U.S watchdog turns blind eye to Israel’s religious rights violations
By Stuart Littlewood
It’s hilarious.
I’m still rolling on the floor laughing my socks off at a report by the US Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF).
What’s the joke? Well, it’s no joke really. The USCIRF has just released its 2013 Annual Report on the world’s worst violators of religious freedom. And – you simply won’t believe this – it doesn’t even mention the worst offender of all, Israel.
Truly. It’s like Israel doesn’t exist.
Persecution of Christians and Muslims
I am regularly bombarded with reports of Israel’s religious persecution of Christians and their Muslim brothers and sisters in the Holy Land. This week included an account of how Israel continues to cause “countless difficulties” for Palestinian Christians and Muslims trying to reach their holy sites. “It is not only that Israel has isolated our occupied capital from the rest of our country – forcing our people to apply for special military permits to access their families and holy places for religious occasions – but even Palestinians from Jerusalem were beaten when trying to reach the Church of the Holy Sepulchre,” said Hanna Amireh, a member of the Palestine Liberation Organization Executive Committee and Head of the Presidential Committee on Church Affairs.
The Israeli forces turned a religious occasion into a battle camp scenario, she said.
This week also saw Jewish settlers storming the Aqsa mosque. The secretary general of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation accused Israel of pursuing a systematic policy of aggression against holy places in occupied Jerusalem.
Imagine the fuss if we road-blocked Jews from their synagogues in Golders Green, Hendon and Finchley.
I have spent time with priests and members of their congregation in occupied Palestine and it’s true that Israel is conducting a religious war. If you don’t believe me, go and see for yourselves – but not by Israeli bus-tour, obviously.
Imagine the fuss if we road-blocked Jews from their synagogues in Golders Green, Hendon and Finchley.
The USCIRF report was sent to the president on 30 April with a covering letter hammering home the commissioners’ recommendation that the secretary of state re-designate eight countries as “countries of particular concern”, or CPCs, “for egregious violations of religious freedom”. These are Burma, China, Eritrea, Iran, North Korea, Saudi Arabia, Sudan and Uzbekistan.
The commissioners also recommend that seven additional countries be designated as CPCs: Egypt, Iraq, Nigeria, Pakistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Vietnam.
Special treatment for Israel
Israel is not even on the list of countries looked at, while the commission’s press release emphasises how US foreign policy recognizes the critical role religious freedom plays in nations and prioritizes accordingly. “Religious freedom is both a pivotal human right under international law and a key factor that helps determine whether a nation experiences stability or chaos.”
The letter is signed in all seriousness by USCIRF’s chairperson, Katrina Lantos Swett. The report she presided over has allowed Fox News to point the finger at Iran, not Israel, and to give poor old Ahmadinejad another verbal blasting. “Religious freedom,” says Fox, “is in short supply in the Middle East, according to the bipartisan US Commission on International Religious Freedom, which has issued a report finding Iran chief among the nations where spiritual beliefs can bring prison sentences or worse.”
An article by Lantos Swett herself, called “US promotion of international religious freedom”, explains that USCIRF was created in 1998 by the International Religious Freedom Act (IRFA) to be
The IRFA defines “particularly severe” violations as ones that are “systematic, ongoing, and egregious”, including acts such as torture, prolonged detention without charges, disappearances, or “other flagrant denials of the right to life, liberty, or the security of persons”. All these are an everyday fact of life to non-Jews living under the Zionist-Israeli jackboot in the Holy Land.
And after a country is designated a CPC, the president is required by law to take specific actions to encourage reform.
In awe of Zionist racists
So, now we begin to see why Israel is omitted. Mustn’t upset the Zionists’ racist programme to steal and ethnically cleanse the Holy Land, must we? The irony seems totally lost on Lantos Swett and her colleagues.
Another reason is the appointment of Elliott Abrams, a Zionist hardliner, to the commission. American readers will know all about Abrams, but for the benefit of fellow Britons and others these extracts from may help:
That’s a frightening message for America and indeed Britain, where the Jewish influence continues apace.
The article continues:
Nice chap to have aboard, then. Abrams’ fellow commissioners are:
- Dr Katrina Lantos Swett (chair)
- Ambassador Mary Ann Glendon and Rev. William J. Shaw (vice-chairs)
- Hon. Sam Gejdenson
- Dr Robert P. George
- Dr Azizah Y. al-Hibri
- Dr M. Zuhdi Jasser
- Ambassador Suzan D. Johnson Cook
Why haven’t they examined the problem in their own country before condemning others?
Scourge of Christian Zionism
I’m talking, of course, about the scourge of Christian Zionism which is rife in the US and is allowed to permeate and bully Congress, influence US foreign policy and thus encourage and fund the Zionist thugs of the Jewish state in their project to oust Christians and Muslims from Palestine and annex their lands.
Doesn’t this fall under “exporting violent and extremist religious ideas”, which Lantos Swett talks about?
American journalist and fearless champion of the truth, Grace Halsell, explained Christian Zionism’s message: “Simply stated it is this: Every act taken by Israel is orchestrated by God, and should be condoned, supported, and even praised by the rest of us. Never mind what Israel does, say the Christian Zionists. God wants this to happen…”
The problem, she said, was their belief system. “They believe that what Israel wants is what God wants. Therefore, it is perfectly acceptable to give the green light to whatever it is Israel wants and then conceal this from the American people. Anything, including lies, theft, even murder, is justified as long as Israel wants it.”
The credit for much of the world’s misery must go to Cyrus Scofield, who was commissioned by the Oxford University Press to rewrite the King James Bible by inserting Zionist-friendly notes with the aim of changing the Christian view of Zionism and creating a pro-Zionist sub-culture within Christianity. Between them they distorted the Biblical message and produced a propaganda classic, the Scofield Reference Bible, which has oozed its nonsense for 100 years.
I commend to Lantos Swett and her fellow Commissioners The Jerusalem Declaration on Christian Zionism, a statement by the Latin Patriarch and Local Heads of Churches in Jerusalem. They are in the front line. They know the score. Here are the key passages…
America, heal thyself first.
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