Teaching Hate
 
It is a well-established fact that Palestinian children are taught to hate Israeli Jews from a very young age.  Some Palestinian textbooks teach addition and multiplication by counting the number of "martyrs" killed by Israel. 
 
Songs worshipping jihadi violence are big hits on social media.  Palestinian children often go to summer camps run by Hamas where they are trained to become terrorists.
 
Thus, I was not shocked when I read a report over the weekend about Muslim school children signing about jihad and the conquest of Jerusalem.  Here are a couple of lines from the song: 
 
"We will defend the land of divine guidance with our bodies, and we will sacrifice our souls without hesitation. 
 
"We will chop off their heads, and we will liberate the sorrowful and exalted Al-Aqsa Mosque.
 
"We will lead the army of Allah fulfilling His promise, and we will subject them to eternal torture."
 
What was shocking was that this war cry was not sung by Muslim children in Gaza or the West Bank, but in Philadelphia!
 
The same message of hate towards Jews that is drilled into Palestinian children is apparently taking place right here in the United States. 
 
The conflicting statements from the Muslim American Society, which runs the Philadelphia mosque, are less than satisfactory.
 
This is not the first time we have reported on hatred being preached in U.S. mosques.  (Here, here, here and here.)  How many other mosques is this happening in? 
 
And what are Representatives Tlaib and Omar tweeting about?  Omar was bashing Israel and Tlaib was defending the Palestinians even as rockets rained down from the sky on innocent Israelis.  (More on that below.)
 
Omar and Tlaib insist their critics are unfairly questioning their loyalty.  Here's a good opportunity for them to set the record straight by condemning the hatred in this Philadelphia mosque. 
 
By the way, CNN seems to think we have more to fear from Catholic students wearing MAGA hats.  The network ran 23 stories about Catholic high school student Nick Sandmann and not one about the Muslim students in Philadelphia singing about beheadings.
 
 
 
Israel Under Siege
 
Hamas and Islamic Jihad celebrated the beginning of Ramadan this weekend by firing 700 rockets and mortars at Israel.  Four Israelis were killed and hundreds were wounded.
 
The Trump Administration is proudly and unequivocally standing with our ally Israel.  President Trump tweeted yesterday, "Once again, Israel faces a barrage of deadly rocket attacks by terrorist groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad. We support Israel 100% in its defense of its citizens."
 
The State Department condemned Hamas and Islamic Jihad, saying:
 
"The United States strongly condemns the ongoing barrage of rocket attacks by Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad from Gaza upon innocent civilians and their communities across Israel.
 
"We call on those responsible for the violence to cease this aggression immediately. We stand with Israel and fully support its right to self-defense against these abhorrent attacks."
 
While a ceasefire is reportedly in place now, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned this morning that Israel's response was ongoing.  Netanyahu said:
 
"Over the last two days we struck Hamas and Islamic Jihad with great force.  We hit over 350 targets.  We struck at terrorist leaders and operatives, and we destroyed terrorist buildings.   The campaign is not over and it demands patience. . . We are prepared to continue."
 
Some Israeli security experts believe Iran is responsible for this latest round of violence.  And there is evidence Iran is up to something.
 
Yesterday, the White House announced that a carrier strike group and bomber task force were being immediately deployed to the Middle East based on evidence that Iranian forces were preparing attacks against U.S. interests. 
 
National Security Advisor John Bolton warned that the deployment was meant "to send a clear and unmistakable message to the Iranian regime that any attack on United States interests or on those of our allies will be met with unrelenting force."
 
 
 
Trump's Tariff Threat
 
After months of negotiations with the Chinese government, the president's frustration level is clearly rising.  He announced over the weekend that tariffs on Chinese products will increase from 10% to 25% this Friday unless there is significant progress in the latest round of trade talks. 
 
The president's warning rattled financial markets.  The Chinese stock market dropped nearly 6%, and the Dow fell 471 points when trading began this morning.  As of this afternoon, it had recovered almost all of those losses.
 
The president's tough stance earned applause from an unlikely source -- Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer, who urged Trump to "Hang tough. . . Don't back down.  Strength is the only way to win with China."
 
 
 
Defending Faith
 
Former Virginia Congressman Frank Wolf and Frank Gaffney, both old friends, held a press conference last week that was blacked out by the mainstream media.  They took on Squire Patton Boggs, of the most powerful law firms in Washington, D.C., because it is representing three of the worst persecutors of Christians in the world, most notably China.
 
Wolf said that the Chinese government is persecuting every faith, including Catholics, evangelicals, Uighur Muslims and Tibetan Buddhists.  He noted the recent testimony of FBI Director Christopher Wray who warned, "No country poses a broader, more severe [spying] threat than China." 
 
Wolf told reporters, "During the Carter and Reagan Administrations, no law firm or public relations firm in [Washington, D.C.] would represent the Soviet Union. There's been a shift."  And not for the better, in my view.
 
Dozens of faith leaders joined Wolf and Gaffney in urging Squire Patton Boggs to put principle ahead of profits and to stop taking money from rogue regimes that brutally suppress religious freedom and human rights.