Friday, September 30, 2011

Jihadi Cockroaches Anwar al-Aulaqi And Samir Khan Killed

Some great news today..Anwar al-Awlaqi was a 40-year-old Muslim cleric who specialized in recruiting potential jihadis for terrorism, and Samir Khan was the co-editor of al-Qaeda's slick internet mag Inspire.

The good news is that both of them caught the wrong end of a Hellfire missile fired from a Predator drone and are now crispy halal critters.

The strike took place this morning five miles from the town of Khashef in Yemen’s northern Jawf province, 87 miles east of the capital, Sanaa.

Both Awlaki and Khan were U.S. citizens, which means some of the usual suspects on the Left ( I'm looking at you, Glen Greenwald) are bewailing this...but then so is Ron Paul. They seem to have forgotten that Awlaki and Kahn are traitors according to the rather strict definition given by our Constitution, and thus subject to summary execution since they chose not to surrender and go to trial and were actively engaged in hostilities against the U.S. They were subject to death or capture, whichever worked out. They won't be missed.

U.S. intelligence had been tracking Awlaki for quite some time, and a local tribal leader said Awlaqi had been moving in the provinces Marib and Jawf for the past three weeks because he was worried about being targeted in Yemen’s southern Shabwa province, the main area where his tribe lives.

There's an interesting political subtext here. Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula ( AQAP) has actively been involved in the local 'Arab Spring' movement seeking to oust Yemen's Saleh regime. Of late, Saleh has been co-operating quite a bit with U.S. intelligence and some of the opposition see this as a ploy for Saleh to remain in power.

Another complex part of the mix is that Yemen has become a sort of proxy war between Saudi Arabia and Iran just like Bahrain was, with Iran backing the rebels and the Saudis backing the Saleh regime. This may be a sign that the Obama Administration has finally come to its senses about the so-called Arab Spring the president helped unleash and is trying to cut its losses somewhat.

In any event, it's a excellent end for two really evil men. And I use that term loosely.

PS: ABC News also refers to these creatures as 'jihadis'. *Gasp* Are elements of the dinosaur media finally starting to catch up to Joshuapundit??!!? What's next? Using the "T" word?

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Obama: 'America's Gone Soft"



"I mean, there are a lot of things we can do," Obama said. "The way I think about it is, you know, this is a great, great country that had gotten a little soft and, you know, we didn't have that same competitive edge that we needed over the last couple of decades. We need to get back on track."

My, my. President Obama has just come out with her version of Jimmy Carter's 'malaise' remarks.

You see, we don't deserve the president's enlightened rule. We're too 'soft', and just not worthy.

Let's talk about that competitive edge, shall we?

As a matter of fact,let's start by asking the GM car dealers who were forced out of business when the Obama Administration turned it into Government Motors...you know, the ones that weren't minority owned or whose owners had the misfortune to either be or have contributed to Republicans.

Or how about the billions the Obama Administration has poured into 'green energy' scams like Solyndra run by his top campaign contribution bundlers while doing everything they can to retard the use of oil and coal?

I wonder, does this president's embrace of 'competitiveness' mean that he's now for school choice and vouchers and right to work laws? Does it mean he's now against against funding NPR, the money he gave to Brazil's oil industry, ObamaCare, the GM subsidies and affirmative action?

No and no...it means the president likes 'competition' when he and Big Government call the shots to reward their loyal subjects. It means the very essence of crony capitalism.

And what about being 'soft'? I mean, I wasn't aware that Martha's Vineyard, separate jets on the taxpayer's dime because a husband and wife can't coordinate their schedules, $100 per pound wagyu steak and five star resorts in Spain were examples of the tough life.

I agree with President Obama on one thing. We really don't deserve his 'leadership'. I only wish we could swap him to another country more worthy of it than America.

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The Council Has Spoken!! This Week's Watcher's Council Results


The Council has spoken, the votes have been cast, and the results are in for this week, carved eternally in the akashic records of cyberspace.

Israel is very much in the news these days (when isn't it) and a number of pundits have looked at the threats the country faces and concluded that its very existence is threatened. This week's winner, Joshuapundit's Can Israel Survive? analyzes at the question and the threats and sees things quite differently. Here's a slice:


There’s a great deal of speculation these days on Israel’s dire situation, most notably from renowned author and scholar Victor Davis Hanson in the National Review, who prefaces it with a remark that the country has never been in more danger.

The Islamist regimes in Egypt and elsewhere brought on by the Arab Spring and their growing hostility to Israel, the genocidal influence of Iran and its missile armed proxies Hamas and Hezbollah, Erdogan's Islamist Turkey, the huge influence of Arab petro-dollars, and the indifference and growing anti-semitism in much of Europe and the exhaustion and debt of the United States are frequently cited.

It's a gloomy picture, and none of it is to be trivialized. But I think dire predictions of Israel's demise are premature, to say the least.

It’s worth remembering that Israel has faced far worst and survived. In 1948, the British left Palestine, but not before confiscating as many arms in the hands of Jews as they could find and turning over strategic locations to Israel's genocidal enemies. In the year leading up to that conflict, the British armed the Arab nations with modern weapons including aircraft and tanks in spite of their open and explicit threats of jihad against Israel's Jews. In the case of Jordan, the British not only trained the Arab Legion but officered it during the 1948 war and oversaw the ethnic cleansing of Jews from their homes in Judea, Samaria and East Jerusalem, led by a Jew hating British Colonel by the name of John Glubb, AKA Glubb Pasha. And this was a mere three years after the liberation of Auschwitz.

The Jews had no aircraft or artillery, and used homemade 'Davidka' mortars and improvised armored trucks as 'tanks'. They were unable to purchase weapons from the United States because President Truman decided to put an arms embargo on both sides, something that affected Israel greatly and the Arabs not at all, since they were able to purchase arms openly from Britain and other European countries, many of whom were unwilling to sell arms to Israel for fear of angering the oil rich Arabs. In one of the ironies of history, a major cache of the arms the Jews used to win their war of independence were Nazi arms left over from the occupation of Czechoslovakia, purchased by Israel on the black market.

Somehow, the Jews prevailed against the attempted second Holocaust. And without the help of Europe, the United States or the UN.

They prevailed again in 1967, after a last minute cutoff of arms and supplies from Charles DeGaulle deprived them of all arms and supplies from France, their major arms source. The US remained neutral during that war and supplied no arms to the Jewish State, who were facing war on three fronts from Arab nations armed with the latest Soviet weapons. The Six Day War was a miracle not only because Israel won against overwhelming odds, but because they were able to win before the supplies and spare parts for their French weapons ran out.

Today's situation is not to be underestimated, but not nearly as dire as it might seem. In many ways, Israel's position is far more secure and superior than it was then.


In our non-Council category, the winner was Gonzalo Lira for What I learned At Dartmouth submitted by Rhymes with Right. It's an excellent first hand account on what can happen because of the war on American males on college campuses and political correctness run amuck.


Here are this week’s full results. Snapped Shot was unable to vote this week, but was not affected by the 2/3 vote penalty:

Council Winners



Non-Council Winners



See you next week! And don't forget to follow us on Facebook and Twitter..'cause we're cool like that!

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Wednesday, September 28, 2011

L'Shanah Tovah!



Happy New Year! Celebrating 5,772 Years With The Same Management...


Tonight at sundown, the Jewish New Year kicks in, traditionally a time for reflection and spiritual self-examination, as it starts the Days of Awe that proceed through Yom Kippur, the Jewish Day of Atonement.

It's traditional to eat apples and honey and sweet things in general, as you see these Jews in Uganda doing:



Pomegranates are also eaten, because the seeds symbolize fertility.

One of the most important traditions of the holiday is the blowing of a ram's horn, the shofar. It is designed to be a trumpet call that galvanizes Jews into a spiritual awakening, in the ten days before Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement.

One of the holiest places to blow the shofar on Rosh Hashona and Yom Kippur is at the kotel, the Western Wall. And there are still Jews alive who remember when that was a crime.

When the British ruled Israel,they did everything they could to deny the Jews a nation in spite of their pledged word and the League of nations mandate they held to create a Jewish state.

As part of that, they forbade Jews to sound the shofar or bring Torah scrolls to the Kotel under pain of arrest and imprisonment. And of course, after the Arabs took over the Old City, the Jews who lived there were forcibly expelled,their Holy shrines were desecrated and destroyed and the Kotel was used as a garbage dump.

Here's a wonderful video showing how the Jews dealt with the British and what happened at the Kotel when the Jews retook the Old City from the Arabs after 19 years of exile. It will make you smile:



Anyone who thinks the Jews are willingly going to give up Jerusalem again ought to seek psychiatric care.

My very best wishes for the coming year....may you and yours be inscribed for a sweet and wonderful year.

Shanah tovah u'metukah.

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Massachusetts Muslim Arrested In Plot To Blow Up Pentagon



Rezwan Ferdaus, 26-year-old Northeastern University grad with a degree in physics was arrested today for what the FBI called an al-Qaeda inspired plot to blow up the Pentagon using small remote-controlled aircraft packed with C-4 explosives. The airplanes involved were no toys - one of the planes Ferdaus intended to use was 68 inches long with a 44-inch wingspan able to travel up to 160 mph and guided by GPS.

He was arrested at a storage facility in in Framingham, Massachusetts after taking delivery of what he thought were C-4 explosives, grenades and AK-47 assault rifles.

He's also accused of trying to rig cell phones to trigger improvised explosive devices to maim or kill U.S. soldiers serving overseas, items he supplied to undercover FBI agents he thought were members of al-Qaeda. He was delighted by reports his bobby-trapped phones worked, the U.S. Attorney in Boston Carmen M. Ortiz said. The FBI also recovered full details of his plot on a computer thumb drive belonging to Ferdaus...who is a US citizen.

Ortiz said today that “Mr. Ferdaus had long planned to commit violent acts against our country” that included using three “small drone planes” filled with explosives and guided by GPS devices. He plotted to have six people, including himself whom he described as an “amir” — an Arabic term for leader — to carry out the plot, feds said.

One day, we're going to wake up to the fact that it just might be common sense to halt immigration and issuing visas to certain countries and to people of certain backgrounds. I would have thought 9/11 would have brought that message home, but apparently it didn't. At least not to those in charge.

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Pam Geller Suing The NY MTA

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-6IrW-xuDfrQ/ToK1JEaZjjI/AAAAAAAAggs/tsWEqBNz8ec/s400/Pam%2BGeller%2527s%2Bsubway%2Bad.png

Atlas Shrug's Pam Geller is suing the New York Metropolitan Transit Authority for refusing to run the above ad on its subways and buses.

According to an MTA spokesman, the agency “does not approve or disapprove of issue-oriented advertisements based on the viewpoint being expressed,” and that it recently approved other ads that focused on the Middle East. “However, our advertising standards do prohibit language that demeans an individual or group.”

Apparently the word 'savage' was the sticking point.

However, the MTA was perfectly happy to run this ad,which calls the IDF savages by implication:

http://atlasshrugs2000.typepad.com/.a/6a00d8341c60bf53ef015435b72cd9970c-500wi

Aw,isn't that cute? I wonder if the good folks over at the MTA ever heard of Samir Kuntar, an honorary 'Palestinian citizen' who was feted by Mahmoud Abbas himself. Or that Abbas referred to the many child murderers held in Israeli prisons as 'heroes of freedom' and insists they all have to be freed in any peace deal...and that includes the Tanzim sniper who shot little 10-month-old Shalhevat Pas in her stroller.

Maybe if Pam used this picture, it would have made her point a bit more graphically:

http://www.chayas.com/images/blood.jpg

That was taken after the non-savages lynched two IDF reservists who wandered across the border accidentally during what was supposed to be peacetime and were literally torn apart by a mob while the 'Palestinian' security forces stood and watched...and participated. They were convicted in an Israeli court of course...the 'Palestinians have never put anyone in jail for murdering Jews.

( sorry about the LGF link...that was back when Chuckles was still sane)

Robert Muise of the Thomas More Law Center and ace lawyer David Yerushalmi are involved, so this isn't frivolous and has major implications for the way jihad and its adherents are portrayed in the future.

Yaser Koach, Pam!

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Quid Pro Quo..GOP Senators Approve Financing To Avert Shutdown In Exchange For...

The Republicans in the Senate voted along with their Democrat colleagues Monday for a last minute bill that will keep the government running through November 18.

Only 12 Republicans voted against the bill, which was touted as a way to keep FEMA from running out of cash at the end of the fiscal year.

Part of the price for GOP support was not disclosed however. It was an under the table deal to confirm four conservative US attorneys recommended by Republicans that had been stonewalled by the Obama DOJ and its allies in Congress.

In other words, in order to make the deal, Harry Reid was willing to toss the Democrat Left under the bus.

Another part of the deal according to my sources involves delaying the Senate taking on President Obama's 'jobs' bill - you know, the one that needs to be passed now, now, now - until after the recess and after other items were dealt with, so the bill might not even come up for debate before the Christmas/holiday recess.

A number of the Senate Democrats were reportedly happy to delay that particular turkey as long as possible, since none of them are anxious t6o have their names attached to what essentially is a tax increase with elections coming up.


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Watcher's Council Nominations - Apples n' Honey Edition



Welcome to the Watcher's Council, a blogging group consisting of some of the most incisive blogs in the 'sphere, and the longest running group of its kind in existence. Every week, the members nominate two posts each, one written by themselves and one written by someone from outside the group for consideration by the whole Council.Then we vote on the best two posts, with the results appearing on Friday.

Council News:

First off, a shout out from me to the Council for their assistance and good will this week...much appreciated! And for those of you whom celebrate it, L'Shanah Tovah Tikatevu.

This week, The Mellow Jihadi, The Grouch, Liberty's Spirit and Capitalist Preservation took advantage of my generous offer of link whorage and earned honorable mention status.

You can, too! Want to see your work appear on the Watcher’s Council homepage in our weekly contest listing? Didn’t get nominated by a Council member? No worries.

Simply head over to the ‘Contact Me’ page at Joshuapundit and post a link to the piece you want considered along with an e-mail address ( which won't be published) in the comments section no later than Monday 6PM PST to be considered for our honorable mention category, and return the favor by creating a post on your site linking to the Watcher’s Council contest for the week.

It's a great way of exposing your best work to Watcher’s Council readers and Council members. while grabbing the increased traffic and notoriety. And how good is that, eh?

So, let's see what we have this week....

Council Submissions



Honorable Mentions




Non-Council Submissions



Enjoy! And don't forget to follow us on Facebook and Twitter..'cause we're cool like that!

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Tuesday, September 27, 2011

Israeli PM Netanyahu: "No More Settlement Freezes"

Israeli PM Benyamin Netanyahu showed a bit of rare spunk today when the usual suspects criticized Israel's decision to build 1,100 homes in Gilo, a predominantly Jewish suburb of Jerusalem that Israel has already annexed.

Saeb Erekat, the chief Palestinian negotiator, said the new housing units represented "1,100 'noes' to the Quartet statement" urging a resumption of frozen peace talks.

"Israel is challenging the will of the international community with the continued settlement policy," Nabil Abu Rdainah, an Abbas spokesman, said.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said the settlement plan was counter-productive to reviving peace talks.

Richard Miron, spokesman for U.N. Middle East envoy Robert Serry, called Israel's decision "very concerning." He said settlement activity "undermines the prospect of resuming negotiations and reaching a two-state solution to the conflict."{...}

In London, Britain's Foreign Secretary William Hague said settlement expansion was illegal and "corrodes trust and undermines the basic principle of land for peace. We call on the Government of Israel to revoke this decision."

U.S. State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said "we are deeply disappointed" and that Washington has "long urged both parties to avoid actions that could undermine trust, including in Jerusalem."


Funny, these people have such a huge objection to Jews building homes in an area that's going to remain part of Israel no matter what, but none of them has ever said anything about a 'Palestinian' moratorium on rocket attacks, on the constant hateful incitement in 'Palestine's' mosques, schools and media or on the salaries the 'Palestinian Authority' pay terrorists convicted of murder and serving sentences in Israeli prisons.

Netanyahu's response to this was "“We already gave at the office,” referring to the unilateral 10- month settlement freeze he initiated in November 2008 at President Obama's request as a concession to get the 'Palestinians' back to peace negotiations. It failed miserably, and Netanyahu just let the world know that he's not going to play sucker again.

“We plan in Jerusalem. We build in Jerusalem. Period. The same way Israeli governments have been doing for years – since the end of the 1967 war".

“We build in Jewish neighborhoods, the Arabs build in Arab neighborhoods – that is the way the life of this city goes on and develops for its Jewish and non- Jewish residents alike.”

Netanyahu said Americans “know this; they have followed this a long time. There is really nothing new.”

"You can’t build hope on the foundation of lies,” he continued, adding that the Palestinians’ inability to utter the words “the Jewish people” or “the Jewish state” is not something that can be glossed over.

“There is a problem there, and you can’t build hope by shutting your eyes and saying it doesn’t matter,” Netanyahu said.

“Of course it matters – this is what this conflict is all about. It is not about the settlements; it is about the Jewish state. And it must be said over and over again.”


A word about Gilo, by the way. Like all the other so-called 'settlements, it was built on land that was either vacant, Jewish owned originally or Jordanian government land seized in Jordan's occupation of Judea and Samaria in 1948. There was no Arab town or private property that was cleared and no Arab residents dispossesed to make room for it.

Terrorism and incitement or building homes for people...which do you think is more damaging to peace?

Kudos to PM Netanyahu for making the distinction clear.


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Germany Spanks Geithner,EU For 'Stupid Idea' On Euro Bailout

German finance minister Wolfgang Schauble had some harsh words for the plan US Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner brought over from the Obama Administration to inflate the EU's bail-out machinery (EFSF) beyond its €440bn lending limit..you know, sort of what President Obama has done here.

I don't understand how anyone in the European Commission can have such a stupid idea. The result would be to endanger the AAA sovereign debt ratings of other member states. It makes no sense," he said.

Mr Schauble told Washington to mind its own business after President Barack Obama rebuked EU leaders for failing to recapitalise banks and allowing the debt crisis to escalate to the point where it is "scaring the world".

"It's always much easier to give advice to others than to decide for yourself. I am well prepared to give advice to the US government," he said.


Ziemlich klar!

As I mentioned before, the Germans have finally revolted and there no way they're going to trash their own economy to bail out Greece, Spain, Ireland or Italy any further. The first scheme, involving eurobonds with Germany's tax payers subsidizing the interest rates was DOA, and pumping up the EFSF artificially isn't going to fly either.

The euro is doomed...it's only survived this long because the Fed is propping the euro up with 'dollar swaps', which means the Fed is buying euros for dollars at an artificial rate to keep it from crashing through the floor. That's literally the Old Jack and the Beanstalk trade in real life, with billions at stake.

Greece will almost certainly default, even though Greek PM George Papandreou vowed that his country would honor its austerity agreement. However, it's highly unlikely, and once Greece goes, it will likely take the rest of the euro zone with it, because it will provide a precedent to the other member nations who are now in deep economic trouble.

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Obama's Rosh Hashanah Greeting - And The Translation



And now the translation:

"Damn, is it that time again?

I gotta remind all you Jews about something..remember, you're liberals and you're not gonna diss the first black president, are you? How would that look, if you stray off the Plantation? Remember, not only are you liberals, but you're rich, so you owe all those struggling communities not only here but worldwide.Let the guilt flow.

Poll numbers among y'all are down, and so are financial contributions so it's important that I tell you at this time about my commitment to Israel. I mean, it's what you wanna hear, right? And I'm very much about giving people what they want at election time. Hey, would I lie?

Keep in mind, with the Arab Spring I helped set off brewing and all those Islamists taking power, Israel's gonna need some friends to pressure Israel to surrender for its own good. And who better than me, your favorite community organizer? So let's just forget about everything that's happened between Israel and my administration over the past three years and just concentrate on getting me re-elected.

I did the usual conference call this year with some of your rabbis, so they're well armed with talking points to work into their sermons this year. So remember, vote Democrat, and most importantly vote Obama. Allahu Akba- uhh, Happy New Year. Later"

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Elizabeth Warren's 'Philosophy' Translated Into Simple Terms

diniro.jpg

( h/t, Woolie via American Digest)


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Major Al-Jazeera Journalist Admits To Being Hamas Operative

http://www.jpost.com/HttpHandlers/ShowImage.ashx?ID=172470

Well, it's hardly unexpected that a journalist for Al Jazeera would be affiliated with a genocidal terrorist organization...

Samer Allawi confessed to being a Hamas operative after interrogation by the Shin Bet. Allawi, who identifies himself as a 'Palestinian' was arrested a month ago at his home near Nablus (Shechem).

Apparently, he was of some importance and it's certain his press credentials were quite useful to him in working for Hamas. Allawi confessed that he joined Hamas in 1993 and served until 2004 on a senior committee that oversees Hamas operations abroad and fund raises for 'operations'.

Allawi made a number of trips to Syria where he reported directly to Mousa Abu Marzook, Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal’s deputy on his activities. the Shin Bet said. Abu Marzook offered Allawi a position as Hamas’s official representative in Iran, but he claims he rejected the offer.

According to Allawi, there are a number of Hamas operatives who work fo r Al Jazeera, and he was a frequent liaison between them and the organization.

Allawi's confession was part of a plea bargain, which gained him a three-year suspended sentence.

My own opinion is that Allawi was in the 'Palestinian' occupied area in Judea and Samaria ( AKA the West Bank) carrying out another liaison mission for Hamas, and that his arrest by the Shin Bet was designed to get him out of the area.

Monday, September 26, 2011

The Current Republican Lineup...The Sale Isn't Over Yet

http://www.wildwings.com/DirectionsWEB/client/images/pick-me-labrador-retriever-puppies-by-larry-beckstein-1047652056.jpg

There's no such thing as a perfect candidate, and the recent furor over the Republican contest proves that, if not much else. No one's close to making the sale yet.

Texas Governor Rick Perry, the front runner stumbled badly in last week's debate and if he has another couple of bad outings, he could very well fade away. Not only were a number of his answers weak, but he failed to take the battle to the other candidates, leaving people wondering how he'd actually do against President Obama.

He continues to double down on the Gardisil question, and his vulnerability on the illegal alien issue has become evident and was exploited handily by Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum last week.

Not only that, but when the foreign policy finally reared its ugly head at long last, he flailed around badly:

BAIER: Which brings us to this, Governor Perry, if you were president, and you got a call at 3 am telling you that Pakistan had lost control of is nuclear weapons, at the hands of the Taliban, what would be your first move?

PERRY: Well obviously, before you ever get to that point you have to build a relationship in that region. That’s one of the things that this administration has not done. Yesterday, we found out through Admiral Mullen that Haqqani has been involved with — and that’s the terrorist group directly associated with the Pakistani country. So to have a relationship with India, to make sure that India knows that they are an ally of the United States.

For instance, when we had the opportunity to sell India the upgraded F-16′s, we chose not to do that. We did the same with Taiwan. The point is, our allies need to understand clearly that we are their friends, we will be standing by there with them.

Today, we don’t have those allies in that region that can assist us if that situation that you talked about were to become a reality.


Is Governor Perry saying that we're going to ask India or Taiwan what to do? Fine, the alliance with India definitely needs work, but we're talking about an emergency situation - our enemies just overthrew a government that wasn't at all friendly to us anyway and got themselves a nuclear arsenal.

This is not the sound of a president-in-waiting.

Former Senator Rick Santorum's answer was almost as bad:

To answer the question on Pakistan, which I’m not too sure was answered. The bottom line is, that we should be establishing relationships in Pakistan with allies of ours, folks like relationships with President Musharraf who we had in the past with others in that country so if in fact something like that would occur we could work in concert to make sure that that coup could be overturned and make sure those nuclear weapon do not fall in those hands.

But working with allies at that point is the last thing we want to do. We want to work in that country to make sure the problem is defused.


Talking about not answering the question! So in Senator Santorum's world, he's just been informed that the Taliban, the Haqqani Group or Lashkar-e-Taiba just took over Pakistan's nuclear facilities in Waziristan and he's going to depend on deposed President Musharraf to help us out? "Quick, get Pervez on the phone.Maybe he can put together a counter-coup."

The fact is that when you have a 3 AM call like that, 'defusing' the problem is already too late and so is talking to 'allies'. It means there's been a civil war,and our enemies just won. My answer, had I been on that stage would have been to say that a faction who are not our friends taking over Pakistan's nukes is quite probable, and as president I would have had a contingency plan ready and waiting with our military for destroying them completely on the ground the minute they fell into questionable hands. The fact that two presidential candidates would go into an Obama-like dithering on something this basic is scary, frankly.

Herman Cain, however likeable has yet to prove that he has the chops needed for the Big Job. The FOX moderators did him a great kindness by not asking him any deep foreign policy or national security questions, since he's already shown that isn't his strong point. And his 9-9-9 plan on taxes which has some merits also has a number of those awful devils in the details. That 9% national sales tax, for instance. Anyone whose seen how politicians around the world have handled a Value Added Tax ( which is essentially what Mr. Cain is proposing) ought to be damned wary of implementing it. Here's a hint; just like sales taxes in your state, they tend to go up, up, up. And it might also be noted that Cain's plan would eliminate the tax break on mortgages, thus putting the boot into an already depressed industry. My prediction is that his straw poll win in Florida will have about as much effect as Muchele Bachmann's in Iowa.

Mitt Romney is an old hand at campaigning by now, and it shows. His answers to questions are clear and obviously well thought out. Unfortunately, he has a habit of only answering half a question and glossing over the rest, and that's going to become more noticeable as time goes on, especially if he overtakes Perry as frontrunner and assumes Perry's role as punching bag for the rest.

His support for the Obama administration's Race to the Top education program is going to come back to haunt him, as will his insistence that RomneyCare's individual mandate only applies to 8% of the population. Actually, that law applies to everyone in Massachusetts. And he's also going to have to figure out how to defend himself on Bain Capital's record on outsourcing jobs.

Speaking of Michele Bachmann, as likeable as she is, she's also proven that she's not quite ready for the Top Job yet. Her positions continue to devolve into talking points, she's shown an unfortunate tendency to be gaffe-prone and continues to be willing to die on questionable hills like the one about how the Gardisil caused retardation in a child.

I'm not even going to discuss the other marginal players. None of them are going to be the GOP nominee,let alone get into the White House.

But I have a feeling that applies to the others as well, at least at the present time. None of them, in my opinion, has really made the sale yet. None of them appears to be an obvious choice for President yet, although Mitt Romney has done a fair job thus far of at least coming close. Plus, it's still very early days and the support of each candidate is still pretty soft.

The 2012 election is the GOP's to lose, but I still think we haven't seen all the candidates. With the first major test being the Iowa Caucus in February, there's plenty of time for someone else to get in.

Actually the deadline is pretty clear. To get your name on the ballot in Florida,you need to pay filing fees by October 31st. And to participate in the South Carolina primary, the last date in November 1st.

I wouldn't be at all surprised to see a major trick or treat in the Republican race before Halloween.

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Sunday, September 25, 2011

Pakistan: 'Keep Accusing Us Of Harboring Terrorists And We'll Stop Pretending We're Your Friends'


U.S. relations with our 'ally' Pakistan took another ratchet downwards when Pakistan's foreign minister accused the U.S. of using Pakistan as a scapegoat after American head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Adm. Mike Mullen testified before Congress and accused Pakistan's ISI agency of supporting the al-Qaeda linked Haqqani network in planning and executing last week’s 22-hour assault on the US Embassy in Kabul and a truck bombing that wounded 77 American soldiers a few days earlier:

The Haqqanis are "veritable arm of Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence Agency [ISI]," he said in opening remarks before the Senate Armed Services Committee, adding that it had provided the Haqqanis with support to conduct the Kabul attacks:


"With ISI support, Haqqani operatives planned and conducted the truck bomb attack, as well as the assault on our embassy," Mullen said of the recent attack on a base in Wardak that wounded 77 U.S. soldiers. "We also have credible intelligence that they were behind the June 28 attack against the Inter-Continental Hotel in Kabul and a host of other smaller but effective operations."

Mullen said Pakistan's government has chosen to "use violent extremism as an instrument of policy," which jeopardizes its relationship with the United States and its role as a player in the region.

Speaking of its support for the Haqqani Network, Mullen said, "they may believe that by using these proxies they are hedging their bets, or redressing what they feel is an imbalance of regional power. But, in reality, they have already lost that bet."

He added that by "exporting violence, they have eroded their internal security and their position in the region. They have undermined their international credibility and threatened their economic well-being."

Panetta said that in recent high-profile meetings with Pakistani officials, U.S. officials have conveyed "a very clear message to them and to others that they must take steps to prevent the safe haven that the Haqqanis are using.

"We simply cannot allow these kinds of terrorists to be able to go into Afghanistan, attack our forces, and then return to Pakistan for safe haven and not face any kind of pressure from the Pakistanis for that to stop."

Panetta called the existence of safe havens "not tolerable" and "unacceptable," and said continued U.S. pressure on Pakistan's leaders was the only way they would get that message. "The only way to deal with the Pakistanis, " he said, "is to keep giving them a clear message of where the lines are. "


The Pakistanis, of course, had their own things to say about where the lines are.Pakistan's interior minister Rehman Malik baldly denied Mullen's accusations about ISI involvement with the Haqqani Network, and warned the U.S. that Pakistan would not allow a U.S. attack over the border aimed at the Haqqanis,who are apparently a protected species in Pock-kee-stawn.

“The Pakistan nation will not allow the boots on our ground, never,” Mr. Malik said in an interview with Reuters. “Our government is already cooperating with the U.S. — but they also must respect our sovereignty.”

Pakistan's Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar likewise warned the U.S. not to cross what she called 'red lines' and not to use Pakistan as a scapegoat. ”If many of your goals are not achieved, you do not make someone a scapegoat,” she said, speaking to the American Government.

Khar spoke these lines with such conviction and inherent dishonesty that I wouldn't be at all surprised to find out she was related to Hillary Clinton somewhere along the line.

The Pakistanis have been nurturing, arming and training the Haqqani Network and other Islamist groups for years. In fact,things are so symbiotic that the Pakistani military and the Haqqani fighters both forces major bases practically next door to each other in Miram Shah, the main town in North Waziristan. The ISI has a similar relationship with Islamist terrorist group Lashkar-e-Taiba and several others of that ilk.

Pakistan sees the Haqqanis in particular as an instrument of policy to attack India and protect their interests in Afghanistan, especially since they know that President Obama has a set-in-stone date for bugging out. He's going to want to campaign as the guy who killed bin-Laden and brought the troops home from those 'illegal' Bush wars.

The fact that Pakistan is a rogue basket case of a nation that actively supports terrorism (the Mumbai Attacks and the British 7/7 bombings are just two examples) and engages in a nice sideline of illegal nuclear proliferation to people like Iran and North Korea is also not exactly unknown to the United States. This isn't new information. That's exactly why we couldn't trust the Pakistanis with our knowledge that Osama bin-Laden had been hiding out in fancy digs with right to the Pakistani Military Academy in Abbotobad for six years, why Pakistan arrested five Pakistani informants who helped the CIA find out where Osama bin-Laden was hiding out and imprisoned them on charges of espionage and why almost every time we've let them know drone attacks are imminent the terrorists have safely moved away and we end up bombing an empty building.

We've essentially turned a blind eye towards Pakistan's treachery and enabled it because we need to bribe them. Around 75% of the supplies needed for our war in landlocked Afghanistan comes through the Pakistani port of Karachi and travels overland via the Torkhum Pass, which is why we've been paying Pakistan off to the tune of billions per year. And while we've finally begun the process of paying baksheesh to five countries instead of one to lessen the impact of our deteriorating relations withPakistan, it isn't nearly complete yet and will likely not have that much of an impact since our leaving Afghanistan is fairly imminent. So we'll do nothing now.

As for Pakistan, it's going to remain the same violent, corrupt Islamist hell hole it always was, with the added attraction of a civil war between various Islamist groups as the army splits apart into factions, with Pakistan's nuclear arsenal as the grand prize for the winner. You see, when Pakistan's powers-that-be got into in bed with various terrorist groups like the Haqqanis and Lashkar-e-Taiba, they thought they were going to be using them. Instead, they've made them strong enough that the Army isn't going to be either unified enough or powerful enough to take them on.

Our whole toxic relationship with Pakistan started because of our involvement in Afghanistan. Under the Bush Doctrine, we would have been more than justified in hitting Pakistan as well, and in terms of our war aims we likely would have been better off.

In the beginning it more or less worked because we had in Pervez Musharraf a dictator who at least stayed bought. Condi Rice, arguably one of the most inept Secretaries of State since William Jennings Bryan torched that arrangement by insisting that Musharraf allow the klepotocrat Bhuttos back in to the country as 'partners, to show more democracy', and the rest is history.

But as I've said before, it would be a nice touch if, as we left AfPak we took out Pakistan's nuclear facilities and perhaps kidnapped their rogue nuclear scientist AQ Kahn and took him to a nice, isolated interrogation room to find out exactly what he sold and to whom.

Of course, nothing remotely like that is going to happen under this president.

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Bristol Palin Faces Down Heckler Calling Her Mom ' Whore', 'Devil'



( warning: NSFW language)

Bristol Palin was filming some footage for her reality show and riding a mechanical bull at the Saddle Ranch bar and restaurant in West Hollywood when one of the patrons began cursing her and her mother out.

"“Did you ride Levi like that? Your mother is a whore! Your mother is a f***ing devil!” he shouts.

Governor Palin apparently didn't raise any cowardly children, because she strides over, confronts this low life and asks him point blank why he would say that about her mother. "Because she's evil...if there's a Hell she's f**king going there" he yells at her.

Palin asks him, “Is it because you’re a homosexual and that’s why you hate her?”

“Pretty much … and why’d you say I’m a homosexual?” he responds.

“Because I can tell you are,” Bristol says.

(For the uninitiated, West Hollywood's nickname among L.A. residents is Boys Town, because of the large and aggressive homosexual community there. Gays of a certain type are not that hard to spot in that neighborhood)

“You’re f***ing white trash from Wasila!” he screams as she leaves with her production crew. “F*** you, you f***ing b***h!”

Of course,it should be said that if Ms. Palin is going to cruise the sewer filming her reality show, she's going to run into cowardly rats - like this one.He must have had a lot of beer to get his courage up to the point where he could shout obscenities at a young girl about her and her mother who was doing him absolutely no harm whatsoever.

Classy.

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Obama's Latest: Gaffe-Tastic!

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-dWeE5oocda8/Tn4dc8bsavI/AAAAAAAABy0/nhPZAk5R8Rk/s1600/obama%2Bwaving.jpg

Our Dear Leader committed another couple of major gaffes recently that would have the dinosaur media hyper-ventilating if it was, say, Governor Sarah Palin...let alone another Ivy League grad who used to be president not too long ago.

The above photo (hat tip The Political Commentator) shows the president in a group photo of dignitaries at the UN committing a lapse of protocol and basic etiquette that would have had any fifth-grader sent to detention or writing 500 sentences after class: "I will not wave to the camera in posed group photos".

Perhaps Obama simply figured that the President of Mongolia wasn't all that important compared to Obama's awesomeness.

We can add this to other lapses of decorum by this president like his bowing fetish, his inability to know that you stop yakking during the Toast to the Queen of England or his inability to call the president of Brazil by his correct name among a host of other mishaps. Needless to say, this isn't being reported in the US at all.

Another doozy of the president's the media is ignoring came during what was supposed to be a photo op to sell his jobs plan next to an allegedly deteriorating highway bridge..which actually isn't. He referred to America as ' the country that built the Intercontinental Railroad'.

Now, I remember we once built a transcontinental railroad across America, finished right around the time of the end of the Civil War. But I never dreamed we built an intercontinental one! Imagine, a railroad from New York to France and I totally missed it! Or maybe it was to Japan or China, or Australia?

Yes, our president lives in a world where there's a language called Austrian, where Canada has a president, where Navy medics are referred to as corpse-men and the US has 57 states. Perhaps that's why I didn't hear about the intercontinental railroad...the American starting point for this miraculous achievement must be in one of them!

You have to wonder what President Obama was actually studying during his expensive education at Occidental, Columbia and Harvard. Based on these and other tidbits littered throughout his speeches, it obviously wasn't history, economics or geography. And it definitely wasn't math. But then, we'll never know will we, since the president's grades and transcripts have all been carefully hidden.

I'm sure there's a perfectly good reason for that. Just like there's a perfectly good reason the media is ignoring this president's constant faux-pas and embarrassing gaffes.

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What The 'Palestinians' Say In Arabic Among Themselves Versus What They Say At The UN



Some excerpts from an interview with Abbas Zaki, a senior member of the Fatah Central Committee, which aired on Al-Jazeera (AKA JihadTV) on September 23, 2011 after Abbas' speech at the UN.Keep in mind there's no free speech per se in 'Palestine' and Zaki wouldn't be saying these things unless they were in sync with the Abbas regime:

Abbas Zaki: The settlement should be based upon the borders of June 4, 1967. When we say that the settlement should be based upon these borders, President [Abbas] understands, we understand, and everybody knows that the greater goal cannot be accomplished in one go.

If Israel withdraws from Jerusalem, evacuates the 650,000 settlers, and dismantles the wall – what will become of Israel? It will come to an end.

[...]

Who is nervous, upset, and angry now? Netanyahu, Lieberman, and Obama... All those scumbags. Why even get into this? We should be happy to see Israel upset.

[...]

If we say that we want to wipe Israel out... C'mon, it's too difficult. It's not [acceptable] policy to say so. Don't say these things to the world. Keep it to yourself.


Hat tip MEMRI, via the Elder)

Quote Of The Day....



Hollywood wasn’t AWOL in the War on Terror. In fact, just the opposite is true. Hollywood summoned every ounce of financial and star power at their disposal to fight this war.

Unfortunately, they chose to fight for the other side.


- John Nolte, 9/11/11, writing in Andrew Breibart's Big Hollywood





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Saturday, September 24, 2011

France Bans Muslim Street Prayers; Muslims Protest, Chant 'Death To The Jews'



A huge issue in France has been the de facto takeover of whole streets from Paris to Marseilles as Muslim worshipers turn them into what amounts to mosques by taking them over during prayer times.

Marine Le Pen, the leader of France's National Front Party scored widespread approval with a controversial speech that compared the situation to the wartime occupation of France.

"For those who want to talk a lot about World War II, if it's about occupation, then we could also talk about (that), because that is occupation of territory," she said at a political rally in Lyons.

"There are, of course, no tanks, there are no soldiers but it is nevertheless an occupation and it weighs heavily on local residents," she said.

In response, French President Nicholas Sarkozy, who is expected to face le Pen in the upcoming election announced he was planning to ban the practice and finally did so last month, with the ban taking effect September 16th.

In response, hundreds of Muslims took to the streets in defiance of the ban and marched in protest, as the above video courtesy of Vlad Tepes via Gates of Vienna shows.

The protestors threatened viokence throughout France, and the old cries of 'Allahu Akbar' and 'morte aux Juifs!' ( death to the Jews) were chanted.

France's police have thus far not trued to enforce the law, fearing they would set off widespread unrest. However, French Interior Minister Claude Guéant told Le Figaro newspaper that Muslims who continue to pray in the street will be arrested: "My vigilance will be unflinching for the law to be applied. Praying in the street is not dignified for religious practice and violates the principles of secularism. If anyone happens to be recalcitrant we will put an end to it."

So far, the French government has attempted to bribe the protesters by giving them the right to set up a temporary mosque in an abandoned fire station in the Goutte d'Or district in Paris until a new, larger mosque is built at the French governments expense in 2013.

The widespread construction of mosques is a major issue in France. There are currently at least 6.5 million Muslims in France, the largest Muslim community in Europe and the number of mosques has doubled to more than 2,000 in the past decade. There are currently a number of mega-mosques under construction in Paris, Marseilles, Lyon and Strasbourg.

President Sarkozy has been fairly outspoken in calling multiculturalism a failure and calling for Muslims to assimilate if they want to be welcomed in France. In a live-broadcast interview with French Channel One television, Sarkozy said: "I do not want a society where communities coexist side by side … France will not welcome people who do not agree to melt into a single community. We have been too busy with the identity of those who arrived and not enough with the identity of the country that accepted them."

Sarkozy was also instrumental in pushing through a ban on burkas in France last year.

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Friday, September 23, 2011

LATMA's Latest - SOTA Israeli Satire!



The 'UN Choir' rendition of 'Somebody To Hate is a real gem!

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Abbas Accuses Israel of 'Ethnic Cleansing' Says Will Never Recognize A Jewish State

'Palestinian' capo del tutti capo Mahmoud Abbas made an incendiary speech at the UN today that channeled his old boss Yasser Arafat, announcing his formal request to create a 23rd Arab state.

He accused Israel of using 'ethnic cleansing' while in the same speech announcing proudly that 'Palestine' would never recognize Israel as a Jewish state.

He also touted the reconciliation agreement with Hamas, and made a number of references to democracy and the rule of law...ludicrous coming from an unelected dictator whose terms expired almost three years ago.

The 'Palestinians' have already announced repeatedly that they will not permit a single Jew to live in their new reichlet, nor will they allow refugees living in camps in 'Palestine' to become citizens.

To put it bluntly, the UN has the opportunity to vote on whether they're going to permit an apartheid racist entity that supports terrorism to be part of the UN, and break two international treaties they signed while doing so.

In his own remarks,Israeli PM Netanyahu had it exactly right in his own speech at the UN when he said that Abbas and the 'Palestinians' want a state without peace. Or as I would have put it myself, they want Israeli territorial and strategic concessions and the right to continue the conflict.

Netanyahu actually made a decent speech, garnering applause when he once again challenged Abbas to meet with him for negotiations 'here today, at the UN" without pre-conditions.

That's not part of the 'Palestinian' agenda. As Abbas made clear in his speech, they're only interested in 'negotiations' after all their demands are met beforehand..when there's nothing really left to negotiate.

Abbas has already submitted a letter to the UN Security Council asking for full membership. Will the UN fulfill it's original mission, or will it simply vote to appease the Muslim bloc and the 'Palestinians'? We'll see.

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Can Israel Survive?



There’s a great deal of speculation these days on Israel’s dire situation, most notably from renowned author and scholar Victor Davis Hanson in the National Review, who prefaces it with a remark that the country has never been in more danger.

The Islamist regimes in Egypt and elsewhere brought on by the Arab Spring and their growing hostility to Israel, the genocidal influence of Iran and its missile armed proxies Hamas and Hezbollah, Erdogan's Islamist Turkey, the huge influence of Arab petro-dollars, and the indifference and growing anti-semitism in much of Europe and the exhaustion and debt of the United States are frequently cited.

It's a gloomy picture, and none of it is to be trivialized. But I think dire predictions of Israel's demise are premature, to say the least.

It’s worth remembering that Israel has faced far worst and survived. In 1948, the British left Palestine, but not before confiscating as many arms in the hands of Jews as they could find and turning over strategic locations to Israel's genocidal enemies. In the year leading up to that conflict, the British armed the Arab nations with modern weapons including aircraft and tanks in spite of their open and explicit threats of jihad against Israel's Jews. In the case of Jordan, the British not only trained the Arab Legion but officered it during the 1948 war and oversaw the ethnic cleansing of Jews from their homes in Judea, Samaria and East Jerusalem, led by a Jew hating British Colonel by the name of John Glubb, AKA Glubb Pasha. And this was a mere three years after the liberation of Auschwitz.

The Jews had no aircraft or artillery, and used homemade 'Davidka' mortars and improvised armored trucks as 'tanks'. They were unable to purchase weapons from the United States because President Truman decided to put an arms embargo on both sides, something that affected Israel greatly and the Arabs not at all, since they were able to purchase arms openly from Britain and other European countries, many of whom were unwilling to sell arms to Israel for fear of angering the oil rich Arabs. In one of the ironies of history, a major cache of the arms the Jews used to win their war of independence were Nazi arms left over from the occupation of Czechoslovakia, purchased by Israel on the black market.

Somehow, the Jews prevailed against the attempted second Holocaust. And without the help of Europe, the United States or the UN.

They prevailed again in 1967, after a last minute cutoff of arms and supplies from Charles DeGaulle deprived them of all arms and supplies from France, their major arms source. The US remained neutral during that war and supplied no arms to the Jewish State, who were facing war on three fronts from Arab nations armed with the latest Soviet weapons. The Six Day War was a miracle not only because Israel won against overwhelming odds, but because they were able to win before the supplies and spare parts for their French weapons ran out.

Today's situation is not to be underestimated, but not nearly as dire as it might seem. In many ways, Israel's position is far more secure and superior than it was then.

The French betrayal in 1967 had a positive aspect in that it taught the Israelis not to rely overly on foreign made armaments. Today, Israel has a thriving state of the art arms industry of its own with products rivaling the best made anywhere, and the advantage that they're no longer at the mercy of another country for spare parts for most of their weaponry. The two main areas the Israelis have not gone into are fighter aircraft and helicopter gunships, both of which they still purchase from the U.S. However, they have produced aircraft in the past like the Kfir and the Avi and might very well make the decision to do so again. And their armed and unarmed drones are top quality.

Israel has a decent arsenal of ballistic missiles, and they also possess a small fleet of nuclear-armed Dolphin class submarines capable of launching ballistic missiles and hitting pretty much anything in the Middle East with precision.

They also have the best trained and most lethal fighting force in the region..and they’re free men fighting to defend their homes.

Let's compare that with the adversaries that Dr. Hanson and others have mentioned.

Unlike Israel, both Egypt and Turkey are extremely dependent on US made parts for their military, and it's difficult for me to believe that America would continue to supply them in a war against Israel, even with a President Obama in the White House. Also, neither can afford a war financially. Egypt is bankrupt with a population it can't afford to feed, and Turkey is sitting on a huge credit bubble that could burst at any moment. A war with Israel would also probably involve Turkey leaving NATO, since neither the U.S. or NATO’s European members would likely get involved in the conflict.

Turkey also has the disadvantage of logistics. They have large conventional forces but getting them in position to fight Israel would involve crossing huge distances, not to mention the problem of air support. And their military command, having recently been purged by PM Erdogan is lacking in depth and experience. Both nations will almost certainly stay out and confine themselves to hostility and encouraging actual combatants.

Hamas and Hezbollah (and I would also include the Palestinian Authority, thanks to the U.S. trained and equipped military America gifted to Fatah) remain Israel's immediate threats, largely because Hamas and Hezbollah remain Iran's proxies in any war with Israel.

Thanks to the inept leadership of former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and former defense minister Amir Peretz, neither of whom had ever held military command, the IDF was thrown haphazardly into Lebanon against Hezbollah in 2006 without adequate planning or logistics and initially suffered heavy casualties, with the unprepared IDF being surprised by Hezbollah's tactics and their level of training. Northern Israel also sustained heavy damage and civilian casualties from Hezbollah's missiles. However, once a coordinated ground assault began, Israeli forces ultimately macerated whole units of Hezbollah's ground forces, and destroyed most of Hezbollah's missile arsenal.

Unfortunately, thanks to Ehud Barack and Tzipi Livni's bending to pressure from US Secretary of State Condi Rice and the UN, a premature ceasefire was enacted that saved Hezbollah from destruction and allowed them to regroup, rearm and consolidate their control over Lebanon.

While they remain a strategic threat, there are several different factors operating today that weren't present in 2006 if war breaks out again.

First, the IDF experienced a major overhaul in tactics, training, equipment and leadership as a result of the 2006 Lebanon War, and they aren't going to be surprised again by Hezbollah, or sent into battle without a coordinated plan.

Also, if a new war breaks out, the rules are going to be quite different. In 2006, the IDF was ordered to avoid attacks on Lebanese installations whenever possible, giving Hezbollah a major advantage because they were able to hide rocket launchers, arms caches and fighters in civilian areas and in Lebanese government buildings. These days, Hezbollah essentially controls Lebanon, and the Israelis have made it quite clear that if Hezbollah attacks Israel again, it's going to be a war between Israel and Lebanon. And based on the Israeli realization of the fiasco that occurred with UNSC Resolution 1701 and UNFIL, this time Hezbollah may not be rescued by a ceasefire, something I’m sure Hezbollah’s leaders have considered.

Hamas survived Operation Cast Lead in December of 2008 by hiding among civilians in Gaza City after heavy casualties inflicted by the IDF, with its missile arsenal devastated and a number of its top commanders killed. Again, the Olmert government made the decision to declare a unilateral ceasefire and withdraw, rather than put the city under siege, cut off its electricity and destroy Hamas utterly. While Hamas has re-armed to a degree, there's no reason to think that another war with Israel would result in a Hamas victory.

The real wild card remains Iran, rapidly approaching status as a nuclear power. Much of Iran's threat comes via its proxies in Gaza and Lebanon and it ability to launch missile attacks, since Iranian conventional forces are too far removed to make a ground war feasible and I doubt that Iraq would allow an Iranian army military access in any event.

Would the ayatollahs risk heavy retaliation by attempting to destroy Israel for Allah? Perhaps. But Iran is not a nuclear power yet - not quite - and a threat to Israel would of necessity be prefaced by a successful nuclear weapons test. The day that happens, look for the Israelis to launch a major pre-emptive strike on Iran shortly afterwards, which could very well include tactical nukes. As I've mentioned before, such an attack would likely be facilitated by the Saudis, who long ago lost patience with the feckless Obama Administration's non-policy on Iran.

It’s certainly correct that Israel faces major challenges, and a combined assault by Iran, Hamas and Hezbollah would not be a negligible threat. Complacency is not a strategy and anything can happen in war. But Israel has faced far greater threats before and won handily.

Actually, those speculating on Israel’s danger ask the wrong question. The real matter up for discussion is not about Israel’s survival, but whether the West will prevail against the assault by Islamism. Because the fate of the West is bound to that of Israel's by the iron chains of history.

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