Tag Archives: Ted Cruz

For The Love Of Jihad

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“God is love,” says the Christian scripture (1 John 4:8). In Judaism, Ahavat Hashem — love of God — is commanded and cultivated with blessing: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your might” (Deuteronomy 6:5). The love of God is a bond between man and heaven built on compassion, holiness, and peace.

But in far too many places across the Global South, another phrase is being taught: “The love of Jihad.”

It’s neither metaphorical nor poetic. It is proudly literal — sung by schoolchildren, broadcast on TV, etched into educational curricula, printed on flags held by terrorists. “We love death like our enemies love life” was a chilling Hamas slogan even before October 7, 2023. It isn’t a chant of a lone errant radical but a core tenet of Islamist extremism: to define one’s identity by war, death, and the annihilation of the other.

Two Loves. Two Worlds.

There is a love that sanctifies hospitals, schools, and synagogues. There is another love that sanctifies suicide belts and the murderers of civilians.

In the Judeo-Christian tradition, love flows downward from a Creator who gives life and asks for holiness in return. Morality is measured by how one treats the stranger, the widow, the orphan. The spiritual path is about elevating the self — resisting the urge to dominate, to hate, to take vengeance. I call it “Humble Faith.”

But in radical Islamist ideology, compassion is redirected from the divine to the destructive. Martyrdom is romanticized. The afterlife is promised not to those who love their neighbor, but to those who murder them. Jihad isn’t just war — it’s the highest expression of spiritual devotion.

Columbia University students call “Glory to the martyrs. Victory to the Resistance” supporting the Hamas war in October 2024 (photo: Mike Segar, Reuters, Redux)

People have attempted to sanitize “jihad” and “intifada” in Western media. We are told jihad means “inner struggle” and intifada means “shake off.” Perhaps it does for some Muslims. But the jihad of Hamas, Al Qaeda, Hezbollah, and Iran’s Revolutionary Guards is unmistakably violent. It’s the jihad of Kalashnikovs, tunnels under kindergartens, and paragliders into music festivals. It’s identical to Adolf Hitler’s “Mein Kampf” which similarly means “My Struggle.”

"Jihad means the fighting of the unbelievers and involves all possible efforts that are necessary to dismantle the power of the enemies of Islam, including beating them, plundering their wealth, destroying their places of worship, and smashing their idols."
- Hassan al-Banna, founder of the Muslim Brotherhood

And yet, around the world, there is a growing refusal to admit this unvarnished truth.

The West’s Romanticization of Jihad

Academics and activists in the West have twisted themselves into knots to justify the “rage” of jihadists. Excuses of “occupation,” “imperialism” and “colonialism” are concocted. New definition of “apartheid” and “genocide” are contrived. The love of jihad is recast as a legitimate cry for justice, while Israel’s efforts to protect its citizens is painted as cruel, racist, even genocidal.

When Hamas terrorists butchered entire Israeli families, raped women, and burned children alive, some depraved people in the West saw “resistance.” When Israel responded, the cries of “Ceasefire now!” emerged to protect Hamas, but not for Israel, which had been dragged into battle.

Hamas terrorist Ahlam Tamimi, who abetted the killing of 15 people and injuring of 122 – almost all women and children, celebrated her jihadi murders. She walks free in Jordan.

A World Turned Upside Down

Imagine a child in Gaza, raised on songs about martyrdom and vengeance, told that killing Jews is a way to please Allah. Compare him to a Jewish child reciting “Oseh shalom bimromav” — “May He who makes peace in His heavens bring peace upon us.”

Imagine a Christian child learning to “turn the other cheek,” and then hearing protesters on Western campuses chant “Intifada until victory” — a call for permanent war.

There are two radically different spiritual trajectories here. One aims upward, toward love, life, and sanctity. The other plunges downward into hatred, death, and hell.

It is no coincidence that the Islamic Republic of Iran calls Israel “Little Satan” and the United States “Big Satan.” The philosophy of radical Islamism is not oriented towards love and God but directed to violence and the underworld.

Choose Your Love

The West must stop pretending. To love God is to abhor the love of jihad. To defend life is not to disrespect culture; it is to preserve culture that can sustain a free and peaceful society.

Jihadism — like Nazism before it — dresses hatred in the garb of purpose. It seduces the young, exploits the poor, and destroys the innocent. And like Nazism, it will not stop until it is confronted with clarity, courage, and conviction.

We must stop asking why terrorists hate and start asking why we excuse it.

Sen. Ted Cruz talking about radical Islamic jihad in 2015, because then President Barack Obama refused to utter the words

The love of God builds nations. The love of jihad destroys them.

So it happened. So it happens again in our time.

Related:

The UN Has Joined The Jihadi Fray (February 2024)

When Founding Fathers Are Psychopaths And Cowards (January 2024)

Jihadi Coexistence (October 2023)

Mother’s Day And Ahlam Al-Tamimi (May 2022)

The Insidious Jihad in America (July 2019)

Considering Nazis and Radical Islam on the 75th Anniversary of D-Day (June 2019)

I’m Offended, You’re Dead (February 2015)

Why the Media Ignores Jihadists in Israel (January 2015)

The Start Of The Overdue Cancelation Of UN Immunity

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At its founding after World War II, the United Nations was declared a bold and righteous institution designed to bring about world peace. To accomplish its mission, it granted itself certain powers under the presumption that the agency’s role and workers were impartial and noble.

Alas, people are people, and the UN’s corruption and partiality grew over the years. It has made the UN not only a deformed shadow of its mission but a deeply dangerous and immoral tool cloaked in nobility.

When United Nations “peacekeepers” were deployed in Africa and Haiti, their role was to stop fighting between warring groups. However, during the deployment, many soldiers raped local women and some young boys. Investigations of the incidents confirmed multiple accounts of sexual assault, and noted that the UN’s shield of immunity protected the rapists, putting the local population at further risk.

Many UN “peacekeepers” have been accused of rape and shielded from prosecution by the UN’s cloak of immunity.

Over the past decades in Gaza, thousands of local Arabs join UNRWA, the UN’s “temporary” agency to house and educate the descendants of internally displaced Arabs who left homes a few miles away. It pays well and provides protection to carry out rapes and massacres like the one they perpetrated on October 7, 2023 in Israel.

Or so the UN terrorists hoped.

After many UNRWA workers were proved to have taken part in the barbaric massacre and provided material support to the U.S.-designated foreign terrorist group Hamas, victims of the atrocities and their families sued the UN. The UN claimed “immunity” from prosecution and the U.S.’s Biden administration agreed, stating “Because the U.N. has not waived immunity in this case, its subsidiary, UNRWA, retains full immunity, and the lawsuit against UNRWA should be dismissed due to lack of subject matter jurisdiction.”

In a pathetic attempt to mask its complicity, the UN fired some of the UNRWA workers, several of whom were already dead. It would not prosecute the fired living workers and left such matter of justice to local Gazans and Hamas to manage. UNRWA Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini said he fired the workers “in the interest of the Agency,” not as a matter of justice for thousands of butchered, raped and injured civilians in Israel.

It was a despicable display of inhumanity cloaked in virtue.

UNRWA’s Philippe Lazzarini

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) had enough. On April 14, 2025, he introduced legislation called the LIABLE Act to strip immunity from toxic bodies like UNRWA. Upon introducing the legislation, Cruz said “The United Nations Relief and Works Agency officials have for decades knowingly provided support to Hamas terrorists, including salaries and materials. That support facilitated Hamas’s terrorist attack on October 7th, which was the worst one-day massacre of Jews since the Holocaust and included the murder and kidnapping of dozens of Americans. Those victims and their families deserve the ability to hold UNRWA accountable, and the LIABLE Act would give them that opportunity.“

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX)

The United Nations has morphed into something deeply corrupt and unjust long shielded from prosecution, even for heinous actions. Perhaps the LIABLE ACT is the first domino to end the invincibility of barbarism under cover of white hats.

Related article:

Impunity Of Immunity Will Always Come For The Jews (November 2024)

The United Nations’ Adoption of Palestinians, Enables It to Only Find Fault With Israel (March 2016)

The Diaspora Intifada

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American Jews fear for their basic safety.

They are scared when praying in their synagogues, visiting Jewish community centers and when they go out to dine. They are scared when they walk on the street or attend classes at school.

In April 2024, the rabbi at Columbia University told the Jewish students to leave campus and return home in an email stating that the school’s policies “have made it clear that Columbia University’s Public Safety and the NYPD cannot guarantee Jewish students’ safety.” It has continued into the Fall 2024 semester, when another New York City school, CUNY’s Baruch College told Jewish students that they could not hold a Rosh Hashana celebration because the school could not “guarantee their security.”

New York Post article blasting the City University of New York being unable to protect basic Jewish human rights

The intimidation, harassment, denial of Jewish human rights and antisemitic attacks since the October 7 attack on the Jewish State of Israel have skyrocketed, especially at universities.

The U.S. House of Representatives held several hearings about the horrific rise in antisemitic attacks at universities. Rep. Foxx (R-NC), Chairwoman of the House Committee on Education and the Workforce, was tireless in her efforts to expose the systemic Jew-hatred prevalent in the institutions – or antisemitic ambivalence, should one choose to be charitable – which receive billions of dollars of government handouts. The Senate’s Republicans wanted a similar panel but are the minority party so could not force a discussion on the topic.

Instead, Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL), Chair of the Senate Committee on the Judiciary, held a generic discussion on September 17, 2024 on “A Threat to Justice Everywhere: Stemming the Tide of Hate Crimes in America.” He and fellow Democrats pointed out that hate crimes against all groups are a problem, just as shrill members of the House like Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) and Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-NY) objected to the special hearing on antisemitism during the Foxx hearings in April 2024.

Despite the Democratic chair calling for a generic hearing on hate crimes, he pulled a narrow panel which consisted of a Muslim Arab, a Jewish rabbi, and a liberal apologist for antisemitism. There was no one there to talk about the most prevalent hate crime – attacks on Black people – revealing the thin veneer of the title meant to obfuscate the obvious problem of antisemitism.

But Democratic politicians were loathe to simply discuss rampant antisemitism without ALSO discussing the much less prevalent anti-Muslim hate crimes. Every Democratic senator on the panel made a point of discussing a wide range of hate crimes to appear balanced, even though the scale of Jew-hatred dwarves hate crime against every other group, and has for years, while Republican senators were laser-focused on antisemitic attacks.

Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) was apoplectic about the refusal to hold hearings specifically on antisemitism (start 1:55:50). He showed the steady rise of antisemitic hate crimes in the U.S. since 2014, with a terrible escalation starting at the beginning of the Biden Administration in 2021 and then again in 2022, before skyrocketing in 2023.

Cruz demanded that more attention be paid to Jew-hatred, a vile form of hatred that has led to genocide. He called college campuses vile “incubators of hatred of Jews,” and went on to list comments by students and student organizations that threatened Jews, including a Jewish student being told to “go back to the gas chambers.”

Cruz also called out the administrations such as M.I.T., which refused to prosecute some of the antisemitic agitators because if the school did, “the students risked losing their visas and being deported.” As he went on to criticize the Democratic administration and local Democratic politicians for refusing to enforce the law because they feared the “pro-Hamas wing of the party,” anti-Israel people in the audience began to protest (2:01:00). The senator concluded his remarks by noting that no university has yet lost federal funding despite being clearly in non-compliance with Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) was similarly angered by the unchecked Jew hatred at universities. He showcased a poster of a student holding a Palestinian flag and a sign which read “THERE IS ONLY ONE SOLUTION,” a reference to the Nazi’s “Final Solution” to exterminate Jews. He showed another with a banner “LONG LIVE THE INTIFADA.”

Maya Berry of the Arab American Institute (AAI) testified that she objected to automatically inferring that the term “intifada” meant the violent slaughter of infidels, such as the brutal “Second Intifada” in Israel where Muslim Palestinian Arabs blew up buses and ice cream parlors full of kids, killing over 1,000 people. Berry said (2:10:15) that intifada “literally just means ‘to shake off’ or ‘get rid of’.” She would not agree that intifada necessarily means the violent destruction of Israel, while it could mean that. She essentially educated the committee that ‘intifada’ is an umbrella Arabic word that could mean a silent protest or the raping and beheading of infidels. Lots of in between.

Unmentioned in the hearing were the perpetrators of the antisemitic attacks. Sen. Durbin mentioned “white supremacists” repeatedly in his comments but no one directly pointed to the pro-Hamas extremists in the fringes of the Muslim and socialist communities who are overwhelmingly the perpetrators of Jew-hatred crimes today.

Whether it’s CAIR-backed protestors taunting Jews at the doorsteps of synagogues or during the anniversary of the October 7 massacre, or threatening non-Jews who don’t abide by the fanatical jihadist credo, the Diaspora Intifada is here.

The president of Rutgers University, Jonathan Holloway who is not Jewish, told a House committee in May 2024 that he did not believe that Israel is a genocidal state and that “intifada” and “from the river to the sea” are calls for violence. He and his family were subsequently threatened and he announced his resignation last week due to fear for his and his family’s safety.

Rutgers President Jonathan Holloway announcing his resignation due to fear for his family’s safety

The Intifadas in Israel are genocidal jihadist attacks to slaughter Jews and destroy Israel. The Diaspora Intifada is more “nuanced” as AAI’s Berry said, and may mean violence and rape or it may simply be taunting and harassment.

It definitely means fear.

Related articles:

The Last Days Of ‘Everlastingly Happy’ At The Edges (August 2024)

The Anti-Israel And Anti-American Woke Grows (July 2024)

A Democratic-Majority Congress Would Not Investigate Antisemitism At Colleges (July 2024)

The Disappearing Jew (July 2024)

Protecting Synagogues Like Abortion Clinics (July 2024)

Peacefully Calling For The Annihilation Of Jews (May 2024)

Why Should Columbia Protect Jews If The Government Won’t? (April 2024)

The Normalization Deformity: No To Zionism and Peace; Yes To Massacres and Terrorism In a Global Intifada (January 2024)

Excerpt of Hamas Charter to Share with Your Elected Officials (May 2021)

The Insidious Jihad in America (July 2019)

The Holocaust Will Not Be Colorized. The Holocaust Will Be Live. (May 2019)

The New York Times Whitewashes Motivation of Palestinian Assassin of Robert Kennedy (June 2018)

Pick Your Jihad; Choose Your Infidel (September 2014)

On Accepting Invitations, Part 2

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Exactly eighteen months ago, many Americans were debating the proper protocol and response to a particular invitation.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accepted an invitation from the US Speaker of the House of Representatives, John Boehner, to address a joint session of Congress.  As Netanyahu had not followed protocol in notifying the White House before accepting the invitation, and because Netanyahu was going to speak against the Iranian nuclear deal that Obama crafted, Obama organized a boycott of Bibi’s speech by many fellow Democrats.

As described in “On Accepting Invitations,” Obama had treated Israel badly regarding invitations once before – when Obama declined the 2013 invitation to speak to the Israeli Knesset.  Obama opted instead to use that same time to address college students, because Obama wanted to address Israelis “directly,” as if Israel wasn’t a democracy and the Knesset didn’t represent the country’s attitudes and interests. (The equivalent would be Netanyahu turning down addressing Congress, and then going up the road to the DC Convention Center to address selected college students about the Iranian deal).  Not nice.

In July 2016, the Republican National Convention (RNC) had its own dynamics regarding invitations and addresses, particularly of Senator Ted Cruz and Rabbi Haskel Lookstein.

Senator Ted Cruz Addresses the RNC

Cruz had a long and contentious fight with Donald Trump for the Republican nomination.  Many of the Republican candidates, like Governor John Kasich and Senator Lindsey Graham, had a severe dislike of Trump, and opted to stay away from the Republican convention.  Cruz elected to accept the invitation and address the audience.  However, during his speech, rather than endorse Trump, Cruz told the audience to “vote your conscience.”

He was loudly booed by the crowd.

Cruz could have declined the invitation.  The invitation to him was made with the clear understanding of what was expected of him: an endorsement of Trump for president of the United States.  If he didn’t want to extend the endorsement, he could have declined the invitation just like Kasich or Graham.

It seems like some politicians – such as Cruz and Obama – do not understand some basic guidelines to accepting an invitation: be gracious and accept if you can; be a good guest and your host should be generous and courteous.

Cruz accepted the invitation and was a poor guest.  The year beforehand, Obama was a poor host.  An in 2013, Obama was obnoxious in turning down Netanyahu’s invitation and acting out in front of his Israeli constituents. Not an impressive showing for politicians.

How did non-politicians do at the RNC?

Rabbi Haskel Lookstein Does Not Address the RNC

Donald Trump’s daughter, Ivanka, asked her rabbi if he would lead a moment of prayer at the RNC.  Rabbi Haskel Lookstein, who oversaw Ivanka’s conversion to Judaism was touched by her request and immediately said yes.  He wrote his speech and went to get a new suit for the occasion.  He was then surprised by an outcry from his community.

Not long after the news of his address became public, “Never Trump” members of his synagogue, Kehilat Jeshrun, and graduates of the Ramaz school where Rabbi Lookstein served as Principal Emeritus, bombarded him with petitions to withdraw from the event.

lookstein
Rabbi Haskel Lookstein

The petition started:

“We, the undersigned, are outraged that Rabbi Haskel Lookstein – rabbi emeritus of Congregation Kehilath Jeshurun and the Ramaz School – has decided to lend his blessing to Donald Trump and speak at the Republican National Convention.

Donald Trump openly spouts racist, misogynistic rhetoric; he advocates torture, the expulsion of millions of families, some long settled in America, and insinuates that some citizens of this great country are somehow less than others.

To embrace Trump and Trumpism goes against all we’ve been taught. As graduates of Ramaz, and as current or former members of the Modern Orthodox community, this is a shanda beyond the pale. 

The petition concluded with:

“This is beyond politics, not a question of left or right, but a question of human decency — and you have decided to embrace and politicize hate. Not in our name. Today we are ashamed to be Ramaz graduates.

Please reconsider your public support of this dangerous man — the future of our country, not to mention your own legacy, is at stake.”

In response to the protests, Rabbi Lookstein withdrew from speaking, even as he disagreed with the petition.  In an email addressed to his constituents he wrote the following:

“Dear Ramaz Family,
 
When Ivanka Trump, a member of our congregation, invited me to deliver the opening prayer at the Republican National convention next Monday,  I made a personal decision to honor her request out of respect for her and our relationship.
Unfortunately, when my name appeared on a list of speakers at the convention, without the context of the invocation I had been invited to present, the whole matter turned from rabbinic to political, something which was never intended.  Like my father before me, I have never been involved in politics.  Politics divides people.  My life has been devoted to uniting a community – Ahavat Yisrael and ahavat ha-adam.
 
In the interest of bringing our community together, I have asked to be relieved of my commitment to deliver the invocation.  My request has been honored with the same love and respect in which it was first offered and intended.
 
May God bless us with a Sabbath of rest, harmony and peace.
 
Shabbat Shalom,
 
Very cordially yours,
 
Rabbi Haskel Lookstein ’47
Principal Emeritus
P.S.  In case you are interested in reading the prayer which I prepared, the text follows.
 
Invocation
Republican National Convention
July 18, 2016
 
רבי חנינה סגן הכהנים אומר:
Rabbi Chanina, the Deputy High Priest said:
“הוי מתפלל בשלומה של מלכות”
“Pray for the welfare of the government,
“שאלמלא מוראה איש את רעהו חיים בלעו”
 For were it not for respect for it, people would swallow one another alive.”
Eternal God:
 
We thank you for this blessed nation that for 240 years has translated into reality the Biblical command to “proclaim liberty throughout the land for all the inhabitants thereof.”
 
We thank you for our constitutional government that has created and fostered the American ideals of democracy, freedom, justice and equality for all, regardless of race, religion or national origin.
 
Almighty God:  We know that we are living in very dangerous times, when all of these blessings are threatened from without, by forces of terror and unimaginable brutality, and from within, by those who sow the seeds of bigotry, hatred and violence, putting our lives and our way of life at risk.
 
And so we pray, Dear God:
 
Help us to form a government which will protect us with sound strategy and steady strength; which will unite us with words of wisdom and acts of compassion; and which will thereby bring peace and harmony, safety and well-being to our beloved America and to all of humankind, and let us all say, Amen.”
Led by “progressives” that had argued for including left-wing J Street in the big tent of Jewish conversation about Israel to avoid the “echo chambers,” the people who signed the petition wanted the rabbi to not acknowledge the other political party in a two-party democracy.  The vocal liberals called the rabbi’s actions a “shanda,” an embarrassment, as they chastised and embarrassed him in public.
Their petition asked for decency, but they showed their rabbi none.

An invitation is an opportunity to welcome another person into the host’s space.  It is an extension of hospitality and warmth and should be treated with care and consideration by both host and guest.

Yet over the past few years, the public has watched politicians act disrespectfully and discourteously with each other, even during moments when a hand is extended.  This has been true of both Democrats and Republicans.

In the heightened emotion of political discourse, civilians have taken note and aped their masters. They shouted down a community leader who was simply acting out of “love and respect” for a member of his congregation.
What is the state of our society, that we have lost the basic ability to treat each other decently?  How can anyone expect an iota of harmony when they burn invitations?

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