04/05 Links Pt1: 6 Months of Terror in Israel; UN rebukes Hamas for stealing cement; Hamas threatens an ‘explosion’

From Ian:

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Israel suspends cement deliveries to Gaza’s private sector

Israel this week temporarily suspended the delivery of cement to Gaza’s private sector after it discovered that Hamas was siphoning the material, which is intended to rebuild destroyed houses.
The Office of the Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT) monitors the flow of cement into Gaza to ensure that Hamas has not used it to construct tunnels to attack Israel. On Friday COGAT posted on its Arabic Facebook page that it suspended the transfer of cement to Gaza because some deliveries had been diverted by Imad Elbaz, the deputy director-general for Hamas’s economics office.
“This is a blatant violation of agreements for the rehabilitation mechanism,” COGAT said in its Facebook post.
COGAT head Maj.-Gen. Yoav Mordechai temporarily halted the shipments until the matter is fully investigated, COGAT said. adding that it regretted that Hamas continues to pursue its own personal agenda at the expense of Gaza’s residents.
The UN Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process, Nickolay Mladenov, issued an unusually sharp response on Monday, accusing Hamas of theft.
“Those who seek to gain through the deviation of materials are stealing from their own people and adding to the suffering of Palestinians in Gaza,” Mladenov said.

Hamas official denies stealing cement, warns of ‘explosion’

A Hamas official on Tuesday denied Israeli charges of siphoning off cement imports to Gaza and warned of a potential “explosion” unless a cement ban is lifted.
Israel on Monday announced it had stopped private imports of cement to the Hamas-run Palestinian enclave, accusing Imad al-Baz, deputy director of the economy ministry, of diverting supplies.
But Baz denied any offense, saying the imports were in line with a UN-brokered Gaza Reconstruction Mechanism, aimed at allowing for reconstruction following a devastating 2014 war with Israel.
“We don’t interfere with the cement mechanism,” he told AFP, adding that all cement distribution sites in Gaza are monitored by Israeli cameras.
He warned that Israel’s decision would have “dire consequences” including “stopping the wheels of reconstruction, destroying the economy and increasing unemployment with adverse repercussions for tens of thousands of citizens.”

6 Months of Terror in Israel

Police nab would-be attacker in West Bank arrest

The Israel Police said Monday that officers arrested a Palestinian in the West Bank who was planning to carry out a car-ramming attack against soldiers.
The 23-year-old Ramallah man was detained Sunday morning at a West Bank checkpoint, where police from the Binyamin district were conducting a “stop and search” operation.
A quick inspection revealed the man did not have a driver license and was driving a car stolen from central Israel a month earlier. The suspect was taken for questioning at Binyamin station, where he confessed that he was planning to carry out a car-ramming attack against IDF soldiers “because of the occupation of Palestinian lands.” He also told investigators that he hoped to become a “martyr” by dying in the attack.
The unexpected checkpoint surprised him, he said, and disrupted his plans.
Police did not say exactly where the incident happened or on which road the checkpoint was deployed.

3 Palestinians to be charged for shooting attack soon -- Shin Bet

Security forces arrested three Palestinian men suspected of carrying out a shooting attack in February on Israeli citizens in the West Bank, the Shin Bet revealed on Tuesday.
The three men were picked up in a joint Shin Bet, IDF and Israel Police operation on February 9, some four days after they had carried out a drive-by shooting at passing cars near Iskaka, near Ariel in the West Bank, the Shin Bet said.
No one was injured in the attack, but one car was damaged.
The three Palestinians were identified as Abdallah Taiseer Abd Arouri, Hamada Salah Abd Arouri and Salah Sabri Abd Arouri. They were all members of the same family, from Aroura, a village north of Ramallah, the Shin Bet said.
Abdallah and Hamada are both 30 years old, while Salah is 23 years old.
According to their confessions, the trio had purchased two weapons — makeshift Carlo submachine guns — from an arms dealer in the West Bank and began practicing with them in preparation for a terror attack.

Terrorist's mother: Knife was just for a salad, she loves Jews

Following yesterday’s knife attack in Rosh Ha’ayin in which a 30-year-old mother of three was wounded, the Arab Israeli suspect’s mother denies the incident was a terror attack, claiming that the knife her daughter was brandishing was “for making salad."
The mother, a resident of the town of Kfar Qassem close to the scene of the attack, told Channel 2 that her daughter wasn’t a terrorist, and decried the media for rushing to judgment.
“She’s dieting. She always carries fruit and a knife with her in her bag to make salads,” she said. In the attack, the terrorist had a box cutter in her hand which she used to stab, and another knife was found in her bag. Police have yet to officially declare the attack as terrorism.
The mother of the accused suggested that her daughter may have been responding to something said or done to her prior to the attack.
“What happened to her on the way? Who spoke with her on the way? We don’t know any of that at this point. God forbid [this was] not a terror attack. We don’t live in the territories [Judea and Samaria]; we’re living in Israel; how could I ever betray the state?”
The mother went on to describe her daughter’s alleged fondness for Jews.
“Do you know how many times she told me ‘Mom, I love living with Jews, more than with Arabs’?”

IDF: Enough evidence to charge Hebron soldier in killing

IDF prosecutors argued in a military court hearing Tuesday in favor of jailing an IDF soldier filmed shooting an incapacitated Palestinian terrorist last month, pointing out that the soldier didn’t warn anybody of a possible explosive charge, and showed no signs of distress afterwards.
Prosecutor Adoram Reigler told the court that the military had gathered enough evidence to move forward with a manslaughter charge, the Ynet news website reported.
The soldier under investigation, whose name has not been released, was filmed shooting 21-year-old Abdel Fattah al-Sharif through the head on March 24, minutes after Sharif and another assailant stabbed and moderately wounded a soldier in Tel Rumeida, an Israeli enclave of the West Bank city of Hebron. The two assailants were shot, with one was killed and Sharif wounded, by an army officer during the course of their attack.

Junior IDF commander of Hebron shooter was concerned about explosives vest

The commander's testimony could potentially substantiate the soldier's claims that he shot the prone terrorist because he feared that he may be wearing such a vest.
When asked by the court about the platoon commander's concerns that there may have been an explosives vest, the IDF prosecution said that his concerns were "at a very low level."
The court implied it did not believe the IDF prosecution could make such distinctions hastily and that even a small level of concern from the junior commander could be a major factor in the court's decision.
The soldier's defense team argued that its client told the IDF investigation following the incident, that when he shot the terrorist he was not ensuring that that he was killed, but rather that he was neutralized.
"This is a decision that I took in a split second, you don't have too much time to think," the soldier told the investigators.
"I didn't just shoot without thinking. I saw the terrorist move his head and his hand. If he had explosives on him I would be in the grave now and not under investigation," the suspect said, according to his counsel.

Turning an Arab Terrorist into an "Innocent Victim"

By blocking the sound on the video from the Arab terror attack on innocent Jews in Hebron last month, B'tzelem managed to distort reality and turn the Arab terrorist into an "innocent victim," sic, when a soldier executed him as he (the terrorist) began moving. There was legitimate fear/suspicion that under the terrorist's coat, which was a sure sign, that some weapon or bomb was hidden and ready to use against the Jews around him.
And very tragically our hapless and gullible Minister of Defense fell for the con and has been leading the B'tzelem extreme Left anti-Israeli security campaign against the quick-thinking soldier.
Family of shot terrorist threatens Israel with legal action
The family of Abd al-Fattah al-Sharif, the terrorist who was shot by a soldier in Hevron last week after a stabbing attack against Israelis, on Monday threatened the IDF with legal procedures, the Ma’an news agency reported.
In a press conference at the Hevron governor’s office, al-Sharif’s uncle Fathi al-Sharif also urged the Palestinian Authority (PA) and its chairman, Mahmoud Abbas, to file legal procedures against Israel at the International Criminal Court, over the incident.
We are at war, and in a battle things happen, and Bogie Ya'alon seems to have forgotten it in his quest for "good press."

The International Media Bias Against Israel Is Beyond the Pale

The willful blindness of the Western media and intellectual elites to Palestinian incitement and their hyper-focus on any incident they can use to portray Israel in a negative light were on abundant display last week when footage emerged of an Israel Defense Forces soldier shooting a wounded and disarmed Palestinian terrorist.
Since then, The New York Times and The Washington Post have run no fewer than 16 stories about the incident. This volume of coverage reinforces the patently mendacious Israel-is-evil “narrative” promoted by the mainstream media, the liberal elites in bed with Palestinian and jihadist killers, the demonstrably one-sided United Nations, and the sanctimonious rants of several congressional leaders who claim they are speaking out in the name of human rights.
Meanwhile, these same news outlets consistently fail to speak out against the massive and ongoing denial of human rights, suppression of basic freedoms and daily torture meted out to any Palestinian dissident by both the Palestinian Authority and Hamas. Many of these violations have been investigated and documented in horrific detail by the courageous Palestinian human rights advocate Bassam Eid.
No, the “narrative” does not allow mainstream news outlets to file negative reports on Palestinian human rights violations, their rampant corruption, and most importantly, their massive incitement to terrorist violence, which is being promoted by the very leadership of the Palestinian Authority. This includes vile lessons in how to kill Jews, taught in US-sponsored Palestinian schools and universities, and instructional videos on stabbing and murdering Jews being shown to thousands of Palestinian schoolchildren.

Hamas animation encourages stabbings, shootings, and ramming attacks


MEMRI: Kuwaiti Writer To Muslims: Stop Cursing Jews And Christians In The Friday Sermons

In the Kuwaiti daily Al-Qabas, liberal Kuwaiti journalist Ahmad Al-Sarraf criticized imams who, in their Friday sermons in the mosques, curse their enemies, including the Jews and Christians. Al-Sarraf wondered why Muslims should yearn for Allah to help the mujahideen behead the Jews and Christians, when the Jews and Christians are behind inventions which benefit Muslims– such as cars, trains, planes, medical equipment, pharmaceuticals, and other vital things, and called on the Muslims to leave them alone and to recognize their superiority in many fields.
It should be mentioned that in another recent article, Al-Sarraf enumerated Israel's advantages over the Arabs in many areas, and called on the latter to learn from the former.
Following are excerpts from Al-Sarraf's article:
"'Allah, punish the Shi'ites, the communists, the Jews, and the Christians. Allah, punish the tyrants. Allah, disperse them, weaken them, and bring disasters upon their heads. Allah, facilitate our mujahideen brothers and help them behead them.'
"This is part of a prayer to Allah delivered a few days ago during Friday worship that was attended by tens of thousands of prayer-goers, and took place before dozens of TV cameras.

Erekat: ‘We’re reporting to the ICC’ on Israeli home demolitions

The Palestinians are reporting to the International Criminal Court on the Israeli demolitions of Palestinian homes and structures, including those in the past 24 hours, PLO Secretary General Saeb Erekat said on Monday.
He spoke in the aftermath of Civil Administration demolitions of seven illegally built Palestinians structures in Area C of the West Bank on Monday. The IDF had also razed early in the morning the family homes of the three terrorists who killed policewoman Hadar Cohen in a terror attack outside the Damascus Gate in Jerusalem, February.
“Each and every crime Israel commits in violation of our rights are documented, reported, and presented to the relevant international bodies, including the International Criminal Court,” Erekat said.
“Granting impunity for continued and systematic Israeli crimes will not achieve a resumption of negotiations, rather, it is killing any realistic political horizon to end the Israeli occupation of the State of Palestine,” Erekat said.

Israel destroys illegal Arab buildings on archaeological site

The Civil Administration has destroyed several illegal Arab buildings at the Khirbet Marjam archaeological site, near Kochav Hashachar
The site contains archaeological findings from the time of the Bible, as well as a system of hidden tunnels dating back to the end of the Second Temple and the Bar Kochva revolt. Due to its significance, Great Britain declared it to be a unique archaeological site during the Second World War.
About a decade ago, Arab criminals began residing in the area and building residences and agricultural structures inside of the archaeological site. In doing so, their use of heavy engineering tools caused massive destruction to ancient remains. Most of the archaeological site has already been damage or destroyed.
About eight months ago - during the shiva period following the murder of Malachi Rosenfeld, a resident of Kochav Hashachar who was shot dead by terrorists - a new illegal home was set up, overlooking the scene of the attack. The home was surrounded by a large stone wall, apparently using rocks taken from the historical site itself.

Israel cuts power at second Palestinian city over unpaid debt

Israel’s state-owned electric company on Monday continued to scale back its electricity supply to Palestinian cities due to almost two billion shekels in unpaid debt, limiting its supply to the city of Bethlehem and vowing to do so in other places across the West Bank over the next two weeks.
The Israel Electric Corporation (IEC) said Monday it was halving its supply to Bethlehem, after taking a similar, short-lived step in the city of Jericho last week.
It was not stated when the power supply to Bethlehem will be restored.
The company says the Palestinian authorities have racked up a debt of 1.74 billion shekels ($460 million). Israel has thus far continued to provide electricity out of concern for the Palestinian population, but the IEC said it could no longer absorb the debt and was taking measures to stop it from growing further.

Tons of Palestinian Meat With Faked Expiry Dates, Kosher Certificates Sold in Israeli Restaurants

Israeli restaurateurs are shocked and angry over revelations that a gang of eastern Jerusalem Palestinians sold them smuggled, unsupervised meat for years.
Nine people were arrested on allegations of being part of the gang on Monday morning. They allegedly forged expiry dates, slaughtering dates, and kosher certifications for the meat products.
The suspects were arrested following a combined investigation by the Israel Police, as well as the Ministry of Agriculture, Tax Authority, and Ministry of Health.
A factory in the neighborhood of Atarot, a Jewish part of eastern Jerusalem, was apparently the main distribution point into Israel for the smuggled meat.
Officers from the Israel Police on Tuesday confiscated more than 20 tons of meat from the factory.
The smuggled meat was allegedly purchased by a Palestinian importer in a South American country, then shipped to the Haifa port in northern Israel. It was transferred to a storage facility in the West Bank and then smuggled into Israel, often in trucks unfit to transport packed meat and without supervision from Ministry of Health inspectors.

Israel to hire another 500 Jordanians for Red Sea hotels

The statement said the Jordanian staff would be employed in cleaning, dishwashing and room service.
“Past endeavors launched by government ministries and the hotel industry to encourage Israelis to work in these positions were not successful,” it said, adding that incentives including bonuses, housing benefits and day care had been offered.
“However, these did not result in recruiting Israeli workers into the Eilat tourism industry.”
It said the new recruits would join 400 Jordanians already employed in Eilat hotels.

PA police release Syriac archbishop day after arrest

The Palestinian Authority police on Sunday night released from prison the archbishop of the Syriac Orthodox Church, Swerios Malki Murad, who was arrested a day earlier in Bethlehem.
Palestinian prosecutors said that the archbishop was interrogated following a complaint against him by a woman belonging to his Syriac community. Although they refused to discuss the nature of the complaint, Palestinians said that the woman had accused the head of the church of “sexual assault.”
Archbishop Murad was released on bail following protests by members of his community and prominent Christian figures in Jerusalem and Bethlehem. However, he was summoned for further interrogation on Monday.
PA policemen arrested the top clergyman on Saturday night as he was on his way back from a celebration in the nearby al-Khader village.

PreOccupiedTerritory: Hand That Feeds Palestinians Now Almost All Scar Tissue (satire)

The appendage used in providing for the needs of the Palestinians has turned almost entirely into scar tissue from repeated biting, medical officials reported today.
In his monthly update of the state of the Palestinian medical system, Dr. Handat Fidzmi of the Ministry of Health in the Palestinian capital informed his colleagues and other interested parties of the recent developments in the hand’s condition, and analyzed the positive and negative ramifications of the scar tissue for the society at large.
“On one crusty, impaired hand, we anticipate some difficulty in the provision of food, economic aid, infrastructure, and graft at the levels Palestinians have become accustomed to receiving, given the restricted movement and responsiveness of the bitten-up hand,” he wrote. “However, scar tissue has its advantages, among which is the ability not to transmit pain with the same intensity as healthy tissue, a fact that will facilitate the continued foul attitude toward the providers of Palestinian aid with less worry that such offensive behavior and statements result in any cessation of aid.”
The biting has taken the form of terrorism against western targets, or on Western soil; societal movements that take pride in calling for the destruction or downfall of Western society; political maneuvering that undermines the stability of supposed allies; and accusing those who provide aid of stinginess.

No True Scotsman: The Logical Fallacy of Obama’s ISIS Policy

Paris, San Bernardino and now Brussels. Once again, the world is horrified by another heinous attack committed by radical Muslims. And once again, questions on the nature of Islam, are sizzling in scholarly circles, the media, and our social communities.
Are these attacks a reflection of what Islam really believes or not? Scholars, political figures, and society as a whole are all divided by this question. Is Islam a religion that promotes violence or not? Many in the media believe that these attacks have nothing to do with Islam.
But arguing that these attacks are not reflective of Islam’s true beliefs runs contrary to a well-known rule of logic: the “no true Scotsman” fallacy. When someone makes a blanket claim, such as, “No Scotsman would do such a thing,” and then is presented with proof that a Scotsman has done such a thing, he responds: “Well, no true Scotsman would do such a thing.” In a world of such logical fallacies, no rule can be proved right or wrong, since once can always respond, “Well, that is not the real one.”
This seems to be the working pattern for dealing with outbreaks of Muslim violence. Yet in the case of Brussels, this fallacy is even worse.

Obama vetoed Assad overthrow plans

President Obama vetoed 50 plans put to him by the CIA to engineer the downfall of the Assad regime in Syria, according to a former operative working on the project.
According to a memoir he is publishing on Tuesday, Douglas Laux was part of a team tasked to find ways to put into effect Mr Obama’s assertion in August 2011 that “the time had come for President Assad to step aside”.
The CIA, under then-leader David Petraeus, ended up running a scheme to arm rebels from the “non-jihadist” Free Syrian Army - but it never reached a scale that outweighed regime support from Iran and the Lebanese militia Hizbollah.
Mr Laux now says that was because more elaborate schemes drawn up and backed not only by former General Petraeus, Hillary Clinton when secretary of state, and defence secretary Leon Panetta were all rejected by Mr Obama.
"We had come up with 50 good options,” he said in an interview with the American television channel NBC. “My ops plan laid them out in black and white. But political leadership…hadn't given us the go-ahead to implement a single one."

'Panama Papers' show Syria regime circumvented sanctions: report

Syria's regime has been able to circumvent international sanctions and fund its war effort through shadow companies, according to leaked "Panama Papers" seen by French daily Le Monde.
The newspaper reported on Monday that three Syrian companies, Pangates International, Maxima Middle East Trading, and Morgan Additives Manufacturing, used the services of Panama-based law firm Mossack Fonseca to create shadow companies in the Seychelles.
Le Monde, a partner in the year-long worldwide media investigation into a trove of 11.5 million documents leaked from Mossack Fonseca, said the shadow companies were "a way for the Syrian regime to circumvent international sanctions imposed since the start of the war".
The three firms are under US sanctions for allegedly providing petroleum supplies to President Bashar al-Assad's regime likely to be used by his military, including aviation fuel.

Iran and Terror Proxy Hezbollah Named in Panama Papers Scandal

Iran and its Lebanese terror proxy Hezbollah have been implicated in the Panama Papers scandal, one of the largest document leaks in history.
According to the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) — which, along with German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung and more than 100 other outlets, conducted a yearlong investigation — the files expose “at least 33 people and companies blacklisted by the US government because of evidence that they’d been involved in wrongdoing, such as doing business with Mexican drug lords, terrorist organizations like Hezbollah or rogue nations like North Korea and Iran.”
In addition, one of the blacklisted companies was charged by US authorities with having “supplied fuel for the aircraft that the Syrian government used to bomb and kill thousands of its own citizens.”
The leak of 11.5 million tax documents outlining the confidential dealings of Panamanian offshore law firm Mossack Fonseca has brought to light the dark side of tax havens and offshore tax laws. Initial public findings of the ICIJ investigation reveal how several companies utilized tax havens to launder money, avoid taxes and finance arms and drug deals.

Syria's grand mufti: Opposition offered ceasefire in exchange for appeasement with Israel

The grand mufti of Syria claimed Monday that the Syrian leadership has recently been offered a deal according to which the rebels would cease their hostilities against the regime if the latter would come to terms with Israel.
In a live interview with the Lebanese TV channel, al-Mayadeen, Grand Mufti Ahmad Hassoun said that since the civil war erupted in 2011, the Syrian leadership has recurrently been receiving offers to make a tit-for-tat deal to end the violent conflict.
"Since the civil war started in 2011, we have been receiving unofficial offers to make a deal that would end it: 'If you announce you would end hostilities against Israel and if you expel the Palestinian resistance from your territory and cut your relations with Hezbollah, we would stop fighting against you," Hassoun said of the alleged deal offered to the Syrian regime.
The grand mufti criticized the Syrian rebel factions fighting against the Syrian regime, claiming they serve the joint Israeli-Western bid to ruin Syria.

Saudi Author Said Al-Suraihi: The Ogre of ISIS Emerged from Our History Books


Report: ISIS militants use mustard gas in attack on Deir al-Zor airport

Islamic State militants attacked Syrian army troops with mustard gas in an offensive against a Syrian military airport in the eastern province of Deir al-Zor that borders Iraq, state media said on late Monday.
Syrian state media did not disclose how many casualties were sustained in the latest drive by the hardline fundamentalist Sunni militants to capture the heavily defended airport located south of Deir al-Zor city, whose main neighborhoods are under the militants control.
"The terrorists fired rockets carrying mustard gas," a statement said on state owned Ikhbariyah television station.
Deir al-Zor is a strategic location. The province links Islamic State's de facto capital in Raqqa with its fighters in Iraq.
Reuters could not independently verify the media reports.

ISIS-Hezbollah rivalry in Latin America

The Sunni-Shi’ite conflict has come to Latin America. Sunni Islamic State (ISIS) is following in the footsteps of the long-entrenched Shi’ite Hezbollah.
Venezuela under Hugo Chavez was an Iranian playground, giving free rein to its Hezbollah acolyte to arm, train and convert. During the 2006 war with Israel, the entire Wayuu indigenous tribe converted to Islam, adopting the Hezbollah name and consecrating the act by a failed attempt to bomb the US Embassy in Caracas.
Now Dabiq, ISIS’s website, has announced its mission to convert the native Mayas in Chiapas, Mexico and across the border in Guatemala.
Exploiting the poverty and marginalization of the indigenous peoples, ISIS announced an “anti-colonial” campaign to Islamicize, among others,the Tainos in the Caribbean, the Wayuu beyond Venezuela in Ecuador, the Guarani and Amazonian tribes in Brazil.
Such sensationalist pretensions are improbable, but the Mexican beginning replicates the Syrian/Iraqi example of cooperation with smuggling cartels.

Head of Iranian Army: We Will Deploy Warships in Latin America

The head of Iran’s armed forces said that the Islamic Republic seeks to have a “mighty presence” in Latin America in order to assert its naval power, the Tasnim news agency reported on Saturday.
Maj. Gen. Ataollah Salehi told reporters in the port city of Bandar Abbas that Iran plans to modernize its navy in the new Iranian year, which began on March 20. One of the goals of the modernization is to allow Iran’s navy to travel further and “take bigger steps” during voyages. It will also enable Iran to carry out joint operations with allies in other regions.
Rear Adm. Habibollah Sayyari, the commander of Iran’s navy, said in February that Iran sought a “constant” presence in international waters, and that the world had acknowledged Iran’s navy as a “power,” according to Tasnim. This recognition required an upgrade of the naval force, Sayyari said.
Iran has previously used its navy as a means of challenging the United States. During naval exercises in February, forces from the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps destroyed a mock American aircraft carrier and broadcast the scene on state television.

Russia again said set to begin delivery of S-300 missile to Iran

The announcement comes a month after reports that Russian President Vladmir Putin froze the transfer after receiving evidence from Israel that Tehran had transferred advanced weapons to Hezbollah.
Putin was said to have scuppered the delivery after Israel showed that Iran had repeatedly attempted to transfer the SA-22 Greyhound short-range air defense system to the Lebanese-based terrorist group.
One of the most sophisticated anti-aircraft weapons in the world, the S-300 is capable of tracking multiple planes at once, and some versions have an interception range of up to 200 kilometers.

US seizes thousands of Iranian weapons, including grenade launchers, in Arabian Sea

The crew of a U.S. Navy ship stopped a massive Iranian arms shipment dead in its tracks, seizing thousands of weapons, AK-47 rifles and rocket-propelled grenade launchers that likely were headed to Yemen, the Pentagon announced Monday.
The seizure, which unfolded in the Arabian Sea on March 28, was the third of its kind in recent weeks, military officials say. Iran has been supporting Houthi rebels in Yemen in their proxy war against a Saudi-led coalition backed by the United States. Like Iran, the Houthis are a Shia-led group.
The arms shipment appears to mark the latest provocative action from the defiant Islamic republic, which reported last month that it tested missiles marked with the phrase "Israel must be wiped out." And on Monday, the Iranian government warned the U.S. to butt out of trying to control its missile program. "The White House should know that defense capacities and missile power, specially at the present juncture where plots and threats are galore, is among the Iranian nation's red lines... and we don’t allow anyone to violate it," Deputy Chief of Staff Brig-Gen Maassoud Jazzayeri told state media.
On Friday, President Obama said Iran was obeying the "letter" of its landmark nuclear agreement with the West, but not the "spirit" of it.

Children's comic printed by Turkish government encourages boys and girls to seek Islamic martyrdom... and shows a mother telling her daughter she just needs to 'desire it enough'

The Turkish government has printed a children's comic apparently encouraging boys and girls to seek Islamic martyrdom, it has been reported
A cartoon called 'may god bless our martyrs, may their graves be full with holy light' was published by Diyanet, the Turkish Presidency of Religious Affairs.
The colourful drawings show a young girl saying 'I wish I could be a martyr' to which her mother replies: 'If you desire enough, Allah will give you that opportunity', according to a Russian news outlet.
The Turkish government has printed a children's comic apparently encouraging boys and girls to seek Islamic martyrdom. One cartoon shows a father explaining to his son 'how good it is to be a martyr'
RT reports that another cartoon shows a father explaining to his son 'how good it is to be a martyr' and telling him that martyrdom gives people the chance 'to gain the right to go to heaven.'
According to RT, the drawings are accompanied by statements, one of which reads: 'Our prophet says: a martyr feels the pain of dying as much as you feel pain when being pinched.'
The cartoon, which was reportedly published by government agency Diyanet, the highest national religious body, has sparked anger in some quarters.

French premier warns Islamic extremists winning ‘cultural war’

French Prime Minister Manuel Valls said extreme forms of Islam were winning the propaganda war for hearts and minds, warning Monday the veil was being used as a political symbol for the “enslavement of women.”
Speaking at a roundtable on Islamism in Paris, the premier warned that Salafists were “winning the ideological and cultural battle” in France, home of Europe’s biggest Muslim population.
And he pledged to “massively” increase France’s security and defense budgets in the coming years, as the country grapples with a growing jihadist threat after two deadly attacks last year.
“The Salafists must represent one percent of the Muslims in our country today, but their message — their messages on social networks — is the only one we end up hearing,” he said.

EXPOSED: Molenbeek ‘Far Right’ Hit And Run Was Muslim-On-Muslim Attack

A hit and run on a Muslim women in Molenbeek this weekend, blamed on ‘far right’ anti-Islam demonstrators, was in fact perpetrated by an allegedly drunk local youth named “Mohamed”.
The revelation comes after news websites across the world – including the Daily Mail, the New York Post, EuroNews, the Evening Standard, Russia Today, the International Business Times, the Sunday Times, the Huffington Post, the Metro, ITV News, the Daily Caller, the Independent, the Sun, the Mirror and more – lumped the blame onto “far right” protesters in the no go zone of Brussels.
Tensions in the notorious district of the capital city of the European Union (EU), now know as the ‘European capital of Jihad’, were exceptionally high over the weekend. The mayor had banned a planned protest by the nationalistic Génération Identitaire (GI) group, but left wing counter protests and local youth were out on the streets en mass.
The Mayor said nationalistic groups should not “express themselves” because they were “extremists” akin to the Islamist terrorists hailing from district, who were behind both the Paris and Brussels attacks.

'Go F**k Yourself' – Daily Beast 'Comedian' Dean Obeidallah's Reaction When He Learned It Was Muslims, Not 'Far Right' Activists Who Mowed Down A Muslim Woman In Brussels

When confronted with the truth behind the falsely reported story that Mr. Obeidallah tweeted out on April 3rd – the Sirius XM host of the Dean Obeidallah radio show reacted angrily, first implying that no reputable news outlets had updated their stories to reflect the fact that the two men who ran over a Muslim women in Molenbeek this weekend were Muslim youths, not far right activists.
Breitbart London’s Editor in Chief Raheem Kassam provided Mr. Obeidallah with the facts behind the article, citing a Times of London story which included the attacker’s names – Mohamed B. and Redouane B. – as well as showing that the Daily Mail website had changed its headline shortly after Breitbart London reported that its story was false.
When Mr. Obeidallah was confronted by the facts of the case, as Breitbart London has reported here, he offered the following response, claiming that he would only clarify if a “Us media outlet… like one from CNN or even Fox News” was cited – despite the fact that his original link was from Britain’s Daily Mail, which has now quietly edited its headline, though its social media share buttons still allege the attackers were “far right”.
When asked by Twitter users if he would apologise, Mr. Obeidallah told them to go f#ck themselves:

“When You Make Generalizations about Muslims, All 1.6 Billion Muslims Are Offended,” Says Apologist with Tenuous Grasp on Concept of Irony (satire)

The question of what constitutes an offensive remark about minority groups continues to plague modern society the way the Bubonic plague plagued old society. Muslims are often cited as being among the most easily offended people, in what has become a close race with hipsters, old-timey Southern women who say, “well, I never!” and Donald Trump. And while it remains obvious to most people that not all Muslims can be offended by any single remark or action, this fact ironically flees from apologists trying to make that exact point.
In an interview earlier this week, Yousef Mohamed, a young, hotshot journalist and political pundit was being interviewed about the alleged oversensitivity of his coreligionists. Mohamed was incensed by the implication that all “1.6 billion Muslims could be grouped together and generalized about.” Ironically however, he then proceeded to make a sweeping generalization of his own, asserting that such accusations serve only to insult all those Muslims about which no generalizations can be made. So, what can we learn from this odd tactic? Well, we’d really rather not say, lest we make a generalization about which people should or should not learn lessons based on points we may or may not be making.

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