In The News: Sunday

Israel Under Fire

Some 200,000 Israeli children throughout southern Israel spent Sunday hiding in bomb shelters instead of going to school as Gaza-based Palestinian terrorists continued pouring missiles and mortars into the area.

By midday Sunday, some 130 projectiles had been fired at communities across the western Negev region over a 48-hour period. At least two dozen Israelis have been injured, some seriously.

Deputy Mayor Heftzi Zohar of the large Negev city of Beersheva told The Jerusalem Post that the situation is unbearable, especially for children "who are living under terror."

Palestinian rocket attacks intensified significantly. Israeli responded with targeted air strikes that managed to kill 15 terrorists, some as they were preparing further rocket launches. Army sources told Voice of Israel that the military has ruled out a ground incursion into Gaza at this time, though even IDF chief Gen. Benny Gantz admits it is only a matter of time before such an operation becomes necessary.

Israel: Jihad Islami Will Pay Dear If Fajr Missiles Fired

Israel has passed a stern warning to the Palestinian Jihad Islami shooting missiles from Gaza for the third day to expect Israel punishment on a different scale from the current surgical air strikes if they dare fire the Fajr surface missiles supplied them by Iran, DEBKAfile reports. The warning was relayed Sunday, March 11, through Egyptian Intelligence Chief Gen. Murad Muwafi who is working with Washington to halt the Gaza violence.

The Iran-backed Jihad has in its arsenal Fajr 5 missiles whose range is 110 kilometers and Fajr 3 which has a 60-kilometer reach. They bring into range Israel’s urban, commercial and population hub cities between Tel Aviv and Rehovoth, which are outside the range of the Grads and Qassams, more 110 of which were fired from Gaza since Friday.

Military sources told DEBKAfile that the Jihad terrorists are aiming for a spectacular, multi-fatality strike in a major Israeli city before ending this round of violence on order to strut as victors in Palestinian and Middle East public eyes. This ambition has been frustrated for three days by the Israeli invention, the Iron Dome interceptor of short-range missiles, which has saved important towns like Beersheba and the ports of Ashdod and Ashkelon from casualties and serious damage by intercepting the Grads before they land.

Iron Dome Foils 90% Of Missiles

The Iron Dome system has intercepted 90 percent of missile attacks on urban centers during the latest rocket bombardment from Gaza.

The expensive systems were inaugurated last year amid controversy over its worth. A primitive Kassam rocket costs terrorists only a few hundred dollars while each Iron Dome anti-missile missile costs $50,000.

Its deployment this past weekend appears to have defeated Hamas, at least for the time being. The terrorist organization has been talking with the new regime in Egypt for another ceasefire after failing to inflict mass casualties or property damage on Israel.

The Iron Dome has been able to defend Israel’s three most populous southern cities, but if Hamas unleashes longer-range missiles that can reach Rehovot, Kiryat Gat and Kiryat Malachi, closer to metropolitan Tel Aviv, the IDF would lack enough systems to cover everyone. Defense Minister Ehud Barak said Sunday morning that expanding the system should be a national emergency project.

Today's commentaries reveal a lot about the status of the world today:

Christians Who Signed Petitions Investigated

A prosecutor has decided to pursue and possibly charge members of El Paso area churches who promoted petitions opposing the city administration’s decision to implement benefits for same-sex partners even after voters decided not to allow that.

The result is an emergency appeal to the state Supreme Court by attorneys with the Alliance Defense Fund, which has been working on the freedom of speech dispute.

The organization today warned that hundreds of Christians and other El Paso citizens “are facing jail time for exercising their constitutionally protected right to speak out against Mayor John Cook’s policies.”

The issue arose when voters in November 2010 placed on the ballot and passed an ordinance prohibiting unmarried domestic partner benefits in their city.

Several members of the city council refused to follow the will of the vote, and voted to rescind the ordinance approved by voters. The mayor joined in the effort.

That produced a grassroots recall campaign seeking to remove the mayor and council members who violated the will of the people.

The mayor subsequently sued Tom Brown Ministries, Word of Life Church of El Paso, El Pasoans for Traditional Family Values and other local citizens who circulated recall petitions. He cited a Texas election law, arguing that it prohibits churches from circulating a petition.

Then the Court of Appeals for the 8th District took up the mayor’s cause and ordered the election stopped and the petition signatures decertified. Almost immediately, El Paso District Attorney Jaime Esparza subpoenaed the petitions and convened a grand jury to proceed with possible criminal indictment of those behind the petition effort.

“El Paso citizens should not live in fear of being arrested and jailed for exercising their constitutionally protected right to free speech,” said ADF Senior Legal Counsel Joel Oster, who argued before the appeals court on Jan. 24 in Cook v. Tom Brown Ministries.

Ritual Defamation: Conservative Immolation By Progressive Foes

Increasingly, Conservative leaders are being isolated and surrounded by implacable, foam-lipped foes, rabid wolves fomenting false-standards, offering victims to the god of Marx. Many recent examples abound, including attacks upon Pat Buchanan, Lou Dobbs, and Rush Limbaugh, etc. These partisan assaults, indecently launched in the name of “decency” caused these to be called-out for violations of some nebulous civil code, i.e. for simply being too Conservative. Is this an example of a sophisticated leftist campaign to purge political opponents, led by Barack from the White House? All indications suggest this collusion is indeed occurring, raising again the specter of Barack employing groups like Media Matters to direct national media discussions.

Ritual Defamation must avoid any debate over the truth or reasonableness of the target’s position. Only condemnation is allowed. Debate opens the floor to examining the issue on its merits; opposite what the ritual defamer is trying to do. Wilcox states: “The primary goal of a ritual defamation is censorship and repression.”

Pravda Asks: What Happened To American Media?

It’s a twist of irony: The Russian news website Pravda has published an accusation that the American media is “tame,” afraid to publish news and is “deliberately hiding the evidence published on the internet about [President Obama's] defrauding of the American public and the deliberate evisceration of the Constitution of the United States.”

In a March 7 Pravda column, “Arizona sheriff finds Obama presidential qualifications forged,” Dianna Cotter, a senior at American Military University, blasts America’s mainstream media for their virtual silence about Maricopa County, Ariz., Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s six-month investigation into the controversy surrounding Obama’s birth certificate and his constitutional eligibility for office.

“A singularly remarkable event has taken place in the United States of America,” Cotter wrote. “This event occurred in Arizona on March 1st and was an earth shattering revelation. … Yet, in the five days since [Arpaio's] revelations there has been little in the way of serious reporting on the findings he presented in his presser. With 6 short videos, the Sheriff and his team presented a devastating case, one the tame US press is apparently unable to report.”

The Politics Of Ritual

Benjamin Netanyahu will not go down in history as the Israeli prime minister who let the second Holocaust take place. Netanyahu will bomb Iran. His red line has been crossed. His window of opportunity is rapidly closing. Obama can chide him, cajole him, threaten him, and be nice to him, but nothing has or will change. As it was before Netanyahu came to Washington, so too is it after he leaves.

Hezb'allah will launch thousands of missiles. Hamas will fire rockets. The UN will meet in emergency session and fire off resolutions. The Arabs will spill more of their bile. Muslims will riot in Europe. There will be talk, but only talk, of regional war. Rabbi Michael Lerner'sTikkun website will condemn Israel. The New Israel Fund will issue some fatuous statement about Iranian culture. Iran will still be bombed.

No state can yield its survival to another, especially one run by the man who embraced Syria as a hope for peace and Iran as a rational actor, a man who has been so wrong about every twist and turn in the Middle East that he makes Thomas Friedman appear prescient.

Obama is not concerned about Israel. He is concerned about winning re-election. An Israeli attack will push up oil prices and crash the American economy's fragile recovery. American voters always know how to vote their pocket books.

If Israel were obliterated, Obama would exude the same concern Franklin D. Roosevelt showed when Jan Karski, of the Polish underground, explained to him what was happening at Auschwitz. Roosevelt blew smoke rings from his cigar and dismissively told Karski to tell the Jews of Poland that all they need to know was that America was going to win the war. For Obama, who bows before Muslim tyrants and thinks Turkish Prime Minister Recep Erdogan is the most important leader in the Middle East, Israel's obliteration wouldn't be worth a smoke ring.

The Awful Parallel

The parallels of the lead up to World War 2 with the current conditions in the Western world are troubling. The cast of players has changed, but the characters remain. The result of years of socialist policies is that Europe is once again on the brink of financial collapse. The people of many European nations are withdrawing into almost tribal enclaves, preparing for the worst.

In place of the tyranny of the German National Socialist Party of Hitler, radical Islam oppresses much of the Middle East. Paralleling widespread support of Fascism by progressive elites in the West is now a troubling acquiescence to radical Islam by western governments and media. In Hitler's role we cast Ahmadinejad of Iran, racing to create nuclear weapons and, like Hitler and the National Socialists, threatening the Jews with extermination. Like Hitler, Iran's diplomats lie and obfuscate, buying time to complete their preparations for attack.

Chamberlain's part is aptly played by US President Barak Obama, whose foreign policy is one of apology, appeasement and isolationism. Obama uses the diminishing influence of the US to dissuade Israel from defending itself, while encouraging radical and corrupt Islamic governments to become bolder. At the same time Obama's domestic policies and those of the Euro-statelets result in huge cuts to defense spending and an alarming lack of preparation, and no stomach to engage in any armed conflicts, hoping instead that sanctions and talk will replace action.

The descent of the countries of North Africa, particularly Libya and Egypt from relatively stable, and tacitly western-friendly states to Islamist, western-hating states is the direct result of Obama's muddled foreign policy -- and something for which the media congratulates Obama endlessly. Obama and the media believe his actions will bring peace in our time.

Like Hitler, Ahmadinejad has declared his intentions. Like Chamberlain, Obama denies the obvious. Like the Allies following World War 1, the Western democracies have allowed socialist domestic and spending policies to bankrupt their economies and comprise their national security. All of the players are in place and field is set. We may well be watching this generation's gathering storm.

It is said those who ignore history are doomed to repeat it. We have our Fascist tyrant and our naïve appeaser. We desperately need our Churchill.

Also see:

Putin Re-Election May Spark "Russian Spring"

Tsar Putin

"Israel's Existence More Important Than Obama"