[BIGSTORY.AP.ORG] Egypt's military leader has vowed the army will not stand by silently in the face of violence after hundreds have been killed in recent days in political unrest.
Gen. Abdel-Fatah el-Sissi also said Sunday that the Army has no intention to seize power while calling on Islamists to join the political process.
El-Sissi led the July 3 coup that ousted President Mohammed Morsi. His comments came during his first appearance since a deadly crackdown Wednesday on two encampments of Morsi supporters left hundreds dead.
El-Sissi appeared at a gathering of top military commanders and police chiefs.
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08/18/2013 10:35 ||
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[Al Ahram] A senior Egyptian religious official said on Saturday that bearing arms during demonstrations and marches is religiously prohibited.
Egypt's Grand Mufti, Shawqi Allam, said that in such cases the perpetrator commits a "great sin" as the action carries the intention of killing, an act "that receives the greatest punishment by God."
The mufti, a state legal expert responsible with issuing Islamic rulings, condemned the violence that has erupted recently across the country. He called upon the authorities to respond with "an iron fist to those who attempt to terrorise citizens or attack public or private property."
Chaos erupted in Egypt after the security forces violently dispersed two major protest camps of supporters of deposed president Mohamed Morsi in Cairo, killing at least 200 people. Nationwide violent festivities followed, leaving a total official corpse count of over 600.
Further festivities on Friday left over 50 people dead. An exact estimate of deaths and injuries has yet to be announced.
Allam further stated that he "strongly condemns" attacks on churches, warning against inciting sectarian strife.
Government buildings, cop shoppes and dozens of churches have been attacked nationwide since the eruption of violence on Wednesday.
Several people amongst the protesters were reported to have been carrying arms over the past days. On Friday, Egyptian state television ... and if you can't believe state television who can you believe?
showed footage of two men armed with automatic weapons at a march on Cairo's 15 May Bridge near downtown Cairo.
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[An Nahar] Egyptian authorities insisted Saturday that non-violent members of ousted president Mohammed Morsi's Moslem Brüderbund movement could take part in the country's transition.
"Anyone from the Moslem Brüderbund or the non-Moslem Brüderbund who would like to come back to join the peaceful Egyptian march towards the future will be welcomed," presidential adviser Mustafa Hegazy said.
Egypt "welcomes all parties" that have not committed any "terrorist acts," he added.
Prime minister Hazem al-Beblawi warned separately that there would be "no reconciliation with those who have blood on their hands and have broken the law".
Hundreds of people have been killed since Morsi's ouster by the military on July 3 following massive demonstrations against his rule.
Morsi has been locked away Keep yer hands where we can see 'em, if yez please! and other Brotherhood leaders have been rounded up or are on the run.
But the army-installed government has insisted that moderate members of the Brotherhood can participate in the political process if they choose.
Authorities have however increasingly referred to "terrorists" among Morsi's loyalists and speculation has swirled that the government could move to ban the Brotherhood.
The group was banned for decades, and only came to power after the 2011 uprising that overthrew president Hosni Mubarak ...The former President-for-Life of Egypt, dumped by popular demand in early 2011...
"We're not into the effort of dissolving anyone or preventing anyone" from taking part in politics, Hegazy insisted on Saturday.
But, he added, "whoever has been instigating violence, has been using violence, will be banned by law."
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08/18/2013 00:00 ||
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[REUTERS] Egyptian prosecutors have placed 250 Moslem Brüderbund supporters under investigation for murder, attempted murder and terrorism, the state MENA news agency said on Saturday.
Police placed in durance vile Please don't kill me! more than 1,000 Brotherhood sympathizers in the wake of festivities on Friday that pitted followers of deposed Islamist President Mohamed Mursi against the security forces. More than 170 people died nationwide in the violence that day.
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08/18/2013 00:00 ||
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[NEWS.YAHOO] Saudi billionaire Prince Alwaleed bin Talal has fired a renowned Kuwaiti preacher and motivational speaker from the top job at the religious television channel he owns for what he described as "extremist inclinations" and links to the Moslem Brüderbund.
Soddy Arabia ...a kingdom taking up the bulk of the Arabian peninsula. Its primary economic activity involves exporting oil and soaking Islamic rubes on the annual hajj pilgrimage. The country supports a large number of princes in whatcha might call princely splendor. When the oil runs out the rest of the world is going to kick sand in the Soddy national face... has come out strongly in support of an army crackdown on the Brotherhood in Egypt following the military overthrow of Islamist President Mohamed Mursi last month. The Brotherhood's rise had unsettled Gulf Arab states which feared it would embolden Islamists at home.
The prince said Tareq al-Suwaidan, who has more than 1.9 million Twitter followers and is known across the Arab world for his lectures on self-improvement from an Islamic perspective, had identified himself as "one of the leaders of the Moslem Brüderbund" during a lecture in Yemen.
"There is no place for those who carry any deviant thoughts at Al Resalah Channel," Alwaleed wrote in a letter to Suwaidan, according to a news release from the prince's office.
Prince Alwaleed said in the letter that he had repeatedly warned Suwaidan against political affiliation.
Suwaidan responded on Twitter, "Only the weak worry about earning a living, and no one abandons his principles but he who cares about earthly matters."
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08/18/2013 10:35 ||
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#1
no one abandons his principles but he who cares about earthly matters
[Dawn] Chairman Pakistain Tehrik-e-Insaf ...a political party in Pakistan. PTI was founded by former Pakistani cricket captain and philanthropist Imran Khan. The party's slogan is Justice, Humanity and Self Esteem, each of which is open to widely divergent interpretations.... (PTI), Imran Khan ... aka Taliban Khan, who isn't your heaviest-duty thinker, maybe not even among the top five... and Jamaat Ulema-e-Islam ...Assembly of Islamic Clergy, or JUI, is a Pak Deobandi (Hanafi) political party. There are two main branches, one led by Maulana Fazlur Rahman, and one led by Maulana Samiul Haq. Fazl is active in Pak politix and Sami spends more time running his madrassah. Both branches sponsor branches of the Taliban, though with plausible deniability... -Fazl (JUI-F) chief Maulana Fazlur Rehman Deobandi holy man, known as Mullah Diesel during the war against the Soviets, his sympathies for the Taliban have never been tempered by honesty ... on Saturday, not for the first time, accused each other for being a Jewish agent.
In an apparent reference to Maulana Fazlur Rehman, the PTI chief said that his candidate in Lakki Marwat was contesting against a person who had asked the American ambassador to appoint him as prime minister.
"Maulana said I am a Jewish agent, but I say in the presence of Maulana sahib there is no need of Jewish agent in the country," said Khan while addressing a public meeting to support his candidate for NA-27 Lakki Marwat by-elections, Amirullah Khan.
The PTI chief said that his party's candidates would win the by-elections in Lakki Marwat, Bannu and Tank and other part of the country despite the unjust behaviour of the 'umpires.'
He said the reflection of "new Pakistain" would soon emerge in KP as there would be a clear difference between the province and rest of the country. We are bringing new local body system in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa ... formerly NWFP, still Terrorism Central... like other departments, he said.
Maulana Fazlur Rehman, at a party meeting in Landi Kotal, responded by saying agenda of 'Goldsmith' would be buried on August 22 when the people will vote in favour of the JUI-F candidates.
He said that performance of the KP government was no hidden secret and the D I Khan jailbreak has proved their competence of governance, adding that there was every possibility of a similar kind of attack in the picturesque provincial capital.
Fazlur Rehman predicted that the PTI government would not be able to survive for too long in the province due to its incompetence.
He said establishment of peace was essential for development of the province and added that recommendations of the 2008 parliament and proposals of the 2011 APC meetings have not been implemented.
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08/18/2013 00:00 ||
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[Dawn] The special Anti-terrorist court in Islamabad has sent the suspects of Bara Kahu suicide kaboom case to prison on a 14 day judicial remand.
During the hearing at the Anti-terrorist court five suspects, one woman and four men, were presented before the bench. Although the police had asked for an extension of the suspects' physical remand, the court ordered the suspects to be sent to jail on a 14 day judicial remand.
All five suspects are close friends of Zaki Allah, who tried to carry out a suicide attack in Ali Masjid situated in the federal capital Islamabad, on the first day of Eid.
The attack was foiled because of the prompt reaction of the security guard outside the Masjid, who shot the jacket wallah before he could detonate the explosives on his jacket. The guard died in the resulting exchange of fire.
Police had incarcerated I ain't sayin' nuttin' widdout me mout'piece! two suspects in connection with the incident the same day from Chattar Park area of Islamabad.
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08/18/2013 00:00 ||
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Because in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa no Muslim is properly educated unless he understands that jihad, a duty incumbent on every Muslim, is conquest to expand Dar al-Islam, not mere self-improvement.
[Dawn] Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa ... formerly NWFP, still Terrorism Central... elementary and secondary education minister Atif Khan on Friday said his government would rectify the mistake of removing Koranic verses on jihad from the curriculum.
He was speaking during a meeting at the Textbook Board of Beautiful Downtown Peshawar ...capital of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (formerly known as the North-West Frontier Province), administrative and economic hub for the Federally Administered Tribal Areas of Pakistan. Peshawar is situated near the eastern end of the Khyber Pass, convenient to the Pak-Afghan border. Peshawar has evolved into one of Pakistan's most ethnically and linguistically diverse cities, which means lots of gunfire. offices, where Zakat and Usher minister Habibur Rehman and local government minister Inayatullah Khan from Jamaat-e-Islami ...The Islamic Society, founded in 1941 in Lahore by Maulana Sayyid Abul Ala Maududi, aka The Great Apostosizer. The Jamaat opposed the independence of Bangladesh but has operated an independent branch there since 1975. It maintains close ties with international Mohammedan groups such as the Moslem Brotherhood. the Taliban, and al-Qaeda. The Jamaat's objectives are the establishment of a pure Islamic state, governed by Sharia law. It is distinguished by its xenophobia, and its opposition to Westernization, capitalism, socialism, secularism, and liberalist social mores... , officials of the provincial elementary and secondary education department and educationists were in attendance. PTI is in alliance with Jamaat-e-Islami in the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa government.
JI has been very vocal in its opposition to changes to the curriculum.
After becoming partner in the PTI government, it demanded that PTI consult it before making changes to the curriculum.
According to a news release issued by the Pakistain Tehrik-e-Insaf ...a political party in Pakistan. PTI was founded by former Pakistani cricket captain and philanthropist Imran Khan. The party's slogan is Justice, Humanity and Self Esteem, each of which is open to widely divergent interpretations.... Media Cell, the participants were briefed on 'lacunas and mistakes' in the curriculum.
Mr Atif Khan, who belongs to Pakistain Tehrik-e-Insaf, said Islamic teachings would be the basis of his government's steps regarding curriculum.
He said his government would accept no bar on religious education and would not tolerate any external interference.
The minister said no foreign NGO would be allowed to interfere in matters relating to curriculum.
He said the mistakes in the curriculum, including mention of Kashmire as an undisputed area and eating with the left hand, and removal of Koranic verses on jihad, would be rectified.
Mr Atif also talked about long and short-term steps for reforming the education system.
According to the news release, the JI ministers appreciated the PTI government's steps in the education sector and expressed satisfaction about them.
However, there's more than one way to skin a cat... an educationist, who has worked on curriculum in the province, said previously, changes were made to the curriculum to indirectly promote peace since violence had badly affected children in the region.
He said instead of Arabs, heroes and celebrities of the land and people like Rehman Baba, Khushaal Baba and others had been included in the textbooks.
The educationist said the process of changing curriculum, which began in 2006 at the federal level, trickled down to the provincial level after the devolution of education ministry under 18th Amendment to the Constitution.
He said textbooks were printed in the province in the post-devolution regime.
"Reversing these changes will do away with all the effort meant to bring more topics of peace and local heroes to textbooks," he said.
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#1
HuckFinn was removed from many HS bookshelves because of his avowed jihad on stupid, so I gotta admire this in some ways.
[Washington Times] BAGHDAD Iraqs prime minister warned Saturday that weapons and fighters flowing into Syria are now making their way to Iraq, as a rising tide of violence sweeps across the country.
Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki said that weapons provided by some countries to the Syrian rebels and foreign fighters attempting to topple Syrian President Bashar Assad, are now ending up in Iraq. You might have given that some consideration prior to permitting Iranian overflights and shipments. Actions have consequences, etc.
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08/18/2013 05:10 ||
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[Ynet] Iraq asked the US for increased aid in order to fight growing bad turban activities within its border, the Alarabiya network reported, citing Storied Baghdad ...located along the Tigris River, founded in the 8th century, home of the Abbasid Caliphate... sources.
Last month more than 1,000 people were killed across Iraq.
Stars and Stripes has a version of the story here. It's too bad the Iraqis didn't figure this out in 2009 or so when we were there and we could arrange for some of our people to stay. But the Iraqis couldn't agree on a Status of Forces Agreement, nor could they agree on what we'd do to help them. Maliki couldn't even say unequivocally that we were needed and would be welcome.
So now you need us. Get in line. Ingrates.
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[Ynet] Four thousand people are currently demonstrating in Nazareth against the violence in Egypt, and the ouster of president Mohamed Morsi, in a demonstration by the northern branch of the Islamic Movement.
One assumes that is the local branch of the Muslim Brotherhood...
Protestors are waving pictures of Morsi and denouncing Minister of Defense Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, some even stomping on his picture.
[An Nahar] Free Patriotic Movement Despite its name a Christian party allied with Hizbullah, neither free nor particularly patriotic... leader MP Michel Aoun ...a wholly-owned subsidiary of Hizbullah... stated that Hizbullah's involvement in the fighting in Syria was an "individual initiative" that the party undertook, reported the pan-Arab daily al-Hayat on Saturday.
He told the daily: "We oppose intervention outside Lebanese territories and no understanding was reached between us and the party over this issue."
"The resistance's involvement in Syria is part of an understanding between the party and the Syrians," he added.
"The situation in Syria is very dangerous and we want democracy to prevail there, but at the same time, we fear the rise of groups, like the Nusra Front, whose ascension to power will have a negative effect on Leb," he said.
"Any impact on Leb will not only affect Christians, but Sunnis and Shiites, meaning all Lebanese people," he stressed.
"We are trying to steer Leb away from conflict and we have so far succeeded thanks to the will of foreign countries that managed to influence local sentiments," Aoun stated.
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[FOXNEWS] One of Leb's most powerful Sunni politicians has accused the leader of the Shiite krazed killer Hezbollah group of dragging the country further into neighboring Syria's civil war.
The comments Saturday from former Prime Minister Saad Hariri Second son of Rafik Hariri, the Leb PM who was assassinated in 2005. He has was prime minister in his own right from 2009 through early 2011. He was born in Riyadh to an Iraqi mother and graduated from Georgetown University. He managed his father's business interests in Riyadh until his father's assassination. When his father died he inherited a fortune of some $4.1 billion, which won't do him much good if Hizbullah has him bumped off, too. come two days after a deadly boom-mobileing struck a Hezbollah neighborhood south of Beirut. Many people see the blast as retaliation for Hezbollah's armed support for Syrian Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad Leveler of Latakia...
Nasrallah on Thursday blamed Sunni bully boyz for the blast and said he was prepared to double the number of Hezbollah fighters in Syria if the bombing is linked to that conflict.
Hariri said on his official Twitter account that Nasrallah's speech "drags Leb further into the Syrian fire, and it is a pity to squander the blood of Lebanese in such a way."
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[An Nahar] The mainstream rebel Free Syrian Army condemned the deadly kaboom that killed over 20 people in Beirut's southern suburb on Thursday.
The FSA military command "condemns this criminal act targeting civilians," Louai Moqdad, the group's political coordinator, told Agence La Belle France Presse, adding that the three masked men did not claim to be Syrian rebels.
"He who takes part in the murder of the Syrian people alongside the criminal is responsible for this crime," he said.
A huge car kaboom killed at least 22 people in Beirut's Dahieh neighborhood on Thursday afternoon.
A previously unknown group, apparently a Syrian rebel cell, said it carried out Thursday's attack in the densely populated southern suburbs of Beirut, between Bir al-Abed and Rweiss, districts where Hizbullah security is normally tight.
Police said the corpse count had climbed to at least 22, while the Red Thingy said 325 people were maimed.
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[Jpost] Salehi: Ahmadinejad "personally responsible for nuclear issue."
Iran has installed 18,000 uranium-enrichment centrifuges, the country's outgoing nuclear chief was quoted as saying by Iranian media on Saturday.
The US and its Western allies are pressing Iran to curb its uranium enrichment program, which they suspect is aimed at developing a nuclear weapons capability, but Iran refuses and insists its nuclear activity is for purely peaceful purposes.
New Iran's diminutive President Hassan Rouhani, a former nuclear negotiator who oversaw a previous deal to suspend Iran's uranium enrichment, has welcomed new talks with world powers over the program but has insisted on Iran's right to enrich uranium.
Iran has 17,000 older "first-generation" IR-1 centrifuges, of which 10,000 are operating and 7,000 are ready to start operations, the ISNA news agency quoted Fereydoun Abbasi-Davani, outgoing head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI), as saying.
A May report from the UN nuclear watchdog indicated that Iran had by then installed roughly 16,600 IR-1 machines in two separate facilities.
Abbasi-Davani also said there were 1,000 new, more advanced centrifuges ready to start operations, in a reference to IR-2m centrifuges, which once operational would allow Iran to enrich uranium several times faster than the IR-1 machine.
The IAEA in its last report in May said Iran had installed a total of 689 such centrifuges and empty centrifuge casings.
Rouhani on Friday appointed Ali Akbar Salehi, Iran's previous foreign minister, to take over the AEOI. Salehi, who once headed the agency, is seen as a pragmatist, as opposed to the more hardline Abbasi-Davani.
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[YNETNEWS] An American al-Qaeda terrorist has called for more attacks on Western diplomats in the Arab world, praising the killers of the US ambassador to Libya on Sept. 11 last year, a US-based monitoring group said on Sunday.
Western nations shut embassies across the Middle East and North Africa early this month, after a warning of a possible terror attack. Many have reopened, and Britannia said its Yemen embassy would open on Sunday after being closed for 12 days.
Adam Gadahn, a Caliphornia, an impregnable bastion of the Democratic Party,-born convert to Islam with a $1 million US price on his head, appealed to wealthy Moslems to offer bully boyz rewards to kill ambassadors in the region, citing bounty set for killing the US ambassador to Yemen, Washington-based SITE monitoring group said.
"These prizes have a great effect in instilling fear in the hearts of our cowardly enemies," Gadahn said in the 39-minute video recording in Arabic posted on websites used by Islamist terrorists, according to SITE.
"They also encourage hesitant individuals to carry out important and great deeds in the path of Allah," he said, in an English transcript on SITE.
This article starring:
Adam Gadahn
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08/18/2013 10:42 ||
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#1
Sounds like more 'workplace violence' for State.
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.
[Al Ahram] A senior Egyptian religious official said on Saturday that bearing arms during demonstrations and marches is religiously prohibited.
Maulana Fazlur Rehman
Michel Aoun
Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir 
[Jpost] Salehi: Ahmadinejad "personally responsible for nuclear issue."
