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Today: 77 articles and 356 comments as of 12:40.
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Iran tests submarine-to-surface missile
Today's Headlines
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Page 1: WoT Operations
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Afghanistan
'Taliban commander' killed in Afghanistan
A coalition forces airstrike killed a local Taliban commander and 15 other militants in fighting in southern Afghanistan, the US military said today.
“The strike brought rebel casualties to 28 in the past 24 hours.”
The strike brought rebel casualties to 28 in the past 24 hours. The “militants’ safe house” was targeted yesterday in the central Khod Valley of the Uruzgan Province, and the leader who was killed was a “known Taliban commander”, a US military statement said. It did not name the local commander, and only said those killed in the fighting were “involved in conducting attacks against the Afghan people and against Afghan, ISAF and coalition forces”.

There were no injuries to civilians during the operation as the “coalition forces used deliberate measures to limit the chances of property damage, and due to the precision of the air strike, no damage was reported to a mosque located adjacent to the militants’ safe house”, the statement said.

“The insurgents were travelling in a 12-vehicle convoy before they were hit. Three vehicles got away while eight were destroyed or disabled.”
The operation came the same day a roadside bomb and a gunfight in eastern Afghanistan left two French soldiers dead and another two wounded as at least 13 insurgents were killed in clashes with police and Nato in the south.

In southern Helmand province, Nato-led forces used artillery against an insurgent convoy yesterday, killing seven militants, an alliance spokesman said. The convoy was spotted by British troops in the Musa Qala district of southern Helmand province before they ordered the strike, said spokesman Major Luke Knittig. The insurgents were travelling in a 12-vehicle convoy before they were hit, he said. Three vehicles got away while eight were destroyed or disabled, Knittig said.

In Ghazni province, militants attacked an old Muqur district building early today, killing one court official and wounding two policemen, said Abdul Ali Fakuri, spokesman for Ghazni’s governor. Three vehicles were burned during the attack.
Posted by: Fred || 08/27/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  A convoy? It looks like all the smart ones have been killed already.
Posted by: trailing wife || 08/27/2006 9:08 Comments || Top||

#2  “The strike brought rebel casualties to 28 in the past 24 hours.”

I don't care HOW motivated you are, 1 KIA per hour is gonna seriously screw with your morale.

Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski || 08/27/2006 9:08 Comments || Top||

#3  'Taliban commander' killed in Afghanistan

Q) How could they tell it waz a Talibunnie commander?

A) Tall Turban + platform curly toed slippers.
Posted by: Uncle Ben || 08/27/2006 9:14 Comments || Top||

#4  You know that in accordance with the theory put forth by Darwin, you need members of the group to actually survive to pass on the experience/ability to continue to operate. The potential gene pool is decreasing every day, both current and potential recruitable.

Weed (wed) -v.t. 2. To free from weeds: to weed a garden. 3. To remove as undesirable or unwanted: to weed out inexperienced players.
Posted by: Anguting Shinenter1301 || 08/27/2006 13:00 Comments || Top||


Guantanamo detainees sent to Afghanistan
The US said today it had transferred five detainees from the military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, to Afghanistan. A written statement from the Pentagon did not say why the detainees were "released" and did not disclose their identity or home country.

In earlier releases, the military has said detainees were freed because they no longer were considered enemy combatants. The Pentagon said the latest releases came after "multiple review processes" at Guantanamo. In all, 315 detainees have been sent from Guantanamo to other governments, including Australia, Denmark, France, Germany, Spain and Britain.
Posted by: Fred || 08/27/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  5 dollars they are found dead in the next month or so fighting the US or other countries
Posted by: sinse || 08/27/2006 9:31 Comments || Top||

#2  they'll be the fat dead ones
Posted by: Frank G || 08/27/2006 10:27 Comments || Top||

#3  We really need implantable radio tracking devices if we're going to do this catch-and-release bullsh!t.
Posted by: Zenster || 08/27/2006 18:48 Comments || Top||


Africa North
Algiers bombings mastermind killed
Algiers security sources reported that one of the already killed terrorist in Borj el Bahri operation taking place last Wednesday, is a distinguished member of “Ben Zerga” squad affiliated to the GSPC’s al Fateh brigade”, called Sofiane Ighyl known as Abd el Fettah. Sources told el Khabar that Abd el Fateh was the mastermind of the network being responsible of the series of explosions, which happened in current August; the first targeted a security check point near Kahouat es-Shergui in Borj el Bahri, and the other targeted the gendarmerie forces in Reghaia, both caused wounded victims.

The security services kept its activity in the eastern suburbs of Algiers under surveillance, according to information given by an ex-terrorist, who was accompanying Ighyl when he was trapped together with another armed element where a violent confrontation with the armed forces took place, and ended up with Abdefatteh death and his friend’s evacuation to the hospital where he is in a coma, after being seriously wounded.

According to the same sources, Sofiane is among the prominent figures in Ben Zerga squad acting under the commandment of el Fath brigade organisationally affiliated to the second region of the structure of the GSPC (Salafist group for preaching and combat). In a relevant context, the security services got into Abdelfattah and his companion house situated in Borj el Bahri, in the same day, and found out hidden weapons and munitions.

The sources reported that the information given by the repentant element allowed the arrest of many people who supplied the explosions network regularly with support and assistance, and insisted on underscoring that the bombing of public places is a GSPC’s message of refusal to the reconciliation charter who excludes the explosions involved terrorists from its provisions. However, the sources consider Abdelfattah killing as a link in the chain of GSPC’s heads elimination process, after the pressure they put on the soldiers to undermine their positive response to the reconciliation procedures.
Posted by: Fred || 08/27/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:


Arabia
Saudis say 34 militants seized in Qaeda swoop
Four militants arrested in the Saudi city of Jeddah this week were part of a group of 34 men rounded up in an effort to prevent a resurgence of Al Qaeda violence, the Saudi Interior Ministry said on Saturday. The four Islamist radicals surrendered on Monday after Saudi security forces besieged the building where they had an apartment in the Red Sea port. "Security work led to the arrest of 34 people of different nationalities in Mecca, Medina, Riyadh and Jeddah because they belonged to the 'deviant group' and had links to escapees from the Malaz prison," a statement on official news agency SPA said.

Officials have said that two of the men arrested on Monday were among seven people who escaped from the Malaz detention centre in Riyadh in June. Saturday's statement said weapons and locally-made explosives were found in the Jeddah apartment. "They were using the flat as a hide-out and as a factory for instruments of death and destruction," it said. It did not specify when the other 30 men were arrested but said they had been under surveillance in recent weeks.
Posted by: Fred || 08/27/2006 00:33 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Spank and release in five ... four ... three ...
Posted by: Zenster || 08/27/2006 2:23 Comments || Top||

#2  Strange how Jeddah has become an Al Qaeda hotspot of late. Saudis and those that have ever spent time there will tell you that the Western regions, especially around the Hijaz and Asir regions tend to be more liberal and less Wahhabist in outlook. Jeddah often is referred to as the most cosmo city in the KSA.

Perhaps Qaeda knows this and is taking advantage of it as a cover? Just a thought.
Posted by: Lancasters Over Dresden || 08/27/2006 17:15 Comments || Top||

#3  As the most cosmopolitan city, it would be the most full of those things which irritate the kind of people who join Al Qaeda... and the Muttawa if they aren't as ambitious to change the world. I've no idea if that's the dynamic, but it's a possibility.
Posted by: trailing wife || 08/27/2006 21:39 Comments || Top||


Bangladesh
Bangladesh arrests bomb suspects
Bangladeshi police arrested five suspected Maoist rebels for questioning on Saturday, a day after four policemen and a businessman were slain in a bomb attack in a northwest district, an official said. At least three bombs ripped through a cattle market on Friday, killing five people and wounding several others in Naogaon district, police officer Naem Ahmed said. The attackers, whose number has not yet been determined, seemed to have targeted policemen posted as guards at the market, in a region where outlawed Maoist guerrillas operate, Ahmed said.
Posted by: Fred || 08/27/2006 00:45 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:


Caucasus/Russia/Central Asia
China, Kazakhstan stage joint anti-terror drill
URUMQI, Aug. 26 (Xinhua) -- China wrapped up the second phase of its joint anti-terror drill with western neighbor Kazakhstan on Saturday in Yining, in western China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region.

The Yining exercise, which began at 9:30 a.m., was a 5-part simulation of a battle in which Chinese guards gradually force terrorists into a narrow valley and cliff caves. It lasted two hours and ten minutes, with groups of mock terrorists being eliminated by police forces consisting of artillery, police dogs, cavalry, special services and other troops.

Chinese troops taking part in the "Tianshan-I (2006)" exercise in Yining were mainly border police and anti-terror special forces. Around 100 observers from Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) member states - China, Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan - were in Yining to evaluate the drill.

China's police authority said the exercise was held to demonstrate the SCO's progress in combating terrorists in the region, namely the "three evil forces" of terrorists, splittists and extremists.
Such as the Judean People's Front
According to China's Ministry of Public Security, the exercise was a concrete demonstration of the consensus on enhancing security cooperation reached by SCO member states at the SCO summit in June, and a means to improve coordination between law enforcement departments and special services.

"The exercise will help establish SCO's active role in maintaining regional security and stability," said Meng Hongwei, China's vice minister of public security and commander of the Chinese troops for the drill. "The SCO should provide more opportunities to cooperate," said Meng, adding that the fight against terrorism was a tough, long-term task.
Posted by: gromky || 08/27/2006 13:05 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:


Violence erupts around Chechnya
Security forces have killed four people accused of extremist activity while three Russian soldiers have been shot dead by gunmen in new violence that is gripping areas near Chechnya. Officials in Dagestan, on Chechnya's eastern border, said police and troops had surrounded a house overnight after observation suggested it was a centre for extremist activity. The occupants refused to surrender and, after children were allowed to leave, a gunbattle erupted, lasting until after dawn. Four men were killed and three women were taken into custody in the regional capital, Makhachkala.

Meanwhile, in Ingushetia, to the west of Chechnya, Interfax news agency said that rebels had opened fire with machine guns on a car carrying Russian servicemen, killing three of them. The agency, quoting prosecutors, said a number of soldiers had been injured.
Posted by: Fred || 08/27/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  How's the sales of advanced weaponry to Iran going?
Posted by: gromgoru || 08/27/2006 15:01 Comments || Top||


Europe
Turkish blasts injure 22
FOUR separate blasts on Turkey's popular coastal region and in the country's commercial capital Istanbul injured at least 22 people, state news agency Anatolian reported today.

Anatolian said three blasts occurred around the southern coastal area of Marmaris early today and another in Istanbul's Bagcilar district late yesterday.

The British Foreign office said 10 British tourists were among the wounded in Marmaris, four of them seriously.

"There have been three explosions in the resort of Marmaris, Turkey and 10 British nationals have been injured and are in hospital. We have consular staff on the ground," a Foreign Office spokeswoman said.

"We have no further details in terms on the cause of the explosions or the location," she said.

Marmaris is a coastal resort popular with west European and Russian tourists as well as Turks.

Anatolian quoted Istanbul police chief Celalettin Cerrah as saying six people had been injured in the explosion in Bagcilar.

Turkey's NTV television network said one person in the Marmaris blasts was seriously injured.

There were no immediate claims of responsibility and authorities were not immediately available for comment.

Television pictures showed ambulances and police cars at the scene of the explosions.

Kurdish separatists, leftists and Islamic militants have carried out bomb attacks in Turkey in the past.

The tourist industry is a powerful motor of the Turkish economy.

The explosions come two days after two bombs exploded in the southern Turkish city of Adana, injuring four people.

The outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which launched a separatist campaign in 1984, and other militant groups have been blamed or claimed responsibility for similar blasts in the past.

Turkey, like the United States and European Union, considers the PKK a terrorist organisation and blames it for the deaths of more than 30,000 people.

Ankara has recently increased its troop presence in the mainly Kurdish southeast, where security forces are battling PKK guerrillas.
Posted by: tipper || 08/27/2006 20:51 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  "We have no further details in terms on the cause of the explosions or the location," she said

I bet I can give them a cause for the explosions. I'm thinking it wasn't gas leaks...
Posted by: Thoth || 08/27/2006 20:57 Comments || Top||

#2  Marmaris is a coastal resort popular with west European and Russian tourists as well as Turks.

Pro-Chechnya elements going after the Ruskies or just the usual festivities? You be the judge. I hope Turkey's tourism pocketbook is hit real hard by this. They need another wakeup call about all this Islamic horseradish.
Posted by: Zenster || 08/27/2006 21:17 Comments || Top||


Kosovo cafe bomb wounds two
A bomb was thrown at a popular Serb cafe in Mitrovica in northern Kosovo on Saturday, seriously wounding two people.
“An ethnic Albanian teenager has been arrested over the attack...”
An ethnic Albanian teenager has been arrested over the attack in the town, scene of some of the worst clashes between ethnic Albanians and Serbs since a 1998-99 war in the UN-administered Serbian province, a police source told Reuters. After the attack, hundreds of Serbs gathered on the main bridge spanning the river that divides Mitrovica's Serbs and ethnic Albanians. The rundown former mining town is patrolled by French NATO soldiers and 500 UN police officers.
Posted by: Fred || 08/27/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Clinton legacy.
Posted by: gromgoru || 08/27/2006 14:56 Comments || Top||

#2  More like Madame Albright's.
Posted by: Fordesque || 08/27/2006 15:13 Comments || Top||


Home Front: WoT
2 Lodi residents refused entry back into U.S.
The federal government has barred two relatives of a Lodi man convicted of supporting terrorists from returning to the country after a lengthy stay in Pakistan, placing the U.S. citizens in an extraordinary legal limbo.

Muhammad Ismail, a 45-year-old naturalized citizen born in Pakistan, and his 18-year-old son, Jaber Ismail, who was born in the United States, have not been charged with a crime. However, they are the uncle and cousin of Hamid Hayat, a 23-year-old Lodi cherry packer who was convicted in April of supporting terrorists by attending a Pakistani training camp.

Federal authorities said Friday that the men, both Lodi residents, would not be allowed back into the country unless they agreed to FBI interrogations in Pakistan. An attorney representing the family said agents have asked whether the younger Ismail trained in terrorist camps in Pakistan.

The men and three relatives had been in Pakistan for more than four years and tried to return to the United States on April 21 as a federal jury in Sacramento deliberated Hayat's fate. But they were pulled aside during a layover in Hong Kong and told there was a problem with their passports, said Julia Harumi Mass, their attorney. The father and son were forced to pay for a flight back to Islamabad because they were on the government's "no-fly" list, Mass said. Muhammad Ismail's wife, teenage daughter and younger son, who were not on the list, continued on to the United States.

Continued on Page 49
Posted by: john || 08/27/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Wanders off softly singing, "Stuck in Lahore, Again".
Posted by: Zenster || 08/27/2006 0:20 Comments || Top||

#2  Any proof of fraud in attaining citizenship, voids same. I question the oath of a Muslim where obedience to American law is claimed. Their law is Shariah.
Posted by: Snease Shaiting3550 || 08/27/2006 0:50 Comments || Top||

#3  Julia Harumi Mass, aclu attorney, said: "The government is conditioning the return to their home on cooperation with law enforcement."
Home? 4 years in Pakiland? Taxes paid? Cherry picker who took illegal Mex job was framed? What's going on in Lodi?
Posted by: Inspector Clueso || 08/27/2006 1:08 Comments || Top||

#4  the ACLU is on the other side, Disregard anything these anti-american whores say. Let em rot in Pakland
Posted by: Frank G || 08/27/2006 8:15 Comments || Top||

#5  Hmm. Individual incident or a trend? Interesting things have been happening behind the scenes lately.
Posted by: trailing wife || 08/27/2006 9:18 Comments || Top||

#6  Lodi is in a lot of articles about Islamist activity and prosecutions in the US. We should add Lodi, Dearborn, Lackawanna and other Muzzie towns to the Thugburg listing. They literally are Thugburgs.
Posted by: Nimble Spemble || 08/27/2006 9:38 Comments || Top||


India-Pakistan
Bugti Mourners Bug-Eyed - Mass Violence in Pakistan

QUETTA, Pakistan (AP) -- Hundreds of rioters have rampaged through the streets in southwestern Pakistan to protest the death of a renegade tribal chief.
What happens if Kahn dies, will they launch a few "mourning nukes"?
Dozens of shops, banks and police vehicles were burned today,
What, more cartoons?
a day after Pakistan government forces killed the well-known fugitive Nawab Akbar Bugti during a raid on his mountain hideout. A city police chief said about 450 people were arrested, even as security forces in Quetta imposed a round-the-clock curfew. Authorities fear the violence may spread to other parts of the impoverished province. In fact, a bomb blast damaged a government building in another town, and arsonists set fire to a telephone exchange.
Sure sounds like cartoons, right down to the seething.
No casualties were reported. An alliance of four nationalist groups announced a 15-day mourning period over the tribal leader's death. They vowed to continue protests throughout the region. A strike of businesses and public transportation is set for tomorrow.
Posted by: Zenster || 08/27/2006 18:15 || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1 
Very Dead


Islamic Rioters, but I repeat myself
Posted by: RD || 08/27/2006 18:40 Comments || Top||

#2  Garnish to America?
Posted by: 6 || 08/27/2006 19:07 Comments || Top||

#3 
Posted by: 6 || 08/27/2006 19:18 Comments || Top||

#4  :-)
Posted by: Frank G || 08/27/2006 19:20 Comments || Top||

#5  The single greatest invention ever was the razor blade.

Those who don't use it demonstrate their lack of civilisation.
Posted by: Bright Pebbles || 08/27/2006 19:41 Comments || Top||

#6  They misspelled "Car Wash".
Posted by: Anonymoose || 08/27/2006 19:49 Comments || Top||

#7  Come to think of it, wouldn't Osama look interesting with a Trekkie "Live long and prosper" Vulcan hand thingy?
Posted by: Anonymoose || 08/27/2006 19:50 Comments || Top||

#8  Foster Brooks is DEAD???
Posted by: tu3031 || 08/27/2006 19:57 Comments || Top||

#9  tu3031, showing your age. And your sense of humor. Very good.
Posted by: plainslow || 08/27/2006 21:04 Comments || Top||

#10  Editorial in the Pakistani newspaper The Daily Times

Bugti’s killing is the biggest blunder since Bhutto’s execution
Posted by: john || 08/27/2006 21:25 Comments || Top||

#11  Maybe they are saying, "David Koresh live?" They may actually be Branch Davidian's that are still in the closet.
Posted by: anymouse || 08/27/2006 22:11 Comments || Top||

#12  Bye Bye Bugs. You Maroon....
Posted by: Phineter Thraviger1073 || 08/27/2006 22:27 Comments || Top||


Militants threaten to kill tribal elders 'spying' for US
WANA: Pro-Taliban militants in Pakistan warned on Saturday that they would behead around 30 tribal elders if "they continued spying for US forces in Afghanistan", said officials. "This is the last warning. They must stop spying for the Americans or we will behead them," read a letter distributed in the border town of Angoor Ada in South Waziristan, an official said. "We have done it in the past and we can do it in the future also," read the letter, which listed the names of several tribes, according to the official.

Several tribesmen have been shot dead or beheaded this year for allegedly spying for US-led forces in Afghanistan, or supporting Pakistan's campaign against Al Qaeda and other militants in the area. The warning came two weeks after militants shot dead a tribesman in Angoor Ada after accusing him of spying for US troops.
Posted by: Fred || 08/27/2006 00:39 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Are they being accused of being wrong headed?
Posted by: Captain America || 08/27/2006 1:52 Comments || Top||

#2  Clear proof that the viper's nest is in Pakistan. About time to start building a border fence and planting minefields.
Posted by: Apostate || 08/27/2006 2:53 Comments || Top||

#3  Along the US border with Pakistan, Apostate? ;-)
Posted by: trailing wife || 08/27/2006 9:19 Comments || Top||

#4  Any tribal elder worth his salt would turn that into a blood feud with the al Qaeda. Any outsiders arrive in the area, and you put the bag on them and they disappear. If anyone shows up looking for them, describe in bloody detail their horrible demise, leaving out the specifics of who was responsible.

Be sure to add some taboo elements, like, most of him was found cut into pieces, sewn inside the skin of a pig.
Posted by: Anonymoose || 08/27/2006 14:10 Comments || Top||


BLA members' bank accounts frozen
The government has told heads of banks and other financial institutions countrywide to freeze the bank accounts of 42 members of the Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA). Sources told Daily Times that the government has also ordered all home secretaries and provincial police officers, as well as the chief commissioner of Islamabad Capital Territory to constitute police parties to conduct raids and arrest these people. Sources said that the Ministry of Finance had forwarded these names to government and private sector banks and have also asked them to immediately inform the police if any of these people tried to make any transactions.
Posted by: Fred || 08/27/2006 00:34 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:


Akbar Bugti killed in army operation
More detail on yesterday's story.
Nawab Akbar Bugti, leader of the Bugti tribe, president of the Jamhoori Watan Party and the driving force behind the anti-government rebellion in Balochistan, was killed in a massive military operation in the Bhambore Hills, an area between the cities of Kohlu and Dera Bugti. “Yes, Nawab Bugti has been killed in the operation,” Federal Information Minister Mohammad Ali Durrani said on Saturday.

“As many as 21 army commandos and 37 rebels had also been killed in the operation...”
According to reports, President Pervez Musharraf was told just before 12am on Sunday that Nawab Bugti had been killed. As many as 21 army commandos and 37 rebels had also been killed in the same operation, which targeted 50 to 80 of Nawab Bugti’s closest family members and top commanders. Reports also indicated that Balochistan Liberation Army Chief Balach Marri and Nawab Bugti’s grandsons Brahamdagh and Mir Ali Bugti were also killed in the fighting.

“Reports also indicated that Balochistan Liberation Army Chief Balach Marri and Nawab Bugti’s grandsons Brahamdagh and Mir Ali Bugti were also killed in the fighting. ”
Nawab Bugti’s location was discovered three days ago and security forces had besieged the hills where he was in hiding. Sources said that Nawab Bugti’s whereabouts were established by monitoring satellite phone intercepts. “It is presumed that Akbar Bugti and a number of other terrorists have been killed,” an official statement issued at 2am said.
"Presumed" implies they haven't found his corpse...
It said that heavy fire was exchanged, which resulted in a cave-in, which buried all those inside, including Nawab Bugti and a large number of his top aides.
Dropped the whole hill on 'em, didja? Well, that'll work, usually...
An ISPR statement said that two army helicopters, flying over the general area of Tartani in Kohlu on August 23, were fired upon from the ground and one helicopter was damaged. Another chopper was then dispatched to investigate and was also hit, but returned safely. According to AFP, security officials said that the military launched air strikes on Friday against a cave complex in the mountains on the border of the Dera Bugti and Kohlu districts, where the chieftain was said to be hiding. There was little fighting on the ground, they said.

“The missile raid destroyed the entrance to the rocky hideout and special forces moved in on Saturday to carry out a ‘cordon and search operation’...”
The missile raid destroyed the entrance to the rocky hideout and special forces moved in on Saturday to carry out a ‘cordon and search operation’, one security official told AFP. Heavy fighting broke out as the insurgents returned fire, killing several soldiers including the leader of the commando team, the official said. The soldiers eventually secured the area and ascertained that Bugti was among the dead, he added, without giving further details.

Sources said that around 24 Marri and Bugti tribesmen, including Nawab Bugti, were killed and 37 injured. The injured have been taken into custody by security forces, sources said. However there is no information on whether the corpses would be handed over to their respective tribes for burial or they would remain in security officials’ custody. Six officers were also among the 21 security force personnel killed, an official told Reuters.
Posted by: Fred || 08/27/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Hallelujah!
Posted by: Pipelines Everywhere || 08/27/2006 10:27 Comments || Top||


ATS says Antop Hill accused is JeM
The anti-terrorism squad (ATS) has confirmed that Mohammad Riyaz Nababuddin, who was arrested from Wadala on Tuesday as part of the Antop Hill operation, is a Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) trained terrorist. But the agency has yet to confirm whether his partner, Mohammad Ali alias Abu Osama, who was killed in the encounter, was also a member of the group. A senior ATS officer said that Riyaz had been in the country for the past eight months. "Riyaz belongs to Jaish," said KP Raghuvanshi, joint commissioner of police and ATS chief. "He temporarily lived in Dehradun after visiting Jammu and Kashmir and New Delhi. In Dehradun, he assumed a Hindu name and got a job with a private company."

But the ATS chief refused to link Riyaz with two alleged Pakistani terrorists arrested by the Kolkata police recently. Mohammad Zuber and Mohammad Sohail were intercepted by the BSF and handed over to the Kolkata police after they crossed over into India from Bangladesh. According to the cops, Riyaz was in possession of a map which had "precise" markings on it.
Posted by: Fred || 08/27/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:


7/11 probe: Two Lashkar activists held in J&K
The anti-terrorism squad (ATS) on Saturday arrested two alleged Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) activists from the Kupwara district of Jammu and Kashmir, who may be involved in the 7/11 Mumbai blasts. The arrests have given a ray of hope to the Mumbai police. With this, the number of people arrested in connection with the blasts have gone up to 21. While nine were booked for unlawful activities, the remaining were arrested for transporting, planting and exploding bombs in local trains which killed 200 commuters.

“They were arrested following the confessional statement of arrested Al-badr divisional commander Tohfeen Akmal Hashmi about LeT militants involvement in the Mumbai blasts.”
The two suspects have been identified as Ghulam Mohammed of Kupwara and Abdul Rashid of Handwara of Jammu and Kashmir district. They were arrested following the confessional statement of arrested Al-badr divisional commander Tohfeen Akmal Hashmi about LeT militants involvement in the Mumbai blasts.

The Mumbai police took the custody of the duo after the disclosures made by Hasmi, who was arrested by the Army from Nadimarg in south Kashmir on Tuesday. However, a senior officer of the ATS in Mumbai, who confirmed the arrests, said: "It's too early to comment. Our officers are on their way to Mumbai with the two."

Meanwhile, the Mumbai ATS teams are now concentrating on finding the source of the RDX which was brought from South India via Kandla port in Gujarat. Investigations have revealed that at least 55 to 60 kg of RDX had landed in Maharashtra, out of which the ATS in May this year seized 43 kg of RDX, AK-47 and hand grenades. Sixteen people were arrested in this regard. The police said that the RDX used in the 7/11 blast may be part of the same consignment. "We're trying to trace where the 15 kg of RDX went. Once this is established the case will be solved," said an ATS officer.
Posted by: Fred || 08/27/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:


International-UN-NGOs
UN posted data on Israeli (not Hezb) troop movements and forces
Pre-2006 and editorializing stripped.

During the recent month-long war between Hezbollah and Israel, U.N. "peacekeeping" forces made a startling contribution: They openly published daily real-time intelligence, of obvious usefulness to Hezbollah, on the location, equipment, and force structure of Israeli troops in Lebanon. UNIFIL – the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon, a nearly 2,000-man blue-helmet contingent that has been present on the Lebanon-Israel border since 1978 – is officially neutral. Yet, throughout the recent war, it posted on its website for all to see precise information about the movements of Israeli Defense Forces soldiers and the nature of their weaponry and materiel, even specifying the placement of IDF safety structures within hours of their construction. New information was sometimes only 30 minutes old when it was posted, and never more than 24 hours old.

Meanwhile, UNIFIL posted not a single item of specific intelligence regarding Hezbollah forces. Statements on the order of Hezbollah "fired rockets in large numbers from various locations" and Hezbollah's rockets "were fired in significantly larger numbers from various locations" are as precise as its coverage of the other side ever got.

This war was fought on cable television and the Internet, and a lot of official information was available in real time. But the specific military intelligence UNIFIL posted could not be had from any non-U.N. source. The Israeli press--always eager to push the envelope--did not publish the details of troop movements and logistics. Neither the European press nor the rest of the world media, though hardly bastions of concern for the safety of Israeli troops, provided the IDF intelligence details that UNIFIL did. A search of Israeli government websites failed to turn up the details published to the world each day by the U.N.

Inquiries made of various Israeli military and government representatives and analysts yielded near unanimous agreement that at least some of UNIFIL's postings, in the words of one retired senior military analyst, "could have exposed Israeli soldiers to grave danger." These analysts, including a current high ranking military official, noted that the same intelligence would not have been provided by the U.N. about Israel's enemies.
Sure enough, a review of every single UNIFIL web posting during the war shows that, while UNIFIL was daily revealing the towns where Israeli soldiers were located, the positions from which they were firing, and when and how they had entered Lebanese territory, it never described Hezbollah movements or locations with any specificity whatsoever.
Posted by: Jackal || 08/27/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Use blue helmets for target practice in the future. That will put a stop to such non nutral practice.
Posted by: Sock Puppet of Doom || 08/27/2006 1:13 Comments || Top||

#2  Ain't that just sweet as sugar ? Next round, order UN out of combat areas. Give them 2 hours to comply. After that, they are considered valid targets. Any news teams, like Al Jiz and Rooters, are immediate targets and should be used by heavy artillery groups for zeroeing exercises.
Posted by: SOP35/Rat || 08/27/2006 1:42 Comments || Top||

#3  Exactly as expected of the UN and UNIFIL. The surprise meter wouldn't budge even with an earthquake.
Posted by: Duh! || 08/27/2006 4:39 Comments || Top||

#4  No more news crew, no more UN observers. This was started to win the propaganda war, it failed miserably and became a tool for our enemies. Why it still exists is a mystery to me, it is only a detriment to us.
Posted by: Juting Unailing8929 || 08/27/2006 9:47 Comments || Top||

#5  I'm sure they're doing the same good job in the Sudan. /sarcasm
Posted by: Closing Ulert7306 || 08/27/2006 9:54 Comments || Top||

#6  Target differentiation continues to be simplified. Next round, won't have to worry about so many "innocent" or "neutrals."
Posted by: SR-71 || 08/27/2006 13:25 Comments || Top||

#7  Hmmm, complicity and treason are unique in their difference.
Posted by: newc || 08/27/2006 13:51 Comments || Top||

#8  Sheik Kofi!
Posted by: gromgoru || 08/27/2006 15:00 Comments || Top||

#9  Thank goodness we're relying upon Europe to establish this massive peace-keeping force. They'll probably still be dithering about where and when to deploy when Christmas time comes around.

Meanwhile, Israel had better take this new development seriously, understand that a UN force will essentially be allied with their terrorist foes and begin this entire process over again until the desired results are achieved.

The UN is now one of our opponents in the Global War on Terrorism. They have served the ends of Islamic Fascism for decades and obviously cannot wean themselves from its withering embrace. Kofi Annan should be brought up on charges of crimes against humanity. He is a terrorist facilitator.
Posted by: Zenster || 08/27/2006 16:37 Comments || Top||

#10  No suprise here. The UN and Koffi has been providing operational and logistical support for Hamas and Hizbollah for years.
Posted by: CrazyFool || 08/27/2006 16:40 Comments || Top||


Iraq
Iraqi MP released by kidnappers
“Al-Mashhadani and seven of her bodyguards were seized on July 1 by gunmen in a Shiite area of east Baghdad as they were travelling to attend a session of parliament”
Kidnapped Sunni MP Tayseer al-Mashhadani was released today after being held for nearly two months, an adviser to the Iraqi Prime Minister said. Iraqi Islamic Party MP Tayseer Al-Mashhadani and seven of her bodyguards were seized on July 1 by gunmen in a Shiite area of east Baghdad as they were travelling to attend a session of parliament the following day. She will meet Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki later. No group claimed responsibility publicly for the kidnap, but Sunnis suspect she was taken by a Shiite militia, in one of many recent attacks aiming to stoke sectarian tension.
Posted by: Fred || 08/27/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:


Israel-Palestine-Jordan
Hostages freed after 'conversion'
MILITANTS in the Gaza Strip released two kidnapped journalists from the American Fox News Channel today after the men appeared on a videotape saying they had converted to Islam, Fox said.

Fox said correspondent Steve Centanni, a 60-year-old American, and New Zealand-born cameraman Olaf Wiig, 36, were in a hotel in the Palestinian coastal strip. They hugged colleagues inside the hotel lobby before running up the stairs to a higher floor, Fox News footage showed. "Our heroes are home," Fox anchorman Shepard Smith said in a live broadcast from New York.

The two reporters were seized on August 14 by a previously unknown group called the Gaza Peoples Front Holy Jihad Brigades.

In a videotape released earlier, Centanni and Wiig were shown separately sitting cross-legged, reading statements announcing that they had converted to Islam. At times in the video they were wearing long Muslim robes. "I changed my name to Khaled. I have embraced Islam and say the word Allah," Centanni said.

Wiig called on leaders of the West to stop "hiding behind the 'I don't negotiate with terrorists' myth".

The Holy Jihad Brigades claimed responsibility on Wednesday for the kidnapping and had warned the United States to free Muslim prisoners to prevent the two captives facing unspecified consequences. That deadline expired on Saturday. The United States had said it would not make "concessions to terrorists".

Palestinian officials had earlier expressed optimism the men would be freed soon.

A separate statement from the captors had said the two journalists had to choose either Islam, a tax imposed on non-Muslims to be paid to a Muslim ruler, or war. "They chose Islam and that is a gift God gives those whom he chooses," the statement said.
Posted by: tipper || 08/27/2006 06:55 || Comments || Link || [3 views] Top|| File under:

#1  I'll bet I could convert them to the Native American Church once they get back.
Posted by: 6 || 08/27/2006 7:03 Comments || Top||

#2  But could you do it so peacefully?
Posted by: Perfesser || 08/27/2006 7:43 Comments || Top||

#3  Put a plate of ribs and links in front of Centanni and Wiig. Anyone want to bet what happens? [crickets]
Posted by: Zenster || 08/27/2006 7:54 Comments || Top||

#4  So if they abandon their new Muslim faith once they're released, will they be sentenced to death by Muslim courts for apostasy? I'm just wondering if they're going to have to avoid Muslim countries forever now. Which wouldn't be a bad idea for all of us, frankly.
Posted by: WhiteCollarRedneck || 08/27/2006 8:14 Comments || Top||

#5  Now the can join the Salman Rushdie Club.
Posted by: Nimble Spemble || 08/27/2006 8:15 Comments || Top||

#6  I'm glad they are free, but this is just an example of what we are facing. Forced conversion.

I'm all for forced silence, by carpet bombing.
Posted by: DarthVader || 08/27/2006 8:29 Comments || Top||

#7  Peeve: already someone at Tim Blair's site trotted out the "OH! This is against Islam!" crap. Sorry, but, no, Wiit and Centanni were given the three choices Mohammed mandated: conversion, dhimmitude, or death. The line about there being no compulsion in religion (invariably trotted out in cases like this) dated to when Mohammed needed the goodwill of the local potentates, and was abandoned as soon as he had the military muscle to start forcing conversions.
Posted by: Robert Crawford || 08/27/2006 8:30 Comments || Top||

#8  #4 If they denounce Islam now yes they can be sentenced to death for apostasy, a sentence that can be carried out by local or any handy muslim once the fatwa is issued.

Worse, though, a) if they don't denounce their diversion, the Islamists look like they've won honour for Allah and

b) If they DO denounce their diversion that might shut the door of the loophole for any future hostages wishing to "convert to Islam" to save themselves. If they denounce it future Islamist kidnappers may simply not believe they will get good PR from the "convert" hostages and kill them anyway - right after they "convert" so they can use the tape for Allah's propaganda.

A lose-lose situation. But in another sense a win, the hostages are alive and safe.

I'd advise them (though every grain and fibre rebels against it on moral grounds) to keep quiet on the fact that it's a conversion of convenience to keep the door over for those that might follow.

This is a war against fascist Islam. Wish we'd called the spade a friggin spade in the beginning and let the Muslims decide whether they wanted all out war or not instead of tippie toeing about their religious sensibilities with that 'war on terror' crap.
Posted by: anon1 || 08/27/2006 8:46 Comments || Top||

#9  I converted.
Posted by: Uncle Ben || 08/27/2006 9:04 Comments || Top||

#10  Notice it's a "separate statement" from the islamonuts that says they were offered 3 choices. The victims have a different story - and a weird slant on islam, the religion of peas.

"We were forced to convert to Islam at gunpoint," Centanni later told Fox. "Don't get me wrong here. I have the highest respect for Islam, and I learned a lot of good things about it, but it was something we felt we had to do because they had the guns, and we didn't know what the hell was going on." (from Yahoo news)

Convert or die seems to have been the only choice presented. What the islamonuts don't get is that westerners don't believe the permanent conversion nonsense they do.
Posted by: Thinemp Whimble2412 || 08/27/2006 9:18 Comments || Top||

#11  You heard of the tea party held by the Lebanese Army for the IDF. I thought the reports were fake. A Youtube video says otherwise. (Sorry, AOL does not handle Tags properly.)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YjxZcmdazpo
Posted by: Snease Shaiting3550 || 08/27/2006 9:20 Comments || Top||

#12  Do these kidnappers get in trouble by the "lions of Islam" for taking the headlines away from the victory of South Lebanon being bombed back 25 years?
Posted by: plainslow || 08/27/2006 9:23 Comments || Top||

#13  Saw Mr. Centanni on television this morning. To paraphrase him he said: We had guns pointed at our heads when we announced our conversion to islam. But don't get me wrong I have the highest respect for islam. We've learned some wonderful things about islam.

People can and should be forgiven for saying and doing certain things while under exteme duress.

Having said that I hasten to add that Mr. Centanni lost my sympathy when he said during his news conference he had the highest respect for islam.

Spit.
Posted by: Mark Z || 08/27/2006 9:25 Comments || Top||

#14  he said that in the presence of the Hamas PM and about 20 swarthy men with weapons. Some "press conference"
Posted by: Frank G || 08/27/2006 10:13 Comments || Top||

#15  "til' Underverse come . . . " Where's Riddick when you need him?
Posted by: ex-lib || 08/27/2006 11:19 Comments || Top||

#16  convert to islam at gunpoint. isn't that what they're trying to do to the west?

how islamic of them.
Posted by: PlanetDan || 08/27/2006 11:33 Comments || Top||

#17  Convert to Islam, in terms of obediance, is what this war on terror has been about from the beginning. 9/11 was a series of acts by Islamic Caliphate Agents (The ICA™) to make all world governments live under the law of Islam.
Posted by: Jules in the Hinterlands || 08/27/2006 12:24 Comments || Top||

#18  So we could baptise every Fucker in GitMo and force them to eat ham at gunpoint!
Posted by: 3dc || 08/27/2006 12:27 Comments || Top||

#19  Here's a report by someone who converted - hopefully she's lying about it to get interviews:
http://memri.org/bin/latestnews.cgi?ID=SD126706
The interviewer is former Sunday Express (U.K.) journalist Yvonne Ridley [1], who was captured by the Taliban in Afghanistan in 2001 and who converted to Islam after her release.....
Aug 25 SD# 1267 - Former Malaysian PM Mahathir Mohammad's Interview on U.K.'s Islam [TV] Channel by Yvonne Ridley: We Should Quietly Undermine the U.S. by Refusing to Use its Currency; Britain is a 3rd-Rate Power & Blair is a Poodle; Nasrallah Fights the Same Way for Same Reason as Bin Laden
Posted by: Dakota Freedom || 08/27/2006 12:58 Comments || Top||

#20  hopefully she's lying about it to get interviews

Lying about what? Having converted? Don't think so. Any major Up-with-terrorists event in Britain features Ridley as a speaker. She was a nut before she converted, though.
Posted by: Angie Schultz || 08/27/2006 13:04 Comments || Top||

#21  Perhaps Ridley is "in bed" with Georgie-boy Galloway.
Posted by: Dakota Freedom || 08/27/2006 13:40 Comments || Top||

#22  Jill Carrol - another reporter hostage turned convert to islam.


Posted by: john || 08/27/2006 13:55 Comments || Top||

#23  Mark Z - re: Centanno's press conference - Stockholm syndrome
Posted by: DMFD || 08/27/2006 13:59 Comments || Top||

#24  Centanni - PIMF
Posted by: DMFD || 08/27/2006 13:59 Comments || Top||

#25  The deal is this, folks. These two newzies went to a place where these activities such as murder, booming, religious fanaticism, kidnapping, etc etc, are the norm. They should not expect sympathy or aid from the outside world when they go into sh*tholes like Gaza or Chechnya. I am glad that they are safe, but I have little sympathy for them, as the bottom line is that they are tools (willing or unwilling) for a bunch of subhuman terrorists in the propaganda war.
Posted by: Alaska Paul || 08/27/2006 14:29 Comments || Top||

#26  That Ridley bitch has been "in bed" with Islam for a very long time. Crap she's made a hobby out of marrying middle eastern men. She also once worked for Al Jazeera.
Posted by: RJB in JC MO || 08/27/2006 14:44 Comments || Top||

#27  Yvonne Ridley
Posted by: Seafarious || 08/27/2006 16:49 Comments || Top||

#28  Of course, under the severe and hostile doctrines of the Wahhabi-Deobandi-Muslim Brother sects of radical Islam, anyone who converts away from Islam is considered an apostate worthy of death.

Word of advice to Cetanni and Wiig: stay clear and far from any lands that hold large numbers of seething Muslims. In other words, make your Mars or Moon landing plans soon.
Posted by: Lancasters Over Dresden || 08/27/2006 16:55 Comments || Top||

#29  *Muslim Brotherhood* ... and I should add, the Shia militants don't take to conversions away from Islam very kindly either.
Posted by: Lancasters Over Dresden || 08/27/2006 16:56 Comments || Top||

#30  I am personally involved in a situation dealing with conversion. I won't use names because I wish to protect the identity of people dear to me. My landlord was posted to Afghanistan last November. I got a call last Tuesday from his very distraught wife (both are vw=ery dear friends). He got back in the US in early August. He has converted to Islam. This is the first instance I know of a US soldier deployed to Afghanistan or Iraq who has converted. She is a very devout Christian and is absolutely devasted. I have known these people for 10 years and would never have believed he could renounce his God and embrace the Moon-worshipping Death-cult. He has abandoned his family (two sons, one of which is in Iraq, the other a junior in High School) for a fools errand. Don't underestimate the appeal of Islam. It absolves one of ALL personnal responsibility claiming everything is the will of Allah. You run a red light and kill someone? The will of Allah. Someone won't convert or submit to Islam? You kill them because it's the will of Allah. Islam is the cult for weak people who will not take responsibility for their own actions or need the extremely rigid regimine of Islam to bring order to their lives. They are incapable of regulating their behavior and wish, in some cases, to justify their bloodthirsty existence by claiming it's "God's will". Bullshit!
Posted by: Deacon Blues || 08/27/2006 17:42 Comments || Top||

#31  Sorry to tell you this, Deacon Blues, but I've met more than a few Christians who navigate by the "God's will" autopilot. That said, Islam's near monolithic use of this mindless justification puts it in a class of its own, and makes it exceedingly more dangerous.
Posted by: Zenster || 08/27/2006 17:55 Comments || Top||

#32  Update
"Palestinian security sources close to the negotiators told TIME that the two Fox Newsmen — reporter Steve Centanni, 60, from Washington D.C. and New Zealand cameraman Olaf Wiig, 36 — were kidnapped from Gaza to embarrass Haniyeh’s government. The militants, who earlier identified themselves as members of the previously unknown Holy Jihad Brigades, were enraged with fellow Hamas militants because they too had joined in the daring capture on June 25th of Corp. Shalit, in which Palestinian gunmen tunneled under a wall and attacked an Israeli army post. But according to these security sources, the militant groups fell out after Hamas’ military wing took control of Shalit and elbowed the other co-conspirators aside.

In revenge, these militants, who belong to a splinter group of the late Yasser Arafat’s Fatah movement, struck back by seizing the two journalists, these sources said.

Haniyeh was able to secure the journalists’ freedom, but at a high price: he has agreed to give these armed extremists a role in deciding the fate of the Israeli soldier, these sources said."
Posted by: tipper || 08/27/2006 18:23 Comments || Top||

#33  Zenster, I am well aware of the Christian proclivity to atribute anything that happens as "God's Will". I don't believe they discount personal responsibility as the Muslims do. When asked directly "So God caused that person to get drunk and run the red light" they invariably answer, "No the person got drunk because he wanted to". Muslims believe EVERYTHING that happens is the will of Allan. Try dealing with the Saudi Arabian passport office.
Posted by: Deacon Blues || 08/27/2006 18:52 Comments || Top||

#34  I don't believe they discount personal responsibility as the Muslims do.

Which is what I said as well;

"Islam's near monolithic use of this mindless justification puts it in a class of its own"
Posted by: Zenster || 08/27/2006 19:00 Comments || Top||

#35  #30 DB: "[Islam] absolves one of ALL personnal responsibility claiming everything is the will of Allah."

I keep saying that the Islamonutz (paleos, et al.) live in backward hellholes and keep getting their asses kicked by the infidels and the Jooooos because it's Allan's will.

I can't understand why they don't just quit fighting and accept their place as the toilet of the world that Allan has decreed for them.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut || 08/27/2006 19:09 Comments || Top||

#36  Agree, Barbara. They get their butts kicked so much one would be tempted to believe God is against them. Only a Muslim could declare victory while standing amid the rubble of all his civilization stands for. Bugwits.
Posted by: Deacon Blues || 08/27/2006 19:37 Comments || Top||

#37  Debka on the Conversion

A Hostage Affair in Gaza is Ended by a Three-Part Ransom

DEBKAfile Exclusive Report

August 27, 2006, 3:29 PM (GMT+02:00)



Gilead Shalit was left out of the release package for Fox journalists


On the face of it, conversion to Islam would appear to provide a painless escape device for any hostage who happens to fall into fundamentalist terrorist hands. After all, once free, the hostage can always revert to his real faith or non-faith. It is hard to blame the two Fox News journalists, the American Steve Centanni, 60, and the New Zealander, Olaf Wiig, 36, for taking that path on to buy their way out of an uncertain fate at the hands of Palestinian terrorists – especially as they later reported they were forced to make the gesture at gunpoint.

And, indeed the two journalists were released from 13 days of captivity in Gaza three hours after announcing their conversion on a new videotape released by the kidnappers in Gaza.

Relief over the two journalists’ coming safely out of their ordeal is quite apart from considerations of the consequences for the war on terrorism. It must be said that the Palestinian kidnappers also walked away without suffering any harm and can keep on snatching victims without fear – exactly as the same terrorist gang got away with murdering three Americans in Gaza in 2003. In fact, the prime minister Ismail Haniya, who belongs to an Islamist terror group, was allowed to take credit for the release after winning a face saver in the form of the conversions and an anti-American diatribe.

Some further points are worth considering:

1. Shortly after Centanni and Wiig were snatched by masked gunmen in Gaza on Aug. 14, the various intelligence agencies operating in Gaza knew who the kidnapper was: the Palestinian warlord Zakaria Dughmush, who had been hired by the same Hamas group which on June 25 kidnapped and - is still holding - the Israeli soldier Gilead Shalit.

Dughmush is a former follower of the late Jemal Semhadana, head of the Palestinian Popular Resistance Committees who was killed in Rafah by rockets fired from an Israeli warplane on June 8, 2006. Semhadana was the first Palestinian terrorist to attack Americans. He staged the bombing attack of October 15, 2003 on a US embassy convoy from Tel Aviv as it drove past Beit Hanoun in the northern Gaza Strip. Three American security officers died in that attack.

After Semhadana’s death, his PRC fragmented into several small militias, one of them led by Dughmush, a fundamentalist freelance terrorist, who set up base in Gaza City. He was adopted by Hamas, but also draws funds and weapons from al Qaeda and Hizballah elements working together in the Gaza Strip.

The efforts of the Hamas abductors of Shalit to negotiate a prisoner swap broke down. Hamas ended up refusing the quid pro quo of a promise by Israeli prime minister Ehud Olmert, already deposited with Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak, to release 600 Palestinian prisoners. The abductors held out for a simultaneous trade and then withdrew from the talks.

Then, when pressure built up to end the episode which was embarrassing Haniya, Mahmoud Abbas and others, they contracted Dughmush to stage a more spectacular abduction operation. He chose the two American Fox New journalists as his prey.

2. Although the foreign intelligence agencies with a presence in Gaza knew where the Fox reporters were being held, neither the Americans, the Israelis nor the British – the senior US ally in the war on terror – were willing to go in and recover them by force, or even lay hands on Dughmush and his gunmen.

In the final reckoning, the Palestinians were granted a face-saver – the Hamas prime minister in particular, who is using the release of the American and the New Zealander to whitewash his organization, without freeing the Israeli soldier.

3. Various Palestinian middlemen were used by British agents at the request of the US to bring the Fox journalists home. They worked out a convoluted deal which entailed their public conversion to Islam, an anti-American harangue on air and a six-figure cash ransom paid under the table to Dughmush to fund his terrorist militia’s operations in Gaza. While the first two parts of the ransom were publicly aired, the third part will no doubt be vehemently denied. But the face remains that a terrorist chief who freelances for at least three fundamentalist terrorist organizations walks free with a strong incentive to develop his profitable hostage-taking business.

4. For Israel, the fate of Gilead Shalit, whom Hamas kidnapped from sovereign Israel in a cross-border assault, is left up in the air. Israel did not link him to the two Fox journalists; Hamas did. The Americans, the New Zealanders and the British worked fast to separate the two abduction episodes. Israeli prime minister Ehud Olmert, who says he does not sleep at night for worrying about Shalit and the two Israelis in Hizballah hands, did not take advantage of the subsequent abductions of Centanni and Wiig to have him included in the package for their release. He must have known that the two journalists would not have been released without the say-so of the Hamas group holding the Israeli soldier. This was a card Olmert did not play.

All that remains to be found out now about this shabby episode is the size of the rake-off the Palestinian warlord Dughmush has handed over from his ransom to Shalit’s Hamas abductors.
Posted by: 3dc || 08/27/2006 20:15 Comments || Top||

#38  Remember, this isn't a religious war or anything like that......
Posted by: Swamp Blondie || 08/27/2006 23:45 Comments || Top||


Israeli air strike kills Hamas member
A member of the ruling Palestinian party Hamas was killed overnight in an attack by Israeli helicopters in eastern Gaza City. A hospital official said Waleed Al-Harazin, 25, a member of the movement's armed wing, was killed by an explosion from an Israeli missile.

Earlier two Palestinian journalists were seriously wounded by a missile fired by an Israeli helicopter in eastern Gaza City. Fadel Shanaa, a Reuters TV cameraman, and a journalist from the Palestinian Media Group were wounded when the missile struck their armoured jeep. The hospital official said that a woman and a child were also injured in the attack.

Israeli attack helicopters sprayed buildings in eastern Gaza City with machine gun fire. Israeli armoured vehicles also entered the Gaza Strip to the east of Gaza City, Palestinian security services said. An Israeli military spokeswoman confirmed that a military operation was underway at the Karni crossing.
Posted by: Fred || 08/27/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  A member of the ruling Palestinian party Hamas was killed ...
two Palestinian journalists were seriously wounded ...
a Reuters TV cameraman, and a journalist from the Palestinian Media Group were wounded ...
Israeli attack helicopters sprayed buildings in eastern Gaza City with machine gun fire.

And there's hamburger all over the highway in Mystic, Connecticut!
Posted by: Zenster || 08/27/2006 2:22 Comments || Top||

#2  Were the dead guy and the two journos in the same jeep? Wouldn't doubt it a bit.
Posted by: Juting Unailing8929 || 08/27/2006 9:48 Comments || Top||

#3  a woman and a child were also injured in the attack

And a kitten! Don't forget the kitten!
Posted by: gromgoru || 08/27/2006 14:59 Comments || Top||

#4  "#3 a woman and a child were also injured in the attack

And a kitten! Don't forget the kitten!"

Any rubber duckies among the piles of twisted metal?
Posted by: Lancasters Over Dresden || 08/27/2006 17:00 Comments || Top||

#5  Powerline has the photos. That jeep was no more hit by missiles than I was. Bullshit Pallywood lies
Posted by: Frank G || 08/27/2006 17:30 Comments || Top||

#6  You're right Frank, something stinks. Even from my limited experience, any vehicle, especially an armored one, penetrated by a rocket would exhibit roof-top bulging. The canopy of that jeep is flatter than piss on a plate. If that hole in the roof is where a missile entered, all occupants of the car would be dead and all of the windows would have blown out. The IDF rarely inflicts so little harm with a missile strike.

The bottom line still remains that the vehicle's occupant was a Palestinian stringer and therefore someone who would most likely be a conduit to the terrorists anyway.
Posted by: Zenster || 08/27/2006 18:58 Comments || Top||

#7  Looks like shrapnel to me.
Posted by: Fred || 08/27/2006 23:24 Comments || Top||


Southeast Asia
Two killed, 7 wounded in southern Thailand attacks
Militants ambushed a group of around 20 soldiers in Thailand's mainly Muslim far south on Saturday and a Thai soldier and a militant were killed, officials said. The militants attacked two pick-up trucks carrying the soldiers in Yala, one of three provinces in the far south near the Malaysian border where more than 1,100 people have been killed in an insurgency which began in January 2004, they said.

In nearby Pattani, a bomb wounded a policeman and a civilian near a weekend market as army chief Sonthi Boonyaratglin visited the province. The government of overwhelmingly Buddhist Thailand has tried many means to overcome the insurgency in a region where most people are Malay and which was an independent sultanate until Bangkok annexed it a century ago. Nothing has worked yet.
Posted by: ryuge || 08/27/2006 00:15 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  origami bombing reply? How about rounding up the Imams and doing a little Thai-time with pliars and blowtorches
Posted by: Frank G || 08/27/2006 8:19 Comments || Top||

#2  Friday afternoon, bomb all the mosques. Saturday morning, start bulldozing muzzie houses. By noon Sunday, have all the muzzies remaining being pushed toward the Malaysian border, with 10,000 Thai Tigers doing the pushing. Tuesday afternoon, begin the Buddhist resettlement program on the cleared land. Re-settle Maa or Hmong on every fourth piece of land, and arm them to the teeth. The muzzies won't be back, at least not permanently.
Posted by: Old Patriot || 08/27/2006 20:31 Comments || Top||


Syria-Lebanon-Iran
Iran tests submarine-to-surface missile
TEHRAN, Iran - Iran test fired a new submarine-to-surface missile during war games in the Persian Gulf on Sunday, a show of military might amid a standoff with the West over its nuclear activities. A brief video clip showed the long-range missile, called Thaqeb, or Saturn, exiting the water and hitting a target on the water's surface within less than a mile. The test came as part of large-scale military exercises that began Aug. 19.

"The army successfully test fired a top speed long-range sub-to-surface missile off the Persian Gulf," the navy commander, Gen. Sajjad Kouchaki, said on state-run television. He did not give the weapon's range. It did not appear capable of carrying a nuclear warhead.

Kouchaki said the Thaqeb could be fired from any vessel and could escape enemy radar. He said it was built based on domestic know-how, although outside experts say much of the country's missile technology originated from other countries like Russia and China.
Posted by: Steve White || 08/27/2006 16:25 || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  I give Iranian subs about 30 minutes, maybe, in an outbreak of hostilities
Posted by: Frank G || 08/27/2006 16:46 Comments || Top||

#2  I didn't know Iran had subs. I didn't even know they had a Navy. This is serious. They could shoot a missile from any location.

How much of this will happen before the US or Israel tries to stop them.

I am curious if how the UN will react to this.
Posted by: Belle || 08/27/2006 16:47 Comments || Top||

#3  I didn't know Iran had subs. I didn't even know they had a Navy. This is serious. They could shoot a missile from any location.

How much of this will happen before the US or Israel tries to stop them.

I am curious if how the UN will react to this.
Posted by: Belle || 08/27/2006 16:48 Comments || Top||

#4  What happens when they shoot from the sub to saudi?
Posted by: 3dc || 08/27/2006 19:08 Comments || Top||

#5  Encapsulated 803.
Posted by: 6 || 08/27/2006 19:24 Comments || Top||

#6  Actually it's based on the Chinese HQ-7/FM-90, which itself is based on the French Crotale:

With a maximum detecting range of 25km, the FM-90 is capable of attacking three targets using three different guidance modes simultaneously. The missile also has anti-missile ability against ultra-low-altitude cruise missiles, air-to-surface missiles, and anti-radiation missiles at a distance of 17km.
Posted by: Pappy || 08/27/2006 20:42 Comments || Top||

#7  I didn't know Iran had subs. I didn't even know they had a Navy. This is serious. They could shoot a missile from any location.

Belle, it appears as though you are worried that the Iranians might be able to launch a nuclear missile from their submarines.

Nothing could be farther from the truth. Warhead designs, currently in the hands of Iran, call for a nuclear device of such enormous bulk that it must ride atop a rather large launch vehicle known as the "Shahab-3 missile [Note: This is an Iranian medium-range ballistic missile designed to be launched from a fixed or mobile launcher at a fixed target]."

The Shahab-3 is almost 50 feet long and has a fueled launch weight of nearly 35 tons. None of Iran's puny submarines could field such a weapon. The subs are Russian designed kilo class platforms and have very limited launch capabilities that do not include ballistic missiles.

The submarine has a launcher for eight Strela-3 or Igla surface-to-air missiles. These missiles are manufactured by the Fakel Design Bureau, Kaliningrad. Strela- 3 (NATO Designation SA-N-8 Gremlin) has a cooled infrared seeker and 2kg warhead. Maximum range is 6km. Igla (NATO designation SA-N-10 Gimlet) is also infrared-guided but heavier, with a maximum range of 5km and speed of Mach 1.65.

The vessels can be fitted with the Novator Club-S (SS-N-27) cruise missile system which fires the 3M-54E1 anti-ship missile. Range is 220km with 450kg high explosive warhead.


I hope this clears things up for you.

Posted by: Zenster || 08/27/2006 22:02 Comments || Top||


IDF blows up Hizbullah bunker near border
The IDF has blown up a Hizbullah bunker, uncovered 400 meters from the northern border near Rosh Hanikra.

Deputy Commander of the Golani Brigade, Lieutenant General Gasam Alian, said that "this is a bunker that sprawls on the ground two kilometers with shooting positions of molded concrete." He added that the bunker was advanced and connected to telephone lines. (Hanan Greenberg)
Posted by: anonymous5089 || 08/27/2006 14:22 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  I'm sure the UN troops would have found it and done the same. Of course that is if the Lebanese military didn't beat them to it.

Ha!
Posted by: RJB in JC MO || 08/27/2006 14:30 Comments || Top||

#2  More on bunker busting
Posted by: Captain America || 08/27/2006 15:56 Comments || Top||

#3  it was reported on Sunday. The bunker was discovered a mere stone's throw from a UN post.

from J-Post article (link above). Yes, that's right, we need UNIFollies 2
Posted by: Captain America || 08/27/2006 15:57 Comments || Top||

#4  What? No Lebanese Red Cross ambulance show? Does the Green Helmet Guy have Sundays off?
Posted by: Raj || 08/27/2006 16:05 Comments || Top||

#5  I thought Israel had side-scanning radar satellite capability. If not, we had better begin sharing (properly de-rezzed) imaging with them right away.
Posted by: Zenster || 08/27/2006 16:29 Comments || Top||

#6  Some clown (not on this site) who didn't bother to read my work carefully called my suggestion that Hezbos intended in part to wage fixed position warfare "rubbage." Not sure what "rubbage" is; it might be a close relative of the root "ramps" that's popular in West Virginia.

Anyway, long story short, my assumptions proved correct. The Hezbos now wish to fight using a combination of guerrilla tactics where and when it suits them, and also bunkered-down, fix-position warfare, using elaborate underground networks conveniently located adjacent to UN posts and civilian areas. The latter of course provides MSM with lots and lots of pictures of rag dolls and rubber duckies among the pile of concrete, dead bodies, and loads of rubbish.
Posted by: Lancasters Over Dresden || 08/27/2006 16:50 Comments || Top||

#7  rubbage is the throw-away parts of cabbage :-)
Posted by: Frank G || 08/27/2006 17:26 Comments || Top||

#8  rubbage is the throw-away parts of cabbage

Drat! I thought it might be something new offered by the local escort service.
Posted by: Zenster || 08/27/2006 17:51 Comments || Top||


Torture fear for Syrian blogger
A Syrian blogger has been arrested by the country's security forces without explanation, raising fears that President Assad's government is seeking to curb freedom of speech on the internet.
Ali Sayed al-Shihabi, an English language teacher, has not been seen since he was summoned to a meeting with security agents in Damascus on 10 August. It is believed his detainment may be linked to articles he has written on a political website.

Amnesty International warned that Shihabi, who is 50, is at risk of torture, and urged its members to write to the Syrian authorities. Amnesty said Syria has a history of persecuting bloggers. Tim Hancock, its UK campaigns director, said: 'We know Syrian military intelligence has held internet dissidents in secret locations in the past and we know they are then at risk of torture.'

Two days after Shihabi was taken, his wife was told that he was being held at the state security centre at Kafr Soussa, Damascus, but that she could not see him. Shihabi has written political articles on the website Hiwar al-Mutamedn ('Civilised Dialogue'). He also has had two books about social affairs published in Syria and was detained between 1982 and 1991 for his membership of the outlawed Party for Communist Action.
Posted by: Steve White || 08/27/2006 00:03 || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Anybody know what he might have posted to upset pencil head?
Posted by: 3dc || 08/27/2006 1:17 Comments || Top||

#2  Just think how lucky he is not to have been sent to Gitmo. He should be thankful.
Posted by: Human Rights Watch || 08/27/2006 9:56 Comments || Top||

#3  Communist, huh?
Posted by: Frank G || 08/27/2006 10:38 Comments || Top||


Good morning...
Hostages freed after 'conversion'Akbar Bugti killed in army operationUS reporter charged with spying in SudanAlgiers bombings mastermind killedCall for Shia autonomy as Iraqi tribes demand peaceBerlin demands to board Lebanese shipsMissing Chechen Was Secret Bride of Terror Leader
Posted by: Fred || 08/27/2006 11:52 || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Known to the boyz as Fort.
Posted by: 6 || 08/27/2006 12:58 Comments || Top||

#2  yep, gottr the rite fortifications!
Posted by: Uncle Ben || 08/27/2006 14:14 Comments || Top||

#3  Fred, maybe you should "TM" Still trying to figure out why we have to be reasonable and they don't. You could use it as a subtitle for about a 1/3 of the Rantburg articles. Also, the saying needs a good graphic.
As a variation you could have a fill in the blank subtitle. Still trying to figure out why_________
-these people aren't being tried for war crimes.
-why a gun is needed to get converts to a religion of peace.
-why all Saudi surround nets have a hole in them.
Posted by: GK || 08/27/2006 18:06 Comments || Top||



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Two weeks of WOT
Sun 2006-08-27
  Iran tests submarine-to-surface missile
Sat 2006-08-26
  Akbar Bugti killed in Kohlu operation
Fri 2006-08-25
  Frenchies to Send 2,000 Troops to Lebanon
Thu 2006-08-24
  Clashes kill 25 more Taleban in southern Afghanistan
Wed 2006-08-23
  Group claims abduction of Fox News journalists
Tue 2006-08-22
  Iran ready to talk interminably
Mon 2006-08-21
  Iran Denies Inspectors Access to Site
Sun 2006-08-20
  Annan: UN won't 'wage war' in Lebanon
Sat 2006-08-19
  Lebanese Army memo: stand with HizbAllah
Fri 2006-08-18
  Frenchies Throw U.N Peacekeeping Plans Into Disarray
Thu 2006-08-17
  Lebanese Army Moves South
Wed 2006-08-16
  Leb contorts, obfuscates over Hezbollah disarmament
Tue 2006-08-15
  Assad: We’ll liberate Golan Heights
Mon 2006-08-14
  Hizbullah distributes Leaflets claiming victory
Sun 2006-08-13
  Lebanese Cabinet Approves Cease-Fire

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