Failing grades…writes Michael Kuttner

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The long summer vacation is over and pupils are bracing for a reluctant return to school.

Michael Kuttner

By the end of the final term they will receive a report card detailing their achievements including comments on all facets of their year’s activities.

It seems timely to issue a report card on the achievements or in many cases the disastrous failures of those politicians and leaders who have been tasked with the responsibility of making the world a better place for all of us to live in.

Almost without exception these individuals who have been entrusted with protecting our welfare have earned grades so low that it does not feature on any scale. In the “olden days” they would have been either run out of town or tarred and feathered in the public square. All democratic societies can do these days is to throw them out of office at election time. Unfortunately this option is not available to those living under oppressive regimes. The inadequate and weak responses to international bullying and terror by democratic countries, has deservedly earned failing grades and explains why we are in the current mess.

Some examples should suffice to illustrate our present dilemma.

Amongst the most glaring affronts is the continuing performance of those whose purported aim is the establishment of a Palestinian Arab State. In a report released last week by MEMRI it has been revealed that the kleptocracy called the Palestinian Authority (our misnamed “peace “ partners) paid more money to jailed terrorists and their families than they paid out as welfare payments to needy individuals. Amounts handed to terrorists and their dependents exceeded US$3,300 monthly. Contrast this with the US$170 paid monthly to needy families. Payments to terrorists are made regardless of their financial status.

In 2016 the PA spent US$319 million on these terrorist stipends which amounts to 20% of the foreign aid it receives. The fact that millions still keep pouring into the bottomless coffers of the PA and that Abbas and his friends refuse to halt rewarding the murderers of Israelis illustrates how rotten the situation has become. In this case the UN deserves a z minus grade while Abbas should receive A plus for continuing to deceive and bamboozle a morally corrupt organisation.

With the commencement of a new school year Palestinian Arab children will be returning to their classrooms and once again immersing themselves in textbooks which delegitimize Israel and Jews. For a detailed analysis of this scandalous situation take a look at this report from the Center for Near East Policy Research:

http://israelbehindthenews.com/new-school-year-old-incitement-curriculum/16378/

Despite all this evidence, Canada and the USA have decided to restore funding to UNRWA and its educational institutions which teach a curriculum dedicated to Israel’s demise. Obviously the Obama/Kerry holdovers in the State Department are still in charge. Where is Donald Trump? Too busy tweeting it seems. Australia at one stage was going to hold hearings on foreign aid to UNRWA. This also seems to have vanished from the agenda.

Hamas this week boasted that its relations with Iran were now fantastic and that it was full steam ahead for manufacturing missiles and preparing plans for the liberation of all of occupied “Palestine.” This declaration drew nary a peep or tweet from the rest of the world. If anyone should have been awarded failing grades it was Obama and Kerry whose folly enabled Iran to receive billions and thus finance terror groups as well as developing the means to deliver weapons of mass destruction.

In this regard North Korea is a classic example of how to thumb ones nose at the world while developing missiles which threaten all and sundry. Top grades to the North Korean leadership which has exposed the impotency of those threatened. The Japanese can only resort to meaningless declarations, the South Koreans can only rely on the USA which itself is paralysed by indecision and an aimless void in how to thwart a bully which past US failures have empowered to threaten world peace. The Iranians are no doubt watching carefully and making notes on how to cheat and beat the powerless UN.

We have just been visited by the UN Secretary General. Although he is undoubtedly a sincere individual and can see for himself what reality on the ground actually looks like he is held hostage by an organisation which has been hijacked. He abhors the continual obsession with passing anti Israel resolutions but he cannot do anything about it. He is like a headmaster whose school has been taken over by thugs and bullies and is powerless to impose discipline and sanctions on those whose agenda is diametrically opposed to the original ethos of the body he nominally represents.

It is therefore no surprise to find that the majority of Israelis whose heads are not in some cloud cuckoo fantasy land hold the UN and its associated groups in utter contempt. Definitely a failing grade well and truly deserved.

Beyond a shadow of a doubt the most spectacular demonstration of someone failing to make the grade was displayed this week by the departing EU Ambassador to Israel. This Danish diplomat has been in Israel for four years and one would have thought that by now he might have internalised what it is exactly that is preventing peace. However, mesmerised by mirages of fantasy and being a proponent of European political correctness it is obvious that he has learnt nothing.

Thus on the eve of his departure he gave a press briefing which demonstrated yet again that Europe is doomed. His main advice to us unenlightened Israelis was to state with a straight face that we have a lot to learn from Europe as to how terrorism can be effectively combated. He then proceeded to explain that the campaign against terror required a “whole toolbox of instruments.” One of these tools was a strong security component which he admitted Israel excelled at. However there were other tools which included de-radicalization, working with social services and education. Presumably these latter three policies are so successfully employed by European countries that they could serve as examples for Israel to follow.

This latest “gospel” from the EU Ambassador elicited an excellent response from Richard Kemp, a former British military officer and an expert in fighting terror. He called it “chutzpah” and further went on to declare that “Israel has nothing to learn from the EU – in fact the EU is actually guilty of encouraging terrorism in Israel.” Its failure to articulate who is right and wrong in our war against Palestinian Arab incitement of terror is a perfect example of the EU’s failed moral compass.

Europe’s continuing refusal to identify the real source of terror now plaguing the continent and elsewhere means that this scourge will never be successfully combated and defeated.

It is mind-boggling to assert that we have much to learn from the EU when it comes to facing up to terrorism. The fact that its ambassador thinks so, gives him not only a failing grade but means that he will never graduate into the real world.

Michael Kuttner is a Jewish New Zealander who for many years was actively involved with various communal organisations connected to Judaism and Israel. He now lives in Israel and is J-Wire’s correspondent in the region.