Media Hypes Non-Story
Despite only attracting a tiny crowd of about 40, the news media has been hyping a protest outside of the U.S. Embassy in Tel Aviv against President Donald Trump’s temporary halt on refugees while the government revamps its flawed security screening process.
Here are some of the screaming headlines about the miniscule protest:
* L.A. Times: “Protesters in Tel Aviv compare Trump immigration order to Israeli refugee policies.”
* Jerusalem Post: “Israelis protest Trump travel ban, citing history of Jewish refugees.”
* I24 News: “Protesters ‘fight back’ against US, Israel’s refugee and immigration policies.”
* Times of Israel: “At Tel Aviv protest, activists hear echoes of Israeli policy in Trump’s refugee ban.”
Despite the headlines, the articles themselves could not hide the small size of the protest, prompting questions as to why the news media would find the gathering newsworthy in the first place.
The L.A. Times conceded the crowd consisted of “several dozen demonstrators.” The Times of Israel put the number at “some 40 protesters,” as did The Jerusalem Post.
The small turnout is particularly noteworthy since Tel Aviv is known for its ability to mobilize massive numbers of left-wing protesters.
Trump’s executive order halts visas for 90 days for “immigrants and non-immigrants” from Syria, Somalia, Sudan, Libya, Yemen, Iran, and Iraq. The order further suspended the entry of all refugees for 120 days, indefinitely blocked Syrian refugees from entry, and lowered the ceiling to 50,000 for refugees allowed to enter the U.S. during Fiscal Year 2017.
Guess Who’s Funding The Groups Trying To Block Trump’s Executive Order?
Immigration lawyers from groups financed by billionaire George Soros, a champion of open border policies, were signatories to a lawsuit filed Saturday to block President Donald Trump’s executive order halting visas for 90 days for “immigrants and non-immigrants” from Syria, Somalia, Sudan, Libya, Yemen, Iran, and Iraq.
The suit was filed by lawyers from the International Refugee Assistance Project, the National Immigration Law Center, the Jerome N. Frank Legal Services Organization at Yale Law School, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), and the International Refugee Assistance Project (formerly Iraqi Refugee Assistance Project) at the Urban Justice Center.
The ACLU is massively funded by Soros’s Open Society Foundations; in 2014 alone it received a $50 million grant. The National Immigration Law Center has also received numerous Open Society grants earmarked for general support, and the Urban Justice Center is also the recipient of an Open Society grant.
Taryn Higashi, executive director of the Center’s International Refugee Assistance Project, which is listed on the Trump lawsuit, currently serves on the Advisory Board of the International Migration Initiative of Soros’s Open Society Foundations.
Over the last decade, Soros has reportedly provided some $76 million for immigrant issues. In 2014, the New York Times credited “immigrant rights groups” financed by Soros and a handful of other donors for influencing President Obama’s immigration policy.
In August, Breitbart Jerusalem first reported that hacked documents from Soros’s Open Society Institute boasted that the billionaire and his foundation helped successfully press the Obama administration to increase to 100,000 the total number of refugees taken in by the U.S. annually. The documents reveal that the billionaire personally sent President Obama a letter on the issue of accepting refugees.
Remember When Obama Barred Refugees?
Amid the furor over President Donald Trump’s executive order temporarily halting refugees while the government can revamp its flawed screening process, it may be instructive to recall that President Obama in 2011 reportedly quietly suspended the Iraq refugee program for six months over terrorism fears.
In 2013, ABC News first revealed that two years earlier, the State Department had imposed a freeze over the processing of Iraqi refugees for six months. The halt was the result of the discovery of two Al Qaeda members admitted as refugees from Iraq who were living in Bowling Green, Kentucky and who had admitted to targeting U.S. troops in Iraq.
The network also cited FBI agents conceding that “several dozen suspected terrorist bombmakers, including some believed to have targeted American troops, may have mistakenly been allowed to move to the United States as war refugees.”
At the time, ABC News reported: “As a result of the Kentucky case, the State Department stopped processing Iraq refugees for six months in 2011, federal officials told ABC News – even for many who had heroically helped U.S. forces as interpreters and intelligence assets.”
ISIS Not Happy With Trump’s Executive Order
Islamic State sympathizers and militants predictably reacted angrily to President Donald Trump’s temporary halt on refugees while the government revamps its flawed security screening process.
Breitbart Jerusalem obtained access to correspondence posted in a closed chat group that utilizes an encrypted Telegram messaging service. The chat group serves as an internal Twitter of sorts for ISIS jihadists and sympathizers, and it has been used in the past to issue ISIS communications.
“The madman Trump is still ignorant of politics, science and culture,” ISIS supporter Abu Maslama wrote to his associates on the Telegram app. “That Islam-hating Crusader prevents Muslims from entering America. That failed Nazi thinks that this will stop the mujahedeen from striking his country. Doesn’t he understand that his country will implode? When that happens, he’ll panic and backpedal on his Islam-hating policies.”
Maslama offered no explanation as to how the U.S. will purportedly implode from implementing stricter security screening procedures aimed at keeping terrorists out of the country. He also falsely claimed that Trump was preventing all Muslims from entering the country.
Meanwhile, Telegram user Omra Alfarouq, another ISIS supporter, wrote: “The decisions made by that fool [Trump] will drag America and its supporters into a war against each other that will be sparked by the mujahedeen, who will take advantage of it to settle in.”
Other messages reflected similar sentiment. ISIS, Al Qaeda and other terrorist groups have reportedly been seeking ways to take advantage of the Middle East refugee crisis to infiltrate Western nations.