The Banality Of Evil

"The Banality Of Evil:" - When The Process Is More Important Than Life

In her book, "Eichmann In Jerusalem," Hannah Arendt uses that phrase to describe Eichmann's peculiar and detached attitude toward the monstrous evil that he perpetrated on the Jewish people. Her thesis is a bit more complex than that, but the phrase applies so well to the clerks and administrators and judges whose slavish attention to the process and the rules and the reinforcement of their own power made sure that Alfie Evans died.

It is nothing more than a firm and unshakable belief that government knows best; that the individual is secondary and subordinate to to the wishes and goals of the central planners and the career bureaucrats whose contempt for Everyman is palpable.

What saddens me almost as much as the death of an innocent child is the obtuseness of the political and medical establishment, who have become so inured to the concept of government as the ultimate arbiter of...everything...that they have lost sight of the basic human right of self determination. As Alfie Evans dies, calls grow for better ways to support grieving parents There are a bunch of awful quotations from the article, but here is one that encapsulates it, from a physician no less...

Looking forward, there is a real need to try to resolve disagreements between parents and doctors. Entrenched disagreement can reach a point where it's very difficult to step back from...

It wasn't a disagreement. The parents of this child were trying everything in their power to save his life, and the government, in the form of the judiciary and the medical establishment was trying to kill him.

Why? because those are the rules, and rules must be obeyed slavishly, or society will soon be filled with individuals who do what they want with their own lives.

The first thing Hitler did when he gained power was to change the law, to make his desire for the destruction of the Jewish people a legally acceptable result. 

Alfie Evans' death does not rise to the level of genocide, but it is on the continuum.

Why do once-great nations crumble and fall?

Because they deserve to.

Like the parents of Charlie Gard – another child similarly condemned to death by a preening NHS – Alfie’s parents disagreed with the hospital’s plans to abandon further treatment and remove life support from their son.  They began to investigate alternatives for care outside the NHS system, never suspecting that the state-run system would see their love for their child as a threat to the NHS and would respond with ferocity.

Alder Hey’s physicians have been unrelenting in their abandonment of this child, having decided more than a year ago, in February of 2017, that Alfie should quit embarrassing them by surviving in spite of receiving no treatment and get on with the business of the afterlife.

Since making that decision, the hospital has refused to perform even the most common of procedures for a patient with Alfie’s needs, such as a tracheostomy to facilitate easier breathing or a gastrostomy feeding tube for nutrition and medication.

For all this time, Alfie has been fed through a nasal tube, never intended as a permanent solution, but rather as a stopgap (weeks, not months) designed to be used until a g-tube can be placed.

The medical treatment Alfie has received is abominable, as a direct result of the hospital’s decision, and subsequent criminal obstinacy toward anyone suggesting that their prognosis might be in error.

To hear the barristers for Alder Hey wax poetic about the “first class care” given Alfie by the NHS (parroted by judge after judge in court proceedings) is indeed revolting – the British equivalent of Baghdad Bob. In truth, they have made no attempt to diagnose Alfie’s condition, preferring instead to place him on heavily sedating anti-seizure medications, then claiming that his lethargy is further evidence of his irreversible decline.

The world is witness to slow-motion murder. The perpetrators are the NHS, and the motive is not pecuniary, but rather a perverse form of institutional vanity.

Italy has conferred citizenship to Alfie, and there is a medical air ambulance standing by at the request of the pope to fly Alfie to the Vatican’s children’s hospital, Bambino Gesù, where Alfie can be treated.

But while socialism requires citizen confidence to operate, it will settle for coercion to gain compliance. This is why Alder Hey refuses to release Alfie. Should the boy survive outside NHS care, their “infallibility” would be shattered, and (gasp!) the sheep may begin to question their shepherd.

Collectivist schemes of medicine are no more sustainable (or just!) than collectivist schemes of societal order. Both require submission, even unto death.

The only “life unworthy of life” is that of the arrogant, self-congratulatory medical murderers of the NHS and their judicial enablers. May God’s judgment be realized in the fullest.

Amen to that. The decree refusing to allow the child to be flown to Italy for treatment at precisely no cost to anybody is what shifts this from typical bureaucratic heartlessness and obstinacy into the realm of purest evil. No caring person—no healer worthy of the designation—would ever countenance being party to such an atrocity.

But these are neither caring people nor healers. We’re talking here about monsters, abominations. To grant them an indulgence they in no way deserve by calling them “human” besmirches the word itself.

Yet instead of being righteously cast out of decent society as they should be—shunned to grub about its margins in wretched disgrace and deprivation—they’re running the damned place. Astoundingly, incomprehensibly, it gets even worse (see the attached threatening Tweet from the Merseyside Police for that). Perhaps worse still, the Facebook post linked in the Tweet is chock-full of nitwit statements of support for the NHS posted by Old Blighty’s bleating sheeple.

Maybe it would be better after all if little Alfie winds up succumbing to England’s inhuman savagery and indifference in the end and passes on to a better place. It might be better than living out his life in such a place, forced to acknowledge such contemptible curs as his countrymen.

May the perpetrators of this repulsive display of wanton cruelty burn in the hottest fires of Hell for all eternity.

And yeah, when the day comes that America’s government-(mis)run health-care system has attained this summit of degeneracy, I think everyone here will agree that it is DEFINITELY time to start shooting the bastards.

Update! The cold, hard truth:

If you don’t understand why the NHS and British courts refused, you don’t get socialized medicine. It is not, nor has it ever been, about health care. It’s about power. Once a government — any government — takes control of your health care, they own you and your children. Alfie’s parents and the British public had for months demanded Alfie’s release just to seek treatment by doctors competent enough to figure out what was wrong with him. But, for a socialized system, that’s dangerous. It implies that an individual Brit has rights not bestowed by the state.

In a social “democracy” like Great Britain, the state isn’t there for the purpose of serving the people — sick or otherwise. The people are there for the purposes of the state. If the state can hold your child hostage in a hospital whose doctors are too incompetent to arrive at a diagnosis — yet may terminate his life without your permission — neither you nor your child are “free” in any meaningful sense of the word. And this doesn’t stop at health care, of course. Remember Brexit? What happened when the voters of Great Britain made their wishes known regarding the European Union? The will of the British electorate was ignored.

Likewise, the wishes of Alfie’s parents never meant anything. Nor did the overwhelming public support they received. It is the “interests” of the state that matter in Perfidious Albion, and they have little or nothing to do with those of the “free people” who populate that benighted isle. There is only one way that Alfie is ever going to escape the clutches of the state apparatus they call, with no intentional irony, the National Health Service. The NHS and Alder Hey Children’s Hospital was always going to have the final word on Alfie’s fate. 

The most chilling thing about all this has little to do with Britain or its inhabitants; the people of Europe have for centuries been perfectly willing to subject themselves to despotism, oppression, and abuse by tyrants—nor have they ever suffered a shortage of would-be dictators willing to step up and take the job. It’s that here in America, a substantial percentage of our own population demands that we walk down this exact same ruinous road ourselves.

Which in turn is why, in my more pessimistic moments, I’m convinced that either a conflagration or a breakup is inevitable. How can people who cherish liberty and self-determination peacefully coexist for long with grasping, megalomaniacal fools and still call themselves free?

Alfie Evans, the State, and Us

You think the issue of the baby in England is just another story of individuals dealing with a personal tragedy?   You're wrong.   The story involves all of us.   It involves all of us in a very serious manner.   It is part of the thus far  nonviolent civil war we fight here in America – a war, again, like the first Civil War, for the soul of our country.   It is the war between Western,  liberal Judeo-Christian values and the values of leftism.   It's a war between the individual as the focus of our lives and culture and the big state as the focus.  

Just look at the stark realities that have played out in England.   Its health care system is now completely absorbed by the state.   (Ours is well on the way.)   The focus was the state, faceless, unaccountable, a massive bureaucracy armed with tremendous power shared with the politicians up in their distant offices, the unelected judges with their lifetime appointments, and the government employee doctors all on one side, and the individuals – Mom, Dad, and the baby – on the other.   Who do you suppose won this give-and-take, this health care transaction?   Talk about inequality. 

 Those on the left are livid if the guy  next door has a BMW and themselves only a Toyota, but they don't blink an eye at the truly massive inequality inherent in state versus individual power.   The state in England crushed Mom.   The state eliminated Dad.   And the state has told the baby his life is up, and he's ready to die.   But of course, keep in mind that all the state actors wrap their actions in  words of kindness, compassion, and  what is best for all concerned, serving the will of the people, and acting for the common good – all their usual regressive Marxist claptrap.

Now, if this is the soul of America one is fighting for, I say a plague on your house.   But this, indeed, is the soul the American left is battling for – the glorious state as the center of American life.   This is what the Democratic Party, our N.Y.  Times  op-ed writers, our mainstream media and tech elites, our university professors, leftist clergy, and Hollywood stars are all lined up rallying for: government – big, controlling, iron-fisted power centered in Washington.   They fight for this because no matter how smart, no matter the Yale or Princeton degree, no matter how sweet and well intentioned, American men and women of the left are now almost completely unmoored from the wisdom and liberalism of our great Western American Judeo-Christian values.   They have bought into what all humans tend to be attracted to, the child in us all, the world of "take care of me forever, Mommy and Daddy."   And government is, for them, that forever Mommy and Daddy of their fantasies.

Those of us who have retained control of that child within, channel instead the free adult inside, and have learned from our great Bible, from Western traditions and the American Founders – we fight this poison.   It is because we know  that though the state  can bring some good to life, when it becomes the center of life, the dominant force in a society, when it overwhelms what should be the center – namely, the individual – great evil comes of that.   That evil has come hard to England, and now it has moved on to America through our civil war between Americanism and leftism.  

What comes of losing to the left is a child kidnapped by state actors for "his own good."   What comes of losing to the left is the government standing in every examining room in America, every operating room, every emergency bay, unseen but present and powerful and demanding.   It is an entity that knows nothing of you, that knows nothing of your life and family and desires and needs, but is there nonetheless saying loud and clear,  "You will see the doctor I demand, have the test I think best, undergo the procedure I assess proper, accept the payment I think socially just, swallow the pill I approve, deal with your family member in the manner I prescribe, and if you disagree or push back, or do not comply,  the fury and massive power  we hold will be unleashed to confront you."

So, men and women of the left, cheer on your Obamacare, single-payer, Medicare for All, and Medicaid.   Cheer on the child inside you.   Cheer on socialism and all the degradation of life that comes with it.   But if at the end of  this civil war in America and you  the left  wins, keep in mind there is much to pay for this utter foolishness.   Mom and Dad in the guise of the state are a demanding and controlling thing.   Brace yourselves to live the degrading lives of children, as subjects of this raw and oppressive power.   Keep in mind that it never, ever  turns out well.   Ask the parents in England, or their child.   Ask the thousands who will die this year in England waiting to get the care they need.   Ask the millions in socialist Cuba about not having an aspirin available in their hospitals.

Leftism poisons everything it touches, from our health care to our economy, our  schools, universities, arts, sports, religious institutions, and even the Boy Scouts.

The child in Great Britain has no chance of ever even becoming a scout of any sort.   The state in England is done with him and his parents.   That's what Hope and Change are all about.  

Nordic Scientists Warn Brussels Over 'Superbugs'

Nordic scientists warn Brussels over 'superbugs'

In the real world, staff at Nordic hospitals are fighting hard to stop antibiotic resistant bacteria from spreading. 

Nykoepings Lasarett, a hospital in Sweden, in March cancelled operations and closed infected sections to stop a superbug named VRE from infecting patients.

As many as 250 patients received a letter from the hospital urging them to test if they carried the bacteria after being treated in the hospital.

"The hospitals do not control the infection yet," reported Sweden's public broadcaster, EKOT, on Thursday (26 April). 

The first VRE case was discovered in Huddinge in northern Sweden before the turn of the year and about 60 patients have now been infected in the Stockholm region. 

In Nykoeping, 44 patients have been reported infected and the resistant intestinal bacterium has spread further between several hospitals and infected patients also in Umeaa, Oerebro plus Nykoeping for several months.

No patient has been seriously ill until now. Most people do not notice that they have been infected, but patients with weakened health may succumb to serious infections such as blood poisoning.

The superbug VRE is part of a much bigger problem, according to Nordic researchers speaking at a seminar in the European Parliament organised by the Nordic council on Wednesday (25 April).

In Europe alone 25,000 people are estimated to die yearly because of multi-resistant bacteria, according to studies published by the Nordic countries.

Less than a century ago, pneumonia often led to death, but the risk was dramatically reduced after the first antibiotic, penicillin, was discovered in 1928.

Antibiotics have been used widely ever since, from human medicine to animal food and saved millions of lives.

But now the risk of dying from a bacterial infection is growing again because bacteria develop resistance to these antibiotics. 

"A world without effective antibiotics is the greatest threat to health care worldwide," Aasa Melhus, professor of Clinical Bacteriology at Uppsala University pointed out at the seminar in Brussels.

Antibiotics reduced mortality rates and prolonged life but no new antibiotics have been developed for the past 30 years.

"It is getting dangerous, because we can not offer the citizens anything more," professor Melhus said.

It is estimated the 60 percent of all infectious diseases stem from animals - but travelling is also contributing to infection and spread of bacteria.

"The only thing you have to do is to go abroad," said Aase Melhus.

She made a study in 2010 concluding that foreign travel is a major risk factor.

Samples from 100 healthy volunteers traveling outside Northern Europe, taken before and after their travel, showed that 50 percent returned with multi-resistant bacteria. 

The most risky country to travel appeared to be India, where 88 percent came back positive. 

"After six months 24 percent were still tested positive and as long as you are positive, you can spread it," professor Melhus explained.

"This is a global problem. Whatever happens in the world will in the end end up at your own doorstep," she said.

Hal Lindsey: Why Teach The Second Coming?

The Hal Lindsey Report: Why Teach The Second Coming?

Through the years I’ve heard a lot of excuses from pastors and teachers who don’t want to address the Second Coming of Christ.  Many of them say it’s just too difficult to understand.  Recently, I heard about a layman who was upset with God over the whole matter.  He asked, “Why can’t it be simple?”

Some of the greatest minds in history have taken on the subject of Christ’s return, and found it overwhelming.  Sir Isaac Newton, one of the most brilliant men who ever lived, spent more time studying the book of Daniel than he did pondering the laws of gravity.

So, yes, it can be complicated.  The deeper you dig, the more treasure you will find.  That’s the way it is with all of God’s revelation to humanity.  The great themes of the Bible are simple enough for a small child to understand, and complex enough to keep the finest theologians working for centuries to mine their mysteries.

But isn’t that good?  Don’t you want the things of God to be challenging, exciting, and fulfilling — to the mentally challenged, as well as to the most brilliant among us?  Proverbs 25:2 says, “It is the glory of God to conceal a matter, But the glory of kings is to search out a matter.” (NASB)

The Swiss theologian, Karl Barth, was famous as a deep thinker and a brilliant scholar.  On his one trip to America, a student asked him if it would be possible to summarize his life’s study into a single sentence.  He answered in the words of a children’s song. “Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so.”

 

Barth wrote many books and gave countless lectures.  He is an example of the fact that the finest scholars find no end to the beauties and intricacies of God’s message to humanity.  But that message can also be summarized in the lyrics to a child’s song. A mentally disabled person can grasp the key to it all — “Jesus loves me… the Bible tells me so.”

 

Can the study of end-times prophecy be summarized as succinctly?  Yes, it can.  We can find that summation in the words of Jesus from John 14:3 — “I will come again.”

 

Anyone can understand that.  And what a glorious thing to know!  None of the Bible makes sense without it.  The Old Testament told of a coming Messiah.  He would suffer and die for our sins (Isaiah 53).  And He would rule and reign over the entire earth.  We saw the first part come true at His first coming.  But to fulfill it all, He must come again.

Jesus must return because a multitude of prophecies from the Old and New Testaments still await fulfillment.  He must come again because justice demands it.  And He must return because our world is spiraling out of control, and humanity cannot survive without His direct intervention.

Jesus made His Second Coming a central part of His message.  He repeated it again and again.  In Matthew 24:3, the disciples asked Him, “When will these things be, and what will be the sign of Your coming, and of the end of the age?”  Jesus then spent the rest of that chapter and all the next one talking about His Second Coming.

In Mark 13:26, Jesus said, “They will see the Son of Man coming in clouds with great power and glory.” In Luke 21:27, He said, “They will see the Son of Man coming in a cloud with power and great glory.”

 

Jesus said to “watch” for His return.  In Matthew 24:42, He said, “Be on the alert, for you do not know which day your Lord is coming.”

 

That means we need to know the signs of His coming.  We need to study, and see how scripture lays out God’s end-times program.  We need to know the promises He has made — including His promises to Abraham.  We know He will keep His word.  He will fulfill every bit of it.  And that means, He will come again!  All we can say is, Praise the LORD.

The Hal Lindsey Report: Jesus Is Coming Soon

For more than fifty years, I have lived in the urgent expectation of Jesus’ return.  Fifty years is a long time.  Do I regret it?  Was I wrong?

No and no!

In Luke 12:37, Jesus said, “Blessed are those servants whom the master, when he comes, will find watching.” (NKJV) 

As followers of Christ, we are to live in a state of watchfulness.  A thousand years ago, there were Christians living in expectation of His coming.  They were not foolish to do so.  They were obedient.  Titus 2:13 directs us to be “looking for the blessed hope and glorious appearing of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ.” (NKJV)

Those Christians from previous generations who lived in expectancy of Christ’s return tended also to be those who lived closest to Him.  They were the ones most interested in His word, in sharing the Gospel, helping the poor, and caring for the sick.  

If you’re always on the lookout for Christ’s return, someone will inevitably remind you that no one knows the day nor the hour. But they’re missing the point.  It’s precisely because we do not know the day nor hour of His return that we are to be watchful.  In Matthew 24:42, Jesus said, “Watch therefore, for you do not know what hour your Lord is coming.” (NKJV)

For two thousand years, people have been watching.  That sounds like a long time, but remember this.  God gave the first promise of His first coming to Adam and Eve.  It took thousands of years, but God kept His word and Jesus came.  By human standards, the Lord may sometimes seem slow.  But He has a reason for that.  2 Peter 3:9-10 says, “The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some count slackness, but is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.  But the day of the Lord will come.” (NKJV)

When skeptics complain about God allowing evil and pain in the world, remember that “the Lord is not slack.”  He will one day stop all the child molesters, terrorists, and other criminals.  And He will hold them to account.  But He won’t just stop the evil you don’t like.  He will stop all evil.  He will hold everyone to account.

Why does he wait?  Because He “is longsuffering toward us.”  He’s “not willing that any should perish.”  He wants everyone to “come to repentance” — turn to Him and be saved.  For now, love and concern compel Him to wait.  But He will not wait forever.

Earlier in the same chapter, Peter wrote, “Knowing this first: that scoffers will come in the last days, walking according to their own lusts, and saying, ‘Where is the promise of His coming?  For since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of creation.’” (2 Peter 3:3-4 NKJV)

I’m convinced that these are the last days, and can assure you that scoffers have come.  “I’ve been hearing this all my life!” … “You’ve been saying this for fifty years!”  Yes, and I will keep on saying it because it’s still true.

There are no signs yet to be fulfilled before the rapture.  But signs of the Second Coming are everywhere.  Since the rapture comes before the Second Coming, the rapture has to be exceedingly close!

The big thing that makes our time different from any other is the existence of Israel as a nation, and the Jews having control of Jerusalem.  But there are other things unique to our time, as well.  For instance, before now the world did not have the technology needed for the Antichrist to control commerce as completely as the Bible foretells.

There’s another sign unique to today.  Jesus is coming soon . . . because He must!

 

In dozens of areas, human civilization is hurtling headlong toward destruction.  Look at just one — machines with artificial intelligence.  Scientists like Stephen Hawking warn of such machines taking over the world, destroying the human race in the process.  Far out?  Even longtime proponents of artificial intelligence have now joined in the warnings.

Air Force General Paul Selva, the Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff at the U.S. Defense Department, recently warned about “autonomous weapons systems” similar to the title character in the movie, “The Terminator” — and just as dangerous.  General Selva sees weapons that are not under direct human control as a menace to mankind. And, like self-driving cars, they’re just around the corner.

Then there’s nuclear proliferation.  Some people take comfort from the fact that no nuclear weapons have been used in combat since 1945.  But that’s like taking comfort from the fact that you’ve been playing Russian roulette for an hour and no shots have been fired.  Just keep playing, and the odds will catch up to you.

During the Cold War, Carl Sagan, wrote, “The nuclear arms race is like two sworn enemies standing waist deep in gasoline, one with three matches, the other with five.”

Except now, a madman in Korea also holds a match.  The nation of Iran, run by religious fanatics who see it as their job to create an apocalypse, also have, or will soon have, a match in their hands.  Next door neighbor enemies, India and Pakistan, both have nukes.  Russia has more than anybody, and no one knows if their leader is crazy or not.

But don’t be afraid. Things are shaping up as God said they would.  Just be sure you have invited Jesus to save you.  Receive the pardon purchased for you when He died on the cross.  He will instantly give you a new heart with new desires.  Ask Him to empower you with His Holy Spirit.  Then remember to thank Him for all these things.

In His power, you will begin to live a life that will draw others to Him as well.

Pompeo Gives 'Green Light' For Israel To Counter Elements Threatening Its Security From Syria

Pompeo’s thumbs up for Israel to counter Russian-backed Iranian drive in Syria

As US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu sat down on Sunday, April 29 in Tel Aviv to discuss the Iranian threat, a Russian-backed Syrian force struck across the Euphrates to capture a string of US-backed fortified Kurdish SDF villages. This incursion of a key US area of influence region in eastern Syria, if confirmed, would rip up a key element of the US-Russian de-confliction zones accord and provide Iran with a springboard for a leap up to the Iraqi border.

Pompeo, on his first Middle East Trip as Secretary of State, reiterated in Tel Aviv – as he did in Riyadh earlier Sunday – that the nuclear deal will need to be fixed or it would be abandoned by President Donald Trump’s on May 12. 

Standing alongside Netanyahu, the secretary backed Israeli efforts to counter Iran in Syria. He said the US is committed to “rolling back to the full range of Iranian malign influence in Syria,” specifically mentioning “Iran’s missile systems, its support for Hezbollah, its importation of thousands of Shiite fighters into Syria.” Pompeo added, “We strongly support Israel’s sovereign right to defend itself.”

This was taken as a US green light for Israel to take on the elements threatening its security from Syria. The secretary also stressed that the US would continue to fight ISIS and not tolerate the Assad regime using chemical weapons.

Our military sources add: If the Syrian push into the US-held region is confirmed, it will tell the Trump administration and its new secretary of state that while they were busy arranging for US troops to leave Syria, Moscow was expanding its support for Iran to move in and deepen presence in that country.

Russia, Iran and Syria were not deterred when their attempt last year to cross the Euphrates was repulsed by the US contingent with heavy casualties inflicted on Russian forces. The same coalition tried again on February 10 and were again thrown back by the US air force. But our military sources report that, on April 13-14, shortly before the US-UK-French missile strike on Syria’s chemical weapons sites, Russian forces were seen transferring to the Syrian army upgraded bridging equipment for their new attempt on Sunday. A few hours after the Syrian army’s claims of success, however, Kurdish troops said they had mounted a counter-offensive and forced the Syrian forces “far away” from the territories they captured.

Pompeo: Recognizing Jerusalem as Capital of Israel is ‘Recognizing Reality’ (video)

Newly-sworn-in U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said during his joint news conference with Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday afternoon, “Recognizing Jerusalem as the capital of Israel is recognizing reality.”

The two men met on a number of issues: primary among them was the nuclear threat from Iran, as well as its military presence in Syria, across Israel’s northern border. That threat and others that create issues for Israel’s security were on the agenda when Netanyahu and Pompeo sat with officials from both sides at the Defense Ministry in Tel Aviv.

“Our bond is special,” Netanyahu told reporters. “America and Israel are closer than ever before.”

Pompeo added, “We are incredibly proud to be opening the new embassy on May 14,” noting in a reference to the continuing controversy over U.S. President Donald Trump’s recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, that the president’s action was simply “recognizing reality.”

Following is the full transcript of the statements of both men after their meeting at the Defense Ministry.

Prime Minister Netanyahu: 

“Secretary Pompeo, it’s wonderful to welcome you. 

This is your first visit to Israel as Secretary of State. I think it’s significant that you chose, as did the President, to include Israel on this important itinerary. I think it’s symbolic of our friendship, which is deep and getting even deeper and stronger.

We’ve known each other for some time. I’ve followed your activities in Congress, and then as the CIA, now as Secretary of State. You’re a true friend of Israel, a true friend of the Jewish people. And I look forward to working with you in your new role.

We’ve just had very productive, very focused conversations on our common interests and how to defend our common values.

I want to thank again President Trump for his historic decision on recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s capital. We look forward to welcoming the American delegation to celebrate the relocation of the embassy with you, Ambassador Friedman. I must tell you that the bold decision by President Trump has prompted other countries, quite a few now, who are planning to move their embassy to Jerusalem as well. It says something about American leadership and about the forthright way in which simple truths are being put forward, and the effect this has on the international scene.

Mr. Secretary, I think the greatest threat to the world and to our two countries—and to all countries—is the marriage of militant Islam with nuclear weapons, and specifically the attempt of Iran to acquire nuclear weapons. We’ve had a very productive talk today on this subject as well. I appreciate the President’s leadership and your position on stopping Iran from ever acquiring nuclear weapons.

I appreciate the President’s and your position on stopping Iran’s aggression in the region. That aggression has grown many-fold since the signing of the Iranian deal. If people thought that Iran’s aggression would be moderated as a result of signing the deal, the opposite has happened, and Iran is trying to gobble up one country after the other. Iran must be stopped. Its quest for nuclear bombs must be stopped. Its aggression must be stopped, and we’re committed to stopping it together.

I was very much encouraged once again by the steadfast support of the United States for Israel and for this common effort, which encompasses many other countries, as you know. You well know, Mr. Secretary. But our bond is special. It’s based on shared values of democracy, freedom, the quest for security and peace. And I can say that today America and Israel are closer than ever before, and I have no doubt that our alliance will grow even closer in the years ahead. 

So I want to welcome you back to Israel, Mr. Secretary. It’s a pleasure to see you and I wish you the best of luck in your important mission.”

Netanyahu And Trump Discuss 'Problems Posed' By Iran

Nuke deal deadline nearing, Netanyahu and Trump discuss 'problems posed' by Iran

With US President Donald Trump’s deadline for amending the Iran nuclear deal or walking away from it just weeks away, he spoke to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu by phone Saturday about Tehran’s malign influence on the region, the White House said on Sunday.

“The two leaders discussed the continuing threats and challenges facing the Middle East region, especially the problems posed by the Iranian regime’s destabilizing activities,” according to a White House readout of the conversation.

Earlier on Sunday, Trump’s newly-minted US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo visited Israel on his first foreign trip. While speaking alongside Netanyahu during a joint press conference, the former CIA director said that Trump remained committed to exiting the landmark accord if changes weren’t made and that Iranian aggression against Israel — by trying to establish a military presence in Syria — was exacerbating American concerns.

“President Trump’s been pretty clear: This deal is very flawed. He’s directed the administration to try and fix it and if we can’t fix it he’s going to withdraw from the deal,” Pompeo said.

Pompeo also warned of Iran’s “destabilizing and malign activities” in the Middle East.

“We remain deeply concerned about Iran’s dangerous escalation of threats to Israel and the region and Iran’s ambition to dominate the Middle East remains,” he said.

“The United States is with Israel in this fight,” Pompeo added.

Netanyahu thanked Pompeo for his and Trump’s opposition to Iran obtaining nuclear weapons and their commitment to countering Iran’s regional “aggression.”

“That aggression has grown many folds since the signing of the Iran nuclear deal. If people thought that Iran’s aggression would be moderated as a result of signing the deal, the opposite has happened,” he said.