Saturday, March 18, 2017
Beyond 'apartheid'--U.N. commission pushes legal and propaganda offensive against Israel
Amb. Haley: Some fat can be trimmed at the U.N. |
A just-published United Nations report that claims to find Israel guilty of the “crime of apartheid,” is only one element of a broader legal and propaganda offensive being pushed by an obscure U.N. regional commission to stigmatize America’s close ally and build support for the Palestinian cause, according to documents examined by Fox News.
The offensive has been gestating for at least two years within the U.N.’s Economic and Social Commission for West Asia (ESCWA), whose entire membership are Arab states, and is timed to this year’s 50th anniversary of the 1967 war between Arab states and Israel, which resulted in Israel’s control of the occupied territories of the West Bank and Gaza.
At least one additional report commissioned by ESCWA, attempting to create an “innovative” and “scientific” methodology for estimated the cost of Israel’s 50-year control of the territories, is still in the works, with the aim of demanding billions in reparations for Palestinians.
A third aspect of the strategy is an elaborate proposed propaganda campaign against the Israeli occupation, making use of U.N. institutions and a variety of diplomatic and media channels, to create a new , sympathetic “brand” for Palestinians as victims “that would cause a snowball effect, thus altering public opinion globally in record time,” as an ESCWA background paper puts it.
All three elements, including the now-notorious apartheid report, were given a thorough airing at the biennial high level meeting of ESCWA’s 18 members, one of them being the State of Palestine, held in Doha from December 13 to 15, 2016.
ESCWA is ostensibly a forum for regional economic coordination and development; the meeting was touted largely as an occasion to examine the U.N.’s ponderous Sustainable Development Goals.
Nonetheless, a preliminary version of the apartheid report, containing much of its final wording, was one of the documents circulated at the session, and a resolution passed at the end of the meeting called on ESCWA’s secretariat to publicize the explosive apartheid study as much as possible.
The resolution also called for an “ESCWA media and communications strategy aimed at increasing global awareness,” of, among other things, “Israeli violations of Palestinian rights and international law,” and orders the bureaucracy to “increase activities on Palestine and organize special activities to mark” the 1967 anniversary.
The apartheid report caused an eruption of outrage from U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Nikki Haley when it was officially published under U.N. auspices on March 15. She noted it came “from a body whose membership nearly universally does not recognize Israel,” and demanded the U.N. officially “withdraw” the report from circulation.
Haley heaped additional scorn on the co-author of the 306-page document: Richard Falk, a notoriously anti-Israel academic who often provoked U.S. irritation for his anti-Semitic statements and anti-U.S. diatribes during a six-year term as U.N. special rapporteur on the rights of the Palestinian people.
Falk has, among other things, cast doubt on the “official version” of the 9/11 attacks as the work of Islamic terrorists and after the 2013 Boston Marathon bombings remarked that the “American global domination project is bound to generate all kinds of resistance in the post-colonial world.”
In her counter-blast against the ESCWA-sponsored report, U.S. Ambassador Haley called him “a man who has repeatedly made biased and deeply offensive comments about Israel and espoused ridiculous conspiracy theories.”
Falk stepped down from his U.N. job in May, 2014, but has kept up his anti-Israel agitation as a professor at the University of California, Santa Barbara, and has made frequent references to the Israel-apartheid theme.
For his part, U.N. Secretary General Antonio Guterres distanced himself from the document, and an official close to him asserted he was blind-sided by its appearance.
A U.N. official pointed the finger of blame for the publication at ESCWA’s Executive Secretary, Rima Khalaf, a Jordanian and longtime U.N. bureaucrat who was appointed to her job by former U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon in 2010.
Khalaf was slated to step down within weeks as part of Guterres’ initial management shuffle, but instead abruptly resigned on March 17 after Guterres asked that the report be removed from ESDWA’s website.
At a Beirut press conference, an unrepentant Khalaf reportedly hailed the report as the “first of its kind” from a U.N. agency to condemn Israel, and added, “It was expected that Israel and its allies would put enormous pressure on the United Nations secretary general to renounce the report."
The U.N. official observed that Khalaf “was in New York recently and did not mention [the apartheid report] to anyone.”
“One of the responsibilities of U.N. economic commissioners,” the official noted, “is to move information up the chain of command” to avoid such problems.
That may well be so. But an official summary of the Doha session is also available on the ESCWA website, accessible to all.
Among other things, it notes the elements of the ESCWA 50th anniversary actions, issuing broadside condemnations of Israel’s actions in the territories without reference to acts of terrorism or other assaults on Israelis, and calling for creation of a “specialized unit on issues related to Palestine and its people,” including further monitoring of “Israeli violations of the Palestinian people’s rights and of international law.”
Along with ESCWA members and officials, the report notes, representatives of at least 15 other U.N. offices and agencies were present. One of them was the Office of the U.N. Special Coordinator of the Middle East Peace Process, although only a lower-level official was listed in attendance.
Questions emailed to ESCWA by Fox News about the apartheid report and the other elements in the organization’s anti-Israel, pro-Palestinian campaign, including some of its future plans, were acknowledged but not answered before this story was published.
Guterres’ claim of ignorance about the Falk report is made more credible by the fact that he has only been in the U.N.’s job since January 1 -–less than three months.
But the ESCWA campaign also offers a smudged window into the maze of bureaucracies, agencies and free-floating organizations that make up the sprawling U.N. system—and their lurking biases and often invisible channels of influence.
Their topmost official of each is usually appointed by the U.N. Secretary General, and their supervision by U.N. member states—their nominal bosses—is often cursory at best.
There are more than 30 funds, agencies and programs alongside the bulky U.N. Secretariat, plus a flotilla of regional commissions (including ESCWA), research and training institutes, facilitating networks, and a bewildering array of other entities, spread around the globe, often with overlapping mandates and spheres of influence.
ESCWA, for example, is a $70 million body ostensibly concerned with social and economic coordination and development in the Middle East. Its biennial budget is part of the U.N.’s regular budget, meaning that 22 per cent of the total is paid by the U.S.
Yet alongside its regional work, ESCWA is also the author of a report issued by the U.N. Secretary General himself, on the living conditions of Palestinians in the Israeli-occupied territories.
The report focuses contributions from a wide variety of other U.N. and U.N.-supported organizations in a 20-page condemnation of allegedly illegal Israeli practices, ranging from illegal detention and displacement of civiians to possible “sustained extensive soil damage, including the removal and destruction of topsoil,” during a 2014 Israeli anti-terrorism offensive in Gaza.
Among other things, the report adds: “According to UNEP [the U.N. Environmental Program], the 2014 offensive may also have resulted in loss of wildlife and native plants.” The document offers no specific evidence at all for the extremely hypothetical claim.
ESCWA’s most recent compendium of Israel crimes was published in July, 2016—as a Note from then-Secretary General Ban Ki-moon.
Hillary Clinton says she's 'ready to come out of the woods'
SCRANTON, Pa. – Hillary Clinton said Friday she's "ready to come out of the woods" and help Americans find common ground.
Clinton's gradual return to the public spotlight following her presidential election loss continued with a St. Patrick's Day speech in her late father's Pennsylvania hometown of Scranton.
"I'm like a lot of my friends right now, I have a hard time watching the news," Clinton told an Irish women's group.
But she urged a divided country to work together to solve problems, recalling how, as first lady, she met with female leaders working to bring peace to Northern Ireland.
"What can we do to try to bring people together and to try to find that common ground, even higher ground, sister, so that we listen to each other again and we know that we can make a difference? I'm not sure it will come out of Washington yet, but I think it can come out of Scranton. Let's find ways to do that," she told the Society of Irish Women.
"I am ready to come out of the woods and to help shine a light on what is already happening around kitchen tables, at dinners like this, to help draw strength that will enable everybody to keep going," said Clinton, who was spotted taking a walk in the woods around her hometown of Chappaqua, New York, two days after losing the election to Donald Trump.
Friday night's speech is one of several she is to deliver in the coming months, including a May 26 commencement address at her alma mater, Wellesley College in Massachusetts. The Democrat also is working on a book of personal essays that will include some reflections on her loss to Donald Trump.
Clinton was received warmly in Scranton, where her grandfather worked in a lace mill. Her father left Scranton for Chicago in search of work during the Great Depression, but returned often. Hillary Clinton spent summers at the family's cottage on nearby Lake Winola.
She fondly recalled watching movies stretched across a bedsheet in a neighbor's yard, and told of how the cottage had a toilet but no shower or tub.
"Don't tell anybody this, but we'd go down to the lake," she quipped.
Trump talks Alec Baldwin, CNN's Jeff Zucker and Sen. Chuck Schumer on Watters' World
President Donald Trump had nothing good to say about Alec Baldwin, CNN's president Jeff Zucker and Democratic Sen. Chuck Schumer in an interview with Jesse Watters to be broadcast this weekend.
During the 'Watters' World' interview to be broadcast at 8 p.m. Saturday and Sunday, Trump would not say who he would fire out of the three men.
"Chuck I'm very disappointed in, because he's a guy who should make deals for the people. Not as a Democrat or Republican," said Trump.
Trump stated that he got Jeff Zucker his job at CNN and described the cable news network as "fake news."
"I think the Alec Baldwin situation is not good," Trump said. "The portrayal of me is ridiculous."
On the subject of whether he believes that former President Obama wants him to succeed, Trump said:
"Well, you know, he's been very nice to me personally. But his people haven't been nice and there's great animosity out there. There's great anger. Leaking is just one example of it. ... So, while he's nice personally there doesn't seem to be a lot of nice things happening behind the scenes. And that's unfortunate."
President Trump no longer safe in White House: Former Secret Service agent
The president is no longer safe on the White House grounds, according to former Secret Service agent Dan Bongino, who once guarded presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama.
Bongino made the stunning assessment in an interview Friday with Fox News. It followed an incident last Friday night when a man jumped the White House fence and may have roamed the property for as long as 15 minutes before he was stopped by the Secret Service.
Jonathan Tran, who carried two cans of mace, set off multiple alarms, Bongino said, and was even spotted by Secret Service officers, but was still able to come within “close proximity” of the White House and even reportedly “jiggled the door” to the executive mansion.
“The intruder set off multiple alarms, alarms that clearly showed someone breached the property, and he was seen by officers who didn't think anything of it. This is a big story,” Bongino told Fox News.
“That just shows the president is not safe there - in the White House. The Secret Service does not have the assets, they don't have personnel on the ground they need to keep him safe.”
Should a group of terrorists decide to storm the White House, the Secret Service would not be able to protect Trump, Bongino predicted.
“The Secret Service cannot even keep one person off the grounds - what will they do if 40 terrorists charge the White House?” he asked. “And believe me the terrorists are already thinking about that.”
According to the Secret Service, Tran was charged with entering a restricted building and carrying a dangerous weapon.
Trump, who was on the property, has praised the Secret Service for doing a “fantastic job” and said the suspect was “troubled.”
But Bongino said the current Secret Service management “sucks.”
“The Secret Service is stuck in their ways and don't want to redo and upgrade the White House security plan. President Trump won't be safe there until they do,” Bongino said.
House Oversight Committee Chairman Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, also blasted the latest incident and said “this keeps happening.” Chaffetz’s panel oversees the Secret Service.
He added, “Our information is incomplete at best.”
In a letter to acting Secret Service Director Bill Callahan, Chaffetz said Tran “may have attempted entry into the building. If true, these allegations raise questions about whether the agency’s security protocols are adequate.”
Chaffetz suggested there may have been alarms that were ignored by the Secret Service.
Chaffetz wants a briefing by the end of next week. He also is asking for all video from the White House grounds that night as well as logs from the Joint Operations Center and information about “alarms” at the White House.
The episode recalled another in September 2014, when Omar Gonzales penetrated the White House grounds and actually made it inside. Then-Secret Service Director Julia Pierson afterward conceded “mistakes were made.” But the Secret Service was found to have publicly lied about how far Gonzales made it into the White House.
It cost Pierson her job.
They later found the White House alarms had been muted in the Gonzales incident.
Friday, March 17, 2017
Trump set to meet Merkel at White House after criticizing her during campaign
President Trump on Friday is set to welcome Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel to the White House in what is expected to be an amicable encounter despite Trump's campaign criticism about her "ruining" Germany.
Merkel was reportedly on her way to the airport Monday to fly to Washington when Trump called her to postpone the trip due to the impending snow storm that blanketed the Northeast. The cancelation was seen by some as a metaphor for the current U.S.-German relationship.
The meeting is one of the more highly anticipated ones of Trump’s young presidency. Politico posted a picture of Merkel and blared a headline, “The Leader of the Free World Meets Donald Trump.”
TRUMP MERKEL HOLD JOINT PRESS CONFERENCE AT WHITE HOUSE AT 1:20 PM ET. WATCH LIVE ON FOX NEWS CHANNEL AND FOXNEWS.COM
“She’s used to awkward meetings,” Constanze Stelzenmueller, an expert on German and trans-Atlantic policy at the Brookings Institution, told McClatchy. “She’s handled them quite well. You don’t linger over the personal.”
The encounter will be aimed at building a personal rapport with a European partner who was among former President Obama's strongest allies and international confidantes, White House officials told the Associated Press earlier this month.
The two are expected to discuss strengthening the NATO alliance, collaborating to fight terrorism and taking steps to resolve the conflict in Ukraine. The BBC reported that the two will also discuss transatlantic trade. Merkel will be joined by top officials at German companies including Siemens and BMW.
Merkel reportedly said that the German relationship with the U.S. is important and a two-way street. She said a BMW plant in the U.S. exported “more cars than GM and Ford together” from the U.S. Officials told Reuters that Merkel has prepared carefully for the meeting.
Trump has not been shy in his criticism of the European Union’s immigration policy, and Merkel has criticized Trump’s travel ban.
Trump frequently criticized Merkel during his presidential campaign, accusing her of "ruining Germany" by taking in large numbers of refugees. Merkel, who wields significant sway in Europe, was critical of Trump's refugee and immigration travel ban, which was blocked by the courts.
Merkel, who is seeking reelection later this year, reportedly told a German newspaper, “It’s always better to talk with each other than about each other.”
Bloomberg reported that a day before Merkel left for her U.S. visit, she spoke to Chinese President Xi Jinping to reaffirm “their common support for free trade and open markets.” The report pointed out that the partnership has gained significance since Trump was elected.
Peter Wittig, Germany’s ambassador to the U.S., told PBS that he believes Merkel is interested in forming a “strong, constructive” relationship with Trump.
“And she has said many times she will not go back to the campaign, but will want to engage with him in a constructive manner,” he said. “And I think that’s what we want to see tomorrow.”
Gregg Jarrett: 4 things you need to know about the rulings against Trump's latest travel ban
Federal judges in Hawaii and Maryland ruled against
President Trump’s revised travel ban with separate, but similar, orders
blocking the main provisions of his executive order which limits travel
and immigration to the United States from six predominately Muslim
countries. Here is what you need to know about the rulings from these
judges:
1.) Legally, what did the 2 judges find wrong with the revised travel ban?
Principally, that the executive order violates the Establishment Clause in the First Amendment of the Constitution because it discriminates against Muslims. The judges relied not on the detailed language of the executive order, but on several of the remarks President Trump made as a candidate on the campaign trail, even though he later revised his stance on immigrants seeking entry into the U.S.
The judges largely ignored the President’s justification stated specifically in the ban that he was acting in the interest of national security to protect American citizens from potential terrorists because the 6 banned nations are state sponsors of terrorism (as identified by Congress and President Obama in an anti-terrorism law) and those governments do not assist the U.S. in vetting applicants with background checks.
2.) How unusual is it for a judge to rely so heavily on campaign rhetoric?
It is extraordinary and well beyond the scope of what judges are supposed to consider. Candidates for office often make statements they don’t entirely mean. Or they later revise or change their views. That is what candidate Trump did. After first claiming he would institute a Muslim ban, he later changed his stance to say that he would ban entry from countries that pose a terrorist threat.
But these two judges ignored his revised position and accused the President if using national security as a pre-text for banning Muslims. In doing so, the judges were pretending to read President Trump’s mind. It smacks of judicial activism and appears contrary to established law on judicial review. Courts don’t normally consider campaign rhetoric in interpreting a law or executive order.
3.) At the same time, 5 judges on the 9th circuit court of appeals issued their own opinion. What was it?
This was also unusual. In an unsolicited filing, five Republican-appointed judges on the 9th Circuit (the same court which last month ruled against President Trump’s first travel ban) wrote this in a published opinion:
“Whatever we as individuals may feel about the President or the executive order, the President’s decision was well within the powers of the presidency.”
These five judges all but accused their colleagues of judicial activism and overreach because they don’t like President Trump or his policies. The five judges recognized that the President has both constitutional (Article 1, Section 8) and statutory authority (the 1952 Immigration and Nationality Act) to dictate immigration as it applies to national security threats.
4.) So, what happens next?
The ruling by the judge in Hawaii can be appealed to the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals. The Maryland ruling would be appealed to the 4th Circuit. They could be reversed on appeal. Or not.
After that, the cases could wind their way up to the U.S. Supreme Court, which currently has 8 Justices. Neil Gorsuch, President Trump’s nominee to fill the seat left vacant by Antonin Scalia’s death, is set to begin confirmation hearings next week. It is possible Democrats may try to delay his confirmation vote, leaving a potential 4-4 split on the high court. In that case, the lower appellate court rulings would stand. But if those rulings conflict, it is unclear what would happen.
But all of this may turn out to be moot. The main part of the travel ban will expire after 90 days.
Gregg Jarrett is a Fox News Anchor and former defense attorney.
1.) Legally, what did the 2 judges find wrong with the revised travel ban?
Principally, that the executive order violates the Establishment Clause in the First Amendment of the Constitution because it discriminates against Muslims. The judges relied not on the detailed language of the executive order, but on several of the remarks President Trump made as a candidate on the campaign trail, even though he later revised his stance on immigrants seeking entry into the U.S.
The judges largely ignored the President’s justification stated specifically in the ban that he was acting in the interest of national security to protect American citizens from potential terrorists because the 6 banned nations are state sponsors of terrorism (as identified by Congress and President Obama in an anti-terrorism law) and those governments do not assist the U.S. in vetting applicants with background checks.
2.) How unusual is it for a judge to rely so heavily on campaign rhetoric?
It is extraordinary and well beyond the scope of what judges are supposed to consider. Candidates for office often make statements they don’t entirely mean. Or they later revise or change their views. That is what candidate Trump did. After first claiming he would institute a Muslim ban, he later changed his stance to say that he would ban entry from countries that pose a terrorist threat.
But these two judges ignored his revised position and accused the President if using national security as a pre-text for banning Muslims. In doing so, the judges were pretending to read President Trump’s mind. It smacks of judicial activism and appears contrary to established law on judicial review. Courts don’t normally consider campaign rhetoric in interpreting a law or executive order.
3.) At the same time, 5 judges on the 9th circuit court of appeals issued their own opinion. What was it?
This was also unusual. In an unsolicited filing, five Republican-appointed judges on the 9th Circuit (the same court which last month ruled against President Trump’s first travel ban) wrote this in a published opinion:
“Whatever we as individuals may feel about the President or the executive order, the President’s decision was well within the powers of the presidency.”
These five judges all but accused their colleagues of judicial activism and overreach because they don’t like President Trump or his policies. The five judges recognized that the President has both constitutional (Article 1, Section 8) and statutory authority (the 1952 Immigration and Nationality Act) to dictate immigration as it applies to national security threats.
4.) So, what happens next?
The ruling by the judge in Hawaii can be appealed to the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals. The Maryland ruling would be appealed to the 4th Circuit. They could be reversed on appeal. Or not.
After that, the cases could wind their way up to the U.S. Supreme Court, which currently has 8 Justices. Neil Gorsuch, President Trump’s nominee to fill the seat left vacant by Antonin Scalia’s death, is set to begin confirmation hearings next week. It is possible Democrats may try to delay his confirmation vote, leaving a potential 4-4 split on the high court. In that case, the lower appellate court rulings would stand. But if those rulings conflict, it is unclear what would happen.
But all of this may turn out to be moot. The main part of the travel ban will expire after 90 days.
Gregg Jarrett is a Fox News Anchor and former defense attorney.
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