Golden Corral Honors Veterans with Military Appreciation Monday
To show their support of the United States Military, every Golden Corral restaurant across the country will be offering a Free Dinner Buffet with choice of beverage to any former or active member of the U.S. Military (including Guard and Reservists) when he or she visits any Golden Corral restaurant. Just identify yourself as military when you visit your local Golden Corral restaurant. Military Appreciation Monday will be Monday night, November 14, 2005, from 5:00 PM to 9:00 PM.
The law enforcers recovered six powerful bombs, each weighing about five to six pound, and huge bomb-making materials from a den of terrorists in a hilly area in Chittagong and also seized two kilograms of explosives from a parcel of a courier service in Rajshahi yesterday.
That would make a nasty hole in somebody.
Acting on a tip off a squad of RAB conducted raid in a den of terrorists at Chakaria upazila in Coxâs Bazar district and recovered the bombs and the explosives including huge quantity of gunpowder and cable detonators. Sensing the presence of the RAB personnel the terrorists managed to escape from the scene.
"It's the RAB! Head for the hills!"
RAB sources said each of the recovered bombs is very powerful which can easily kill at least 50 people and damage property to a great extent if it explodes in a crowded place.
Couple kilos, surround with rusty nails, yep, that'd do it.
The RAB also found letter written in tribal language in which the names of twelve terrorists were mentioned but the date was illegible. RAB personnel refused to disclose the names and identity of the terrorists for the sake of investigation.
We'll be reading about each of them soon in Tales from the Crossfire Gazette.
Sources said, the letter containing instruction to make at least 50 bombs with the bomb-making materials and asked to send those to Khagrachhari district mentioning any particular place, date and time.
"Ship it somewhere, we don't care, and just have it go boom at some time or another. Whatever. Remember, you're a terrorist."
The recovered bombs are now in RAB-7 headquarters in Chittagong.
Acting on a tip off a team of police of detective branch from Dhaka recovered two kilograms of explosives from the Parcel office of the courier service in Rajshahi yesterday morning. It is learnt, the DB police recovered a packet wrapped in polythene and paper board which was kept under the seat of a bike. The packet contains ingredients of making bombs including one kilogram of sugarflourheroin white powder, half kilogram of aluminium oxide and half kilogram of sulphur. The parcel also contains a number of leaflets of JMB and the same statements like those distributed with the bombs of August 17.
Police arrested the manager of the parcel section of courier service Nazmul, employees Khaleque and Nur Hossain.
Next time go FedEx.
Posted by: Steve White ||
11/03/2005 00:00 ||
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The government has ordered the law enforcing agencies including Rapid Action Battalion (RAB), to hunt down forty-two leaders and activists of four banned extremist organisations, who are absconding, considering their potential to pose a threat to security during the upcoming SAARC Summit to be held on November 12-13, sources said. Most of the members of the extremist outfits like âJanajuddhaâ, âNew Biplabi Communist Partyâ, âPurbo Bangla Communist Partyâ and âBiplabi Communist Partyâ have reportedly gone into hiding in Satkhira district, the south-western part of the country, and elsewhere. According to an intelligence source, the absconding extremists are carrying out crimes including extortion, killing and robbery to collect money with a view to implementing their blue print. It is alleged that the law enforcement agencies are unable to track the movement or whereabouts of the chiefs of these banned extremist organisations due to their covert liaison with a section of people who have access to information.
#1
The government has ordered the law enforcing agencies including Rapid Action Battalion (RAB), to hunt down forty-two leaders and activists of four banned extremist organisations, who are absconding, considering their potential to pose a threat to security during the upcoming SAARC Summit to be held on November 12-13, sources said
Police made their first arrests in last year's $47 million bank robbery, one of Europe's largest ever, officials said Wednesday. The theft was blamed on the IRA and tarnished its image, despite repeated denials.
"Nope. Nope. Wudn't us."
The arrest of a 30-year-old man Wednesday in Belfast came a day after two others were taken into custody in the city of Kilcoo, police said. The IRA-linked Sinn Fein political party protested the arrests, claiming they were politically motivated.
"Faith! An' tiz the IRA! Stick 'em up, me boyos!"
"Aaaarr! Yer politically motivated! We been framed!"
"Shuddup. Into the paddy wagon wit' yez!"
Member Willie Clarke argued that the men were targeted because they've supported the IRA's cause. The alleged involvement of the IRA in the December robbery was a setback for Sinn Fein, which represents most of the Catholics in the province, in negotiations over a power sharing agreement. Since the robbery, the IRA has declared that it has disarmed and scrapped its hidden weapons stockpiles â moves that have raised hopes of reviving a joint Catholic-Protestant administration.
Posted by: Fred ||
11/03/2005 00:00 ||
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#1
The theft was blamed on the IRA and
tarnished its image...
LOL
Posted by: Red Dog ||
11/03/2005 2:16 Comments ||
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#2
Tarnished their image, eh? Let's see, before that I thought of them as a child-and-woman-murdering bunch of cowardly thugs who didn't have the balls to face the British Army or even the UVF or UDA straight up. I personally always favored the Brits first torturing, then executing without trial, any of these bastards they caught. Tarnish their image? No, they couldn't have gone any lower--unless they had a race change and became Paleos.
Posted by: mac ||
11/03/2005 5:44 Comments ||
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#3
That will teach ya for stealing me Lucky charms.
#4
Yes laddy, polio it is, and such a shame indeed the boy is only ten. We're taking up a collection for the wheel chair blasting caps and det cord for Johnny. It's the big jar on the end of the bar with his sad photo attached. Feel free to drop in a dollar or two. Mikey will see it gets sent to his poor mother our lads in Belfast.
2 million ethnic Muslims adopted baptism in Russia while only 2,5 thousand Russians converted to Islam - expert
... The number of ethnic Muslims in Russia who adopted Christianity is 2 million, while the number of the Orthodox who have been converted to Islam is only 2,5 thousand, stated Roman Silantyev, executive secretary of the Inter-religious Council in Russia.
âChristianization happens not so much as a result of some purposeful missionary activity (in which only Protestants are engaged) as under the influence of Russian culture which has express Christian rootsâ, Silantyev said in a interview published this week by the Itogi weekly...
[I doubt whether any reliable records really exist -- nevertheless this is interesting]
#2
This is not unique to Russia. Islam is being punished around the world, when faced off with a preferred Christian sect. That is, not just any version of Christianity will do.
In Africa, huge inroads are being made with Anglicanism, but Evangelism, Catholicism and other versions of Protestantism have much less success.
In Russia, big advances are being made with most likely Evangelism, as R Orthodox is too ethnically oriented to bring in many new recruits.
In South America, Evangelism is making big inroads against Catholicism, so it is not entirely an anti-Islam reaction.
Non-Evangenlical Protestantism is rapidly fading in northern Europe as well as Central America, being supplanted by, of all things, pagan religions.
Posted by: Fred ||
11/03/2005 12:30 Comments ||
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#4
AM, I have to correct you. Charismatics, Pentecostals, and their doppelgangers in the Catholic Church are causing an explosion in church membership in South America.
In africa, the United Methodists are advancing by leaps and bounds: my church is paired with one in Uganda that's way too big for the biggest warehouse in the jungle village it's at, right at the bleeding edge where Islamic Africa meets Christian Africa.
A while back, a pastor 20 miles from there got beaten up by Muslims: the attack was reported here, at Rantburg, and MY pastor visited him at the hospital. The Congregation was on pins and needles, wondering if there would be a flare-up, with our group caught in the middle. They came back safe and sound.
We've made two more trips, and the church is suggesting that I go next! Job this year prevents it, but maybe next year. In the meantime, we're rallying other churches in Georgia to pair up with specific Churches in Uganda.
In the meantime, y'all will be VERY pleased to know that the conflict in the area has cooled considerably, not coincidentally at the same as Operation Iraqui Freedom. Scuttlebutt on the street there says to keep hands off the Methodists: South Georgia Merkins keep dropping by for friendly visits, but might bring the US Marines with them next time if their pals in town are threatened.
#5
Ptah: one heck of a microcosm, indeed. Imagine that being extrapolated to most of the planet? Yeepers.
As far as the Anglicans go, the US schism couldn't have happened at a better time. With wealthy US Episcopalian churches becoming African Anglican Missionary Churches, to get away from their liberal bishops, they've been pumping huge amounts of US dollars into their African archdioceses.
Suddenly, enormous African congregations have a lot more money for everything they want to do. And that spells bad news for the local Imams.
MAKHACHKALA, Russia (AP) - Police in the troubled Russian region of Dagestan have killed a militant leader and detained eight fighters in an operation near the Chechen border, a law enforcement spokesman said Thursday. Makhach Mamashev was killed Wednesday evening near the city of Khasavyurt, said Interior Ministry spokesman Abdul Musayev. He was wanted for several attacks on police in at least two Chechen villages, Musayev said. Eight other fighters suspected of having links to Mamashev were also seized by police forces.
The Caspian Sea province has long been roiled by violence - some linked to criminal gang feuds, some spilling over from neighboring Chechnya.
Posted by: Steve ||
11/03/2005 09:33 ||
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#1
Q: What is the world's most dangerous occupation?
One Russian serviceman was killed and another seriously wounded in an explosion on Wednesday in Russia's Chechnya, Interfax news agency reported, citing police.
The bomb exploded on the side of a road in the centre of Grozny, Chechnya's capital, as the soldiers passed by, Interfax said.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
11/03/2005 00:53 ||
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RADICAL Muslim clerics who praise terrorist acts could have their mosques banned and members of their assemblies defined as terrorists under the nation's new counter-terrorism laws. Under the legislation, tabled in Federal Parliament yesterday, recent comments by radical clerics Sheik Mohammed Omran and Sheik Abdul Salam Mohammed Zoud could be defined as advocating a terrorist act. As reported in The Australian yesterday, Sheik Zoud recently told worshippers at the Haldon Street prayer hall in Sydney's west: "God grant victory to the mujaheddin in Iraq".
University of NSW law academic Ben Saul said the real danger to Muslim imams and mosques was that praising the actions of terrorists could lead to their mosques being proscribed as a terrorist organisation. Similar comments by Melbourne's Sheik Omran recently could also be defined as praising a terrorist act, Dr Saul said. In a recent sermon, Sheik Omran said: "No victory (for Islam's brothers and sisters) can be stopped by George Bush or Tony Blair or John Howard".
In what he described as a "significant" extension of the power to ban terrorist organisations, Dr Saul said a person in an organisation such as a mosque only had to praise a terrorist act to run the risk of having their organisation banned.
A spokeswoman for Attorney-General Philip Ruddock would not comment on whether mosques could be closed if clerics praised terrorism. "We can't offer a legal opinion," the spokeswoman said. "We ultimately take advice from our agencies on these matter." A spokesman for Sheik Abdul Salam Mohammed Zoud denied the Sydney cleric preached hatred against the West. "Sheik Zoud is not a person who preaches hatred," Samir Benkadi said. Sheik Omran refused to comment.
Posted by: God Save The World AKA Oztralian ||
11/03/2005 21:13 ||
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POLICE are expected to move within days against a group of terror suspects in Sydney and Melbourne after the Senate rushed through new anti-terror laws yesterday.
A group of radical Muslim youths linked to controversial Melbourne cleric Nacer Benbrika fear they will be arrested under the emergency legislation, which received vice-regal assent from Governor-General Michael Jeffery in Sydney last night.
Members of the group were raided by ASIO in June in connection with a suspected plot to attack prominent Melbourne landmarks, including a railway station and the Australian Stock Exchange in Collins Street.
At the time there was not enough evidence to arrest or charge any of the men but investigations have been continuing.
The group includes two men in Sydney, one of whom has allegedly been identified by a US terrorist informant who claimed to have met him at a military training camp that was run by the outlawed terrorist group Lashkar-e-Taiba.
The Sydney man is believed to be the key link between the two groups.
However, a second Sydney-based man, who had connections to a country NSW property that was watched by authorities before the Sydney Olympics, is also under suspicion.
In a special sitting yesterday, the Senate approved Government amendments to the criminal code designed to help police arrest people planning a terrorist attack.
While Labor backed the changes, the party warned the Government that it expected results. It fears that the publicity of recent days may have prejudiced police operations.
"We are concerned whether or not operational matters have been compromised," Opposition justice spokeswoman Nicola Roxon said yesterday.
"You don't want to be in the position where you are alerting people that might be subject to these laws."
In the Senate, the minor parties accused the Government of using national security for "political leverage" in order to divert attention from its industrial relations legislation.
The new law will allow people to be charged with terrorist offences even if they have not decided on a specific target for an attack.
John Howard and his senior ministers strongly denied yesterday that the decision to rush through amendments to the law had been designed to deflect criticism of the Government's industrial relations legislation.
"The idea that it was all manipulated is ridiculous, " the Prime Minister said.
Mr Howard said on Wednesday that he had received specific intelligence which "gives cause for serious concern about a potential terrorist threat".
Labor's John Faulkner told the Senate debate on the terror bill that Australia's involvement in the Iraq war had made the country less safe.
Posted by: God Save The World AKA Oztralian ||
11/03/2005 17:21 ||
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#1
Labor's John Faulkner told the Senate debate on the terror bill that Australia's involvement in the Iraq war had made the country less safe.
Yeah, the LLL mantra. Close our eyes and hope that the trouble goes away on its own. Faulkner should know better if he read his country's history. Imperial Japan was knocking on Australia's door in 1942, I recall, until the Yanks and Australians started fighting back.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
11/03/2005 21:31 Comments ||
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#2
Yep, true. The Japs started to bomb Darwin
Posted by: God Save The World AKA Oztralian ||
11/03/2005 23:59 Comments ||
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Rampaging youths shot at police and firefighters Thursday after burning car dealerships and public buses and hurling rocks at commuter trains, as eight days of riots over poor conditions in Paris-area housing projects spread to 20 towns.
Youths ignored an appeal for calm from President Jacques Chirac, whose government worked feverishly to fend off a political crisis amid criticism that it has ignored problems in neighborhoods heavily populated by first- and second-generation North African and Muslim immigrants.
Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin called a string of emergency meetings with Cabinet ministers throughout the day. He told the Senate the government "will not give in" to violence in the troubled suburbs.
"Order and justice will be the final word in our country," Villepin said. "The return to calm and the restoration of public order are the priority our absolute priority." At some point either the French Army or the Foreign Legion are going to be called in to "quell" the rioting. Let's see how the rioters greet men with bayonets.
#3
"riots over poor conditionsin Paris-area housing projects "
I dont know if thats really whats driving things, but I dont think the conditions are great. Look at the pics - some (but not all) the projects look like the kinds of things American cities have been tearing down the last couple of decades. And one gets the impression the French (surprise!) really do discriminate in hiring - not that riots like this are going to help with that.
All in all not a bright time for the "european social model"
#4
âSarko has declared war on the estates, so itâs war heâs going to get,â said Mohamed, 20, the son of a Moroccan immigrant. Sidi, his friend, concurred: the suburbs had endured another night of street fighting because Nicolas Sarkozy, the Interior Minister and would-be President of France, had âdisrespectedâ the estates with his tough talk and harsh police actions.
Sarko be dissin them? Give them their war. See how they like it.
#5
"Sarko has declared war on the estates, so itâs war heâs going to get"
"this aint a great territory, but its the only one wes got, right?
jets - "right"
"when youre a jet, youre a jet all the way, from you first cigarette......
#6
Youths ignored an appeal for calm from President Jacques Chirac,..
Yeah, like an appeal is going to get results. If these "youths" are anything like their distant relatives in the Middle East, things will spiral even more out of control because Jacques, instead of exercising what power he does have to impose order, is displaying weakness with his "appeal for calm".
"French Muslims make up a significant percentage of cite-dwellers, but West Africans and Eastern Europeans are also present. The rioting in Clichy-Sous-Bois was carried out by Arabs and Berbers, yes, but also by Africans who were probably not Muslim. To take a more general example, while Muslims make up 70% of prisoners in France, other immigrants are similarly over-represented. Franceâs social ills, like Britainâs, cut across cultural boundaries.
"
#10
I don't think the government can legally deploy the Foreign Legion within France's borders
When you enlist in the Foreign Legion, you report for duty and train in France. The Foreign Legion fought on French territory in both the Franco-Prussian War and World War I. Don't think there was enough time for them to do anything in WWII.
#15
Saint Denis is full of Arabs and is traditionally a communist stronghold. This is definately being organized by the Left and the Jihadis. Paris is almost completely surrounded by housing projects "predominantly möselman". C'est tres dangereus dans les quartiers"
Posted by: Saint Michel ||
11/03/2005 16:38 Comments ||
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#16
and the problem is?
Posted by: Gir ||
11/03/2005 16:46 Comments ||
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#17
Paris police would not go in and patrol and assist Muslim areas in Paris. Just as France will not go in to patrol and assist Baghdad.
People of those areas of France do not have representatives in the government of Paris or France.
Allow representatives in local and federal government, and the fires stop...
#18
This does not seem like a 'spontaneous' escalation of unrest. Somebody is organizing it. Has to be Islamist mosque-rats (hey fellow Louisianians, do you like my new term?) I wonder if there is any connection with the increased tendency of the French government to listen to arguements regarding Iranian nuclear adventurism?
#20
But, guys! Liberalhawk says it's not related to Islamism! That means it can't be!
(On a related note, Australia's leading imams have been preaching messages of hate in their mosques, despite assurances to the government they wouldn't. The mosques are apparently still being attended by Muslims, despite the claims that Islam is a religion of peace that finds incitement to violence offensive.)
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
11/03/2005 17:56 Comments ||
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#21
Muslims in Algiers decided to riot on VE Day, May 7 1945. French police confronted them. The flics brought out machine guns and killed either ~45 rioters or 45,000 "men, women and children"; depending on whether you believe first-hand accounts or the multi-cult academa-liars who put the latter figure in several recent reference works, including the Golden Book Encyclopedia. The latter of course is marketed to children.
Either way, the riot ended almost as soon as it started.
Actually, the 45,000 figure is a "poli-typo," a wild exaggeration that can be explained away as a typographical error if it is seriously questioned.
It is a favorite device of lefty academics, who have an amazing propensity for adding zeroes when a higher figure would tend to discredit non-PC forces, and losing them when the truth works against communists, revolutionaries, Islamo-fascists or other favorite totalitarians.
Lefty polemicist Tom Gervasi was a master of this. His Arsenal of Democracy, an anti-Pentagon screed that should have won the Stalin Prize, contains literally hundreds of them, mostly concerned with exaggerating the cost and prevalence of American weaponry around the world.
#22
We have now analyzed the strange muffled sounds emanating from Napoleon's tomb. It is a male voice saying, "A whiff of grapeshot, you fools, a whiff of grapeshot!"
#23
Rather than, "Who?" the more interesting questions to me are, "To what end?" and, "What next?"
We could accept LH's seeming premise that these are merely repressed minorities righteously voicing their displeasure at their mistreatment by an evil western power but I think not. History informs us that immigrant ghettos have nearly always been poor dirty places characterized by their high crime and unemployment rates yet I am unable to identify a historical precedent where such a group engaged in organized lawlessness on this scale for this length of time. Perhaps our enlightened modern societies to which immigrants arrive ready to thrust forward their hands for a welfare check rather than roll up their sleeves to get to work have bred a new sort of immigrant community that sees riots as a surer path to success than hard work but I'm not yet cynical enough to accept that premise.
#28
I am unable to identify a historical precedent where such a group engaged in organized lawlessness on this scale for this length of time.
Scale? There's a certain amount of relativitiy given the size of cities today, but this is certainly not unprecedented. Further, it is not clear to me that it is, or was initially, organized. In any case, the French have only themselves to blame for the duration.
#31
CT - Thanks for making my point. The cases you cited seem to have been either: smaller, of shorter duration, or triggered by singularly divisive events which are easily identified. Quick scans of your cites has reinforced my opinion that the current events are nearly unprecedented.
#32
My slower scan says the only part unprecedented is the failure of the authorities to reimpose order on a timely basis with overwhelming force, especally in the cases of the draft riots, Watts riots and labor riots.
#36
liberalhawk was quoting from a much longer entry by Colt (EurabianTimes) at Winds of Change. It sounds as if most people didn't bop over to WOC to read the whole thing, since the response to lh has been off base WRT that article.
French Muslims make up a significant percentage of cite-dwellers, but West Africans and Eastern Europeans are also present. The rioting in Clichy-Sous-Bois was carried out by Arabs and Berbers, yes, but also by Africans who were probably not Muslim. To take a more general example, while Muslims make up 70% of prisoners in France, other immigrants are similarly over-represented. Franceâs social ills, like Britainâs, cut across cultural boundaries.
However, these problems are not blind to the quirks of culture. The problem for Europe is the heightened, yet incoherent, sense of identity many of these Muslims develop. Male chauvinism is a good example. Many young Muslim men, for instance, will quite happily have pre-marital sex with multiple partners, but would be furious to discover their sister doing the same thing.
The incoherence of what is becoming the prevalent European-Muslim identity, taking the worst elements of both cultures, leaves the way open for radical groups to convert and recruit to their cause.
In Britain, Hizb ut-Tahrir has frequently transformed criminals, including successful drug dealers, in to pious Muslims. While not a large proportion, the number of European Muslims who have âfound Allahâ and rejected their previous un-Islamic lifestyles is growing. Itâs unfortunate that reforming criminals must have a downside, but the groups that are doing it are quite often the same ones in favour of jihadist terrorism. These converts from the secular, Europeanised Muslim identity to a more-Muslim-than-Muslims one are the obvious target for terrorist recruiters...
Iâd hesitate to divide between the lawlessness committed by unobservant Muslims and the terrorism perpetrated by their devout brothers and sisters. Native terrorist cells, the 7/7 four being a prime example, mostly seem to hail from the pious section of Europeâs Muslims, disgusted as much by the un-Islamic lifestyle of their fellow Muslims as by the Westâs immorality at home and tyranny abroad.
But this may not last. Al-Qaeda has allied itself with groups and ideologues with a lot less in common with them than the angry Muslims of Europeâs cities. And those denied the lives âsocietyâ supposedly owes them often develop a nihilism not unlike that of the savages who make up the jihadi ranks.
The trends are all pointing in one direction. Europe may yet be reminded of what open warfare on the streets of Paris, Berlin, and Brussels looks like.
#38
lotp, how does that support LH's argument that Islamists aren't the issue? If anything, it supports the opposite -- the Islamists are turning the criminals into organized terrorists.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
11/03/2005 20:28 Comments ||
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#39
I don't know if lh was misinterpreted, or misinterpreted the thrust of the WOC article. But I certainly agree with the WOC entry on this point ....
Note, tho, that what Colt is saying at WOC is that there IS a serious socioeconomic dimension to these riots. He goes on to place them, tho, firmly in the context of issues of Muslim identity for the teens and young adults there, and notes the breeding ground for overt terrorism.
Meant to add that it's misleading to attribute these riots EITHER just to social issues OR just to religion. It's a deadly mix of the worst of both elements ....
The government has quietly put a lot of AK-47-toting soldiers on patrol in Paris, especially around key public transportation points and at the monuments and high-traffic areas such as Forum des Halles. I think there are three reasons for this - 1) to reassure the public - and the tourists, 2) to take some pressure off the Police Nationale, who have been deployed in greater numbers to the north-eastern suburbs and 3) to send a message to would be trouble-makers.
The French have the reputation of being wimps, but in my experience, when they crack down, they crack down HARD. For one example, ChIRAQ's crony in the OFF scandal, Merimee, was quickly imprisoned in la Conciergerie which has the reputation of being one of the toughest prisons in France....
#42
First generation Arab families in France average 11.5 people. Subtract out the parents that's 9.5 kids..... Say any more and I would be accused of racism so.... make your own opinions.
#47
A riot is a riot. A mob is an organism that takes on a psychology of its own. You do not reason with a mob. You control a mob with a massive show of force. It does not mean that you go in with machine guns and hose 'em down right off the bat. It means that you bring in a massive force and judiciously apply overwhelming force if the mob does not disburse.
The rioters have had their way because the French govt has been more into meetings than assembling the massive force to quell the riots. Now the French govt is behind the power curve, way behind. Of course, this unrest has been bubbling away in the 'hoods for years, finally blew the top off.
Well, good luck, Chiraq. Hope you get this problem solved. Hope things work out. By the way, what is happening with your bag of tricks with regard to Iran these days? I know that you are busy. I'll get back to you later.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
11/03/2005 21:58 Comments ||
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#48
My $ on inflame. Mutual assurances of humiliation and need to seethe.
Posted by: Frank G ||
11/03/2005 22:19 Comments ||
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#49
I would presume that the imams would certainly take advantage of the situation - and seize control if at all possible. The presumption that they, and Islam, have little or no place in this situation flies in the face of experience, but hey, anything's possible. As Judy Tenuda would say, "Hey, it could happen."
Careless talk from Belgian Interior Minister Patrick Dewael hindered criminal investigations into the terrorist group GICM, the judiciary has claimed.
Dewael revealed in March 2004 that members of the Moroccan Islamic Combatant Group (GICM) were being shadowed in Belgium. The minister made his comment despite an explicit request from the judiciary to keep quiet. The minister's comments forced the premature ending of surveillance operations, which were cut short a month ahead of planning, newspaper 'De Tijd' reported on Thursday.
The trial of 13 suspected members of the GICM terror network will start in Brussels later on Thursday. The network is held responsible for bomb attacks in the Moroccan capital of Casablanca and the Saudi capital of Riyadh in May 2003 and in Madrid on 11 March last year. Some 271 people were killed in the attacks.
Pre-trial investigations started in November 2002 when the Belgian security service VS started shadowing suspected GICM member K. Bouloudo, 30, of Maaseik, in Limburg. He was arrested in the Netherlands on 27 January last year after a routine traffic inspection. However, the Belgian judiciary decided to shadow the companions of Bouloudo for "another month of two".
"These companions were the key figures in the dossier, not Bouloudo. By shadowing them unnoticed we could identify still more terrorists," the judiciary said.
"In the interests of the investigation the federal public prosecution office asked Dewael not to disclose the operation."
However, on 17 March last year, Dewael spoke carelessly in the Parliament Commission for Interior Affairs. Upon questioning by Flemish Interest MP Francis van den Eynde, Dewael said that those involved in the investigation of Bouloudo were under surveillance.
The revelations reached the broad public via the media and the companions of Bouloudo became suspicious. The judiciary claims there was a danger the suspects would flee the country and the surveillance had to be ended prematurely. Some 20 house raids were then quickly carried out on 19 March last year in Maaseik, Brussels and Antwerp.
"Politicians don't understand how much damage such a disclosure can bring to an investigation which our people have worked on in difficult situations for years," the judiciary said.
Neither Dewael nor his staff were available for comment this week.
#1
Hey! Do you know who I am!
Laws are for the "little people"!
Posted by: Patrick Dewael ||
11/03/2005 14:22 Comments ||
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#2
Sounds like a lot of American politicians. It's more important to THEM that they let people know how important they are by disclosing things that shoundn't be disclosed, than any true service to their nation, its government, or its people. I've always thought that people like that should be hung the second time they did it. They either CAN'T learn, or refuse to learn.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
11/03/2005 21:53 Comments ||
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Belgium opened a trial on Thursday of 13 men accused of belonging to an Islamic militant group blamed for bombings in Madrid and Casablanca.
They face charges of providing false papers, safe houses and logistical help to members of the Moroccan Islamic Combatant Group (GICM), which is held responsible for the 2004 Madrid attacks on four commuter trains that killed 191 people.
Among those accused is Khalid Bouloudo, an alleged leader of the GICM's Belgian cell.
Another suspect, Youssef Belhadj, was extradited to Spain where he was wanted on suspicion of being the al Qaeda spokesman who claimed responsibility for the Madrid bombings.
If found guilty, the 13 men â three Belgians and 10 Moroccans â face five to 10 years in prison.
None is accused of direct involvement in the bombings.
Three of them were missing in court on Thursday, one of whom is in prison in Syria.
The trial, which begins in earnest on November 16, is the first prosecution under Belgium's new anti-terrorist law, which explicitly makes terrorism a crime. In previous trials, suspects were charged with belonging to a criminal organization.
Although police found no guns or bombs or attack plans when they began arrests in 2004, they produced transcripts of tapped phone conversations between some of the suspects and alleged perpetrators of the Madrid bombings.
Outside the courtroom, lawyers said the new anti-terrorist law made it hard for them to defend their clients.
Filip Van Hende said his client's friendship with suspected GICM members was enough to send him to jail regardless of whether he actually belonged to the group.
"It will be very difficult to defend because the legislation is so vague," he told Reuters.
Lawyer Gilles Vanderbeck said the law put the burden of proof on his client, Omar Mourad, to explain why he had been in touch with suspected militants.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
11/03/2005 13:57 ||
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Menacing youths smoked cigarettes in doorways Wednesday and hulks of burned cars littered the tough streets of Paris' northeastern suburbs scarred by a week of riots that left residents on edge and sent the government into crisis mode.
Non-menacing youths chew tobacco. That's the way you can tell the difference.
In a seventh consecutive night of skirmishes, young people threw rocks at police Wednesday in six suburbs in the Seine-Saint-Denis region north of Paris â about a 40-minute drive from the Eiffel Tower.
I've occasionally wondered why the cops don't throw rocks back at them. Seems to me that a disciplined formation of police replying to the yoots in kind with their weapon of choice should be able to clobber them. The yoots are a pickup team, and the cops presumably are trained. And it'd be hard for even an AP writer to work up much sympathy for young Mahmoud blubbering about his busted head because Officer Friendly chucked a rock back at him.
In one of them, Le Blanc-Mesnil, about a dozen cars burned and curious residents, some in slippers and bathrobes, poured into the streets.
"Car swarm!"
Some said the unrest â sparked by the accidental deaths of two teenagers last week â is an expression of frustration over grinding unemployment and police harassment in the communities, where many North African immigrants live. "It is not going to end. It is going to explode," said an 18-year-old who would only give his name as Amine.
"Ah, Mahmoud! I'm so frustrated! I must give my frustration expression!"
Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin and Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy both canceled trips abroad to deal with the unrest. "The government is entirely mobilized. Its immediate priority is to restore public order, and restore it without delay," de Villepin said.
In that case, start conking some turbans. Or at least throw their rocks back at 'em and set fire to their cars...
Muslim leaders at Clichy-sous-Bois' mosque, meanwhile, prayed for peace and asked parents to keep teenagers off the streets after skirmishes broke out after two teenage boys were electrocuted last Thursday while hiding in a power substation because they believed police were chasing them. The unrest spread to at least nine Paris-region towns overnight Tuesday, exposing the despair, anger and criminality in France's poor suburbs â fertile terrain for Islamic extremists, drug dealers and racketeers.
Despair. Anger. Seething. And lots of violence. European Islam in a nutshell.
The violence, concentrated in neighborhoods with large African and Muslim populations, has highlighted the difficulties many European nations face with immigrant communities feeling marginalized and restive, cut off from the continent's prosperity and, for some extremists, its values, too. "They have no work. They have nothing to do. Put yourself in their place," said Abderrahmane Bouhout, president of the Clichy-sous-Bois mosque, where a tear gas grenade exploded Sunday evening. Local youths suspected a police attack, and authorities are investigating.
Even better, let's put my grandaddy in their place. He left the social unrest of post-WWI Italy to come to the U.S. He arrived speaking Italian, Croatian, Greek, German and French, but not English. He worked in a stone quarry, learned English, saved some cash, bought a home, raised two daughters. He lived in a predominantly Italian neighborhood but never, to the best of my knowledge, ever took part in a riot â though he and Harry Alonzo did have a fairly spectacular duke-out one time over a bocce game. He got along with his non-Italian neighbors just fine. He lived to a moderately ripe old age, and died respected by his peers. He's buried next to his beloved wife under the spreading branches of an oak tree, brought flowers a couple times a year by his grandchildren, who remember him fondly. Most of the other old Italians had similar lives and their sons and daughters married the locals of English, German, Irish and other descents as often as they married each other. Obviously they can't do that in France because... ummm... they don't have stone quarries.
The violence cast doubt on the success of France's model of seeking to integrate its large immigrant community â its Muslim population, at an estimated 5 million, is Western Europe's largest â by playing down differences between ethnic groups. But rather than be embraced as full and equal citizens, immigrants and their French-born children often complain of police harassment and of being refused jobs, housing and opportunities. "If French society accepts these tinderboxes in its society, it cannot be surprised when they explode," said Claude Dilain, the Socialist mayor of the Clichy-sous-Bois suburb.
In that case, why accept them? Why allow people from a foreign culture to swarm into your country and large numbers and set up their own local caliphates?
Eric, a 22-year-old in Clichy-sous-Bois who was born in France to Moroccan parents, said police target those with dark skin. He said he has been unable to find full-time work for two years and that the riots were a demonstration of suburban solidarity.
Could it be that he can't find full-time work because he can't speak the language and has no salable skills? And maybe dresses funny and makes faces at the natives?
"People are joining together to say we've had enough," he said. He refused to give his surname because talking to reporters was poorly regarded in his neighborhood. "We live in ghettos," he added. "Everyone lives in fear."
That might have something to do with the menacing yoots smoking cigarettes on the street corners and making faces at people.
Many immigrant families are trapped in housing projects that were built to accommodate foreign laborers welcomed by post-World War II France but have since succumbed to despair, chronic unemployment and lawlessness. In some neighborhoods, drug dealers and racketeers hold sway and experts say Islamic radicals seek to recruit disenchanted youths by telling them that France has abandoned them. "French society is in a bad state ... increasingly unequal, increasingly segregated, and increasingly divided along ethnic and racial lines," said sociologist Manuel Boucher. Some youths turn to Islam to claim an identity that is not French, "to seize on something which gives them back their individual and collective dignity."
Speaking French, dressing well, having an education, finding gainful employment, caring for your family and contributing to the nation give you individual and collective dignity. Wearing funny hats and rolling your eyes doesn't.
Posted by: Fred ||
11/03/2005 00:00 ||
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#1
"In that case, why accept them? Why allow people from a foreign culture to swarm into your country and large numbers and set up their own local caliphates?" Been to LA lately?
#2
You don't even have to have that great an education.Learn the language,be willing to work hard and don't be an asshole and they would get along ok.Not great but ok,you don't have to have a college degree to swing a muck stick.I mucked out chicken coops to put a roof over our heads and put food on the table,these poor,disadvantaged youths don't get a damn bit of sympathy from me.But you do have to get off your ass and be willing to work.That's the biggest part of the problem These dipsh#%ts have been on the dole so long(many all thier lives)they don't have any concept of what work is.Hell,at least most of our imagrints(legal and illegal)are willing to work.The government of France is just as much to blame,if they had made,made the imargrints learn the language and work instead of handing out frebbies for decades France wouldn't be in this position.Pay attention Euorpe or your turns coming.
Sweden: ââIf we park our car it will be damaged â so we have to go very often in two vehicles, one just to protect the other vehicle,â said Rolf Landgren, a Malmo police officer."
France: âSarkozy says that violence in French suburbs is a daily fact of life. Since the start of the year, 9,000 police cars have been stoned and, each night, 20 to 40 cars are torched.â
Brussels: âThe police has been told [by the Mayor] that it is ânot expedientâ to patrol [in the Brussels suburb of Molenbeek] and officers are not allowed to drink coffee or eat a sandwich in the street during ramadan.â
Denmark: 4 days of riots caused by these cartoons here.
#7
7 days is full blown out of control. You will never stuff this genie back in the bottle. No matter if and when the violence subsizes (it will on it's own at some point perhaps the government hopes). Those who carried it out are now emboldened by the free reign they have already had and have been given by the French Government. France is in for much worse.
#8
Encourage these yoots to find employment opportunities in the Southern Med.
Posted by: ed ||
11/03/2005 2:07 Comments ||
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#9
A greed,SOP.Given the weak response of the police & French gov,France is in some sirious doodoo.The bad boys will do what they want,when they want.The only way out of this is for France to send in the military and do some sirious,old fashion ass stompin,followed by mass deportations.And I don't foresee this happing.Byebye France it's been real.Get out while you can JFM!
#12
The RBers who spoofed the paleostinian intifada were right : the (muslim) "mediators", les grands frères (the big brothers), were greeted by the sweet melody of "allah U akbar", always a good sign, as seen on tv... their revendications include the "respect of their identity", "the retreat of the police", and "its stay on the periphery, assuming a discreet stance".
LOL! The french entity must evacuate the Gaza strip, I mean the Seine Saint-Denis!
Oh, and of course, "the truth on the death of the two teens" (truth being they died of sheer stupidity, IMHO), and "the truth on the hurling of a teargas canister in a mosque" (because the infidels who dood it must be punished!)...
Note that the few rioters who were caught have been so far sentenced to über-dissuading 1-3 months of jailtime, so the situation must not be as as bad as it seems, or so say the judges.
One police union wishes the gvt to establish a curfew, sounds like a good idea to me; note that there was some more sniping on police officers; IIRC the unions have long said that if/when the situation gets so bad they're shoot at (again, I repeat myself, this is not something that appeared spontenaously, this has been going since the 90's, getting worse by the year, and the exceptional thing is now the international media coverage), they'll use their "droit de retrait", IE fall back, and ask for the army to go in.
You can go there to check the "Wacco plan" set by the military to hold back the suburbs (in french, but there is an autotranslation button, don't know if the comments which are very interesting will be translated too) http://www.france-echos.com/actualite.php?cle=1227
This is truly an identity/sovereignty problem : theses populations mostly feel muslim and/or arab, maghrebian, algerian, moroccan,... first, and not french at all (and this even for quite normal and non-yob people, I can attest of that, having very colleagues who are nice, respectable people, but insist their country is Tunisia or Morocco).
An survey on muslim teens found that only one in ten would fight for France, and an internal survey on muslim volunteers in french army found about the same ratio willing to fight against a muslim country (!); I do not remember the exact results, but a 2004 survey in french schools found that a large majority of muslim teens felt "muslim" first, and not french.
Add appeasement (gesture toward islam by mayors, mosque built with public money regardless of it being forbidden by the 1905 law on State-Church separation,...) and buy-off (subsidies, benefit,...), and you've got an explosive situation in which the muslim pressure grows at the same rate than the muslim population itself (300-500 000 migrants each year, not counting children, 80% muslim, birthrate between 2,5-4 against 1,2 for "ethnic" french,...).
For the third time, I really feel sorry for "joe-six pack", plain people, average folks who do not deserve this, especially the ones having to live it (insecurity, antiwhite/judeochristian prejudice,...) but official France has built an "occupied territtories" problem for herself, and this is hilarious.
The Enlightened Elites sold us to Eurabia, and managed to shoot themselves in the foot at the same time. LOL!
And the worst part is : France is bankrupt, no more money. As soon as the payments dry off, all the public sector will convulse, and so will the muslim suburbs living off benefit. There may be an "Argentina scenario" in the making for France in a decade or so, or even sooner... with the added 8-10 millions muslim minority problem, and a revolutionary left that has allied itself to it.
#13
Shoot the Muzzy bastards down in the streets. Let Sarkozy state publicly that rioters will be shot on sight and their families immediately deported to country of origin. Immediately stop any immigration from Muslim countries and start massively deporting those Muslims who are in France. Give the welfare money you're paying them to the Moroccan, Algerian or Tunisian governments to take these scumbags. They'll find someplace to put these "yoots" to work that will induce them to be peaceful citizens--or fertilizer.
Posted by: mac ||
11/03/2005 5:14 Comments ||
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#14
If this really is the start of a series of revolts in France, then the Muslims have made a mistake. Waiting 5 years would be a much better idea. France still has some strength in her, if she would remember. The Muslims started the civil war too soon.
#15
I have been thinking about this. This very well could bring down the current government. Chirac is useless. Sarkozy and de Villepin look at themselves and see Chirac's replacement (fat chance of that currently.)
After 7 days this is clearly a larger threat to the 5th Republic than we are being led to believe. The French government is actually powerless to respond as needed. A major threat to Europe and the EU exists here as well. I always thought Germany would be the first victim. It appears France will be.
#16
Just got started,5089,but this article is going to be tuff to follow.
The syntax and phraseology of this thing is very bizzar(ex:(1)voluntary projection of a heavy object... is moulted in "fall" whose cause disappeared.(2)...due to the ethnic bands, ...(3)
#17
This is just a taste of what is to come when a severe recession hits (in the next 12 months). Bankrupt European governments will cut welfare payments as revenues decline and the 'contract' of we will stay quiet as long you pay us ends. The social disorder will be something to behold.
#18
I've occasionally wondered why the cops don't throw rocks back at them.
Because that would be use of deadly force, and you're not allowed to do that unless you're facing deadly force. And if you're wondering, no, a rock chucked by a teen thug isn't deadly force, because he's an oppressed minority.
Many immigrant families are trapped in housing projects that were built to accommodate foreign laborers welcomed by post-World War II France but have since succumbed to despair, chronic unemployment and lawlessness.
Ya know, know one forced them to succumb to despair, etc. That was their choice.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
11/03/2005 7:31 Comments ||
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#19
oops
(3)the assumption that bands can fold up their great sets towards wooded sectors was explicitly programmed.
Could be a problem with the translation,but I think this thing is deliberatly written to be almost unintelagible.
"...under another denomination, in the press of the in addition to-Mediterranean"What the heck is that supposed to mean?
The 1 overriding thing I got from this article is:I'm dan glad I'm not a French cop.
#23
"Can't throw the rocks back because they will be throw back at you again."
Not if you throw them accurately, and FAST enough. Think 'refined galena, supersonic'.
#25
Some said the unrest ... is an expression of frustration over grinding unemployment and police harassment ...
who said it? Why is it that these excess adjectives reporters never have any real meat to their stories? "Some say"", "an 18-year-old who would only give his name as Amine", easily available quotes from Chirac and Sarkozy and the local mayor and a "sociologist". Nothing from police sources or anyone who might shatter the reporters carefully worded picture of the poor, poor, yoots.
Oh wait, my bad..he did get this: unnamed "Muslim leaders at Clichy-sous-Bois' mosque, meanwhile, prayed for peace and asked parents to keep teenagers off the streets"
but maybe the reason the yoots didn't listen to the unnamed "Muslim Leaders" is because the one quote that he did get from Abderrahmane Bouhout, president of the Clichy-sous-Bois mosque expresses sympathy for their actions: "They have no work. They have nothing to do. Put yourself in their place,"
That's why I read blogs. Because from this report, which was little more than the standard 1960's gruel of frustration and despair caused by The Man(TM)...I got to read anon5089's real reporting on the subject. And if I want, I can go to Belmont and get some more details.
#28
Reading the comments on the France-Echos site, they sound like Rantburgers. They are debating whether it is time to form militias. The vocabulary is similar to here: Eurabia, the caliphate, demographic decline, decadence vs patriotism, lefty collaboration with the enemy, spineless politicians. There are obviously some Frenchmen who are not going to submit quietly!
Posted by: jolly roger ||
11/03/2005 9:04 Comments ||
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#30
@ Raptor : sorry, it's autotranslation like babelfish, it's bound to be gibberish; the article is an emergency plan unofficially dubbed "Wacco" whose existence was known after it was leaked to the algerian army, and it has been drawn up in the early 90's not by police but by the french army (law enforcement in France is both civilian/police and military/gendarmerie), and assumes civilian police will be overhelmed and will fallback if/when TSHTF.
Then, the army would have to step in, coordonate civilian defense, police and army, and reduce 70 major nodes of unrest, using urban counterguerilla tactics, with the help of other european units (the bit about "wooden area" is simply about how prescient the plan was, since it anticipated moves by the 1995 islamists, or the Roubaix gang shoot-out place).
It concludes with a review of the contradictatory orders given to law enforcement, its internal divisions (right wing union vs left wing, military vs police), and the dread situation it faces, with officers powerless against ethnic bands and having to defend themselves while being abandoned by their hierarchy.
Comments are by two editors of the website, and concerns the possibility of a muslim uprising, the reaction population should adopt, and what shoudl be done (regroup into defendable place, as the authorities would be way too much occupied to defend each and every citizen and it would facilitate their action), one seign more of a "political solution" (army will do its job), the other an "armed" one, with the creation of a citizen militia.
@2b: thanks, but that's giving me way too much credit, I'm just another schmuck who follow this in media, real reporting would be from the locals, all I give is a french view, and a biased one to boot... and JFM would be more interesting because he's got more clarity on that.
#31
Chirac should meet with the leaders of the EU to give them fair warning prior to the deportations to allow some of them to do the same thing at the same time giving each other a bit of political cover.
From what I understand Chirac is going to jail anyway when his term is up, he might as well act to save his country now, and do the politically unpleasant task because when the Muslims control the jails he'll be in trouble.
#32
Who would hire youths or any other group, for that matter, who riot? How many businesses prize employees who assault others with rocks, or set property ablaze? Duh.
And if these immigrants were they actually awarded jobs, think of what effect their spiritual principles would have on the workplace in France. Principles that have them justifying violence, discriminating against women, and forcing their religious ideals on everyone.
France is notorious for long-arming anyone who is not a "native", but this makes little difference to immigrants who do not want to "assimilate". If some common hoop of assimilation were estabilshed as a condition of residency, the rioting would flare, but France would eventually gain the upper hand. But France lacks the will to do so.
France still has to decide whether it cares that immigrants are trying to impose their cultural norms on the host country.
#34
From Belmont Club - The riot police, fire department and public order apparatus may have been present in the rioting banlieus, but the Idea of France was conspicuously absent. The Idea of France, not the hodgepodge of welfare benefits, Marxist obscurantism and world-weariness that that is palmed off as sophistication, is what has to present itself as an alternative to the Green Banner of Islam. Otherwise it will be a contest between something and nothing.
Posted by: Bobby ||
11/03/2005 10:26 Comments ||
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#35
SPOD you are RIGHT.
After 7 days, the muslims KNOW they have France by the balls.
This will embolden them.
France can look out for MUCH worse in the future, this is just a taster.
If the French want control of their country they are going to have to meet the next major riot with loudhailers and media announcements declaring martial law, and stating that rioters will be shot on sight.
They will then need to issue coppers with shoot-to-kill orders and give them automatic weapons.
There is going to be blood in the streets one way or the other. The only way the 5th republic has a hope in hell is to make the mussies fear them.
Fear and actual oppression will make them fit in and assimilate. It is the only way.
#36
The irony that just cracks me up is that the purported reason all these mooselimbs are there was because of the labor shortage. Now we're told, constantly, that the poor puppies have no work.
#40
Reading the comments on the France-Echos site, they sound like Rantburgers. They are debating whether it is time to form militias. The vocabulary is similar to here: Eurabia, the caliphate, demographic decline, decadence vs patriotism, lefty collaboration with the enemy, spineless politicians. There are obviously some Frenchmen who are not going to submit quietly!
Thanks for passing that on, Jolly Roger. I have no idea how prevalent that spirit is in france, but that it even exists (and has a common point at which to rally) is the best news I've heard in quite a while.
1. So far this is only in Muslim North African areas? There are other immigrant in France - non-muslim Africans, for ex, I think. So this is a muslim issue, not a general immigrant thing?
2. Nonetheless - its all youths complaining (rightyly or wrongly) about police "brutality". No Islamist slogans. No support from adults.
3. Note well - Sarkosy, whose tough line on crime seems to be whats pissed the "youths" off (best line from Sarkosy - when you shoot at police, youre not a youth, youre a lout) is the principle pol SUPPORTING funds for mosques. De Villepin, whos taking the softer line on the riots, OPPOSES the funds, as do the French Socialists.
#42
The French authorities appear to have given the rioters carte blanche to continue for as long as they like, so the question is: will the rioters eventually get bored and give up, or will they raise the stakes and start killing people?
#43
Here is a January 2004 Telegraph article that influenced my thinking of France's future. If the muzzies had any brains, the imams would advise the ummah to lie low for the next 20 years, continue procreating and drain France of welfare benefits.
Is France on the way to becoming an Islamic state? France is facing the problem that dare not speak its name. Though French law prohibits the census from any reference to ethnic background or religion, many demographers estimate that as much as 20-30 per cent of the population under 25 is now Muslim. The streets, the traditional haunt of younger people, now belong to Muslim youths. In France, the phrase "les jeunes" is a politically correct way of referring to young Muslims.
Given current birth rates, it is not impossible that in 25 years France will have a Muslim majority. The consequences are dynamic: is it possible that secular France might become an Islamic state?
Posted by: ed ||
11/03/2005 13:25 Comments ||
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#44
Re: jobs vs. laziness, no doubt there's a ghetto mentality in the cites at this point. But that said, the French workplace is heavily structured to prevent wage competition or job creation. enterprising immigrants would find far fewer low-level/entry jobs they could leverage into a better lifestyle even if they were enterprising and skilled.
#45
2. Nonetheless - its all youths complaining (rightyly or wrongly) about police "brutality". No Islamist slogans. No support from adults.
And you know this, how, exactly? I mean, to know there are no Islamist slogans -- then the press is reluctant to even discuss who is rioting -- requires more information than appears to be available.
The same for "no support from adults" -- you know this how, exactly?
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
11/03/2005 13:40 Comments ||
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#46
It may be time to recycle an old WWII joke: Why are the streets in Paris lined with trees? Because the Germans Islamonauts like to march riot in the shade.
#47
Oh, and LH. On the matter of "no Islamist slogans", read comment #12:
The RBers who spoofed the paleostinian intifada were right : the (muslim) "mediators", les grands frères (the big brothers), were greeted by the sweet melody of "allah U akbar"
Is there are more quintessential Islamist slogan than "Allah is greatest"?
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
11/03/2005 14:39 Comments ||
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#48
#17: This is just a taste of what is to come when a severe recession hits (in the next 12 months). Bankrupt European governments will cut welfare payments as revenues decline and the 'contract' of we will stay quiet as long you pay us ends. The social disorder will be something to behold.
Posted by: phil_b|| 2005-11-03 07:19
Unfortunately Phil, under the circumstances you have described, it could happen right here in the big PX. New Orleans (a former French outpost) was a tasteless hor d'vour. Lawless anarchy knows no bounds.
#49
A couple of companies of paras stalking the streets and exterminating all resistance sounds about right. Show the kiddies what the war they're so hot for actually looks like when it comes for YOU.
#50
The French need to rediscover the trusty old slingshot. Hit a few of these "angry yoots" in the head, in the arm, or in the face with some of those large European chestnuts, and they'll very quickly realize that this is no longer fun. The effective range is about 40 yards. The worst that could happen is that someone could lose an eye, but with chestnuts, that's unlikely (marbles or ball bearings, on the other hand, are far more deadly - I speak from experience). They would probably badly bruise those they hit, making it easier to round up the hotheads the next day or so. With a bit of training, you can whap someone on the ear hard enough they'll decide continuing to riot is too much trouble. Sometimes low-intensity weapons are more effective than the alternatives.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
11/03/2005 15:18 Comments ||
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#51
"And you know this, how, exactly?"
Ah, I ran out of question marks. Like with most such notes, I welcome correction.
Now you say someone shouted Allahu Akbar? Ok, theres a start. Do we have a citation? Did they go beyond it to a specifically political slogan? Was the phrase Allahu Akbar on a sign, or just shouted? In unison, or by individuals.
The English language MSM is not just covering this poorly, theyre not covering it much at all (in fairness most Americans dont care what happens in France, nobodys died during the riots - note in LA post Rodney King we had like 50 deaths in the same time frame - and there are no good bars in the banlieues, so why would any good reporter leave central Paris?) I was hoping to get some more INFO from RB.
"More reading has made me more familiar with the purely 'social' aspects of the Parisian rioting, i.e. hidden French racism, the failure of its economy to efficiently create jobs, etc. Juan Cole, for example, sees events in Paris as a simple "race riot". Others see it as the consequence of the French social model. From that point of view, the "Islamic" aspects are purely coincidental or of minor importance in comparison to the 'real' causes.
One argument for derogating the Islamic factor has been the absence, so far, of any direct link to terrorist masterminds. It could be counter-argued that Islam figures more broadly by fostering a sense of apartness or entitlement, etc. which then provokes the resented discrimination. I'll leave these caveats as they are for the readers to think about, although I am personally unpersuaded that Islamic cultural factors are irrelevant to the disturbances in France."
#54
Muslim leaders at Clichy-sous-Bois' mosque, meanwhile, prayed for peace and asked parents to keep teenagers off the streets after skirmishes broke out after two teenage boys were electrocuted last Thursday while hiding in a power substation because they believed police were chasing them.
Uh, didn't I read somewhere's else that cops were chasing these 2 yoots? Because they'd just robbed a local store, and while fleeing the coppers, they hopped a fence into an electrical substation! Think that was Reuters or somewhere else today. It's just a shame they didn't fall into one of France's nuke plants and burn to death (although, electrical burns are just as bad, I imagine). And, my final rant...I'm SICK & TIRED of this whole "disaffected, unemployed, poor Mooselimbs" tripe. Enough already! Only other city that's erupted in chaos lately is New Orleans...ironic that it's a former French outpost too, eh?
Posted by: BA ||
11/03/2005 15:46 Comments ||
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#55
That was simply on teevee, "mediators", some in djellaba (or some kind of white robe), greeted by onlookers who shout them quite audible "allah u akbar" from the windows (probably hindoos), though that was only in the "noise background" and the reportage wasn't focused on that.
I don't know if there is a djihadist per se undertone in theses riots, but they certainly are steemed by a "muslim" identity, for lack of better words; not all the rioters are arabs, there is a large proportion of african blacks and certainly an handful of whiteys, but they all hail from a counterculture which includes "gangsta" elements, but draws heavily on islam, as opposed to the "french" identity.
All I can tell you is there is a revolt brewing in there since a decade or so, this is actually an overall "minor" upsurge (the fact that it gets international coverage is the exceptional thing). This will end in a few time. Then, the authorities will appease even more, send more money, delegate the muslim notables to handle theses restless "youths", share power with them (affirmative action),... This is the way.
http://www.drudgereport.com/flash8.htm Rioting in French suburbs 'well organized'
Thu Nov 03 2005 14:56:34 ET
French Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy said Thursday that the riots in several Paris suburbs over the previous night were "not spontaneous" but rather "well organized."
"What we saw in the department of Seine-Saint-Denis overnight was not spontaneous, it was perfectly organized. We are looking into by whom and how," Sarkozy told French news channel i-tele.
The interior minister also said the government would not allow "troublemakers, a bunch of hoodlums, think they can do whatever they want" in the country.
A force of 1,000 police were assigned late Thursday to Seine-Saint-Denis, following the previous night of violence which affected about half of the 40 towns in the department, mostly communities of immigrants from Africa, officials said.
http://no-pasaran.blogspot.com/2005/11/
french-media-heads-we-win-tails-you.html French media : heads we win, tails you lose
posted by U*2 @ 11:31 AM (NB = "W", from Merde in France)
http://no-pasaran.blogspot.com/2005/11/
more-media-censorship-on-way.html More media censorship on the way
posted by U*2 @ 1:17 PM
French cable TV news channel i-tele is openly considering showing fewer images and less video footage of the riots claiming that such coverage might be fanning the flames. The fact is that they do not want to continue showing what the French citizenry is really like in these battling suburbs. The last two days have given free reign to images of violent vulgarity spouting youths, vowing vengeance on French society, along with a new media figure -- the djellaba garbed neighborhood mediators who claim they will not deal with Sarkozy.
#56
LH, as much as I respect Belmont Club, the involvement of "terrorist masterminds" is not necessary for an event to be related to Islamism. The Beltway shooters, for example, have never been tied to any Islamic masterminds, but clearly expressed Islamist sympathies. Ditto the LAX shooter.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
11/03/2005 16:23 Comments ||
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Compared to the LA riots, this is a mere child's play, but I do not agree to LH social explanation; there IS a social background, I have no doubt about it, I fully agree, but there also truly is a clash of identities, one muslim identity vs a "french" one. I'm sorry, but I'm 100% persuaded that islam is a big factor here. It's not Al Qaida and Ben Laden pulling the strings, it's more like an amorphous "cultural jihad" feeding on resentment, post-colonial hatred (big factor too), cultural habits,... with "self-conscious" pseudopods (all the muslim orgs, charities, imams,...) acting as a central nervous system, and with street thugs as foot soliders whenever there is aneed for applying pressure.
#60
Too true 2b. On the other hand, LH is the only liberal in the blogosphere willing to hang out with us! His polite and insightful comments are always welcome, as far as I am concerned. LH is never rude.
#61
"LH, as much as I respect Belmont Club, the involvement of "terrorist masterminds" is not necessary for an event to be related to Islamism. The Beltway shooters, for example, have never been tied to any Islamic masterminds, but clearly expressed Islamist sympathies. Ditto the LAX shooter."
Sure, thats true. I was just thinking if there was any overtly islamist content to this BC would have info on it.
My take, at this point - this is the fruit of A. Poverty and unemployment - the fault of French etatisme, as much as anything else. B. A PC victim mentality on the part of the immigrants - mentality that seems to be shared by non-muslims among them, but perhaps worse among the muslims C. Actual racism among the French D. The police being too willing to concede the streets, and allowing the gangs to gain a sense of ownership.
Now C makes me sound lefty, and B and D righty and A kinda both (poverty causes violence, but socialism of the French variety can cause poverty) so i guess y'all will say im being too damned subtle or something - so what - life is complex that way. I guess some folks will think Im lefty cause Im not saying this is all about Islam. Im not excluding that possibility - the troubles in Denmark, for ex, DID seem to be all about Islam. I just want evidence, is all.
#62
"On the other hand, LH is the only liberal in the blogosphere willing to hang out with us!"
Thats mainly cause Im not really all that liberal - Im really about dead center for the US electorate - just some of you guys have been in the echo chamber so long, you think im some kind of lefty.
#63
I can't help but admire LH's unending wealth of optimism and there is nothing wrong with cheering for the underdog - as long as you aren't placing bets.
#65
One would think since these are muslims I would say it is about Islam.
Islam seems to have no sense of self control. Islam has no self critisim (it abides none what so ever.) Islam is insular, find Muslims and you will find self segregation.
All the typical leftist and socialist memes are easy to overcome if you look a reality and are actually interested in it.
#66
"Thats mainly cause Im not really all that liberal - Im really about dead center for the US electorate - just some of you guys have been in the echo chamber so long, you think im some kind of lefty."
ROFLMAO!
I'm mainstream, LOL. That's what everybody says. Oh yeah, if you say so then it must be so. Please, keep them coming, lol. :)
LH, as much as I respect Belmont Club, the involvement of "terrorist masterminds" is not necessary for an event to be related to Islamism. The Beltway shooters, for example, have never been tied to any Islamic masterminds, but clearly expressed Islamist sympathies. Ditto the LAX shooter.
AND... neither of them really did that much damage, at least compared to the sorts of guys overseas who did have contacts with more organized groups and cells, like the Madrid bombers or the London Underground bombers.
Posted by: Phil ||
11/03/2005 17:52 Comments ||
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#68
LH: I disagree with you that this is being caused strictly by poverty, but I also disagree that the problems are strictly caused by socialism per se; I think there are also other factors involved in many European countries' failures to assimilate their immigrant populations.
(IF you could blame it on that. (Although I disagree with him on a lot, Howard Bloom has made the point in the past that the _parents_ of these kids doing this have often moved to the west to get AWAY from the sort of society the kids are rioting on behalf of). I don't pretend to understand the answer to the question of why Europe seems so bad at integration of their immigrants into mainstream society, but I think it's an important question.)
I also think Islam isn't quite as big a problem as they're saying here. Some of the immigrants are no doubt from Turkey, for instance, but despite being a majority moslem (albeit nominally secular) nation Turkey AFAIK doesn't tolerate behavior such as is being shown here no matter whose party was in power.
I do have some partial hunches:
I think part of what separates "Islam The Religion of Peace" from "Islam the Religion of Pieces" is a strong trend of millenialism in the latter, and Europe's last two natively-developed fanatical belief systems, Marxism and Naziism, had (or have) strong millenialist trends too, as well as a recurring belief that dictatorial revolution should be waged when possible in support of their respective ideologies.
I also have strong suspicions that the trend in Europe away from more traditional forms of religion have actually made things worse. They have created a false dichotomy, that one's moral choices are between a tolerance dependent on absolute moral relativism, or the salafism that's being preached in the Mosques, with no middle ground.
(There's an interesting thread along those lines in many of Neal Stephenson's books, in particular the novel _Snow Crash_ and the nonfiction _In The Beginning Was The Command Line_. They're both on the fanaticism-reading-list I'm going to assemble one of these days...)
That's all for now, I probably won't have time to comment later.
(Heck, you should read _Snow Crash_ just because it's so good...)
Anyway, I gotta go.
Posted by: Phil ||
11/03/2005 18:23 Comments ||
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#69
Phil, how did you get that out of Snow Crash? Please enlighten me.
#70
Phil, how did you get that out of Snow Crash? Please enlighten me.
I didn't get all of it from _SC_. But look closely at both the Librarian's and Juanita's comments on the nature of the virus ("So is this a disease, a computer virus, or a religion?" "What's the difference?") and Juanita's belief that exposure to certain religions could actually innoculate people against the more dangerous ones.
And I'll quote some of the relevant bits from ITBWTCL:
The lesson most people are taking home from the Twentieth Century is that, in order for a large number of different cultures to coexist peacefully on the globe (or even in a neighborhood) it is necessary for people to suspend judgment in this way. Hence (I would argue) our suspicion of, and hostility towards, all authority figures in modern culture. As David Foster Wallace has explained in his essay "E Unibus Pluram," this is the fundamental message of television; it is the message that people take home, anyway, after they have steeped in our media long enough. It's not expressed in these highfalutin terms, of course. It comes through as the presumption that all authority figures--teachers, generals, cops, ministers, politicians--are hypocritical buffoons, and that hip jaded coolness is the only way to be.
The problem is that once you have done away with the ability to make judgments as to right and wrong, true and false, etc., there's no real culture left. All that remains is clog dancing and macrame. The ability to make judgments, to believe things, is the entire it point of having a culture. I think this is why guys with machine guns sometimes pop up in places like Luxor, and begin pumping bullets into Westerners. They perfectly understand the lesson of McCoy Air Force Base. When their sons come home wearing Chicago Bulls caps with the bills turned sideways, the dads go out of their minds.
The global anti-culture that has been conveyed into every cranny of the world by television is a culture unto itself, and by the standards of great and ancient cultures like Islam and France, it seems grossly inferior, at least at first. The only good thing you can say about it is that it makes world wars and Holocausts less likely--and that is actually a pretty good thing!
The only real problem is that anyone who has no culture, other than this global monoculture, is completely screwed. Anyone who grows up watching TV, never sees any religion or philosophy, is raised in an atmosphere of moral relativism, learns about civics from watching bimbo eruptions on network TV news, and attends a university where postmodernists vie to outdo each other in demolishing traditional notions of truth and quality, is going to come out into the world as one pretty feckless human being. And--again--perhaps the goal of all this is to make us feckless so we won't nuke each other.
On the other hand, if you are raised within some specific culture, you end up with a basic set of tools that you can use to think about and understand the world. You might use those tools to reject the culture you were raised in, but at least you've got some tools.
In this country, the people who run things--who populate major law firms and corporate boards--understand all of this at some level. They pay lip service to multiculturalism and diversity and non-judgmentalness, but they don't raise their own children that way. I have highly educated, technically sophisticated friends who have moved to small towns in Iowa to live and raise their children, and there are Hasidic Jewish enclaves in New York where large numbers of kids are being brought up according to traditional beliefs. Any suburban community might be thought of as a place where people who hold certain (mostly implicit) beliefs go to live among others who think the same way.
And not only do these people feel some responsibility to their own children, but to the country as a whole. Some of the upper class are vile and cynical, of course, but many spend at least part of their time fretting about what direction the country is going in, and what responsibilities they have. And so issues that are important to book-reading intellectuals, such as global environmental collapse, eventually percolate through the porous buffer of mass culture and show up as ancient Hindu ruins in Orlando.
Anyway, I suggest reading the whole thing; there's still some context missing from the above. I'm too busy to pick out enough quotes to provide perfect context, and you can find the whole shebang here.
Please note, he wrote it before 9/11.
Posted by: Phil ||
11/03/2005 18:49 Comments ||
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#71
It is my belief that the Global Anti-Culture pretends to exalt tolerance but is actually self-destructive of tolerance. At some point you have to have someone saying that killing your next door neighbor because he's Christian/Muslim/Jewish/Whatever is _morally wrong_ in the same sort of way that the salafists are saying that the riots and suicide bombers are morally right.
Posted by: Phil ||
11/03/2005 18:52 Comments ||
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#72
So, Phil, you are saying that these kids rioting outside of Paris are the victims of a sociorganically grown popular âvirusâ culture that humanity has instinctually produced as a sort of antibody designed to prevent global catastrophes from occurring? A kind of anti-culture that, while is allows for globalization and a certain level of peace, also provides no nourishment for the soul thus leading them down an inadvertent path toward religious fanaticism?
Well, I donât know about that. Having read all of Stephensonâs fiction (except for Zodiac), I must say that the manâs great love of pure ideas often leads him to inadvertent sophistry. It IS reassuring, however, to know that I can still reason like an over-caffeinated undergraduate student!
#73
No. Their teachers are either adherents of the g-a-c or marxists, and while they may be neither it makes them particularly vulnerable to millenialist fanatic belief systems, whether they're marxist, christian, or whatever...
Posted by: Phil ||
11/03/2005 19:23 Comments ||
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#74
I always enjoy watching those who don't have a personal grasp of religion try to explain it away with hip jaded coolness.
There is a reason why so many people embrace religion....and it's not due to a desire to belong - though for many that may be the case - but for most who truly grasp it, it is a desire to improve oneself by looking inward. The problem with the Muslim religion is that it doesn't focus on inward reflection, but shame and blame. And though they get many of the benefits of belonging to something bigger than themselves, they are forced to find an "other" to blame.
#75
I was not trying to explain religion away, and I don't think Stephenson was either. (And I really have to go now.)
Posted by: Phil ||
11/03/2005 19:33 Comments ||
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#76
Lets not lose sight of the fact that these people came as a result of government action and inaction. They could have been stopped at any time and even now could be relatively painlessly bribed to leave.
The problem is not specifically that they are muslim, or a racial minority, or poor, or even unassimilated. The problem at root is they are in France in the first place. The reality is that large numbers of people came into France that almost nobody wants and if anybody speaks out about it they are labelled a facist/racist.
The unassimilated and growing minorities in Europe are the consequence of PC driven wishful thinking that one day we will have a rainbow future where we link arms and sing Kumbyeyar(sp).
I long ago concluded that only some social catastrophe will end this nonsense. The open questions are how long it will take and how bad it will be when it happens.
#77
I really didn't mean you, and not having read Stephenson, I'll bow out. But too often I see religion explained as a misguided venture into fantasy or fanaticism which I think is simply a lack of understanding.
It's an interesting discussion and I didn't mean to imply disagreement.
#78
how about this: "you immigrants came here to make a better life. You haven't. Instead you accept welfare, create no-go neighborhoods for the recognized law and order and life-safety members. Now it's all over. Time to collect your meager belongings and get the F*&k out. Molotov and rock throwers will be shot on sight. Mosques preaching hate and anti- gov't violence will be torn down. We will enforce a dusk to dawn curfew with deadly force for groups and individuals will be required to submiot to search and have a valid reason for travel"
Posted by: Frank G ||
11/03/2005 20:26 Comments ||
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#79
BTW: via Roger L Simon - an American student shares his experiences (including the fact that the common French are not our enemy)
"He also writes this about the current situation:
The government has quietly put a lot of AK-47-toting soldiers on patrol in Paris, especially around key public transportation points and at the monuments and high-traffic areas such as Forum des Halles. I think there are three reasons for this - 1) to reassure the public - and the tourists, 2) to take some pressure off the Police Nationale, who have been deployed in greater numbers to the north-eastern suburbs and 3) to send a message to would be trouble-makers.
The French have the reputation of being wimps, but in my experience, when they crack down, they crack down HARD"
Posted by: Frank G ||
11/03/2005 20:28 Comments ||
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#80
Is the AK-47 the new Euro Rapid Deployment force weapon of choice?
#81
If I was the French - I would dose the area with BZ for a week with a cordon around the areas ... then come in a 5 days later with an occupying force.
Oh have lots of UAVs and cameras set up and broadcast the whole insurrection live on TV.
Record all the rapes and murders to play back later after every interview with the mullahs.
Three armed men broke into a regional government office in the southeastern French city of Carpentras on Wednesday, briefly holding 17 people hostage before making off with 1,500 passports, police said. The three masked men slipped into the building as a cleaner arrived before sunrise, and took her hostage along with the deputy prefect, his wife and other staff as they arrived at work. The men escaped around an hour later, on two motorbikes, after stealing 1,500 blank passports from a safe. Some 80 police officers backed by a helicopter were carrying out road checks across the region to track the thieves down.
#1
When will the French ever learn. We give em away here, along with a cold drink, a lift to town, some chow, and a voluntary court summons. All you have to do is make it across the border.
Canada's spy agency has revealed that it has dismantled a suspected terrorist cell last year in Toronto that included an al-Qaeda-trained explosives expert, The National Post has reported. The cell consisted of four Algerian refugee claimants alleged to be members of the Salafist Group for Call and Combat, a radical Islamic group, Larry Brooks, Canadian Security Intelligence Service chief of counterterrorism for the Toronto region, told delegates at a closed-door security meeting this week.
A closed-door super-secret security meeting, you say? Then why are we hearing anything about it?
Among them was a former al-Qaeda training camp instructor who had studied bomb-making at Osama bin Laden's Al Farooq and Khaldun training camps in eastern Afghanistan, Brooks said, according to the report. Three of the men, who had entered Canada from the United States, were arrested and deported back to the United States in recent months. The alleged bomb-maker left voluntarily in March, 2004, after investigators confronted him. He had entered Canada in 1998 using a forged Saudi passport, the report said.
#2
The cell consisted of four Algerian refugee claimants alleged to be members of the Salafist Group for Call and Combat ...Three of the men, who had entered Canada from the United States
That makes no sense. Why would Algerians claim refuge from the USA, unless we had expelled them? And if they were expelled from the US, why would Canada accept them?
#3
Excellent question Trailing Wife. Maybe we should ring up the United States Bureau of Deportation and inquire. Oh, there is no Bureau of Deportation? There are no deportations you say? Well I guess than answers the question.
#4
And if they were expelled from the US, why would Canada accept them?
Because Canada doesn't care?
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
11/03/2005 13:31 Comments ||
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#5
Immediately after the 9/11 atrocities, fearing reprisals, a lot of muslims left the US. If memory serves me correctly, 10,000 Pakistanis alone left (many illegals, many claiming asylum) and Canada was the favorite destination. Looks like some terrorist cells also relocated to a neighborhood where the heat was not on.
Posted by: ed ||
11/03/2005 15:13 Comments ||
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Perhaps it's good the Bush administration is getting the third year of the second term out of the way in the first. Soldier up, learn from the mistakes, move on. But move on they can't. Not yet.
The Alito bump notwithstanding, a peculiar sort of depression affects many Republicans these days. Indictments both grave and specious? Sigh. The Harriet Miers internecine death-match? Alas.
But there's more. The Valerie Plame imbroglio suggests -- merely suggests, mind you -- that the left's true objective is to undermine the rationale for war to cripple a wartime president for short-term political gain.
A shocking charge. Almost unimaginable! But look at the history. Five years of pessimism and defeatism from the chattering class has made conservatives wonder why they bother. From the quagmire of Afghanistan -- the brutal winter looms! -- to the quagmire in the first week of the Iraq operation, every action is seen through a dark, cracked prism of fear and defeat.
Never mind the constitutional vote; there were graphic designers who spent a nice, comfy workday sifting through their collections of fonts, looking for the right typeface to herald the 2,000th casualty. (Hmm. Helvetica Bold? No, used that for the 1,000th death.) Prime example: an editorial cartoon by Mike Luckovich, which had 2,000 soldiers' names forming the word "Why?"
You have to ask? Well, one more time:
Because we've been told by all the root-causers that the lack of freedom in Arab nations breeds desperate terrorists. Because it's better to leave a country with a democracy and a constitution than nuke it clean and walk away whistling. Because the United States has been at odds with Iraq since 1990, and the alternative was more oil-for-food corruption and porous sanctions until Saddam was free to romp about untrammeled.
Because upsetting the precious "stability" of the Middle East gave Libya a case of the yips, helped mobilize the occupied Lebanese and even made Egypt pretend to hold a good election. Because it gave the United States bases right next door to Iran, the leader of which has announced that Israel and the U.S. should be destroyed. With nukes.
Because after 9/11, leaving rogue states to their own devices and hoping Kofi Annan and Jacques Chirac would talk down our enemies seemed a rather weak definition of defense.
Oh, sorry. Mentioned 9/11. That's not permitted. Iraq has nothing to do with 9/11. Iraq is about Halliburton and oil, just as the invasion of Sicily in World War II was about cannoli and Chianti. According to some, Bush just threw a dart at a map in 2002; it hit Iraq, and off we went. According to others, he came into office determined to invade Iraq -- sure, the Clinton administration had made regime change the official U.S. policy, but at least it wasn't foolish enough to do anything about it.
Point out to the critics that Saddam gave refuge to the man who planned the first attack on the World Trade Center, and you'll get a dismissive wave of the hand: That was '93.
Point out the constant assertions in the Clinton years of Saddam's WMD capabilities and connections with terrorist groups -- points made by the mainstream media and accepted as fact by all -- and you get another wave: Well, we found no WMDs.
Why waste time connecting those dots? Those are old and boring dots. What matters most is whether the lies about yellowcake -- Bush's lies, of course, not Joe Wilson's -- led to the outing of a double-secret CIA agent.
Point out how the left used to regard the revelation of covert agents' names as a civic duty, and eyes roll. This is now, please.
Once upon a time you could count on both sides to have the same set of assumptions and facts. Now you have Howard Dean's favorite singer, Wyclef Jean, rapping about "Father Saddam."
Of course the Republicans are depressed. The media and the Democrats appear to have improved on the old description of the Bourbon monarchy: They have learned nothing. And forgotten everything.
Letter-writer talking points: The above was a transparent attempt to shift attention away from Scooter. Because that's really the biggest problem the nation has faced in the last five years. Osama bin Libby.
Posted by: Steve ||
11/03/2005 13:55 ||
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#1
I say we take wilson AND plame and hang them both for subversive espionage.wadda ya think??
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito joined the Army Reserve while he was a college student because his lottery number had made it likely he would be drafted for the Vietnam War, college roommates said Wednesday.
You mean like when John Kerry joined the Naval Reserve when his student deferment was denied? Oh, that's right, Reserve duty dosen't count when you're a conservative.
Alito was part of the Army's ROTC program during his years at Princeton -- 1968 to 1972 -- a period when the war in Southeast Asia escalated and more American men were drafted.
So, he enrolled in the Reserve Officer Training Program, you know, a college program to train Army officers, and he wasn't planning to join the Army, Reserve or otherwise?
In 1971, President Nixon ended student deferments, increasing the pool of potential military inductees. Four lottery drawings were held during that period in which a birthday and 366 blue plastic capsules dictated the order in which all men of draft age would be called.
In the first drawing, held December 1, 1969, Alito received the lottery number of 32, according to the U.S. Selective Service. Although the military was calling up men with numbers as high as 195, Alito had a student deferment.
Yes, as a student OFFICER!
He participated in the ROTC program and did two summers of training at Fort Knox, Kentucky, and Fort Indiantown Gap in Annville, Pennsylvania. With graduation looming, the student deferment gone and Yale Law School waiting, Alito joined the Army Reserve.
SEE: Reserve Officer Training Program
"It was draft-related," college roommate Mark Dwyer said of Alito's decision. "I joined the teacher preparation program. We were all focused on the draft lottery when those numbers got called. We thought about where we were. "Sam looked like he was sure to be drafted. He said, 'If I'm going into the Army, I might as well be an officer.'"
Uh, dude, why do you think he was in the ROTC?
Another roommate, David Grais, said he remembered Alito had a low lottery number. Upon graduating from Princeton, Alito attended Yale and "did active duty after law school," Grais said.
Which is how the Army trains officers that don't go to West Point
"Judge Alito is proud to have served his country in the U.S. Army Reserves," said Steve Schmidt, a White House spokesman.
Vietnam War service was a critical issue in the 2004 presidential campaign and has shadowed President Bush since the previous campaign.
Only in the minds of his critics
Bush joined the Texas Air National Guard in 1968 after graduating from Yale University and questions have been raised about whether efforts were made to get him in the Guard to avoid service in the war. Vice President Dick Cheney received five student and marriage deferments of service during the war.
Democratic Sen. John Kerry, the party's 2004 nominee, volunteered for the Navy and served two tours of duty in Vietnam.
The hell he did, he joined the Naval Reserve and got called up to active duty.
In the questionnaire Alito submitted to the Senate in 1990, when he was up for a seat on the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, he wrote of his military service:
"I was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the Army upon graduation from college in 1972. After law school, I was on active duty for training from September to December 1975. I was in the Army Reserves from 1972 to 1980, when I was honorably discharged as a captain."
I'll bet he will even let us see his DD-214. How about you, Sen. Kerry?
Documents from Princeton show that Alito, then an Army cadet, received six weeks of "practical application in military leadership at the Army Reserve Officer Training Corps' basic summer camp at Fort Knox, [Kentucky], June 12 to July 23" in 1970. "He will train as a small unit leader and instructor in realistic exercises, and will receive command experience and the opportunity to apply classroom knowledge in the field," the document said. Alito delayed entering the service while at law school..
Like I said, the Army wanted him to get that training as much as he did
and then spent time in 1975 at Fort Gordon, Georgia, for signal officer training. He was on the inactive reserve for a period and then promoted to captain before he was honorably discharged in 1980. The military draft ended in 1973.
And we've been hearing about it and who's service is honorable ever since. DISCLAIMER: I was in Junior ROTC at Smith Vocational High School in Northhampton, Mass just down the road from Amherst with all it's lefty colleges. We got protested against as warmongering highschoolers. Graduated in 1970. We sweated out the draft as well. My number was in the mid three hundreds, so I was safe. Didn't enlist till 1976 after Vietnam. So I guess I'm not qualified to join the court either.
Posted by: Steve ||
11/03/2005 10:19 ||
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Democratic Sen. John Kerry, the party's 2004 nominee, volunteered for the Navy and served two tours of duty in Vietnam.
OMFG.
Did I read that right? Did the AP, in the course of a story critical of TWO people for joining the Army Reserve, gloss over another person joining the Naval Reserve, describing it as "volunteering"?
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
11/03/2005 10:53 Comments ||
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#2
BIG FREAKIN' DEAL!!! This isn't even a talking point.
#3
And, BTW -- we still don't have all the details of Kerry's service record. Yet the press still plays games like this.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
11/03/2005 10:54 Comments ||
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#4
Have CNN's reporter in Baghdad leave the bar at the Palestine and ask some Guard and Reserve guys if they think they're in the real army, which is kinda the inference here, yes?
#5
Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito joined the Army Reserve while he was a college student because his lottery number had made it likely he would be drafted for the Vietnam War, college roommates said Wednesday.
#6
The Leftist-Elites, seeing their cabal in the courts about to end, is resorting to grasping at straws. God forbid I would ever enter public service. My birthday number was drawn 340, and they would probably condemn my mother for doing everying thing in her power to delay my birth, as I was born at 1:00 AM, and the previous day's number was 75. They would say she had a preminition of the situation and did something "unfair" and tried to protect me.
#7
Cracks like tu3031's piss me off. Not two weeks ago I was blown off of this very barstool. I've seen the face of war. It looks like broken bottles of Chivas and Grey Goose. War is hell. I know.
Screw it Achmed. Keep bringing me straight shots.
#9
He served honorably from 1972 to 1980? The draft ended (not a good day in my opinion) in 1973. I believe the commitment at that time was only for 6 years. You do the math. Sounds like he is a partiot...something the congress certainly won't understand.
#12
We have laws to deal with these people. Rome didn't have legal authority over Carthage.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
11/03/2005 12:46 Comments ||
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#13
If this is the best they can do, it's over, Alito gets confirmed with a comfortable margin.
Posted by: Steve White ||
11/03/2005 13:33 Comments ||
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#14
Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito joined the Army Reserve while he was a college student because his lottery number had made it likely he would be drafted for the Vietnam War, college roommates said Wednesday.
Hell, my draft number was 97, but the Army offered me a college scholarship and a commission, so I took it. You had to be able to do the math to get the damn thing, so it wasn't too much of a leap to take the better deal. I got a BA on it, a MA on the GI Bill, and the taxpayers got 20 years of my life. I've been enjoying 11 years of retirement so far. Then again I haven't been nominated for the court either. I will not run if nominated and will not serve if elected. Good enough for o'Bill [Sherman] its good enough for me :)
#15
I guess I'm a draft evader, too. I got my draft notice in July, 1965, ordering me to New Orleans for an induction physical. My drill sergeant told me I could ignore it...
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
11/03/2005 15:26 Comments ||
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#17
Article: Alito was part of the Army's ROTC program during his years at Princeton -- 1968 to 1972 -- a period when the war in Southeast Asia escalated and more American men were drafted.
This is a typical AP lie. The war escalated until 1968. The Tet Offensive in 1968 crushed the Vietcong. The peak year for American casualties was 1968. It fell every year after that. It may have escalated for the Vietnamese Communists, as a Republican President took the gloves off. But American casualties are presumably the yardstick AP uses to define escalation. And by that standard, AP is lying, as usual.
FLIGHT records and other evidence points to Poland and Romania as countries that allowed their territory to be used by the CIA to hold top suspected al-Qaeda captives, Human Rights Watch said overnight.
Tom Malinowski, the Washington director of the human rights group, said the evidence, though circumstantial, strongly pointed to Poland and Romania as being among the unidentified eastern European countries referred to in a Washington Post report yesterday on secret CIA-run prisons.
Mr Malinowski said sources in Afghanistan told the New York-based rights organisation that top al-Qaeda suspects, including Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, were moved out of Afghanistan in September 2003.
The same month, a Boeing 737 leased by the CIA to transport prisoners departed from Kabul and made stops at remote airfields in Poland and Romania before continuing on to Morocco and then to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, he said.
"It's a large aircraft so one could imagine a large group of detainees flying on this plane, as against some other smaller executive jets that they used," he said.
"The fact that it stops in eastern Europe, then Morocco and then Guantanamo suggests different classes of prisoners being deposited in different places," he said.
#1
a big bonus to Romania and Poland! F*&k Mr HRW - he should be tried and imprisoned for the traitorous POS he is
Posted by: Frank G ||
11/03/2005 13:53 Comments ||
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#2
"The fact that it stops in eastern Europe, then Morocco and then Guantanamo suggests different classes of prisoners being deposited in different places," he said.
wow! Rock solid investigative reporting. Someone send Joe Wilson to see if it's true.
#6
"The fact that it stops in eastern Europe, then Morocco and then Guantanamo suggests different classes of prisoners being deposited in different places," he said.
Shit if I'm running this thing I'm landing everyplace I can about every five minutes. I'd drive these nitwits nuts trying to track shit down.
#7
Manolo! Another shipment of truncheons and tasers to Warsaw and Bucharest.
Posted by: ed ||
11/03/2005 15:30 Comments ||
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#8
Ok I will surrender that fact that we may be holding some prisoners in other countriesâ¦.SO WHAT! HRW acts like we are kidnapping children off the streets and selling them into slavery. IF this is really happening, I strongly suspect we are not grabbing the average Acmed off the streets and spiriting him away from his motherland. More than likely we are using these facilities sparingly for those deemed special prisoners. Have them in a third party country would make them think twice about their standing (as a POW) and what protections they think they might have. They already know that if they are sent to Gitmo the worst thing they could expect is being forced to listen to Harry Potter, play soccer, or being straddled by some female interrogator. If they find themselves in a backwater base in say Romania might make them think twice as to how well they are treated. Itâs all about getting leverage over them and making them give up the goods. You will never EVER break them by asking, âpretty pleaseâ one hundred jillion times. Oh and FUCK the HRW, what is their position on beheading of prisoner by Al Queda?
November 3, 2005: The U.S. Marine Corps has officially assigned its 2,600 strong Marine Special Operations Command, to SOCOM (Special Operations Command.) When SOCOM was formed in 1986, to control all the special operations units in the American military, there was resistance from all the services, except the army (which had the most special operations troops, mainly in its Special Forces.) But the Secretary of Defense overruled the services, and, by 1990, the navy and air force had assigned their special operations units to SOCOM control. The marines resisted, and got away with it by insisting they didnât have any âspecial operationsâ troops (or that âall marines are special operations troops,â depending on what day you asked them.)
But by late 2001, it was obvious even to the marines that SOCOM was where the action was, and the marines wanted in. After four years of haggling and negotiation, the marines are in, with a combination of traditional commandoes, long range recon and ârangerâ type forces. The marines may add more forces in the future, or perhaps the entire Marine Corps will join SOCOM and take it over.
Posted by: Steve ||
11/03/2005 09:47 ||
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#1
The Marines are assigning two battalions to SOCOM, bringing to mind the 1st and 2nd Raider Battalions of WWII. These outfits were disbanded because the top Marine brass didn't like the idea of having an elite force within an elite force. The Navy SEAL program was created from the RECON Marines, but few people know about RECON. The Corps believes that a Marine is a Marine, and that SEALs and Green Berets are still "squids" and "doggies".
#4
Though it's far less popular song than it used to be, it used to bug Marines intensely that the lyrics of the Marine Hymn fit perfectly to the country tune, "The Wabash Cannonball".
(I am far from anti-Marine, BTW. I had a great uncle Marine who had the fourth highest "peace bond" of any Marine in WWII. Great combat NCO, but you just couldn't send the man on shore leave without creating an international incident.)
#6
It's going to be interesting. Having worked with Marines while running an ODA -way back in the mid-eighties, I found them to be disciplined, motivated, general assault troops but a far cry from adequate for foreign internal defense, insurgency or other non-direct action missions.
#7
White cat: Roger Roger, Tng MTT's, FID and DA fir sure maybe, UW prolly not their cup of tea. BHG too tightly wrapped I'm afeared. But rat now, suspect we can use the aug.
#8
From what I've heard, though, WhiteCat, 21st-century Marine NCOs have been great as MTTs; there was an article on it back in April by Robert Kaplan, "America's African Rifles."
Posted by: Edward Yee ||
11/03/2005 16:15 Comments ||
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#9
I like the Marine spirit that "We don't have any special operations troops or that all Marines are special operations troops." Kind of like Joe Paterno and not having names on football jerseys. On the other hand, the Marines coming into SOCOM can't do anything but add to.
#10
I found them to be disciplined, motivated, general assault troops but a far cry from adequate for foreign internal defense, insurgency or other non-direct action missions
1980s? Gee, somebody ought to tell the jarheads that they didn't do it right in China, Haiti, the Dominican Republic, or the Philippines. Oh, and that their 'Small Wars' manual is all wrong. I guess you ought to inform the State Department, which used the Corps in foreign ops some 180 times in the 20th century...
A federal judge in Manhattan refused yesterday to overturn the 2001 convictions of a former aide to Osama bin Laden in a major terrorism case, but he sharply criticized the United States Marshals Service for suppressing evidence and then trying to hide what it had done.
The judge, Kevin Thomas Duffy of United States District Court, raised "grave concerns" about the marshals' actions in a scathing109-page ruling that nevertheless upheld the convictions of the defendant, Wadih El-Hage.
Judge Duffy had held hearings over the past year about how the Marshals Service made 28 hours of video recordings of prosecutors' interviews with a crucial government witness that were then not given to the defense before the trial.
The witness, Jamal Ahmed al-Fadl, a former member of Al Qaeda, was in the witness protection program, which is run by the Marshals Service. Without telling prosecutors, the Marshals Service taped a series of video conferences between Mr. Fadl and the prosecutors interviewing him. Under the law, the transcripts of those tapes should have been turned over to the defense before trial, Judge Duffy said, but the prosecutors themselves did not learn of the tapes until after the trial.
"Through a mixture of inaction, incompetence and stonewalling to cover up their mistakes," Judge Duffy wrote, "the United States Marshals Service and the Department of Justice's Office of Enforcement Operations have seriously jeopardized the convictions of Al Qaeda terrorist Wadih El-Hage."
The judge, in his decision, carefully analyzed the suppressed evidence, which included 647 pages of transcripts. Mr. El-Hage's lawyers argued that they could have used the material to try to impeach Mr. Fadl when he testified.
The judge concluded that some of the evidence would have provided "fertile grounds for impeachment" by the defense lawyers. In one case, the judge said, the defense could have shown that Mr. Fadl perceived that his immigration status and chances of avoiding prison depended on his testimony going well.
But, the judge concluded, "none of the undisclosed material is powerful enough to displace the government's other evidence of El-Hage's guilt." Mr. Fadl testified at length about the history of Al Qaeda and also Mr. El-Hage's role, and the judge noted that other evidence corroborated Mr. Fadl's testimony.
"Obviously, we are disappointed but not discouraged," said Joshua L. Dratel, one of Mr. El-Hage's lawyers, who said that the matter would be part of his client's appeal.
"Unfortunately," Mr. Dratel added, "sometimes the only thing that prosecutors and agents and people like the Marshals Service understand is the word 'reversed.' You can't reform their behavior by letting them off the hook."
Megan L. Gaffney, a spokeswoman for the United States attorney in Manhattan, said there would be no comment, and a spokesman for the Marshals Service in Washington said that agency had not yet seen the opinion, and would not comment.
Mr. El-Hage is serving a life sentence at the so-called Super Max prison in Florence, Colo. He was convicted in May 2001 with three other men of charges of terrorism conspiracy, and he was also found guilty of lying in the investigation of Al Qaeda. The conspiracy included the 1998 bombings of two American embassies in East Africa, which killed more than 200 people.
It was not until early 2002, Judge Duffy noted, that prosecutors first learned of the recordings. Prosecutors told the judge that the tapes were the result of "an unauthorized, independent decision by one or two employees" of the Marshals Service, and that the prosecutors had nothing to do with making them.
In his opinion, Judge Duffy indicated that prosecutors had acted in good faith and were themselves stymied by the marshals' stonewalling. The judge wrote, for example, that when the Marshals Service first revealed the existence of the tapes to prosecutors, one assistant United States attorney, Patrick J. Fitzgerald, "was (to put it mildly) shocked and angered." Yet, despite repeated demands by the prosecutors for the tapes, the Marshals Service took more than two months to turn them over, the judge said. After obtaining the tapes, the prosecutors made transcripts available to the defense.
Even then, the judge said, the Marshals Service did not provide until last February an explanation as to why the tapes had been made. The judge cited one official's explanation that the tapes "were erroneously made as a result of miscommunication between members of my headquarters and field staff."
Judge Duffy also said that one employee of the Justice Department's Office of Enforcement Operations had suggested that if the Marshals Service kept the tapes, the prosecutors "might avoid any disclosure obligation to the defense" because they would never have possessed the material. The idea was "rejected out of hand" by a superior, the judge noted.
The judge also criticized what he suggested was the agency's failure to train its employees in their legal obligations. "On the whole," he added, "the hearings did not paint the Marshals Service as an entity that understood its mistake, let alone an organization working actively to prevent similar debacles in the future."
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
11/03/2005 00:34 ||
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The United Nations Security Council on Thursday began a debate on extending the mandate of US-led foreign forces in Iraq, which is set to expire at the end of this year.
Iraqi politicians, meanwhile, say that there may need to be new regulations on how US troops operate to satisfy the demands of Sunni Arabs, who are expected to wield new power after elections set for December 15.
UN Security Council resolution 1546, which gives the US-led multinational force broad licence to maintain security in Iraq, expires after the December elections and the subsequent formation of a government ends Iraqâs transitional âpolitical processâ.
The Security Council began on Thursday to circulate a US-sponsored draft resolution extending that mandate to December 2006, after receiving a letter from Iraqâs Shia- and Kurdish-dominated government.
It also states that this agreement should be reviewed eight months later, or could be reviewed or terminated at the request of the Iraqi government. There was no word on when the text might be put to a vote.
âThe [current UN] mandate includes all necessary measures, the power to do whatever force you need to do, including detention,â a senior Pentagon official said.
âThe bottom line is to extend the mandate so that whatever authority you have now will continue until a new Iraqi government and the coalition can work something out differently,â he said.
The new government will include a large contingent of Sunni Arabs, who largely stayed away from the polls in the last elections but who are expected to turn out in droves in December.
Virtually all of Iraqâs prominent Sunni Arab politicians have criticised US military operations.
Some have called for immediate withdrawal of foreign troops, and many others call for a withdrawal timetable.
Most Shia and Kurdish leaders say that the troops should remain, as the countryâs military is still incapable of fighting the insurgency on its own.
As a compromise, some Iraqi leaders have suggested that there may be a âstatus of forcesâ agreement between the Iraqi government and the coalition that would govern the foreign troops presence.
âI disagree with those who are asking for a timetable, but I would agree with them that we need to have a modality by which the presence of foreign troops could be regulated or ended one way or the other,â said Iraqi deputy prime minister Barham Salih, a Kurd.
âIf there is an operation in [Sunni Arab towns like] Haditha or al-Qaem or Ramadi, [Sunni leaders] can also be part of the decision making,â he said.
Mr Saleh also said there needed to be aggressive investigation of reported human rights abuses of detainees held by the Iraqi security forces.
However, Mr Saleh declined to offer details of changes in how US forces might operate.
Sunni Arab leaders have many specific complaints about US military behaviour â use of heavy weapons and air strikes that kill bystanders, insurgent suspects held incommunicado for lengthy periods without trial, or roads closed and orchards bombed as a form of collective punishment against communities which harbour guerrillas.
However, some may be reluctant to call for regulating and therefore legitimising a force that many Sunni consider to be an unacceptable violation of national sovereignty.
Many Iraqis believe that the presence of foreign troops harms security, but others believe immediate withdrawal would make things worse.
Iraqi politicians point out that the new elections would at least bring a public debate on the rules governing the US military presence â a debate that so far has been held behind closed doors.
#1
Mandate? Extension? What in the hell are they talking about? Can someone tell me when (if ever) the un became relevant as to what goes on in Iraq? We will call them when we need white collar criminals, but until then STFU.
#2
Since the Iraqis have voted on -- and accepted -- a constitution, what gives the UN any grounds to have a say?
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
11/03/2005 17:58 Comments ||
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#3
That's the point of the discussion about a status of forces agreement. But we don't have one now. At this point we are in the country with a UN mandate to return the country to its own governance. There may be a gap between the time the UN mandate expires and the SOF agreement is reached. That will be papered over by an extesion of the UN mandate or not. It really won't make any difference to what we do.
This is just politicians who opposed the war and Sunnis mouthing off. What they say will affect nothing unless we agree to it. Let the ankle biters play. It keeps them amused and out of serious matters.
Al-Qaeda in Iraq claimed Thursday to have shot down a U.S. attack helicopter that crashed near Ramadi, killing two Marines aboard, and a third serviceman died when his patrol struck a roadside bomb while rushing to their rescue.
Another U.S. soldier was killed Thursday when his vehicle hit a roadside bomb during a combat operation near Baqouba, northeast of Baghdad, the military said. The killing raised to at least 2,037 the number of U.S. military service members who have died since the war began in 2003, according to an Associated Press count.
The helicopter crash that killed the two Marines occurred Wednesday in the insurgent stronghold west of the capital during two days of fighting in the area that saw three other U.S. service members killed by roadside bombs.
Boys stood Thursday beside the wreckage of the AH-1W Super Cobra and residents of the insurgent stronghold buried dead from what they said was a subsequent U.S. airstrike nearby.
"Brethren in al-Qaeda in Iraq's military wing downed a Super Cobra attack helicopter in Ramadi with a Strella rocket, thanks be to God," the group said in a statement posted on an Islamist Web forum often used for its claims.
The authenticity of the statement, which bore the nickname of the group's spokesman, Abu Maysara al-Iraqi, could not be confirmed.
The military did not specify the cause of the crash, but Maj. Gen. Rick Lynch said Thursday that witnesses "believe they saw a munition fired at the helicopter and saw the helicopter break in pieces in midair and then crash."
Vermont Army National Guard Adjutant Gen. Martha Rainville said 2nd Lt. Mark Procopio, 28, of Burlington, Vt., was killed Wednesday by the roadside bomb as his patrol of four Humvees and two tanks headed to secure the crash site.
"He and his patrol were on a routine mission when they saw a Marine helicopter coming under fire, realized it was going to crash, and responded to provide assistance as necessary and to secure the site," Rainville said. The Humvee in which Procopio was riding struck the bomb and he was killed instantly, she said.
Hours later, a U.S. fighter jet dropped two 500-pound bombs on what the military said was an "insurgent command center" about 400 yards from where the helicopter went down.
Associated Press Television News video from the scene Thursday showed residents digging through the rubble of several homes and burying a half-dozen bodies in graves. The bodies were covered with blankets, making it impossible to identify them.
In a separate statement, al-Qaeda in Iraq also said it sentenced to death two Moroccan Embassy employees kidnapped last month in Iraq.
Two Iraqi policemen were killed in a drive-by shooting in Baghdad on Thursday, and bodies of 12 men who had been kidnapped and killed were found in a sewage station, police said.
But few attacks by Sunni-led insurgents were reported in Iraq on Thursday as Sunni Arabs began the three-day religious holiday of Eid al-Fitr, which ends a month of fasting during the Islamic holy month of Ramadan. Most Iraqi Shiites start the holiday Friday.
In Saddam Hussein's hometown of Tikrit, children appeared on the streets in new clothes, and the amusement park was crowded with families for the start of the Eid al-Fitr holiday.
But long-standing animosity to U.S. forces also was apparent in the mostly Sunni city, 80 miles north of Baghdad.
"The real Eid for Iraqis will be the day that occupation forces get out of our country," said Aqel Omar, 48, a retired government employee, as he gathered with about 30 relatives.
"I hope that next year our country is liberated and stable and that we can rebuild it again."
On Wednesday, a suicide bomber detonated a minibus in an outdoor market packed with shoppers ahead of Eid, killing about 20 people and wounding more than 60 in Musayyib, a Shiite Muslim town on Euphrates River, about 40 miles south of Baghdad. On July 16, nearly 100 people died in Musayyib in a suicide bombing near the same site.
But little violence was reported across Iraq by late afternoon Thursday.
In Tikrit, the day began for many Sunnis with early-morning services at their mosques. At one, a preacher called for the withdrawal of all U.S. forces from the country. But his sermon also urged Sunnis to vote in the Dec. 15 parliamentary election.
Most Sunnis boycotted the Jan. 30 vote that elected the current interim parliament, but many turned up for the constitutional referendum on Oct. 15, and plan to cast ballots in the December election in an effort to get more Sunnis into Iraq's next government.
As Eid began in Tikrit, no American patrols were seen on the streets for the first time in weeks. Iraqi police and soldiers were on duty instead in an apparent effort to reduce the chance of violence ruining the holiday.
Eid celebrations also were taking place in Baghdad's mostly Sunni neighborhood of Azamiyah.
Children flocked to an amusement park as Iraqi and U.S. troops stepped up security in the area. Boys and girls lined up to take rides on a small Ferris wheel, a swing set and a horse-drawn carriage.
But Zuhair Shihab, 45, the owner of a food stall in the park, said he felt sad, having just heard that the body of a friend had been found on a Baghdad street 10 days after he was kidnapped.
Such killings are fairly common in Baghdad, some caused by fighting between Sunnis and Shiites, others the result of criminals taking hostages in search of ransoms.
Shihab also was angered by the coalition forces in Azamiyah.
"What kind of Eid we can we celebrate in the presence of U.S. troops?" he said. "They brought all this misery to us."
Elsewhere in Baghdad, some Sunnis marked the start of the holiday by visiting cemeteries and praying at the graves of their relatives.
Fighting between coalition forces and insurgents, and the militants' use of drive-by shootings, suicide bombers and roadside bombs, often make security a top priority for Iraqi families. Some feel they have to closely guard their houses, day and night.
The timing of this year's Eid holiday also is another sign of the deep divisions that developed between minority Sunnis and majority Shiites under Saddam, a Sunni who persecuted many Shiites.
The months of the Muslim calendar are lunar. Therefore, they start when the new moon is spotted by a trustworthy members of the community. Based on that observance, Sunni clerics decided that Eid would begin on Thursday this year, while Shiites chose Friday.
Those differences were obvious at the Kazimiyah shrine in Baghdad on Thursday, where Shiite cleric Hazimal Araji, waving a rifle in the air, led worshippers chanting for the liberation of Iraq â not from U.S. forces but from Sunni insurgents.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
11/03/2005 13:56 ||
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Posted by: Frank G ||
11/03/2005 22:48 Comments ||
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#4
How can one comment on such a Chinese Menu so-called story? They left out what Aqel Omar had for lunch last Thursday and that everyone they quote is a Sunni, therefore now a disenfranchised murderous dictator sycophant, but other than those, well...
Baghdad, 3 Nov. (AKI) - The two Moroccan embassy officials kidnapped in Baghdad will be killed because they are infidels, al-Qaeda in Iraq has said in a statement posted to the Internet. The group led by the Jordanian militant, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, said an al-Qaeda Sharia 'court' had interrogated the two men and found them guilty. The two Moroccans were abducted last week. "We have judged the two in the framework of the war announced by the mujahadeen against the infidel diplomatic representatives" the statement reads. The group indicated that it would announce the mens' deaths in a successive statement.
The two Moroccan embassy staff were kidnapped while they were travelling on a highway, considered to be extremely dangerous, that links Baghdad to the Jordanian capital, Amman. To prove that the Moroccans had indeed fallen into the hands of al-Zarqawi's group, internet sites linked to al-Qaeda earlier this week published a claim of responsibility accompanied by the identity documents of the two Morrocan embassy employees, Abdelkrim El Mouhafidi, the advisor to the diplomatic mission, and driver, Abdelrahim Boualam. On Monday, the Sunni Council of the Ulema made an appeal for the release of the Moroccan nationals.
Posted by: Steve ||
11/03/2005 08:37 ||
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#1
Happy Eid, Zarko.
Posted by: Howard UK ||
11/03/2005 8:55 Comments ||
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#2
The group led by the Jordanian militant, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi
Why not just get a quote from Zarky himself? Haven't heard anything from Sparky since the middle of last year when when rumor said he was dead. Always.. "a group led by"
A car bomb outside a mosque in central Iraq killed at least 23 people and wounded 46 on Wednesday, targeting Shi'ite Muslims in an apparent sectarian attack as the holy month of Ramadan drew to a close.
You don't say.
Earlier several roadside bombs and shootings killed at least a dozen people, mostly in Baghdad, and a U.S. Marine helicopter came down in Ramadi, killing both crew members. U.S. forces launched an air strike near the crash site and a local doctor said there were dozens of casualties. The car bomb in the mainly Shi'ite town of Musayyib, south of Baghdad, came as people were preparing for the three-day Eid holiday marking the end of Ramadan. Eid should start on Thursday or Friday, with a possible lag between Sunni and Shi'ite rites.
Always gotta be *special* don't you, Sunnis? I have a message: It is NOT all about you.
Two U.S. Marines were killed when their Super Cobra helicopter crashed in the area of Ramadi west of Baghdad, the military said. The cause of the crash was under investigation but witnesses reported it had come under fire from the ground.The U.S. military said a fighter jet dropped two 500-lbs bombs on "a reported insurgent command centre" around 500 metres from where the helicopter crashed. "No casualty information is known at this time," it said in a statement.
"We're still counting kneecaps."
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
11/03/2005 00:48 ||
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#1
I remember how the press would talk about how we have to be careful about fighting during Ramadan, in the first Gulf War and Afganastan. I can now see what they meant. It appears to be very importnant not to fight and kill other Muslims on that holiday.
#4
Jason van Steenwyck (Iraq Now) noted that the MSM were reporting the complaints of a former Bagram Air Base prisoner. Haji claimed that he was beaten repeatedly and that guards used pages from the Koran to shine their boots.
Jason wanted to know why it was left up to him to point out that the US military desert boots ARE MADE OF SUEDE.
#5
... the US military desert boots ARE MADE OF SUEDE.
Just as how sacred cows make the tastiest hamburgers, only a page from the Koran can give suede that "showroom" shine.
Actually, I look down upon such pettiness as abusing the Koran and crap like that. If you're going to coerce the prisoner, do it by making them suffer physically. There's plenty of ways to humiliate someone without being intentionally sacreligious. Admittedly, with Muslims, almost everything any non-Muslim does is sacreligious, but that's their problem, not ours.
In the gathering dark inside the cavernous mosque, Mullah Omar Sweri takes his time leading the last Muslim prayer session of the day.
The Sunni preacher speaks of moderation, a message commonly heard in the officially monitored mosques of the Kurdish north. The contrast could not be greater, measured against the harsh rhetoric of the Sunni militants to the south, who drive Iraq's insurgency.
So it was a surprise to many Kurds that small Al Qaeda and Ansar al-Sunna cells were among six groups of extremists arrested in Arbil this summer - and that nearly all the militants were home-grown Kurds.
"Kurds are religious people, but they have never been extremists - God does not need extremists," says Mullah Sweri. "Extremism is not an action, it is a reaction. So the more injustice grows in a society, the more extremism there will be."
While the cells were small, they were lethal. Among them were militants deemed responsible for suicide bombings on May 4 and June 20 that killed more than 75 people in Arbil, mostly police recruits. In confessions shown on TV, some described mortar attacks on South Korean coalition troops, and a botched remote-controlled bombing.
In the totality of violence in Iraq today, the northern Iraq attacks and subsequent arrests might seem little more than a footnote. But the fact that these militants are Kurds highlights a little-known history of how Islamist ideology first came to northern Iraq - and how today it is helping bolster the ranks of the insurgency.
Analysts say that key factors include Saudi Arabia's proselytization and mosque-building here in the 1990s, combined with the return of mujahideen veterans from the Afghan war against the Soviet Union.
"They were trying to create a new generation of jihadists in Kurdistan," says Nyaz Saeed Ali, a specialist on Islamic Fundamentalism who heads the "Cadre's Institute" of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), one of two main political parties in northern Iraq.
"When they came back they wanted to duplicate the [Afghan] experience in Kurdistan, and fight the secular government," says Mr. Ali, who says he was unsuccessfully targeted last year by one Ansar cell. "The purpose of their return was not to fight Saddam Hussein, but secular Kurds."
Many bolstered the ranks of the Islamic Movement of Kurdistan (IMK), which fought the PUK from 1993, and later joined its regional government. By the time the US invaded Iraq a decade later, Islamist groups had split and split again, and targeted most Kurdish political factions. The most significant to emerge, by 2001, was Ansar al-Islam.
Though it had ties with Al Qaeda, Ansar al-Islam bases were limited to a remote strip of villages on Iraq's northeastern border with Iran where, ironically, they were part of the Kurdish safe haven protected by US and British warplanes. The bases were destroyed by US airstrikes in 2003.
But their growth here is also a cautionary parable of how a few persistent seeds of Islamic radicalism, no matter how unwelcoming the soil, can take tenuous root. Experts and security officials, as well as arrest patterns of Kurdish militants, indicate that after fleeing to Iran, one wing of dispersed Ansar members hooked up with Abu Musab al-Zarqawi's Al Qaeda in Iraq, which works out of Baghdad, Fallujah, and western Anbar Province. A second wing, under the rubric Ansar al-Sunna, operates from points north such as Baquba, Tikrit, Mosul, and Kirkuk.
"There are two million people [in Kurdistan], and they have their ideas - at least 20 would follow radical thinking," says Esmat Arkoshi, the chief of security for the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) in Arbil. "When they were captured [and confessed publicly], they didn't know their religion deeply - they knew they had been cheated."
The lack of local sympathy for the extremists, and efficient Kurdish security operations, mean that most attacks here are ordered from bases elsewhere.
"There are some small, hidden signs of their presence in Kurdistan, but they are not easily recognizable, and work under the umbrella of [legal] Islamic parties," says Ali, the PUK Islamist expert. "We have our own agents among these groups, trained to infiltrate. They are under constant watch."
For years, the appeal of fighting for a cause has drawn young Kurdish men beyond Kurdistan's borders. The first key departure took place after the collapse of Kurdish resistance in 1975, led by Mustapha Barzani, in the aftermath of the Algeria agreement made between Iran and Iraq.
"The people gave up hope in [Kurdish] nationalist ideology, and began to look for alternatives," says Mohammed Ihsan, the Minister for Human Rights of the Kurdistan Regional Government. Many Kurds went to Iran, where the government, after the 1979 Islamic revolution, helped create Kurdish Islamic parties. Later, Saudi Arabia, in a bid to counter the growing power of Mr. Hussein, established links to Islamist Kurds.
Other Kurds traveled to Pakistan and eventually Afghanistan, where they trained and fought alongside the mujahideen against the Soviets.
These paths all coincided during the 1991 Gulf War and its aftermath, which witnessed a Kurdish uprising in northern Iraq. That rebellion failed to topple the government, but after an exodus of more than 1 million Kurdish refugees, it led to the creation of the Kurdish safe haven.
The Islamist Kurdish groups took advantage of this disorder, working under the guise of the Saudi-based International Islamic Relief Organization and other "charities," which pumped $22 million a month into Kurdish areas in 1992-93, says Mr. Ihsan.
"We were a devastated state, we had nothing," says Ihsan, who took part in a pre-war opposition conference in Beirut, where he said Saudi Arabia pushed hard for "their" Kurdish Islamists to be given a piece of the political pie. "They started to pay people, give them salaries and jobs, and we had nothing to offer."
In the decade starting in 1991, Saudi charities built 1,832 new mosques - a boom that shocked Kurdish officials to the point of clamping on new restrictions in 2001. Along with the mosques came the translated books and Saudi Arabia's Wahhabi teaching, and the introduction of the Salafi strain - which adheres to an even more puritanical, strict interpretation of the Koran and forms the basis of Al Qaeda ideology.
"Of course they tried to spread their ideologies here," says Mullah Omar Changiany, a Saudi-trained sheikh who was considered at the time one of the importers of Salafi thinking in Kurdistan, until his Sulaymaniyah mosque was burned down in 1993.
"After the uprising, after we had just got rid of Saddam Hussein, we were just out of a prison - we felt the taste of freedom," says Mullah Changiany. "[But] because of lack of experience, we committed mistakes."
Changiany now speaks with a moderate voice, and even conducts the daily religious program on one official Kurdish TV channel in Arbil. Today he says extremists "are far from the real Islam.
"I can say the trend is still level, not up or down," says Changiany. "It depends on the government, and how it deals with this [Islamist] problem. We shouldn't forget that terrorism is very organized and has purpose, so ... we should avoid giving excuses for terrorism to grow in our country."
"There are more groups inside; the main danger for Kurdistan is Islamic fundamentalism," says minister Ihsan. "You can divert a good Muslim to a terrorist Muslim very easily ... the answer is to fill the vacuum."
Ihsan faults the ideology itself, and says adherents can't be reformed. "Most of them are educated from the same school [of thought]," says Ihsan. "They may veer from the line, but they have the same conclusion: 'Start to rule, if anyone doesn't like it, kill them.'"
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
11/03/2005 00:37 ||
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So the Salafists tried to turn Kurdistan into another Chechnya and failed dismally. I'd call that a win.
Arrest raids like the one early Wednesday in Jenin that unfortunately killed Staff-Sgt. Yonatan Evron, combined with targeted assassinations, have come pretty close to quashing Palestinian terror. c'mon. that's simply ludicrous!
On the surface, this statement appears ludicrous toldja in light of last week's suicide bombing in Hadera and the repeated attempts to fire Kassam rockets out of the Gaza Strip into Israel. But security officials stress that the terror organizations are in distress, and disregard rhetoric about whether they will renew their truce or not. Listen, Abdul, I have an idea. We will we take our time as to whether we will renew our truce or not with the Joooos. That will teach them a lesson but good, my friend!
BWAHAHAHAHA!!!
Each night, security forces fan out across Judea and Samaria and detain suspected fugitives. Nearly 1,000 have been nabbed and brought in for questioning in the past few months. While many were eventually released, the arrest of key terrorists has decimated their ranks, particularly in Hamas, who are now suffering from a dearth of local leaders in the run-up to Palestinian elections. Get Achmed to be our new leader.
But he's been dead for 3 weeks!
Ok, you do it.
I have an idea. I'll get Achmed to be our new leader. Dead, Shmed. Listen. We can't be too picky these days.
But most of the pressure has been focused on Islamic Jihad, which has carried out three suicide attacks during the so-called truce (Netanya, Tel Aviv and Hadera).
In the past week alone, the Israeli security forces have killed two Islamic Jihad commanders in Tulkarm, another seven in Gaza, and at least five in Kabatiya. The IAF also killed a top Fatah and Hamas terrorist in Gaza. how many have to get shot to win the big stuffed animal on the top shelf?
But the crackdown on the terrorist groups in the West Bank has been so vast and consistent that they are resigned to attempting to sneak in from the Gaza Strip not just know-how, but muscle as well. Palestinian muscle. heh. just sounds funny, that's all.
This was evident in the revelation this week that security forces had nabbed three veteran terrorists attempting to sneak out of the Gaza Strip, through the Sinai and to the West Bank through the Negev.
These three men, members of the Popular Resistance Committees, were not just experts in manufacturing Kassam rockets and explosives, but at organizing active cells and carrying out attacks against Israelis. Their job was to fill the void and set up a military infrastructure in the northern West Bank.
"We are talking of transferring not just brains, but muscle as well," said a senior security official. "They were to be the bridgehead." oops
According to senior security officials, fewer and fewer people are involved in Palestinian terror. Hamas is refraining from openly staging attacks in order to present itself as a political movement in the lead-up to the elections. and after? then what?
A poll conducted by the PCPO showed that three out of four Palestinians favor the continuation of the "calm" and indicates that the escalation in terror by the Islamic Jihad and Hamas was not supported. except by Iran and Syria
From the point of view of the Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency), Palestinian terror cells like the PRC have gone beyond the world-accepted definition of terrorism that generally defines it as a means for a political end.
"They lack a political agenda other than causing attacks," a senior Shin Bet official said. "The Popular Resistance Committees are the closest to the ideology of global jihad because they don't have a political agenda other than the destruction of the West." We're jes' killin' fer the fun of it, these days.
Even if some Palestinian cell does manage to pull off another serious attack, it would be the exception rather than a sign of renewed capability. that would be, of course, in the spirit of DIRE REVENGEâ¢
Israel never trusted the Palestinians and their various cease-fires, lulls and informal truces. And it is highly unlikely at this stage that Israel will accept any kind of agreement to halt its targeted killings so Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas can declare he will start dismantling the terrorist infrastructure. Good. If Abbas wants to dismantle 'em, let him. But Israel shouldn't hold it's breath.
Even IDF Chief of General Staff Lt.-Gen. Dan Halutz said that as far as he was concerned it was possible to defeat terrorism through military means. "In contrast to the theory that the army cannot exterminate terrorism, I believe the army can reduce terrorism to the very lowest level," Halutz told The Jerusalem Post last month.
While not promising to bring terrorism to an "absolute zero" level, Halutz said the IDF policy has proven that there was a military answer to terrorism, and we are watching this unfold daily. the only question is how quickly the paleos will kill each other in response
#1
IMNSHO Abbas and his faction are helping eliminate the opposition with intel for the Joooos. When this round is done, Hamas and IJ will do the same for the PA/AlAqsa
Posted by: Frank G ||
11/03/2005 20:16 Comments ||
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Awwwwwww. Da' poor widdle paleos. Nobody wuvs dem. Dey can't even kill Jooooooos without somebody coming for dem.
Don't that just break your heart?
NOT!
However, heartfelt sympathies to the family of Staff-Sgt. Yonatan Evron. May he rest in peace.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
11/03/2005 20:44 Comments ||
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Most all of the mayhem and murder brought courtesy of the Paleos can be stopped by stopping the funding from Iran and Saudi oil money. The Paleos are high cash flow consumers. They produce nothing so they need a financier to power their game. The big question is how to make it painful for those Iranian, Syrian, and Saudi financiers to bankroll this madness. Maybe a bit of *ahem* reasoning with those bankrollers might make them See the Lightâ¢
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
11/03/2005 22:35 Comments ||
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Doctors' groups have filed a petition at the Israeli Supreme Court seeking to halt air force jets from breaking the sound barrier over the Gaza Strip. The UN says the tactic is an abuse of human rights, causing widespread fear especially among children, and medics say it induces miscarriages. The sonic booms from Israeli jets are designed to be a show of force to militant groups, correspondents say. Israel evacuated its settlers and troops from Gaza earlier this year. However, the Jewish state continues to control the territory's airspace, coastline and borders. It has also continued to carry out air raids against what it says are militant targets.
The joint Israeli-Palestinian petition filed in the Supreme Court by the Gaza Community Mental Health Programme and Physicians for Human Rights-Israel says that according to international law, "the booms are collective punishment against the civilian population and thus illegal".
What about the "booms" on Israeli buses?
The head of the Gaza group, Dr Eyad Sarraj, a psychiatrist, has said that the sonic booms are having serious effects on children in Gaza, including anxiety, panic, fear, poor concentration and low academic success. He also reports that the number of miscarriages among pregnant women increase during periods of frequent sonic booms.
The United Nations spokesman in Gaza, Khaled Abdul Shafi, said: "We at the United Nations have already submitted a letter of protest to the Israeli government urging them to stop... the sonic booming and the air raids immediately, because we simply think that this is a violation of basic human rights, especially rights of children to live in peace and to be educated in peace." The Israeli military declined to comment.
I think I'll decline to give a f**k as well
"Because the subject is before the Supreme Court, the response will be given in that framework," the army spokesman's office said.
Posted by: Steve ||
11/03/2005 08:52 ||
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I have never heard such a brutal and shocking injustice that I cared so little about. -- Capt. Zap Brannigan
#4
As a kid in the 50's we loved sonic booms. But hey weren't done at 500 feet. Has anyone heard of windows being shattered or is these just a boom from 10 angels? Are the booms inaudible in Israel because it has installed the Halliburton Sonic Boom Fence?
#5
pacifist lefty "physicians" whining about something they should STFU about.
How about "Engineers against Kabuki"? Same moral standing
Posted by: Frank G ||
11/03/2005 9:51 Comments ||
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What a load of crap ,I lived near Fort Carson Army base and airforce academy and heard sonic booms all the time at low altitudes, it shook windows alot, but other than that I am alright :)
#7
Doctors' groups have filed a petition at the Israeli Supreme Court seeking to halt air force jets from breaking the sound barrier over the Gaza Strip. The UN says the tactic is an abuse of human rights, causing widespread fear especially among children, and medics say it induces miscarriages.
Not a problem. Send in the IDF to clear Gaza of its "militants", and any reason to induce sonic booms is gone.
... thats certainly a first-order prognostical stretch. More likely coitus interruptus...which is a defensible goal I'd say. And I thought all this time the little buggers, unlike laying hens, actually enjoyed loud noises and clatter.
Real bombs are much more effective in the long (and short) run.
Anybody know how many bunker-busters or MOABs it would take to turn Gaza into the world's largest swimming pool? I'm sure we could lend them to the Israelis. :-D
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
11/03/2005 15:20 Comments ||
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Sonic booms were only a minor problem when I was stationed at Shaw AFB. Having F-16s come directly over my house (base housing) on final was much worse. The real noise problems I had were when the F-111s would visit RAF Alconbury, and warm up their engines 40 FEET from the "temporary" building (built in 1942) I worked in. That caused a large part of my tinnitus problem.
If they don't like 'em at 100 feet, drop down to 50, and fly in formation. If they want 'em to stop, stop the a$$holes from firing Kassam rockets into Israel. Simple, no? If Israel REALLY wanted to get nasty with the paleos, we could always "lend" them a couple of AC-130's for a month or two...
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
11/03/2005 16:48 Comments ||
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Unimpressed by Hamas' ability to carry out attacks against Israel, nine members of the radical outfit including two trained in Pakistan and Afghanistan, have decided to join the al-Qaeda terror network, a report said.
Israeli Prison Service officials discovered the move by the group of nine prisoners with "blood on their hands" after they recovered written messages that the inmates attempted to smuggle to each other.
An examination revealed that the notes contained al-Qaeda propaganda, detailed the terror network's ideology, and provided instructional information, officials told local media.
"Were talking about a move of defiance against the Hamas, which isn't radical enough in the prisoners view," a prison official was quoted as saying.
On initiating a full-scale investigation the prison authorities found that two of these detainees were trained by the al-Qaeda in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
The probe also revealed that the inmates have already informed Hamas prison leaders about their decision to join Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda network. The Hamas leaders were unhappy at the "defection" of nine members, Ynetnews reported.
"In their (the nine prisoners) opinion, Hamas is not doing enough, not carrying out enough terror attacks, and allowing the Jihad organisation to lead the struggle against Israel," a prison official said.
"Their move was meant to create a situation in prison where they serve as al-Qaeda's arm in jail," the report said quoting the official.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
11/03/2005 00:28 ||
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In exchange, Hamas to receive first-round pick in next year's draft.
The militant group Hamas said Wednesday it would not renew an informal 9-month-old truce, which expires at the end of the year, after Israel killed one of its leading activists in an airstrike in Gaza. The truce was brokered by Egypt, which is expected to invite militant groups, including Hamas, to Cairo in the coming weeks to discuss extending the agreement. In the past nine months, violence has dropped sharply, and Hamas refrained from carrying out suicide bombings in Israel. But it has repeatedly fired rockets from Gaza at Israeli towns, in what it said was retaliation for Israeli truce violations, such as airstrikes and deadly arrest raids.
On Tuesday, a Hamas activist and a top fugitive from another armed group were killed in an Israeli airstrike in a Gaza refugee camp. "In the face of this Zionist aggression, no one should dream about the renewal of this truce," said a Hamas spokesman, Mushir al-Masri. Hamas reserves the right to retaliate for the attack, though it won't pull out of the truce right now, he said.
Violence continued Wednesday. Israeli troops entered the northern West Bank town of Qabatiyeh and killed Rafat Turkman, an al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades militant, as he tried to escape, residents said. The military said soldiers fired back, hitting three gunmen. After sundown Wednesday, a mortar shell fired from Gaza exploded in Netiv Haasara, just north of the territory, the military said. Channel 2 TV reported a soldier was slightly wounded.
Yeah, they're gonna miss that hudna...
Posted by: Fred ||
11/03/2005 00:00 ||
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So the IDF can now resume the job of liquidating the rest of Hamas' leadership?
#2
Gloves off, brass knuckles on, pummel until liquified. Rinse and repeat. Yassin and Rantissi were just the beginning. Palestinian investors would be wise to go long on body bags, coffins and ashtrays.
#3
the past nine months, violence has dropped sharply, and Hamas refrained from carrying out suicide bombings in Israel. But it has repeatedly fired rockets from Gaza at Israeli towns, in what it said was retaliation for Israeli truce violations, such as airstrikes and deadly arrest raids..
refrained, eh. Deadly arrest raids had nothing to do with the drop.
And, pray tell, Why did Israel conduct airstrikes and deadly arrest raids against the peaceful Hamas? Just didn't like the quiet?
November 3, 2005: The U.S. Department of Defense has set up a special school for the bomb disposal teams they send to Iraq. The âAdvanced Improvised Explosive Device Training Facilityâ is run by the U.S. Navy, and trains people from all the services. Because of the large number of roadside bombs used in Iraq (30 or more a day are encountered), the navy and air force have sent many of their bomb disposal teams to Iraq, to help the army out.
The new facility has six buildings typical of those encountered in Iraq, and the troops train using the remote control robots and other tools available to find and dispose of bombs planted by terrorists. There is a team of Seabees attached to the facility, to repair damage students are expected to make to buildings (like breaking through walls), in the course of their bomb detection and disposal efforts.
The bomb disposal specialists also learn about some types of weapons (chemical, biological and nuclear), that they have not encountered yet, but may in the future.
Posted by: Steve ||
11/03/2005 09:49 ||
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I'd offer up the Silver Bullet at Bowling, more rooms, better parking and mess. To enhance realism, recommend doing it on a Tuesday through Thursday when most (but never all) of the lizzards are present. Something productive would finally be accomplished there.
Martial law has been imposed in parts of Songkhla province in southern Thailand. The provision covers the two districts of Chana and Thepha, which border three southern provinces already under tight restrictions.
The announcement came as police said three people had been killed in the latest violence in the region, including one man who was beheaded.
About 1,000 people have died in the Muslim-majority south since early 2004.
The army instituted martial law for parts of Songkhla after eight fake explosives were found in Thepha and Chana districts, The Nation newspaper reported. It is the first time this provision, which allows the authorities to arrest suspects and search their properties without a warrant, has been issued in Songkhla. The three neighbouring provinces of Yala, Pattani and Narathiwat are all under emergency law, which is not as punitive.
There was violence in all three of these provinces on Wednesday and Thursday, police said. A man's severed head was found early on Thursday in Talogapo village, Pattani province. He has not yet been identified as the police have not found the body, but his head was shaved, leading to reports that he was a Buddhist. Buddhists have frequently been targeted in the insurgency.
Late on Wednesday, a suspected militant blew himself up in Narathiwat town as he set up a device against an electricity pole - one of a series of blasts which knocked out power to the area, police said. And also on Wednesday, a Muslim villager was shot dead in Raman district of Yala province while riding a motorcycle.
In addition to the fake devices found in Songkhla, there was also a number of fake bombs found in five districts of Pattani province on Thursday, police said. Effigies of Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra were found near these devices, and on roadsides in Yala province. Those in Yala had Thai national flags across their bodies and the word "Satan" written across their chests.
Posted by: Steve ||
11/03/2005 08:47 ||
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Those in Yala had Thai national flags across their bodies and the word "Satan" written across their chests.
A suspected top al-Qaeda operative who escaped from a U.S.-run detention facility in Afghanistan poses a serious threat to Southeast Asian security, anti-terror officials said Wednesday. Some said Washington failed to tell them Omar al-Farouq was free.
Al-Farouq, born in Kuwait to Iraqi parents, was considered one of Osama bin Laden's top lieutenants in Southeast Asia until Indonesian authorities captured him in 2002 and turned him over to the United States.
It was not clear how he and three other suspected Arab terrorists broke free from a heavily fortified detention facility in Bagram in July - though they reportedly claimed in a video broadcast earlier this month that they picked the lock of their cell.
Several razor-wire fences surround the base and areas outside the perimeter remain mined from Afghanistan's civil war and Soviet occupation. Military teams patrol constantly and the mainentrance is a series of heavily guarded checkpoints.
Though the escape was widely reported at the time, al-Farouq was identified by another name.
The U.S. military only confirmed this week that the suspected terrorist - who lived in Indonesia for years, allegedly setting up terror training camps - was among the four.
Indonesian and Thai intelligence officials said Wednesday that Washington had not informed them of al-Farouq's escape - even though he had been planning terrorist strikes in the region, including their own countries.
"We know nothing about it," said Maj. Gen. Ansyaad Mbai, Indonesia's anti-terror chief. "If it's true, the U.S. government ... should have informed us. This man is dangerous and his escape increases the threat of terrorism in Indonesia."
"We need to coordinate security here as soon as possible to anticipate his return," Mbai added, noting that al-Farouq's wife and two children still live in a modest concrete home about an hour's drive from the capital, Jakarta.
Mbai said al-Farouq's escape "could energize a new generation of terrorists in Southeast Asia and the world."
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
11/03/2005 00:56 ||
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Dammit...how the hell did he and 3 top al-queda operatives just escape! Private Johnson wake up!
The Philippine military has lost track of a suspected Islamic extremist.
The suspect, Tyrone Dawud Santos, was arrested in Cubao, Quezon City, in March on a charge of gun possession and was implicated in a plot to bomb a club in Malate, Manila, during Holy Week. He was freed on bail a month later, the Manila Times reported Tuesday.
A military intelligence officer said the Philippine Armed Forces (AFP) had been keeping Santos under constant surveillance since his release but "that he dropped from the screen" sometime last week. That was about the time when Santos's older brother, Hilarion del Rosario, alias Ahmad Santos, the leader of the radical Rajah Solaiman Movement, was arrested in Zamboanga City.
"Right now we do not know where he [Dawud Santos] is. He's nowhere to be seen," said Rear Adm. Tirso Danga, Philippine Armed Forces deputy chief of staff for Intelligence (J-2).
A day after Santos's arrest, military and police agents recovered 1,320 pounds of ammonium nitrate, an ingredient in making explosives, in another Rajah Solaiman safe house in Fairview, also in Quezon City.
Intelligence sources pointed to Dawud Santos as the designated mastermind of the plan to bomb the Malate club, which is reportedly frequented by foreigners, the Manila Times said.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
11/03/2005 00:55 ||
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Good someone's paying attention to what's going on in the Archipelago, but please check some of your facts...things are even worse than they seem...
#4
A military intelligence officer said the Philippine Armed Forces (AFP) had been keeping Santos under constant surveillance since his release but "that he dropped from the screen" sometime last week.
Isn't this what happened in Britain before 7/7? They were following some people, then lost track?
Keep your heads up and your eyes open, Filipinos. I think you're in for something.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
11/03/2005 8:19 Comments ||
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Interesting blog, Rizalist. But please, where your personal expertise finds error in a Rantburg post, please provide the correct facts (preferably with links!). Rantburg is a collaborative effort from all who read here, not just the blogger whose name is is at the top. Thank you, and welcome!
Philippine police arrested the alleged finance officer of the Abu Sayyaf terrorist group in Baguio City, the northern Philippines on Saturday, local TV reported on Wednesday.
Officers of the National Capital Region Police Office (NCRPO) on Wednesday identified the suspect as Amil Flamiano Salih alias Abu Tagalog, who had been responsible for raising funds for Abu Sayyaf and has a reward offer of 20,000 US dollars for his capture,said the report.
NCRPO chief deputy director Vidal Querol was quoted earlier as saying that Salih was coordinating with Hilarion Santos alias AmadSantos, who is said to be planning attacks in Metro Manila and other parts of the country.
The suspect was arrested by virtue of a warrant of arrest for kidnapping and serious illegal detention. The case is non-bailable,according to Judge Danilo Bucoy of the Regional Trial Court Branch2 of Isabela, Basilan.
Salih, 28, was arrested near a mosque in Baguio. He was allegedly involved in the Dos Palmas hostage taking in 2001 when Filipino nurse Deborah Yap was killed, American Guillermo Sobero was beheaded and American missionary Martin Burnham was killed.
Salih was reported traveling to Manila whenever he can but now detained at NCRPO in Bicutan.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
11/03/2005 00:54 ||
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Firebrand Indonesian cleric Abu Bakar Bashir has missed out on a cut to his jail term, in a surprise move which has outraged his followers. Bashir's personal aide Hasyim Abdullah told AAP that the 67-year-old was not included in remissions granted to Indonesian prisoners to mark the end of Islam's Ramadan fasting month. "He did not get it," he said. Abdullah said the denial was the direct result of Australian "meddling" in Indonesia's justice system.
Foreign Minister Alexander Downer travelled to Jakarta last month to try to persuade President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono to block sentence reductions for people convicted of terrorist offences. But Mr Downer said he had not expected Indonesia to agree after Justice Minister Hamid Awaluddin said remissions for Thursday's Eid al-Fitr Muslim holiday, known as Lebaran, would go ahead according to existing regulations.
A spokesman for the Bashir-founded Majelis Mujahidin Indonesia, or Indonesian Council of Holy Warriors, said the elderly cleric, jailed in March for conspiracy in the 2002 Bali bombings, appeared to one of the few prisoners to miss out. "We deplore the Australian regime which is clearly intervening in his judicial process," the MMI's Fauzan al-Anshari told AAP. "But Ustadz (honoured cleric) Abu told me he accepts the decision with an open heart. Hopefully there is a blessing in disguise from Allah."
Fauzan urged Bashir's followers and "all Indonesian Muslims" to remain calm, including the cleric's students from the radical Ngruki school in the central Java city of Solo, who rioted when Bashir was rearrested last year."We advise all his followers to be patient and not be emotional," he said. Lawyer Mohammad Assegaf said he was still waiting to be informed of the decision. The decision will please Canberra and the United States, which believe Bashir is the spiritual leader of the al-Qaeda linked Jemaah Islamiah terrorist movement.
But the head of the terrorism desk at Indonesia's Security Ministry, Major-General Ansyaad M'bai said he did not believe there would be a backlash among Bashir's followers in the paramilitary Majelis Mujahidin Indonesia, or Indonesian Council of Holy Warriors. Camouflage-clad MMI supporters and members of the terrorist-linked Islamic Defenders Front led rioting in Jakarta and Sumatra last April after Bashir was rearrested in a move which ultimately led to his jailing in March this year for conspiracy in the 2002 Bali bombings. "I don't think it will happen again," M'bai told AAP. "I think the terrorists and MMI are already angry at us, so it will not make any difference whether he gets the remissions were given to him or not.
"They will still be angry."
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
11/03/2005 00:31 ||
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Abdullah said the denial was the direct result of Australian "meddling" in Indonesia's justice system.
All those Australians that died in the bombing, I guess their lives were "meddled" with, right?
#2
I look forward to Australia doing a whole lot more 9mm "meddling" once this dirtbag gets out.
While it would be nice to think that this is a big step forward, Amrozi getting so much "face time" and other half-hearted measures by Indonesia have yet to convince me of any major sea-change in the way they address terrorism.
Were Indonesia truly serious, they would never even have insulted the global community by announcing a sentence reduction for Bashir in the first place.
#3
67's kinda old to be in prison. He could maybe roll out of the top bunk and break his neck? Slip on soap in the shower and cave in his skull? Get depressed and hang himself in his cell? Heart attack? Choke to death on dinner? Struck by lightning? Allah's will? All kinds of bad "stuff"...
#4
So, basically, the muscle are free to roam the streets while the motivator is kept in prison, guarded from anyone who might want to retaliate, and still able to incite more attacks?
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
11/03/2005 15:06 Comments ||
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. . . basically, the muscle are free to roam the streets . . .
In at least one notable and serious case, that's our fault:
A suspected top al-Qaeda operative who escaped from a U.S.-run detention facility in Afghanistan poses a serious threat to Southeast Asian security, anti-terror officials said Wednesday. Some said Washington failed to tell them Omar al-Farouq was free. Al-Farouq, born in Kuwait to Iraqi parents, was considered one of Osama bin Laden's top lieutenants in Southeast Asia until Indonesian authorities captured him in 2002 and turned him over to the United States.
See Link. It might make some sense to give the Indonesian government some credit for what it's done since 9/11/2001. As noted in the above story,
I think the terrorists and MMI are already angry at us, so it will not make any difference whether he gets the remissions were given to him or not. They will still be angry.
The islamofascists are angry at the Indonesian government precisely becuase the Indonesian government has acted to put an end to islamofascism and terrorism. At least four people have been sentenced to death by Indonesian courts for terrorist activities, and over thirty convicted and given prison terms [in Indonesian prisons] of three years to life. See, e.g., Jakarta issues death sentence for embassy bombings. Hundreds of others have been arrested and questioned [by Indonesian methods]. What other country has been this stern?
I understand I'm bucking the PC mindset that we should hate "muslim countries" and tar them all with the same brush, but I really think that is a poor approach to the war on terror. If the enemy of my enemy is my friend, I think Indonesia has shown itself to be some kind of friend. Granted, it has some serious shortcomings and internal problems to address, but it is working on them. The whole Bashir thing is a media creation. No Western (or Australian) court would have ever convicted him of anything given the p#ss poor evidence that was available. Oh, and in anticipatory response to those who will say (of those sentenced to death) that they haven't been executed, yet: How long do people stay on death row in our nations? Also, don't you think it would make sense for Indonesia to hold off on executing those rat bastard until AFTER they pass new laws (already in the works) that give the police and military broad new powers to root out the islamofacists who will inevitably retaliate in response to the executions. New laws that even the NRA would oppose in the U.S. as a suspension of civil liberties?
#6
cingold: No Western (or Australian) court would have ever convicted him of anything given the p#ss poor evidence that was available.
Good to see you back. But I'll have to disagree with you there, with respect to American courts. Receiving terrorist funding from abroad would have been cause for his indictment and conviction. Urging the killing of infidels would have been cause for his indictment and conviction. Two Muslims have been jailed for precisely those offenses - one a professor in Florida and another an imam. I believe the terms are 5 to 10 years, and they're not even connected to a specific terrorist attack. This - and the fact that many American Muslims are patriotic individuals* who will go straight to the FBI - is why terrorist wannabes in the American Muslim community are keeping their noses clean.
* Despite their disagreements with American foreign policy.
Bombs have exploded in several locations in southern Thailand, police and local media say. A restaurant, a prison and electrical resources were said to be among the targets of the attacks in the southern province of Narathiwat. One person was injured in the attack on the prison, officials said. Bombs aimed at power supplies knocked out power in parts of the city of Narathiwat, capital of the province of the same name. The authorities also defused other devices, Thailand's ITV television network said.
The Moro Islamic Liberation Front said Wednesday that it would dismantle a headquarters in South Cotabato following protests by villagers.
Yay!
Gov. Daisy Fuentes of South Cotabato said civilians are scared by the presence of armed rebels in the village. She said the rebels build camps in the area. The MILF denied the group is building camps in the area, but admitted maintaining a command post manned by about 50 rebels.
Er, how does a "command post" differ from a "headquarters"?
MILF spokesman Eid "Babalu" Kabalu said members of the joint committees on the cessation of hostilities and the Malaysia-led truce observers are investigating the report. âThere are neither new camps nor ongoing construction of camps in the area. What we have there is a small command post manned by about 30 to 50 members,â Kabalu told The Manila Times.
"Really nothing. We play cards, bitch about our wives, reminisce about the good old days of the caliphate, plan global jihad. We only keep a few dozen RPG's and a couple of days' supply of C-4 on hand. Hardly worth bothering about."
#2
"Really nothing. We play cards, bitch about our wives, reminisce about the good old days of the caliphate old AFC, and we always plan global jihad more fishin trips. We only keep a few dozen RPG's cases of beer and a couple of days' supply of C-4 snacks on hand. Hardly..Hey and that trip to the inlaws, it ain't worth bothering about."
According to initial reports, army forces besieged Wednesday evening the offices of Syrian President Bashar Assad's brother-in-law, Asef Shawkat, in Damascus. Shawkat serves as the Syrian army intelligence chief and is considered to be Assad's closest aide.
And the chief suspect
The story was reported by the ANN network, owned by Rifaat Assad, the Syrian president's uncle and rival, who is in exile.
Which makes the story somewhat suspect, but interesting
According to the report, the Syrian forces demanded that Shawkat to give himself in, but he refused.
"Come on out, Asef! We just want to take you for a ride."
In the meantime, there has been no confirmation or reference to the report by any other source.
If nothing else, a propaganda war by Rifaat Assad may be starting
Another link, same source: Syrian army forces have surrounded the offices of Aâsif Shawkat, the brother-in-law of Syrian President Bashar Al-Asad and head of Syriaâs Military Intelligence service. According to a report from the ANN network, run by a Syrian exile, Syrian forces demanded Shawkat surrender but he refused. The report has not been confirmed by other sources.
Shawkat, as well as Bashar Al-Asadâs brother, Mahir Al-Asad, are both suspects in the assassination of former Lebanese prime minister Rafiq Al-Hariri. Shawkat is said to be a close aide of the president, but analysts say the president fears him because of his strong influence.
Another: Unconfirmed reports in the past 24 hours spoke about military movements around the Damascus houses of senior Syrian officials mentioned by U.N. chief investigator Detlev Mehlis in connection with the assassination former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri. The Beirut-based An Nahar reported on its Thursday's front-page that "These reports have raised questions on whether these movements were precautionary measures or for other purposes."
This story came after a TV network, owned by Rifaat Assad, the Syrian president's uncle and rival, who is in exile, reported that Syrian forces besieged Wednesday evening the offices of Syrian President Bashar Assad's brother-in-law, Asef Shawkat, in Damascus. Shawkat heads the Syrian army intelligence and is considered to be Assad's closest aide. Shawkat is suspected of being involved in Hariri's assassination.
Posted by: Steve ||
11/03/2005 12:32 ||
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#1
Let's have a pool on when and how he committs suicide.
#3
Let's have a pool on when and how he committs suicide.
And how many shots it takes.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
11/03/2005 13:32 Comments ||
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#4
Suicide over the weekend. How, bullet to the back of the head with is arms tied. Its a tricky move, as suicides go, but I think he'll be able to pull it off before the UN starts asking him any questions that might embarrass him or his brother-in-law.
#5
My favorite story is from a comedian, who told the tale of a suicide he had heard about on the local news one night. Seems the poor distraught fellow shot himself in the head with a bolt-action rifle.
Four times.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
11/03/2005 14:32 Comments ||
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#6
That would be easier to believe than the guy down here who tried to explain to the jury how he accidently shot his wife.
Nine times. With a six shot revolver.
Posted by: Steve ||
11/03/2005 15:25 Comments ||
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#7
...The best line from The Godfather my be adaptable here:
"It was nothing personal, Asef - just business."
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
11/03/2005 19:28 Comments ||
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A homemade grenade exploded outside the offices of British Airways in Tehran on Wednesday, causing no casualties, the British Embassy said. Embassy spokeswoman Mitra Behnam Mojtahedi said the bomb exploded on the 10th floor of the building where the airline's offices are located. She said it was not clear if the target was British Airways, as other foreign companies have offices on the same floor, including British Petroleum, Lloyds and Mercedes Benz. But British Airways offices were the closest to the bomb, which was placed next to the stairs' door. Mojtahedi said the explosion broke some windows but nobody was wounded. Police are investigating, she added.
Posted by: Fred ||
11/03/2005 00:00 ||
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#1
Some on Rantburg predicted this sort of attack two days ago. Good job!
#2
This is so typically Iranian, the finger prints of the government are all over it. Look for a uptick of terrorist acts against the UK all over the world not jsut in Iran and Iraq.
#3
Read a story yesterday (Taheri?) that the Iranian gov was diverting the marchers away from the Brit embassy and businesses, almost like they are responsible for suspected bombings and didn't want their supporters injured.
Posted by: ed ||
11/03/2005 1:52 Comments ||
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BERLIN - Iran will process a new batch of uranium at its Isfahan nuclear plant beginning next week, despite pressure from the United States and European Union to halt all sensitive nuclear work, diplomats said on Wednesday. âBeginning next week, the Iranians will start a new phase of uranium conversion at Isfahan. They will begin feeding a new batch of uranium into the plant,â a European diplomat familiar with the result of inspections by the UN nuclear watchdog told Reuters on condition of anonymity.
Iran denies wanting nuclear weapons, insisting its atomic ambitions are limited to the peaceful generation of electricity. However, it has acknowledged concealing many nuclear activities from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) for 18 years.
Nuttin' to see, move along ...
A Western diplomat close to the IAEA said he was unable to provide details on how much uranium would be fed into the plant.
A report issued by IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei on Sept. 2 said Iran had produced 6.8 tonnes of uranium hexafluoride (UF6) at Isfahan by the end of August, which nuclear experts said could theoretically be processed into fuel for a single bomb. It is unclear how much more UF6 Tehran has produced since the Sept. 2 report.
However, diplomats close to the IAEA said the quality of the 6.8 tonnes of UF6 produced at Isfahan was too low to be useable in centrifuges, casting doubts on Tehranâs ability to make good on threats to begin work on the most sensitive part of the nuclear fuel cycle -- uranium enrichment. However, the Iranians are eager to keep running the Isfahan plant so they can improve their ability to convert raw uranium into UF6 gas, the form of uranium that is fed into centrifuges for enrichment, several diplomats close to the IAEA said.
Posted by: Steve White ||
11/03/2005 00:00 ||
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What sort of cred do they get about blabbering about it? Sort of sounds like a want-a-be crook braging about how he's going to rob the bank down the street on Monday at 2pm.
#2
a European diplomat familiar with the result of inspections by the UN nuclear watchdog told Reuters on condition of anonymity.
I can appreciate the necessity of using unnamed sources in certain reports. I can also half appreciate the reluctance of some to not assign their names to these reports. But all too often I see these accusations as an addendum to a related story in the form of "as previously reported" without proving their validity.
Islamabad, 3 Nov. (AKI) - The Pakistani police have captured a leading al-Qaeda suspect and killed another, but the authorities have denied media reports that the suspect is a Syrian, Mustafa Setmarian Nasar, who is wanted in connection with the 2004 Madird train bombings. Pakistan's information Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed has said that the men were Arab but that he was not the al-Qaeda operative that the media had been speculating about. At a press conference in Islamabad, the minister also said that for security reasons, the identities of the men would not be revealed.
"I can say no more"
Earlier reports had quoted unnamed government officials saying that they were checking to see if the man that was captured was Mustafa Setmarian Nasar, also known as Abu Musab al-Suri. A Syrian national with dual Spanish citizenship, Nasar is alleged to have played a role in the attacks which killed 191 people in March 2004. The US authorities have offered a five million dollar reward for his capture.
Of course, he may really be Nasar, Pakistan has denied capturing people they've captured before
The US Justice Department website said that Nasar is a former trainer at two terror camps in Afghanistan who pledged allegiance to Osama bin Laden after the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States. It said Nasar worked with another key militant to train extremists in the use of poisons and chemicals. The Pakistani authorities have arrested several people beleived to be al-Qeda leaders including Abu Faraj al-Libbi, who was captured in May. Al-Libbi, who was described as being the "al-Qaeda's number three", was handed over the the authorities in the United States.
Additional: Intelligence officials said a third suspect from a Pakistani militant group was also captured in the raid this week in Quetta, the capital of Pakistan's southwestern Baluchistan province. "I can only confirm that there was an encounter, and our security forces arrested one suspected al-Qaida terrorist while another terrorist was killed," Information Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed told The Associated Press. He did not identify the suspects.
---------
One of the intelligence officials, based in Quetta, said the suspect who died in the firing was a Saudi named Shaikh Ali Mohammed al-Salim. He said al-Salim had been living with Nasar.
They were lovers...
He said the third suspect was from Jaish-e-Mohammed, a Pakistani Islamic militant group allegedly linked to al-Qaida.
Posted by: Steve ||
11/03/2005 08:19 ||
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Pakistani security agencies have arrested two al-Qaeda suspects and are investigating whether one is a Syrian believed to be a key figure in Osama bin Laden's terror network in Europe, two intelligence officials and a senior government official said Thursday.
Now saying they got one alive and one dead, but no Mustafa
The two suspects were captured this week during a raid on a house in Quetta, the capital of Pakistan's southwestern Baluchistan province, said one of the intelligence officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he is not authorized to speak to the media. A senior government official confirmed the arrests and said authorities were investigating whether one of the suspects was Mustafa Setmarian Nasar, alleged to have had a key role in the March 11, 2004, Madrid bombings. That official also declined to be named, saying he was not allowed to comment on the investigation.
Neither the intelligence officials nor the government official had information about the identity of the second suspect. Pakistani government spokesmen and the U.S. Embassy said they could not immediately confirm the arrests. The U.S. government last year announced a $5 million reward for information leading to the capture of Nasar, also known as Abu Musab al-Suri. The U.S. Justice Department's Rewards for Justice website describes Nasar as an al-Qaeda member and former trainer at terrorist camps in Afghanistan who instructed extremists in using poisons and chemicals. It also says he is likely to be in Afghanistan or Pakistan. Al-Suri was born is Syria and also has Spanish nationality. His name has also been linked to July 7 bombings in London that left 52 people dead.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
11/03/2005 00:24 ||
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#1
I'm really curious with respect to whatever investigative techniques are used by the Pakistanis. Do these apprehensions require endless hours of surveilence details and dogged pursuit of suspects through forbidding terrain, or do they just tear a few cards out of some ISI officer's Rolodex?
#2
How to boost a flagging international relief effort... An even more catastrophic natural disaster may yield up one of the big guys.
Posted by: Howard UK ||
11/03/2005 6:30 Comments ||
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#3
HK, you sure got that right. Anytime they want something, like their F-16's, they fork over a dope. I think we should charge 'em much more dear. One tight-turban per F16 or one per any future favors we ever do them.
Posted by: DO ||
11/03/2005 17:19 Comments ||
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NEW DELHI - Militants on Wednesday delivered a âgiftâ of a deadly car bomb to Indian Kashmirâs incoming chief minister as police released sketches of a key suspect in the weekend Delhi bombings that killed 62 people.
Police said five people including a suicide bomber were killed and more than a dozen wounded in Wednesdayâs car bomb blast in the Nowgam area on the outskirts of the Indian Kashmir summer capital Srinagar.
Islamic militant group Jaish-e-Mohammed immediately claimed responsibility for the bombing in telephone calls to a local news agency. âThe car bomb is our first gift to Ghulam Nabi Azad,â Abu Qudama, spokesman for Jaish-e-Mohammed, told the Kashmir News Service.
Can we return the gift?
Azad was later on Wednesday to be sworn is as the Himalayan stateâs new chief minister, as part of a power-sharing deal between the regional Peoples Democratic Party and Azadâs Congress party. The PDPâs chief minister Mufti Mohammed Sayeed completed his three years in power on Wednesday.
Posted by: Steve White ||
11/03/2005 00:00 ||
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Can we return the gift?
yes, many happy returns.
Posted by: Red Dog ||
11/03/2005 2:13 Comments ||
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A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
The law enforcers recovered six powerful bombs, each weighing about five to six pound, and huge bomb-making materials from a den of terrorists in a hilly area in Chittagong and also seized two kilograms of explosives from a parcel of a courier service in Rajshahi yesterday. 
Police made their first arrests in last year's $47 million bank robbery, one of Europe's largest ever, officials said Wednesday. The theft was blamed on the IRA and tarnished its image, despite repeated denials.
RADICAL Muslim clerics who praise terrorist acts could have their mosques banned and members of their assemblies defined as terrorists under the nation's new counter-terrorism laws. Under the legislation, tabled in Federal Parliament yesterday, recent comments by radical clerics 
Menacing youths smoked cigarettes in doorways Wednesday and hulks of burned cars littered the tough streets of Paris' northeastern suburbs scarred by a week of riots that left residents on edge and sent the government into crisis mode. 
Three armed men broke into a regional government office in the southeastern French city of Carpentras on Wednesday, briefly holding 17 people hostage before making off with 1,500 passports, police said. The three masked men slipped into the building as a cleaner arrived before sunrise, and took her hostage along with the deputy prefect, his wife and other staff as they arrived at work. The men escaped around an hour later, on two motorbikes, after stealing 1,500 blank passports from a safe. Some 80 police officers backed by a helicopter were carrying out road checks across the region to track the thieves down.
Canada's spy agency has revealed that it has dismantled a suspected terrorist cell last year in Toronto that included an al-Qaeda-trained explosives expert, The National Post has reported. The cell consisted of four Algerian refugee claimants alleged to be members of the Salafist Group for Call and Combat, a radical Islamic group, Larry Brooks, Canadian Security Intelligence Service chief of counterterrorism for the Toronto region, told delegates at a closed-door security meeting this week.
Baghdad, 3 Nov. (AKI) - The two Moroccan embassy officials kidnapped in Baghdad will be killed because they are infidels, al-Qaeda in Iraq has said in a statement posted to the Internet. The group led by the Jordanian militant, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, said an al-Qaeda Sharia 'court' had interrogated the two men and found them guilty. The two Moroccans were abducted last week. "We have judged the two in the framework of the war announced by the mujahadeen against the infidel diplomatic representatives" the statement reads. The group indicated that it would announce the mens' deaths in a successive statement. 
Doctors' groups have filed a petition at the Israeli Supreme Court seeking to halt air force jets from breaking the sound barrier over the Gaza Strip. The UN says the tactic is an abuse of human rights, causing widespread fear especially among children, and medics say it induces miscarriages. The sonic booms from Israeli jets are designed to be a show of force to militant groups, correspondents say. Israel evacuated its settlers and troops from Gaza earlier this year. However, the Jewish state continues to control the territory's airspace, coastline and borders. It has also continued to carry out air raids against what it says are militant targets. 
The militant group 
A spokesman for the Bashir-founded Majelis Mujahidin Indonesia, or Indonesian Council of Holy Warriors, said the elderly cleric, jailed in March for conspiracy in the 2002 Bali bombings, appeared to one of the few prisoners to miss out. "We deplore the Australian regime which is clearly intervening in his judicial process," the MMI's Fauzan al-Anshari told AAP. "But Ustadz (honoured cleric) Abu told me he accepts the decision with an open heart. Hopefully there is a blessing in disguise from Allah." 
A homemade grenade exploded outside the offices of British Airways in Tehran on Wednesday, causing no casualties, the British Embassy said. Embassy spokeswoman Mitra Behnam Mojtahedi said the bomb exploded on the 10th floor of the building where the airline's offices are located. She said it was not clear if the target was British Airways, as other foreign companies have offices on the same floor, including British Petroleum, Lloyds and Mercedes Benz. But British Airways offices were the closest to the bomb, which was placed next to the stairs' door. Mojtahedi said the explosion broke some windows but nobody was wounded. Police are investigating, she added.
BERLIN - Iran will process a new batch of uranium at its Isfahan nuclear plant beginning next week, despite pressure from the United States and European Union to halt all sensitive nuclear work, diplomats said on Wednesday. âBeginning next week, the Iranians will start a new phase of uranium conversion at Isfahan. They will begin feeding a new batch of uranium into the plant,â a European diplomat familiar with the result of inspections by the UN nuclear watchdog told Reuters on condition of anonymity.
Pakistani security agencies have arrested two al-Qaeda suspects and are investigating whether one is a Syrian believed to be a key figure in Osama bin Laden's terror network in Europe, two intelligence officials and a senior government official said Thursday. 
