July 2006 Archives

Lashkar-e-Toiba -- "the Army of the Pure" -- continues to operate with impunity and to prepare to strike high-value targets. From AP:

NEW DELHI - India’s defense minister on Monday repeated a warning that Islamic militants based in Pakistan were targeting Indian nuclear, military and religious sites, a news agency reported.

Defense Minister Pranab Mukherjee told lawmakers that militants from Lashkar-e-Tayabba - a group believed to have links to al-Qaida - “are planning to carry out some strikes on critical infrastructure items, military targets and religious places,” according to the Press Trust of India.

There’s also intelligence reports indicating Lashkar is planning to attack nuclear installations in India, Mukherjee said.

His comments came three days after National Security Adviser M.K. Narayanan issued a similar warning, which was dismissed by Islamabad as an Indian attempt to defame Pakistan.

Lashkar is among the groups suspected of taking part in a string of bombings in India, including the July 11 Bombay train bombings, which killed 207 people.

Mukherjee told Parliament the government was taking the latest threats seriously.

“Necessary steps are being taken to protect our vital installations and other high-profile targets,” he said, without elaborating.

Banned in Pakistan and but reportedly still operating there openly, Lashkar is among the more than a dozen Islamic rebel groups fighting Indian rule in Kashmir. The rebels want the territory to be independent or merged with Pakistan, and New Delhi has long accused Islamabad of providing material aid and training to the insurgents. Pakistan says it only gives them diplomatic and moral support.

A new essay from the ever-insightful Fjordman:

I have commented that there is an undercurrent of anti-Western self-loathing permeating parts of our popular culture and our news media. There is. But there are also some other trends worth studying.

I watched the movie Superman Returns recently. I knew it had received some criticism in advance. Rather than Superman's traditional motto "truth, justice and the American way," his mission had now been transformed to "truth, justice and all that stuff" by scribes Michael Dougherty and Dan Harris. "The world has changed. The world is a different place," Harris said. "The truth is he's an alien. He was sent from another planet. He has landed on the planet Earth, and he is here for everybody. He's an international superhero." "We were always hesitant to include the term 'American way' because the meaning of that today is somewhat uncertain," Dougherty explained.

Some commentators complained that Superman had adopted too much of the "metrosexual" trend and had been reduced from the Man of Steel to the Flying Girlie-Man. I think they were being too hard on Superman. Sure, he probably wears more mascara than his great love Lois Lane, but he still fights the bad guys and kicks their asses.

The Superman Returns movie by itself is a decent movie, but not a classic. It is mainly interesting because it is part of a wave of successful superhero and fantasy movies in recent years. Why do we show such an interest in superheroes? Why now? Superman was invented during the troubled economic times of the Great Depression. He was created by Canadian artist Joe Shuster and American writer Jerry Siegel in 1932, although he first appeared in 1938. He was a popular character in the 1950s and 1960s, when the West lived in material comfort, but also in fear of a global nuclear war between the two superpowers. He quite literally died as a cartoon character in the 1990s, after the threat of such a showdown seemed to have disappeared. I personally think the 1990s should be dubbed the Seinfeld Decade, after the funny, but rather navel-gazing friends of Jerry Seinfeld, preoccupied with the little things in life. The 90s as an historical epoch lasted from the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 to the terror attacks of September 11th, 2001. It was a period when the West didn't feel that it was faced with any major ideological threats, and hence indulged in decadence and irony as a sigh of relief after the Cold War had ended.

Maybe I'm reading too much into it, but is the sudden reappearance of superheroes exemplified by Superman, Spider-Man and swarms of other similar characters a sign of a renewed sense of vulnerability and insecurity in the West following the Jihad attacks of 9/11? Another closely related meta-trend is the renewed popularity of fantasy literature. In online magazine The American Thinker, blogger Bookworm has some interesting comments to the surge in fantasy literature and some of the values we are presented there. J.K. Rowling's enormously successful books about teenage wizard Harry Potter have been belittled as merely "silly books for children." But as Bookworm notes, some of the later books such as Order of the Phoenix are much darker than its predecessors. It "centers on Harry's desperate efforts to convince the Powers That Be that evil once again walks among them. Only with tremendous effort is he able to rally some believers to his side and prepare them for war." Sounds familiar, doesn't it?

Rowling's dark tone continues unabated – indeed, it deepens – in Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. "Harry questions whether it's worthwhile engaging in a fight so destructive to the Wizarding community. [His mentor] Dumbledore will have none of this. Essentially, he tells Harry that, in the battle between Good and Evil, those on the side of Good cannot give up, but must press ahead, knowing that they are doing the right thing."

Evil wizard Lord Voldemort, who killed Harry's parents, is terrorizing society together with his followers, murdering all those who stand in their way. He is so feared that most people dare not mention his name, referring to him only as "You-Know-Who" or "He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named." Harry will have nothing of this and insists on calling Voldemort by his real name. As his best female friend Hermione Granger says: "Fear of a name only increases fear of the thing itself."

Did the dark wizard Voldemort have a difficult childhood? Yes, he was an orphan. But so was his nemesis Harry Potter, and he still didn't become evil. The difference between the two lies not in their background or their abilities, but in their choices. Sometimes people don't do evil things because they have a troubled past or a difficult present, sometimes they do evil things simply because they are evil or deliberately choose to do evil.

Far from being "silly books for children," the story of Harry Potter in fact contains murder, betrayal and terrorism, but also bravery as well as some highly politically incorrect ideas about Just War. In Harry Potter's fictional Britain, some people are simply evil and should be confronted and crushed, and if necessary killed. In real life Britain, PM Blair and others are afraid to name the enemy, and launch ridiculous attempts at dialogue with terrorists. Let's see: Naming your enemy, confronting him to defeat him and, if necessarily kill him. Thumbs up for Harry Potter, thumbs down for Tony Blair. Isn't it a bit sad that the main person left in the UK standing up to and clearly identifying evil is a fictional teenager?

The Lord of the Rings by British author J. R. R. Tolkien, written against the backdrop of WW2, saw a surge of interest following the 2001-2003 release of the movies made by Kiwi director Peter Jackson. Besides being excellent advertisement for Jackson's native New Zealand, one of the few countries of the world to rival the fjords of Norway for scenic beauty, it contains much of the same message as Rowling's books. It praises traditional values such as honor, loyalty, bravery and steadfastness. As Bookworm notes: "The movie's story acknowledges that evil exists and recognizes that the only thing to be done against evil is to attack it, root and branch. A war against evil is a total war, from which one cannot walk away. The Fellowship of the Ring has no talk about trying to understand Saruman's unhappy childhood as a way of exonerating his evil acts."

Why do so many people like the Lord of the Rings book and movies? There are probably many reasons for this, but I suspect one of them is the refreshing idea of defending your civilization and your lands against evil, as well as praising old-fashioned virtues such as honor, dignity and pride in your heritage. Predictably, Leftist, pro-Islamic newspaper The Guardian has criticized Tolkien's work for its "stereotypes," and radical feminists are suspicious of its display of traditional masculinity.

Note how he uses indignation to try to divert the questioner. From "Torkelson: Mosque adapting to its diversity," in the Rocky Mountain News, with thanks to Twostellas:

A local landscaper, a Denver-born consultant, and a kid from Kansas - if you hung around Denver's largest mosque at 2071 S. Parker Road, it's likely you'd bump into them all. They reflect Islam's changing profile from foreign-born faith to American presence.

On Sunday, I found myself in the company of the three - Mohammad Noorzai, Malik Taylor and Ammar Amonette - because I had heard big changes were coming to the mosque, whose formal name is the Colorado Muslim Society. It's a major, influential Islamic center where thousands of Colorado's estimated 15,000 Muslims worship, and where the demographics are changing.

Non-Arabs represent slightly more than half the mosque's members. The fastest growing segments are African Americans, whites and Latinos.

"We're a community that's more diverse than any (American) parish," says Amonette.

Three major firsts reflect the mosque's efforts to adapt.

• Amonette, 45, has been named the society's first American-born imam, or spiritual leader. He's believed to be the only American-born imam to run a major Islamic center in the U.S. His predecessor was the Egyptian-born Ahmed Nabhan, who left in December by "mutual decision."...

Today, with the Mideast aflame, there was one question that I thought many Americans, rightly or wrongly, might want to ask: If America were attacked by terrorists who professed to do it in the name of Islam, whom would you support?

"I can't believe that question - I'm shocked," Amonette, open-mouthed, said. "You don't ask that kind of question of other people."

But Noorzai, the mediator, recognized the question as an opportunity to help Americans understand how Muslims express the values of their faith: "She just wants to shed light on it," he said. "Muslim loyalty - where is it?"

The first loyalty is to Islam's principle of not harming innocent people, ever. "We're going to be on the side that's just and fair," he said.

Note that they didn't give a straight answer.

A War-Is-Deceit Update from AP, :

DETROIT (AP) A Michigan man has been charged with lying to officials investigating what the U.S. government says was a plot to recruit and train terrorists to attack U.S. and allied troops overseas.

Jihad Hekmat Dahabi, 47, of Dearborn was charged Thursday in U.S. District Court with making ``false, fictitious and fraudulent material statements'' in the course of an investigation of Marwan Othman El-Hindi.

In February, a federal grand jury indicted El-Hindi, a 42-year-old Jordanian-born U.S. citizen, and two other Toledo, Ohio, men on terrorism charges alleging they planned attacks to kill U.S. and coalition military personnel in Iraq and other countries.

The other defendants are Wassim I. Mazloum, 24, and Mohammad Zaki Amawi, 26.

The three were charged with conspiracy to kill, kidnap, maim, or injure people or damage property in a foreign country; conspiracy to kill U.S. nationals; and harboring or concealing terrorists. They have pleaded not guilty.

Vichy lives! From Reuters (link and quip thanks to Paul):

BEIRUT, July 31 (Reuters) - Iran is a significant, respected player in the Middle East which is playing a stabilising role, French Foreign Minister Philippe Douste-Blazy said on Monday.

"It was clear that we could never accept a destabilisation of Lebanon, which could lead to a destabilisation of the region," Douste-Blazy said in Beirut.

"In the region there is of course a country such as Iran -- a great country, a great people and a great civilisation which is respected and which plays a stabilising role in the region," he told a news conference.

Geoff Elliott in The Australian, with thanks to JE, examines the larger agenda behind recent headlines:

FIRST the Hezbollah attacks on Israel, now this. Yesterday, Hezbollah's key sponsors, Tehran, indicated it would not comply with any UN resolutions trying to suspend Iran's nuclear program.

"Iranians will not accept unfair decisions, even in the framework of resolutions by the international bodies," Iran's state-run radio said.

The announcement provides the backdrop to what plenty in Washington are saying about the Hezbollah-Israel conflict. It appears as no coincidence that Hezbollah started to fire rockets into Israel just as the Security Council sat down to draft its resolutions on how to deal with Iran and its ambitions to go nuclear.

"It sure looks an attempt by Iran to remind us (what) it has the capability of doing if we pursue a tough policy towards Iran," says Philip Gordon, a former White House National Security Council adviser now at Washington think tank Brookings.

A Stop-the-Presses Alert from the Indo Asian News Service, with thanks to DFS:

New Delhi, July 29 (IANS) Ahead of the SAARC foreign ministers' meeting next week in Dhaka, India has said it has evidence of Pakistan's role in cross-border terrorism.

In an interview with CNN-IBN TV channel, National Security Adviser M.K. Narayanan said Pakistan-based terrorist group Lashker-e-Toiba has international influence and it was crucial for the US to understand its 'ramifications'.

Yes indeed.

Expect to see much more of this around the world. From AP, with thanks to Romy:

An attack on a Sydney synagogue may have been fueled by anger over the Middle East conflict and the spiraling civilian death toll in Lebanon, a rabbi said Monday....

Concrete blocks smashed the windows of two cars, and other projectiles were hurled at the synagogue roof. Shortly after the incident, witnesses told police they saw a group of about 10 Middle Eastern men laughing and running down a nearby street.

Werner said the conflict between Israel and Lebanon might have been a trigger for the attack.

"I don't see how people could link something that is going on the other side of the world to a small family synagogue," the 32-year-old Werner told reporters. "I feel a little sorry for them, that they think that is an appropriate action."

Against Botox. Not, mind you, against Osama bin Laden. Not against the targeting of civilians by jihadists. Not against terrorism in the name of Islam, or suicide bombing, or honor killing. Against Botox. "Malaysia: Botox Fatwa," from AFP, with thanks to Twostellas:

Malaysia's highest Islamic authority, the National Fatwa Council, has decided that Botox injections are not permissible for Muslims for cosmetic purposes, The New Straits Times, Malaysia's largest newspaper, reported. The council decided that substances used in Botox, a trade name for botulinum toxin A, could not be deemed "halal," or permissible, under Islamic law. The council chairman, Shukor Husin, said that since the introduction of the cosmetic form of botulinum toxin, there have been "many fake products in the market and that is another reason why it is 'haram,' " or forbidden.

Over the presence and assertiveness of Muslims in the country. Note the intimidation tactics of the Muslim side. "Bulgarian Fined for Disrupting Anti-Mosque Sign-up," from Novinite, with thanks to Twostellas:

A Bulgarian man has been fined for hooliganism because he disrupted a nationalist sign-up against the loudspeakers placed on the mosque in the Danube city of Ruse.

The 29-year-old Filip Chernev insulted Ataka (Attack) activists who were gathering signatures against the mosque, and jumped on the table where the sign-up sheets were. He tore Bulgaria's flag and tried to destroy the papers too, Ataka members told the court.

The man was charged with hooliganism, but the nationalists want him charged with desecrating a national symbol too.

The judge has sent all the materials to the prosecution, who have to decide whether they are going to charge the young man with a second offence.

Tension over Sofia's downtown mosque has been escalating as well, after a nationalistic Bulgarian party launched a campaign claiming that the "ezan," a Muslim invitation to prayer via loudspeakers, was too loud and disturbing for people in the capital's central area. The nationalists say they collected over 35,000 signatures in support of their move to silence the speakers.

In the midst of the campaign, Ataka's official website was attacked by hackers, who moderated the main page and replaced its content with Turkish national symbols and music.

Silly Aussie dhimmis. They're manifesting their ignorance of Islam again. I'm confident that the Australian Muslim leaders will be only too happy to explain it all to them, and calm their fears. From the Herald Sun, with thanks to JE:

The poll of 502 people discovered:

ONE in three people are more fearful of Muslims since 9/11.

SEVENTY-ONE per cent say women in Islam are treated as inferior.

FIFTY-SIX per cent believe Muslims are unfairly discriminated against and two in three people believe Muslims should be allowed to wear religious dress in schools and workplaces.

ONLY a quarter of people say they understand Islam well.

The research summary states: "The results show a complex mix of feelings about Muslims in Australia."

People aged between 18 and 29 are more likely to hold sympathetic views about Muslims, the research found.

Queenslanders and people in the over-56 age group felt most threatened by Islam, while Victorians and people in the 40 to 54 years age group felt they had the best understanding of the religion, according to the poll....

Melbourne Islamic cleric Sheik Fehmi Naji El-Imam expressed anger at the poll results, which showed widespread fear of the religion.

"It is not fair at all," the sheik, who is general secretary of the Board of Imams of Victoria, said.

"They don't know what they are talking about - they should know Muslims first before they pass opinions."

D. C. Watson, many of whose columns have appeared here at Jihad Watch, has written a book: Truth Is Not Bigotry (Sometimes It Just Hurts). It is only $7.97; the download is $2.50, and is available here.

D. C. Watson is an example that I hope thousands will emulate: an American citizen, moved to action by the crisis that he sees in our nation and the world at large. May many others awaken to the threat posed by the global jihad the way D. C. Watson has, and join him in telling the jihadists and their allies that they have no chance of succeeding in America.

Or anything about Britain's cultural heritage -- which will help ensure that that cultural heritage will soon disappear under the black flag of Islam. From the TimesOnline, with thanks to Teri:

SCHOOLS would no longer be required to teach children the difference between right and wrong under plans to revise the core aims of the National Curriculum.

Instead, under a new wording that reflects a world of relative rather than absolute values, teachers would be asked to encourage pupils to develop “secure values and beliefs”.

The draft also purges references to promoting leadership skills and deletes the requirement to teach children about Britain’s cultural heritage....

The requirement to teach Britain’s “cultural heritage” will also be removed. The present version states: “The school curriculum should contribute to the development of pupils’ sense of identity through knowledge and understanding of the spiritual, moral, social and cultural heritages of Britain’s diverse society.”

I don't much like gossip shows, but I believe that the error that Western conservatives fall into is thinking that when Muslim groups make such moves, they are demonstrating the basis for an alliance. In fact, this endeavor stems from the same Sharia impulse that would subjugate non-Muslims as dhimmis. Sharia Alert from modern, moderate Indonesia, from AFP, with thanks to Twostellas:

JAKARTA • Indonesia’s largest Islamic movement, the Nahdlatul Ulama (NU), is considering issuing an edict that would ban Muslims from producing or watching popular television gossip shows, an NU official said yesterday....

Musa said the edict, if agreed by a congress of the organisation in Surabaya, capital of East Java, would declare it a sin for Muslims to produce or watch the gossip shows, known as infotainment news.

August 1939 Alert from Reuters, with thanks to all who sent this in:

TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iran's hardline forces should get ready to take revenge on Israel and the United States for the offensive on Lebanon, the head of the Revolutionary Guards was quoted as saying on Sunday.

"The Basij and Revolutionary Guards should prepare to get even with the Zionists and Americans," Yahya Rahim-Safavi was quoted as telling Islamic militiamen by the conservative Fars news agency.

More fruits of the British dhimmis' refusal to confront the jihad ideology, which prevents their screening for it properly among Muslim applicants for sensitive positions. "Yard quizzes three Muslim officers in hunt for terrorist sleepers," from the TimesOnline, with thanks to Twostellas:

SCOTLAND YARD has placed one of its Muslim officers on restricted duties while it investigates intelligence that he may have attended a terror camp linked to Al-Qaeda in Pakistan.

The policeman — who firmly denies the allegations — is said by police sources to be one of three Muslim officers questioned in a Yard search for terror “sleeper cells” in its ranks.

The move follows disclosures earlier this month that Islamic terrorist sympathisers had attempted to infiltrate the intelligence services by applying for jobs in MI5.

It raises the risk of terrorist “fifth columnists” passing on information about secret operations and compromising the identities of undercover agents.

The Metropolitan police last week said that it would look at individual cases if there were concerns, but added that it was not reassessing the backgrounds of all its 400-500 Muslim staff....

The inquiry appears to have been triggered by the belated discovery that the officer made a trip to Pakistan before joining the police in 2001. He returned to Britain shortly after the September 11 terrorist attacks.

During an interview with the Yard’s secret vetting unit, which works closely with MI5, it was suggested he may have attended or associated with people at an Al-Qaeda training camp. The British-born officer, whose parents are from Pakistan, denies knowingly meeting terrorists....

The Association of Muslim Police (AMP) says there are two other investigations in which Muslim officers have been interviewed about trips to Pakistan.

Tahir Butt, secretary of the AMP, has raised the cases with senior management. He said that a policy which targeted Muslims and not other religions would be “wholly inappropriate”.

Sure, Tahir. I'm all for investigating Buddhist Scotland Yard men who attend Buddhist terrorist training camps also.

Tiny Minority of Extremists Alert: "Nigerian Muslims Continue Protests: Anti-Israel and anti-American sentiment is high," from OhMyNews, with thanks to Twostellas:

For the second time in less than a fortnight, millions of Nigerian Muslims took to the streets across the country on Friday to protest Israeli attacks on the Lebanese faction Hezbollah.

Under the overall command of Sheik Ibrahim Zakzaky, the leader of the Islamic Movement in Nigeria, the July 28 protests were especially well attended in all the northern parts of the country.

In Kaduna state, in the heart of northern Nigeria, the protest was led by Malam Muktar Sahabi, one of Sheik Zakzaky's followers. Thousands of Muslims, including children, chanted "death to Israel and America" in the state capital.

In Sokoto state, Malam Munir Sokoto led an 8 a.m. procession that chanted anti-Israel slogans and called on Muslims around the world to rise up against Israel.

"We came out and took to the streets protesting against Israeli attacks on Hezbollah, under the command of our spiritual leader Sheik Ibrahim Zakzaky. We will continue to protest for death or success," said Sokoto in a phone interview.

In Kano, over 1 million Muslims took to the streets, dragging American and Israeli flags on the ground, and proclaiming a jihad (Holy War) against the Jews of Israel and those in Nigeria. They promised to take revenge soon for what they described as "Israeli illegal attacks on innocent Lebanese."

"If Nigerian Muslims will rise against Israel as Sheik Zakzaky commanded us, certainly the Jews sheltered in Nigeria would run on their heels," Sheik Turi said.

In "Islamofascist Rage in Seattle" in the Arizona Republic (thanks to Thomas Haidon), M. Zuhdi Jasser of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy says what the entire mainstream media should be saying to the American Muslim advocacy groups:

On Friday the Jewish Federation of Greater Seattle was viciously attacked by the terror of madman Naveed Afzal Haq. Haq is apparently a 30 year old “Muslim American” who was reportedly a ‘loner’ and ‘mentally ill.’ At 4 P.M. on July 28th, he stormed into the offices of the Jewish Federation of Greater Seattle and reportedly announced that he was a “Muslim American” and that he “was angry with Israel.” He began shooting indiscriminately at the 18 employees in the office murdering one and critically injuring five....

Can this all simply be dismissed as the actions of a lone crazed gunman? Is the fact that he was Muslim a footnote or actually a symptom of a more systemic illness-- islamism? What inspired his hate? Is his inspiration only the truly fanatic or do the likes of Naveen Haq find something from within the ideology of mainstream Islamism which lights their spark?...

Recall, on July 4, 2002, Mr. Hesham Mohamed Hadayet, a crazed Egyptian-American immigrant Muslim, opened fire at the ticketing counter of El Al Airlines at Los Angeles International airport murdering two and wounding four before being shot down. In March of this year, Mohammed Reza Taheri-Azar, terrorized the campus of the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill driving his vehicle into nine pedestrians all of whom fortunately survived. Before their rampages each had blamed the U.S. and the west for ‘killing Muslims’ so they responded with rage....

Defeat the ideology and these radical outbursts will disappear.

As some Muslim organizations rushed yesterday to condemn the shootings, in “the strongest possible terms”, such condemnations seem to be misplaced and just more misdirected energy. If these organizations had active concerted anti-Islamist campaigns to deconstruct the supremacist Islamist ideology which feeds these individuals, they would shed the sense of need to ever make bizarre pronouncements of condemnations which should go without saying. The problem they find themselves in is that many sane Muslims as part of radical political movements from Bin Laden to Zawahiri to Nasrallah to Ahmednidijad say and do the same type of violence.

My coreligionists along with conventional wisdom need to finally begin working toward defeating Islamism as an ideology, or these series will sadly continue.

Within the widely prevalent ideology of Islamism (in its most radical form-Islamofascism) is a utopian, intolerant, anti-Semitic, anti-Western, theocratic exclusivity. This is the clinical progenitor of the primary malignant tumor cell of all that is islamofascism whether in the individual or the community. These cells can divide and produce many different cancers—some more malignant than others....

Only Muslims can acknowledge the role of Islamism in sparking this violence. Only Muslims can place the inebriating nature of this ideology outside of Islam and thus outside our consciousness. Even a moderated Islamism may be less violent but it is still intoxicating to the weak accepting mind in its all-encompassing form. The growing list of radical violent outbursts from selected Muslim individuals and terror organizations makes the case for the fact that Islamism is actually a malignancy and could never be moderated since it is a failed ideology at its core.

Islamists would argue that they cannot be held responsible for preventing the actions of a deranged few within their midst. Is this reply much different from a family or our society arguing that it bears no responsibility for the deaths caused by a drunk-driver. Law enforcement does have an impact, but there is no greater prevention than the treatment of alcoholism. Similarly, Islamism needs to be defeated. For, when infused into a consciousness it can lead to this type of spontaneous violence in the name of religion.

The American Muslim community needs to take the first of its twelve steps and acknowledge that Islamism may be the spark within the community which keeps setting localities ablaze. As we learn and expose where Islamism directly conflicts with Americanism we will cross each step towards a treatment and a sorely needed cure against the malignant manifestations of radical Islamism.

Rather than waste time condemning acts which any sane human being would find unconscionable, sane Muslim Americans need to dismantle the ideology which fuels the minds that commit these acts. That is the least we can do to honor the memory of those who lose their lives or are injured in these heinous hate crimes.

This is very good, but of course it doesn't go far enough. I hope that M. Zuhdi Jasser would be willing to confront Taheri-azar's abundant Qur'an quotations, and the role of the example of Muhammad in inspiring jihad violence today. If he is, and if others like him are, then there might really be some progress toward the ideological confrontation with jihadism that he calls for.

This group is performing da'wa, that is, the preaching of Islam, which is the precursor to jihad. No doubt they will not tell the German dhimmis anything about dhimmitude, or about the jihad itself, except comfortable half-truths and distortions. From Deutsche Welle, with thanks to Fjordman:

This summer, a group of Muslims is touring Germany with a mosque on wheels. They hope their ''rolling mosque'' will help change German public opinion, which often associates Islam and Muslims with terror and fanaticism.

On a recent Friday afternoon, a truck with a large trailer pulled up across from the historic town hall in Hanau, near Frankfurt. Oriental music blasted from the speakers, attracting attention.

A stage had been built on top of the trailer. A cupola and two minarets soared above the roof. Pillars and arches decorated the sides. Alongside was written "Islamobil," a word made up from the German words for Islam and automobile.

The Islamobil is a sort of travelling mosque, one that aims to inform Germans about Islam. A group of young Muslims from the small city of Brühl near Cologne came up with the idea in 2001 and will travel around Germany with it this summer.

One of the founders, Gülüzar Keskin, said the idea was born out of the desire to explain and illustrate Islam on-the-spot.

''First we established an organization with the goal of informing Germans about Islam,'' Keskin said. ''Then we thought it would be a very good and practical idea to create a mobile mosque and travel around Germany in it."

The image of Islam and Muslims has deteriorated in Germany since the terrorism attacks on Sept.11, 2001. Many citizens associate the religion with terror, fanaticism and the repression of women. The organizers hope the Islamobil will correct this picture.

Tiny Minority of Extremists Update: "Survey reveals Muslim views on violence," from The Jakarta Post, with thanks to all who sent this in:

Up to 1.3 percent of Indonesian Muslims nationwide admit using violence against people or objects they consider contradictory to their beliefs, a survey found, with more than 40 percent ready to wage war for their faith.

Acts of violence in the survey on religion and violence by the Center for Islamic and Social Studies (PPIM) ranged from 0.1 percent of respondents admitting their involvement in demolishing or arson of churches constructed without official permits, to 1.3 percent who committed "intimidation" against those they considered had blasphemed Islam.

The survey spanned 1,200 Muslims in 30 of the country's 33 provinces.

"The percentage looks very small but it is very high in its real figure when you note that 85 percent, or 200 million, of the country's 230 million population are Muslims," PPIM researcher Jajat Burhanudin said Thursday during the release of the results.

However, other scholars said violence was traditionally widespread in local cultures, and it was unfair to blame Islam for its prevalence.

Of course. It's never any fault of Islam, despite dozens of Qur'anic verses enjoining violence against unbelievers, as well as innumerable Hadith passages and jurisprudential rulings from all the schools of Islamic law.

The survey, conducted from 2001 to March 2006, found 43.5 percent of respondents were ready to wage war on threatening non-Muslim groups, 40 percent would use violence against those blaspheming Islam and 14.7 percent would tear down churches without official permits.

"This condition has helped terrorists easily recruit new comrades and makes the country a fertile ground for sectarian radicalism," Jajat said.

He added that a simultaneous study on the reasons for the results found Islamic teaching and Islamism made the most significant contributions to violent behavior, both in the domestic and public spheres.

"The more Muslims give their support for certain Islamic teachings legitimizing the use of violence, the more violence will happen."

He noted that between 30 percent and 58 percent approved of amputation of the left hand for thieves and the stoning to death of rapists, as well as other tenets of sharia law, and opposed the election of non-Muslims for president.

More on the Al-Qaeda manual that reveals the sophistication and careful planning of the mujahedin. "Terror's playbook," from the New York Daily News, :

Most Americans know that Al Qaeda and its franchises are willing to sink to any depth to destroy the United States. But few people realize just how deep those depths are.

The public's knowledge of the terror group's goals and motives is largely confined to the English translations of Osama Bin Laden's and Ayman al-Zawahiri's propaganda. Consequently, Al Qaeda and like-minded groups, or "jihadis," are viewed either as unthinking zealots or misguided freedom fighters.

"The Management of Savagery" - a book written in 2004 by Abu Bakr Naji, a high-level Al Qaeda strategist - suggests that both perspectives are off the mark.

Most jihadi writings in Arabic are similar to those already available in English. These are lengthy exposés on the Western plot to destroy Islam, dense with religious references meant to justify a violent response to this plot. Naji's book is different. Unlike typical jihadi tracts, this genre eschews religious propaganda in favor of scientific analysis, drawing on close readings of Western political theories.

In "The Management of Savagery," Naji argues that the jihadis failed in the past to establish an Islamic state because they were focused on toppling local regimes. These efforts were fruitless, he argues, because jihadis were seen as fighting their own people, which alienated the masses. Moreover, the local governments proved impervious to revolution as long as they were supported by the U.S. Based on his understanding of power politics, Naji says that the jihadis had to provoke the United States to invade a country in the Middle East.

This would 1.) turn the Muslims against local governments allied with the U.S.; 2.) destroy the U.S. aura of invincibility, which it maintains through the media, and 3.) create sympathy for the jihadis, who would be viewed as standing up to Crusader aggression. Moreover, the invasion would bleed the U.S. economy and sap its military power, leading to social unrest at home and its ultimate withdrawal from the Middle East.

Naji had hoped that Afghanistan would play out in this manner for the U.S., as it did for the Soviets. Now, Naji places his hopes on Iraq. Once the U.S. withdraws from Iraq, he contends, the jihadis must quickly move to invade neighboring countries.

Some countries are particularly ripe for jihadi incursion: Jordan, Nigeria, Pakistan and Yemen, as well as North West Africa and the Arabian Peninsula. These areas were selected by Al Qaeda because of each region's geographic features, weak central governments, the receptivity of the people and the proliferation of weapons and jihadi propaganda. The plan, according to Naji, is to conduct small- to medium-scale attacks on crucial infrastructure (like oil or tourism), which will cause the government to draw in its security forces. Chaos or "savagery" will erupt in the unpoliced areas.

Then, the jihadis will move into these security vacuums and provide basic services to people, who will welcome an end to the instability. The final goal is to establish a single global state ruled by a pious Muslim dictator, the caliph, who will implement a strict interpretation of Islamic law.

Drawing on the experience of jihadis in Egypt and Algeria, Naji cautions his readers that no plan will succeed unless the jihadis learn how to respond to public opinion and manipulate the media.

They are very good at that.

In "Right showing left the way on radical Islam," Martin Bright in The Guardian/Observer (thanks to Crickman) says: "It's fascism by any other name and it's time that all political factions joined forces to fight it." Well, that's what I've been saying for years. It's nice to see The Guardian getting close (very close) to the truth.

I am being feted by the right. As the political editor of the New Statesman and usually written off by conservative thinkers as a dangerous, pinko liberal, this is a novel and rather awkward position in which to find myself.

Two weeks ago, Channel 4 screened a programme I presented concerning Whitehall's love affair with radical Islam. It was based on a stream of Foreign Office leaks first published in The Observer and the New Statesman which showed that mandarins were prepared to open lines of communication with organisations such Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood. Since then, the right-wing plaudits for my work keep coming in, not just in this country but from America, too, where none other than David Frum, the neoconservative Bush adviser credited with coining 'axis of evil', has begun quoting my work approvingly. Neocon journal American Thinker ran a 2,500-word analysis of my findings. While any attention is always welcome, these offers of solidarity are also a challenge.

The programme was accompanied by a pamphlet I wrote for the centre-right 'Cameroon' think-tank, Policy Exchange, which identified an ongoing Foreign Office policy to develop links with Islamists abroad and in Britain. I argued that progressives on the left and right of British politics should view this with concern, especially in the domestic context, where mainstream voices were being kept from dialogue with government by groups ideologically linked to Islamists in the Middle East such as the Muslim Brotherhood and its south Asian equivalent, Jamaat-i-Islami. Chief among these is the Muslim Council of Britain, whose leadership has established sympathies for the Jamaat-i-Islami in Pakistan and Bangladesh. Both the Brotherhood and the Jamaat believe in the creation of an Islamic state and the establishment of Sharia law.

Conservative commentators in Britain were also quick to take up the cause. Peter Dobbie praised the programme in the Mail on Sunday for 'lifting the lid' on the Foreign Office's dalliance with the radicals. Frank Johnson, Telegraph columnist and former Spectator editor, described the Policy Exchange document, rather generously, as 'one of the most important pamphlets for decades' and said that I had 'presided over a fine... documentary'. Writing in the Spectator, former Telegraph editor Charles Moore said: 'Sorry to praise the New Statesman in these pages, but its political editor, Martin Bright, has just produced an excellent pamphlet.' I realise that their reaction does not come without an agenda. There is no doubt that at it has fed into the perception in some circles on the left, encouraged by the MCB, that I am part of some Islamophobic campaign to 'divide and rule' Britain's Muslims.

It is depressing that so few on the left have been prepared to engage with the issue of the Foreign Office appeasement of radical Islam except to minimise its significance. In contrast, the responses on the right have been largely measured. Moore, for instance, fitted the Foreign Office's search for radical figures it could do business with, such as Muslim Brotherhood's spiritual head, Yusuf al-Qaradawi, into a wider historical perspective. In the 1930s, we adopted a similar strategy with the Mufti of Jerusalem to 'deliver' Muslim opinion. The Mufti went on to support the Nazis.

Read it all.

The IDF investigates an interesting anomaly. From Ynet News, with thanks to Rudi:

An IDF investigation has found that the building in Qana struck by the Air Force fell around eight hours after being hit by the IDF. "The attack on the structure in the Qana village took place between midnight and one in the morning. The gap between the timing of the collapse of the building and the time of the strike on it is unclear," Brigadier General Amir Eshel, Head of the Air Force Headquarters told journalists at the Defense Ministry in Tel Aviv, following the incidents at Qana.

Eshel and the head of the IDF's Operational Branch, Major General Gadi Eisnkot said the structure was not being attacked when it collapsed, at around 8:00 in the morning.

The IDF believes that Hizbullah explosives in the building were behind the explosion that caused the collapse.

A press release from the World Council of the Cedars Revolution:

HEZBOLLAH IS RESPONSIBLE FOR THE MASSACRE

The World Council of the Cedars Revolution, after having observed the security developments in the last 48 hours and the horrific deaths caused by warfare between Hezbollah and Israel on Lebanese territories, and in the area of Qana in particular; and after having reviewed the causes of the civilian casualties, including children and women who were located in a shelter, the Council declares the following:

1) Its total dismay at the sight of innocent civilians who were killed during an exchange of long range fire between Hezbollah and Israeli forces. These civilians were put in a defenseless posture between the two warring parties, against all laws of war, and were killed and maimed as a result of irresponsible acts of war. Their deaths and the injuries caused by the shelling calls for an immediate investigation by the international community as to the causes of the fight and the particular military acts that lead to the massacre. The Council calls on the United Nations to dispatch a team to the region to investigate this and other incidents where civilians are caught in the firefight, and establishes the reasons for their victimization.

2) The Council, in view of the history of this conflict, which started by an irresponsible War launched by Hezbollah, without authorization by the Lebanese Government, and triggered harsh Israeli responses causing damages to the people and infrastructure of Lebanon, blames Hezbollah, its leadership and the Syrian and Iranian regimes for dragging Lebanon into the horrors of a suicidal War. The WCCR accuses Hezbollah and its regional allies of intentionally forcing the civil society of Lebanon, and in particularly the communities under the control of Hezbollah’s militias, to become a shield for Hezbollah’s military operations. By doing so, Hezbollah is breaching international law and must respond to international responsibility. Any military force, which is in control of the security of a civilian population in geographical areas, is responsible for their security. By maintaining that control over south Lebanon and the Bekaa valley, Hezbollah, even as a Terrorist organization is responsible for the safety and security of all civilians it has under its control. Hence the WCCR, representing the aspirations of millions of Lebanese inside the country and in its Diaspora, urges the United Nations to take immediate action by dispatching international troops to protect the civilian populations of Lebanon from the effects of the ongoing war on Lebanese territories.

3) The Council, after reviewing reports from South Lebanon, strongly condemns the deployment by Hezbollah of artillery and rockets in the vicinity of civilian population centers. This tactic, which puts civilians at risk of death and destruction, is a war crime to be sanctioned by international law. The Council attributes the responsibility of the deaths of Lebanese citizens by Israeli fire, to Hezbollah’s leadership and to its Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah. For installing guns and launchers just next to a civilian shelter and firing from it, during a military confrontation that already started two weeks ago, is a calculated decision to cause retaliation and deaths, which are being used in the media to further the image of Hezbollah. This tactic, while using the pro-Jihadi media in the region, and abusing the horrific images of corpses of Lebanese citizens, won’t change the reality of Hezbollah’s responsibility and won’t be used to shield Nasrallah from the international community or from the popular majority of the Lebanese people.

4) The Council calls for an investigation of this war crime by questioning Hassan Nasrallah and the Hezbollah militiamen who were deployed at the location of the massacre. The Cedars Revolution is not going to allow Terrorists to use the blood and flesh of Lebanese citizens to shield their organization from disarmament. It won’t accept that an entire Lebanese community is taken into hostage by a Pro-Iranian, pro-Syrian organization which aim is to obstruct democracy in Lebanon and reverse the Cedars Revolution.

5) As expresses its deepest condolences to the families of the massacre’s victims, the Council calls on the Lebanese masses to resist the tactics of Terrorism and to upraise against Hezbollah’s control of civilian centers. Let M. Nasrallah and his supporters chose another land to wage their personal wars with whomever they want. Lebanon is not their private property to use and abuse. The Council calls on the Lebanese people to mobilize in order to end this suicidal war, even if it is going to take another revolution.

The World Council of the Cedars Revolution

Joe Baini, President, Australia
Tom Harb, Secretary General for UNSCR 1559, USA
Dr Anis Karam, President World Lebanese Cultural Union
Fady Bark, Secretary General, World Lebanese Cultural Union
Attorney John Hajjar, North American director, USA
Attorney Joanne Fakhre, Director Caribbean Region
Toni Nissi, Coordinator Committee 1559, Lebanon
Sami Khoury, Chairman, Hispanic America
George Chaya, Media Chairman, Latin America
Iskandar Riachi, Secretary, Cedars Revolution, Brazil
Roni Doumit, Secretary General, WCCR, Europe
Kamal El-Batal, Human-rights, WCCR

Matthias Küntzel notes that yesterday,

...the Berlin daily the Tagesspiegel published a letter-to-the-editor from Dr. Mounir Herzallah, a Shiite from the South of Lebanon. Dr. Herzallah reports on how Hezbollah-terrorists came to his town, dug a munitions depot and then built a school and a residence directly over it. He writes:

“Laughing, a local sheikh explained to me that the Jews lose either way: either because the rockets are fired at them or because, if they attack munitions depot, they are condemned by world public opinion on account of the dead civilians.” Hezbollah, he says, uses the civilian population “as a human shield and then when they are dead as propaganda.”

Just how indifferent the lives of their fellow Muslims are to the Shiite Islamists was already made clear during the Iran-Iraq War, when Khomeini sent thousands of Iranian children into the mine fields. Still today, this mass murder is defended as “martyrdom” by people like Ahmadinejad and Nasrallah.

In April, The New Republic published an abridged version of Küntzel's article on these “children of the minefields.” He has now made available the unabridged version. The particular role of Hizballah is also touched upon in the text. The English translation is by John Rosenthal. You will find the article here.

And he says that "the world understands." But alas, it doesn't. It doesn't understand the nature of jihad warfare, it doesn't understand the implications of Muhammad's dictum "war is deceit," and it doesn't understand that Israel doesn't strike civilians intentionally. Above all, Condoleeza Rice doesn't seem to understand any of this, and is using the Qana incident to press for a cease-fire -- which in such a context would just reward the Hizballah practice of firing from civilian areas, and would thereby encourage it.

"Israel defends Qana strike," from the UK's Sun:

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said: “The Hezbollah is using its residents as a human shield. They want to see children’s blood, this is the only weapon they have left”.

The Israeli leader expressed his “great sorrow” for the deaths of civilians and added: “There is nothing further from our thoughts and our interests than striking civilians. Everyone understands this.

“When we strike civilians, the world understands this is an exceptional case that does not represent how we act.”

From AP:

TEHRAN, Iran - Nothing in the office of Iran's sole Jewish lawmaker calls attention to his faith — no Star of David, no menorah or other symbol of Judaism. But like nearly every public building in Iran, it has a portrait of the Islamic Revolution's patriarch, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.

Moris Motamed's political headquarters highlight the well-practiced survival skills of Iran's remaining 25,000 Jews — caught again in a political no man's land by the fighting between Israel and the Iranian-backed Hezbollah in Lebanon.

Any public expression of sympathy for Israel would invite a sharp crackdown from authorities and hard-line Islamic groups.

"We are Iranians. We work for what's best for Iran. The fighting, fortunately, does not affect the Jewish community in Iran," said Motamed, who holds the single parliament seat reserved for Jews. Other seats are set aside for the Christian Armenian and Assyrian minorities and followers of Iran's pre-Islamic Zoroastrian faith.

The State Department's 2005 International Religious Freedom Report notes:

The Government's anti‑Israel policies, along with a perception among radical Muslims that all Jewish citizens support Zionism and the state of Israel, create a hostile atmosphere for the small community. For example, during the reporting period, many newspapers celebrated the one-hundredth anniversary of the anti-Semitic publication "Protocols of the Elders of Zion.

Mr. Motamed is apparently feeling the additional pressure of the ongoing conflict in painting a rosier picture of Jewish life in Iran, as he registered complaints in the 2005 report:

On April 13, Representative Maurice Motamed, who represents Jews in the Majlis, complained that Iran's state television was broadcasting anti-Semitic programs. According to the press, Motamed claimed that "insulting Jews and attributing false things to them in television serials over the past 12 years has not only hurt the feelings of the Jewish community but has also led to the emigration of a considerable percentage of the Jewish community." Motamed also claimed that repeated complaints about this problem have not had the desired effect.

The article continues:

But Iran's Jews have undeniable bonds with Israel — most notably Israel's Iranian-born president, Moshe Katsav. Thousands of Iranian Jewish families have relatives in Israel. The historical links between Persia and the Holy Land go back to antiquity and are celebrated each year with the festival of Purim.

In January, the leader of Iran's Jewish community, Haroun Yashayaei, issued a rare challenge to Islamic authorities after President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad called the Holocaust a "myth." He said Ahmadinejad was questioning "one of the most obvious and saddening incidents in human history."

Israel, however, presents a red line no one will cross. Iran's Jews have remain publicly silent as Iranian leaders have called for Israel's destruction, including Ahmadinejad's call last year for Israel to be "wiped off the map."

Last week, Jews in the southern city of Shiraz held a pro-Hezbollah rally that was covered by state-run television — a sign that the march was likely overseen by the Islamic regime to reinforce the idea of national solidarity.

The Web site of the Tehran Jewish Community includes statements opposing Israel's military offensive in the Gaza Strip and praising uranium enrichment by Iranian scientists. The U.S. and many of its allies, including Israel, believe Iran is using its nuclear reactor project as a cover for a weapons program.

"For Iranians, there is a distinction in their mind between Zionism and Judaism," said Motamed. "This is a very important distinction for us."

"Until the time of revenge comes": a time which the Iranian regime would like to hasten as much as possible, as their self-assigned August 22 deadline on responding to the nuclear issue draws closer. From AFP: "Top Iran general says hopes to avenge Muslim deaths"

TEHRAN (AFP) - The head of Iran's Revolutionary Guards said he hoped the Islamic republic could one day "avenge the blood of innocent people in Palestine, Lebanon, Iraq and Afghanistan".

"We have to keep this sacred hatred of the enemies of Islam alive in our hearts until the time of revenge comes," General Yahya Rahim Safavi was quoted as saying by the semi-official Fars news agency.

"I hope our nation can one day avenge the blood of innocent people in Palestine, Lebanon, Iraq and Afghanistan," he said, adding: "I ask God to arouse the dignity of Muslims and destroy America, Israel and their associates."

[...]

"I ask God that the crimes and atrocities of Zionists hasten the annihilation of this regime. Hezbollah and Lebanese people are invincible and this cancerous tumor... should die," he added, calling on "clerical leaders in the Islamic world (to) clarify the duty of Muslims against Israel."

"Americans love Pepsi Cola; we love death" Alert from Reuters: "Zest for martyrdom fuels Hezbollah in battle"

BEIRUT - A sister of Hezbollah fighter Mustafa Zalzali wears mourning black for her brother, but his death in battle with Israel elicits more pride than grief.

“We thank God almighty for making us the family of a martyr,” she said. “We received the news of his martyrdom with pride,” she told Hezbollah’s al-Manar television.

[...]

The family of Zalzali, killed in a recent battle, say they are ready for more sacrifices.

“His martyrdom has lifted our heads high,” said another of his sisters. “Whatever more we can offer, we will. Our men, our children, our siblings."

The Qana "massacre" has become the latest pretext for jihad. Western analysts continue to miss the fact that if it weren't Qana, it would be something else, and that Qana is just the latest in a long, long line of similar incidents used by jihadists to stir up a sense of grievance among Muslims and thereby increase support for the jihad du jour. "MB Chairman: Peace Treaties Provided Cover for Zionist Massacres," from Ikhwanweb, with thanks to Sr. Soph:

Israel committed a heinous massacre in Qana on Saturday July 29, 2006, which claimed the lives of 57 civilians. This is the second massacre in the same town in ten years; the first one was in the year 1996. In condemnation of the recent massacre and other Israeli despicable crimes against civilians, Muslim Brotherhood Chairman Mohamed Mahdi Akef issued a statement holding the Arab leaders accountable for the massacres perpetrated by the Zionists against noncombatant Lebanese civilians in South Lebanon. He said that the Zionists persist with their crimes in impunity out of their conviction that the stillborn peace treaties and agreements with Arab regimes serve as an umbrella for the massacres they are committing against civilians in Lebanon and Palestine.

The Chairman added that the recent massacres come as a continuation of the Zionist unchangeable policy adopted for tens of years and not in retaliation of Nasrullah’s statements in which he affirmed the resolve of the resistance to launch their rockets as far as Haifa and other Israeli towns. However, the Chairman affirmed that these massacres will not hinder the Arab people from resisting the “Zionist guerrillas”, stressing that these strikes will kindle zeal for jihad within the hearts of Arab and Muslim people, spurring them into going on struggle until the liberation of all their occupied land.

Addressing the Arab leaders, the MB chairman called on them to arm their people as a appropriate means in confrontation of the enemy which poses a threat to all the Arab and Muslim nations.

Walid Jumblatt explains exactly what Nasrallah is. "Lebanese Druze Leader Walid Jumblatt Criticizes Nasrallah and Says: 'Adolf Hitler Also Aroused His People's Sense of Honor, And Led Germany into War,'" from MEMRITV, with thanks to Sr. Soph:

Following are excerpts from an interview with Lebanese Druze leader Walid Jumblatt, which aired on Al-Mustaqbal TV on July 29, 2006.

[...]

It does not come to us from the theories of several intellectuals. Noam Chomsky, because of his hatred for the Bush administration, comes from America, from Yale or Columbia University, in order to present his theory about the weapons of Hizbullah. Great. But I say to Noam Chomsky today: Our country is in flames. One of those people, an Israeli Knesset member, who enjoys the so-called "democracy" of Israel, presents his theory on how Syria cannot be separated from Iran (sic), but he does not care that at least two-thirds of the Lebanese people want freedom and independence, and to preserve this pluralistic model, which is one of a kind throughout the Arab and Islamic world.

[...]

There can be no honor associated with a fascist regime like the Syrian regime, or, to be more precise, there can be no honor associated with a regime which is semi-divine, like the Iranian regime.

Interviewer: You are referring to the principle of the rule of the jurisprudent.

Walid Jumblatt: I don't want to go into jurisprudent theories... Ultimately, there were civilized peoples... I don't want to make a comparison, but Adolf Hitler also aroused his people's sense of honor, and led Germany into war.

[...]

[Bashar Al-Assad] will desperately try to bring Lebanon to a state of anarchy, if he can. I remember that two weeks ago or more, he said that Lebanon has become a base for Al-Qaeda. In other words, there is a possibility that if his efforts to reach a settlement and to get closer to America fail, he might send to Lebanon - just like he sent to Iraq - the so-called "martyrdom-seekers," whom I call "suicide bombers," because they killed without discriminating between American soldiers, Shiites, Sunnis, and Christians. They made no discrimination. He might do this. He sent a messenger to Saudi Arabia, four days before going there himself. This messenger, a high-ranking officer, said to one of the princes, in charge of internal security in Saudi Arabia: "We fear that you will suffer terrorist attacks. If you want, we can help you." That is regarding Al-Qaeda... In other words, he threatened them indirectly...

More evidence of the fact that Hizballah tries to provoke attacks on civilian areas in order to exploit such attacks for propaganda purposes -- a highly successful strategy, as we see again with Qana.

"Photos that damn Hezbollah," from the Sunday Herald Sun, with thanks to Murph:

THIS is the picture that damns Hezbollah. It is one of several, smuggled from behind Lebanon's battle lines, showing that Hezbollah is waging war amid suburbia.

The images, obtained exclusively by the Sunday Herald Sun, show Hezbollah using high-density residential areas as launch pads for rockets and heavy-calibre weapons.

Dressed in civilian clothing so they can quickly disappear, the militants carrying automatic assault rifles and ride in on trucks mounted with cannon.

The photographs, from the Christian area of Wadi Chahrour in the east of Beirut, were taken by a visiting journalist and smuggled out by a friend.

[...]

The images include one of a group of men and youths preparing to fire an anti-aircraft gun metres from an apartment block with sheets hanging out on a balcony to dry.

Others show a militant with AK47 rifle guarding no-go zones after Israeli blitzes.

Another depicts the remnants of a Hezbollah Katyusha rocket in the middle of a residential block blown up in an Israeli air attack.

The Melbourne man who smuggled the shots out of Beirut and did not wish to be named said he was less than 400m from the block when it was obliterated.

He identified himself as a Muslim and explained that that was why he was shooting, and that evidently isn't enough for the Seattle Joint Terrorism Task Force. From "Community responds with sorrow, unity," from the Seattle Times, with thanks to David:

The man accused of barging into the offices of the Jewish Federation of Greater Seattle and killing one woman and wounding five others will be prosecuted on state murder and attempted-murder charges rather than federal hate-crime laws, officials said.

Naveed Afzal Haq, 30, appeared Saturday before Seattle District Court Judge Barbara Linde, who set bail at $50 million. Haq, wearing a King County Jail uniform, stood silent before the judge, occasionally whispering to his attorney.

Dan Donohoe, spokesman for the King County Prosecutor's Office, said attorneys would be meeting this week to discuss which specific charges they will file and whether it will become a capital case, which could bring the death penalty or life in prison without parole....

There were 18 women and one man in the offices when the shooter opened fire just after 3 p.m. Friday. The chief said Haq had picked the foundation as his target after conducting a random Internet search for Jewish organizations on his computer.

Haq briefly held one of the victims hostage and told dispatchers, "I want these Jews to get out."

"I'm not upset at people, I'm upset at your foreign policy," Haq said in a recorded conversation with police dispatchers that was detailed in court documents. "These are Jews and I'm tired of getting pushed around and our people getting pushed around by the situation in the Middle East.

"I just want us to get out of Iraq," Haq reportedly said. "I'm an American too, but I want our people out of Iraq."

Witnesses reportedly heard Haq declare he was an American Muslim. Police have said Haq's statements indicate the shootings were a hate crime.

A law-enforcement source, who is a member of the Seattle Joint Terrorism Task Force and familiar with the investigation, said Haq was not a practicing Muslim.

On what are they basing this? Probably that the local mosques all said that they don't know him, they never saw him. But what else are they going to say -- that he was an active member?

Kerlikowske said Haq forced his way through a security door behind the 13-year-old niece of one of the shooting victims. Haq had been lingering in the foyer and stuck a handgun in the girl's back when she approached a door that's opened by a keypad. He shoved his way past her after she was buzzed through.

"She could not have kept him out," Kerlikowske said. "She was a hostage."

Haq "then entered the premises and made several statements indicating anger at Jews," according to court documents.

But no hate crime here, oh no.

Relax, it's just jihad.

Missing the point, or perhaps willfully overlooking it, in Nairobi. From Reuters: "Don’t exaggerate Somali crisis, African Union urges"

NAIROBI - Despite the murder of a [government] minister, Somalia’s crisis should not be exaggerated and negotiations are still key to finding a political solution, the African Union envoy to Somalia said on Saturday.

“A pimple is being made to look like a boil,” Muhammad Ali Foum said after Friday’s assassination, which stoked international fears of all-out conflict in Somalia.

“There is more violence on the streets of New York and Paris and London than in Baidoa.”

Constitution and Federalism Minister Abdallah Deerow Isaq was shot dead at a mosque in Baidoa, provincial seat of the interim Somali government.

With the Supreme Islamic Courts Council looking to institute Sharia law by force in Somalia, it will be interesting to find out, if it is possible whether the assassination of Isaq, the Constitution and Federalism minister, was an opportunistic act, or a targeted killing.

Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Gedi blamed the attack on ”criminals linked to international terrorism”. Protesters burned tyres and looted shops on Friday, but calm returned on Saturday.

[...]

“I wouldn’t put too much into the resignations at the moment,” Foum said. “Power-sharing can only come when the people go back to Khartoum, sit down and talk and sort out what needs to be done by whom, where and when.”

The government boycotted a second round of peace talks in the Sudanese capital Khartoum this month to protest alleged Islamist violations of an earlier pact. It has now said it is ready to go back.

[...]

“We should encourage them to have one common idea: a resolution of the crisis, stabilisation of Somalia and the creation of an environment that can allow the Somalis to ... create a government system that will work for everybody.”

Jordan is the moderate Muslim country where the Parliament declined on Islamic grounds to stiffen penalties for honor killings. From AFP, :

AMMAN - A Jordanian woman hacked her 26-year-old daughter to death in her sleep with an axe for giving birth out of wedlock, the Jordan Times reported Sunday.

The 69-year-old mother and another daughter turned themselves in to police after Saturday’s killing, claiming they had acted to cleanse the “family honour”, the paper said, quoting official sources.

They were charged with premeditated murder, the sources said.

The victim had been divorced for the past seven years and had given birth to a boy on the day she was murdered.

Hours later “her enraged mother decided to kill her to cleanse the family honour,” one official told the newspaper.

“The mother and daughter waited until the victim went to sleep, took an axe and hacked her repeatedly until they made sure she was dead,” the official said.

More than 10 women have been killed in similar “honour crimes” since January in the conservative Muslim kingdom.

More details of Naveed Haq's freelance jihad in Seattle: "Seattle suspect allegedly ambushed girl," from AP, with thanks to SD:

SEATTLE - The man suspected in a fatal shooting rampage hid behind a potted plant in a Jewish charity's foyer and forced his way through a security door by holding a gun to a 13-year-old girl's head, the police chief said Saturday.

Once inside, police say, Naveed Afzal Haq opened fire with two semiautomatic pistols. One woman, Pam Waechter, 58, of Seattle was killed at the scene. Five more women were wounded.

Haq, 30, was ordered held on $50 million bail Saturday pending formal charges of murder and attempted murder.

Haq, a Muslim, told authorities he was angered by the war in Iraq and U.S. military cooperation with Israel.

"He pointedly blamed the Jewish people for all of these problems," Seattle Police Chief Gil Kerlikowske said at a news conference Saturday.

According to a statement of probable cause, Haq told a 911 dispatcher: "These are Jews and I'm tired of getting pushed around and our people getting pushed around by the situation in the Middle East."

Muhammad Ullah, a close family friend and a senior member of a mosque founded in part by Haq's father, described Haq as a quiet loner with few friends.

In a statement, the Islamic Center of the Tri-Cities offered condolences to the shooting victims and said "we disassociate this act from our Islamic teachings and beliefs."

Great. What are you doing to teach your people not to adopt such attitudes toward Jews and modes of response to grievances?

Seattle police said Haq picked up the two handguns and spare ammunition just days earlier, and appeared to have targeted the federation after a cursory Internet search for Jewish organizations....

When Haq got on the phone with 911 operators, he identified himself by name and said, "This is a hostage situation and I want these Jews to get out," according to a statement of probable cause.

Juveline Jihad from Kashmir: "J&K children enlisted for terror attacks," from NDTV.com, with thanks to Kisan:

There is a new disturbing trend emerging among militant groups, as they enlist children to carry out terror attacks in Jammu and Kashmir.

Recently a 14-year-old boy Tipu was arrested for a grenade attack at a bus stand in the heart of Jammu that killed one person and left dozens wounded.

NDTV: How much money was given to you for throwing a grenade?

Tipu: I was given Rs 1000 for one throwing one grenade. The training given to me was that I was told couple of times how to throw a grenade, how to take out pin its and then throw it.

NDTV: Who told you?

Tipu: Abu Arbaz told me.

NDTV: Where does he live?

Tipu: He is a militant of Lashkar-e-Toiba and lives in Pakistan.

That is, our friend and ally.

Jonathan Rosenblum offers some common sense in the Jerusalem Post:

European criticism of Israeli military responses to attacks upon Israel and its citizens has become so formulaic that the various EU officials and foreign ministers can probably recite it in their sleep.

First comes a ritualistic acknowledgment of Israel's right to defend itself, followed inevitably by the accusation that the particular Israeli response was disproportionate. So automatic is the second statement that it completely vitiates the first.

The Europeans never bother to explain what response they would consider proportionate, or how those actions would obviate the threats to Israel's civilian population. After the Sbarro bombing, for instance, would the proportionate response have been to send an Israeli suicide bomber into a Ramallah pizzeria?

How do the Europeans know that Israel's actions are disproportionate? The "asymmetry in the reported death tolls," explains The New York Times's Steven Erlanger, in a July 19 news story. In short, there are too few dead Jews.

THE RELIANCE on death tolls to determine the propriety of Israeli military action is more than a little problematic. First, it turns warfare into a weird kind of boxing match in which you can only hit your adversary as hard as he hit you. That is not how either boxers or nations fight.

American UN ambassador John Bolton rightly ridiculed the European view of proportionality earlier this week. If Hizbullah kidnaps two Israeli soldiers, he asked, does that mean Israel can do nothing more in response than capture two Hizbullah operatives?

Something close to that view does, in fact, prevail among critics of Israeli military action. News stories denigrate the destructive capabilities of Palestinian weapons, for instance, and downplay the impact of those weapons on Jews living under their threat. Thus the Times's Erlanger quotes a Gaza resident who characterizes Kassams as nothing more than "needle pricks," even as he insists on the Palestinians' inalienable right to continue delivering those needle pricks.

To limit Israel's response to such "needle pricks" - actually it is usually far less, since Israel would never fire Kassams into Beit Hanun - constitutes an open invitation to aggressors, since they know in advance that they will never pay a higher price than the damage they inflict.

A MERE count of body bags further ignores the fact that those bags have a provenance. Many other questions have to be asked - for example, are the bodies those of combatants or civilians? If they are of civilians, were they killed because the enemy embedded military targets among the civilian population?

It is also relevant to know who started the fighting. How many Lebanese would have been killed by Israel in the past two weeks if Hizbullah had not attacked Israel within its internationally recognized border?

Read it all.

Of course, the use of civilian areas by Hizballah is being ignored yet again. From Australia's ABC, with thanks to JE:

Several houses collapsed and a three-storey building, where about 100 civilians were sheltering, was destroyed, witnesses and rescue workers said.

Israel's military said it had warned residents of Qana to leave and said Hezbollah bore responsibility for using it to fire rockets at the Jewish state.

"Hezbollah used the village of Qana as a base to launch rockets and it bears responsibility that this area is a combat zone," army spokesman Jacob Dalal told AFP.

[...]

Qana is already a potent symbol of Lebanese civilian deaths at the hands of Israel's military.

Israel has rejected responsibility for civilian deaths saying Hezbollah bore the blame because it used the village as a rocket-launching site.

Meanwhile in their latest attacks, Hezbollah militants have launched more than 90 rockets at northern Israel.

An Israeli commander, Shuki Shahar, says 1,700 rockets have been fired over the border so far.

"All of it were addressed to the cities, to the settlements, to the villages to hit the innocent population and we are acting exactly the opposite - we address all the fire to hit the terrorists."

This is not surprising. After all, the British authorities, like all Western authorities, don't even know what questions to ask in order to screen for this sort of thing. "Radical past of top Whitehall Islamic aide," from the TimesOnline, with thanks to Anon:

DISTURBING details have emerged about the radical background of the chief adviser on Islamic affairs at the Foreign Office.

Mockbul Ali, a 26-year-old civil servant, was involved in a Muslim student group that has published material supporting Palestinian female suicide bombers.

The Union of Muslim Students (UMS), which has been repeatedly praised by ministers as a paragon of moderate Islam, also carried articles in its newspaper by Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi, a Qatar-based preacher banned from entering America.

Leaked documents show that since joining the Foreign Office Ali has argued for Qaradawi to be allowed into Britain and played a part in sending Sharif Hasan al-Banna, president of the UMS, to Islamic conferences in Indonesia and Nigeria at taxpayers’ expense.

Eurabia Alert: "Jews warned against harassment," from Aftenposten, with thanks to Teri:

The Mosaic Religious Community has advised its Jewish members against speaking Hebrew loudly on the streets of Oslo or wearing Jewish emblems. The suggestion has infuriated some in the membership.

It comes after a Jewish man wearing a kippah, or yarmulke, was assaulted on an Oslo street Saturday. The Mosaic Religious Community wants its members to be careful.

"We have encouraged our members to avoid speaking Hebrew loudly on the street," Anne Sender of the Jewish organization told newspaper Vårt Land. She also told Norwegian Broadcasting (NRK) that men may want to reconsider wearing the yarmulke.

The Times presents this as a "new mission," when in fact it has been his mission all along. "Bali terror chief’s new mission," from the Times, with thanks to JE:

THE venerable preacher named as a terrorist leader by the United States had a twinkle in his eye as he talked of his new mission to convert Indonesia, the world’s biggest Muslim nation, into what he calls an “Allahcracy”.

Abu Bakar Bashir is a free man after serving just over two years in jail for participating in the conspiracy to bomb two nightclubs in Bali in 2002. The suicide attacks killed 202 people, including 88 Australians, 38 Indonesians and 26 British citizens.

He was in fine form, sitting with his lawyer, Akhmad Michdan, and six followers round a table at Jakarta airport strewn with the debris of a copious, if sober, lunch consumed at the expense of the infidel press.

“Bali was a reaction,” said Bashir, who has learnt to measure his inflammatory words with care since our last interview at his Islamic boarding school, three weeks before the bombings on the holiday island.

“With regard to the bombings everywhere, these are reactions by Muslims to defend themselves. Muslims are being tortured everywhere from Afghanistan to the Philippines. So these reactions against America are global.”

Bashir, 68, was flying to Sumatra on the latest stage of a celebrity preaching tour that has hardly stopped since he was released from jail last month, to the fury of the American and Australian governments.

His followers murmured in indignant approval at the words of their ustad, or teacher, several of them typing busily on BlackBerrys or mobile phones as they did so. They chuckled when he joked that he had turned down a speaking invitation from a mosque in Australia “because I’m not 100% popular there”.

“George Bush is trying to rot Islam from within,” Bashir continued, sipping a milkshake, “and America is attacking Indonesian Muslims — with ideas. That’s why I’m fighting America — but only with preaching and ideas, of course.”

Of course. And on that front Americans are not fighting at all.

A software programmer. No doubt another one of those desperately poor people we keep hearing so much about -- the ones who turn to jihad out of a sense of desperation. (Actually, study after study has shown that jihadists are generally more affluent than others in the societies from which they come.) "Brothers arrested over Bombay train blasts," from the Times Online, with thanks to JE:

Two brothers who have been linked to a Muslim militant group have been arrested by Indian police in connection with the Bombay train bombings which killed 183 people earlier this month.

Faizal Sheikh and Muzammil Sheikh were arrested yesterday by anti-terrorist investigators after being questioned on suspicion of being members of the Lashkar-e-Taiba group.

According to The Times of India, Faizal Sheikh is suspected of being the western India commander for Lashkar-e-Taiba, a banned militant group which is fighting against Indian control of part of disputed Kashmir.

He and his brother, a software programmer, will appear in court later today accused of conspiracy in connection with the blasts. Lashkar-e-Taiba has denied any role in the attacks.

Brash, the Muslims don't like your tone, buddy. Don't adopt that tone of voice with them. How dare you call for defense of democracy and the rule of law, religious and personal freedom and legal equality of the sexes? You dirty racist, you. Don't you realize that dhimmis are supposed to cower and burble about multiculturalism and never, never, never talk about any values that any Western state might have that might be worth defending?

From DPA, with thanks to JE:

A prominent New Zealand politician was accused of racism on Saturday after a speech in which he said immigrants who did not accept the country's "bedrock values" should not be allowed to stay.

Don Brash, leader of the conservative opposition National Party, defined the values as "an acceptance of democracy and the rule of law, religious and personal freedom and legal equality of the sexes".

Diversity in society was fine, but there could be too much of a good thing, he said told an immigration consultants' conference on Friday, likening it to drinking red wine.

"A certain amount is good for one's health - too much too quickly alters your personality and can be thoroughly bad."

Brash, who is the shadow prime minister, refused to specify who he was talking about, but Muslim group leaders had no doubt it was their people.

Javed Khan, president of the Federation of Islamic Associations, told Radio New Zealand the speech made it clear that Brash wanted immigrants to fit his view of a mainstream New Zealander, and therefore excluded people like Muslims.

Pancha Narayanan, president of the Federation of Ethnic Councils, said a comment by Brash that immigrants should have a good command of English, or quickly learn the language, was a sign that he would prefer them to come from English-speaking countries.

He said the speech had an element of racism and an anti-Muslim tone.

New Zealand's Race Relations Commissioner Joris De Bres ducked for cover, refusing to intervene and saying he would leave the debate on Brash's speech up to the public.

Good move, Joris.

We are already hearing from all over that the jihad shooter at the Seattle Jewish center, Naveed Haq, is simply "crazy."

A few points:

The entire Muslim world consists largely of people who are raised in a politico-theological belief-system that offers a Total Regulation of Life and a Complete Explanation of the Universe. The idea is that the Qur'an contains all of wisdom and includes all the scientific discoveries that have been made since its appearance, or that ever will be made. In this respect the Qur'an is like the famous Master of Balliol, Benjamin Jowett: "I am the master of this college/And what I don't know isn't knowledge.”

This idea, of course, is or must be rejected by the more intelligent. But the more intelligent have to be wary of expressing their doubts, for this totalitarian belief-system has its enforcers, or rather the Qur'an and Sunnah prescribe what should be done to those who fall away from Belief into Unbelief.

There is a great deal good that can be said, and should be said, about Victor Davis Hanson. Victor Davis Hanson has the right dislikes. His attacks on the American -- or at least the Californian -- university system are a pleasure to read. His contempt for those who are unfair to Israel, and his general take on the universe endear him to all sensible people.

However, much as one may permit oneself to admire him for the reasons enumerated above and for others still, there are elements of his writings that are not quite so winning. What is not endearing, and what has in fact been so disturbing and even maddening for the past 2 1/2 years, is his refusal to contemplate what the belief-system of Islam is all about -- even though in his writing he has made much of the influence of "culture" in explaining the success of Western man as warrior (those free Greeks, those serried ranks of Persian myrmidons).

As Sioniora tries to portray Israel as targeting civilians, it is good to see Israel not giving in, but pointing out the truth about how the jihadists try to provoke civilian deaths. From AFP, with thanks to JE:

Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Siniora has refused to meet US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice until a ceasefire is in place, after an Israeli bombing in southern Lebanon killed at least 51 civilians, many of them children.

Israel rejected responsibility for civilian deaths in the village of Qana, saying Hezbollah was to blame. An Israeli army spokesman alleged Hezbollah had used the village as a base from which to launch rockets. He said the Israeli military had warned residents for several days to leave the area.

Unholy Alliance Alert: here is still more evidence of the totalitarian Left's affection for the mujahedin. From AP, with thanks to JE:

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) - The presidents of Iran and Venezuela, leading U.S. critics, pledged Saturday to support one another in disputes with Washington, with the Iranian calling Hugo Chavez "a brother and trench mate."

As Chavez arrived for a two-day visit. Iran faced renewed international criticism for its nuclear program and for backing Hezbollah guerrillas in its war with Israel.

The five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council on Friday reached a deal on a resolution that would give Iran until the end of August to suspend uranium enrichment or face the threat of economic and diplomatic sanctions. Iranian state radio said Saturday the government would reject the proposed resolution.

Chavez pledged that his country would "stay by Iran at any time and under any condition."

Iran's president, Mahmoud Ahmedinejad, said he saw in the Venezuelan president a kindred spirit. "I feel I have met a brother and trench mate after meeting Chavez," the state-run Iranian television quoted Ahmedinejad.

Chavez, who peppers his speeches with mentions of assassination plots and purported U.S. efforts to oust him, said he admired the Iranian president for "his wisdom and strength."

Women-Only drinking fountains can't be far behind. Now all we need is an Iranian Rosa Parks. From Iran Focus, with thanks to JE:

Tehran, Iran, Jul. 29 – Iran will soon launch new women’s only parks in the holy city of Qom, south of Tehran.

The City Islamic Council in Qom announced that it had put forward a plan to segregate four of the city’s parks.

Sharia Alert from modern, moderate Indonesia. Actually, they got off lightly: the Qur’an commands lashes for adultery, but there is more to the story. The Qur'an says: “The woman and the man guilty of adultery or fornication, flog each of them with a hundred stripes. Let not compassion move you in their case, in a matter prescribed by Allah, if ye believe in Allah and the Last Day: and let a party of the Believers witness their punishment” (24:2). In another place Allah directs that adulterous women be confined to their homes until they die: “If any of your women are guilty of lewdness, take the evidence of four (reliable) witnesses from amongst you against them; and if they testify, confine them to houses until death do claim them, or Allah ordain for them some (other) way” (Qur’an 4:15).

These punishments are harsh enough, but at least they seem to hold out some hope that the traditional Islamic penalty of stoning for adultery, which is still carried out in states that enforce Sharia in its fullness, can be mitigated. However, that hope is illusory. The Hadith says that the Qur’an originally contained a verse enjoining stoning for adultery, but it was inadvertently dropped:

Allah sent Muhammad with the Truth and revealed the Book (the Qur’an) to him, and among what Allah revealed, was the Verse of the Rajam (the stoning of married person (male and female) who commits illegal sexual intercourse, and we did recite this Verse and understood and memorized it. Allah’s Messenger did carry out the punishment of stoning and so did we after him.

I am afraid that after a long time has passed, somebody will say, “By Allah, we do not find the Verse of the Rajam in Allah’s Book,” and thus they will go astray by leaving an obligation which Allah has revealed. And the punishment of the Rajm is to be inflicted to any married person (male and female) who commits illegal sexual intercourse if the required evidence is available or there is conception or confession.

So in this Indonesia really is moderate: all they got was the lash -- and so few lashes! Isn't Islamic moderation grand?

From Reuters, with thanks to Liz:

BANDA ACEH, Indonesia (Reuters) - Two people in Indonesia's Aceh have been caned for adultery, the latest case of public punishments since courts in the province were allowed to implement Islamic sharia law. Indonesia is the world's most populous Muslim nation but only Aceh has the right to adopt sharia law in the judicial system.

Aceh courts received that freedom in 2003 as part of an autonomy package Jakarta offered in an attempt to quell separatist passions in the province, where thousands died in a long-running insurgency.

``Both of them were arrested by sharia police in a kiosk in Sawang district two weeks ago after they were caught in an intimate situation,'' Tengku Marnus Labsyar, head of the South Aceh Sharia's office, told Reuters by telephone.

He said the woman was a 23-year-old widow, while the married man was a 35-year-old teacher.

Television footage showed first the man and then the woman, both dressed in white, given nine and seven strokes respectively with a rattan stick on a platform surrounded by a jeering crowd in the compound of the Kasik Putih mosque in Samadua, a town in the south of Aceh.

The woman was led away sobbing after receiving her punishment from a blindfolded man man wearing a red robe. The caning took place on Friday.

More details on the jihadist killer who murdered one and wounded five at the Jewish Federation of Greater Seattle yesterday. "Hatred hits home: 6 shot at Jewish office," from the Seattle Times, with thanks to Rudi:

A Muslim man angry with Israel barged into the offices of the Jewish Federation of Greater Seattle Friday afternoon and opened fire with a handgun, killing one woman and wounding five others before surrendering to police.

Three of the women were in critical condition late Friday.

A law-enforcement source identified the arrested suspect as Naveed Afzal Haq, 30, who until recently had lived in Everett, and said Haq apparently has a history of mental illness. Court records show Haq has a charge of lewd conduct pending against him in Benton County.

So that is what the focus will be upon: mental illness and lewd conduct. And once again the media will ignore the question of why a man who describes himself as a Muslim American angry at Israel would think that murder of innocents was an appropriate outlet for his anger. No one will ever consider whether such behavior is encouraged by the texts and atmospherics of Islam, and if so, what can be done about it.

The shooting came a day after the FBI had warned Jewish organizations nationwide to be on alert after Hezbollah leaders in Lebanon and al-Qaida's second in command urged that the war raging in the Middle East be carried to the U.S. However, the law-enforcement source, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said there is no evidence Haq was involved with any group.

When (if ever) will law enforcement officials realize that it is enough for Zawahiri and others to say this sort of thing? That that in itself is enough to move some Muslims to act? There doesn't need to be any organizational connection for there to be an ideological connection, an identity of motive and goal.

"He said he hates Israel," said the source, who is part of the Seattle Joint Terrorism Task Force, which was called in to help investigate the shootings.

David Gomez, the assistant special agent-in-charge of the Seattle FBI office, said there is "nothing to indicate he is part of a larger organization."

"We believe he is a lone individual with antagonism toward this organization," said Gomez.

He didn't say he was angry with the Jewish Center. He said he was angry with Israel. Israel is not an organization. It is a sovereign state.

Witnesses said the man announced he was an Muslim American as he forced his way into the federation offices just after 4 p.m. and fired randomly at employees with a semiautomatic 9-mm handgun. Seattle Police Assistant Chief Nick Metz said there were at least 18 people in the offices when the shooting started.

Witnesses say the gunman shot one receptionist, then ordered her to dial 911. He then took the phone from her.

"He told the police that it was a hostage situation and he wanted us to get our weapons out of Israel," said one woman who heard the account from the wounded co-worker.

Yes, this is all about mental illness. This has nothing to do with jihadist hostage-taking and murder.

The woman, who would not allow her name to be used, said she was at her desk when she heard what she thought were balloons popping.

"It went 'Pop! Pop! Pop! Pop! Pop!' and then we heard a woman scream," said the employee. The man surrendered about 15 minutes after the shooting started. The center is located on Third Avenue between Lenora and Virginia streets in Belltown.

During a news conference Friday night, Seattle Police Chief Gil Kerlikowske said that, based on the conversation Haq had with 911 dispatchers, police are treating the shootings as a hate crime.

A Harborview Medical Center spokesman said all the victims were women, ranging in age from their early 20s to 40s. Three were in critical condition and underwent surgery Friday evening. One woman, age 43, was shot in the abdomen, according to Seattle Fire Department medics. Another was 17 weeks pregnant.

One of the victims was identified by family members as 23-year-old Layla Bush. "We just heard she's alive a minute or two ago," said her mother, Kathryn Bush, from her home in Panama City, Fla. The other wounded victims have been identified as Carol Goldman, Dayna Klein, Christina Rexroad and Cheryl Stumbo.

Most of the shooting victims were able to flee the building. Federation employee Marla Meislin-Dietrich said security videotapes show the gunman shoved his way past another employee who had just entered a pass code to open a security door.

"He was armed and he pushed his way in," she said.

Amy Wasser-Simpson, the vice president for planning and community services for the Jewish Federation, said the man told staff members, "I'm a Muslim American; I'm angry at Israel," then began shooting, Wasser-Simpson said she heard the account from staff members who witnessed the shootings....

Haq's father, Mian A. Haq, was a founding member of the Islamic Centre of Tri-Cities in Richland, said center member Youseff Shehadeh. He described the younger Haq as a loner who attended holidays at the center but was barely involved in recent years.

Naveed Haq's parents moved into a new suburb in Pasco less than three years ago after living in nearby Richland for more than a decade, said Maureen Hales, a neighbor.

Mian Haq was involved in an Islamic center in Richland, but he did not discuss his religion with his neighbors, said Hales.

She said she had not seen Naveed Haq, but found his parents and his younger brother, Hasan, to be "quite enjoyable." The two families exchanged food, and Maureen Hales said she watches the Haqs' house when they're away.

Naveed Haq lived in an apartment building at 2924 Nassau St. in Everett until about two weeks ago, when he abruptly left, said tenant Chris Richey. The landlady told Richey that Haq was heading to Pakistan. Richie often talked with Haq about guns and politics, though little stuck out. Richey said Haq didn't like President Bush....

"There was something strange about him," Richey said. "There was something about him I didn't like."

A friend, Andres Atencio, 29, a real-estate agent in Maple Valley, said he lost touch with Haq after high school. He described Haq as studious and friendly.

"He was pretty much just a normal guy. He was a little more toward the academic side than the average high-school person," Atencio said. "He was the kind of guy when you talked to him he was always laughing ... not outgoing but not reclusive either."...

Kerlikowske said extra officers would be posted at temples, synagogues and mosques in the area even though Seattle police and the FBI believe the shooter acted alone.

He said police would be posted at mosques to prevent "retaliatory" crimes.

Great. I'm glad of that. But it should be borne in mind that there have been virtually no such "relatiatory" crimes -- not in North Carolina after Taheri-azar committed his jihad attack in Chapel Hill, not after another jihadist shot up the El Al ticket counter at LAX, and not after other Muslims have committed jihad hate attacks in the U.S.

The Washington, D.C.-based Council on American-Islamic Relations, issued a statement calling the shootings a "senseless attack on a religious institution."

"The American Muslim and Jewish communities must do whatever is within their power to prevent the current conflict in the Middle East from being transplanted to this country," the council said.

Good. Then I expect CAIR will stop enflaming tensions with trumped-up hate crimes and speciously vague condemnations of terrorism.

Here is the obligatory story about what a great guy Haq is and what a surprise this is -- also from the Seattle Times, with thanks to Rudi.

Nou Shalhoub is dead. Nasrallah still lives. "Report: Hizbullah leader killed in IAF strike," from the Jerusalem Post, with thanks to Sr. Soph:

A senior Hizbullah leader, Nou Shalhoub, was killed Friday afternoon in an IAF strike in the Bekaa Valley in Lebanon.

Shalhoub was responsible for obtaining advanced weaponry for Hizbullah, Channel 10 reported.

Violent intimidation to achieve political goals. "Lebanon protesters mob PM," from the Sunday Times, with thanks to Sr. Soph and Liz:

VIOLENT scuffles have broken out between police and Lebanese protesters who mobbed Prime Minister John Howard's car as he left the WA Liberal Party conference in Perth.

Mr Howard was leaving the WA Liberal Party state conference when about 200 protesters, many of whom were waving Lebanese flags and shouting "we want peace'', mobbed his vehicle.

Punching, kicking, and throwing projectiles: now there's a good way to show your desire for peace.

Protesters punched, kicked and threw projectiles at Mr Howard's car as police struggled to keep them at bay.

Mr Howard's entourage sped from the scene as police wrestled protesters to the ground.

The Prime Minister said this week he understood Israel's decision to carry out its devastating military offensive against Lebanon to put an end to attacks by Hizbollah guerrillas who have fired rockets deep into Israeli territory.

At least one protester was arrested and taken away by police.

Protesters later continued their rally along one of Perth's main streets calling for peace in the middle east.

Protest leader Muhammad El Khatib said he has family in Lebanon and the Australian government is not doing enough to broker peace in the region.

"There are mothers watching their children die,'' Mr El Khatib said.

Muhammad El Khatib has been to choir practice. He knows the tune the media loves to hear sung.

Courtroom jihad in Britain. The British dhimmis will now have to spend another huge sum of money to reconvict this jihadist thug -- all because some members of the British press had enough spine left to report on his words accurately. From the Telegraph, with thanks to JE:

The radical Islamic cleric Abu Hamza was given leave to appeal yesterday against his conviction for soliciting to murder on the grounds of the bad publicity he had received before and during the trial.

Hamza's lawyers claimed he was unable to get a fair trial because he had become the most notorious person in Britain after the attacks of September 11, 2001 and July 7, 2005.

Edward Fitzgerald, QC, said putting Hamza on trial six years after the last of the speeches was delivered was comparable to putting Hitler on trial after the end of the Second World War for speeches he made in the 1920s.

Mr Fitzgerald told the Appeal Court that almost every story about terrorism since those events had been accompanied by a picture of Hamza with his hook.

"In many ways he was the most notorious person in Britain," Mr Fitzgerald said. "People would say, 'Abu Hamza, ah, this is Captain Hook'."

It was now impossible to put Hamza on trial in the circumstances that prevailed when he made the speeches between 1997 and 2000.

"The lapse of time has left him exposed to an unfair trial. He couldn't be tried in the atmosphere when he made the speeches. He could only be tried in an atmosphere poisoned by these events," Mr Fitzgerald said, referring to the bombings in New York, Madrid and London.

So where are you going to try him, Fitzgerald? Fiji?

The jihadists who were hailed by some segments of the dhimmi Western press as bringing peace and unity to a country that has been torn apart by chaos for well over a decade now seems to be bringing it only more strife and chaos. From the BBC, with thanks to JE:

Riots have broken out in the Somali town of Baidoa after a minister in the transitional government was shot dead. Minister Abdallah Isaaq Deerow was killed outside a mosque in Baidoa, where the government is based.

On Thursday, at least 19 members of the transitional government - which controls only a small area - resigned.

In another development, a second cargo plane has landed in Mogadishu, fuelling allegations that the Islamic forces who control the city are receiving arms.

Mr Deerow, minister of constitutional affairs, was killed after Friday prayers at the mosque.

Later on Friday, hundreds of people took to the streets of Baidoa in protest at his killing, burning tyres and looting shops.

Mr Deerow was not among the group of ministers who resigned on Thursday.

Obstacle

The resignations were prompted by some ministers' dissatisfaction that Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Ghedi had failed to make progress in talks with the Union of Islamic Courts, which controls Mogadishu.

Public Works Minister Osman Ali Atto said he came back from the capital to the government's base with an agreement from the Islamic courts that fresh talks be held.

But he said that Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Ghedi was "an obstacle to progress" and had refused to listen.

Some MPs are planning a motion of no confidence in the government.

Western Resistance has the full story.

Cardinal Pell's backbone remains strong. He remarks: "I am not sure how much Mr Hamza's comments improve the situation, but there are no teachings of Jesus, unlike Mohammed, which advocate violence against followers of other religions."

I will show the truth of the Cardinal's words about Muhammad in immense detail in my forthcoming book The Truth About Muhammad.

Meanwhile, if this debate actually takes place, it will show that Cardinal Pell is anything but ignorant of Islam, as Abu Hamza (not the hook-handed British preacher) predictably charges. And it may put into the public debate some issues that the dhimmi PC media seems bent on hiding. I hope it happens.

A jihad murder in Seattle. "One dead, at least five injured in shooting at Jewish Federation in Seattle," from KING5.com, with thanks to Ken:

SEATTLE – One person has been killed and at least five others have been injured in a shooting at the Jewish Federation at 2031 Third Ave. in downtown Seattle. One suspect has been taken into custody.

Police have taken one person into custody. Seattle police spokesman Rich Pruitt said police are confident that only one shooter was involved.

Sources told KING 5 the suspect is a Pakistani man with a criminal background. He is from the Tri-Cities but his citizenship is unknown. Officials are on the way to the Tri-Cities to interview his family.

According to the Seattle Times, a man got through security at the Jewish Federation and told staff members, "I'm a Muslim American; I'm angry at Israel," then began shooting, according to Amy Wasser-Simpson, the vice president for planning and community services for the Jewish Federation.

If he has no ties to Al-Qaeda, Hamas, or Hizballah, officials will hasten to assure us that this was not a terrorism-related murder. After all, non-Muslims go on killing sprees, don't they? Of course; but until officials address the ideology that fuels killings such as this, there will be a peculiarly high occurrence of "random" incidents such as this in which the one who "snaps" is, coicidentally, a Muslim who believes deeply in jihad warfare.

"My Brother Against My Brother, But Both Of Us Against Our Cousin" Alert from AKI, with thanks to Sr. Soph:

Doha, 27 July (AKI) - The latest statement by Ayman al-Zawahiri aired on Thursday by al-Jazeera is an unprecedented step by the number two leader of a Sunni militant group towards Shiite movements and perhaps even the Hezbollah militias. At the end of the statement announcing that al-Qaeda will avenge Israel's offensive on Lebanon and the Palestinians, Al-Zawahiri launches an appeal to the 'disposessed of the world' (in Arabic 'Mustadifin fil ard'), a Koranic term often used by the founder of the Islamic Republic Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini in his speeches following the 1979 revolution.

Such a quote by the man who is widely considered al-Qaeda's strategist is unlikely to be a coincidence. An overture to a potential alliance with the Shiites must be viewed as part of a new Middle Eastern context within which the leader of the Shiite militia Hezbollah, Hassan Nasralla, is consider the new leader in the war on Israel.

A useful overview of Hizballah's ties with Iran: "Hezbollah's hate, made in Iran," from the National Post, with thanks to Sr. Soph:

For the last two weeks, innocent Israelis have been killed in missile barrages from Lebanese-based Hezbollah terrorists and militia. On the other side of the border, more than 300 Lebanese civilians have been accidentally killed by Israeli bombs aimed at Hezbollah assets. Meanwhile, Israeli soldiers have engaged with Hezbollah gunmen in ground combat, with both sides taking heavy casualties. All this loss of life was caused by Hezbollah's decision to stage an unprovoked act of war on uncontested, sovereign Israeli soil two weeks ago.

But why did Hezbollah do it? Since the government of Lebanon and most ordinary Lebanese people plainly didn't want this war, who did? Who is pulling Hezbollah's strings?

HERE ARE A FEW CLUES:

- The Shiite terrorist group receives US$120-million in annual financing from Tehran, where it operates an office on a central downtown street.

- Hezbollah was created by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). Several hundred IRGC officers are operating in Lebanon to this day, assisting Hezbollah's war effort.

- According to Western intelligence sources, over the last six months, the IRGC has been teaching Hezbollah how to operate its massive stock of rockets, many of which are from Iran. These include Zelzal missiles, which can reach Tel Aviv and beyond.

- On Wednesday, more than 60 Iranian self-declared suicide bombers, bedecked in Hezbollah paraphernalia, set off from Tehran in a "holy war" against Israeli forces in Lebanon.

- Yesterday, a Kuwaiti newspaper broke the news that Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah is travelling to Damascus for secret meetings with Iranian Supreme National Security Council Secretary Ali Larijani.

- During fighting in Lebanon, Israeli soldiers have seized weaponry marked with the logo of Iranian military manufacturers, such as the grenade launcher featured in the photo below.

- Earlier this month, Iranian troops assisted Hezbollah in firing a C-802 radar-guided missile at an Israeli warship, killing several crew members and nearly sinking the craft.

- Iranian officials met with Hezbollah leaders in Damascus on July 12, the very day this conflict started and -- as David Frum has noted on these pages -- the same day Western nations announced a threat of economic sanctions against Iran if the Islamic Republic refused to curtail its nuclear program.

Read it all.

In line with my brief posting here. Note the information about Hizballah launching attacks from civilian Christian areas. That way, if Israel responds, civilians are killed, giving Hizballah grist for its propaganda mill, but the dead civilians are just Christians, so no harm, no foul. "Christians Fleeing Lebanon Denounce Hezbollah," from, of all places, the New York Times, with thanks to Sr. Soph:

TYRE, Lebanon, July 27 — The refugees from southern Lebanon spilled out of packed cars into the dark street here Thursday evening, gulping bottles of water and squinting in the glare of the headlights to find family members and friends. Many had not eaten in days. Most had not had clean drinking water for some time. There were wounded swathed in makeshift dressings, and a baby just 16 days old.

But for some of the Christians who had made it out in this convoy, it was not just privations they wanted to talk about, but their ordeal at the hands of Hezbollah — a contrast to the Shiites, who make up a vast majority of the population in southern Lebanon and broadly support the militia.

“Hezbollah came to Ain Ebel to shoot its rockets,” said Fayad Hanna Amar, a young Christian man, referring to his village. “They are shooting from between our houses.”

“Please,’’ he added, “write that in your newspaper.”

[...]

Many Christians from Ramesh and Ain Ebel considered Hezbollah’s fighting methods as much of an outrage as the Israeli strikes. Mr. Amar said Hezbollah fighters in groups of two and three had come into Ain Ebel, less than a mile from Bint Jbail, where most of the fighting has occurred. They were using it as a base to shoot rockets, he said, and the Israelis fired back.

One woman, who would not give her name because she had a government job and feared retribution, said Hezbollah fighters had killed a man who was trying to leave Bint Jbail.

“This is what’s happening, but no one wants to say it” for fear of Hezbollah, she said.

Note that the New Duranty Times provides no supporting evidence for its assertion that these Lebanese Christians are outraged by the Israeli strikes as much as they are by Hizballah -- unless you count the statements by a Muslim they quote at the end of the article.

In my book Onward Muslim Soldiers, I discuss the fact that many jihadists travel from country to country, seeking to fight in the latest jihad -- and giving the lie to the common assumption that jihad conflicts around the world are actually just a series of nationalistic struggles.

"Iranians volunteer to fight Jihad against Israel," from AP, with thanks to the Constantinopolitan Irredentist:

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) — Surrounded by yellow Hezbollah flags, more than 60 Iranian volunteers set off Wednesday to join what they called a holy war against Israeli forces in Lebanon.

The group — ranging from teenagers to grandfathers — plans to join about 200 other volunteers on the way to the Turkish border, which they hope to cross Thursday. They plan to reach Lebanon via Syria on the weekend.

Organizers said the volunteers are carrying no weapons, and it was not clear whether Turkey would allow them to pass.

If Turkey lets them pass, it will once again demonstrate its unfitness for EU membership.

In saying this, Jan Egeland demonstrates that he doesn't have the first foggiest idea of what Islamic jihad is or how it operates. If he did, he would know that Muslims in Lebanon and elsewhere can't possibly hate Israel more than they already do simply because it exists, and thereby constitutes an affront to the Islamic idea that land that once belonged to the Dar al-Islam belongs to it forever. If the Israelis had been completely supine in the face of Hizballah's rocket barrages, Muslims would not love them one whit more than they do now.

Of course, jihadists will use trumped-up Israeli atrocities in Lebanon to stir up a sense of grievance among Muslims, so as to gain recruits. They did the same thing with Abu Ghraib, the Qur'an-flushing non-incident, the Danish cartoons, and many other pretexts. The error that most Western analysts continue to fall into is that they take this propaganda at face value. Not recognizing that it is all actually in service of the jihad imperative, they believe that if they redress these alleged "injustices" by granting various concessions to Muslims, they will make the jihad go away. They don't realize that the jihadists will simply find another pretext and keep up the pressure.

From the Jerusalem Post, with thanks to all who sent this in:

United Nations humanitarian chief Jan Egeland accused Israel on Wednesday of committing "catastrophic mistakes" in its attack on Hizbullah, which have caused civilian casualties and alienated the Lebanese public.

"It will create a generation of hatred," he said in an interview held with The Jerusalem Post after he had concluded tours of northern Israel, Gaza and Lebanon.

"I'm talking more as a friend of Israel than as an aid worker," said Egeland, who noted that he studied at Jerusalem's Hebrew University as a Truman Fellow, while his brother lived on a kibbutz.

The UN's under secretary-general for humanitarian affairs and emergency relief coordinator, Egeland called for an immediate cessation of hostilities. "The rockets have to stop. The terror has to stop. But please remember that for every civilian killed in Israel there are more than 10 killed in Lebanon. It has to stop on both sides." He charged that Israel had used "excessive" and "disproportionate" force in violation of international humanitarian law, and dismissed Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni's contention that proportionality is measured in relation to the threat posed by a force.

This is ridiculous. As others have pointed out, wars are not conducted according to a principle of proportionality. No general ever counted casualties during World War I or World War II or any other war and then told his troops that they could only inflict that same number of casualties on the enemy, and no more. That is not how wars are won. As General Patton pointed out, the object war is not to die for your country, but to make the other SOB die for his. Only in our pusillanimous age have we forgotten that war is an ugly business, and that wars are fought to be won. The media establishment also persists, because of its ideological affinity with the forces arrayed against America and Israel, in refusing to apply the same standards to the jihadists that it applies to those who are resisting them.

Iraqi Sunnis are...targeting civilians! Expect an immense outcry from the Islamic world, condemning them roundly!

What's that? There won't be an outcry? This charge is only a stick used to beat the Israelis and Americans, despite the fact that jihadists stage their attacks from civilian areas in order to provoke responses they can use to score propaganda points? What are you, some kind of Islamophobe?

From the Los Angeles Times via the Seattle Times, with thanks to Arjun:

BAGHDAD, Iraq — A multi-pronged attack on one of the city's most well-heeled quarters Thursday killed at least 31 Iraqi civilians and left behind scores of wounded, most of them moderate, middle-class Shiite Muslims shopping in one of the capital's only vibrant commercial districts.

At least five blasts struck the Karradah area of central Baghdad, including a devastating car bomb that set shops ablaze and incinerated passers-by along a crowded strip of butcher shops.

In "Crusade in a New Setting?" in Arab News (thanks to Sr. Soph), Hassan Tahsin paints a fantasy picture of an Islamic world more sinned against than sinning, and characterizes Israel's self-defense against the global jihad as an aggressive, bloody Crusade. The ludicrousness of this in light of international jihad terrorism, and particularly the relentless jihad against Israel, does not diminish the fact that this sort of analysis is exactly what plays best not only in the Islamic world but among the American and Western Left.

Hassan Tahsin in this is mining a venerable tradition, as old as the Crusades themselves. In my book The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam (and the Crusades), I show how Muslim reactions to the First Crusade treated it as a gratuitous act of aggression by the Christian West, and completely ignored (as does Tahsin) the 450 years of Islamic jihad aggression that preceded the Crusades. Wolfgang Bruno points out today that this is in line with the Islamic understanding that jihad is intrinsically an act of justice, not aggression; only infidels can be aggressors. That is absolutely true; it is also true that the stonewalling unanimity of Muslim spokesmen in maintaining that they are the victims, not the perpetrators, is immensely impressive as a propaganda tool -- particularly in today's culture of victimology, in which victims are accorded privileged status.

Arab and Muslim countries are being subjected to savage attacks, which are reminiscent of the brutalities of the Tartars of the Middle Ages or Crusaders before that. The only difference is that Israel takes the place of Tartars and Crusaders.

The Western threat is also looming over Syria and Iran whom the West blames for the present bloodshed in the region. The West also continues meddling in Iraq and Afghanistan apart from creating trouble in Darfur and threatening Sudan with sanctions. The Westerners are also upset because the Islamic Courts forces have succeeded in bringing back considerable amount of peace and security to Somalia.

The American-supported Israeli terror acts have, paradoxically, been unleashed in Palestine and Lebanon under the pretext of fighting international terror.

People in the Middle East still remember US President George Bush using the word “Crusade” in a speech following the 9/11 attacks alluding to the centuries-old unjust wars of the Christian kings against the people in the Arab and Muslim countries in the Middle East. Though the president retracted his words later explaining it as a mistake in translation, the later events make one wonder whether the present day attacks were not the forerunners of the approaching crusades under new names.

European colonialist kings with the prompting and blessings of the 11th century Christian religious leaders had set out to finishing off the uncivilized Muslims in the Middle East. The Crusades began in 1097 and the campaigns ended with the fall of Acre in 1291.

An illuminating new piece from the European essayist Wolfgang Bruno:

Andrew G. Bostom, editor of "The Legacy of Jihad," notes that President Bush has repeatedly stressed the paramount importance of promoting freedom in the Middle East. However, Bostom points out that Hurriyya, the Arabic for "freedom," and the uniquely Western concept of freedom "are completely at odds." Hurriyya - "freedom" - is – as Ibn Arabi (d. 1240) the lionized "Greatest Sufi Master," expressed it -"perfect slavery" under the will of Allah. Bernard Lewis, in his analysis of hurriyya for the venerated Encyclopedia of Islam, maintains that:

"…there is still no idea that the subjects have any right to share in the formation or conduct of government—to political freedom, or citizenship, in the sense which underlies the development of political thought in the West."

Meanwhile, the German-Syrian scholar Bassam Tibi, a Muslim reformist, is warning the West against wishful thinking in its "dialogue" with Muslims. "The dialogue is not proceeding well because of the two-facedness of most Muslim interlocutors on the one hand and the gullibility of well-meaning Western idealists on the other."

Muslims frequently claim, to obscure the realities of the war against non-Muslims, that "Islam means peace." The word "Islam" does indeed come from the same three-letter Arabic root (s-l-m) as the word "salaam," peace. "Islam," however, means "submission," not peace. "Peace" in Islam equals submission to the will of Allah through his divine and eternal law, sharia. The absence of sharia is the absence of peace. Bassam Tibi explains: "First, both sides should acknowledge candidly that although they might use identical terms these mean different things to each of them. The word 'peace,' for example, implies to a Muslim the extension of the Dar al-Islam – or 'House of Islam' – to the entire world," explained Tibi. "This is completely different from the Enlightenment concept of eternal peace that dominates Western thought, a concept developed by Immanuel Kant," an 18th-century philosopher. "Similarly, when Muslims and the Western heirs of the Enlightenment speak of tolerance they have different things in mind. In Islamic terminology, this term implies abiding non-Islamic monotheists, such as Christians, Jews and Zoroastrians, as second-class believers. They are 'dhimmi,' a protected but politically immature minority." According to Tibi, the quest of converting the entire world to Islam is an immutable fixture of the Muslim worldview. Only if this task is accomplished, if the world has become a "Dar al-Islam," will it also be a "Dar a-Salam," or a house of peace."

This strategy of deceiving non-Muslims by twisting words to conceal the real, Islamic agenda while Muslims are not yet strong enough to impose their will is sanctioned by Islamic texts. IslamOnline quotes Sheikh `Atiyyah Saqr, former head of Al-Azhar Fatwa Committee, in stating:

"Lying is forbidden unless it is for necessity. In that case, the principle "necessity makes the unlawful permissible" applies. (…) Some of these acceptable lies is what we call connotation, a word carrying a double meaning. The Muslim may use the positive not the negative interpretation of the word."

Robert Spencer, who gives examples of this in his book "Onward Muslim Soldiers," confirms this:

"Religious deception of unbelievers is indeed taught by the Qur'an itself: "Let not the believers take for friends or helpers unbelievers rather than believers. If any do that, in nothing will there be help from Allah; except by way of precaution, that ye may guard yourselves from them" (Qur'an 3:28). In other words, don't make friends with unbelievers except to "guard yourselves from them": pretend to be their friends so that you can strengthen yourself against them. The distinguished Qur'anic commentator Ibn Kathir explains that this verse teaches that if "believers who in some areas or times fear for their safety from the disbelievers," they may "show friendship to the disbelievers outwardly, but never inwardly."

This strategy seems to be working quite well with the dhimmis of the European Union, who are now promoting an official dictionary to use when writing about matters related to Islam. "Jihad means something for you and me, it means something else for a Muslim. Jihad is a perfectly positive concept of trying to fight evil within yourself," said an EU official. Really? Writing over six decades ago, Arthur Jeffery belittled as "the sheerest sophistry" such attempts to rewrite the bloody reality of Jihad:

".. .the early Arabic sources quite plainly and frankly describe the expeditions as military expeditions, and it would never have occurred to anyone at that day to interpret them as anything else…"

Armed Jihad is not just a thing of the past. Observers of school textbooks in Egypt of the present age note that "[the] concept of jihad is interpreted in the Egyptian school curriculum almost exclusively as a military endeavour." Majid Khadduri, a Muslim scholar, whose 1955 treatise on Jihad remains one of the most respected analyses of this institution, summarized these consensus views, as follows:

"The Prophet Muhammad is reported to have declared 'some of my people will continue to fight victoriously for the sake of the truth until the last one of them will combat the anti-Christ.' Until that moment is reached the jihad, in one form or another will remain as a permanent obligation upon the entire Muslim community. It follows that the existence of a dar al-harb is ultimately outlawed under the Islamic jural order; that the dar al-Islam is permanently under jihad obligation until the dar al-harb is reduced to non-existence (…) The universality of Islam, in its all embracing creed, is imposed on the believers as a continuous process of warfare, psychological and political if not strictly military."

This editorial, or "analysis" from the Islamic Republic News Agency offers a look into the distorted lens through which Iran views the present conflict between Israel and Hizballah. Their twisted version of reality would be endlessly amusing if it weren't the basis for policies and aspirations that pose such a threat to the rest of the world.

Israeli attempts to destroy the Islamic resistance of Lebanon overnight turned to a full-scale war Israel has unleashed against innocent civilians of Lebanon.

The occupying regime of Israel used taking two Israeli soldiers as captives by Hizbollah as a pretext to embark on aggression on Lebanon from the air, ground and the sea.

The occupiers in Tel Aviv thought that they would implement the plan for destroying Hizbollah within three or five days and make preparations for other targets against regional states.

But, the Zionist occupiers did not know that Lebanese resistance movement enjoys popular support. They did not know military power of Hizbollah and were not aware of their own capability as well.

They have admitted after two weeks of heavy and destructive bombardment of Lebanon that they could not attain their goals despite heavy price they paid for their savage attacks.

Now, the Zionist regime's military and political people have begun to criticize each other for such a failure to the extent that American media have disclosed the differences in the occupied territories despite [the fact that] Israel had appealed for censorship of the news about Lebanon conflict.

Israeli so-called political people say that the military officers have not provided them with accurate information and have dragged the occupying regime to a war with dark future bringing mishap for the Zionists.

In contrast, the military people describe the political people as lacking enough courage to press ahead with great targets! The feedback from confrontation of resistance movement of Lebanon with the armed-to-the-teeth military of the occupying regime has surprised the observers.

The Zionist regime enjoying billions of dollars worth of military supplies of the US and Britain every year has now drawn to a desperation.

[...]

The international community should fulfill its obligation to end the current crisis which may engulf other areas and find regional and international dimensions.

The international community has realized that it should stop bloodshed in Lebanon and the only way out of the current tragedy is establishment of an immediate ceasefire.

The United Nations and majority of the countries are calling for ceasefire, but, the United States and Israeli leaders are opposing.

So... they're desperate for a ceasefire, but they're opposed to a ceasefire... and Iran wants that same ceasefire that Israel is "desperate" for as well, because Israel is losing. Gotcha.

This indicates the real nature of the US and Israel.

Ibrahim Hooper, call your office. Retired Pakistani General Muhammad Nasir Akhtar seems to think that jihad has something to do with hot warfare. Now where could he have gotten such an idea?

Hmmm. Maybe from reading the Qur'an and studying the Sunnah?

"'Our religion says to fight for jihad,'" from Rediff.com, with thanks to the Constantinopolitan Irredentist:

Lieutenant General Muhammad Nasir Akhtar (retd) served in the Pakistan army for 36 years and took part in two wars against India....

While upbeat about the peace process in an interview to Managing Editor (National Affairs) Sheela Bhatt, General Akhtar proudly proclaims that the Pakistan army is a Muslim army fighting for jihad.

[...]

The Pakistan army is considered hawkish and is believed to be highly Islamised.

All armies are hawkish, otherwise we can't survive.

When you talk of the Islamisation of the Pakistan army you must realise that we are Muslims. Right? We have lived with Indians before. A large section migrated to Pakistan from India. Now all of us are religious Muslims, but we are not fundamentalists.

We are practicing Muslims. Our army is the most modern army. But we are Muslims and our religion says to fight for jihad.

All over the world the armies fight with religion in their minds. Christians do. Yes, we are a Muslim army. There is no denying that fact. It has always been Islamised.

All armies have religion on their minds. When an Indian Muslim soldier fights against us he too has his motherland and his religion on his mind as an Iraqi would have when fighting against a Kuwaiti. When Pakistanis fight they fight for Pakistan and also for Islam.

Our religion says to fight for jihad.

When you accept that you are fighting for religion, you are targeting Hindus. There is a kind of malice.

Why do you say that? Haven't Muslims ruled the subcontinent for 800 years? Haven't Hindus and Muslims lived together? Haven't you fought the First War of Independence against the British in 1857? You are always fighting for a cause.

Jihad is one of the important factors when you fight. It is a greater motivation.

What are the differences between the Indian and Pakistani armies?

The Indian Army is very professional and hardworking. Basically, the Indian Army is predominantly a Hindu army and the Pakistan army is a Muslim army. The fundamental difference is in the religious approach.

During the wars with Pakistan, the Indian Army was fighting for the nation, not for a religion.

Pakistanis also fight for the motherland. It is not a religious war between us. It is a war for Kashmir. But when you are fighting, religion does play a predominant role. You have to motivate the troops. And the troops can only be motivated through religion....

Iraq had a troubled history. I will not be surprised if Iraq is spilt into three small principalities. Basra for the Shias, the Baghdad triangle for the Sunnis and Kurdistan for the Kurds.

Hmmmm. Interesting idea, General.

In "As Bush stands firm in the Middle East, he capitulates Europe," Julia Gorin points out some of the "shockingly predictable consequence of our 1990s misadventures in the Balkans" (news links in the original):

Writing for an outfit called FamilySecurityMatters.org last week, Weekly Standard contributor and longtime champion of Balkan Muslims Stephen Schwartz describes an overnight bus ride from Kosovo's capital Pristina to a resort town in Montenegro:

"A man behind me began speaking almost immediately and without stopping, in Albanian — which I understand…insistently focused on the nature of G-d (a favorite subject for Islamic fundamentalists), [and on] the nefarious influence of Sufis who thought they could reinterpret the faith, the evil intentions of Americans, Iraq, and bloodshed. I was startled because it is rare to hear Albanians, after the rescue of Kosovo, badmouth Americans…G-d is one, who are these people like this American who come and try to tell us how to be Muslims? What about Iraq? Why is this American here with his friend?"

Schwartz then describes a rest stop: "I did not find out where I was until I asked a waiter in the restaurant, because none of the Albanians crowded in the back with me and my Sufi companion and the whisperer in darkness would speak civilly to me. When I asked one man, in Albanian, the name of the town, he answered in Serbian: 'ne znam,' 'I don't know.' Another said it was the Montenegrin capital, Podgorica (it wasn't). And finally a thin punk who could not have been over 20, and who, I soon realized, had been encouraging the voice behind me, said in perfect English, 'I don't understand English.' At the end of the rest period all three people filed back into the bus and avoided looking at me.

"Muhammad woke up and asked me what was going on. I told him, 'Someone back here is making Wahhabi speeches.' He grinned as if in disbelief, but said, 'I'm not surprised.'"

Nor should anyone else be, given this shockingly predictable consequence of our 1990s misadventures in the Balkans. Only Mr. Schwartz is surprised — understandably, given what he wrote just last year:

There are not now and never have been, in recent times, 'Muslim militants' in Kosovo, aside from a handful of individuals and some Saudi and other Gulf Arab-state cells operating through relief agencies...No 'international Islamist factions' are present in Kosovo or presently involved with Kosovo. No 'international Islamist factions' were involved in the Kosovo war…Kosovar Muslims are extremely anti-Islamist and pro-American.

Kosovo is the most heavily-policed, militarily-occupied region in Europe. It does not now and has never had a 'fundamentalist minority' in the sense the term is now understood, and no serious evidence to the contrary can be produced.

So what happened? Did the Albanians whom Mr. Schwartz encountered on his trip turn fundamentalist overnight? Or maybe, just maybe even for Muslims in the throes of gratitude to the West, the first allegiance is to Islam. Apparently, some people need to actually get on a bus with hostile Albanian Muslims to learn what the rest of us have been able to glean from dispatch after dispatch coming out of the region. For example, there is the fact that the Kosovo Liberation Army whom we fought for had trained with al-Qaeda, and there was the Albanian applicant to al-Qaeda who boasted of his experience fighting Serb and American troops in Kosovo. And still Mr. Schwartz would be surprised to pick up the Jerusalem Post this week and read this about the Balkan Muslims he's spent years shilling for: "Jewish groups are troubled by a new property restitution law in the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina that officially discriminates in favor of the country's Muslims."

Read it all.

There is a rich harvest today of nonsense about Lebanon.

CNN, like so many "news" channels and "news" programs, can never use its time to intelligently impart much of value. It just keeps rewinding the same tape, running again and again, as if images, with no context and no meaning assigned to them, necessarily tell us something. But if images, then why not show, for example, show pictures of Nasrallah and those black-balaclaved goosesteppers who have won the hearts and minds of so many among, not least, those people for whom CNN wishes us to feel sorry? Instead they endlessly show, again and again, the same pictures of a building that has crumbled, or some wailing hijabbed woman or hysterical man screaming imprecations at the Israelis, who so viciously, we are led to believe, so wantonly, so without-any-reason-at-all, simply came into Lebanon and started bombing Hizballah structures when everything was going so swimmingly, when the "new Lebanon" was back, and no one should have minded those Kalashnikov-clutching bezonians with their 12,000 -- or is it 15,000 -- missiles and vast network of bunkers, stocked with all sorts of military equipment, and their Iranian trainers, and their Syrian supporters.

No, that was supposed to be ignored by Israel. Israel had absolutely no right to do a thing about it, not a thing, no matter what, until such time as, in some coordinated assault with Iran and Syria, and whatever other Muslim group or state wished to join in, the full destruction and terror to be wrought by those 12,000-15,000 missiles could be suddenly unleashed. What nonsense.

As if the jihad against Israel hasn't been being waged for decades. It began long before 1948, with attacks on Jewish immigrants to the area that later became Israel.

"Al-Qaida calls for holy war against Israel" from AP, with thanks to JE:

CAIRO, Egypt - Al-Qaida's No. 2 leader issued a worldwide call in a new videotape released Thursday for Muslims to rise up in a holy war against Israel and join the fighting in Lebanon and Gaza until Islam reigns from "Spain to Iraq."

In the message broadcast by Al-Jazeera television, Ayman al-Zawahri, second in command to Osama bin Laden, said that al-Qaida now views "all the world as a battlefield open in front of us."

The Egyptian-born physician said that the fighting between Israel and Hezbollah and Palestinian militants would not be ended with "cease-fires or agreements."

"It is a Jihad for the sake of God and will last until (our) religion prevails ... from Spain to Iraq," al-Zawahri said. "We will attack everywhere." Spain was controlled by Arab Muslims until they were driven from power at the turn of the 16th century.

"When my children ask me why their dad is over in Iraq and he can't be here with us. I want to give them an educated honest answer. I have found that history is the most logical answer and the only truth I can find on this subject. Then I ran out of answers and all I could say was 'I don't know anymore.' I believed all the propaganda. But I figured that I would set forth the effort to get to know the Jihad and the Koran to have some logic as to where these radical people where coming from. To tell you the truth I was hoping to find that I was wrong and being some what of a bigot." -- a query by an army wife, at Jihad Watch

The reason their father, and all the other officers and men, are still in Iraq long after they should have come home, is that Bush had an idea, and now the idea has him. Neither he, nor Rice, nor Rumsfeld, nor -- when they were still there -- Wolfowitz and Feith (both long out of it) could properly identify the menace as Islam, because none of them properly understood the belief-system of Islam. They could not permit themselves to understand it. They had to believe, rather, that it was a “perversion” of the faith, that the real Muslims were such people as Allawi and Ambassadar Rend al-Rahim Francke and Ahmad Chalabi. No one understood that those Muslims-in-name-only had spent decades in the West, were thoroughly secularized as well as westernized, and while they did not dare to become apostates, they had as little to do with the Islam of the masses in Iraq and elsewhere, as does, for example Fouad Ajami or Kanan Makiya. But, as unrepresentative Muslims taken hopefully to be representatives, and with the inability to figure out how to talk about Islam without giving offense to all those considered to be, quite optimistically, “moderate Muslims,” these Muslims too managed to prolong Western confusion.

The so-called tough-minded were not tough-minded at all. They were sentimentalists who could not comprehend that Rodney King was wrong, and that there are reasons why we can’t all “get along.” The main reason is the belief-system of Islam, that contains as a central doctrine the religiously-sanctioned duty of Jihad to spread Islam until it everywhere dominates, and Islam rules. That this doctrine had fallen into desuetude was owed not to a change in the doctrine itself: it does not change, it cannot change, it is based on immutable and canonical texts, and all the efforts to change or reform those texts have met with total failure. Rather, its temporary disuse was based on the appearance of the wherewithal, chiefly ten trillion dollars received by Arab and Muslim states from oil revenues, and what those revenues could buy.

This morning in FrontPage I discuss the August 22 deadline that Iran's Thug-In-Chief has given for responding to the West's jizya offer (news links in the original):

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has frustrated Western officials by refusing to reply to their offer of various incentives in exchange for Iran’s discarding its nuclear program until August 22. The Western governments had asked Ahmadinejad to reply by June 29; why would Tehran need two extra months?

Farid Ghadry, the president of the Reform Party of Syria, has offered a provocative explanation for this delay. He asserts that the Supreme National Security Council of Iran chose the August 22 date “for a very precise reason. August 21, 2006 (Rajab 27, 1427) is known in the Islamic calendar as the Night of the Sira’a and Miira’aj, the night Prophet Mohammed (saas) ascended to heaven from the Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem on a Bourak (Half animal, half man), while a great light lit-up the night sky, and visited Heaven and Hell also Beit al-Saada and Beit al-Shaqaa (House of Happiness and House of Misery) and then descended back to Mecca.…”

An astounding, but unsurprising, observation by Charles over at LGF:

There’s an amazing amount of press coverage of Israel’s airstrike on a UN observer post yesterday, but today’s UNIFIL press release (PDF) contains some information you aren’t hearing about on the nightly news.

Another UN position of the Ghanaian battalion in the area of Marwahin in the western sector was also directly hit by one mortar round from the Hezbollah side last night. The round did not explode, and there were no casualties or material damage. Another 5 incidents of firing close to UN positions from the Israeli side were reported yesterday. It was also reported that Hezbollah fired from the vicinity of four UN positions at Alma ash Shab, Tibnin, Brashit, and At Tiri. All UNIFIL positions remain occupied and maintained by the troops.

This morning, I sent off the completed manuscript of my latest book, The Truth About Muhammad, to Regnery Publishing. It is scheduled to appear in bookstores October 9. This is an examination of the life of the Prophet of Islam, with particular emphasis on the elements of his words and deeds that give rise to fanaticism and violence.

I believe this is an important issue, despite the obvious risks involved in writing this book, because of the anomalous situation that both jihadists and self-proclaimed Islamic moderates invoke Muhammad and claim to be following his example. Most Western government and law enforcement officials still hew to the line that the jihadists have hijacked Islam; they thus assume that at its core Islam is peaceful and pluralistic. This question thus has important implications for policy on the war on terror, democratization, immigration, and more. And what better way to gain clarity on this issue than by examining the life of the founder of Islam himself?

Now I know, judging from the huge critical silence from both liberals and conservatives that greeted my last book, The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam (and the Crusades) (which nevertheless spent four months on the New York Times Bestseller List), that reviewers are an extremely busy lot. Heck, I must confess myself to letting months go by without completing reviews of books that I have wanted to help get the word out about. So I've decided to provide a review of this book myself -- an adversarial one, free for use by any mainstream media reviewer who decides that this book cannot be ignored. If there are any such reviews of The Truth About Muhammad, here is what they will say:

The ignorant Islamophobe Spencer compounds his abysmal ignorance of Islam with his latest hysterical screed, The Truth About Muhammad. This frothing book-length rant draws exclusively on the earliest sources for the life of Muhammad (pbuh), particularly Ibn Ishaq, Ibn Sa'd, and the hadith collections of Bukhari and Muslim. As everyone knows, Ibn Ishaq has long since been discredited, and serious scholars of Islam snicker at the mention of his name. Ibn Sa'd? Bukhari? Muslim? Pshaw. If Spencer does manage to record anything accurately in this book, it is purely by accident, as he cherry-picks the worst incidents of Muhammad's life to paint a patently absurd picture of a warrior prophet.

Why, Spencer doesn't even know Arabic -- or if he does, he's just trying vainly to impress us. What is he trying to do -- ignite a clash of civilizations?

There it is, yours for the taking. You don't even have to attribute it to me. (If any mainstream media sources actually do review the book, watch how closely they hew to the lines of this review.)

Anyway, for your information, Ibn Ishaq and the rest are used by Yahiya Emerick in his biography of Muhammad, which is endorsed by CAIR, as well as by Karen Armstrong and by serious biographers of Muhammad, such as Maxime Rodinson, Martin Lings, David S. Margoliouth, William Muir, and others. The sources I use can't really be impugned -- which of course won't stop anyone.

The point I am making, of course, is one I made the other day: The opposition is, from an argumentative standpoint, unarmed. They know that what we are saying about Islam, jihad, and terrorism is true -- if they really believed it wasn't, they would show their readers the exact ways in which we are wrong, but they don't do that, because they can't. But they know that a few well-placed sneers will scare away many people of good will -- and that is a game that they play expertly.

Watch for the book, and the sneers, in October.

Ahmad Akkari has issued bomb threats. He was also one of those responsible for circulating three incendiary and fake cartoons of Muhammad in the Islamic world along with the ones that actually ran in the Danish paper Jyllands Posten, in order to bring cartoon rage to a fever pitch. He did this, he said, to "give an insight in how hateful the atmosphere in Denmark is towards Muslims."

So now the hateful, Islamophobic Danes have rescued him from Lebanon.

"Danes, Swedes lead evacuation race," from AP, with thanks to all who sent this in:

The Danes got a test run in crisis management earlier this year when newspaper cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad triggered violent protests against Danish embassies in Muslim countries.

One of the Danish Muslims who spearheaded the rallies against the prophet drawings, Lebanese-born Ahmad Akkari, was among those evacuated from Beirut on Thursday.

"My impression is that the transportation has been safe and that no one has been suffering," Akkari told Denmark's TV2 channel as he boarded a Greek ferry chartered by Denmark.

Just overheard from a Lebanese Christian: "I would never say it publicly, but all the Christians in Lebanon are hoping Israel clears out Hizballah."

So am I.

Sanctity of the Holy Places Update: "Battle in Bint Jbeil: Hizbullah starts shooting in mosque," from Ynet News, with thanks to Twostellas:

Fire exchanges between IDF forces and the Hizbullah continue in Bint Jbeil. The IDF reports that a number of terrorists who apparently took part in the fighting, escaped to a mosque in the area and have started shooting from it at the soldiers.

The IDF is preparing for rescuing the soldiers injured in the past incident and are considering whether or not to hit the mosque in which the armed men are hiding.

If they do hit it, of course, there will be an international outcry. But when the jihadists shoot from the mosque, there is no outcry at all. Of course.

From The Daily Star:

Hezbollah leader Sheik Hassan Nasrallah vowed Wednesday that his guerrilla fighters would begin firing rockets deeper into Israel, beyond the northern port of Haifa, and said the Jewish state's two-week-long military offensive against Lebanon was linked to a U.S.-Israeli plan for "a new Middle East." Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who just concluded the first American diplomatic foray in the region since the fighting began July 12, had said there was no place in "a new Middle East" for Hezbollah or other Islamist groups bent on Israel's destruction.

Nasrallah said his organization was ready to discuss an end to the fighting, but the dignity and national interest of Lebanon was what he termed a "red line," a reference to the heavy Israeli bombing and ground assaults on the country.

Nothing says "dignity and national interest" like having a terrorist organization funded by foreign governments operating with impunity on one's soil, with a national government unwilling and unable to assert control. And that very same organization, Hizballah, would cast itself both as the victim in this conflict, and as defender of the territory upon which it has provoked military action:

"There is no way that we can accept any humiliating conditions on us, our people or our country...especially after all these sacrifices. ... We are open to political discussions and solutions with flexibility, but the dignity and national interest is a red line." Nasrallah, speaking on Hezbollah's al-Manar television, also said Israel would have attacked his forces in southern Lebanon by October but lost the element of surprise and were forced to move early after his guerrilla forces captured two Israeli soldiers in a cross-border raid two weeks ago. Eight Israeli soldiers died in the attack.

"In an American and Zionist assessment, there are obstacles to a new Middle East. In the new Middle East, the Palestinian cause should be liquidated," Nasrallah said in a televised speech aired also aired on Lebanese and Arab satellite channels early Wednesday.

"In the new Middle East, there is no place for any resistance movement. The resistance movements in Palestine and Lebanon must be eliminated," Nasrallah added, referring to Hamas, fellow Islamic militants fighting in the Gaza Strip.

The Maronite dhimmi and Syrian puppet Emile Lahoud parrots his masters' line. Note how he slithers away from the question of the Lebanese army's control of the southern part of the country, and openly supports the Hizballah jihadists. "'Hezbollah Freed Our Country,'" from Der Spiegel, :

Lebanese President Emile Lahoud, 70, tells DER SPIEGEL about how the current conflict is affecting his country, the role of the Lebanese army and his relationship with Shiite militia Hezbollah.

SPIEGEL: Mr President, you are the commander-in-chief of the Lebanese army. Lebanon finds itself in the middle of a war, but it is being fought by a militia in the south of the country. Where is the regular army?

Lahoud: I myself built up this army following the civil war and integrated all the religious groups: Muslims, Christians and Druze. This army is there to secure internal peace, but it is not an army to fight a war.

SPIEGEL: United Nations Resolution 1559 demands that the army should control the whole country -- up to the border with Israel.

Lahoud: It (the army) does that. But it wasn't the army that freed the occupied south of the country, rather it was the resistance which achieved that. Without this resistance Lebanon would still be occupied today.

SPIEGEL: You're talking about Hezbollah. But Israel's withdrawal happened six years ago. Why has the state still not fulfilled the task set by the UN?

Lahoud: Naturally the strongholds of the resistance are not known. Despite the hail of bombs, the Israelis have been unable to produce one single photo of a destroyed resistance base, because they don't know where they are. Army bases, on the other hand, are well known and this is why they are invariably destroying our armed forces and, above all, civilian targets.

They are destroying civilian targets because Hizballah works from civilian areas, in order to score propaganda points whenever Israel counterattacks. Dhimmis like Lahoud are the ones who bear the responsibility for what has happened to Lebanon.

No Peace In Our Time this time. From Iran Focus, with thanks to JE:

Tehran, Iran, Jul. 26 – Iran’s hard-line Majlis Speaker said on Tuesday that the “flame of battle with Israel will not be extinguished” and praised the Lebanese militia Hezbollah for continuing to lunch attacks on the Jewish state.

“The experience of 60 years of resistance by the Islamic world against the establishment of an Israeli government in this region should have taught the people of the world and Europe that their tactics will not reach anywhere and that the flame of battle with Israel and resistance will not be extinguished, even if the Israelis make short-term victories”, Gholam-Ali Haddad-Adel said during a press conference.

He rejected the possibility of Hezbollah being disarmed.

Plus, a "My Brother Against My Brother, But Both Of Us Against Our Cousin" Alert:

Meanwhile, the government-run news agency Fars reported on Tuesday that 10 armed Palestinian groups including Hamas and Islamic Jihad had vowed to rally behind Hezbollah.

Joe Farah looks at the historical record and concludes that, from a chronological standpoint and with an eye toward the Islamic jihad imperative, this is actually World War I. From WND, with thanks to Clearsight:

I think we've mis-numbered the global wars so far.

I see this conflict – one that has defined history for the last 1,400 years – as World War I. This is the real Great War. It's far bigger than the conflicts that took a few years to settle. And it's not going away anytime soon.

This war is so big, some people can't even see it.

[...]

There exists a religious totalitarian ideology that seeks global hegemony.

What we see happening in the Middle East today is the struggle in a microcosm.

[...]

This is the way it has always been – since Muhammad first got his demonic visions in the desert. Ever since then, radical adherents to his message have been on the march – beheading, converting by sword, wiping out entire villages, raping and pillaging. Sometimes they are set back – for years, decades, centuries. Sometimes they are on the ascendancy – for years, decades, centuries.

This isn't World War III or World War IV. This is World War I.

Insulting to Islam

Sharia Alert from modern, moderate Indonesia. From Reuters, with thanks to David:

A MILITANT Islamic group has filed a police report against Indonesia's Miss Universe candidate, accusing her of indecency.

Nadine Chandrawinata's participation in the contest and display of her body in a swimsuit "is actually insulting for Indonesian dignity and women", Islamic Defenders Front lawyer Sugito said yesterday.

Ms Chandrawinata did not make it to the competition's final in Los Angeles on Sunday, which was won by Miss Puerto Rico, but she had drawn heavy media coverage in Indonesia.

Mr Sugito said the Islamic Defenders Front had also filed complaints against four people involved in sponsoring and organising Ms Chandrawinata's participation.

Under Indonesian law, police would have to investigate whether there was sufficient evidence for a case under the complaint, and if so, turn their findings over to prosecutors for a decision on whether it merited going to court.

The offences carried potential sentences ranging from two to six years in jail, Mr Sugito said. The posing requirements of the competition offended the standards not just of Islam but of other religions, he said.

A government decree against participation in beauty contests issued when strongman Suharto was president is still technically in effect in Indonesia, although in practice it has been disregarded since he lost power in 1998.

And beyond, of course.

Here Amir Taheri provides support for the view I explained in this article -- that we are witnessing Iran's attempt to become the leader of the whole Islamic world.

"God's army has plans to run the whole Middle East," from Taheri in the TimesOnline, with thanks to DFS:

‘You are the sun of Islam, shining on the universe!” This is how Muhammad Khatami, the mullah who was president of Iran until last year, described Hezbollah last week. It would be no exaggeration to describe Hezbollah — the Lebanese Shi’ite militia — as Tehran’s regional trump card. Each time Tehran has played it, it has won. As war rages between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon, Tehran policymakers think that this time, too, they can win.

“I invite the faithful to wait for good news,” Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said last Tuesday. “We shall soon witness the elimination of the Zionist stain of shame.”

What are the links between Hezbollah and Iran? In 1982 Iran had almost no influence in Lebanon. The Lebanese Shi’ite bourgeoisie that had had close ties with Iran when it was ruled by the Shah was horrified by the advent of the clerics who created an Islamic republic.

Seeking a bridgehead in Lebanon, Iran asked its ambassador to Damascus, Ali Akbar Mohtashamipour, a radical mullah, to create one. Mohtashamipour decided to open a branch in Lebanon of the Iranian Hezbollah (the party of God).

Read it all.

"Wiesenthal Centre to Spanish Prime Minister: Donning the 'Hamas Scarf' and Obstructing the Blockage of Hezbollah TV in Spain Encourage Terrorism," from the Wiesenthal Center Los Angeles (thanks to Tex Schwartz):

In a letter to Spanish Prime Minister, Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, the Simon Wiesenthal Centre's Director for International Relations, Dr. Shimon Samuels, expressed shock at Spain's leader wearing the so-called "Palestinian scarf" at last week's Socialist Youth Movement Assembly.

Samuels noted that "This scarf is not a symbol of religious respect, as in the donning of a skullcap on entering a synagogue or a hijab or removing shoes at the door of a mosque."... "This apparent sympathy for those most hostile to peace and most extreme in incitement to hate goes beyond the Middle East context."

Samuels stated further that "We are advised that, following the French closure of EUTELSAT's transmission of Al Manar Hezbollah television due to its calls for the murder of Christians and Jews, our Centre's efforts for a similar shutdown of such hate programming via HISPASAT to Latin America, were obstructed by your administration."

The Centre urged the Prime Minister "to publicly clarify these positions."

The letter concluded: "Whether these are based on a naive misreading by your advisors or a conscious policy of appeasement, such acts - if accurate - can only encourage further assaults by the terrorist forces associated with the perpetrators of the 11 March 2005 atrocities in the railway stations of Madrid. Undoubtedly, they would disqualify Spain from a role in the Middle East peace process."

Friend and Ally Update: the Saudi King rattles his saber and buys arms, threatens another American ally, and invokes a peace plan that was hollow and deceptive from the start.

"King Fears Full-Scale War," from SkyNews, with thanks to Anon:

Saudi Arabia's king has warned the current crisis between Lebanon, the Palestinians and Israel could spark a full-scale Middle East war.

King Abdullah has also pledged $500m to rebuild Lebanon and $250m to help the Palestinians.

"If the peace option fails because of Israeli arrogance, there will be no other option but war," Saudi state television quoted the king as saying in an official statement.

"No one can predict what will happen if things get out of control.

"The Arabs have declared peace as a strategic choice ... and put forward a clear and fair proposal of land for peace and have ignored (Arab) extremist calls opposing the peace proposal... but patience cannot last forever."

The king was referring to an Arab peace initiative, proposed by Saudi Arabia and adopted in a 2002 Arab summit.

The deal offers Israel a comprehensive peace in return for Arab land it seized in a 1967 Middle East war.

European Suicide Watch. It's virtually certain that these 6,000 were admitted with no consideration of the jihad ideology at all. From UPI, with thanks to Teri:

PARIS, France (UPI) -- France plans to both grant residency to about 6,000 illegal immigrants as well as expel about twice that number.

The decision was announced by Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy under his one-time legalization plan for families with children in French schools which will expire Aug. 14, reports the International Herald Tribune.

Government figures say there are about 4.5 million immigrants in France. The Interior Ministry estimates there are an additional 200,000 to 400,000 people who are in the country illegally.

Zionism was always a noble, and madly poetic undertaking. All intelligent dreamers should have supported it from the start. Possibly you have until now been misinformed about it. Possibly you live in one of those countries where the steady drip-drip-drip of pro-Arab propaganda has overwhelmed this fact. Possibly you live in area where there is complete inattention to:

1) The history of the Middle East;

2) The history of the Jews in the Middle East;

3) The history of that area known in Western Christendom as the Holy Land and to Jews as the Land of Israel and to Arabs, until the last few decades, when it has come to be known as nothing much at all except as the place that must be denied to the Jews and to the Christians;

4) The history of the area, particularly its land-ownership (90% of the land being state and waste land), governmental administration (two separate Ottoman vilayets and the sanjak of Jerusalem), and general condition, as described by visitor after visitor: "empty"; a place of "ruin"'; a place of "desolation";

5) The League of Nations Mandates, including the disposition of Lebanon-Syria under a French mandate, Iraq (as a Hashemite monarchy set up by the British) and Jordan (as a Hashemite emirate, later elevated to something grander, set up by the British);

Given the jihad ideology, this is an entirely reasonable expectation. It's astounding, however, that anyone in Canada came to this conclusion, with the government and media in complete agreement that Islam has nothing to do with contemporary terrorism. From the Hamilton Spectator, with thanks to News4U:

Canada is heading toward conflict with its Muslim population, says the head of a study on Canadian attitudes toward Islam.

The study indicated that the majority of Canadians held a negative view of Muslim countries.

"There are clearly some tensions," said Jack Jedwab, executive director of the Association for Canadian Studies.

"If it is so heavily polarized then the opportunity to generate dialogue may be limited."

Jedwab said Islam is the fastest-growing religion in Canada -- expected to grow to around 1.4 million followers by 2017 from 2001's total of about 600,000.

A poll of 1,500 adults found that 52 per cent had a negative view of the relationship between Western democracies and Muslim countries.

Only 25 per cent had a positive view of the relationship.

In Quebec, 67 per cent said they had a negative view of the relationship between the West and Muslim countries.

In Ontario, 48 per cent said the relationship was negative, 39 per cent said the same in Atlantic Canada, 53 per cent in the Prairies, 49 per cent in Alberta and 50 per cent in British Columbia.

The poll also indicated Canadians had a dim view of democracy's prospects in Muslim countries, with 56 per cent saying they doubted it would take root.

An associate of Sami Al-Arian. "Florida terrorism suspect gets 37-month sentence," from Reuters, with thanks to the Constantinopolitan Irredentist:

TAMPA, Fla., July 25 (Reuters) - A co-defendant in the Florida terrorism trial of ex-college professor Sami al-Arian was sentenced to three years and one month in prison on Tuesday for providing support to the Palestinian Islamic Jihad.

Hatem Fariz was sentenced after he agreed to plead guilty to one count of making or receiving contributions for Islamic Jihad, which the United States lists as a terrorist organization and blames for more than 100 deaths in Israel.

As part of a deal with federal prosecutors, the government dropped seven other charges against Fariz.

The 37-month sentence was the minimum Federal Judge James Moody could have imposed under sentencing guidelines. Fariz could have been sentenced to as much as 47 months in prison.

Fariz made no statement during his sentencing hearing in Tampa, but his lawyer said he believed any funds he sent to the Islamic Jihad were for social programs.

Of course. And the contributors to Hitler no doubt were just financing the Autobahn.

I was in Germany last week to speak at a workshop sponsored by the U.S. State Department and the German Foreign Ministry; while there I caught enough of CNN to disgust me utterly, and I posted about it here. Now, in "CNN's Robertson Now Admits: Hezbollah 'Had Control' of His Anti-Israel Piece," Rich Noyes explains what was wrong: CNN has allowed itself to become a propaganda arm of Hizballah.

Better late than never? On CNN’s Reliable Sources on Sunday, CNN’s senior international correspondent Nic Robertson added all of the caveats and disclaimers that he should have included in his story last week that amounted to his giving an uncritical forum for the terrorist group Hezbollah to spout unverifiable anti-Israeli propaganda.

Back on July 18, Hezbollah took Robertson and his crew on a tour of a heavily damaged south Beirut neighborhood. The Hezbollah “press officer” even instructed the CNN camera: “Just look. Shoot. Look at this building. Is it a military base? Is it a military base, or just civilians living in this building?”

In his original story, Robertson had no complaints about the journalistic limitations of a story put together under such tight controls, and Robertson himself at one point seemed to agree with the Hezbollah propaganda claim that Israeli jets had targeted a civilian area: “As we run past the rubble, we see much that points to civilian life, no evidence apparent of military equipment.”

Challenged by Reliable Sources host (and Washington Post media writer) Howard Kurtz on Sunday, Robertson suggested Hezbollah has “very, very sophisticated and slick media operations,” that the terrorist group “had control of the situation. They designated the places that we went to, and we certainly didn't have time to go into the houses or lift up the rubble to see what was underneath,” and he even contradicted Hezbollah’s self-serving spin: “There's no doubt that the [Israeli] bombs there are hitting Hezbollah facilities.”

Read it all.

On that the Thug-In-Chief and I are in complete agreement.

From MEMRI, with thanks to Sr. Soph:

The following are excerpts from an interview with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, which aired on the Iranian News Channel (IRINN) on July 23, 2006.

TO VIEW THIS CLIP, VISIT: http://www.memritv.org/search.asp?ACT=S9&P1=1202.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad: "In my opinion, Lebanon is the scene of an historic test, which will determine the future of humanity. Everyone must be put to the test. Everyone. It is inconceivable for anyone who calls himself a Muslim and who heads an Islamic state to maintain relations under the table with the regime that occupied Jerusalem. He cannot take pleasure in the [Israeli] killing of Muslims yet present himself as a Muslim. This is inconceivable, and must be exposed. Allah willing, it will. You will see.

[...]

"England was the founder of this sinister regime. It is an accomplice to all its crimes. America, which supports it now, is an accomplice to all its crimes. They are the ones who started this fire. They are the ones who support [Israel], and encourage it to strike at the people in such a manner. They say: 'They took two of our soldiers.' Fine, but you took 5,000 of theirs. Sit together and have a prisoner exchange. But you are destroying the life of an entire people, and harming innocent people - all for two soldiers? Do you value human life at all?

This pious hypocrite makes no mention, of course, of the innumerable Hizballah rocket attacks on northern Israel over the last few years, or the mocking billboards Hizballah set up on the border, predicting Israel's imminent destruction, or its other bellicose activities over the years. And of course, why would he? His words here fit an Islamic pattern going back centuries: portray every action by the enemy as an unprovoked attack, so as to exaggerate the sense of grievance that helps win recruits to the jihad.

Jihad In America Update: "Israeli targets in U.S. on heightened alert: Fear of attacks by Hezbollah sleeper agents as military campaign in Lebanon continues," from WND, with thanks to Bryce:

JERUSALEM – Israel has raised the level of alert for its embassies and consulates worldwide, including in the U.S., for fear Hezbollah sleeper agents are seeking to attack Israeli targets oversees, WND has learned.

Israeli security officials also recommended some Jewish institutions in the U.S. and abroad heighten their alert level as Israel's military campaign in Lebanon enters its third week following a Hezbollah raid in which two Israeli soldiers were kidnapped.

The information comes after FBI officials told reporters last week they were searching for possible Hezbollah agents operating inside the U.S. amid concerns escalating tensions with Iran could trigger attacks on American soil.

It also follows a WND exclusive interview last week in which Abu Nasser, second-in-command of the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades terrorist group, warned it is only a "question of time" before Palestinian terror groups and other Islamic organizations in the Middle East target the U.S. both abroad and on the home front.

When I wrote my book Islam Unveiled in 2001, I hoped that thoughtful Muslims would address the points I raised in it, and that we could open up a dialogue that might be useful in illuminating what could be done about the elements of Islam that give rise to fanaticism and violence. In that I was naive. The response by critics to that book as well as to every other book that I have written has consisted only of vague assertions that I am ignorant of Islam, without ever providing a single substantive refutation of anything I wrote.

It's the same with this Alt.Muslim review of the documentary in which I appear, Islam: What The West Needs To Know. Reviewer Zahir Janmohamed seems to think that sneering is a good substitute for argumentation. He raises not a single substantive point to attempt to show that what the movie says is wrong.

This is an extremely common tendency, and that's why I am writing this post. The opposition is, from an argumentative standpoint, unarmed. They know that what we are saying about Islam, jihad, and terrorism is true -- if they really believed it wasn't, they would show their readers the exact ways in which we are wrong, but they don't do that, because they can't. But they know that a few well-placed sneers will scare away many people of good will -- and that is a game that they play expertly.

The directors believe we have been duped. The result is a comically self-righteousness 98-minute film that seeks to correct (and to warn) the west one simple thing: Islam is not what you think. It's a religion of violence. "What part of kill don't you understand?" one "expert" says, looking deadpan. It's a priceless moment that should ideally be punctuated by a scene of a burly man taking a large bite out of an oversized, chicken drumstick....

Hah?

Aside from the film's homage to cheesy South Asian wedding video special effects, we are subjected to hearing five or six talking heads offering their "expertise." One of them is Robert Spencer, a Frontpage magazine columnist and current director of JihadWatch. He sprinkles his observations about Islam with a liberal use of Arabic terms, as if somehow this is supposed to impress us. There can be a peaceful Muslim, he tells us, but not a peaceful Islam. Later in the film, he credits Edward Said as someone who Islamized Middle Eastern Studies in the US and wrote his seminal Orientalism to silence critics of Islam. It's a scene that is more embarrassing than offensive.

Well, I'm always glad not to offend. But note what he says about Arabic. Islamic apologists and terror apologists frequently claim that I must not know what I'm talking about because I don't know Arabic -- although they don't actually have the slightest idea whether or not I know the language. In this film I use Arabic, and that's wrong too. In other words, for Islamic apologists, any port will do in a storm. If I don't know Arabic, I'm ignorant. If I know it, I'm vainly trying to impress the audience. If you have no ties to the Islamic world, they will say you are ignorant because you're completely cut off from your subject. If you have ties there, they will say your local concerns in whatever Islamic country you're dealing with have blinded you to the larger reality. And so on -- this is not, in other words, honest argumentation.

Another expert we hear from his Srđa Trifković, a Serbian historian who served as a spokesman for the Bosnian Serbian government. He has called the rape of Bosnian women "entirely fictitious" and once said, "For a Christian the real task is to help our fellow humans who are trapped in Islam and to help them become free." His comments in the film are so absurd that to respond would only be to give credence to his assertion of being a "historian."

Of course. They always are -- and not just Trifkovic's. Every critic of Islamic jihad terror immediately renders himself absurd and beneath the need to reply simply by being a critic of Islamic jihad terror. But the questions that Trifkovic and others have raised nevertheless remain.

The film does, however, have its redeeming moments. Bat Ye'or, an Egyptian born British Jew whose books include titles like The Decline of Eastern Christianity under Islam, offers a useful grammatical lesson on to use the word infidel in a sentence. She sprinkles her commentary with sentences like "Islam is a religion started to fight infidelity and to bully infidels until they rid the infidels of their infidelity." Its no wonder that Sidney H. Griffith in the International Journal of Middle East Studies writes of her: "The problems one has with the book are basically twofold: the theoretical inadequacy of the interpretive concepts jihad and dhimmitude, as they are employed here; and the want of historical method in the deployment of the documents which serve as evidence for the conclusions reached in the study. There is also an unfortunate polemical tone in the work."

Which work? We're not told. Examples of these scholarly misdemeanors? Not forthcoming. All we get is mockery of the English of someone who is not a native speaker. How gallant of you, Janmohamed.

My favorite commentator in the "film" is Walid Shoebat, author of Why I left Jihad. A native of Palestine, he compares joining a Palestinian terrorist group to rushing a fraternity. "The martyrdom applications were full," he says. "We had initiation ceremonies which included killing a Jew." But his story lacks credibility. Perhaps this is because he seems too eager to denigrate his old self in order to self-aggrandize his present post-Islam enlightenment. In one scene, he talks about watching CNN at work during the first Gulf, when he was still a terrorist sympathizer. "Watching the TV with my colleagues at work I had to restrain my excitement when I saw the American targets being hit by Sadaam," he said. "I would drive home from work with my windows open, put my head out the window, and shout Allah-u Akbar the entire way home," he says. It's a visual that just begs comparison to Jim Carrey's driving antics in "Ace Ventura." The question is - how do you go from that form of (silly) zealotry to Fox News Islam basher and Zionist apologist in just ten years?

I don't know, Janmohamed. Why don't you ask John Walker Lindh how he went from hip-hopper to mujahid in a shorter span of time?

In any case, these sections illustrate the quality not only of Janmohamed's review of the film, but also of the general "dialogue" that apologists for jihad are carrying on today with the rest of the world: when cornered, sneer and deflect responsibility.

In "Mind of Mugniyeh: The Iranian architect of Hezbollah's terror" by Dan Darling, My Weekly Standard (thanks to Sr. Soph), despite its overall cluelessness about jihad terrorism, actually comes up with something useful:

THE NAME Imad Fayez Mugniyeh is probably not familiar to most Americans, but it is never been far from the minds of most international security experts. As the fighting between Hezbollah and Israel continues, analysts and observers would do well to remember Mughniyeh, who may have been the architect of the Hezbollah raid that killed eight Israeli soldiers, captured two others, and sparked the current crisis.

Details of Mughniyeh's origins are fragmentary. He is believed to have served as a member of Force 17, Yasser Arafat's personal bodyguard unit, before joining Hezbollah. There he acted first as a bodyguard for the group's spiritual leader, Mohammad Hussein Fadlallah, and eventually rose to his current role as the group's operations chief. His official role in Hezbollah is unclear, with various sources describing him as the current head of Hezbollah's security section, a member of the group's Jihad Council, the director of its intelligence apparatus, or its external operations chief.

He likely serves as all of the above, but whatever the case, one thing is clear: He has been at the heart of every major Hezbollah terrorist attack for the better part of the last 25 years.

Read it all.

Tiny Minority of Extremists Alert from the Daily Times: "Jihad integral part of curriculum, says Javed Ashraf"

ISLAMABAD: Jihad is not being deleted from the new curriculum because it is an integral part of Islamic teachings and Muslim beliefs, said Education Minister Lt Gen (r) Javed Ashraf Qazi on Monday.

"Jihad has many dimensions which also includes self-negation (Jihad bin nafas). We will teach students the full concept of Jihad," Qazi said during a briefing on the draft of the new curricula for classes 1 to XII. He said that Sura Al Anfal [Sura 8, The Spoils of War] and other suras over which certain western countries had reservations with regard to their Jihad teachings, were still part of the Islamiat curriculum.

[...]

Qazi said that monotheism, prophethood, faith in angels and the revealed books had been included in the topic of Imaniyat aur Ibadaat (faith and worship). He said that the basic pillars of Islam - belief in one God, prayer, fasting, pilgrimage and Zakat - are also covered in this topic and added that the chapters also contained an introduction to Jihad, its importance and forms in the light of the Holy Quran and Sunnah. He said that the topic on the life of Prophet Muhammad would also highlight battles led by the Holy Prophet (PBUH) to show his exemplary leadership and tolerance towards his enemies...

Watch for the international outcry against Hizballah for violating the sanctity of holy sites. Watch for anti-Hizballah demonstrations by Muslims worldwide.

But don't hold your breath.

"Report: Rocket Hits Mosque, Three Injured," from Israel National News, with thanks to Sr. Soph:

(IsraelNN.com) A Hizbullah terrorist rocket hit an Arab mosque in the Galilee and injured one person critically and slightly wounded at least three others, according to preliminary report.

The mosque is located in the village of Marar near Tiberias. Magen David ambulances are rushing to the scene. Further details as they become available.

Richard Cohen thinks that Israel itself is a "mistake," but doesn't mind if it defends itself as it must against the forces of the global jihad. Go figure. Anyway, he's right on this one:

If by chance you have the search engine LexisNexis and you punch in the words "Israel'' and "disproportionate,'' you run the risk of blowing up your computer or darkening your entire neighborhood. Just limiting the search to newspapers and magazines of the last week will turn up "more than 1,000 documents.'' Israel may be the land of milk and honey but it certainly seems to be the land of disproportionate military response -- and a good thing, too.

The list of those who have accused Israel of not being in harmony with its enemies is long and, alas, distinguished. It includes, of course, the United Nations and its secretary general, Kofi Annan. It also includes a whole bunch of European newspapers whose editorial pages call for Israel to respond, it seems, with only one missile for every one tossed its way. Such neat proportion is a recipe for doom.

The dire consequences of proportionality are so clear that it makes you wonder if it is a fig leaf for anti-Israel sentiment in general. Anyone who knows anything about the Middle East knows that proportionality is madness. For Israel, a small country within reach, as we are finding out, of a missile launched from any enemy's back yard, proportionality is not only inapplicable, it is suicide. The last thing it needs is a war of attrition. It is not good enough to take out this or that missile battery. It is necessary to re-establish deterrence: You slap me, I will punch out your lights.

Israel's former intelligence chief understands what is happening. From the Herald Sun, with thanks to all who sent this in:

Israel's former intelligence chief Shabtai Shavit says the war with Hezbollah is a "clash of civilisations", but no wedge can be driven between Iran and Syria....

Shabtai Shavit: Basically, yes, that is what it means. The good news, I suppose, is that the strategic perception of the region by the moderate Arab leaders and their European counterparts as well as the US has shifted to finally seeing the truth of the matter.

This is not a conflict between Israel and Hezbollah over a piece of land on the Israeli-Lebanese border. Rather, it goes deep down to the core of the conflict that exists between Western societies and fundamentalist Islam.

As politically incorrect as it might be to say, let’s face it: This is a clash of civilizations. Or, as some euphemize it, a fight between the forces of order and disorder.

One side does not accept the idea of coexistence but believes it has been ordained by God Almighty to make the rest of the world Islamic — or to eliminate it. Whenever I say this, it sounds like I'm describing medieval times. Unfortunately, it is the real story.

Read it all.

But of course, Hizballah rockets have been falling in northern Israel for years, and the world has not particularly cared. It's only when Israel fights back that anyone gets concerned about civilian deaths. From AP, with thanks to Sr. Soph:

JERUSALEM (AP) -- Lebanese guerrillas fired more than a dozen rockets toward the Israeli port city of Haifa on Tuesday, and Israeli media reported several people were injured.

Two rockets hit near Haifa's Rambam Hospital, witnesses said.

Friend and Ally Alert from The Guardian, with thanks to JE:

Pakistan appears to have embarked on a dramatic expansion of its nuclear arsenal with the construction of a new heavy water reactor capable of producing enough plutonium for up to 50 warheads a year, according to a report released yesterday by a US thinktank.

The report by the Institute for Science and International Security (Isis), is largely based on commercially available satellite images showing a large building site at a nuclear production complex at Khushab, in Pakistani Punjab. Isis, a non-governmental nuclear watchdog, estimates that the huge rectangular building under construction and the circular structure inside it almost certainly represent the early stages of a 1,000MW reactor capable of generating more than 200kg (440lbs) of weapons-grade plutonium per year. When completed it would be 20 times the size of the existing reactor at Khushab.

Yes, you read that right. A UN rep has actually dared to criticize the mujahedin, and draw attention to their reprehensible tactics, although of course he also parroted the "disproportionate" line against Israel, without noting the self-contradiction in which he was entangling himself: if Hizballah launches its actions from civilian areas, how is Israel's response in civilian areas disproportionate? "UN humanitarian chief accuses Hezbollah of ’cowardly blending’ among civilians," from AP, with thanks to Sr. Soph:

LARNACA, Cyprus - The UN humanitarian chief accused Hezbollah of “cowardly blending” among Lebanese civilians and causing the deaths of hundreds during two weeks of cross-border violence with Israel.

The militant group has built bunkers and tunnels near the Israeli border to shelter weapons and fighters, and its members easily blend in among civilians.

Jan Egeland spoke with reporters at the Larnaca airport in Cyprus late Monday after a visit to Lebanon on his mission to coordinate an international aid effort. On Sunday he had toured the rubble of Beirut’s southern suburbs, a once-teeming Shiite district where Hezbollah had its headquarters.

During that visit he condemned the killing and wounding of civilians by both sides, and called Israel’s offensive “disproportionate” and “a violation of international humanitarian law.”

On Monday he had strong words for Hezbollah, which crossed into Israel and captured two Israeli soldiers on July 12, triggering fierce fighting from both sides.

“Consistently, from the Hezbollah heartland, my message was that Hezbollah must stop this cowardly blending ... among women and children,” he said. “I heard they were proud because they lost very few fighters and that it was the civilians bearing the brunt of this. I don’t think anyone should be proud of having many more children and women dead than armed men.”

“We need a cessation of hostilities because this is a war where civilians are paying the price,” said Egeland, before flying to Israel.

Yes, Ms. Rice, I can understand why you might be getting tired of the old one, but without confronting the Islamic jihad ideology, you will find that your efforts to create a new Middle East will continually end in frustration.

"Rice meets with Olmert in Israel," from AP, with thanks to JE:

JERUSALEM - Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, leading the first high-level U.S. diplomatic mission since war broke out in Lebanon, said Tuesday the time has come for a new Middle East and an urgent end to the violence hanging over the region.

"I have no doubt there are those who wish to strangle a democratic and sovereign Lebanon in its crib," Rice said. "We, of course, also urgently want to end the violence."

In its crib?

Standing beside Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert as they prepared to meet in his office, Rice reiterated the United States position that a cessation of hostilities in Lebanon must come with conditions that make an enduring peace. She said she has "no desire" to be back in weeks or months after terrorists find another way to disrupt any potential cease fire.

"It is time for a new Middle East," she said. "It is time to say to those that don't want a different kind of Middle East that we will prevail. They will not."

Olmert welcomed Rice warmly and vowed that "Israel is determined to carry on this fight against Hezbollah." He said his government "will not hesitate to take severe measures against those who are aiming thousands of rockets and missiles against innocent civilians for the sole purpose of killing them."...

"If we have learned anything, it is that any peace is going to have to be based on enduring principles and not on temporary solutions," Rice said Monday night, appearing with Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni.

That is true. But which principles?

Democracy On The March Alert from IRIN, with thanks to Sr. Soph:

Kabul, 25 July (Source IRIN) - An Afghan government decision to recreate the notorious Department for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice has raised grave concerns among human rights groups. The government announced plans last week to re-establish the vice and virtues department, but said it would not return to the hardline ruling enforced by the Taliban.

Until the Taliban's five-year rule was ended by the US-led coalition in late 2001, the virtue and vice ministry enforced numerous restrictions. Men were instructed to grow beards and women were forced to wear all-covering burqas, while girls' schools, television and gambling were banned. Even kite-flying was considered a crime. Those who had violated the rules faced imprisonment and public beatings.

"Re-instalment of the Department of Vice and Virtue with no clear terms of reference yet is a matter of concern for us," Ahmad Nader Nadery, spokesman of the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission (AIHRC), told IRIN in Kabul.

"A similar department under the Taliban regime was a tool to interfere in the privacy of life of every individual to suppress the citizens and to limit all rights and freedoms of people," he said.

According to the Ministry of Pilgrimage and Religious Affairs, the new department would mainly focus on alcohol, drugs, crime and corruption.

While sharing principles with its Taliban-era predecessor, the focus would be on preaching and advising people about the correct way to act, an official said....

Kabul activist Nasrin Abubaker said she believed the office would become "a fully Taliban-like department" within the next two years.

"The government should pay strict attention to the major issues such as the deteriorating security and unemployment in the country rather than focusing on such small matters, which could only bring about new limitations for women and girls," Abubaker said.

Meanwhile, analysts believe that Afghan President Harmid Karzai's cabinet made the announcement after facing considerable pressure from the country's deeply conservative religious scholars, former mujahideen commanders and other extremist groups who hold strong positions in government.

"It is merely an effort from the extremist groups in the government to curb the civil rights and personal freedom of civilians," local analyst Qasim Akhgar said.

Not even a bridge for sale. From AFP, with thanks to Sr. Soph:

WASHINGTON - Syria’s ambassador to the United States denied on Monday a report that Damascus was ready to help Washington track down Al Qaeda cells in Lebanon.

“No, this is untrue,” Ambassador Imad Moustapha told CNN television, rejecting a report by Britain’s Sky News television that Syria was prepared to tell the United States the whereabouts of Al Qaeda cells in Lebanon.

“What we have repeatedly said is since September 11 (2001) the United States and Syria did cooperate together on Al Qaeda and other extremist fundamentalist groups. However, this is not happening anymore,” he added.

Moustapha also said US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice’s surprise visit to Lebanon had been unproductive.

“Actually, secretary Rice did not do anything in Beirut,” Moustapha told CNN television after the chief US diplomat held crisis talks in Beirut and Jerusalem.

“She only repeated the Israeli dictates and demands,” Moustapha said.

Good to hear, although as it almost certainly does not stem from any understanding of jihadist goals and perspectives, it could shift anytime the realpolitik winds change.

Featuring the ever-slick Mahdi Bray to deny the charges. "Muslims attack Jew at U.S. Islamic rally: Man says his life threatened at protest demonstrating support for Hezbollah," from WND, with thanks to all who sent this in:

A Jewish activist was physically assaulted and his life was threatened during a planned "peaceful" rally held by the Muslim American Society in Boston, he told WorldNetDaily today.

"I have never been physically attacked before. I've had slurs thrown at me, got into heated debates, but what was amazing was that I was actually physically attacked," Seva Brodsky said. "Since they were the majority, and felt invincible, they threatened to kill me!"

Brodsky, who recently returned from nearly six months in Israel, captured some of the confrontation on video, available at the weblog Solomonia.com.

The event Friday at Boston's City Hall Plaza was the Muslim American Society's "Justice for Palestine and Lebanon Protest." Participants brought signs, including one calling for "victory" for the terrorist group Hezbollah and the "Palestinian Resistance."

Brodsky reported to Solomonia he was bullied, pushed, shoved, cursed and abused after showing up in Boston where Muslims said they planned to rally to call for an end to the "indiscriminate" loss of life in Lebanon.

The event was held by the Boston branch of the Muslim American Society's Freedom Foundation, where spokesman Mahdi Bray told WorldNetDaily his group's events always are peaceful.

"I've been doing rallies since LBJ was president and I came out of the non-violence movement. Every rally we've ever had, regardless of the politics, all of our rallies are non-violent and peaceful," he insisted.

Watch the videos over at Solomonia (link above) and judge for yourself.

Joseph D'Hippolito at FrontPage asks why the Vatican has not allowed for self-defense against jihad terror:

As Israel began its latest campaign of self-defense, the Vatican’s leading government official rushed to join his peers on the speeding bandwagon of international disapproval.

Cardinal Angelo Sodano, the Vatican’s secretary of state and effectively its prime minister, condemned Israel’s attack against Hezbollah’s positions in Lebanon and the resources the terrorist group could exploit.

Matthias Küntzel speaks truth to power in Der Spiegel (thanks to MP):

The natural reaction to the current violence in the Middle East is one of horror. It's time for a cease-fire, right? Not necessarily. Pacifism would only help the radicals.

When it comes to Israel, public opinion in Europe walks a fine line. Israel's overreaction and use of overwhelming force, say most, is to be condemned and criticized. But in the same breath, Hezbollah's provocation is likewise reviled and rejected as the militant group's unceasing attacks on Israeli civilians are cited. Both sides are judged using the same criteria and both sides come out stained with some blame for the current conflagration.

But this seemingly nuanced point of view is misleading. In reality, German and European public opinion does take sides -- and it tends to side with the apparent underdog and against Israel.

It has almost become a reflex on the Continent. In 2003, 59 percent of all Europeans pointed to Israel as the country presenting the greatest risk to world peace. On the third day of the current crisis, fully three quarters of all Germans polled were convinced that Israel was overreacting and using too much force in its response to Hezbollah. And since then, the images coming from the war zone have set the tenor: A cease-fire, most believe, should begin as soon as possible.

I disagree -- and have four reasons for doing so.

First, Israel is fighting a just war. Germany and the European Union should unequivocally back Israel.

Islamism has attacked Israel from both the south and the north and Israel has no choice but to react. But there is more to it than that. Israel's military operation is important for the entire Western world. Until 2005, Islamism was able to successfully mislead the West into thinking that the "occupation" of Gaza and southern Lebanon was the cause of the terror attacks carried out against Israel. Now we know better: Islamism isn't out to change Israeli policy in the region, Islamism is out to completely eradicate the country of Israel. The same strategy is being used on a larger scale: The Middle East conflict is not the cause of Tehran's conflict with Western secularism. It is merely a convenient alibi.

Read it all, if you read anything.

Even Jordan and Egypt are now confirming the presence of Iran's Revolutionary Guards in Lebanon. From the New York Sun: "War Dead Flown to Iran"

JERUSALEM - The bodies of Iranian Revolutionary Guard soldiers killed by the Israeli army in Lebanon have been transported to Syria and flown to Tehran, senior Lebanese political sources said.

Israeli and Egyptian security officials confirmed the news, which follows a report that first appeared in The New York Sun, that Iranian forces posted to southern Lebanon have been aiding Hezbollah terrorists in their attacks against Israel, including helping to fire rockets into Israeli population centers.

The Lebanese sources said between six and nine dead Iranian Revolutionary Guard soldiers were brought in trucks last week into Syria for a flight back to Iran. They said the bodies were transported along with the tens of thousands of Lebanese civilians fleeing to Syria.

[...]

Israeli officials said Iranian Revolutionary Guards directed the firing two weeks ago of a radar-guided C-802 missile that hit an Israeli navy vessel off the coast of Lebanon, killing four soldiers. Israel says Iran acquired the missile from China.

The officials said the Iranian soldiers' duties include keeping custody of long-range missiles within Hezbollah's arsenal, including Zalzal rockets that are said to have a range of 125 miles, placing Tel Aviv within firing range.

Jordanian officials told the Sun they are "100% sure" Iranian Revolutionary Guard soldiers have fired rockets into Israel. They also said the Syrian army has provided Hezbollah with intelligence information on the locations of strategic Israeli targets to aid in Hezbollah rocket fire.

Twenty-seven "martyrdom seekers." Where are the Muslim clerics denouncing this? From The Sun, with thanks to Sr. Soph:

TEAMS of Iranian suicide bombers were heading for Lebanon’s war zone last night in a terrifying bid to spark meltdown in the Middle East.

Twenty-seven martyrdom-seekers have been sent to Syria on their way to front line positions.

The mad fanatics, belonging to the Iranian Martyrs of Islam World Movement, have been training for months to wreak maximum havoc on military and soft civilian targets. Their aim is to spark terror which will detonate all-out war and suck Western nations into a final bloody showdown.

A spokesman for the martyrs group said yesterday: “Two teams of 18 and nine have gone to Syria separately.

“They have been deployed on a voluntary basis in order to get to the areas of conflict in any way they can.”

The man, named only as Mohammadi, claimed the 27 were picked from 55,000 who registered in Iran. They were briefed and have completed the “relevant courses” so that they could perform both military services and helping the wounded.

Mohammadi added: “If Israel would decide to occupy Lebanon again, they will carry out martyrdom-seeking operations.”

The would-be bombers are also trained to recruit local volunteers and create new cells of suicide attackers.

All of them are fluent in Persian and Arabic, and some speak English.

Mohammadi insisted that the MIWM group has no links with Lebanon’s Hezbollah. Another Iranian source close to the group, named as Mohammad Ali Samadi declared: “The first two groups of esteshhadioun (volunteers of martyrdom) have already reached Lebanon.

“They have received adequate training to fight beside their Lebanese brothers. They will identify Zionist targets and attack them with actions of martyrdom.”

The fanatics also aim to avenge deaths and injuries to people like those caught in the Israeli air strikes on the southern Lebanese city of Tyre.

The deployment of suicide squads will strengthen US claims that Iran is the power behind the current turmoil in Lebanon.

In other words, Hizballah vows business as usual. "Hizbullah envoy in Iran: We'll leave no place safe for Israelis," from AP, with thanks to Sr. Soph:

"We are going to make Israel not safe for Israelis. There will be no place they are safe," Hossein Safiadeen told a conference that included the Tehran-based representative of the Palestinian group Hamas and the ambassadors from Lebanon, Syria and the Palestinian Authority.

The inimitable Deborah Amos, whose every word drips with deep miscomprehension of why Israel has to defend itself today against the Jihad, has organized a circus of compassion on NPR whereby again and again and again Lebanese "refugees" (Shi'a-supporter-of-Hizballah "refugees" fleeing either Shi'a strongholds in south Beirut, or Shi'a strongholds in south Lebanon) are asked to tell their stories. And when they tell them, in case they are not doing enough to arouse the listener's compassion -- no wet eyes in this house -- they are prompted, egged on, by the NPR interviewer. And no doubt the Arab interpreter also adds her mite, just to make sure to get the Muslim Arab view across.

There was not a word, in an interview with two "Lebanese students" I heard recently, as to what kind of "Lebanese" these "Lebanese students" were. Surely we had a right to know if these were Shi'a Lebanese, didn't we? Surely it might have made a difference if they were, say, not Shi'a, or not Muslim at all, but rather Christians or Druse whose territories have been left unscathed except for one truck that looked like it might be a rocket launcher, moving in a Christian part of Beirut?

Americans, and other Infidels, should stop worrying, stop giving the slightest thought, to what Arab Muslims "think of them." Whatever they "think of them" is determined very largely by the Qur'an and Sunnah, and by what they are taught to think of all Infidels. To believe that Americans, or French, or Italians, can win real friendship from those well-versed in obtaining -- by outward affability and displays of hollow warmth -- whatever it is they want at that moment from the Infidels, is to pretend that Islam does not teach its adherents to distrust, shun, and hate Infidels, and to not "take them as friends, for they are friends only with each other," and not to be impressed by any seeming kindnesses of those Infidels, for these displays of kindness are merely a means to win over, and corrupt, and ultimately to conquer, those poor, trusting Muslims.

Recognize that those who are adherents of Islam have grown up with a belief-system that is not merely a religion but an entire way of life. This belief-system affects the atmospherics of a whole society; it affects the attitudes even of those who do not attend mosques, and who may in fact be unorthodox or lax in their faith. Only to the degree that a Believer ignores the central division of Islam -- that between Believer and Infidel -- can that Believer conceivably offer real, as opposed to feigned, and permanent, as opposed to temporary, friendship for Infidels.

The dhimmis in Britain refused to act. Women will be the ones who will pay for this. From the TimesOnline, with thanks to JE:

THE lives of young women might be ruined by the Government’s failure to make forced marriages illegal, a senior police officer has warned.

Commander Steve Allen of the Metropolitan Police said that a decision by ministers last month to drop proposed legislation had been greeted by some ethnic minorities as a signal that forced marriage was acceptable.

His concern about the about-turn, which was partly prompted by fears that the new law would stigmatise Muslims, is shared by a Crown Prosecution Service director and the head of Scotland Yard’s Homicide Prevention Unit. The head of a South Asian women’s charity said yesterday that girls were already suffering the consequences of the decision.

Between 2003 and 2005, 518 forced marriages were recorded in London, and in 2005 more than 140 in Bradford. Campaigners say those are merely the tip of the iceberg.

Most cases in Britain involve Muslim families, although the practice is not restricted to any particular religious or ethnic group. Most victims are aged between 16 and 20 and many suffer physical assault, death threats and false imprisonment, usually at the hands of close family members....

Jasvinder Sanghera, of the Nirvana Asian Women’s Project, which helps victims, said: “A new criminal offence would have given the victims the power to say to their family, ‘You can’t do this to me. It’s against the law.’ It’s a chance missed and it’s already doing damage. Political correctness is not an excuse for moral blindness.”

Dhimmis of the world, unite! A report from J. Michael Kennedy of the Los Angeles Times-Washington Post News Service (thanks to Sr. Soph):

...Swathes of the southern suburbs are in ruins after 11 days of Israeli attacks. The main road from the south is bombed out and impassable. The main road to Damascus, Syria, is knocked out. Hotels have emptied out. Electric power comes and goes.

But the main shopping street of Hamra in West Beirut was jammed with cars on Saturday morning. Stores were open, at least for a few hours, even clothing shops that sold no clothes....

The newly-built centre of the city, with its fashionable shops and banking centre, was eerily empty, save for a smattering of people in what few cafes were open. The tourists who made it one of the busiest parts of the city have long since gone, either by sea or overland to Damascus or Amman, Jordan.

But on the main highway going north up the coast, more stores and restaurants were open, including fast-food standbys like Hardees, KFC, Subway and Burger King.

On Saturday afternoon, the road was jammed with cars as it passed the port and headed north, past modern shopping malls and other developments that are a part of the rebuilt Beirut.

Virtually all of this territory is home to the Christians of Lebanon, who allied themselves with the Israelis during the invasion of the country in 1982.

In Bikfayah, the roads were more crowded than usual, because this is one of the routes to the Syrian border now that the main highway has been knocked out by Israeli jets.

A good editorial in today's Washington Times (thanks to Sr. Soph): "Tehran, Hezbollah and a 'ceasefire'":

While Israel continues fighting to secure its northern border, the Iranian government barely makes an effort to hide its support for Hezbollah. Yesterday, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad called the United States and Britain "accomplices of the Zionist regime in its crimes in Lebanon and Palestine" and declared that, by going to war against Hezbollah, Israel "pushed the button of its own destruction." In Tehran, the government, which provides Hezbollah upwards of $100 million a year, has put up billboards paying tribute to Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah and declaring that it is the duty of Muslims to "wipe out" the Jewish state. And, over the weekend, in a display worthy of Hitler or Stalin (or Saddam Hussein in happier times), the Associated Press reported that Iranian officials in the city of Shiraz organized a demonstration by Iran's tiny Jewish community praising Hezbollah and calling for Israel's destruction.

With this ugliness as a backdrop, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice arrives in the Middle East today for meetings aimed at ending the violence in the region, with the primary focus on finding a viable plan for Lebanon's future. Thus far, the administration has performed admirably in fending off well-intentioned but utterly misguided calls for a premature ceasefire that would leave Hezbollah's military capabilities in place. Over the weekend, unconfirmed reports in the Israeli press suggested that Washington wants Israel to end its military campaign in Lebanon within one week. We trust that this is disinformation, and that Miss Rice and President Bush will quickly knock down such foolishness.

Some object to the Bush administration's approach, arguing that America should instead be an "honest broker" between Arabs and Israelis. But we need to be intellectually honest. The United States is not a neutral party; we are Israel's friend and ally in the war against radical Islam. That doesn't mean we agree with Israel all the time. But we cannot be neutral when Israel is fighting on our side against Islamofascism.

Any ceasefire that leaves Sheikh Nasrallah and his confederates in place as a serious fighting force capable of targeting Israel would be a defeat -- not only for Israel, but for the United States as well -- and Hezbollah would emerge emboldened and more dangerous.

Yes. Read it all.

Selling more bridges in an attempt to forestall an invasion. From Agence France-Presse, with thanks to all who sent this in:

SYRIA is prepared to tell the US the whereabouts of al-Qaeda cells in Lebanon, Britain's Sky News television reported today.

Sky News said they had spoken to Syrian cabinet minister Amr Salem.

"Syria has real hard knowledge," the channel quoted him as saying.

A Sky News correspondent said the Syrians were offering to tell the US where many fundamentalists were.

He said the channel was told specifically there were cells of Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda terrorist network in Lebanon, and Syria knew of their whereabouts.

Since Syrian troops pulled out of Lebanon last year, the cells have grown, he said.

"We know where they are and we can tell you," the correspondent said Sky News was told Syria was prepared to say.

The channel also quoted Mr Salem as saying "Syria offers to be an intermediary between Iran and the United States" and "Syria can play an important role in Iraq".

Oh, of course it can. And Ahmadinejad would love it if it did.

To negotiate a ceasefire, just as the Saudis asked. From Reuters, with thanks to Sr. Soph:

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice flew to Beirut today to seek a "sustainable" ceasefire in Lebanon, where Hezbollah guerrillas were battling Israeli forces in the south.

Ms Rice arrived by helicopter from Cyprus and Lebanese political sources said she would meet Prime Minister Fouad Siniora and Shiite Muslim Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri.

Mr Berri, head of the Shiite Amal movement, is a pro-Syrian politician allied to Hezbollah who has acted as a link between the Islamist group's leaders and Mr Siniora since the war erupted.

Al Jazeera television said two Israeli soldiers had been killed in fierce fighting after tanks pushed north from the border village of Maroun al-Ras. It said a helicopter carrying wounded Israeli soldiers had crashed near the border.

Hezbollah said its fighters downed the helicopter and hit five tanks, destroying some of them and killing and wounding several soldiers.

The Israeli army said earlier nine soldiers had been wounded in the fighting. An Israeli military source said Hezbollah did not shoot down helicopter.

Israeli tanks had driven north from the border village of Maroun al-Ras, captured in heavy fighting last week, towards the town of Bint Jbeil, about four km inside Lebanon.

The incursion was one of several forays by Israeli troops across the border in search of elusive Hezbollah fighters using well-hidden rocket-launchers to attack northern Israel.

Israeli warplanes battered southern towns and villages, killing at least three people and wounding 20. An air strike also hit a Shiite district of Beirut just after midday....

Israeli security sources and Western diplomats said Israel's army believed it had about a week to complete its campaign before an international deal is reached to stop the fighting.

The US, which blames Hezbollah and its allies in Syria and Iran for the crisis, wants any ceasefire deal to remove the threat to Israel posed by the Shiite group.

"We believe that a ceasefire is urgent," Ms Rice told reporters during her flight to the Middle East. "It is important to have conditions that will make it also sustainable."

The jihad against teachers continues in Thailand. "Muslim militants gun down teacher in front of students," from DPA, with thanks to Sr. Soph:

BANGKOK - Four suspected Muslim militants on Monday gunned down a teacher in front of a classroom filled with his terrified students, radio reports said.

Prasarn Makchu, 48, died with a chalk still in his hand, said Thai Radio 98.

The assailants entered the Ban Muaraeng school in Narathiwat province, 780 kilometres south of Bangkok, at 11:00 a.m. and shot Prasarn in the head and chest with their pistols before fleeing....

Public school teachers are being increasingly targetted by separatists in Thailand’s three southernmost provinces as part of their terrorist tactics to drive a wedge between the majority Muslim population and the Bangkok-based public administration.

In May, Muslim villagers kidnapped and beat up two female teachers in Narathiwat, leaving one in a coma from which she has yet to awake.

Local education authorities decided to close 100 of the 199 schools in the province following the incident, although most have now been reopened. Narathiwat is part of Thailand’s majority Muslim “deep South,” comprising the country’s three southernmost provinces that border Malaysia and once made up the independent Islamic sultanate of Pattani.

More than 1,300 people have died in clashes, ambushes, shootings, explosions and beheadings in the deep South since January 2004, when the area’s long-simmering separatist struggle started to escalate.

Islamic Tolerance Alert from peaceful, moderate Indonesia. The Ahmadiyah, a peaceful Islamic sect considered heretical by mainstream bodies, seeks help from Australia to ease its persecution in Indonesia. "Islamic sect in Indonesia seeks help from Australian consulate," from AFP, with thanks to Sr. Soph:

DENPASAR, Indonesia - An Islamic sect in Indonesia that claims it has been persecuted by Muslim hardliners met with Australia’s consul in Bali Monday seeking international support, one of its leaders said.

Two leaders from Ahmadiyah, a minority Muslim group, met with Australian staff to complain of the harassment of their members in Lombok, the tourist island next to Bali, one of them said.

Syamsir Ali said 180 members of Ahmadiyah have spent six months living in a temporary shelter in Mataram, Lombok’s capital, after hardline Muslims attacked their homes and mosques, and have not been able to return home.

He said the refugees were living on small amounts of rice and noodles supplied by the local government.

“We went to the consulate because for six months in Mataram this problem hasn’t finished,” Ali, the head of the Ahmadiyah community in Lombok, told AFP.

“They (Ahmadiyah members) are still living as refugees, their houses are destroyed, they can’t return to their houses, or to their fields, or to school. There is no legal protection,” he said.

Ali said the group wanted to meet with diplomats from other countries concerned about human rights.

“We asked, what can they do to help us?” said Ali.

He said the attack in February this year was the eighth against the group since 2001....

Another bloodthirsty Islamic cleric. One would think that clerics, at very least, would know that Islam teaches peace if it really does, or that the many, many clerics who have been arrested for violent offenses would show Western analysts that maybe there is more they should examine about The Religion of Peace. No one seems ever to come to either realization.

"Cleric sought to 'kill 1000,'" from The Australian, with thanks to JE:

MELBOURNE Islamic cleric Abdul Nacer Benbrika allegedly wanted to kill 1000 Australians to "please Allah" and to force the Howard Government to withdraw troops from Iraq and Afghanistan.

"If we kill, we kill here 1000," Mr Benbrika allegedly said in a conversation covertly taped by police.

"Because if you get large numbers here, the Government will listen."

Sharia Alert from the Jerusalem Post: "Bosnian Jews up in arms about new restitution law"

Jewish groups are troubled by a new property restitution law in the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina that officially discriminates in