Here at Rantburg we have been watching Egypt's descent, tracked against Spengler's analysis and predictions (here's his latest). Below is what it looks like from within Egypt. May God help them all, because President Morsi most assuredly won't be able to.
[AlAhram] Egypt is descending deeper into the trap of borrowing and repaying debt. This trap is not only an economic one, but also a political one, with consequences for Egyptian national illusory sovereignty
"Qatari funds are a short-term boost because of Egypt's current economic condition, but will they help it recover?" That is the question Bloomberg news agency, specialising in financial and economic issues, put to Said Hirsh, the financial analyst and expert in London, who has a PhD in economics from Bristol University, right after Qatar announced it is buying Egyptian government bonds worth $3 billion and sending natural gas to Egypt. Hirsh's response was definitive: "I don't think so. It is entirely unclear what the Egyptian government is trying to do."
The impact of Qatari loans was quick (and I do not use the term Qatari assistance because it is buying government bonds -- a news scoop for Al-Shorouq quoting a source at the Ministry of Finance who said it will be for 18 months with an interest rate of 4.6 per cent). Alongside a loan worth $2 billion from Libya without interest for five years and a grace period of three years (meaning Egypt would not begin paying back the loan for another three years), these funds directly propped the Egyptian pound after it lost 10 per cent of its value in four months, and about one quarter of its value since January 2011.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: trailing wife ||
04/21/2013 00:00 ||
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#2
Arab and Egyptian commentators on this never seem to be able to admit that Egypt's economic problems include the fact that Egypt produces essentially nothing of value to the rest of the world beside Islamic law books (exporting below $10M/yr) and tourism experience.
Posted by: lord garth ||
04/21/2013 10:51 Comments ||
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Posted by: Barbara ||
04/21/2013 11:20 Comments ||
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#5
Well Egypt used to could market a certain variety of Western Veneer, with the ascendancy of the MB even that poor product has gone the way of the tourists.
[ALLAFRICA] The government has finally tilted towards granting amnesty to the Boko Haram ... not to be confused with Procol Harum, Harum Scarum, possibly to be confused with Helter Skelter. The Nigerian version of al-Qaeda and the Taliban rolled together and flavored with a smigeon of distinctly Subsaharan ignorance and brutality... . Our present government as we all know is in a perpetual flux and constant change towards the directions whichever the wind blows us to or the tidal waves lands us to. The first mistake we made towards the issue of amnesty as a country is considering particularly economic factor and others like the political factor centrifugal to the amnesty solution for Boko Haram.
While the Niger Deltans rebelled for developmental, economic and environmental problems and complete resource control, they also benefit economically and finance their atrocities from the operation of illegal refineries, oil bunkering, illegal taxation of companies and individuals, kidnapping etc.
But Boko Haram have no clear economic demands to be provided through amnesty or any dialogue, just as they don't have clear sources of finance within the country for their weapons and operations. And their religiosity is not tenable because they are not backed by any known sound Islamic principles but its opposites and excuses and excesses of a sworn fault seeker which amount to no objective at all but to create confusion and insecurity and a bad name for Islam to hang it.
The second difference between the two is while the Niger Delta snuffies have full support of their leaders and fellow Niger Deltans, the Boko Haram are disdainfully rejected and never supported by any known entity in Borno or Yobe state. And this was when they were operating in the open and were really a group of untrained young, illiterate and poor misguided and brainwashed members of the society. After their dismantling by the army in 2009, there was a significant paradigmatic shift in membership and operational strategy, displaying higher sophistication in training, finance and co-ordination, and with considerable recruitment of more non Mohammedans into the operational network of the Boko Haram.
The thousand that flocked behind Muhammad Yusuf at that time are not faceless and are up to date known for they are our brothers, sisters, relatives and friends but seem to be from all indications totally disoriented from the second phase of the Boko Haram hullaballoo. These suggest a limited group of trained snipers and explosive physicists trumpeting their heinous acts in the name of the earlier hoodwinked Islamist that carried the first guns. The Niger Delta Militants were not in hiding in that fashion and were therefore able to come forward to accept the amnesty and benefit from the accompanying boom it brought to them.
The Boko Haram of today will never be able to trust any government and come out for any amnesty or dialogue, because amnesty or dialogue does not tally in any way with their mission or be able to placate their grievances that are never coherent or reinforce their believe for agreeable and better days for all in terms of justice, economy and politics which are not their objectives. They are only a bunch of pipers under the dictate of their payers.
Although there have never been problems without solutions, an amnesty or dialogue with Boko Haram, even if staged, is like a pact with the devil where both sides would be rangers in the shortest time. The only option open to government is to re-strengthen its security outfits particularly the Customs and Immigrations services, alongside the police. The Nigerian Immigration service in particular must be up to date with the movement in and out of both foreigners and Nigerians alike while at the same time being thoroughly vigilant on the activities of foreigners residing in Nigeria. The Nigerian Customs must be on red alert to what is imported and exported. And the search should not be limited to weapons alone but full and all round information about all goods because snuffies do transfer most of their finance in form of goods that are legal not liquid cash. However, a hangover is the wrath of grapes... painful to the lives of Nigerians is the fact that it is debatable who is less corrupt between our customs operatives and the police or any other Nigerian institution, including the top brass as the executive, judiciary and legislature.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/21/2013 00:00 ||
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[Bangla Daily Star] WE are outraged by a group of criminals torching a 200-year-old Hindu temple at Rajoir upazila in Madaripur. This adds to a long list of places of worship coming under assault since the pronouncement of capital sentence to Saydee on February 28. As many as 94 Hindu temples have been attacked in March alone.
Attack on temples is the worst of crimes that anyone can commit because it is a direct assault on the values of a pluralistic society whose inner strength lies in communal harmony, coexistence and peaceful pursuit of one's religion. Respect for other faiths, their places of worship and symbols is anchored in our cultural heritage and therefore is a prized object for us. The wave of violence on Hindu community has come about on a scale that is unprecedented and therefore so worrying.
It is undoubtedly the state's responsibility to protect minorities, their places of worship and ways of life. But that this government did not foresee it coming and has been somewhat caught unawares is indefensible. Also incomprehensible is the local administrations' failure to throw security rings around potentially vulnerable minority community pockets in the country. The government has 'failed to discharge its constitutional obligation to protect the minority'.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/21/2013 00:00 ||
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Rep. Peter King is calling for greater law enforcement focus on Muslim communities, arguing that authorities should put aside what is politically correct and recognize that America faces major threats from Islamic terrorism.
Obviously the main international base, the terrorist threats are coming from the Muslim community, King (R-N.Y.) told POLITICO on Saturday. "There have been 16 terror plots against New York [since Sept. 11, 2001], all Islamist-based. Were at war with Islamic terrorism. Its coming from people within the Muslim community by the terrorists coming from that community, just like the mafia comes from Italian communities.
King, the former chairman of the House Committee on Homeland Security, now leads the sub-committee on counterterrorism and intelligence. He spoke to POLITICO a day after the suspects in the Boston Marathon bombings were subdued: Tamerlan Tsarnaev was killed in clashes with law enforcement, while his younger brother, Dzhokar, was taken into custody and sent to the hospital following a stand-off with police Friday night.
I think these two obviously were Islamic terrorists motivated by Islamist views, said King, who also noted in the interview that he thinks the bulk of Muslim Americans are good people.
He said that while al Qaeda and other groups now have limited abilities to launch attacks from outside the country, people within the United States, possibly working with outside groups, can stay under federal law enforcements radar, as the Boston Marathon suspects may have done, he said. The FBI did interview Tamerlan Tsarnaev in 2011, but the case didnt significantly advance.
Stepping up local vigilance is key, added King, who has held controversial hearings before on radical Islam. He pointed to New York law enforcement, noting that there are special units devoted to counterterrorism, and that authorities arent afraid to keep tabs on certain communities.
NYPD [does] monitor the community, capture people, and they are not politically correct, they do what has to be done, he said. When youre going after the mafia you go to Italian communities If youre looking for Islamic terrorism, you focus on Muslim communities.
[WEEKLYSTANDARD] "In this age of instant reporting and tweets and blogs, there's a temptation to latch on to any bit of information, sometimes to jump to conclusions," said President Obama, in the late evening of April 19, after Dzokhar Tsarnaev was captured alive in Watertown, Mass. "But when a tragedy like this happens, with public safety at risk and the stakes so high, it's important that we do this right. That's why we have investigations. That's why we relentlessly gather the facts. That's why we have courts. And that's why we take care not to rush to judgment -- not about the motivations of these individuals; certainly not about entire groups of people."
Fair words of caution. We might all do well, after a week like this one, to take a deep breath and reconsider what we think we know with clear eyes and an open mind.
But it's equally important not to avoid conclusions about the motivations of these individuals because such conclusions are discomfiting. And it's especially important not to explain away facts because they contradict assumptions about the threats we face.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/21/2013 09:04 ||
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[NATIONALREVIEW] In America, all atrocities are not equal: Minutes after the Senate declined to support so-called gun control in the wake of the Newtown massacre, the president rushed ill-advisedly on air to give a whiny, petulant performance predicated on the proposition that one mans mass infanticide should call into question the constitutional right to bear arms. Simultaneously, the media remain terrified that another mans mass infanticide might lead you gullible rubes to question the constitutional right to abortion, so the ongoing Kermit Gosnell trial in Philadelphia has barely made the papers even though it involves large numbers of fully delivered babies who were decapitated and had their feet chopped off and kept in pickling jars. Which would normally be enough to guarantee a perpetrator front-page coverage for weeks on end. In the most recent testimony, one of the clinics nurses testified that she saw a baby delivered into the toilet, where his little arms and feet flapped around as if trying to swim to safety. Then another womens health worker reached in and, in the procedures preferred euphemism, snipped the babys neck i.e., severed his spinal column. Doctor Gosnell seems likely to prove Americas all-time champion mass murderer. But his victims are ideologically problematic for the media, and so the poor blood-soaked monster will never get his moment in the spotlight.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/21/2013 09:03 ||
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#1
So says Howie Carr, meanwhile in Australia another Carr named Bob who is reportedly an undocumented escapee from a lunatic asylum and is presently Foreign Minister has a panic attack and opines thus; AUSTRALIA has taken a lead role in Syria's humanitarian crisis amid warnings that if not resolved within months, the world would have to deal with the greatest exodus of refugees since World War II.
Foreign Minister Bob Carr last night took an emergency aid plan to a meeting of European foreign leaders and the Arab League which said Australia would immediately boost its medical and food aid by $24 million for the two million people so far forced from their homes.
Mr Carr said Australia would also offer to help rebuild a future democratic government in the war-torn Middle Eastern country, but demanded terrorist groups such as al-Qaeda played no role in ruling the country.(sure Bob)
The country's chemical weapons would also have to be secured so they did not fall into the hands of terrorists.(by you and whose army?)
Australia would not be spared the ultimate knock-on effects of millions of refugees if the regime of Bashar al-Assad was not removed.
"The Syrian war is one of the world's great humanitarian disasters," Mr Carr said. "It has been described as risking the greatest refugee crisis since World War II."
Cambridge prides itself on embracing people from across the world, people of different religions and cultures, people, in other words, like Tamerlan and Dzhokhor Tsarnaev. Embracing, as they are, the notion that "progress" in any direction -- up, down, left, right, in, out -- is good.
What about charmed? I think that's one of 'em.
The young Muslim brothers of Chechen descent from Kyrgyzstan found a hospitable community in the city that sees diversity and tolerance as one of its greatest strengths.
They attended Cambridge Rindge and Latin, the city's only public high school, where the student body includes teenagers from 80 nations.
They found religious brethren at the Islamic Society of Boston on Prospect Street, a short walk from their home on Norfolk Street, near Central Square.
They found friends, coaches, mentors. Dzhokhor even won a scholarship from the city.
And then it all shattered on Friday...
Perhaps more than anywhere else, people here were grasping for answers.
"This is a progressive town, the People's Republic, and how could this be in our midst?" said Larry Aaronson, a longtime Rindge and Latin teacher who knew Dzhokhor and who lives three doors down from the brothers on Norfolk Street. "I'm at a loss. I'm at a total and complete loss."
Peter Payack, the assistant wrestling coach at Rindge and Latin, said Dzhokhor wrestled on the team for three years and was captain for two years and a Greater Boston League all-star....
Payack, who has run the Marathon 24 times and often wears his blue-and-yellow Marathon jacket around Cambridge, said he was saddened that Dzhokhor has been accused of targeting a race that he knew his coach loved.
"It was like a bomb going off in my heart this morning," Payack said.
City leaders said they expected there would have to be some soul-searching in the days ahead.
"That we have a relationship to the people who perpetrated this, it does cause one pause, because we all truly believe we are the best community we could be," Councilor Kenneth E. Reeves said.
"I would almost think the Cambridge experience couldn't incubate a terrorist because that's how oriented toward peace and community this city believes itself to be." I signed a memorial book in the vestibule of St. Paul's in Cambridge the Sunday after 9/11, dedicated to the memory of parishioners & residents of Cambridge killed during the hijackings. 9/11 apparently made little impression on the city.
#1
And at the top of the list of folks we've not heard from in reference to Mr. Tsarnaev and his Chechen clan, sits CIA Director Brennan. How remarkable.
Rico, would you get me the Anwar al-Awlaki and Nadal Hasan files please ?
#2
"This is a progressive town, the People's Republic, and how could this be in our midst?" said Larry Aaronson, a longtime Rindge and Latin teacher who knew Dzhokhor and who lives three doors down from the brothers on Norfolk Street. "I'm at a loss. I'm at a total and complete loss."
I gloat.
It is a joyless gloating, but I gloat.
How DARE you, mister public school union teacher/NPR listening pseudointellectual/holier-than-thou leftist/worshipper of the postmodern, anti-Western memeset - how DARE you go through life believing that you are better, smarter, and more well informed than us bitter-clinger untermensch (not my words, but the words of YOUR president)?
You bastard. WE were right all along, and you act surprised and offer no apologies to those you treat as less than human. I am NOT above crowing, "I told you so".
So now the wages of your arrogance and condescension and self-superior attitude and bigotry against me and mine - that is to say, this attack from within your precious tender Cambridge enclave - have shattered your crappy little narrative.
Good. The shame is that more people had to suffer and die for the cluebat to have an effect on your sorry self. You should have figured it out twelve years ago when all of us ignunt subhuman bitter-clingers did, but instead you told yourself that you were just so much better and smarter than people like me with our Christianity and our guns and our beliefs in things like limited government and a strong national defense.
No, instead of getting off your high horse and at least trying to understand that we may have been onto something, it suited your worldview to say that people like me were unenlightened Neanderthals. Not "the right kind of white people, doncha know".
I gloat.
Posted by: no mo uro ||
04/21/2013 6:58 Comments ||
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no mo uro, well said. I don't gloat but I do sneer.
My son and daughter in law (late 20's) have lived in Cambridge and environs for the last 6 years.
Cambridge is only tolerant if you buy into the left-wing meme lock, stock and barrel. The people are not friendly in general. They are smug, self-satisfied and superior. It's hard to walk down the street without wanting to slap someone.
Ironically, this son is a musician that went on a tour with his band and what city did he say was the friendliest and most welcoming? Was it one of the NE enclaves? No, it was Iowa City, followed by one of his southern stops. His was not a country western or southern band, it was an alternative rock group (lousy to me ;^) but they were welcomed by all in fly-over country.
That's NOT Cambridge, their tolerance amounts to smirking equally at anyone (everyone) they judge to be their inferiors. It really is a mean and nasty place from an intellectual/emotional perspective. Not physically violent, but really nasty.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/21/2013 8:50 Comments ||
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Well-said, NMU.
Except, like Alan, I also sneer at those arrogant bastards.
"How could this be in our midst?"
Easy, you idiot. You're arrogant, self-centered, clueless jackasses (apologies to normal jackasses everywhere) who refuse to understand or even acknowledge that there are lots of people from all over the world (mostly of one particular "religion") who HATE AMERICA AND ALL IT STANDS FOR, INCLUDING YOU.
It's telling that this clown is most upset that this "happened" to them, our enlightened "betters." Obviously, it would be OK if it had "happened to" us losers in flyover country.
Suck it, fool. >:-(
Posted by: Barbara ||
04/21/2013 10:05 Comments ||
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Lived in Belmont, MA two years. Folks are superficially hard to get to know but once friends, there are none better.
It is a shame this tragedy had to happen, but it is no coincidence that it happened in the town of Richard Saltonstall. The multi-cultural acceptance of non-Americans and the rejection of and condescension toward other Americans' values is rampant throughout the holier-than-thou region. That's how it is with the Elect.
But now the nest of the Hub (of the universe) has been fouled. It won't happen overnight, but the Old Testament stiff-neckedness that underlies the region's contempt for the rest of the US will ultimately be turned toward Islam. When this is complete and the Puritans and Backcountry are united in there conviction that this too must end, the Jihadis and those who harbor them will understand what happened in Dresden in 1945.
Poor target selection by the Jihadis. Turned an ally into an enemy.
#7
That we have a relationship to the people who perpetrated this, it does cause one pause, because we all truly believe we are the best community we could be, I would almost think the Cambridge experience couldn't incubate a terrorist because that's how oriented toward peace and community this city believes itself to be.
Anybody want to take a shot at diagramming those sentences?
Posted by: Matt ||
04/21/2013 11:35 Comments ||
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NS, you must have run into the exceptions; real friends are hard to make and keep around here and I've lived in or near Boston for 40+ years.
The best description I can come up with for the elites of Boston & Cambridge are that they evince similar feelings to the noblesse oblige of the European Colonial period.
They stride casually, smirking all the way, down the streets bestowing a few coins on the beggars and street performers wallowing in their own beneficence. They all act like they think they're the Pope bestowing their wonderfulness on the masses.
#10
"This is a progressive town, the People's Republic, and how could this be in our midst?"
Numbers and geography. There are plenty of Chechens, Russians, Syrians, Middle Easterners. Afghans, Somalis, etc. on the Eastern seaboard. It's closer to 'home'. Not so many on the Western coast, and relatively few in places like San Francisco. The Iranian refugees that fled from the mullahs were smart: a significant majority settled in the Los Angeles area.
If the Islamists from Southeast Asia ever get an idea to move or expand their influence, well...
#12
Boston Globe opinion writer going back to the same old same old today: To fight the so-called war on terror, the country gave up a degree of privacy and freedom in exchange for safety and security, some of it illusory. What happened at the Boston Marathon will doubtless inspire more restrictions. There will be a brief moment of rallying, during which New York Yankees fans will sing Sweet Caroline. But the old, depressing politics of terror will ultimately break out again and continue to divide the country along ideological lines unless todays generation does something to stop it.
#13
fortunately, it was in the red-ink-producing Boston Globe, so only a few Americans saw it
Posted by: Frank G ||
04/21/2013 15:19 Comments ||
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The Cambridge so-called liberals project their phony kumbayah values on everything and wonder why it literally blew up in their faces.
The answer is simple. There are bad people out there that do not adhere to your looney values. They hate you and want to kill you and your way of life and values. That is the way of the world. Get used to it and learn Jeff Cooper's Color Code system of situational awareness. Take responsibility for your and your family's safety. Your system does not work and is suicide on the installment plan. Your choice.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
04/21/2013 15:30 Comments ||
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But the old, depressing politics of terror will ultimately break out again and continue to divide the country along ideological lines -- unless today's generation does something to stop it.
Is it too much to point out that the last several mass murders including 911 were committed by the members younger generation?
I was on an NPR show this morning, talking as I drove back from Cambridge to write this column, and a caller came on the air and started talking about how weve got to look in the mirror and ask what we as Americans have done to create angry young men like this.
I almost drove off the road.
No one who lost their life or their limbs on Boylston Street last Monday did anything to create angry young men like this. And I know that 8-year-old Martin Richard, a beautiful little boy from Dorchester who was killed by a bomb the authorities say the Tsarnaev brothers prepared and left near the finish line of the Boston Marathon, never hurt a soul. He was a kind little boy who was unfailingly nice to his classmate, the daughter of the Boston firefighter who knelt over his body.
Sean Collier, the 26-year-old MIT police officer who was shot to death Thursday night, was a wonderful young man. He worked as a civilian for the Somerville Police Department, but desperately wanted to be a cop. He was thrilled when he got the call to join the MIT force last year, and he was willing to put his life on the line for all of us, as he did late Thursday night when he responded to a call in Kendall Square and was, the police say, executed by the Tsarnaev brothers before he could even get out of his cruiser.
I am willing to bet my life on the certainty that Sean Collier would have laid down his life for anybody, including immigrants from Kyrgyzstan or Chechnya. In the end, he did lay down his life, trying to protect others.
I dont want to listen to how innocent people bear some responsibility for creating the twisted minds of the Tsarnaev brothers, who emerged from the break up of a totalitarian form of government that collapsed under the weight of ordinary people wanting freedom.
The Tsarnaev brothers are responsible for twisting a great religion to foment hatred. They dont speak for Muslims any more than I speak for overweight Irish-American guys who like to play hockey. It would be a horrific insult to their victims, and to the unimaginably brave first responders who ran toward the bombs last Monday, if there is a backlash against Muslims.
But, please, spare me the guilt.
At least lets see how this ends. At least let us bury our dead first. At least let us heal our wounded. At least let us take care of our first responders. Then maybe Ill listen to what did we do to make them hate us claptrap. Then maybe Ill go to some soul-searching debate about how our foreign policy is screwed up and how were creating too many enemies and too few allies.
#17
fortunately, it was in the red-ink-producing Boston Globe, so only a few Americans saw it
Please note the original article in this whole thread was from the Boston Globe online, which dropped its paywall right after the Marathon bombs went off. I have been watching it the entire week since. I knew there would be some real gems of reporting in it, very much like the situation right after 9/11.
The original article was a gem, IMNSHO. The opinion piece was the usual rot one might expect. The Boston Globe paywall goes up again tomorrow. Anyone interested in reading the leading local paper's reporting of this past week in its entirety had better catch up on it while they still can.
#18
Here's another item I considered a 'gem', from the NY Post online. It will probably be available for some time, and contradicts the current internet meme that the two suspects on their Thursday night shooting and explosive spree, allowed their carjack victim to go free (a meme which never made sense):
The Boston Marathon bombers took a man captive Thursday night during a carjacking that set off a frenzied police chase.
[The captive] came in here, he was in a rush running in here. T . . . telling the [night cashier], They are going to kill me! You need to call 911! said Martin El Koussa, 20, who works at a Cambridge, Mass., Mobil station.
Security footage captured the man running away from his captors.
He was terrified, said Koussa of the captive. He crawled on the ground behind the counter and hid.
Sources said the bombers had carjacked a Mercedes SUV, then used the drivers ATM card to take out $800.
They drove to a Shell station, where Dzhokhar Tsarnaev grabbed a bunch of junk food while his brother waited outside, sources said.
He was real calm, just browsing around. No emotion. He was calm like nothing happened, said station owner Alan Mednick, who reviewed the security footage before handing it over to police.
Dzhokhar dropped the food Red Bulls, chips and candy when the owner caught him trying to shoplift.
Thats when the car owner ran to the Mobil and the bombers drove away.
I have no idea why they stopped here, said Mednick bewildered. The cashier, his wife, and his whole family are scared to death right now.
IIRC, photos posted on the 'net show the hijacked vehicle had a COEXIST sticker on the back. I doubt there will be a followup article that brings both these items together in one piece.
#19
Sorry tu but he only gets it a little bit. People that get it don't say s#!t like this: The Tsarnaev brothers are responsible for twisting a great religion to foment hatred.
That "great" religion is preached just that way by mullahs and imams and emirs world wide. Moderate Muslims cheer the Tsarnaevs on it's only apostate Muslims that don't believe in these evil tactics. Tactics that are meant to eventuate the subjugation of the world.
#21
#14: "Your system does not work and is suicide on the installment plan."
As long as no innocent people get hurt ....
Posted by: Barbara ||
04/21/2013 17:36 Comments ||
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#22
kinda a funny when the wish bubble bursts.
Posted by: Jack Salami ||
04/21/2013 17:56 Comments ||
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#23
kinda a funny when the wish bubble bursts
That is merely a temporary phenomenon. Just like the Housing Bubble, the Denial Bubble will re-construct itself. Even on the afternoon of 9/11, a casual search of the internet turned up the beginnings of the deniers, distorters, and agenda pushers. This same phenomenon is already happening. Google is your friend, just remember that information now on the internet may be gone in 5 minutes.
#28
In Islam I believe it's Thou shalt not kill another muslim'. Killing Christians, Jews, and muslims-you-don't-consider-muslim-enough is A-OK - the more the merrier!
[Dawn] IN Boston, three people were killed in an act of terrorism earlier this week, and it's still headline news in the United States. President B.O. has denounced the attack, and an FBI official has promised to hunt the perpetrator to "the ends of the earth".
In Pakistain, a terrorist attack that claimed "only" three lives would probably be buried on page three of our national newspapers. As for the search for the killers, we'd be lucky if the police even registered the case.
Why this difference in approach to terrorism? The reason lies in the seriousness with which the two states take their primary duty of protecting their citizens.
In the United States, the intelligence failures that permitted 9/11 to occur prompted American leaders to ratchet up security, change laws and become highly proactive in fighting the scourge of terrorism.
Undoubtedly, these steps, taken under the Homeland Security Act of 2002, have eroded personal liberties and human rights ...which are usually open to widely divergent definitions... . But it is a fact that the Boston bombing was the first successful act of terrorism after 9/11, apart from the Fort Hood shootings by Major Nidal Hasan in 2009.
In a number of sting operations, the FBI and local police have entrapped a number of suspects -- usually Moslem -- who agreed to participate in bizarre attacks.
Through wiretaps on telephone conversations and email intercepts, American intelligence agencies have disrupted a number of terrorist plots.
As a result of this vigilance, terrorism in the US has virtually been stamped out. It is precisely because of this success that the Boston attack has caused so much fear and outrage.
Compare this muscular, no-nonsense approach with Pakistain's hopelessly inadequate response to terrorism.
For over two decades, Paks have suffered from murderous attacks from a lethal brew of gangs killing and maiming in the name of Islam. Frequently, these criminals boast of their deeds, and post videos of beheadings on the internet.
Almost invariably, the state is a mute onlooker. Intelligence agencies are either incompetent or occasionally collusive. While brave but ill-trained and poorly equipped coppers, bully boyz and soldiers have died in their thousands, politicians and generals have been unable to get their act together.
Despite the heavy casualties suffered in this vicious war, Rehman Malik Pak politician, Interior Minister under the Gilani government. Malik is a former Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) intelligence officer who rose to head the FIA during Benazir Bhutto's second tenure. Malik was tossed from his FIA job in 1998 after documenting the breath-taking corruption of the Sharif family. By unhappy coincidence Nawaz Sharif became PM at just that moment and Malik moved to London one step ahead of the button men. He had to give up the interior ministry job because he held dual Brit citizenship. , our ex-interior minister, can still pass the buck to provincial governments in the wake of the atrocities Shias have been subjected to recently.
In the US, the FBI has primary jurisdiction over all cases involving terrorism. In Pakistain, we have been unable to create a federal force along the same lines.
The result is a mishmash of agencies, ranging from covert military outfits to the Intelligence Bureau to local police who arrive at the scene of terrorist acts.
With little coordination, it should not surprise us if investigations seldom lead anywhere.
And when a suspect is actually incarcerated Drop the rosco, Muggsy, or you're one with the ages! , even with illegal arms in his possession, he is likely to be let off by our courts. Witnesses are scared of reprisals, and judges terrified of the consequences of a guilty verdict. The result is before us in the shape of an increasingly violent jihadi insurgency.
When faced with a major threat to their illusory sovereignty and to their citizens, states normally respond with force. Pakistain's response to the existential threat we face has been equivocal and half-hearted. While our army and paramilitary units have fought bravely when called upon to do so, both our military and politicianship has been ambiguous and confused.
There has been talk of an elusive consensus at GHQ and the presidency. But leadership is about forging a consensus and taking the nation along in difficult decisions, not heeding divided counsel.
As we have seen in the ongoing Taliban campaign of targeting candidates in next month's elections, there are wide variations in how these killers are viewed by different political parties. The Taliban, too, differentiate between parties: witness their threats against candidates from the PPP, the MQM and the ANP, all mainstream secular parties.
Clearly, apart from the religious parties, PML-N and PTI are both acceptable to the Taliban and their ilk. This is one reason our politicians have been unable to unite on a single platform and condemn these killers in unequivocal terms.
In other countries, any political party seeming to side with terrorists, or seeking their support, would pay a heavy price at the polls.
Not so in Pakistain. This reveals the confusion among people that has been sowed by politicians and the media. People like Imran Khan ... aka Taliban Khan, who who convinced himself that playing cricket qualified him to lead a nuclear-armed nation with severe personality problems... have been pretending that Islamic militancy is the result of the US-led war against Al Qaeda and the Afghan Taliban. By blaming the Americans and their drone campaign, our leaders absolve the Pak Taliban of their vicious crimes.
Elsewhere, no politician can get away with letting Islamic fascistioff the hook by saying their violence is motivated by extraneous factors. But by using Islamic fascistifor their own ends in Kashmire and Afghanistan, the Pak establishment is reaping what it sowed. Over the years, various jihadi groups have gained legitimacy as well as support in our intelligence agencies.
Another reason for their growing self-confidence and success is the increasingly fanatical tilt in Pakistain's public discourse.
Fuelled by a reactionary electronic media that demonises all things Western and openly justifies extremism, the deadly virus of Islamist violence grows ever more virulent.
No other country has provided as much space to terrorism as Pakistain has, and no other country has suffered as much as we have.
And yet, we continue to grope in the dark, unable to evolve a consensus or forge a strategy to confront and defeat the jihadi monsters we have ourselves unleashed.
Posted by: Fred ||
04/21/2013 00:00 ||
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Top|| File under: Govt of Pakistan
#1
In the US, the FBI has primary jurisdiction over all cases involving terrorism. In Pakistain, we have been unable to create a federal force along the same lines.
Before you undertake a somatic cell nuclear cloning, take a long hard look at the donor organization.
#2
Intelligence agencies are either incompetent or occasionally collusive
Occasionally?
While brave but ill-trained and poorly equipped coppers, militiamen and soldiers have died in their thousands, politicians and generals have been unable to get their act together
Oh, they have their act together. It's just that their 'acts' are at odds with what passes for the national interest in Pakistan.
IMNSHO, there's not a lot of difference between Pakistan and most African nations. In fact most African nations are rather superior; the governments are corrupt, but they have no delusions about being "the Land of the Pure".
[Jpost] The very fact that 110 members of Jordan's parliament (out of a total of 150) signed a petition for the release of the murderer from Naharayim speaks volumes about what parades as morality and coexistence next door to us.
Jordan, it needs to be stressed, is formally at peace with Israel.
Even the minimally fair-minded agree that the cold-blooded shooting of Israeli schoolgirls is as heinous a crime of hate as imaginable.
Hence the implicit message from Amman is disconcerting in the extreme. Purported representatives of public opinion showed us where their hearts are, regardless of whether the massacre-perpetrator stays behind bars or not.
Surely even the minimally fair-minded must agree that the March 13, 1997, cold-blooded shooting of Israeli schoolgirls is as heinous a crime of hate as imaginable.
There should be no equivocation here.
In the wake of the 1994 Israel-Jordan peace treaty, the confluence of the Jordan and Yarmouk rivers, (Naharayim -- two rivers in Hebrew) was reserved as a tourist site and named optimistically "the Island of Peace." It was under Jordanian illusory sovereignty but developed and maintained by several Israeli kibbutzim. It was ironically there that a Jordanian corporal, Ahmed Daqamseh, opened fire on Israeli children from Beit Shemesh during their school outing.
He killed seven 13-year-old girls and maimed others.
Daqamseh was sentenced to seven life terms, which in the Jordanian context means 25 years in prison. Yet he is far from being disowned and condemned by his compatriots.
The reverse is true. There has been continued overt and vociferous agitation for his release and he is often out-rightly celebrated as a hero. Distressingly, King Abdullah keeps mum.
Two years ago then-justice minister Hussein Mjali didn't hesitate to hector blatantly for an immediate release and to portray the cowardly killer of maidens of tender years as a laudable role model.
Now and then Jordan informally promises that no release is being contemplated, but these soothing messages are relayed in whispered tones behind the scenes, almost furtively. The impression is that a bold statement would run afoul of the predominant public sentiment.
This is far from incidental and attests to unsettling trends in the monarchy, which has obviously come a very long way away from the contrition so compellingly expressed immediately after the homicide by King Hussein.
Israelis haven't forgotten his gesture of humane humility when he came here personally and visited each of the bereaved families.
Hussein's son Abdullah, the current king, has obviously failed to emulate his father and speak up forthrightly and fearlessly in the name of common decency. We have no way of ascertaining whether Hussein in his day indeed accurately reflected the mood of his people, but he certainly tried to change perceptions for the good. This trend appears to have been effectively reversed.
The very fact that Abdullah at all countenanced -- even for a while -- Mjali's appointment as justice minister in 2011 was mind-boggling. Mjali after all served as Daqamseh's attorney during his trial, and hence his predisposition was no unknown quotient to begin with. It should have been no surprise that he'd be the blusterous chief speaker at a demonstration for Daqamseh's release.
The signal to public opinion in Jordan and beyond was particularly troubling. The grassroots was encouraged to revere Daqamseh.
Jordan's powerful Islamist movement and the country's 14 trade unions, with more than 200,000 members, relentlessly campaign for Daqamseh's release. Against this background, the support expressed for Daqamseh by an overwhelming majority of Jordanian politicians is no bolt from the blue.
Moreover, Daqamseh is no chastened penitent. He told a Jordanian weekly that "if I could return to that moment, I would behave exactly the same way. Every day that passes, I grow stronger in the belief that what I did was my duty."
His mother told Al Jizz: "My son assured me he has no regrets... He said: The only thing that angers me is that the gun didn't work properly. Otherwise I would have killed everyone there."
Abdullah won't secure his position by letting this genie out of the bottle. Instead of appeasing the voices of hate, he should educate the masses to reject hate. He ought to courageously embrace his father's inspirational heritage.
[Jpost] A general mobilization of Iranian regional allies on behalf of Assad appears to be taking place. As a part of it, Hezbollah is heading further and deeper eastwards, even at the risk of provoking Syrian response.
For the record, if y'all kill each other off, we won't mind. Though we would prefer if you left the civilians out of it, if possible.
This week saw a sharp escalation in the emerging confrontation between the Syrian Sunni rebels and the Lebanese Hezbollah organization. This conflict is the result of Hezbollah's increasingly visible engagement in Syria on behalf of the Assad regime.
Syrian rebels for the first time this week fired rockets into the Hezbollah controlled Hermel region, adjoining the Syrian border. Two Lebanese citizens were killed and a number of others maimed, as rockets landed in the villages of al-Qasr and Hawsh al- Sayyed Ali. The rebels took responsibility for the attacks, saying they were targeting Hezbollah-controlled sites in the two villages.
Continued on Page 49
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
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Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
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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.
[WEEKLYSTANDARD] "In this age of instant reporting and tweets and blogs, there's a temptation to latch on to any bit of information, sometimes to jump to conclusions," said President Obama, in the late evening of April 19, after Dzokhar Tsarnaev was captured alive in Watertown, Mass. "But when a tragedy like this happens, with public safety at risk and the stakes so high, it's important that we do this right. That's why we have investigations. That's why we relentlessly gather the facts. That's why we have courts. And that's why we take care not to rush to judgment -- not about the motivations of these individuals; certainly not about entire groups of people." 
[Jpost] A general mobilization of Iranian regional allies on behalf of Assad appears to be taking place. As a part of it, Hezbollah is heading further and deeper eastwards, even at the risk of provoking Syrian response.
