I had a conversation this morning with a confidential European source and keen observer of the Turkish scene. Some of his astute observations were covered in the January NER, article, “Could the Crisis in Turkey Impact US Policy in the Middle East?” It was prompted by a Gatestone Institute article, published today, “Where is Turkey Going?” by Veli Sirin, who […]
Dr. Ronen Bergman, intelligence and military columnist for Israeli daily Yediot Ahronoth confirmed, Wall Street Journal reports that Syria and Iran’s Qod’s Force may have successfully disassembled and transferred to Hezbollah 12 Russian Yakhont anti- ship cruise missiles. See New York Times article, “Hezbollah Moving Long-Range Missiles From Syria to Lebanon, an Analyst Says”. This despite the IAF five attacks conducted against Syria […]
Want to know what it is like to live as a non-Muslim woman under Islamic gender apartheid? Dr. Phyllis Chesler, noted feminist author and defender of universal women’s rights, experienced sharia first hand during a brief marriage to an Afghan Muslim husband and troubled sojourn in Kabul, Afghanistan. During this time she was a virtual prisoner […]
In December 2003 we organized a summit with noted counter-Jihadists at a private university club in Manhattan. We were endeavoring to develop a concerted campaign in America to warn about the threat of Qur’anic doctrine and sharia to Constitutional guarantees of free expression, liberty and freedom. We had assembled notable figures from both academic and […]
Since December 17, 2013, police in Ankara, Istanbul and other cities in Turkey have arrested more than 52 persons in a wide-ranging corruption probe. Those arrested include some prominent persons and sons of AKP cabinet ministers on charges of bribery, illicit gold trading and payoffs on tenders for construction deals. The state-run Andalou News Agency cited the range of arrests […]
The Wall Street Journal weekend edition had an article by former Ha’aretz editor Adi Schwartz, “Israel’s Christian Awakening” discussing the grassroots movement led by a Greek Orthodox Priest, Fr. Gabriel Naddaf, a charismatic former spokesperson for the Greek Orthodox Patriarch in Jerusalem. He hails from the village of Yaffia, located between Migdal Ha’emek and Nazareth. Nazareth, with its Church of […]
The revelations of duplicity in the Turkish corruption investigations have apparently reached Premier Erdogan and his family. Could these unraveling developments destabilize relations with the Obama Administration over both Iran and Syria? Yesterday, we posted on the Turkish gas for gold scheme with Iran. The boxes of funds uncovered by Turkish prosecutors at the state-owned Halkbank resulted […]
Yesterday’s New York Times Business Day Section had a major article reporting on Shariah Compliant Finance, “Islamic Banks, Stuffed with Cash, Explore Partnerships in West.” In late October 2013, we posted on the Iconoclast about cheerleading that UK Prime Minister David Cameron gave at the London meetings of the World Islamic Economic Forum extolling the virtues of making the City, “the […]
In our Iconoclast post on Harold Rhode’s speculations regarding a possible alliance of convenience between the Gulenists and Secularists that might topple Premier Erdogan, he drew attention to the illicit gold trading conducted by the state-owned Halkbank. Suleyman Aslan, the head of Halkbank at the center of the illicit gold trading had been prominent among the 52 arrested in […]
Harold Rhode, former Pentagon Islamic Affairs and expert on Turkey has a provocative Gatestone Institute analysis. Could Premier Recep Tayyip Erdogan fall from power amidst the current corruption controversy in Turkey, “Are Erdogan’s Days Numbered”? We published an interview with Dr. Rhode in the December NER concerning his role as the Savior of the Iraqi Jewish archives in […]
In response to the introduction of the bipartisan Nuclear Weapons Free Iran Act of 2013 last Thursday in the US Senate co-sponsored by 26 Senators, see our Iconoclast post here, the Iranian government struck back. Press TV filed a story Wednesday that 100 MPs in the Majlis, the Iranian Parliament, signed legislation to accelerate enrichment and completion of construction of […]
After a powerful devastating suicide bombing that tore apart a police station in Mansoura, Egypt on Tuesday Egypt’s interim government Wednesday declared the Muslim Brotherhood (MB), a terrorist organization. An Al Qaeda affiliated group that claimed responsibility for the Mansoura bombing suggested further retribution would befall Egyptian military who did not desert. The MB has […]
Questions on the integrity of Boston Jewish communal groups, the regional office of the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), Combined Jewish Philanthropies (CJP) and its affiliate, the Jewish Community Relations Council (JCRC) were raised in a Boston Jewish newspaper report released this week. The investigation was prompted by a raging dispute with Americans for Peace and Tolerance (APT) over the Newton, Massachusetts […]
When I opened David Hornik’s FrontPage Magazine article, “Ari Shavit’s ‘Doomed’ Israel”, I felt compelled to answer him, as he had not read Shavit’s New York Times “best seller”, My Promised Land: The Triumph and Tragedy of Israel. Shavit’s book is the Winner of the Natan Book Award. On the reverse of the jacket are blurbs extolling his personalized view […]
The corruption probe in Turkey pitting two former Islamist allies, the Gulen Movement (GM) versus the inner circle of the AKP party of Premier Erdogan, has roiled the Middle East country and its economy. Premier Erdogan suggested that an international plot was behind the alleged corruption probe, saying at a rally in Samsun, Turkey, “an ill-intentioned move […]