Salman Rushdie stabbed at New York institution

The India-born author who had an Islamic fatwa placed upon his head by the Iranian ayatollah Khomeini in 1988 after writing the Satanic Verses was stabbed 15 times while preparing to give a speech at an institution in New York (via Geller Report):

Salman Rushdie is on a ventilator, cannot speak, and will likely lose an eye, after being stabbed up to 15 times on Friday by a suspect police have identified as a man from New Jersey ‘with sympathies toward the Iranian government.’

Authorities descended on the Fairview, New Jersey home of 24-year-old Hadi Matar hours after he allegedly attacked Rushdie onstage at a literary event in upstate New York.

The bloodied Rushdie, 75, who has been the subject of death threats from the Iranian regime since 1989, was airlifted to the hospital and his condition was updated by his agent Andrew Wylie shortly before 7 p.m.

‘The news is not good,’ Wylie said in a statement. ‘Salman will likely lose one eye; the nerves in his arm were severed; and his liver was stabbed and damaged.’

Rushdie was attacked and stabbed multiple times, including in the neck and abdomen, as he was being introduced for the CHQ 2022 event in Chautauqua, near Buffalo, on Friday morning.

Matar, who police say gained access to the grounds with a pass, managed to walk off the stage before being restrained, as people rushed to assist Rushdie.

Law enforcement sources told The New York Post that an initial investigation suggests Matar is sympathetic to the Iranian regime and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard, although he was born around nine years after the fatwa against Rushdie was first issued.

Event moderator Henry Reese, 73, a co-founder of an organization that offers residencies to writers facing persecution, was also attacked. He and Rushdie were due to discuss the United States as a refuge for writers and other artists in exile.

What's decidedly telling is that no security check was made to see if the jihadist carried any weapons. This tragedy also occurred within a Democrat-run state, which could suggest why it was possible for the culprit to gain access so easily. Something tells me that in Britain, it wouldn't have been as easy.

So far, Rushdie is still alive (also via Geller Report). But for all we know, things could turn much more sour any moment, as a terrible incident that could've been prevented tragically took place.

UN holds another anti-Israeli hatemongering conference

After Israel defended itself against the Islamic Jihad in Gaza, the UN's held yet another attack on the Israel:

Israel came under fire once again at the United Nations, this time for defending itself against Iran-backed terrorists in Gaza who fired 1100 rockets into the country over the weekend.

An emergency Security Council session was called at the behest of Norway and Ireland in the wake of the 66-hour escalation between Israel and Gaza.

Which basically demonstrates how these 2 countries still maintain a most anti-Israeli position of their own.

Israel’s U.N. ambassador Gilad Erdan censured both countries ahead of the meeting.

“How would Norway react to Islamists plotting to fire missiles at civilians in Oslo? How would Ireland react if Jihadi rocketeers were raining down on Dublin in an effort to wipe out the ‘infidel?” he asked.

“The Palestinian (Islamic) Jihad deliberately fired eleven-hundred rockets at Israelis civilians, with roughly two-hundred landing inside the Gaza Strip, killing innocent Palestinians and among them young children.”

“The Palestinian Islamic Jihad is a radical terror organization, armed, funded and trained by Iran,” he added.

And Iran's tragically a member of the UN's "human rights council". It's truly despicable.

Israel will have to act against Iran

One of the IDF's commanders made the point:

In a clear warning to Iran, IDF Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Aviv Kohavi said that the military is preparing for the possibility that it would have to act against Iran's nuclear program.

"Preparing the home front for war is a task that must be accelerated in the coming years, especially in light of the possibility that we will be required to act against the nuclear threat," he said Sunday evening during the change of command of the Homefront Command.

"The IDF continues to prepare vigorously for an attack on Iran and must prepare for any development and any scenario. Preparing a military option against the Iranian nuclear program is a moral obligation and a national security order."

One sure thing, Israel cannot wait for the USA government to provide any backing on this subject, considering how incompetent Joe Biden's turned out to be. All that aside, the conflict with Iran was coming, and war with them was inevitable.

Anne Frank's memory desecrated by the woke Twitter mob

And what next, will they attack 9-11 Families? Here's some sad news (via The American Thinker) on a truly disgusting case found on Twitter of antisemitism leveled against one of the most notable victims of the WW2 Holocaust:

Anne Frank trended on Twitter on Sunday as users on the social media platform debated whether the Holocaust victim was a beneficiary of 'white privilege,' advantages that society supposedly bestows on those who are racially white.

"Anne Frank had white privilege," said one Twitter user. "Bad things happen to people with white privilege also but don't tell the whites that."

"Yes, all white people are safe," said another commenter. "No one is saying the Nazis didn't target white people, just that white people can hide behind their whiteness, whereas in Nazi USA black people can't. Go tell black people the wites got it hard."

[...] "I cannot believe I log on to Twitter this morning and see Leftists unironically debating whether or not Anne Frank had white privilege," said Republican Texas congressional candidate Irene Armendariz-Jackson.

Unfortunately, this is what the modern left-wing has degenerated into, acting along the way as though National Socialists never persecuted blacks and Asians too. Though it does demonstrate what a monumental embarrassment Twitter has become in over a decade. Just sad.

New cartoon based on King David could be laced with PC

The Jerusalem Post tells of an animated film in the works based on biblical king David, produced by a south African animation studio called Sunrise (apparently not the same as the Japanese studio of a similar name), but there's suggestions this could all be a most politically correct development indeed:

An animated feature film on the life of King David, called David, is currently in production in South Africa, and its producer, Phil Cunningham, visited Jerusalem last week to research the film.

“We are aiming for the quality to be the same as Disney or Pixar or Dreamworks Films,” he said. “We’ve done a lot of research trips to Israel; we’ve been on four trips prior to this one to make sure it’s deeply authentic.”

And here's surely a beginning point of contention, or a sign of the mistakes about to be made: Disney and their Pixar affiliate are going off the deep end today in wokeness, and Dreamworks was originally co-founded by ultra-leftist Steven Spielberg, who himself has long lost the talent he used to have, as his most recent film, a needless remake of West Side Story, made clear. To say you're going to make your cartoon similar to what men like Spielberg specialized in doesn't inspire much confidence, mainly because he watered down Prince of Egypt a quarter century ago to appease anti-Israeli Islamists (yet it was barred for screening in most Muslim countries anyway), mainly by not depicting the ancient Israelites returning to their country. Yet that's the very film they seem to be taking their cue from here:

The obvious model for an animated biblical feature like this is the 1998 The Prince of Egypt, but there has not been another such high-profile Bible-based animated film in the intervening years.

“We are really leaning into the authenticity and we want the project both visually and in every other way, to be as authentic as possible and grounded in history and to be as accurate as possible,” Cunningham said. “But at the same time, we want it to be highly entertaining and accessible to the whole world.”

But what if they're not, considering the Dreamworks-produced cartoon was hardly the best rendition itself? These filmmakers say things, but only the finished product convinces, or doesn't.

One of the ways Cunningham and his team will make it authentic is in the voice cast. “We’re going to make sure we only cast people of Israeli origin” in the appropriate roles in the movie, he said.

And this, I think, is silly wokeness to boot. It may be one thing to hire people with foreign accents, but it's not like they have to be Israeli per se in order to provide an aura of authenticity. As though it weren't bad enough the Simpsons resorted to this PC approach in the past few years. I don't think this is a good idea either.

Cunningham has assembled a team that includes Pixar and Disney alumni, such as Nathan Stanton, who is head of story of David and who has worked on such Pixar classics as Toy Story 2 and Finding Nemo. Brent Dawes, the leading writer and director at Sunrise, is directing the film.

Oh, and what if it turns out former employees of these studios are little different from the SJWs running the stores today? Somehow, the recruitment of folks from these 2 companies doesn't make me feel encouraged or inspire confidence. Honestly, I think in the end, the Bible is best left to the books, because with all the PC running amok these days, there's little chance it'll be done justice.

New Jersey magazine sugarcoats G. Willow Wilson

Last year, the New Jersey Monthly fawned over state native G. Willow Wilson, the Islamic convert propagandist hired by Marvel comics to create the ultimate propaganda product that's really put a stain on their reputation, and predictably, she made use of victimology:

When Marvel Comics approached G. Willow Wilson about creating the first female, Muslim superhero for an ongoing series, Wilson didn’t respond with unbridled enthusiasm. “You’ll have to hire an intern just to open the hate mail,” she warned editors Sana Amanat and Steve Wacker.

Indeed, the 2013 debut of Kamala Khan, aka Ms. Marvel—a Pakistani-American, Urdu-speaking, body-morphing, teenage crime fighter living in Jersey City—raised the ire of Internet trolls and some far-right websites. But it also did something neither Wilson nor her editors anticipated: It marked the beginning of a remarkably successful run that would comprise more than 50 issues and 10 compilations, including Ms. Marvel Volume 1: No Normal and Ms. Marvel Volume 9: Teenage Wasteland, winners of the Hugo and American Book awards, respectively. Ms. Marvel (a cocreation with artists Adrian Alphona and Jamie McKelvie and editors Amanat and Wacker) would gain Wilson accolades for her writing and for the realization of a minority character whose complexity made her much more than a token Muslim in the largely white Marvel universe.

When they speak so snidely and contemptuously of "far-right", you know something's wrong. All they're doing is implying contempt for communities like 911 Families for a Safe & Strong America, along with whites. Indeed, what's skin color got to do with any of this? Are they confusing religion with race to boot? All this does is hurt the reputation of Stan Lee, a white man himself, in the process. No doubt, Wilson also indirectly resorted to the now classic accusations of "islamophobia", which is nothing more than an excuse to avoid serious questions and other issues regarding the Religion of Peace. As expected, no sales figures were given at the time the magazine first wrote this, nor are any questions asked whether the Muslim Ms. Marvel book was kept going as long as it did for the sake of propaganda at all costs.

Wilson’s personal life is similarly unconventional. Brought up by nonreligious, white parents, she converted to Islam at 21. Though she moved to Colorado with her family when she was 14 and currently lives in Seattle with her husband and two school-age children, she continues to be inspired by her New Jersey childhood.

Born in Long Branch, Wilson grew up in Marlboro. The diversity she encountered there had what she describes as “a tremendous impact” on her life and subsequent work. “When I was in elementary and middle school,” she says, “I had classmates from all over the world. I was one of the very few white kids who weren’t also the children of immigrants, and tons of my classmates were South Asian, East Asian—so to me, that’s what normal was.” Moving to Colorado and entering an overwhelmingly white high school, she adds, was “quite a shock.”

What exactly is the big deal for a white person to move to a school where the students are mainly white too? This is peculiar, like somebody's suggesting that being white is synonymous with "wrong". And that's just one of this modern world's problems, where everybody's making whiteness out to be entirely a bad thing. Funny thing about Wilson stressing the students in the former school came worldwide, she doesn't say whether any came from backgrounds like Hungary, Denmark, Uruguay, or even Armenia. As a result, what she says comes off more as superficial talk of a SJW that doesn't add up to much of anything.

Wilson’s first exposure to comics was in fifth-grade health class, via an anti-smoking comic starring Marvel’s X-Men. She was drawn in by the characters, she says, not so much for their superpowers, but because “they always seemed intuitively to know what the right thing to do was.” That was especially appealing to a young woman with a contemplative bent, who would spend much of her life musing over issues of philosophy, spirituality and religion. That she’d become a writer was almost preordained. “I can remember answering, ‘I want to be a writer,’ pretty much as soon as adults started asking me that question,” she says.

As a kid, she recalls, “I thought about things you couldn’t see more than the other kids around me seemed to”—a tendency that came to a head in her late teens. She’d read about Islam in some of her classes and was struck by how the religion’s teachings seemed to reflect her burgeoning worldview—particularly, the idea that neither bad experiences nor good represented God’s judgment, but were simply “part of the challenge of being human, the hurdle that’s put in front of you when you’re born.”

And this is a predictable whitewash, with taqqiya accompanying it. Why no mention, for example, of Sura 19:4294? If she won't be more open about anything in the Religion of Peace, she's not saying anything worth pondering.

She might well have converted then and there, but on the road to Islam, she encountered a major stumbling block: the 9/11 attack on the World Trade Center by Muslim terrorists. “It took a couple of years for me to circle back to it after that and grapple with the idea with fresh eyes after this horrible tragedy had happened,” she says.

What's fascinating is how she refused to wake up and acknowledge the more violent themes in the Koran, like Sura 47:3-4. That she remained superficial on the issues involved only compounds the perception she remains dishonest and cryptic about the Religion of Peace's exact content.

Her adopted religion and its Middle Eastern roots inform much of her writing, which has been widely praised for its deft genre blending and its inspired interweaving of mythology, religion, philosophy, folklore, history, technology and current-day politics. Her 2007 graphic novel, Cairo, for instance, sets a drug dealer, an expat, a journalist and an Israeli soldier on a search for a stolen hookah housing a genie. The protagonist of Alif the Unseen, winner of the World Fantasy Award for best novel, is a hacker in an unnamed Arab emirate who’s drawn into a fight against state censorship, aided by a magical manuscript. Her second novel, The Bird King, takes place during the final Spanish emirate and recounts the relationship between a royal courtesan and a mapmaker who possesses supernatural skills.

Considering how much censorship the left's advocated for the sake of defending the Religion of Peace, it sure is weird she'd write a book about the subject, when she herself isn't being open about her belief system. Also, who knows how the Israeli soldier in her book is depicted? What if it's most negative in the extreme?

In spite of her immersion in fantasy, reality is important to Wilson, and depth of character matters to her at least as much as diversity. Initially, she says, the publishing industry’s interest in diversity “was very cosmetic and surface level”—unlike Wilson, whose characters have always been complex, no matter their racial, ethnic or religious backgrounds. “All I really try to do,” she explains, “is tell stories with as much compassion and accuracy as I can.”

Wilson doesn’t see herself as an ambassador for diversity. “I’m a white convert,” she says. “You can’t really take my experience and extrapolate anything meaningful about the American Muslim community from me.” Still, says critic Emily Barton, “her religious background, combined with her apparently natural, boundless empathy, bring a strong moral sensibility to her work.”

Umm, the Arab community, from which the Religion of Peace originated, is by and large white/caucasian, and the way she makes it sound like her alleged experiences don't make her fit to say much based on her background only makes this all the more insulting to the intellect. Why no mention of apostates from Islam, and what they think of the belief system she goes by? And has she ever met with the aforementioned 9-11 Families to understand their viewpoints? Obviously not.

It's good if she's no longer employed by the Big Two (last time I looked though, Saladin Ahmed sadly still was), though even now, they could still be open to employing propagandists like her, no matter how poorly the products she writes actually sell. The damage people like Wilson have caused to the literary industry in general is far reaching, and will take eons to repair.

SUPREME COURT OVERTURNS ROE V. WADE! Justice Clarence Thomas's Concurring Opinion Puts Contraceptives, Gay Rights, and Homosexual Marriage on the Chopping Block (VIDEO)

The day has come. The Sword of Damocles has crashed down on the constitutional right to an abortion. The Court's decision is the most consequential in generations, and will make the abortion issue even more contentious and controversial than it's been already.

But contra the Democrats, especially President Biden and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, it's doubtful that "abortion will be on the ballot" this fall. Bread and butter issues, kitchen table issues, will be on the ballot, and what better way for the radical Democrat Party to try to change the subject, try to turn the page on the misery the great majority of Americans are feeling amid the worst economy since the 1980s. 

It's a big day. 

At the Los Angeles Times, "In historic reversal, Supreme Court overturns Roe vs. Wade, frees states to outlaw abortion: The ruling marks the most significant curtailing of an established constitutional right in the Supreme Court’s history":

WASHINGTON — In a historic reversal, the Supreme Court on Friday overturned the landmark 1973 Roe vs. Wade decision and ruled states may again outlaw abortion.

The court’s conservative majority said the Constitution does not protect the rights of women to choose abortion and instead leaves these decisions in the hands of state lawmakers.

The 5-4 ruling marks the most significant curtailing of an established constitutional right in the court’s history.

The opinion written by Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. closely tracks a draft that was leaked by Politico in May.

“We hold that Roe and [the 1992 Planned Parenthood vs.] Casey must be overruled,” Alito wrote. “The Constitution makes no reference to abortion, and no such right is implicitly protected by any constitutional provision, including the one on which the defenders of Roe and Casey now chiefly rely — the Due Process Clause of the 14th Amendment.”

The opinion was joined by Justices Clarence Thomas, Neil M. Gorsuch, Brett M. Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett.

Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. concurred but did not join the majority opinion in overturning Roe, saying he would have upheld only a Mississippi 15-week ban on abortion. That made the decision to uphold Mississippi’s law a 6-3 opinion.

“The court’s decision to overrule Roe and Casey is a serious jolt to the legal system,” Roberts wrote.

The court’s three liberal justices — Justice Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan — dissented.

“Today, the court ... says that from the very moment of fertilization, a woman has no rights to speak of,” their dissent read. “A state can force her to bring a pregnancy to term, even at the steepest personal and familial costs.”

The dissenting justices concluded, “Whatever the exact scope of the coming laws, one result of today’s decision is certain: the curtailment of women’s rights, and of their status as free and equal citizens.”

The ruling figures to set off a fierce political fight nationwide and state by state as politicians and voters weigh in on whether abortion should be restricted or prohibited entirely.

Opinion polls show most Americans support access to abortion, at least in the early months of a pregnancy. Nevertheless, half the states are expected to seek to quickly enforce laws that make most abortions illegal.

The decision is the high court’s most far-reaching reversal on a matter of constitutional rights since 1954, when the justices reversed six decades of precedent and struck down laws authorizing racial segregation.

But that unanimous decision in Brown vs. Board of Education expanded the rights of individuals and rejected conservative state laws, while today’s does the opposite. It empowers states and reverses what had been the most significant women’s rights ruling in the court’s history.

For the U.S. Catholic bishops as well as evangelical Christians who believe abortion ends a human life and is immoral, the ruling is a triumph decades in the making. They had refused to accept the idea the Constitution protected abortion as a fundamental right...

Keep reading.

 

It looks like Israel is headed to elections again

So after losing a majority in the coalition due to the defection of Nir Orbach, now both Naftali Bennett and Yair Lapid have decided to support dissolving the Knesset and going to another election:

Israel is heading to its fifth election in three and a half years, after Prime Minister Naftali Bennett and Alternate Prime Minister Yair Lapid gave up Monday on their efforts to stabilize the coalition.

In a joint statement, Bennett and Lapid said they would bring a bill to dissolve the Knesset to a vote next Monday. There is a consensus in the coalition and opposition on an October 25 date for the election.

Sources close to Bennett said the duo’s goal was to initiate an election on their own terms and not be forced out by opposition leader Benjamin Netanyahu.

According to the coalition agreement, Lapid will become caretaker prime minister until the election and until the new government takes power. He is set to greet US President Joe Biden when he comes to Israel next month.

See, that's the bad news; Lapid becoming even so much as a caretaker premier, considering what a leftist he is. And if he's meeting with Biden, that's also decidedly bad news. But, it looks like the farcical government Bennett/Lapid erected has crumbled. Let's hope they fare poorly as possible come the election day, and that Bennett will be on his way out of politics for good, after all the trouble he ultimately caused. He was never fit to be a premier in the first place.

"West Bank" has to stop being used as a PC substitute for Judea/Samaria

Here's an important statement made by Victor Sharpe why all this contrivance of an Arab/Islamic people called "palestinians" has to cease:

When did it become an accepted truism that peace between Israel and the Arabs who call themselves Palestinians requires that Israel give to them its very own Biblical birthright in the Jewish heartland? When did the Oslo Accords supersede the eternal possession of the Jewish people to that God-given heartland of Judea and Samaria, the territory a hostile world insists on calling by its illegitimate Jordanian name; the West Bank?

Who are they who dare divide the land that the Almighty bequeathed to Abraham and to his descendants through Isaac and Jacob? Who are they who would give any part of tiny Eretz Yisrael (the Land of Israel) to the alleged descendants of Ishmael, who possess vast territories throughout the Middle East and North Africa?

Judeophobes (aka Anti-Semites) may not like being told this, but the following facts are truths that cannot shrivel away.

Unlike the deeply appreciated last incumbent of the White House, President Donald J. Trump, too many previous U.S. presidents displayed pro-Muslim Arab policies, which created clear and present dangers to the very existence of the reborn Jewish state. It is thus with the present Democrat president, Joe Biden. He, like his malign handlers, should take note of Genesis 12:3.

Also vital to note:

Jewish communities are not inhabited by alien “settlers.” The Jewish population of Judea and Samaria inhabit and redeem their own ancient and ancestral land. These men and women and children are not “settlers” in what is already theirs by virtue of millennial historical and spiritual attachment. Indeed, many present-day Jewish villages, especially throughout Judea and Samaria, are built upon the very Biblical Jewish sites which existed millennia ago. On the Golan, for instance, numerous sites abound where ancient synagogues existed over two thousand years ago.

I personally consider it anathema to describe Jewish communities in the Biblical heartland of Judea and Samaria with the odious term, “settlements.” For too many Israelis, as well as pro-Israelis, to continue calling them “settlements” without thinking is almost as if they have resigned themselves to demeaning ancestral and Biblical Jewish history. This is the linguistic terminology used by rank anti-Semites and those who peddle anti-Israel hatred and should never be used by Israelis or defenders of the Jewish state.

And this too is something that's got to cease in wider media: they have to stop calling them "settlements" and "settlers". The demand for this has practically got to be made that something has to change for the better here.

MSM fawns over new Muslim Ms. Marvel TV show, and spins negative reviews as trolling

When the new Muslim Ms. Marvel TV series premiered, the BBC predictably made sure to sugarcoat the whole affair, and take everything out of context, warping it all to suit their Orwellian visions, not to mention villify any Marvel fans galled at the hijacking of the franchise for the sake of far-left ideologies:

Ms Marvel comes to our screens via Disney+ today with lofty fan expectations, following other critically acclaimed Marvel shows such as Wandavision and Loki. The online buzz around the series and glowing reviews from critics ahead of its release point to Disney having another hit on their hands. However, success for this hero wasn't always guaranteed.

In 2013, when Marvel announced that they were reimagining the comic book character of Ms Marvel – originally a blonde superpowered military hero – as a Muslim Pakistani-US teenager called Kamala Khan, it was considered a controversial and risky proposition. Comic books, for the most part, have traditionally been male-dominated and white-centric – something Kamala was the antithesis of. Other attempts to diversify characters, such as creating a biracial Spiderman, had attracted backlash from some very vocal quarters of the fandom. In 2017, Marvel's vice president of sales stated that feedback from retailers indicated that readers were being alienated by the push for diversity. "What we heard was that people didn't want any more diversity," he said. "They didn't want female characters out there. That's what we heard, whether we believe that or not."

Ah, so here, they're distorting it to make it sound like the people they speak of didn't want any female characters at all. (Do they realize that makes it sound like said readers aren't heterosexual?) What most realists didn't want was characters being built around political activism and indoctrination tactics, as the Khan character was, with Marvel replacing the original bearer of the title, Carol Danvers, with a brand new one whose existence was almost entirely centered around her being Islamic, and all without being honest about the content of the Koran. This BBC article, like so many others of its ilk, all but obscures that there have been Black/Latino/Asian charcters well before this, and most of the earlier ones prior to 2000 weren't built on the heavy-handed leftism seen nowadays.

Yet the performance of the Ms Marvel comic books demonstrated otherwise. "Ms Marvel almost immediately became a hit comic and one of the biggest sellers online," says Dr Mel Gibson, an associate professor at Northumbria University and a comics scholar. "It absolutely leapt in sales to what could be considered non-traditional comic book readers – such as females, Muslims, or Pakistani Americans for example. The idea of who reads comics and how they read them was changing. It helped draw in new folk and diversify the fan base."

By mid 2018, even without a live-action TV show or movie, Ms Marvel had sold more than half a million trade paperbacks. Kamala Khan's arrival into the Marvel Cinematic Universe is not just some PR exercise: the popularity of the character demanded it. "A huge reason Ms Marvel has struck the chord it has is because it deals with the role of traditionalist faith in the context of social justice, and there was – apparently – an untapped audience of people from a wide variety of faith backgrounds who were eager for a story like this," wrote G Willow Wilson, the writer who helped craft Kamala Khan, in 2017.

Unfortunately, even that claim of huge-selling paperbacks is sketchy at best, because there's no clear data provided by leftist Bleeding Cool - who originally wrote the latter claim - that the paperbacks were actually bought. Also note that little more than 60,000 copies for as many as 9 volumes were actually printed. But this awful puff piece does reveal what kind of leftism Wilson goes by, and it's laughable at worst, because it's taqqiya (deception).

Kamala's faith certainly does differentiate her from the overwhelming majority of her comic book counterparts. The depiction of Muslim characters in comic books has often been problematic, but there was an especially tricky path to tread in a post-9/11 world. It is a testament to the team behind Ms Marvel how deftly they navigated it. Wilson weaved together storylines and interactions in a thoughtful and nuanced manner that prevented characters from turning into stereotypes. Her familiarity with the religion is understandable – she is Muslim, after all – but some of the specific details that went into her writing made me often wonder if she was secretly Pakistani as well.

"I just thought it was so interesting because I can see how different Kamala was from other personifications of Muslim or Arab characters in previous comics – notably other characters like Dust who were exoticised and where there is a whole element of orientalism going on," says Dr Gibson.

But he doesn't think it's interesting no attempt has been made to date to introduce an Armenian character with emphasis on his/her background? Or how about Arabs/Pakistanis with non-Islamic backgrounds like Buddhism, Hinduism and Christianity, as Bahrain happens to have? Why do only Muslims matter? When they make it sound like only one, very bad belief system should apply, that's insulting to the intellect.

According to Sue Obeidi, director of the Hollywood Bureau for the US Muslim Public Affairs Council (MPAC), the importance of Ms Marvel being a strong, authentic female Muslim character cannot be overstated. "Islam has no shortage of heroic Muslim women in its history. When you look at Aisha [bint Abu Bakr] or Khadija [bint Khuwaylid] – they were one of Islam's first heroes. They were powerful, brave and independent women with their own agency. If this character embodies some of the great attributes that many Muslim women are renowned for, you can't go wrong because that means that the character will also represent the faith well."

And this is also taqqiya, because it obscures how, as described in the Koran, Aisha was 6 years old when Mohammed took her as a child bride, and consummated said marriage when she was 9. That's hardly somebody in a position of independence or agency. But the pure disgrace coming from the BBC is nothing new. If anything, it demonstrates why they're one of the worst English-language news networks overseas.

And now, it looks like the MSM has gone out of their way to make a fuss over people supposedly "review bombing" the series on IMDB as well. One such example is Forbes:

Ms. Marvel is currently not only the best-reviewed MCU series on Disney Plus, but at a 97% on Rotten Tomatoes from critics, that’s even above Black Panther’s 96% score, meaning it’s the best-reviewed MCU show or movie…ever, at the moment.

That’s why it’s noticeable that Ms. Marvel is actually the lowest scored MCU series on IMDB based on its user star ratings. And yes, the answer is that it’s being review-bombed.

“It’s not review-bombing if people just don’t like it,” some will say, but looking at the data, it’s impossible not to see what’s going on with Ms. Marvel as an outlier with malicious origins.

Here are the scores across all MCU Disney Plus series:

Loki – 8.2/10

WandaVision - 7.9/10

Hawkeye – 7.6/10

Moon Knighit – 7.4/10

What If…? – 7.4/10

Falcon and the Winter Soldier – 7.2/10

Ms. Marvel – 6.6/10

So because one mere series doesn't rate above number 7, but is far from being rated at the bottom 1, it's suddenly a scandal? The guy who wrote this is really grasping at straws for the sake of headlines to smear Marvel fans who find the propaganda tactic revolting, but that's what the following pretty much makes clear:

I would absolutely venture that more weight is being given to those first two items, and I’ve been sent examples of closed Facebook groups protesting Ms. Marvel as “replacing” the white, blonde Carol Danvers as Captain Marvel (not what’s happening) and they view a Muslim superhero as an assault on Christian values.

Well it doesn't take much to guess he's not very enthusiastic about Christianity, and probably doesn't celebrate Easter, Lent or Palm Sunday either. I hesitate to think what his view of Judaism and Hinduism is, in that case.

Even Next Shark got in on the exaggerated act:

The inconsistency between the crowd-sourced ratings and critic reviews also suggests something more is going on than viewers simply disliking the new show. On Rotten Tomatoes, the show currently boasts a staggering 95 percent, making it the second-highest rated MCU film or show to date.

[...] Iman Vellani as Ms. Marvel serves as representation on multiple fronts. The character is a Muslim, South Asian teenage girl entering a superhero universe that’s primarily been explored on screen by white male actors named Chris.

Chloe Zhao’s “Eternals” also fell victim to review-bombing after its premiere, as did “Captain Marvel,” one of MCU’s few feature-length films centering around a female superhero.

So they don't think Capt. Marvel was even the slightest bit overrated? Or that negative takes on Eternals had any good reason for being that way? As for RT, I wonder if they've deliberately fixed the polls to make it all look higher in user ratings than we'd think; they did after all fulfill Disney Corp's apparent wish to stifle any negative views of CM, a movie that reeked of political correctness and Mary Sue ingredients.

For people making such a fuss over supposed review-bombing, the examples above sure are giving telling hints how biased they really are in favor of the Muslim Ms. Marvel show, all because of the components it's built upon. If a show built on respectable Judeo-Christian values, or even Buddhism, got even the most remote negative ratings, they wouldn't be fussing at all. The way many leftists go out of their way to do spins is hugely dismaying.

Muslim violence on Temple Mount continues

Some more news about the Islamic violence that's sadly continuing its staple on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem's Old City, and this time occurred during the Shavuot holiday (via Front Page Magazine):

Police scuffled with Palestinians on Jerusalem’s flashpoint Temple Mount holy site on Sunday morning as Jews toured the compound during the Shavuot holiday.

Palestinians barricaded themselves inside the compound’s Al-Aqsa Mosque and threw stones at police in response to the visits. There were no reports of injuries or arrests in the incident.

Footage from the scene showed officers outside the mosque doors, while Palestinians barricaded inside threw stones out of windows and chanted “Allahu akbar,” or “God is great.”

Other videos showed a small group of Jews walking through the plaza surrounded by police, with Palestinians trailing the Jewish group holding Palestinian flags and shouting.

The visits by Jewish groups continued as usual under police protection, Hebrew media reported.

Yet that's one of the saddest parts of this whole horror that continues due to political correctness. Which makes for another sad subject of what goes on in such places.

Predictable Islamic violence on Jerusalem Day

This year's Jerusalem Day celebrations, as sadly expected, have been marred by Islamic rioting:

Palestinian rioters hurled rocks, chairs and fireworks at thousands of Israeli Jews who ascended the flashpoint Temple Mount on Sunday to celebrate Jerusalem Day, amid warnings by the Palestinian Authority that Israel was “playing with fire.”

The violence comes ahead of the controversial Flag March, in which Jews armed with Israeli flags march through the Old City of Jerusalem — including the Muslim Quarter — to celebrate the day, which marks the reunification of Jerusalem after Israeli troops recaptured it from Jordanian occupation during the 1967 defensive Six Day War.

And it's disgusting, to say nothing of a most poor example. It shouldn't have to be made clear that when Islamofascists commit such acts of violence over petty issues, it basically makes clear they choose to be enemies, not friends. And the flag march should not be any more controversial than in any other country. And there's even the following to ponder:

Arab bus drivers contracted to drive yeshiva students from southern Israel into the capital for Jerusalem Day refused to transport the students Sunday.

Students from the Ohel Shlomo Yeshiva, a Bnei Akiva school in Beersheba, were left without transportation to Jerusalem Day festivities in the capital Sunday morning, when all five bus drivers assigned to the school refused to drive the students.

“The bus company’s drivers are Arabs,” Aviad Tzadok, the school’s principal, told Israel National News. “All of them cancelled their drives this morning. I ended up with no buses this morning.”

Another school administrator, Rabbi Shlomi Tuvol, spoke with the manager of the bus company, who told him that the bus drivers had received death threats aimed at deterring them from driving the students.

It's very bad that death threats were made against the drivers. Simultaneously, one must wonder why this Bnei Akiva outfit's employing them far more than Jewish drivers, if it matters. See also this item about a Gaza actor who incited violence.

Now, if you want some more positive news, here's some with photos:

Thousands of Israelis gathered in central Jerusalem Sunday afternoon to mark the 55th anniversary of the reunification of Israel's capital city.

The Jerusalem Day Flag March (Rikudgalim) is set to head out from Bezelal Street in the capital, with two gatherings set for 5:00 p.m., including one in front of the Great Synagogue of Jerusalem on King George Street, and one on HaMa'alot Street.

See the whole article for the pics. Jerusalem Day is something that should be celebrated, and it's a shame Islamofascists continue to soil the better impact of the occasion.

New documentary appears to be a fishy apology for Islam, involving 1973 incident from NYC

There's a new documentary out called "Hold Your Fire", focused on an incident involving a hostage situation in 1973 and the following gushy review suggests it may be a whitewash of Islam:

“Hold Your Fire” uncovers the untold story behind the longest hostage siege in New York Police Department history that also became the origin story of modern hostage negotiation. Director Stefan Forbes’ “Rashomon”-esque examination of policing in America, told from a triad of conflicting perspectives, arrives as the country finds itself amid a relitigating of the historically volatile relationship between police and African American communities.

In January 1973, a fatal 47 hours at John and Al’s Sporting Goods store in Brooklyn began when four young Black men — Shuaib Raheem, Salih Abdullah, Dawud Rahman, and Yusef Almussidig — were cornered by the NYPD after they attempted to steal guns and ammunition. The four men took hostages, a gun battle ensued, and soon police officer Stephen Gilroy lay dead on the sidewalk.

[...] Journalists did misreport that the young Muslim men were members of the Black Liberation Army, an anarchist organization with a goal of armed war against the United States government. In truth, they were comprised of a transit worker (Raheem); a college student (Rahman); a TV repairman (Abdullah); and a carpenter (Almussidig). “Four squares,” as Raheem says in the film.

Forbes’ documentary reveals a more complex background. Earlier that month, seven Muslims were brutally executed in a Washington, DC home owned by former professional basketball player Kareem Abdul Jabbar. The target was Hamaas Abdul Khaalis, leader of the Sunni Islamist Hanafi Movement, who wrote letters highly critical of Nation of Islam leader Elijah Muhammad. The murders brought attention to the armed conflict between Sunni Muslims and NOI Muslims.

Raheem, a Sunni who also challenged NOI ideology, was convinced that he was also a target and an assault was imminent. That led him, along with his Muslim brothers, to John and Al’s Sports for a gun and ammunitions heist to protect themselves.

And I'm wondering why it's made to sound as though robbing firearms from a store was acceptable, rather than seek police protection and testify against NOI? So, it's troubling there seems to be an apologist lens this history is being told through by the press. Yet that's long been par for the course over the past 20 years and more. And for all we know, this documentary could also be an insult to law enforcement too. One more reason why it'd be better for realists to avoid this production.

European publishers self-censor and capitulate on Islam

Giulio Meotti's written about the terrible state of modern censorship on the issues of Islam, much worse than it was when Salman Rushdie wrote the Satanic Verses:

When Salman Rushdie published The Satanic Verses in 1989, Viking Penguin, the British and American publisher of the novel, was subjected to daily threats from Islamists. As Daniel Pipes wrote, the London office resembled "a battlefield", with police on guard, metal detectors and an escort for visitors. At the New York office, trained dogs sniffed mail packages and the offices were called a "sensitive place."

Many bookstores were attacked and many others refused to sell the book. Viking spent three million dollars on security measures, but it never faltered. Today, Western publishers all self-censor. And London capitulates to intimidation.

A popular children's book from the Biff, Chip, and Kipper series has just been retired following complaints that its portrayal of the Muslim people was racist, the Telegraph said. Oxford University Press is the publisher of The Blue Eye, in which young characters are transported to a foreign land with the help of a magic key. Children gather at a busy street market, which appears to be somewhere in the Middle East, where men are wearing white turbans and a woman is dressed in a niqab. The publisher said: "The book has been completely withdrawn from print and we have destroyed our remaining stock of the book, although a small number of copies may still remain in the supply chain. Some older titles may still be available in bookstores or as second-hand copies."

"And it doesn't matter, as the Times recalls, that" millions of children were trained in England on the books of Biff, Chip and Kipper". Turbans and niqabs are not appropriate, says the BBC.

Islam is treated in white gloves in so-called multiculturalism.

[...] Today the ancient fear of Islam has been welded to the new Woke hegemony. “Wokism has just begun” Pascal Bruckner writes this week in Le Figaro. “It is introduced as a product imported from the United States, especially on campuses (synthesis of asylums and re-education camps) with all the seduction of novelty and chic. It is a passing fad that is turning into a leftist ideology and is destined to consolidate itself for many years in the media, at school and in business. It will disappear only when public opinion gets tired of the nonsense or professed abominations of gender, identity, race. It will take a whole generation”.

Sadly, it makes sense that wokism's come from leftist USA institutions, and now, it's resulted over the years in a tragedy where only so many challenging issues are shunned by publishers and even film studios and such because it doesn't meet their modern standards of political correctness. It's one of the leading reasons why modern literature and entertainment is in such a dire, bankrupt state. That aside, any publisher who doesn't have the courage any more than the resources to deal with all these issues has no business working in book publishing. The query now is, will conservatives be willing to show the courage to work on what leftist outfits aren't?

Bennett and Shaked both got yelled at by bereaved families during Memorial Day ceremonies

Looks like families of terror victims aren't approving of 2 hijackers of the government, and made it clear during some Memorial Day services:

Prime Minister Naftali Bennet and Interior Minister Ayelet Shaked were both heckled while they spoke at different Remembrance Day ceremonies on Wednesday.

At Mount Herzl, dozens of bereaved families interrupted the prime minister's remarks during the state memorial service as he was beginning his speech.

"You should be ashamed of yourself," some of the protesters shouted, to which Bennett responded with "I love you all and I hear your pain."

No, he does not. It's utterly hollow words he's got at this point, and he's an absolute disgrace.

In Petah Tikva, Shaked faced heckling on Wednesday when she spoke at a memorial day ceremony at the Segula Cemetery.

Arik Hanan, who was grieving over his brother, heckled Shaked immediately when she started her address.

He called Shaked "disgusting" and called on her to "be ashamed" and to "go home."

The heckler was called upon to respect the ceremony by the host and by other grieving families around him. He responded that it was Shaked who should have respected grieving families by not coming.

Hanan said her attendance "spat in the face of those in grief" after government representatives were urged to not attend such ceremonies. He claimed that her government had approved stipends for terrorists.

Well the way she and her Knesset party boss have gone about has been an utter disgrace that's led to serious disasters that could've been avoided if they'd remained in a right-wing coalition, and not associated as they are now with leftist parties whose responsibility is far less. I can only imagine what kind of reception they'd get if they attended a memorial service with 9-11 Families for a Safe & Strong America stateside. They wouldn't be welcome there either.

Moral equivalence at a Memorial Day gathering

On the week of Israel's Memorial Day for both terror victims and fallen soldiers, some corrupt excuses for Israelis held a morally equivalent gathering with Islamists:

When the solemn, piercing siren announcing the advent of Israel’s Memorial Day rang through Beit Jala on Tuesday night, both Palestinians and Israelis gathered in a small house in the Palestinian town stood still in respect.

The assembly was part of the controversial annual joint memorial ceremony held by bereaved Palestinian and Israeli families, organized by the Parents Circle and the left-wing Combatants for Peace group, that calls for reconciliation and peace.

About 1,000 Israelis attended a packed theater in Tel Aviv to watch the ceremony, while several dozen Palestinians and Israelis gathered in Beit Jala, which lies just north of Bethlehem. Organizers said that more than 200,000 watched the ceremony, which was live-streamed online in Arabic, Hebrew and English.

What are the chances these people will ever attend a memorial for September 11, 2001 victims from al Qaeda's attack on the World Trade Center in New York City? Sadly, all signs suggest the answer is close to none. Nor will they ever ask if the Religion of Peace had any responsibility in the murder of Jews, or whether the Muslim families participating in these ceremonies raised any jihadists who'd actually met justice as a result of evil activities. And that's why this "ceremony" is such a disgrace.

Like many of the speakers at the ceremony, Inbar said Israel’s “occupation” of the Palestinians was spurring the cycle of violence between the two peoples.

“It pains me that the sanctification of stones and land, which do not ultimately belong to us, is given precedence over the sanctification of life,” said Inbar. “End the occupation, end the occupation, end the occupation.”

The joint memorial ceremony has been controversial since its inception. Several coalition lawmakers — including Labor’s Ibtisam Mara’ana and Meretz’s Mossi Raz — attended the event, sparking right-wing criticism.

“It is shameful to sit with terrorists. It shows that the left has lost its way, and they don’t have the strength to fight for the just path,” said Religious Zionist party leader Bezalel Smotrich.

Exactly. The left's sold out to evil in the worst ways possible, and it goes without saying they're doing it at the expense of victims of Islamic terrorism in the USA too, right down to how blame-the-victim tactics are employed.

Israeli president Isaac Herzog's speech at Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial service

While Herzog may be a leftist, an important distinction between him and some others is that he seems to know how to remain apolitical, and refrain from taking divisive positions most of the time. Here's what he had to say for Holocaust Memorial Day:

Israeli President Isaac Herzog spoke Wednesday at the State's Opening Ceremony for Holocaust Martyrs’ and Heroes’ Remembrance Day 2022 at Yad Vashem.

"There are moments in which a single photograph, in black and white, tells the whole story and echoes all the words that could be said," Herzog began. "I stand here before you, carrying with me, etched on my heart, such a photograph. It is a rare photograph, which nobody who sees it can ever forget."

"The eyes see, the mind grasps, yet the soul refuses to believe that what appears in black and white is in fact blacker than black."

He continued, "It is not a photograph about big numbers, about thousands, tens of thousands, or millions. It is a photograph of a single Jewish family. A family executed by diabolical Nazi jackboots and their collaborators."

"A mother and her children on the edge of a pit. Rifle butts touching her back. We cannot see the woman's face, nor her children's. A moment before her body collapses into the pit of death, she bends over her infant children. And in a single moment, all the rifles send up a plume of smoke.

"They shoot her together, not making do with a single bullet. Coordinated. Efficient. One child slips beneath her. With her last ounces of strength, the mother grasps her little boy's hand, sitting on his knees barefoot, on soil drenched with blood.

"What did the mother whisper in her little boy's ear? Did she beg him not to cry? And what of the child? Did he cry? Did he stay silent? Did he understand? Was he afraid? The photograph is silent, but its voice cries out. It shakes us. It stuns us to silence.

"Do not murder." (Exodus 20:13)

"Do not raise your hand against the boy." (Genesis 11:12)

"Do not take the mother together with her young." (Deuteronomy 22:1)

"Do not slaughter it on the same day with its young." (Leviticus 22:28)

"This photograph was taken on 13 October 1941. When I saw it in a book by the historian Dr. Wendy Lower, a book about this photograph, and this photograph alone, I felt my entire essence being turned upside down inside me with grief, with fury, with pain."

Read the whole report. Herzog does a lot better than even the awful Naftali Bennett and Yair Lapid.

Jordan condones Islamic violence on Temple Mount

It's hardly a shock they'd do it, though:

Amid escalating diplomatic tensions with Jordan over recent clashes on Jerusalem’s Temple Mount, Prime Minister Naftali Bennett said on Monday that he views “with utmost severity” comments blaming Israel for the violence.

Bennett spoke after Israel’s Foreign Ministry directly accused Jordan of “backing those who… resort to violence.”

Alluding to comments made earlier in the day by Jordan’s prime minister, Bennett lashed out at “the remarks accusing Israel of the violence directed against us,” and fumed that “there are those who are encouraging rock-throwing and the use of violence against the citizens of the State of Israel.

This is unacceptable to us,” he said. “This is a reward for the inciters, especially Hamas, which are trying to ignite violence in Jerusalem. We will not allow this to happen.”

This is one thing, in itself, where Bennett's right upon, even though again, he has blame of his own to shoulder in how he's handled things. With that told, here's where the Jordanian government reared their ugly head, demonstrating their true image influenced by Islam:

Earlier Monday, Jordanian Prime Minister Bisher Khasawneh hailed Palestinian rioters and used unusually hostile language to condemn “Zionist sympathizers” and what he called Israel’s “occupation government.”

“I salute every Palestinian, and all the employees of the Jordanian Islamic Waqf, who proudly stand like minarets, hurling their stones in a volley of clay at the Zionist sympathizers defiling the Al-Aqsa Mosque under the protection of the Israeli occupation government,” Khasawneh told a session of the Jordanian parliament.

Justice Minister Gideon Sa’ar directly responded to the Jordanian prime minister’s remarks, tweeting that “statements made by senior officials in the Kingdom of Jordan are grave and unacceptable.”

“The sovereignty of Israel in Jerusalem as its capital is the guarantee of freedom of worship for members of all religions in the city. The attempts of extremist and terrorist elements, such as Hamas, to ignite the territory through a false anti-Israel campaign are transparent and should be condemned,” he added.

And while Saar's response is valid, in itself, let's not forget he too has blame to shoulder, mainly because he went into this government as part of a boycott of Netanyahu, not out of altruistic motives.

This editorial makes a point what the real motivations were by the jihadists:

The Muslims who stockpiled stones, rocks, logs and firecrackers in al-Aqsa did not do so for religious purposes. They prepared for a riot – to attack police and Jewish worshipers – not for prayers. Police did not storm al-Aqsa Mosque to “conquer” it. They broke in to arrest the rock throwers who had barricaded themselves inside after Friday prayers. Some of the masked Palestinians waved Hamas flags and praised arch-terrorist Muhammed Deif as they tried to bombard the Jewish worshipers who had come to pray at the Western Wall at the start of the Passover holiday.

[...] It is Jewish worship that is limited at Judaism’s holiest site. The Muslim extremists object to any Jewish presence on Temple Mount and now refer to the entire area as “al-Aqsa” and yesterday they threw rocks at buses traveling to the Western Wall. Jews who ascend Temple Mount note, however, that part of the area serves as a soccer field, far from serving religious needs.

Hamas, Islamic Jihad and the Palestinian Authority have all accused Israel of carrying out “provocations” and an “assault” at the site. They are hoping to turn it into a battle cry. It is easy to rally Muslims everywhere around the lie that al-Aqsa is in danger and needs defending. The terrorist organizations are hoping that this becomes as self-fulfilling prophesy.

And Jordan's only adding fuel to the fire by backing this up, which demonstrates what an enemy country they actually are. It suggests that one day, relations with them will fall apart altogether, so long as they adhere to the Religion of Peace.

Israeli police must stop confiscating weapons of Jews defending themselves against Muslim attackers

Ariel Kahana brought up a very disturbing tactic by the leftists running the Israeli police that's actually been in use for decades:

Amichay Ben Saadon is not alone. There are thousands just like him in Israel. Attacked, usually by Arabs, tried to defend themselves with the weapons the State of Israel authorized them to use for precisely such a situation. As Prime Minister Naftali Bennett said just a few weeks ago, "Whoever has a license to carry a weapon, this is the time to carry it."

While the diplomatic echelon has encouraged civilians to defend themselves, the Israel Police has done the exact opposite. It has systematically punished those facing attacks and constantly backed up the attackers. It is hard to believe, but this is the twisted approach.

I personally know of dozens of cases in which the Jews who were attacked were taken into custody and their weapons were seized for a prolonged period of time. This is because when both sides filed a complaint, the Israel Police chose to adopt the Arabs' version of events. When the law enforcement system automatically believes an abused woman but not an abused man, it will also prefer the Arab attacker's version to that of the Jewish victim.

And why? Because these are mainly leftists who're running these double-standard policies that're meant to put the right to self-defense on trial, and always view the adherent to the Religion of Peace as the "victim". Read more of it to know why this must be addressed, and put to a stop. Not to mention that the government must make a call for the bias to cease as well. It's very similar to the propaganda the left in the USA was pushing, "believe all women", as though a woman supposedly can't lie about sexual assault. Yet when the Religion of Peace is involved, past conduct in Europe, for example, takes the side of Islamofascists over rape victims. This kind of victimology has to stop.

China, Fearing Regime Change by the U.S, Bulks Up Its Nuclear Deterrence Capabilities

An eye opening report. 

My first thought, "Well that's just great (*Eye-roll*)."

At the Wall Street Journal, "China Is Accelerating Its Nuclear Buildup Over Rising Fears of U.S. Conflict":

China has accelerated an expansion of its nuclear arsenal because of a change in its assessment of the threat posed by the U.S., people with knowledge of the Chinese leadership’s thinking say, shedding new light on a buildup that is raising tension between the two countries.

The Chinese nuclear effort long predates Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, but the U.S.’s wariness about getting directly involved in the war there has likely reinforced Beijing’s decision to put greater emphasis on developing nuclear weapons as a deterrent, some of these people say. Chinese leaders see a stronger nuclear arsenal as a way to deter the U.S. from getting directly involved in a potential conflict over Taiwan.

Among recent developments, work has accelerated this year on more than 100 suspected missile silos in China’s remote western region that could be used to house nuclear-tipped missiles capable of reaching the U.S., according to analysts that study satellite images of the area.

American leaders have said the thinking behind China’s nuclear advance is unclear. Independent security analysts who study nuclear proliferation say they are also in the dark about what is driving Beijing after exchanges between Chinese officials and analysts mostly dried up in the past few years.

The people close to the Chinese leadership said China’s increased focus on nuclear weapons is also driven by fears Washington might seek to topple Beijing’s Communist government following a more hawkish turn in U.S. policy toward China under the Trump and Biden administrations.

American military officials and security analysts are concerned China’s nuclear acceleration could mean it would be willing to make a surprise nuclear strike. The people close to the Chinese leadership said Beijing is committed to not using nuclear weapons first.

China plans to maintain an arsenal no larger than necessary to ensure China’s security interests, they said, adding that the Chinese military believes its nuclear weapons are too outdated to present an effective deterrent against a potential U.S. nuclear strike.

“China’s inferior nuclear capability could only lead to growing U.S. pressure on China,” one person close to the leadership said.

Nervous international reaction to Russian leader Vladimir Putin’s call for his nuclear forces to be put on alert following his invasion of Ukraine has offered Chinese officials a real-world lesson about the strategic value of nuclear weapons. So did Ukraine’s decision in 1994 to turn over the nuclear weapons left in the country after the breakup of the Soviet Union in return for security assurances from the U.S. and Russia.

“Ukraine lost its nuclear deterrence in the past and that’s why it got into a situation like this,” said a retired Chinese military officer with ties to the country’s nuclear program.

The people familiar with the Chinese leadership’s thinking said Beijing hasn’t conveyed any adjustments to the country’s nuclear policy as a result of developments in Ukraine. China’s Ministry of Defense didn’t respond to a request for comment.

The people have knowledge of Beijing’s thinking about nuclear policy through their work with various agencies involved in security issues. None are directly involved in the setting of nuclear policy. They didn’t preclude that future developments might change Beijing’s approach and said other factors may also be influencing the leadership’s approach to nuclear weapons.

Their observations nevertheless bring greater clarity to a shift in Beijing’s thinking that has far-reaching consequences globally. Rising tension between the U.S. and China over nuclear weapons could throw the world back into a Cold War-style nuclear standoff similar to that seen in the decades following World War II between the U.S. and Soviet Union.

The risk of miscalculations this time could be higher, however, because while the U.S. and Soviet Union communicated about their nuclear weapons during arms control talks from the late 1980s, the Chinese program and Beijing’s thinking on the role of nuclear weapons has been shrouded in secrecy. China has declined to engage in nuclear arms control talks with the U.S., saying Washington should first reduce its nuclear inventory.

U.S. government and private sector estimates put China’s nuclear arsenal in the low hundreds of warheads, far below the roughly 4,000 warheads held by both Russia and the U.S. The Pentagon says it now expects China to have 1,000 warheads by the end of this decade.

Satellite images taken during January show the last 45 of the temporary covers over each of 120 suspected missile silos near the city of Yumen have been removed, suggesting the most sensitive work at all of the silos has been completed, said Matt Korda, a senior research associate for the Nuclear Information Project at the Federation of American Scientists in Washington. At two other smaller silo fields in western China, work is at earlier stages.

The silos at each of the sites are large enough for a new long-range Chinese missile known as the DF-41 that was put into service in 2020 and is capable of hitting the U.S. mainland, analysts say. Tests of missiles that are launched from aircraft and can carry nuclear warheads also give Beijing a stronger chance of being able to retaliate if it is hit first in a nuclear attack.

In public, China has played down its nuclear pursuits.

“On the assertions made by U.S. officials that China is expanding dramatically its nuclear capabilities, first, let me say that this is untrue,” Fu Cong, director general of the Foreign Ministry’s arms control department, said earlier this year. He said that China is working to ensure its nuclear deterrent meets the minimum level necessary for national defense.

Chinese leaders had seen nuclear weapons as being of limited value because they don’t offer realistic options for fighting most wars. A major shift occurred in early 2020, according to the people familiar with the leadership’s thinking, as the U.S. government hardened its stance toward Beijing in the early stages of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Strong criticism of the Communist Party from senior Trump administration officials spurred a consensus among Chinese leaders that Washington was willing to take greater risks to stop China’s rise, some of the people said.

A May 2020 speech in Mandarin by former Deputy National Security Adviser Matt Pottinger was particularly alarming, they said. Speaking on the anniversary of a pivotal 1919 student protest in China, Mr. Pottinger said: “Wasn’t the goal to achieve citizen-centric government in China, and not replace one regime-centric model with another one? The world will wait for the Chinese people to furnish the answers.”

“The speech was obviously calling the Chinese to topple the Communist Party,” one person familiar with the Chinese leadership’s thinking said.

In response to a request for comment, Mr. Pottinger said that such an interpretation was “a profound admission that the Communist Party knows it has failed to deliver citizen-centric governance, and it confirms what everyone already suspected: What Beijing fears above all is its own people.”

At the same time, increased support from the U.S. for Taiwan, a democratically self-ruled island that Beijing views as a part of China and has vowed to put under its control, prompted Chinese leaders to debate the prospect that the U.S. might be willing to use nuclear weapons in a conflict over the island, according to the people close to the leadership...

 

2 people murdered in terrorist attack on Tel Aviv's Dizengoff Street

Naftali Bennett and Yair Lapid's disastrous government has led to more tragedy on Dizengoff Street, a commercial neighborhood:

Two people were killed and eight people were wounded - some seriously - in what appeared to be a terrorist shooting attack in the center of Tel Aviv on Thursday night. The attack took place in multiple locations on Dizengoff Street, a popular scene filled with restaurants and bars in the main Israeli city.

The gunman was feared to still be on the loose and large security forces - police and IDF soldiers - were running down the main Tel Aviv boulevard in search of the attacker. Police are asking the public to stay at home and get off the streets until the gunman is caught.

At least four of the wounded were said to be in critical or serious condition, according to Sourasky Medical Center. Prime Minister Naftali Bennett and Defense Minister Benny Gantz were making their way to the Kirya Military headquarters in Tel Aviv and receiving regular updates about the attack.

Gantz is clearly also to blame for failing on his part to prevent this from an army perspective. Now, they've led to yet more horrific disaster as a result of this mess.

Update: another terrorist who'd been part of this latest attack was found and killed:

Israel was on high alert after a Palestinian terrorist killed two people and injured several other on a busy street in central Tel Aviv on Thursday night. The terrorist was killed in an exchange of fire with Israeli forces several kilometers away in Jaffa on early on Friday morning.

Dizengoff Terrorist identified

Identified as 28-year-old Ra’ad Fathi Hazem from the Jenin refugee camp, he was located hiding near a mosque in Jaffa by two Shin Bet officers who identified a suspicious figure who was similar to the suspect. According to reports, Zaydan pulled out his gun and fired 10 bullets toward the officers who returned fire and killed him.

Walla! Reported that it's believed that Hazem knew the area and that he hoped to hide in the mosque during the first Friday prayers of Ramadan.

The Shin Bet said that he had no known organizational affiliation, previous arrests or security background. Palestinian reports said that his father was a senior officer with the Palestinian Authority security forces but retired about a decade ago. His uncle praised the attack on Facebook, saying that he had joined his uncles who were affiliated with Fatah and were killed in clashes with security forces.

His father was later filmed outside his house telling a crowd that had gathered that “You will see the victory soon… God, liberate the Al-Aqsa Mosque from the occupiers.”

The agency said that Hazem had entered Israel illegally and that it is being investigated if he had received any support.

Some could say that this particular jihadist acted as a lone wolf attacker, yet predictably, they carefully avoid any deeper discussion of Islamofascism and its role in this incident. What it does reveal is the minds of the attackers.

Update 2: Nadav Shragai makes a valid point on how lone wolves are part of a murderous ideology.

Update 3: Robert Spencer points out how British news sources like the UK Guardian and Reuters have villified Israel in all this.

China's dictator supports the Taliban

The Chinese communists have just revealed they embrace the Taliban in Afghanistan, and want everyone else to do so as well:

Chinese dictator Xi Jinping praised the “sovereignty, independence and territorial integrity” of Afghanistan in a message to a foreign ministers’ meeting featuring a Taliban representative on Thursday, encouraging neighboring countries to “do their best” to support the “Afghan people.”

China is currently hosting a two-day summit in Anhui province of regional leaders to discuss the future of Afghanistan. Taliban “Foreign Minister” Mawlawi Amir Khan Muttaqi arrived on Wednesday and is participating in conversations with China and other top diplomats.

This is definitely bad news. Commies of modern times are definitely taking this world in the direction of darkness and barbarism if this is type of movements China's government is embracing.