Taleban fighters have told the BBC they plan to target and kill British troops starting a tour of duty in Afghanistan. A local Taleban commander in Helmand, one of the country's most volatile provinces, called the British "an old enemy of Afghanistan".
The comments emerged as Defence Secretary John Reid visited UK troops in the southern Helmand province, where they are aiding reconstruction efforts. He acknowledged the 3,300 soldiers being deployed faced "massive risks". He stressed their main job was to help reconstruction efforts, but said they may be used at times to seek out and kill Taleban and al-Qaeda terrorists to prevent their return to power in Afghanistan.
British officers in Helmand have said they are facing a "rocky period ahead". But Brigadier Ed Butler, commander of British forces in Afghanistan, said there was a chance to bring lasting security to the country. He said: "We need to expect some setbacks and we need to prepare ourselves and the public.
"Nobody should be under any illusion that if attacked we will defend ourselves," said Defence Secretary John Reid. "But we genuinely think we can make a difference and there is a window of opportunity here to improve the life of the ordinary Afghan.
"We will do that by providing him with security and they have not had that security for the last 30 years. We are realistic that is going to take time."
British troops in Helmand are thought to be most at risk from roadside bombings and attacks by suicide car bombers.
Insurgents have been distributing DVDs on the Pakistan border trying to recruit locals in Afghanistan for attacks. Taleban fighters on the ground in Helmand are specifically threatening British troops. One man, a local Taleban commander, told the BBC: "The British have been defeated in the past. Afghans are not scared of death.
"The British are an old enemy of Afghanistan. Our resources are getting better day-by-day and we have good skills of fighting guerrilla war."
British troops are taking over the Provincial Reconstruction Team (PRT) from US forces in Helmand.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
04/26/2006 00:46 ||
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The Tallies have been saying this for months. They are trying to split off an important part of the Coaltion allied against them and Binny.
Let them expose their fannies, the UK troops are much more than their match.
Posted by: Captain America ||
04/26/2006 9:45 Comments ||
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#3
I hope the Brits can entice the talibs into a mass attack and call in the B-52s. There needs to be more proactive ambushing of the turbans by our team.
#4
They should use the old trick of tying captured ones to the front of artillery guns, though that is no doubt strongly discouraged in the tech manual.
US aircraft pummelled pro-Taliban forces on either side of the Afghanistan-Pakistan border, while Afghan police battled 50 armed militants in the south, in clashes that killed at least 11 insurgents, officials said on Tuesday.
"Ha! Ha! Home free! We're in Pakistan now, so youse can't [KABOOM!]... touch us."
At least five Afghan soldiers were also killed, including four in a Tuesday roadside bombing during a joint operation with US forces in eastern Afghanistan, officials said. Militants detonated a powerful roadside bomb as a joint-Afghan-US patrol passed in Kunar, killing four Afghan soldiers and wounding two, said a coalition military spokesperson.
US warplanes fired two Hellfire missiles and dropped one bomb on a suspected Taliban camp in the Lashkar Gah district of southern Afghanistan's Helmand province, which borders Pakistan, killing three militants late on Monday before another fled.
"Quetta, here I come! Curly-toed slippers, don't fail me now!"
Separately, about 50 Taliban militants raided a police checkpoint in Miana Shien district, local official Shabi Khan said. The gunfight continued into Tuesday morning, leaving five Taliban and one policeman dead, Khan said.
"Ha ha! Take that, coppers!... Ow!.. Ow! Aaaaaiiiieeee!... Rosebud!"
Posted by: Fred ||
04/26/2006 00:00 ||
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I'd still like to see a 24/hour, eight-day ARCLIGHT strike along the Afghan/Pak border from the Khyber Pass to just opposite Quetta. Binny 'n boyz will be quite able to plead insanity after that, I'm sure.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
04/26/2006 14:40 Comments ||
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Eight Taliban terrorists and one Afghan policeman were killed in clashes with Afghan and coalition forces in southern Afghanistan, the country's most volatile parts. In the first incident, Taliban clashed with police in Afghanistan's insurgency-plague Kandahar province. In the ensuing fight, one policeman and five terrorists attackers were killed, said a district official on Tuesday. A senior official, introducing himself as Shadi Khan, said about two dozen terrorists insurgents attacked a police post killing one soldier. As the fight continued, the policemen called support and in the ensuing fight, five terrorists militants were killed while the rest managed to run away flee taking advantage of the dark in the night.
Meanwhile, the US military issued a press release on Tuesday in which they claimed killing three terrorists militants in a missile attack in another southern province named Helmand. The statement said the terrorists insurgents were holding a meeting. The US jet fired two AGM-114 Hellfire missiles and dropped one bomb on them killing three Taliban terrorists fighters.
"Hi! Mind if we drop in?"
Identity of the dead terrorists militants is unknown. However, the statement said the terrorists people killed were involved in carrying out and financing terrorist activities in the war-ravaged. Spokesman for the coalition's Combined Joint Task Force - 76 Army Lt Col Paul Fitzpatrick said: "Afghan and coalition forces will continue to pursue those who stand in the way of the government of Afghanistan's objectives." The statement said no civilian casualties were reported from the Monday attack that was carried out in the provincial capital of Lashkar Gah.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/26/2006 00:00 ||
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AL QAEDA is seeking to exploit Western plans for a UN peacekeeping force in Darfur to open up a new battleground in its holy war, analysts said Monday after Osama bin Laden called for preparations for a prolonged conflict in the restive Sudanese region.
Bin Laden did not discuss the question of Darfur in the past, but the current situation imposes such an intervention as the problem is deteriorating rapidly, said the director of the London-based Islamic Observatory, Yasser al-Serri.
Serri, whose organisation defends Islamist movements, said the growing likelihood of foreign interference in Darfur had spurred the new focus on the region from the Al Qaeda leader in his latest audiotape aired Sunday.
He wanted to warn of foreign attempts to find a foothold in Sudan, Serri told AFP, referring to US-led pressure for a NATO-backed UN force to replace overstretched African Union troops in the vast desert region the size of France.
Serri said bin Laden also still held a grudge against Sudanese President Omar al-Beshir, whose Islamist-backed military government sheltered the Al Qaeda leader until 1996 when he was forced to flee, eventually finding refuge in Taliban-ruled Afghanistan.
He believes the Khartoum government betrayed his confidence by expelling him under US pressure, the London-based analyst said.
Egyptian Islamist lawyer Mountasser al-Zayyat said the Al Qaeda leader was seeking to widen the front of resistance to the crusade against the Muslim world.
He wants to turn Darfur into a front for jihad (holy struggle) ... profiting from any development taking place in the Muslim world, Zayyat told AFP.
In the latest audiotape, the Western worlds most wanted man had called upon supporters to prepare for a prolonged war against crusader thieves in Darfur.
He said that Muslims should get to know the territory and the tribes of Darfur and its surroundings in readiness for the conflict.
The launch of an uprising by ethnic minority rebels in Darfur three years ago prompted a scorched earth response from the Arab-dominated regime in Khartoum in which up to 300,000 people have died and more than two million fled their homes.
But unlike in southern Sudan, where the population is largely Christian or animist, in Darfur the population overwhelmingly shares the same Muslim faith as Sudanese Arabs and both sides - government and rebels alike - were quick to reject the Al Qaeda leaders bid to get involved.
We categorically reject these declarations, said Ahmed Hussein of the Justice and Equality Movement, one of the two Darfur rebel groups.
His words are completely disconnected from the reality in Darfur. Bin Laden is still preaching the theory of an American-Zionist conspiracy when the real problem comes from Khartoum, which is a Muslim government killing other Muslims, Hussein told AFP.
The Sudanese government was equally quick to distance itself from its onetime guest, despite its own Islamist leanings and its strong opposition to the replacement of the existing AU force in Darfur with UN peacekeepers.
Sudan has nothing to do with such statements, foreign ministry spokesman Jamal Mohammed Ibrahim told AFP. Darfur is an internal problem that we are trying to resolve under the auspices of the African Union.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
04/26/2006 00:22 ||
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"new battleground"? Binny has been behind the killing of innocence in Darfur all along.
Posted by: Captain America ||
04/26/2006 9:50 Comments ||
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AL QAEDA is seeking to exploit Western plans for a UN peacekeeping force in Darfur to open up a new battleground in its holy war, analysts said Monday after Osama bin Laden called for preparations for a prolonged conflict in the restive Sudanese region.
#3
Bin Laden is still preaching the theory of an American-Zionist conspiracy when the real problem comes from Khartoum, which is a Muslim government killing other Muslims, Hussein told AFP.
Afraid there is no way the west can take credit for this rather delightful anomaly.
#4
My memory serves me correct, Binny spent a great deal of the 90's in the Sudan before he emigrated high tailed and ran to Afghanistan. At one point, the Sudan government offered to turn Osama over to the CIA but Willie Whitewater demurred. So there may not be a lot of good faith between al Qaida and Khartoum.
Posted by: john ||
04/26/2006 11:20 Comments ||
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One of Binny's premier henchclans, the al-Ghamdis, have a big presence in Sudan.
#6
In the latest audiotape, the Western worlds most wanted man had called upon supporters to prepare for a prolonged war against crusader thieves in Darfur.
Okay, now he's conceding that the hated Crusaders are a bit tougher than he thought.
#7
The Sudan UBL's home for the planning AQ's rise. From a global scale it looks to me as if he is retreating to his final fighting position. This will turn to be good news.
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
04/26/2006 17:51 Comments ||
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A string of suicide bombings and shooting attacks strike the Gaza Strip, Sinai and Egypt in rapid succession Wednesday. Information is still sketchy. DEBKAfiles sources have some details on the confused sequence of violent outbreaks that occurred two days after a triple al Qaeda bombing attack devastated the Dahab coastal resort in eastern Sinai, killing at least 34 people and injuring 70.
Wednesdays attacks began when Palestinian police stopped two cars, one booby-trapped, from crashing their barrier at the Karni goods crossing from Gaza into Israel. There was a shoot-out with five terrorists.
Next, two suicide bombers blew themselves up outside the El Arish base in northern Sinai of the Multinational Observer force. One hit a car carrying peacekeepers to their base. The second rode a motorcycle which blew up as Egyptian security and aid units arrived on the scene. Two peacekeepers were injured a New Zealander and a Norwegian - and two Egyptian policemen. The MFO force was set up in 1981 to monitor Sinais demilitarization under the Israel-Egyptian peace treaty.
Finally, a group of gunmen stormed a police station in the Egyptian town of Balbit south of Ismailiya on the east bank of the Suez Canal. The Egyptian authorities deny this attack took place. No further details are available.
Posted by: Steve ||
04/26/2006 10:03 ||
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Palestinian police stopped two cars, one booby-trapped, from crashing their barrier at the Karni goods crossing from Gaza into Israel. There was a shoot-out with five terrorists.
Presumably the terrorists were from the wrong "militant" group, but even so I am surprised the Palestinian police acted so decisively to stop them. The other attacks look like Al Qaeda (or associates) are continuing their little war against Egypt. It does seem as though bin Laden's speech was the trigger.
#2
For me these violent acts are just PC buildup to inducing a US-Iran conflict, whereupon the Radics will hold themselves justified in attacking US, Isreali, andor Western targets. Iran had already set a March 2006 deadline for its Natantz plant to be prepped for usage of up to 3000 centrifuges, which by US officials' calculation means Iran may officially get its first bomb by end-of-year 2006 or early 2007, assuming that Iran stays at 3000 centrifuges for the year. The threat from Iran then, for time being, remains via nuclearized, "dirty bomb" or "suitcase bomb" random terror attacks. WIth FOOD-WORK RIOTS starting to occur in Iran, North Korea, and Cuba, etal. the motivation is there for both the Mullahs, etal. to intensify nucprogs dev before lose their grip on power, as well as to PC instigate new 9-11's against America in order to divert poitical and international attention. Since we all know the MSM and Socialist OWG-happy Dems-Lefties will blame Dubya, the GOP-Right, and America for everything anyways, regardless of merits, it behooves Dubya-America to attack Radical-controlled Iran while Iran's capability is still in [perceived]infancy.
Cairo, 26 April (AKI) - Egyptian police arrested three computer engineers from Cairo in connection with the terrorist attack on the Dahab resort in Egypt's Sinai peninsula which killed at least 18 people and wounded scores, a newspaper report said on Wednesday.
Never did trust them computer engineers, a shifty lot, all of them
Egyptian security sources told London-based al-Sharq al-Awsat the three men are accused of a key role in the attacks. The pan-Arabic paper did not specify whether the three were part of a group of ten suspects arrested on Tuesday. Investigators said the computer scientists allegedly left the scene of the attack half an hour before the three blasts.
The men - reportedly identified by the police as Faruq Muhammad Ali, Karim Ashraf Abdullah and Majid Ali Mahmoud - arrived in Dahab last Sunday. They were arrested at a road block as they were returning to Cairo on Tuesday and produced fake documents to the police. One of them was reportedly wounded.
Before they were arrested or after?
Egypt's interior ministry has confirmed 18 deaths, among them four foreigners - a Russian, a Swiss man, a German child and a Lebanese national. Earlier the ministry put the death toll at 23.
The three explosions on Monday night were probably from time bombs planted on the ground rather than carried by suicide bombers, investigators have said.
Depends on which investigator you listen to
The bombings, the third similar attack in the Sinai peninsula in the past 18 months, are threatening Egypt's tourist industry, which brings in more than 7 billion dollars a year and employs around 10 percent of the country's workforce.
Posted by: Steve ||
04/26/2006 09:34 ||
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Cairo, 26 April (AKI) - Two suicide bombers on Wednesday struck outside a military base in el Gorah housing multinational peacekeepers south of the Rafah border crossing to Gaza, on Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, reports said, citing Egyptian police. At least two peacekeepers - a New Zealander and a Norwegian - with the Multinational Force and Observers (MFO) independent peacekeeping force were reportedly injured in the blast along with two Egyptian policemen. The incident comes two days after a terrorist attack on the Egyptian resort town of Dahab, which killed at least 18 and wounded scores.
The first blast was reported just outside the air base where the multinational force is headquartered in the northern part of the Sinai Peninsula, 10 miles from the Israeli border near Rafah. The suicide bomber was reportedly on foot and wounded two peacekeepers, the governor of northern Sinai Ahmed Abdel Hamid told Egyptian television. The second attacker drove his bicycle into the path of an oncoming police car, wounding two officers. Both bombers reportedly died in the blasts.
The MFO force has been stationed in Sinai since 1982, following the Egypt-Israeli peace deal. The force's biggest contingent is US soldiers, though it includes a significant Canadian deployment as well as soldiers from other nations. It has another base in southern Sinai. The peninsula has been rocked by a number of Islamic extremist attacks in the past year and a half.
Posted by: Steve ||
04/26/2006 09:32 ||
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The Al Qaeda 'C' team at work (on foot and a bicycle).
#5
The impression that all islamonutz can do is seethe and blow things up is getting harder and harder to deny. We may have to sterilize the entire area and hope the returning life-forms are less prone to violence. Maybe we can import Esquimoux or Icelanders, maybe even some of our own overstock of hispanics.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
04/26/2006 14:43 Comments ||
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The US always has a battalion there
Really? I figured it was some sorta small platoon sized thingy.
Ten people, nine of them members of a local security force, were killed in Algeria Sunday in an ambush by Islamic extremists, several independent newspapers reported.
According to the reports Monday, the communal guard members were riding on a bus, unarmed and in civilian clothing, when it was ambushed by about 20 assailants on a road near El-Kassa, in the Skikda region some 500 kilometers (300 miles) east of Algiers.
The gunmen exploded a handmade device on the road in front of the vehicle, then mounted and opened fire on the passengers, killing the guards and one civilian, according to the reports.
The newspapers laid blame for the attack on the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC), and said Algerian security forces were scouring the area for the killers.
Police launched a major search operation in the area between Skikda and Jijel, 360 kilometers east of Algiers, to try to find the armed group responsible.
The GSPC has rejected a reconciliation charter initiated by President Abdelaziz Bouteflika, which offers to pardon armed Islamists who have not committed blood crimes and are still underground, and gives early release or pardons to those previously convicted.
Under the charter, several thousand Islamic extremists have already been released.
The charter, adopted in a referendum last September, also provides for compensation for "victims of terrorism", families of terrorists and of those arrested by the security services and not seen again.
In spite of its implementation violence has continued and the state of emergency, in force since February 1992, has not been lifted.
On April 7, 13 customs officials died when their convoy was attacked about 600 kilometers south of Algiers.
Since the start of this month, according to official statistics and media reports, at least 45 people have been killed and since the start of the year about 100 have died.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
04/26/2006 01:10 ||
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A bomb exploded near a minibus near the Algerian city of Skikda, some 500 kilometres east of the capital Algiers, killing between 10 and 15 people, Algerian media reported Monday.
Nine of the victims were local police officers who had just been relieved and were travelLing home late Sunday when the device exploded on the road.
Following the explosion, a group of about 20 men presumed to be members of the Islamic terrorist group GSPC shot to death some of the survivors.
Some newspapers reported that 10 people were killed in the attack, while others put the number of dead at up to 15. An estimated 12 people were injured in the attack.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
04/26/2006 01:09 ||
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Three bombs spaced just minutes apart ripped through the crowded Egyptian beach resort of Dahab on Monday, killing at least 18 people and confirming the extent to which domestic terror groups have reestablished themselves after years of relative peace.
It's the third time since October 2004 that Egypt's popular Sinai Peninsula beaches have been targeted. Prior to that first attack - three suicide bombs that killed 31 at Taba - Egypt had not experienced any terror attacks since 1997.
After each previous strike, Egyptian authorities sought to paint the bombings as isolated incidents that could be prevented in the future by stepped-up security measures. But while analysts say that the government was successful in dismantling domestic terror networks of groups like Jemaah Islamiyah and Islamic Jihad in the 1990s, the intellectual roots of modern Islamist militancy run deep in Egypt and appear to be bearing new fruit.
Egyptian police said they weren't sure if Monday's bombs at two cafes and the Ghazali supermarket were suicide attacks or not. The government said Tuesday that it had made 10 arrests. Four of the dead were foreign tourists, the rest Egyptians.
Egypt has moved hundreds of officers into the area, shut most of the roads out of the city, and established a network of checkpoints.
Dahab, once the playground of backpackers and hippies, saw $500 million in new investments last year. Like the rest of the peninsula's beaches, it has shifted toward higher-spending tourists.
Since the tourism industry rebounded well after each of the past two attacks, the mood in Dahab in the wake of the latest attack was grim, but hopeful. Tourism is Egypt's second-largest foreign-currency earner.
"The workers and business owners here are very angry," says Emad Nawar, a Cairo real-estate agent on vacation in Dahab. "I've talked to some who just finished a small business project that they were about to sell. Still, they hope that business will bounce back quickly like it did after the Taba bombings."
In addition to attacks on the Sinai, there have been at least three smaller terrorist incidents involving tourists in Cairo since 2004. In the 1990s, domestic terror groups targeted tourism in an effort to undermine the country's finances, to devastating effect. The 1997 attack on foreign tourists in Luxor sent Egypt into a deep recession.
Memories of that past are still fresh for some. "It's a disaster," says Mohamed Kabany, owner of Dahab's Inmo Hotel. "It could mean that we won't have business for the next year or two."
Still, many average Egyptians were furious at the attackers, which offers hope, since anger at the Islamic Jihad in the 1990s helped undermine support for that group. "No religion, not Islam or Christianity, accepts killing," says Lamia Farouk, a young mother in Cairo. "The people who did this are deranged."
It was business as usual in Dahab Tuesday despite the bombings, according to sources there. Shops opened, as did restaurants. Hotels reported few early checkouts. Tourists were out enjoying the sun, residents said.
"We are continuing," says Hany Aly, manager of the Neptune Hotel. "Our hotel, diving center, and coffee shop are full.... Life is going back to normal. This is to show those who set off these bombs that we are strong."
Located next to one of the bombing sites, the Neptune Hotel had its windows shattered. New glass has already been ordered, Aly said.
There were also several small antiterror protests in Dahab Tuesday. About 100 people marched through Dahab in remembrance of the blasts' victims on Tuesday.
Many Dahab residents and visitors seemed shocked by the horror of the bombings. "I was sitting on a high balcony and could see everything," says Mr. Nawar. "There was a big fire and the land was shaking like an earthquake. I heard people crying and an Egyptian boy, maybe eight to nine years old, looking for his father. It was terrible."
Nawar, a Christian, says he may take his faith more seriously now: He would have been at the Ghazali market when the blast occurred if a friend hadn't delayed him.
The attack came during the Egyptian spring holiday of Shem al-Nessim and a day before what Egypt calls Sinai Liberation Day, marking the return of the peninsula by Israel after the two countries agreed to a peace deal in 1979. That peace deal, and the repressive approach of President Hosni Mubarak's government to all Islamist movements, has long made the country a target of militants. Much of Al Qaeda's senior leadership, including Ayman al-Zawahiri, Osama bin Laden's chief deputy, are exiled Egyptians.
While there is no evidence that Mr. Zawahiri's last videotape from March, or Mr. bin Laden's long screed on Sunday urging attacks against dozens of nations, helped trigger the strike, experts say Al Qaeda continues to serve as a potent guiding light for militants.
Bin Laden's audiotape, released by Al Jazeera, came too close to attacks that would have taken at least weeks of planning to be directly involved. But Al Qaeda, with its senior leaders cut off from directly contacting global followers, has evolved into a source of inspiration for a host of smaller Islamist groups who may share its goals but plan and execute attacks on their own.
That's been the pattern worldwide. Global terror attacks have soared since 2003, with anger at the US wars in Iraq and Afghanistan inspiring new operatives.
"Virtually every single attack since 9/11 can be laid at the doors of other terrorist groups, even though they may have been inspired by bin Laden's ideology of global jihad,'' says M.J. Gohel, president of the Asia-Pacific Foundation, which focuses on security issues. "After 9/11, Al Qaeda effectively became decentralized ... and it continues as a deadly source of ideological inspiration for mass murder but there isn't any kind of central organization."
Increasingly, that's the view of other experts. In an interview with Al Jazeera, Dia Rashwan, one of Egypt's leading scholars on Islamist groups, says small, cellular groups are emerging without direct ties to Al Qaeda or each other.
He says these new structures make it much harder for intelligence services to penetrate them than the old, more highly coordinated groups.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
04/26/2006 01:07 ||
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First clue?
Posted by: Captain America ||
04/26/2006 9:55 Comments ||
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"We are surrounded," a senior security official said Tuesday, describing the aftermath of Monday's deadly attack on the Sinai beach resort of Dahab.
For months now, security officials have warned that al-Qaida and Global Jihad were slowly closing in on Israel and were attempting to establish cells in the Palestinian territories. Even though this most recent attack was not in Israel, it was still cause for concern at the Kirya military headquarters in Tel Aviv, where senior officers on Tuesday referred to it as another sign of Global Jihad's encroachment on Israel.
In December, an al-Qaida cell in Lebanon fired Katyusha rockets at Kiryat Shmona, and in August Global Jihad-affiliated cells in Jordan fired Katyushas at Eilat.
But Monday's bombings did not come as a surprise to the defense establishment, which months ago issued an advisory against traveling to Egypt and particularly Sinai. Military Intelligence believes Sinai has turned into an al-Qaida hotbed whose cells were behind all of the latest Sinai terror attacks, including the bombings in Sharm e-Sheikh last July and in Taba in 2004, which together killed over 100 people.
Although Egypt has sent special forces into the Sinai hills of Jabal Halal to weed out the terror cells, Monday's attack, security officials said, proved that their efforts were not as effective as they may have thought.
Evaluations note that the cells operating in the Sinai are composed of local Egyptian Beduin who are easily recruited into al-Qaida due to their disdain of President Hosni Mubarak's regime. It is also thought that the explosives used by the cells are no longer coming from old mines and tank shells left behind by Egyptian-Israeli wars, but are being smuggled into the Sinai from Egypt's neighbors, possibly even Saudi Arabia.
Even as officials are concerned with the events inside Egypt, their real concern is whether the terror there would spill over into Israel.
Demonstrating the delicate situation along the fenceless Egyptian-Israeli border, three Sudanese refugees on Tuesday were caught south of Nitzana trying to infiltrate into the country.
While these infiltration attempts are thwarted almost daily, most of Israel's border with Egypt is wide open, as the government recently decided not to invest the funds necessary to close off the border with a security fence, as exists with Jordan and Lebanon. Instead, the army was ordered to reinforce its troops along the border, and two weeks ago the Golani reconnaissance unit replaced the Givati Brigade and took up - together with the Border Police's Ramon Battalion - surveillance and security.
Security services admit that they don't know how many infiltrators have gotten through undetected into Israel.
Last month, a senior security official stationed along the border with Egypt told The Jerusalem Post that Israel was concerned with the possibility that the Jihad cells, which he said were stationed a mere 30 km. away, would try to kidnap IDF troops or border policemen nearby.
Security coordination with Egypt, a high-ranking IDF officer said, was at an all-time high, with Israel keenly aware that the al-Qaida presence in Sinai posed a threat not only to Egyptian resort towns like Dahab, but also to the Negev and possibly even to central Israel.
The Egyptians, the officer said, had improved their patrols along the border with Gaza, and while the Rafah border terminal was open to anyone, the Egyptian Border Police units, he said, were doing a better job at stopping arms smuggling from their side of the border into Gaza.
The only hope, he said, was that they would have similar success in stopping al-Qaida in the Sinai.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
04/26/2006 00:54 ||
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#1
This event should be watched closely. The Sinai is key for terrorists and their logistics and it looks like they are on the winning hand. They can launch oparations into Egypt, Israel, the Arabian peninsula, Sudan and the Suez canal.
#2
The Sinai is the new CANADA, waiting to be saved from either Fascist Israel = Amerika, or Radical Terror , by the Motherly "Holocaust is Good for You + Everybody like Vitamin C/Liver/Veggies" Commie Airborne!?
Three explosions shook the Egyptian Sinai resort of Dahab yesterday, killing at least 33 people and wounding at least 150, a security official said.
Witnesses said smoke could be seen rising from the towns tourist bazaar, and residents said they saw body parts and debris on the street after an explosion at a restaurant.
An official with the local ambulance service said many of the dead appeared to be foreigners.
The Dahab resort is popular with Western backpackers and budget Israeli tourists. Many Egyptians were also vacationing in the Sinai Peninsula as the bombings struck on Sham Al-Nessim, a public holiday which traditionally marks the beginning of spring.
Around 7 p.m., we heard three explosions close to the seafront alongside a supermarket in the center of Dahab, French tourist Frederic Mingeon said from the town. There was a plume of smoke and people started running and screaming.
State television said the blasts appeared to have been the result of remote-controlled bombs not suicide bombers. All exits from the town were sealed off by police.
Israel, whose border is less than 160 km from Dahab, immediately offered to send emergency teams to help with rescue efforts. Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz offered to send army rescue teams and doctors, his ministry said. Hundreds of Israeli tourists were rushing home after the blasts, Israeli police said, although the Defense Ministry could not confirm any Israeli deaths.
The Interior Ministry said the blasts ripped through the Ghazala supermarket and the Nelson and Aladdin restaurants in central Dahab.
There was blood everywhere but the victims were evacuated very quickly, said Cecile Casey, a young French tourist who was spending a few days in Dahab.
Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak pledged to punish the perpetrators of the bombing. said. The perpetrators of these heinous acts of terrorism will be tracked down and punished, Mubarak was quoted by the official MENA news agency as saying.
President George W. Bush denounced the attacks as a heinous act. I strongly condemn the killings that took place, the innocent lives lost, Bush said of the attack.
I assure the enemy... we will bring them to justice for the sake of justice and humanity, he said.
No one immediately claimed responsibility for the attack, which came a day after a new tape of Al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden surfaced calling for Muslim fighters to go to Sudan to wage war against crusader thieves and slamming the international isolation of the Hamas-led Palestinian government.
In Ankara, visiting Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas condemned as criminal and cowardly the Dahab blasts.
This cowardly act which targeted innocent people is the expression of blind hatred of groups which hurt our nation and religion, a statement issued by the presidents office said.
The Palestinian government run by Hamas condemned the bombings. Our government strongly condemns this criminal act which flouts our religion, shakes Palestinian national security and works against Arab interests, government spokesman Razi Hamad said.
A state of alert was declared at the main hospital in the Israeli border town of Eilat, both to handle any casualties sent for treatment there and to free up doctors for dispatch to the scene.
Some 20,000 Israeli holidaymkers were believed to have been in the Sinai at the time of the blasts despite repeated warnings from their government of the risks of attack.
Israels ambassador in Cairo, Shalom Cohen, told Channel 10 there were three explosions in a hotel, a police station and a marketplace.
Police said the explosions hit the central part of the city where there are many shops, restaurants, bars and guesthouses. The blasts ripped through the town shortly after nightfall when the streets would have been jammed with holidaymakers.
Terrorist attacks have killed nearly 100 people at several tourist resorts in the Sinai region in the past two years.
Bombings in the resorts of Taba and Ras Shitan, near the Israeli border, killed 34 people in October 2004. Suicide attackers in July in the resort of Sharm El-Sheikh killed at least 64 people, mainly tourists.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
04/26/2006 00:48 ||
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Egyptian authorities said they have identified two of the three Dahab suicide bombers as Bedouins from the northern Sinai. Cairo originally reported that that the three blasts were caused by time bombs and not suicide bombers.
At least 23 people, 20 of them from Egypt, were killed in the multiple blasts. Authorities have arrested 30 suspects and indicated that area residents were behind the bombings, but foreign security experts said that the organizers probably are aligned with or sympathize with Al Qaeda.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
04/26/2006 00:36 ||
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"It was like war. I'd never seen anything like it before, a child, a baby, blood everywhere," said German doctor Michael Hartlich, shaking at the memory, tears in his eyes. "A boy died in my arms."
As the sun rose over the Red Sea on Tuesday, the appalling destruction of three deadly explosions remained littered through the Egyptian holiday resort of Dahab.
Flies hovered over patches of blood caked with mud. The lingering acrid smell of burnt flesh laced the sea breeze.
Tearful but stoical, holidaymakers and resort workers recounted the chaos that decimated their idyll on Monday's traditional spring holiday and the eve of Sinai Liberation Day commemorating the end of Israeli occupation in 1982.
"Sirens went off. People were running around. Police on the streets. Firemen. It was like organised chaos. People picking up bits of people. It was crazy," said 42-year-old diving instructor Paul McBeath from Scotland.
He has lived and taught in Dahab for four years. One of his colleagues at the Red Sea Relax school was blown from the shopfront to the seafront by the force of one of the almost simultaneous explosions.
At a restaurant named after notorious gangster Al Capone that was gutted by the same blast, uneaten plates of congealed chips remained on tables, half-finished fruit cocktails in glasses.
In the bazaar, smashed spice stalls and perfume jars oozed a sickly stench as locals sat staring into space, fighting the urge to cry, and shopkeepers with light bandages shifted through mountains of broken glass.
"I saw a lot of bodies. A lot of wounds. A lot of mess. The place was completely destroyed," said 32-year-old Internet cafe owner Ibrahim Sadek.
On holiday in Dahab for the past week, Hartlich ran within minutes of hearing the explosions to help with the horrific casualties.
"One dead man had his brain out. I sent a baby with a leg cut off to surgery in Sharm el-Sheikh. A boy died in my arms. He had severe chest injuries. He was sitting in the Chinese restaurant," Hartlich said.
The doctor worked through the night at the local clinic - "worse than even a jungle hospital", without even water to wash his hands.
Security and medical officials said the carnage left 18 dead, revising an earlier count of 23. Some body parts had been attributed to different people when in fact they belonged to the same victim.
Officials said: "Twelve Egyptians and six foreigners, including a Swiss national, a Russian, a Lebanese and a five-year-old German child, were killed."
Security officials said at least two of the three explosions shortly after 7pm were caused by suicide bombers.
Dahab, more affordable than the upmarket Sinai resorts of Sharm el-Sheikh and Taba, which were both hit by attacks since 2004, attracted Europeans and Egyptians alike with its coral and pink mountains behind deep-blue seas.
Business had been booming for Easter. Egyptians had escaped the dust of the cities for the glorious sun, sea and diving marvels of Dahab, which means "gold" in Arabic.
With Dahab boasting some of the best diving in the world, according to local instructors, businessmen fear their livelihoods have been pulverised by departing tourists and gruesome international television footage.
"There will never be tourism in Dahab again or in Egypt. I'm worried about my friends, I'm worried about my future," said 24-year-old jeweller Hani Sadek Mikhail, who came looking for a better life from the Nile Delta.
One of his colleagues had a leg amputated and another his face blown off. Following the third Sinai bomb attack in 18 months, many foreigners already knew they were taking a risk by staying in the Sinai.
"There have been bombs up and down the coast. You'd have to be pretty stupid to think nothing could happen here," said Jason Lovett, a 36-year-old diving instructor from New Zealand who has worked in the resort for three years.
A cruiser liner shimmered on the horizon in the morning haze while rescue workers and swarming journalists picked their way through the rubble, leaving locals begging "why".
"Stop violence everywhere. Message to governments: stop war from Dahab," said a chalked message on a blackboard outside one bar.
"This is the third time it has happened in Sinai. I don't know why. I think it's Bin Laden," said one local tradesman, referring to al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden, from whom an audiotape was released on the eve of the Dahab bombings.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
04/26/2006 00:34 ||
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#2
A good value for the Euro 3dc. They think because they are from Europe nothing will happen to them.
Posted by: SPoD ||
04/26/2006 3:42 Comments ||
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SPoD-Sadly, I think you are right, at least for a number of Europeans. Whenever I read the pontificating comments from Euro bloggers on the beeb website, I am reminded of how unimaginative, how removed they must be from the aftermath of terror attacks to make the ignorant comments they do. When they go on about the suffering of Palestinians, while ignoring the splatter the Hamas and Hezbollah leave behind; when they go on about the mean policies of the US while ignoring the splatter Al Qaeda leaves behind, I sadly conclude that personal immersion in bloodbaths seems to be the only persuasion that brings them out of their intellectual slumber. The same is true of many leftist Americans, more dedicated to whining about gas prices and press leaks and affirmative action and wire taps than they are about this life and death fight against Islamic Terrorism.
#6
"It was like war. I'd never seen anything like it before, a child, a baby, blood everywhere," said German doctor Michael Hartlich, shaking at the memory, tears in his eyes. "A boy died in my arms."
Herr Doktor just got a reality check...Dar ul-Islam has taken up arms against Dar ul-Harb, and we are *all* on the front lines. Just remember that child dying in your arms the next time you say this isn't your fight.
Egyptian authorities, already struggling with elusive terror cells in the rugged Sinai Peninsula, moved quickly Tuesday arresting 30 men in the triple bombings that ripped apart a crowded resort town, killing 24 on a tranquil holiday evening.
"You, you, you, and you! Into the paddy wagon!"
"What'd we do?"
"Shuddup. Into the wagon wit' yez!"
Radical Muslim groups moved just as rapidly to distance themselves from the Dahab attacks.
"Wudn't us."
The leader of Egypt's banned Muslim Brotherhood condemned them as "aggression on human souls created by God." The militant Palestinian Hamas organization called them a "criminal attack which is against all human values."
Much like your run-of-the-mill Hamas attack, in fact...
Many frightened tourists fled Sinai coastal resorts where two previous bomb attacks like the Dahab blasts bore the hallmarks of al-Qaida-linked groups that appear to have a free hand to continue operations in the barren, backward and extremely rugged Sinai Peninsula.
Desolate, inhospitable terrain, a buffer between one failed protostate and an attempted failed state... Just about perfect Qaeda qonditions, isn't it?
Egyptian authorities despite massive sweeps by thousands of troops and hundreds of arrests after each previous Sinai attack appeared increasingly frustrated by the ease with which terrorists continue to hit the country's vital tourism industry.
In authoritarian states like Egypt, the "intelligence" services tend toward the secret police end of things, rather than concentrating on analysis and reporting. Usable intel's essential to cleaning out terrorist groups. You've got to identify the bastards, then catch them, before you can beat on them. Merely taking random samples doesn't work.
It brought in $6.4 billion in 2005 and is the top source of foreign exchange. "This incident is addressed to the whole of Egypt, there is no reason for it other than an attempt to destroy the economy of Egypt by attacking tourism," said Prime Minister Ahmed Nazif as he visited blast victims in a Sharm el-Sheik hospital.
The economic war continues to rage, be it in the form of high gas prices for the West or attacks on Egypt's tourism industry, or attacks on Iraq's oil infrastructure.
President Hosni Mubarak, who oversees an already-stagnant economy with unemployment rising in lockstep with the population explosion, called the attack a "sinful terrorist action." The attacks came just one day after al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden had urged Muslims to support al-Qaida in what he called a war against Islam.
Gosh. You don't suppose the two could be related, do you?
Egyptian officials have said local people were behind the previous bombings in the Sinai, but outside security experts say Sinai's extremists seem either al-Qaida linked or at least aligned with its views.
I'd guess they're linked in the same way GSPC is, only not as tightly organized. Even with good intel it'd be difficult to root them out.
Security officials, who refused to be identified because they were not authorized to release the information, said the remains of three men recovered from the scene of the blasts were so badly torn apart that they could have been suicide attackers.
Kinda casts doubt on the previous statement that they were remote control booms, doesn't it? I knew that statement came too quick.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/26/2006 00:00 ||
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Saudi Interior Minister Prince Naif Bin Abdulaziz said the educational authorities in his country have banned the collection of donations from students at all levels toward or for the benefit of charitable organizations. He said that it was necessary to restrict this matter. The General Education Administration in the Riyadh area confirmed in a report earlier this month that government and charitable schools, as well as private educational institutions in and around the city of Riyadh, would be prohibited from collecting donations inside schools for any charitable organizations whatsoever.
"Alms for ammo! Alms for ammo! Please, mister?"
"Beat it kid or I'll call the mutawa on yez!"
Dayafallah al-Balawi, the supervisor general for Charitable Associations and Organizations in the Saudi Ministry of Social Affairs, denied that his administration had registered any violations in the collection of funds. Dayfallah al-Balawi told that it is in the interest of charitable work in Saudi Arabia that it is subject to regulated procedures and that this is perfectly valid. Concerning ways of collecting donations, Al-Balawi explained that there are methods and procedures, such as transferred contributions authorized by the ministry or contributions collected by authorized agents on behalf of charitable organizations working in the area of specialty of these organizations but not outside of them.
"That's right, citizens, in the future make sure you donate for the Paleo Widow 'n Ophans Ammo Fund only through approved channels, and thanks in advance for your understanding and cooperation. Insh'allan."
In his remarks on Interior Minister Prince Naif's telegram concerning the banning of collecting donations inside schools and the consequences of specific violations committed by some persons, he reported that such a directive confirms the necessity of following orderly procedures in collecting funds for charitable works in compliance with stipulations for collecting donations, and he denied in the same context that his administration had registered violations by charitable organizations associated with it in this regard.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/26/2006 00:00 ||
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Bangladesh security forces said on Wednesday they had captured the two remaining fugitive leaders of a banned Islamic militant group wanted for a series of deadly blasts.
Salauddin, who uses one name, was captured at a hideout in Chittagong city late on Tuesday while Khalid Saifullah was later arrested after an all-night siege at a house in Dhaka, paramilitary spokesman Mashuk Hasan said.
With the capture of the two leaders, we have now arrested all seven members of the Jamayetul Mujahideen Bangladeshs top decision making body, the Majlish-e-Shura, or ruling council, the Rapid Action Battalion commander said.
The elite battalion is at the forefront of the countrys battle against Islamic militants and conducted a series of raids in the past weeks in their hunt for Salauddin and Saifullah.
Hasan said the two were leading the remnants of the group and were preparing for an attack on key government targets.
Its a big sigh of relief for us. All seven leaders of the JMB are now under our custody and the groups backbone is now completely broken, he said.
Jamayetul Mujahideen Bangladeshs leader, Shaikh Abdur Rahman, was detained last month after a siege in the northeastern city of Sylhet.
The second in command, Siddiqul Islam, alias Bangla Bhai (Bangla brother), was caught after a gunbattle a week later.
Islam is also leader of outfits sister group, Jagrat Muslim Janata Bangladesh (JMJB), blamed for a number of vigilante killings in northern Rajshahi district.
The two outlawed groups want strict Islamic laws imposed in the largely Muslim country and have waged a bloody campaign that has left 28 people dead, including four suicide bombers, in a wave of bombings since August.
The government has vowed to preserve Bangladeshs secular character and root out the extremists. Thousands of police, paramilitaries and elite security have been engaged in the effort to arrest members of the groups.
Nearly 1,000 Jamayetul Mujahideen Bangladesh members have been arrested, with 22 given death sentences.
The government banned both groups more than a year ago blaming them for a series of earlier bomb attacks on shrines, musical events, cinemas and other targets.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
04/26/2006 01:13 ||
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I think the Shutter Gun will be taken out of its case soon.
Fahima Chowdhury, wife of JMB second-in-command Bangla Bhai, was sent to jail on Monday following her confessional statement to a court in Netrakona. The police produced Fahima before the first class magistrate court one day before the expiry of her 15-day remand. Magistrate Aminul Islam ordered to sent her to jail after recording her statement under section 164.
"Bailiff! Toss her in the clink!"
In her confessional statement, Fahima said that December 8 blast in Netrakona was planned at Nongar Bhaban in Akua Haji Bari of Mymensingh town on the night of December 6 in presence of Bangla Bhai and three other JMB Shura members. Police did not reveal their names for the sake of the investigation. The aim of the blast that took place before the Netrakona Udichi office was to kill people and damage the office completely, she added. Fahima also confessed that the letter of JMB, which was found at the spot of the blast, was written by her.
"I wrote it, and I'm glad! Glad, y'unnerstand! Glad!"
She also mentioned the name of the suicide bomber who blasted the bomb, but the IO of the case refused to disclose it.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/26/2006 00:00 ||
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The Rapid Action Battalion (Rab) yesterday arrested two members of banned Jama'atul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB) and seized a huge cache of explosives and bomb-making materials at Rupganj in Narayanganj. The recovered materials include 1 kg each of nitrogen benzene and potassium chlorate, 100 grams of lead azide, 500 grams each of sodium nitrate and sodium azide, 45 detonators, 11 integrated circuit (IC), 24 electric connectors and an explosive measuring scale, said a Rab press release.
The arrestees are Mohammad Wasim, 25, and Ali Hossain, 25, of Rupganj.
Soon to be last seen leaving in a RAB truck at 3 am.
The Rab members were raiding the area, taking the two with them as of filing this report at 8:30pm.
Like we were just saying ...
Following up a tip-off that JMB activists might come to Gobindaganj of Rupganj to dump some explosives, a joint team of Rab Intelligence Wing and Rab-3 was keeping a close watch on the area. At around 2:00pm, they saw two men carrying a sack on a rickshaw. Looking suspicious, the two were challenged by the crime busters. But as they could not give any satisfactory answer, the Rab men searched through the bag and found the explosives.
You get the sense that the bag would have been searched regardless of the answers.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/26/2006 00:00 ||
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A terror suspect once arrested in connection with a possible ricin plot against Britain has launched an appeal against a government bid to deport him. The Algerian, known only as Y, was cleared last year of conspiring to use ricin but the government maintains he is a threat to national security. Y says sending him back to Algeria would breach his human rights.
Poisoning people with ricin would seem to be a violation of human rights as well, but that thought prob'ly didn't occur to him.
But claims he would be in danger were not backed up, the Home Office told the Special Immigration Appeals Commission.
"Him? In danger in Algeria? Pshaw! Now, danger from the SAS is a different matter, mind you ..."
Ian Burnett QC, for the home secretary, told a London hearing Y had "extensive Islamic extremist connections". He said Y was in fact the leader of the UK branch of the DHDS - an Algerian terrorist group which aims to unite disparate Islamic extremist groups - this is denied by Y.
"Lies! All lies!"
He may have trained in Afghanistan and had been found to have "significant numbers" of false documents, the tribunal was told. He had "close links" with north London's Finsbury Park mosque, where he was often trusted with the keys and did the photocopying, the government lawyers claimed.
Campaigners argue that this is the first appeal against deportation to a country where it is accepted that a person would be at risk of torture or death.
And it couldn't happen to a nicer guy.
Under human rights laws suspects cannot be deported to countries where they may face abuse.
But Mr Burnett told the hearing there were no substantial grounds for believing that Y would be at risk of torture on his return to Algeria and that the appeal should be dismissed.
Not that they'll throw a parade for him, either ...
It comes a day after Amnesty International published a report highlighting a series of torture techniques used by Algeria's military intelligence service, the DRS.
Britain is seeking to sign a "memorandum of understanding" with Algeria, aiming to guarantee that anyone returned there would not be ill-treated. The level of risk Y would face if deported is "very low", Mr Burnett said.
"How low?"
"Very low!"
Y was alerted that a deportation order was being sought against him on 15 September, 2005. Along with four other potential Algerian deportees, his terms of conditional bail were varied in January to allow him to visit the Algerian consulate to talk to the authorities about a voluntary return.
"So guys, you think I can come home and keep my fingernails?"
"Two chances, slim and none."
"uurk."
Another four Algerians have since withdrawn their appeals and are set to return voluntarily to their homeland, the tribunal was told.
Y arrived in Britain on a false French passport in March 2000. He claimed asylum, showed his genuine passport and was granted indefinite leave to stay in June 2001. Despite his denials of being a senior figure in the DHDS movement, his arrest in January 2003 over the alleged ricin plot was quickly reported back to the DHDS command in Algeria, Mr Burnett told the hearing. False documents and a DHDS audiotape were found at Y's home and his fingerprints were on documents at the heart of the terrorist ricin plot, Mr Burnett added.
Y, who was cleared on conspiracy along with three others at the Old Bailey, claims his fingerprints were found through "innocent association" because of his job at the mosque.
"I wuz just cleaning up the office, see, and these papes were on the floor, see ..."
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
04/26/2006 01:14 ||
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#1
Y
Posted by: Captain America ||
04/26/2006 10:21 Comments ||
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#3
hey, Algeria's part of th UN. Surely he would be safe among such a human-rights-honoring group that includes Algeria, Iran, Sudan, Cuba, China. He should be deported. His argument makes no sense, right?
Posted by: Frank G ||
04/26/2006 11:38 Comments ||
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#4
Y 2 B or not Y 2 B (any longer)
Posted by: Captain America ||
04/26/2006 12:56 Comments ||
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Editors Note: The Great Game is a term, usually attributed to Arthur Conolly, used to describe the rivalry and strategic conflict between the British Empire and the Tsarist Russian Empire for supremacy in Central Asia. The term was later popularized by British novelist Rudyard Kipling in his work, Kim. In Russia the same rivalry and strategic conflict was known as the Tournament of Shadows (Òóðíèðû òåíåé). The classic Great Game period is generally regarded as running from approximately 1813 to the Anglo-Russian Convention of 1907.
India is to open its first overseas military base this year in the impoverished central Asian country of Tajikistan - a testament to its emerging status on the world stage. The Indian air force will station up to two squadrons of MiG-29s at the refurbished former Soviet airbase of Farkhor more than 60 miles from the Tajik capital of Dushanbe, Jane's Defence Weekly said, citing defence officials. A control tower is already in place, Indian media reported. The Indian army had a military hospital there from 1997 to 2001, where it treated Northern Alliance guerrillas fighting the Taliban in Afghanistan. The 12 Russian built MiG-29s will be staffed by about 40 personnel and use two aircraft hangars, Jane's said. The base's third hangar will be used by the Tajik air force which is also being trained by the Indians.
Tajik officials would not comment on the reports. Igor Sattorov, spokesman for the Tajik foreign ministry, said: "I can neither deny nor confirm this information. Let's be cautious about this."
India will become the fourth economic power to compete for influence in central Asia. Russia has a military base in Tajikistan and one in neighbouring Kyrgyzstan. The US also has a base in Kyrgyzstan and Germany has a base at Termez, in southern Uzbekistan, both of which are used to assist operations in Afghanistan.
India has stepped up its activity in central Asia, eager to gain access to its gas supplies. Manmohan Singh, the Indian prime minister, is expected to meet with Uzbekistan's president, Islam Karimov, during a visit to the capital, Tashkent, which began yesterday. Mr Karimov has become an international pariah since his troops shot dead hundreds of protesters in the southern town of Andijan a year ago, and Mr Singh's critics will seize upon the visit as an unprincipled play for oil. India currently needs 1.9m barrels of oil a day, but this is forecast to rise to 4m by 2010.
Additional: TASHKENT - Uzbekistan, its eyes set on Asia as its relations sour with the West, agreed on Wednesday to open up its oil and gas sector to India and invited one of the worlds biggest energy consumers to invest in new fields.
Speaking after talks with visiting Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, Uzbek President Islam Karimov said his Central Asian state, increasingly criticised in the West over human rights, was ready for a closer energy dialogue with Delhi. Uzbekistans vast oil and gas reserves are attractive to India which needs resources to ensure its energy security, Karimov said, standing beside Singh in the capital Tashkent.
During the visit, Uzbekistan and India signed three framework agreements specifying Indias role in Uzbekistans energy and minerals sector. Karimov said he was ready to offer India new exploration sites under a production-sharing agreement, but gave no details.
Posted by: Steve ||
04/26/2006 09:55 ||
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#1
India is stepping up to counter Chinese moves into the Stans. Russia is a dying power Puty's blind hatred to the US is driving him to empower China with technology and weapons that will inevitably be directed to either his Russia/Siberia or the Stans which with India/US alliance moving into the Stans that Siberia must be looking mighty good.
#2
To counter Chinese moves in the Indian Ocean, India is building up its Andaman Islands Base. A squadron of Su-30 NKIs is earmarked for there along with air to air IL78 refuellers.
On the other side of the Indian ocean, India is leasing a base from Madagascar. So far, only ELINT is planned but aircraft and naval assets may be based there in future.
Posted by: john ||
04/26/2006 15:24 Comments ||
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#3
I'm happy to see India take responsibility for their neighborhood. I'd be happier if Japan/South Korea/Taiwan took responsibility for their neighborhood.
The US could support them of course, but the blood and treasure should come from those whos real interests and survival is on the line.
#4
MAO-ISM in its most basic or purest form is NOT inconsistent with the tenets or ideals of alleged Fascism, i.e. [Ultra] Rightism-based Socialism. The glitch for the Indians, etal. is the contemporary Maoism is Chinese-centric. and as modified by Mao's adoption of Marxism-Stalinism and Chinese-centric Sovietization. What it comes to is that INDIA, PAKISTAN, and the other nations of CENASIA, EAST ASIA, and SOUTH-SE ASIA ARE VIEWED UNDER MAO-ISM AS FUTURE CHINESE TERRITORIES. As with CLINTONISM is alleged SOCIALIST/PRE-/PSEUDO-COMMUNIST AMERIKA, FASCISM = DE-REGULATED or COMPETITIVE COMMUNISM-SOCIALISM. Among other precepts, the GWOT for the US and anti-American Lefts > KIND OF LEFTSOCIALISM or DEGREE OF LEFTSOCIALISM.
#2
The Russians would have plenty of influence over Iran if they told the mullahs to stop enriching uraniun or they'd join the US in an anti-turban gang-bang. Don't forget it was the Russians who got Milosevic to surrender in 1999 by telling him that they'd allow NATO to flatten Serbia if he didn't accept the terms on offer.
#3
Russia has long been the undisputed king of playing both sides against the middle.
Russia & China run around the world-playing con to Americas pro. I remember in the run up to the Iraq war Russia & the Norks all sold Iraq large amounts of weapons that much of was never delivered or delivered in working order anyway.
Russia really is the bold Hore of the world pay to play definitely applies and she is still the scorned woman to America that runs around throwing salt everywhere. Hell Russia is even giving top-notch tech to China a move that sounds great in her hatred to the US. But in reality everyone must know that China is decades away from being able to take Taiwan a prize that even if taken would be little gain that will emphasize all of Chinas military weaknesses against the USs strengths (navy air force).
However what China needs above all and especially if they want to ever try the US is Natural Resources and that is in bulk right across from china in Siberia and the Stans. Here China would play to all their strengths and their enemys weaknesses the targets are either weak Stans or Russian/Siberia a shrinking power that will have the same tech just in smaller numbers (and did I say that there is more Chinese in much of Siberia than Russians NOW). The gain is huge, huge numbers of resources for China and its far away from anything if the US or EU decide to get involved they will be forced to project their forces deep inland (remember how hard Afghanistan was imagine even deeper inland then also remember we are talking heavy divisions not light infantry like Afghanistan needed)
Puttys blind hatred for the US will cost his nation dearly and it will give China the ability to face the US on Taiwan and not be starved by the US navy/air force. Best case for Russia will be if China doesnt go for Siberia and instead goes for the Stans which could be in many forms say to preempt a terrorist threat to china what could Russia do short of not report the event beg the evil US for help. If you remember we already had a dry run of type in Kazahcistan were a rebellion of Chinese trained karate movement overran the gov.
#7
the ruskies are very good at this old game of selling "yacky" weapons that don' work.
the ruskies as well as the chinese will not allow a nuclear Iran near their borders.
The chinese, whether they like it or not have the 7th.fleet as their neighbours.
What kind of game is this?
Can somebody offer their ideas................
and respond?
#8
Despite the hoopla/hype, an article in the US Naval War College review indicates the US Navy =USDOD regards China's best, most modern submarines as inferior to the US Navy's in stealth and capability. The article does, however, infer the PLAN wants to give it the good ole' college try in challenging or stopping US battle groups from going anywhwere in East Asia-Pacific-World they please.
The Central Intelligence Agency has warned former employees not to have unapproved contacts with reporters, as part of a mounting campaign by the administration to crack down on officials who leak information on national security issues.
A former official said the CIA recently warned several retired employees who have consulting contracts with the agency that they could lose their pensions by talking to reporters without permission. He added that while the threats might be legally "hollow," they were having a chilling effect on former employees.
Posted by: Captain America ||
04/26/2006 20:00 ||
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So who leaked this?
Posted by: ed ||
04/26/2006 20:05 Comments ||
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#2
My exact thought when I read this.
I still think somebody needs to be made example of thou. Somebody needs to do the long walk for these Leaks of Classified info. And no getting fired or forced retirement is not the long walk that is a slap on the wrist at the worst.
A federal jury on Tuesday convicted a 23-year-old man of supporting terrorists by attending an al-Qaida training camp in Pakistan three years ago. Hamid Hayat, a seasonal farm worker in Lodi, an agricultural town south of Sacramento, was convicted of one count of providing material support to terrorists and three counts of lying to the FBI.
The verdict came hours after a separate jury hearing a case against the man's father deadlocked, forcing the judge to declare a mistrial. The father, 48-year-old ice cream truck driver Umer Hayat, is charged with two counts of lying to the FBI about his son's involvement in the training camp. Defense attorneys and prosecutors will meet in court May 5 to decide whether he will be retried.
One down, one to go.
Both men are U.S. citizens and stood trial in federal court before separate juries. They have been in custody since their arrests last June. Both cases initially generated widespread interest because they raised concerns about a potential terrorist cell centered in the wine- producing region about 35 miles south of the state capital. But the government presented no evidence of a terror network during the nine- week trial.
Instead, the case centered on videotaped confessions the men gave to FBI agents and a government informant who secretly recorded hundreds of hours of conversations but whose credibility was challenged by the defense. Prosecutors described Hamid Hayat as having "a jihadi heart and a jihadi mind" who returned from a two-year visit to Pakistan intent on carrying out attacks. Possible targets included hospitals, banks and grocery stores.
They presented no evidence to show that such attacks were imminent or even planned. But in closing arguments, a prosecutors said the case was intended to prevent terrorist attacks "long before anybody is hurt."
As opposed to afterwards, which tends to be something the otherwise dead victims will, or at least should, appreciate.
Defense lawyers for both men argued that the government didn't have a case against their clients because it had produced no evidence that the son ever attended a terrorist training camp. Their biggest hurdle was trying to persuade jurors to discount the men's videotaped confessions. The statements were given separately last June during lengthy interrogations by the FBI in Sacramento.
"Members of the jury, you have to disregard what my client said on those tapes! Why, he must have been under duress! Under the influence! Maybe he's just stoopid!"
"Hey!"
"Shaddup Hamid, I'm doing my best with what you gave me!"
Defense lawyers said the confessions were made under duress, after the men had been questioned for hours in the middle of the night.
"My client is an early to bed kind of man, and they kept him up past his bedtime! Obvious duress if I ever saw it!"
The father and son eventually told the agents merely what they thought they wanted to hear, without realizing the legal consequences, their lawyers argued.
"Where my clients came from, you can say anything to the cops and it doesn't matter!"
The trial is the result a government investigation into Lodi's 2,500-member Pakistani community that began after agents received a tip in 2001 that Lodi-area businesses were sending money to terrorist groups abroad. That investigation ultimately lead agents to Naseem Khan. The 32-year-old former Lodi resident was working a variety of fast-food and convenience store jobs in rural Oregon when agents approached him in October 2001, just a month after the terrorist attacks.
Khan, a Pakistani native who moved to the U.S. as a teenager, was recruited to infiltrate Lodi's Pakistani community. He initially investigated the money laundering allegations and then targeted a pair of local imams before finally befriending Hamid Hayat. The Hayats grew to eventually consider Khan almost a member of the family.
After Hamid Hayat left for Pakistan in spring 2003, Khan kept in touch and recorded their telephone calls _ some of which show Khan urging Hayat to attend a jihadi camp. In one conversation, Khan exhorted Hayat to "be a man _ do something!"
Hamid Hayat's lawyers seized on such conversations to show that the FBI informant pushed Hayat to attend a training camp, but ultimately produced no evidence that he had. They also questioned the informant's credibility, in part because of his own testimony. Khan said that just before he was recruited, he told FBI agents he had seen Osama bin Laden's physician and two other international terrorists living in Lodi during the late 1990s. At the time, they were wanted for attacks in the Middle East and Africa.
Defense attorneys and terrorism experts said it was highly unlikely they would have been in the U.S. at that time, a point prosecutors conceded later in the trial.
Posted by: Steve White ||
04/26/2006 00:00 ||
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And all CNN radio was saying this afternoon was that dear old Dad's trial was a mistrial due to the jury deadlock, and that "..his son was being tried separately." Fair and balanced? (not!)
A Saudi charged with being part of an al Qaeda bomb-making cell was set to appear on Tuesday before a U.S. military tribunal in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, on evidence that his military defense attorney says was obtained through torture.
Jabran Said bin al Qahtani, an electrical engineer captured at an al Qaeda safe house in Pakistan in March 2002, was trained by the militant network to make small hand-held remote detonators of a kind later used in improvised devices against U.S. forces in Afghanistan, the U.S. military says.
Tech support guy, was he? Let the Pakistanis Taliban do the heavy work.
A military charge sheet says Qahtani wrote two instruction manuals on how to assemble circuit boards that could be used as timing devices for bombs and was preparing to join the fight against U.S. troops when Pakistani forces captured him and two alleged co-conspirators in the Pakistani city of Faisalabad.
Long way from home, wasn't he? Musta been a pilgrim.
The three men -- Qahtani, Algerian Sufyian Barhoumi and Saudi Ghassan Abdullah al Sharbi -- are scheduled to appear separately before the tribunal for pretrial hearings this week.
They are among only 10 out of 490 detainees in the Guantanamo Bay prison camp who have been charged with war crimes before the tribunals, known formally as commissions. All of those charged so far face life in prison if convicted. Air Force Col. Moe Davis, chief prosecutor for the tribunals, said the military was developing charges in two dozen more cases against Guantanamo prisoners, including some that could draw the death penalty.
Qahtani is to make his first appearance before the tribunal on Tuesday for what his military attorney, Army Lt. Col. Bryan Broyles, said would be an uneventful proceeding. But Broyles is preparing to challenge the case against his client under a Defense Department directive that formally instructs tribunals to prohibit the use of evidence found to result from torture. "I believe there's torture-related evidence in the prosecution's case against my client," he told reporters without elaborating.
"I mean, he said he was tortured."
"It'll be a pretrial motion," Broyles added. "I have to take a specific piece of evidence and say, 'This statement I challenge because I believe it's a result of torture."'
Posted by: Fred ||
04/26/2006 00:00 ||
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I know Broyles, he's a good dude. What an awful position to be in, defense counsel at Gitmo. Every judgment you have to make involves a conflict between your duty to your client -- duties you have been ordered by the government to carry out -- and duty to your country, knowing that every move you make will be milked for propaganda value in the Arab press. And the MSM, for that matter.
No one likes defense attorneys, but bear in mind that military defense attorneys have nothing in common with civilian defense attorneys, who will say anything for a buck. Military defense attorneys are soldiers doing their assigned duties like everyone else -- not necessarily with any joy -- so resist the urge to blame Broyles. I'm sure his conscience is tormented all on his own.
If I'm pissed at anyone, it's the policymakers who put soldiers in this position, basically ordering officers who took an oath to betray it. The alternative is to refuse, which could mean the end of your career. Which, perhaps, is the right answer, but it's still a shitty position to be in. I hate seeing my colleagues forced to make these choices. We're too freakin' civlized for our own good.
#2
I wouldn't be too worried about the position Lt. Col. Broyles is in. He's both an officer and a defense attorney. Sounds like he's making his case as best as possible, and letting the tribunal reach whatever conclusions it deems appropriate. Whatever was done, let the tribunal decide - it will be very useful to start building a record of various penal activities, and whether they constitute torture or not.
Given the evidence on the "detainees" so far (weight gain, recidivism, willingness of released prisoners to appear) every little fact contradicts the wild misleading allegations.
Maybe Cuban authorities can share their prison practices and results with the media and EU as well?
KARACHI: Police have registered cases against the editor and publisher of a Danish newspaper and several other European dailies over their publication of cartoons depicting the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH), under a blasphemy law that carries the death penalty, an officer said.
Internet giants Yahoo, Hotmail, and the search engine Google were also named in the cases for allowing access to the drawings of the Holy Prophet (PBUH) that were considered sacrilegious by Muslims. A lawyer who runs a citizens rights group submitted the cases.
The drawings were first published by Denmarks daily Jyllands-Posten in September. Newspapers in several other European countries later reproduced the caricatures, triggering violent protests across the Muslim world. At least five people died in the unrest in Pakistan.
Islamic tradition bars any of drawings of the Holy Prophet (PBUH), favourable or otherwise, in a policy to discourage idolatry. Lawyer Iqbal Haider, who runs Awami Himayat Tehrik or Peoples Support Movement, had petitioned the Supreme Court against the publication of the cartoons under a blasphemy law that allows the death penalty for anyone guilty of insulting the Holy Prophet (PBUH) or the holy Quran.
Cases were registered on Tuesday against Jyllands-Posten, its editor, publisher, a cartoonist, and newspapers in France, Italy, Ireland, Norway and the Netherlands at a police station in Karachi on the courts orders, said Tariq Malik, an official at the station.
It is now the governments job to contact the Interpol and bring the offenders to a court of law in Pakistan, Haider said on Wednesday.
It was not clear immediately whether or when the government would approach the Interpol but a senior Karachi police officer said that the case would be further probed.
At this stage we cant say whether or not Interpol will be contacted in this matter, said Mushtaq Shah, chief of Karachi police operations.
We will first investigate and file our report to the government, he said, adding, This is for the higher authorities to decide what to do next.
A government prosecutor, who opposed the petition, says Pakistans courts have no jurisdiction over a crime committed abroad.
The courts in Pakistan ... have jurisdiction to try a person for an offence within their territorial jurisdiction in Pakistan, prosecutor Makhdoom Ali Khan said in a written statement to the Supreme Court on April 7. AP
Posted by: john ||
04/26/2006 20:15 ||
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It is now the governments job to contact the Interpol and bring the offenders to a court of law in Pakistan, Haider said on Wednesday.
******
Uhhh, no, I don't think so. Fat chance of that happening.
#2
And if a cartoon in a Pakistani newspaper offends me, I'll sue them right here in southeastern Pennsylvania. Interpol will drag them here. Right. Sure thing.
#4
I think it's time to create laws in the west specifically criminalizing the issuance of death fatwas, and allowing for extradition or capture of such individuals who make such death threats.
Enough of this Holy Prophet Mocmud (PTUI) bulldada.
#6
I think it's time to create laws in the west specifically criminalizing the issuance of death fatwas, and allowing for extradition or capture of such individuals who make such death threats.
EXACTLY! The sooner you do so the better for world wide sanity and real civilizational advancement. Failure to do that means genuflexing to the Forces of Darkness in part or wholely. And we know that such Forces want it all, no less.
The Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) will contest the upcoming Azad Jammu and Kashmir Legislative Assembly elections with the promise to fight for an independent Kashmir, JKLF Chairman Amanullah Khan told a press briefing on Tuesday.
He called upon the governments of Pakistan and Azad Kashmir to remove the provision from the nomination papers that demands that election contestants take an oath to support Kashmir's accession to Pakistan. He described the provision as a draconian law, adding that it was against human rights and the Kashmiris' right to self-determination.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/26/2006 00:00 ||
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While nonsense about "independent kashmir" might be tolerated in India, the JKLF is playing with fire if it attempts the same in Pakistani Kashmir.
The Pak Army is quite ruthless.
Posted by: john ||
04/26/2006 15:15 Comments ||
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Cobra gunship helicopters hit the hideouts of suspected pro-Taliban militants in North Waziristan on Tuesday after a military convoy was attacked late on Monday evening, leaving up to three soldiers and four militants dead. Sources in Miranshah said that three soldiers were killed when the militants ambushed the convoy heading towards the Afghan border. However, military spokesman Maj Gen Shaukat Sultan said that one soldier was killed and around a dozen were injured in the attack. He said that four militants were killed in the ambush. An appropriate response to the attackers continues and I will not give operational details, Sultan told Daily Times.
Purported Taliban spokesman Tariq Jameel claimed to have inflicted greater casualties on the security forces than what the military admits to and none of my comrades were killed.
"Nope. Nope. They're fine. Just a flesh wound or two..."
Jameel warned the tribal elders against meeting government officials and also defended the burning of newspapers for referring to them as terrorists and miscreants. He said there was no chance of talks between Taliban and Islamabad.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/26/2006 00:00 ||
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"Quagmire" verrrry loosely defined
Posted by: Frank G ||
04/26/2006 0:19 Comments ||
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I wonder if they get upset at being called 'miscreants', because in Pakistan it still retains its archaic meaning of heretic.
A suspected Afghan bomb-maker and four members of his family were killed when an explosive device he was building blew up in their home in southwestern Pakistan, police said on Tuesday.
Another workmans' comp claim for Mutual of Quetta.
The mans wife, mother-in-law, brother and three-year-old son died in the blast on the outskirts of Quetta, Balochistan province police chief Chaudhry Mohammad Yaqoob said.
Darwin would be pleased.
His second wife and another son aged 13 were injured and the roof of the house collapsed after the blast, he said.
Maybe even giddy.
Police found a timer and other material for making bombs. The suspect, Kamaluddin, an Afghan national who goes by one name, was wanted by police following intelligence reports that some saboteurs had entered Pakistan for subversive activities, Yaqoob said.
Too bad about the women and kiddies. Perhaps Allan will forgive him.
Yaqoob said foreign agents were involved in acts of terrorism in impoverished Balochistan which is in the grip of low level insurgency.
Perhaps the Balochis wouldn't be so impoverished if they weren't so gripped by insurgency.
But it's not the Balochs insurging. Of course not. It's them dang furriners...
Two days ago an Afghan carrying explosives was injured when a bomb he wanted to plant in a passenger bus went off prematurely, the police chief said. Police detained Mohammad Saeed, a resident of Afghanistans Zabul province, who confessed that he had recently crossed the border to set bombs in Quetta, he said.
"Ow! Ow! Aaaaaiiiieeee! I confess! I crossed the border to set bombs in Quetta! I killed Jon Benet, too!"
Posted by: Fred ||
04/26/2006 00:00 ||
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At least 20 people were injured Tuesday in two separate blasts in Indian-administered Jammu and Kashmir. While the first incident took place in Lolab in north Kashmir's Kupwara district, the second explosion occurred in south Kashmir's Tral town in Pulwama district, news agency Indo-Asian News Service reported from capital Srinagar.
In the first blast, nine people in a Tata Sumo vehicle were injured when their vehicle hit a pre-planted improvised explosive device (IED), police said. In the second incident, at least 11 people - seven civilians and four paramilitary troopers - were wounded in Tral town Tuesday afternoon when terrorists lobbed a grenade at a paramilitary patrol. The injured have been shifted to the hospital. The entire area around the two explosion sites has been cordoned off by police and security forces, the news agency reported.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/26/2006 00:00 ||
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BAGHDAD, Iraq Coalition forces killed 12 terrorists during a raid April 25 in Yusifiyah at a safe house associated with foreign terrorists. Multiple intelligence sources led the troops to the specific structure located approximately 8 kilometers N/NE of the location where the U.S. Apache helicopter crashed April 1.
Upon arrival the troops took direct fire and immediately engaged the threat with small arms fire as well as rotary wing aircraft machine gun fire. The troops initially killed five terrorists outside of the safe house, and then called for an air strike to neutralize the persistent direct fire coming from the safe house.
After the precision air strike, the ground troops conducted a tactical search of the destroyed safe house (I guess it wasn't so safe. And no bulldozer required.) and located the bodies of seven more terrorists and a woman. Every male who was found in the rubble was wearing an AK-47 vest with two loaded magazines and two grenades. The troops also discovered suicide notes on one of the terrorists, body bombs, weapons to include a shoulder-fired rocket and ammunition.
The first terrorist who ran out of the safe house upon the troops arrival was attempting to launch the shoulder-fired rocket and was immediately engaged and killed.
Two wanted terrorists, one potentially transnational, were believed to be operating from this safe house. However, it is unknown at this time if the two were killed in the raid.
Coalition forces are currently determining the identity of those killed.
The troops destroyed the weapons, suicide vests/body bombs and ammunition on-site.
Hundreds of Shiite Muslim militiamen have deployed in recent weeks to this restive city -- widely considered the most likely flash point for an Iraqi civil war -- vowing to fight any attempt to shift control over Kirkuk to the Kurdish-governed north, according to U.S. commanders and diplomats, local police and politicians.
Until recently, the presence of the militias here was minimal. U.S. officials have called the Shiite armed groups the deadliest threat to security in much of the country. They have been blamed for hundreds of killings during mounting sectarian violence in central and southern Iraq since the bombing of a revered Shiite shrine in February.
The Mahdi Army, led by firebrand cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, has sent at least two companies, each with about 120 fighters, according to Thomas Wise, political counselor for the U.S. Embassy's Kirkuk regional office, which has been tracking militia activity. The Badr Organization, the armed wing of Iraq's largest Shiite political party, has also boosted its presence and opened several offices across the region, military officers here said.
Although still in its early stages, the militia buildup "is something that definitely concerns us, and something that we are watching very carefully," said Col. David R. Gray, 48, of Herscher, Ill., commander of the 101st Airborne's 1st Brigade Combat Team, based in Kirkuk. "So far they haven't been that violent, but does it add to the tension, putting them into this maelstrom? Absolutely."
The fate of oil-rich Kirkuk -- Iraq's third-largest city with about a million residents and sizable ethnic Kurdish, Arab and Turkmen communities -- has been a pivotal and divisive issue since long before the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003. Iraq's constitution, endorsed in nationwide balloting in October, calls for a referendum on the future of the region by the end of 2007, but many key details are in dispute, such as who will be permitted to vote.
Kurdish leaders speak openly of their intention to use force if necessary to gain control of the city, which they consider the historical capital of a vast Kurdish nation also extending into Iran and Turkey. During the rule of President Saddam Hussein, Arabs brought in from elsewhere in Iraq displaced thousands of Kurds. As many as 300,000 Kurds who were pushed out have returned to the area, according to U.S. estimates, establishing vast settlements on the outskirts of the city and making them its largest ethnic community. Kurds also occupy most of the top provincial political and security jobs.
Many Iraqi Arabs, both Sunni and Shiite, are adamantly opposed to relinquishing Kirkuk, among them Sadr and his political followers.
Operating within and alongside Iraq's police and army, Shiite militias have grown politically more powerful and boosted their membership, despite being outlawed under Iraq's new constitution. U.S. officials have called on the Shiite-led government, whose leading parties are tied to Badr and the Mahdi Army, to rein them in, but few if any such steps have been taken.
Gray said the militias used the bombing of the Askariya shrine in Samarra, north of Baghdad, as a pretext for expanding into Kirkuk, ostensibly to protect their mosques and people. Shiite residents of Kirkuk, most of whose families were transferred here by Hussein decades ago, are believed to make up less than 5 percent of the local population.
For the most part, however, the militias have maintained a low profile, U.S. military officials said. Shortly after they arrived, an Iraqi police unit told them to stow their guns and promised that the mosques would be protected. The militias complied. They have held at least three large but peaceful street demonstrations, including two by Badr that attracted more than 2,000 people. Wise said Badr is less troubled by the prospect of Kurdish control of Kirkuk.
"We know they are here, but they are not patrolling in the streets publicly, not yet," said Brig. Gen. Sherko Shakir, the provincial police chief.
A few hundred Shiite militiamen would be no match for the tens of thousands of Kurdish fighters either serving in Iraqi army units in Kirkuk or stationed outside the city in Kurdish-controlled provinces.
In a meeting here last week, Sadr's representative in the city, Abdul Karim Khalifa, told U.S. officials that more armed loyalists were on the way and that as many as 7,000 to 10,000 Shiite residents were prepared to fight alongside the Mahdi Army if called upon. Legions more Shiite militiamen would push north from Baghdad's Sadr City slum, he said, according to Wise.
"His message was essentially that any idea of Kirkuk going to the Kurds will mean a fight," Wise said. "He said that their policy here was different from in other places, that they are not going to attack coalition forces because their only enemy here is the Kurds."
U.S. officials said the Shiite armed groups had not disrupted security here, but local police and government officials, many of them Kurds, have accused them of a wave of crimes.
"We fear the expansion of the role of Shiite armed men in Kirkuk," said Yadgar Abdullah, commander of the police emergency operations center in Kirkuk and an official with the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, which administers the Kurds' decades-old militia, the pesh merga . He said the number of kidnappings for ransom in Kirkuk has surged since the militias arrival.
Another Kurdish security official, who spoke on condition he not be named, said Shiite militias are thought to have conducted at least five killings of Kurds in Kirkuk and the surrounding area.
"We are dealing with anybody that carries weapons and stands against the Iraqi government to disturb security," Abdullah said. "They will be considered terrorists that must be fought and disarmed."
In a recent interview, Khalifa, the Sadr representative, said the Mahdi Army -- which battled U.S. troops across southern and central Iraq in 2004 -- was responding to a power play by Kurdish politicians, whom he accused of plotting "to marginalize us in the political process and trying to force the Shiite Arabs out" by seizing control of Kirkuk.
Despite intense competition among Iraqi factions for control of the city, U.S. forces here have been largely successful at limiting violence. But the influx of Shiite militias poses a new challenge for American troops, who have long considered the primary threat to be the Sunni Arab-led insurgency.
Last week about two dozen U.S. soldiers and an Iraqi SWAT team launched a midnight raid in search of 12 men accused of planting a deadly roadside bomb last month. They crammed into a dozen Humvees and, with helicopters buzzing overhead, swarmed a quiet neighborhood in central Kirkuk, kicking down doors and rummaging through a half-dozen houses.
The six suspects they detained, whose names were provided by local informants, were believed to be members of the Mahdi Army, accused by U.S. and British forces of recent attacks on coalition troops in Baghdad and several southern cities. Photographs of Sadr were plastered on virtually every wall of every raided home.
"I had never heard of these Mahdi guys being up here until tonight," said Lt. John Reynolds, 23, of Ararat, Va., a platoon leader, as he rifled a cabinet full of Shiite prayer flags, posters depicting Imam Ali, and portraits of the youthful Sadr and his white-bearded father.
In a courtyard outside, a woman in a head scarf clutched three weeping children to her chest. Two men arrested inside sat blindfolded and bound in plastic handcuffs, one a soldier in the Iraqi army, the other a local policeman.
"Just what we need in a place like this," Reynolds said, "something new to worry about."
In response to the Shiite buildup, the Kurdish pesh merga militia has boosted its already substantial presence in Kirkuk and in the city of Tuz, where nearly 100 Kurdish gunmen arrived in recent weeks, Wise, the State Department representative, and U.S. commanders said.
The Kurds have also increased to about 15,000 the number of private security workers guarding offices and government buildings in the Kirkuk region, according to a Western official here, who said they could be called upon to fight if ethnic conflict escalated.
Tuz, a city of about 200,000 south of Kirkuk, was considered so peaceful in January that U.S. forces transferred out almost all their soldiers, with about 40 remaining as advisers to the Iraqi troops remaining behind.
"Now you are seeing lots of attempts by the militias to intimidate Iraqi soldiers there," said Lt. Col. Bob Benjamin, 42, of Chicago, deputy commander of the 1st Brigade Combat Team. "We found bombs near some mosques. There is definitely the potential for increased violence, but the Iraqis so far have kept the lid on the pot."
U.S. officers here say a further cause for concern is that the arrival of the militias, who U.S. officials say receive training, arms and funding from Iran, has coincided with an influx of Iranian sniper rifles and roadside-bomb technology in the region. The latter includes highly lethal Iranian-designed "shape charges" that channel the blast to punch through armored vehicles. Such a device killed a U.S. soldier this month, the first U.S. fatality in the city of Kirkuk since the 101st Airborne returned to Iraq in November.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
04/26/2006 01:15 ||
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This may become the flashpoint that begins the long overdue drive to eliminate the militias - al Sadr in particular. Bet on the Peshmerga.
#2
Drama Queens WaPo: Shi'ite militias moving towards Kirkuk while Kurds dig in
If Tater and the Tots got their ASSes handed to them in Shiite Najaf + etc, what chance does he have in Kirkuk?
...............
Interesting re-cap or re-cast about the various factions in Iraq Michael Yon, Tuesday, April 18th, 2006..sample:
'The Civil War did not start subsequent the invasion; it was already underway. The former Iraqi regime had slaughtered unknown thousands of civilians and buried many of them in mass graves that are still today being discovered and catalogued. If anything, the previous Civil War has merely changed shape, the advantage has clearly shifted....
#6
As I understand it, Kirkuk was historically largely Kurdish but Saddam moved a lot of Kurds out and gave/sold their property to Arabs - who were certainly Saddam supporters and thus largely Sunni Arabs. These Arabs are understandably upset now that the Kurds are coming back and reclaiming 'their' property and forcing the Arabs out. Many of these Arabs who are being evicted bought or inherited the property and have owned it for perhaps 20 years (think how Atlantans might feel about having the Cherokee come back and kick them out.) Most of the violence in the Kurdish borderlands (e.g. Kirkuk) would thus be Sunni/Baath vs. Kurd. That does not sound like the most fertile ground for Mookie's boys to work in. 'Enemy of my enemy is my friend' may apply to some degree, but certainly not with a lot of loyalty. Sounds like an opportunity to generate good intel on both groups of 'our' enemies. Sometimes 'the enemy of my enemy' is actually just your worse enemy.
#7
The Kurdish region is some of the most secure and peaceful in Iraq. The Kurds are heavily supporting US moves into Iran both with rebels in Iran and with I would imagine escorting SOF. That is the point of this in its whole.
Sadr and his Mehdi Army are nothing more than Iranian expeditionary unit. Iran has a big interest in putting some pressure on the Kurds and sowing more chaos in Iraq to keep the US tied down. We should have permanently faded Sadr long ago.
#9
If we know that shia militia are moving into the area, then, why don't we pick them up and have them dig for WMDs for a year or two ? We can get them for crossing a province border with a loaded weapon.
#10
Any Shia militia moving into Kirkuk will have a difficult logistics task.
Since there isn't much indiginous Shia population or institutional capacity, the militia will have create bunking and other facilities. These will be very vulnerable to sunni suicide bombers.
#12
You'll notice that their hasn't been much of a suicide bomb war in the Kurd's area. As stated, the Kurd "militia" is a whole different animal than Sadr's group of Iranian trained thugs. If Sadr moves into the Kirkuk area he'll soon find himself in a Dien ben fooey situation, trapped and getting pounded.
Terror mastermind Abu Musab al-Zarqawi revealed his face for the first time Tuesday in a dramatic video in which he dismissed Iraq's new government as an American "stooge" and called it a "poisoned dagger" in the heart of the Muslim world.
The video, in which he also warned of more attacks to come, was posted on the Internet only days after a breakthrough in Iraq's political process allowing its Shiite, Sunni and Kurdish leaders to start assembling a government.
It also followed a high-profile audiotape from Osama bin Laden and seemed a deliberate attempt by al-Zarqawi to reclaim the spotlight following months of taking a lower profile amid criticism of bombings against civilians. It was his first message since January.
A U.S. counterterrorism official, speaking on condition of anonymity in compliance with office policy, said analysts believe al-Zarqawi is showing his face to demonstrate that he is still engaged as a leader of jihad, or holy war.
The message also appeared to be an attempt by the leader of al-Qaida in Iraq to rally Iraqis and foreign fighters to his side at a time when U.S. and Iraqi officials are touting political progress as a setback to insurgents.
Al-Zarqawi appeared in the 30-minute video, which he said was made Friday, dressed head-to-toe in black with a black scarf around his head and a beard and mustache.
He seemed healthy, shown in one scene standing and firing a heavy machine gun in a flat desert landscape that resembled the vast empty stretches of western Iraq, where he is believed to be hiding.
He delivered his statement, sitting inside with an ammunition vest hung from his neck and an automatic rifle propped nearby.
Al-Zarqawi addressed Sunni Arabs in Iraq and across the Arab world, warning that their community was in danger of being caught between "the Crusaders and the evil Rejectionists," the terms used by radical Sunnis for the Americans and the Shiites.
"God almighty has chosen you (Sunnis) to conduct holy war in your lands and has opened the doors of paradise to you ... So mujahedeen, don't dare close those doors," he said. "They are slaughtering your children and shaming your women."
Any new government "whether made up of the hated Shiites or the secular Zionist Kurds or the collaborators imposed on the Sunnis will be stooges of the Crusaders and will be a poisoned dagger in the heart of the Islamic nation," he said.
He trumpeted the success of the insurgency, saying "when the enemy entered into Iraq, their aim was to control Iraq and the area. But here we have been fighting them for the last three years."
He addressed President Bush, telling him, "By God, you will have no peace in the land of Islam."
"Your dreams will be defeated by our blood and by our bodies. What is coming is even worse," he said.
A U.S. intelligence official, who also declined to be identified in compliance with office policy, said a technical analysis had determined that the voice on the tape was al-Zarqawi's.
Al-Zarqawi has claimed responsibility for some of the bloodiest suicide bombings in Iraq since the 2003 fall of Saddam Hussein and for the beheadings and killings of at least 10 foreign hostages, including three Americans and a Briton. The U.S military has put a $25 million bounty on his head.
He has made several audiotapes with similar messages, but the last time video in which al-Zarqawi was believed to have appeared was one released on May 11, 2004, in which U.S. intelligence says he is a masked figure shown beheading American Nicholas Berg with a knife. His face is not visible.
Arab television network aired portions of the tape at the same time that Iraq's government-owned TV broadcast an interview with the Prime Minister-designate Jawad al-Maliki, who called for Iraq's sharply divided Sunnis, Shiites and Kurds to unite in a front against terrorism.
"If we can reach unity between all the components of the people, the canals of terrorism will dry up," al-Maliki said.
If made on Friday, the tape came three days before a triple bombing at a resort in Egypt that killed at least 24 people, including 21 Egyptians and three foreigners.
It was believed to be the first time al-Zarqawi's group has released a video showing his face, said Ben Venzke, head of IntelCenter, an Alexandria, Va.-based firm that provides counterterrorism intelligence services to the U.S. government.
The counterterrorism official said U.S. intelligence still believes that al-Zarqawi is in Iraq and there was no evidence the video was linked to either the Egypt bombings or the bin Laden video.
A video, rather than an audio, is thought to increase the risk to the speaker, he said.
One or two pictures of al-Zarqawi's face have circulated on Islamic militant Web sites before, and he appeared in a video of his sister's wedding in Afghanistan in the 1990s.
U.S. and Iraqi troops hunting al-Zarqawi also have several old photos of him at their checkpoints some showing him bearded, others showing a younger, softer face. Wanted posters offering a $25 million reward are kept at checkpoints across Iraq with several photos showing al-Zarqawi at different stages of his life.
Iraqi security forces detained al-Zarqawi in Fallujah in 2004 but released him after a few hours because they didn't realize who he was, deputy interior minister Maj. Gen. Hussein Kamal said last year.
The footage showed al-Zarqawi and about two dozen insurgents undergoing combat training together.
In another scene, he sat indoors with masked lieutenants and a man identified in a caption as the insurgent commander for Iraq's western province of Anbar. The men, sitting on traditional Arab cushions and mats, were discussing strategy over a large map spread on the ground. Only his face was shown.
Al-Zarqawi had taken a low profile in recent months after al-Qaida in Iraq claimed responsibility for a Nov. 9 triple bombing in Amman, Jordan, that killed 60 people, most Sunni Arabs.
That attack raised a backlash against the militant leader. His tribe in Jordan renounced him, and even some extremist leaders criticized the shedding of civilian blood.
In January, al-Zarqawi's group said in a Web statement that it had joined five other Iraqi insurgent groups to form the Mujahedeen Shura Council, or Consultative Council of Holy Warriors. Since then, al-Zarqawi's group stopped issuing its own statements.
Tuesday's video was issued under the aegis of the Mujahedeen Shura Council, whose logo appeared on the screen, along with the black flag logo of al-Qaida in Iraq.
London-based security consultant Charles Shoebridge also said the video could be an attempt by al-Zarqawi to shore up his standing among insurgents.
"He appeared to have a sense of mystique by never showing his face ... (The video) could well be motivated by the perceived weakening of his position within the insurgency," Shoebridge, a former counterterrorism officer with London's Metropolitan police and an ex-British Army intelligence officer, told The Associated Press.
It also may seek to undermine Sunni Arabs participating in the government, "which he would see as a great threat to the future of the insurgency and as further marginalizing both him and al-Qaida sections of the insurgency," he said.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
04/26/2006 00:58 ||
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I made the mistake of listening to NPR on the drive in this morning. Their spin was that Zark's message is the counterpoint to Rumsfeld and Rice visiting Iraq. Equivalent, ya see?
Posted by: Matt ||
04/26/2006 9:50 Comments ||
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Matt--SHAME--SHAME,SHAME.WHY would even listen to that dribble???????
#5
Zarq is losing, and losing badly. This video proves it. If he weren't losing, there would be no need for a recruitment video. He understands that each time the government moves forward, he loses that much more. He wants to fight a "hundred years' war", but the people around him have already grown tired of his rants, his indiscriminate killing, and the lack of progress (financial security for average Iraqis) that Zarqawi is mostly responsible for.
Hate doesn't do much to fill the belly or cool the nights. Zarq is doomed, and even he knows it.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
04/26/2006 16:07 Comments ||
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When grown men begin making gun-sex videos of themselves, and chum along with their pals patting them on the back...."Stories about Gladiators" soon follow. It's simply down hill from there.
#7
I've noticed the weapon placement in videos may be sending a message of sorts. When Bin Laden was in Afghanistan, he was shown with his weapon in hand, and those who were with him. Zawahiri has been shown between to rifles propped up, about the time he was thought to be in Iran, between the two lands of armed conflict. In this one, Zarqawi is shown with his rifle in hand in the western Iraqi desert, but is then shown with his circle of friends with it propped barely above his shoulder. This could mean is safely riding it out in western Iran, near where his old Ansar al-Islam camps crossed borders. Bin Laden doesn't want to be seen at all, but they are letting everyone know they are still alive. Their bluster is desperation.
#10
NPR does a good job with classical and jazz music, and the Olde Tyme Radio Shows. It's only when the poor dears try to think that it gets really ugly. They have this unfounded idea that they have the capability.
Posted by: mac ||
04/26/2006 23:17 Comments ||
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Logo's? Multiple freakin' LOGOs?
AQI is a black flag, huh? LOL. I assume that is to remember the massive amount of Jihadi dead as they confonted true American warriors, locked n' loaded, who proceeded to snuff them out by the score.
The beauty of Iraq is that the Jihadis had to attack our troopswhich, by their presence, constituted a mortal threat. They must attack to save face and yet suffer debilitating losses when they do against American tactics.
The reality is how little the Muzzie Jihadis have actuallt done in the way of military damage. While I feel for every fallen troop, I know that the price we have paid after 3 years of combat is surprisingly low, less than Pearl or Normandy or the Bulge or Tarawa, the 'canal or many other places.
A man identifying himself as Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the head of Al Qaeda in Iraq, appeared in a video released Tuesday calling the American effort here a "crusader" campaign and denouncing the efforts to form a new Iraqi government.
The 34-minute video, posted on a Web site used by jihadist groups, shows a man who appears to be Mr. Zarqawi, speaking and gesturing, meeting with his lieutenants, and firing long bursts from an American machine gun in a stretch of empty desert. He has a mustache and a beard, wears black fatigues and a cap, and at one point identifies himself by name. He also refers to himself as "the brains of Al Qaeda in Iraq."
The video predicted American "defeat and humiliation" while praising the insurgents in Iraq and urging them on, saying at one point, "They are slaughtering your children and shaming your women."
"God almighty has chosen you to conduct holy war in your lands and has opened the doors of paradise to you," he said. "So mujahedeen, don't dare close those doors."
He also mocked President Bush and accused him of lying to the American people.
"Why don't you tell about the reality of your soldiers and their failure to fight?" he said on the video. "Why don't you tell your people about the soldiers who commit suicide? Why don't you tell your people that your soldiers cannot have any sleep without taking drugs, which makes them like animals?"
He said American troops were "driven by your generals, who are like the crusaders and evangelists, to the slaughterhouse."
Mr. Zarqawi, a Jordanian, is believed responsible for dozens of car and suicide bombings here that have killed and wounded thousands of Iraqi civilians. He also took credit for the November bombing of three hotels in Jordan that killed at least 57 people.
While the authenticity of the video could not be verified, an American official said Tuesday night that intelligence agencies had completed an analysis of the video and concluded that the speaker was Mr. Zarqawi. The man who appears in the video bears a strong resemblance to various photos the American and Jordanian governments have distributed of him.
If it is authentic, the video would be the first time that Mr. Zarqawi had willingly shown his face to the world. And it would amount to a public resurfacing after several months of obscurity.
In January, Mr. Zarqawi's group, Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, declared that it had joined something called The Freedom Fighter Council with several other insurgent groups and submitted itself to the leadership of an Iraqi man, identified as Abdullah al-Baghdadi.
Al Qaeda then stopped taking credit for attacks altogether in Iraq, and the Freedom Fighter Council has not claimed responsibility for the kind of mass murder of civilians for which Mr. Zarqawi has been blamed.
Even so, the suicide attacks and car bombs have continued, and American officials said Mr. Zarqawi's group was the most likely culprit in the destruction of the golden shrine in Samarra, which had set off a wave of sectarian bloodletting and brought the country to the brink of civil war, one of his professed goals.
The video, titled "Address to the People," was part propaganda blast against the United States and President Bush, and part paean to the insurgency in Iraq. Though it makes references throughout to Al Qaeda, the video carried the signature of "The Freedom Fighter Council."
"Your mujahedeen sons were able to confront the most ferocious of crusader campaigns against a Muslim state," the speaker said, gesturing with an index finger. "They have stood in the face of this onslaught for three years."
It was not immediately clear why Mr. Zarqawi would release such a video now. It was made public just two days after Osama bin Laden, the leader of Al Qaeda, released an audio tape accusing the West of a "Zionist-crusaders war on Islam," a statement similar in parts to Mr. Zarqawi's.
Many experts believe that there are elements of a rivalry between Mr. Zarqawi and Mr. bin Laden, despite the declaration in 2004 that Mr. Zarqawi was submitting himself to Mr. bin Laden's leadership. While Mr. bin Laden has been in hiding since late 2001, presumably in Pakistan, Mr. Zarqawi has become the world's most active terrorist.
The video released Tuesday opens with an excerpt of a speech by Mr. bin Laden urging men to take up a jihad against the West, and in it, the man identified as Mr. Zarqawi refers to Mr. bin Laden as "our prince."
Several other explanations for releasing the video also suggested themselves, including the possibility that the timing was meant to coincide with the first steps toward a new Iraqi government, which was agreed on last week after a five-month deadlock. The government is made up of leaders from the country's Shiite majority, as well as Kurds and Sunnis. The Sunnis form the backbone of the guerrilla insurgency.
Indeed, American and Iraqi officials have been hoping for months that the greater inclusion of Sunnis in the democratic process could begin to marginalize insurgents and terrorists like Mr. Zarqawi, who have hidden among the population.
[Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld sought to show support for Iraq's new leadership on Wednesday, making a surprise visit to Baghdad just days after the Shiite politician Jawad al-Maliki was chosen as prime minister-designate, Reuters reported. Mr. Rumsfeld swooped into the capital aboard a military cargo plane for his first visit to Iraq in 2006.]
In a letter obtained by American forces in January 2004 and believed to have been written by Mr. Zarqawi, the Jordanian expressed concern that his efforts in Iraq could be undermined by a functioning democracy. In the video, the Iraqi government is singled out.
"By God, you will have no peace in the land of Islam," the speaker says. "Your dreams will be defeated by our blood and by our bodies. What is coming is even worse."
He then refers to the Shiites as "Rawafidh," which means, roughly, "rejecter."
"We believe that any government made up of rejecter or godless Kurds or people who call themselves Sunnis is only a collaborators' government, and that it would be a sword in the Islamic nation's body," he said.
The video could have been intended to dispel any notion that Mr. Zarqawi is dead or unable to lead his movement. Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia said last year that Mr. Zarqawi had been wounded while fighting in Iraq, and there was widespread speculation that he had died. Various statements, including ones believed to have been made by him, asserted that he had recovered. There was no mention of any wounds in the video.
Mr. Zarqawi is perhaps the single most hunted man in Iraq, with the Americans offering a $25 million reward for information leading to his death or capture. His picture, particularly the one taken from a booking photo at a jail, hangs on the walls of American and Iraqi checkpoints here. There are unverified reports that Mr. Zarqawi was in either American or Iraqi custody at some point after the fall of Saddam Hussein's government in April 2003.
The man in the video cuts a vigorous figure. When he holds up the heavy machine gun, he shows his bare forearms. The scenery surrounding him is mostly flat and brown and bare, suggesting any number of places in the Middle East.
In another frame, he is shown poring over a map, and in another he is meeting with someone referred to in a caption as "one of the commanders in Anbar Province," a large area in western Iraq.
Unlike Mr. Zarqawi, the other men in the video are masked. At one point in the tape, a printed imperative flashes across the screen.
"Don't forget to pray for us," it says.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
04/26/2006 00:15 ||
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#1
The Democrates should be calling for a timetable to our defeat. We could then work towards that date and get past this inconvenient war and get on with world peace.
#3
And, what's up with him firing an American gun? Runnin' out of AK-47 ammo due to wedding celebrations in Anbar?
"Why don't you tell about the reality of your soldiers and their failure to fight?" he said on the video. "Why don't you tell your people about the soldiers who commit suicide? Why don't you tell your people that your soldiers cannot have any sleep without taking drugs, which makes them like animals?"
The supreme example of projection here. Wasn't there a report a while back (in the Fallujah seige maybe) that Zark's boyz were hopped up on all kinds of uppers and acting crazy in battle? I guess now that the Awards shows are over, Zark and Binny are competing for next year's oscars? And, I think Zark should talk to the guy who wrote the opinion piece in Kuwait about the supposed "quagmire" (linked in today's RB).
Posted by: BA ||
04/26/2006 10:02 Comments ||
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#4
It is a recruitment drive. He is running out of people. They keep getting killed.
#9
I wish the psyops boys would make a truly wicked video showing someone who looked a LOT like Zarqawi at a supposedly homosexual marriage party, drinking liquor from a bottle, looking like he was having sex with a pig, and drunkedly praying to a picture of Osama as god on Earth. Maybe even making a crude sketch and yelling out that it is Mohammed.
I'm sure a real expert could make that a hundred times more offensive than I could imagine. But the bottom line is to tout is as a viral video on the Internet.
Five unidentified bodies were found Tuesday in southern Baghdad's Dayala Bridge area. In a press statement, an Iraqi police source said the five bodies were found near the area's distillation tanks. The bodies, he added, appeared to have been the result of torture before being killed with shots to the head.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/26/2006 00:00 ||
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Way to go to keep that vital Karni border crossing open, Paleos...
Six members of the Palestinian security forces were shot and wounded by militants who had planned to ram an explosives-packed vehicle into a Gaza-Israel border crossing. The militants, driving in two vehicles, opened fire at members of national and preventive security who were manning a post close to Karni, the main trade crossing between the Gaza Strip and Israel, security sources and the office of the Palestinian Authority president said Wednesday. The security forces ordered the militants to stop but instead they began shooting at the post.
According to Palestinian security sources, the militants had been planning an anti-Israeli suicide attack on Karni by driving a jeep into the crossing. The militants who intended to carry out the attack fled the scene in their second car but only after abandoning the first vehicle containing two explosive devices, later detonated by members of the security forces. There was no immediate claim of responsibility but security sources believe those planning the attack were members of the Popular Resistance Committees.
#3
I agree, LH, but the actual events aren't so clear. If this news report is accurate, all the shooting was done by the militants, and several of the Paleo coppers are in hospital in quite serious condition. But yes, it does look like they were attempting to police their border.
#4
Now they are in power , its a bit of a nightmare not knowing who's goin across the borders .. Is it the Peoples Judean Front , or the Judean Peoples Front , aaaw fuck .. if its not Hamas authorized , kill em or at least try .. The last thing they want is a precision guided bomb on their cabinet .. hence they are attempting to look like they are attempting to police the border ..
I bet the Israeli guards had a laugh watching that one unfold
#5
AL dont get to happy or feel surprised this is just more like rival gang warfare over whos turf is what. The Popular Resistance Committees is supported by Hezbollah in Lebanon who is supported by Iran. On top of that the Committees leader just happened to get the top security post and orders to form a new security force for PA made up of terrorist and to fit with all these other coincident this just happened to happen right after the Iranian agreement with Hamas for financial support.
So Fatah who is getting the boot on the security forces and I imagine arent to keen on letting these guys run their ops in their faces. That would explain why the PA made a fight of this. But the real question is Jordan rolling up Hamas/Syria (Iranian ally) weapons agents who were planning ops in Jordan, you got PRC leader getting sudden top job by Hamas who just met with Iran, and recent ops in Egypt by these very groups. In Iraq we got Sadr boys showing up in Kirkuk see
http://www.jeffkouba.com/myblog/2006/04/some-thoughts-on-kirkuk-and-iran.html
AQ videos from both Bin Laden and Zark, Mullahs running here and there making threats of attacks just like these above all over the world. Think maybe Iran is running interference with their proxies or trying to say something?
A little info on the main suspect group Popular Resistance Committees.
http://www.tkb.org/Group.jsp?groupID=4211
The group is also suspected of being under the influence of Hezbollah, but no definitive connections between the groups have been discovered yet.
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1145961231105&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
In talking about the Gaza part of the operation undertaken against Egypt. The Gaza part was a VIED that was stopped by PA security forces. Not mentioned but I would guess those security forces were loyal to old school Fatah who has a dog in this fight because of their want to get back in power.
There was no claim of responsibility, but PA security officials suspect the Popular Resistance Committees were behind the attempt. Last week, Jamal Abu Samhadanah, the leader of the group, was appointed director-general of the PA Interior Ministry by PA Interior Minister Said Siam, setting off a crisis between the Hamas-led government and PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas.
Irans fingers are all over all of these recent events everywere you look if you just dig they are thier.
GAZA - Gunmen from Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas Fatah movement announced on Wednesday a plan to form a new militia, a move likely to raise tensions with the governing Hamas group over security control in the Gaza Strip.
The new force would aim to protect Fatah men against the Israeli enemy and against any attempt by any party inside the homeland to target them, Abu Saqer, a spokesman for Fatahs Yasser Arafat Brigades, told Reuters.
"We need a militia to protect our militia from them other militias!"
Some 30 people were wounded in Gaza in clashes earlier in the week between Fatah and Hamas gunmen.
The violence followed Abbas veto of a police force Hamas said it would set up through the Interior Ministry to curb lawlessness in Gaza. Abbas also rejected the appointment by Interior Minister Saeed Seyam of Jamal Abu Samhadana, a senior militant wanted by Israel, to a top security post.
Several armed wings from Fatah, including Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, said they would take part in a new militia of 2,000 gunmen in response to Hamass plan to set up a police unit. The new Fatah force will aim to unify the armed groups and protect them even against the Interior Ministry force if it attempts to block Fatah men carrying out their missions to attack Israeli targets, Abu Saqer said.
Yummmm, pass the butter
The Hamas led-government said it had no plans to arrest militants who launch rockets from Gaza towards Israel.
Posted by: Steve ||
04/26/2006 10:13 ||
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Well, when Plato contemplated setting up the Guardians to guard the Greek social order, he did realize there was a built-in defect: Who would guard the guardians?
JERUSALEM - Israel was launching a satellite on Tuesday to spy on Irans nuclear program, an Israeli defense official said. Israel planned to launch from Siberia its Eros B satellite, designed to spot images on the ground as small as 70 centimeters (27.5 inches), the defense official said.
Launched from Siberia?
The most important thing in a satellite is its ability to photograph and its resolution, he said, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitive subject matter. This satellite has very high resolution, and (state-run) Israel Aircraft Industries has a great ability to process information that is relayed.
If the launch is successful, it will take seven to 10 days to see whether the images that are transmitted are sharp and clear, he said.
Posted by: Steve White ||
04/26/2006 00:00 ||
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Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, the military arm of Fatah movement, claimed responsibility of launching three "Al-Fateh Yaser" and "Al-Qaqaa" advanced missiles on Asderot Israeli settlement Tuesday morning. This comes in response to the operation that targeted three Brigades leaders in the past two days, the Brigades said in a military release distributed in Gaza Tuesday.
Guys? Guess what's gonna happen in the next two days?
Posted by: Fred ||
04/26/2006 00:00 ||
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Israeli troops detained nine Palestinians including a 50-year-old woman in the West Bank city of Nablus and its camps during a raid on Tuesday morning. The troops stormed into the houses and especially those in the old town, Palestinian sources said.
"Awright! Stick 'em up, all of yez! You, too, Granny!"
"I'm only 50!"
"Okay. You've had a tough life. Into the paddy wagon wit' yez!"
In the Jenin city, Israeli soldiers broke into many towns and arrested a number of Palestinians including Hamas Movement leader Farhat Asaad.
"Stick 'em up, Farhat!"
"But I'm just a spokesman!"
"Moshe! We got enough room in the paddy wagon for a spokeman?"
"Toss him in, Avi!"
Meanwhile, Israeli forces have isolated the northern part of the West Bank. They have forbidden Palestinians from moving through the military checkpoints and forced them to go through sandy and bumpy roads. The Israeli forces have taken strict measures especially after the Tel Aviv bombing carried out by an Islamic Jihad Movement member, which killed nine people.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/26/2006 00:00 ||
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The government on Tuesday said Hamas members arrested recently were close to attacking officials and installations in Jordan under orders from a movement military leader based in Syria.
They don't give up easy, do they?
Government Spokesperson Nasser Judeh also said security services, guided by a detained Hamas man, seized more arms, which were hidden in a northern village. He said the weapons included TNT explosives and light anti-tank LAW rockets. The foiled plots by Hamas elements against officials and installations in Jordan were in the final stages of execution, Judeh told reporters during a weekly press briefing. Interrogations of suspects proved that they received instructions from a Hamas leader, specifically an official of the Hamas' military wing, who is now in Syria.
Syria's just a fountainhead of Middle Eastern good will, isn't it?
Jordan last week indefinitely postponed a visit by Palestinian Foreign Minister and a Hamas leader Mahmoud Zahar after finding a weapons stash belonging to the group. Authorities found explosives and rockets in the hands of a Hamas cell, which had been surveying strategic spots in Amman and other cities, the government said. Officials believe the weapons were smuggled into the country from neighbouring Syria. Hamas on Tuesday denied any involvement and a Syrian foreign ministry official said Damascus was unaware of any Hamas military leadership within its borders and that the group's presence in Syria was solely political, Reuters reported.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/26/2006 00:00 ||
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Whack Syria now
Posted by: Captain America ||
04/26/2006 10:58 Comments ||
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Philippine soldiers arrested a Muslim militant with links to al Qaeda suspected of a series of kidnappings and bombings since 2000 that killed Americans and Filipinos, an army spokesman said on Tuesday.
Major Bartolome Bacarro said troops seized Sharie Amiruddin, a suspected member of the Abu Sayyaf group, on Monday in Zamboanga City on the southern island of Mindanao.
"He was the planner of the Dos Palmas kidnapping," Bacarro told reporters, adding Amiruddin was also blamed for bomb attacks in three southern cities in 2002.
In May 2001, a boatload of Abu Sayyaf rebels snatched 20 tourists and workers from the Dos Palmas resort on the western island of Palawan and brought them to the south, where most of them they were held in the jungle for several months.
One American tourist, Guillermo Sobero, was beheaded by the rebels.
Another American, Martin Burnham, was killed during a rescue operation by elite troops and his wife, Gracia, was shot in the leg. The Burnhams, Christian missionaries working in the mainly Roman Catholic Philippines, were held for more than a year.
Bacarro said Amiruddin had been under surveillance for weeks after the military got information the Abu Sayyaf was plotting to bomb shopping malls and public parks in Zamboanga during Easter holidays earlier this month.
The plans were disrupted when the supposed bomb-maker was killed during a raid by police and soldiers on a hideout outside Zamboanga two weeks ago, a senior police intelligence official said.
Three days after that raid, security forces stormed another Abu Sayyaf hideout in a Muslim village in Zamboanga, confiscating blasting caps and materials for making crude bombs.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
04/26/2006 00:26 ||
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Shark food.
Posted by: Captain America ||
04/26/2006 10:56 Comments ||
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The frayed cease-fire accord between the government and the ethnic Tamil rebels seemed closer to collapse today, as the air force fired on rebel-controlled areas after a suicide bomber attacked the military headquarters here. The attack killed 10 people and injured at least 28, including the country's top military official.
Government troops have not fired on rebel positions since the 2002 cease-fire agreement with the main rebel group, Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam.
Although no group has claimed responsibility for the bombing, the government attributed the attack to the Tigers, saying it bore the hallmarks of previous rebel assaults.
The suspected bomber disguised herself as a pregnant woman on her way to visit the military hospital, the military spokesman, Brig. Prasad Samarasinghe, said. The bomb was detonated near a convoy of vehicles carrying the army commander, Lt. Gen. Sarath Fonseca, to lunch. The suicide bombing comes on the heels of a steady spate of assassinations and landmine attacks over the last several weeks, which effectively quashed talks on the 25-year-old war that were due to resume in Geneva last week. An estimated 65,000 people have been killed so far in the war.
The head of the government's peace secretariat, Palitha Kohona, said in a telephone interview, "We have not gone back to war and don't intend to." He said the strikes on rebel positions were a "pre-emptive action designed to deter further provocations of the type we witnessed today." The Tigers did not issue a statement, but TamilNet, a Web site that is sympathetic to the rebel cause, confirmed that fighter planes had fired on a rebel post in the eastern port city of Trincomalee. A 14-hour curfew has been imposed there.
Military officials said rebel areas in the Sampoor region, about 140 miles east of the capital, Colombo, were also targeted.
The main highway connecting rebel-controlled territory with the rest of the country was closed indefinitely, the officials said. Helen Olafsdottir, the spokeswoman for the Scandinavian-led Sri Lanka Monitoring Mission, said the suicide attack and the government strikes on rebel areas "could jeopardize any possibility for future talks."
"There is a desperate need for the two parties to resume talks if the situation is not to result in a serious conflict that could escalate out of control and lead to war," she added.
Jehan Perera, an analyst with the National Peace Council, an independent advocacy group, described each strike as an "act of war."
"In practice, the cease-fire is a dead letter," he said.
The injured military leader, General Fonseca, is known as a hardliner opposed to making concessions with the rebels.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
04/26/2006 00:21 ||
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I have been watching activities in Sri Lanka for many years since I had some neighbors who were from there and I knew it was the home of Arthur C. Clarke, one of my favorite sci-fi writers. It was the first place I noticed suicide bombers as a trend about 20+ years ago. Interestingly the tamils are mainly hindu so I wonder where their penchant for self booming comes from?
Posted by: DanNY ||
04/26/2006 12:38 Comments ||
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I wonder where their penchant for self booming comes from?
An excess of female children to dispose of? (From the article, "The suspected bomber disguised herself as a pregnant woman")
The Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei warned on Wednesday that the United States would gain global revenge if it launches an attack on the Islamic republic, the state television reported.
"The Americans must understand that if they make a surprise attack on Iran, their interests around the world will be under retaliation, our country will give them diploid (I think that means double) reply," Khamenei was cited as saying.
The supreme leader stressed that the U.S. has been threatening Iran for many years, but the Islamic republic would not be really concerned about it.
Earlier on Wednesday, Iran's hardline President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad vowed that the country would neglect the UN calls to freeze its sensitive nuclear activities.
"We won't retreat from our legal rights," Ahmadinejad was quoted as saying by the official IRNA news agency.
"If the international institutions acknowledge our country's rights, we will also respect their demands, but if they deprive our legal rights, I don't think Iran could accept any requests," he said.
"If they can carry out their responsibilities legally, there's no reason for us to reconsider our relations with them," the president stressed.
The two leaders made the flinty remarks just two days before a nuclear deadline set by the UN Security Council expires, which demanded Iran to suspend all uranium enrichment activities by Friday.
Based on a Feb. 4 resolution, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) on March 8 handed over the Iranian nuclear issue to the UN Security Council.
After weeks of heated bargains, the 15-member Security Council on March 29 approved a non-binding presidential statement, asking Iran to suspend uranium enrichment activities in 30 days and demanding the UN nuclear watchdog to report on Tehran's compliance.
Mohamed ElBaradei, chief of the IAEA, is expected to submit the report to the Security Council in the coming days.
With the deadline looming, President Ahmadinejad said on Monday that he believed sanctions were unlikely, vowing to press ahead with the nuclear program.
He also warned that Tehran would "reconsider" its cooperation with the IAEA, hinting a possible withdrawal from the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, if western countries continued to prevent Iran from obtaining peaceful nuclear technologies.
Earlier this month, Iran officially declared that it had gained ticket to joining the global nuclear club by having produced 3.5 percent enriched uranium, a technological leap in the process for nuclear power plant construction, which immediately aroused strong international concern.
The United States has accused Iran of secretly developing nuclear weapons under a civilian front, but Iran dismissed the charge, saying that its nuclear program is fully peaceful. Enditem
#6
"The Americans must understand that if they make a surprise attack on Iran, their interests around the world will be under retaliation, our country will give them diploid (I think that means double) reply," Khamenei was cited as saying.
now really, it shouldn't be a surprise, should it, big mouth?
Posted by: Frank G ||
04/26/2006 15:28 Comments ||
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#7
Iran's supreme leader: US attack will cause global warming revenge.
#8
Oh, ferchrissakes - first it's Dire Revenge™; now it's Global Revenge™.
If they keep this up, I'm going to have to bill these clowns for excess use of "™."
And my rates ain't cheap.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
04/26/2006 15:52 Comments ||
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#9
It would be a superb idea to let it be known that if the US goes to war against Iran, that we have a list of about 300 Mullahs and others who would be hung--not after an extended trial like for Saddam, but after a brief military tribunal.
Then let is also be known that it was very possible to have one's name removed from this list, given certain unspecified consideration prior to any hostilities.
Finally, after an interval, to let it be known that the list has been foreshortened by several dozen, without comment as to why.
Of course, under considerable pressure, we might slip out a name or two of those who were on the cooperative list.
#10
"If the international institutions acknowledge our country's rights, we will also respect their demands, but if they deprive our legal rights, I don't think Iran could accept any requests," he said.
Does this mean they will recognize Israel if they are allowed nuclear power reactors?
#11
I have to admit: every time this scumbag opens his hole to vow Dire Revenge , it piques my interest in attacking them to see what happens. Probably not the response he's looking for.
#12
Next it'll be "Dire Global Revenge," and from there it's just a short step to a "Triple-Dog Dare."
Posted by: Mike ||
04/26/2006 16:19 Comments ||
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#13
How is it possible that none of these cement head dictators can see the pattern? Here's the pattern morons. You bluster, you get our attention, you bluster more, you get more of our attention, you shoot your mouth off when we believe that you really could be a threat, we become very attentive. That is when you die.
Hint to Madmouth: We believe that you will have a bomb.
Posted by: Mike N. ||
04/26/2006 16:55 Comments ||
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#14
Nice idea, Anonymoose, but I'd just as soon we bomb their nuke sites, missile sites, and mullahs tonight and not play any games with them. I'm a little disappointed that we didn't do it yesterday on Holocaust Remembrance Day.
#15
AyaToilet has not idea who he is taunting. Not until he gets one down his windpipe.
Posted by: Captain America ||
04/26/2006 17:31 Comments ||
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#16
It took us what, 18 months to get Saddam? I doubt any threat we'd make to 300 people would have much effect, expecially with people who want to be martyrs.
#17
Dire global revenge? Are they getting their PR from the political lleaders of the Philippines?
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
04/26/2006 17:54 Comments ||
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#18
Theyre playing primitive warfare. Its all posturing and shouting and dancing as they motivate themselves to do something stupid. They only understand that game. They dont understand the cold methodical engineering approach of modern American warfare. Therefore there is a disconnect in communication. So that is why sometimes you have to adjust your behavior so that these twits understand what is at stake.
Make it public. Make it clear. No apologies. If these twits so as much as act upon their public threats, the United States will not only wipe the Persian civilization off the planet, but it will go to the extent of identifying every single remaining ethnic member by DNA tag and gene wash the globe of their kind. They will join the Carthaginians as people who are only know in history books.
For the handwringers, just remind them that it will only happen if the Persians act upon their threat and the way to avoid it all this is to convince THEM to change their behavior.
#19
2007 by most is the year Iran starts indigens production of more than one or a few nukies - once Iran starts having them in numbers, attaining regional empire is the next phase. Iff Khameini is try to tell us the Commie Airborne will liberate "occupied" NOLA and other Clintonian Fascist = Half-A-Commie, defective US SOCIALIST-held CONUS-NORAM territories, Mother Cindy told us already.
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Taleban fighters have told the BBC they plan to target and kill British troops starting a tour of duty in Afghanistan. A local Taleban commander in Helmand, one of the country's most volatile provinces, called the British "an old enemy of Afghanistan".
US aircraft pummelled pro-Taliban forces on either side of the Afghanistan-Pakistan border, while Afghan police battled 50 armed militants in the south, in clashes that killed at least 11 insurgents, officials said on Tuesday.
Eight Taliban 
Cairo, 26 April (AKI) - Two suicide bombers on Wednesday struck outside a military base in el Gorah housing multinational peacekeepers south of the Rafah border crossing to Gaza, on Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, reports said, citing Egyptian police. At least two peacekeepers - a New Zealander and a Norwegian - with the Multinational Force and Observers (MFO) independent peacekeeping force were reportedly injured in the blast along with two Egyptian policemen. The incident comes two days after a terrorist attack on the Egyptian resort town of Dahab, which killed at least 18 and wounded scores.
Egyptian authorities, already struggling with elusive terror cells in the rugged Sinai Peninsula, moved quickly Tuesday arresting 30 men in the triple bombings that ripped apart a crowded resort town, killing 24 on a tranquil holiday evening.
Bangladesh security forces said on Wednesday they had captured the two remaining fugitive leaders of a banned Islamic militant group wanted for a series of deadly blasts.
Fahima Chowdhury, wife of JMB second-in-command 
The Rapid Action Battalion (Rab) yesterday arrested two members of banned Jama'atul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB) and seized a huge cache of explosives and bomb-making materials at Rupganj in Narayanganj. The recovered materials include 1 kg each of nitrogen benzene and potassium chlorate, 100 grams of lead azide, 500 grams each of sodium nitrate and sodium azide, 45 detonators, 11 integrated circuit (IC), 24 electric connectors and an explosive measuring scale, said a Rab press release. 
A terror suspect once arrested in connection with a possible ricin plot against Britain has launched an appeal against a government bid to deport him. The Algerian, known only as Y, was cleared last year of conspiring to use ricin but the government maintains he is a threat to national security. Y says sending him back to Algeria would breach his human rights.
A Saudi charged with being part of an al Qaeda bomb-making cell was set to appear on Tuesday before a U.S. military tribunal in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, on evidence that his military defense attorney says was obtained through torture.
Cobra gunship helicopters hit the hideouts of suspected pro-Taliban militants in 
A suspected Afghan bomb-maker and four members of his family were killed when an explosive device he was building blew up in their home in southwestern Pakistan, police said on Tuesday. 
Five unidentified bodies were found Tuesday in southern Baghdad's Dayala Bridge area. In a press statement, an Iraqi police source said the five bodies were found near the area's distillation tanks. The bodies, he added, appeared to have been the result of torture before being killed with shots to the head.
GAZA - Gunmen from Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas Fatah movement announced on Wednesday a plan to form a new militia, a move likely to raise tensions with the governing Hamas group over security control in the Gaza Strip.
JERUSALEM - Israel was launching a satellite on Tuesday to spy on Irans nuclear program, an Israeli defense official said. Israel planned to launch from Siberia its Eros B satellite, designed to spot images on the ground as small as 70 centimeters (27.5 inches), the defense official said.
Israeli troops detained nine Palestinians including a 50-year-old woman in the West Bank city of Nablus and its camps during a raid on Tuesday morning. The troops stormed into the houses and especially those in the old town, Palestinian sources said.
The government on Tuesday said Hamas members arrested recently were close to attacking officials and installations in Jordan under orders from a movement military leader based in Syria. 
