Grass’s poem hovers over German president's visit

Günter Grass’s poem attacking the Jewish state has locked German- Israeli relations into a war of words. Germany’s freshly minted President Joachim Gauck, who is currently visiting Israel, decided to remain on the sidelines of the international debate in April about contemporary anti-Semitism in the Federal Republic. Will Gauck use his first Israel visit as Germany’s symbolic moral voice to tackle the anti-Israel Grass lyric? Israeli Ambassador to Germany Yakov Hadas-Handelsman, who, like Gauck, took his position in March, seems to expect Gauck to use his bully pulpit for a pedagogical moment on modern anti-Semitism. Hadas-Handelsman told the French wire service AFP on Monday ahead of Gauck’s visit that rising anti-Semitism in Germany is “a big danger.” According to AFP, Hadas-Handelsman noted that in connection with the poem from Grass, a Nobel Prize Laureate in Literature, “anti-Semitism is more present in Europe. We see it, unfortunately, almost every day. Also in Germany the phenomenon has now recently emerged and spread.” Grass wrote in his poem, “What Must Be Said,” earlier this year, that Israel seeks to obliterate Iran’s population, and the Jewish state is the main impediment to Mideast security. Israel’s top diplomat in Germany stressed that the topic of Grass will be discussed during Gauck’s visit. Gauck has traveled to Israel several times before becoming president. In an email to The Jerusalem Post on Monday, German-Israeli Melody Sucharewicz, who serves as a voice for Israeli public diplomacy in the Federal Republic, wrote that Gauck’s visit has enormous potential for German-Israeli relations. She explained the significance of the meeting taking place shortly after the Grass debate, which was the launching pad for a new wave of public criticism of Israel in Germany. “The distortion of historical and geopolitical facts inevitably inciting against Israel received a legitimacy seal with the Nobel Prize winner’s poem,” she said. Sucharewicz added that “the Grass debate is over, the problem underlying it is not. The new quality of Israel criticism in Germany comes along with a rising trend of anti-Semitism and increasing evidence for the connection of both phenomena.” “Gauck, as a real freedom fighter, would do good both for Germany’s role in the peace process, but especially for the future of German-Israeli relations, if he used this visit to increase awareness in Germany about the trends underlying the public resentment against Israel and to advance creative policy to oppose these trends before it becomes irreversible,” she said. Speaking from Jerusalem on Monday, Dr. Efraim Zuroff, the head of the Israeli office of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, told the Postduring a telephone interview that Gauck “ has to make the decision to respond to Grass. [That would be] one way to assure Israelis that official Germany is no longer party to Grass.” Zuroff asked that if Gauck were to distance his government from Grass in Israel, “why did he not use the opportunity in Germany where his stature carries moral weight?” Grass’s tirades against Israel were “quite shocking to Israelis and Jews the world over, and remain on the minds of Israelis,” said Zuroff, the world’s most famous hunter of Nazi war criminals. Grass served as a member of the Nazi Waffen-SS during World War II. Zuroff noted that it was “good news” that high officials in Germany challenged Grass. Yet, “if Gauck would add his voice to the criticism, it would be meaningful and important” in Israel. Zuroff is one of Gauck’s sharpest critics in Israel, largely because the German president signed the controversial Prague Declaration. Zuroff said Gauck was one of only three leading Western European figures who signed the declaration. According to Zuroff, the document is a “distortion of the Holocaust because it rewrites the narrative and turns the Shoah into a tragedy among many tragedies. This is the heart of the Prague Declaration.” Gauck issued his support for the declaration before assuming the tenure of German’s president. Zuroff sees the Prague Declaration as the “most serious threat to Holocaust memory in decades.” Critics argue that the Prague Declaration mistakenly conflates the crimes of Soviet communism with the Holocaust.
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Austria’s Günter Grass scandal: The Socialism of Fools

However, while Mr. Darabos sat comfortably in Austria and downplayed the Iranian threat, that very same weekend saw Major General Hassan Firouzabadi, chief of staff of the Iranian armed forces, give a speech in Tehran where he declared the need for the “full annihilation of the Zionist regime of Israel to the end.”

To compound the question marks over Mr. Darabos’ conclusions on Iran and fitness as defense minister, a UN report on Friday noted that Iran increased its work on its illicit uranium enrichment program.

Moreover, the British Guardian reported on Saturday that a widely respected US-based think tank—Institute for Science and International Security—asserted in its analysis that "Iran has significantly increased its output of low-enriched uranium and if it was further refined could make at least five nuclear weapons."
Clifford D. May, a colleague of mine at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, penned last week a must read on “What Iran’s Ruler Want: War, genocide, and nuclear Weapons.”

He neatly captured the multi-pronged lethal nature of Iran’s terror apparatus since the country’s 1979 Islamic Republic revolution.

One of Austria’s most insightful writers, journalist and blogger Christian Ortner, seized the timing of Mr. Firouzabadi’s call for the obliteration of Israel and Mr. Darabos’ pooh-poohing of Iran’s drive to obtain a nuclear weapon to deliver a powerful recommendation. Mr. Ortner writes that Mr. Darabos ought to be sacked.

However, while Mr. Ortner is clearly no Darabos-supporter, he does clarify that it is not likely that Mr. Darabos seeks to secure votes from the “partly latent anti-Semitic milieu of SPÖ-voting migrants in Vienna.” Rather, he writes, the work of winning over the latent anti-Semitic part of Vienna’s Muslim voters has been delegated to the SPÖ-city council man Omar al-Rawi. Mr. al-Rawi spoke at a pro-Hamas demonstration in 2010 and incited violence against the state of Israel.

The pro-Hamas council man’s conduct triggered at the time a number of Jewish resignations from the Austrian Social Democratic party.

In view of the social democratic defense minister Darabos’ attacks on the Jewish state, the SPO's courtship of the anti-Semitic vote, and the growing number of social democrats launching tirades against Israel, perhaps it is time to cart out the 19th century saying “Socialism of Fools.” When mushrooming anti-Semitism consumed left-wing Europeans in the late 19th century, the German Social Democrat August Bebel coined the phrase “Socialism of Fools” to describe the new expression of Jew-hatred.
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Muslim refuses to sing Serb anthem: the West can now enjoy his seditious way

Muslims all across the world have issues with authorities they dwell into, even though they, or their ancestors, voluntary moved into those areas in search of booty and often no honest work.
Nowhere are the effects of this sort of a semi-slavery more apparent then in the Balkans.
In the Balkans, Muslims became a minority by virtue of land conquest of the Balkan Christians so that the Muslim empire, which has no social incentives for technological or any sort of development, enslaved the locals in order to extract anything they make.
Among other things, Muslim rulers in the Balkans forcefully extracted little Christian boys from their parents in order to turn them into Islamic warriors that can defend the Caliphate.
Many Serbs have family members that have forcefully been abducted by Muslims so that Islam could have a future flock that is firmly indoctrinated in genociding its past.
Adem Ljajic, a soccer player from Serbia, is no doubt one of some such.
Adem became a focus after he refused to sing the Serbian national anthem before a soccer game, although it stipulates in his contract that he must do so if he is to play.
Sure that this is a contractual issue, and I applaud Serbia’s coach Sinisa Mihailovich for dumping this player back to where he belongs, but this never solves the underlying issue that Muslims in Serbia and everywhere pose – sedition.
Islam teaches sedition and if there is a place to learn how Islamic sedition operates it is the Balkans.
Sure that US bombed Serbia over a minority of seditious Muslims that could have been dealt with easily, yet the tactics that seditious Muslims show in the Balkans, Serbia in particular, is a symptom that shows up in all the places where Muslims comprise a minority let alone a majority.
Refusing to sing the national anthem of a country to which one ethnically belongs, even though an offspring of a forcefully converted, is just a minor symptom of a larger Islamic whole that seeks to convert anything that does not bow down to the fascist view of the world Islam teaches their believers.
By bombing Serbia over these battling fault lines, Europe and West can now enjoy these Islamic tendencies because coach Mihailovich did right: he sent the seditious Ljajic back to the West so they could enjoy his seditious ways… and Serbia should encourage this by inviting any and every Islamaniac into their country, seditious like Ljajic or militant like any other, then send them over to places where governments bombed the Serbs.
M. Bozinovich

Muslims want more burial space in Germany

In a sombre sign that Muslims are becoming more integrated in German society, the 300,000-strong Islamic community in Berlin has complained that it is running out of graveyard space, and is urging authorities to help solve the problem. The shortage of sites reflects a desire by increasing numbers of Muslims to be buried in Germany rather than be taken to their countries of origin after their death. Community leaders have stepped up their campaign this month for more burial space. "They live here in the second and third generation and they want to be buried where they lived and worked," said Ender Cetin, the chairman of the Muslim association at the Sehitlik mosque in Berlin. "This is a problem that urgently needs to be solved." Berlin has only two operational cemeteries dedicated to Muslims, and their 2,000 gravesites will be full by early next year. The graveyards are attached to public Christian cemeteries. The Turkish-Islamic Union for Religious Affairs (DITIB) has applied for permission to expand one of the cemeteries bordering the former airport of Tempelhof, but the city government has other plans for the area.
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Salafist police officer suspended in Germany

Authorities in the west German city of Duisburg suspended an officer who is a member of a growing radical movement of Islamists in the Federal Republic because he misused his access to confidential domestic intelligence information in connection with the observation of the Salafi group. “It is a very, very serious case,” said a spokesman for the Interior Ministry of North Rhine-Westphalia, according to a report last week in the Westdeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung (WAZ). The suspended officer is named Ali K. German media frequently do not release the last names of suspects. The WAZ reported that Ali K’s police functions could have been compromised because he was supposed to monitor Salafists. Ali K. had contacts to radical Islamic preachers who advocate hate, the newspaper said. The radical group of German Salafists is considered as rejecting the democratic structure of the Federal Republic and propagating violence against non-Muslims, specifically women, gays, and Jews. The authorities first discovered the 31-year-old Ali K.’s pro-Salafist activity last month when he registered for a permit allowing an information booth to give out Salafist literature in a public place. According to the WAZ, Essen police president Stephania Fischer-Weinsziehr believes he will be “dismissed from the civil service.” Neither Ali K. nor his attorney have issued statements. Salafist Muslims in Germany moved forward with a campaign in Germany, Austria and Switzerland to give away 25 million Korans. Ibrahim Abou Nagie, a Gazaborn Palestinian preacher, who lives in Cologne is the principal organizer of the growing Salafist Koran distribution campaign. The Interior Ministry in North Rhine- Westphalia termed the actions as aggressive proselytizing. It is unclear if Ali K. has contact with Abou Nagie. A March report in The Guardian noted that United Kingdom officials believe Germany has become a hotbed of radical Islamic recruitment activity. A German Islamist from Kosovo, Arid Uka, shot two American soldiers and was linked to Salafist groups. Critics charge lax German laws with failing to rope in growing Islamic extremism in the Federal Republic. German Muslims have over the years travelled to the war theaters of Afghanistan and Pakistan to participate in violent attacks on American serviceman. Last week, a German court convicted Ahmad Wali Siddiqui, a German-Afghan from Hamburg, of membership in al-Qaida. The court sentenced him to six years. Siddiqui was allegedly planning attacks on Europe’s economic institutions. He travelled to Pakistan and Afghanistan in 2009 with a group of fellow German Muslims for secure training from al-Qaida and the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan. The US government captured him in Kabul in 2010 and learned about the planned terror attacks in Europe.
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Gray Falcon: Wherefore the Distortions?

On the pages of the Washington Post, Serbophobia tends to be impersonal: just your everyday sneering at nations standing in Empire's way. Even the famously wrong Richard Cohen sticks to using the standard manual of Serbophobia, hitting the appropriate cliches in order to make a point about supporting interventionism.

Then there is the Washington Times, a paper claiming to be as conservative (i.e. GOP) as the Post is liberal (i.e. Democratic). True enough, over the years, the Times has printed criticism of the Democrats' Balkans policies. And in 2007, they did publish an unusually frank staff editorial condemning the "perception management" in the case of the Fort Dix Six. On the other hand, they employ Jeffrey T. Kuhner.

A regular columnist at the Times, Kuhner can be relied on for a good hysterical rant about the "Evil Serbs" just about anytime. In 2003, he blamed the Serbs for jihad in Bosnia. In 2004, he saw the sky falling when the Serbian Radical Party got the biggest chunk of votes in the election that saw the demise of DOS. Yet the apocalypse he foresaw failed to materialize. Now he's at it again, arguing that the election of Tomislav Nikolic to Serbian presidency is a "vote for war" in the Balkans.

Kuhner's latest screed is simply stuffed with so many factual errors that arguing with them would take up three times his word count: a clever strategy, when letters to the editor are typically limited to 150 words. But at its core is the smear of the newly elected President of Serbia as "neo-fascist", and the Serbs themselves as Nazi Germany reborn.
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Poll: Most Germans view Israel as 'aggressive'

A recent survey conducted for Stern news magazine found that a large majority of Germans view Israel as "aggressive" and think Germany no longer has a special obligation to the Jewish nation. Some 59% of those questioned viewed Israel as "aggressive", an increase of 10 percentage points over a similar survey in January 2009. About 70% said they believed Israel pursued its interests without consideration for other nations, Stern said in a pre-release of its Thursday edition, up 11 percentage points from three years ago. And 67 years after the end of the Nazi regime, 60% said Germany had no special obligation towards Israel, while a third believed the contrary, according to the survey of 1,002 people conducted on May 15 and 16.
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Anti-Germany Incitement Posted On Jihadi Websites, Following Demonstrations In Germany Featuring Signs Of The Prophet Muhammad

In a May 17, 2012 article on the jihadi forum Shumoukh Al-Islam, Ahmad 'Ashoush, 52, a leading figure in the Salafji-jihadi movement in Egypt,[1] focused on rebuking the rulers of the Arab states, their religious establishments, and the mainstream Salafi movement for disregarding what he considered to be the Europeans' ongoing offenses against Islam. He put forward three possible courses of action for Egyptians to respond to the offenses in Germany: organizing a million-man demonstration to support the Prophet Muhammad and denounce the insults against him; demanding the expulsion of the German ambassador and diplomatic staff from Cairo; and declaring a boycott of German products. 'Ashoush went on to remind Muslims that "all Muslim scholars are in accord that whoever curses the Prophet must be killed" and that it is incumbent upon every able-bodied Muslim to kill the offender or to die trying.
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Iranians seek return of Iranian-born singer from Germany: They called the singer an apostate

Iran's official news agency says protesters in front of the German Embassy in Tehran are seeking return of an Iranian-born singer who went into hiding after receiving death threats.
Singer Shahin Najafi allegedly insulted a Shiite Muslim saint.
The Wednesday report by IRNA said the protesters also demanded that Germany apologize for hosting the singer, who has lived in Germany since 2005.
They called the singer an apostate.
The threats began after comments by religious authorities in Iran were taken to mean the singer insulted Islam with a song meant to be humorous.
Najafi first contacted German police about the threats May 8. A day later, an anonymous person posting on a Persian-language website put a $100,000 price on his head.
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'Austrian minister has problem with living Jews'

Austrian Defense Minister Norbert Darabos reinforced his attacks on Israel and a leading Jewish NGO, prompting the head of Austria’s Jewish community, Oskar Deutsch, to declare on Thursday to the daily Die Presse that the minister “has problems with living Jews.” Dr. Shimon Samuels, the head of the Simon Wiesenthal Center´s international division, told the Jerusalem Post that Austria’s government should "denounce and fire" Darabos because he marginalized the Iranian nuclear weapons threat, launched biased criticisms of Israel, and disgraced Austria`s foreign policy reputation. In a telephone interview with the Jerusalem Post on Thursday, Samuels said “Necrophilia is not an excuse against anti-Semitism. Unfortunately, the European Left uses dead Jews from seven decades ago as a fig leaf to not see anti-Semitism.” In an email to the Post on Wednesday, Stefan Hirsch, a spokesman for Darabos, outlined a list of Holocaust commemoration events that Darabos attended or supported honoring murdered Jews and anti-fascist fighters. Hirsch said that Darabos sharply "rejects the accusation of anti-Semitism" and termed the charge of Jew-hatred to be "absurd" because of his work as a resistance fighter against right-wing extremism. Samuels asserted that the “the Austrian government is complicit” unless they sack and criticize Darabos, whose "obstinacy and insensitivity makes it even more inappropriate for him to be defense minister.” The angry reactions reflect the growing concern among Jewish organizations in the United States and Austria that Darabos endangered international security by playing down the Iranian nuclear threat, helped make Iranian anti-Semitism respectable, and showed bias with his fixation on criticizing Israel and its foreign minister. After the Wiesenthal Center’s call on Wednesday for his resignation, Darabos flatly rejected Samuel’s demand, but reiterated his anti-Israel views. He has over the last week strongly defended his controversial interview with Die Presse. In the interview, Darabos called Foreign Minister Avigdor Liberman “unbearable,” and accused Israel of using Iran’s work on a nuclear bomb – and the Palestinian issue – to deflect attention from domestic problems. “Mr. Liberman is unbearable for me as a member of the Israeli government,” Darabos said in the interview. In connection with Iran, Darabos said that Israel’s “threats” were "unnecessary" because “Iran is not ready to build the bomb.” Oskar Deutsch, the head of the roughly 7,500-member Jewish community, told Die Presse that either Darabos is ignorant or cynical or both. Deutsch called on Darabos to apologize for his insulting statements directed at Israel and Liberman. He added that Darabos showed no respect toward Liberman. Critics see Darabos, who is a member of the Austrian Social Democratic Party, as part of a larger problem in which left-wing politicians use their anti-Nazi credentials as a kind of immunity against charges of modern anti-Semitism—the hatred of Israel and Israeli Jews. Vienna social democratic city council member Omar al-Rawi spoke in 2010 at a pro-Hamas rally in the capital inciting violence against Jews. Samuels asked, “why doesn’t Darabos save his breath for the poor Syrians or for the Yemenites? Why is he only focusing on the Jewish state? What does this say about him?” Darabos refused to answer a Post query on Thursday if he has criticized other countries in a similar manner as the Jewish state.
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German intelligence chief warns of Islamist attacks

Germany could be a target of an Islamist attack similar to those carried out by a gunman in France two months ago, the head of the country's intelligence service said on Tuesday. German intelligence chief Heinz Fromm's comments, quoted in an interview with the top-selling Bild daily, follow a series of clashes in several German cities and towns between police and ultra-conservative Salafist Muslims. "The danger for Germany has unfortunately not decreased. And it is not by any means abstract. An attack like in France in March... is also conceivable here," Fromm told Bild, adding that Merah had had contact with Salafists before his shooting spree. Gunman Mohamed Merah, a Frenchman of Algerian origin, killed seven people - three soldiers, three Jewish children and a rabbi - before being shot dead by elite French police commandos in Toulouse on March 22. He had said al Qaeda inspired him to kill. Fromm cited a video made by a Berlin-based Salafist, a former rapper known as Denis C., which calls for 'holy war' and praises Merah and the late Osama bin Laden, founder of al Qaeda. "We must take (this video) seriously. It could well be that this video is taken as an inducement for attacks," he said.
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Switzerland: Anti-Islam group must be protected

The Federal Court says an anti-Islam group has the right to give out leaflets from an information booth if it wants – and the local authorities must protect them. Fribourg Council banned the group – The Movement Against the Islamization of Switzerland – from setting up an information booth Place Georges-Python during the anti-minaret campaign in 2009. It said it refused to give permission because of a fear that violence and unrest would break out as a result, provoking a legal challenge. The Federal Court upheld the group’s complaint that the authorities had impinged on its freedom of expression as well as on freedom of information, newspaper Neue Zürcher Zeitung reported. The court said the local authorities should instead have taken additional measures to safeguard against such an event. In particular, the court said that the authorities could have drafted more police in to safeguard the site. Although public law does grant local authorities powers to ban demonstrations from public spaces, the court confirmed that they may not do so simply because they disapprove of the ideas being communicated.
thelocal

'Austrian defense minister should resign'

Dr. Shimon Samuels, Director for International Relations at the Simon Wiesenthal Center, called for the resignation of Austria’s Defense Minister Norbert Darabos for playing down the Iranian nuclear threat against Arab Gulf countries and Israel, as well as singling out Israel for biased treatment. In an exclusive interview with The Jerusalem Post on Tuesday, Samuels said Darabos "should resign" because "he has discredited Austrian impartiality in terms of Iran -- especially as Austria is host to the International Atomic Energy Agency -- and this is extremely dangerous." Samuels said he "finds it very strange" that Darabos continues to be defense minister because the "Austrian government has disassociated itself from the minister, and logically he should have no standing on defense." "It is extremely worrisome to see Austria take any role in Iran negotiations through this mouthpiece," he added. At the EU human rights agency in Vienna, Samuels said Darabos's attacks on Israel meet the definition of the EU’s classification of modern anti-Semitism, saying it also is disturbing "when you take into context his statement playing down the Iranian threat." He continued, "I wonder how Gulf leaders feel about the Austrian defense minister playing down the Iranian threat. They are in the line of fire." In an interview with the Die Presse over the weekend, Darabos called Foreign Minister Avigdor Liberman “unbearable,” downplayed the Iranian threat, and accused Israel of using that threat – and the Palestinian issue – to sidetrack attention from domestic problems. “Mr. Liberman is unbearable for me as a member of the Israeli government,” Darabos said in the interview. In connection with Iran, Darabos said that Israel’s “threats” were“unnecessary” because “Iran is not ready to build the bomb.” When asked if Darabos plans to resign, Stefan Hirsch, a spokesman for the Austrian defense ministry, wrote the Post by email on Wednesday that the “call to resign is ridiculous. A resignation is not being discussed in Austria. The minister has, in contrast, received support.” However, Chancellor Werner Faymann and Austrian Foreign Minister Michael Spindelegger have distanced themselves from Darabos’ statements, saying his comments do not reflect the position of the Austrian government. Austria’s largest daily, Krone, slammed Darabos in a commentary by the popular columnist Jeannée .He compared Darabos to the former Nazi-Waffen SS member Gunter Grass and his anti-Israel tirades.
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Pan-European call for P5+1 to not tolerate Iranian delaying tactics on nuclear issue -- Policymakers, prominents and STOP THE BOMB demand determined action against Iranian nuclear program

STOP THE BOMB, the European coalition for a nuclear-free and democratic Iran, which was founded in 2007 in Austria, published today a common statement by European policymakers and prominent public figures to warn about the danger of a weak compromise with the Iranian regime ahead of the nuclear talks in Baghdad. The joint statement that was signed by former head of British forces in Afghanistan Richard Kemp, former Foreign Minister of Spain Ana Palacio, Nobel Prize Laureate Elfriede Jelinek, former Dutch Minister of Interior Bram Peper, Beate Klarsfeld, former foreign policy Spokesman of the German SPD Gert Weisskirchen and others, reads as follows:

"On the eve of the upcoming talks between the P5+1 and Iran in Baghdad, we, the undersigned, together with the European STOP THE BOMB coalition urge policymakers in the European Union and the United States to be united and determined in our prevention of an Iranian nuclear bomb.

Western Governments must not tolerate Iranian tactics to obstruct progress and impede decisive international action. It is imperative that the P5+1 enforce the demands of the international community that Iran suspends all of its uranium enrichment and reprocessing activities, as prescribed in UN Security Council Resolution 1696.

Additionally, the European Union must not allow any delay with the implementation of the oil embargo, as well as the ship insurance ban. Western Governments must work to increase the political and economic pressure placed on the Iranian regime and should extend greater support to the Iranian secular and democratic opposition."

The spokesperson of STOP THE BOMB, Simone Dinah Hartmann, adds: “The numerous details of the Iranian nuclear weapons program that were published by an Iranian opposition group, particularly in regards to the feverish development of a nuclear warhead, demonstrate once more the severity of this situation.”

Pan-European Call

On the eve of the upcoming talks between the P5+1 and Iran in Baghdad, we, the undersigned, together with the European STOP THE BOMB coalition urge policymakers in the European Union and the United States to be united and determined in our prevention of an Iranian nuclear bomb. Western Governments must not tolerate Iranian tactics to obstruct progress and impede decisive international action. It is imperative that the P5+1 enforce the demands of the international community that Iran suspends all of its uranium enrichment and reprocessing activities, as prescribed in UN Security Council Resolution 1696. Additionally, the European Union must not allow any delay with the implementation of the oil embargo, as well as the ship insurance ban. Western Governments must work to increase the political and economic pressure placed on the Iranian regime and should extend greater support to the Iranian secular and democratic opposition.

Signatories:

Baroness Caroline Cox, cross-bench Member of the House of Lords. Founder and CEO of the Humanitarian Aid Relief Trust (HART)

Baroness Ruth Deech, Chair of the Bar Standards Board and former Principal of St Anne's College, Oxford

Colonel Richard Kemp, former commander of British Forces in Afghanistan

Ana Palacio, former Foreign Minister of Spain and a current Member of the State of Council of Spain

Luuk Blom, former Chairman of Defence Committee, Dutch Parliament – Dutch Labor Party, PVDA

Henk de Haan, former Dutch chairman of Foreign Affairs Committee – Christian Democratic Appeal, CDA, Netherlands

Bram Peper, former Dutch Minister of Interior – Dutch Labor Party, PVDA

Florus Wijsenbeek, former Dutch member of European Parliament – Dutch Liberal Party, VVD

Beate Klarsfeld, Association of the sons and daughters of Jews deported from France (FFDJF)

Rudolf Dressler, former German Ambassador to Israel, Social Democratic Party Germany (SPD)

Prof. Gert Weisskirchen, former Foreign Policy Spokesman of the Social Democratic parliamentary group (SPD) of the German Bundestag

Petra Bayr, Member of the Foreign Affairs Committee, Austrian Parlament - Social Democratic Party of Austria (SPÖ)

Efgani Dönmez, Member of the Federal Parlament - The Greens, Austria

Elfriede Jelinek, Nobel Prize Laureate in Literature

Marco Schreuder, Member of the Federal Parlament - The Greens, Austria

Rise of the "Undertaker"

No, this isn't an article about staged wrestling, but rather about the (somewhat) surprising triumph of Tomislav Nikolić in yesterday's presidential election in Serbia. Contrary to "journalist" fantasies, his graveyard-related moniker has nothing to do with the phantom "gruesome reputation... organising recruitment to Serbian paramilitaries to fight in Croatia and Bosnia" [sic], and everything to do with the fact that he once held a job as manager of a cemetery.

His enemies - who generally never held honest jobs in their lives, but had really good spin doctors - used this to smear him as a man who'd "bury" Serbia if elected. Meanwhile, they did "everything they could" (in the favorite phrase of the now ex-President) to destroy Serbia and salt the earth in their wake. They even resorted to wholesale fraud to ensure their continued rule. Yesterday's vote brought those plans to a halt.

Or did it? For all the bleating of Western "journalists", spoon-fed sordid political pornography by their well-paid Serbian (or rather, Serbophobic) sources, Nikolić is not the same man he was four years ago.

Having lost the second presidential election to Boris Tadić, and seeing his party once again left out of the cabinet - cobbled together in a mockery of electoral results by Western ambassadors - Nikolić snapped. He left the Radical Party, whose caretaker leader he'd been, and founded the Progressives. He also hired former American ambassador William Montgomery as a consultant, went to Brussels and Washington to pledge fealty, changed his tune on Serbia getting annexed by the EU, and offering a platform filled with nothing but fluff. His criticism of the Tadić regime boiled down to, "We'd do the same thing, only better."

Especially interesting was his choice of party name. It is possible it was chosen for him by Montgomery or some other foreign consultant, since progressivisim is all the rage in the West right now. But to the few who still have a working knowledge of Serbian history, the choice was very symbolic: the Progressives used to be the ruling party under the corrupt, Austrophile King Milan Obrenović, and were famously defeated by the Radicals in 1887. They were so hated by the people, that their final convention in 1889 was dispersed by an angry mob throwing stones and wielding clubs. For over a hundred years, their name was mud - until Nikolić resurrected it.

Wouldn't it be par for the course if the "nationalist" Nikolić was really an Imperial agent? It is a distinct possibility. What is certain, however, is that the Empire will now try to pressure him to continue Tadić's policy of unconditional surrender in order to prove he's not a "nationalist." It is, of course, an impossible quest: the moment Nikolić gives them an inch, they will move the goalposts and demand more, just as they've done with Tadić.

But while Tadić was ideologically committed to Imperial supremacy and even ran his mouth about the need to "transform society" and "change the mentality" of the Serbian people so they would fit better into the Brave New World of EUtopia, Nikolić's principal support comes from the frustrated, disenfranchised Serbs who still care about their identity, tradition, culture, history and nation. He wasn't their ideal candidate by any stretch, but they voted for him because Tadić was worse.

By the virtue of that victory, Nikolić is in the unenviable position of having many expectations to meet and very little room to maneuver. If he defies the Empire, expect the storm of abuse to increase. But if he chooses to be another Tadić, he will quickly draw the wrath of the Serbians - without having Tadić's media machinery and direct foreign backing to shield him. The question then remains who will Nikolić fear more, the foreign overlords or his own folk.

If this really turns out to be a ploy to replace a worn-out puppet with a fresh one (while fooling the Serbs they had a choice in the matter), it may well explode in its authors' faces. The fall of Tadić has opened the floodgates of frustration. No amount of marketing tricks will close them again.
grayfalcon

Austria condemns minister for attacking Liberman

Austria’s Foreign Ministry condemned Norbert Darabos, the country’s defense minister, on Monday for his sharp and undiplomatic criticism of Israel and Foreign Minister Avigdor Liberman. Alexander Schallenberg, spokesman for Austrian Foreign Minister Michael Spindelegger from the conservative People’s Party, told the daily Die Presse that Darabos’s “statements in no way express the position of the Foreign Ministry or the federal government.” Schallenberg added that the defense minister’s position is not compatible with the level of bilateral ties between Austria and Israel. Darabos, of the Social Democratic Party, called Liberman “unbearable” in an interview published Saturday in Die Presse and downplayed the Iranian threat. He accused Israel of using that threat – and the Palestinian issue – to divert attention from domestic woes. Schallenberg’s comments came a day after Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon met in Jerusalem with visiting Austrian Foreign Ministry secretary-general Johannes Kyrle for a meeting that was scheduled long before Darabos’s comments. Ayalon, according to diplomatic officials, told his guest that Darabos’s remarks were “unacceptable,” and that Israel expected Vienna to express that they did not reflect the opinion of the Austrian government. The officials said the incident “created a degree of discomfort” during the meeting. Darabos, who has triggered controversy over the years for his foreign policy positions, is currently at the NATO summit in Chicago. Born in Vienna, Darabos is part of the ethnic Croatian minority from the Austrian state of Burgenland. He has served as defense minister since 2007. The year he was appointed to the position, Darabos elicited sharp criticism from Czech Foreign Minister Karel Schwarzenberg because he opposed the US plan to station missile-defense shields in Poland and the Czech Republic. His apparent inexperience in the European security field, coupled with his opposition to the rocket shields, also prompted reproach from former Austrian chancellor Wolfgang Schüssel. Schwarzenberg expressed disbelief that a defense minister would hold such a pacifistic position. Schüssel, meanwhile, termed Darabos “a real disappointment as defense minister” in a conversation with former US ambassador to Austria Susan McCaw, according to documents released by WikiLeaks. The WikiLeaks cables also revealed that Austrian military officials complained about the defense minister in connection with contact with US officials. According to the cables, Darabos was labelled as “incapable” due to his unwillingness to increase the military budget.
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General Draja Mihailovich: Zip’s Hall of Fame, October, 1942

Comic books and the superhero archetype are integral to American culture and how American society sees itself.  Ever since the emergence of the comic book format during the 1930s, a period known as the Golden Age, comic books and the superhero archetype or paradigm have dominated American entertainment and the American mindset. Even into 2012, the comic book and superhero archetype have remained a dominant theme in American movies. The comic book hero continues to thrive and to endure as a fixture of American culture, albeit on the big screen. The pervasive superhero archetype and the comic book format are vital to understanding the American psyche and the way Americans perceive themselves.

Comic books emerged as a dominant, mainstream pastime in the U.S. in the late 1930s. In the 1940s, the circulation of comic books exploded in the United States. The looming threat of war engendered panic, uncertainty, and fear. Comic books were a way to escape and to live out fantasies, becoming psycho-dramas where one could engage in role-playing. They were more than mere escapism, however, because they tapped into the psychological stratum of American society and culture. If you wanted to understand and to grasp the American national persona and subconscious, the values and beliefs of a society, comic books were one of the ideal places to start. This was where all the subconscious and unconscious desires and fixations and wish fulfillments played out. Comic books were the graffiti of the American subconscious. At the surface level, comic books were merely a form of mindless entertainment and escapism. But at more complex levels, the comic book is a pyschological panorama that reveals the American subconscious.

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Islamist calls for murder of German far-right party: media

A German Islamist is calling for the murder of members of a far-right party that regularly provokes ultra-conservative Muslims using cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed, a newspaper reported.

According to an article due to appear Monday in the Tageszeitung daily, an Islamist from Bonn in western Germany has appeared in a video on an Islamic forum in which he encouraged "the killing of all activists from the Pro NRW party".
Members of the small extreme-right political party held a campaign event using anti-Islamic caricatures ahead of an election in Germany's most populous state North Rhine-Westphalia on May 13.
In his appeal, the Islamist urged the collection of personal information on Pro NRW members, including their home addresses and work schedules, with the goal of attacking them.
"We take this message seriously," an Interior Minister spokesman told the newspaper, which said the man had broadcast messages for the "Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan".
Several police were injured during recent clashes between Islamists and Pro NRW members.
The right-wing activists have for several years campaigned against the construction of mosques and have in some protests marched with cartoons of Mohammed that were initially published by a Danish newspaper in 2005, leading to a wave of violence and anger across the Muslim world.
Islam strictly prohibits the depiction of any prophet as blasphemous.
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Austrian Günter-Grass-style minister calls Liberman 'unbearable'

Austria’s Defense Minister Norbert Darabos (SPÖ) called Foreign Minister Avigdor Liberman “unbearable” in an interview published Saturday, downplayed the Iranian threat, and accused Israel of using that threat – and the Palestinian issue – to divert attention from domestic woes.

“Mr. Liberman is unbearable for me as a member of the Israeli government,” Darabos said in an interview published Saturday on the website of the Austrian daily Die Presse. Saying that Israeli policies overall were difficult for him, Darabos said he was glad Kadima entered the government because it could “mitigate radicalization.”

Liberman’s office declined comment.

Austria is considered one of Israel’s harshest critics inside the EU, along with Ireland, Belgium and Luxembourg, and was one of only two EU countries that voted for a UN Human Rights Council decision in March to establish a fact-finding mission to probe the effects of settlements on Palestinian human rights. Six other EU countries abstained on the measure.

Regarding Iran, Darabos said that Israel’s “threats” were“unnecessary” because “Iran is not ready to build the bomb.”

An Israel military step would trigger a conflagration in the region that could be difficult to control, and would create sympathy for Iran even among Arab nations that are critical of it, Darabos said.

Israel, he claimed, was using “outside enemies such as Iran or the Palestinians” to “distract attention from internal social problems.”           
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German Islamist arrested in Kenya

Kenyan security forces on Wednesday arrested a German convert to radical Islam, for whom a warrant was issued at the weekend, the Die Welt daily reported.

The man was named as Bonn-born Ahmed Mueller. He was reportedly arrested near Naivasha, north of Nairobi, Thursday's paper quoted a Kenyan police spokesman as saying.

However neither the German police nor the foreign ministry made any comment.

The news came days after Kenyan police arrested a Swedish national suspected to have links with the Somali Islamist militia Shebab.

Since Kenya sent forces into southern Somalia in October to fight the al-Qaeda-linked Shebab rebels, it has been hit by retaliatory attacks.

The Kenyan police last weekend began a hunt for Mueller, saying he could have “information about Shebab activities being prepared.”

Mueller has a history of Islamist activism. He was among a group of German Muslims from the Rhineland and was arrested by Pakistani forces in the border zone with Afghanistan in 2009.

His activities abroad came to the attention of the German authorities as his Eritrean wife and children, including a four-year-old girl, were held for several months in Pakistan before being expelled to Germany.

Mueller had left Germany again last August, once again with his family, heading for Somalia.

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Switzerland: Wife-Beating 101 Taken to Court

Regular readers of Counterjihad sites are familiar with Koran 4:34, which lays out the strict rules for beating one’s wife. Now the matter has been brought to court in Switzerland, after a man publicly declared his Koran-inspired views on spousal abuse in a TV documentary.
Many thanks to Hermes for translating this article from Donaufalter-Zeitung:
If the man needs sex, he is allowed to beat his wife
Islamist from Basel has the right to say such thing openly, court of justice ruled.
Aziz Osmanoglu, 36, the secretary of the Muslim community in Basel lives in strict accordance with the Koran. "I stand by it entirely. I regret nothing of what I said at that time”. He stood trial again.
In the documentary from the SF1 channel called "behind the veil”, Aziz Osmanoglu was one of the chief characters. There he explained to the viewers:
"A (Muslim) man needs sex, that’s why in extreme cases he is allowed to beat his wife if she refuses. If he did not do that, then the man would look for another partner, and this is not acceptable in Islam”
He finds whipping or cutting off hands a proper punishment for thieves. "I would willingly stand for Sharia”, he said additionally in an interview. What does he have the stomach for? Many from the audience shook their heads.
The reaction from the public prosecutor’s office:
Osmanoglu was denounced for "public instigation to crime and violence”. The Muslim was at first instance released by the court.
But the issue went ahead in the court of appeal.
During yesterday’s trial, the judge stated that "the declarations of the accused are clear instigations to violence. And as the secretary of a Muslim organization, he has a great capability of influencing others.”
Osmanoglu denied the charges. He wanted to overcome the preconceptions about the Muslims, and not call for violence. People have picked out the statements from the whole context of the documentary, and he did nothing unlawful.
The president of the court, Claudius Gelzer, judged the declarations of Osmanoglu as censurable: "violence against women is strongly deserving of condemnation; these declarations are neither morally nor ethically right.”
In spite of this, Osmanoglu was once again released because he did not call directly for anyone to behave like that.
Sharia lives. Among us. How does one say it? Be welcome?
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Ratko Mladic & Srebrenica: memory loss of massacres by all sides and the role of Alija Izetbegovic

The trial of Ratko Mladic will be sweet music to the American agenda, the “Muslim victim card,” to cover-up the international terrorist ratlines which allowed terrorists to enter Bosnia, to cover-up the role of the Bosnian Muslim leadership in allowing Srebrenica to happen; and so forth. Therefore, the trial of Ratko Mladic is aimed at shaming the Bosnian Serbs and to pin all the blame on one side. Irrespective of the guilt of this individual this distortion is beyond what is reasonable because it is based on covering-up the real events of what happened. Indeed, the BBC today, like other major agencies, will mention the slaughter of 7,000 Muslim men and boys in Srebrenica but ignore the 3,500 Orthodox Christians who were slaughtered by Muslim forces before this event took place. These massacres apply to killing Orthodox Christians in and around Srebrenica, irrespective if they were little girls to old and elderly people.
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Jihad in Berlin (Again)

Some 50 Salafists in Berlin’s Potsdamer Square slashed at 20 counter-demonstrators. The police had to take drastic measures. Four were injured. A member of the CDU calls now for the curbing of the hate preachers’ freedom of speech.The followers of the radical Islamic Salafists gathered on Sunday at an information booth in Berlin’s Potsdamer Square. They wanted to distribute free copies of the Koran. Some 20 counter-demonstrators stood in front of them, and then a fight took place. It was only through the use of pepper spray and physical force that the police could control the attack of the Salafists against the demonstrators. Three agents were slightly injured, and a Salafist suffered a laceration on his head.
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Vampire Journalism

No sooner had Ratko Mladic's "trial" before the Hague Inquisition opened today, reports began appearing in the press of his "taunting the victims". Supposedly, Mladic motioned towards the "Mothers of Srebrenica" sitting in the observation gallery with a throat-slitting gesture.

The claim accompanied the descriptions of Mladic as the organizer of the "murder of 8,000 unarmed men and boys" in Srebrenica, which was of course the "worst massacre in Europe since World War Two," easily inducing the casual observer to instantly dislike Mladic.

The problems with this "trial" are many, from the ICTY lacking legitimacy to try anyone, the fact that it writes its own posto facto laws and rules, has standards of evidence that would be laughed out of any legitimate courtroom, to the consideration that the people brought before it have already been lynched in the court of public opinion, and therefore cannot have a fair trial even if the Tribunal itself weren't a travesty.

But the story of the taunting throat-slitting gesture is a prime example of journalistic misconduct when it comes to the Balkans, a case of not just gilding the lily, but of actually reversing the facts of the case.

You see, the throat-slitting gesture was first mentioned in June last year, when it supposedly took place at Mladic's "status conference" hearing. News agencies and papers relying on their feeds reported that the general had taunted his (alleged) victims with a throat-slitting gesture. However, some careful research by an observant reader quickly produced the actual story:

Kada Hotic, who has relatives who were killed at Srebrenica, said Mladic taunted her when she threatened him.
“I told him he will pay the price for murdering my son,” she said, adding that she drew her finger across her throat. Mladic could not hear her, but she said he gestured back, holding his thumb and forefinger close together to indicate she was insignificant. (emphasis added)

So, the gesture did happen. But it wasn't Mladic who made it, but a Muslim observer! She admitted to it, proudly - and the only interpretation of Mladic's finger gesture is hers, too. Now, it is obvious why the AP would mis-report that Mladic had made the motion - it makes the designated villain look properly villainous, and fits the propaganda narrative. But how dare they, when it was so obviously not true? Did they think they wouldn't get caught?

Apparently so. Until someone did catch them, and informed blogger Julia Gorin. She then sent letters to the offending agencies and newspapers, pointing out the problem. Finally, on September 30, 2011, the Toronto Star - one of the papers that ran AP's story on July 4, issued the following correction:

"Online News Correction for September 30
Published On Fri Sep 30 2011
A July 4 article about the war crimes tribunal of Gen. Ratko Mladic incorrectly stated that Mladic drew his finger across his throat while looking at the public gallery. In fact, a person in the gallery made the threatening gesture to Mladic." (emphasis added)

The Star's correction prompted a chain reaction of retractions by other papers, and the AP itself. Gorin's blog entry provides a complete list and many details of the case.

Of course, the retraction got very little attention, while the lie of Mladic threatening the women in the gallery got spotlight treatment. And now the story has been raised from the dead, reported in the exact same words - again, with no visual evidence to back it up, no indication that it refers to an event from last year, or that it was originally mis-reported in a manner that merited an official retraction!

There you have it, folks: vampire journalism, courtesy of your mainstream media. Ready the garlic and the stakes.
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Germany: Iranian Rapper Fears for His Life After Fatwa

Iranian rapper Shahin Najafi expected his song calling on a Shiite saint to save Iran from its current rulers to stir up controversy, but he never imagined it might cost him his life. He is now being dubbed the Salman Rushdie of music after two influential clerics in Iran issued fatwas—religious edicts—justifying his murder on grounds of blasphemy. "I am still in disbelief. I'm only 31, with my whole life ahead of me," said Mr. Najafi in an interview from Germany, where he lives and, since last week, has been in hiding under the protection of German police.
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