Biden’s Pier Is a Gift to Hamas Terrorists

Biden’s Pier Is a Gift to Hamas Terrorists

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Ubwami bw’Ubupersi na bamedi (Persian’s Kingdom and Med’s Kingdom)

Ubwami bw’Ubupersi na bamedi (Persian’s Kingdom and Med’s Kingdom)

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Hamas’s Industrial Murder: Why Is Senator Chuck Schumer Not Demanding a Change of Leadership in Hamas and Iran?

Hamas’s Industrial Murder: Why Is Senator Chuck Schumer Not Demanding a Change of Leadership in Hamas and Iran?

When the terrorist organization Hamas murders, tortures, rapes and abducts Jews in Israel, do not be surprised that the Jews of today will respond with the righteous might of a nation that More »

Israel’s Strategic Game of Survival

Israel’s Strategic Game of Survival

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“Biden’s actions are a violation of Israel’s sovereignty.”

“Biden’s actions are a violation of Israel’s sovereignty.”

  Israel Betrayed? It seems clear that the Biden administration would like to see the rapid creation of a Palestinian state or at least a “Palestinian unity government” — unfortunately composed of More »

 

Greece and Iran: The Dark Side of the Relationship by Maria Polizoidou

  • The Iranian government, with these two cases (Kabis and Noor 1), seems to hold in its hands a bomb that can blow up the Greek economic and political system. If Greek authorities seriously investigate these cases, they will trigger a domino-effect of disclosures that could well destabilize Greece’s government.

  • Iran can blackmail and manipulate its political influence inside Greece, or Iran can use its ability to destabilize a member of NATO and Eurozone, Greece, to strengthen its international position.

As Sunnis and Shiites are fighting for regional hegemony in the Middle East — Syria, Yemen — Greece, as geographical gate for Europe and the Balkans, is a trophy country for the Iranian regime. In recent years, the Iranians have been exploiting the corrupt establishment’s thirst for money. Through drug dealing and oil smuggling, Iran seems to be trying to buy political influence and access to the Greek media. Well-informed diplomatic sources say that the Iranian Embassy in Athens is extremely active in Greece’s political and economic life behind the scenes.

Until now, the Greek political and economic regime, after the junta in 1974, had always been extremely friendly to Sunni political Islam. During the Iran-Iraq war, the Greek regime sided with Iraq. Andreas Papandreou, former Prime Minister of Greece, was a close friend and supporter of the PLO and its chairman, Yasser Arafat. Greek businessmen and media owners always had close economic relationships with the Gulf States’ petrodollar business, and lobbying by Greek ship-owners, who carry Arab oil to international markets, always favored Sunni Arabs.

The influence of Sunni Islam in Greece is also large in the political and economic systems — many times stronger than in other countries of the European Union, with the Greek media always on the side of the Palestinians, Hezbollah and in recent years, many did not hide their sympathy for Hamas.

Dimitris Kabis, a professor at the University of Piraeus and recently a ship-owner — as president of Empire Shipping Limited — seems to be the protagonist in a network of oil-smuggling, arms-dealing and lobbying in Greece for the Iranian regime.

In March 2013, the US froze Kabis’s accounts, after accusing him of violating the US and EU sanctions on Iran, by bringing oil from Iran to China.

Dimitris Kabis was accused by the US that, with $500 million from Iran, he bought eight tankers for the National Iranian Tanker Company (NITC). Each of the eight tankers carried oil worth $200 million — per shipment — to China, in violation of the sanctions imposed on Tehran. In 2014, the NITC reportedly returned five of the eight tankers, but he illegally sold the remaining three in India and Bangladesh and received $100 million, which he apparently embezzled from the Iranian government.

Kabis, with the Iranian funds and a network of 20 Greek businessmen, for years supplied Iran with pharmaceuticals, weapons, high-technology products, money-laundering services and everything else Tehran needed. Among the Greek businessmen, at least one was confirmed as a TV station owner who has close relationships with Kabis.

Kabis seems to have violated an agreement signed by him and the NITC, and in July was arrested in Tehran and sent to prison. Although Tehran’s “special” court acquitted him, the Iranian seized took his passport. Kabis now resides in the Greek Embassy in Tehran, but does not have the necessary documents to return to Greece. That is why he sent a letter to the Greek Minister of Foreign Affairs to help him come back.

American authorities seem to have knowledge of Greek businessmen cooperating with Kabis. Kabis, in turn, and the Tehran regime, have all the names belonging to the network that took part in the corrupt Greek scheme, and is making the Greek economic establishment nervous. After the JCPOA agreement — the “Iran nuclear deal” with five permanent members of the UN Security Council plus Germany (P5+1) — which led to the lifting of most of the sanctions against Tehran — in July 2015, the US government demanded that Iran give them the all names in Kabis’s network.

The first time there was a reference to smuggled oil from Iran showed up in Greece’s Intelligence Services files about the Greek-owned ship, the “Noor 1”.

The Noor 1 apparently smuggled 18 tons of oil and two tons of Iranian heroin. The heroin was then distributed throughout Europe. The Noor 1 case was solved, and led to perpetrators’ arrests, with the cooperation of the US Drug Enforcement Agency and the Greek authorities. The arrests of the participants and the investigations showed that behind the Noor 1 case were indications that the masterminds were Greek businessmen with social status and access to the media.

The Noor 1 case has a lot of puzzle pieces, such as the relationship, if any, between the actions of those who are involved and the traffickers of the two tons of heroin. Possible connections were illuminated when some of the trial judges’ lives were threatened, and the lives of their relatives. The court’s president resigned out of fear, she said, for herself and her family. Terrorists sent another judge in the same trial a book packed with razor blades and explosives.

In court, only two people were found guilty of directing a criminal organization and transporting the heroin. Most of the crew were found not guilty, and just three of the defendants were convicted of simply being accessories to drug dealing. Usually, conventional drug dealers do not have the power to prevent a full-scale investigation of a case, or to threaten judges or send bombs. It would seem that only people with power inside the Greek establishment could do that, because only those people have access to the Greek Department of Justice, the Ministry of Citizen Protection and the Greek Intelligence Services — all of which recorded conversations between the masterminds and those who carried out the plan.

The media apparently put a lot of pressure on the establishment for a full-scale investigation — but nothing happened. The people involved appear untouchable. In this case, again, are Greek media owners offering the Iranians special protection for illegal activities?

The Greek coalition of Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras and Minister of Defense Panos Kammenos also made another unusual decision. The Greek government, famous for its blind obedience to decisions by the EU, nevertheless, for the first time decided to ignore the organization. When the EU voted to place sanctions on Iran’s Bank Saderat Iran (BSI), the Greek coalition vetoed the EU’s decision.

BSI evidently has close economic ties to terrorism. According to the Wall Street Journal, the U.S. Department of the Treasury announced that BSI was being cut off from all access to the U.S. financial system, direct or indirect, because it was funding Hezbollah, Hamas and other organizations that Washington has designated as terrorist.

After the JCPOA agreement in July 2015, the Saderat Bank was one of the three banks that remained on the European Union’s sanctions list. For Washington, the sanctions against the bank last as long as Iran finances terrorism.

Greece was the only country to oppose the ban to extend the sanctions on BSI, to prevent the bank from interacting with Europe’s financial system — despite US appeals to allow the continuation of the sanctions. Senior officials of the Greek Ministry of Foreign Affairs stated to the Wall Street Journal, that “there were very strict instructions from Athens to block the sanctions.”

In early 2016, Greek PM Alexis Tsipras, was among the first Western leaders who led a large business delegation to Tehran, after the economic sanctions were lifted.

Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras meets with Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in Tehran, on February 8, 2016. (Image source: Office of the Supreme Leader)

Circles in the Greek Ministry of Foreign Affairs, responding to WSJ‘s report, stated:

“The rule of law applies in Greece, an EU member-state that ought also to act as a community of law. Greece defends the rule of law in a fragile region where there is unrest, conflict and illegal activity.”

“The Court decision against the European Council that judged – at first instance in May 2013 and at second instance last April – the sanctions against Saderat bank to be illegal, was not the decision of a national court, nor an Iranian court or a neutral court. It was the decision of a European court, the European Court of Justice. If we, as the EU, do not enforce judicial decisions, how will we convince the world that we respect the rule of law and that we do not apply double standards?”

The Iranian government, with these two cases (Kabis and Noor 1) seems to hold in its hands a bomb that can blow up the Greek economic and political system. If Greek authorities seriously investigate these cases, they will trigger a domino-effect of disclosures that could well destabilize the Greece’s government. Iran can blackmail and negotiate its political influence inside Greece, or Iran can use its ability to destabilize a member of NATO and Eurozone, Greece, to strengthen its international position.

It is absolutely sure that the whistle-blowers, in order to have legal amnesty, will reveal to the judicial authorities and Greek people the dirty world of political and economic elites damaging Greece’s government in an irreversible way.

Greece borders two worlds: The Islamic world and the Jewish world. The Islamic world seems to have been using less than lily-white means to control the country through corrupt elites. By contrast, the Jewish world, through Israel’s Embassy in Athens, is trying to help Greek youth and society to prosper, by sharing know-how for business startups and new technologies.

Greek society must find the will, and the political means, to get rid of the corrupt establishment. There is no other way to save itself from the economic meltdown and the unbelievable poverty. It is now or never.

Maria Polizoidou, a reporter, broadcast journalist, and consultant on international and foreign affairs, is based in Greece.

Great Power Realignment – To Russia? by Shoshana Bryen

  • As the Russians insist that the Assad government is the only legitimate government, all anti-Assad fighters — ISIS, al Qaeda-related, or U.S.-backed or Turkish-backed “moderates” — are, by definition, terrorists.

  • Russian — and in particular Syrian — tactics are appalling. Washington would rather not be associated with them, but has a horror of the vacuum that might emerge if Assad is swept aside. Mainly, the U.S. has hung its hat on the International Syria Support Group. The U.S. is muddled, as usual, without a clear goal, clear allies or fixed positions beyond support for a “political process.”
  • The U.S. is looking less and less relevant, as historic Great Powers do what they have historically done best — fight for their national interests as they define them. President Obama appears to be conceding the lead to Russia and Russian aims.

The shelling of Syrian soldiers by the Turkish military is one more step back into Great Power politics — historic Turkish-Russian enmity played out over Kurds and Syrians. The U.S. appears to believe 21st century wars cannot be won by military force and that battling parties can be induced to set aside their national and religious aims for a negotiated “peace.” Meanwhile, the parties to the conflict are using their armies to pursue victory.

Last week, Turkey attacked Kurdish fighters who were struggling to connect Kurdish territory in northern Iraq with a Kurdish enclave in northern Syria along the Turkish border. The Kurds, backed by Russian air power, want to oust Turkish-backed Syrian rebels from the Azaz region, in order to create contiguous territory from northern Iraq to Syrian Kurdistan, and prevent the Syrian rebels from being resupplied by Turkey. The net effect is to boost Kurdish-Russian cooperation; to provide relief for Assad’s army in the north; to increase Turkey’s hostility toward Russia; and possibly to put Turkey on a collision course with the U.S. — if Ankara believes its position in NATO will protect it from Russian fallout. (It should be noted that although Turkish troops attacked Syrians, they stayed clear of threatening Russia directly.)

The U.S. has urged both Turkey and the Kurds to decrease hostilities, but Turkey dismissed U.S. calls for a ceasefire. Attacks on the Kurds continued as Turkey began to fire on Syrian forces, and Turkey’s President Tayyip Recep Erdogan did not rule out a ground attack inside Syria.

The history is Sunni Muslim Ottomans vs. Orthodox Christian Russians, beginning in 1568. The Armenian genocide, Russian massacres in Chechnya and Dagestan, and the desire for revenge on both sides of the Russian invasion of Afghanistan are just recent occurrences. The Kurds, oppressed by the Ottomans and then the Turks, had believed the U.S. would be their sponsor, both in Iraq and in the larger region claimed as Kurdistan. But for the non-jihadist and non-anti-Assad Kurds, anti-Turkish Russians are an equally compelling ally. Hence last week’s Russian air strikes against Turkish allies on behalf of the Kurds.

To drive home the public relations point, the Russian media outlet RT ran a long article Sunday on the economic collapse of Northern Iraq (also known as Iraqi Kurdistan). The article focused on corruption, Turkey’s control of Kurdish oil and how the Kurds feel abandoned by the West as well as by Baghdad.

Where is the U.S. in this? Muddled, as usual, without a clear goal, clear allies or fixed positions beyond support for a “political process.”

The U.S. regards some Kurdish groups as terrorists, but agrees with Russia that the Kurds are an ally against ISIS. Closer U.S.-Russia cooperation means less American patience for Turkey. Russian — and in particular Syrian — tactics are appalling. Washington would rather not be associated with them, but has a horror of the vacuum that might emerge if Assad is swept aside. Mainly, the U.S. has hung its hat on the International Syria Support Group (ISSG), which last met in Munich on February 11 and 12.

The ISSG is a mélange that includes Britain, China, Egypt, France, Germany, Iran, Iraq, Italy, Jordan, Lebanon, Oman, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, the UAE, the U.S., the Arab League, the EU and the UN. The Assad government, the Kurds, and various Syrian rebel groups are not included, and Russia vetoed the participation of U.S. allies Australia and Japan.

Like any large group with disparate aims, the ISSG has no leverage, and while demanding the “cessation of hostilities” and delivery of humanitarian aid to Syrian civilians, it did not condemn attacks against ISIS and the Nusra Front. The ISSG also did not mention halting Russian bombing raids on Aleppo. The communiqué produced on February 12, at the end of the meeting, called for plans and reports, and made unenforceable demands that all parties live up to UN Resolutions on the table. It called for:

The reaching of agreement within six months on a political transition plan that establishes credible, inclusive and non-sectarian governance and sets a schedule and process for drafting a new constitution, free and fair elections, pursuant to the new constitution, to be held within 18 months and administered under supervision of the United Nations, to the satisfaction of the governance and to the highest international standards of transparency and accountability, with all Syrians, including members of the diaspora, eligible to participate.

U.S. President Barack Obama, perhaps sensing futility, called Vladimir Putin last weekend. The Kremlin’s report of the phone call posits the U.S. and Russia getting closer — although, it appears, on Russia’s terms.

According to reports, President Obama pushed for humanitarian aid and a halt to Russian bombing of “moderate opposition groups.” The Russian president said his forces would bomb only “terrorists,” emphasizing “the importance of creating a united anti-terrorist front while giving up double standards,” according to Putin’s spokesman. As the Russians insist that the Assad government is the only legitimate government, all anti-Assad fighters — ISIS, al Qaeda-related, or U.S.-backed or Turkish-backed “moderates” — are, by definition, terrorists.

According to the Kremlin, Mr. Obama “emphasized the need to establish close working contacts” between Russian and U.S. military officials to fight the Islamic State “and other terrorist organizations.” For the U.S. military to move toward closer working contacts with the Russian military implies political as well as military coordination, regardless of American distaste for Russian/Syrian tactics.

The White House readout of the call sounded as if a different conversation had taken place. The readout started with Ukraine, not Syria, stressing, “full implementation of the Minsk agreements by all parties” and local elections in the Donbass region. The readout noted as well the need for a strong international response to North Korea’s missile launch and, oh yes, the “necessity of taking steps to foster productive discussions between representatives of the Syrian opposition and regime under United Nations auspices, principally by reducing violence and addressing the urgent humanitarian needs of the Syrian people.” There was no mention of Obama asking Putin to refrain from bombing Aleppo.

U.S. President Barack Obama, perhaps sensing futility, called Russian President Vladimir Putin last weekend. The Kremlin’s report of the phone call posits the U.S. and Russia getting closer — although, it appears, on Russia’s terms. (Image source: Kremlin.ru)

The U.S. is looking less and less relevant, as historic Great Powers do what they have historically done best — fight for their national interests as they define them. President Obama appears to be conceding the lead to Russia and Russian aims.

ISIS will continue to come under attack by the U.S. and its allies, but Russia will continue to roll up the non-ISIS opposition, including groups the U.S. had supported. Assad is breathing easier. Iran is viewing the Shiite Crescent as a done deal, and Hezbollah can be assured of Iranian resupply. The Kurds will try to strengthen their territorial gains while Sunni Syrian civilians will continue to flee the Assad/Russian/Iranian assault.

The end result may be “peace,” but of the Machiavellian sort. “Peace,” Machiavelli wrote, is the set of conditions imposed by the winner on the loser of the last war. The Turks and the Russians understand him. The Americans? Perhaps not so much.

Shoshana Bryen is Senior Director of the Jewish Policy Center.

Give Women the Right to Defend Themselves by Geert Wilders and Machiel de Graaf

“Cultural enrichment” has brought us a new word: Taharrush. Remember it well, because we are going to have to deal with it a lot. Taharrush is the Arabic word for the phenomenon whereby women are encircled by groups of men and sexually harassed, assaulted, groped, raped. After the Cologne taharrush on New Year’s Eve, many German women bought pepper spray. Who can blame them?

A culture that has a specific word for sexual assaults of women by groups of men is a danger to all women. The existence of the word indicates that the phenomenon is widespread. Frau Merkel, Prime Minister Rutte and all the other open-door politicians could and should have known this.

The Islamic world is steeped in misogyny. The Koran explicitly states that a woman is worth only half a man (Suras 2: 228, 2: 282, 4:11), that women are unclean (5:6), and that a man can have sex with his wife whenever he wants (24:31). The Koran even says that men are allowed to have sex slaves (4:24), and that they have the right to rape women whom they have captured (24:31).

The hadiths, the descriptions of the life of Muhammad, the ideal human being whose example all the Islamic faithful must follow, confirm that women are sex objects, that they are inferior beings like dogs and donkeys, and that there is nothing wrong with sexual slavery and raping female prisoners.

Taharrush is quite common in Islamic countries. Women are frequently surrounded by men and subsequently abused. The Egyptian website Jadaliyya points out that it also happens to veiled women. Women are victims simply because they are women and not because they have provoked the men by their conduct or “provocative” clothing. It can happen in the streets, public transport, supermarkets, or during protest demonstrations.

In 2011, the American television journalist Lara Logan had her clothes ripped off and “was raped with the hands” by a group of 200 men on Tahrir Square in Cairo. Two years later, a young Dutch woman became a taharrush victim at the same square. Now, along with the flow of migrants from the Islamic world, the phenomenon also reached Europe. The elite tried to keep it hidden from the people, but they cannot do so anymore.

Geert Wilders: “Taharrush is the Arabic word for the phenomenon whereby women are encircled by groups of men and sexually harassed, assaulted, groped, raped. A culture that has a specific word for sexual assaults of women by groups of men is a danger to all women.” Pictured at right: This month has seen public protests in Germany, in response to mass sexual assaults on New Year’s Eve in Cologne and other cities.

Cartoonists in the West already experienced Islamic killers coming to their front door if they dare to draw Muhammad. Now, thousands of women in Cologne and dozens of cities in Germany and elsewhere in Europe, such as Zurich, Stockholm, Malmo and Vienna, experienced rapists standing behind the door if they dare take to the streets.

Islam means submission. And there is a good reason for it. The arrival of Islam has led to the curtailment of Western freedoms under the threat of violence. And this threat will only increase. It is an insidious process until the whole West submits to Islam.

Last week, the Mayor of Cologne advised her female citizens to keep strange men at an arm’s length. In Vienna, the head of the police said that in future women better not walk the streets alone. It seems that Austria will soon resemble Saudi Arabia, where women are not allowed alone in the streets. Earlier, in the Netherlands, women from families hosting asylum seekers had already been advised to wear “appropriate” clothes (even indoors), “so no prom dress or bare shoulders,” and to ensure that they are never alone in the room with male asylum seekers.

But the behavior of women has nothing to do with it. Moreover, it is a disgrace that our women are advised to modify their behavior because the government has invited thousands of dangerous men into our country. When one imports Islam in the Netherlands, one also imports the misogynistic culture of Cairo, Damascus, Riyadh into our cities. Next to headscarves, burkas, mosques, honor killings, and terrorism, we now have taharrush.

The solution is not that our women keep an arm’s length from the male barbarians, but that the government keeps these men thousands of kilometers away from us. Until that happens, other measures are needed. It is irresponsible to turn our country into a jungle and subsequently send women unarmed into the jungle. They must at least have the right to defend themselves. Contrary to countries such as Germany and France, in our country it is illegal to carry pepper spray. With the Netherlands now being overrun by men who see women as inferior sex tools, it is time to legalize pepper spray in the Netherlands as a weapon against taharrush.

Germany: Wave of Muslim Honor Killings by Soeren Kern

The court heard how Amer K. stabbed the mother of his three children in the chest and neck more than twenty times with a large kitchen knife, because he thought she wanted to divorce him.”Then he takes the knife and plunges it into her chest, [penetrating] the pericardium and heart muscle. A second stab opens the left abdominal cavity. Nurettin B. then pulls out the ax.

With the blunt side he hits her head, cracking her skull. Then he grabs the rope. On one end he ties a gibbet knot around her neck, then he ties the other end to the trailer hitch on [his car]… He races through the streets at 80 km/h [until] the rope breaks.” — State Prosecutor Ann-Kristin Fröhlich, reconstructing the husband’s actions.

In Ahaus, a 27-year-old Nigerian asylum seeker stabbed to death a 22-year-old woman after she seemingly offended his honor by rejecting his romantic advances.

The trial of a Kurdish man who tied one of his three wives to the back of a car and dragged her through the streets of a town in Lower Saxony has drawn attention to an outbreak of Muslim honor violence in Germany.

Honor violence — ranging from emotional abuse to physical and sexual violence to murder — is usually carried out by male family members against female family members who are perceived to have brought shame upon a family or clan.

Offenses include refusing to agree to an arranged marriage, entering into a relationship with a non-Muslim or someone not approved by the family, refusing to stay in an abusive marriage or living an excessively Western lifestyle. In practice, however, the lines between crimes of honor and crimes of passion are often blurred and any challenge to male authority can elicit retribution, which is sometimes staggeringly brutal.

On May 22, a court in Hanover heard how a 39-year-old Turkish-born Kurd named Nurettin B. attempted to murder his second wife, Kader K., 28, after she asked him to provide financial support for their two-year-old son. State Prosecutor Ann-Kristin Fröhlich reconstructed Nurettin B.’s actions:

“At around 6PM on November 20, 2016, Nurettin B. got into his car in Hamelin to meet Kader K. The trunk contained a knife, an ax and a rope. Sitting on the back seat of the car was their two-year-old son, who had spent the weekend with him. On the street, the former couple got into an argument and he begins hitting her. Then he takes the knife and plunges it into her chest. The 12.4 centimeter long blade penetrates the pericardium and heart muscle. A second stab opens the left abdominal cavity. Nurettin B. then pulls out the ax. With the blunt side he hits her head and upper body, cracking her skull.

“Then he grabs the rope. On one end he ties a gibbet knot around her neck, then he ties the other end to the trailer hitch on the back of his black VW Passat. Nurettin B. steps on the gas. He races through the streets at 80 km/h (50 mph). After 208 meters (680 feet) the rope breaks. Kader K. is hurled against the curb. Nurettin B. drives to the police station to turn himself in. The child is still sitting in the back seat.”

Presiding Judge Wolfgang Rosenbusch asked Kader K., who was comatose for weeks, to tell her side of the story. She said “the horror” began immediately after their Islamic sharia wedding (the marriage is not valid according to German law) in March 2013, when Nurettin B. prohibited her from having any contact with friends and family. She was allowed to leave the house only for grocery shopping and medical visits. She was not allowed to have a mobile phone. Rosenbusch asked: “Does he have a problem with women?” Kader K. replied: “He believes women are slaves; they must keep silent.”

Nurettin B. has confessed to the crime but insists it was not premeditated. He has been charged with attempted murder and faces a maximum sentence of 15 years in prison.

The picturesque town of Hamelin, Germany was the scene of horrific honor violence, when a Turkish-born Kurd named Nurettin B. attempted to murder one of his three wives. (Image source: Martin Möller/Wikimedia Commons)

On May 9, a court in Kiel sentenced 35-year-old Turkish man to two-and-a-half years in prison for shooting his estranged wife in both knees and permanently laming her, in the hope that she would be unattractive to other men. The court heard how the man took his wife to the back of a local mosque after Friday prayers, accused her of offending his honor and shot her, saying: “Now you can no longer walk. You will stay at home.”

In court, however, the woman, possibly under pressure from her family or the mosque, told the court that they couple had reconciled and would attend marriage counselling. Some observers surmised that the dispute may have been resolved in a sharia court. In any event, the German court allowed the man to return home with his wife and it remains unclear if and when he will serve his sentence.

In Münster, a court sentenced a 36-year-old Lebanese man named Amer K. to 12 years in prison for stabbing his wife to death. The court heard how Amer K. stabbed 26-year-old Fatima S., the mother of his three children, in the chest and neck more than twenty times with a large kitchen knife because he thought she wanted to divorce him.

Meanwhile, a court in Hanau sentenced a 22-year-old Syrian refugee to twelve years in prison for stabbing to death his 30-year-old sister, Ramia A., with a kitchen knife. She was 23 weeks pregnant and was accused of having brought shame to her family. Her unborn child also died in the attack.

The true scale of Germany’s honor crime problem is unknown: many such crimes go unreported and reliable statistics do not exist. Empirical evidence indicates that honor violence — primarily but not exclusively the product of Muslim culture and Islamic law, sharia — has metastasized since Chancellor Angela Merkel allowed in some two million migrants from Africa, Asia and the Middle East.

In March 2011, the Max Planck Institute published a landmark study on honor killings. The study analyzed all such crimes known to have occurred in Germany between 1996 and 2005. The report found that there were two honor killings in 1998 and 12 in 2004. By 2016, however, the number had jumped to more than 60, an increase of 400%, according to the website Ehrenmord.

The actual number of honor crimes presumably is much higher. Increased censorship by the police and the media, aimed at stemming anti-immigration sentiments, makes it impossible to know the names and national origins of many victims or perpetrators, or the true circumstances surrounding many murders, which often appear to be honor killings but are downplayed as “domestic disputes” (Familienangelegenheiten).

2017 is nevertheless on track to be a record year for honor violence in Germany; in the first five months of this year, there have been at least 30 honor killings, including the following:

May 18. In Berlin, a 32-year-old Bosnian, Edin A., murdered his former girlfriend, a 35-year-old German woman named Michelle E., after she ended their abusive relationship. He also abducted and tortured her 12-year-old son, who was forced to watch his mother’s murder. Neighbors said they had repeatedly alerted the police about Edin A.’s violent behavior, but the police did nothing.

May 17. In Pforzheim, a 53-year-old Tajik man stabbed to death his 50-year-old wife at her place of employment, a Christian daycare center. It remains unclear if the woman was a convert to Christianity.

May 17. In Wardenburg, a 37-year-old Iraqi man stabbed to death his 37-year-old wife while she was asleep in her bed. The couple’s five children, between the ages of four and 15, were at home at the time of the murder and are now living with relatives.

May 8. In Neuendettelsau, a 24-year-old Ethiopian asylum seeker, Mohammed G., stabbed his 22-year-old girlfriend in the stomach at a restaurant after she allegedly “provoked” him. The woman was five months pregnant; the unborn baby died in the attack.

May 4. In Freiburg, a 33-year-old Syrian asylum seeker stabbed his 24-year-old wife, a Kurdish Christian who had moved out of the couple’s apartment, but had returned to collect some personal belongings. The couple’s three children — aged six, three and ten months — are now in protective custody.

April 29. In Prien am Chiemsee, a 29-year-old Afghan man stabbed to death a 38-year-old Afghan woman, Farima S., who had converted to Christianity. The attacker ambushed the woman as she was exiting a grocery store with her two children.

April 23. In Syke, a 32-year-old Iraqi man, Murad B., strangled his 32-year-old wife, Mehe K., in front of the couple’s three children, ages one, two and nine.

April 23. In Dresden, a 29-year-old Pakistani refugee, Shahajan Butt, murdered his girlfriend, a 41-year-old Vietnamese woman named Thu T. Police say the man, who arrived in Germany in December 2015, became enraged after he noticed that the woman had not posted any photos of him on her Facebook page, and suspected that she may have had another boyfriend.

April 16. In Mainz-Finthen, a 39-year-old Egyptian asylum seeker stabbed to death his 32-year-old wife. Police said the couple had been arguing at the time of the attack. Their two children are being held in protective custody.

April 5. In Leipzig, a 34-year-old Syrian man stabbed his 28-year-old wife because she wanted a divorce. The couple’s two children witnessed the attack; they are being held in protective custody.

March 31. In Gütersloh, a 43-year-old Syrian man burned his 18-year-old daughter with a cigarette and threatened to kill her. When the police intervened, the father refused to allow his daughter to leave the house. After police succeeded in bringing the girl to safety, the father and son attacked the police, who used pepper-spray to fend them off. The girl is being held in protective custody.

March 15. In Kiel, a 40-year-old German-Turkish man stabbed to death his 34-year-old Turkish wife in front of a daycare center. Neighbors said the couple, who were separated, had quarreled about moving their three children to Turkey.

March 4. In Duisburg, a 30-year-old Syrian asylum seeker, Mahmood Mahrusseh, stabbed his 32-year-old ex-girlfriend. The woman survived; her attacker remains at large.

March 3. In Mönchengladbach, a 32-year-old asylum seeker, Ahmed Salim, murdered a 47-year-old German woman, Nicole M., apparently after she ended a relationship with him. The man, who also uses the alias Jamal Amilia, was arrested in Spain. In his asylum application, he had written that he was from Israel. In another asylum application filed in another country, he had written that he was from Morocco. He is believed to be from Iraq.

March 2. In Scheeßel, a 42-year-old Iraqi man stabbed to death his 52-year-old wife, also from Iraq. Police described the murder as an honor killing. The couple’s children are now in protective custody.

February 25. In Euskirchen, a 32-year-old German-Turkish man stabbed to death his former girlfriend, a 32-year-old German woman who had begun dating someone else.

February 17. In Offenbach, a 32-year-old Turkish man, Volkan T., shot to death his former girlfriend, a 40-year-old woman, Silvia B. The man said he was angry that the woman, who had two children, had ended her relationship with him.

February 15. In Bielefeld, a 51-year-old Iraqi man tried to murder his 51-year-old wife by attacking her with a hammer while she was attending a German class at a local language academy. The man was apparently angry that his wife was mixing with other language students.

February 10. In Ahaus, a 27-year-old Nigerian asylum seeker stabbed to death a 22-year-old woman after she seemingly offended his honor by rejecting his romantic advances. The woman, a Hindu, was employed at the same asylum shelter where her attacker lived. He was arrested in Basel, Switzerland.

February 7. In Hanover-Mühlenberg, a 21-year-old Serbian man stabbed his ex-girlfriend after she ended their relationship and had begun dating someone else.

February 1. In Hamburg, a 26-year-old Afghan man stabbed his estranged 28-year-old wife during an argument; she survived the attack.

January 15. In Bremen-Vegesack, a 39-year-old Turkish man murdered his 40-year-old Syrian wife, who was nine months pregnant, because she wanted to divorce him. The unborn baby also died during the attack.

January 5. In Waldshut-Tiengen, a 47-year-old Turkish man stabbed his estranged wife as she was walking with a friend. When she tried to run away, he pursued her and plunged a knife in her back.

January 4. In Köln-Buchheim, a 44-year-old Iraqi man murdered his 19-year-old daughter because he did not approve of her boyfriend. Two days later, he called police. “I killed my daughter,” he said. The man may never face justice; he is believed to have fled to Iraq.

Germany: The Terrifying Power of Muslim Interpreters by Stefan Frank

  • “Everything I told you then is true. … But the interpreter there told me that a faithful woman must not use words like sex and rape. Words like that would dishonor my husband and our family. She also said that I was a blasphemer, because I went to the police. No woman should report her own husband. The husband must be honored.” — “Sali,” in an apparent suicide note to her lawyer, Alexander Stevens.

  • “I am aware of statements in which interpreters have pressed and supposedly said to Christians on the way to the police or beforehand: If you complain, you can forget your application for asylum. I often noticed that statements were retracted because Christians were threatened.” — Paulus Kurt, Central Committee of Eastern Christians in Germany (ZOCD).
  • “The interpreters are neither employed by the Federal Agency, nor are they in any way sworn in to the legal system of the Federal Republic of Germany. Ultimately, examination of the asylum application is left solely to these interpreters… In our view, a decision-making process such as this, which is practiced on a massive scale, is not in keeping with due process.” — Open letter from employees of Germany’s Federal Agency for Migration and Refugees.

Alexander Stevens is a lawyer at a Munich law firm specializing in sexual offenses. In his recent book, Sex in Court, he describes some of his strangest and most shocking cases. One such case raises the question: What do you do when interpreters working for the police and courts lie and manipulate? As no one monitors translators, it is likely that in many instances, the dishonesty of interpreters goes undetected — Stevens’ book chronicles the devastating effects one dishonest interpreter had on a case.

The parents of a Syrian girl, “Sali,” had promised their daughter to a man named Hassan, who, at the time, was still living in Syria. The arrangement was seen as mutually beneficial: Sali’s parents would receive money and Hassan would be allowed to enter Germany. Sali would never willingly have married a man 34 years her senior, but the family’s honor required it. However, Sali did not receive any benefits from this arrangement. Hassan’s interest in Sali was apparently confined to her body. He forced Sali to perform all kinds of sexual practices several times a day, and brutally abused the girl in the process.

Sali was unable to hide the fact that she took no pleasure in these rapes and she became ill, so Hassan reproached her and “openly threatened to demand a large compensation payment from her family, for the cost of the wedding reception and lost pleasures of love.” Sali sought help from a women’s shelter, where an employee took her to a lawyer: Stevens. At the shelter, Sali described her misfortune, but was careful repeatedly to come to her husband’s defense. She was more worried about her family’s honor, should Hassan decided to divorce her, than about herself.

“After two hours of painstaking depictions of sexual abuse, corporal punishment, and mental humiliation,” Stevens writes, “I had no doubt that everything had actually happened as she said.”

The next day, Stevens tried to get an appointment for questioning with the police and an interpreter. But he was surprised when he got to the shelter. Sali was like a different person. Suddenly, she wanted nothing to do with him or the women’s shelter employee.

Sometime later, an employee of the women’s shelter sent him a letter that Sali had left behind for him. It read:

Dear Mr. Stevens,

I am very sorry to have caused you so much inconvenience. Please believe me when I say I did not want to. Everything I told you then is true. I also wanted to make a statement to the police regarding what I told you. But the interpreter there told me that a faithful woman must not use words like sex and rape. Words like that would dishonor my husband and our family. She also said that I was a blasphemer, because I went to the police. No woman should report her own husband. The husband must be honored. I did not know what to do, Mr. Stevens. Because I think she is right. I should never have disgraced my husband and my family. Therefore, I would ask you not to tell anyone. I do not want to create any more trouble for my family and my husband’s family. Please forgive me. You were very good to me.

Sali

By this time, Sali was already dead. According to the employee from the women’s shelter, the police suspected suicide.

Interpreters Decide on Asylum

Non-Muslim refugees, in particular, complain of the pressure exerted on them by Muslim interpreters. As Gatestone Institute has already reported, Christians and other non-Muslims are beaten, threatened, and harassed in German refugee homes. One of the reasons that German authorities do not intervene has to do with the Muslim interpreters, says Paulus Kurt, head of the work groups for the Central Committee of Eastern Christians in Germany (ZOCD):

“Interpreters belonging to the Islamic religion often stick with the defendants. I am aware of statements in which interpreters have pressured and supposedly said to Christians, on the way to the police or beforehand: ‘If you complain, you can forget your application for asylum.’ I often noticed that statements were retracted because Christians were threatened.”

The effects of these abuses of power are devastating: interpreters in Germany have great influence on who is granted asylum. In a November 2015 open letter to Frank-Jürgen Weise, the head of their agency, employees of the Federal Agency for Migration and Refugees (BAMF), pointed out the potential problems of this system within their agency:

“A Syrian is someone who identifies himself as a Syrian in writing (checks the proper box on the questionnaire), and the interpreter (usually not sworn in, or from Syria) confirms it. The interpreters are neither employed by the Federal Agency, nor are they in any way sworn in to the legal system of the Federal Republic of Germany. Ultimately, examination of the asylum application is left solely to these interpreters — insofar as it involves the verification of nationality and, therefore, the country of persecution. In our view, a decision-making process such as this, which is practiced on a massive scale, is not in keeping with due process.”

Television Reports

In May 2016, the German public television station Bayerischer Rundfunk broadcast a report on Muslim interpreters who lie. The report, entitled “Treason in the Refugee Home: When Translators Mistranslate,” exposed several instances of the same issue:

Moderator: With the growing number of refugees, the demand for interpreters has also rapidly increased. Ultimately, translators play a central role in the asylum procedures, for example. Since there is an overall shortage of qualified and sworn interpreters, the Federal Agency for Migration and Refugees has recently been advertising for translators with this flyer [title: “We are Looking for Interpreters”]. Inside, it says: “You take on great responsibility in your work, and we expect you to be neutral and reliable.” But there is often a gaping hole between expectations and reality.

Reporter: Bullied and threatened by other refugees. A nightmare, what this Iraqi refugee is telling us. He asks one of the translators for help, but he [the translator] takes the side of the attacker.

Hassan: “They wanted to beat us; they insulted us. And the interpreter thought about everything while translating, and alleged that none of it had happened.”

Reporter: Hassan, as we call the young man, belongs to a small religious community of Yezidis. Radical Sunni Muslims despise Yezidis, even in Germany. Instead of conveying the message, the translator cheated him.

Hassan: “The interpreter translated that we merely had a dispute on the street.”

Reporter: That was a conscious mistranslation. Not an isolated incident, says Gian Aldonani. She fled to Germany as a young Yezidi girl. As a student in Cologne, she got involved in working with refugees. In the process, it became apparent to her again and again:

Gian Aldonani: “It is purposefully mistranslated. At first, we thought these were isolated cases out of Cologne and the surrounding area. But in documenting all of the cases, we recognized that translators all over Germany were very purposefully mistranslating. […] The social workers are reliant on the translators. The translators take advantage of this situation. These people are doing the same thing here that they do with minorities in their countries of origin.”

Hasan (left), a Yezidi refugee in Germany who was threatened by Muslims, speaks to a reporter from German public television about how a government-employed translator deliberately mistranslated his complaint and took the side of his attackers. (Image source: Bayerischer Rundfunk video screenshot)

More “Isolated Cases”

Similar cases — always labelled “isolated cases” — are found in German and Austrian newspapers again and again.

In Austria, in June 2016, the Salzburg regional court sentenced a jihadist to two years in prison. He had fought for the Al-Nusra Front in Syria. Incidentally, it became known that: “The 29-year-old came to Salzburg as a refugee in October 2015 and helped at the Freilassing border crossing as an interpreter.”

Regarding “interpreter and cultural mediator Besnik S.,” the Hamburger Morgenpost newspaper wrote:

“Besnik S. also interpreted for the young refugees — until one of his colleagues became suspicious of him. Besnik S. was consistently translating incorrectly. Instead of facilitating communication for the young men, he allegedly tried to bring them closer to his ideology. “

Particularly grotesque is the March 2016 case of a Chechen interpreter, who worked as a court translator in Graz, Austria:

“The interpreter had already interpreted several people’s statements. As another witness was supposed be questioned at that point, the woman [interpreter] explained that the witness in question was her husband. But she claimed that he could not come that day, and sent his apologies, because he was in Russia at the moment and had already informed the court of that. The man was accused in another proceeding of a similar type. … Observers had already noticed that, during recesses in the proceedings, the interpreter had talked with about 20 Chechens among the courtroom spectators.”

Alexander Stevens, the Munich lawyer, often gets the impression that there is a “fraternal solidarity” between interpreters and criminal defendants, he tells Gatestone. From his own experience and from conversations with judges, prosecutors, and fellow attorneys, he knows that Muslim interpreters in particular often violate their duty of neutrality:

“My personal feeling is that not only the defendants [but also the interpreters] of Islamic society are cunning, sly, and sometimes crafty. In this room, organized crime, gang violence, theft, and fraud are frequently dealt with. They are often very smart, and there is an incredible cohesion within the respective cultural and religious community, particularly among Albanians, Turks, Syrians and Moroccans. The common denominator is possibly Islamist conditioning. They are very close, almost like family, but without being related by blood.”

Negligence on the Part of the Authorities

This problem is well known among judges and defense lawyers, says Stevens: “It starts as soon as the judge asks: ‘What is your name?'” Instead of simply translating those three words, the interpreter often talks “forever.”

“Conversely, the interpreter then only says one sentence where you expect a lengthy testimony. Often, you are not really sure what the interpreter and the defendant are discussing.”

Stevens cites negligence on the part of German authorities as exacerbating this problem. While there are strict admission requirements for court interpreters in languages such as English or Spanish, this is not the case in Germany for many other languages. He points out that the German state of Bavaria’s Court Interpreters Act clearly states: “The recognition of foreign degrees falls under the responsibility of the Bavarian Ministry of Education” — meaning that even applicants with flimsy degrees can be hired if the Ministry feels that there is a shortage of interpreters in a particular language.

Stevens criticizes the naïveté of the Germans:

“The swearing-in process goes like this: The judge reads aloud to him from the Judiciary Act, proclaiming that he [the interpreter] will translate faithfully and diligently. That’s it! With that, he is sworn in, and according to German law, he is absolutely credible.”

Stevens points out that although this problem has existed for a long time, it has become even more harmful since the start of “the refugee problem, which involves a whole potpourri of crime, including sexual assault.”

Human Rights Activists: “No Trust for Muslim Translators”

Karl Hafen, the former longtime Executive Chairman of the German section of the International Society for Human Rights (ISHR), is concerned about the situation faced by non-Muslims in German refugee housing, where interpreters seem complicit. He told Gatestone that

“Most of what is reported to us about translators involves threats that they will not translate if the affected victims blame Muslims for their misfortune, or that interpreters try to point out that what happened is mandated by the Koran.”

Many refugees are already intimidated by the mere presence of a Muslim interpreter.

“Some victims complain that they can no longer speak openly when an interpreter reveals she is Muslim by wearing a headscarf. Others tell us that they are afraid to go to the doctor with a Muslim interpreter, because based on what was done to them, they cannot trust her.”

Hafen does not want to label those interpreters as Islamists — they are normal, conservative Muslims:

“Again, there is a strong return to Islamic rules, a kind of de-integration. It also depends on how the interpreters themselves live, whether alone or in a family that practices Islam. The Muslim interpreters refuse to believe that what happened actually took place as described. And among other things, this practice is encouraged, because part of our media — but especially politicians and bishops — downplay the brutalities and simply refuse to recognize that the people who have become victims, or who have had to witness crimes with their own eyes, no longer trust Muslims.”

We cannot allow translators to continue misrepresenting and manipulating an already vulnerable refugee population. The German authorities need to reform the system for employing translators for courts, police and government agencies, so that all refugees receive the due process they deserve.

Stefan Frank, based in Germany, is an independent journalist and writer.

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