Hagel-chaired think tank predicts Iran will be ‘natural partner’ for U.S.
(JNS.org) The Atlantic Council, a think tank chaired by defense secretary nominee Chuck Hagel which last month published a column titled “Israel’s Apartheid Policy,” during the same month predicted that Iran “should be viewed as a potential natural partner” for the U.S.
The Washington Free Beacon reported that the think tank’s December policy paper titled “Envisioning 2030: U.S. Strategy for a Post-Western World,” which was not written by Hagel himself, predicted the following of an Iranian regime that continues to forge ahead with its nuclear program and bankroll both Hamas and Hezbollah terrorism: “A post-mullah dominated government shedding Shia [Muslim] ideology could easily return to being a net contributor to stability by 2030.”
The Republican Jewish Coalition (RJC) has called President Barack Obama’s Hagel’s nomination of Hagel “a blow to U.S.-Israel relations, to the President’s relationship with the American Jewish community, and to U.S. security in the Middle East.”
Glenn Kessler, author of the Washington Post’s “Fact Checker” column, noted that Hagel told the Associated Press after his 1998 Middle East visit that the Israeli government “essentially continues to play games.” Commenting on Palestinian terrorism, the former Nebraska senator said “Desperate men do desperate things when you take hope away.”
Additionally, in 2002, Hagel told CNN regarding Yasser Arafat that he would not “single out the Palestinians and Arafat as the real problem” in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict because “it doesn’t help when we take public sides on this and castigate and assign all of the responsibility and all the blame to one side.”
Obama nominates Orthodox Jew for treasury secretary
(Israel Hayom/Exclusive to JNS.org) U.S. President Barack Obama was expected to nominate his chief of staff, Jack Lew, as the next U.S. treasury secretary on Thursday. Lew is an Orthodox Jew and one of Obama’s closest advisers. The Lew appointment comes on the heels of Obama’s selection of John Kerry as Secretary of State and the controversial Chuck Hagel for Secretary of Defense.
White House Press Secretary Jay Carney praised the expected nominee Lew: “Over the past more than quarter of a century, Jack Lew has been an integral part of some of the most important budgetary financial and fiscal agreements, bipartisan agreements in Washington.” As treasury secretary, Lew will jump straight into the fire of a tough battle against Republicans in Congress over the deficit ceiling and extensive cuts to government spending.
Obama’s choice of Lew is seen as a signal of the president’s determination to control record-breaking budget deficits. The 57-year-old Lew would bring private sector and international experience to the Treasury Department. He has held top jobs at Citigroup’s wealth management branch and at the State Department, where he oversaw international economic issues in his first job for Obama.
A person familiar with the selection process said Lew’s budget experience was particularly important to the president, given the treasury secretary’s key role in coordinating with European allies on the continent’s debt crisis, among other global financial matters. Assuming that Lew is confirmed by the Senate, he will replace Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, the last of Obama’s original economic team of 2008.
B’nai B’rith now raising awareness on persecution of Middle East Christians
(JNS.org) B’nai B’rith International, the world’s oldest Jewish service organization, is teaming up with experts to promote knowledge about the roughly 200 million Christians who are being persecuted in the Middle East.
The Jerusalem-based B’nai B’rith World Center is undertaking this initiative. Around 200 million Christians are persecuted in this region every year.
“This is an issue that’s a major human rights issue in the world, that it’s not getting the attention it deserves in the West,” said Alan Schneider of B’nai B’rith World Center, according to CBN News.
Schneider and his group recently hosted Assyrian Christian Juliana Taimoorazy from the Iraqi Christian Relief Council and Egyptian Coptic Christian Author Raymond Ibrahim in for discussion about persecution of Christians. “Since 2003, there has been a systematic attack launched against the Christian community and other minorities in Iraq,” Taimoorazy said.
By the end of Saddam Hussein’s reign, Taimoorazy said Islamic extremists “were to go in and attack families—kill children, kidnap women, impregnating them, torturing men, beheading them.”
“Then they started attacking clergy members,” she said.
“If this idea gets out that Islam is intolerant to the other, then it kind of puts the struggle with Israel in a different light,” Ibrahim said.
Fatah and Hamas leaders hold meeting in ‘positive atmosphere’
(JNS.org) In another sign of increasing collabortation between the rival Hamas and Fatah factions, Palestinian Authority (PA) President Mahmoud Abbas met with Hamas politburo chief Khaled Mashaal in Cairo on Wednesday.
Senior Abbas aide Nabil Abu Rudeineh said the two leaders had a lengthy meeting in a “positive atmosphere.” Abbas plans to call upon all Palestinian factions to hold a larger meeting in Cairo at a later date to discuss reconciliation, according to reports.
Rudeineh said there was an agreement to hold more Fatah-Hamas meetings, but declined to give details.
The two Palestinian groups have been at odds since the terrorist group Hamas overran the Gaza Strip in 2007, ousting forces from Abbas’s Fatah. Since then, Abbas has ruled in the West Bank, and Hamas has held sway in Gaza. But recently, the groups showed signs of warming up to each other by holding rallies in each other’s territory for the first time since 2007.
Also on Wednesday, Abbas and Mashaal reportedly held talks individually with Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi, who hails from the Muslim Brotherhood, the fundamentalist Islamist group that is the parent organization of Hamas. Egypt’s efforts in this regard stem from its goal “to contribute to the fight against Israel in any way possible and to force Israel to revoke its peace treaty with Egypt, while still appearing to contribute to peace and stability in the region (to avoid losing American financial and military aid),” Professor Alexander Bligh of Ariel University wrote in an oped for Israel Hayom.
According to Bligh, Hamas “likely demanded one of two things as a jumping off point for reconciliation talks: A violent, armed intifada against Israel, which would shake up the West Bank and cement a new Palestinian hierarchy, or alternately, to nominate Khaled Mashaal, Hamas designated leader, as the presidential candidate to vie for Abbas’s seat in the Palestinian Authority presidential election.”
Jerusalem blanketed by heaviest snowfall in two decades
(JNS.org) Jerusalemites woke up to a world of white on Thursday morning, as the city experienced its heaviest snowfall since 1992, Israel Hayom reported.
Jerusalem municipal official Elisha Peleg told Army Radio that 10 to 15 centimeters (4 to 6 inches) of snow had accumulated in the center of Jerusalem, with higher amounts piling up in outlying areas.
“The downtown area is bathed in white,” Peleg said.
The snow blocked the main Jerusalem-Tel Aviv highway and public transportation inside Jerusalem was operating on a reduced basis. Schools in the city were closed.
President Shimon Peres came outside to enjoy the snow after his security guards built a snowman at the entrance to the presidential residence in Jerusalem.
“Jerusalem has many colors,” Peres said. “In the morning in the sunshine, she is golden. In the sunset, she is blueish. But when she is white, it so rare, so beautiful, so unifying. Whatever happens in Jerusalem is a blessing. This time is a blessing in white.”
Saudis arrest man for wanting Jewish bride
(JNS.org) Saudi authorities have arrested a man in Mecca after they discovered that he was seeking to marry a Jewish woman. Officials now say the man, 49, may have a “mental illness,” according to the Al-Hayat newspaper.
The man, who was caught near the Grand Mosque after police found papers with evidence of his intentions to find a Jewish bride, is currently in police custody and awaiting possible prosecution, along with mandatory medical or psychological treatment.
Vatican condemns bishop’s comment that Jews are ‘enemies of the Church’
(JNS.org) A Vatican spokesman condemned comments by the head of the traditionalist Society of St. Pius X, who called Jews “enemies of the church.”
The spokesman, Jesuit Father Federico Lombardi, said that it is “absolutely unacceptable” to “define the Jews as enemies of the Church.” The remark was made in response to Bishop Bernard Fellay, who made the statement in a two-hour talk Dec. 28 at Our Lady of Mount Carmel Academy in New Hamburg, Ontario, which was later posted on YouTube. In addition to Jews, Fellay identified Masons and the modernists as “enemies of the church” because those groups oppose the Society’s canonical recognition by the Church.
The Society later published a clarifying press release, stating that “The word ‘enemies’ used here by Bishop Fellay is of course a religious concept and refers to any group or religious sect which opposes the mission of the Catholic Church and her efforts to fulfill it: the salvation of souls. By referring to the Jews, Bishop Fellay’s comment was aimed at the leaders of Jewish organizations, and not the Jewish people.”
Lombardi told Christian News Service that the Second Vatican Council document “Nostra Aetate,” which describes Christians and Jews as sharing a common heritage, and other Papal documents show the Catholic Church’s desire for “dialogue and deepening relations” with the Jewish people.
Report: Iran behind U.S. bank hacking attacks
(JNS.org) A wave of online attacks has targeted several dozen online banking websites in a coordinated attack that U.S. government officials believe was perpetrated by Iran, the New York Times reported.
“There is no doubt within the U.S. government that Iran is behind these attacks,” said James A. Lewis, a former official in the State and Commerce Departments and a computer security expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, DC.
Several prominent U.S. banking institutions such as Bank of America, Citigroup, Wells Fargo, U.S. Bancorp, PNC, Capital One, Fifth Third Bank, BB&T and HSBC, have been targeted since September.
The hackers have used advanced encrypted denial of service attacks (DDoS), which cause large traffic spikes to sites until they collapse.
A hacker group calling itself Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Cyber Fighters is claiming responsibility for the attacks. U.S. intelligence officials believe that the group is a cover for Iran, which may be seeking revenge against U.S.-led international sanctions and previous computer viruses such as Stuxnet, which have disrupted Iran’s nuclear progress.
Computer security experts believe that the level of sophistication behind these attacks suggests the state backing and not amateur hackers. Additionally, the attacks did not attempt to steal money, another hallmark of amateur hackers.
“The scale, the scope and the effectiveness of these attacks have been unprecedented,” said Carl Herberger, a computer security expert. “There have never been this many financial institutions under this much duress.”
Amid Syrian violence, the exodus of Christians continues
(JNS.org) Amid the Syrian civil war, Christians are fleeing in greater numbers from the region, with many more heading to neighboring Lebanon then Europe.
“We don’t want to lose the Christianity in the Arab region,” reporter Nasir Habish told Vatican Radio, the Catholic News Agency (CNA) reported. “This is the land of Jesus. I can’t imagine the land of Jesus without Christians.”
According to Sister Agnes-Mariam de la Croix, Mother Superior of the Greek Catholic Monastery of St James the Mutilated in Syria, the uprising has been “hijacked” by Islamist mercenaries. She estimates that over 300,000 Christian Syrians have become refugees, CNA reported.
Syrian Christians fear a repeat of what happened in Iraq, where Islamists fighting U.S.-backed coalition forces have targeted Iraqi Christians for intimidation, killings and kidnappings that drove hundreds of thousands of Christians out of the country.
But despite the threats of Islamism and government forces, some Christians are holding on.
At the St. Elie Rest Home, in the besieged Syrian city of Aleppo, Christians are looking out for one another.
“We welcome everyone who has been abandoned or is in need,” Sister Marie, 75, the Mother Superior, told the Lebanese Daily Star.
The Christian-run home for the elderly was founded in 1863 and has been transformed into a tiny refuge for those escaping the violence.
“Every day we pray for peace,” and when the bombs fall, “we take refuge in the chapel, the safest place in the building,” the Sister said.
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