Saturday, October 17, 2015

The Middle East and Orwellian Historical Arguments - Bruce Thornton



by Bruce Thornton

When lies are the foundation of policies.



Bruce Thornton is a Shillman Journalism Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center.

Many of our policy debates and conflicts both domestic and foreign call on history to validate their positions. At home, crimes from the past like slavery and legal segregation are used to justify present policies ranging from racial set asides to housing regulations long after those institutions have been dismantled. Abroad, our jihadist enemies continually evoke the Crusades, “colonialism,” and “imperialism” as justifications for their violence. Yet the “history” used in such fashion is usually one-sided, simplistic, or downright false. Nor is the reason hard to find: as we read in 1984, “Who controls the past . . . controls the future: who controls the present controls the past.” Bad history is a powerful instrument for gaining political power.

Nowhere is the abuse of history more rampant than in the Middle East. Since World War II all the problems whose origins lie in dysfunctional tribal and religious beliefs and behaviors have been laid at the feet of “colonialism” and “imperialism.” Western leftists––besotted both by a marxiste hatred of liberal democracy, and by juvenile noble-savage Third-Worldism–– have legitimized this specious pretext, which now for many has become historical fact.

In reality, Europeans never had colonies in the modern Middle East, for the simple reason that the territory was controlled by the Muslim Ottoman Empire. Hence “colonialism” is irrelevant for that region’s history. The facts of that history teach us that the feckless incompetence of a series of Ottoman sultans, in pursuit of imperialist dreams of recovering their lost Balkan provinces and restoring their hegemony over Egypt, had financially weakened the empire and made it dependent on the European powers who lent them the money. As a result, it became the geopolitical “sick man” that England had to protect against Russian adventurism and Egyptian expansionism.

Historians Efraim Karsh and Inari Karsh succinctly state the conclusion of a sober examination of these facts:
Twentieth-Century Middle Eastern history is essentially the culmination of long-standing indigenous trends, passions, and patterns of behavior rather than an externally imposed dictate. Great-power influences, however potent, have played a secondary role, constituting neither the primary force behind the region’s political development nor the main cause of its notorious volatility. Even at the weakest point in their modern history, during the First World War and in its immediate wake, Middle Eastern actors were not hapless victims of predatory imperial powers but active participants in the restructuring of their region.
From the Ottoman decision to join the Central Powers in World War I in order to regain imperial status and recover lost territory, to the Hashemite clan’s inveigling England into giving them most of the Ottoman territories after the war, the prime movers in creating the modern Middle East were the Ottomans, Egyptians, and Arabs, not the “colonial” powers who, as great powers have done since ancient Sumer, attempted to influence events in order to advance their own interests. But that’s not “imperialism” properly understood.

The most egregious example of this Orwellian history, however, is the predicating of Muslim violence against Israel on its status as a neo-imperialist Western stooge violently thrust into the “homeland” of the “Palestinian” people whose ancient lands were stolen by an “illegitimate” nation that continues brutally to “occupy” the territory rightfully belonging to the “Palestinians.”

Everything about this narrative is false. There is no such thing as a “Palestinian” people, an idea that arose only after the Six Day War of 1967. The bulk of the people mistakenly called “Palestinians” are ethnically, religiously, and linguistically indistinguishable from Arab Muslims in Lebanon, Jordan, or Syria. Numerous comments by Arab leaders before 1967 emphasized this fact. For example, Zouhair Muhsin, a member of the Executive Council of the PLO, said, “There are no differences between Jordanians, Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese. We are all part of one nation. It is only for political reasons that we carefully underline our Palestinian identity… Yes, the existence of a separate Palestinian identity serves only tactical purposes. The founding of a Palestinian state is a new tool in the continuing battle against Israel.”

Second, the region in question was never an Arab homeland, and Arabs only began to inhabit it permanently after the Muslim conquest of Jerusalem in 637. Since then Muslim Arabs have come as conquerors, occupiers, migrant laborers, and immigrants, but they are no more “indigenous” peoples than Americans are of North America. On the other hand, abundant literary and archaeological evidence confirms the presence of Jews in the area and the status of Jerusalem as a Jewish city since 1300 B.C. This fact explains the Orwellian rewrite of history the Palestinian Arabs are currently engaged in, most despicably by destroying the archeological evidence on the Temple Mount that confirms the Jews’ presence on that site almost 2000 years before Islam even existed.

Third, the claim that Israel is an “illegitimate” state is false. Israel was created as part of the mandatory system put into place after World War I as part of the peace settlement, and confirmed by several international treaties, the League of Nations, and later U.N. Resolution 181. Except for the U.N. resolution, that same process created the new nations of Jordan, Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon. If Israel is illegitimate, why aren’t those other nations? Could it be because for traditional Muslims, it is Jews who are illegitimate, not their state? Could that explain why over a million Arabs live in Israel, but any future Palestinian state must be Judenrein?

Finally, the charge of an “illegal occupation” of the “occupied West Bank” is a canard. Those territories, comprising the heartland of the ancient Jewish nations of Judea and Samaria, are disputed, their final disposition awaiting a peace treaty. There are no “borders” thought to define the mythical Palestinian nation. Those lines on the map are armistice lines, created after Israel defeated the armies of Syria, Jordan, and Egypt in 1967. By all rights as the victor, Israel could have incorporated the so-called West Bank into the state of Israel, on the same eternal wages of war that led to the American Southwest being incorporated into the U.S. after the 1846-48 war with Mexico, or of Prussian Germany into Poland after World War II. Indeed, since the territory in question was for thousands of years the homeland of the Jewish people, Israel would have had a better case for restoring Judea and Samaria to Israel. Instead, in the Orwellian history created by Muslims and accepted by the West, the indigenous peoples are considered the “occupiers” of their own lands, and conquerors, invaders, and colonizers considered the disenfranchised victims.

The recent suicide-murders of random Israelis by Palestinians have been analyzed in terms that perpetuate this false history. Our intellectually challenged Secretary of State, John Kerry, referred to this false history when he said at Harvard, “There’s been a massive increase in settlement over the course of the last years and there’s an increase in the violence because there’s this frustration that’s growing,” he said. “Settlements” is nothing more than a mindless mantra, like “cycle of violence” or “checkpoints” or the “sanctity of the al-Aqsa mosque,” for the pusillanimous West, while for Muslims they are the pretexts for practicing their traditional Jew-hatred and sacralized violence.

The history this reporting on the Temple Mount ignores is the great forbearance, and to be sure tactical pragmatism, of the Israelis in leaving the Temple Mount under the management of the Arabs; while a mosque created as a triumphalist boast over conquered Christians and Jews, in a city never mentioned in the Koran, is respected more by the West than its own empty cathedrals. Meanwhile the travails of Muslim immigrants are hyped and agonized over more than the crucifixions, torture, rape, and murder of Christians in the greatest mass persecution of Christians in history.

These are the wages of historical ignorance and the acceptance of a history made up by an adversary who can “thrust its hand into the past and say of this or that event, it never happened,” as Orwell says of the Party in 1984. Our foreign policy has often been predicated on these lies, and the outcome has been predictable when lies are the foundation of policies––the abject failure we are witnessing in the region today.


Bruce Thornton is a Shillman Journalism Fellow at the Freedom Center, a Research Fellow at Stanford's Hoover Institution, and a Professor of Classics and Humanities at the California State University. He is the author of nine books and numerous essays on classical culture and its influence on Western Civilization. His most recent book, Democracy's Dangers and Discontents (Hoover Institution Press), is now available for purchase.

Source: http://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/260465/middle-east-and-orwellian-historical-arguments-bruce-thornton

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

Palestinian and Western Leaders: Blood on Their Hands - Richard Kemp



by Richard Kemp

  • Secretary Kerry's comments will encourage the continuation of violence and lead to further deaths of both Israelis and Palestinians. His explanation for the widespread knifings, suicide bombings, shootings, arson, firebombings, vehicle attacks and lethal rock-throwing is either naive or mendacious; perhaps both.
  • Kerry asserts that the frustrations of Israeli settlement activity are responsible for the Palestinians' murderous behaviour. The reality is that this new wave of killings is a continuation of the aggression against Jews that has been going on in the territory of Palestine for many decades -- since long before 1948 and pre-dating the first Israeli settlements in the West Bank that Kerry falsely brands as illegal.
  • The violence is motivated by the same racist and sectarian zeal that drives the Islamic State and numerous Arab governments and jihadist groups that have sought to eradicate the presence of "infidels," whether Jews, Christians or Yazidis, from land that they consider the exclusive preserve of Muslims.
  • Palestinian children are taught that Jews are descended from apes and pigs and must be killed before their "filthy feet" desecrate the holy places of Islam -- in the words of President Abbas.
  • Secretary Kerry, the UN, and the EU should be discouraging further violence by condemnation and by meaningful threats of sanction against the Palestinian Authority leadership. The international community has encouraged Hamas's illegal use of human shields and berated Israel for defending itself and for inflicting civilian casualties, which were in reality the unavoidable consequence of Hamas's unprovoked aggression and its way of fighting from within private houses, schools, hospitals and mosques.
  • This encouragement of Hamas violence, especially the effectiveness of its human shield strategy, did not go unnoticed by other Islamist terrorist groups. That is also what Hizballah wants: the wholesale deaths of their own people as a trigger for unbearable international pressure against Israel.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry has shockingly justified the latest Palestinian murder campaign in Israel. His comments this week at Harvard University will encourage the continuation of violence and lead to further deaths of both Israelis and Palestinians.

Secretary Kerry's remarks are particularly troubling because it is unimaginable that he would provide such justification other than for the killing of Israelis. His explanation for the widespread knifings, suicide bombings, shootings, arson, firebombings, vehicle attacks and lethal rock-throwing is either naive or mendacious; perhaps both. He asserts that the frustrations of Israeli settlement activity in the West Bank are responsible for the Palestinians' murderous behaviour. Of course this is nonsense.

The reality is that this new wave of killings is a continuation of the aggression against Jews that has been going on in the territory of Palestine for many decades -- since long before the re-establishment of the Jewish state in 1948 and pre-dating the first Israeli settlements in the West Bank that Secretary Kerry falsely brands as illegal. The violence is motivated by the same racist and sectarian zeal that drives the Islamic State and numerous Arab governments and jihadist groups that have sought to eradicate the presence of "infidels," whether Jews, Christians or Yazidis, from land that they consider the exclusive preserve of Muslims.


For years, the Palestinian people have been betrayed by their weak, divided and jaundiced leadership who have consistently rejected every opportunity to make peace with their Israeli neighbours. Seeking to divert attention from their gross failures, the immediate trigger for the current murder campaign was the unfounded accusations of Palestinian Authority (PA) President Mahmud Abbas and other rabble-rousers that the Israeli government was planning to change the status of the Temple Mount in Jerusalem -- a holy place for both Jews and Muslims.

But what made it possible to conjure up widespread violence so rapidly and to such devastating effect were the years of incitement to hatred against Jews by the Palestinian leadership, including President Abbas. In propaganda that would have impressed Nazi Germany's Dr. Josef Goebbels himself, Palestinian children are indoctrinated with hatred for Jews and the Jewish State from the very earliest stages of their learning. In schoolbooks, on the TV and in the mosques, they are taught that the whole of the land of Israel, Gaza and the West Bank is Arab territory, stolen from them by the Jews. They are taught that Jews are descended from apes and pigs and must be knifed, blasted and stoned to death before their "filthy feet" are allowed to desecrate the holy places of Islam -- in the words of President Abbas.

It is this type of sustained, government-sponsored incitement to hate, reducing the objects of their venom to subhuman status, which made it so easy for ordinary Germans to indulge readily in the orgy of violence that enabled the most efficient genocide in the history of the world.

Although the Palestinian leadership must bear the brunt of responsibility for their incitement to murder, Western leaders also have blood on their hands. Much of the material of hate that inspires Palestinian children is funded by the U.S., Europe and other Western as well as Arab nations.

Rather than seeking to appease the perpetrators by blaming the victims for their fate, Secretary Kerry should be discouraging further violence by outright condemnation and by meaningful threats of sanction against the Palestinian Authority leadership. Instead, he adopts a morally relativistic stance that has the darkest consequences. Understanding that, as so often in the past, the U.S. and the West sympathizes with their fascistic barbarity against a Western democratic state, the Palestinians will step up their violence.

This is the same moral failure that has encouraged three wars in Gaza since Israel withdrew in 2005. Western governments, international bodies such as the UN and the EU and human rights groups consistently refused to condemn salvo after salvo of Hamas rocket attacks against Israeli civilians. Only when Israel has been forced to strike back in self-defence have they bestirred themselves. Then, more often than not, it has only been to justify Hamas's terrorist aggression, as Secretary Kerry has justified Palestinian violence this week. Emboldened first by a lack of international interest and then by international condemnation of Israel's defensive response, Hamas and their fellow Gaza terrorists continued, repeatedly, to attack Israel. There is little doubt that this will happen again in the future.

In each of the Gaza wars, the international community encouraged Hamas's illegal use of human shields that resulted in so much death and suffering in Gaza and Israel. At best with only token criticism of Hamas's war crimes, international leaders vigorously berated Israel for defending itself and for inflicting civilian casualties which were in reality the unavoidable consequence of Hamas's unprovoked aggression and its way of fighting from within private houses, schools, hospitals and mosques.

This encouragement of Hamas violence, especially the effectiveness of its human shield strategy, did not go unnoticed by other Islamist terrorist groups. Lebanese Hizballah, for example, has embedded 100,000 rockets -- all pointed at Israel -- among the towns and villages of southern Lebanon. Many houses have a kitchen, sitting room and rocket room. Should Israel need to defend itself against these missiles, which threaten their civilian population, many hundreds -- perhaps thousands -- of Lebanese civilians will inevitably be killed in the process. As with Hamas, that is what Hizballah wants: the wholesale deaths of their own people as a trigger for unbearable international pressure against Israel.

It is here that Secretary Kerry should be focusing his energies -- on the removal of this threat, which is certain to materialize if international action is not taken. But of course, he will not. Because those missiles are under the control of Iran. Indeed, today Iran is intent on strengthening and reinforcing Hizballah's offensive capability against Israel. And Secretary Kerry and President Obama have invested too much political capital in their nuclear deal with Iran. Itself catastrophic for the region and the world, the deal is nevertheless their proud legacy, and they cannot afford to upset the ayatollahs and risk them walking away.

Neither will the UN nor the EU lift a finger to prevent the inevitable future conflict and death in southern Lebanon or in Gaza. Like Secretary Kerry, they and the international human rights industry will continue to justify and encourage anti-Israel aggression, reserving their efforts for the repudiation of the Jewish State and perpetuating current and future waves of violence and death.
 
 
Colonel Richard Kemp spent most his 30-year career in the British Army commanding front-line troops in fighting terrorism and insurgency in hotspots including Iraq, the Balkans, South Asia and Northern Ireland. He was Commander of British Forces in Afghanistan in 2003. From 2002 - 2006 he heading the international terrorism team at the Joint Intelligence Committee of the British Prime Minister's Office.


Source: http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/6703/palestinian-blood-hands

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

Kerry, Israeli Arabs and the Separation Delusion - Caroline Glick



by Caroline Glick

Why Israel will never be able to separate from the Palestinians.



Originally published by the Jerusalem Post

Israel’s political leaders have rightly expressed anger at the US State Department’s hostile characterizations of the Palestinian terrorist onslaught. Secretary of State John Kerry’s claims, parroted by his spokesmen, that Israel is either entirely to blame for Palestinian terrorism or shares the blame equally with the Palestinians, are baseless lies.

Kerry and his spokesmen have alleged that the current Palestinian convulsion of murderous violence is a product of “a massive increase in settlements.” Yet as Haaretz reported this week, Israel has built fewer homes for Jews in Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria since 2009, when Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu (and President Barack Obama) entered office, than it had since 1995. The steep increase in the Jewish population in the areas is almost entirely the result of Jewish women having babies.

The other accusations the State Department has leveled against Israel – that it incites violence and engages in terrorism – are so obscene that there is no point in trying to set the record straight. Quite simply, an administration comfortable with libeling Israel in this way doesn’t want to know the truth.

While at this point it is abundantly clear that Kerry like the administration he serves has an unpleasant, irrational obsession with the Jewish state, it’s hard to shake the conclusion that there is more going on here than simply opposition to Israel.

For instance his claim this week that “Unless we get going, a two-state solution could conceivably be stolen from everybody,” is more an assault on reality generally than on Israel in particular.

Kerry, like the Obama administration as a whole, is angry at reality because at least as far as Israel and its Palestinian neighbors are concerned, reality shares no common ground with the administration’s assumption of Israeli guilt.

There is no chance that Palestinian Authority Chairman and PLO chief Mahmoud Abbas will agree to make peace with Israel. We know this not only because Abbas rejected peace and a Palestinian state when then-prime minister Ehud Olmert offered him both in 2008. We know this as well because three years ago Abbas rejected the idea of a negotiated settlement and opted instead to use the UN to gain international recognition of a Palestinian state at war with Israel.

For the past several years, Obama and his advisers have collaborated with Abbas’s UN strategy by refusing to commit themselves to vetoing a UN Security Council resolution mandating the establishment of a Palestinian state.

In so doing, they have shown that they want Israel to vacate Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria no matter what.

If we learn nothing else from the current violence, we must learn that the idea we can separate from the Palestinians is a delusion.

The current round of Palestinian terrorism, like last year’s offensive, has been largely undertaken by Arabs who live in Israel – either Israeli citizens from the Galilee or permanent residents from Jerusalem. The natural response that many Israelis have had to the fact that it is our fellow citizens and residents of our capital city that are perpetrating the violence has been to hope that a way can be found to finally separate from them.

While understandable, this visceral response to Arab-Israeli terrorism is based on a misunderstanding of reality.

Israelis who preach separation from the Palestinians as a strategic goal claim that the reason the Palestinians of Judea and Samaria and Jerusalem – like the Palestinians of Gaza and Hezbollah forces in Lebanon before them – oppose Israel is because Israel controls the territory they live in. Accordingly, they argue, if Israel quits these areas – as it withdrew from Gaza and south Lebanon in the past – the Palestinians will stop their attacks.

They are wrong.

Arab Israelis and Jerusalem residents aren’t attacking Jews because Israel exercises sovereignty over the areas they live in. They are attacking Israel because like the Palestinians in Judea, and Samaria, they watch Palestinian and pan-Arab television, and like the Palestinians they use Facebook.

In other words, the 1.7 million Arabs inside sovereign Israel, and the 1.7 million Palestinians in Judea and Samaria have been subjected to the same campaign of incitement and solicitation of terrorism against Jews over the past year and to the same 22 years of indoctrination to hate Jews and seek Israel’s destruction. The geographic borders separating these two groups have no impact whatsoever on their hearts and minds.

The question isn’t how they feel, but whether or not they can act on their feelings.

The reason that the Arab Israelis who have been moved to murder Jews do so with knives and pistols rather than missiles and suicide vests is that Israel controls Jerusalem and the Galilee. Israel’s sole security control over its territory enables the security cabinet to decide to deploy security forces throughout the country and to place roadblocks at the entrances to all the major Arab neighborhoods in Jerusalem without fear of armed opposition.

Likewise, the reason the Palestinians of Judea and Samaria haven’t renewed their mass casualty bombings from a decade ago despite the Palestinian and pan-Arab incitement is that beginning in Operation Defensive Shield in April 2002, the IDF retook control over the Palestinian population centers from the PA.

Today Palestinian terrorist cells operating in the areas know that if they turn their guns on Israelis again, the IDF will immediately take their guns and arrest or kill them. Had Israel implemented then-prime minister Ehud Olmert’s plan to unilaterally withdraw from Judea and Samaria in 2007, Israel would be facing a catastrophic situation today.

The main difference between the Arabs of Israel and of Judea and Samaria today is not their intentions, but the fact that in Israel proper, the government is the sole governing authority, while in Judea and Samaria, Israel shares sovereign control with the PLO-controlled PA. Two unique military challenges arise from this distinction. First, unlike the situation in Israel proper, in Judea and Samaria, the Palestinians are armed to the teeth. The quantities of firearms and explosives in Judea and Samaria are dizzying.

Since 2007, when his forces were thrown out of Gaza, Abbas has viewed Hamas as a greater threat to his regime than Israel. As a result, he has cooperated with Israel in fighting Hamas and has not ordered his US-trained forces to turn their guns on the IDF and Israeli civilians.

So since Israel’s ability to operate in Judea and Samaria at will has kept Hamas at bay, and Abbas’s belief that Hamas is a greater threat than Israel has kept him in check, Israel’s security control over the areas has prevented both Hamas and the PA from waging a renewed terrorist offensive against Israel.

Unfortunately, this state of affairs will not last much longer. In all likelihood, at some point in the near to medium term, the PA’s threat assessment will change. The US-trained PA security forces will come to view Hamas as less of a threat than Israel.

The main reason for this changed assessment is incitement. Like the rest of Palestinian society, the PA’s security services have been marinated in genocidal Jew hatred at the hands of Abbas’s media and Al Jazeera for the past 22 years. And as we see with the Jerusalem Arabs who run over Jews and then butcher them with meat cleavers, 22 years of indoctrination leaves a mark.

But that’s not the only reason that the PA as we know it is about to disappear. In the not too distant future, Abbas will either retire or pass away.

The PLO chief who incites Palestinians to murder Jews while owing his life and regime to the IDF which keeps Hamas and his Fatah challengers at bay is 80 years old. Just a month ago he resigned for the 10th time.

None of Abbas’s possible successors will be likelier to lead the Palestinians to peaceful coexistence with Israel than Abbas has been.

Moreover, none of them is likely to succeed in maintaining the PA as a coherent regime throughout Judea and Samaria. It is far likelier that after Abbas departs, the PA will fall apart and each Palestinian population center will be ruled by a local clan or militia. Under such a scenario, the current distinctions between Hamas and Fatah affiliates are likely to fall by the wayside.

Here it is important to note that Israel has no interest in prolonging Abbas’s tenure. To the contrary, his record in office makes clear that he has personally caused great damage to Israel.

For while Abbas owes his life and regime to Israel, he leads the diplomatic war against Israel in the international arena.

Abbas’s refusal – despite his repeated resignations – to vacate his position, along with claims by Israeli officeholders that he serves as a moderating force in Palestinian society, have placed Israel in a situation where it is forced to participate in the diplomatic war against itself.

After all, if Abbas is moderate and legitimate, then his incitement against Israel is similarly legitimate.

Israel’s reluctance to abandon the fiction of Abbas’s moderation makes it impossible for it to prepare for the day after he disappears.

Such preparations would involve setting the stage for expanded Israeli control over the territories.

Steps to this end include limiting the transfer of weapons and additional Palestinian forces to Judea and Samaria. To this end, Israel must begin explaining to Congress that continued US funding of the Palestinian security forces endangers Israel.

So, too, Israel must pounce on any opportunity to seize weapons in Judea and Samaria.

The more weapons Israel takes control over today, the fewer it will need to seize in the future.

Perhaps more important than any specific step that it can and should take to minimize the long-term dangers posed by the heavily armed Palestinian militias and security forces, our political and military leaders simply need to recognize that Palestinian society in Judea and Samaria is about to undergo major political changes. The better Israel recognizes the dynamics at play, the better prepared it will be to shape the new reality ways that minimize threats to our long-term security.

No, Israel cannot change what is in the hearts and minds of the Palestinians, or of its Arab citizens and permanent residents. And it is because of this that separation is a chimera.

All we can do is limit their ability to act on the hatred that has been instilled in them for the past 22 years.

As for Kerry and his delusions, we have no choice but to allow him to fail to make peace again. But while we are at it, we need to recognize that given that he lives in his world of delusion, no concession Israel makes in the real world will satisfy him.


Caroline Glick is the Director of the David Horowitz Freedom Center's Israel Security Project and the Senior Contributing Editor of The Jerusalem Post. For more information on Ms. Glick's work, visit carolineglick.com.

Source: http://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/260485/kerry-israeli-arabs-and-separation-delusion-caroline-glick

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

The NGO "Excessive Force" Campaign and Its Impact - NGO Monitor



by NGO Monitor

-- the “excessive force” accusations are part of an entrenched narrative that only sees Palestinians as victims and Israelis as aggressors. This is a political framing that stands in direct contrast to the human rights principles these groups claim to advance.


Officials from the U.S. State Department, UN Secretary General’s office, and UNRWA have all uncritically repeated NGO claims this week, alleging that Israeli police and security personnel, in responding to stabbing and other terror attacks against civilians, have used “excessive force” in stopping the attackers (See Appendix 1 for statements). Articles with similar content have appeared in the international media.


This theme is a central tactic of politicized NGOs (and the Palestinian Authority) that seek to criminalize Israeli self-defense, and it has appeared frequently in NGO statements since the terror campaign intensified on October 1. The NGO statements apply a unique, unrealistic and unreasonable standard to actions of Israeli security forces. They also erase efforts by emergency responders and doctors to save the lives of injured terrorists.  

In addition, despite video evidence and severely injured victims, a number of NGOs question or reject the reality of these terror attacks.

More broadly, the “excessive force” accusations are part of an entrenched narrative that only sees Palestinians as victims and Israelis as aggressors. This is a political framing that stands in direct contrast to the human rights principles these groups claim to advance.
Some particularly problematic examples of such allegations include:
  • A group of Israeli NGOs (most funded by the New Israel Fund), including B’Tselem, Adalah, Physicians for Human Rights-Israel, and Yesh Din, described “a worrying trend to use firearms to kill Palestinians who have attacked Israelis or are suspected of such attacks” (emphasis added). They go on to say that public “support for such actions endorses the killing of Palestinians in the Territories and in Israel.”
  • Amnesty International condemned “the widespread use of excessive force by Israeli forces against demonstrators across the occupied West Bank,” despite acknowledging that “Palestinian demonstrators have thrown rocks and firebombs towards Israeli forces in many demonstrations, and there are reports that Palestinians have shot at Israeli forces in isolated cases.”
  • Human Rights Watch claims that it has “documented the unlawful use of force by Israeli security forces…over many years.” Director Kenneth Roth tweeted, “Horrible deadly cycle: ‘lone wolf’ Palestinian attacks, excessively lethal Israeli response.”
  • Palestinian Center for Human Rights refers to terrorists who have carried out attacks against Israeli civilians as “victims” and alleges that “Israeli forces could have used less force against the victims or could have arrested and tied them if their allegations were true.” 
  • Al Haq also accuses Israeli personnel of “wanton and excessive use of force against Palestinians, with no accountability for the deaths they cause.”
Excerpts from NGO statements: 
Table of Contents
Joint NGO StatementAssociation of Civil Rights in Israel, Amnesty International, B’Tselem, Gisha, Public Committee Against Torture in Israel, Hamoked- Center for the Deference of the Individual, Yesh Din- Volunteer for Human Rights, Adalah- The Legal Center for the Rights of the Arab Minority in Israel, Physician for Human Rights- Israel
Human Rights Organizations in Israel: Politicians’ calls to police and soldiers to shoot rather than arrest endorse the killing of Palestinians (Press Release: October 14, 2015)
Since the beginning of the current wave of violence, there has been a worrying trend to use firearms to kill Palestinians who have attacked Israelis or are suspected of such attacks. Several incidents have been documented and reported, raising concern that the chosen response to such persons is the harshest possible, with lethal or – at the very least – unnecessary consequences. In instances when Jews have been suspected of attacks, none of the suspects has been shot.
Politicians and senior police officers have not only failed to act to calm the public climate of incitement, but on the contrary have openly called for the extrajudicial killing of suspects. They have also urged civilians to carry weapons. For example, Jerusalem District Police Commander Moshe Edri was quoted as saying: “Anyone who stabs Jews or hurts innocent people is due to be killed.” Interior Security Minister Gilad Arden declared that “every terrorist should know that he will not survive the attack he is about to commit.” MK Yair Lapid stated that “you have to shoot to kill anyone who pulls out a knife or screwdriver.” Much of the media joined in and encouraged a similar approach. The bodies responsible for supervising police operations – the State Attorney’s Office and the Department for the Investigation of Police – remained silent in the face of these comments.
No-one disputes the serious nature of the events of recent days, nor the need to protect the public against stabbing and other attacks. However, it seems that too often, instead of acting in a manner consistent with the nature of each incident, police officers and soldiers are quick to shoot to kill. The political and public support for such actions endorses the killing Palestinians in the Territories and in Israel.
Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR)
Weekly Report On Israeli Human Rights Violations in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (08-13 Oct. 2015) (Update: October 14, 2015)
Israeli forces have escalated the use of excessive lethal force against peaceful protests in occupied Palestinian territory.
The reporting period witnessed bloody escalation and blatant disregard by Israeli forces for the lives of Palestinian civilians. Moreover, Israeli forces continued to use excessive force against Palestinians participating in peaceful protests in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Occupied East Jerusalem witnessed shooting incidents against all those suspected of attempting to stab Israeli soldiers and settlers.
Field investigations indicate that Israeli forces used excessive lethal force in the Gaza Strip in violation of the principles of proportionality and military necessity. Many of the Palestinian victims were shot in the upper parts of their bodies, reflecting an Israeli intention to cause maximum casualties among Palestinian civilians, who did not pose any serious threat to the lives of Israeli soldiers stationed in fortified military sites far away from the demonstrators.
Videos and Photos Showing Israeli Violations Against Palestinian Civilians (Update: October 14, 2015)
In some cases, Israeli forces claim that shootings or other practices were carried out in response to the Palestinians' attempts to stab Israelis. However, the videos and photos showing the employment of excessive force reflect shooting-to-kill policy in violation of the international standards.
Child Killed and His Cousin Seriously Wounded Amidst Settlers' Cry "Die" and "David Red Star" Ambulance Deliberate Delay (Press Release: October 13, 2015)
Moreover, PCHR stresses that in the above-mentioned cases,  Israeli forces could have used less force against the victims or could have arrested and tied them if their allegations were true. PCHR reiterates its call upon the international community to take immediate and effective actions to put an end to such crimes…
Israeli Forces Continue to Kill Palestinians on grounds of Alleged Stabbing Attempts (Press Release: October 12, 2015)
Committing such crimes as a policy adopted by Israeli forces is a translation of the decisions taken by the Israeli government and statements made by its members inciting for killing Palestinian civilians, who carry out and/or attempt to carry out stabbings against Israeli forces, police and settlers.
PCHR strongly condemns the use of excessive force by Israeli forces against the Palestinian civilians in disregard for their lives.  PCHR stresses that in the above-mentioned cases, Israeli forces could have used less force against the victims or could have arrested them.
In less Than 12 Hours, Israeli Forces Kill 4 Palestinian Civilians, Including Pregnant WOman, Her Child and another Child, and Wound 24 Others, Including 3 Children and Woman, in the Gaza Strip (Press Release: October 11, 2015)
Using excessive lethal force in the Gaza Strip, Israeli forces killed in less than 12 hours 4 Palestinian civilian... Moreover, they wounded 24 civilians, including three children and a woman. Thus, the number of Palestinians killed in the Gaza Strip since Friday afternoon has increased to 11, including two children. In addition, the number of the wounded has reached 91, including 20 children and a woman.
10 Palestinian Civilians Killed and 187 Civilians Wounded, Including 27 Children, Physician and Turkish Journalist, by Israeli Forces in the oPt; Seven of the Victims Were Killed in the Gaza Strip in Few Hours (Press Release: October 10, 2015)
Using excessive force, on Friday, 9 October 2015, Israeli forces killed seven Palestinian civilians, and wounded 67 civilians, including 17 children and a Turkish photojournalist, in five locations near the border between the Gaza Strip and Israel.
Field investigations indicate that Israeli forces used excessive lethal force in the Gaza Strip in violation of the principles of proportionality and military necessity. Many of the Palestinian victims were shot in the upper parts of their bodies, reflecting an Israeli intention to cause maximum casualties among Palestinian civilians, who did not pose any serious threat to the lives of Israeli soldiers stationed in fortified military sites far away from the demonstrators.
Israeli Forces Continue to Escalate Their Arbitrary Measures in the West Bank (Statement: October 5, 2015)
For the fifth consecutive day, Israeli forces continued to use excessive force against peaceful protests organized by Palestinian civilians in protest at the escalation policy practiced by Israeli forces in the West Bank, especially in East Jerusalem.
In another crime of excessive use of force, on Sunday afternoon, 04 October 2015, Israeli forces killed a Palestinian civilian and wounded two others, when Israeli soldiers opened fire at dozens of Palestinian civilians who organized a protest in the vicinity of "Gishory” factories, west of Tulkram…
Israeli Forces Escalate their Arbitrary Measures in the West Bank, Israeli Police Officer Willfully Kills Palestinian Civilian in Occupied Jerusalem (Statement: October 4, 2015)
PCHR strongly condemns the willful killing of Aloon in East Jerusalem, which further proves the use of excessive force by Israeli forces against the Palestinian civilians in disregard for the civilians’ lives.  Moreover, PCHR condemns collective punishment measures taken by the Israeli forces in the oPt and the attacks launched by Israeli settlers before the eyes of Israeli forces.
Amnesty International (AI)
Violence spirals in Israel and Occupied Palestinian Territories (October 13, 2015)
Israeli forces have used excessive, sometimes lethal, force against Palestinian demonstrators, injuring hundreds with live ammunition and rubber-coated metal bullets, and have failed to protect Palestinian civilians from a wave of settler attacks.
 “Israeli forces have used excessive force on a large scale and intensified restriction on movement and have vowed to increase illegal punishments such as home demolitions. Security measures must respect international law. Collective punishment of the Palestinian population can never be justified.”
No Justification for Deliberate Attacks on Civilians, Unlawful Killings by Israeli Forces, or Collective Punishment of Palestinians (Public Statement: October 9, 2015)
On the morning of 4 October, Fadi Alloun, 19, from Issawiyya in East Jerusalem, was shot and killed by the Israeli police near Jerusalem’s Old City, in what appears to have been an extrajudicial execution. Israeli police said that he tried to stab a 16-year-old Israeli boy who was lightly injured, and had a knife in his hand when he was shot.
Amnesty International also condemns the widespread use of excessive force by Israeli forces against Palestinian demonstrators across the occupied West Bank, and their failure to protect Palestinians from a wave of settler attacks. The organization urges the Israeli authorities to halt the use of excessive force and unlawful killings of Palestinians by Israeli forces…
Since 1 October, Israeli military and police forces have responded to dozens of spontaneous Palestinian protests throughout the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, by massively increasing their use of excessive force from what was already an unacceptable level. While Palestinian demonstrators have thrown rocks and firebombs towards Israeli forces in many demonstrations, and there are reports that Palestinians have shot at Israeli forces in isolated cases, Israeli military and police forces are heavily protected and must ensure that all use of force is strictly necessary and proportionate, and that firearms must only be used to protect against the imminent threat of death or serious injury.
Human Rights Watch
Tweet by Kenneth Roth, director (October 13, 2015)
 
Human Rights Watch Investigator Shot (News Release: October 11, 2015)
“Indiscriminate or deliberate firing on observers and demonstrators who pose no imminent threat violates the international standards that bind Israeli security forces,” said Kenneth Roth, executive director of Human Rights Watch. “It is particularly troubling when those seeking to monitor the security forces’ conduct are among the casualties.”
Human Rights Watch has documented the unlawful use of force by Israeli security forces in policing demonstrations in the West Bank over many years, and in particular firing live ammunition that hit protesters, journalists, and human rights activists who posed no imminent threat to the forces.
Israel/Palestine: Gunfire Kills Child at Protest (News Release: October 8, 2015)
“The death of a child after security forces used live ammunition against demonstrators should be a wake-up call for Israeli officials,” said Joe Stork, deputy Middle East director. “Israel needs to ensure that its police and army comply with international standards for the use of force.”
 “Especially in light of the rising number of civilian deaths and injuries in the West Bank, Israel should abide by international standards and immediately cancel the loosened rules of engagement for police,” Stork said.
Al-Haq
Al-Haq Action Alert: Palestine on the brink (October 10, 2015)
Palestinians have been killed and injured throughout the OPT and in Israel at an alarming rate… This is a direct result of Israel’s wanton and excessive use of force against Palestinians, with no accountability for the deaths they cause.
Al-Haq has documented countless cases of excessive use of force where the IOF have showed complete disregard for Palestinians’ lives and safety.
B’Tselem
In view of mounting violence, B'Tselem expresses its deep shock at contempt for human life and strongly condemns it; while individuals are responsible for their own particular actions, the government bears responsibility for the reality of the Occupation (Press Release: October 13, 2015)
Meanwhile, Israeli government officials and others in position of authority have been calling explicitly to “shoot to kill”, so the lives of Palestinians suspected of perpetrating attack are forfeit, even when they no longer pose a threat. To date, more than ten people have been shot to death when suspected of perpetrating attacks.
The excessive force Israel has been using to quell these demonstrations has left at least five Palestinian dead and hundreds injured.
Al Mezan
Israeli Attack on House Kills Pregnant Woman and Her Child in Gaza; Al Mezan Calls for Immediate International Protection for Civilians in the oPt (Press Release: October 11, 2015)
Al Mezan Center for Human Rights strongly condemns the Israeli violations against civilians in the oPt. Al Mezan asserts that many of the IOF practices represent serious and systematic violations of international humanitarian law and international human rights law
Al Mezan Condemns the IOF Lethal Force against Civilians; Calls on the International Community to Intervene and Ensure Due Protection for Civilians (Press Release: October 11, 2015)
The Israeli occupation forces (IOF) have used excessive and lethal force against Palestinian protestors, including children, who were near the border fence in the east of the Gaza Strip.  Al Mezan Center for Human Rights condemns the excessive and lethal use of force against civilian protestors and calls for immediate international protection of Palestinian civilians in the occupied Palestinian territory (oPt).
Al Mezan asserts that the direct IOF shooting at unarmed protestors reflects instructions given by the Israeli government which has relaxed the regulations regarding the use of live fire at demonstrators and stone throwers.
Adalah
Family demands that Israeli Police Investigation Unit “Mahash” investigate police killing of Palestinian youth Fadi Alloun (Press Release: October 11, 2015)
…the police officers at the incident violated the rules of engagement, which only permit fatal shooting as a last resort, after all other measures have been exhausted, and when the suspect poses an immediate danger. "The police in this case chose to use deadly weapons as the only option, as a first course of action instead of as a last resort," wrote the attorneys.
Israeli police acting above the law, taking brutal measures to suppress legitimate protest of Palestinian citizens of Israel (Press Release: October 11, 2015)
Over the last week, during the extremely violent events taking place throughout Israel...the Israeli police, backed by the courts, have been trying to prevent the legitimate protest of Palestinian Arab citizens of Israel against the government's policies by means of brutal and illegal acts.
Physicians for Human Rights- Israel (PHR-I)
Facebook Post: October 11, 2015 (Translated from Hebrew)
In recent weeks we have witnessed more incidents involving Palestinians that within a split second turn into a mega-event, which is immediately handled by shooting a suspect, either to wound or to kill [sic]. Instead of reacting according to the different nature of events, police officers and soldiers react both as judges and executioners. The default is killing, regardless of the actual danger posed by the attacker or suspect at the given moment…This practice is backed by government ministers and public officials who inflame the situation and authorize the spilling of the blood of Palestinians.
Addameer
Addameer Demands the Immediate Release of the Body of Fadi Alloun (News Update: October 8, 2015)
The lawyer of Addameer Prisoner Support and Human Rights Association, Adv. Mohammad Mahmoud, submitted a request earlier today demanding the Israeli occupation’s prosecution to immediately release the body of 19-year-old Fadi Alloun, who was extra-judicially executed by Israeli police in occupied East Jerusalem last Sunday.
War on Want
Palestinians Facing Intensified Violence (News: October 9, 2015)
Israeli military, police and settler violence against Palestinians is intensifying quickly. Over the past week, at least 900 Palestinians have been injured, at least 60 with live fire. Only today, six Palestinians in Gaza were shot dead by Israeli soldiers who opened fire on a demonstration. These peaks in lethal violence are a part of the systematic violence Palestinians are subjected to under Israel’s Apartheid regime.
Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP)
JVP Statement on State of Emergency in Jerusalem and the West Bank (Statement: October 4, 2015)
Jewish Voice for Peace mourns the lives lost in violent attacks, both Palestinian and Israeli, in the last days and weeks.
We are deeply alarmed by the escalated level of collective punishment being imposed on Palestinians by both settlers and the Israeli Army. In the last 24 hours, the IDF has used live fire in Jenin and elsewhere in the West Bank, wounding over 100 Palestinians. The Palestinian Red Crescent Society has declared a state of emergency after their staff and ambulances were attacked 14 times in the last 72 hours.
Appendix 1
U.S. State Department Briefing (October 14, 2015)
John Kirby: “Now, we have seen some – I wouldn’t call the checkpoints this, but we’ve certainly seen some reports of what many would consider excessive use of force… we’ve certainly seen some reports of security activity that could indicate the potential excessive use of force… we’re always concerned about credible reports of excessive use of force against civilians, and we routinely raise our concerns about that.”
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon (October 13, 2015)
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon urged Israel to carry out a “serious review” on whether its security forces are resorting to “excessive force” against Palestinians. Ban found “the apparent excessive use of force by Israeli security forces” to be “troubling,” his spokesman Stephane Dujarric told reporters.
UNRWA statement  (October 12, 2015)
“Further to the recent statement of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, the high number of casualties, in particular those resulting from the use of live ammunition by Israeli forces raise serious concerns about the excessive use of force that may be contrary to international law enforcement standards. Under international law there are strict limits to the use of lethal force whether in the context of law enforcement operations or during conflict.”


NGO Monitor

Source: http://ngo-monitor.org/article/the_ngo_excessive_force_campaign_and_its_impact

Copyright -
Original materials copyright (c) by the authors. 

Congress May Cut $5 Billion to PA Over Incitement - Ari Yashar



by Ari Yashar

Measure calls to end aid until PA stops incitement and condition it on acceptance of Jewish state, slamming Obama for executive transfers.



Mahmoud Abbas, Barack Obama
Mahmoud Abbas, Barack Obama
Reuters
 
There is a push in the US Congress to cut over $5 billion in US aid to the Palestinian Authority (PA), so as to punish it for its open incitement that has fueled the current wave of Arab terror in Israel that has seen at least eight Israelis murdered.

Representative Martha McSally (R-AZ), who is a retired Air Force colonel, submitted the proposal which seeks to block US taxpayer funds from being transferred to the PA in light of its calls for terror.

The measure, which was revealed by Washington Free Beacon late Friday, demands US President Barack Obama's administration voice stronger condemnation against Arab terror against Israel, and condition aid to the PA on the PA's acceptance of the Jewish state.

It "demands, as a condition of continued United States aid...that the President re-certify that the Palestinian Authority government, including all ministers, has publicly accepted" Israel's right to exist.

In a direct call for action, the measure calls to "freeze all United States funding to the Palestinian Authority until their leaders openly increase efforts to end their incitement of violence."

The resolution condemns the way in which the Obama administration has continued to use executive authority so as to continue sending funds to the PA and keep it afloat amid massive debt, despite the open support for terrorism expressed by the PA.

Specifically the text expresses concern "about the use of national security waivers to continue supplying aid to the Palestinian Authority."

The measure also calls not to fund a PA unity government containing members of the Hamas terrorist organization. The US has continued working with the unity government formed after a unity deal in April 2014, claiming no Hamas members were in the government, when in fact at least one was formerly a minister in the Hamas government.

Obama's administration has been sharply criticized for the way it has condemned Israel for the current wave of Arab terror targeting its civilians and security forces.

US Secretary of State John Kerry blamed the terrorism on "Israeli settlements" in an interview last Tuesday, a statement his spokesperson John Kirby later tried to backtrack on.

Kirby himself had to issue a semi-retraction after falsely blaming the terrorism on Israel for changing the "status quo" on the Temple Mount last Wednesday, and likewise delegitimizing Israeli self-defense by claiming there are "credible reports" of Israeli "excessive force."

The State Department spokesperson also accused Israel of "terrorism," saying "individuals on both sides of this divide are - have proven capable of, and in our view, are guilty of acts of terrorism."

In response, Republican presidential candidate Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) last Friday demanded Kerry's immediate resignation.


Ari Yashar

Source: http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/202029#.ViK8uiuzdds

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

Muslim 'Migrant' Chaos in Calais - Carol Brown



by Carol Brown


Truckers and bus drivers in Calais struggle to navigate major roadways flooded with invaders trying to board their vehicles.


The number of ways invaders from Islamic countries are wreaking havoc across Europe appears to be countless. Here’s one report among the daily barrage.

Over a year into the European migrant crisis, a lorry driver and a haulage union representative has warned that morale is at an “all time low” among truckers who are faced with the daily ordeal of navigating the daily chaos at Calais.

And what exactly is this “ordeal?” It is this: hordes of Muslim “refugee” invaders flood onto the roadway, blocking traffic and criss-crossing lanes as they attempt to enter trucks and buses in any manner possible. It looks like this.




As one trucker noted, “It is not a pleasant thing to be sitting in a cab with people running every which way.” He asked, “Do you think you could see the whites of another human’s eyes seconds before running into them? I don’t know if I could. I don’t know how it would affect me and I don’t want to find out.”

Increasing numbers of truckers are traumatized for fear of hitting an invader as drivers attempt to navigate this chaotic and dangerous scene. It is taking an emotional toll. As one trucker said: “All I want to do is come to work, do my bit and get home to my family safely with my sanity and pride. This is becoming more and more difficult as the days go by.”

And the truckers are put in an untenable position as they face not only the daily trauma of trying to do their job without killing someone, but face large fines if any invader makes it into the UK aboard one of their trucks. How, pray tell, any of these poor souls is supposed to protect against that is anyone’s guess. Are they supposed to get out of their truck and confront a mob of young men fresh from North Africa and other Islamic hellholes?

Meanwhile, this is occurring against the backdrop of invaders getting killed by freight trains that also run through this port area. And of course, no such backdrop would be complete without high drama reaction from the left, as useful idiots in the UK stage protests, replete with fake blood, in support of migrants and open borders. They have catchy slogans like this one: “No more borders, no more nations, no more racist deportations!”


Hey, y’all over there across the pond. If things keep going the way they are, you’ll get your wish. There will be no more United Kingdom or any other nation. Except one. It will be the Islamic Caliphate 24/7. Good luck with their “racist deportations,” because that is the least they will have in mind for you folks.

Hat tip: Breitbart, The Right Scoop


Carol Brown

Source: http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2015/10/muslim_migrant_chaos_in_calais.html

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

Sweden Close to Collapse - Ingrid Carlqvist



by Ingrid Carlqvist

  • If the wave of migrants keeps coming, in 10-15 years, Swedes will be a minority in their own country. That there is, in fact, an exchange of populations going on, should be clear in any sober assessment.
  • The final consequence of... Sweden's immigration policy is that the economy will collapse -- because who is going to pay for it all? And economic breakdowns, once they happen, always happen very fast." -- Lars Hedegaard.
  • In the last two weeks, more than 1,000 "unaccompanied refugee children" have arrived from Germany via ferry; more than half of them have now vanished and are listed as missing.
  • For the last few weeks, the central train station in Sweden's third largest city, Malmö, has been overrun with migrants; the volunteers that for the first few days showed up with food, water and clothes now seem to have lost interest.
  • It will not be long until the Swedes realize that the state will not look after them. The country that just 20 years ago was considered one of the safest and most affluent in the world, is now in danger of becoming a failed state.

Sweden is fast approaching a complete collapse. More and more municipalities are raising the alarm that if the migrants keep coming at this pace, the government can no longer guarantee normal service to its citizens. In addition, ominous statements from government officials have left Swedes in fear of what tomorrow may bring. If the migrant wave keeps coming, in 10-15 years, Swedes will be a minority in their own country.

At a press conference October 9, Prime Minister Stefan Löfven said that Sweden is in a state of crisis. However, when asked to clarify what he meant by this, Löfven was unable to produce a single coherent sentence.

Three ministers appeared by the Prime Minister's side at the hastily summoned press conference, which came on the heels of an extraordinary government meeting. The purpose of the press conference seems to have been to convey two messages:
  1. To explain to the world and the Swedish people that Sweden is facing "one of the largest humanitarian efforts in Swedish history."
  2. That there is no more housing available, and migrants should be prepared to live in tents.
During the question period after the ministers' speeches, journalist Tomas Ramberg of Ekot Public Radio asked: "You say that Sweden is preparing for a crisis situation, what do you mean by those dramatic words?"

Stefan Löfven's reply was incomprehensible:
"Yes, well first of all we, we are in the middle of what I mean seriously when I'm saying, when I express a, a big thank you to all the people doing such a great job, because it is a humanitarian effort, it's just as the Minister for Justice and Migration just said. What we are actually doing is that we are saving lives when people who come from bombs, from, from killing, from oppression, their lives are shattered. We, we help them and that is a, that is a great humanitarian effort, and of course now that we can see the number of people who need it, that are seeking protection, then it is one of the greatest humanitarian efforts. And that we are facing a crisis situation, that is in part why I, we are outlining today that we are also preparing for a situation where we may need to house people in tents, because we stand up with the humanitarian refugee policy, right of asylum, but we can now also see that we cannot close our eyes to the fact that there are more coming than ever in such a short time, and we need to provide a roof over their heads. Then it is -- other things may be required."
However, the fact that the government is now talking about housing migrants in tents, may be a signal that Sweden, despite everything, may not want to be on the front lines of the "humanitarian" battle anymore, after all. The prospect of spending an ice-cold Swedish winter in a tent may make migrants choose countries other than Sweden. If not, a complete collapse of the Swedish system is imminent.

In 2014, the Danish historian and social commentator Lars Hedegaard prophetically remarked in the book "Farliga ord"(Dangerous Words), that the economic breakdown of a nation always happens quickly and unexpectedly:
"If there is any lesson to be drawn from history, it is that what you do not think will happen, does. Time and again. The final consequence of the West and, above all, Sweden's immigration policy is that the economy will collapse -- because who is going to pay for it all? And economic breakdowns, once they happen, always happen very fast."

Right now, the Swedish government is borrowing money abroad to pay for immigration. But that amount is not enough. On October 8, the Swedish Association of Local Authorities and Regions (SKL) warned that municipalities need to increase the tax rate by 2%. The average municipal income tax is already 32%, on top of which many Swedes also pay a federal income tax. A 2% rise in the tax rate would mean 15,000 kronor ($1,825) more in taxes each year for the average household.

High-ranking politicians and officials are also saying the situation is extremely grim. On October 1, Minister for Home Affairs Anders Ygeman said that the current wave of immigrants will lead to "huge economic strains;" and a few days later Immigration Service Director General Anders Danielsson explained that "within the framework of the system we all know, we are now approaching the end of the road." Statements such as these have never been heard before in Sweden, especially in connection with the "sacred" issue of migration. Until now, Swedes have perpetually been told that we live in a rich country that has no problem handling all asylum seekers who want to come here.

Swedish Prime Minister Stefan Löfven (left) said last week that Sweden is in a state of crisis. Pictured at right, the results of rioting in a Stockholm suburb, December 2014.

In the shadow the 1.5 million migrants expected to arrive this year in Germany, the EU's largest country (population 81 million), migrants are also pouring into a rather smaller Sweden. Geographically Sweden is large, but consists mainly of forests and wilderness, and fewer than 10 million people live in the country. Until 2010, Sweden took in about 25,000 migrants a year. However, in 2010, then Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt made a deal with pro-immigration Green Party, (Miljöpartiet) -- by his own admission to punish voters for allowing the anti-mass-immigration Sweden Democrats party (Sverigedemokraterna) into parliament.

Reinfeldt's deal opened the immigration floodgates. In 2014, 81,000 people sought asylum in Sweden; and 33,500 were granted asylum. However, as many of the immigrants subsequently brought over their relatives, that figure substantially increased. Last year, 110,000 people were granted residency status in Sweden. One should add to this figure an unknown number of illegal aliens.

There is now talk of 180,000 asylum seekers coming to Sweden in 2015. That number is more than twice as many as the year before. If half of them are granted asylum, and they each bring over three relatives, we are talking about 270,000 new immigrants to Sweden -- within one year. Over 8000 people arrived just last week, 1,716 of whom were so-called "unaccompanied refugee children."

Swedes who only follow the mainstream media get the impression that all the migrants arriving are war refugees from Syria, but the number of Syrians is actually less than half of the total: 2,864 people last week claimed to be from Syria. 1,861 claimed to be from Iraq, and 1,820 from Afghanistan. Clearly, many people from countries that are not at war are taking their chances and applying for asylum in Sweden; but this is something about which the mainstream media does not see fit to inform its followers.

That there is an exchange of populations going on, should be clear in any sober assessment. The Swedish economist Tino Sanandaji (of Iranian-Kurdish descent, and therefore tougher than most Swedes, who, if they criticize the immigration policy, are immediately accused of racism) writes on his blog that Swedes could soon be in the minority in their own country:
"1,000-1,500 asylum seekers a day for 15 years equals 5.5 to 8.2 million asylum seekers. At the end of 2014, the Statistical Central Bureau, SCB, calculated that 21.5% of the Swedish population were of foreign descent: 2.1 million, out of 9.7 million. The number of people of Swedish descent -- born in Sweden with two parents born in Sweden -- has been stable at about 7.7 million and is expected to remain stable or increase slightly due to birth surplus. If those of foreign descent increase their number by about 5.6 million, they will become the majority."
One of the municipalities that has been flooded with migrants is Trelleborg (population 43,000), located on Sweden's southernmost coast. Over 100 "unaccompanied refugee children" arrive from Germany via ferry on a typical day. During the last two weeks, more than 1000 such youths have been registered; more than half of them have now vanished and are listed as missing. No one knows why, or where they have gone. Add to this 13,000 adult asylum seekers.

Impromptu temporary lodgings have been created in sports centers, ice rinks, and at the Sturup airport hotel, to name a few.

Trelleborg has written a desperate letter of appeal for help to the government, just as, a few weeks ago, the Örkelljunga municipality did in vain. The mayor and the Municipal Director of Trelleborg, who signed the letter on October 1, wrote:
"In the past, many asylum seekers have taken the route through Denmark to Malmö, but this changed about two weeks ago. From September 10 until the morning of October 1, 14,100 asylum seekers arrived in Trelleborg by ferry. There is no indication that the pace is slowing; if anything it is continuously increasing. On Tuesday, September 22, Trelleborg received word from the Immigration Service that the municipality where children and young people arrive is by law the authority that is required to provide housing, care and living expenses, until such time as the Immigration Service decides upon a designated municipality. ... Trelleborg has quickly ended up in a situation where the regular services to the community are at great risk of being affected. ... By writing this letter, we would like to bring to your attention the enormous strain we now find ourselves under."
Apparently, the Minister for Justice and Migration, Morgan Johansson, has since been in contact with Trelleborg's mayor via telephone to discuss possible solutions. On October 9, the Immigration Service decided that Trelleborg should be exempt as a designated municipality for unaccompanied children. However, it is unclear how this will alleviate Trelleborg's plight as far as the new arrivals go. The only concrete help so far has come from some of the neighboring municipalities, who have opened up facilities to house some of the Trelleborg migrants.

Malmö, about 18 miles from Trelleborg, is also in dire straits. For the last few weeks, the central train station in Sweden's third largest city has been overrun with migrants, and the volunteers that showed up for the first few days with food, water and clothes now seem to have lost interest. The daily Sydsvenska Dagbladet summed up the desperate situation in Malmö, where even the city's empty jail was considered (and rejected) as possible housing for refugee children. It now looks more like a possibility for adult refugees.

The Social Democratic mayor of Filipstad, Per Gruvberger, also recently raised the alarm that his municipality of 6,000 people will not be able to provide schooling and childcare for the 1,100 asylum seekers now assigned to his municipality.

The reply of the Minister for Justice and Migration, Morgan Johansson, to this cry for help was: "If need be, Filipstad will just have to expand its operations."

This insensitive statement from Johansson caused the Mayor of neighboring Årjäng, Daniel Schützer, to go ballistic. He wrote about his fellow party member on Facebook:
"Pardon my French, but Morgan Johansson is totally f---ing stupid. 'Expand,' he says. It is not f---ing bricks and planks that we are lacking, it is teachers!!!!"
The Immigration Service, which is tasked with reviewing the asylum seekers' reasons for immigrating, is understandably swamped with work. Even before the latest "refugee crisis" -- and despite 1,200 new employees being hired last year -- its staff is struggling. The employees' union is now raising the alarm, concerning more and more incidents of violence, vandalism and suicide attempts -- this year (up to August), 1,021 such incidents were reported.

"The work situation for the entire authority is very strained. The pressure is enormous. The work environment has deteriorated severely," said Sanna Norblad, local chairperson of the ST union, to daily Norrköpings Tidningar.

While all this plays out, large portions of the Swedish people watch in horror from the sidelines and wonder when the unavoidable collapse will occur. At the same time, a surprisingly large portion of the citizenry still overconfidently believe that "Daddy State" will make everything all right. This a very Swedish view, like the wishes of children, that Peter Santesson, head of polling institute Demoskop, wrote about on the website Dagens Opinion. Santesson states that the Swedes have an unusually high level of trust in the social order, and that they are convinced that "somewhere higher up, there is always someone smarter and more informed, taking responsibility and making sure everything works." If the government officials turn out to be incapable of handling the refugee chaos they themselves have created, it could be disastrous. Santesson continues,
"Responsible decision makers need to ponder the trust the people have now bestowed on them, and they need to handle this trust with care in this difficult crisis. If the people's confidence is betrayed by them turning out not to be able to handle the situation – if 'Sweden' turns out to be insufficient as a miracle cure and the crisis becomes too much to handle -- the outcome could be political and social consequences reaching far beyond the issue of immigration."
The blogger Johan Westerholm, a Social Democrat who is critical of the government, points out in an October 7 titled "System infarction in the Immigration System," that in addition to those who are already in Sweden, we need to add those who are not granted asylum in Norway and Finland, and will therefore be sent back to the last country they were in -- Sweden. Considering that Finland rejects 60% of asylum applications, it is fair to assume that during the coming weeks, the chaos will only escalate.

Westerholm writes that the situation in Malmö is "out of control," and states that we do not have any idea who those arriving in Sweden are:
"A very large group of administrators [at the Immigration Service] do not even know the designated terror organizations, and then there are the sympathizers -- people who, on principal, would never file a report to the Immigration Service security department, for ideological reasons. A large group consists of those who are scared into silence. In an organization characterized by fear and stress, to do nothing is a surefire way to keep your job. If a report of suspicion is filed anyway, typically nothing happens. If the life and health of the terrorist is threatened, as is often the situation, the person gets to stay. Initially he is given a temporary residence permit, but in practice, this turns out to be permanent."
The 152 asylum seekers reported to the Security Service so far this year as possible threats to national security, are thus most likely just the tip of the iceberg.

The Swedes who have already lost faith in the authorities and the politicians are now preparing for the unthinkable -- that their once so secure society is about to collapse. On the website 72timmar.se, the Civil Contingencies Agency informs the public on "our five most basic needs: Water, food, heat, sleep and security." The readers are told to keep water and canned goods at home, and make sure they can stay warm.

"Prepping" is becoming more common in Sweden. Last summer, the daily Svenska Dagbladet ran a story on the first Swedish online store for preppers, and that interest was huge. According to the polling institute Sifo, until recently, seven out of ten Swedes have been completely unprepared for a crisis that knocks out the power supply and thereby the infrastructure. The owner of the online store, Fredrik Qvarnström, told the paper that, in his estimation, the Swedes are the worlds most poorly prepared for a crisis:
"There is lot of talk about the greenhouse effect and economic crisis. People seem to be aware that there are problems, but I do not think they know how vulnerable we really are. We rely on the state to take care of us, as it has in the past."
It will not be long until the Swedes realize that the state will not look after them. The country that just 20 years ago was considered one of the safest and most affluent in the world, is now in danger of becoming a failed state.
 
 
Ingrid Carlqvist is a journalist based in Sweden, and a Distinguished Senior Fellow of Gatestone Institute.
  • Follow Ingrid Carlqvist on Twitter

Source: http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/6697/sweden-collapse

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.