DOES ABBAS OWN THE POPE? - MAY 18, 2015

His Holiness met with the un-holiest, creepiest man on earth, Mahmoud Abbas, and gave him everything he wanted.

My Catholic friends, we need to talk.

Those pictures of Pope Francis hugging and smooching Mahmoud Abbas are making me squirm. How about you?

Sorry to be disrespectful. But somebody needs to break this up. This needs intervention.

I cite myself as a friend of the Church, as an admirer of the faith and of the faithful. To prove this I have credentials. The Church of Toulouse saved my family when the Nazis came marching into France. Other Jews in the region likewise owe their lives to the Archbishop of Toulouse, Jules-Gerard Saliege – God bless his name.

Somebody needs to break this up. This needs intervention.
Indeed that’s what my parents did here in America. They blessed Saliege and FatherLaRoche, who studied Talmud with my fatherand sheltered us against the Gestapo. I wrote about this frequently and lovingly and included a chapter about it (“The Cardinal”) in my book of memoirs Escape From Mount Moriah.

Then there’s John W. Cassell. We lost him only a few weeks ago. How tragic that a man, a writer so stouthearted should die from heart failure.

We were on the phone practically every day. For 10 years we spoke about my Jewishness and his Catholicism and how beautiful it is that so much of Church liturgy comes from the Hebrew Bible. Except for this and that, we have so much in common.

So now what the hell is going on, if you’ll excuse the expression.

Well, we know exactly what’s been happening. His Holiness meets with the un-holiest, creepiest man on earth, Mahmoud Abbas and gives him everything, nearly the entire Vatican. Abbas wants official recognition of “Palestine.” There is no Palestine, never was, but the Pope complies, as painful as that is to Israel – and to his own flock being slaughtered round the world.

Whatever Abbas wants, Abbas gets. Does Pope Francis know that Abbas is a mass murderer of Jews – and Christians? The big picture on this,here.

Either way, we’re witnessing a nauseating performance, which didn’t start today.

We go back exactly a year ago when the Pope visited the Holy Land. Here’s what I wrote for Arutz Sheva under the title “Pope’s Visit To Israel A Victory for Islamic Terrorism” (May 27, 2014). So from that alone you get the picture what I had in mind and worse, what the Pope had in mind.

I quote from the piece: “The trip had absolutely nothing to do with Israel. It had nothing to do with Jews or Catholics. It was all about Islam and its grievances. Whatever Abbas wanted, The Pope complied.”

Yes, Mahmoud Abbas was in charge. Mahmoud Abbas was the boss. He took over the Pope’s itinerary. He took over the Pope.

So then I wrote: “If the Pope’s journey to the Holy Land was to justify terrorism, mission accomplished.”

Followed by: “Abbas took the stage and never let go. He wrote, produced and directed the entire spectacle…and the Pope obliged.”

Here’s Cassell’s comment: “As an American Catholic I am ASHAMED. And to think Jack's father taught his children to respect the Catholic Church.”

Once upon a time it was different.

“That was Pope John XXIII who (quoting Genesis 45:4) declared to the Jews, ‘I am Joseph, your brother.’

“No, this Pope is Islam’s brother.”

Back to the moment at hand: What hell…I mean what in Heaven’s name is going on?

Jack Engelhard writes a regular column for Arutz Sheva. The new thriller from the New York-based novelist, The Bathsheba Deadline, a heroic editor’s singlehanded war on terror and against media bias. Engelhard wrote the int’l bestseller Indecent Proposal that was translated into more than 22 languages and turned into a Paramount motion picture starring Robert Redford and Demi Moore. Website: www.jackengelhard.com

MEGYN KELLY - AND WHO ELSE FOR FREE SPEECH - MAY 11, 2015

t’s getting lonely out there for Megyn Kelly. At the moment she’s about the only American journalist defending Pamela Geller and, by the way, free speech.

The rest of American Journalism agrees that the First Amendment is okay, so long as it comes with a dash of restrictive Sharia Law. Speak your mind but do not take your opinions to Texas or any place that might offend peoplewho go crazy at the sight of a cartoon.

In other words, as we’ve been listening to the clobber-fest against Pamela Geller, freedom of expression, we’re being advised, must be exercised with caution. So they tell us, these opinion makers, who without a sense of shame insist that they love the First Amendment – but conditionally, fitfully, reluctantly, sporadically.

Who says this? People who by the luck of the draw have the Bill of Rights to sustain their livelihoods. 

But apparently Judeo/Christian values are not worth savoring and fighting for, particularly if you are a journalist.

From Moses’ declaration in Leviticus, to “proclaim liberty throughout the land,” how quickly we’ve gone to proclaiming the suppression of liberty.

Who saw this day coming? I did. Not because I’m smart, but because I’m a pessimist. Pessimists are correct 98.7 percent of the time. Novelists are pessimists and that’s what gets us in trouble so much of the time, when we use fiction or part fiction to get digging into the truth – like this book that spills the beans about news media dishonesty and what really goes on in our newsrooms.

From “Half The News That’s Fit To Print” we can hardly be expected to make up our minds intelligently.
We are a misinformed public and nothing is more dangerous than a people being misled by liars and fakes…in this case ideologues of the Left.

The shift may have begun when Edward R. Murrow brought down a Senator, Joseph McCarthy, but it certainly began when Woodward and Bernstein, back in the 1970s, brought down a President, Richard Nixon. A generation wanted to “do good” and found journalism as the perfect means to “repair the world,” quicker than dentistry and root canal.

Now we are still in the clutches of news being presented by social activistswho, starting with The New York Times, hardly pretend to be neutral.

From “Half The News That’s Fit To Print” we can hardly be expected to make up our minds intelligently.

Take George Stephanopoulos, please. This is a journalist? Yes, this is a journalist. ABC-TV hired him straight from the Clinton White House (the old one, not the new one quite yet) where he served as a political advisor. They offered him big money, and presto; he is a journalist, indeed the leading voice at ABC.

You expect both sides of the story?

Or take Geraldo Rivera, who specialized in trash sensationalism, like the search for Al Capone’s Vault, and now reports for Fox News. 

But Fox News must be forgiven because despite the presence of Juan Williams and Shepard Smith, it’s all we’ve got for news and opinion fair and square.

This is where we find Megyn Kelly. This is where steady customers to the network were astonished to find Miss Kelly all alone doing battle for Pamela Geller. One by one, the rest fell like dominoes for limits to free speech, while for Kelly it is all or nothing.

We sense her frustration as even the most tough-minded conservative speakers clobber away at Pamela Geller and the First Amendment.

Kelly must have thought she stumbled into the wrong studio when colleagues Greta Van Susteren and Bill O’Reilly sounded like Chris Matthews.

It’s good that we have her, but sad that we have her practically all alone.

Jack Engelhard writes a regular column for Arutz Sheva. The new thriller from the New York-based novelist, The Bathsheba Deadline, a heroic editor’s singlehanded war on terror and against media bias. Engelhard wrote the int’l bestseller Indecent Proposal that was translated into more than 22 languages and turned into a Paramount motion picture starring Robert Redford and Demi Moore. Website: www.jackengelhard.com

JUSTICE MINISTER AYELET SHAKED --- TOUGH GIRLS DON'T DANCE. HER FLAW? SHE TELLS THE TRUTH - MAY 8, 2015

Her flaw? She tells the truth.

They used to say that oftentimes Golda Meir was “the only man in the room.” The same might be said of Ayelet Shaked.

A Member of Knesset since 2013, Shaked, 39, was recently appointed to serve as Minister of Justice for Benjamin Netanyahu’s government. The appointment has been greeted with satisfaction from many on the Right and with howls of protest from everybody on the Left.

The Left does not like her because too often she speaks her mind and tells the truth. To the Left, this is a flaw.

Shaked believes in no two-state solution and Arab MKs, including Ahmed Tibi and Haneen Zoabi often felt the lash of her rebuke. The lady is no pushover.

She is called “extreme”…an “extreme right-winger”…but that’s what they call anyone who is combative for the Jewish State.

Arabs in Israel, to her thinking, are welcome to their rights.

Objectifying her for her good looks (as some keep trying) – not recommended. She served as an infantry instructor for the Golani Brigade.
But if they deny Jewish rights to the Jewish homeland they are welcome to leave, along with foreign infiltrators.

Objectifying her for her good looks (as some keep trying) – not recommended. She served as an infantry instructor for the Golani Brigade.

She’s been hearing it from Liberals ever since the Gaza War, when she blamed the terroristsand the mothers and fathers who sent them as well.

Their hands are no less bloody, she charged.

We do that all the time over here in the United States. The man who drove the car is as guilty as the man who pulled the trigger. It is the law.

For daring to implicate those who arm, incite and support the terrorists, swiftly Haaretz, Turkey’s Erdogan and Leftist bloggers galore accused her of decreeing “genocide” against “the Palestinian people,” something she never said or even suggested.

Shaked, who holds a degree in Electronical Engineering and Computer Science, did suggest that Palestinian Arabs were being manipulated to hate.

This, the conditioning, not the people, has to be expunged. The Left, however, makes it a business to misunderstand.

While in the Knesset, Shaked lobbied for equality for women, especially Arab women academics. So she is not easy to define.

However, as Hamas kept firing missiles into Israel, Shaked lost her tempter. Enough is enough. She used some heated language – and whythe hell not?

Apparently, emotions such as anger, rage, indignation are forbidden to Israelis and denied to Jews in general. Not so for this daughter of Israel.

Israelis are expected to keep taking it on the chin and to suffer in silence. Jews, no matter how provoked, must remain obedient.

Radical Muslims are governed by no such restrictions and five times a day Jews are called sons of dogs and pigs. The world does not object.

But Ayelet Shaked is advised to stay polite.

Trouble is, she was born in Israel and was not told that Jews are bred to be willing victims. Read this for the drama of people who refuse to kowtow. 

Jimmy Carter and a thousand campuses are in an uproar against Israel.

But Ayelet Shaked is cautioned to speak softly.

Otherwise, the world won’t love her.

This proud defiant Sabra, this fighter for the honor and glory of Israel – it is unlikely that she gives a damn. Better to be respected than loved.

Jack Engelhard writes a regular column for Arutz Sheva. The new thriller from the New York-based novelist, The Bathsheba Deadline, a heroic editor’s singlehanded war on terror and against media bias. Engelhard wrote the int’l bestseller Indecent Proposal that was translated into more than 22 languages and turned into a Paramount motion picture starring Robert Redford and Demi Moore. Website: www.jackengelhard.com

PAMELA GELLER'S WAR ON RADICAL ISLAM AND EVERYBODY ELSE - MAY 5, 2015

Pamela Geller tested the First Amendment and America failed.

Have you hugged a Jihadist today? Everybody else has. Have you trashed Pamela Geller this morning? Welcome to the club.

Pamela Geller made a mistake. She tested the First Amendment and the First Amendment lost.

This fighter for Israel, this battler against Radical Islam can seem to find no friends after what she did.

She tried to prove that America is not France, where 11 were murdered by Islamists for printing Mohammad cartoons, nor are we the Netherlands, where Ayaan Hirsi Ali’s partner, Director Theo van Gogh was murdered for his documentary Submission, which exposed Islamist mistreatment of women.

This cannot happen in America, assumed Miss Geller, here in the land of the free, home of the brave, and she was wrong.

It can happen here, and it did…in part.

Together with Robert Spencer, Geller organized a Mohammad Cartoon Contest in Garland, Texas; obviously as a means to illustrate that America will not be intimidated. Two apparent Jihadists (with possible links to ISIS) tried to storm the event, but were killed by local police.

After that came the denunciations. No, not against the Islamic fanatics. But against Geller. 

From all across the Liberal dials, plus The New York Times, came blasts of outrage against Geller for being “provocative” and “asking for trouble.”

But Conservatives? They too piled on. Donald Trump, Bill O’Reilly, Bill Donohue of the Catholic League, Don Imus – all those and others want her scalp.

Fox News anchor Martha MacCallum was especially harsh during this morning’s interview with Geller.

Better, they allege, if Geller would hush up and forget the First Amendment. Safer, they suggest, if we submit and become a nation of wimps.

There was a time, among journalists especially, when Americans were unafraid and quick to speak their minds.
Imus, legendary as a shock jock and as a man who fearlessly speaks his mind, was astonishingly disapproving of Geller, and fearful.

“When you inflame people,” he said, “what else can you expect?”

Well, Don, you can expect a touch of support for a woman who champions free speech.

Besides, how can you inflame people, these Jihadists, who are always on fire anyway?

Robert Spencer writes bestsellers and runs the Jihad Watch website to reveal outrages committed in the name of Islam. Ditto Geller who refuses to be stopped in support of Israel and in exposing the encroachment of Islamic Extremism. They are brave. Are they the last of the brave? 

There was a time, among journalists especially, when Americans were unafraid and quick to speak their minds. We saw this from last week’s PBS program about Vietnam, which featured reporters going after LBJ and Nixon with a vengeance. Compare that to today’s reporters who remain putty in the hands of Obama.

Seems that we have trained ourselves to be compliant, passive, easily cowed and entirely too close to being cowards.

If freedom of speech is not worth fighting for – what will we give up next?

Jack Engelhard writes a regular column for Arutz Sheva. The new thriller from the New York-based novelist, The Bathsheba Deadline, a heroic editor’s singlehanded war on terror and against media bias. Engelhard wrote the int’l bestseller Indecent Proposal that was translated into more than 22 languages and turned into a Paramount motion picture starring Robert Redford and Demi Moore. Website: www.jackengelhard.com

HYPE OF THE CENTURY - MAY 4, 2015

Waji runs the news shop up the corner. It’s where we all go to buy the papers and gather to solve the world’s problems and smoke cigars where there’s not a snitch in the crowd.  Waji -- every morning he waits to rub it in when I come in for the New York Post. He is always right. So he says. Today he has thrilling news.

“I told you this day would come,” he gloats with that friendly twinkle in the eyes. “My fellow Arabs are sending messages of love and peace to Israel.”

“Oh really.”

“I predicted this, my friend. I predicated everything.”

He also predicted the Mayweather win over Pacquiao, termed “The Fight of the Century.”

I kept calling it “The Hype of the Century,” a catch phrase that covers practically everything these days.

“So now what happens to your cynicism?” says Waji. “No more books to write, no more columns. You’re out of business.”

So Fukuyama was right? The End of History is upon us? Nothing more to say? If peace breaks out – then what?

No more war, no more suffering, no more injustice. What a spot to be in for a writer. Without anger, there is no writing,

“Not so fast,” I tell him as he uses even me for proof, the column I wrote about an Egyptian journalist who gushed, “Go Israel. We are with you.”

This was a plea to take out Iran’s nukes. The shadow of Iran looming over the Arab world has supposedly convinced the Arabs that for all this time they had it wrong when they chose Israel as the enemy. It was always Iran, -- and so tweets keep coming in from all over avowing reconciliation and friendship with the Jewish State.

It’s coming mostly from the young who want no part of the old hostilities. They view Israel as indeed a beacon of liberty – even as their savior.

An amazing trend -- Arabs dancing to Hava Nagila.

“So now what do you say?” asks Waji.

“I call it hype is what I say. Everything is hype.”

Or is it just me? I see nothing but rage and hatred from the Muslim world. Am I talking to the wrong people? Reading the wrong newspapers? Speaking to the wrong campuses? Should I forget the beheadings, the chants of Death to America and Israel and what keeps happening to Pamela Geller when she tries to speak the truth?

“You’re impossible,” says his wife with the usual smile.

They arrived as infants during the PLO brutalities in Beirut and since coming to America -- life is good. Waji calls me his brother.

Waji and his family are practically Zionists. At least this: They believe the Arab wars against Israel have been a waste of time and blood. “Listen,” he says. “The change has come. My Arab customers, more and more they see what’s going on, ISIS, Iran, Obama, and they want Israel. They love Israel.”

Tough sell considering our leaders who parade us down the path of ruin as they beguile us with hype and fatten themselves with our misguided trust.

Bill Clinton makes $500,000 per speech and Hillary makes her own fortune by exchanging gifts and favors with Arab oil billionaires.

Mayweather raked in more than $180 million to exchange a few punches in the boxing ring. The unpopular champ spoke the truth about everything when he said it’s all about MONEY. He has also been known to hit and knockout women. This he reportedly does without gloves and for free.  

I explained this to Waji, how Mayweather knows us for what we are – suckers, a world of suckers, and I am not buying.

“We need you to accept change and to tell Israel to get ready for a new day,” says Waji.
But this I had to admit, getting back to his point, yes about the jitney driver in Atlantic City who drives around with an Israeli flag fastened to his windshield. That takes courage, I thought. I asked him if he gets any reaction. I expected the worst. “It’s all positive,” he said. “Thumbs up. Even the Arab passengers.”

“When will you write about that?” says Waji. “You know I’m reading you. So be careful.”

I used him (or a facsimile) to be Jay Garfield’s improbable Arab buddy inThe Bathsheba Deadline, a novel his wife half-jokingly calls the most scandalous book she has ever read, which is one reason she recommends it; the other reason is that her husband serves as a co-star in a book that takes pity on no one – especially the Arabs and most spectacularly the media. 

“You will have to re-write your hard-hitting unforgiving messages,” says Waji. “Even the book, starting with Jihad Watch.”

“Not a chance.” Robert Spencer’s Jihad Watch stays in the book, as does Kahane’s Dear World, though Pamela Geller came too late. Next time, perhaps.

“We need you to accept change and to tell Israel to get ready for a new day,” says Waji.

I will, when that day comes.

Jack Engelhard writes a regular column for Arutz Sheva. The new thriller from the New York-based novelist, The Bathsheba Deadline, a heroic editor’s singlehanded war on terror and against media bias. Engelhard wrote the int’l bestseller Indecent Proposal that was translated into more than 22 languages and turned into a Paramount motion picture starring Robert Redford and Demi Moore. Website: www.jackengelhard.com