A new law Turkish law breaks a 90-year-old ban on Muslims wearing the veil at university or at government work offices and reflects the growing Islamic influence on the once secular government.

The secular Turkish republic in 1925 banned  civil servants from wearing overt symbols of religious affiliation, That presumably includes the kippa, for those Jews brave enough to wear it anywhere in public in Turkey.

The restriction kept many observant Muslim women out of the government civil service.

Critics of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan have viewed the new law as evidence of a “secret Islamic agenda,” but he said it represents more “democracy” and also gives more freedom for Kurdish minorities.

Another radical change in policy is discontinuing the practice of school children reciting a vow of national allegiance each week.

The “foreign terrorists’ invasion” of Syria, supposedly financed and armed by the United States and its allies, have brought on Syria its own 9/11,” Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Moallem told the United Nations Monday.

“The people of New York have witnessed the devastations of terrorism, and were burned with the fire of extremism and bloodshed, the same way we are suffering now in Syria,” Moallem said. “How can some countries, hit by the same terrorism we are suffering now in Syria, claim to fight terrorism in all parts of the world, while supporting it in my country?”

The report of his speech in Turkey’s Hurriyet News did not note whether U.S. Ambassador Susan Rice was in the hall at the time, but its amazing that there has been no storm of protest from the United States.

Perhaps it is not amazing. The U.N. has become so anti-American and anti-anything that represents normal civilization that the very fact that the United States continues to finance it, let alone suffers the insults spouted from the podium, says a lot about America’s loss of intellectual honesty and integrity.

Moallem, perhaps Syrian President Bassar al-Assad’s closest loyal aide who has not defected, represents a country that by all accounts – except  in Iran – has committed atrocities beyond belief and has gone unpunished.

Using the tactic of turning the accused into the victim, a twisted method perfected by the Palestinian Authority and Iran, he told the United Nations, “Terrorists from more than 83 countries are engaged in the killing of our people and our army under the appeal of global Takfiri jihad.”

It’s all Turkey’s fault, he declared, And Saudi Arabia’s. And Qatar’s. And Britain’s. And, of course, it is the United States’ fault.

All of these evil countries armed, financed and trained the “terrorists,” according to Moallem, whose speech was duly recorded without a peep of protest.

The equation of 9/11 attacks with the rebellion is sicker than sick but is par for the course in the United Nations, which has succeeded in making the old League of Nations a collection of angels.

As for the chemical warfare in Syria, it was “terrorists who used poisonous gases in my country [and] have received chemical agents from regional and Western countries that are well known to all of us,” he said.

The hijacking of the United Nations by the Axis of Evil and its radical Islamic sympathizers is all but complete.

The United Nations is the perfect stage for Moallem to denounce the international body, where the West still has influence through the Security Council, for its handling of the Syrian crisis. It should be condemned for its mis-handling the crisis.

“There is no civil war in Syria, but it is a war against terror that recognizes no values, nor justice, nor equality, and disregards any rights or laws,” according to Moallem.

In that case, the question is, “Why isn’t the United Nations fighting a war against Syria?”

Turkish planes shot down a Syrian Helicopter which Turkey claims was flying 2 kilometers inside their airspace, according to an AFP report on Monday.

Turkey claims to have warned the Syrians a few times to exit their airspace, before hitting the helicopter with a missile. The helicopter reportedly crashed on Syrian soil.

I appreciate the fact that this Jewish publication was willing to publish my article. I’m not sure how easy it would be for a Jewish pundit to get his or her work published in a Turkish, Egyptian or Iranian magazine. I believe it’s high time someone gave it a try.

History buffs among us know all too well that the best time for Jews over the past two millennia—ever since they were overcome by the force of the Roman empire following two bloody rebellions—was under the rule of the Arab caliphates, both in Spain and in North Africa. So much so, that Jewish sources refer to that time as “The golden age.”

The various Muslim caliphates, which began ruling a very large chunk of the known world in the 7th and 8th centuries, were driven by a single, fundamental, religious mission: to spread Islam. But their agenda for the pagans populating Asia, Africa and Europe was different from their agenda for the “peoples of the book,” followers of Christianity and Judaism. While, most often, the heathens were given no choice about conversion: you became Muslim or you died – Christians and Jews who refused to convert to Islam only had to endure a kind of second class citizenship, with different features in different locales.

It would be helpful to recall that while Jews in Muslim territories at the time were forced to wear articles of clothing that set them apart, and were forbidden to ride horses or use the main public sidewalks—a few miles up north, in Christian Europe, they were being raped, pillaged and burned alive on a steady basis. And while in Christian Europe Jews were blocked from most of the professions, under the caliphates their economic options were much more exciting, hence the term “golden age.”

While Jewish culture in Christian Europe centered almost strictly around the houses of study, with little evidence of a robust culture, in Spain and North Africa the Jews wrote songs and books of philosophy, and excelled as military generals and court politicians—in addition to their flourishing business as traders and bankers.

It is true that Islam had its low point even during that golden age, and every once in a while the mainstream in various provinces—for a variety of geopolitical and social reasons—would take on an ominous spirit of fanaticism and start harassing the “peoples of the books” with fanatical impatience and zeal, threatening their lives unless they converted. But even those waves of fanaticism are dwarfed by the pogroms and expulsions that marked the lives of Jews under Christian rule.

Indeed, the demise of the thriving Jewish culture in Spain came not under Muslim rule, but only after the Christian invasion of the late 1300s, which ended with the expelling of all the Jews of Spain and Portugal in 1492.

What followed was particularly grim for Islam. Just as the original Muslim invasion of the Middle East, North Africa and Southern Europe was enabled by the decline of the Roman Empire, so did was decline of the Caliphate an invitation to a new force, the great Ottoman Empire, to quickly overtake those same areas, and to push far north into Central Europe, only to be blocked, finally, at the gates of Vienna.

But something went wrong in Muslim history at that point. Historians will continue to argue over the precise reasons – the reality is that sometime around the Renaissance period, while Christian Europe began to emerge from its barbarism, to usher in an age of discoveries, inventions and the rise of the human spirit—at a high cost to many indigenous peoples on several continents—Islam began its sad and disheartening decline that set aside Muslims in general and Arabs in particular as the second class citizens of a developing world. Instead of setting the tone in science and scholarship, as it used to do in the middle ages, Islam was relegated to the position of a spectator in a game it could not hope to win.

We have a big problem with cognitive dissonance in most Arab countries, which are trying to be simultaneously Muslim and modern. By “modern” I mean doing all the things a normal Western society takes for granted: publishing books, making movies, starting businesses, dining in restaurants, driving cars, writing laws to serve the community, delivering state services. Every single one of these aspects of your life which you take for granted represent a potential clash with Islam.

The White House announced Monday that more than dozen more countries have formally backed a “strong international response” to the use of chemical weapons in Syria.

The United States now has the support of 24 countries, not including Israel which has tried to lay low. The list includes an interesting collection of allies, such as Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Italy, Germany, France, Albania, Australia and Denmark.

“We condemn in the strongest terms the horrific chemical weapons attack in the suburbs of Damascus on August 21st that claimed the lives of so many men, women and children,” the statement says. “The evidence clearly points to the Syrian government being responsible for the attack, which is part of a pattern of chemical weapons use by the regime.”

Syrian President Bassar al-Assad told interviewer Charlie Rose that the United States, Israel and other American allies can expect to be hit with chemical weapons if President Barack Obama carries out his threat to attack.

Assad, who has denied that his regime used chemical weapons despite widespread evidence to the contrary, implied that Iran and Hezbollah or rebels could use chemical weapons to repel a military strike.

“It could happen…if the rebels or the terrorists in this region or any other group have” chemical weapons, he explained.

The United States “should expect everything, not necessarily from the government,” if the United States attacks, he said. Assad added that Syria is “not the only player in the region” and that “you have different parties, you have different factions, you have different ideology.”

It would only take one or two deranged Al Qaeda terrorists, and not necessarily Assad’s soldiers, to use an American attack as an excuse to try to be the Great Arab hero who tried to destroy Israel with a “dirty bomb” or poison gas.

However, based on Assad’s previous actions and statements during the civil war, he used the interview to prepare the groundwork to use chemical weapons and blame others for it.

Rose is one of the few journalists allowed into the country and to meet Assad, dispelling rumors that he is hiding underground. Rose described Assad as “remarkably calm.”

As for the chemical attack on Syrian civilians last month, Assadcontinued to maintain a “What, me?” attitude in the interview, which will be aired in full on Rose’s PBS show Monday evening after excerpts were viewed Monday morning on CBS.

“Our soldiers, in another area, were attacked chemically,” Assad maintained. “But in the area where they say the government used chemical weapons, we only have video, pictures and allegations. We were not there, our forces, our police, our institutions, don’t exist.

“How can you talk about what happened if you don’t have evidence?”

While Assad was warning of a chemical attack, an Israeli official who has been briefed by Washington told Reuters that the Obama administration would give Israel only “hours” notice before attacking Syria.

That could mean two hours or 10 years. In either case, that is enough to rev up the F-16 engines but not enough to mobile troops.

Former Defense Ministry top honcho Amos Gilad, who has sounded suspiciously dovish and often has been dead wrong since leaving office, said in a speech at a counterterrorism center that Israel is totally out of the picture concerning if and when President Obama orders an attack.

There also is the possibility that the unidentified Israeli official who spoke with Reuters simply is lying and that the United States and Israel are cooperating closely towards a military strike.

If the Obama administration were not to give Israel enough notice to prepare for an attack, then Washington would have to take on the job of answering a lot of questions if Israeli civilians end up being killed.

It also is no secret that the American government relies heavily on Israel for intelligence information in the Middle East in general and in Syria specifically. Israel, and not the United States, has the human resources to plant dark-skinned Arabic-speaking agents in Syria.

Regardless of whether Israel will have no notice or plenty of notice before an American attack, President Obama already has given the world a least a couple of weeks to prepare for it.

The results have been panic. Russia has sent warships to the region and has threatened that Obama is laying with fire that will erupt into a regional war, or not a world war. Israel has deployed a battery of the anti-missile Iron Dome system around Jerusalem, and Turkey has placed anti-aircraft batteries along its southern border with Syria.

The rhetoric is great for headlines, and no one will say that Syria will throw out the welcome mat for an American attack.

But so far, Obama has one powerful diplomatic weapon on his side: Russia and Syria bear the burden to prove that the Assad regime did not deploy chemical weapons. No one believes Assad’s’ denials accept, perhaps, his properly British educated wife.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry has given Assad the “exit option” of turning over chemical weapons in a week to the international community in return for President Obama’s pushing the “stop” button.

Originally published at Rubin Reports.

See introduction, Obama policy, the second term: ”"Second-Term Obama Agenda: Part 1: –  Why U.S. Policy Betrayed the Moderates.” These are the new (hopefully temporary):

White House’s Seven Pillars of Idiocy in the Middle East:

(NAMED AFTER LAWRENCE OF ARABIA’S VERSION)

One:  Other than aid and official government rhetoric, the United States is now neutral on the Israel-Palestinian conflict and, to put it more accurately, tilting toward the Palestinian side.    This does not mean disaster for Israel—and no Israeli official will say so in public–but it is a strategic reality. Part of the dynamic motivating this U.S. policy is that:

–The White House believes it can win over “moderate Islamists” in power as in Egypt, Sudan, Turkey, Tunisia, Bahrain, Iran, and Syria, among other countries. This would form a pro-U.S. bloc against al-Qaida and, secondarily the Iran-Syria bloc. Only al-Qaida cannot be won over; but the White House believes that even the Taliban, the Tehran rulers, Hezbollah, and Hamas might be convinced. (I’m not kidding and can prove it.)

–Rather than mobilize active opposition to Palestinian Authority diplomatic gains in Europe, the UN, the World Court, and international institutions, the Obama Administration is eitherleading exploiting, or bowing to these gains.

–This of course intensifies Western cultural surrender to anti-Israel positions. Here’s an example: The highly prestigious Foyle’s bookstore in London has closed its Israel section. If you know London, you know what an intellectual earthquake that is.

–The United States will not privately pressure or publicly criticize Palestinian Authority policies or statements, but will not hesitate to do so for Israel.   --The Palestinian Authority is not even held responsible for its total inability to deliver half the Palestinian forces, including Hamas and the Gaza Strip. Imagine a White House not thrilled to use the Egyptian coup regime to press and suppress Hamas! Their strategy would be to make a deal: Palestinian concessions to get a state in exchange for the capture of Gaza! Who has even thought of that! Of course the talks will not go anywhere because the Palestinians know that they have a strong hand and they will overplay it. But, the administration’s willingness to punish Israel to win public relations points and shore up the doomed U.S. alignment with Islamists had to be reckoned with.

The problem is by no means regarding U.S.-Israel relations alone, but it is with every Middle Eastern ally and with every potentially pro-U.S democratic opposition movement.

Second pillar: The system the White House seeks to impose on the Middle East appears to be revolutionary Islamism! If many objective Iranian, Turkish, Kurdish, Israeli, and Arab observers see this as self-evident, Islamists themselves view Western policy, however, as a sign of their own victory due to Allah’s backing plus Western fear and weakness.

Consider the bizarre situation in regard to Egypt. The last time, Egypt had to join the enemy  Soviet bloc and wage war on a  U.S. ally to be America’s enemy; now it can do so by joining American goals,  opposing terrorism and working too closely with U.S. allies and goals!  

Third pillar, conservative traditionalists, moderates, and liberals seem to be viewed by the U .S. government as enemies because only Muslim Brotherhood can stop al-Qaida by out-jihading them. Instead of applauding the army coup in Egypt—would that it had happened in Turkey and Tunisia!—the White House opposed it on the belief that the Egyptian masses were the most reactionary advocates of dictatorship and hate Christians, Jews, Shia Muslims, women, gays and of course Americans. That’s partly true but doesn’t mean we should want a the Muslim Brotherhood in power there.

Instead, there is no notion of realpolitik or national interests but this strange foreign policy philosophy. –Surrender is better because it avoids international friction, and especially for conflicts involving America. — The ridiculous notion that sharing power with anti–American radicals will bring internal stability. If you force the army to have a coalition with the Muslim Brotherhood or a predictably unstable two-state solution you will get immunity from civil conflict.

–The idea that betraying allies will make more people want to be allies.

These are the ideas that, remarkably, many pompous statesmen, much prized experts, brilliant academics, and totally ignorant (you’d be amazed how little many know despite their job titles) really believe in.

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s anti-Israel rhetoric is interfering with Turkish-Israeli cooperation that could turn Turkey into a regional energy base to ship Israeli natural gas to Europe.

“Their inability to complete a pipeline deal would hurt Turkish ambitions to become a regional transit center and mean continued dependence on Russia and Iran for gas,” according to Bloomberg News.

Erdogan last week accused Israel of being involved with the military coup that ousted Muslim Brotherhood president Mohammed Morsi from power in Egypt.

“Rising tensions between the former allies risk the ability of Israel’s Delek Group Ltd. and Turkey’s Zorlu Holding AS to negotiate a pipeline from Israel to Turkey that could feed markets in Europe. While trade has been resilient to the souring of diplomatic ties, building the $2 billion pipeline requires inter-government cooperation for a long-term commercial agreement,” Bloomberg explained.