TN Senator Converts Sharia Bill to Anti-Terrorist Measure
By Joe White, WPLN News
Murfreesboro Senator Bill Ketron today proposed a new, 16-page rewrite of the controversial bill that would have outlawed Sharia. That’s the religious law that underlies the practice of Islam.
Ketron’s original bill was criticized as banning Muslim practices. The new version, he says, backs away from that position.
“And it removes the word ‘Sharia,’ to where there’s no implication of restricting the way one worships. So it’s directed… the intent, as it has always been, the intent is to go after those extremists and terrorist who want to do harm to the people of Tennessee.”
Ketron’s new bill hasn’t yet been adopted by any Senate committee. It allows the governor and the state attorney general to name an organization or person as being of material support to terrorists. That’s potentially based on information that might not be made public.
The Murfreesboro senator says he intends the process of identifying such a terrorism supporter would be initiated by police, not by anonymous complaints.
The amendment hasn’t yet been officially posted by the state, but you can read a copy of it here (PDF).
Ketron says his bill closely follows the federal Patriot Act.
Once the suspected terrorist-helper is identified, he says, jurisdiction would shift to federal authorities.
The intent of his bill, he says, is to give state and local law enforcement the authority to investigate such potential crimes.
“Heretofore, the Feds always come in and will take over the investigation of a case. This just gives them [local and state law enforcement] the ability to do it first, once they’ve been identified.”
The bill involved is SB 1028 Ketron/HB 1353 Matheny. This link shows the bill’s progress. The original bill is here.
| — Hat tip: AC | [Return to headlines] |
Under Suspicion: Illinois Man Barred From Flying
Abe Mashal, a 31-year-old dog trainer, says FBI agents told him he ended up on the government’s no-fly list because he exchanged e-mails with a Muslim cleric they were monitoring. The topic: How to raise his children in an interfaith household.
Mashal, a former Marine from St. Charles, Ill., found out he’d been flagged last April, when he tried to board a flight to Spokane, Wash., to train dogs for a client. Since then, his family members and friends have been questioned, and he said he has lost business because he is not allowed to fly.
Mashal, who says he has never had any links to terror or terrorists and is a “patriotic,” honorably discharged Marine Corps veteran, is one of 17 plaintiffs in lawsuit filed in June by American Civil Liberties Union lawsuit over the list.
FBI agents questioned him at Chicago’s Midway Airport, then in his home. Finally he was summoned to a hotel in Schaumburg, Ill., where more FBI agents told him he’d been placed on the no-fly list because of an e-mail he had sent to an imam, or Muslim cleric, that they had been watching.
Mashal said he had sought the iman’s advice about raising children in a mixed-religion household. Mashal is Muslim, and his wife is Christian.
The agents offered to get him off the list if he would become an undercover informant at mosques, Mashal said. He refused and said he feels he was being blackmailed.
“I feel like I’m living in communist Russia, not the United States of America, for someone to jump into my life like that,” he said.
The FBI and the Department of Homeland Security, which enforces the no-fly list, would not comment on Latif’s case. In October, Homeland Security sent Mashal a letter saying that it had reviewed his file and that “it has been determined that no changes or corrections are warranted at this time.”
| — Hat tip: AC | [Return to headlines] |
France Invites Italians to Avoid ‘Sterile Controversy’
(AGI) Rome — A spokesman for the French presidency, Bernard Valero, has told AGI that France has invited Italy to “avoid sterile controversies’, reiterating that cooperation over Libya is excellent. Valero added that France is very grateful for Italian participation in military operations within the framework of U.N. Resolution 1973.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Spain: Moroccan Minor Forced to Wed, Freed by Agents
(ANSAmed) — MADRID, MARCH 22 — A Moroccan minor forced to marry in her country of origin and resident in L’Hospitalet de Llobregat (Barcelona) was rescued by the ‘Mossos d’Esquadra’, the Catalan police agents, thanks to the cooperation of her former Italian teacher. The agents arrested the 27-year-old husband of the young girl and charged him with mistreatment and sexual abuse, according to investigation sources quoted by El Periodico. The alarm was raised in Italy in early March by one of the teachers of the girl who reported that her former student had been forced by her family to get married in Morocco, during a trip they made to the Maghreb country.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Anti-Aircraft Fire Erupts in Tripoli
Gunfire and explosions shake the Libyan capital for a fourth night as Gaddafi vows to continue fighting.
Anti-aircraft fire has erupted over the Libyan capital, Tripoli, after a day of heavy fighting between pro-democracy fighters and forces loyal to leader Muammar Gaddafi.
Anti-aircraft crews began firing shortly after nightfall in the capital on Tuesday, four nights after an international military coalition launched an operation enforce a no-fly zone over the country.
“We’ve been hearing big noises. We’ve heard some explosions in the last 10 minutes,” Al Jazeera’s Anita McNaught, reporting from Tripoli, said.
“We haven’t seen any smoke on the horizon. People are firing guns in defiance. We’re in the loyalist heartland here where people are utterly defiant of the international effort to force Gaddafi to surrender, as they would see it.
“The anti-aircraft fire has not been as intense [as Monday night when two naval installations outside the city were hit]. Perhaps they feel in the immediate neighbourhood that most of the significant targets have already been hit.”
The AFP news agency reported that at least two blasts were heard at a distance before the capital’s air defences opened fire.
Several strong detonations followed, said the journalists who were unable to determine the site of the explosions.
They said anti-aircraft fire streaked into the night sky for around 10 minutes, especially in the area near Gaddafi’s residence, not far from the hotel where the international press corps is housed.
In the previous night’s operations, the coalition air campaign suffered its first loss with the crash of a US fighter jet in the rebel-held east.
Both crew ejected safely.
The no-fly zone is intended to protect civilians from attack by forces loyal to Gaddafi in their battles with opposition fighters. The United States announced on Tuesday that it is shifting its focus to widen the no-fly zone across the north African country.
Despite the strikes, Gaddafi has remained defiant. The Libyan leader made a public appearance at his Bab Al-Aziziyah compound in Tripoli that was the target on Sunday of a coalition missile strike, Libyan state television reported.
In televised remarks, Gaddafi said Libya was “ready for battle, be it long or short”.
“We will win this battle,” footage showed him telling supporters at the compound. “The masses were the strongest anti-air defences.”
Fighting rages
The developments came after a day of intense fighting in the three Libyan cities of Misurata, Ajdabiya and Zintan.
Forces loyal to Gaddafi have been shelling Misurata for days, pressing their siege of the embattled western city. Four children were killed in the shelling on Tuesday and at least 40 people were killed on Monday, a resident said.
There was also fierce fighting further east in Ajdabiya. Opposition fighters were seen retreating in the face of an attack by government forces.
Al Jazeera’s Tony Birtley, reporting from an area close to Ajdabiya, said there had been clashes outside the city.
“There’s been heavy fighting and heavy shelling going on … the rebels told me there have been heavy casualties and there are a number of corpses between here and the town [of Ajdabiya] that they have been unable to reach,” he said.
Meanwhile, around 106km south of Tripoli, Libyan pro-democracy fighters forced government troops to withdraw from the outskirts of Zintan, breaking a siege of the town.
A resident of Zintan told the Reuters news agency that at least 10 people were killed in the bombardment by Gaddafi’s forces.
“Gaddafi’s forces bombarded Zintan this morning and killed 10 to 15 people,” Abdulrahman said…
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Defiant Gaddafi Pledges Victory
The Libyan leader, Col Muammar Gaddafi, has appeared at a site in Tripoli that was recently attacked by the Western coalition and told his followers: “We will be victorious in the end.”
In a brief speech at the Bab al-Aziziya compound, targeted on Sunday, he said “all Islamic armies” should join him.
Forces loyal to Col Gaddafi are engaged in fierce fighting with rebels.
The coalition is enforcing a UN Security Council resolution to protect civilians and set up a no-fly zone.
Major partners in the alliance have been thrashing out a new command structure that will tone down US leadership.
Meanwhile, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has said people close to Col Gaddafi are making contact with other states to explore options for the future.
“We’ve heard about other people close to him reaching out to people that they know around the world — Africa, the Middle East, Europe, North America, beyond — saying what do we do? How do we get out of this? What happens next?” she told ABC News.
“I’m not aware that he personally has reached out, but I do know that people allegedly on his behalf have been reaching out.”
Col Gaddafi made a speech that lasted about three minutes and was carried on state television.
He said there was a “new crusader battle launched by crusader countries on Islam”.
“Long live Islam everywhere. All Islamic armies must take part in the battle, all free [people] must take party in the battle…. We will be victorious in the end.”
Col Gaddafi denounced the bombing campaign, saying: “We shall not surrender and we shall not fear passers by. We jeer at their missiles. These are passing missiles.”
“In the short term, we will beat them. In the long term, we will beat them.”
“The most powerful air defence, the most powerful air defence is the people. Here are the people. Gaddafi is in the middle of the people. This is the air defence,” he added.
He concluded his address by saying: “I do not fear storms that sweep the horizon, nor do I fear the planes that throw black destruction. I am resistant, my house is here in my tent… I am the rightful owner, and the creator of tomorrow. I, I am here! I am here! I am here!”
His troops continue to be engaged in fierce fighting with the rebels.
Misrata — the last rebel-held city in western Libya — is one of the bloodiest battlegrounds.
One doctor there told Associated Press: “The number of dead are too many for our hospital to handle.”
A resident of the city told Reuters: “The situation here is very bad. Tanks started shelling the town this morning.”
As in Misrata, neither of the warring sides appears strong enough to hold the eastern city of Ajdabiya.
The BBC’s Ian Pannell, in eastern Libya, says the rebels there have divergent strategies — some envision pushing west, perhaps even as far as Tripoli, while others want to just take Ajdabiya and then consolidate their hold on the east, hoping Libyans in other cities will rise up and liberate themselves.
Fighting was also reported on Tuesday in Zintan, near the Tunisian border, and in Yafran, 130km south-west of Tripoli. Witnesses in the towns reported 10 deaths in each.
Late on Tuesday, renewed explosions and anti-aircraft fire were heard in the Libyan capital, Tripoli, as it appeared allied forces were conducting another night of strikes…
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Libya: A Just War — But Just What Kind?
The primary objective of Operation Odyssey Dawn — to protect Libyan civilians — is a just one, says the European press. But the other issues — oil, the fall of Gaddafi and the image of Nicolas Sarkozy — are not neglected.
It is “a very European war,” writes El País editorialist Xavier Vidal-Folch. As in Kosovo in 1999, “the action against Libya was launched once Western public opinion reached a humanitarian point of no return: the good European conscience could not tolerate more killings so close to home.” The war in Libya, however, “is more ad hoc” and “can count on all possible blessings” from the UN Security Council. The “strict international legality is the key that distinguishes the ‘just war’ from the one that is not.”
“In large part,” it seems to editorialist Marek Magierowski, writing in Poland’s Rzeczpospolita, “Operation Odyssey Dawn is precisely this ‘just war’ of which Cicero and Tomas Aquinas wrote… Today Muslims are uniting with the infidel West to take down a dangerous lunatic.”
For România Libera, it is above all a “war in the French style.” Nicolas Sarkozy, the daily notes, has kept NATO out of the “spectacle” because the French president “must, above all, restore the prestige of France in the Arab world, following accusations that Paris had been too cosy with certain dictators. France then needs as many Arab countries as possible to join in to legitimise an attack that must not come to resemble the offensive in Iraq. Finally, Sarkozy needs this war, as he once needed the war in Georgia [in 2008], to buff up his image for the next presidential campaign.”
However, Xavier Vidal-Folch goes on to observe in El País, “in distinction to Kosovo, France is taking a leading role, while Germany is looking like a political midget…. We are witnessing a repeat of the continuous rebalancing of the relationship between the economic giant Germany, which flexed its muscles itself during the euro crisis, and French political capability, which is also exercised through military power…. If Kosovo has strengthened stability in the Balkans, Libya can now help lay the groundwork to relaunch and rethink the Euro-Mediterranean process that Paris had undermined.”
For De Standaard, the most optimistic scenario envisages “Gaddafi throwing in the towel himself, though that may seem highly improbable given the statements he made this weekend.” The Brussels daily evokes the spectre of a partition of Libya if the goal is to “protect the population of Libya from Gaddafi’s troops.” If on the other hand the objective is regime change, they question whether that can be done without using ground troops.
Another Belgian daily, De Morgen, writes for its part of a “cynical” twist in this umpteenth “war for oil”. Once the new Libyan authorities have “guaranteed the restoration of the supply of oil to France and gas to Italy, the objective of the war will have been achieved,” adds Dziennik Gazeta Prawna, which holds that the other objective is “the destruction of the power of the dictator.” A dictator who, “if he does not die in a bombing, will be hanged by the rebels,” prophesies the Polish daily.
Meanwhile, “The trap is closing in on Gaddafi,” headlines Le Figaro, which warns that “this war will be fully approved of only if it is on the way to being won. To avoid stalemate and the risk of splitting up the country, the insurgents will have to take advantage of the help offered them to organise, to mount their own offensive and to bring in a new regime in Tripoli. They will then receive the greatest support. Let us hope they will be able to pull it off.”
And that is what motivates Le Temps, sweeping aside any presumption of negotiating with “a man accused of war crimes”, described as a tyrant by the U.S. President and stripped of all legitimacy by the UN Secretary General, to launch an appeal to “arm the insurgents to let them fight a regime that has kept them down for 42 years.”
The position is shared by Gazeta Wyborcza. “The intervention in Libya demonstrates that the international community considers the right of peoples to live in security far more important than the right of dictators to keep foreigners from interfering in the internal affairs of his country.”
Despite opposition from the Northern League and Berlusconi’s initial prudence vis-à-vis his former “friend” Gaddafi, Italy is finally taking an active part in the coalition. Angelo Panebianco argues in Corriere della Sera that the Italians “are most at risk, not only economically but physically. We are the country that is closest and most exposed” — an observation confirmed by the arrest of an Italian civilian vessel on March 20 by Libyan gunmen.
Italian fears are justified. While military operations are ongoing in Libya, the humanitarian crisis is worsening on the nearby Italian island of Lampedusa. La Stampa reports that more than 5,000 migrants have been gathered in the centres around the island, whose inhabitants — numbering not much more — have blocked the building of a temporary camp to house them and are asking for their immediate transfer to the mainland.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Libya: Obama’s Iraq Moment?
By Victor Kotsev
TEL AVIV — United States President Barack Obama is in a major predicament over Libya. His lack of enthusiasm for a military campaign against Colonel Muammar Gaddafi’s forces, evident in his pointed silence on the issue for most of last week, found new justification on Sunday when the Arab League condemned the killing of “civilians” by Western forces in the initial bombing raids.
A request by the league for a no-fly zone over Libya, made a week ago, was considered one the main sources of international legitimacy for the bombing raids against Gaddafi’s army. All of the BRIC countries (Brazil, Russia, India and China) opposed the move, as did the African Union. Thus, the token support of the Arab League was all the more important, and when its secretary general (incidentally also one of the front-runners for the Egyptian presidency), Amr Moussa, said on Sunday that “what is happening in Libya differs from the aim of imposing a no-fly zone, and what we want is the protection of civilians and not the bombardment of more civilians”, this undermined severely the moral foundation of the campaign.
True, the legal basis is quite solid, in the form of a remarkably Byzantine United Nations Security Council Resolution 1973, which, in the words of Asia Times Online’s M K Bhadrakumar “opens up all sorts of dangerous possibilities to stretch the type and scope of military operations”.
Still, for an American leader who built much of his foreign policy image in contrast to his predecessor’s unilateral interventionism and who received a Nobel Peace Prize practically on a naked promise for “change we can believe in”, selective interpretation of legal documents to justify a war with no clear objective or exit strategy is a slippery slope.
Obama came under a lot of pressure to act, and part of this pressure was of his own making. As Senator Joe Lieberman put it in an interview with CNN, “Once the president of the United States says, as President Obama did, that Gaddafi must go, if we don’t work with our allies to make sure Gaddafi does go, America’s credibility and prestige suffers all over the world.”
It is not just prestige that is at stake, though that is important, abroad as well as at home (where Obama badly needs to burnish his foreign policy credentials by showing that he is capable of decisive action). United States Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who was instrumental in swaying the president’s opinion last week amid heated internal debates on Libyan intervention, [1] was reportedly worried about another “genocide” in the image of Rwanda — but even that fails to explain the rationale of the American government.
In an article in Foreign Policy titled “What if Qaddafi wins? Then what?” Peter Feaver blasts “the wishful thinking of those who would pretend that the US does not have serious national security interests at stake in the outcome in Libya”. Even as he assumes, prior to the events of the past few days, that the American government would decide against intervention, Feaver outlines the potential disastrous consequences of a Gaddafi victory. These include “the humanitarian disaster of a collapsed Libyan economy”, “a renewed push for [weapons of mass destruction] by Qaddafi, who will likely view all previous deals as not only null and void but also blunders”, “the radicalization of whatever rump rebellion remains” and “the region-wide effects of resurgent authoritarianism on fledgling democratic movements”.
Translation: if Gaddafi wins, that would leave a powerful and bitter enemy of the West in North Africa, would unleash a wave of refugees the entire Mediterranean region (including Europe), and would increase support for al-Qaeda among the rebels. Add to these arguments the argument of oil (of which Libya has plenty, a fact that has already cause convulsions on the international oil markets), and we get an intervention.
However, aside from the moral hiccups, there are other major problems with intervention. Most importantly, it lacks a clearly defined objective and exit strategy. “President Obama’s speech on the impending war in Libya Friday afternoon was eloquent, passionate and stirring,” writes Spencer Ackerman for the Wired blog. “So much so that it was almost easy to overlook the one thing the speech lacked: an end game.”
Indeed, it is uncertain what exactly Obama and his allies are hoping to accomplish. The goal of UN resolution 1973 — to protect civilians — is quite limited, and according to one scenario, the intervention countries might settle for a “stalemate” with the Libyan government in Tripoli (the chairman of the United States military’s Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Mike Mullen, told CBS on Sunday that this was a “possibility”).
However, there is also an enormous temptation to try to ouster Gaddafi. In the analysis of American think-tank Stratfor, “The long-term goal, unspoken but well understood, is regime change — displacing the government of Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi and replacing it with a new regime built around the rebels.”
Not having a clear long-term strategy, the military campaign violates the so-called Powell Doctrine, a document designed to assist American military planners to avoid entanglement in prolonged asymmetrical conflicts. The last time an American president — George W Bush — ignored this informal doctrine, he started the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.
In an article titled “Memo to Madam Secretary: First, Do No Harm”, veteran American negotiator Aaron David Miller cautioned last week against repeating such mistakes:
Finding a middle ground between doing too much and not enough to get rid of Qaddafi looks less like solid terrain and more like a slippery slope that could end with America in control of or at least responsible for yet another Arab/Muslim country … Downsizing US ambitions isn’t pretty, but at a time of serious domestic economic dislocation and two ongoing wars, it’s smart. And in the case of Libya, never a vital American interest, it’s imperative. America is still the world’s greatest power, but maybe a little smarter, having learned from the cautionary tales that history and its own current limitations provide.
Current American administration officials such as Secretary of Defense Robert Gates and National Security Adviser Tom Donilon reportedly took a similar stance in the discussions.
Indeed, Iraq is quickly turning into something of a nightmare scenario for Obama in Libya. Parallels with both Persian Gulf wars, and especially the second one, are growing — and not only because a blunder in Libya could damage Obama’s relationship with the entire Muslim world, much in the manner Iraq ultimately tarnished George W Bush’s. This would be especially true if the coalition against Gaddafi lost its international legitimacy and started to be perceived widely as a clumsy replica of Bush’s “coalition of the willing”.
There are numerous structural similarities between the situations in Libya and Iraq. These start with two incredibly fragmented societies ruled with an iron fist by eccentric dictators and continue all the way through the intertwined motifs of weapons of mass destruction, oil and bringing democracy to the Middle East. It should be noted that Western analysts, who by and large assumed 10 days ago that Gaddafi was a goner, had similar troubles understanding how Saddam Hussein stayed in power after his devastating losses in Operation Desert Storm in 1991.
Gaddafi is borrowing directly from Saddam Hussein’s manual against air campaigns. “As a skilled tyrant who does not shy away from utilizing the means that allowed Saddam Hussein and his regime to survive the first American offensive against Iraq in 1991, [Gaddafi] is transporting large groups of civilians to major air bases in order to serve as human shields,” writes respected Israeli analyst Ron Ben-Yishai. “He is also sending his tanks and armored personnel carriers into the heart of civilian neighborhoods at the outskirts of rebel-controlled towns, so that Western jets concerned about harming innocent civilians would refrain from striking Libya’s armor.”
By all accounts, the Libyan leader is well prepared for an intervention, and stands a similar chance to his Iraqi former counterpart to survive anything short of a full-scale ground incursion. He has reportedly consolidated his grip over the western part of the country, including by securing the loyalty of the most populous tribes, the Warfallah, the Megariha and the Tarhuna.
He is subjected to massive fire power and might incur formidable losses. However, past experience shows that air campaigns often end up building consensus around besieged dictators. This may even affect rebel morale significantly — in the early days of the uprising, some rebel forces had even threatened to unite with Gaddafi against any foreign intervention.
Even as the opposition gradually warmed up to Western aerial support (and eventually pleaded for it), a British special forces team on a “friendly” undercover mission experienced these strong nationalist sentiments first-hand when it was arrested and promptly deported by the rebels. It should be noted, furthermore, that there are few signs of genuine unity among the opposition leaders and militias.
Gaddafi, who has already announced his readiness to “die like a martyr”, is reportedly arming the population in the western part of the country en masse. He even has a doomsday scenario in store, also out of Saddam’s cookbook, but with a distinct African twist that he has mastered during the years of support for brutal rebel movements in countries like Liberia and Sierra Leone.
If he is toppled, he — or whatever is left of his forces — could unleash a bloody civil war replete with guerrilla tactics and savage murders and mutilations of civilians. Over time, the carnage could rival that in Rwanda; the conflict would take on a life of its own and would either force the foreign powers out in a humiliating defeat (something similar happened to the Americans in Somalia in 1993) or keep them busy, and bleeding, for a long time.
Moreover, he could strike deep inside Europe and the United States, for example by organizing and financing terror attacks. This is also something he is skilled at, he is wealthy enough to be able to do it, and he has already threatened instability in the entire Mediterranean.
However, he probably would not need to use the doomsday contingency plans. Wars are fought over perceptions; the outcome of a war is decided not so much on the battlefield as in the minds and hearts of observers. Gaddafi has already started playing a masterful ceasefire game, and he is cultivating several narratives that he could use, as needed, in order to frame the situation favorably at a later moment…
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Libya: Turkish PM Criticizes Western-Led Airstrikes
(ANSAmed) — ANKARA, MARCH 22 — Criticizing the Western-led airstrikes in Libya, Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan vowed Tuesday that Turkey would never point guns at the Libyan people, a position he said Ankara would make clear to NATO. Speaking to his party’s parliamentary group amid ongoing debate about how NATO should proceed on the issue, Erdogan said the United Nations should only head up humanitarian operations, not military ones, in Libya.” “The operation should proceed on legitimate grounds,” Erdogan said, adding that Ankara’s position would be explained to its NATO allies Tuesday at a meeting in Brussels. U.S. President Barack Obama and Erdogan have reaffirmed their support for the full implementation of United Nations Security Council Resolutions 1970 and 1973 over UN mission in Libya, the White House said on Tuesday over a telephone conversation between the U.S. and Turkish leaders on Monday evening. The leaders, as Anatolia news agency reports, agreed that “this will require a broad-based international effort, including Arab states, to implement and enforce the UN resolutions, based on national contributions and enabled by NATO’s unique multinational command and control capabilities to ensure maximum effectiveness.” Erdogan said Monday that his government would give conditional support to a NATO-led operation, as long as it is done to ensure that Libya belongs to its people, not to distribute the country’s natural resources to outside powers, and as long as the intervention does not turn into an occupation. On Tuesday, Erdogan said Turkey was willing to be involved in the distribution of humanitarian aid in Libya, to manage the Benghazi airport and to deploy naval forces to control the area between Benghazi and the Greek island of Crete.
The Turkish government is planning to hold a Libya session in Parliament, according to Erdogan. Sources said the session could be a closed one.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Libya: Fillon: French Flag Waves in Benghazi
(AGI) Paris — “There is hope in Benghazi now”, France’s prime minister, Francois Fillon, told the French parliament after the French flag was raised over the rebel stronghold of Benghazi.
“Last Thursday — he added — the revolution in Libya seemed almost over — two days after hope was restored in Benghazi. The French flag is being waved there, and also the flag of a different Libya” .
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Libya: US Fighter Jet Crash Lands in Field Near Benghazi
A US warplane has crash landed in a Libyan field in the area around Benghazi, The Telegraph can disclose.
The two crew members on the F-15E fighter jet ejected to safety. One has already been recovered by US forces, who say they are in the process of rescuing the other.
It is understood that at least one of the crew members was initially rescued by rebel Libyan soldiers after ejecting from the aircraft.
The crashed plane was discovered by a Telegraph journalist reporting in and around Benghazi, the rebel-held city.
It is thought the F-15E fighter jet came to ground after suffering a mechanical failure.
The US military confirmed that one of its jets had crash landed but said that it had not been shot down.
Vince Crawley, a spokesman for the US military’s Africa Command, said that one crewman had been recovered and one was “in process of recovery”.
Both crew members suffered minor injuries.
Crawley said the crash occurred “overnight.” He declined to give the location of the incident and also would not say how the rescued crewman was picked up.
This is the first coalition aircraft to have crash landed during the Libyan conflict following the third night of air strikes.
The developments comes after British ministers yesterday contradicted senior military commanders by suggesting that coalition forces in action over Libya can legitimately target Colonel Muammar Gaddafi.
The Chief of the Defence Staff, Gen Sir David Richards, flatly insisted that seeking to hit the Libyan dictator was not allowed under the terms of United Nations Security Council resolution 1973.
But after Defence Secretary Liam Fox suggested over the weekend that Col Gaddafi could be a “legitimate target”, No 10 sources insisted it was legal to target anyone killing Libyan civilians.
The controversy blew up as Col Gaddafi’s compound in Tripoli was hit in a second night of coalition air strikes aimed at suppressing the regime’s air defences and command and control structure.
Following a meeting of the newly formed Libya subcommittee of the National Security Council, chaired by David Cameron, Gen Richards was adamant that it was not permitted to target Col Gaddafi.
“Absolutely not. It is not allowed under the UN resolution and it is not something I want to discuss any further,” he said…
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NATO Command in Libya ‘Key’ Says Italy
‘Return to rules’ Frattini says amid French opposition
(ANSA) — Rome, March 22 — Putting the United Nations-sanctioned Libya mission under NATO command is key for Italy, Foreign Minister Franco Frattini said Tuesday.
Speaking ahead of a NATO meeting, Frattini voiced the hope that British Prime Minister David Cameron’s “support for the Italian position” would prevail over French opposition.
Turning the Libya mission over to NATO “is a highly political decision,” Frattini said on Italian radio. “We cannot imagine there being separate commands, each taking different decisions,” he said, adding that he hoped that the NATO meeting would “reach a decision”.
“It’s time to get back to the rules,” Frattini stressed, “with a NATO unified command” to ensure the mission sticks to its UN mandate after the three first days in which “an acceleration (had been) necessary”.
A NATO command would mean “single coordination and sharing the responsibility of everything with everybody”.
“Who, if not NATO, can take on this task?” Italy has threatened to resume control over its seven bases unless NATO is put in charge, but France, the prime mover for the mission and the country that fired the first shots, opposes this, saying it would raise tensions with the Arab world since the Alliance is already leading a war in Afghanistan.
Germany, Turkey, the Arab League and the African Union have also come out against a NATO umbrella.
United States President Barack Obama said the command of operation Odyssey Dawn would move from the US to France and Britain in a matter of days with NATO playing a big role.
Frattini voiced the hope that “our American friends” would spell out that NATO should take over.
He reiterated that the operation “is not a war mission but a humanitarian one to get (Libyan leader Muammar) Gaddafi to respect an absolute ceasefire”.
Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi, who has had to appease opposition from key political ally the Northern League, said Monday that Italy’s 10 planes would not fire but only carry out patrols.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Israeli Jets Bomb Gaza. Israel Accused of “Ethnic Cleansing”
At least 17 injured including seven children. The raid was in retaliation against Hamas rockets on Ashkelon. In Geneva, Israel is accused of operating “ethnic cleansing” through the policy of settlements in the occupied territories.
Tel Aviv (AsiaNews / Agencies) — Israeli aircraft bombed Gaza for at least an hour in retaliation for a series of missiles launched by Hamas three days ago on the coast of Ashkelon. The Hamas missiles caused no victims, instead the Israeli bombing wounded 17 people, including seven children and at least two women.
The military escalation coincides with a closed door discussion at the UN Council for Human Rights in Geneva, where Israel has been accused of operating “ethnic cleansing” with its policy of Jewish settlements in East Jerusalem and the Occupied Territories.
The Israeli bombardment targeted a training camp of the radical militia, some shops and a cement factory. Yesterday afternoon the Armed Forces of the Israeli army had carried out another bombing raid on what it claimed was a “tunnel” along the border, used to “smuggle terrorists” into Israel. In a statement the Israeli army said: “We suggest Hamas halt the escalation in the region and not to test the strength of the armed forces.”
Meanwhile, yesterday in Geneva, the UN Human Rights Council, prepared to debate and vote on a resolution condemning Israel for the settlements in the occupied territories that are expelling Palestinians from their lands.
UN investigator, academic Richard Falk, denounced the policy of settlements as “a form of ethnic cleansing.”
Israel has accused Falk of being biased towards the Jewish state. Falk said that he would like the Council to ask the International Tribunal in The Hague to open an inquiry into the conduct of Israel in the occupied territories. The Israeli envoy to the UN, Aharon Leshno Yaar, has called Falk “an embarrassment to the United Nations.”
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Kuwait: Criticism of Nations Sending Troops to Bahrain Banned
(ANSA) — ROME, MARCH 22 — Criticising the countries of the Gulf Cooperation Council could cause serious harm to Kuwait’s relations with its GCC allies, reports Al Arabiya’s website, citing statements made by Kuwaiti MP Waleed Al Tabtabai. Kuwait’s Ministry of Information announced their intention to take disciplinary action against Addar newspaper and the Al Adala TV network, both accused of criticising the Gulf countries and especially Saudi Arabia for sending troops to Bahrain to quell protests. Following a meeting with the Minister of Information, Rodan Al Rodan, the editor-in-chief of the daily, Mahmud Haider, expressed his full commitment to obey the instructions of the ministry and to not publish criticism against the countries of the GCC in the future.
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Libya is on the Brink. But Meanwhile, Lebanon is Already Lost
Hezbollah has won there, with the support of Iran and Syria. Here are the ideology and plans of the “party of God,” explained in “Oasis,” the magazine of the patriarchate of Venice
ROME, March 3, 2011 — While the world follows with bated breath the events in Egypt, Tunisia, and even more so in Libya, in another nation of the Middle East there is already happening, without fanfare, precisely what is feared most: the victory of the most radical Islamic currents.
This nation is Muslim and Christian Lebanon. Where one is witnessing the irresistible rise to power of Hezbollah, the “party of God” of the Shiite Muslims, armed and financed by Iran and supported more and more also by Syria.
The latest issue of “La Civiltà Cattolica” — the magazine of the Rome Jesuits printed after inspection and authorization by the Vatican secretariat of state — made Hezbollah the subject of its cover story, signed by its leading historian, Fr. Giovanni Sale.
The article describes the maneuvers of Hezbollah from the first Israeli-Lebanese war of 1982 to the second one of 2006, then to the present day. He describes it with the impassible detachment of the analyst. He registers the current successes without any critical commentary. On the contrary, he concludes by saying that in Hezbollah “the nationalist element is gaining the upper hand over the fundamentalist and religious element, a change that must be encouraged and supported by the international community.”
But is this really the case? During the same days, the eminent scholar of international politics Vittorio Emanuele Parsi, a professor at the Catholic University of Milan and an editorialist for “La Stampa” and for the newspaper of the Italian bishops “Avvenire,” wrote of the success of Hezbollah in much more pessimistic terms.
The “Cedar Revolution” of 2005, when crowds of young people filled the squares of Beirut to defend Lebanon’s independence from Syria and Iran, is now just a memory. Today the West can consider Lebanon a lost cause, because the reins of power are increasingly in the hands of Hezbollah, because Syria and Iran are throwing their weight around more and more in the area, and because of the repercussions of actions taken by the United States which Parsi does not hesitate to call “suicidal.” With everything that follows from this for Israel, again tempted by war operations.
If this is the scenario, the “nationalist” shift of Hezbollah prized by “La Civiltà Cattolica” is not enough to reassure. It was Hezbollah, for example, that inaugurated the practice of suicide “martyrdom” as a means of combat, later copied by Hamas against Israel. And if today this practice is used less often, the ideology that inspires it remains in effect.
In the latest issue of “Oasis,” the multilingual magazine published by the patriarch of Venice and dedicated to the East, founded by Cardinal Angelo Scola, the first installment was issued of an analysis of the founding principles of the Lebanese “party of God.”
The author is Dominique Avon, Arabist, a professor in Paris and author in 2010 of an essay on Hezbollah written together with A. T. Khatchadourian.
The following is an extract from it. The words and phrases in quotes are taken from speeches by Hezbollah leaders and from books they have had published…
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Syria: Unrest in Syria: Four Days of Protests Leave Dead and Injured
Security forces crack down hard on protesters who responded to an appeal launched on Facebook. The situation in Syria is different from that in Tunisia and Egypt because it is unclear who might head the opposition, bereft of leaders or organised parties because of repression.
Beirut (AsiaNews) — The winds of change sweeping the Middle East have reached Syria. Protests and clashes with security forces have broken out in the Middle Eastern country, leaving five dead, hundreds injured and unspecified high number arrested over the past four days in the southern part of the country, in towns like Deraa, Enkhel, Nawa and Jassem.
Despite the regime’s tight controls on media and ordinary citizens, demonstrations were sparked by a Facebook page. Launched on 15 March, an appeal was posted, calling for a “Syrian revolution against Bashar al-Assad in 2011”. Syrians were urged to “demonstrate for a Syria without tyranny, emergency laws, special tribunals, corruption, thefts or wealth monopolies.”
Protests broke out in Damascus and in many cities, but the intervention of police rapidly dispersed demonstrations. Nevertheless, Deraa (pictured), a town about a hundred kilometres south of the capital, became the centre of the anti-government movement when 15 pupils were arrested for writing graffiti calling for an Egyptian-styled popular uprising. An angry mob eventually attacked and torched a local courthouse.
Security forces cracked down hard, causing death and injuries. An 11-year-old boy, Mundhir al-Masalmah, died from tear gas inhalation. When he and others were buried yesterday, demonstrators gathered in front of the al-Omari mosque, shouting “God, Syria and freedom” as well as “revolution, revolution”.
According to some residents, thousands of police and military were deployed across the city, which is now divided in two with locals unable to move from one end to the other.
Human Rights Watch accused Syrian authorities of using “excessive force”, asking the government to “cease the use of live fire and other excessive force against protesters”. Police apparently received contradictory instructions concerning the use of weapons.
Syria’s official news agency SANA played down the unrest, blaming some “troublemakers”, whilst government officials made unspecified accusations against the “West” for the turmoil.
A government delegation visited Deraa where it expressed condolences for the victims. The pupils in police custody were released. President Assad announced an investigation into the incident and punishment for the culprits.
For some activists, all this will not calm the protests. For pan-Arab newspaper Al-Hayat, unrest in Syria is not likely to end like in Tunisia and Egypt.
Syrian exile Haitham al-Maleh told Al Jazeera that “All the Syrian provinces will erupt. There is near consensus that this regime is unsustainable. The masses do not want it”.
An exiled cousin of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad warned the regime Monday that it only had a “small window of opportunity” to introduce reforms or face being overthrown by a mounting protest movement.
In reality, the opposition movement suffers from a lack of a leadership and organised parties because of the tight controls by Syria’s security apparatus over the people and media.
Even demonstrators do not appear to have far-reaching demands. In Deraa, local leaders want an end to emergency laws and courts in force for 48 years and the closure of the local security forces offices. They have said nothing about the regime and the president. (PD)
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Yemen: 13 Al Qaeda Militants Killed in Clash With Army
(AGI) Aden — Thirteen Al Qaeda militants have been killed in a clash with troops in southern Yemen. The clash took place in the province of Abyan, a stronghold of the terror group.
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Medvedev Complains of “Indiscriminate Use of Force”
(AGI) Moscow — Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has complained to U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates about the manner in which U.N. Resolution 1972 is being implemented. It was during an official visit by Robert Gates that Medvedev complained to him about the coalition’s “indiscriminate “use of force in Libya.
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Muslim Leaders Call for an Islamic Education System in Russia
The supreme mufti Talgat Tadzhutddin proposes to introduce a comprehensive network of schools, from madras to academy: so we can attract other Muslims from the West.
Moscow (AsiaNews / Agencies) — Making Russia a centre for Islamic education that will attract Muslim students from the West. This is the proposal of the supreme mufti of the Spiritual Council of Russian Muslims, Talgat Tadzhutddin, who suggests creating a network in the Federation of Islamic institutions, from the madras to the academy through universities.
“This is an important strategic objective because in this way we are no longer dependent on foreign Islamic universities,” said Tadzhutddin during a meeting March 19 in Penza between the spiritual leaders of the Volga region and Grigory Rapota, Special Representative of the Russian President in the area.
As Ria Novosti agency reported, according to the mufti foreign Islamic education has “side effects that are not easy to vanquish and which influence the minds of our youth.” “In the near future — said Tadzhutddin — with state support seven Islamic universities will be built, but it is only the first step.” The country, he said, needs a complete school system, made up of three levels: “madrassas, Islamic universities and academies.” In this way the use of foreign teachers will be reduced only to the teaching of Arabic, excluding religious disciplines. (N.A.)
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Christian Woman Lawyer Told She Cannot Represent People Before Malaysia’s Islamic Courts
The lawyer will appeal to a higher court after an initial rejection of her application for a permit to practice before Shari’a courts. Malaysia has a dual, secular-religious, legal system.
Kuala Lumpur (AsiaNews/Agencies) — A Christian woman lawyer in Malaysia was unsuccessful in her bid to obtain a permit to practice law before Shari’a courts. Victoria Jayaseele Martin said she wanted to represent non-Muslims. Malaysia has a dual legal system, a secular system for non-Muslim Malaysians and a religious one for Muslims, who constitute the country’s majority.
Ms Jayaseele Martin objected to a decision by a religious council to bar non-Muslim lawyers from Shari’a courts, but a judge in Kuala Lumpur rejected her claim. She said however that she would appeal to a higher court to argue that the ruling against her was unconstitutional.
Victoria Jayaseele Martin’s lawyer, Ranjit Singh, said that it is hard to find Muslim lawyers willing to represent non-Muslims before Islamic counts because they usually do not like to take cases that might run counter to their faith.
Increasingly, there are cross-faith cases in which one spouse converts to Islam, whilst the other remains faithful to his or her religion. The Islamic legal system focuses on family law, frequently tackling issues such as divorce, polygamy and custody battles.
Last year, the Malaysian government agreed to appoint women judges to its Islamic courts for the first time, something a group called the Sisters in Islam had been demanding for many years.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Indonesia: Foreign Minister Concerned Over Libya Military Action
Jakarta, 22 March (AKI/Jakarta Post) — Indonesian foreign affairs minister Marty Natalegawa has expressed concern over the violence in Libya — both the attacks by Muammar Gaddafi’s forces against the local people and the air assaults by coalition aircraft to implement the United Nations’ no fly zone resolution.
“I am concerned that the situation in Libya has led to a justification of violence as a tool to solve the problem there,” Marty said on Tuesday.
He said, in the end, the conflict in Libya should be resolved through political dialogue. “Looking at the violence there, it is hard to imagine that there will be conditions suitable to conduct such a dialogue,” he said.
The minister called on the coalition forces, in executing its mandate from the UN Security Council, to make civilians< security in Libya their top priority.
“The implementation of the UN resolution about Libya must be in line with the spirit of protecting civilians and not create new problems,” he said.
Earlier, US president Barack Obama reiterated his country’s demand for Libyan leader Gaddafi to step down, stressing that the goal of the international military operation in Libya was to protect its citizens.
Speaking during a joint news conference with Chilean president Sebastian Pinera in Santiago on Monday, Obama said the UN-sanctioned operation was aimed at averting “the humanitarian threat posed by Col. Gaddafi to his people.”
The US could not “simply stand by with empty words” while Gaddafi, who had “lost his legitimacy,” was “carrying out murders of civilians” and “threatened more,” the Obama said.
“It is US policy that Gaddafi needs to go,” he added.
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Japan: All Reactors Reconnected to Power Lines
Japanese workers struggling to avert a nuclear disaster succeeded in reconnecting all six reactors to power lines at the quake-hit Fukushima Daiichi plant on Tuesday, marking a significant progress in the tedious task of bringing the radiation-leaking complex under control.
The development came as the tsunami-hit northeast was again jolted by a series of powerful quakes, including two measuring 6.6 on the Richter Scale.
In a major relief, engineers working overtime at Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant reconnected all six reactors to external power, the plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Company said Tuesday, according to Kyodo news agency.
The progress was made despite the efforts to restore power and cool down spent nuclear fuel pools being hampered by the detection of smoke at the No. 2 and No. 3 reactors.
However, TEPCO cautioned that a lot of work still needed to be done before electricity can actually be turned on at the plant. The company said workers are checking all additional equipment for damage to make sure cooling systems can be safely operated.
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A Chavez Terror Network?
Roger Noriega raises the question,
Is there a Chavez terror network on America’s doorstep?
On Aug. 22, 2010, at Iran’s suggestion, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez hosted senior leaders of Hamas, Hezbollah and Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) in a secret summit at military intelligence headquarters at the Fuerte Tiuna compound in southern Caracas. Among those present were Palestinian Islamic Jihad Secretary General Ramadan Abdullah Mohammad Shallah, who is on the FBI’s list of most-wanted terrorists; Hamas’s “supreme leader,” Khaled Meshal; and Hezbollah’s “chief of operations,” whose identity is a closely guarded secret.
…
According to information from within the Venezuelan regime, arrangements for the August conclave were made by Chavez’s No. 2 diplomat in Syria, Ghazi Nassereddine Atef Salame. Nassereddine is a naturalized Venezuelan of Lebanese origin who runs Hezbollah’s growing network in South America — which includes terror operatives and drug traffickers.
…
A Venezuelan government source has told me that two Iranian terrorist trainers are on Venezuela’s Margarita Island instructing operatives who have assembled from around the region. In addition, radical Muslims from Venezuela and Colombia are brought to a cultural center in Caracas named for the Ayatollah Khomeini and Simon Bolivar for spiritual training, and some are dispatched to Qom, Iran, for Islamic studies. Knowledgeable sources confirm that the most fervent recruits in Qom are given weapons and explosives training and are returned home as “sleeper” agents…
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13 Illegal Immigrants Arrested in California Wearing U.S. Marine Uniforms
By Joshua Rhett Miller
Clad in U.S. Marine uniforms, the illegal immigrants were apprehended at the Campo Border Patrol Westbound I-8 checkpoint at 11 p.m. on March 14 near Pine Valley, Calif., according to a March 15 report by California’s El Centro Border Intelligence Center.
Border Patrol agents recently arrested 13 illegal immigrants disguised as U.S. Marines and riding in a fake military van, U.S. Customs and Border Protection said Tuesday.
The illegal immigrants were clad in Marine uniforms when they were apprehended at the Campo Border Patrol Westbound I-8 checkpoint at 11 p.m. on March 14 near Pine Valley, Calif., border officials said. Two U.S. citizens in the van also were arrested.
After the suspicious white van was subjected to secondary inspection, it was determined that the driver of the vehicle and its front seat passenger were U.S. citizens who were attempting to smuggle 13 illegal immigrants into the United States. All of the vehicle’s occupants wore U.S. Marine uniforms, reportedly emblazoned with the name “Perez.”
“This effort is an example of the lengths smugglers will go to avoid detection, and the skilled and effective police work and vigilance displayed everyday by Customs and Border Protection personnel,” the agency said in a written statement.
The van used in the smuggling attempt, according to California’s El Centro Border Intelligence Center, was a privately owned vehicle registered out of Yucca Valley, Calif., and was bearing stolen government plates that had been defaced. The center digit — 0 — was altered to read as an 8. Further research through multiple government agencies determined that the plate belonged to a one-ton cargo van registered to the U.S. Marine Corps.
The military referred inquiries back to Customs and Border Protection.
The van entered into the United States via Mexicali, Mexico, and proceeded to Calexico, Calif., where the U.S. Marine uniforms were donned, according to Homeland Security Today.
The Campo Border Station was constructed in June 2008 and is located roughly 28 miles east of San Diego Sector Headquarters in rural East San Diego County. It is responsible for securing approximately 13.1 linear miles of the U.S.-Mexico border and 417 square miles of surrounding territory. An estimated 7,000 vehicles pass through its two checkpoints daily, according to its website.
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UN: Italy Must “Relieve” Immigrant Detention Centre
Rome, 22 March (AKI) — The United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHRC) said that Italy must reduce overcrowding on the tiny island of Lampedusa by transferring illegal immigrants to other locations in the country.
“Lampedusa has to be relieved immediately,” UNHCR spokeswoman Laura Boldrini during a senate hearing on Tuesday in Rome. ““The situation is unsustainable and is increasing tensions between the migrants and the local population.”
More than 5,500 mostly Tunisians are being detained in Lampedusa after making the 113 kilometre boat trip from Tunisia. That is roughly the same at the island’s resident population.
The island is much closer to Tunisia than Italy and has long been a destination for illegal immigrants who leave North Africa seeking a better life in Europe. However, Lampedusa’s sole detention centre is designed to hold a maximum of 800 people. With nowhere to go, many migrants are “sleeping under trucks and on the ground,” Boldrini said.
Boldrini said a ferry would transfer the migrants elsewhere later on Tuesday.
Interior minister Roberto Maroni on Monday said 15,000 people have arrived on the southern island of Lampedusa since the beginning of the year, when Tunisia’s government was overthrown by a month of protests.
Italy has asked other European Union countries to house some of the migrants who make up what Maroni has warned is an immigrant wave “of biblical proportions.”
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Uprisings: Ambassador: Greece/Italy Take on Immigration Burden
(ANSAmed) — ROME, MARCH 22 — Italy and Greek shoulder the greatest amount of the burden of the migration that has already started to be generated by the ongoing turmoil in the Southern Mediterranean countries, and more support is needed from the other EU countries to deal with the situation, said Michalis Cambanis, Greece’s Ambassador to Italy, in an interview with ANSAmed. “The risk of a sharp increase in illegal immigration is more than evident in this phase due to the recent developments in North Africa, and let’s not forget that our two countries, as external borders of the European Union, are called upon to deal with the greatest amount of the pressure created by migration in the Mediterranean region,” explained Cambanis, a longtime diplomat. “The recent developments on Lampedusa are indicative of the evolution of the situation and the dimensions that it is taking on. Therefore it is evident that the problem is mainly European in nature. And this was the issue that was stressed during the extraordinary meeting of Interior Ministers held a few days ago in Rome with representatives from Spain, France, Cyprus, Malta and Greece, called by Italian Interior Minister Roberto Maroni, during which a decision was made to create a permanent network of collaboration between the countries of the Mediterranean area.” At the next European Council (March 24-25), on a request made by Greece and Italy, the issue will be discussed even further in order to fairly divide the burden between the EU member-states, at least as a sign of solidarity to the countries, like Italy and Greece, that are subject to greater pressure,” said the ambassador. “We are eagerly awaiting the decisions that will be made in consideration of the most recent developments. I would like to point out that the Frontex operation in the Aegean Sea has contributed to a significant reduction in this phenomenon. Moreover, there has been a 30% reduction in migration across the Ebro River, where Frontex has been present since October.” Cambanis continued: “The crisis in the Mediterranean is not simply a local phenomenon. The events in recent days confirm this. It is an issue regarding the international community.” He also pointed out that “Greece fully respects the decision of the Security Council, as a NATO and an EU member. The country does not participate in military operations that do not take place under NATO control, while on a bilateral level, we provide support in response to the requests of friends and allies. Greece has made the Souda Air Base in Crete available to NATO as well as the airports of Aktio (Epirus) and Andravida (Peloponnesus), a frigate, which is already positioned at sea between Crete and Libya with its helicopter and mobile radar. Greece is also ready to provide a search and rescue helicopter at any time.”
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