Allah's Willing Executioners

The Bishops’ Conference of Scotland (BCOS) published a message on Tuesday reflecting on and expressing their concerns over the country’s radical abortion buffer zone laws that have resulted in the arrest of pro-life activists silently praying near abortuaries.

In the January 6 statement, the bishops lamented that Scotland’s draconian “buffer zone” laws have punished pro-lifers for peacefully praying or holding signs outside abortion centers, and could punish citizens praying within their own homes. In 2024, the Scottish legislature passed a law barring the harassment, intimidation, and “influencing” of anyone seeking to kill their babies within 200-meter-wide “exclusion zones” or “buffer zones” surrounding all the country’s abortuaries.

“It is therefore unsettling that this season saw the first person in Scotland charged under the new so-called ‘buffer zone’ law in Scotland; a law the Church believes curtails Scotland’s commitment to freedom of expression and conscience, and restricts critical voices from democratic debate in the public square,” the bishops wrote.

Here, the BCOS appears to be referring to the case of Rose Docherty, a 75-year-old pro-life grandmother who was arrested for silently holding a sign that read “Coercion is a crime, here to talk, only if you want,” within the “buffer zone” of Queen Elizabeth University Hospital’s abortuary last fall. Docherty was held in custody for several hours, during which she was refused a chair to sit on in her cell despite making it known that she had a double hip replacement.

“I can’t believe I am here today. I simply stood, in love and compassion, offering consensual conversation to anyone who wanted to engage,” Docherty said after a court hearing just days before Christmas.

“Nobody should be criminalized just for offering a chat,” she declared. “Conversation is not a crime on the streets of Glasgow.”

The bishops noted that while the Church does not condone the harassment or intimidation of those planning to abort their unborn child, this “undemocratic” law was really meant to deny Scottish pro-lifers their basic freedoms.

“When parliaments introduce criminal offences where existing law is already sufficient, questions should be raised and alarm bells ring,” they said. “We oppose this law because it is disproportionate and undemocratic. It represents state overreach and curtails basic freedoms. The Church would similarly oppose legislation mandating buffer zones outside nuclear weapons facilities or refugee detention centres. This should concern every Scottish citizen, regardless of their views on abortion.”

“As the Parliamentary Officer for the Catholic Church in Scotland pointed out, women experiencing crisis pregnancies may be ‘denied the opportunity to freely speak to people and organisations who may be able to help them,’” they added. “A law supposedly designed to protect choice risks doing the opposite — eliminating one side of a conversation and one set of choices altogether.”

The bishops further stressed their concern that the law extends to private homes within the “buffer zones.”

“The Act extends to private homes within designated zones. A pro-life poster displayed in a window, a conversation overheard, a prayer said by a window; all could, in principle, fall within the scope of criminal sanction,” they said.

“That sends a chill down the spine of anyone who cares about civil liberties,” they added. “Criminal law that depends on the perception of a passer-by is certainly not the hallmark of a free Scottish society.”

The BCOS concluded its message by emphasizing that a society confident in its values does not criminalize opposing voices.

“It does not criminalise silent prayer,” they wrote. “It does not ask its police or judges to peer into the minds of its citizens. Scotland’s buffer zones law represents a profound shift in the relationship between the State and the individual — one that restricts free speech, free expression and freedom of religion in ways that should concern us all.”

“As we look to the child in the manger this Christmas and Epiphany, we are reminded that babies do not have a voice of their own,” they added. “It is a shame that the State has now also curtailed the voices of ordinary citizens who advocate for them within its borders.”

Scotland’s “buffer zone” law has been heavily criticized by pro-life activists and conservative politicians across the globe. Perhaps most notably, U.S. Vice President J.D. Vance blasted the law’s ban on private prayer in the homes of citizens living in these zones during his speech at the Munich Security Conference last year.

“(J)ust a few months ago, the Scottish government began distributing letters to citizens whose houses lay within so-called ‘safe access’ zones, warning them that even private prayer within their own homes may amount to breaking the law,” the VP said. “Naturally, the government urged readers to report any fellow citizens suspected guilty of thoughtcrime in Britain and across Europe.”

To read the bishops’ full statement, click HERE.

lifesitenews

The nationwide protests across Iran continue without letup, and the Supreme Leader may feel even more uneasy today, having seen with what ease the hated Americans removed Nicolás Maduro from his Caracas office to a New York jail, which came just after Donald Trump warned the embattled regime in Tehran not to kill protesters. Otherwise, Trump said, he was prepared to attack Iran yet again.

More on the Supreme Leader’s plans to escape to Russia if the protests cannot be suppressed can be found here: “Iran’s Khamenei has escape plan to flee to Moscow if regime falls amid protests – report,” by Tobias Holcman, Jerusalem Post, January 5, 2026:

The supreme leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, reportedly has an “escape plan” that involves fleeing to Russia if the current nationwide protests continue to intensify, British newspaper The Times reported on Sunday.

The plan, called “Plan B” by the British report, would include 86-year-old Khamenei and 20 close people, including family and aides.

It will also involve a way of taking his vast asset network, which, according to a 2013 Reuters investigation cited by The Times, is valued at about $95 billion, and includes the Setad organization, one of the most powerful organizations in Iran, and the Ayatollah’s system of semi-state charitable foundations known for their financial obfuscation.

If Khamenei absconds to Moscow with tens of billions of dollars that he and his closest cronies have taken from the Iranian treasury, a new regime in Iran should be able to demand that the Russians locate the funds — Russian President Vladimir Putin will have ways to extract such information from his new guest, the no-longer Supreme Leader — and hand them over to the new Iranian government. Or Putin may do nothing, and let Khamenei, like Bashar Assad, keep whatever loot he manages to transfer to Russia.

“The ‘plan B’ is for Khamenei and his very close circle of associates and family, including his son and nominated heir apparent, Mojtaba,” The Times said, citing intelligence sources.

The report also mentioned that, according to former Israeli intelligence official Beni Sabti, Khamenei would leave for Russia as “there is no other place for him.”

Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei meets with the families of Iranians who died during the 12-Day War between Israel and Iran, January 3, 2026. (credit: KHAMENEI.IR)

Khamenei had previously assured that he “admires Putin, while the Iranian culture is more similar to the Russian culture,” the report noted.

How is Iranian culture similar to Russian culture? A penchant for supreme leaders, a population used to submitting to dictators, the mind-forged manacles of an ideology — Islam in Iran, Communism in Russia — that has led to much misery.

So pack your bags, Supreme Leader, just in case, as those protests across Iran show no signs of stopping. Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian is trying to calm things down by telling the security forces to use brute force sparingly, but it’s a little late for that; police batons have split open too many protesters’ heads for things to calm down. Alert your family and closest cronies to transfer as much of their money as they can right now to Sberbank — its headquarters are located at 19 Vavilova Street, Moscow, 117997. Bank officials are standing by. As Fats Waller said so memorably, one never knows, do one?

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Video footage has emerged showing the moment a biological male pretending to be a female was caught performing a vile sexual act while inside the female’s bathroom.

As The New York Post reported, California resident and gymgoer Grace Hutson posted a TikTok video which has since gone viral, claiming that while she was inside the women’s Planet Fitness bathroom, she witnessed a trans person pleasuring himself in a stall.

The incident reportedly occurred at the gym’s Concord location, just outside San Francisco.

Hutson’s video, which was posted in May 2025, shows a clear shadow of the man grabbing and stroking his p*nis for several seconds.

Hutson looks absolutely horrified as she watches on.

WATCH:

@borderlinebimbo_ #stitch with @gracie 𖣂 ♬ original sound – gracie 𖣂

Later on, Hutson and her boyfriend confront the man, who makes excuses for his behavior.

“What the f**k is wrong with you, bro?” Hutson’s boyfriend says to the trans person.

“I’m allowed to be in here, I’m a transgender,” the man responds.

As The Post notes, Hutson informed the gym’s front desk about the incident, but the employees had no clue how to handle it.

On Sunday, Hutson posted a follow-up video regarding the incident.

“At the end of the day, whether you’re transgender or not, you should not be stroking your sh*t in the women’s bathroom,” Hutson said.

She also expressed regret for not contacting authorities at the time.

“I was just really uncomfortable and, honestly, I kind of just wanted to say my piece and get the f**k out of there,” she said. “Looking back, I do have regrets, like I should have done more. I should have called the cops.”

News of this incident comes two months after recording artist Tish Hyman was kicked out of a Gold’s Gym after confronting a biological male who entered the women’s locker room while she was naked.

Hyman, who identifies as a lesbian and outspoken advocate for women’s spaces, detailed the horrifying encounter on Facebook, where she described being naked and vulnerable when she turned around to find a man, dressed in “boy clothes” and lip gloss, staring at her.

This person told me HE was a woman and demanded that I leave the women’s locker room.

He said, “Straight women like dick, and they’re probably looking at me more than you 👀😭.”#GoldsGym staff said their hands were tied by law — they couldn’t make him leave. pic.twitter.com/wJV6mnhcCL

— Tish Hyman (@listen2tish) October 28, 2025

According to Hyman, Gold’s Gym terminated her membership after the confrontation, even though police escorted the man out.

“[Golds Gym] terminated my membership after the man was escorted out by police, then had me escorted out by officers afterwards. It was embarrassing! I left, but not before making sure everyone knew that they were allowing men in the locker room,” she wrote.

thegatewaypundit

NCF Senior Fellow Rafe Heydel-Mankoo explains what happened in Venezuela and lays out the arguments put forth by all sides in this debate.

Germany’s right-wing AfD opposition has continued to extend its lead in opinion polls in the new year.

In the latest survey by pollster GMS, conducted between December 23 and January 5, the Alternative for Germany party (AfD) has put a record distance between itself and the ruling CDU/CSU of Federal Chancellor Friedrich Merz.

While the AfD came in first place with 27 per cent of the hypothetical vote, only 24 per cent of respondents would cast their ballot for Merz’s Union parties, a difference of three percentage points.

Never before has a nationwide German poll put the AfD so far ahead of the governing Conservatives. Its support of 27 per cent also represents a new high water mark for Alice Weidel’s party.

For the survey, 1,027 Germans were questioned online and via telephone between December 23 and January 5.

No other party came close to the AfD and CDU. The Social Democrats (SPD) coming in third at 15 per cent, the Green Party reached 12 per cent, and the hard-left Die Linke party came in at 10 per cent.

Only a year ago, the same long-running poll placed Merz’ party at 33 per cent while only 18 per cent of respondents favoured the AfD.

In the twelve months since, the CDU has lost 9 percentage points while the AfD is up by a corresponding amount.

The GMS poll was the first nationwide survey to be published in 2026. Another poll by INSA placed AfD and CDU almost equally at 25.5 per cent versus 25 per cent.

The AfD are also polling well in many of the five German States (out of 16 total) who are holding State parliament elections in 2026.

On March 8, the southwestern state of Baden-Wurttemberg is going to kick off election season.

The latest poll by pollster Infratest dimap shows CDU coming in first place there with 29 per cent, followed by AfD with 21 per cent and the Green Party with 20 per cent.

The Greens are down massively from the last State parliament election in 2021, which they won with 33 per cent of the vote.

The CDU then achieved 24 per cent and AfD barely won 10 per cent of the vote.

The Conservatives are also set to come in first in State parliament elections in North Rhine-Westphalia on March 22 where they can currently expect 29 per cent of the vote, followed by SPD with 23 per cent and AfD with 19 per cent.

The SPD-led State government of NRW has recently made headlines with exceptionally harsh and – according to critics – borderline undemocratic measures against AfD members.

These have included attempts to exclude them from public service or banning them from standing for public office.

Finally, in September 2026, there will be elections in the eastern German States of Saxony-Anhalt and Mecklenburg-Vorpommern.

In both states, the AfD is currently polling around the 40 per cent mark – which might finally make it impossible for the other parties to keep the AfD out of state governments.

The German capital of Berlin is also holding city council elections in September 2026.

The latest polls put the Union parties at 22 per cent there. They are narrowly ahead of Die Linke, the successor of the former Eastern German Communist unity party SED, polling at 19 per cent.

brusselssignal

A report from Samnytt provides an unprecedented look inside Sweden’s Migration Agency, highlighting challenges related to staff composition, workplace culture, and internal practices. Sources who have worked at the agency for decades describe a complex environment shaped by linguistic groups, clan affiliations, and internal loyalties.

Currently, a majority of the agency’s approximately 6,000 employees come from non-Swedish backgrounds. Many do not hold Swedish citizenship, and staff often speak their own language within their group. According to a source, “What affects things most is that everyone speaks their own language, so you don’t understand what is being said between groups and colleagues.” This dynamic, combined with longstanding clan networks, has reportedly introduced a Middle Eastern clan mentality into daily operations.

The source described how group loyalties influence decisions on residence permits, work permits, and other administrative matters, sometimes benefiting relatives or clan members. This behavior became so normalized that it happens openly, without any fear of internal consequences. Additionally, chants and songs such as “from the river to the sea” have been heard in the agency’s break room, reflecting political or cultural affiliations among some staff.

The Migration Agency oversees key decisions on asylum, citizenship, and residence in Sweden. During the refugee crisis of 2015, structural weaknesses emerged, which continue to affect management, oversight, and legal certainty today.

Sweden’s challenges have attracted international attention. Canada recently placed the country in the same travel advisory category as Turkey and Morocco, citing rising gang violence and terrorism risks. Authorities warned travelers to remain alert in residential areas, shopping centers, and public spaces, linking the developments to crime increases associated with migration pressures.

europeanconservative

Far-left parliamentarian and candidate for Mayor of Paris, Sophia Chikirou, will stand trial later this year over allegations that she committed fraud against a media company in 2018.

Chikirou, 46, who has represented the 6th constituency of Paris in the National Assembly since 2022 for the far-left La France Insoumise (France in Rebellion/LFI) party of Jean-Luc Mélenchon, will stand trial before the 13th Criminal Chamber of the Paris Judicial Court in May, according to the Agence France-Presse news agency.

She is reportedly accused of having in 2018 “attempted on several occasions to defraud the Crédit du Nord bank” to the detriment of the Le Média production company, which she co-founded, in order to obtain over 67,000 euros ($78,000) fraudulently.

According to a judicial source cited by the AFP, Chikirou is said to have presented herself as the president of the company when she “no longer held that position” to obtain the funds. She is also accused of having “fraudulently removed two check books”.

The accusations come on top of a separate fraud case involving Chikirou, who was indicted last year over alleged “aggravated fraud” in relation to the 2017 presidential campaign of Jean-Luc Mélenchon, for which she served as communications director. She has denied the charges.

The Algerian-heritage LFI MP claimed Sunday that the two parties involved in the latest case against her have already reached an agreement and thus accused the Paris prosecutor’s office in attempting to “smear and hinder” her mayoral campaign to replace outgoing Socialist Anne Hidalgo.

Chikirou has long courted controversy during her time at the heart of the far-left party, including for allegedly being romantically involved with party leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon, who is nearly thirty years her senior.

Last year, she was a main subject of the exposé book The pack: Investigation into Jean-Luc Mélenchon’s La France Insoumise, authored by journalists Charlotte Belaïch of the Libération newspaper and Olivier Pérou of Le Monde.

The book, which detailed the cultish and cutthroat inner workings of the radical LFI party, claimed that Chikirou’s position is central to the clannish ecosystem, allegedly using her position as Mélenchon’s lover to enact purges of her perceived rivals within the party.

She was also accused of going on frequent tirades and of engaging in antisemitism. Chikirou is quoted in the book as denouncing two former Mélenchonist activists as a “couple of little Jews who are going to take my money”.

Chikirou has likened her campaign in Paris to that of fellow radical leftist Zohran Mamdani in New York City, saying in November that if elected, she would implement his policies of “tackling the rich, speculation, making public transportation free, supporting Palestine, and giving a voice to workers against gentrification.”

The far-left MP is currently a long shot in the race, however, with a recent poll putting her candidacy at 12 per cent, trailing behind Green Party candidate David Belliard at 13, Macronist candidate Pierre-Yves Bournazel at 14 per cent, Socialist Emmanuel Grégoire at 20 per cent, and centre-right Les Républicains candidate Rachida Dati at 26 per cent.

breitbart

Freeland goes to Kiev.

Canada’s former deputy prime minister Chrystia Freeland announced that she will leave parliament and will accept a job as adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

Freeland is the granddaughter of Mykhailo Chomiak, a willing collaborator with Nazi Germany during World War II.

Chomiak was the editor of a Ukrainian-language newspaper in Nazi-occupied Krakow, Poland, in which he promoted Nazi propaganda, celebrated Adolf Hitler and justified the Holocaust in Ukraine.

Freeland’s grandfather also recruited for the Waffen-SS’s 14th Galicia Division, the Ukrainian unit under Nazi command known for atrocities and war crimes against Jews, Poles, and others.

So, it was never surprising how Freeland pushed weak PM Justin Trudeau into spending endless amounts of Canadian taxpayer’s cash to prop-up present-day Nazis in Ukraine.

Now, she will work for her real cause.

BBC reported:

“Freeland said her role as an economic development adviser for Ukraine would be unpaid. In July, she will also take on a position to lead the Rhodes Trust, an educational charity, in the UK.”

“Freeland posted on X on Monday: ‘Ukraine is at the forefront of today’s global fight for democracy, and I welcome this chance to contribute on an unpaid basis as an economic adviser to [Zelensky]. In the coming weeks I will also leave my seat in Parliament. I want to thank my constituents for their years of confidence in me. I am so grateful to have been your representative’.”

Yes, you read it right: she will work for the corrupt country with a president with an expired mandate because they are ‘the forefront of today’s global fight for democracy’.

You can’t make this crap up.

Chrystia Freeland just got named the economic adviser for Ukraine by President Zelenskyy.

This is the same Chrystia Freeland who wrecked Canada’s finances so badly she quit before delivering her own budget triggering Trudeau’s resignation.

You can’t make this up. pic.twitter.com/HA9S5M8e3C

— Marc Nixon (@MarcNixon24) January 5, 2026

Chrystia FREELAND met George SOROS in 1990, the same year he set up his foundation in UKRAINE 🇺🇦

2026, and Freeland is now a member of Canadian Parliament, Advisor to Zelensky in UKRAINE, and CEO of Rhodes in UK

This has been in the works with SOROS since 1990 pic.twitter.com/vv1CBcwO8S

— Melissa 🇨🇦 (@MelissaLMRogers) January 5, 2026

Chrystia Freeland says that from her perspective, the recent corruption revelations in Ukraine "speaks of a healthy society determined to become healthier."

Spoken from a true Liberal perspective, I suppose. pic.twitter.com/v3LBmQhQ8b

— Bret 🍁 (@Bret_Sears) December 3, 2025

thegatewaypundit

Churches turned into mosques are the proof of the Western takeover by Islam. No clangor, no titanic clash. Just doors that close for one community and open for another.

When a year ago I walked out of the former basilica of Hagia Sophia in Istanbul, reconverted into a mosque by Erdogan, I said to one of my children-old enough to begin understanding the world we live in and the one that awaits him: “You’ll see, they will do the same in the West”.

When sanctuaries change hands, civilizations speak. The transformation is architectural, but the message is cultural: a testimony to what one society has abandoned and what another is willing to claim, sealing the decline of a civilization that illuminated the world for centuries.

Tulsi Gabbard, Director of Intelligence in the Trump administration, is right: “Their goal is not only the Islamization of Australia, but of the entire world, including the United States. It is probably too late for Europe, and perhaps also for Australia. It is not too late for the United States of America. But soon it will be.”

In Italy until now there were two churches transformed into mosques. Both in the heart of Arab-Norman Sicily.

First the church of San Paolino dei Giardinieri in Palermo, where in place of the Creed the Shahada is now recited. Then a mosque in a church in Agrigento.

The Court of Appeal has now ruled in favor of the Association of Muslims of Bergamo. And the former church of the Ospedali Riuniti can become a mosque.

The case dates back to late 2018, when the church was put up for sale by the Giovanni XXIII hospital authority. Following a public tender, the property was awarded to the Muslim Association. The regional president, Attilio Fontana, declared that the building, as a symbol of Christianity, would be safeguarded. The Region decided to exercise its right of first refusal, acquiring the church. And the legal battle began.

In Livorno too, there is talk of transforming a historic evangelical church in the city center into a mosque. It is the “Temple of the Dutch,” one of the testimonies of the city’s cosmopolitan character.

Soon, that temple which told the story of Protestant merchants from Northern Europe will become a mosque, with the minaret in place of the cross, veiled women, and the altar transformed into a mihrab facing Mecca.

Not to mention the Florentine mosque built on land belonging to the Catholic diocese.

And a church for sale in Veneto: the parish priest promises it will never become a mosque. But it sounds very much like a promise written on water.

I went to Edinburgh, the Scottish city whose breathtaking architecture leaves you speechless, but where you can no longer find a church that is not a restaurant or a mosque.

I had read a report in The National titled “Empty Churches, Full Mosques”: “Churches in Scotland are being converted into mosques as Christian congregations decline and Muslims seek places of worship.”

So I started looking for them. In a church on the Royal Mile, a Christmas market is held.

Others have become souvenir shops.

The most striking is the old church now Al Arqam Mosque. My hotel was next door.

It stands beside the university with its neat green lawns and next to a convent of nuns, also long closed.

Less than a kilometer away is the Frankenstein pub in place of an old church, like Bertie’s, where they serve the best fish and chips in the city.

In England, a church has just been purchased for £3.5 million to be turned into a mosque. St Thomas’ Church will reopen as Masjid Al-Ummah in 2026.

In Stoke-on-Trent, the BBC reports, a Catholic church becomes a mosque. In Bradford, it is a Protestant church. The same in Blackburn. Then in Birmingham. Then in Liverpool.

In one generation it will all be over. “Church or mosque?” asks The Telegraph. We know the answer.

Another church becomes a mosque in Canada. After remaining empty for three years, St. Margaret’s Catholic Church in Ottawa reopens as a mosque, CBC reveals. In Chatham, Ontario, another church converted into a mosque. In Toronto, a 148-year-old Catholic church is now a mosque. In Winnipeg, another church converted into a mosque. In Windsor, a 1915 church becomes a mosque.

Hundreds of Catholic and Protestant churches in America are becoming mosques.

We are in a historical trend. And obviously completely unconscious of it.

In Drammen, 66,000 inhabitants and eighteen mosques in Norway, the Landfalløya church is a mosque. In Norway, Aftenposten reports, the Islamic Cultural Center received one million kroner from the government to purchase two churches in Skien and Stavanger and turn them into mosques.

Dozens of English churches pass to Islam: in Keston, the Hyatt United Church, St Peter’s Church, the Brick Lane Mosque, in Clitheroe, in Manchester, in Leeds, in Fulmer… Catholic and Protestant churches.

A church in Hagen, Germany, has also become a mosque. The cross on the external façade has been painted white. Similar scenes from Hamburg to Berlin. At Flughafenstrasse 43 in the capital, only the organ pipes recall that Christian services were once held there. Where there were pews, there is a red carpet. In place of the altar, the imam’s staircase.

The phenomenon of churches being converted into mosques-now out of control and reaching even sleepy little Italy-presents itself as an epochal sign. Not so much for what it announces, but for what it reveals: a silent, slow transformation determined by the succession of generations, cultural evolution, religious pluralism, and the identity crises of the West itself.

The empty pews, one after another, made way not for a sudden assault, but for the simple passage of time.

For those who observe this transformation with unease (I am in favor of a law preventing the conversion of churches into mosques), the feeling is that of witnessing the conclusion of a long sunset. Islamic tiles on walls once decorated by time-worn frescoes become the sign of a Europe that no longer recognizes itself; of cities that change face more rapidly than their inhabitants can accept.

It is an ancient weariness, that of the West, which does not stem from encountering the other, but from the exhaustion of its own spiritual energies and from the void left by the loss of a shared cultural center.

No clangor, no titanic clash. Just doors that close for one community and open for another.

On social media an extraordinary English woman-cultured, calm, and courageous-says everything that needs to be said, starting from a paraphrased quote by T.S. Eliot, who wrote “This is the way the world ends, not with a cry but a whimper”:

“We must understand with Eliot. This is the beginning of the end. I lived 12 years in Iran and I know Islam. Persians are not Islamic. They have religion there, but they do not have the mentality of Arab nations and Pakistan, this type of Islamist. And what is happening here now is a conquest. If you see a young British girl in a T-shirt, this was normal for us. Today they look at us and consider us something to be gotten rid of, removed. Their mentality is evil. And they are demolishing churches. The situation will not improve. Neither in your country nor anywhere else in the world. This is the beginning of the end.”

There is a square in Oslo where stands announce that “Jesus is Muslim.” When will we understand?

The multicultural mass is over. The West goes in peace.

israelnationalnews

Berlin’s handling of the prolonged power outage in the southwest of the city has sparked an angry public debate over priorities, after residents were initially asked to pay €70 per night for hotel accommodation while nearby migrant centers were evacuated and rehoused at public expense.

The blackout, now in its third day, has left around 26,900 households and 1,220 businesses without electricity, heating, or hot water following an arson attack on a cable bridge for which the far-left Volcano Group claimed responsibility.

Entire neighborhoods in Steglitz-Zehlendorf and Zehlendorf remain affected.

As reported by Welt, under the Senate’s initial response, residents unable to use their homes were offered hotel rooms at a reduced rate under a campaign branded “Berlin Hotels for Berliners,” launched with VisitBerlin and around 200 partner hotels. The state waived the city tax, but affected residents were expected to cover the remaining cost themselves.

The offer triggered an immediate backlash. On social media, users questioned how pensioners, families with children, or people on welfare were supposed to afford several nights in a hotel. “Not every resident of Steglitz-Zehlendorf will be able to just pull seventy euros a night out of their pocket,” one user wrote, cited by the German newspaper, while others described the scheme as “a bad joke” and “fake solidarity.”

Flüchtlinge in Berlin wurden evakuiert, während krebskranke und alte Anwohner in der Kälte verbleiben. Das ist Deutschland unter einer CDU und SPD Regierung. https://t.co/yzVJbEygmk pic.twitter.com/GEWaYmBkF0

— spaceloop23 🗽 (@spaceloop23) January 5, 2026

Anger intensified as stories emerged from the blackout zone. Nius reported speaking to a cancer patient who said he was sleeping in the hallway of his apartment building because it was the warmest place available.

“I sleep in the hallway tonight, because the hallway is the warmest part of our house. Unfortunately, in my flat I am hit from every side by the cold,” he told the interviewer.

At the same time, residents reported that a nearby refugee center had been evacuated at the start of the crisis. “The refugees there have now been relocated,” one neighbor said. “They are no longer here, they are in the heat,” another added.

There is no evidence of a formal policy giving migrants preferential treatment during the outage, but decisions to evacuate refugee centers while asking Berliners to cough up the majority of a hotel bill to be relocated themselves have raised questions about priorities.

According to figures confirmed to the German Press Agency in December last year, the city paid €883 million in 2024 to house refugees, up from €312 million in 2020. Large facilities such as Tegel and Tempelhof account for particularly high costs, with Tegel alone costing around €260 million last year.

Kurze Erinnerung, wofür in Berlin genügend Geld da ist. Die Kosten für die Unterbringung von Asylbewerbern sind in den vergangenen Jahren explodiert. pic.twitter.com/Zb9LtREz7b

— Björn Harms (@Spreeathen1) January 5, 2026

City officials are now under pressure to justify the ever-rising cost to the German taxpayer to house migrants, when those funds could have been saved and used as a contingency fund for a crisis such as the one now enveloping southwest Berlin.

Berlin’s Senator for Economic Affairs and Energy, Franziska Giffey, defended the hotel initiative as an act of solidarity. “People from 35,000 households in the southwest of our city are in need, and with this special offer, the hotels are offering their rooms at cost price,” she said, praising the waiver of the overnight accommodation tax and thanking hotels for what she called a “fantastic initiative.”

Imagine the media response if a far-right terrorist group sabotaged the power grid in a wealthy area of Berlin and left 45,000 homes without power and heating in deep winter.

A leftist terrorist organisation did exactly that and it has barely been covered outside Germany. pic.twitter.com/ntbRoaYRFn

— Keith Woods (@KeithWoodsYT) January 6, 2026

However, after days of pressure, the Senate reversed course. The Steglitz-Zehlendorf district office announced on Tuesday that hotel costs for affected residents will now be reimbursed in full. Residents who cannot use their apartments due to power, heating, or hot water outages can stay in hotels and reclaim the costs by submitting the hotel bill, proof of hardship, and proof of identity to the social services office. Emergency shelters remain available.

Tim Richter, deputy mayor of the Wannsee district and CDU chairman in Steglitz-Zehlendorf, welcomed the change. “I advocated for a swift solution for the residents of Steglitz-Zehlendorf, and I am very grateful to the Senate that we can now provide pragmatic and rapid assistance,” he said.

Some, however, will say that city officials have already revealed their true colors when it comes to their priorities, and vulnerable Berliners appear to be at the back of the line.

The outage is the latest in a series of attacks claimed by the far-left “Volcano Group,” which has repeatedly targeted power and data infrastructure in Berlin and Brandenburg. In September 2025, the group knocked out electricity to around 50,000 households in southeast Berlin, and in 2024, it caused a blackout near the Tesla factory in Grünheide.

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