Saudi Arabia has been quietly preparing for another round of Al Qaida attacks against Westerners. Saudi security sources said Al Qaida has demonstrated signs of renewing its effort to abduct and kill Americans, Britons and other Westerners in the kingdom. They said authorities have already received reports of gangs of suspected Al Qaida operatives or supporters surveying Saudi companies for Westerners. On July 7, three Saudis held a guard at gunpoint at the Al Zamil Group's construction facility in Dammam and demanded that he take them to Western employees. The gunmen drove off after the guard convinced them that there were no Westerners on the premises. Later, a German national who served as a consultant to Al Zamil fled Saudi Arabia. The incident was the first reported since the death of Al Qaida network chief Abdul Aziz Al Muqrin. Al Muqrin was killed in a shootout in Riyad hours after his group executed a U.S. engineer, Paul Johnson, an employee of Lockheed Martin. Al Qaida's new chief in Saudi Arabia was identified as Saleh Awfi, 33, a former Saudi security officer who fought U.S.-led coalition forces in Iraq.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
07/13/2004 9:23:43 PM ||
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#1
well, at least their spin machine is ready....if I was a western ex-pat, I'd keep large kitchen cutlery and an escape route handy at all times. When will we put a royal in the sniper's scope for every American killed?
Posted by: Frank G ||
07/13/2004 21:32 Comments ||
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#2
I'm sure that this guy has helped immensely by moderating his sermons and calling for peace - among Muslims, anyway. Inspires confidence, doncha think?
#3
not as much as a Barrett .50 center-ring-on-a-bad-royal response for every gringo sacrified
Posted by: Frank G ||
07/13/2004 21:50 Comments ||
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.com---Mr. Confidence Imam there in the pic has a bad bicuspid on the top starboard side.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
07/13/2004 21:54 Comments ||
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#5
Lol - you're hardcore, Frank! Of course, others say if we were only more sensitive, then we would be forgiven for our stupidity and could have a world-wide group hug.
#6
AP - That's not the only flaw you can point to, I'd bet! Amazing. This is the touchstone, the source that all the Wahhabis look to for marching orders. Boggles.
#7
not if the fight is taken to them...boggling would wear a table cloth and a couple fan belts, then, I bet
Posted by: Frank G ||
07/13/2004 22:07 Comments ||
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Frank,
You are not too far from the truth. By biggest and sharpest kitchen knives are strategically distributed/hidden around the house. We always have a spray bottle filled with jalapeno juice or clorox at hand, too. My son's baseball bat is next to our bed and every window in that house is obstructed with something meant to make noise or trip.
The Saudi who was seen visiting Osama bin Laden in the videotape released last week is a 38-year-old veteran of conflicts in Afghanistan, Bosnia and Chechnya who left the kingdom most recently on Sept. 21, a senior Saudi official said Saturday. The official's account was the most authoritative yet in solving the mystery surrounding the dinner guest, who was seen and heard on the tape paying effusive tribute to Bin Laden and flattering him with news of Saudi clerics who, he said, had endorsed the Sept. 11 attacks in their sermons, fatwas and other messages. The official identified the dinner guest as Khaled al-Harbi, a former fighter in Afghanistan, Bosnia and Chechnya who was not regarded as a religious scholar. He said earlier accounts by Saudi and U.S. officials naming him as Ali Sayeed al-Ghamdi, a religious scholar, were incorrect. Unlike Al-Ghamdi, who had been banned from preaching by the government in 1994, Al-Harbi has never been arrested by the Saudi government or included on any security watch list, the Saudi official said.
The official said Saudi Arabia did not know Al-Harbi's whereabouts between his departure from the kingdom 10 days after the Sept. 11 attacks and his appearance on the videotape, which was released in Washington on Thursday. If Al-Harbi does turn up now, the Saudi official said, he will be detained and questioned because of his association with Bin Laden, who was stripped of his Saudi citizenship in 1994 for calling for the toppling of Saudi rulers, whom he has labeled as apostates. The senior Saudi official said Al-Harbi was among the estimated 15,000 or more volunteers from the kingdom who took part in the war against the Soviets in Afghanistan during the 1980s, in what Saudi scholars advocated as a holy war against infidel occupiers. Al-Harbi was believed to have operated from the southern Afghan city of Kandahar, the Saudi official said, and in that role he could have become acquainted with Bin Laden. The Saudi official said little is known about Al-Harbi's role in Bosnia and Chechnya, except that it took place during the early to mid-1990s and that he lost his legs in one of the conflicts.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
07/13/2004 9:16:43 PM ||
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Laughing boy needs to be turned over to the FBI for conspiracy in the terrorist murder over 3000 Americans on 9-11
A disabled sheikh has turned himself in to the Saudi authorities under a government amnesty for militants. Khaled al-Harbi aka Abu Suleiman al-Makki surrendered in Tehran after spending years on Iran's Afghan border. According to some reports the paralysed sheikh had appeared in one of Osama Bin Laden's video tapes praising the 11 September attacks in the US. His surrender comes after a senior Saudi expressed dismay that very few militants had applied for the amnesty. Mr Harbi was seen in Saudi televised footage being carried off a plane in a wheelchair after arriving in the kingdom from Tehran. His name does not appear on the list of the kingdom's 26 most wanted militants and it has not been announced what he is wanted for. That's interesting
The December 2001 videotape - thought to have been filmed in the Afghan city of Kandahar - was taken by the Bush administration as proof that Bin Laden masterminded the 11 September attacks. Saudi diplomats arranged travel documents for Mr Harbi after he turned himself in at the Saudi embassy in Tehran, the interior ministry said. "Thank God, Thank God... I called the embassy and we were very well received," he told Saudi TV at the airport terminal. "I have come obeying God, and obeying the rulers." He described the amnesty as "generous" and urged others to take advantage of it. He was accompanied by an unidentified woman dressed in black and a teenage boy. After arriving back in Saudi Arabia, Mr Harbi was taken to hospital for medical treatment, officials said.
Past reports have identified him as Bin Laden's interlocutor in the Kandahar videotape, saying he was married to the daughter of al-Qaeda's number two, Ayman al-Zawahri. On Monday, Interior Minister Prince Nayef Bin Abdul Aziz expressed disappointment that the amnesty appeared to have been largely ignored by militants who have shattered Saudi security in the last 14 months. About 90 people have died in a wave of attacks since May 2003 that have been blamed on al-Qaeda supporters. Only two others militants have availed themselves of the amnesty offer announced on 23 June. But Prince Nayef said the one-month deadline for the amnesty would not be changed and he said hundreds of people had been taken into custody and some had already been tried and convicted.
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
07/13/2004 7:37:27 PM ||
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A suspected Saudi al Qaeda militant has flown back to Saudi Arabia from the Iranian-Afghan border region to surrender under a government amnesty, state television said on Tuesday. It said Khaled al-Harbi, also known as Abu Suleiman al-Makki, gave himself up at the Saudi embassy in Tehran. Television showed a wheelchair-bound Harbi being carried off a plane on arrival in the kingdom.
To a hero's welcome no doubt.
More from News24:
A disabled wanted Saudi militant and suspected al-Qaeda leader has turned himself in to authorities under a royal amnesty, the interior ministry announced on Tuesday. "The wanted Saudi Khaled bin Odeh bin Mohammed al-Harbi, alias Abu Suleiman al-Makki, who had been in the Iranian-Afghan border region, contacted the (Saudi) embassy in Iran", state television reported, quoting an interior ministry official. Harbi said he wanted to take up the amnesty offer and was flown to Saudi Arabia after an identity check, the official said. "Since he is paralysed, he will be transferred directly to hospital to receive medical treatment," he said. State TV showed Harbi being carried down a plane and put on a wheelchair. He was accompanied by a woman and a teenager. He is only the third militant to surrender since the one-month amnesty was offered on June 23, but does not figure on a most-wanted list of suspected Islamist militants.
More from BBC:
According to some reports the paralysed sheikh had appeared in one of Osama Bin Laden's video tapes praising the 11 September attacks in the US. The December 2001 videotape - thought to have been filmed in the Afghan city of Kandahar - was taken by the Bush administration as proof that Bin Laden masterminded the 11 September attacks. Saudi diplomats arranged travel documents for Mr Harbi after he turned himself in at the Saudi embassy in Tehran, the interior ministry said. "Thank God, Thank God... I called the embassy and we were very well received," he told Saudi TV at the airport terminal. "I have come obeying God, and obeying the rulers." He described the amnesty as "generous" and urged others to take advantage of it. Past reports have identified him as Bin Laden's interlocutor in the Kandahar videotape, saying he was married to the daughter of al-Qaeda's number two, Ayman al-Zawahri.
Interesting
Posted by: Steve ||
07/13/2004 11:00:37 AM ||
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#1
Erm....I know geography is one of my weak points, but isn't Tehran somewhere in the middle of the country?
#2
Good pick up, trailing wife, this is the dirt ball that was featured with bin Laden in the gleeful, boostful video over 9/11.
Posted by: Capt America ||
07/13/2004 13:47 Comments ||
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Yeah, Capt A, that's what DEBKA sez: Senior bin Laden associate Abu Suleiman al-Makki has turned himself into Saudi authorities under month-long royal amnesty offered June 23. Al-Makki - disabled sheik who appeared in videotape with al Qaeda leader found in Afghanistan - contacted Saudi embassy in Tehran from hideout on Iran-Afghan border.
Now that the Saudis have given him amnesty, any chance we can question him about.........silly me.
Posted by: Steve ||
07/13/2004 13:55 Comments ||
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He was in the video along with Suleiman Abu Ghaith and Sheikh al-Ghamdi when Binny was gloating over the 9/11 attacks. I would also take note of the fact that he is now in all likelihood a free man in the Magic Kingdom.
That he was picked up in Iran should tell you something about where the higher-ups are hanging out these days ...
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
07/13/2004 14:39 Comments ||
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Ok I know he was offered amnesty and all but they must be under some serious pressure to take up the offer...
#6
This is bullcrap. If the Saud's don't give him up there should be serious consquences for their "Charity" funds here in the states, Diplomatic immunity revoked, and anything else the get here as a luxury.
Posted by: Charles ||
07/13/2004 15:05 Comments ||
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#7
You gotta think that amnesty entails them giving up all the info they know on al queda etc. as well as remaining under some type of house arrest... does anyone know the details?
I had assumed the amnesty was for AQs at large IN Saudi Arabia. Does Saudi even have the RIGHT to amnesty someone whos been living, presumably, on the run in AFGHANISTAN, and against whom the AFGHAN govt undoubtedly has charges? Shouldnt Hamid Karzai have some say in this?? That plus the fact that he surrendered in Teheran makes me think theres something else going on here. Frankly this smells alot more than the case of the Lebanese-American Marine.
#9
Maybe he came back to Saudi to take over as Senior Homeland al-Qaeda Director. You know, smooth over those misunderstanding about over throwing the Royal family, set the young lads straight about killing the goose that hands over the golden eggs. As one of Binny's closest aides, they might listen.
Perhaps the Royals asked him to come home, amnesty gives them cover in case anyone got a look at him and started asking questions. Now he's just a tired old cripple in hospital, nothing to see, move along.
Posted by: Steve ||
07/13/2004 15:40 Comments ||
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Must be hard to run from the 101st Airborne when you're in a wheelchair in the Kandahar. Has this Islamogimp always been paralyzed, or did he have an oopsie in Afghanistan recently?
#11
It's my assumption that he was offered amnesty by Saudi Arabia for the crimes he was wanted for by Saudi Arabia. Obviously they can't give him amnesty for crimes he commited against other countries, like the US.
#12
Btw, I just watched an interview with the Saudi ambassador to Britain speak on this topic. According to him all the amnesty promises is that they won't be executed. But they will be imprisoned and interrogated and depending on how helpful they are they will be judged.
Also he said that when this guy and the 2 other terrorists gave themselves up they said they were living like bums, sometimes in caves, had lost everything and were reduced to eating refuse. Doesn't sound like morale is very high for the jihadis.
#13
DPA - But that's the word of Al Turki... Al Harbi will be a pet, I'd bet, a useful tool at Nayef's direction. The cannon fodder, no matter what was promised, will get whatever treatment Nayef decides - and that will depend upon their pliability / cooperation quotient. It's not like the Int'l Red Thingy will be watching or anything.
#14
About 7 months ago a FOX reporter clearly stated Osama and top al-Qa'ida commanders were also lurking in Iran, of course under the protection of the mullahs...of course.
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
07/13/2004 20:01 Comments ||
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#15
Mark - I heard the same...from different sources
Posted by: Frank G ||
07/13/2004 20:19 Comments ||
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The Soddies will attach the tracking device to his wheelchair...then he'll swap wheelchairs and roll off into the sunset...
#17
Think of Saudi Arabia as a sink trap for Jihadis. Just like the RB sink trap is for trolls. It is a concentrator, a rather large concentrator, to be sure. The jihadis must realize that they will be relatively safe in the Magic Kingdom, but they dare not wander out of their secure sinktrap.
Patience, folks. We will just have to keep track of them for a day of reckoning at a later date.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
07/13/2004 21:30 Comments ||
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Saudi Interior Minister Prince Nayef has acknowledged for the first time that Saudi militants may have gone to neighboring Iraq to fight against the U.S.-led occupation force. Previously, Saudi officials have vehemently denied fighters were leaving the oil-rich desert kingdom and close U.S. ally to fight in Iraq.
"Surely, there are Saudis (in Iraq)," the prince told reporters late Monday. "But the number, and how (they got in to Iraq) is not available to us now."
"We'll look into it and get back to you."
Hundreds of such militants, the minister said, are detained in Saudi custody and some have been tried and convicted. He did not say how many were arrested or provide a number for those convicted, but Prince Nayef said more trials would be held.
Which will also not be reported, it's like they never happen.
Iraqi officials have repeatedly said Saudis were involved in the fighting in Iraq. On Monday, Iraq's Human Rights Minister Bakhtiyar Amin said the government had 99 foreign fighters in detention, including 14 Saudis.
Got a few live ones with good ID, so the Saudis can't pretend anymore.
Prince Nayef said the Saudi government has not been officially notified of the detention of any Saudis in Iraq.
Posted by: Steve ||
07/13/2004 10:31:18 AM ||
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Prince Nayef also said Saudi followers of Osama bin Laden's al-Qaida terror network are "being dealt with."
Yeah, sure. Probably served a king's banquet. Prince Nayef's words have run out of credibility, even in the MSM. Watch out, Nayaf, when you play "tickle the dragon's tail."
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
07/13/2004 11:25 Comments ||
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#2
In other surprising news, John Kerry said he may be a Democrat . . . astronomers predict that the sun may rise over the eastern horizon tomorrow . . . confidential sources suggest Ohio State football coach Jim Tressell may harbor resentments against the University of Michigan . . .
Posted by: Mike ||
07/13/2004 11:33 Comments ||
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"Saudi Militants May Be Fighting in Iraq"
Lol! Yeah, they were right here just a moment ago... mebbe they went to McDonald's for a burger...
Saudi security forces have arrested a man wanted on security-related charges in Al-Qassim region, 320 kilometers north of Riyadh, but he does not figure on a most-wanted list, newspapers said on Tuesday. "Security forces cordoned off early on Monday the old quarter of Al-Malek where the wanted man had rented a house since his arrival in the city of Buraidah," Al-Jazirah reported. It said the man surrendered without offering any resistance during a raid in which police used helicopters.
"Come out witcher hands up, Muggsy! The jig's up!"
Security forces also confiscated some electronic equipment, including a computer and CDs, the paper added. Okaz reported that the arrested man is not on the list of most-wanted terror suspects, which has been cut down from 26 to 13 since it was issued by Saudi authorities last December. However, the man was "one of those attempting to undermine security by supporting the deviant group intellectually".
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
07/13/2004 9:28:53 AM ||
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OH, the horror!! I wonder what Mr. Johnson thinks of all the "harrasment" that saudis are experiencing in the US...Ooops, I forget..he cannot think. His head is not attached to his shoulders!Saudi students returning from the US have spoken of shocking treatment at the hands of the FBI. Among other things, they complain of discrimination against them once they identify themselves as Saudis. Ibrahim Al-Toeimi, a finance and banking student at the University of Tampa, Florida, told Arab News the FBI would conduct random searches of his home once or twice a month. "They would come and knock on my door any day at any time... there was one occasion when they came to my house at eight o'clock on a Sunday morning." Without any warrants or justification, the FBI would proceed to search the apartment with a fine toothcomb. "They used to open my closet and search the pockets of my clothes to make sure I wasn't hiding anything. They would go through my drawers and even check my shoes," Ibrahim continued. "Once they took all my CDs and played them one at a time to check what's on them." When he asked them why, he was told: "It is part of our procedure." He went on to describe how agents would search his bathroom, kitchen and even checked under the carpet. "When they finished searching the place they would question me where I'd been and what I'd done.... they would ask me where my money came from and what I'd spent it on," Ibrahim said. "The thing is that they know every detail about you but they ask you anyway just to make you nervous."
Abdul Aziz Al-Shammary, an engineering student at the University of Central Florida, recently returned, but said he did not do so willingly; he was deported. Al-Shammary comes from a well-off family. Once he traveled to the US, he continued to live the upscale life he was accustomed to in the Kingdom. During a random search, the FBI questioned him where his money came from and how he was able to afford his lifestyle. Al-Shammary simply replied that his father sent him money, and this led to the question of how his father was able to afford to send him such large amounts. "He was insinuating that my father was dishonest," he said. The comment led to a heated argument that eventually provided a reason to deport him. Al-Shammary is now banned from the US for seven years.
Faleh Al-Makhazim, another student who was deported from the US, said he was in the wrong place at the wrong time. While taking a walk to the local store, Faleh was picked up by the police and accused of car theft. "Apparently I fitted the description of a guy who stole a car from that area earlier that day," he recalled. "I was taken to the police station and questioned. They treated me like I was a murderer or something." The woman whose car was stolen could not positively identify him as the thief, he said, and lack of evidence meant they could not keep him in custody, so instead they deported him. "When I asked why I was being forced to leave, they said that they know I stole the car but couldn't prove it, and since I had no respect for their laws I had no business being in their country."
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Posted by: Anonymous4617 ||
07/13/2004 5:31:25 AM ||
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âOnce they know youâre Saudi you can see the change of attitude in their faces,â said Faleh. âThe way they look and talk to you, the way they serve you... it all changes once they know your nationality,â he said.
I should hope so.
Posted by: Dave D. ||
07/13/2004 6:27 Comments ||
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Lol! What a hoot! This is classic Arab lying / wild-eyed exaggeration. Pre-Patriot Act, the FBI couldn't even search Moussaui's phreaking computer when he was considered to be a prime potential terrorist suspect. Get a grip, there Abdul. The Fibbies aren't now free to cycle repeatedly through raid target lists. For each and every encounter, they must obtain a warrant from a Judge. I can see them doing a "registration" search... then one, maaaaaybe two, follow-up(s), since once they've had the "treatment" and survived it, some asshats assume they're in the clear - and begin their real work. Total bullshit - except for the thoroughness of the search. Oh yeah, baby - THAT they do.
This rings true: âThe thing is that they know every detail about you but they ask you anyway just to make you nervous.â
It's not about making you nervous, Ibbie, its about seeing if you can remember your lies, if you're a liar. If you're not lying, then your answers will match. Get it, there, camel-boy?
And this sings: "During a random search, the FBI questioned him where his money came from and how he was able to afford his lifestyle. Al-Shammary simply replied that his father sent him money, and this led to the question of how his father was able to afford to send him such large amounts. 'He was insinuating that my father was dishonest,' he said. The comment led to a heated argument that eventually provided a reason to deport him. Al-Shammary is now banned from the US for seven years."
The Al Shammary family is very connected, very wealthy, and consequently arrogant beyond words. As for honesty, are we talking real honesty - or are we talking Arab-style? I'm sure he did flap his gums and get his sorry ass tossed - cuz he's Al Shammary!
This is classic Arab News fluff stuff. Their audience of fervent conspiracy phreaks, Jooo holocaust deniers, Zionist Al Qaeda zoomers, and djin believers eat it up with a spoon. The Green Truth (the newsprint of the hardcopy version is tinted light green...), still sucks, as always.
#4
.com - a former girlfriend of mine who worked in Saudi as a nurse complained of being attacked with 'sticks' by the religious police for taking her towel off her head in public (she was suffering heatstroke). She also claimed to have been spat at by native women and of being threatened with arrest for smoking by the entrance to a Mosque. She was only there for two weeks before returning home, extremely disillusioned. Does this sound credible? I must admit I found it hard to believe - if this was true then why are these guys whingeing about the treatment of foreigners abroad, partic with regard to 9/11?
Posted by: Howard UK ||
07/13/2004 8:00 Comments ||
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#5
Sounds to me like some dumb pogues had to make up a good story for why they got sent home. U of Tampa and UCF are hardly citadels of higher learning, but Tampa is a hotbed of jihadi fundraising. My guess is the FBI sniffed too close for comfort, so they left. Bye-bye!
#6
I picked out the same quote. Gee, could there be a reason, why Americans have become suspicious of our Saudi Friends? Saudis come here, enjoy our freedom, train to fly jets, then use said jets to murder 3000 Americans. Oh, just the latest, beheaded American Paul Johnson's family is complaining that the Saudis are NOT cooperating in providing info on the murderers of their kin. That's just the latest Saudi support for murderers of Americans.
I don't know about that, but I suspect that just as the Eskimos have dozens of words denoting subtly different varieties of snow, Arabs probably have dozens of words denoting subtly different varieties of "playing the victim."
Posted by: Dave D. ||
07/13/2004 9:39 Comments ||
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#8
I was crying a river while reading this....NOT.
Posted by: jawa ||
07/13/2004 10:19 Comments ||
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#10
If I was visiting somewhere they all hated me like that I think I'd leave. Maybe they can get a technical education somewhere else ... yeah right.
Posted by: Formerly Dan ||
07/13/2004 10:29 Comments ||
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#11
âOnce they know youâre Saudi you can see the change of attitude in their faces,â said Faleh. âThe way they look and talk to you, the way they serve you... it all changes once they know your nationality,â he said.
Straight Jacksonian right there.
I don't think you're my enemy... YET... but I sure as hell know you ain't my friend.
#14
(holds up sign) I give this a 3.2. No womans panties, no pointing at little wee-wees by women of questionable moral character, No nasty dogs barking at you.
A poor performance all around. Very disappointing. Back to the whiners training camp for you!
#15
Ibrahim Al-Toeimi, a finance and banking student at the University of Tampa,
Translation - future controller / bagman.
there was one occasion when they came to my house at eight oâclock on a Sunday morning.â
Right around the morning rug munch prayer session. How insensitive...
Abdul Aziz Al-Shammary, an engineering student at the University of Central Florida,
Translation - bombmaker. Wasn't there also some CAIR affiliated asshat professor from UCF up on terrorism charges? I'm sure it's just a big coincidence misunderstanding.
#16
Abdul Aziz Al-Shammary, an engineering student at the University of Central Florida, Translation - bombmaker.
Raj, that's not far from the truth. When I was an undergrad, a Palestinian in one of my extramural classes told me that he was in the US to learn how to fight and make bombs and weapons to fight the Jews. Here he was, one of the brightest in Palestine, sent to the US on US funded scholarship, using this opportunity to learn to kill Jews. And you wonder why the west Bank and gaza is in the shape it is. Of course I told him I was a Jew (I'm not).
Posted by: ed ||
07/13/2004 12:36 Comments ||
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#18
UCF, not USF, per the article. I think UCF is in Sarasota. Neither of these teach any useful trades, so I think HogTown's the winner here.
However, #16, Sami al Arian is the USF (located in Tampa) professor now in jail for being a Hamas fundraiser.
FWIW, the mosques around here are all virulent (yes, probably redundancy here), which is why I'm suspicious of the Saudi whiners--this is a major fundraising conduit for the jihadis. I suspect they got caught up in the Sami al Arian follow-ups, their hands were dirty, and they had to leave to protect their own asses.
Here's a little game that Saudi "students" on "scholarships" play. See, to get the scholarship in the first place, you need "wasta", literally an intermediary. In Chicago, it's called "pull". In other words, the student doesn't settle the issue; it's his dad, mom, sister, brother, cousin, etc. who makes the effort to get little Youssef the scholarship through work or university in Saudi. In other words, it has to be finessed, protocoled, face-saved, sugared, tead, all the bases touched, all the beaks wetted. Saudi friends all had super stories about how intercine battles are fought all the time over scholarships. OK, now Youssef is accepted to the Florida school of whatever. First order of business is pleasure, i.e. car, girlfriend, savings account, apartment, actually a combination of the above. Next step is to figure out how to get around INS rules re keeping visa. In other words, how many classes can I miss before I get in trouble? Well, in a regular university, a foreign student pays two ways if he doesn't go to class: 1. He fails academically; 2. He gets in trouble with school admin. How to avoid problem one? Enroll in the ESL affiliate of the university in question. There are lots of companies that do this: ELS, Aspect, Kaplan, among others. Why enroll at these schools? Because they are much easier on student status than the mean old university. However, things have changed much in the past three years. Old days are gone; foreign student visa holders now have to attend classes and if they don't, the school is obligated to inform INS; the program is called SEVIS; it's an acronym for Student Eligibility something-or-other. Now students get warning letters with teeth, sit-downs with language school admin, the riot act read, etc. IE, the perps are now treated as radioactive and language schools try to shoo them away ASAP as opposed to five years ago when the only thing that mattered was for the check not to bounce.
It's instructive to note that students 2 and 3 were both deported, one because he got into an argument over how his dad made a living and the other over a stolen car and mistaken identity. What a laugh! I'd bet $100 that they were not in status due to excessive absences and they were flagged on a SEVIS check. Surprise the Arab News didn't bring up racial profiling regarding #3.
Moral of the story: Welcome to the Home of the Brave, boys, but keep your noses clean or go try Canada.
Posted by: Michael ||
07/13/2004 14:08 Comments ||
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#22
Howard UK - Your ex-girlfriend's comments are absolutely spot-on. The Religious Police, called muttawas, have these sticks, like riding crops, which they hit women with (as you saw in Afghanistan - remember the Taliban?) for any "infraction" of propriety. The black thing they have to wear, the abaya, if it's too short and their ankles or calves show, these guys will whack 'em where skin shows. Keeping the head covered is the most important part! Stray hair is almost as bad. There are legends*. I've seen the muttawas at work with these sticks myself, doing precisely this, so I have no reason to doubt the story -- or your ex-girlfriend's comments. Spot-on.
As for smoking at the moskkk entrance - oooooh baby - that's some bad juju, bro. You bet they got excited. Women are not supposed to smoke in public at all. In front of a moskkk? Scandalous! Modern update: I saw a group of 3 super-privileged young women do it at Aramco but that was outside an office bldg, they stood between the bldg and the 5+ft tall shrubbery, and they were from high-ranking families - that's why they were "working" at Aramco - using the term very very loosely. This was an office complex called West Park and there were no muttawas "on duty" there. And this was 2003 - I'd bet that's at least 10 years since your nurse friend was there.
Believe her. She's telling the truth!
* I recall a legendary episode at the old Al Shula Mall in Khobar (recounting the story - I wasn't present) where some German woman was shopping. She must've been 6ft 2in - a Teutonic Goddess - and they just don't make abayas that big! Some little twerp with his stick popped her on the back of the legs because the skin was quite visible. The story goes that she was instantly furious and wheeled on him intent on shoving that stick up his ass. The Saudis there placed themselves between them and wouldn't let her get to him - allowing him to make his escape - and he wanted to get away from this frightening woman.
#23
Michael - I was rattling keys when you posted. SEVIS sounds great!!! I was worried, when the avant garde universities, like Stanford, stopped giving Pass / Fail such that no one ever fails, heavens no! They get incompletes and are invited to spend even more tuition money to retake the class. Heh. The fact that INS is on top of these guys is most welcome news, Thx! You should pop an anecdotal bit, too. The examples of the double-standards are endless.
My absolute favorite is being up in First Class on a flight headed out of the Magic Kingdom. The instant the plane reaches Int'l airspace, while still climbing, the Saudis all hit the Stewardess "call" button - to order cocktails. As soon as the seat belt sign goes off, the ninjas in 1st Class and Business all run to the restroom - to change. What goes in is an MOB (Moving Black Object). What emerges 10-20 minutes later is a very modern Western-dressed woman, ready for shopping in NY or London. I think of it as the chrysalis to butterfly transition... What a hoot! What insane hypocrisy... and so very natural for the Arabs.
#26
.com - Many thanks! I was wrong to doubt her - she was utterly pissed to miss a year's tax free £££ but Northern [English] girls are notoriously hard to suppress - like the German ones I've met!
Posted by: Howard UK ||
07/13/2004 15:17 Comments ||
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#27
Kicking a student out of bed at 8am is truly torture. Does the Red Cross know about this??
Must time for another prison fire ...
Saudi Arabia's interior minister has confirmed that hundreds of suspected extremists are in detention and said an amnesty for militants who turn themselves in will not be extended despite the fact that only two have surrendered so far. "As far as those under arrest are concerned, there are hundreds," Prince Nayef bin Abdul Aziz told reporters late Monday after attending a session of the appointed Shura (Consultative) Council devoted to examining the wave of terrorism by suspected Al Qaeda sympathizers which began in May 2003. "Some have taken part in acts (of violence) and are being questioned. They will be put on trial," he said.
"Others have been convicted and will be released once they serve their sentences. It is an ongoing process and there is no fixed number. We always prefer to release the largest possible number if investigations do not require their continued detention," Nayef said.
Cut anybody's head off? Didn't think so.
King Fahd on June 23 offered an amnesty to militants who turn themselves in within a month, but only two - including one on a most-wanted list - have done so. "If we go back to the speech of (King Fahd), it set the deadline at one month and said there would be no (extension of the) deadline after that. I haven't been told otherwise," Prince Nayef said. "Those who surrendered have been reported to have done so, and no one else has (surrendered) until now," he said. However, Nayef said he hoped that Muslim clerics who have predicted that many suspects will give themselves up in the countdown to the expiry of the deadline will be proven right.
They're all prob'ly waiting until the last minute. No doubt there'll be thousands of them on Day 29 1/2.
#3
Why do I always picture Nayaf as speaking like Jimmy Cagney?
"Nyahh! We got the boys locked up, see? And we picked up a few people I never liked, too, see? And we're gonna cut their heads off, whaddaya think of that, copper? Nyahh!"
#7
Interesting note: the Saudis are way behind head chopping quota for the year. On average they do somewhere between 50-70, but so far, I gather, they are only up to #7. (An immigrant maid who conspired to murder her employer. Some things just can't be tolerated by slaves.)
Steyn of course
A couple of years back, I mentioned the fatwa against Salman Rushdie and received a flurry of lively e-mails. It was Valentine's Day 1989, you'll recall, when the Ayatollah Khomeini issued his extraterritorial summary judgment on a British subject, and shortly thereafter large numbers of British Muslims were marching through English cities openly calling for Rushdie to be killed.
A reader in Bradford recalled asking a West Yorkshire officer on the street that day why the various "Muslim community leaders" weren't being arrested for incitement to murder. The officer said they'd been told to "play it cool". The calls for blood got more raucous. My correspondent asked his question again. The policeman told him to "F--- off, or I'll arrest you."
Isn't that pretty much how it's likely to go once David Blunkett's new protection for Islam is in place? If you're the "moderate" Imam Yusuf al-Qaradawi, you'll be invited to speak at the "Our Children Our Future" conference sponsored and funded by the Metropolitan Police and the Department for Work and Pensions. But, if you express concern about ol' Mullah Moderate, an Islamic lobby group will file an official complaint about you.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: tipper ||
07/13/2004 2:41:37 AM ||
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#1
These two portions sort of leapt off the page at me. How odd that Churchill made these observations over a century ago and they are still pertinent. I suppose it shows something about the stagnation timelessness of Islam.
"The fact that in Mohammedan law every woman must belong to some man as his absolute property - either as a child, a wife, or a concubine - must delay the final extinction of slavery until the faith of Islam has ceased to be a great power among men."
Few truer words could be spoken even to this very day.
"Individual Moslems may show splendid qualities. Thousands become the brave and loyal soldiers of the Queen: all know how to die. But the influence of the religion paralyses the social development of those who follow it. No stronger retrograde force exists in the world. Far from being moribund, Mohammedanism is a militant and proselytising faith."
Again, quite the spot-on analysis of a political system masquerading as religion.
#3
Don't shout too loudly about Churchill's lack of PC - we'll be forced to take his statue down ;) Great post.
Posted by: Howard UK ||
07/13/2004 8:21 Comments ||
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#4
I have to say, if the Government think they can stifle my freedom to criticise Islam, they've got another thing coming.
If they did enact this law, we might just see the final showdown between the forces of PC and common sense. Could actually turn out to be a good thing...
#5
Is this law 2 way? If a mosque sermon entreats Allah (and what sermon does not?) to destroy the Jews and Christians, bring fire to homosexuals, and shake the ground beneath Club Girls, can charges be brought against the Imam and mosque?
Posted by: ed ||
07/13/2004 9:34 Comments ||
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#6
I don't think that's the intention at all, ed. You see, criticising Jews, Christians and other varieties of infidels isn't actually necessarily criticising their religion. Just them. The crime would be for a Jew, Christian, homosexual, etc. to criticise Islam for being intolerant. And criticising a cleric or Imam himself would no doubt constitute attacking Islam, as he speaks for the great Pooh-Bah.
Intelligence reports examined Tuesday by lawmakers investigating Madrid's train bombings indicated that police found evidence pointing to Islamic militants hours earlier than they had announced, members of the panel said. The closed-door session marked the start of the second week of Parliament's inquiry into the March 11 attack that killed 190 people and injured more than 2,000. The 16 members of the panel spent hours examining 20 classified documents from the National Intelligence Center, Spain's version of the CIA, dealing with a threat by Osama bin Laden in October 2003 to attack Spain and with the first stages of the March 11 probe. Later, they were to examine documents from the Interior Ministry.
Some documents from the intelligence center offer new information on the first big break in the case - a van containing detonators, traces of dynamite and a cassette tape with Quranic verses, and found near the rail station where the four bombed trains originated or passed through, said Emilio Olabarria, a panel member representing the Basque Nationalist Party. Police testified last week that the evidence in the van was not found until the afternoon of the attack. At that point, the then-conservative government - which had backed the Iraq war and feared an Islamic link would hurt it in general elections due in three days' time - had already blamed Basque separatists for the attack. It went on to lose the election to the Socialists. But Olabarria, without going into detail on the documents he read, suggested the evidence was found right away in a preliminary search of the van within hours of the attacks. "We have seen things that are surprising," he told reporters. The inquiry aims to clarify how the attacks were organized as well as to blame study the then government's handling of the crisis in the run-up to the elections. Lawmakers said some of the documents contained paragraphs that had been blotted out. Olabarria and others played down the deletions as insignificant, saying they apparently referred to intelligence sources. But others complained it made no sense for the new Socialist government to make documents available in a secret session, with no photocopying allowed, and then hold back information.
To me that means there's something there that the Socialist government doesn't want them to see, like maybe al-Qaeda plans to return Spain to Islamic rule.
Last week's testimony featured senior police officials closely involved in the March 11 probe who cast doubt on the government's initial insistence that ETA was the prime suspect even after the evidence of an Islamic link emerged. The government of then-Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar had sent 1,300 troops to Iraq, despite widespread opposition to the war, and allegedly feared that word of Islamic involvement would doom it in the March 14 elections. Voters ousted the Popular Party and elected the Socialists who opposed the war and quickly brought the troops home.
Posted by: Steve ||
07/13/2004 11:28:38 AM ||
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German authorities have said they want to expel terror suspects Mounir Motassedeq and Abdelghani Mzoudi, both accused in the September 11 attacks. Retrials of the two -- Motassedeq's original conviction was overturned and Mzoudi was acquitted -- must take place before any deportation procedures. Even then the decision can be appealed, said Hamburg Interior senator Udo Nagel. Motassedeq's February 2003 conviction -- on charges of providing logistical help to Mohammed Atta, the reputed ringleader of the September 11, 2001, attacks in the United States -- was thrown out in March. Authorities want to expel Motassedeq and Mzoudi because they are considered "particularly dangerous" to the "laws and security of the Federal Republic of Germany," the interior ministry said. "In addition, it is the view of the interior ministry that evidence shows that (they) support international terrorism." Nagel also said officials were prepared to go a second route if deportation did work -- the German government has denied the pair student visa applications because they are not enrolled in a university.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
07/13/2004 9:31:47 AM ||
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So what is the problem with deporting them to the US?
Posted by: ed ||
07/13/2004 9:53 Comments ||
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Amen! Ship then here. We have a nice cage at gitmo waiting for them.
EFL
BRITAIN will deploy teams of intelligence officers and surveillance experts in cities where it is feared that extremists are radicalising Muslim youth, according to The Times. The internal security service, M15, would fan officers out from its London HQ in a bid to snuff out any incipient terrorist threats within urban Muslim communities, the paper said, citing "government sources".
Posted by: Dragon Fly ||
07/13/2004 6:40:31 AM ||
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#2
Why not make it a law that every prayer broadcast has to be taped? Then make it a law that anyone who calls for violence in a religous institution should then be thrown in jail or deported.
#3
The UK could save itself the predictably huge and growing huger costs of monitoring "any incipient terrorist threats within urban Muslim communities" if it would put a kabosh on the Labor government's loosey goosey refugee&immigration policies. Think, think...what would Churchill do if faced with the same problem? What Blair is doing is avoiding acknowledging that his liberal "let's turn the UK into a UN looking country" is patently stupid and dangerous especially re: opening the floodgates holus bolus to every Third World Muslim under the sun. Address the cause, not the effects, eh, Tony?
Posted by: rex ||
07/13/2004 11:52 Comments ||
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#4
I'm surprised MI5 haven't been doing this for years already. Or has political correctness been holding them back?
#5
Any country that wants to survive the onslaught of Islamism had better well be doing just the same, right down to monitoring the content of sermons preached inside Mosques. The Muslims wanted noteriety for their faith, now they have it. Call this "backlash" if you will, I care not. It is time to put them under a really big magnifying glass. If jihadists keep asking for their day in the sun, they'll get it.
Terrorists are not usually talkers. But the man who calls himself the mastermind of the March 11 train bombings in Madrid is an exception. For nearly three months, the Italian police have eavesdropped on Rabei Osman Sayed Ahmed, or "Muhammad the Weasel Egyptian" as the 32-year-old Egyptian is known. The contents of his conversations, in custody and before his arrest in Italy last month, have provided the police with a lode of information about the secret world of a man who claims to have recruited suicide bombers and organized terrorist operations in the name of Islam. Spanish investigators believe that Ahmed played an important role in the Madrid bombings, which killed 190 people, and could indeed be the architect of the operation, although they are also searching for other leading suspects.
Dozens of pages of transcripts obtained by The New York Times and interviews with officials in Spain, Italy, Germany and France have shed light on Ahmed and his ability over the years to take on new identities, cross borders and avoid the police as he pressed his cause against the West. They also offer a case study of the challenges and frustrations Europe faces in monitoring radicals, routing out sleeper cells and prosecuting and convicting those they arrest.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
07/13/2004 12:38:20 AM ||
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The Italians seem to do a bang-up job in the eavesdropping department. Or is it that they just publicize their results more than others?
German police raided a Moroccan mosque in the western city of Frankfurt on suspicion that children were being shown violent extremist propaganda, prosecutors said Monday. Some 200 police officers seized 19 computers and several video cassettes, CD-Roms, diskettes and written documents at the Taqwa mosque Sunday after a teacher told authorities that a nine-year-old student reported seeing brutal films in Islam classes at the institution. Officials at the mosque allegedly showed the children "films with violent battle scenes" and sold a video calling for "holy war" against unbelievers, a spokeswoman for the prosecutor's office told a news conference. Authorities said it would take several weeks to analyze the material confiscated because it would have to be translated from Arabic. The vice president of the mosque's steering committee, Ahmed Ayaou, denied the charges. "We do not preach violence here," he said. "We expect an official apology in a few days."
"Lies! All lies!"
Ayaou said that some 500 people regularly took part in public services at the mosque and some 350 families belonged to the institution. Frankfurt city authorities said that the mosque's steering committee had a reputation for integrating its members well into German society. City integration ombudsman Albrecht Magen said the mosque had organized an anti-violence demonstration after the March 11 train bombings in Madrid blamed on al-Qaeda and sent a consolation note to the Spanish consul general.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
07/13/2004 12:09:53 AM ||
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#1
There are 'non-profit' 'mosques' from Brooklyn, to Bayonne and even Boise engaged in a lot worse. The enemy is laughing at U.S.
It's high time the jihadic party across the USA drew to a conclusion. Does Washington have the will? Or, do we sit here, like the last episode, awaiting 9-11 ...........phase two?
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
07/13/2004 0:24 Comments ||
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#2
That is what I am wondering, Mark. Are we fighting this war against western civilization, or are we doing a survey of our own collective alimentary canal? I cannot believe the ignorance of people. It absolutely feels like 1938 all over again.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
07/13/2004 11:42 Comments ||
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#3
German police raided a Moroccan mosque in the western city of Frankfurt
#4
"German mosque raided for showing jihadi propaganda"
Scanning the page, for a second there I thought it said German mosque razed.... That would send a clearer message, wouldn't it? Ain't no call for such behaviour, Mohammed. Now sling yer hook, an' tell yer friends what 'appened 'ere.
#5
Alaska, the comparison to 1938 is frighteningly relevant especially concerning the Jewish people. Is this thing heading toward another 'Krystal Nachtâ in France, which is rapidly reverting to the Vichy era, or will it happen in Germany or elsewhere in the western world?
In terms of the U.S. the upcoming presidential conventions may turn out to be the turning point in public tolerance, when it comes to the leftist-pro-terrorist enemy within, if anything get so out of control it allows the jihadees an open door to really cause enormous loss of life in either Manhattan or the City of Boston.
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
07/13/2004 18:38 Comments ||
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CYPRIOT authorities wrongly deported 10 Pakistani students from Cyprus on suspicion of belonging to the Al-Qaeda terror network, their lawyer claimed. He said he would take their case to the European Court of Human Rights.
"They're pure as the driven snow, yer honor!"
But local newspaper reports said the "group leader" was a former pilot in the Pakistani air force, with expert knowledge of surface-to-air-missiles and an unlikely student on the hotel management course he was pursuing in Cyprus.
I'll bet he can clear a room.
The local Politis newspaper said the 39-year-old pilot and civil engineer, who was not named, had thousands of hours of flying time under his belt, having trained on Mirages and F-16s, and experience of maintaining and constructing SAMs. Aircraft diagrams were found in his flat, said Politis, which claimed the man was also the group`s spiritual leader.
He does seem an unlikely hotel management candidate.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
07/13/2004 12:09:53 AM ||
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i want to know the name of 10 pakistani students deported from cyprus
Posted by: Muhammad Zeeshan ||
07/15/2004 4:37 Comments ||
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#2
Probably a couple of Muhammads in there!
Posted by: Howard UK ||
07/15/2004 4:41 Comments ||
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#3
can u tell me the list of names of deported students
Posted by: Muhammad Zeeshan ||
07/15/2004 5:07 Comments ||
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#4
No - I'll have a quick search for ya.. suggest you contact the Pakistani consulate in Cyprus/Athens and charm them with some bullshit about a missing relative.
Posted by: Howard UK ||
07/15/2004 5:16 Comments ||
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Posted by: Howard UK ||
07/15/2004 5:18 Comments ||
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#6
"It is most unjustified that whenever there is intimation of terrorist attacks or terrorism anywhere in the world only Pakistanis and Muslims are blamed and being victimised,"
Here for political comment, Muhammad or to locate jihadi friends? ;)
Posted by: Howard UK ||
07/15/2004 5:21 Comments ||
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#7
It wasn't one of your mates who's the missile systems specialist is it now? I don't think they'll be releasing his name in a hurry.. or any of them if they're bona fidae Al-Q.
Posted by: Howard UK ||
07/15/2004 6:38 Comments ||
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Less than a year before the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, Canadian High Commission officials in Pakistan helped an al-Qaeda terrorism suspect replace his confiscated Canadian travel documents -- a decision that is making it difficult for the suspect's son to get a passport today. Abdurahman Khadr, a 21-year-old Torontonian who says he has renounced his late father's militant brand of Islamic extremism, has launched a Federal Court action to get a Canadian passport -- a document that Foreign Affairs Minister Bill Graham is denying him on security grounds.
I mean, just because everyone else in the family is a terrorist, doesn't mean he is.
Documents newly made public because of that court case reveal that these concerns are based, in part, on the fact that Mr. Khadr's father, Ahmed Said Khadr, repeatedly approached the High Commission in Islamabad to ask for help in getting back his own travel documents after Pakistani guards seized them from him and his wife, Maha Elsamnah, when they crossed over from Taliban-controlled Afghanistan late in 2000. The elder Mr. Khadr described himself as a charity worker, even though he was later described as an associate of Osama bin Laden. On Jan. 25, 2001, the United Nations Security Council decreed that Mr. Khadr's assets must be frozen as part of a global clampdown on al-Qaeda. Soon after, he became a fugitive. He was killed by Pakistani forces in a raid against Islamic militants last fall.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
07/13/2004 9:46:40 AM ||
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I was in Afghanistan doing ... charity work ... that's it!
Posted by: Formerly Dan ||
07/13/2004 10:22 Comments ||
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Yeah....and I was a U.S. spy in....Bosnia...that's it!
#4
look--this guy has rejected the jihad of his family--after being picked up in afghanistan he worked for the cia as a spy in gitmo and bosnia--when he quit they dumped him--he needs a break--he hates the fucking salafis--he really changed and did good things for the west against the jihadis
Posted by: SON OF TOLUI ||
07/13/2004 15:47 Comments ||
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When are we going to treat the enemy within (radicals) as the enemy within?
The government is quietly shipping stocks of antidotes against chemical weapons to states under a long-awaited program to boost response to a potential terrorist attack. New York and Boston, sites of the upcoming political conventions, are among the first areas to receive the "chem-packs." Within two years, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention hopes to have the allotments dispersed to every state. "Itâs a quick way for hospitals to know theyâll have the antidotes they need," Donna Knutson, CDCâs deputy director of terrorism preparedness, said Tuesday in an interview with The Associated Press.
The program was begun in part because there has been "an uneven level of protection across the country," added Steve Adams, deputy director of the Strategic National Stockpile Program. Much of the nationâs efforts to prepare for terrorism have focused on biological attacks. For example, the National Pharmaceutical Stockpile contains tons of drugs, vaccines and other medical supplies in storage around the country, so that any U.S. city could receive an emergency shipment within 12 hours. Thatâs probably plenty of time to react to an incubating infection like anthrax, but the ability to survive a chemical attack depends on immediate decontamination and rapid administration of appropriate antidotes. Yet the antidotes are expensive and have fairly short shelf lives, making them hard for many states to keep stocked.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
07/13/2004 7:22:09 PM ||
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Chilling, Mark, but such are the times in which we live.
I imagine the other major US cities will get their antidotes for the November election and the threatened Madrid-like attack.
Posted by: Jen ||
07/13/2004 23:04 Comments ||
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#1
Great read tipper! There's a lot of meat to grind here. I'd like to stand by the sky boys some but it's hard to argue with killing the enemy, post haste!
Consider our enemies in the War on Terror. Men who believe, literally, that they are on a mission from God to destroy your civilization and who regard death as a promotion are not impressed by elegant maneuvers. You must find them, no matter how long it takes, then kill them. If they surrender, you must accord them their rights under the laws of war and international conventions. But, as we have learned so painfully from all the mindless, left-wing nonsense spouted about the prisoners at Guantanamo, you are much better off killing them before they have a chance to surrender.
Excellent paragraph--to afford the enemies of civilization the protection offered by that same civilization is obscene, so it is best to minimize the opportunity!
Posted by: Dar ||
07/13/2004 12:07 Comments ||
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#5
I disagree with this article. In a way, #3s statement is its capsuled summary.
In truth, war *is* about attrition; but it is also about *selective* attrition, not just "them" instead of "us", but also of "hearts and minds."
War is also about reducing, *if not eliminating*, the enemy's ability to wage war. War is also about "attitude adjustment" in an enemy government, or the replacement of an enemy government, to get rid of those factors that led to war in the first place. War is also about *protecting* the innocent from the violent, and even a little bit like being a policeman--protecting civility from criminals.
Do you see where I am going? "War is diplomacy by other means." War is not an end in itself, it is an extention of policy, before, during and after the war is over. The US State Department was almost as busy as the Pentagon with Iraq, just from a *complementary* direction.
So what is the single thing that the military does? The question is false. The military takes ALL possible means and methods at the same time, along with many non-military organizations, to accomplish not ONE goal, but many. Maneuver and strategy are part of it, as is technology, numbers, firepower, logistics, intelligence, discipline, community relations, and even the dreaded "nation building."
#6
To me, the money quote;
"The truth is that even if you canât kill yourself out of the problem, you can make the problem a great deal smaller by effective targeting."
The head of a new federal voting commission suggested to congressional leaders Monday that there should be a process for canceling or rescheduling an election interrupted by terrorism, but national security adviser Condoleezza Rice said no such plan is being considered by the administration. Federal officials warned last week that intelligence indicates Al Qaeda wants to attack the United States to disrupt the upcoming elections. "There does not appear to be a clear process in place to suspend or reschedule voting during an election if there is a major terrorist attack," DeForest B. Soaries, chairman of the U.S. Election Assistance Commission, wrote in a letter to Republican and Democratic leaders in the House and Senate. The Associated Press obtained a copy of the one-page letter.
Rice said the Bush administration, while concerned about the impact of terrorism, is not thinking of postponing the elections. "Weâve had elections in this country when we were at war, even when we were in civil war. And we should have the elections on time. Thatâs the view of the president, thatâs the view of the administration," Rice said in a televised interview Monday. Soaries also sent lawmakers copies of an earlier letter he wrote to Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge. In that letter, dated June 25, Soaries noted that Sept. 11, 2001, fell on Election Day in New York and state officials delayed voting until later that month. He wrote that no federal agency has the statutory authority to cancel or reschedule a federal election.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
07/13/2004 12:09:53 AM ||
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#1
I've already seen scumbags trying to play this up as Bush asked for this and is trying to become a dictator. How low can these bastards go?
#2
Why, who... in their right mind allowed this insanity to go public??
Talk about giving the enemy(s) a score card of mega-ideas.
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
07/13/2004 0:26 Comments ||
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#3
I dunno. My wife and I were talking about this tonight over dinner, and she thought it was proper foresight to have some sort of plan. I think it ought to be the states that plan this, however, and not the feds.
Posted by: Steve White ||
07/13/2004 0:39 Comments ||
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#4
Could be possible that Kerry would conspire with BinLaden to do something in the week of the election so Kerry can win? like what happened in Spain !
#5
Not unless Kerry channels with the dead. Maybe, since he's got the Hollyweird crowd rooting for him, he can get Shirley McClain to assist. She's into dead shit.
#6
We should NOT delay the elcetions, no matter the turnout. Any delay or change makes the terrorists the winners. Besides I read that the CIA said that the Kerry/Edwards ticket was a "Slam Dunk." Why make them wait for the outcome?
#7
I think the question only pertains to the Presidential elections, since individual Congressional districts affected by terrorist strikes can always have a temporary Congressman appointed by the state's governor.
For Presidential elections, the question is this - what happens to a state that is struck by a major terror attack? Does the state count only the votes for the presidency cast by the districts that are able to vote? If so, then we have business as usual. NYC gets leveled by a nuke, but voting in NY state goes on as it normally does, and the presidential candidate who wins a majority in the state gets all the electoral votes, in accordance with tradition.
There would be some similarities with 1864, where Abraham Lincoln was reelected without the votes of the Confederate-controlled states. The president-elect (Kerry or Bush) would win the 2004 elections on the basis of electoral votes tallied up without reference to the votes of whatever districts are unable to vote due to a terrorist attack.
My bottom line is that the Presidential election should go on as scheduled, even if entire cities are leveled, and are thus unable to participate. State-by-state majorities can be tallied without the participation of those districts destroyed. Entire states were excluded during the Civil War because they were unable to participate. Merely excluding specific districts due to infrastructure or security problems is minor compared to the extraordinary measures taken during the Civil War.
#8
We should NOT delay the elcetions, no matter the turnout. Any delay or change makes the terrorists the winners. Besides I read that the CIA said that the Kerry/Edwards ticket was a "Slam Dunk." Why make them wait for the outcome?
I don't care if I have to be scared about getting hurt. I vote, attack or not, in November. The idea that an election could be influenced in this country by a buncha pussies who can't survive a stand up fight is a hateful idea to me.
Is this the beginning of the end for old camel face?
UN Mideast envoy Terje Roed-Larsen leveled rare public criticism of Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat during a carefully balanced briefing Tuesday to the Security Council. "The PA, despite consistent promises by its leadership, has made no progress on its core obligation to take immediate action on the ground to end violence and combat terror, and to reform and reorganize the Palestinians Authority," Larsen said. Larsen balanced this statement by adding that "the Israeli government has made no progress either on its core obligation to immediately dismantle settlement outposts erected since March 2001 and to move towards a complete freeze of settlement activities."
Larsen said that "progress on the implementation of Palestinian reform continues to be slow, and cannot be explained except by the lack of political will to advance along that road." Without mentioning Arafat by name, Larsen said "the President of the PA has lent only nominal and partial support to the commendable Egyptian efforts aimed at reforming the ailing Palestinian security services, consistent with the road map." Larsen sad that "all those who yearn for peace have already and repeatedly urged President Arafat, in public and in private, to take immediate action to restore" the PA's diminished credibility. "Unfortunately," he said, "there is â so far â no sign of any of those measures being taken."
Israeli diplomatic officials, while expressing satisfaction with Larsen's statements, said they are a manifestation of a frustration with Arafat because his actions are keeping the UN and EU away from the diplomatic process. The official said Arafat is a major stumbling block for the Europeans and the UN, because Israel will not give an active role in the diplomatic process to those who continue to deal with Arafat, which includes the EU and the UN. The EU's frustration was evident at a press conference in Brussels Monday, during which Dutch Foreign Minister Bernard Bot, whose country holds the EU's rotating presidency, said that "if Israel is not prepared to engage in dialogue in a satisfactory way with the European Union, then obviously the European Union must also consider possible consequences of that." The Europeans should not threaten Israel, an Israeli official said, and "need to understand that if they want an active part in the process, they need to be more balanced." Larsen was careful in his briefing to try and preserve a balance, opening his remarks by telling the tale of three-year-old Afik Zahavi-Ohayon and Mordechai Yosefov, 49, killed on June 28 by a Kassam rocket attack in Sderot, followed by the story of the killing of engineering professor Khaled Saleh and his 16-year-old son Muhammad during a gun battle near Nablus a week later. Consistent with this almost symmetrical approach, Larsen's criticism of Arafat was followed by criticism of Israel. After talking about Arafat and the lack of Palestinian reform, Larsen said "Israel's lack of compliance on the sensitive issue of settlements is equally frustrating. Territory lies at the heart of this conflict." part two via link
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
07/13/2004 9:33:42 PM ||
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Isn't Larsen the one who started the "Jenin Massacre" bullsh*t?
Posted by: Tibor ||
07/14/2004 13:22 Comments ||
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The international Red Thingy Cross said Tuesday that it fears U.S. officials are holding terror suspects secretly in locations across the world.
Who, us?
The Geneva Conventions on the conduct of warfare require the United States to give the Red Thingy Cross access to prisoners of war and other detainees. "We have access to people detained by the United States in Guantanamo Bay, Afghanistan and Iraq, but in our understanding there are people that are detained outside these places for which we haven't received notification or access," said Antonella Notari, a spokeswoman for the International Committee of the Red Thingy Cross. The United States says it is cooperating with the organization and has allowed Red Thingy Cross delegates access to thousands of prisoners, including former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein. But Notari told The Associated Press that some suspects reported as arrested by the FBI on its Web site, or identified in media reports, are unaccounted for. "Some of these people who have been reported to be arrested never showed up in any of the places of detention run by the U.S. where we visit," Notari said.
Bwahahaha!!!
She said she had read media reports that some people are being held at Diego Garcia, a British-held island in the Indian Ocean used as a strategic military base by the United States, but the ICRTC has not been notified of any prisoners there.
Diego Garcia? Nothing about any prison on the website. Guess there's nothing to this "high-security, black-hole grade prison/interrogation facility" story. Move along.
"We just simply have absolutely no confirmation of this in any formal way," she said. The U.S. government has not officially responded to a Red Thingy Cross demand for notification of all detainees, including those held in undisclosed locations, she said.
That's the beauty of undisclosed locations.
Posted by: Steve ||
07/13/2004 11:17:12 AM ||
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As long as the ICRC is acting whore handmaiden to terrorism, why should we let them in?
#4
Tell ya what ICRC. Talk to a Mr. Zarqawi about access to his "detainees", get that squared away, and we'll talk.
Better hurry up though, as he's not a very patient man and it's tough talking to "detainees" when they don't have fucking heads.
#12
"The Geneva Conventions on the conduct of warfare require the United States to give the Red Cross access to prisoners of war and other detainees ."
Incorrect, I believe. POWs, yes, of course. "Other detainees"? I could have this wrong, but since the "other detainees" in question are clearly not POWs under the Conventions, and are also not interned neutrals or civilians or otherwise protected persons, I don't think ICRC has any standing to see them. As a matter of policy, the US generally grants ICRC access to the detainees, for example in Gitmo.
Anyone here know the specifics and whether I've got this right? Pretty sure the article is wrong -- in a way typical of media coverage of these issues since 9/11.
I don't need any confirmation that the ICRC has seriously departed from its core operational principles of neutrality and confidentiality. A part of this posted article noted that some had criticized the ICRC for not "speaking out" on problems it found with US detention activities it was allowed to inspect. A beautiful reminder of the widespread ignorance on this matter, and of the ridiculous anti-American bias not just of most media but the ICRC itself. The ICRC managed to leak some of its Iraq reports to pile on during the height of the Abu Ghraib hysteria -- a very, very big deal, one made even more contemptible by the ICRC holding a press conference to discuss the leak. Then there's the comical performance of the ICRC's B'dad rep, who denounced the US attack on the western Iraqi village ("the wedding party") instantly, before possibly having any serious info on what actually happened. And on, and on.
#13
FUCK the red cross, FUCK the red crescent, FUCK the u.n., FUCK phrancistan,(formerly known as france), Fuck canadianistan,..... FUCK 'EM ALL
The red cross only represents the bad guys anyway. They can go straight to HELL! What has the red cross EVER done for the U.S.A.? NOTHING!!
Posted by: Halfass Pete ||
07/13/2004 14:21 Comments ||
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#14
Verlaine,
You are spot on. So, what exactly is a POW? Let's look behind Door #1:
Geneva Conventions of 1949
Article 4. A. Prisoners of war, in the sense of the present Convention, are persons belonging to one of the following categories, who have fallen into the power of the enemy:
(1) Members of the armed forces of a Party to the conflict, as well as members of militias or volunteer corps forming part of such armed forces.
(2) Members of other militias and members of other volunteer corps, including those of organized resistance movements, belonging to a Party to the conflict and operating in or outside their own territory, even if this territory is occupied, provided that such militias or volunteer corps, including such organized resistance movements, fulfil the following conditions:[
(a) that of being commanded by a person responsible for his subordinates; (b) that of having a fixed distinctive sign recognizable at a distance;
(c) that of carrying arms openly;
(d) that of conducting their operations in accordance with the laws and customs of war.
#17
#11 "Tell 'em we'll only talk to Magen David Adom."
I like that idea. At least they wouldn't be carrying suicide bombers. And the 'other detainees' would assume they were carrying Mossad agents and panic... I like it!
Posted by: Kathy K ||
07/13/2004 19:06 Comments ||
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Three Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILT) rebels who are said to be protecting illegal fishermen were killed in a clash with government forces off the southern Philippine city of Zamboanga on Monday, the military reported Tuesday. The clash with the disgruntled MILF rebels occurred early Monday at the vicinity of Barangay Licomo, Vitali district, local Army Infantry Division commander Major General Trifonio Salazar said in a statement.
Disgruntled because they got busted down to fish patrol?
Elements of the local infantry battalion were conducting sea patrol when they spotted the 10 armed men from the MILF and protector of illegal fishing, Army spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Buenaventura Pascual said in a statement. Pascual said the rebels withdrew after a five-minute exchange of clash. Based on information from fishermen in the area, Pascual said the enemy suffered at least three fatalities whose bodies were dragged by their comrades. Likewise, the military Tuesday said three members of the Abu Sayyaf kidnap-for-ransom was killed during a 45-minute clash at Barangay (village) Tanum in Patikul town, Sulu province in the southern Philippines on Saturday. The killed victims include a sub-leader of Radulan Sahiron, identified as Anni Jalmaani, who was together with about 30 bandits at the time of the clash.
Picking them off one by one.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
07/13/2004 9:48:08 AM ||
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Pascual said the rebels withdrew after a five-minute exchange of clash.
A report by a Brussels-based think tank says Jemaah Islamiah (JI) is using connections with Filipino Muslim rebels to train replacements for members arrested after the Bali bombings. The International Crisis Group (ICG) says graduates from camps in the southern Philippines have revitalised JI ranks at home in Indonesia.
They have launched terror attacks in the Philippines itself and breathed new life into the Abu Sayyaf militants.
Abu Sayyaf provides shelter and security for the camps, JI provides funding and training in advanced booming techniques.
The ICG report says the Philippines is crucial to the evolving terrorist threat in South-East Asia. Since the mid-1990s, it has become a main training ground for JI and other Islamic extremist groups.
Afghanistan East.
The report says weak policing, especially in the south, "continues to make it a country of convenience for âlone wolfâ operators and cells of various jihadist organisations." Such groups, including Al Qaeda in the past, "rely on the enabling environment of long-term separatist insurgencies in the southern Philippines". The report says the most serious threat "is the possibility of international terrorism and domestic insurgency becoming ever more closely interwoven and mutually reinforcing".
The continuing connections between JI and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) could also endanger the peace process in the southern Philippines, says the report. "While the MILF leadership continues to deny any ties, all evidence points to ongoing operational and training links," it says.
Which the Philippine government pretends it doesn't see.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
07/13/2004 9:27:56 AM ||
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A report by a Brussels-based think tank says Jemaah Islamiah..
I dunno, but every time I see this name I think of pancakes, waffles, and syrup.....
Many sectors in the country -- from Luzon to Mindanao, including the Moro and communist guerrillas -- have trained their attention to only one issue these days: making an appeal to President Arroyo to order the return of the Philippine humanitarian contingent from Iraq in order to save the life of overseas Filipino worker Angelo de la Cruz. The call has been aired by many Filipinos since de la Cruz, a truck driver in Saudi Arabia, was snatched by his captors while driving a truck to Iraq on Wednesday. De la Cruz, 46, is in danger of being beheaded unless the Philippine government withdraws its 51-man humanitarian contingent from Iraq. On Monday several proposals from different quarters also came out in an effort to solve the impasse.
Meanwhile, the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF ) has expressed its willingness to help the Philippine government in saving the life of de la Cruz. MILF peace panel negotiator Mohagher Iqbal said on Monday the Front has received appeals from Christian groups, militant organizations, and well-meaning Muslim and Christian individuals in Mindanao to intercede in behalf of de la Cruz. Iqbal said the groups are asking the Front to do whatever it can to help save the life of de la Cruz.
For a fee, of course.
He clarified, however, that the task is not easy because the MILF has no link with the captors.
"No, no! Certainly not!"
"It is up to the MILF central committee to decide how to help the hostage. This is a matter of utmost urgency where every second counts," Iqbal pointed out. However, he clarified that in calling for the freeing of the Filipino hostage, the Front would also call for the withdrawal of all foreign troops occupying Iraq, including the Filipino humanitarian contingent, in order to free the Iraqi people and give them back their full independence. In a separate statement, Communist Party of the Philippines spokesman Gregorio "Ka Roger" Rosal vowed rebels "will exert all effort to make sure that the head of the puppet [Philippine] government would also fall" if de la Cruz loses his life.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
07/13/2004 12:16:17 AM ||
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While back in Mullahland ....
Iran ruled out on Monday holding direct talks with the United States on its nuclear program. "There is no justification for accepting suggestions to hold negotiations with a country which adopts a bullying attitude toward others," Hassan Rohani, secretary-general of Iranâs Supreme National Security Council, told state television. Washington accuses Iran of trying to develop nuclear weapons. Tehran says its ambitions are limited to generating electricity from nuclear reactors. Mohamed ElBaradei, head of the U.N. nuclear watchdog the International Atomic Energy Agency, had told U.S. policymakers in March that Iran might be open to a deal and suggested direct U.S. contacts with Tehran, U.S. officials said. Washington broke ties with Tehran following its Islamic revolution in 1979.
Rohani also played down negotiations with Germany, France and Britain and said Iran held talks with them in the past year because the big three European powers initiated the dialogue. "The other party to the negotiations for us is the International Atomic Energy Agency and we have nothing to do with any other country," he said. "If we are talking with the Europeans countries, it is because we have normal relations with them and they took the initiative to do so." The IAEA board passed a resolution in June that rebuked Tehran for not fully cooperating with IAEA inspectors. In retaliation, Iran said it was resuming production and testing of centrifuges, which can be used to enrich uranium, ending an agreement with the European states that it would suspend such activities.
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
07/13/2004 7:17:27 PM ||
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"There is no justification for accepting suggestions to hold negotiations with a country which adopts a bullying attitude toward others,"
Yeah, Black Turbans, we are in total agreement on that issue. See ya later. Oh, by the way, watch your borders, fuel trucks, students, women, young men, well, hell, anything within your borders. Have a nice day.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
07/13/2004 19:20 Comments ||
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Who are these guys trying to kid? There's nothing to talk about, as they probably wouldn't honor any sort of agreement anyway (like Kim Chee Jong Ill).
DIRECT FROM THE PRINCE ABDULLAH INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMACY SCHOOL
Iran's Supreme Leader said on Tuesday he believed the United States and Israel, rather than Muslims, were behind the kidnapping and killing of foreign nationals in Iraq. "We seriously suspect the agents Americans and Israelis in conducting such horrendous terrorist moves," the official IRNA news agency quoted Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei as saying in a meeting with visiting Singaporean Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong. Yeah, and we've almost mastered weather control too.
Wait till we get the shuttle flying again with our earthquake machine!
Don't need no space shuttle. I've got one in my basement now...
"(We) cannot believe that the people who kidnap Philippine nationals, for instance, or beheaded U.S. nationals are Muslims." And we cannot believe that you are such stupid ignorant lying sh!ts as to bother wasting everybody's oxygen by blathering about utter surreality.
Radical Islamic groups opposed to the presence of U.S.-led forces in Iraq have claimed responsibility for the kidnappings of foreign nationals there. In fluent Arabic and covered on Al-Jazeera
A group calling itself the Islamic Army in Iraq has demanded the withdrawal of Filipino troops from Iraq by July 20 in return for the freedom of kidnapped Filipino truck driver Angelo de la Cruz. Iran frequently trades barbed rhetoric with its arch foes the United States and Israel, which accuse Tehran of sponsoring terrorist groups and developing nuclear arms. But Khamenei said Iran was committed to fighting terrorism. Just as soon as you're all done with beating your wives.
Depends on your definition of terrorism...
"Terrorism is a loathsome, horrible phenomenon and the Islamic Republic of Iran has deeply felt its consequences ever since many years ago and that is the reason why we consider the campaign against terrorism not only essential but also of great importance," he said. We'll remember you said that, hypocritical @sshole! Stop winding your turban onto your head with a block and tackle and maybe the blood flow will return to your brain. Until then, STFU!
KILL ALL OF THE IRANIAN MULLAHS NOW!
THEY ARE OF NO USE TO THE HUMAN RACE.
Posted by: Zenster ||
07/13/2004 5:03:12 AM ||
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KILL ALL OF THE IRANIAN MULLAHS NOW!
Zenster,
Wouldn't you rather let them live, powerless, among a free people? Or, like Saddam, suffer the humiliation of being judged by their former subjects, to live or die at *their* sufferance?
#3
After hearing him lie in such a ludicrous way how can anyone doubt they are lying about not harbouring terrorists too. To me this is as good as an admission of guilt.
That's all the evidence I need, when do we attack?
#6
Zenster,
Wouldn't you rather let them live, powerless, among a free people? Or, like Saddam, suffer the humiliation of being judged by their former subjects, to live or die at *their* sufferance?
trailing wife, in some cases I advocate enduring shame as a truly severe punishment. Not here. The Iranian mullahs represent the most virulent sort of pathological religious meme. Their deceit and prevarication go to almost primal levels and it must not be allowed to spread.
Like the ebola virus, any level of exposure can be fatal. There is little way to build up a resistance to such an infectious pathogen. It is better to sterilize the entire "hot zone" and go from there. Consider just how much terrorism Iran has already sponsored and then compare that to what they promise to do once they have nuclear weapons, death is the only answer.
I'm not calling for the liquidation of all Muslims. All I want is the Iranian people out from under these murderous, tyrannical, lying thugs. Iran is a picture perfect example of Islam brought into full political flower (as its true intent decrees). The mullahs are guiding Iran on an ultimate nuclear suicide mission. Their blind hatred of Israel and all things Western make them both predictable and extremely dangerous.
Iran's entire population is at risk of being consumed in their mullah's fantasized (but what will be pyric) victory of annihilating Israel. The Land of David will not go quietly into the night. Iran's possession of an atomic bomb spells doom for the entire Middle East. If subjected to nuclear attack, I do not think Israel would hesitate to immolate the entire surrounding Arab populations, nor would I blame them. On their way out, the Jews may as well cleanse the region of their historic enemy and, from all appearances, they would be doing this world a favor.
Harsh words, I know. Ayatollah Kahmenie represents the ne plus ultra of Islamic bigotry and deceit. His entire regime is rotten from head to toe. As with damaged buildings which are so structurally unsound that they cannot even be occupied in order for repairs to commence, so it is with Iran's government. Little, save the filing cabinets and desks, will serve another incoming body of politicians in good stead. Iran's entire moral and socioeconomic fabric is rotted clean through. As with bristlecone pine trees, Iran may benefit best from a brush fire sweeping its halls of law. If they are allowed to continue unfettered, a greater cataclysm awaits not just Iran, but the entire region.
TEHRAN: Iranian President Mohammad Khatami on Monday accused the UN nuclear watchdog of double standards and told it to pay closer attention to countries that had not signed up to global anti-proliferation safeguards. In a meeting with visiting Singaporean Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong, Khatami reaffirmed that nuclear weapons had "no place" in the Islamic repubcic's defence doctrine and that he was campaigning for a Middle East free of such arms. According to the IRNA news agency, Khatami "expressed regret over the double standards approach towards those countries possessing nuclear weapons", a reference to Iran's view that it is being unfairly targetted by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) while Israel has escaped major pressure. "If atomic weapons are dangerous, then the world should be concerned about atomic programs of those countries that are not members of the International Atomic Energy Agency," Khatami was quoted as saying. He loves to push all the wrong international buttons.
Iran has been subject to more than a year of tough IAEA inspections related to suspicions it is seeking to develop the atomic bomb under cover of its efforts to generate nuclear power, as well as the target of a string of IAEA resolutions criticising its level of cooperation. The Islamic republic's arch-foe Israel, widely believed to possess a nuclear arsenal, is not a signatory of the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and hence not subject to IAEA supervision. During a visit to Israel last week, IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei made little progress on his hopes for a Middle East free of nuclear weapons, with Israel holding fast to its longstanding "strategic ambiguity" policy of secrecy about whether it has nuclear weapons and its refusal to sign the NPT.
Singapore's prime minister arrived in Tehran for a five-day visit Monday for a string of talks mostly focussed on trade issues. But the nuclear issue was raised, as Singapore will soon be taking a seat on the IAEA's executive, the board of governors. According to IRNA, Goh will also pay his respects to Iran's late revolutionary leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini by visiting mausoleum in southern Tehran. He will also travel to the historic city of Isfahan in central Iran.
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
07/13/2004 12:12:11 AM ||
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#6
Someday they'll have them unless we kill them all and shut off their funds
Well that's the plan then, agreed?
Posted by: Frank G ||
07/13/2004 22:50 Comments ||
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Two years ago, based on scanty information, CNS concluded that such weapons (a) existed and (b) were intended for special forces of the Ministry of Defense (Spetsnaz). We also tentatively sketched the likely characteristics of these weapons. Newly available information confirms and expands these conclusions. It has been disclosed that these weapons were indeed intended for Spetsnaz. Two versions of these devices were created - RA-155 for the army and RA-115-01 for the navy (to be used under water). The weight of one device was 30 kilograms and it could be armed by a single operator in just 10 minutes.[4] These weapons, which were called "nuclear backpacks" ("yadernyi ranets"), had a yield of 0.5 to 2 kilotons and could contaminate areas of up to 10 square kilometers. They were kept at only two secret storage facilities and had never been released to troops.[5]
Information vital for the assessment of the threat presented by these weapons if they had fallen into the wrong hands has also been confirmed, namely that "nuclear suitcases" have a very short shelf-life and have protection against unauthorized use. The former director of Research Institute No. 4 (the research arm of the Strategic Rocket Forces) General (ret.) Vladimir Dvorkin confirmed that portable nuclear devices were designed in such a way that they could not remain in the ready-to-use status for a long time because certain components had to be periodically replaced by experts[6] (sources quoted in the CNS report mentioned regular maintenance at six-month intervals). In addition to some type of permissive action link (PAL) device, they were also protected against attempts to forcibly remove electronic locks. In the event of such an attempt, the weapon automatically switched into a "non-use" mode and would not explode.[7]
In addition to the above, it's my understanding that the smaller the weapon, the "hotter" the fissile material must be and thus the more difficult it is to handle. In addition the decay of the hotter material leads to isotope problems developing rather quickly and rendering the weapon less effective/useless. If you thought of it as the usable shelf-life of the weapon decreasing something like exponentially with the size of the core you probably wouldn't be far off.
#8
Here's a link to a good discussion about "micro nukes" http://www.geocities.com/wecontrolamerica/bali2.html"
I have to express some respect for the author's observations and analysis, and even his conclusions, but - I have a lot of questions about his attribution of responsibility.
The acting director of the CIA said Tuesday that Osama bin Laden must be aware of any planning for a terrorist attack to disrupt the U.S. elections because operatives believed involved in the plot have been closely associated with him. In an interview with The Associated Press, John McLaughlin, who took over the agency this week while President Bush decides who to name as permanent director, also said the CIA has enough personnel in Iraq to recruit the necessary intelligence sources there. McLaughlin's rise from deputy to acting director came after Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge warned last week of a heightened period of alert for a terrorist attack, given the upcoming elections and assessments indicating Muslim extremists may want to disrupt the democratic process and influence the outcome. McLaughlin said Ridge based his announcement on "very solid" information. Although local terrorist cells appear to have more autonomy, McLaughlin said bin Laden is still thought to be knowledgeable of any plotting under way. "It would be very hard for me to imagine that he is not aware of all of this planning because the people responsible for it are people with a history of close association with him," McLaughlin said. Last week, a senior intelligence official, briefing reporters on the condition of anonymity, said U.S. authorities were working to understand whether cells were part of the al-Qaeda organization or offshoots of it.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
07/13/2004 9:20:18 PM ||
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"aware" as in "alive"?
Posted by: Frank G ||
07/13/2004 21:28 Comments ||
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Lawyers for two Algerian terror suspects at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, said Tuesday they filed a lawsuit challenging the U.S. government's authority to hold the men and saying they were wrongly handed over to American forces in Bosnia. The lawsuit was filed Monday in U.S. District Court in Washington, lead attorney Stephen Oleskey said from Boston. (Must be a Kerry delegate)
Lakhdar Boumediene and Mohammed Nechla were doing relief work in Bosnia when they were detained in 2001, according to the suit, which demands the U.S. government justify their detentions or free them. "There is no lawful basis for their detention, and they should be released," said Steven Watt, a lawyer involved in several Guantanamo cases for the New York-based Center for Constitutional Rights. The challenges follow similar lawsuits brought earlier this month on behalf of nine detainees at the U.S. Naval base in Cuba. The U.S. military maintains the nearly 600 detainees there are "enemy combatants" captured in the Afghanistan war and suspected of links to the fallen Taliban regime or al-Qaida.
All the planes that brought detainees to Guantanamo originated in Afghanistan, said Army Lt. Col. Leon Sumpter, a spokesman. Lawyers for the Algerians, however, say they were not al-Qaida members, had no links to terrorism and were not involved in the Afghan conflict. The lawsuit says neither man "was in or near Afghanistan, or any other theater of war" when they were detained. The lawyers said the two Algerians were among six arrested by Bosnian police in October 2001. Bosnian authorities said the police, investigating possible al-Qaida cells, acted on a tip-off from U.S. authorities who suspected the six of threatening U.S. and British embassies. Their lawyers appealed to Bosnia's top human rights court, the Human Rights Chamber. On Jan. 17, 2002, a few hours before the men were to be released for lack of evidence, Bosnian police handed over the six to U.S. authorities, acting on a late-night request. Their families sued the Bosnian government at the Human Rights Chamber, which ruled the families should be paid compensation. In December, the Bosnian government said it would offer each family $19,000. The latest lawsuit was prepared with the consent of the Algerians' wives, Oleskey said. The men, like most at Guantanamo, have not been allowed contact with lawyers.
So far, 15 detainees have been designated to stand trial by military tribunals, including three charged with offenses including war crimes conspiracy. In response to a June 28 Supreme Court ruling, U.S. officials said they began notifying detainees Monday that they may challenge their detentions in American courts, and challenge their status as "enemy combatants" before military panels.
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
07/13/2004 7:40:54 PM ||
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Ten years ago, fellow inmates remember, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi emerged as the tough-guy captain of his cellblock. In the brutish dynamic of prison life, that meant doling out chores. "He'd say, 'You bring the food; you clean the floor,' " recalled Khalid Abu Doma, who was jailed with Mr. Zarqawi for plotting against the Jordanian government. "He didn't have great ideas. But people listened to him because they feared him."
A thug boy!
In Jordan, where he stamped strong impressions on people as he climbed the ladder of outlaw groups, friends and associates described the making of a militant. They say he grew up in rough-and-tumble circumstances and adopted religion with the same intensity he showed for drinking and fighting, though he became far less a revolutionary mastermind than a dull-witted hothead with gruff charisma.
Russian border guards patrolling Tajikistan's border with Afghanistan seized some 120 kilograms of heroin destined for Western markets. A border-guard spokesman said today that the haul has an estimated street value of $1.5 billion. The spokesman did not say when the heroin was seized. Tajikistan is a main smuggling route for drugs destined for Western markets from Afghanistan, the producer of about 80 percent of the world's opium, from which heroin is made. Since the beginning of the year, Tajik police have confiscated a total of 3.5 tons of heroin. Last year, Tajik authorities confiscated a record 5.6 tons of Afghan heroin. Tajikistan shares a 1,340-kilometer border with Afghanistan, which is patrolled by thousands of Tajik and Russian troops.
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
07/13/2004 9:57:46 PM ||
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That represents one helluvalotta bleeding (literally) poppies!
Suspected Taliban fighters have killed two local Afghan police chiefs in the past day in separate incidents. Khalid Pashtun, a spokesman for the governor of Kandahar Province, said that Taliban militants attacked and set fire to a district police headquarters last night, killing the local police chief. In Ghazni Province, a police chief and his driver were killed today in a suspected Taliban ambush. The incidents are the latest in a wave of violence in Afghanistan tied to loyalists of the ousted Taliban regime. On 11 July, at least five people were killed in a bomb attack in the western city of Herat. Police in Herat Province today said they have detained three men suspected of masterminding the attack. In another incident, a senior Afghan commander, General Khial Baz, said a mine exploded near his car late yesterday, but he escaped uninjured.
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
07/13/2004 9:55:03 PM ||
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Chechnyaâs acting president escaped an assassination attempt Tuesday when an explosion tore through his motorcade, although one of his bodyguards was killed and three other people were wounded, officials said. Sergei Abramov, who was appointed to lead the Kremlin-backed Chechen government after the May 9 assassination of Akhmad Kadyrov, was not injured by the roadside blast in the ruined Chechen capital of Grozny. The attack came six weeks ahead of a scheduled presidential election in Chechnya.
The explosion underscored Russian forcesâ inability to purge insurgents from the city, despite a huge troop presence, and challenged Kremlin contentions that Chechnya is stabilizing after nearly five years of war. Earlier, Chechen officials said 18 members of the presidential security forces and 24 rebels were killed about 20 miles outside Grozny near the village of Avtury -- some of the bloodiest fighting in months. The explosion that hit the convoy was believed to have been a land mine set off by remote control, a method frequently used by separatist rebels to kill and demoralize Russian forces. One of Abramovâs guards, who was in a car following the presidentâs, was killed and three others were wounded, the ITAR-Tass news agency quoted Chechen Prosecutor Vladimir Kravchenko as saying. Abramov was en route to an inspection of a construction site, ITAR-Tass said. Such inspection trips are an important symbolic component of the Chechen administrationâs efforts to portray life as returning to normal in Grozny, much of which is a jagged landscape of war-ruined buildings.
Russia, unable to defeat the rebels and refusing to negotiate with them, has focused on trying to undermine support for the militants with civic improvement projects and by conducting elections in the republic. But rebels and their supporters have inflicted a series of brazen terrorist acts, including the explosion at a stadium that killed Kadyrov; the 2002 truck-bombing of the Moscow-backed Chechen governmentâs headquarters, which killed 72 people; and last yearâs truck bombing of a military hospital treating soldiers wounded in Chechnya.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
07/13/2004 7:42:23 PM ||
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Israeli helicopters fired missiles at suspected weapons-making factories in Gaza City, the army said. Plumes of black smoke were seen rising above buildings in the south-eastern Zeitoun neighbourhood. There were no immediate reports of casualties. An army spokesman was quoted by Reuters news agency as saying several workshops in the same building were hit. There have been a number of homemade rockets on Jewish settlements in Gaza and surrounding Israeli towns. "The Israeli air force attacked weaponry workshops, all in the same structure... used by Hamas terrorists and other terrorist organisations to produce a variety of weapons, especially Qassam rockets," said the spokesman in Jerusalem. The Associated Press reported that the attack started a huge fire, and Palestinian firefighters battled to stop flames spreading to nearby buildings.
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
07/13/2004 7:30:22 PM ||
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#1
Rooters headline tomorrow: "Palestinian Freedom Fighter Employment Centres Destroyed by Zionist Gunships - UN,ICJ Appeals to Sharon to Stop War Crimes"
Posted by: Frank G ||
07/13/2004 20:07 Comments ||
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Sounds like a another tough night in the "metal shop" district. The unemployment office at UNWRA will be open early tomorrow.
Slightly EFL'd. Hat tip to the mighty Instapundit.
Al Qaeda operations in Iraq have encountered unexpected problems. Iraqis have become increasingly hostile to al Qaeda's suicide bombing campaign. Religious leaders, which al Qaeda expects to get support from, have been openly denouncing these bombings. Iraqis, aware that they are more likely, than American soldiers, to be victims of these attacks, are providing more information on where the al Qaeda members are hiding out. So much for the "general uprising" theory.
Most of the al Qaeda in Iraq are foreigners, and easy for Iraqis to detect. "Hey, you ain't from around here!"
As a result of this, many of the al Qaeda men have moved back to Fallujah, which has become a terrorist roach trap sanctuary. The interim government is trying to convince the tribal and religious leaders of Fallujah to back a military operation in the city to clear out the various al Qaeda, criminal and Baath Party gangs. But the gangs of Fallujah are quick to threaten any local leader that shows signs of supporting the government. While the Fallujah leadership is intimidated, many residents of Fallujah are not, and are providing information to the coalition, which has led to attacks, with smart bombs or coalition and Iraqi troops, on buildings used by al Qaeda, or other gangs, as headquarters. While flattening Fallujah with an arc light strike or three might have been viscerally satisfying, it appears that the people in charge of the war know what they're doing. It also appears that there are a number of friendlies in Fallujah.
Al Qaeda has found the atmosphere even more hostile elsewhere in Iraq, and many of the terrorists have returned home. This is especially true of those who came from Saudi Arabia (and other Gulf nations, particularly Yemen) and Syria. . . . Al Qaeda is dominated by Sunni Moslems who are often violently anti-Shia. A point not greatly appreciated by the pro-terrorist Left, who assumed (in accordance with their fantasy ideology) that the Shia would join in "solidarity" with their Sunni "brothers" against "U.S. imperialism."
While the hundreds of returning al Qaeda veterans are still determined to achieve al Qaeda's goals of world domination, they are also more realistic. Fanaticism was not sufficient to chase the foreigners from Iraq, and the Arab media's sensational, and largely false, reporting of the impact of al Qaeda's attacks contributed to the disillusionment. Instapundit comments: "Al Jazeera -- CIA tool!" As a result of inflated claims that don't pan out, both al-Jiz and al-Q lose credibility with their followers.
Saudi Arabia and Syria are seeing an increase in al Qaeda activity because of the return of these survivors of the Iraq operations. However, many of those Saudis and Syrians who went to Iraq, didn't come back. [Insert ululation here.]
Casualties were heavy, and the guys who ran like frightened ducks had more on the ball, and were luckier, made it back to carry out al Qaeda's plans in their home countries. D'ya suppose that al-Q's best and brightest took most of the casualties, while the less committed beat feet? It's certainly possible.
Here, al Qaeda wants to establish Islamic republics, and drive out infidels (non-Moslems.) This is much harder to do in Syria, which has an experienced secret police and security organization which has crushed Islamic radicals in the past. If Baby Assad's goon squads want to kill off a few hundred bad guys for us, I can work with that.
Saudi Arabia has also put down Islamic radicals in the past, but has a much less effective oppressive police force than Syria. . . . All the Persian Gulf nations are seeing an increase in al Qaeda activity, especially in Yemen. Here, in the homeland of the bin Laden family, al Qaeda has always been active. But the Yemen government had made deals with many of the pro-al Qaeda tribes to keep the violence down. Unfortunately, that "arrangement" allowed al Qaeda to establish sanctuaries for recuperation and training. "When life gives you Yemen, make Yemenaide!"
While the surviving al Qaeda members are pretty clueless about the futility of their operations, many Arabs, in particular, and Moslems in general, are. Even Moslem journalists are starting to point out that al Qaeda consistently loses, and tends to hurt Moslems more than infidels. Moslem media is still eager to push al Qaeda as heroes, but the illusion is wearing thin and time is working against the "holy warriors". In other words, we're winning.
Posted by: Mike ||
07/13/2004 12:51:22 PM ||
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#1
Well, the title should maybe be,
"Why Al Qaeda is sequestering itself in Fallujah"
although actually I think Al Q is in a few other cities in the sunni triangle
#2
Attrition of Al Qaeda forces is the name of the game. Just like the Paleos, they lose their most rabid and fanatic, leaving intellectually challenged cannon fodder. Great comments, also, Mike.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
07/13/2004 13:21 Comments ||
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I think that in all of Iraq, the arrogant pinworm Sunnis have been and were long suspected of being the most annoying. It is one of the hardest things to do: convince someone to surrender power that they have held for years.
So why not the abject lesson of the alternative? How do these people like being under the thumb of their Moslem brothers? Do they feel more empowered under what is effectively Sharia Law, or really, The Law of the Gun?
It will really start to put pressure on them when the see the elections getting closer, with them on the outside, getting the worst of both worlds--disenfranchisement because of the troublemakers *and* being lorded over by them at the same time.
The clock is ticking if they wish to retain any power at all in the new Iraq. The prospect of coming in a far #3 behind Shiites *and* Kurds must really make them shudder.
Twenty-four rebels have been killed in a series of armed clashes outside the Shali districtâs village of Avtury over the past 24 hours, Chechen Deputy Interior Minister Ruslan Alkhanov told Interfax on Tuesday. "The fight continued for several hours" after Chechen presidential security service units had spotted this rebel group near Avtury, Alkhanov said. "A reliable report suggests that 24 rebels have been killed. We are searching for the rest of the rebels. The village of Avtury has been sealed off and an operation to find the rebels and detain them is in progress," he said. "Eighteen servicemen of the [Chechen presidential security service] have been killed," Alkhanov said.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
07/13/2004 10:10:04 AM ||
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An explosion hit the motorcade of Chechnya's acting president on Tuesday, the Interfax news agency reported. Sergei Abramov was unhurt but other casualties were reported. Chechnya's acting president escaped injury in the Chechen capital Tuesday when an explosion hit his motorcade, but one person was killed and three were wounded, officials and news reports said. Sergei Abramov took over administration of the violence-plagued region when President Akhmad Kadyrov was assassinated in May. The Interfax news agency said the dead victim was one of Abramov's bodyguards and that one vehicle in the column of cars was damaged. A Chechen official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the victims were not traveling in Abramov's car. The Chechen official said one person was killed and three were wounded in the blast. Interfax and the ITAR-Tass news agency reported one dead and two injured. Abramov aide Igor Tarasov told Interfax the explosion occurred as the motorcade was traveling through Grozny's violent Lenin district.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
07/13/2004 10:11:14 AM ||
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EFL & Hat tip to LilGreenBalls
Iraqi police seized more than 500 criminal suspects in raids in Baghdad Tuesday, an Interior Ministry source said. There are police in Iraq? Hey, wherd they come from?
"Till now the police have arrested 527 people in Rusafa," the source said, referring to a swathe of Baghdad on the east bank of the Tigris river. He said the raids had begun in the early hours and were still under way. The number (of detainees) is more than we expected," he told Reuters, adding that those held included suspected drug dealers and weapons traders. Raids? Wait a minute. The country is in disarray. Why ITS FALLING APART AT THE SEAMS!
He said the raids would continue in the Rusafa area, and would be expanded to other areas of the capital. Hehehehehehe.
Posted by: Dragon Fly ||
07/13/2004 9:58:59 AM ||
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#1
I think this kind of thing is only going to increase. The Iraqis know who the criminals are. Removing them takes out a security concern and potential hired guns for Zarqawi. I am shocked, shocked I tell you, that I did not see this on the front page of the NYT. (Course I wouldn't read that rag for money.)
Posted by: remote man ||
07/13/2004 12:16 Comments ||
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Iraq begins to clean itself up
First Iraq... next France.
Buy shower curtains or prepare for
the communal tub.
Posted by: Field Marshall L Buoy ||
07/13/2004 14:02 Comments ||
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I hope the Iraqi police remember to read these guys their Miranda rights.
Posted by: Matt ||
07/13/2004 14:03 Comments ||
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Matt - Instead of Miranda, I think you're referring to the Al Fuqyou rights. Just thinking out loud, here...
#5
On-the-spot reporting from Iraq The Model: The IP carried out a huge campaign yesterday to clean up Baghdad from criminals. I heard in the news that hundreds of suspects were detained in the operation but I didn't believe the number until Al-Sharqiya TV broadcasted pictures for the arrested suspects and the scene was awesome; the detainees looked stunned as the operation was quiet surprising and unexpected as this kind of preventive strikes by IP is totally new.
Many people may think that the number is so big, and I myself had doubts that maybe there were many innocents among the detainees but knowing that the operation was performed in Bab Al-Sheikh and Al-Kifah neighborhoods explained everything.
These two areas have always been recognized by Iraqis as rich habitats for many gangs responsible for drug dealing, car jacking, murders, looting and burgling and I even believe that there are still many more of them to get busted but hopefully when those watch their colleagues being captured they will think twice before they continue with their crimes.
Something that worth mentioning is that when you walk in these areas you can see pro-Saddam slogans covering most of the walls and in my opinion thereâs a strong relation between ordinary criminals and the âresistanceâ as each group serves the otherâs interests; as a thief would love to see chaos spread everywhere and would make use of attacks that target the security forces because this would provide a favorable environment for his work. On the other hand, the âresistanceâ and their allies would like to see more crimes to prove their theory that things were better off in the past and that the change in Iraq has made things only worse. The routes through which drugs are being smuggled are most likely to be the same ones used to smuggle explosives.
This operation was accomplished with almost no casualties among the security forces and in a remarkably short time. The action was highly organized and performed in coordination with the special intelligence department in the IP, as a senior officer stated in an interview for Al-Hurra TV, he also mentioned that satellite images provided by the multinational forces made the job much easier as it helped to specify the exact locations of the suspects and prevented unnecessary casualties among IP members or civilians.
This is the second time in this month where IP (with logistic support from the multinational forces) carry out such a large operation; the first one was in Battaween area which is another stronghold for criminals and more than 150 gangsters were arrested.
Posted by: Steve ||
07/13/2004 15:24 Comments ||
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CNN has been forced to cover this Iraqi success.
How will the NYTimes and WashPost be able to minimize the success - we'll see tomorrow.
You may be right. However, the usual tactic is to quash the good news with a combination of rehased old news and minimization,
e.g., "Iraqi police make progress amidst chaos" or
"Electricity still out in Iraq but arrests are up"
or
"New Iraqi prisoners will not go to Abu Graif"
#12
What about the Conspiracy to intentionally cover up the Camp Roberts Incident? The Sexual Assault of a male soldier and cover up from the top to the bottom.
Why have the Governor of California, the President of the United States, and Congressman Issa not helped this soldier?
Why has this soldiers plt sgt been blackballed for seeking justice for his soldier?
WHY?
Posted by: leo ||
08/17/2004 1:16 Comments ||
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A minor girl was killed and at least 14 people, including six members of security forces, were wounded as fierce clashes between militants and paramilitary forces continued in the troubled South Waziristan region on Monday. The three-day-long intense fighting between security forces and militants is taking a heavy toll on civilians as a large number of families were seen moving to safer places to escape the relentless shelling, eyewitnesses said. At least six soldiers were wounded, two of them seriously, when an army vehicle hit a land-mine in Azam Warsak near the Afghan border. The seriously wounded soldiers were flown to Peshawar. Witnesses said the army vehicle was carrying water for soldiers when it hit the explosive device on the road. Inter services Public Relations (ISPR) Director-General Maj-Gen Shaukat Sultan confirmed the incident, but did not give exact figures of casualties.
Talking to Dawn by telephone, the spokesman said that unprovoked attacks by militants were inviting the artillery response from the army as overall situation in the region was under control. Unofficial reports said that the militants had destroyed a checkpoint of the security forces in the Pine-forest-covered Mantoi area, north of Shkai, on Sunday night. The number of casualties could not be ascertained in that attack. Thousands of paramilitary forces and army soldiers and hardened militants were exchanging heavy artillery shells and machineguns fire and missiles, targeting each other round the clock. Reports collected from different sources said that one minor girl was killed and eight others, including four women, were wounded in Santoi, Mantoi, Dand and Owarbad areas, north of Shakai.
In Dand area an artillery shell hit a house of a tribesman in Malikshahi, wounding four women. Four people, including two children, were wounded seriously when a shell hit the house of Kalam Mahsud in Owarbad area while a religious seminary also came under attack in Santoi area. The building was partially damaged. Reports said that the ongoing clashes between the troops and the foreign militants and their local supporters had badly affected life in the region.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
07/13/2004 9:53:38 AM ||
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Suspected Al Qaeda militants fired mortars at an army post in South -Waziristan on Tuesday, the latest attack in at least two days of fighting in the rugged border region where security forces have been hunting down members of the terrorist group, an army spokesman said. Three mortars fired by suspected Al Qaeda militants in the attack early Tuesday missed the post in Khamrang,
al-Q was trained by Hek's mortar company.
... a village near Wana, the main town of South Waziristan, said Maj. Gen. Shaukat Sultan, the chief army spokesman. Sultan said security forces and suspected Al Qaeda loyalists have clashed in South Waziristan over the past two days. No injuries have been reported in the fighting, though three paramilitary soldiers were injured when a land mine exploded near a vehicle carrying them in the vicinity of Wana on Monday.
Sultan denied a front-page report in The News, the nation's largest English-language daily, that some 10 civilians had been killed in a crossfire, mostly around the nearby town of Shakai. He did say, however, that there were sporadic clashes near the town Monday night. Shakai was the scene of an operation by Pakistani forces last month that left about 100 militants and Pakistani soldiers dead.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
07/13/2004 9:50:55 AM ||
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#1
Why o' why won't "suspected Al Qaeda militants" cross the Afghani side of the border so US forces can kill them? It seems, they are shirking the duties of the AQ charter to fight the Americans.
Posted by: ed ||
07/13/2004 10:20 Comments ||
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Over 25,000 Jehadis, who have undergone terrorist training in Afghanistan, are operating in the troubled port city of Karachi and Punjab province targeting Shias and continuing with their anti-Indian activities unbriddled, media reports said here. ''The Jehadis are continuing to kill Shias quite freely. In some cases the Police has been found involved in the Shia-killing spree,'' reports Friday Times. It said leaders of the coalition of the Jehadi organisations -- Brigade 313 -- were either allowed to flee or escape from police dragnets. Lashkar-e-Taiba, Jaish-e-Mohammed, Harkatul Jihad Islami, Harkatul Mujahideen Al Alami and Lashkar -e-Jhangvi are among the coalition.
The authorities have recently captured some police officials who maintained close links with the Harkatul Mujahideens and other groups, it said and added the Jehadis, facing trial in the province, were being acquitted by the courts. The Weekly said that a worrying development was that Punjab was becoming a sanctuary for the Lashkar Jhangvi terrorists. President Pervez Musharraf,who had launched a campaign against the terrorist groups, have failed to contain their activities in Punjab and Sindh Provinces as Jehadis have stepped up their activities. The President said that Al Qaeda elements were operating from the tribal Areas and were responsible not only for acts of terror inside Pakistan, but also in other friendly countries including China.
The Weekly said that leaders of the top five terrorists groups were ''either in confinement or allowed to remain at large. Those in confinement under the state surveillance have been allowed to get out and disappear.'' At least two important terrorist satraps Hafiz Mohammed Saeed of the LeT and Maulana Masood Azhar of JeM, whose groups were actively involved in ''low intensity conflict in Kashmir'' were virtually free and issuing ''provocative statements'', it said. Both Hafiz Saeed and Maulana Azhar had maintained links with Osama bin Laden. It said ''the militants that would kill President Musharraf are militants that have spearheaded the Kashmir jihad. They are all deobandi-Wahhabi in character and aligned with the Al-Qaeda. President Musharraf should grasp the mettle [sic] of terrorism in Pakistan and get rid of it even it means no option on the resumption of Jehadi in Kashmir. The price for Kashmir option is very high and the people of Pakistan may finally refuse to pay it with their blood.''
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
07/13/2004 9:49:30 AM ||
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#1
I've been hearing some pretty ridiculous figures being bandied about: 30,000 "resistance" fighters in Iraq, now 25,000 Jehadis in Karachi. Phooey.
These guesstimations have no basis in reality, unless you count anybody and everybody who isn't "happy" with the way things are today. By those standards, half the people in NYC are Jehadis.
"They did not pick up my garbage this week, so I and my comrades will attack the place where garbage trucks come from with RPGs and Machine Guns! The people of Brooklyn will not be thwarted!"
#2
The low body count is just the Muslim work ethic in practice. Can you image the havoc a division of Americans can do Karachi?
Posted by: ed ||
07/13/2004 12:01 Comments ||
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Remember that Pakistanis have been going to Jihadi training camps for over 2 decades now. At the very least there are several thousand Jihadis fighting in Indian Kashmir, who are constantly being killed or rotated out to be replaced by others.
The figure is pretty credible, baring in mind that only a tiny minority of the Jihadis have actively turned against the Pakistani state and commited terrorist acts. Most just hang out at the local mosque and madrassa because their leaders tell them it is unislamic to fight against the government.
Posted by: Paul Moloney ||
07/19/2004 2:03 Comments ||
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Taleban guerrillas, who have vowed to disrupt Afghanistan's October 9 election, launched several raids across the south and east and five people were killed, including a police commander, officials said on Tuesday. In the most serious of the latest incidents, Taleban fighters attacked a district government headquarters in Kandahar province on Monday night, killing the chief of police. "Taleban torched the district's headquarters," said an official based in Kabul who declined to be identified. A Taleban commander confirmed his men had carried out the attack. Mullah Rahim Akhund">Mullah Rahim Akhund told Reuters four government men were killed and five wounded. He said there were no casualties among his 50 fighters.
In another incident, two government soldiers were killed and two wounded in an ambush in Ghazni province, southwest of the capital, Kabul. Governor Haji Assadullah said two Taleban fighters were wounded and captured. In two other incidents -- one in Helmand province, near Kandahar, and the other in Nangarhar in the east -- officials said two Taleban fighters carrying explosives had been killed. A government army commander in Khost province said he narrowly escaped a roadside bomb, also on Monday night. The commander, Kheyal Baaz Khan Sherzai, said 19 suspected Taleban had been arrested on suspicion of involvement in the blast. A bomb on a busy street in the western city of Herat killed five people and wounded 34 at the weekend, raising concern the Taleban were extending their campaign. Police said on Tuesday they had detained three suspects but were not sure they were Taleban. Hundreds of people have been killed in attacks this year, including several election workers and a group of 16 people carrying voter cards. Afghanistan will hold a landmark presidential election on October 9. Parliamentary elections have been put off until April, partly because of security worries. The polls are seen as a crucial test for US nation-building efforts.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
07/13/2004 9:29:58 AM ||
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Kurdish security forces have captured 15 militants in northern Iraq, including one man believed to be a senior leader of a local al-Qaida-linked group, an official in a pro-American Kurdish party said Tuesday. Among those arrested late Monday evening was a man identified as Hemen Banishiri, reportedly the second-in-command for the radical Kurdish group, Ansar al-Islam, said Saadi Ahmed, a senior member of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan's political wing.
Can we let the Kurds question him, I mean , we don't want to offend his islamic sensibilities?
The arrests took place in the oil-rich northern city of Kirkuk and several other towns, Ahmed said. Although Ahmed said U.S. forces participated in the arrests, confirmation from the American military was not immediately available. The PUK and another main Kurdish party, the Kurdistan Democratic Party each has a separate government, based in Sulaimaniyah and Irbil, but are jointly represented in the parliament. Each group has its own security apparatus, which has the power to make arrests and detain suspects. The PUK has been in a state of conflict with Ansar al-Islam for several years. Earlier this month, Kurdish authorities arrested six men believed linked to the group as suspected of carrying out a number attacks and assassination attempts on senior police officials and political leaders.
In Mosul, insurgents clashed with an Iraq National Guard patrol on Tuesday, killing one soldier and injuring nine, authorities said. Two guerrillas hiding in an alley opened up on the passing patrol in Mosul, 250 miles north of Baghdad. The guard forces counterattacked, killing one insurgent and injuring another, said one Iraqi officer, who spoke on condition of anonymity. One Iraqi soldier was killed and nine injured during the clash, said Leith Ibrahim, an official at al-Jumhouri hospital.
Posted by: Steve ||
07/13/2004 9:31:10 AM ||
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#1
Reuters now reports Iraqi Police have arrested 500 criminals in Baghdad, including drug and weapons dealers. Theyre cleaning up the criminal mess created when Saddam released common criminals prior to the war.
You go, girls!!! An unknown women's group, calling itself Banat Iraq al-Yawm [the girls of today's Iraq], has threatened lawyers planning to defend Saddam Husayn with death.
[Begin unidentified veiled woman speaking] We, banat Iraq al-yawm, the mothers, sisters, widows, and daughters of the martyrs who were killed by Saddam the destructor in his mass graves, warn all lawyers, [word indistinct] opportunists, who dare to violate God's laws and our rights, against embarking on any dishonest venture to defend the tyrant who shamed humanity with his disgraceful acts. We remind them of their professional duties and ethics and of Saddam's crimes, which have humbled even the devil. We ask them, where were you when he tormented our free men without a sense of right and wrong? [end recording]
Posted by: Anonymous4617 ||
07/13/2004 5:37:30 AM ||
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#1
Pissed off emancipated Muslim women versus French-led trial lawyers. Has it ever been so easy to choose sides?
#6
I was hoping that SOMEONE, ANYONE would stand up to these lawyers and prevent Saddam's trial from becoming a circus. Saddam's trial should be a gut-wrenching tour through over 30 years of murderous and torturing dictatorship, and an accounting of Saddam's and his cronie's crimes against humanity. If the world needs to review what the MSM forgot to report, they should have a look at the 49 page mass graves exhumantion website.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
07/13/2004 14:40 Comments ||
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#7
Heh.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
07/13/2004 18:09 Comments ||
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Children as young as 10 are being recruited to fight for the Palestinian cause. Sky News has gained access to a young people's camp in Gaza, where the only lesson taught is how to kill Israelis. Sky's Middle East Correspondent Emma Hurd said the camp, at an undisclosed location, had been set up to drill children in the ways of war. The recruits, some of whom are dwarfed by their AK-47 assault rifles, are taught how to carry out ambushes. They are also made to do an obstacle course, crawling under barbed wire and leaping through hoops of fire while their instructors fire live bullets overhead. Hurd witnessed one training session in which a militant, dressed as a Jewish settler complete with yarmulke skull cap, was ambushed in his car.Gunmen pulled the "settler" from his vehicle and Hurd was told if this had been real he would have been killed.
She spoke to two 10-year-old recruits. One of them, Mustafa, said he wanted to shoot down Israeli aircraft and blow up tanks. The camp is run by a group called the Popular Resistance Committee, which said the next generation of Palestinians needed to know how to fight the Israeli "occupation". The boys even "graduate" at the end of their training, receiving a certificate from the camp commander.
Posted by: Howard UK ||
07/13/2004 05:25 ||
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Please swap around Fred... Ooops.
Posted by: Howard UK ||
07/13/2004 5:27 Comments ||
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Where's the outrage from the Left and the UN about "children soldiers"?
Posted by: Robert W. ||
07/13/2004 10:22 Comments ||
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#3
Yesterday, one of our moderate American Muslim posters in explaining the point blank murder of a Jewish woman and 4 small chilren, claimed that Israeli children were a legitimate target because they will one day grow up to be soldiers. Here is an example of the incredible brainwashing of 10 year old Palestinean children, training to kill Jews. So I have of a question for you Muslim readers. Are Palestinean children training to kill Jews legitimate targets? Will you cheer on Israelis to round up these children and shoot them at point blank range?
Posted by: ed ||
07/13/2004 10:47 Comments ||
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#4
Clear, incontrovertible evidence that palis are being trained to kill Jews.
There is abundant, documented evidence that Israel is not the aggressor in this conflict. Obviously, then, it is not evidence the world needs to decide who is right and who is wrong. I can only conclude that world opinion, heavily against Israel, is swayed more by political, economic and historical biases than by facts.
Therefore, Israel needs to do whatever it sees as being in its best interests, because reason and diplomacy are irrelevant and pointless: keep an active nuclear program, build the wall, attack terrorist leaders wherever and whenever.
#7
I wonder if the Paleos will start putting bombs in baby cradles and leaving them on Israeli doorsteps . . . and if Kofi & Krew will condemn them for it.
Posted by: The Doctor ||
07/13/2004 21:36 Comments ||
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Posted July 12th, 2004 via Internet Haganah
An Egyptian militant with hatred towards Christians, who once played hockey for a top Italian club, was the suicide driver who took a lorry loaded with explosives into the United Nations compound which killed its top envoy Sergio Vieira de Mello and 21 other people last August, the Guardian newspaper reported Saturday, July 10. Its website said it had obtained a video tape which attempts "to glorify several suicide bombers who have died in Iraq over the past year", including Abu Farida al-Masri, described as Egyptian, who had a history of violent attacks. "On his return from Italy he ran several operations against filthy Egyptian Coptic Christians, who were specializing in removing the virginity of Muslim women," the Guardian quoted the tape as saying.
Abu Farida also was said to have told friends later he had a dream that "God will give me the head of a Christian." "The tape then says that the dream came true with the killing of Mr. de Mello with the use of a lorry containing several tons of explosives, the Guardian reported from Baghdad. The UN building was full of "agents", it claims, but he was specially targeted because the top UN envoy "had been used like a surgeon's scalpel to cut East Timor from Indonesia and cut up Yugoslavia, and the [UN] wanted to cut Iraq into pieces also."
Human rights organizations have expressed concern about growing Muslim violence towards Christians in especially countries like Iraq and Egypt, where Coptic girls have reportedly been kidnapped and forced to convert to Islam.
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
07/13/2004 12:45:06 AM ||
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#3
"On his return from Italy he ran several operations against filthy Egyptian Coptic Christians, who were specializing in removing the virginity of Muslim women..."
It always comes back to sexual anger and repression, doesn't it?
#6
Man! It just proves over and over again that these guys are permanently miswired. Can't even sell them for scrap. Too bad Dan Blather and Co does not run this story on the Alphabet Channels.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
07/13/2004 17:06 Comments ||
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#7
Indoctrination. Take their children away for 2 generations and most of this wacked-out Jooo-hatred, most of the world's misogyny, and all of the world's desire for the 7th century caliphate go *poof*.
UNITED NATIONS (AP) - Secretary-General Kofi Annan has selected Pakistan's ambassador to Washington for the job of U.N. envoy to Iraq, replacing a top diplomat who was killed in a Baghdad bombing last year. Ashraf Jehangir Qazi, who has served in key posts around the world, was chosen from a short-list of three candidates after extensive consultations, U.N. associate spokeswoman Marie Okabe said.
via XinhuaNet - EFL
Guess theyâre not waiting for Skeery to save them, after all.
Palestinian permanent observer to the United Nations Nasser al-Kidwa said on Monday that the Palestinians would ask the UN General Assembly and the Security Council to press Israel to demolish its separation barrier in the West Bank as requested by the International Court of Justice (ICJ). Al-Kidwa told reporters that the Arab group at the United Nations would first push the 191-nation General Assembly to adopt a resolution before raising the issue with the 15-nation Security Council. He said a draft resolution had been circulated to UN member states and it could be debated at the assembly on Friday. The draft document, obtained by Xinhua, would demand that "Israel, the occupying power, comply with its legal obligations as authoritatively determined in the (ICJâs) advisory opinion." Diplomats said it is fairly easy for the Palestinians to get the draft adopted by the assembly, but the measure would be undoubtedly blocked by Israelâs closest ally, the United States, at the Security Council. ...more...
As for getting everyone but the US to fall in line, no shit. Your UN at work.
Posted by: .com ||
07/13/2004 12:41:19 AM ||
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Palestinians to urge UN action on Israeli barrier
#4
Palestinian permanent observer to the United Nations Nasser al-Kidwa said on Monday that the Palestinians would ask the UN General Assembly and the Security Council to press Israel to demolish its separation barrier in the West Bank as requested by the International Court of Justice (ICJ).
Requested?? Well, there's for and against. Which will Israel choose?.....such a difficult choice.....
Who is going to cave in next...with a Strike Out....to Terrorist Inc.?
BAGHDAD, Iraq Pleading for the life of a truck driver held hostage in Iraq, Philippine Undersecretary of Foreign Affairs Rafael Seguis said the country would withdraw its troops "as soon as possible." Seguis' appeal to the group holding Angelo dela Cruz, 46, was aired on Arab-language television network Al-Jazeera on Tuesday morning Iraq time. But he did not elaborate on whether the Philippines would move up their scheduled Aug. 20 pullout from Iraq, saying only the move would come according to the government's commitments.
It appeared the statement may have been deliberately ambiguous in a bid to save dela Cruz. "I appeal to you and to your kind hearts as Muslims to please release Angelo dela Cruz so that he can return to his family and children," Sequis said from Baghdad.
Seguis spoke after the kidnappers issued a statement at that gave Manila until 3 p.m. EDT Monday to respond. That deadline passed with no indication on his fate. The militant group, the Iraqi Islamic Army-Khaled bin Al-Waleed Corps (search), had initially said they would kill dela Cruz by Sunday if the Philippines did not agree to pull out its 51-member peacekeeping force one month earlier than planned. Earlier on Monday, the Philippines announced that the kidnappers had extended their deadline to 3 p.m. EDT Tuesday.
But in a videotape and statement broadcast by Al-Jazeera, the group said it was only extending the deadline to 3 p.m. EDT Monday.
Labor Secretary Patricia Santo Tomas had earlier expressed hope for dela Cruz's release as she visited Dubai, where she was accompanying his wife and brother as they traveled to Amman, Jordan. "This is a time when hope and optimism are particularly important to all of us," she said. "The wife and brother of Angelo are in high spirits."
Dela Cruz's wife, Arsenia, said, "Let us not stop, let us not lose hope."
Dela Cruz was snatched Wednesday. The Philippines' announcement Saturday that it would pull out its 51-strong contingent on Aug. 20, when its current mandate ends, did not satisfy his captors, who issued a statement Sunday demanding the withdrawal be moved up to July 20. In the videotape, dela Cruz, while pleading to be spared, also asked that his body be sent to the Philippines for burial should he be killed. He appeared to wearing an orange garment similar to those worn by two other hostages who have been beheaded: American Nicholas Berg and South Korean Kim Sun-il.
The militants' statement said they had done everything in their power to prove they had wanted to spare his life.
Recognizing the fine line that Manila was taking to obtain dela Cruz's release while remaining one of Washington's closest supporters, U.S. Ambassador Francis Ricciardone earlier expressed support for Arroyo. "It's a tough crisis and leaders are called upon in a crisis to do hard things, and she has stood up and she's shown a deep, deep care for this hostage but also careful of the country's long-term interests," he told ABS-CBN TV. But Arroyo's handling of the crisis has also drawn criticism. About 400 protesters marched to the presidential palace Monday to demand the withdrawal of Filipino troops from Iraq, but were turned back by riot police using truncheons and shields.
Iraqi militants have repeatedly used terrorist attacks to try to force governments to withdraw from the U.S.-led occupation force.
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
07/13/2004 12:05:07 AM ||
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"A senior Philippine official said the timetable for the pullout of the small contingent remained unchanged, despite a suggestion by Deputy Foreign Secretary Rafael Seguis late Monday that the process could be speeded up."
#2
I don't know how many of you know this but Victor Mordecai predicted 911, he also predicted this with the Pill-a-pino's Scary
You have to read his spew....
#5
A1781 - It's not about aid from the US, it's about facing the Izzoids. You can cower - or you can stand up and fight. Of course Arroyo cares about Filipino citizens -- and voters. Does she care about the fact that once you kow-tow you move UP, not down, the target list? We'll see.
#6
"When the enemy advances, we retreat; when the enemy halts, we harass; when the enemy tires, we attack; when the enemy retreats, we pursue." Some Chinese dude said this once.
#7
Anonymous1781 ...with a remark such as that, you should indeed remain very anonymous to all thinking people, living in the real world.
You actually buy into appeasing Islamic terrorists as a meaningful method which will simply stop their obsession with total global jihad?
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
07/13/2004 1:12 Comments ||
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#8
A1781: Filipino government has proven that it really cares about its citizens regardless of the US threat to halt finical aids if it withdrew forces.
Actually, it has proven that it cares about one high-profile hostage in Iraq, but not about the greater danger to thousands in the Philippines when the US does withdraw both its financial and military assistance. Then the Filipino military can face the Chinese, the Malaysians, the Indonesians and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front all by its lonesome.
#9
Zhang, you haven't noticed the real story; the dog that isn't barking, AFAICT, is that the government in the Philipines hasn't started pulling its workers out of Saudi Arabia, in spite of the fact that the jihadis have already killed several Filipinos there, and may kill more.
Posted by: Phil Fraering ||
07/13/2004 1:25 Comments ||
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#10
Phil F -
You are on to it! At this point and time, make Mecca Radio active and all of Islam will succumb.
They will have nothing and will realize they are beaten, at least for another 1000 years. It could be just that simple.
If the government of the Philippines really cared for his people, it would never allow them to work anywhere in the Middle East, specially in Saudi Arabia. Here, when they are not being treated like slaves, they are being decapitated.
#15
1781,when the Phillpine army was battling its homegrown and imported Islamic terrorists on its own they were getting thier ass whipped.They didn't start making headway until the Phillipine government asked the U.S. for logistical and training help from U.S. Special Forces.All that this turn tail and run appeasment is going to do is give the MLF a huge boost.
The best thing the Phillipine government could have done is ask for 5,000 member volunter force of PI military whose only mission in Iraq is to hunt down and kill(not capture,kill)terrorist wereever they are found.This should be announced far,wide and loud.Put the fear of God in thier sick ass'.
Al Jazeera broadcast footage of Philippine deputy foreign minister Rafael Seguis reading out a statement, which the television station translated into Arabic, shortly after the expiry of a new execution deadline set by the militants. "In response to your request, the Philippines ... will withdraw its humanitarian forces as soon as possible," Seguis said according to the translation of the statement, addressed to the Islamic Army in Iraq group holding 46-year-old de la Cruz. "I hope the statement that I read will touch the heart of this group," said Seguis. "We know that Islam is the religion of peace and mercy."
#19
Let's wait and see if the Filipinos really to withdraw. If so, then the US should withdraw all help in fighting their own Muslim guerrillas. They will have shown they are not worth one US soldier's life and not one dollar of US taxpayer's money. Help and friendship is a two way street. Let's see how many lives and how much territory the Filipinos will then piss away.
Posted by: ed ||
07/13/2004 9:44 Comments ||
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#20
I just sent an email to their embassy here in Wash DC.
"How does it feel to cower?
How does it feel to hang your head in shame?
How does it feel to run from your enemies?
How does it feel that that the Filipino people are not strong enough to face evil?"
Here is their email address if you want to add to it. wdcpe@aol.com
#21
11A5S,forgot to add.That would be "Sun Zu's The Art of War".Sun Zu was a Chinnies warrior/philosipher/poet about2,500 years ago.His teachings are still taught at military acadmeys now.
#22
I'm into seeing modern, western, liberal, freethinking, moral, scientific, republican democracy beat or destroy rote mezmerized stonemen.
Well the Eloy don't have a change if they don't fight back.
Posted by: ed ||
07/13/2004 10:54 Comments ||
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#23
That's chance not change.
Posted by: ed ||
07/13/2004 10:58 Comments ||
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#24
Just sent this to the embassy.
If you bow down to the terrorist in Iraq,then you might as well give-up and let the MLF and other terrorist take over in the Philippines.Removing your troops from Iraq because of the actions of terrorist is tantamount to cowardice.The chicken hearted running from Iraq will cause me to re-think America's commitment to the support of the Freedom of the Philippines.You will have proved that you are not worthy of the sacrifice of one American life,and certainly do not deserve in financial support from America.
#25
Bowing down to the demands of hostage takers in Iraq is just the tip of the iceberg. I was reading somewhere yesterday of the HUGE amounts of ransoms paid to home grown terrorists and hostage takers for kidnapped victims in the Phillipines. Especially from Europeans kidnapped at some dive resort, to the tune of $1 million per person.
You make a stand now or you make a last, despairate stand when it is too late. The Phillipine government has failed its people. This is bad news, but there will be alot of storms before we see the sun again.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
07/13/2004 12:03 Comments ||
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#26
It's true. Using the ransom money, Abu Sayaf grew from the low 100s to 3000 overnight and an urban bombing campaign was launched. Kidnapping subsequently increased, including the two Burnham missionaries.
Posted by: ed ||
07/13/2004 12:12 Comments ||
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#27
I wonder how you say "pussies" in Tagalog?
If The Phillipines takes their 51 soldiers and sends them home to hunt Abu Sayyef, MILF and JI types, then this is no loss, especially since 30 more Aussies are being sent to Iraq. I would take 30 Aussies over 500 Filipinos any day. Hopefully, Arroyo will allow our SF types to help the army hunt for the bad guys despite this total wuss move.
Posted by: Tibor ||
07/13/2004 12:43 Comments ||
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#28
Must read Wretchard re: the price we paid in blood to help them.
#29
Check out this reprint "The new Islamic fascism"
Posted by: Mark Espinola ||
07/13/2004 19:06 Comments ||
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#30
Tempting as it might seem, we cannot abandon the Philippines' 80m people to Islam or to China. We must continue to deny the Filipino population, the location and the resources of the Philippine islands to the enemy. We colonized the Philippines all those years ago to prevent other powers from establishing a stranglehold in the area. Today, we must safeguard Filipino sovereignty to prevent the expansion of either Muslim or Chinese empire.
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