In this mailing:
by Sohail Raza
• September 7, 2016 at 6:30 am
- At this fraught
time in the history of Islamist radicalism, extremism and terrorism,
it is important that Canadian authorities -- especially the police
and security services -- not inadvertently confer legitimacy and
credibility on organizations and individuals whose histories and
associations raise legitimate questions about their ideological
background, links and agendas.
- According to a
US court, "The Government has produced ample evidence to
establish the associations of CAIR, ISNA and NAIT with HLF, the
Islamic Association for Palestine ("IAP"), and with
Hamas." Under Canadian and US law, Hamas is a designated
terrorist organization.
- In July 2013,
CAIR-CAN announced its change of name to the National Council of
Canadian Muslims (NCCM), some specialists regarding this as a way of
masking the connection to CAIR or to its history as part of CAIR
- Like its
American mother organization, NCCM/CAIR-CAN has on occasion been
thought to embrace a victimhood narrative that risks alienating
Muslims in general -- and Muslim youth, in particular -- from their
non-Muslim fellow citizens. The propagating of the word
"Islamophobia" has been regarded as especially unhelpful,
and condemned by some as a means of silencing Muslims and
non-Muslims who would warn of the growing hazards of Islamist
radicalism, extremism and terrorism.
At this fraught time in the history of Islamist radicalism,
extremism and terrorism, it is important that Canadian public authorities
-- especially the police and security services -- not inadvertently
confer legitimacy and credibility on organizations and individuals whose
histories and associations raise legitimate questions about their
ideological background, links and agendas.
One way in which authorities unintentionally assist in building the
credibility of undeserving groups and individuals is by sponsoring and
attending meetings and events involving such persons and organizations.
It is therefore important for those in positions of authority to acquit
themselves properly of their responsibility to meet due diligence
obligations, when it comes to screening those involved in such events.
by Malcolm Lowe
• September 7, 2016 at 4:00 am
- All the
settlements created by Israel before the Oslo accords are
legitimate, including the new Israeli housing estates created in the
extended boundaries of Jerusalem. As long as the "interim
period" envisaged in those accords remains in force, Israel is allowed
to build within the originally defined pre-Oslo boundaries of the
settlements, but is not allowed to change their pre-Oslo status. The
Palestinians are not excluded from demanding a total Israeli
withdrawal to the ceasefire lines of 1949, but Israel is likewise
not excluded from demanding the retention not merely of the
settlements but also of any other part of the Mandatory Palestine of
1947.
- The Fourth
Geneva Convention contains a Part I that applies to wars both within
a Power and between Powers. Otherwise, the Convention applies
primarily to wars between Powers alone. The conflict between
Israelis and Palestinians began as a civil war under the British
Mandate for Palestine and continued as such until at least the late
1980s. Until then, consequently, Part I of the Convention applied to
the conflict, including Israeli settlements beyond the Green Line,
but Part III – which purportedly forbids the existence of such
settlements – did not yet apply. Part III became relevant, if at
all, only for events that postdated the Oslo accords of the 1990s.
Picture: Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, U.S.
President Bill Clinton, and PLO chairman Yasser Arafat at the Oslo accord
signing ceremony on September 13, 1993.
Arafat clearly never abandoned the struggle to eliminate the State of
Israel. In 1996, Arafat publicly stated: "We Palestinians will take
over everything ... You understand that we plan to eliminate the State of
Israel, and establish a purely Palestinian state. ... I have no use for
Jews; they are and remain, Jews." (Image source: Vince Musi / The
White House)
If there is anything that perplexes good friends of Israel, it is
the issue of settlements beyond the "Green Line" (a misleading
term, as we shall see). In a familiar phenomenon, a foreign politician
arrives in Jerusalem to make a speech that manifests genuine admiration
of the State of Israel and its achievements, but proceeds to an equally
genuine cry of distress over its settlement policies. Why? Because they
are supposedly "illegal under international law."
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