A former Afghan governor and key ally of President Hamid Karzai's has been found dead in eastern Afghanistan a day after being kidnapped, police said.
Mohammad Ali Jalali's body was recovered Monday from a deserted area in Ghazni province, the police chief of the neighboring Paktika province said.
Jalali and four others had been abducted from a car Sunday after attending a funeral in Ghazni. The other abductees were released, Radio Free Afghanistan reported.
A Taliban spokesman claimed that the rebels were responsible for the killing.
Jalali was a respected tribal leader in Paktika, a volatile province bordering Pakistan. He was the first governor that Karzai appointed in Paktika after the demise of the Taliban regime in late 2001.
KANDAHAR - Three police and 12 Taleban were killed Tuesday in a gun fight that erupted after rebels ambushed a convoy of a provincial deputy governor and police chief in southern Afghanistan, an official said. Taleban militants ambushed the police convoy in Helmand provinces Baghran district, not far an area where they have been major clashes between security forces and rebels in recent days, provincial spokesman Muhaidin Khan said.
Three police were martyred and six police were wounded. Twelve Taleban were also killed in the attack today, Khan said.
Deputy provincial governor Amir Akhund and police chief Abdul Rehman Sabir were attacked while travelling back to the provincial capital after assessing the security situation in Baghran, he said.
Helmand has seen several bloody clashes in the past days that have been part of a dramatic upsurge in violence across the country linked to an insurgency launched by the Taleban movement after it was removed from government in 2001.
About 60 Taleban were killed in a major battle in the provinces Musa Qala district on May 17, the US-led coalition said. Twenty fighters were captured.
Sixteen police were killed and 20 wounded.
There was more fighting in Helmand on Saturday, in the Sangin area. War planes of the British forces newly deployed to the province were used for the first time in the battle. Thirteen Afghan troops were killed and at least nine Taleban militants were killed. Two French special forces soldiers were also killed in fighting in the province on Saturday, officials have said without releasing details of the incident.
Posted by: Steve ||
05/23/2006 09:11 ||
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When accused of terrorism, throw back the accusation. Pretty soon the press reports it as "Afgahistan claims.." "Pakistan claims..".
So both victim and assailant are treated equally.
This worked for them against India. Look at any news report. You'll see a disclaimer about Pak providing only moral and diplomatic support and "India claims..".
Never mind that it is a fact, published even in Pak newspapers that the ISI runs the terror camps.
Posted by: john ||
05/23/2006 15:59 Comments ||
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That's not a bad PR strategy John. Cheap, and evergreen.
Clerics in Kabul mosques are urging worshippers to join the Talibans fight against the Afghan government and international troops.
Insurgency has spread recently, with many provinces falling under control of Islamists intent on driving out foreign forces. Encouraged by this growing militancy, some imams here believe the time is right to call for holy war.
"The only thing (people) can do is fight against the government and I am telling them they can do that. They can pick up a gun and fight against the government," said Abdullah, a 52-year-old imam wary of giving his full name for fear of reprisals.
Support for the militant Islamist Taliban traditionally comes from the conservative, Pashtun-dominated south and east. Attacks against security forces are common in provinces near the Pakistan border but had been rare elsewhere.
That changed last year, when more than 1,500 civilians were killed. In recent months, violence has spread swiftly, moving north to districts just outside Kabul.
A car bomber struck a truck near a U.S. military base yesterday, killing at least two people here.
Those additional deaths, including 20 Taliban, 12 Afghan troops and a coalition soldier, killed Saturday and identified by the Los Angeles Times as an American, brought the toll to more than 190 people since Wednesday, when a storm of violence broke out in the south.
The car accident apparently prevented the bomber from reaching his target, either a store frequented by foreigners on Kabuls outskirts, or the U.S. or NATO forces with bases on the same road, said interior ministry spokesperson Yousuf Stanizai.
The Taliban now control many rural areas south of the capital and their increasing success is finding favour with fundamentalists here.
"Its a reality, the fighters are getting stronger and stronger because the government is alienating the community and the people," Abdullah said.
"Real mullahs, imams and anyone with a knowledge of Islam has to say its time for jihad. Those people who are fighting against the Americans and the government are doing good, but the government and the Americans say they are terrorists just because they want to give them a bad name."
Christian Willach, operations co-ordinator for ANSO, the Afghanistan NGO Safety Office, said attacks in the capital region have only targeted government or NATO troops and insurgents have not yet threatened aid groups in Kabul. "(But) If people are instigating other people to pick up arms for whatever reason ... thats always a bad sign.
"Kabul is relatively safe" for workers with the 600 to 800 aid groups working here, Willach said, but non-government organizations have stopped operations in many other districts because security is deteriorating, which fuels insurgent claims that aid groups are not in place to help Afghans.
"Its a self-fulfilling prophecy. It makes an easy recruiting ground for militia commanders, Taliban, Al Qaeda - whatever. If people are frustrated, its easy for them to be recruited."
Abdullahs long beard reached the top of his shalwar kameez as he sat cross-legged on the floor of his mosque. Every Friday he preaches for 500 to 600 and says he has seen their anger grow to boiling point.
"The people dont co-operate with the government because money came to Afghanistan and it just went into the pockets of the NGOs and people in high positions. The poor people got nothing. (Officials) spend the money on alcohol, big houses, security guards and big cars with dark windows. That is why the people are very angry with the government."
Also his worshippers want Islamic law, sharia, restored.
"Afghanistan is an Islamic country and it should be following the law of sharia," Abdullah said. "In previous regimes, there were no shops where they clearly sold alcohol. There were no houses or hotels where they had prostitutes. Now we do have those things."
At another mosque, built with money donated by a Kuwaiti businessman, Mustafa said the "time is ready for jihad." He accused foreign troops of insulting Afghan culture when they raided homes looking for militants.
"I cant tell them directly to start jihad because then I will get into trouble," said Mustafa, 37. "But I will tell them to go away and do what they want, because it is forbidden in Islam for soldiers to search our houses."
Mustafa preaches to about 8,000 Muslims every Friday. His mosques exterior is decorated with posters of Abdul Rasul Sayyaf, an extremist MP and ex-warlord whose forces devastated Kabul in the 1990s civil war.
Imam Mohammed Sadiq happily gave his surname. As the gap between rich and poor grows, he said a call to jihad "is getting nearer and nearer."
At his mosque, the 35-year-old said "drinking alcohol is `harem (forbidden), prostitution is `harem and for men to have sex with boys is `harem ... and it is all going on in Kabul. If these conditions continue, everyone will say its time for jihad.
"So far I have one lot of evidence - that is, that the Americans and the foreigners are entering houses and searching women with their hands."
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
05/23/2006 01:17 ||
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What fails to register on these fools is that it is muslims killing muslims...all across the globe. They talk of jihad. Against whom? Iraq, Gaza, Pak-land, Afghanistan....muslims killing muslims in the name of almigthy allan.
#2
Mustafa preaches to about 8,000 Muslims every Friday. His mosques exterior is decorated with posters of Abdul Rasul Sayyaf, an extremist MP and ex-warlord whose forces devastated Kabul in the 1990s civil war.
The mind boggles at islamic stupidity.
Posted by: ed ||
05/23/2006 1:33 Comments ||
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Article: At another mosque, built with money donated by a Kuwaiti businessman, Mustafa said the "time is ready for jihad." He accused foreign troops of insulting Afghan culture when they raided homes looking for militants.
You gotta love it - a Kuwaiti businessman donates a *mosque*. If there's one thing Afghanistan has enough of, it's mosques.
#4
Note that most of these guys are likely tied in with Abdul Rasul Sayyaf (a Saudi creation if there ever was one) at some level. Whether this represents any serious intrigue on his part or not remains to be seen.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
05/23/2006 1:50 Comments ||
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This may not amount to a hill of beans as you can't trust jurnos to get the truth to you esp a Pakistani one. I would be more interested in what the boots on the ground say. Sounds like propaganda to weaken European/NATO resolve more than "reality"
#7
You gotta love it - a Kuwaiti businessman donates a *mosque*. If there's one thing Afghanistan has enough of, it's mosque
From the Arabian view point this is an investment: a mosque is an officine who incites people to spend their hard earned money in Arabia or to do war to extend Isalm so there more people spending their hard earned money in Arabia.
Through the hadj, piss poor countries like Bangladesh have been bleeding money to Saudi Arabia. Also when after the fall of the Taliban Afganistan was donated 500 million dollars by the developed countries the pilgroims spent 45 millions (30,000 pilgrims * 1500$ unitary cost) in the Hadj ie nearly 10% of the aid.
#12
and if Sharia is imposed, assholes like Abdullah will have power once again to issue fatwas, order beheadings, other tithings of Islam. Kill him. Publicly
Posted by: Frank G ||
05/23/2006 20:23 Comments ||
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AMERICAN-LED forces in southern Afghanistan claimed to have killed up to 80 fighters yesterday in a night-time airstrike on a Taleban stronghold as violence continued to spread in the region.
However, the operation, about 30 miles from the second city of Kandahar, left dozens of civilian casualties. Local authorities said that 16 people had been killed, including women and children, and 16 had suffered serious wounds. A coalition statement said an investigation was under way into reports of civilian deaths.
Another wedding party gone to hell.
Asadullah Khalid, the governor of Kandahar, who visited some of the wounded in hospital, urged villagers not to shelter Taleban fighters. These sort of accidents happen during fighting, especially when the Taleban are cowardly skulking about hiding in homes, he said. The airstrike caused extensive damage in the village of Azizi, in Panjwayi district, which is made up mainly of mud-walled compounds. There is no electricity and water is drawn from a well.
It is known as a rebel stronghold and has been the scene of fighting in recent days. It is believed that the Taleban had forced their way into villagers homes and fired at coalition troops from rooftops.
Local anger, though, was vented on the allied attackers. Attah Mohammad, 60, said: Oh my God, they killed my kids. His silver beard was streaked with tears and his hands were covered in blood. God may take revenge on them. They took everyone from me, he said, his voice crackling with emotion.
Haji Ikhalf, 40, a villager, said Taleban fighters had taken shelter in a religious school. When the bombing started, they fled into family homes. Then those homes were bombed. I saw 35 to 40 dead Taleban and around 50 dead or wounded civilians, he said. Zurmina Bibi, who was caught in the fighting with her family, cradled her wounded eight-month-old baby as she said that ten people were killed in her home. There were dead people everywhere, she wailed.
The death toll seemed certain to rise, with many villagers unable to get to the hospital in Kandahar. Ambulances were denied access to the area. We have taken this fight directly to the extremists who threaten the future progress of the people of Afghanistan, said Lieutenant Colonel Paul Fitzpatrick, a coalition spokesman. Coalition forces are aware of media reports of civilian casualties and are continuing to review assessments from ground elements in the region.
Colonel Tom Collins, a US military spokesman, said: Its common that the enemy fights in close to civilians as a means to protect its own forces. We targeted a Taleban compound and were certain we hit the right target.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
05/23/2006 00:03 ||
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#1
Maybe next time the fear of sheltering the Taliban will be greater than the fear of the Taliban. They should learn the hazards of keeping a nest of vipers in their bosom.
#3
Giving comfort and aid to our enemies.
That always has been a death sentence in war.
Don't see any reason to change it now, no special circumstances here.
Trucks owned by anti terror alliance moved from Mogadishu, capital city of Somalia and Jowhar, 90 km north of the capital to the border of Ethiopia where they are about to load military shipment offered by Ethiopia government, reliable sources told Somalinet. The Lorries will pass through districts of Hiran region before reaching Ferfer, Ethiopian border town. Sources close to the anti terror alliance in Mogadishu say the weapons were donated by Ethiopian government and are part of movements by the alliance to wage fresh fighting with Islamic militiamen.
Mogadishus Somalinet correspondent Mohamed Abdi says if the weapons offered by Ethiopia got into alliances hand, it would be in violation against the embargo imposed by the UN in 1992. Last week Islamic courts in Mogadishu were reported to have received weapons from Dhuso-Mareb of Galgadud region in central Somalia. Weapons collecting by both sides came as at least one woman has been killed in small clashes between militias of Islamic courts and anti terror alliance in Sisi area in north Mogadishu on Sunday.
There have been sporadic gunfire in the area and both sides took position from where they were and people are too much worried about another clash. Witnesses told Somalinet office in Mogadishu. Both rival sides are now getting reinforcements for possible fresh battle in the capital at any time, with people in the capital are in dreadful stage fearing more clashes to more bloodshed. This time the situation in Mogadishu will be bad to worse if fresh battles rage.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/23/2006 00:00 ||
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#1
I would guess that is in response to Sudan playing peace-keeper?
CAIRO (Reuters) - A man named by the Egyptian authorities as a member of a group behind bomb attacks in the Sinai peninsula received weapons and bomb-making training in the Palestinian territories, the Interior Ministry said on Tuesday.
Fancy that
An Interior Ministry statement said Yousri Mohareb and his two brothers, part of the group the authorities have blamed for a series of attacks on tourist resorts since 2004, had communicated with Palestinian religious fundamentalists.
The last attack, in the resort of Dahab in April, killed 20 people. Mohareb had said he received congratulations from "Palestinian elements" for the Dahab bombings.
The statement said a Palestinian had helped Mohareb enter the territories. Security sources said Mohareb had gone to Gaza last September when Israeli forces withdrew from the border between Gaza and Egypt. Palestinians blew holes in the border and poured into Egypt while some Egyptians crossed into Gaza.
"The Palestinian Majid al-Deiri had ... facilitated the entrance of Yousri Mohareb to the Palestinian territories, his training in bomb-making techniques and use of weapons," it said. It did not say whether Deiri was in police custody.
Mohareb was in touch with another Palestinian, Tamer al-Nuseirat, who had said he was willing to take part in attacks in Egypt, the statement said. It did not say whether Nuseirat was in custody.
Nasr Khamis el-Milahi, named by the interior ministry as leader of the group, had sought to send other militants for training in the Gaza Strip, the statement said. It did not say whether they had actually gone there. Police killed Milahi this month. His group, named by Egypt as Tawhid wal Jihad (One God and Jihad), had used explosives from landmines left in the Sinai desert for their bombs, the statement said.
Egypt has described the group as Sinai Bedouins with militant Islamic views, though the group itself has never issued a statement or claimed responsibility for attacks. The police have killed a total of seven suspects since the Dahab bombings, the statement said.
The interior ministry blame the same group for bomb attacks on the Taba Hilton and two beach camps further south in October 2004 which killed 34. They said the leader of the group behind that attack was a Palestinian.
A Palestinian cabinet spokesman said the Palestinian government had been promised more information than released by the Egyptian government statement.
"We are still awaiting more details but we have previously condemned the bombings in Dahab and we have said we reject and denounce any action that harms Egyptian security," Ghazi Hamad told reporters in Gaza.
Posted by: Steve ||
05/23/2006 16:01 ||
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BAMAKO - Armed men believed to be Tuareg rebels took over two army camps in remote northern Mali early on Tuesday, military sources said. The sources, who asked not to be identified, said the camps were attacked at Kidal in the desert zone where Tuareg warriors staged a revolt in the early 1990s. A subsequent peace deal ended the rebellion but sporadic unrest has continued. There was no immediate information on casualties.
We can still hear gunfire, Jean Pierre Tita, the correspondent of the Malian state news agency in Kidal, more than 1,000 km (600 miles) north east of Bamako, told Reuters.
After the peace deal that ended the Tuareg rebellion, the desert warriors were integrated into the Malian national army. But in February this year, a senior officer and former Tuareg rebel, Lt.-Col. Hassan Fagaga deserted his post with a group of men, raising fears of a possible armed challenge to the central government.
Fearing the infiltration of Islamic militants from Algeria in the north, the United States has been helping to train the Malian army in anti-terrorism tactics.
Posted by: Steve ||
05/23/2006 08:53 ||
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Saudi Arabia will put on trial its 15 Gitmo returnees after establishing their involvement in terrorist activities through interrogation, Interior Minister Prince Naif announced yesterday before leaving for Abu Dhabi to attend a GCC meeting. "It's premature to talk about it now," the prince commented when a reporter asked him whether the Saudi returnees from the US detention camp in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba would be given back their government jobs. "First of all, they will undergo investigation to establish whether they were involved in any terrorist activity or not. After that they will be transferred to court for trial," the Saudi Press Agency quoted the minister as saying.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/23/2006 00:00 ||
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#1
"First of all, they will undergo investigation to establish whether they were involved in any terrorist activity or not. After that they will be transferred to court for trial,"
And then the court will emulate its Kuwaiti counterpart.
#2
The Saudis no longer speak much of "Grandfather", their head executioner, his staff, and their sacred obligation. They used to average 70 heads a year, but last I heard, Grandfather was sorely troubled with bursitis and tennis elbow.
#3
Still yet,
Interrogation in S.A. is probably a little more "strenuous" than in the U.S. and the accomodations are probably somewhat less posh.
Enjoy your stay boys!
A Kuwait criminal court on Sunday acquitted five former Guantanamo detainees of charges that they collected money for Osama bin Laden's al-Qaida network. The five were freed from the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay in November but were arrested upon their return home to Kuwait and were charged with belonging to al-Qaida. But on Sunday, a court found all five innocent of all charges, according to a ruling released to the media.
The defendants pleaded innocent when the trial opened in March. Their lawyers argued that there was no evidence to convict them and that Kuwaiti courts had no jurisdiction to try them because they had not done anything illegal in Kuwait. Defense attorneys also told the tribunal that testimonies collected at Guantanamo Bay and provided by the United States could not be used in a Kuwaiti court because they did not have the signatures of the detainees or interrogators. The defendants were charged with collecting money through Al-Wafa, an Afghan charity the U.S. military says helped finance al-Qaida. They were also accused of fighting alongside Afghanistan's ousted Taliban regime that hosted the terror group.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/23/2006 00:00 ||
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How could national heroes be charged?
Posted by: ed ||
05/23/2006 0:35 Comments ||
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"Go forth, sons of Allan, go forth and fundraise no more."
Man in fetters killed in 'crossfire'
A man in fetters was killed in a so-called "crossfire" between the police and his accomplices at Lalbagh in the city early yesterday while an alleged criminal was killed in a similar incident at Madanganj in Narayanganj.
It is hard to escape wearing leg irons
Lalbagh police claimed a police team led by its officer-in-charge took Ismail Hossain, also known as Mark Cuban Tunda Ismail and placed on remand earlier, to Noor Dairy Farm near Shahidnagar Balurmath to recover his hidden firearms around 3:55am.
Ah yes, the old "arms cache at 3:55am trick. Hope the gunfire didn't wake the cows
This is a level of precision in timing that even the RAB would admire ...
Ismail's cohorts ambushed the team trying to snatch him from custody and the police retaliated leading to an encounter when Ismail received bullets, a police press release said.
Several bullets. At high velocity. At point blank range. In the back.
The RAB just finds it easier to put two in the back of the head while he's still in the truck.
He was taken to Sir Salimullah Medical College Hospital where on duty doctors declared him dead.
"He's dead, Jim"
However, Ismail's elder brother Shah Alam said a chairman of Kamrangirchar area who is close to a ruling BNP lawmaker used the police to kill his brother over a land dispute.
As if his brother is some wealthy landowner or something ...
He also alleged the dispute with the chairman started in 2001 after he bought a piece of land which the chairman also wanted to buy. "Since then the chairman has been trying to harm us. This time he used police to kill my brother," Shah Alam told reporters at Sir Salimullah Medical College morgue where the body was sent for an autopsy.
This is a police hit, the RAB is much more nuanced.
Morgue sources said the bore had 15 bullets and it was delivered to them with the fetters on.
I guess they mean the body had 15 holes in him and was still tied up. Amateurs!
Maybe he really was a bore?
... or were they hunting boars and just got confused ...
Police said they arrested Ismail, an accused in 12 cases including five for murder, on April 18 in Munshiganj and he was placed on a two-day remand in an arms case. Police said two police constables -- Mahbubul Alam and Nazrul Islam -- sustained critical injuries during the encounter. Police also said they fired 44 bullets during the shootout.
RAB can have a two day shootout and not go thru that many rounds
The accomplices of Ismail managed to flee the scene but police recovered two pistols, one magazine and 16 bullets from the spot.
Two pistols? Those Lalbagh cops must be rolling in bribe money
NARAYANGANJ
Police claim Sumon, 28, also known as Phensy Sumon, was killed in 'crossfire' when police and his accomplices exchanged fire in Madanganj area of Narayanganj yesterday, our Narayanganj correspondent reports.
Phensy must not be much to get second billing
Who the hell names a kid 'Phensy'?
Police said they had arrested Sumon with 48 Phensidyl bottles on Sunday.
Phensidyl is a industrial grade cough syrup
They said following Sumon's information ...
"Ahhhhhhh!! I'll talk, just put THAT away!"
... a police team along with Sumon tried to raid their den in Madanganj area to arrest his accomplices and recover firearms.
Same story, same unhappy ending
But hardly had they reached Madanganj when Sumon's cohorts opened fire on them from their hideout forcing the police to retaliate.
"It's da coppers! Open wildly inacurate fire!"
Police claimed during the shootout Sumon tried to escape but he was bullet hit and died on the way to Narayanganj Upazila Health Complex.
They untie him this time?
The accomplices of Sumon managed to escape leaving behind a foreign-made revolver and seven bullets. Police said Sumon, son of Hossain Khalifa of Tikkamore area, was accused in several cases including one murder case.
There are millions of crossfires in the Naked City. This has been two of them.
Posted by: Steve ||
05/23/2006 00:00 ||
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Phensy "the Fence" Sumon? Another Bangla legend bites the dust.
MOSCOW, May 23 (Itar-Tass) - - A powerful explosive device was discovered in the Vedeno region of Chechnya, Itar-Tass learnt at the law enforcement bodies of the republic.
The bomb was discovered by servicemen in the forest near the village of Verkhatoi on Monday. The explosive device consisted of two RGD-5 grenades, 200 grams of plastid and 400 grams of TNT, a police representative said. The bomb was destroyed on the spot.
MOSCOW, May 23 (Itar-Tass) - - A resident of Chechnya who participated in combat actions against servicemen of federal forces was detained in the Moscow Region, Itar-Tass learnt at the law enforcement bodies of the Moscow Region on Tuesday. The member of illegal armed groups was detained in Solnechnogorsk on Monday, a police representative specified. According to the available information, the 27-year-old resident of the Shali region participated in combat actions as a member of gangs.
Officers of the Chechen Interior Ministry came to the Moscow Region to detain him.
It was the first day of school, and the returning students -- the second- through 12th-graders -- lined up and waited for the annual opening ceremony to begin. Soon the new first-graders would march in, then one of them would be hoisted on the shoulders of a senior and ring a bell to start the new year.
Suddenly, a military truck pulled up and guerrillas wearing ski masks jumped out, firing AK-47s and yelling "Allahu akhbar!" There were more than 30 of them, including two veiled women wearing belts packed with explosives. They seized the school, shot a man who resisted and herded 1,100 students, teachers and parents into the gym. Then they rigged the gym with bombs, some on the floor, others hung from wires strung above the hostages.
"Everybody be silent!" one terrorist said after firing into the ceiling. "You have been taken hostage."
They were Chechen rebels, he explained, and they'd seized the school to demand that Russia withdraw from Chechnya. He appointed a hostage named Ruslan Betrozov to translate his remarks to the crowd.
"Are you finished?" the terrorist asked when Betrozov stopped speaking.
Betrozov nodded, and the terrorist shot him in the head.
It was Sept. 1, 2004, and the long ordeal of School No. 1 in Beslan, Russia, had begun. When it was over, 56 hours later, 362 people would be dead, including 186 children, 31 terrorists and 10 Russian commandos who were killed storming the school. It was the second-deadliest terrorist act in history.
Now Esquire has published "The School," an amazing account of the Beslan massacre and one of the best pieces of narrative journalism to appear in any American magazine in this millennium.
It was written by C.J. Chivers, who covered the siege for the New York Times and then returned to Beslan many times to interview survivors. He crafted their memories into a riveting, hour-by-hour account of horrific brutality and amazing courage. His story is as bloody as a slasher movie, as suspenseful as a thriller and, like the film "United 93," a tribute to the extraordinary heroism of ordinary people who find themselves confronting murderous terrorists.
Chivers's story is 18,000 words long -- the longest piece published in Esquire in 20 years, says Editor in Chief David Granger -- and it is definitely not for the squeamish. But if you stick with it, you'll be rewarded by meeting several authentic heroes.
One of them is Larisa Kudziyeva, a beautiful young widow who came to the school with her son and daughter. In the crowded gym, early on the first day, Larisa demanded bandages so she could tend the wounds of a man who'd been shot for refusing to kneel to the guerrillas. Her demands irked one of the gunmen.
"Are you the bravest person here?" he asked. "We will check."
He ordered her to kneel.
"No," she said.
"Get on your knees," he said.
"No."
The terrorist raised his AK-47 and pressed the muzzle against her forehead.
She brushed it aside. "What kind of spectacle are you playing here?" she said.
The other hostages watched, stunned, certain that Larisa would be shot, just like the man whose wounds she'd tended. But another terrorist stepped forward and told her to sit down and shut up.
Two days later, when the terrorists' bombs exploded in the gym, killing scores of hostages, Larisa survived with only minor wounds. A few hours later, she lived to see her captors make their last stand against Russian commandos in the cafeteria. Lying on the floor with her children, as both sides fired over them, she watched as a dying terrorist threw a grenade at a commando. It flew over her, then fell to the floor and bounced. She squeezed her children beneath her, absorbing the blast with her body. She saved her kids, but the grenade blew off much of her face.
As of April, Chivers writes, she had endured 14 surgeries and was awaiting more.
Perhaps the most amazing story is the saga of a man named Karen Mdinaradze. A cameraman for a local soccer team, Karen was hired to videotape the school's opening ceremony. It turned out to be the unluckiest -- and the luckiest -- experience of his life.
Karen happened to be standing near one of the female terrorists when the bomb she was wearing exploded. It ripped off her head and sent shrapnel flying. But Karen was shielded from the blast by a man who was standing between him and the explosion. That man died; Karen was wounded.
Terrorists took him and other wounded men to a classroom where dead hostages were piled on the floor. One terrorist ordered the wounded men to lie down. Another fired, emptying his rifle into the wounded men. All were killed except Karen, who was miraculously unhurt.
The terrorists left, then returned with two hostages and ordered them to throw the corpses out the window of the second-floor room. When they got to Karen, he stood up. He expected to be shot.
He wasn't. "You walk under Allah," the stunned terrorist said, and he sent Karen back to the gym.
Karen was unconscious when the bombs in the gym exploded. "He woke, heard moaning and found himself surrounded by gore," Chivers writes. "Human remains had rained down; two girls near him were covered by a rope of intestines."
Karen saw hostages escaping through a hole the bombs had blown in the gym wall. He ran, too, scurrying to safety through a rain of gunfire, clutching a little boy in his arms.
"The School" is a strange, shocking, surreal story. It'll make a great movie. But don't wait for that. Read the article.
#2
It always amazes me that terrorists think act like this will further their cause. All it does is galvanize their enemies and provoke a painfull response. How many Chechens have died for this? Russia has been sending special forces and anti-terror paramilitants into chechnia ever since, along with regular army and police. They have killed a chechen commander every week for the last couple of years it seems like.
#4
That horror-show was one of the few times I've ever felt sympathy for Putin. I think he really wanted to reach out and seriously touch someone, but he didn and doesn't have the means, short of an SS-18 to do it. Ever a continental force.
A SURGE in deadly violence in East Timor has kept an 800-strong Australian military taskforce on high alert, ready for a possible intervention mission.
Civil unrest in the troubled country, which subsided last week, flared again yesterday with the death of at least one government soldier and the wounding of five others.
The violence came a few days after a crucial meeting of the ruling Fretilin party, in which Prime Minister Mari Alkatiri outmanoeuvred an attempt to unseat him, despite his unpopularity among the East Timorese.
In Canberra, Cabinet's national security committee ordered the Darwin-based taskforce - the biggest assembled since the 1999 East Timor crisis - to maintain its high state of readiness.
Regional security jitters have fanned out across the Tasman, with an announcement by New Zealand it was putting a platoon of soldiers on standby for possible deployment to East Timor.
Foreign Minister Alexander Downer told Parliament yesterday Canberra remained concerned about the security situation in East Timor after a sudden escalation in violence following the end of the Fretilin national conference last Friday.
The sound of automatic weapons echoed across the dilapidated capital Dili yesterday as government security forces and armed rebel soldiers exchanged gunfire. At least two government soldiers were wounded in one exchange.
Many embassies have evacuated non-essential staff and more than 20,000 people have fled the capital since the violence erupted on April 27 and 28.
A spokesman for Mr Downer said last night SBS cameraman David O'Shea was safe and "in an embassy car" after fears he had been caught up in a gunbattle between rebel soldiers and government troops outside Dili.
He had been interviewing a renegade Australian-trained officer - Major Alfredo Reinaldo, the commander of East Timor's military police.
A third of the East Timorese army - 595 soldiers - were dismissed in March after protesting about pay and conditions and promotion based on ethnicity.
"Reports we are getting today are that parts of Dili and other parts of the country are descending into violence," Mr Downer told Parliament.
"There are reports of injuries and property damage."
He said the violence showed the need for an independent government commission investigating the grievances of the dismissed soldiers to finish its work as quickly as possible.
"Rebel military and security personnel must cease destabilising the situation and work with the Government to resolve their differences," he said.
Mr Downer said he had held talks with his East Timorese counterpart, Jose Ramos Horta, about the worsening violence.
He said the Government stood ready to offer military assistance if requested by the East Timor Government or the UN.
RAAF aircraft, three navy amphibious transport ships and a battalion-size combat force are on standby in Darwin to evacuate the estimated 800 Australians living in East Timor or to undertake peace-enforcement operations.
As a young nation, East Timor was still coming to terms with the responsibilities of democracy and government, Mr Downer said.
BERLIN (Reuters) - A Moroccan man won a landmark legal victory on Tuesday when Germany's highest court set strict limits on the ability of police to trawl electronic databases at random in search of possible terrorists.
The Constitutional Court said such data trawling, for example to identify foreign male Muslim students, was only lawful if there was a concrete threat to Germany or one of its regions, or a danger to human life or freedom.
"A general threat situation, of the kind that has existed continuously in regard to terrorist attacks since September 11, 2001, or external political tensions, are not sufficient," the court said.
"The pre-condition is, rather, the existence of further facts pointing to a concrete danger, such as the preparation or commission of terrorist attacks."
The case arose from a complaint brought by a Moroccan student after the September 11 attacks on the United States, when German police began scanning local authority and university databases to identify Muslim men aged 18 to 40 who were current or former students.
Men who met that description were then subjected to further police checks in an attempt to uncover more al Qaeda "sleepers" like the three Hamburg-based Arab students who led the suicide hijack attacks on America. None were actually found.
Since 2001, governments around the world have tightened anti-terrorist legislation and stepped up security measures, provoking frequent criticism from human rights groups.
Debate flared anew in the United States this month after a newspaper report that the National Security Agency had collected telephone records of tens of millions of Americans.
The German court ruling said general police trawling of electronic records exposed the people concerned to an increased risk of further investigation.
It added that if such measures became publicly known, they could "reinforce prejudices and stigmatise the affected social groups in the perception of the public".
#1
...if such measures became publicly known, they could "reinforce prejudices and stigmatise the affected social groups in the perception of the public".
#5
Right NS, just like we have SJR:23 [NB - 2(B)(1)] and many sitting members of the federal courts can't seem to figure out we're at war too. Ignoring, of course, that AQ declared war a long time ago upon us [i.e. Kobar, African Embassies, Cole, Twin Trade Towers].
#6
Yep, they're going to hit us any way they can, any place they can. And we are going to pay for bullshit legislation like this with lives. The U.S. is getting slack on it again. It will take another good attack to wake us up and remind us that we can't play nice with these skidmarks. I just hope it isn't a nuclear device this time.
A Turkish soldier was killed, another wounded, in a landmine blast on Monday in southeastern Turkey. Turkish Ikhlas News Agency quoted Turkish security sources as saying that a military patrol ran over a landmine on a road leading to the town of Lissa near Diyarbakir city, mostly occupied by Kurdish people, noting that the landmine was planted by Kurdish insurgents.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/23/2006 00:00 ||
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DUBAI (Reuters) - Osama bin Laden said Zacarias Moussaoui, the only person convicted in a U.S. court for the September 11 attacks, had nothing to do with the operations, according to a Web site audiotape released on Tuesday. well then, release the prisoner!
Bin Laden said he had personally assigned tasks to the 19 hijackers who staged the attacks on U.S. cities which killed about 3,000 people. "I don't remember this Moosie or whatever his name is"
"The truth is that he has no connection whatsoever with the events of September 11. I am certain of what I say because I was responsible for entrusting the 19 brothers ... with the raids," said the speaker who sounded like the leader of Al Qaeda.
The authenticity of the tape could not be verified. It was posted on a Web site often used by Al Qaeda. Moussaoui was sentenced on May 4 to life in prison with no chance of release, ending 4-1/2 years of legal wrangling over his fate. buh-bye!
The 37-year-old French citizen of Moroccan descent pleaded guilty last year to conspiracy in connection with the attacks, in which hijacked airliners were flown into buildings in New York City and Washington D.C.
Some U.S. officials initially said they believed Moussaoui was to have taken part in the September 11 attacks as a 20th hijacker. Others later said he was supposed to have been part of a second wave of attacks that were not carried out. guilty? Innocent? guilty? I'm ssoooooo confused. Best thing is to assume they lie, as they usually do, and are permitted to by their book of lies. Lock his ass up on concrete furniture for life.
Posted by: Frank G ||
05/23/2006 18:25 ||
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#3
Bin Laden said he had personally assigned tasks to the 19 hijackers who staged the attacks on U.S. cities which killed about 3,000 people.
But muslims will continue to claim he had nothing to do with it.
Posted by: john ||
05/23/2006 18:43 Comments ||
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#4
I, as King Frank, would've ordered a Craftsman lobotomy of this POS so that he couldn't feed himself or harm anyone, and sent him back to France...good thing I'm underemployed, eh? LOL
Posted by: Frank G ||
05/23/2006 18:45 Comments ||
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#5
Boy, you know you are in the stew when your only character witnesses are your mom and Osama bin Laden.
So what will it be, your Highness? The table saw? Or shall I fire up the radial arm?
Some shipworkers say the hairs stood up on the backs of their necks the first time they touched it. Others have postponed their retirement so they can be part of the project.
One worker, Tony Quaglino, said: I was going to go in October 2004 after 40 years here, but I put it off when I found out I could be working on New York. This is sacred and it makes me very proud. Glen Clement, a paint superintendent, said: Nobody passes by that bow section without knocking on it. Everybody knows what it is made from and what its about.
The ship is being built by Northrop Grumman on the banks of the Mississippi. It should be ready to join the US Navy in 2007.
Posted by: Matt ||
05/23/2006 00:00 ||
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#1
One worker, Tony Quaglino, said: I was going to go in October 2004 after 40 years here, but I put it off when I found out I could be working on New York. This is sacred and it makes me very proud. Glen Clement, a paint superintendent, said: Nobody passes by that bow section without knocking on it. Everybody knows what it is made from and what its about.
#10
#9, you ought to be proud. Not to tell you what you already know, but the San Antonio class is not only a new ship design but a new ship design process. A battalion of Marines suddenly showing up on Achmed's doorstep will get his attention, although I agree that 16" naval artillery would have been a nice touch.
Posted by: Matt ||
05/23/2006 17:14 Comments ||
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#11
You gotta respect the Guy(or Girl)Whom after the twin tower attacks said to themselves fuck with us will you, I'm gonna turn the remains into a warship!
#13
Don't tie yourself in knots, pihkalbadger. "Guy" is a gender-free noun as commonly used. However if you feel you must make it masculine, the feminine is "gal". Just for future reference, and because you are being so nicely inclusive about it, my dear. :-D
#14
Great, but I'm still pissed over the ORISKANY - still can't believe the people and Govt. of NY State or NE States couldn't find someone to save the "BIG/MIGHTY O" from becoming a reef.
Hizbullah may be planning to activate sleeper cells in New York and other big cities to stage an attack as the nuclear showdown with Iran heats up, according to a New York Post report Monday. The FBI and Justice Department have launched urgent new probes in New York and other cities targeting members of the Lebanese terror group. Law-enforcement and intelligence officials told The New York Post that about a dozen supporters of Hizbullah have been identified in recent weeks as operating in the New York area.
Sources said FBI counter terrorism agents were monitoring the activities of these New York-based operatives as part of a nationwide effort to prevent a possible terror strike if the confrontation with Iran over its nuclear program spins out of control. Additional law-enforcement attention is being centered on the Iranian Mission to the United Nations, where there have already been three episodes in the last four years in which diplomats and security guards have been expelled for casing and photographing New York City subways and other potential targets.
The nationwide effort to neutralize Hizbullah sleepers in the United States, being spearheaded by the FBI and Justice Department's counter terrorism divisions, was triggered in January in response to alarming reports that Iran's president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, met with leaders of Hizbullah and other terror groups during a visit to Syria. US officials, according to the New York Post stressed there is no intelligence information pointing to an imminent attack by Hizbullah, but officials said they have detected increased activity by Hizbullah operatives - including more heated rhetoric by its leaders and in Internet chat rooms as the US-Iran diplomatic showdown heats up. A US counter terrorism official called the latest effort a "major undertaking," with separate probes also under way in Los Angeles, Boston and Detroit.
#3
You're working too hard again, lotp. It's 2006 now, to the best of my recollection. ;-) And thank goodness it's a full two years until 2008 -- my nerves need the time to recover from the last go-round.
IN THE Pakistani village of Mahmoud Abad, a mile from the rugged Afghan border, several dozen people gathered at the mosque yesterday to honour a local boy killed in a battle with coalition forces near Kandahar last week.
He was a soldier of Islam who laid down his life fighting the infidels, a bearded and blackturbanned Taleban commander told the crowd, which chanted Allahu akbar (God is greatest).
The family of Abdul Baqi, 24, a religious student who had joined the Taleban insurgents in Afghanistan a month ago, likewise celebrated his martyrdom. We are proud of him, said Abdul Qadir, his older brother.
Many young men from the dirt-poor village have enrolled as volunteers with the Taleban forces fighting in Afghanistan. Across the Chamman district hundreds have joined up since the madrassas religious schools closed for the summer.
Maulana Abdul Ghani, a 75-old-cleric who is dean of Al Jamia Islamia, one of Chammans largest madrassas, said he believed many of his 3,000 students had gone willingly to fight in Afghanistan. The situation is fast changing in Afghanistan in favour of the Taleban, he said.
Most of the madrassas are run by clerics like Mr Ghani who belong to Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam, the Islamic fundamentalist party that leads the coalition government in western Baluchistan.
The dusty border town of Chamman has become the main centre of Taleban activities as fighting intensifies in southern Afghanistan and many Taleban commanders are thought to have been operating from the area. The Taleban can move freely across the long and porous border.
The Pakistani authorities deny they are using Pakistani territory as a base, but senior Taleban commanders admit that they receive indirect support from local officials.
We cannot fight for long without support from our sympathisers in the local administration, said one, Samiul Haq. Mr Haq, who recently returned from Afghanistan, gave warning of more attacks on coalition forces. He said that as many as 600 suicide bombers were being trained and said such attacks were the most effective weapon against the occupation forces. Another Taleban commander said many insurgents had returned from Iraq.
#2
Maulana Abdul Ghani, a 75-old-cleric who is dean of Al Jamia Islamia, one of Chammans largest madrassas, said he believed many of his 3,000 students had gone willingly to fight in Afghanistan.
Targeting coordinates.
Posted by: ed ||
05/23/2006 9:56 Comments ||
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#3
What a small world. I too, celebrate thier death.
Four people were sentenced to death and three brothers to life in prison in a 2004 suicide attack in Pakistan that killed six but whose target, Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz, escaped, official media reported Tuesday.
Anti-Terrorist Court Judge Safdar Malik announced the sentences late Monday in the garrison town of Rawalpindi, awarding the death sentences to Malik Noor Badshah, Qari Muhammad Siddique, Sulman alias Zaheer and Qari Ahmed.
All the convicts were also tried under the Explosives Act and sentenced to another 10 years in prison and fined 8,333 dollars, the official Associated Press of Pakistan said.
Eight people were acquitted in the case.
Several people were also wounded in the July 30, 2004, attack when a suicide bomber blew himself near the car of then-finance minister Aziz after a public meeting in the Fateh Jhang area of the Attock district, south of Islamabad.
President Pervez Musharraf has also escaped at least three attempts on his life since his country joined the US-led war against terrorism in the aftermath of September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks in the United States.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
05/23/2006 00:32 ||
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Militants in the tribal areas bordering Afghanistan have said they are investigating the 18 tribal chiefs who met President General Pervez Musharraf and violated the ban prohibiting contacts with the government. Abdullah Farhad, a spokesman for militants, told reporters that a shoura (council) would decide the fate of two tribal chiefs, Mir Sharof Ederkhel and Nawab Khan Borakhel, who had apologised for meeting the president. "Sharof and Khan have admitted meeting the president was a mistake and pleaded for mercy," said Farhad. Sharof confirmed contacting the militants, saying he had attended the meeting to plead for the military's withdrawal from the tribal regions. Pro-government tribal elder Malik Tooti Gul was kidnapped and killed last week by unidentified assailants. Militants denied killing him, adding that they were investigating his murder.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/23/2006 00:00 ||
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At least seven security personnel and 16 others were injured in a series of powerful explosions in Srinagar, summer capital of Indian-administered Jammu and Kashmir Monday. Terrorists lobbed a powerful hand grenade at a bunker of the Indian Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) in downtown Srinagar Monday, news agency Indo-Asian News Service reported. "The grenade exploded near the bunker injuring four paramilitary CRPF troopers and two civilian bystanders. The injured were taken to the hospital for treatment," police told reporters today in Srinagar.
The terrorists also attacked the Jammu and Kashmir police in another part of Srinagar with a hand grenade that exploded injuring five people including two police personnel. In another incident terrorists fired a rifle grenade towards a police check-point at Munwar in downtown Srinagar, injuring three policemen and two civilians, the agency reported. Meanwhile, security has been strengthened in Srinagar ahead of the two-day roundtable on Kashmir issue to be chaired by the Indian Prime Minister beginning May 24. Four guerrilla groups have threatened to disrupt the roundtable.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/23/2006 00:00 ||
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Two prominent Sunni hard-liners laid out conditions yesterday for an end to Iraq's insurgency, including a clear date for the withdrawal of U.S. and British troops and a restoration of the old Iraqi army.
But they warned of greater conflict if Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's choice for defense minister was not satisfactory to disaffected Sunnis.
Fakhri al-Khaisy, who speaks for the Salafi sect of fundamentalist Muslims in Baghdad, and Abdul Kareem al-Zobai, a leading member of the Muslim Scholars Association, also threatened to "remove" any Sunnis cooperating with the new Shi'ite-led government if an unsatisfactory defense minister is chosen.
Mr. al-Maliki said during a press conference with British Prime Minister Tony Blair yesterday that Iraqi forces would start taking over large portions of the country from coalition troops by the end of the year -- opening the way for major reductions in U.S. troop levels.
"There is an agreement for the transfer of security under a timetable which starts in June, when Iraqi forces will take control of the provinces of Samawa and Amara," Mr. al-Maliki was quoted as saying by Reuters news agency.
"The other provinces will be transferred gradually, and by the end of this year most of them will [be under Iraqi control], with the exception of Baghdad and perhaps Anbar," he said. The two provinces are at the heart of the insurgency and sectarian killings.
U.S. and British forces have said that the withdrawal of the roughly 135,000 coalition troops in Iraq is contingent on the establishment of an effective government and security force in the country.
Mr. Blair, who was in Baghdad on a surprise visit to show support for the two-day-old government, said that the "Iraqi people are about to take charge of their own destiny. ... There is now no excuse for people to carry on with terrorism and bloodshed."
But Mr. al-Khaisy, who is thought to have ties with Wahhabis in Saudi Arabia, and Mr. al-Zobai, whose tribe forms part of the insurgency in western Iraq, told The Washington Times that the Sunnis were ready to "struggle to the end."
"We believe the Sunni people will reject this new government and will turn their hatred toward those Sunnis in the government, like Tariq al-Hashimi and the Islamic Party," Mr. al-Zobai said.
The sister of Mr. al-Hashimi, a Sunni vice president and Islamic Party leader who decided to join the political process, was fatally shot in the streets of Baghdad last month.
"And there will be big problems if the Sunnis lose the Ministry of Defense," said Mr. al-Zobai, adding that the government should appoint a Sunni who would be accepted by the insurgency, such as Khalaf al-Elayan, a member of the Sunni National Dialogue Council.
Mr. al-Khaisy, sporting a full Salafi beard and dressed in black, outlined what he said were the Sunni demands to end the insurgency -- a firm schedule for the withdrawal of coalition troops, a larger role for Sunnis in the government, and the recall of the army as it existed under Saddam Hussein. That army dissolved after the U.S. invasion, and a decision was made not to call it back to barracks by L. Paul Bremer, the U.S. administrator at the time.
Otherwise, Mr. al-Khaisy said, "we will support the resistance, and we will try to remove this temporary Sunni leadership [in the government] by any way."
"The Sunni people will struggle to take back their rights. They consider themselves neglected, so they will struggle to the end," he said.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
05/23/2006 02:38 ||
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#1
Sounds like he is threatening a Sunni on Sunni civil war.
#2
One can only hope that these two are that stupid : initiate a Sunni civil war, while at the same time attacking the Shia/Kurdish government troops. Won't be a lot of the Triangle Arabs left at this rate.
#3
Sounds like the usual Arab trick of
(a) Starting a war.
(b) Loosing a war.
(c) Trying to impose conditions on the victors.
Good luck Sunnis. As soon as US troops withdraw, the Shia will exterminate you.
#5
They'll probably get everything they ask for if they hold out long enough. Nobody in either ours or their govt. has a belly for fighting anymore. Look at ol' Tater, he started out with 2 murder warrants on him and look at him now. If you make yourself a big enough pain in the ass for long enough, your off the hook.
Whole neighborhoods are lawless, too dangerous for police. Some roads are so bomb-laden that U.S. troops won't use them. Guerrillas attack U.S. troops nearly every time they venture out _ and hit their bases with gunfire, rockets or mortars when they don't.
Though not powerful enough to overrun U.S. positions, insurgents here in the heart of the Sunni Muslim triangle have fought undermanned U.S. and Iraqi forces to a virtual stalemate.
"It's out of control," says Army Sgt. 1st Class Britt Ruble, behind the sandbags of an observation post in the capital of Anbar province. "We don't have control of this ... we just don't have enough boots on the ground."
Reining in Ramadi, through arms or persuasion, could be the toughest challenge for Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's new government. Al-Maliki has promised to use "maximum force" when needed. But three years of U.S. military presence, with nearly constant patrols and sweeps, hasn't done it.
Today Ramadi, a city of 400,000 along the main highway running to Jordan and Syria, 70 miles west of Baghdad, has battles fought in endless circles. Small teams of insurgents open fire and coalition troops respond with heavy blows, often airstrikes or rocket fire that's turned city blocks into rubble.
"We're holding it down to a manageable level until Iraqis forces can take over the fight," Marine Capt. Carlos Barela said of the daily violence battering the city.
How long before that happens is anybody's guess.
U.S. and Iraqi commanders say militants fled to Ramadi from Fallujah during a devastating U.S.-led assault there in 2004. Others have joined from elsewhere in Anbar, blending into a civilian population either sympathetic to their cause or too afraid to turn against them.
They've destroyed police stations and left the force in shambles. The criminal court system doesn't function because judges are afraid to work; tribal sheiks have fled or been assassinated.
While al-Maliki has vowed to crush the insurgency, a major military operation to clear Ramadi risks destroying any hope of reaching a political settlement with disaffected Sunnis.
U.S. commanders also say a Fallujah-style operation is not in the cards, at least not yet, and might not have the desired effect. "That would set us back two years," said Lt. Col. Stephen Neary, commander of the 3rd Battalion, 8th Marine Regiment.
However, the status quo with its bloodletting doesn't sit well with the troops.
"We just go out, lose people and come back," said Iraqi Col. Ali Hassan, whose men fight alongside the Americans. "The insurgents are moving freely everywhere. We need a big operation. We need control."
Some Americans also say ground needs to be taken and held. Most U.S. missions typically consist of going out, coming under fire and returning to base _ leaving behind a no-man's-land held by neither side that insurgents in black ski masks always pour back into.
"This just 'we ride out, hold it for an hour, get hit, ride back in and now we don't hold it anymore,' what's the point?" said Ruble of the Army's 1st Battalion, 506th Infantry Regiment. "I believe in the cause and I believe in doing good, but when were going out, getting hurt and ... not accomplishing anything, why are we going out there? If you're saying killing one insurgent is worth one of my guys getting hurt ... you're crazy. That's like killing one guy in the Chinese army. What have you done? not a thing."
The sheer scale of violence in Ramadi is astounding.
One recent coalition tally of "significant acts" _ roadside bombs, attacks, exchanges of fire _ indicated that out of 43 reported in Iraq on a single day, 27 occurred in Ramadi and its environs, according to a Marine officer who declined to be named because he's not authorized to speak to the media.
And that, he said, was "a quiet day" _ when nothing from Ramadi even made the news.
In Ramadi, machine-gun fire and explosions are heard every day and tracer fire or illumination flares are seen every night. Even after airstrikes have transformed already ruined buildings full of gunmen into huge balls of gray debris, Marines have marveled at surviving insurgents who've come out shooting.
Even though such assaults kill dozens at a time, guerrillas keep on coming _ and keep dying.
"They're crazy to be coming in the numbers that they do," Lance Cpl. Chris Skiff, 25, of Tupper Lake, N.Y.
Inside a palatial Saddam-era guesthouse near the Euphrates River _ now a fortified U.S. base where sand-filled barriers and camouflage netting surround even the portable toilets _ Marines stare in wonder at photos of U.S. troops deployed here less two years ago.
The pictures show their predecessors riding in open-topped vehicles, often with little armor. They show freshly painted buildings, since destroyed or splattered with gunfire. They show U.S. troops walking through a downtown marketplace, a casual outing unthinkable today.
Some of the pictures show bullet-strafed buildings and cars on fire, but it's a far cry from Ramadi, 2006. Case in point: Government Center, headquarters of the provincial governor.
Once, civilian traffic was allowed to pass in front of the near-pristine edifice. Today, only military vehicles are allowed near. The wrecked building is enclosed by blast walls, barbed wire and a sometime moat of sewage. From machine-gun nests, walls of sandbags and tents of camouflage on the roof Marines repel several attacks a day.
Marines say that the governor is unfazed and comes to work despite 29 assassination attempts.
"If you wanna get blown up or shot at or anything else, then this is the place," said Marine Staff Sgt. Jacob Smith, 28, from Martin, S.D., who helps clear roadside bombs that are sometimes replaced just after the minesweepers drive past.
In one Ramadi neighborhood, Master Sgt. Tom Coffey, 38, of Underhill, Vt., gestured to a paved road his forces would not drive on. "They hit us so many times with IEDs (roadside bombs), we ceded it to them," he said.
Though coalition forces answer with massive firepower, they rarely pursue attackers _ for fear of falling into an ambush and because they have few troops to spare. Though U.S. and Iraqi troops conduct frequent raids and hit targets, the insurgents fight back in their own way.
When U.S. and Iraqi troops question civilians, insurgents follow in their footsteps to visit and sometimes kill the suspected informants.
After U.S. troops use residential rooftop walls as observation posts, insurgents have been known to knock them down.
Ramadi is dangerous not only for combatants, but for civilians caught in the crossfire.
"It's getting worse. Safety is zero," Col. Hassan said.
After one neighborhood sweep devolved into an hour-long gunbattle, Iraqi Maj. Jabar Marouf al-Tamini returned to base and drew his finger across a satellite map of the area he'd just fled under fire: "It's fallen under the command of insurgents," he said, shaking his head. "They control it now."
U.S. commanders would argue otherwise, but acknowledge perhaps a bigger problem.
"They don't have to win. All they have to do is not lose," said Barela, 35, of Albuquerque, N.M., citing an adage about guerrilla war.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
05/23/2006 01:43 ||
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#2
Houston Chronicle looking to suck up to the big league loser media
Posted by: Frank G ||
05/23/2006 18:42 Comments ||
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#3
If the situation is as described, then issue a 24 hour "get outa Dodge with only what you can carry" after surrounding the place, either w/ ground troops or AC-130s. Anybody trying to do otherwise gets to play the horizontal dirt nap game for a long time. Then at the appointed hour MOAB the place until the rubble can be run through a flour sifter.
British officials said they expected all foreign combat troops to withdraw from Iraq within four years, as British Prime Minister Tony Blair flew into Baghdad to show support to its new government yesterday.
It was the firmest statement yet from one of the two main allies in the 2003 invasion to topple Saddam Hussein on a date for pulling out troops from Iraq. Washington has said it is too soon to discuss such a timetable.
As Blair arrived in the capital's fortified Green Zone, two bomb attacks killed nine people in other parts of Baghdad -- a fresh reminder of the tough challenges new Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki faces in restoring stability.
The trip, just a day after Maliki's first Cabinet meeting, underlined the political capital Blair has invested in Iraq.
It also came a day after a series of bombs killed at least 19 people in Baghdad, the bloodiest of them being claimed by an al-Qaeda-affiliated Sunni Islamist militant group.
Washington and London count on Maliki, a tough-talking Shiite Islamist who has vowed to use "maximum force against terrorists," to start tackling such violence plaguing Iraq.
His government's appointment to some extent completes the process of rebuilding Iraq's political institutions, so much is now riding on those institutions performing to end the conflict.
A senior British official said Maliki's unity government will speed the handover of security control from US-led forces to Iraqis, letting London bring some troops home by mid-year.
Three years after the invasion to topple Saddam, the US has some 133,000 troops in Iraq while the British troop strength is around 7,000, mainly patrolling Iraq's south.
At least 2,450 US soldiers and 111 British troops have been killed in Iraq since 2003, and both countries are keen to start drawing down their military presence.
"The aim is to take Iraq to a position where the multinational force is able to withdraw during its [the government's] period in office," said a British official, accompanying Blair on his fifth visit to Iraq since the war.
"During the four years, the present role and structure of the multinational force will change and come to an end," he said, adding some troops may stay beyond the government's four-year term in a non-combatant role to train Iraqis.
Blair was meeting the top US and British military commanders in Iraq and members of the country's new government. Parliament was meeting for the first time since it approved the new government on Saturday.
Maliki said after he was sworn at the helm of a grand coalition of Shiites, minority Sunnis and Kurds that he will work to complete rebuilding Iraq's US-trained armed forces so foreign troops could leave within an "objective timetable."
Shortly before Blair arrived in a helicopter, a bomb exploded in a city market in the New Baghdad district killing at least three people and wounding 12, police sources said.
Meanwhile, France, Italy and Germany sanctioned the payment of a total of US$45 million in deals to free nine hostages abducted in Iraq, London's Times newspaper reported yesterday.
The paper said it had seen documents confirming that all three governments had paid cash ransoms for the release of kidnap victims, despite official denials.
According to the documents, held by security officials in Baghdad involved in hostage negotiations, sums from US$2.5 million to US$10 million per person were paid over the past 21 months.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
05/23/2006 00:43 ||
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#1
Four years is the political equivalent of "Sometime before the universe winds down, proving that entropy does actually win."
Prime Minister Nuri Al Maliki said on Monday he believed Iraqi forces could take over security in most of the country by the end of this year.
Theres an agreement and, according to this schedule for handing over security, Samawa and Amara provinces will be handed over to Iraqis in June and by the end of this year this operation will be completed except for Baghdad and maybe Anbar, he told a joint news conference with British Prime Minister Tony Blair.
Blair declined to be drawn on a timetable for withdrawal but stressed that foreign troops would pull out as fast as Iraqi forces were able to take over. Earlier, one of his officials said all foreign combat troops could be gone in four years.
Samawa and Amara are southern, Shiite provinces, largely peaceful and controlled by British troops whose commanders have said they may withdraw from some provinces soon. Anbar is the restive western desert stronghold of Sunni Arab insurgents.
Malikis timetable, which would coincide with the expiry of a United Nations mandate for the US-led coalition forces, is more ambitious than anything voiced publicly by US or British commanders, who stress that any withdrawal will depend on Iraqi forces being able to ensure security.
Maliki also said Iraqi forces needed more training as the foreign withdrawal proceeded province by province and he warned that if his policy of disarming and disbanding militias failed, it could yet lead to civil war.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
05/23/2006 00:05 ||
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A mortar shell fired by suspected insurgents crashed into a populated village in the governorate of Dyali northeast of the Iraqi capital wounding three civilians, police said on Monday. The police said the civilians who were wounded in Al-Rasoul village were transported to hospital.
In the nearby village of Baldrouz, police located and defused a bomb, planted in Al-Asri district. Armed insurgents, including radical gunmen advocating Islamic slogans and remnants of the ousted Baath regime, have been waging a violent warfare against the allies-backed authorities since ouster of Saddam's Hussein regime in 2003. The ongoing violence has claimed heavy casualties and damage.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/23/2006 00:00 ||
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#1
What an ugly looking weapon. Looks like the something the CSA secret technology labs deep in the Blue Ridge came up with in 1865 just in time for the fall of Richmond.
Posted by: Steve ||
05/23/2006 17:47 Comments ||
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#4
Think I was right. Picture of what looks like same beast here.
The re-birth of the mortar caught the French army entirely by surprise, as it did the British. At least the French could scramble to put into use ancient century-old Napoleonic mortars (referred to by the British as Toby mortars in honour of the British officer who had been struck with the idea of securing such old stockpiles of the weapon from the French).
Posted by: Steve ||
05/23/2006 17:52 Comments ||
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#5
Here and here are more pictures, this time it's called a "French aerial torpedo about to be fired from a trench (GWS)"
I guess that's more info than anyone wanted.
Posted by: Steve ||
05/23/2006 17:59 Comments ||
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#6
looks....like less than GPS accuracy LOL
Posted by: Frank G ||
05/23/2006 18:00 Comments ||
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#7
cool pix Steve, thx
Posted by: Frank G ||
05/23/2006 18:12 Comments ||
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#8
"I guess that's more info than anyone wanted."
Wrong steve *wrings hands with glee*
#9
Rantburg University, Steve. There's no such thing as too much obscure information. Think of what a hit I'll be at the next dinner party when I casually mention that bit about WWI Toby mortars in passing. *delighted giggle*
A car bomb explosion killed three Iraqis Monday in south Baghdad, the Iraqi police said. A police source told KUNA that a booby-trapped vehicle blew up in Al-Zaafaraniyah area in south Baghdad, in which three people were killed and several shops were damaged. The source added that the first car explosion in Al-Ameen neighborhood in eastern Baghdad killed two people and wounded 10 others.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/23/2006 00:00 ||
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A university student was arrested by the Iraqi police in Kirkuk, Northern Iraq, for carrying out terrorist operations in the city. Chief of a police station in Kirkuk Colonel Salah Saber told reporters on Monday that several policemen on Sunday arrested Murad Muwafaq in Al-Masli neighborhood where he confessed working for a terrorist organization besides being a university student in Kirkuk. The police officer added that he was arrested after he was seen by a citizen planting an explosive device, where he informed the police which rushed to the scene to defuse it then besieged his house and arrested him.
There goes the old accounting degree.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/23/2006 00:00 ||
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Four Iraqi policemen were killed in a bomb blast in southern Baghdad on Monday, a police source said. He told KUNA a road-side bomb exploded while an Iraqi police patrol vehicle was passing in Jurf Al-Sakhar area killing four policemen. The attack took place while British prime minister Tony Blair was making a surprise visit to Baghdad.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/23/2006 00:00 ||
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Police Lieutenant Nazem Al-Obaidi, chief of the citizenship and passports department in Kirkuk was gunned dead Monday by a group of unidentified gunmen. A senior official in the Kirkuk Police Department told KUNA that Al-Obaidi was attacked on the Baghdad road near Al-Mansour Mosque and was transferred immediately to Kirkuk's general hospital, where he succumbed to his wounds.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/23/2006 00:00 ||
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May 23 (Bloomberg) -- An aide to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the leader of al-Qaeda in Iraq, today appeared on state-run Jordanian television and confessed to involvement in the killings of Iraqis and other Arabs. Ziad al-Karbouli, also known as Abu Houthiyfah, admitted to working for Jordanian-born al-Zarqawi and said he took part in looting and theft in Iraq.
Al-Karbouli described how last year he kidnapped and killed a Jordanian driver in Iraq, and how he seized two Moroccans who worked at their country's embassy there, as well as how he killed Iraqis.
Al-Zarqawi's group has carried out some of the bloodiest attacks in Iraq since the ousting of Saddam Hussein in 2003, including beheadings of non-Iraqi hostages. The U.S. has a $25 million bounty on al-Zarqawi, whose organization also acknowledged responsibility for suicide bombings last November at three hotels in Jordan's capital, Amman, that killed at least 57 people.
Jordanian security forces in March foiled a suicide bomb attack in the country and arrested three suspected al-Qaeda terrorists, two of them Iraqi nationals and the third a Libyan citizen. Jordan's King Abdullah II ordered security forces to undertake a war on terrorism in the aftermath of the Amman hotel bombings. Jordanian courts have sentenced al-Zarqawi to death in his absence for an attempted bomb attack on the border with Iraq and for the murder of U.S. diplomat Lawrence Foley in Amman in 2002.
State television, citing an unidentified security official, described al-Karbouli as a customs employee on the Iraqi border, adding that he was arrested in a joint operation by the intelligence forces and army special forces after he was drawn out of Iraq, Agence France-Presse reported. Al-Karbouli also confessed to killing four Iraqi national guards, television cited the security official as saying, AFP reported.
Posted by: Steve ||
05/23/2006 16:09 ||
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#1
An aide to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi...
Hmmm...guess we wacked all the senior aides, so we're now just working on the regulars.
#5
If the Jordanian secret police pick you up, there is ALWAYS "encouragement" to confess your sins; some of the "encouragement" is actually quite inventive and does not leave noticable marks on the subject.
RAMALLAH, West Bank - The West Bank commander of the Hamas military wing surrendered to Israeli troops Tuesday after they surrounded his hideout and threatened to demolish it with him inside. Ibrahim Hamed emerged from the building before dawn and troops told him over a loudspeaker to strip to his underwear, witnesses said. ...and hop on one foot. And sing show tunes.
Hamed complied, was cuffed and taken to a nearby building. Army officials said Hamed was armed and alone at the time of his capture. Oh, if he had his gun, he wasn't really "alone"...
The army said Hamed, 41, masterminded attacks that killed 78 Israelis and wounded hundreds. Hamed has been on Israel's wanted list since 1998, frequently evading capture. Hamed, a university graduate and influential leader, became the West Bank's commander of Izzedine al Qassam, the Hamas military wing, in December 2003.
Before dawn Tuesday, a dozen jeeps and two armored personnel carriers surrounded his hideout, an apartment building in downtown Ramallah, just 200 yards from the home of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. My, how convenient...
Mohammed Azzam, 48, said he watched the arrest from his balcony facing the two-story building where Hamed was holed up. He said an army bulldozer rammed the door to the hideout, which consisted of two apartments over shops on the ground floor. Ding-dong. IDF calling...
Using a loudspeaker, troops then called out Hamed's name in Arabic. They told Hamed they would demolish the building with him inside if he didn't surrender, Azzam said. After Hamed was arrested, having removed his shirt and pants, soldiers entered the building and blew out doors and windows, as a robot searched for explosives. Sorry, Hamed. We lied...
The two apartments were sparsely furnished with bamboo chairs and mattresses. A reporter touring the hideout saw two copies of Newsweek magazine on the floor. Newsweek? Who da thunk it?
Palestinian militants surrendering to troops are routinely asked to strip to ensure they don't carry explosives.
The Israeli army said Hamed "masterminded some of the most deadly terror attacks against Israel in recent years," including suicide bombings at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, an outdoor cafe in Jerusalem and a pool hall in central Israel. Hamas has observed an informal truce with Israel since February 2005. For some time, Hamed was held in a Palestinian jail for involvement in the Hamas military wing, but was released in 2002, during a major Israeli military offensive in the West Bank. Hamed graduated from the West Bank's Bir Zeit University in 1993, with degrees in history and political science, his nephew Ayman said. College. It's worth it...
Hamed grew up in the West Bank village of Silwad, and belongs to the same clan as Khaled Mashaal, the top Hamas leader based in Damascus. A little message from Abbas?
The capture came as rival Palestinian factions held talks to quell two weeks of deadly clashes in the Gaza Strip. The violence has raised concern that the internal fighting will escalate into a civil war, but the prime minister of the Hamas-led government said he was persuaded Palestinians would not let that happen. "We are concerned about ending this crisis. The term civil war does not exist in our dictionary," Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh said at the start of the meeting in Gaza City. "I assure our people that we can overcome these incidents. These incidents have taken place before and we have overcome the similar incidents." How did it evah get so far...
The fighting has been fueled by a bitter power struggle between the Hamas government and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, who is a member of the rival Fatah movement. On Monday, in the heaviest battle yet, an aide to the Jordanian ambassador was killed in crossfire and 11 people were wounded in Gaza City. Tensions soared last week when the Hamas government deployed a 3,000-strong force of Hamas militants. The new militia poses a challenge to the Fatah-dominated Palestinian security forces. Armed men from both camps have been patrolling the streets in large numbers, often taking up positions close to each other. Abbas, who led a similar meeting Tuesday of all factions in the West Bank city of Ramallah, he said he was hopeful that a round of "national dialogue" talks supposed to begin Thursday could help the sides resolve their differences. "Each one of us feels the national cause is in danger so we have to work to make sure this dialogue succeeds," Abbas said. Can you speak up? I can't hear the "national dialogue" over the incoming...
#3
Abbas on the phone: "down that street, left, No dammit, left! Yes, that building on the right...that's it. Gotta go now and prepare my 'surprised' expression. Thanks"
Posted by: Frank G ||
05/23/2006 9:55 Comments ||
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#4
Amazed that they managed to take him alive. Must have been hit by Joooo Surrender Gas.
#5
Interesting how the bigger they are, the more likely they are to surrender. Lower pawns shoot it out. And go on suicide bombing missions. And choose to die.
#10
Fatah wants the reins of government back so they can access the Arafat Fund that is squirreled away. Without that money, they will dry up and blow away like the pond scum they are. Hamas is talking and acting even more stupidly than Fatah, so the Israelis are intelligently letting the Arabs rat each other out, and scooping up the trash in the process. Even the spokesman for Hez is talking more reasonable and sane than Hamas, "Iran is on its own if it attacks Israel". Besides which, Abbas needs to IDF to keep hitting Hamas and taking down their leadership so he can stay alive and avoid a Mussolini moment at the hands of Hamas.
Officials said security forces have been vigilant ever since al-Qaeda militants carried out the November suicide attacks.
Jordanian officials say they have foiled many militant attacks against well-guarded embassies and tourist sites, but admit they now face unprecedented challenges.
Security sources said in March that two Iraqis and a Libyan suspected of having links with al-Qaeda in Iraq were arrested who had planned to carry out a suicide attack against a vital, undisclosed civilian Jordanian installation.
Officials and security experts said the planned al-Qaeda suicide bombing in Jordan was a signal that Zarqawi was stepping up his campaign against one of Washington's closest Arab allies.
They say Zarqawi, angry at his country's close ties with the United States and emboldened by the hotel bombings, has opened a new front in Jordan, where he was jailed for three years.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
05/23/2006 00:06 ||
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#1
Interesting. I hope they've been coordinating with Coalition forces, or at least keeping them informed. I'm sure they'd all be unhappy if something bad happened because key people weren't in the loop.
Gunmen fired at two Fatah activists in Southern Gaza killing one and injuring the other during Monday's early morning hours. The two men, Mohammad Abu Tuaima and Mahmoud Abu Salah, were members of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, the military wing of the mainstream group, according to Palestinian security sources sources. Medical sources said, Abu Tuaima was instantly killed with a gunshot to the head, Abu Salah was wounded when a bullet pierced his chest. Abu Salah was taken to a nearby hospital for treatment.
Palestinian radio reported that the two were attacked by members of the new security force assembled by Hamas. Two weeks ago, the same town, Absan, had witnessed clashes between Fatah and Hamas supporters which lead to the death of three people and an injury. Security forces have also said, an explosive device was planted outside a Fatah member's house, Ziad Abu Hayah, in Southern Gaza. The perpetrators hurried away in a getaway car before they were recognized. Eyewitnesses have said that clashes began between the two factions in Absan after that incident killed two people and injured several others.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/23/2006 00:00 ||
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#1
muzi v. muzi kill. What does allan think of that?
#6
Donkeys are big animals, and paleos gunmen love automatic weaponry and wild gunsex, you do the math. I don't think it bothers donkeys much, though I could be mistaken.
Al-Fath Al-Mubin brigades which is a new military group in Gaza, claimed responsibility Monday for the attack on Israeli Soldiers in northern Beit Hanoun. The Brigades said that a sniper group attacked the Israeli soldiers causing serious injuries to the soldiers. It added that Israeli military reinforcements and ambulances arrived to the location shortly after the attack.
On other developments, Ahmad Abu Reesh Martyr Brigades, one of Al-Fatah Military wings announced that it launched rockets on Israeli southern city of Sderot. The Brigades said the attack came to retaliate to the Israeli blockade imposed on the West Bank.
Meanwhile, two Palestinian factions attacked Kfar Eztion Settlement with four rockets. Salah Al-Din brigades, the military wing of the Popular Resistance Committees and Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, the military wing of the Fatah Movement said in a joint statement that the Israeli army attacked the resistance fighters injuring two of them.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/23/2006 00:00 ||
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#1
Another day. Another new group. Same old hell-hole.
#2
Seems like the Israelis could just finish walling off the Paleo territories, begin chucking lots of small arms over said newly-constructed wall, and call it a day having pretty much solved their largest problem.
Hamas and Fatah officials met to try to calm tensions on Monday after a new Hamas militia battled gunmen from a Fatah-dominated force near Gaza's Palestinian parliament in clashes that killed a Jordanian diplomat's driver. Six bystanders were wounded as the rival groups traded fire from rooftops, behind buildings and on a Gaza City street in the latest internal fighting that will add to fears of civil war erupting in the impoverished territory of 1.4 million people.
The Hamas and Fatah leaders were brought together by Egyptian mediators after which they both condemned the driver's killing and sent condolences to the Jordanian people and to King Abdullah. They agreed to hold daily meetings to try to calm tensions and sent a message to their respective gunmen that they would not protect them if they violate public order.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/23/2006 00:00 ||
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#5
"Civil war is the red line that nobody dares cross, no matter which side they are on ... Civil war is forbidden," Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said...."
I saw this a couple of days ago on LGF. I guess Hamas didn't get the memo
#6
Thanks, gromgoru. Filling in the program is much appreciated! I look forward to their eventual mutual destruction, heh. Popcorn? Malted Milk Balls? :)
#7
How long before they hate each other more than - oh, the Americans? And I suppose it is still the fault of the Joooos that they are killing each other - the 60 years of preaching hate couldn't have had anything to do with it!
Posted by: Bobby ||
05/23/2006 14:08 Comments ||
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#8
My advice column:
Hamas - Go for it. Those Fatah asshats have been abusing the glorious paleostinian peoples for decades and they need to pay the price. You are Allen's own. NOW if the time to strike and kill them all!
Fatah - Go for it. As if Hamas is better than you. They are just trying to put you down and humiliate you. NOW if the time to strike and kill them all!
Jordanian security forces have arrested a senior al Qaeda operative thought to be behind a spate of kidnappings and killings of foreigners, the state news agency said on Monday. A security official who requested anonymity was quoted by the agency as saying the man was an aide to Jordanian militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the al Qaeda leader in Iraq. The militant was seized during a covert operation conducted by Jordanian secret agents inside Iraq, another security source told Reuters. The militant's identity and nationality were not disclosed.
Jordanian covert ops within Iraq. I think that's a first confirmation, though lots of us have suspected such things...
I'll wager when Zarqawi is captured, it'll be by a 'Jordanian team" and he'll be wisked off to Jordan for trial.
"The intelligence department has arrested one of the officials of al Qaeda in Iraq who has committed multiple crimes of theft and looting of trucks and kidnapping and killing of Jordanians and Arab citizens," the first security source told Reuters. More details about the arrested militant would be broadcast on state television on Tuesday, the state news agency reported. Zarqawi claimed responsibility for triple hotel bombings that killed 60 people in Amman in November, saying in an Internet audiotape that the hotels were home to U.S. and Israeli spies. He vowed more strikes against Jordan, which supported the March 2003 U.S.-led invasion of Iraq. The state news agency did not say whether the arrested man's operations were carried out in Iraq or in Jordan, or whether he might be linked to the Amman attack.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/23/2006 00:00 ||
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#1
Make it painful. For the US servicemen he has helped kill. For the innocent Iraqi citizens he has killed.
#4
"A security official who requested anonymity was quoted by the agency as saying the man was an aide to Jordanian militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the al Qaeda leader in Iraq."
By Kyai Haji Abdurrahman Wahid
Tuesday, May 23, 2006; Page A17
For a few days this year the world's media focused an intense spotlight on the drama of a modern-day inquisition. Abdul Rahman, a Muslim convert to Christianity, narrowly escaped the death penalty for apostasy when the Afghan government -- acting under enormous international pressure -- sidestepped the issue by ruling that he was insane and unfit to stand trial. This unsatisfactory ruling left unanswered a question of enormous significance: Does Islam truly require the death penalty for apostasy, and, if not, why is there so little freedom of religion in the so-called Muslim world?
The Koran and the sayings of the prophet Muhammad do not definitively address this issue [Because, I suppose, they go only 99% of the way]. In fact, during the early history of Islam, the Agreement of Hudaibiyah between Muhammad and his rivals stipulated that any Muslim who converted out of Islam would be allowed to depart freely to join the non-Muslim community [the most recent piece of enlightened thought on the subject happened 14 centuries ago]. Nevertheless, throughout much of Islamic history, Muslim governments embraced an interpretation of Islamic law that imposes the death penalty for apostasy.
It is vital that we differentiate between the Koran, from which much of the raw material for producing Islamic law is derived, and the law itself. While its revelatory inspiration is divine, Islamic law is man-made and thus subject to human interpretation and revision. For example, in the course of Islamic history, non-Muslims have been allowed to enter Mecca and Medina. Since the time of the caliphs, however [this bit of moderate Islam ended thirteen centuries ago], Islamic law has been interpreted to forbid non-Muslims from entering these holy cities. ..
Muslim theologians must revise their understanding of Islamic law [actually the law would have to be changed in all 4 judicial schools of the Sunni and all 4 of the the schools of the Shia - but how hard could that be], and recognize that punishment for apostasy is merely the legacy of historical circumstances and political calculations stretching back to the early days of Islam.
Another islamic apologist gets his blather in the WaPo
#1
This is a two edged sword for Islam. It works to help fool the Dhimmis and to keep them sedated, but it also works on the Muslims too. I'm not so sure this is a bad thing.
#4
So let me get this straight, Islam is a religion of "Peace and Love"TM. They all say the same thing. What I see is a misogynistic, nihilistic, death cult that has all the peace and love of Nazi facism. They have all the reason and willingness to compromise as Stalin. And they have all the respect for life as Pol Pot. Then one out of 5,000,000 tries to lay this "peace and love" shit on us.
"Ex -Prez of Indonesia says Islam doesn't have to be violent... but it helps!"
"Ex -Prez of Indonesia says Islam doesn't have to be violent... but we sure act like it does!"
"Ex -Prez of Indonesia says Islam doesn't have to be violent... but then we wouldn't be following Mohammed!"
Posted by: Rob Crawford ||
05/23/2006 10:00 Comments ||
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#9
I agree with Tipper ... this guy represents what many here have been calling for, a reformed Islam.
The question is whether he and others like him can gain sufficient influence and traction within the Ummah to prevent the sort of massive open conflict we've been debating here at RB the last few days. I'm not sure they can -- but that's no reason to fail to see a reformed Muslim when he does speak out.
#10
He is an ex-president. It is like having an ex-footballer hawking insurance. You recognise the face but know he doesn't believe in what he is selling.
#13
Ex-Prez Walid's statements represent a more honest appraisal then we've gotten in the past from CAIR-like Islamic apologists.
Walid admits, more or less, that death has been the penalty for apostasy since the later years of the Ommiad phase of the caliphate.
Most Islamic apologists won't admit that. He also (in the full version) admits to the fact of moslem on moslem murder on a massive scale (again most apologists won't admit this).
Of course, it is sad that we have to celebrate incremental movement toward factual truth, but that's the way it is.
#14
The Oil Princes will diminish over the next few decades, but Indonesia has vast natural resources and a population that hasn't quite been beaten into giving up local control and customs. It's also one of the most populous muslim countries and its demographics are young.
Means that any influences to encourage tolerance and moderation there could have a big positive impact on the whole region and on the global economy. Worth supporting, then.
#15
So if their murder and bombing rates decline we can sleep sounder next year.
I'm betting all hell will break loose before any moderation can be measured.
#17
As long as the site isn't overwhelmed with connections, this site, Jaringan Islam Liberal, represents the kind of tolerant thought being espoused by President Wahid, which really is the prevailing theological bent of most Indonesians. One can hope that it reforms the Islamic world.
#19
The question is whether he and others like him can gain sufficient influence and traction within the Ummah to prevent the sort of massive open conflict we've been debating here at RB the last few days.
I doubt they can until we either succeed in making Iraq a model for them or we Shermanize them. But I'm happy to let them try and wish them the best until then.
#20
Let me get this straight. If the Koran says something nasty, but muslim practice the last 1300 years has been different, then we are to ignore the practice, and focus on the Koran text, cause thats "authentic" Islam, but if the Koran says something moderate, while Islamic practice the last 1300 years has been nasty, we should discount Koran?
Posted by: Mike N. ||
05/23/2006 13:01 Comments ||
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#23
LH
with respect to apostasy, the Koran has contradictory assertions but more toward the 'death to apostate' side and these nasty ones are thought to be chronologically later
with respect to practise, death to apostasy has been the judicial norm for 1300 years but has been enforced unevenly; in the Umayyad period, it was not enforced (most of the great scholars of the Caliphate were non moslems or non believers); in non moslem countries or during periods were moslem rule was weak or where moslem rulers were under pressure from infidel countries the rule was also generally not enforced
yes it is a mixed bag, but the death to apostates law is firmly and universally held throughout the Islamic Law depts in every University throughout the Islamic world (including, I'm willing to bet, in Indonesia).
#24
Anyone who is against an innocuous form of Islam taking control of the Islamic world is more stupid than I would think possible. Let the moderate Indonesians lead the way OUT of Arab-controlled Islam. I prefer a "pick and choose" version of Islam that allows people to edit Islam down (rather, up) to an acceptable form that rejects terrorism, masogyeny and FGM, abuse of children, etc.
"While its revelatory inspiration is divine, Islamic law is man-made and thus subject to human interpretation and revision."
Yeah -- let's go for revision. Remember that people are people, and especially outside the Malaysian/Arab model, a revision toward sanity is possible. Better than what we've got going on now, right?
#28
I got an idea, LH -- let's watch what Muslims do.
So far, a hell of a lot of them have been doing what the nasty bits in the Koran say. The ones that aren't doing it don't seem to be bothered by it, or are supporting the ones who do it. Even odder -- the ones not doing it seem real quick to threaten to do it if they feel it'll get them something. They sure don't object when their religious leaders preach all the nasty stuff.
Posted by: Rob Crawford ||
05/23/2006 16:28 Comments ||
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#29
Preach it, RC! So-called Moderate Muslims have done f&ck all to change the course of Islam since 9-11. Please note that it isn't the imams or mullahs whose sons and daughters are 'sploding themselves. Nearly all of the suicide murderers come from Moderate Muslim families. For all they do, Moderate Muslims may as well be Moderate Nazis.
#30
Youve taken a poll RC? Seems to me the ones jumping up and down about killing a convert, were in Afghanistan, which is not the most advanced place in the modern world. And even there, some folks were quite embarrased by the proposed DP, and were happy to have the guy leave the country.
#33
Not sure if they're "Nazis" Zenster, or just lower intelligence types. However, the point that the blabber-mouth mullahs NEVER walk the talk, is a good one. Follow the money/power. They love both.
"Pick and choose" will only happen if the majority of Moslems exercise some self-determination regarding their culture and as individuals--but they'll have to organize to get it across and have a voice.
Not sure if it can happen, but everything in that direction is okay with me.
Suspected Muslim insurgents opened fire on a government employee and then set him on fire Monday in the latest slaying in Thailand's restive south, an official said.
Somkiart Prasansilp, 51, a telephone bill collector, was attacked as he was riding his motorcycle to work in Saiburi district of Pattani province, said police Maj. Gen. Korkiat Wongworachat.
"The attackers opened fire on him and then set fire to the motorcycle to burn the victim. It was a very cruel act by the insurgents," Korkiat said.
In Bangkok, Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra ordered his deputy to travel to the south and develop a plan to deal with the separatist movement and improve security in the region.
More than 1,300 people have been killed in violence in the south since the separatist movement flared in January 2004.
"Thaksin suggested that schools in risk areas move students and teachers to schools in safer areas," Deputy Prime Minister Chitchai Wannasathit told reporters after he briefed Thaksin. Chitchai is acting as caretaker prime minister while Thaksin is taking a break from politics. Thaksin ordered him "to go down south to map out new strategies with officials to tackle the problem," Chitchai said.
Thaksin returned to his office Monday, three days after a mob of Muslim villagers held two female teachers hostage and severely beat them in Kujing Ruepa village in Narathiwat province's Rangae district.
Suspected Muslim insurgents fatally shot two border patrol police Tuesday in the latest violence in Thailand's restive south, the regional army chief said. Two market vendors were also hurt in the firing.
Two assailants fired at police Sr. Sgt. Maj. Supot Suwanphasit, 49, and Sr. Sgt. Maj. Pradit Thecha, 48, as they were shopping in a market in Yala province's Krong Pinang district, said the southern region army commander, Lt. Gen. Ongkorn Thongprasom.
Supot died at the scene, while Pradit was critically injured and died later at a local hospital, Ongkorn said. Stray bullets hit two villagers who worked in the market, he said.
Ongkorn said the assailants stole a pistol and an assault rifle from the officers before fleeing the scene.
More than 1,300 people have been killed in violence in the south since an Islamic separatist movement flared there in January 2004.
The latest violence comes days after a mob of Muslim villagers held two female teachers hostage and severely beat them in Kujing Ruepa village in Narathiwat province's Rangae district.
Doctors said one of the hostages, Juling Kamphongmoon, was unlikely to survive the injuries she sustained in the beating. The other hostage suffered less serious injuries.
About 200 villagers held the women _ both Buddhist teachers _ hostage for about three hours Friday in a classroom at their school. They demanded the release of two suspected Muslim rebels arrested earlier in the day for allegedly killing two marines.
Police have arrested seven suspects over the beating, including the wife of one of the men whose release the mob had been demanding.
The country's three southernmost provinces of Narathiwat, Yala and Pattani are the only Muslim-majority areas in Thailand, which is predominantly Buddhist.
Six Maldivians arrested in Sri Lanka have arrived in town according to a Maldives Police Services news release in Dhivehi, official language of the country.
Parents had told us that they had seen e-mails and letters which made them worried that their children would flee Maldives and join Islamic fundamentalist groups, chief government spokesman Mohamed H. Shareef said earlier according to The Hindu.
Police at Sri Lanka's only international airport on Monday detained three people from the Maldives - a Sunni Muslim nation- on suspicion of links with Islamic fundamentalist groups, a police officer said. Two additional Maldivians were arrested in Sri Lanka who had connections with the three previously detained.
Police in Maldives said that five of the six deported were arrested on Monday. Police did not comment when the sixth person was arrested.
A Sri Lankan officer had earlier linked the suspects with al-Qaeda, but later said he used the name because he had thought it was synonymous with Islamic fundamentalism.
Sri Lankan authorities later on put the arrested in to the hands of Maldivian diplomats in Sri Lanka for deportation.
Maldives Police Services said that they were investigating the case in their press release.
According to Police in Male, capital of Maldives, the arrest-request was communicated to the Sri Lankan authorities as a guardian of one of the arrested was looking for a missing 21 year old woman.
Maldives, a tiny Indian Ocean archipelago, has a population of about 300,000 people.
A Maldives citizen identified as Ibrahim Fauzee was on a list of detainees held by the United States at its military base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. He was released in 2005 and has since returned to Maldives according to Shareef.
There is no indication that the deported Maldivians have links with Fauzee.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
05/23/2006 00:47 ||
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tick tock
Iran conducted a test launch Tuesday night of the Shihab-3 intermediate-range ballistic missile, which is capable of reaching Israel and US targets in the region, Israel Radio reported. The test came hours before Prime Minister Ehud Olmert met with US President George W Bush in Washington to discuss the Iranian threat.
Military officials said it was not clear if this most recent test indicated an advance in the capabilities of the Shihab 3. They said the test was likely timed to coincide with the Washington summit
ya think??
and with comments made by Hizbullah leader Hassan Nasrallah during celebrations in Beirut marking the 6th anniversary of Israel's withdrawal from southern Lebanon
were there ponies and clowns and balloons? how about gun sex???
Ht to Drudge
Posted by: Frank G ||
05/23/2006 21:07 ||
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Just in time for NORTH KOREA's missle - the NorKors want the Korean people and Asia to know they stand absolutely, undeniably, and unequivocally against Koreas and Asia being controlled by foreign powers, or CHINA, ergo North Korean missles are aimed only at America. Dem Norkies fought for the liberation and freedom of the Koreas from China, D*** you, in order to be ruled by China - OOOOOPPPPPSSSSS, not ruled by China, just lawfully un-annexed Chinese territory!?
Chief U.N. investigator Serge Brammertz is almost certain now that the massive blast that killed former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri over a year ago was caused by an underground explosion that was followed by a truck bomb, a newspaper reported Monday. The Saudi-based Asharq al Awsat newspaper, quoting sources in Lebanon and at U.N. headquarters in New York, said that Brammertz has discovered crucial information about the Feb. 14, 2005 attack that killed Hariri and 22 others at Beirut's seaside Corniche.
The inquiry commission has gathered evidence and information showing that the same party was responsible for all crimes that have occurred in Lebanon since the May, 2002 kidnapping and murder of Lebanese Forces activist Ramzi Irani until the Dec., 2005 assassination of An Nahar General Manager Gebran Tueni, the report said.
A party to be named later. Can you say Baa-th?
Brammertz, a Belgian prosecutor, took over the probe in Jan. from his German predecessor Detlev Mehlis. The new probe chief has revived the theory of an underground bombing that had been the subject of speculations early on in Mehlis' investigation but was not mentioned in his reports. Mehlis, a German judge, had focused on the premise that the Mitsubishi truck, laden with 1,000 kg of TNT explosives, caused the blast.
Earlier this month, Brammertz set up a tent at the bomb site and reopened the crater that was carved by the explosion. The chief investigator and his team have been analyzing soil samples and carrying out a comprehensive survey of all underground tunnels, pipes and the sewage system at the site, Asharq al Awsat said. It is almost certain now that there were two simultaneous bombings, the paper said. The first one, a charge hidden in underground pipes, was set off by remote control causing the second bomb placed in the Mitsubishi to explode.
Which rules out a lone boomer
The article said Brammertz also based his conclusion on eyewitnesses who testified hearing two explosions. Furthermore, he relied on the analysis of recently hired explosives experts who noted cracks in the foundations of the structures near the site and that large amounts of asphalt had landed on the top floors of the buildings in the vicinity, an effect that can only be caused by an underground blast.
I seem to recall the Syrians cleaning up the blast site and filling in the crater before outside investigators arrived. Now we know why.
The paper said that after the Belgian prosecutor issues his next report on June 15, he will start preparing his files and list of suspects to submit them to the international court, where the case is expected to be tried. It said the tribunal will be ready in two or three months.
Gonna be a hot summer in Damascus
The other focus of Brammertz's investigation has been securing an interview with Syrian President Bashar Assad, his Vice President Farouk Sharaa and other members of Syria's Baath regime about their possible connection with the murder. The meeting with Assad and Sharaa took place in Damascus in April.
Syria has been largely blamed for the Hariri killing that sparked an international outcry and massive protests in Beirut. The demonstrations led to the withdrawal of Syrian troops from Lebanon in April 2005 ending 29 years of military domination.
In spite of the pullout, anti-Syrian politicians still accuse Damascus of destabilizing Lebanon. They hold it responsible for a string of bombings that have targeted politicians and journalists opposed to the Syrian regime since the Oct., 2004 attempt on Telecommunications Minster Marwan Hamadeh.
Asharq al Awsat's report mentions for the first time a possible connection between these attacks and the murder of Ramzi Irani, who headed the LF Students' Department. He was kidnapped on May 7, 2002 and his body was found three weeks later in the trunk of his car.
Brammertz is expected to return to Beirut on Monday from U.N. headquarters in New York where he held consultations about progress in his investigation and the international tribunal, al Liwa newspaper reported.
Posted by: Steve ||
05/23/2006 15:52 ||
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A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
A former Afghan governor and key ally of President Hamid Karzai's has been found dead in eastern Afghanistan a day after being kidnapped, police said. 
KANDAHAR - Three police and 12 Taleban were killed Tuesday in a gun fight that erupted after rebels ambushed a convoy of a provincial deputy governor and police chief in southern Afghanistan, an official said. Taleban militants ambushed the police convoy in Helmand provinces Baghran district, not far an area where they have been major clashes between security forces and rebels in recent days, provincial spokesman Muhaidin Khan said.
Clerics in Kabul mosques are urging worshippers to join the Talibans fight against the Afghan government and international troops.
AMERICAN-LED forces in southern Afghanistan claimed to have killed up to 80 fighters yesterday in a night-time airstrike on a Taleban stronghold as violence continued to spread in the region.
Trucks owned by anti terror alliance moved from Mogadishu, capital city of Somalia and Jowhar, 90 km north of the capital to the border of Ethiopia where they are about to load military shipment offered by Ethiopia government, reliable sources told Somalinet. The Lorries will pass through districts of Hiran region before reaching Ferfer, Ethiopian border town. Sources close to the anti terror alliance in Mogadishu say the weapons were donated by Ethiopian government and are part of movements by the alliance to wage fresh fighting with Islamic militiamen. 
CAIRO (Reuters) - A man named by the Egyptian authorities as a member of a group behind bomb attacks in the Sinai peninsula received weapons and bomb-making training in the Palestinian territories, the Interior Ministry said on Tuesday. 
Saudi Arabia will put on trial its 15 Gitmo returnees after establishing their involvement in terrorist activities through interrogation, Interior Minister Prince Naif announced yesterday before leaving for Abu Dhabi to attend a GCC meeting. "It's premature to talk about it now," the prince commented when a reporter asked him whether the Saudi returnees from the US detention camp in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba would be given back their government jobs. "First of all, they will undergo investigation to establish whether they were involved in any terrorist activity or not. After that they will be transferred to court for trial," the Saudi Press Agency quoted the minister as saying.
A Kuwait criminal court on Sunday acquitted five former Guantanamo detainees of charges that they collected money for Osama bin Laden's al-Qaida network. The five were freed from the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay in November but were arrested upon their return home to Kuwait and were charged with belonging to al-Qaida. But on Sunday, a court found all five innocent of all charges, according to a ruling released to the media.
Man in fetters killed in 'crossfire'
Hizbullah may be planning to activate sleeper cells in New York and other big cities to stage an attack as the nuclear showdown with Iran heats up, according to a New York Post report Monday. The FBI and Justice Department have launched urgent new probes in New York and other cities targeting members of the Lebanese terror group. Law-enforcement and intelligence officials told The New York Post that about a dozen supporters of Hizbullah have been identified in recent weeks as operating in the New York area.
Militants in the tribal areas bordering Afghanistan have said they are investigating the 18 tribal chiefs who met President General Pervez Musharraf and violated the ban prohibiting contacts with the government. Abdullah Farhad, a spokesman for militants, told reporters that a shoura (council) would decide the fate of two tribal chiefs, Mir Sharof Ederkhel and Nawab Khan Borakhel, who had apologised for meeting the president. "Sharof and Khan have admitted meeting the president was a mistake and pleaded for mercy," said Farhad. Sharof confirmed contacting the militants, saying he had attended the meeting to plead for the military's withdrawal from the tribal regions. Pro-government tribal elder Malik Tooti Gul was kidnapped and killed last week by unidentified assailants. Militants denied killing him, adding that they were investigating his murder.
At least seven security personnel and 16 others were injured in a series of powerful explosions in Srinagar, summer capital of Indian-administered Jammu and Kashmir Monday. Terrorists lobbed a powerful hand grenade at a bunker of the Indian Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) in downtown Srinagar Monday, news agency Indo-Asian News Service reported. "The grenade exploded near the bunker injuring four paramilitary CRPF troopers and two civilian bystanders. The injured were taken to the hospital for treatment," police told reporters today in Srinagar.
A mortar shell fired by suspected insurgents crashed into a populated village in the governorate of Dyali northeast of the Iraqi capital wounding three civilians, police said on Monday. The police said the civilians who were wounded in Al-Rasoul village were transported to hospital.
A university student was arrested by the Iraqi police in Kirkuk, Northern Iraq, for carrying out terrorist operations in the city. Chief of a police station in Kirkuk Colonel Salah Saber told reporters on Monday that several policemen on Sunday arrested Murad Muwafaq in Al-Masli neighborhood where he confessed working for a terrorist organization besides being a university student in Kirkuk. The police officer added that he was arrested after he was seen by a citizen planting an explosive device, where he informed the police which rushed to the scene to defuse it then besieged his house and arrested him. 
Police Lieutenant Nazem Al-Obaidi, chief of the citizenship and passports department in Kirkuk was gunned dead Monday by a group of unidentified gunmen. A senior official in the Kirkuk Police Department told KUNA that Al-Obaidi was attacked on the Baghdad road near Al-Mansour Mosque and was transferred immediately to Kirkuk's general hospital, where he succumbed to his wounds.
RAMALLAH, West Bank - The West Bank commander of the Hamas military wing surrendered to Israeli troops Tuesday after they surrounded his hideout and threatened to demolish it with him inside. Ibrahim Hamed emerged from the building before dawn and troops told him over a loudspeaker to strip to his underwear, witnesses said. 
Gunmen fired at two Fatah activists in Southern Gaza killing one and injuring the other during Monday's early morning hours. The two men, Mohammad Abu Tuaima and Mahmoud Abu Salah, were members of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, the military wing of the mainstream group, according to Palestinian security sources sources. Medical sources said, Abu Tuaima was instantly killed with a gunshot to the head, Abu Salah was wounded when a bullet pierced his chest. Abu Salah was taken to a nearby hospital for treatment.
Al-Fath Al-Mubin brigades which is a new military group in Gaza, claimed responsibility Monday for the attack on Israeli Soldiers in northern Beit Hanoun. The Brigades said that a sniper group attacked the Israeli soldiers causing serious injuries to the soldiers. It added that Israeli military reinforcements and ambulances arrived to the location shortly after the attack.
Hamas and Fatah officials met to try to calm tensions on Monday after a new Hamas militia battled gunmen from a Fatah-dominated force near Gaza's Palestinian parliament in clashes that killed a Jordanian diplomat's driver. Six bystanders were wounded as the rival groups traded fire from rooftops, behind buildings and on a Gaza City street in the latest internal fighting that will add to fears of civil war erupting in the impoverished territory of 1.4 million people.
Jordanian security forces have arrested a senior al Qaeda operative thought to be behind a spate of kidnappings and killings of foreigners, the state news agency said on Monday. A security official who requested anonymity was quoted by the agency as saying the man was an aide to Jordanian militant 
