Arizona professor punished by employer, told that he “would likely need to take a class taught by a Muslim before teaching about Islamic terrorism”

PJ MEDIA
Arizona: Muslim Students Threaten to Kill Prof for Suggesting Islam Is Violent
by Robert Spencer
May 8, 2020

This will teach those Islamophobes that Islam is a religion of peace: a professor is facing death threats for suggesting otherwise. Nicholas Damask, Ph.D., has taught political science at Scottsdale Community College in Arizona for 24 years. But now he is facing a barrage of threats, and his family, including his 9-year-old grandson and 85-year-old parents, is in hiding, while College officials are demanding that he apologize – all for the crime of speaking the truth about the motivating ideology behind the threat of Islamic jihad worldwide. READ MORE

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“As for the annexation of the West Bank, the Israelis will ultimately make those decisions,” Pompeo told reporters. “That’s an Israeli decision”

JERUSALEM POST
Amid COVID-19, Pompeo to visit Israel and meet Netanyahu, Gantz
by Omri Nahmias
May 9, 2020

US Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, is expected to visit Israel on Wednesday…Secretary Pompeo will meet with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Blue and White leader, Benny Gantz. The brief visit will take place on the same day in which Netanyahu and Gantz’s new government would be sworn-in…Pompeo’s visit comes on the heels of the signature of a coalition agreement between Netanyahu and Gantz. The agreement set July 1 as the day in which the government could start promoting a move to annex parts of the West Bank. READ MORE

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An otherwise positive story from #NYT about Israel’s battle against coronavirus “marred by its opening” which has now been changed online

FORWARD
New York Times gets slammed for highlighting fact that Israel Defense Forces kills people
by Aiden Pink
May 8, 2020

…But some current and former Israeli defense officials pointed out that the article [which has since changed the lede], which went into detail about the various ways Israel’s military-industrial complex is fighting COVID, had a more nuanced view of the situation than its lead sentence indicated. Former IDF spokesperson Peter Lerner said it was a “great story” marred by its opening. David Halbfinger, the Times’ Jerusalem bureau chief, responded by arguing that pointing out the IDF’s mission to eliminate threats was not inherently a criticism.

CAMERA BLOG NY Times Frames Iron-Dome Researchers as Killers and Destroyers Jerusalem bureau chief David Halbfinger begins the article, titled “Israeli Army’s Idea Lab Aims at a New Target: Saving Lives,” by casting the research and development arm of Israel’s defense establishment in derogatory terms that Israel’s enemies might use: “The Israeli Defense Ministry’s research-and-development arm is best known for pioneering cutting-edge ways to kill people and blow things up, with stealth tanks and sniper drones among its more lethal recent projects. [emphasis added]”

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“To be fair, Daniel Pipes has written many strong articles in favor of a robust Israeli policy; this one seems to be a departure”

JEWISH PRESS
When it Comes to Sovereignty, Daniel Pipes is Wrong
by Yishai Fleisher
May 9, 2020

In a recent New York Times article, noted Middle East scholar and pro-Israel pundit Dr. Daniel Pipes warns that Israeli application of sovereignty in parts of the “West Bank,” known as Judea and Samaria, would be a grave mistake for the Jewish state and backs up his thesis with six reasons. However, while Pipes sees himself as pragmatic, the article is riddled with one consistent flaw: It’s entirely founded on needlessly fearful conjecture…Daniel Pipes’s latest article serves as a boon to enemies who wish to weaken Israel through exaggerating the very fears he mentions. READ MORE

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Iran: ‘It makes little sense to lift an arms embargo on a regime that has steadily increased its violent behavior over the past year”

NEWSWEEK
Extend the Arms Embargo on Iran
by Richard Goldberg and Mark Dubowitz
May 7, 2020

In line with a request issued Monday by 387 members of the U.S. House of Representatives, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is preparing a diplomatic campaign to block one of the most damaging concessions enshrined by the Iran nuclear deal—namely, the lifting of the international arms embargo on Iran this coming October. Mr. Pompeo’s effort merits bipartisan support at home and allied support abroad—not only to counter Iran’s proxy war campaigns, but to stop Russia and China from shifting the balance of power in the Middle East. READ MORE

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“Pro-Palestinian activists, paleocons attack Ilhan Omar over support for maintaining Iran arms embargo”

FREE  BEACON
Omar Attacked as Insufficiently Anti-Israel
by Adam Kredo
May 8, 2020

Rep. Ilhan Omar (D., Minn.) is under fire from an unlikely group—the anti-Israel, pro-Palestinian activists who once hailed her as their movement’s biggest star. Omar, who has championed anti-Israel causes from her perch in Congress, recently signed on to a congressional letter urging the Trump administration to ensure that an international embargo on Iran’s purchase of advanced military equipment is not lifted later this year. In a rare display of agreement with her Republican colleagues, Omar lent her name to the letter, which was spearheaded by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, the nation’s most prominent pro-Israel group. READ MORE

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“Thousands of Israeli Arab health-care professionals have been putting their own lives on the line by treating virus patients alongside their Jewish colleagues”

JNS
Israel still suffers virus of hate even as it saves Arab lives
by Melanie Phillips
May 7, 2020

While countries around the world struggle to get on top of the COVID-19 crisis, Israel’s achievement so far has been remarkable. Its mortality rate from the virus has been vastly smaller, in proportion to its population, than the rate in countries such as Britain, Sweden or the United States. That’s largely because it tackled the virus with the kind of bold, strategic approach with which it defends itself against its physical foes...It vividly illustrated the prominence of Israeli Arabs in the country’s health system, in which they make up 17 percent of its doctors, 24 percent of its nurses and 48 percent of its pharmacists. READ MORE

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“Annexation of the Jordan Valley is a long-standing Israeli objective, going back to Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin”

AL-MONITOR
Netanyahu’s Annexation Plan Can’t Be Stopped
by Efraim Inbar
April 29, 2020

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s plan to annex the Jordan Valley is not just a far-right wish, but the fulfillment of long-standing Israeli security objectives. Further, despite alarms by Netanyahu’s critics in the United States and elsewhere about the plan, there is actually widespread agreement among Israelis about the strategic importance of the valley. ‪That’s why Blue and White leader Benny Gantz could sign off on the deal to form an emergency government. The consensus extends to Labor and even members of the opposition to the new national unity government. The extension of Israeli law to the Jordan Valley is in accordance with former Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin’s strategic tenets (the Allon Plan). READ MORE

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FDA confirms Abbott Labs and Roche antibody tests highly accurate; it’s time to quickly ramp up antibody testing in Illinois

WIREPOINTS
With New FDA Action, Gov. Pritzker and Dr. Ezike Have No Excuse for Further Stonewalling Antibody Testing
by Mark Glennon
May 9, 2020

…The Food and Drug Administration last week published results from the first batch of COVID-19 antibody diagnostics to have their accuracy independently evaluated by federal laboratories…Tests made by Abbott Laboratories and Roche scored particularly well and are highly likely to give accurate results, according to the evaluation.”…Pritzker last week finally started saying what we’ve long said, which is that daily new case numbers mean little. That’s because, as Pritzker said, new cases are “really a function of how many tests we do.” Testing has exploded, now reaching as much as 17,000 per day in Illinois. More tests mean more reported cases. READ MORE

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“Sweeping bans on ‘non-essential’ procedures have left medical professionals idle and patients less healthy”

NATIONAL REVIEW
Let the Doctors Work
by Joel M. Zinberg
May 7, 2020

Buried in the recent announcement by the Bureau of Economic Analysis that real gross domestic product (GDP) decreased at an annual rate of 4.8 percent in the first quarter of 2020 was a remarkable fact: Nearly half of the GDP decrease was due to reduced spending on health-care services. You read that correctly — in the middle of the worst pandemic in over a century, and after decades of unrelenting expenditure growth, we spent less on medical care. How can one explain this anomaly? It is because Americans, in response to government guidance and fear of an unfamiliar pathogen, are putting off medical care — care that is often essential to their health. READ MORE

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