A Review of A Father's Story: My Fight for Justice Against Iranian Terror written by Stephen M. Flatow

In new memoir, father seeks justice from terrorists who killed his daughter

jpost.com/Magazine/Fighting-back-576170

By Gil TroyJanuary 1, 2019

In April 1995, a Palestinian terrorist murdered Alisa Flatow, a 20-year-old American.

Beyond further illustrating Palestinians’ obsession with killing Jews and not building Palestine, this crime showed that six months before Yitzhak Rabin’s assassination, Palestinian terrorists were already sabotaging the Oslo Peace Process.

This tragedy also mobilized Stephen Flatow against the terror infrastructure that murdered his daughter. Flatow’s determination created a new tool against terrorism – lawfare; drained billions from the networks bankrolling terrorism; and pushed back creatively against Iran, the world’s great terror-paymaster.

His battle was one “I’d win, but one which could never compensate me for what I had lost,” Flatow writes in his new book, A Father’s Story: My Fight for Justice Against Iranian Terror.

That subtle, tear-stained sentence captures the nightmare haunting his life – and both sides of his remarkable memoir. It’s a compelling legal-political thriller, and a searing tribute to a missing daughter.

The first dimension is a real-life Hollywood thriller. A regular guy – a real-estate lawyer from New Jersey – seeking justice, punishes evil, confronts hypocrisy and inspires millions. Flatow wanted to sue the Iranians for financing Alisa’s murderer. He assumed the discovery process would embarrass them, exposing the mullahocracy’s evils. But – surprise! The court quickly awarded his family $250 million.

Then the real drama began.

As Flatow explained to me recently in Jerusalem, the American government “was caught flat-footed by the judgment, too.” Then-president Bill Clinton feared this decision might unleash many Lone American Rangers against foreign governments – making a mess of American foreign policy. Less explicable was Clinton’s softness toward Iran – which Barack Obama mimicked. That’s “what still frustrates me the most,” Flatow says. “I could never quite understand what his goal was.”

Thanks to Flatow’s superhuman persistence – lobbying, cajoling, button-holing, speechifying, op-eding – the Flatows eventually received about one-tenth of the award. Today, the money funds good causes, especially the kind of year-in-Israel programs Alisa was enjoying when she was killed.

Unfortunately, they were double-crossed.

Flatow refused to take “one cent” from the American taxpayer. The Clintonites implied the funds came from $400 million in seized Iranian assets. Only in 2016, when the Obama administration inexplicably paid Iran the $400 million – plus $1.3 billion in interest – did Flatow realize he’d been snookered.

What makes the book most memorable is the emotional journey Flatow shares with the reader as the international intrigue is playing out.

Alisa was a vivacious kid who, like all kids, wasn’t perfect, and wondered why things went wrong when they did. Once, when she broke her foot, Flatow explained to Alisa: “Things happen. We just don’t understand why. You were just in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

FLATOW WRITES movingly about his excruciating last-minute flight to Israel, with his daughter on life-support, to authorize ending her life – and sharing her organs with others. It will be a challenge for readers – seeing how he’s shepherded with love along the way – to get through the book without getting misty-eyed.

At the funeral, after calmly recounting the Israeli and American love that enveloped them, Flatow said: “What breaks my heart the most is this. There’s one family mourning the loss of a child. And there’s a family dancing with glee that their son killed himself – and my daughter.”

Later, he recalls being cross-examined by his lawyer, Tom Fay, who asked: “Mr. Flatow, you were the father of Alisa Flatow?”
Flatow responded: “No.”

Fay “looked lost.” Flatow explained: “I’m still her father.”

Fay teared up. The judge swiveled away, trying to hide his emotions. Flatow realized then that he just might win.

Today, Flatow tells Orthodox students: “You must learn how to stand up for yourself as a person and a Jew. History has taught us if we don’t stand up for ourselves no one else will. But we do it in a civil way.” He tells non-religious Jews: “Israel is our home. We can always look toward Israel for our strength and our inspiration.” Then he adds, “Please, understand that people there are under tremendous pressure and they deserve our support.”

Flatow has lived a full life, with a loving wife, four surviving children and 16 grandchildren. He has full days, often waking up at 5 a.m. But, he says, “Eventually, every night, you run out of steam. You never quite recover.” 

This Jewish hero, this American hero, this extraordinary human being, ends his love poem to his daughter, to Judaism, Israel, Zionism and humanity, with the wrenching words: “I can only hope that I will find my right place.”

We hope so, too, while imagining how many lives he – and Alisa by extension – saved by pursuing the terrorists and their enablers, putting them on the defensive for a change.

The writer is the author of the newly-released The Zionist Ideas, an update and expansion of Arthur Hertzberg’s classic anthology,The Zionist Idea, published by the Jewish Publication Society. A distinguished scholar of North American History at McGill University, he is the author of 10 books on American history, including The Age of Clinton: America in the 1990s.  

Loretta Lynch’s Appalling Response to Terrorism

"Loretta Lynch’s Appalling Response to Terrorism"

US Attorney General Loretta Lynch says the Obama administration has deleted references to Islamic State from the transcript of the Orlando killer’s 911 calls. She says that mentioning the group would “re-victimize” the families of those whom he murdered.

Well, I’ve got news for the attorney general. As the father of a victim of radical Islamic terrorism, it’s not the mention of the terrorist group that re-victimizes me and my family. It’s the ongoing refusal of the Obama administration to name the group to which my daughter’s killers belong that causes us fresh pain every single day.

Alisa was a junior at Brandeis University who was visiting Israel in 1995 when members of Palestinian Islamic Jihad attacked the bus in which she was riding. She and seven other passengers were murdered. Some of the terrorists involved in the attack were subsequently captured or killed. But some of them are still walking free today — and the Obama administration is helping to cover up for them.

Find that hard to believe? Visit www.rewardsforjutsice.net –that’s the US Justice Department website that offers rewards for information leading to the capture of terrorists who have killed Americans abroad. At the bottom of their home page, click on “Middle East and North Africa.” Then go to the right-hand column and choose the item called “Violence in Opposition to the Middle East Peace Negotiations, 1993 – Present.”

Now as you look at this section, keep in mind that since 1993, at least 68 Americans have been murdered, and 94 wounded, by Palestinian terrorists. Some were victimized by Fatah (the group led by the late Yasser Arafat, and currently by Mahmoud Abbas); some by Hamas; and some, including Alisa, by Palestinian Islamic Jihad.

Also keep in mind that in some other sections of the website—sections not involving Palestinian terrorists—the names of victims are mentioned, and the names of the groups that harmed them are mentioned as well.

But notice the difference in the section on the Palestinian attacks.

There, no victims’ names are mentioned. No specific attacks are listed. No organizations — not Fatah, Hamas, or Islamic Jihad — are identified. They are described merely as “terrorist groups and individuals opposed to a negotiated peace agreement.”

The fact that the terrorists were trying to murder Jews or Israelis is not even acknowledged. “The intent of these attacks,” the website claims, “was to disrupt peace negotiations and to modify the attitudes of the leaders engaged in them.”

They were just trying to “modify” leaders’ attitudes! It sounds as if they were just expressing some policy disagreements, and perhaps went a little overboard.

The website’s claim about “disrupting peace negotiations” is not only inadequate — it’s absolutely false. Fatah was never trying to “disrupt” negotiations. Fatah’s leaders — Arafat, then Abbas — were the ones who were conducting the negotiations with Israel. Fatah’s terrorism was a way of trying to increase pressure on Israel to make more concessions within the negotiations. Fatah’s bombings and shootings were part and parcel of Arafat and Abbas’s negotiating strategy.

All of which brings us back to the attorney general and the “re-victimizing” claim.

The omission of the Orlando killer’s Islamic State connection will not spare the families any additional pain. Indeed, it is the very omission which causes them pain, just as the Obama administration’s omission of the names of my daughter’s killers and sponsors causes my family pain.

 The names of the Palestinian killers are omitted because the administration does not want to irritate the Palestinian Authority, which sponsors and shelters the killers. The name of the radical Islamic terrorist group that inspired the Orlando killer is being omitted because the administration wants to play down any connection between terror and Islamic factions. In other words, it’s all politics.

That’s what “re-victimizes us,” Madam Attorney General. Every time we look at that website, we are reminded that your administration is willing to cover up the identity of terrorists in order to further a political or ideological agenda.

This column first appeared on the Algemeiner.com via JNS.ORG

Iran gets its money, terror victims are disgusted by the Obama administration's disrespect

Mike Kelly of northern New Jersey's Bergen Record writes today about the release of money earmarked to pay American victims of Iranian sponsored terror.

Promised that the American government would reimburse itself for payments made on behalf of the Iranian government, the money has now been released.

As said by Arline Duker, the mother of Teaneck resident Sara Duker murdered 20 years ago this week-

"No one sat with us or sent us anything to indicate that our children’s lives and that our feelings mattered in all of this,” she said. “It’s as if this is only about the money and the agreement with the Iranians, and the lives of the Americans didn’t matter. It feels disrespectful.”

And so it goes.

The full column may be read here.

Lack of Western compassion over Middle East terror attacks

The below article appears in Russia Today.  "RT news covers the major issues of our time for viewers wishing to question more and delivers stories overlooked by the mainstream media to create news with an edge. RT provides an alternative perspective on major global events, and acquaints an international audience with the Russian viewpoint."  OK, so let's expect a bit of condemnation of the West, shall we?

Facebook users were not instructed to do so, but may nonetheless wish to change their profile pictures in solidarity with the families and friends of victims of recent terrorist attacks.

A great many of the victims were aspiring university students, others were school teachers, children, infants, parents, and elderly. Their bodies were torn apart in the acts of violence, many unidentifiable.

Most of these innocent victims will go unnamed, their murders obfuscated, or largely unnoticed, in Western media.

There then follows a list of various terror attacks that received little attention in the Western media or on government levels.  They are compared to the Paris attacks that resulted in President Obama ordering US flags to be flown at half-staff.

As has often been explained to me by news editors in the US, there is no "news" in most Middle Eastern terror attacks.  They are called "dog bites man" stories, and they're just not news.

Of course, RT has an objective here to place the US and Western Europe among the world's hypocrites when it comes to identify terror.  You can read the full article here.

France and Israel: Obama’s double standard

FRANCE & ISRAEL: OBAMA'S DOUBLE STANDARD

 

(Stephen M. Flatow, an attorney in New Jersey, is the father of Alisa Flatow, who was murdered in an Iranian-sponsored Palestinian terrorist attack in 1995.)

 

Israel's prime minister has called the latest terrorist attacks "an act of war." He called the attackers "barbarians," vowed to wage a war of "no mercy" against them, and ordered bombing strikes on "terrorist training camps," even though they were located adjacent to medical clinics, a museum, and a soccer stadium. 

 

Remarkably, neither the Obama administration nor the United Nations condemned Israel's strong response to the terrorists. Has the world finally come to its senses? Does it finally understand that Islamic terrorism, whether against Israelis or anybody else, is an attack on us all?

 

Actually, no. Because I misspoke. 

 

It was French prime minister Francois Hollande, not Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who called the latest terrorism (in Paris) an "act of war."  It was Hollande who called the attackers "barbarians," and vowed to wage a war of "no mercy" against them. It was the French air force that bombed medical clinics, a museum, and a soccer stadium located near terror camps in the ISIS-controlled Syrian city of Raqqa. 

 

When Netanyahu says that Palestinian Islamic terrorists have carried out "acts of war," he is accused of exaggerating the threat. When he calls the killers "barbarians," he is denounced as a racist. If Israel strikes terrorist sites that are situated near civilian areas, Israel is accused of "war crimes" and "disproportionate" responses. 

 

Remember when Secretary of State John Kerry sarcastically grumbled, "Hell of a 'pinpoint' attack" after one Israeli strike in Gaza? We don't hear Kerry calling the French bombing of those Raqqa medical clinics a "hell of a 'pinpoint' attack." We don't hear National Security Adviser Susan Rice demanding that Hollande apologize for describing Islamic killers as "barbarians." We don't hear President Obama calling for "both sides" to "exercise restraint" as he always does when Israel responds to Arab terrorists.

 

On the contrary: Obama administration officials are boasting that the U.S. provided "military intelligence" that assisted the French in their bombing of Raqqa. This, a cynic might say, makes the Obama administration complicit in the bombing of a medical clinic, a museum, and a soccer stadium.

 

Israel has always understood the nature of this conflict. Now, it seems, France does, too. 

 

Yes, every terrorist attack is an act of war. No, the terrorists are not "the JV team," as President Obama once put it. 

 

Yes, the terrorists are barbarians. No, we should not "show respect even for one's enemies" and "try to understand…and empathize with their perspective and point of view," as Hillary Clinton said in her December 3, 2014 speech at Georgetown University, in Washington, D.C.

 

Yes, terror targets must be struck, regardless of whether or not they are situated near civilian sites. 

 

And yes, the terrorists must be fought with "no mercy" and completely destroyed--not merely "contained" or "degraded," as President Obama often says.

 

France's leaders have belatedly awakened to the fact that the civilized world is at war with the forces of Islamic terrorism. Israel is one front in that war. France is another. And if the Obama administration does not wake up and fight, then America will soon become the next front.

 

 

The online version may be found here.

Who's watching the hen house at the White House?

Douglas Murray at Gatestone Institute invites us to Bizarro world [OK, you have to have read Superman comics to know that in Bizarro world everything was backwards] asks:

Imagine that in recent weeks alone, dozens of Muslims around the world had been murdered by Christian extremists armed with suicide belts and similar paraphernalia.

Imagine that at the same time, around other parts of the world, Christian mobs had set fire to, and burned to the ground, the holy places of some of the oldest and most established Muslim communities in the world.

Do you think there would be a reaction to such events? Probably yes.

Would that reaction be wholly negative and unceasing in its condemnation? Probably yes.

Would it be remotely conceivable that a senior U.S. government official or advisor would have used the opportunity to claim that Muslims who had been targeted had brought it upon themselves? Probably no.

Welcome then to the mirror-image of the real-world persecution of Christians that is going on across the globe today.

And say hello again to two of the most appallingly over-promoted and sinister figures involved with the current U.S. government: Mohamed Elibiary and Dalia Mogahed.

Elibiary and Mogahed are shining lights in the Obama Administration's attempts to reconcile America's role in the world with its perceived bias towards thing Western.  Unfortunately, the president didn't pick the best of the best to assist him.

Read the full article - New Extremist Foxes Welcomed into U.S. Chicken Coop and I think you will agree.

Well, that's what I have to say.

Stephen M. Flatow

William Kristol to President Obama - who are you in bed with?

William Kristol has sent an open letter to President Obama about the Obama's campaign "Rabbis for Obama."  The problem is this - some of its members are not exactly what one would call friends of Israel.  And for a president who is being criticized daily by many for his positions on Israel, the Palestinians, settlements, the peace process, and the like, it may not have been a good idea to add them to the list.

One paragraph from the letter:

“Rabbis for Obama” includes many leaders of the Boycott, Divest, and Sanction (BDS) Movement, a movement inimical to Israel’s well-being. It includes founders of the pro-Hamas “Fast for Gaza” initiative. It even includes one person who was pleased to dine with Iranian President Ahmadinejad in 2008 and another who says the United States and Israel bring terrorism on themselves. Several members of “Rabbis for Obama” are officials of Jewish Voice for Peace, a radical group that the Anti-Defamation League featured in its list of the “Top 10 Anti-Israel Groups in America.”

Now before you start shouting that the Obama administration has done more for Israel militarily than any other president by increasing arms' sales, let me tell you that you are right but you miss the point.  American arms sales to Israel are part of the foreign aid package Israel gets each year. That's right kiddies, Israel gets money from the US to spend in the US buying weaponry from American companies.  So, not only is it aid to Israel, it's aid to American workers.  The military aid goes up with the cost of arms.
The gripe with President Obama is over his creation of issues on borders and settlements that were not issues on the Palestinian radar.

In any event, here's the
Letter from ECI Chairman William Kristol to President Obama

On Middle East peace: Heckuva job (not!)

I love Frida Ghitis and I enjoy reading her syndicated columns as they appear around the country.  This column On Middle East peace: Heckuva job (not!) is typical of her fine writing.

Her bottom line is that there is plenty of blame to go around for today's stalemate between Israel and the Palestinians, but the person who got everything off on the wrong foot was Barack Obama.

Enjoy this column, it's a good one.  What do you think?

stephen flatow alisa terror

Conrad Black - Canada as a moral leader

Conrad Black, writing in The New York Sun about Canadian premier's thumbing his nose at American policy, for the good, I might add-

As befits a modest country unaccustomed to leading the world other than by homogenized measurements of the quality of life, Canada seems not to have noticed that Stephen Harper has kicked off his new term as head of a majority government with the assumption of the moral leadership of the world (in the usual unobtrusive Canadian way); and even more astoundingly, has done so by successfully contradicting the president of the United States.

By killing it [the Obama plan for Israel to return to 1967 borders] in the G-8 (U.S., Germany, Japan, the U.K., France, Italy, and Russia), Stephen Harper became the moral leader of the world’s statesmen, as the first head of an important country to debunk the 1967 fraud upon which the Arab-Israeli crisis, the longest-running and most definitive moral litmus test in the geo-political world (and least successful extended negotiation in history) is based.

What it boils down to is this- Stephen Harper has smarts and is willing to stand up for what he believes is right. Black's article goes through some Canadian history to give us the background to the importance of Harper's move.

Canada Emerges as a Moral Leader by Standing Up for Israel

Assad and the sanctions, shmanctions

Reading the news about the imposition of financial sanctions on Syria President X, I just had to check the OFFICE OF FOREIGN ASSETS CONTROL - SPECIALLY DESIGNATED NATIONALS & BLOCKED PERSONS and there was his name on page 20 -

AL ASSAD, Bashar Hafez (a.k.a. AL-ASAD,
Bashar; a.k.a. AL-ASSAD, Bashar; a.k.a.
ASSAD, Bashar); DOB 11 Sep 1965; POB
Damascus, Syria; President of the Syrian Arab
Republic (individual) [SYRIA]

According to the New York Times story,.

The sanctions against Syria reflected mounting American frustration that Mr. Assad’s government was ignoring international condemnation by not pursuing a peaceful resolution to the popular uprising that has swept the country since March.

Well, "gee whiz, Phil," what's going on here? Is the Obama administration going to pressure the Europeans to impose sanctions, too? As the Times reports, the Europeans are considering it.

Now remember, we're the same country that has found it increasingly difficult to isolate Iran through the use of sanctions that are primarily American in nature.

Without European support, sanctions are meaningless. Tie up Assad's personal bank accounts and the ATM card no longer works.

More disconcerting is the face of post-Assad Syria. Who steps in to fill his shoes? Well, we'll just have to see, won't we?

Senator Menendez and associates weigh in on Hamas-PA deal

U.S. Senator Robert Menendez from New Jersey and colleagues have signed a letter to President Obama addressing the recent unity agreement between Hamas and the Palestinian Authority.

In the letter signed by 27 Senators, the Senators urged the Administration to stand by its refusal to work with any Palestinian government that includes Hamas and consider cutting aid to the country should the U.S. designated terrorist group remain in the government. Preconditions in U.S. law prevent aid from being provided to a Palestinian government that includes Hamas, unless the government and all its members have publicly committed to the Quartet principles.

The Hamas charter calls for the destruction of America's only democratic ally in the Middle East. That's inimical to American interests and the senators are correct when they remind the president of that fact.

Here's the full letter as released by Senator Menendez.

I am one terror victim's father who says "Thank you Senator Menendez, et al."

Stephen M. Flatow


President Barack Obama
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W.
Washington, DC 20500


Dear Mr. President:

The decision of Palestinian Authority (PA) President Mahmoud Abbas to form a unity government with Hamas – a designated terrorist group – threatens to derail the Middle East peace effort for the foreseeable future and to undermine the Palestinian Authority’s relations with the United States.

Hamas rejects peaceful efforts to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and continues to call for the destruction of the State of Israel. Soon after this agreement was signed, senior Hamas official Mahmoud Zahar declared that "our plan does not involve negotiations with Israel or recognizing it." Hamas and other Iranian-backed terrorist groups in Gaza have also stepped up their smuggling of Iranian arms and increased their mortar and rocket attacks against Israeli civilians, firing more than 130 during the past month alone and nearly 300 this year. Hamas’ response to the killing of Osama Bin Laden, condemning “the assassination and killing of an Arab holy warrior” is emblematic of Hamas’ ideology and underscores Hamas’ continued support for terrorism.

The United States should stand by its refusal to work with any Palestinian government that includes Hamas. We welcome statements from the Administration recognizing that Hamas is a terrorist organization and insisting that it accept the Quartet conditions (of recognizing Israel’s right to exist, rejecting violence, and endorsing previous Israeli-Palestinian peace agreements). We strongly support Secretary Clinton’s 2009 Statement that: “we will not deal with nor in any way fund a Palestinian government that include Hamas until Hamas has renounced violence, recognized Israel and agreed to follow the previous obligations of the Palestinian Authority.”

It is imperative for you to make clear to President Abbas that Palestinian Authority participation in a unity government with an unreformed Hamas will jeopardize its relationship with the United States, including its receipt of U.S. aid. As you are aware, U.S. law prohibits aid from being provided to a Palestinian government that includes Hamas, unless the government and all its members have publically committed to the Quartet principles. We urge you to conduct a review of the current situation and suspend aid should Hamas refuse to comply with Quartet conditions.
Ultimately, the legitimacy of any peace process must always be weighed against the assurances Israel needs for its security and the security of the region. Hamas’ participation in the Palestinian government eliminates the trust and commitment to peace that must exist between the parties to move forward and therefore, as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has stated, the choice is between “peace with Israel or peace with Hamas” because “there is no possibility for peace with both.”

As fellow Democrats, we thank you for your continued commitment to and investment in Israel’s security. We urge you to make clear to President Abbas and the international community the United States’ opposition to a Fatah-Hamas unity government that does not fully accept the Quartet principles. Such a government will prove fatal to the peace effort, as well as to efforts to establish a Palestinian state, and will severely harm relations with the United States. The Palestinian Authority needs to get back to the negotiating table rather than pursue futile and harmful efforts to join with Hamas or seek recognition of Palestinian statehood at the UN.

Sincerely,
Senator Robert Menendez
Senator Robert P. Casey, Jr.
Senator Daniel Inouye
Senator Carl Levin
Senator Max Baucus
Senator Joseph Lieberman
Senator Kent Conrad
Senator Frank Lautenberg
Senator Charles Schumer
Senator Barbara Boxer
Senator Daniel Akaka
Senator Barbara Mikulski
Senator Ron Wyden
Senator Bill Nelson
Senator Debbie Stabenow
Senator Ben Nelson
Senator Mark Pryor
Senator Benjamin Cardin
Senator Sherrod Brown
Senator Amy Klobuchar
Senator Jon Tester
Senator Kirsten Gillibrand
Senator Al Franken
Senator Joe Manchin
Senator Christopher Coons
Senator Richard Blumenthal
Senator Claire McCaskill
Senator Tim Johnson
Senator Michael F. Bennet

Is Iran afraid of Egyptian uprising? Hanging dissidents is proof

From Frida Ghitis writing in the Miami Herald, Iran sees threat, promise, in Egyptian uprising

"When Arab leaders looked at the uprisings in Egypt and Tunisia, they saw the flames of revolution lapping at their own heels. To protect themselves, they rushed to make preemptive concessions, handing out cash, rolling back subsidy cuts, and promising new elections. Iranian leaders, on the other hand, chose to respond in precisely the opposite way. Instead of granting the people what they might demand, the government chose to protect itself by killing even more of its opponents, according to figures from human-rights organizations."

That's the Iranian approach- encourage change abroad but kill your opponents at home. The unasked question, for now, is what message President Obama will send to Iranians who are fighting, and dying, for change in their government.

Read more.

Michael Gerson gets it right on Eric Holder and terror trials

About a year ago we wrote of the American government’s decision, announced by Attorney General Eric Holder, that terror suspects being held at Guantanamo Bay would be tried in civilian courts. We thought it would be a disaster, and it turns out we were right. The first Guantanamo Bay prisoner tried in civilian court beat the U.S. last week when a jury of our peers convicted him of 1 out of 200 plus charges arising from the 1998 African embassy bombings.

Michael Gerson, writing in the Washington Post, takes Holder and the Obama Administration to task for using the civilian court to try Ahmed Ghailani and losing the case. (A minor conviction was gotten.)

The case of embassy bomber Ahmed Ghailani - the only Guantanamo Bay detainee the Obama administration has brought to trial in the United States - was intended to increase public faith in civilian prosecutions. But a terrorist hugging his lawyers in victory can’t be considered a confidence builder. Days before the Ghailani verdict, the White House admitted that Mohammed, because of massive, public resistance, would not be seeing the inside of a Manhattan courtroom anytime soon. “Gitmo,” one official told The Washington Post, “is going to remain open for the foreseeable future.”

We’ve been personally through this type of trial before. The case of Sami Al-Arian. The weaknesses in both cases was pretty much the same-- the trial took place years after the event in question, many charges were brought, and the evidence is confusing. In my opinion, more than the layperson can digest.

So, Gerson asks the question,

Where do these developments leave Holder, for whom failure is not only an option but a habit? A recent profile by Wil Hylton in GQ attempts to put his tenure in the best possible light - the lonely, naive man of principle undone by politics. But the portrait is unintentionally devastating. Holder clearly views the war on terrorism as a distraction. “The biggest surprise I’ve had in this job,” he told Hylton, “is how much time the national security issues take.”

Doh.

By insisting on civilian trials for terrorists, the Obama-Holder team embarked on a dangerous course of action. Obama needs a way to back off this course and get the next trials before military tribunals, where they belong.

National security is not a traffic infraction violation. It’s life and death stuff and we should learn to play by the rules need for it. And that’s what I think.

Read the full Op-ed.

Frida Ghitis - "Middle East peace requires courage"

Frida Ghitis writing in the Miami Herald - "Middle East peace requires courage"

One of the most extraordinary moments in recent Middle East history came in 1993, when the world discovered that Israeli and Palestinian teams had held secret peace talks. Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, formerly sworn enemies, came together on the White House lawn, formalizing their commitment to peace. The decision, and that memorably awkward hand-shake, prodded along by President Bill Clinton, required uncommon courage. They called it the Peace of the Brave. [Ed. - Yes, they did and it gave rise to a new vocabulary, such as, a Sacrifice for the Peace, to describe the murders of innocent civilians such as Alisa Flatow.]

The term deserves dusting off because it highlights one of the key requirements for peace, and one whose absence could prove the undoing of the new effort unfolding under U.S. sponsorship. Bravery, courage, are indispensable because no matter how comforting the idea of peace, reaching an agreement between Israelis and Palestinians is a frighteningly dangerous process.

To reach a deal, the leaders -- Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas -- must make compromises that will break the hearts of millions of their followers. They will have to accept terms that will anger some enough that they will kill. And they will have to sign on to borders that could make their land -- especially in Israel's case -- vulnerable to unthinkable risks.

The euphoric events of 1993 gave way to disappointment, but they also helped draw the blueprint guiding the new quest for peace.

No one claims the new effort suffers from unrealistic expectations. Skepticism about its chances for success prevails. I call it skepticism and not pessimism, because many who claim peace is impossible in fact hope for failure. By their standards, they are optimistic.

When the leaders of Iran, Hamas or Hezbollah say the process will fail they remind us of their plan. Their solution is the destruction of Israel and its replacement with a fundamentalist Muslim regime; an alternative, backed by weapons, militias and money, that looms over the peace talks like a thick dark shadow, but also provides some of the impetus to persevere.

Ironically, the negotiating sides already agree on the solution's rough outlines. With the possible exception of the future of Jerusalem, everyone knows what is required for peace.

Even more frustrating is that the subject of closest agreement has become the most contentious. Partly because of missteps by the Obama administration, the issue of settlements has moved front and center and could provide a timid Mahmoud Abbas a way out of the talks. Abbas says without a settlement freeze he will pull out. Netanyahu says that, like all other differences, this should be resolved "through direct continuous talks.''

Already in the Clinton days that problem was essentially solved. Settlements take up about 4 percent of the disputed land. Most settlers live on a few large blocs, which in an agreement would be swapped for equal amounts of land within Israel proper.

To be sure, tough disagreements remain. But a basic obstacle to peace today is that Abbas, the Palestinian representative, appears to lack the power, the legitimacy and, yes, the courage, to close a deal.

Abbas, who rules only over the West Bank, asked for permission not just from Palestinians but from the Arab League, to start negotiations. When talks started in Washington, Hamas, which controls Gaza's 1.5 million Palestinians, signaled its rejection by murdering more Israelis. The London-based Arab newspaper Al-Quds al-Arabi editorialized that Abbas "negotiates without being granted the authorization to do so by his people.''

Adding irony to this sad situation, majorities of Palestinians and Israelis desperately want a peace deal. Contrary to what an ill-informed article in Time recently argued, Israelis are eager for peace. For years a vast majority of Israelis has expressed strong support for a two-state solution. A recent War and Peace Index poll found 80 percent support negotiations, easily outnumbering opponents of compromise.

A majority of Palestinians also back negotiations. But in the Arab world, public opinion carries less weight. Writing in the influential Arab daily Ashar al-Awsat, Mamoun Fandy wrote, ``The Palestinian division is not simply an internal one, as some may think, but is first an Arab division, and secondly a regional one.'' Even if Abbas achieved an agreement, he argued, he would find much of the Arab world pressuring Palestinians to reject it.

That's why Abbas announced shortly after leaving Washington that, "I can't allow myself to make even one concession.'' If he meant that, the new peace process is already over. Clearly, these are not the words from a man with the courage to make the peace of the brave. But then, Arafat ultimately lost his nerve. Maybe Abbas can find his.

Read the column on-line.

I know that Netanyahu has made previous decisions that did not rest well with sectors of his political support, but he made them anyway. Abbas, considered a terrorist by Yitzhak Rabin, does not, in my opinion, have either the willingness or the guts to make similar decisions. Will we back to base one again? The next days and weeks will tell.

What do you think?

The West is backing the wrong side

Caroline Glick writes in the Jerusalem Post,

By backing the terrorist group against Israel, western countries are backing Hamas against Fatah and Islamist states against ME moderates.

The leader of the group is America's own Barack Obama.

Led by US President Barack Obama, the West has cast its lot with Hamas. It is not surprising that Obama is siding with Hamas.

Is this just another incident of "he just doesn't get it," or something worse for the Israelis, that is, a reversal of a decades old alliance between the U.S. and Israel? While Glick understands Obama's shift because of his associations and actions, how about the leadership of other western countries?

What is alarming however is how leaders of the free world are now all siding with Hamas. That support has become ever more apparent since the Mossad’s alleged killing of Hamas terror master Mahmoud al-Mabhouh at his hotel in Dubai in January.

Israel is not the only player affected by these steps.

As for Fatah, it is hard not to feel sorry for its leader Mahmoud Abbas these days. In what was supposed to be a triumphant visit to the White House, Abbas was forced to smile last week as Obama announced the US will provide $450 million in aid to his sworn enemies who three years ago ran him and his Fatah henchmen out of Gaza.

So too, Abbas is forced to cheer as Obama pressures Israel to give Hamas an outlet to the sea. This will render it impossible for Fatah to ever unseat Hamas either by force or at the ballot box. Hamas’s international clout demonstrates to the Palestinians that jihad pays.

This is the Obama's foreign policy? What a mistake. And it's one that can only lead to more bloodshed in the Middle East.

Read Our World: Hamas rises in the West

On the air waves - Palestinian Hate, U.S. Silence

An op-ed I have written discussing the continuing trend in the Palestinian Authority to pay tribute to mass murderers is now circulating in the Jewish press throughout the United States. As a result, I've been invited by Jay Bernstein of Shalom USA radio in Baltimore to be his guest on the opening segment of the Sunday morning radio program at 8:30 AM. You can hear the interview on the web here.

Here's the op-ed as it appears on-line:

Palestinian Hate, U.S. Silence

There they go again. Palestinian Media Watch reports that the official Palestinian Authority newspaper, Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, announced Prime Minister Salam Fayyad's plan for an upcoming fencing tournament for youth named after terror chieftain Abu Jihad. You read right. Salam Fayyad, the man who is constantly touted by Western leaders as a "moderate" and a "peace advocate," is heading up a tournament that glorifies mass murderer Abu Jihad.

A founder and longtime leader of Yasir Arafat's Fatah movement, Abu Jihad (real name: Khalil al-Wazir) had a long resume of atrocities on his resume, including planning the hostage-taking at the Savoy Hotel in Tel Aviv in 1975 in which eight hostages and two Israeli soldiers were killed, until his career was cut short by an assassination in 1988.

Funny: The U.S. media played up ex-president Bill Clinton's warning about the dangers of hateful rhetoric here in America on the anniversary of Oklahoma City. But our pundits and policymakers don't seem to worry much about the PA's far more active promotion of violence.

PA newspapers, radio stations and school textbooks routinely characterize Jews as insects, animals, terrorists, Nazis and demons.

During Vice President Joseph Biden's visit to the region last month, the PA named a public square in the El Bireh neighborhood of its capital city, Ramallah, after the notorious terrorist Dalal Mughrabi. She was one of the leaders of a terror group that murdered Gail Rubin - a relative of the late former senator Abe Ribicoff - and 37 Israeli bus passengers in another attack devised by Abu Jihad.

That outrage was drowned out in all the furor over the Israeli announcement of construction in an East Jerusalem neighborhood the PA has its eyes on. Eventually, the Obama administration expressed some mild disapproval of the PA action. But while anger over the Israeli building generated lists of specific U.S. demands for Israeli concessions, the response to the Palestinians contained no demands, no deadlines, no consequences of any kind.

The square in Ramallah and the fencing tournament join a long list of schools, summer camps, streets, and computer centers named after terrorists in PA-controlled territory.

Assistant Secretary of State Philip Crowley said last week that the PA's policy of publicly glorifying terrorists "must end." Good words, but where's the beef? The deadline? The consequences for not going along?

Crowley made his statement the day after President Obama signed an order to continue U.S. financial aid to the PA - now more than $500 million a year.

"The words we use really do matter," Bill Clinton said last week. Yes, they do. The words of the Palestinian Authority - on its street signs, in its newspapers, on the banners at its fencing tournaments - really do matter. When will the Obama administration take meaningful steps to change them?

Stephen M. Flatow is founder of the blog Terror Victims' Voice. His daughter Alisa was murdered by Palestinian terrorists in Gaza in 1995.

Ronald S. Lauder writes to President Obama about Israel

Ronald S. Lauder is the president of the World Jewish Congress. It's websites states its history as follows: "Founded in Geneva in 1936 to unite the Jewish people and mobilize the world against the Nazi onslaught, the WJC is the representative body of Jewish communities and organizations in over 80 countries from Argentina to Zimbabwe across six continents." In my book, it's a good organization.

It was heartening to me that Mr. Lauder wrote to President Obama on April 15, 2010. His letter begins:

I write today as a proud American and a proud Jew.

Jews around the world are concerned today. We are concerned about the nuclear ambitions of an Iranian regime that brags about its genocidal intentions against Israel. We are concerned that the Jewish state is being isolated and delegitimized.

Mr. President, we are concerned about the dramatic deterioration of diplomatic relations between the United States and Israel.

Lauder is right, many American Jews feel that the relations between the United States and Israel are deteriorating. And many believe, as I do, that the fault lies with the United States.

Read what Lauder says, in Letter from Ronald S. Lauder to President Obama.

What do you think?


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US demands will thwart Mideast Peace

Frida Ghitis has got it right when a friend hits her with "a daunting request."

"One of these days,'' she said, "you'll have to explain to me this whole thing with Jerusalem.''

So how do you address it? Ms. Ghitis's solution:

Instead of arguing about what part of the past matters most, we should focus on the future most people say they want. A majority of Israelis and Palestinians say they want to see peace, with two states living side by side. That, in the most contentious sliver of the world, is a delicate point of agreement that must be carefully nurtured, particularly because it remains a matter of passionate disagreement for minorities on both sides.

Yet, the Obama administration appears to have "tangled up the possibility of peace in this most difficult of problems." While the announcement of the Israeli decision to build housing in a Jewish neighborhood of Jerusalem was a misstep, Washington compounded the matter by raising "demands on Israel to a level never done even by Palestinians."

Read more here.

Jeff Jacoby - The wake-up call from Flight 253

Jeff Jacoby writes,

"AFTER THE SEPT. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, it was widely asserted at the time, nothing would be the same. What Pearl Harbor had been for our parents and grandparents, 9/11 would be for us: a shattering national wake-up call revealing both the gaping holes in America's homeland security and the reality that we were at war with an implacable enemy whose defeat would require years of sacrifice and resolve."

What lessons from 9/11 have been dismissed by our government leaders?

• Terrorism isn't caused by poverty and ignorance.
• The global jihad is real.
• Terrorists can always adapt to new restrictions.
• The Patriot Act was not a reckless overreaction.

It's time that the Obama administration took steps to make us safer. Step 1, Janet Napolitano, the Homeland Security secretary, has to go. And in her place, should be a man or woman who understands that we were very lucky, again, in averting a catastrophe. Just how long will our luck hold out?

Read the Jacoby column.

1010WINS.com - Obama: Professed 9/11 Mastermind Will be Convicted

Does the president know when to keep his opinions to himself? Judging by his latest expression of guilt and innocence (remember the Gates v. Cambridge police fiasco) it appears not.

As reported on 1010WINS.com - Obama: Professed 9/11 Mastermind Will be Convicted

President Barack Obama predicted that professed Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed will be convicted, as Attorney General Eric Holder defended putting him through the U.S. civilian legal system.

In one of a series of TV interviews during his trip to Asia, Obama said those offended by the legal privileges given to Mohammed by virtue of getting a civilian trial rather than a military tribunal won't find it "offensive at all when he's convicted and when the death penalty is applied to him.''

Obama quickly added that he did not mean to suggest he was prejudging the outcome of Mohammed's trial. "I'm not going to be in that courtroom," he said. "That's the job of the prosecutors, the judge and the jury."

Obama's comments come along with Attorney General Eric Holder's statements that the civil justice system will be more than adequate to address the issues to be raised by the defense at trial.

In my experience, juries have difficult jobs with cases involving conspiracy and long distance planning. It's hard for them to connect the dots because there is usually no evidence of the defendant pushing the plunger or squeezing the trigger. Add to that the evidential issues surrounding getting Mohammed's confession, and, well, you can see the problems.

In testimony before the Senate, the New York Times reports Attorney General Holder said,

''I have every confidence that the nation and the world will see him for the coward that he is,'' Holder told the committee. ''I'm not scared of what Khalid Sheik Mohammed has to say at trial -- and no one else needs to be either.''

Interesting, Mr. Attorney General, that you don't recognize the defendant's constitutional right not to testify at his trial and the requirement that the court explain to the jury that his decision to not take the stand cannot be held against him.

I have no doubt that NYC can handle the security. Sure, thousands of drivers and pedestrians will be inconvenienced as they are routed for blocks out of their way by frozen zones. But, hey, it's worth it right?

In the meantime, I hope Mr. Obama can act with a little more dignity as president. Not every news item requires his personal two cents, and the jury is sure to hear how the president of the United States has already prejudged this case. As for our attorney general, my advice is to not get too cocky. Other terror prosecutions have fizzled, this case might, too.

That's what I think.

Stephen M. Flatow

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