Periodically, as a form of psychological warfare, the Israelis hack into Lebanese television and play this video, which expresses disdain--to put it mildly--for Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah:
Video at the link. Catchy tune. I love the chorus:
Yalla ya Nasrallah
We'll screw you inshallah We'll send you back to Allah
With all of the Hezbollah
Dear IDF:
Can you make a free MP3 download available?
--a fan
Posted by: Mike ||
08/04/2006 16:17 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[7 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Note the IDF / IAF women pictured as contributing to the attacks on Hezb'Allah. Cold!
#3
It was on YouTube for a while. Now YouTube makes you log in because it's so controversial and has so much filthy language, and so they need to know that you're adult enough to watch it. How lame.
Posted by: Eric Jablow ||
08/04/2006 17:40 Comments ||
Top||
#4
I say they hack into the Minarets. I'd pay to hear Homer Simpson's voice over a Minaret, "Doohh!!"
#5
Mac - Can you imagine Bart's prank call to Moe's over the Minaret loudspeaker: "I'm looking for Homer Sexual... Moe: "is there a homer sexual here?""
and all the male faithful raising their hands? D'oh! would be right
Posted by: Frank G ||
08/04/2006 17:51 Comments ||
Top||
#6
this song is catchy. and the arab side has their propaganda songs too. they should have an american idol style square-off. i have the name already:
"False Idol"
Afghan and US-led coalition forces have killed 25 Taleban militants in an operation in the southern province of Helmand, the coalition says. A coalition statement said that Afghan and coalition forces were conducting a search operation in the Nahr Surkh district of Helmand when they come under fire from militants. The security forces retaliated and killed 25 militants, the coalition said.
"The combined force took precise precautions in preventing harm of Afghan civilians during the mission, and no reports indicate injuries to civilians," the statement said. There has been no independent verification of the fighting.
Posted by: Steve ||
08/04/2006 08:20 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[3 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
There has been no independent verification of the fighting.
So what ? Do you need to score each encounter ? This is war for Christ's sakes, when one side is wiped out, the other side will declare victory, and the war will be over.
Posted by: Howard UK ||
08/04/2006 07:56 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[5 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
The snipers actual toll is probably higher than 39 but the Talibans tendency to reclaim bodies makes deaths difficult to confirm.
yep - 40 is the acknowledged standard toll. Not necessarily by a single guy tho'. They've culled the herd and now 20 is the daily goal
like this part too:
In 2003 Royal Marines sniper Corporal Matt Hughes killed an Iraqi gunman from 900 yards with a wonder shot in which he aimed 56ft to the left and 35ft high to allow for wind. The bullets trajectory was calculated by his spotter after he studied the movement of dust in the breeze
Posted by: Frank G ||
08/04/2006 8:18 Comments ||
Top||
#2
Carlos Hathcock called that a SWAG, scientific wild ass guess.
With wind strong enough to blow a bullet 56 feet as it travels 900 yards...that's a wonder shot alright.
With snipers, we fight at a more advanced level than the terrorists. We own the night, we own the sky, we own the field. All they have going for them is that they hide among civilians.
"Earlier this year it was revealed that the Army is creating an elite force of almost 700 snipers, with all 38 infantry battalions required to have an 18-man platoon of sharpshooters by 2008. It will be the first time formal sniper platoons will have existed since the end of the First World War in 1918."
Al
Posted by: Frozen Al ||
08/04/2006 9:13 Comments ||
Top||
#9
"Killing" isn't that important. Killing the right people is what counts. I want to see a sniper that takes out the leaders while they're giving the cannon fodder their pep talk. THEN I'll listen to some bragging (and I don't care if it's an A-10 or an AC-130 that does the hosing, as long as it gets the job done).
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
08/04/2006 13:34 Comments ||
Top||
#10
The guys that wacks armanutjob while giving speech on Iranian TV gets my vote for bragging rights.
Militant attacks killed four Canadian soldiers and wounded 10 Thursday while 21 Afghan civilians died from a suicide car bombing - the latest barrage of violence that has accompanied NATO's new security mission in southern Afghanistan. Suspected Taliban fighters firing rocket-propelled grenades from a school killed three soldiers and wounded six involved in a security operation with Afghan troops near the village of Pashmul, west of Kandahar city, a NATO statement said. It said NATO and Afghan troops "inflicted severe casualties on the insurgents and disrupted their leadership in the Pashmul area," but gave no details.
Hours earlier, two bombs hidden along a highway, also near Kandahar, killed one soldier and wounded four, said Maj. Scott Lundy, a spokesman for the Canadian military. The bombings occurred three hours apart.
In Ottawa, authorities confirmed all the dead and wounded served with the 1st Battalion Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry. It was Canada's worst loss since April 22, when four of its soldiers were killed by a roadside bomb, also in the south. Seven NATO soldiers have now been killed since the alliance took over command Sunday in southern Afghanistan from a U.S.-led coalition, beginning the toughest combat mission in NATO's 57-year history.
Posted by: Fred ||
08/04/2006 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[3 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
My condolences to the families and friends. Harper and his soldiers have stepped up, into the breech - and are sticking up for the modern, civilized way of life. They are paying a grim price, but such is the cost of defending civilization. RIP, soldiers.
Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi says his government has been conducting "military sweeps" against rebels in Ethiopia's Somali region.
The push against Ogaden National Liberation Front rebels came after Somali elders had gone to Europe and the US to meet them, he said. Mr Meles said he endorsed the meetings to try to resolve the conflict in the region, but that the talks had failed. He said the offensive was requested by elders after they returned to Ethiopia.
"I am not aware of innocent civilians being killed by our forces. I am aware of Somali people being killed by the ONLF because they are accused of supporting the government," he said.
Ethiopia's eastern Ogaden region shares a long and porous border with Somalia, and most of its people are of the Somali ethnic group. Mr Meles has also denied reports that Ethiopian soldiers have been sent into Somalia recently, in support of the fragile transitional government based in Baidoa.
Posted by: Steve ||
08/04/2006 08:10 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[3 views]
Top|| File under:
A court in Bangladesh trying suspected Islamic militants was thrown into panic when five live bombs were produced as exhibits during the hearing of a case.
The discovery prompted the presiding judge to order a hasty adjournment as the court was evacuated.
A security force officer said that he got the "shock of his life" when he realised that the bombs were live.
Officials blame police for not defusing the devices before coming to court. The police say they were not asked to.
The incident happened during the trial of five suspected members of the banned Islamist organisation, Jamatul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB).
The JMB is accused of carrying out a string of bomb attacks across Bangladesh at the end of last year.
They were alleged to have been caught in possession of the explosives in December 2005, and the devices were brought to the court as evidence.
The BBC's Qadir Kallol in Dhaka says that the only trouble was that police forgot to defuse them.
When Captain Tareq Rahman Khan of the Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) saw the Public Prosecutor, Shahidul Islam, uncovering the explosives in front of the judge, he admitted suffering temporary heart failure.
"I got the shock of my life," he was quoted as saying in the New Age newspaper.
Captain Khan warned the prosecutor that the bombs could go off at any moment and cause carnage in the crowded courtroom.
RAB officials say that they asked the police to defuse the bombs after they were seized.
But the police said they had not received any such communication.
Later on Wednesday, police did eventually take the bombs away, but with the utmost caution.
"It was fortunate we were not all blown to smithereens," one officer was reported as saying.
Posted by: john ||
08/04/2006 19:13 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[4 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
But you must admit it's a good way for the Public Prosecuter to get his point across to a jury...
#2
why not have the defendants handle them from a "secure" remote location (like a firing range)?
Posted by: Frank G ||
08/04/2006 19:22 Comments ||
Top||
#3
Crossboom.
Posted by: ed ||
08/04/2006 19:32 Comments ||
Top||
#4
"Officials blame police for not defusing the devices before coming to court. The police say they were not asked to."
It's official - they're all phucking NUTS.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
08/04/2006 20:33 Comments ||
Top||
#5
"The police say they were not asked to."
(1)Are they stupid?
(2)Are they unable to consider the consequences of their inaction?
(3)Are they so jaded by death that it matters little?
(4)All of the above
#6
Hey, they were taught by the best British colonial bureaucrats. "It is not my job to defuse bombs." That office is down the hall, over the hills and far away.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
08/04/2006 22:30 Comments ||
Top||
At least 25 suspected Islamic militants were arrested after Bangladesh's crack security force raided their hideout in a forest north of the capital, officials said on Thursday. The militants were training in the hideout close to a madrassa near Bhaluka town, north of Dhaka, when they were arrested late on Wednesday, according to Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) commander Colonel Nurul Momen. "We found bomb-making materials, fuses, wires in the hideout," Momen said.
The raid was the biggest by Bangladesh security agencies in recent months. It came in the wake of intelligence reports that Islamic militants were regrouping in the countryside. The arrested militants were led by 35-year-old Maolana Abdur Rouf who is "wanted in several blast cases and is an Afghan war veteran," Momen said. The other men arrested were aged between 20 and 25. The official BSS news agency said the militants gave up without a fight. Momen said it was not immediately known whether the militants belonged to the banned Jamayetul Mujahideen, Bangladesh (JMB) or another clandestine group. "We are interrogating them," he said.
Posted by: Fred ||
08/04/2006 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[3 views]
Top|| File under:
GROZNY: Five Russian soldiers were killed on Thursday in the war-torn republic of Chechnya, while two police officers from the interior ministry's forces were killed in neighbouring Ingushetia, police said.
The soldiers were burned alive when the vehicle they were travelling in exploded in Chechnya's second biggest town, Gudermes. The vehicle veered off the road, crashed into an electricity pole, overturned and caught fire, the interior ministry's press service said.
Apparently their ammunition exploded," the ministry said...
"There were then explosions. Apparently their ammunition exploded," the ministry said. It did not say why the vehicle came off the road in the first place. An inquiry has been launched.
Separately, local police said two officers from the interior ministry forces were shot in the unstable North Caucasian republic of Ingushetia on the road to its capital Nazran. Their car was sprayed with bullets by gunmen in a passing car. A third police officer escaped.
Posted by: Fred ||
08/04/2006 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[2 views]
Top|| File under:
NEW DELHI: The Delhi High Court showed no mercy to a man who allegedly planted a bomb in a bus in 1997 during the serial blasts which shocked the Capital. The high court sentenced the man to death, upholding the verdict of a lower court.
In a strongly worded judgment, Mohammad Hussain's plea to set him free was struck down by a Bench of Justice R S Sodhi and Justice P K Bhasin for "satisfying the conscience of society", as the accused was a "menace to society" and did not "deserve to exist on this earth".
"Showing any mercy to people like the appellant (Hussain) would be a mockery of justice... whenever some person is found guilty of this kind of gruesome act and ghastly murder, the penalty of death sentence is the only appropriate punishment and there is no alternative to it," the judges observed.
Referring to a Supreme Court judgment, the court bracketed the case under the rarest of rare category, which is the ground for death penalty for those found guilty of murder.
Subscribing to the view of the trial court and giving it their consideration, the judges termed Hussain's act of creating circumstances causing the death of four people as heinous.
"Our country has been a victim of many such incidents of bomb blasts for some years now at the hands of the terrorists and innocent lives have been lost."
Posted by: john ||
08/04/2006 18:16 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[8 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
cool - hope it's sharp drop
Posted by: Frank G ||
08/04/2006 19:01 Comments ||
Top||
QUETTA: A powerful bomb exploded outside the office of the Noshaki district coordination officer on Thursday, but there were no casualties. "The blast was so powerful that it broke the windowpanes of the office and was heard in the far-off areas of the district," local journalist Shah Nazar Badani told Daily Times. Badani said the blast took place in a store owned by some Afghan refugees.
Posted by: Fred ||
08/04/2006 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[7 views]
Top|| File under:
LANDIKOTAL: The Khyber Agency political administration raided a house on Thursday, seizing stolen US radar equipment and arresting three suspects.
A jirga tried to negotiate with the suspects but they responded with fire...
The radar, which was meant for the US forces stationed at the Bagram airbase, was stolen during transit to Afghanistan. A jirga tried to negotiate with the suspects but they responded with fire. Later, the Khyber Rifles and Khasadar Force besieged the house of one Mairajuddin in the Zarga Khel area of Landikotal, seized the radar and arrested Daud, Gul Khair and Nahid.
Posted by: Fred ||
08/04/2006 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[6 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Maybe they were trying to make a microwave oven?
Posted by: Bobby ||
08/04/2006 6:02 Comments ||
Top||
#2
"I tell you, Daud, you have to rub the thing to get the djinn out, and he will grant you three wishes!"
MUMBAI: Faisal Shaikh (30), arrested in connection with the 7/11 blasts, was shown the clippings of atrocities on Muslims across the world. He was willing to go as 'fidayeen' to Lebanon or Iraq but was instructed to take revenge against atrocities on Muslims in India, an Anti-Terrorist Squad (ATS) officer said. Faisal, a class XI drop-out, was arrested last week by the ATS and is aid to be the Lashkar-e-Taiba's western India commander. "We was asked to retaliate the humiliation and killings of his brothers (Muslims)."
The clippings related to Iraq, Lebanon and other cities of Palestine were shown to all the participants in a training camp in Pakistan. Faisal was one of them. Though he offered his 'service' for Lebanon or Iraq, his plea was turned down," an officer from the crime branch unit-II who questioned Faisal said. According to the police, Faisal visited Paksitan's Bulwarah camp twice, first time in 2002 and again in 2004, each time for six months. Faisal would report to LeT's Pakistan commander Azam Chima about new recruits and ensure that he was making good grounds in Mumbai.
The police have seized a cd from Faisal which the police suspect, could provide vital information about LeT's city operations. "The cd has a series of communal riots and atrocities on Muslims." It shows the 9/11 bombing in the US too. Moreover, it also has the clippings of training camps in Pakistan which is shown to other candidates before they leave for training," sources said. The crime branch also seized around 30 cds from Faisal's younger brother, Muzammil Shaikh. The training camp, funded by Lashkar-e-Taiba, is being taken care by one of its hardened commander, Azam Chima.
Posted by: Fred ||
08/04/2006 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[7 views]
Top|| File under:
TO most people, soft-spoken, well-educated Tanvir Ahmad Ansari might seem an improbable terrorist. In Mumbai's Mominpura slum, though, there is little surprise. If the practitioner of Unani medicine who was detained on July 24 does turn out to be one of the Lashkar-e-Taiba terrorists who executed the serial bombings in Mumbai on July 11, it will have a curious kind of fitness.
Twelve years ago, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) had carried out a series of raids just up the road from the one-room tenement in the BIT Chawl where Tanvir Ansari lived with his 70-year-old mother. Jalees Ansari, a government-employed doctor, was arrested then for having executed a series of bombings in 1993 - the Lashkar's first terror strikes outside of Jammu and Kashmir. Azam Ghauri, who helped execute those attacks, managed to escape the CBI net. A third man also vanished.
In late June, Mominpura residents watched the twin stories of that third man, Syed Abdul Karim `Tunda', and Tanvir Ansari unfold in almost fugue-like fashion on their television sets. Neither Karim's strange arrest and bizarre disappearance, nor even the deaths he helped bring about, are the key motifs of this dark composition. Instead, his story, like that of Tanvir Ansari, illustrate the intimate embrace between Islamist terrorism and Hindu fundamentalism - the ways in which communalism feeds communalism.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Fred ||
08/04/2006 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[9 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Maybe the Sunnis can send in a half dozen splodedopes to get this civil war thing started.
Posted by: regular joe ||
08/04/2006 13:50 Comments ||
Top||
#2
The important thing in the article seems to be later. With the withdrawl of US forces from Mosul to Baghdad, the insurgents tried a Tet Offensive in Mosul and it just petered out.
"...The violence erupted as 3,500 U.S. troops were being moved from the Mosul area to Baghdad to help bolster security in the capital.
Fighting raged in at least eight neighborhoods in Mosul, the largest city in Iraq's northern tier about 250 miles (400 kilometers) north of Baghdad.
At least 80 insurgents drove vehicles into several neighborhoods and attacked police patrols and checkpoints, police said.
Two car bombs also went off. In one of the attacks, Col. Jassim Mohammed Bilal, a police battalion commander, and two other police officers were slain when attackers targeted his convoy in the eastern Noor neighborhood, said Nineveh province Gov. Duraid Kashmoula.
Police and civilians were wounded in the blast. The bodies of an unknown number of insurgents were strewn on the ground across the city."
#6
To be honest I wouldnt want to see Sadr/Badgr take over Iraq but the idea of the Shia wiping the Sunni out just doesnt make me feel much pitty or regret at all.
I was one who early on actually had high hopes for the Sunnis who I considered wise and westernized enough to see that in a capitalist democracy their huge head start in education and experience of leadership would easily allow them to become the ruling elite of the economic, military along with ranking positions in the government due to experience. The US would have been willing to help them short the hardcore Sadamites but instead of participating they chose to gamble all and they have now lost on the edge of losing all. The Shia/Kurd has taken those places the Sunnis could have filled in both the military, government and quickly in the economic (hence Iraq operation taking almost 4yrs to get moving right instead of the earlier optimistic estimates). The Sunni if they are not driven out or slaughtered when we leave will never again be the ruling class in Iraq. They did it to themselves.
Killing women and children at the market for no reason but the 15second blip on the Western media does little but play to the pansies heart strings of uncontrollable fiasco cry babying but does nothing to the military balance and has drastic consequences for the future of the Sunnis in Iraq. With the Shia/Kurd no longer needing the Sunni expertise in the government and military the Sunni will soon be nothing more than a liability and in the Arab world liabilities are dealt harshly wish.
It make work out all nice and pretty in the end but I think we should prepare for the worst and not be discouraged of our end goal if along the way the Sunni are liquidated. They made their bed its theirs to sleep in. We should concentrate on making sure Sadr/Badgr and Iran dont take over because our PC warfare rules say we cant support them if they do certain things.
#7
Killing women and children at the market for no reason but the 15 second blip on the Western media does little but play to the pansies heart strings of uncontrollable fiasco cry babying but does nothing to the military balance and has drastic consequences for the future of the Sunnis in Iraq.
And such rationality fits in exactly where with a Sunni universe which, to this day, remains entirely uncontaminated by even the remotest comprehension of Cause & Effect? [/snark]
At least 44 people were killed in sporadic violence in Iraq on Thursday. Ten people were killed on Thursday in a roadside bomb in Al-Amin, an eastern district of Baghdad, a police source said. A further 14 were wounded. The casualties appeared to be civilians, rather than members of the security forces, the police source said.
Iraqi police came under attack and fought intense battles with gunmen overnight in the southern outskirts of Baghdad, at the end of a bloody day in which at least 44 people were killed across Iraq. In the first clash, 30 kilometres south of the capital, gunmen attacked a police checkpoint killing 14 people, including six policemen, Kut police said on Thursday. A second battle erupted nearby between a joint military and police force and insurgents, the prime minister's office announced. Iraqi forces chased the insurgents through a rural area 40 kilometres southwest of the capital and killed 15 of them, the statement said, adding that two policemen had also died.
Police in Kut also reported finding 18 bodies in the Tigris river showing signs of torture. They had all been shot. In Baghdad, police said the death toll from Wednesday's twin bomb attack on a soccer pitch where children were playing in west Baghdad's predominantly Shiite neighbourhood of Amil had risen to 16. Further attacks around the country brought the days death toll to 44.
Posted by: Fred ||
08/04/2006 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[5 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Okay, I'm going to say it....
Put Saddam back in power! I am really now believing he was an asshole for a very good reason. Give the Kurds their own country, and let the rest of these farks squabble amongst themselves. They have shown me nothing except that they deserved a Saddam in the first place.
#2
Actually, they should shoot Saddam as soon as possible. As long as he is processing oxygen and Doritos, the Baathist have hope that he can somehow survive to return to power. Eliminate Saddam, and the oath of loyalty of many of those insurgents dissolves.
#3
And do you think once he's dead they are all just going to drop their arms and quit? I don't think so. I think it will just be an excuse to ratchet shiat up a notch.
#5
Thoth, I agree. On one hand, I don't think rape rooms, wood chippers, and gassing whole villages are necessary under any circumstances. But our experience in Iraq certainly has revealed why Islamic countries tend to be ruled by jack-booted dictators: they have to be, to keep the splodeydopes from destroying everything. You'd think Muslim rulers would start realizing that Islam is the problem -- the reason their countries are shitholes, the reason they lose wars, the source itself of Muslim "humiliation." As long as there is Islam, there will be brutal dictatorships.
Posted by: ST ||
08/04/2006 2:14 Comments ||
Top||
#6
The Saddam loyalists might. But what you have in Baghdad is basically the Iraqi equivalent of Hamas and Hezbollah (Sunni and Shiite armed groups) fighting each other for control. It isn't really so much a civil war where you have the people against the government so much as it is a Crips vs. Bloods gang war on a larger scale.
They aren't going to get anywhere until they decide to start shooting armed militia members on both sides. At some point the people are going to have enough of it and start shooting at the militias. That will be the end of the game.
#7
They aren't going to get anywhere until they decide to start shooting armed militia members on both sides.
Sorry, I don't see it. We have those rare instances now and then where some regular folk go and disarm a jihadi, but they are rare and far between. Let's not kid ourselves here. This is really pissing me off. These assholes want nothing but to kill each other and we're the jack asses cuaght in the middle of the mess. This was a monster created by the French and the British, and it should be their problem to fix, not ours.
#8
#5 Thoth, I agree. On one hand, I don't think rape rooms, wood chippers, and gassing whole villages are necessary under any circumstances.
I used to think the same thing, but now I'm thinking it was the kind of crap that was necessary to keep animals in line.
And I will use that line again. The people that are pulling this crap day in and day out have lost the right to call themselves human beings in my opinion. They are animals,...no lower than animals...and deserve to be treated as such.
#10
"Elsewhere today, Iraqi soldiers arrested four terrorists involved in a drive-by shooting early this morning in northeastern Baghdad. The terrorists were arrested after exchanging small-arms fire with an Iraqi civilian in his home. One terrorist was seriously wounded."
#11
Bottom line is that the armed political militias need to be disarmed and disbanded. Either voluntarilly or by force. Nobody has the guts to do that at this point.
#12
Halting the sectarian murders is the responsibility of the Iraq government. The US-UK role should be supportive. If the Shiite dominated Parliament choses to do nothing about the Mahdi Army's ethnic cleansing by murder policies, then they can take the blame.
It is interesting that death tolls from deliberate religious murder that number 100 per day, do not shock the world while the Israeli Air Force's accidental killing of collaterals at Qana has been treated as the worst crime in history.
#13
I think we're still on the same page, Thoth. What I meant was that Saddam's brutality went too far and cast too wide a net. Gassing Kurdish children and Uday's rape sprees served no tangible security interest.
But my main point was that keeping the jihadis under control does require a certain level of brutality. For example, I don't know precisely what happens to suspected jihadis in, say, Egyptian, Jordanian, Saudi, or Pakistani prisons, but I bet ain't nice, and whatever it is, I betcha I wouldn't have a problem with it.
Posted by: ST ||
08/04/2006 4:38 Comments ||
Top||
#14
Those who are hoping for the US to fail in Iraq ought to be careful what they wish for. We've given nearly three thousand of our best people, dead, thousands more wounded, billions of dollars, immeasurable grief among service families.
We've facilitated elections under the worst circumstances.
If they can't make it go, it will demonstrate that Arab societies are violent, destructive, mindless, and primitive.
Which might make a difference on how the WOT is seen.
If it doesn't work, it will be harder to say, "They're just like us." Or, as the multi-cultis would say, "They're just like us, only 'way better."
Posted by: Richard Aubrey ||
08/04/2006 6:54 Comments ||
Top||
#15
They wouldn't have jihadis if they didn't carefully rear and train them. They wouldn't have Sunni and Shiite armed militias if Saddam Hussein hadn't allowed and encouraged and suborned such things over the decades of his vicious rule. And they wouldn't be nearly as effective if Saddam's Baathist agents weren't running and financing things in counterpart with Al Qaeda, exactly as Saddam set it up just before the invasion in 2003.
Iraq, and the Arab world, are at a nexus point: either they choose the way of civilization and put down what was so carefully grown, or we will have to wipe the slate completely clean, perhaps planting our own 12 million illegal aliens as seed stock for the empty lands.
Those are our choices, Thoth. Putting Saddam Hussein back, or another strongman who will end up like him (or like Bashir al Assad if he is not as effectively vicious), starts the whole thing all over... only worse and faster, because Saddam's interim successes have been observed and Iran, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan have progressed further down the path of evil in the meantime. Israel fought the Intifadas against not only the PLO, Hamas, Islamic Jihad and all, but against the funding, training and arms of Iraq at a distance. Would you condemn her to fighting against that again, plus Iran's donations, with real WMD in the mix? Because that's exactly what will happen if we let them slither off to the old, comfortable ways. Not to mention what our boys and girls will come up against the next time they have to invade to clean out the rat's nest that threatens us all.
This is a test. Either Iraq and Afghanistan can become safe to allow amongst us, or they are proven an incalcitrant threat that must be completely erased, along with the rest of their fellow-thinkers. There is no in-between, because the in-between metastasizes, and the world is too small, and the weaponry and connections too destructive, to share the planet with.
#16
This is a test. Either Iraq and Afghanistan can become safe to allow amongst us, or they are proven an incalcitrant threat that must be completely erased, along with the rest of their fellow-thinkers. There is no in-between, because the in-between metastasizes, and the world is too small, and the weaponry and connections too destructive, to share the planet with.
Posted by: trailing wife 2006-08-04 07:49
Setting the applause machine on 10! Excellent assessment TW.
What the US has been doing is fighting a "rich man's war", which I think was first coined by Wretchard or Steven Den Beste. The US can afford to drop $20,000 bombs on a house to kill just the people inside and limit collateral damage. There are even concrete bombs being dropped to further limit shrapnel damage - the idea of a $50 million jet dropping a lump of concrete just boggles the mind...
It's not just the weapons though. There have been elections in Afghanistan and Iraq, massively supported by the US, there is the rebuilding process going on as well, again at almost the exclusive expense of the US.
This won't go on forever, sooner or later the US is going to require these governments to be looking after themselves. The signs are not encouraging; Afghanistan bringing back the morality police, death squads roaming Iraq and some recent statements from Iraqi politicians haven't been that good either.
I'm just one guy who had the scales lifted on 9/11, so much so that when 7/7 happened, I was furious of course, but I knew that it was a matter of time before we got hit (we'll get hit again, I'm certain of that), and I know there are many many more people like me that are looking over at events in the Middle East and the Islamic world in general and wondering how much longer we keep spending vast amounts of money and having our people killed just for trying to drag them into the 21st century. Me? I'm fed up now, so how the US has managed to keep trying this long is beyond me.
TW's last para is the crux of the matter. This is a test. Iraqi's and Afghani's are dissimilar enough for us to discount ethnic ties, their political systems (such as they are) are different too. So what's the one thing that both these countries have in common?
The sands of time are running low and these morons are rattling the hourglass!
Posted by: Tony (UK) ||
08/04/2006 8:36 Comments ||
Top||
#18
Food for thought:
When you look at numbers raw you see only the barbarism. That's why I've taken to using the Orc images to describe the daily carnage.
When you look at concentrations, which is what the intel guys are looking at (or should be), you see a military campaign that's being carried out in three centers: Baghdad and environs, Mosul and Kirkuk, with a sideshow in Basra.
Looking at the picture, we're not seeing the symptoms of a society that's incapable of living in the civilized world. We're seeing Sammy's Baathists determined to make the country uninhabitable and Tater's idiots trying to either make the country an Iranian colony or to make it uninhabitable.
The carnage in the north is the Baathists and their Qaeda allies. The idiocy in Basra is Tater. Baghdad is where the two meet and try and outdo each other in brutality. Our losses in Anbar are incurred cutting supply lines.
The rest of the country is where the normal people live.
Posted by: Fred ||
08/04/2006 9:29 Comments ||
Top||
#19
Nice density plots Fred. Wish they represented down-wind drift however.
Outstanding picture and analysis. Baghdad as the convergence point for the Barbarians! What irony, the most learned, cultural center in Islam history now reduced to this.
#22
It's a test they've failed. However, we were totally incorrect in our initial approach. We should have eliminated much more of their populace during initial advances. This idiot idea of a war with no casualties is completely incorrect. Massive suffering changes minds. Since we didn't do it, they're doing it themselves. Fine. What really sets me off is sending our troops back into the middle ? Why ? Many will get killed for no reason. We need to retreat completely to the perimeter and let the mayhem unfold. Send Al-Jizz right to the front so the whole world sees how Muzzies function when left to their own devices.
#23
Excellent analysis, TW. However, many is this country will see a failure as just that - another failure, and reason to become uninvolved again. I fear we'll (well, not us Rantburgers, but the general populace) learn the wrong lesson - "we never should've gotten involved, and should pursue diplomatic methods via the UN."
John Kerry gets to say he told us so.
Posted by: Bobby ||
08/04/2006 11:42 Comments ||
Top||
#24
Oh, and Fred - GREAT map!
Posted by: Bobby ||
08/04/2006 11:42 Comments ||
Top||
#25
Thank you for your generous comments. A lot of my thinking is based on things I've read here over time, and especially on the analysis of our options by Rantburg's own Dave D., engineer extraordinaire.
Thoth, I'm sorry if I came on to strong -- you know I respect you enormously -- but I really don't see walking away as effectively different than surrendering; it might give us as much as half a decade before we follow France into the abyss, again because the path to get there is already well laid out. History iscontingent and mono-directional, and there is no reset button. Buwaya got back from Japan yesterday, and last night posted his observations on some of the threads -- well worth checking out -- but the key thing I took away was that people and countries are making sacrifices to fight this war, and if the US walks away now, they won't be there next time because the pressure won't be worth it.
Fred, a very, very helpful map. You do have a knack. ;-)
#26
Thanks, but it's not my work. Somebody gave it to me. I should be keeping one each for Iraq and Afghanistan.
Posted by: Fred ||
08/04/2006 13:55 Comments ||
Top||
#27
I don't think you came on too strong. I just wish we could wall all the orcs pulling these stunts in, and let them kill each other off. Let everyone else be in peace.
I felt hopeful about Iraq after Saddams statue fell. I felt hopeful after those 1st elections, but to me it looks like it has went into a tailspin that it can't pull out of till theres a crash. I feel hopefull about Afghanistan, I don't with Iraq. I'll try to muster what little faith I have left with the Iraqis and keep my fingers crossed though.
#28
I wish we could too, Thoth. But they actively export the insanity, and Saddam Hussein was a big player in that export. The Arab Strongman is proven to create and increase the danger, not be the cork in the bottle -- we're seeing that continue to play out in Pakistan, after all, where on the one hand Musharref drinks scotch with Western ambassadors, and on the other his ISI runs the Taliban as a wholly owned subsidiary, while he shelters A.Q.Khan from the consequences of exporting Pakistan's nuclear weapons technology (on government orders perhaps, but certainly with government connivance). This is one we are just going to have to fight to the finish -- either now or at a greater price later.
#29
I think the map gives false hope -- the attacks are "limited" to where the Shiites and Sunni are -- the non-conflict areas are mostly desert. The idea of bringing civilization to this region was a nice one, but not practical. Going forward, we need to support a free and productive Kurdistan and look at the rest of Iraq as our military base for operations against Iran.
Posted by: regular joe ||
08/04/2006 15:32 Comments ||
Top||
#30
I'm not ready to write Iraq off as a loss yet. Things would certainly be a lot better there if Iran were not constantly stirring up shit; and they would be better still if our own cut-and-run, "responsible redeployment" crowd weren't giving aid and comfort to the jihadis by conveying the impression, with every breath they take, that America is weak, impatient, and is on the verge of giving up and going home any minute now.
Get rid of the Mad Mullahs and our seditious Left, and this endeavor has a pretty good chance of succeeding.
Oh, goody. We have an "Iraq expert". Maybe you should team up with SOP35, since he is the military genius. You two would make quite a duo. We would have World War Three won in days.
#1
Iran and Syria are just bound and determined to get nuked, aren't they? We should oblige them - let the Israelis keep their nukes while we use BIG ones.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
08/04/2006 21:00 Comments ||
Top||
CAIRO (AFP) - Arab foreign ministers will hold an extraordinary meeting Monday in Beirut to support Lebanon, Arab League number two Ahmed Ben Helli told AFP.
ADVERTISEMENT
"The meeting of Arab foreign ministers will take place next Monday in Beirut, it will be a follow-up of the session which took place in Cairo on July 15," the deputy secretary general of the pan-Arab body said Friday.
Israeli warplanes pounded areas north and south of Beirut on Friday, killing at least 28 people, as part of the military offensive against Lebanon launched following the July 12 capture of two Israeli soldiers by the Hezbollah militia.
"We are holding this meeting in Beirut to express solidarity with Lebanon," the official added.
Ben Helli said Arab League chief Amr Mussa was expected in Beirut on Sunday to prepare the meeting and hold talks with Lebanese officials on the crisis.
In the meeting they held three days after the start of the military confrontation, Arab foreign ministers had admitted their impotence and Mussa had declared the Middle East peace process "dead".
The idea of holding an extraordinary meeting of Arab League foreign ministers in the war-torn country was initially floated by Saudi Arabia.
Permanent representatives at the Cairo-based organisation have been discussing the possibility of holding an extraordinary summit at the level of heads of state but the 22 members have so far failed to reach an agreement.
Arab countries have been divided on the stand to take since
Israel launched its onslaught, with the more moderate regimes refusing to rally behind the Iran-backed Hezbollah movement despite vocal criticism of Israel's assault.
According to Lebanese officials, more than 900 people have been killed, mainly civilians, in Israel's devastating land, sea and air offensive.
France and the United States were still locked in intense negotiations Friday over the wording of a United Nations Security Council resolution for a cessation of hostilities in Lebanon.
PALESTINIAN gunmen dressed in police uniforms broke into a prison in the West Bank city of Jericho today and shot dead six Palestinian inmates, security sources said.
Four of the dead had been accused of killing two officials within President Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah faction in the West Bank city of Nablus last year. The four were in prison awaiting trial. The other two victims were cell mates.
Tawifiq Tirawi, the deputy head of intelligence in the West Bank and Gaza, said Palestinian authorities believed the attack was carried out by relatives of the two dead Fatah officials from a village near Nablus.
"Those who committed this crime will be brought to justice," Tirawi told reporters in Jericho, where a state of emergency was declared.
The attack occurred at a Jericho prison run by Abbas's intelligence service.
Earlier this year, Israeli forces used tanks and bulldozers to tear apart the same prison to grab a militant leader accused by Israel of overseeing the 2001 assassination of an Israeli cabinet minister.
Tirawi said the damage caused by the Israeli raid made it harder for prison guards to protect the facility against the Palestinian gunmen.
There have been a series of armed clashes in Gaza between members of Abbas's Fatah faction and Hamas, which won elections in January and took control of the Palestinian government.
(BNA) Israeli forces arrested today one of Hamas's top leaders in Al Bera city in Ramallah in the West Bank. Palestinian sources said that the Israeli army arrested Zayed Abu Diya, from his home located in the centre of the West Bank. The Israeli forces had conducted an arrest campaign in the West Bank last night arresting 31 people from various Palestinian movements.
Posted by: Fred ||
08/04/2006 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[3 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
trade bait?
Posted by: Captain America ||
08/04/2006 1:07 Comments ||
Top||
#2
Shark bait.
Posted by: ed ||
08/04/2006 1:19 Comments ||
Top||
A barrage of Hezbollah rockets slammed into northern Israel on Thursday, killing at least eight Israelis. Four people were killed when a rocket crashed directly into a house near the northern town of Ma'alot, and another four were killed when a rocket exploded near their vehicle in Acre. Four people were seriously wounded and two others sustained moderate wounds in rocket strikes in Acre, Hurfeish and Kiryat Shmona. Another 31 people were also lightly wounded in the attacks. Shimon Zaribi, 44, and Albert ben Abu, 41, both of Acre, were killed in the rocket attack on their hometown. Sinati Sinati, Amir Naeem and Mohammed Fouad, all 17-year-old residents of the village of Tarshiha, were killed in the attack near Ma'alot.
Also Thursday, four Israel Defense Forces soldiers were killed and two others were seriously wounded Thursday in heavy fighting with Hezbollah guerillas in south Lebanon.
The Prime Minister's Office said the government would continue to fight the Hezbollah and put an end to the rocket attacks. "The Israeli government, along with the Israeli people are fully determined to break this Hezbollah threat and to restore quiet to Israel's north. We will seek and pursue Hezbollah without relenting and we will put an end to these murderous attacks," said David Baker, an official in the PMO.
A total of 160 rockets were fired by late afternoon Thursday, 130 of which fell between the hours of 4 P.M. and 5 P.M. Hardest hit were the towns of Nahariya, Ma'alot and Kiryat Shmona. Rockets also landed in Haifa, the Golan Heights, Rosh Pina and Safed. More than 2,050 rockets have been fired at Israel from Lebanon during the current conflict, killing 27 civilians. Hezbollah fired at least 30 rockets across the north on Thursday morning, striking Kiryat Shmona, Haifa, the Ma'alot area and the Golan Heights.
Posted by: Fred ||
08/04/2006 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[2 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Imagine if the US faced the same bombardment, how long would it take to kill every swinging dick lobbing them?
Could you imagine a US president allowing several weeks of this continuous bombing?
Posted by: Captain America ||
08/04/2006 20:11 Comments ||
Top||
Israel Air Force aircraft on Wednesday bombed a house in central Gaza used by Hamas militants to store weapons, the Israel Defense Forces said. Palestinian security sources said the house was owned by a Hamas militant and was largely destroyed. There were no immediate reports of casualties in the air strike.
A Palestinian teenager and a woman were killed, and four other people were wounded, in an Israel Air Force strike in the northern Gaza town of Beit Lahiya. The two victims of the strike were named as Araf Abu Qaida, 16, and Marvat Abu Sharkh, 24, were killed by shrapnel from a missile that eye-witnesses said landed close to a moving vehicle. The four people inside the car were wounded in the strike. The Israel Defense Forces said that troops were targeting a group of armed men who planned to fire a Qassam rocket at Israel.
IDF forces were operating in the Dahaniyeh area in the southern Strip on Tuesday. The operation was described as part of the wider effort to counter terrorist activity stemming from the area.
The Rafah border crossing between Egypt and the Gaza Strip remained closed on Tuesday despite Israel's pledge to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice it would open to traffic. European Union observers told Haaretz they received a message from Israel at 7:30 A.M. that the crossing was to remain shut. Defense Minister Amir Peretz on Monday promised Rice the crossing would open for a 48-hour period to allow civilians and foreigners to cross from the Gaza Strip to Egypt. Palestinian sources said that Palestinian students, businessmen and humanitarian workers would also be allowed to leave the Strip. Israel placed a general closure on Palestinian Authority territories Monday, following a dramatic increase in alerts of planned terrorists attacks.
Posted by: Fred ||
08/04/2006 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[2 views]
Top|| File under:
A Qassam rocket fired from the Gaza Strip landed Wednesday morning in an industrial zone in Ashkelon, lightly wounding one person. The wounded man was hit by shrapnel and evacuated to the Barzilai Medical Center for treatment. Another Qassam landed in a community in the western Negev, causing no injuries or damage. A salvo of five Qassam rockets were fired early Tuesday from both the northern and southern Gaza Strip at Sderot and the western Negev, causing damage but no injuries.
Posted by: Fred ||
08/04/2006 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[3 views]
Top|| File under:
Gunmen clashed with members of the Hamas-led police force in a Gaza City hospital on Tuesday, wounding at least five people, medics and witnesses said. It was the latest round of internal fighting in the Palestinian-ruled coastal territory since Hamas rose to power in March after an upset election victory. In the last two days two members of the rival Fatah movement have been shot and wounded by unknown assailants in Gaza. Earlier on Tuesday, a gunman shot and wounded a Hamas member earlier in the southern Gaza town of Khan Younis, medics and witnesses said.
Posted by: Fred ||
08/04/2006 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[2 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Blasting away in a hospital? Was there a wedding there or something?
Israeli aircraft dropped on Thursday thousands of flyers over Gaza City to incite the Palestinians' discontent with politburo chief of the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) Khaled Mashaal, Palestinian witnesses said. They said that the A4-size flyers showed a cartoon image for Mashaal as a gambler who bet on Palestinian towns in the Gaza Strip, including Rafah, Khan Younis, Gaza City, Jabalya, Biet Lahia and Biet Hanoun.
"Mashaal gambles on the future of Palestine and brings you destruction, failure and despair," read a text beyond the cartoon, which was showing Mashaal holding three playing cards with the word of future, safety and development on it respectively. Israel has been using the airborne propaganda to foment the discontent with the Palestinian militant groups among the Gaza residents since it finished a major withdrawal from the Gaza Strip in September 2005.
Posted by: Fred ||
08/04/2006 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[4 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
More simply...
How do you say, "Khaled Mashaal is a d**khead, and has sold you out." , in Arabic...
More than 200 Islamic militants from Southeast Asia have
been sent on missions to bomb Israel's "vital interests" and countries that support the Jewish state, their leader said on Friday.
The militants have been trained to carry out suicide bombings to avenge Israel's military strikes on the Palestinian territories and Lebanon, said Suaib Didu, chairman of the Jakarta-based ASEAN Muslim Youth Movement.
"We will limit our targets to Israel's vital interests and those that support Israel's aggression in Palestine and Lebanon," Didu said. "We will not carry out attacks indiscriminately."
Hardline militant groups in Indonesia have made claims in the past of sending volunteers to participate in conflicts overseas that have sometimes proved exaggerated.
Western countries such as the United States and Britain, as well as businesses, could be targeted unless they cease supporting Israel, he said.
Didu said the group was watching Australia's position on the Middle East conflict.
"If John Howard makes a statement in support of Israel, he will be a target," Didu said.
More than 3,000 people have signed up for the mission, and 217 people from Indonesia, the Philippines, Malaysia and Singapore have been dispatched abroad so far, he said.
A "show of force" of the more than 3,000 volunteers will be held on Saturday in Pontianak in West Kalimantan province on Borneo island, Didu said, adding that many of the 200-plus militants had fought with Afghanistan against the Soviets.
Din Syamsuddin, chairman of the moderate Muhammadiyah, Indonesia's second largest Muslim organization, said Thursday that threats by radical Muslim groups to send volunteers to fight Israel were just "symbolic gestures" to show solidarity with the Palestinians and Lebanese.
"There are too many obstacles for these people to travel there. It is too costly and the Israeli army is no match for them," he told reporters.
But in Canberra, Human Services Minister Joe Hockey said Friday the government was not shrugging off reports of the plans to carry out suicide bombings.
"The minister for foreign affairs and the Department of Foreign Affairs are investigating what is reported in the papers today and we are treating it very, very seriously," Hockey told Australian television.
#2
This type of action helps to paint targets on all Muslims. Moderate Muslims (hopefully not a mythological being)must purge themselves of the splodeydopes or suffer the consequences at some point.
#4
"We will not carry out attacks indiscriminately."
If organizations have to distinguish their future plans from their past actions in this manner, it should confirm that the term Youth Movement has opposite connotations in different parts of the world.
#7
We need to build a new bomber - one that can carry hundreds of dumb, iron bombs inside its bomb bay, fly around the world twice without refueling, and penetrate just about any airspace in the world with impunity. Every time one of these splodeydopes goes "boom", his home town should be visited by ten or twelve of these new bombers, during the wee hours of the morning. Sooner or later the splodeydopes will learn not to target US or allied interests, or there won't be anyone left alive to be a splodeydope. That seems to be the only message they really understand, so we should send it to them.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
08/04/2006 14:13 Comments ||
Top||
#8
We used to have the basic capacity OS; it was called the CVA or Attack Aircraft Carrier. And while far from supersonic speeds and mass distances, it mere presence would cause the bad guys to rethink what was happening. And the aircraft then carried had a range AND capacity for many miles and many pounds of bombs. Think Intruders and a dark stormy night, low level and 15K worth of dumb bombs hung on each one. Toss in a couple of KA-6D tankers and they had the legs and ability to go in low and deliver a nasty wake up call to whoever deserved it. The Lawn Darts just don't have the legs or capacity for that many bombs and with IFR now the province of the USAF (and a couple of S-3As and/ or Lawn Darts with a buddy store), we are reduced to hitting the beach and that's about all. No more far inland flights. Yeah the A-6 was about as stealthy as a barn door and nowhere near as sexy as the Lawn Dart or anything the AF has, but for pure boom/ pound, only the BUFF beat it. (I am not a fan of the Hornet, can ya tell?)
#9
More than 200 Islamic militants from Southeast Asia have
been sent on missions to bomb Israel's "vital interests" and countries that support the Jewish state, their leader said on Friday.
Won't these splodadopes sort of stand out in Israel?
#11
Israel guards its borders pretty well. I can't imagine they'd be permitted off the airplanes or through the border crossings. They're just engaging in histrionics for the girls back home.
#13
It this isn't an invitation for Muslim Youth Movement leaders and members to go boom in their homes while sleeping, then I don't know what is.
Posted by: ed ||
08/04/2006 17:56 Comments ||
Top||
#14
It looks like an invitation to leave their sisters and girl friends in the hands of the chairman. You see, he had to stay home because 72 wasn't enough for him.
Cotabato City, 4 August (AKI) - A Filipino Muslim cleric was detained over alleged links with the Abu Sayyaf terrorist organization, police and military officials told Adnkronos International (AKI) on Friday. Senior Inspector Samson Obatay, the city's police spokesperson, confirmed that Hussain Abedin was a suspected member of the group Abu Sofia and was arrested at 7.00 pm at the terminal of Weena Buss Company in Cotabato City, in Mindanao, southern Philippines on Thursday. "He had existing arrest warrants and we have been looking for him," Obatay said.
Known for its kidnapping and ransom activities, Abu Sofia often provides sanctuary to members of the militant Islamist separatist group Abu Sayyaf and both organisations have been involved in terrorism.
Obatay said Abedin's arrest came 10 days after three other suspected Abu Sofia bandits were nabbed while holding meetings with their recruits in the village of Bulalo, in Sultan Kudarat town, Mindanao. The three named Alo, Talip and Manan and all surnamed Binago - were involved in the abduction of Korean Jae Kwon Yoon and his Filipino partner Belonio, in February 2004. Yoon and Belonio were snatched by heavily armed men in Palimbang, Sultan Kudarat province, while surveying sites there for treasure hunting. The victims were released after relatives paid ransom.
Colonel Julieto Ando, the army's Sixth Infantry Division spokesperson, said that Abedin was also a renowned bomb-maker. "He is also involved in bomb making. The suspect was detained at a military prison facility located in Pedro Colina Hill," Ando told AKI.
However, the arrest of the cleric has upset local Muslim militant organizations that have staged protests. Amirah Lidasan, head of Suara Bangsamoro group, denounced Abedin's arrest, saying the victim is a Muslim cleric who belongs to United Youth Bangsamoro for Peace and Development, a non-government organization based in Maguindanao. "We demand his immediate release. We denounce the use of Uztads (religious teachers) as fall guys of [Filipino] President Arroyo's renewed campaign against Abu Sayyaf and Jemaah Islamiyah in Mindanao," Lidasan told AKI in a telephone interview.
Demanding the release of Abedin is also Eid Kabalu, spokesperson for the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), who confirmed that the cleric belongs to their organization. "But he is not a member of any Abu Sayyaf group or kidnap gangs. He was a victim of mistaken identity," Kabalu said. The MILF, which is engaged in peace talks with Manila, repeatedly denies links with Abu Sayyaf militants.
The Abu Sayyaf Group is a home grown terrorist organisation in the Philippines which in the early 1990s received financial support from the al-Qaeda terrorist network via Osama bin Laden's brother-in-law, Saudi Arabian businessman Mohammed Jamal Khalifa, who at that time headed a network of Islamic charities and universities in Zamboanga City, Mindanao.
The group gained international notoriety with the kidnapping for ransom and murder of foreigners and Christian clerics. Since its inception the group has also carried out bombings, assassinations and extortion in its fight for an independent Islamic state in western Mindanao
Posted by: Steve ||
08/04/2006 08:04 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[2 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
United Youth Bangsamoro for Peace and Development, a non-government organization based in Maguindanao
This is an NGO sponsored by the middle east and Nur Misuari's family. Nothing more than a terrorist from to pass money to groups like the ASG and MILF. No wonder Lipless Eid is bitching, the hand that feeds him is telling him to.
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
08/04/2006 13:27 Comments ||
Top||
Iran is racing to resupply Hezbollah across the Syrian border ahead of a possible cease-fire being ironed out this week at the United Nations. Meanwhile, Israeli jets have begun a new bombardment of Beirut's suburbs and Hezbollah is threatening to launch a missile attack on Tel Aviv. Israeli military and intelligence officials here say Iranian technicians were aboard a flight to Damascus on Monday with the Iranian foreign minister, Manouchehr Mottaki. The Israel Defense Forces also says it has not been able to seal the border between Syria and Lebanon, making it possible to ferry men, small rockets, and other materiel to Hezbollah through the back roads and smuggling routes in the Bekaa Valley.
And an interesting bit of analysis: The Iranians this week began a double game in Lebanon best summed up by President Ahmadinejad's message to Muslim nations yesterday in Malaysia: "Although the main solution is for the elimination of the Zionist regime, at this stage an immediate cease-fire must be implemented."
This approach of seeking both Israel's destruction and a temporary ceasefire is evident in signals from Iran's Foreign Ministry to European countries. Mr. Mottaki met with his French counterpart Monday at the Iranian Embassy in Beirut. The French are supporting an immediate cease-fire and have pledged to contribute troops to an international force for southern Lebanon. The meeting was significant because the French in the past year have been supportive of efforts to censure, if not sanction, Iran for its nuclear program at the United Nations, and have pressured Syria to remove its forces from Lebanon in 2005 as part of resolution 1559.
As Hezbollah was the only major political party in Lebanon to oppose the withdrawal of Syrian forces from Lebanon, the French meeting with Iran preceded by French praise for the "constructive" role Iran is playing in the region signals that Paris is willing to keep Hezbollah armed for now.
But the diplomatic game for Iran is only part of their role in the war, Israeli officials say. One intelligence analyst pointed to statements this week from an Iranian member of parliament and former ambassador to Syria, Mohtashemi Pur. Mr. Pur, who was one of the founders of Hezbollah in the early 1980s, told the Iranian reformist newspaper Sharq that Hezbollah had the Zelzal-2 missile, with a range of 160 miles and the "courage to use them." This analyst interpreted this as "a green light from Iran to use the Zelzals at their own discretion and without permission." If such a decision was made, then it would partly explain Hezbollah leader Sheik Hassan Nasrallah's threat to Israel yesterday on Al-Manar television. He said, "If you bomb our capital Beirut, we will bomb the capital of your usurping entity," he said. "We will bomb Tel Aviv."
A retired colonel in Israel's military intelligence, Reuven Erlich, said yesterday that there were gaps between the Syrian-Lebanese border that could be exploited by Iran. "Of course there are gaps. The Syrian-Lebanese border is a long border. It is very difficult to close such a border hermetically if the Syrian regime does not cooperate, and this is not the case. I guess the IDF are doing their best to decrease the amount of supply, but I don't think it can be stopped."
Israel Severs Lebanon Road Link to Syria
Israeli attacks on the four bridges on the main north-south coastal highway linking Beirut to Syria severed the only remaining major road link between Lebanon and Syria. The 90-minute drive to the Syrian border takes at least double the time on the small coastal road that remains open. Border crossings in the east have been shut by airstrikes. Israel has imposed a naval blockade and has hit the international airport to seal off Lebanon's sea and airspace.
"This is Lebanon's umbilical cord," Christiane Berthiaume of the World Food Program told The Associated Press. "This (road) has been the only way for us to bring in aid. We really need to find other ways to bring relief in."
#1
berlin air lift come to mind? Not very helpful for missile launchers/weapons resupply, but that's the point, isn't it, dimwit. Nobody can read the "GTFO" memos dropped all over south lebanon?
Posted by: Frank G ||
08/04/2006 18:01 Comments ||
Top||
#2
If the Lebanese are smart, they won't rebuild the Leb-Sryia roads. Ever.
Posted by: ed ||
08/04/2006 18:27 Comments ||
Top||
#3
Big "if," ed.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
08/04/2006 18:41 Comments ||
Top||
#4
It appears they've cut them off. Now finish them.
#3
US: we knew that. Now you must understand when Israel is done with the Hez you are next!
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
08/04/2006 17:47 Comments ||
Top||
#4
I think the IDF took out the long range stuff early and that is why Iran won't give the supposed go ahead. Its a face saving deal.
Posted by: RJB in JC MO ||
08/04/2006 17:56 Comments ||
Top||
#5
We supplied Israel with Tomahawks. Real sorry about the exploding Iranian refineries.
Posted by: ed ||
08/04/2006 18:57 Comments ||
Top||
#6
Israel has missile defense at the ready, Patriot-3 and Arrow, likely Iran will wait till its guard is down.
Posted by: Captain America ||
08/04/2006 20:21 Comments ||
Top||
#7
Is there anybody here that thinks Iran's misdeeds will go unpunished? No? I thought not. Israel is doing the prudent thing by taking on its tasks in manageable stages. Iran's punishment is coming, but not until after her local neighborhood is cleaned up. Faster, please.
Posted by: Rob Crawford ||
08/04/2006 15:36 Comments ||
Top||
#8
Let me know when all of Beirut looks like our Marine barracks in 1983. Although heartwarming, these developments, much like the proverbial 70 lawyers in a bus at the bottom of a lake, are merely a good start.
#15
Looks like we've come a long way since the vaunted Norden bombsight. Works for me!
Posted by: Dar ||
08/04/2006 16:27 Comments ||
Top||
#16
Much as I detest the NYT, they have a very nice interactive page for these pictures that also includes labels. Click the buttons at top to toggle before/after pix and labels.
Posted by: Dar ||
08/04/2006 16:41 Comments ||
Top||
#17
The lighting angle between the two photographs is different. This seems to give the "before" picture much higher contrast than the "after" one.
Posted by: Phil ||
08/04/2006 16:44 Comments ||
Top||
#18
The lighting angle between the two photographs is different. This seems to give the "before" picture much higher contrast than the "after" one.
because the "camera was sad" at the destruction spawned by the evil Jooooos
Posted by: Frank G ||
08/04/2006 16:51 Comments ||
Top||
#19
Contrast on 'flat' is less, Phil, because all the flatness is humilliating.
#20
It's too bad Moses is dead. Robert Moses, that is. I'm waiting for the Beirut SimCity scenario.
Posted by: Eric Jablow ||
08/04/2006 17:57 Comments ||
Top||
#21
EJ, you bring up a great point. Moses probably would have been the only modern who could have understood and worked the Middle Eastern web of corruption to his advantage.
Last night, al-Arabia TV (Dubai) reported that a new Sunni Jihadi front has been established in Lebanon, named The Islamic Action Front (Jabhat al-Amal al-Islami). According to Muslim World News (MWN), Fathi Yakan, a follower of Sayyid Qutb, is believed to be the main establisher of the new Front, which brings together major Sunni organizations from all parts of Lebanon (which altogether include several thousand members), aiming to fill an existing gap and create an authoritative body for the Sunnis in Lebanon, that will work in co-operation with the other authoritative bodies. Yakan further stated the Fronts commitment to all aspects of Jihad, including its military side, and its willingness to fight alongside Hizbullah.
In addition, Ibrahim al-Masri, Deputy Head of the Jamaa Islamiyya (the Lebanese branch of the Muslim Brotherhood, also according to al-Arabia), said in a seperate interview their fighters stand shoulder-to-shoulder fighting with Hizbullah. Al-Masri dated the military co-operation of the Muslim Brotherhood and Hizbullah back to the 1980s. He said their fighters are stationed in villages on the Lebanon-Israel border strip (including Shabaa and Shuba); they are assisted, he affirmed, by the Jamaas infrastructure of (civilian) institutions and have their own ammunition and stocks.
Today, Muslim Brotherhood leader Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawis website, Islam Online published an article that quotes Masri as stating The Sunni Islamic Group in Lebanon fighters are defending southern Lebanon hand-in-hand with Hizbullah. He further states that we have military combatant groups in the border areas to defend villages there. This is probably one of the first times Muslim Brotherhood has admitted to having a military combatant group.
It is also clear that Qaradawi and the Muslim Brotherhood are rejecting the fatwa issued last week by Saudi prominent clergymen which prohibited support of Hizbullah due to its Shiite background.
On July 30th, Qaradawis official webpage published an interview the Sheikh gave to the official paper of the nationalist liberal al-Wafd party in Egypt on July 27. MWN analysis highlights the following points the Sheikh raised:
Qaradawi states that the Lebanese resistance is a lawful (shari) Jihad, which, alongside its Palestinian sister represents the noblest form of resistance. Currently, says the Sheikh, when our Nation is in a situation of lack of vividness and disgrace, the only proof the Nation is still alive is the resistance we see in Palestine and Lebanon. There is no dignity, says the Sheikh, in any other acts, and all the Arab organizations are surrounded by submission. Qaradawi now sees Jihad as a religious individual commandment (faradh ayn) which is obligatory to women even without the consent of their husbands, to children even without the consent of their parents and servants even without the consent of their masters.
In the Sheikhs opinion, the Arab organizations think Israel is an unbeatable force, in a similar way to how the Mongols were thought of (in the 13th century). He calls upon them to start acting and stop talking. The Sheikh adds that the problem with achieving Jihad is the lack of freedom inside the Nation, and if there had been freedom in our countries, millions would have volunteered to join Jihad and help resistance in all the Arab and Muslim countries to win.
Sheikh Qaradawi stresses the Lebanese resistance should not be perceived Shiite but as part of the Muslim Nation (ummah). The ground for his statement is (the Shiites) agree with (the Sunnis) on most of the main principles (of Islam) and (only) differentiate over part of the branches. Furthermore, says the Sheikh, the Shiites in Iraq should be condemned for their radical approach. He calls them to abandon their hostility towards their Sunni Muslim brothers and stand together against the daily massacres, from which the only ones to gain are the American occupation and the Zionist entity.
Sheikh Qaradawi praises the Lebanese resistance, which succeeded in cleansing the Muslim land from the Israeli filth, except for the Shabaa farms, that, with Allahs will be released soon. He says one of the noblest achievements of the Lebanese resistance is the capture of Israeli soldiers, after the prisoners were only from our side, and thousands of our sons are in the occupation prisons. The Sheikh further praises the Lebanese resistance which succeeded in bombarding with missiles the Israeli valley, made the Zionists hide in shelters, made Israel for the first time acknowledge its (civilian) casualties by Hizbullahs bombardments and caused it (financial) damages in millions.
Sheikh Qaradawi says the US hopes to change the map to create a new Middle East, in which Israel is the only ruling power and is able to force its wills over everyone. He proves it by saying that while all the world calls for a cease fire, Rice granted Israel a green light to complete the destruction of all essentials of life, and (Israel) started it by destroying houses, killings of innocents and turning civilians into refugees.
#1
which succeeded in cleansing the Muslim land from the Israeli filth,
Are'nt there, like, 15,000 of them there now, that were'nt there a month ago?
I would be fired fom my job if I was that successful.
#3
If this is serious, it represents several things.
First, the MB is huge, and international. Unless this is just a local faction of the MB, this is a major game change.
Second, the US has never declared the MB to be a terrorist org, even though it has spun off dozens of recognized terror orgs.
Third, if this includes the Egyptian branch of the MB, it is in open revolt against Egypts official and clear statement of neutrality, and may be a de factor declaration of civil war.
#4
Sheikh Qaradawi praises the Lebanese resistance, which succeeded in cleansing the Muslim land from the Israeli filth, except for the Shabaa farms, that, with Allahs will be released soon.
Does anyone still believe that Qaradawi is a "moderate" Muslim. It astounds me that this psychopath f&ckwit is still stealing oxygen.
IAF fighter jets attacked at least 15 targets around Beirut on Friday - three bridges linking Beirut with north Lebanon and a bridge linking Beirut to the south. It was the first time Israel struck a major Christian population center to the north of the Lebanese capital. Four civilians were killed and ten wounded in the strike, according to the Lebanese Red Cross. The IAF also attacked a power station in the southern Bekaa Valley, causing a blackout in the area of Kiraoun. Four bridges on the main north-south coastal highway were hit. The road links Beirut to Syria. Three more bridges, linking Beirut to northern Lebanon were also destroyed. The bridges were located in Maameltain, Madfoun and Halat.
South of Beirut, a Lebanese soldier was killed in an air strike on an army base near the airport. Three were also killed as warplanes targeted a building, a 'safe house' and an office used by Hizbullah terrorists in the Dahiyeh neighborhood in south Beirut. The IAF also flew 15 sorties over the neighborhood of Ouzai, another Hizbullah stronghold. The highway to the south begins in the southern Beirut neighborhood.
The attacks come in the wake of a threat by Hizbullah chief terrorist Hassan Nasrallah, who warned on Thursday that Tel Aviv would become the next target if Beirut was attacked. If you bomb our capital Beirut, we will bomb the capital of your usurping entity, he said. We will bomb Tel Aviv. The White City, as Tel Aviv is known, remains untouched thus far.
Also, in news briefs:
(IsraelNN.com) 120 Katyusha rockets have landed in northern communities since Friday morning.
(IsraelNN.com) A woman sustained moderate-to-serious injuries in a rocket attack near Maalot.
(IsraelNN.com) IDF Homefront Command officials report that sirens did sound in Zichron and Binyamina, but there were no rocket attacks in those areas. Military officials stated with certainty that the sirens in those areas were false alarms.
Posted by: Steve ||
08/04/2006 08:29 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[6 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Nasrallah, the capital of Israel is Jerusalem. Idiot.
Posted by: Eric Jablow ||
08/04/2006 8:50 Comments ||
Top||
#2
No wonder they hit the Gaza strip the other day then!
Posted by: Tony (UK) ||
08/04/2006 9:26 Comments ||
Top||
#3
Time for this piece of human kak to join his predessor Sheikh Musawi, who, thanks to the forward thinking IDF, left this troubled world and joined his heavenly virgins in 1992.
#7
Well the hezbos must be taking an ass kicking, it appears their strategy for relief is to report large numners of civilian casualties ... see jerusalem post reports.
And the US still doesn't have its embassy in Jerusalem either. We're idiots too.
Posted by: Eric Jablow ||
08/04/2006 13:57 Comments ||
Top||
#9
OT, but I am wondering why I have not seen/heard of any Apaches or other attack helicopters participating in the Israeli actions. Can anyone educate me? I would think that they would be very handy in close air support and targeting the Katyusha launchers.
Israeli Defense Minister Amir Peretz ordered the army late today to advance into southern Lebanon up to the Litani River after almost 500 rockets fell on Israel in the past two days, killing nine civilians.
The Defense Minster instructed the Israel Defense Forces this evening to prepare for the next stage of the operation...
``The Defense Minster instructed the Israel Defense Forces this evening to prepare for the next stage of the operation,'' a ministry spokeswoman said, speaking anonymously by regulation. ``The objective is to paralyze rocket launching areas of the short range rockets from the international border and up to the Litani.''
A push to the river, which runs across southern Lebanon and in some places is as many as 30 kilometers (19 miles) from Israel's northern border, would give Israel control of a stretch of land about 30 kilometers wide and 30 kilometers deep, and would mark an escalation in the conflict, now in its fourth week, with the militant Islamic group Hezbollah. Israel previously focused on air attacks on Beirut and other places, as well as limited incursions across the border.
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said Aug. 1 Israel won't stop fighting until a United Nations peacekeeping force great enough to contain Hezbollah is deployed in southern Lebanon. He said in an interview with The Times, London, published today that it would have to be about 15,000-strong. A UN meeting planned for today to discuss the force was canceled.
Cease-Fire Offer Hezbollah Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah said from his hidey hole his fighters won't stop attacks until all Israeli soldiers leave Lebanon, while offering a cease-fire if Israeli halts assaults.
When you decide to halt your aggression on our cities, towns, civilians and infrastructure, we will not hit any settlement or town with rockets...
``When you decide to halt your aggression on our cities, towns, civilians and infrastructure, we will not hit any settlement or town with rockets,'' Nasrallah said from a deep, deep, deep bunker and plenty of burly hard boyz guarding the door in a speech broadcast on the group's al-Manar television station late today. Hezbollah seeks to inflict maximum casualties on Israel and is able to launch attacks on any town it chooses, he said, "and as soon as I get out of the swimming pool behind Assad's guesthouse youse are gonna get it!".
The UN has made little progress toward a cease-fire since U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice left Israel July 31 after failing to broker an agreement. A French resolution calls for an immediate cease-fire. The U.S. has resisted such a halt until a political framework is in place to disarm Hezbollah and bar the group from control of southern Lebanon.
Israeli Air Strikes
Israeli air strikes today targeted missile launchers, Hezbollah offices and a vehicle carrying weapons, the army said. Hezbollah fired 150 rockets into Israel, killing four civilians in Acre and three in Maalot, police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said. An eighth died in Acre, Israeli medics said, making today the single deadliest day since July 16, when eight people also died.
In Lebanon, two soldiers were killed and two wounded north of Marwaheen, an Israeli Defense Forces spokesman said, speaking anonymously by regulation. That town is one of several new locations where Israeli forces are operating, said Milos Strugar, a spokesman for the UN Interim Force. Exchanges of fire in the area are ``heavy,'' Strugar said, and soldiers maintained a presence in the villages of Ayta al- Shaab, Maroun al-Ras, Mais al-Jabal and Kfarkila.
In a separate operation, aircraft fired missiles early today near Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip, killing eight Palestinians, unidentified Palestinian medical officials and witnesses said.
... Israeli forces had created a security zone encompassing 20 villages in Lebanon...
The army declined to comment on reports that Israeli forces had created a security zone encompassing 20 villages in Lebanon. Israel hasn't launched a full-scale military attack on Lebanon or Hezbollah since pulling troops out of an area of southern Lebanon held for 18 years until May 2000.
Israeli jets dropped leaflets at about 6:45 p.m. local time today on two areas in southern Beirut, urging its residents to leave, Lebanon's national news agency reported.
Lebanese Deaths
More than 900 Lebanese have been killed since the fighting began, Prime Minister Fouad Siniora said in a video statement. Sixty-five Israelis have been killed, according to the military and police in Israel. Hundreds of thousands of people have been forced from their homes by Hezbollah rocket attacks on northern Israel and Israeli air raids in Lebanon.
Hezbollah's resisting so forcefully to Israel has raised their popularity...
Lebanon's acting foreign minister said he doubts that his government would agree to invite a European-led peacekeeping force into southern Lebanon because of opposition from Hezbollah and its allies Syria and Iran, the Washington Post reported today, citing an interview with Tareq Mitri in New York. ``Hezbollah's resisting so forcefully to Israel has raised their popularity'' during the current conflict and the group's views on the size and mandate of an international force must be considered, Mitri told the newspaper.
Posted by: Fred ||
08/04/2006 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[13 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Hezbollah's views on the size and mandate of an international force must be considered, Mitri told the newspaper
Right. And Ben Laden's views on the fate of non-muslims should be considered too. And Ahmadimonkey's views on Israel, of course.
#2
We have now dared Nasralla to send rockets to Tel Aviv.
I guess if he swallows bait he will send a few ZilZal missiles on their way to Tel aviv, clearing the way to an Israeli full war declaration on Siria (initially) and on his secret Master Pupeteers TM the vererable Ahmadinagad and the Ayatollas.
This will be the best opportunity we will ever have of sending a few well aimed nukes at the Iranian reactor and Uranium enrichment sites.
Please correct me if I'm wrong.
Posted by: Elder of Zion ||
08/04/2006 6:15 Comments ||
Top||
#3
ever notice that Hezbollah and the lebanese puppets hold NO cards and yet make demands.
Isn't Nasrallah still in Damascus "for consultations"?
Posted by: Frank G ||
08/04/2006 8:29 Comments ||
Top||
#4
Hezbollah Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah said his fighters won't stop attacks until all Israeli soldiers leave Lebanon, while offering a cease-fire if Israeli halts assaults
You mean a cease fire in which you lob rockets, send hit teams across the border, and kidnap Israeli citizens. Hmmmmmmm....NO.
#6
Frank, unfortunately they do have the card of world public opinion with its anti-Israeli and anti-US bias. The more heat that gets put on the US the more likely a brokered cease fire becomes in which some of the demands actually get met. So, Israel has to target the enemy more aggressively in the limited time left. I know the general Rantberg view is that public opinion counts for little, but it does impact elections for good (Germany) or ill (Spain, Italy) and it does make a difference who comes to power.
#9
Notably absent from this article is the fact that the UN has called for the disarmament of Hezbullah and removal of Syrian influence from Lebanon. Funny how when Israel is enforcing UN resolutions, these resolutions go down the memory hole, but when Israel is violating the spirit of ridiculous, unjust UN resolutions it is screamed from the highest mountain that they are in violation of the UN.
#11
true, now the exchange of lebanese prisoners and shabaa farms to Lebanon become the new baseline - totally contradicting prior positions by all involved - message: "kill and kidnap Jooooos, suffer the consequences, and we'll make sure you save face and gain in the end"
Posted by: Frank G ||
08/04/2006 19:33 Comments ||
Top||
#12
A problem
The Israeli tanks dont have real protection against RPGs - their Defence was too cheap to finance a Raphael Trophy anti RPG system :(
Hope they remember Psalm 91
j
Posted by: Jimbo ||
08/04/2006 22:31 Comments ||
Top||
Israel resumed air strikes on the southern suburbs of Beirut Thursday. Israel's prime minister says his government is close to accomplishing its goals in Lebanon, and a cease-fire could take effect next week. At least 646 Lebanese and 56 Israelis have died so far in the conflict. Israeli war planes carried out strikes on southern Beirut as well as against targets in Lebanon's eastern Bekaa Valley, and on roads near the Syrian border Thursday.
In an interview with the Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera, Israel's Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said Israel was close to achieving its objective of carving out a six-to-seven kilometer wide security zone in southern Lebanon. He also said he believed the United Nations will vote on a cease-fire next week. Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni told reporters that she believes Israel and the international community share the same goals in Lebanon. "The idea is to disarm Hezbollah and to assist the Lebanese government exercise its sovereignty on the entire Lebanon. This is not a simple task but I believe the international community will stick to its goal," she said.
Posted by: Fred ||
08/04/2006 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[2 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Wat u see Ben? Nothing yet, just some smoke from what appears to be a goat BBQ, resume firing please.
A massive wave of guerrilla rockets pounded northern Israel in a matter of minutes Thursday, killing eight people hours before Hezbollah's leader offered to stop the attacks if Israel ends its airstrikes. With four soldiers killed in Lebanon, it was the deadliest day for Israel in its two-front war.
Israel unleashed airstrikes on the southern Beirut suburb of Dahieh early Friday, saying its targets were Hezbollah facilities and an office of Hamas, the militant group which runs the Palestinian government. Israeli artillery shells earlier soared into the hills of southern Lebanon, sometimes as many as 15 per minute.
In the second front of its offensive against Islamic militants, Israel sent dozens of tanks into the Gaza Strip as aircraft fired at clusters of militants. The heavy clashes killed eight Palestinians, including an 8-year-old boy.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Fred ||
08/04/2006 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[3 views]
Top|| File under:
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.
Periodically, as a form of psychological warfare, the Israelis hack into Lebanese television and play this video, which expresses disdain--to put it mildly--for Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah:
Militant attacks killed four Canadian soldiers and wounded 10 Thursday while 21 Afghan civilians died from a suicide car bombing - the latest barrage of violence that has accompanied NATO's new security mission in southern Afghanistan. Suspected Taliban fighters firing rocket-propelled grenades from a school killed three soldiers and wounded six involved in a security operation with Afghan troops near the village of Pashmul, west of Kandahar city, a NATO statement said. It said NATO and Afghan troops "inflicted severe casualties on the insurgents and disrupted their leadership in the Pashmul area," but gave no details. 
At least 25 suspected Islamic militants were arrested after Bangladesh's crack security force raided their hideout in a forest north of the capital, officials said on Thursday. The militants were training in the hideout close to a madrassa near Bhaluka town, north of Dhaka, when they were arrested late on Wednesday, according to Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) commander Colonel Nurul Momen. "We found bomb-making materials, fuses, wires in the hideout," Momen said.
GROZNY: Five Russian soldiers were killed on Thursday in the war-torn republic of Chechnya, while two police officers from the interior ministry's forces were killed in neighbouring Ingushetia, police said.
QUETTA: A powerful bomb exploded outside the office of the Noshaki district coordination officer on Thursday, but there were no casualties. "The blast was so powerful that it broke the windowpanes of the office and was heard in the far-off areas of the district," local journalist Shah Nazar Badani told Daily Times. Badani said the blast took place in a store owned by some Afghan refugees.
LANDIKOTAL: The Khyber Agency political administration raided a house on Thursday, seizing stolen US radar equipment and arresting three suspects. 
MUMBAI: 
TO most people, soft-spoken, well-educated 
At least 44 people were killed in sporadic violence in Iraq on Thursday. Ten people were killed on Thursday in a roadside bomb in Al-Amin, an eastern district of Baghdad, a police source said. A further 14 were wounded. The casualties appeared to be civilians, rather than members of the security forces, the police source said. 
(BNA) Israeli forces arrested today one of Hamas's top leaders in Al Bera city in Ramallah in the West Bank. Palestinian sources said that the Israeli army arrested Zayed Abu Diya, from his home located in the centre of the West Bank. The Israeli forces had conducted an arrest campaign in the West Bank last night arresting 31 people from various Palestinian movements.
A barrage of Hezbollah rockets slammed into northern Israel on Thursday, killing at least eight Israelis. Four people were killed when a rocket crashed directly into a house near the northern town of Ma'alot, and another four were killed when a rocket exploded near their vehicle in Acre. Four people were seriously wounded and two others sustained moderate wounds in rocket strikes in Acre, Hurfeish and Kiryat Shmona. Another 31 people were also lightly wounded in the attacks. Shimon Zaribi, 44, and Albert ben Abu, 41, both of Acre, were killed in the rocket attack on their hometown. Sinati Sinati, Amir Naeem and Mohammed Fouad, all 17-year-old residents of the village of Tarshiha, were killed in the attack near Ma'alot.
Israel Air Force aircraft on Wednesday bombed a house in central Gaza used by Hamas militants to store weapons, the Israel Defense Forces said. Palestinian security sources said the house was owned by a Hamas militant and was largely destroyed. There were no immediate reports of casualties in the air strike. 
A Qassam rocket fired from the Gaza Strip landed Wednesday morning in an industrial zone in Ashkelon, lightly wounding one person. The wounded man was hit by shrapnel and evacuated to the Barzilai Medical Center for treatment. Another Qassam landed in a community in the western Negev, causing no injuries or damage. A salvo of five Qassam rockets were fired early Tuesday from both the northern and southern Gaza Strip at Sderot and the western Negev, causing damage but no injuries.
Gunmen clashed with members of the Hamas-led police force in a Gaza City hospital on Tuesday, wounding at least five people, medics and witnesses said. It was the latest round of internal fighting in the Palestinian-ruled coastal territory since Hamas rose to power in March after an upset election victory. In the last two days two members of the rival Fatah movement have been shot and wounded by unknown assailants in Gaza. Earlier on Tuesday, a gunman shot and wounded a Hamas member earlier in the southern Gaza town of Khan Younis, medics and witnesses said.
Israeli aircraft dropped on Thursday thousands of flyers over Gaza City to incite the Palestinians' discontent with politburo chief of the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) Khaled Mashaal, Palestinian witnesses said. They said that the A4-size flyers showed a cartoon image for Mashaal as a gambler who bet on Palestinian towns in the Gaza Strip, including Rafah, Khan Younis, Gaza City, Jabalya, Biet Lahia and Biet Hanoun. 
Cotabato City, 4 August (AKI) - A Filipino Muslim cleric was detained over alleged links with the Abu Sayyaf terrorist organization, police and military officials told Adnkronos International (AKI) on Friday. Senior Inspector Samson Obatay, the city's police spokesperson, confirmed that Hussain Abedin was a suspected member of the group Abu Sofia and was arrested at 7.00 pm at the terminal of Weena Buss Company in Cotabato City, in Mindanao, southern Philippines on Thursday. "He had existing arrest warrants and we have been looking for him," Obatay said.
Hezbollah Secretary General 
Israel resumed air strikes on the southern suburbs of Beirut Thursday. Israel's prime minister says his government is close to accomplishing its goals in Lebanon, and a cease-fire could take effect next week. At least 646 Lebanese and 56 Israelis have died so far in the conflict. Israeli war planes carried out strikes on southern Beirut as well as against targets in Lebanon's eastern Bekaa Valley, and on roads near the Syrian border Thursday. 
A massive wave of guerrilla rockets pounded northern Israel in a matter of minutes Thursday, killing eight people hours before Hezbollah's leader offered to stop the attacks if Israel ends its airstrikes. With four soldiers killed in Lebanon, it was the deadliest day for Israel in its two-front war.
