'Our hearts are filled with pain and sadness'

News Books on the Hill Press Small Press Releasing Dyslexic-Friendly Books Signs Major Novella Deal One small press is making reading more accessible than ever By Vanessa Armstrong | Published on October 7, 2024 Comment 0 Share New Share The Clevedon U.K. bookstore, Books on the Hill, already has a dyslexic-friendly shop,  and its owner, Alistair Sims, set up a small press that just closed a deal with major authors like Peter James, Lee Child, Karin Slaughter, and Bernard Cornwell to publish dyslexic-friendly novellas. Books on the Hill Press has different formatting than typical books, which makes reading easier for those who are dyslexic. Some of those attributes include larger font size, more space between lines, and having left-aligned text. You can see their current offering here, which includes books by Neal Asher, Garth Nix, Gareth Powell, and Adrian Tchaikovsky. Today marked the beginning of World Dyslexia Awareness Week, and Sims is urging all publishers to have one percent of their books printed in a dyslexic-friendly fashion. “People assume that, if a book is for dyslexic adults, then it’s simplified in plot and language, but it’s not,” he told The Guardian. “We’re not really changing the contents, we’re changing the formatting to make it easier to read.” Sims—who has dyslexia—also shared with The Guardian that his books have been well-received by those with the same condition: “I’ve had people come into the shop and once they’ve looked at those books, they’ve said: ‘That’s something for me specifically, I can read this.’ A couple of people even cried. So it does make a difference to people’s lives.” [end-mark] The post Small Press Releasing Dyslexic-Friendly Books Signs Major Novella Deal appeared first on Reactor.

FIRST ON THE DAILY SIGNAL—Rep. Sharice Davids, D-Kan., appears to have used tax dollars to communicate with constituents too close to the Nov. 5  election. Both federal law and House ethics rules restrict the use of taxpayer-funded resources to communicate with constituents within 90 days of an election.  Photos provided to The Daily Signal show boxes of documents marked as “499s,” a Capitol Hill term for mass mailings to fewer than 500 constituents.  A photo provided to The Daily Signal appears to show 499s from the office of Rep. Sharice Davids, D-Kan. Any mass mailings to 500 or more recipients must be approved by the House Commission on Congressional Mailing Standards, which also is known as the House Franking Commission.  The photos show documents in the boxes said: “Rep. Davids’ Final 499 APC Mailer Drop Checklist.” It wasn’t clear what APC stands for in this context. The documents are dated Sept. 16 and the named staff contact is Eric Stecklow, listed online as a senior communications adviser to Davids.  Federal law imposes a 90-day ban on a member of the House or Senate spending official funds for any unsolicited mass communication within 90 days of an election in which the lawmaker’s name is on the ballot.  Further, House Administration Committee regulations prohibit a House member from spending official funds to make any unsolicited mass communication within 90 days of any election in which the member’s name is on the ballot. The regulation defines “unsolicited mass communication” as “any unsolicited communication of substantially identical content to 500 or more persons in a session of Congress.”  A photo provided to The Daily Signal appears to show a box of documents designated as 499s from the office of Rep. Sharice Davids, D-Kan. Davids was first elected to represent Kansas’ 3rd Congressional District in the House in 2018, a major year for Democrats that saw the party flip the House of Representatives.  The Daily Signal reached two spokespersons for Davids—Zac Donley and Riley George—on Friday and Monday. Neither responded to requests for comment.  Davids, a lawyer, previously was a professional fighter in mixed martial arts. In 2019, the chief of staff to a fellow House freshman Democrat, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, publicly attacked Davids for voting to fund border security.  Categories and issues of interest are noted among documents from the office of Rep. Sharice Davids. It’s not clear how or if federal law on congressional mailings close to an election is enforced, but the House Ethics Committee could choose to enforce it, said Hans von Spakovsky, a former Justice Department lawyer who is a senior legal fellow with The Heritage Foundation. “If she was going to do this mass mailing, it would seem to not only be in violation of ethics rules, but also federal law,” von Spakovsky told The Daily Signal, referring to Davids.  “This would be up to the U.S. Justice Department [to pursue],” he added. “Given the way that [Attorney General] Merrick Garland has totally politicized the department, the chances of him enforcing the law against a Democrat are nil.”  The post EXCLUSIVE: Do House Democrat’s Mass Mailings Run Afoul of Law and House Rules? appeared first on The Daily Signal.

DAILY CALLER NEWS FOUNDATION—Republican Sen. Eric Schmitt of Missouri released a letter Friday pressing the FBI in response to an audit from the Office of the Inspector General that found “egregious failures” in the agency’s handling of child sexual abuse cases. Schmitt, who was joined by 10 other Senate Republicans, addressed FBI Director Christopher Wray after the OIG report found instances of “gross negligence” in areas such as victim services, mandatory reporting of suspected child abuse, case transfers between offices, and timely responses to child sexual abuse allegations, according to the letter. Schmitt asked the FBI to explain how these lapses took place, if the agency implemented any disciplinary measures, and to describe how resources were allocated to handle child sexual abuse cases. “This level of negligence is beyond unacceptable—it’s indefensible,” Schmitt said in the letter. “At a time of historically low trust in American institutions, the FBI continues to undermine its own credibility when it comes to safeguarding our children from predators who wish to do them harm,” Schmitt said in a press release. “It is not only outrageous but unacceptable that the FBI continues to fail the victims of sexual abusers. These victims deserve justice. The FBI has questions to answer and changes to make in the coming days and months.” In nearly half of the cases reviewed by the OIG, the FBI failed to fulfill mandatory reporting requirements to state and local law enforcement as well as to social services, according to the letter. Of the reports that were filed, only 43% were reviewed within 24 hours, and only 17% were fully documented. The audit also revealed that an alarming 73% of transferred allegations lacked verbal contact or confirmation of a receipt, according to the letter. In one case, the FBI delayed action on an allegation against a registered sex offender for over a year, during which he began to allegedly abuse another individual. “How can the American public trust the FBI when it consistently neglects to fulfill its duties in protecting our children from abuse?” Schmitt said in the letter. Following the Larry Nassar scandal, where the U.S. gymnastics coach was convicted of sexually abusing hundreds of athletes, the FBI said it would improve its standards to ensure cases like these are properly handled, according to the letter. Schmitt pointed out that the OIG report proves the FBI’s enforcement is not sufficient. “Under [Wray’s] leadership, the FBI has not only failed to implement effective changes but has instead continued to mishandle cases of child sexual abuse with disturbing frequency,” Schmitt said in the letter. Along with these findings, Schmitt points out a whistleblower report from 2022 alleging child sexual abuse investigations were “deprioritized in favor of politically charged January 6 inquiries,” according to the letter. The Department of Justice requested over $30 million from Congress specifically for Jan. 6 investigations, prioritized “DEI hiring practices,” and other “radical reforms.” “Protecting all Americans, especially children, must take priority over politically motivated sideshows,” Schmitt said. “Ignoring child exploitation investigations for political expediency is a grave betrayal to the victims who depend on the FBI’s expertise and resources.” The letter was signed by Schmitt as well as Republican Sens. Rick Scott of Florida, Ted Cruz of Texas, Mike Braun of Indiana, Josh Hawley of Missouri, Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, Marco Rubio of Florida, Joni Ernst of Iowa, Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, Mike Lee of Utah, and Roger Marshall of Kansas. The FBI did not immediately respond to a request for comment from the Daily Caller News Foundation. Originally published by the Daily Caller News Foundation The post Eric Schmitt, GOP Senators Press FBI Over ‘Indefensible’ Mishandling of Child Sexual Abuse Cases appeared first on The Daily Signal.

The North Carolina State Board of Elections unanimously passed measures attempting to address concerns about hurricane-ravaged western counties leading up to the Nov. 5 presidential election.  With the notable exception of the more metropolitan Asheville, county seat of Buncombe County, most of the hardest-hit North Carolina counties in the path of Hurricane Helene are rural and lean Republican.  But the state election board for the fiercely contested battleground state—former President Donald Trump is neck and neck with Vice President Kamala Harris—has a 3-2 Democratic majority. Harris and Trump are polling less than 1% with one another, according to the Real Clear Politics polling average, and past presidential contests have been tight in the state.  The election board unanimously voted Monday to allow 13 counties most affected by the storm to make changes in election procedures, so long as there is a bipartisan majority to do so.  The process would include changing or adding voting sites and notifying voters by mail and through local media about such changes as quickly as possible. The resolution adopted by the state board allows the chairman of local election boards to appoint replacement members if someone is unable to carry out his or her duties.  “These measures were put in place to ensure the victims of Helene can vote in the upcoming election and provide election officials in the hardest-hit areas the tools they need to conduct a secure election under extraordinarily difficult conditions,” Karen Brinson Bell, executive director of the North Carolina State Board of Elections, said Monday during a teleconference with reporters. I am in Big Oak Park, a mobile home community 30 mins south of Asheville. Its residents, many of whom are 55+ years-old and at-risk have been without power for 10 days. Residents tell me that trash has been building up, inviting disease and bears. More to come. pic.twitter.com/kOTZHXxH9b— Tim Kennedy (@TimKennedyJr1) October 6, 2024 In response to a question about absentee ballots, Bell said that “some of the ballots haven’t been delivered to homes or the local boards of elections, and certainly we are working on tracking those.”  But, she added, many civilian absentee ballots were received by voters. She encouraged residents to use the state’s online ballot tracking system. State officials haven’t done enough to respond to election challenges posed by Hurricane Helene, contends a former deputy secretary of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.  Ken Cuccinelli, acting deputy homeland security secretary in the Trump administration, said North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper, a Democrat, and the board failed to respond to the lessons learned from Hurricane Sandy, which made landfall on the East Coast weeks before the 2012 presidential election.  “America has learned a great deal about how best to execute an election following a natural disaster in the nearly 20 years since [Hurricane] Katrina struck [in 2005],” Cuccinelli, now national chairman of the Election Transparency Initiative, said in a public statement.  Meet Dianne Messer, who, along with Doug Warden, who is 93-year-old, run Big Oak Mobile Park in Hendersonville, North Carolina.Dianne was kind enough to show me around the property and introduce me to some of the residence, many of whom have been without power for 10 days.… pic.twitter.com/tRZuvYhqi9— Tim Kennedy (@TimKennedyJr1) October 6, 2024 “While several of North Carolina’s neighboring states have moved to implement those lessons, North Carolina’s Gov. Cooper has been shockingly inactive, as have his allies on the state board,” he said. The Tar Heel State has become a major battleground for the 2024 presidential election. In 2020, incumbent Republican Trump carried the state against Democratic challenger Joe Biden by just 1.3%. In 2016, Trump beat Democrat Hillary Clinton in North Carolina by less than 4% of the vote.  In-person early voting begins Oct. 17. Mail-in voting began Sept. 21, after a brief delay to accommodate a court ruling to remove independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s name from the ballot.  “We have every intention of starting early voting as scheduled on Thursday, Oct. 17, in all 100 counties,” Bell, the state election board’s executive director, said.  This is how high the water got during hurricane Helene over a week ago in?River Arts District, Asheville pic.twitter.com/RgNdOgYrLr— Tim Kennedy (@TimKennedyJr1) October 6, 2024 Hurricane Helene made landfall first in Florida, then swept through parts of Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Alabama, killing more than 220 and leaving catastrophic property damage. Of these states, North Carolina sustained the worse beating.  Cuccinelli’s Election Transparency Initiative noted one reported concern that relocated nursing home residents won’t be able to vote.  The elections watchdog group also noted that it’s still unknown which preapproved polling sites are unserviceable in the 22 counties affected by Helene. North Carolina law requires the election board to approve alternate sites.  Also, suspension of deliveries by the U.S. Postal Service in the state’s western counties disrupted mail-in voting.  Cuccinelli said Cooper and the elections board should “stop stalling and start working to ensure that those communities already devastated by Helene at least have their voice through their votes.” Cuccinelli, also a former Virginia attorney general, specified two top North Carolina Republicans who could do this. “To the extent Gov. Cooper refuses to make immediate adjustments, when the General Assembly convenes next week we urge swift action from House Speaker Tim Moore and Senate Leader [Phil] Berger to maintain the integrity of the upcoming election across the western counties of North Carolina—ensuring it proceeds securely and fairly without compromising the democratic process,” Cuccinelli said.  Cooper’s office did not respond to inquiries from The Daily Signal by publication time.  Patrick Gannon, a spokesman for the North Carolina State Board of Elections, referred The Daily Signal’s request for comment to the governor’s office, but also sent an email statement from the board arguing that criticism of the state is “uninformed.”   “The State Board of Elections is committed to ensuring every eligible voter is able to cast their ballot, regardless of their circumstances following the disaster,” the board’s statement said, adding: The affected counties and their staffs are working around the clock to guarantee their neighbors their right to vote. Criticism like this is simply uninformed. It’s also a slap in the face for the dozens of election workers, especially those who are themselves victims of the disaster, who are putting in long hours under trying circumstances to serve their voters. Hendersonville, North Carolina | Alexander, a resident of Big Oak Park, gave me a tour of his community yesterday. Many of the trailers destroyed by hurricane Helene are uninsured and Some belong to families with newborns. @DailySignal pic.twitter.com/XcMQ315EEK— Tim Kennedy (@TimKennedyJr1) October 7, 2024 The board provided increased flexibility to these 13 counties: Ashe, Avery, Buncombe, Haywood, Henderson, Madison, McDowell, Mitchell, Polk, Rutherford, Transylvania, Watauga, and Yancey. The board’s Democratic chairman is Alan Hirsch, president of the North Carolina Healthcare Quality Alliance, a nonprofit focused on rural treatment of opioid addiction and prevention as well as on mental health issues. Hirsch has donated thousands of dollars to Democrat campaigns, including the state’s Democratic Party, then-President Barack Obama, and Cooper, the sitting governor, according to Open Secrets.  Bell has been executive director of the North Carolina Board of Elections since 2019. She is listed on the board’s website as the state’s “chief elections official.”  Bell previously was the election board’s deputy director beginning in 2015. She oversees 100 county election boards. Bell has worked in administrative roles for county and state elections since 2006. From 2011 to 2015, she directed the election board in Transylvania County, which is heavily Republican-leaning. Before that, she was a district elections technician for the state board. NCSBOE-Helene-20241007 Emergency Resolution for 13 WNC Counties_Final_SignedDownload In a Monday op-ed in Townhall, former Ohio Secretary of State Ken Blackwell, a Republican, noted that about 40,000 mail-in ballots were sent to voters in Helene-affected counties and that only 1,000 were returned.  “These hard-hit counties, which supported Donald Trump with 61% of the vote in 2020, are now grappling with slow recovery efforts, unreliable communications, and an inadequate federal response,” Blackwell wrote. “As citizens in rural, heavily Republican regions seek to participate in the democratic process, the state’s electoral integrity is on the line, especially as concerns about political maneuvering grow in the aftermath of the storm.” Blackwell also warned against sweeping statewide changes that could undermine confidence in the Nov. 5 election.  “Expanding voting measures across the entire state, including areas that were not affected by the hurricane, could open the door to accusations of partisanship,” he wrote. “It’s important that we help the residents of these rural, counties without altering the broader electoral landscape in a way that might be seen as tipping the scales.” Tim Kennedy contributed to this report. The post Will Battleground North Carolina Voters Overcome Hurricane Helene Challenges? appeared first on The Daily Signal.

Columbia Student Protesters Celebrate Hamas on Anniversary of Attack (Update)

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With Vice President Kamala Harris set to appear on ABC’s The View on Tuesday, the liberal ladies spent part of their Monday show praising her for only making media appearances with friendly shows and outlets like theirs. Fake Republican and ABC News co-host, Ana Navarro lashed out at Harris’s critics who said she need to actually answer tough questions, shrieking: “What more do you all want?!” “You know, there's been a lot of moaning and groaning for weeks now that Kamala Harris hasn't been doing interviews, isn't doing interviews,” Navarro huffed. She then proceeded to list off some of the media appearances Harris had done and had coming up, seemingly ignorant of the fact that many of the hosts were either openly liberal, leaned to the left, openly anti-Trump, or had publically endorsed her at some point: So look, tomorrow she's doing The View live. It is the first LIVE interview she does [sic] since becoming the nominee. She's been here before. She's doing The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. She's doing The Howard Stern Show. She did 60 Minutes. She's doing a Univision town hall on Thursday night. She did Call Her Daddy. She did Ricky Smiley. She did Oprah for two hours. She did All the Smoke. She did Dana Bash on CNN. She did Stephanie Ruhle on MSNBC. “What more do you all want?!” Navarro unironically shrieked.     Faux conservative Alyssa Farah Griffin immediately chimed in to commend Harris for finally going on podcasts, something the Trump campaign had been doing for months already: But he’s been targeting what would be – we consider low propensity voters; ones who aren’t likely to turn out. And he specifically wants young, white men. Kamala Harris – This is the second biggest podcast in the world after Joe Rogan. I love Alex Cooper, I love Call Her Daddy. She is reaching a lot of people who likely don't always vote. They're not necessarily engaged, but she's talking about issues in a real way that they care about. And it could really come down to who can activate more people from these platforms they’re hitting. It’s no surprise Harris chose to appear alongside the ladies of The View. As a recent NewsBusters study found, the week following the second assassination attempt on former President Trump, The View was 100 percent negative against Trump and 100 percent positive for Harris. In recent weeks, Farah Griffin teamed up with former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to push Harris as a moderate. They lashed out at Jeff Walz, the brother of Harris’s running mate Governor Tim Walz (MN), for speaking out against his brother, telling him to “mind you own damn business!” They also celebrated the Democratic National Convention with the campaign’s approved talking point proclaiming it “joyful,” and insisting she was “running a flawless campaign.” If their recent interview with President Biden was any indicator of how the Harris interview would go, it would be an absolute gushfest. The transcript is below. Click "expand" to read: ABC’s The View October 7, 2024 11:34:21 a.m. Eastern (…) ANA NAVARRO: You know, there's been a lot of moaning and groaning for weeks now that Kamala Harris hasn't been doing interviews, isn't doing interviews. So look, tomorrow she's doing The View live. It is the first LIVE interview she does [sic] since becoming the nominee. She's been here before. She's doing The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. She's doing The Howard Stern Show. She did 60 Minutes. She's doing a Univision town hall on Thursday night. She did Call Her Daddy. She did Ricky Smiley. She did Oprah for two hours. She did All the Smoke. She did Dana Bash on CNN. She did Stephanie Ruhle on MSNBC. What more do you all want?! [Applause] ALYSSA FARAH GRIFFIN: So, an interesting kind of like side thing in this election, is it can kind of come back to the podcast wars. And what I mean by this, is Donald Trump – Sara’s pointed this out – has been targeting right-of-center, male-driven, young audience podcasts for a while. Think of it as the Joe Rogan crowd. He hasn’t specifically done Joe Rogan’s but some others – WHOOPI GOLDBERG: He’s made at Joe. FARAH GRIFFIN: Yeah, because he complimented Kamala Harris But he’s been targeting what would be – we consider low propensity voters; ones who aren’t likely to turn out. And he specifically wants young, white men. Kamala Harris – This is the second biggest podcast in the world after Joe Rogan. I love Alex Cooper, I love Call Her Daddy. She is reaching a lot of people who likely don't always vote. They're not necessarily engaged, but she's talking about issues in a real way that they care about. And it could really come down to who can activate more people from these platforms they’re hitting. So, I think it's incredibly smart. I would have done it two months ago, but I'm glad she did it. GOLDBERG: Well, I think people should just know it – it – it is not easy to do what – what she's doing because she's still also the vice president. So, she's still got other things she's supposed to be doing as does our acting president, Joe Biden. (…)

The liberal media helped set the stage for two assassination attempts against President Donald Trump, advancing false narratives and alarmist rhetoric. Various publications have doubled down in recent weeks, characterizing Kamala Harris' opponent as the embodiment of evil but, more specifically, as the second coming of Adolf Hitler. NBC News, the Washington Post, and other Democratic-boosting publications dutifully did their part Monday, suggesting that Trump outed himself as a racist and a eugenicist — perhaps of the Planned Parenthood variety — in conversation with radio host Hugh Hewitt earlier in the day. Of course, this latest false narrative relies upon both a willful misinterpretation of Trump's remarks as well as their de-contextualization. Background Patrick Lechleitner, deputy director of ICE, noted in a Sept. 25 letter to Rep. Tony Gonzales (R-Texas) that as of July 21, 2024, "There were 662,566 noncitizens with criminal histories on ICE's national docket, which includes those detained by ICE, and on the agency's non-detained docket." Lechleitner's letter further revealed that over 13,000 illegal aliens were living outside of ICE detention and that another 1,845 illegal aliens had pending homicide cases. Trump has in recent days cited the figure as further evidence that the Biden-Harris administration's failure to secure the southern border has endangered Americans. In conversation Monday with Hewitt, Trump criticized Kamala Harris, stressing that she is a "mentally deficient person," who cannot manage to do anything right. Harris' apparent deficit is all the more troubling, suggested Trump, because she seeks to manage virtually every aspect of Americans' lives. "She wants to go into government housing. She wants to go into government feeding. She wants to feed people. She wants to feed people governmentally. She wants to go into a Communist Party-type of a system," said Trump. "When you look at the things that she proposes, they're so far off. She has no clue." The Republican added: How about allowing people to come through an open border — 13,000 of which were murderers. Many of them murdered far more than one person, and they're now happily living in the United States. You know, now, a murderer — I believe this — it's in their genes. And we've got a lot of bad genes in our country right now. They left — they had 425,000 people come into our country that shouldn't be here that are criminals. Trump made no mention of race when speaking collectively of murderers. After all, those pouring over the southern border under Harris' watch are racially diverse. Pew Research indicated the illegal alien population from nearly every region around the world grew under the Biden-Harris administration, such that even illegal aliens from Europe and Asia saw increased representation. In the excerpt, Trump insinuated that murderers' violent disposition may be inherent (i.e., "it's in their genes") and that America suffers as a result of the presence of so many imported murderers. Liberal press rushes to mislead In its report of Trump's remarks, NBC News neglected to note that Trump was specifically referring to murderers in the country illegally. The publication also decided to conflate illegal aliens with immigrants more broadly, titling its piece, "Trump suggests immigrants have 'bad genes.'" There was no mistaking the publication's intent as it made sure not only to parrot a Hitler accusation from the defunct Biden campaign but to suggest Trump was dabbling in "race science." Rikki Ratliff-Fellman, director of programming at Blaze Media, responded, "THE ACTUAL QUOTE WAS: 'You know, now a murderer, I believe this, it's in their genes. And we've got a lot of bad genes in our country right now.' Per ICE: Over 13K illegal immigrants convicted of murder have been released into US. Where the HELL are your editors?!" Blaze News senior editor Cortney Weil called out NBC News, writing, "Calling Trump a racist and implying that he's Hitler-adjacent. A completely new and original angle. Will likely impact his chances in November." Brittany Hughes, managing editor at MRCTV, tweeted, "Trump said *murderers* have bad genes, and that Biden/Harris have allowed thousands of *murderers* into the country. Which is true. Lying @NBCNews is running the old 'murderers and rapists' hoax again." Trump campaign spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt told NBC News, "He was clearly talking about MURDERERS — not migrants." NBC News was not, however, alone in glossing over the intended and obvious meaning of Trump's remarks. Jeff Bezos' Washington Post, a key media exponent of the Russian collusion hoax, appeared keen to outdo the absurdity of other liberal publications with an article titled "Trump finally just says that some immigrants are genetically inferior." After torpedoing his own thesis by alluding to past Trump references to luck and genetics, which lacked racial connotations, Philip Bump claimed that Trump specifically suggested "non-White immigrants are genetically inferior." Despite the diversity of the criminals flooding into the country, Bump presumed "racism" on Trump's part, then mounted a defense of illegal aliens stealing into the homeland. The Washington Post has already walked back its original headline, such that Bump's misleading piece is now titled, "Saying immigrants bring 'bad genes' echoes Trump's history — and the world's." That didn't stop another Post writer, Jennifer Rubin, from once again signaling her poor grounding in reality, then insinuating Trump should be silenced. "This is fascism," wrote Rubin, who previously fumbled a hit piece against Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis. "Giving someone a platform for this is reprehensible." Politico, a publication that recently beclowned itself trying to help Kamala Harris, suggested that Trump was arguing that "immigrants are predisposed to violence" — missing the fact that Trump explicitly suggested that murderers might share a gene in common. The Huffington Post's Matt Shuham unsurprisingly joined the game, writing, "The xenophobic claim that immigrants are genetically predisposed to committing violent crimes is shocking and false — but xenophobia is also a cornerstone of Trump’s presidential campaign." Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

“It may be dangerous to be America's enemy, but to be America's friend is fatal,” said the late Henry Kissinger to William F. Buckley. Israel’s alliance with the United States hasn’t proved fatal — and probably won’t — but it has left Israel with difficult choices and an enduringly dangerous security situation. Zoom out from the battlefields in Gaza, about the size of Brooklyn and Queens, or the 18 miles from the Israeli-Lebanon border to the Litani River and consider the mess that the Biden administration has made of the world. Israel’s biggest problem is that U.S. influence is imploding around the world and to be an American ally means to wear a target on one’s back. Israel’s second-biggest problem is that its American ally has sandbagged it at every turn. Instead of peace through strength, Biden has offered promulgation from weakness. That has grave implications for Israel’s position. October 7, 2023, was the worst day for the Jewish people since the Holocaust, with 1,200 dead and many raped and tortured as well as 250 kidnapped. Relative to Israel's Jewish population of 7.2 million, that’s the equivalent of 55,000 Americans, or roughly 20 times the death toll on 9/11. America’s Global War on Terror caused 900,000 civilian casualties, according to a Brown University estimate. Taking the Iraqi city of Mosul from ISIS during 2016-2017 killed anywhere between 10,000 and 40,000 civilians. Israel’s campaign to extirpate Hamas from Gaza has been measured by comparison. But Hamas succeeded in forcing Israel into a war on its terms, in which its objective is to maximize casualties among its own civilian population, the better to isolate Israel diplomatically. That is an innovation in warfare. No precedent exists for the deliberate mass killing of a combatant’s own civilians. But that has provided a pretext for the global left to demonize the Jewish state. For the first time, the destruction of Israel — implied in the slogan “from the river to the sea” — is an acceptable opinion in polite company. Overshadowing what, after all, is a little war on Israel’s border are two great conflicts: the Ukraine War and the U.S.-China cold war. The American side is losing both, thanks to the fecklessness of the Biden administration. Biden stated in a March 2023 post that the U.S. foreign policy establishment believed economic sanctions would reduce the Russian economy by half. Instead, Russia’s economy has expanded, and its production of ammunition and weapons has exceeded NATO's combined efforts. Russia is gradually winning a war of attrition that is exhausting Ukraine’s limited pool of manpower. Having staked NATO's credibility on a confrontation with Russia, the Biden administration may have destroyed NATO. Amir Levy/Getty Images Tariffs and technology sanctions on China have slowed but not stopped the world’s largest manufacturing economy. Since the COVID-19 epidemic, China has doubled its exports to the Global South, and its supply chains drive the Global South’s exports to the United States. America’s trade deficit has surged to a record $1.2 trillion, and we now import more Chinese goods through third-party countries than before the tariffs. Tech sanctions on China have kept China a few years behind the United States in chip technology but have not stopped it from producing advanced computer chips. Nor have they stopped China from dominating many of the world’s key high-tech industries, including electric vehicles, alternative energy, and telecom infrastructure. What some analysts call China’s “overcapacity” is better characterized as rapid progress in AI applications to manufacturing and logistics, drastically lowering production costs for EVs and other key exports. Instead of peace through strength, the Biden administration has offered promulgation from weakness. That has grave implications for Israel’s position. Russia has sought help where it can and has deepened its relationships with Iran, North Korea, and China. China imports 90% of Iran’s burgeoning oil production. As long as the United States conflicts with Russia and China, our ability to contain Iran is limited. On the principle that the friend of my enemy is my enemy, China has become an adversary of Israel. Israel’s biggest problem, though, is that it cannot trust its American ally. Withholding crucial ammunition during a shooting war is the least of Biden’s misdeeds. Washington has insisted that Israel offer a cessation of hostilities (that is, allow Hamas to survive as a military force) in exchange for the return of hostages under the mediation of Qatar. That adds injury to insult. Israel’s intelligence failure on October 7 has been examined endlessly. A half-dozen attack helicopters deployed to the border would have stopped the attack, as Israeli commentator Ehud Yaari observed. The lower ranks of Israeli signals intelligence officers warned repeatedly of a possible attack, yet the top military and political leadership refused to believe them. Specifically, Israel’s leaders believed disinformation from Qatar, a gas bubble with a postage-stamp principality on top. Qatari diplomats visited Gaza monthly with suitcases containing more than $15 million in cash and assured the Israelis that Hamas had been paid to keep quiet. In January 2022, the Biden administration elevated Qatar to the same status as Israel or South Korea, a “major non-NATO ally.” Qatar hosts America’s largest military base outside the continental United States, and U.S. intelligence services collaborate closely with the Qataris, who gave $5 billion to the Sunni jihadists backed by the CIA during the Syrian civil war between 2010 and 2017. Qatar is the leading financial supporter of the Muslim Brotherhood, of which Hamas is the Palestinian branch. Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates attempted to blockade Qatar in 2018-2019 but were foiled by Iran, which continued trade with Qatar and the United States. After Qatar’s Hamas client attacked Israel, Qatar exacted no penalties from Hamas, which continued to operate out of luxury hotel suites in Doha as it did before. The United States, which treats Qatar as an ally on par with Israel, exacted no penalties from Qatar. On the contrary, it elevated Qatar's status as the mediator between Hamas and Israel. Meanwhile, the Biden administration granted Iran access to $6 billion in frozen accounts in South Korea in 2023 and released an additional $10 billion in frozen assets in March 2024. While China, Russia, North Korea, and others can bypass U.S. sanctions, the administration’s generosity toward a nation that supports Hezbollah and other terrorist groups is reprehensible. After Iran launched 180 ballistic missiles at Israel last week — causing virtually no casualties but causing non-trivial damage — Israel only has terrible choices. It could destroy Iran’s two main oil terminals and shut off its source of foreign exchange at the cost of bringing the outrage of the world on its head. It could attempt to destroy Iran’s missile production capacity. Whether destroying its dug-in nuclear facilities is an option is unclear. ARIS MESSINIS/Getty Images There are several possible outcomes. If Donald Trump is elected in November, we can expect a turn in American policy away from coddling Iran and Qatar and back to the core idea of the last Trump administration’s policy for the region: Extend the Abraham Accords to Saudi Arabia. If the Ukraine war ends, the politics of the region will shift. Russia will have less incentive to act as a spoiler and more incentive to restore normal relations with its European trading partners, making Iran the odd man out. If the Biden-Harris administration continues, Israel faces a long and debilitating war in which it can hold its own but not achieve a stable peace. Betrayed by the United States, Israel will have to maneuver as best it can in a world of diminishing American influence. October 7 will have been a dark day not just for Israel but also for the United States.