Communist China's Genocide

There is growing pressure around the world to hold communist China accountable for the genocide that is taking place against the Uighurs and other ethnic minorities. 

The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, which I serve on, has been warning for years about communist China's growing human rights atrocities. (To call them "abuses" would be a gross understatement.) 

Last month, the bi-partisan Congressional-Executive Commission on China declared that there was evidence of genocide in the Xinjiang province. This week, the Canadian parliament unanimously approved a resolution condemning the genocide against the Uighurs and called for the 2022 Winter Olympics to be moved from Beijing.

The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is not happy about the growing focus on its horrific human rights record. 

The CCP's primary propaganda outlet issued an opinion piece this week blasting the "five eyes alliance" (the intelligence sharing alliance between the United States, Canada, Great Britain, Australia and New Zeeland) as "today's axis of white supremacy."

That's a really catchy phrase. I wonder where they got an idea like that. The Communist Chinese must be reading talking points from Joe Biden, Nancy Pelosi, Chuck Schumer and other progressive anti-American organizations. 

Or is it the other way around?

Is China Our Future?

Conservatives and most Americans want to beat communist China. But a new poll suggests that many worry Joe Biden is going soft on the communist regime. They're right to be concerned. 

Meanwhile, there is growing evidence that some on the left want to be like communist China. For example:

·     You can't open an independent media outlet in Communist China. Right now congressional liberals are holding hearings pressuring cable providers to cancel or censor Fox News and Newsmax TV.

·     Communist China used COVID as an excuse to crackdown on churches. When COVID hit the United States, leftwing mayors and governors used it as an excuse to close churches while keeping abortion facilities, casinos and marijuana stores open.

·     The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom advocates on behalf of prisoners of conscience. Many of them are in communist China because they have the courage to practice their faith even when it goes against the policies of the Chinese Communist Party. The political left tried to bankrupt the Little Sisters of the Poor. It threatened John MacArthur and other pastors with jail and severe fines for defying the COVID lockdowns. And it is stripping legal protections from faith-based institutions in the Equality Act.

·     You can't publish a book in China that defies the CCP. Here in America major publishers and retailers are banning books that don't toe the left's ideological line.

·     If you attend a demonstration in China or misbehave in anyway, you risk getting canceled. You can't get a loan, go to your doctor and your child might not be allowed to go to college. There may be travel restrictions imposed on you. The American left invented doxing to intimidate and silence conservatives. Remember what happened to Nick Sandmann? The left tried to drive Jack Phillips out of business. When one American basketball manager tried to defend free speech in Hong Kong, the NBA canceled his free speech.

I could go on, but you get the point.

For years, we were told that trade with communist China would change communist China. It hasn't. Instead, it has changed us as the left has increasingly adopted the worst aspects of communist China's anti-American rhetoric and anti-liberty behaviors.

The Deep State Does It Again

As Congress debates new measures to crack down on domestic terrorism, some are sounding the alarm against overreaches by the Deep State. 

In the aftermath of the January 6th riot on Capitol Hill, we have learned that Bank of America turned over the personal records and financial transactions of hundreds of Americans who were in Washington, D.C., over a period of several days. 

Now it's one thing if the FBI or prosecutors need information on a specific suspect and they get a warrant. But that didn't happen here.

Even worse, we're now learning that the FBI also seized the cellphone records and text messages of private citizens and members of Congress!

As Sen. Josh Hawley said, "We've seen this movie before." He's right. There's a pattern here. The Deep State spied on Congress when the Obama Administration was attempting to pass its nuclear deal with Iran. And we know the CIA spied on the U.S. Senate too.

Criminals must be prosecuted. But our intelligence agencies must not be weaponized against innocent Americans, political campaigns and members of Congress!

Purim

Tonight, Jews all over the world will celebrate Purim. It is the story of Queen Esther, who broke protocol and saved the Jewish people in Persia from a plot to annihilate them.

Just as it did so many centuries ago, Israel is once again facing an existential threat from modern day Persia. Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Khamenei, routinely promises a second Holocaust and the annihilation of Israel.

His regime is working feverishly to develop ballistic missiles and other weapons of mass destruction, while his terrorist proxies, Hamas and Hezbollah, encircle the Jewish state from Gaza, Lebanon and Syria.

So long as God gives me breath, I promise to fight the ancient evil of anti-Semitism (see next item), and to always stand with Israel and its people, the apple of God's eye.

To all of our Jewish friends and supporters, Chag Purim Sameach!

Exposing Anti-Semitism

Sadly, anti-Semitism is on the rise in many parts of the world today. The Anti-Defamation League recently released a harrowing report on anti-Semitism in Europe. And it is here in the United States as well.

When we think of anti-Semitism, what often comes to mind are images of ignorant neo-Nazis vandalizing synagogues. But it is also creeping into the mainstream of academia and Hollywood, where there seems to be a growing acceptance of anti-Semitism on the left.

Oberlin College is in the news this week. It turns out that a tenured professor of religion, Mohammad Jafar Mahallati, previously served as Iran's U.N. ambassador. He denied Israel's right to exist and defended Palestinian terrorism against Israel. Why would any American university hire him?

NBC is taking fire for promoting anti-Semitic tropes on the comedy show "Saturday Night Live" and the medical drama "Nurses."

And there's renewed concerns about anti-Semitism in the "woke" progressive movement after Temple University Professor Marc Lamont Hill said recently that the Black Lives Matter movement isn't just about "dismantling white supremacy" in America, but also in Israel, which he referred to as a "settler-colonial movement in Palestine."

Again referring to the Jewish state of Israel, Hill added, "Black Lives Matter, very explicitly, is talking about the dismantling of the Zionist project" and "very explicitly embracing BDS [boycott, divestment and sanctions against Israel] on those grounds." 

This isn't Hill's first controversy involving his deep-seated anti-Semitism. He was fired by CNN in 2018 after speaking at a U.N. conference where he called for "a free Palestine from the river to the sea." That phrase is the unofficial slogan of Hamas and other radical anti-Israel groups, and it means erasing the nation of Israel.

Again, anti-Semitism is not confined to the dark corners of the Internet or to any one end of the political spectrum. It is a sin that must be confronted and condemned whenever and wherever it rears its ugly head.