Has Iran Developed Nuclear Weapons in North Korea?

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During his State of the Union Address on January 28th, President Obama told a joint Session of Congress he saw no need for strengthened standby sanction authorities against Iran in pending legislation, the Nuclear Weapons Free Iran Act (NWFIA), S-1881. Instead he suggested that pursuit of the diplomatic process under the P5+1 agreement and Joint Plan of Action offered the best hope of avoiding a military action.

Last week, Undersecretary of State Wendy Sherman testified in a hearing on the interim deal that went into effect on January 20th. At one point in her testimony, Sherman said, “that if Iran can’t get the bomb then its ballistic missiles would be irrelevant.” The Capitol Hill hearing was held by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, chaired by a very skeptical Sen. Robert Menendez (D-NJ) co-sponsor of NWFIA. The Committee heard findings from an IMF report that the granting of sanctions relief under the interim deal would virtually eliminate the 2% drop in gross domestic product experienced by Iran’s economy during 2013. This would wipe out the sanctions’ economic impact reducing the country’s crushing hyper-inflation rate from over 47% to 20%. The Wall Street Journal report on Iran’s improving economy noted these comments on the IMF report by critics of the Administrations sanctions relief during the Senate hearing:

“Regrettably, the administration and its allies may be miscalculating,” Mark Dubowitz, the head of the Washington think tank, Foundation for Defense of Democracies, told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. “If Iran’s economy recovers, the pressure on Iran’s leaders to follow through on a nuclear deal lessens.”

Illinois Sen. Mark Kirk, a Republican, said the IMF report comes after he and others in Congress warned the White House “that providing sanctions relief before dismantling Iran’s illicit nuclear infrastructure would be a serious foreign policy blunder.”

The Obama White House issued a warning to American owned firms not to engage in violation of existing sanctions. President Obama said, “We will come down on them like a ton of bricks.”

This was in the face of Iran’s President and Foreign Minister issuing statements that there would be no dismantling of Iran’s nuclear program facilities or stoppage of work on the Arak plutonium reactor thus throwing into question whether a final  P5+1 agreement might even be possible.

When the P5+1 negotiations with Iran reconvened on February 18th in Vienna, Senior American officials raised the issue of Iran’s Ballistic Missiles. That was prompted by an Iranian test of a missile with sufficient range (900 miles) to reach Israel and US assets. Further there was intelligence alleging that Iran was working on fitting a warhead to a Shahab-3 missile. The Wall Street Journal, reported on February 20th, how Iran had successfully excluded missiles from the final agreement negotiations despite U.S. objections:

“Nothing except Iran’s nuclear activities will be discussed in the talks with the P5+1, and we have agreed on it,” [Iran’s Foreign Minister Javad] Zarif told reporters.

Other Iranian officials have said in recent days that Tehran’s missile program is a “red line” and nonnegotiable.

Senior U.S. officials, however, said Thursday that Tehran’s ballistic missile program—which the U.N. fears is being developed to deliver nuclear warheads—would be included in the coming negotiations.

The Freedman Report Revelations

What if Iran already had more than a dozen nuclear bombs and successfully tested a device deep underground? Moreover, what if that information had been shared with Secretary John Kerry, who chose not to disclose it to the other members of the P5+1 delegation? Kerry publicly sought the support of China while endeavoring to halt North Korea’s nuclear program, as China supplies the hermit kingdom’s fuel and international banking services. Arriving in China for talks with the country’s leadership on February 13th, Kerry said:

Our belief is that China can do more now to urge North Korea to begin taking action to come into compliance with its international obligations. And I will encourage China to use all of the means at its disposal to do so. Now I want to make it clear: China has responded.

Note the similar effort that failed when current Undersecretary of State Sherman led Clinton Administration efforts. But international efforts are further confounded by the lack of access to the regime of President Kim Jong Un. Meanwhile North Korea has rebuilt its nuclear facilities. The same Voice of America news report quoted American Enterprise Institute analyst Michael Auslin on how dangerous the situation is:

We understand less about what’s going on in Kim Jong Un’s North Korea than we did with Kim Jong Il’s North Korea. And that’s something to be worried about. And from every indication we have, things are getting more uncertain and capricious there.

Given China’s rising hegemony over the South China Sea, what leverage would the US have in prodding it to convince North Korea? To make matters worse, the UN nuclear watchdog agency, the IAEA has no access to North Korean nuclear facilities. These developments corroborate the assessment of private intelligence and national security analyst Ilana Freedman. See The Freedman Report on Januay31st, “A Friendlier Iran? Or Have They Just Moved Their Nukes to North Korea?” We were prompted to interview Freedman following a discussion of this report during a security conference call. In her published report Freedman cited the following:

According to my sources, Iran began moving its bomb manufacturing operations from Iran to North Korea in December 2012. Two facilities near Nyongbyon in North Pyongan province, some 50 miles north of Pyongyang, have become a new center for Iran’s nuclear arms program.

Over the last year, Iran has been secretly supplying raw materials to the reactor at Nyongbyon for the production of plutonium. At a second facility, located about fifteen miles north and with a code name that translates to ‘Thunder God Mountain’, nuclear warheads are being assembled and integrated with MIRV platforms. MIRVs are offensive ballistic missile systems that can support multiple warheads, each of which can be aimed at an independent target, but are all launched by a single booster rocket. Approximately 250-300 Iranian scientists are now reported to be in North Korea, along with a small cadre of IRGC personnel to provide for their security.

According to the reports, the Iranian-North Korean collaboration has already produced the first batch of fourteen nuclear warheads. A dedicated fleet of Iranian cargo aircraft, a combination of 747′s and Antonov heavy-lifters, which has been ferrying personnel and materials back and forth between Iran and North Korea, is in place to bring the assembled warheads back to Iran.

As to where North Korea might have obtained the feedstock for cooperative development of nuclear devices with Iran, Freedman commented in an email, “going way back, the original feedstock was provided to the North Koreans by the infamous AQ Khan. Then Bill Clinton’s administration provided North Korea with two 1,000-megawatt light-water nuclear power reactors. The U.S.-North Korean Agreed Framework was supposed to keep North Korea from producing bomb grade material in their reactor, but, of course, it did not.”

Those findings were followed a few days later with details on the test of a uranium bomb that may have been detected in mid-January 2014 by seismic services of both the South Korean Defense Ministry and the Japanese Self Defense Forces. According Freedman report:

1)    The region in which the blast site is located is extremely mountainous and unpopulated, and the area was selected because the readings taken by North Korean engineers indicated that the sub-strata of the rock has a unique feature that dampens seismic vibrations, making such a test difficult to detect. A low gamma yield weapon was used so that, when detonated at that depth, there would not be much more than background radiation on the surface.

2)    The blast site was specially constructed over an eighteen month period in an isolated North Korean Special Forces training facility, approximately 30 miles southeast of the reactor. North Koreans took 18 months to construct the site, since they only worked when they knew US satellites would not be overhead. The site was built with the forced labor of 2,500 prisoners, who were housed in existing barracks on the Special Forces training base. The original report indicated this was an underground storage area or Command Bunker.

3)    The test chamber was constructed 1/2 mile underground, by digging a lateral mine shaft on the bottom of a valley. The blast chamber itself was 500 x 500 feet. Once the weapon was in position, a 400 foot long concrete plug was built into the entrance to the chamber and positioned 400 feet into the shaft, effectively sealing the tunnel. Venting tunnels were dug from the blast chamber to distribute the force of the blast laterally, in order to minimize any deformity to the surface that could be observed by comparative satellite imagery.

Despite these elaborate precautions, according to Freedman’s sources, both South Korean and Japanese seismic monitors picked up an earthquake with a 4.2 Richter scale rating on January 16, 2014, just four days before the P5+1 Joint Plan of Action went into effect.

An American, Freedman honed her skills as a business intelligence expert in Israel over a period of 16 years.  That experience allowed her to build an open source national security intelligence information network as well as develop an analytical system for evaluation of large amounts of raw unstructured data from multiple sources. Freedman has provided intelligence and security intelligence analysis for law enforcement and corporate clients, to further their security programs, and to protect their intellectual property, operations, assets, and personnel. Through her global network of several hundred associates around the world, she has been responsible for the inter­cession of at least one mass casualty event, and has helped clients secure their facilities and develop security protocols in high risk environments.

Between 1990 and 2009, as CEO of Gerard Group International, Freedman developed a global network of over 400 specialists and field assets that continues to provide an ongoing resource of essential real-time intelligence and domain expertise. She now works as a private consultant in counter-terrorism intelligence analysis, basing her analysis on open source and proprietary information resources.

In the course of the post-9/11 shift to national security analysis, as CEO of Gerard Group International, she expanded her credible network of information sources and analysts to assist in the evaluation of both confirmed and unconfirmed information.

2007 IAF Operation Orchard Al-Kabir Syrian Reactor. Source: Der Spiegel

Evidence of North Korea Nuclear Cooperation

Freedman began tracking the Iran-North Korea collaboration in 2006, when her sources began providing information about the presence of North Korean scientists in Iran. We noted that David P. Goldman, whose columns appear regularly in the Asia Times and PJ Media, had also raised the question in a March 2012 report. He questioned whether a nuclear test in 2010 by North Korea had really been done for Iran; Did Iran Test a Nuclear Bomb in North Korea in 2010? Goldman noted:

The Sunday morning edition of Germany’s Die Welt reports that Western intelligence agencies detected two nuclear weapons tests in North Korea in 2010, and that one or both of them might have been conducted for Iran. Die Welt sets the reported nuclear tests in the context of new documentation showing that the Iranian regime began its drive for nuclear weapons as early as 1984, under the direct orders of the late Ayatollah Khomeini. The author is the respected German analyst Hans Rühle, whose evaluation of Israel’s capacity to cripple the Iranian nuclear program created a stir last month.

During our interview with Freedman, we pointed out that still photos of North Korean and Iranian nuclear scientists were surreptitiously taken by agents deployed by Israel’s Mossad as part of the preparation for Operation Orchard against what was purported to be a Syrian nuclear plant by the IAF in September 2007. Before and after photographs of that facility were also part of Freedman’s file on the growing relationship between Iran and North Korea, whose influence was clearly evident in the construction design. That raid destroyed the Al Kabir nuclear reactor on the banks of the Euphrates River. The Pentagon went public about these disclosures, while Israel has only referenced the operation. Syria’s Assad has maintained silence about the raid’s apparent success. Watch this CIA video briefing presented to Congress revealing the extent of North Korean technical cooperation in design and construction of a plutonium producing reactor at Al-Kabir in Syria.  This evidence from the Operation Orchard IAF raid may be a precedent for the alleged joint Iran North Korean nuclear development project at Nyongbyon.

Alleged Paraguana IRGC Missile base site in Venezuela. Source: Google Earth.

Development of MIRV Warheads and Iranian Ballistic Missiles

Freedman notes that while Iran may have MIRV warheads, it may not have the lofting capabilities to mount them on missiles based on North Korean technology. According to Freedman, Iran will be testing a new missile within four-six months that will be capable of carrying the MIRV platform. While earlier rumors suggested that they were having trouble with cracks that were appearing in the new engines, Freedman’s sources report that they have now solved that problem. Because the North Koreans have learned the hard way to carry out exhaustive testing before rolling their new missile out to the launch site, precise estimates of when the rockets will be unveiled are at best imprecise. However, Freedman’s sources estimate that the new rockets will be fully operational in no later than 18 months.

It is alleged that a company owned by the IRGC is currently building a missile base on the Paraguaná peninsula in Venezuela. We noted in an Iconoclast November 2013 post:

Alleged development of Iranian rocket bases in Venezuela on the Paraguaná peninsula by construction companies controlled by Iranian Revolutionary Guards was reported in 2011 by Die Welt and the Jerusalem Post  from Western security sources. These were disputed by both Venezuela and the US, according to a subsequent CNN report.

That may explain the report in the Washington Free Beacon by Bill Gertz of the visit to North Korea by Iranian missile technicians in November 2013 seeking assistance with large booster rockets for the latter’s ICBM and Satellite program, “Iran, North Korea Secretly Developing New Long-Range Rocket Booster for ICBMs.” Gertz noted:

Several groups of technicians from the Shahid Hemmat Industrial Group (SHIG), a unit in charge of building Iran’s liquid-fueled missiles, traveled to Pyongyang during the past several months, including as recently as late October, to work on the new, 80-ton rocket booster being developed by the North Koreans, according to officials familiar with intelligence reports.

The booster is believed by U.S. intelligence agencies to be intended for a new long-range missile or space launch vehicle that could be used to carry nuclear warheads, and could be exported to Iran in the future.

Recent U.S. intelligence assessments have said that both North Korea and Iran are expected to have missiles capable of hitting the United States with a nuclear warhead in the next two years.

The Iranian EMP Threat

Freedman’s initial concerns about Iran’s nuclear missile program capabilities grew with information in 2009 that the Russian had developed a launch-ready missile in a container system known as Club-K, which had already reportedly been purchased by Iran. It could be launched from a commercial container vessel off any US coast or on land from a tractor trailer.  Witness the ship borne vertical launch of modified Scud B rockets that have been conducted in the Caspian Sea by Iran since 2008. This has concerned Freedman and former White House science advisor William Graham about possible use of Iranian nuclear bombs in EMP threats to the US.

An Iranian naval flotilla is currently on its way which could project such a possible threat. CNN noted that Press TV reported in January that the frigate Sabalan and the supply ship Kharg, which also carries helicopters, were headed to the Atlantic, “to provide the safety of Iran’s shipping lines in international waters and to provide training for the new recruits.” Anthony Cordesman of the Washington, DC-based Center for Strategic and International Studies dismissed this Iranian effort saying:

What this does is, to people who don’t know anything about sea power, which is a fairly substantial number of people in the developing world, it looks like a major gesture, Within Iran’s sort of politics, it follows a long theme of Republican Guard and other statements that Iran can defeat the United States.

Peter Pry, former Congressional EMP task Force head commented in a recent Washington Examiner article:

Yes, patrols by the Iranian Navy off our coasts could pose threat of a surprise EMP attack. Pry, with others such as former CIA Director R. James Woolsey, has convinced several state legislatures to take moves to harden their electric and energy grids from EMP attack because Washington won’t.

Pry, president of EMPACT America, revealed that Iran recently purchased Russia’s Club-K missile launcher, which can be hidden in tractor-trailer-sized cargo boxes.

Mobile Shahab-3 Missile, 2000 KM Range.

Selji-2 Missile, 2600 KM Range.

North Korean Bm-25 Missile, 3500 KM Range.

Iranian ICBM Threat

We noted in a recent Iconoclast/ Counter Jihad Report post, “Could Iranian Missiles Reach Florida by 2015?”, comments by Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu’s spokesperson Mark Regev and Israeli Brig Gen. (ret.) Michael Herzog about Iran’s missile developments. As noted in a Jewish Press article by Lori Lowenthal Marcus, Regev commented during a CNN interview:

I mean, the Iranians are building intercontinental ballistic missiles. They’re not building them for us; they’ve already got missiles that can reach Israel. They’re building them for you! For targets in North America and Western Europe. It’s crucial that we don’t allow them to get nuclear weapons.

Herzog referred to the status of Iranian development of nuclear warheads and simulation tests of nuclear triggers at the Parchin facility in Iran. He cited three missiles in the Iranian inventory, the liquid fueledShahab 3, the solid fuel Selji-2 and North Korean-supplied MB-25 solid fuel ICBMs, – many in reinforced silos in Iran. They have  ranges from 2,200 to 3,500 kilometers covering all of the Middle East and virtually many major capitals of Europe – London, Paris, Berlin.

In October 2013, Reuters reported Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu saying that American Intelligence knew that Iran may have under development missiles capable of eventually hitting the US. Netanyahu was probably basing that assessment on a July 2013 Defense Intelligence Agency report, entitled Ballistic and Cruise Missile Threat 2013. The joint intelligence report predicted that “Iran could develop and test an ICBM capable of reaching the United States by 2015.” An assessment that the London–based International Institute for Security Studies called, “a distant prospect.”

MANPAD from the Qaddafy arsenal

Rogue MANPAD Threat to Commercial Aviation

There are more pressing Iranian and possible Hezbollah threats involving the use of rogue MANPADS to attack civilian airliners in commercial air lanes over international waters. A 2012 Defense News report pointed out more than 20,000 MANPADS went missing after the fall of the late Libyan dictator Gaddafi from his arsenals. Less than 5,000 of those have been recovered. Some of those have been interdicted in transit across Egypt destined for Hamas in Gaza and Salafist and Al Qaeda affiliates in the Sinai.

An  ex-CIA covert operations officer, who goes by the nom de guerre “Beowulf,” considers a MANPAD attack on vulnerable US and foreign airlines a plausible scenario in the near term.  As Freedman commented, “only Israel’s national airline EL AL has fully equipped its fleet” with pods capable of deflecting infrared MANPADS. The motivation for Israeli air carriers El Al and Arkia to do that was the November 2002 “near miss” attack by al Qaeda terrorists using a MANPAD at Mombasa airport against a chartered Boeing 757 jet carrying over 261 Israeli passengers on holiday. Freedman observes that Israel is particularly vulnerable to MANPAD attack, as its primary airport is only kilometers away from the disputed West Bank, from where many of the attacks against Israel emanate. She has participated in such a MANPAD threat scenario with DHS, the Coast Guard, FBI, TSA and other national security agencies. She considers “MANPADs to be a very serious threat here in the US, as well as in the Middle East.”

Dr. Rachel Ehrenfeld in a U.S. Aviation and Space Technology Weekly article in February 2014 discussed the MANPAD threat. She pointed out that while the US has spent hundreds of millions on development of a counter-measure, Israeli defense systems company Elbit Systems, Ltd. has successfully developed and installed the light weight Multi-Spectral Infrared Countermeasure system (MUSIC)  for both aircraft and helicopters. Ehrenfeld asked why the American commercial aviation industry has resisted adopting what Israel’s El Al has done to protect its air fleet and passengers:

Despite the alarming spread of MANPADS, U.S. aviation security experts argue that the threat to America’s civil aviation fleet posed by MANPADS is minimal. They say the cost of equipping passenger aircraft with MANPAD countermeasure devices–estimated at $43 billion–is prohibitive and unjustified. However, if a single missile found its way to Hezbollah operatives in Mexico and was then smuggled into the U.S. and fired at any of the 7,000 aircraft comprising the U.S. civilian fleet, the struggling U.S. economy would be devastated in a flash. This time, U.S. government officials and airline executives could not claim they were unaware of the threat. This time, they would be held responsible for hundreds of deaths.

Conclusion

If Freedman’s prediction of development of a MIRV warhead fitted on an Iranian/North Korean ICBM with large boosters within the next four to six months is correct, then a plausible nuclear capability for Iran may already exist. Moreover, as Iran has recently purchased a Russian Club-K container missile launcher this raises concerns over a possible EMP threat as well. If both cases are ultimately confirmed by secret intelligence, then who will be able to stop that dangerous development taking place in North Korea’s hermit Kingdom? Who is best able to counter these threats in both Iran and North Korea? Then there is the exposure of America’s commercial air fleet to MANPAD’s from Iran and its proxy, Hezbollah. Stay tuned for developments.

EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared in the New English Review.

Independence Day: Why we fight

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I have posted the substance of this year after year, and wasn’t even going to bother this year, with so many Americans so eager to throw their freedom away with both hands, but I decided to do so after all when I saw this cynical tweet from Harris Zafar, who has been unmasked more than once as an opponent of the freedom of speech, as well as a deeply dishonest dissembler about the global jihad. I will not stand by silently as the forces of deception and hatred appropriate America’s foundational principles and pretend that those principles are in accord with their sinister agenda. So here again is why we fight:

Another Independence Day is upon us, and it always bears repeating that the struggle for freedom has not changed, and will not change. It is the eternal struggle over whether human beings will live free, or willingly submit to slavery.

I see slaves seeking slavery, and slaves defending slavery, all over the world today. As those who are standing against tyranny are increasingly branded as “enemies of the people,” demonized, and marginalized, the avoidance of slavery will be harder than ever, and not coming solely from jihad. Nonetheless, the enablers of one are the enablers of the other. I see people defending oppressors and carrying water for bullies and tyrants, and thinking all the while that they’re serving the cause of freedom.

In reality, this is what it is all about. You are either fighting for one thing, or the other. It is always useful to check one’s daily efforts against this, for if you’re not working to advance the cause of one side of this comparison, you’re working to advance the other.

1. Governments deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.

What we must defend:

“That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed…” — Declaration of Independence

What we must defend it against:

Non-Muslims have “absolutely no right to seize the reins of power in any part of God’s earth nor to direct the collective affairs of human beings according to their own misconceived doctrines.” If they do, “the believers would be under an obligation to do their utmost to dislodge them from political power and to make them live in subservience to the Islamic way of life.” — Syed Abul Ala Maududi, founder of the Pakistani political party Jamaat-e-Islami

2. Equality of rights before the law.

What we must defend:

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” — Declaration of Independence

What we must defend it against:

“The indemnity for the death or injury of a woman is one-half the indemnity paid for a man. The indemnity paid for a Jew or Christian is one-third the indemnity paid for a Muslim. The indemnity paid for a Zoroastrian is one-fifteenth that of a Muslim.” —‘Umdat al-Salik, o4.9

“Thus if [a] Muslim commits adultery his punishment is 100 lashes, the shaving of his head, and one year of banishment. But if the man is not a Muslim and commits adultery with a Muslim woman his penalty is execution. … Similarly if a Muslim deliberately murders another Muslim he falls under the law of retaliation and must by law be put to death by the next of kin. But if a non-Muslim who dies at the hand of a Muslim has by lifelong habit been a non-Muslim, the penalty of death is not valid. Instead the Muslim murderer must pay a fine and be punished with the lash. … Since Islam regards non-Muslims as on a lower level of belief and conviction, if a Muslim kills a non-Muslim, then his punishment must not be the retaliatory death, since the faith and conviction he possesses is loftier than that of the man slain…Again, the penalties of a non-Muslim guilty of fornication with a Muslim woman are augmented because, in addition to the crime against morality, social duty and religion, he has committed sacrilege, in that he has disgraced a Muslim and thereby cast scorn upon the Muslims in general, and so must be executed. … Islam and its peoples must be above the infidels, and never permit non-Muslims to acquire lordship over them.” — Sultanhussein Tabandeh, A Muslim Commentary on the Universal Declaration of Human Rights

3. Freedom of speech

What we must defend:

“Congress shall make no law…abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press…” — First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution

What we must defend it against:

“In confronting the Danish cartoons and the Dutch film ‘Fitna’, we sent a clear message to the West regarding the red lines that should not be crossed. As we speak, the official West and its public opinion are all now well-aware of the sensitivities of these issues. They have also started to look seriously into the question of freedom of expression from the perspective of its inherent responsibility, which should not be overlooked.” — Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu, secretary general of the 57-nation Organization of the Islamic Conference

“Pakistan will ask the European Union countries to amend laws regarding freedom of expression in order to prevent offensive incidents such as the printing of blasphemous caricatures of Prophet Muhammad (Peace Be Upon Him) and the production of an anti-Islam film by a Dutch legislator…” — Daily Times, June 8, 2008

4. Freedom of religion, and non-establishment of religion

What we must defend:

“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof…” — First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution

What we must defend it against:

“Islam isn’t in America to be equal to any other faith, but to become dominant. The Koran should be the highest authority in America, and Islam the only accepted religion on Earth.” — CAIR co-founder and longtime board chairman Omar Ahmad (he denies saying it, but the original reporter stands by her story)

“I wouldn’t want to create the impression that I wouldn’t like the government of the United States to be Islamic sometime in the future.” — CAIR’s Ibrahim Hooper

The Muslim Brotherhood “must understand that their work in America is a kind of grand Jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within and ‘sabotaging’ its miserable house by their hands and the hands of the believers so that it is eliminated and Allah’s religion is made victorious over all other religions.” — Mohamed Akram, “An Explanatory Memorandum on the General Strategic Goal for the Group in North America,” May 22, 1991

Never surrender. Never submit. Never be silenced. Freedom and independence forever.

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It’s Ramadan 2015 — Time to Kill Some Jews! [VIDEO]

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If you want to break the Fitna code regarding how Muslims can increase the killing of Jews during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan tune in to our daily radio show – Monday thru Friday.

We start out with a little history lesson where we try to convince us Americans to change Independence Day to July 3rd! Huh?

Then we move into a report from Jerusalem Jane, in Jerusalem, about the many attacks this week, against Jews, by Fitnaphobic Muslims celebrating their Holy Month! Yep, there are dead Jews in Israel because of devote Muslims believing they are doing Allah’s will.

Folks, this is evil personified.

RELATED ARTICLE: Islamic State Boy Soldier Reportedly Kills At Least 50 Kurds In Suicide Attack

The ‘War’ On Drugs And Sophisticated Border Tunnels Could Lead To A Terrorist Attack On U.S. Soil

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cartel book coverNEW YORK, PRNewswire/ — Don Winslow, the acclaimed author of The Cartel, which hit the New York Times bestseller list on Wednesday, says that the U.S. is so concerned with the terrorists half a world away that we don’t recognize them just across our border, and that it could lead to an attack on American soil.

“While the dominant Sinaloa Cartel might be reluctant to risk American retaliation by smuggling terrorists, the lesser cartels, with little to lose, will be tempted,” Winslow said.  “Human trafficking now makes up almost 30% of one such cartel’s income; it’s not a huge leap from smuggling undocumented workers to trafficking terrorists. The cartels are motivated by profit – drug money or terrorist money is the same to them, and these sophisticated tunnels, with railroad tracks, air-conditioning, elevators, and dormitories are perfect clandestine entry points for terrorists.”

Winslow’s epic crime novel The Cartel has been compared to The Godfather and Game of Thrones, and since its June 23 publication has received wide praise by The New York Times, The New Yorker, Rolling Stone, Esquire, Associated Press, Entertainment Weekly, The Los Angeles Times and dozens of other publications.  Winslow has spent more than fifteen years writing and researching the Mexican cartels and the war on drugs for the international bestsellers The Power of the Dog and Savages.

“Politicians and Donald Trump keep talking about building a wall that stretches the entire 2,000-mile land border with Mexico. It doesn’t matter how high a wall you build if the traffickers can tunnel under it,” Winslow said.

“Every few months we discover a new tunnel under the Mexican-American border, mostly in the Tijuana–San Diego area,” Winslow said.  “Since the early 1990’s they’ve been used to smuggle drugs, but how long will it be before they’re used to transport terrorists into the United States?  Congress’s tough-on-crime stance makes us soft on border security.”

“The Mexican drug cartels are more sophisticated and wealthier than the jihadists, already have a presence in 230 American cities, and have carried out executions inside the United States,” Winslow stressed.  “The cartels were running the ISIS playbook—decapitations, immolations, videos, social media—ten years ago.  There is a very direct connection between the Mexican cartels and ISIS in the sense of the atrocities they carry out, and largely ISIS learned this behavior from the cartels.  There are also credible reports that ISIS considers the Mexican border to be vulnerable.  Right now it’s just a threat, but how long will it be before the threat is real?”

July 4th and the Unknown Unknowns

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The heightened terrorism concerns around the July 4th holiday weekend are troubling. The evolving terror threat in the United States is metamorphosing into one where the greatest concerns are from what former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld calls the “unknown unknowns.” Although some pundits panned Rumsfeld for the statement, he was accurate in his diagnosis of the problem.

The older terror models constructed around operational cells, taking orders from a terrorist central-command, are the “known unknowns”, and they still present a clear and present danger. But the difference with these types of threats is that we are aware of many of these groups, many of their affiliated groups, and are currently pursuing an investigative and intelligence gathering strategy to destroy them and their plans.

With self-radicalized terrorists we have a number of challenging “unknown unknowns” investigative and intelligence gathering obstacles which differ from the terror-cell model. Obstacle number one is, we don’t know who these people are? Many of these individuals can learn the tools of the terror trade, and can absorb terrorist propaganda, using nothing more than a keyboard and an Internet connection. This solitary radicalization leaves behind few investigative breadcrumbs because the individual’s limited interaction with others in the terror arena limits the potential for detection and pre-attack mitigation as he crosses paths with the “known” terrorists being tracked and monitored.

Obstacle number two is the self-radicalized terrorist’s tendency to default to simple, yet deadly, attacks using homemade explosives or small arms. Homemade, simple explosive devices can be made by following instructions on the open Internet and by acquiring easily acquired chemicals. Absent any additional surreptitious behavior, the purchase of these easily accessible items is unlikely to arouse suspicion. Again, leaving behind few investigative breadcrumbs. These simple attacks also require little, if any, training. Training requires contacts and actions which can all leave behind a trail of evidence and learning to pull the trigger of a firearm or to remotely depress a detonator device doesn’t require a significant investment of time or energy.

EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared in the Conservative Review. The featured image is by Carolyn Kaster/AP.

What You Need to Know Regarding Sharia Law

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The dedicated Muslims throughout the world are on a mad mission of inflicting upon the world their uncivilized form of existence know as shari’ah law.  It is comprised of several authoritative Islamic texts, the chief of which is the Qur’an.  Dedicated Muslims understand the qur’an to be the undisputed so-called holy revelation of allah to be the prophet Muhammad for all Muslims.  As the prolific Islamic author, Dr. Daniel Izzi Dien, noted in his book Outlining Sources of Islamic law.

The Qur’an, also known as the book, al-kitab, represents the most important source of Islamic law, being the ultimate word of the divine.  It is not seen by dedicated Muslims as purely a book of law.  .  But (“the book”) indicates the significance of textual authority, in the Islamic legal mind.  It therefore also implies what was composed and given by Allah.  This so-called first source if Islamic law is to be respected more than any other human made law.  The muslims believe that the qur’an was secured by the divine will and accuracy of the Qur’an as a document can be affirmed on the grounds that it was presented and recorded by oral transmission as well as script.

Of nearly equal importance to the Qur’an in terms of both influence and authority is the Sunnah (the “words and actions, approvals or even silence” ascribe to Muhammad), as recorded in the hadiths.  The Qur’an lays the foundation for the hadiths authoritativeness, commanding true or dedicated Muslims to obey the book and to obey Muhammad.  The Muslim founder, Muhammad likewise declared  that obedience to the qur’an and to his dictates was essential to avoid destruction.  Perhaps this is one of the excuses dedicated Muslims use today to murder, rape, enslave, behead non Muslims and even burn puppies to death.

The hadiths, therefore, are the secondary primary source of Islamic law and are binding authority on how the Qur’an’s dogmatic principles should be administered in Islamic society.  To collections of hadiths are considered “sound” and authoritative; these two are the books are of the Muslim persuasion.  Where the Qur’an and hadiths are silent (or where there is no consensus about authenticity, interpretation, or application of hadiths) the development of the oppressive shari’ah has relied on secondary sources.

One such source is ijma, which is a consensus of academic opinion on any legal issue that arose subsequent to the death of the brutal Muhammad.  The other commonly recognized secondary source of shari’ah qiyas, which are analogized configurations of shari’ah principles to contemporary legal issues by the “highest ranked and most able” shari’ah jurists throughout the Islamic legal tradition.  Due to the various secondary sources of shari’ah and differing levels of acceptance of hadiths among islamists multiple sects, shari’ah differ from nation to nation in the Islamic orb.   This difference of belief and practice within Islam further demonstrates the practical impossibility of incorporating Islamic shari’ah into a foreign legal system or even allowing it to co-exist as a separate legal system.

The framers of the United States Constitution were wise to raft a Bill of Rights that zealously protects religious freedoms while, at the same time, does not establish or force upon Americans, an official national religion.  What resulted are the religion clauses of the First Amendment: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.  Theses clauses, in recognition of the far reaching effects of volitional religious belief, are critical now and were critical at our republic’s founding.  The authors of the constitution were fully aware of the dangers of establishing a combined church and state combination in the national government.

Unfortunately, Islam recognizes no such difference between religion and state.  In fact, Islam is defined as submission to the will of Allah and demands a comprehensive code of laws.  They completely cover the political, social and economic life of the overall community, as well as rituals of worship, including the five times per day bumping of the head on little rugs by Islamic worshiping men.  Many customs of cruelty have emerged out of the dogmatic religion of Islam per instructions within the Qur’an, including the brutal inhumane treatment of women and girls.

The Islamists also believe that wherever they pray, that is automatically their territory and that Allah will provide the means to physically conquer the world.

Whether it is Dearbornistan, MI or near Fort Worth, Texas, Muslims are more boldly either acting out or just demanding the inclusion of shari’ah law into our nations legal system.  On the national level, the Muslim brotherhood is using their numerous American attorney friends and progressive judges to gain an increasingly legal, but unconstitutional foot print within our republic.  May America awaken from her present practice of allowing enemy Muslims to gain a stranglehold on our beloved nation.  If not, we may soon not be able to free ourselves from their evil intentions, without tremendous effort and a substantial loss of life.

Many thanks to the American Center for Law & Justice for informative contributions.

Obama, J Street and the American Jewish Divide

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Former Israeli Ambassador to Washington, Michael Oren is a native of West Orange, New Jersey best exemplifies the special relations between the two allies, Israel and the U.S. Ally-book cover jpgWith the publication of his memoir, Ally: My Journey Across the American-Israeli Divide (2015), he has another best seller. Previous ones were Six Days of War: June 1967 and the Making of the Modern Middle East (2003) and Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East, 1776 to the Present (2007). Having read Ally, I concur with praise from two pundits: Bret Stephens, the Tuesday Wall Street  Journal columnist of note, and Vic Rosenthal, a former resident of Fresno, California, now a Jerusalem resident whose Abu Yehuda blog  posts are a must read about an American  living in Israel.

Bret Stephens’ opening stanza in his June 29, 2015 WSJ column “The President Against the Historian“ explains why Oren’s memoir is a must read:

Michael Oren, Israel’s former ambassador to the United States, has written the smartest and juiciest diplomatic memoir that I’ve read in years, and I’ve read my share. The book, called “Ally,” has the added virtues of being politically relevant and historically important. This has the Obama administration—which doesn’t come out looking too good in Mr. Oren’s account—in an epic snit.

Vic Rosenthal in his July 2, 2015, Abu Yehuda blog post, Michael Oren is tired of American Jews, and so am I, addresses  the yawning  divide between Israel and American Jews, another of Oren’s themes in Ally:

Rabbi Eric Yoffie is offended by Michael Oren, on behalf of (non-Orthodox) American Jews. These Jews, like America’s “first Jewish president,” turn out to be very easy to offend: just suggest that Israelis are more qualified than they are to decide the future of their country.

Oren’s new book has offended both Yoffie and the Obama Administration, which has launched an all-out media blitz against him (as far as I know, Obama spokespeople haven’t called him a ‘chickenshit’ yet, but give them time).

Yesterday morning, I dialed into an Israel Project  (TIP)sponsored presentation by Oren. He told the listeners ,unlike the daylight between Obama and Netanyahu over the Iranian nuclear nightmare threat, that there is no daylight across the political divide in the  obsessive democratic cockpit of the Knesset. As Oren tells it, whether Likud, Zionist Union and even Arab parties, all Israel is united that Iran achieving nuclear breakout is “a very bad deal”. Further, he said while some  in the media, the Obama claque of  “senior officials’ and former aides have excoriated him for the early publication  of his memoir, he was heartened that they haven’t addressed the facts of what the Administration has perpetrated. Listen to this recorded  TIP presentation by Oren and the following Q&A.

Oren’s memoir has a lot to say about President Obama and his Administration acolytes isolating Israel over Iran and  Netanyahu’s vigorous defense of Israel  sovereign right of Israel to warn America and the untrusting world about Iran’s nuclear  threat and the very bad P5+1  deal. Perhaps  a  deal about to be announced in Vienna in a few days. Or if not simply kicked down the road.  All while Iran’s  Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Khamenei  and Mahdist acolytes of terrorism perfect the means of taking out the “little Satan”, Israel ,with one bomb and the “big Satan”, the  US, with a nuclear tipped ICBM.

Oren clearly takes pride that his well honed skills as a Columbia and Princeton educated historian who earned his PhD in Middle East Studies with the venerable Bernard Lewis.   Not bad for a pudgy dyslexic , pigeon toed 15 year old who shook the hand of the late Israeli PM Yitzhak Rabin, when the latter was  Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary to the US.  He exclaimed on that memorable occasion that some day he would be Israel’s Ambassador.  A late bloomer in high school Oren fulfilled his quest, slimed down hardened through rowing .  Equipped with his backpack he made aliyah to Israel to go through  grueling  paratrooper training  earn his coveted red beret along with an oath taken  to defend Israel on Masada with his IDF comrades.  He ends up in combat and later as a reserve officer during the Second Lebanon War as a military spokesperson to the foreign press.  Along the way he  meets his  American wife Sally Edelstein, a  Jersey girl, dancer and former San Francisco hippy groupie when she makes Aliyah to Israel and they ultimately form their Israeli family.

Ally  depicts what it was like for an American-Israeli to fulfill his dream as his adopted country’s Ambassador in Washington  Israel’s  interests in the byzantine politics of the Obama era from 2009 to 2013. After leaving Washington, Oren turns home to Tel Aviv to lecture, teach at Harvard and Yale and write his memoir.   Oren is now a member of the Kulanu party headed by former  Likud Communications Commissioner and economic reformer Moshe Kahlon.  Oren is a thinking liberal and  both he and the family are members of a Reform synagogue.  His memoir culminates on a dramatic note when he  and Sally attend  a  Bar Mitzvah celebration for 13 year olds at  Kibbutz Na’an, with one of his former Washington Embassy aides, Lee Moser, mother of  one of the bar mitzvah candidates when a red alert sounds, sirens wail and they scurry for shelter. He writes:

I held Sally’s hand and glanced over my shoulder over my shoulder just as two Hamas rockets roared in. Then with twin booms that rattled the tin overhang  and shook the ground below, the missiles exploded. Iron Dome interceptors, developed by Israel and funded by the United States, scored perfect hits. For moment afterward, as we emerged into the uncertain night, the glow of those bursts hovered over us, beaming like kindred stars.

All  of which brings  us to why he has frosted the J Street  fawning rabbinic leadership of the Reform Movement in America and  earned  both Vic Rosenthal’s and my admiration. This came on the cusp of having orchestrated a  recent viewing and panel discussion of the Americans for Peace and Tolerance documentary, J Street Challenge with Pensacola pro-Israel colleagues; Rabbi Eric Tokajer of Brit Ahm synagogue, Mike Bates, 1330amWEBY general manger of “Your Turn host and Florida State Representative Mike Hill, a U.S. Air Force Academy grad.

Vic Rosenthal notes a similar experience in his Fresno in his Abu Yehuda column:

We tried to bring the local Jewish community – the organizations, the synagogues and individual Jews – along with us. With a few exceptions, mostly people like us who had lived in Israel or had relatives there, we had to drag them kicking and screaming. Most of our pro-Israel events drew the same few supporters.

The local Reform temple was probably the most frustrating. A film critical of J Street, followed by a discussion? Absolutely not, it would be ‘divisive’! The Jewish Federation and Hadassah were better, but it was always easier to organize an event about Jewish culture than Israel.

Is Oren right that American Jews are more interested in helping others than their own? Certainly they were far more upset about terrorism in Charleston than Jerusalem, and far more ready to criticize our Prime Minister than their own Administration. The Reform rabbi threw himself into activities to help the poor and homeless. He is seen on TV on panels with the Imam of the Islamic Cultural Center. He is an outspoken advocate of liberal causes, but he did not give a sermon in favor of PM Netanyahu’s speech about Iran before the Congress.

In preparation for the recent J Street Challenge  Pensacola event, we culled excerpts from Oren’s Ally about his views on J Street  and its defenders inside the Obama Administration, illustrative of what  concerns Vic Rosenthal.

On J Street’s inclusion in Major American Jewish organizations meeting with Obama in 2009 p. 78

He promised to be more evenhanded in asking all parties, not just Israelis, to make sacrifices for peace. Yet the meeting would be remembered as a turning point in the administration’s approach toward the Jewish State.

Included for the first time with the mainstream Jewish leaders were the heads of Americans for Peace Now and the newly founded J Street, both organizations stridently critical of Israel and its traditional American supporters.  Their presence rattled the other participants, many of whom had been personally slighted by these parvenus.

The President concluded, “When there is no daylight, Israel just sits on the sidelines and that erodes our credibility with the Arabs”.

Commenting on the discussion, J Street founder Jeremy Ben Ami cited Obama’s ability to connect with the Muslim World and his immense standing in America and the World. “He was very clear that this is a moment that has to be seized and he intends to seize it.  By contrast the other American Jewish leaders emerged from the meeting concerned about Obama’s departure from the long standing principle of “no daylight” in U.S. –Israel relations.

On J Street’s promotion of the Goldstone Report that Maligned Israel in Operation Cast Lead in 2008 – 2009 p. 102

Though J Street refrained from formally endorsing the [Goldstone Report], activists in the organization escorted Goldstone to Congress for meetings with progressive members.  Assistant Secretary of State Michael Posner told the UNHRC of America’s disappointment with the document’s double standards. But he also cited Goldstone’s ‘distinguished record of public service” and called on Palestinians to investigate Hamas abuses. This, for Israelis, was tantamount to asking al-Qaeda to investigate 9/11.

On the contretemps between the Israeli Embassy and J Street P. 107

Irksome was the embassy’s continued imbroglio with J Street. Unlike my predecessor, Sallai Meridor, who had shunned the lobby, I initially engaged it in a dialogue.  I had no illusions about the group, which received funds from anti-Israel contributors, supported every legislator critical of Israel, and stridently attacked mainstream American Jewish leaders. Though J Street defined itself as “pro-Israel” and “pro-peace”, its logo bore no connection to Israel whatsoever, not even the color blue, and portrayed other pro-Israel organizations as anti-Israel. Before becoming Ambassador, I chanced to meet one J Street board member and asked him why he had joined. “I’m uncomfortable with the special relationship,” he told me. “I want to normalize U.S.-Israel ties.”

Outrageously, J Street members hosted Goldstone in Congress and lobbied  against sanctions on Iran. These actions were deeply deleterious to Israel’s security – “they endangered seven million Israelis,” I said –and made interacting with J Street virtually impossible. Both the Prime Minister [Netanyahu] and the foreign minister [Avigdor Liberman] vetoed my participation in its annual conference.

On the Obama White House relations with J Street p. 108

J Street… fashioned itself as the Administration’s wing in the American Jewish Community. Obama acknowledged that fact by sending his National Security Advisor [former Marine General] Jim Jones, one of Washington’s most powerful officials to greet the organization. “I’m honored to represent President Obama at the first national J Street conference.  And you can be sure that this administration will be represented at all other J Street conferences…” Obama’s newly appointed advisor on anti-Semitism, Hannah Rosenthal, an early J Street supporter, issued her first denunciation not of anti-Semites, but rather of me for boycotting the summit.

Michael Oren’s Ally might be considered a 21st Century version of Emile Zola’s J’accuse.  Oren , like Zola in the fin de siècle Dreyfus affair,  addresses the calumnies of President  Obama, nurtured  in Muslim Indonesia, creating daylight isolating Israeli PM Netanyahu over nuclear Iran and recognition of a Faux Palestinian State.  Daylight promised  to Obama’s  Chicago anti-Israel confreres, Rashid Khalidi, holder of the Edward Said Endowed Chair on Modern Arab Studies  at Columbia and Ali Abunimah , editor of The Electronic Intifada blog, that he wouldn’t forget them. Oren chronicles how Obama delivered on that promise.

EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared in the New English Review. The featured image is of President Obama and former Israeli Ambassador Michael Oren, July 2009. Source: White House Photo

UN IAEA: Iran Violated Nuclear Deal Before it is Even Inked

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Amidst frenetic Administration efforts to spin a possible Iran deal comes evidence that it has already been violated given an IAEA Report and analysis by Washington, DC –nuclear watchdog, the Institute for Science and International Security.   Adam Kredo in today’s Washington Free Beacon  reported these last minute developments, “Iran Violates Past Nuclear Promises on Eve of Deal”:

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) disclosed yesterday that Iran has failed to meet its commitments under the interim Joint Plan of Action to convert recently enriched uranium gas to powder.

While Iran has reduced the amount of enriched uranium gas in its stockpiles, it has failed to dispose of these materials in a way that satisfies the requirements of the nuclear accord struck with the United States and other powers in 2013.

Wednesday’s disclosure by the IAEA sent the State Department rushing to downplay the Iranian violation.

Obama administration officials insisted that despite Iran’s failure to meet its obligations, negotiations were still on track and that Tehran would face no repercussions.

One U.S. official who spoke with the Associated Press on Wednesday said that instead of converting its uranium gas into uranium dioxide powder as required, Iran had transformed it into another substance. The IAEA found that Iran had converted just 9 percent of the relevant stockpile into uranium dioxide.

The official went on to downplay concerns about Iran’s violation, claiming that Tehran was only having some “technical problems.”

The “technical problems by Iran had slowed the process but the United States was satisfied that Iran had met its commitments,” the AP reported the official as saying.

“Violations by Iran would complicate the Obama administration’s battle to persuade congressional opponents and other skeptics,” the AP continued.

David Albright, a nuclear expert and founder of the Institute for Science and International Security (ISIS), warned that the United States is weakening its requirements on Tehran as a final deal gets closer.

“The choosing of a weaker condition that must be met is not a good precedent for interpreting more important provisions in a final deal,” Albright wrote in an analysis published late Wednesday.

While Iran was not in compliance with the oxidation requirement, the IAEA found that it did get rid of uranium gas that surpassed a self-imposed benchmark of 7,650 kg.

The IAEA’s disclosures are in contrast to comments made by Kerry last summer when he assured observers that Iran would live up to the interim agreement.

“Iran has committed to take further nuclear-related steps in the next four months” and “these include a continued cap on the amount of 5 percent enriched uranium hexafluoride and a commitment to convert any material over that amount into oxide,” Kerry said.

The Israel Project (TIP), which has sent officials to Vienna to track the deal, wrote in an email to reporters that the administration looked like it was “playing Tehran’s lawyer” in a bid to defuse potential fallout from the IAEA’s report.

This is not the first time that Iran has been caught by the IAEA cheating on past nuclear arrangements.

As negotiations between the sides slip past their June 30 deadline and stretch into July, Iranian officials have become more insistent that the United States consent to demands on a range of sticking points.

President Hassan Rouhani also threatened to fully restart Iran’s nuclear program if negotiators fail to live up to any final agreement.

One Western source present in Vienna said the administration is scrambling to ensure that nothing interferes with a final deal.

“Once again, the White House will go to any length needed to preserve the Obama-Iran deal, even if it means covering up Iran’s failure to convert all of the nuclear material as promised,” said the source.

“If they had admitted Iran failed to live up to the letter of the JPOA—as is the case—this one-week extension period of the JPOA would be totally invalidated and the talks would be over,” the source added. “Like they have for months, the administration continues to hide violations and is acting more like Iran’s advocate than the honest broker the American people deserve. “

Will these IAEA/ISIS revelations upend the P5+1 Iran deliberations in Vienna?  We bet the Obama State Department and White House spokespersons will continue the charade of “don’t believe your lying eyes”. All while Iran ‘s Supreme Ruler stiff arms the talks in Vienna with new ‘red lines” trusting that greed by the P5+1 over billions of trade and development deals  will  lift $150 billion in sanctions relief upon inking a deal.  Both Israel and the US Congress are increasing wary of this deal that will provide a nuclear breakthrough by Iran. If achieved the deal  will vault Iran’s  state sponsorship of terrorism.  Iran could develop one bomb to wipe Israel off the map of the world and an ICBM to detonate an EMP over the US fulfilling their Mahdist apocalyptic dream and both Israel’s and our nightmares.

EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared in the New English Review. The featured image is of U.S. Energy Secertary Moniz, Secretary of State Kerry and Undersecretary Wendy Sherman taken in Vienna, July 1, 2015. Source: Reuters.

Huma Abedin, Hillary Clinton and Iran Unmasked with Dr. Andrew Bostom

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How can Hillary Clinton win the White House in 2016? You will be surprised.

On the first day of the extension of the 13th year of antagonism with Iran we feature the renown scholar, Dr. Andrew Bostom with his witty and acerbic insights about this geopolitical blunder.

Join The United West team as they analyze and deconstruct the Obama’s Administration’s horrendous failures at stopping the Iranian quest for thermonuclear weaponry.

In addition, we show two of the Clarion Project’s powerful videos, including their newest, entitled; “When the World Stayed Silent.”

The Ideological Gutting of American Foreign Policy

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It was clear on the morning of September 11, 2001, that the United States was at war with Islamic radicals, and while there may have been differences of opinion regarding strategy, there was no denying the need to defeat doctrinal terrorism.  But as the U.S. became mired in foreign wars, critics questioned whether its actions were achieving the goal, and ultimately whether the goal was even justified.  Voices on the left falsely claimed that Arab-Muslim extremism was an understandable response to western chauvinism, and instead of condemning terrorists for their actions, they started blaming the victims for allegedly insulting Islam.

We saw it with the Charlie Hebdo massacre, when progressive pundits blamed free expression for inciting violence instead of the ideology that sanctified the killing of “infidels,” “heretics” and “blasphemers.”  Such attitudes arise from a perverse political correctness that elevates radical sensitivities over western cultural values.  But how can secular apologists defer to a doctrine that repudiates liberal democratic traditions?  How can they dignify claims of blasphemy against those who criticize beliefs they don’t consider sacred?

These questions were discussed at a program in Massachusetts entitled, “Freedom Isn’t Free: From the Greatest Generation to the Challenges of Today,” featuring former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense Frank Gaffney, former CIA Operations Officer Clare Lopez and retired Admiral James A. “Ace” Lyons, Jr., who provided insight into how such issues affect government policy.

Progressives who reflexively condemn religion in politics or any perceived trespass of faith into the affairs of state are strangely silent when the religion is Islam.  Incongruously, they often discourage free speech to avoid insulting radical beliefs.

The panel agreed that such muddled thinking influences the Obama administration’s views regarding national security and foreign policy.  Despite the global threat represented by ISIS, al-Qaeda, Boko Haram, Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood, and regardless of the nuclear danger posed by the Islamic Republic of Iran, the White House has taken the dangerous road of appeasing the unappeasable.  Since his first days in office, President Obama has turned American foreign policy away from its traditional allies and towards an axis of regimes committed to doctrinal totalitarianism.

He seems driven by the progressive compulsion to validate claims of Arab-Muslim victimhood while denying the extremism and anti-Semitism so common in Islamic society.  Secular liberals often misrepresent Islamist aspirations by claiming that jihad means “introspection” or “inner striving,” and by denying the history of Islamic conquest in the Mideast, Asia, North Africa and Europe.  They also ignore the theological motivations for persecuting non-Arabic and non-Muslim indigenous peoples, such as Copts, Yazidis and Maronites.

Lenin described western leftists as “useful idiots” for supporting communism over their own national interests; the term applies to progressives today who defend or justify Islamism.  Frank Gaffney described the left-wing’s relationship with radical Islam as a “red-green alliance.”

According to Gaffney, the term “jihad” has only one meaning under Sharia, and that meaning is holy war.  He said it motivated the 9/11 attacks, the 1983 bombing of the marine barracks in Beirut, the Fort Hood massacre in 2009, and the attacks on Charlie Hebdo and the Jewish market in Paris earlier this year.  While not all Muslims support jihad –indeed many come to the West specifically to escape doctrinal extremism – there is no definition of the concept that preaches respect for “infidels” or their beliefs.

Those unable to engage in violent jihad, says Gaffney, are exhorted to engage in “civilizational jihad” by transforming western society from within.  The process includes disseminating propaganda in public schools, promoting sharia courts over civil courts, pursuing sharia-compliant financing requirements, and using societal institutions to assist in spreading the faith.  Gaffney said the existence of the “Civilizational-Jihadist Process” was confirmed in a Muslim Brotherhood documententitled, “An Explanatory Memorandum on the General Strategic Goal for the Group in North America,” which sets forth mission and strategy.

The success of this program in the West, said Gaffney, is reflected by the Organization of Islamic Cooperation’s pervasive influence in the United Nations and the establishment of Sharia compliant zones throughout Europe.  This strategy is pursued in the U.S. through initiatives seeking civil recognition of sharia court jurisdiction, the circulation of educational materials produced by Islamist front organizations, legal and illegal immigration, and efforts to gain access to the White House and the security, defense and intelligence establishments.

Islamist intrusion in government (with the complicity of the left) affects national security through the adoption of policies contrary to American strategic interests, said former CIA officer Clare Lopez.  Progressive-Islamist cooperation, she said, was instrumental in purging the FBI’s clandestine library of materials deemed offensive to Islam – though these materials were essential for teaching how to identify Islamist terrorists – and in depriving the military of the means to spot Islamist sympathizers within the ranks.

According to Lopez, the shielding of Islamists from scrutiny is not simply a case of political correctness run amok, but of government policy to empower the Muslim Brotherhood and support its ascendancy in the Mideast.  She said this was the crux of Presidential Study Directive 11 (“PSD 11”), which reportedly called for backing the Brotherhood to force political change in the Mideast and North Africa.  Leaks from this classifieddocument suggest the administration supported the Brotherhood and related groups when they toppled governments in Egypt, Tunisia and Libya, she explained.

This policy produced disastrous consequences across the region, said Lopez, observing that “the outcomes [were] chaotic … shortsighted and ignorant.”  These would have been egregious if only caused by negligence.  However, the uprisings misleadingly dubbed the democratic “Arab Spring” were ignited by a strategy that in itself “wasn’t error [but] policy,” she said.  These policy failures were especially glaring after the attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi on September 11, 2012.

Lopez and the panel believe the Benghazi attack resulted from the administration’s support of militias linked to the Muslim Brotherhood and al-Qaeda in their quest to overthrow Muammar Qaddafi (and also the governments in Egypt and Tunisia).  Although Qaddafi had renounced terrorism, relinquished weapons of mass destruction, submitted to nuclear inspections, and jailed terrorists released from Gitmo, Islamist opposition militias in Libya were supported with arms funneled by the U.S. through Benghazi.  After he was overthrown, she said, weapons from Benghazi were redirected to anti-government militias in Syria.

During this time the Ansar al-Sharia moved near the consulate and called for attacks on Americans.  Lopez explained that when Ambassador Chris Stephens requested increased security, he was denied by Hillary Clinton’s State Department because of optics; with the 2012 election approaching, the administration wanted to continue claiming it had defeated al-Qaeda and won the war on terror.  Thus, despite multiple warnings of impending attack, no reinforcements were provided, the consulate was overrun and four Americans were killed.  According to Admiral Lyons, there were military assets in the region that could have been deployed, but which inexplicably were not.

The White House and State Department thereafter claimed the attack was a spontaneous reaction to a video critical of Islam – although information immediately available showed it was preplanned and unrelated to the video.  The ruse continued for weeks and included Mr. Obama’s statement during a “60 Minutes” interview the next day that it was “too early to know exactly how it came about” and Susan Rice’s repetition of the false video narrative during multiple television appearances.

As the administration supported Sunni militias aligned with the Brotherhood and al-Qaeda in Syria and North Africa, it pandered to Iranian Shiites around the Persian Gulf.  According to Lopez, Obama’s policy was to recognize Iran as the hegemonic power in the Mideast.  He thus snubbed Sunni allies like Saudi Arabia and embraced a Shiite regime that threatens those allies, condemns America as the “Great Satan,” seeks Israel’s destruction, and exports international terrorism.

The courting of extremist Sunnis on one side of the Mideast and apocalyptic Shiites on the other might seem incongruous, but Admiral Lyons sees it as consistent with the goal of fundamentally changing America.  “Never in my lifetime did I think I’d ever see America taken down by our own administration,” he said, observing that challenging U.S. influence is considered a progressive virtue.  Admiral Lyons believes that President Obama always intended to restructure national policy according to progressive ideals that disparage America, Israel and the West, and instead validate Islamist, Iranian and anti-western interests.

He cites as evidence the President’s use of sequestration to cut defense spending and disarm unilaterally at a time when China and Russia are growing in influence, militant Islam is on the rise, and military reductions are viewed as weakness.  “We’re headed for the smallest army since [before] World War II,” he said, noting that military experts are no longer certain the U.S. could prevail in a conventional regional conflict.  The question is how such fundamental changes could have occurred without significant opposition.

The answer, said the panel, lies in the pervasive acquiescence to anti-American priorities and sensibilities.  Nowhere is this more apparent than in the liberal affinity for anti-blasphemy laws that contravene free speech.  The U.N. periodically entertains resolutions seeking to criminalize “slander” of Islam, and these are supported by progressive governments and NGOs.  Moreover, a number of European nations have enacted laws banning criticism of Islam as hate speech.

Though such laws would violate the First Amendment, many American progressives favor them as a way of curtailing “hate-speech” and encouraging diversity.  Even without such laws on the books, liberals often discourage free discourse by accusing those who criticize radical Islam of Islamophobia.  This attitude seems to pervade Obama’s denial of the religious basis of Islamist terrorism, and much of his Mideast policy.

The panel concluded that Obama’s policies have compromised America’s ability to defend itself and lead the world.  He has spurned Israel, appeased Islamists, reduced the military, enabled Iran’s nuclear ambitions, and refused to acknowledge the existential threat of ISIS.  These acts and omissions are not hallmarks of effective leadership, but of submission to a feckless worldview that has damaged U.S. power and influence to a degree that may not be easily reparable.

EDITORS NOTE: This op-ed column originally appeared in Arutz Sheva – IsraelNationalNews.com.

Empowering Kurdistan

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The State of the Kurds WSJ 6-20-15In the Wall Street Journal Weekend edition, June 20-21, 2015, Yaroslav Trofimov writes of the possible rise of an independent Kurdistan, “The State of The Kurds.” An independent Kurdistan was promised by the WWI Allies in the Treaty of Sevres that ended the Ottoman Empire in 1920. That commitment was dashed by the rise of the Turkish Republic under the secularist Kemal Atatürk which confirmed in the 1923 Treaty of Lausanne the denial of an independent Kurdistan in what is now Eastern Turkey. All territory combined, a future Kurdistan (encompassing eastern Turkey, Northern Syria, northwest Iran and northern Iraq) might comprise a landlocked republic of 30 million with significant energy and agricultural resources. The rise of Kurdistan is reflected in these comments in the Trofimov WSJ review article:

Selahattin Demirtas, Chairman of the HDP party in Turkey:

The Kurds’ existence was not recognized; they were hidden behind a veil. But now, after being invisible for a century, they are taking their place on the international stage. Today, international powers can no longer resolve any issue in the Middle East without taking into account the interests of the Kurds.

Tahir Elçi, a prominent Kurdish lawyer and chairman of the bar in Diyarbakir, Turkey:

In the past, when the Kurds sought self-rule, the Turks, the Persians and the Arabs were all united against it. Today that’s not true anymore—it’s not possible for the Shiite government in Iraq and Shiite Iran to work together against the Kurds with Sunni Turkey and the Sunni ISIS. In this environment, the Kurds have become a political and a military power in the Middle East.

Elçi, amplifies a concern that Sherkoh Abbas, leader of the Kurdish National Syrian Assembly (KURDNAS) has expressed in several NER interviews with him:

The PKK has made important steps to adopt more democratic ways. But you cannot find the same climate of political diversity in [Kurdish] Syria as you find in [northern Iraq], and this is because of PKK’s authoritarian and Marxist background. This is a big problem.

As effective as the KRG government and peshmerga have been in pushing back at ISIS forces threatening the capital of Erbil, the real problem is the divisiveness in the political leadership. That is reflected in the comment of Erbil province’s governor, Nawaf Hadi cited by Trofimov:

For 80 years, the Arab Sunni people led Iraq—and they destroyed Kurdistan. Now we’ve been for 10 years with the Shiite people [dominant in Baghdad], and they’ve cut the funding and the salaries—how can we count on them as our partner in Iraq?” All the facts on the ground encourage the Kurds to be independent.

That renewed prospect reflects the constellation of events in Turkey, Syria and Iraq.

Supporters Cheer Selahattin Demirtas of Kurdish Peoples' Democratic Party HDP Istanbul May 2015 Emrah Gurel AP.jpg

Supporters cheer Selahattin Demirtas, co-chair of the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party. Source: Emrah Gurel/AP. The fall of the AKP government in the Turkish Election of June 7, 2015

There was the stunning defeat of the 12 year reign of the Islamist AKP headed by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan by the trio of secular, nationalist and upstart Kurdish parties, the CHP, HNP and HDP that might form a minority ruling coalition 45 days from the June 7, 2014 parliamentary elections. These minority parties garnered a plurality of 299 seats in the Ankara Parliament. That is, if these parties can coalesce. If not, Islamist figurehead President Erdogan might seek new elections if they can’t put together a new ruling coalition government. A Washington, DC forum on the results of the Turkish election convened by the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD) presented nuanced views. Watch this C-Span video of the FDD forum.

FDD Senior Counselor John Hannah moderated the discussion with former U.S. Ambassador to Turkey and FDD Senior Advisor  Eric Edelman and FDD Non-Resident Fellow and former member of  the Turkish parliament Ayman Erdemir.

John Hannah

June 7 in my opinion was an inspiring performance, a much needed triumph of the spirit of liberal democracy in a Middle East landscape currently inundated with way too much bad news.

For those of us who have watched over the past decade with great dismay the slow drip of Turkey’s democracy being drained away by Erdogan’s creeping Islamism and authoritarianism, we frankly weren’t sure anymore if the Turkish people had this kind of an election in them.

Aykan Erdemir

My take-home message would be that we should not read these elections too much with a progressive, liberal-democratic interpretation. But we should not underemphasize the importance of it either, because ultimately June 7 proved to us that there could be a return from competitive authoritarianism, where an incumbent with huge advantages nevertheless can suffer a relative defeat in the ballot box.

I have always argued that Erdogan’s policies and politics cannot be interpreted within the nation-state borders. Erdogan’s policies right from the start have been transnational; it has always been a Muslim Brotherhood-oriented policy, whether in Syria, Jordan, or Egypt. He is a visionary transnationalist politician.

Ambassador Edelman

Turkey is a deeply polarized society, and the bad news there is that the AKP is the only party that is competitive across the nation.

Erdogan will not see this vote in any way as inhibiting him in creating an executive presidency. My suspicion is that Erdogan does not want to see a government formed within the 45-day period set by the constitution and would like to see the country go back to elections. He thinks that if he could apply the ‘keep voting until I get the right answer’ standard, there is a chance he will do better in a second election, get at least a governing majority if not the super-majority.

Dr. Harold Rhode, former Turkish and Islamic Affairs expert in the Office of the Secretary of Defense held a more optimistic view cited in a JNS.org article on the Turkish Elections, “noting that he personally knows pro-American and pro-Israel officials within the senior leadership of all three of the [non-AKP] parties.”

The second development was the victory on June 15, 2015 by Syrian Kurdish YPG fighters, Christian Assyrian and secular FSA militias wresting the strategic border gateway of Tal-Abyad from ISIS with support from US coalition air strikes. The YPG combined force advanced further along the highway seizing a military base and on June 22, 2015 Ain Issa less than 55 kilometers from the Islamic State stronghold of Raqaa. Both the military base and Ain Issa lie astride the main road between Kurdish-held territory, Aleppo province to the west and Hasakah province to the east. These string of victories followed the successful  January 2015 siege at the border city of Kobani may complete the recapture of Kurdish controlled land lost to the ISIS advances in 2014 and early 2015. The Syrian YPG, affiliated with the Turkish PKK, a terrorist group designated by Turkey, the EU and the US, has been assisted by fighting units of the Iraqi Peshmerga from the adjacent Kurdish Regional Government (KRG) in northern Iraq. The third development was the KRG Peshmerga wresting control of Kirkuk and its vast  oil field. Kirkuk, as Trofimov noted is considered the “Kurdish Jerusalem.” Not to be outdone by Kurdish compatriots in Syria and Iraq, in mid-May 2015, Iranian Kurdish Party of Free Life in Kurdistan ( PJAK)  forces in northwestern Iran’s Zagros mountain fought Iranian security forces in Mahabad. Mahabad was the capital of the short-lived State of Republic Kurdistan established with Soviet Russian support in Iran in 1945-1946.

Smoke Rises in Kobani, Syria, June 27, 2015, Source: Reuters.

ISIS strikes back with Raids on Kobani and Hasakah

On June 24, 2015, ISIS fighters wearing YPG fighter combat fatigues struck back simultaneously at both Kobani and Hasakah. The defense of Hasakah was divided between Assad Regime forces and those led by the YPG. It was rumored that the ISIS commandos might have entered via Turkey. The YPG reported 60 ISIS fighters killed, while more than 200 civilians were killed in the ISIS assault at Kobani. Once again beleaguered Syrian Kurdish civilians fled to the Turkish border city of Suruc seeking temporary sanctuary. US air strikes destroyed a building held temporarily by ISIS. The Kurdish YPG regained control of Kobani on June 26, 2015. The ISIS raid on Hasakah was reported to have displaced over 120,000 in the Northeastern governorate.

Erdogan Weighs In, Denying Hopes for Kurdistan while Bolstering ISIS

The Syrian Kurdish YPG victories and resilience in repelling ISIS assaults on their ancestral homeland in Syria’s northeast prompted an outburst from embattled Turkish President Erdogan. His goal of a complete transformation of the figurehead post to an executive one was thwarted with the June 7, 2015 election victories of the opposition minority parties. AKP’s Premier Ahmet Davutoğlu resigned. The three minority parties garnered a majority of the 550 seats in the Ankara Parliament, 299 seats. Additionally, Erdogan’s negotiations over a peace agreement with PPK leader Abdullah Ocalan under house arrest in Istanbul is also in abeyance. According to Reuters, Erdogan spoke out on Friday June 26, 2015 against the prospect of a Kurdistan arising from the combination of majority Kurdish southeastern Turkey and adjacent Northern Syria, saying:

We will never allow the establishment of a state in Syria’s north and our south. We will continue our fight in this regard no matter what it costs.

They want to complete the operation to change the demographic structure of the region. We will not turn a blind eye to this.

There have also been allegations by Turkish officials that the advancing Kurds have been ethnically cleansing Arabs from recaptured areas. Those have been denied by YPG officials, who point to the mixed Kurdish, Christian and secular FSA forces in the spear point of recent advances.

These allegations by Erdogan led Michael Totten to comment in a World Affairs Journal article, “Turkey Chooses ISIS Over the Kurds”:

Twenty five percent of Turkey’s population is Kurdish and Erdogan—like most of his ethnic Turkish countrymen—is terrified that Turkey may lose a huge swath of its territory if Syrian Kurdistan liberates itself alongside Iraqi Kurdistan. Turkish Kurdistan could very well be the next domino.

They are not crazy to fear this.

But they’re reacting by treating as ISIS the lesser of evils. If ISIS can keep the Kurds down, Turkey’s territorial integrity is more secure.

“ISIS commanders told us to fear nothing at all,” a former ISIS communications technician told Newsweek, “because there was full cooperation with the Turks and they reassured us that nothing will happen…ISIS saw the Turkish army as its ally especially when it came to attacking the Kurds in Syria. The Kurds were the common enemy for both ISIS and Turkey.”

Erdogan is not a state sponsor of terrorism. He is not championing ISIS, nor is he on side with them ideologically. He is not their patron or armorer. But he is letting one of our worst enemies grow stronger while stomping on one of our greatest allies.

The Daily Beast has a report that Erodgan is threatening to establish a buffer zone in Northern Syria, the better to halt the successful Syria Kurdish advance against ISIS, “Turkey Plans to Invade Syria, But to Stop the Kurds, Not ISIS.” These developments followed Erdogan’s remarks last Friday night at a Ramadan break-fast Iftar dinner saying that he would never accept a Kudistan state comprised of southeastern Tirkey and adjacent Northern Syria. The Daily Beast article noted the unease of Turkish military about this latest diktat by the figurehead President whose Islamist AKP party was defeated by a minority of Kemalist, Nationalist and a Kurdish secular party. The Daily Beast reported:

Following Erdogan’s  speech, several news outlets reported that the president and Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu had decided to send the Turkish army into Syria, a hugely significant move by NATO’s second biggest fighting force after the U.S. military.  Both the daily Yeni Safak, a mouthpiece of the government, and the newspaper Sozcu, which is among Erdogan’s fiercest critics, ran stories saying the Turkish Army had received orders to send soldiers over the border. Several other media had similar stories, all quoting unnamed sources in Ankara. There has been no official confirmation or denial by the government.

The government refused to comment on the reports. Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said “the necessary statement” would be issued after a regular meeting of the National Security Council, which comprises the president, the government and military leaders, on Tuesday, June 30, 2015.

The reports said up to 18,000 soldiers would be deployed to take over and hold a strip of territory up to 30 kilometers deep and 100 kilometers long that currently is held by ISIS. It stretches from close to the Kurdish-controlled city of Kobani in the east to an area further west held by the pro-Western Free Syrian Army (FSA) and other rebel groups, beginning around the town of Mare. This “Mare Line,” as the press calls it, is to be secured with ground troops, artillery and air cover, the reports said. Yeni Safak reported preparations were due to be finalized by next Friday.

There has been speculation about a Turkish military intervention ever since the Syrian conflict began in 2011. Ankara has asked the United Nations and its Western allies to give the green light to create a buffer zone and a no-fly area inside Syria in order to prevent chaos along the Turkish border and to help refugees on Syrian soil before they cross over into Turkey. But the Turkish request has fallen on deaf ears.

Remember Obama saying that he wished there were more Islamist leaders like AKP Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in the Arab ummah of the Middle East. Erodgan’s threatening to invade Syria to build a buffer zone to do what, protect shrines of ancient Ottoman Sultans? More likely, he’s angered at the Kurdish HDP party, that together with the Kemalist CHP and Nationalist HNP, thwarted his dream of becoming the Sultan of a neo-Ottoman empire with minority parties copping a plurality of votes in the June 7th parliamentary elections. He’s also mad at the plucky Syrian Kurds for beating back the ISIS in a string of victories this month. This despite bloody raids by ISIS on both Kobani and Hasakah that were beaten back. Those Kurdish actions may have cut off the main route for those ISIS foreign fighters entering Syria that Turkey gives a wink and a nod to, backed by funds and assistance from the infamous Muslim Brotherhood global IHH charity, You remember IHH? The Muslim charity underwrote the infamous 2010 Free Gaza Flotilla Mavi Marmara incident infamy.

We wrote about how IHH was caught sending cash and weapons from Turkey into Syria for their brothers in AQ and possibly the ISIS. Presumably, the Turkish military isn’t so keen to do Erdogan’s bidding given their NATO membership and because the 45 days aren’t up yet to see if a ruling minority government can be formed or a new election is called so that Erdogan might return his Premier, Ahmet Davutoglu to power with a super majority. Based on KRG meetings with the Obama White House, the Administration doesn’t want to give the Syrian Kurds the promised quality weapons that it and Syrian Kurdish fighters could effectively use against ISIS. Perhaps U.S. Rep. Trent Franks (R-AZ) and Senate Armed Forces Committee Chairman Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) might request US Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter to release those weapons from the US War Reserve Stock already positioned in Israel. Perhaps this latest development may be a clarion call to action to deliver those long promised weapons to both Syrian Kurds and Iraqi Peshmerga to push back ISIS. They are the only boots on the ground doing this successfully. Besides those U.S. weapons stockpiles in Israel have already been paid for.

KRG Delegation meets with resident Obama VO Biden and National Security Council May 2015.jpg

Kurdish President Barzani and delegation meet President Obama and VP Biden May 2015.

KRG Meets with President to Free up Arms Deliveries

The KRG quest for independence has been stymied by the Baghdad government of PM Haidar al-Abadi. The  Baghdad government has not lived up to its agreement reached in December 2014 to provide regular payments to the KRG amounting to nearly $5.7 billion in exchange for selling 550,000 barrels of oil. The result has been that KRG government and the 160,000 Peshmerga force have not been paid in months. More troubling has been the current agreements between the Obama Administration and the al-Abadi government for allocation and deliveries of heavy weapons that have not found their way to the highly effective Peshmerga fighting force. This is especially galling given the thousands of Humvees, mobile artillery, anti-tank, main battle tanks and MRAP vehicles abandoned by fleeing Iraqi national security forces in the ISIS conquest of Mosul in June 2014 and Ramadi in late May.

A meeting occurred in Washington in early May 2015 including KRG President Barzani and senior officials with President Obama, Vice President Biden and members of the National Security Staff seeking resolution of this impasse. Michael Knights of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy wrote about this in a May 15, 2015 Al Jazeera, article, “A big win for Kurds at the White House”:

From May 3-8, Washington, DC hosted a high-powered delegation from the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG). KRG President Massoud Barzani was flanked by Deputy Prime Minister Qubad Talabani, National Security Chancellor Masrour Barzani and Minister of Peshmerga Affairs Mustapha Sayyid Qadr, among other KRG ministers and officials.  [The delegation was originally scheduled for a five minute meeting with President Obama, instead the session lasted an hour].

In particular, the Kurds complained that Washington has allocated too small a proportion of its $1.6bn Iraq Training and Equipment Fund (ITEF) assistance to Kurdistan.

Slow and indirect delivery of US weapons systems is a major concern. Washington has chosen to funnel most weapons shipments via the federal Iraqi Ministry of Defense, the only entity entitled by US law to sign end-user certificates (EUCs) for the weapons.

In reaction to these views, the House Armed Services Committee introduced clauses into the annual National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), the Pentagon’s budget, in an attempt to protect the Kurds’ fair share of US weapons.

[…]

The draft NDAA for Fiscal Year 2016 was amended by congress to include a clause (Section 1223) that named the Peshmerga as one of a number of security forces collectively entitled to “not less than 25 percent” of the annual $715m of US support.

Most controversially the amendment would allow the KRG “as a country” to “directly receive assistance from the United States” if Baghdad failed to meet the aforementioned condition, a clause that sparked security threats from Shia militia leaders against US trainers in Iraq.

Baghdad protested the language, and US Vice President Joe Biden signaled one day before the Kurdish delegation landed that “all US military assistance in the fight against [ISIL] comes at the request of the Government of Iraq and must be coordinated through the Government of Iraq”.

[…]

Instead of trying to force the White House to do Kurdistan’s bidding through pressure politics, Barzani seems to have adopted a longer-term view in his dealings with the US on defense.

Section 1223 did not give the Kurds a great deal – sharing a quarter of US material collectively with Sunni Arab paramilitary recipients – but it would have soured relations with the Obama administration at a critical time.

When we interviewed Sherkoh Abbas of KURDNAS on these Capitol Hill developments in Washington he said:

KURDNAS and the Kurdish National Council represent more than 15 political parties and many organization, 123 major tribes and religious leaders and many other civic leaders. So we coordinate and work together. We showed up on Capitol Hill, stressing our views that the Kurds are the people with boots on the ground, an estimated 20,000 fighters to push ISIS. However we cannot do it for two reasons; we don’t have the equipment and we don’t want to coordinate with the Assad regime and the YPG.

We had several meetings on Capitol Hill with Representative Trent Franks. He and Senator McCain introduced an amendment asking for the support for the Kurds. We appreciated Congressman Franks when he asked Secretary Ashton Carter, what he’s doing to help. Frankly, he didn’t know how to answer. This Administration is not willing to do anything to support the Syrian Kurds. The US military are not on the same wavelength with their commander and chief. This despite the military who believe the Kurds are the key element and should be fully supported. Unfortunately, this Administration is not ready to do that.

Israeli Support for an Independent Kurdistan

One Middle East nation that supports an independent Kurdistan is Israel. As exemplified by comments from Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu, Israel supports the creation of an independent Kurdistan. There is a long connection between the Kurds and the Jewish nation. There are an estimated 150,000 Kurdish Jews in Israel who have fostered cultural–linguistic exchanges with Iraqi Kurdistan. Iraqi and Iranian Kurds smuggled Iraqi Jews to freedom via Iran, during the days of the late Shah, to Israel and the West. Iranian Kurds continued that effort despite threats from the Islamic Republic. From the 1950’s to the mid-70’s Israel provided covert military training and equipment to Iraqi Kurds against the Ba’athist regime of the late Saddam Hussein. That ended with a treaty between the late Shah of Iran and Hussein orchestrated by Henry Kissinger in 1975. During the 1980’s Hussein took his revenge on Iraqi kurds during the Iran-Iraq War  in a series of genocidal revenge campaigns including a massive gas attack that killed thousands decimating Kurdish villages. Israel currently hosts the billion dollar US War Reserve Stock for use in Middle East conflicts. Perhaps, the Obama Administration might relent on the current agreements with the Baghdad government and permit transfers from the US War Reserve Stock in Israel of much needed weapons, equipment and munitions to the Peshmerga in Iraq and the Syrian Kurdish militias fighting ISIS. Israel is less than several hundred miles from Erbil and Northern Syria, Israel for its own security interests is immediately concerned about addressing Hezbollah, Al Nusrah and Druze problems on the Golan Syrian Frontier. One illustration of that was the attack on an ambulance conveying an injured Al Nusrah fighter for treatment inside Israel who has beaten to death by rampaging Druze on the Golan. That gave pause enough for Israeli PM Netanyahu to warn against “lynch behavior” by the normally very loyal 130,000 Israeli Druze, many of whom serve in the IDF and border police.  Abbas of KURDNAS during our interview with him indicated his group would welcome Israeli support, but suspects that any transfers of US equipment stocks held in Israel and training would require clearance by the Obama Administration. He is naturally skeptical that would be forthcoming and might have to await a new Administration in January 2017.

Conclusion

When we interviewed Sherkoh Abbas of KURDNAS three years ago in June 2012, his hope was that a secular federalized Syria might emerge from the civil war that has claimed over 230,000 lives. That idealized federal Syria would have provided regional autonomy for Kurds in their ancestral homeland in the northeast, the former Alawite statelet in the northwest, Druze in the Southeast, while the Sunnis would predominate in Aleppo and the Damascus regions. The Syriac Christians are fleeing to their diasporas.

That was before the failure of the Administration to intervene militarily in both Syria and Iraq. The former occurred in August 2012 when the Administration balked at undertaking punitive action against the Assad regime for chemical attacks on civilians. Instead it handed the task over to an obscure UN affiliate group, the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons to allegedly reduce the threat. The failure in Iraq occurred when a status of forces agreement with the former al-Maliki Baghdad regime was not concluded when US forces exited in 2011.

The  wild card was the emergence of both the Al Nusrah Front of Al Qaeda and fearsome Salafist Islamic State fighters decimating the Assad military, hollowing out the largely Alawite force and causing the flight in Iraq of its largely Shi’ite national security force. Now the Al –Abadi regime in Baghdad has become a virtual satrap of Iran relying on Al Quds Force and Revolutionary Guards Corps cadres to train and direct extremist Shi’ite Militia.

Abbas has always contended that Iran and Assad had actually fostered these developments in a cynical attempt to divide internal opposition in Syria.

Billions of dollars of US supplied equipment abandoned by fleeing Iraqi forces propelled the ISIS blitzkrieg and its barbarous assault on Christians, ancient Yazidi and religious minorities. That assault by ISIS initially pummelled the Peshmerga in Iraq and Syrian Kurdish militias, primarily the PKK-related YPG. The default strategy of a US air campaign backing local resistance has only worked in the Syrian Kurdish homeland and adjacent Kurdish Regional Government in Iraq. The Syrian Kurds, bolstered by recent victories clearly deserve US deliveries of quality arms and equipment to defend these regions of the failed state of Syria. The same is evident in the rollback of ISIS by Peshmerga forces in Iraq that threatened the KRG capital, Erbil, and de facto control over Kirkuk and its massive oil fields. That is stymied by the lack of effective deliveries of quality heavy arms and ammunition, as well as a significant increase in close air support sorties.

On the geo-political front the prospects for a rising Kurdistan are reflected in the results of the June 7, 2015 Turkish elections that saw a Kurdish led secular party take 13 percent of the seats in the Ankara parliament bolstered the defeat of the 12 year reign of Turkish President Erdogan and his Islamist AKP Party. We shall soon see whether a minority ruling coalition can be formed thwarting Erdogan’s ambitions or whether new elections are called. Erdogan has been complicit in providing lines of communication for foreign fighters to join the Islamic State. He views the success of the Syrian Kurds as a threat to formation of a breakaway landlocked Kurdistan composed of southeastern Turkey and adjacent northern Syria. That is unlikely to occur for the Kurds in Turkey. They now see their way clear to become a political force, a reflection of their significant population growth. As Abbas sees it, Syrian Kurdish goals have been abetted by successes in the war against ISIS. At issue is what is required to compel a reluctant Obama Administration to relent and provide the means to both defend and govern their ancestral Syrian Kurdish homeland of Rojava that would acknowledge the minority rights of Assyrian Christians and Sunni Arabs. Abbas pointed out in our interview with him, Kissinger saw that both Syria and Iraq are failed states, he suggested the Kurds deserve one of their own promised in the Treaty of Sevres in 1920.

EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared in the New English Review. The featured image is of Syrian YPG fighters capture Tal-Abyad from ISIS, June 2015, Source: Reuters.

On Iran: This is What Happens When the World Stays Silent

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When the Jews were being slaughtered in the holocaust the world remained silent. Today Iran repeatedly calls for the destruction of Israel and attacks ,through its proxy terrorist groups, Jewish and Israeli civilians around the world. If Iran gets the nuclear bomb will the world stay silent again?

To see all the films in the Clarion Project’s Iran short film series visit: http://iran.clarionproject.org/iran_f…

Iran: Deal or No Deal!

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Ha…chalk another win up for the Iranians who are making John Kerry and his negotiating team look like novice riders in the Camel Triple Crown! This fiasco is so serious that all Americans should be up in arms and walk away from any deal with this evil, lying nation.

U.S. Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL), a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, commented on the extension of nuclear negotiations with Iran:

Once again, the Obama Administration has given into Iran’s obfuscation and stalling tactics. In April, the President announced to the world that the United States had reached ‘a historic understanding with Iran.’ Now, as the Iranian leadership attempts to walk back the key provisions of that deal, we’re told a few more days are required to negotiate a deal that was supposedly concluded months ago. The events of recent weeks have shown that it is clearer than ever that Iran is not serious about resolving longstanding concerns regarding its illicit nuclear program. Another week of negotiations at this point is just another week for further U.S. concessions. Tehran knows this. Our allies and partners in the Middle East see this because they’ve experienced it before.

“The major points of this agreement are already clear, though there may in the coming days be additional American concessions. We already know that this deal is not in the interests of the United States. It will not keep Americans safer. It will only embolden the world’s foremost sponsor of terrorism as it expands its influence and sows instability across the Middle East. It will provide billions of dollars to a regime that brutalizes its citizens and acts like a criminal gang by kidnapping American citizens and effectively holding them for ransom. If the President were serious about negotiating a deal that advances our security and protects our allies, such as Israel, he would walk away from the table and impose new sanctions on Iran until the regime comes to the table ready to negotiate seriously. If he instead chooses to conclude a deal that ensures that Iran will be a nuclear threshold state, I am confident that a majority of both houses of Congress will join me in opposing it, which will lay the foundation for our next President to undo this disaster.

On today’s show The United West team explains that there is one thing missing from the American negotiating side.

Tune in to find out what, or who is missing and how the States of New Jersey or New York play a role in successful U.S. negotiations.

Turkey Aiding the Islamic State by Establishing a Buffer Zone in Syria to Punish Kurds

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The Daily Beast has a report today, that Erodgan is threatening to establish  a buffer zone in Northern Syria, the better to halt the successful Syria Kurdish advance against ISIS, “Turkey Plans to Invade Syria, But to Stop the Kurds, Not ISIS”. These developments followed Erdogan’s remarks last Friday night at a Ramadan break-fast Iftar dinner saying that he would never accept a Kurdistan state comprised of southeastern Turkey and adjacent Northern Syria. The Daily Beast article noted the unease of Turkish military about this latest diktat by the figurehead President whose Islamist AKP party was defeated by a minority of Kemalist, Nationalist and a Kurdish secular party:

In a speech last Friday, Erdogan vowed that Turkey would not accept a move by Syrian Kurds to set up their own state in Syria following gains by Kurdish fighters against the so-called Islamic State, or ISIS, in recent weeks. “I am saying this to the whole world: We will never allow the establishment of a state on our southern border in the north of Syria,” Erdogan said. “We will continue our fight in that respect whatever the cost may be.” He accused Syrian Kurds of ethnic cleansing in Syrian areas under their control.

Following the speech, several news outlets reported that the president and Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu had decided to send the Turkish army into Syria, a hugely significant move by NATO’s second biggest fighting force after the U.S. military.  Both the daily Yeni Safak, a mouthpiece of the government, and the newspaper Sozcu, which is among Erdogan’s fiercest critics, ran stories saying the Turkish Army had received orders to send soldiers over the border. Several other media had similar stories, all quoting unnamed sources in Ankara. There has been no official confirmation or denial by the government.

The government refused to comment on the reports. Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said “the necessary statement” would be issued after a regular meeting of the National Security Council, which comprises the president, the government and military leaders, this Tuesday.

The reports said up to 18,000 soldiers would be deployed to take over and hold a strip of territory up to 30 kilometers deep and 100 kilometers long that currently is held by ISIS. It stretches from close to the Kurdish-controlled city of Kobani in the east to an area further west held by the pro-Western Free Syrian Army (FSA) and other rebel groups, beginning around the town of Mare. This “Mare Line,” as the press calls it, is to be secured with ground troops, artillery and air cover, the reports said. Yeni Safak reported preparations were due to be finalized by next Friday.

There has been speculation about a Turkish military intervention ever since the Syrian conflict began in 2011. Ankara has asked the United Nations and its Western allies to give the green light to create a buffer zone and a no-fly area inside Syria in order to prevent chaos along the Turkish border and to help refugees on Syrian soil before they cross over into Turkey. But the Turkish request has fallen on deaf ears.

Remember Obama saying that he wished there were more Islamist leaders like AKP Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in the Arab ummah of the Middle East. Erodgan’s threatening to invade Syria to build a buffer zone to do what,protect shrines of ancient Ottoman Sultans. We bet he’s mad at the Kurdish HDP party, that together with the Kemalist CHP and Nationalist HNP, thwarted his dream of becoming the Sultan of a neo-Ottoman empire with the minority parties copping a plurality of votes in the June 7th parliamentary elections. He’s also mad at the plucky Syrian Kurds for beating back the ISIS in a string of victories this month. This despite bloody raids by ISIS on both Kobani and Hasakah that were beaten back.

Those Kurdish actions may have cut off the main route for those foreign fighters that Turkey gives a wink and a nod to backed by funds and assistance from the infamous Muslim Brotherhood global IHH charity, You remember IHH? They backed the infamous 2010 Free Gaza Flotilla Mavi Marmara incident infamy. We wrote about IHH caught sending cash and weapons from Turkey into Syria for brothers in AQ and, ahem, ISIS. We bet the Turkish military isn’t so keen to do Erdogan’s bidding given their NATO membership and because the 45 days aren’t up to see if a ruling minority government can be formed or a new election is called so that Erdogan might return his Premier, Ahmet Davutoglu to power with a super majority.

Since the Obama White House doesn’t want to give the Syrian Kurds perhaps U.S. Rep. Trent Franks (R-AZ) and Senate Armed Forces Committee Chairman Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) can put the squeeze on Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter to release those quality weapons from the U.S. War Reserve Stock already positioned in Israel. Perhaps this Daily Beast report may be a clarion call to action to deliver the quality weapons fro both Syrian Kurds and Iraqi Peshmerga to push back ISIS. They are the only boots on the ground doing this successfully. I’ve said my piece and more in a forthcoming July NER article with the apt title “Empowering Kurdistan”. watch for its release on Tuesday June 30th.

EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared in the New English Review. The featured image is of female Kurdish fighters prepare to fight to the death to defend their homes against the Islamic State.

VIDEO: Islamic State Marks Gay Marriage Ruling by Throwing 4 Gay Men Off a Roof

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Yet gay activists in the West tend to side with Leftists who consider resistance to jihad terror to be “Islamophobia.” Suicidal short-sightedness.

Apparently the Islamic State was not moved to repentance by photos of gay marriage supporters — which will come as a surprise to the editors of Foreign Policy.

“Horrific moment ISIS kill four gay men by throwing them from a roof,” by Jamie Lewis, Mirror, June 27, 2015:

A sickening new ISIS video shows four gay men being thrown to their deaths from the roof of a building.

The footage was posted on the day the historic legislation of same-sex marriage was passed in the US.

Twitter account @Raqqa_Sl, which campaigns to end the violence in Syria, tweeted photos from the execution in the Syrian city of Deir ez-Zor.

Sick: Militants secure a man before throwing him to his death

A video uploaded by the campaigners showed the men being forced to queue on a five-storey building before being thrown over the edge.

No screams are audible as they fall to their deaths.

Hundreds of people living under the Islamic caliphate gathered to watch the brutal execution.

Spectators can be heard gasping in an atrocious scene as the men died one after another, with their corpses piling up on the ground.

Yesterday marked one of the greatest steps in gay rights history after a landmark Supreme Court decision making same-sex marriage a right for everyone in the US.

It has been suggested that the Islamic extremists flung four men from a rooftop before allowing them to plunge to their deaths to ‘celebrate’ the occasion.

Many ISIS extremists online were seen to ironically use the hashtag #LoveWins – a rallying tweet for gay rights campaigners across the globe….

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Guardian: Motives of Muslim who beheaded man “remain unclear”

U.S. officials warn of Islamic State July 4 attacks

California: Mortars discovered, highway shut down

“Islamic State in Palestine” tells Christians to leave by Ramadan’s end or be killed