Suspends the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program for 120 days while vetting procedures are revamped. Suspends admissions of people from “countries of particular concern” for 90 days. Bans Syrians until vetting is determined to be sufficient. Limits total refugees admitted in 2017 to 50,000. Some refugees may be admitted on a case-by-case basis.
The US played both sides in Syria; completely took over Iraq, leading to the deaths of hundreds of thousands; helped stage a coup in Iran; invaded Libya and overthrew its leader; sent drones to Somalia, Sudan, and Yemen; and its buddy Saudi Arabia is currently bombing and starving the Yemeni population.
The ZOA said that Mattis’ remarks were “hostile to Israel.” Mattis also said he “paid a military-security price every day as CentCom commander because the Americans were seen as biased in support of Israel.” Mattis opposes torture, and President Trump says he will allow Mattis’ view to override him on this.
Michelle Flournoy, who was expected to be Hillary Clinton’s Defense Secretary, said that her worry was that Donald Trump would not consider Israel’s interests in forging a deal with Russia over Syria.
2016 was the deadliest year in the past decade for Palestinian children in the West Bank. Some were killed on their way to class, or coming home from. Several were shot dead while protesting the occupation. A brother and sister were killed in their home when their neighborhood was hit in an Israeli airstrike. See their photos and learn the details.
Moving the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem would mark a reversal of almost seven decades of US policy. Presidents from both parties have consistently refused to move the US Embassy to Jerusalem because it would impede efforts for peace, quite likely lead to fatal, tragic violence, and create dangerous hostility to Americans. Congress, at…
Chaim Levinson reports in Ha’aretz that there is a “conspiracy of silence” about Israeli torture. The fact that Israel tortures prisoners has been exposed many times. In 1977 the London Sunday Times described it; award winning journalist and author Grace Halsell described it in her 1081 book Journey to Jerusalem and an article; Israeli torture of American…
The Forward reports that Jewish groups successfully worked to prevent the Women’s March on Washington from officially including Palestine: “Jewish groups intensified their engagement with the platform-production process” and felt “very good with the results.” “The way to deal with it was by sitting around the table, talking and editing,” said Nancy Kaufman, CEO of the National Council of Jewish Women.
The agreement was an instrument in which Israel could pursue traditional objectives, including settling the “Whole Land of Israel.” Settlement building could accelerate, “security” in occupied Palestine was subcontracted to Palestinian “security forces” who protected Israeli settlers but not Palestinians, and many of the costs of the occupation were borne by other countries. Whitbeck gives an eye-witness analysis of what went wrong.
Philip Giraldi reports that the Israel-first, pro-war neocons and their affiliated think tanks aren’t having the power under Trump that they expected under Hillary. “That the defeat of Hillary was also a defeat of the neoconservatives and their alphabet soup of institutes and think tanks is sometimes overlooked.” Giraldi writes: Many of the Trump dissidents like…