Trump makes vital point at UN

In his address to the insufferable UN, president Donald Trump made the following clear:

US President Donald Trump warned against unilateral recognition of a Palestinian state during his address to the UN General Assembly on Tuesday, saying it would amount to rewarding Hamas for its atrocities while hostages remain in captivity. “This would be a reward for these horrible atrocities, including October 7th, even while they refuse to release the hostages or accept a ceasefire,” Trump said.

The President stressed the urgency of halting the conflict in Gaza. “We have got to come together, and we will come together. We have to stop the war in Gaza immediately. We have to get it done. We have to negotiate peace,” he declared.

Trump sharply criticized Hamas for rejecting ceasefire proposals and for continuing to hold hostages. “Instead of giving in to Hamas ransom demands, those who want peace should be united with one message: release the hostages now,” he said, emphasizing that the remaining captives must be returned together and without delay. He also mentioned the bodies of 38 victims, saying their families deserve their return “very quickly and very badly, as though they were alive.”

He's right that those countries who said they'd recognize a "palestinian state" without any historical proof that a Muslim/Arab state of that sort ever existed have done a horrible thing that only continues to embolden Israel's enemies. Senator John Fetterman also made this point:

Hamas views the move by Western nations to recognize a Palestinian state as a "reward," Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa., told Newsmax Tuesday.

France recognized Palestinian statehood on Monday at the start of a high-profile meeting at the United Nations aimed at galvanizing support for a two-state solution to the Middle East conflict. Andorra, Belgium, Luxembourg, Malta, and Monaco also announced or confirmed their recognition of a Palestinian state — a day after the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, and Portugal did.

"Yes, it's a reward, but it also creates a narrative. And I even hear what Hamas is saying, like, This is part of the sacrifice, and now it's all made it all worth it," Fetterman said during an appearance on "The Record With Greta Van Susteren.”

The Pennsylvania senator is unique among his Democrat colleagues in that he supports Israel's actions.

"I support what they continue to do because I don't understand why in the world these countries now are looking to recognize Palestine. Why aren't they demanding — before we do anything — to release all those hostages?" he added.

All this is why sanctions have been imposed upon the PLO along with Hamas in the USA, and even in Israel, there's considerations to that effect. The European governments appeasing the Hamas are a disgrace to history, and have only made things worse for their own countries since it doesn't change what the Islamic Koran commands doing to infidels.

Neturei Karta meet with Iranian officials at the UN

This isn't the first time the ultra-Orthodox clan that's even worse than the Satmar met with Iranian officials, but they're back at their anti-Israel mission again, meeting with the Iranian "president" at the UN in the past week or so:

Members of Neturei Karta, an extreme anti-Zionist ultra-Orthodox Jewish sect, met with Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly on Wednesday.

"We found that throughout the history of the Islamic Republic of Iran, they respected and protected the Jewish community till today and you're only distinguishing that Zionism has nothing to do with the religion and the occupation is unacceptable,” said the Neturei Karta members who met with Raisi.

Oh, do tell us some more taqqiya, please. Very few Jews live in Iran today, if at all, and violent hostility to being Israeli is the order of the day with their dictatorship and the Religion of Peace. All these attempts to separate between Zionism and Israeli history have long become severely offensive.

Neturei Karta opposes the modern state of Israel on religious grounds, regularly protesting against the Jewish state. They have regularly met with Holocaust deniers as well as leaders of the Iranian regime and the Hamas terror organization in the Gaza Strip.

"I have heard that there are anti-Zionist Jews here and this is a great thing," said Raisi. "We always reiterate the fact that we have no issue whatsoever with the Jewish faith, with the Torah, and in Iran, the Jews have freedom of religion. Our only issue is with the Zionists."

Forget it, they do have issues with the Torah and Judaism, because the Torah/Bible affirms the Jewish connections with the land of Israel. And these 5th columnist Karta kreeps continue their awful efforts to undermine Israel, and it wouldn't be shocking if they were against judicial reform, and the secular leftists opposing it were more than perfectly comfy with Karta too.

President Trump's Speech To The United Nations (September 24, 2019)

HEAR! HEAR!

AMERICA FIRST!

"The future doesn't belong to globalists. The future belongs to patriots. The future belongs to strong independent nations."

US Exits UN "Global Compact on Migration"

WINNING!

AND THEN THERE'S THIS:

Europe's Migrant Crisis: Millions Still to Come https://t.co/8wvGU2UsrI

— Voice of Europe (@V_of_Europe) December 4, 2017

Nikki Haley to UN on North Korea: "The Last Time The U.S. Made Clear, If They Chose The Path of Peace, The World Would Live In Peace With Them, Yesterday They Made a Choice"

Donald Trump's Congressional Testimony on the Construction Cost Overruns of the United Nations Building, and How To Fix The Problem

People don't like Donald Trump.

There is no doubt. The man looks like a buffoon.

He is a reality television star.

He talks as if he knows everything.

He makes pronouncements like a drunk standup at a comedy club.

He is an embarrassment.

But he is not truly an idiot. He is a man of his time, of the media world, who knows how to communicate in soundbites.

He is a "Great Communicator", one who knows how to manipulate the confines of our LOL age.

He is well-aware of his buffoonish nature. He has a bitter of Shakespeare's Hal in him.

Truth is, he wouldn't be as successful as he is, if he were not able to buckle down and focus when the situation calls for it.

At a time like that, he ceases to be the buffoon.

A few years back, Trump was called to testify before Congress on the subject of the cost overruns on the reconstruction of the United Nations building.

His testimony was focused, intelligent, and concise, considering the massive amount of information and analytics he had to deal with in his testimony.

I came away convinced that Trump did not just get lucky in the business world. I also came away convinced that Trump knows how to work a room, any room. The man is a communicator, on whatever level he needs to communicate on at the time, for the specific purpose of a specific setting.

I am not predisposed to liking Trump. I do not like much of his politics. But I do like his anti-immigration stance, and his no-nonsense quality.

Oh, by the way, in his testimony, Trump noted that the cost they were projecting was $1.2 billion. Trump said he could do it for $750 million.

Trump PREDICTED that in three years, cost overruns by the company contracted would bring the project to $3 Billion.

Currently, it seems, the cost is at almost $2.6 Billion:

As of March 2014, the cost overrun was estimated at $370 million — a 19 per cent increase. Turning to the estimated final cost of the Plan, he noted its amount of $2.21 million and that 99.2 per cent of the estimated costs to completion had been expended and/or committed. Noting that the responsibilities for the post-renovation construction and close-out activities would be transferred from the Plan’s Office to the Office of Central Support Service, he sought assurances that Plan-related costs would be borne by that Office under the regular budget.

So Trump was right, even if a little off.

Read his testimony. Watch the video. Tell me what you think:

TESTIMONY OF DONALD J. TRUMP,\1\ CHAIRMAN AND PRESIDENT, 

THE TRUMP ORGANIZATION


Mr. Trump. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman and Members of 
the Subcommittee. It is a great honor to have been invited, and 
if I can lend a hand, I would certainly love to do so.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    \1\ The prepared statement of Mr. Trump with attachments appears in 
the appendix on page 315.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    I have to start by saying I am a big fan, a very big fan of 
the United Nations and all it stands for. I cannot speak as to 
what has been happening over the last number of years because 
it certainly has not been good, but the concept of the United 
Nations and the fact that the United Nations is in New York is 
very important to me and very important to the world as far as 
I am concerned. So I am a big fan, such a fan in fact that at 
great expense I built a building across the street. It is the 
tallest apartment house in the world. It has been a 
tremendously successful building, sold out, and I am very proud 
of it. And if the United Nations were not there, perhaps I 
would not have built it in that location, so it means quite a 
bit to me.
    My involvement with the United Nations began with a letter, 
which I will give to the Subcommittee, from the Ambassador to 
the United Nations from Sweden, and it is a long letter and a 
very beautifully written letter, and essentially he read an 
article about the success of Trump World Tower, which is the 
building that I can show you right here, which is, as you can 
see, very substantially taller than the United Nations, bigger 
than the United Nations. And he read an article in the New York 
Times saying that the building cost approximately $300 million 
to build.
    So he wrote me a letter and ultimately called me and said, 
``Is it possible that that building cost $300 million, because 
it just seems so much bigger and so much better and so much 
more expensive and so much more luxurious, and how could you 
have done that for $300 million?'' When at that time, Senator, 
they were talking about $1.5 billion to renovate the United 
Nations and this was around December 2000. I said, well, there 
are only two reasons, either gross incompetence or something 
far worse than that, and you know what the something is, and 
that is corruption, because there is absolutely no way that 
that building could have cost $1.5 billion to build.
    And I did a chart, and I looked at other buildings, and I 
heard the numbers today. I am very impressed with Mr. Burnham, 
but Mr. Burnham, it is not his business. Mr. Burnham is in a 
different business. The man he hired who has done some work, I 
guess, has just been on the payroll for 2 days, so perhaps he 
will be a great genius and he will bring down the cost to what 
it should be, which I think is about $700 million tops, and 
that is complete.
    But I did a little chart, and I looked at buildings that 
were comparable that I built, and I looked at fees also, 
architectural fees. The architectural fee for this building--
and you have to understand a residential luxury building is far 
more complex than an open-floor office building to build. It is 
much more. You have many more bathrooms, you have many more 
kitchens, you have many more rooms. It is more complex. An 
office building is essentially open space with subdividers.
    So I looked at it and I added up some of my costs, and for 
Trump World Tower, across the street, built not long ago, I 
spent approximately $258 a foot. It is the tallest residential 
building in the world, $258.32 a foot. I have 871,000 feet. It 
cost $225 million to build.
    Anybody that says that a building of renovation is more 
expensive than building a new building does not know the 
business ...

New World Order: Unanimous Vote At The UN

The tool for the global redistribution of wealth:

Obama Ambassador to UN Quotes COMMUNIST to Push New Socialist UN Sustainable Development Goals

It’s official. On Friday morning [September 25, 2015] the United States, and 192 other nations, unanimously adopted the new United Nations Sustainable Development goals. These “goals“, designed to eradicate world poverty and fight Climate Change, include the Socialist ideals of universal healthcare, universal education, universal employment, and wealth redistribution, all of which must in place by 2030.

Read the rest HERE.

The Iran Deal: Super Power Poker

The wry and terrible truth:


Since this video was created, the deal is done. And the United Nations Security Council has blessed it.

Is This True? UN Caught Posting New York "DDR" Jobs for DISARMAMENT?

midnight rider updates at bottom

UPDATES AT BOTTOM OF POST



PASTORIUS NOTE --- DEBUNK THE FOLLOWING, PLEASE! 

MAKE IT STOP!

The United Nations accepting applications forProfessional Gun Grabbers for multiple missions in New York.

The Title Of The Positions They Are Looking To Fill IsDisarmament, Demobilization, And Reintegration Officers.

The Required Work Experience Includes “Small Arms Control”And “Conflict/Post-Conflict Crisis Management.”

ONLY ENGLISH LANGUAGE FLUENCY IS REQUIRED FOR THESEPOSITIONS.

UN Caught Posting New York "DDR" Jobs for DISARMAMENT! 
THIS IS A REAL JOB ANNOUNCEMENT

IT IS NOT A HOAX

US CITIZENSHIP IS NOT A JOB REQUIREMENT FOR THIS POSITION. 

COULD THIS POSSIBLY BE TRUE?


---


UPDATE -

Ok, already I see that there was a job like this listed back in 2012.

And that job listing/opening has since expired.

It seems to be true that, if you click around on the UN Jobs List website, that they do, indeed, post jobs with a note as to where the deployment will be.

For instance, click here and you'll see you can go to the Congo and serve as a "Technical Officer" dealing with Pandemics and Influenza.

But the fact that this "DDR" job was listed two years ago, and nothing has come of it makes it seem to me to probably be something innocuous.

Anyway, like I said, I'm looking for the seemingly inevitable debunking. I think this HAS to be bullshit.

Someone, please, offer me an explanation.

midnight rider updates:

This appears very much to be aimed at restoring/keeping the peace in conflict areas after the conflict. Collect the weapons from the good and bad guys. Tell them they were good and bad guys. Get 'em jobs. Turn their swords and Kalashnikovs and rocket launchers into ploughshares. That sort of thing.

Keep in mind the U.N. is a global entity (for better or worse). Just because they're headquartered in New York (THROW THEM OUT!) does not necessarily mean we're their main focus of every seemingly freedom abridging action.

Besides, if they were to try to disarm Americans I am rather certain they would create a conflict zone (and a helluva one at that) when we turned our guns on those trying to disarm us.

From the Untied Nations DDR section:

Disarmament, Demobilization and Reintegration

Disarmament, demobilization and reintegration (DDR) has become an integral part of post-conflict peace consolidation, featuring prominently in the mandates of peacekeeping operations over the last twenty years.  

UN Photo/Martine Perret

UN Police officers completing a successful weapons recovery operation.

DDR activities are crucial components of both the initial stabilization of warn-torn societies as well as their long-term development. DDR must be integrated into the entire peace process from the peace negotiations through peacekeeping and follow-on peacebuilding activities in Timor-Leste.
Disarmament is the collection, documentation, control and disposal of small arms, ammunition, explosives and light and heavy weapons from combatants and often from the civilian population.
Demobilization is the formal and controlled discharge of active combatants from armed forces and groups, including a phase of “reinsertion” which provides short-term assistance to ex-combatants.
Reintegration is the process by which ex-combatants acquire civilian status and gain sustainable employment and income. It is a political, social and economic process with an open time-frame, primarily taking place in communities at the local level.
The objective of the DDR process is to contribute to security and stability in post-conflict environments so that recovery and development can begin. DDR helps create an enabling environment for political and peace processes by dealing with security problem that arises when ex-combatants are trying to adjust to normal life, during the vital transition period from conflict to peace and development.
DDR supports ex-combatants to become active participants in the peace process through:

• removing weapons from the hands of combatants;
• taking the combatants out of military structures;
• integrating combatants socially and economically into society.

Where do we do it?

We support DDR processes through several of our missions:

• Democratic Republic of the Congo - UN Organization Stabilization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (MONUSCO)
• Côte d’Ivoire - UN Operation in Côte d'Ivoire (UNOCI)
• Haiti - UN Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH), through Community Violence Reduction

We are at the planning stages for both Darfur/Sudan - African Union-UN Hybrid Operation in Darfur (UNAMID) and Somalia - UN Political Office for Somalia (UNPOS)*.
We also provide operational advice and support to:

• Burundi - UN Integrated Peace-Building Office in Burundi (BINUB)*
• Central African Republic - United Nations Integrated Peace-building Office in the Central African Republic (BINUCA)*
• Guinea-Bissau - UN Integrated Peace-building Office in Guinea-Bissau (UNIOGBIS)*

 * Special Political Missions led by the UN Department of Political Affairs.

"UN" Trucks In Alabama - WTF?

Anonymous comments:

The vehicles appear to come equipped with M231 firing port weapon ports. The question that you really need to ask is, are they being produced here and then shipped overseas, or have they been built somewhere else and are now being delivered here for use by international UN troops on American soil?   

I don't recognize a weapon's port on these vehicles, but I'm not very swift at that stuff.

Anyone else got any comments?

AND THEN THERE'S THIS, from Will at THE OTHER NEWS:

These Tanks were seen being Transported in GA. this week along with UN Trucks.It's going on in 5 other States also.

To my untrained eye, those look like regular old, U.S. military tanks.

Am I wrong?

Obama Moving Quickly On His Agenda

Two recent items from the Washington Times:

1. Gun ban back on Obama’s agenda:

That didn't take long. Less than a day after President Obama's re-election, the administration breathed new life into the United Nations' previously comatose treaty regulating guns.

Last July, the U.N. General Assembly began formal discussion of the Arms Trade Treaty, which seeks to establish "common international standards for the import, export and transfer of conventional arms." Talks on the controversial agreement were put on indefinite hiatus after the United States requested an extension to the time allotted to negotiate the agreement. Gun rights supporters blasted the treaty as it inched toward approval, and many suspected U.S. procedural maneuvers were intended to delay the treaty so it wouldn't become a topic of discussion during the election. It appears these suspicions were correct since "indefinite" turned out to mean until hours after Mr. Obama was re-elected....

Read the rest HERE.

2. Keystone pipeline pushed to forefront:

With a second term now in hand, President Obama no longer can delay a decision on the Keystone XL pipeline and must either side with environmentalists within his party or greenlight a major step toward North American energy independence.

The pipeline decision could be an early sign for the direction of Mr. Obama's green agenda for the next four years, after a campaign in which he sparred with Republican opponent Mitt Romney over the pipeline and on issues such as subsidies for alternative energy companies, the future of the coal industry, and drilling policy on federal lands and along the nation's coasts.

Green-energy and environmental groups said Wednesday that they were buoyed by the president's re-election and that they think it will kick off another chapter for clean energy in America. Mr. Obama's previous attempt to tackle carbon emissions, the ill-fated and unpopular "cap-and-trade bill," died in the Democrat-dominated Congress during Mr. Obama's first two years in office, but many of the president's supporters see his re-election as an opportunity to resurrect it....

Read the rest HERE.

We frequently hear that we will see a President's real agenda in that President's second term because he no longer has to consider tempering his policies so as to get re-elected.

The above two items are just the beginning of the Obama Agenda.  In his 2012 victory speech, he uttered, "The best is yet to come."

We're about to discover what he means by the best, and the meaning will become clear with great alacrity!

UN-Funded Teachers Refuse To Teach The Holocaust Because "It Harms The Palestinian Cause"

From Times of Israel: 

Rumors of a UN decision to re-introduce Holocaust studies in schools run by UNRWA — the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian refugees — have raised the ire of Jordanian teachers, who say they will refuse to teach history that “harms the Palestinian cause.”

In a statement issued Monday, the Executive Committee of UNRWA teachers in Jordan responded to rumors that Holocaust studies would be reintroduced this year to the enrichment curriculum on conflict resolution, which is taught in schools operated by the UN agency in Palestinian refugee camps.

“We condemn this decision, which equates the butcher and the victim,” read the teachers’ statement, demanding instead to introduce classes on the Palestinian “right of return” to Israel and the history of the 1948 war with Israel.

Some 2 million Palestinian refugees are registered with UNRWA’s Jordan offices. The UN agency operates 172 schools in 10 refugee camps across the kingdom, serving a total of over 122,000 students.

Keep reading…

Criminalizing Free Speech

(With thanks to Will)

The following amounts to blasphemy laws, which will further Islamic supremacism:

The European Union has offered to host the next meeting of the so-called Istanbul Process, an aggressive effort by Muslim countries to make it an international crime to criticize Islam.

The announcement comes less than one month after the United States hosted its own Istanbul Process conference in Washington, DC.

The Istanbul Process – its explicit aim is to enshrine in international law a global ban on all critical scrutiny of Islam and/or Islamic Sharia law – is being spearheaded by the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), a bloc of 57 Muslim countries.

[...]

The OIC therefore scored a diplomatic coup when the Obama Administration agreed to host a three-day Istanbul Process conference in Washington, DC on December 12-14, 2011. In doing so, the United States gave the OIC the political legitimacy it has been seeking to globalize its initiative to ban criticism of Islam.

[...]

The OIC is especially angry over its inability to silence a growing number of democratically elected politicians in Europe who have voiced concerns over the refusal of Muslim immigrants to integrate into their host countries and the consequent establishment of parallel Islamic societies in many parts of Europe....

Much more HERE. Read it and weep.

Why is the West so determined to commit suicide?

Obama's UN Speech Displeases Palestinian Official

The head shake heard around the world appears around time marker 1:50. The entire video is worth your time:



From the Daily Mail:

...The graphic show of displeasure by a Palestinian official at the speech will enrage White House aides who want to promote Mr Obama’s bid to play a central role in finding a Middle East breakthrough....

That aspect aside, how did the early part of the above video — the portions supporting Israel and delineating her travails with Islamic terrorism and anti-Semitism — go over in the Islamic world? Note this recent column in a Saudi newspaper; the essay takes the position that Hitler was right about the Jews.

Palestinian Authority Threatens US Over Security Council Veto

From this source:

Palestinian Authority officials on Saturday threatened the United States saying vetoing its statehood bid in the United Nations Security Council next week would "destroy" the so-called two-state solution.

The warning came hours after PA chairman Mahmoud Abbas announced in a speech in Ramallah that he would ask the UN Security Council to accept membership of a PA state despite a firm US warning the move would fail.

Chief PLO negotiator Saeb Erekat warned a US veto would not only destroy the two-state solution, but could lead to the dismantling of the PA.

"Anyone who supports the two-state solution should back the Palestinian effort [at the UN]," he said.

Erekat hinted that if the PLO dismantles the PA, it would subsequently insisting on the 'right of return' for millions of 'Palestinian refugees' to Israel.

[...]

US lawmakers in Congress, over State Department objections, have overwhelmingly called on the Obama administration to cut funding to the PA should it present its bid to the world body.

So, what will Obama do now?

About Those Slain U.N. Workers

From AOL News:

"They were killed when they were running out of the bunker," said Staffan de Mistura, the top U.N. envoy in Afghanistan, who recounted their harrowing deaths to reporters on Saturday evening. "One was pulled out alive because he pretended to be a Muslim."

[...]


When the killers forced themselves inside they saw Pavel Ershov, the mission chief who is fluent in Dari, one of two languages spoken in Afghanistan. They beat him, but stopped after he convinced them, in Dari, that he was a Muslim, de Mistura said.

[...]

President Hamid Karzai publicly condemned the March 20 Quran burning, leading some to blame him for triggering the protests. De Mistura, however, blamed the person who torched the holy book.

[...]

"Freedom of speech does not mean freedom of offending culture, religion or traditions," de Mistura said. "Those who entered our building were actually furiously angry about the issue about the Quran. There was nothing political there."...

Interesting words: "nothing political there." Is de Mistura equating Islam with politics? If so, he has admitted that Islam is both religion and politics, in other words, a geopolitical ideology.

And just how does de Mistura define "freedom of speech?" It's fine as long as it doesn't offend anyone? That way lies madness.

Posts for Nov 5th: Ramala's 5-Star Hotel, Abdel Hameed Shehadeh, Sexual Harrassment in Egypt, ISAF kills Haqqani network leader, Soutudeh in danger, US Human Rights reacord scrutinized in UNHRC,

1. Ramallah gets five star luxury hotel: The hotel, a franchise of the Swiss-based Movenpick chain, has 171 rooms and suites, an outdoor pool, and a fitness center, and cost $40 million.
   
2. UK: Jihadist webmaster Abdel Hameed Shehadeh held without bail in Brooklyn Federal Court: Abdel Hameed Shehadeh, 21, of Staten Island, was arrested last week in Hawaii, where he had tried in the past to travel to Somalia, but failed because he was on a “no fly” list.
   
3. Egypt: Challenging sexual harrassment on Cairo's streets: The project, called HarassMap, aims to create a map of the ‘hotspots’ of harassment in Cairo – that is, the places where harassment most frequently occurs.
   
4. Afghanistan: fifth Haqqani network leader confirmed killed during Paktiya operation: Intelligence reports later confirmed the death of the five Haqqani leaders as well as several additional Haqqani fighters. It is assessed the security force had broken up a Haqqani leadership meeting.
   
5. Iran: Life of Jailed Human Rights Lawyer at great risk: On Sunday, 31 October, Nasrin Sotoudeh, one of Iran’s most prominent human rights lawyers went on a dry hunger strike protesting her detention and ill treatment inside Tehran’s Evin prison. Her family reported that her health is quickly deteriorating.
   
6. UN: Cuba, Venezuela, Iran top the list of countries lining up to scrutinize US Human Rights during UN review: ccording to diplomats cited Wednesday by a Geneva-based NGO, U.N. Watch, Cuban officials “took the lead last week in circulating an advance sign-up sheet.” “We are concerned that Iran, Cuba, Venezuela and other non-democracies are planning to hijack the session to score propaganda points and drum up anti-American sentiment worldwide,” said the organization’s executive director, Hillel Neuer.
   
7. UK: Al-Qaeda terrorist arrested: Talking to the Royal United Services Institute, May revealed that an associate of al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula was arrested earlier this year and is suspected of planning an attack on the country. This terrorist unit has been blamed for the cargo bomb plot on the US just last week, which was intercepted. The bombs were found in printer cartridge packages in Dubai and Britain and were being mailed to the US. It’s believed that Anwar al-Awlaki, a US national and al-Qaeda leader, was the mastermind behind the attack from his base in Yemen.

The People's Cube.com

U.N.: Vote on 'Religious Defamation' Resolution to be held in December

For the sixth year in a row, the U.N. General Assembly will vote in December on a resolution presented by the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) that calls on governments to act against “religious defamation.”

Similar resolutions have been passed every year since 1999 by the U.N.’s main human rights body. However, in both the UNGA and the Geneva-based Human Rights Council, the resolutions have drawn declining support in recent years.
Last December’s UNGA vote passed by 80-61, with 42 countries abstaining. The 19 vote margin was the smallest number yet; margins in the four previous years’ votes had ranged from 33 to 57.
Over the past five years, only seven countries have changed their position to “no.” The rest of the difference has been the result of non-Muslim developing countries shifting from supporting the measure, to abstaining.
Those who oppose the resolution, including religious freedom, freedom of expression, legal and humanist advocacy groups, believe that this trend will continue until the OIC measure fails altogether.
But the OIC is hoping that incidents over the past year, especially the Quran-burning and “Ground Zero mosque” episodes in the U.S. and the Swiss ban on the building of minarets, will help to rally supporters.
Although the OIC resolutions profess to cover all religions, only Islam and Muslims are cited by name. Last year’s text expressed concern that “Islam is frequently and wrongly associated with human rights violations and terrorism” and referred also to the “ethnic and religious profiling of Muslim minorities.”
While the resolutions themselves are non-binding, they open the door for the OIC's attempts to amend the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, which is legally binding.
Christian ministries working among persecuted religious minorities are ramping up their lobbying of governments that have voted for the resolution or abstained in the past, and are calling for public support.

via Christian Web News - cwnewz.com - U.N. to Vote on 'Religious Defamation' Resolution.

Open Doors USA has launched an advocacy campaign against this UN Resolution, on the basis that it's against freedom of religion.

Cross-posted from T&P.

Another Reason For All Those Missing "Moderate" Muslims

While grazing through Trencherbone's excellent "Everything You Need to Know About Islam"
compendium, I cam across this address by Ibn Warraq on the subject of Islam, apostasy and the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The whole thing is well worth the read, but this paragraph jumped right out:


Any verbal denial of any principle of Muslim belief is considered apostasy. If one declares, for example, that the universe has always existed from eternity or that God has a material substance, then one is an apostate. If one denies the unity of God or confesses to a belief in reincarnation, one is guilty of apostasy. Certain acts are also deemed acts of apostasy, for example treating a copy of the Koran disrespectfully, by burning it or even soiling it in some way. Some doctors of Islamic law claim that a Muslim becomes an apostate if he or she enters a church, worships an idol, or learns and practises magic. A Muslim becomes an apostate if he defames the Prophet's character, morals or virtues, and denies Muhammad's prophethood and that he was the seal of the prophets.


(Just an idle thought, but if Muhammad was the seal of the prophets, could he balance a ball on his nose while flapping his flippers together? For a fish?)

While such action may not be subject to enforcement of the death penalty against apostasy from Islam -- here or in other Muslim and non-Muslim countries -- the "chilling effect" of this traditional attitude expresses itself in the Muslim's fear of being ostracized by the Ummah for speaking out too boldly about the shortcomings of the Krayon, the cruelties built into Sharia, the injustice of accusations by Islamists against the West, arrogant jihadist imams seeking to build a rabat at Ground Zero, and the numerous other inconvenies living in a kuffar country imposes upon the Believers. They may secretly hope the jihad will fail and that they can continue their comfortable lifestyle amongst the kuffar. Let those such as Imam Rauf taqiyya away about "building bridges". The average "moderate muslim" is more concerned about not "burning bridges" with the Ummah if s/he can possibly avoid it.

Senator Cornyn (R-TX) Seeks to Have Ahmadinejad Banned from US

April 29, 2010 4:15 PM ET
Senator Seeks to Ban Iranian President From U.S.

With diplomats in New York saying that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad could attend next week’s United Nations conference on a nuclear weapons treaty, Sen. John Cornyn, R-TX, a member of leadership, penned a letter Thursday to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton asking that the foreign leader be barred from entry into the U.S. The conference is set to review the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty at its headquarters in New York starting Monday.

“This is preposterous, and allowing it to happen will make a mockery of the effort to stop the spread of nuclear weapons to rogue states and terrorist groups. There is simply no compelling reason for Ahmadinejad to be allowed to enter the United States,” Cornyn says in the letter, obtained by Fox News and to be released on Friday, with the senator noting that Iran is still designated a state sponsor of terrorism.

This comes amid increasing tensions over Iran’s nuclear program and what western countries believe is its intention to develop nuclear weapons. Ahmadinejad has maintained that his country wants nuclear power for energy purposes not to make bombs. Both the UN and Congress are considering the imposition of additional sanctions against Tehran.

A State Department spokesman said Thursday that the Iranian delegation presented applications for visas this morning at the U.S. embassy in Bern. Those visas, the spokesman said, are being processed.

Cornyn, a member of the Judiciary Committee and former judge on the TX Supreme Court, cites a section of the Enhanced Border Security and Visa Entry Reform Act of 2002 and states, “…your Department can deny a nonimmigrant visa to any alien from a country that is so designated, regardless of that alien’s official status. As such, the U.S. Government has the legal authority to deny Ahmadinejad’s request and bar his entry – even if he is transiting only to the UN.”

Secretary Clinton told reporters Thursday, according to the Associated Press, that the Iranian President would not be permitted to cause a disturbance at the conference, but Cornyn, in his letter that he is circulating to colleagues for signature, says Ahmadinejad should not be granted entry under any circumstances.

"The mission of those of us going to New York to review, revise and reinvigorate the NPT regime is very clear. If that's not his mission, then it won't be a particularly useful or productive trip on his part," Clinton said.

"If he believes that by coming he can somehow divert attention from this very important global effort or cause confusion that might possibly throw into doubt what Iran has been up to ... then I don't believe he will have a particularly receptive audience," the secretary said.

Cornyn says in his letter, which he is circulating to colleagues for their signature, that should the Iranian President be permitted entry into the U.S., “We request that you severely restrict his movement, limiting it to the UN Headquarters District. “

Members of Congress have, in the past, tried to bar entry for the Iranian leader. The U.S. has, at times in the past, barred entry into the U.S. for some Iranian officials.

There is a copy of the letter here.