The Iconoclast

by Fergus Downie I’m glad it was posted but an august journal having the good manners to air a discordant viewpoint doesn’t mean you’re entitled to have your views treated with breathless seriousness. A couple of points on ‘consciousness raising’ and and ‘Western appropriation of foreign cultures’. ...Read More...

by Conrad Black The prime minister should be congratulated for refusing to be bullied by the People’s Republic of China into returning Huawei executive Meng Wanzhou to China, though she is being detained in Vancouver for extradition on a demand from the United States for alleged commercial offences. ...Read More...

by Hugh Fitzgerald The New York Times could not possibly ever see fit to print the following story, to be found at algemeiner.com: Palestinian Authority (PA) officials are warning of wave of violence in response to the possible annexation of parts of the West Bank by Israel, but at least ...Read More...

by Fergus Downie It had to happen eventually I guess and in retrospect Dominic Raab, a serious man who I feared had dug his political grave, showed what a modest exertion of stubbornness could achieve. Johnson followed in a deft manoeuvre and soon even the ludicrous Starmer rose to the occasion ...Read More...

by Hugh Fitzgerald The Hezbollah leader imitates the puff adder, so-named because it puffs itself up to scare its enemies. The story is at the Jerusalem Post here: Marking 20 years since Israel’s withdrawal from Lebanon, Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah in late May warned ...Read More...

From France 24 and Deutsche Welle A French court on Friday handed a 30-year prison sentence to a jihadist for crimes committed in Syria between 2013-15 including overseeing the execution of two prisoners while a senior figure in the Islamic State extremist group.  French-born extremist Tyler Vilus, ...Read More...

London meaning 'has lived in a London borough for a time'. From ITV news, a jihad connection I have been keeping an eye out for developments for over 5 years.  An east London man - who is suspected of involvement in the kidnap of a British journalist in Syria - has been transferred to Iraq by American ...Read More...

From Microsoft News A female Isis supporter who plotted to bomb St Paul’s Cathedral and other London targets has been jailed for life. Safiyya Amira Shaikh, a Muslim convert who was formerly known as Michelle Ramsden, asked online contacts to fit out two bags with explosives. But the people ...Read More...

by David Bellavia and Dr. Marc Epstein This 4th of July is like no other that we’ve ever seen before.  A highly contagious virus courtesy of China has morphed into a worldwide pandemic, leaving over 130,000 Americans dead in its wake.  Social distancing is the watchword of the day, so parades, ...Read More...

by David J. Baldovin With the Communist-inspired insurrection and Antifa in the news, it might be appropriate to offer a glimpse, into my former employer. Item number 35 from the Congressional Record dated January 10, 1963 on the “Current Communist Goals,” here, is “Discredit and eventually ...Read More...

by Michael Curtis The killing of George Floyd and the Black Lives Matter campaign has had a dramatic impact on political and economic activity in the U.S. and elsewhere, and has led to considerations of the social, economic, and psychological legacies of slavery and racism. The conversation about ...Read More...

A Silent Strategy for the President Will Spur the Silent (and Sane) Majority by Conrad Black Possibly by accident, there are preliminary signs, green shoots, that the president is by experimentation moving toward the campaign strategy most appropriate for the summer. It is Donald Trump, even ...Read More...

by Theodore Dalrymple The orgy of riot and looting that followed the killing of George Floyd was accompanied by an orgy of self-righteous sentimentality among the opining classes. They detected a straightforward causative link between the killing of the victim and the looting of stores in Fifth ...Read More...

by Hugh Fitzgerald UAE Minister of Foreign Affairs Anwar Gargash The UAE ambassador to Washington was one of three Arab representatives – the other two were the ambassadors of Bahrain and Oman – to attend the White House ceremony announcing the Trump Administration’s “Deal of the Century.” The ...Read More...

I don't know what sort of tree this is, which I spotted on a walk through some old established woodland this morning. But I love the root formation.    ...Read More...