Solsticewitch13's BOS

http://www.stonegateinstitute.org/2848/islam-french-elections

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Are the media actually interested in helping the Palestinians, or really just in bashing Israel? The media's overkill fixation on bashing Israel hurts not only Jews and any chances for peace, but also Palestinians.

Helen Thomas, dubbed "the First Lady of the Press", was a renowned veteran reporter, "a trusted source" on White House politics, and for decades, considered a public opinion-maker, when on May 27, 2010, she made anti-Semitic remarks: she wanted Jews to simply "get the hell out of Palestine" and return "Home to Poland, Germany" or "America."

How had she managed to keep her anti-Semitism out of sight all that time? And to what extent had that affected her reporting, especially on the Arab-Israeli conflict? Also, is Thomas just an isolated case? Or is she just the tip of the iceberg; is there much more of this sentiment prevalent among reporters under the surface? How many anti-Semitic and biased media stars are out there who are more devious than Thomas, and have chosen to keep their anti-Semitism still in the closet?

Thomas went on to claim that Israel treated the Palestinians the way the Nazis had treated the Jews. Thomas, who is of Arab descent, probably knows that this is not true by any means. All she had to do to was check the way her country of heritage, Lebanon, treats the Palestinians versus the way Israel does. As Palestinian refugees in Lebanon are institutionally and systematically discriminated against by both the Lebanese society and the Lebanese state, how come Thomas never mentioned that? Was Thomas actually concerned with the welfare of the Palestinians or with hating Jews?

Some might argue that Thomas's case was remote; former White House correspondent Sam Donaldson said her comments likely reflected the view of many people of Arab descent. Nonetheless, according to Helen's own description of herself, she is not really an Arab. Born in 1920 in Kentucky to Lebanese parents, Thomas described her family growing up in Michigan: "We were never hyphenated as Arab-Americans. We were American, and I have always rejected the hyphen and I believe all assimilated immigrants should not be designated ethnically. Or separated, of course, by race, or creed, either. These are trends that ever try to divide us as a people."

Thomas even emphasized her Americanism in an interview with Rabbi Nesenoff: when he asked her, "Do you speak Arabic?" she responded: "Very little. We were too busy Americanizing our parents...." In other words, Thomas is an all-American journalist; her case is not necessarily an isolated case because she is of an Arab-descent. To the contrary, what is alarming is how Thomas was able to go undetected for her bias an anti-Semitism for over five decades, all while she was contributing to America's public opinion. The question now is: who else is still is in the closet?

Thomas has not been an exception to the international media, who feed on demonizing Israel and systematically complicating even the potential for peace by painting a demonic picture of the Jewish state. No question, the global media body is eager to jump at any story in which it can swiftly demonize Israel, be it deliberately or simply to catch a juicy story by the end of the day to please the editor in chief. This habit has harmed the Palestinians in many ways, for example: very few media sources are interested in reporting on the inhumane conditions of the Palestinians living in Arab countries. The media re excellent at forgetting the simple fact that most Palestinian "refugees" actually do live in Arab countries and not in Israel.

A major example is the renowned British journalist Robert Fisk, who went to Jordan in 2010 to meet with right-wing Jordanian Bedouins only to come back with an article entitled "Why Jordan Is Occupied by Palestinians." Since then, this article has been used by Bedouin extremists as the equivalent of Pravda, a Soviet agitprop publication that did not even pretend to be news. Those Bedouins want the Palestinians expelled from Jordan, and Fisk has just given them their dream "15 minutes of fame" in an internationally prominent newspaper. Again, was Mr. Fisk concerned with the Palestinians, or with blaming Israel for everything?

While Fisk is considered a classic example of anti-Israel bias, some younger media stars, or emerging heavyweights do not necessarily seem any different. According to the British newspaper, The Daily Mail, for instance, the relatively young Wikileaks founder, Julian Assange, was plunged into anti-Semitic row as he told a journalist he thought a Jewish conspiracy was being worked against him, which "included" the Guardian's editor Alan Rusbridger. When told Rusbridger was not Jewish, Assange reportedly noted that Rusbridger was "sort of Jewish" because he was related to David Leigh, a Jewish journalist. How do his views and convictions possibly filter down to the way he runs Wikileaks? As it took Helen Thomas close to six decades to come out about her true feelings, this is something that perhaps one can only speculate about.

Anti-Semitic journalists, however, keep surfacing from all professional backgrounds. Take Matt Moss, for example, recently in the New York Times travel section, who in a breath,taking combination of unprofessionalism, prejudice (pre-judging something without so much as a current look at it), lack of curiosity, boasted that although he is Jewish, the only country on the entire planet he does not want to visit is Israel. He did not even have the grace to acknowledge that -- in an earlier time, not so long ago, without an Israel as the sole country that offered sanctuary to boatloads of people fleeing the Third Reich's killing machine while other countries, including the United States, either turned boats away or let them sink -- he too might well have ended up in an oven or as a cake of curio soap.

Or take Gregg Easterbrook, who in 2003 was fired from ESPN for a blog he had written for the New Republic Online, in which he described Jews in the film industry, including Disney's CEO, Michael Eisner, as "Jewish executives who worshiped money above all…by promoting for profit the adulation of violence."

The list could go on and on, but there is another point:

Thomas's attitude is not only unkind and unfair to Jews, it is also unfair to Palestinians. The media's Israel-bashing Jews-haters are not only harming Jews; they are harming the Palestinians as well. They have established a culture of tolerance for Arab abuse of the Palestinians: the 1970 massacres of the Palestinians in Jordan, for example and the 1980s massacres of Palestinians in Lebanon, and the abuse of Palestinians in Syria and Iraq-- before and after Saddam's fall -- all received little coverage compared to the media's overkill fixation on Israel.

How do the media serve the Palestinians when they choose to demonize Israel, the only country that allows the Palestinians not only full freedom of speech and of the press, but also employment at the highest levels, from full membership in Israel's Parliament [Knesset], to serving as a justice on the Supreme Court, or appointments as Ambassador in the Diplomatic Corps? Do the Turks, for example, do that for their minorities? Do the Egyptians? Does Jordan? Does any Arab country?

Related Topics: Mudar Zahran

Islam Looms in French Elections

by Soeren Kern
February 14, 2012 at 4:45 am

http://www.stonegateinstitute.org/2840/greece-euro-germany

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"We have been too busy with the identity of those who arrived and not enough with the identity of the country that accepted them." - Nicolas Sarkozy

With just ten weeks to go until the first round of presidential elections in France, Islam and the question of Muslim immigration has become a central issue in the campaign.

France, home to between five and six million Muslims, has the largest Muslim population in the European Union; polls show that millions of French voters are worried about the proliferation in France of "separate Islamic societies" that are ruled by Islamic Sharia law.

Responding to these concerns, French President Nicolas Sarkozy outlined an important part of his re-election platform -- imposing restrictions on Muslim immigration -- during a February 10 interview in the weekend magazine supplement of the pro-government newspaper, Le Figaro.

Sarkozy rejected calls by his Socialist rival, François Hollande, to offer an amnesty to all of the estimated 350,000 illegal Muslim immigrants currently in France. Sarkozy said: "I say very clearly that, unlike Mr. Hollande, I am not in favor of regularizing the status of illegal immigrants, which would immediately create fresh demand."

Sarkozy also spoke out against Hollande's plan to allow Muslim immigrants to vote in local elections. "This is not the time," he said, "considering all the risks associated with the rise of multiculturalism."

In an effort to fight back against skyrocketing social security fraud, Sarkozy said he would make i harder for a foreign-born spouse to obtain French nationality by marrying a French citizen.

Sarkozy also promised a constitutional change to make it easier to expel illegal immigrants and failed asylum-seekers, and he called for stricter surveillance of legally resident foreigners.

Just a week earlier, French Interior Minister Claude Guéant, in a clear reference to the Muslim world, said that not all civilizations are equal.

"Contrary to what the left's relativist ideology says, for us all civilizations are not of equal value," Guéant told the conservative student association UNI on February 4. "Those which defend humanity seem to us to be more advanced than those that do not. Those which defend liberty, equality and fraternity, seem to us superior to those which accept tyranny, the subservience of women, social and ethnic hatred."

Guéant also stressed the need to "protect our civilization."

The comments sparked a predictable uproar, with critics denouncing his comments as dangerous and xenophobic. But when journalists asked Sarkozy to distance himself from Guéant, Sarkozy brushed aside their objections as a "ridiculous argument."

"The interior minister said that a civilization that does not accord the same place and rights to men and to women does not have the same value. It is common sense and I don't want to argue about it," Sarkozy remarked in an interview with France 2 television.

The latest IFOP poll dated February 9 shows Hollande leading Sarkozy, 31% to 24.5%. Marine Le Pen, leader of the far-right, anti-immigrant National Front party, is polling at 19.5%.

It still ,remains to be seen however, whether Le Pen will get her name on the ballot. All French candidates must secure the signed endorsement of 500 elected local officials before they can be put on the ballot. Le Pen has so far been able to gather only 350 names, largely because of the perceived political risk of being associated with her populist campaign. She has until March 16 to collect the remaining signatures.

The IFOP poll forecasts that if Le Pen cannot run, Sarkozy would come in with roughly one-third of the vote in the first round, equal to Hollande. But Sarkozy would probably still lose the run-off vote to Hollande.

Not surprisingly, Sarkozy has been reaching out to Le Pen's supporters, signaling that he shares many of their concerns about Islam and Muslim immigration.

In January 2012, for example, the Sarkozy government implemented a new law that makes it harder for Muslim immigrants to obtain French citizenship. As of January 1, foreigners seeking French nationality will be tested on French culture and history, and will have to prove that their French language skills are equivalent to those of a 15-year-old mother-tongue speaker. They will also be required to sign a new charter establishing their rights and responsibilities.

In September 2011, the French government enacted a new law prohibiting Muslims from praying in the streets. The ban was Sarkozy's response to growing public anger over the growing phenomenon of Muslim street prayers, in which thousands of Muslims from Paris to Marseille and elsewhere closed off streets and sidewalks, thereby shutting down local businesses and trapping non-Muslim residents in their homes and offices, to accommodate overflowing crowds for Friday prayers.

The weekly spectacles provoked a mixture of anger, frustration and disbelief, but despite public complaints, local authorities had declined to intervene, largely out of fear of sparking riots.

The issue of illegal street prayers was catapulted to the top of the French national political agenda in December 2010, when Le Pen denounced them as an "occupation without tanks or soldiers."

Sarkozy said the street cannot be allowed to become "an extension of the mosque," and warned that the overflow of Muslim faithful onto the streets at prayer time when mosques are packed to capacity risks undermining the French secular tradition separating state and religion.

Guéant told Le Figaro 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."

In June 2011, the French government refused to give French nationality to an Algerian-born man living in France because of his "degrading attitude" towards women. The man is married to a Frenchwoman but he does not allow her to leave the family home.

In a legal precedent, his application for French nationality was turned down because "his idea of sexual equality is not compatible with that of the French Republic," according to a government official quoted by the French radio station Europe 1.

The French constitution states that the government can refuse nationality or strip nationality for a "failure to integrate." Guéant said he expects candidates for French nationality to not only integrate but to "assimilate" into French society.

In April 2011, France's much-debated "burqa ban" took effect. The new law prohibits the wearing of Islamic body-covering burqas and face-covering niqabs in all public spaces in France.

Also in April, Sarkozy's center-right Union for a Popular Movement (UMP) party held a controversial debate on the compatibility of Islam with the rules of the secular French Republic. The three-hour roundtable discussion, the title of which was altered to remove any reference to Islam, resulting in the anodyne "Secularism: To Live Better Together," was held at the upscale hotel Pullman Paris Montparnasse in the presence of 500 religious leaders, legislators and journalists.

In February 2011, Sarkozy denounced multiculturalism as a failure and said Muslims must assimilate into the French culture 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."

The first round of France's presidential election will be held on April 22; the second-round run-off vote is scheduled for May 6.

Soeren Kern is Senior Fellow for Transatlantic Relations at the Madrid-based Grupo de Estudios Estratégicos / Strategic Studies Group. Follow him on Facebook.

Related Topics: Soeren Kern

Greece: The Euro Should Never Have Happened

by Peter Martino
February 14, 2012 at 4:30 am

http://www.stonegateinstitute.org/2850/nato-iran-worry-about-missile-shield

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As Greek economy collapses and the politicians refuse cuts for themselves, the Greeks take it out on -- Germany

The front page of last Thurday's Greek newspaper Demokratia was clear: "Dachau!" it headlined over the paper's full length. Also on the front page was a picture of German Chancellor Angela Merkel in a Nazi uniform. Demokratia is a right-wing newspaper. Leftist Greek papers and organizations are even stronger in their anti-German feelings. During a trade union protest in Athens last week, flags of the Federal Republic of Germany were burned alongside flags of Nazi Germany. Next April, Greece is holding general elections. Bashing Germany promises to yield electoral rewards.

The Greeks are blaming Germany for their present economic predicament. That is hardly fair given that Greece is virtually bankrupt and only manages to survive thanks to Berlin's generosity. Two years ago, Germany and the other countries of the eurozone, the group of 17 European nations using the euro as their common currency, bailed out Greece with €110bn ($145.2bn). Germany provided the bulk of the money. Today, German Chancellor Merkel is prepared to bail out Athens again, with an even more staggering €130bn ($171.6bn). She is doing so despite the unpopularity of the bailouts with her own German electorate. In return for her generosity, however, Merkel wants the Greeks to implement a credible austerity program. But the Greeks are not grateful and shout abuse at Merkel and the Germans.

Greece seems to be a bottomless pit. Even if Greece's private creditors write down 70% of the country's debt and the Greek government implements all the austerity measures which it has promised to take so far, the Greek debt of 170% of GDP will only fall to 136% by 2020, while Germany and the eurozone demand that it be reduced by that time to 120% of GDP. Hence, the eurozone demands that the Greeks adopt additional austerity measures. If not, more aid will not be forthcoming and Greece will go bankrupt by the end of next month when it needs to refinance existing debt. A so-called "troika," consisting of representatives of three organizations – the European Commission, the European Central Bank and the IMF – regularly visits Greece to supervise the seriousness and the progress of the Greek austerity efforts. The troika's reports are hardly encouraging.

The Greek state is collapsing rapidly. Its failure to collect taxes is an indication of the unraveling of the government apparatus. Last week, the Greek authorities admitted that they systematically fail to collect tax penalties. Over the last two years, the Greek authorities issued a total of €8.6bn ($11.3bn) in fines for tax evasion and other tax-related offenses. However, only 1% of this sum ended up in the public coffers. Corruption has exacerbated the Greek problems. It is estimated that the country loses an amount of €15bn ($19.8bn) in unpaid taxes every year. More than 60,000 Greek households have investments exceeding €1m ($1.3m), while only 5,000 Greeks declare annual incomes that exceed €100,000. Tax officials often agree to an under-the-counter payment in exchange for not imposing penalties. There is a backlog of 165,000 pending tax cases, representing about half of the total arrears of €60bn ($79.2bn), according to a European Commission report.

Being unable or unwilling to collect taxes and keep its austerity promises, Greece has lost international credibility. The eurozone countries are skeptical about Greek declarations that more austerity measures and economic reforms, such as privatization, will be implemented and tax revenue will be raised. Germany and the other eurozone members are tired of the continued failure of Greece to keep its promises. If the eurozone countries do not provide additional billions within the next four weeks, Greece will default, possibly dragging the euro down as a consequence. Merkel insists that if the German taxpayers bail out Greece again, the Greek politicians must stick to their part of the deal and deliver, after the April elections as well.

The Greek population, however, after two years of austerity is rebelling. During this period wages were cut, pensions slashed, income and property taxes doubled (though probably not collected), unemployment rose to 20%, thousands of businesses – 111,000 last year alone – closed down, half a million of the 11 million Greeks left the country looking for a better life elsewhere, and half a million claim they have seen almost all their savings evaporate. Suicide rates have gone up 40%, the fastest increase in Europe.

Anger among ordinary Greeks is rising. Last Friday, Greece's largest police trade union threatened troika inspectors with arrest. According to the union, the troika, through its insistence on harsh austerity measures, are "trying to overturn the Greek democratic order, violate national sovereignty and steal essential goods from the Greek people."

Every other country in Greece's dire situation would devaluate its currency. However, as Greece is a member of the eurozone, it cannot devaluate. This leaves its politicians no other option but to subject the people to ever harsher austerity measures. The Greek government is currently proposing to cut wages by an additional 22% and dismiss 150,000 civil servants, including 15,000 this year.

Significantly, however, the Greek politicians are sparing themselves. The members of the Greek parliament refuse to lower their own salaries, which can amount to the net sum of €8,500 ($11,200) a month – excluding an expenses allowance of €4,900 ($6,500) – and are among the highest for parliamentarians in the entire eurozone. In contrast, the average minimum wage in Greece is €871 ($1,149) and will be cut by 22%. As the Brussels based blog Open Europe writes "There is clearly something wrong in a place where 'normal' citizens have either lost their jobs are faced a series of pay cuts over the last two years, while the political class – which certainly bear a good deal of responsibility for the conditions Greece finds itself in – continues to ignore the option of substantially reducing their own salaries. It wouldn't do a whole lot to solve Greece's debt problems, but it would surely be the right thing to do."

And yet, ironically, the Greeks are taking their anger out on Germany rather than their own politicians. Perhaps they realize that Merkel's obstinate insistence that Greece remain in the euro – and, hence, will never be able to devaluate – is dooming ordinary Greeks to ever more austerity. The only solution to the Greek tragedy would be a return of Greece to the drachma. This would, however, imply an admission by the ruling European establishment that their experiment of imposing a common currency on the continent has failed.

Unless the straitjacket of the single currency is removed, the Greeks will face a dismal and prolonged future of stagnant living standards. It is not surprising that ordinary Greeks are not eager to accept it. Last October, in an op-ed piece on the euro, Norman Lamont, Britain's former Chancellor of the Exchequer, who kept Britain out of the eurozone, wrote "As Winston Churchill once observed, if we do not face reality, reality will face us," and added: "It would be better to recognize that the euro experiment has failed. Europe, Britain and the rest of the world would be better off if the euro had never happened. It would be preferable if it were now dismantled in an orderly manner."

Merkel's refusal to face reality is making her extremely unpopular. Not just in Greece, but soon also in Germany.

Related Topics: Peter Martino

NATO to Iran: Don't Worry about Missile Shield, Unless Planning Attack
And more from the Turkish Press

by AK Group
February 14, 2012 at 3:00 am