and weakened by the political echelons.”

On Saturday night, in Gush Etzion, Arabs threw four Molotov cocktails at an Israeli car. No one was hurt and there was no damage.

In interview with UAE newspaper, senior Lebanese organization member declares Jewish state ‘will be destroyed by resistance fighters.’ Responding to Northern Command chief’s threats, he says ‘Israel is frustrated over internal problems and is incapable of launching a new war’
Roee Nahmias

Northern Command Chief Gadi Eisenkot’s recent declarations in a Yedioth Ahronoth interview, that the Israel Defense Forces would respond in a disproportionate manner against villages from which Hizbullah fires missiles into Israel, have apparently not caused panic in the Lebanese organization. A senior group member responded to the statements with contempt, saying he did not fear Israel’s threats.

In an interview published Sunday in the United Arab Emirates-based al-Ittihad newspaper, the Hizbullah member said his organization was on the alert. He referred to Israel as “a cardboard country which will be destroyed by the resistance fighters, who achieved the grand victory against the entity robbing Palestine’s land in the years 2000 and 2006.”

He added that his organization dose not believe Israel will launch an attack against Lebanon. “Israel is frustrated by many internal problems and is incapable of launching a new war against Lebanon,” he said.

He went on to say that Major-General Eisenkot’s remarks were a “media war.”

The senior Hizbullah member repeated remarks made by his leader, Hassan Nasrallah, that whether Israel send five or eight divisions to Lebanon – they will all be destroyed.

Eisenkot told Yedioth Ahronoth that the next war, if and when it breaks out, must be determined fast, forcefully, and without being concerned about the global public opinion.

“We have the ability to do this. I have great power in relation to what we had before. I have no excuse not to fulfill the goals I am tasked with,” he said.

“Hizbullah understand very well that firing from villages will lead to their destruction. Before Nasrallah issues an order to fire at Israel, he will have to think 30 times if he wants to destroy his basis of support in the villages. It’s not a theoretic thing with him. The possibility of hurting the population is Nasrallah’s main restraint and the reason for the calm in the past two years.”

He noted that Israel’s armament scope has grown hundredfold since the Second Lebanon War, more than two years ago.

Hizbullah brigades in Palestine?
The London-based Arabic-language al-Sharq al-Awsat newspaper reported Sunday that a new Palestinian organization, “The Hizbullah Brigades in Palestine,” has announced its establishment.

According to a statement issued by the group, its members are dissidents of other Palestinian organizations aimed at “fighting the occupation.” The organization claims to be a Sunni movement with no ties to Lebanon’s Hizbullah, saying its goal is “jihad in the name of Allah and a war on the enemies of Islam.”

The organization also said it will work “for the national Palestinian interest.” The newspaper noted that the reliability of the statement could not be determined.

Outgoing PM’s ‘stunning revelations’ have already been uttered decades ago

B. Michael
Israel Opinion

Even though Prime Minister Olmert had been ridiculed on more than one occasion for his delayed grasp of reality, it is very difficult not to feel great anger in the wake of his Rosh Hashana interview with Yedioth Ahronoth. In fact, this interview is truly infuriating. A few moments before he departs the political stage, two and a half years after he officially assumed his post, and after 30 months where he did nothing to advance all the beautiful notions he discussed in the interview, suddenly he has been instilled with wisdom and courage. All of a sudden, he speaks up in order to warn us and issue predications, advice and consult, outline a path, and discover “new” ideas, which in fact have been known for ages.

Had we been able to only accuse him of complete diplomatic blindness and a special talent for failing to grasp reality around him, this would be one thing. We may have been able to forgive that. However, the prime minister himself praises himself for saying “five years ago already,” (in an interview with Nahum Barnea,) that time is running out, and that we must understand this, and that if we fail to grasp this, heaven forbid…

Five years have passed since then, yet all those sensational insights remained tucked away in the drawer. Apparently, he saved them for his final interview. Yet he did nothing to realize them, advance them, or promote them. The opposite is true: The occupation became more deeply entrenched, wickedness flourished, the malignant settlement “enterprise” worked full steam, and the disease that is prompting the State of Israel’s demise became worse.

Yet only now, when it is clear to both us and him that he cannot do anything, he decided to become a hero. Only now, when his bags are already packed, the outgoing prime minister seeks to depart with a bang. Indeed, his record in terms of deeds is quite poor, but when it comes to words, as usual, there’s great richness there.

And as usual, all of this belated wisdom comes with a significant degree of boasting: “No Israeli leader before me has said what I’m saying now; we need to withdraw from almost all the territories.”

Olmert heard nothing

Ehud Olmert obviously has a very high opinion of himself. Figures such as David Ben-Gurion, Pinchas Sapir, Uri Avneri, Yossi Sarid, and Yitzhak Rabin (and this is a very partial list) are not considered leaders in the book of Olmert the leader. Their views and words were apparently never formulated or uttered. In any case, Olmert heard nothing.

The fact that the abovementioned figures, and tens of thousands of others, discovered all these truths a day after the 1967 defeat makes no difference to him: He’s the only one.

Yet even though it appears to Mr. Olmert that he broke all records of courage with his words, it would be good to remind him that he did not even utter one tiny word about the most important and scariest issue, which has intimidated all of Israel’s leaders for decades now. Not even one word about the most terrible threat jeopardizing the State of Israel, its sanity, character, existence, and even its right to exist: National-Orthodox-messianic fascism. The one that was taken out of the bottle 40 years ago and ever since then has been dragging the entire country to the edge of the abyss and to great corruption. It appears that Olmert still fears them.

But that’s not a big deal. Perhaps Tzipi Livni will be talking about that; in her farewell interview.

Bombings, border deployment have raised suspicions
By Hussein Abdallah
Daily Star staff
Saturday, October 04, 2008

Major powers warn against any Syrian move into Lebanon

BEIRUT: French, Russian, and American officials were quoted by the Beirut press on Thursday as rejecting any form of Syrian military intervention in Lebanon following Syria’s recent deployment of 10,000 soldiers on the border between the two countries. Damascus has sought to explain the deployment as a means of countering smuggling, but a number of Lebanese politicians have accused Syria of wanting to send its army to Lebanon under the pretext of fighting Islamist extremists in the North. An-Nahar newspaper quoted an official US source Friday as saying that US Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs David Welch had told Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Moallem that the United States totally rejected any Syrian military intervention in Lebanon.

The source said Welch made it clear to Moallem that recent bombings in Damascus and Tripoli should not be used to justify any kind of military intervention in Lebanon.

At least 17 people were killed in a car explosion in Damascus last Saturday. Two days later, a similar blast targeting Lebanese troops killed seven people and wounded 33 others in Tripoli.

Future Movement leader MP Saad Hariri lashed out at Syrian President Bashar Assad in the aftermath of the Tripoli bombing, accusing Assad of trying to insinuate that Lebanon, the North in particular, was responsible for the apparently deteriorating security situation in Syria. Prior to Hariri’s remarks, Assad told the head of Lebanon’s Journalists Union, Melhem Karam, that North Lebanon had become “a real base for extremism and constitutes a danger for Syria.”

Meanwhile, a French source was quoting as telling the pan-Arab Al-Hayat newspaper on Friday that Paris believed it was not possible for Syria to send its troops to Lebanon despite Assad’s recent remarks.

In a related development, former MP Fares Soueid of the anti-Syrian March 14 Forces said on Friday that French authorities have recently assured a delegation from the March 14 Forces that Syria would not be given the green light to return to Lebanon.

The delegation, including Soueid, MP Marwan Hamadeh, MP Samir Franjieh, and National Liberal Party chief Dori Chamoun, met with French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner for talks in Paris on Thursday that addressed the mounting tensions between Lebanon and Syria.

Meanwhile, a Russian official was quoted as telling the local Al-Mustaqbal newspaper on Friday said that Moscow was also against any form of foreign intervention in Lebanon.

The paper added that Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Sultanov stressed in a meeting with Iran’s ambassador to Russia, Golam Reza Ansari, Moscow’s complete commitment to stability in Lebanon.

Tariq Alhomayed
Asharq Alawsat

It is not wishful thinking inasmuch as the reality of events that demonstrates that democracy has been defeated in our region and in developing countries. These troubled states will enter the stage of the rational dictator rather than a democratic regime. America’s failure to define its battle and its causes, after 9/11, and Bush’s undeveloped vision to spread democracy has hindered the wave of democracy in many countries throughout the world. The reality of our Arab world is what concerns us here.

Let us look at Libya, Sudan, Syria and Mauritania; Libya had its slate wiped clean because it abandoned its nuclear ambitions, not because it is improving its democratic record. All that Syria has done is negotiate with the Israelis via Turkish mediation whilst French President Nicolas Sarkozy rushed to open the doors for Syria despite the fact that the Syrians are embroiled in cases that make them more deserving of international sanctions than the former Iraqi regime. Then we have Sudan that has been presented with a tempting offer from France to rescue [its president] Omar al Bashir. As for Mauritania, the price for us to accept it as it stands is yet to be determined.

After the 9/11 terrorist attacks, Washington overlooked the important need for stability and protection of humanity in our region that is more vital than the need for democracy. But the Americans rushed to the extent that [US Secretary of State] Condoleezza Rice spoke about “creative chaos”.

Rice did not pay attention to the “Islamist chaos” in the region that has more of an impact than creative chaos since the former has the ability to paralyze any system that does not give it absolute authority. The people who are most responsible for deforming and bringing chaos to the democratic process in our region are the Islamist movements.

For example, in Iraq we have the Dawa Party, the Mehdi Army and the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council. In Egypt, we have the Muslim Brotherhood that wants to reach a position of power in order to breach international conventions and add Islamist fuel to the Coptic fire.

A clearer example is Hamas and the Hamas coup that overthrew the legitimate authority. We also have Hezbollah in Lebanon that brought Lebanese democracy to a close with the Beirut coup. There is no point in protesting the Islamist experience in Turkey as negotiations with Israel are taking place under the supervision of Turkish Islamists!

It is noticeable that all Islamist groups that obstruct the process of democracy in our region are affiliated to Iran, which forms the biggest obstacle to democracy in Iraq, Lebanon, Palestine, Bahrain and Kuwait and even in Iran itself.

It must be said that the Sunni extremists launched the war of terror in 2001, whilst the Iranian Shia blew out the candle of democracy in our region. What is odd is that while Sunni regimes are fighting extremists, Iran is courting them.

Despite that the war on terror and the spread of democracy are two successful issues, their failing defenders such as Bush and Sarkozy, as well as the global financial crisis and the troubles in Iraq and Afghanistan, demonstrate that we are heading towards a just dictator and not democratic regimes. It was neither reconciliation nor democracy that led to a reduction in the level of terrorism in Iraq; this was a result of the Awakening Councils and the retreat of [Muqtada] al Sadr. It is clear that Afghanistan is following in the footsteps of the Iraqi Awakening Councils as democracy has not found its feet in Kabul.

Furthermore, attention must be paid to the fact that Pakistan, as a state, did not wake up until after the Marriot Hotel terrorist operation despite all the victims that have fallen for the sake of democracy. Of course nobody can read the future but the signs indicate that democracy has been defeated.

Misunderstander of Islam rails against the “enemies of Islam.” Not that this has anything to do with Islam, of course. More on the traitor’s new video. “Al-Qaida: US economic crisis equals Muslim victory,” from AP, October 4 (thanks to all who sent this in):

CAIRO, Egypt (AP) — An American member of al-Qaida pointed to economic troubles in the United States as proof that “the enemies of Islam” face defeat, in an English-language video released Saturday.

In a half hour video message, California-native Adam Gadahn urged Pakistanis to unite against their government and U.S. forces, and taunted Americans over their economic crisis, relating it to their military interventions.

“The enemies of Islam are facing a crushing defeat, which is beginning to manifest itself in the expanding crisis their economy is experiencing,” said Gadahn, in a clip of the message distributed by the SITE Intelligence Group, a Washington-based monitor of militant Web sites.

“A crisis whose primary cause, in addition to the abortive and unsustainable crusades they are waging in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Iraq, is their turning their backs on Allah’s revealed laws, which forbid interest-bearing transactions, exploitation, greed and injustice in all its forms.” [...]

Gadahn also urged Pakistanis to unite and establish an Islamic state. Al-Qaida’s media arm, al-Sahab, is increasingly using English-language videos to address Muslims in Pakistan who are unlikely to speak Arabic.

Gadahn warned Pakistanis to continue to fight their government which, according to him, bows to American interests.

“Someone wanted us to imagine that the same Pakistani government, which is probably responsible for the death of more Muslims in Pakistan than the Americans are, and the same Pakistan army (is) suddenly prepared to fight kufars (infidels) instead of Muslims,” Gadahn said.

IPT News
http://www.investigativeproject.org/article/784

DALLAS – From donations urging violence to advertisements and videos lauding one of the fathers of global jihad, evidence in the Hamas-support trial against former officials at the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development (HLF) Thursday took a decidedly bloody tone. The five defendants are accused of illegally funneling $12 million to Hamas through a series of charities, or zakat committees in the West Bank and Gaza. FBI agent Lara Burns has been on the witness stand all week, presenting evidence establishing the group’s stated and passionate support for Hamas.

A mistrial was declared last October after jurors could not reach unanimous verdicts on most counts. Defendant Mohamed El-Mezain was acquitted on all counts against him with the exception of a conspiracy to provide material support to terrorists.

This time, added care seems to be taken to identify all the players and define their connections to the case. In addition, some of the exhibits were not entered into evidence last year.

Defense attorneys argue the men merely sought to alleviate suffering by needy Palestinians living under occupation. The images displayed Thursday rarely invoked those needy people, but focused instead on the need to attack.

Several exhibits showing HLF’s invocation Abdullah Azzam, an iconic Palestinian jihadist, are among the new evidence presented by the government. Azzam moved to Pakistan after the Russian invasion of Afghanistan to set up the Office of Services of the Holy Warriors (Mujahideen) and is considered a mentor to Osama bin Laden.

The Azzam exhibits were admitted over the objection of defense attorneys. Under the judge’s order, jurors were not told of Azzam’s role with bin Laden and the global jihad, but did hear references to Azzam’s work on behalf of Afghanistan’s mujahideen. In a video from a 1988 rally in California, the year HLF was founded as the Occupied Land Fund, Azzam is shown urging Palestinians to fight to the death:

“O, people of Palestine, it is time for you to pledge death.

Live with self-respect or die honorably between

piercing lances and fluttering flags. The heads

of the spears are stronger than treachery and are

a better healing to the cunning chest of the envious.

What is life? What is life if I don’t live it with honor and respect.”

Azzam was killed in a car bombing in 1989. He was mourned in an issue of Ila Filastin, a magazine published by the Islamic Association for Palestine (IAP). The IAP and HLF had a formal agreement to work together on fundraising.

An advertisement near the article urged readers to “perform jihad with your money to the maximum you can” to the HLF.

Jurors then saw another rally in which HLF officials raised money in Hamas’ name. And they saw a second skit featuring defendant Mufid Abdelqader portraying a Hamas terrorist. He confronts an actor portraying an Israeli civilian and tells him to “get out.”

The “Jew” says he isn’t afraid, prompting a chilling audience response:

And I, the Jew, do not get scared.

And Hitler had killed thousands.

Audience: May God increase them

….

Where are you, O fleeting Zionist?

Hamas is after you every where.

Where are you, O fleeting Zionist?

Abdelqader then throws his arms out wide and strangles the Israeli as the crowd cheers.

Under questioning from federal prosecutor Barry Jonas, FBI agent Lara Burns said she interviewed Abdelqader in 2002. Abdelqader told her he didn’t work with HLF or know its leaders until he moved to Dallas in 1995. But HLF records indicate the foundation covered Abdelqader’s travel expenses and paid him fees for his performances. And HLF executive director Shukri Abu Baker mentioned Abdelqader in a 1990 rally in which he named all the performers on stage.

Rallies after Hamas was designated as a terrorist organization in 1995 took on a softer tone, Burns said. Still, a rally after the designation featured praise for Hamas leaders Ahmed Yassin, Mousa Abu Marzook and Abdel Aziz Rantisi.

Other exhibits showed that defendant Mohamed El-Mezain often received Hamas communiqués distributed by the IAP, both before and after Hamas’ designation as a terrorist entity. And El-Mezain and defendant Abdelrahman Odeh, who ran HLF’s New Jersey office, discussed how to handle money in the wake of the Hamas designation.

Concerned about drawing attention, Odeh subsequently made two cash deposits at a New Jersey bank on consecutive days; one for $8,500 and one for $8,000. Jurors were told that any deposit more than $10,000 would trigger a currency transaction report.

Before the designation, HLF often accepted donations made out to support the “Palestinian Mujahideen,” which Yassin said in an interview was the original name of the Hamas military wing, the Izzedin Al Qassam Brigade. A New Jersey man donated $25 in 1996, urging that his money go “for relief supplies and weapons to crush the hated enemy.”

The donation letter grew more strident, as the writer, Sultan Mahmoud, cited the Thanksgiving holiday and said the United States stole the land from Native Americans who were either killed or left on reservations:

“The Islamic Ummah (nation) must not let this happen to us. We must destroy Isreal (sic) & unite & get nuclear weapons to kill the west if they attack our member nations of the Ummah. Unity -> means restore kilafa (Khalifa).”

HLF put Mahmoud on its mailing list and sent him repeated solicitations for more donations, Burns said. He gave another $95 the following year.

Burns and Jonas quickly pored through a series of bank records showing hundreds of thousands of dollars flowing from HLF to the zakat committees in the West Bank and Gaza. Prosecutors did not yet try to show how those committees are connected to Hamas, something that could prove pivotal in the jury’s deliberations.

That, Jonas indicated, will come in subsequent testimony. After jurors were dismissed, Jonas told U.S. District Judge Jorge A. Solis that his questioning of Burns likely was finished. Defense attorneys will begin their cross examination of her Friday morning.

Austin Hill
Sunday, October 05, 2008

This just in: American media outlets are suffering a breakdown in the free-flow of accurate information.

Just as the pipelines of credit have been clogged by bad assets on the balance sheets of American banking institutions, creating severe downward pressure on the economy, so also are many of America’s old-guard news and information outlets clogged with conjecture, triviality, and inaccurate information - - creating a perfect environment for an “uninformed electorate.” And if there was ever a time that the American people needed a “rescue plan” to be implemented by the new alternative media, that time is now.

The recent train wrecks on both Wall Street and Capitol Hill - - and the ways in which they have been portrayed - - illustrate this media meltdown. With presidential candidates traversing across the country over the past 2 years blaming “fat cat executives” for banking failures, many news outlets have been content to simply regurgitate the political rhetoric without even attempting to contextualize what has been happening before our eyes.

Thus, we have many Americans - - how many is unknown, but likely many millions - - actually believing that the failures of lending institutions were all caused by “corporate greed” and “predatory lenders.” It’s likely that many of these Americans know nothing about how lenders have been pressured by government over the past many years to make loans to risky and lower-income borrowers, under the auspices of “fair” and “affordable housing,” and how these government-induced, high-risk loans have in part led to bank failures.

But Americans do know that lending institutions have failed, and that these failures are hurting the overall economy, and that they are scared about the economy. And Barack Obama has the anecdote for our fears: government will take care of us all. Obama has now begun criticizing John McCain’s “risky” plans for “de-regulation” of lending institutions, and is proposing more, “tougher” regulation.

But where is the big old media on this one? There seems to be no interest in the fact that over the past five years, the Bush Administration and several key Republicans in the Congress (John McCain being one of them) have been pushing for more regulation of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, not less. Indeed, in 2003, the New York Times labeled Bush’s regulatory proposals as “the most significant regulatory overhaul in the housing finance industry since the savings and loan crisis a decade ago.”

But guess who opposed the Bush Administration’s regulatory proposals? Obama’s fellow Democrat Barney Frank, who is now Chairman of the House Financial Services Committee. In 2003, Frank rebuffed the Bush regulatory proposals, saying “These two entities—Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac—are not facing any kind of financial crisis…The more people exaggerate these problems, the more pressure there is on these companies, the less we will see in terms of affordable housing.”

Similar circumstances surround Senator Christopher Dodd, Chairman of the Senate Banking Committee. As recently as last year, Dodd opposed what he called the Bush Administration’s “ill-advised” reform policies for Fannie and Freddie.

Worse yet, we now know that in the face of increased regulatory efforts by President Bush and congressional Republicans, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac bought the silence of many in the Congress. Indeed, between the years 1998 and 2008, Senator Dodd, along with Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, Senator John Kerry, and - - yes - - Senator Barack Obama, were the top four recipients of Fannie and Freddie campaign donations, all the while they mocked the regulatory efforts of their Republican colleagues.

But among the ranks of the big, old media, seemingly nobody cares to question Congressman Frank’s pledge to “fully investigate” what went wrong, or Senator Dodd’s remarks on Bloomberg television when he said “I have a lot of questions about where was the administration over the last eight years.”

This current crisis of information makes for an interesting parallel with the federal government shutdown of 1995. Back then, the Republican majority in Congress, frustrated with a lack of cooperation from the Clinton Administration on budgetary matters, chose to simply not pass governmental funding bills, and allow for major portions of the government to become inoperative.

The old media chose at that time to convey the Administration’s side of the story almost exclusively. Thus, news accounts were filled with tragic stories of governmental employees being furloughed, Americans suffering for lack of governmental services, and so forth. Ultimately, the shutdown proved to be politically damaging for Congressional Republicans, and a boon for President Clinton.

But that was in 1995. Back then, blogs, pod casts, talk radio and web tv did not exist as they do today.

Today, some of the very same Congressional Criminals who helped push our nation’s financial institutions to the brink, now want to lead us down the paths of righteousness - - and one of them wants to be President. These circumstances constitute an emergency, and new media must redouble its efforts to respond to it.

Copyright © 2008 Salem Web Network. All Rights Reserved.

Nicholas Guariglia
Family Security Matters

Sen. Obama’s former top foreign affairs advisor, Robert Malley, recently had to resign his role in the Obama campaign due to holding meetings with the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas. Mr. Malley’s favorable views of Hamas have been widely known for years. Malley had written extensively, sometimes co-writing articles with the late Yasser Arafat’s advisor Hussein Agha, blaming Israel, not Arafat, for the failure of the Camp David talks. Had Malley’s views on (and meetings with) Hamas not been unveiled, who knows where Mr. Malley would have ended up in a potential Obama administration? Perhaps he would have been the Secretary of State. This is a sad and frightening possibility, or probability, because Sen. Obama is the least-vetted man in U.S. political history.

Nobody likes “gotcha!” politics. Both Sen. McCain and Sen. Obama have made serious gaffes during the course of this election, which began earlier and has lasted longer than any other election in American history. Both men are being recorded and watched at all times, and they’re human. Missteps and goof-ups are to be expected. Just ask Joe Biden.

But this issue is different. In a New York Times article, written by David Brooks on May 16th of this year, Sen. Obama made a very revealing admission that has gone overlooked by the mainstream press. The article, entitled “Obama Admires Bush,” focused on Sen. Obama’s views regarding the Middle East. The “Bush” in question was George H.W. Bush, the senior, and throughout the interview Obama displays his affection for old-school James Baker/Brent Scowcroft foreign policy realism.

About midway through the interview, however, the man who wants to be President of the United States gave a whopper of a quote. In Brooks’ words:

The U.S. needs a foreign policy that “looks at the root causes of problems and dangers.” Obama compared Hezbollah to Hamas. Both need to be compelled to understand that “they’re going down a blind alley with violence that weakens their legitimate claims” (emphasis mine).

Why has no one to date asked the would-be Commander-in-Chief what he means by “legitimate claims”? Certainly there is a large distinction to be made between Palestinian and Lebanese innocents vs. the terrible Hamas and Hezbollah organizations. The former have aspirations which, if addressed, would help the United States geopolitically. But the latter? To suggest these terrorist groups have legitimate claims? Something does not sit right, there.

To be fair, Mr. Obama acknowledges that the two groups are conducting vicious violence, and previously in the article asserts that Hezbollah is “not a legitimate political party.”

Which is all well and good. So what does he mean when he says Hamas and Hezbollah, specifically, have legitimate claims? They both consider themselves at war with the West, they both want to destroy Israel, and they both want to impose a puritanical version of Islam over their people.
Clearly, any grievances they might have – which to the amoral and relativist would seem “legitimate” – should be overlooked and ignored, no?

This is more than a gaffe. It occurred during an interview with a respected journalist. It is in print.

What are the implications of this statement? Is Sen. Obama implying he opposes Hezbollah and Hamas merely due to their actions and not their beliefs? Is he solely against20what these Jihadist groups do, and not what they represent? That’s like hating the gas chambers but excusing the fascism; opposing the gulags but delving into the nuances about the “legitimacy” of Stalinism.

The Third Reich complained about a raw deal at Versailles and a lack of Lebensraum, or “living space,” for the white race. The Bolsheviks harped about the excesses of the bourgeoisie. None of these “claims,” legitimate or not, were even considered by Western statesmen serious about the continuity of the Western way of life – and rightly so.

Hamas and Hezbollah could stop the neck-slicing and car bombing tomorrow, and they would still be theocratic and neo-fascistic movements attempting to usurp their citizenry and democratic principalities in Palestine and Lebanon.

In fact, that is the route most Jihadist groups go: they use insurrection and terrorism to achieve governmental power and the apparatus of the state, then they morph into dictatorial regimes which no longer need to rely primarily on asymmetrical violence to brutalize their population and threaten their neighbors.

It is a disgrace that Sen. Obama has not had the chance to clarify himself, and an even further disgrace that nobody has held his feet to the fire on this issue (amongst others). Hezbollah and Hamas have combined to kill hundreds of Americans. Before 9/11, Hezbollah was the one terrorist group which had killed the most Americans throughout the world.

To put this statement by Sen. Obama into further context, consider this: Hamas and Hezbollah are both direct proxies of Iran. The same Iran which is blowing up Americans and Iraqis in Iraq.

The same Iran which Sen. Obama once promised to negotiate with without diplomatic preconditions.

The same Iran which Sen. Obama apparently believes does not, or would not, work with Sunni Jihadists (Iran being a Shi’ite country).

On top of all this, last year Sen. Obama voted against labeling Iran’s elite paramilitary unit, the Revolutionary Guards Corps, a “terrorist organization.” Sen. Obama did not want to des ignate the Revolutionary Guards – who created Hezbollah, and directly train and arm Hezbollah and Hamas to this day – a terrorist group.

The Revolutionary Guards, along with their surrogates, have been involved in some of the most egregious and destructive terrorist activities all across the world since 1979. And since 2003, they’ve killed U.S. forces in Iraq.

Again, Sen. Obama voted against calling them “terrorists” – and just several weeks ago, said Hezbollah and Hamas had “legitimate claims.”

More vetting of Sen. Obama’s views about the Middle East needs to happen before we have another foreign policy debate, let alone hold an election.

More context, still: Hamas actually endorsed Sen. Obama, to which Obama replied:

It’s conceivable that there are those in the Arab world who say to themselves, “This is a guy who spent some time in the Muslim world, has a middle name of Hussein and appears more worldly and has called for talks with people, and so he’s not going to be engaging in the same sort of cowboy diplomacy as George Bush.”

That’s a perfectly legitimate perception as long as they’re not confused about my unyielding support for Israel’s security.

While Hamas might not be confused about Sen. Obama’s views, I am. The press is supposed to be the watchdog for the American people. It took more than a year after the rantings of Rev. Wright were reported for the pastor’s hateful sermons to break the news nationally. It took prompting from Sean Hannity for George Stephanopoulos to finally question Sen. Obama about his connections to former domestic terrorist William Ayers.

This article might be from a few months ago, but this quote is too important to overlook. In not addressing this issue, Sen. Obama ends up concealing something which might be very unpleasant if further explored. Considering the context of this statement – his pro-Hamas advisor, the endorsement by Hamas, his refusal to label the Revolutionary Guards terrorists, etc. – the American public simply must know what Sen. Obama meant when he told David Brooks that Hezbollah and Hamas, mortal terrorist adversaries and theocratic extremists, had “legitimate claims.”

Before I walk into that voting booth, I need to know that. Period. Someone in the media, or in the McCain campaign, or at his rallies, needs to ask him what he means. And they need to ask him now.

FamilySecurityMatters.org Contributing Editor Nicholas Guariglia is a polemic and essayist who writes on Islam and Middle Eastern geopolitics. He can be reached at nickguar@gmail.com.