I didn’t have time to blog on the big news of the day, so I’ll lay it out here in the news feed so that it won’t be completely neglected: a Duke University study sponsored by the Department of Justice reports that the threat of Muslim terrorism in the United States has been exaggerated, that there really aren’t that many Muslims who have been radicalized, that bias and discrimination must be avoided to help prevent radicalization, that all we need is more education and outreach and blah blah blah, and now everyone should just go back to sleep.This is part and parcel of the entire establishment “narrative” about Islamic terrorism under the law-enforcement model championed by the Obamanauts. Don’t just read the CNN article; download the pdf of the report and see for yourself.
In other news, the family of Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is rumored to have fled to Russia in advance of the expected troubles that are coming to Iran. Family members have been safely stowed in a dacha with the help and co-operation of Vladimir Putin, and there is alleged to be an “escape jet” fueled and ready to spirit away the Supreme Leader himself when it becomes necessary.
Thanks to Barry Rubin, C. Cantoni, Fjordman, Gaia, Insubria, JD, Judith Apter Klinghoffer, Sean O’Brian, TB, TV, and all the other tipsters who sent these in. Headlines and articles are below the fold.
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Banks and Bailouts: Playing Politics
Banks with strong political connections were more likely to receive bailout money from the government — and more of it — in the past year than those with weaker ties, say Ross researchers.
A new study by Ross professors Ran Duchin and Denis Sosyura found that banks with connections to members of congressional finance committees and banks whose executives served on Federal Reserve boards were more likely to receive funds from the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), the federal government’s program to purchase assets and equity from financial institutions to strengthen its financial sector.
Further, their research shows that TARP investment amounts were positively related to banks’ political contributions and lobbying expenditures, and that, overall, the effect of political influence was strongest for poorly performing banks.
“Our results show that political connections play an important role in a firm’s access to capital,” says Sosyura, assistant professor of finance. “The effects of political ties on federal capital investment are strongest for companies with weaker fundamentals, lower liquidity, and poorer performance — which suggests that political ties shift capital allocation toward underperforming institutions.”
In their study, Duchin and Sosyura focused on the Capital Purchase Program, the largest TARP initiative in terms of the number of participants and the amount of expended capital. As of late September, nearly 700 financial institutions had received about $205 billion under the program.
Hat Tip: www.ncpa.org/National Center for Policy Analysis
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EU Parliament Sees Crisis as ‘Opportunity’ For Tax Harmonisation
The economic crisis could present an opportunity to harmonise taxation policy across EU member states, according to officials at the European Parliament who contributed to a major report on the future development of the EU.
Policy experts advising the Parliament are predicting deeper integration of European economies and potentially closer ties on direct taxes — a suggestion likely to raise the hackles of several Anglo-Saxon and Eastern European finance ministers.
The comprehensive documentexternal, released with minimal fanfare at the end of 2009, was prepared by researchers in the EU assembly’s five policy departments.
Klaus Welle, secretary-general of the European Parliament, stressed that the reports are the views of individual policy experts rather than the official line.
The report sets out three possible scenarios likely to emerge over the next five-to-ten years, saying further harmonisation of direct taxation would be “desirable but has not been realistic until now”.
Unified corporate tax rates, a long-standing target of European federalists, is set out as an objective. This will cause controversy in some corners, not least in Ireland, which last year was given assurances by European leaders that the Lisbon Treaty would not affect its relatively low corporate tax regime.
The officials suggest the window of opportunity may not last long.
“It remains to be seen whether the crisis presents a lasting opportunity for more harmonisation in direct taxation legislation, such as the Common Consolidated Corporate Tax Base (CCCTB),” the report says.
| — Hat tip: Sean O’Brian | [Return to headlines] |
In Italy One in Four Families Cannot Pay Bills
(ANSAmed) — ROME, DECEMBER 29 — In Italy the number of families that cannot pay their bills is on the rise: in 2008 17% had difficulties paying their monthly bills. Many had to save at the table, on clothing, and heating: in Molise the year of the Lehman Brothers crisis was a period of economic prosperity. This was the snapshot provided by the National Statistics Institute (ISTAT) on the living conditions and income for Italians in 2008. According to the study, more than one out of ten families last winter felt the cold, since they could not afford sufficient heating for their homes. Economic difficulties, which compared to the previous year affected more people (+1.6%), also prevented 18.2% of people from buying the necessary clothing (+1/3%). The percentage of people who were not able to regularly pay their bills was 1.9% (+3.1%). Up by 1%, the number of people that did not have enough money for transport costs increased to 8.3%. Finally, for basic goods such as food and drink, 5.7% of Italian families did not have enough income to go shopping without difficulty. According to the study 11.2% said the medical expenses were a luxury. Problems were not evenly spread across the country: the further south one goes and the more children one has, the greater the difficulties. In fact, compared to the national average, which shows that 17% of families are having economic difficulties, the level in the south is 25.6% and 30.7% for families with more than three children. Sicily was the region that suffered most in 2008: on the island over 30% had difficulty paying their bills and one out of ten families did not have enough money to buy sufficient food and drink. More than one out of four avoided turning on the heat in order to save money. In northern Italy the situation is completely different. In Valle d’Aosta, only 6.8% of families had difficulty paying their bills and only 2.6% did not have enough money to shop at the supermarket. The only region in the country that saw its living conditions improve despite the crisis was Molise.(ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Spain: Record Unemployment, Almost 4 Million in 2009
(ANSAmed) — MADRID, JANUARY 5 — Spain’s 2009 ended with a record level of unemployed people (almost 4 million), with 794,640 more workers losing their job in the year. The figures, released by the Labour Ministry, report a 25.4% increase compared to 2008, with a total of 3,923,603 unemployed workers, which represents a record low since the start of data collection in 1996. Some 54,657 people lost their jobs in December, approximately 1.4% more than in the previous month, but less than the loss of 139,694 jobs registered in the same month of 2008. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
The Bailout Bowl
…Yesterday’s matchup between Central Michigan and Troy was particularly insulting to taxpayers because it’s the annual GMAC Bowl, says Tad DeHaven, a financial analyst with the Cato Institute.
GMAC, the former in-house financing arm of General Motors, has been sponsoring the bowl game since 2000, when it paid $500,000 for the right.
More recently, the firm was battered by the collapse of GM and the housing market, and it was allowed to restructure as a bank holding company, which made it eligible for TARP bailout funds.
The federal government has given GMAC $12.5 billion in return for 35.4 percent ownership stake in the company, however, the bailout just got larger.
From last week’s Wall Street Journal:
The Treasury Department last week said it will provide GMAC Financial Services with an additional $3.8 billion in capital and assume a majority stake in the firm.
[…]
The additional aid brings the total U.S. investment in GMAC to $16.3 billion and raises the government’s ownership interest to 56 percent…
In exchange for committing more funds, the Treasury will appoint a total of four directors to the company’s board instead of two as previously planned.
[…]
…it is a poke in the eye to bailout-fatigued taxpayers that a government-owned corporate failure continues to blow money on a largely irrelevant football game…
[Source: Tad DeHaven, “The Bailout Bowl,” Cato Institute, January 4, 2010]
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An Upheaval to Remember
2010 is shaping up to be a rare year in American politics
With trust in government at perhaps an all-time low, 2010 looks as though it will be an extraordinarily intense and unpredictable political year. In just the last two days, the five-term but scandal-tarred Senator Christopher Dodd of Connecticut has decided not to run for reelection; so has Democratic Senator Byron Dorgan of North Dakota; so has Governor Bill Ritter of Colorado, another Democrat. White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel has hinted that he will leave the administration in about six months to run for mayor of Chicago. And the Obama administration’s mishandling of health care and terrorism has introduced uncertainty even in Massachusetts, a state that hasn’t had a Republican in the U.S. Senate since 1972, where state senator Scott Brown is within range of Democrat Martha Coakley in the January 19 special election to fill Ted Kennedy’s seat. If he wins, Brown would represent the decisive vote against the Democrats’ health-care plans.
But New York may be in for the wildest ride of all. It’s the only state where both U.S. senators are up for election in 2010, and it will also choose a governor, state legislators, and members of Congress this year…
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Bolton on Obama’s Next Three Years
I shudder to think…… but Ambassador Bolton lays it out in the January issue of Commentary magazine, and it is bleak. As bad as Bolton paints it, global governance being the cornerstone of American defeat, I predict it will be worse than even Bolton describes.
[…]
The first policy on the table will almost certainly be American arms reduction, achieved through budget decisions and arms-control agreements, both bilateral agreements with Russia and multilateral pacts with other nations. At a time of profligate federal spending, only the Department of Defense’s budget is constrained. With economic stimulus all the rage, Obama has rejected enlarging the standing military; decided against increasing defense procurement to replenish the weapons and other equipment consumed by wars in Iraq and Afghanistan; and stalled progress on critical high-tech military systems. These expenditures (and others) are central to future power-projection capabilities, and all would result in tangible assets and greater policy options, in contrast with the pathetic “shovel-ready” programs of the actual stimulus. This disparity is not accidental.
Even worse, both Obama’s Prague speech on a nuclear-weapons-free world and the first U.S. Nuclear Posture Review since 2001, heavily determined by the White House, point toward unilateral nuclear disarmament by the United States, whatever the success of international negotiations. The president believes strongly, evidence to the contrary notwithstanding, that lowering U.S. nuclear capabilities toward zero will induce would-be proliferators around the world— Iran and North Korea take note—to give up their own nuclear-weapons programs. This is what Obama means by “strengthening” the regime established by the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, and what Gordon Brown has already proposed in giving up one of Great Britain’s four nuclear-missile submarines.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Boy, Now He’s in Real Trouble; Obama Administration Revokes U.S. Visa of Accused Nigerian Bomber
Under the category of looks-like-about-12-days-too-late, the State Department has announced it is revoking the U.S. visa for suspected Nigerian underwear bomber Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab.
That will show him and who knows how many others that the Obama administration really means business.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
‘Christians Are Terrorists, Too’
I don’t know how many times I’ve heard it.
Over the years I’ve had many debates with moral relativists who insist on turning a deaf ear to the obvious connection between Islam and terrorism.
They never fail to minimize the direct connection between Islam’s embrace of violent jihad and the actions of its adherents, while claiming, “Christians are terrorists, too.”
When you ask for an example of a Christian terrorist, the name Timothy McVeigh, the man executed for his role in the Oklahoma City bombing, is usually offered as exhibit A.
Next month, ABC will be airing a documentary called “Different Books, Common Word: Baptists and Muslims” featuring the Rev. Bruce Prescott, executive director of something called “Mainstream Oklahoma Baptists.”
In publicizing the documentary, Prescott made the following statement: “We have extremists in both our faiths. We’re just trying to find some common ground to promote peace.”
Ask Prescott about who those extremists are within his faith and he will readily point to McVeigh.
There’s just one problem with this example: McVeigh was not a Christian.
McVeigh was a secular humanist who claimed “science is my religion.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Congress Tinkers With Withholding Tax Tables for 2010
After much investigating and several discussions with the IRS, it appears the Democrats have played a “cash-flow trick” on working Americans and are taking more out of American’s paychecks across the board — all the while touting the Making Work Pay tax credit.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Flight 253: The Lessons Not Learned
Frontpage Interview’s guest today is Dave Gaubatz, the first U.S. civilian (1811) Federal Agent deployed to Iraq in 2003. He is the owner of DG Counter-terrorism Publishing [1]. He is currently conducting a 50 State Counter-terrorism Research Tour (CTRT). He is the co-author (with Paul Sperry) of the new book, Muslim Mafia: Inside the Secret Underworld that’s Conspiring to Islamize America. [2] He can be contacted at davegaubatz@gmail.com [3]. Visit his new site MuslimMafiaInternational.com [4].
FP: Dave Gaubatz, welcome to Frontpage Interview.
Let’s talk about the recent botched terror attempt on Flight 253 and whether it has been a wake up call for Americans and the Obama administration.
Gaubatz: I wish I could tell you that it has been a wake-up call but unfortunately that is not the case.
Let me begin by saying this: I believe if you ask the same left-wing politicians (who wittingly and unwittingly are supporters of Islamic-based terror groups) if America should again start using the correct terminology of “The War on Terrorism,” there would be no change in their attitude or way of thinking in regards to Islamic terror groups. Most politicians and news organizations still have more allegiance to Saudi Arabia than they do America and our children.
FP: Can you explain further what you mean by this?
Gaubatz: Well, Jamie, our book, Muslim Mafia, reveals the strong ties the Saudi government has in influencing the shape of America in regards to instilling more violent aspects of Islamic Sharia law into our system. Our security actually comes down to money. The more money we allow Saudi Arabia to pump into our country, the more control and influence they have over every aspect of our lives. Why we allow a country that advocates the destruction of our country to dictate what news journalist’ provide to the public is a good question for Americans to ask.
In 2007, during my first-hand research at Islamic centers across America, I was continually coming across a booklet being distributed by CAIR (Muslim Brotherhood). The booklet cover seemed innocent enough, but when I began reviewing the editors and authors of this book, it was apparent they were Wahhabi and had Saudi-backing. Some were convicted terrorist serving life prison sentences in America.
I personally coordinated with the Saudi Embassy in Washington DC to determine if they (the Saudi Govt.) were responsible for distributing materials to innocent children written by convicted terrorists trying to destroy America. I asked the Saudi Embassy to send me their best example of Islam. A few weeks later, the Saudi Embassy sent me a book by Ali Al Timimi. Timimi and others had been plotting to commit terrorism against innocent men, women, and children in America. The Saudi Government said Timimi was their best example of Islam. Readers should note they did not send me the Qur;an; they sent convicted terrorist material.
FP: You have the evidence?
Gaubatz: Yes. I have my recorded conversation with the Saudi Embassy and the original manual and package that the Embassy sent the material in.
Keep in mind Jamie that the Saudi government and CAIR also put this manual in our schools and public libraries.
FP: This is crazy. What can be done about this?
[…]
FP: In your book, you mention the U.S. military has been infiltrated by Islamic terror supporters. Can you be more specific?
Gaubatz: Over the years, specifically since returning from Iraq in 2003, it still amazes me that people find it difficult to believe terrorists would infiltrate the world’s best equipped and well-trained military. It amazes me even more how our nation’s leaders do not even address this national security matter.
People need to ask themselves: Why would Islamic terrorists not join the U.S. armed forces? Where else can they receive better military training and collect intelligence on their enemy? This is fundamental 101 in the intelligence field. My team and I did not rely on 2nd or 3rd hand intelligence in regards to determining if the Muslim Brotherhood was active in America. We went inside. The best source of intelligence is always ‘inside’. This is why CAIR pushes for more Muslims in political positions. They can control America from inside. The documents in Muslim Mafia support this and thousands other documents we obtained provide more details.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
For Obama, Terrorism is a Four-Letter Word: Bush
Obama pledged a new, quieter approach. He would improve America’s image in the world, reach out to Muslims and dial back the fear.
So when a radical Islamist Army officer shouting “Allahu Akbar!” murdered 13 of his fellow soldiers at Fort Hood, Texas, Obama’s response was so low-key it took him days to recognize it as a terrorist incident. And when a radical Islamist Nigerian nearly succeeded in detonating enough explosives to bring down a Northwest Airlines jumbo jet as it approached Detroit, Obama remained silent.
Some observers thought it was a mistake for the president to continue golfing, swimming and munching shave ice in Hawaii while the nation learned the details of Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab’s terrifying plot. But it was a deliberate plan.
“There is a reason why Obama hasn’t given a public statement,” journalist Marc Ambinder wrote the day after the attempted bombing. “It’s strategy.”
[…]
Obama chose not to “chest-thump, prejudge, interfere, politicize.” Instead, he would “project his calm on the American people.” It was, Ambinder wrote, “a tough and novel approach” to terrorism.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Kennedy Replacement Could Threaten Dem Majority
Analyst says GOP win would ‘rock American politics’
The race to fill the Senate seat left vacant by the death of Sen. Ted Kennedy, D-Mass., is closer than many expected, and the results could, in the words of one analyst, “rock American politics.”
Republican candidate state Sen. Scott Brown is within nine points of the Democratic nominee in the heavily Democratic district, according to the latest Rasmussen poll. That assessment said Democrat Attorney General Martha Coakley would get 50 percent of the vote, while Brown would get 41 percent.
But strategists with the Massachusetts Republican Party say their internal polling indicates the Jan. 19 special election is closer than the Rasmussen poll shows.
Brown says voter turnout will be crucial.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Married Couples Pay More Than Unmarried Under Health Bill
WASHINGTON — Some married couples would pay thousands of dollars more for the same health insurance coverage as unmarried people living together, under the health insurance overhaul plan pending in Congress.
The built-in “marriage penalty” in both House and Senate healthcare bills has received scant attention. But for scores of low-income and middle-income couples, it could mean a hike of $2,000 or more in annual insurance premiums the moment they say “I do.”
The disparity comes about in part because subsidies for purchasing health insurance under the plan from congressional Democrats are pegged to federal poverty guidelines. That has the effect of limiting subsidies for married couples with a combined income, compared to if the individuals are single.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Michael Steele Must Go
The Chairman of our party should not be someone who agrees with the radical leftist agenda of Barack Obama almost one third of the time
As time went on, Michael Steele increasing showed himself to be clueless on policy, devoid of ideas and bereft of a competitive political philosophy — this at a time when Americans are clamoring for one. Most of all, his organizational skills, of primary importance to the position which the party chairman is elected to fill, were shown to be all but nonexistent. As I watched on with dismay, I hoped against hope that Steele would grow into the job. Regrettably, this was not to be the case.
None of the above listed faults can come close to his latest misstep, that of downplaying our party’s standing and of deflating our morale with his outrageous prognostications on the 2010 race. That his comments were made in the very same week that the distressingly liberal Los Angeles Times admitted that the GOP is poised to regain control of the US House, and possibly the Senate, is troubling beyond words.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Obama’s 2010 Budget Includes ‘Poverty Traps’
The Heritage Foundation estimates that President Obama’s budget includes a 30-percent increase in programs for the poor, including Medicaid, food stamps, S-CHIP, daycare, and energy assistance. Kiki Bradley, a research fellow at Heritage who analyzed the president’s budget, says the increased welfare spending “traps people in a lifetime of poverty.” Katherine (Kiki) Bradley (Heritage Foundation)
“A lot of people ask, ‘Well, what’s the problem with that? We’re having some economic downturn,’“ says Bradley. “Well, out of all these programs for the poor — and we looked at 70 in particular; that’s 70 different programs across 15 different agencies —…we found that out of all those 70 programs only one was instituted with reforms to put people into jobs and self-sufficiency. That was the TANF program — Temporary Assistance for Needy Families.”
Bradley — who before joining The Heritage Foundation was the associate director of the TANF Bureau at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services — says unfortunately, all the other 69 programs for the poor “keep them poor” and “do nothing to help them become self-sufficient.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Passenger Forced Off Detroit-Bound Plane After Shouting ‘I Want to Kill All the Jews’
Police say the Northwest Airlines flight was taxiing at Miami International Airport yesterday, but was turned around after Mansor Mohammad Asad became abusive.
Miami police said in a statement today that 43-year-old Mansor Mohammad Asad, of Toledo, Ohio, faces several charges including disorderly conduct.
Police say the Northwest Airlines flight was taxiing at Miami International Airport yesterday, but was turned around after Asad became abusive.
Witnesses told authorities he was loud, disruptive and claimed to be Palestinian. They believed he was sometimes speaking Arabic.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Radical Fundraiser Becomes Illinois Police Chaplain
Previously on the IPT blog we stressed the need for the Defense Department’s Islamic Chaplaincy program to adopt a stricter vetting process, citing historically radical imams who have served in the program. Now the same can be said for the chaplaincy program for the Illinois State Police. The Mosque Foundation website reports that Sheikh Kifah Mustapha recently completed a four day training session in Springfield, Illinois to become the first certified Muslim chaplain for the Illinois State Police.
Mustapha’s name appears on a list of unindicted co-conspirators in the Holy Land Foundation (HLF) Hamas financing trail, which ended with sweeping convictions in November of 2008. On this list he is identified as a member of the Muslim Brotherhood’s Palestine Committee. According to the indictment in the HLF trial, the “Muslim Brotherhood is an international Islamic fundamentalist organization” that is “committed to the globalization of Islam through social engineering and violent jihad.” It created the Palestine Committee with a “designed purpose to support HAMAS” politically and financially.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Report: Congressman Challenges Obama Eligibility
‘This forever changes the public discourse’
An new media initiative assembled by a group of citizen-journalists is reporting that Rep. Nathan Deal, R-Ga., has written to President Obama asking him to prove his eligibility to hold the office of U.S. president.
According to the Post and Email, “This forever changes the public discourse.”
“What does this mean?” the site asks. “This is probably the first time in 233 years of American history that a sitting member of the House of Representatives has officially challenged the legitimacy of a sitting president… one full year into his term.”
The website said Todd Smith, chief of staff for Deal, confirmed that Deal sent a letter “to Barack Hussein Obama requesting him to prove his eligibility for the office of president of the United States of America.”
[…]
“Even if the putative president ignores the challenge, he cannot hide from it, because by doing so he admits his guilt through silence. The question has to be asked near and far, why would a president who has promised greater transparency than any previous administration pay upwards of $2,000,000 of taxpayer money to hide documents that could resolve the matter once and for all time for the cost of $20.00. He has publicly admitted on more than one occasion that his father was NOT an American citizen. This alone disqualifies him from eligibility based on Article 2, Section 1, Paragraph 5 of the Constitution, and consequently makes him a usurper,” the site said.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Stakelbeck: U.S. Intel Center Working With Radical Islamist
The National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC) was established after 9/11 to help the U.S intelligence community connect the dots when it came to identifying Islamic radicals and terror plots
Now the NCTC is enlisting some dangerous help in its efforts to battle Islamic jihadists.
Yasir Qhadi has made a series of inflammatory statements about Christians and Jews and has even admitted to being on a terror watch list.
But that hasn’t stopped NCTC from using him as a “de-radicalization” expert in the U.S. Muslim community.
Is NCTC using an Islamic radical to “counter” the radicals?
One terrorism analyst called it “insane.” You can watch the story at the link above.
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State Toys With Mandatory Tests for Homeschoolers
Rights organization gearing up to oppose proposal
Lawmakers in New Hampshire are toying with the idea of demanding annual tests and portfolios as well as vast new score-reporting requirements for every homeschooler in a plan described as the “most anti-homeschool legislation ever conceived” in the state.
But the Home School Legal Defense Association is encouraging constituents to speak out against the plan pending in the state lawmaking body.
Staff attorney Mike Donnelly told WND the proposal was scheduled for a vote today but didn’t make the cut of subjects under consideration. Now it is expected to be on the agenda at some point next week, and parents need to speak out now, he said.
“This legislation is completely unnecessary. The existing New Hampshire law works well, and in an era when homeschoolers are significantly out-performing their public school counterparts the last thing homeschoolers and taxpayers need is another bureaucracy wasting their time and money,” he said. “We hope that enough legislators will see through the maneuver which is being used and vote to retain the existing homeschool law.”
Pending is a possible amendment to the state’s requirements that would make the state’s homeschool demands “the most restrictive and burdensome in the nation,” HSLDA says.
“Members of the Democratic leadership are taking advantage of the system and attempting to slip through the most anti-homeschool legislation ever conceived in New Hampshire,” he said.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Study “Threat of Muslim-American Terrorism in U.S. Exaggerated”:
See: www.sanford.duke.edu/news/Schanzer_Kurzman_Moosa_Anti-Terror_Lessons.pdf
(CNN) — The terrorist threat posed by radicalized Muslim- Americans has been exaggerated, according to a study released Wednesday by researchers at Duke University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
A small number of Muslim-Americans have undergone radicalization since the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on New York and Washington, the study found. It compiled a list of 139 individuals it categorized as “Muslim-American terrorism offenders” who had become radicalized in the U.S. in that time — a rate of 17 per year.
That level is “small compared to other violent crime in America, but not insignificant,” according to the study, titled “Anti-Terror Lessons of Muslim-Americans.”
To be included on the list, an offender had to have been wanted, arrested, convicted or killed in connection with terrorism-related activities since 9/11 — and have lived in the United States, regardless of immigration status, for more than a year prior to arrest.
Of the 139 offenders, fewer than a third successfully executed a violent plan, according to a Duke University statement on the study, and most of those were overseas. Read the report:”Anti-Terror Lessons of Muslim-Americans”
“Muslim-American organizations and the vast majority of individuals that we interviewed firmly reject the radical extremist ideology that justifies the use of violence to achieve political ends,” David Schanzer, an associate professor in Duke’s Sanford School of Public Policy and director of the Triangle Center on Terrorism and Homeland Security, said in the statement.
In the aftermath of 9/11, however, as well as terrorist attacks elsewhere in the world, the possible radicalization of Muslim-Americans is a “key counterterrorism concern” — magnified by heavy publicity that accompanies the arrests of Muslim-Americans, such as that seen in the wake of the November shootings at Fort Hood, Texas, in which 13 people were killed. Army psychiatrist Maj. Nidal Hasan, a Muslim born in Virginia, is charged in connection with that incident.
Other high-profile incidents include the charging of eight Somali-American men on charges related to what authorities say are efforts to recruit youths from the Minneapolis, Minnesota, area to fight for al-Shabaab, a Somali guerrilla movement battling the African country’s U.N.-backed transitional government. At least two young men from Minnesota have been killed in Somalia, including one who blew himself up in what is believed to have been the first suicide bombing carried out by a naturalized U.S. citizen.
In addition, five Americans were arrested last month in Pakistan, and police have said they are confident that they were planning terrorist attacks. A Pakistani court Monday gave police two weeks to prepare their case against the five; authorities have said they plan to prosecute the youths under the country’s anti-terrorism act.
But it is the Muslim-American communities themselves who play a large role in keeping the number of radicalized members low through their own practices, according to the study. Leaders and Muslim-American organizations denounce violent acts, for instance, in messages that have weight within communities.
In addition, such communities often self-police — confronting those who express radical ideology or support for terrorism and communicating concerns about radical individuals to authorities. Some Muslim-Americans have adopted programs for youth to help identify those who react inappropriately to controversial issues so they can undergo counseling and education, the researchers said.
“Muslim-American communities have been active in preventing radicalization,” said Charles Kurzman, professor of sociology at UNC, in the statement. “This is one reason that Muslim-American terrorism has resulted in fewer than three dozen of the 136,000 murders committed in the United States since 9/11.”
However, “since 9/11, there has been increased tension among Muslim-Americans about their acceptance in mainstream American society,” the study said. Muslim-Americans report feeling a stronger anti-Muslim bias from the media as well as from day-to-day interactions.
“While Muslim-Americans understand and support the need for enhanced security and counterterrorism initiatives, they believe that some of these efforts are discriminatory, and they are angered that innocent Muslim-Americans bear the brunt of the impact of these policies.”
Steps can be taken to minimize radicalization among Muslim-Americans, the study said. The most important is encouraging political mobilization among Muslims, which helps prevent radicalization and also demonstrates to Muslims abroad “that grievances can be resolved through peaceful democratic means.” Policymakers should include Muslim-Americans in their outreach efforts, and public officials should attend events at mosques, as they do churches and synagogues, the study recommended.
Also, Muslim-American communities should widely disseminate their condemnation of terrorism and violence, and those statements should be publicized, the study said. Law enforcement has a role to play as well, by making efforts to increase the level of trust and communication with such communities. This could include the cultivation of Muslim-American informants, the study suggested, a policy that could be developed and openly discussed with community leaders.
Governments can promote and encourage the building of strong Muslim-American communities and promote outreach by social services agencies, the study said. “Our research suggests that Muslim-American communities desire collaboration and outreach with the government beyond law enforcement, in areas such as public health, education and transportation.”
And the Muslim-American community can promote enhanced education about its religion and beliefs, the study said. Increased civil rights enforcement can also be an important tool.
However, policies that alienate Muslims may increase the threat of homegrown terrorism rather than reducing it, the study said.
“Our research suggests that initiatives that treat Muslim-Americans as part of the solution to this problem are far more likely to be successful,” said Schanzer.
Schanzer, Kurzman and Ebrahim Moosa, associate professor of religion at Duke, co-authored the study, which summarized two years of research involving interviews of more than 120 Muslims in four different communities nationwide — Seattle, Washington; Houston, Texas; Buffalo, New York; and Raleigh-Durham, North Carolina. The study was funded by a grant from the Department of Justice.
| — Hat tip: TV | [Return to headlines] |
Talk Host: GOP Plotted Christmas Bombing
‘Killing 200 to 300 people on a jetliner to make a point is nothing’
Left-leaning talk-radio host Mike Malloy is accusing Republicans of plotting the Christmas Day attempted bombing of a flight to Detroit — possibly planning to kill 200 to 300 people — simply to “embarrass” the Obama administration.
During his syndicated program Tuesday, Malloy said, “Now, the inquiry, the questions are being raised as to whether or not this is not a deliberate attempt to embarrass — ah, that’s not quite a strong enough word, but let’s start there — embarrass the Obama administration.”
The following is a short clip of several similar statements he made on the topic…
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Tyranny: The Left’s True North
One of the blessings of the left’s assent to power last year — there aren’t many — is that ordinary Americans have glimpsed what the left looks like without the mask.
Here’s Barack Obama promising — eight times on different televised occasions — to open the health-care debate to all comers and televise the debate process on CSPAN.
The reality is just a wee bit different, isn’t it? Extraordinary measures are being taken to prevent even senators and congressmen from finding out what’s in the bill prior to voting on it. The “discussees” are few and members of only one political party. And bribery — not merits — has purchased the necessary support. Not only is our opinion not considered — it’s not wanted.
How did we get from “hope and change” to “deceit and tyranny”? The short answer is: America had forgotten what the left really looked like.
The memory of “Uncle Joe” Stalin’s political opponents being herded onto cattle cars and left to freeze to death on Siberian railway tracks is no longer taught in the schools. Unfortunately, however, it happened. Sixty million of the Soviet Union’s own citizens murdered, so the communist left could do away with religion and create the communist version of “heaven on earth.”
Hitler’s murderous reign is still in the textbooks — but only because the Jews won’t let the world forget. What has been forgotten, however, is that Hitler was a socialist. His party was the National Socialist Worker’s Party. That didn’t work out so well, however, for anyone who opposed “the party.”
And let’s not forget Mao’s quiet revolution in China. It was quiet because millions of his political opponents were locked up in concentration camps, being “re-educated” by ritualized beatings in the joys of forfeiting one’s property, one’s family and finally one’s life — to the almighty state.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
U.S. Learned Intelligence on Airline Attack Suspect While He Was En Route
Reporting from Washington — U.S. border security officials learned of the alleged extremist links of the suspect in the Christmas Day jetliner bombing attempt as he was airborne from Amsterdam to Detroit and had decided to question him when he landed, officials disclosed Wednesday.
The new information shows that border enforcement officials discovered the suspected extremist ties involving the Nigerian, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, in a database despite intelligence failures that have been criticized by President Obama.
“The people in Detroit were prepared to look at him in secondary inspection,” a senior law enforcement official said. “The decision had been made. The [database] had picked up the State Department concern about this guy — that this guy may have been involved with extremist elements in Yemen.”
If the intelligence had been detected sooner, it could have resulted in the interrogation and search of Abdulmutallab at the airport in Amsterdam, according to senior law enforcement officials, all of whom requested anonymity because of the sensitivity of the case.
“They could have made the decision on whether to stop him from getting on the plane,” the senior law enforcement official said.
But an administration official said late Wednesday that the information would not have resulted in further scrutiny before the suspect departed. Abdulmutallab was in a database containing half a million names of people with suspected extremist links but who are not considered threats. Therefore, border security officials would have sought only to question him upon arrival in the U.S., the administration official said.
| — Hat tip: Sean O’Brian | [Return to headlines] |
US Group Warns Against Racial Profiling
The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) has appealed to airline crews and security personnel to avoid the ethnic and religious profiling that may be triggered by the Christmas Day attempt to detonate a bomb on a Northwest Airlines flight, CAIR’s National Communications Director told Al Arabiya on Wednesday.
“Racial and religious profiling labels an entire religion and alienates the very people we need to reach out to,” Ibrahim Hooper said.
This kind of policy is ineffective, counterproductive and it stigmatizes Muslims in America and all over the world.”
Hooper stated that the U.S. is already reporting examples in which passengers were allegedly targeted based solely on their national origin or religion.
“A woman in Dallas was followed by security and asked to remove her hijab simply because she was veiled. When she refused they patted her down to make sure she had no explosives.”
In Arizona, CAIR reported that two men were removed from a U.S. Airways flight and questioned by the FBI allegedly because they looked “Middle Eastern” and spoke in a foreign language.
And in Michigan, a Nigerian passenger was removed from a flight because he spent too much time in the airplane’s bathroom according to other passengers, CAIR said.
“While everyone supports robust airline security measures, this kind of profiling can lead to a climate of insecurity and fear,” said Hooper.
Security experts agree
Hooper is not the only to think profiling is counterproductive. On the Jan. 3 edition of NBC’s Meet the Press, Former Bush Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff said that “relying on preconceptions or stereotypes is actually kind of misleading, and, arguably, dangerous.”
Other national security experts also agree. International security service executive Steve Koenig said, in a Jan. 1 McClatchy News report, that there’s no place for racial profiling in a modern society.
And aviation security expert Sheldon Jacobson agreed adding; “we’re dealing with a moving target. If we keep chasing the risks that we’ve already seen, we will ultimately miss the risk that is going to be coming toward us.”
In Feb. 2, 2009, The New York Times had already published a report showing the ineffectiveness of profiling. The report’s author, University of Texas computational biologist and computer scientist Dr. William H. Press, was quoted saying: “We have been told that strong profiling will somehow find and siphon off the worst offenders and we’ll be safe. It’s not true. The math does not support that.”
But despite the expert protests and supporting proof, a lot of people remain unconvinced because they are simply afraid, argued Hooper.
“It is a kneejerk response, an easy argument to make. And an emotional argument can not lend itself to intellectual debate,” he said.
| — Hat tip: TB | [Return to headlines] |
What the Dems Know: Universal Voter Registration
Many are puzzled that Democrats persist in ramming unpopular and destructive legislation down our collective throats with no apparent concern for their plummeting poll numbers. A widespread belief is that the Democrats are committing political suicide and will be swept from one or both houses of Congress with unprecedented electoral losses next November. But since Democrat politicians rarely do things that will not ultimately benefit themselves, this column asked two weeks ago, “What do they know that we don’t?”
We may have found out. It’s called universal voter registration. The Wall Street Journal’s John Fund described the Democrat plan recently at a David Horowitz Freedom Center forum. Watch the video here.
Fund describes the proposal as follows:
In January, Chuck Schumer and Barney Frank will propose universal voter registration. What is universal voter registration? It means all of the state laws on elections will be overridden by a federal mandate. The feds will tell the states: ‘take everyone on every list of welfare that you have, take everyone on every list of unemployed you have, take everyone on every list of property owners, take everyone on every list of driver’s license holders and register them to vote regardless of whether they want to be…’
Fund anticipates that Congress will attempt to ram this legislation through, as with the health care bill. What a surprise! Fund covers the vote issue at greater length in his book, How the Obama Administration Threatens to Undermine Our Elections.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Why Liberalism is a Reactionary Ideology
The modern liberal is wedded to a thoroughly reactionary worldview in which he worships the institutions he control and is full of paranoia and suspicion of those he does not. He disdains the common man and longs for enlightened leaders to uplift him and to transform his country into a messianic vision of a kingdom of heaven in which no one ever goes hungry and everyone is perfectly equalized—a pseudo-religious vision of government as religion that is wholly primitive in its conflation of theology and civics.
Every time a liberal pundit self-righteously trots out the stereotype of the ignorant science bashing conservative who just won’t accept the science of the environmentalist movement, he needs to be reminded that the entire environmentalist movement is founded on a fear of the products of science, namely technology and modern civilization. Environmentalism dabbles in pseudo-religious mysticism about mother earth, and treats technology as the evil villain
[…]
Liberal Luddites might argue that they can’t be accused of being anti-science and anti-technology, after all they have blogs, webpages, iPhones and Twitter. But there is a fundamental difference between the use of technology and the conception of technology. Islamic fundamentalists make use of the same social media, even as they work to impose a reactionary ideology that is just as anti-technology on the world. Environmentalists who Twitter the latest claims that technology is killing us, and we should be riding bicycles and living in a shack in the woods, are no different than them.
Anyone can use technology, but not just anyone can accept technology as a praiseworthy and useful tool. Environmentalists may exploit science and technology, but only in order to undermine it. Just as Islamic fundamentalists post Islamic lectures on YouTube, environmentalists post videos of themselves living in trees. Both are examples in which technology is used to advocate a society that minimizes the use of technology.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Why My Insurance Agent is Opposed to Obamacare
I discovered something about Charles I did not know. He was born in Hungary. In fact, he was 12 when his parents made their way to the United States. Charles remembers what it was like to live in a country where the government had complete control of the health-care system.
[…]
His stories reminded me of an article I read in the October Free Market, a publication of the Ludwig von Mises Institute, by Yuri N. Maltsev, a former people’s deputy in Moscow. The Soviet Union was the first country to promise universal “cradle-to grave” health-care coverage.
Maltsev reminds us that “the proclaimed advantages of this system” are the very same ones we are hearing today: “reduced costs” and the “elimination of waste that stem from unnecessary duplication and parallelism (a euphemism for competition).”
Maltsev writes, “In order to receive minimal attention by doctors and nursing personnel, patients had to pay bribes…. [A]nesthesia was usually ‘not available’ for abortions or minor ear, nose, throat, and skin surgeries. This was used as a means of extortion by unscrupulous medical bureaucrats…. While workers and peasants were dying in the state hospitals, the medicine and equipment that could save their lives was sitting unused in the nomenklatura system.”
Lest you think these problems are limited to the “barbarous” Russia and other backward countries, Maltsev chronicled some of the realities in our motherland. In England, the waiting list for surgeries is nearly 800,000 out of a population of a mere 55 million. England pioneered the development of kidney dialysis, yet Great Britain has one of the lowest dialysis rates in the world and state of the art equipment is nonexistent in most British hospitals.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Bad Weather: France, Difficult Situation Around Paris
(ANSAmed) — PARIS, JANUARY 7 — Traffic conditions are difficult this morning in Ile-de-France, the region around Paris, due to several centimetres of snow which fell over the night on frozen land. Gridlock and accidents have also been reported in the Grenoble region, in the Alps and in the south-west, in Bordeaux. Thirty-one departments are under a state of alert due to snow and ice, from Normandy to the Pyrenees, from the Marseilles region to Provence. South of Paris road circulation is very slow due to pile-ups, especially lorries which have flipped onto their sides and blocked the entire road, resulting in traffic halted for several kilometres. Police have urged drivers to avoid the Francilienne, the large ring road in the Paris region. School buses have also been called off in many regions. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
BBC Probe Casts Doubt on Lockerbie Evidence
A BBC investigation has cast doubt on key evidence in the case against the Libyan convicted of blowing up a U.S. jet over the Scottish town of Lockerbie in 1988, the broadcaster said Wednesday.
A tiny fragment of the timer allegedly used to blow up Pan Am flight 103, crucial in linking Abdelbaset Ali Mohmet al-Megrahi to the bomb, was not properly tested and was also unlikely to have survived the explosion, it said.
Megrahi was jailed in 2001 for the attack which left 270 people dead, but was controversially released from his Scottish prison in August 2009 because he was suffering from terminal cancer and only had months to live.
Investigators believe the plane bomb was contained in a Toshiba radio cassette player inside a brown suitcase with various items of clothing, and was triggered by a digital timer that was later linked to Libya.
But according to the BBC’s Newsnight program, the fragment of the timer, found embedded in a charred piece of clothing three weeks after the bombing, was never tested to confirm if it had actually been in a blast.
The BBC also quoted an explosives expert, John Wyatt, who recreated the suitcase bomb 20 times and found that each time, the timer and its circuit board were completely destroyed, casting serious doubt on the fragment found.
“I do find it quite extraordinary and I think highly improbable and most unlikely that you would find a fragment like that, it is unbelievable,” Wyatt, the U.N.’s explosives consultant for Europe, told the program.
It is not the first time doubts have been raised about the timer fragment. In 1995, a British lawmaker suggested it could have been planted by the CIA.
A review by the Scottish Criminal Case Review Commission also cast doubt on evidence linking Megrahi to the clothes in the suitcase and concluded in 2007 that “a miscarriage of justice may have occurred”.
Megrahi, who has always protested his innocence, subsequently launched a second appeal but dropped this in anticipation of his release.
In december it was reported that his condition had deteriorated and that the cancer that afflicts him had spread through his body, a medical bulletin had said.
| — Hat tip: TB | [Return to headlines] |
Bulgaria Backpedals on Turkey Compensation Claim
Bulgaria’s prime minister has threatened to sack one of his ministers in an attempt to make good in a dispute over Turkey’s EU accession.
“I have warned Bojidar Dimitrov that the next time something like this happens, we will have to let him go. You don’t come out and make such declarations without their having been discussed by the Prime Minister, the cabinet, or the parliament,” Prime Minister Boyko Borissov said in remarks cited by Bulgarian TV on Wednesday (6 January).
Bojidar Dimitrov, a minister without portfolio responsible for the Bulgarian diaspora, told a newspaper on Sunday that Bulgaria would veto Turkey’s EU bid unless it pays €14 billion in compensation for Bulgarians driven out in 1913.
A Bulgarian official later said the question is being handled by Bulgarian and Turkish experts and that Mr Borissov will raise it on an upcoming visit to Ankara.
The comments elicited a high-level rebuke from Turkey.
“The friendship between Bulgaria and Turkey is for the good of the two countries. It would be much better if statements that might hurt this friendship are avoided,” Turkish foreign minister Ahmet Davutoglu told a press conference on Tuesday.
Bulgarian deputy foreign minister Marin Raykov also tried to ease tensions in recent days, saying that there is no threat of a veto and that Bulgaria “backs all the decisions of the European Union, concerning the dialogue between Brussels and Ankara,” according to Bulgarian press agency Novinite.
Bojidar Dimitrov is a 64-year-old medieval historian who has in the past attracted controversy over allegations that he was a Communist-era spy, as well as for a book attacking Macedonian nationalism.
The Turkish affair comes in the middle of an already bad week for Bulgaria’s EU relations.
A popular investigative journalist, Boris Tsankov, was shot dead in broad daylight in Sofia on Tuesday, compounding the country’s reputation as a black spot in terms of organised crime.
Prime Minister Borissov on Wednesday also rebutted an article in Germany’s Die Welt which said that the husband of Bulgaria’s commissioner designate, Rumiana Jeleva, has ties to the Russian mafia.
“Jeleva a gangster’s bride? An absolute lie. Her husband has worked for a bank licensed by the Bulgarian National Bank and the European Central Bank,” Mr Borissov said, Novinite reported.
| — Hat tip: Sean O’Brian | [Return to headlines] |
Ex-Nazi: ‘I Was Auschwitz Sign Middleman’
A Swede suspected of involvement in the theft of the “Arbeit Macht Free” sign from Auschwitz has spoken out about his role in the raid on the former Nazi death camp.
“My role was to go get the sign in Poland. I was the middleman and was
supposed to take care of the sale,” the man, a former neo-Nazi whose name was not disclosed, told Swedish daily Expressen.
The paper referred to the man only as “a former Nazi leader.”
The Polish daily Fakt identified the man as Anders Högström, who in 1994 founded the National Socialist Front, a Swedish neo-Nazi movement he headed for five years before quitting.
Another Polish newspaper, Gazeta Wyborcza, referred in its article to “Anders H.”
After leaving his party, Högström, 33, claimed he distanced himself from the movement and joined an association called Exit which helps youths quit far-right movements, according to Swedish media.
Polish prosecutors said on Wednesday they wanted to question three Swedish
residents over the December 18th theft of the death camp sign, without revealing
their names.
Five Poles have already been arrested.
The men are charged with theft and damage and face up to 10 years in prison.
According to Expressen, the “former Nazi leader” claimed the sign was to be sold for several million kronor (hundreds of thousands of dollars) which was to be used to finance bombings against the Swedish parliament and government.
“But that was not something I wanted to be involved in or carry out, in any way,” he told the paper.
“I contacted the police immediately, as soon as the sign was stolen, and gave them all the information I had. I haven’t committed any crime. I was the one who saw to it that the sign was found,” he added.
Police recovered the five-metre metal sign — which means “Work Will Set You Free” in German — on December 20th in northern Poland and arrested the five Polish men. The sign had been cut into three pieces.
The sign above Auschwitz’s gateway has long symbolised the horror of the camp, created by Nazi Germany in occupied Poland in 1940 and in operation until Soviet troops liberated it in 1945.
| — Hat tip: TB | [Return to headlines] |
France to Set Up New Court to Investigate Genocide
The French government has announced that it will set up a new panel to try cases of genocide and war crimes committed in France or abroad.
The new court would speed up the way genocide cases are tried where the suspect is on French territory but the process involves several jurisdictions.
The unit is to include linguists and specialists with historical knowledge.
French authorities are currently hearing several cases against Rwandan genocide suspects living in France.
Those being investigated include Agathe Habyarimana, the widow of the late president Juvenal Habyarimana, whose plane was shot down in 1994, triggering the violence and killing inside Rwanda.
‘No sanctuary’
In a joint statement to the newspaper Le Monde, the French foreign minister, Bernard Kouchner, and the justice minister, Michelle Alliot-Marie, said legislation to create a new unit within the Paris High Court would be presented in the coming six months.
“As the homeland of human rights, France will never be a sanctuary for the authors of genocide, war crimes or crimes against humanity”, the statement said.
The move, part of broader legal reform in France, will not change French war crimes law.
However, it will enable courts to move more rapidly through the complicated international procedures involved in investigating crimes committed outside France.
The announcement comes as Mr Kouchner is in Rwanda at the start of an African tour which will also take him to Ivory Coast, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Burkina Faso.
Mr Kouchner is due to hold talks in Kigali with the Rwandan president Paul Kagame, in his first visit following the resumption of diplomatic ties between France and Rwanda last November.
| — Hat tip: Sean O’Brian | [Return to headlines] |
Germany: ‘How Much Bush is There in Obama?’
Germany’s left-wing Die Tageszeitung newspaper says US President Barack Obama is no “Prince of Peace.”
President Barack Obama has slammed the “near-disastrous” intelligence failures surrounding an attempted Christmas Day terror attack on a Northwest Airlines jetliner. Looking beyond his tough rhetoric, German commentators scratch their heads and wonder if he is getting a bit too much like his predecessor.
The White House will on Thursday release an unclassified version of a report into intelligence failures relating to anti-terror watch lists, after security services failed to detect an abortive attack on an airliner on Christmas Day.
White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said sections of the report will be released after President Barack Obama receives a classified version of the data from John Brennan, his leading anti-terror expert.
“I think you’ll see tomorrow that this is a failure that touches across the full waterfront of our intelligence agencies,” Gibbs said, adding that Obama would make a public statement after he has seen the report.
A jury in Michigan on Wednesday indicted Nigerian Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, 23, on six counts for his bid to bomb the Northwest Airlines flight from Amsterdam to Detroit. The failed plot has raised a number of questions about the effectiveness of US security and intelligence. It has also put Obama firmly on the defensive.
On Tuesday, Obama said that the review into the terrorist watch listing system had revealed “human and systemic failures.” He said it showed that US intelligence agencies missed a series of alerts related to Abdulmutallab. The terror suspect was known to have extremist links, but was still able to board the plane. In addition, Obama has said that US intelligence agencies were aware that the al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula terror group aimed to attack targets in the United States over the holidays.
Earlier this week, the US president summoned members of the security services to the White House and voiced his anger over their shortcomings. “The bottom line is this: The US government had sufficient information to have uncovered this plot and potentially disrupt the Christmas Day attack, but our intelligence community failed to connect those dots,” he said. “This was not a failure to collect intelligence, it was a failure to integrate and understand the intelligence that we already had.”
But German editorialists on Thursday asked whether Obama was too tardy in his reaction to the security debacle. Meanwhile, disconcerting parallels were drawn between his response to the attempted attack and the War on Terror conducted by his predecessor. The point was drummed home by the front page of the left-wing Tageszeitung which displayed a photoshopped image of Obama merged with George W. Bush alongside the question: “How much Bush is there in Obama?”
The center-right Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung writes:
“This was new to American audiences: Obama publically summoned senior intelligence personnel to the White House and the language he used to castigate the authorities’ ‘near-disastrous’ failure, which almost caused a catastrophe on Christmas Day, left nothing to the imagination. It gives a measure of the extent of the President’s wrath — and the political damage.”
“This foiled assassination attempt will have consequences beyond the authorities’ pledges to improve their act. The issue of security and terror has been returned to the top of the Americans’ list of concerns. Of course the Republicans try to use the issue against him. Whether he likes it or not, Obama finds himself in the position of a terror fighter who, within his own parameters, is continuing the work started by his predecessor. His colleagues are already using a term which the government has banned: The war on terror. Is Obama a ‘Bush Light’?”
SPIEGEL ONLINE Washington correspondent Gregor Peter Schmitz writes:
“The images speak for themselves: Nearly a year after taking office, Obama has now become an anti-terrorist president. His spokesman Robert Gibbs already speaks of the ‘War on Terror,’ as if George W. Bush were still in power. This speech leaves no doubt as to Obama’s determination. It aims to counteract the impression that he was not tough enough in the fight against the enemy. The only question which remains is whether his statement comes too late.”
“This has given political fodder to opponents, especially those who had already slammed Obama as a half-hearted anti-terrorist fighter during the presidential campaign. The president sent out his men to redress the balance. But they became entangled in the task at hand. As it became clear that US security authorities had made mistakes, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano still insisted that the system had worked. Soon after, she was forced to retract her statement.”
“Obama now must shake off this impression of mismanagement. To this end, he opted for sharp words during his appearance following the security summit at the White House.”
The left-wing Tageszeitung writes:
“Barack Obama has never — not even during his electoral campaign — made a secret of the fact that he does not rule out war as a political tool. Otherwise he would not have been elected. Those in Europe who believed that his statement wasn’t serious, and was accompanied by a knowing wink towards the pacifists, only have themselves to blame. Military strength and the willingness to use it, are fundamental in the United States, which has not had territorial wars since the mid-19th century.”
“You don’t have to like it, but ignoring this global political reality… reveals naivety. Whoever saw Obama as a prince of peace has made a mistake. He is a rational military commander. But at least he is rational, and honest — at least as far as we have seen so far. Both of these traits set him apart from his predecessor.”
The business daily Handelsblatt writes:
“All of a sudden President Barack Obama has presented himself as a determined fighter of terrorism. But he is not saying how he wants to eliminate the deficiencies in the intelligence and security services. Following the crisis meeting on security policy in the White House, one thing is clear: There is no single solution, but there is a realization that the intelligence system is being hampered by its own organization.”
“Obama has avoided dealing with the anti-terrorist theme for a year. Now it has caught up with him. Obama is facing the same issues as George W. Bush. But he has not come up with any new answers than those of his predecessor. He hasn’t even got rid of the ugly legacy of Guantanamo.”
“Obama will only manage to restore confidence in the safety of the country if he succeeds in presenting a concept that is both efficient and lean. That is not an easy task given that the heads of the intelligence services often like to spend more time arguing than organizing the defense of their country. Following the recent debacle, Obama must realize that, alongside all his other problems, he now has a new issue to deal with — and urgently.”
Jess Smee
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Germany: Kosovar Cousins Jailed for Vicious Munich U-Bahn Beating
Two cousins who beat a young man nearly to death at a Munich U-Bahn station 13 years ago were sentenced on Tuesday to five and seven years’ prison for the savage attack.
The Munich regional court found the two men, who were aged 18 and 19 at the time of the attack, guilty of attempted murder, sentencing the younger man to seven years and his older cousin to five years’ jail.
Together with another man, who has already been sentenced, the pair knocked down a 23-year-old carpenter in July 1996 after he took them to task for smoking in the station, where it was forbidden.
The younger man then stabbed the victim with a knife 10 times in the upper body, including one thrust aimed right at the man’s heart, which was stopped only by his wallet.
The victim fell onto the train track and had to use his last strength to climb back onto the platform. He had to undergo several operations and was in a critical condition for weeks. He remains limited to 60 percent of normal movement.
Both the perpetrators sentenced Tuesday were Albanian Kosovars who had fled their homeland, where Albanians were facing persecution by Serbian leader Slobodan Milosevic.
One was arrested in Switzerland in December 2008 and the other in autumn of 2009 in Italy.
The sentencing follows other high-profile attacks on Munich public transport that have caused deep public anguish in the Bavarian capital. Last October, Dominik Brunner, 50, was beaten to death after stepping in to protect a group of youths from a gang of older bullies who were demanding money.
And in December of 2007, two young men attacked and nearly killed a retired teacher after he also admonished them for smoking. They received 12 years and eight-and-a-half years’ prison respectively.
The court’s senior judge said the present case showed violence on Munich’s public transport was nothing new.
“The case shows that 13 years ago, there was violence in the U-Bahn, just as it makes headlines today,” the judge said.
The other attacker was given three years in a juvenile prison but was released after just one year.
In the trial against cousins, he refused to give testimony supporting the cousins’ claim they had been responding to the xenophobic aggression of the carpenter they attacked.
| — Hat tip: TB | [Return to headlines] |
Germany Warms to Turkish EU Bid
Germany has pledged not to block Turkey’s bid to join the EU, but has urged it to press on with reforms.
“What the EU and Turkey have agreed stands. And that applies to this German government too,” German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle said.
Speaking in the Turkish capital Ankara, he called Turkey’s negotiations “open-ended”. Progress has been slow since Turkey began talks with the EU in 2005.
Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel does not back full EU membership for Turkey.
She has spoken of Turkey getting a “privileged partnership” with the EU — less than full membership.
Within the ruling German coalition, Mr Westerwelle’s liberal Free Democrats are seen as more open to Ankara’s ambitions than Mrs Merkel’s conservative Christian Democrats, correspondents say.
He is in Turkey for his first visit since the election last October that returned Mrs Merkel to office.
Stumbling blocks
The BBC’s Jonathan Head in Istanbul says the “privileged partnership” idea has been widely condemned in Turkey as an insult — and it has led to tense relations with France and Germany, the two countries that proposed the idea.
Turkey’s accession process has become bogged down, with the divided island of Cyprus remaining the biggest obstacle.
Talks to reunite the breakaway Turkish-controlled north and Greek Cypriot south have stalled. The Republic of Cyprus is internationally recognised and already an EU member — unlike the breakaway north.
Turkey’s refusal to let Cypriot ships use its ports is a violation of existing treaties with the EU. The Cypriot government has also been able to block the opening of a number of chapters in the Turkish-EU membership talks.
Mr Westerwelle urged Turkey to speed up the reforms it needs to make to meet EU membership criteria, including religious and political freedom, judicial impartiality and treatment of the Kurdish minority.
And he pointed out that however many years it takes, eventual EU membership cannot be guaranteed.
| — Hat tip: Sean O’Brian | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Building Costs Down 1% in Q3
(ANSAmed) — ROME, DECEMBER 30 — Residential building costs in Italy dropped by 1% in the third quarter of 2009 compared with the same quarter of last year, and by 0.1% compared with the previous quarter. The announcement was made by Italy’s national statistics office ISTAT, which noted that it is the first drop on an annual basis after the +1.2% seen in the second quarter and the +3.6% seen in the first three months of 2009. In practical terms, this means that building houses in Italy now costs less. The only thing to increase were labour costs, up by +0.1% compared with the second quarter of 2009. On a quarterly basis, down instead were costs for materials (-0.5%) and those for transport and rental services (-0.2%). Compared with the same quarter in 2008, labour costs were up by 2.3%, while those for materials were down 5.9%. Transport and rental services were overall stable (-0.1%). (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Street Cleaners Sue for Washing Costs
Sweepers near Naples forced to clean job clothes for ten years
(ANSA) — Naples, January 6 — Streetcleaners near Naples are suing the council for making them wash their work clothes at home for ten years.
A lawyer for the 17 workers told local daily Metropolis that putting the garments in the washing machine had cost his clients about 500 euros ($720) a year.
The total cost for bringing the grime home came out as 5,500 euros ($7,900) from 1998 until last year, when the workers finally persuaded their employers to start cleaning the clothes.
The lawyer said he was counting on a 1997 ruling by Italy’s supreme court which ordered a firm to pay out in a similar case.
Torre del Greco outside Naples, where the sweepers work, was one of the many Campania towns hit by a chronic rubbish crisis that earned international headlines and spurred a government-led clean-up last year. photo: sweepers in Naples in 2007
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Italy: Football Racism Row Erupts in Verona
Verona, 7 Jan. (AKI) — A racism row has erupted in Italian football after Inter Milan’s champion striker Mario Balotelli said he was “disgusted” by rival fans in the northern city of Verona. “Every time I come to Verona to play, the city disgusts me even more,” Balotelli said in a TV interview after scoring the winning goal over Chievo Verona on Wednesday.
“These fans are really unacceptable,” Balotelli said.
Balotelli, born in the Sicilian capital, Palermo, to Ghanaian parents, scored the only goal of the game in the 12th minute to send Inter 11 points clear of closest rivals AC Milan as Serie A resumed after a short winter recess.
During the game he was subjected to racist chants and jeering that left the 19-year-old striking sensation “more and more disgusted” with Chievo, which is based in Verona.
However, the mayor of Verona Flavio Tosi, from the anti-immigrant Northern League, rejected Balotelli’s claims of racial abuse in a scathing retaliation.
“Balotelli is an immature and arrogant kid. He will never be a champion,” Tosi told the sports daily, La Gazzetta Dello Sport.
“The real champions are those who show humility and have good sense. Balotelli doesn’t have these qualities.
“Taking things out on Chievo fans, who are among the best in Italy, is a paradox. Poor Balotelli will never be a champion.”
Chievo coach Domenico Di Carlo said Balotelli should recognise that wherever he plays, he will face similar behaviour.
“Wherever he goes they will always say something,” he said. “So I think Mario should understand it is up to him to change his attitude.I also think it is normal to challenge an opponent in the field of sport.”
Inter coach Jose Mourinho tried to play down the incident.
“Mario is a guy that often says things that he should not and often does what he should not,” Mourinho said. “But he is a great champion and he should be judged for what he does on the field.”
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
More Snow Coming for Already Frigid Europe
It has already been an unusually cold winter across much of Europe. But more snow is on the way in the coming days, and there’s no end to the big chill in sight.
The irony was difficult to ignore. As world leaders gathered in Copenhagen in early December for what turned out to be a failed attempt to agree on a worldwide plan to combat global warming, temperatures outside the conference were bitterly cold. Delegates from equatorial countries were shivering under multiple layers, and even those from northern Europe had a hard time staying warm.
Now, almost three weeks after the conference ended in fiasco, Europe continues to be in the grips of frosty and snowy weather. And with a new low-pressure system — rather incongruously dubbed “Daisy” — set to move in over the weekend, much of Central Europe could soon be buried in a new layer of snow.
On Friday, snow will fall across Germany,” the German Weather Service said in a statement posted on its Web site. “Across the middle part of the country, the snow could be extensive and substantial.”
Coldest in Years
The prolonged cold snap has already claimed scores of victims, and dozens of people — many of them homeless — have frozen to death in Poland amid temperatures as low as minus 25 degrees Celsius (minus 13 degrees Fahrenheit). Germany has also seen a number of weather-related deaths. For example, a wheelchair-bound man who had been missing since Christmas was found Monday near Duisburg frozen to death in the snow.
Preliminary figures suggest that the UK is also suffering through one of its coldest winters in years, having experienced its most frigid December since 1995. The chill is expected to continue at least through this week, with further heavy snowfall expected.
Clogged with Ice
The Continent is likewise bracing for more bad weather. Temperatures could plunge below minus 20 degrees Celsius (minus 4 degrees Fahrenheit) in parts of Germany, and up to 20 centimeters (8 inches) of snowfall is expected. In Poland, there are heightened concerns about flooding, as water levels of the Vistula River, the country’s largest, have risen rapidly as it has become clogged with ice.
Still, while there may be those tempted to see the cold snap as proof that global warming isn’t all it’s cracked up to be, scientists say that most of the northern hemisphere is actually much warmer than usual. Large swaths of northern Canada and Alaska are a balmy minus 30 degrees Celsius (minus 22 degrees Fahrenheit) instead of normal temperatures, which are between 5 degrees and 10 degrees cooler than that.
In Europe, however, temperatures are roughly 5 degrees Celsius colder than usual, according to the UK’s weather authority, the Met Office.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Paris Wants Pan-European Carbon Tax
France intends to push for a tax on carbon emissions across the European Union, President Nicolas Sarkozy said on Wednesday (6 December), a week after his country’s top court struck down an attempt to introduce just such a tax domestically.
Mr Sarkozy also wants to see carbon “tariffs” slapped on products entering the EU from countries with weaker environmental legislation.
“We will not accept goods that fail to conform to our environmental standards,” the French leader told a group of businessmen in Cholet, French media reports.
“In future we will levy a ‘climate tax’ at Europe’s borders.”
Any carbon tariff move is likely to meet with stiff resistance from other EU member states, particularly the more free-trade oriented nations, who would view such a levy as a form of protectionism.
When an EU carbon tax imposed at the borders of the bloc was first mooted at a meeting of European environment ministers last July, the idea was given a frosty reception, particularly by Germany.
Mr Sarkozy’s words come just a week after his flagship carbon tax was struck down by the country’s top court as unjust and counterproductive to the fight against climate change.
The Constitutional Court last Wednesday (30 December) ruled that the law, announced in September and originally due to enter into force from 1 January, had included so many loopholes that some 93 percent of industrial greenhouse gas emissions would have been exempt.
The judges found that this placed the overwhelming burden of the tax, set at €17 per tonne of CO2 emitted, on households instead of industry.
The opposition Socialists as well as the Green Party and some 70 percent of the population were opposed to the law, which would have increased household gas bills and the cost of petrol significantly.
In response, the French government is to present a re-edited version of the bill on 20 January, taking into consideration the court’s objections.
On Tuesday, French finance minister Christine Lagarde said that the new law would would involve a progressive tax, with different brackets similar to income taxation.
Left-wing opponents of carbon taxes have argued that they are stealth attempts at introducing flat taxation under the guise of helping the environment.
Paris hopes the new bill will enter into force on 1 July.
| — Hat tip: Sean O’Brian | [Return to headlines] |
Ryanair Won’t Pull Out of Italy
Budget airline backs down on threat, agrees to new ID policy
(ANSA) — Rome, January 7 — Budget carrier Ryanair withdrew its threat to suspend domestic service in Italy on Thursday and agreed to the Italian aviation authority ENAC’s new policy on passenger ID.
Last month, the company said it would cancel all ten of its internal routes by January 23 unless ENAC rescinded a new policy allowing passengers to board flights using forms of identification other than passports and state-issued ID cards. Ryanair said that a “relaxed” boarding regime would compromise the safety of its passengers and infringe upon its prerogative to choose what kinds of ID to accept.
“This policy would allow a person to board a plane carrying nothing more than a fishing license,” the company complained.
The threat came just days after a foiled attempt by an Al Qaeda-trained Nigerian man to bomb a plane over Detroit on Christmas Day.
It sent a ripple of unrest through Italian airports, where Ryanair is closing in on Alitalia to become the nation’s leading domestic carrier.
It also irritated ENAC, which accused the company of leveraging its market share to dictate civil aviation policy and making a mountain out of a molehill.
ENAC also railed against the airline for insinuating that airport security in Italy wasn’t up to scratch.
After a round of negotiations on Thursday, ENAC chief Vito Riggio announced that the airline had “apologized” for the implication and accepted the new policy.
Ryanair later confirmed the statement, hailing a revised version of the policy as a “major improvement”.
“We will accept all forms of identification issued by European Union member states in addition to passports and national ID cards,” the company agreed. It explained that expanding the range of acceptable ID any further would make it impossible to verify a passenger’s identity via the airline’s online check-in system. Transport Minister Altero Matteoli praised both parties “for resolving the dispute without any cancelled flights or inconvenience to passengers”.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
The Silent Symbols of Islam and Their Importance in the European Public Sphere
Islam becomes a political and cultural source for identifying immigrants, their quest for acknowledgment. They in turn manifest their particular citizenship within the European public arena. This visibility marks the end of a stage in the migratory phenomenon, that of integration, as well as experiences and ways of appropriating the public sphere in Europe. It is the difficulty in acknowledging this passage from foreigner to citizen that lies beneath the controversies surrounding Islam. The concept of acknowledging Islam and Muslims as a phenomenon endogenous to Swiss society has been rejected.
Nilüfer Göle is Director of studies at the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales in Paris and the author of “Interpénétrations: l’Islam et l’Europe”, published by Galaade éditions, 2005.
Every time I cross the Galata Bridge I never tire of gazing in amazement at the view of Istanbul where the silhouettes of its tall minarets stand out like drawings. Unlike the Eiffel Tower, the many discreet minarets are not erected as symbols of the city of Istanbul. And yet, without its slim minarets symbolising man’s spiritual elevation towards God, Istanbul would lose part of its soul. In the eyes of both its pious and secular inhabitants, Muslims and non-Muslims, the minarets are part of the familiar landscape of a shared legacy. Of course many regret that new mosques built in contemporary Turkey are far from a match for those of the great architect Mimar Sinan, created in the glorious age of the Ottoman Empire. Most contemporary mosques lack any architectural innovation, any finesse or proportion between the domes and the minarets. Even the calls to prayer, after the adoption of loudspeakers and recordings have become a constant source of public debate addressing the nuisance caused by the noise.
Public debate, however, is not restricted to these subjects. Projects to reopen Saint Sophia as a place of worship for Muslims and the building of a new mosque in the heart of Istanbul have for decades caused lively and passionate controversy. A controversy that divides citizens into those objecting to signs of islamisation and those who wish to mark its social rise with religious symbols in the public sphere. This gap between those defining themselves as defenders of secularism and the more religious who demand freedom of conscience, is one that currently affects all political life in Turkey. The conflict has intensified since minarets were compared to bayonets and mosques to barracks, in a poem recited in public by Recep Tayyip Erdogan after he won the 1997 elections. Turkey’s current prime minister was sentenced and imprisoned for “inciting religious hatred” after reciting these verses attributed to a nationalist poet, expressing himself about the national war of independence.
One is entitled to be astonished that in a country like Turkey with its Muslim majority, Islam’s historical and cultural symbols are no longer part of the unchangeable and peaceful familiar legacy and have assumed a new public visibility and reawakened religious and political differences. One could ask oneself when and how a symbol, or an object, familiar and imperceptible to us should one day become “visible” and therefore ostentatious and upsetting in the eyes of the public? The Swiss referendum, that with a popular and majority vote decided to ban the building of minarets, has revealed that Islam’s visibility is distressing in the eyes of Europeans. Simultaneously this conflict confirms the transformation of the terms of the debate on Islam in Europe.
First of all the public visibility of Islam’s religious and cultural symbols marks the presence of Muslims in Europe. Just like the other silent symbol, the veil, minarets reveal the presence of Muslims both pious and female in public life. This visibility certifies the presence of Muslims in European society and their desire to remain there, demanding freedom of conscience, freedom to practice their religion and also the freedom to dress according to their personal interpretation of their religion. Paradoxically, Islam becomes a political and cultural source for identifying immigrants, their quest for acknowledgment. They in turn manifest their particular citizenship within the European public arena. This visibility marks the end of a stage in the migratory phenomenon, that of integration, as well as experiences and ways of appropriating the public sphere in Europe. It is the difficulty in acknowledging this passage from foreigner to citizen that lies beneath the controversies surrounding Islam.
The debates on minarets and on the ban to build them have born witness to Swiss society’s problems in acknowledging the presence of Muslims who are establishing their roots and their place in public life. Debates have been feeding on the feeling that Islam is invading their territories and the fear of losing one’s “home”. Speeches include demands for Muslims to build their minarets “in their own countries,” posters compared them to dangerous “black sheep” hence as “foreign” and symbolically expelled. All the semantics of the debate seem to indicate that the concept of acknowledging Islam and Muslims as a phenomenon endogenous to Swiss society has been rejected. The debate’s leitmotiv, to protect oneself in one’s own country from this conquering religion, also conceals a reticence experienced by Swiss citizens in renouncing a monopoly over their public sphere. The non-democratic aspect of this referendum lies in its intention to contain and freeze the public arena in its strict adaptation to the nation, refusing to open it to a plurality of citizens. On one hand, Muslims, with their multiple attachments, including languages, ethnic groups, religions and oumma, disturb the national definition of citizenship awakening suspicion regarding their loyalty. The definition of a public sphere identifying with a pre-established national community can only create tension and exclusion in a world filled with migratory and transnational dynamics, be these religious, economic or cultural.
Secondly, Islam’s passage to the West causes Muslims to address a series of new issues that characterise Islam in Europe in a particular manner. Islam that has become European, exacerbates the paradox of visibility and invisibility. Unlike what happens in Muslim countries, here the minarets are silent and the mosques are discreet. Concerned with security and transparency, European democracies have encouraged the visibility of places of worship, inviting them to abandon cellars and garages and show themselves. Nonetheless, it is not that simple to provide a mosque with visibility. What form should it have, what space should it occupy, what ideas should be attributed to it? Does a mosque always have a dome and a minaret? Is it possible to create a mosque that is not identifiable? Is it possible to separate mosques from minarets as the Swiss hope? Is it possible to replace the word “mosque” which frightens some people with “place of worship”? In Europe, minarets and mosques face “existential” problems.
Minarets are always silent, without the muezzins calling people to prayers; mosques have begun to acquire new architectural characteristics respecting the landscape and the environment. How can mosques assemble together different ethnic communities? Do, for example, the Turks in England attend Pakistani mosques in Birmingham? Are the Turkish mosques in Berlin attended by citizens of the Maghreb and by other Muslim minorities? How can one ensure that mosques are acknowledged as the public and religious space of European Muslims? According to what criteria should one decide what language should be used for preaching? How should one rethink the mosque area for women, for the young and for various activities? These are all questions that become more important when considering the experiences and daily lives of Muslims in Europe. Mosques act as an interface between the urban environment, Muslim citizens and religious pluralism. Accepting their visibility involves a series of negotiations and rules that involve aesthetics, worship, finance, architecture and space, so as to create objects of a future shared legacy. The Swiss referendum has now imposed non-negotiability and it is also in this sense that this referendum indicates a non-democratic attitude, because it involves stopping the process of evolution, exchange and cultural mixing.
The sensation caused by the minarets: Islam obliges Europe to go public
Far from being restricted to the Swiss context, this referendum caused a sensation in other countries and set off a transnational European debate…
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Colleges Closed for ‘Radicalizing’ Muslims
Intel community cites links to Islamic extremists
Fourteen bogus colleges in Britain have had their licenses to operate revoked after intelligence agents at MI5 discovered they had “multiple communications” with Islamic extremists in Britain — including the alleged Detroit bomber, 23-year-old Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, according to a report from Joseph Farah’s G2 Bulletin.
The colleges also are suspected of being funded by al-Qaida after MI5, Britain’s counter-intelligence and security agency, followed the money trail to banks in Pakistan and Yemen.
Counter-terrorism officers have told the Home Office, which issues licenses to the “colleges,” that they are “places where Muslims are radicalized.”
There are close to 100,000 Muslim students in the United Kingdom. The total number of foreign students in Britain is now over 500,000.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: London Mayor Boris Johnson’s Ex-Wife, 45, In Secret Marriage to Muslim Aged 23
Allegra Mostyn-Owen even implied she would be content to be one of several of his wives. Since she is 45, she said she would be happy for her new husband to have children with a younger woman.
They would then live as an ‘extended family’ as sanctioned by the Prophet Mohammed ‘who said it was OK to marry up to four women’, she declared.
Miss Mostyn-Owen was the London Mayor’s first wife. They met when they were students at Oxford and married in 1987, aged 23, but divorced in 1993. She has no children.
She revealed how she stunned her family on Christmas Day by announcing her marriage to the Muslim man — whom she did not name because his Pakistani family ‘know nothing’ of what he has done.
Miss Mostyn-Owen is the only daughter of Italian writer Gaia Servadio and multimillionaire landowner and art historian William Mostyn-Owen.
Describing the scene at Christmas, she said: ‘My mum accused me of spoiling her Christmas and was sure I am heading for a nervous breakdown.
‘My older brother also said he would be there for me when I had a breakdown. My father was very annoyed, saying he’d only tolerated “him” — the Muslim — because our relationship had kept me off the booze.
‘Nobody asked his name, whether we were happy, what our plans are and what his livelihood is.’
The society beauty and one-time Tatler cover girl revealed they had married in a mosque and then again in a register office. She said she had not converted to Islam.
She added that her young husband — who ‘has got all his own teeth, a fine head of sleek hair and an excellent degree’ — would be in a position to look after her when she is old.
Writing in the London Evening Standard newspaper, she then made her comments about sharing him with another woman.
She wrote: ‘At my current ripe/mature/middle-aged stage in life, I realise that I am unlikely to conceive children so we have agreed that so long as he chooses a good partner, then I am happy to live together in an extended family.
‘It is not so far removed from the Prophet’s own life (peace be upon him)…The Prophet said it was OK to marry up to four women if you could guarantee them all quality of life.’
Her second marriage sounds a world away from her first. When she met Boris Johnson in 1984, he was about to become president of the Oxford Union and she was one of society’s most eligible debutantes.
Recalling their first encounter, she said his typical bungling led him to her room at Trinity College on the wrong night for a party.
‘I was reading this textbook, and suddenly there’s this stranger at the door, who goes, “Oh, oh, oh, oh.” We drank a bottle of wine and talked. He made me laugh,’ she said.
After they divorced in 1993, Mr Johnson went on to marry his current wife Marina, the barrister daughter of distinguished BBC correspondent Sir Charles Wheeler.
Miss Mostyn-Owen, deeply wounded by the break-up, withdrew from society circles and took up art.
Since 2005 she has been running workshops for five to 14-year-olds at the Minhaj-Ul-Quran Mosque in Forest Gate, East London. Mosque president Istiyaq Ahmed described her as an ‘excellent and hard-working’ teacher.
He has said: ‘She is not a Muslim, but is an important part of our attempts to de-radicalise young people. Allegra provides a positive message that something is being done for our community.’
Friends of Miss Mostyn-Owen said she and Mr Johnson ‘get on fine’ on the rare times they meet.
Last night the mayor’s office said he would be unlikely to be making any comment on her latest nuptials.
| — Hat tip: Gaia | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Police Officers Ordered by Home Office: ‘Don’t Talk About Crime — it Upsets People’
Police officers have been told to avoid talking about crime to members of the public after Home Office chiefs found it ‘upsets them’.
A report, called Improving Public Confidence in the Police Service, states that when officers highlight crime and anti-social behaviour problems at community meetings it can lead to ‘feelings of fear’ among the public.
One officer from Thames Valley Police, who did not want to be named, said the report sounded like a ‘bad joke’.
He said: ‘What the hell do they expect us to talk about at a public meeting? The price of tea in China or how much a pint of milk costs?
‘This report sounds like a really, really bad joke, but unfortunately it’s the kind of nonsense we have to deal with time and time again from a Government which doesn’t understand policing.’
[…]
Detective Constable Alex Challenor, of Lancashire Constabulary, said the report was ‘ridiculous’.
He said: ‘This is just another way the Government is trying to control everything we think and say.’
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Women Who Wear Burkhas and Niqabs on the Street in France Face Fines of £750
Women who wear Islamic veils in public will be liable to a fine of more than £700 under strict new laws being formulated in France.
The amount could be doubled for Muslim men who force their wives or other female members of their family to cover their faces.
Jean-Francois Cope, president of Nicolas Sarkozy’s ruling UMP Party in the French parliament, said the new legislation was intended to protect the ‘dignity’ and ‘security’ of women.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Croatia: Ruling Party Expels Former Leader and Prime Minister
Zagreb, 5 Jan. (AKI) — The ruling Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ) has expelled its former leader and prime minister Ivo Sanader from its ranks, accusing him of having done “irreparable damage” to the party, to the government and the state.
After an entire day of deliberations, the HDZ presidency voted late on Monday to expel Sanader with 16 votes in favour, three against and two abstentions.
Sanader had called a press conference on Sunday, criticising prime minister and current HDZ leader Jadranka Kosor for having eroded the HDZ’s ratings and for the failure of its candidate Andrija Hebrang in presidential elections two weeks ago.
Sanader announced he would be returning to active politics. He stunned Croations in July when he resigned as prime minister and HDZ president last July without giving any reasons or explaining his plans.
Hebrang came third among 12 candidates in the first round of the presidential election on 27 December.
Opposition candidate Ivo Josipovic and an independent, Milan Bandic, will compete in a run-off on Sunday.
Sanader said he too was to blame for Hebrang’s poor showing, because he had left the party affairs to Kosor.
But opposition leaders and analysts said Sanader was trying to make a comeback to grant himself with political immunity, because his name has been linked to several corruption scandals.
Sanader’s decision caused alarm in the HDZ ranks, fearing a party split, and several HDZ coalition partners threatened to quit the government if Sanader returned. Opposition Social Democrats seized the opportunity to call for a snap election.
“We all respected Sanader’s decision to leave, but we haven’t agreed that he should return,” Kosor said.
“I definitely cannot and will not head the party and the government for which I take responsibility while someone else pulls the strings,” she added.
Kosor said she had a stable parliamentary majority and saw no reason for early parliamentary election.
The parties of the ruling coalition have vowed to carry on if Kosor remains in charge,
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Kosovo: Serbian President Tadic Visits Decani Monastery
(ANSAmed) — PRISTINA (KOSOVO), JANUARY 6 — The Serbian president Boris Tadic has gone to Kosovo to be present at the religious ceremonies for the Orthodox Christmas in the Decani monastery. The Kosovo government granted Tadic a special permit after his request to go to Decani was delivered through EU offices. Among the conditions imposed on Tadic is that of not making any political statements during his visit. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Serbia: Talks on Underground Gas Storage
(ANSAmed) — BELGRADE, JANUARY 4 — The negotiations between the Serbian government and the Slovak companies which have shown interest in building a new underground tank for the storage of natural gas will start in a few days. The announcement was made by Serbia’s Energy Minister, Petar Skundric, who has specified that the analyses and feasibility studies will be decisive in the choice for the location of the gas storage system, with the possibility to use the old gas fields in Vojvodina. The investor and first in line of the project, which will reportedly be completed in around three years, is a company from Slovakia. The Serbian State-controlled gas company, Srbijagas, will become the owner of the installation once it has been completed. Serbia currently uses the underground storage facility of Banatski Dvor, which has a capacity of 800 million cubic metres. Minister Skundric has scheduled to invest around 9 billion euros in the energy sector in the coming 5 years, part of a series of investments initiated in 2009. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
55 Injured in Clashes in Gaza
(ANSAmed) — AL-ARISH (EGYPT), JANUARY 6 — Fifty-five people were injured Tuesday night in clashes between Egyptian police and pro-Palestinian activists in Al-Arish, in the Egyptian Sinai. The activists were members of a convoy led by British MP George Galloway taking relief supplies to Gaza. The announcement was made by militants and hospital sources which said that those injured included 40 of the 520 militants demonstrating against Egypt’s decision that some trucks should reach Gaza via Israel, and 15 Egyptian police officers. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
8 Coptic Christians in Egypt Shot Dead as They Left Christmas Mass
by Mary Abdelmassih
Egypt (AINA) — An assassination attempt on the life of Bishop Kirollos in southern Egyptian town of Nag Hammadi was foiled tonight. Eight Copts were killed and 15 wounded as they came out of Church after celebrating the Coptic Christmas Eve midnight mass on Wednesday 6th January at 11.15 PM.
“I was the one intended to be assassinated by this plot, and when it failed the criminals turned round and started shooting and finishing off the young ones.” Bishop Kirollos of the Nag Hammagi Diocese told Middle East Christian Association (MECA) today in an aired interview.
Eyewitnesses saw a dark-green “Fiat” 131 without registration, one Peugeot 504 car and a half-truck. The cars were driven by masked men shooting randomly at the congregation as they came out of Church. The cars then went into three nearby areas (15th March Street, 15 May Street and Railway Station Street) shooting Copts.
One eye-witness told MECA that those killed were mostly young men in their early 20s. He said that most people were killed or wounded near the church, but that the cars went around shooting in other areas, resulting in two more death, besides the wounded. It was reported that among the dead was a young man and his fiancé and a 14-years-old boy.
Another witness criticized the absence of security. “Security came as everything was over, instead of trying to catch the criminals, they were interrogating us about the description of the cars.” This video shows the shootings.
An eye-witness told Coptic News Bulletin from Nag Hammadi Hospital that the situation is dire, and there is a critical shortage of blood for transfusions. “The Muslims promised us a wonderful Christmas, and I think the message is received now,” he said.
The Bishop accused security services of negligence in dealing with the events which led to the massacre, and added: “Not one single security man intervened to prevent casualties.” He criticized the absence of adequate State Security forces guarding the church, which is customary on such events and in view of the unrest which took place in the area in November 2009.
According to Wagih Yacoub of MECA Bishop Kirollos had recently received a death threat.
Bishop Kirollos told Freecopts that the assassination attempt was meant to dispose of him in view of his standing position on the rights of the victims of the attacks on Christians in November 2009, in the areas of Farshout, Abu Shusha, Aerky and Alshokeify, part of the parish of Nag Hammadi. The State Security was heavily criticized at the time for the shameful role it played when Muslims assaulted Copts, in addition to looting and burning their businesses. One hundred and sixty three Copts were forcibly deported from their village by State Security following the events. These events were sparked by a rumor that a Copt had indecently assaulted a minor Muslim girl. Many Copts believe that the rape incident was fabricated by the Muslims to use it as a pretext to start violence against them. The accused Copt has not yet been charged by the Police. (AINA 11-22-2009, 11-23-2009).
A state of curfew was imposed tonight on the city of Nag Hammadi, and those inhabitants who were outside could not get back into their homes in the city.
Most witnesses interviewed believe that there was collusion between those carrying out today’s shooting and the State Security, as for the first time, none of them attended the Christmas Eve midnight mass, which is customary in those events. “They must have known in advance of the shootings and avoided the embarrassment of participating in the festivities inside church,” said one witness.
All Christmas festivities have been cancelled said the Bishop. “Copts are terrified and will be staying indoors.”
A similar incident occurred in April 2009 when Muslims opened fire on worshipers as they left the prayer service on Easter Eve in the village of Higaza, Qena Governorate, resulting in the death of Amir Stephanos (36 years) Ayub Said (22) and the injury of Mina Samir (35) Higaza village turned into a military barracks since April last.
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Egypt: 1st Union for 2nd, 3rd Generation Set Up
(ANSAmed) — CAIRO, JANUARY 5 — Egypt’s Minister of Manpower and Immigration Aisha Abdel-Hadi announced today the establishment of the first union for the children of Egyptian expatriates, MENA news agency reports. She said on the sidelines of a meeting with the children of Egyptians abroad of the second and third generations in Austria, Germany, Italy, France, Britain and the United States that the Egyptian government, under Prime Minister Ahmed Nazif, took a package of measures and facilities including a cut on customs duties for Egyptians abroad. President Hosni Mubarak attaches great importance to Egyptian expatriates and the sons of the second and third generations of the expatriates, said the minister. Meanwhile, head of the National Council for Sport Safiyyeddin Kharboush said the meeting is the fruition of the sixth conference on expatriates which was held recently in Egypt. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Egyptian Soldier Killed in Gaza Border Clash
Gaza City, 6 Jan. (AKI) — An Egyptian soldier was killed and four Palestinians were wounded in a gunbattle during a protest over a new fence on the Gaza border on Wednesday. The violence was the most serious between Egyptian and Hamas forces since Cairo began constructing the underground steel barrier a month ago.
The 21-year-old officer died from his wounds in hospital in the divided border town of Rafah, an Egyptian security official said.
Witnesses said the Egyptians opened fire after about 200 young Palestinians hurled stones at them.
An Egyptian security official said nine police officers were slightly wounded by the stone-throwing.
Meanwhile, around 50 people were injured in clashes between Egyptian police and pro-Palestinian activists who were trying to deliver supplies to Gaza.
Protests reportedly broke out when Egyptian authorities at the port city of Al Arish ordered several trucks to go through an Israeli-controlled checkpoint.
Several hundred activists broke down the gate at the port in Al Arish late Tuesday to protest against the Egyptian decision, eyewitnesses told the media.
The protests were provoked by an Egyptian decision to allow 139 vehicles to enter Gaza through the Rafah crossing, but required another 59 vehicles to pass via Israel.
Around 40 members of the convoy reported minor injuries while over a dozen policemen were hurt in the clashes with protesters, who also blocked the two entrances to the Sinai port with vehicles, medical workers said.
The Viva Palestina convoy, was led by George Galloway, a controversial British MP and had already been delayed by more than a week.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Gaza: Kouchner: Egypt’s Sovereignty Over Borders
(ANSAmed) — CAIRO, JANUARY 6 — French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner has spoken today on the barrier that Egypt is building along its border with Gaza, saying that “Egyptians have the right to exercise their sovereign rights over their borders, and to establish all necessary regulations”. His statements came in response to a question during a press conference this morning at the Arab League’s headquarters, before the news had come out on the clashes set off by a group of Palestinians on the Rafah border and the death of an Egyptian soldier. Kouchner said that it was necessary to “respect Egypt’s sovereignty and supply aid to Gaza in order to facilitate the humanitarian situation” in the Gaza Strip. France was the first western country to condemn the Israeli military operation Cast Lead last year, he added, “but we are not willing to take lecturing from those who do not respect rules set by their friends. It is easy to target one’s friends without acting on the origin of the problem.” In any case, Kouchner reiterated the need for “solidarity with Gaza and its population”, underscoring the French pledge to reconstruct a hospital in the Gaza Strip. Arab League secretary Amr Moussa has also stressed the need to respect Egyptian measures, and that “sovereignty has its needs”. He concluded by saying that it is a sovereignty which accompanies the commitment to help Gaza habitants by way of the Rafah border crossing. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Gaza: Galloway Convoy Leaving for Rafah
(ANSAmed) — CAIRO, JANUARY 6 — Following clashes last night between activists and police in the El Arish port, the convoy of humanitarian aid Lifeline 3, organised by the British MP George Galloway, is reportedly getting ready to leave for Gaza. An agreement has been made with Egyptian authorities for almost all of the 198 aid vehicles to be allowed to directly enter the Gaza Strip via the Rafah border crossing: the three refused entry include a vehicle equipped for radio broadcasts, another with an energy generator and a third due to its weighing over 3.5 tonnes. It is therefore a step forward compared with the initial conditions laid down by authorities in agreement with their Israeli counterparts, which called for 65 vehicles — from Turkish and Jordanian donors — to first go through Israel by way of the Al Ojua border crossing to be checked. In the clashes last night at the port — where police were armed with truncheons and water cannons and protestors threw stones — three Britons, two Americans and a Kuwaiti national were arrested. According to a statement released by the Interior Ministry and broadcast by MENA news agency, some activists also set fire to a number of cardboard boxes while preventing firemen from intervening. The incidents broke out after a lengthy but unproductive attempt at mediation with Egyptian authorities led by Galloway himself, in which Turkish diplomatic authorities are said to have taken part. Among the 528 activists who have arrived in Egypt to accompany the aid there are 300 Turkish nationals (10 of whom MPs) and about fifty Jordanians. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Sahara: Morocco Colonising as France Did, Algeria Warns
(ANSAmed) — ALGIERS, JANUARY 5 — “Their colour, religion or language do not count: a coloniser remains a coloniser. The Western Sahara issue is a matter of decolonisation”. The Speaker of the Algerian parliament, (the ANP), Abdelaziz Ziari, thus compared the Moroccan occupation of Western Sahara to the French colonisation of Algeria. “France, too, proposed autonomy projects and development programmes to the Algerians to make them drop their calls for independence”, said Ziari, speaking during his first visit to the Sahraouian refugee camps in Tindouf, southern Algeria. Reaffirming Algerian support for the “Sahraouian struggle for self-determination”, the Speaker of the ANP said he was sure of a “victory of the will of the people over the colonisers”. Yesterday, King Mohamed VI, in reaffirming that the planned devolvement of the former Spanish colony was “the only solution to the conflict”, also announced a federalising reform of the structure of his Kingdom, including the area of the Western Saharan territories. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
The Terrorist Who Won’t Die
Nearly five months after his controversial release from a Scottish prison, the Lockerbie bomber has outlived his prognosis—enraging the loved ones of his victims on Pan Am Flight 103.
[…]
How sick, in fact, is Megrahi today? A recent report from Sky News quoted an unnamed Libyan hospital source suggesting his condition may be deteriorating. But the real answer, it seems, is a closely guarded secret.
My efforts to find out were unsuccessful but illuminating. As with the initial controversy surrounding Megrahi’s release—apparently a prerequisite for a lucrative oil exploration deal between British Petroleum and the Libyan government, with top British government officials and Scottish authorities dodging accountability and heaping blame on one another after the fact — there’s an impressive amount of bureaucratic buck-passing.
A British embassy official in Washington directed me to phone the Scottish government in Edinburgh. There, a Scottish official advised me to contact the East Renfrewshire Council. Unbelievably, the municipal authorities of this Glasgow suburb, where Megrahi had been serving his time in a two-room cell with a television set and a prayer area, are responsible for monitoring his health in Libya, thousands of miles away, and enforcing the conditions of his compassionate release—when not dealing with rubbish collection and pothole repair, of course.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Flight Security — Israel Introduces Biometrics
(ANSAmed) — TEL AVIV, JANUARY 5 — In a bid to improve flight security, Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion Airport has today introduced a biometric passenger-recognition system, for now on a voluntary basis. The news was broken in an interview given by the head of Israel’s airports, Koby Mor, to the dialy Maariv. Those opting to undergo biometric recognition have to spend some extra minutes at check-in. But in future precious time will be saved because they will no longer have to answer questions asked by security staff when handing in their cases or having their passports checked. The paper describes how the system, which has been dubbed ‘Unipass’, records biometric characteristics of the passenger’s face, their fingerprints and their passport data. On its memory-bank it also holds the replies given to a set of questions. The ends by producing a personalised pass for the passenger which can be used, Maariv reports, “over their entire lifetime”. Thanks to the ‘Unipass’, the paper notes, following check-in, passengers at Ben Gurion Airport will henceforth be able to proceed directly to embarkation where they will be required to present their passes once again and to have their fingerprints checked. The paper says that the new system is still at the experimental stage, but is giving rise to a great deal of interest abroad.(ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Israel: In Test, Iron Dome Successfully Intercepts Rockets
Israel inched a step closer on Wednesday to deploying the Iron Dome missile defense system along the border with the Gaza Strip after it successfully intercepted a number of missile barrages in tests held in southern Israel this week.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Israel to Pay UN Compensation of US $10m
Israel will pay US $10m in compensation for damage caused to United Nations buildings in Gaza during the assault a year ago, officials have said.
This will be the first compensation paid by Israel for damage caused during the Gaza offensive.
UN storehouses, school buildings, offices and vehicles were damaged or destroyed during the conflict.
Israel insists UN sites were not targeted during the offensive and says the payout is for collateral damage.
Israel also says that Hamas fighters operated in or near UN-protected buildings during the offensive.
The payout is a result of several months negotiation. A UN inquiry in May last year found that Israeli forces had, on seven occasions, “breached the inviolability of United Nations premises” and were responsible for deaths and injuries.
At the time UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon said he would seek more than $11m compensation from Israel for damage to UN property.
Israeli officials say that the settlement should be viewed as a good-will gesture and says it has a good working relationship with the UN.
Israel’s Defence Minister Ehud Barak personally notified Ban Ki-Moon of the decision, reports say.
In a statement released last month Mr Ban said he was, “deeply concerned that neither the issues that led to this conflict nor its worrying aftermath are being addressed”.
Operation Cast Lead lasted three weeks. Palestinians and Israeli human rights groups say about 1,400 Palestinians were killed in the offensive, although Israel puts the figure at 1,166. Thirteen Israelis, including three civilians, died.
According to the United Nations, the offensive left more than 50,000 homes, 800 industrial properties and 200 schools damaged or destroyed, as well as 39 mosques and two churches.
| — Hat tip: Sean O’Brian | [Return to headlines] |
Mortar Shelling From Gaza
(ANSAmed) — JERUSALEM, JANUARY 7 — Seven mortar shells shot from the Gaza Strip have exploded this morning on Israeli territory without causing any casualties or damage of any sort. Some of the shells fell near the Kerem Shalom border crossing, used for cargo and humanitarian aid headed for Gaza. The border crossing has been closed temporarily.(ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
No Make Up: Israel’s Female Warriors
Igor Kruter photographed female Israeli soldiers as he would in a fashion shoot. “Women give life, but can also take it away.”
By Ilse van Heusden. Pictures by Igor Kruter
Dikla Mimouni (21) never sleeps alone, as the stuffed animal lying beside her proves. Below her pillow lies her other bunkmate: her rifle. Her stuffed rabbit has no name, but her rifle does: Pikachu. Then again, her rifle never leaves her side during the day either. “I sleep with it, eat with it, and go out with it. My weapon protects me. I have never had such a long relationship,” Dikla said. Whenever she feels like sleeping on the bus, she embraces her rifle tightly. She wakes up in the middle of the night sometimes because she is lying on top of it.
Click here to see a series of photos (will be displayed in a pop-up window)
Dikla is one of seven girls portrayed by Igor Kruter, an alumnus of the Arnhem art academy, in a series of photographs depicting the so called ‘Karakal-girls’. The series won the 30-year old Israeli photographer the Tarbut art prize in Israel. Kruter’s work emphasise the absurdist combination of the girls’ beauty and the brutality of the arms they bear.
The Karakal is the only battle group in the Israeli armed forces in which boys and girls follow the same training and do the same jobs. Walking down the street in battle gear, Dikla is frequently met with approving comments. Conscription is a reality for both sexes in Israel, but women can only join battle groups by volunteering.
No depiction of reality
On duty, the girls would not be allowed to walk around the way Kruger has depicted them. Jewellery, for one, is not allowed. “The enemy might be able to see it shimmer on your face,” Dikla explained. Make up is also out. “It would be pointless anyway, because we put camouflage paint on our faces.” Hair must remain bundled up at all times, and even the rolled up sleeves some of Kruger’s models boast are forbidden.
“This is not reality,” the artist explained. “I try to draw on reality for the symbols and icons I want to portray. In my work, I try to study the female existence. She gives life, but can also take it away.”
Even though he has served in the Israeli forces himself, the photographer refused to discuss the hard times he experienced there. Yes, he carried a weapon, and no, “it was not all fun and games.”
Dikla enjoys serving in the military. She guards the Egyptian border, where smuggling is rife. She is at her best when out on patrol. “It is exiting to get out there with the dogs. It gives me a good feeling, and that is what I do it for,” she said. After two years, she doesn’t regret joining Karakal one bit: “After doing this, I know I can do anything.”
She thinks the military has not become softer under female influence. It just makes the girls that join it tougher. “You start talking like a man. You hide your feminine traits to fit in better,” one girl stated in a documentary entitled, To See if I’m Smiling, by Tamar Yarom, an Israeli filmmaker who interviewed women looking back on their tours in the Palestinian territories.
Dancing in uniform
Pictures from back then show smiling girls dancing in uniform and posing with the dead body of a prisoner. In the documentary, they share the horrors: torture, fear of dying, bearing responsibility for the lives of others. Horrible events that still haunt them years later. “Sometimes I feel a little bit crazy. I have all these memories that have so little to do with reality,” one former soldier said.
For the women, the question is not if they deal with these problems differently from men, but how to deal with them in the first place. One former soldier who is now a mother is interviewed as saying: “Every time my baby starts crying hysterically, it hits that one nerve. It takes me back in time. I am not a bad mother, except in those moments. Then I can be like the devil.”
The younger girls in the Karakal do not have these issues to cope with. They are not serving in the Palestinian territories, and are still caught up in the euphoria the army can generate. They are still lapping up the camaraderie, the tough image and the respect of their fellow citizens. What they enjoyed most of all was this photo shoot. “Every girl dreams of having her picture taken this nicely. I am a warrior and proud of it,” Dikla said.
Still untouched by cruelty
The idea for a series depicting soldiers was floating around Kruter’s head when he met Tania, one of the soldiers portrayed. “I asked her to pose like a soldier, but women in uniform stand differently then men do. These women have chosen to be a member of Karakal. You can see that pride in the pictures,” Kruter explained.
Through Tania, he got in touch with the other girls. He asked them to bring a personal item from their childhoods to the shoot. He took the pictures at various locations in Israel late in the afternoon. The soft light gives the pictures the look and feel of a fashion shoot.
The photographer hoped to show the contrast between the cruelty of war and the tenderness of a woman, and youth. Dikla has not yet been privy to that cruelty. She has only used her weapon once, to fire a warning shot during a chase. She has four months left before her time is up and she has to turn in her weapon.
The series is on display throughout January in the Eduard Planting Gallery in Amsterdam.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Emirates: Construction Delays for Ecological Town of Masdar
(ANSAmed) — DUBAI, JANUARY 5 — Masdar City, the completely ecologically sustainable town with a zero rate of pollution which the Emirate of Abu Dhabi is creating a few kilometres outside the capital, is reviewing its completion deadline. This will no longer be 2016, as was initially scheduled, but “within the decade”. So reported The National daily. “The success of Masdar will not be measured in terms of the speed with which it was constructed, but by the standards it will be able to establish in response to the challenges of clean energy and self-sustainability”, stated a spokesperson for Masdar, as quoted by the newspaper. While 2013 remains as the date for completion of the first phase, “the following six will be completed by the end of the decade”. According to the planners, Masdar City — a project costing up to 22 billion dollars and commenced in February 2008 — will provide a home for 50,000 residents and 1,500 businesses once it is ready. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Iran Arrests, Coerces Christians Over Christmas Season
Authorities threaten to take ailing daughter from parents. ISTANBUL, January 6 (CDN) — A wave of arrests hit Iranian house churches during the Christmas season, leaving at least five Christian converts in detention across northern Iran, including the mother of an ailing 10-year-old girl.
Security officers with an arrest warrant from the Mashhad Revolutionary Court entered the home of Christian Hamideh Najafi in Mashhad on Dec. 16. After searching her home and confiscating personal belongings, including books and compact discs, police took her to an undisclosed location, according to Farsi Christian News Network (FCNN).
FCNN reported that on Dec. 30 the Mashhad Revolutionary Court sentenced Najafi to three months of house arrest and ordered that her daughter, who suffers from a kidney condition, be placed under foster care. Because of the seriousness of the girl’s illness, however, she was left in the custody of her parents — on the condition that they cease believing in Christ and stop speaking publicly of their faith, FCNN reported.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Iran: Students and Journalists Targeted in New Wave of Arrests
Tehran, 6 Jan. (AKI) — Iran has responded to the latest wave of anti-government protests by arresting more than 180 people in recent days, including journalists, students and human rights campaigners, a banned opposition website said on Wednesday. Rahesabz said 99 students, 10 aides to opposition leader Mir Hossein Mousavi, and 17 journalists working mostly for reformist media, and members of the outlawed Bahai faith were among those arrested.
On 27 December eight people were killed after clashes erupted between security forces and opposition supporters staging fresh protests during the Shia mourning period of Ashura.
Security forces arrested hundreds of people during the protests, at least 300 of whom are still being held in Tehran, according to police.
And government supporters staged counter-demonstrations calling for opposition leaders to be punished.
Rahesabz was one of 60 organisations on a blacklist drawn up by the Iranian government.
Citizens are banned from having any contact with it and other organisations including the BBC, Human Rights Watch and Voice of America.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
Iranian Students: Khamenei’s Family Has Fled to Russia
(IsraelNN.com) Pro-democracy activists in Iran reported Wednesday that family members of Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei have been secretly flown to Russia. The move was allegedly prompted by concerns over continuing anti-regime protests and resistance.
The Iranian Students Solidarity organization, representing tens of thousands of students in Tehran and other major cities, claims that contacts within the regime leaked the information to them. According to these sources, Khamenei’s family, including his son, daughter-in-law and grandson, have been evacuated to Russia in a private plane. In their secret trip, the Khamenei family members were accompanied by special security personnel assigned to maintain their safety.
The pro-democracy organization further claims, quoting the same alleged regime contacts, that Khamenei dispatched a close confidante to Russia to explore the possibility of the Russians hosting the Khamenei family. According to the student solidarity movement sources, the emissary met with various Russian officials, including President Vladimir Putin and Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev. The source added that Putin’s wife offered the Supreme Leader’s relatives an estate near Moscow to “accommodate [them] for as long as it is necessary,” according to an Iranian Students Solidarity statement.
The trip to Russia allegedly took place in the wake of violent clashes between regime forces and protesters on December 28.
An Iranian pro-democracy activist in contact with the students who released the information told Israel National News that he believes the information to be reliable. “Our contacts spoke with [the Iranian Student Solidarity activists]… as well, in case their site was hacked and this was ‘rumor’. All indications are [that] it is credible,” he said.
In response to a suggestion by Israel National News that the claims may be disinformation, the activist replied, “Time will tell. Since they have a large family, it will be noticed soon!” He feels the secret flight of the Khamenei family was undertaken “in anticipation of an upcoming uprising.”
In early December, Iranian pro-democracy sources told Israel National News that Khamenei was spirited to a “secret location” for his own safety and that the nation’s religious leaders are “scared.”
A letter that was purported to be from within the regime was circulated through the Internet last month saying that Khamenei’s “escape jet” was fueled and ready, if needed. Most observers dismissed the report as a fabrication intended to boost protesters’ motivation.
| — Hat tip: Sean O’Brian | [Return to headlines] |
Jonathan Spyer: Iran Hasn’t Won the Cold War Yet
The salient strategic fact in the Middle East today is the Iranian drive for regional hegemony. This Iranian objective is being promoted by a rising hardline conservative elite within the Iranian regime, centred on a number of political associations and on the Iranian Revolutionary Guards corps.
This elite, which is personified by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has received the backing of Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.
Their aim is a second Islamic revolution that would revive the original fire of the revolution of 1979. They appear to be aiming for the augmenting of clerical rule with a streamlined, brutal police-security state, under the banner of Islam. Building Iranian power and influence throughout the Middle East is an integral part of their strategy.
The Iranian nuclear program is an aspect of this ambition.
A nuclear capability is meant to form the ultimate insurance for the Iranian regime as it aggressively builds its influence across the region.
This goal of hegemony is being pursued through the assembling of a bloc of states and organisations under Iranian leadership. This bloc, according to Iran, represents authentic Muslim currents within the region, battling against the US and its hirelings. The pro-Iranian bloc includes Syria, Sudan, Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas among the Palestinians, and the Houthi rebel forces in northern Yemen.
A de facto rival alliance is emerging, consisting of states that are threatened by Iran and its allies and clients. This rival alliance includes Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and Kuwait.
Israel, despite lacking official diplomatic relations with Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states, is also a key member of this camp. Unlike the pro-Iranian bloc, which has a simple guiding ideology of resistance to the West, the countries seeking to counter Iran are united by interest only.
The rivalry between these two camps now informs and underlies all-important developments in the Middle East. It is behind the joint Israeli-Egyptian effort to contain the Iran-sponsored Hamas enclave in the Gaza Strip. It is behind the fighting in north Yemen, as Saudi troops take on Shia rebels armed and supported by Iran. The rivalry is behind the face-off between pro-American and pro-Iranian forces in Lebanon. The insurgencies in Afghanistan and in Iraq are also notable for the presence of weaponry traceable to Iran in use by insurgents against Western forces.
Who is winning in this ongoing Middle East cold war?…
| — Hat tip: Barry Rubin | [Return to headlines] |
Unrest in Iran: The Vindication of George W. Bush
The Iraq War-achieved-zero crowd begrudged Bush nothing even after the democratic Cedar Revolution in Lebanon. Never mind that Walid Jumblatt, a Lebanese Druze Muslim leader, said: “It’s strange for me to say it, but this process of change has started because of the American invasion of Iraq. I was cynical about Iraq. But when I saw the Iraqi people voting (in 2005), 8 million of them, it was the start of a new Arab world.”
[…]
Meet Mohsen Kadivar. In May 2004, TIME magazine profiled this Iranian intellectual in a flattering article called “The Critical Cleric — Reclaiming Islam for a New World.” Newsweek called him a global leader “to watch in 2005.” His criticism of the Iranian regime landed him in jail. He now teaches at Duke University, and PBS’s Charlie Rose interviewed him in July. What does this cleric says about Iraq’s possible influence on his native country? In February 2005, he said: “I think the Iraqis can make what we wanted to create but were unsuccessful: a real Islamic Republic. By that I mean a republic with Islamic values, democracy with Islamic values…[where] the clergy has no special rights. If they have a good government with Islamic democracy and without any special or divine rights for the clergy, the Iranian government won’t be able to justify its situation to the Iranian citizens.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Yemeni Forces Launch Manhunt for Al Qaeda Leader
SAN’A, Yemen — Security forces in Yemen have launched a manhunt for the suspected leader of an Al Qaeda cell.
Mohammed Ahmed al-Hanaq is believed to be hiding in a mountainous region northeast of Yemen’s capital. Tribal leaders in the area tell The Associated Press that officials are demanding that they surrender al-Hanaq and another Al Qaeda suspect related to him.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Germany Mulling Afghan Police Training to Avoid More Troops
The German government is planning to counter US demands to send more troops to Afghanistan by offering to increase police training, the Financial Times Deutschland reported on Thursday.
Citing high-ranking sources in Berlin, the paper said Germany will propose boosting the number of specially trained Afghan police to 110,000 officers — some 30,000 more than currently planned — at a conference in London at the end of the month.
Washington is hoping to convince Germany to deploy more soldiers to the strife-torn country, but Berlin has appeared sceptical towards increasing troop levels above the 4,400 it already has in Afghanistan. Germany also has around 100 police trainers there.
“The government’s wish to become more strongly involved in civilian areas is in the USA’s interest,” Elke Hoff, the defence expert for German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle’s Free Democrats, told the paper.
She also rejected comments made on Wednesday by Richard Holbrooke, the US special envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan, which called into question Germany’s commitment to the military mission in Afghanistan.
“Mr. Holbrooke is the special representative to Afghanistan and Pakistan — not Germany,” Hoff said.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
India Militant Group Threatens Bangladeshi ‘Migrants’
The leading separatist group in India’s north-eastern state of Assam has threatened to attack “illegal migrants” from Bangladesh.
The announcement by the United Liberation Front of Assam (Ulfa) came days after its top leaders were detained in Dhaka and handed to India.
Ulfa rebels have attacked settlers of Bengali origin, including leaders of minority groups, in the past.
They have fought for a separate Assamese homeland since 1979.
“I appeal to the people of Assam to free all our lands occupied by the illegal migrants from Bangladesh, Nepal and Bhutan. If these illegals resist, they will be attacked,” said Paresh Barua, the military wing chief of Ulfa in an e-mailed message to the media.
Mr Barua warned of a series of attacks on vital installations and security forces all across Assam, and said that those who kill Ulfa members will face “dire consequences”.
Ulfa was born out of popular discontent in Assam about illegal migration from Bangladesh between 1979 and 1985.
But after it found shelter in Bangladesh in the early 1990s, the group stopped attacking Bengali settlers, although it continued to attack Hindi-speaking settlers who have come to live in Assam from other parts of India.
Now that Bangladesh’s Awami League-led government has cracked down on Ulfa rebels and handed over several of its top leaders to India, the rebel outfit is once again threatening to target migrants from Bangladesh.
Analysts say this stance against illegal migration — a perennially important issue in Assam — may also be a move on the part of the rebels to regain popularity.
| — Hat tip: Sean O’Brian | [Return to headlines] |
Mumbai: I Tried to Save My Girlfriend From Terrorists — and Ended Up Crippled — Now She’s My Saviour Every Day
Will Pike and girlfriend Kelly Doyle were dressing for dinner at the famous Taj Hotel in Mumbai in November 2008 when terrorists stormed the building. Will, 30 and Kelly, 33, hid in their room as the Pakistan-trained gunmen set about slaughtering guests and staff — in all 172 people died. Fearing for their lives, the couple, both freelance film-makers from London, decided to flee — with devastating consequences.
[…]
KELLY SAYS: It broke my heart when Will asked if I wanted to leave him. How could he possibly imagine I’d love him any less because he can’t walk? I simply don’t want a life without Will. If anything, I love him even more.
Although our lives are now on a totally different track, I don’t have the slightest doubt that we’ll be together for ever.
To me he’s the same Will — good humoured, charming and fun loving. He even managed to keep the other patients laughing through all those grim months in hospital.
But there’s one thing I didn’t realise about him until now — how extraordinarily brave he is. He did everything in his power to protect me. He’s battled through endless operations and even now, he will never admit he’s in pain although I know he is.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Mumbai Terrorists ‘Had 320 Targets Around World’
Lashkar-e-Taiba, the terrorist group accused of the attacks on Mumbai, had drawn up a list of 320 targets around the world, it has been claimed.
If a newspaper report is confirmed, it suggests that the Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) group had ambitions to strike beyond South Asia.
According to Western intelligence sources cited in the report, only 20 of the 320 targets were in India.
The targets appear in an email account of Zarar Shah, LeT’s communications chief who is in custody in Pakistan.
His group is believed to have planned and carried out the attacks in the Indian city of Mumbai, formerly Bombay, last year, which left more than 170 people dead.
LeT, a banned terrorist organisation whose goal is uniting divided Kashmir and bringing it under the control of a hardline Islamist government in Pakistan, has links to Europe. One of its members now in custody was tricked into returning from Spain to be arrested in Pakistan after he was discovered organising the transfer of money to aid LeT’s operations.
After months of denying accusations by India, the Pakistani government conceded last week that militants had helped to plan the Mumbai attacks from within the country’s borders.
Rehman Malik, the country’s top interior ministry official, said that six suspects had been arrested and two others are being sought in connection with the attacks.
| — Hat tip: Judith Apter Klinghoffer | [Return to headlines] |
No. 1 Persecutor Tests Weapons on Christians
North Korea tops list dominated by nations under Islamic law
North Korea, which reportedly has used believers as guinea pigs to test chemical and biological weapons, is the world’s worst persecutor of Christians, while Iran, which may be using Christians as scapegoats for internal opposition to its president, is No. 2 on the Open Doors 2010 World Watch List.
Iran is among eight nations in the top 10 of the group’s ranking of the 50 worst persecutors of Christians in which Shariah, the Islamic religious law, is dominant. A total of 35 nations on the list are under some form of Shariah.
“We can classify that as a growing trend,” Jerry Dykstra, a spokesman for the ministry that works to serve persecuted Christians around the globe, told WND. “We’ve seen more countries (on the list) from the Muslim world.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Security Warning to Indian Students Travelling to Australia After ‘Racist’ Killing and Attacks
Students in India are being warned against travelling to Australia after the ‘racist’ murder of a graduate.
Nitin Garg, 21, from Punjab, was stabbed to death at a fast-food outlet in Melbourne.
Police in Victoria state revealed that another Indian man was attacked on the same night.
In neighbouring New South Wales state, officers confirmed that a partially burned body found by a road last week belonged to an Indian national.
India’s Foreign Ministry has urged students to be on their guard.
An Indian advisory said: ‘The government advises Indian students studying in Australia as well as those planning to study there, that they should take certain basic precautions in being alert to their own security while moving around.
‘These incidents are continuing to occur despite efforts by the local police to step up anti-crime measures, and are occurring all over Melbourne without any discernible pattern or rationale behind them.
‘Increasingly also, the acts of violence, are often accompanied by verbal abuse, fuelled by alcohol and drugs.’
Indian media have labelled attacks as racist, but police and the government have said the attacks are purely criminal.
However, official figures show that 1,447 people of Indian descent were victims of a crime in Victoria in the 12 months to July 2008.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Terrorism: Mauritania Reorganizes Army and Security Forces
(ANSAmed) — PARIS, JANUARY 7 — The government of Mauritania has ordered a major overhaul of both the armed forces and security forces to counter increasing terror attacks and kidnappings of western civilians in the country. Most of the attacks are carried out by Al Qaeda and the Islamic Maghreb. Measures aimed at modernizing the armed and security forces will be taken soon, said prime minister Moulaye Ould Mohamed Laghdaf. Addressing the national assembly, the prime minister went on to say that it is necessary to improve life conditions and increase the professionalism of these forces so that they will be able to effectively protect the Republic countering not just terrorism but also drug trafficking and illegal immigration. The national assembly has recently adopted a series of amendments to the 2005 anti-terror legislation, legalizing wire-tapping and abolishing the statute of limitations in cases involving terror attacks. These measure were introduced after the November 29 kidnapping of three volunteers working for Spanish NGOs and the kidnapping of two Italians last December. The opposition harshly criticized the new amendments on grounds that they limit individual and collective freedom and are aimed at giving free hand to the security forces. (ANSAmed).
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Does the United States Need More Terrorists?
The State Department has awarded 1,011 special “diversity visas” allowing Yemeni nationals to immigrate to the United States since 2000, the year 17 U.S. sailors were killed when the USS Cole was attacked by terrorists in the Yemeni port of Aden. The “diversity visas” are designed to encourage immigration from countries that do not otherwise send significant numbers of immigrants to the United States.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
European Return Fund Helped 139 Illegal Immigrants to Return Home From Lithuania in 2009
In 2009, the European Return Fund helped 139 illegal immigrants to return from Lithuania to their countries of origin. According to the Ministry of Interior, despite economic hardship, Lithuania remained an attractive refuge provider for the citizens of the third world countries, a transit state to other countries of the European Union.
Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs Stanislovas Liutkevicius claimed that last year, 320 foreigners were presented to the Foreigners Registration and Center, out of which 218 were illegal immigrants. More than 125,600 litas (36.37 euros) were used out of European Return Fund to return 139 foreigners to the countries of their origin, writes ELTA/LETA.
According to the data provided by the Foreigners Registration Center (URC), 81 immigrants came from Russian Federation, 77 — from Georgia, 24 — Belarus, 17 — Sri Lanka.
“We are interested in returning those foreigners to their countries as soon as possible with the help of European Return Fund. Moreover, all illegal immigrants are provided with information on possibility voluntary return to their country, which is more profitable than forced return,” said URC Head Robertas Petraitis.
| — Hat tip: Sean O’Brian | [Return to headlines] |
France Exceeds Deportation Targets by Expelling 29,000 in Past Year
France has exceeded its own targets in the deportation of illegal immigrants. Paris says that in order to be fair to new French citizens, it must be firm with those who do not follow the rules.
France expelled more than 2,900 illegal immigrants last year, exceeding government targets.
The figure, announced by Immigration Minister Eric Besson, is 2,000 more than a target set by French President Nicolas Sarkozy.
About 175,000 illegal immigrants had initially arrived in France on long-term visas during 2009, according to government figures. In the same period, Besson told France’s Europe 1 radio station, 108,000 foreigners were given French nationality.
Policy “must be firm”
Besson reiterated that French policy on immigration was “firm and fair.” He said that foreigners who settled legally were welcome and given help to integrate by learning the language as well as finding employment and accommodation.
“Therefore,” said Besson, “we must deport those who enter illegally.”
Among the deportations were the controversial repatriations of 12 Afghans, who were sent back to their home country on planes chartered with Britain.
Besson, who was criticized for the deportations to Afghanistan, pointed out that Britain deported 1,000 Afghans during 2009.
| — Hat tip: Sean O’Brian | [Return to headlines] |
Rise in Sham Marriages to Beat UK Immigration Laws
The number of suspected sham marriages by illegal immigrants has leapt by more than half in the past year.
Figures from the Home Office show a 54% jump in suspected cases reported by registrars in England and Wales.
The leap comes after the Law Lords overturned a government scheme designed to stop illegal immigrants marrying.
Registrars have told the BBC that marriage rackets are using Eastern European brides to provide other migrants with a toehold in the UK.
The scale of the problem has been highlighted in a special BBC investigation in which a reporter posed as an illegal immigrant — and quickly found people offering to help him marry.
In 2005, the government told foreigners they needed the home secretary’s permission to get married in the UK. If someone did not have a legal right to be in the country, they were denied a certificate of approval.
Registrars had lobbied for the change saying they had been powerless to stop a massive rise in bogus marriages, with more than 3,500 suspected cases in one year alone.
Within months of the introduction of the home secretary’s veto, the number of cases dropped dramatically.
[…]
Registrars have told the BBC that sham marriage rackets have returned and many are using Eastern European spouses who have a legal right to be in the UK. This makes it easier for the migrant from another part of the world to settle.
[…]
Mr Rimmer said registrars were seeing cases where the couple could not speak each other’s language and their body language made it obvious that they barely knew each other.
“Pakistani and Portuguese is one that has seemed to crop up recently. If you see one [couple]… that’s OK. But when you see three in a week, you start to think that something strange is going on.”
Immigration minister Phil Woolas said the government regretted the Law Lords’ ruling and was looking again at the law.
But he added: “Just because someone is married does not mean at all that their immigration status is granted.
“The registrars have a system of reporting where they think a marriage is not genuine. Those reports are then used by the immigration officials. The issue of marriage is different to immigration status. A visa will not be issued if there is reason to think the marriage is not genuine.”
The government is considering whether to introduce new methods of controlling marriages involving foreign nationals, including the introduction of biometric checks.
| — Hat tip: Sean O’Brian | [Return to headlines] |
2 comments:
The 'resistance' in Iran will get no help from the U.S.
On the subject of the middle-aged ex-wife of London mayor Boris Johnson, who married a much younger Muslim while rejoicing about polygamy in advance :
"She added that her young husband — who ‘has got all his own teeth, a fine head of sleek hair and an excellent degree’ — would be in a position to look after her when she is old."
How deluded can you get ? Embarking upon such a relationship on such grounds is hopelessly naIve, regardless of the husband's ethnicity or religion. But betting your whole life in such a way with a Muslim is beyond stupidity.
Talking of stupidity...
"She said she had not converted to Islam."
But she also said :
"It is not so far removed from the Prophet’s own life (peace be upon him)…The Prophet said it was OK to marry up to four women if you could guarantee them all quality of life.’ "
Meanwhile, Boris Johnson, a supposedly Conservative who used to be quite politically incorrect before he was elected mayor of multicultural London, has encouraged his Christian constituants to give fasting a try during last Ramadan, because, you know, that would be a nice gesture towards Muslims, and it's also generally a good thing.
It seems it is not only his ex-wife who is "not Muslim".
Expect to see a lot of this newspeak in the coming years.
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