In August 2014, ISIS tried to secure the release from a U.S. federal prison of Dr. Aafia Siddiqui — a Pakistani neuroscientist educated in the United States — formerly known as the “most wanted woman alive,” but now referred to as “Lady al Qaeda”, by exchanging her for American war correspondent James Foley, who was abducted in 2012 in Syria. When the proposed swap failed, Foley was beheaded in a gruesome propaganda video produced and released by his captors, while Siddiqui remained in jail serving an 86-year sentence.

Part of an FBI “seeking information” handout on Aafia Siddiqui — formerly known as the “most wanted woman alive.” (Image source: FBI/Getty Images)

ISIS also offered to exchange Siddiqui for a 26-year-old American woman kidnapped in Syria while working with humanitarian aid groups. Two years earlier, the Taliban had tried to make a similar deal, offering to release U.S. Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl in exchange for Siddiqui. These efforts speak volumes about Siddiqui’s profile and importance in Islamist circles.

Her affiliation with Islamist ideology began when she was a student, first at M.I.T. and then at Brandeis University, where she obtained her doctorate in 2001. Her second marriage happened to be to Ammar al-Baluchi (Ali Abd al-Aziz Ali), nephew of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the principal architect of the 9/11 attacks.

During the 1995-6 academic year, Siddiqui wrote three sections of the Muslim Students Association “Starter’s Guide” — “Starting and Continuing a Regular Dawah [Islamic proselytizing] Table”, “10 Characteristics of an MSA Table” and “Planning A Lecture” — providing ideas on how successfully to infiltrate North American campuses.

The MSA of the United States and Canada was established in January 1963 by members of the Muslim Brotherhood at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign campus. Since its inception, the MSA has emerged as the leading and most influential Islamist student organization in North America — with nearly 600 MSA chapters in the United States and Canada today.

The first edition of the MSA Starter’s Guide: A Guide on How to Run a Successful MSA was released in 1996. A subsection on “Islamization of Campus Politics and the Politicization of The MSA,” written by Hussein Hamdani, a lawyer who served as an adviser on Muslim issues and security for the Canadian government, states:

“It should be the long-term goal of every MSA to Islamicize the politics of their respective university … the politicization of the MSA means to make the MSA more of a force on internal campus politics. The MSA needs to be a more ‘in-your-face’ association.”

In early 2015, Canadian Minister of Public Safety Steven Blaney suspended Hamdani from the Cross-Cultural Roundtable on National Security. No reason was given for the suspension, but Hamdani claimed it had been politically motivated — related to his support for Justin Trudeau’s Liberal Party. The French-language Canadian network TVA suggested, however, that the suspension was actually due to activities in which Hamdani had engaged as a university student, and radical organizations with which he was associated. During the 1998-9 academic year, Hamdani was president of the Muslim Students Association at the University of Western Ontario; in 1995, he was treasurer of the McMaster University branch of the MSA.

Several alumni of the MSA have gone on to become leading figures in Islamist groups. These include infamous al Qaeda recruiter Anwar al Awlaki, Osama bin Laden funder Ahmed Sayed Khadr, ISIS propagandist John “Yahya” Maguire and Canada’s first suicide bomber, “Smiling Jihadi” Salma Ashrafi.

What they have in common (whether members of ISIS, al Qaeda, Jamaat e Isami, Boko Haram, Abu Sayyaf or others) is ideology often rooted in the Muslim Brotherhood — as findings of a 2015 U.K. government review on the organization revealed.

Siddiqui’s involvement in the MSA, her subsequent literal and figurative marriage to al Qaeda and her attempted release by ISIS, perfectly illustrate this ideological connection and path.

Thomas Quiggin, a court qualified expert on terrorism and practical intelligence, is based in Canada.

Right after signing the Iran nuclear deal with itself — Iran still has not signed it, and even if it did, the deal would not be legally binding — members of the P5+1 (the five permanent members of the UN Security Council plus Germany) have been showing their eagerness to establish improved relations with their imaginary partner.

Last month, after the lifting of international sanctions, Iran’s president, Hassan Rouhani, went on a five-day trip to Italy and France.

Officials from the host countries were so enthusiastic to welcome the Iranian president, it was as if they were unaware of Iran’s multiple violations of The Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) — which Iran did sign in 1968. They also seemed unaware of Iran’s expansion into Syria, Lebanon and Yemen, as well as Iran’s continuing role in sponsoring global terrorism.

Although both the leaders of France and Italy seemed eager to appease the president of Iran, in Paris, thousands of demonstrators gathered on the streets to protest Mr. Rouhani’s visit, and staged mock executions to highlight Iran’s dire human rights violations. In 2014, for instance, at least nine people were executed on the charge of moharebeh (“enmity against God”).

Even today, dozens of child offenders remain on death row in Iran. According to Iranian law, girls who reach the age of 9 and boys who reach the age of 15 can be sentenced to capital punishment. A recent report by Amnesty International called Iran one of the world’s leading offenders in executing juveniles. Despite the country’s ratification of the Convention on the Rights of the Child — which abolishes the use of the death penalty against offenders under the age of 18 — the UN estimates that 160 minors remain on death row.

The Iranian delegation, according to The New York Times, had asked Italian officials to hide all statues leading to the grand hall of the Capitoline Museums — where a news conference between Prime Minister Matteo Renzi and the Iranian president took place — to avoid any “embarrassment” for Rouhani, who casts himself as a moderate and reform-seeker. So on the first stop of Mr. Rouhani’s European visit, statues were encased in tall white boxes. In addition, “The lectern, was placed to the side — not the front — of an equestrian statue of the emperor Marcus Aurelius, apparently to avoid having images of the horse’s genitals appear in news photographs.”

As any kind of image is haram (forbidden) in Islam, any form of statue is considered idolatry.

Many Italians expressed their outrage over the decision to censor the statues. They accused the government of betraying Italian history and culture for the sake of economic interests.

An Iranian women’s rights organization, My Stealthy Freedom, condemned the Italian government’s decision. In a post on their Facebook page, the group wrote:

“Italian female politicians, you are not statues, speak out. Rome covers nude statues out of respect for Iran’s president in Italy and Islamic Republic of Iran covers Italian female politicians in Iran. Dear Italy. Apparently, you respect the values of the Islamic Republic, but the problem is the Islamic Republic of Iran does not respect our values or our freedom of choice. They even force non-Muslim women to cover up in Iran…”

In France, protesters demanded that President François Hollande challenge the Iranian president about his country’s human rights abuses. France’s leadership, however, raised no questions of that sort. Instead, Mr. Rouhani was welcomed as a superstar.

Big business deals were signed. France’s car-maker Peugeot and Iran’s leading vehicle manufacturer, Khodro, are engaged in a €400 million partnership. France’s energy giant, Total, signed a Memorandum of Understanding to buy crude oil from Iran. Total will reportedly begin importing 160,000 barrels of oil per day starting on February 16. Twelve days after the West lifted economic sanctions, Airbus announced that Iran Air had agreed to purchase 118 new planes. The deal is estimated at $25 billion.

Prime Minister of France Manual Valls hailed his country’s trade agreements with Iran. “France is available for Iran,” he said.

During a recent visit to Tehran, Germany’s Foreign Minister, Frank Walter Steinmeier, asked the Iranian president to keep Germany in mind as a future stop on his next trip to Europe.

Meanwhile, according to a US State Department report, Iran has pledged to continue its assistance to Shiite militias in Iraq. Many of these militias have poured into Syria and are now fighting alongside the Assad regime. Rouhani’s government also continues to support its Lebanese proxy Hezbollah, and Palestinian militants in Gaza.

For many years, the Iranian president has kept up close ties with leaders of Hezbollah, including Abbas Moussavi (the former leader of Hezbollah who was killed in 1992) and Hassan Nasrallah. In March 2014, Mr. Rouhani publicly pledged support for Hezbollah.

Rouhani’s Defense Minister is a former Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) officer, Brig. Gen. Hossein Dehghan. He commanded IRGC forces in Lebanon is Syria during Hezbollah’s founding years from 1982-1984.

Last September, Dehghan said that Tehran will continue arming Hezbollah, Hamas and any group that is part of the “resistance” against the U.S. and Israel. Iran, he explained, considers America to be the Great Satan.

“Hizbullah,” Dehghan stated, “does not need us to supply them with rockets and arms. Israel and the U.S. need to know this. Today, Hamas, the Islamic Jihad, and Hizbullah have the capability of producing their own resources and weapons themselves. Nevertheless, we shall not refrain from supporting them.”

As well as Dehghan, almost all of Rouhani’s appointments are either former members of the IRGC or other revolutionary institutions, such as Iran’s Judiciary and Intelligence Ministries.

Iran’s human rights violations under Rouhani’s governance have been increasing. A 659-page report published by Human Rights Watch concludes that Iranian authorities have repeatedly clamped down on free speech and dissent. “In a sharp increase from previous years, Iran also executed more than 830 prisoners.”

Since Hassan Rouhani (right) became the president of Iran, the surge in executions has given Iran the world’s highest death penalty rate per capita.

Social media users, artists and journalists face harsh sentences on dubious “security” charges. In May 2014, four young men and three unveiled women were arrested after a video showing them dancing to the popular song “Happy” went viral on YouTube. They were sentenced to up to a year in prison and 91 lashes on several charges, including “illicit relations.”

In November, the Iranian Supreme Court upheld a criminal court ruling sentencing Soheil Arabi to death for Facebook posts “insulting the Prophet” and “corruption on earth.”

In the Saudi Kingdom, the primary source of law is the Islamic sharia, based on the principles of a school of jurisprudence (Hanbali) found in pre-modern texts. Ultra-puritanical judges and lawyers form part of the country’s Islamic scholars.

But there is another main source of law: royal decrees. Simple death penalty along with beheading, stoning to death, amputation, crucifixion and lashing are common legal punishments. In the three years to 2010, there were 345 beheadings. But the legal system is usually too lenient for cases of rape and domestic violence.

The common punishment for offenses against religion and public morality such as drinking alcohol and neglect of prayer is usually lashings. Retaliatory punishments are also part of the legal system, such as, literally, an eye for an eye. Saudis can also grant clemency, in return for money, to someone who has unlawfully killed their relatives.

It is not surprising to anyone that Saudi Arabia is widely accused of having one of the worst human rights records in the world — the Kingdom is one of the few countries in the world not to accept the UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights. There is capital punishment for homosexuality. Women are not allowed in public places to be in the presence of someone outside the kinship. They are not allowed to drive.

But what makes Saudi Arabia an even uglier country than all of that medieval legal absurdity and systematic and cruel torture of its own citizens combined, is the fact that those pre-modern laws do not apply to all Saudis. One powerful visual evidence of this was a few photographs showing a Saudi prince vacationing on an ultra-luxurious yacht off Turkey’s Mediterranean coast. The very strict Quranic ban on all forms of extravagance and the command for modesty are probably not printed in Saudi copies of the Muslim holy book. But there was more than that.

Prince Nawaf al Saud spent four days with his friends and bikini-clad Swedish models on the yacht, which he rented for one million euros for a week, and was photographed partying all day. There were reports of a 4,500-euro dinner on a nearby Greek island and 1,000-euro tips for the waiters. Turkish columnist Ahmet Hakan wrote that the prince could have accommodated at least 80 Syrian refugees with the million euros spent for the chartered yacht:

“You in your country immediately draw your swords if a poor Bangladeshi [laborer] has accidental eye contact with a woman in her full niqab … What does your [holy] book say about your extravagant partying with models in bikinis?”

Good question.

But Turkey saw another Saudi prince recently. Business magnate, investor and, according to some, philanthropist Al-Waleed Bin Talal visited a Turkish resort on the Mediterranean coast shortly after Turkey’s failed coup of July 15.

Al-Waleed is a grandson of Ibn Saud, the first Saudi king, and a half-nephew of all Saudi kings since. Forbes listed him in March as the world’s 41^st richest man, with an estimated wealth of $17.3 billion. While in Antalya, the Turkish resort, he was interviewed by the leading Turkish daily, Hurriyet. His messages were:

• “When the coup took place in Turkey I said to myself I should go to Turkey immediately [in solidarity with President Erdogan].”
• “Erdogan and I defend a ‘progressive Islamic’ understanding.”
• “Some say that Islam and democracy cannot cohabit. But the Turkish example shows that this [argument] is totally invalid. Turkey is the best indication that Islam and democracy can cohabit. It is a country that is taken as precedent. We can see how much Turkey could internalize democracy.”

If the honorable prince was not joking, he must have come to Turkey to tell millions of Turks suffocating under Erdogan’s autocratic regime fairy tales from an Arab kingdom. With the third-world democratic culture it features, Turkey can be taken as a precedent only by North Koreans, almost all inhabitants of the Gulf and Arab countries and by Iranians. Apparently, what the prince understands of democracy is a totally different thing than what the term means in more civilized parts of the world.

Saudi Prince Al-Waleed Bin Talal meets with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in Ankara, May 6, 2015.

And if Prince Al-Waleed so passionately defends democracy, he should spend less of his office time in showing solidarity with undemocratic leaders, and more in giving at least a bit of democratic breathing space to his own people.

Burak Bekdil, based in Ankara, is a Turkish columnist for the Hürriyet Daily and a Fellow at the Middle East Forum.

As a fourth Gaza war looms on the horizon, we should be aware of the hypocrisy and demagoguery of past Gaza wars: because we are likely to see more of the same.

The Accusation

U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders, a candidate in the Democratic primaries for president, claimed that Israel’s response in the 2014 Gaza war was “disproportionate,” and Haaretz columnist Asher Schechter agreed. Yet neither Sanders nor Haaretz provided evidence to back that claim.

Schechter made one point worth mentioning: the claim of “extremely permissive rules of engagement during the operation that aimed to protect the lives of IDF soldiers even if the cost was a greater loss of civilian lives.” If true, it simply means that IDF soldiers, as all soldiers, have to make split-second decisions, and when they do so in a situation when confronted with Palestinians who appear to be terrorists, they err on the side of assuming they are terrorists in order to protect their own lives. That is not unexpected, and Israel has no obligation to do otherwise.

Israel has repeatedly demonstrated how much it values the civilian lives of the people it is fighting. No other military force drops leaflets, telephones its adversaries and “knocks on the roof” to warn them of an imminent attack, so that civilians will have time to evacuate. Israel values the lives of Palestinian civilians, but naturally, it values the lives of its own soldiers more. Israel has repeatedly demonstrated how much it values its soldiers, for example when it freed more than one thousand Palestinian criminals. Why would anyone expect Israel to suddenly to value its soldiers less when forced to fight terrorism in Gaza?

What is disgraceful is not that Israel cares about its soldiers, most of whom have families at home — in many cases dependent on them for their livelihood. What would morale in any military be if soldiers felt they were merely regarded as cannon-fodder, not cared about?

What is disgraceful is that the Palestinian government in Gaza cares less about the lives of its own civilians, who themselves have families, than about killing Jews. This is why the terrorists exploit those civilians as part of their “dead baby strategy,” described by American human rights lawyer Alan Dershowitz.

As Dershowitz has also written, Hamas has a “calculated strategy designed to point the emotional finger of moral blame at the IDF for doing what every democracy would do: namely, defend its civilians from rocket attacks by targeting those who are firing the rockets, even if they are firing them from civilian areas.”

No Credible Evidence

There has been no evidence from an unbiased and credible source that Israel’s actions in Gaza were disproportionate — in the laws of war, not meaning that the number of dead on both sides of a conflict have to be the same (which would be nonsense) — but that the amount of military force to be applied to accomplish a particular military operation may not exceed the amount of force required to accomplish the goal of that military operation: “Loss of life and damage to property incidental to attacks must not be excessive in relation to the concrete and direct military advantage …”

This is not a simple concept, especially for a public not versed in military matters.

Among the biased sources that have weighed in is Amnesty International (AI), which made that accusation in July 2015. The Israeli government explained why AI’s conclusion was not valid, but AI’s thoroughly documented record of anti-Israel bias already tainted its report.

AI’s bias against Israel has also been documented by several analysts, in addition to NGO Monitor: Dr. Yvette Alt Miller and Alan Dershowitz himself. AI’s national office denied Alan Dershowitz the right to speak after AI’s Columbia chapter had invited him. AI even co-sponsored the speaking tour of a Palestinian activist who promotes violence and who openly exploits his own children to provoke Israeli soldiers.

In addition to the lack of credibility of the accusations, non-Israeli and non-Jewish sources have also reached the conclusion that Israel committed no crimes of disproportionality. During the 2014 Gaza war, Colonel Richard Kemp, former commander of British forces in Afghanistan, said, “No other army in the world has ever done more than Israel is doing now to save the lives of innocent civilians in a combat zone”. In April 2016, he reiterated that assessment.

Haaretz‘s Schechter admits that “Hamas, of course, launched rocket attacks against schools, hospitals and houses. It did so deliberately, with the intent of inflicting death and suffering.” Everyone who is not an outright terrorist supporter, including Sanders and Haaretz, agrees that Israel has the right to defend itself against terrorist attacks from Gaza. It is, of course, the duty of Israel to use only the force required to stop the attackers and not much more, but how does one determine if Israel went “too far”?

To the naïve observer, it seems that because far more Palestinians died than Israelis, Israel must be using disproportionate force. This conclusion, however, does not take into account that Israel goes to great lengths to protect its civilians while Hamas encourages civilian casualties in order to gain sympathy, as Dershowitz explains. It also does not take into account the actual meaning of proportionality.

A Betrayal of both Israelis and Palestinians

By making an accusation of disproportionality without defining the meaning of the term, Sanders and Haaretz betrayed not only the Palestinians and the Israelis, but also their professions. They made false and unsubstantiated accusations while ignoring the thousands more Palestinian deaths that the Palestinians are inflicting on their own people — by training toddlers and children for war, using their own people as human shields and failing to provide shelters for them, as the Israelis do for their citizens.

In addition to helping Sanders attract the naïve and anti-Israel vote, and helping Haaretz attract anti-Semitic readers, unsubstantiated claims of disproportionality divert attention from the fact that preventing more wars requires replacing Gaza’s Iranian-backed terrorist regime with a regime that is interested in the well-being of the Palestinians. Sanders and Schechter propose nothing to achieve this. They prefer falsely to accuse Israel of anything that might possibly sound damning, and hope that no one will dig for some truth or ask any questions.

To naïve people, Sanders and Schechter appear thoughtful, compassionate individuals who care about the Palestinians; in fact, they merely are either ignorant themselves or duplicitous. If betraying Israelis and Palestinians equally is what Sanders means by “a more balanced position,” all that is disproportionate is their unjustified hostility towards Israel that is also unhelpful to the Palestinians.

Fred Maroun, a left-leaning Arab based in Canada, has authored op-eds for New Canadian Media, among other outlets. From 1961-1984, he lived in Lebanon.