Todd Palin, husband of 2008 GOP Vice Presidential nominee Sarah Palin, tells Breitbart News that Chris Kyle was âan unbelievable manâ who âfought for freedom in this country.â Kyle had appeared alongside Todd Palin on the reality TV show Stars Earn Stripes, where several celebrities competed in military training competitions to raise funds for charities that help American troops.
Kyle also served as the personal bodyguard for Sarah Palin, the former Alaska governor, at many points throughout her political career, including at the screening of Breitbart News Network Executive Chairman Stephen K. Bannonâs film about her political rise: âThe Undefeated.â
âMeeting Chris, when he was doing Sarahâs security, he was just completely professionalâan expert in his business,â Todd Palin said in an exclusive phone interview.
And then it was an honor for me and others to participate in Stars Earn Stripes with Chris and others in the military. You can have a conversation with somebody but until youâre side-by-side in the trenches with somebody, then you really know somebody. These guys, being a sniper, being out ahead of his unit and saving lives, Chris was just a good man, an expert in his field and he was one heck of a teacher.
Palin explained that Kyle taught actor Dean Cain how to shoot for the reality show.
He and Dean Cain were partnered up in Stars Earn Stripes and he turned Dean into a sharpshooterâand Dean was an excellent student. I canât say how much Chris was a great instructor, along with all the other military ops. And that just goes to show you with their training and dedication and discipline. From spending time with him on the show and out on the trail, and at different functions, was just a true honor and I just canât say enough about our troops. Itâs just an honor to spend time with them and to stand shoulder to shoulder with them and learn just a little bit about what they were trained to do and what some of the missions were. It was unbelievable.
Palin says that military service teaches young men and women, including his son Track who enlisted and went through boot camp in 2007 at Fort Benning in Georgia, values that are important to the nation.
As father and mother, Sarah and I witnessed our son [Track] go through boot camp. Itâs just an unbelievable process. You have an 18-year-old go down to boot camp and then you go down there a few months later when they graduate from boot camp and theyâre just mentally strong, physically strong and have all the respect in the world for their drill sergeant because their drill sergeant is right next to you climbing up that mountain or running the five miles. But it just shows years of training, dedication and protecting freedom and liberty. Thatâs the motto of our military.
Palin also praised the other celebrities who participated in the reality show Stars Earn Stripes â where Kyle and other military operators taught them how to engage in various military exercises.
But if you look back at the celebrities that participated in Stars Earn Stripes, Picabo Streetsâa gold medalistâNick Lachey, Laila Ali, Terry Crews, Dean Cain, Dolvett Quince, Eve [Torres]âyou know, for those guys to roll up their sleeves and risk their life to raise money for military based charities and it was hats off to them for what they did to participate and compete to raise money for those charities,â Palin said. âWe were all just honored to be side-by-side with all of our military ops.
During the show, according to a blog post from the Palinâs oldest daughter Bristol on Patheos, Kyle praised Todd Palin as being tough.
âHeâs Rambo, heâs straight up Rambo,â Kyle said of Todd Palin. âNext time Iâm in a war, I want Todd Palin on my side.â
âHe was the first one on the boat, the first one under the wire, and about the time the rest of the guys were getting through, he already had the crate,â Kyle added about Todd Palin. âYou donât need anyone else. Forget Chuck Norris, send in Todd Palin.â
Kyle is considered the U.S. militaryâs most lethal sniper in history. He had 160 confirmed kills out of 255 probable kills. A Navy SEAL, Kyle served four tours in the Iraq war and won numerous medalsâincluding two Silver Stars, five Bronze stars, a Navy and Marine Corps Commendation Medal, and two Navy and Marine Corps Achievement Medals. After his honorable discharge from the U.S. military in 2009, Kyle wrote his bestselling autobiography âAmerican Sniper: The Autobiography of the Most Lethal Sniper in U.S. Military History,â published in 2012.
Kyle was killed, along with his friend Chad Littlefield, at a gun range near Chalk Mountain, Texas, on Feb. 2, 2013, by a man who is awaiting trial on murder charges. (Cont.)
Posted by: Steve White ||
01/22/2015 8:56 Comments ||
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#3
They don't hate the movie. They hate Kyle. Because he fought for the US, and because he was very, very good at it. In their mind, that's a crime which justifies all the hate and anger their well-practiced hate and anger machine can generate.
[ARABNEWS] Toppling the legitimate Yemeni government, which is supported by the UN Security Council, was expected ever since the rebels entered the capital, Sanaa, three months ago. The rebels who had already occupied Sanaa have now taken over power.
They will dominate it despite local and international rejection; however, their situation won't stabilize without resorting to the first agreement. In my view the pirates of power are the Houthis and ousted President President-for-Life Ali Abdullah Saleh ... Saleh initially took power as a strongman of North Yemen in 1977, when disco was in flower, but he didn't invite Donna Summer to the inauguration and Blondie couldn't make it... .
The Houthis are a religious group and a political militia in support of Iran. Their partner, Saleh, is a leader whose time in power has expired. What happened in Yemen is a repetition of the scenario of invading Sanaa last September by the Houthi ...a Zaidi Shia insurgent group operating in Yemen. They have also been referred to as the Believing Youth. Hussein Badreddin al-Houthi is said to be the spiritual leader of the group and most of the military leaders are his relatives. The Yemeni government has accused the Houthis of having ties to the Iranian government, which wouldn't suprise most of us. The group has managed to gain control over all of Saada Governorate and parts of Amran, Al Jawf and Hajjah Governorates. Its slogan is God is Great, Death to Americaâ¢, Death to Israel, a curse on the Jews ... militias, supported by military and security leaderships who sympathize with the ousted president Saleh.
No major confrontations happened because during the past 15 weeks, Sanaa was semi-occupied. They had left President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi besieged in his palace. Those staging the coup practically attacked the last of standing forts after they failed to convince the president of willingly handing them power.
But the latest news is worrying even if there were no surprises. Regardless of how vague upcoming events will be, there are some expected possibilities. Saleh, the ousted president who rides the Houthi horse and uses the Houthis as a weapon and as a political front, will try to impose military and political leaderships affiliated with him to lead the transitional phase while he puts together a new political order that directly, or indirectly, brings him back to managing the state through forged electoral claims.
The second possibility is that the Houthis, who aspire to bring back the imamate and subsequently appoint Abdul Malek Al-Houthi as an absolute leader, will try to dominate power until Saleh drags them into deadly wars against tribal and political groups, like he did in six previous wars. Whether Abdul Malek Al-Houthi declares himself imam or whether Saleh returns as president or someone else inherits the presidency, Yemen has entered a dark tunnel, which will lead to breaking up of the country's unity and to the separation of south Yemen.
It will also push some northern areas and governorates to rebel. Some gangs will also form amidst this chaos in order to fight the Houthis over power. History is almost repeating itself after the fall of Imam Al-Badr bin Hamideddine.
The rebels won't enjoy power and their control over Sanaa for long. Yemen mainly lives off foreign support and the country is based on tribal and regional balances, and it's difficult to achieve security without tribes' and local groups participation or approval.
We don't know how the Houthis can possibly manage the government and honor their commitments toward citizens. Houthis are like Leb's Hezbollah who wants to control state institutions to serve its own interests but without having to be involved in the government's obligation to provide services to the people. The situation in Yemen is not less difficult than Leb's management.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/22/2015 00:00 ||
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#1
Anarchy is natural concomitant of tribalism---all western experts who say otherwise, are crooks & crackpots.
Why do Europeans feel such revulsion toward Jews? At a certain level, to be sure, European leaders deeply regret the new persecution of Europe's Jews. Many share the sentiment of European Commission Vice-Chairman Frans Timmermans, who warned yesterday that an exodus of Europe's Jews would call into question the premises of European society. Last September, Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel told a rally in Berlin that it was the duty of every German to fight anti-Semitism. Nonetheless even the best-intentioned Europeans feel their skin crawl in the presence of the sort of Jews who represent the future of the Jewish people: those who follow Jewish tradition, raise Jewish families, and embrace the cause of Zionism. Europeans adore secular Israelis who wallow in existential doubts, for example, the novelist Zeruya Shalev, a bestseller in Germany and the winner of any number of European literary awards. I've never read Shalev, but then again, I don't like fiction. Jews like Naftali Bennett, Israel's economy minister and leader of the Jewish Home party, give them the creeps.
#1
All leftists everywhere hate anyone who gives allegiance to anything outside of the state and the postmodern narrative.
The analogy in the U.S. is the deep and intractable anti-Christian bigotry that is found in nearly 100% of the audience of NPR/PBS, the leftist-controlled education industry, the publicly employed, and the grievance industry. And, just as in EUroland, there are certain sects of exsanguinated and emasculated secular Christians (Unitarian Universalists, Quakers, liberation theology "Catholics", etc.) who are given dispensation because their critiques of more serious Christians can be plucked and used by the anti-Christian bigots to great political effect.
Posted by: no mo uro ||
01/22/2015 11:25 Comments ||
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So, what are these places? A unique and as-yet un-named mix.
On the one hand, West European states can intervene anywhere and at any time in their sovereign territory. As the shoot-out in Verviers and the subsequent raids in Belgium suggest, their overwhelming advantage in force â including military, intelligence, and police â means they have not ceded control.
On the other hand, governments often choose not to impose their will on Muslim-majority areas, allowing them considerable autonomy, including in some cases the Shariah courts that Emerson mentioned. Alcohol and pork are effectively banned in these districts, polygamy and burqas commonplace, police enter only warily and in force, and Muslims get away with offences illegal for the rest of population.
The Rotherham, England, child sex scandal offers a powerful example. An official inquiry found that for sixteen years, 1997-2013, a ring of Muslim men sexually exploited â through abduction, rape, gang rape, trafficking, prostitution, torture â at least 1,400 non-Muslim girls as young as 11. The police received voluminous complaints from the girls' parents but did nothing; they could have acted, but chose not to. I.e. the police voluntarily respected the boundaries of a virtual legal no-go zone, withdrawing the protection of the legal system from the abused non-Muslim girls.
What does one call Rotherham and Birmingham? They are not no-go zones, neither in terms of geography or sovereignty. This is where we â Emerson, others (such as Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal), and I stumbled. The English language lacks a readily-available term for this. And for good reason: I know of no historical parallel, in which a majority population accepts the customs and even the criminality of a poorer and weaker immigrant community. The world has never seen anything comparable to the contemporary West's blend of achievement, timidity, and guilt, of hugely superior power matched by a deep reluctance to use it. This is an apt observation also in light of NATO and US policy post 9/11.
Instead of no-go zones, I propose semi-autonomous sectors, a term that emphasizes their indistinct and non-geographic nature â thus permitting a more accurate discussion of what is, arguably, West Europe's most acute problem. Whatever the name, people who are entitled to the protection of the Western legal system aka the Queen's Peace are left to the tender mercies of Sharia and Dhimmitude.
A few years ago when you went to the supermarket and bought your groceries, all you were buying was food. Now when you buy food you are also buying religion â in many cases it is not even labelled.
Quietly in the last few years, Halal certification organisations have been collecting large amounts of money from the food industry in return for certification needed to export to Saudi Arabia and Indonesia. Large abattoirs in Australia will pay up to $27,000 a month.
But it has now spread over almost all products in the domestic market, especially those stocked by the large supermarket chains. Most payments are subject to secrecy agreements. Muslims Australia, which certifies Vegemite publicly says on its website that it uses its funds to help pay for mosques to be built and to spread Islam.
According to Dr Hergey, Muslims are free to consume anything except blood and blood products, pork and carrion â as long as they say a prayer over food before eating, it is all Halal.
So the Halal certification racket is about raising money for Islam and imposing restrictive trade practices.
There is no reason why this religious donation should be forced on consumers without a label. That is a violation of your fundamental right to freedom of and from religion.
Halal ritual slaughter is conducted differently to non-Halal slaughter and is considered less humane as the animal is bled to death for up to 5 minutes after being given a conventional electric stun that lasts about 40 seconds on a cow (Academic study: The efficacy of pulsed ultrahigh current for the stunning of cattle prior to slaughter; A. Robins, H. Pleiter, M. Latter, C.J.C. Phillips).
Muslim men only are allowed to be employed in Halal slaughter.
Consumers who are not religious should be able to make an informed choice on whether they want to support this practice or not. That is our right to freedom of and from religion.
This is a big issue in Australia, and increasingly so in the UK. They are probably trying it on in the US too.
Australian voters can sign this petition to ask the House of Representatives to change the law to force correct labelling, and to require religious organisations to provide certification for free so the non-religious are not subsidising it.
This petition does NOT call for Halal certification to be banned, and it wonât harm exports. This petition SUPPORTS the freedom of Muslims to follow their religion and to eat Halal food.
This petition simply calls for religious certification groups to provide their certification services for free so that non-religious consumers are not subsidising them.
That is fair.
Also this petition calls for halal-containing products to be clearly labelled in all cases. That is so that consumers can decide whether they want to participate in supporting a religious practice when they buy food. That is their freedom of and from religion.
That is also fair.
It needs to be printed and signed then posted to fit the rules of the House of Representatives before January 31. Aussie voters only. But those around the world: check out what is happening in your country. You could be making a tiny donation to Islam every time you go shopping.
#2
The Messenger felt his pulse quicken;
Such shame! He was mortally stricken.
"So that wasn't halal,
But please, Allah, ol' pal,
Don't roast me for choking that chicken!"
[DAWN] IF the Learned Elders of Islam belonging to the various schools of thought have really agreed to accept a regulatory mechanism for their madressahs and also changes in their curriculum there is good reason to celebrate the development -- although one hopes that the government is not misreading the situation.
Before the Learned Elders of Islam sat down with the ministers of interior and religious affairs last Saturday to discuss matters relating to the madressahs they issued an edict against suicide kabooms and denounced war against Pakistain as un-Islamic. Whether this decree represents an honest change of heart on the part of the Learned Elders of Islam and whether they did not consider it expedient to stay aloof from the people's resolve to fight the hard boys, only time will tell.
A resolution of this kind was nevertheless necessary at the moment at least to counter Maulana Fazlur Rehman Deobandi holy man, known as Mullah Diesel during the war against the Soviets, his sympathies for the Taliban have never been tempered by honesty ... 's quaint plea for avoiding any reference to religion while thinking of dealing with terrorism. Any concession to the JUI-F chief on this point would have amounted to rejecting evidence about the identity and objectives of many a Death Eater group. There is no need to emphasise the lesson the world has learnt, that while all Moslems do not indulge in terrorism, many of the terrorist formations openly claim to be carrying out their religious duty.
However, it was a brave man who first ate an oyster... this fatwa has less meaning than the accord that is reported to have been reached between the government and the Learned Elders of Islam.
According to media reports -- and it would have been better to release the text of the agreement so that ordinary citizens could check whether any side was reading more into it than what the text warranted -- the Learned Elders of Islam have agreed to compulsory registration of all madressahs. This should mean that nobody will be allowed to open and run any seminary without registration.
Much will depend on what new conditions for registration/recognition are going to be because 35,337 madressahs, out of a total of 43,586, or more than 80pc, are reported to be already registered and yet they have been outside any regulatory system.
It is reasonable to expect that before registering an institution the competent authority will satisfy itself about the sponsors' bona fides, as to whether they are an association recognisable under the law, whether they are answerable to a body and to the community on the lam, and whether their capacity to manage an educational institution can be objectively verified.
More important than registration is the madressah organizations' readiness to accept the principle of regular audit of their accounts and to receive foreign funds only through official channels. While democratic elements and rights activists are unlikely to allow the government unlimited power to interfere with the receipt of foreign funding by educational institutions a system of documenting all transactions should be put in place. This will go a long way towards guaranteeing supervision of the use of foreign parties' philanthropy.
What the government has pledged the Learned Elders of Islam in return needs a closer look because in the past religious parties gained more at the cost of the government than what they appeared to concede to it. The madressahs have been assured that no action will be taken against anyone without concrete evidence of its having violated the law. A strange promise since action on the basis of solid evidence of unlawful action is supposed to be the rule regardless of the identity and status of the party at the receiving end. Or is it a wrong assumption?
Two joint committees (Learned Elders of Islam, federal and provincial governments' representatives) will be set up, one to decide upon registration formalities and the other to propose curriculum reform. Reference has been made to an understanding on deleting from the madressah courses material that contributes to militancy or causes hatred among different communities.
The agreement on joint committees to develop a supervisory mechanism or approve curriculum reform suggests extension of state-public partnership to religious seminaries and one should like to see this principle extended to stakeholders in other fields.
Matters could improve considerably if lawyers, medical practitioners, academics, engineers, farmers, labour leaders and other civil society organizations too were considered entitled to meaningful consultation before laws and policies affecting them were finalised. It is also necessary to ensure that the facility offered to the seminaries does not obstruct efforts for a thorough revision of the place of madressahs in the country's educational system.
It is perhaps time to define the role of madressahs. During the colonial period the madressah offered Moslem children the facility of instruction in religious matters that was not available at public schools. The madressah thus supplemented the scheme of educating the young ones. For that purpose the madressah is no longer needed, for study of religion is compulsory in all state and private institutions.
If the madressahs constitute a parallel system of education then the rationale for their existence and unchecked proliferation needs to be scrutinised. What after all is expected of the madressah graduates? What are the possibilities of their being employed on jobs that promote the public weal? Has anyone ever estimated the number of madressahs and their graduates this country needs or can afford?
The production of seminary graduates in a greater number than the country's capacity to offer them proper assignments will create enormous problems. Nobody can say where a large horde of jobless seminary graduates will be landed by their ambition, inclination and frustration.
Finally, there is much to be said in favour of looking at madressah reform not merely in the context of the war against terrorism but in the broader context of the need for reorganising the entire education sector. Thanks to the flawed curriculum and the distortions in the textbooks the state sector is perhaps creating more hard boyz than the madressahs.
The demand for reforming the management of public education and the curriculum, particularly for offering students in all institutions a narrative about rationalism, tolerance, pluralism and peace can no longer be resisted.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/22/2015 00:00 ||
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[DAWN] IN order to effectively put bad boy groups out of business, it is essential to dry up their finances.
Religiously-motivated bully boyz do raise funds through local sources and criminal rackets, but foreign funding -- particularly from Moslem states in the Middle East -- is also a major source of cash.
While the Gulf states are often cited as sources of bad boy funding, especially from private donors, it is extremely rare for government officials in Pakistain to openly identify any one of them.
Hence, when Inter-Provincial Coordination Minister Riaz Pirzada named names at an event in Islamabad on Tuesday, eyebrows were certainly raised. The minister, though he claims he was quoted out of context, told a conclave that "Saudi money" had destabilised this country.
In fact, it has been largely established that Pakistain has been a conduit for funds destined for religiously inspired fighters for over three decades.
In 1979, two monumental events took place in this region that forever altered the geopolitical calculus: the Islamic Revolution in Iran and the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan.
Thereafter, funds flowed in freely from the United States, Soddy Arabia ...a kingdom taking up the bulk of the Arabian peninsula. Its primary economic activity involves exporting oil and soaking Islamic rubes on the annual hajj pilgrimage. The country supports a large number of princes in whatcha might call princely splendor. When the oil runs out the rest of the world is going to kick sand in the Soddy national face... and others for the 'mujahideen' battling the Soviets across the border, while many Arab states -- fearful of a revolutionary and explicitly Shia Iran -- started to fund groups that could resist Tehran's ideological influence in Moslem countries.
Ever since, a jumble of jihadi and sectarian groups (of varying persuasions) has thrived in Pakistain, as the country became a proxy battlefield for Iran and Saudi Arabia, as well as a front line of the last major battle of the Cold War.
Since then, militancy has morphed out of control to such an extent that it now threatens the internal stability of this country; neutralising the myriad jihadi outfits has then become Pakistain's number one security challenge.
While documentary evidence is often hard to come by, Gulf money has been linked to the promotion of militancy in many instances.
There have been reports of Gulf funding for Death Eaters in the Syrian conflict, while the WikiLeaks disclosures of 2009 also attributed comments to Hillary Clinton ... sometimes described as America's Blond Eminence and at other times as Mrs. Bill, never as Another Philander C. Knox ... linking Saudi funds to bad boy groups.
Another cable claimed donors in Saudi Arabia and the UAE were pumping millions into south Punjab, with much of these funds ending up in the hands of jihadis. Even Interior Minister Nisar Ali Khan admitted recently in a written reply to a question in the Senate that madressahs were receiving funding from "Moslem countries".
In principle, there is nothing wrong with seminaries or charities receiving foreign funds. But when this cash is used to fund terrorism and extremism, things become problematic. The best way to proceed is for the intelligence apparatus to monitor the flow of funds.
If the authorities have reasonable evidence that funds from the Gulf or elsewhere are being funnelled to bad boys, the issue needs to be taken up with the countries concerned.
Posted by: Fred ||
01/22/2015 00:00 ||
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[Ynet] Analysis: There are steps that Israel can take to reduce the chances of yet another 'lone-wolf' attack; making political gain from such an event is not one of them.
Israeli Military Intelligence believes that 2015 will be a volatile year, prone to flare-ups in the Paleostinian arena - both in Gazoo and the West Bank, and inside Israel. This assessment is pertinent to the attack on Wednesday morning in Tel Aviv, given that a sensitive and explosive Paleostinian arena produces lone-wolf terror attacks, from which it is difficult to protect oneself - as Israel has learned from dozens of stabbings and even shootings.
It is possible to profile the "lone-wolf" terrorist. He is usually a young man, in his 20s or 30s, and he is angry, perhaps because he or a family member was maimed by Israeli security forces or tossed in the calaboose Book 'im, Mahmoud! and interrogated. Less often, it is someone who is trying to clear his name over crimes committed within Arab society, or is going through a form of "audition" for a terrorist organization.
Another element that goes hand in hand with the personal factors is the overall atmosphere on the Paleostinian street, whether as a result of deliberate incitement in the mosques or by politicians, or even due to events in far-off countries. For example, the terrible events in La Belle France may also influence radical Islamists in the region. But ultimately what counts is the ability of that person to approach his victims with murderous intent. Not just get into close proximity, but so close to them that they find it difficult to defend themselves.
And there are many cases of so-called "lone-wolf attacks" or "atmosphere attacks" (attacks motivated by the tense atmosphere on the Paleostinian street) that involve Paleostinians who have entered Israel illegally. The most common case, not only in Jerusalem but also in the rest of Israel and the Paleostinian territories, is an attack on public transportation â in buses and at Jerusalem's light rail stations.
These are places where many Israelis are concentrated, and are usually in a place, such as a bus or a train platform, that does not offer an easy escape route, so the victims are stuck in the path of the terrorist. Escaping to the side usually takes the victims out of the line of fire, presumably forcing the terrorist to change course. Usually he does not.
There are also certain steps than can be taken to reduce the risk of "lone-wolf" attacks:
Daunting security presence. The presence of security personnel in uniform and armed at public transport stops, bus and train stations, especially during peak hours, would serve as a deterrent. Not so long ago, Tel Aviv municipality set up a security detail to patrol the streets of the city. This is exactly what Israel Police should do, given intelligence difficulties in identifying the next terrorist.
This kind of presence is almost the only means one can take to prevent such attacks. The prevalent calm in Jerusalem was achieved by flooding the city and its Arab neighborhoods with coppers â both clearly visible and undercover.
Detecting and thwarting illegal entry to Israel. So much has been said about this issue over the years, that there is little to add. This has to be done.
Intelligence from illegal entrants. Given that attacks inside Israel tend to be carried out by Paleostinians who have entered the country illegally, it is vital to carry out intelligence gathering in their midst. And this intelligence-gathering should be utterly thorough, both to diminish the phenomenon and also to identify a lone terrorist as early as possible, without human rights ...which often include carefully measured allowances of freedom at the convenience of the state... violations or democracy being undermined.
Israel must also put an end to another ugly phenomenon that normally accompanies attacks during election season â "dancing in the blood" of the victims. On Wednesday, it was actually Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu who took the first step onto this dancefloor, immediately pointing the finger of blame at Paleostinian President the ineffectual Mahmoud Abbas ... a graduate of the prestigious unaccredited Patrice Lumumba University in Moscow with a doctorate in Holocaust Denial... . But the signs are that this statement has no grounding in fact,. going on the police investigation into the terrorist. The man acted out of personal motivation.
True, stabbing attacks in Tel Aviv may challenge one's sense of security, but Israelis are already familiar with trying times. Dancing in the blood of the victims only serves as an added bonus to terrorists, giving them a sense of satisfaction and encouraging copy-cat attacks.
It seems that the year ahead will be a hard one vis-Ã -vis security, and as such Israelis should, despite the looming elections, try to maintain a sense of calm and preserve their sanity. In this way, perhaps we can reduce the number of those trying to imitate the handiwork of Wednesday's knife-wielding terrorist.
[Ynet] Analysis: Even those who planned the Quneitra strike never imagined the entire axis of evil – Iran, Syria and Hezbollah – would be hit at once, suffering a painful public humiliation. An operation aimed at foiling tactical events has turned into a strategic crisis.
It was Israeli writer Ephraim Kishon who coined the immortal patriotic sentence, "So sorry we won." Today, in Kishon's land of Partachia, there are likely some people who are mumbling amongst themselves, "Oops, sorry we were too successful."
An operation aimed at foiling tactical events has turned into a strategic crisis, and Iron Dome batteries have already been deployed in northern Israel.
Without exposing the anonymous body behind the assassination in Syria, we may assume that even the masterminds did not dream of such success. With the stroke of two missiles, three birds were killed with one stone: The Syrian sovereignty was violated, a Hezbollah symbol was hit and an Iranian general was killed. The entire axis of evil – Iran, Syria and Hezbollah – was struck at once, suffering a painful public humiliation.
There is no wonder that there is a reasonable suspicion that those who carried out the assassination were not exactly aware of the identity of all those sitting in the attacked convoy. They were likely planning to hit Hezbollah's regional commander, Jihad Mughniyeh, and his assistants, but it's uncertain that they knew about the presence of a senior Iranian officer from the Revolutionary Guards as part of the gang.
Actually, we should hope that they didn't know. Otherwise, we would be witnessing a problem in the strategic thinking.
The plan was probably to carry out a tactical operation on the border in order to thwart a terror attack, but the result is embarrassment. And Israel is not the only one keeping quiet. All foreign ministries in the world are keeping quiet.
In the meantime, everyone is bending down and burying their heads in the sand, hoping that this incident will somehow pass. And if it does create some kind of storm – from Iran, Syria, Hezbollah, or the three of them together – they are hoping that it will be a short one.
It's perfectly clear that when Iran publicly announces its dead, and Jihad Mughniyeh is buried in a mass funeral, we are witnessing preparations and a message to the public opinion at home and around the world: We plan to retaliate.
So all the players are gathering their forces and entering a state of alert, including the Lebanese army, the United Nations forces in southern Lebanon and the IDF, which is boosting its forces in the north.
While the population in the north has been told to continue its routine life and stay away from the border, the security squads have been ordered to stay in the communities and maintain a heightened state of alert.
This order corresponds very well with the latest reports – including Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah's interview last week – about Hezbollah's plans to occupy communities in the Galilee. And as for the Jewish communities and Israeli institutions abroad, they have already shrunk as it is since the Paris terror attack. Now they are shrinking even more.
The targeted assassination carried out in Quneitra on Sunday exposed up a problematic abscess which has been developing in six villages at the foot of the Syrian Mount Hermon. The area is still controlled by the Syrian regime, but in fact serves as a Hezbollah outpost on the Israeli border. The dish, likely prepared by Jihad Mughniyeh, also included firing rockets from that area into Israel.
And by the way, three of the six villages are Druze villages in which another Hezbollah commander is active – Samir Kuntar, the terrorist of Druze descent who was released from an Israeli prison in 2008. Kuntar is busy recruiting Druze people for terror attacks against Israel along the border fence.
This corner, at the foot of Mount Hermon, has become a strategic area as far as Hezbollah is concerned. In October 2014, the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI) published an article from a newspaper affiliated with Hezbollah, in which the organization detailed its list of interests.
Hezbollah believes that Israel is being pressured by its Druze residents, who are urging it to move towards the Druze towns in the Syrian Golan Heights with the pretext of defending the Druze against an expected massacre by the Islamist organizations. The organization is relying on a comment made by IDF Chief of Staff Benny Gantz while visiting the leader of the Druze community in Israel, Moafaq Tarif, in October, when he promised to defend the villages in the Syrian Golan.
Hezbollah is concerned that an Israeli takeover of the Druze villages at the foot of the Syrian Golan is part of Israel's comprehensive plan to gain control of all of the Hermon summits. An Israeli takeover of this area will not only remove the Assad regime from its last outpost in the Golan, but will also encircle Hezbollah and outflank it in a future conflict.
In addition, Hezbollah is afraid that if Israel takes over the foot of Mount Hermon, claiming to be helping the Druze, it may allow organizations in Syria which are hostile towards Hezbollah to cross into Lebanon through Mount Dov.
Sunday's strike is perceived by Hezbollah as another stage in the Israeli plan to remove its people from that area. As far as Hezbollah is concerned, this is a cause for an armed conflict.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
A few years ago when you went to the supermarket and bought your groceries, all you were buying was food. Now when you buy food you are also buying religion â in many cases it is not even labelled. 
Maulana Fazlur Rehman
Hillary Clinton
