Copyright Disclaimer Under Section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976?Fair use is a use permitted by copyright statute that might otherwise be infringing. Non-profit, educational or personal use tips the balance in favor of fair use. Unless you are in this field of investigative journalism, especially covering extremely sensitive subjects and potentially dangerous subjects as well, you simply cannot understand the complexities and difficulties involved with this work that I face every day.
A tuberculosis outbreak at Grant Union High School in Sacramento is
providing a glimpse into the new reality we will face under Hussein
Obama’s open borders.
It used to be that health screenings were a common part of the
immigration process, and they still are for those who respect the
country and its laws enough to go through the system.
For today’s modern border-crashers, under our “if you can get here
you can stay” policy, physicals are a minor consideration only for those
apprehended and released. Those who are able to evade our severely
understaffed Border Patrol agents can bring their infections in with
them and share them with the American citizens and our families.
One student at Grant Union tested positive for TB in February, and
that led to more testing which revealed four other students who were
infected with active TB. The Sacramento County Department of Health and
Human Services spokesperson, Laura McCasland, said that the three related cases are considered an outbreak.
Four of the originally discovered student’s friends and relatives
also have contracted active TB, for a total nine known related cases.
Active TB, according to Olivia Kasirye, the county public health
officer, is contagious if it is located in the lungs and accompanied by a
cough.
The four additional students are not considered infectious, Kasirye
said, adding that an outbreak such as this was not uncommon. The four
additional students are receiving treatment.
Over 450 students and staff have been tested as a result of this
infection and their close proximity to the initial infected student.
The frequency of discoveries and outbreaks such as this is sure to
increase dramatically as those infected among the ranks of what they are
calling “Central American refugees” are dispersed among our population.
Additionally, those who have an unobstructed path across the border
due to the overwhelmed interdiction capacity of our preoccupied Border
Patrol agents are free to bring with them unknown threats of every
imaginable kind, and surely are.
Rick Wells is a conservative author who recognizes that our nation,
our Constitution and our traditions are under a full scale assault from
multiple threats. Please “Like” him on Facebook, “Follow” him on Twitter or visit www.rickwells.us
There is a current genocide of Christians that Obama doesn’t want you
know about. Its happening in Iraq where the Christian population is on
the brink of extinction and being completely driven out or killed.
Chaldean Catholic Patriarch Louis Raphael I Sako of Baghdad said:
This is very serious. We are losing our community. If
Christian life in Iraq comes to an end, this will be a hiatus in our
history.
The patriarch also made it clear that the Islamic deluge that is uprooting the Christians is the fault of America’s war in Iraq:
The Americans have been here and they made a lot of
mistakes. The current situation is their fault. Why replace a regime
[with] something even worse? This is what happened after 2003.
In the first time in 1600 years, there was no Christian mass services held in the Iraqi city of Mosul, as we read from one report:
The Chaldean Catholic Church’s Archbishop Bashar Warda of
Erbil, in Kurdish-governed northern Iraq, is reported as saying that
for the first time in 1,600 years there was no Mass said in Mosul on
Sunday June 15. This is the city taken over days before by ISIS forces.
Reports say the estimated 3,000 or so Christians still there – from
about 35,000 in 2003 – all fled ahead of the militias’ takeover of
control, although some families were reported to have returned. They
cited lack of job prospects and shelter once they’d become internally
displaced, or refugees in Kurdish Iraq.
PLEASE CLICK HERE TO MAKE A DONATION THAT WILL SAVE CHRISTIAN LIVES
The Islamic cleansing of Christians is most apparent in Egypt, where
cases of Muslims kidnapping Christians is increases. Just recently a
Christian engineer was kidnapped at gunpoint in the Sinai, as we are
informed by one report:
A group of armed masked men in Sinai kidnapped at
gunpoint a Christian engineer who works at a cement factory in the
Peninsula on Monday, reported state-run Al-Ahram.
Officials of the Catholic Church have also given warning of a genocide of Christians in Nigeria. According to one report:
Catholic Church officials in northern Nigeria’s diocese
of Maiduguri are warning of “genocide” against the Christian minority in
the region, where daily attacks, killings and abductions by Islamist
terrorist group Boko Haram are continuing unabated.
Since 2009, Christians in the country’s north-eastern states have
been under siege from the well-armed, highly trained, and massively
funded Islamists.
In the latest attack on Sunday 29 June, the terrorists attacked
churches and villages in Borno state killing more than 30 people. The
attacks occurred about 10 kilometres from Chibok town, where more than
200 schoolgirls, most of them Christians, were abducted in April and are
still missing.
Four churches, including the Protestant Church of Christ of Nigeria,
the Pentecostal Deeper Life Bible Church and the 1920 American
missionary built Ekklesiyar Yan’uwa were destroyed. More than 2,000
people have been killed, this year alone, in the Boko Haram campaign of
atrocities.
“What is worrying is the silence of government on the on-going
genocide of the Christian minority,” Fr John Bakeni, the secretary of
the Catholic Diocese of Maiduguri told The Tablet. “We cannot keep track
or records of the attacks. It’s terrible.”
With the increasing attacks, said Bishop Oliver Doeme of Maiduguri,
“the human mind could not understand what is happening in the region.”
The violence has forced many Nigerian churches to implement strict
security measures such as screening of worshippers and introducing bomb
detection equipment.
The message to doctors and nurses was simple; you talk, you go to
jail. That message was delivered by officers of the government security
contractors hired to police the Lackland Air Base illegal alien
induction facility.
Some have spoken up anyway, because the risks are so great. They say
the American taxpayers and citizens have a right to know what disease
epidemic risk is being brought into our nation. They were interviewed
confidentially by Todd Starnes of Fox News.
The secret nature of the process is itself of concern to the
whistleblowers. One psychiatric counselor said, “There were several of
us who wanted to talk about the camps, but the agents made it clear we
would be arrested. We were under orders not to say anything.”
The security guarding the workers is provided by “Baptist Family
& Children’s Services,” a contractor hired by HHS. They are referred
to by themselves and others within the facility ominously as the “Brown
Shirts.”
The counselor said “It was a very submissive atmosphere, once you
stepped onto the grounds, you abided by their laws – the Brown Shirt
laws.”
Upon entry to the facility all cell phones and other communication
devices are confiscated and anyone caught with a phone is immediately
terminated. She said, “Everyone was paranoid, the children had more
rights than the workers.”
The infectious diseases that are still being brought in include
measles, scabies, chicken pox and strep throat. Mental health and
emotional conditions are also being diagnosed, and may or may not be
treated.
The counselor described watching lice crawling down the hair of children she was attending to.
A former nurse calls it a “lice epidemic.” She said, “You could see
the bugs crawling through their hair,” and added, “After we would rinse
out their hair, the sink would be loaded with black bugs.”
That former nurse said, “We have so many kids coming in that there
was no way to control all of the sickness – all this stuff coming into
the country. We were very concerned at one point about strep going
around the base.”
The counselor and the nurse both said the official position is to conceal the extent of the illnesses from the public.
The nurse describes how, “When they found out the kids had scabies,
the charge nurse was adamant – ‘Don’t mention that. Don’t say scabies.’
But everybody knew they had scabies. Some of the workers were very
concerned about touching things and picking things up. They asked if
they should be concerned, but they were told ‘don’t worry about it.’”
Another problematic condition which concerned the nurse was the fact
that the children were transported to Lackland on domestic charter buses
and airplanes. Whatever conditions they have may have been left on the
seats and other surfaces and could infect others.
The counselor noticed children who she recognized as being suicidal
and recommended that they be sent to a psychiatric unit. Rather than
treat one boy she pointed out, he was placed with a family in America.
It was at that point that she filed a Child Protective Services
report and quit her job, concerned that her license was at risk if the
child later committed suicide.
The counselor says she kept a detailed journal about what is going on
inside the Lackland facility and remarked, “When people read that
journal they are going to be astonished. I don’t think they will believe
what is going on in America.”
She reports that she was later contacted by federal agents who
demanded that she return to Lackland and surrender her journal to them.
She refused to do so and has not returned to Lackland.
It is Cloward-Piven in action. The nurse expressed her belief that,
“They’re going to crush the system. We can’t sustain this. They are
overwhelming the system and I think it’s a travesty.”
Rick Wells is a conservative author who recognizes that our nation,
our Constitution and our traditions are under a full scale assault from
multiple threats. Please “Like” him on Facebook, “Follow” him on Twitter or visit www.rickwells.us
They are devout. Respect it, you filthy islamophobes!
The UK banned Robert Spencer and me from speaking about jihad, but
welcomed these hostile invaders. How’s that working out for you, Home
Secretary May?
As for yesterday’s technology, the master of explosives turned his own brother into a bomb: ‘Evil genius’ created devices that can be sewn into the body and are virtually undetectable.
“New air terror: UK airports on alert over ‘different and
disturbing plots to bring down jets’ amid fears terrorists are working
on undetectable bomb which could be surgically implanted in the body,” Daily Mail, July 3, 2014 (thanks to Todd)
UK airports on terror alert amid fears of attacks from Islamist extremists
Influx of sky marshals could be brought in on some transatlantic routes
New measures thought to include second checks on electronics and shoes
Passengers could face delays at departure gates due to security measures
Terror alert comes as U.S. calls for heightened precautions across Europe
It is thought new bombs could be ‘non-metallic’ or ‘surgically-implanted’
Militants in Syria may have tested devices in the war-torn country
There is growing fears UK citizens returning from conflict pose a risk
By Ray Massey, Transport Editor and Richard Spillett and Emma Glanfield
Air passengers are facing extra delays at departure gates across the UK
as security staff carry out heightened checks amid fears that Islamist
groups are working on an undetectable ‘stealth bomb’ which could bring
down an airliner.
Increased patrols and extra precautions were brought in at terminals
around the UK overnight as Britain remained on a ‘substantial’ terror
alert following reports that two networks are trying to produce a new
explosive.
However, the increased security measures have left thousands of
passengers facing possible delays with some claiming the increased
scrutiny of hand luggage and X-ray machine images has slowed the pace at
departure gates.
The increased security warnings from the Department of Transport and
Downing Street today came as millions of holidaymakers prepared to
embark on their summer breaks.
Although the full extent of the new security measures has not been
divulged, they could include second checks on personal electronics and
footwear before passengers board a plane.
It is feared Islamist groups may be putting together a ‘non-metallic’
device, which could potentially be surgically-implanted inside a
terrorist’s body and be almost invisible to current security checks.
Concerns are growing over the ‘new generation bombs’ – possibly being
developed by Syrian and Yemeni terrorists – which could slip past
conventional detectors and may already have been tested by militants in
war-torn Syria.
ABC News today quoted a US defence insider as saying the new threat
is ‘different and more disturbing’ than attempted terror attacks in the
past.
Travellers at London’s Heathrow said airport staff’s painstaking
analysis of hand luggage and heightened security measures had slowed the
pace at the departure gate at Terminal Three today.
American student Eryk Salvaggi, 35, who was due to travel on a Virgin
Atlantic flight to Boston this evening, said: ‘We had to go through the
same process as usual, taking belts off, electronics out of bags, no
large amounts of liquids and stuff, but the security guys were paying a
lot of attention to everyone’s bags and items as they went through the
scanners.
‘It seemed to take twice as long for each bag to go through, I’ve
never seen it done like that before and I have travelled a lot.
‘There were a lot of bags being taken aside too, when they came out the other side, for extra searches.
‘There seemed to be a lot of frisking going on too.
‘Luckily it seemed pretty quiet, there weren’t big queues. It’s a good thing it’s not the holidays.
Read more:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2678737/UK-airports-alert-plot-bring-jet-Security-level-increase-set-lead-longer-queues-thousands-families-prepare-summer-breaks.html#ixzz36SDtYmup
Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook
If you get your news from the Obama Administration or the
U.S. State Department you probably haven’t heard about this yet. That’s
because the U.S. President, a man who far too often comments on issues
of racism with the purpose of stirring emotions, has not held a press
conference about what might be the largest act of racism in modern
history.
It is now confirmed that President of Zimbabwe Robert Mugabe has
sealed the deal as dictator and declared that whites are no longer
allowed to own land in his country. He’s officially booting all white
farmers and taking their land.
Via Daily Nation.
The 90 year-old old leader, who launched a violent land
reform programme in 2,000 that displaced the majority of the 4,000 white
commercial farmers, on Wednesday said Zimbabwe was no country for white
farmers.
“There are white farmers who are still on the land and have the
protection of some Cabinet ministers and politicians as well as
traditional leaders,” President Mugabe said.
“That should never happen and we will deal with ministers but as for
our chiefs we do not want to harass you. We do not want trouble.
“I have been given a list of 35 white farmers in Mashonaland West
(province) alone and in just a few districts that have been audited.
“We say no to whites owning our land and they should go.
“They can own companies and apartments in our towns and cities but not the soil.
“It is ours and that message should ring loud and clear in Britain and the United States.”
President Mugabe has often justified the wholesale seizure of productive farms saying he was correcting historical injustices.
This ignorant statement ignores the fact that most of these farmers,
if not all of them, personally had nothing to do with any ‘historical
injustices.’ This sets a dangerous precedence and it’s shameful the
world’s leaders aren’t denouncing it.
On August 6, 2011, in Wardak Province, Afghanistan,
jihadists perched on top of a building shot down a decrepit CH-47
helicopter, Extortion 17, packed with 30 Special Ops forces–most of them
part of the elite SEAL Team 6. Almost immediately, facts about the
attack were hushed up that included skirting away the black box.
Furthermore, within hours, everyone on board was cremated, supposedly
because they were burned beyond recognition. Family members of the
victims have learned that virtually everything the Obama administration
has revealed about the attack is a lie.
The likely reason for the coverup? The high-tech weapon used to shoot
down Extortion 17, a heat-seeking missile, more than likely was
supplied by none other than Barack Hussein Obama.
In this video, we reveal this and much more…
The views expressed in this opinion article are solely
those of their author and are not necessarily either shared or endorsed
by WesternJournalism.com.
Read more at http://www.westernjournalism.com/revealed-seal-team-6-murder-weapon-supplied-obama/#Bkv3zfG9137HVoxm.99
Mayor Bill de Blasio’s press office announced this
morning a dinner he is hosting at Gracie Mansion tonight for Muslims
will be closed press, despite initially being listed as open.
The Ramadan Iftar dinner, according to de Blasio spokesman Phil
Walzak, “was always designed to be closed but was erroneously listed as
open” on the mayor’s schedule last night “due to an internal
miscommunication.”
Walzak also said, “Tonight’s event is closed press because it is a
sit-down dinner and there also is a praying portion. Last year and the
year before this event was closed press — it historically has always
been closed.” [...]
Of the guests, Walzak said, “There are 150 attending tonight, many of
whom have been fasting. This includes religious leaders, community
leaders, elected officials, and members of Administration.”
Israel offers Hamas one last out before hitting hard
If the rocket fire from Gaza doesn't stop within a day or two,
what’s next may be the assassination of Hamas leaders and missiles on
Tel Aviv.
A spokesman of the armed wing of Hamas gives a press conference in Gaza City on Thursday. /
Photo by AFP
By
Amos Harel
Published 01:41 04.07.14
Since Monday, when the bodies of the three kidnapped teens
were found, the main locus of Israeli-Palestinian friction has moved
from the West Bank to East Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip. The manhunt for
the suspected kidnappers continues. But the murder of East Jerusalem
teen Mohammed Abu Khdeir,
and the ongoing exchanges of rocket attacks from Gaza and retaliatory
airstrikes have expanded the confrontation to new theaters.
Though a majority of ministers remain opposed to
expanding Israel’s military operations, the balance in the
diplomatic-security cabinet is fragile. Continued violent rioting in
Jerusalem or casualties from rocket fire could yet lead to escalation.
As always, one option is assassinating senior Hamas officials. But Hamas
would almost certainly respond with massive rocket fire, including on
Tel Aviv.
In the three weeks since the kidnapping, there has
been a steady drizzle of rocket and mortar fire from Gaza. Israel has
responded cautiously, usually with airstrikes on empty buildings. The
intelligence agencies still think Hamas wants to avoid escalation. Yet
the organization has begun playing a double game: It has been behind
some of the mortar fire and has let other groups launch rockets.
The defense establishment opposes a large-scale
operation in Gaza, but Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is still
maneuvering between this position and political pressure for action.
Thus, despite the risks he might view resuming assassinations as a good
solution.
On Thursday, a senior military official sent an unusual message
to Hamas. “Quiet will be answered with quiet,” he told journalists
hours after a rocket hit a house in Sderot. “Israel has no interest in
escalation. If Hamas reins in the shooting now, we won’t act, either.”
It seems Jerusalem was thereby offering Hamas a
final exit ramp. The statement included no deadline, but most likely
Israel will give Hamas only a day or two to restore calm. After that, if
the rocket fire continues, Netanyahu will enjoy more legitimacy at home
(and also overseas) for aggressive action.
Meanwhile, Israeli rage over the teens’ murder is
finding other outlets. Some are official: For instance, the policy of
razing terrorists’ houses has been resumed. In other cases, the
authorities seem to be turning a blind eye, as in Monday’s raids on the
homes of the suspected kidnappers, Marwan Qawasmeh and Amer Abu Aisheh:
Ostensibly, soldiers merely forced entry by dynamiting the doors. But in
practice, the damage was extensive. Finally there are the civilian
manifestations: mobs assaulting Palestinian workers in Jerusalem,
Facebook campaigns for vengeance and, perhaps, Abu Khdeir’s murder.
So far, there is no evidence that Hamas’ leadership
either in Gaza or abroad was involved in the kidnapping. But either way,
the finding of the teens’ bodies deprived Hamas of the last chance to
wrest a significant achievement from the operation by negotiating over
the return of the bodies. The abduction may have scored Hamas some
points in Palestinian public opinion, but there were also many
Palestinians who opposed killing unarmed boys. Moreover, the kidnapping
undermined Hamas’ relations with the Fatah-led Palestinian Authority and
effectively froze the Fatah-Hamas reconciliation.
Abu Khdeir’s murder altered the picture slightly,
since Palestinians now have their own innocent victim – allegedly killed
by a nationalistically-motivated Jew, though police haven’t yet
confirmed this, saying the murder could also have stemmed from an
internal Palestinian feud. Either way, the fact that it occurred at the
start of Ramadan obviously didn’t help. Today’s Ramadan prayers on the
Temple Mount could spark more rioting, and police are consequently
beefing up their forces in East Jerusalem.
The Palestinian riots in Jerusalem on Wednesday,
after Abu Khdeir’s body was found, were more violent than other riots in
previous years. Pipe bombs were thrown at policemen in broad daylight
and masked men torched some of the light rail stations in the city’s
east. Nevertheless, it’s premature to talk about a third intifada.
Israel also has better control over Jerusalem than it did during the
second intifada, because the separation fence prevents Palestinians from
the West Bank from coming to join the violence.
Intelligence failure
Meanwhile, the investigation of the Israeli teens’
kidnapping shows that it was fairly well-planned. Someone had to obtain
the stolen car, the weapons, the money and the intelligence. Avi
Issacharoff reported on the Walla news site this week that the boys’
bodies were found in a fenced plot purchased by the Qawasmeh family a
few months ago. In other words, the kidnappers prepared the site, or at
least knew of it.
Qawasmeh and Abu Aisheh were well-known Hamas
operatives who have been arrested by both Israel and the PA in the past,
yet they managed to completely conceal their plot from the Shin Bet
security service. That is a failure that even the agency’s success in
foiling 44 previous abduction attempts can’t erase.
This was compounded by the failures of the police
and the Israel Defense Forces. That five precious hours were wasted
because a police hotline mishandled a call from one of the teens, Gilad
Shaar, is well known. But tapes of several calls between Shaar’s father,
Ofir, and other hotlines, which were published this week by Channel 10
television, expose additional snafus.
The elder Shaar first called the security hotline of
the Binyamin Regional Council, the area of the West Bank where he
lives, at 3:10 A.M. on Friday, June 13. Four minutes later, the hotline
operator called an IDF hotline. Two hours after that, Shaar was finally
connected directly to the IDF. But army sources say that only at 6 A.M.
was the regional brigade commander informed. Fifteen minutes later, he
was en route to the yeshiva where two of the boys studied, where he
checked out the situation and became convinced the case was serious.
Thus a kidnapping alert finally went out to all army units only at 7:40
A.M.
Granted, the IDF deals with many false alarms. Yet
this timetable begs the question: Why did it take three critical hours
to inform the brigade commander? It was already too late to save the
boys, but had the army swung into action earlier, the kidnappers would
have had less time to make their getaway.
This series of failures by the security services –
and there are likely others that the media haven’t uncovered – obligates
the prime and defense ministers to launch a serious investigation. Only
thus can the problems be solved before another kidnapping occurs.
Fortunately, there’s a chance that a lawsuit due to be decided in a matter of days could be the bullet through the heart of this atrocious socialist program.
The suit calls into question the use of the term “state” in “state
exchange” as a provision in the bill says that individuals who use these
exchanges instead of the federal one will have subsidies to help pay
for coverage. Since so many states don’t have an exchange, this could
mean millions who signed up won’t receive subsidies and could lose
coverage, causing a downward spiral. Hot Air reports:
Remember the Halbig case? If not, catch up right now by
re-reading this post from January, written after a D.C. district court
judge ruled in Obama’s favor. O-Care is a famously complex law but the
lawsuit that could end up demolishing it is surprisingly simple. In a
nutshell, there’s a line buried deep in the statutory text that says
federal subsidies for insurance premiums will be available to anyone who
buys a plan on “an Exchange established by the State.”
Question: Does Healthcare.gov, the exchange built by the federal
government after 34 states refused to build their own exchanges, qualify
as an “Exchange established by the State”? Or do only state exchanges
qualify? If it’s the latter, then millions upon millions of people
who’ve signed up for O-Care through Healthcare.gov since October in the
expectation that Uncle Sam will be paying part of their bill are in for a
nasty surprise. The only fix that’s available (unless His Majesty tries
some executive gambit, of course) is for Congress to amend the statute
so that subsidies are available on the federal exchange too, but what
are the odds of the House GOP agreeing to that?
If the D.C. Circuit, which is set to rule any day now on the appeal
of the earlier ruling, sides with the challengers against O, consumers
will be forced to either come up with the money for their premiums
themselves or drop their coverage. And if most of them choose to drop
coverage, leading to a mass exodus of healthy people from various
insurance risk pools, suddenly the White House is facing a death-spiral
problem where hiking premiums on the remaining enrollees is the only way
to pay for all the sick people still in the pool. That’ll lead to more
dropped coverage, which means even higher premiums, and then it’s
spiralmania.
The challenge was initially written off by some as a fool’s errand
because there’s a lack of evidence that the Democrats who crafted and
passed the Affordable Care Act intended to block subsidies on the
federal exchange, which was designed as a backstop on behalf of the
states. (They’ve signed a brief saying as much.) But the challengers
seized on an ambiguity in the language of the statute which says the
subsidies are to be provided by “an Exchange established by the State.”
“If the legislation is just stupid, I don’t see that it’s up to the
court to save it,” Judge A. Raymond Randolph said during oral arguments
in March.
Randolph, a George H.W. Bush appointee, said the text of the statute
“seems perfectly clear on its face” that the subsidies are confined to
state-run exchanges. Carter-appointed Judge Harry T. Edwards slammed the
challengers’ claims as “preposterous.” So the deciding vote appears to
be with George W. Bush-appointed Judge Thomas B. Griffith, who wasn’t
resolute but sounded unconvinced of the Obama administration’s defense,
saying it had a “special burden” to show that the language “doesn’t mean
what it appears to mean.”
House Republicans are now calling on the President to take the crisis head on by ending this program and enforcing current immigration laws.
There are 33 GOP lawmakers who have taken a stand against the DACA
program, and are hoping the pressure they put on the president will
force him to take action.
via Breitbart:
In response to the ongoing flood of unaccompanied
immigrant minors illegally crossing the nation’s southern border, 33
Republican congressmen, lead by Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA), are pressing
Obama to roll back policies and perceptions that they say have helped
spur the onslaught.
“As our country faces an unprecedented surge in the arrival of
unaccompanied alien children (UACs) at our southwestern border, we call
on you to immediately end the failed policies that encourage young
individuals to put themselves in peril, leave their home countries, and
make a long and dangerous journey to enter our country illegally,” they
wrote Wednesday in a letter to Obama.
Since October, more than 52,000 unaccompanied minors have been
detained illegally crossing the southern border — many telling Border
Patrol agents that they came because they believe they will be able to
stay.
According to the GOP congressmen, the president must take the crisis
on by first ending the DACA program — which shields certain illegal
immigrants from deportation and allows them to live and work in the U.S.
— “to send a clear signal to all individuals that our immigration laws
will be enforced.”
Further, they call on Obama to “make an explicit public commitment
that you will not support legislation that extends legal status to the
newly arriving illegal aliens no matter the age.”
They also requested Obama disclose the intent of the Department of Homeland Security’s review of deportation policies.
Signatures include: Rep. Darrell Issa, Rep. Pete Sessions, Rep. Sam
Graves, Rep. Lamar Smith, Rep. Blake Farenthold, Rep. Gus Bilirakis,
Rep. Marsha Blackburn, Rep. Tim McClintock, Rep. John Duncan, Rep. Tom
Cotton, Rep Jim Bridenstine, Rep. Alan Nunnelee, Rep. Gregg Harper, Rep.
Doug LaMalfa, Rep. Paul Gosar, Rep. Lynn Jenkins, Rep. Vicky Hartzler,
Rep. Tom Cole, Rep. Markwayne Mullin, Rep. Ken Calvert, Rep. Brad
Wenstrup, Rep. Virginia Foxx, Rep. Ander Crenshaw, Rep. Phil Gingrey,
Rep. Rob Wittman, Rep. Ralph Hall, Rep. Roger Williams, Rep John
Campbell, Rep. Steve Stockman, Rep. Dan Benishek, Rep. David Jolly, Rep.
Ted Yoho, Rep. Tim Griffin.
Awesome. It’s great to see House Republicans continuing to stand up against President Obama and attempt to hold him accountable for his actions.
This mess was made by Barack Obama, and it’s his duty to take the
lead in cleaning it up, and it all starts with ending the DACA program,
which is the source of the problem.
Obama is obviously attempting to use this crisis as justification for
passing immigration reform through executive order, once again superseding Congress. This must not be allowed to happen.
Please share this article on Facebook and Twitter if you
support House Republicans calling for Obama to step in and clean up his
mess at the border.
Teenagers’ Deaths Raise Fears of Shift From Political Struggle to Blood Feud
Photo
Israeli said it had launched 15 airstrikes against sites in Gaza that are associated with Hamas.Credit
Mohammed Abed/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
SDEROT,
Israel — In this resilient town about a mile from Israel’s volatile
border with the Gaza Strip, the streets were empty on Thursday but the
residents expressed defiance as Israeli troops massed around Gaza after a
barrage of rockets including three that hit homes here.
“We
need to finish them off before they finish us off,” said Avichai Jorno,
34, whose bedroom was littered with debris and bathroom was destroyed
by an unexploded rocket.
In
Shuafat, the East Jerusalem neighborhood where a Palestinian teenager
was kidnapped and killed the day before, streets strewn with remnants of
Wednesday’s violent protests were mostly quiet, too, but for a smallish
clash with Israeli soldiers. And the boy’s family was also defiant,
calling on the Israeli authorities to declare the attack an act of
revenge by Jews for last month’s abduction and murder of three Israeli
teenagers, not the result of a family dispute.
“We
want a written paper from the Israeli government saying the crime was
committed on a national background, and we want the Israeli government
to condemn this crime,” Ishak Abu Khdeir, the victim’s uncle, told
reporters.
Israelis and Palestinians are caught in another cycle of violence with little hope for a political solution.
Video Credit By Mona El-Naggar and Tamir Elterman on
Publish Date July 3, 2014.
Image CreditMohammed Ballas/Associated Press
A
familiar sense of foreboding engulfed Israelis and Palestinians, with
both preparing for the possibility of another of Israel’s periodic
military blitzes on Gaza, and with growing worry about a potential third
intifada, or uprising, in Jerusalem and the West Bank.
But
two months after the collapse of the latest round of peace
negotiations, there was also a new kind of fear bubbling, a sense that
these brutal crimes against young people — and the hate-laced social
media campaigns surrounding them — had revealed an alarming depth of
demonization and distrust on both sides.
“It
could be a shift in the nature of the conflict, from political struggle
to blood feud,” said Moshe Halbertal, a professor of philosophy at
Hebrew University. “It’s no more the Palestinian possible state
vis-Ã -vis the Israeli state; it’s kind of two peoples entangled in
cycles of vengeance.”
Photo
A spokesman for the armed
wing of Hamas at news conference in Gaza City on Thursday. There have
been conflicting accounts about the group's willingness to convince
militants to hold their fire.Credit
Mohammed Salem/Reuters
Diana
Buttu, a Palestinian lawyer and analyst, said Israel’s aggressive
crackdown on the West Bank — with hundreds of homes searched, mostly in
cities supposedly under Palestinian control — had left “an overwhelming
feeling of just this great vulnerability.”
“A
lot of the problem with this place is that compassion has become quite
selective,” said Ms. Buttu, who is a citizen of Israel but lives mainly
in Ramallah. “I hate to say this, but all of the ingredients are there
for things to get worse.”
The
Israel Defense Forces on Thursday sentenced four recent recruits to 10
days in military jail for joining a Facebook revenge campaign by posting
pictures of themselves with signs urging Israel’s prime minister to
“let us terminate the terrorists.”
Clashes between Israeli security forces
and Palestinian protesters continued in East Jerusalem as tensions
remained high over the deaths of four teenagers.
Publish Date July 3, 2014.
Image CreditRina Castelnuovo for The New York Times
After
nearly three weeks of intense activity in the West Bank, Israel’s
military on Thursday turned toward Gaza, where the daily exchange of
rockets answered by airstrikes threatened to explode into a full-scale
operation.
With
more than 40 rockets fired toward Israel in 24 hours, Lt. Col. Peter
Lerner, a military spokesman, said troops were mobilizing around Gaza
“to serve defensive positions and forward preparations.” But he
repeatedly said that “we have no interest in escalation,” and said
Gaza’s fate was in the hands of Hamas, the militant Islamic group that
dominates there and that Israel blames for the kidnap-murder of its
three teenagers.
“Our
activities on the ground are in direct relation to what Hamas has been
dealing out,” Colonel Lerner said. “We don’t want to take it further,
but we will be prepared for developments.”
Photo
In Sderot, Israel, a man looked at a home that was damaged by a rocket fired by Palestinian militants from Gaza.Credit
Abir Sultan/European Pressphoto Agency
Hamas
political leaders, too, have said they are not interested in
escalation, but that they are having trouble persuading other militias
to hold their fire, especially with Wednesday’s discovery of the burned
body of the 16-year-old from Shuafat, Muhammad Abu Khdeir.
After
a meeting of the Gaza factions on Thursday afternoon, masked men from
the Hamas military wing declared themselves “ready for all
possibilities.” Thirteen rockets hit Israel as night fell.
“We
monitor the barbaric and brutal aggression by the enemy’s army in the
West Bank and Jerusalem,” a Hamas fighter said through a kaffiyeh
covering all but his eyes. “We promise to turn your settlements, posts,
the targets that you expect and those you don’t expect into a burning
coal if your leadership makes any stupid step.”
The
people of Sderot, where the first crude Qassam rockets made in Gaza
fell 13 years ago, were preparing for another round, but were skeptical
that Israel would take strong action. “It’s a waste of fuel,” Itzik
Biton, who owns a falafel store, said of the mobilization. “They won’t
do anything.”
“We
were born here and we will die here,” Mr. Biton, 43, added. “The
question is whether we will die of old age or from a Qassam.”
Ministers
and Parliament members, insurance assessors and reporters visited
Sderot, but local residents were scarce. In the midafternoon heat, a
half-dozen children had the public pool — reopened this week after
years’ closed for security reasons and then renovations — to themselves.
Photo
An Israeli woman inspected
the damage to a home in the border town of Sderot on Thursday after
Palestinian militants fired rockets there.Credit
Jack Guez/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
Mr.
Jorno’s wife, Tami, said that when the rocket alert sounded at 8 a.m.
Thursday, she and a friend rushed their three small children into the
safe room off the kitchen and almost immediately heard two booms. She
went out to her garden with its ornamental gnomes and toadstools,
sensing that one had landed close by. Neighbors pointed out the hole in
her stucco wall.
Later, bomb disposal experts carried the unexploded rocket away. Debris littered the Jornos’ flowery summer bedcovers.
Shuafat
was also riddled with detritus from Wednesday’s clashes. Smashed
traffic lights. Overturned garbage bins. A vegetable stand in an
unfinished two-story building blackened by firebombs protesters had
hurled at soldiers using it as a staging area.
“Resistance
lives on,” read a splash of fresh red graffiti. Next to Muhammad’s
name, another said, “Palestine is free and Arab.” Most were in Arabic,
but one, in Hebrew, said, “Death to Jews.”
Around
5 p.m., some 300 Palestinians threw stones at soldiers, who responded
with stun grenades. But most of the day was quiet, as mourners
congregated at a canopy in front of Muhammad’s house and adorned with
his picture, waiting for word on when the autopsy would be complete. The
funeral was expected after Friday’s noon prayer.
“It
will not be a normal funeral,” said a cousin, Said Abu Khdeir, who owns
a restaurant in the neighborhood. “It will be a wedding for a martyr.”
A
police spokesman said the investigation was continuing and had not yet
determined whether the killing was revenge or a nonpolitical crime.
Wasem Abu Khdeir, 17, a cousin of Muhammad’s, said the police had
questioned four of his other teenage cousins for hours on Thursday about
whether they had anything to do with the crime.
Tamir
Lion, an anthropologist who focuses on youth and combat soldiers, said
on Israel Radio, “The state of Israel in recent years is looking for its
ethos — that is to say, ‘Where are we going.’
“When
there is no ethos, and it does not matter why, you always withdraw to
the most primitive ethos — us and them,” he added. “It becomes a group
that defines itself not as what it is, but what it hates.”
Isabel Kershner reported
from Sderot, and Jodi Rudoren from Jerusalem. Said Ghazali contributed
reporting from Jerusalem, and Fares Akram from Gaza.
Suha Abu Khdeir, center, whose son Muhammad was found dead, with relatives on Wednesday. “We don’t feel safe,” she said.Credit
Rina Castelnuovo for The New York Times
JERUSALEM
— The abduction and killing of a Palestinian teenager whose burned body
was found in a Jerusalem forest on Wednesday further poisoned relations
between Israelis and Palestinians and prompted international outrage as
the police investigated the death as a possible Israeli revenge
killing.
The
death of Muhammad Abu Khdeir, 16, came a day after the burial of three
Israeli teenagers who were kidnapped and killed in the occupied West
Bank last month. The killing of the teenager set off fierce riots in the
ordinarily quiet and relatively well-to-do East Jerusalem neighborhood
where he lived, threatening to ignite broader unrest and underlining
deep fissures in Israeli society.
The
abductions and killings of the Israeli and Palestinian teenagers raised
the specter of individual vendettas within the broader conflict, making
it all the more personal. Both sides, while angry and grieving, seemed
stunned by the turn of events, in which each side sees itself as both
victim and perpetrator.
Photo
Clashes between Palestinians
and Israeli border police broke out in Jerusalem on Wednesday after the
kidnapping and killing of a Palestinian teenager.Credit
Mahmoud Illean/Associated Press
While
Israeli officials said they were still investigating the death of the
teenage Palestinian, including possible criminal motives, the killing
followed passionate calls for retribution on a Facebook page named “The
People of Israel Demand Revenge” that quickly gathered 35,000 “likes”
and included pictures of soldiers posing with their weapons. The page
was taken down after two days.
The
latest killing seemed to set off introspection among many Israelis who
only a day earlier nursed their grievances over the killings of the
three Israeli teenagers. The justice minister, Tzipi Livni, reacted
harshly to the public calls for revenge and said if Muhammad was the
victim of a reprisal killing it amounted to “an act of terrorism.”
Prime
Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed on Tuesday to hold accountable those
who killed the three young men in the West Bank, pointing a finger at
the Palestinian militant group Hamas. On Wednesday, after the body of
the Palestinian teenager was found in the woods, the prime minister
called on Israelis to obey the law, and asked investigators to quickly
look into what he called “the abominable murder.”
Given
the explosive atmosphere after Muhammad’s death, Israel found that its
options for punitive measures had been narrowed for fear of inflaming
the situation. Many Israelis engaged in soul-searching, recognizing that
both sides in this blood feud had suffered at each other’s hands. About
a thousand Israelis gathered for a demonstration in Jerusalem against
violence and racism.
Secretary
of State John Kerry, in a statement, strongly condemned what he called
“the despicable and senseless abduction and murder” of Muhammad. He
added, “Those who undertake acts of vengeance only destabilize an
already explosive and emotional situation.”
Photo
Muhammad Hussein Abu Khdeir was killed a day after the burial of three Israelis.Credit
Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
The
Israeli teenagers, Eyal Yifrach, 19; Naftali Fraenkel, 16, who also
held United States citizenship; and Gilad Shaar, 16, were abducted on
June 12 as they tried to hitch a ride home from their West Bank
yeshivas. Muhammad was forced into a car near his neighborhood mosque, a
few yards from his home in the Shuafat neighborhood before 4 a.m. as he
waited for his friends to go and pray, witnesses told his parents.
“We
don’t feel safe,” Suha Abu Khdeir, Muhammad’s mother, said as she sat
in an upper floor of the family’s stone house, quiet and tearful,
surrounded by women who had come to comfort her. “They took him from in
front of our home,” she added.
Outside
in the small yard, masked youths with slingshots were hurling rocks and
rolling burning tires toward Israeli security forces. The forces, a
short distance away on the main road, responded with tear gas, stun
grenades and other means, according to a police spokesman, who said
protesters had also thrown several pipe bombs.
A
half-mile section of the main thoroughfare, in an area that Israel
seized in the 1967 war and annexed in opposition to international
opinion, was carpeted with rocks and remained closed as clashes
continued throughout the day. Shelters at stops along Jerusalem’s
light-rail line, which runs through Arab and Jewish neighborhoods, were
smashed.
Tensions
had already been running high. During the recent Israeli crackdown in
the West Bank, six Palestinians were killed in confrontations with
Israeli forces and about 400 Palestinians, many of them affiliated with
Hamas, were arrested. Militants in Gaza fired more than
20 rockets and mortar rounds into southern Israel on Wednesday. They
fell without causing injury.
Palestinian and Israeli officials and a
relative of the slain teenager, whose body was found in a Jerusalem
forest early Wednesday, discussed the kidnapping and killing.
Video Credit By Quynhanh Do on
Publish Date July 2, 2014.
Image CreditMenahem Kahana/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
Sitting
in an enclosed porch surrounded by male mourners, Hussein Abu Khdeir,
Muhammad’s father, who owns an electrical appliance store, said he had
spent eight hours with police investigators. Tired and unshaven, he said
that he had not been allowed to see his son’s body, which was at the
Abu Kabir Forensic Institute in Tel Aviv, but that investigators had
identified it by matching DNA samples taken from the saliva of both
parents.
“I don’t expect any results,” he said of the investigation.
Muhammad,
who was studying at a vocational school to be an electrician, was the
fifth of seven children, three sons and four daughters.
“I
am against kidnapping and killing,” his father said. “Whether Jew or
Arab, who can accept the kidnapping and killing of his son or daughter? I
call on both sides to stop the bloodshed.”
Muhammad’s
mother said he had been playing a computer game on a laptop with one of
his brothers, then left the house about 3:30 a.m. to meet his friends
for the dawn prayer that starts the daily fast during the Muslim holy
month of Ramadan.
Photo
Palestinian protesters threw stones at Israeli police during clashes on Wednesday in Shuafat, a neighborhood in Jerusalem.Credit
Thomas Coex/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
Mahmoud
Abu Khdeir, the imam of the mosque and a cousin, said the other youths
left to get food for the predawn meal when a gray Hyundai pulled up and
its occupants forced Muhammad into the car.
The
police said they were reviewing images from security cameras along the
street; Muhammad’s father showed visitors photographs, on his cellphone,
that he said were from the security camera of a store near the mosque,
showing two young men walking on the pavement, who he said were the
kidnappers. Witnesses told him a third man was in the driver’s seat of
the car.
Youths
came to the house to tell Muhammad’s parents that he had been abducted.
They called the police and tried to call Muhammad’s cellphone. It rang,
but nobody answered.
On
Wednesday, the Ynet news site posted the full two-minute recording of
an emergency call one of the Israeli youths placed to the police from
the car in which they were apparently shot to death. After what sound
like gunshots and cries of pain, the kidnappers can be heard
congratulating themselves and singing.
As
funerals for the three were underway on Tuesday, hundreds of
extreme-right protesters gathered in Jerusalem demanding vengeance.
Chanting “Death to Arabs,” they tried to attack passers-by, who had to
be extricated by the police. More than 40 protesters were arrested.
The
two events exposed the extent to which parts of each side have
dehumanized the other. After the kidnapping of the three Israeli
teenagers last month, messages posted on social networks by Palestinians
celebrated the capture of “three Shalits,” in reference to Gilad
Shalit, the Israeli soldier held captive by Hamas militants in Gaza, who
was eventually released in exchange for 1,027 prisoners.
A
17-year-old created the Facebook group calling for revenge for the
kidnapping of the three Israelis, and an Israeli blogger, Ami Kaufman,
pointed to a photograph submitted to the Facebook group by two smiling girls who held a sign reading, “Hating Arabs is not racism, it’s values!”
President
Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority strongly condemned the
killing of the Israelis. And Yoaz Hendel, a former director of
communications for Mr. Netanyahu, expressed dismay after the death of
Muhammad.
“It
is unbelievable how a few hundred racist Jews can cause so much damage
to an entire country,” Mr. Hendel wrote on his Facebook page in Hebrew.
“The results of the investigation into the death of the boy are already
unimportant. After pictures of the mob shouting ‘Death to Arabs,’ the
damage is done.”
Jodi Rudoren and Said Ghazali contributed reporting from Jerusalem, and Robert Mackey from New York.
A version of this article appears in print on July 3, 2014, on page A1 of the New York edition with the headline: Arab Boy’s Death Escalates Clash Over Abductions. Order Reprints|Today's Paper|Subscribe
