Video: "The Middle East Today: A post-Arab-spring analysis" from AIPAC Policy Conference. Bret Stephens, Robert Satloff, & Amos Harel (Ha'aretz)

"The Middle East Today: A post-Arab-spring analysis" from the most recent AIPAC Policy Conference in Washington, March 2013.

Robert Satloff: Executive Director, Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Amos Harel: Ha'aretz newspaper, military correspondent and defense analyst
Bret Stephens: Foreign affairs columnist & Editorial Board member, The Wall St. Journal
Moderator: David Victor: former President, AIPAC



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Audience questions and panelists' answers 

Amb. John Bolton: Assessing Obama admin's ability to protect the free-world in defeating Islamofascism

Will our world be safer since 9/11, Iraq, and Afghanistan under Obama (& Hillary's) administration's management? Former U.N. Amb. John Bolton's address to the American Freedom Alliance, September 11, '11 at the Intercontintal Hotel in Century City, Los Angeles.



Amb. Bolton assesses how the Obama administration has proven itself unwilling or incapable to protect the world from Islamofascism.

Muslim Brotherhood reveals make-up at Cairo rally "One day we'll kill all Jews!"

Arab hate: A Muslim Brotherhood rally in Cairo's most prominent mosque Friday turned into a venomous anti-Israel protest, with attendants vowing to "one day kill all Jews."

Winds of Jihad Blog by Sheik Yer'mami:

“All Jews- not just Zionists, as the so-called “moderate Muslims” in the west keep telling us.  The world stands by in eery silence, just like 1938."

Some 5,000 people joined the rally, called to promote the "battle against Jerusalem's Judaization." The event coincided with the anniversary of the United Nations' partition plan in 1947, which called for the establishment of a Jewish state.

Speakers at the event delivered impassioned, hateful speeches against Israel, slamming the "Zionist occupiers" and the "treacherous Jews." Upon leaving the rally, worshippers were given small flags, with Egypt's flag on one side and the Palestinian flag on the other, as well as maps of Jerusalem's Old City detailing where "Zionists are aiming to change Jerusalem's Muslim character."

Muslim Brotherhood spokesmen, as well as Palestinian guest speakers, made explicit calls for Jihad and for liberating the whole of Palestine. Time and again, a Koran quote vowing that "one day we shall kill all the Jews" was uttered at the site. Meanwhile, businessmen in the crowd were urged to invest funds in Jerusalem in order to prevent the acquisition of land and homes by Jews.

Speaking to Ynet outside the mosque following the prayer, elementary school teacher Ala al-Din said that "all Egyptian Muslims are willing to embark on Jihad for the sake of Palestine."

"Why is the US losing in Afghanistan? Because the other side is willing and wants to die. We have a different mentality than that of the Americans and Jews," he said.

Eldad Beck is reporting from Cairo on behalf of Ynet and Yedioth Akhronot. Roee Nahmias contributed to the story. Published November 25, 2011 in YNet News.com


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The Arab Spring/Summer signals the autumn for Western illusions of Middle East stability

Triumphant: A group of rebels ride through the centre of Tripoli yesterday
as others fought running battles with pro-Gaddafi troops
 as they battled to save the city (Photo: Daily Mail)

"Why this is the moment Libya's Islamic extremists have prayed for" By John R. Bradley in the Daily Mail Online

The fall of the Libyan capital represents a clear victory for freedom over tyranny, they tell us, and a new country — defined by an enthusiastic embrace of democracy, pluralism and representative government — will emerge. However, we have been here twice before in the Middle East in recent months. First, when Tunisia’s strongman, Zine El-Abidene Ben Ali, fled Tunis, and then when Egypt’s dictator Hosni Mubarak vacated the presidential palace in Cairo.  

Rebel leader Abdul Jalil says his opposition forces had chosen to start their first attack on Tripoli on the 20th day of Ramadan, which marks the ancient Islamic Battle of Badr, when Muslims fought for the holy city of Mecca in AD 624. That hardly inspires confidence in a secular, liberal future for Libya.  

The fiercely independent Islamists, moreover, will not relent on their demands for an Islamist state. In the transitional council’s draft constitution it is clearly stated that Islamic law will be ‘the principal source of legislation’. Nato, then, can at best achieve replacing the Gaddafi regime with an Islamist-infiltrated tribal council. And that means Libya is as far as ever from being a Western-style democracy. Indeed, it is more likely to turn into the West’s worst nightmare. 

Rachel Lipkin, the Egyptian born Jewess and ex-Israeli government interpreter, gleans info from studying Arab media. Her husband, Avi Lipkin, interprets it and shares it in books, videos, and lectures in English. Last week, he presented his interpretation of the differences between Western culture and Arab/Islamic culture in a presentation to LA's ACT! for America, San Fernando Valley Chapter.



In "The End of Normal," Daniel Greenfield of Sultan Knish, illuminates the social, cultural, and political distinctions which Westerners mis-understand in forging treaties with Muslim cultures which don't abide by Western expectations.

Western diplomats have been convinced that solving the Rubik's Cube of the Muslim-Israeli conflict is the key to regional stability. But the Arab Spring disproves it on both points. 

The Arab Spring is a reminder that it is only a bit player in the larger dramas of the Muslim world. A scapegoat for Muslim states who come to terms with it behind the scenes, while using their state controlled media to spread paranoid and bigoted conspiracy theories about it. And a reminder that no treaty can create regional stability when it can hardly outlast the men who sign their names to it. 

Even if a Palestinian state is created, what of the Kurds, who have also acted as the Palestinians of Turkey, Iran, Syria and Iraq. And what of the countless stateless ethnic and religious minorities in the region. What of the Iranian refugees in Camp Ashraf who duplicate on a smaller scale the dilemma of Palestinian refugee camps. Even if all these people received their own micro-states, the violence would still not end. And if it somehow did, that would only mean less proxy warfare through terrorist groups and more direct confrontations between regional armies. Is that something anyone really wants? 

The Middle East has never been normal, or rather it is as close to normal for a baseline that goes back thousands of years. The progressive model applied to the West has no relevance to its Muslim conquerors. And there is no normalization to be had anywhere here. 

If the Arab Spring has accomplished anything, it is to destroy the illusion that a treaty signing and a handshake will stabilize the region and allow Israeli mothers to stop worrying about their sons. These childish ideas have created an entire peace industry built on expectations that have not been realized anywhere in the region. 

It is a moral and mental laziness that the peace depends upon. A willingness by the public to believe sentimental slogans about the power of love and of politicians to think that a shortcut to market stability can be reached with territorial concessions and foreign aid. This laziness carries as high a price as war, but with far less to show for it. 

The Pax Americana is losing its grip on the Middle East, and its American and European leaders are pressuring the one country still intimidated by them. The one regional democracy that they can count on as an ally.