“Israeli forces suppressed Palestinian crowds at return camps using live bullets and tear-gas bombs … [in a futile attempt to stop the] ‘Great March of Return’ protests … launched by thousands of Palestinian civilians in Gaza … to demand their right of return as refugees to their original homelands” …
… while Israelis offer claims that “stones and fireworks were thrown at the police forces” as the excuse for the attack on Palestinian worshipers “just a week after over a thousand Israeli settlers stormed the Al-Aqsa compound under the protection of Israeli occupation forces” …
- Israel Storms Al-Aqsa Compound During Friday Prayers, Shots Fired (Middle East Monitor)
… but back off of closure of the mosque after calls “for non-violent action/protest and prayed in front of lions gate until they open the Al-Aqsa mosque”:
- Israeli Reopens Al-Aqsa After Palestinians Protest Closure (Middle East Eye)
Iran would be well-advised to denominate its planned cryptocurrency in gold and back it with oil, but only if it is not intimidated by the fact that the “plot to overthrow Gaddafi was fueled by first their desire to quash the gold-backed African currency“:
“[P]olitics are everywhere in the United States’ current approach to religious freedom … [starting with] President Trump’s indebtedness to conservative evangelical Christians for his election … including excessive deference to politicians and co-religionists who have shown hostility toward Islam”:
- A Religious Freedom Summit Can’t Undo Trump’s Record on Islam (Religion News Service)
Rather than being held to different standards; Israel isn’t “held to any international legal standard at all. Israel has been criticized and condemned by numerous international bodies and foreign governments, yet there has been absolutely no sanctions or consequences for its illegal actions”:
Increasing isolation of Hamas and Iran drives their move to reconcile, but dictators in both Damascus and Cairo want to thwart it:
- What Is Behind the Hamas-Iran Rapprochement? (Al-Jazeera)
U.S. support for a brutal Saudi-led military campaign in the country has created a humanitarian crisis of staggering proportions, while offering an opening for Iran to expand its influence in the country … [making] insurgents more reliant on support from Tehran and is turning civilians against U.S. partners”:
- How the U.S. Is Empowering Iran in Yemen (Foreign Affairs)
A leading rabbi is concerned that instead of exposing and countering extremists, European states are taking children away from their parents to teach European “‘values,’ including Christmas and Easter traditions”:
Rep. Betty McCollum’s bill to “prohibit Israel from using any of the billions of dollars in annual aid received from Congress for ‘the military detention, interrogation, abuse, or ill treatment of Palestinian children’ … has 28 co-sponsors, all of them Democrats”:
- Divide over Israel Widens in Democratic Party (Roll Call)
“Former Bush spokesman Ari Fleischer…, who was for eight and a half years a chief propagandist for the catastrophic US war on and occupation of Iraq, appears to have learned nothing”:
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