At the end of the Cold War, Francis Fukuyama pronounced that we had arrived at “The End of History”, and that capitalism and liberal democracy would now be the only global system left. But when I look at Europe today, I see democracies under threat because of an elaborate Eurabian bureaucracy and Islamic fanaticism. I see countries unwilling or unable to defend themselves against massive immigration/colonization.

As the Israeli war on Hezbollah continues – and it is, pace the protests of the anti-Israel crowd at home and abroad, not a war on “Lebanon” – the outline of the endgame for this phase becomes more clear. The Israelis are willing to accept an international force on its northern border, provided that force has a robust mandate, and provided it is led by NATO. This is at once a good idea and a bad one, and its implications extend far beyond the mere imposition of peace, such as it is, between Israel and the Litani.

Not for the first time, people are talking about a forthcoming sectarian division of Iraq. This is an increasingly good idea, and a sound policy will embrace it and its consequences.

Western societies tend to view pluralism as a good in itself, and the failure of pluralism as a failure of their own basic premises. This is false on two counts: First, social pluralism is not a good in itself, except from an efficiency standpoint, wherein competition of thought and values drives – or at least speeds up – human progress. But this isn’t a moral case per se, and it does not follow that the good derived from the coexistence of many elements will be derived from the coexistence of all elements. We should have seen by now – even though many of us have not – that some societal elements tend toward the destruction of the very structures and mores that make social pluralism (or the “open society” of Popper, as you prefer) peacefully functional. This leads us to the second count on which the traditional Western view of pluralism is false: the West itself is not a mere agora, nor a set of morally-neutral social mechanisms, but a society with its own definitive values that need defense, and will be eroded from within if and when hostile elements take their place in its forum.

Bat Ye’or is the most informed contemporary scholar of the unique Islamic institution of dhimmitude, the repressive and humiliating apartheid system imposed upon those non-Muslims (i.e., dhimmis) subjugated by Jihad. Sir Jadunath Sarkar, the pre-eminent historian of Mughal India, wrote the following in 1920 regarding the impact of centuries of Jihad and dhimmitude on the indigenous Hindus of the Indian subcontinent:

In an interview in the largest Swedish newspaper Dagens Nyheter the former Soviet spy Stig Bergling revealed that he has been a member of the Swedish Left Party (v, Vänsterpartiet) since the beginning of this year. Officially it is no problem for the party, which supports the Swedish minority government of Social-Democrat Prime Minister Göran Persson, that a convicted spy is an active member, "because he has done his time in prison, and everybody deserves a second chance."

Should the U.N. be able to tax you? Over the last several years, officials at the U.N. and other international organizations have been hatching schemes to directly tax the world’s people. Traditionally, only sovereign governments have the right to tax. The U.N. and other international organizations have largely depended on their ability to extract dues or other payments from their sovereign members.

In recent months, the suppression of the freedom of expression in Turkey has reached new heights. An embarrassingly extensive list of journalists and writers are embroiled in the process of court sentencing, intimidation, imprisonment or legal proceedings. Among those cases has been the trial of Turkish writer, Orhan Pamuk at the end of 2005 after the author claimed in a Swiss newspaper that 30,000 Kurds and one million Ottoman Armenians were killed in Turkey yet nobody would talk about it – a trial dismissed earlier this year by the Ministry of Justice.

Only about 1,300 Jews live in Norway, but because of the tensions and the current events in the Middle East, they are at risk of being attacked. The Norwegian newspaper Vårt Land reports that a Jew was assaulted by Arabs in the streets of Oslo last Saturday. In response, The Mosaic Community in Oslo has sent out a recommendation to its members to leave the kippah at home, or cover it under a cap. It is also warning its members against speaking Hebrew in public. During the past few days the Community has received several threats and other unpleasant messages.

In a true, totalitarian society such as the old Soviet Union, crime rates are usually low because of the crushing state control of all its citizens. Supposedly, street crime in Moscow in the USSR was rare, probably because the state itself was the biggest criminal. In contrast, in the European Union of today, which is not a totalitarian society, at least not yet, crime rates are booming in major cities. At the same time, authorities are stepping up censorship efforts, openly talking about media “speech codes” and aggressively slapping labels such as “racism” or “xenophobia” on anybody daring to criticize the immigration policies or pointing out the inadequate response to Muslim gang violence.

EU Enlargment commissioner Olli Rehn demands that Turkey amend its laws on curbing free expression, in particular Article 301 of its penal code. Recently, Turkish courts upheld a prison sentence against a Turkish editor, Hrant Dink. The Turkish citizen, Elif Shafak – author of Father and Bastard – also faces renewed charges of “insulting Turkishness” under the notorious Article 301 of the Turkish Criminal Code, despite the earlier dismissal of the case.