Ban Ki-moon says UN has 'disproportionate' focus on Israel


United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has said the organisation has a “disproportionate” volume of resolutions against Israel, which he believes has “foiled the ability of the UN to fulfill its role effectively”.

Addressing the UN Security Council on Friday, Mr Ban said: “Over the last decade I have argued that we cannot have a bias against Israel at the UN.

"Decades of political maneuvering have created a disproportionate number of resolutions, reports and committees against Israel.

“In many cases, instead of helping the Palestinian issue, this reality has foiled the ability of the UN to fulfill its role effectively."
In response, Israel's Ambassador to the UN, Danny Danon, said Mr Ban "had admitted the clear truth", adding that the UN's hypocrisy towards Israel had "broken records over the past decade".
Mr Danon continued: “During this time the UN passed 223 resolutions condemning Israel, while only eight resolutions condemning the Syrian regime as it has massacred its citizens over the past six years. This is absurd.
“With a new Secretary General set to take office next month, we look forward to the possibility of a new era of fairness at the UN.”
At least 33 Israelis and two foreign visitors have been killed in Palestinian stabbings, shootings and car rammings since October last year, while more than 230 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli security forces in the period.
Israel says at least 156 were carrying out or attempting attacks but others were killed during protests, while human rights groups have raised concern over the proportionate use of force. 
Mr Ban is to be replaced on 1 January by the former prime minister of Portugal, Antonio Guterres.





Writing in The Manhattan Contrarian, Francis Merton predicts how the global warming thesis, still unable to account for a twenty year “pause” in its predicted temperature rise, will crumble, thanks to Donald Trump becoming president. Here are some of the most important points, but read the whole thing:


Start with the EPA.  To the extent that the global warming movement has anything to do with "science," EPA is supposedly where that science is vetted and approved on behalf of the public before being turned into policy.  In fact, under Obama, EPA's principal role on the "science" has been to prevent and stifle any debate or challenge to global warming orthodoxy.  For example, when a major new Research Report came out back in September claiming to completely invalidate all of the bases on which EPA claims that CO2 is a danger to human health and welfare, and thus to undermine EPA's authority to regulate the gas under the Clean Air Act, EPA simply failed to respond.  In the same vein, essentially all prominent global warming alarmists refuse to debate anyone who challenges any aspect of their orthodoxy.  Well, that has worked as long as they and their allies have controlled all of the agencies and all of the money.  Now, it will suddenly be put up or shut up.  

There could be a lot of interesting spectacles headed their (and our) way:

Now the backers of the global warming alarm will not only be called upon to debate, but will face the likelihood of being called before a highly skeptical if not hostile EPA to answer all of the hard questions that they have avoided answering for the last eight years.

 Questions like:  Why are recorded temperatures, particularly from satellites and weather balloons, so much lower than the alarmist models had predicted?  How do you explain an almost-20-year "pause" in increasing temperatures even as CO2 emissions have accelerated?  What are the details of the adjustments to the surface temperature record that have somehow reduced recorded temperatures from the 1930s and 40s, and thereby enabled continued claims of "warmest year ever" when raw temperature data show warmer years 70 and 80 years ago?  Suddenly, the usual hand-waving ("the science is settled") is not going to be good enough any more.  What now?

And then there is the matter of the precious “international community.”

…people like Isabel Hilton predict a combination of ostracism and "loss of leadership" of the issue, most likely to China.  Here's my prediction:  As soon as the United States stops parroting the global warming line, the other countries will quickly start backing away from it as well.  This is "The Emperor's New Clothes," with the U.S. in the role of the little kid who is the only one willing to say the obvious truth in the face of mass hysteria.  Countries like Britain and Australia have already more or less quietly started the retreat from insanity.  In Germany the obsession with wind and solar (solar -- in the cloudiest country in the world!) has already gotten average consumer electric rates up to close to triple the cost in U.S. states that embrace fossil fuels. 






President-elect Donald Trump “remains firmly committed” to moving the U.S. Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, his transition team said.


“This is a commitment that the president-elect made numerous times on the campaign trail, that he remains firmly committed to,” Jason Miller, a transition team spokesman, said Friday. His remarks came on the heels of Trump’s nomination of David Friedman to be the U.S. ambassador to Israel.
In a statement, Friedman said he looked forward to working from the embassy in Jerusalem.
Miller said that a timeline as to when the embassy would be moved would be “premature” at this point, but reiterated Trump’s commitment to the transfer.
Meanwhile, the Palestinians claimed that were Trump to make good on his promise, it would “destroy” the peace process.






Then we have petition platforms like Change.org that are not only planning protests for December 19, 2016, to protests the electoral college members from casting their votes in a manner consistent with their state's vote,  but are hosting a multitude of "petitions" that range from the ridiculous to the outright insane, two of which are "Impeach Donald Trump," and "Order an emergency psychiatric evaluation of Donald Trump," and one to postpone the date the electors vote and the inauguration.


Unable to comprehend or deal with their loss this election cycle, now they are planning protests, from peaceful, to plans for a "Road-Blocking 'Clusterf--k'" as reported by US News & World Report.


The most dangerous of the groups planning Inauguration Day protests is one with reported links to George Soros' money, Act Now to Stop War & Racism or ANSWER Coalition, who have been named a "a key agitator during the November riots in Chicago and other major cities," by WND. ANSWER, along with MoveOn.org were also behind the professional protests held the week following the presidential election.

Another group planning Inauguration Day protests are 'Disrupt J20,  where their stated goal is to "shut down the inauguration," by "trying to create citywide paralysis on a level that I don’t think has been seen in D.C. before," according to Legba Carrefour, a local anarchist handling press for the more radical protest-organizing network DisruptJ20. (Source)

One major faction plans an orderly but large demonstration along the parade route. But a more radical effort operating under the tagline "no peaceful transition" seeks to block major roads into the nation's capital and prevent foot traffic from reaching security checkpoints along the route.


Other groups planning protests include the Women's March, the snowflakes from the #NotMy President, who say they "refuse to recognize Donald Trump as the President of the United States," another Soros' linked group MoveOn.org, and a liberal activists group called Progressive Independent Party are planning a "March on the Inauguration" event. Occupy Inauguration is also planning to protest, although they were slated to protest no matter who won the presidential election. 

Last but not least, let us not forget the threat from "A self-avowed Marxist member of the Seattle City Council who is part of the George Soros-funded Occupy Wall Street movement," to orchestrate a "nationwide shut down’ on Inauguration Day."

Countering groups will be showing up in support of Trump's inauguration, including the 2 Million Bikers 2 DC event named 2 Million Trump Supporters To DC. Inauguration Day, and the Let America Hear US, Roar For TRUMP!, event hosted by Ski Bischof.

While the majority of the groups are calling for "peaceful" protests, as evidenced by previous protests at Trump events, where paid protesters started actual riots, causing bodily injury to others, damaging buildings, burning cars and generally protesting violently, it is highly likely we will see a number of disturbing incidents, and probably outright rioting.

What we have witnessed over the last year and a half is liberal progressives determined to make national news, where from Chicago to California, and more recently in Oregon, these "peaceful" protests devolve into outright chaos, because protesting is not their goal, anarchy is. Violence is. Rioting is. Their ultimate goal is to generate headlines and in order to do so, they have shown they are willing to figurative "burn down the town," looting, lighting cars on fire, attacking Trump supporters, blocking roads, and more.