Tag Archive for: Al Jazeera

Hamas And Al-Jazeera, A Decades-Long Symbiotic Relationship

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Qatar, Palestinians | MEMRI Daily Brief No. 631

As the conflict between Israel and Hamas in Gaza went on day after day, Al-Jazeera dubbed it “Gaza Resists” and used the phrase in all of its advertising and promos for continuing news coverage. Once the war seemed to die down and even end, the Qatari pan-Arab broadcaster switched from “Gaza Resists” to “Gaza has triumphed.”

But this was not the current war in Gaza unleashed by Hamas on October 7, 2023, but a war a decade earlier – Operation Protective Edge – waged in July-August 2014. In this earlier conflict, the symbiotic relationship between Al-Jazeera and Hamas was in sharp relief as the broadcaster followed closely Hamas’s own guidelines to the media on how to portray the conflict. The Hamas Ministry of the Interior and National Security had issued a video directive for “Facebook activists” to follow on reporting the war.[1] As The National Interest reported at the time, “the channel’s Gaza coverage seems to have taken its cues from Hamas’ own media playbook.”[2]

The network not only provided wall-to-wall coverage of the war but also gave unstinting, positive, uncut, and premium coverage to Hamas leaders. This included a 40-minute speech and press conference by Hamas political leader Khalid Meshaal but also messages from Hamas’s military wing and from the allied Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) group. Such a scenario of collaboration between Hamas and Al-Jazeera would be repeated in subsequent years. In May 2021, after the end of two weeks of fighting between Hamas in Israel, Hamas political chief in Gaza Yahya Sinwar would be seen on Al-Jazeera giving a victory speech while praising the Qatari broadcaster as “the best pulpit to give the accurate voice to our position.”[3]

Origins

But the historical record of Al-Jazeera’s open support for Palestinian terrorist operations goes back much further. As early as November 1999, Al-Jazeera had invited Hamas leaders to talk about their “resistance” operations against Israel, and in doing so shattered the long-standing Arab media hegemony of Fatah and the PLO. In 2005, after the full Israeli withdrawal from the Gaza Strip, Al-Jazeera carried footage of Hamas Friday sermons and military parades held in the abandoned Israeli compounds to celebrate the withdrawal.[4] This included remarks by Sheikh Nizar Rayyan, a cleric who was also a senior official in the military wing of Hamas: “The vanquishing of the enemy in Gaza does not mean that this stage has ended. We still have Jerusalem and the pure West Bank. We will not rest until we liberate all our land, all our Palestine. We do not distinguish between what was occupied in the 1940s and what was occupied in the 1960s. Our Jihad continues, and we still have a long way to go. We will continue until the very last usurper is driven out of our land.”

At the same 2005 event, Hamas spokesman Mushir Al-Masri commented on Al-Jazeera that liberating Gaza was like liberating Tel Aviv, both were the same. He added a phrase that would become quite famous in the West in 2023: “the weapons of the resistance that you see here will remain, Allah willing, so that we can liberate Palestine – all of Palestine – from the [Mediterranean] Sea to the [Jordan] River, whether they like it or not.”[5]

Indeed, the cause of Palestine would be a staple of Al-Jazeera coverage and the media campaigns built by the network around conflict in the Holy Land would be a constant. Other causes would come and go. In 2006, Al-Jazeera’s championing of Hezbollah and Hassan Nasrallah during the Tammuz War with Israel succeeded in making the cleric a famous and beloved figure in the region, if only for a few years until Nasrallah sent his fighters into the Syrian Civil War on the side of the Assad regime.

Other media campaigns, especially in the early years after 2001, focused on fawning coverage of Osama bin Laden and Al-Qaeda and later the head of Al-Qaeda in Iraq (later to become the Islamic State or ISIS) Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi. Just as there was a moment when Lebanon was the issue, Iraq had its moment, as did Egypt when Hosni Mubarak was overthrown and the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood came to power. In all these incidences – Palestine, Lebanon, Iraq, Egypt, and many others – Al-Jazeera was always consistent, taking the side of the Islamist, anti-Western, and anti-Israel part, the hero in the network’s narrative. And yet even when it came to Palestine, Palestinian officials, from the time of Arafat to this day, would sometimes complain that the Qatari network preferred the Islamists (Hamas) over the Palestinian Authority and its security forces.[6]

The bias should come as no surprise. It was baked in from the beginning. Both Hamas and Al-Jazeera come from the same root, from various iterations of the regional Muslim Brotherhood political organization. Hamas, officially dating from December 1987, was a Palestinian offshoot of local Islamist groups heavily influenced by the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood. Al-Jazeera, launched in November 1996, began from a cell of staffers initially hired and then fired by BBC Arabic.

Early Al-Jazeera staffers had ties to the Syrian and Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood. The network’s director for many of those early formative years (2003-2011) was Palestinian Wadah Khanfar. A subsequent director, the Jordanian Yasir Abu Hilaleh (2014-2018) was a well-known Islamist.[7] And looming over all the channel’s staff, no matter their personal preference or orientation, was Qatar’s openly Islamist foreign policy, not just strongly pro-Palestinian but strongly Palestinian Islamist as it favored similar causes elsewhere, from Turkey’s Erdoğan to Afghanistan’s Taliban.[8] The support and the bias in favor of Hamas and Islamist causes is both institutional and personal.[9]

And the cross-fertilization on the screen among Al-Jazeera’s (and Qatar’s) various pet causes and favorites – Hamas, Erdoğan’s Turkey, Jihadism, Political Islam, antisemitism – was always there through the years. You might see Erdoğan on Palestine, Hamas’s Khalid Meshaal praising Al-Jazeera cleric Yussef Al-Qaradawi or Hamas speaking on antisemitism. So, for example, a 2016 Al-Jazeera interview with Hamas leader Mahmoud Al-Zahhar included the charge that President-Elect Trump was possibly a Jew, but that even if he was not, “he loves the Jewish religion and even more, Jewish money.”[10] Sinwar was not mistaken when he called Al-Jazeera, the best of pulpits.

Senior Hamas official Mahmoud Al-Zahhar on Al-Jazeera, November 8, 2016.

More War, More Popularity

Al-Jazeera was deeply interested in and invested in the cause of Palestine but what was the receptivity of the Palestinians themselves to the influence of the Qatari network? The most recent Shikaki (PCPSR) Poll (carried out May 26-June 1, 2024) reported that “Al-Jazeera is the most-watched TV station in Palestine with 68% selecting it as the one they watched the most during the past two months. West Bankers are more likely than Gazans to watch Al-Jazeera, 82% and 46% respectively [partly due to the inability of many in Gaza to watch TV]. The distant second most popular TV station is Hamas’s own Al-Aqsa (4%) followed by Palestine TV (3%), Palestine Today, Saudi-owned Al Arabiya, Ma’an and pro-Iranian Al-Mayadeen (2% each).”[11] Similarly, the previous Shikaki poll, published in March 2024, found Al-Jazeera to be the most watched (61%) with the second-place station at only 4% (Palestine Today).[12]

While all polling in the Middle East, even the well-respected PCPSR polls, should always be treated with caution, these results generally ring true. The latest results are even more striking if one looks at the last poll before the current war, from early September 2023, we see that Al-Jazeera was still then most watched station at that time but the figures were much lower – 28% with Hamas’s Al-Aqsa a distant second at 11% (4% on the West Bank, 22% in Gaza).[13] The percentage of Palestinians watching Al-Jazeera has more than doubled since the outbreak of the war – 28% in September 2023, 61% in March 2024, and 68% in May 2024.

Covering the Gaza War has been a priority for the channel from October 7. A key part of Al-Jazeera’s effectiveness as a media or propaganda outlet is its willingness to lavishly devote airtime and resources to breaking news, particularly to news events of its own choosing. So that the network in a sense does not just cover the news, it makes it, working closely with its political and militarized partners (in this specific case, Hamas and its allies). This is especially true in covering live events that conform with and shape a previously expressed narrative. As Brussels-based Palestinian activist Amjad Abu Koush has noted: “It seems that five months of annihilation are not enough for Al-Jazeera TV, in its efforts to garner as much viewers and like-clicks as possible.”[14]

It is that specific combination of breaking news and propagandistic spin that has made Al-Jazeera so popular among Palestinian audiences. That is the likely reason why its viewership seems to have more than doubled. It is telling its viewers both what they think they need to know, in terms of coverage, and also what they want to hear, in terms of an overall narrative.

A Consistent Narrative

And what is Al-Jazeera’s narrative, specifically when it comes to Palestine? There is a sturdy consistency going back more than two decades to the current Al-Aqsa Flood War of 2023-2024.

First of all, in the Al-Jazeera narrative on Palestine, Palestine is not “winning” (it is certainly not losing) but rather it (in this case “Gaza”) has already won.[15] The “victory” in the current war was not achieved, as in other conventional conflicts, with the situation at the end of the war but rather announced at the beginning. October 7 is portrayed as a victory in a way as if December 7, 1941, was both the beginning and the defining moment of the conflict between Japan and the United States. As if the conflict had ended with the deterrence or shock inflicted on the Americans on that day.

Al-Jazeera fired the first media shots of the war. The October 7 war was formally first announced in a recording by Hamas military commander Muhammad Deif on Al-Jazeera, a fact that shows a high level of coordination and appreciation by Hamas of the role Al-Jazeera had played in previous conflicts and would play in this one. In that recording Deif called on all Palestinians elsewhere, not just in Gaza but also on the West Bank and inside Israel to rise up with any weapon they had on hand.

Since that date Al-Jazeera has essentially functioned as Hamas TV around the clock, making it, unsurprisingly, essential watching for Palestinians trying to understand what is happening on the ground.[16] That thirst for knowledge comes with a price as information is filtered through the Hamas and Al-Jazeera ideological lens.[17]
The Qatari channel’s direct material support and service to the Hamas war effort are both massive and multi-faceted and have included:

  • Broadcasting threats by Hamas leaders and leaders of other terror organizations;
  • Celebrating and praising the terror attack and missile attacks on Israel;
  • Airing hostage videos to exert pressure on the Israeli government;
  • Broadcasting military announcements on an almost daily basis;[18]
  • Airing footage on military encounters and the killing of IDF soldiers;
  • Broadcasting near IDF troops and airing analysis by military experts to advise Hamas fighters on recommended tactics and maneuvers;
  • Pinpointing potential Israeli quality targets;
  • Fabricating anti-Israel propaganda;
  • Fabricating information designed to thwart Israel’s instructions to the Gaza population;
  • Silencing any criticism of Hamas, and constantly rebroadcasting Hamas war propaganda focusing on IDF soldiers killed in the fighting; Hamas statements in Hebrew inciting the Israeli public against its government, including scenes from the current hostage families’ demonstrations in Israel; and Hamas propaganda referring to every city, town, and community inside Israel as a “settlement”;
  • Describing the hostages abducted by Hamas on October 7 as “convicted prisoners” – equating them with the convicted Hamas terrorists in Israeli prisons – and referring to the young Palestinian adults in Israeli custody as “children”;
  • and Propagating the lie that IDF soldiers raped Palestinian women during the attack on Hamas terrorists at Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza.[19]

As Al-Jazeera columnist Hani Ismail Muhammad, an Egyptian Islamist based in Turkey, wrote on the channel’s website on October 12, 2023, “to complete the victory, Muslims in the east and west of the globe must and should show solidarity with Palestine and Gaza and with the Resistance and its battle.”[20] The late Ismail Haniyeh, the head of Hamas’s Political Bureau, underscored the already-won victory in remarks broadcast live by Al-Jazeera on January 9, 2024: “We should hold on to the victory that took place on October 7 and build upon it,” and he added: “Time is on our side.”[21]

Retired Jordanian Major General Fayiz Al-Dwairi pontificating on Al-Jazeera (July 2024)

One key part of the victory narrative on Al-Jazeera in this war (2023-2024) has been the skewed commentary provided by its chief military analyst Fayiz Al-Dwairi, a retired Jordanian Major General and military engineer.[22] In a glowing profile written by Al-Jazeera staff and posted on its website in January 2024, Al-Dwairi is described as “the Analyst of the Resistance,” beloved and eagerly followed by Hamas fighters. And it should be no surprise that he is popular. The piece goes on to gush that Al-Dwairi “was known for his optimistic assessment of the performance of the Palestinian resistance after the Al-Aqsa flood.”[23] According to the article, while praising the qualities of the Hamas fighter over the IDF soldier, and pointing out the supposed inadequacies of Israeli equipment, Al-Dwairi rhapsodized about Hamas’s military prowess, “there is nothing like it in military history from Alexander the Great until today.”[24]

The victory narrative has real power to inspire the masses but it is not fool proof. What Al-Jazeera has been doing is similar to what the organization calling itself the Islamic State or ISIS did in its own propaganda from 2013 on – projecting the image of victory. The presentation of a narrative of success – whether military advances or political progress or steadfastness, etc. – is compelling and attractive but only as long as it is somewhat tethered to reality. If the propaganda gets too far away from the reality on the ground, then it produces a reverse reaction where it is not believed. This is somewhat like the boasting of Arab regimes in the June 1967 war with Israel, which then turned out to be false and exposed these regimes to ridicule. Arab regimes – one may remember Iraqi Information Minister “Baghdad Bob” (Muhammad Said Al-Sahhaf) during the 2003 American invasion of Iraq – and terrorist groups have tended to exaggerate, if not actually fabricate events involving military success against the enemy.

But while both Al-Jazeera and Hamas do exaggerate and fabricate, they also know that they cannot fabricate an entirely false reality out of whole cloth. The spin must be selective. So, a Hamas victory narrative must be based on some objective truths, even if clothed in layers of exaggeration. For such an image to be sustained, the war must end in a way that the claims of victory seem somewhat plausible, even if many or most observers know that this is not really true.

The Hamas/Al-Jazeera victory narrative would find its climax in a visual endgame that included something like a defiant and triumphant Yahya Sinwar coming out of a bunker and speaking to the masses in a public event in the ruins of Gaza. Even if the words are empty and the masses rented, such an event would provide a fitting visual conclusion to the victory narrative. Another relatively effective way of doing it would be, of course, an exchange of Palestinian prisoners for Israeli hostages with scenes of public jubilation as the prisoners raise their hands in victory while exalting national and political symbols. Defiance by the living, claims of steadfastness – surviving the conflict – and mass prisoner releases are the tangible badges of victory that have already been used in past wars between terrorist groups and Israel. They were used by Hizbullah and Al-Jazeera in 2006 and by Hamas and Al-Jazeera in 2014.

Still another Al-Jazeera columnist, Yasser Saad Al-Din, put it this way in April 2024: “Israel has been defeated, but has the Resistance won?” The author relied heavily on Israeli opinions about the war and particularly on criticism by internal opponents of the current Israeli government. But on the Palestinian side, there was no criticism but rather conformity, “the resistance has triumphed militarily, morally and even politically over the occupation army.”[25]

A new element in the victory narrative, in contrast with past Gaza conflicts, has been the rise of the pro-Gaza protest movement, especially in the United States, a surprising factor that has not been missed by Hamas or Al-Jazeera. Indeed, even the Houthis in Yemen and Iran’s Supreme Leader have praised the movement. Saad Al-Din depicted Israel as “dismantled as an occupation state in the eyes of Western public opinion.”

An even more tangible example of victory would have been if the war would have brought Hamas to power on the West Bank, replacing Fateh and the PLO. This was certainly one of the reasons for the October 7 war in the first place. It was a possibility dear to the hearts of both Erdoğan’s Turkey and Qatar, two of Hamas’s closest supporters. But this was never something that would have happened immediately once the current conflict concludes. The fact that the destruction in Gaza has been so widespread, and that so many leaders, like Muhammad Deif and Ismail Haniyeh, have been eliminated by the Israelis will make the final attempted selling of that victory narrative so much harder at the end of the day. It was a lot easier to push the victory story earlier in the conflict, less so in August 2024. But some sort of effort will be made nevertheless.

In seeming stark contrast to the victory narrative, but actually complementary to it is the “Palestinians are Victims” narrative. Just as a martyr is in a very real sense both a victor and a victim, so do both Al-Jazeera and Hamas seek to highlight as much as possible the suffering of the Palestinian people, highlighting real events, exaggerating others and fabricating still others.

This narrative also requires the playing down of military casualties while highlighting civilian ones. An entire process of linguistic alchemy is required to be put into action in order to make such an approach work. Teenage gunmen become children, Hamas members become independent journalists, Palestinian profiteering becomes Israeli starvation tactics, collateral damage become intentional targeting, failed Hamas/PIJ missiles falling on Gaza facilities become Israeli airstrikes, as in the notorious blood libel about the Al-Ahli Hospital on October 17, only ten days after the beginning of the war.

AI-generated image of a defeated Netanyahu and Biden (Midjourney) from Al-Jazeera

No story is complete without a villain and, coupled with the segments on “Palestinians as Victors” and – simultaneously – “Palestinians as Victims,” there is a third stool in the narrative: the “Israel is Lacking/Defeated/Finished” component. Military analyst Al-Dwairi on Al-Jazeera describes the Israelis in Gaza as “advancing towards death, fighting without protection against an adversary willing to do anything for victory” and “with great fear for his life, which exposes him to great psychological pressure.” It does not matter that Al-Dwairi’s analysis of this factor or anything else turned out to be wrong, what mattered is that, in the moment, he provided the cover of supposed expert analysis to what was actually advocacy and confirming the preconceived notions of his Arab and, especially Palestinian, audience: Hamas was winning and the Israelis, as soldiers and as people, were losing, lacking or inferior, solely propped up, if that, by technological prowess given to them by the Americans. As Arab-American columnist Hussain Abdul-Hussain said recently, if you follow Al-Jazeera and other Islamist media, there are “76 years of Israeli failure and Palestinian successes.”[26]

Given these factors and the sheer weight and breadth of Al-Jazeera coverage on the Gaza War (analyst Al-Dwairi was featured almost daily for months), it is then not so surprising that Palestinian audiences have responded by tuning in and by expressing views that are broadly in sync with Al-Jazeera’s narrative. One might ask, what came first? The Al-Jazeera “chicken” or the Hamas “egg” in shaping and influencing public opinion? The reality being that, as we have shown, both entities came from a common root and shared a common, deeply held, worldview. And both reflect views already held by a significant percentage of the Palestinian population. When asked in a May 2023 poll what has been the most positive or the best thing that has happened to the Palestinian people since 1948, the largest percentage (24%) said that it was the establishment of Islamic movements, such as Hamas and Islamic Jihad and their participation in armed struggle; 21% said that the best thing was the eruption of the first and second intifada. Only 9% saw the establishment of Fateh as the best thing that had happened.[27] The propaganda work of Al-Jazeera on behalf of Hamas was half-done even before the war began.

But important questions remain for the day after. Once the war does end, will Al-Jazeera’s numbers decline, from 68% in the latest poll back to 28% in September 2023? It is quite likely that other conflicts or events will rise elsewhere to capture the channel’s attention – that is the nature of the news business – ­­although Palestine has been a staple of the channel for decades. What could fill the information gap if Al-Jazeera’s numbers decrease? Can the channel’s stranglehold on Palestinian public opinion be challenged? And will there ever be a final reckoning for Al-Jazeera’s shameless and deadly promotion of Hamas and other terrorist groups, not among Palestinian public opinion but, more importantly, by policymakers in Washington? That is the ultimate question.

AUTHORS

Yigal Carmon and Amb. Alberto M. Fernandez

Yigal Carmon is President of MEMRI.

Alberto M. Fernandez is Vice President of MEMRI.

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SOURCES:

[1] Youtube.com/watch?v=VxzZ5cm8ZCw, July 10, 2014.

[2] Nationalinterest.org/feature/the-problem-al-jazeera-11239, September 10, 2014.

[3] See MEMRI Special Dispatch No. 11037, Hamas Leader In Gaza Yahya Sinwar, Israel’s Most Wanted – In His Own Words: ‘We Support The Eradication Of Israel Through Armed Jihad And Struggle; This Is Our Doctrine’; ‘The Brothers In Iran And Hizbullah Spared Us Nothing’, December 22, 2023.

[4] See MEMRI Special Dispatch No. 991, >Hamas Friday Sermons in Abandoned Gaza Settlements on Al-Jazeera TV: ‘We Can Liberate Palestine – From the Mediterranean to the Jordan River’, September 21, 2005.

[5] See MEMRI Special Dispatch No. 991, Hamas Friday Sermons in Abandoned Gaza Settlements on Al-Jazeera TV: ‘We Can Liberate Palestine – From the Mediterranean to the Jordan River’, September 21, 2005.

[6] X.com/KhaledAbuToameh/status/1817408090246967320, July 27, 2024.

[7] Al-ain.com/article/resignation-qatar-yasser-al-jazeera, May 10, 2018.

[8] See MEMRI Inquiry & Analysis No. 1527, Al-Jazeera Unmasked: Political Islam As A Media Arm Of The Qatari State, August 12, 2020.

[9] See Special Dispatch No. 10879, Presenters, Reporters From Qatar’s Al-Jazeera Praise Hamas Attack, Celebrate Israel’s Disaster, October 17, 2023.

[10] See MEMRI TV Clip No. 5758, Hamas Leader Mahmoud Al-Zahhar: Trump Possibly a Jew; Money Is the Jewish Religion, Key to U.S. Decision-Making, November 8, 2016.

[11] Pcpsr.org/en/node/985, May 26-June 1, 2024.

[12] Pcpsr.org/en/node/973, March 5-10, 2024.

[13] pcpsr.org/en/node/955, September 6-9, 2023.

[14] See MEMRI TV Clip No. 10944, Brussels-Based Palestinian Activist Amjad AbuKoush: We Are Paying The Price For 17 Years Of Hamas Policies; Al-Jazeera TV Wants The Bloodshed To Continue So It Can Garner More Viewers And More ‘Likes’; Qatar Has Taken Over Palestinian Decision-Making, March 7, 2024.

[15] See MEMRI JTTM report Canada-Based Pro-Al-Qaeda Cleric: Hamas’ Claims Of Victory Are Absurd, Its Only Accomplishment Is Increasing The Suffering Of Palestinians, February 27, 2024.

[16] See MEMRI Inquiry & Analysis Report No. 1751, Al-Jazeera Arabic: The Qatari-Owned TV Channel That Promotes Islamist Terrorism Worldwide – UPDATED, May 6, 2024.

[17] See MEMRI Special Dispatch No. 10872, Qatar Enabling Hamas’ War Against Israel, October 15, 2023.

[18] See MEMRI TV Clip No. 11011, Al-Jazeera Airs Hamas’s Al-Qassam Brigades Video Calling On Muslims To Join Jihad; Shows Ambush Against Israeli Soldiers, April 10, 2024.

[19] See MEMRI Daily Brief No. 587, Al-Jazeera’s Gaza Script Sabotaged By Their Ally Hamas, April 1, 2024.

[20] Aljazeera.net/blogs/2023/10/12/7-%d8%a3%d9%83%d8%aa%d9%88%d8%a8%d8%b1-%d8%a7%d9%84%d9%88%d8%b9%d8%af-%d8%a7%d9%84%d9%85%d9%86%d8%aa%d8%b8%d8%b1-%d9%88%d8%a7%d9%84%d9%88%d9%87%d9%85-%d8%a7%d9%84%d8%b6%d8%a7%d8%a6%d8%b9, October 12, 2023.

[21] See MEMRI Special Dispatch No. 11072, Hamas Leader Ismail Haniyeh: We Should Hold On To The Moment Of The Victory Of October 7 And Build Upon It; Time Is On Our Side; Donations To Gaza Are Not ‘Humanitarian Aid’ But ‘Financial Jihad’, January 10, 2024.

[22] See MEMRI TV Clip No. 11089, Al-Jazeera Military Analyst Fayez Al-Dwairi Explains Anti-Tank Missile Used By Hamas In Gaza, Adds: It Can Penetrate Israel’s Namer APC And Merkava Tank, January 1, 2024.

[23] Aljazeera.net/encyclopedia/2024/1/4/%d9%81%d8%a7%d9%8a%d8%b2-%d8%a7%d9%84%d8%af%d9%88%d9%8a%d8%b1%d9%8a-%d9%85%d8%ad%d9%84%d9%84-%d8%a7%d9%84%d9%85%d9%82%d8%a7%d9%88%d9%85%d8%a9, January 23, 2024.

[24] Aljazeera.net/encyclopedia/2024/1/4/%d9%81%d8%a7%d9%8a%d8%b2-%d8%a7%d9%84%d8%af%d9%88%d9%8a%d8%b1%d9%8a-%d9%85%d8%ad%d9%84%d9%84-%d8%a7%d9%84%d9%85%d9%82%d8%a7%d9%88%d9%85%d8%a9, January 23, 2024.

[25] Aljazeera.net/opinions/2024/4/14/%D9%87%D8%B2%D9%85%D8%AA-%D8%A5%D8%B3%D8%B1%D8%A7%D8%A6%D9%8A%D9%84-%D9%81%D9%87%D9%84-%D8%A7%D9%86%D8%AA%D8%B5%D8%B1%D8%AA-%D8%A7%D9%84%D9%85%D9%82%D8%A7%D9%88%D9%85%D8%A9, April 14, 2024.

[26] X.com/hahussain/status/1818983797553078667, August 1, 2024.

[27] Pcpsr.org/en/node/944, June 7-11, 2023.

Al-Jazeera Journalists By Day, Hamas Commanders By Night

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Qatar, Palestinians | Special Dispatch No. 11388

Since the October 7 attack, Hamas’s leaders have been managing the war from Doha, Qatar, and conveying their messages mostly via the Qatar-owned Al-Jazeera TV channel. The network has been operating as a propaganda outlet in the service of Hamas 24/7, with hardly any coverage of other topics. It expresses unreserved support for Hamas, justifying the deadly attack, showing footage from it obtained from the terrorists’ bodycams, and celebrating it as a victory that has brought pride and honor to the Islamic nation.[1]

It therefore comes as no surprise that it was in the home of Al-Jazeera journalist Abdullah Al-Jamal, in Nuseirat in the Gaza Strip, that three Israeli hostages were held captive.

Some Al-Jazeera journalists have recently been “outed” as Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad fighters. A Palestinian journalist working for Al-Jazeera, Muhammad Wishah, appears to have also been a commander in the military wing of Hamas, according to documents on a laptop found by the Israeli army in a Hamas base in northern Gaza. Wishah, from Al-Buriej in the central Gaza Strip, has featured in Al-Jazeera broadcasts in recent months, with the station identifying him as one of their journalists. According to Israeli military sources, however, Wishah is a prominent commander in Hamas’s anti-tank missile unit, who in late 2022 began working in R&D for the terror group’s air unit. A photo that emerged of Wishah together with Yahya Sinwar suggests warm relations between the two.

Another Al-Jazeera correspondent, Ismail Abu Omar, who participated in the October 7 attack and who documented it from within the Gaza Envelope, was airlifted to Doha for medical treatment on February 19 after being wounded in an Israeli airstrike in Rafah a week earlier. He has been identified as a Hamas platoon deputy commander.

Mustafa Thuraya, an independent journalist who worked with Al-Jazeera TV and Agence France-Press, was, according to documents found by the Israeli army in Gaza, an operative in the Al-Qassam Brigades’ Gaza City Brigade, and he specialized in developing drones. Hamza Al-Dahdouh, another Al-Jazeera journalist and photojournalist, was a member of the electronic engineering unit of the PIJ’s Northern Gaza Brigade.

A document seized by the Israeli army in the Gaza Strip reveals that Hamza Al-Dahdouh was a PIJ military operative and a member of its electronic engineering unit.

Since the recent Israel-Hamas war began, Al-Jazeera has been providing the following services to Hamas:

  • Broadcasting threats by Hamas leaders and leaders of other terror organizations
  • Celebrating and praising the terror attack and missile attacks on Israel
  • Airing videos of hostages to pressure the Israeli government
  • Broadcasting near-daily military announcements
  • Airing footage on military encounters and killings of IDF soldiers
  • Broadcasting near IDF troops and airing analysis by military experts in order to advise Hamas fighters on recommended tactics and maneuvers
  • Pinpointing potential quality Israeli targets
  • Fabricating anti-Israel propaganda
  • Fabricating information designed to thwart Israel’s instructions to the Gaza population
  • Silencing any criticism of Hamas, and constantly rebroadcasting Hamas propaganda focusing on: IDF soldiers killed in the fighting; Hamas statements in Hebrew inciting the Israeli public against its government, including with scenes from the current hostage families’ demonstrations in Israel; and Hamas propaganda referring to every city, town, and community in Israel as a “settlement”
  • Describing the hostages abducted by Hamas on October 7 as “convicted prisoners” – equating them with the convicted Hamas terrorists in Israeli prisons – and referring to Palestinian young adults in Israeli custody as “children”
  • Propagating the lie that IDF soldiers raped Palestinian women during the attack on Hamas terrorists at Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza – see MEMRI Daily Brief No. 587, Al-Jazeera’s Gaza Script Sabotaged By Its Ally Hamas, April 1, 2024.

Source:

[1] See Inquiry & Analysis No. 1751, Al-Jazeera Arabic: The Qatari-Owned TV Channel That Promotes Islamist Terrorism Worldwide – UPDATED, by Yigal Carmon, May 6, 2024.

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Islamic Hatred: The Foundation of the Palestinian/Israeli Conflict

EDITORS NOTE: This MEMRI column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

Report: Noa Argamani was held in Al Jazeera reporter’s apartment

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Arab journalist Abdallah Aljamal killed while reportedly attempting to prevent the rescue of a female hostage he held captive in his apartment.

Noa Argamani, the 26-year-old Israeli woman who was rescued yesterday in a daring raid by the IDF after eight months as a hostage in Gaza, was held in the apartment of an Al Jazeera reporter, according to Open Source Intelligence Monitor, as reported by Israel National News.

According to the report, Noa was held by Abdallah Aljamal, “a photojournalist and writer/editor for both Al-Jazeera and the Palestinian Chronicle.

The Palestinian Chronicle reported that Aljamal was one of the Gazans who was killed during the rescue, which it called the “Nuseirat massacre.” OSIM reported that Aljamal and several members of his family were killed while attempting to prevent the rescue.

Noa was held in a separate apartment and a different building from Andrey Kozlov, Shlomi Ziv, and Almog Meir Jan, who were rescued at the same time.

Noa Argamani’s kidnapping became one of the symbols of Hamas’ attack on Israel. On October 7, a video was published of Argamani and her boyfriend Avinatan Or being kidnapped from the Nova music festival.

Noa’s mother Liora published a video addressed to US President Joe Biden in November begging that he ensure that she would be able to see her daughter one last time due to her terminal brain cancer.

Noa was reunited with her family following her rescue Saturday morning, including both of her parents. She celebrated her father Yaakov’s birthday, which coincided with the day of her rescue.

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EDITORS NOTE: This Newsrael News Desk column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

WATCH: Al-Jazeera films Hamas terrorists storming mosque, then deletes the video!

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It seems that this video was aired inadvertently, and indeed was cut from further repeats of this segment.

Al-Jazeera shows Hamas terrorists storming a mosque and fighting inside it, including using grenades against their own “people”.

Nothing is sacred to these thugs.

Not their religion.

Not people’s lives.

Only their hatred for Jews and other infidels.

When they blame Israel for not “respecting Islam” — remember this!

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EDITORS NOTE: This column with video by NEWSRAEL Editor is republished with permission. All rights reserved.

Hamas is Directly Trying to Influence Biden

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“He wants to keep the fighting going on until the U.S. elections in November for Trump to win.”

While plenty of Hamas supporters are besieging the administration and the Democratic Party, Hamas is more directly trying to manipulate Biden.

Via Al Jazeera. (Not linked for the same reason I don’t directly link Al Qaeda or other Islamic terrorist groups.)

Mohammed Nazzal, a senior Hamas figure, told Al Jazeera that Netanyahu “wants the war to continue to stay in power, and doesn’t want to lose his right-wing coalition.”

“He wants to keep the fighting going on until the US elections in November for Trump to win,” Nazzal said.

Al Jazeera is Qatar’s terrorist propaganda network. The quote is carefully chosen, but who is it aimed at?

Biden, at the very least, and certainly the Democratic Party.

Hamas is trying to play on its fears, to pursue the ‘Netanyahuization’ of Israel that Obama began, and to convince them that Israel isn’t fighting because of Oct 7, but because it’s all a conspiracy to help Trump win.

It’s insane and yet you can expect some to believe it.

AUTHOR

DANIEL GREENFIELD

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EDITORS NOTE: This Jihad Watch column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

How Major News Outlets Use Headlines to Deceive

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Eighty-percent of Americans who bother to read the news at all do not read beyond the headline. So when major news outlets reporting on the violence in Israel in just one 12-hour period failed in their headlines to properly identify the perpetrators of terror attack, or their victims, or the nature of the attack, it is cause for concern. More on this worrisome dereliction of journalistic duty can be found here: “Headlines Hazy on Details in Coverage of Palestinian Terror Attacks,” by Chaim Lax, HonestReporting, August 31, 2023:

Within the span of 12 hours, one Israeli was killed and at least six others were wounded in two separate Palestinian terror attacks.

The first attack occurred on the evening of August 30, when a Palestinian teen from East Jerusalem stabbed a 25-year-old Israeli in the back at the Shivtei Yisrael light rail station. The victim managed to escape before an off-duty Border Police officer shot the terrorist multiple times, ultimately killing him.

Approximately 12 hours later, a Palestinian terrorist rammed a truck into a group of off-duty soldiers walking along the highway near a checkpoint, hit a nearby car and then drove away. Israeli security forces were able to kill the terrorist before he could commit another ramming attack.

In their coverage of these two terror attacks, several news outlets provided vague headlines that left readers with hazy information as to the nature of these attacks.

In the headlines for their reports on the Jerusalem light rail stabbing attack, both the Associated Press (AP) and Agence France-Presse (AFP) wire services focused on the fate of the terrorist while obscuring the identity of his victim and the nature of his attack….

Here is the AP headline: “In latest violence, Israeli police kill Palestinian teen assailant and West Bank bomb hurts Israelis.” The headline is the killing of the “teen assailant” by the Israeli police, but there is no information given about what the “assailant” had done or about the identity of the person attacked. Might that Palestinian, for example, have been throwing rocks at the police? In fact, he had stabbed an Israeli civilian in the back, in an attempt to kill him. And no mention is made of the assailant’s affiliation with a terror group. It turns out that he was “claimed” by both Hamas and the Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigade, both groups proud of the teen assailant’s attempt to murder an Israeli and wanting the credit.

That AP headline was then enlarged so as to mention another attack, but again that new part of the headline — “West Bank bomb hurts Israelis” — does not make clear who planted the bomb that wounded those Israelis. Some might even think the bomb belonged to the Israelis and that this was a “work accident.” Why didn’t AP write “Palestinians plant bomb that injures Israelis”?

The AFP headline about the stabbing was this: “Teenage attacker shot dead after Jerusalem stabbing: police.” This was even more vague than the AP headline, not identifying the “teenage attacker” as a Palestinian, not mentioning that his victim was an Israeli, and failing to note that the attack was not personal but, as the Israelis say, “of a nationalistic character,” meaning it was one more attack designed to drive the hated Jews out of “Palestine, from the river to the sea.” AFP could have had as its headline: “Palestinian terrorist stabs Israeli in back, is shot dead by off-duty Border Police officer.”

Perhaps the most egregious (but unsurprising) headline on the Jerusalem attack came from Al Jazeera, which not only omitted the fact that an innocent Israeli had been stabbed in the back but left out any mention of an attack altogether.

For anyone reading the Al Jazeera headline, it would appear as if a random Palestinian teenager was killed by the Israel Police for no reason. This is the perfect example of how the Qatar-funded news organization conceals reality in order to promote its anti-Israel narrative.

Similar to its report on the Jerusalem light rail stabbing attack, AFP’s initial headline on the truck ramming attack was equally vague and uninformative.

Why did the AFP merely report that three people were injured in a truck ramming attack, omitting the fact that the perpetrator was a Palestinian, and that the victims were Israelis?

Even the first paragraph of this AFP report was hazy with the details, merely referring to the attack being committed by a “truck driver” and that “three people”– not “three Israelis” — had been injured.

In its headline, The Guardian not only omitted the fact that the victims were Israelis but even attempted to minimize the nature of the attack by describing it as “Palestinian motorist drives car into pedestrians.” For all the average reader can tell, this is a simple road accident and not the deliberate mowing down of Israelis by a terrorist bent on killing them….

This was no “motorist” who simply lost control of his car, but a terrorist hellbent on killing Israelis by running them down. The Guardian should have written “Palestinian terrorist rams car into Israeli pedestrians, kills one.”

So it will take organizations such as HonestReporting.com and CAMERA.org to continue their difficult and at times exhausting work of constantly monitoring not just the contents of the media stories about Israel and the Palestinians, but also the headlines of those stories, that for 80% of readers constitute all that they will see.

AUTHOR

HUGH FITZGERALD

EDITORS NOTE: This Jihad Watch column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

VIDEO: Justice Department Designates Al Jazeera ‘Agent of Qatari Government’

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AJ+, a subsidiary of Qatar’s media arm Al Jazeera, will now be required to register in the U.S. as a foreign agent, according to the U.S. Department of Justice.

The Justice Department also declared the Al Jazeera Media Network an “agent of the Qatar government.” Al Jazeera is owned by Qatar’s ruling family.

The new requirement falls under the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA), a safeguard that was put in place in 1938 for the purpose of addressing threats to national security and promoting transparency with respect to influence ops conducted by foreign governments within the U.S.

The act requires that the government, as well as the public, are kept abreast of the source of information coming from foreign governments aiming to influence American public opinion, policy and laws.

Under FARA, AJ+ will have to disclose that information to the government which, in turn, will make the information available on a database accessible to the public.

Al Jazeera spends hundreds of millions of dollars on lobbyists, think-tanks and U.S. universities to influence American public opinion and policy. The emir of Qatar personally appoints its board.

In August of 2013, the network launched Al Jazeera America. Outrage was felt in a number of circles and pressure was put on the channel’s advertisers. Three years later, Al Jazeera America, which generated consistently poor ratings, shut down citing the “economic landscape.

Qatar has a history of aiding and supporting terror groups, including Al-Qaeda, Hamas, the Muslim Brotherhood as well as the Iranian regime.

Al Jazeera media outlets are known for its parroting of the regime’s views. They also have long histories of spreading antisemitism.

In 2019, AJ+ Arabic came under fire for producing a Holocaust-denial video. The video denied exterminations at the Nazi concentration camps and accused “the Zionists” of being the main beneficiary of the Holocaust.

One of the most egregious acts by the network occurred in 2008 when Al Jazeera made an on-air birthday party for notorious Palestine Liberation Front terrorist Samir Kuntar.

In 1979, Kuntar headed a group of four terrorists who infiltrated Israel, killed a policeman, broke into an apartment and shot a father to death and murdered his four-year old daughter by smashing her skull against a rock. During the attack, the mother, who was hiding with her two-year old daughter, accidentally smothered the child to death trying to keep her quiet.

In the letter sent to AJ+, the Justice Department noted that the Qatari government was free to “withdraw or limit funding at any time.”

The letter coincided with a visit to the U.S. by top-ranking officials from Qatar to strengthen US-Qatar diplomatic and economic relations.

Other media outlets required to register as foreign agents include Russia’s RT and Sputnik, Turkish public broadcaster TRT, and five Chinese media outlets

The letter was also sent the day before two historic peace treaties were signed with Israel by the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Bahrain. The two countries are among a number of Arab countries at odds with Qatar over their support of terror.

While Left-wing media outlets opined that the designation was pushed by the UAE as a condition to signing the treaty, the UAE ambassador to the U.S. flatly denied that claim.

“At no point in our discussions was Al Jazeera or even Qatar raised,” Ambassador Yousef al-Otaiba told The New York Times.

“They [Al Jazeera] are really not as important as they think they are,” al-Otaiba added.

Three years ago, a coalition of Gulf States including Saudi Arabia and the UAE as well as Egypt and other Sunni states in North Africa cut off relations and trade with Qatar for their support of terror.

SEE MORE ON JAZEERA & QATAR

Questioning Qatar’s Terror Financing? Here Are the Facts

Al Jazeera Opens Propaganda Front on U.S. Shores

Northwestern University Partners with Al Jazeera

Al Jazeera Wants You to Hate Thanksgiving

Al Jazeera Arabic: Should All the Alawites Be Slaughtered?

Islamic Scholar Pledges Allegiance to ISIS on Al Jazeera

New York Times Shills for Al Jazeera

Rep. Sherman on Al Jazeera: Your Owners Fund Hamas

Watch Clarion Project’s latest documentary Covert Cash on the influence foreign money has on American Universities:

EDITORS NOTE: This Clarion Project video is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

Obama faces Veto Dilemmas at the United Nations and 114th Congress

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As 2014 was closing a vote on a draft resolution introduced by the Jordanian UN Ambassador at the Security Council hit what may be a temporary speed bump for PA President Abbas. He is striving g to impose a draconian solution to the long simmering dispute on the Jewish nation of Israel. The draft resolution failed to achieve the requisite 9 votes, losing by one vote.  The US and Australia voted no.  Five others abstained including the UK, Lithuania, South Korea and Nigeria. France, Luxembourg, Russia, China, Jordan, Chile, Argentina, and Chad voted in favor of the draft resolution. The draft resolution sought to fix a one year deadline for negotiations on declaration of a Palestinian state with its capital in East Jerusalem based on the infamous War 1949 Armistice line. What fabled Israeli Foreign Minister Abba Eban deemed the “Auschwitz line”.  The draft resolution would require the end of the alleged ‘occupation’ of the West Bank by Israel losing its control over the Jordan Valley approaches and protection of over 350,000 Israelis in both Samaria and Judea.

Virtually on the announcement of the vote, PA President Abbas, now serving in the tenth year of an elected four year term, signed 20 UN covenants including the Rome Treaty making it eligible for observer status at the International Criminal Court (ICC) at The Hague. That would enable it to bring a charge of war crimes against Israel. This will confront the ICC with a choice between recognition of anti-Israel issues versus international law matters. Further, the unilateral move by Abbas will likely cause the incoming GOP led Congress to consider retaliatory legislation further consternating Administration diplomacy in the region.  Israeli PM Netanyahu countered saying:

The one who should fear the International Criminal Court at The Hague is the Palestinian Authority, which is in a unity government with Hamas, a declared terrorist organization like ISIS that commits war crimes.

We will take steps in response and we will defend the soldiers of the IDF, the most moral army in the world. We will repel this latest effort to force diktats on us, just as we have repelled the Palestinian turn to the UN Security Council.

 US UN Ambassador Power blasted the PA vote because it precluded consideration of security guarantees outlined in UNSC Res. 242 for Israel to have defensible borders.  She noted in her remarks, “The deadlines in the resolution take no account of Israel’s legitimate security concerns.” The State Department director of its press office, Jeff Rathke, criticized  the PA saying:

 We are deeply troubled by today’s Palestinian action regarding the ICC. Today’s action is entirely counterproductive and does nothing to further the aspirations of the Palestinian people for a sovereign and independent state.

Palestinian Resolution reprise Veto

Besides the ICC ploy, the PA was anything but supine. The change in the non-permanent membership of the UNSC might afford them another opportunity to re-submit the draft resolution, possibly obtaining the requisite 9 votes.   As former US UN Ambassador John Bolton in a Wall Street Journal op Ed published today, “The U.N. Vote on Palestine Was a Rehearsal,”   wrote, “An influx of new Security Council members means a likely ‘yes’ vote – and a veto dilemma for Obama.” Obama, as we have noted previously in Jeffrey Goldberg’s Atlantic interview gave a broad hint that the US might abstain.

Bolton notes in his WSJ op ed the elements of this dilemma that may shortly face the Administration:

A firmer U.S. strategy might have prevented the dilemma from arising. The White House’s opening diplomatic error was in sending strong signals to the media and U.S. allies that Mr. Obama, wary of offending Arab countries, was reluctant to veto any resolution favoring a Palestinian state. Secretary of State John Kerry took pains not to offer a view of the resolution before it was taken up. Such equivocation was a mistake because even this administration asserts that a permanent resolution of the Israeli-Arab conflict requires direct negotiations and agreements among the parties themselves.

No draft resolution contrary to these precepts should be acceptable to the U.S., or worth wasting time on in the diplomatic pursuit of a more moderate version. This American view, advocated for years and backed by resolute threats to veto anything that contradicted it, has previously dissuaded the Palestinians from blue-smoke-and-mirror projects in the Security Council.

Bolton addresses how the reprise could shortly occur:

Several factors support a swift Palestinian reprise. First, they obtained a majority of the Security Council’s votes, even if not the required supermajority of nine. In today’s U.N., the eight affirmative votes constitute a moral victory that virtually demand vindication, and sooner rather than later.

Second, the text of Jordan’s resolution was wildly unbalanced even by U.N. standards—for example, it demands a solution that “brings an end to the Israeli occupation since 1967,” and calls for “security arrangements, including through a third-party presence, that guarantee and respect the sovereignty of a State of Palestine.” A few meaningless tweaks here and there and several countries that abstained could switch to “yes.” Third, on Jan. 1 five of the Security Council’s 10 nonpermanent members stepped down (their two-year terms ended), replaced by five new members more likely to support the Palestinian effort.

Consider how Wednesday’s vote broke down, and what the future may hold. Three of the Security Council’s five permanent members (France, China and Russia) supported Jordan’s draft. France’s stance is particularly irksome, since it provides cover for other Europeans to vote “yes.” The U.K. timidly abstained, proving that David Cameron is no Margaret Thatcher; the abstention signals that a more “moderately” worded resolution might be enough to flip London to a “yes.”

Washington cast the only permanent member’s “no” vote, which is characterized as a veto only when nine or more Security Council members vote in a draft resolution’s favor. Will President Obama now have the stomach to cast a real veto against a U.N. Charter majority backing the Palestinians? Is this the point where the “liberated” Mr. Obama allows a harsh anti-Israel resolution to pass?

Happy New Year, Jerusalem.

He notes the lineup of new rotating non-permanent members in the UNSC that could tip the vote over the required 9 votes:

Three “yes” votes came from Jordan, Chad and Chile, which all remain Security Council members in 2015. Two additional supporters, Argentina and Luxembourg, have been replaced, respectively, by Venezuela (no suspense there) and Spain. Spain narrowly won election in October, defeating Turkey after three ballots. Madrid might be expected to support Washington, but not necessarily, given recent EU hostility to Israel and the appeasers’ argument to soothe wounded Muslim feelings about Turkey’s loss by backing the Palestinians.

Only Australia joined the U.S. in voting “no.” Its successor, New Zealand, would either have abstained or voted affirmatively, according to Foreign Minister Murray McCully.

South Korea abstained, but its replacement, Malaysia, is a certain affirmative vote. Angola, taking Rwanda’s seat, is an abstention at best. While abstainers Lithuania and Nigeria remain, Nigeria’s Boko Haram problem could easily move it to “yes” as an olive branch to the Muslim world. And Lithuania, as a new member of the euro currency union, could well succumb to arguments for EU solidarity, especially if Britain also surrenders.

Bolton notes in conclusion:

The Obama administration can only prevent what it dreads by openly embracing a veto strategy, hoping thereby to dissuade pro-Palestinian states from directly confronting the U.S.

And if that fails, the veto should be cast firmly and resolutely, as we normally advocate our principles, not apologetically. As so often before on Middle Eastern issues, a veto would neither surprise nor offend most Arab governments. If the Administration had courage enough to make clear that a veto was inevitable, it would minimize whatever collateral damage might ensue in Arab lands. But don’t hold your breath.

Iran Sanctions Veto

However, this is not the only veto dilemma facing the Administration in 2015.   On Tuesday, December 30, 2014, Reuters reported  that Undersecretary of The Treasury for Finance and Terrorism, David Cohen issued new financial sanctions “against nine targets who Washington says have helped Tehran avoid existing sanctions or commit human rights abuses.”    The IRNA news agency noted these comments by an Iranian foreign ministry spokeswoman, Marzieh Afkham saying: “At a time negotiations are underway with P5+1, such a move raises doubts about America’s intentions and violates the good will principles” “This action is for mere publicity and will have no bearing whatsoever on our commercial policies,”

Just prior to the onset of Republican control of the 114th Session of Congress on January 6, 2015, Illinois Senator Mark Kirk gave an interview on December 28, 2014  on Fox News Sunday following statements by South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham that new sanctions against Iran’s nuclear program may be brought up for an early vote.

That followed an NPR interview with President Obama that he might be prepared to use his veto authority on specific legislation passed by the new Congress.  Kirk in the Sunday Fox interview indicated that 17 Democrats, including New Jersey’s Bob Menendez and New York’s Charles Schumer may have the requisite votes to pass new stronger sanctions legislation against Iran’s nuclear program in view of the Islamic regime fobbing off failed P5+1 negotiations . Those 17 Democratic Senate votes would make such a measure veto proof. This puts President Obama in a difficult situation regarding his engagement of the Islamic Regime in Tehran. A regime that has successfully outmaneuvered the P5+1 and Administration and likely has already achieved nuclear breakout. Omri Ceren chronicled this in a Commentary article,“Enabling Iran’s Nukes” saying, “The lies began at the very beginning with American assurances had secured a ‘halt’ in Iranian nuclear program.”   This is a matter of great concern to Israel’s PM Netanyahu who would support such Congressional action on tougher Iran sanctions.  Watch the Fox News interview with Sen. Kirk.

Iran is feeling the ravaging of its economy due to the loss of revenue from oil and gas production.  Given the precipitous fall in world energy prices, due in part to the drop in demand and the vaulting of US energy production to first rank in 2015.  That has forced Iran to suggest that fellow OPEC member Saudi Arabia cooperates to cut production. This is an unlikely prospect since the Saudis are unwilling to relent given their $750 billion dollar hard currency reserve cushion.

We shall shortly see whether President Obama will issue vetoes at the UNSC against a reprise of the Palestinian draft resolution and another against tougher sanctions legislation passed on a bi-partisan basis in the new Republican controlled Congress against the Iranian nuclear program.

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

Geert Wilders’ Anti-Islamization Immigration Stand Resonates Across Europe

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Geert Wilders, leader of the Freedom Party (PVV) in the Netherlands is being investigated for the second time in five years by Dutch prosecutors for  alleged hate speech during  his March 2014 local election campaign rally statement of “fewer Moroccans”.  This comes while his ratings in Dutch polls has rocketed him to the top with fully 30 seats in the Hague parliament, if snap elections were held.  That is more than the combined seats currently held by the ruling Rutte coalition of the PvdA and VVD parties.  Note  this remark: “The short message of PVV-leader Geert Wilders to the Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte: ‘The revolution in The Netherlands has started now, Mark.”

Poll 21-12-2014

Dutch polls 12-21-14. For a larger view click on the image.

Wilders drew attention to that irony in a Wall Street Journal (WSJ) op-ed, “Talking About the Moroccan Issue is not A Crime”.  Wilders is exercising free speech, something that Americans take for granted as a right guaranteed under the First Amendment of the US Constitution.  Wilders’ message about “fewer Moroccans” reflects the social consequences of permissive mass Muslim immigration undermining the social fabric of foundational  Western values of, liberty, freedom and tolerance. In Holland’s case it is exemplified by the rejection of those values by the Dutch Moroccan émigré community that even Dutch liberal parties have begrudgingly come to recognize.

What Wilders’ PVV and other parties in EU countries deemed ‘far right” have drawn attention to is the seeds of destruction of national values from compliance with UN humanitarian refugee programs straining resources and social welfare budgets caused by Jihadist warfare in the Middle East.  That is reflected in the rallies in Dresden and throughout major cities in Germany this Christmas season by the Pegida movement (Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamization of the West).

As Al Jazeera reported Pegida rallies for “the right to preserve and protect our Christian-Jewish dominated West culture”, and against parallelgesellschaft – a German term used to describe immigrant communities that maintain their cultural norms and don’t integrate in local society.”  The third mass Pegida rally of more than 17,500 occurred Monday night before the Semper Opera House in Dresden where the Pegida movement arose in October. The trigger for Pegida was the more than 200,000 Syrian refugees granted asylum by Germany. Recently, the short lived Swedish Social Democrat liberal government fell on a no confidence vote allegedly provoked by the anti-immigration Swedish Democrat party. It had forged an alliance with center right parties in Sweden’s parliament over the issue of a ballooning social welfare budget to accommodate 80,000 Syrian war asylumees.

Participants hold German national flags during a demonstration organised by anti-immigration group PEGIDA in Dresden

Pegida Rally  Semper Opera House Dresden, Germany 12-22-14. Source: Reuters.

Wilders’ WSJ op-ed reflects the Dutch unease with the policies of the ruling coalition government in the Hague  Parliament. Those concerns have  that has now cross the EU and even here in America to comply with UN humanitarian refugee standards.  The subsequent generations of Muslim émigrés in host EU countries have led to spikes in Antisemitism, Synagogue fire bombings, allegations of sexual assault and grooming of non-Muslim women, tolerance of Shariah law in so-called Muslim dominated “no go areas”, murders perpetrated in the name of Jihad against Jews and others.  The specter stalking across the EU landscape of 28 members is the threat of homegrown Jihadists as returning veterans from the barbaric Salafist Islamic State.  That threat was crystallized by the murders of Israeli tourists and workers at the Brussels Municipal Jewish Museum by returning Syrian war French jihadist Mehdi Nemmouchet.

The large Muslim émigré communities in the EU were the results of granting host country citizenship coupled with the deficit in manpower to rebuild Europe following World War II. It was also a reflection  of the Eurabia paradigm articulated by the scholar Bat Ye’or  driven by OPEC control  over the  World’s and EU’s energy needs that arose during the October War of 1973. That led to the EC and the EU ‘accommodation’ of  Organization of Islamic Cooperation demands for tolerance of Sharia Blasphemy codes  demanded  by burgeoning Muslim émigré communities under the guise of host country hate laws.

That is the wind behind Wilders’ WSJ op–ed and the sudden emergence of groups like Pegida in Germany, and anti-Mass immigration parties in Denmark, Austria and Sweden.

Geert Wilders

Hon. Geert Wilders, PVV.

Note these excerpts from Wilders’ WSJ op-ed:

In the Netherlands, as in many other Western European countries right now, problems arise when Muslim immigrants refuse to assimilate and integrate into the wider community. In our case I referred specifically to the Moroccans not because I have anything against them generally but because they are one of the largest immigrant groups here and are over represented in our crime and welfare statistics.

Moroccans are suspects in violent robberies 22 times as often as indigenous Dutch. Between 1996 and 2010, more than 60% of the Moroccan male youths born in 1984 had at least once been suspected of a crime, a rate three times as high as their indigenous counterparts. … According to Dick Schoof, the Dutch national coordinator for counterterrorism and security, Moroccans also account for three-quarters of all Dutch Muslims who leave for Syria to wage jihad.

[…]

For almost a decade, my party has proposed three measures to address this issue. First, we want an end to immigration from Muslim countries. Second, we want to expel all criminals of foreign nationality and, for those offenders who have dual nationality, deprive them of their Dutch citizenship, sending them back to the country of their other nationality. Third, we want to encourage the voluntary repatriation of non-Western immigrants.

The prosecutor’s decision can’t be seen as being anything but politically motivated, especially when he has refused to prosecute two leading politicians of the governing Labor Party, Diederik Samsom and Hans Spekman, for similar statements on Moroccans. Mr. Samsom said that Moroccans have an “ethnic monopoly” on street crime, while Mr. Spekman said that Moroccans who don’t abide by the law have to be “humiliated in front of their own people.”

Polls have indicated that more than 43% of Netherlanders agree with me…. I was thus expressing the feelings of millions in my country. In a democracy, a public debate about important political issues, such as “the Moroccan issue,” shouldn’t be restricted by criminalizing the expression of certain problems and policy proposals.

 […]

Prosecuting me as an elected politician for expressing the opinions of my constituents is absurd. Excluding certain problems from the political debate by making it a crime to discuss them won’t lead to the disappearance of these concerns, let alone contribute to a solution. This prosecution, moreover, is also dangerous. People will begin to lose their trust in the democratic process. Festering political problems do not go away simply because they are kept in a dark corner. I wish the Dutch public prosecutor had been wise enough to see that.

EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared in the New English Review. The featured image is of a protest sign which reads “No Hatred, No Violence, No Koran” at the Pegida rally in Germany. Source: Al Jazeera Yermi Brenner

Saudi-led Gulf Squabble Spells Trouble for Obama?

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The Obama White House and the world media are pre-occupied with Russian President Putin’s grab of the Ukrainian autonomous province of Crimea. There are undertones of “Back to the Future”- meaning a possible return to Cold War era geopolitics with Russia.

Despite that overriding ruckus there was a less well publicized series of events in the Persian Gulf region among members of the Gulf Cooperating Council (GCC). Does this spell trouble ahead for President Obama’s Middle East policies?

At the GCC meeting on March 5th in Riyadh, Qatar was effectively isolated by “sisterly” Sunni Arab states. The Emir of Qatar, a member of the GCC, has been prominent in supporting financial aid and assistance to Muslim Brotherhood (MB) affiliates in Egypt under Morsi, Hamas in Gaza and the Syrian Opposition Council, one of whose leaders is a dual American Syrian citizenLouay Safi.

Virtually on the heels of the squabble at the GCC gathering, Saudi King Abdullah announced decrees on Friday, March 7th. They listed the MB as a terrorist organization along with several AQ affiliates in Syria and Iraq, as well as Shia terrorist groups in North Yemen and in the oil rich Eastern Province. The latter are backed by both Iran’s Qod Force and Hezbollah. This should present problems and potential conflicts of interest for President Obama’s senior National Security advisor Robert Malley and White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough. Both of these men espouse outreach to the MB, Iran and proxies, Hezbollah and Hamas.

This train wreck about to happen has been in development since the July 3, 2013 ouster by Egyptian Gen. al-Sisi of President Morsi in Egypt. Morsi was a former leader of the Muslim Brotherhood endeavoring to create a Sharia compliant constitution with him as Emir. Egypt’s interim government in December 2013 outlawed the MB. This week an Egyptian court went after Hamas, the Gaza affiliate of the MB banning activities in Egypt. Following, the ouster of Morsi, Saudi Arabia and several of members of the GCC provided upwards of $12 billion in financial assistance to the interim Egyptian interim government. The stage now appears set for Gen. Abdel Fateh al-Sisi to run as the country’s President, a harkening back to the days of Gamal Abdel Nasser and the possible return of military autocracy in Egypt.

The flashpoint for the GCC isolation of Qatar was the notorious aged Egyptian MB preacher Yousuf al Qaradawi who had been in exile in Qatar before temporarily returning to Egypt in February 2011. He issued Fatwas for the reconquest of Al Quds (Jerusalem) and preached anti-Semitic hatred to crowds in Tahrir Square. In a January 2009 broadcast from Qatar, al Qaradawisaid about Jews: “kill them, down to the very last one.” While in Doha, Qatar he steadfastly refused to participate in annual International Interfaith Conferences.

A news report by Radaw noted the isolation of Qatar by “sisterly” Sunni Arab states because of the mischief of al Qaradawi and sanctuary provided by the Emir:

The Arab states of the lower Gulf are engaged in the latest and potentially most serious of their periodic family squabbles, which this week provoked three of them to withdraw their ambassadors from tiny Qatar.

The Qatar government expressed regret and surprise at Wednesday’s decision by the “sisterly countries” of Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates and Bahrain, but said it did not plan to retaliate by pulling out its own envoys.

All four states, together with Kuwait and Oman, are members of the GCC.

The official reason for the diplomatic spat is Qatar’s alleged failure to live up to a recent commitment not to interfere in the internal affairs of fellow GCC states.

The three conservative states are particularly distressed that Qatar continued to provide a platform for Yousuf Al Qaradawi, a Qatar-based Egyptian cleric, to use his fiery sermons to attack Saudi Arabia and the UAE despite Riyadh’s threat to freeze relations unless he was silenced.

The scope of King Abdullah’s terrorist designations was reported by Al-Jazeera:

Saudi Arabia has listed the Muslim Brotherhood as a terrorist organization along with two al-Qaeda-linked groups fighting in Syria.

The decree against the Brotherhood, whose Egyptian branch supported the deposed Egyptian president, Mohamed Morsi, was reported on Saudi state television on Friday.

Egypt in December listed the Brotherhood as a terrorist organization, prompting the arrest of members and associates and forcing the Islamist group further underground.

Saudi Arabia also listed Jabhat al-Nusra, which is al-Qaeda’s official Syrian affiliate, and the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (Sham) (ISIS), which has been disowned al-Qaeda, as “terrorist organizations”.

It also listed Shia Huthi rebels fighting in northern Yemen and the little-known internal Shia group, Hezbollah in the Hijaz.

Early in February, 2014, Ayman al Zawahiri at Al Qaeda Central announced that the global Islamic terrorist group had no association with ISIS, instead providing support for the Al Nusrah front fighting against the Assad regime in Syria.  ISIS however has rampaged across the Anbar province in neighboring Iraq overtaking the Sunni town of Fallujah.

About the same time as the AQ ISIS declaration, King Abdullah had announced new counterterrorism policies that were directed against so-called reform movements in the Saudi Kingdom. The Washington Post  reported the new law “states that any act that ‘undermines’  the state or society, including calls for regime change in Saudi Arabia, can be tried as an act of terrorism.” This Saudi law appears  to be in violation of human rights taken for granted in the West, but clearly viewed as seditious in the autocratic and Sharia compliant Wahhabist Kingdom.

These latest Saudi initiatives could have significant implications for the Obama Administration and Secretary Kerry. Kerry is endeavoring to fashion an Israel- Palestinian final status agreement and resolution of the 37 month civil war in Syria.  We noted earlier the presence of Louay Safi as spokesperson for the Syrian Opposition Council at the recent Geneva II plenum talks. Safi was Research Director at the northern Virginia- based MB supported International Islamic Institute of Thought. Moreover, he was also Leadership Development Director at the MB front, the Islamic Society of North America, an unindicted co-conspirator in the 2008  Federal Dallas  trial and convictions of leaders of the Holy Land Foundation. The Muslim charity group had been accused of funneling upwards of $35 million to MB affiliate Hamas. Safi was also invited by the US Army Chief of Staff to lecture troops on Islam at Fort Hood in early December 2009 following the massacre perpetrated by Maj. Nidal Hassan a month earlier. Clearly, Safi’s rise to prominence in the Syrian Opposition Council is indicative of the MB controlling presence.

White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough and senior National Security Aides were present at the May 2012 meetings of the Brookings Doha Center in Qatar. They were engaged in outreach to MB officials from Egypt, Tunisia and other Arab states and facilitated assistance to ousted President Morsi. Obama Appointments of MB members, especially Department of Homeland Security Assistant Secretary for Policy, Arif Alikhan and Senior Advisory board member Mohamed Elibiary have been problematic. National Security Advisor Malley was a former Middle East foreign policy aide to President Clinton during the failed 2000 Camp David Israel-Palestinian negotiations between former Israeli PM Ehud Barak and the late Yassir Arafat. Malley had accused Israel of nixing the agreement, when it was evident that Arafat had purposely sabotaged it. Malley went on to become head of the Middle East and North African program of the International Crisis group and later advised then Senator Obama and was part of the President’s transition team. He holds views that may further complicate Administration Middle East policies.  Malley propounded speaking with terrorist proxies Hamas and Hezbollah as well as the MB. Malley, was recently appointed to the National Security Council. He has the portfolio for Israel -Palestinian peace talks and the Iran nuclear P5+1 diplomatic initiative.

Now that Egypt and Saudi Arabia have designated the MB as a terrorist group, would the Obama Administration dare follow their lead? How Messrs. McDonough, Malley and Secretary of State Kerry will contend with a plethora of problems arising from efforts by the Egyptian government and now the Saudi led GCC targeting the MB is a ‘puzzlement’.

EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared on The New English Review.

Obama’s Faceoffs with Putin and Netanyahu

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Washington was the center of contretemps over Putin’s seizure of Crimea and widening public differences with visiting Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu

We recently interviewed Michael Rubin of the American Enterprise Institute and reviewed of his new book Dancing with the Devil: The Perils of Engaging Rogue Regimes. (See The Peril of Engaging Rogue States: An Interview with Dr. Michael Rubin  and Engagement is Folly}.

Putin, according to Rubin is the consummate zero sum geo -politician. Diplomacy for the Kremlin thugocracy pales in comparison to unleashing military adventurism to recreate the former Soviet empire. Witness Georgia in 2008 with the severance of South Ossetia, Abkhazia and even the Kremlin support for Russian speaking breakaway state of Transnistria between the Ukraine and Moldavia. Remember Putin abhors NATO presence anywhere near the Russian sphere of influence. See the prescient title of a piece I wrote back in August 2008, Georgia: “Moscow Rules” and the West Wimps Out.  We had Bush and Condoleezza Rice back then.

The 1991 Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) witnessed the transfer of nearly 2000 nuclear missiles to Russia followed by 1994 Budapest Memorandum on Security Assurances by the UK, US and Russia that guaranteed Ukrainian sovereignty including the rights of Russian citizens who chose to live there.  Recently Russia negotiated the extension of the lease on the Black Sea naval base in Sevastopol from 2017 to 2042. The move was heavily criticized by the opposition forces now in power in Kiev.  By seizing the Crimea province from Ukraine, the Russian guarantee of Ukrainian sovereignty has been breached. Russian military exercises near Finland and the Ukraine are clear demonstrations of military force to send a message to the EU and the Obama White House West Wing not to dare send NATO forces to the Polish Ukrainian border. Thus, while there will be lots of economic sanctions and isolation rattling by Washington and Brussels, it is up to the G-8 and G-20 groups to consider ejection of Moscow, which will doubtless come up short.

Sochi may lose tourist revenues from the upcoming Paralympics, followed by the loss of the G-8 Summit in June and even the inaugural Russian Formula 1 race scheduled for August 2014.  Meanwhile the Moscow Stock Exchange and Ruble were punished in trading today. Whether that continues will be influenced by Putin’s contempt for the West and the threats by Obama that “there will be consequences”.  So, while Obama’s Russian reset strategy like his pivot to Asia and push for a Final Status agreement between Israel and the PA have been potential failures.

Just look at the interview with Obama by Bloomberg’s Jeffrey Goldberg about the President’s entreaties to Netanyahu to “seize the moment and make peace”. This included  a veiled no veto threat by the US should the PA, as suggested in the Oxford Union remarks of PA negotiator Saeb Erekat on Al Jazeera’s Head to Head program of last Friday,  might opt for accession to the UN Security Council for statehood.

This would let 5 million Palestinian UNWRA refugees file for compensation against Israel.  Further, the PA could file a case for crimes against humanity brought before the International Criminal Court at The Hague the day after the April 29 deadline is passed for an agreement set by Secretary of State Kerry.  Even the brief comments by Obama and Netanyahu in the Oval Office about “tough choices” versus non helpful Palestinian moves sent a chilling message.  (See this CBS news report, here).

Tomorrow, we shall see what happens when Netanyahu speaks to 14,000 delegates at the AIPAC Policy Conference following Sen. Bob Menendez’s (D-NJ)   speech. They would urge the delegates to scamper up Capitol Hill to convince their Senators and Representatives to pass the Nuclear Weapons Free Iran Act, S. 1881 co-sponsored by Sens. Mark Kirk (R-IL) and Menendez. Problem is that Iran may already have its nukes given a decade long cooperative weapons development and ICBM program with North Korea. Read my article; Has Iran Developed Nuclear Weapons in North Korea?

As to Israel’s capabilities, realize that it already has ICBMs – the nuclear equipped Jericho III.  Yes, as the ancient Chinese curse goes, “may you live in interesting times”.

RELATED COLUMN: ‘Delusional’: Krauthammer Slams Obama Admin’s Belief that Putin has ‘Blinked’ on Ukraine

EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared on The New English Review.