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Yemen Executes American Missionaries’ Murderer
Today's Headlines
Headline Comments [Views]
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Down Under
Aussie Liberals caught emailing Mohammad cartoons
The Liberal MP charged with selling the Howard Government's message on multiculturalism has been embarrassed by his own branch members distributing the cartoon of Mohammed that sparked deadly protests worldwide.
What's to be embarrassed about? They're not Muslims, and Muslims aren't in charge of them.
Andrew Robb, the federal member for the Victorian seat of Goldstein and recently appointed Parliamentary Secretary for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs, confirmed yesterday that he demanded action after his Brighton party branch distributed the offending images. The 200-strong Brighton branch published the offending cartoons in an email newsletter just days before violent protests over the images in Nigeria in which 16 people were killed.
The contents of Australian emails had nothing to do with the Nigerian riots. Even if the Nigerians had been aware of the emails and rioted over them, the emails still wouldn't have been any of their damned business.
Mr Robb, who coincidentally spent yesterday in talks with Muslim leaders in Canberra, told The Australian that email distribution of the Mohammed cartoons was "offensive".
To whom? To the recipients? Or to the people they weren't directed to?
In a letter to Victorian Liberal Party state director Julian Sheezel, Mr Robb, a former federal Liberal Party director, demanded "appropriate action" be taken over the caricatures of the prophet Mohammed.
Yeah. Have a beer and forget about them.
"It's provocative and offensive. I feel strongly that the attachment runs counter to the advice of the Prime Minister that the right to freedom of speech is an essential right, but one which must be exercised responsibly and sensitively," he wrote.
If it's free, you can exercise it any way you damned well please. If you can't, it's not free.
However, Mr Robb defended the "naive" branch member who emailed the cartoon to other party members. "If someone does try to tar-and-feather the young bloke, I will defend him," he said. "He's upset and remorseful."
At the risk of repeating myself, have a beer and forget about it.
Mr Sheezel said he had counselled the Brighton branch president and secretary to prevent further circulation of the "offensive material".
Posted by: Oztralian || 02/28/2006 20:59 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Thanks for moving this article to page 2 :). I was still half asleep when i posted it.
Posted by: Oztralian || 02/28/2006 21:31 Comments || Top||


Israel-Palestine-Jordan
Mother sad daughter didn't carry out bombing
The mother of a woman arrested in a suicide-bombing attempt told a Palestinian TV interviewer she was upset by her daughter's capture, but only because it meant the 21-year-old wouldn't be able to kill Israelis targeted for attack, including children.

The mother of Wafa Al-Bas – arrested at the Erez border crossing last June concealing a 20-pound bomb under her clothing – spoke to official Palestinian Authority television in a segment translated by Israel-based Palestinian Media Watch.

Al-Bas was on her way to bomb the outpatient clinic of Soroka Hospital in Beersheba, where she had been receiving regular treatments for serious burns to 45 percent of her body from a gas stove explosion in her home.

She said her greatest wish was to kill 30 to 50 Israelis, including children.

PMW said the attack likely would have killed or maimed the Israeli doctor who saved her life.

In the Feb. 20 interview, the mother said her daughter had wanted to be a martyr since she was a little girl. But the mother didn't encourage her – not due to opposition to suicide bombing – but because Wafa was female.

"If it was a boy, I would have supported, but since she is a girl I discouraged," the mother said.

PMW commented: "Once again, the message to Palestinian society from broadcasts like this is that suicide bombing is not wrong. Indeed, it is seen as an honor and a joy to raise a child to be a suicide bomber – at least if that child is a son."
Posted by: tipper || 02/28/2006 19:04 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  They forgot the bit where the joooos made her stove blow up.

Then again, a great deal of "stove explosions" happen to get rid of females that have "dishonoured" a family or are just too ugly to marry. With burns over 45% of her body, I'm sure her family encouraged her to 'spode. No marriage stuff here, and well that's the fault of the jooos.


Besides, the family didn't think it could get away with a 2nd "gas stove explosion" so soon.

Sick, sick people. Mass psychosis. Untreatable.
Posted by: Hupomoger Clans9827 || 02/28/2006 19:18 Comments || Top||


Europe
Cavegirls were first blondes to have fun
THE modern gentleman may prefer blondes. But new research has found that it was cavemen who were the first to be lured by flaxen locks.

According to the study, north European women evolved blonde hair and blue eyes at the end of the Ice Age to make them stand out from their rivals at a time of fierce competition for scarce males.

The study argues that blond hair originated in the region because of food shortages 10,000-11,000 years ago. Until then, humans had the dark brown hair and dark eyes that still dominate in the rest of the world. Almost the only sustenance in northern Europe came from roaming herds of mammoths, reindeer, bison and horses. Finding them required long, arduous hunting trips in which numerous males died, leading to a high ratio of surviving women to men.

Lighter hair colours, which started as rare mutations, became popular for breeding and numbers increased dramatically, according to the research, published under the aegis of the University of St Andrews.

“Human hair and eye colour are unusually diverse in northern and eastern Europe (and their) origin over a short span of evolutionary time indicates some kind of selection,” says the study by Peter Frost, a Canadian anthropologist. Frost adds that the high death rate among male hunters “increased the pressures of sexual selection on early European women, one possible outcome being an unusual complex of colour traits.”

Frost’s theory, to be published this week in Evolution and Human Behavior, the academic journal, was supported by Professor John Manning, a specialist in evolutionary psychology at the University of Central Lancashire. “Hair and eye colour tend to be uniform in many parts of the world, but in Europe there is a welter of variants,” he said. “The mate choice explanation now being put forward is, in my mind, close to being correct.”

Frost’s theory is also backed up by a separate scientific analysis of north European genes carried out at three Japanese universities, which has isolated the date of the genetic mutation that resulted in blond hair to about 11,000 years ago.

The hair colour gene MC1R has at least seven variants in Europe and the continent has an unusually wide range of hair and eye shades. In the rest of the world, dark hair and eyes are overwhelmingly dominant.

Just how such variety emerged over such a short period of time in one part of the world has long been a mystery. According to the new research, if the changes had occurred by the usual processes of evolution, they would have taken about 850,000 years. But modern humans, emigrating from Africa, reached Europe only 35,000-40,000 years ago.

Instead, Frost attributes the rapid evolution to how they gathered food. In Africa there was less dependence on animals and women were able to collect fruit for themselves. In Europe, by contrast, food gathering was almost exclusively a male hunter’s preserve. The retreating ice sheets left behind a landscape of fertile soil with plenty of grass and moss for herbivorous animals to eat, but few plants edible for humans. Women therefore took on jobs such as building shelters and making clothes while the men went on hunting trips, where the death rate was high.

The increase in competition for males led to rapid change as women struggled to evolve the most alluring qualities. Frost believes his theory is supported by studies which show blonde hair is an indicator for high oestrogen levels in women.

Jilly Cooper, 69, the author, described how in her blonde youth she had “certainly got more glances. I remember when I went to Majorca when I was 20, my bum was sore from getting pinched”.

However, Jodie Kidd, 27, the blonde model, disagrees with the theory: “I don’t think being blonde makes you more ripe for sexual activity. It’s much more to do with personality than what you look like. Beauty is much deeper than the colour of your hair.”

Film star blondes such as Marilyn Monroe, Brigitte Bardot, Sharon Stone and Scarlett Johansson are held up as ideals of feminine allure. However, the future of the blonde is uncertain.

A study by the World Health Organisation found that natural blonds are likely to be extinct within 200 years because there are too few people carrying the blond gene. According to the WHO study, the last natural blond is likely to be born in Finland during 2202.
Posted by: tipper || 02/28/2006 18:39 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  **cough**bullshit**cough**
Men with screw any women they have access to. Try this: high melanin is not necessary for survival in cold climates, therefore blondes and reds have as much chance for survival in cold climates (actually slighly more since light colors radiate less heat). Now give me my PhD and a large NIH grant for a hands on study of breast size vs mating success.
Posted by: ed || 02/28/2006 19:29 Comments || Top||

#2  Oh yeah, it's the blonde hair. That's it. Yup.

Terpsboy, of course, heh.
Posted by: .com || 02/28/2006 19:33 Comments || Top||

#3  So what about redheads? They were almost exclusively restricted to the British Islands. Numerous Romans commented on the many people in Britain with red hair, and that they had never encountered red haired people elsewhere.
Posted by: phil_b || 02/28/2006 19:34 Comments || Top||

#4  Lightly pigmented corneas (blue, gray, green eyes), allow in more light and give better vision under low light conditions and less pigmentation (melanine) allows more vitamin D production under low sunlight.
Posted by: phil_b || 02/28/2006 19:40 Comments || Top||

#5  I'm confused, phil_b - is that a request or rhetorical? ;-)
Posted by: .com || 02/28/2006 19:41 Comments || Top||

#6  Dang commas.

So, what

So what,
Posted by: phil_b || 02/28/2006 19:43 Comments || Top||

#7  Thanks .com. I want to hire her as my reseach assistant.
Posted by: ed || 02/28/2006 19:48 Comments || Top||

#8  Phil, what did the Romans have to say about the freckles?
Posted by: ed || 02/28/2006 19:50 Comments || Top||

#9  Just one, ed? Clinton needs dozens... sure you don't want some more? A redhead, brunette, and jet black would complete the set, heh.

BTW - you deserve the PhD. ;-)
Posted by: .com || 02/28/2006 19:51 Comments || Top||

#10  They were almost exclusively restricted to the British Islands.

I thought there were redheads in Mesopotamia and the Persian/Afghan regions, too.
Posted by: Robert Crawford || 02/28/2006 19:52 Comments || Top||

#11  The were also redheaded Celts on the Eurasian steppes. Mongolian food didn't agree with them.
Posted by: ed || 02/28/2006 19:55 Comments || Top||

#12  One will do .com. Holding up those puppies for thorough study can tire out my arms. Clinton had a lot more practice with heavy lifting.
Posted by: ed || 02/28/2006 20:00 Comments || Top||

#13  I agree. He works out all the time.
Posted by: .com || 02/28/2006 20:04 Comments || Top||

#14  high melanin is not necessary for survival in cold climates, therefore blondes and reds have as much chance for survival in cold climates (actually slighly more since light colors radiate less heat).

Is that why so may eskimos are blue eyed blonds?
Posted by: Nimble Spemble || 02/28/2006 20:09 Comments || Top||

#15  Oh, okay, NS. You can have a PhD, too, heh.
Posted by: .com || 02/28/2006 20:14 Comments || Top||

#16  #4 "Lightly pigmented corneas (blue, gray, green eyes), allow in more light and give better vision under low light conditions"
Corneas are not pigmented -- irises are. And irises are designed to control the amount of light by adjusting pupil size, not by having color.
Posted by: Darrell || 02/28/2006 20:23 Comments || Top||

#17  Finding them required long, arduous hunting trips in which numerous males died, leading to a high ratio of surviving women to men.

And this differs from today how?
I never saw a race by the feminist to the dangerous jobs [miners, alaska fishing, etc]. Even some of the rare dangerous jobs which have some numbers show up [police, fire, military] they are greatly out numbered by males. We have seen a explosion of soft academic programs [not the engineering, math, hard sciences, the old agricultural/mechanical] largely filled by the females since the 50s. The tendency is that males even today carry the responsibility of group's survival in the dirty side of the house. How many social units survive first contact where the males practice risk avoidance?
Posted by: Gromoque Glaish6758 || 02/28/2006 20:26 Comments || Top||

#18  The mutations (X # genes) have to happen before they can be passed on. Some mutations, such as light skin, are so beneficial at extreme latitudes that they are almost universal and across races. Others such as blonde or redhead are about neutral to survival and propagate based piggybacking on other factors like conquest or high social status of the initial mutants (therefore higher survial rate, hemophilia and the royals sound familiar?) of the ancestors.

Blondes are a northwest European mutation, while redheads (another gene) showed up in another population. There is no requirement (or even much probability in such a small population) that either mutation must show up in eskimos.
Posted by: ed || 02/28/2006 20:35 Comments || Top||

#19  it still doesn't make sense. if there were more men than women, the men don't get to choose who they mate with. In this scenario, ALL women are desirable. Thus, there is no differential selection favoring blonde women.

If the MEN were blonde, and that was somehow more desired, then these blonde men would be more likely to be chosen to reproduce.
Posted by: PlanetDan || 02/28/2006 21:12 Comments || Top||

#20  And then we sent Darwin to the showers in the 7th...
Posted by: .com || 02/28/2006 21:19 Comments || Top||

#21  Heh -- Rantburg University at it's best!
Posted by: Sherry || 02/28/2006 21:37 Comments || Top||

#22  Thanks for the correction Darrel.

The color of the Iris does affect the amount of light entering the eye, by a significant amount. Seen at its most extreme in albinos who have no Iris pigmentation and are often highly sensitive to bright lights.

Iris (eye) color doesn't seem to affect visual acuity in high light levels, but there is evidence lightly pigmented (blue) eyes are more sensitive in low light conditions and detecting movement in the peripheral vision, which would be a useful adaptation for a hunter in northern areas with their extended periods of twilight.
Posted by: phil_b || 02/28/2006 22:20 Comments || Top||

#23  detecting movement in the peripheral vision, which would be a useful adaptation...

Or warning of the husband's return.
Posted by: .com || 02/28/2006 22:23 Comments || Top||


Iraq
Zogby 72% of American troops in Iraq say should exit country within the next year
In wars of America's century just past, we have sent our soldiers to far-off fields of battle and were left to wonder about their opinions of the life-and-death conflicts in which they were involved.

Letters home, and more recently telephone calls and emails, would give us a peek into their states of mind. Some who returned would regale friends and family with tales from the front lines.

Times have now changed. A first-ever survey of U.S. troops on the ground fighting a war overseas has revealed surprising findings, not the least of which is that an overwhelming majority of 72% of American troops in
Iraq think the U.S. should exit the country within the next year.

Further, a new Le Moyne College/Zogby International survey shows that more than one in four (29%) thought the U.S. should pull its troops immediately.

The poll, conducted in conjunction with Le Moyne College's Center for Peace and Global Studies, also showed that another 22% of the respondents, serving in various branches of the armed forces, said the U.S. should leave Iraq in the next six months. One in every five troops - 21% - said troops should be out between six and 12 months. Nearly a quarter - 23% - said they should stay "as long as they are needed."

The troops have drawn different conclusions about fellow citizens back home. Asked why they think some Americans favor rapid U.S. troop withdrawal from Iraq, 37% of troops serving there said those Americans are unpatriotic, while 20% believe people back home don't believe a continued occupation will work. Another 16% said they believe those favoring a quick withdrawal do so because they oppose the use of the military in a pre-emptive war, while 15% said they do not believe those Americans understand the need for the U.S. troops in Iraq.

At 55%, reservists serving in Iraq were most likely to see those back home as unpatriotic for wanting a rapid withdrawal, while 45% of Marines and 33% of members of the regular Army agreed.

The wide-ranging poll also shows that 58% of those serving in country say the U.S. mission in Iraq is clear in their minds, while 42% said it is either somewhat or very unclear to them, that they have no understanding of it at all, or are unsure. Nearly nine of every 10 - 85% - said the U.S. mission is "to retaliate for Saddam's role in the 9-11 attacks," while 77% said they believe the main or a major reason for the war was "to stop Saddam from protecting al Qaeda in Iraq."

Ninety-three percent said that removing weapons of mass destruction is not a reason for U.S. troops being there. Instead, that initial rationale went by the wayside and, in the minds of 68% of the troops, the real mission became to remove
Saddam Hussein.

Just 24% said that "establishing a democracy that can be a model for the Arab World" was the main or a major reason for the war. Only small percentages see the mission there as securing oil supplies (11%) or to provide long-term bases for US troops in the region (6%).

More than 80% of the troops said they did not hold a negative view of Iraqis because of continuing insurgent attacks against them. Only about two in five see the insurgency as being comprised of discontented Sunnis with very few non-Iraqi helpers.

On this question there appears to be some confusion among the troops, but two in every three do not agree that if non-Iraqi terrorists could be prevented from crossing the border into Iraq, the insurgency would end.

To control the insurgency, a majority of respondents (53%) said the U.S. should double both the number of troops and bombing missions, an option absolutely no one back in Washington is considering.

Reservists were most enthusiastic about using bombing runs and a doubling of ground troops to counter the enemy, with 70% agreeing that would work to control the insurgency. Among regular Army respondents, 48% favored more troops and bombing, and 47% of Marines agreed. However, 36% of Marines said they were uncertain that strategy would work, compared to just 9% of regular Army, 6% of National Guard respondents, and 2% of reservists who said they were not sure.

Those in Iraq on their first tour of duty were less optimistic that more troops and bombing runs would work. While 38% of first-timers agreed, 62% of those on their second tour and 53% in Iraq at least three times favored more U.S. troops and firepower.

As new photos of prisoner abuse in Iraq surface, a majority of troops serving there said they oppose harsh interrogation methods. A majority - 55% - said it is not appropriate or standard military conduct to use harsh and threatening methods on possible insurgent prisoners to information of military value.

Among all respondents, 26% said they were on their first tour of duty in Iraq, while 45% said they were on their second tour, and 29% said they were in Iraq for a third time, or more. Three of every four were male respondents, with 63% under the age of 30.

The survey included 944 military respondents interviewed at several undisclosed locations throughout Iraq. The names of the specific locations and specific personnel who conducted the survey are being withheld for security purposes. Surveys were conducted face-to-face using random sampling techniques. The margin of error for the survey, conducted Jan. 18 through Feb. 14, 2006, is +/- 3.3 percentage points.

In other words, the poll is a sound, solid measurement of what is going through the minds of our front-line warriors. It's no letter home, but it's still good to hear from them.
Posted by: Sherry || 02/28/2006 18:36 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  "...944 military respondents interviewed at several undisclosed locations throughout Iraq."
To my way of thinking, "several" precludes "throughout Iraq" -- I'm wondering if the pollsters ever left the Green Zone or the Baghdad Hotel.

"Just 24% said that 'establishing a democracy that can be a model for the Arab World' was the main or a major reason for the war."
"Just" -- that's a loaded word that suggests the author's bias to me.

This is a very interesting buried nugget:
"...62% of those on their second tour and 53% in Iraq at least three times favored more U.S. troops and firepower..."
Posted by: Darrell || 02/28/2006 19:22 Comments || Top||

#2  The world renowned and universally respected Le Moyne College's Center for Peace and Global Studies.

That's a credibility builder.
Posted by: Nimble Spemble || 02/28/2006 19:26 Comments || Top||

#3  Hell ask me when I was stationed in Europe in the 70s or Asia in the 80s and I would have said the same thing. We should be out last year. However, to stay or go was a political decision which we weren't asked our personal opinion.
Posted by: Gromoque Glaish6758 || 02/28/2006 20:14 Comments || Top||

#4  Leadership is about principles, not about polls -- the Clintons and their ilk still don't understand that.
Posted by: Darrell || 02/28/2006 20:42 Comments || Top||

#5  *shrug* It's a Zogby poll. I've no doubt whatsoever the questions were completely slanted going in, and the analysis of results was slanted further.
Posted by: trailing wife || 02/28/2006 21:15 Comments || Top||

#6  I would be real interested in the exact wording of the question of when to leave. This part really makes me wonder here (by the way it wasn’t part of the top breakdown for some reason of their report):

” The troops have drawn different conclusions about fellow citizens back home. Asked why they think some Americans favor rapid U.S. troop withdrawal from Iraq, 37% of troops serving there said those Americans are unpatriotic, while 20% believe people back home don’t believe a continued occupation will work. Another 16% said they believe those favoring a quick withdrawal do so because they oppose the use of the military in a pre-emptive war, while 15% said they do not believe those Americans understand the need for the U.S. troops in Iraq”

That says they see Americans calling for rapid withdrawal “unpatriotic” the rest basically either being defeatist, pacifist, or just plain dum. So they can’t be slamming the people they agree with.

I would guess they were asked the question in when will we be ready to pull out type way. The soldiers see the progress the ME refuses to recognize. Massive troop reductions if things continue the way they are evident unless you get your news from the ME only.

Who knows
Posted by: C-Low || 02/28/2006 22:07 Comments || Top||

#7  Iran would attack Iraq within a month of an Anglo-American pullout.
Posted by: Listen To Dogs || 02/28/2006 22:34 Comments || Top||

#8  agree with TW. It's a Zogby poll. Yawn.
Posted by: 2b || 02/28/2006 23:25 Comments || Top||


Britain
The Acorn Jihadi Falls Close to "Hook's" Tree: A Baby "McHook"
JAILED cleric Abu Hamza’s terrorist son is spreading words of hate — as a rapper. Mohammed Kamel Mostafa’s song lyrics rant about waging Jihad (holy war) and carrying weapons, and praise banned Middle East terrorist groups Hezbollah and Hamas.

In one he raps: “I was born to be a soldier, Kalashnikov in my shoulder, peace to Hamas and Hezbollah, that’s the way of the lord Allah . . . we’re Jihad through, defend my religion with the holy sword.” He also sings of his Islamic “brothers” who vowed to die for Allah.

Mostafa, 24 — dubbed MC Hamza by his henchmen — has played venues ranging from Wembley Arena to Oxford University. He launched Islamic group Lionz Of Da Dezert last year — and is now aiming for solo success. The sponger has raked in hundreds of pounds in merchandising spin-offs — while claiming taxpayer-funded benefits worth around £200 a month.

The Sun set up a recording studio in North London where he met our undercover reporters in a bid to clinch a music deal. Speaking in broken English, greedy Mostafa boasted: “I think I can easily make more than a million. A million is nothing.

“I’ve been concentrating on gigs but there’s a big market out there, trust me. 5,000 people came to see me play at Wembley.”

Mostafa revealed he made more than £300 at a recent gig by flogging branded T-shirts and key rings. He said he had already rejected one deal because he was “only going to get £1.50 per album”.
Posted by: Captain America || 02/28/2006 17:26 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  The sun has officially set on the British empire.
Posted by: doc || 02/28/2006 17:58 Comments || Top||

#2  As is typical with these things, enlightenment does not strike twice in the same place. I doubt he has the old-world elan that daddy did. Hopefully he will soon learn the joys of nose candy and crap like that.
Posted by: Anonymoose || 02/28/2006 19:46 Comments || Top||

#3  hmmm. is gangsta-jihad rap "hate speech?" "incitement speech?"
Posted by: PlanetDan || 02/28/2006 21:32 Comments || Top||


Europe
Gang leader confesses to grisly murder of French Jew
A Paris gang leader was arrested overnight in Abidjan and has confessed to the kidnap, torture and murder of a young French Jewish man, Ivorian investigators said on Thursday, in a case that has horrified France. Youssouf Fofana, 25, who fled to Ivory Coast shortly after the dying Ilan Hamili was found on February 11, could be extradited back to France by the end of the day, according to French Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin. "He has French nationality. He has been arrested by the Ivorian police. [French] police investigators are on the scene, so we believe he could be repatriated to France in the coming hours," Villepin told Canal Plus television, referring to Fofana. "This is an odious crime, and it is therefore important that justice be rapidly carried out," he said.

However, Abidjan state prosecutor Raymond Tchimou was quoted by the French daily Le Monde as saying that the process could take longer. "Extradition can be a drawn-out process. We need to get all the documents together ... We will go as quickly as we can. He could be back in France by the end of the week," Tchimou was quoted as saying. Ivorian police said that Fofana - a convicted petty criminal of Ivorian origin - had admitted taking part in Halimi's kidnap and murder. But they said that "he denies any anti-Semitic dimension" to the crime.
Posted by: Fred || 02/28/2006 16:42 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  "he denies any anti-Semitic dimension" to the crime.

Well of course he did. He didn't understand a word of that. Try the question again, but with jooooos. Wanted to get you some joooos?
Posted by: Hupomoger Clans9827 || 02/28/2006 18:39 Comments || Top||

#2  hating Jews is so ingrained in their culture, I'm surprised he didn't admit it simply as a matter of fact.
Posted by: PlanetDan || 02/28/2006 18:45 Comments || Top||

#3  "he denies any anti-Semitic dimension" to the crime.

Naw. Of course not. Never mind his telling the family to run to the synagogue to get the ransom.

And never, ever, bring up the "Friends and Family Torture Party" they ran.
Posted by: Robert Crawford || 02/28/2006 19:47 Comments || Top||

#4  Fortunately for him, he did it in France and not Texas.
Posted by: Gromoque Glaish6758 || 02/28/2006 20:16 Comments || Top||

#5 
Posted by: DMFD || 02/28/2006 23:00 Comments || Top||


Syria-Lebanon-Iran
Syrian and Iranian Interests Converge in Lebanon
Posted by: DepotGuy || 02/28/2006 15:57 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


Arabia
Al-Qaeda Attack on Abqaiq: The Vulnerability of Saudi Oil
The February 24 attack by al-Qaeda on Saudi Arabia’s giant oil processing facility at Abqaiq failed. At least two of the attackers were killed, along with two security guards. On February 27, Saudi authorities said they had killed another five terrorists linked to the Abqaiq attack in a clash in Riyadh, and they were interrogating a further suspect. The failure of the attack and the reported success of the subsequent counterterrorist operation give the impression of Saudi efficiency, but it should at least as much serve as a warning. The planned attack, targeting the world’s largest oil exporter, should give impetus to President Bush’s determination, declared in his January State of the Union address, to wean the United States off foreign oil.
The Abqaiq incident was the first direct attack by al-Qaeda on a Saudi oil installation, although Osama bin Laden, in a December 2004 audio message, had called for attacks against oil, and his deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri, repeated the call in autumn 2005. In a website message claiming responsibility for the Abqaiq attack, “al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula” said it was part of al-Qaeda’s “war against the Christians and Jews to stop their pillage of Muslim riches and part of the campaign to chase them out of the Arabian peninsula.”

Conflicting Reports

According to official Saudi statements, security precautions worked. Two vehicles were stopped at a checkpoint. Guards opened fire and both vehicles blew up, apparently because of the explosives they were carrying. Unofficial reports quoted by news agencies speak of the vehicles bearing Saudi oil company logos with drivers in uniform getting through one set of gates and being stopped by suspicious guards at a second. Several hours of gunfire followed the explosions, according to these reports, suggesting other terrorists giving covering fire or acute nervousness by guards.

However, initial reports are not always the full story, as illustrated by recent terror episodes in Saudi Arabia. When the U.S. consulate in Jeddah was attacked in 2004, the reaction of the Saudi security forces was initially praised. Subsequently a clip of the security video footage of the attackers’ car trying to enter the consulate gate was broadcast by an American television network; it showed members of the Saudi national guard abandoning their weapons and running away.

In theory, Saudi oil facilities are among the best guarded installations in the kingdom. The state owned company, Saudi Aramco, employs what is effectively a private army to provide security. Saudi Aramco’s force reportedly is backed up by eight different official security agencies, but this is possibly a recipe for confusion. As it is, the previously all-powerful Saudi interior minister, Prince Nayef, is reported by diplomats to have been politically sidelined. In the Saudi tradition, no official statement has been made, but many of Nayef’s previous responsibilities have been transferred to his son—the assistant minister—Prince Mohammed bin Nayef, now effectively the minister for counterterrorism.

Abqaiq is an important symbolic target but a difficult installation to knock fully out of commission. It is the largest oil processing plant in the world and handles more than half Saudi Arabia’s daily exports. Stretching over a wide area, the processing plant removes water, gas, sulfur, and other impurities from freshly pumped crude oil so that it can be loaded onto tankers for shipment across the world. Apart from being well protected by fences and electronic security devices, it is also said to have been designed with built-in redundancy, meaning damage need not reduce the quantity of oil processed. Besides ground attack, Saudi authorities are said to have anticipated the possibility of a hijacked aircraft being crashed into the plant. Saudi air force F-15s are reported to be on continual standby.

Saudi authorities will likely be relieved that at least the two terrorists killed in the initial attack were known to authorities beforehand—their names were on a most wanted list released last year. So far, diplomats say, every al-Qaeda attack in the kingdom has been forensically linked to known networks. Officials in the kingdom are said to be dreading the “bleedback” from Iraq of battle-hardened Saudi jihadist fighters who might be unknown to the Saudi security agencies. The Saudis are also well aware that beating the challenge of al-Qaeda requires more than just effective intelligence and counter measures. Prince Mohammed bin Nayef, the assistant interior minister and effective counterterrorism chief, has told diplomats that only 20 percent of the problem can be tackled with police work; the other 80 percent must be combated by countering the deviancy of al-Qaeda’s interpretation of Islam.

Challenge for U.S. Policy

Saudi Arabia is proud of its reputation as a reliable oil supplier as well as its status as the largest supplier of crude oil to the world market. With exports of other major producers like Nigeria and Iraq affected by insurrection, the official U.S. interest is that Saudi exports should be maintained and make up for any market shortfall. Hence, presumably, the fulsome praise in the aftermath of the attack by U.S. ambassador to Saudi Arabia James Oberwetter, who posted a message on his embassy website giving “considerable credit” to the Saudi Government and Saudi Aramco. “When [the security systems] were needed, those systems worked,” Oberwetter wrote.

But Washington must be keenly aware that Saudi oil production remains extremely vulnerable to sabotage. A Saudi police raid on a terrorist hideout last year reportedly uncovered copies of maps and plans of the prestigious, newly producing field of Shaybah. At particular risk also must be the estimated twelve thousand miles of pipelines in the kingdom. Blowing up pipelines in Iraq has been a visible sign of the insurgency; though the pipeline damage is often quickly repaired, the attacks have contributed to the lack of recovery in Iraqi oil exports.

Last week President Bush spent two days traveling and giving speeches about his new energy policy, noting, “Some of the nations we rely on for oil have unstable governments or fundamental differences with the United States.” That formulation carefully avoids naming Saudi Arabia, which is apprehensive about his plans. The Abqaiq attack, though unsuccessful, should serve as an additional argument for advancing as quickly as possible to the target of reducing dependence on oil from unstable regions.

Posted by: DepotGuy || 02/28/2006 15:50 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  This attack is nothing compare to the devastating attack that is going to come from the fact that a 2b Poll states that 85% of Americans are sick of our dependence on corrupt, terrorist funding, spoiled brat princes and politicians like Chirac and Putin and that new sources of energy to will become unstoppable.
Posted by: 2b || 02/28/2006 23:28 Comments || Top||


India-Pakistan
Pakistan gets "joint standoff weapons"
Pakistan gains capability to hit invisible target
(Updated at 2200 PST)

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan has gained what it calls ‘joint standoff weapons’ a capability through which an invisible target can be hit.

The weapon, in which integrated Global Position System and Inner-shell Management System Navigation are used, is a part of a joint programme of Navy and Air force in the U.S.

Joint airframe, guidance system and flight control is used in this programme which is designed on the modular programme and thanks to this system the missile can hit a target at range of 70 kilometers.

The missile can hit an enemy target without entering air limits of an enemy.
Posted by: john || 02/28/2006 15:46 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  They sold the Paki JSOWs? Hard to believe.
Posted by: 6 || 02/28/2006 16:44 Comments || Top||

#2  In my day we called a Joint Standoff Weapon a sharpend roach clip.
Posted by: BrerRabbit || 02/28/2006 16:48 Comments || Top||

#3  WTF?
Posted by: 3dc || 02/28/2006 17:22 Comments || Top||

#4  Let us hope that this merely refers to a capability that the Pakistani military is advertising as JSOW, whether or not it meets our definition thereof...
Posted by: Hupeash Cleart9965 || 02/28/2006 18:18 Comments || Top||

#5  The article is describing JSOW and nothing else. NATO allies, Singapore and others have ordered it, so I would not be too surprised if JSOW is being sold to Pakistan to go with the F-16s. Still, I am against it, including the reason that anything going to Pakistan is also going to China.
Posted by: ed || 02/28/2006 18:34 Comments || Top||

#6  Exactly are Pakistanis giving back for all this US largesse?

Last week, I read a report that the State of Utah yielded more patents last year than has the Saudi terrorist entity in its entire history. In general, Muslims contribute almost nothing to the world in either science or culture. Given the cartoon-jihad, they are no longer a source of our derisive amusement.
Posted by: Assess Muslims || 02/28/2006 19:02 Comments || Top||

#7  Let's hope they put pushed-up noses and little curly tails on each one. Imagine the seething!
Posted by: Jackal || 02/28/2006 20:18 Comments || Top||

#8  This is GW's way of trying to make his trip to India more interesting. I'm sure India's PM will want to discuss this.
Posted by: DMFD || 02/28/2006 23:04 Comments || Top||


Arabia
UAE Poll: Friend Or Foe?
Posted by: ed || 02/28/2006 15:30 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Surprise meter?
Posted by: gromgoru || 02/28/2006 15:39 Comments || Top||

#2  -- Asked to identify their "most admired" world leaders, 18% of UAE citizens chose Osama bin Laden. "No one" finished first with 22%.

-- When asked how they viewed themselves, only 19% said they identified first and foremost as citizens of the United Arab Emirates, while 66% said they saw themselves as "Muslims" first.


"Muslims first". Someone try and tell me that Islamic loyalty doesn't override the deepest of political or contractual commitments. Toss in admiration for Osama bin Laden, even at a mere 18%, and this is a recipe for disaster.

Now, add on the lack of requirement for UAE to keep a full set of books stateside. I can see it now:

"We don't know how that shipping container with the nuclear weapon got into port."

"Um ... no, our off-loading books don't show exactly who trans-shipped it or its point of origin. That information is back at the main office."

"Gee ... we'd love to help you trace it, but there's been a fire at the main office back in Abu Dhabi, so we don't think we'll ever be able to find out."

Think it won't happen?

Posted by: Zenster || 02/28/2006 21:13 Comments || Top||

#3  From PowerLine:

Jayson Ahern, Assistant Commissioner for Customs and Border Protection:

AHERN: Sure, I think a couple of things. First in the last couple of weeks with the Dubai Ports World transaction here in the United States, one of the things I've seen consistently misrepresented is that this foreign company was going to come in and take over ports and port security. First off, that's not true. Port authorities are still run by state and local and county governments consistent with standards set forth by the United States Coast Guard, and also the companies that would be involved with this transaction are actually purchasing another foreign company that actually runs or leases a terminal within that port. So I think that's one of the first distinctions is making sure that the public understands this is not a foreign company coming in and taking over the United States' ports or running a port or setting security standards. They're merely coming in to lease a terminal within that port, which is just one of the facilities that operates within a port.

It's so simple, even a fucking child can understand it.

Demagoguery is unbecoming.
Posted by: .com || 02/28/2006 21:38 Comments || Top||

#4 
Zenster, you are preaching to deaf ears and closed minds! Their argument is that the UAE won't be handling security.

THat isn't the issue for me. They, the UAE, does deserve the port management contract.

Posted by: Vinkat Bala Subrumanian || 02/28/2006 21:50 Comments || Top||

#5  Interesting take from John Podhoretz...

AFTER THE PORT FIGHT: WIN FOR THE PHONIES

Login: 123456@gmail.com / 123456

Will there ever come a time when the company seeking American clearance to assume management of several major U.S. ports actually achieves its aim? After last week's political firestorm surrounding the company, which is called Dubai Ports World and is owned by the government of that Persian Gulf emirate, its directors clearly took the advice of the Bush administration and decided to institute a cooling-off period. It requested an additional 45-day review of the deal, clearly hoping that by late April, the whole business will be forgotten.
Over the past couple of days, reasonable pundits on both sides of the political spectrum have explained patiently that this is all a misunderstanding. Port security will not be damaged by the fact that a company owned by an Arab nation will be managing the flow of shipping goods in and out of New York and other cities. In fact, they have said convincingly, this is precisely the sort of deal we should be making with friendly Arab countries to reward their positive actions in the War on Terror.

That's all very nice. But does it matter?

No.

In the film version of "Breakfast at Tiffany's," someone says of the movie's heroine, "She's a phony. But she's a real phony. She honestly believes all this phony junk she believes in."

The issue of the ports is probably a phony, just like the Wise Men are saying. But if it's a phony issue, it's a "real phony." The overwhelming majority of Americans who oppose the deal honestly believe it's wrong, and they won't be talked out of it so quickly.

It is true that the American people aren't really the best judges of international contracts and the language in them. But they are the judges of American politicians, and when an issue emerges from the shadows of Official Washington and the people weigh in, the politicians begin to shake at the knees. As politicians should.



Now, whether Sen. Chuck Schumer and Gov. Jon Corzine and others who have so relentlessly stoked the anti-deal fires are "real phonies" or just plain phony phonies is an issue best left for posterity to decide.

Hold on — posterity just called me, and began ranting about how they are just "phony phonies," so I guess we won't have to wait for our answer.

Schumer and others simply and transparently invented, stoked and exploited this issue, and did so masterfully. Their behavior may be contemptible, especially if it has damaged America's capacity to make common cause with moderate Muslim states. But you can't help admiring their political skills.

They've done so well with it — in fact, it's the first national-security issue Democrats have dominated since 9/11 — that there's little chance they're going to let it go just because, hey, it might be better for the country.

As far as they're concerned, it will be far better for the country if they take control of the House and Senate in November — so if our relations with Dubai have to be injured in pursuit of that cause, so be it.

It's unquestionably the case that if roles were reversed, Republicans on Capitol Hill would be doing exactly the same thing. Indeed, Republicans on Capitol Hill are trying to do exactly the same thing — they're me-tooing Schumer & Co. in an effort to limit the damage the issue might do to them.

What this means is simple: There will be no ports deal. The delay is perfectly timed to allow the Democrats to raise it all anew in a couple of months, and if necessary to go toe-to-toe with George W. Bush should he hold firm on his determination to veto any congressional attempt to block the port deal.

A couple of months from now is a couple of months closer to the election. They'll just ride a second wave, and unless polls shift dramatically, the president will remain all alone out there.

There will be no ports deal. The wise men are wrong. The "phony phonies" have convinced the "real phonies," and there's no going back.


That's just fucking sad. When the Truth is slain, we all lose. Fucking partisan assholes and toolfools. Which are you, Zenster? One of the assholes or just a fucking tool?
Posted by: .com || 02/28/2006 21:51 Comments || Top||

#6  Funny, VBS, a closed mind is precisely what I accuse you of having. Impervious to the facts and a steady Kool Aid IV drip. That's fucking sad, man. Same question to you, asshole or tool? Ain't no other choices, son.
Posted by: .com || 02/28/2006 21:55 Comments || Top||


India-Pakistan
Maoists blow up 50 tribals in India
In the worst ever attack by Maoists, at least 50 people were feared killed and over a hundred others injured in a landmine blast detonated by the Left extremists near Darbhagura village on Sukma Konta road of Dantewada district on Tuesday morning.

The attack took place more than 500 km from Chhattisgarh's capital, Raipur, on the State's border with Andhra Pradesh.

Chief Minister Raman Singh said one vehicle was blown up in the blast while the Maoists opened fire on a bus and truck in which people were returning after attending a salwa judum (peace march) meeting in Dornapal.

He said though the toll was likely to go up, till Tuesday afternoon there was information about the death of 25 people. He said 38 people were injured.

Unconfirmed reports, however, said more than 50 people were killed. About 15,000 people are said to have attended the salwa judum meeting.

While a military helicopter was called in to evacuate the injured to Bhadrachalam in Andhra Pradesh, additional security forces, along with commandos, were sent to the spot.

"Our first priority is to evacuate the people and provide medical assistance," Mr Raman Singh said before leaving for the spot along with Home Minister Ram Vichar Netam and DGP RP Rathod.

The Chief Minister said he had earlier pointed out that people should go on foot and cycle in the Maoist-infested areas. "Such incidents are due to carelessness," he added.

Asked if it was a setback to the ongoing salwa judum, Mr Singh said that the march against Left extremism would not be stopped. However, he added that the strategy would be reviewed in view of the latest incident. The issue was raised in the ongoing Assembly session. A statement about the incident was given by Parliamentary Affairs Minister Ajay Chandrakar. After paying condolence to the deceased, the Assembly was adjourned till Wednesday.

Interestingly, Congress seemed to be divided over the issue of salwa judum. While Leader of Opposition Mahendra Karma, who is known as the hero of salwa judum, described the incident as an act of desperation, former Chief Minister and senior Congress leader Ajit Jogi held the State Government responsible for the violence. He alleged that the tribals were being used as security cover in the name of salwa judum by the Government and police. He said the salwa judum in its present form was not correct and that before going ahead with the meeting, proper protection to the people should be ensured.

Meanwhile, Mr Singh, after visiting the spot, denied reports of kidnapping by the Maoists. He said that the Maoists were resorting to violence because the people had challenged them.

Besides, the Government is taking all possible measures against them. "Maoists are reacting here because they are being challenged by the people and the Government is taking action," Mr Singh told The Pioneer over telephone. "How can the problem be solved if only Chhattisgarh takes action against the Maoists and other affected States remain reluctant?" he asked. The problem can be solved if all affected States adopt a joint action plan against the Maoists, he added.

An ex-gratia of Rs 2 lakh to the next-of-kin of the deceased has been announced.

Posted by: john || 02/28/2006 14:41 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  You don't challenge Commies - you appease them and make unilateral concessions, like one does for any rampaging horde, warlord, bandit-slavers, etal. OOOOOOOOOOOOPPPPPPPPPPSSSSSSS, NOT a HORDE or MAFIA or TRIAD, but "COUNCIL" or "LEADERSHIP GROUP"!?
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 02/28/2006 21:09 Comments || Top||


Arabia
Saudis Say Kingdom's al-Qaida Leader Slain
RIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AP) -- The leader of al-Qaida in Saudi Arabia and two men who helped attack the world's largest oil-processing complex were among five militants killed during police raids in the capital, authorities said Tuesday. The announcement was the first acknowledgment by Saudi authorities that some attackers had escaped after Friday's attack on the Abqaiq facility, which processes about two-thirds of the country's oil for export.

Fahd Faraaj al-Juwair, the kingdom's most-wanted terror suspect, and two militants who attacked the Abqaiq facility, died in a Monday shootout, the Interior Ministry said in a statement carried by the official Saudi Press Agency. Two other militants also were killed. Saudi authorities said al-Juwair and slain militants Ibrahim Abdullah Ibrahim al-Mutair and Abdullah Muhia Shlash al-Sulaiti al-Shamari were on the kingdom's list of most-wanted terrorists issued in June. The fourth slain militant was identified as Saudi Jaffal Rafea al-Shamari, whose identity has not previously been made public. Authorities said they are still trying to identify a fifth militant killed in what they called a "fierce" but brief gunbattle in eastern Riyadh. All were sought in connection with the attack, but the authorities did not say which of the five men participated.

Al-Juwair, who was in his mid-30s, was the latest in a long line of leader of al-Qaida in Saudi Arabia and a longtime extremist whose two brothers were killed in clashes with Saudi forces in 2004, authorities said. Saudi officials said a sixth wanted militant was arrested at an undisclosed location in the same part of Riyadh. His name was not made public Tuesday. Police said they found 11 AK-47 rifles, ammunition, hand grenades, pipe bombs, rocket-propelled grenades and $53,000 in Saudi currency at the scene of the shootout. Two cars also were found at the scene. One had been used in the Abqaiq attack, the first-ever strike on Saudi Arabia's vital oil infrastructure. The Saudi branch of al-Qaida claimed responsibility for the attack, which killed two suicide car bombers identified by the Interior Ministry on Sunday as Abdullah Abdul-Aziz al-Tweijri and Mohammed Saleh al-Gheith. Both also were on the most-wanted list.
Posted by: Anonymous || 02/28/2006 13:58 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


Britain
Imam's son embraces rap
Posted by: BrerRabbit || 02/28/2006 13:44 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Wishing the young, aspiring IMAM Jr. much continued success and a career that will parallel those of Tupac Shakur and B.I.G.
Posted by: Visitor || 02/28/2006 15:02 Comments || Top||

#2  In one of his songs, The Sun said, Mostafa raps: "I was born to be a soldier/Kalashnikov in my shoulder/peace to Hamasa and Hezbollah/that's the way of the lord Allah ... we're jihad through/defend my religion with the holy sword".

Well what're ya waiting for, kid? I hear there's lot's of openings. Or are you just full of shit?
My bet is option 2...
Posted by: tu3031 || 02/28/2006 15:16 Comments || Top||


Muslims who want sharia law 'should leave'
Muslims who wish to live under a system of sharia law should leave Britain, the chairman of the Commission for Racial Equality suggested yesterday. Speaking in the wake of demonstrations against Danish cartoons depicting the prophet Muhammad, Sir Trevor Phillips said those living in the UK had to accept that British values include a commitment to freedom of speech, even if that means offending people.

"What some minorities have to accept is that there are certain central things we all agree about, which are about the way we treat each other - that we have an attachment to democracy, that we sort things out by voting not by violence and intimidation, that we tolerate things that we don't like," he told ITV1's Jonathan Dimbleby programme. "Short of people menacing and threatening each other, we have freedom of expression. We allow people to offend each other."

Sir Trevor - who stirred controversy with his attacks on multi-culturalism and calls on ethnic minorities to integrate - said a consequence of freedom of speech was that non-Muslims must accept imams' right to denounce homosexuality. He rejected the idea that British Muslims should be allowed to live under sharia law in their communities. "I don't think that's conceivable," he said. "We have one set of laws ... and that's the end of the story. If you want to have laws decided in another way, you have to live somewhere else." Sir Trevor said he wanted to promote a sense of "Britishness" in the UK. "One point of Britishness is that people can say what they like about the way we should live, however absurd, however unpopular it is," he said.
Poll: 40% of Muslims want sharia law in UK
Posted by: ed || 02/28/2006 13:23 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  When I read this yesterday I thought I caught a glimpse of a shoe in mid fall. Then I realised I was thinking a socialist nanny state might actually wake up a do something. Then I realised I was possibly wrong. Sir Trevor will be punished for saying this instead of appreciated.
Posted by: SPoD || 02/28/2006 14:39 Comments || Top||

#2  You are probably right, SPOD, but I'm not so sure anymore. I think that there is and always has been a limit to western tolerance. I think we've reached it.

Calling oneself a liberal is becoming synonymous with calling onself a loon these days. I don't think we are going to see credible leaders pulling Galloways or Livingstons and getting away with it anymore.
Posted by: 2b || 02/28/2006 15:15 Comments || Top||

#3  I suspect that would be an insult to the Loon.
Posted by: Visitor || 02/28/2006 15:21 Comments || Top||

#4  UMM 40% OF MUSLIMS IN THE UK SHOULD BE DEPORTED.
But this statement from Phillips is the most rational to come out of Britain in awhile. The statement to all European muslims should be: "If you are not pleased with our western style life and the freedoms it affords you, by all means we will be more than happy to find you a way to get back to your native land in Iran, Sudan, Algeria, etc."
Posted by: bgrebel || 02/28/2006 15:57 Comments || Top||

#5  Dont just tell them they can leave, the minute they get caught jaywalking, if its a crime, pack their asses to the airport and ship them back. Let them go where they will be happier.....and poorer and deader...
Posted by: Live to Ride || 02/28/2006 17:46 Comments || Top||

#6  State within a State, Gummermint within a Gummermint - iff the Clinton-led Demolefties are firing on tiny little Fort Sumter, the Muslims in Britain are firing on HMS Victory [and NOT even at Suez = Battle of the Nile}???
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 02/28/2006 21:54 Comments || Top||


Iraq
Sad News from Iraq
From a US Army Captain/Blogger wounded in Iraq:

I've often felt (both prior to deploying and since getting hurt) that I just don't give a damn about Iraq--they should all just be lined up and shot. Regardless of all the good things we did, and are doing; regardless of the good iraqis I met and worked with; regardless of how much I, and for the most part, all service members feel about what we're doing.

And then I get to thinking about the friends I made, the people that I worked with. The fine men whose lives were affected by the simple act of going to work--most of the soldiers in the Iraqi Army have to hide their identities from their friends and neighbors to protect their families from retribution. The kind of cowards we were fighting had no problems killing the wives and children of these soldier who were simply trying to make Iraq a better place to live. How many of us would be willing to risk the lives of our families for something like that? We all like to say we would, but until you're put in that position, you just never know.

Major Kareem, my counterpart, the guy who looked just like Eugene Levy, was just such a man. His house (where his family, brothers and their family, parents, and nieces and nephews all llived) was frequently the target of these attacks. They would not be scared off, and he just worked harder to try and give them a more secure home. Frequently, he would stay at work for weeks on end, sleeping in his office, so that he couldn't be followed home. Major Kareem was the best of the best--He flat didn't care what tribe you belonged to, whether you were a sunni or a shia, or even if you were an Arab. If you were dirty, he was going after you. He took my getting wounded personally, and because of that, they caught the bastard who planted the IED the next day--after he and his boys dismantled the town where I got hit. I often had to reign him in during operations, because he was being too aggressive in his methods, and getting over-extended. But he always got the job done. We saw eye-to-eye on a lot of things, and he was my friend. He often would stop by the FOB with a basket of fruit from his orchard--oranges, pomegranate, grapes--whatever was in season. Not as a bribe, just as a gift from a gentleman farmer--all he ever wanted to be. I visited him in the US hospital in Balad (the same one I would be in months later) after he was injured in a truck bomb attack where he stood his ground with a pistol as insurgents attacked his headquarters. I even drove him home from the hospital in my truck--an act he asked for the honor of repaying once I returned to Iraq.

Because of his tenacity, character, and loyalty, I recommended him for command of the whole Iraqi battalion in our area of operations. He was eventually given the job, (we had to get rid of his politically connected, and utterly worthless, boss). MAJ Kareem was given the job, and recently promoted to Lieutenant Colonel. A few days ago he was killed by a suicide bomber in the Old Baqubah Market. I don't doubt that he was doing his job, looking for shitheads, being a warrior. I will miss him dearly.

Goodbye, Ra'ad (Major) Kareem.

--Chuck

I want to go back, right now, just to be with his family and his men. And to find and kill the sons of whores who planned and resourced this attack. And their families.
Posted by: Jeresing Ebboling5032 || 02/28/2006 13:12 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  I hope Lt. Col. Kareem is, at this moment, jeering the roasting shithead in hell who killed him, surrounded by the 72 adoring Houris plying him with wine and grapes...
Posted by: Ptah || 02/28/2006 15:18 Comments || Top||

#2  Ptah, I bet he's got better things to do than being adored by houris.
Posted by: twobyfour || 02/28/2006 17:05 Comments || Top||

#3  there are Iraqis who're above and beyond the leftist rabble we have living comfy and large in our very own nation. Major Kareem kicks ass - still - when his story is repeated.

thx JE
Posted by: Frank G || 02/28/2006 18:11 Comments || Top||

#4  Why, oh why, must such integrity and honor be so lacking just where it is needed so vitally? Rest in peace, Major Kareem. Iraq weeps for the want of you.
Posted by: Zenster || 02/28/2006 20:31 Comments || Top||

#5  I can't imagine such a man of action and integrity lying about for very long being fluttered over. The Major has no doubt already started reorganizing Paradise, applying what he learnt from his beloved American teachers. Those poor houris are no doubt learning to type and file even as we speak. ;-)

Chuck makes it sound like the Iraqi army is full of men like this. I hope so.
Posted by: trailing wife || 02/28/2006 21:05 Comments || Top||

#6  Chuck makes it sound like the Iraqi army is full of men like this. I hope so.
Posted by: trailing wife 2006-02-28 21:05


It is.
Posted by: N guard || 02/28/2006 22:41 Comments || Top||


Science & Technology
Really Bad Bird Flu News
A dead cat in Germany has found to be infected with the H5N1 bird flu virus. Tests are still ongoing to see whether the virus was the deadly variant which has led to sickness and fatalities among humans in Turkey and Asia. It said the cat was found at the weekend on an island off Germany's northern coast.

Meanwhile, the Government's Chief Scientific Adviser has predicted bird flu will definitely arrive in the UK and, when it does, it will remain for at least five years, Professor Sir David King said that avian flu poses no risks to consumers and added that he expects the disease to reach British shores in months, rather than days or weeks, due to migratory patterns.

And in a turnaround, he conceded vaccines may have to be used if the outbreak is widespread.

Meanwhile, Sweden said it has detected its first cases of an "aggressive form of bird flu" - though it was not yet confirmed as the deadly H5N1 strain - in two wild ducks.

Sir David said: "I would anticipate that avian flu will arrive at some point in the UK.

"We also have to anticipate that it will be here for five years plus. We are talking about the possibility of this disease being endemic here in the UK as it did in China. It is a long-term factor."

"The Chinese have adopted the position of mass vaccination, and if it became so widespread here we might have to go down that route even with the vaccination not being very good," he said.

Yesterday, he said the existing H5N1 inoculation would mask signs of the virus in birds but not prevent its spread.

Rare breeds of birds kept in zoos would be the only cases where vaccines would be feasible. The inoculation of organic or free range birds would not be recommended.

Sir David said the UK was currently monitoring the development in China of a new vaccine against the H5N1 strain of avian flu.

Commercial poultry owners who keep 50 birds or more have until today to register their flocks on Defra's new national poultry register.

Keepers with fewer than 50 birds are not required to register at present but may do so voluntarily after today if they wish.
The US has an estimated 60 million domesticated and 60 million feral cats. This makes them an extraordinarily dangerous animal vector, far worse than birds.
Posted by: Anonymoose || 02/28/2006 12:19 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Okay, you're on an island off the coast and looking for signs of bird flu. You find a dead feral cat. Do you test it for the H5N1 bird flu virus? There's something strange about this report.
Posted by: Darrell || 02/28/2006 13:42 Comments || Top||

#2  So do we call it Cat Flu now?
Posted by: BH || 02/28/2006 13:52 Comments || Top||

#3  Cat Scratch Fever
Posted by: Deacon Blues || 02/28/2006 14:07 Comments || Top||

#4  Nothing strange about it at all. What do you think feral cats eat?
Posted by: Phil || 02/28/2006 15:50 Comments || Top||

#5  Okay, avian flu in cats. It turns out that this is not an isolated incident -- see this recent story regarding cats in Thailand.

Excerpt:
"Several studies have shown that a small number of mammalian species, including pigs, seals, whales, mink, and ferrets, are susceptible to natural infection with influenza viruses that are purely avian in their genetic make-up. Of these species, only the pig has significance for human health. Pigs can be co-infected with both avian and human influenza viruses and can thus serve as the “mixing vessel” for the mingling of genetic material, possibly resulting in the emergence of a new influenza virus subtype."

I conclude that this cats news is NOT "Really Bad Bird Flu News" as headlined.
Posted by: Darrell || 02/28/2006 16:59 Comments || Top||

#6  Darrell: Domestic and feral cats are seen as a primary predator for small wild birds, and as such are high on the watch list. (Ironically, #1 on the list is ferrets, because their immune system is very close to humans. Finding a bunch of diseased and dead ferrets is "blue panic" time.)

Cats, however, are not that close to people as far as immune system goes, which is almost as bad. That means that the spectrum of animals affected by the avian flu could be very large.

Two other biggies are dogs, again because of their numbers and proximity to people; and horses, because of their closeness to humans with their immune system.

Finally you have pigs, ducks and geese, which are the worst of both worlds: close to humans in proximity, and in immune system, *and* numerous.

I can see why the medicos are lighting fires under politicians around the world. Can't say that we weren't warned.
Posted by: Anonymoose || 02/28/2006 17:11 Comments || Top||

#7  And yes, it is bad. The primary fear from animals is not that they would contribute to mutations. It is that they are "vectors" of the disease, catching it from and giving it to humans.

This being said, the US has 120 million feral and domestic cats eating infected dead birds, giving the disease to each other, and sharing it with their human owners. Even if dogs can't catch the disease, this provides an "end-around" for any quarantine that we might set up for people, *and* creates a lasting repository for the illness outside of human controls.

That is bad.
Posted by: Anonymoose || 02/28/2006 17:17 Comments || Top||

#8  A 'bird flu' pandemic requires the virus achieves sustained transmission in humans precisely once. That is the pandemic will result from a single animal/bird to human transmission. That transmission will almost certainly result from domestic chickens somewhere chickens and humans are in frequent close proximity.

The spread of 'bird flu' into the West and into domestic pets is irrelevant to the genesis of the pandemic.
Posted by: phil_b || 02/28/2006 18:30 Comments || Top||

#9  This could easily be worse than the looming Peak Oil crisis or global warming. Especially for Prissy.
Posted by: 6 || 02/28/2006 18:51 Comments || Top||

#10  moose - it's always a DISASTER LOOMING! for you. I agree we need to watch it, but keep perspective dude
Posted by: Frank G || 02/28/2006 18:57 Comments || Top||

#11  "That transmission will almost certainly result from domestic chickens somewhere chickens and humans are in frequent close proximity."
phil_b, you clearly either didn't read or didn't understand the article I linked. The mutation required is extremely unlikely to occur in chickens.
Posted by: Darrell || 02/28/2006 19:28 Comments || Top||

#12  WE'RE ALL GOING TO DIE!
---What do we do now?
Posted by: Thrinetch Tholumble7024 || 02/28/2006 19:44 Comments || Top||

#13  "So Foxy Loxy led Chicken Little, Henny Penny, Ducky Lucky, Goosey Loosey, and Turkey Lurkey across a field and through the woods. He led them straight to his den, and they never saw the king to tell him that the sky is falling."
Posted by: Darrell || 02/28/2006 20:15 Comments || Top||

#14  My point is not the disease genesis. It is its spread. Once it happens there are three big factors: what animals carry the disease; what are the inter-species transmissions; and the virulences.

Say for example, only bird-to-cat happens. This means that a lot of birds die, and some cats die from eating birds. But if cat-to-cat happens in addition to bird-to-cat, then a LOT more cats die. But this alone doesn't effect people much at all.

However, we know that bird-to-human happens, which means that birds and some people die. If human-to-human happens in addition to bird-to-human it is a LOT worse for humans.

Now consider other animal vectors. If you also have cat-to-human, dog-to-human, etc., along with bird-to-human and human-to-human, the number of human fatalities jump.

The disease may not be equally dangerous in different species. It could be deadly in humans but cats, dogs or some kinds of birds might be able to carry the disease for months without dying or even getting seriously ill.

Normally, a flu progresses in two waves (why exactly is unknown), because it is usually limited to human-to-human only. But when you introduce an animal vector, the progression gets a lot less predictable. A two-year long epidemic? More?

Typically, the two main animal vectors are ducks and pigs, which is why most new flus happen in the Orient. They initially jump from ducks and pigs to people, but from there, they spread h2h only because there are far fewer animals to act as vectors in the rest of the world.

But cats and dogs are everywhere, not just on the farm. The immune system of cats is not like humans at all, and for them to catch the same flu that people can catch means that it is very capable, as diseases go, not just among birds, but among mammals as well.
Posted by: Anonymoose || 02/28/2006 20:30 Comments || Top||

#15  Wow, real thing against cats!

Vector spread is most likely fowl to human. That the cat might be infected will be well behind you. The jump will be from fowl and then the human to human infection will carry from there.

No cats really needed. Please don't start slaughtering them now.
Posted by: Hupomoger Clans9827 || 02/28/2006 20:57 Comments || Top||

#16 
Posted by: .com || 02/28/2006 20:59 Comments || Top||

#17  I knew there'd be something interesting from dot com.

Remember, the more deadly the faster it dies out. Don't ask me to explain it; think Ebola versus the common cold. Bird flu spreads quickly among avians because it does NOT kill them!

I read it in Scientific American.

I think.
Posted by: Bobby || 02/28/2006 21:50 Comments || Top||

#18  The ticker's the best part of that one, IMHO.
Posted by: .com || 02/28/2006 21:53 Comments || Top||

#19  PLANET OF THE APES? - see REVENGE OF.
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 02/28/2006 22:08 Comments || Top||

#20  The problem with "new" diseases is that they start extra deadly, then have a typical curve to less deadly forms. However, that curve can be vicious. It can be drastic or very gradual.

For example, in the first introduced rabbit epidemic in Australia, well over 90% of the rabbits in the country died in the first season. An additional 4% or so in the second season. It was only after that, that the curve "kicked in", the rabbits becoming universally immune to the disease.

AIDS also has a curve, but while its curve is taking decades for the disease to decline in virulence, it is still rapid for its class, and also variable by geography and other factors.

Now, influenza is far from being as deadly as the rabbit plague, and people have all sorts of ways to limit its spread and human casualties. But it is terribly flexible in finding ways around natural and artificial limitations.

I am personally very aware of this, having had an interest in the subject of epidemics in general and killer flus in particular since the 1980s. I have interviewed survivors of the Spanish flu epidemic, and was really taken aback by the murderous nature of the thing.

When I mention this, the first response is usually that we know so much more today. However, while that is true as to the mechanisms of the flu, our biggest advance is in public health awareness. That is, personal hygiene and sanitation are our biggest advances.

The medical community was very aware of what we would call sanitary procedures back then, disinfectants and the like, but it still seemed that the disease was everywhere, and just wouldn't go away. The people of the time were far more familiar with epidemics of all sorts than we are today, and so actually were better prepared in that way.

Many of the better homes had isolation rooms for sick family members, and every doctor had available quarantine signs, and would post them quickly when there was an outbreak. People knew that if you couldn't resist pawing over your bereaved dead family member, you would probably be next.

So what am I talking about in practical terms?

In the US on average, a "normal" flu will kill from 30-50,000 people each year. That is typical. So what will a killer flu do? anywhere from 250k to perhaps half a million. That is pretty horrific, but represents only 1/600th of the US population.

If everything is worst case scenario for the killer flu, we could lose as many as 2-5 million people. Maximum 1/60th of the population, at a very liberal estimate.
Posted by: Anonymoose || 02/28/2006 23:04 Comments || Top||


Europe
We should fear Holland’s silence
Islamists are stifling debate in what was Europe’s freest country, says Douglas Murray.
Via Instapundit
Posted by: ed || 02/28/2006 11:47 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  And so it grows. Tell me again about the tipping point?
Posted by: Hupomoger Clans9827 || 02/28/2006 21:18 Comments || Top||

#2  not the “liberalism” that is actually libertarianism, but the liberalism that is freedom. Not least freedom of expression.

Is there a time that there was such a thing? Oh yeah, prior to 1950, I've heard that liberals were actually about liberty instead of speech codes, dysfunction, victimization, blame and making a government act as our nanny.
Posted by: 2b || 02/28/2006 23:55 Comments || Top||


Britain
Galloway: MoToons "worse than the 11 September attacks in the US and the 7/7 incidents"
George Galloway has given a nice interview to El Khabar newspaper in Algeria. There is an English language extract from it here, but BBC Monitoring has produced a full translation of the article, which I've reproduced below. If you can't be bothered to read all of it, here are the choice passages.

The MoToons:

Halimi: Mr Galloway! Let us deal with the core of the issue immediately. What is your personal position and that of your party towards the events and the demonstrations which have been taking place in the Muslim world against the publication of cartoons depicting the prophet?
...
Galloway: Personally, I condemn these barbaric and evil acts. Today, the objective of the Western states is to control the oil of the Muslims whatever the price. In fact, the cartoons published in Denmark did not surprise me because the Western states have been waging fierce attacks against Islam for years. These began by humiliation, insults and then occupation. Today they reached the point of ridiculing the prophet. This incident is worse than the 11 September attacks in the US and the 7/7 incidents in London. Therefore, today it is the right of Muslims to express their anger and to defend their right and faith.

The future of RESPECT:

Halimi: Is it possible to tell us how the Respect party will perform in the next elections?

Galloway: [smiles and says in Arabic] Praise be to God. [Then in English] Our party will be very strong in these elections. The proof is the fact that I am an MP. In the near future, Respect will become one of the strongest political parties in Britain.

On his personal faith:

Halimi: Many people are wondering where you derive this strength with which you speak and defy the powerful. Is there a secret power behind you?

Galloway: [in Arabic] This strength comes from God.

Halimi: You constantly use nice Arabic words, in addition to your relations with Arabs and Muslims. Does that mean that you have converted to Islam but you cannot admit that publicly?

Galloway: [shaking his head] This issue is between me and God. This answer is directed at you, the Algerian journalist, and at everyone who asks me this question.

There is loads more larf-a-minute stuff in this vein from the Hero of 1.2 Billion Muslims in the full post.
Posted by: tipper || 02/28/2006 10:37 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  So Galloway's out-and-out "reverted", then?
Posted by: Robert Crawford || 02/28/2006 10:49 Comments || Top||

#2  "reverted"?
No. Once a traitor, always a traitor.
Posted by: ed || 02/28/2006 10:52 Comments || Top||

#3  Relatives of 911 victims should sue him for damages.

Posted by: 3dc || 02/28/2006 11:02 Comments || Top||

#4  Him being such a weasely little arab *ss-kisser would be actually just a little bit more "forgiveable" if he's doing it because he's part of the Master Religion(tm), rather than doing it because he's been bought.

Of course, one reason doesn't necessary excludes the others, in fact I'm sure he's both a Moderate Muslim (hasn't he married a Yasser relative? If so, he's obligatory a muslim, an unbeliever HAS to convert in such a situation) and a greedy scumbag.

Btw the 9/11-cartoons analogy was also made by Javier "Eurabia" Solana too.
Posted by: anonymous5089 || 02/28/2006 11:04 Comments || Top||

#5  "the publication of cartoons depicting the prophet . . . = 'barbaric and evil acts' "

Equating CARTOONS and SATIRE with barbaric and evil acts is completely insane.

"This incident is worse than the 11 September attacks in the US and the 7/7 incidents in London . . . "

So, publishing cartoons is worse than killing thousands. This is the Moslem mindset and it is also the biggest PR campaign I've ever witnessed.

Note: "the Western states have been waging fierce attacks against Islam for years." (huh? what?) "These began by humiliation" (how's that?) "insults" (what kind?) "and then occupation" (whatever)" and "it is the right of Muslims to express their anger and to defend their right and faith."

Seems to me that these guys want to gain power to control the oil money themselves, so they can be the fat cats. They know that hundreds of thousands of Moslem men (and women) have NOTHING TO DO in their ratty-ass countries, so they are attempting to mobilize the masses, put themselves in power, and get in on the good life, Arab-style.

Really, they shouldn't be underestimated, since they are in following Hitler's footsteps: tell lies and tell them long enough and enough people will believe you to get the job done. In this case, I think the "job" is the subjugation of the world to Islam, or at least subjugate the world to the masses who will do it for them, so they can be about the business of garnering funding for themselves. And I do believe they are dead serious about it.


Hope everyone is shopping Danish products.
Posted by: ex-lib || 02/28/2006 11:12 Comments || Top||

#6  They obviously hate being laughed at.

Har-de-har-har...
Posted by: mojo || 02/28/2006 11:42 Comments || Top||

#7  The next Islamist atrocity needs to be laid squarely at Galloway's feet. This maggot has gone beyond appeaser to flat-out facilitator. He needs to be left alone in a room full of 9-11 survivors and victim families for a few hours of parking lot therapy. His oxygen consumption permit has expired.
Posted by: Zenster || 02/28/2006 11:44 Comments || Top||

#8  Halimi: Mr. Galloway, do you have any plans to do your self-abasing cat imitation from Big Brother in public again?

Galloway: Meow . . . meow . . . meow-meow.
Posted by: Mike || 02/28/2006 12:26 Comments || Top||

#9  "Tragedy is when I cut my finger. Comedy is when you fall into an open sewer and die."
- Mel Brooks
Posted by: BH || 02/28/2006 13:00 Comments || Top||


#11  Can we please, oh pretty please, have the infamous pic of him in the red leotard, next to the cross-dresser in a blue leotard? It would just add so much to our appreciation of this story, and of Mr. Galloways' many notable qualities, none of which are notable in a good way.
Posted by: Sgt. Mom || 02/28/2006 13:52 Comments || Top||

#12  Look at these photos of Galloway and then tell me you can take anything he says seriously ever again.
Posted by: Mike || 02/28/2006 14:06 Comments || Top||

#13  He needs to be left alone in a room full of 9-11 survivors and victim families for a few hours of parking lot therapy

Zenster, maybe he needs to be dropped off on the outskirts of Quetta. Drunk and singing at the top of his lungs. Nothing but 2 bottles of whiskey, a copy of Playboy and framed laminated enlargments of "the cartoons" - all 15 of 'em. Grab the women for slobbery kisses, cause he's, like ya know, one with them.

Wearing nothing but the catsuit.

Let's see how that goes?
Posted by: Hupomoger Clans9827 || 02/28/2006 19:28 Comments || Top||

#14  Let's see how that goes?

HC, I like the way you think. One slight difference though ... I'd have him tattooed with the cartoons so they can gently skin remove them from his unanesthetized body.
Posted by: Zenster || 02/28/2006 19:38 Comments || Top||

#15  oooh! squeal of delight Absolute Squeal!
Posted by: Hupomoger Clans9827 || 02/28/2006 19:57 Comments || Top||

#16  He is right from an Arab point of view the Sept 11 attacks and 7/7 incident could be written off by the west as a few crazy bastards. The MoToons however showed that most of Islamic society is ill, and thus the exposure was far worse.
Posted by: rjschwarz || 02/28/2006 20:05 Comments || Top||


India-Pakistan
Meet the most hated man in Pakistan
February proved that US President George W Bush is the most hated man in Pakistan.

Thousands of Pakistanis descended on the roads of Lahore, Islamabad, Peshawar, Karachi and other cities to protest the publication of blasphemous caricatures of their Holy Prophet Mohammed by a newspaper in Denmark.

Significantly, the protesters raised more slogans against Bush than against Denmark, indicating that many Pakistanis believe Bush is a crusader who refused to apologise for the desecration of the Holy Quran at the Guantanamo Bay and Kandahar prisons by American soldiers in the summer of 2005.

Many observers in Islamabad were surprised when a few thousand students of English medium schools and colleges attacked the heavily guarded diplomatic enclave in front of the ministry of foreign affairs. Young boys did not pelt stones at the Indian high commission, but they damaged the embassy of Egypt, an Islamic country.

Why? Because they believe Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak is a ruthless dictator, and that Bush is protecting dictators all over the Muslim world.

The anti-Bush slogans raised by the new generation of moderate Pakistanis in the federal capital is a matter of great concern for many Western diplomats.

Cricket legend Imran Khan, who initially stayed aloof from the anti-caricature rallies which began in the second week of February, now plans to lead a big anti-Bush rally from Rawalpindi to Islamabad on March 3, the day President Bush is expected to arrive in Pakistan.

When Jamaat-e-Islami chief Qazi Hussein Ahmad offered to join his rally, Imran replied: 'Please stay away from me. I am going to march against Bush with boys in jeans and beautiful girls without headscarves. I will prove that not only Mullahs but majority of liberal Pakistanis thinks that Bush is the biggest terrorist on earth who killed thousands of innocent people from Iraq to Afghanistan and now he is planning to invade Iran in the name of war against terror.'

Another question doing the rounds in Islamabad is why Bush took the risk to say that 'America supports a solution that is acceptable to Indians, Pakistani as well as the citizens of Kashmir.'

Many Pakistani officials are very happy about the statement, thinking that Bush, aware of the burning hatred against him in the minds and hearts of common Pakistanis, is trying to make amends by issuing the most supportive statement of Pakistan's position on Kashmir ever made by any American president.

But some analysts think that by using the words 'citizens of Kashmir,' Bush actually supported the idea of Independent Kashmir, which is not acceptable to either India or Pakistan.

It is also believed by many in Pakistan that Bush is using the Kashmir card to achieve some of his own objectives.

On one side he is giving an impression that the 'citizens of Kashmir' are not citizens of India. On the other hand he told Doordarshan in an interview 'on my trip to Pakistan, I will, of course, talk about the terrorist activities, the need to dismantle terrorist training camps and to protect innocent life.'

Is he trying to blackmail both India and Pakistan? What could be his objective behind using the Kashmir card?

Bush wants India to sign a nuclear deal on the terms and conditions laid down by Washington. Many security experts in Pakistan are 'happy,' believing that Washington is trying to penetrate India's nuclear weapons programme.

But some experts in Islamabad expressed fear that after conquering the Indian nuclear installations, America would also like to track Pakistan's nuclear programme in the name of 'peaceful cooperation.'

Bush is also trying get Indian and Pakistani support for his adventure in Iran.

The removal of Mani Shankar Aiyar as India's petroleum minister led many Pakistanis to believe that the 'biggest democracy' in the world is now taking dictation from America.

Aiyar, like Pakistani Senator Mushahid Hussein, secretary general of the pro-Musharraf Pakistan Muslim League, is know to be anti-American. It is not a secret in Islamabad that a major group in the Pakistan Muslim League wants to remove Senator Hussein from the office of secretary general because of his criticism of America and the West. Both Aiyar and Hussein are also avid supporters of the proposed Iran-Pakistan-India gas pipeline project which is opposed by the Bush administration.

Why did Bush announce that he would bring up terrorist training camps with Musharraf?

Actually he is pressurizing Islamabad to do more against the Taliban and Al Qaeda. The visits of Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai and Commonwealth Secretary General Don MacKinnon to Islamabad a few days before Bush's arrival are seen as pressure tactics from Washington by many in Islamabad.

Karzai claimed in Islamabad that Al Qaeda does not exist in Afghanistan, while MacKinnon said Musharraf had to remove his military uniform by 2007. Most Pakistanis have no doubt that the Commonwealth will not raise any objection to Musharraf's uniform if Islamabad hands over a big Al Qaeda fish to Washington in coming weeks.

There is no denying America did a lot in the earthquake-affected areas of Pakistan after October 8. So why are most Pakistanis unwilling to trust America? Why do they still think that Bush is not sincere in solving the Kashmir dispute?

The answer is the current situation in Balochistan.

Pakistan helped America to dislodge the Taliban from Kabul in December 2001. Hamid Karzai was installed there as the new ruler, but he never protected Pakistani interests. There were at least two major attacks on the Pakistani embassy in Kabul after the fall of the Taliban. Now Pakistani officials openly complain that the recent terrorist activities in Balochistan are being organised and financed from Afghanistan, a country that is controlled by a pro-Washington administration.

Bush invaded Iraq in 2003 to destroy Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction, but has been unable to produce even a single such weapon from Iraq since then.

So how can he be trusted?

To establish his credibility in this part of the world, he needs to do a lot more. First, he must resolve the Palestine problem. He must accept the democratically elected government of Hamas in Palestine.

Only after that will he be in a position to speak on the issue of Kashmir.

Hamid Mir is Bureau Chief, Geo TV, Islamabad
Posted by: john || 02/28/2006 09:43 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [2 views] Top|| File under:

#1  So why is Bush giving billions of dollars to those who want to kill Americans? It was the Pakistani government who set up the Taliban, hosted Al Qaeda and the ISI head honcho who wired $100,000 to Mohammed Atta to fund the WTC and Pentagon/White House mass murders. Why isn't the American government explaining the depth of Pakistani involvement in the 9/11 atrocities, the depths of hatred Islam engenders and then systematically reducing Pakistan. Instead Bush gives them $40 billion and the first positive economic growth rate in years. In return, Americans get death threats and AQ and the Taliban get shelter. To those in charge in D.C., I say good job!
Posted by: ed || 02/28/2006 10:43 Comments || Top||

#2  "to protest the publication of blasphemous caricatures of their Holy Prophet Mohammed a few silly political cartoons by a newspaper in Denmark"

Hope everyone is shopping Danish products.
Posted by: ex-lib || 02/28/2006 10:57 Comments || Top||

#3  There is a group within the state department that believes that if Pakistan feels secure, it will assist more in the WoT.
Look carefully at the US military assitance.

26 Jetranger helicopters
40 Cobra helicopters
6 C-130E Refurbished Hercules
5 Aerostat radars
6 AN/TPS-77 radars plus Command & Control software
8 P-3C Refurbished & Upgraded Orions
6 Phalanx CIWS,
2,000 TOW missiles,
60 Harpoon missiles,
300 Sidewinder missiles,
Tactical Radios
100 155mm Howitzers
75 F-16s
etc


Each item is meant to address a weakness in the Pak defence and give it near parity with India.
They are meant to neutralize any overt Indian military advantage.

Tow missiles to destroy the Indian T-72 tank force, Harpoons to destroy Indian navy ships, 155mm artilery and weapon locating radar to respond to Indian gunners. Helicopters and transport aircraft to airlift commandos in case of war in Kashmir.

Does this strategy actually make sense?
Probably not, since whenever Pak has felt secure, it has attacked India. The Pak military doesn't expect to conquer India. They have a war fighting strategy where the fight lasts two weeks and they seize some Indian territory. Then the international community forces both countries to a ceasefire and Pak gets what it wants in negotiations because it holds parts of the Indian Punjab.

Sound weird? That is Pak military logic.

What this aid does is piss off India.

Today the Indian Finance Minister Chindabaram (a leftist dove) unveiled the Indian budget.
He raised the defence budget by 7 percent to twenty billion dollars, 42 percent of which is earmarked for new weapon purchases.

Posted by: john || 02/28/2006 11:03 Comments || Top||

#4  So much for goodwill from helping a nation with a major earthquake that would have killed thousands if we didn't help out.
Posted by: Penguin || 02/28/2006 11:17 Comments || Top||

#5  I think this calls for a big foam rubber #1 finger graphic.
Posted by: Xbalanke || 02/28/2006 11:39 Comments || Top||

#6  "On one side he is giving an impression that the 'citizens of Kashmir' are not citizens of India. On the other hand he told Doordarshan in an interview 'on my trip to Pakistan, I will, of course, talk about the terrorist activities, the need to dismantle terrorist training camps and to protect innocent life.'

Is he trying to blackmail both India and Pakistan? What could be his objective behind using the Kashmir card?"
This is a way to beat these idiot's. Say things that confuse them, they will think themselves to death.
Posted by: plainslow || 02/28/2006 11:44 Comments || Top||

#7  Pakistan under Musharraf is much, much, preferable to the alternative.
Posted by: gromky || 02/28/2006 12:31 Comments || Top||

#8  You're falling for the "Apres moi, le deluge" extortion strategy that Pakistan has used for decades.

The very first Pak PM, Liqiat Khan used this to pressure India into concessions.. after him was supposed to be the flood of bearded islamists.

This was fifty years ago!

And the Paks still use it, to great effect.

Debunking the Myth of Pakistan’s Islamist Threat

The fact is that religious political parties and militant organizations are manipulated by the Pakistani Army to achieve its own objectives, domestically and abroad. The army, not the Islamists, is the real source of insecurity on the subcontinent
Posted by: john || 02/28/2006 12:47 Comments || Top||

#9  After Perv is another General, after him is another.

There may be the facade of a civilian PM but the real power will be the army.

It takes most of the Pak budget, is above criticism, its veterer foundations control a sizeable chuk of the Pak economy and the Pak property market.

Pak is essentially a praetorian state.
The Pak army will slaughter everyone who presents a real challenge to their power.
They are ruthless.

To quote a former Pak Military dictator - Yahya Khan - "Kill three million of them and the rest will fall into line"

Posted by: john || 02/28/2006 12:52 Comments || Top||

#10  So, a MODERATE Pakistani is like Siegfrid and Roy having a FRIENDLY CUTE WHITE TIGER?
Posted by: 3dc || 02/28/2006 12:54 Comments || Top||

#11  The moderate Pakistani is like Yahya Khan or like Mohhamed Ali Jinnah.

Jinnah loved his bacon and his whisky but thratened the British with jihad.. the first time since 1857 mutiny that muslims had challenged the Raj.

Yahya loved his mistresses, and really loved his whiskey.

Whiskey driking, clean shaven officers are a dime a dozen in the Pak army.
They represent the Pak elite.

You need to understand which muslims backed the creation of Pakistan.

The Deobandi Ulema, the Jammaat-Islami-Hind etc did not back Pakistan. They called it the work of the devil.

The poor muslim Bengalis did. Many hoped to be free of Hindi landlords.
The Punjabi feudal class did. They were afraid of the land reform promised by Ghandi, Nehru and the Congress party. They didn't want to lose their serfs.
The muslim civil service did. They had special quotas under the British with various priviledges and did not want to lose them in an independent India.
The Pak feudal elite that man the civil service and officer corps of the army use islam to maintain their power over their co-religionists.


Posted by: john || 02/28/2006 13:11 Comments || Top||

#12  Which is not to say that they are not religious..

Many are. Islam is the defining part of the Pak identity.

What, then, was partition all about?
But to recap the usual factors held responsible for the founding of Pakistan, Islam was not in danger in pre-1947 India. Indeed, considering the sectarian violence and religious bigotry we face today, it was in better health then. Nor was democracy the issue because even if partition had not happened, India was getting democracy once the British left. The Indian Independence Act promised that.

So what was the compelling reason for the Muslims to insist on a separate homeland especially when there was no going around the uncomfortable fact that, no matter how generously the frontiers of the new state were drawn, an uncomfortably large number of Muslims would remain in India?

The purpose of Pakistan, transcending anything to do with safeguarding Islam or promoting democracy, was to create conditions for the Muslims of India, or those who found themselves in the new state, to recreate the days of their lost glory.

Posted by: john || 02/28/2006 13:16 Comments || Top||

#13  john, have you started on your book yet? Or is it already written? I'd gladly buy a dozen copies.
Posted by: Seafarious || 02/28/2006 13:26 Comments || Top||

#14  I think I spend far too much time reading Pak newspaper columns...

Posted by: john || 02/28/2006 13:35 Comments || Top||

#15  More evidence that there is no M³.
Looking for them is futile. They don't exist.
Posted by: SPoD || 02/28/2006 14:30 Comments || Top||

#16  Great, informative posts, John! This is why I love Rantburg: well-informed opinions that cut through diplomatic sugar-coating and confusing media-spin. Thank you for your contributions.
Posted by: ryuge || 02/28/2006 17:37 Comments || Top||

#17  Didn't Mushy launch the Kargill War (another humiliating Pak defeat) 6 months after the "Peace Summit" with India? He can be trusted as far as Bush could spit against a hurricane.
Posted by: Listen To Dogs || 02/28/2006 22:27 Comments || Top||


Pakistan: 5,000 children demand execution of 'blasphemers'
About 5,000 children chanting “Hang those who insulted the Prophet” rallied in Pakistan’s largest city today in the latest fiery protest in the Islamic nation against the publication of Prophet Mohammed cartoons.
KARACHI (Rantburg News Service): 5000 screaming children, toddlers and babies rioted in Karachi. The little brats chanted "Hang those who insulted the Profit," "More toys!", and "I don't wanna take a nap!" as they rallied outside a daycare center, the latest fiery protest in a nation that does little but protest things and kill people.
The children, aged 8 to 12, torched a coffin draped in US, Israeli and Danish flags at a traffic intersection in the port city of Karachi as police in riot gear looked on.
The children, aged 6 months to 12 years, set fire to a coffin draped in US, Israeli and Danish flags at a chowk, flung their diapers, and lay down on the streets, screaming and kicking their feet. Cries of "No more Fisher-Price!" and "Tonka rulez!" were heard from those old enough to talk.
The rally was organised by Jamaat-e-Islami, Pakistan’s largest Islamic group.
"We believe that for proper development children should be taught to riot early," said Liaqat Baloch, the JI second-in-command and organizer of the event.
Children, some wearing school uniforms and headbands emblazoned with “God is great,” were released from schools and Islamic seminaries to take part.
The children, some wearing school uniforms and headbands emblazoned with "Allahu Akbar [Holy Shit!]," carrying pictures of Barney, Evil Bert, and Osama bin Laden, were released from schools and madrassahs to take part in the festivities.
Meanwhile, opposition politician Liaqat Baloch, deputy secretary-general of the coalition, today welcomed the European Union’s first statement on the controversy. EU foreign ministers yesterday said they regretted the cartoons were “considered offensive” by Muslims around the world after first appearing in a Danish newspaper in September. But Baluch demanded that Denmark should also apologise.
Baloch, a prominent figure in opposition politix in Pakland, welcomed the European Union's first pitiful statements on the Mohammad cartoons controversy. European foreign ministers said they regretted the cartoons and requested that their cars not be bombed. But Baloch said the statements of regret were "too little, too late," and demanded that the foreign ministers present themselves in Karachi or Rawalpindi and grovel publicly.
Posted by: john || 02/28/2006 09:07 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  I'm sure theses kids will grow up to be stand up productive members of that productive pakistani society which has contributed so much to Humanity.
Posted by: anonymous5089 || 02/28/2006 10:10 Comments || Top||

#2  One, why are these kids playing with fire? Two, where were the adults? Three, whatever became of milk and nap time? And finally, will these kids end up like the Children's Crusade?
Posted by: Happy 88mm || 02/28/2006 10:16 Comments || Top||

#3  When children go rabid and start demanding hangings, you know your society has gone totally to crap.. real Lord of the Flies time...

Posted by: john || 02/28/2006 10:17 Comments || Top||

#4  I am OK with this. Since the worst cartoons were not the original Danish ones but the ones made by wahabists tthey should hang wahabi sympathisers (includes taliban) and burn wahabi or wahabi-like mosques and madrassas.
Posted by: JFM || 02/28/2006 10:26 Comments || Top||

#5  You've got to be taught
To hate and fear
You've got to be taught
From year to Year
It's got to be drummed
in your dear little ear
You've got to be carefully taught

You've got to be taught
To be Afraid
Of people whose eyes
are oddly made
And people whose skin
Is a different shade
You've got to be carefully taught

You've got to be taught
Before it's too late
Before you are 6 or 7 or 8
To hate all the people
your relatives hate
You've got to be carefully taught

"You've Got To Be Carefully Taught"
South Pacific
Posted by: Seafarious || 02/28/2006 10:26 Comments || Top||

#6  This perfectly exemplifies everything that is wrong with Islam. Children don't know from sh!t from a tree when it comes to politics or blasphemy. These little goons are nothing but marionettes and puppets. What we are seeing is merely a subroutine of the programming that eventually leads to adolescents strapping on a bomb vest and killing as many as they can find in one place. At the risk of sounding PC, this is a case of mass child abuse, which pretty much defines Islam to begin with.
Posted by: Zenster || 02/28/2006 11:17 Comments || Top||

#7  Every morning when I awaken, I first realize that the world is going nuts before my eyes. about one fifth of the world's population follow a religion which depends solely upon across the board brainwashing. One fifth of the world's population are taught not to think, not to prosper, not to expand their horrizons, not to participate in openness and friendship, but to use violence. One fifth of the world's population are taught to stab and decapitate anyone they deem as opposed to their otherwise pointless religion.
It's time to open the debate on what to do to eliminate Islam. The problem is far too big to ignore. Now they burn 3 flags. Next year, it'll be nine flags.
I want to wake up in a world of sanity before I die.
Posted by: wxjames || 02/28/2006 11:43 Comments || Top||

#8  Hope it's like our country. The kids always distance themselves from the parents when they grow up.
Posted by: plainslow || 02/28/2006 12:16 Comments || Top||

#9  Well..theres my "warm-n-fuzzy" for the day.
Posted by: DepotGuy || 02/28/2006 12:29 Comments || Top||

#10  see - early education works!
Posted by: Rob Reiner || 02/28/2006 12:36 Comments || Top||

#11  "How's the StinkDiaperTerribleTwos BratFestProtestMarathon going?"

"They're dropping like flies!"

"Groovy."
Posted by: .com || 02/28/2006 13:29 Comments || Top||

#12  Hope it's like our country. The kids always distance themselves from the parents when they grow up.

We have a culture that encourages that.

They don't.
Posted by: Robert Crawford || 02/28/2006 15:11 Comments || Top||

#13  You haven't seen a Paleo baby in a suicide vest, you haven't seen nada.
Posted by: gromgoru || 02/28/2006 15:29 Comments || Top||

#14  "Hope it's like our country. The kids always distance themselves from the parents when they grow up."

Alas, if that were the case we would have islamic skleletons in musuems in the room next to the dinosaurs.
Posted by: kelly || 02/28/2006 17:16 Comments || Top||

#15  The late Indian National Security Advisor JN Dixit told a story about visiting a Pakistani friend (from pre-partition days). This was a top official in the Pak governement, a member of the educated powerful elite, raised in British India.

At the dinner table, the little six year old daughter of his friend discovered that Dixit was a Hindu.

Dixit was shocked as she began running around the table chanting "Hindu Kutta" "Hindu Kutta"

(Kutta means dog).

Do not assume the Paks raise their children like normal folk. They inculcate hatred at all levels.

Posted by: john || 02/28/2006 17:59 Comments || Top||

#16  Rememeber that they have to justify the creation of the state to their children.

So they teach the most outrageous stuff.. that Indian muslims are not allowed to go to the mosque, that there are regular pogroms of muslims, that muslims are superior...

Posted by: john || 02/28/2006 18:06 Comments || Top||



Iraq
American Casualties Fall for 4th month in a row in OIF
OCT 05 - 96
NOV 05 - 84
DEC 05 - 68
Jan 06 - 62
Feb 06 - 54 (preliminary, may be raised a few)

obviously every death hurts but maybe we are finally seeing the light at the end of the tunnel
Posted by: mhw || 02/28/2006 08:35 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  I wouldn't call it a trend yet. The average casualty rate for 2004 and 2005 has been 70 per month. There were quite a few months with 50 or less, but then spiked with battles such as Najaf, Sadr city and Fallujah, just like Oct and Nov 2005 spiked with offensives in preparation for the Dec 2005 elections. The Army may have to go after Sadr and the Madhi army again.
Posted by: ed || 02/28/2006 9:49 Comments || Top||

#2  trouble is positive trends will not be mentioned anyway no matter how good they may be. we could be down to just 20 a month and the media would keep parroting the same old line ' The war is getting worse everyday with no end in sight' or perhaps from the really anti war John Simpson type it'd be still deamed a 'Quagmire'!
Posted by: ShepUK || 02/28/2006 10:10 Comments || Top||

#3  QUAGMIRE!
Posted by: CrazyFool || 02/28/2006 10:54 Comments || Top||

#4  Old newspaper saying:
If it bleeds, it leads.
Posted by: tipper || 02/28/2006 11:12 Comments || Top||

#5  As a senior reserve officer with a son who will soon deploy to SW Asia...the truth is the military is a dangerous place even in peacetime. If you have a friend or co-worker who is/was a naval or marine aviator...ask themhow many friends they have lost in training accidents. Carrier ops, shipboard ops, amphib assauults, etc....all dangerous. We fight like we train and train like we fight.

Posted by: anymouse || 02/28/2006 11:26 Comments || Top||

#6  CF: QUAGMIRE is sooo '05. It's IMPENDING CIVIL WAR now.
Posted by: Xbalanke || 02/28/2006 11:40 Comments || Top||

#7  anymouse,

I recall doing a short study more than a decade ago (when I was in the Reserves) on fatalies.

I don't have the study or the data but I think it was something like like 200-500 fatalities a year in accidents related to military service and 300-700 a year in accidents unrelated to military service (mostly automobile accidents).
Posted by: mhw || 02/28/2006 14:23 Comments || Top||

#8  mhw...I recall that the military loses, on average, about 1 person per day due to training related activities (~400/year). It is not unsual at all to lose 1 or 2 personnel per deployment overboard in what we call now an ESF.

It doesn't make it feel better. It's just a fact of life. The military, by its very nature is a dangerous place.
Posted by: anymouse || 02/28/2006 15:29 Comments || Top||

#9  ...the truth is the military is a dangerous place even in peacetime.

Amen! I can recall at least 70 people who died during my military career THAT I KNEW. Three of them were pilots at Holloman AFB in 1970, including John Ryan, my cadet squadron commander at the Air Force Academy. Three of my classmates that I knew personally died in Vietnam - only one from combat. We lost an aircraft and two pilots at an airshow in England in 1987. I lost a good friend in a training accident in Germany in 1983. We had a spate of drunk-driving accidents in Germany in the late 1980's that left three people dead. A plane crash in Panama took nine lives - a plane I was supposed to be on until the last minute. War is not a game - it's a very dangerous business. People get hurt even practicing. Working 12-16 hour shifts leaves people tired, and they don't pay as much attention as they should. When things go wrong in high-performance aircraft, more often than not it's fatal.

We had a police officer shot here last week. It made nationwide news. A security-police friend of mine was shot by someone trying to break into the restricted area in Panama - no mention even in the local newspapers. That was in the 1960's, not recently, so it's not just the MSM being themselves. Being injured or killed in the military isn't "news", unless it can be used to make someone else look bad, or to promote an agenda.
Posted by: Old Patriot || 02/28/2006 15:40 Comments || Top||


Home Front: Culture Wars
WW II fighter ace Scott dies at 97
Retired Brig. Gen. Robert L. Scott, the World War II flying ace who told of his exploits in the China-Burma-India theater in his book "God is My Co-Pilot," died Monday. He was 97.

His death was announced by Paul Hibbitts, director of the Museum of Aviation at Robins Air Force Base, where Scott worked in recent years.

The Georgia-born Scott rose to nationwide prominence during World War II as a fighter ace in the skies over Asia, then with his best-selling 1943 book, made into a 1945 movie starring Dennis Morgan as Scott.

Among his other books were "The Day I Owned the Sky" and "Flying Tiger: Chennault of China."

Scott, who retired from the Air Force as a brigadier general, won three Distinguished Flying Crosses, two Silver Stars and five Air Medals before he was called home to travel the country giving speeches for the war effort.

He shot down 22 enemy planes with his P-40 Warhawk, though he recalled some were listed as "probable" kills.

"You had to have two witnesses in the formation, or you needed a gun camera to take a picture," he once said. "Only we didn't have gun cameras in China. I actually had 22 aerial victims, but I only had proof of 13."

He worked with the Flying Tigers, Gen. Claire Chennault's famed volunteer force of pilots who fought in China, but he was not one of its original members in mid-1941. With the Flying Tigers, he earned five of his aerial kills in May 1942 when he flew more than 200 hours in combat.
Making of a legend

Scott's story is the stuff of aviation legend: He flew a homemade glider off the roof of a three-story house at age 12 and crash landed on a spiky rose bush.

At 33, Scott was considered too old for combat and was still at a training job in California when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor and the United States entered the war in December of that year.

But then came a phone call.

"One night about 3 a.m., the phone rang. A man asked `did you ever fly a B-17,' Scott said in a 1996 interview. "So I said yes, I have flown a B-17. But I never had. I got my airplane and went to work."

After he got the call to serve in combat, he was assigned to a mission to bomb Tokyo from China. When that plan was scrubbed, he flew gasoline and ammunition over Japanese-held territory to the Flying Tigers. When the Tigers were formally incorporated into the Army as the 23rd Fighter Group of the China Air Task Force, Scott was asked to be its commander.

In the years just after the war, Scott was one of the proponents of making the Air Force into a separate service.

"They just plain couldn't see why we wanted a special service," Scott said in 1997, at the time the Air Force was marking its 50th anniversary as an independent service. "They all wanted their own Air Force. We were fighting against public opinion."
New life at museum

From the mid-1980s onward, Scott was an active staffer at the Robins air base's aviation museum.

Scott, who had more than 33,000 flying hours during his 60 years of flying, credited the museum with giving him a new lease on life, Hibbitts said.

Despite his age, he remained active until a few years ago, carrying the Olympic torch in 1996, piloting an F-15 fighter jet on his 88th birthday and flying a B-1 bomber on his 89th birthday, Hibbitts said.

"He's been our resident hero, cheerleader and biggest fan," said Pat Bartness, museum foundation president and chief operating officer. "He's been the biggest drawing card we've had."
Posted by: Anonymoose || 02/28/2006 07:48 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Despite his age, he remained active until a few years ago, carrying the Olympic torch in 1996, piloting an F-15 fighter jet on his 88th birthday and flying a B-1 bomber on his 89th birthday, Hibbitts said.

He da man!

RI(well earned)P
Posted by: Xbalanke || 02/28/2006 11:46 Comments || Top||

#2  Scott, who had more than 33,000 flying hours
A rare old and bold 'un.
Posted by: 6 || 02/28/2006 12:12 Comments || Top||

#3  piloting an F-15 fighter jet on his 88th birthday

The two-seat trainer version, I sincerely hope.
Posted by: mojo || 02/28/2006 14:44 Comments || Top||

#4  I wonder how old was he when he gave up or lost his medical certification to fly. Regardless, he was made of the right stuff, and we owe him a debt of thanks for his service to our country and for being such a great inspiration to so many of us.
Posted by: Alaska Paul || 02/28/2006 17:30 Comments || Top||

#5  Here's the Bobster....
Posted by: 6 || 02/28/2006 18:14 Comments || Top||

#6  Had the great fortune of both serving under Gen. Scott and meeting him at the W-R museum a few years ago. Gen. Scott was the genuine article.

You can finally take this bird on over the horizon, sir. God speed.
Posted by: DancingBear || 02/28/2006 18:20 Comments || Top||

#7  DancingBear!
Posted by: 6 || 02/28/2006 18:44 Comments || Top||


Home Front: Politix
Binny Helped Elect Bush, Book sez
Page 15 in the .pdf version; the front-page link didn’t seem to work
President Bush now says his 2004 victory over Democratic Sen. John Kerry, who is mulling a comeback in 2008, was inadvertently aided by al-Qaida terrorist leader Osama bin Laden. And Republican National Committee Chairman Ken Mehlman, who steadfastly refused to defend Swift Boat Veterans for the Truth when he ran Bush’s campaign, now calls them “heroes” who played a crucial role in vanquishing Kerry. For the first time, the president says he was helped by bin Laden, who put out a videotaped diatribe against Bush the Friday before the 2004 election. Bush said there were “enormous amounts of discussion” inside his campaign about the 15-minute tape, which he called “an interesting entry by our enemy” into the presidential race. “What does it mean? Is it going to help? Is it going to hurt?” he said in an exclusive interview for the new book “Strategery.” “Anything that drops in at the end of a campaign that is not already decided creates all kinds of anxieties, because you’re not sure of the effect.

“I thought it was going to help,” he decided. “I thought it would help remind people that if bin Laden doesn’t want Bush to be the president, something must be right with Bush.” Mehlman agreed, citing polls that show Americans trust Republicans more than Democrats on matters of national security. “It reminded people of the stakes,” he said in an interview for “Strategery.” “It reinforced an issue on which Bush had a big lead over Kerry.” Even the mainstream media fretted about the tape’s potential to help Bush. Former CBS anchorman Walter Cronkite told CNN that White House strategist Karl Rove “probably set up bin Laden to this thing.”

The bin Laden tape was not the only curveball thrown at Bush in the closing days of the campaign.
The New York Times published a story faulting the administration for failing to safeguard a cache of
weapons in Iraq that went missing around the time of the U.S. invasion more than 18 months earlier.
Some Republicans regarded the story as a political “stink bomb,” much like the revelation just before the 2000 election that Bush had once been arrested for driving under the influence of alcohol. Bush said the weapons flap “was different from the DUI story, which defined me personally — as opposed to my policies. And there’s a difference.”

The Times quoted Kerry accusing the president of “incredible incompetence” and calling the missing explosives “one of the great blunders of Iraq.” Bush responded by turning Kerry’s newfound concern over weapons against him. “After repeatedly calling Iraq the wrong war, and a diversion, Senator Kerry this week seemed shocked to learn that Iraq was a dangerous place, full of dangerous weapons,” Bush deadpanned, drawing laughter from an audience in Pennsylvania. Mehlman was similarly incredulous that Kerry would deviate from his long-held position that Bush had exaggerated the weapons threat in Iraq. “I was stunned that he brought it up,” the campaign manager
said. “He was essentially saying it was wrong to remove Saddam Hussein, even though we’ve just
discovered all these dangerous weapons in the country.

“Politics is like a chess game,” he added. “If you don’t think a few moves ahead, then you always end up like Homer Simpson going, ‘Doh!’ ” Even more helpful to the Bush campaign was the flap over Kerry’s Vietnam service. For the first time, Mehlman is now defending the Swift Boat veterans, who questioned Kerry’s Vietnam record and savaged his claim that U.S. soldiers were war criminals. “These are people who are incredible,” Mehlman said of the “Swifties.” “You may disagree with what they’re saying. But these are heroes. These are people that suffered in prison camps for America. “And to respond and say, ‘These are bums who don’t have a right to speak. But other veterans who
agree with us do,’ is responding with a hammer and not a scalpel,” he added. “The Kerry campaign
seemed unable to use a scalpel. Instead, they had to use a hammer for everything.”

After the election, Rove and other Bush officials initially downplayed any role the Swift Boat Veterans might have played in the campaign. But now there is widespread acknowledgment in the White House that the veterans were pivotal in vanquishing Kerry. “I felt they had a very big impact,” Mehlman said.
White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card said in an interview that the Swift Boat Veterans “had an impact to Kerry’s detriment. I think they tended to put him on the defensive.” But that impact would not have been possible had Kerry not spent so much time emphasizing his Vietnam record, Mehlman said.
“I think the mistake that Kerry made was making the entire essence of his campaign that he served in Vietnam,” he said. “Ultimately, it wasn’t that relevant of an issue.” Besides, by focusing on Vietnam,
Kerry invited criticism of his 1971 congressional testimony that fellow Vietnam veterans were war
criminals, Mehlman said. “No one’s taking away his service,” he emphasized. “The question
was his judgment when he came back.”
Ultimately, Kerry’s emphasis on Vietnam proved self-defeating. “It reinforced something about him,” Mehlman said. “By the end of the campaign, from a character perspective, he came across as
a guy who is just ambition over everything.” He contrasted Kerry unfavorably with former Sen. Bob Dole, R-Kansas, who was severely wounded in World War II, and Sen. John McCain, R-Arizona,
who spent more than five years as a prisoner of war in Vietnam. “Dole didn’t talk about his service
almost ever,” Mehlman said. “McCain, when he talks about it, talks about it in a way where
it’s very clear it affects him very deeply.”

Bush was asked in the Oval Office interview whether Kerry had blundered by making Vietnam the
cornerstone of his campaign. “I don’t know if you’d call it ‘blunder,’ ” he replied. “It didn’t
work.”

EXCLUSIVE SERIES
» Bill Sammon makes his debut in The Examiner as senior White House correspondent this week. Sammon is a veteran journalist, FOX News analyst and author of three previous New York Times best-sellers on
the presidency.
TOMORROW PART THREE
» How the mainstream media helped the Bush campaign


Whoa! I can't wait for that!
Posted by: Bobby || 02/28/2006 07:37 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  I doubt that bin laden or the Swift voters had little effect on the 04 Presidential election.
People had pretty much made up their minds who they were going to vote for.

Democrats lost the presidential elections of 2000 & 2004 because they didnt compete in the south/midwest.They essentially wrote off those areas. They didnt win a single southern state in either election. Hopefully its a mistake they wont make in future elections
Posted by: Common Sense || 02/28/2006 14:53 Comments || Top||

#2  I think the record reflects the fact that the Democrats can't compete outside the big cities, because they're promising to take away from those that live outside the cities and give to those inside the cities.

That's my opinion, and I shall not be drawn into an argument about it. I do hope I remember to post the next part, tomorrow!
Posted by: Bobby || 02/28/2006 17:17 Comments || Top||

#3  So, Hitler helped relect Roosevelt in '44?

I guess when BDS strikes, it strike hard.
Posted by: Gromoque Glaish6758 || 02/28/2006 20:29 Comments || Top||

#4  Blame Canada Dan Rather.
Posted by: ed || 02/28/2006 20:43 Comments || Top||


Israel-Palestine-Jordan
WND : Leftist U.S. Jews stand by 'failed' border deal
Rice-brokered agreement has terrorists infiltrating the Gaza Strip
By Aaron Klein
© 2006 WorldNetDaily.com

JERUSALEM – Two months after their organizations reportedly urged U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to pressure Israel into accepting a border deal Israeli officials now call an "abject failure" that is threatening the country's security, leftist American Jewish leaders said yesterday they stand by their vocal support for the international agreement.

The Jewish leaders made the statements in spite of a WND probe last week that found Rice's border agreement is currently allowing terrorists to infiltrate the Gaza Strip, where they are poised to attack Israel. WND also found the deal allows Gaza-based terrorists freedom to travel into the nearby Sinai desert, where they can meet with regional jihadists.

"We don't have any regrets. The Palestinians need their freedom of movement," Seymour Reich, president of the Israel Policy Forum, a prominent leftist think tank, told WND.

Reich was one of several leftist Jewish leaders who urged Rice during a meeting prior to her trip here this past November to pressure Israel into signing a deal regarding security at the Rafah crossing, the main checkpoint between Egypt at Gaza. The checkpoint is one of the largest crossings between the Sinai and the Gaza Strip. It has been the scene of rampant Palestinian weapons smuggling the past few years.

Prior to Israel's withdrawal from the Gaza Strip in August, the Gaza side of the border was entirely controlled by the Israeli Defense Forces. But Rice's border deal, which Israel accepted reportedly after intense American pressure, restricted the Jewish state to monitor the area by camera, called for a European presence at the border station, and offered the Palestinians some veto power on vehicles and persons entering Gaza.

WND reported at the time just before Rice brokered the deal in November several leftist Jewish groups encouraged her to take a tough line with Israel against settlement expansion and involvement in Palestinian border affairs.

Reich reportedly said after meeting Rice before her Mideast trip: "I have no doubt that we bolstered the secretary of state's instinct and strengthened her opinion that aggressive American involvement was needed to achieve practical results."

A source close to the Jewish groups pressuring Rice told WND one senior Jewish leftist leader said to the secretary of state her tough stance against Israel while brokering the Rafah deal will result in strong support from American Jews.

After Rice's border deal was finalized in November, both Egyptian and Palestinian security forces deployed at the Rafah crossing, and a rotating team of European inspectors was stationed at the border.

New border rules stipulate Israel cannot restrict who leaves Gaza, but it can ask the European monitors to delay for several hours anyone crossing the border if Israel provides immediate information indicating an entrant may be a security threat. The regulations, which sources close to the deal say were partially devised by Rice herself, restrict Israel to rely on security cameras at the border and a list of entrants supplied by the Palestinians.

Israeli security officials told WND last week the cameras at the border are not sufficient to identify entrants, and they said the Palestinians have been failing to supply accurate and timely lists of individuals crossing into Gaza.

"There have been many cases of Israel not getting lists at all," said a security official. "Or we get them so near the time of arrival we don't have nearly enough time to ask an entrant to be delayed."

Israeli security officials charged the Palestinians have tampered with the names of entrants, accusing Palestinian border workers of deliberately disguising the personal information of terrorists crossing the border.

"The result," one security officials said, "is that the border between Gaza and Egypt is nonexistent."

Indeed, several senior terrorists based in Gaza told WorldNetDaily the past few weeks they were able to cross into the Sinai and back without a problem.

One terror leader said he went to Egypt for "vacation."

Hamas chief Mahmoud al-Zahar's brother, Fadel, entered Gaza through Rafah just day's after Rice's border deal was implemented, reportedly bringing with him 13 other wanted terrorists. Fadel Al-Zahar had been deported by Israel to Lebanon in 1991 after he was accused of orchestrating attacks.

According to security officials, there is information indicating some Palestinian terrorists who crossed into the Sinai last month may have met with local jihad cells there before returning to Gaza.

Both Israeli and Palestinian security sources say the Iran- and Syria-backed Hezbollah terror group maintains a presence in the Sinai desert. Israel says Egypt has had difficulty eliminating al-Qaida cells in Sinai suspected of involvement in recent terror attacks, including the bombings in Sharm el Sheikh in July and Taba last year, which together killed more than 100 people.

"It is time to conclude Rice's Rafah deal is an abject failure," said an official close to the deal.

But the leftist Jewish leaders who urged Rise to pressure Israel said yesterday their support for the Rafah border deal remains unchanged in spite of information indicating border infiltration is threatening the Jewish state's security.

Lewis Roth, assistant director of Americans for Peace Now, a popular leftist group supporting final status negotiations to create a Palestinian state, said, "We continue to support the agreement. It was necessary for the Palestinians, who need access to the outside world."

Roth told WND his organization, which encouraged Rice to pressure Israel on the Rafah deal, is reassessing its support for allowing the Palestinians to build a seaport, which was also called for during the Rafah agreement.

"But the overall support for the deal has absolutely not changed," said Roth.

One Jewish leader close to the Jewish groups' talks with Rice, speaking on condition of anonymity, told WND, "I don't think there was any doubt the Rafah border crossing would fail and damage Israel. Only Israel can provide for its own security."

Reich of the Israel Policy Forum said, "We support the utility of the Rafah deal. It was the right agreement at the right time."
Posted by: anonymous5089 || 02/28/2006 07:19 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  "officials now call an "abject failure"...reportedly after...WND reported...reportedly said...A source close to the Jewish groups...which sources close to the deal say...Israeli security officials told WND...said a security official...Israeli security officials charged... one security officials said...According to security officials...there is information indicating...may have met...Both Israeli and Palestinian security sources say...suspected of involvement...in spite of information indicating...One Jewish leader close to the Jewish groups'...speaking on condition of anonymity..."

What...can't find any "diplomats" to weigh in?
Posted by: DepotGuy || 02/28/2006 9:22 Comments || Top||

#2  Leftist Jews = Judenrat officials redux
Posted by: borgboy || 02/28/2006 15:38 Comments || Top||

#3  DG - good point.
Posted by: 2b || 02/28/2006 15:50 Comments || Top||

#4  Clearly, being Jewish does not guarantee intelligence.
Posted by: trailing wife || 02/28/2006 21:08 Comments || Top||


Europe
The Closing of Civilization in Europe
Hat tip Ms. Trailing wife and her WMD article for providing me the link, though I often read the Brussel journal.
Europe’s current problems are entirely self-inflicted. This does not mean, however, that the result will be less catastrophic. By subverting the roots of its own Judeo-Christian culture – a process that started with the French Enlightenment (as opposed to the Scottish Enlightenment, which was not anti-religious) – a religious and cultural vacuum was created at the heart of European civilization. The collapse of faith in its own values has, not surprisingly, led to a demographic collapse because a civilization that no longer believes in its own future also rejects procreation. Today, a new religion and culture is supplanting the old one. There is little one can do about it, but hope for a miracle.

America’s immigration problems pale in comparison with what confronts Europe. America’s major ethnic minorities – Blacks as well as Hispanics – are Christian, while the meanstream culture is also rooted in Christianity. In Europe a secularized post-Christian culture is facing a Muslim one. The secularized culture is hedonist and values only its present life, because it does not believe in an afterlife. This is why it will surrender when threatened with death because life is the only thing it has to lose. This is why it will accept submission without fighting for its freedom. Nobody fights for the flag of hedonism, not even the hedonists themselves.

One could also put it in a slightly different way: Europe lacks what America still has, namely the so-called “conservative reserves,” or as the German sociologist Arnold Gehlen explained over 30 years ago, “the reserves in national energy and self-confidence, primitiveness and generosity, wealth and potential of every kind.” Every so often I travel to the U.S. to recharge my batteries, and I am not the only European Conservative to do so. From time to time one needs to breathe the air of freedom before submerging again in the stifling atmosphere of Europe.

America’s “conservative reserves” are far stronger than Europe’s, because America, unlike secular Europe, has remained rooted to a larger extent in traditional Christian values. I do not doubt that if these values continue to decline in the U.S., American culture will collapse as European culture and civilisation have collapsed. However, America can learn from the impending European catastrophe, and avoid a similar fate.

The old European civilization – the pre-secular or the pre-post-Christian one – will live on in the U.S. If it perishes there too, mankind will relapse into the dark ages that are now taking hold of Europe, the cradle of Western civilization.

I suppose one could feel sad about all this, but sadness is not what I feel. One can feel compassion for those who die in accidents, fall in battle or get murdered (like the countless unborn children that perish every day) but can one pity those who have killed their own future for the pleasures of the present? Europe’s predicament, I repeat, is entirely self-inflicted. Not Islam is to blame. Secularism is.

The coming decade will witness the war between the values of Islam and the secular “values” of the decadent, hedonistic post-Marxist Left. We have seen the assassinations of Pim Fortuyn and Theo van Gogh, last November’s prelude to the French civil war, the Danish cartoon case. This is just the beginning of the beginning. I do not consider myself a pessimist, merely a realist. It is quite clear who is going to lose – and whose fault that will be.
My thoughts, *exactly*.
Posted by: anonymous5089 || 02/28/2006 07:04 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  I don't see it as Christianity fighting Islam here in the US, as opposed to atheism losing to Islam in Europe. Nor do I see the battle as being won by those believing in an afterlife,, and lost by those who don't. Eleven percent of Americans self-identify as atheist/agnostic, and they appear (if Rantburgers are any example) to be spread across the spectrum of American ideologies. Rather, this is a fight between those who firmly believe in colonizing the future in this life -- on one side with free individuals, on the other with the slaves of the nastiest version of Allah, with the nihilists gladly surrendering to slavery between the lines. Europe doesn't necessarily need to recover its Christianity, but its belief that it can make a future if it only reaches out its hand to do so.
Posted by: trailing wife || 02/28/2006 8:18 Comments || Top||

#2  Warriors exist to fight for a future. The fight is always about what kind of future will happen. Those who have no interest in any future won't fight at all.
Posted by: Thrinetch Tholumble7024 || 02/28/2006 19:50 Comments || Top||

#3  America’s immigration problems pale in comparison with what confronts Europe.

Actually, its an advantage. You forget we took in all those that Europe tossed out, both in the 19th and 20th centuries. They had the motivation to make something of themselves other than wards of the prince or state that you offered them.
Posted by: Gromoque Glaish6758 || 02/28/2006 20:33 Comments || Top||

#4  Good point, GG. We get the self-motivators from the West, the go-getters, the make shit happen people. They get the self-boomers from Shitistan, the blow-uppers, the tear shit down cretins.

Purdy good deal... for us.
Posted by: .com || 02/28/2006 20:36 Comments || Top||

#5  Don't forget we're currently holding immigration from Europe down. Let's loosen the limits and see what happens.
Posted by: Nimble Spemble || 02/28/2006 21:23 Comments || Top||


Home Front: Politix
Change the 1975 Law, not the Port Operator
By C. Fred Bergsten
Washington Post, Tuesday, February 28, 2006; Page A15

Nearly all objective
you, and me, and ... who else?
observers of the uproar over "selling American ports to the Arabs" agree on three key elements of the situation. First, the purchase of port management operations by Dubai Ports World from a British-owned company will have no operational impact on the national security of the United States. Port owners and managers are not responsible for port security. There are risks at our ports, but they stem from the fact that the American agencies responsible for our security -- U.S. Customs and Border Protection and the Coast Guard -- examine only about 5 percent of incoming cargo, along with a modest portion of shipments at the point of export.
But Bush's poll numbers are down, so the campaign is successful
Mid-level officials at 12 agencies of the U.S. government, including the Department of Homeland Security and the Pentagon, reviewed the Dubai investment in considerable depth, apparently with full cooperation from the company. They unanimously concluded that there was no reason to refer it to their own superiors, let alone the president. The substance of the government's vetting process, conducted through the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS), worked precisely as intended by the legislation under which it operates.
And has operated for 30 years - see below
Second, that process contains a major flaw: its failure to inform Congress of pending transactions in a way that would enable lawmakers to express meaningful objections in an orderly manner.
Wow. Meaningful and orderly? Is this guy ironic, or what?
The CFIUS process is opaque and secretive, requiring after-the-fact notification of the Hill for only the very few deals that have already been acted on through the president's personal intervention. Congress can therefore express its concerns only by leaping into individual cases with great fanfare, as in the current case and, even more so, when it in effect vetoed the bid for Unocal by the China National Offshore Oil Corp. last year even before that deal was considered by the CFIUS.

Third, it would be a grave mistake to enact new legislation that permitted Congress to exercise case-by-case review of individual applications for foreign investments in the United States.
But Hilly has introduced legislation to ban foreign operators!
Such congressional micromanagement
See? I said he was good at irony!
exists in other specialized policy areas such as arms exports to foreign countries. But applying it to commercial transactions would generate such uncertainties and potential delays for foreign investors that it would have a huge chilling effect on their proclivity to buy American assets. The United States needs to attract almost $1 trillion of foreign financing annually to fund our huge and growing trade and current account deficits. It would be the height of national folly to erect any such deterrent to one of the most desirable channels for such flows.

Drawing on my experience as the second chairman of the CFIUS after it was created in 1975, and on an in-depth study of the CFIUS process to be published shortly by the Institute for International Economics, I offer two suggestions. To help deal with the immediate problem, the administration should obtain and make public immediately a letter of assurance from the government of the United Arab Emirates committing itself to avoid any involvement in the business operations of Dubai Ports World and to take all steps necessary to guard against security problems. Both the government and the company have proclaimed that Dubai Ports would act solely as a commercial entity, and the company has pledged its full participation in all U.S. security programs, so it should be routine to obtain such a letter. Any violation of these commitments, by the UAE government or the company itself, would subject the company to cancellation of its approval to operate in the United States and thus force its immediate divestiture, presumably at a fire-sale price. We obtained a similar statement from the French government in 1979 to resolve concerns about the acquisition of American Motors by Renault, which was then partially government-owned.
And when was the last time you heard of American Motors or Renault?

The more fundamental problem of inadequate CFIUS transparency should be resolved by a structural change in the governmental review process. The CFIUS should henceforth provide to the leadership of the relevant committees of Congress, on a confidential basis to preserve legitimate business interests, quarterly (or even monthly) reports and briefings on pending as well as completed applications for approval of specific investments. The responsible members could then register any concerns they might have directly with the relevant government agencies for consideration during the CFIUS review itself.

Similar procedures are followed in a wide range of policy areas, especially with respect to sensitive intelligence issues. They have also been used for other economic issues; for example, the Treasury Department, which chairs the CFIUS, used to conduct frequent interventions in the foreign exchange markets, and informed the members of Congress responsible in that area. The administration could simply adopt this reform on its own, or Congress, if it wants to be seen as taking action on the current issue, could amend the governing legislation.

The debate over the Dubai investment could result in real damage to U.S. economic and security interests. Foreign investment in this country might be deterred by imposition of an overly intrusive approval process; our economy would then lose the multiple benefits of such investment, and it would become even more costly to finance our external deficits. Major foreign policy costs could ensue from another rejection based solely on the nationality of the investor. But we could blame Bush for that, too, yes? The very real issues raised by this case and, more important, the government's procedures for handling such transactions on an ongoing basis, should be resolved through much more moderate and balanced measures.

The writer is director of the Institute for International Economics and a former assistant secretary of the Treasury for international affairs (1977-81). He will answer questions today at 1 p.m. on www.washingtonpost.com.
Posted by: Bobby || 02/28/2006 07:02 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


Europe
An Interview with Ali Sina on Muslims in Europe
Long multi-parts Ali Sina (Faith Freedom.org, which I very much recommand) interview.
By Jarek N.

The following are answers given to Jarek's questions concerning the Muslim dilemma in Europe. This is a long interview. Every day I will publish a part of it.

Jarek N.
Dear Ali Sina: Thank you for accepting this Interview.

Sina:
It is my pleasure.

Jarek
Q01: You have often stated that Islam is a dangerous cult which promotes violence. Yet many Islamic scholars and officials say that this is only a misunderstanding, a bad picture of Islam made by few misguided terrorists. They say that Islam is a religion of peace and tolerance. In fact, the word “islam” actually means “peace” in Arabic. How can you explain this difference between their opinion and yours?

Sina:
Words can mean different things to different people. It is important to understand what people mean when they use a certain word. Let’s make an example. Take the word gay. Fifty years ago, gay meant exclusively cheerfulness, lighthearted excitement, merry or bright colors. Today this word has a different meaning. You won’t call a cheerful person gay because it could be understood as something else.

Just as the same word can mean different things in different times, it can also mean different things in different cultures. Islam does not mean peace. It means submission. The word “peace” for Muslims has a different meaning. Peace, according to Muslims, will be achieved when everyone submits to Islam. Muslims can't offer peace. They can offer truce. In their minds, peace will be achieved only when you are subdued and they are the masters. Any other arrangement is not Islamic.

Recently the newly elected leaders of Hamas, who have been surprisingly honest, have spelled the concept of Islamic peace eloquently. They said that they won't give up on their quest to destroy Israel but meanwhile, as long as they are weak and realizing that such dream is not yet possible, they are willing to work out a truce, to be broken when they feel strong enough to wipe out Israel from the map and establish the "peace" as it is acceptable by Islam.

Muhammad divided the world in two sectors. One he called Dar us Salam (House of Peace) and the other, Dar al Harb (House of War). All countries, where Islam is not the ruling authority, are Dar al Harb. It is the duty of the Muslims to wage Jihad in Dar al Harb, overthrow the governments and force people into submission. This is the only kind of peace that Islam recognizes.

The concept of Islamic peace is expressed in the verse 2.193 of the Quran.

And fight them until fitnah is no more, and religion is for Allah.

What is fitnah? Fitnah means sedition, perfidy or mischief. In Islamic terminology it means resisting Islam or disbelief. For example this site is fitnah.

All translators of the Quran have translated fitnah as oppression, tumult, persecution, etc. This is taqiyya. They have invariably lied to conceal the real meaning of the verse and fool the Western reader.

At the end of an article written to refute me, the author offers a prayer and asks Allah to "give all Muslims the strength to remain true to Your chosen path in the face of the fitnah inflicted upon us by the enemies of Islam." I have no means of persecution. Clearly, fitnah means disbelief and criticizing Islam and not persecution.

When we say the objective of Islam is to force people into submission, it does not mean that you'll be forced into conversion. It means that you'll become a dhimmi, a subordinate to Muslims. You work and pay the Jizyyah, an extortion fee, to the Muslims who would treat you as second class citizen. They become the master race and you, their virtual slave and the source of their livelihood. .

Narrated Juwairiya bin Qudama At-Tamimi:
We said to 'Umar bin Al-Khattab, oh Chief of the believers! Advise us." He said, "I advise you to fulfill Allah's Convention (made with the Dhimmis) as it is the convention of your Prophet and the source of the livelihood of your dependents (i.e. the taxes from the Dhimmis.) " Bukhari 4, 53, 388:

The good news is that you can change your status by converting to Islam. So in a a very sarcastic sense, there is no compulsion in Islam. You convert "voluntarily". But you are free not to convert by accepting subjugation, humiliation, discrimination and constant harassment. What can be more democratic?

This meaning of "peace" is understood by all the Muslims. However they know that the non-Muslims have a different understanding of this word. So, they deceitfully promote their religion as a religion of peace taking advantage of the fact that the root of both words Islam and Salam is slm. However one means submission and the other means peace.
Rest at link (6 parts).
Posted by: anonymous5089 || 02/28/2006 05:03 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Ali Sina is a brilliant fellow, a hard worker and a knowledgeable guy. And also he is brave since he goes on working despite getting dozens of death threats every day.

However, he does not mentally discipline himself. He frequently counsels people to have pity on muslims because they are exploited by Islam and sometimes he says Muslims are just inherently liars, mentally ill, etc.

Yes he is worth reading but remember that he uses analogies that he doesn't understand; he sometimes gets so angry at the muslim condition that he loses track of his own thoughts.
Posted by: mhw || 02/28/2006 8:51 Comments || Top||


Terror Networks
Muslim Preacher on Temple Mount: Restore Worldwide Islamic Rule
Couldn't be clearer about their ambitions. Perhaps we should be listening?
By Hillel Fendel
Sheikh Ismail Nawahda, preaching to Moslem masses on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem on Friday, has brought it out into the open: the call to restore the Moslem Khalifate, or, "Genuine Islamic Rule." A plan for the "Return of the Khalifate" was published secretly in 2002 by a group called "The Guiding Helper Foundation." The group explained that it wished to "give direction to the educated Muslim populace in its increasing interest in the establishment of Islam as a practical system of rule."
Sounds like Son of the Supreme Council of Global Jihad, or maybe a committee within it.
This past Friday, Feb. 24, however, the plan went public. Sheikh Nawahda called publicly for the renewal of the Islamic Khalifate, which would "unite all the Moslems in the world against the infidels."
They're assuming all the non-Muslims in the world won't eventually unite against them. Either that, or they can't count very well.
The Khalifate system features a fearless leader, known as a Khalif, who heads worldwide Islam. Assisted by a ten-man council, his decisions are totally binding on all Moslems.
"You'll do as you're told, dammit!"
According to the Foundation's vision of the Khalifate, significant punishment can only be meted out for 14 crimes, including "accusing a chaste person of fornication," "not performing the formal prayer," and "not fasting during Ramadan." The Foundation recommends working to restore the Moslem dictatorship using a system of small groups around the world. The purpose is so that the "enemies of Islam" who "will definitely try to stop us" will have a "much harder task, if not impossible, if they are faced with a myriad of small groups of differing locations, ethnicities," etc. This method also "ensures that if one group... is found and cut off, other similar groups will remain undetected."
If they push it too far they'll end up with people hunting down all Muslims and killing them in the streets, simply as a matter of self-protection. This is the eventual goal, of course, since that will in theory unite all the Muslims against all the infidels. The flaw is that their head counts seem to be off, and since it's been quite a while since colonialism went out of fashion they've forgotten just how ruthless the West can be.
Sheikh Nawahda reminded his Temple Mount audience that the first step taken by Muhammed in stabilizing his rule was to form the nucleus of the first Islamic country in the city of Medina. Nawahda also said that the status of Moslems around the world has dropped drastically ever since the collapse of the last Khalifate in 1924, after Turkey became a democratic republic.
Once they had to rule themselves, rather than have somebody do it for them, they found they weren't able to compete. Being Muslims, they decided the answer was more shariah.
Nawahda called upon the Arabs of the Palestinian Authority to rise above their personal and party interests, and said that Moslems must return to Islam and join forces in the struggle against the West. He praised the worldwide protests against the anti-Muhammed cartoons, and encouraged the Moslem public to continue such activities. He implied that those who insulted Muhammed are liable for death. The Sheikh designated the Moslem masses as a strong point that can be utilized in the fight against the West.
Posted by: anonymous5089 || 02/28/2006 05:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely. The last "Khalif" (Vahdettin VI) was an out of touch despot.
Posted by: Mullah Richard || 02/28/2006 8:54 Comments || Top||

#2  Can I have a pony ?

And a red wagon?

How 'bout a Fullah dolly ?

Posted by: john || 02/28/2006 8:54 Comments || Top||

#3  I think about the only way a Caliphate would ever be restored was if J.R. "Bob" Dobbs was the Caliph.

I'm not saying that it's impossible...
Posted by: Anonymoose || 02/28/2006 9:57 Comments || Top||

#4  "working to restore the Moslem dictatorship using a system of small groups around the world"

One only has to look at the countries of Europe: France, England, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Belgium, Germany, Italy, then across the sea to the US and Canada, (as well as the Latin American countries), and Australia and New Zealand, to realize that THEY ARE DOING EXACTLY WHAT THEY SAID THEY'D DO. Usually, in political situations, this is not a good thing. First, the ground rules are set down, then enacted on, then made stronger, THEN the dictator emerges. In this case, all Moslems are required to OBEY WITHOUT QUESTION this future leader--the Kalif.

No one paid much attention to Hitler in the early days, because his goals and plans seemed SO outside the norm, even ridiculous. But he was able to command the desire of the "humiliated" German people to regain a sense of "honor" (sound familiar?), and to rally that community to himself. If any people needed a sense of honor (especially considering the high level of sodomy of young boys in Arab society) it is the disempowered, ineffectual, bored, inferiority-complexed Moslems.

Absolutely we should be listening.

Posted by: ex-lib || 02/28/2006 11:24 Comments || Top||

#5  Their world was so small back then, they should stick to their borders.

Leave the rest of US alone.
Posted by: anonymous2u || 02/28/2006 11:26 Comments || Top||

#6  It doesn't even seem to register to him that the last "Caliph" was a Turk. You'd think the Arabs just loved being ruled by the Ottomans.

Snicker.
Posted by: mojo || 02/28/2006 11:45 Comments || Top||

#7  Muslim Preacher on Temple Mount: Restore Worldwide Islamic Rule

"Restore"? I don't recall there ever being "Worldwide Islamic Rule" in the first place. Getting a little ahead of himself isn't he? Or is this just another case of repeating a lie often enough to where it is accepted as truth?

The Foundation recommends working to restore the Moslem dictatorship using a system of small groups around the world. The purpose is so that the "enemies of Islam" who "will definitely try to stop us" will have a "much harder task, if not impossible, if they are faced with a myriad of small groups of differing locations, ethnicities," etc. This method also "ensures that if one group... is found and cut off, other similar groups will remain undetected."

One more excellent reason to outlaw Islamic worship in all countries with freedom of religion. Let all Muslims migrate back to their theocratic countries of origin and thereby coalesce into the legitimate targets they deserve to be.

For every atrocity, a major Islamic city is razed, perhaps with warning to create a massive wave of economically crippling refugees, perhaps not if the atrocity is simply too much to countenance. The tipping point will arrive. Everything being done by Islam is merely accelerating the process instead of otherwise, incredible as it may seem. The outside world needs to recognize this and make preparations for commensurate retaliation against coming Islamist atrocities. Sadly, this is the only language Islam understands. So be it, it is written and the moving finger moves on never to return.
Posted by: Zenster || 02/28/2006 11:57 Comments || Top||

#8  I'm of the opinion the US needs to build the 747 bomber. A 280,000 pound payload is gonna come in handy.
Posted by: ed || 02/28/2006 12:15 Comments || Top||

#9  "unite all the Moslems in the world against the infidels."
He should be careful what he asks for. Given the Muslim vs. non-Muslim world-wide head counts and world-wide nuke counts, he'd be more likely to win playing the PowerBall lottery.
Posted by: Darrell || 02/28/2006 12:21 Comments || Top||

#10  Uh, how can you restore somthing that never was? These people really don't 'get' reality, past present or future.
Posted by: BrerRabbit || 02/28/2006 12:45 Comments || Top||

#11  He can say that in Jerusalem and live; why can't an infidel say that in Tehran and make it out alive? What's wrong with this picture? Are we too submissive, or are they too violent? (Some of 'them'). Or both........
Posted by: Bobby || 02/28/2006 13:45 Comments || Top||

#12  Ahura Mazda demands the restoration of Zoroastrian rule in Persepolis!
Posted by: Fred || 02/28/2006 15:20 Comments || Top||

#13  Two words. (1) Karl. (2) Martel.
Posted by: gromgoru || 02/28/2006 15:39 Comments || Top||

#14  Too many damn people arent paying attention to what these people are saying..."well, that doesnt affect me"..not yet it doesnt, but it will...and some of us arent just sitting back unconcerned and lazy....as a non-muslim, I and others are very, very ready for these folks to start telling us what to do.....and changing the laws and demanding that we accept their misguided beliefs....Very ready. It wont work here...this is the wild west....we dont suffer fools gladly...thats what the hanging tree is for...and it is still there.
Posted by: Live to Ride || 02/28/2006 17:55 Comments || Top||

#15  Perhaps that's what driving so bizonkers. They declared "the big jihad" several years ago. it's underway and all these are their best efforts. All the infidels have done is draw a few cartoons?

Driving them nuts that we just apparently aren't getting it. They've mistaken our lack of return "on with the crusade" (complete with appropriate foaming, eye-rolling and explosions) with submission and surrender.

We are not deaf, we are ignoring you. Stupidly hoping you will just go away. What we should do is tell you to shut up (like the Vatican) and keep saying it over and over, while picking off the one's who simply won't.
Posted by: Hupomoger Clans9827 || 02/28/2006 18:55 Comments || Top||

#16  while picking off the one's who simply won't.

HC, the more [cough] assertive [cough] of us around here refer to this as "wetwork." Bashir, Omar, Bakri, Qawadari, Sadr, Ahmadinejad, Hamza plus various and sundry cartoon fatwa issuers figure prominently on the list.
Posted by: Zenster || 02/28/2006 19:45 Comments || Top||

#17  HC, the more [cough] assertive [cough] of us around here refer to this as "wetwork."

As far as I can tell, the problem is so widespread and deep that the "wetwork" would quickly come to resemble a Gallagher performance.
Posted by: Robert Crawford || 02/28/2006 19:49 Comments || Top||

#18  Would have been a nice time to fire off the Halliburton earthquake machine at the Temple Mount. In the middle of the speach, SHAKE, SHAKE, Crumble! Allah has spoken and he is not pleased.
Posted by: rjschwarz || 02/28/2006 20:04 Comments || Top||

#19  Spetznatz101, aka Support-Your-Local-Conventional-First Strike-and-PYOPS God-based Lefty Secular apparatniks.
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 02/28/2006 21:37 Comments || Top||

#20  "If they push it too far they'll end up with people hunting down all Muslims and killing them in the streets, simply as a matter of self-protection. "

This is starting to sound like a necessary evil - for now, I'll settle for hunting down and killing all Imams.
Posted by: Lone Ranger || 02/28/2006 21:54 Comments || Top||

#21  Joe! You're gettin' more lucid all the time!

Or is it the Gin?
Posted by: Bobby || 02/28/2006 21:55 Comments || Top||

#22  Bam! Yes, indeed: the imams...

LR, you rock, Bubba.

The all or nothing now (aka the IWWIWWIWI*) crowd will bemoan such a civilized, step-wise, approach, however.

*IWWIWWIWI - I Want What I Want When I Want It
Posted by: .com || 02/28/2006 22:02 Comments || Top||


Europe
Caroline Glick : Ilan Halimi and Israel
Posted by: anonymous5089 || 02/28/2006 04:59 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


Arabia
Al-Qaeda's Soddy oil targets
At a time of record-high oil prices, analysts are beginning to consider the implications of possible terrorist attacks on Middle Eastern oil facilities. The crown jewel of these facilities is Saudi Arabia's oil production infrastructure. It is worth noting that Saudi Arabia possesses 261.9 billion barrels of proven oil reserves.

On January 19, al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden broke a 14-month-long silence to warn that his organization is preparing further attacks against Western targets. Bin Laden said, "The war against America and its allies will not be confined to Iraq…As for similar operations taking place in America, it's only a matter of time. They are in the planning stages, and you will see them in the heart of your land as soon as the planning is complete" (al-Jazeera, January 19).

Saudi Arabia and its oil have long been in bin Laden's thoughts; in 1996, he said, "The ordinary Saudi knows that his country is the largest oil producer in the world, yet at the same time he is suffering from taxes and bad services…Our country has become a colony of America…Saudis know their real enemy is America" (UPI Intelligence Watch, March 21, 2005).

Neighboring Iraq demonstrates the crippling effects of an insurgency on oil installations. Since June 2003, there have been 298 recorded attacks against Iraqi oil facilities (Institute for the Analysis of Global Security, http://www.iags.org/iraqpipelinewatch.htm). As of December 2005, Iraqi production was averaging around 1.9 million barrels per day as compared with its January 2003 2.58 million barrels per day production rate (U.S. Energy Information Administration, December 2005). Moreover, the costs of infrastructure attacks are becoming staggering, with the Iraqi oil ministry announcing on February 19 that insurgent attacks had cost the oil industry $6.25 billion in lost revenue during 2005.

Aside from Saudi crude oil production capacity being the world's largest, at 10.5-11 million barrels per day, Saudi Arabia, along with the United Arab Emirates, controls the world's only significant excess production capacity, an extra 2.5-3 million barrels per day. This makes the kingdom the world's only guarantor of liquidity in the oil market. The Saudi economy is heavily dependent on energy, with oil export revenues bringing in around 90-95 percent of total Saudi export earnings, and generating around 40 percent of the country's gross domestic product.

The country's hydrocarbon infrastructure, with its massive production fields, ports and 10,000 miles of pipelines, presents a number of opportunities for potential attackers, whose success would have implications far beyond the kingdom, driving the world into recession or depression as energy costs soar.

Over half of Saudi Arabia's oil reserves are contained in just eight massive fields, including the huge 130-mile long, 20-mile wide Ghawar field, covering 2,600 square miles. Ghawar alone accounts for nearly half of Saudi Arabia's total oil production capacity. Aramco's skein of pipelines depends on 30 pumping stations, powered by six generators, which would shut down the flow if destroyed. Port facilities are concentrated on a 20-mile stretch of Persian Gulf shoreline from Juaymah to al-Khobar.

Saudi Arabia's offshore Safaniya oilfield is the largest of its kind in the world, with estimated reserves of 35 billion barrels. Continuing the trend toward gigantism, the Abqaiq refinery 25 miles inland from the Gulf of Bahrain processes about two-thirds of Saudi Arabia's crude oil. On the Persian Gulf, Saudi Arabia's Ras Tanura facility is the world's largest offshore oil loading facility, accounting for a tenth of the world's daily oil supply. A second loading facility is at Ras al-Juaymah, while Yanbu terminal is located on the Red Sea, supplied from Abqaiq via the 750-mile East-West pipeline.

Terrorist attacks could be easily launched against onshore facilities and tankers. Over 60 percent of the world's oil is shipped on 3,500 tankers through a small number of "chokepoints" including the Strait of Hormuz, which alone transits 13 million barrels of oil per day.

Al-Qaeda has already carried out maritime attacks on both warships and tankers. On October 6, 2002, the 299,364 DWT-ton French Very Large Crude Carrier (VLCC) tanker Limburg, carrying a cargo of 397,000 barrels of crude from Iran to Malaysia, was rammed by an explosives-laden boat off the port of Ash Shihr at Mukalla, 353 miles east of Aden. A crewman was killed and the double-hulled tanker was breached. The impact on the Yemeni economy was immediate, as maritime insurers tripled their rates.

Al-Qaeda issued a statement following the attack warning that it "was not an incidental strike at a passing tanker but...on the international oil-carrying line in the full sense of the word," prompting the U.S. Navy's Maritime Liaison Office in Bahrain to issue a warning stating that "Shipmasters should exercise extreme caution when transiting...strategic chokepoints such as the Strait of Hormuz, or Bab el-Mandeb, or...traditional high-threat areas such as along the Horn of Africa."

Al-Qaeda's cadre of maritime specialists recently received a boost when on February 3, 23 prisoners escaped from a jail in Sanaa. Five days later, Interpol issued a global security alert, a Red Notice, to its 184 member states, as law enforcement officials believe that at least 13 of the fugitives have links to al-Qaeda. Among those who broke out of the prison was Jamal al-Badawi, who was serving a 10-year sentence for his part in the October 12, 2000 bombing of the destroyer USS Cole in Aden harbor during a refueling stop; 17 sailors died and 39 more were injured in the attack.

The most worrisome scenario revolves around al-Qaeda crashing a hijacked commercial passenger jet into an oil installation. To consider just one scenario, a jetliner crashing into the Ras Tanura facility could remove 10 percent of the world's energy imports in one shot.

Former CIA agent Robert Baer has considered the implications of terrorist attacks on Saudi oil facilities, writing, "At the least, a moderate-to-severe attack on Abqaiq would slow average production there from 6.8 million barrels a day to roughly a million barrels for the first two months post-attack, a loss equivalent to approximately one-third of America's current daily consumption of crude oil. Even as long as seven months after an attack, Abqaiq output would still be about 40 percent of pre-attack output, as much as four million barrels below normal—roughly equal to what all of the OPEC partners collectively took out of production during the devastating 1973 embargo" (see Robert Baer's Sleeping with the Devil: How Washington Sold our Soul for Saudi Crude). An al-Qaeda assault on Abqaiq would have the added propaganda effect of killing Americans. Abqaiq is an oil-company town; in 2005, nearly half of its approximately 2,000 inhabitants were U.S. citizens.

In the last few years, the Saudis have moved to tighten security around their oil installations. Unlike in Iraq, where insurgent attacks are focused mainly on the country's hydrocarbon infrastructure, thus far al-Qaeda attacks in Saudi Arabia have focused on "soft targets," namely the 3,000 foreign oil workers employed in the kingdom.

On December 16, 2004, bin Laden released an audiotape making an explicit connection between U.S. forces in Iraq and the region's oil reserves; in the audiotape, he praised the terrorists who attacked the U.S. Consulate in Jeddah. Bin Laden said, "Targeting America in Iraq in terms of economy and losses in life is a golden and unique opportunity. Do not waste it only to regret it later. One of the most important reasons that led our enemies to control our land is the theft of our oil. Do everything you can to stop the biggest plundering operation in history—the plundering of the resources of the present and future generations in collusion with the agents and the aliens...Be active and prevent them from reaching the oil, and mount your operations accordingly, particularly in Iraq and the Gulf, for this is their fate" (BBC, December 16, 2004). Three days later, the "al-Qaeda Organization in the Arabian Peninsula" posted a message on its website urging its members "to strike all foreign targets and the hideouts of the tyrants to rid the peninsula of the infidels and their supporters. We call on all the mujahideen to target the sources of oil which do not serve the Islamic nation but serve the enemies of the nation" (Agence France Press, December 19, 2004).

Judging by al-Qaeda's pronouncements, an attack on Saudi Arabian oil facilities seems to be only a matter of time. In terms of the global impact of such a strike, Robert Baer provides an extreme but not altogether improbable scenario: "Such an attack would be more economically damaging than a dirty nuclear bomb set off in midtown Manhattan or across from the White House in Lafayette Square…[and] would be enough to bring the world's oil-addicted economies to their knees, America's along with them."
Posted by: Dan Darling || 02/28/2006 02:29 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [2 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Judging by al-Qaeda's pronouncements, an attack on Saudi Arabian oil facilities seems to be only a matter of time. In terms of the global impact of such a strike, Robert Baer provides an extreme but not altogether improbable scenario: "Such an attack would be more economically damaging than a dirty nuclear bomb set off in midtown Manhattan or across from the White House in Lafayette Square…[and] would be enough to bring the world's oil-addicted economies to their knees, America's along with them."

But it'll stop global warming, won't it.
Posted by: gromgoru || 02/28/2006 6:29 Comments || Top||


Europe
A threat to the Italian general elections?
The upcoming general elections in Italy, scheduled for April 9, present a perfect opportunity for Islamic militants to disrupt the Italian political process and destabilize a key U.S. ally by staging a massive terrorist attack.

On January 24, the director of Italy's Military Intelligence and Security Service (SISMI), Nicolò Pollari, officially addressed the issue of possible terrorist attacks against Italy at a hearing before the parliamentary committee for oversight of secret services (COPACO). The government's key figure, Deputy Secretary Gianni Letta, also attended the conference. Moreover, on February 17, Rome's secret services stated in their six-month report to parliament that the riskiest time for an attack would be either during the Winter Olympic Games (February 10-26) or just before the elections.

Although worries about terrorist threats to Turin's Winter Olympic Games have attracted the most global media attention, Pollari said that the upcoming April 9 legislative elections (followed by the election for a new head of state) are also a high-risk event in light of information collected by the Italian intelligence community. Pollari added that pro-active monitoring of extremist activities will have to be stepped up during the electoral campaign that started on February 11 (RAI, January 24).

COPACO's director, Enzo Bianco, told the press after the hearing that "information from various sources collected both in Italy and abroad indicate particular exposure to risk in the coming months" as the elections approach. "There is concrete evidence, as well as analyses, which confirm the need for high alert in Italy," Bianco added, before calling for the avoidance of scaremongering in relation to this news (La Repubblica, January 25).

Although Italy's secret services have avoided disclosing the sources of their information, the Italian media has identified some elements that may well be among those scrutinized closely by intelligence analysts.

The first dates back to January 24, when a Lombardy-based private TV Channel, Odeon-Telereporter, broadcast an interview with Abdul Qadir Fall Mamour, a Senegalese imam deported to his home country by Italian authorities in November 2003 after he had been branded a national security threat due to his praise for Osama bin Laden. Mamour, the former imam of Carmagnola (Lombardy), said Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi and other key political figures in the country "will be attacked in the vicinity of the elections" (La Padania, January 25).

Mamour, whose trustworthiness is questioned by many counter-terrorism specialists, had told journalists that he had "personally heard bin Laden ordering the punishment of Berlusconi and Blair." Despite Mamour's dubious reliability, his declarations remain of obvious interest to analysts for two reasons. First of all, he had been living and preaching in Italy, and had therefore been able to make direct contact with Italy's Islamist circles. Secondly, he allegedly has close connections with al-Qaeda-related Islamist groups and is said to be personally acquainted with some prominent extremist leaders.

Mamour had already warned Italy last July, immediately after the London bombings, that terrorist attacks were likely to be attempted in 2006 since Italy was "next in line" among the supporters of the U.S.-led war in Iraq. Furthermore, he even claimed that militants would strike with "weapons of mass destruction" in major Italian cities. In his recent interview, he explained to Odeon-Telereporter journalists that Rome, Milan, Turin, Bologna and Venice are the most probable targets of the planned attacks.

A second source was highlighted by the Italian daily La Repubblica on January 27, which gave more precise and alarming information. Journalist Claudia Fusani extensively described the contents of a confidential document issued by Rome's Interior Ministry, which referred to "articulated information," carefully analyzed by the Anti-Terrorism Strategic Analysis Committee (CASA). CASA is based in the Interior Ministry and formed by officials of the Italian police, the Carabinieri, and the financial police, in addition to Italian and foreign intelligence analysts.

The information in question consists of intelligence reports regarding a planned terrorist attack targeting Milan's main railway station (Milano Centrale) to be perpetrated "in the first half of March 2006, so as to strike the Italian government near the elections in order to condition the outcome." Further investigation, the article states, has confirmed the attack was conceived so as to coincide with the key political event.

The intelligence reported by La Repubblica even specifies the operational method of the planned strike. Two powerful explosives would be detonated in the railway station, with an interval of one-half-hour between the two blasts. The idea is to target passengers first and then the rescue services quickly thereafter.

Interestingly, the document reveals that the basic information had been provided to intelligence agencies by a "Middle Eastern man who has been living in Italy for a year" and collaborates with Italy's secret services. The man provided details, the document states, about a meeting he had with "four foreigners." One of them, called "A.M." in the report, is said to have described the planning of terrorist attacks against both the Olympic Games and the elections. In addition, "A.M." has reportedly spoken about a "bag," presumably containing explosives, that is supposed to arrive in Milan from Romania.

It is unclear, however, whether the contents of this "bag" were intended for the "three aspiring Syrian suicide bombers," alleged to be planning to attack the Turin Olympic Games and who were identified in Milan in January and deported to Syria, or instead for the possible attack on Milan's railway station.

Eavesdropping—disclosed during the aforementioned hearing of January 24—has added further evidence to those preliminary indications, confirmed also by intelligence material collected by SISMI and analyzed by CASA on January 20 at the Italian Ministry of Internal Affairs (La Repubblica, January 27).

On February 2, after another hearing, COPACO's Director Enzo Bianco said that Dr. Mario Mori, the chief of Italy's SISDE (Secret Services for Democratic Security), had highlighted Italy's "high exposure" to terrorism during the interval between the Olympic Games and the elections. He also said, however, that Mori did not reveal any concrete evidence of plans to carry out specific attacks (ANSA Press Agency, February 2).

Professor Arduino Paniccia, a strategic studies expert at Trieste University and a specialist on terrorism, told Terrorism Monitor that "a terror attack shortly before the elections is probably more likely to occur than one against the Olympic Games." Several elements, Paniccia said, suggest the coming political event will be a critical moment. "There are signals indicating a resurgence of al-Qaeda," he stated, "as the recent tapes by Ayman al-Zawahiri and Osama bin Laden seem to indicate." There is likely to be a "connection between such messages and the planning of new attacks in Western countries," he said, insisting that "today's context is very similar to those of previous attacks in Europe." In fact, Paniccia said, it is impossible to overlook the reality that the Madrid bombings of 2004 coincided with general elections, and that London was struck during the G-8 summit at Gleneagles.

Moreover, the Italian specialist added, "the danger in Italy today is in fact greater than some months ago, given the furious anger unleashed by the irreverent cartoons of Prophet Mohammed and also because new key Islamist militant figures appear to have less respect for Rome and Italy as symbols of worldwide Christianity."

Italian magistrate Armando Spataro recently told the media that Islamist terrorism cells had changed their strategic use of European territory. "Before the Madrid attacks," he said, "European countries were considered mainly as a logistics base," but "this situation has changed, and every EU country is now at risk" (Famiglia Cristiana, January 22).

As with all intelligence analysis on terrorist activities, a crucial element is the identification of the most likely targets. Rome and the Vatican City are obviously exposed near election time due to their political and religious significance. Italy, however, is full of places of high symbolic value. For instance, Venice is a sensitive target for many reasons. One of Europe's major tourist destinations and a city unique in the world, it was once a powerful republic that successfully fought against the chief Muslim power in the 16th century: in the Gulf of Lepanto (Western Greece), Venice, allied with Spain, defeated a powerful Ottoman fleet.

Apart from that historical memory, Venice is also a possible target because of its extensive chemical-industry site at Porto Marghera. "A massive strike against the chemical facilities in that area," according to Paniccia, "would be simply devastating." Similarly, "a suicide attack against the city carried out with boats would combine maximum damage with the greatest possible impact," he said.

A high-casualty attack linked to the elections would prove "profoundly destabilizing for Italy," and could also be a heavy blow for the U.S. since "Washington's capability as a security provider would be severely damaged," Paniccia concluded.

Commenting on the terrorism threat, Interior Minister Giuseppe Pisanu told the press that Italy's strategy of enhanced human intelligence and strategic cooperation with foreign secret services has already produced encouraging results and helped to prevent several terrorist attacks (Famiglia Cristiana, January 22). It is to be expected, therefore, that this strategy will be steadfastly pursued by Italy in the crucial weeks ahead.
Posted by: Dan Darling || 02/28/2006 02:28 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  I didn't realize the Italian election was April 9 when I read the article last week that was pointing to some kind of major attack or disruption for April 8. Can't recall the source - perhaps it was citing Zawahiri, or maybe Ahmadinejadi. Can anyone else refresh my memory?
Posted by: Glenmore || 02/28/2006 10:14 Comments || Top||


India-Pakistan
Baluchistan under al-Qaeda's shadow
The sudden surge in violence in southern Afghanistan, which Kabul blames on Pakistan-based al-Qaeda and Taliban fighters, has thrust Baluchistan into the international spotlight (Dawn, January 21). Afghanistan's southeastern province of Kandahar and southwestern province of Helmand, which border Baluchistan, have recently convulsed with violence. On January 16, Kandahar's border town of Spin Boldak, which adjoins northwestern Baluchistan, suffered a deadly suicide attack in which 26 people were killed. Since November 2005, there have been 13 suicide attacks in Afghanistan. Similarly, Helmand, which borders southwestern Baluchistan, has witnessed the Taliban's lethal engagements with Afghan and coalition forces; on February 3, for instance, 25 people were killed in a skirmish (BBC, February 4).

Afghan leaders blamed the violence on the growing presence of al-Qaeda and Taliban fighters in Baluchistan, who are reportedly using the area as their logistical base, while keeping their military base in Pakistan's Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA), especially its North and South Waziristan agencies. It is worth noting that FATA, including North and South Waziristan, is a geographical extension of northwestern Baluchistan. Successive governments in Kabul have described this area as "South Pashtunistan," to which they have laid territorial claims. Whenever al-Qaeda and Taliban fighters have come under military pressure in North and South Waziristan, they have retreated into Baluchistan where they instantly drop off the radar. Baluchistan's vast deserts, high-rolling mountains, and sparsely populated plains provides many places to hide.

In late 2005, however, al-Qaeda and the Taliban transformed Baluchistan from a logistics center to an operational base. Two factors explain this shift. The first factor is that al-Qaeda and the Taliban have brought FATA and North and South Waziristan under their virtual writ. They have successfully immobilized 70,000 Pakistani troops in the area, forcing them into their fortified barracks and checkpoints. In February 2005, the Pakistani military indirectly paid them 32 million rupees (about half a million dollars) in extortion money (South Asia Tribune, February 10). Having tamed the government, they brought in line the local population by executing more than 100 government loyalists in North and South Waziristan alone (Dawn, January 19). None of these executions have been punished by Islamabad. These militants are now regulating moral life, administering justice, and enforcing their version of Sharia in the region. Their control is so complete that one of their clerical allies has set up an FM Radio Station in the neighboring town of Bara near Peshawar to air his religious broadcasts against non-Salafi Muslims (Dawn, January 18). The government has yet to take the station off the air and dismantle the illegal radio transmissions. These intrepid measures suggest that al-Qaeda and the Taliban feel far safer in FATA and no longer need Baluchistan as a safe haven.

The second factor is that the impending redeployment of U.S. troops in Kandahar has further emboldened the insurgents to open another front in Baluchistan. They think that NATO forces, which will replace U.S. troops, cannot match their determined assaults. Al-Qaeda and the Taliban think that they can bring Kandahar and Helmand under heavy military pressure by mounting attacks from northwestern and southwestern Baluchistan.

Alarmed by the gathering strength of the Taliban and other Pashtun insurgents, Afghan leaders believe that the Afghan provinces along the Durand Line with Pakistan—such as Kandahar, Helmand, Kunar and Paktika—are increasingly vulnerable to insurgent attacks. The Afghan minister for foreign affairs publicly accused Islamabad of allowing al-Qaeda and the Taliban to regroup in Baluchistan (Khabrain, January 21). It is pertinent to note that Pashtuns live in the northwest of Baluchistan and Baluchs in the southwest. Pashtuns in northwestern Baluchistan are ethnically linked to those in Kandahar. Spin Boldak, Kandahar's border town, adjoins northwest Baluchistan's border city of Chaman, whose residents routinely cross over into Spin Boldak and stay there at will. Many top leaders of Lashkar-i-Jhangvi, a Sunni supremacist terrorist group (and the armed wing of the formerly Sipah-e-Sahaba organization) that has killed hundreds of Shiites in Baluchistan and elsewhere in Pakistan, took up residence in Chaman after the fall of the Taliban.

On the other hand, the Afghan province of Helmand has a substantial Baluch population. Although there is no evidence that Afghan Baluchs are helping al-Qaeda or the Taliban, Baluch residents of Helmand have long supported the nationalist Baluch armed struggle against Islamabad. Al-Qaeda and the Taliban, however, draw on the religious affiliation of Baluchs, who happen to be predominantly Sunni. What fires up this mutuality, however, is the alleged persecution of Sunni Baluchs by the Iranian government. Iranian Baluchs are spread across southern Khorasan and Sistan-Baluchistan provinces in southeastern Iran and have long nursed grievances against Iran's Shiite majority. Such grievances find ready resonance with their nationalist co-ethnics in Afghanistan's provinces of Helmand, Farah, Nimroz and Herat, as well as in Pakistani Baluchistan. To avenge the "persecution" of Iranian Sunni Baluchs, al-Qaeda and its allied group Jandallah are reported to have established a presence in southeastern Iran. Recently, Jandallah's fighters kidnapped nine Iranian soldiers from Saravan along the Iran-Pakistan border. Iranians asked Islamabad to intervene, but nothing happened. On January 29, Jandallah, on its own terms, released the soldiers after two months of captivity (Dawn, January 29). Lawlessness in southeastern Iran, on the border of southwestern Baluchistan, is so widespread that on December 15, 2005, a motorcade of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad came under heavy fire on Zabul-Saravan Highway, in which one of his bodyguards was killed (Jomhouri Islami, December 17, 2005).

Although southwestern (Pakistani) Baluchistan is predominantly Baluch, it also, however, represents a demographic twist. In the 1970s-1980s, the Pakistani government settled hundreds of thousands of Afghan refugees of Pashtun descent as a buffer between Iranian and Pakistani Baluchs. The major brunt of this resettlement was borne by the all-Baluch border town of Chaghi, which made its name as Pakistan's nuclear-test site in May 1998, turning its native Baluch population into a minority. Afghan Pashtuns of this restive border area provide much-needed cover to the fleeing operatives of al-Qaeda and the Taliban, as well as to the gangs of gunrunners and drug traffickers, who saturate the place.

In addition, Pakistani Baluchistan has been gripped by an active Baluch insurgency before and after the fall of the Taliban, which Pakistan blames on Afghanistan and India. This insurgency is so fierce that on December 14, 2005, Baluch rebels fired scores of rockets at Musharraf while he was present in the heavily guarded Quetta Garrison. Earlier reports indicated that rockets were fired at Musharraf when he was addressing a public meeting in the troubled district of Kohlu in southwestern Baluchistan. Although Pakistani intelligence agencies set off rumors of al-Qaeda's presence in Kohlu, there is no evidence that Baluch nationalists have any link with al-Qaeda. The Baluch insurgency and Pakistan's restive western borders with Afghanistan are, however, absorbing almost one-third of Pakistan's military resources, which relieve some pressure from al-Qaeda and the Taliban.

More importantly, al-Qaeda and the Taliban are benefiting from the rising tide of crime in Pakistan, especially in its most populous province of Punjab, where, according to Dr. Mubashar Hassan, Pakistan's former finance minister, 52,000 outlaws are on the run. Many of them have joined jihadi organizations to escape detection. Tens of thousands of them have since moved into Baluchistan, where they have set up "ferari (fugitives) camps." Many of them have secured the protection of Baluchistan's cabinet ministers, who are largely drawn from the pro-Taliban Jamiat-I-Ulema-I-Islam (JUI). Pakistani intelligence agencies overlook JUI leaders' patronage of feraris to curb Baluch nationalists. Recently, a senior ranking JUI minister unleashed his operatives into the private residence of a prominent Baluch nationalist leader, Attaullah Mengal, in Wadh. Intelligence agencies, as such, are combating "ethnic nationalism" with pro-Pakistan "Islamic nationalism."

While Afghan leaders charge that al-Qaeda and the Taliban are present in Baluchistan, the governor of Baluchistan, Owais Ghani, emphatically rejects this assertion. "We have swept Baluchistan clean of even the shadow of Taliban and al-Qaeda," says Ghani. Instead, he has slapped Kabul with a charge sheet of his own: "We have seen 500 million rupees worth (approximately US$8.2 million) of Afghan weapons being smuggled into Baluchistan every year" (Khabrain, February 4). Musharraf further berates Kabul and coalition forces for their lax control of the Afghan border that he regards as enabling terrorists to sneak into Pakistani territory.

Contrary to Pakistan's denials, diplomatic sources claim that al-Qaeda's leaders have found refuge in Baluchistan. A Western diplomat claims that the Pakistani government squandered a CIA lead that bin Laden was hiding in Baluchistan because Islamabad "delayed giving permission for the attack on its soil" (Dawn, January 30). The source said that by the time U.S. officials received the go-ahead, bin Laden had left the suspected hideout in Zhob in Baluchistan, where he and "his bodyguards had sought temporary shelter." The source speculated that "elements within Pakistan's ISI [Inter-Services Intelligence] may have sought to protect bin Laden."

Similarly, Afghan President Hamid Karzai recently alleged that Mullah Omar is hiding in Baluchistan. Asfandyar Wali Khan, Pakistan's most prominent pro-Karzai Pashtun leader, publicly castigated Pakistani intelligence agencies for holding Afghanistan hostage to their misguided Afghan policy. Wali goes so far as to claim that intelligence agencies are treating al-Qaeda and Taliban leaders as their "guests" (Dawn, January 18).
Posted by: Dan Darling || 02/28/2006 02:27 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:


Arabia
Yemen's passive role in the war on terrorism
For the past five years, Yemen has been what is best described as a passive partner in the U.S.-led war on terrorism. It has taken a number of steps to limit the activities of al-Qaeda and other like-minded groups within the country, but most of these have been at the behest of the U.S., and it is often schizophrenic in its pursuit of Islamic militants. In April 2004, Prime Minister Abd al-Qadir Bajammal claimed that Yemen had eradicated 90 percent of the al-Qaeda organization in the country. Yet rumors that factions within the country's political and security establishment assisted in the recent jailbreak of 23 militants, including prominent figures in the attacks on the USS Cole and the Limburg, have once again raised questions about Yemen's reliability as an ally in the war on terrorism (Terrorism Focus, February 7).

In the immediate aftermath of the September 11 attacks, Yemen was often mentioned in the same breath as Afghanistan as a possible hideout for al-Qaeda. Many Yemenis, including prominent government officials, felt their country was next on a "hit list" after the U.S. finished in Afghanistan. That fear has been expressed more recently by President Ali Abdullah Saleh, during a speech in Aden in December 2005, when he claimed that he dissuaded the U.S. from occupying the country following the attack on the USS Cole in October 2000 (al-Arabiya, December 1, 2005).

The country's fears stemmed from a long and close history with Islamic militants. Following the withdrawal of Soviet troops from Afghanistan in 1989, many of these fighters—known as Afghan Arabs—made their way back to their countries of origin, full of religious zeal and the thrill of victory, and eager to replicate their successes at home. The governments of the Arab world, however, were not as excited with the prospect of a local jihad within their borders. Massive crackdowns by many of these governments forced a number of the Afghan Arabs to flee their countries yet again. Many of them seized on an apocryphal hadith of the Prophet Muhammad: "When disorder threatens, seek refuge in Yemen." Even Osama bin Laden has alluded to the ideas expressed in the hadith and the situation in Yemen during the mid-1990s when he told Abd al-Bari Atwan of al-Quds al-Arabi in an interview in November 1996 that he would like to live in Yemen because it was one of the few places in the Arab world where one could still breathe the air of freedom.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Dan Darling || 02/28/2006 02:27 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


Soddy al-Qaeda members were from leading Soddy tribes
In a sign of weakening loyalties to the ruling tribe of Al-Saud, two Saudi suicide bombers who attacked the Abqaiq gas plant Friday, hail from two leading Saudi Najdi families with numerous members occupying leading official positions in the absolute monarchy.

The first suicide bomber Abdullah AbdulAziz AlTwaiajri's, is relative to Abdul Aziz Al-Twaijri, King Abdullah's closest advisor for over 50 years, and among the most influential men in the country. Khalid and Abdul Mohsen Al-Twaijri are secretary and advisor for the King consecutively. Ahmed Othman Al-Twaijri is a member of the Shoura Council, and Major General Saad Al-Twaijri is the head of the Saudi Civil Defense. Numerous other members of Al-Twaijri family occupy political and security positions. Similarly is the case of Mohamed Saleh Al-Ghaith, who is a relative of Wahhabi cleric Ibrahim Abdullah Al-Ghaith, the head of the Saudi religious police.

The Al-Saud ruling tribe depends on the loyalty of Najdi families to assure its grip on the country. Thus these families have been the prime recipients of most senior government offices. The fact that these families comprise Al-Qaeda suicide bombers undercuts the security of the tribal monarchy, and reveals that Al-Qaeda has penetrated and split the loyalty of leading families, families that the ruling Al-Saud depends on to maintain control. The Saudi government is dominated by Najdi officials, lead by the ruling tribe of Al-Saud, which occupies the largest share of senior political positions. A study by Dr. Mohamed Bin Sunitan, published in 2005, found that 78% of senior government jobs were held by Najdis, who make up only 26% of the country's citizens.
Posted by: Dan Darling || 02/28/2006 02:21 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Every family has its black sheep.
Posted by: Howard UK || 02/28/2006 7:46 Comments || Top||

#2  Every family has its black sheep.

Is there a Saudi that isn't the black sheep of his family?
Posted by: Robert Crawford || 02/28/2006 7:54 Comments || Top||

#3  The real infiltrators into the Saud family are the democrats, that is, individuals with democratic tendencies. And while the al-Qaeda might be purged, the democrats will continue to unceasingly push for more democracy.

The important distinction is that al-Q offers only destruction; whereas the democrats offer a better way of doing business. The latter will win.
Posted by: Anonymoose || 02/28/2006 8:07 Comments || Top||

#4  Faster please, moose.
Posted by: Scott R || 02/28/2006 10:06 Comments || Top||

#5  Similarly is the case of Mohamed Saleh Al-Ghaith, who is a relative of Wahhabi cleric Ibrahim Abdullah Al-Ghaith, the head of the Saudi religious police.

Pure coincidence, I'm sure.
Posted by: mojo || 02/28/2006 11:19 Comments || Top||

#6  Fox breaking: the leader of AQ in Saudi was among those killed in the attack last week
Posted by: Frank G || 02/28/2006 12:28 Comments || Top||

#7  They all have delusions of grandeur.

It's usually the rich, pampered ones.

Posted by: anonymous2u || 02/28/2006 15:09 Comments || Top||

#8  The mills of the Gods grind slowly, but they grind exceedingly fine.
Posted by: gromgoru || 02/28/2006 15:30 Comments || Top||

#9  Ain't that the shitz?
Posted by: Captain America || 02/28/2006 17:09 Comments || Top||


Israel-Palestine-Jordan
Iran plans to turn Hamas into Palestinian Hezbollah
Iran wants the same control over Hamas it has over Hizbullah, an organization that is nothing less than a "delivery system" for Iranian weapons, Henry A. Crumpton, the State Department's counterterrorism coordinator, told the Jerusalem Post.

Crumpton, who last week held a joint counter-terror dialogue with Israel, said that while most pundits think in terms of missiles when talking about Iranian delivery systems, Hizbullah - which he said is "just an extension of the Iranian government" - must be thought of in these terms as well. (The full text of the interview will appear in Tuesday's Jerusalem Post.)

"You combine the Iranian nuclear weapons program with Hizbullah, and that is a pretty nasty mixture," he said.

Crumpton said that while Iran does not yet have that kind of control over Hamas, "it is clearly an objective. The Iranians would love to have another proxy like that."

Asked what will keep Hamas from gaining such control, Crumpton said, "I hope the Palestinian people; and I hope the leadership of Hamas, if they are going to be responsible or courageous enough."

Crumtpon, a 20-year CIA veteran and highly respected former spy master, has been credited with coming up with the US strategy after the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks to use elite intelligence and military officers together with elements of Afghani society to oust the Taliban.

Faint echoes of a partnership strategy can be heard when he talks about the how the international community and US should be acting vis- -vis Hamas.

While the two situations are markedly different - primarily because while the Taliban was foisted on the Afghans, the Palestinians voted for Hamas themselves - Crumpton said the similarity is that "Israel and the US cannot impose our will, force our will on the Palestinian people, they have to be a part of this."

The soft spoken Crumpton "starred" in the US's National Commission report on 9/11 as the person known simply as "Henry" who pressed the CIA to do more in Afghanistan to hunt down Osama bin Laden before the attacks in the US, but who had two of his key proposals rejected.

He also figured prominently in Bob Woodward's book on the war in Afghanistan, Bush at War, this time as the CIA operative "Hank" who - among other things - understood the importance of money and aid in gaining the support of Afghan warlords.

"This is not about us versus them," Crumpton said about Hamas and the PA. "It is about the Palestinian people working with foreign partners -the US, Europe and Israel - to persuade the new Hamas government to be responsible, or if not, then eventually get a new government in there."

While he did not say that the goal was to economically destabilize the PA so that the population would turn on Hamas, he did say the US was not interested in giving Hamas a "free ride."

"This is not about destabilizing the PA, it is about providing humanitarian assistance to the Palestinian people while not supporting Hamas, and giving the Hamas the political opportunity to step forward and become responsible leaders," Crumpton said.

He was not, however, starry eyed about the prospects of Hamas rising to the occasion by recognizing Israel, accepting previous agreement with it, and renouncing terrorism.

"I think it will be tough," he said. "I think that they will have to make some bold decisions, and fundamentally change the way they look at Israel and the world. It won't be easy for them; I'm not kidding myself about this. To a large degree violence is part of their identity, it defines who they are. But change is not impossible."

Things are not being made any easier, he said, by the fact that countries such as Russia and Turkey are relating to Hamas as a legitimate actor, "when they are clearly not. It is a problem. We have communicated this. We have told the Russia and others that this is not helpful."
Posted by: Dan Darling || 02/28/2006 02:20 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  I think the Egyptian Brotherhood may have something to say about that. Hamas is one of their wholly-owned subsidiaries, and I find it unlikely they will be willing to share.
Posted by: Anonymoose || 02/28/2006 8:09 Comments || Top||

#2  Iran had to share control of Hizb Allah in Lebanon with Syria for many years and even today, Hizb Allah does more work for Syria than for Iran. Frankly, I think Iran may be dissappointed in what Hizb has done over the past few years.

Hamas also represents a liability for Iran. As Anonymoose points out, they owe the Moslem brotherhood and they also owe Syria because Syria has given them diplomatic support for two decades. They also owe various Saudis for past aid. With Hamas running the PA show they are a big revenue sink and sooner or later they are going to get the general Paleo population upset at them.

Posted by: mhw || 02/28/2006 9:34 Comments || Top||

#3  While I don't doubt that Iran would like to control Hamas, why would Sunni Arab Hamas want to be controlled by Shia Persian Iran?
Posted by: Spot || 02/28/2006 10:19 Comments || Top||

#4  And get their asses handed to them on a regular basis by the IDF/IAF?

Hokay.
Posted by: mojo || 02/28/2006 10:22 Comments || Top||

#5  Ditto Mojo!
Posted by: Visitor || 02/28/2006 14:32 Comments || Top||

#6  While I don't doubt that Iran would like to control Hamas, why would Sunni Arab Hamas want to be controlled by Shia Persian Iran?
There's this olde joke about a scorpion wanting a ride from a baby crocodile across the Nile.....

Punchline "What did you expect... it's the Middle East"
Posted by: 6 || 02/28/2006 17:11 Comments || Top||

#7  The franchise business with an epicenter in Tehran, sounds like striking the core makes sense.
Posted by: Captain America || 02/28/2006 17:31 Comments || Top||


Europe
GIA financier faces trial in France
A key suspect in a deadly series of terror attacks in Paris in 1995 went on trial today after a decade-long battle by France for his extradition from Britain.

Rachid Ramda, considered the banker for Algerian terrorists who carried out the bombings in the Paris Metro, faces charges of providing logistical help for the attackers. He risks up to 10 years in prison.

The Paris trial, expected to run until March 22, is only the first act in Ramda’s judicial confrontation. In a second trial, not yet scheduled, he will answer to murder charges in the deaths of eight people and the attempted killing of 150 others in three attacks.

For 10 years, Ramda was the object of an extradition battle between Paris and London, which began taking a tougher stance on terror suspects after the September 11, 2001, al Qaida attacks on the United States.

Once Britain gave the green light for his extradition, Ramda used every possible appeal to avoid his transfer to France. He was extradited to France in December, and his first trial date was set days later.

The session is unlikely to go like clockwork.

Ramda’s lawyer, Guillaume Barbe, says he will seek to have the trial postponed until the end of a police inspection into alleged torture of Islamic militants arrested in crackdowns during the attacks.

A book published this month by three journalists at the newsweekly Le Point alleged that Islamist suspects were subjected to torture by interrogators in Paris and Lyon.

Supporters of a campaign to block extradition alleged that Ramda may eventually be deported from France to Algeria and could face execution there. But the British High Court judges said there was no real risk Ramda would be ill-treated in French custody or deported to Algeria.

The prosecution claims that Ramda provided funds for the attackers from his London base. On October 16, 1995, he allegedly sent a money order for £5,000 (€7,300) to one of the leaders of the bombing plots, Boualem Bensaid. Bensaid is now serving a life sentence in France.

A radical Algerian insurgency movement, the Armed Islamic Group, claimed responsibility for most of the attacks, revenge for alleged French support of Algeria’s military-backed government in the brutal insurgency there that began in 1992.

The bloodiest attack, on July 25, 1995, killed eight people at the Saint Michel Metro station and injured 150 others. Two other people died in later attacks and scores were injured.
Posted by: Dan Darling || 02/28/2006 02:16 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


International-UN-NGOs
Indians on high alert in Kashmir during Bush visit
Alerted by a plot to organise a major terror attack in J&K to coincide with and sabotage the visit of US president George Bush, Centre has put all the security forces in the state on high alert, according to top intelligence sources.

This follows a tip-off that terror groups, Al-Qaida affiliates Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-e-Mohammad, might attempt a repeat of the Chattissinghpura massacre of March 2000 on the eve of the visit of the then US president Bill Clinton.

Besides their intense loathing of the American president, the terrorist groups conspiring to pull off a headline grabbing incident in the Valley might also be motivated by their determination to embarrass the Indian government and to seek to portray J&K as a danger spot.

The possibility of India signing a nuclear energy deal is seen as a another driver.

Both Lashkar and Jaish figure on the top of the list of "potential threats" prepared by the US agencies collaborating with their Indian counterparts to secure the visit. Jaish is an offshoot of Harkat-ul-Mujahideen, which was one of the signatories of the infamous "jehad against the US and Jews" fatwa Al Qaida issued in 1998.

However, it is Lashkar which has emerged as the key strike formation of the Al-Qaida in the region. The close link that the jehadi outfit, a derivative of Ahl-e-Hadis sect, has formed with Qaida was borne out by the arrest of one of its senior figures, once the chief of its operations in J&K, in Iraq last year.

In March 2000, 35 Sikhs were gunned down at a time when New Delhi had pulled all stops to ward off any trouble in the Valley during Clinton's presence.
Posted by: Dan Darling || 02/28/2006 02:15 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:


Europe
European GICM leader arrested
Indeed, as the weekly La Gazette du Maroc reported citing insiders Moroccan sources, Saad Hussaini was arrested in Syria and extradited to Morocco.

As far as I know, Moroccan officials have not confirmed this scoop yet.

Hussaini is one of the leaders of the Moroccan Islamic Combatant Group GICM and is most likely the brain behind the Casablanca attacks in 2003 which killed 45 and the Madrid bombings in 2004 which killed 192.

Hussaini is considered by many as one of the GICM founders and its European leader.

According to Spanish press, Morocco and Spain have been looking for him for more than three years.

Hussaini was arrested in Syria a few months ago at the border with Iraq and was just delivered to Moroccan authorities. His capture was possible thanks to the cooperation between different intelligence services and in particular American ones. In fact, American operatives tracked Hussaini down from Pakistan to Afghanistan to Saudi Arabia and finally Syria where he was arrested. Since Hussaini is known by Western services for his efficient recruiting skills, he was most probably trying to recruit new mujahidins for the Jihad in Iraq.

If all this is confirmed, this is a very big catch and that's why French, Spanish and Belgian authorities are going to be very keen to interview him.
Posted by: Dan Darling || 02/28/2006 02:14 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


Southeast Asia
Al-Qaeda has bankrolled all major JI attacks
Osama bin Laden's terror network helped fund all the suicide bombings in Indonesia in recent years, a senior police official said Tuesday, highlighting links between al-Qaida and the regional militant group Jemaah Islamiyah.

Money for the attacks, which have occurred annually in the world's most populous Muslim country since 2002, was delivered by courier to leaders of Jemaah Islamiyah, said Col. Petrus Reinhard Folose of Indonesia's counterterrorism taskforce.

"It came from the head of al-Qaida," he told reporters on the sidelines of an international terrorism conference, refusing to say if he meant bin Laden himself.
Posted by: Dan Darling || 02/28/2006 02:11 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


Europe
Spanish al-Qaeda member arrested
Spanish police have arrested a Tunisian man in the southern city of Malaga as part of an investigation into an al Qaeda recruiting network that police cracked in December, the Interior Ministry said on Monday.

The ministry identified the man as Chafik Jalal, 44, and said in a statement that he was carrying two false French identity cards and a fake French driving licence.

In December, police arrested 16 people in Spain on suspicion of recruiting volunteers to send as suicide bombers or insurgents to Iraq, Chechnya or Kashmir. Two more people gave themselves up when they heard police were looking for them.

The judge jailed six of the suspects and freed the rest on condition that they report regularly to the courts near their homes.

The investigation focused on a mosque in Malaga that was attended by people with radical Islamist beliefs, the judge said.

Jalal was closely linked to the group's Iraqi leader, Abu Sufian, and helped provide recruits with false passports, the Interior Ministry statement said.
Posted by: Dan Darling || 02/28/2006 02:06 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


Southeast Asia
Yudhoyono and Downer warn of JI threat
The most dangerous terror groups are more resilient, creative and technologically savvy than ever, despite being driven further underground by the global security crackdown since Sept. 11, 2001, Indonesia's leader warned Monday.

"Terrorists keep changing their strategies and tactics," Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, the president of the world's most populous Islamic nation, in a speech to open an international counterterrorism conference.

To keep up, governments must anticipate these changes and adapt to them before the terrorists have a chance to strike, he said.

If the terrorists "try to think one step ahead, we must think two or three steps ahead," Yudhoyono told the conference in Jakarta, which brought together officials and experts from more than 40 nations.

Law enforcement agencies across the region have arrested hundreds of terror suspects, including top Jemaah Islamiyah leaders. The group's chief bomb-making expert Azahari bin Husin was killed last November in a raid on an Indonesian hideout.

But several key Jemaah Islamiyah leaders remain on the run, including Malaysian Noordin Top, its operational chief, and Dulmatin, an Indonesian electronics and explosives specialist who goes by only one name.

"The fact that they are on the run does not make them any less dangerous," Yudhoyono said.

They are "more adaptable, more resilient, more autonomous, more creative, more 'techno-minded' and more determined to launch spectacular attacks with no regard whatsoever for casualties," he said.

Yudhoyono cited al-Qaida's use of jetliners as missiles in the Sept. 11 attacks as an example of the ingenuity of some terrorists' thinking.

Australia's Foreign Minister Alexander Downer, whose people and embassy have been targeted by Jemaah Islamiyah attacks in Indonesia, said the recent adoption of the tactic of suicide bombings in Indonesia was a worrying trend.

The willingness of "misguided young men" to strap bombs to their bodies makes the planning and execution of attacks easier for terrorist leaders and permits the militants "to portray themselves, and their acts, in heroic terms," Downer said.

Conference participants said governments and religious leaders should make battling extremist Islamic thought a priority, and try to counter the militants' message that those who kill in the name of their faith will be rewarded in heaven.

"We must not lose this battle for the hearts and minds," Yudhoyono said.

"Yes, (terrorists) want to harm us, but they also want to radicalize our society, undermine our values, destabilize our community, because this is the best environment for them to grow."
Posted by: Dan Darling || 02/28/2006 02:05 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


Iraq
Mahdi Army may have killed 1,300 during initial Askariya violence
Grisly attacks and other sectarian violence unleashed by last week's bombing of a Shiite Muslim shrine have killed more than 1,300 Iraqis, making the past few days the deadliest of the war outside of major U.S. offensives, according to Baghdad's main morgue. The toll was more than three times higher than the figure previously reported by the U.S. military and the news media.

Hundreds of unclaimed dead lay at the morgue at midday Monday -- blood-caked men who had been shot, knifed, garroted or apparently suffocated by the plastic bags still over their heads. Many of the bodies were sprawled with their hands still bound -- and many of them had wound up at the morgue after what their families said was their abduction by the Mahdi Army, the Shiite militia of cleric Moqtada al-Sadr.

"After he came back from the evening prayer, the Mahdi Army broke into his house and asked him, 'Are you Khalid the Sunni infidel?' " one man at the morgue said, relating what were the last hours of his cousin, according to other relatives. "He replied yes and then they took him away."

Aides to Sadr denied the allegations, calling them part of a smear campaign by unspecified political rivals.

By Monday, violence between Sunni Arabs and Shiites appeared to have eased. As Iraqi security forces patrolled, American troops offered measured support, in hopes of allowing the Iraqis to take charge and prevent further carnage.

But at the morgue, where the floor was crusted with dried blood, the evidence of the damage already done was clear. Iraqis arrived throughout the day, seeking family members and neighbors among the contorted bodies.

"And they say there is no sectarian war?" demanded one man. "What do you call this?"

The brothers of one missing man arrived, searching for a body. Their hunt ended on the concrete floor, provoking sobs of mourning: "Why did you kill him?" "He was unarmed!" "Oh, my brother! Oh, my brother!"

Morgue officials said they had logged more than 1,300 dead since Wednesday -- the day the Shiites' gold-domed Askariya shrine was bombed -- photographing, numbering and tagging the bodies as they came in over the nights and days of retaliatory raids.

The Statistics Department of the Iraqi police put the nationwide toll at 1,020 since Wednesday, but that figure was based on paperwork that is sometimes delayed before reaching police headquarters. The majority of the dead had been killed after being taken away by armed men, police said.

The disclosure of the death tolls followed accusations by the U.S. military and later Iraqi officials that the news media had exaggerated the violence between Shiites and Sunnis over the past few days.

The bulk of the previously known deaths were caused by bombings and other large-scale attacks. But the scene at the morgue and accounts related by relatives indicated that most of the bloodletting came at the hands of self-styled executioners.

"They killed him just because he was a Sunni," one young man at the morgue said of his 32-year-old neighbor, whose body he was retrieving.

Much of the violence has centered on mosques, many of which were taken over by Shiite gunmen, bombed or burned.

In the Shiite holy city of Najaf, aides to Sadr denied any role in the killings.

"These groups wore black clothes like the Mahdi Army to make the people say that the Shiites kidnapped and killed them," said Riyadh al-Nouri, a close aide to Sadr.

Sahib al-Amiri, another close aide, said: "Some political party accused [Sadr's political party] and the Mahdi Army because they considered us as competitive to them. So they recruited criminals to kill Shiites and Sunnis."

After Wednesday's mosque attack in Samarra, Sadr and other Shiite clerics called on their armed followers to deploy to protect shrines across Iraq.

Clutching rocket-propelled grenade launchers and automatic rifles, the militias rolled out of their Baghdad base of Sadr City. Residents of several neighborhoods reported them on patrol or in control of mosques. U.S.-backed Iraqi security forces did not appear to challenge the militias, which are officially outlawed.

Sunni leaders charged that more than 100 Sunni mosques were burned, fired upon or bombed in the retaliatory violence after the attack on the Samarra mosque.

Iraqi officials, at the urging of Sunni leaders, imposed what became a round-the-clock curfew in Baghdad to try to quell the violence.

Sunnis speaking at the morgue said many of the dead had been taken away at night, when security forces were supposed to have been enforcing the curfew.

By Monday, the reported violence had subsided. Four mortar rounds hit a Shiite neighborhood of Baghdad, killing four people, news agencies reported. More mortar attacks boomed in other parts of the capital.

Also Monday, Iraq's interim government lifted the round-the-clock curfew in Baghdad. The new curfew orders residents inside from 8 p.m. to 6 a.m.

Residents rushed out of their homes to refill gas tanks and kitchen shelves. Lines at gas stations stretched for miles and sometimes clogged both sides of highways. One motorist in the line was seen clutching a blanket and pillow, apparently anticipating an overnight wait for gas.

Making their way through the traffic were a few cars with plastic-wrapped corpses in crude wooden coffins strapped to the roofs.

During two hours at the morgue on Monday, families brought in two more victims of the violence to receive death certificates. Other families carried away 10 dead. Most of the victims were Sunni.

At the blue steel doors of the morgue, dozens more bloody bodies could be seen on the floor or on gurneys. Two hundred were still unidentified and unclaimed, morgue workers said.

Claiming the dead has become automated. Morgue workers directed families to a barred window in the narrow courtyard outside the main entrance. A computer screen angled to face the window flashed the contorted, staring faces of the dead: men shot in the mouth, men shot in the head, men covered with blood, men with bindings twisted around their necks.

Men and a few women in black abayas pressed up to the window's black bars as the reek of the bodies inside spilled out.

"What neighborhood?'' a morgue worker asked one waiting man.

"Adhamiyah,'' the man said, naming a predominantly Sunni neighborhood.

Tapping at the keyboard, the morgue worker fast-forwarded through the scores of tortured faces.

"Criminals. How can you kill another human for nothing?" someone clutching the bars asked.

"Good news, we found the body," another man called out. "We found him."
Posted by: Dan Darling || 02/28/2006 01:56 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  It seems Sadr and his boys are up to their hips in this. Maybe this will be the time he gets wacked. For sure it's going to lead to a new round of score settling.
Posted by: SPoD || 02/28/2006 2:07 Comments || Top||

#2  I love democracy.
Posted by: gromgoru || 02/28/2006 6:25 Comments || Top||

#3  I was sceptical of the reported body count over the last few days. The good news here is the Sunnis needed a sharp lesson that stuff has consequences. Maybe they will get, maybe not. We shall see.
Posted by: phil_b || 02/28/2006 6:44 Comments || Top||

#4  "Criminals. How can you kill another human for nothing?" someone clutching the bars asked.

"Not like they were kaffir or anything."
Posted by: Robert Crawford || 02/28/2006 8:02 Comments || Top||

#5  Sadr should have been dealt with long ago. Unfortunately, his cover of religion (peaceful faith of Islam, etc, etc), successfully backed us off again.
Posted by: Visitor || 02/28/2006 8:21 Comments || Top||

#6  Iraqi TV has done a great job of getting terrorists on the screen bragging about their work.

I'd like to see a few of tater's tots doing the same kind of bragging.
Posted by: mhw || 02/28/2006 8:27 Comments || Top||

#7  It goes beyond human comprehension to understand why Sadr is still allowed to rob oxygen from more deserving lifeforms like cockroaches and lice.
Posted by: Zenster || 02/28/2006 11:36 Comments || Top||

#8  Does anybody know who would take charge of his minions if Sadr slipped and broke his neck? Ideally this would happen while he was standing on the gallows, but let's assume natural causes to simplify the politics.
Posted by: James || 02/28/2006 14:34 Comments || Top||

#9  Iraq the Model has totally different numbers. I'd be skeptical of anything I read about what's going on over there. This may be another attempt to promote a civil war, rather than actual, verifiable facts.
Posted by: Old Patriot || 02/28/2006 15:43 Comments || Top||

#10  Bet you're right OP.
Posted by: 6 || 02/28/2006 17:06 Comments || Top||

#11  I suspect it may be a media ramp-up to the "let's get out of Iraq" squack that will fully unleash to co-oincide with Bush's India visit. Aimed at freaking out the LLL hand-wringers. So is the kiddies march. Touches the heartstrings don't it? Poor widdle muslims that the west hate so.

It's possible an Al Q "PR event", with MSM loofing right along with stirring the pot.

Get ready for another round of "it's all America. it's all the joooooos fault." This time, all together now.
Posted by: Hupomoger Clans9827 || 02/28/2006 18:27 Comments || Top||


Syria-Lebanon-Iran
IAEA sez Iran still not cooperating
The International Atomic Energy Agency released a report today saying that it cannot conclude that Iran's nuclear program is intended for peaceful purposes only, as Tehran insists, unless Iran provides more information about its past activities, an agency official said.

The report was sent to the 35 nations that make up the agency's board of governors, who are to discuss the looming showdown over Iran at a meeting next week in Moscow. On Feb. 4, the board voted to refer Iran's case to the United Nations Security Council, but it extended a grace period of a month to allow for diplomatic efforts.

In the report, the agency's director, Dr. Mohamed ElBaradei, wrote that "it is regrettable and a matter of concern that the uncertainties related to the scope and nature of Iran's nuclear program have not been clarified after three years of intensive agency verification."

The report did not conclude that Iran is pursuing nuclear weapons, but rather that the agency cannot be sure that nothing is being hidden unless Tehran adopts an attitude of "active cooperation," the agency official said.

Iran's cooperation so far has been "very limited," said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the report publicly.

Iran acknowledged in 2003 that it had deceived international inspectors for many years, but it said that its program was now meant solely to develop reactors to meet its needs for electricity. The United States, and more recently its European allies, have argued that Security Council action is needed to block Iran from the road to nuclear weapons.

While the United States had emphasized the need to stop the program before Iran's scientists master the techniques of nuclear enrichment, Dr. ElBaradei and agency officials have focused in recent discussions on the need for "transparency" in clearing up unanswered questions from the period of violations.

They have noted that under the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty Iran has the right to conduct research and even to enrich uranium, although Dr. ElBaradei has called on Tehran to resume its research moratorium as a confidence-building measure as the international community considers its case.

The report released today also stressed that theme, saying that to dispel doubts about the program Iran needed to provide a level of cooperation "that extends beyond the formal legal requirements" of its agreement with the agency.

Otherwise, it said, "the agency's ability to reconstruct the history of Iran's past program and verify the correctness and completeness of the statements made by Iran, particularly with regard to its centrifuge (nuclear fuel) enrichment program, will be limited, and questions about the past and current direction of Iran's nuclear program will continue to be raised."

The agency official said that full cooperation would include restoring an agreement that gave inspectors the right to conduct unscheduled visits and actively working to make documents and scientists available.

"They should be volunteering access to the scientists who worked on these things 10, 15 years ago," the official said.

In particular, the International Atomic Energy Agency needs more information about the fate of "dual use" equipment purchased long ago, including aluminum tubes that could have been used in a nuclear centrifuge for enriching uranium or for other industrial uses, the official said. "They have to show that they went to this particular refinery or aircraft repair shop."

Another focus of interest is the "Green Salt Project," a secretive entity described in an agency report earlier this month that involved uranium processing, high explosives and a missile warhead design.

Iran replied last week to the I.A.E.A.'s inquiries by saying that the Green Salt allegations "are based on false and fabricated documents," the agency official said.

The new report released today also comes as negotiations are scheduled to continue over a Russian proposal that many view as the last chance to head off an international showdown over the Iranian program.

On Sunday, Russian and Iranian officials announced an agreement "in principle on the plan," which would involve shipping uranium from Iran to Russia for enrichment in a jointly owned plant, thereby providing Tehran without giving it the means of turning the fuel into weapons.

Today, officials of both countries said the talks would continue, but they still disagreed over a basic precondition. Russia wants Iran to renounce the research work on enrichment that it recently resumed before a deal is reached, but Iranian officials insist on their right to conduct exactly such research, along with its right to conduct large-scale enrichment at some future date.

"What Iran wants added to this proposal to complete it is that eventually Iran's right to enrich uranium on its soil is accepted," Hossein Entezami, a spokesman for Iran's Supreme National Security Council, told reporters in Tehran today, news agencies reported.

Mr. Entezami said that Iran was ready "to expand its cooperation with I.A.E.A.," including allowing snap inspections that go beyond its obligations under the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty — but only if the agency recognizes "our right to nuclear technology, including research and development."

And in Tokyo, Iran's foreign minister, Manucher Mottaki, said after a meeting with Japanese diplomats that Tehran had no intention of suspending the nuclear research it began earlier this month.

"What we are doing is research at the laboratory level and it is impossible to stop it, and that's Iran's right," Mr. Mottaki was quoted by saying by a Japanese official who briefed reporters.

Russia's foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, said in Moscow today that talks over the weekend had produced progress on the technical aspects of the joint enrichment plan. "We now have a better idea of how the idea can be implemented in practice," he said, according to the state-run Novosti news agency.

But Mr. Lavrov also emphasized that the Russian proposal "is not isolated" and would require approval by "all the members" of the atomic agency's board of directors.

The United States, along with Europe and China, have endorsed the Russian proposal, but it is not willing to allow Iran to conduct research that would give it the ability to manufacture weapons at a later date.

The agreement in principle reached over the weekend was announced after a meeting between Sergei V. Kiriyenko, the Russian nuclear chief, and Gholamreza Aghazadeh, the head of Iran's Atomic Energy Organization in Bushehr, where the Russians built Iran's first nuclear power plant.

"We held talks with the Russian side on Russia's proposal yesterday and today," said Mr. Aghazadeh, the ISNA student news agency reported. "The talks saw good progress."

Mr. Kiriyenko said the two countries "have almost no organizational, technical or financial problems" over the proposal. But he said, "It is just an element of a complex approach, and more work is needed in the area," ISNA reported.

In Washington, White House spokesman Scott McClellan sounded a note of caution over the announcement. "We'll have to see what the details of any agreement are," he said. "Given their history, you can understand why we remain skeptical."
Posted by: Dan Darling || 02/28/2006 01:52 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Pretty soon, Mo. Pretty soon. No, really. Just, you know, be patient, okay. You got our word on it. Whatever you need, just give us some time to get all the paperwork together and this is as good as done. Trust us, we ain't like the others.
Thanks, Mo. We knew you'd understand...
Posted by: tu3031 || 02/28/2006 10:06 Comments || Top||

#2  And exactly how much caviar was required to publish this splendid little BGO (Blinding Glimpse of the Obvious) require? Wankers.
Posted by: Zenster || 02/28/2006 12:02 Comments || Top||


Arabia
Al-Ahdal tied to Soddy businessmen, Chechen Killer Korps
Al-Qaida's number two man in Yemen appeared in court for a second hearing on charges of raising large funds from Saudi businessmen to support the terrorist group. Public Prosecutor Khaled Mawry told the court Monday that Mohammed Hamdi Ahdal, also known as Abu Assem, admitted he has raised in four years more than one million Saudi riyals ($266,000) from Saudi businessmen to support al-Qaida operations in Yemen.

Mawry said Ahdal acknowledged that he gave 70,000 riyals to Abu Ali al-Harithy, al-Qaida leader in Yemen who was killed in November 2002 in a U.S. drone attack in the province of Maarib, northeast of Sanaa. Ahdal also confessed that he has traveled to Afghanistan for military training then went to Bosnia to fight through the intermediary of a Saudi charity group called Berr and Ihsan. He was later imprisoned in Saudi Arabia before being deported to Yemen. Additionally, he raised funds for Chechen fighters in Yemen and handed 30,000 Saudi riyals to Ghaleb Sayidi, also a defendant in the same case, to promote Muslim extremism and encourage youth to take on jihad (holy war) in the province of Maarib.

Ahdal denied before the court all the accusations filed against him by the public prosecutor, arguing that he was forced to make false confessions during his 7 months in solitary confinement. Ahdal was arrested in 2003 and his trial began on Feb. 13, a week after 23 al-Qaida prisoners deemed among the most dangerous in the country, escaped from the central intelligence prison in Sanaa, touching off Washington's outrage and criticism. Among the escapees, 13 were convicted in the Oct. 23, 2000 bombing of USS Cole in which 17 U.S. servicemen were killed.
Posted by: Dan Darling || 02/28/2006 01:47 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


Terror Networks
Bagram escapee vows to take the fight to the US
A Web site often used by militants posted a video tape on Monday in which a purported al Qaeda escapee from a U.S. airbase in Afghanistan vowed to fight Americans in Iraq and the United States. The man, identified as Faruq al-Iraqi, said he was one of four al Qaeda members who escaped from the base in July. A U.S. defence official said in November four Qaeda members, including the group's most senior operative in southeast Asia, Omar al-Faruq, escaped from Bagram military prison in July. "I say to the Americans ... we will fight them ... in Iraq and in their country," the man said on the tape recorded late in 2005 and posted on the Web site. "They (Americans) will not be able to stop the march of Jihad ... with their checkpoints, forces, machinery, advanced equipment. No matter how strong or equipped they are they will not defeat the Almighty."

Sitting in a jungle wearing an ammunition belt, the man told the story of an "easy" escape from the Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan where he was held after his arrest in Indonesia. "We did not think it was this easy, to leave like this. We thought there were military positions...," said al-Iraqi, who said he escaped with three other Qaeda members he identified with aliases Abou Nasser, Abou Yehya and Abdullah al-Shami. The tape showed what purported to be all four of them. U.S. intelligence officials say Faruq, a Kuwaiti, was captured in Indonesia in 2002 and handed to U.S. custody.
Posted by: Dan Darling || 02/28/2006 01:46 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  you just can't make up names like that.
Posted by: 2b || 02/28/2006 15:09 Comments || Top||

#2  "vowed to fight Americans in Iraq and the United States"

Oooo, that's a good idea!

May I suggest you start in Texas? It's got a nice, warm, dry climate; you can sneak in from Mexico (in fact, for some money they'll help you); and hardly anybody has a gun.

Yeah, that's the ticket. Good plan. Come onnnn down. :-D
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut || 02/28/2006 16:40 Comments || Top||

#3  Yes, please do come to Texas...we would love to have you.
Posted by: Live to Ride || 02/28/2006 17:27 Comments || Top||


Iraq
The Iraqi militias
Look in the pockets of Iraqis whose jobs take them around Baghdad every day and you are likely to find a clutch of passes and identity cards, one for every police, military or militia checkpoint they may run into.

"This one is says I'm Badr, this one I show to police, and I have the American press pass and my ordinary ID. I applied for a Mehdi Army pass on Friday but it hasn't arrived yet," said one Iraqi driver working for a foreign media organisation.

"I am Sunni so these passes mean I don't get in trouble with anyone while I'm out and about."

The sheer proliferation of armed groups -- some official, some unofficial and some that operate in the murky middle ground -- underscores the lawlessness of Iraq, where neither U.S. forces who invaded in 2003 nor the Iraqi armed forces they trained have been able to impose their authority on the whole country.

Add to that the militias, most drawn up on ethnic or religious lines, and the mix is potentially explosive as the sectarian violence that brought Iraq to the brink of civil war last week showed all too clearly.

Wednesday's attack on a major Shi'ite shrine prompted reprisals against Sunni mosques by gangs of armed men. The Shi'ite militias blamed by many minority Sunnis for some of the attacks have denied any role, but the bloodshed was only quelled by a three-day curfew and ban on carrying weapons in the street.

The chaos raised questions over Iraqi politicians' commitment or ability to impose central control.

"With no central apparatus that can rely on its own non-partisan security forces to stand in the way of parties and militias holding ethnic, sectarian and even separatist agendas, the most likely outcome is the gradual erosion or perhaps disintegration of the state," said a report released by the International Crisis Group (ICG) think-tank on Monday.

With rival political forces building up militias, U.S. officials have struggled to create effective Iraqi national forces so Washington can pull its 136,000 troops out.

In some areas, analysts say, it is only the U.S. military that has kept militias with their own sectarian, ethnic and political agendas from attacking each other.

The ICG report said any assessment of the consequences of a withdrawal "should take into account the risk of an all-out war," although it added the question of a troop drawdown was likely to be determined by domestic U.S. concerns.

Iraqis already pay the price of the militia proliferation.

Ali Issa's story is typical. The 30-year-old told Reuters 20 men dressed as Interior Ministry forces stormed his Baghdad office and seized him and two business partners, handing them to a kidnapping ring that demanded a ransom from their families.

A day after the attack on the Shi'ite shrine in the northern city of Samarra, an Iraqi reporter working for Reuters received a call to say black-clad gunmen had stormed his sister-in-law's housing compound in Baghdad and shot her dead.

The middle-aged woman was a Sunni from Samarra and while it is virtually impossible to ascertain who was behind the murder, her family and neighbours have blamed it on Shi'ite militiamen.

In 2004, nine militias with over 100,000 fighters agreed to disband and join the new security forces or return to civilian life.

It is not clear how far that process got, but with the Interior Ministry now run by the Shi'ite Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), many Sunnis complain that police, commando and counter-insurgency units are no more than bands of its Badr militia in national uniform.

The Interior Ministry denies accusations it sanctions death squads targeting Sunnis but admits that gunmen wearing its uniforms are behind a spate of abductions and murders.

Badr leader Hadi al-Amery said five percent of his 20,000-strong militia -- formed in Iran in the early 1980s to topple Saddam Hussein from exile -- had been integrated into the Iraqi forces, with the rest engaged in political work.

"We say to our members who go to the armed forces that when you go to be a part of the armed forces your relationship with us will be severed," said Amery, now a member of parliament. "No one is above the law."

Much of last week's chaos was blamed on gunmen dressed in black -- an image many Iraqis associate with the Mehdi Army, a Shi'ite militia loyal to radical cleric Moqtada al-Sadr.

Sadr denies the Mehdi Army, which mounted two rebellions against U.S. forces in 2004, was involved in the attacks.

There are also several nationalist Sunni militant groups, formed after Saddam's overthrow to drive out U.S. forces.

Sunni fighters, many of whom feel marginalized since the formation of a government led by formerly exiled Shi'ite politicians, recently formed their own militia -- the Anbar Revolutionaries.

Designed to oppose Shi'ite and Kurdish militias and foreign militant groups such as al Qaeda, who have carried out devastating attacks against Shi'ites, the new Sunni force is mainly made up of Saddam loyalists and Iraqi Islamists and nationalists who have been fighting U.S. and Iraqi soldiers.

Kurds have mainly stayed out of the recent violence but they have up to 140,000 "peshmerga" fighters in the north even though the militia has been officially disbanded and thousands of fighters have joined Iraq's new army, mostly in Kurdistan.

U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad said last week that Washington would not tolerate sectarianism or militias in the new government.

"To build a functioning democratic society you need authoritative police forces, security forces and military and militias ... are threats to a successful democratic order,' Khalilzad said.
Posted by: Dan Darling || 02/28/2006 01:44 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Kurds have up to 140,000 "peshmerga" fighters in the north

Interesting. That's close to double the number usually bandied around.
Posted by: phil_b || 02/28/2006 6:51 Comments || Top||

#2  According to a friend of mine who's over there, the Peshmerga also work the closest with the US AND the Iraqi Army. Sadr, on the other hand...
Posted by: Old Patriot || 02/28/2006 17:05 Comments || Top||

#3  That's what I was saying the other day. The Peshmurga have had lots of time to organize and recruit now, not to mention looking for arms caches in the desert.

Telling them "no" now might not be all that easy, for anybody.
Posted by: mojo || 02/28/2006 17:13 Comments || Top||


Home Front: Politix
NYT sues for more info on NSA wiretapping program
The New York Times sued the Department of Defense on Monday, saying the government has refused to turn over records related to its domestic warrantless surveillance program.

In its federal lawsuit, the Times asked the court to order the government to comply with a Freedom of Information Act request requiring it to release documents or provide a lawful reason why it cannot.

The Times said a Dec. 16 letter to the Defense Department requested all internal memos, e-mails and legal memoranda and opinions since Sept. 11, 2001, related to the National Security Agency spying program. The department is the parent agency of the NSA.

The spying program was revealed by the Times in a story in December.

Maj. Susan Idziak, a Defense Department spokeswoman, said the department would work closely with the Department of Justice on litigation regarding the matter.

The newspaper said it asked for meeting logs, calendar items and notes related to discussions of the program, including meetings held by Vice President Dick Cheney and his staff with members of Congress and telecommunications executives.

It also requested all complaints of abuse or possible violations in the operations of the program or the legal rationale behind it.

And it sought the names and descriptions of people or groups identified through the use of the program and a description of relevant episodes used to identify the targets of the intercepts.

The lawsuit said the Defense Department acknowledged receipt of the request on Dec. 30, 2005, but the response, required in 20 business days, never came.
Posted by: Dan Darling || 02/28/2006 01:42 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [2 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Surely the only proper response in a situation involving classified, national security information is, "No."
Posted by: trailing wife || 02/28/2006 6:34 Comments || Top||

#2  Of course, why didn't you say so? And here are the nuclear targeting codes in case of a Russian launch. And here are the ones in case of a Chinese launch, and here ...
Posted by: Perfessor || 02/28/2006 9:24 Comments || Top||

#3  WE should require them to publish the "insensitive cartoons" first. That should be the end of their lawsuit!

Al
Posted by: Frozen Al || 02/28/2006 12:56 Comments || Top||

#4  TW - the 'proper response' to a newspapers request for classified national security data during wartime is probably unprintable even in Rantburg.

Imagine the NYT in 1943 suing the government to find out about this 'Manhattan Project', and 'Ultra' thing.
Posted by: DMFD || 02/28/2006 20:21 Comments || Top||

#5  DMFD, I think the word you want is appropriate. The proper response, the one someone like me is capable of giving, is "No." I fear I lack the vocabulary for the appropriate response. ;-)
Posted by: trailing wife || 02/28/2006 20:30 Comments || Top||

#6  TW - Of course, you are correct. I shouldn't let the NYT peg my 'Outrage Meter'. Serenity now! Serenity now!
Posted by: DMFD || 02/28/2006 22:56 Comments || Top||


Africa North
US special forces hunting GSPC in Mali
The sun has just set over the dunes of the Sahara, and the terrace bar of the Hotel Bouctou, Timbuktu's oldest tourist lodge, is filling up with customers. Tuareg nomads draped in traditional blue robes, or bubu; Westernized locals in jeans and college t-shirts; and foreign tourists sway to the music of Salif Keita, the great Malian vocalist. In the fading light, almost nobody seems to notice the five young Americans with close-cropped hair and trim physiques nursing Castel beers at a circular table in the corner. "They've taken over a block of the Hotel Bouctou, and they keep to themselves," Azima Ali, a Tuareg tour guide, whispers to me as the call of the muezzin from Timbuktu's dozens of mosques rises over the sandy alleys in the gathering darkness.

The strangers at the corner table may seem mysterious, but, here in Timbuktu, their identity has become something of an open secret: They are U.S. Special Forces. What's far less clear is exactly what they do when they leave the hotel and strike out over the dunes. "We're not authorized to talk to the press, sir," one of them responds when I sidle over to their table and introduce myself.

For centuries, the word "Timbuktu" has been a metaphor for the end of the earth. But, now, this desolate patch of mud mosques and mud-brick houses at the southern fringe of the Sahara has assumed an unlikely new identity: a focal point in the global war on terrorism. According to Western diplomats and Malian officials in Bamako, Mali's capital, Islamic terrorist groups have come to regard the poorly controlled, sparsely populated region north of Timbuktu as both fertile ground for recruitment and as a potential site for training camps, modeled after the secret enclaves set up by Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan in the 1990s. Concerned about the radical threat in Mali, the Bush administration has been sending teams of Special Forces to Timbuktu and Gao, an oasis 250 miles to the east, to train Malian troops in counterterrorism and to conduct their own operations.

After a rocky start that one American diplomat attributes to bureaucratic rivalry and a clash of strategies for fighting terrorism, the State and Defense departments are cooperating closely in the Sahel, the vast region bordering the southern Sahara. Military training and border patrols have gone hand in hand with an ambitious outreach program run by diplomats in Tuareg villages along the old salt route between Mali and Algeria. But the Islamic extremists in Mali aren't giving up easily. Repeating a pattern seen in other countries, such as Kenya, they are marrying into the local population and buying support among sheiks and imams, quietly spreading the message of jihad.

The roots of the problem in Mali's north go back at least 15 years, when Tuareg nomads, frustrated by years of drought and the failure of the Malian government to come to their aid, rose in armed rebellion. After a series of peace accords, the uprising ended in 1996, and the Tuaregs surrendered hundreds of Kalashnikov rifles, which were buried in the concrete pedestal of a "Monument to Peace" that sits on a rise on Timbuktu's outskirts. But the final agreement was essentially a face-saving device for the Malian government, which had neither the funds nor the manpower to continue fighting. Malian authorities agreed to draw down their military presence in the region north of Timbuktu, and diplomats say there was also a tacit understanding that they would not interfere with the Tuaregs' traditional source of income, the smuggling of contraband across the porous desert borders. After the Malian army retreated in the mid-'90s, the area became an ever wilder no-man's-land, and radical elements moved into the vacuum.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Dan Darling || 02/28/2006 01:38 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Another great post...thx. Dan.
Posted by: DepotGuy || 02/28/2006 10:13 Comments || Top||


India-Pakistan
Karzai gave Perv intel on Mullah Omar's location
Afghanistan has solid evidence about militant training camps in Pakistan and the presence there of fugitive Taliban leader Mullah Mohamed Omar, a senior Afghan security official said yesterday.

President Hamid Karzai visited neighbouring Pakistan this month and urged it to take action against the Taliban, Al Qaeda and other militants who he said launched attacks from sanctuaries there.

During the visit, his delegation handed over confessions of 13 Pakistani terrorists arrested in Afghanistan and details of Taliban leaders in Pakistan, including phone numbers, locations and descriptions, the Afghan security official said.

“It is currently crystal clear ... that terrorists are using Pakistan soil for planning attacks, for masterminding attacks on our soil,” he said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

“It is not helping the long-term relations between the two countries if our people continue to be hurt by terrorists who have safe haven in the Pakistani soil.”

A spokeswoman for Pakistan’s Foreign Ministry told a news briefing that Pakistani intelligence were investigating a list of under 40 suspected Taliban members Kabul suspects are running the insurgency from Pakistani soil.

“Separately (from the list), some information was provided about Mullah Omar’s whereabouts,” spokeswoman Tasnim Aslam said. “Some of that information has already been checked and it’s not correct.”

She said Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden did not figure on the list handed over by the Afghan government and rejected speculation that he was hiding in Pakistan.

“There is no evidence that Osama bin Laden is here, was here or where he is. If we knew where he was he would have been caught,” Aslam said.

A body of opinion in intelligence circles, however, suggests bin Laden is probably living on the Pakistan side of the border with Afghanistan, either in the Pashtun tribal areas or in the northern mountains of North West Frontier Province (NWFP).

Pressure on President Pervez Musharraf to act against the Taliban leadership comes just ahead of US President George W Bush’s planned visit to Pakistan later this week.

US commanders in Afghanistan have in the past voiced frustration with Pakistan’s failure to act more strongly to stem Taliban infiltration, although Pakistan’s security forces have been praised for running Al Qaeda members to ground.
Posted by: Dan Darling || 02/28/2006 01:35 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Time to move
Posted by: gromgoru || 02/28/2006 6:25 Comments || Top||

#2  Or rather....

Memo from Perv to operators of ISI safehouse -
"Time to move"
Posted by: john || 02/28/2006 8:53 Comments || Top||

#3  Why is he telling Perv? I don't see why the Afgans can't infiltrate the camps themselves and do the job. Treat Pakiwakiland like the Paks treat Afganistan.
Posted by: Spot || 02/28/2006 10:03 Comments || Top||

#4  He wants the camps closed and only the Pak ISI can do that. They operate them.

Pakistan has also used its position and support to the Taliban to establish within Afghanistan a series of training camps for Kashmiri terrorists. ISI personnel are present, in mufti, to conduct the training. This arrangement allowed Pakistan “plausible denial” that it is promoting insurgency in Kashmir.

Testimony to the Congress by Vincent Cannistraro, Former Chief of Counterterrorism Operations and Analysis, CIA, now Security Advisor to the Vatican.

Posted by: john || 02/28/2006 10:35 Comments || Top||

#5  We need to start whacking prominent ISI membership until they toe the line. If this means reducing their roll call to a single office clerk with a bewildered expression, so be it.
Posted by: Zenster || 02/28/2006 11:29 Comments || Top||

#6  trouble is, not all ISI are jihadi-oriented
Posted by: Frank G || 02/28/2006 12:31 Comments || Top||

#7   trouble is, not all ISI are jihadi-oriented

Mebbe so, but enough of them are perfidious lying b@stards to where losing several dozen of them off the top could only be an improvement.
Posted by: Zenster || 02/28/2006 12:42 Comments || Top||

#8  Simple solution: bomb Quetta to rubble. Tell Perv that if the ISI doesn't bring in Omar's and bin Laden's heads in 30 days, the rest of Pakland gets the same treatment. Start flying some of the hypersonic aircraft the US still has over pakland at 3:00 AM at an altitude that will create a sonic boom. Bring a dozen B-1s in over Karachi at 500 feet, on full AB. Have a couple of US carrier strike groups pull a full-deck fly-by over Baluchistan. Run one of the "NASA" SR-71s at 45,000 feet over the NWFP from north to south, at about Mach 1.5. Let the entire nation of pakland know they exist only at our discretion, and we're getting very, very unhappy with them. THEN drop the hint that Halliburton has REALLY invented an earthquake machine. After the previous, they'll believe it.
Posted by: Old Patriot || 02/28/2006 15:26 Comments || Top||

#9  Old Pat. How about, stop the $$$?
Posted by: gromgoru || 02/28/2006 15:33 Comments || Top||

#10  Old Pat. How about, stop the $$$?

gromgoru, work with the guy. At least he left out the nukes this time.

Old Patriot, I tend to agree with you. Pakistan has done little more than pay lip service to the global war on terror, while remaining one of its principal suppliers of terrorist cannon fodder. It's time to start yanking their chain. Our massive earthquake aid package was all for naught (predictably) and the country continues to inculcate its youth (see today's article on the children's demonstration), with hatred for all things American. We have nothing to lose and everything to gain by a show of force. It's all they will ever understand anyway.
Posted by: Zenster || 02/28/2006 19:30 Comments || Top||


Home Front: WoT
FBI updates most wanted list
The FBI has updated and revised its list of "Most Wanted Terrorists" to include 26 persons indicted by federal grand juries throughout the United States, many of whom also have State Department rewards posted for them ranging from $5 million to $25 million. "We will continue to bring all necessary resources to bear to protect Americans from terrorist attacks," said FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III. "The combined strength of law enforcement at home and abroad, with a vigilant and engaged public, will ensure success."

The list, established a month after the September 11 attacks, is headed by Osama bin Laden, founder of al Qaeda. Added to it were:

• Ramadan Abdullah Shallah, 45, born in the Gaza Strip in the Occupied Territories and now a resident of Damascus, Syria, who is the leader of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ), a designated foreign-terrorist organization. A member of the PIJ's Shura Council, he served as executor director of the World Islam and Studies Enterprise in Tampa, Fla., and was an instructor at the University of South Florida.

• Abd Al Aziz Awda, 52, born in Gabaly, Israel, is a resident of the Gaza Strip and imam of the Al Qassam Mosque in the Gaza Strip. Awda was a founder and spiritual leader of the PIJ and also a member of the Shura Council. In January 1995, he was named by the United States as a specially designated terrorist.

• Khadafi Abubakar Janjalani, 30, Isnilon Totoni Hapilon, 38, and Jainal Antel Sali, Jr., 41, are suspected members of the terrorist organization Abu Sayyaf Group, which is responsible for the kidnapping and slaying of foreign nationals in and around the Republic of the Philippines. In June 2001, the group beheaded American national Guillermo Sobero.

• Mohammed Ali Hamadei, 41, a Lebanese citizen indicted in the United States in the hijacking of TWA flight 847 on June 14, 1985, during which U.S. Navy Diver Robert Stethem, 23, of Waldorf, Md., was tortured, dragged to an opened aircraft door, shot point blank in the head and tossed onto the runway. Hamadei was arrested in Germany in January 1987 and convicted in that country in 1989 of murder, hostage taking, assault and hijacking. He was sentenced to life in prison but was released in 2005 and returned to Beirut.

Abu Musab Zarqawi, Saleh Ali Saleh Nabhan and Noordin Mohammad Top have been added to the FBI's "Seeking Information -- War on Terrorism list." Zarqawi is sought in connection with terrorist attacks and threats in Iraq. Nabhan is wanted for questioning for attacks in Kenya in 2002. Top is a suspected member of the Jemaah Islamiah group, which was involved in bombings in Indonesia between 2002 and 2004. Zarqawi, who has been identified by U.S. authorities as the link between Iraq and the al Qaeda network, is believed to be one of bin Laden's chief supporters. In February 2005, the interim Iraqi government issued warrants for the arrest of 29 of Zarqawi's terrorist network," saying they posed "a grave threat to the Iraqi people.
Posted by: Dan Darling || 02/28/2006 01:30 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Jeeeez, guy on the upper right looks like a calm Tony Stewart.
Posted by: 6 || 02/28/2006 12:01 Comments || Top||


Iraq
Khalizhad sez initial crisis is over, Baghdad relatively calm
Sunni Arabs are ready to end their boycott of talks to form a new Iraqi government if rival Shi'ites return mosques seized in last week's sectarian attacks and meet other unspecified demands, a top Sunni figure said yesterday.

That prompted the State Department to praise the Sunni leadership for "looking to get back into the game, full strength."

"That's to be welcomed," deputy spokesman Adam Ereli said.

Iraqi security forces yesterday announced the capture of a senior al Qaeda in Iraq figure, identified as Abou al-Farouq, a Syrian who financed and coordinated groups working for Iraq's most wanted terrorist, Abu Musab Zarqawi.

Members of the Interior Ministry's Wolf Brigade captured al-Farouq with five other followers of Zarqawi near Bakr, about 100 miles west of Baghdad, said an Interior Ministry officer who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

Sunnis boycotted the talks Thursday after the bombing of a Shi'ite shrine in Samarra sparked attacks against Sunni mosques in Baghdad, Basra and elsewhere. The walkout and Sunni-Shi'ite clashes threatened U.S. plans to establish a unity government capable of luring Sunnis away from the insurgency and raised doubts about U.S. plans to begin withdrawing some of its 138,000 troops this year.

Adnan al-Dulaimi, whose Iraqi Accordance Front spearheaded the Sunni boycott, said the Sunnis have not decided to return to the talks but are "intent on participating" in a new government.

"The situation is tense, and within the next two days we expect the situation to improve, and then we will have talks," he said. "We haven't ended our suspension completely, but we are on the way to end it."

Meanwhile, Iraq's interior minister told ABC News that he thinks American journalist Jill Carroll is alive and will be released, even though the Sunday deadline set by her kidnappers had passed. Interior Minister Bayan Jabr also said he thought the 28-year-old journalist was "still alive."

Miss Carroll, a freelancer working for the Christian Science Monitor, was abducted Jan. 7 in Baghdad and was last seen on a videotape broadcast Feb. 10 by a Kuwaiti television station, Al-Rai. The station said the kidnappers threatened to kill Miss Carroll unless the United States met unspecified demands by Sunday.

Baghdad was generally peaceful yesterday, the first day without extended curfews or a ban on private vehicles since the crisis erupted. Violence across Iraq killed 36 persons yesterday, but sectarian clashes declined sharply since the bloodletting after the destruction of the revered shrine, bringing the country to the brink of civil war.

"That crisis is over," U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad said.

Saddam Hussein has ended a hunger strike he began earlier this month to protest the conduct of his trial, his chief attorney said yesterday. The ousted Iraqi leader is due back in court today.
Posted by: Dan Darling || 02/28/2006 01:27 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  No, no, no, Noooooooooooo!!!!!!!!

Yahoo News headline sez, "Civil War Looms"

We're gonna have us a civil war, just so we can sell ads!

Oh. And blame Bush.
Posted by: Bobby || 02/28/2006 18:01 Comments || Top||


Afghanistan
Afghan prison riot enters 4th day
A siege at the Afghan capital’s main jail entered a fourth day on Tuesday but the government expressed hope for a peaceful resolution to a bloody revolt by hundreds of inmates.

Four prisoners have been killed and 38 wounded since more than 1,000 prisoners led by Taleban commanders and a kidnap gang leader took over parts of the Pul-i-Charkhi prison on Saturday night, prisoners told a human rights lawyer.

Troops backed by tanks and armoured personnel carriers have surrounded the jail on Kabul’s eastern outskirts, but numbers appeared to have declined from hundreds to dozens on Tuesday.

Authorities sent food to the prisoners on Monday as a sign of good faith after negotiations led by Sibghatullah Mojadidi, a former president who heads a state-appointed peace commission trying to encourage Taleban insurgents to lay down their arms.

On Tuesday, trucks were seen entering the prison carrying mattresses and blankets to replace bedding prisoners set fire to during the siege.

Authorities have promised to restore electricity and water supplies once prisoners move from a block they have occupied, Deputy Justice Minister Mohammad Qasim Hashimzai told Reuters.

“There has been breakthrough in the talks,” he said. “The prisoners have promised Mr. Mojadidi to evacuate the wing they had occupied. So we have optimism that this will happen today and I think we are nearing a peaceful end.”

During the siege, prisoners occupied a block housing about 70 women inmates and their children, raising concerns for their safety. Officials said on Monday no hostages were being held and male and female prisoners were back in their respective blocks.

Officials said inmates did not appear to have guns but did have makeshift weapons made from broken furniture.

Nader Nadery of the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission, which has been involved in talks with the prisoners, said Taleban suspects, about 200 of whom were being held without trial, were demanding to be tried or freed.

Prisoners have also demanded an end to a new rule requiring them to wear uniforms and the removal of cell bars.

Corruption and inefficiency in Afghanistan’s war-shattered legal system means suspects are often held without trial for years, especially if they lack resources or influential patrons as is the case for many militant suspects.

On Monday, Mojadidi said the prisoners had agreed to allow treatment of the wounded and preparations for the burial of any dead. Referring to the prisoners’ demands, he said “some of them were logical, some minor and some important”.

Nadery said ringleaders included Timoor Shah, head of a gang that kidnapped an Italian aid worker last year and police named the Taleban commanders as Mullah Mujadid and Mullah Shahidzai.

While the Italian aid worker was free unharmed, Timoor Shah faces a death sentence for murdering an Afghan businessman.

Officials initially said Al Qaeda suspects were among the ringleaders, but later said the militants were mostly Taleban.

The jail at Pul-i-Charkhi, where thousands of Afghans who opposed communist rule were killed and tortured in the 1980s, has been the scene of unrest before.

Officials say the riot erupted after authorities issued uniforms to prisoners to prevent a repeat of an escape last month by seven Taleban who mingled with visitors.

In December 2004, four policemen and four inmates died in a siege at the jail when militants attempted a breakout.
Posted by: Dan Darling || 02/28/2006 01:26 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  No hostages? Screw'em. Let them starve to death. Call it a hunger strike. Then go in and shoot who's left.
Posted by: tu3031 || 02/28/2006 9:55 Comments || Top||

#2  "Prisoners have also demanded an end to a new rule requiring them to wear uniforms and the removal of cell bars."

Reminds one of Jack Elam and the jail he ran with James Garner!
Posted by: Slolush Glinter8169 || 02/28/2006 13:02 Comments || Top||

#3  "How's the TalebanJihadiTribalGoon PrisonRiotMarathon going?"

"They're dropping like flies!"

"Groovy."
Posted by: .com || 02/28/2006 13:31 Comments || Top||

#4  Taliban went into the women's block?

Isn't that verboten?
Posted by: anonymous2u || 02/28/2006 17:56 Comments || Top||


Syria-Lebanon-Iran
Iran aims to widen nuclear program
Iran appears determined to expand its uranium enrichment program — a key international concern because of fears it could eventually make nuclear weapons, the International Atomic Energy Agency said in a new report Monday.

The U.N. watchdog, in a confidential report made available to The Associated Press, said Iran plans to start setting up thousands of uranium enriching centrifuges this year even as it negotiates with Russia on scrapping such domestic activity.

The IAEA also suggested that unless Iran drastically increases its cooperation, the agency would not be able to establish whether past clandestine activities were focused on making nuclear arms.

The report, prepared by IAEA head Mohamed ElBaradei for a March 6 meeting of the agency's 35-nation board of governors, could help determine what action the
U.N. Security Council will take against Iran, which says its nuclear program is intended solely for peaceful purposes.

A Feb. 4 board meeting already reported Tehran to the council over concerns it might be seeking nuclear arms. But further action was deferred until the end of next week's meeting on the insistence of veto-wielding council members Russia and China, which have close economic and political ties with the Islamic Republic.

The 11-page report emphasized that a more than three-year probe has not revealed "any diversion of nuclear material to nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices."

Still, it declared that — because of lack of sufficient cooperation from the Iranian side — the IAEA remained unable "to conclude that there are no undeclared nuclear materials or activities in Iran."

The finding was essentially an admission that the agency cannot establish whether Iran is hiding aspects of its nuclear program that it is obligated to report to the IAEA, the U.N. atomic watchdog, under the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty.

The evidence of Iran's intention to embark on full-scale uranium enrichment appeared to jibe with news of lack of progress in talks between Moscow and Tehran meant to move Iran's nuclear enrichment program to Russia, thereby defusing concerns it might be misused to make nuclear warheads instead of fuel.

Earlier in the day, Russian officials played down reports of a deal in principle on the Russian proposal, reminding Tehran it must freeze its domestic uranium enrichment.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said the Kremlin proposal to set up a joint uranium enrichment facility on Russian soil was contingent on Iran's agreeing to such a freeze — something Tehran has so far refused to do.

"It seems there has been no decisive progress," German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier said. And Adam Ereli, the deputy U.S. State Department spokesman, described news of agreement as "more chaff being thrown up by the Iranians ahead of the Board of Governors meeting" next week.

"There's no deal, frankly, that I'm aware of," Ereli said.

White House spokesman Scott McClellan said: "Given their history, you can understand why we remain skeptical."

The United States and the
European Union have backed the Russian offer to host Iran's uranium enrichment program.

But the report made available Monday showed Iran pressing ahead with enrichment at home by going from testing a lone centrifuge — a machine that spins uranium gas into enriched uranium — to introducing the gas into 10 centrifuges and beginning enrichment between Feb. 11 and Feb 15.

Furthermore, said the report, Iran began final maintenance of an additional 20 centrifuges a week ago, reflecting determination to further expand enrichment.

That would leave Iran still far short of the thousands of centrifuges it needs to enrich substantial amounts of uranium. Still, it reflected the country's plans to forge ahead with domestic enrichment even as it talks with Moscow.

And just a few months down the road, "commencement of the installation of the first 3,000 ... (centrifuges) is planned for the fourth quarter of 2006," said the report.

Experts estimate that Iran already has enough black-market components in storage to build the 1,500 operating centrifuges it would need to make the 45 pounds of highly enriched uranium needed for one crude weapon.

The report also repeated appeals for Iran to cooperate that have been a staple of the more than a dozen documents produced by ElBaradei on the status of the probe into Tehran's nuclear program.

Detailing some of Iran's foot dragging over the past month, as well as new findings of concern, the report said:

• "Iran again declined to provide" a copy of a document located earlier by IAEA inspectors showing how to cast fissile uranium into the shape to fit a warhead.

• There were "inconsistencies" in tests of plutonium isotopes provided to the agency to help it look into plutonium separation experiments in the mid-1990s, suggesting that not all plutonium had been accounted for.

• Iran dismissed information based on U.S. intelligence documenting links between the so-called "Green Salt Project" — a precursor of uranium enrichment — with nuclear-related high explosives and warhead design as "based on false and fabricated documents."

"It is regrettable and a matter of concern that the ... uncertainties related to the scope of nature of Iran's nuclear program have not been clarified after three years of intensive agency verification," said the report.

"Without full transparency ... the agency's ability to reconstruct the history of Iran's past program and verify the correctness and completeness of statements made by Iran ... will be limited and questions about the past and current direction of Iran's nuclear program will continue to be raised."
Posted by: Dan Darling || 02/28/2006 01:22 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Iran aims to widen nuclear program

Give it another few months and we should have their entire nuclear program widely distributed over several hundred square miles of desert ... in tiny little pieces, too.
Posted by: Zenster || 02/28/2006 12:06 Comments || Top||

#2  DemoLeft > the burden is on Dubya and America, and only Dubya and America, to prove or disprove whether Iran, Syria, and North Korea, etal. are telling the truth about their State/Nation-specific Nucprogs, no matter what the Govts. of these states, or US-International medias, say.
Thats why the Rogues can publicly, perenially claim to have one to 1.0M nukes - what matters to the Lefties is that Dubya = USA is wrong. PRE-OWG, PROTO-COMMIE, WOT AMERICA MUST "LOSE" EVEN WHILE IT "WINS".
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 02/28/2006 21:18 Comments || Top||


Southeast Asia
Indonesian, Thai hard boyz maintain active al-Qaeda links
TERRORISTS in Indonesia and Thailand are maintaining strong links with al-Qaeda leaders in Afghanistan and still represent a serious security threat, according to Australian Federal Police commissioner Mick Keelty.

Speaking outside a counter-terrorism conference in Jakarta yesterday, he said the links were "quite strong, and we see intelligence on that almost every day".

Although intelligence gained from recent arrests in Indonesia indicated that terror network Jemaah Islamiah had split up, small groups were moving "throughout the region, indicating they are trying to amass support and resources to continue their operations".

He revealed that an Australian police terrorist tracking team was in the Philippines, hunting for two of the most wanted regional terrorists, Dulmatin and Umar Patek. It was also helping Indonesia hunt for Bali bombing ringleader Noordin Top. About 30 Australian police were involved, he said.

Mr Keelty called for greater regional co-operation to combat terrorism.

Opening the conference, Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono called for countries in the region to fight together to address the "clear and present danger to our people".

More attention needed to be given to the "battle for hearts and minds" against terrorists. It was vital that Western leaders vocally reject the publication of caricatures of the prophet Muhammad, Dr Yudhoyono said. "If not, I fear you will lose more Muslims to this battle of the hearts and minds."

Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer endorsed Muslim leaders who had attacked terrorists justifying their attacks on religious grounds, but rejected Dr Yudhoyono's request to condemn the controversial cartoons, which have sparked widespread protests.

Editors in a free society were able to make decisions about what they published, Mr Downer said. He said there was no excuse for the violent protests.

Mr Downer said the "corrosive world view" that Islam was under attack from the West must be challenged.

"To characterise this fight against terrorism as a fight against Islam is to invite not just a clash of civilisations but the broadening of support for terrorists."

He announced that planning had begun for joint naval patrols with Indonesia to crack down on illegal fishing and other activities. He rejected Indonesia's requests for access to 43 Papuans seeking asylum in Australia.

Mr Downer applauded Indonesia's tough anti-drugs laws. While Australia would protest against the two Bali nine death sentences, it would not request reduced terms for the others sentenced to life for heroin smuggling, he said.
Posted by: Dan Darling || 02/28/2006 01:21 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


Iraq
Iraqi shrine crisis plays into Zarqawi's hands
Iraqi leaders, from Kurdish President Jalal Talabani to Shia Prime Minister Ibrahim Jaafari and Sunni Defence Minister Saadoun al-Dulaimi, scramble to avert what they have no hesitation in describing as the danger of civil war

IRAQI leaders are now saying exactly what their deadliest enemy, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, may want to hear - Iraq faces a real threat of civil war. The destruction of a Shia shrine on Wednesday plunged postwar Iraq into its deepest crisis, setting off a furious wave of sectarian violence that claimed more than 200 lives.

Iraqi leaders, from Kurdish President Jalal Talabani to Shia Prime Minister Ibrahim Jaafari and Sunni Defence Minister Saadoun al-Dulaimi, scrambled to avert what they had no hesitation in describing as the danger of civil war. US and Iraqi officials suspect that Zarqawi, Al Qaeda’s leader in Iraq, ordered the Golden Mosque attack in Samarra to set off just such a conflict in the hope of giving militants a regional base for holy war and dashing US hopes for stability that would let American troops go home. The Jordanian Sunni militant’s group has in the past declared all-out war on “apostate” Shias and has claimed responsibility for suicide bombings that Iraqi and US officials say were designed to provoke Shia reprisals.

Majority Shias had largely heeded calls for restraint by their clerical leaders in the past, but last week’s violence showed that some were spoiling for revenge on minority Sunnis. “Zarqawi and Al Qaeda have made big gains from this crisis,” said Hazim al-Naimi, a political science professor in Baghdad. “He wants Iraq out of control and this will help.” An Iraqi militant grouping that includes Al Qaeda blamed the Baghdad government and Shia Iran for the bombing of what it called the Shia idol in Samarra and said it was a scheme to impose Shia domination - highly inflammatory language.

Analysts say Zarqawi wants anarchy in which he can maintain long-term operations in the country, not unlike Al Qaeda’s use of bases in Taliban-ruled Afghanistan, with the overall aim of fostering religious rule throughout the region.

“Zarqawi wants to do one thing and that is create chaos that will help him reach his goal,” said Joost Hiltermann, an Iraq expert at the International Crisis Group think-tank.

Zarqawi may have rejoiced when the Golden Mosque blast set off retaliation by men wearing the black of Shia militiamen. Shia militia leaders disowned the reprisals but said they reflected the degree of anger in their community. Conversely, the violence has also reinforced efforts among many Iraqis to uphold a sense of unity. After 12 people were killed in their home near Baghdad on Saturday in what police called a sectarian attack on Shias, neighbours and relatives gathered to insist their mixed community would resist violence.

But Iraqi leaders are not taking any chances. Defence Minister Saadoun al-Dulaimi, who warned of “endless civil war” if the violence spiralled, threatened to fill the streets with tanks to stop sectarian tensions that have been building for two-and-half bloody years from exploding.

Fearful leaders: The Iraqi government only has a few tanks but they are backed by 130,000 US troops, now widely seen as critical to stopping civil war, even though both Sunni and Shia gunmen resent the US military presence.

“Zarqawi and Osama bin Laden want destructive anarchy, instability and chaos - anything so that the American project fails in Iraq,” said Abdel-Bari Atwan, editor of London-based newspaper al-Quds al-Arabi and an expert on Al Qaeda.

Iraqi and US leaders hope splits between Arab militants loyal to Zarqawi, Iraq’s most wanted man, and Iraqi insurgents will make it easier to stabilise the country.

Both are Sunni Arabs hostile to US policy, but their aims contrast, with Al Qaeda militants fighting for radical Islamist rule in the Arab world and Iraqi nationalist rebels seeking to re-establish a Sunni-dominated government in Baghdad.

Zarqawi has angered fellow Sunnis with suicide bombings in areas populated by the minority sect. And the attack on the shrine deepened Iraqi fighters’ suspicions of him.

“The armed resistance is convinced that Zarqawi and others who have ties to the outside such as Iran and Israel are trying to hurt the Sunni Arabs and diminish their role in the Iraqi leadership,” said a militant known as Abdel Salaam of the nationalist insurgent group Mohammed’s Army in Falluja.

“We will open fire on them if they attack the symbols of national leadership and we have warned them,” he said.

Atwan said the mosque explosion might widen rifts between Al Qaeda-linked Sunni militants in Iraq and more moderate elements in the minority Sunni Arab community, but if a full-scale sectarian conflict erupted, these divisions would wither.

Zarqawi, who has a $25 million US bounty on his head, is not expected to give up his holy war campaign, even if he has created deadly enemies of his own in Iraq.

“He has angered insurgents who don’t believe in his methods or in attacks on holy sites,” ICG’s Hiltermann said. “But that won’t stop him.”
Posted by: Dan Darling || 02/28/2006 01:20 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  In contraast to a couple of articles posted here suggesting Zark-boy might have overplayed his hand with the same bombing.

Hmmm... I wonder what George Clooney thinks?
Posted by: Bobby || 02/28/2006 6:45 Comments || Top||

#2  much of the article narrative contradicts the headline

Its almost as if this Pakland paper has the same disease that the NYTimes has.
Posted by: mhw || 02/28/2006 8:25 Comments || Top||


India-Pakistan
Perv defends record on terrorism in interview
Pakistan's President Pervez Musharraf has been a close ally in fighting al Qaeda since the terror attacks of 9/11. But in recent months, there have been growing questions about his and his army's role, especially in the hunt for Osama bin Laden. ABC News' chief White House correspondent, Martha Raddatz, is in Pakistan, where she conducted an exclusive interview with Musharraf. What follows is an excerpt from their conversation.

Osama bin Laden

Martha Raddatz: There are people who don't feel you've gone after him [bin Laden] aggressively enough — that if you wanted to find him, the Pakistanis could find him.

Pervez Musharraf: Well, I, I — that is not true at all. Now what do you mean going after him really? Should we be using this whole force out in the mountains checking all over the place looking for him? That is not what is done. We are operating against al Qaeda and basically, 80,000 troops really are being used to operate against al Qaeda and Taliban who are in South and North Warizistan mainly and we are concentrating that.

We are not using the army only to track down Osama. I mean, this kind of a misperception should be removed. We are using the army against al Qaeda and Taliban. Now in the process, if you get word on him, very good. But we are not certainly focusing entirely only on tracking Osama bin Laden and Zawahri. This is not the case.

Raddatz: So he is not a priority?

Musharraf: He is a priority as well as — when you're operating against al Qaeda, well, he's the leader of al Qaeda. So we are operating against him. But what I am trying to explain is that if somebody thinks that we aren't doing anything but trying to track him, no, we are not doing that.

Wherever we find them, wherever we get information or intelligence of location al Qaeda or Taliban, we attack them. Now, in the process, if he's attacked, very good.

Bin Laden in Pakistan?

Raddatz: He [bin Laden] never comes back over into Pakistan, you don't think?

Musharraf: Now, if anyone says he comes here, he's just guessing. I call that in intelligence terms information.

Raddatz: And you're not guessing. You know he's in Afghanistan.

Musharraf: Absolutely. Because he's not located. We are listening. We are seeing. We have far more greater intelligence than [Afghan president Hamid] Karzai has. I'm sure you would understand that. What intelligence does he have?

Raddatz: You're listening and seeing intelligence, and you believe from that intelligence that you're listening to -- that Osama bin Laden's in Afghanistan, not Pakistan?

Musharraf: No. No. I will never say something which I don't know. I don't believe in saying something which is information -- if somebody tells me something. I believe in only giving intelligence when I'm sure what has happened. Now talking about Osama bin Laden or Mullah Omar is all information.

Where Osama bin Laden is concerned, we had intelligence in the past. As far as Mullah Omar is concerned, there is absolutely never has been any intelligence of his being here other than now, just five days back when President Karzai gives me a list of numbers, ridiculous kind of numbers that they are here and they are talking and we find that two-third is a waste of time. They are all dead numbers. They are not even there.

And I have involved CIA and I've told my intelligence agencies to involve the foreign intelligence also, bring them in also and take them to the place where they have said that Mullah Omar is there, the geo-coordinates that he said. I've told my intelligence people, call the foreign intelligence guys. Take them there. And show them which families are living in those houses so that their lies are once and for all nailed down. And this is a nonsensical thing.

Fight Against al Qaeda

Raddatz: The president often says that America, with your help, has captured three-quarters of the known al Qaeda leaders. First of all, do you think that's true?

Musharraf: Yes, it's certainly true. Maybe more than three-quarters.

Raddatz: But in those intervening years, how many more do you think have been created?

Musharraf: Well, I can't estimate that. We've caught much more than three-quarters. I mean, there are few leaders who are left. But whenever we catch somebody, there is always, always an alternative which is created. So I wouldn't be able to say how many have been created. I can't say that.

While we are applying military against terrorism, we need to address bigger issues, bigger issues of political disputes. I think that is at the root, root of the problem. We have to resolve political disputes. And then the issue, I keep saying, poverty and education which is a long term issue, but in the short term getting to the resolution of the political disputes and military action, this combination of the two.

Raddatz: And what do you mean specifically in political --

Musharraf: Well, we have to resolve this Palestinian dispute. And from our point of view, in this region, in our region, the Kashmir dispute. Because that has its fallout on Pakistan. That has its fallout on people wanting to operate in Kashmir having nexus with the al Qaeda or the Taliban or the extremists who live in our society. So this becomes a very, very dangerous nexus and combination. So therefore, Kashmir dispute and Palestinian dispute, both are ripe for resolution and we must resolve them.

Going After the Taliban

Raddatz: I'm also told by many American officials that as far as the Taliban is concerned, you're not going after them. Who have you arrested? Who have you gone after in the Taliban, not al Qaeda?

Musharraf: I think this is another misperception that everyone has and they keep asking me. I think the number of Taliban we have arrested and deported to Afghanistan should be well-known to the whole world.

I think we are just not clear about what we are doing-

Raddatz: In the last year you've arrested senior leaders of the Taliban?

Musharraf: Just a few months back. I'm just talking three months back. He was the main spokesman of Taliban whose name--he used to appear and gave interviews on their behalf. We caught him. And we gave him to Afghanistan.

Karzai Cooperating?

Raddatz: Did President Karzai give you more names? These are unfortunate perceptions, misperceptions even being created by Afghanistan and sometimes President Karzai himself.

Musharraf: Yes, indeed, he gave these names just now when he came here. He gave me telephone numbers. He gave me a lot of names. Now, I first asked him, "Were you waiting for me -- and meeting me to give these names? Why didn't your intelligence agency give these names before so that we act?"

Two-thirds of them are dead numbers and I'm quoting this with full authority. Even CIA here, we have involved them in the whole process. Even they are saying they are all dead numbers. So these are some, one year back, or six months back, they must have heard them on the telephone through some means and they are giving all those numbers to us. Now the other one-third is, we are trying to track down these numbers.

Pakistani Suicide Bombers?

Raddatz: There are reports that Pakistanis are going in as suicide bombers. They're recruited in Pakistan and sent into Afghanistan?

Musharraf: Right. Now, this is, nobody denies that. Nobody denies that there is Taliban and al Qaeda activity here in our border. Nobody denies that. I don't deny it. There is and that is against whom we are operating. But if anyone thinks that everything that happened in Afghanistan is from Pakistan, Osama bin Laden is in Pakistan --- certainly Mullah Omar is in Afghanistan. I'm 200 percent sure. And let him not cast any aspersions that he's in Qettah or anywhere. He's in Afghanistan. He's living in his own area. His own area there is a big void.

Muhammad Cartoon Controversy

Raddatz: You think it will go away?

Musharraf: Yes, yes, indeed. Absolutely.

Raddatz: Why will it go away? What will it take to make it go away?

Musharraf: We need to get a hold of those leaders behind the scene who incite people for political ends. These are the people who are inciting them for political ends. Their interest is not so much in the blasphemy but in creating some kind of destabilization against me, against the government. That is their interest. And the moment we get hold of the people behind the scene, it will die down.

Terrorist Training Camps in Pakistan?

Musharraf: Let's be very clear. Certainly there are people here. I have been telling Karzai and the United States, "Let us fence the border and let us mine it." Today I say it again: let us mine their entire border. Let us fence it. It's not difficult. We'll do it. Let the United States come, let Afghanistan in so that nobody crosses. They die when they cross.

Raddatz: That's all you can do about it?

Musharraf: (laughs) 80,000 troops are operating. That is what I'm doing about it. 400 casualties we've suffered. That is what we are doing about it.
Posted by: Dan Darling || 02/28/2006 01:18 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:


Europe
Former Soviet Dissident Warns For EU Dictatorship
Via Instapundit: It was all plotted before the fall of the USSR.

Vladimir Bukovsky, the 63-year old former Soviet dissident, fears that the European Union is on its way to becoming another Soviet Union. In a speech he delivered in Brussels last week Mr Bukovsky called the EU a “monster” that must be destroyed, the sooner the better, before it develops into a fullfledged totalitarian state....
Posted by: anonymous2u || 02/28/2006 01:10 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Very good interview, this should have perhaps been posted more completely; by the way, once I've catched up a little on my severely out of hand stock of books yet-to-be-read, I do plan on buying and possibly even reading one day (who knows?) his book.
Posted by: anonymous5089 || 02/28/2006 8:25 Comments || Top||

#2  To paraphrase a Net blogger's rant, AMERICA IS LEFTSOCIALIST NATION MOVING TOWARDS NATIONAL AND GLOBAL LEFT-COMMUNISM - GOD HELP US ALL, THE LEFTIES DON'T KNOW WHAT THEY CAN DO TO STOP THE FUTURE/PENDING VICTORY OF THE LEFT. We need Stalin to save Fascist = Limited Communist Clintonian Amerika from Stalinism; Marx from Marxism, the United Socialist Republics [USR] from the United Socialist States of Amerika/Union of Soviet States of Amerika [USSA], etal. - dem dar wily Dick-Dastardly Fascist Comunists don't how to stop dem dar wily Dick-Dastardly Communist Fascists!?
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 02/28/2006 21:32 Comments || Top||

#3  WTF? Thanks for coming out.
Posted by: Hupomoger Clans9827 || 02/28/2006 22:08 Comments || Top||


Syria-Lebanon-Iran
IAEA sez Iran advancing uranium enrichment
Iran is advancing its uranium enrichment program, but the U.N. atomic monitoring organization still cannot determine whether the country is secretly developing nuclear weapons, according to an agency report made public on Monday.

The International Atomic Energy Agency "has not seen any diversion of nuclear material to nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices," Director General Mohamed ElBaradei said in a report to the IAEA's board. But the agency was not "in a position to conclude that there are no undeclared nuclear materials or activities in Iran," the report added.

ElBaradei distributed the assessment to the 35 board members on Monday in advance of a meeting in Vienna next week to debate plans for exerting greater international pressure on Tehran to halt any nuclear developments that could facilitate production of weapons. The report's contents were shared with reporters by diplomats monitoring the debate.

ElBaradei's report criticizes Iran for failing to reveal "the scope and nature" of its nuclear program despite three years of IAEA monitoring efforts. At the same time, the report noted that Iran had made some incremental efforts to meet the agency's requests for information.

Last Sunday, Tehran permitted an IAEA official to meet with an Iranian official involved in purchases of nuclear-related equipment that could be used for either civilian or military purposes, the report said. Iran allowed inspectors access to some, but not all, of that equipment, the report added.

According to the report, Iran has begun testing about 20 centrifuges used in enriching fuel and is making improvements at its Natanz nuclear facility, about 150 miles south of Tehran. Nuclear experts generally say Iran is years away from being able to carry out the industrial-scale uranium enrichment that would allow it to build a nuclear weapon or explosive device.

The report also said that earlier this week Iranian officials had dismissed as forgeries documents indicating their engineers were planning a small-scale facility to produce uranium gas. The documents were contained in a laptop computer obtained by U.S. intelligence in 2004. Portions of those and other documents purporting to show that Iran was trying to modify ballistic missiles to carry nuclear warheads were shared with the IAEA last year.

The documents' authenticity has not been independently verified.

Inspectors reported that although Iran obtained instructions in the late 1980s for the production of uranium metal -- a substance used to protect the core of a nuclear bomb-- Iranian scientists did not appear to have used them. Iran offered written proof in support of previous claims that it had purchased some sensitive equipment through official channels and not from a nuclear black market run out of Pakistan, the report said.

The report described unexplained "inconsistencies" regarding plutonium experiments conducted at least several years ago and said Iran had acknowledged purchasing other equipment it had previously denied possessing.

Recent inspections of large facilities revealed that the Iranians were having technical or financial difficulties completing a heavy-water reactor in the town of Arak and a fuel manufacturing plant in Isfahan.

The IAEA board voted this month to report Iran to the U.N. Security Council for "many failures and breaches of its obligations to comply" with the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and because of an "absence of confidence that Iran's nuclear program is exclusively for peaceful purposes resulting from the history of concealment."
Posted by: Dan Darling || 02/28/2006 01:07 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


Israel-Palestine-Jordan
EU to stave off Palestinian funds crisis
The European Union will release substantial aid to the Palestinians to stave off a looming financial crisis despite the appointment of a leader of the Islamist militant group Hamas as prime minister. EU foreign ministers are gathering for talks on how to respond to the impending formation of a Palestinian government by the movement, which does not recognise Israel's right to exist. "Today I will announce a very substantial package of assistance to meet basic needs," European External Relations Commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner said. She says the package will total 120 million euros ($A192 million), including 40 million euros to pay electricity bills and 64 million euros channelled through the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian refugees. "In effect we will pay electricity bills for them, direct to the utilities concerned, including in Israel," she said.
"That way the rest of their money will be available to buy explosives."
The EU is the largest donor to the Palestinian Authority, but its funding has been thrown into doubt by the election of Hamas, which the bloc lists as a banned terrorist group. The move comes after Israel stopped the monthly transfer of $50 million to $55 million ($A80 million to $A88 million) in tax payments to the Palestinians.
Posted by: Fred || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Thereby delaying the cause => effect / choices => consequences learning process, ad nauseum.

Criminal morons.
Posted by: .com || 02/28/2006 0:18 Comments || Top||

#2  The King of Belgium decided that is what he wished and the EU obliged. How Euro of them.
Posted by: SPoD || 02/28/2006 0:23 Comments || Top||

#3  I would let them have some cash and then throw up a blockade around the country. For every month of peace I would release a set amount of money. Every time a rock is thrown, bomb explodes, or rocket is fired would result in a loss of funds for two months. They also need a third party to manage their funds and ensure that money for milk goes to buy milk. I know it sounds whacky but I would appoint a well known Japanese or Korean Businessman to oversee the project.
Posted by: Cyber Sarge || 02/28/2006 11:20 Comments || Top||


Africa Horn
Pirates hijack Indian-owned dhow off Somali coast
NAIROBI - Somali gunmen hijacked an Indian-owned dhow off Somalia’s coastlines with 25 crewmembers aboard, a maritime official said on Monday. The dhow was attacked by two small boats while on route from the southern port of Kismayo to El-Maan, 35 km (22 miles) from the lawless capital Mogadishu on Sunday, Andrew Mwangura, programme coordinator for the Seafarers’ Assistance Programme, said.

“Normally when they take captives, they want to get in contact with the chief owner,” Mwangura told Reuters, adding he did not know whether the hijackers had contacted the owners.
"Paging Lord Jim, Paging Lord Jim ..."
He said the dhow was called the Bhakti Sagar, but did not name the owners. El-Maan used to be the most peaceful port, he said. “Those ships who are still in Mombasa are afraid to go to El-Maan now.”
Posted by: Steve White || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


Security Council Split on Darfur Conflict
UNITED NATIONS (AP) - The U.N. Security Council remained divided Monday on imposing punitive measures over the conflict in Darfur despite calls for sanctions against Sudanese allegedly blocking peace in the region.

U.S. Ambassador John Bolton, on the next to last day of the U.S. presidency of the council, scheduled a closed-door meeting to discuss a report by a U.N.-appointed panel that recommended sanctions against key figures from all groups. Most of the 15-member council were in favor of sanctions, led by the United States, Britain, France and Denmark - but Qatar, China, and Russia were strongly opposed, council diplomats said. Qatar is the only Arab member of the council, China is a major buyer of Sudanese oil, and Russia traditionally opposes sanctions.

The council heard a report from Greece's U.N. Ambassador Adamantios Vassilakis, who chairs the sanctions committee on Sudan. The committee - which includes all 15 council members - ``does not agree with the recommendations'' of the U.N.-appointed panel which called for sanctons against all the parties in the conflict. Human rights groups have also called for sanctions. Bolton told reporters after the meeting that some committee members, whom he didn't name, don't agree with the recommendations for sanctions. But he said ``it will be not very far from now'' that the council will have to make a decision.

The report by the four-member panel included a confidential list of names to the Security Council committee of its recommendations for sanctions, including all parties. Bolton expressed the council's concern that some names had been published in the media. Qatar, China and Russia are now insisting that the sanctions committee establish criteria to determine who should be subject to sanctions, which some supporters view as a sneaky, underhanded delaying tactic, council diplomats said, speaking on condition of anonymity because the meeting was closed.

Bolton said he told the council that it should mean what it says - and carry out its resolutions. ``If the council doesn't mean what it says and isn't willing to take steps to persuade people to follow what it says, its credibility will decline,'' he said. ``People need to consider that consequence.''
The UN did that decades years ago and has lived with the consequences ever since.
This month, the United States also failed to get council approval for a U.N. peacekeeping force to replace African Union troops now deployed in Darfur. Many council members want to wait for a formal request from the African Union, which is scheduled to meet on March 3.
And then they'll wait longer.
Posted by: Steve White || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


Europe
Group displays Christians killed in Muslim nations
A Christian group in the Polish city of Poznan has put up posters in the city’s trams of modern “martyrs” who have died at the hands of Muslims or in Muslim nations, its head said Monday. “We did this in the spirit of Christian solidarity with those who suffer for their faith,” said Boguslaw Kiernicki, head of the St Benedict Foundation which was created six months ago. “Christians in Poland are in a comfortable situation, but there are others in other countries who are not,” he said.

A grouping representing Poland’s tiny Muslim population, which represents some 30,000 people out of the country’s population of 38 million, called the poster exhibition a “provocation”. It also said it was ill-timed, as anger in the Muslim world runs high after publication in European newspapers of cartoons of Islam’s Prophet Mohammed.
We all know what Muslims do when "provoked."
"Allan helps those who can't help themselves!"
Some 300 posters are on display in Poznan’s trams, showing Christians who have died in Pakistan, Egypt, Turkey and Indonesia, among other countries. The captions on the posters describe their “road to Calvary” and call on Poland’s predominantly Roman Catholic faithful to pray for “these modern martyrs”.
Posted by: Fred || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  It works very well for me. I think we need this type of thing here in the United States of America.
Posted by: SPoD || 02/28/2006 0:21 Comments || Top||

#2  A "provocation"?

This is disgusting, shameless, especially more since the bulk of persecuted christians around the world are killed, humiliated and oppressed by the Pious Peace Loving Muslims.... who do theses dorks think they are anyway?
Shut up, or the polish christians will treat you like you treat your own religious minorities (well, they should, they really should... but as we all know, the non-reciprocity principle is at the heart of the muslim mindset).

It's not because their own arabic "mein kampf" sez they are the Master Religion(tm) they can expect the other "lesser" faiths to submit to their whims.

They truly are stuck in a schizophrenia mental double-bind : on one hand they ARE superior, the Ultimate Revealed Religion, etc, etc... on the other hand, they've been left over by modernity for the last 200-300 years; they are the manly Lions of Islam(tm) up against the decadent, soft, feminized unbelievers, but they had their tails kicked by them for about 800 years and counting (though they enjoyed many political successes due to the infidel world 's infighting, they had no actual military victory); they are expected to lower and humiliate the "false religions" (remember, jews and christians willingly altered their own scriptures to rebel against allah, Jesus was not the son of God, he was even not even crucified as he actually secretly went on to mecca pilgrimage since he was truly as devout muslim, and polytheists are non-humans), but they DEMAND islam and its derogatory treatment of all non-muslims to be held in the utmost respect... they always dish it out, can can't take it at all.

In short, they're torn between their own self-image of absolute superiority and dire reality, between their whiny victimization (as seen in the conspiracy theory mindset to explain why they suck ass in this magnitude) and their casual, scriptural hate of anything "not them", between their aggressivness and imperialist designs and their impotency,...

They truly, truly, are a failed, dangerous "religion" (islam truly is nothing but a vehicle for arab imperialism and cultural genocide of conquered people). If we westerners were not in the process of comitting suicide, if we were who we were in the 19th century, or even pre-60's 20th, they would not even register on the radar screen, as we would bump their heads a few times, and they would go back in the passive, insh allah, mektoub, mode.
If only the oildfields would have been seized in 1973...
Posted by: anonymous5089 || 02/28/2006 5:35 Comments || Top||

#3  Btw, according to what I've read, about 8 000-10 000 christians are killed for they faith every month (about 100 000 a generic year), many of them by you-guess-which-religion followers... In 2001, there was 10 000+ killed in northern Nigeria alone, for example in waves of ethnic epuration.
Posted by: anonymous5089 || 02/28/2006 6:17 Comments || Top||

#4  a5089, we Westerners are not in the process of committing suicide. Western European Westerners have been in the process, although that may be turning around now -- we'll see how the next year or so goes -- and Canada certainly was under the former government. But the U.S. was not, is not, will not, full stop. No matter how much our self-defined elites wish to ape their European cousins, no matter how loudly they proclaim their man shoulda won the last election, and the one before, and the next one, too...In a decade or two you may have to choose between fighting the enemy at home, or making a tactical retreat to the States (where you'll be welcomed with open arms, despite your Buddha-like proportions, my dear).
Posted by: trailing wife || 02/28/2006 7:44 Comments || Top||

#5  A grouping representing Poland’s tiny Muslim population, which represents some 30,000 people out of the country’s population of 38 million, called the poster exhibition a “provocation”.

Jesus.

OK, folks, here's a brilliant chance for the moderates to raise their heads. With 30,000 Muslims, then the "radicals" are -- we're supposed to believe -- only, what 3? 30? 300? Even if there are 3,000, that leaves 27,000 to slap them down.

You know what I think will happen? The "moderates" won't show, or we'll find out that the group that declared these posters to be "provocation" are the moderates.

Someone needs to make English-language versions of these posters. Let's see how America's Muslims respond to this "provocation".
Posted by: Robert Crawford || 02/28/2006 7:47 Comments || Top||

#6  "...called the poster exhibition a “provocation”."

How dare anyone suggest that a martyr be defined as anything other then in the context of Jihad.
Posted by: DepotGuy || 02/28/2006 9:49 Comments || Top||

#7  Yeah, well they get all "provoked" over stupid cartoons, too.

To Moslems, it is a provocation to tell the TRUTH about Islamics killing Christians. So, TRUTH = PROVOCATION if you're a Moslem, and "provocation" equals an excuse to act out, riot, destroy, kill, rape, and defame.

Well, we sure don't want to "provoke" them now, do we?

Personally, if I were in charge I'd provoke the hell out of them, then deport every last one of them who refused to obey the rule of law.

“We did this in the spirit of Christian solidarity with those who suffer for their faith.”

'Nuff said.
Posted by: ex-lib || 02/28/2006 11:37 Comments || Top||

#8  they are a provocation - to the RC majority. A reminder that 30,000 could barely fill a Taliban soccer stadium for the killings, or that 30,000 among them practice a religion that excuses that behavior. Time to get those exit papers filled out Mahboob
Posted by: Frank G || 02/28/2006 12:34 Comments || Top||

#9  Gateway Pundit has a few of the posters: Poland Introduces "Martyrs of Our Time" Ad Campaign
Posted by: ed || 02/28/2006 12:37 Comments || Top||


Science & Technology
Microsoft talks up new operating systems
US-based computer software giant Microsoft has touted a new line-up of computer operating systems to become available later this year. According to the company, Microsoft's Windows Vista operating systems will come in six versions, two for businesses, three for residential users and one for emerging markets.
One more expensive than the other...
Vice president of Windows product management and marketing, Mike Sievert, says that a new systems is needed to accommodate the information-crammed digital world. "The PC needs to give people the clarity and confidence to handle this 'world of more' so they can focus on what's most important to them," Mr Sievert said. Microsoft contended the Vista line-up would enable users to easily accomplish tasks, find what they want, enjoy entertainment, stay connected at home or on the go and help ensure PCs run smoothly and securely. The number of versions is the same as Microsoft offered with its Windows XP operating systems. Vista operating software was scheduled to be available in the second half of 2006.
I'm in the middle of rediscovering the joy of *nix after a 15 or 20 year hiatus. I had to bump the server a minimum of once a week under Windows, and we've been ticking along for two weeks under the latest start. Windows retains a slight edge on the desktop. I can't see Excel ever being replaced. But I'll never run a Win web server again. It's not even all Microsoft's fault; the script kiddies just like them too much.
You will convert to a Mac someday ...
Posted by: Fred || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Which is the almost useless version which OEMs will install on their products so the users has to go out and buy a usefull version? It is still called 'Home'?

Oh, and checkout OpenOffice 2.x. Its free, runs on multiple OSes (Linux / Solaris / Windows / Mac / etc...) and (mostly) Excel compatable...
Posted by: CrazyFool || 02/28/2006 0:12 Comments || Top||

#2  oops, that link should be www.openoffice.org
Posted by: CrazyFool || 02/28/2006 0:13 Comments || Top||

#3  I use Open Office every day. Highly recommended. MS compatibility is pretty good.

Replacement of Excel is an issue, becuase of the abominations people use it for. I have seen some truly unbelievable stuff in Excel that could have been done better and with 1/20th of the effort using a more appropriate tool
Posted by: phil_b || 02/28/2006 0:37 Comments || Top||

#4  My early take: more worthless junk, more lardy files.
Posted by: Captain America || 02/28/2006 0:38 Comments || Top||

#5  Without Microsoft, we wouldn't be hating it and developing other cool stuff. I'm excited!
Posted by: Huperesh Ebbineter8979 || 02/28/2006 1:27 Comments || Top||

#6  Get readyto your replace your hardware too. It's MS way. Heheheh. For 99% of you desktop users Microsoft is good enough. My wife is using OS X at work and Linux at home. No more Microsoft personal PC's allowed in the house unless they dual boot and you fix them your own self. I decided in 2000 I was not going to spend my life working on machines for fools who think running a computer is like running a toaster Microsoft can keep catering to them.

All that said I go with what works for me. If MS does it cheaper and easier I'll use it. Usually that ain't the case for the things I want to do though.
Posted by: SPoD || 02/28/2006 1:34 Comments || Top||

#7 
Microsoft talks up new operating systems

LongHorn 10% Havarti + 90% Velveeta = best PC softfuel ever!
Posted by: RD || 02/28/2006 2:06 Comments || Top||

#8  RD, better not let the Islamonutz see your comment. They'll think Windows is part Danish and go even crazier.

Sure hope it's better than Windows ME.
Posted by: Desert Blondie || 02/28/2006 6:40 Comments || Top||

#9  I have seen some truly unbelievable stuff in Excel that could have been done better and with 1/20th of the effort using a more appropriate tool

If anybody knew how to use the appropriate tool. But it would take 5x the effort to learn the approrpiate tool and create the solution. So, creating clunky solutions with Excel do make sense, though barely.

I have also seen better spreadsheets than Excel. But the training invested in the installed base is so great that a suboptimal technology will dominate for a long time to come. Sort of like the non-Dvorak keyboard you're using. Or the obtuse spelling of English. or...
Posted by: Nimble Spemble || 02/28/2006 7:09 Comments || Top||

#10  If it's badder, not better.
Don't bother to blather.
Posted by: Redneck Jim || 02/28/2006 8:30 Comments || Top||

#11  Vista has huge hardware requirements and is not for upgraders. It is designed for multi core CPUs and 256MB 3D graphics cards. Here is list of Vista hardware requrements. The computer manufacturers are drooling over this.
Posted by: ed || 02/28/2006 8:51 Comments || Top||

#12  And doesn't the new OS intend to become the policeman for the entertainment industry? First an alliance of MS and the Chinese Communists and now an alliance with multi-billion dollars RICO babies*.


*Talk about corruption, see what the 'Sonny Bono Copyright Extension Act' did to your public domain, or make that former public domain. Brought to you by the most politicians that entertainment money could buy.
Posted by: Glaising Jinter9531 || 02/28/2006 9:08 Comments || Top||

#13  Yes it is. Look at post 11's link and read item
Display: Prepare to feel the red mist of rage - no current TFT monitor out there is going to support high definition playback in Vista. You may already have heard rumblings about this, but here it is. To play HD-DVD or Blu-Ray content you need a HDCP compatible monitor. Why? Because these formats use HDCP to encrypt a video signal as it travels along a digital connection to an output device, to prevent people copying it. If you have just standard DVI or even an analogue output, you're going to see HD scaled down to a far-less-than-HD resolution for viewing - which sucks. This isn't really Microsoft's fault - HDCP is something that content makers, in their eternal wisdom, have decided is necessary to stop us all watching pirated movies. Yay.

But I see no reason why some smart programmers can't write an HD DVD ripper, decryptor and player software to bypass this.
Posted by: ed || 02/28/2006 9:28 Comments || Top||

#14  Microsoft's Windows Vista operating systems will come in six versions, two for businesses, three for residential users and one for emerging markets.

And Seven for the Dwarf-lords in their halls of stone.
Posted by: BH || 02/28/2006 10:03 Comments || Top||

#15  As a database guy, Excel users occasionally drive me bats. At least once a year one of my clients reinvents the relational database, proving Codd wasn't all that smart.

I haven't messed with the spreadsheets in Open Office much, but when I did, I didn't find anything approaching Excel's macro capability.

Open Office seems to have everything else covered, to include compatibility (though I couldn't get a Powerpoint presentation to play in it) except for a baby-simple desktop database like Access. An early version I used a few years ago had Adabas, which wasn't quite the ticket.

I consider Access to be one of the most under-rated tools ever, capable of much more than most organizations use it for, and much to be preferred over abortions like Powerbuilder. When I need a desktop application, that's usually what I use. Its advantage is that an inexperienced user can generate something using the wizards and the built-in stuff, while an expert can create a professional-level application that doesn't even resemble the wizard-generated stuff. If I ever have to build a desktop database application on Linux, I'll probably end up putting a web interface on it and running it from localhost.
Posted by: Fred || 02/28/2006 11:53 Comments || Top||

#16  Fred, do you have an opinion yet about gnumeric?
Posted by: Phil || 02/28/2006 12:19 Comments || Top||

#17  Win2K was one of the finest Microsoft platforms ever produced. Redmond's abandonment of support for it is a slap in the face for all MS consumers. These constant moves designed to force user migration are milking the public like the last cow on the farm.

Somewhere, there is a special corner in hell awaiting Bill Gates where he will be obliged to perform fluid dynamic calculations* on an abacus.

* Fluid dynamic calculations model reactions such as a drop of dye dispersing in water. Some are so complex that a human being with a pencil and pad of paper could not complete a single one during an entire lifetime.
Posted by: Zenster || 02/28/2006 12:38 Comments || Top||

#18  Those bastards! Somebody copyrighted Sonny Bono's work?
Posted by: Frank G || 02/28/2006 12:56 Comments || Top||

#19  This is about Microsoft Windows -- shouldn't this be filed under WOT?
Posted by: Darrell || 02/28/2006 14:56 Comments || Top||

#20  Considering Micro$oft's business practices, it ought to be filed under War On PC Users.
Posted by: BH || 02/28/2006 14:58 Comments || Top||

#21  Screw Excel. It makes me nuts.

Lotus 1-2-3 is the only way to fly.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut || 02/28/2006 17:13 Comments || Top||

#22  I always prefered Letus 123. Under 20 dollars on 3 5.25 disks.
Posted by: 6 || 02/28/2006 18:54 Comments || Top||

#23  Everyone always overlooks the really important stuff.
Posted by: .com || 02/28/2006 21:15 Comments || Top||

#24  I'm going to be buying a new computer in the next couple of weeks, probably an HP. One of the first things I'm going to be doing is partitioning the hard drive into two segments, and creating a dual-boot capability with Windows XP Professional and Windows 98. I have a ton of software from my testing days that won't run on XP, but that I enjoy (a few games, lots of weird stuff that used to drive SCSI devices NUTS). I'm getting rather tired of Bill "I'm Great" Gates and his arrogance. At the same time, Linux still has bugs in it that affect much of the software I run. One of these days some nerdy kid in high school will write an operating system that will put Gates in the poor house. When that kid does that, I personally will laud his/her talents to the heavens!
Posted by: Old Patriot || 02/28/2006 22:11 Comments || Top||


Iraq
Iraqi WMDs and Russian Military Strategy in the Middle East
Long, detailed, a good background piece by a man who claims to be a former intelligence operative, according to the blurb at the end of the article. Perhaps some of Rantburg's experts can let us know whether this report rings true.

Introduction
In the 1970s and 1980s there were several indications about Saddam Hussein’s development of the WMD programs (biological, chemical and nuclear). The Israeli attack on the Iraqi French-made Osirak nuclear reactor in 1981 slowed down the progress of the Iraq’s nuclear weapons program but the biological and chemical WMDs were highly developed, due to the Soviet assistance, Iraqi scientists and a sophisticated system of procurement, organized by the Iraqi Intelligence in Western Europe and in other parts of the World. The nuclear weapons program was never abandoned by the regime, and before the first Gulf War (1991) Iraq was very close to producing its own nuclear weapons. (There is some evidence that Saddam could have purchased nuclear technology from Pakistan, through Dr. Khan’s network, and that he has tried to buy nuclear weapons or components from China). The war destroyed the technical base for the production. But the highly skilled scientific and technical personnel (over 200) remained in place, dispersed. The regime managed to save their nuclear fuel, many technical means of production and the blueprints of the nuclear weaponization. The after-war international (UN) control proved ineffective. Iraq also saved an essential part of its biological and chemical warfare technology, materials and personnel. Some of the WMDs, materials, specialists from Iraq have been transferred abroad to continue research and to organize the production abroad: mainly to Sudan, Libya and Algeria but also to the neighboring Syria (with a purpose to strengthen Syrian regime’s offensive capabilities against Israel).

Continued on Page 49
Posted by: trailing wife || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  One point of collaboration is the speed of which Russia (the first to hit the Iraqi tarmac) landed large aircraft in Iraq almost instantly after the paperwork was signed upon the end of overt military activity of the Gulf War.

Of course, the French landed aircraft shortly thereafter.
Posted by: Captain America || 02/28/2006 0:21 Comments || Top||

#2  Russia #1 world killer still, they need to do something creative like in space
Posted by: Huperesh Ebbineter8979 || 02/28/2006 1:39 Comments || Top||

#3  This fits with what Ion Pacepa has been claiming for a couple of years about the russian involvement in Iraq's WMD, including their relocation/removal/destruction shortly before GWII (the "Sarindar" soviet doctrine of denying the ennemy propaganda cookies by stealing the rug under him).
Posted by: anonymous5089 || 02/28/2006 6:45 Comments || Top||

#4  OT : Btw, is anyone here aware of one non-NWO anticommunist conspiracy theory (to which Joseph seems close), "The Final Phase"???

In short, islamic terror (soon nuclear as conventional "grey terror" shifts to WMD "pink terror", before actual war) is a proxy for the true ennemy, international communism, the "asymetrical military" side of a multipronged attack on western civilization also done through generalized cultural subversion.

Tinfoil hat needed, no doubt, but this much more agrees with me than the "western elites are Evil" NWO, as I think there is at least a basis of truth ("reformed" commies are NOT our friends!).

For thoses interested, check out :
http://www.jrnyquist.com/
http://www.thefinalphase.com/FirstWelcomePage.htm
Posted by: anonymous5089 || 02/28/2006 6:56 Comments || Top||

#5  I'm keeping an eye on you 5089. Have you felt a recent urge to LASH DOWN THE CAP LOCK AND DAMN THE CONSEQUENCES? Do you have a fear of Fanny FarmerCrats?
Posted by: 6 || 02/28/2006 17:59 Comments || Top||


Bangladesh
Killing of housewives on the rise in B'desh
Truly the mark of an advanced civilization.
Three housewives were killed allegedly by their husbands for dowry in Sadar and Abhoynagar upazilas on Friday and Saturday. Police said Gahar Ali of Echhamati village in Abhoynagar upazila beat and strangulated his 2nd wife Noorjahan Begum, 35, to death Friday night as she refused to bring dowry money from her father. Victim's son found the body and informed police. The killer husband went into hiding.

In another incident, Roni Begum, 20, was strangled by her husband Nazrul Islam at Sankarpur in the town on Saturday as she failed to bring dowry money from her parents.

In yet another incident Delwar Hossain of Noorpur village in Sadar upaizla beat his wife Fatema Khatoon, 27, to death for dowry on Friday. The bodies were sent to the Jessore General Hospital morgue for autopsy. Separate cases were filed with the police.
Posted by: Steve White || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [2 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Honor Killing
Posted by: I.B.DePrimate || 02/28/2006 13:27 Comments || Top||

#2  Gee. Get the dowry upfront. Before the kids come.
Posted by: Hupomoger Clans9827 || 02/28/2006 21:00 Comments || Top||

#3  This type of murder happens in India, with a different modus operandi. If there's some kind of dowry dispute, the lady gets burned to death, supposedly because her sari caught fire while she was cooking. Sorry I don't have link; will look for it.
Posted by: mom || 02/28/2006 22:23 Comments || Top||


Fifth Column
NYT: Now openly on the other side
Hat tip Lucianne.com EFL
NYT sues Pentagon over domestic spying
The New York Times sued the U.S. Defense Department on Monday demanding that it hand over documents about the National Security Agency's domestic spying program. The Times wants a list of documents including all internal memos and e-mails about the program of monitoring phone calls without court approval. It also seeks the names of the people or groups identified by it.

The Times had requested the documents in December under the Freedom of Information Act but sued upon being unsatisfied with the Pentagon's response that the request was "being processed as quickly as possible," according to the six-page suit filed at federal court in New York.
Posted by: trailing wife || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  They seem quite defensive. I wonder why? (he-he)
Posted by: Captain America || 02/28/2006 0:28 Comments || Top||

#2  Huh?
Posted by: Sherry || 02/28/2006 1:00 Comments || Top||

#3  Okay, the two NY Slimes reporters divulged the NSA program in its 12-16-2005 article.

The Justice Dept is investigating the leak of sensitive information about the program and plans to quiry the "press" (i.e., the Slimes reporters).

It more likely that the Slimes will get more discovery information for their own defense through the Freedom of Information Act than through mounting its own defense of its reporters (particularly since Judith Miller spent some cell time).

Posted by: Captain America || 02/28/2006 1:13 Comments || Top||

#4  A couple of minutes of googling would have told the applicants the following -

Because of the sensitivity of NSA's functions and activities, the most often cited exemptions are (b)(1) (national security information) and (b)(3) (exemption by statute). The statutes most often applied to the protection of information are the following:

-- Section 6 of the National Security Agency Act of 1959 (Public Law 86-36, 50 U.S.C. Sec. 402 note), which provides that no law shall be construed to require the disclosure of, inter alia, the functions or activities of NSA;

-- the National Security Act, 50 U.S.C. Sec. 403-3(c)(6), which protects information pertaining to intelligence sources and methods; and

-- 18 U.S.C. Sec. 798, which prohibits the release of classified information concerning communications intelligence and communications security information to unauthorized persons.

http://www.nsa.gov/foia/foia00002.cfm

So by the language of FOIA, the information is not accessible. Of course the printed word means nothing to judges anymore. They just make it up as they go along.
Posted by: Glaising Jinter9531 || 02/28/2006 9:27 Comments || Top||

#5  Is the New York Times inclined toward suicide? Has it ever occurred to them that New York City is at or certainly near the very top of the target list for a future Jihadi terror squad armed, G-d forbid, one day with a WMD? And should that WMD be a low-yield nuke, and if it is delivered say within a mile of the Grey Lady's building, don't these clowns realize they too will be vaporized along with potentially tens of thousands of New Yorkers? Do they give rat's ass?
Posted by: Happy 88mm || 02/28/2006 10:21 Comments || Top||

#6  New York City is at or certainly near the very top of the target list
But it would sell a lot of papers. So that's one in the NYT win column.
Posted by: ed || 02/28/2006 10:29 Comments || Top||

#7  Yeah, and they're keeping the door open in case the Moslems gain power . . . follow the money.
Posted by: ex-lib || 02/28/2006 11:28 Comments || Top||

#8  Read James Bamford's "The Puzzle Palace", one of the only books ever written about the NSA. Even the NSA's original charter from 1952 remains classified to this day. Someone I knew worked at Cray Supercomputer and maintained that Tom Clancy's scribbling about "rooms full of Crays" was essentially truthful.
Posted by: Zenster || 02/28/2006 12:49 Comments || Top||

#9  NYT could easily reinstate reporter Jayson Blair. Jayson could safe them a great deal of legal expense by simply writing the documents in question for them.
Posted by: Visitor || 02/28/2006 14:38 Comments || Top||

#10  "NYT: Now openly on the other side"

Waddaya mean "now"?

As opposed to the last 50 years?
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut || 02/28/2006 16:54 Comments || Top||

#11  about the program of monitoring phone calls without court approval.

we're at war, W has the power and authority. They ARE on the other side.
Posted by: Frank G || 02/28/2006 17:44 Comments || Top||

#12  Key word in that phrase is openly, Barbara. I wouldn't know when to put the start of on the other side with regard to the NYTimes, perhaps sometime not long after the end of WWII, perhaps during that war. But they've never been so blatant about it before. Suing to get all the details, including names of analysts and suspected bad guys? Someone's BDS has taken him over the cliff, and is now beyond syndrome and deep in psychosis territory.
Posted by: trailing wife || 02/28/2006 20:06 Comments || Top||

#13  The New York Times: All the news we print in a fit.
Posted by: Hupomoger Clans9827 || 02/28/2006 20:12 Comments || Top||

#14  Pinchy the acorn did not fall far from the tree - and it was to the Left of the tree.
Posted by: .com || 02/28/2006 20:13 Comments || Top||

#15  ...which was already in Left field...
Posted by: .com || 02/28/2006 20:15 Comments || Top||


Arabia
Saudis Tighten Border Control with Yemen
An investigation is currently underway in Saudi Arabia to determine the identities of several individuals who were hiding in a farm near the Saudi- Yemeni border after illegally entering the Kingdom. Lieutenant Mansour al Turki, official spokesman for the Interior Ministry, told Asharq al Awsat on Sunday the security services had detained several men who had illegally entered Saudi Arabia from Yemen. They were discovered on Saturday in the Dagharir village, in Samta province, south of Jizan.
"Y'aint from around here, air yew?"
There was nothing to suggest the men were connected to terrorism. A preliminary interrogation had revealed they were illegal residents.
"So just what do youse guys do for a living?"
"We are but simple itinerant fruit pickers, effendi!"
"This is Soddy Arabia. Look around. There ain't nothin' but sand and rocks. You got a better story?"
"We are but simple itinerant rock pickers, effendi!"
Conflicting reports in the media indicated twelve to twenty people had been detained. However, al Turki said, “I do not remember the exact number now” but the most important issue was that they did not belong to any terrorist group.
Free lancers, were they?
There were fears that the arrests were connected to the recent prison escape in the Yemen capital. Twenty three inmates affiliated to al Qaeda, some of whom took part in the attack on USS Cole as it refuelled in the Yemeni port of Aden in October 2000 and a 2002 attack on the French tanker Limburg off Yemen 's coast, escaped from their prison in Sanaa. Amongst them were Fawaz Yahya al-Rabei, sentenced to death, Jamal al Badawi, sentenced to ten years and Abu Assem al Hadel, who was caught last year after a four-year chase and is described at al Qaeda in Yemen’s second in command.
"But it ain't them. Really."
For his part, Saleh al Santaly, head of border patrols in Jizan, indicated that Yemenis are regularly detained after illegally crossing into Saudi Arabia and estimated their number at 600 per day. He added that elderly men, women and children often enter the Kingdom illegally in search of a better life and denied that any wanted militants had crossed the border.
"No, no! Certainly not! We asked around and everything!"
In Najran, a senior source in the border guards in Najran said illegal border crossings were a daily occurrence with 20 to 30 individuals attempting to enter Saudi Arabia everyday, including women and children, who cross the border region on foot. Many are found to suffer from AIDS and other diseases after health checks are conducted, he added.
That's where it comes from, huh?
Meanwhile, the FBI has added the names of al Badawi and Jaber al Banna to its list of most wanted terrorists. A third, Abdullah al Rimi, is sought for questioning. The FBI has earmarked rewards ranging from five to 25 million to anyone who provides valuable information that may lead to the arrest of any of 26 most wanted terrorists, including Osama bin Laden, Ayman al Zawahiri and Abu Musab al Zarqawi.
Posted by: Fred || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  How's that fence coming along, Turki? We haven't heard much since the big Squabble two years ago.
Posted by: GK || 02/28/2006 7:36 Comments || Top||


Iraq
Civil War Fears in Iraq Persist
An edgy normality returned to Baghdad yesterday with the lifting of a curfew imposed to stem days of sectarian bloodshed but heightened fears of civil war saw families fleeing hostile neighbors and manning barricades. The Iraqi army said it was deploying some of its few tanks around the capital — a partly symbolic move given the large if discreet presence of heavily armed US forces — after a mortar attack killed four people in a Shiite district of Sunni west Baghdad.

The US ambassador, closely engaged in efforts to forge a national unity government, acknowledged Iraqis “came to the brink of civil war” after Wednesday’s suspected Al-Qaeda bombing of a Shiite shrine but said: “Things are getting better.” But the Sunni minority’s main political bloc said it was not ready to end the boycott of coalition talks which it announced in protest at reprisal attacks on Sunni mosques; police tallies indicate that over 200 people died in the five days of violence. Still fearful of sectarian reprisals, some families on both sides of Baghdad’s religious divide abandoned homes where they felt threatened by neighbors, or barricaded themselves in.

Iraq’s Defense Ministry said security forces had killed 35 “terrorists” and detained 487 since Wednesday. State television later announced the capture of a possibly Syrian aide to Al-Qaeda leader Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi; few details were available. The ministry said it had lifted the curfew to let people go back to work. Overnight curfews remain in force across Iraq. “It was a courageous decision to impose the (daytime) curfew and lifting it was more courageous,” spokesman Maj. Gen. Abdul Aziz Mohammed told a news conference, saying the security forces had “exercised restraint” to avoid inflaming passions.
Posted by: Fred || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Hmmm...

Civil War Fearmongering in MSM Persists

Yeah, that's better.
Posted by: .com || 02/28/2006 1:13 Comments || Top||

#2  Noting the increase in shia-sunni violence and decrease in US casualties, I think something's going on and it's that Zark and Co. are losing and are shifting their tactics as a result. They can't beat the coalition, so they figure to cause enough trouble to gain traction through at least "instability", if not civil war. The MSM is too dumb to see it, so they shift from the Oh no, Quagmire! meme to the Oh no, Civil War! meme. Any excuse to bitch.
Posted by: Spot || 02/28/2006 10:15 Comments || Top||

#3  Agree with SPOT - the "insurgency" has failed to sucessfully destabilize or induce the removal of the USA from Iraq, both in Iraq and Afghanistan, and while the Samarra, etal violence has shaken the new Iraqi Govt also has NOT led to either its destruction, dissolution, or sudden calls for new elex. The insurgents are wilfully upping the ante of violence before the US Coalition and new Iraqi Govt can finish them off as an organz Iraq-based force-network once and for all. For me, SAMARRA = TET OFFENSIVE, where prohibitive local losses > foreign govts will have to take over the fight. AS WITH CHINA IN KOREA 1, AND HANOI DURING POST-TET VIETNAM, THE US-LED FORCES DESTROYED SO MUCH MANPOWER AND ASSETS AS TO PUT AT RISK/THREATEN THE ABILITY OF THE CHINESE AND LATER NORTH VIETNAMESE GOVTS TO CONTROL/HOLD ON TO THEIR OWN PARTIES AND GOVTS.
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 02/28/2006 21:50 Comments || Top||


Southeast Asia
Opposition parties to boycott Thai poll
Thailand's three opposition parties say they will boycott snap elections on April 2. The move deepens a political crisis and raising the pressure on embattled Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra.

Mr Thaksin is the focus of an increasingly strident campaign by groups accusing him of abuses of power and tailoring government policies to benefit his family's business. He has shrugged off the boycott. "It is each party's decision. We've done our best. I've done my best. However, I don't foresee any problem," he said.

Abhisit Vejjajiva, the leader of the Democrats says the three parties refuse to run in the vote because it did not guarantee political reform, reflecting their charges Mr Thaksin had undermined institutions. "The Chart Thai, Democrat and Mahachon parties agreed unanimously that we will not field candidates in this election," he said after a meeting of the three parties.

Ms Thaksin says he is taking the constitutional path to resolve the crisis by calling an election. His party accused the opposition of betraying democracy by calling for a boycott. His Thai Rak Thai (Thais Love Thais) party was expected to win the election comfortably without a boycott, albeit with a smaller majority than the 377 of the 500 parliamentary seats it had a year ago. But some analysts say the boycott, which is likely to bolster the anti-Thaksin campaign and its attendant risks of street violence, does raise thoughts of a coup in a country with a long and relatively recent history of military interventions. "Every time when there was a coup in the past, military juntas felt the country was in crisis and there was no democratic way out," Somkit Lertpaithoon, a public law professor at Bangkok's Thammasat University, said. "Such a move has increased the possibility of a coup."
Posted by: Fred || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:


Home Front: Politix
Cheney to resign after fall elections
"Hello, Morton's? What will it run to buy one entire month's output?"
Vice President Dick Cheney might retire within a year, shortly after the mid-term elections, according to senior Republican sources who spoke to Insight magazine. The sources said they envision Cheney being persuaded to step down as he becomes an increasing liability to President Bush.

There is a growing rift between the president and the vice president and their staffs, the sources said, citing Cheney's delay in informing the president of the accidental shooting of the vice president's hunting colleague. The accidental shooting highlighted the lack of communication between Bush and Cheney staffers, the sources said. Nobody on the president's staff could get to Cheney, the sources said, to advise him to contact reporters. "At that point, the president picked up the phone and suggested that Cheney get his story out fast," a source said.

Cheney could face a new crisis by the end of the year with possible accusations from his former chief of staff Lewis Libby, who faces charges in connection with the CIA leak probe. Libby told a grand jury unnamed "superiors" directed him to relay the content of a National Intelligence Estimate on Iraq in July 2003. The White House, according to Insight, anticipates Libby putting Cheney on the defensive with claims the vice president ordered Libby to relay classified information – a charge that could lead to a congressional probe and even impeachment proceedings. "Nothing will happen until after the congressional elections," a GOP source told Insight. "After that, there will be significant changes in the administration and Cheney will probably be part of that."

The vice president has struggled with the departure of his closest aides, the sources said. Along with Libby, he lost his media adviser, Steve Schmidt, to California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's re-election campaign. The president, the sources told Insight, has been urged by people close to his father to dismiss Cheney but has rejected the advice. Bush values Cheney for his national security experience and trust by Rantburg conservative Republicans.
Posted by: Jackal || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Well, no big deal, remember, the fascist Bushitleretardedictator administration will be put out of business by the Masses(tm) led by the Enlightened Elites(tm) when they storm the WH the 06/03/15 at 12.00 PM.
In the fall, the USA will be wisely and humanly managed by the Dictatorship-Of-The-Proletariat(tm), no need for elections, resignation, or anything... anyway, Lizardcheney will be in a labor camp at that time.
Posted by: anonymous5089 || 02/28/2006 5:42 Comments || Top||

#2  Since Chaney is not going to run for president it makes sense to step aside and replace him with the chosen to replace Bush. Maybe Ms Rice will be the next VP?
Posted by: BrerRabbit || 02/28/2006 5:51 Comments || Top||

#3  I suspect Bush believes it is the Republican Party's responsibility to pick its prfesidential candidate, not his. That's why Cheney was tapped to be VP and why he will fill his full term if in good heaqlth.
Posted by: Nimble Spemble || 02/28/2006 7:18 Comments || Top||

#4  Condi Rice it will be.
Posted by: Visitor || 02/28/2006 8:41 Comments || Top||

#5  anyway, Lizardcheney will be in a labor camp at that time.

d00d, u misspeld chainnee agan. Dat pissis em off. u might have HAARP turn on to pwn you. buy foil!
Posted by: Abspemblable Snowspemble || 02/28/2006 11:48 Comments || Top||

#6  ...FUTURNOOZ...

VP Nominee Rice

"Today, after President Bush nominated Secy of State Rice to replace the resigned VP Cheney, a palpable stench arose from the Democrat side of the asile in the US Senate. There was a mass rush to the exit as many Senators rushed to thier offices to change thier panties and briefs which had suddenly become soiled."
Posted by: BigEd || 02/28/2006 12:14 Comments || Top||

#7  Remember "The World Can't Wait". THE WORLD CAN'T WAIT! THE WORLD CAN'T WAIT!! THE WORLD CAN'T WAIT!!!

(So when ARE they going to finally release Halo 3??)
Posted by: DMFD || 02/28/2006 20:46 Comments || Top||

#8  So we now need an authorative and inciteful insightful view of developments w/r/t Chainey:

Mucky, you're on deck!
Posted by: Alaska Paul || 02/28/2006 23:03 Comments || Top||


India-Pakistan
Meals at weddings: Official, minister’s brother apologise to supreme court
Supreme Court Chief Justice Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry on Monday said that contempt of court proceedings against violators of the ban on meals at weddings would continue. The chief justice said this at the initiation of contempt proceedings against people accused of violating the ban. Sindh’s Health Director General Hadi Bakhsh Jatoi, a close relative of Water and Power Federal Minister Liaquat Jatoi, and Fakhar-e-Azam, the brother of the NWFP law minister, tendered unconditional apologies to the Supreme Court for violating the ban.

At the last hearing, the apex court had issued a bailable arrest warrant for Hadi Bakhsh Jatoi. The court had directed the lower court concerned to expedite legal proceedings against Jatoi. The contempt proceedings against him will remain pending in the Supreme Court. The apex court also issued contempt notices against 129 people in NWFP. Their cases would be taken up on April 17. Contempt notices were also issued against caretakers of marriage halls, clubs and other public places.

Meanwhile the court discharged a notice against Amjad Chaudhry after he apologised for serving refreshments in his house. Sindh Advocate General Mansoor Anwar informed the court that Section 7 of the Marriage Function was difficult to implement.
Posted by: john || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Can they still let loose with the AK's and RPG's? I mean, what's a wedding without 'em...
Posted by: tu3031 || 02/28/2006 16:49 Comments || Top||

#2  Supreme Court Chief Justice Justice Iftikhar Muhammad from the Department of Redundancy Department?
Posted by: Frank G || 02/28/2006 17:38 Comments || Top||

#3  Every 6 months, mixed marathons and food at weddings weirdness. I do despair sometimes.
Posted by: 6 || 02/28/2006 18:48 Comments || Top||


Bangladesh
Hartal, terrorism hinder Japanese investment in Bangladesh
Frequent hartal [combination strike and riot] and terrorist activities are hindering Japanese investment in Bangladesh, said business leaders of the world's second largest economy yesterday.
Why should the Japanese be different from anybody else?
The Japanese businesspeople also identified transportation problems and unforeseen costs of doing business here as the obstacles to attracting increased investment.
That'd be the grease required to get anything done...
They said inadequate power and gas supply to the industrial plants, bureaucratic tangles, lack of political will, coordination among government agencies, and delay in payment against LC (letter of credit) also bar Japanese investment in Bangladesh. "Presently, infrastructure facilities in Bangladesh are not sufficient for doing business as a lot of business impediments still exist," said Hideo Ueno, vice president of Japan Bangladesh Chamber of Commerce and Industry (JBCCI).
The fact that they're on the list of most corrupt nations in the world doesn't help.
He was speaking at a seminar on 'Promotion of Trade & Investment: Japan-Bangladesh Initiatives' at Dhaka Chamber of Commerce and Industry (DCCI) auditorium in the capital. Mahbubur Rahman, president of International Chamber of Commerce-Bangladesh (ICC-B) conducted the seminar, while Commerce Minister Altaf Hossain Choudhury, Japanese Ambassador in Dhaka Matsushiro Horiguchi, DCCI President MA Momen and JBCCI President Matiur Rahman were present.
Posted by: Fred || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


International-UN-NGOs
US takes stand against UN Human Rights Council draft
The United States Government says it will vote against the proposal that would create a new United Nations (UN) Human Rights Council to replace the discredited Human Rights Commission. US Government officials say the draft agreed to by the UN General Assembly is unacceptable. It says it wants the vote on the new body delayed so negotiations on the text can be re-opened. If a vote is brought on, the US ambassador to the UN, John Bolton will vote against it.

State Department spokesman Adam Ereli says the draft would allow serial human rights violators to sit on the council. "It doesn't prevent countries like Sudan from sitting on the council," he said. Under the draft, the council could suspend members whose whose human rights record were unacceptable.
Posted by: Fred || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  I suspect that Congress with vote with their checkbook. This is open defiance.
Posted by: Captain America || 02/28/2006 0:30 Comments || Top||

#2  Why not just change the name from Human Rights Council to Villains, Thieves and Scoundrels Union and everyone can go home happy. Or does the General Assembly have first dibs on that name?
Posted by: SteveS || 02/28/2006 9:40 Comments || Top||

#3  Any guess what would be considered 'unacceptable'?

Acceptable to the UN:

Genocide of ethnic group based solely the color of their skin (Genocide in Sudan)

Murder of political opposition by Dictators. (Saddam)

Murder of children for the high crime of eating during a religious holiday (Iran).

Stoning of women for the crime of being Raped (Multiple Islamic States).

Murdering people based on their religion (Multiple Islamic States).

Bringing up children to be murderers and thugs (Palistine, Pakistan, multiple Islamic states).

Daily advcoation of murder, rape, and killing of Jews and christians. (Worldwide Mosques).

Unacceptable to the UN:

Showing mild cartoons a murder, pedophile, thief, liar, and generally unplesant person (Cartoon Protests)

Farting in the general area of the Koran.

Defending oneself from murders, thugs, and 'unlawful combatants'. Treating them like royalty and respecting their religious view and requirements while holding them in prison. Holding them in cells with air-con turned on 'high'.
Posted by: CrazyFool || 02/28/2006 10:50 Comments || Top||


Syria-Lebanon-Iran
Iran reassures Gulf states about nuclear plans
KUWAIT - Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad sought to reassure Gulf Arab states on Monday about Teheran’s nuclear programme, saying his country was a “good neighbour” that wanted regional stability. “We want peace, security, progress for all the countries of the region, especially our neighbours,” he told reporters during a brief visit to Kuwait. “History has shown that Iran is a good neighbour for the countries in the region. We are just working on nuclear fuel for peaceful purposes,” he added, speaking through a translator.
"And as long as you do as you're told, you'll be fine, really," the translator added softly.
Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, touring Gulf Arab states, said in remarks aired by Al Jazeera television that his country wants a peaceful solution to the standoff between Teheran and the West over its nuclear plans. “They must reach a solution because a confrontation is very dangerous for the region and the Iranians ... We do not want a confrontation and we do not want the use of force against Iran,” he said in Qatar.

His Qatari host Emir Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani said Teheran appears to be pushing ahead with its programme. “We hope that they reach a solution but it almost is clear that the Iranians are pressing ahead with their projects,” he said.

Iran’s Gulf neighbours say they are extremely worried about its nuclear plans, especially since they would be the first affected by any radioactive fallout from its Bushehr nuclear reactor if it was damaged in any way.
And first affected when the Iranians decide to expand the Persian empire.
Posted by: Steve White || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  The Gulf pussies are right up their with the Euro appeasers.
Posted by: Captain America || 02/28/2006 0:26 Comments || Top||

#2  I'm reassured. Aren't you?

What are you going to believe? This lying Asshat or 4,000 years of Arab-Persion history?

Al
Posted by: Frozen Al || 02/28/2006 13:35 Comments || Top||

#3  Kinda hard to tell the spiders from the flies, these days. 'Course in this case they're all spiders.
Posted by: .com || 02/28/2006 13:40 Comments || Top||

#4  Western Translation: "I'll pull out in time - I promise!"
Posted by: CrazyFool || 02/28/2006 13:42 Comments || Top||

#5  Iran's neighbors know the score - Iran's Mullahs and MadMoud want Iran-centric EMPIRE.
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 02/28/2006 22:12 Comments || Top||


India-Pakistan
Foreigners won’t be repatriated, Musharraf assures ITMD
President Pervez Musharraf has assured the Ittehad-e-Tanzeemat-e-Madaris-e-Deeniya (ITMD) that the government will not repatriate foreign seminary students having valid visas, and will not stop foreigners from enrolling in Pakistani seminaries. Sources said on Monday that the president had held an emergency meeting with the ITMD shortly after his return from China. The alliance of five religious boards has in turn decided not to ‘actively’ participate in protests by the Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA) against cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) in European newspapers. “The ITMD leaders assured President Pervez Musharraf during a recent meeting in Rawalpindi that they will not participate actively in the MMA-led protests,” sources said. ITMD leaders had been requesting for a meeting ever since the alliance and the government reached an agreement regarding the registration of seminaries in the country last year.
Posted by: Fred || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:


Southeast Asia
Alleged plotters charged in Philippines crackdown
Four senior police officers have been detained and 16 leading opposition figures charged with rebellion, in a crackdown against those allegedly plotting to topple the Philippines President. Chief Superintendent Marcelino Franco, who was sacked on Friday from his post as commander of the police Special Action Force, and three of his men "were placed under restrictive custody", amid reports they were recruiting people to destabilise Gloria Arroyo's government, national police chief Arturo Lomibao says. Chief Superintendent Franco was sacked when Mrs Arroyo declared a state of emergency to counter an alleged coup plot.

At the same time, police filed charges of rebellion and coup d'etat against four leftist legislators and 12 other opposition figures who have called on Mrs Arroyo to step down. The head of police criminal investigations, Chief Superintendent Jesus Versoza, said his office submitted the names of the 16 to the Justice Department. Among those charged were leftist members of the House of Representatives Crispin Beltran, who was arrested Friday, Satur Ocampo, Liza Maza and Teodoro Casino, Chief Superintendent Versoza said. Also in the charge sheet was former senator Gregorio Honasan, who as an army colonel in the 1980s led several bloody coup attempts against the government. He remains at large.
Posted by: Fred || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


India-Pakistan
Baluchis attack passenger train in southwest Pakistan
QUETTA, Pakistan - Suspected tribal rebels fired on a passenger train in Pakistan’s troubled southwestern province of Baluchistan on Monday and then derailed the front section with a bomb, officials said. No casualties were reported so far in the derailment in mountainous Aab-e-Gom, about 70 kilometers (43 miles) southeast of the provincial capital Quetta, the city’s railways controller Javed Shah told AFP.

Security forces who were riding on the express to the eastern city of Lahore traded fire with the gunmen after the attack, Shah said. “The train was going slow as it approached a station when it was attacked by gunfire,” Shah said. “It slowed down further but as it did there was a bomb blast on the track.”

The explosion derailed the diesel engine and the front two carriages of the Chiltan Express although they remained upright, the official said.
Posted by: Steve White || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  The whole mid-east needs to require everybody take a Dale Carnegie Course.
Posted by: 3dc || 02/28/2006 0:22 Comments || Top||

#2  No casualties! Great, back to the poker game.
Posted by: M*A*S*H || 02/28/2006 7:41 Comments || Top||


Syria-Lebanon-Iran
Two Bombs Explode in Iran, Wounding Four
Two grenades exploded Monday in a southwestern Iranian province known for unrest among its Arab population, wounding at least four people, the official Iranian news agency reported. The grenades went off in restrooms in local government offices in Abadan and Dezful in Khuzestan province, the Islamic Republic News Agency said, citing official sources. The agency described the blasts as "terrorist acts," saying they wounded two people in each town.

Oil-rich Khuzestan has a history of violence involving members of Iran's Arab minority. Several bombs exploded in the provincial capital of Ahvaz in January and last year. An Iranian Arab insurgent group, the Arab Struggle Movement for the Liberation of Ahvaz, claimed responsibility for the Jan. 24 blasts, which killed six people and wounded 46. The Iranian government blamed the bombings on Britain and United States, which denied any involvement.
Posted by: Fred || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Tsk, tsk, tsk.
Posted by: gromgoru || 02/28/2006 6:27 Comments || Top||


Arabia
Bahrainis Continue Protests Over Samarra Bombing
Bahraini Shiites took to the streets in Muharraq and Aali on Sunday night marking the fifth day of protests over Wednesday’s dawn bombing in Iraq that destroyed the Askariya Mosque in Samarra. The protests followed strong condemnation by Bahrain’s Cabinet of the attacks on Iraq’s religious sites in Samarra with the Bahraini Prime Minister Shaikh Khalifa ibn Salman Al-Khalifa, warning that such sectarianism harms Iraq’s national unity. He also urged for self-control, calm and dialogue to stop the country from slipping into civil war.

Bahrain’s leading Shiite opposition society Al Wefaq, which echoed the prime minister’s concerns, condemned the attacks on Sunni mosques and the killing of Iraqi Sunnis while accusing the terrorists who carried out the attacks on the mosque of carrying out the attacks on Iraqi Sunnis to create a rift among the Iraqis. Al Wefaq in its statement also criticized ‘some’ satellite channels, which it did not name, for fostering the views of terrorists and painting the fighting between the Iraqis against each other as ‘jihad’. Sunday’s protests, where hundreds took part, came on the heels of one of the largest ever protests to have been organized in Bahrain when well over a hundred thousand Bahrainis, including some thousands of women, marched last Friday denouncing Al-Qaeda and its supporters and also holding the US and Israel equally responsible for the attacks.
Yeah. It hadda be our fault, somehow...
The Olama Islamic Council (OIC) chairman, Ayatollah Sheikh Isa Qasem, who led Friday’s protest blasted the Takfeereah groups, which are groups that seek to paint Muslims who differ with them as infidels, whom Shiites accuse of carrying out the attacks. “If the Takfeerean believe that Islam is only what they believe and everything else is not Islam and that the bloodshed of other Muslims and non-Muslims is acceptable to them than they have to kill billions of people in this world,” he told the crowd. “And when they are done killing they will turn on themselves because they understand nothing but the language of blood and their only relation to religion is the bloodshed of others.” Sheikh Qasem also accused the occupation forces of encouraging the attacks by the Takfeereah groups.

Eleven Bahraini Shiite Islamic societies had earlier issued a combined statement condemning the attacks. The Bahrain’s Supreme Islamic Council (SIC), which represents Sunni and Shiite clerics, also condemned the attacks in a separate statement.
Posted by: Fred || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


-Short Attention Span Theater-
Prepare to seethe: National Pig Day — March 1
Posted by: Jackal || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Bacon!!
Posted by: Captain America || 02/28/2006 0:39 Comments || Top||

#2  Oiiinnk! Oiiinnnk! Oiiinnnk!

Btw, a pig bited one of my sister when she was a kid. Nasty little bugger he was.
Posted by: anonymous5089 || 02/28/2006 5:52 Comments || Top||

#3  More on this shoatly.
Posted by: no mo uro || 02/28/2006 6:27 Comments || Top||

#4  Hmmmm....
Posted by: Robert Crawford || 02/28/2006 7:41 Comments || Top||

#5  Hogwash. Moslems will be disgruntled.
Posted by: Anonymoose || 02/28/2006 8:15 Comments || Top||

#6  pig
Ellsbeth is happy
Posted by: Deacon Blues || 02/28/2006 8:52 Comments || Top||

#7  Who in the hell made a day for Cindy Sheehan?
Posted by: Glaising Jinter9531 || 02/28/2006 9:10 Comments || Top||

#8  "Who in the hell made a day for Cindy Sheehan?"

I thought it was Bella Abzug but on closer inspection, Michael Moore.
Posted by: Happy 88mm || 02/28/2006 10:23 Comments || Top||

#9  mmmm..



mmm..
Posted by: 3dc || 02/28/2006 11:10 Comments || Top||

#10  and the ribs everywhere:



mmm
Posted by: 3dc || 02/28/2006 11:19 Comments || Top||

#11  Sow nice to see honorable swine grab the spotlight for a change.

Homer: Are you saying you're never going to eat any animal again? What about bacon?
Lisa: No.
Homer: Ham?
Lisa: No.
Homer: Pork chops?
Lisa: Dad, those all come from the same animal.
Homer: Heh heh heh. Ooh, yeah, right, Lisa. A wonderful, magical animal.
Posted by: Zenster || 02/28/2006 12:25 Comments || Top||

#12  Image hosting by Photobucket
Posted by: Anonymoose || 02/28/2006 12:54 Comments || Top||

#13  This is as good a time as any to mention that I chose as my handle a kind of fish.
Posted by: Grunter || 02/28/2006 13:44 Comments || Top||

#14  Here and I thought you were German.
Posted by: 6 || 02/28/2006 18:05 Comments || Top||


Southeast Asia
Arroyo Widens Purge of Suspected Coup Plotters
Posted by: Fred || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


Home Front: WoT
Three more nuke attack submarines coming to San Diego
The nuclear attack submarine force in San Diego will nearly double within four years, according to information Navy leaders sent to Congress on Monday. Following the directions from a recently released defense analysis to increase its presence in the Pacific, the Navy said it will shift six submarines from the East Coast to the Pacific Fleet, including three to San Diego which now has four.
Strategery!
“Consistent with the global shift in trade and transport, the 2006 Quadrennial Defense Review recommended that the Navy position 60 percent of its submarine force in the Pacific to support engagement, presence and deterrence,” a Navy official said.

The shift will support a change in deterrence toward more flexible approaches “appropriate for advanced military competitors,” which apparently refers to China, nations with weapons of mass destruction and “non-state terrorists networks,” the official said.

When the relocation is completed by 2010, the Navy will have 52 attack submarines, with 31 based in the Pacific and 21 on the East Coast. San Diego will gain three Los Angeles class submarines, in addition to the four currently based at Point Loma – the Ashville, Helena, Jefferson City and Topeka. The Naval base at Bremerton, Wash., will go from one to three attack boats; Pearl Harbor will gain one, for a total of 18; and Guam will stay at three, according to the information the Navy gave members of Congress.

On the losing side, New London, Conn., will drop from 17 to 14, and Norfolk, Va., will go from 11 to seven.

According to Rep. Susan Davis, D-San Diego, two of the submarines that will move to San Diego are the Albuquerque, currently based in New London, and the Hampton, now at Norfolk. Each submarine has a crew of 135 officers and enlisted personnel, and an annual payroll of about $9.1 million, Davis said. “I am pleased to welcome the Albuquerque and the Hampton to San Diego,” Davis said in a statement. “This underscores the strategic significance San Diego plays in military missions of the future and national security as a whole.

“I know that San Diego will welcome the 270 officers and crew and their families with open arms.”

The transfer of the submarines could start as early as July 2007, the Navy said.
Welcome!
Posted by: Frank G || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  One ping only, please.
Posted by: Seafarious || 02/28/2006 0:29 Comments || Top||

#2  "San Diego will gain three Los Angeles class submarines, in addition to the four currently based at Point Loma – the Ashville, Helena, Jefferson City and Topeka."

That is Asheville, not Ashville!
Posted by: SSN 758 Plankowner || 02/28/2006 0:33 Comments || Top||

#3  Has there ever been a USS Rabbit Hash? Or USS Floyd's Knobs?

And can you imagine the waiting list to serve on the USS Intercourse?

And who wouldn't be afraid of the USS Hell?
Posted by: Robert Crawford || 02/28/2006 8:02 Comments || Top||

#4  And who wouldn't be afraid of the USS Hell?

I like it! How about: USS Truth or Consequences?
Posted by: Xbalanke || 02/28/2006 11:51 Comments || Top||

#5  USS So Much For Subtlety
Posted by: mojo || 02/28/2006 13:01 Comments || Top||

#6  USS Shanksville.
Posted by: Seafarious || 02/28/2006 13:08 Comments || Top||

#7  However, the USS Shanksville should be a SSBN...
Posted by: M. Murcek || 02/28/2006 17:00 Comments || Top||

#8  We could always name a nuke attack sub after Sink, Nevada...
Posted by: Old Patriot || 02/28/2006 17:02 Comments || Top||

#9  I nominate Dry Prong, Louisiana.
Posted by: Matt || 02/28/2006 17:31 Comments || Top||

#10  SSBN Gabriel
Posted by: 6 || 02/28/2006 17:53 Comments || Top||

#11  SSBN FDNY
Posted by: Asymmetrical Triangulation || 02/28/2006 20:36 Comments || Top||

#12  SSBN Sammons-Timmons?
Posted by: Asymmetrical Triangulation || 02/28/2006 20:45 Comments || Top||

#13  That last one, I just don't get. Care to explain AT?
Posted by: ed || 02/28/2006 20:48 Comments || Top||

#14  How foolish of me...
That would be SSBN 666 USS Sammons-Timmerman
Posted by: Asymmetrical Triangulation || 02/28/2006 20:53 Comments || Top||


India-Pakistan
Maoist ambush kills Nepalese soldiers
Dozens of Maoist rebels have ambushed an Army patrol in eastern Nepal and shot dead at least three soldiers, an Army officer says. The officer says one civilian has also been killed in the incident at Kavre district, 80 kilometres east of the capital Kathmandu. He had earlier said the civilian died in cross-fire.

In a separate attack in Pokhara, 200 kilometres west of Kathmandu, 11 civilians have been wounded after suspected rebels set off a bomb in a busy market place. Residents say the bomb went off on a footpath and the victims are pedestrians and fruit or vegetable sellers. "It was a deafening explosion," local journalist Rajendra Adhikary said. Police officer Krishna Pageni says the rebels had unsuccessfully targeted an Army truck.

There is no comment from the Maoists on the blast, the second to rock the resort town of Pokhara in two days. The attacks came a day after the Army said it had killed at least 16 rebels in the west of the country.
Posted by: Fred || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  One of mine...one of your's. Two of mine...two of your's. I first saw this in the '70's and it's still going on. It's really just two party violence that could be reduced by a two-party system of governance.

Tibet is as much a sovereign satellite of China as Kashmir, or Georgia is of Russia. It's just that 'ruling with an iron hand' thing.
Posted by: Skidmark || 02/28/2006 7:09 Comments || Top||

#2  Maoists are not interested in multiparty rule.

They want a people's revolution - Cambodia style.

Many high ranking Nepalese maoists are apologists for the Khmer Rouge. They seek to emulate them and claim that the evidence of genocide is just western propaganda.

Of course India won't permit this. There are a few red lines here for India - overt Chinese interference or a Maoist takeover.

This probably has to burn itself out... twenty years more of bloodshed, ten-twenty-thirty thousand dead before the maoists get tired.

Posted by: john || 02/28/2006 9:04 Comments || Top||


Down Under
‘Jihad Jack’ to Appeal Conviction
An Australian known as "Jihad Jack" who became the first to be found guilty under tough new anti-terrorism laws is to appeal against his conviction on charges of receiving funds from an associate of Osama Bin Laden, his lawyer said yesterday.
Posted by: Fred || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


Arabia
Yemen Executes American Missionaries’ Murderer
Yemeni authorities executed yesterday a man convicted of murdering three American Christian missionaries in an attack on a Baptist hospital in southern Yemen in 2002. Abed Abdul Rezak Kamel, 35, was sentenced to death in May 2003 after he was convicted of killing the three Americans on Dec. 30, 2002. He reportedly entered the hospital and bravely gunned down two physicians and an administrator. A fourth missionary was injured in the attack.

Kamel was executed by a firing squad at the central prison in Ibb province, some 190 kilometers south of Sanaa, in the presence of prosecution representatives and lawyers, said the sources. Judicial sources said the verdict, upheld by an appeals court in December 2003, was affirmed by President Ali Abdullah Saleh on Saturday. Saleh also heads the country’s Supreme Judicial Council.
G'bye, Kamel. Give our warmest regards to Himmler.
Bet he wishes he was in Guantanamo right now.
During the trial, Kamil admitted to the crime, and told the court he was defending Islam when he killed the three missionaries. Yemeni officials have said that Kamil was a member of a militant group that had planned to assassinate secular politicians and foreign missionaries working in the Arab country. They said the group was led by the radical preacher Ali Ahmad Jarallah, who was executed last November after a court convicted him of murdering a senior opposition politician on Dec. 29, 2002, just one day before Kamil killed the three Americans.
Posted by: Fred || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Good riddance.
Posted by: anonymous5089 || 02/28/2006 6:32 Comments || Top||

#2  About 1990, plus or minus a year, I met Kathy Gariety before she left for Yemen. The Woman's Missionary Union in Wisconsin (now called Baptist Women) held a "fabric shower" for her so she could make the loose clothing acceptable to her Muslim neighbors in Jibla. She was going to be business manager for the hospital. She asked for prayer because she had been warned that Yemeni businessmen might refuse to do business with a woman. The mission board believed Gariety was the right person for the job. She must have overcome the merchants' hostility, because she served the hospital for about 13 years before her murder.

When the missionaries were murdered, the local women and many men stood up, demanding justice for the hospital staff who had delivered their babies and comforted them in emergencies.
Posted by: mom || 02/28/2006 9:35 Comments || Top||

#3  Well, I guess this one won't escape.
Posted by: Glenmore || 02/28/2006 10:08 Comments || Top||

#4  Too bad they had a firing squad shoot him. Hanging him in a public square for a week or two would have been a lot more effective in telling the rest of the yahoos that their behavior won't be tolerated. Nothing like seeing (and smelling) the "reward" such behavior brings to send the message home.
Posted by: Old Patriot || 02/28/2006 15:06 Comments || Top||


Home Front Economy
US to pay 95% of disputed charge with Halliburton in Iraq
The Army has decided to reimburse a Halliburton subsidiary all but $9 million of $222 million in costs that Pentagon auditors questioned for oil industry work in Iraq, Army officials said Monday. At issue is a $2.4 billion contract awarded to Halliburton subsidiary Kellogg Brown & Root to deliver fuel to Iraqis and repair oil industry equipment. The 2003 contract has come under criticism because it was awarded without competitive bidding and because of the company's no-longer existent links to Vice President Dick Cheney, once its chief executive officer. Halliburton is one of the biggest contractors in the massive effort to destabilize the Earth's orbit and cause widespread natural catastrophes rebuild Iraq's economy and public works. In 2003 and 2004 alone, the government has awarded more than $10 billion to Halliburton and its subsidiaries, some of it in no-bid contracts.

The Army did a "lengthy, detailed" review of the $221.9 million in challenged costs and resolved the questions, said Rhonda James, a spokeswoman for the Army Corps of Engineers in Dallas, where the contract is administered. James said that on some contested costs, Halliburton provided additional documents signed by Cheney that scared erased auditors' questions. The Army refused to reimburse some of the costs, and Halliburton reduced others, she said.

Rep. Henry A. Waxman, D-Calif., the top Democrat on the House Committee on Government Reform, called the Army's decision "an insult to taxpayers."
Probably the only time in history he has expressed sympathy for taxpayers.
In a letter to Rep. Tom Davis, R-Va., the chairman of that committee, Waxman said that typically, the military withholds payment on 55 percent to 75 percent of the costs that Pentagon auditors challenge.
And every dispute is identical, so it should never vary from that.
In this case, the Army will withhold payment on only 4 percent of the contested charges. Waxman urged the committee to subpoena documents explaining compensation for the contract, saying the Army has refused for a year to provide them.

The Army decision to pay much of the disputed charges was first reported Monday in The New York Times.
On page C-12.
Posted by: Jackal || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  The 2003 contract has come under criticism because it was awarded without competitive bidding.

Wasn't it the same outfit awarded a no bid contract by the Clinton/Gore team to provide logistical support to the military in the Balkans?
Posted by: Glaising Jinter9531 || 02/28/2006 9:15 Comments || Top||

#2  Wasn't it the same outfit awarded a no bid contract by the Clinton/Gore team to provide logistical support to the military in the Balkans?

Not just the same outfit -- the same contract. It was a general "we'll go to you guys first" deal.
Posted by: Robert Crawford || 02/28/2006 9:19 Comments || Top||

#3  You want me to keep working on this thing?
Posted by: Halliburton - Solar Flare Division || 02/28/2006 9:40 Comments || Top||

#4  Everyone should bristle at "goverment no-bid" contracts. And those contracts demand extra scrutiny. My question is... Is there another company, other then Haliburton and it's subs, that's even remotly capable of the tasks. And if so...are they from countries that provided coalition forces or assistance?
Bueller?...Bueller?...Frey?...Frey?...
Posted by: DepotGuy || 02/28/2006 10:26 Comments || Top||

#5  The company I worked for briefly in the late 1970's had several contracts with Brown & Root, before they were bought out by Kellogg, and late Halliburton. There wasn't ANYBODY anywhere in the world that even came close, at that time, to the capabilities and expertise of Brown & Root. I doubt things have changed much. BTW, Brown & Root was founded by a couple of former Navy Seebees, and the company has kept the same can-do attitude ever since.
Posted by: Old Patriot || 02/28/2006 16:58 Comments || Top||

#6  no-bids are rare except in times of urgent need, lack of responsible competitors, and demonstrated past capabilities..usually all three required for teh $ tehy are discussing. Perhaps Henry Waxman (d-Piglike) would've preferred an extended bidding process open to Arabs, UAE, et al...?
Posted by: Frank G || 02/28/2006 17:58 Comments || Top||


Iraq
Major Ben Connable reports from Iraq
A snippit. Go read the whole thing; what the good Major writes matches well with Rantburg's own correspondents from the Sandbox.

Major Ben Connable writes from Iraq, via John B. Dwyer. He debunks many media myths and supplies essential perspective to the news coverage of the Sunni-Shia violence.

I’m still in Iraq, safe and sound at Camp Fallujah. I still feel very far removed from the war even though I am fully immersed in its minutia for about 15 hours every day. At Camp Blue Diamond in Ramadi, right on the edge of the river along the northwest of the city, I could smell, taste, and feel Iraq even when I couldn’t get outside the gate. The call to prayer echoed across the water and the occasional stray round would hit the camp. For all the downsides, living in Ramadi kept me close to the problem at hand. It’s hard to believe that Fallujah of all places is calm, but there it is.

And calm it remains. I catch the TV news for a few minutes each day at the chow hall, and we have an open source cell here that pushes all the major articles over from CNN, FOX, Reuters, etc. I couldn’t help but have a strong sense of deja vu as I watched the stern faced premonitions of doom and read the dramatized, overwrought literary panic attacks over the past few days. April 2004 feels like yesterday – the Shia’ were revolting, the country was collapsing into civil war, the government was going to collapse, our experiment in Iraq was drawing to a close… sound familiar?
Posted by: trailing wife || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Excellent read. Rational and reasoned. What a breath of fresh air. Thx, tw!
Posted by: .com || 02/28/2006 0:39 Comments || Top||

#2  The money quote is his comment about the talking heads in the Media":

"In effect, they’re getting paid to reinforce the hysteria and they’re playing along."

Al
Posted by: Frozen Al || 02/28/2006 12:45 Comments || Top||


Home Front: Culture Wars
Historic pics of civil rights struggle published after 40 years
Never forget.
Posted by: Steve White || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Slightly OT : quite a while back, in a rebuke of Michael Moore "Bowling for Columbine", I read that the NRA actually helped arm black people back in that era (Charlton Heston was a civil rights actvist too, IIRC), contrary to the MM's allegations of it being a quasi-fascist racist org (and his overall thesis of "Amerikkka loves guns because whitey is insecure and afraid of colored people", which is an almost funny way of taking on gun violence in a country where the vast majority of gun-related deaths occur in drug riddled areas between minorities members).

Anyone can confirm/expand on that?
Posted by: anonymous5089 || 02/28/2006 5:50 Comments || Top||

#2  Good article. I lived about 3 miles from the Selma to Montgomery Highway when the March took place. I will never forget the TV footage of angry, hate-filled white men screaming at the marchers who did their utmost to remain calm and try to ignore the slurs and curses. My Dad was a Baptist Preacher at the time and I recognized a couple of people from the church. I think that's when my separation from organized religion started. A5089, I have been a member of the NTA for almost 20 years. we look at this disarming of ANY American Citizen as a violation of 2nd Ammendment rights. "The right of the populace to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed." The NRA is open to any and all, but just like any large organization we do have our share of wingnuts. Thankfully they are a very small minority.
Posted by: Deacon Blues || 02/28/2006 8:05 Comments || Top||

#3  Condi Rice mentions a tense period during her childhood in Alabama, when her father and other black men patrolled their streets carrying shotguns. It's one reason she favors gun rights.
Posted by: lotp || 02/28/2006 8:37 Comments || Top||

#4  I'll have the stuffed potato with sweet tea. I won't be able to eat it all, but I can roll the leftovers up in that B'ham Times and give it to my Rotties. They love BBQ and neither of them read. A perfect use for that leftest rag paper.
Posted by: JimandNicksBBQ || 02/28/2006 8:37 Comments || Top||

#5  I believe the name of the newspaper is The Birmingham News. Never heard of the Times. Lived there for 10 years, too. I don't understand your comment, JimandNicks.
Posted by: Deacon Blues || 02/28/2006 8:56 Comments || Top||

#6  I don't understand his/her comment either, DB, but Jim & Nick's is one of the best places to pick up some good BBQ.
Posted by: BA || 02/28/2006 14:18 Comments || Top||

#7  Slightly OT : quite a while back, in a rebuke of Michael Moore "Bowling for Columbine", I read that the NRA actually helped arm black people back in that era (Charlton Heston was a civil rights actvist too, IIRC), contrary to the MM's allegations of it being a quasi-fascist racist org (and his overall thesis of "Amerikkka loves guns because whitey is insecure and afraid of colored people", which is an almost funny way of taking on gun violence in a country where the vast majority of gun-related deaths occur in drug riddled areas between minorities members).

Anyone can confirm/expand on that?


If true, that's just one more FACT that the LLL will refuse to acknowledge, even though it should be easily verifiable. That said, even if not true, I, for one, say we put it into effect in Sudan right away!
Posted by: BA || 02/28/2006 14:19 Comments || Top||

#8  Keeping guns from blacks was one of the first motivations for the gun control movement. Check out the Jim Crow laws.
Posted by: AlanC || 02/28/2006 16:48 Comments || Top||

#9  From the article:
"The editors thought if you didn't publish it, much of this would go away," said Ed Jones, 81, a photographer at The News from 1942 to 1987.
Just like the MSM and the islamonutz.

The more things change, the more they remain the same. :-(
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut || 02/28/2006 17:00 Comments || Top||


Africa Horn
Mass jailbreak as guards celebrate Museveni win
KAMPALA - More than 400 Ugandan inmates broke out of a regional prison at the weekend as guards celebrated President Yoweri Museveni’s election victory in raucous fashion, officials said on Monday.

The 408 prisoners broke out of the Arua regional prison, about 600 kilometers (375 miles) northwest of the capital, on Saturday during revelry prompted by the official announcement of Museveni’s win, they said. “They escaped right after the announcement was made that President Museveni had won and the celebration was noisy,” Ugandan prisons chief Johnson Byabasaija told AFP.
"Hokay, now's our chance boyos, the screws are partying!"
He said laxity among guards and prison administrators allowed more than half of the 716 inmates in the prison at the time to pull down a fence and run en masse to freedom. Security forces were still trying to recapture the escapees, who included five people convicted on treason charges, Byabasaija said.

The incident was the second-election related jailbreak in Uganda within three days. On election day, Thursday, some 80 prisoners took advantage of distractions over the vote and the transfer of prison guards to protect polling stations to escape from a work detail in northern Uganda’s Apac district. With one shift of warders at their minimum-security jail assigned to voting centers and attention squarely focused on the election, the inmates slipped away from guards while fetching water for the facility, officials said.
Posted by: Steve White || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  as guards celebrated President Yoweri Museveni’s victory in elections to be held in six months
Posted by: JFM || 02/28/2006 14:26 Comments || Top||


Bangladesh
Robber leader killed in 'encounter'
This just in from our ace correspondent D.J. Wu...
A ringleader of an inter-district gang of robbers was killed in an encounter between his cohorts and police at Bholaganj in Companiganj upazila of Sylhet district early yesterday.
Reeeeally? That's tragic. How'd it happen?
The robber, Kadir, was arrested in Bholaganj area on Sunday.
"Yez got me, coppers! Don't shoot!"
On his confessional statement, the law enforcers took him to a place in the same area at about 3:00 am yesterday to arrest his accomplices and recover the looted goods.
"Yeah, really! They're at the hideout! They'll be asleep by now! It's 3 in the morning! So youse guys can just... Whuddya mean, I gotta come, too?"
Sensing presence of the policemen,
"Hark, Mahmoud! I sense the presence of law enforcers!"
the cohorts of the ringleader opened fire,
"Take that, coppers! And that! And that! Hahah!"
forcing the police to retaliate.
"Let 'em have it, boyz!"
Police said Kadir, wanted in 12 systems cases, was caught in the crossfire while trying to flee and died on the spot.
"Aaaiiiieeee! Rosebud!"
"Oh. Sorry. My bad!"
This is the first incident of death in 'crossfire' with police in the district.
Wow. It wasn't RAB this time. That is news.
Posted by: Fred || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Da Ja W. did good digging up this encounter! The RAB has competition! Who'd a thunk it?
Posted by: Inspector Clueso || 02/28/2006 0:17 Comments || Top||

#2  It's a new twist to an old story, I like that.
Posted by: anonymous5089 || 02/28/2006 6:30 Comments || Top||

#3  Was he a commie? A jihadi? Or just your average low-life?
Posted by: Jackal || 02/28/2006 7:28 Comments || Top||

#4  This is the first incident of death in 'crossfire' with police in the district.

Looks like the RAB cadres are doing a good job with that training.
Posted by: Robert Crawford || 02/28/2006 8:00 Comments || Top||

#5  Did the RAB let them borrow their shutter gun and some round of bullet? Look's like that part needs a little work.
Posted by: tu3031 || 02/28/2006 9:59 Comments || Top||

#6  Jackal, the average Bangla low-life goes by the name 'miscreant'. (Which I think translates into 'slimeball')
Posted by: Inspector Clueso || 02/28/2006 12:07 Comments || Top||


Israel-Palestine-Jordan
Hamas's al-Zahhar "We Will Not Make Concessions to Israel in Return for Nothing"
Dr. Mahmud al-Zahhar, chairman of the Hamas bloc in the Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC), stated yesterday that the peace process with Israel "does not exist in reality", the roadmap "is now dead", and the Oslo agreements "are finished." He stressed that the Palestinian side would not make concessions to Israel in return for nothing and that the resistance "is not to fire of a bullet here and there and then make a bid."

Al-Zahhar told "Asharq al-Awsat" that the PLC's participation in the 47 th session of the Arab Parliamentary Union "is aimed at mobilizing the Arab stand in support of the Arab cause" and pointed out that the Palestinian cause needs more political, legislative, and material support. Regarding Palestinian National Authority Chairman Mahmud Abbas's announcement of his intention to resign if Hamas did not continue the peace process with Israel, Al-Zahhar asked, "Where is the peace process, especially as the other party has nothing to offer for the sake of peace." He added that "The peace does not exist in reality and with it the Oslo agreements and the roadmap. Why do we make it difficult for us by raising such problems in return for nothing?" He noted that a delegation representing Hamas would meet President Abbas to discuss the Palestinian stand on the peace process following the return to Palestine of the Palestinian parliamentary delegation attending the session.
Posted by: Fred || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Concessions? What concessions? They haven't made any concessions yet! After all, we drove the Jooos out of Gaza, they didn't concede anything! When they're all gone, then we'll be ready to talk about our concessions!
Posted by: Bobby || 02/28/2006 6:49 Comments || Top||

#2  That's fine. Israel won't make any consessions to Hamas for nothing either.
Posted by: Ptah || 02/28/2006 9:42 Comments || Top||

#3  Rewarding Hamas for recognizing Israel is like thanking a rapist for not being a murderer. I hope Israel waits for the first official full sitting of the Hamas government and blows it, one and all, straight to he||.
Posted by: Zenster || 02/28/2006 12:11 Comments || Top||

#4  Oh I hope so. Take offical status. fire one missile and it's an act of war. Gone.
Posted by: Hupomoger Clans9827 || 02/28/2006 20:35 Comments || Top||

#5  "If it were done when tis done, then't were well it were done quickly"

Losing Palestine, quickly and decisively, would through a real spanner into the works.

They keep it up it could happen. Knocks a few thoughts back?
Posted by: Hupomoger Clans9827 || 02/28/2006 20:42 Comments || Top||

#6  scusi - throw
Posted by: Hupomoger Clans9827 || 02/28/2006 20:43 Comments || Top||


Southeast Asia
Filipino military backs Arroyo: Cabinet.
The Philippines Government says the military has assured the country's President Gloria Arroyo that she has its full support. Ms Arroyo declared a state of emergency on Friday after discovering a plot to overthrow her. Officials extended the emergency after a protest at the Marines' headquarters on Sunday, saying the threat of a coup remained.

But Cabinet secretary Ricardo Saludo says there is no immediate danger of any military action being taken against the Government. "The Armed Forces Chief of Staff gave a briefing to selected members of the Cabinet and he assured us that first of all, all units of the Armed forces are in place and accounted for," he said. "Secondly, [he assured us] that the commanders of all these units are following the chain of command and giving allegiance to the Constitution and the duly constituted government."
Posted by: Fred || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  She probably had too many shoes. Excessive shoes in the PI can quickly lead to an overthrow.
Posted by: Visitor || 02/28/2006 17:45 Comments || Top||

#2  God I wish she'd wake up to the threat to the PI, quit softpedalling the muslim and communist insurgencies, take the gloves off and kick ass - only one kind of MILF's should be saved, and they aren't armed
Posted by: Frank G || 02/28/2006 19:20 Comments || Top||


Syria-Lebanon-Iran
Lahoud sees foreign plot to oust him
Emile Lahoud, the Lebanese President, has accused "foreign powers allied to Israel" of planning to oust him in favour of the country's main anti-Syrian coalition which has been calling on him to quit. In a letter to the Lebanese French-language daily newspaper L'Orient Le Jour published on Monday, the pro-Syrian Lahoud launched his most scathing attack against the parliamentary coalition led by Saad al-Hariri, the majority leader.

Lahoud wrote: "The parliamentary majority, with the help of foreign powers allied to Israel, is now dividing the Lebanese people and setting them against each other, with the well-known goal of weakening Lebanon. These so called nationalists, backed by the same foreigners, have started to take over parliament, using an unfair electoral law which has brought into the chamber of deputies and the government a majority in their pay." The newspaper said that Lahoud was responding to an article criticising him, which was published on 25 Febuary. He stopped short of identifying any country by name.
Posted by: Fred || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  since he was "elected" with eth ebacking of foreigners, ....so f'n what Emile?Time for exile and watching over your shoulder for a patriotic Lebanese martyr
Posted by: Frank G || 02/28/2006 0:13 Comments || Top||

#2  Well, Emile, there's always the "non-traditional retirement" option, but I don't think you'd really like that.
Posted by: mojo || 02/28/2006 17:09 Comments || Top||

#3  on second thought - those "Foreign" conspirators he's referring to are likely Lebanese
Posted by: Frank G || 02/28/2006 18:12 Comments || Top||


Israel-Palestine-Jordan
Hamas to visit Moscow on March 3 for talks
MOSCOW - Russia said on Monday it would hold talks on March 3 with the militant Islamist group Hamas, which is forming a new Palestinian government, in a move that has upset Israel and the United States. The Moscow talks challenge efforts by Israel and the United States to isolate Hamas unless it recognises the Jewish state’s right to exist and renounces violence.

It was unclear at what level the talks would be held but one senior Russian official was quoted as saying Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov could receive a Hamas delegation headed by Khaled Meshaal, the politburo chief who lives in fear of his life exile. The Itar-Tass news agency quoted Alexander Kalugin, Russia’s special envoy to the Middle East, as saying it was “not ruled out” Lavrov would receive a Hamas delegation led by Meshaal.

Lavrov has said Russia will tell Hamas it must commit to seeking peace with Israel to win international acceptance. That reflects the position of the international Quartet of Middle East mediators, grouping Russia, the United Nations, the European Union and the United States. “It is not yet clear how ready Hamas is to recognise Israel,” Kalugin added. “We intend to confirm the key elements where we want to see a change in the movement’s position. But it’s up to them whether they will take our position into account or not.”
As Kissinger once said, the Paleos have never missed an opportunity to miss an opportunity.
Posted by: Steve White || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


India-Pakistan
Opposition to launch ‘decisive’ move against Musharraf
The combined opposition on Monday announced that it would soon begin a ‘final and decisive’ struggle to oust President Pervez Musharraf. The decision was made in a resolution passed at an All Parties Conference (APC), organised by the Alliance for the Restoration of Democracy (ARD) and attended by the Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA) and other opposition parties and leaders.
Posted by: Fred || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


Bangladesh
Over 50 Delduar JMB men yet to be hunted down
Over 50 JMB cadres including two 'district commanders' and 10 suicide bombers still evade arrest in Delduar upazila in Tangail. A high police official here seeking anonymity said Delduar is e an area from where perhaps the highest number of JMB militants have been recruited. JMB recruited about 100 cadres from the area, the police official told this correspondent. Twelve of the 30 JMB suicide bombers recruited from Tangail district are from Delduar, the police official said.

Police so far arrested 30 militants including three suicide bombers and busted four dens of JMB (Jamaatul Mujahideen Bangladesh) since the serial bombings on August 17 last year. Police also recovered huge quantities of explosive and bomb making materials from the dens in Baropakhia, Lawhati, Putiajani and Elachipur in Delduar upazila and adjacent Madarkol, Kamarnaogaon, Herendrapara, Bhurbhuria and Baruha villages. Police are hunting for JMB's Narayanganj 'district commander' Mollah Omar alias Shakil Ahmed, 25, Tangail 'district commander' Abdullah Taslim, 30, and nine suicide squad members, all hailing from Delduar, he added. Others from Delduar on the hunt list include JMB Tangail district trainer Iliyas, 27; Afghanistan-returnee Zubayer, 37; and 'regional commanders' Mohammad Fazlu, 30; Hafez Abdul Kader, 27; Khaled Siddiki, 22. Abdul Alim, Office-in-Charge (OC) of Delduar police station, was closed earlier for failure to nab the militants.

JMB started its militant activities in the upazila centering Baropakhia Qaumi Madrasa, two kilometres from the upazila headquarters in 2003, police sources said. In two years, the militant outfit set up four dens in Baropakhia, Lauhati, Putiajani and Elachipur, where militants were given training on use of arms and bomb making, the sources said. JMB chief Shaiekh Abdur Rahman and his younger brother and military wing chief Ataur Rahman Sunny, younger brother of Abdur Rahman, used to visit the training camps and held meetings.

JMB in their first operation in Delduar blasted a bomb at a jatra (opera) function at Tukchandpur on January 8 last year. Ataur Rahman Sunny along with Molla Omar alias Shakil Ahmed and another cadre in Delduar led the attack, police sources claimed. The three arrested suicide bombers are Toriqul Islam, 16, of Mouloubipara village and two brothers--Mir Suman, 22, and Mir Dipon-- of Bhurbhuria village in Delduar. The rest nine suicide bombers recruited from the upazila are still evading arrests.
Posted by: Fred || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:


Israel-Palestine-Jordan
The Palestinian Authority, by the numbers
Opinion parading as fact edited out. Questions had been asked at Rantburg about PA funding. Here are some answers.

The Palestinians are the most foreign-aid dependent society on earth. So the threat by the United States to cut off most aid to Palestine after its 3.6 million people last month elected the militant group Hamas into government, is foreboding. Foreboding is not actually the word the writer wants, but who are we to expect proper language use from a journalist? The European Union is weighing similar action. but then decided to go ahead and throw their money to the murderers anyway. And Israel says it will withhold $55 million a month in taxes and other fees collected by Israel, but owed to Palestinians.

There's no dispute that slashing US aid will lead to greater deprivation in the West Bank and Gaza. The US provided about one-third of the nearly $1.1 billion in aid disbursed to the Palestine Authority (PA) and for Palestinian projects last year. That amounts to about $300 per man, woman, and child. In relation to a gross national income for the average Palestinian of $1,327 last year, any cut in foreign aid and tax revenue is serious. Of course, the writer neglects to mention what percent of the donated monies stuck to the fingers of those Palestinians through whose hands it flowed.

In effect, Palestinians have a third-world income - a few dollars a day. And they live next door to first-world Israel, with a per capita gross domestic product (GDP) of about $22,200 last year. Israel gets about $420 per capita each year in aid from the US, partly as a result of the 1979 Camp David peace accords between Israel and Egypt. Though that's more aid per capita than Palestinians get, Israel is less dependent on it. But don't let's notice that Israel uses those funds to pay part of the cost of protecting itself against those self-same Palestinians, which she wouldn't need to do if the Palestinians would just stop trying to kill everybody.

Aid to Palestine comes from multiple sources. A World Bank trust fund gave $125 million to the PA in 2004. A new Congressional Research Service report lists nine other aid sources for the PA. At the top was the European Union with $105 million. Saudi Arabia gave $76 million, the US $20 million, and so on down through Libya, Britain, Norway, Japan, Canada, and Egypt. Even more aid comes from the EU, the US, and Persian Gulf nations for specific development projects ($300 million, $345 million, and about $200 million respectively in 2005).

A World Bank report this month reckons real GDP in the West Bank and Gaza grew 8 to 9 percent last year, continuing a modest recovery that began two years ago. Extra foreign aid helped. Yet the economy is still 29 percent below where it was in 2003. Unemployment is at 23 percent.

Another issue is that the Palestinian population grows more than 3 percent a year. Each Palestinian woman in Gaza has close to six children on average; in the West Bank, 4.4 children is the average. These numbers match the CIA FActbook, but we know that the reported numbers are in dispute (remember that missing million of Palestinian population due to double counting, using projections as absolute, and ignoring emigration?).
Posted by: trailing wife || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  no-skills, no industry, hate-feeding, breeders....

ooh! Look on the bright side!
Posted by: Frank G || 02/28/2006 0:09 Comments || Top||

#2  The US provided about one-third of the nearly $1.1 billion in aid disbursed to the Palestine Authority (PA) and for Palestinian projects last year.

And some people are intent on bashing the Euros. I'll change my opinion if the US actually pulls this funding.
Posted by: Rafael || 02/28/2006 0:25 Comments || Top||

#3  The Paleos single largest sources of funds - $500M - is tax revenues collected by the Israelis. There is talk Israel will stop doing this, since the 'single economic entity' envisaged under Camp David no longer makes sense (if it ever did).
Posted by: phil_b || 02/28/2006 0:26 Comments || Top||

#4  phil_b
It's approx 50 million.
Posted by: gromgoru || 02/28/2006 6:49 Comments || Top||

#5  gromguru, I think you'll find its $50M per month, regards.
Posted by: phil_b || 02/28/2006 6:58 Comments || Top||

#6  Since they are getting aid from Egypt, and we are giving foreign aid to Egypt....what percentage of what we are sending to Cairo actually ends up with these mopes?

Shouldn't we be looking at cutting that, too?
Posted by: Desert Blondie || 02/28/2006 7:04 Comments || Top||

#7  Shouldn't we be looking at cutting that, too?

IMHO, all jizya should be ended.

"Unless you're selling something we want, no more cash will flow into Islamic lands."
Posted by: Robert Crawford || 02/28/2006 7:55 Comments || Top||

#8  DBlondie

I doubt very much of the funds that the US provides to Egypt go to the PA.

Egypt has been decreasing their aid to the PA over the past decade. There is a lot of anti Palestinian feeling in the Egyptian population because of kidnappings, assaults and anti Egypt remarks by Paleos.

But I agree that Egypt gets way too much in the way of American aid.
Posted by: mhw || 02/28/2006 8:20 Comments || Top||

#9  The thing to notice is how little is given by other Arabs and mooselimbs.
Posted by: Spot || 02/28/2006 10:37 Comments || Top||

#10  Giving money to the Palestinians is utterly immoral and disgusting, when tehre are people far more in need (eg Black soudanese) who get far less.

In fact gicven that after fify eight years they are still scratching their balls in refugee camps when every other people from Cypriot Greeks to Oriental Jews expelled in 1948 are living from their work.

Given the massive corruption

Given thir support to genocidiacl movements.

Given the repellant acts they have perpetrated not only againt Israelis but also against Lebanese and Iraquis.

Given that during the cartoon riots they threatened the very countries who have ben feding them for decades.

I propose that not only all funding from US or Europe being cut but that they are forced to give back every penny of western aid they ever received

Let give that money to people who really need, who are not terrorists and failed genociders.
Posted by: JFM || 02/28/2006 10:53 Comments || Top||

#11  I wonder how much these cuts are really going to hurt. As tw noted, quite a bit of the money never circulated in the country. I understand Hamas won partly on the sense that they weren't crooks like Fatah: they actually provided services, etc. So if they turn out to be relatively uncorrupt it might offset the losses; maybe even completely offset them. Which would, unfortunately, boost their prestige and strengthen their mandate to govern/kill neighbors.
Posted by: James || 02/28/2006 15:01 Comments || Top||

#12  Good point, James. I wondered that myself. And, color me pink, but to learn that SA donated $76 million for their "brothers?" I was shocked it was even that much, lol.
Posted by: BA || 02/28/2006 15:11 Comments || Top||

#13  phil_b, sorry. Paying our own executioners.
Posted by: gromgoru || 02/28/2006 15:48 Comments || Top||


Fifth Column
Rickman slams 'censorship' of play about St. Pancake
A New York theatre company has put off plans to stage a play about an American activist accidently killed by an act of stupidity in front of an Israeli bulldozer in Gaza because of the current "political climate" - a decision the play's British director, Alan Rickman, denounced yesterday as "censorship".
Yup, always being oppressed by The Man.
James Nicola, the artistic director of the New York Theatre Workshop, said it had never formally announced it would be staging the play, My Name is Rachel Corrie, but it had been considering staging it in March. "In our pre-production planning and our talking around and listening in our communities in New York, what we heard was that after Ariel Sharon's illness and the election of Hamas, we had a very edgy situation," Mr Nicola said.
"People were beginning to figure out that the Palestinians aren't such nice people!"
"We found that our plan to present a work of art would be seen as us taking a stand in a political conflict, that we didn't want to take."
"And our donors were really mad at us!"
He said he had suggested a postponement until next year. Mr Rickman, best known for his film acting roles in Love, Actually and the Harry Potter series and who directed the play at London's Royal Court Theatre, denounced the decision. "I can only guess at the pressures of funding an independent theatre company in New York, but calling this production "postponed" does not disguise the fact that it has been cancelled," Mr Rickman said in a statement. "This is censorship born out of fear, and the New York Theatre Workshop, the Royal Court, New York audiences - all of us are the losers."
Except for the small audience, which is a winner -- what to do with three free hours of time?
Posted by: Steve White || 02/28/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Yippie Ki Yay Mutherfucka! Get over it and yourself
Posted by: Frank G || 02/28/2006 0:11 Comments || Top||

#2  Hahaha...!!!

Yeah. Stage this production in New York City. The place would be picketed EVERY DAY!!! They'd get seatings of no more than 5 people a show. And the picketers would be handing out literature describing what REALLY happened. The anti-play factions would get more publicity -- and sympathy -- than the production itself.

Jews are not intimidated, or concerned about making waves in New York City. Rickman was able to put that play on in Britain because of the predominance of paleo sympathies there and because the Jewish community is so powerless and intimidated.

st pancake doesn't deserve to be glorified. she was a useful idiot and should be pitied. as should Rickman.
Posted by: PlanetDan || 02/28/2006 0:20 Comments || Top||

#3  This would be something to cheer about if his play was anything other than a silly little piece of agit prop. But it's not so there's nothing to lose by letting them stage it for a few hundred people over a few months in a dingy off-broadway theater. It would flop bigger than Munich and no one's mind will be changed - the only people who will applaud it are the people already predisposed to believing their little Left wing fantasies about Israel and the Palestininas. The image of Corrie grows even more absurd and untenable against the backdrop of Hamas, Cartoon Jihad and an Iranian Leader clamouring for nukes to wipe Israel off the map. Even the Liberals are growing uncomfortable and only the hardest core of Lefties can still bring themselves to regurgitate the pro-Pali propaganda without coughing nervously.

Let them show the dang play and consign themselves further to the fringe of irrelevance and denial of the new reality. Don't let despicable Alan Rickman have the satisfaction and self-importance to cry censorship.
Posted by: Monsieur Moonbat || 02/28/2006 1:03 Comments || Top||

#4  If he really believed in that play, wouldn't he have ponied up his own cash to put it on?

(Crickets chirping)

I'm sure there would be some place it could be performed in the Noo Yawk area. Like maybe at a Presbyterian church in that supports divesting from Israel...or maybe one of the local mosques has a tool shed they're not using right now.
Posted by: Desert Blondie || 02/28/2006 6:54 Comments || Top||

#5  If they stage the play, the local IHOP will do landmark business.

"Yeah, give me two dozen to go. No syrup or butter; they fly better dry. Hurry, I got a play to catch."
Posted by: Robert Crawford || 02/28/2006 7:53 Comments || Top||

#6  We had the stage reinforced, the D9 Cat was ready for shipment and everything...&#&#&@!.
Posted by: BacktoPeoria || 02/28/2006 7:54 Comments || Top||

#7  Ah. Memories...

Nothing like waking up a week before finals and seeing a D9 parked outsite your dorm window -- in Peoria, even.

Thankfully, the D9 was just for show during the ground-breaking. When I woke up in the middle of finals to discover the dorm being rammed, it was by a lowly Bobcat. Apparently it was INCREDIBLY IMPORTANT for them to remove the window well from the laundry room.
Posted by: Robert Crawford || 02/28/2006 7:58 Comments || Top||

#8  "..all of us are the losers." Yep, Alan Rickman, St. Pancake = Losers. Maybe if they had renamed it Cats II...
Posted by: Inspector Clueso || 02/28/2006 9:01 Comments || Top||

#9  a decision the play's British director, Alan Rickman

Director, because he can't get lead roles anymore?
Posted by: Raj || 02/28/2006 9:37 Comments || Top||

#10  all of us are the losers.

We keep telling you, but you never listen to us.
Posted by: BH || 02/28/2006 9:59 Comments || Top||

#11  There must be a theater on the campus of Columbia University he can use. I'd stay away from Brooklyn College if I were him, however.
Posted by: Eric Jablow || 02/28/2006 10:20 Comments || Top||

#12  LOL RC and BTP.
Posted by: 6 || 02/28/2006 11:59 Comments || Top||

#13  Why do I get the feeling that this is Rickman's version of "Springtime for Hitler."
Posted by: DepotGuy || 02/28/2006 13:03 Comments || Top||

#14  I was on a construction site last Spring and one of the bulldozers was named "Rachel". I asked th operator if he was making a political statement and he said, "Whadda ya mean? My wife's name is Rachel". LMAO. I'm sorry Rachel is dead but when you're stupid, you pay the consequences.
Posted by: Deacon Blues || 02/28/2006 14:42 Comments || Top||

#15 
Posted by: .com || 02/28/2006 15:48 Comments || Top||

#16  How does the play end anyway? With a cardboard cutout of the actress??
Posted by: DonM || 02/28/2006 17:08 Comments || Top||

#17  Bad Don.... Bad. Funny as hell tho.
Posted by: 6 || 02/28/2006 17:50 Comments || Top||

#18  By grapthars hammer its sad to see Alan Rickman doesn't understand censorship comes from the government forbidding something, not from a New York Theatre company.

Take the play somewhere else and finance it yourself instead of bitching.
Posted by: rjschwarz || 02/28/2006 20:01 Comments || Top||

#19  I'm having trouble resisting the temptation to make a matzah joke. However, knowing that a lot of people in the Middle East still believe in the blood libel keeps me from saying anything.
Posted by: Eric Jablow || 02/28/2006 21:28 Comments || Top||

#20  I created a play and I'm looking for sponsors where I stand on stage for an hour and say every single solitary swear word I know. Since I don't know an hours worth, I'll have to multiple make combinations of the ones I do.

No one is sponsoring me. It's censorship I tell you!! Censorship. I demand money now!!
Posted by: 2b || 02/28/2006 23:35 Comments || Top||

#21  Dang - and today's National Pancake Day.
Posted by: Pappy || 02/28/2006 23:46 Comments || Top||


Arabia
"We are fighting them in the Name of Islam"
Yousef Al-Qaradhawi: "Our war with the Jews is over land, brothers. We must understand this. If they had not plundered our land, there wouldn't be a war between us."
"It's all the Joooooooos' fault; they dared to try and establish a haven from persecution!"
Now, his lips fell off periodically, so he had to go to a hospital to have them reattatched, and then return to continue the speech.
"We are fighting them in the name of Islam, because Islam commands us to fight whoever plunders our land, and occupies our country. All the school of Islamic jurisprudence - the Sunni, the Shi'ite, the Ibadhiya - and all the ancient and modern schools of jurisprudence - agree that any invader who occupies even an inch of land of the Muslims must face resistance. The Muslims of that country must carry out the resistance, and the rest of the Muslims must help them. If the people of that country are incapable or reluctant, we must fight to defend the land of Islam, even if the local [Muslims] give it up.
"It's ours, Precious. They stole it!"
"They must not allow anyone to take a single piece of land away from Islam. That is what we are fighting the Jews for. We are fighting them... Our religion commands us... We are fighting in the name of religion, in the name of Islam, which makes this Jihad an individual duty, in which the entire nation takes part, and whoever is killed in this [Jihad] is a martyr. This is why I ruled that martyrdom operations are permitted, because he commits martyrdom for the sake of Allah, and sacrifices his soul for the sake of Allah.
Why couldn't Mohammed (May his gummas heal) (May the Lord have mercy on his soul) have kept his day job?
"We do not disassociate Islam from the war. On the contrary, disassociating Islam from the war is the reason for our defeat. We are fighting in the name of Islam."
Fat lot of good it'll do you Mad Mullahs. To borrow the slogan from an LLL bumper sticker, you're making enemies faster than you can kill them.
"They fight us with Judaism, so we should fight them with Islam. They fight us with the Torah, so we should fight them with the Koran. If they say 'the Temple,' we should say 'the Al-Aqsa Mosque.' If they say: 'We glorify the Sabbath,' we should say: 'We glorify the Friday.' This is how it should be. Religion must lead the war. This is the only way we can win."
It would be a rather Pyrrhic victory for your souls.
"Everything will be on our side and against Jews on [Judgment Day]; at that time, even the stones and the trees will speak, with or without words, and say: 'Oh servant of Allah, oh Muslim, there's a Jew behind me, come and kill him.' They will point to the Jews. It says 'servant of Allah,' not 'servant of desires,' 'servant of women,' 'servant of the bottle,' 'servant of Marxism,' or 'servant of liberalism'... It said 'servant of Allah.'
Given what the rocks say, it sounds to me more like "servant of Haman."
"When the Muslims, the Arabs, and the Palestinians enter a war, they do it to worship Allah. They enter it as Muslims. The hadith says: 'Oh Muslim.' It says 'oh Muslim,' not 'oh Palestinian, Jordanian, Syrian, or Arab nationalist.' No, it says: 'Oh Muslim.' When we enter [a war] under the banner of Islam, and under the banner of serving Allah, we will be victorious."
Posted by: Korora || 02/28/2006 0:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Seech like this should make it difficult to leave the middle east for him but it won't. He will be welcomed in London, Paris and Berlin.
Posted by: SPoD || 02/28/2006 0:28 Comments || Top||

#2  "... the Sunni, the Shi'ite, the Ibadhiya - and all the ancient and modern schools of jurisprudence - agree that any invader who occupies even an inch of land of the Muslims must face resistance...They must not allow anyone to take a single piece of land away from Islam."

Greed, pure and simple(minded). Buy a vowel and learn a new word. 'Share'. As in 'human beings sharing the earth'.

"We are fighting in the name of religion, in the name of Islam, which makes this Jihad an individual duty, in which the entire nation takes part, and whoever is killed in this [Jihad] is a martyr..."

[Cue] This is the part where the moderate Muslim community disassociates itself from radical Islam. Uh oh, was that an Islamophobic thing to say?

"Religion must lead the war. This is the only way we can win."

What a loving, one might even say, PEACEFUL God.
Posted by: Jules || 02/28/2006 0:28 Comments || Top||

#3  Seech like this should make it difficult to leave the middle east for him but it won't. He will be welcomed in London, Paris and Berlin.

Also Cambridge, New Haven, and George Town. *sigh*
Posted by: Seafarious || 02/28/2006 0:42 Comments || Top||

#4  al Andalus might not be so fond of this talk.
Posted by: anonymous2u || 02/28/2006 1:17 Comments || Top||

#5  "...On the contrary, disassociating Islam from the war is the reason for our defeat. ..."
Good grief. Military strategy, weaponry, training, logistics, discipline, professionalism creativitity, flexibility. Could Muslim armies ever consider even attempting to address such concepts? Nahhh. They just need to study the Koran harder. Pray harder, be even more unquestioningly obedient to the imams and sheiks who will unfailingly (mis)lead you to (another) humiliating defeat.
Posted by: Monsieur Moonbat || 02/28/2006 3:21 Comments || Top||

#6  "Religion must lead the war. This is the only way we can win."

He's right. If the power-mongers can mobilize the masses around a central theme, then they can gain more power and get what they want. It's a brilliant strategy, really, because "Islam" is the only thing the people groups in the region will unite over. Kind of like a transnational corporation--no loyalties to anything, anywhere, or anyone except the corporation. This is better than Hitler had it, since he had to mobilize around German-ness, bascially, which was a much smaller rally point.
Posted by: ex-lib || 02/28/2006 11:44 Comments || Top||


Home Front: Politix
Rove apolgizes for "brittleness" remark
ScrappleFace
(2006-02-27) — Deputy White House Chief of Staff Karl Rove today publicly apologized for telling the author of the new book, Strategery, that Sen. Hillary Clinton cannot be elected president because she has “a brittleness about her” that voters don’t like.

“I shouldn’t have called Sen. Clinton brittle,” said a contrite Mr. Rove. “That might leave the impression that she’s emotionally or psychologically fragile and could snap at any moment.”

By saying that the junior senator from New York has a “brittleness about her,” Mr. Rove admitted, “I may have inadvertently caused some people — who don’t realize how much I respect her — to think that Sen. Clinton might be unfit to serve as president, because she’s cold, curt, brusque, negative, tense, aloof, testy, on-edge … you know, brittle. I’m really quite sorry.”

Mr. Rove, President George Bush’s old friend and top adviser, acknowledged that the remark was “over the top” and asked the former First Lady to forgive him “within the next decade or so, if she ever gets over the bitterness of harboring a grudge against me due to my ‘brittleness’ comment.”

Sen. Clinton, asked to respond to Mr. Rove’s apology, said, “No comment,” and hung up the phone.
Posted by: Korora || 02/28/2006 0:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  ROFL! Ott, world-renowned surgeon, cuts sooo close to the bone, lol.
Posted by: .com || 02/28/2006 0:22 Comments || Top||

#2  In reality, Rove has Billary's tit in a vise and he just tightened it up a few notches.

She is and will continue to be a walking basket case, wanting to express her "inner Billary" be being uncertain to do so. And then Rove mentions she is to cautious -- what's a gal to do?
Posted by: Captain America || 02/28/2006 0:36 Comments || Top||

#3  Just knowing Rove is "obsessed" with her makes Hillary spend a small fortune on kinky underwear, knowing that somewhere, somehow out in the dark he must be watching her. He just has to be. Lewdly. He just has to.
Posted by: Anonymoose || 02/28/2006 8:19 Comments || Top||

#4  Moose - I'd rather find a pair of unfamiliar wingtips under my bed than even think about Billary in anything from Victoria's Secret. ACK!!
Posted by: Doc8404 || 02/28/2006 10:33 Comments || Top||


#6  think it'll fit over the strap-on?
Posted by: Frank G || 02/28/2006 11:48 Comments || Top||

#7  Aaagh!!!!!

Damn you Frank!
Posted by: danking_70 || 02/28/2006 12:44 Comments || Top||

#8  Damn, Frank!

Now I have to go scrub my mind's eye with Brillo.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut || 02/28/2006 17:07 Comments || Top||

#9  And I thought Billary would be tickled pink.
Posted by: Captain America || 02/28/2006 17:22 Comments || Top||

#10  So much more fun than news!
Posted by: Bobby || 02/28/2006 17:55 Comments || Top||

#11  California's going after Coffee and Chocolate, so why should pre-OWG, Fascist = Limited Communist/Socialist Amerikans get to enjoy [peanut?] brittle???
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 02/28/2006 22:01 Comments || Top||

#12  BILL CLINTON > the American diet will eventually kill Americans as easy as disease or war, SSSSHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH, unless of course the Fed, and only the Fed, takes over and regulates everything ad infinitum.
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 02/28/2006 22:04 Comments || Top||

#13  Seen this Hillary image?

Joe, I just know you could write the capion for it, bro...
Posted by: .com || 02/28/2006 22:05 Comments || Top||

#14  That graphic is too funny!
Posted by: 2b || 02/28/2006 23:43 Comments || Top||



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Two weeks of WOT
Tue 2006-02-28
  Yemen Executes American Missionaries’ Murderer
Mon 2006-02-27
  Saudi forces clash with suspected militants
Sun 2006-02-26
  Jihad Jack Guilty
Sat 2006-02-25
  11 killed, nine churches torched in Nigeria
Fri 2006-02-24
  Saudi forces thwart attack on oil facility
Thu 2006-02-23
  Yemen Charges Five Saudis With Plotting Attacks
Wed 2006-02-22
  Shi'ite shrine destroyed in Samarra
Tue 2006-02-21
  10 killed in religious clashes in Nigeria
Mon 2006-02-20
  Uttar Pradesh minister issues bounty for beheading cartoonists
Sun 2006-02-19
  Muslims Attack U.S. Embassy in Indonesia
Sat 2006-02-18
  Nigeria hard boyz threaten total war
Fri 2006-02-17
  Pak cleric rushdies cartoonist
Thu 2006-02-16
  Outbreaks along Tumen River between Nork guards and armed N Korean groups
Wed 2006-02-15
  Yemen offers reward for Al Qaeda jailbreakers
Tue 2006-02-14
  Cartoon protesters go berserk in Peshawar

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