What are we to make of the fact that no one has taken credit for Wednesday’s (3/23) Central Bus Station bombing in Jerusalem? Wednesday’s bombing was not a stand-alone event. It was part and parcel of the new Palestinian terror war that is just coming into view. As Israel considers how to contend with the emerging onslaught, it is important to notice how it differs from its predecessors. For both Fatah and Hamas, the most important target audience is Europe.  Fatah, for example, is in the midst of a global campaign to build international support for a unilateral Palestinian declaration of independence in September. The fact that Fatah and Hamas have neither waited until after September to attack nor sought to differentiate themselves from one another as the attacks coalesce into a new terror campaign indicates strongly that the Palestinians no longer feel they need to pretend to oppose terror to maintain European support for their war against Israel.

Gaza Strip -- Newly installed in her Gaza City office, National Public Radio’s Vice News Chief (Oppression and Victimization Department) Consuela “Muffy” Leer-Geist looks right at home. Generously granting her first on-site interview to FSM, Ms. Leer-Geist wore a tasteful chador, set off with a stunning Sweetbriar-logo headscarf (black is always correct). Her half-veil, designed by bad-boy fashionista John Galliano, completed an outfit that can only be described as a cutting-edge fashion statement that also displays cultural empathy.

Picking at her chickpea salad (and careful to use only her right hand), NPR’s reigning regional news-doyenne put down the script over which she’d been chuckling and opened our conversation:

Islamist Bigots Lose One - And They're Outraged The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) is furious. For the first time since the birth of Mohammed, it isn’t getting its way in Washington. In the past, whenever our government raised the possibility of doing the least little thing of which CAIR might not wholeheartedly approve, the soft-core jihadis shrieked, “Bigotry!” And presidents, cabinet secretaries, senators, representatives and bureaucrats—even intelligence analysts and military officers--ran for cover (while, no doubt, suggesting that their spouses don head-scarves for a probationary period).

In the face of Islamist terrorism, we’ve been foolish. In the face of Islamist bullying of our government, we’ve been cowards.

Now, just this once, CAIR isn’t being allowed to dictate its sharia-flavored will to our nation’s capital.

A new Middle East is upon us and its primary beneficiary couldn't be happier. For generations, the stability of global oil supplies has been guaranteed by Saudi Arabia's reserve capacity that could be relied on to make up for any shocks to those supplies due to political unrest or other factors. When Libya's teetering dictator Muammar Ghaddafi decided to shut down Libya's oil exports last month, the oil markets reacted with a sharp increase in prices. The very next day the Saudis announced they would make up the shortfall from Libya's withdrawal from the export market.   In the old Middle East, the Saudi statement would never have been questioned. Oil suppliers and purchasers alike accepted the arrangement whereby Saudi Arabian reserves - defended by the US military -- served as the guarantor of the oil economy. But in the New Middle East, Iran feels comfortable questioning the Saudi role.   With each passing day, the Iranian regime is actively destabilizing Saudi Arabia's neighbors and increasing its influence over Saudi Arabia's Shiite minority in the kingdom's Eastern Province where most of its oil is located. The Obama administration has failed completely to understand what is happening.

It was a stunning moment of moral clarity. As the South Vietnamese refugees clambered onto rickety boats in the South China Sea to escape the victorious Communists, the American Left that orchestrated the US defeat through a sustained campaign of propaganda and fake calls for peace stood silent.

As Pol Pot, the "progressive" dictator tortured and murdered a third of his people in Cambodia, the leftists "peace" activists in the US and Europe who never saw a US military operation that was justified, turned a blind eye.

The silence of the likes of Susan Sontag, Jane Fonda, Noam Chomsky and their fellow travelers came to mind last week when the Western media and intellectual elites averted their gaze as Sheikh Yusuf Qaradawi, the long exiled spiritual guide of the Muslim Brotherhood spoke before a crowd of millions at Cairo's Tahrir Square.

To date the most egregious attack on a foreign journalist in Cairo's Tahrir Square took place last Friday, when CBS's senior foreign correspondent Lara Logan was sexually assaulted and brutally beaten by a mob of Egyptian men. Her own network, CBS, took several days to even report the story, and when it did, it left out important information. The fact that Logan was brutalized for 20 to 30 minutes and that her attackers screamed out "Jew, Jew, Jew" as they ravaged her was absent from the CBS report and from most other follow-on reports in the US media. This week, a group of female US soldiers filed a class action lawsuit against Secretary of Defense Robert Gates and his predecessor Donald Rumsfeld. The plaintiffs allege that both men and the US defense establishment are responsible for the sexual assaults they suffered during their military service. They claim that the men who abused them were a product of US military culture. The US media has provided blanket coverage of the story, which effectively places the entire US military on trial for rape. What is interesting about the lawsuit story is that it highlights the alleged perpetrator. Coverage of the lawsuit has been heavy on details about the alleged misogyny of US military culture. In stark contrast, coverage of Logan's sexual assault makes almost no mention of the perpetrators.

IDENTITY THEFT & THE OBAMA PRESIDENCY In one of the most bizarre political gambits in our history, President Obama and his dwindling band of cheerleaders—nervously eyeing the big game in 2012—have been trying to cast an over-inflated community organizer as the reincarnation of the Gipper. No matter how often Obama drops President Reagan’s name or how shamelessly his flaks attempt to link this shrinking, spineless president to the bold, visionary giant who turned a broken nation around, nobody’s buying this preposterous propaganda. Comparing Barack Obama to Ronald Reagan is like comparing Bernie Madoff to Warren Buffett: Hustling your clients isn’t heroism, and fraud’s not a formula for enduring success.

To all outward appearances, the just-concluded Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) was a huge success. It was attended by a large, boisterous crowd, a substantial part of which was student-age - a promising indicator of the movement’s appeal to the coming generation. A number of luminaries, including several prospective presidential candidates, addressed enthusiastic audiences clearly invigorated by November’s successes at the polls. CPAC’s apparent vigor, however, obscured the fact that the conservative movement is at a crossroads: Will it continue to be comprised of, and appeal to, all three elements of Ronald Reagan‘s winning coalition - fiscal discipline, traditional family and other social values, and a national security approach rooted in the philosophy of “peace through strength”? Or will it be reduced to a libertarian-dominated, small-government agenda that ignores or repudiates Reagan‘s conservative values and robust defense platform? Upon the answer rests not only the future of this vital movement, but of America.

Pakistan is a textbook example of a disaster of biblical proportions in the making. Its hyperactive nuclear expansion, weak central government, impoverished, radicalized population, and pro- Islamist military and intelligence arms are sources for major concern. That concern becomes all-out alarm in light of the Taliban/al-Qaida's control over anywhere from a quarter to a third of Pakistani territory and the widespread public support for them throughout the country. Since taking office, the Obama administration has failed to conceive of a strategy for contending with the situation. One of the main obstacles to the formation of a coherent US strategy is the Obama administration's move to outlaw any discussion of the basic threats to US interests. Shortly after entering office, President Barack Obama banned the use of the term "War against terror," substituting it with the opaque term "overseas contingency operation." Last April, Obama banned use of the terms "jihad," "Islamic terrorism" and "radical Islam" in US government documents. Given that US officials are barred from using all the terms that are relevant for describing reality in places like Pakistan, it is obvious why the US cannot put together a strategy for contending with the challenges it faces there. The Obama administration's decision to ban relevant language from the official US policy discourse was ideologically motivated. And in choosing ideology over reality, the Obama administration has induced a situation where rather than construct policies to deal with reality, at all levels, US officials have been charged with constructing policies to deny and ignore reality.

Challenges in court to the constitutionality of Obamacare have exposed the broader agenda of those who are committed to the permanent expansion of government power which that legislation represents. The specific legal issues are almost irrelevant because Obamacare is so clearly outside the scope of limited, constitutional government. This has made it necessary for the advocates of unrestrained government power to either attack the U.S. Constitution itself or the very concept of constitutional limits on the tyranny of the majority or of a ruthless minority elite. Some try to sidestep the attack on the Constitution by substituting a war on English. They claim to support the Constitution but deny that words have any objective meaning.

As the threats against Israel mount from all directions, the job of the IDF Chief of General Staff is becoming more challenging by the day.

First on the list of threats is Iran. While it is apparently true that the Stuxnet computer virus continues to wreak havoc on Iran's nuclear program, it is also true that Iran remains dedicated to moving forward, despite all obstacles.

Then there is Egypt. Iran's dictator-in-chief Ali Khamenei has spent the two weeks since the anti-regime protests began in Egypt bragging that the unrest shows Iran's star is rising. The "Islamic awakening" hearkened by the 1979 Iranian revolution is unfolding before our eyes, he says.

POLITICAL DEVELOPMENTS in Egypt, as well as the sabotage of the natural gas pipeline from Egypt to Israel at el-Arish, show that the southern front is active again after 30 years. The IDF needs to prepare for the possibility of a conventional war in the south and the north. It will have to relearn how to fight a war in the desert. New weapons systems will have to be developed and procured. Troops will have to receive expanded training.

In short, the ways the IDF thinks about war, plans for war, arms for war, trains for war and wages war are all going to have to change.

In light of these awesome challenges, the IDF's next chief of general staff will have to have the attitude of a revolutionary as he guides the IDF through massive change, and commands it in complex and perhaps existential battles.

Unfortunately, chances that such a commander will arise received a blow last week when Attorney General Yehuda Weinstein decided to force the government to cancel its decision to appoint Maj. Gen. Yoav Galant to replace outgoing Chief of Gen. Staff Lt. Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi next Tuesday.

South Africa is a country of paradoxes. On the one hand, it is exhilarating to see the blacks now in charge after their long struggle. On the other, the ruling African National Congress' record of governance is at best a mixed bag.

This has been a great year for South Africa. Throngs of tourists visited during the World Cup soccer championship, and the international press coverage was fantastic. Unfortunately, the relative safety enjoyed by World Cup tourists was a striking deviation from the norm. The ANC has failed to provide personal security for South Africans. According to the UN, South Africa has the second highest per capita murder rate in the world. South African sources place the annual murder rate at 23,000.

South Africa is the rape capital of the world. In a 1998-2000 UN survey, one in three women said they had been raped in the past year. One in four men admitted that he was a rapist. Nearly 20 percent of South Africans are infected with the HIV virus.

On top of this, the ANC regime is one of the most anti-Israel governments in the world today. Although the physical beauty of South Africa is arresting, and the material standard of living that South African Jews enjoy is impressive, it is clear that Jewish life in South Africa will only get worse.

Today, practically, the only individuals willing to speak honestly about who Islamic supremacists are and what they want are the Islamic supremacists themselves.

For instance, in an interview last week with Reuters, the Islamic supremacist Hamas movement's "foreign minister" Mahmoud al- Zahar told the Christian West, "You do not live like human beings. You do not [even] live like animals. You accept homosexuality. And now you criticize us?"

Al-Zahar also made the case for Islamic feminism. As he put it, "We are the ones who respect women and honor women ... not you. You use women as an animal. She has one husband and hundreds of thousands of boyfriends. You don't know who is the father of your sons, because of the way you respect women."

Last year, in an attempt to block Obama's plan to nationalize healthcare, Massachusetts voters elected Republican Scott Brown to the Senate. Brown was elected because he pledged to block Obamacare in the US Senate.

Rather than heed the voters' message and abandon his plans, Obama abandoned the voters. Instead of accepting his defeat, Obama changed the rules of the game and bypassed the Senate.

So it is safe to assume that for the next two years, Obama will do everything he can to bypass the Congress and govern by executive orders and regulations. Although much can be done in this fashion, Congress's control of the purse strings will check his domestic agenda.

In matters of foreign policy however, Obama will be less burdened by - but not immune - to Congressional oversight. We can therefore expect him to devote far more energy to foreign affairs in the next two years than he devoted in the last two years.

This bodes ill for Israel.

Olmert's and Livni's assaults on Netanyahu made clear that like most of their colleagues on the Left, they believe that relations between countries and relations between governments are the same thing.  Leaders of the Israeli left believe the major determinant in the quality of the U.S.-Israeli relationship is the view of the U.S. president.

Luckily for Israel, Livni, Olmert and the Left they represent have no idea what they are talking about. As a poll released last week makes clear, Americans are far more likely to ditch leaders they believe are harming the US-Israel alliance than they are to ditch the alliance.

The Veterans of Foreign Wars Political Action Committee has endorsed "Senator Ma'am for re-election.  Scott Swett finds this odd.  So do the leaders of the VFW, who have asked the VFW PAC to rescind that and other endorsements of anti-military Democrats, and who are contemplating abolition of the PAC, which is run separately from the VFW.

By Iranian and Hizbullah accounts, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's visit to Lebanon this week will be a splendid affair. The man who stole his office and then killed his countrymen to protect his crime will be greeted as a conquering hero. Billboards bidding him welcome and Iranian flags will line the roads from the Beirut airport down to the border with Israel.

AHMADINEJAD'S VISIT must be seen within the regional context that it is taking place. Specifically, it must be seen against the backdrop of Lebanese politics. It must also be seen in the context of waning US power and influence in the region. Finally it should be evaluated in terms of Iranian domestic affairs and Ahmadinejad's ongoing struggle with his people who reject his leadership. While Iran's ill-intentions towards Israel remain static, all of the other developments in the region are dynamic.

One aspect of Ahmadinejad's visit is abundantly clear. It is the diplomatic equivalent of a victory lap. Iran's ruler is using his trip as an opportunity to flaunt his position as the colonial overlord of Lebanon.

That means that Iran now believes it is in its interest to expose that Lebanon today is nothing more than an Iranian colony.

There's a new cyber-weapon on the block. And it's a doozy. Stuxnet, a malicious software, or malware, program was apparently first discovered in June.

Although it has appeared in India, Pakistan and Indonesia, Iran's industrial complexes - including its nuclear installations - are its main victims.

No other malware program has ever managed to move from cyberspace to the real world. And this is what makes Stuxnet so revolutionary. It is not a tool of industrial espionage. It is a weapon of war.