Afghan Interior Ministry spokesman Yusof Stanizai told RFE/RL today that two Taliban leaders were among those killed in ongoing fighting between government troops and militants in Afghanistan's southern Helmand Province. Stanizai told RFE/RL's Afghan Service, "Two well-known Taliban commanders, Mullah Torjan and Haji Nasru, are among those enemy forces who were killed today [during clashes in Helmand]."
Stanizai also told RFE/RL that at least 30 Taliban militants were killed in the fighting.
Stanizai said coalition forces on the ground were supported by U.S. air strikes during a series of battles that started on 2 February. Stanizai confirmed that three Afghan police were also killed in the clashes. Helmand Deputy Governor Mullah Mir said the battle was still in progress today and that the government has sent reinforcements to the area. He said there were some 200 Taliban militants involved in the fighting.
Helmand Province has been a haven for insurgents. Clashes between government forces and militants are common.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
02/04/2006 01:04 ||
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#1
Me likes the sound of a running battle, especially since we manuver way faster. Helmand Province,afghanistan
click to enlarge and scroll down.
#2
Do bear in mind that this announcement came from an Afghan government spokesman; they have been known to issue premature or inflated assessments of battle damage. Season with salt until the US confirms.
#3
CentCom press release is up. Sounds like a pretty big fight, but no confirmation of the claim of killing Taliban commanders. Yet.
EIGHT DETAINED IN SOUTHERN AFGHANISTAN FIGHTING
Release Date: 2/4/2006
BAGRAM AIRFIELD, Afghanistan Eight enemy fighters were detained and a motorcycle destroyed after Afghan and U.S. forces attacked enemy forces who fired on a government complex in Afghanistan s Helmand province.
Six Afghan National Police were killed as were an unknown number of enemy forces. Battle damage assessment continues, officials said.
Close-air support was called to the scene of the attack. British Harriers, Air Force A-10 Thunderbolt II and B-52 Stratofortress aircraft responded to the scene attacking enemy positions forcing them to flee into a nearby town.
Afghan and coalition forces reacted quickly to these events, said Army Lt. Col. Jerry OHara, Combined Joint Task Force-76 spokesman. Our forces will continue our aggressive attacks on the enemy whenever and wherever they attempt to conduct their operations.
Al Qaeda and Taliban militants are coordinating attacks on Afghan government troops and foreign forces and using increasingly sophisticated, and deadly, weapons, Afghanistan's defence minister said on Friday.
The militants, who have launched a string of attacks, including 14 suicide bombings in recent months, were getting their equipment from abroad but Defence Minister Abdul Rahim Wardak declined to speculate on where it was coming from. "It is quite obvious that all the infiltrations to Afghanistan and all the equipment, some of it really technically sophisticated equipment, are supplied from outside Afghanistan," Wardak told Reuters in an interview.
The equipment included high explosive used in roadside bombs and remote-control mechanisms to set off blasts, he said. "We don't have this equipment readily available in Afghanistan," Wardak said.
But Soviet-era stuff, they've got tons and tons.
About 1,500 people, most of them militants but including Afghan forces, aid workers, civilians and nearly 70 foreign troops, have been killed in the insurgency over the past year.
Wardak said he did not know the level of cooperation between al Qaeda and the Taliban, but said Afghan militants were able to help their foreign comrades. "It is a combination ... al Qaeda by itself will not be able to do much," he said. "There are Taliban, there are Haqqani's group, there are Gulbuddin's groups and there are other foreign militant organisations," he said.
Jalaluddin Haqqani is a pro-Taliban militant commander whose forces are active in southeastern Afghanistan. Militants none of whom can throw loyal to former prime minister Gulbuddin Hekmatyar are active in the east, near the border with Pakistan.
Wardak said he could not confirm speculation that al Qaeda militants from Iraq might be slipping into Afghanistan from Iran. The militants had lost the ability to confront Afghan and foreign forces, he said, and had changed their tactics to suicide attacks, virtually unknown in Afghanistan until recently.
While Wardak declined to speculate on where militants were getting their weapons from, President Hamid Karzai said he would raise the violence in talks during an official visit to Pakistan this month. "Bombs go off ... the children of Afghanistan suffer," Karzai told a news conference.
Afghanistan could not go on making sacrifices, he said. "This is an issue we will speak about. Both of us should find a solution," said Karzai.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
02/04/2006 00:35 ||
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Fierce fighting between militants and Afghan troops backed by US warplanes in southern Afghanistan left at least 16 suspected Taliban rebels and three police dead, an official said yesterday.
The fighting broke out near southern Helmand province's Sangin district when police began a sweep in response to several recent attacks on security posts.
Amir Mohammed Akhund, deputy governor of southern Helmand province, said more than 250 Afghan police and army troops were hunting dozens of militants.
It was the biggest guerrilla attack in Afghanistan for several months and came hours before the centre-right Dutch cabinet confirmed it would send troops to southern Afghanistan, ending months of political uncertainty that had threatened to bring down the government, embarrass Nato and stall international peacekeeping efforts.
The announcement followed a marathon parliamentary debate in which the vast majority of MPs in the 150-seat Dutch lower house - including all but one member of the three largest political parties - agreed to send up to 1,400 soldiers on the two-year mission. The breakthrough came when PvdA, the Labour opposition party, overcame concerns about the likely effectiveness and security of the Nato operation and sided with the main parties of government in backing the mission.
The outcome was painful for D66, the smallest of the three governing parties, which opposed the move, believing Uruzgan, the region where they will serve, is too unstable to allow reconstruction.
Boris Dittrich, D66 parliamentary leader, resigned yesterday after fierce criticism of his party's threat to quit government - which would trigger a snap general election - if the deployment went ahead, a threat it later withdrew.
Nato officials had expressed concern that a No vote by the Dutch would slow down the roll-out of the operation, which is set to take place during the first six months of the year.
It could also have embarrassed Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, Nato secretary general and a former Dutch foreign minister, who has identified Afghanistan as Nato's most important mission.
A Nato spokesman said: "We are glad that the Dutch parliament has confirmed the government's decision to go forward. What we have done in Afghanistan up to now is a success. This decision will help us reinforce the success."
The expansion to the south of the country will be spearheaded by 3,300 British troops, as well as 2,200 Canadians, but the Dutch contingent was seen as a significant part of the operation, for both symbolic and practical reasons.
The Dutch decision came as western security sources in southern Afghanistan warned of a rise in al-Qaeda infiltration in the region, and an increase in suicide bombings and radical preaching in local mosques.
The Dutch detachment will include armoured vehicles as well as air support from F16 jet fighters and Apache helicopters.
*The lower house of the Czech parliament yesterday approved the dispatch of an 120-strong special forces unit on a six-month mission to Afghanistan.
Karel Kuehnl, the defence minister, told the lower house the mission would be similar to one deployed in 2004 when Czech elite forces searched for fighters of the former Taliban regime in the Afghan mountains.
The troops will serve alongside US units under the US-led Operation Enduring Freedom, and will be based at the Bagram base north of the capital Kabul, he said. The lower house voted 127-39 to approve the mission. The upper house approved the mission earlier this week.
At present, the Czechs have 60 soldiers in Afghanistan under separate Nato missions.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
02/04/2006 00:29 ||
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Exhausted refugees were building ramshackle shelters in a dry river bed yesterday after 55,000 people fled a raid mounted by the Janjaweed militia in the Sudanese province of Darfur. It was the biggest movement of refugees there so far this year. The victims, many of whom have fled attacks twice or even three times before, are camped around the town of Menawashi in southern Darfur.
They abandoned the nearby town of Mershing after two attacks from the pro-regime militia in the space of eight hours last Tuesday. The flight took place as President Omar al-Bashir was assuring 53 African leaders gathered for a summit in Khartoum of his desire for peace in Darfur.
Evidence suggests that Sudan's security forces colluded with the Arab raiders.
Well of course they did, they're one and the same.
The first assault took place around noon. Abdul Majid Hassan, 28, was herding cattle with his brother, Tibin, 30, when five Arab gunmen approached on horseback. "They said, 'Give us your cattle,' " Mr Hassan said. "I told Tibin, 'Give them our cattle to save our lives.' But my brother refused. The Janjaweed raised their guns and I ran."
As he fled, Mr Hassan heard a burst of automatic gunfire. He turned to see that his brother had been shot. "I went back and found him lying on the ground. There was a bullet in his back. He said, 'I know I am dying. I ask one thing, please take care of my family.' "
About 400 Janjaweed gunmen raided a refugee camp in Mershing, riding among the shelters, beating up or firing on anyone who crossed their path. They returned about eight hours later, attacking the town and looting the market.
Mershing's entire population of 55,000 fled the next morning to Menawashi, 10 miles away. Panic-stricken refugees stampeded, trampling to death about 13 infants. Another 220 children disappeared during the flight.
A single compnay of Green Berets with logistical support could teach these 55K people to defend themselves. Rifles, ammo, hand-held radios, light machine guns, binoculars, food, uniforms, and simple infantry training. They wouldn't ever be at the level of western infantry, but they'd be good enough to kill sufficient numbers of Janjaweed to make the rest think about learning to become auto mechanics.
All the refugees in Menawashi are black Africans, and the Arab-dominated regime views them with deep suspicion. Evidence suggests that the Janjaweed were unleashed to clear the black Africans from a strategically vital road. Paramilitary police were seen talking to Arab gunmen.
Because it's all about the oil. And the Master Race.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
02/04/2006 00:59 ||
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#1
We need the President to authorize those Horn of Africa Socom operators a little target practice.
Sudanese demonstrators in Khartoum yesterday exhorted al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden to retaliate after the publication of cartoons mocking the prophet Muhammad.
Must be flush from their recent victory over defenseless civilians in Darfur.
Tens of thousands of angry demonstrators called for a boycott of Danish goods following the insult to their prophet. Some shouted: "You Danish Satan, the Muslim people are now out after you!"
"Strike, strike, strike, bin Laden!" pockets of protesters shouted. "We are ready to die in defence of you our beloved prophet," demonstrators shouted.
Nearly 50,000 attended the rally, according to press reports.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
02/04/2006 00:44 ||
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#1
"We are ready to die in defence of you our beloved prophet," demonstrators shouted.
#3
What are the odds that Al Qaeda's affiliates in Europe are prepared to launch a terror attack right now? How does bin Laden look to the mobs when his people don't deliver?
#4
Ya Skid that 30,000 pounder from a C5 would about do it. Not only would it solve the support from Khartoum problems it would also solve the horrors going on in Southern and Western Sudan.
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
02/04/2006 12:44 Comments ||
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The Security Council has approved a first step in sending UN peacekeepers to Sudan's Darfur region. On Friday the council authorised UN officials to draw up a range of options for the operation. The 15 council members said in a statement they looked forward to a decision by the African Union, which has 7000 monitors and soldiers in Darfur, to transfer its operation to the United Nations. The council asked Kofi Annan, the UN secretary-general, to "initiate contingency planning without delay" and produce a range of options in consultation with the AU.
"Send forth the Mighty Uruguayans!"
John Bolton, the US ambassador to the UN and current council president, said: "The purpose of today's statement was to kick off contingency planning. And my instructions, and my intentions are very clear, which (are) to move as far and as fast as we can during the month of February."
Posted by: Fred ||
02/04/2006 00:00 ||
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#1
The UN won't actually do it... there aren't any unspoiled underage girls and boys left...
Two leading members of the Salafist Group of Preaching and Combat (GSPC) , namely Mourad Khattab known alias "Abu Omar Abdelbar" and Amar Saidi alias "Abu Bilal Elwalbani", who has surrendered to security services, last December, in the wilaya of Medea, has made a plea to all the armed groups to surrender. Urging them to give up and join national reconciliation of president Abdelaziz Bouteflika.
The plea was made yesterday on Radio Noble Quran, at 06:40 am.
The plea made to the members of the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat by Abu Omar Abdelbar from the commune of "Khemis Elkhechna", in the wilaya of "Boumerdes" and "Bilal Elwalbani" from the village "Ouelbane", in "Alkadiria", wilaya of "Bouira", lasted six minutes.
The first was responsible of information in the organization, led by "Abdelmalek Droudkal" alias "Abu Musab Abdelouadoud", and the second was in charge of internal and external communication.
Both of them were prominent members of the terrorist organization GSPC, whose surrender severely hit the Salafist group.
Note worthy that El Khabar has previously and exclusively published their surrender on the 3rd of January, but the Salafist group for preaching and combat denied, through a communique, the information saying that they were arrested by security services.
This detail was not made clear by the radio's appeal during which "Abu Omar Abdelbar" seemed very calm when urging the armed groups to give up. They have also recognized that many terrorists want to join national reconciliation in order to take advantage of amnesty's provisions.
From his part, Mourad Khettab has called his previous men to surrender saying that the operation was "very easy", he added then: "we have lost 10 years. It's a man's life period", insisting: "my call is real, and it is time you rescued yourselves".
They added that they have been convinced of the necessity to surrender following the fetwa by religion's doctors as Mohamed Nacereddine El Albani and sheikh Ben Othaymin.
Radio Noble Quran programmes covered Mauritania, Mali, Niger and Chad in addition to the Algerian Sahara in which there is a high terrorist movement, and the area experienced many terrorist operations as the foreign tourists' kidnaping, in 2004, by Amar Saifi alias Amar El Para, who is currently in prison after he was captured by the rebellious group in Chad and delivered by Libya to Algerian security services.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
02/04/2006 00:49 ||
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A group of 23 convicted al-Qaida members have escaped from a prison in Yemen's capital. The men were sentenced last year on various charges of terrorism, an official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorised to speak to the press. They were being held at a detention centre for military intelligence in Sanaa. No further details were available.
The escape on Friday, came a day before the trial Mohammed Hamdi al-Ahdal of, an al-Qaida suspect, and 14 others charged with involvement in operations in Yemen, particularly the 2000 attack on the USS Cole. Al-Ahdal is suspected of masterminding the Cole bombing, which killed 17 US sailors, and the 2002 bombing of a French oil tanker off Yemen's coast, which killed a Bulgarian crew member and spilled 90,000 barrels of oil into the Gulf of Aden.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/04/2006 00:00 ||
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#1
Hey-
You cut me out of the picture, dang it! I have the funniest face of all of them.
#3
Escaped? Or 'released'? Seems to happen quite a lot. Maybe they need to wear explosive collars that detonate when they get out of range of a 'safe code' signal. How's that for a creative idea.
'Listed' outfits of Jamaatul Mujahedeen, Bangladesh (JMB) have come out of their hideouts and are regrouping in shoal areas in Gangachara upazila in the district, allegedly due to lax police vigilance to nab them. Many of the JMB cadres who went into hiding after the August 17 serial bombing across the country are moving freely there, locals alleged. Police were informed but they did not take any action, some of them said seeking anonymity.
According to a source in police, 53 JMB militants were listed in Nohali, Alambiditor, Kolkond, Changmari, and Gajghanta Sadar unions. After august 17 blasts, all of them JMB left their houses overnight. But recently many of them have come out in the open. The locals also named some of the JMB cadres moving openly. They include Faijul Islam Munnu of Paikan, Azhar Uddin of Kuribishla, Belal and Bhutta of Changmari, Abdul Hoque, Sirajul Islam, Fazlul Hoque, and Abdul Kaiyum of Boro Rupai villages, they said. Rangpur police did not yet frame charges against the JMB outfits who were involved in the August 17 bomb blasts in Rangpur. This has raised questions among people and political leaders about role of police as regards militants. Talking to this correspondent, Gangachara upazila Awami Laegue President Mojibor Rahman Pramanik claimed that several JMB activists not seen in his area after the August 17 blasts are moving freely.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/04/2006 00:00 ||
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Police have started combing operations in Mirzapur, Sakhipur and Kaliakair forest areas in Tangail and Gazipur districts to find out JMB (Jamatul Mujahideen Bangladesh) dens and nab its activists. A top police official in Tangail on condition of anonymity told this correspondent yesterday that at least 100 'dedicated' JMB activists including some suicide squad members are hiding in forest areas in three upazilas of the two districts. JMB leader Enayetullah alias Jewel, arrested from Joydevpur upazila in Gazipur district with a huge quantity of bomb making materials few weeks back, had recruited a large number of activists from the areas, staying at a rented houses at Kalihati in Tangail, he added. Jewel hailed from Kotalipara upazila in Gopalgang district.
Meanwhile the three JMB cadres arrested on Wednesday from Gazipur and Tangail districts along with two hand grenades and bomb making materials are being interrogated by Tangail police. They were placed on seven days' remand on Thursday. The three arrestees are Mahmudur Rahman alias Russel, 19, Jahirul Islam alias Jahir, 22, and Shahadat Hossen alias Imran, 19. They were arrested following confessional statements by JMB 'regional commander Akash, arrested from Tongi on Monday. The bomb making materials included including detonators and 33 lead splinters.
Police said they gave important information about JMB activities in the two districts. Quoting Jahir, police said he took part in the August 17 bomb blasts at Gazipur road-intersection. He also said the recovered grenades were produced at a local factory of JMB. Jahir further told that he joined JMB under the influence of one Nizam Uddin Reza, a charge sheeted accused in Gazipur bomb blast case, and became an 'Ehsar' of the banned militant Islamist outfit within a few days.
During this correspondent's visit on Thursday, locals said there were several training camps and dens of JMB at Asgana, Namasola, Ashulia, Bhati Khalpar, Media, Solai, Rashidpur, Mazidpur, Telina, Kanchanpur, and Taktarchala villages in Kaliakair, Mirzapur and Sakhipur upazilas. It was gathered that Russel, youngest of three brothers, joined JMB when he was a student of Kaliakaur Senior Fazil Madrasa. Russel's widowed mother Rahima Begum, 45, said, despite poverty, she was trying to educate her sons. Her husband died 10 years ago. Her two other sons are since Russel's arrest.
Kazi Akkas Ali, 55, Imam of Asgana Mosque also acknowledged that three might have been JMB activists in the area. Saiful Islam, 50, teacher of Hafizia Madrasa in the same village, was driven away from the village after villagers knew about his involvement with JMB, Akkas said. Saiful admitted many students, whom he might have trained, Akkas claimed.
Hossen Ali, 16, son of Mofazzal Hossen of Taktar Chala village under Sakhipur upazila, who had blasted bombs on Chittagong court premises killing a policeman and injuring many others also hailed from the area. Mirzapur and Sakhipur police so far arrested only eight JMB cadres from different areas of the upazilas. When contacted, Ashraful Alam, officer-in-charge (OC) of Mirzapur thana however said they have launched a combing operation in forest and hills in the upazila to nab JMB cadres.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/04/2006 00:00 ||
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LEADERS of radical British Muslim groups threatened a campaign of protest last night as demonstrations spread from Europe to the Far East.
A crowd of several hundred demonstrated outside the Danish Embassy in Knightsbridge, with protesters repeatedly shouting: UK you must pray, 7/7 is on its way.
Western leaders were hoping that Muslim protests had reached their peak after apologies from many politicians and newspapers yesterday for any offence caused by the publication of cartoons depicting the Prophet Muhammad. However, organisers in Britain gave warning that their protests would accelerate over the weekend, with BBC offices a target for their wrath.
Jack Straw, the Foreign Secretary, condemned the decision by some media outlets in Europe to republish the cartoons, calling it insensitive, disrespectful and wrong.
He said that freedom of speech did not mean an open season on religious taboos, and he praised the British media for what he called their considerable responsibility and sensitivity for not publishing them.
A radical Islamic cleric who lived in London until he was banned from Britain called for the killing of broadcasters and newspaper editors who showed insulting cartoons of Muhammad. Omar Bakri Mohammed issued his instructions in a religious fatwa from his hideout in Lebanon. He said that the first to be murdered should be the editor of the Danish newspaper that first published the drawings.
His followers in Britain who helped to organise yesterdays rowdy demonstration in London supported his demands as they called for more terror attacks to emulate the July 7 suicide bombers. However, the number of protesters was fewer than organisers expected and there were no other significant protests in the capital.
Police refused to act on complaints from passers-by to order the demonstrators to take down banners praising the British-born terror bombers as the Fantastic Four, saying that their job yesterday was to ensure that the protest by 500 Muslims passed off peacefully.
Security officials across Europe are concerned that some Islamic militant may act on such a fatwa and attack any one of the 27 editors from 13 European countries who have shown the offending material.
The Irish Daily Star in Dublin was the latest to publish the drawings yesterday.
While Mr Straw criticised such behaviour, French ministers supported the right of editors to reproduce the images in a debate over free speech.
In demonstrations in the West Bank and Gaza yesterday a preacher told 9,000 worshippers at one mosque: We will not accept less than severing the heads of those responsible.
But as thousands converged on the Palestinian parliament building, Mushir al-Masri, a Hamas spokesman, told the crowd that, whatever their anger, they should not disgrace their religion.
Most of the demonstrations in the Islamic world passed off largely peacefully.
Demonstrators in Indonesiabesieged the Danish Embassy and pelted it with paint and eggs. There were protests in Sudan, Egypt, Iraq, Lebanon and Pakistan where 800 people converged on the Danish mission in Islamabad. The Pakistan Government called for economic and political sanctions against offending countries.
The US State Department called for European media to act more responsibly and not to offend Muslims. Kurtis Cooper, a department spokesman, said We all respect freedom of the press but . . . inciting religious or ethnic hatreds in this manner is not acceptable.
No main US publication has published the images as politicians in Washington seek to repair their reputation in the Islamic world by criticising Western governments that back the showing of the cartoons.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
02/04/2006 00:58 ||
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#3
There is so much irony in the cartoon protest. The eye rolling, the threats of "Dire Revenge(TM)", the chest beating, all the typical Lions of Islam crap being done worldwide. The Muslim response is itself a cartoon. Its as if someone cast this as a bad stereotype play, a caricature of their society. But no, they are doing it themselves. And then they expect the western world to take them seriously. I have to laugh.
#4
should have had the RAF put a few cluster bombs on that cluster fck crowd of wannabe Jihadis. Some lovely signs on display during the protest too such as 'Behead the non beleivers' and 'Kill those who mock Alan' . I want to hire a small plane with one of those big banners hanging off the back of it that says 'The Prophet Muhammad Was A Peodophile' and fly all over the UK especially London dropping cartoon leaflets of anti Alan cartoons.
Posted by: Shep UK ||
02/04/2006 6:10 Comments ||
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I will repeat a modest request found in these pages. Each day, the MSM should publish a choice cartoon from the pages of the Arab media.
#8
Found this on Belmont's fallback page and thought it quite intriguing:
"...For America an open antipathy between the West and Islam would destroy its carefully crafted attempt to ally itself with the Muslim street. It would place Washington in the intolerable position of having to choose between its old European allies and its newfound friends in the Middle East and Central Asia. For Europe the consequences would be no less disastrous because in following the policy of Appeasement its leaders have risked falling so far behind their publics that they now find themselves unable to steer the course of popular events..."
#10
" . . . as politicians in Washington seek to repair their reputation in the Islamic world by criticising Western governments that back the showing of the cartoons."
They were really stupd, ineffectual cartoons anyway. Can't believe the admin is cowtowing. In some ways not surprising, though. The whole thing on tort reform is an attack on the jury system. What's next?
#11
Surrender now to Sharia or you die! A little pushy wouldn't you say? Even with the lilly section of the UK.
Posted by: Captain America ||
02/04/2006 13:25 Comments ||
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#12
State Dept. comments were fence straddling, not a full apology / criticsm of the cartoons. But in any case, given the French foreign minister's harsh words about the protests, and given recent coordintion between DC and Paris, this might be a good cop - bad cop routine.
The Palestinian militant Islamist group Hamas, which won the Palestinian legislative elections last month, plans to send emissaries to South America to seek financial and political support, a Brazilian newspaper reported.
The O Estado de Sao Paulo newspaper said Hamas planned to send envoys to Argentina, Brazil, Bolivia and Venezuela. South America is home to large Palestinian immigrant communities.
Hamas wants to reach out to South American leaders "to disabuse them of the view that we are terrorists and to demonstrate that the problem is the Israeli occupation," a Hamas spokesman, Abu Kuhri, told the paper THursday.
Kuhri said senior Hamas leaders would travel to the region seeking support for the Palestinian cause, as well as potential investors.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
02/04/2006 02:45 ||
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#1
This is a piece of news that we can do without! The boomers are getting progressively closer. Creeping Alanism spreads itself more intimately with the likes of MS13, Chavezistas and blowboy Morales - be worried, be real worried.
Posted by: Carlos Menem ||
02/04/2006 10:04 Comments ||
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#2
Actually, I think that it's good to see them working together. No matter what you heard most of these countries are economic basket cases. They may give money to Hamas but they will have to give up something at home. How long will it take the public to realize that funding terrorists is a bad thing?
Six Russian soldiers and a Chechen fighter have been killed since 2 February in fighting in Chechnya.
AFP quoted an unidentified official with the pro-Russian Chechen administration as saying that three soldiers were killed during a series of attacks by Chechen separatists.
Two other soldiers were killed when their vehicle was attacked near the village of Alkhan-Yurt in southeastern Chechnya.
The sixth fatality was a member of the Vostok Battalion, composed of Chechens under Russian command. He died in clashes with rebels in the southeast. A Chechen guerrilla was also killed in the clashes.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
02/04/2006 01:04 ||
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A statement from Shamil Basayev, the Military Commander of the Mujahideen Shura Council in Chechnya, was issued Tuesday, January 31, 2006, to the Arabic website of the Chechen jihad, alqoqaz.net , denouncing Denmark and Norway for the picture representations appearing in publications within their respective states ridiculing the Prophet Muhammad and thereby insulting Muslims everyone. He states his belief that the publications would not have dared to print such a thing if the Muslims were not weak and divided, and advises that Muslims should close ranks to defend the Prophet.
Further, the statement indicates that the Mujahideen Shura Council in Chechnya will hold a meeting to study the situation and do what must be done about this serious matter.
Jihadist websites and forums, in general, have been profuse in their condemnations towards the artist and editors involved in the caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad appearing in Jyllands Posten and Magazinet, the Danish and Norwegian publications respectively, for any picture representation of the Prophet is forbidden in Islam. This statement from Chechnya is an example of such outpouring, which has been mirrored amongst not only the jihadist Internet community, but insurgency groups within Iraq, as well.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
02/04/2006 00:47 ||
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Mass protests, threats of violence and boycotts in the Arab world are exaggerated reactions to the Mohammed cartoon and an example of how governments instrumentalize hatred against the West for political purposes.
Several thousand Syrian demonstrators set the Danish embassy on fire on Saturday to protest the printing by a Danish newspaper of cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad. The fire badly damaged the embassy's building, a Reuters witness said, but fire engines later put it out. Protesters also threw stones at the building, shattering windows.
Chanting "God is Great," they stormed the embassy, burned the Danish flag and replaced it with another flag reading "No God but Allah, Mohammad is His Prophet."
BBC News 24 quoted Jorgen Nielsen, the representative of Danish Institute in Damascus, as saying the building was empty at the time because the protest was expected. The embassy was closed on Saturday. "There were policemen there but it seems to have been a symbolic presence," he said.
It's almost as if they didn't care, eh?
A security official present at the scene said the building, located at the upscale Abou Remaneh area, also housed the Chilean and the Swedish embassy. He had no further details.
Protestors were expected to march to the Norwegian embassy as well, witnesses said.
#3
Sorry to repeat post, but surely even MSM has got to see the irony in this. And the truth of the necessary "at guard" mode on defending free speech.
#4
Again the ROP shows what it really is. It is absurd for this religions practitioners to insist that the world follow it's sharia law when commenting on it or making representations of it. We are in the 21st Century not the 7th.
Posted by: Howard UK ||
02/04/2006 15:42 Comments ||
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#6
This is not my original thought, but I fully agree with the poster who said that if Kawme West wasn't such a little girl, he would have played dress up as Mohammad instead of Jesus for his cover on the Rolling Stone.
sumbitch wants to undermine Mubarak and let Hamas in to take over, I 'spect
MP George Galloway has been refused entry into Egypt by security officials, his Respect party said. The politician flew to the Middle East after being invited to take part in an event against the war in Iraq organised by Egyptian campaigners. Mr Galloway left the UK on Friday night and is believed to have been stopped by security officials who refused him entry.
"Get out and stay out!"
The Respect party said in a statement that the MP, who has visited Egypt many times, was refused entry due to "Egyptian 'national security'".
"And you're ucky! Imitating a cat, how un-Islamic. Now git!"
It added: "He flew out last night at the invitation of Egyptian anti-war activists to give testimony at a 'trial' of George Bush for war crimes organised by the anti-war movement, one of several such events that have taken place recently including in New York last week.
"George Galloway has been an outspoken critic of the President Hosni Mubarak's dictatorship in Egypt and of other pro-western Governments in the Middle East.
"Mubarak of course enjoys very warm relations with George Bush and Tony Blair. The Respect Party deplores the decision of the Mubarak Government to bar entry to a British MP visiting Egypt purely for his own goofy, partisan political purposes the purposes of promoting the cause of peace."
A Foreign Office spokeswoman said Mr Galloway was stopped from entering Egypt at Cairo airport at midnight local time. She added: "We contacted him and he explained the situation, and he's now booked on to a flight back to the UK." The Respect MP is due to fly into Heathrow airport on Saturday evening.
Too bad the Brits can't borrow from the Egyptians.
#2
Nice bitch slap. Galloway is used to getting differential treatment. Egypt just reminded him he isn't entitled to it. Entering a foreign counrty is not a right. You do it only because the government of that counrty wants you to enter. If you can't, tough luck.
TWELVE Danish cartoonists whose pictures sparked such outcry have gone into hiding under round-the-clock protection, fearing for their lives.
The cartoonists, many of whom had reservations about the pictures, have been shocked by how the affair has escalated into a global clash of civilisations. They have since tried, unsuccessfully, to stop them being reprinted.
A spokesman for the cartoonists said: They are in hiding around Denmark. Some of them are really, really scared. They dont want to see the pictures reprinted all over the world. We couldnt stop it. We tried, but we couldnt.
Mogens Blicher Bjerregaard, president of the Danish Union of Journalists, told The Times: They are keeping a very low profile. They are very concerned about their safety. They feel a big responsibility on their shoulders. Its blown up so big. It is tough for them.
The cartoonists names were originally printed in the Danish paper Jyllands-Posten. Flemming Rose, the papers cultural editor, invited 25 newspaper cartoonists to draw a picture of Muhammad how they saw him, after a childrens author complained that cartoonists would only dare illustrate a book he was writing on the life of Muhammad if they could be anonymous. Twelve cartoonists responded, had their pictures printed in September, and were paid 800 Danish krone (£73) each.
In an interview with a Swedish newspaper this week, some of the cartoonists expressed their doubts about the entire episode. It felt a little like a lose-lose situation. If I said no, I was a coward who contributes to self-censorship. If I said yes, I became an irresponsible hate monger against Islam, one of the cartoonists said.
Another said: I was actually angry when I first received the letter [from Jyllands-Posten]. I thought it was a really bad idea. At first I didnt want to participate, but then I talked it over with some friends from the Middle East, and they thought I should do it.
The cartoonists come from a variety of different political backgrounds, which is reflected in their work. While some of the pictures satirise Muhammad, others attack populist right-wing politicians and even Jyllands-Posten itself, which is rightwing.
Having failed to stop the cartoons being reprinted across Europe, the cartoonists have now decided to use all the money raised from the sales of the pictures to set up a foundation which will award an annual international prize for press freedom.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
02/04/2006 02:45 ||
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#1
These cartoonists should be packing sidearms & wearing bulletproof vests. (I know, it's a stretch of my imagination.) Denmark (& all of Europe) should check their laws concerning incitement to commit murder & then commit to enforce those laws. We are all Danes now.
#3
Those bovines deserve it. And the public apology by the Danish prime Minister is not enough. We need to see the bovine more humiliated on T.V.,although he did a fairly good job on Aljazeera channel. (Begging and pleading for forgiveness would satisfy us more.) And ofcourse, the person who drew the cartoons should be publicly executed under Sharia law in Denmark. And the next time Denmark newspapers publish another cartoon, we will boycott all European goods and wreck their entire economy. You loosers. Ha! Ha! Ha!
Posted by: Truth has come.com ||
02/04/2006 7:21 Comments ||
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#4
Too bad Denmark owns the seconds largest oil reserves in the world - after Canada. Once we pump Saudi Arabia dry as the empty quarter we can make the Danes extra rich. Perhaps Truth can drive a cab in Copenhagen.
Posted by: Truth has come.com ||
02/04/2006 7:48 Comments ||
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#9
I don't think so.
It may take thousands of deaths in some western city, but at some point enough people in the west will wake up. I am deeply hoping it doesn't come to this but I tell you with all solemnity and seriousness: before you impose your religious practices on me, millions will die. And they won't be in my country.
#16
The Dems demand an exit criterion for the war. How about this: the war against Islam will be over when people can draw cartoons of anything they please without fearing for their lives.
#20
I am deeply hoping it doesn't come to this but I tell you with all solemnity and seriousness: before you impose your religious practices on me, millions will die.
Frankly, I'm looking forward to it. How else can we rid the world of this backward, hatefilled, death cult which brainwashes it's children creating perpetual lunacy throughout the world and through the centuries. We MUST lance this boil. Since the extremism of using nuclear weapons to end WW2, the nations of the world attempted to organize to discuss differences and share prosperity. There have been many positive outcomes, yet the world slides toward chaos over the hate filled words of an eighth century pedophile. MADNESS ! Let's end it. Let's end it NOW.
#21
What Mr. "Truth" fails to remember is that the Muslim conquests were achieved by trained warriors fighting as an army. The pathetic little terrorists that Islam can scrape up these days wouldn't be successful against my two little black-belted daughters, let alone the trained armies of the West. Let Mr. "Truth" look to the examples of the conquests of Iraq and Afghanistan, of the failure of the Arab Ummah's four open wars against Israel, and of the failure of two Palestinian intifadas. Yes, Israel's troops have withdrawn from the Gaza Strip, but see what Allah gives the Gazans for their reward: wind-blown sand and unemployment. Israel's Separation Wall is nearly completed; soon those in the West Bank will share Gaza's riches, and the world's scorn.
#22
before you impose your religious practices on me, millions will die. And they won't be in my country.
Dont be silly. When our armies conquer you, we will give you three choices. First choice: Become a Muslim and you will have the same rights and privileges as all of us-a full citizen of the Islamic state-you will become one of us!). Second choice: Dont become a Muslim. In this case you may practice your religious rituals but NOT publicly. You must obey Sharia law. You CANNOT obey secular common law although you may obey your religions family law (However, even these cases of personal law may be over-ruled by our courts). You cannot display your religious symbols publicly. You cannot preach your religion (But we can, of course). If you approach a Muslim walking on the side walk you MUST immediately move out of his way. In other words, you must act subdued and humbled. You cannot walk with honor and pride because you have been humiliated. You must act meekly in the Islamic state. (Your days of talking freely, like now, are numbered). You must, of course, pay the jizya (a tax) to the Muslims each year. All this is because you have chosen to follow your false religion and have not accepted the true religion, Islam. Third choice: You must be killed by us if you dont accept the above two choices. You may ask why Muslims enjoy full rights in secular countries. This is because we are the people chosen by God to spread His true religion. We are the best people. Muslims deserve all the rights. Non-Muslims deserve limited rights.
Those who have taken the name Mohammad, strapped bombs to themselves and murdered 1000s. That's what I find offensive
Your being offended by these extremists in is not the fault of us Muslims. We are not responsible for their acts. Osama bin laden, Zarqawi and other such fanatics were all made by YOU! In fact, these people are still on the pay roll of your leaders. They are paid and protected by George Bush and Tony Blair. That is why our Muslim security forces cannot find and punish them. YOUR governments are sheltering them. They even know where these fanatics are. How come Osama pops up on Aljazeera just when Bush gets in trouble? They are all pals! Yes. Muslim secret service agents recently caught George Bush, Tony Blair, Osama Bin Laden, Zarqawi, Mullah Omar, Condoleeza Rice, Donald Rumsfield and Karzai all hudled together, naked, in a Rotary club in Kabul, singing the following song:
"Fifteen men on a dead man's chest,
Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum,
Drink and the devil had done for the rest,
Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum.,
The mate was fixed by the bosun's pike,
The bosun brained with a marlinspike,
And cookey's throat was marked belike,
It had been gripped by fingers ten;
And there they lay, all good dead men,
Like break o'day in a boozing ken,
Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum."
Posted by: Truth has come.com ||
02/04/2006 12:19 Comments ||
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#23
Dont be silly. When our armies conquer you, we will give you three choices
Your armies will be a cooling pool of radioactive slag well before it comes to that.
#25
Now, on the other hand, if you are here to troll and are NOT a believing Muslim, that's a different angle on this thread. But since you are posting via an IP block dedicated to the Saudis, I rather think you believe what you are writing here.
#26
The poster "Truth has come" is not a Moslem, but is attempting a charade of sorts (think Jonathan Swift + he's giving lots of hints that direction in his piece) to illustrate his points regarding the problems with Islam and the Moslem mindset against the West. Somewhat effective, but also may be intended to flame up opposition to the Islamic threat. Again, somewhat effective, but no cigar from ex-lib.
Posted by: Dave D. ||
02/04/2006 12:33 Comments ||
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#28
The first large paragraph is an accurate summary of the Moslem "ONE ISLAMIC WORLD" position, and is therefore useful.
The other point is this--if you found yourself boiling mad at this naive representation of what the Moslem extremists are all about, then you probably understand what Moslem extremists are all about.
However, before we jump off the deep end, the Indonesian president said only that the cartoons were "insensitive" and that "as a religious people" we (the Indonesians) "should accept the Danish aplogy."
There's hope in this mess--just not on the side of the extremists.
#30
One more thing--the Danish cartoonists should be afraid, and I think that illustrates why more Moslems don't challenge the extremists. Think about it. If you had the leaders of the Crips or Bloods living in your neighborhood, would you speak out against them? You wouldn't.
As a trained journalist I feel bad for the cartoonists, but really, they're heroes because they showed the world what Islamofacism is all about, and who widespread it is. We owe them.
So buy Danish cheese and other products and send letters of support. They could really use it about now.
#31
You may be right ex-lib - the using of a known Saudi proxy makes your theory either wrong - or way the hell right and good. I'd like to think the last - and I'm starting to lean that way and laugh.
#32
Yeah, lopt. We had the same problem going on with Antiwar and Gentle a couple of years ago. In this case, Moslem men pretending to be an Australian woman and a female university student, respectively. Truth has come is Caucasian/American, and is probably trying to drive the point home about the issues--still just a poser. The real Islamofacists are way different and much, much worse.
#33
Nice try, Truth. I understand your frustration, and you're not that far off regarding the mindset, but you need to do better homework and try not to be so reactionary. The points about what will actually be instituted if they have their way were accurate, but I think I'd like to get in on that naked rum party. LOL.
#35
If sharia becomes law....I'd best divest myself from personal hygiene product stock, huh?
Posted by: Frank G ||
02/04/2006 13:02 Comments ||
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#36
A couple of good places to buy Danish gifts--can shop online or get the catalogs for better selection.
www.ingebretsens.com
www.hemslojd.com
Danish cheese is great and available in most supermarkets or natural grocery stores.
We Americans have more purchasing power than the Islamos, so let's put our money where our mouth is. When you order, you could let the merchant know why. Word gets around.
#39
Not true. My parents always taught me to speak the truth. They taught me to never trust non-Muslims and to always hate them. This is because they say blasphemous things about God; that God became a man, or that He has a son, or that there is no God, or that God is a cow etc. Actually God is unique and there is nothing like Him and He is outside the Universe. This is what Muslims believe.
We hate you because of the horrible things you say about God. You must live in subjugation under us if you don't change your beliefs.
Posted by: Truth has come.com ||
02/04/2006 13:58 Comments ||
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#40
Lots of people itching for clash of civilizations right now. Far left, far right, Islamacists .... getting hard to tell them apart.
#41
But whatever your game, "Truth", be clear about one thing: neither I nor many like me plan to submit. Come to grips with that or come to grips with far more in the way of blowback than you appear to anticipate.
And that includes blowback to those, from the far left or the far right, who use Islamacists to further their own agendas.
#42
"My parents always taught me . . . to . . . hate."
'nuff said, "Truth has come"
If someone else believes something wacky about God, what's it to you? If you think you know better, isn't that enough? Or is your God so small he needs you--in your enormous insignificance--to defend his allmighty Being? Hmm? Do you propose to put yourself ahead of Him? Wouldn't be better to wait unti the end of the age and let Him sort it out? Or is this more about you, in reality, and isn't that idolatry? You cannot know God's mind, so you cannot know what to do about other people. Take care of yourself and your own problems. That should be enough for a lifetime.
#43
lopt: True about extremists on either end of the spectrum -- some just want a fight. Of course it will always be argued that one culture was minding it's own business when the other "started it." How it's finished will depend on the courage and clear thinking of those who understand the complexities of the conflict, and the ability to lead.
#45
"My parents always taught me . . . to . . . hate."
But that doesn't mean we should not be kind to non-Muslims and treat them with fairness. You can hate some one and still be kind and fair towards him. Peace.
Posted by: Truth has come.com ||
02/04/2006 14:31 Comments ||
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#46
Truth, check out www.prophetofdoom.net
guess what your going to hell:)
#50
Wonder why the Muslims have been so frisky recently? There seems to be some sort of epidemic of foolishness among them...
Posted by: Dave D. ||
02/04/2006 15:27 Comments ||
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#51
Well, on the one hand they have the success (more or less) of the Iraqi and Afghan elections - terribly threatening to the Islamacists.
And on the other hand they have the example of Ahmadinajad and the likelihood (as they see it) that Muslims will be able to bully the rest of the world into sharia and special treatment. As one writer in the Arab News put it on Friday or Saturday, "You need us more than we need you."
European actions pretty much have encouraged that attitude, at least until this incident, as has our boy Kofi and many in the MSM.
#54
Pushed to the limit - we can get the technology to the point where we use our own oil plus solar, hydrogen, ethanol and coal and hybrids. And once we get the fuel cells up and running, the Saudi princes can go back to farming sand.
#57
This one is a poser, but he captures some of their views. Shari'a will never come widely to the west. The general war is coming. If .com is right about Muslim first, etc, there won't be too many "moderate' Muslims to worry about.
#59
I was just remembering some things .com said about the Saudi men he worked with over there. No contact with girls except for his mothers and sisters unless Daddy was rich enough to buy him a wife, or until he was making a substantial enough income of his own to effect the purchase himself (anyone remember the Saudi unemployment figures?). The resulting years of frustration channeled into sadistic plans for revenge against the little wife for taking so long to get there, no doubt partially fueled by fears that after all that waiting he won't be able to perform, and she'll look elsewhere. I wonder if Mr. Truth's Daddy bought him a wife, or if he is killing time at at cyberpub because that's one experience he'll never have?
#61
You mean the image where the Western woman points and laughs, Darrell? Or the one where she explains that he can't help his fears and overcompensations, it's all the fault of the nonfunctional society he grew up in?
I was shocked by .com's retelling here of what he said were the more innocuous of such conversations he had on the subject. (I like to think I don't shock all that easily -- as a child I read Mama's textbooks as she headed toward that doctorate in developmental psych.) He refused to share the nocuous conversations, but they clearly shaped his conclusions about how Islam's jihad problem must be solved.
#62
You left out the part where that woman who is bought is also a cousin t.w. Marrying cousins is also done by the mostly the elites in another culture I know of. They don't have to buy their wives however.
#63
Wonder why the Muslims have been so frisky recently? There seems to be some sort of epidemic of foolishness among them...
I think there's a strong element of Iran stirring up trouble as a way to distract the west and/or give us an idea of how bad they could make things if they're pressed.
Also, there hasn't been a big terrorist attack inside the western world since 7/7, and I suspect there's a strong element of blood thirst to all this.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
02/04/2006 21:38 Comments ||
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Islamic extremists are using Norway as a base for terrorist operations overseas, but the head of Norway's security police claims they're being watched.
"We believe we have control," Jørn Holme, who heads the equivalent of Norway's national security agency (Politiets sikkerhetstjeneste, PST), told newspaper Dagbladet on Friday. "But as with any other country's security police, we can't make any guarantees."
Holme said there are people in Norway "who support terror" in other countries. "They use Norway as a base," he said.
He stressed that the terror groups, or cells, are few, but dangerous.
Last week Holme pointed to second- and third-generation immigrants in Norway as representing the largest challenge to PST's battle against terrorism. He toned down the threat that asylum seekers earlier were believed to represent.
He told Dagbladet that he views the threat of a terrorist act in Norway as "moderate."
At the same time, however, he urged Norwegians not to become overly alarmed, and to recognize the difference between the vast majority of Muslims and Islamic extremists. He likened it to the difference between church-goers and members of the Ku Klux Klan.
Muslim leaders in Norway were also urging moderation among their followers, with one noting that the controversy stemming from publication of a cartoon offensive to Muslims had grown out of proportion.
He told Norwegian Broadcasting (NRK) on Friday that "unfortunately, it's been the extremists who are setting the agenda here," first by a Christian magazine publishing the cartoon in Norway and then by Islamic extremists reacting violently to it.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
02/04/2006 01:05 ||
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#1
Mullah Krekar hangs his turban there. He was/is the spiritual leader of Ansar al-Islam...
#2
Hmm, Norway. A little bit closer to Greenland. Are the alanists acclimating themselves for the big push to take over Greenland and the potential oil reserves? Say, isn't Greenland where Superman keeps his doomsday machine?
Posted by: Jack is Back! ||
02/04/2006 10:11 Comments ||
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#3
Norway has also been a base for the Russian mob. A stolen car ring out of Chicago was shipping stolen SUV's from Chicago to Norway, where they were driven across the border to Russia in the mid '90's. I hope they are watching the ports, as that is how the blackmarket moves goods.
#4
Well, the Spetzies are causing anarchies and mayhems on one side of the Mediterranean, so why not NATO's [and Europe's]northern flanks. DEnmark > approxi one-half, iff not most, of Germany and the feared German Bundeswehr + Poland is flanked before the shooting starts.
The Pentagon Friday announced plans to significantly increase special operations forces, expand psychological warfare and develop a program to counter biological terrorism as part of a new broadbased military strategy for the 21st century.
The plan comes three days before President Bush sends Congress a 2007 budget that seeks a nearly 5 percent increase in Defense Department spending, to $439.3 billion, with significantly more for weapons programs, according to senior Pentagon officials and documents obtained by The Associated Press.
Under the long-range plan, called the Quadrennial Defense Review, the Pentagon will increase special operations forces by 15 percent, including the establishment for the first time of a Marine Corps commando unit. And there will be a one-third increase - or a jump of 3,700 - in troops assigned to psychological warfare and civil affairs units.
There also will be a new $1.5 billion program to develop medical countermeasures for bioterrorism threats.
The plan will reduce the number of Minuteman III land-based nuclear missiles from 500 to 450, and calls for the conversion of a small number of nuclear missiles aboard Trident submarines to non-nuclear ballistic missiles.
The long-range strategy document, more than a year in the making, outlines broad plans to reshape the military into a more agile fighting force better able to fight terrorism, in what the document calls the Long War, while still preserving the ability to wage large conventional wars. The review, which does not call for the elimination of any of the largest weapons programs, as initially expected, will guide how dollars are spent within the Pentagon budget.
"Now in the fifth year of this global war, the ideas and proposals in this document are provided as a roadmap for change, leading to victory," said Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, in a letter accompanying the document. This represents the second four-year review that Rumsfeld has led during his tenure heading the department.
As part of the effort to shift the focus of the military toward more non-traditional terrorist enemies, the plan calls for doubling the procurement of unmanned aircraft, particularly for surveillance; calls for the development of a new long-range strike system, as a greater deterrent against future threats and stresses the need to build strong partnerships both with other nations and other U.S. government agencies.
The plan also recommends reducing the number of Navy aircraft carriers from from 12 to 11, a proposal rejected by Congress last year.
Posted by: Captain America ||
02/04/2006 14:15 ||
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#1
Under the long-range plan, called the Quadrennial Defense Review, the Pentagon will increase special operations forces by 15 percent, including the establishment for the first time of a Marine Corps commando unit.
And what would one call Carlson's Raiders
Also the idea of converting some of the Tridents to non-nuclear ballistic just does not make sense to me. Launch one and how do we know some body is not going to get itchy trigger fingers
#2
Is it really the time to reduce nuclear deterrent and navy?
I'm just a clueless jerk wondering, but even if the USA are currently needing an "agile" projectable army able to defeat guerilla, do Naton-building, etc, etc,... there is still China acting all imperial and busy anting up its own forces, most probably with your army in mind.
Conventional forces, with tracked heavy armored vehicle, serious firepower (self-propelled artillery type), plenty of warships and nukes (theses would come in handy),... is what's needed there.
How do you get the two together?
Frankly, for the USA, the only real "military" threat from the Lions of islam is mega-terror (scary, but hopefully unlikely), and self-inflicted political defeat à la Viet Nam. There is still the "global djihad" thingie, but as in Europe's case (much more threatening, the USA are the ennemy, Europe is the prize), it is cultural, demographical, subversive,... not really a war, but a clash of collective will and popular lifeforce.
Shouldn't China be recognized as the main strategical threat to you, and priorities assigned that way?
#3
Anonymous50898. The way I see it, we will never use nukes, at least not in the thousands. They are very expensive to maintain. Money spent on them, above a certain level, is wasted. Let's cut them back, dramaticly. Redirect the money into systems that will be used against enemies we do have. To my mind, these reductions are insufficient.
#4
DOD is reducing the old systems for division/corps/army level force-on-force ground wars to build up SOCOM on one end and high-tech capabilities on the other end of the spectrum.
Makes sense to me. We don't need to put armies all around China and we have plenty of capability to do a MAD balance with China.
A West Texas sheriff's deputy warned federal lawmakers Friday that drug traffickers are helping terrorists with possible al-Qaida ties cross the porous Texas-Mexico border into the United States.
Terry Simons, the chief deputy in Val Verde County, offered little evidence publicly of his claims. An FBI special agent in Houston, Shauna Dunlap, said there's "no credible evidence" that supports the warning.
Simons, part of a group that has been pushing state and federal officials for more law enforcement funding on the border, told congressmen meeting in Houston that Texas authorities have learned of newly established camps in Mexico, where so-called "narco-terrorists" are getting trained in "escape and evasion, as well as fighting techniques and combat maneuvering."
Simons also said the FBI has informed the border sheriffs that suspects with Islamic backgrounds and possibly al-Qaida ties are training with them.
Simons and other members of the Texas Border Sheriffs Coalition outlined the threat in a presentation to U.S. Reps. John Culberson, R-Texas, and James Sensenbrenner, R-Wis.
"We need more boots on the ground," Simons said. "The thing we're facing, it's a war."
Culberson said the FBI told him that suspected terrorists from countries "with known al-Qaida connections" have adopted Hispanic surnames and are "blending in with the other illegals coming over the border."
Sensenbrenner said protecting the border is now a national security issue.
"What I learned today is the type of people who are coming across the border have changed," Sensenbrenner said. "Now, a lot of the people coming across the border are criminals, and potentially terrorists people who have a mind to commit crimes against Americans and maybe to blow us all up and kill us."
In December, the U.S. House passed a border security bill authorizing $100 million for the sheriffs in the border counties. The money can be used to hire more deputies, build detention facilities and buy equipment, including weapons.
"The threat has changed on the border," Culberson said.
The bill is now pending in the Senate.,
In Austin, Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, said immigration reform and border security are "very high" on the Senate's agenda and could be addressed as early as mid-March.
"We know in a post 9/11 world, the same vulnerability that allows people who want to come across to work can be exploited by criminals, drug cartels and those who perhaps want to come to the United States to perhaps terrorize innocent Americans," Cornyn said.
Federal officials in San Antonio Friday announced nearly 30 arrests and the seizure of explosives, machine guns and other weapons in a crackdown that started in July in the border city of Laredo.
Officials with the Border Enforcement Security Task Force said they had arrested 28 people and seized materials to make 33 lower-grade explosive devices, such as pipe bombs or grenades. They also seized dozens of assault rifles, machine guns, silencers, hundreds of pounds of narcotics and $1.4 million in cash.
Cornyn warned against assuming the seized items belonged to terrorists.
"This is concerning, but I would say we have to be careful and make sure we get the facts and not act on the basis of rumor or speculation," he said.
The task force is made up of federal, state and local police who coordinate efforts and also exchange intelligence with Mexican law enforcement.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
02/04/2006 00:46 ||
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#1
It's only been a matter of time, tick tick tick
protecting the border is now a national security issueNOW??? Well Dah
Officials with the Border Enforcement Security Task Force said they had arrested 28 people and seized materials to make 33 lower-grade explosive devices, such as pipe bombs or grenades. They also seized dozens of assault rifles, machine guns, silencers, hundreds of pounds of narcotics and $1.4 million in cashWoo Hoo!
exchange intelligence with Mexican law enforcement. Now is this really fair?
Posted by: Jan ||
02/04/2006 3:10 Comments ||
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#2
Dang it, I keep saying, there is only *one* way to really seal that US-Mexico border to terrorists, and that is to look at it as a separate problem from that of illegal Mexicans crossing the border.
Pay Mexicans a BOUNTY on any non-Hispanic trying to cross. For a TINY amount of money, that border would be as airtight as an unopened Pepsi can.
Sure, some al-Qaeda would try to bribe them more to help them across. The Mexicans would take their money, and *then* inform on them for the reward. It's a proud custom.
In Mexico, a BOUNTY of this kind would attract as many players as a multi-state lottery does in the US. No illegal foreigner could get within 500 miles of that border without a dozen pairs of eyes looking at them greedily.
$5,000 -- $10,000 -- $20,000 for a really big one. To the Mexicans who live just South of the border, that amount of money looks like MILLIONS of dollars.
The BOUNTY doesn't even have to be offered by the government. Even a private organization could set up a phone line and print a bunch of flyers. The word would spread like wildfire.
#4
Because the MSM keeps its head in the sand in Iraq, they are unable and unwilling to learn that the link between smugglers, bandits, and terrorists is a natural alliance. Watch them 'discover' the problem after the fact, once again. Explain to me again, why the MSM is protected under the Constitution and the Internet is not?
#6
This is why the Minutemen are so valuable. they are a force multiplier for both Federal and local authorities, and they cost nothing -- neither funding nor planning effort on the part of the professionals. Give them a shared wavelength, and wait for the phone to ring!
Customs investigators seized grenades, pipe bombs and material to make improvised explosive devices twice in the last week in Laredo, federal law enforcement agents said Friday, a sign that the violence among warring drug cartels continues to escalate along the U.S.-Mexico border.
Laredo law enforcement officials called the weapons' discovery which apparently marks the first time such explosives have been found in the city a worrisome development.
"I'm very concerned about explosive devices that would cause major damage or injury," said Laredo Police Chief Agustin Dovalina III. "We're doing our best ... to keep the violence from spreading over to our side, the American side."
Julie Myers, head of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Bureau, said Friday that agents had seized "two improvised explosive devices and ... materials designed to make 33 more."
In a raid on a home in Laredo on Jan. 27, and another in Laredo on Thursday, agents found stacks of fully automatic rifles, military-style grenades, pipe bombs, gunpowder, drugs and homemade bombs similar to the IEDs used in Iraq. Some of the bombs were loaded with BBs and ball bearings.
Don Carter, special agent-in-charge of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms in Houston, said the investigation of who made the bombs and for what purpose is just getting started. He noted, however, that discovery of the improvised explosive devices marks a significant change in the picture of drug violence along the border.
"We've not seen any explosive device used during the outbreak of violence in Nuevo Laredo, though Mexican federal police have made several raids in Nuevo Laredo where hand grenades were found," Mr. Carter said. "But these devices had the capacity to kill, and the success here is that we found them before they were used. None of us wants to go to the scene of an explosion."
The announcement Friday comes on the same day that the Val Verde County chief deputy warned federal lawmakers meeting in Houston that drug traffickers are helping terrorists with possible al-Qaeda ties cross the Texas-Mexico border into the United States. An FBI spokeswoman in Houston could not immediately confirm his account.
Terry Simons, chief deputy in Val Verde County, is part of a group that has been pushing state and federal officials for more law enforcement funding on the border. And he mentioned the threat in a presentation to U.S. Reps. John Culberson, R-Houston, and James Sensenbrenner, R-Wis.
Ms. Myers' announcement also follows a week in which Mexican and U.S. officials have challenged each other over so-called Mexican military incursions into the United States at the border near El Paso. Officials in Mexico announced Friday that they had identified the men responsible, although they are not in custody.
U.S. Sen. John Cornyn, chairman of the Immigration, Border Security and Citizenship subcommittee, said Friday that he's "encouraged by the law enforcement professionals for their actions, and for potentially saving numerous American lives with this seizure."
"The weapons seized are a stark reminder of the vulnerability created by the federal government's failure to secure our borders," said Mr. Cornyn, R-Texas. "Texans are rightly concerned by the state of our borders and the potential means for a terrorist to exploit that vulnerability."
As if to underscore the unpredictability of border violence, unidentified gunmen opened fire with assault rifles on a federal police convoy in Nuevo Laredo on Thursday as officers transported two suspects in an earlier shooting. Two police and one of the suspects were wounded. The daylight attack occurred just a block from the federal police headquarters.
There have been four shooting deaths in four days in Nuevo Laredo. Officials recorded 22 people killed by gunfire in the border city in January.
The eruption of violence in Mexico has claimed hundreds of lives in the last year as a result of the bloody turf battle between two Mexican trafficking organizations, the Gulf Cartel and the Federation, that seek control over the lucrative network of smuggling routes, known as La Plaza, that runs through Nuevo Laredo into Texas.
The day before the seizures of the explosives, task force agents arrested a 30-year-old Laredo man after he sold a fully automatic weapon to an undercover ICE agent.
At his home, agents found what amounted to a firearms factory, with six kits to make fully automatic rifles, 20 assembled weapons, including AR-15 and AK-47 assault rifles, and assorted pistols.
Agents also seized silencers, bulletproof vests, sniper scopes, police scanners, pin-hole cameras, 2,600 rounds of ammunition, and an unspecified amount of cocaine.
"Our intelligence and witnesses tell us that it appeared the weapons we seized were headed to Mexico, which does support the idea that this involves violence between the cartels," Ms. Myers said.
"Keeping explosives and other high-powered weaponry out of the hands of violent criminal organizations is a central focus" of the task force, she said. "As these seizures demonstrate, ICE is working day and night with its task force partners to stem the tide of violence that has been ravaging the border communities in South Texas in recent months."
The discovery of the bomb-making materials is an indication of the success of ICE's latest border initiative, the border enforcement security task force or BEST.
The task force, made up of federal, state and local law enforcement agencies, was launched last July in Laredo as an intelligence-led attack on the leadership of the Mexican drug trafficking organizations responsible for the spike in violence along the border.
Task force investigations have led to the arrest of 28 suspects and the seizure of 36 assault rifles, 10 handguns, five silencers, a large quantity of weapons components and ammunition, as well as 700 pounds of marijuana, 336 pounds of cocaine and about $1.1 million in cash.
Three weeks ago, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff announced plans to expand the task force borderwide.
Ms. Myers' appearance in San Antonio on Friday marks her first press conference since her controversial appointment Jan. 4 as head of ICE.
The niece of former Joint Chief of Staff Gen. Richard Myers, Ms. Myers, 36, was the subject of congressional questions about her lack of law-enforcement experience after her nomination. President Bush bypassed a congressional vote with a recess appointment, prompting howls of protest and complaints of cronyism.
Thursday, she brushed off the criticism, stressing that in her four weeks on the job, she's been very impressed with the agents under her command and that she is committed to working with them to target and take down the leaders of the drug cartels.
"The consequences of violence [are] felt on both sides of the border, and we're working very hard to end the violence and to make the nation safer," she said.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
02/04/2006 00:28 ||
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Who owned these weapons? Mexican drug smugglers? Their American allies? American immigration vigilantes? Islamic terrorists? Neo-Nazi terrorists? Guys who like to make big noises out in the desert?
#3
Ms. Myers doesn't sound highly qualified for this job, so we had better watch her closly. I don't get Bush; family and friends, family and friends. Does he think the rest of us are all corrupt and backward ? I see he's discovered the recess appointment, one of these days he'll discover the veto.
Rumor has it that he appointed the little girly to head ICE because he doesn't consider that an important position. He got burned with FEMA, and now explosives on the border ?
Stay tuned, my brothers.
#6
I don't get Bush; family and friends, family and friends. Does he think the rest of us are all corrupt and backward ?
Or he simply doesn't trust other people. Considering the frequency with which parts of the government nominally under his authority have acted to sabotage his efforts, I can't say that I blame him.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
02/04/2006 14:21 Comments ||
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#7
she's the daughter of Gen. Richard Myers - he must trust her
Posted by: Frank G ||
02/04/2006 15:12 Comments ||
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#8
Interesting.
I've thought for some time that the creation of the North American Command was one of Rumsfeld's important steps. I wish I didn't believe that we will soon see it doing more than ballistic missile defense and scanning of ships approaching from the sea.
A Yemeni-born man who has lived in the United States for decades and owns an ice cream shop in Brooklyn was sentenced yesterday to more than 15 years in federal prison for illegally funneling nearly $22 million overseas.
The case against the man, Abad Elfgeeh, 51, stemmed from a broad terrorism investigation that began in December 2001 and resulted in the conviction last year of a prominent Yemeni cleric on charges that he had conspired to aid Hamas and Al Qaeda.
Mr. Elfgeeh was only charged with illegally transferring money overseas, and prosecutors acknowledged they had been unable to develop evidence linking his case to terrorism, but his ties to the cleric and the specter of terrorism hung over the case.
Mr. Elfgeeh, who was arrested in January 2003, had acknowledged in a secretly tape-recorded conversation with an informant that he transferred money for the cleric, Sheik Mohammed Ali Hassan al-Moayad, before the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, according to court papers filed in the case. He said he had been reluctant to do so since then because Yemenis were being closely monitored and everything was being linked to terrorism.
Mr. Al-Moayad, in an interview with the F.B.I., acknowledged that he knew Mr. Elfgeeh and that Mr. Elfgeeh had helped him raise money in the United States, the court papers said.
But Judge Sterling Johnson of United States District Court in Brooklyn, before pronouncing sentence, said he was treating the case as one involving unlawful and unlicensed money transfers and would sentence Mr. Elfgeeh accordingly.
A jury convicted Mr. Elfgeeh of running an illegal money-transmitting business from his Brooklyn storefront, a convenience store called Carnival French Ice Cream, at 473 Fifth Avenue in Park Slope, sending $21.9 million to a range of countries between 1996 and 2003. Mr. Elfgeeh ran a hawala, an informal service that many immigrants in Brooklyn use to move money around the globe outside traditional financial channels.
By sending Mr. Elfgeeh to prison for 15 years and eight months, and fining him $1.25 million, Judge Johnson gave him the lowest recommended prison term under federal sentencing guidelines. The maximum is 19 years and seven months.
Yesterday, before he heard his sentence, Mr. Elfgeeh made an impassioned plea for leniency. A naturalized American citizen, he said he came to this country 35 years ago and raised his family here.
"While it is true that I am an active member of the Yemeni community in this city, and I am a Muslim, these affiliations have not interfered with my pledge of allegiance to this country," he said, reading from a prepared statement, his voice breaking several times with emotion.
He said six of his eight children had left school, one dropping out of college, three from high school and two leaving grammar school.
"I believe I deserve your mercy," he said. "But should I not, please have mercy on my family and particularly, my children. I do not wish that my children get lost, lose their education and become bad children. The thought is really too much to bear."
Mr. Elfgeeh's lawyer, Frank J. Hancock, who argued for home confinement for his client, said after the sentencing that Mr. Elfgeeh had been prosecuted only because he was an Arab.
"If the man's name was Adam Evans instead of Abad Elfgeeh, he never would have been arrested," Mr. Hancock said.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
02/04/2006 00:26 ||
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"If the man's name was Adam Evans instead of Abad Elfgeeh, he never would have been arrested"
So no one with an English name has ever been arrested for funding terrorists money laundering?
I call bullshit on both these clowns.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
02/04/2006 0:36 Comments ||
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This week I noticed the the menu for the deli/ice cream shop near my office has a logo with a crescent moon and a star over the Capitol dome. Am I getting paranoid or what?
A man accused of mailing hundreds of anthrax hoax letters, including one to George Bush, the US president, has been arrested. The arrest came two days after he was charged with threatening to use a weapon of mass destruction. Derek Brodie, 42, sent more than 200 letters, each containing a white sheet of paper with the word "anthrax" written vertically in multi-coloured block letters, according to the FBI. The letters were sent to government agencies, media personalities, actors and actresses and businesses. "He had a habit of using the same rainbow-coloured pencil," said FBI Special Agent Steve Siegel. "He was sending these out to hundreds of people, various governmental agencies, media people, actresses."
If all the criminals were smart, the prisons would be empty.
None of the envelopes contained anthrax, the biological agent used in a series of unsolved 2001 mailings that killed five people. All were tested at a New Jersey Department of Health and Senior Services laboratory, Siegel said. The mailings apparently began in May. Twenty of the letters were intercepted by US Postal Service employees in Freehold Township and Westfield in May and June, according to a complaint filed by Special Agent David Goldkopf. One reached a hospital in Freehold on 7 June, prompting authorities to shut down its mail room and decontaminate workers as a precaution.
Three days later, a letter carrier intercepted 19 more of the letters from an outgoing mailbox in Brodie's multi-unit building, and from that point on, more than 200 were intercepted, all with the same format, Goldkopf said. The one to Bush, addressed to "President Bush, Abilene, TX,: was found in the building's outgoing mailbox on 21 September, according to the complaint.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/04/2006 00:00 ||
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"we are still trying to connect him with Dr. Stephen Hatfill, who remains a person of interest"
Posted by: Frank G ||
02/04/2006 0:11 Comments ||
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I imagine at least a few Rantburgers are ham radio guyz. This information is from http://www.w4uvh.net/dxlatest.txt, which looks to be a very bare bones ham radio blog. Scroll down to USA for this story, it looks like there's a lot of good info on his site. Via DCRTV, an outstanding DC radio and TV blog.
** U S A. Rumors have reached us about imminent drastic cuts in the output of VOA, RFE/RL and possibly other IBB outlets, on shortwave, as
of Feb. 1. If you find your favorite, or any such frequencies missing, that may be why. Please report your monitoring results on this. PS: Happy birthday, VOA! (Glenn Hauser, Jan 31, DX LISTENING DIGEST) Viz.:
THE VOA IS DEAD
Circle February 1, 2006, on your calendars. That's the day VOA ceases
to be a significant global broadcaster on shortwave. Note the last-
minute nature of this communication and the non-sequiturs given as
reasoning for this death blow. VOA dies so that radios Martí, Fardá,
Sawa and Al Hurra can live? Gimme a break. Norm Pattiz may be gone,
but his sorry legacy lives on (John Figliozzi, NY, Jan 31, dxldyg via
DX LISTENING DIGEST) Viz.:
Sent: Tuesday, January 31, 2006 5:43 PM
Subject: Transmission Reductions
Date: Sat, 28 Jan 2006 07:45:00 -0500
From: George Moore, Director of IBB Engineering and Technical Services
Gentlemen, Fiscal Year 2006 and 2007 budget constraints for the
Broadcasting Board of Governors require implementation of across the
board efficiencies so that our overall broadcast mission can
concentrate on its support of this country's war on terrorism. The
nation's need to secure and bolster its defenses against terrorism,
the terrible damage and cost of recovery caused by hurricane Katrina,
added to an already high U.S. Government budget deficit, means that
our broadcasting mission must become more focused.
In realignment of funding for 06 and 07, we have to reduce shortwave
transmissions throughout the network for most of our broadcast
services. Approximately 90,000 transmission hours will come off of the
network. These reductions will provide greater flexibility within the
network for Engineering to realign its transmission assets to achieve
maximum effectiveness for its target areas. Operational orders
implementing these reductions will be sent to all stations in the next
few days, effective February 1st, that will provide further details of
the individual station reductions. In addition to these reductions, it
is possible that further efficiencies will be necessary to meet the
budgetary goals and objectives that have been established by the
President.
As you may "read" into this message, the next few years are going to
require the Agency to make very difficult decisions. I'm providing you
with as much information on the budget situation as I can at this
time. You may use the information in this email to brief your staff,
as they will be concerned when they see the reduced schedule.
Islam doesnt accept legal manslaughter
Reported in the daily Pakistan, the Supreme Court opined that there was no option of a lesser punishment for unintentional killing called manslaughter. Under Islam, a man who accidentally kills someone will be treated as a killer of premeditation. It struck down the Lahore High Courts sentencing on this basis.
New Year night blues
According to Khabrain, New Year night in Lahore was observed by the rich in their houses and farm houses by inviting couples as guests while model girls roamed around in their parties, glasses full of wine in their hands. There were titliyan (butterflies) all around. (Titlian is the Urdu press desk story jargon for young girls.) The less rich came out in the streets and danced while being thrashed by the police and advised by the danda force of the Jamaat to desist from un-Islamic practices. Actress Deedar in Sargodha was shocked during her dance as firing started among her lovers. She ran away from the mujra to save her life.
Assemblies to break up in 2006!
Quoted in Khabrain, astrologer Yaseen Wattoo stated that in 2006, the Kalabagh Dam would be started after President Musharraf got the approval of all the provinces, after which the assemblies will break up. In the following election the PPP would get the highest number of seats. This election would be held under President Musharraf while in uniform. After that, Rao Sikandar would arrange an understanding between the PPP and Musharraf. The graph of the MMA will go down and Musharraf will take off his uniform in 2007. He will remain civilian president till 2012.
I will do kuchch na kuchch!
Quoted in Khabrain, Qazi Hussain Ahmad stated that he would do kuchch na kuchch (meaning violence?) to stop the lessons of Islam being taken out of textbooks and the setting up of an Aga Khan University and the rejection of the degrees from religious seminaries. He said he had to restore the religious and civilisational identity of the country.
Dont give meat to Qadianis!
The daily Nawa-e-Waqt reported the various great ulema of Lahore as saying that Qadianis could not be included in the animal sacrifice on the Eid al Azha. They said some true Muslims made the mistake of sending the sacrificial meat to the homes of Qadianis, which was a mortal sin.
Dr Isrars son-in-law defrauded
According to the daily Pakistan, Dr Khalid Zaigham, who is a specialist at Childrens Hospital in Lahore, was defrauded when someone posing as an ISI officer ensured him that his under-hand chores will be performed if he gave him Rs 70,000. Dr Zaigham gave the money, only to discover later that he was a trickster.
American mischief in Balochistan
Quoted in the Nawa-e-Waqt, ex-army chief Aslam Beg said that the trouble in Balochistan was being fomented by the Americans and the Indians, with the latter providing weapons to the Balochistan Liberation Army. The centre of this conspiracy was in the Valley of Panjshir in Afghanistan. The US wanted that after being ousted from Iraq and Afghanistan, it should latch on to Balochistan and stay there.
Bhutto blessed for takfir of Qadianis
Quoted in the daily Pakistan, ex-president of Pakistan Justice (Retd) Rafiq Tarar said that Bhutto needed nothing else to take him to Paradise but the apostatisation of the Qadiani community. In the same meeting, others conceded that his big achievement was the 1973 Constitution of Pakistan.
Punjabis killed in Balochistan
Writing in the Jang, Hamid Mir wrote that a few months ago, federal minister Sardar Yar Muhammad Rind of Kachchi, Balochistan, had told him that things in Balochistan were becoming alarming. Now recently he burst out and said that in his area, Punjabis were being taken out of buses and shot and those who shot them said they were being bombed in Balochistan and so they were taking revenge. Rind said although Balochistan had been given many projects, political dialogue was a must.
PMLN women indulge in markutai
According to the Jang, a meeting of the ladies wing of the PMLN descended into markutai (exchange of blows) when two factions led by Ayesha Javed and Shahzadi Kabir disagreed over a detail of the function. When the swear words dried up, the ladies threw themselves at each other and exchanged blows while some ran off and came back with stones to throw at their rivals.
When Hazrat Adam craved fruit
According to Din magazine, after Cain had killed Abel, Adam was given yet another son Sheeth (meaning gift of God) who was with him one day when Adam was taken by the desire to eat the fruits of Paradise again. As Sheeth went out to get the fruits, the angels of death, ready with the paraphernalia to take Adams life, accosted him. Back at home, when the angels arrived to kill Adam, Eve fell upon him defensively but he rebuked her for her weak feminine nature and said that she could not come between him and his God once again.
When my blood boiled
Writing in the Jang, Javed Chaudhry said that reading the following news, his blood began to boil against the ruling lawbreakers of Pakistan. In the press of 31 December, 2005, the Supreme Court of Pakistan had served notices on the violation of the law against serving of food during wedding functions. The Chief Justice of Pakistan Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry had asked a federal minister and a provincial minister from the NWFP for holding lavish wedding functions and serving food there against the law (an Ordinance of 2000). The columnist protested that those who should make the law and uphold it were busy violating it.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/04/2006 00:00 ||
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Praise allan and slap me for a Jinn, The Nuggets are Back!
As Sheeth went out to get the fruits, the angels of death, ready with the paraphernalia to take Adams life, accosted him.
Angels with shutter guns. Jinns with countrymade.
The bullet-riddled bodies of 14 Sunni Arab men purportedly seized by police a week ago were found dumped in Baghdad in the latest bout of Sunni-Shiite sectarian violence in the capital, a top Sunni group said on Saturday. The grisly discovery threatens to further polarize Iraqs ethnic and religious groups at the same time as Iraqi officials are trying to form a national unity government, which the United States hopes will lead to a curbing of this countrys rampant bloodshed. Sunni Arab leaders protested the killing, saying the victims were rounded up at a mosque on the northern outskirts of Baghdad last week and were found by relatives late Friday in the same area. The bodies were taken to a morgue to be collected by their families.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/04/2006 22:18 ||
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CAMP TAQADDUM, Iraq Soldiers with the Illinois National Guard and Marines from 2nd Marine Logistics Group (Forward), captured a weapons cache during a combat patrol west of Fallujah Feb. 2.
The cache consisted of 470 60 mm mortar rounds, 360 82 mm mortar rounds, 43 57 mm rockets, 75 tubes of C3 explosives, 125 hand grenades, 7 50-kilogram bags of TNT, eight land mines, 250 mortar fuses, 500 artillery primers, 15 82 mm illumination rounds, 5 60 mm mortar systems, 1 82 mm mortar system, 11 rocket propelled grenade rounds, eight RPG, 50 anti-aircraft rounds, 20 sticks of TNT, four 12.7 mm machine guns, 1,000 7.62 mm rounds and additional items in the cache.
This marks the eleventh weapons cache these service members discovered in a 13-day period in order to help maintain a safe environment for both the Iraqi people and Coalition Forces.
The service members make up what is known as Task Force Blackhawk.
#2
Excellent work. I hope they followed a splodydope to the stash. If we can get enough eyes and ears out there, these 'freedom fighters' will have to resort to throwing snowballs.
I think "discovered" is the wrong term. These men are using good intel, detailed planning, and swift execution. Great work performed by a first class team.
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
02/04/2006 19:43 Comments ||
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#4
have to resort to throwing snowballs.
...which they can manufacture from ice scrapped from refrigerators. ;-)
#6
Did they get the location by interrogating a terrorist?
Did his accomplices open fire when they approached the cache?
I know, Iraq is not Bangledesh.
Two prosecution witnesses testified before an empty defendants' box Thursday amid a defense boycott of the troubled trial of Saddam Hussein. The former Iraqi leader and his fellow accused, refusing to participate, watched by video linkup.
No skin off my fore. You've got the right to confront your accusers, I'd say, but it's not an obligation...
The chief judge who had appeared determined to push ahead quickly with the trial whether the eight defendants attend or not ordered a nearly two-week halt in the proceedings, apparently to give time to resolve a standoff that could hurt the trial's credibility.
A two week halt isn't pushing ahead quickly. Or am I missing something?
Saddam's original defence team refuses to participate in the trial unless chief judge Raouf Abdel-Rahman, who they allege is biased against the former leader, is removed. Saddam and four other defendants have rejected court-appointed lawyers and refused to attend Wednesday and Thursday. Abdel-Rahman ordered the remaining three defendants barred from the session Thursday after they, according to him, caused a disturbance outside the court. Their absence has meant two days of calm in the normally tumultuous court.
That wasn't supposed to happen, of course...
The two witnesses Thursday, who gave their testimony from behind a curtain to conceal their identity, recounted their detention along with their extended families and of torture and beatings at the Baghdad headquarters of the Mukhabarat, or intelligence agency. Both men named Saddam's half brother and co-defendant Barzan Ibrahim, who led the Mukhabarat at the time of their ordeal, as a participant in their torture.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/04/2006 00:00 ||
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I want to see Saddam chained to his seat in a glass cage in the courtroom, looking like Eichmann circa 1960. A perp seat beats a perp walk any day.
AoS note: don't embed the source link in the story, put it in the source box. Pick the right category for the post and don't just leave it in SAST. The mods don't have tme to clean every post right now, so if you can't help us out, we just have to delete your posts. AoS.
TWO Palestinians were kidnapped in central Gaza early today by masked gunmen who mistakenly took them to be foreign nationals, Palestinian security sources say. The two victims, a man and a woman of Western appearance, were initially believed to be foreign nationals but later discovered to be locals, the sources said.
The gunmen, who were driving a Volkswagen camper van without number plates, blocked the road in Zuweida village near Deir al-Balah, forcing the couple to pull over. They then grabbed them and bundled them into the van before driving southwards, the sources said.
It was still not known if the pair were to be imminently released after their identity became clear.
Suspected Abu Sayyaf gunmen attacked a group of farm workers on the island of Sulu, killing at least five people, including an infant, and wounding four others, military officials said on Friday.
Officials said the gunmen, clad in camouflage uniform, raided the farm early Friday morning in the remote village of Liang, Patikul. "Five people are confirmed dead and four others are also wounded in the attack," said Brig. Gen. Alexander Aleo, the islands military chief.
"Survivors of the carnage told military investigators that the attackers asked them if they were Christians and when they answered yes, the gunmen just opened fire," Aleo told The Manila Times.
The victims said the gunmen had long hair and were armed with automatic weapons, a separate military report said.
Maj. Gamal Hayudini, a spokesman for the militarys Southern Command, said some 20 gunmen were involved in the attack. "We believed this has something to do with a family feud," he said without elaborating.
Hayudini identified those killed as Itting Pontilla, 45; Emma Casipong, 16; Melanie Patinga, 9 months; Selma Patinga and Pedro Casipong. The wounded were Norde Patinga, 38; Jason Patinga, 3, Jennifer Pontilla, 19; and Lucring Casipong, 50.
The attack came barely a week after 20 people were wounded in separate attacks by unidentified men in Patikul and Jolo.
On Wednesday Abu Sayyaf gunmen also killed a father and son in Jolos Busbus village on suspicion that the man was a spy for the military. The group has previously attacked and killed dozens of civilians suspected of aiding the military on the island.
Abu Sayyaf militants also fired two rounds of rifle grenades Tuesday at a military post in Indanan where troops from the 53rd Infantry Battalion were stationed. There were no reports of casualties.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
02/04/2006 00:48 ||
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THey are trying to stir up fear that the US will get involved if it happens during Balikatan. Usually the Manila government will stop the exersizes in fear. The ASG are trying hard here, we need to stand fast on the training event and see it through.
Posted by: 49 pan ||
02/04/2006 9:48 Comments ||
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Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has ordered the cancellation of economic contracts with countries where the media have carried cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed, the ISNA news agency reported.
The report said the hardline president had ordered the creation of an official body to respond to the cartoons, saying the regime "must revise and cancel economic contracts with the countries that started this repulsive act and those that followed them."
The presidential decree also condemned Saturday the "the insult by certain Western media of the prophet which shows the hatred towards Islam and Muslims of the Zionists who govern these countries and the absence of serious action by the leaders of these countries".
The body looking into reprisals will be headed by Iran's commerce minister and include a deputy foreign minister, a deputy oil minister and a deputy industry minister, ISNA said.
The cartoons, first published last September by the conservative Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten, have since appeared in newspapers in countries including Norway, France, Germany, Belgium, Italy, Spain, Switzerland, Ireland, Austria, the Netherlands, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic and Hungary.
In a separate report, an influential state body -- the Council for Islamic Propaganda -- was quoted as calling for the expulsion of the Danish ambassador to Tehran as well as a boycott of Danish products.
Iran's foreign ministry has already summoned the ambassadors of Denmark, Norway and EU presidency holder Austria to pass on the regime's complaints.
It was the Islamic republic's late revolutionary leader Ayatollah Khomeini who in 1989 demanded Indian-born British author Salman Rushdie's execution over his novel the "Satanic Verses," deemed blasphemous and insulting to the Prophet Mohammed.
Khomeini's successor as Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has yet to speak out on the issue.
#2
have since appeared in newspapers in countries including Norway, France, Germany, Belgium, Italy, Spain, Switzerland, Ireland, Austria, the Netherlands, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic and Hungary.
And now Poland! Don't forget Poland!
Vi er sammen med Danskere !
Posted by: Rafael ||
02/04/2006 14:51 Comments ||
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#3
If there was just some way of running these cartoons in North Korea and Syria...
The U.N. nuclear watchdog Saturday reported Iran to the U.N. Security Council in a resolution expressing concern that Tehran's nuclear program may not be "exclusively for peaceful purposes." Iran retaliated immediately, saying it would resume uranium enrichment at its main plant instead of in Russia.
The landmark decision by the International Atomic Energy Agency's 35-nation board sets the stage for future action by the top U.N. body, which has the authority to impose economic and political sanctions.
Still, any such moves were weeks if not months away. Two permanent council members, Russia and China, agreed to referral only on condition the council take no action before March.
Twenty-seven nations supported the resolution, which was sponsored by three European powers Britain, France and Germany and backed by the United States.
Cuba, Syria and Venezuela were the only nations to vote against. Five others Algeria, Belarus, Indonesia, Libya and South Africa abstained, a milder form of showing opposition.
Those backing the referral included India, a nation with great weight in the developing world whose stance was unclear until the vote.
Iran reacted immediately, saying a proposal by Moscow to enrich Iranian uranium in Russia was dead.
#4
n-2 Vote in Congress to authorize use of force pursuant to War Powers act.
n-1 Congressional elections.
Maybe the vote in Congress, but I don't think the Congressional elections are going to have anything to do with this. I think this is on the fast track now and should come to a head in March by my reckoning.
Posted by: DanNY ||
02/04/2006 14:48 Comments ||
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Iran has made a grave miscalculation. Mahmoud may soon discover the true nature of Hell, according to a former member of German intelligence.
#6
DanNY, are you really from NY? There will definitely be a vote in congress. The pres does not have enough authority to go to war with Iran based on the war powers he has now and the absence of any aggression by Iran. We are going to have to go through the whole UNSC minuet weveral times before the reptiles from Europe are willing to sign on to us commencing hostilities. That will be a lot longer than March.
If the vote is not taken before the elections, it will be a party line vote in which the donks will seek to embarass Bush and prevent him from going after Iran. And it would be difficult for Bush to conduct the kind of war I suspect he intends to, one similar to that in the excellent link doc provided.
With the vote before the election, the donks will have to vote the way their constituents want, or face defeat in November. But if they vote the way their constituents want, the moneybags of the party and the Kos Kids will be really po'ed and will move heaven and earth to get a crazy liberal to run in '08, assuring a trunk hat trick.
A rovian plot that ends up with lots of dead mullahs. What's not to like?
#8
Spemble, I got to agree with Dan. Can't wait till November. The donks are around 50 percent of the Congress, but they don't represent 50 percent of the people. If the Mullahs behave badly, then the people will want to spank them. Most of us thinkers want to already. And, the fuse is already lit, is it not ? 2 weeks ago, Israel said 10 weeks.
#9
Those who think its a positive advance have missed a minor news item. To wit, The US dropped its opposition to the Egyptian proposal that the Middle East be a nuclear-free zone.
Which means that the discussion will be diverted into demands for Israel to disarm. Which means, best case*, there will be no resolution for sanctions against Iran.
*Worst case: there will a resolution demanding Israel disarms & Iran given a free pass until that happens.
#10
Yes, Nimble, Born and raised in Flatbush, Brooklyn. Now a Long Islander.
As to my reasoning, I don't think a congressional vote would be party line. Many of the donks have already said that Iran is the greater danger. They may be panderers to the left wing but not all of them are suicidal. I think they will realize that the mood of the people is in favor of taking care of the Iran situation and if they vote against it they are more likely to get tossed in November. Rovian, indeed!
More to the point, I think Iran is going to make some further mistakes that will bring the day of reckoning sooner.
The undermining of the Iranian regime has already begun as witnessed by the news report regarding the kidnappers of the Iranian border patrol in Eastern Iran. When asked about his use of a satellite phone and if he feared being tracked by Americans he smiled and said "We are not fighting America."
I think Iran will go down almost as easily as Iraq. And a victory there will be a tremendous victory in the war on Islamofascism. Remove the moneymen behind many of the worst terrorist groups and they will either have to spend a lot more time getting finances through criminal activity or wither away for lack of funding.
Finally, also, a selfish motive. Living in New York and having lost friends and almost a brother on 9/11, and knowing that NY remains very high on the enemy target list. I have a vested interest in wanting to secure total victory in this war before the enemy has the time to figure out a way to attack us again. So, more, faster, please...
Posted by: DanNY ||
02/04/2006 23:19 Comments ||
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U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld accused Iran on Saturday of being the world's leading sponsor of terrorism, a charge that his Iranian counterpart rejected as "ridiculous" and "outrageous." "The Iranian regime is today the world's leading state sponsor of terrorism," Rumsfeld told an annual security conference in Munich where talk of Iran's nuclear program was at the top of the agenda. "The world does not want, and must work together to prevent, a nuclear Iran," he said.
Correction, Don, a big part of the Western world either doesn't care or is secretly hoping the Iranians nuke the Joooos.
Rumsfeld spoke just before the UN's nuclear watchdog decided to report Iran, which Washington and the European Union fear is covertly developing atomic weapons, to the UN Security Council. "We must continue to work together to seek a diplomatic solution to stopping the development of (Iran's) uranium enrichment program," Rumsfeld said.
"While we oppose the actions of Iran's regime, we stand with the Iranian people who want a peaceful democratic future. They have no desire to see the country they love isolated from the rest of the civilized world," he said.
Iranian Defense Minister Mostafa Mohammad-Najjar was quoted by Iranian state television as saying Rumsfeld's comments were "outrageous remarks and a ridiculous projection by the White House leaders."
"Rumsfeld had better try to act responsibly for the disgrace of attacking Afghanistan and Iraq, because the people of the world will never forget the torturing of the prisoners of Abu-Ghraib," he said.
IAlthough he labeled the Islamic republic of Iran as the main sponsor of terrorism, Rumsfeld said Islamic terrorists had made Iraq the "central front in their war against the civilized world." Rumsfeld said they were using Iraq as a training and recruiting ground, in the same way as they operated in Afghanistan when the Taliban were in charge.
But he vehemently rejected any suggestion that Iraq had been a catalyst for a global wave of terrorist acts. "Any argument that Iraq might have been a trigger is inconsistent with the facts," he said, listing a number of terrorist acts that took place even before September 11, 2001. In addition to the September 11 attacks, which are believed to have been carried out by al Qaeda, Rumsfeld named other attacks which he said Islamic terrorists had masterminded. He mentioned the massacre of schoolchildren in Beslan, Russia and bombings in Britain, Spain, Egypt, Israel and elsewhere.
Rumsfeld said that the world needed to prepare itself for a long fight against Islamic terrorists who he said wanted to set up a global Islamic empire. "They have designed and distributed a map where national borders are erased and replaced by a global extremist Islamic empire," he said. "As during the Cold War, the struggle ahead promises to be a long war."
Washington and its allies were doing everything possible to ensure that terrorists did not get hold of weapons of mass destruction, which he described as a nightmare scenario. "The world would change overnight if a handful of terrorists managed to obtain and launch a chemical, biological, or radiological weapon," he said.
#1
"The world would change overnight if a handful of terrorists managed to obtain and launch a chemical, biological, or radiological weapon"
We must remember these words.
Specifically, because that is precisely what the handful of terrorists who run Iran want to do: change the world.
They know it, Rumsfeld knows it. So he is challenging them to use a nuclear weapon. He is telling them that they are right, that when they use their nuke, it will change the world.
In their minds, however, "change" means something very different than what "change" means to Rumsfeld. For them, "change" means the return of the 12th Imam and the world bathed in fire and blood.
For Rumsfeld, assuming that we shoot down that nuclear weapon when launched, "change" means that Iran will no longer be able to threaten the world. That when and if they launch a nuclear weapon, the US will have carte blanche to do to Iran whatever it feels is necessary to insure this.
And yes, the world will be changed forever. Because everyone will see what happens when you are foolish enough to throw a nuclear weapon at your hated enemies.
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad ordered the government on Saturday to study scrapping contracts with European countries where cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad have been published, the official IRNA news agency reported.
Ahmadinejad has ordered Commerce Minister Masoud Mirkazemi to set up a committee to "consider and cancel economic contracts with the countries that started the hateful action", said the report.
The Iranian president also slammed the publication of the cartoons as an "insult" to Islam, saying that the cartoons showed Western media's "rudeness."
On Friday, former Iranian President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani also condemned the cartoons as "loathsome", but called on Muslims to refrain from extremist moves.
Meanwhile, several Iranian cities, including the capital Tehran, witnessed rallies staged by thousands of angry demonstrators protesting against the cartoons, IRNA said.
Danish daily Jyllands-Poste published 12 cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad last September, including one depicting the Islamic religion's founder wearing a bomb-shaped turban.
Over the past few days, the cartoons, which are considered blasphemous by most Muslims, were reprinted in some other European papers, which provoked an outrage in the Muslim world and a boycott of Danish products in most Muslim countries.
#4
Imagine a man who has a personal exercise routine involving a vacuum cleaner, a tube of ky, and a dvd showing various farmyard animals. Imagine that one day he forgets to draw the curtains while doing his workout, and when it is over he looks up to see that all his neighbours are staring in through the window. This is what the Islamic world has done. The rest of the world is embarrassed
and would like to look away, but cannot. They are transfixed by the spectacle, and don't know whether to laugh or scream.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel likened Iran's nuclear program on Saturday to the threat posed by Germany's Nazi regime in its early days, saying the world must act now to prevent it building the atom bomb.
Addressing the annual Munich security conference, she said there had been complacency in other countries as Adolf Hitler rose to power. "Looking back to German history in the early 1930s when National Socialism (Nazism) was on the rise, there were many outside Germany who said 'It's only rhetoric -- don't get excited'," she told the assembled world policy makers.
"There were times when people could have reacted differently and, in my view, Germany is obliged to do something at the early stages ... We want to, we must prevent Iran from developing its nuclear program."
Post-war Germany, conscious of the Nazis' crimes, has made support for Israel's existence a pillar of its foreign policy. Speaking to an audience that included U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, Merkel had particularly blunt words for Ahmadinejad: "Iran has blatantly crossed the red line," she said.
"I say it as German chancellor. A president who questions Israel's right to exist, a president who denies the Holocaust cannot expect to receive any tolerance from Germany."
Merkel said Iran was a threat to Europe as well as Israel. But she also said diplomacy rather than military action was the way to deal with the threat. "Diplomatic avenues need to be exhausted. We need to hold our nerve, go step by step," she said.
I dunno if diplomatic avenues have been exhausted, they seem more terminal to me.
Rumsfeld, speaking after Merkel, also voiced his support for a diplomatic solution, but said Iran's nuclear program posed a grave threat. "The Iranian regime is today the world's leading state sponsor of terrorism," he said. "The world does not want, and must work together to prevent, a nuclear Iran."
#1
Merkel said Iran was a threat to Europe as well as Israel. But she also said diplomacy rather than military action was the way to deal with the threat.
#3
The kids saying, "It takes one to know one" holds some truth here. If any nation could talk about building a monster under the nose of the rest of the world it would be Germany. In the strictist form she is also correct in diplomacy is alway the best answer. But there comes a time when the threat becomes real and rational nations take action over diplomacy. Or as Carl Von would say diplomacy just extended it's arm of action. I don't think we are ready yet to take them out, but I think the active duty military RBr's that have more than three years left will probably get to add Iran to their tour list.
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
02/04/2006 12:52 Comments ||
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#4
I (heart) her for Valentine's.
A Rummy soul mate with clarity of mind and word.
Posted by: Captain America ||
02/04/2006 14:12 Comments ||
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#6
Good for Germany - I guess there are beginning to be signs of a re-awakening in Europe.
Iran, terrorist sponsoring and hate-spewing, is dangerous like the Nazi's were; the al Qaeda Islamist types continue to show themselves as zealous killers of innocents; and now Muslems, broadly it seems, upset about cartoons but not over the Killers who have become the image of Islam.
Totalitarianism approaches (a new 9th century type), and maybe, just maybe, Eurpoe will see it before it arrives.
#7
Merkel said Iran was a threat to Europe as well as Israel. But she also said diplomacy rather than military action was the way to deal with the threat.
Me too, but then I had a thing for Maggie in her prime - tough, smart babes. What's not to like? Ima waiting for Condi to crush the Arabist coalition at State before I bestow my unrecquited love for her. Now, Hillary(!) is an evil beast simply hiding in female form til the time is right to show her true form (Cthulhu).....
Posted by: Frank G ||
02/04/2006 17:13 Comments ||
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#9
Merkel said Iran was a threat to Europe as well as Israel. But she also said diplomacy rather than military action was the way to deal with the threat.
Diplomacy is operating on credit---sooner, or later, the bill is due.
Posted by: Lord Kalvan ||
02/04/2006 17:38 Comments ||
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#10
Diplomacy at this point is like yelling 'DUCK'. It's a little late for words.
#11
If Miss Merkelreally means to equate Iran with Nazi Germany, she needs to review her high school history books. Hitler loved diplomats and diplomacy, because he could keep them happy with conversation and cognac while his armies rolled over his next target. The only thing that stopped Hitler was endless armies fighting against him; and had the diplomats put down their crystal glasses earlier, the required armies could have been smaller. I'm pleased that the good Fraulein noticed, I am not impressed with her logic chain.
#12
Merkel apperently seems to pay attention to the inteligence briefings she gets. Unlike many world leaders and major political figures.
Diplomacy will be stressed until we are ready to strike. Then we will strike. I don't think this will be like Iraq. No UNSC resolution, no endless debate. It's just going to happen and then we will know it happened.
#13
Merkel's comments were solely about the RISE of Hitler - i.e. that there was a time during which he could have been confronted without all-out war, a time in which many chose to ignore the rising danger.
Hundreds of Syrian demonstrators stormed the Danish Embassy in Damascus Saturday and set fire to the building, witnesses said.
The demonstrators were protesting offensive caricatures of Islam's Prophet Mohammed that were first published in a Danish newspaper several months ago.
Witnesses said the demonstrators set fire to the entire building, which also houses the embassies of Chile and Sweden.
Protesters have been staging sit-ins outside the Danish Embassy in downtown Damascus almost daily since the furor over the drawings broke out last week.
Saturday's protest started out peacefully but as anger escalated, protesters broke through police barriers and torched the building, the witnesses said.
The cartoons, first printed in Denmark and then published elsewhere in Europe, have touched a raw nerve in the Arab and Islamic world, in part because Islamic law is interpreted to forbid any depiction of the Prophet Mohammed, favorable or otherwise.
Aggravating the affront was one caricature of Mohammed wearing a turban shaped as a bomb with a burning fuse.
The Danish government has expressed regret for the furor, but refused to become involved, citing freedom of expression.
Rage against caricatures of Islam's revered prophet poured out across the Muslim world on Saturday, with aggrieved believers calling for the execution of those involved, storming European buildings, and setting European flags afire.
#10
Man, that link to Malkin was great. Very well done. Got chills watching and listening to it.
Where are the "courageous" British and American politicians on this cartoon "scandal"? Have they lost their voice or have they lost our will? They use to be in the forefront in this struggle...now they seem to be hiding quietly in the back of the room, hoping no one will call their names...
#11
Not Peace rather Piece as in smashed to pieces.
So the root structure of the religion is a mob.
Perhaps the name should be changed from Islam to: Anarchy R Us.
#12
"In Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim nation, President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono denounced the cartoons as insensitive. But "as religious people, we should accept the apology extended by the Danish government," he added."
Right on. See, now that's a normal response.
"Angry demonstrators took to the streets in Denmark and Britain on Saturday, signaling a ratcheting up of tensions among European Muslims."
Not very "European" are they?
"At the demonstration later Saturday outside Copenhagen, right-wing extremists plan to protest the recent burning of Danish flags -- a gathering that could inflame tensions with the Muslims."
Yeah, maybe better not get the vikings pissed off. The genetics are all still there, simmering on the back burner.
"Although many of Denmark's 200,000 Muslims were deeply offended by the cartoons, mass demonstrations have not broken out."
The Danish Muslim majority who "gets it" about the Danes. Significant, since Denmark is the country of origin in this "great offense" against Moslems.
"We should have killed all those who offend the Prophet and instead here we are, protesting peacefully," Mahmoud Zahar, a top leader of the militant Islamic group that won the January 25 Palestinian elections, told Italian daily Il Giornale. "We should have killed them, we should have required just punishment for those who respect neither religion nor its holiest symbols," Zahar was quoted as saying."
Right . . . except if we're talking about OTHER religions. As expressed in this next clip.
"At least 500 Israeli Arabs gathered peacefully in Nazareth for the first protest against the caricatures on Israeli soil. A procession set off from the As-Salam mosque toward the Basilica of the Annunciation, where Christian tradition says Mary was informed of Jesus' impending birth. Sheik Raed Salah, a radical leader of the Islamic Movement, was to address the crowd later.
"Allah is the only God, and Mohammed is his prophet," loudspeakers blared as the march began."
Not much room there for a difference of opinion.
"CNN has chosen to not show the cartoons out of respect for Islam." (see bottom of page at link)
And the American Press bends over . . . way over. Never thought you'd see it here? Only the beginning.
#17
Vi er sammen med Danskere!!! (We stand with Denmark!)
Posted by: Rafael ||
02/04/2006 14:47 Comments ||
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#18
Remember those peaceful Muzzies ? Remember that the actions of a few radicals should not reflect upon the entire Muzzie population.
Then, one cartoonist writes one cartoon, and those peace loving Muzzies set Europe on fire in retaliation. Let these jerk*ffs make the rules, I'm ready to burn all the mosques and behead all the Muzzies. The word stupid doesn't quite explain them, does it ?
How about salivating fucktard cluster ?
#20
I called the Danish Embassy in Washington and told them how much I admired them standing strong in the defense of freedom of speech. They seemed appreciative.
Posted by: mac ||
02/04/2006 16:07 Comments ||
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#21
Wasn't Muhammed a pedophile? Why not some cartoons depicting that? How about a cartoon where muslims enter a door expecting thier 76 year old virgin and come out the other side sterialized.
IRAN secretly tested a new surface-to-surface missile (SSM) on January 17, seeking to establish the measurements needed for long-range missiles, the German daily Die Welt reported in its issue to appear today.
The test, conducted by members of the Revolutionary Guard led by Yahya Rahim Safavi, was successful, according to Western diplomats cited by the newspaper, which did not indicate the location where the test took place.
On January 28, Safavi said that Iran would use its ballistic missiles if it was attacked. "Iran has a ballistic missile with a range of 2,000 kilometres," he said on Iranian public television. "We do not intend to attack any country, but if we are attacked, we are capable of effectively responding. Our position is defensive."
Mr Safavi was referring to the Shahab-3 missiles that Iran possesses which can reach Israel and US bases in the Middle East.
Posted by: Steve White ||
02/04/2006 00:09 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[2 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
I am pretty sure if Iran launches any missile we will know it and might report it.
#3
Too bad an ODA was not there to shoot it down on take-off. That would have been fun and a very diplomatic warning.
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
02/04/2006 13:01 Comments ||
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#4
It's not against the law for a country to fire missiles within it's own borders; Iran could fire in the north to land in the south to tune their trajectory rates! However, everyone elses early warning systems would light up like a christmas tree and could cause scrambling!
The Internal Security Forces raided late on Thursday suspected hide-outs, as part of their investigation into the bombing of the Lebanese Army barracks in Ramlet al-Baida. On Thursday at 11 p.m., a suspect threw a hand grenade in Dirani Square toward the zone of the Ein al-Hilweh refugee camp. The zone is located dozens of meters away from the Lebanese Army checkpoint in the neighboring Hay al-Taamir area. The blast did not inflict any human or material damages. The explosion occurred soon after a bomb exploded near an army barracks in Beirut, in the wake of a warning by an alleged Al-Qaeda operative made from a public phone booth located in Ain al-Hilweh, Lebanon's largest refugee camp.
Sources familiar with the issue in the port city said the raid targeted various residential apartments and mobile phone shops. Several persons were taken to Beirut for interrogation, the sources said. Security forces raided several suspected hide-outs, including an apartment located on the eastern boulevard of the city next to the ALPHA company, two homes in the old city of Sidon, a third home in the Bustan al-Kabir area, two mobile phone shops on Dellaa street and one library for Islamic studies.
Posted by: Fred ||
02/04/2006 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[1 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
hint: "toward the zone of the Ein al-Hilweh refugee camp"
Posted by: Frank G ||
02/04/2006 0:10 Comments ||
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The U.S. spy agencies have not known where Osama bin Laden is hiding for some time, the nations top intelligence official said Friday in an Associated Press interview.
National Intelligence Director John Negroponte said the general view is that the terror leader and his deputy, Ayman al-Zawahri, are still alive.
Yet we are not certain where he is, Negroponte said of bin Laden during a rare interview at his office. I think its been a while since we had a fix on that. ... Every now and then they broadcast messages to their following and the world as a way of proving they are alive.
Clearly, they are operating in more difficult circumstances than before 9/11, Negroponte said. The successes we had in going after bin Ladens top leadership over the past several years have definitely cramped his style.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
02/04/2006 00:40 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[1 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
The bad guys who actually DO stuff tend to get caught or killed. It's a lot harder to get the ones who just sit quietly in caves - or even in sleeper cells in Detroit. One tries to catch them when they start actively PREPARING to do stuff, rather than after real stuff happens. The bigger the planned action, the more preparation is needed, which means the more opportunity to get caught. The problem is when you catch plots in the preparation stage the offenses are minor - even trivial, and you often don't know what plot you prevented. Plus, it's hard to STAY vigilant when nothing ever happens.
There is a high level of unusual activity in the back end of the 'Burg. I'm not sure if it's meaningful or just bored skriddies; Fred's got the keys to the server room. If the site gets unstable again, we'll go back to Rantburg Junior. Carry on.
#9
Could someone explain for us laypeople what all this means? And what's RantburgJunior? Thanks. I don't have a lot of time for the burg anymore, regretably, but I don't want to be left out.
#10
RB Junior was the RB regulars emailing each other during the Great RB Outage of '06. If you send your address to me (seafarious -at- yahoo) or Alaska Paul -at- gmail, we'll stick you on the list. It's *extremely* informal, and your email will not be sold, loaned out, or used for anything other than idle chatter, dirty jokes, and bad card tricks.
#12
and engineering humor, which I'm sure Islam also finds blasphemy
Posted by: Frank G ||
02/04/2006 14:41 Comments ||
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#13
Islam finds engineering to be blasphemous. Look at all the Islamist engineers. And when the profit says In'shallah instead of Seek ye the truth and the truth shall set you free, what kind of results can one expect from its engineers.
I've got you on the list
I've got you on the list
And they'll none of them be missed
They'll none of them be missed
[/channeling Gilbert and Sullivan's Mikado]
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
02/04/2006 14:49 Comments ||
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#15
AP - I never figured you for a light opera guy..bluegrass, yes, lol
Posted by: Frank G ||
02/04/2006 14:55 Comments ||
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#16
Twisted from Madame Butterfly's aria:
Un belle dee feremo
The young man died
by drinking draino
They didn't know that he was a lame-o
For being stupid and drinking Draino
Hope the Italians don't seethe.....
Ima runnin for cover
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
02/04/2006 20:33 Comments ||
Top||
#17
I've got a little list,
I've got a little list,
from being hit amidst,
And it looks like I am going down.
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
02/04/2006 21:43 Comments ||
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#18
Engineers, what taste, G&S, Puccini. What's next Bambi?
Drip, drip, drop
Little B-2 bomber
Bombing Iraq
As the Mullahs fall down.
Drip, drip, drop
Little B-2 bomber
What can compare
To your beautiful sound
Drip, drip, drop
When the sky is cloudy
Your pretty music
Can brighten the day
Drip, drip, drop
When the sun says howdy
You say goodbye right away
Drip, drip drop
Little B-2 bomber
Bombing Iraq
with JDAMs all day long
Drip, drip drop
Little B-2 bomber
Iraq is gone
And I don't care at all
Drip, drop, drip, drop
I'll never be afraid
Of a good little
Gay little
April serenade
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.
Afghan Interior Ministry spokesman Yusof Stanizai told RFE/RL today that two Taliban leaders were among those killed in ongoing fighting between government troops and militants in Afghanistan's southern Helmand Province. Stanizai told RFE/RL's Afghan Service, "Two well-known Taliban commanders, Mullah Torjan and Haji Nasru, are among those enemy forces who were killed today [during clashes in Helmand]."
Al Qaeda and Taliban militants are coordinating attacks on Afghan government troops and foreign forces and using increasingly sophisticated, and deadly, weapons, Afghanistan's defence minister said on Friday.
Exhausted refugees were building ramshackle shelters in a dry river bed yesterday after 55,000 people fled a raid mounted by the Janjaweed militia in the Sudanese province of Darfur. It was the biggest movement of refugees there so far this year. The victims, many of whom have fled attacks twice or even three times before, are camped around the town of Menawashi in southern Darfur.
The Security Council has approved a first step in sending UN peacekeepers to Sudan's Darfur region. On Friday the council authorised UN officials to draw up a range of options for the operation. The 15 council members said in a statement they looked forward to a decision by the African Union, which has 7000 monitors and soldiers in Darfur, to transfer its operation to the United Nations. The council asked Kofi Annan, the UN secretary-general, to "initiate contingency planning without delay" and produce a range of options in consultation with the AU.
A group of 23 convicted al-Qaida members have escaped from a prison in Yemen's capital. The men were sentenced last year on various charges of terrorism, an official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorised to speak to the press. They were being held at a detention centre for military intelligence in Sanaa. No further details were available. 
Police have started combing operations in Mirzapur, Sakhipur and Kaliakair forest areas in Tangail and Gazipur districts to find out JMB (Jamatul Mujahideen Bangladesh) dens and nab its activists. A top police official in Tangail on condition of anonymity told this correspondent yesterday that at least 100 'dedicated' JMB activists including some suicide squad members are hiding in forest areas in three upazilas of the two districts. JMB leader Enayetullah alias Jewel, arrested from Joydevpur upazila in Gazipur district with a huge quantity of bomb making materials few weeks back, had recruited a large number of activists from the areas, staying at a rented houses at Kalihati in Tangail, he added. Jewel hailed from Kotalipara upazila in Gopalgang district. 
A statement from Shamil Basayev, the Military Commander of the Mujahideen Shura Council in Chechnya, was issued Tuesday, January 31, 2006, to the Arabic website of the Chechen jihad, alqoqaz.net , denouncing Denmark and Norway for the picture representations appearing in publications within their respective states ridiculing the Prophet Muhammad and thereby insulting Muslims everyone. He states his belief that the publications would not have dared to print such a thing if the Muslims were not weak and divided, and advises that Muslims should close ranks to defend the Prophet.
Several thousand Syrian demonstrators set the Danish embassy on fire on Saturday to protest the printing by a Danish newspaper of cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad. The fire badly damaged the embassy's building, a Reuters witness said, but fire engines later put it out. Protesters also threw stones at the building, shattering windows.
A Yemeni-born man who has lived in the United States for decades and owns an ice cream shop in Brooklyn was sentenced yesterday to more than 15 years in federal prison for illegally funneling nearly $22 million overseas.
A man accused of mailing hundreds of anthrax hoax letters, including one to George Bush, the US president, has been arrested. The arrest came two days after he was charged with threatening to use a weapon of mass destruction. Derek Brodie, 42, sent more than 200 letters, each containing a white sheet of paper with the word "anthrax" written vertically in multi-coloured block letters, according to the FBI. The letters were sent to government agencies, media personalities, actors and actresses and businesses. "He had a habit of using the same rainbow-coloured pencil," said FBI Special Agent Steve Siegel. "He was sending these out to hundreds of people, various governmental agencies, media people, actresses."
** U S A. Rumors have reached us about imminent drastic cuts in the output of VOA, RFE/RL and possibly other IBB outlets, on shortwave, as 
Islam doesnt accept legal manslaughter 
The bullet-riddled bodies of 14 Sunni Arab men purportedly seized by police a week ago were found dumped in Baghdad in the latest bout of Sunni-Shiite sectarian violence in the capital, a top Sunni group said on Saturday. The grisly discovery threatens to further polarize Iraqs ethnic and religious groups at the same time as Iraqi officials are trying to form a national unity government, which the United States hopes will lead to a curbing of this countrys rampant bloodshed. Sunni Arab leaders protested the killing, saying the victims were rounded up at a mosque on the northern outskirts of Baghdad last week and were found by relatives late Friday in the same area. The bodies were taken to a morgue to be collected by their families.
Two prosecution witnesses testified before an empty defendants' box Thursday amid a defense boycott of the troubled trial of Saddam Hussein. The former Iraqi leader and his fellow accused, refusing to participate, watched by video linkup. 
U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld accused Iran on Saturday of being the world's leading sponsor of terrorism, a charge that his Iranian counterpart rejected as "ridiculous" and "outrageous." "The Iranian regime is today the world's leading state sponsor of terrorism," Rumsfeld told an annual security conference in Munich where talk of Iran's nuclear program was at the top of the agenda. "The world does not want, and must work together to prevent, a nuclear Iran," he said.
Iranian Defense Minister Mostafa Mohammad-Najjar was quoted by Iranian state television as saying Rumsfeld's comments were "outrageous remarks and a ridiculous projection by the White House leaders."
German Chancellor Angela Merkel likened Iran's nuclear program on Saturday to the threat posed by Germany's Nazi regime in its early days, saying the world must act now to prevent it building the atom bomb.
IRAN secretly tested a new surface-to-surface missile (SSM) on January 17, seeking to establish the measurements needed for long-range missiles, the German daily Die Welt reported in its issue to appear today.
The Internal Security Forces raided late on Thursday suspected hide-outs, as part of their investigation into the bombing of the Lebanese Army barracks in Ramlet al-Baida. On Thursday at 11 p.m., a suspect threw a hand grenade in Dirani Square toward the zone of the Ein al-Hilweh refugee camp. The zone is located dozens of meters away from the Lebanese Army checkpoint in the neighboring Hay al-Taamir area. The blast did not inflict any human or material damages. The explosion occurred soon after a bomb exploded near an army barracks in Beirut, in the wake of a warning by an alleged Al-Qaeda operative made from a public phone booth located in Ain al-Hilweh, Lebanon's largest refugee camp.
