September 2007 Archives

Steven R. Watts is "a global management consultant and a Research Fellow and Intercultural Studies Ph.D. candidate at Fuller Theological Seminary." He is "currently creating risk mitigation strategies for multicultural corporations operating in developing countries. These strategies focus on non-traditional, innovative approaches to sustainable economic development, eradication of poverty and reduction of risk to business continuity in some of the most challenging regions of the world. He is also an invited speaker to universities and business organizations."

His non-traditional, innovative approach at this website, "Welcome to the 21st century" (thanks to Hal), appears to revolve around the emergence of a new dominant world superpower, the "Islamic Union."

Take a look around the website. Look at every page. While those who know how Sharia institutionalizes the oppression of women and non-Muslims may recoil at this prospect, Watts is certainly being a realist given the world situation and the abysmal failure of the West so far to respond to the full reality of the Islamic supremacist challenge in all its dimensions.

I am not saying that the emergence of this superpower is inevitable, or that anyone should ever give up as long as life and breath remain. But while those who are concerned about human rights may not want to see this happen, given the world situation as it stands today can Watts reasonably be faulted for thinking that it will happen, and that the best we can do is try to ride the wave and adapt to the new world order?

How he got in, and whatever failure of communication between German and British officials that made this possible should be urgently investigated and corrected. "Germany Terror Plot Suspect On Run in Britain," from The Times of London:

A key suspect in the alleged plot to mount an attack in Germany on the scale of 9/11 is on the run in Britain, German security officials disclosed Saturday.

Scotland Yard counterterrorism detectives are hunting the man, who escaped from Germany after a plot to explode bombs at Frankfurt airport and a U.S. airbase. The collective power of the bombs would have exceeded those in Madrid and London in 2004 and 2005.

The plot was foiled on Sept. 4 when three men were arrested at a rented holiday apartment near the central German town of Kassel. Police recovered chemicals and bomb-making equipment which investigators believe would have led to the biggest loss of life since the 9/11 attacks in America six years ago.

About 10 other members of the gang were said by German prosecutors to have escaped and one is now in Britain. The arrested three — two of whom were German nationals who had converted to Islam — were alleged by prosecutors to be members of an Al Qaeda splinter group called the Islamic Jihad Union.

At the time the British and German authorities denied that there were any links between the cell and Britain. Security sources also played down reports that there had been telephone contact between members of the cell and people in Britain.

However, it emerged Saturday that the Germans have told Britain that at least one of the fugitives has since made his way to this country. A security dragnet has been put in place by Scotland Yard’s counter-terrorism command to try to arrest the man.

This nation was indeed founded on principles that are derived from the Judeo-Christian tradition. The Daily News, predictably, is treating McCain's remarks as if he were saying that this is a Christian country in some kind of sectarian or exclusionary sense. I hold no brief for McCain, but I doubt that's what he meant. He might have expressed himself more clearly, explaining that the views of the dignity of all people and their equality of rights before the law were Judeo-Christian principles that traditional Islam, with its devaluation of the life of unbelievers, denial of the freedom of conscience, and more, does not share. This is one of the major points of my book Religion of Peace?.

"McCain: No Muslim president, U.S. better with Christian one," by Helen Kennedy in the New York Daily News (thanks to JoJo):

GOP presidential candidate John McCain says America is better off with a Christian President and he doesn't want a Muslim in the Oval Office.

"I admire the Islam. There's a lot of good principles in it," he said. "But I just have to say in all candor that since this nation was founded primarily on Christian principles, personally, I prefer someone who I know who has a solid grounding in my faith."

"I admire the Islam"? Do you speak the English, John?

In a wide-ranging interview about religion and faith with the Web site Beliefnet, McCain said he wouldn't "rule out under any circumstance" someone who wasn't Christian, but said, "I just feel that that's an important part of our qualifications to lead."...

McCain later clarified his remarks, saying, "I would vote for a Muslim if he or she was the candidate best able to lead the country and to defend our political values."

A Muslim rights group ripped the Arizona Republican's remarks.

"That kind of attitude goes against the American tradition of religious pluralism and inclusion," said Ibrahim Hooper, spokesman for the Council on American-Islamic Relations.

He urged McCain to "clarify his remarks" and "stress his acceptance of political candidates of any faith."

Honest Ibe could set a good example for McCain in this by clarifying his organization's ties to Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood. The manifest disingenuousness and incompleteness of the unindicted co-conspirator CAIR's explanations of these ties only fuels the suspicions that lead Americans to believe that CAIR's political agenda is actually quite different from the agendas of various groups within the spectrum of American pluralism.

It soon became clear why these particular documents had not been directed to the West. They were theological treatises, revolving around what Islam commands Muslims to do vis-à-vis non-Muslims. The documents rarely made mention of all those things — Zionism, Bush's "Crusade," malnourished Iraqi children — that formed the core of Al Qaeda's messages to the West. Instead, they were filled with countless Koranic verses, hadiths (traditions attributed to the Prophet Muhammad), and the consensus and verdicts of Islam's most authoritative voices. The temporal and emotive language directed at the West was exchanged for the eternal language of Islam when directed at Muslims. Or, put another way, the language of "reciprocity" was exchanged for that of intolerant religious fanaticism. There was, in fact, scant mention of the words "West," "U.S.," or "Israel." All of those were encompassed by that one Arabic-Islamic word, "kufr" — "infidelity" — the regrettable state of being non-Muslim that must always be fought through "tongue and teeth." – from this article by Raymond Ibrahim

Jorn Holme, and all those who continue to believe that there is something called "Islamism" that is a threat, and something called "Islam" that is not a threat, that is perfectly fine, that makes no claims on Infidel institutions or Infidel lives, should start, perhaps, by reading the article, linked above, by Raymond Ibrahim that has just appeared in the Chronicle of Higher Education.

Ibrahim, who is a researcher in the Near East Division of the Library of Congress, has had the intelligence to publish the writings of Al Qaeda members. He had noticed that these assorted manifestos and appeals, when addressed to Infidel audiences, always contained some rhetoric about such obvious "grievances" as Iraq, "Palestine," Kashmir, Kosovo, and so on. This litany, however, was completely absent from the writings and speeches directed at fellow Muslims. For them, Bin Laden, Al-Zawahiri, and others had no need to deceive ("war is deception") but could stick to Islam -- plain Islam.

Possibly the scandal of Esposito can be brought to the attention of the Vatican. Possibly the Vatican can persuade the administration at Georgetown to sever all ties with the "Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding." Esposito would still have his Saudi money and his lecture fees. He would still be lean, mean, jogging about, the man who seldom even puts in an appearance any more at the office. But at least the Georgetown prestige would no longer rub, wrongly, off onto him. He would simply be alone, with his "Center."

Surely someone on the Georgetown faculty, or in the Catholic hierarchy, or among powerful lay Catholics, can get the ball rolling on this.

Tawdry Accusations Jihad. "Fatah-Hamas mired in tawdry accusations," by Khaled Abu Toameh for the Jerusalem Post (thanks to Davida):

The Hamas-Fatah power struggle has descended into the gutter over the past few days, with both parties trading allegations about the involvement of their members in homosexual relations and adultery.

The alleged "sex scandals" are said to have occurred in the Gaza Strip, which fell into Hamas's hands in June.

Shortly after the Islamist movement wrested control of the Strip, Hamas officials began talking about "embarrassing" and "damning" documents and films that were seized inside Palestinian Authority security headquarters formerly controlled by Fatah.

According to the officials, the Fatah men had been spying on several senior PA officials, some of whom were caught on tape having homosexual intercourse.

A DVD distributed among a limited number of Hamas representatives features a former PA official having sex with another man. The disc, according to a Palestinian journalist in Gaza City, is being sold on the black market for NIS 20.

Hamas says the PA's Preventive Security Force played a major role in collecting the evidence against the senior PA officials. In some cases, Hamas said, the documents and tapes were used to extort large sums of money from the PA officials.

Two documents that were allegedly seized inside Preventative Security Force headquarters provide insight into the method used to collect information about the sexual conduct of the top officials.

According to one document, entitled "A Large Number of Homosexuals," a number of wealthy and influential figures in the Gaza Strip had formed a "gang" for practicing homosexual intercourse.

"Some of them were summoned for questioning and they admitted to having sexual intercourse with boys and adult males," the document, dated May 12, 2005, stated.

"Some of them had individual sex, while others preferred group sex. Some of them paid money for sex, while others performed sexual intercourse with males in front of their wives."

The sex allegedly took place in hotels, clinics and private homes - in some cases with a picture of Yasser Arafat hanging overhead.

That seems peculiarly fitting.

The flier said: "Kill Jews and Christians if they don't believe in Allah and Mohammad." Those nutty Methodists, at it again.

"Anti-Jewish, anti-Christian fliers found on cars," by Gordon Wilczynski for the Macomb Daily (thanks to MG):

Police said anti-Jewish and anti-Christian fliers were found on cars parked in a lot on the northwest corner of 15 Mile and Ryan roads.

Sterling Heights police Detective Sgt. Paul Jesperson said three separate complaints were filed by residents Tuesday who found the fliers on their windshields.

He said the flier said: "Kill Jews and Christians if they don't believe in Allah and Mohammad."

It further advises people to "Fight those who do not believe."

"I really don't know what it means other than suggesting violence to Jews and Christians," Jesperson said. "We certainly have no intentions of stifling someone's religious beliefs but it is most certainly a violation of the law if you're condoning violence with this hate literature."

Jesperson said police received three complaints and the fliers were seen on at least 15 other cars in the parking lot.

He said there was no damage to the cars and no one else filed a complaint.

"I would imagine many people thought this was some type of advertising flier and didn't even read it," Jesperson said.

Sam Richardson, who was shopping at the Kroger store on Tuesday, saw the flier on his windshield while walking to his car and asked his 11-year-old daughter to remove it.

He said she walked toward him while she was reading the flier and then she started crying.

"She asked me what the flier was all about," said Richardson, an electrician at General Motors. "I tried to explain to her what it meant and I then had to explain it to my 7-year-old son."

Welcome to the new Detroit.

No mention here of who made the list or who is on it, but since it is coupled with the threats to Austria and Germany, it seems clearly jihad related. "List of politicians as possible attack targets surfaces in Austria," from AP (thanks to Joel):

Austrian authorities have found a list of politicians circulated online as potential targets for attacks, an Interior Ministry spokesman said Friday. But, while they notified the people on the list, they said there were no indications any of them were ever in danger.

Authorities found the list during an investigation of a video posted online in March threatening Austria and Germany with attacks if they did not withdraw military personnel from Afghanistan, said Rudolf Gollia, the Interior Ministry spokesman.

ISNA is an unindicted co-conspirator in the Holy Land Foundation terror funding case. "Islamic Group Honors Religious Left," by Mark D. Tooley for the Christian Post (thanks to DFS):

At its recent convention in Chicago, the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) honored the National Council of Churches’ top interfaith official with its “Interfaith Unity Award.”

Undoubtedly, the award was well deserved! The NCC, like most of the Religious Left, defends or accommodates radical Islam, even as it denounces “fundamentalist” Christianity and condemns Israel. Despite the Religious Left’s support for liberal social causes like same-sex unions and abortion rights, it prefers the supporters of Islamic “Sharia” law to Christians or Jews who might sometimes vote Republican.

“You are doing the will of God,” gushed NCC Associate General Secretary for Interfaith Relations Shanta Premawardhana. “You are the ones upholding faith and serving humanity. You are my sisters and brothers.” ISNA says over 40,000 of its Islamic supporters attended its annual convention.

The award inscription read: "Islamic Society of North America presents Rev. Dr. Shanta Premawardhana, a fellow activist for peace, justice and reconciliation, a 'Christian believer' as described in Qur'an (3:113) in recognition of his tireless contribution to advancing inter-religious dialogue and partnership, with our prayers for a continued demonstration of energy, understanding and commitment."

Here is Qur'an 3:113: "Not all of them are alike: Of the People of the Book are a portion that stand (For the right): They rehearse the Signs of Allah all night long, and they prostrate themselves in adoration."

The Signs of Allah. That's ayat in Arabic. It refers to the verses -- ayat -- of the Qur'an. Ibn Kathir says in explaining this verse that "there are believers and also criminals among the People of the Book," and that the believers among them "implement the Book of Allah, adhere to His Law and follow His Prophet Muhammad." In other words, they become Muslims. The Rev. Dr. Premawardhana must be so proud.

Sharia is making life difficult for Christians in the Egyptian secular state. "In Egypt, Religious Freedom or Shariah? Catholics Struggle With Conflicts in Law," from Zenit (thanks to DFS):

CAIRO, Egypt, SEPT. 27, 2007 (Zenit.org).- The patriarch of the Coptic Catholic Church says that the contradiction in the legal system embodied in the Egyptian Constitution makes life difficult for the faithful.

Patriarch Antonios Naguib explained the difficulties of the Egyptian legal situation to the Germany-based group Aid to the Church in Need.

The patriarch said that on the one hand, the constitution guarantees freedom of religion and conscience while, on the other, it enforces Islam as the state religion and makes Shariah, Islamic law, the "fundamental source of the legal system."

A grave problem for the Church in Egypt, resulting from the unclear legal situation, is difficulty in obtaining permission to build churches, he said.

Patriarch Naguib expressed the hope that things might soon change, as there are some voices calling for the equality of all citizens.

By Philip Sherwell and Ben Leapman in the Telegraph:

Fears have been growing in the Maldives that Islamic radicals would bring violence to the Muslim island state.

There were concerns that yesterday's bombers had deliberately targeted foreign tourists – as Islamic terrorists did on the holiday island of Bali in 2002.

Despite its reputation as an Indian Ocean paradise, the former British protectorate is no stranger to unrest, riots and attempted coups. But this is the first time that it has been bombed.

"The Maldives has become an increasingly radicalised society in recent years and there was a sense of foreboding that something like this could happen," said a British media consultant who advises the government of the autocratic president Maumoon Abdul Gayoom.

"This has been threatening to rear its head. Islamic groups have complained that tourists have imported Western values and undermined traditional Islamic culture."

Another Western adviser to the government said: "I would immediately suspect this has been done by enemies of the state. The government has been concerned that radical Islam is infiltrating the country.

"The government has taken a hard line against radical Islam."

President Gayoom is Asia's longest-serving leader and has been in charge of the Maldives since 1978. Educated in Islamic jurisprudence in Egypt, he has run the country as a one-party state with a legal system based on Sharia law.

Was this a slip of the tongue? The implication here is that "radical Islam" -- which the government is resisting -- and Sharia -- which the government is based on -- are somehow at opposite ends of the spectrum. Both statements are, of course, wrong. "Radicalism," i.e., violence, and Sharia are both entirely within the mainstream of Islam. Et tu, Telegraph?

Amnesty International has reported allegations of arbitrary detention, unfair trials, and torture and rape in custody.

The main opposition, the Maldivian Democratic Party, was founded by Sri Lanka-based exiles and is led by Mohamed Nasheed, an author who was educated at Liverpool University and has spent more than a year in solitary confinement.

Tourism has brought greater affluence to the teeming city of Male, home to one-third of the country's population, but there is little mixing between foreign visitors and locals.

Drug abuse is a growing problem, prompting calls from another opposition group, the Islamic Democratic Party, for the execution of drug smugglers.

Best keep the pot at home, friends.

Latest from the Washington [bleep].

Here is a good example of the not-completely-wrong sort of writing that does so much to cloud the issue over Islam's fundamentally hostile and intolerant nature. Here Paul Marshall appears critical of practices in Islamic countries such as repressing speech on the grounds of blasphemy. OK. But the article gives the impression -- falsely -- that anti-blasphemy laws are somehow aberrant in the Islamic dispensation. Hardly. Muhammad himself had critics and deriders of his faith assassinated.

Some of the world's most repressive governments are attempting to use a controversy over a Swedish cartoon to provide legitimacy for their suppression of their critics in the name of respect for Islam. In particular, the Organization of the Islamic Conference is seeking to rewrite international human rights standards to curtail any freedom of expression that threatens their more authoritarian members.

Islamic tyrannies hardly need the Swedes to justify repressing Islam's detractors. What isn't pointed out here is that the OIC already does not accede to the UN Declaration on Human Rights but accepts only an "Islamic Declaration of Human Rights," which explicitly accepts the paramouncy of Islam, i.e., the systematic repression of the human rights of freedom of speech, religion, conscience, etc, etc. Maybe the [bleep] could point this out someday?

The issues here go beyond the right of cartoonists to offend people. They go to the heart of repression in much of the Muslim world. Islamists and authoritarian governments now routinely use accusations of blasphemy to repress writers, journalists, political dissidents and, perhaps politically most important, religious reformers.

[...]

As the late Naguib Mahfouz, the only Arab winner of the Nobel Prize in literature, and whose novel Children of Gebelawi was banned in Egypt for blasphemy, put it: "no blasphemy harms Islam and Muslims so much as the call for murdering a writer."

A pithy comment -- except that it utterly contradicts Islamic teaching. Blasphemy laws and calls for heads on platters may be bad PR in the West, but it comes straight out of orthodox Islam.

Repressive laws, supplemented and reinforced by terrorists, vigilantes and mob violence, are a fundamental barrier to open discussion and dissent, and so to democracy and free societies, within the Muslim world.

Well, duh. The writer is clearly under the mistaken impression that Islamic countries want "democracy," etc. or that they care about what the infidel world thinks of them.

When politics and religion are intertwined, there can be no political freedom without religious freedom, including the right to criticize religious ideas. Hence, removing legal bans on blasphemy and 'insulting Islam' is vital to protecting an open debate that could lead to other reforms.

This last sentence is a good example of a statement that is simultaneously technically correct and fantastically bone-headed. One might as well have said that stopping the deportation of Jews in Nazi Germany or the destruction of churches in the Soviet Union was "vital to protecting an open debate that could lead to other reforms" -- it completely misunderstands that nature of the regimes in question. It is the nature of Muslim countries to repress anyone critical of Islam just as it was the nature of the Third Reich to be anti-Jewish or the Communists to be anti-Christian.

Paul Marshall, a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute's Center for Religious Freedom, is writing a book on blasphemy.

A "book on blasphemy?" Another politically correct abstraction that purposefully avoids the peculiar nature of Islamic attitudes toward blasphemy, etc. One expects it will be something like Amanpour's series on religious "fundamentalism" -- projects intended to show that all seriously religious people are dangerous whack jobs just itching for the opportunity to fly a 767 into a crowded office building.

Ah, if only the West understood Islam better, this sort of thing wouldn't happen. "Police captain killed in southern ambush," from the Bangkok Post (thanks to all who sent this in):

(BangkokPost.com) - A police captain was killed in Yala province by a group of insurgents on Saturday morning.

Pol Cap Toranit Srisuk, 28, was ambushed at around 8.40am, when he led 12 police officers to patrol a road along borderline between Ban Sai Surant village and Ban Pakdee village in Bannang Sata district.

Here is an excerpt from Fred Kagan's recent My Weekly Standard article:

The takfiris insist that anyone who obeys a human government is a polytheist and therefore violates the first premise of Islam, the shahada (the assertion that "There is no god but God"), even though Muslims have lived in states with temporal rulers for most of their history. The chief reason al Qaeda has limited support in the Muslim world is that the global Muslim community overwhelmingly rejects the premise that anyone obeying a temporal ruler is ipso facto an unbeliever.

Today's takfiris carry Qutb's basic principles further. Some pious Muslims believe that human governments should support or enforce sharia law. This is why Saudi Arabia has no law but sharia. But to Osama bin Laden and his senior lieutenant, Ayman al Zawahiri, it is not enough for a state to rule according to sharia. To be legitimate in the eyes of these revolutionaries, a state must also work actively to spread "righteous rule" across the earth. This demand means that only states aligned with the takfiris and supporting the spread of takfirism--such as the Taliban when it was in power--are legitimate, whereas states aligned with unbelievers, like Saudi Arabia, are illegitimate even if they strictly enforce sharia law. Some takfiris, particularly in Iraq as we shall see, argue in addition that all Shia are polytheists, and therefore apostates, because they "worship" Ali and Hussein and their successor imams. This distorted view of Shiism reflects the continual movement of takfiri thought toward extremes.

The entire article is a demonstration of severe mental confusion. Fred Kagan appears to believe that Al Qaeda, because it preaches obedience to the Holy Law of Islam, argues that "anyone who obeys a human (!) government is a polytheist" -- that is, guilty of shirk. But this is not what preaching against rulers who are deemed to be bad Muslims means. Rulers, ideally a single Caliph who is true to Islam, head a "human" government that can and must be obeyed. Indeed, the duty of a good Muslim is to obey any ruler who is himself a good Muslim, however cruel and despotic he might seem to be to our eyes.

Karzai says this attack was "against humanity, definitely against Islam." It's funny how so many Muslims have gotten the opposite impression. Why aren't there demonstrations against these misunderstanders? Schools teaching against them?

"Kabul bus bomber kills 30 troops," by Bronwen Roberts for AP (thanks to all who sent this in):

KABUL (AFP) - A suicide bomber wearing an army uniform blew up an Afghan military bus in Kabul Saturday, killing around 30 people and wounding many more in one of the deadliest attacks of the Taliban's insurgency.

Afghanistan's US-backed president, Hamid Karzai, called for "stronger vigour" in the worldwide fight against terrorism after the devastating blast.

The attacker detonated his explosives at the entrance of the bus as it picked up army personnel going to work at the defence ministry in the centre of the heavily guarded city, ministry spokesman General Zahir Azimi said.

The force of the explosion blew off the roof and sides of the large bus, which was torn into mangled metal.

[...]

Karzai strongly condemned Saturday's attack at a media briefing hours after the explosion.

It "is something that would indicate to us that the war against terrorism must go on with much stronger vigour," the grim-faced president told reporters at his palace.

"From Algeria to Indonesia, from the United States to Japan, we all have to keep together and remain steadfast in the war against terrorism," he said.

He said the attack was "against humanity, definitely against Islam."

RICHMOND, Va. - A member of the state's Commission of Immigration resigned Thursday, a few hours after Gov. Timothy M. Kaine was told about online videos showing the appointee condemning Israel and advocating "the jihad way."

Kaine learned of the videos from a caller to his live monthly radio program and accepted the resignation of Dr. Esam S. Omeish about three hours later. -- from this news article

One small step for mankind.

But the moral of the tale is this: in order to avoid a misstep that will come to haunt you, if you are a political figure, and that will undoubtedly be used at this point -- and with full justification -- by your political opponents as an example of your naiveté or failure to exercise due diligence, do not meet with, do not have smiling photographs taken with, do not endorse in any way, and certainly do not appoint to any office, someone who believes in Jihad as a central duty, Jihad through whatever means. That includes almost every Believer. And do not accept, ever, either someone's claim to be a "moderate" or someone else's description of someone -- especially if that someone is in the hopelessly naive Interfaith Dialogue racket -- as a "great guy, no problem, he's really on our side."

Use your head. Enough running from all those in positions of political or academic or other power running around like candidates for Jay Leno's Jaywalkers.

An update on this story, from the Associated Press:

TEHRAN, Iran — Iran's parliament on Saturday approved a nonbinding resolution to label the CIA and the U.S. Army "terrorist organizations."

The move is seen as diplomatic a tit-for-tat after the U.S. Senate voted in favor of a resolution urging the State Department to designate Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps a terrorist organization.

"The aggressor U.S. Army and the Central Intelligence Agency are terrorists and also nurture terror," said a statement by the 215 lawmakers who signed the resolution at an open session of the Iranian parliament. The session was broadcast live on state-run radio.

No, they're not terrorists, but it does serve to demonstrate the uselessness of the term. Perhaps part of this could have been avoided if the Senate had simply branded the Revolutionary Guards a "foreign jihadist" organization. What would the Iranians do then, label the Army and CIA "foreign Crusader" entities?

Sharia Alert from the country of the Two Holy Places: "Wife divorced for watching male TV host," from the Times of India (thanks to Hot Air):

RIYADH: A Saudi man divorced his wife for watching alone a television programme presented by a male, an act he deemed immoral, the Al Shams newspaper reported on Saturday.

The man, whom the paper did not identify, ended his marriage on the grounds his wife was effectively alone with an unrelated man, which is forbidden under the strict Islamic law enforced in the ultra-conservative kingdom, the paper said.

Men in Saudi Arabia have the authority to divorce their wives without resort to the courts.

In accord with Islamic law.

She would probably accept this invitation sooner than she would accept one from, say, Pat Robertson. "Oh, Rosie! Terrorists invite her to Mideast," from WorldNetDaily (thanks to Tammy Bruce):

Muslim jihadist leaders interviewed for a new book were ecstatic about statements from television talk host Rosie O'Donnell about the war in Iraq and the global war on terror, agreeing with her outspoken views.

Some even invited her on a "fact finding mission" to the Middle East.

"I agree with what this O'Donnell says. ...We welcome Rosie O'Donnell to stay among us and to get to know the truth from being here, like many American peace activists are doing," said Ala Senakreh, West Bank chief of the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades terrorist organization.

Senakreh and other terror leaders were quoted sounding off about O'Donnell in the new book "Schmoozing with Terrorists: From Hollywood to the Holy Land Jihadists Reveal their Global Plans – to a Jew!," by author and WND Jerusalem bureau chief Aaron Klein.

For one of the chapters of the book, Klein assembles a panoply of senior terrorist leaders and asks them to sound off about the views of high-profile liberals and conservatives.

The terrorists interviewed stated they had never heard of O'Donnell, a former host of ABC's "The View," who made regular headlines with her heated political battles against conservative-leaning co-host Elizabeth Hasselbeck. Klein told the terrorists O'Donnell was a high profile television personality and read to them a series of her political statements, with which they mostly agreed....

"[She can report to Americans that] we are not in love with killing, we like peace, we are human beings, it is the occupation that obliges us to do what we do," Senakreh said.

Yes, you have no responsibility whatsoever for your own actions. Of course.

Predictable.

"The sitcom 'Aliens in America' plays anti-Muslim hostility for laughs," by Janice Rhoshalle Littlejohn for The Associated Press (thanks to Twostellas):

A group of Muslim worshippers were gathered for evening prayer inside the Islamic Center of Southern California when Moses Port and David Guarascio arrived.

"The fact that we're here is bigger than anything we could have even hoped for," said Guarascio, creator, along with Port, of the CW sitcom "Aliens in America." "But being here seems to make sense, you know, appropriate."

Appropriate, certainly, for the bold, satirical comedy, premiering at 8:30 p.m. Oct. 1, which explores Americans' fears and cultural ignorance of Muslims. Port, who's Jewish, and Guarascio, who was raised Catholic, were at the Islamic Center this night to introduce their new series to the faithful.

Though not unique – the popular Canadian series "Little Mosque on the Prairie" also deals with anti-Muslim attitudes – it's rare these days for an American sitcom to tackle such sensitive social and political issues.

At first, "Aliens in America" seems more akin to NBC's short-lived 1999 series "Freaks and Geeks" with its story of Justin Tolchuck (Dan Byrd), a nerdy Wisconsin high school student who just doesn't seem to fit in.

Then the twist: His overly involved mother, Franny (Amy Pietz), agrees to take in a foreign exchange student, hoping it will help Justin become as popular as his sister Claire (Lindsey Shaw). Only the student who arrives is Raja Musharaff (Adhir Kalyan), a Muslim from Pakistan.

Raja is polite, idealistic and hardworking, much to the pleasure of Justin's father, Gary (Scott Patterson). But everyone else in town sees Raja as a potential terrorist.

In one scene from the pilot, Raja sits wearily in class listening to a student confess that she is angry with him because "his people" blew up the twin towers. The teacher then asks if others in the class are angry with Raja and all raise their hands.

The response from the Islamic Center crowd was overwhelmingly positive, just as it has been with TV critics. Although a small minority of columnists complained that the pilot suggests Americans are "bigoted and stupid."

Yes. There is no reason for the teacher or the class to be angry with Raja, and this is a deft and vicious caricature of those who call upon Muslims to repudiate and work against the global jihad movement.

These are the people to whom Hamid Karzai is extending a hand of reconciliation.

"Taliban unveils hardline Afghan constitution," by Isambard Wilkinson and Ashraf Ali in the Telegraph (thanks to all who sent this in):

The Taliban has published a shadow Afghan constitution outlining an alternative hardline government to that of President Hamid Karzai.

The 23-page document envisages a country where women would remain veiled and uneducated, "un-Islamic thought" would be banned and human rights would be ignored if "contrary with the teachings of Islam".

The Constitution of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, comes days after the Defence Secretary, Des Browne, said that the Taliban will need to take a role in the peace process in Afghanistan.

On freedom of speech the Taliban charter, which is written in Pashto and Dari, is clear: "Every Afghan has the right to express his feelings through his views, writings or through other means in accordance with the law."

However "un-Islamic thought" is strictly forbidden and "violators will be punished according to sharia" - under the Taliban's strict interpretation of Islamic teachings.

In reality, of course, the Sharia is not an invention of the Taliban.

Surrender. From The Associated Press (thanks to all who sent this in):

KABUL, Afghanistan: President Hamid Karzai offered Saturday to meet personally with Taliban leader Mullah Omar for peace talks and give the militants a high position in a government ministry as a way to end the rising insurgency in Afghanistan.

Reiterating a call for negotiations he has made with increasing frequency over the last several weeks, Karzai also said he was willing to meet with factional warlord leader and former Prime Minister Gulbuddin Hekmatyar.

"If I find their address, there is no need for them to come to me, I'll personally go there and get in touch with them," Karzai said. "Esteemed Mullah, sir, and esteemed Hekmatyar, sir, why are you destroying the country?"

Karzai said he has contacts with Taliban militants through tribal elders but that there are no direct and open government communication channels with the fighters.

"If a group of Taliban or a number of Taliban come to me and say, 'President, we want a department in this or in that ministry or we want a position as deputy minister ... and we don't want to fight anymore ... If there will be a demand and a request like that to me, I will accept it because I want conflicts and fighting to end in Afghanistan," Karzai said.

"I wish there would be a demand as easy as this. I wish that they would want a position in the government. I will give them a position," he said.

Karzai earlier this month renewed a call for talks with the Taliban, and a spokesman for the militant group initially said the fighters might be open to negotiations. But spokesman Qari Yousef Ahmadi later said foreign troops must first leave the country — a demand Karzai said Saturday he would not meet.

"It should be very clear until all our roads are paved, until we have good electricity and good water, and also until we have a better Afghan national army and national police, I don't want any foreigners to leave Afghanistan," he said.

Read that last paragraph again.

"We are unexperienced and a bit stupid as regards diversity and a multicultural population, says head of Security Service Jørn Holme to nrknyheter.no."

"We confuse Islam and Islamism. Islamism is after all a very particular form of Islam. I believe many Norwegians mix it up completely." -- from this news article

A "bit stupid as regards diversity"? Meaning not everyone in Norway is convinced that the most important and practically the greatest thing that any government can promote is "diversity"? Is that it? Are there still not enough university rectors in Norway to echo the sentiments of one Mary Sue Coleman of the University of Michigan, in her world-famous address "We Are Diversity"?

And that business about "we [Norwegians] confuse Islam and Islamism." We are all confused. We are confused, and we are alarmed. For the last person in Norway who should make such a remark, that is, the head of the Norwegian security service, confidently tells us that there is a great difference between "Islam" and "Islamism"?

But remember: it is not the perpetrators, but we who report on this sort of thing who are the "haters." "US army recovers bodies of murdered Sunni couple in Baghdad''s Adhamiyah," from the Kuwait News Agency (thanks to Twostellas):

BAGHDAD, Sept 28 (KUNA) -- The bodies of a murdered Sunni Iraqi police lieutenant and his wife were recovered in Baghdad's Adhamiyah neighborhood three days ago, a US army statement said on Friday.

The couple had been abducted several days before by Sunni insurgents, the statement quoting a relative as saying, adding that the bodies were discovered dumped in a pile of trash beneath a pedestrian overpass in the Sunni-dominated neighborhood of Adhamiyah in Baghdad.

Both victims appeared to have been killed by gunshot wounds to the head.

The police lieutenant also had drill holes in his face that indicated he was tortured before being executed, said 1st Lieutenant Daniel Lake with the 3rd Squadron, 7th Cavalry Regiment of the US unit responsible for security in the Adhamiyah area.

Lake said the lieutenant and his wife; both Sunnis, were most likely targeted by Sunni terrorists associated with al-Qaeda in Iraq or Islamic Government of Iraq because of their involvement with security efforts.

1. At independence, Malaysia (or, as it was then known, Malaya) did not have a Muslim majority. There has been a steady rise in the percentage of Muslims, compared to the indigenous tribes, the Hindus, and the Chinese. What explains this demographic shift?

2. Singapore broke off from Malaysia and established a separate state. What were the main reasons the Chinese of Singapore so desperately sought to be independent of Malaysia?

3. The Bumiputra system was established to favor in education and in the economy, supposedly, the "sons of the soil" or the indigenes. The "sons of the soil" tribes, however, are mostly Christian. Yet the Bumipura system, as every Chinese and Hindu in Malaysia knows, favors only one group: Muslims. Why is that? And do you now believe it is time to assure all citizens of Malaysia equality before the law by ending the Bumiputra preferments for Muslims in Malaysia?

What does this have to do with jihad? Here's what, from "Taxi 'Fear' Hike," by Jeremy Olshan for in the New York Post, September 4:

September 4, 2007 -- Fear and paranoia are driving the taxi strike planned for tomorrow and Thursday, industry sources said yesterday.

The global-positioning systems being installed in all 13,000 cabs will be used to target and spy on Muslims, according to pro-strike literature being distributed by members of the New York Taxi Workers Alliance, the group behind the two-day walkout.

"This is where deep racial, ethnic and religious prejudices and biases come into play," one flier reads. "DNA samples are obtained, scrutinized and archived. Personal and family histories are scoured for evidence of ethnic and religious fervor. Clearly, surveillance technology can be a death sentence once you are in its crosshairs."

But they didn't win this one: "NYC cabbies lose court battle over GPS," by Larry Neumeister for Associated Press:

NEW YORK - A federal judge refused Friday to block a new city rule that requires taxi drivers to install global positioning systems and credit card machines in their cabs by Monday.

The drivers argue that the city overstepped its authority and acted unconstitutionally when it mandated the units. Their lawsuit also claims GPS will give away trade secrets by disclosing the cabbies' driving patterns, which they say give them a competitive edge.

U.S. District Judge Richard M. Berman refused to block the rule from taking effect, saying the use of the technology to improve taxi service appeared to outweigh drivers' privacy rights. He urged the two sides to negotiate and set the next hearing for Oct. 10.

Alan Dershowitz in FrontPage:

In his speeches, most especially the one at Columbia University, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad repeats two myths about the Holocaust. The first every reasonable person knows is a total lie: namely that the Holocaust did not occur. The second myth, however, is one that escapes critical attention for the most part, because many people are not aware of its falsity. The myth is that the Palestinian people and their leadership had absolutely nothing to do with the Holocaust. The conclusion that is supposed to follow from this “fact” is that the establishment of Israel in the wake of the Nazi genocide of the Jewish people was unfair to the Palestinians. This is the way Ahmadinejad put it in his Columbia talk.

“…[G]iven this historical event [the Holocaust], if it is a reality, we need to question whether the Palestinian people should be paying for it… “The Palestinian people didn’t commit any crime. They had no role to play in World War II.”

These statements about the role of the Palestinians are demonstrably false. The truth is that the Palestinian leadership, supported by the Palestinian masses, played a significant role in Hitler’s Holocaust. The Palestinian leader at the time was Hajj Amin Al-Husseini, the Grand Mufit of Jerusalem. As Professor Edward Said has acknowledged:

“Hajj Amin al-Husseini represented the Palestinian Arab national consensus, had the backing of the Palestinian political parties that functioned in Palestine, and was recognized in some form by Arab governments as the voice of the Palestinian people.”

Husseini was “Palestine’s national leader” and it was in that capacity that he made his notorious alliance with Hitler and played an active role in promoting the Holocaust. Here is the true story that Ahmadinejad tried to mythologize.

Read it all.

More suicidal politically correct short-sightedness. By Bill Gertz in the Washington Times (thanks to all who sent this in):

The FBI is cooperating with a U.S. Muslim group recently linked to global extremists and is asking the group to provide "cultural training" for its special agents, according to a Senate Judiciary Committee report.

The FBI's "Muslim outreach" community program included talks with the vice president of the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) about cooperating with the FBI, according to a report recently made public that contains written answers to questions posed by committee members.

The FBI as of June was seeking ISNA's help to "schedule tours and cultural training for FBI [special agents] at the All Dulles Area Muslim Society Center, and to coordinate the introduction of the community executive seminar training program to the local organizations by the national leaders," the FBI stated in the report.

ISNA was recently identified as part of the Muslim Brotherhood organization in a document submitted into evidence at the federal terrorism trial of the Holy Land Foundation, a group facing charges of illegally funding the Hamas terrorist group.

Disclosure of the FBI link to ISNA comes amid congressional opposition to the Justice Department's participation in an ISNA conference held over Labor Day weekend. Two members of Congress urged the department in a letter not to attend the conference to avoid lending credibility to a group linked to extremists. The department ignored the request.

Reps. Peter Hoekstra, Michigan Republican, and Sue Myrick, North Carolina Republican, stated in a letter to the Justice Department that ISNA should not be legitimized by Justice's participation in the conference, because of ISNA's "extremist origins."

An FBI spokesman had no comment.

According to the 1991 Muslim Brotherhood document, ISNA is among 29 organizations in the Muslim Brotherhood, an international Sunni extremist group that supports global Islamist "jihad" but publicly says it opposes the use of violence.

"War is deceit": "Three local guards were killed Thursday after attackers set up a false roadblock in Tadmait..."

"6 Algerian security force officers killed in attacks by Islamic militants," from The Associated Press (thanks to Twostellas):

ALGIERS, Algeria: Six members of Algeria's security forces were killed in violence by a militant group that claims to be the north African affiliate of al-Qaida, officials said Friday.

The separate attacks came in a particularly violent September in Algeria, where government efforts to end a long-running insurgency have increasingly faced setbacks.

Three local guards were killed Thursday after attackers set up a false roadblock in Tadmait, a village in the restive Kabylie region, 100 kilometers (60 miles) east of Algiers, security officials said....

A group calling itself Al-Qaida in North Africa has led the recent upsurge in violence. It has been composed of a former Salafist militant group that was part of a long-running insurgency in Algeria.

That unrest broke out in 1992 after the army canceled elections that a now-banned Islamic party was poised to win. Up to 200,000 people are estimated to have been killed.

Con Coughlin discusses the Thug-In-Chief's apocalyptic beliefs in the Telegraph (thanks to all who sent this in):

Not since the prime minister of the tiny Caribbean island of Grenada presented an address claiming that UFOs posed a mortal threat to the future of mankind has the United Nations been treated to such a bizarre spectacle.

Many people believe the greatest threat to world peace concerns Iran's nuclear programme, so there was understandably great interest at this week's general assembly in New York when the country's president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, took the platform.

But instead of seeking to reassure delegates that Iran's nuclear intentions were purely benign, Mr Ahmadinejad took advantage of his official visit to a country deemed – in the lexicon of the Iranian Revolution – "the Great Satan" to embark on a discourse about the wonders of the 12th Imam.

For those unacquainted with the more obscure tenets of Islamic theology, the 12th Imam is held by devout Shi'ite Muslims to be a direct descendant of the Prophet Mohammed who went into "occlusion" in the ninth century at the age of five and hasn't been seen since.

The Hidden Imam, as he is also known by his followers, will only return after a period of cosmic chaos, war and bloodshed – what Christians call the Apocalypse – and then lead the world into an era of universal peace.

Rumours abound of Mr Ahmadinejad's devotion to the 12th Imam, and last year it was reported that he had persuaded his cabinet to sign a "contract" pledging themselves to work for his return.

Another example of his messianic tendencies surfaced after 108 people were killed in an aircraft crash in Teheran. Mr Ahmadinejad praised the victims, saying: "What is important is that they have shown the way to martyrdom which we must follow."

For many of the hundreds of delegates who attended Mr Ahmadinejad's speech to the UN this week, his discourse on the merits of the 12th Imam finally brought home the reality of the danger his regime poses to world peace.

Rather than allaying concerns about Iran's nuclear ambitions, Mr Ahmadinejad spoke at length about how a Muslim saviour would relieve the world's suffering.

The era of Western predominance was drawing to a close, he said, and would soon be replaced by a "bright future" ushered in by the 12th Imam's return. "Without any doubt, the Promised One, who is the ultimate Saviour, will come. The pleasing aroma of justice will permeate the whole world."

The really alarming aspect is that – if the world's leading intelligence agencies are to be believed – he is seriously attempting to acquire a nuclear weapons arsenal.

Only yesterday, the opposition group that first revealed the existence of Iran's uranium enrichment facility at Natanz claimed that Iran was building a new bomb-proof underground site for developing nuclear weapons.

The National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) said the regime was near to completing a vast underground chamber that was linked by two tunnels to the existing complex at Natanz, and was protected against aerial attack.

As with so many of the allegations relating to Iran's nuclear activities, the NCRI's claims are impossible to verify, not least because Iran continues to impede UN nuclear inspectors.

And even if, as Mr Ahmadinejad claimed in New York, Iran has no interest in developing nuclear weapons, there is every indication that Teheran is preparing itself for war, not least because the clash with Western civilisation that the Iranian president so obviously desires will hasten, or so he believes, the arrival of the 12th Imam.

Read it all.

More comments on the current Sixth Session of the Human Rights Council by David G. Littman, NGO Representative of the Association for World Education (AWE) and the World Union for Progressive Judaism (WUPJ) to the United Nations Office in Geneva:

On September 20, while delivering our third oral statement to the 6th session of the UN Council on Human Rights in Geneva, a representative of Egypt (one of the 47 Member States) raised a ‘point of order’ twice in an attempt to censor our statement, delivered on behalf of the WUPJ and the AWE. His first intervention occurred soon after our reference to Iranian President Ahmadinejad. The Egyptian delegate stated that the mention of Iran (in connection with Hamas) was not relevant to the “situation in Palestine”.

His second intervention came after our quotation from the Hamas slogan (article 8 of its Charter, copied from the Charter of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood of 1928): “Allah is its target, the Prophet is its model; the Koran is its Constitution; Jihad is its path, and death for the sake of Allah is the loftiest of its wishes.” This time, Egypt objected that references to ‘religion’ and to ‘Allah’ were not relevant to item 7 and such declarations were “unwise”. Council President, Romanian Ambassador Toru Romulus da Costea, allowed the NGO speaker to finish his three minute statement.

Our full text is reproduced below with the 2 places indicated (*) and (**) when Egypt’s interventions occurred; they heightened general interest.

After delivering a strong criticism of President Ahmadinejad in another oral statement on September 25, we then learned from the Secretary of the Council that while criticism of a Head of State by NGOs was accepted, any mention of “Allah” should be avoided – and that was perhaps why the Egyptian delegate had made his second ‘point of order’ under item 7.

This is a new development at the Council, maybe due to the persistence by Ambassador Masood Khan of Pakistan, speaking often on behalf of the Organization of the Islamic Conference. In one statement he declared: “Even terrorist acts carried out by non-State actors in the name of religion should be delinked from religion to ensure freedom of religion or belief.”

Paradoxically, many representatives of Muslim States – including Iran and Pakistan – always begin their statements with the first words of the Koran: “In the name of Allah, the Merciful, the Compassionate. Praise be to Allah…” As is well-known, this first surat ends with a strong criticism against “… those who have incurred Your wrath” and “those who have gone astray” – this implicitly refers to “the Jews” and “the Christians”.

Our understanding that mention of “Allah” by NGOs was now taboo at the Council was confirmed after the closure of the 6th session of the HRC at 6:00pm on Friday, 28 September, when we asked the Secretary for a clarification on this point. He raised his eyes, stating that “they” (the OIC) did not want a mention of the Divine Name other than by them at the beginning of a statement. This would seem to have been accepted, which would indicate another UN step on the descent to full dhimmitude.

A ‘blasphemy’ accusation by the Sudanese government against the Special Rapporteur on Sudan, Gaspar Biro, occurred at the Commission on Human Rights in 1994. This was followed by the extraordinary ‘Blasphemy Affair’ launched by the OIC on April 18, 1997, that resulted in the Chairman’s censorship decision 1997/125, excising a passage from the Racism Report.
[details in: http://www.intjewishlawyers.org/docenter/frames.asp?id=9259; and http://www.meforum.org/article/379 ; and several articles in The Myth of Islamic Tolerance: How Islamic Law Treats Non-Muslims (edited by Robert Spencer), Part 5 – “Human Rights and Human Wrongs at the United Nations,” pp. 305-50]

The “Defamation of Islam” campaign by the OIC began in earnest from 1999 at the Commission – led by Pakistan’s ambassador – and then, after 9/11, came the all-embracing accusation of worldwide “Islamophobia”.

It would now seem that the mention of “Allah” – even when quoted from the Charter of Hamas or from other Jihadist statements – would be considered unwise unless used as a blessing by Member States of the OIC.

One of the latest examples of this “Islamophobia” campaign by Muslim countries was pronounced on September 25 by Pakistan’s Ambassador Masood Khan, speaking on behalf of the OIC, on the HiCHR’s Report on ‘Defamation of Religions’. There was no official reaction to this very grave calumny by any State Members, but a strong letter of complaint signed by numerous NGOs – initiated by United Nations Watch on – was sent to the ambassador on September 28, the last day of the session. One paragraph of his statement is enough to show the depths of the duplicity being used.

“Accomodation of Muslims and their religious aspirations in the Western world will create space for political and social harmony. All is not dark. Enlightened communities and opinion leaders in Europe and North America are trying to steer their societies in that direction. It is, however, surprising that in many instances Holocaust survivors, instead of promoting such harmony, are campaigning against Muslim symbols in the Western world. They should be the most ardent advocates against discrimination. Islamophobia is also a crude form of Anti-Semitism."

* * * * *

Just before being called to speak under item 9 on September 25, the NGO liaison officer brought me an oral request from the Council President, who had received a copy of our statement. I was given to understand that one particular passage might cause him embarrassment if it was pronounced. He might well have been anticipating a ‘point of order’ or several – and his request was very diplomatic. Having already decided that this passage had to be omitted for lack of time I readily agreed to strike out the quotation from President Ahmadinejad’s advisor that ended with the “….Jews are very filthy people.” (below)

Our severe criticism of the Iranian President was pronounced without any interruption. This is an example of a fair President of the Human Rights Council being wary of pressure from delegates on “Islamophobia”.

Badawi's problem here is that there are so many Muslim Misunderstanders of Islam, as we document here every day. If there weren't so many murders committed by Muslims who explain and justify their actions by reference to Islamic texts and teachings, maybe Western nations wouldn't have so much trouble grasping this glorious complexity. "Malaysia says Western nations misunderstand Islam," from Deutsche Presse-Agentur (thanks to the Constantinopolitan Irredentist):

New York - Malaysia's Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi called Friday for increasing dialogue to repair misunderstandings by the West about Islam.

'The main cause is the misperception in the West that Islam promotes exclusively and encourages extremism,' Badawi said in an address to the UN General Assembly.

He said action should be taken to generate 'greater understanding' between civilizations and cultures and dialogue to establish 'the truth that Islam is a religion which espouses universalism, not exclusivity, and tolerance, not bigotry.'

As always, for no controversial statement by a Muslim figure has ever been taken in context. "Omeish Says He's 'Victim of Smear Campaign,'" by Tim Craig and Joshua Zumbrun for the Washington Post:

Esam S. Omeish, the Muslim leader from Fairfax County who resigned from the state immigration commission after controversial remarks made on video surfaced, defended his remarks today and said he was the victim of a smear campaign.

"The smear campaign brings forward comments and speech excerpts which were taken out of context . . . and used to undermine a whole community of faith in a relentless campaign of Islamophobia intimidation," Omeish said in an 11 a.m. news conference.

Omeish submitted his resignation to Gov. Timothy M. Kaine (D) yesterday after video surfaced of one speech in which he referred to the "Israeli war machine" and another 38-second excerpt from a speech he made at a December 2000 rally in support of the "Jihad way."

"All these allegations revolve around obsolete historical associations, out of context statements wrapped in hateful, misleading insinuations by individuals who are bent on alienating and intimidating Muslim leaders and activists," Omeish said.

What about the Muslim Brotherhood, for which the Muslim American Society is a front? Are they making obsolete historical associations and taking things out of context?

"Kamikaze," says the ANSA headline. "We have 400 Kamikaze Ready, Hamas Warns." Really? Kamikaze? 神風? Hamas has 400 men ready to die for the Japanese Empire? 400 men ready to kill themselves and others for the divine emperor?

ANSA, an Italian news service, uses -- three times -- a word out of another conflict and another age, probably so as to avoid having to refer to these attackers by any term that is remotely Islamic. They'd rather pretend it's 1943 and Gaza is an outpost of Imperial Nippon than say anything about jihad martyrdom, or the blessing promised to those who "kill and are killed for Allah" in Qur'an 9:111.

"Gaza: We Have 400 Kamikaze Ready, Hamas Warrns," from ANSAmed (thanks to Insubria):

(ANSAmed) - GAZA, SEPTEMBER 28 - If Israel decided to return to occupy the Gaza Strip, it would find 400 kamikaze in expectation ready to die for their cause, and 50,000 combatants: Hamas member Nizar Rayan issued the threat to Arab journalists today. Rayan said that "the most surprising thing" is that among the 400 kamikaze ready to self-explode "against the armed tanks of Israel" there are 200 women. Already in the past Hamas had utilised women to commit suicide attacks, but until now there had been no confirmation that others had been trained to act....

"US brands Iran Guard 'terrorist organisation'," from Agence France-Presse:

WASHINGTON — The US Senate has called for Iran’s Revolutionary Guards to be officially designated a “foreign terrorist organisation,” a day after the House of Representatives passed a similar measure.

The Senate on Wednesday voted 76-22 for the non-binding amendment sponsored by Republican Jon Kyl and independent Joseph Lieberman to place the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps, or Pasdaran, on the US terrorist blacklist.

A list of who voted for and against the amendment can be found here.

Such a designation if adopted by the US government would open the corps and affiliated companies to economic sanctions.

The measure is a “sense of the Senate” amendment, which means it cannot impact the president’s foreign policy, but is an important symbolic measure expressing will of lawmakers.

It says that senators agree it is in the critical national interest of the United States to prevent Iran turning Shia extremists in Iraq into a “Hezbollah type force.”

The amendment says that senators believe that “inside Iraq” US economic, military, diplomatic economic and intelligence ”instruments” should be used to back US policy against the government of Iran and “its proxies.”

[...]

During a debate among Democratic presidential hopefuls on Wednesday night, the amendment was criticized as helping lay the foundation for President George W. Bush to take possible military action against Teheran.

Any military action at all? Including strikes on Iran's nuclear "power" industry?

“I have no intention of giving George Bush the authority to take the first step on a road to war with Iran,” said former senator and presidential hopeful John Edwards at the debate at Dartmouth College.

Long-shot candidate Mike Gravel blasted front-runner Senator Hillary Clinton for supporting the amendment. “And I am ashamed of you, Hillary, for voting for it.”

Clinton defended her vote, saying by designating the Revolutionary Guard as a terrorist organisation “gives us the options to be able to impose sanctions on the primary leaders to try to begin to put some teeth into all this talk about dealing with Iran.”

The Bush administration said in August it would designate all or part of the Guard as a terrorist organisation.

Iran's reaction: "Iran condemns US move to brand Guards 'terrorist'," from Reuters:

TEHERAN - Iran has said any US move to brand its elite Revolutionary Guards a foreign terrorist organisation would be illegal and amount to a confrontation with the entire Islamic Republic.

The House of Representatives approved a bill on Tuesday mandating sanctions on foreign energy companies doing business with Iran and urging the US government to brand the Guards ’terrorist’.

INSA news agency carried a foreign ministry statement late on Wednesday branding any such move irresponsible and illegal.

“Any confrontation with this humane force is a confrontation with the great nation of Iran and those who are after accusing the Guards are in fact putting themselves in front of a nation of 70 million people,” spokesman Mohammad Ali Hosseini said.

A month ago, there were plans within the US administration to label the entire Guards Corps a foreign terrorist group -- the first time the United States would place the armed forces of any sovereign government on such a list.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice told Reuters in New York on Monday the United States was considering sanctions against the Guard’s Qods unit, enabling Washington to target its financing.

[...]

The Qods force is a special unit of the Revolutionary Guard Corps and considered the most elite unit. There are varying estimates of its strength but it is in charge of Teheran’s support for groups such as Hezbollah and Hamas.

"Sharia-bank bids trigger concerns," by Steven Chase and Tavia Grant for The Globe and Mail:

OTTAWA and TORONTO -- Ottawa has received its first applications to start up Canadian banks operating within the strictures of Islamic religious law - financial institutions that, if approved, would be among the first in the West.

Canada's bank regulator, the Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions, is studying two proposals for banks that offer services in keeping with Islamic laws that forbid speculation and interest but are in favour of transactions where profit and loss is shared.

The applications came to light in government documents obtained by The Globe and Mail under access to information laws, files that show Ottawa believes there are four other possible applicants keen to start banks operating under Islamic religious law, or sharia.

While some banks in the West offer sharia-compliant products, few aside from the Islamic Bank of Britain are standalone institutions set up expressly for this purpose.

See also this article, which appeared on Dhimmi Watch in May, for a stinging critique of Sharia banking in the West by Tarek Fatah.

[...]

Today, however, demand for sharia-compliant products in Canada remains unclear and several Islamic finance companies have folded.

Whether or not various ventures succeed, Sharia advocates are still laying the groundwork for collaboration with, enforcement, and support of Sharia law by Western governments, setting a disturbing precedent.

So says the Secretary of State in "Nations must fight climate change like terrorism, Rice says," from CNN. Let's see, that will mean:

1.) Being afraid to name the activities and people who are part of the problem.

2.) Insisting that only a tiny minority of vehicles on the road are belching greenhouse gases. Make no effort to verify for fear of offending motorists and car companies.

3.) Continuing to aid parties who pay lip service to helping, but do either nothing, or as little as possible in order to keep up appearances.

Abbas' government tries to counter the influence of Hamas, not by trying to boost its ever-undeserved "moderate" credentials, but by demonstrating its zeal for Islamic law. Sharia Alert. By Dalia Nammari for the Associated Press:

RAMALLAH, West Bank (AP) - A new squad of morality police has begun detaining Palestinians who eat or drink in public during Ramadan in the West Bank, where the Islamic month of daytime fasting was always widely observed but never imposed.

The 12-member squad appears to be an attempt by President Mahmoud Abbas' West Bank government to challenge the monopoly on religious righteousness claimed by the militant group Hamas, the rival ruler of Gaza.

The sudden deployment of Ramadan police was unexpected in Ramallah, the seat of Abbas' government and the most cosmopolitan and well-to-do of the Palestinian cities. Ramadan squads have not been set up in other West Bank towns.

Watching observers arrive at one of the town's main mosques one recent afternoon, vice squad Lt. Murad Qendah got a radio call telling him a suspect has been spotted in the street imbibing "karoub"—a local soft drink made from carob pods. He ordered his six-man squad to seize the man's papers pending investigation. Police say violators are usually held for 24 hours.

Police spokesman Adnan al-Damari said police have arrested at least 50 alleged public morality offenders in Ramallah since the start of Ramadan, but would not be going after people who break the fast in their own homes.

"The duty of the morality police is to preserve public manners in public places, and to preserve the feelings of the people who are fasting," he said. "Violating the holiness of Ramadan is a violation of people's freedom."

[...]

Writer Hassan Dandees, 58, said the government was right to seek to uphold religious standards.

"This is not a violation of anybody's freedom," he said. "Ramadan has a holiness every person should respect."

But Ruba el-Mimi, 21, said she opposes the police action.

"It interferes with the privacy of the individual. People are free to fast or not," she said. "If somebody is not fasting, he's not doing harm."

In addition to booking smokers, snackers and carob juice drinkers, Qendah is also on the alert for young men whistling at girls or drivers playing their car stereos too loud.

Although the piety squad has government sanction, Cabinet minister Ashraf al-Ajrami, said he is uncomfomtable with the operation and the impression that the government was trying to be more zealous than Hamas.

"We are studying this issue, and there's a possibility we shall end it," he said. "We don't want to change the order of things and appear as if we are following in the footsteps of somebody or imitating somebody."

"Martyrdooms."

"Documents point to S.C. terror plot: Explosives materials in car," by Adam Beam and Lee Higgins for The State (thanks to all who sent this in):

Four key developments disclosed Tuesday in an application for a federal search warrant of the car driven by two Egyptian students arrested last month in South Carolina:

• Ahmed Mohamed admitted to FBI agents that he made a training video to show people in “Arabic countries” how to use remote-controlled bombs against American soldiers.

• Someone using Mohamed’s laptop computer used the search words “martyrdooms” and “suiciders” to link to the video on YouTube.

• Authorities found a toy remote-control boat, still in its box, and a partially dismantled digital watch at Youssef Samir Megahed’s Tampa, Fla., home. They suspect that the items are the beginnings of a homemade bomb.

• On Mohamed’s computer, authorities found a file titled “Bomb Shock,” which contains files about explosives, including detailed descriptions of TNT and of C-4, a military-grade plastic explosive.

In a 12-minute video posted on YouTube, an Egyptian man wearing a white shirt, khaki pants and rubber gloves explains in Arabic how to turn a toy boat into a bomb.

His name is Ahmed Abdellatif Sherif Mohamed, and last month he was arrested in Goose Creek after authorities found four PVC pipes containing a mixture of potassium nitrate, kitty litter and sugar in his car’s trunk.

There is much more. Read it all.

UPDATE: Omeish has stepped down. LGF has the story.

An update on this story. "Virginia Governor Tim Kaine Examining Incendiary Videos Featuring Appointee," from the Associated Press:

RICHMOND, Va. — Gov. Timothy M. Kaine examined online videos Thursday that show a man he appointed to the state Commission on Immigration condemning Israel and advocating "the jihad way."

In a video that appears on YouTube, Muslim American Society president Dr. Esam S. Omesh is shown at an August 2006 rally in Washington denouncing the invasion of Lebanon during that time by the "Israeli war machine."

Omesh, chief of the division of general surgery at INOVA Alexandria Hospital, also accused Israel of genocide and massacres against Palestinians and said the "Israeli agenda" controls Congress.

In a separate, undated video, Omesh tells a crowd of Washington-area Muslims, "...you have learned the way, that you have known that the jihad way is the way to liberate your land."

That video was credited to Investigative Project, a Washington-based organization that investigates radical Islamic organizations.

A caller to Kaine's program on WRVA radio in Richmond asked the governor about the Omesh appointment and the video.

"That is news to me, what you say, and it's something we will check out," Kaine told the caller, identified on the air only by the name Kent.

"That is news to me." Obviously, that doesn't speak well of the screening process prospective appointees underwent.

Neither Kaine nor The Associated Press was immediately able to contact Omesh. Mahdi Bray, a spokesman for the MAS, said Omesh was performing surgery and not immediately available for comment.

Omesh was among 10 appointments Kaine made on Aug. 2 to a 20-member panel created this year by the General Assembly to assess the benefits and costs of immigration and the effects on federal immigration policies on the state. The commission met in Richmond for the first time Tuesday.

And other interesting observations from just before the 2003 entry into Iraq. "Saddam suggested $1bn exile," by Jason Webb in The Scotsman (thanks to Hot Air):

SADDAM Hussein was prepared to take $1 billion and go into exile before the Iraq war, George Bush, the United States president, is said to have told José WMaria Aznar, the then prime minister of Spain, a month before the 2003 invasion.

During a meeting at his ranch in Crawford, Texas, on 22 February, Mr Bush told Mr Aznar that Saddam could also be assassinated, according to a transcript of their talks published yesterday in the Spanish newspaper El Pais.

"The Egyptians are speaking to Saddam Hussein. It seems he's indicated he would be prepared to go into exile if he's allowed to take $1 billion [£500 million] and all the information he wants about weapons of mass destruction," Mr Bush was quoted as saying. Asked by Mr Aznar whether the Iraqi dictator could really leave, Mr Bush replied: "Yes, that possibility exists. Or he might even be assassinated."

[...]

Mr Bush was dismissive about Jacques Chirac, the former French president, saying he "thinks he's Mr Arab", and he described the US as playing a game of "good cop, bad cop" with the former prime minister, Tony Blair.

"I don't mind being the bad cop if Blair is the good cop," he said.

Mr Bush referred optimistically to the reconstruction of Iraq, which he thought "could be organised into a federation".

Not "The Security Service fears that a jihad terror attack will do serious harm to Norwegians." The concern is all with an imagined backlash, not with preventing it by heading off a terror attack, and calling upon Muslims in Norway to be active in anti-terror efforts.

A translation by Christian of this Norwegian article, "Frykter lynsjing av muslimer" in Nyheter.

- Norwegians are stupid and not good at integrating.

This according to Norway's Police Security Service, which fears a lynching mood in case there will be a terror attack.

The Security Service fears that serious harm will be done to Norwegian Muslims in case of a terror attack in Norway.

- We are unexperienced and a bit stupid as regards diversity and a multicultural population, says head of Security Service Jørn Holme to nrknyheter.no.

- We confuse Islam and Islamism. Islamism is after all a very particular form of Islam. I believe many Norwegians mix it up completely.

- The Security Service is particularly worried about the possibility of extreme right-wing elements attacking Muslim compatriots, and that we will have a polarized population attacking and losing confidence in each other.

The minister of justice agrees with the head of Security Service.

- This is a preoccupation shared by all of us. Serious crimes like these create even more stigmatization and even more problems in connection with the preventive efforts, says Knut Storberget (social democrat) to nrknyheter.no.

Wednesday evening the head of Security Service for the first time particepated in a public discussion, arranged by the Muslim Students' Society. As reported by NRK previously this week, many Muslims think they are under surveillance and feel they have to face responsibility for what extreme Islamists do....

So why not actively cooperate, and help police find the "extreme Islamists"? If they were operating someplace known to me, that's what I would do. If they were operating in the name of something I believed in, I would make every effort to stop them, instead of claiming victim status for being under surveillance. Want to not be under surveillance? Take away the reason why anyone would be watching.

Here is part two of Fjordman's essay on Islam and the Greek heritage. Part one is here.

According to scholar Lynda Shaffer, "Francis Bacon (1561-1626), an early advocate of the empirical method, upon which the scientific revolution was based, attributed Western Europe's early modern take-off to three things in particular: printing, the compass, and gunpowder. Bacon had no idea where these things had come from, but historians now know that all three were invented in China. Since, unlike Europe, China did not take off onto a path leading from the scientific to the Industrial Revolution, some historians are now asking why these inventions were so revolutionary in Western Europe and, apparently, so unrevolutionary in China."

The Song dynasty, from the tenth to the thirteenth century, was arguably the most dynamic period in Chinese history. Although printing "was invented by Buddhist monks in China, and at first benefited Buddhism, by the middle of the tenth century printers were turning out innumerable copies of the classical Confucian corpus."

According to Shaffer, "The origin of the civil service examination system in China can be traced back to the Han dynasty, but in the Song dynasty government-administered examinations became the most important route to political power in China. For almost a thousand years (except the early period of Mongol rule), China was governed by men who had come to power simply because they had done exceedingly well in examinations on the Neo-Confucian canon. At any one time thousands of students were studying for the exams, and thousands of inexpensive books were required. Without printing, such a system would not have been possible."

As she explains, "China developed the world's largest and most technologically sophisticated merchant marine and navy." The Chinese "could have made the arduous journey around the tip of Africa and sail into Portuguese ports; however, they had no reason to do so. Although the Western European economy was prospering, it offered nothing that China could not acquire much closer to home at much less cost."

In contrast, the Portuguese, the Spanish and other Europeans were trying to reach the Spice Islands, what is now Indonesia. "It was this spice market that lured Columbus westward from Spain and drew Vasco da Gama around Africa and across the Indian Ocean." In Shaffer's view, technologies such as gunpowder and the compass had a different impact in China than they had in Europe, and it is "unfair to ask why the
Chinese did not accidentally bump into the Western Hemisphere while sailing east across the Pacific to find the wool markets of Spain."

Yes, Asia was the most prosperous region on the planet at this time. Europeans embarked on their Age of Exploration of the seas precisely out of a desire to reach the wealthy Asian lands (and bypass Muslim middlemen), which is why Christopher Columbus and his men mistakenly believed they had arrived in India when they reached the Americas. Asians did not possess a similar desire to reach Europe. But this still doesn't explain why the Chinese didn't embark on the final and most crucial stage of the Industrial Revolution in the West: Harnessing the force of steam and the use of fossil fuels to build stronger, more efficient machinery, faster ships and eventually railways, cars and airplanes.

Printing and literacy greatly expanded during Song times; the world's first printed paper money (bank notes) was introduced and a system of canals and roads was built, all facilitating an unprecedented population growth. Iron smelting and the use of coal multiplied several times over as China reached a stage sometimes called "proto-industrial." And yet China produced no Thomas Savery, Thomas Newcomen or James Watt to develop successful steam engines, nor a George Stephenson to build railway lines or a Karl Benz to make the first gasoline-powered automobile. Although experiments with flying had been undertaken in many nations around the world, the airplane was made possible only with the invention of modern engines, which is why China didn't produce the Wright brothers.

For thousands of years, human beings were limited by their ability to harness muscle power, of men and animals. This was later supplemented with windmills, watermills and similar inventions, which could be important, but in a limited fashion. The harnessing of steam power for engines and machinery was a revolution which provided the basis for enormous improvements in output and efficiency. For some reason, China never did take this final step, and although the country remained prosperous for centuries, later dynasties never quite matched the dynamism under Song times. Emphasis was on cultural continuity, and China experienced no great cultural flowing or event similar to the Renaissance, the Reformation and the Enlightenment in Europe. China was in its own eyes the Middle Kingdom. It had some annoying barbarians at its frontiers, but no immediate neighbors to rival its size and power, and thus little incentive for improvement. The result was relative (though not necessarily absolute) scientific stagnation. China could afford to grow self-satisfied, and she did. In contrast, Europeans, who were divided into numerous smaller states in a constant state of rivalry instead of one, large unified state, had stronger incentives for innovation, including in weapons technology.

The Mongol invasion, which ended the Song dynasty, is sometimes blamed for this loss of impetus. After the conquest of Beijing in 1215 the soil was greasy with human fat for months. According to Genghis Khan, "The greatest pleasure is to vanquish your enemies and chase them before you, to rob them of their wealth and see those dear to them bathed in tears, to ride their horses and clasp to your bosom their wives and daughters." He believed in practicing what you preach. DNA studies indicate that he may have as many as 16 million descendants living today.

The Mongols were notorious for their brutality, but they had a particular dislike for Muslims. Hulagu Khan led the Mongol forces as they completely destroyed Baghdad in 1258, thus ending what remained of the Abbasid Caliphate. The Christian community was largely spared, allegedly thanks to the intercession of Hulagu's Nestorian Christian wife.

The irony is that many Mongols soon adopted Islam as their preferred creed. Maybe the warlike nature of this religion appealed to them. It is possible to make a comparison between Muhammad and Genghis Khan. Temüjin, who gained the title Khan when he founded the Mongol Empire in 1206, did believe he had received a divine mandate to conquer the world, and he created an impressive military force out of nothing by uniting scattered tribes and directing their aggressive energies outwards. He created a Mongolian nation where no nation had existed before, similar to what Muhammad did with the Arabs. The difference is that the Mongols didn't establish a religion of their own throughout their empire which outlasted their rule. We should probably be grateful for that, otherwise the Organization of the Mongolian Conference would be the largest voting bloc at the United Nations today, our schools would teach us about the glories of Mongol science and tolerance and our media would constantly warn us against the dangers of Genghisophobia.

In Europe, the Mongol conquests had the most lasting impact in the Ukraine and Russia. The city of Kiev was devastated while a new Russian state slowly grew out of Moscow. Ivan the Great in the 1400s expanded the Russian state and defeated the Tatar yoke, as the now Islamized Turko-Mongols of the Golden Horde were called. The Mongols invaded Eastern Europe and in the course of a few years attacked Hungary, Poland, Lithuania, Bulgaria and Serbia. They had reached as far as Vienna in 1241 when the Great Khan suddenly died and the commanders had to return to elect a new leader.

The Black Death, the great Eurasian plague pandemic, swept from Central Asia along the Silk Road through the Mongol Empire, reaching the Mediterranean and the Middle East in the 1340s. The disease, which killed at least a third of the population and more than 70% in some regions, probably reached Europe after the Golden Horde used biological warfare during a siege of the Black Sea port of Caffa, catapulting plague-infested corpses into the city. It was then carried to the European continent with fleeing Genoese traders. The Mongols thus didn't invade Western Europe, but at least they gave us the plague.

Many historians place great macrohistorical importance on the Mongol conquest. It certainly had a disruptive impact, and the trail of devastation it left behind severely depopulated regions from China and Korea via Iran and Iraq to Eastern Europe. It ended the dynamic Song dynasty, yet even before the Mongol conquest, there were few indications that a development towards modern machinery was about to take place in China. Japan, which has always learned a lot from China, escaped unscathed. A series of typhoons, dubbed kamikaze or "divine wind" by the Japanese, saved the country from the Mongol fleets in 1274 and 1281, but they, too, didn't develop a fully fledged industry until they adopted a Western model during the Meiji Restoration in the late nineteenth century.

Moreover, even if Western Europe escaped the Mongols, we should remember that Western Europeans had recently experienced centuries of political disintegration and population decline, longer than in any period in Chinese history for several thousand years. Europe also had to face a much more prolonged assault by Islam. Belgian scholar Henri Pirenne in his work Mohammed and Charlemagne asserted that the definitive break between the Classical world and the Middle Ages in the West was not the downfall of the Western Roman Empire following the partition in 395, but the Islamic conquests in the seventh century.

An update on this story. "Official Links German Terror Plot to Syrian Arms, Pakistani Operatives," by Spencer S. Hsu and Craig Whitlock for the Washington Post:

Three terrorism suspects arrested this month in Germany had acquired detonators that originated in Syria and received direct orders to act from operatives in Pakistan, the German interior minister said Tuesday.

The minister, Wolfgang Schaeuble, told reporters in Washington that the detonators were smuggled into Germany from Syria through Turkey and that the suspects were days away from acting on plans to target Americans in Europe. He did not disclose further details about the connections to Syria and Turkey, adding, "We don't really know more."

"We know that this is a clear network, highly conspiratorial," Schaeuble said after two days of meetings with U.S. security officials, including Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff. "The demand came from Pakistan . . . 'You should go on for action. Do not go on preparing for months and months and months, but now is the time to take action in the first half of September,' and they did."

[...]

German officials said the suspects had trained at camps in Pakistan run by the Islamic Jihad Union, a Central Asian network based in Uzbekistan and Pakistan. U.S. and German investigators said they were examining whether al-Qaeda operatives may have been involved in organizing the plot but have not uncovered firm evidence of a connection.

[...]

Some interesting and unfortunate information:

In Germany, it is not against the law to attend a terrorist training camp outside the country.

German lawmakers are debating whether to change the law but have been unable to find a solution. Some legislators have said that it should not be illegal simply to attend a training camp and that prosecutors should have to prove intent to engage in terrorism; others argue that such an approach would be impractical.

Schaeuble said authorities know of several citizens and residents of Germany who have returned after attending militant camps in Pakistan but lack evidence to charge them with any crimes. At least three remain under surveillance, he said.

"We know we have a lot of people in Germany who are suspected of becoming terrorists," he said. "It is a delicate issue. We don't have enough evidence to make it a legal situation. But we know they are linked to a terrorist network. . . . Now we have to watch them."

Mohamed and Megahed Update. This story echoes the recent case in the Netherlands in which a suspect who was ultimately convicted had earlier been acquitted because his plans were too "clumsy and primitive" to be a threat.

"Experts Say Explosives In Car Trunk Were Unlikely To Harm Naval Station," by Elaine Silvestrini for the Tampa Tribune:

TAMPA - When two Egyptian students at the University of South Florida were charged with having explosives in their trunk, a South Carolina sheriff said the men may have targeted a nearby naval weapons station.

Determining what exactly Ahmed Mohamed and Youssef Megahed planned to do with the devices illustrates "the fundamental problem we have across the board when we try to deal with terrorism," said explosives expert, Michael Hopmeier, president of Unconventional Concepts, an engineering and consulting firm.

Discerning whether the two students posed a threat is complicated by the fact that Hopmeier and other experts contacted by The Tampa Tribune question whether the devices described by a federal prosecutor could have done much damage.

"Anything can be a terrorist device," Hopmeier said. "You can kill somebody with a ballpoint pen or a rolled-up newspaper or a book of matches. The question is not the technology but the intent. … Whether they caught them with anything or nothing in the back of their car doesn't speak to whether they are terrorists or would-be terrorists."

But I'm sure you'll agree there's just something, well, special about explosives.

A lack of direct evidence about the students' intent was central to a federal magistrate's decision that one of the men should be released on bail under restrictive conditions. That ruling is under appeal, and both men remain behind bars. The students are scheduled to be arraigned Oct. 3.

When a federal prosecutor struggled during the bail hearing to convince the judge that one of the students is too dangerous to be released, he didn't mention the military installation. The prosecutor told the judge about "jihadi" images found on a laptop computer and about the men's travels and ties abroad but said he had no direct information on what the students intended to do with the devices.

A defense attorney says the idea that the men could threaten the heavily fortified military facility is far-fetched.

Eurabia Alert. From Adnkronos International:

Rome, 26 Sept. (AKI) - The first Islamic bank respecting Koranic law, is slated to be inaugurated next year in Italy, the Union of Arab Banks president, Adnan Yousif, the Association of Italian Banks (ABI) president Corrado Faissola jointly announced Wednesday.

The Union of Arab Banks, based in Beirut comprises more than 300 Arab financial and banking institutions, representing the biggest Arab banks in the region.

"The next step should be the creation of a real Italian-Arab banking federation, which in perspective could represent a model to follow for other countries in the European Union". said Faissola in a press release in ABI's website.

"The consolidation of dialogue and cooperation opens important opportunities for growth and development not only for the banking sector and for Italy, but for all of Europe, and looking further ahead, for the stabilisation of the entire Mediterranean area and the Middle East", Faissola said.

Why is it always someone else's job to take responsibility for the "stabilization" of the "entire Mediterranean area," and of the Middle East? Are they admitting they can't put their own house in order without outside help, and without passing on the burden of a banking system that is part of the problem -- the drive to implement Sharia law -- where stability is concerned in the Middle East? For that matter, it seems like the northern half of the Mediterranean coast is doing quite alright, except for the large influx of immigrants with unexamined allegiances from the southern coast.

Koranic law forbids the payment and collection of interest and the investment in businesses that are considered unlawful, such as activities involving the selling of alcohol or pork products.

The imam Fawaz Damra of Cleveland, Ohio, was a master of deception, condemning terrorism while having ties to terror groups.

Now it appears that his successor, the Imam Ahmed Alzaree, is cut from the same cloth. Tom Blumer has the details, and the Investigative Project has analysis.

Both Blumer and the Investigative Project note Alzaree's quoting of a notorious hadith:

Among the signs of the approach of Day of Judgment is what the messenger of Allah PBUH said: "The hour of judgment shall not happen until the Muslims fight the Jews. The Muslims shall kill the Jews to the point that the Jew shall hide behind a big rock or a tree and the rock or tree shall call on the Muslim saying: hey, O Muslim there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him, except the Gharqad tree which will not say, for it is the tree of Jews."

Hardly a good basis for..."Interfaith Dialogue."

It's easy to see why they would feature this Saudi-funded jihad apologist as a speaker: he tells them what they want to hear. Still more fantasy-based analysis: "NJ'S Obscene Invitation," by Stephen M. Flatow in the New York Post (thanks to all who sent this in):

September 26, 2007 -- AS the father of a terror victim, I can no longer be shocked by much. And as a New Jerseyan, I'm used to strange goings-on in my state's government. But I was shocked and surprised to I learn that John L. Esposito will be a featured speaker at next week's state Department of Homeland Security confernce on counterterrorism.

Esposito teaches at Georgetown University in its His Royal Highness Prince Alwaleed bin Talal Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding. To get a sense of the center's purpose, recall that bin Talal is the Saudi prince who shortly after 9/11 blamed the attacks on U.S. Mideast policy (prompting then-Mayor Rudy Giuliani to throw the prince's $10 million gift to the city back in his face).

Esposito finds time to appear around the country at events sponsored by the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) - helping the group raise funds to explain that the real problem fronting us today is less a clash of cultures than a clash of Islam with American foreign policy. The Esposito-CAIR position is that Americans constantly ask Muslims to understand them without scrutinizing our own actions.

CAIR, by the way, is an unindicted co-conspirator in the trial against the Holy Land Foundation, which stands accused of diverting over $12 million of charitable contributions to the terrorist group Hamas. Esposito has spoken at fund-raisers for Holy Land's defense, and praised its work.

If we judge someone by the company he keeps, Esposito could do better - for at a CAIR gathering in Dallas, Esposito described Sami Al-Arian as "a very good friend of mine." Al-Arian is the Palestinian professor who pleaded guilty last year to conspiring to provide money to Palestinian Islamic Jihad - the group responsible for the 1995 bus-bombing murder of my daughter Alisa and seven others.

The Investigative Project has background.

Charles at LGF has the story, and some video of the appointee, Dr. Esam Omeish.

This is the same Esam Omeish whom I have debated twice on the Laura Ingraham Show. The first time, he denied that Islamic law mandates death for apostasy. The second time, he acknowledged that he'd be happy to see Sharia law come to the US.

Plus, there's this: "Valley delegate challenges Kaine appointee to immigration panel," by Garren Shipley for the Northern Virginia Daily:

A local delegate has asked Democratic Gov. Timothy M. Kaine to re-think his appointment of the head of the Virginia-based Muslim American Society to the Virginia Commission on Immigration.

Del. Todd Gilbert, R-Woodstock, wrote to Kaine earlier today, saying he was concerned about the appointment of Dr. Esam S. Omeish, a Northern Virginia physician and the group's president, to the panel. The commission was created earlier this year to study the impact of illegal immigration on the commonwealth.

The Muslim American Society has significant ties to the Muslim Brotherhood, a group founded in Egypt, Gilbert said.

"It is unfortunate that the Governor would choose the leader of an organization such as this to represent many the freedom-loving Muslim citizens of Virginia on this important commission," Gilbert said.

"While the Muslim American Society claims to be the innocent face of peaceful Islam in America, their history and teachings tell a much different story. Unfortunately, it is a story about which all Americans have become much too familiar -- that of the promotion of a global Islamic state. The questionable origin and teachings of this group should give the Governor some serious concerns about his recent appointment. Even though this organization has a savvy public relations machine, the public face that it projects may disguise some very troubling hidden intentions."

Indeed.

Sunni/Shi'ite Jihad, women's auxiliary division. From AKI (thanks to Insubria):

Baghdad, 25 Sept. (AKI) - A gang of women who are part of the Mahdi army militia, loyal to radical Iraqi Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, have killed a group of Sunni Muslim women in the al-Washshash district of the Iraqi capital Baghdad.

This is according to a statement released on Tuesday by the Congress of the People of Iraq, the party led by Adnan al-Dulaimi, who is also the leader of the Iraqi Accord Front, a key Sunni political bloc.

"The vast campaign of forced migration by the militias of the Mahdi Army against the Sunnis in that district of Baghdad, has led to entire Sunni families being forced to flee the area, except for some women who have remained to protect their homes," said the statement.

"The gang, led by the sister of one of the commanders in the Mahdi Army, murdered three Sunni women, killing them after they broke into their homes with the help of some elements of the militia and before the eyes of the government forces, who have been massively deployed in the district of al-Washshash".

Here (thanks to Carolina) is the list of candidates in the Etobicoke North Ontario Provincial Election, 2007. The 3 major political parties (Conservatives, Liberals and NDP) are all running Muslim candidates. Yet Carolina informs me that Etobicoke North doesn't have a Muslim majority. Evidently, however, they are already a powerful enough bloc to compel all the major parties to pander to them.

Candidates:

New Democratic
BOUDJENANE, MOHAMED

Family Coalition
CEOLIN, TERESA

Progressive Conservative
KASSIM, MOHAMED

Green
KORSHEL, JAMA

Liberal
QAADRI, SHAFIQ

Teresa Ceolin? How'd she get in here?

Qaadri, by the way, is the incumbent.

The Los Angeles Times tut-tuts the "ignorance" of Islam that has led Americans to think that it is different from Judaism and Christianity, and encourages violence. Now where could they have gotten crazy ideas like those? Safaa Ibrahim, executive director of the Bay Area chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, is "not surprised. It's difficult to remove the tarnish of twisted interpretations of terrorists from what Islam means."

As this statement comes from a representative of a group that has been named an unindicted co-conspirator in a terror funding case, it's easy to see why it is so difficult.

The larger problem here is that neither CAIR nor any other Muslim group in the West has ever attempted to untwist the "twisted interpretations of terrorists." For example, CAIR signed and pushed the Fiqh Council of North America's condemnation of terrorism, which condemned the killing of innocent civilians, but neither the Council nor CAIR ever explained who exactly is an innocent civilian -- and some jihadists claim that no non-Muslim can possibly be innocent.

It also might be easier for CAIR to untwist the twisted terrorist interpretations of Islam if they would specify who are the terrorists whose interpretations need to be refuted. CAIR officials have consistently and on many occasions refused to condemn Hamas and Hizballah as terrorist groups.

Americans aren't stupid: they can recognize this kind of disingenuousness, even if the Los Angeles Times can't.

Note also that there is no hint in this piece that Muslims can do anything, or should do anything, to reverse these negative perceptions. It's all about non-Muslim "ignorance."

"Knowledge lacking of Islam, Mormonism," by Theo Milonopoulos in the Los Angeles Times (thanks to the Constantinopolitan Irredentist):

WASHINGTON -- Most Americans say they know little to nothing about the practices of Islam and Mormonism but say their own religious beliefs have little in common with either of these faiths, according to a national survey released Tuesday.

Forty-five percent of those polled said Islam was more likely than other religions to encourage violence among its believers. Nearly 1 in 3 respondents say Mormonism is not a Christian religion, the report said.

The survey of 3,002 Americans was conducted last month by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press and the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life.

Although 58% of respondents said they knew little or nothing about Islamic practices, 70% of non-Muslims said Islam was very different from their own religious beliefs.

Pew Forum senior fellow John Green said that respondents' knowledge of Islam might be even lower than the survey results suggested. Respondents "tend to overestimate their own knowledge, so these figures may well underestimate their lack of knowledge," he said.

The survey found that public attitudes toward Muslims have grown more negative in recent years, with 35% of respondents expressing an unfavorable view. In 2002, the figure was 29%. Respondents who knew a Muslim or who were college graduates were more likely to express positive views about Islam.

But the belief that Islam encourages violence has increased even among groups that have relatively favorable views of Muslims. According to the survey, college graduates are just as likely as those with no college experience to associate violence with Islam.

"We're not surprised," said Safaa Ibrahim, executive director of the Bay Area chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations. "It's difficult to remove the tarnish of twisted interpretations of terrorists from what Islam means."

If they weren't there, make it up.

"British history 'needs rewrite,'" by Brian Wheeler for the BBC (thanks to Stephen):

British history should be rewritten to make it "more inclusive", says Trevor Phillips, the head of the new human rights and equality commission.

He said Muslims were also part of the national story and "sometimes we have to go back into the tapestry and insert some threads that were lost".

He quoted the example of the Spanish Armada, which was held up by the Turks at the request of Queen Elizabeth I.

"It was the Turks who saved us," Mr Phillips told a Labour fringe meeting.

For pete's sake. Is Mr. Phillips then also going to include the slave raids that the North African Muslims, clients of the Turks, carried out against British ships and seacoast towns for centuries?

Sharia Dentist Update: this is the same fellow who is charged with refusing to treat a woman unless she was wearing a headscarf. Now it comes out that he gave the hijabbed ones a discount, too. "Dentist cut fees for women in Islamic dress," from the Manchester Evening News (thanks to Morgaan Sinclair):

A MUSLIM dentist has admitted reducing his fees to encourage female patients to wear the Islamic headscarf.

Dr Omer Butt, from Prestwich, told a disciplinary hearing he would ask Muslim women to cover up in observance of Islamic law before he treated them.

But he denied refusing to treat a nurse because she would not follow his rules.

The nurse, known as Patient A, told the hearing she was left `humiliated and upset' when she went to Dr Butt's Unsworth Smile clinic in Bury, in April 2005.

The nurse, a non-practising Muslim, claimed Dr Butt said she would have to find another dentist because she wouldn't wear a headscarf.

Dr Butt told the General Dental Council professional conduct committee the Islamic ethos of his surgery was a `marketing tool'.

He said: "If they are prepared to wear the headscarf, I am willing to reduce the fee or completely waive the fee."

He said he identified the woman as a Muslim because of her name, which has roots in Islam, then `politely' asked her to wear a headscarf.

He said: "I did request her to wear the headscarf. I said `It would help me if you would wear a headscarf'.

"Her response was she looked at me with a smile and said `Oh, that's strange'."

He said it was `unlawful' for him, as a Muslim, to look at a Muslim woman who was not properly covered up. He added: "If she was to adhere to my request, it makes me feel more comfortable.

"It was a polite request. It was a simple request. It was never more than a request."

You just can't parody this stuff. "Terrorist Lawyer Lynne Stewart to Teach Legal Ethics," from Federal Review (thanks to Michelle Malkin):

HEMPSTEAD,NY--A disbarred lawyer convicted of aiding terrorists will be teaching at an upcoming law school ethics conference.

Lynne Stewart, who was found guilty of conspiring with terrorist Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman, will be speaking October 16 at Hofstra Law School's 'Legal Ethics: Lawyering on the Edge,' in Hempstead, New York.

The speaking engagement comes only a year after Stewart was sentenced to twenty-eight months in prison on charges of conspiracy and providing material support to terrorists.

Prosecutors alleged that Stewart had passed on messages to Abdel Rahman's radical Muslim followers, authorizing a resumption of terrorist operations against the Egyptian government.

As a result of the convictions, Stewart was automatically disbarred from practicing law.

Her client, Abdel Rahman, was convicted in 1996 of plots to bomb landmarks around New York City.

Stewart will be speaking at Hofstra Law School's 2007 Legal Ethics Conference, 'Lawyering at the Edge: Unpopular Clients, Difficult Cases, Zealous Advocates.' The conference is scheduled for October 14 to 16, 2007 in the Sidney R. Siben and Walter Siben Moot Courtroom (room 308) of Hofstra Law School.

According to the University's website, the conference will feature 'dynamic speakers who will weigh in on controversial issues such as prosecutorial abuse, the challenges of representing prisoners at Guantanamo, and attacks on lawyers who represent unpopular clients and causes.'

The irony of all this is that among the Hofstra students and faculty, there is nothing unpopular about Lynne Stewart's client or cause. They don't have the first foggiest idea about the Islamic jihad threat, but they know Stewart was striking a blow against Amerikkka, and that's good enough for them.

"The group is banned in Europe, China and Saudi Arabia, but remains legal in Britain and Australia, actively pushing the idea of a Muslim rule."

"Islamist 'leader' wants revolution," by Natalie O'Brien in The Australian (thanks to Writer Mom):

THE mysterious sheik behind the Australian chapter of Islamist group Hizb ut-Tahrir has revealed the organisation's support for military coups and revolutions to overthrow non-Muslim governments worldwide.

Ismail Al Wahwah, who was little known until last month when he was banned from a Hizb ut-Tahrir conference in Indonesia, spoke out on an Arabic radio program that revealed him as the "active member" of the group in Australia....

"I say any occupied people have the responsibility to defend their country," he told SBS's Arabic radio program. "The victim should not be asked how he is defending himself."

Sheik Wahwah is understood to be the unofficial leader of Hizb ut-Tahrir in Australia. The Australian has obtained the first pictures of the man widely known in the Muslim community as Abu Anas.

Hizb ut-Tahrir's media spokesman, Wassim Doureihi, denied the sheik was the group's leader in Australia, saying Sheik Wahwah was a senior member and that his brother, Ashraf, a civil engineer at North Sydney Council, was the official leader.

But Sheik Wahwah is sent to address senior members of the Islamic community in Sydney on behalf of Hizb ut-Tahrir, and he was Australia's representative for the Indonesian conference....

Hizb ut-Tahrir is a secretive organisation known as the Party of Islamic Liberation, which advocates the destruction of Western civilisation and the overthrow of governments and their replacement by Islamic rule.

The group is banned in Europe, China and Saudi Arabia, but remains legal in Britain and Australia, actively pushing the idea of a Muslim rule....

"It is up to the Ummah (community) to sort out its own matter with these rulers and remove their ruler in a public manner," he said.

"It could be such as a public revolution, public disobedience or a military coup.

"We are in the front line with the Ummah. We don't engage in militant activities. Our case is to make the case of Islam the case of the Ummah."

An update on Oussama Kassir, the globetrotting misunderstander of inner spiritual struggles. "Terror suspect in Oregon plot extradited," by Pat Milton for the Associated Press:

NEW YORK - A European terrorism suspect facing charges in the United States planned to set up a camp in Oregon to teach followers how to make bombs, poison people and slit throats, a federal prosecutor said Tuesday.

Oussama Kassir, a Lebanese-born Swede, also offered bomb and poison-making tips on several Web sites, U.S. Attorney Michael Garcia said in announcing the suspect's extradition to New York from the Czech Republic.

One of the Web sites was located on an Internet server in suburban White Plains, the prosecutor said.

"The purpose of the camp was to identify and further radicalize individuals that would be willing to carry out attacks against the United States at home or abroad," said Richard Falkenrath, deputy commissioner for counterterrorism at the New York Police Department.

Kassir was scheduled to appear in court for arraignment later Tuesday.

Prosecutors say Kassir and others wanted to set up the camp in Bly, Ore., to teach military-style methods so a community of Muslims could move to Afghanistan to fight or receive further training there. The camp was never realized.

Kassir also discussed hijacking trucks and killing the drivers to raise money to support the camp, Garcia said.

Kassir is accused of operating at least three Web sites that sought to recruit terrorists from December 2001 until his arrest Dec. 11, 2005, at Prague's Ruzyne international airport while flying from Stockholm, Sweden, to Beirut, Lebanon.

Authorities said the sites included such titles as "The Mujahideen Explosives Handbook" and "The Mujahideen Poisons Handbook."

An indictment says Kassir told witnesses that he supported Osama bin Laden and al-Qaida and that he had personally undertaken jihad training in Afghanistan, Kashmir and Lebanon.

118 of them. Will they welcome the graduates into Norway?

"Critics blast Norwegian aid to 'Koran schools' in Pakistan," from Aftenposten (thanks to Fjordman):

Norway's Foreign Ministry has been sending financial aid to controversial religious schools in Pakistan. Researchers and local Pakistani experts want it to stop, as does a conservative politician.

Government Minister Erik Solheim said the aid was aimed at promoting dialogue and religious tolerance.

Critics aren't at all sure that's what will happen.

As much as NOK 6 million (more than USD 1 million) has gone to 118 so-called "Koran schools" in northwest Pakistan. Some local experts, however, fear Norway risks supporting fundamentalist groups because it makes no demands on the schools' curriculum.

Karin Ask, a researcher at the Christian Michelsen Institute, told newspaper Dagsavisen that Norway could wind up even supporting jihadists, those encouraging holy war.

Glenn Beck does some good reporting about the Islamic jihad threat, but he doggedly plays pretend, assuming repeatedly that Islam is a religion of peace, the Qur'an is a book of peace, etc.

What he doesn't realize is that this doesn't empower Muslim moderates, as he clearly wants to do -- rather, it cuts the ground out from under them, for you can't reform what you won't admit needs reforming. Rightly or wrongly, the Protestant Reformers didn't indignantly deny that the Catholic Church taught Transubstantiation -- rather, they argued against this and other doctrines with which they disagreed. How far do you think they would have gotten if they had simply charged with "bigotry" anyone who pointed out that the Church taught the Real Presence or the papal primacy?

If we all pretend that the jihadists have no real leg to stand on in regard to Islam texts and teachings, we may all feel very good about ourselves for being tolerant folks, but the jihadists will continue to use various Islamic texts and teachings to recruit terrorists from among peaceful Muslims, and their efforts will go unchallenged -- because we can't even admit that that is what they're doing.

So it was last night (thanks to Awake):

BECK: Oh, well, apparently now he`s the George Washington of all of Iran. Unfortunately for us, the "Real Story" is that, in some warped views of Islam, lying is not only permissible, but it is encouraged, so long as that lie will further the cause. The cause? I`ll tell you exactly what that cause is here in just a bit....

Some warped views on Islam:

"Let not the believers take disbelievers for their friends in preference to believers. Whoso doeth that hath no connection with Allah unless (it be) that ye but guard yourselves against them, taking (as it were) security. " -- Qur'an 3:28

"(unless you indeed fear a danger from them) [or above, 'unless (it be that ye but guard yourselves against them'] meaning, except those believers who in some areas or times fear for their safety from the disbelievers. In this case, such believers are allowed to show friendship to the disbelievers outwardly, but never inwardly. For instance, Al-Bukhari recorded that Abu Ad-Darda' said, 'We smile in the face of some people although our hearts curse them.' Al-Bukhari said that Al-Hasan said, 'The Tuqyah [taqiyya] is allowed until the Day of Resurrection.''' -- Ibn Kathir's Tafsir (commentary) on Qur'an 3:28. Ibn Kathir is a mainstream Qur'anic commentator whose commentaries are still widely read today.

"War is deceit." -- Muhammad, prophet of Islam

"Ibn Shihab said he did not hear that exemption was granted in anything what the people speak as lie but in three cases: in battle, for bringing reconciliation amongst persons and the narration of the words of the husband to his wife, and the narration of the words of a wife to her husband (in a twisted form in order to bring reconciliation between them)." -- Sahih Muslim 6303, referring to Muhammad's words.

So: who is responsible for this "warped view of Islam" that allows for lying when one is under pressure, or in order to further the cause of the Muslims? The Qur'an, and Muhammad. Beck can play pretend all he wants, but his game will not make these facts go away. The moderate Muslims he wants so deeply to succeed will have to confront them sooner or later if they want to try to do anything effective to counter the jihadist challenge within the Islamic world.

BECK: Zuhdi, in that note from CAIR, did they say that they were protesting at all his -- anything that he said?

JASSER: Absolutely not. And just as the Khatami visit a year ago, they said that it`s a time for dialogue. No criticism about human rights. No criticism about free speech in Iran. No encouragement of dissidents to change that government from a theocracy to a liberal, freedom-loving democracy, not just for democrats and democracies to control the minority, but to give free rights for the minority.

BECK: Well, I have to tell you, Zuhdi, thank you very much for everything that you do. I have to tell you, America, I`m going to write the National Organization of Women, GLAAD, CAIR. I would really like to hear where they were, why are they not protesting someone that says homosexuals should be killed, and women should be stoned to death, and who are so grossly misusing their religion. That will be on tomorrow`s program. Hopefully, we`ll have an update.

Grossly misusing their religion:

"Kill the one who sodomizes and the one who lets it be done to him” -- Muhammad (‘Umdat al-Salik, p17.3).

"If a man who is not married is seized committing sodomy, he will be stoned to death" -- Abdullah ibn Abbas

And this hadith:

Narrated 'Abdullah bin 'Umar:

The Jews came to Allah's Apostle and told him that a man and a woman from amongst them had committed illegal sexual intercourse. Allah's Apostle said to them, "What do you find in the Torah (old Testament) about the legal punishment of Ar-Rajm (stoning)?" They replied, (But) we announce their crime and lash them." Abdullah bin Salam said, "You are telling a lie; Torah contains the order of Rajm." They brought and opened the Torah and one of them solaced his hand on the Verse of Rajm and read the verses preceding and following it. Abdullah bin Salam said to him, "Lift your hand." When he lifted his hand, the Verse of Rajm was written there. They said, "Muhammad has told the truth; the Torah has the Verse of Rajm. The Prophet then gave the order that both of them should be stoned to death. ('Abdullah bin 'Umar said, "I saw the man leaning over the woman to shelter her from the stones." -- Bukhari 4.56.829

And one more:

Narrated Ibn 'Abbas:

'Umar said, "I am afraid that after a long time has passed, people may say, "We do not find the Verses of the Rajam (stoning to death) in the Holy Book," and consequently they may go astray by leaving an obligation that Allah has revealed. Lo! I confirm that the penalty of Rajam be inflicted on him who commits illegal sexual intercourse, if he is already married and the crime is proved by witnesses or pregnancy or confession." Sufyan added, "I have memorized this narration in this way." 'Umar added, "Surely Allah's Apostle carried out the penalty of Rajam, and so did we after him." -- Bukhari 8.82.816

Glenn Beck's heart is in the right place. He apparently thinks he is helping out peaceful Muslims by pre-emptively exonerating the Qur'an and Muhammad from complicity in such crimes. I hope he and others like him will soon come to see that fantasy-based analysis ultimately won't accomplish anything, and that peaceful Muslims will never be able to stand up to the jihadists until they have the courage to formulate a radical reinterpretation of the core Islamic sources, acknowledging the violent and supremacist elements within them and explicitly rejecting them. They will never be able to do this, or to do anything but reassure uninformed non-Muslims, by pretending that those elements don't exist and wishing, wishing, wishing they would disappear.

Watch for the cries of "Islamophobia," without anyone in the mainstream media offering the shadow of a hint that the behavior of Muslims might have something to do with this, and that Muslims have the power to reverse it also, by stopping violence committed in the name of Islam.

From The Associated Press (thanks to all who sent this in):

DENVER (AP) — Negative opinions about Islam are on the rise, Mormons are viewed as Christian but different and Pope Benedict XVI trails his predecessor in popularity, a poll of Americans released Tuesday said.

The survey of 3,000 adults from Aug. 1-18 was conducted for the Pew Research Center and the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life.

The number of Americans who say Islam has little or nothing in common with their own religion has spiked to 70 percent in the past two years from 59 percent, the poll found.

Another significant shift has taken place: In 2005, 36 percent of the public said Islam is more likely than other faiths to encourage violence among its believers. That number has risen to 45 percent.

After all, "marry women of your choice, two or three or four; but if ye fear that ye shall not be able to deal justly (with them), then only one, or (a captive) that your right hands possess" (Qur'an 4:3). I doubt that comparing one wife unfavorably to another -- to her face -- qualifies as dealing "justly," but human nature being what it is, it's going to happen.

Human Cost of Sharia Alert: "Scorned wife takes knife to man's penis in Malaysia," from Reuters:

KUALA LUMPUR (Reuters) - Malaysian doctors have reattached a man's nearly severed penis after his first wife, enraged by his comparison of her sex skills with those of his younger second wife, decided to chop it off with a kitchen knife.

The man, a 43-year-old Indonesian worker in southern Johor state, was lying in bed with his 48-year-old wife talking about his newly wed second wife, who is in her 30s, when the incident happened, the New Straits Times newspaper reported.

Despite his shock and pain, the man managed to pull on his trousers and ride his motorcycle to a nearby hospital, where doctors had to put in 11 stitches to reattach the organ.

Maybe they tried to open a door. Maybe they had a knife. "Syrians detained on Panama-bound plane," by Juan Zamorano for Associated Press (thanks to Louis):

PANAMA CITY, Panama - Six Syrians were detained in Panama on Tuesday after the crew on their flight from Cuba alerted authorities to suspicious behavior. An aviation official denied police reports that the Syrians tried to open the cockpit door.

"This is not a hijacking," said Victor de la Hoz, spokesman for the Panamanian Civil Aviation Authority.

Panama's National Police director, Rolando Mirones, said earlier that the passengers approached the cockpit "apparently with the intention of opening a door."

But de la Hoz said the Copa Airlines crew simply notified authorities on the ground that a knife was missing after they served the meal in the first-class cabin, where the Syrians were sitting. He did not say whether the Syrians were suspected of taking the knife.

Mirones said the suspects "did not commit any violent acts inside the airplane, but they raised suspicions," adding: "That is why we are investigating."

I've been calling for this for years. It is good to see others calling for it also. By Douglas MacKinnon, a former White House and Pentagon official and author of the novel America's Last Days:

New York Republican Congressman Peter King has become the latest target of those who value political correctness and pandering over the national security of our nation.

For recently speaking his mind and worrying about the influence radical Islam has in this nation, Congressman King is being predictably attacked by the left-leaning media, by the Democratic National Committee, and certain Muslim organizations. What exactly did Congressman King say to incite the anger and rage now being directed at him? Only things that seem to be of concern to a great many Americans.

Among his statements, Congressman King said, “There are too many people sympathetic to radical Islam…We should be looking at them more carefully and finding out how we can infiltrate them…I think there has been a lack of full cooperation from too many people in the Muslim community…too many Mosques in this country do not cooperate with law enforcement…85 percent of Mosques in this country are controlled by extremist leadership.”

Did the Congressman say anything that is not true? Is what he said not verified by a recent Pew Center survey, by the U.S. government, and by a number of news accounts of homegrown Muslims being taken into custody for plotting against our nation. Do facts no longer matter when it comes to protecting the United States from within?

According to that recent Pew Center survey, a quarter of younger Muslim-Americans support suicide bombings in some circumstances. That’s right. They support suicide bombings. 25% of Muslim-Americans refused to give an answer when asked if they had a favorable or unfavorable view of Al-Qaeda. 5% of Muslim-Americans said they had a favorable view of the group that attacked the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and tried to attack the White House or Capitol building.

If we accept the Pew Center’s estimate that there are 2.35 million Muslims in the United States, then 5% of that number would be 117,500 Muslim-Americans who have a favorable view of Al-Qaeda. A number that should not only send chills down our spines, but cries out for eternal vigilance.

What about the American Mosques themselves? According to various reports, at least 80% of U.S. Mosques follow or are influenced by the Wahhabi sect of Saudi Arabia. Among other things, this sect believes it is a “religious obligation” to hate Christians and Jews and to think of the United States as “enemy territory.” In 2006, Bernard Lewis, one of the world’s leading scholars on Islam, called Wahhabism, “The most radical, the most violent, the most extreme and fanatical version of Islam.”

Why do those on the left in our country not want us to speak of this? Why do so many Democrats not want us to question the motives of those from within who look favorably upon Al-Qaeda? Surely it’s not for crass political reasons or to pander for votes.

It isn't just Democrats. Virtually no one wants to speak about this. Fantasy-based analysis rules the airwaves, and fantasy-based policymaking dominates Washington.

Ready to welcome their new overlords. "Loo With No One To Use It," by Paul Gilbride for the Daily Express (thanks to JD):

BAKERY giants Greggs have installed a Muslims-only toilet at their new Scottish headquarters - despite the fact that no Muslims work there.

Workers at the state-of-the-art factory were shocked when they were given a tour of the building and told a cubicle had been fitted for the use of Muslim employees. The staff said they are baffled at the decision because they are not aware of any Islamic workers at the base in Cambuslang, near Glasgow.

Last night, management at the bakery said they had received several requests from all over the country for the exclusive facility. All their new buildings will now be fitted with the specialised toilet regardless of the number of Muslims in the workforce.

But staff at the new £15million plant labelled the decision "political correctness gone mad".

One said: “We were being given a guided tour of the new factory before moving there when they told us that they had a toilet for use only by Muslims.

"I couldn’t believe, everybody was stunned because we don’t know of any Muslims who are working here. I don’t think anybody is really angry about it, but there just doesn’t seem to be any need for it. This sort of things is just political correctness gone mad."

Another worker said: "The toilet just looks like a ceramic hole in the ground. I don’t think it will be getting much use and I don’t see why we couldn’t all just use the same toilet anyway.

"This sort of thing creates divisions between the workers."

of course does.

It's Gene W. Heck's When Worlds Collide: Exploring the Ideological and Political Foundations of the Clash of Civilization, published a few weeks ago by Rowman & Littlefield.

According to Daniel Pipes:

Gene W. Heck has an impressive biography, being "a senior business development economist operating in Saudi Arabia and throughout the Mideast. Prior to joining the private sector, he was a member of the United States Diplomatic Corps, with postings to the U.S. embassies in Saudi Arabia and Jordan. He also serves as adjunct professor of government and history with the University of Maryland."

Pipes goes on to detail some of the key points of the book:

* There is nothing bellicose about the Koran, which is no more aggressive than the Old Testament.

* Islam's theological differences with Judaism and Christianity are "surprisingly limited."

* The Shari‘a is completely consonant with the Hague and Geneva Conventions.

* Jihad frequently means "the unending struggle of the devout to be good Muslims."

* The Wahhabi movement is innocent of aggressive intentions.

* Today's troubles go back to the efforts by Western intelligence agencies to further their own interests by sponsoring Islamist organizations – notably British backing for the Muslim Brethren in Egypt and American backing for Islamist groups in Afghanistan.

* Al-Qaeda is basically a Muslim Brethren offshoot.

* "Anglo-American democracy" is exactly what the Muslim world does not need; theocracy is the ticket.

* If Westerners want to help Muslims, they should send them money.

And:

Disclaimer: Heck mentions me (along with Robert Spencer, Bat Ye'or, David Littman, and Ibn Warraq) as one of those who decry "present perceived religious suppression, presumed political discrimination, and alleged civil rights violations in certain Middle East states wherein Islam today is practiced." Well, yes, I guess I am guilty of decrying those perceived, presumed, and alleged problems.

I am honored to be in that company, but the adjectives that Pipes notes here -- perceived religious suppression, presumed political discrimination, and alleged civil rights violations in certain Middle East states -- raise Heck's book to the level of the risible. If it weren't already there for the assertions that "there is nothing bellicose about the Koran, which is no more aggressive than the Old Testament," and that Islam's theological differences with Judaism and Christianity are "surprisingly limited," and that "the Shari‘a is completely consonant with the Hague and Geneva Conventions," and "Jihad frequently means "the unending struggle of the devout to be good Muslims." For detailed refutations of all of those, see my book Religion of Peace?.

There's that word again, "restive." Do a search and you'll find dozens of mainstream media articles about Thailand that describe the Muslim southern region as "restive." It's their Homeric epithet of choice. But what causes a place to be "restive"? Just something in the air or water? Do a search for the use of the word "jihad" in connection with Thailand, and you will find many fewer articles.

"Buddhist teacher shot and killed in Thailand's troubled Muslim south," from The Associated Press (thanks to Twostellas):

BANGKOK, Thailand: Suspected separatist insurgents shot and killed a Buddhist teacher on Tuesday in Thailand's restive Muslim far south, police said.

Somchoke Chitkongsat, 59, a teacher at a government-run secondary school was shot while waiting for a bus to school in Yala provincial township, said police Lt. Veerakij Kaewnuanjing.

Somchoke teaches in nearby Pattani province but lived in Yala, which is 780 kilometers (480 miles) south of Bangkok, and traveled by bus to work everyday.

"Police believe that the insurgents knew that he waited for the bus at that point every morning, and shot him today," Veerakij said.

Witnesses told police that the gunman arrived on the back of motorcycle and shot Somchoke at close range, then sped away, Veerakij said.

Irish Infidel kindly sends along the above picture and this note:

Here is a photo I took today of one of the Islamist counter-protestors outside of Columbia. His sign reads "May Allah make a mushroom cloud over Israel."

At the bottom is a link to what turns out to be the man's personal website for him and his family. His name is Yousef al Khattab, formerly Joseph Cohen. That's right, he is a tale of a Jew (a former settler from Gush Qatif according to his claims!) who has turned to Jihad. Here is an account he wrote of his and his wife and children's conversions (his first son's name is now Abdel Rahman):
http://www.angelfire.com/ak5/salafi/jewishconvertyousefalkhattab.htm

But the family's website is much more interesting to look around at, especially their photo albums. The Khattabs are really like any other family, doing average things like dressing their children up in military fatigues and posing with machine guns in front of giant posters of Al-Aqsa and suicide bombers in the West Bank.

But what really shocked me was in his media section in a video "2006 Islam Forbids Killing Innocent Civilians." He gives a sick rationale, actually encouraging the murder of non-Muslim children, that I've never come across before. He states that according to some Islamic teachings all children are actually born Muslims. However before they hit puberty they become corrupted by rabbis, priests, teachers, etc.. and are no longer Muslim. Which means that if they kill them BEFORE they hit puberty, while they are still Muslims, the Jihadists are actually doing them a great favor by guaranteeing them a spot in Paradise. Have you ever come across such a teaching before? This is the most dangerous justification for Islamic Jihad that I have ever heard -- it makes ALL non-Muslim children legitimate targets.

It is common Islamic teaching that everyone is born Muslim and -- in non-Muslim countries -- is corrupted by his parents and society into becoming non-Muslim. But I haven't come across the accompanying rationale before. If anyone has, please send in links or info.

This makes 39 indictments. Will the Islamophobia never end? "FBI arrests six more Pakistan-origin suspects on charges of money laundering," from ANI :

Washington, Sept 24: The US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) has arrested six more suspects of Pakistani origin from Maryland on charges of money laundering.

On Thursday, 11 suspects were arrested in Maryland, including nine illegal immigrants from Pakistan. On the same day, US federal officials had indicted 39 people, including some Pakistani operators of convenience stores in Eastern Shore communities, the Dawn reported.

Saifullah Ranjha, one of the defendants, was also charged with attempting to finance the al Qaeda.

Commenting on the arrests, Pakistan's Ambassador Mahmud Ali Durrani said that he did not know the details of this particular case, but similar cases in the past has shown that "American officials were often too zealous."

Durrani further said that in many cases either the charges brought against the suspects were difficult to prove or the suspects were released or offered plea bargains.

Meanwhile, Spanish officials said on that acting on tips received from the FBI, they had arrested two Pakistanis from Madrid and Barcelona.

According to police, Anar Muhammad Shan and Mehmood Sandhu, who are members of a terror group, have allegedly collaborated with their accomplices in the US to transfer money to alleged al Qaeda men in Pakistan.

The FBI, however, has claimed that no such money transaction took place.

Meanwhile, it's all about the FBI's overreaction:

These arrests have stunned Pakistani-Americans, as they fear that it would further strengthen the negative stereotyping of their community in this country.

"People are scared. It will have a very negative impact on the entire community," said Munir Ahmad, a member of the Maryland Muslim Council.

"People say that they were licensed money dealers and apparently law-abiding citizens. We don't know what happened," Munir Ahmad added.

Really? I do.

Pakistani-Americans are so sacred [sic] that even during Ramzan, they are not giving money charities to mosques, Irfan Malik, of the National Association of Pakistani-Americans who also lives in Maryland, said.

The poor dears. A few jihadist charities get shut down, and what's one to do to pay alms? Call upon charities not to finance jihad? That idea doesn't seem to enter anyone's mind.

"There are many people who must have gone to the stores and gas stations run by the suspects. Now they fear that the FBI may knock at their doors," Malik said.

After 9/11, in some people were arrested "just for standing near a suspect," he added.

Such as whom? What happened then?

At Hot Air.

Bollinger's speech.

The Thug-In-Chief denying that there are any homosexuals in Iran.

I didn't expect this. Even better, neither did he.

"Ahmadinejad questions 9/11, Holocaust," by Nahal Toosi for Associated Press (thanks to Phil):

NEW YORK - Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad questioned the official version of the Sept. 11 attacks and defended the right to cast doubt on the Holocaust in a tense appearance at Columbia University, whose president accused the hard-line leader of behaving like "a petty and cruel dictator."

Ahmadinejad smiled at first but appeared increasingly agitated, decrying the "insults" and "unfriendly treatment." Columbia President Lee Bollinger and audience members took him to task over Iran's human-rights record and foreign policy, as well as Ahmadinejad's statements denying the Holocaust and calling for the disappearance of Israel.

"Mr. President, you exhibit all the signs of a petty and cruel dictator," Bollinger said, to loud applause.

He said Ahmadinejad's denial of the Holocaust might fool the illiterate and ignorant.

"When you come to a place like this it makes you simply ridiculous," Bollinger said. "The truth is that the Holocaust is the most documented event in human history."

Ahmadinejad rose, also to applause, and after a religious invocation, said Bollinger's opening was "an insult to information and the knowledge of the audience here."

"There were insults and claims that were incorrect, regretfully," Ahmadinejad said, accusing Bollinger of falling under the influence of the hostile U.S. press and politicians. "I should not begin by being affected by this unfriendly treatment."

During a question and answer session, Ahmadinejad appeared tense and unsmiling, in contrast to more relaxed interviews and appearances earlier in the day.

In response to one audience, Ahmadinejad denied he was questioning the existence of the Holocaust: "Granted this happened, what does it have to do with the Palestinian people?"

But then he said he was defending the rights of European scholars, an apparent reference to a small number who have been prosecuted under national laws for denying or minimizing the Holocaust.

"There's nothing known as absolute," he said.

He reiterated his desire to visit ground zero to express sympathy with the victims of the Sept. 11 attacks, but then appeared to question whether al-Qaida was responsible.

"Why did this happen? What caused it? What conditions led to it?" he said. "Who truly was involved? Who was really involved and put it all together?"

Asked about executions of homosexuals in Iran, Ahmadinejad said the judiciary system executed violent criminals and high-level drug dealers, comparing them to microbes eliminated through medical treatment. Pressed specifically about punishment of homosexuals, he said: "In Iran we don't have homosexuals like in your country."

With the audience laughing derisively, he continued: "In Iran we do not have this phenomenon. I don't know who's told you that we have this."

Bollinger was strongly criticized for inviting Ahmadinejad to Columbia, and had promised tough questions in his introduction to Ahmadinejad's talk. But the strident and personal nature of his attack on the president of Iran was startling.

"You are either brazenly provocative or astonishingly uneducated," Bollinger told Ahmadinejad about the leader's Holocaust denial.

During his prepared remarks, the Iranian president did not address Bollinger's accusations directly.

What a surprise!

A master of deception in action. From FoxNews:

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad opened his much-anticipated speaking tour Monday by again inferring the Holocaust was a myth, taking a swipe at Israel — it's "a regime based... on racism" — and defending his request to visit Ground Zero.

The Iranian leader, speaking via video from New York City to journalists at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., tossed aside a question about Israel by saying Iran doesn't recognize the "regime," accusing it of killing people and committing various other atrocities.

It was typical of many of Ahmadinejad's responses, which often started with, "That's not right," or laughing challenges to journalists in which he asked, "Where are you getting that?"

On the Holocaust — which the Iranian leader has called a "myth" — he said that "if the Holocaust is a reality, why don't we let more research be done on it? ... Where did the Holocaust happen to begin with? It happened in Europe, and given that, why is it that the Palestinian people should be displaced? Why should they give up their land?"

He also said that he wanted to "pay my respects" at Ground Zero — the site of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on New York City, where the World Trade Center once stood — since his visit here last year. But, he claimed, the U.S. government and other politicians prevented that from happening.

"I was interested in expressing my sympathy to victims of tragedy," he said. "It's the responsibility of everyone to understand the root causes of 9/11."...

Indeed it is.

Ahmadinejad said the world needs to build a better future "based on peace and security of all humanity," and he spoke of a world full of love, kindness, beauty and allegiance to God as the ultimate goal.

"No one should prevent love and kindness from flourishing in mankind and turn it into hostility," the Iranian president said. "Family is the center of love and beauty."

He said people should follow God, who would lead them to a "sublime" state.

"When we take a look around us, we are not happy with what we see," Ahmadinejad said. "Threats of war have affected everyone. Continuous wars have in fact hurt the human spirit. If we look at the root cause of some of these problems, we will be able to think about how to build a better future, a more prosperous future based on peace and security of all humanity."

No one realizes, of course, that when he is calling people to follow God, he is calling for the institution of Sharia.

The Mad Mahdist takes Manhattan.

Robert Stacy McCain has live coverage at the Washington Times.

Michelle Malkin has pictures.

Take action -- from UN Watch:

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad systematically denies one genocide while actively seeking another: repeatedly denying the Holocaust, repeatedly threatening to eliminate Israel, and madly pursuing nuclear weapons. All this stands in contempt of the basic principles of the United Nations and warrants Iran's expulsion from the world body. Write to the President of the General Assembly urging him to take action against Ahmadinejad's Iran.

Go to UN Watch for details.

Of course it isn't. Who needs it, when you can get what you want without it? And when you're feted at a major American university, and no one has the spine to stand up to you, you have every reason to believe that your path is free and clear. "Ahmadinejad Arrives in U.S., Denies Nuke Program," by Karen Matthews for Associated Press :

NEW YORK -- Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad arrived in New York Sunday as critics protested his planned speech at Columbia University and the hardline leader denied that his country is building a nuclear weapon.

"In political relations right now, the nuclear bomb is of no use," Ahmadinejad said in a "60 Minutes" interview airing Sunday. "If it was useful it would have prevented the downfall of the Soviet Union. If it was useful it would resolved the problem the Americans have in Iraq. The time of the bomb is passed."

The interview with CBS reporter Scott Pelley was taped Thursday in Tehran. Ahmadinejad arrived Sunday in New York, according a spokesman for the Iranian Mission to the United Nations. He was to speak at Columbia on Monday and address the U.N. General Assembly on Tuesday.

The university defended the decision to allow Ahmadinejad to speak, arguing it was a matter of free speech, but said it would not "honor the dishonorable."

But the protests had already started. Elected officials demonstrating at Columbia claimed the Iranian leader is trying to obtain nuclear weapons, is a Holocaust denier and rules his country with an iron fist.

"He should be arrested when he comes to Columbia University, not invited to speak for God's sake," said state Assemblyman Dov Hikind.

Yep.

Are the unindicted co-conspirators at the Council on American Islamic Relations feeling the heat from the revelations coming from the Holy Land Foundation trial, which has exposed CAIR as part of the Muslim Brotherhood apparatus in America? Well, I'm told that for whatever reason, they have removed from their website the section entitled "Anti-Hate Blogger Slams Robert Spencer's 'Spin,'" which quoted from and linked to the ludicrous and libelous hit piece by the felonious and fraudulent "Rev." Jim Sutter, whom the good folks at Phonyrev.com term (with abundant documentation) a "Tax Evader, Convicted Felon, Navy Seal Imposter, Bogus Academic, Fraudulent Combat Medals Claimant, Pathological Liar, Phony Minister and perhaps even worse..."

The slimy Sutter's hallucinatory libels would be beneath all notice were it not for CAIR's endorsement, now apparently withdrawn, and for his ongoing campaign to silence voices he dislikes by manipulating net filtering services into categorizing Jihad Watch and other sites (even Phonyrev.com) as advocates of violence and "hate speech." We are still fighting that, and will continue to do so -- and it is good to see that even the generally quite unscrupulous people at CAIR are now apparently getting a bit picky about their bedfellows.

UPDATE: This one is gone also.

Has his on-again, off-again game been calculated to throw off protestors? "Iranian president to face protests in New York," from AFP (thanks to the Constantinopolitan Irredentist):

NEW YORK (AFP) — Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was to face angry protests Sunday in New York, where he was due to arrive amid a storm of controversy over his appearances at the United Nations and a top university.

The outspoken Iranian leader, who has openly called for the destruction of Israel and questioned the scale of the Holocaust, is due to speak at Columbia University on Monday, a day before addressing the UN General Assembly.

[...]

City politicians and Jewish groups have led opposition to Ahmadinejad's visit, with New York City council speaker Christine Quinn urging Columbia University to withdraw its invitation to the Iranian leader.

"Ahmadinejad is a Holocaust denier, here for one reason -- to spread his hate-mongering vitriol on the world stage," she said.

Protesters were due to rally at Columbia on Sunday and Monday against his address to the university, while Iranian opposition exiles were to demonstrate at the United Nations on Tuesday while Ahmadinejad addresses the world body.

Columbia's president Lee Bollinger, however, defended the university's decision to invite Ahmadinejad, saying that Columbia "as a community dedicated to learning and scholarship, is committed to confronting ideas."...

Except ones they don't like. When I get invited to speak at Columbia, you'll know that Columbia really is dedicated to learning and scholarship, and is committed to confronting ideas. When Ahmadinejad gets invited to speak to Columbia, it's just more of the same perspective that gets aired there every day.

What angered many New Yorkers more than anything was Ahmadinejad's plan to lay a wreath at Ground Zero -- the site of the September 11 attacks of 2001. New York City officials denied permission for the visit last week on security grounds.

President George W. Bush offered support to city officials, saying: "I can understand why they would not want somebody running a country who is the state sponsor of terror down at the site."

Ahmadinejad appeared surprised by the storm over the wreath-laying, telling CBS television: "Why should it be insulting?" He said he would not insist on visiting the site if city officials could not arrange it.

But foreign ministry spokesman Mohammad Ali Hosseini insisted a visit to Ground Zero was still on the itinerary.

"The visit to the site of the twin towers to pay tribute to the victims is part of president Ahmadinejad's program even if some people are trying to have it cancelled," he said....

Rice and Olmert indulge in more fantasy-based policymaking. "Rice Wants Syria, Other Arab States, at Mideast Talks (Update1)," by Janine Zacharia for Bloomberg (thanks to Steve):

Sept. 23 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice called on Syria and Saudi Arabia to join an international meeting later this year in Washington that will work toward establishing a Palestinian state.

Rice outlined U.S. expectations for a Middle East meeting at talks today in New York with representatives of the so-called Quartet, the peacemaking body formed by the U.S., the United Nations, European Union and Russia.

``There's a sense of momentum in support of the Palestinians and Israelis in their effort to end the conflict,'' Rice said. ``Given that it has been a number of years since the Israelis and Palestinians have expressed their interest in discussing the core issues between them, it is very important that the regional players of the international community mobilize to support them.''

[...]

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's Cabinet today approved the release of about 90 Palestinians from Israeli jails in a gesture of goodwill during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.

An update on this story. By Sidhartha Banerjee for The Canadian Press:

MONTREAL -- An Austrian-Canadian jihadist cell was targeting European politicians in addition to a number of physical targets in Austria and Switzerland, according to communications obtained by a terrorist watchdog group.

The SITE Intelligence Group, a U.S.-based research organization that tracks and analyzes terrorist groups for corporate and government clients, said Thursday human beings were also among targets that included next June's Euro 2008 soccer tournament.

"The member of the cell enumerated several physical targets to attack, specifically mentioning the Euro 2008 championships to be held in Austria and Switzerland, UN buildings in Vienna and Geneva, and OPEC's headquarters in Vienna," SITE said in a statement.

In addition, the individual also listed human targets, naming certain British, German and Austrian politicians.

SITE says there was no indication that any member of the cell was ready to carry out an attack or had the operational capabilities to do so.

"However, the individual did describe rough, general plans of how to carry out some of the attacks," the release said.

The information comes as the alleged Canadian component to the cell made a brief court appearance in Montreal on Thursday.

Said Namouh, 34, who is charged with conspiring to bomb unspecified targets in Vienna, was arrested in the small Quebec rural town of Maskinonge last week as authorities in Austria and Canada swept down and arrested four people in a suspected international bomb plot.

One of the three alleged al-Qaida sympathizers was released in Vienna last Friday after a judge decided there was not sufficient evidence to justify his detention.

Two others, a couple in their early 20s, remain in custody in Austria.

Authorities identify the Austrian man still detained as Mohammed Mahmoud, the prime suspect and a leader of the Global Islamic Media Front, an al-Qaida propaganda group increasingly tied to terrorism operations.

Mahmoud's name appears on a Canadian charge sheet filed in Montreal that says Namouh and Mahmoud conspired between March and September "for the purpose of delivering, placing, discharging or detonating an explosive in a place outside Canada."

None of the allegations against Namouh has been proven in court.

The three people arrested in Europe were nabbed in connection with a video that surfaced in March threatening to attack Germany and Austria unless the two countries withdrew their troops from Afghanistan.

SITE says the incident "once again shows the nexus between those jihadists who produce propaganda and those who seek to carry out or facilitate terrorist attacks."

Interior spiritual strugglers threaten to target Hindu places of worship. "Letter warns of terror strikes in Hyderabad," from The Times of India:

HYDERABAD: A letter delivered on Friday to Andhra Pradesh police chief has warned of terror strikes in Hyderabad on September 25, the day of Ganesha immersions. The city police are on high alert after receiving the letter, which doesn't mention the name of the sender.

Written in English, the letter claimed that one person from the Old City has been entrusted with the task of executing blasts in the city. It named the person as Zakir, a resident of Hafeezbaba Nagar, who has links with the Harkat-Ul-Jihadi Islami (HuJI).

Zakir is said to be involved in a case of illegally possessing arms and a case was registered against him at the Saidabad police station three years ago.

Zakir also received Rs 50 lakh to execute the terror acts and he, along with his son and 10 other associates, are on the job, a senior officer said quoting the anonymous letter, addressed to DGP M A Basith.

The targets are places of worship, including the Bhagya Lakshmi temple at Char Kaman, a place of worship at Chaderghat, and the Santoshi Maa temple opposite police commissioner's office, Basheerbagh.

Or burqa-clad persons in general. "Govt warned of attacks by female bombers," by Shahnawaz Khan for the Daily Times:

LAHORE: Law enforcement agencies have forwarded intelligence reports to the senior government officials regarding suicide attacks expected to be carried out by women bombers across the country, highly reliable Interior Ministry sources told Daily Times on Sunday.

“There are chances that that male and female former students of Jamia Hafsa, Jamia Fareedia and Lal Masjid that managed to escape from ‘Operation Silence’ could carry out suicide attacks across the country,” the intelligence agencies’ reports said, according to sources. The report also suspected involvement of students from these madrassas in the suicide bombing on July 17 in Islamabad.

Intelligence agencies had forwarded detailed reports to the Interior Ministry as well, the sources said, following which authorities had issued special instructions in this regard.

Police told to keep an eye on burqa-clad women: In the report, sources said, authorities suggested that police seniors across the country immediately issue instructions to keep a close eye on suspicious women wearing shuttlecock burqas and/or youngsters roaming near important installations, especially foreign ones, as well as important personalities, law enforcement personnel and important public and business places.

They said that the ministry had also circulated special letters in this regard to senior security and administrative officials across the country. Provincial police officers (PPOs) of Punjab, Sindh and Balochistan, NWFP, and the Islamabad police inspector general (IG) had also been especially directed to take precautionary measures on an emergency basis, they said.

Peshawar stadium likely target: Intelligence agencies said in the report that in Peshawar, Kernal Sher Khan Shaheed Stadium, Khyber Road, would be the likely target of such attacks, since there was a large number of rickshaws and public transport vehicles parked there most of the time.

The second half of the Qur’an’s fifth sura continues to expound upon the wickedness of the Jews and Christians. Verses 61-86 criticize the Jews and Christians for refusing to follow Muhammad. Why don’t the Jews’ rabbis stop their evil behavior (v. 63)? They even dare to say that “Allah’s hand is fettered” (v. 64).

Allah’s hand is fettered? It is unclear what Jewish concept, if any, the Qur’an is referring to in this case. Ibn Kathir comments: “Allah states that the Jews, may Allah’s continuous curses descend on them until the Day of Resurrection, describe Him as a miser. Allah is far holier than what they attribute to Him.” He is also absolute will, with hand absolutely unfettered: Allah’s unfettered hand is a vivid image of divine freedom. Such a God can be bound by no laws. Muslim theologians argued during the long controversy with the heretical Islamic Mu‘tazilite sect, which exalted human reason beyond the point that the eventual victors were willing to tolerate, that Allah was free to act as he pleased. He was thus not bound to govern the universe according to consistent and observable laws. “He cannot be questioned concerning what He does” (Qur’an 21:23).

An important message that is circulating now about the mother of all fauxtography scandals, the Muhammad Al-Durah case:

I am sure you know the French courts have asked France 2 to release the hidden Al Durah Videos (rushes). Over 70 publications have now carried the news of the outcome (often based on an Associated Press story) as can be seen in this link: http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&ned=us&tab=wn&ncl=1120909160&scoring=d

The courts expect the tapes to be delivered by France 2 by early October - so we need your help and action today: Monday, Sept. 24:

1) If you have not signed the petition asking for France 2 to release the 27 minutes of hidden Al Durah Video - please do so NOW!
2) Please ask friends to also sign the petition today!

Here is the petition link. Although you or your friends need to supply your email address to stop or reduce voter fraud, the petition service does not (at least so far!) release your email address - only your name- if you supply it!

http://www.petitiononline.com/france2/petition.html

Our intention is to convey the Petition this week to both the President of France 2 and to the head of France - Sarkozy!

If any of you actually have not been up to speed on this -- here again is a must-watch 14-minute video on You-tube from Richard Landes of Second Draft:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pOwZ8wgV7I4

More background information on Al Durah from Pajamas Media -- at

http://pajamasmedia.com/2007/09/al_dura_petition.php

The purity of their Islam -- this is ever the basis of the jihadist appeal, and is ever ignored and downplayed by Western analysts, rather than studied so that it can be effectively combatted. From AP:

An al-Qaida front group lashed out Sunday at a key nationalist Sunni Muslim insurgent faction in a rare criticism of a follow rebel group, accusing it of betraying religion by joining the US forces in their fight against al-Qaida.

In a statement posted on at least two Islamic Web forums used by Iraqi insurgents, the Islamic State of Iraq, an umbrella groups of insurgent factions dominated by al-Qaida, called on members of the 1920 Revolution Brigades to repent during the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan.

"We call on the leaders and wise men of the (1920 Revolution) Brigades to reconsider where this path will lead them and, swearing to God, we tell them that you have betrayed your religion and the pure blood of your martyrs," the statement said.

A jihadist (or useful idiot or fellow traveler) football fan, IP address 69.105.136.245, sends on this incisive critique of our efforts in defense of human rights and the West:

you are a faggot! trust me this site is coming down, legally or illegally suckaaaa. i'd do it right now but the bears game is on. f*** you. have a nice day.

You too, sir!

Old Henry Wallace said it best: "The American fascist would prefer not to use violence. His method is to poison the channels of public information."

52 percent. From AFP (thanks to Rosie):

QATAR has upped its share in the London Stock Exchange to nearly 24 per cent, giving the gulf state and its neighbour Dubai a controlling stake of nearly 52 per cent.

Quoting LSE sources, a Qatari newspaper reported the gas-rich Gulf state bought an additional 3 per cent of shares on Friday, a day after it bought a 20 per cent slice of Europe's oldest stock exchange.

The Qatar Investment Authority (QIA), the investment unit of the Qatar government, initially bought a 20.8 per cent stake off two hedge funds.

This would put the QIA's overall share in the LSE at nearly 24 per cent.

The United Arab Emirates' group Borse Dubai meanwhile agreed to buy a 28 per cent LSE holding from Nasdaq, meaning the two now hold nearly 52 per cent of the stock exchange.

Fires, tear gas, and the fear that rioting may spread to other cities -- all because of a dropped Qur'an. "Police posts set on fire in mob fury," from the Times of India (thanks to PRCS):

NEW DELHI: Two police posts were set on fire by thousands of agitated residents and students around Jamia Milia Islamia University on Saturday evening. The angry mob first set Jamia police post on fire and later targetted Sahinbagh police post in Sarita Vihar. About 40 people, including policemen, were injured in the violence.

Around two dozen police officers were injured in which four were reported to be critical. The incident happened after local residents in the area resisted police’s efforts to remove a patri market. In course of the encroachment removal drive, the Koran was reportedly dropped by a policeman, leading to tension. A local leader reportedly slapped a police officer.

Police had to use tear gas to disperse the angry mob. Around 3,000 people had collected around 6.30 pm and took out the police records from the Jamia police post and set them on fire before setting fire to the the post too. The SHO of the area Rajesh Sharma and additional SHO Akhilesh Singh were severely injured. The injured police officers were rushed to AIIMS, Holy Family and Apollo. Several vehicles including police jeeps were also set ablaze by the mob.

Traffic in the area was disrupted for nearly four hours. CRPF personnel and additional police force from other districts were deployed. Just when the traffic situation became normal, the mob pelted stones at the Sahinbagh police post and set it on fire too.

The Delhi Police has declared high alert in other minority-dominated areas like Seelampur, Jafarpur etc. Said Sultan Ahmed, a local leader: "We were sorting out the issue with the police. They urged us to bring in the person who had put up the bookstall and to whom the Koran belonged. Suddenly the mob started pelting stones at the post. The gate was locked but the mob broke the gate down and many policemen were hurt in the process."

The New York Times actually notices the phenomenon of honor killing. "A Dishonorable Affair," by Katherine Zoepf (thanks to all who sent this in):

In speaking with the police, Zahra’s brother used a colloquial expression, ghasalat al arr (washing away the shame), which means the killing of a woman or girl whose very life has come to be seen as an unbearable stain on the honor of her male relatives. Once this kind of familial sexual shame has been “washed,” the killing is traditionally forgotten as quickly as possible. Under Syrian law, an honor killing is not murder, and the man who commits it is not a murderer. As in many other Arab countries, even if the killer is convicted on the lesser charge of a “crime of honor,” he is usually set free within months. Mentioning the killing — or even the name of the victim — generally becomes taboo.

Read it all.

He couldn't just not eat it. It had to not be there. And now the Canadian prison system will pay for its sin against multiculturalism. "Prison fries for serving bacon," by Tom Godfrey for the Toronto Sun (thanks to Allahfanculo):

A Muslim inmate has won $2,000 and a partial human rights victory over a Correctional Service of Canada policy not to replace bacon with a halal diet for Islam-worshipping cons.

Duane David, who is serving time in Kingston's Joyceville Institution for an unknown crime, had complained to the Canadian Human Rights Commission that his rights were being violated as the prison failed to offer a halal replacement for bacon served to inmates with breakfast every Wednesday.

The court heard Muslims are forbidden from eating pork for religious reasons.

A Federal Court of Canada hearing was told the breakfast included three pieces of bacon, two eggs, three slices of toast, jam, ketchup, milk, coffee, juice and cereal.

'REQUEST WAS REFUSED'

"Muslim inmates who follow a halal diet (usually) receive all of these items, except the bacon," Madame Justice Eleanor Dawson was told. "Mr. David had requested a substitute for the three pieces of bacon, but the request was refused by the institution."

Yes, yes, he knows all about the "greater jihad" and the "lesser jihad" -- read the whole interview, "One on One with Steven Emerson: 'Jihad is jihad,'" by Ruthie Blum in the Jerusalem Post (thanks to all who sent this in):

Has Bush, perhaps, relinquished his earlier convictions - those that dominated his speeches in the immediate aftermath of 9/11?

He goes back and forth, one minute denouncing "Islamofascism," another saying that peaceful jihad has been hijacked by the those who "pervert" Islam. What crockery! Jihad is jihad.

Read it all.

Stop the Presses! Stratfor has, through keen study of intelligence data, made a momentous discovery -- one that no one else has ever happened upon!

By Khalid Hasan in the Daily Times :

Washington: “The coming political transition is unlikely to foster stability because Musharraf will be sharing power with a civilian prime minister leading a coalition government, and with an army chief. This means the next army chief and the new head of the ISI could be heavily involved in politics at a time when they need to concentrate on combating jihadism,” according to a commentary by Stratfor.

[...]

Stratfor said Pakistan now faces the biggest challenge since its inception: a growing jihadist insurgency. Thus far, the military establishment has been on the defensive regarding an unprecedented wave of suicide attacks, mostly against army personnel and facilities - including some very sensitive installations.

The process of purging militant sympathisers within the ranks of the military and the intelligence apparatus has been going on since the 9/11 attacks, but the new ISI chief will not be able to deal with the jihadist problem before sealing the leaks in the national security network - an objective that is not likely to be achieved any time soon. Among other problems, this could create a conflict between Washington and Islamabad over the United States’ counter-terrorism imperatives.

Gee, ya think?

Meanwhile:

"Pakistan backs off Al Qaeda pursuit: Political realities force Musharraf to reduce efforts against Al Qaeda, depriving the U.S. of one of its strongest counter-terrorism allies," by Greg Miller in the Los Angeles Times :

WASHINGTON -- -- Political turmoil and a spate of brazen attacks by Taliban fighters are forcing Pakistan's president to scale back his government's pursuit of Al Qaeda, according to U.S. intelligence officials who fear that the terrorist network will be able to accelerate its efforts to rebuild and plot new attacks.

The Brotherhood "works to dissuade the Muslims from violence, instead channeling them into politics and charitable activities," said Robert S. Leiken, director of the Immigration and National Security Program at The Nixon Center in a recent article in Foreign Affairs, a publication of the nonpartisan Council on Foreign Relations. --from this Dallas Morning News article

That sudden scholar of Islam, Robert Leiken, could cheerfully explain his new "expertise" about the Ikhwan and everything to do with Islam the way that candid crook did in the late nineteenth century, Jay Gould or someone of that railroad-magnate or Tammany ilk: "I seen my opportunities, and I took 'em."

That's Leiken. A presto-chango artist, he went from being an "expert" on Latin America to becoming a great "expert" on How To Deal With Islam. Nothing he has written so far shows a deep familiarity, or any familiarity at all, with the texts or tenets of Islam. Nothing he has written so far shows any deep familiarity, or any familiarity at all, with the 1350-year history of Jihad-conquest and of the subsequent subjugation of non-Muslims (Christians, Jews, Zoroastrians, Hindus, Buddhists, and many smaller groups), a conquest and subjugation which faithfully put into practice the doctrines of Islam, derived from Qur'an, Hadith, and sira, as further discussed by Qur'anic commentators and jurisconsults, resulting in a system of codification, or Holy Law of Islam (i.e., the Shari'a).

GENEVA (Reuters) - United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Louise Arbour said on Monday that bigotry and prejudice, especially in regard to Muslims, were common in Europe and called on governments to tackle the issue. -- from this news item

The assumptions, the skewed knowledge, the mental set, the entire world view, of Louise Arbour, of all the louise-arbours of this world, need to be anatomized, spread out on a table, or possibly held up for close inspection. How did she arrive at her views, and at her position? What is it that went into her formation? Did she study history? Has she studied Islam? Has she bethought herself, and wondered if, just possibly, she had a duty to study Islam, and a duty to study the history of Islamic conquest and subjugation of non-Muslims -- Christians, Jews, Zoroastrians, Hindus, Buddhists, and others -- in time and space? Or should she remain content with the bland assumptions of Bush and Blair, that because the word one commonly uses for Islam is "religion," then therefore, Islam is entitled to automatic respect, without more thought, because "religion" is a good thing?

One suspects that Louise Arbour would protest. She would insist she does not see it that way, for she would be horrified, would she not, to be put in the same galere as George Bush. Or as one high Pentagon official, slightly rattled by my presentation but not rattled enough, tried to complacently assure me a few years ago that my view of Islam must be wrong and that Islam "must be alright" because, you see, "more than a billion people believe it." It's the old comical "fifty million Frenchmen can't be wrong" -- updated, and far more dangerous as a basis for policy.

Sunnis will kill Shia and vice versa, but they do not hesitate to unite against the Infidel when they see such a union to be expeditious. From the Associated Press (thanks to DFS):

KABUL, Afghanistan - A top U.S. commander on Friday accused Iran of supplying powerful roadside bombs to militants in Afghanistan, as a suicide car bomb in the capital killed a French soldier and an Afghan bystander.

Heavy battles in the violence-plagued south, meanwhile, killed 75 Taliban and at least six civilians.

Adm. William Fallon, the head of U.S. Central Command, said Iran's Revolutionary Guard is supplying roadside bomb parts for the type of sophisticated and deadly bombs found in Iraq known as explosively formed penetrators.

"The Iranians are clearly supplying some amount of lethal aid," Fallon told The Associated Press during a trip to Afghanistan. "There is no doubt ... that agents from Iran are involved in aiding the insurgency."

Fallon said the U.S. would "act decisively" if the cross-border flow continues. His comments were not meant as a threat of military action against Iran but a suggestion that border interdiction efforts may need to be increased, Fallon's aides said later.

Iran has denied that it is supplying arms to fighters in Afghanistan.

Fallon said Iran is also providing development assistance in western Afghanistan, which he labeled as helpful.

NATO's International Security Assistance Force has said that three shipments of weapons originating in Iran have been intercepted in Afghanistan since April. The latest was discovered in the western province of Farah on Sept. 6.

They will "respect" the ruling. But it is unlikely that they will give up their attempts to compel Sweden and other European countries to adopt Sharia blasphemy laws. By Ahmad Maher for IslamOnline (thanks to PRCS):

CAIRO — Swedish Muslims were disappointed Saturday, September 22, at a ruling by Justice Chancellor Goeran Lambertz, who said the anti-Prophet Muhammad cartoon published in a local newspaper did not constitute incitement to racial hatred.

"Of course we reject the ruling, but we can't help but respect it," Stockholm-based Chaka Benmakhlouf, President of the Federation of Islamic Organizations in Europe, told IslamOnline.net over the phone.

Benmakhlouf said the powerful Jewish lobby in Sweden had lost a similar case in the past after suing the Stockholm Mosque for alleged anti-Semitism.

"Jewish leaders translated some Islamic books which they said contained anti-Jews materials and forwarded them to Chancellor Lambertz, who overturned the lawsuit on free speech grounds," added Benmakhlouf, who holds Swedish citizenship.

Three Swedish Muslim organizations had asked Lambertz — the only official in Sweden entitled to indict in cases concerning freedom of the press — to press charges of incitement to racial hatred against the newspaper Nerikes Allehanda and its editor-in-chief Ulf Johansson.

The newspaper published in August a cartoon that depicted Prophet Muhammad (peace and blessings be upon him) as a dog, citing freedom of speech.

1938 Alert. By Uzi Mahnaimi and Sarah Baxter for the Sunday Times :

Israeli commandos seized nuclear material of North Korean origin during a daring raid on a secret military site in Syria before Israel bombed it this month, according to informed sources in Washington and Jerusalem.

The attack was launched with American approval on September 6 after Washington was shown evidence the material was nuclear related, the well-placed sources say.

They confirmed that samples taken from Syria for testing had been identified as North Korean. This raised fears that Syria might have joined North Korea and Iran in seeking to acquire nuclear weapons.

And so it begins. By Nebi Qena for Associated Press (thanks to the Constantinopolitan Irredentist):

SRBICA, Serbia - Three students were suspended from school in Kosovo this week for wearing Muslim headscarves, reflecting a debate that is echoing across Europe and complicating the province's quest for independence.

The argument over whether secular society should trump religious rights is similar to those taking place in France, Turkey, Britain and elsewhere.

But some in the breakaway Serb province fear its bid for statehood could suffer if Kosovo is perceived as overly Islamic.

"Not only does religion damage the quest for independence, it damages our entire concept," said Rexhep Ismajli, the head of Kosovo's Academy of Science, a body that includes the province's leading thinkers. "It damages Kosovo's society, it damages our vision."

Your vision, maybe, Rexhep, but not that of many of your fellow Kosovars.

Fatmire Jashari, 18, was suspended from her high school in the central Kosovar town of Srbica — a former stronghold of the now-disbanded Kosovo Liberation Army, the guerrilla group that fought Serb forces in the 1998-1999 war.

"I hope I won't be pushed to choose between the two," she said. "But if I am, I will choose the headscarf."

Read it all.

Now wait a minute. Didn't David Dawson of the Indianapolis Airport say the other day that "These facilities are for everybody's use"? Yet even while decrying the "Islamophobia" that they think is inspiring the protests against this, IslamOnline seems to be granting the "Islamophobes" their point by calling the footbaths "wudu basins" -- i.e., installations for Islamic religious purposes, and for no other purpose.

"Indiana wudu basins spark controversy," from IslamOnline (thanks to all who sent this in):

CAIRO - The planned construction of wash basins at the Indianapolis International Airport to accommodate the wudu (ablution) needs of Muslim taxi drivers has become a bone of contention between Islamophobes led by a church leader and Muslims who defend the sinks as being practical, The Indianapolis Star reported Saturday, September 22.

Putting sinks on public property would be "unconstitutional, given that their primary purpose is to serve Muslims," Bishop Jerry Hillenburg of the Hope Baptist Church on the Far West said in a letter to Mayor of Indiana Bart Peterson.

The article goes on and on, but never addresses the Constitutional point.

Everyone loves a parade. Just before his glorious trip to the UN and Columbia University, during which he is sure to mesmerize his audience with a weird celestial light, just as he did last time, Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad relaxes by watching a parade featuring banners that read al-mawt al-Amrika and al-mawt al-Israil -- Death to America and Death to Israel.

You can see, however, that they are rendered in English on the same banners as "Down with USA" and "Down with Esrail." (Thanks to LGF.)

Every effort should be made to stop Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons, but failing that, the world could live with a nuclear-armed regime in Tehran, a recently retired commander of U.S. forces in the Middle East said Monday.

John Abizaid, the retired Army general who headed Central Command for nearly four years, said he was confident that if Iran gained nuclear arms, the United States could deter it from using them.

"Iran is not a suicide nation," he said. "I mean, they may have some people in charge that don't appear to be rational, but I doubt that the Iranians intend to attack us with a nuclear weapon." -- from this news article

No, the world -- that is, the rational world of Infidels -- cannot "live with a nuclear-armed regime in Tehran." It is not true that such a regime can be counted on to be a rational actor akin to the Soviet government.

Why not?

On September 18, Hamas' Al-Aqsa TV labeled U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice a "black snake." -- MEMRI

Read the comments made by marauding Arabs as they attacked and burned and killed in Darfur. The reports of the survivors offer example after example of the Arabs of the Janjaweed telling them that "you blacks have to die." This kind of thing seldom is reported, and when it is reported, nothing is made of it. It disappears. It should be constantly publicized, along with the Arab enslavement of blacks in the southern Sudan, Mauritania, and even Saudi Arabia itself. Pictures of black Africans, from the 1930s, being sent off to the slave markets of Arabia exist and used to be reprinted, but not in recent decades. For one example of such a picture, see Dagobert Rune's "Tyranny."

And then there is the Hadith quoted by Robert Spencer in his lucid, line-by-line exegesis of the Qur'an:

The believers, meanwhile, are exhorted to “obey Allah, and obey the Messenger, and those charged with authority among you” (v. 59). To obey Muhammad today is, many Islamic authorities say, to obey his dictates in the Hadith, which some contemporary Muslims wish to disregard and say that only the Qur’an has authority. And Muhammad himself is quite clear about the necessity to obey earthly rulers: “You should listen to and obey your ruler even if he was an Ethiopian (black) slave whose head looks like a raisin."

When I point out that this is permitted -- to this day -- in Islamic law, I get called an "Islamophobe." But the Muslim writers yesterday over at Ummah.com (thanks to Never Mind) don't have any problem with the concept.

They explain, of course, that it refers only to prisoners of war, and spend a lot of time comparing this peculiar institution favorably to conditions in Western prisons and prisoner-of-war camps. And the slaves can only be legitimately awarded to the Muslims by the caliph -- yet another reason why the mujahedin so hope to get the caliphate back up and running again.

As one commenter puts it:

I have heard everything now.

From a brisk read through the posts on this thread I can see we now have a sizable group of people who are quite happy to argue that keeping slaves is morally acceptable. Does this one even need discussing?

You do know what the definition of a slave is?

I thought I would include this piece by William Dalrymple in The Guardian because, despite its general muddle-headedness, it nonetheless indicates some kind of improvement in the media's grasp of the nature of the Islamic danger.

Six years after 9/11, throughout the Muslim world political Islam is on the march; the surprise is that its rise is happening democratically - not through the bomb, but the ballot box. Democracy is not the antidote to the Islamists the neocons once fondly believed it would be. Since the US invaded Afghanistan and Iraq, there has been a consistent response from voters wherever Muslims have had the right to vote. In Lebanon, Iran, Iraq, Palestine, Pakistan, Egypt, Turkey and Algeria they have voted en masse for religious parties in a way they have never done before.

Now that is a very trenchant point. We've said it here before, of course, but the idea that "democracy" -- i.e., giving people what they want via the ballot box -- is somehow going to solve our problems in the Muslim world is utter fantasy. While it sounds unseemly, we should be grateful for the dictatorships of Egypt and Jordan -- and the Turkish army -- that keep the hard-core Muslims out of power. Of course, there are good dictatorships and bad dictatorships: Iran and Saudia Arabia are examples of the latter. But we have got to get over the progressivist nonsense that all dictatorships are created equal and that "democracy" can do no wrong. Throughout Islamic history there have been only two types of government: Islamic dictatorships and secular dictatorships: I know which I prefer.

Of course, that "not through the bomb, but the ballot box" quip is hardly accurate. The jihadists are plainly happy enough to use bombs.

Egypt is typical: at the last election in 2005 members of the nominally banned Muslim Brotherhood, standing as independents, saw their representation rise from 17 seats to 88 in the 444-seat people's assembly - a five-fold increase, despite reports of vote-rigging by President Mubarak's ruling National Democratic Alliance. The Brothers, who have long abjured violence, are now the main opposition.

The figures in Pakistan are strikingly similar. Traditionally, the religious parties there have won only a fraction of the vote. That began to change after the US invasion of Afghanistan. In October 2002 a rightwing alliance of religious parties - the Muttahida Majlis Amal or MMA - won 11.6% of the vote, more than doubling its share, and sweeping the polls in the two provinces bordering Afghanistan - Baluchistan and the North West Frontier Province - where it formed ultra-conservative and pro-Islamist provincial governments. If the last election turned the MMA into a serious electoral force, there are now fears that it could yet be the principle beneficiary of the current standoff in Pakistan.

The Bush administration proclaimed in 2004 that the promotion of democracy in the Middle East would be a major foreign policy theme in its second term. It has been widely perceived, not least in Washington, that this policy has failed. Yet in many ways US foreign policy has succeeded in turning Muslim opinion against the corrupt monarchies and decaying nationalist parties who have ruled the region for 50 years. The irony is that rather than turning to liberal secular parties, as the neocons assumed, Muslims have lined up behind parties most clearly seen to stand up against aggressive US intervention.

Religious parties, in other words, have come to power for reasons largely unconnected to religion.

Now we are starting to drift, but there still is some good stuff there. It is certainly possible that the US war in Iraq has helped galvanize Muslims against us. But it is not correct to infer that, "Religious parties, in other words, have come to power for reasons largely unconnected to religion." Religious (i.e., Islamic) parties have come to power -- for example, in Iraq -- because of the push for democracy that has opened up the Islamic option hitherto repressed by more secular dictators.

The usual US response has been to retreat from its push for democracy when the "wrong" parties win. This was the case not just with the electoral victory of Hamas, but also in Egypt: since the Brothers' strong showing in the elections, the US has stopped pressing Mubarak to make democratic reforms, and many of the Brothers' leading activists and business backers, as well as Mubarak's opponent in the presidential election, are in prison, all without a word of censure from Washington.

Yet on a recent visit to Egypt I found everywhere a strong feeling that political Islam was there to stay, and that this was something everyone was going to have to learn to live with; the US response had become almost irrelevant. Even the Copts were making overtures to the Brothers. As Youssef Sidhom, who edits the leading Coptic newspaper, put it: "They are not going away. We need to enter into dialogue, to clarify their policies, and end mutual mistrust."

The reality is that, like the Copts, we are going to have to find some modus vivendi with political Islam.

That's easy: pay the jizya and feel yourselves subdued (Quran 9:29).

This has been going on for years. In my book Onward Muslim Soldiers, written in early 2003, I discussed a camp that had recently been discovered in rural Alabama, with shot-up school buses, the works. "Terrorists Training in Rural America?," by Erick Stakelbeck for CBN News (thanks to LGN):

CBNNews.com - RED HOUSE, Va. - Islamic extremists in the United States have traditionally set up shop in big cities with large Muslim populations: places like New York City, Dearborn, Michigan and even Washington, DC. But one secretive group is doing just the opposite.

They call themselves Muslims of America. They've established compounds throughout the rural U.S. Members say they moved to the countryside to lead peaceful lives free of "Western decadence." But others say that doesn't tell the whole story.

"Certainly, when you're in a rural area it enables you to better escape from the prying eyes of law enforcement," said CBN News consultant David Gartenstein-Ross.

He says Muslims of America has close ties to a violent Pakistani group named Jamaat Al-Fuqra. Both groups are led by the same extremist cleric: Sheikh Mubarak Gilani.

"Sheikh Gilani is an extremist figure known to be very much involved in the jihads against India, also known to be very much anti-Semitic," Gartenstein-Ross said.

Gilani's images and messages are all over the Muslims of America Web site.

He founded the group during a visit to Brooklyn in 1980. Shoe bomber Richard Reid and Beltway sniper John Allen Muhammed are said to have been among his followers.

Gilani encouraged his U.S. pupils-mostly African Americans-to move to rural areas and establish Muslim communes. The group now has dozens of these communes nationwide.

"Al Fuqra has compounds from coast-to-coast.and what this indicates is they're going to areas where land is plentiful--where you can get land for relatively cheap prices," Gartenstein-Ross said.

CBN News visited the group's 45-acre site in Red House, Virginia - a town so small you can barely find it on a map. There are no traffic lights, and the only signs of industry are a pair of convenience stores. So when a street sign popped up named after a radical Pakistani sheikh-along with men and women dressed in traditional Islamic garb- the locals took notice.

Sheikh Gilani has been on U.S. intelligence agencies' radar for years. He's currently under investigation for possible ties to al-Qaeda. He also trained jihadists to fight against the Soviets in Afghanistan during the 1980s.

Read it all.

Feel the love. "Lo! Allah hath bought from the believers their lives and their wealth because the Garden will be theirs: they shall fight in the way of Allah and shall slay and be slain." -- Qur'an 9:111

"Israel says thwarts suicide bomb attack in Tel Aviv," from Reuters (thanks to all who sent this in):

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israeli police seized an explosive belt that was intended to be used in a Tel Aviv suicide bomb attack on the Jewish holiday of Yom Kippur, a police spokesman said on Saturday.

Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said police raided an apartment in Israel's commercial capital early on Saturday and arrested four people, including a suspected would-be suicide bomber and an explosive belt he was planning to use.

An army spokeswoman said Palestinian militants arrested during a raid in West Bank city of Nablus earlier this week had been planning the attack. Two militants and an Israeli soldier were killed during the raid.

The Hamas leader in al-Ein refugee camp gave the explosive belt to a Nablus resident who worked in Tel Aviv, she said. A news report said the belt was smuggled in parts and was assembled in the apartment.

Hijabbed security guard frisks nun (thanks to all who sent this in).

Of course there should be random searches, and no one should be exempt -- if any group is exempt, its dress will soon be adopted by the terrorists.

But there is an absurdity to this photo. And a hint that maybe we would do better devoting our resources to searching those who are more likely to be threats -- were that not so politically incorrect.

An interesting perspective on what the mainstream media thinks of as the chasm-wide distinction between "moderate" and "radical" Muslims. Mohammed Atif Siddique's family argues that he wasn't a terrorist, he was just growing more devout in his Islam, and it's just Whitey's racism that causes him to confuse the two. But of course it is also entirely possible that Mohammed Atif Siddique's devoutness led him to see Al-Qaeda's perspective on jihad as reasonable. It wouldn't be the first time: a fervent commitment to Islam is the one scarlet thread that unites all the jihadists. Atta's visits to strip clubs do not negate this point -- his devoutness is well established, and he may have thought that such visits were a good way to throw off any investigators who may have been nosing around, and/or that he was about to perform a great act of martyrdom that would outweigh all his sins, so he had nothing to lose by living it up a little.

By Michael Howie in The Scotsman (thanks to Twostellas):

THE family of Mohammed Atif Siddique, the Scottish student convicted this week of al-Qaeda terrorist offences, have come together to tell of their heartache and their anger at the way he has been treated.

They described how their son adopted a stricter Islamic way of life, a change that fractured their close relationship and ultimately led to his conviction.

But they insisted Atif - who faces at least ten years in prison - was not a terrorist and that his actions were similar to those of thousands of ordinary young Muslims seeking answers about al-Qaeda and the "war on terror".

In a wide-ranging interview, the family claimed "thousands" of other people ran the risk of falling foul of the same offences for which Atif was convicted.

They said he had been criminalised for carrying out research on al-Qaeda.

Atif was the first person in Scotland to be convicted under controversial new terror laws that have raised questions about the balance between civil liberties and protecting the public.

Speaking exclusively to The Scotsman, Mohammed Siddique, the father of the 21-year-old, said: "After what's happened to my son, stop your children going on the internet in case they end up in jail.

"The sad thing is, why shouldn't our young people be able to find out what is happening in Iraq or Afghanistan? Does it mean every child that goes on to a website is considered to be a terrorist? Thousands of young people in the Muslim community will have accessed the same material."

His wife, Parveen, said: "I would like, as a mother, to tell their children not to go anywhere near their computers. But, despite all of that, you cannot say going on the internet is a crime.

"It's not just Muslims that go on these websites; white people also go on them. My son is being made a scapegoat.

The convicted student's brother, Asif, said: "Every Muslim is asking questions within themselves: what is happening in Iraq? Why it is happening? What is happening in Afghanistan, Israel and Palestine?

"I was of the opinion a few years ago that unless s*** was happening on my own doorstep, it was nothing to do with me.

"But Atif was different. He was of the belief that it was to do with us, because we are Muslims and what is happening to them could happen to us. Britain was going in there - they must have a reason, he thought. But the Taleban were retaliating, encouraging people to carry out suicide bombings. Was it justified? What's leading them to do that? These are the questions he was asking."

And...what answers did he discover?

"The explosion resulted in the destruction of the Toyota vehicle which carried the Frenchmen and the death of those who were in it, thanks be to God." Feel the love.

"France on Al-Qaeda alert after attack," from The Australian (thanks to PRCS):

AL-QAEDA'S branch in North Africa has claimed responsibility for a suicide bombing in Algeria that wounded two French people and one Italian, hours after it had threatened French targets in the region.

In an "audio statement" posted on the Internet and received by Al-Arabiya television's office in Algiers, Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb said one of its militants carried out the attack with a car laden with "more than 250 kilos of explosives".

Friday's bombing in Lakhdaria, about 75 kilometres (50 miles) southeast of Algiers, "killed three foreigners" and wounded others, Al-Arabiya quoted the group as claiming.

But the Algerian interior ministry said in a statement that no-one was killed while nine people suffered injuries which were not life-threatening.

Al-Arabiya aired part of the audio recording, in which the spokesman of the group said "the heroic martyrdom-seeker Othman Abu Jaafar" rammed a Mazda car into a convoy in which "French crusaders working on building the biggest dam" in the area were travelling.

The news channel showed a picture of a militant carrying a machinegun, with the inscription "martyrdom-seeker Othman Abu Jaafar" written on it, which accompanied the statement.

The targeted French men were escorted by Algerian army and police vehicles at the time, the recording said.

"The explosion resulted in the destruction of the Toyota vehicle which carried the Frenchmen and the death of those who were in it, thanks be to God," the spokesman added.

Suicidal idiocy. By David Morgan for Reuters (thanks to Davida):

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Nearly 10,000 people from countries designated as sponsors of terrorism have entered the United States under an immigration diversity program with relatively few restrictions, a report released on Friday said.

The report by the U.S. Government Accountability Office said the State Department's inspector general warned in 2003 that the Diversity Visa Program posed a significant risk to national security and recommended it be closed to people from countries on the U.S. list of state terrorism sponsors.

But four years later, the program remains open to people from those nations and little is known about what becomes of them once they enter the United States, the GAO said.

From 2000 to 2006, the program allowed 3,703 people from Sudan, 3,164 from Iran, 2,763 from Cuba and 162 from Syria to enter the United States and apply for permanent legal resident status, the report said. That totals 9,792 new immigrants.

"We found no documented evidence of ... immigrants from state sponsors of terrorism committing any terrorist acts," said the GAO, a nonpartisan investigative arm of Congress.

Oh, good. Nothing to worry about, then. Go back to sleep.

How proud they must be -- of their high-mindedness, their transcendence of narrow chauvinism, their ignoring of Ahmadinejad's genocidal statements in view of the single most salient fact: that he, like they, hates America above all.

"Iranian President to Speak at NPC's First-Ever Videoconference Luncheon," a National Press Club press release (thanks to LGF):

WASHINGTON, Sept. 21 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad will speak and take questions at the National Press Club's first- ever videoconference luncheon at noon on Monday, Sept. 24.

Ahmadinejad will appear in the NPC Ballroom in Washington via videolink from New York, where he will be attending the UN General Assembly. After Ahmadinejad's speech, NPC President Jerry Zremski will ask questions handed up from the audience for a minimum of a half-hour.

Please note: the format of the luncheon with President Ahmadinejad will differ from the typical NPC luncheon program in many ways. President Ahmadinejad will be introduced at noon. His speech will last a half hour, and will be followed by 45 minutes of questions. Lunch will be served after the speech and question period.

NOTE TO BROADCASTERS: Switched feed is available. Please contact Tiina Kreek in the NPC Broadcast Operations Center at tkreek@press.org or call (202) 662 7510.

Attendance at this luncheon will be limited to NPC members, their guests and accredited media only. Luncheon tickets are $16 for members and $28 for their guests. To reiterate, the only nonmembers to be admitted to this event will be accredited media.

To reserve a seat at the luncheon, call the NPC reservation line at 202- 662-7501. Accredited media with questions should email Melinda Cooke at mcooke@press.org to reserve a seat.

Look out for Pope Rage II. "Pope in 'freedom' blast at Islam," by Simon Caldwell for the Daily Mail (thanks to Irish Infidel):

The Pope has again risked provoking the wrath of the Islamic world, by criticising its treatment of Christians.

Benedict XVI attacked Muslim nations where Christians are either persecuted or given the status of second-class citizens under the Shariah Islamic law.

He also defended the rights of Muslims to convert to Christianity, an act which warrants the death penalty in many Islamic countries.

His comments came almost exactly a year after he provoked a wave of anger among Muslims by quoting a Byzantine emperor who linked Islam to violence.

Yesterday, near Rome, the 80-year-old pontiff made a speech in "defence of religious liberty", which, he said "is a fundamental, irrepressible, inalienable and inviolable right".

In a clear reference to Islam, he said: "The exercise of this freedom also includes the right to change religion, which should be guaranteed not only legally, but also in daily practice."

Addressing the problem of Islamic extremism, he added: "Terrorism is a serious problem whose perpetrators often claim to act in God's name and harbour an inexcusable contempt for human life."

Many people have been emailing me John Derbyshire's latest piece, "Islamophobophobia," in which I figure prominently. Yes, of course I will answer, and of course my answer will be entitled "Islamophobophobophobia," but today I am unfortunately quite busy with other matters.

I also have a "You talkin' to me?" email in to Jonah Goldberg, asking if he means me in this Corner piece, when he says, "For some on the Right the mantra is 'Islam is the problem.' They will not stomach D'Souza's fine distinctions between good Muslims and bad ones....We aren't near the point where a respectable conservative says 'the only good Muslim is a dead Muslim,' but one can smell the whiff of sulfur bubbling to the top of certain swamps." I get the impression that Goldberg has imbibed of D'Souza's relentless and uncorrected mischaracterizations of my positions, in which he persisted even after I corrected him repeatedly, but I am confident that all this will be sorted out in the near future.

[UPDATE: Jonah Goldberg writes: "Naw, I certainly didn't have you in mind when I wrote that. Seriously. I have interactions, professional and from general readers, where people call me dhimmi simply because I don't 'hate' islam enough for their tastes or show sufficient zeal. You weren't part of all that." Thanks, Jonah.]

So if you'll permit me the self-indulgence of announcing that I am going to write a piece before I actually write it, allow me also to explain that I'm only doing so to set up this reply to Derbyshire by my good friend Jeff, who sent this to Derbyshire and has kindly allowed me to post it here also, and in many ways it surpasses anything I will eventually be able to write on these issues.

A fascinating piece, but let me play Devil's advocate a bit. I think what I'm up against in a way is the positive version of your mild anti-Catholicism, and any riposte to your essay will fare about as well as an attempt to make you a fellow traveller of Pope Benedict!

Greco-Roman civilization and Christian civilization were open-ended and forward looking. Chinese civilization and Hindu civilization were more static but not closed to influence from outside, so that they could incorporate the forward looking elements of Western civilization with relative ease.

Islamic civilization is a "whole system," as a Muslim friend told me recently. It tends toward totalitarianism, and toward constant renewals and self-purifications that push Western-type influences out. It's much more like (but not completely like) communism. When communism learns to incorporate economic dynamism and individual rights, it ceases to function.

Perhaps part of the reaction of Islam today is not just religious pride in the ordinary sense of the word. Rather, it is a last-gasp defense of people with a religion that cannot adapt to the influence of free-market democratic secularism, and so feel the lime between the bricks dissolving.

One can be sympathetic with that to a large extent. But I think your mental image of non-intellectual Christians doesn't quite fit the bill. You're thinking of cultural Catholic and Anglicans and Orthodox, whose religion is more or less inherited.

Perhaps you'd do better to think of evangelical Christianity in the US. There is a constant tendency among evangelicals to "get religion," though not all of them do. When they do, there are certain text-based core ideas that they will return to again and again.

And when Muslims "get religion," those text-based elements will also come to the fore. Since Islam is fundamentally ABOUT social organization and law rather than inner spirituality (ask them! they will tell you so themselves!), those totalitarian, aggressive impulses and ideas will naturally appear.

And Muslims are wonderful at tiring out their competitors and conquerors. The Mongols and everyone else eventually decides that the easiest thing is just to become Muslims...then there won't be such a fuss all the time.

The trouble is that then this systematic element of social dessication is there at the heart of what we are. Is it only Christians that have an interest in seeing that we don't gradually Islamize to appease these irritable folks in our midst? Can one be a non-Christian and still see that the Greco-Roman and Christian elements at the root of our civilization are not random and incidental, but rather constitutive? Or does one have to be a "booster" to think so?

Stirred up to wage the inner spiritual struggle by Friday sermons, the pious in Bangladesh take to the streets. "Violence over Bangladesh cartoon," from the BBC (thanks to Paul):

Street clashes have broken out in the Bangladeshi capital, Dhaka, as Islamic activists protested over the publication of an "offensive" cartoon.

Witnesses say that hundreds joined the protest, even though such demonstrations are officially banned under the country's state of emergency.

Police baton-charged some of the protesters as they tried to break through barricades.

The leading Bangla-language newspaper published the offending cartoons.

Prothom Alo has since apologised for them and said that it has sacked an editor.

Islam is Bangladesh's state religion and past governments have banned publications for insulting Muslim.

The country's religious traditions are moderate but some people believe conservatives are becoming more influential.

Gee, ya think?

Witnesses say the violence began after Friday prayers, when protesters tried to break through barricades put up to prevent them reaching the Prothom Alo offices.

The demonstrators demanded the execution of the paper's editor, Matiur Rahman, and burned effigies of him and his Bengali-language daily.

I wonder if a newspaper has ever been burned in effigy before.

A report by David G. Littman, Representative of the World Union of Progressive Judaism (WUPJ) to the United Nations Office in Geneva:

The three week 6th session of the UN Human Rights Council at the Palais des Nations, Geneva (September 10-28, 2007) is demonstrating that the Council is not “restoring credibility… on Human Rights” – as Kofi Annan’s High-Level Panel in 2004 had hoped, but – as we predicted from the start – may soon ‘out-Commission the Commission’.

The 1st week ended with Mr. Doudou Diène – the Senegalese UN Special Rapporteur on racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance – presenting his report (A/HRC/6/6) on ‘defamation of religions’. He writes of “the increasing trend in defamation of religions and the factors that explain it, particularly in the context where human rights violations are justified as measures to combat terrorism, to protect national security and preserve national identity.”(…) His report “… also analyses specific forms of religion-based discrimination, including Islamophobia and its manifestations – in particular following the events of 11 September 2001...”. He refers several times to that horrible climacteric in world affairs simply as “the events”, and nowhere does he even mention the term “Jihad” or “Jihadist terrorism”. In his Report of 21 pages, Mr. Diène refers briefly to antisemitism (1½ pages), “Chistianophobia” (1 page), and to “Islamophobia” and “defamation of religions” (mainly Islam), at great length( 7½ pages).
http://daccessdds.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/G07/137/32/PDF/G0713732.pdf?OpenElement

In presenting his Report, he mentioned three recent developments that illustrate, as he wrote, the gravity of “Islamophobia”: first, a manifestation outside the European Union Parliament in Brussels on 11 September 2007 against the “Islamization of Europe” that took place despite the mayor’s refusal to provide an authorisation to allow it; second, the “intellectual and ideological theorisation of Islamophobia by Norman Podhoretz (editor-in-chief of the influential review “Commentary” and advisor to a U.S. presidential candidate) in his latest book: World War IV: The Long Struggle Against Islamofascism”; third, increasing restrictions on the construction of mosques in Europe. He also stigmatised the campaign by the Swiss UDC political party to stop further building of minarets, and a caricature of a “black sheep”– representing foreign criminals – being kicked out of Switzerland by a white sheep, with two others watching.

Pakistan’s Ambassador Masood Khan – making several statements on behalf of the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) – reiterated the usual formulae that: “Denunciations of terrorisms and extremisms have been made by opinion leaders of the Muslim world. A matching response has not been forthcoming.” He added that: “Equating certain religions with terrorism would have far reaching consequences for its followers. Even terrorist acts carried out by non state actors, in the name of religion, should be de-linked from religion to ensure freedom of religion or belief.”

It is a fact that neither he or any other member state of the OIC – nor any Muslim clerics – have condemned the reiterated calls of non-state actors to kill in the name of Allah and of Islam; and all our efforts to add a single phrase to this effect in the Commission resolution on “Combating defamation of religions” that the OIC has sponsored annually since 1999 have proved futile. He also declared that: “the OIC has been cautioning that Muslims are being demonized and dehumanised as Jews were in the interwar period in the last century.” Such an absurd allegation totally ignores the fact that the demonization of the Jews is inherent in sacred Islam texts and continues to be propagated today by Islamic leaders throughout the world. Ambassador Khan also referred to “recent acts of defamation in the shape of blasphemous sketches in Sweden and posters in Switzerland.”

* * * * *

Speaking on behalf of the Association for World Education, the Association of World Citizen and the World Union for Progressive Judaism during the “interactive dialogue” with the Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Religion and Belief (September 13), we asked Ms. Asma Jahangir the following questions, but none of them received an answer in the eight minutes at her disposal to ‘react’ to the many comments and questions from States and NGOs:

Female Genital Mutilation / Calls to kill in the name of God or Religion /
Rampant Judeophobia

We warmly welcome the very comprehensive report (A/HRC/6/5) of the Special Rapporteur on freedom of religion and belief.
http://daccessdds.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/G07/134/40/PDF/G0713440.pdf?OpenElement

As time is of the essence, we shall be brief. We have 3 questions to ask in three minutes:
Regarding vulnerable groups, particularly women, your § 28 refers to “some harmful practices such as genital mutilation [which] are perpetrated in the name of religion or imputed to religion.” In this context, our statement to the 4th session 6 months ago and our written statement on this barbaric crime is very pertinent. (E/CN.4/Sub.2/2005/NGO/27).
http://daccessdds.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/G05/149/14/PDF/G0514914.pdf?OpenElement

Reports show that there are over 300 million victims alive today, and roughly 3 million girls are mutilated each year in 32 countries, of which 29 are Member States of the OIC. After the recent mediatised death of two young girls in Egypt – a country where the FGM toll is 97% according to UNICEF, despite a 1997 State law condemning it – would it not be the moment for the Grand Sheikh Sayyed Tantawi to issue an unambiguous fatwa that would effectively take religious precedence over the previous, ambiguous Al Azhar fatwas of 1949, 1951, and January 29, 1981 – that encourages parents “to do their duty?”

Our second question refers to your §44 where you state that “terrorist acts which are carried out by non-State actors in the name of religion ought to be de-linked from religion, so that the actions are not associated with freedom of religion or belief.”

In an academic presentation exactly one year ago at Regensburg University, Pope Benedict correctly used the terms “jihad” and “holy war” when he declared that: “Violence is incompatible with the nature of God and the nature of the soul.” Our joint written statement Appeal to condemn calls to kill in the name of God (A/HRC/6/NGO/5) [http://www.iheu.org/system/files/IHEU+to+HRC+Killing+in+the+name+of+God.pdf] also contains our recent Appeal to the Secretary-General and the HCHR on 9 August. It too called upon the UN, the Organization of the Islamic Conference and others: “to condemn unequivocally all those who kill or incite to kill in the name of God or religion – and especially to include this phrase in the Council’s resolution: Combating defamation of religions. Surely, this teaching of hate in the path of Jihad, leading to endless ‘Jihadist Martyrdom’ bombings worldwide should not be ignored? And, we would add, the term ‘suicide’ for such Jihadist bombers carried out ‘in the path of Jihad’ is inappropriate.

Banned at the local mosque, but not at the local hospital. "Extremist was hospital chaplain," from the BBC (thanks to Writer Mom):

A radical Muslim cleric banned from his local mosque was allowed to work as a hospital chaplain, according to a BBC London investigation.

Usman Ali has been banned from his local mosque in Woolwich, London, after trustees won a court injunction.

But the ex-member of banned group Al Muha-ji-roun led prayers for NHS staff at Woolwich's Queen Elizabeth Hospital.

Hospital staff said they had suspended Mr Ali two days ago after concerns were raised by the police.

Banned for life

The 30-year-old British born preacher was banned for life from entering his local mosque in Woolwich after trustees won a county court injunction against him in January.

It was an unprecedented step and cost the mosque £30,000.

BBC London has seen the judge's order on the case and found that Ali had shown a video to children in the mosque containing clips of planes flying into the world trade centre during which he chanted "God is great".

Mosque trustees said they warned hospital officials about Mr Ali months ago but nothing was done.

It isn't nearly enough, but it's a start. "Immigration restrictions OK'd in France," by Elizabeth Bryant in the Washington Times (thanks to Ruth King):

PARIS — The National Assembly approved tough new restrictions on immigration yesterday, completing a major step in President Nicolas Sarkozy's program to roll up a famously well-trodden welcome mat.

The bill, which still needs Senate approval and a second vote in the Assembly, requires would-be immigrants for the first time to demonstrate a knowledge of the French language and cultural values.

Its most controversial clauses provide for voluntary DNA testing of applicants seeking to show they are related to current French residents, and legalize some data gathering based on race and ethnicity.

The bill is largely driven by a public perception that the flow of unskilled workers into France contributes to high unemployment and strains the nation's social welfare system. Such fears were crystallized by weeks of riots in suburban areas populated mainly by Muslim and African immigrants in the fall of 2005.

"For many of our countrymen, immigration is a source of concern," said Immigration Minister Brice Hortefeux upon introducing the bill. "They see a threat to their security, their jobs, their lifestyle. We must understand the ... hopes of this silent majority."

"Unfortunately, Muslims in the West must live with the local laws on freedom of expression." But for how long?

An update on this story. "Bangladesh detains cartoonist for offending Islam," from IslamOnline (thanks to Paul):

A Bangladeshi cartoonist has been detained for drawing a caricature offensive to Prophet Mohammed (PBUH).

Bangladesh witnessed mass protests after the publication of an anti-Islamic caricature by cartoonist Arifur Rahman.

The offensive cartoon, published in the 431st issue of Alpin, a weekly supplement of Bangladesh daily Prothom Alo, led to a one-month jail sentence to Rahman after the Bangladeshi Home Affairs Minister ruled that his drawings hurt Muslims’ feelings.

Islam was introduced to Bangladesh in the twelfth century by Sufi missionaries, and subsequent Muslim conquests helped spread the noble faith. Even though religion is practiced in a moderate manner in Bangladesh, the government bans any insult to Islam.

According to the BBC, the cartoon featured a conversation between a cleric and a child and ended with a joke about Prophet Mohammed's (PBUH) name.

The head of clerics of Dhaka’s main mosques filed complaints against the cartoonist who was arrested from his residence last Tuesday and handed over to the Tejgaon police station.

Rahman violated Section 54 code of criminal procedure and under such emergency laws; the government has the authority to detain people without charge if they are deemed to threaten national security.

Meanwhile, Prothom Alo published an apology on its front page for the “unfortunate publication”, withdrew the copies of that issue from the market and fired the cartoonist.

However, many in Bangladesh did not view such measures as enough and demanded that the newspaper be shut down....

Muslims might be a little relieved that those who offend their religion get punished in some countries as this is not the first time that involves the publication of anti-Islamic cartoons....

Western media often claims that such offensive cartoons shouldn’t anger Muslims and that their publication do not violate the laws of “freedom of expression“.

Unfortunately, Muslims in the West must live with the local laws on freedom of expression, Ibrahim el-Zayat, of the Federation of Islamic Organisations in Europe, told the BBC....

"Magazine banned for 'Mohammad cat' cartoon," from Reuters (thanks to JE):

BANGLADESH has suspended publication of a magazine after a cartoon it published this week triggered protests by Muslims who said it was offensive to the devout.

The suspension of publication of the Alpin, the weekly satire magazine of leading Bengali daily Prothom Alo, was ordered as some Muslim groups called for a street protest after Friday noon prayers, and a march towards the Prophom Alo office.

The daily has apologised for the cartoon in which a small boy referred to his cat as "Mohammad cat".

The protesters said it was a deliberate attempt by the cartoonist to ridicule Islam's Prophet Mohammad....

Police said that to avert any violence over the cartoon they would strictly enforce emergency laws banning protests and rallies.

"We shall impose a tight watch around Dhaka's Baitul Mokarram mosque from where the protesters would likely start their march," said a police officer.

Police have also deployed outside the daily's office.

Prothom Alo published a third apology toay and appealed to all to take the printing of the cartoon as a mistake.

On Wednesday police broke up a street march by hundreds of Islamists in Dhaka, demanding "death to the Prothom Alo editor" and "hang the cartoonist".

A government statement on Thursday said: "The magazine in its 431st issue has hurt the sentiment of devoted Muslims" and risked upsetting law and order....

"They are trying to make something out of nothing for their own gain." Considering the trumped-up quality of CAIR's hate crimes report, this is eminently plausible.

By Eugene Scott for The Arizona Republic (thanks to Twostellas):

The three men accused of harassing a Muslim imam at a Tempe mosque on Sept. 11 say the incident has been misportrayed as a hate crime.

"We walked inside the mosque. We were curious about what was in there, like any other church," said Brandon Garcia, one of the three men. "We didn't stop to cause any trouble or to be mean to anyone."

Garcia, Michael Estes and Armando Tolosa were near the mosque on a plumbing job when they decided to go in to learn more about Islam, according to their employer, Richard Yeates, owner of a Mesa plumbing company.

Ahmed Al-Shqeirat, the imam, said Estes cursed at him and made derogatory comments about Muslim children passing by.

Because the incident happened on the sixth anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, Al-Shqeirat and others in the Muslim community have said they consider the incident a hate crime.

Tempe police arrested Estes, 32, on suspicion of disorderly conduct. The other two men were not arrested.

"We basically looked at what the victims told us and we've done an investigation and determined there was a crime committed," said Mike Horn, Tempe police spokesman.

But Garcia and Tolosa said it was Al-Shqeirat who provoked Estes.

Al-Shqeirat said Estes asked him what he was hiding in the mosque. Garcia and Tolosa said Al-Shqueirat's report that Estes asked him what he was hiding in the mosque was untrue. They also said they never made any negative comments about kids.

"We were just asking questions. And (Al-Shqeirat) was fine at first," Tolosa said. "I guess he felt offended."

Al-Shqeirat got more upset as Estes asked more questions, Tolosa said. He said the imam suggested they make an appointment for a tour, which matches the imam's story. Tolosa said they told Al-Shqeirat that they were interested in a tour, but that Al-Shqeirat abruptly asked the men to leave. They complied, he said.

Tolosa and Garcia admit that when Al-Shqeirat began taking pictures of them as they walked out to their company vehicle, Estes cursed at him. Estes' language was in response to them being photographed without permission, they said.

"They are trying to make something out of nothing for their own gain," Yeates said of the imam....

The dhimmis, useful idiots, and fellow travelers at Columbia are hanging tough: they want Ahmadinejad to speak there. In "Outrage over Iranian president's NYC visit," WABC reports:

Ahmadinejad is scheduled to arrive September 24 to speak to the U.N. General Assembly, as the Security Council decides whether to increase sanctions against Iran for its uranium enrichment program.

The Iranian leader will then speak at the school. Columbia spokesman Robert Hornsby said there was no plan to cancel the appearance.

New York City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, however, has asked the school to withdraw the invitation.

"The idea of Ahmadinejad as an honored guest anywhere in our city is offensive to all New Yorkers. ... Ahmadinejad is a Holocaust denier, here for one reason - to spread his hate-mongering vitriol on the world stage," Quinn wrote.

And this:

The Iranian president, in an interview to air Sunday on "60 Minutes," indicated he would not press the issue. "I won't insist," Ahmadinejad said, although he expressed disbelief that the visit would offend Americans.

Police Commissioner Ray Kelly said Wednesday the proposed ground zero visit by Ahmadinejad trip during next week's U.N. General Assembly was a dead issue. The Iranian president, who is under Secret Service protection while in the country, was told to steer clear of lower Manhattan.

"We have communicated our concerns to the Iranian Mission. ... I am sure they will abide by our statement ... Our position is that he will not be permitted to go," Kelly said.

This is welcome news. Last night Michelle Malkin quoted an earlier WABC report saying that Ahmadinejad was going to defy the ban and go to Ground Zero anyway. Protests were developing. If the Thug-In-Chief decides to make an unscheduled detour, I expect he will find a peaceful but hostile reception at the site of the handiwork of his fellow mujahedin.

"The US loses all opportunities to cooperate with regional and other world states by trying to support a regime (the Zionist regime) which is now at its weakest political and social position."

"Zionist regime's allies to receive response on World Qods Day," from IRNA :

Supporters of the Zionist regime will receive their response during the world Qods Day's rallies, government spokesman, Gholam-Hossein Elham, said Wednesday.

The spokesman made the remarks during his weekly press conference while commenting on the current visit to the occupied Palestine of the US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.

Qods Day is held each year on the last Friday of Muslims fasting month of Ramadan after it was nominated by the late Founder of the Islamic Republic, Imam Khomeini, as a day to voice the protest of the Islamic Ummah against the Zionists.

The day falls on October 12 this year.

"The US loses all opportunities to cooperate with regional and other world states by trying to support a regime (the Zionist regime) which is now at its weakest political and social position," Elham said.

He warned that Washington's insistence on its wrong policies and arrogant approaches would have no result "but further political disgrace" for itself.

Referring to the approaching World Qods Day, the spokesman stressed, "Supporters of the Zionist regime will definitely receive the final response for their support on that day."

Another expression of the "Palestianians'" deeply held desire for peace.

"Dedicates to the Arab and Palestinian community in Sweden." Does this dedication have something to do with Lars Vilks?

"A Hamas TV Music Video in Hebrew Sings: 'In Black Bags, Chunks of Flesh of Jews,'" from MEMRITV (thanks to Morgaan Sinclair):

Following is a music video in Hebrew entitled "Hamas – The Apple of My Eye," which aired on Al-Aqsa TV on September 19, 2007:

Hamas, Hamas, Hamas the apple of my eye – Hamas

They destroyed the Merkava [tank]

the apple of my eye – Hamas

Repeated eight times

A bombing every minute

Soldiers are afraid

A bombing every minute

Soldiers are afraid

In black bags

Chunks of flesh of Jews

repeated five times

In retaliation for Yassin we want Sharon's head

We want Sharon's head

we want Sharon's head!
p>Hamas, Hamas, Hamas the apple of my eye – Hamas

They destroyed the Merkava [tank]

the apple of my eye – Hamas

Repeated five times

the apple of my eye – Hamas

the apple of my eye – Hamas

"Produced by AL-Aqsa TV, 2007"

Dedicates to the Arab and Palestinian community in Sweden

The Islamic bloc has replaced the Soviet bloc as the largest unified voting bloc in the UN. Here are the results: when the IAEA's attention should be focused on Iran, they do this instead. By Mark Heinrich for Reuters (thanks to Twostellas):

VIENNA, Sept 20 (Reuters) - Islamic nations, targeting Israel's undeclared nuclear arsenal, pushed through a U.N. atomic watchdog resolution on Thursday urging all Middle East nations to renounce atomic weapons.

The vote was 53-2 but with 47 abstentions by Western and developing states, highlighting reservations that the resolution politicised the International Atomic Energy Agency's work.

The decision was non-binding but symbolised international tensions over Israel's presumed nuclear might and shunning of the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), and it frayed the traditional consensus culture of the Vienna-based IAEA.

A similar measure calling on all Middle East nations to adopt IAEA safeguards on nuclear work passed overwhelmingly at last year's IAEA general assembly, with only Israel and top ally the United States opposed, as they were again on Thursday.

A new Socrates? I might believe a new Hipparchus, but not a new Socrates.

From AKI (thanks to all who sent this in):

Tehran, 20 Sept. (AKI) - A research centre run by the office of the president of Iran has released a 15-page document in which they define President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as the "Socrates of the Third Millennium".

The document has been released just days before Ahmadinejad is due to visit New York. The Iranian president will arrive in the city on Sunday to address the United Nations General Assembly.

In the document, various speeches and letters written by the Iranian president are analysed and it concludes that "Ahmadinejad reasons and discusses exactly as Socrates did in ancient Greece, by disarming other speakers and through his sharp reasoning."

"It's mainly the irony used by the president in his dialogue with foreigners," said the document refering to letters Ahmadinejad had written to Pope Benedict XVI, US president George Bush and German president Angela Merkel.

Yes, those letters were heavy with irony, although I don't think they were in the way the Socratic Thug-In-Chief probably intended.

Friend and Ally Update.

"Looming $20B Arms Sale Raises Concerns," by Barry Schweid for AP:

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Bush administration's proposed multibillion-dollar weapons sale to Saudi Arabia brought new allegations on Capitol Hill Tuesday that the monarchy has been lax in countering terrorism.

The kind of weapons that the Saudis would purchase and other details, including any U.S. conditions on how they might be used, have not been disclosed yet by the administration.

The sale is part of a broader effort to strengthen U.S. friends in the region, with Israel and Egypt due to receive major boosts in military aid. One goal is to counter Iran's hard-line policies, including suspicions it is building nuclear weapons.

Keynoting the skepticism at a hearing, Rep. Gary L. Ackerman, D-N.Y., chairman of the House Foreign Affairs subcommittee on the Middle East and South Asia, said the Bush administration has been unable to persuade Saudi rulers to stop the flow of fighters to Iraq and to attend a proposed regional meeting on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

"Then why," he asked, "should we believe that they see the war on terror as we do, and why sell them those weapons?"

"In the end," he said, "selling them arms won't guarantee their cooperation, much less their love."

Indeed not. For this is how they are showing their gratitude:

"Fears of dollar collapse as Saudis take fright," by Ambrose Evans-Pritchard in the Telegraph:

Saudi Arabia has refused to cut interest rates in lockstep with the US Federal Reserve for the first time, signalling that the oil-rich Gulf kingdom is preparing to break the dollar currency peg in a move that risks setting off a stampede out of the dollar across the Middle East.

"This is a very dangerous situation for the dollar," said Hans Redeker, currency chief at BNP Paribas.

"Saudi Arabia has $800bn (£400bn) in their future generation fund, and the entire region has $3,500bn under management. They face an inflationary threat and do not want to import an interest rate policy set for the recessionary conditions in the United States," he said.

The Saudi central bank said today that it would take "appropriate measures" to halt huge capital inflows into the country, but analysts say this policy is unsustainable and will inevitably lead to the collapse of the dollar peg.

As a close ally of the US, Riyadh has so far tried to stick to the peg, but the link is now destabilising its own economy.

Given the recent stream of propaganda, al-Qaeda is much too comfortable in its safe haven in the Pakistani frontier regions. Will a direct threat such as this motivate Musharraf to do something about that? "Bin Laden tape to declare war on Musharraf," by Lee Keath for the Associated Press:

CAIRO, Egypt - Osama bin Laden will release a new message soon declaring war on Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf, al-Qaida announced Thursday.

The announcement of the upcoming message came as al-Qaida released a new video in which bin Laden's deputy, Ayman al-Zawahri, boasted that the United States was being defeated in Afghanistan, Iraq and other fronts.

Speakers in the video promised more fighting in Afghanistan, North Africa and Sudan's Darfur region.

[...]

A banner posted on an Islamic militant Web site on Thursday advertised that another message would be released, though it did not say whether bin Laden would appear in video or speak in an audiotape.

"Soon, God willing: 'Come to Jihad (holy war)', from sheik Osama bin Laden, God protect him" the banner read.

"Urgent, al-Qaida declares war on the tyrant Pervez Musharraf and his apostate army, in the words of Osama bin Laden," it read.

[...]

The sophisticated 80-minute video released Thursday on the same Web site was in the style of a documentary, intersplicing the speech by al-Zawahri with footage from the Sept. 11 attacks, interviews with experts and officials taken from Western and Arab television stations, and old footage and audiotapes of bin Laden.

Al-Zawahri began by condemning the Pakistani military's July assault on Islamic militants who took over the Red Mosque in Islamabad, and he paid tribute to one of the militants' leaders, Abdul Rashid Ghazi, who was killed in the fighting.

The siege "revealed the extent of the despicableness, lowliness and treason of Musharraf and his forces, who don't deserve the honor of defending Pakistan, because Pakistan is a Muslim land, whereas the forces of Musharraf are hunting dogs under (President) Bush's crucifix," al-Zawahri said.

"Let the Pakistani army know that the killing of Abdul Rashid Ghazi and his male and female students ... has soaked the history of the Pakistan army in shame and despicableness which can only washed away by retaliation," he said.

[...]

Al-Zawahri called for attacks on French and Spanish interests in North Africa and on U.N. and African peacekeepers expected to deploy in Sudan's wartorn Darfur region.

[...]

The video included footage of al-Qaida's leader in Afghanistan, Mustafa Abu al-Yazeed, meeting with a senior Taliban commander. In contrast to past videos that showed al-Qaida and Taliban fighters in rough desert terrain, Abu al-Yazeed and the commander were shown sitting in a verdant field surrounded by trees as a jihad anthem played, extolling the virgins that will meet martyrs in paradise.

Abu al-Yazeed said al-Qaida's ties with the Taliban were strengthening. The Taliban commander, Dadullah Mansoor, said: "We shall target the infidels in Afghanistan and outside Afghanistan: inside all the infidel countries oppressing the Muslims. And we shall focus our attacks, Allah willing, on the coalition forces in Afghanistan."

Another clip in the video showed Abu Musab Abdulwadood, the leader of Algeria's main Islamic insurgency movement, addressing bin Laden and vowing that "our swords are unsheathed."

Al-Zawahri called on supporters in North Africa to "cleanse the Maghrib (western region) of Islam of the children of France and Spain ... Stand with your sons the mujahideen against the Crusaders and their children."

The video also included what IntelCenter said appeared to be old, but previously unreleased footage of bin Laden. The images show the terror leader, with a beard streaked with gray and a a white cloth draped over his head, in front of a map showing the Middle East and South and Central Asia. He points to the map with a stick and addresses an unseen audience.

He condemns Arab Gulf governments that have allied themselves with the United States, saying they have "sold the Islamic nation, colluded with the enemies of Islam and backed the infidels. And this is the greater form of being an infidel ... But Allah permitting, they shall leave the Gulf under the blows of the mujahideen," bin Laden said.

An important note from Alec Rawls:

Tom Burnett Sr. is rested up and has renewed his protest against the crescent design with an op-ed column and a new radio interview. Great stuff.

http://errortheory.blogspot.com/2007/09/tom-burnetts-911-protests-against.html

The Memorial Project is refusing to honor Tom Sr.’s request that Tom Jr.’s name not be inscribed on one of the 44 blocks, and the local press is siding with the Project.

http://errortheory.blogspot.com/2007/09/flight-93-memorial-project-will-not.html

The press is also refusing to honor Mr. Burnett’s request for fact checking of my easily verifiable claims. Instead, the Project and the press are both trying to counter my warning that the giant crescent is oriented on Mecca by pretending that there is no such thing as the direction to Mecca!

http://errortheory.blogspot.com/2007/09/no-direction-to-mecca.html

An update on this story. "New York: Iran's leader can't visit ground zero," from CNN:

NEW YORK (CNN) -- City officials in New York have denied Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's request to visit the site of the destroyed World Trade Center next week, a police spokesman said Wednesday.

The controversial, outspoken president wanted to "pay his respects" and lay a wreath at the site of the 2001 al Qaeda attacks during his visit to the U.N. General Assembly, Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly said, citing Iranian officials.

But workers are rebuilding the foundations of the site, "and it would not be possible for him to go where other people don't go," Kelly told CNN.

Iranian officials have not put in any additional requests to visit the public platforms at ground zero, police spokesman Paul Browne told CNN. But, he said, "If there were a further request, we'd reject it" because of security fears.

Why make excuses? The matters of principle involved should be aired unapologetically.

The Iranian mission to the U.N. said it had not been told of the decision, but in a statement issued Wednesday evening, it called the rejection "unfortunate."

Iran is ruled by a Shiite Muslim government hostile to the fundamentalist Sunni al Qaeda.

But also to Israel and the U.S.

[...]

"It is appalling that President Ahmadinejad, one of the world's leading sponsors of terror, would find it appropriate to visit this hallowed ground," State Department spokesman Tom Casey said.

Exactly.

Both Hugh Fitzgerald and I have discussed the (generally successful) efforts by a Washington lobbyist named Jim Guirard to stop military and government officials from using the word "jihad" for the...global jihad. Their contention is that Islam is a religion of peace, that the jihadists' use of the language of jihad is illegitimate on Islamic grounds, and that Americans and other non-Muslims can help delegitimize the jihadists by employing other Arabic terms for them and their activities -- terms which brand them criminals.

This idea sounds terrific, but it has many serious flaws. I discussed some of them here, and Hugh here.

And now it has come to light that the whole enterprise may be a Muslim Brotherhood deception campaign. Douglas Farah at the Counterterrorism Blog reproduces a memo by LTC Joseph C. Myers, Senior Army Advisor at Air Command and Staff College at Maxwell Air Force Base in Montgomery, Alabama.

Myers's memo says:

This assessment makes the point that the Muslim Brotherhood should be considered a threat organization and the affiliated US domestic Muslim NGOs and associations identified in the strategy document should likewise be considered part of the Muslim Brotherhood network, that these are “front” functional organizations operating as links and nodes of the overall network.

Exceptionally important in the analysis is the role of the “Truespeak” organization and Jim Guirard who has been arguing in DoD circles and academic institutions that the term jihad should be suspended from the GWOT lexicon to be replaced by hiraba. This analysis demonstrates that “Truespeak” contributors are part of the Muslim Brotherhood threat network, with the implication that this entire communication and lexicon effort is part of a strategic disinformation and denial and deception campaign.

Those involved in strategic communication or IO, whether senior leaders, practitioners or analysts should take a close note.

This analysis begins to provide clear I&W for domestic threats that DoD, DHS and the USG must come to terms with.

Myers also has at The American Thinker an article about the Muslim Brotherhood's latent insurgency in America: "Homeland Security Implications of the Holy Land Foundation Trial":

The on-going Holy Land Foundation trial has established important facts about the resident domestic Islamic jihad threat inside the United States. Although evidence brought forward in documents and testimony has explosive implications for US Homeland Security, the intelligence community, and every American citizen, relatively little media attention has been paid to it.

This information also has serious implications for professionals, military and civilian, involved in homeland security, DoD plans and strategy as well as national agency intelligence analysts and local law enforcement. The raw documents outlining the strategic goals and activities of the Muslim Brotherhood in America, now exposed for public view, are substantiating the concerns and information long raised by various private sector counterterrorism think-tanks, organizations and blogs such as Stephen Emerson's Investigative Project and Robert Spencer's Jihad Watch among others.

From an intelligence perspective, the first thing in assessing and evaluating these raw, translated documents is that they all passed sufficient legal scrutiny to be entered into evidence in a federal trial. Secondly, since these are raw, primary sourced documents of the Muslim Brotherhood and not secondarily sourced, they are the equivalent in a tactical or operational sense of key leadership defector, or detainee debriefing statements, or the capturing of the enemy's strategic campaign plan. Indeed the title of one document is "An Explanatory Memorandum on the General Strategic Goal for the Group in North America." Third, the defendants did not challenge in court the authenticity or veracity of the evidentiary documents. All of which immediately speaks to both the credibility and reliability of these reports for intelligence analysis and exploitation.

Civilization Jihad and the Settlement Strategy

The Brotherhood's strategy memo, while published in May 1991, was drafted earlier, upon a

"...general strategic goal of the Group in America which was approved by the Shura Council and the Organizational Conference for the year [I987]."

In other words this strategy has already been operative for at least 20 years in America. The strategic objective of the Brotherhood in America is clear:

"The Ikhwan [The Muslim Brotherhood's name for itself] must understand that their work in America is a kind of grand Jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within and ‘sabotaging' its miserable house by their hands and the hands of the believers so that it is eliminated and Allah's religion is made victorious over all other religions."

The primary strategic concept to accomplish the Brotherhood's objective is "civilizational jihad," the usurpation and replacement of American Judeo-Christian and Western liberal social, political and religious foundations by Islam. The campaign plan is one of colonization, described by the Ikhwan as a "settlement strategy." Explaining this concept they describe it as establishing Islam in America as "stable," "rooted" and "enabled on which the Islamic structure is built and with which the testimony of civilization is achieved." Recognizing this strategy cannot be carried forward alone by the Brotherhood they recognized the strategy requires that, "They are then to work to employ, direct and unify Muslims' efforts and powers for this process. In order to do that, we must possess a mastery of the art of "coalitions", the art of "absorption" and the principles of "cooperation."

Read it all.

"PJM Paris: Many have accused the photo of young Mohammed Al Dura’s father shielding him from Israeli bullets of being a fake, but the original videotape from which this photo was drawn has been hidden from view by France 2. Yesterday a French judge finally ordered the channel to produce it. PJM’s Nidra Poller was one of the only journalists to witness this stunning turning point."

Important Al-Dura Update by Nidra Poller for Pajamas Media:

Maître Bénédicte Amblard, representing Charles Enderlin and France 2 in their libel suit against Philippe Karsenty (Media Ratings) dropped her pencil and lost her composure when presiding judge Laurence Trébucq, overriding the opinion of the Avocat Général, firmly demanded handover of the 27-minute unedited film shot by Talal Abu Rahmeh at Netzarim Junction in the Gaza Strip on September 30, 2000. The Maginot Line of France 2 collapsed then and there. From here on in, anything is possible.

Karsenty is appealing his October 2006 conviction for defamation in a case brought by state-owned TV channel France 2 and the station’s Mideast correspondent, Charles Enderlin. In the incriminated Media-Ratings press release, Karsenty had called for the immediate dismissal of Enderlin and then news director Arlette Chabot for their respective roles in broadcasting and upholding a hoax—the famous news report of the “death” of 12 year-old Mohammed al Dura, “target of gunfire from the Israeli position.”

While the court of first resort had granted Karsenty’s right to question the authenticity of the news report, it followed the plaintiff’s arguments and found him guilty of bad faith and publication of unsubstantiated accusations based on a single source (Metula News Agency). Karsenty appealed.

Things looked grim for Karsenty as the hearing began. There was a technical problem with the large screen he had been authorized to bring into the courtroom (which is normally equipped with a tiny outmoded TV). And the judge sternly rejected his proposed projection of a didactic montage of the disputed al Dura images.

After a brief recess during which the technical problem was solved, the hearing began with a brief interrogation on Karsenty’s professional and financial situation, followed by a rather awkward résumé—by the second judge, designated as the “advisor”— of the initial case and conviction Karsenty’s counsel, Maître Marc Lévy, interjects a request for an expertise on the 27-minutes of unedited footage, which had been viewed by three journalists—Jeambar, Leconte, and Rosenzweig—who testified that they consisted of 24 minutes of staged scenes, with no images of the al Dura boy and his father and no trace of the boy’s “death throes” that Enderlin claimed had been edited out because it was “unbearable.”

The renowned European essayist Fjordman discusses Islam's encounter with Greek philosophy:

I have written a couple of essays regarding the Greek impact on the rise of modern science, and why the Scientific Revolution didn't happen in the Islamic world. I find this to be an interesting topic, especially since there are so many myths regarding this perpetrated by Muslims and their apologists today, so I will explore the subject in some detail.

I mentioned the ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs in one of my previous essays. It has been claimed by one researcher that an Arab alchemist in the ninth century managed to decode some of the hieroglyphs. Even if this should be true, his research didn't leave any lasting impact and wasn't followed up by others, which is in itself significant. The proven track record is that Arab Muslims had controlled Egypt for more than a thousand years, yet never managed to decipher the hieroglyphs nor for the most part displayed much interest in doing so. The trilingual Rosetta Stone was employed by the French philologist Jean-François Champollion to decipher the hieroglyphs in 1822. He chose an intuitive (though ultimately correct) approach by employing the Coptic language, the liturgical language of the Egyptian Christians (which was a direct descendant of that of the ancient Pharaohs, as opposed to the language of the Arab invaders) rather than the more mathematical approach of his English rival Thomas Young.

For the sake of historical accuracy, it should be mentioned that when hieroglyphs were finally put out of use, thus ending one of the oldest continuous cultural traditions on the planet, dating back at least to the Narmer Palette celebrating the unification of Upper and Lower Egypt in the 32nd century B.C., this was also done by Christians. The process was begun in the fourth century AD, before the partition of the Roman Empire, and was completed by the Eastern Roman (Byzantine) Emperor Justinian who abolished the worship of Isis on the island of Philae in the sixth century. As the Egyptian religion was shut down, so the writing system associated with it was forgotten. The remnants of Plato's Academy were also closed in the name of Christian (Nicaean) unity.

Justinian is otherwise remembered for constructing the Hagia Sophia, the grandest cathedral in Christendom for almost a thousand years, and for his ultimately unsuccessful attempts at restoring the unity of the Roman Empire by reconquering the Western lands. This stretched the resources of the Empire, and along with a plague pandemic, drained its strength. The long wars between the Byzantines and the Sassanid (Persian) Empire weakened both states and were one of the reasons why the Arabs could make their Islamic conquests in the seventh century.

Logically speaking, the Middle East should be perfectly situated to combine the knowledge of all major centers of civilization in the Old World, from the Mediterranean and the Greco-Roman world via the Persian and other pre-Islamic cultures in the Middle East to India and the civilizations of the Far East. As I will demonstrate, the Muslim thinkers and scientists whose names are worth mentioning did just that.

According to scholar F. R. Rosenthal: "Islamic rational scholarship, which we have mainly in mind when we speak of the greatness of Muslim civilisation, depends in its entirety on classical antiquity.....in Islam as in every civilisation, what is really important is not the individual elements but the synthesis that combines them into a living organism of its own....Islamic civilisation as we know it would simply not have existed without the Greek heritage."

Greek thought was certainly an important inspiration for virtually all Muslim thinkers, but it wasn't the only one. Alkindus (Al-Kindi), the Arab mathematician who lived in Baghdad in the ninth century and was close to several Abbasid Caliphs, was one of the first to attempt reconciling Islam with Greek philosophy, especially Aristotle, a project that was to last for several centuries and prove ultimately unsuccessful. His other lasting impact was his writings about Indian arithmetic and numerals. Alkindus was one of a handful of people primarily responsible for spreading the knowledge and use of Indian numerals in the Middle East.

India has a long-standing mathematical tradition and the Hindu numerical system is one of its most important contributions to world culture. It was slowly introduced in Western Europe during the Middle Ages, gained momentum after the Italian mathematician Fibonacci in 1202 published his book Liber Abaci and reached wide acceptance during the Renaissance. Europeans learned about Indian numerals via Arabs, which is why they were mistakenly called Arabic numerals in the West. They were superior to Roman numerals in several ways, the revolutionary concept of zero being one of them. There is no doubt that this numerical system reached the West via the Islamic world, but we should remember that since the Middle East is situated between India and Europe, any ideas from India by necessity had to pass through that region to reach Europe. I'm not sure how much credit we should give Islam for this geographical accident.

Al-Razi was a talented Persian physician and chemist who lived in the ninth and early tenth century. He combined Greek, Indian and Persian traditions, and relied on clinical observance of patients in the Hippocratic tradition. He also commented, and criticized, the works of philosophers such as Aristotle. Some of his writings were translated into Latin. As Ibn Warraq writes in his book Why I Am Not a Muslim, "Perhaps the greatest freethinker in the whole of Islam was al-Razi, the Rhazes of Medieval Europe (or Razis of Chaucer), where his prestige and authority remained unchallenged until the seventeenth century. Meyerhof also calls him the 'greatest physician of the Islamic world and one of the great physicians of all time.'" He was also highly critical of Islamic doctrines, and considered the Koran to be an assorted mixture of "absurd and inconsistent fables." Moreover, "His heretical writings, significantly, have not survived and were not widely read; nonetheless, they are witness to a remarkably tolerant culture and society - a tolerance lacking in other periods and places."

Avicenna (Ibn Sina) was a Persian physician who continued the course set by al-Razi of mixing Greek, Indian, East Asian and Middle Eastern medical learning. His book The Canon of Medicine from the early eleventh century was a standard medical text for centuries. A striking number of the Muslims who did leave some imprint upon the history of science were Persians, who could tap into their proud pre-Islamic heritage. Historian Ibn Khaldun admitted that "It is strange that most of the learned among the Muslims who have excelled in the religious or intellectual sciences are non-Arabs with rare exceptions."

Evidently the jihadists didn't get the memo about how Islam eschews all racism, etc., despite some of the, shall we say, dodgier statements of Muhammad. There they go, misunderstanding their own religion again.

"Hamas Al-Aqsa TV: Rice 'Black Snake,'" from the MEMRI blog (thanks to all who sent this in):

On September 18, Hamas' Al-Aqsa TV labeled U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice a "black snake."

The phrase is circled in the above image.

A query just came in from an interested Jihad Watch reader:

Since you keep calling people thug in chief, so I guess one call also call you "son of a bitch"? Fair and square, eh?

Dear Sir,

I don't call "people" Thug-In-Chief. I call Mahmoud Ahmadinejad Thug-In-Chief. Unless you yourself are Mr. Ahmadinejad, please don't take it personally!

As for your question, that's fine. I've been called worse. You can call me anything you like. What you and your friends can't do, and never have done, is show that anything I have written about the jihad ideology and Islamic supremacism is false.

Cordially,
Robert Spencer

Islamic Chutzpah Alert: "U.S. May Escort Ahmadinejad to Ground Zero: Talks Underway After Iranian Requests a Visit," by Sarah Garland in the New York Sun (thanks to Ray).

In a move that has stunned New York, the Bloomberg administration is in discussions to escort the Iranian president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, to ground zero during his visit to New York next week, Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly said today.

The Iranian mission to the U.N. made the request to the New York City Police Department and the Secret Service, which will jointly oversee security during the leader's two-day visit. Mr. Ahmadinejad is scheduled to arrive September 24 to speak to the U.N. General Assembly as the Security Council decides whether to increase sanctions against his country for its uranium enrichment program.

What does the Thug-In-Chief want to do at Ground Zero? Reminisce about the good times?

Will the Islamophobia never end?

From AP (thanks to Stlreader):

BEIRUT, Lebanon - An explosion rocked a Christian suburb east of the Lebanese capital Wednesday, but the cause was not immediately known, a senior Lebanese security official said.

It was not known if there were any casualties.

The official, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to the media, said the explosion occurred in the Sin el-Fil district.

UPDATE: "Beirut car bomb kills anti-Syrian lawmaker," from Reuters (thanks to Davida):

BEIRUT (Reuters) - A car bomb killed an anti-Syrian Lebanese lawmaker and at least six other people in Beirut on Wednesday, just six days before parliament was due to elect a new president, security sources said.

The lawmaker, Antoine Ghanem of the Christian Phalange party, was killed by the blast in a Christian district of the Lebanese capital. At least 19 other people were wounded by the bomb in the busy commercial and residential area of Sin el-Fil.

Several cars were set ablaze and rescue workers carried bodies from the scene in eastern Beirut.

Ghanem, 64, was a member of the anti-Syrian governing coalition which has been locked in a power struggle since November with factions backed by Damascus.

And so it begins. Sharia Alert from Turkey. From Reuters :

ANKARA (Reuters) - Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan was quoted in the Financial Times on Wednesday as saying he wanted to lift the ban on the Islamic headscarf in universities as part of a planned constitutional overhaul.

The remarks by Erdogan, whose Islamist-rooted AK Party won a new five-year mandate in July elections, could reignite tensions with Turkey's powerful secular elite, including army generals, which suspects him of wanting to boost the role of religion.

"The right to higher education cannot be restricted because of what a girl wears. There is no such problem in Western societies but there is a problem in Turkey and I believe it is the first duty of those in politics to solve the problem," he told the FT in an interview in Ankara.

The secularists regard the headscarf as a symbolic threat to Turkey's separation of state and religion. They also fear any lifting of the ban would put social pressure on uncovered women to start wearing the headscarf in overwhelmingly Muslim Turkey.

Litigation Jihad: CAIR, abetted by the ACLU, goes after the FBI. "Southland Muslim groups sue FBI over surveillance," by H.G. Reza for the Los Angeles Times (thanks to Twostellas):

Several Islamic groups in Southern California sued the FBI on Tuesday to force the agency to release more documents about the alleged surveillance of individuals and local mosques following the Sept. 11 attacks.

In May 2006, 11 Muslim leaders and community groups sent the FBI a Freedom of Information Act request for documents about suspected surveillance of them and sued after the bureau released just four pages, one of them largely blank.

The ACLU, which filed the request and lawsuit, believes the FBI is withholding information. The civil rights group said in a statement that the FBI "squandered an opportunity" to build trust with the Muslim community by not releasing the information.

The lawsuit was filed in U.S. District Court in Santa Ana and alleges that the FBI's document search was inadequate. The suit says there is concern that FBI investigations "threaten to erode the constitutionally protected freedom of religion that Muslim Americans enjoy."

Tom Blanton, director of the National Security Archive at George Washington University in Washington, said that in the last five years the FBI had increasingly responded to FOIA requests by saying there were no records. "So, four pages is a gold mine," he said....

Last year, local Islamic leaders said they turned to the ACLU for help after the FBI provided little information in response to their concern about government monitoring. They said mosquegoers reported being questioned by the FBI about their religious practices and the sermons given during prayer services.

"We're baffled why this information is not being released. The onus is on them to show our community is not under surveillance," said Shakeel Syed, executive director of the Anaheim-based Islamic Shura Council of California. The council, identified in the suit as a federation of more than 60 mosques, and Syed are plaintiffs.

The four pages the FBI released pertain to Hussam Ayloush, executive director of the Southern California chapter of the Council of American-Islamic Relations, and his group. Two pages recount a 2006 meeting between Ayloush and an FBI agent about improving relations between the FBI and Muslims. Another page had four lines about an offending e-mail the group had received.

"We hope that CAIR has not been under surveillance, because every thing it's engaged in fits within the 1st Amendment," Ayloush said. "We have views that aren't popular around certain circles of government, but they are legal."

Ayloush said he asked the FBI for information about himself because "I want to know why I get stopped at airports every time I return from an overseas trip." He said he hoped to learn that "I'm being stopped for a reason other than I'm Muslim." He and CAIR are also plaintiffs.

Well, Hussam, maybe it's because you're an official of a group that has been named an unindicted co-conspirator in a terror funding case.

Hussam Ayloush is one of the most personally repellent employees of an organization that routinely employs nasty characters. Here is a long-ago FrontPage Symposium in which he and I, along with several others, participated, and in which, true to form, he traffics in smears and contempt but offers little in the way of substantive argument. I have had the pleasure of dealing with him, or with his smoothly deceptive presentations, in other contexts also.

And they're talking about their air force, not suicide bombers, though the Revolutionary Guards wouldn't let that be neglected. An update on this story, by Ali Akbar Dareini for the Associated Press:

TEHRAN, Iran - The deputy commander of Iran's air force said Wednesday that plans have been drawn up to bomb Israel if the Jewish state attacks Iran, according to the semi-official Fars news agency.

The announcement comes amid rising tensions in the region with the United States calling for a new round of U.N. sanctions against Iran over its disputed nuclear program and Israeli planes having recently overflown, and perhaps even attacked, Iranian ally Syria's territory.

"We have drawn up a plan to strike back at Israel with our bombers if this regime (Israel) makes a silly mistake," deputy air force chief, Gen. Mohammad Alavi was quoted as telling Fars in an interview.

The Fars news agency confirmed the quotes when contacted by the Associated Press, but would not provide a tape of the interview. The Iranian Air Force, for its part, had no immediate comment on the interview.

Defense Minister Mostafa Mohammed Najjar, however, did tell the official IRNA news agency Wednesday that "we keep various options open to respond to threats ... we will make use of them if required."

Iran has threatened in the past that Israel would be Iran's first retaliatory target if attacked by the United States. But Alavi's comments were the first word of specific contingency plans for striking back on Israel.

Speaking of Cartoon Rage, here's some more. The main character in The Infidel, the upcoming graphic novel by the ex-Muslim Bosch Fawstin, is another ex-Muslim cartoonist. The one who is a character in the book creates "Pigman," a ruthless counter-jihad superhero, as a response to 9/11. His creating the Pigman comic book brings him face to face with the enemy: his born-again Muslim brother, who has become a jihadist.

Here is Pigman's principal enemy, SuperJihad.

Will the death fatwas fly when The Infidel appears? (It will be released in chapters beginning late fall 2007.) Will Pigman, or his ex-Muslim creator, be intimidated or frightened into submission if they do? Or will they stand up and fight more fiercely than ever? Oh, how will our heroes ever get out of this one? Stay tuned!

ADDENDUM: Bosch informs me that he has received this email from the jihad apologist Sami Zaatari, who keeps stuffing my inbox with garbarge too. Feel the love:

September 19th, 2007 at 10:24AM (EDT).

from: sami-zaatari@hotmail.com

mesg: indeed once again you infidels show what scum you are, making your comics to mock, insult, and make fun of muslims and Islam. plz continue doing it because it will only backfire on you on the long-term, because really if your looking for a fight you dont have to look no further than us Muslims because we will easily destroy you. :) you will never defeat Islam or Muslims, even with all your wars, hate crimes, discrimination and racism, you are in a never ending losing war and you will be thrown into hell when its all said and done. backward infidel, thats all you are.

Enough is enough, for the sake of Sderot and other areas afflicted with Qassam rocket attacks. From the Associated Press:

JERUSALEM - Israel's Security Cabinet declared the Gaza Strip an "enemy entity" Wednesday, Israeli radio stations reported.

The decision would let Israel cut off vital electricity, water and fuel supplies to the Palestinian territory, which the Islamic militant Hamas group took over in June.

The action would be the most severe of the retaliatory measures Israel has taken recently against near-daily rocket fire from Gaza into southern Israel. Israel hopes to force Hamas to stop the projectile attacks because Israeli airstrikes and land incursions against the rocket launchers have not been effective.

Oh, to be Gordon Brown or Nicholas Sarkozy for a day. Or even an hour. Just long enough to fire off a brief note to Louise Arbour, explaining that the coinage of the term "Islamophobia" is an exercise in blaming the victim, and that if Muslims want to end "Islamophobia" instantaneously, here's how they can do it:

1. Focus their indignation on Muslims committing violent acts in the name of Islam, not on non-Muslims reporting on those acts.
2. Renounce definitively not just "terrorism," but any intention to replace the U.S. Constitution (or the constitutions of any non-Muslim state) with Sharia even by peaceful means.
3. Teach Muslims the imperative of coexisting peacefully as equals with non-Muslims on an indefinite basis.
4. Begin comprehensive international programs in mosques all over the world to teach against the ideas of violent jihad and Islamic supremacism.
5. Actively work with Western law enforcement officials to identify and apprehend jihadists within Western Muslim communities.

If Muslims do those five things, voila! "Islamophobia" will vanish. No UN program, and no action by European governments will be needed.

"U.N. rights chief sees bigotry in Europe on Islam," by Robert Evans for Reuters (thanks to all who sent this in):

GENEVA (Reuters) - United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Louise Arbour said on Monday that bigotry and prejudice, especially in regard to Muslims, were common in Europe and called on governments to tackle the issue.

The remarks from the former Canadian Supreme Court judge, which came in the wake of similar charges issued last week by a U.N. rights investigator, were quickly challenged by a leading global non-religious grouping.

The report by investigator Doudou Diene of Senegal documented what he called an alarming rise in intolerance, and in particular Islamophobia, in European countries, and Arbour said, "I have no reason not to share his concerns."

Europeans "are shocked at times when it is pointed out that bigotry, prejudice and stereotyping is still sometimes very present in their attitude to others," she said.

Diene's work, she declared, highlighted "a challenge for Western countries that needs to be addressed."

Roy Brown, past president of the International Humanist and Ethical Union (IHEU) which groups non-religious organizations around the globe said Arbour was "just plain wrong."

"The little regrettable hostility that does exist among indigenous Europeans has not arisen in a vacuum, but as a reaction to Islamic extremism -- demonization of Jews, infidels and homosexuals and contempt for Western culture," said Brown, the IHEU's representative at the U.N.'s Human Rights Council.

Diene's report said Islamophobia and equating Islam with terrorism created a climate favoring racial and religious hate.

But it also criticized Islamic states for their treatment of non-Muslim minorities and for refusing to recognize the right of people born into Islam to change their religion.

Diene pointed to the recent appearance of a cartoon in a provincial Swedish newspaper that governments of Islamic countries say offended their religion as an example of abuse of the right of free speech to sow suspicion of Muslims.

Watch out. Sharia blasphemy laws are coming.

Muhammad Cat: Can you imagine getting arrested for this?

Image and translation of the cartoon from LGF (cartoon via the Sudharamblog):

* Boy, what is your name?

- My name is Babu.

* It is customary to mention Muhammed before the name.

* What is your father’s name?

- Muhammed Abu

* What’s this in your lap?

- Muhammed cat

Yeah, that's enough for a healthy jail term, if not worse. Remember that even though this time it is happening in Bangladesh, this is part of the agenda for the West: compel it through intimidation (and canny appropriation of civil rights language) to adopt Sharia norms for speech and blasphemy. And that in turn is part of the larger jihadist agenda, to impose Sharia everywhere it can.

"Bangladesh authorities ban cartoon insulting Islam, arrest cartoonist," from The Associated Press (thanks to Twostellas):

DHAKA, Bangladesh: Bangladeshi authorities Tuesday arrested a cartoonist after drawings that Muslims said insulted their religion were published in a national newspaper, police and the government said.

A Home Ministry statement said Arifur Rahman's sketches — titled "Name" — that came out Monday in a weekly supplement of the Prothom Alo — "hurt the religious sentiments of the people."

Police detectives picked up Rahman from his house in the capital, Dhaka, after the home ministry ordered his arrest, Janey Alam, a police officer at Tejgaon police station said.

Rahman was yet to be formally charged, Alam said, adding that he was arrested under a stringent law that allows detention without any specific charges.

Bangladesh, a Muslim-majority nation, has no specific blasphemy laws. But offenders can be prosecuted for hurting religious or public sentiments....

Islamic leaders also demanded the Bangali daily Prothom Alo be shut down for printing the "highly objectionable" cartoons and that its editor and published be arrested.

"This is a grievous offense, this is dangerous," said Obaidul Huq, head cleric of the National Baitul Mukarram Mosque.

Bangladesh has in the past banned publications for insulting Islam or Prophet Muhammad.

Not "Islamic Prophet Muhammad." Just "Prophet Muhammad." Imagine AP referring to "the Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God."

To what lengths will the dhimmi press go to conceal the Islamic aspect of misbehavior committed by Muslims in the name of Islam? I don't think there is any limit, any limit at all -- just check out this story. A Muslim student distributes leaflets calling on people to convert to Islam, and issues threats, and..."the student's religion was not immediately known." Darn those Methodists! They're so ecumenical these days, they're even distributing leaflets calling on people to convert to a different religion!

"Islam Leaflet School Bust," by Larry Celona in the New York Post (thanks to Morgaan Sinclair):

September 19, 2007 -- A Queens teen was arrested yesterday after placing fliers in his teachers' mailboxes asking them to convert to Islam - then made threats once he was caught, authorities said.

Yaseen Chowdhury, 17, of Woodside, wrote the fliers himself and put them in the mailboxes at the Renaissance Charter School in Jackson Heights, sources said.

When confronted there about the fliers, he made unspecified verbal threats, according to the sources.

Chowdhury was charged with aggravated harassment as a hate crime.

A Department of Education spokesman did not return a call seeking comment.

The student's religion was not immediately known.

His plans were "clumsy and primitive," so let's let him walk the streets until he learns how to do it right. "Samir A. convicted again for terrorism," from Expatica (thanks to Sr. Soph):

THE HAGUE (AFP) - A Dutch Muslim radical was sentenced to four years in jail by an Amsterdam appeals court on Monday for planning a terrorist attack in 2004.

Samir Azzouz had already been acquitted on the same charges twice by a lower court and an appeals court which said his plans were "so clumsy and primitive" that they were not a threat.

But the case was referred for re-trial by the Dutch supreme court earlier this year, and the Amsterdam appeals court ruled Monday that the Azzouz was indeed planning an attack.

Police found floor plans of government buildings, chemicals and night vision goggles and a silencer for a gun at his home.

Azzouz, 21, was convicted in December last year and sentenced to eight years in prison for planning terrorist attacks against Dutch politicians and the headquarters of the intelligence services in 2005.

Arrested in 2003 because police suspected he was planning to make a bomb, he was released due to lack of evidence.

He was arrested again in 2004 on the charges he is now convicted of, and again in October 2005. He has been in jail since his last arrest.

Azzouz has been linked to a group whose leader was jailed for the murder of Dutch filmmaker Theo van Gogh.

According to prosecutors in other cases against Azzouz he had ties to Mohammed Bouyeri, who was sentenced to life imprisonment two years ago for killing Van Gogh in November 2004.

Azzouz attended religious meetings at Bouyeri's Amsterdam residence before he killed the filmmaker.

Sharia Alert from modern, moderate Jordan. From AKI (thanks to Insubria):

Amman, 18 Sept. (AKI) - Jordan has forced several restaurants with international links to close for Ramadan because it would "violate the sanctity" of the month.

Authorities said serving daily meals is contrary to a directive from the interior ministry that has blocked the opening of restaurants during daylight hours during the month of fasting.

Even though Jordan has a Christian minority of around 5 per cent and Ramadan coincides with the beginning of the autumn tourism season, the interior ministry has decided to close restaurants such as McDonald's and Burger King.

Authorities in Amman have made it known that no-one will be permitted to violate the sanctity of the month.

Jordanian laws only allow those restaurants that cater for tourists to supply their services during Ramadan since they are under the supervision of the tourism ministry and not the province.

CORRECTION: Sami has kindly alerted me to the fact that Al-Awdah does mention 9/11 in a negative light, although Gulf News doesn't quote that. It's in the full text of his letter, here. It is refreshing, then, that Al-Awdah apparently rejects the contention (explained by Anjem Chaudary here) that no non-Muslim is innocent.

Now if he can go the whole way and renounce the whole Islamic supremacist project, we might be getting somewhere -- although his emphasis on da'wah in this letter, as more effective than jihad violence, doesn't make that likely.

----------

This is already being hailed, predictably enough, as a major breakthrough, and predictably enough, there is less here than meets the eye. "Why now, Sheikh?," asks Tareq Al Homayed, and he has a good question. In the first place, it's noteworthy that "clerics in his native Saudi Arabia...have avoided direct criticism of the Al Qaida leader." Why have they done that? Are they afraid that if they criticize Osama they will alienate Saudis who find his assumption of Islamic purity compelling?

Also, Salman Al Awdah decries the innocents killed by Al-Qaeda, but does not of course clarify the burning question of just who qualifies as innocent in Islamic law, and whether non-Muslims can ever be legitimately regarded as innocent.

He is upset about Al-Qaeda activity in Morocco, Algeria, Lebanon and Saudi Arabia -- unmentioned, you'll notice, is the United States, or Britain. And his support of Islamic "charity" work -- that is, financial contributions to the global jihad -- and of the jihad in Falluja indicate that his quarrel with Osama is just over the killing of fellow Muslims, and perhaps of some tactics, but not over larger questions of his motives and goals.

"Top Saudi cleric denounces Bin Laden," from Gulf News (thanks to Sami Zaatari):

Riyadh: A leading Saudi cleric has publicly denounced Osama Bin Laden, a rare move among clerics in his native Saudi Arabia who have avoided direct criticism of the Al Qaida leader.

Salman Al Awdah issued his "open letter to Osama Bin Laden" on his Web site this week (www.islamtoday.net) and read it out on a show he presents on Saudi-owned pan-Arab channel MBC.

Western and Arab critics of Saudi Arabia's hard line religious establishment have often criticised senior clerics for failing to unequivocally distance themselves from the mastermind of 9/11 attacks that killed 3,000 people.

"Brother Osama, how much blood has been spilt? How many innocents among children, elderly, the weak and women have been killed and made homeless in the name of Al Qaida?" he said.

"The ruin of an entire people, as is happening in Afghanistan and Iraq, ... cannot make Muslims happy," he said, attacking Al Qaida's policy of revolt across the region.

"Who benefits from turning countries like Morocco, Algeria, Lebanon or Saudi Arabia into places where fear spreads and no one can feel safe?"

Al Awdah said Al Qaida's actions had led Western governments to rein in Muslim charity work around the world and Arab governments to jail thousands.

One Saudi commentator said the letter was six years too late.

"Why now, Sheikh?," wrote Tareq Al Homayed in the pan-Arab Saudi daily Asharq Al Awsat on Monday. "He is distancing himself from Bin Laden at a time when those who do so have nothing to lose and no price to pay."

Awdah was one of 26 Saudi clerics who supported resistance to US forces in Iraq as "jihad", or holy war, during the US siege of Falluja in November 2004.

How calls for tolerance of Muslim practices quickly edge over into assertions of Islamic supremacism. By Steve Doughty and Jaya Narain for the Daily Mail (thanks to all who sent this in):

A muslim dentist made a woman wear Islamic dress as the price of accepting her as an NHS patient, it is alleged.

Omer Butt is said to have told the patient that unless she wore a headscarf she would have to find another practice.

Later this month, Mr Butt will appear before a General Dental Council professional misconduct hearing, which has the power to strike him off.

It is claimed that the 31-year-old dentist asked to speak to the woman in private after she turned up for an appointment at his clinic in Bury.

According to the charges, he questioned her on whether she was a Muslim and told her that if he was to treat her she would have to wear Islamic dress.

He is also said to have read out a number of religious rules to her.

He then told his nurse to give the patient her own headscarf to wear, the accusation says.

It is not known whether the woman was a Muslim.

The charges to be heard by the General Dental Council say that Mr Butt undermined public confidence in his profession by discriminating against a patient and failed to act in her best interests.

of course. But he was certainly acting in his own best interests, and those of Islam, as he perceived them.

Two hundred is troubling enough, but one also can't help but recall how the estimate of 1600 "extremists" in the entire United Kingdom quickly went to 2000 and beyond.

Tiny Minority of Extremists Alert. "Muslim leaders: not enough work being done in extremism fight," from The Herald:

Scotland's first high-profile terrorism trial has made uncomfortable viewing for members of the Muslim community.

Unlike those behind the attempted bombing of Glasgow Airport, Mohammed Atif Siddique was born and raised in Scotland. He attended mosques in Glasgow, Stirling and Alloa and his religious education was the same as any young Muslim growing up here could expect to receive.

The question facing community leaders now is: if Siddique could become so radicalised, could others? A study published recently by the Council of British Pakistanis in Scotland found that half the country's 31 mosque leaders thought extremist behaviour existed here, with the "vast majority" citing the UK Government's foreign policy as the reason.

And that assertion is accepted uncritically. But many Anglicans, Quakers, Buddhists, atheists, and so on, also disagree with British foreign policy. What keeps them from setting off bombs?

Security sources claimed yesterday there may be up to 200 other radicalised young Muslims in Scotland. But the Crown Office and Central Scotland Police went out of their way to stress that Siddique had been prosecuted as an individual for criminal acts, and that the case did not reflect on the wider Muslim community.

Muslim leaders who spoke to The Herald defended the reputation of Scottish mosques - the majority of which are Sunni - as liberal and moderate. Unlike some English mosques which have earned a reputation for radicalism, notably Finsbury Park in London where Abu Hamza gave sermons supporting terrorism, Scotland's mosques are not home to radical preachers or group meetings, they said.

Bashir Maan, chairman of Glasgow Central Mosque, said Siddique's was an isolated case which illustrated the dangers posed by extremist websites. Young people with access to computers could become influenced "anywhere in the world", Mr Maan said, comparing the dangers posed by extremists to that of paedophiles who groomed children via the web.

However, while Scotland's mosques have not been criticised for radicalising their members, prominent Scottish Muslims said not enough had been done to combat radicalism.

Naeem Raza, a consultant who advises and trains companies on understanding and dealing with Muslim communities, said there was "no evidence" that any mosques or formalised Islamic groups were spreading a jihadi message in Scotland.

But he said there was an attitude of "let's not talk about it" when it came to radical politics. The result, he said, was that young people in danger of being radicalised did not have an open forum in which to discuss political issues and be dissuaded from pursuing extremism.

Yes, facing the issue head-on would be a welcome change. But true progress would require the community to look inward, rather than blaming external factors as the fundamental cause of jihadist violence.

"Invariably, those who become radicalised will have been convinced by someone with a higher level of Islamic knowledge than them. It may not be correct, but it is more informed," said Mr Raza.

As usual, the texts themselves couldn't possibly be problematic.

[...]

Amanullah De Sondy, a divinity lecturer at Glasgow University, said Muslims were still "ghettoised" in Scotland, making them more vulnerable to radicalisation. "Why do people use this phrase Scottish Muslims'? Why not just Scots?" he asked. "Too many Muslims have two hats. One hat they wear when talking to people in the mosque, another when talking to people outside."

Indeed, but we have seen with the Doctor's Jihad Plot and other incidents that being well integrated into Western culture does not rule out the jihadist impulse, either.

Some might argue that situations like this demonstrate why coalition troops need to stay in Iraq, in order to attempt to prevent Iraqi society's slide into sectarian violence and Sharia law. But how long? More than four years was not enough, and the speed of Basra's degeneration into the situation described in this article following the departure of the British only underscores how terribly Western governments miscalculated their plans in assuming "we all want the same thing": Civil liberties? Equal rights? Separation of religion and state? Underlying that error, of course, is the politically correct dogma that Islam is inherently egalitarian and peaceful.

" 'Shiite Taliban' rises as British depart Basra," by Sam Dagher for the Christian Science Monitor:

Basra, Iraq - The billboard in Umm al-Broom Square was meant to advertise a cellphone service. Instead, it has become a message to those who dare to resist the rising tide of fundamentalist Islam in Iraq's second largest city.

The female model's face is now covered with black paint. Graffiti scrawled below reads, "No! No to unveiled women."

That message joins the chorus of ultraconservative voices and radical militias that are transforming this once liberal port city that boasted some of Iraq's most lively nightclubs into a bastion for hard-line Shiite Islamists since the fall of Saddam Hussein.

Now, as the British prepare to exit Basra Province altogether after pulling out from this provincial capital last week, they leave behind what has been described by many here as an emerging "Shiite Taliban state," a reference to Sunni extremists in Afghanistan.

And with the British gone, many say, they leave open the possibility that Iran could extend its influence within the mosques, religious schools, and militant party headquarters. Over the past four years, Basra has undergone its own Islamic revolution of sorts.

Posters of the leader of Iran's 1979 social and religious revolt, Ayatollah Khomeini, who at the time imposed similar limits on his society, are plastered everywhere in Basra.

"There is pressure from parties backed by Iran to sideline liberal, secular, and leftist forces," says a labor union leader and a former communist, who, like most people interviewed for this story, did not want to be named for fear of retaliation. "Personal freedoms are being squashed … the fabric of Iraqi society has been ruined."

Public parties are banned. Selling musical CDs is forbidden in shops. Those who sell or consume alcohol face recrimination, even death. Artists and performers are severely restricted and even labeled as heretics. A famous city landmark, a replica of the Lion of Babylon statue that stood here for decades was blown up by militants in July. It was considered idolatrous, according to the strict interpretation of Islam.

Signs ordering women to cover up appear throughout the city. One woman, an Iraqi female activist from Basra, says the notices even threaten death. One banner, she says, said unveiled women could be murdered and no one could remove their bodies from the street.

More Lars Vilks Cartoon Rage. Manufacturers will continue to be threatened, as will others, and Cartoon Rage will not ultimately end until Europe adopts Sharia blasphemy laws. "Ericsson Threatened by Al-qaeda in Iraq," from Cellular News:

The Swedish telecoms manufacturer, Ericsson has apparently been threatened in an audio message hosted by an Islamist blog if the Swedish government did not apologize for a recent Swedish cartoon deemed to be insulting to Islam.

Last month, the Swedish newspaper, Nerikes Allehanda published a cartoon which depicted the Prophet, Muhammad as a dog. Over the weekend a message was posted on the Malaysia based, Al-ekhlaas website where the self-declared leader of Al-Qaeda in Iraq, Sheikh Abu Omar al-Baghdadi offered a US$100,000 reward for whoever kills the Swedish cartoonist, Lars Vilks and a US$50,000 reward for the killing of the news editor, Ulf Johansson.

He further threatened Sweden with "an economic blow against your giant companies such as Ericsson, Scania, Volvo, Ikea, and Electrolux" if it did not repent for "its crime against the Prophet Muhammad."

The Swedish daily, Dagens Nyheter itself reproduced the cartoon in smaller form as well over the weekend. "We live in a country where freedom of expression is not dictated by fundamentalists, nor by governments," wrote Dagens Nyheter chief editor in an editorial. "Dagens Nyheter has already published the cartoon. To me, publishing it was the obvious thing to do."

It should be obvious to all Western newspapers.

Stop the presses! The Muslim Brotherhood is an Islamic supremacist group! It is good to see this article in the Dallas Morning News echoing what we have said here for years. Robert Leiken of the Nixon Center, one of the chief proponents of the idea that the U.S. should negotiate with the Brotherhood, is quoted toward the end still as resolute as ever not to take the Brotherhood at its word, but the Holy Land Foundation is waking up at least some people.

"Group's takeover plot emerges in Holy Land case," by Jason Trahan for The Dallas Morning News (thanks to all who sent this in):

Amid the mountain of evidence released in the Holy Land Foundation terrorism financing trial, the most provocative has turned out to be a handful of previously classified evidence detailing Islamist extremists' ambitious plans for a U.S. takeover.

A knot of terrorism researchers say the memos and audiotapes, many translated from Arabic and containing detailed strategies by the international Islamist group the Muslim Brotherhood, are proof that extremists have long sought to replace the Constitution with Shariah, or Islamic law.

But some academics and Muslim leaders say that the ideals contained in the documents were written by disgruntled foreign dissidents representing a tiny radical fringe. The documents also pre-date the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, and the 80-year-old Muslim Brotherhood is now either inactive or largely underground in America.

Hardly.

The documents – introduced in recent weeks as part of the prosecution's case in the trial of the now defunct Holy Land Foundation and five of its organizers – lay out the Brotherhood's plans in chillingly stark terms.

A 1991 strategy paper for the Brotherhood, often referred to as the Ikhwan in Arabic, found in the Virginia home of an unindicted co-conspirator in the case, describes the group's U.S. goals, referred to as a "civilization-jihadist process."

"The Ikhwan must understand that their work in America is a kind of grand jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within and sabotaging its miserable house by their hands and the hands of the believers so that it is eliminated and God's religion is made victorious over all other religions," it states. This process requires a "mastery of the art of 'coalitions,' the art of 'absorption' and the principles of 'cooperation.' "

Success in the U.S. "in establishing an observant Islamic base with power and effectiveness will be the best support and aid to the global movement," it states.

A transcript of a Brotherhood orientation meeting recorded in the early 1980s includes discussions of the need for "securing the group" from infiltration by "Zionism, Masonry ... the CIA, FBI, etc. so that we find out if they are monitoring us" and "how can we get rid of them." Discussions later turn to "weapons training at the Ikhwan's camps" in Oklahoma and Missouri.

[...]

Esam Omeish, president of the Virginia-based Muslim American Society, or MAS, says the documents introduced in the Holy Land trial are full of "abhorrent statements and are in direct conflict of the very principles of our Islam."

"The Muslim community in America wishes to contribute positively to the continued success and greatness of our civilization," Dr. Omeish said. "The ethics of tolerance and inclusion are the very tenets that MAS was based on from its inception."

His group, formed in 1993, is thought by many to be the Brotherhood's current incarnation in the U.S., although he and other MAS leaders say their group formed as an alternative to radicalism.

"MAS is not the Muslim Brotherhood," Dr. Omeish said. The society "grew out of a history of Islamic activism in the U.S. when the Muslim Brotherhood once existed but has a different intellectual paradigm and outlook."

[...]

Mahdi Bray, director of the Washington, D.C.-based Muslim American Society's Freedom Foundation, which promotes Muslim civil rights, called the Holy Land documents "a throwback." He has attended portions of the Holy Land trial.

"If those documents talk about the establishing of Shariah law in America, I'm saying that's a lot of hype: wishful thinking from an immigrant perspective. ... It doesn't reflect genuine American perspective in terms of where we're heading," Mr. Bray said.

He said members of MAS decided in 1993, when the organization was founded, that they would pursue political and nonviolent tactics.

"I wouldn't be candid if I didn't say there weren't some old-timers who want to hold onto the old way, who say that this is the way the Ikhwan did it, this should be our model," he said. "We said 'So what? It doesn't work here.' We've been very adamant about that."

Mr. Bray, an Islamic convert, has been criticized by some as being an apologist for terrorists, particularly for his condemnation of Israel's 2004 missile strike in the Palestinian Gaza Strip that killed Hamas' spiritual founder, Sheikh Ahmed Yassin.

Mr. Bray says that although his politics are controversial, he's not anti-American.

"Those on the right and many of those who I would classify as Islamophobes, many of them have failed to realize that there is an authentic American Muslim organization here and movement in America that wants to integrate," he said. "We believe the ballot is an appropriate place to be."

He said that he "liked the Bill of Rights" and didn't want to see the Constitution replaced with Islamic law.

"There's a maturation that's taken place in the American Muslim community that's either not understood, or understood but viewed as a threat to other interest groups in this country."

[...]

There are those in the U.S. government who believe that the Brotherhood is the Bush administration's best chance for reaching out to moderate Islamists internationally.

The Brotherhood "works to dissuade the Muslims from violence, instead channeling them into politics and charitable activities," said Robert S. Leiken, director of the Immigration and National Security Program at The Nixon Center in a recent article in Foreign Affairs, a publication of the nonpartisan Council on Foreign Relations.

While he has not studied the Holy Land documents, Dr. Leiken said that the U.S. discussion on Islamic thought tends to be polarized and that what passes for scholarship is often more selective than rigorous.

"The more you study it, the more distinctions and differences should emerge," he said. "And scholars should see these distinctions. In Europe, these things are understood better, but in the U.S., they often get brushed aside in the heat of the debate."

Yes, in Europe they understand it all so well.

Euro anti-dhimmitude, and a courageous showing from Lars Vilks. An update on this story. From AFP (thanks to Geeza):

STOCKHOLM -- The Swedish media rallied Sunday behind a cartoonist whose depiction of the Islamic prophet as a dog earned him death threats from Al Qaeda in Iraq, as Swedish companies braced for a backlash.

Cartoonist Lars Vilks said he was ready to die after extremists in Iraq offered $150,000 to anyone who slit his throat, or $100,000 for his murder by other means.

"We must not give in," he was quoted as saying in the Dagens Nyheter daily that republished the cartoon in small format Sunday.

"I'm starting to grow old. I could die at any time - it's not a catastrophe," he said.

The group calling itself the Islamic State of Iraq, otherwise known as Al Qaeda in Iraq, also put $50,000 on the head of Ulf Johansson, editor in chief of the Nerikes Allehanda newspaper that published the caricature.

Swedish media condemned the threats, issued through the Internet Saturday in the form of a statement in the name of the group's purported leader, Sheikh Abu Omar Al Baghdadi.

"We live in a country where freedom of expression is not dictated by fundamentalists, nor by governments," wrote Dagens Nyheter chief editor Thorbjorn Larsson in an editorial.

And let's keep it that way, shall we?

A case similar to this one -- which sheds light on why the husband is able to do this.

From Kyodo News (thanks to Twostellas):

PUTRAJAYA — A Malaysian Hindu woman began her final bid Monday to get Malaysia's top court to prevent her estranged husband from converting their son to Islam.

The story goes on to say that this case is being closely watched, as it deals with the increasingly vexed question of the overlap between Sharia and civil law.

Imagine the scene: "State police! Put down that sandwich and keep your hands in plain view!" Orwell's nightmare featured the Thought Police; even he never imagined the Food Police.

Sharia Alert from modern, moderate Malaysia. From Reuters (thanks to Twostellas):

A Malaysian state ruled by a hard-line Islamist party has set up a snoop squad to catch Muslims who ignore a religious ban on eating, drinking and smoking during the fasting month of Ramadan. Ramadan, which began last Thursday in Muslim-majority Malaysia, is the holiest month of the Islamic calendar.

Practicing Muslims abstain from food, drink and sex during daylight hours in a discipline intended to purify their souls. Religious officials in the northeastern state of Kelantan, ruled by the opposition Parti Islam se-Malaysia (PAS), have detailed 10 municipal officials in plainclothes to keep watch at food outlets, the New Straits Times newspaper said on Monday. "This is the first time the council is taking action as we have received numerous complaints about those who eat openly during the fasting period," said Azman Mohamad Daham, a municipal spokesman in Kota Baru, the state capital.

Iran is threatening to destroy Israel if any move is made against the Iranian nuclear program, and General Abizaid is saying we may just have to live with it.

"'600 Iranian missiles pointed at Israel,'" from the Jerusalem Post (thanks to Sr. Soph):

Six hundred Iranian Shihab-3 missiles are pointed at targets throughout Israel, and will be launched if either Iran or Syria are attacked, an Iranian website affiliated with the regime reported on Monday.

Behind a poster of Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei reading: "Missile maneuver of the Great Prophet," Iran's elite Revolutionary Guards tests the long-range Shihab-3 missile in a central desert area of Iran.

"Iran will shoot at Israel 600 missiles if it is attacked," the Iranian news website, Assar Iran, reported. "600 missiles will only be the first reaction."

According to the report, dozens of locations throughout Iraq, which are being used by the US Army, have also been targeted.

The Shihab missile has a range of 1,300 km, and can reach anywhere in Israel.

"Abizaid: World could abide nuclear Iran," by Robert Burns for AP (thanks to all who sent this in):

WASHINGTON - Every effort should be made to stop Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons, but failing that, the world could live with a nuclear-armed regime in Tehran, a recently retired commander of U.S. forces in the Middle East said Monday.

John Abizaid, the retired Army general who headed Central Command for nearly four years, said he was confident that if Iran gained nuclear arms, the United States could deter it from using them.

"Iran is not a suicide nation," he said. "I mean, they may have some people in charge that don't appear to be rational, but I doubt that the Iranians intend to attack us with a nuclear weapon."

This appears to be based on Western calculations of risk that, of course, may not be employed by those irrational "people in charge":

The Iranians are aware, he said, that the United States has a far superior military capability.

"I believe that we have the power to deter Iran, should it become nuclear," he said, referring to the theory that Iran would not risk a catastrophic retaliatory strike by using a nuclear weapon against the United States.

"There are ways to live with a nuclear Iran," Abizaid said in remarks at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a think tank. "Let's face it, we lived with a nuclear Soviet Union, we've lived with a nuclear China, and we're living with (other) nuclear powers as well."

He stressed that he was expressing his personal opinion and that none of his remarks were based on his previous experience with U.S. contingency plans for potential military action against Iran.

Yet another manifestation of the incompatibility of the Sharia provisions in the Iraqi and Afghan constitutions with the pluralistic democracy that the State Department and the Administration have declared they want to plant in both countries.

By Andrew Tully for Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (thanks to the Constantinopolitan Irredentist):

WASHINGTON, September 14, 2007 (RFE/RL) -- One day after U.S. President George W. Bush touted successes in local reconciliation in Iraq, the State Department said religious freedom is often a victim in that struggling democracy.

But John Hanford, the State Department's ambassador at large for religious freedom, said these problems involve more the country's fragile security situation rather than any deficiencies in the government's respect for religious freedom. In fact, he pointed to what he called the Iraqi constitution's "robust guarantees" of religious freedom.

Yes, we saw how "robust" that guarantee was in Afghanistan during the Abdul Rahman apostasy case. The Sharia provision gives you all the religious freedom you want, within the limits of Islamic sharia law, which means essentially little religious freedom at all.

"Religious minorities are vulnerable, sometimes due to their small numbers and lack of organization," Hanford said. "For the most part, people are getting caught in the crossfire. In the case of these minorities, though, there have been cases where it's clear that certain groups have been targeted. The real problem that we're dealing with is that, with the sectarian violence -- not necessarily focused on religious practice -- that at the same time religious practice winds up being affected."

Afghanistan faces issues of religious tolerance, too, the State Department report finds. It cites a constitution requiring all laws to be consistent with Islam, nearly three decades of war, a period of rule by the Taliban, and immature democratic institutions as allowing intolerance, harassment, and even violence against religious minorities and some reformist Muslims.

What a surprise!

There is no telling at this point whether these were sent by genuine mujahedin or just some nut -- not that it much matters for their victims if they follow through with action. From the National Terror Alert Response Center (thanks to Morgaan Sinclair):

Investigators in Marion County, Fla., are searching for the author of nine postcards sent to different schools on the same day, with the words ‘Jihad-Boom” and cartoons drawn by hand, of a building being blown up with people inside.

Investigators released the postcards with the threatening drawings on them Monday in hopes of generating leads in the case. Officials said that the postcards are made up of various and traditional themes, and each one has a distinctive hand-drawn cartoon on it. Several of the threats arrived on postcards featuring Walt Disney World. Detectives said the threat-maker crossed his or her No. 7s and attached a suffix to the address. Six of the nine postcards spell the word “Jihad” correctly, while the others are incorrect.

The U.S. Postal Service said that the postcards were all mailed to the schools from the Ocala-Gainesville mailing district before the sixth anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. A $10,000 reward has been issued to anyone who provides information which leads to the arrest and conviction of the person or persons responsible for using the postal service to mail the threatening postcards to schools.

He glorified suicide bombing, which must mean that he is in reality a venomous Islamophobe trying to defame Islam.

Yes, that sentence is sarcastic. It is designed to call attention to the absurdity of the public dogma that Islamic terrorism has nothing to do with Islam -- a blind dogma that prevents honest discussion of the elements of Islam that jihadists are using to recruit terrorists, and of what can be done about them.

"Scottish student convicted on terror charges," from the Guardian (thanks to Sr. Soph):

A 21-year-old student was convicted today of possessing CDs and computer material linked to Islamist terrorism, along with charges including threatening to become a suicide bomber.

Following the verdict, police said Mohammed Atif Siddique, from Alva, Clackmannanshire, near Stirling in central Scotland, had been found guilty of "serious terrorism offences" which posed a genuine threat.

Siddique's lawyer said he would appeal, arguing the student's actions amounted to nothing worse than "what millions of young people do every day - looking for answers on the internet".

"This verdict is a tragedy for justice and for freedom of speech and undermines the values that separate us from the terrorists, the very values we should be fighting to protect," Aamer Anwar said outside Glasgow high court.

The jury returned guilty verdicts on four charges, including one of possessing CDs and videos that could be used for terrorist purposes.

Siddique was also convicted on two charges of setting up websites with links to terrorist publications that showed how to use weapons and make bombs, and causing a breach of the peace at Glasgow Metropolitan College by threatening to become a suicide bomber and blow up Glasgow. He will be sentenced on October 23.

During the four-week trial, prosecutor Brian McConnachie labelled Siddique a "wannabe suicide bomber", who helped distribute material that amounted to "a call to arms for Muslims".

"It's clear from that material that the whole idea was to glorify martyrdom operations, which we call suicide bombings," Mr McConnachie said.

Senator Warner: Are you able to say at this time if we continue what you have laid before the congress here, this strategy. Do you feel that that is making America safer?

General Petraeus: Sir, I believe this is indeed the best course of action to achieve our objectives in Iraq.

Warner: Does that make America safer?

General Petraeus: Sir, I don't know actually. I have not sat down and sorted this in my own mind. What I have focused on and what I have been riveted on is how to accomplish the mission of the multinational Iraq. -- an exchange during the recent testimony of General Petraeus before the Senate

A Few More Questions For General Petraeus:

Q.: General, you have not “sat down and sorted this out in [your] own mind.” Does that make sense? Shouldn’t you not merely “accomplish the mission,” but ask yourself if the mission makes sense?

A.: Sir, I don’t know actually. I have to focus on the job I was given.

Q.: But what if the job, what if the mission, does not make sense?

A.: I’d have to think about that long and hard, Senator.

Q.: You have been in Iraq, General Petraeus, for a long time.

A.: Yes.

Q.: You were there in 2003.

A.: Yes.

Q.: You were there in 2004. You were in Tel Afar. You were building up Iraq’s forces. You were allowing American weaponry to be distributed to what were called “Iraqi” forces without much oversight.

A.: I was there, yes, in 2004. In Tel Afar. And elsewhere in the north. There was no time to waste in getting those weapons into what we thought were the proper hands, Iraqi hands, so they could help defend themselves.

Q.: Not all of those hundreds of thousands of weapons did end up in hands that were using them only to defend themselves, were they?

A.: No, sir.

Q.: Where did that weaponry end up? Isn’t it true that some of it ended up on arms markets, sold to the highest bidder, or even ended up in Syria? Isn’t it true that some of those weapons ended up in the hands of people who hate Americans and want to kill them?

A.: Well, Senator, if we are going to worry about that, there are plenty of people in Iraq to hate Americans and would like to see them dead, and if we counted all of those, I’m just not sure, outside of Kurdistan, how many people we would have left to work with.

No Compulsion In Religion Alert. Islam forbids forced conversion, so why aren't authorities cracking down hard on this? Because this is a prohibition that is all too often honored in the breach. "Egypt: Christian Twins Forced To ‘Become’ Muslim," from Compass Direct:

ISTANBUL, September 5 (Compass Direct News) – An Egyptian court on Monday (September 3) adjourned the hearing of young Christian twins legally forced to take Islamic education after their estranged father became Muslim.

The attorney for the two young Christian boys forced the adjournment by skipping the hearing, as the outcome of another case involving converts to Islam seeking “re-conversion” could affect the twins’ case.

The twins’ case highlights inequalities non-Muslims face in Egypt, where one’s religion, printed on all official documents, regulates family laws. Custody of children is automatically given to whichever parent is Muslim, according to many interpretations of sharia (Islamic law), enshrined in the nation’s constitution.

Christian twins Mario and Andrew Medhat Ramsis unwillingly “became” Muslim after their father converted to Islam and used his legal right to change the religion on their birth certificates.

In February, the boys’ mother discovered that they had been placed in Islamic education classes at school to reflect their father’s choice, though the Muslim man was no longer living with his Christian family since his conversion and remarriage in 2002.

The twins gained notoriety when they refused to take their Islamic religion exam in May, required in order to pass to the next grade.

“I am Christian,” each boy wrote on a make-up test in July. They turned in the exam with all of the answers left blank.

Egyptian Education Minister Yusri al-Gamal announced on August 25 that he would automatically pass the boys on to the next grade, but the twins’ Christian mother said that an underlying problem remains.

“I was made to understand that Egyptian law grants a mother custody of her children until they are 15, but I lately discovered that this applies only to Muslim mothers,” Kamilia Lutfi said in an August 27 press conference, according to Coptic-owned weekly Watani.

Read it all.

"Against them make ready your strength to the utmost of your power, including steeds of war, to strike terror into the hearts of the enemies of Allah and your enemies..." (Qur'an 8:60)

I'd like to know what words AFP is translating below as "Islamist terrorism," as I doubt Al-Qaeda would use the phrase, and wonder what the tape really says.

"Qaeda urges Islamic terror in West in third 9/11 video," from AFP :

DUBAI (AFP) - Al-Qaeda called on Islamists to sow terror in the West to create a climate of fear, in a third video marking the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States which was posted on the Internet on Monday.

Called "reasons and motives for the attacks on New York and Washington," the video features a montage of images of the burning World Trade Centre towers and scenes from Islamist training camps.

"We must take Islamist terrorism to Western countries so that it becomes a normal part of life like natural disasters," a voiceover says.

"In that way, we will have acts of mass extermination in which people will feel that their affluence also brings death... and we will have created a balance of deterrence between us and them," the unidentified voice adds.

Feel the love.

Sura 5, “The Table,” dates from the Medinan period (as do suras 2-4). Verses 1-11 exhort Muslims to obey Allah’s commands regarding food, religious observances, and sexual morality. V. 5 permits Muslim men to marry not only “chaste women who are believers, but chaste women among the People of the Book.” However, nothing is said of Muslim women being permitted to marry non-Muslim men, and indeed, this is prohibited in Islamic law. This is part of the subjugated status of the dhimmis, the “protected people,” in Islam: since traditionally a man takes his wife into his own household, but not vice versa, the prohibition of Muslim women marrying non-Muslim men, but the allowance of Muslim men marrying non-Muslim women, means that the Islamic community will be in a position always to grow, while the non-Muslim community declines.

Verses 12-26 return to castigating the Jews and Christians. Allah, we’re told, “did aforetime take a covenant from the Children of Israel” (v. 12), but the Jews broke it. And so they are now cursed by Allah, for they have altered the divine revelations they received, and also because they are deceitful; nonetheless, the Muslims are told here to “forgive them, and overlook (their misdeeds): for Allah loveth those who are kind” (v. 13). According to Allusi in his Ruhul Ma’ani, this forgiveness should be extended only to those Jews who become Muslims or agree to pay the jizya and accept subservient dhimmi status in accord with 9:29. Tabari, on the other hand, suggests that v. 13 was abrogated by the commands to wage jihad against the unbelievers that came later in Muhammad’s career.

The strange case of Houssein Zorkot, and its implications. The featured article at FrontPage today (news links in the original):

Houssein Zorkot, a third-year medical student at Wayne State University in Michigan, was arrested on September 8 at Hemlock Park in Detroit. He was wearing camouflage makeup, black clothes, and carrying an AK-47 assault rifle; he reportedly had to be tasered by police when he was arrested. His website features photographs of the Ayatollah Khomeini and a great deal of pro-Hizballah material. Most ominously, on the day he was arrested he uploaded onto his site an image that included a photo of a soldier holding a rifle, with the caption, “The Start of My Personal Jihad (in the US).” Underneath in Arabic was Qur’an 9:20: “Those who believe, and have left their homes and striven with their wealth and their lives in Allah’s way are of much greater worth in Allah’s sight. These are they who are triumphant.” The Arabic for “striven…in Allah’s way” is jahadoo fi sabil Allah, which in Islamic theology refers in particular to jihad as warfare.

The start of Zorkot’s personal jihad will have to wait; he is being held on $1 million dollar bond. But his case carries some troubling implications. According to Michigan’s WLNS, police say that on his website Zorkot claims to be a member of Hizballah. If that claim is true, was his abortive personal jihad in Hemlock Park ordered by Hizballah leadership? If so, and if Zorkot had succeeded in murdering anyone in the park, his attack would have been the first known strike by Hizballah on U.S. soil. Even though unsuccessful, Zorkot’s attack, if it was a Hizballah project, would signal an end to the terror group’s policy of not staging attacks in America because the reaction to such an attack would hinder the group’s freedom of action here. Last April, Thomas Fuentes, special agent in charge of the FBI’s International Operations, explained that Hizballah wants to “maintain a low profile by engaging in criminal activity [but] not direct attacks….They’ve not been enthusiastic about doing it on US soil because of the attention and reaction that would occur.” But if Zorkot went to Hemlock Park on Hizballah orders, those days are over -- and Americans can brace themselves for more Hizballah operations here.

Imagine! They enter Islam with open mind and open heart, and somehow they get the crazy idea that the Qur'an and Muhammad are commanding them to subjugate the infidel, by violence if necessary! What a crazy notion! One would think that Muslim groups in Europe and America would be anxious to head this off, and are instituting comprehensive programs to teach against Islamic supremacism and the jihad ideology in every madrasa and mosque in the West. Aren't they? Mr. Hooper, care to comment on CAIR's efforts in this direction?

"Converts To Islam Move Up In Cells," by Craig Whitlock for the Washington Post (thanks to Isabella the Crusader):

BERLIN -- Religious converts are playing an increasingly influential role in Islamic militant networks, having transformed themselves in recent years from curiosities to key players in terrorist cells in Europe, according to counterterrorism officials and analysts.

The arrests this month of two German converts to Islam -- Fritz Gelowicz and Daniel Schneider -- on suspicions that they were plotting to bomb American targets are just one example of terrorism cases in Europe in which converts to Islam have figured prominently.

In Copenhagen, a convert is among four defendants who went on trial this month for plotting to blow up political targets. In Sweden, a webmaster who changed his name from Ralf Wadman to Abu Usama el-Swede was arrested last year on suspicion of recruiting fighters on the Internet. In Britain, three converts -- including the son of a British politician -- are awaiting trial on charges of participating in last year's transatlantic airline plot.

"The number of converts, it seems, is definitely on the rise," said Michael Taarnby, a terrorism researcher at the Danish Institute for International Studies. "We've reached a point where I think al-Qaeda and other groups recognize the value of converts, not just from an operational viewpoint but from a cultural one as well."

Religious converts are sometimes more prone to radicalization because of their zeal to prove their newfound faith, analysts said. They are also less likely to attract police scrutiny in Europe, where investigators often rely on outdated demographic profiles in terrorism cases.

Yes, zeal is key, but new converts to Christianity, as zealous as they may be, don't seem to be blowing anything up. Now, why is that?

No compulsion in religion. "Iraq: Bicycle bomb strikes, 5 dead," by Sinan Salaheddin for the Associated Press:

BAGHDAD - A booby-trapped bicycle exploded near a cafe serving tea and food during Ramadan fasting hours Sunday, killing at least five people in a religiously mixed area in northern Iraq, police said.

[...]

In all, at least 39 people were killed or found dead nationwide. The bloodshed came the day after al-Qaida in Iraq announced a new offensive in the Islamic holy month and was a blow to government hopes that a peaceful Ramadan would demonstrate the success of the seven-month operation in the capital.

[...]

In the late-morning blast in Tuz Khormato, 130 miles north of Baghdad, witnesses said a boy left the bicycle bomb near the cafe, which was located in a popular market and was one of the few open during daylight hours despite Ramadan. Tradition requires faithful to abstain from eating and drinking from sunrise to sunset during the monthlong observance.

Two of the slain victims were in the cafe, while three were in the market, police chief Capt. Abbas Mohammed said. He also said 19 people were wounded.

I travel a great deal, and I can't tell you how many times, as I'm existing on stale coffee and plastic food, beaten down by the bustle, the noise, and endless dinning of the numbingly repetitive security announcements ("Report suspicious behavior," they keep saying, in outrageous Islamophobic defiance of CAIR and the Flying Imams), there is nothing I long for more than a chance to sit down, close my eyes, and let some cool water run between my toes.

Don't you feel the same way? Can you think of anything more relaxing? More restorative? Isn't it great that the Indianapolis Airport, like so many others, is now bowing to public pressure and installing these footbaths, so that finally the legions of foot-weary travelers, trudging endlessly through, harried and poked by officious airport personnel, dragging their roller bags, subjecting themselves to what Christopher Hitchens aptly calls the "misery and humiliation" of air travel, this endless succession of Willy Lomans on their way to peddle their paltry wares -- now they have a chance to reach for something higher. Now they have a chance, as the cool water massages their feet, to dream of better things, of better days, of moonlit streams where righteous kings paused a moment to compose psalms.

In reality, of course, I think it very likely that as you have gone through airports throughout your life, you have never once stopped and longed to wash your feet. Not even once. You did not ask, and no one but Muslims ever have asked, for footwashing stations in the Indianapolis Airport or anywhere else. Last night during a layover in a major American city I saw an Oxygen Bar in an international airport. Some airports have massage facilities. Many have big leather armchairs in which, for a small fee, one can repose and become, for a moment, an armchair strategist. But these are truly facilities "for everybody's use," as Indianapolis Airport spokesman David Dawson would have us believe the footbaths are. I tried to explain to Francesca Jarosz when she called me that these footbaths were quite obviously meant to accommodate Islamic prayer and only Islamic prayer, that no one else would want them, and that to pretend otherwise was only a face-saving (or foot-saving) measure. She didn't see fit to print any of that, but I have no quarrel with Francesca Jarosz; I've learned over the years to brace myself for the worst whenever a reporter calls, but she was not as outrageously unfair as most -- in fact, her article is almost balanced. Instead of giving him the last word, she might have called Dawson on his nonsensical statement and asked him to explain just under what circumstances non-Muslims might even want to use the footbaths, and what might happen if a non-Muslim decided on an aqua-foot-massage just as a crowd of Muslim taxi drivers converged upon the footbaths to prepare themselves for prayer, but hey, you can't have everything. "Indianapolis," says Michael Saahir, an imam at the Nur-Allah Islamic Center of Indianapolis, "is coming of age. They need to have accommodations for all of their citizens" -- and that's all that matters. Accommodation is the order of the day, and the one certain thing is that we will be seeing plenty more of it.

"Airport's sinks to help Muslims carry out rituals," by Francesca Jarosz in the Indianapolis Star:

In the parking lot where they wait to be dispatched, some fill plastic bottles with water and pour it over the right foot, then the left. Others clean their feet in the restroom sink.

The practice is the last step in a ritual called ablution -- "wudu" in Arabic -- which involves washing several parts of the body to cleanse before Muslims' five daily prayers.

And by November 2008, when the new $1.07 billion airport terminal is scheduled to be complete, the restroom near the parking lot where taxi drivers stay between runs will include floor-level sinks that will make their daily ritual easier.

Such foot baths have started to crop up across the country, in schools such as the University of Michigan-Dearborn, where more than 10 percent of students are Muslims, and at airports such as Kansas City International Airport.

They have drawn the ire of bloggers and pundits, who say they violate the separation of church and state, and the praise of advocacy groups like the Council on American-Islamic Relations....

An official cost estimate for the foot baths won't be ready until November, but Hawvermale said similar sinks cost between $400 and $600 to purchase and install.

The new airport terminal is funded primarily through general airline revenues. About 10 percent of funding, for devices such as safety and flight equipment, comes from federal grants.

But some critics say these foot baths are religious facilities in a public place -- and a clear constitutional violation.

Robert Spencer founded the group Jihad Watch, which aims to raise awareness of what its founders perceive as a proliferation of Islamic law into mainstream society. Spencer compares installing a foot bath in a restroom to putting in a holy water font to accommodate Catholic cab drivers.

"The only conceivable group that will use the foot bath are Muslims for prayer," Spencer said. "It's a religious installation for a religious use."

Airport officials say they see it differently.

"These facilities are for everybody's use," said David Dawson, spokesman for the new terminal project....

Khalid Zouecha, 38, said he rinses his feet with a bottle of water outside the bathroom to avoid the stares of other drivers.

"Most of them look at you like, 'What are those guys doing?' " Zouecha said. "They know what we're doing, but they look at us like they're strange actions."

And some drivers say the water-bottle routine gets old, especially in the winter.

"It's like you are in the jungle, like a primitive human," said Aziz Nachid, 42.

Performing the ritual in these conditions doesn't interfere with its religious aspect, as long as the water is moving and all the body parts are cleaned in the correct order, said Michael Saahir, an imam at the Nur-Allah Islamic Center of Indianapolis.

But he said the drivers deserve better conditions, which the foot baths will provide.

"This is long overdue," Saahir said. "Indianapolis is coming of age. They need to have accommodations for all of their citizens."

Clash of civilizations, the illustrated version

Welcome to Eurabia: Fortress McDonalds opens in Berlin, an event well attended by riot police. No doubt the cops were there to repel trendy Euroveggie neo-fascists, but you also never know in Europe these days when the mujahedin may decide to take revenge against that ubiquitous symbol of American pop cultural hegemony.

"McDonald's Opens in Kreuzberg," by Josh Ward in Spiegel Online (thanks to Ruth King):

It looks like any of Germany's nearly 1,300 other McDonald's franchises. Colorful glossy plastic and shiny stainless steel, bright lights, smiling counter people, a playground, a grasshopper-green manicured lawn, a McCafé and a McDrive. Everything McNormal.

Take a closer look, though, and you see something strange. Hidden in a parking lot around the corner are three police paddy wagons with wire-mesh-protected windows, full of bored police officers in riot gear waiting for a smoke break. Security cameras hang in bunches on light poles like coconuts. Almost everyone outside has a long-lensed camera, video recorder or reporter's spiral notepad.

Nice shot. By Uzi Mahnaimi, Sarah Baxter and Michael Sheridan in the TimesOnline (thanks to Sr. Soph):

IT was just after midnight when the 69th Squadron of Israeli F15Is crossed the Syrian coast-line. On the ground, Syria’s formidable air defences went dead. An audacious raid on a Syrian target 50 miles from the Iraqi border was under way.

At a rendezvous point on the ground, a Shaldag air force commando team was waiting to direct their laser beams at the target for the approaching jets. The team had arrived a day earlier, taking up position near a large underground depot. Soon the bunkers were in flames.

Ten days after the jets reached home, their mission was the focus of intense speculation this weekend amid claims that Israel believed it had destroyed a cache of nuclear materials from North Korea.

The Israeli government was not saying. “The security sources and IDF [Israeli Defence Forces] soldiers are demonstrating unusual courage,” said Ehud Olmert, the prime minister. “We naturally cannot always show the public our cards.”

The Syrians were also keeping mum. “I cannot reveal the details,” said Farouk al-Sharaa, the vice-president. “All I can say is the military and political echelon is looking into a series of responses as we speak. Results are forthcoming.” The official story that the target comprised weapons destined for Hezbollah, the Iranian-backed Lebanese Shi’ite group, appeared to be crumbling in the face of widespread scepticism.

Andrew Semmel, a senior US State Department official, said Syria might have obtained nuclear equipment from “secret suppliers”, and added that there were a “number of foreign technicians” in the country.

Asked if they could be North Korean, he replied: “There are North Korean people there. There’s no question about that.” He said a network run by AQ Khan, the disgraced creator of Pakistan’s nuclear weapons, could be involved.

It just gets better with every paragraph.

Islamic Tolerance alert.

By Jamie Doward in The Observer:

One of the Church of England's most senior bishops is warning that people will die unless Muslim leaders in Britain speak out in defence of the right to change faith.

Michael Nazir-Ali, the Bishop of Rochester, whose father converted from Islam to Christianity in Pakistan, says he is looking to Muslim leaders in Britain to 'uphold basic civil liberties, including the right for people to believe what they wish to believe and to even change their beliefs if they wish to do so'.

Some Islamic texts brand Muslims who convert to other faiths as 'apostates' and call for them to be punished. Seven of the world's 57 Islamic states - including Iran - impose the death penalty for conversion.

Some Islamic texts? You mean like the pre-eminent collection of authoritative hadiths, Sahih Al-Bukhari, quoting Muhammad himself?

Volume 9, Book 84, Number 57: Narrated 'Ikrima:

Some Zanadiqa (atheists) were brought to 'Ali and he burnt them. The news of this event, reached Ibn 'Abbas who said, "If I had been in his place, I would not have burnt them, as Allah's Apostle forbade it, saying, 'Do not punish anybody with Allah's punishment (fire).' I would have killed them according to the statement of Allah's Apostle, 'Whoever changed his Islamic religion, then kill him.'"

Where do those extremists get their ideas!

Now Ali, who some see as a potential Archbishop of Canterbury, has told Channel 4's Dispatches programme of his fears about the safety of the estimated 3,000 Muslims who have converted to other faiths in Britain.

'It is very common in the world today, including in this country, for people who have changed their faith, particularly from being Muslim to being Christian, to be ostracised, to lose their job, for their marriages to be dissolved, for children to be taken away,' Ali said. 'And this is why some leadership is necessary from Muslim leaders themselves to say that this is not what Islam teaches.'

I think we may just have hit a snag here, Your Grace. Of course, I guess they could say that "this is not what Islam teaches" even while it does.

Dispatches obtained Islamic texts sold in Britain that say the punishment for apostasy is death - according to all four schools of Islamic jurisprudence. One text called for Muslims to cut off the head of those who reject Islam.

Of course, rigorously logical thought has not exactly been one of the outstanding characteristics of the C of E of late.

The radical Islamist group Hizb ut-Tahrir, which some in Britain want to see banned, states in its constitution that in countries that practise Sharia law, apostates are to be executed. Its message is disseminated on university campuses across Britain and has found a following among a minority of young Muslims.

A poll of more than 1,000 British Muslims, conducted by the Policy Exchange think-tank this year, found that 36 per cent of Muslims aged between 16 and 24 believe those who convert to another faith should be punished by death.

Only 36 percent?

Sheikh Mogra, a senior member of the Muslim Council for Britain, told Dispatches: 'We live in a country where we respect people's choices. It is not right for any British Muslim to harm in any way whatsoever; to bully them, to intimidate them, to threaten them, is all against Muslim law.'

So, as noted, "the punishment for apostasy is death - according to all four schools of Islamic jurisprudence," a teaching given by Muhammad himself -- so how do we make sense of this last quote? Well, it's obviously wrong, but that's not something it seems the Observer -- or anybody else in the dhimmi press -- wants to get into.

Latest setback in the effort to turn Iraq into Massachusetts.

By Robert H Reid for AP via The Guardian:

BAGHDAD (AP) - An al-Qaida front group threatened to assassinate Sunni leaders who support American troops in Iraq as a Shiite bloc loyal to radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr defected Saturday from the Iraqi government's parliament base.

The two developments cast doubt over prospects for political and military progress in Iraq as the U.S. Senate gears up for a debate next week on Democratic demands for deeper and faster troop cuts than President Bush plans.

The threat against Sunni leaders came from the Islamic State of Iraq, which claimed responsibility for the assassination Thursday of Abdul-Sattar Abu Risha, the mastermind of the Sunni Arab revolt against al-Qaida in Anbar province. Bush met Abu Risha at a U.S. base in Anbar this month and praised his courage.

[...]

The Sunni revolt which Abu Risha spearheaded has led to a dramatic improvement in security in Anbar, although the province remains unstable. Nevertheless, the decline in violence in Ramadi and other Anbar cities has been one of the major success stories for the U.S. mission in Iraq.

A prominent Sunni sheik told The Associated Press that the province's leaders would not be intimidated by al-Qaida threats and would continue efforts to drive the terror movement from their communities.

"We as tribesmen will act against the al-Qaida, and those standing behind it who do not want us to put an end to it,'' Ali Hatem al-Suleiman said.

Still, the al-Qaida threats and the assassination of Abu Risha, one of the best protected tribal figures in Iraq, could cause some tribal leaders in other Sunni provinces to reconsider plans to stand up against the terror movement.

With U.S. and Iraqi overtures to the Sunnis under threat, the government faced a deepening political crisis with the announcement that al-Sadr's followers were withdrawing from the Shiite alliance in parliament. Al-Sadr's followers hold 30 of the 275 parliament seats.

The announcement, made to reporters in Najaf, means the Shiite-led government can count on the support of only 108 parliament members - 30 short of a majority. However, it could probably win the backing of the 30 independent Shiite parliamentarians, as well as some minor parties.

Still, the decision by al-Sadr's followers will complicate further U.S.-backed efforts to win parliamentary approval of power-sharing legislation, including the oil bill and an easing of curbs that prevent former Saddam Hussein supporters from holding government jobs.

Al-Sadr's decision will also sharpen the power struggle among armed Shiite groups in the south, which includes major Shiite religious shrines and much of the country's vast oil resources.

Now while al-Qaeda may be the nastiest of the bunch right now, the idea that defeating them will at last liberate that huge reservoir of Islamic goodwill and cooperation currently only latent is, well, fantasy. If it's not al-Qaeda it will be somebody else -- unless they are forcibly repressed.

In an Islamic context, there are exactly two kinds of regimes possible: Islamic tyrannies and non-Islamic tyrannies. Either way, force is what holds the whole thing together. And don't talk to me about Turkey. Turkey continually oscillates between full-blown Sharia and military dictatorship. Turkey is as secular as it is thanks to Gemal's outright repression of Islam.

Force is invariably the key: the question is whether it is employed to repress or to abet Sharia, jihad, and general Islamic imperialism. The result the US administration ostensibly desires in Iraq -- a competent, popular, Shia republic -- might prove the worst of the possible outcomes. It would effectively turn Iraq into another Iran. Though US policy success in Iraq hardly seems likely. Small consolation.

Tiny Minority of Extremists Update from TradingMarkets.com (thanks to Twostellas).

Berlin - The lack of cooperation of Muslim communities with the security authorities remains a weak point of the fight against terrorism in Germany. Six years after the attacks on 11 September 2001, according to a survey of the news agency ddp in all federal laender, the authorities can hardly count on active support from Muslim communities. In 2007, they have received practically no specific information on "radicalized fellow believers, on recruiters of terrorist organizations, or on planned attacks."

Why is that? Whenever someone says something like this in the U.S., Muslim spokesmen charge that they are helping, they are working against terror, but they don't get any coverage in the press for such efforts. But this is the word of German authorities, who have every interest in playing up the extent of Muslim cooperation.

Yet still, this question, Why not?, as crucial as it is, will not even be asked, or if asked, will be answered by charges of offensive, hyper-suspicious behavior on the part of German authorities.

In response to the key question of whether they had active help this year in the form of tips from Muslim communities, the answer was almost entirely a clear no. It was reported from Lower Saxony that there had been isolated tips on radicalization. In Hessen, there was reserved talk of "slight tendencies towards openness." In three laender, the authorities did not want to give any information. These laender had declared in previous ddp-inquiries that they had not received any corresponding tips in the past years. In addition to the obvious attempt not to offend the Muslim communities, some answers showed a certain lack of understanding for the missing cooperation. From Bavaria, for example, it was reported that the "Bavarian Office for Constitutional Protection has still not received any tips from Muslims despite appeals in the Internet and a special contact telephone set up for this purpose." The security experts in Berlin had similar experiences. In the past there, an anonymous telephone had not yielded any tangible results. In response to the question of whether it has received any tips, the Senate Interior Administration answered simply: "No." Hamburg's interior authority pointed out that the situation had not changed since the last surveys. Accordingly, no corresponding tips had been received in the Hanseatic city. Experts there assess the access to Muslim communities as "extremely difficult." In response to the question of new tendencies in cooperation between Muslims and security authorities, it was generally said that the authorities are trying to establish a basis for trust. For example, the police in Baden-Wuerttemberg have named permanent contacts for the Muslim communities. In Berlin, it was said that the cooperation had definitely changed since 11 September 2001. Accordingly, on the part of the Muslims, there is great interest "in not having their faith come under general suspicion." Apart from the fight against terrorism, there have obviously been some changes in Berlin and in other laender. In the capital city, it was said that Muslim communities would become involved in various bodies. Next year a continuing education series is supposed to increase the socio-political competence of imams. Identical inquiries of the news agency ddp in past years had yielded the same results for the time after 11 September 2001.

Muslims didn't even object to them. As you can see from this article, not even CAIR's Ibrahim Hooper, a man who is hair-trigger quick to take offense at the slightest provocation (whether real, imagined, or trumped-up), took offense at these cartoons. The worst thing that can be said about them is that they aren't funny, but that's beside the point. The Washington Post was playing the dhimmi in advance, censoring itself in anticipation of ruffling feathers that weren't ruffled. Such is the absurd state of the "freedom of the press" on this day, Ramadan 3, A.H. 1428.

An update on this story. "Why Were These Comics Dropped?," by Deborah Howell in the Washington Post (thanks to all who sent this in):

Readers were confused and angry that "Opus" comic strips with a Muslim theme did not appear in the Aug. 26 and Sept. 2 Sunday print editions. The strips, created by Berkeley Breathed, were distributed by the Washington Post Writers Group and published on washingtonpost.com.

Most of the controversy involved the Aug. 26 strip, which showed regular character and spiritual seeker Lola Granola in her version of a burqa, declaring she has become a "radical Islamist. Hot new fad on the planet." Her boyfriend, the piggish super-patriot Steve Dallas, is horrified. She tells him he "won't be getting a girlfriend obsessed with Western crud" or one "who resists a man's rightful place." Steve, with a leer and then a concerned look, asks: "Anything else I won't be getting?" Lola answers: "God willing."

Executive Editor Len Downie decided to kill the strip because he felt the language and depiction of Muslim female dress could be offensive. He consulted with other editors, one of whom talked to a Muslim staff member, who believed the strip was problematic.

[...]

Ibrahim Hooper, spokesman for the Council on American-Islamic Relations, a civil rights and advocacy group, wasn't offended. " 'Opus' poked fun at the strip's characters, not Muslims or Islam. I see hundreds worse on the Internet every day," he said.

Akbar Ahmed, chair of Islamic studies at American University, also wasn't offended. He said there is a strong Muslim tradition of satire and self-deprecation. "I think there is a danger of us becoming so politically correct that we end up by blunting the critics' bent and the satirists' wit. Muslims need to be sensitive to the fact that in Western culture there is a healthy tradition of not taking things too seriously."

Feel safer? Ain't political correctness grand?

"Bomb suspect worked at airport," from News24.com (thanks to the Constantinopolitan Irredentist):

Berlin - One of three men arrested in Germany on suspicion of plotting major bomb attacks worked at Frankfurt airport, one of the alleged targets, according to the weekly Der Spiegel.

The report to be published on Monday said Adem Y, a Turk, had been employed from 1997 to 2002 by German railways, working in particular in the department handling freight at Frankfurt airport station.

The three arrested on September 5, who also included two Germans converted to Islam, were suspected of planning "massive" attacks on facilities used by Americans, among them Frankfurt airport and the US military airbase at Ramstein.

Federal prosecutor Monika Harms said they were members of the Islamic Jihad Union, a little-known group from Uzbekistan with links to al-Qaeda.

The Sunni Muslim group said the aim of the planned attacks had been to put pressure on Germany to withdraw its soldiers stationed at the Termez base in southern Uzbekistan, according to the German interior ministry.

More diplomacy by intimidation. In both its violent and its peaceful forms, it's all the rage these days.

When Ashraf threatened the West by saying, "We come to you with slaughter," he was merely quoting Muhammad, the prophet of Islam, who told the pagan Quraysh: "I swear by Him in Whose Hand lies the soul of Muhammad! Verily, I have come to you with slaughter!" Given Muhammad's central role in Islam as the uswa hasana, or excellent example of conduct (Qur'an 33:21), it is extremely difficult for peaceful Muslims to refute the jihadist contention that they represent true and pure Islam. It might be more effective for them to acknowledge that such elements of Islamic tradition exist, and to deny definitively that such elements should be implemented now or ever again.

Meanwhile, non-Muslim analysts will continue to insist as a prerequisite to being admitted into polite society that such people as Ashraf represent a twisting of the original peaceful Islam. That is a comforting notion, but a false one. Not only is it false; it actually cuts the ground out from under actual Muslim reformists, by denying that they have any legitimate reason to question and reevaluate Islamic texts and teachings.

"'We Came To You With Slaughter': Quebec Terror Suspect; Berated Muslims online for not fighting jihad," by Stewart Bell And Graeme Hamilton for the National Post (thanks to Alex):

MONTREAL - On the Internet, he was known as Ashraf. It means noble in Arabic.

But the hundreds of incendiary messages he posted to pro-al-Qaeda Web sites were anything but.

From his computer in Quebec, Ashraf disseminated articles that berated Muslims for not fighting jihad; called for war until "religion will be for Allah alone"; and bluntly advised the West that, "We came to you with slaughter."

Yesterday, Said Namouh, 34, a landed immigrant from Quebec, appeared briefly in a Montreal courtroom, accused of working with an Austrian extremist to plot a truck bombing in Europe.

The RCMP said Mr. Namouh used the alias Ashraf, and a U.S. terrorism research group said Mr. Namouh and the on-line Ashraf who appears regularly on jihadist Internet forums are one and the same.

"It's definitely him," said Rita Katz, Director of the SITE Institute, a terrorism research company that monitors the "on-line jihadist community" for government and corporate clients.

"I am confident that the member by the name Ashraf that SITE found as a member of Global Islamic Media Front is the same Ashraf who was arrested by the Canadians."

She said Ashraf was "a prominent and senior" member of the GIMF, an international network of al-Qaeda sympathizers who translate, repackage and disseminate the propaganda of Islamist terrorist groups.

Through the GIMF's on-line forum, Ashraf communicated with Mohammed Mahmoud, the alleged leader of the group's German branch who was arrested in Vienna on Wednesday along with two other suspects. The RCMP accuses Ashraf of conspiring with Mr. Mahmoud to detonate a bomb.

On other jihadist message boards, Ashraf switched to different aliases. But while he has been charged with planning an attack, what he mostly did was spread propaganda.

He distributed links to videos by al-Qaeda deputy Ayman Al-Zawahiri and Azzam the American. In one posting, he reacted to a suicide bombing in Iraq with the message: "May God defeat the crusaders and the Shia." Said Ms. Katz, "A lot of what he was doing on-line was in support of the Islamic State of Iraq."...

Not grinning now

Taking a page from the venerable Alger Hiss Playbook, who wondered to the end of his days how Whittaker Chambers got into his house and used his typewriter to type out copies of secret State Department documents, Mohamed's father, Abdel Latif Sherif, says: "This was created and put on his computer to blame him." But for those of us who may have been on the receiving end of Mohamed and Megahed's plans, whatever they were, for their explosives and ammunition, it is becoming increasingly clear that they were not the "naive kids" that CAIR's Ahmed Bedier insisted they were.

"'Jihadi' Images, Detonator Video Found," by Elaine Silvestrini for the Tampa Tribune (thanks to Cumulus Nine):

TAMPA - A laptop computer deputies found when they pulled over two University of South Florida students in South Carolina contained a video made by one of the men showing how to use a toy to detonate a bomb remotely, a federal prosecutor said Friday.

On that video, the student, Ahmed Mohamed, said the detonator could 'save one who wants to be a martyr for another day, another battle,' Assistant U.S. Attorney Jay Hoffer said.

The prosecutor said that video was posted by Mohamed on YouTube, a popular Web site.

Also on the laptop were 'jihadi' images and footage of rockets used by Hamas, Hoffer said.

Although a judge granted bail for the other student, Youssef Megahed, prosecutors immediately appealed, delaying his release until at least next week. Mohamed waived his right to a bail hearing.

Hoffer disclosed the computer evidence Friday as he laid out the prosecution's case that Megahed should be denied bail because he is a danger to the community and a flight risk.

U.S. Magistrate Elizabeth Jenkins ruled Megahed could be released on $200,000 bail if he meets a number of strict conditions, including what amounts to house arrest. 'I do agree he poses a danger, no question about that, based on what was found in the car,' Jenkins said. She also said the government failed to demonstrate a specific danger to the community, as required by law.

Hoffer acknowledged under questioning from the judge that he had no specific evidence of Megahed's intentions. Hoffer said that under the current charge, Megahed likely faces less than three years in prison if convicted.

A defense attorney maintained his client was not dangerous and that he has strong ties to the community and no record of violence. The federal courtroom was packed with Megahed's family members and friends, and Jenkins said she had received numerous letters in Megahed's support.

Neither the defense nor the prosecution presented sworn testimony during the hearing.

Megahed's public defender, Adam Allen, said there was no evidence his client made or saw the video that prosecutors said Mohamed made.

Both defendants are Egyptian citizens. Megahed is a legal, permanent resident of the Unites States, and Mohamed is here on a student visa.

Hoffer said that when deputies in South Carolina pulled the pair over for speeding on Aug. 4, they saw Megahed, who was the passenger, trying to put away the laptop computer that belonged to Mohamed. When investigators analyzed the computer, they found that the last-viewed images showed Qassam rockets, which are used by Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad. Also on the computer were videos of discussions of martyrdom and videos showing the firing of M-16 rifles, Hoffer said.

'Explosive Mixture'

In the trunk, deputies found four small sections of PVC pipe, at least three of which were stuffed with a 'potassium nitrate explosive mixture' of potassium nitrate, Karo syrup and kitty litter, Hoffer said. He said the kitty litter served as a binder to keep the substance from coming out of the pipes, which were not capped.

Investigators also found a container of gasoline, 20 feet of safety fuse and an electric drill, which Hoffer said could be used to drill holes in the pipe so fuses could be attached.

'Obviously, that raised the hackles of law enforcement in South Carolina,' Hoffer said. 'That's why we're here.'

Both men are charged with transporting explosives without a permit, relating to the stuffed PVC pipes deputies have described as pipe bombs. Hoffer conceded in court, however, that the devices, while explosive, were not pipe bombs and were not 'destructive devices' under the law.

Allen maintained that the filled PVC pipes couldn't do much damage because there were no caps and no metallic material that could serve as shrapnel.

Mohamed also is charged with demonstrating how to make explosives with the intent of helping terrorists. That charge evidently refers to the video, which Hoffer said Mohamed admitted making in his home in July using a camcorder. Hoffer said Mohamed posted the video on YouTube under another name. It shows Mohamed from the chest down standing in front of a tabletop and taking apart a radio-controlled toy car and pulling a wire from the remote control.

Speaking later from Cairo, Mohamed's father, Abdel Latif Sherif, said his son is being framed.

'This was created and put on his computer to blame him,' Sherif said. 'I can take a computer and put anything on it. They are making this up to make him look bad.'...

Under the passenger seat of the car in South Carolina, deputies found ammunition, said Hoffer, but no firearms.

Hoffer said investigators also searched a commercial storage facility. Inside they found a .22-caliber rifle that Megahed had purchased lawfully. Hoffer said Megahed recently tried to purchase a handgun.

Also in the storage facility were welding supplies and scuba diving equipment. Hoffer said Megahed has skill as a welder, so there could be a legitimate reason for those items.

The prosecutor said that when deputies questioned Megahed, he initially denied knowing about 'these rockets or fireworks in the trunk.' But when both defendants were put in the back seat of a patrol vehicle, their conversation in Arabic secretly was recorded, Hoffer said.

A translation summary of the recording shows Megahed asking about what happened to the explosives, Hoffer said, which the prosecutor said shows Megahed was aware of what was in the trunk. The car, Hoffer said, was registered to Megahed's brother.

"The meeting will investigate the "roots of intolerance towards Muslims...'" Will the violence committed by Muslims in the name of Islam be on the agenda as one of the contributing factors, and possibly the most important contributing factor, of this intolerance? Will the imperialistic boasts by Muslim leaders about the impending Islamic conquest of Europe be on the agenda?

I doubt that either one will be discussed. But why not?

From the FOCUS News Agency (thanks to Twostellas):

Madrid. Discrimination and intolerance towards Muslims will be the subject of an October 9-10 conference in the Spanish city of Cordoba under the aegis of the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), organisers said Friday, quoted by AFP.

The meeting will investigate the "roots of intolerance towards Muslims, the consequences and the role of the media," a Spanish Foreign Ministry statement read.
Spain currently holds the presidency of the OSCE and Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos will chair the meeting....

Still more assaults on freedom of speech. An update on this story from Asharq Alawsat (thanks to all who sent this in):

CAIRO, Egypt (Agencies) - The leader of al-Qaeda in Iraq offered money for the murder of a Swedish cartoonist who recently produced images deemed insulting to Islam and promised a new offensive in Iraq during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, in a statement carried by Islamist Web sites Saturday.

In a half hour audio file entitled "They plotted yet God too was plotting," Abu Omar al-Baghdadi also named the other insurgent groups in Iraq al-Qaeda was fighting and promised new attacks, particular against the minority Yazidi sect that was recently devastated by massive car bombs. "We are calling for the assassination of cartoonist Lars Vilks who dared insult our Prophet, peace be upon him, and we announce a reward during this generous month of Ramadan of US$100,000 (¤72,000) for the one who kills this criminal," the transcript on the Web site said.

During Ramadan, because that is a time when a Muslim intensifies his commitment to Islam. "They plotted and God too was plotting" is from Qur'an 3:54.

In "5 Myths About Terrorism" in the Washington Post (thanks to Steve), Alan B. Krueger provides a sterling example of the politically correct myopia that prevents an accurate analysis of the global jihad and Islamic supremacism. And he does so in such a clumsy way that it is remarkable that no one at the paper caught this before it was printed:

4. Terrorism is mainly perpetrated by Muslims.

Wrong. No religion has a monopoly on terrorism. Every major religious faith has had followers involved in terrorism. (Sri Lanka, for instance, has grappled for decades with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, a separatist group that pioneered suicide bombing as a terrorist tactic and hopes to create a homeland for the country's mostly Tamil minority, who are largely Hindu.) Although radical Islamic terrorists are the worry du jour because of 9/11 and Iraq, the data show pretty clearly that the predominant religion of a country is not a good predictor of whether its people will become involved in terrorism.

After all, it was not long ago that homegrown villains such as Timothy McVeigh and the so-called Unabomber were the most notorious terrorists. That makes sense; the vast majority of terrorist incidents are local, motivated by local concerns and carried out by natives. Even international terrorist events tend to be local affairs, most frequently carried out by local militants who target foreigners who happen to be in their country. (Just think of last week's foiled plot to attack U.S. targets in Germany.) This suggests that the likelihood of attack by homegrown terrorists is far greater than the threat of another 9/11-style attack by foreigners.

Did you catch that? Terrorism isn't "mainly perpetrated by Muslims" because "no religion has a monopoly on terrorism." This doesn't even establish what Krueger wants it to establish, because the fact that people of all religions have committed terrorist acts doesn't disprove the contention that terrorism is mainly perpetrated by Muslims. If one group is responsible for something, say, 80% of the time, it is mainly responsible for it: you can't point to the existence of the other 20% as if it were proof that the 80% group is not mainly responsible.

Also, it should be obviously absurd to everyone at this point, but of course it isn't, to drag out poor old McVeigh, and the Unabomber to boot, and stack them up as equivalent to the plethora of armed Islamic organizations that can be found all over the planet, and the more the 9,000 terror attacks committed in the name of Islam since 9/11. But of course since the overwhelming majority of those have not been reported by Krueger's friends with any significant mention or exploration of the Islamic texts and teachings that the perpetrators used to justify them, most Americans don't realize that they have anything to do with Islam in the first place -- while every schoolchild knows that McVeigh was a Christian (he wasn't).

Finally, it is in no way relevant to a discussion of terrorism in general, much less Islamic jihad terrorism in particular, to assert that "every major religious faith has had followers involved in terrorism." It's a shame that such superficial analysis is so dominant these days. While the statement may be broadly true, it brushes by the central question: does Islamic theology and tradition contain any elements that encourage its followers to be involved in terrorism? Do other religions? This is a central consideration of my book Religion of Peace?, and it is a question media and policymakers should be asking. They don't, of course, because CAIR and others have mau-maued them into thinking that even to ask such questions promotes "bigotry" and "intolerance," as well as that trumped-up concept "Islamophobia." It never occurs to them that such discussions would actually aid the moderate Muslims they profess to support, being a necessary step toward the self-criticism that would have to be an essential component of any genuine Islamic reform.

Three jihad propagandists have been arrested -- one later released -- in Austria, and another suspect in Canada. "Austria's 'Jihad by Telecommute," by Yassin Musharbash for Spiegel:

They translated and prepared terror videos, claims of responsibility and al-Qaida propaganda on the Internet. Austrian police have now attributed this handiwork to the Global Islamic Media Front and the leader of this network is reportedly among the arrested.

It's been three weeks since the Global Islamic Media Front (GIMF) put out an ad for a translator to help with the growing workload in terror news. "Brothers and sisters with English language skills are especially sought," wrote a GIMF member. "We're looking for someone with time to sacrifice for Allah and thereby support the jihad." Instructions were to send an e-mail response, after which one would receive "a little job" in return.

"Jihad by Telecommute" could have been GIMF's business slogan. For almost two years it operated a pair of Internet sites in German, one of which used a discussion forum to publicize acts of terror committed by bin Laden & Co. No one else in the German-speaking world was more effective at this task.

At least until Wednesday, when Austrian police took three people into custody believed to be connected with the site -- including two men, 26 and 21, and a 21-year-old woman. They are accused of having been involved in the production of a video published on the GIMF homepage on March 11 that showed a disguised Arabic-speaking spokesperson threatening attacks in Germany and Austria if those countries did not withdraw their soldiers from Afghanistan.

One line from a video asking the question, "Is it not dumb to embolden the mujahedeen to carry out attacks in your country?" proved particularly worrisome to the authorities.

One has since been freed, though there is also a suspect in custody in Canada. "Austria frees one in Internet Islamic threat case," from Reuters:

VIENNA (Reuters) - Austrian authorities on Friday freed one of three people arrested on suspicion of posting a video message on the Internet threatening attacks on Austria and Germany, a judiciary spokesman said.

A fourth person is in custody in Canada in connection with the same case of links to al Qaeda.

In Austria, a Vienna judge released a 26-year-old man for lack of sufficient evidence that he committed a crime, judiciary spokesman Christian Gneist said.

[...]

Austrian authorities said they decided to close in on the suspects after learning that the man and wife were about to leave the country to go to Egypt for their honeymoon.

The suspect arrested in Canada had also been about to leave the country, Austrian authorities said.

Lastly, two other details from Agence France-Presse:

Public security chief, Erich Buxbaum, said the three, all resident in Vienna, were second-generation Austrian Muslims whose families came from the Arab world.

"It was a conspiratorial network but we have no concrete evidence of planned terrorist attacks in Austria or elsewhere," he said.

Nevertheless, wiretaps carried out before the arrests allegedly revealed discussion on how to handle explosives, he added.

"These individuals are going to take the path of least resistance. And I'm sad to say that that path is the border."

Farida Ahmed Update. "Homeland Security: Woman Had Terrorist Ties," from KRGV:

MCALLEN - For the first time, Homeland Security openly admitted a Pakistani woman captured in McAllen has terrorist ties.

Farida Ahmed was caught at the McAllen-Miller International Airport in 2004. She was on her way to New York with $7,000 in cash and a South African passport.

We learned she had swum across the river into the U.S.

At the time, NEWSCHANNEL 5 uncovered Ahmed was on a terror watch list. The information confirmed off the record through our sources.

Just this week, Texas Homeland Security Director Steve McCraw admitted publicly that Ahmed did have terrorist ties to an insurgent group in Pakistan. The group reportedly smuggles Afghanis and other foreign nationals.

Fred Burton is a counterterrorism expert recently appointed to the Texas Border Security Council.

He says, "You had an individual that had associations with an international terrorist organization all probability that would have been a jihadist group."

Burton recalls the Ahmed case. He tells us there are ongoing investigations right now.

"These individuals are going to take the path of least resistance. And I'm sad to say that that path is the border," says Burton.

Hamid Hayat Update. "Hamid Hayat sentenced" by Layla Bohm for the Lodi News-Sentinel:

Lodi resident Hamid Hayat was sentenced Monday to 24 years in federal prison after a jury convicted him of supporting terrorists and then lying about it to the FBI.

Hayat, who turned 25 Monday, has been jailed since June 2005, when he was arrested during a large scale FBI investigation in Lodi. He had faced a maximum of 39 years in federal prison, though U.S. District Judge Garland E. Burrell Jr. noted his lack of criminal record at sentencing — but not before issuing strong words about the defendant.

"Hamid Hayat attended a terrorist training camp, returned to the United States ready and willing to wage violent jihad when directed to do so regardless of the havoc such jihad could wreak on persons and property within the United States," Burrell said as he handed down the sentence.

Hayat, wearing shackles and orange jail clothing, expressed no visible emotion. His mother and 12-year-old sister, seated in the courtroom behind him, cried silently. His father, Umer Hayat, said his son is innocent.

"It's a sad day for us but we are confident he's going to get out on appeal," he said.

Another story at EarthTimes specifies that the case will go to the rather infamous 9th Circuit Court of Appeals. Stay tuned.

[...]

The defense, as well as the Muslim community, has expressed strong skepticism of the government's methods. If nothing else, the government "sent a clear message to the Muslim community that you do not speak to the FBI without a lawyer present," said Basim Elkarra, executive director for the Central Valley branch of the Council on American-Islamic Relations.

Of course the defense did. That's kind of their job.

More misplaced alarm about "Islamophobia" in Europe, while the jihadists plot, and legal coercion and demographic conquest proceed. Again, the label "right wing" is the kiss of death, inviting the wholesale dismissal of any issue being addressed.

"Islamaphobia on rise, especially in Europe," from Reuters:

GENEVA - The United Nations investigator on racism on Friday condemned a rising trend of Islamaphobia, especially in Europe, where he said it was being exploited by some right-wing political parties.

Doudou Diene, UN special rapporteur on racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related forms of intolerance, also accused Switzerland’s most popular party, the right-wing Swiss People’s Party (SVP/UDC), of inciting hatred.

He urged the withdrawal of the party’s controversial campaign poster calling for expulsion of foreigners who commit serous crimes, depicting three white sheep booting out a black sheep under the headline “For the Security of All”.

“In the current context, Islamaphobia constitutes the most serious form of religious defamation,” Diene said in a speech and report to the UN Human Rights Council, whose 47 member states were holding a debate on religious defamation.

More and more political leaders and influential media and intellectuals were “equating Islam with violence and terrorism,” and some were seeking to “silence religious practices by banning the construction of mosques”, Diene said.

Pakistan, speaking for the Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC), called the rise of Islamaphobia “alarming”.

Of course, Cartoon Rage makes an appearance:

“Recent acts of defamation in the shape of blasphemous sketches in Sweden and posters in Switzerland reinforce this conclusion. Such blasphemy should not be encouraged in the name of freedom of expression,” Pakistan’s envoy Masood Khan said.

He said the 57-nation OIC, which represents 1.3 billion Muslims, condemned terrorism in all its forms.

That's nice. What about jihad? Wait, sorry, we're supposed to "de-link" Islam and violence in our minds, according to the OIC.

“The international media continues to use the misguided actions of a small extremist minority as an excuse to malign the entire Muslim world, as well as the religion of Islam,” he said.

“Scapegoating”

Diene, a Senegalese lawyer, said in his 21-page report to the Council that Islamaphobia had grown since the Sept 11 2001 attacks on the United States.

Worldwide, an increasing number of traditional democratic parties were “resorting to the language of fear and exclusion, scapegoating and targeting ethnic or religious minorities in general, and immigrants and refugees in particular”, he said.

In Europe, Muslims faced growing difficulties to establish places of worship and carry out their religious practices such as dietary regimens and burials, according to the UN envoy.

“Political parties with open anti-Islamic platforms have joined governmental coalitions in several countries and started to put in place their political agendas. In sum, Islamophobia is in the process of permeating all facets of social life.”

As we have said here before, the surefire way to end Islamophobia would be to end violent attacks committed by Muslims in the name of Islam.

The Swiss SVP/UDC has launched a referendum to ban construction of minarets in the Alpine country, home to 350,000 Muslims. A similar move is underway in Cologne, Germany.

Switzerland’s delegation defended its system of direct democracy, where multiple issues are put to referendum each year, saying it showed great political transparency although ”sometimes with exaggerated, regrettable views being expressed”.

“The Swiss government has repeatedly stated its commitment to fight racism and the Swiss government will continue to take a clear stance against all forms of discrimination and xenophobia,” Swiss ambassador Blaise Godet said.

Possibly a major terror attack averted in Detroit. The above image is from Houssein Zorkot's website (thanks to all who sent this in), via HotAir:

An update on this story. "Police Prevent Terrorist Attack in Michigan," from WLNS.com :

Federal authorities in Dearborn may have stopped a planned terrorist attack and mass murder before it happened. Police got a tip that a 26-year-old medical student was planning an attack, and when they stopped him in a Dearborn park, he had an AK-47 assault rifle and was dressed in black military style clothing. He also had black makeup on his face as he climbed into an SUV with the loaded weapon. The man was arrested and is facing several felony charges. Police say he has a website where he claims to be a member of the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah.

More in this video.

At last the truth -- the truth we have repeated here for years -- is coming out. "Inside the Ring," by Bill Gertz in the Washington Times (thanks to Matthew):

The international Sunni jihadist group Muslim Brotherhood set up numerous U.S. front groups since the 1990s that should be regarded as hostile and a threat to the United States, a Pentagon Joint Staff analyst said.

Stephen Caughlin, a lawyer and military intelligence specialist on the Joint Staff, stated in a Sept. 7 memorandum that many U.S. Muslim groups viewed as moderate by the Justice Department and other government agencies secretly are linked to the pro-terrorist Muslim Brotherhood. The groups also are engaged in influence and deception operations designed to mask their true aims, he said.

Documents entered into evidence in the federal terrorism trial in Dallas of the Holy Land Foundation, a charity charged with illegally funding the Palestinian Hamas terrorist group, reveal new security threats from a network of more than 29 U.S. Muslim groups.

"These documents are beginning to define the structure and outline of domestic jihad threat entities, associated nongovernmental organizations and potential terrorist or insurgent support systems," Mr. Caughlin said.

Specifically, a 1991 Muslim Brotherhood memorandum "describes aspects of the global jihad's strategic information warfare campaign and indications of its structure, reach and activities," Mr. Caughlin said.

The Muslim Brotherhood memo on organizing Muslims in North America said that all members "must understand their work in America is a kind of grand jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within, and 'sabotaging' its miserable house by their hands and the hands of believers so that it is eliminated and God's religion is made victorious over all other religions."

Mr. Caughlin said in his memo that "consequently, outreach strategies must be adjusted in the face of credible information that seeming Islamic humanitarian or professional nongovernmental organizations may be part of the global jihad with potential for being part of the terrorist or insurgent support system," he said.

Mr. Caughlin said the 1991 memorandum identifies the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) as part of the Muslim Brotherhood. The ISNA, one of more than 300 unindicted co-conspirators in the Holy Land Foundation trial, recently became a subject of controversy among officials who opposed the Justice Department's participation in a conference held last month, despite opposition from two members of Congress.

In August, Rep. Peter Hoekstra, Michigan Republican, and Rep. Sue Myrick, North Carolina Republican, wrote to Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales to oppose the Justice Department's attendance at the ISNA conference in Chicago as a "grave mistake" because it would legitimize a group with "extremist origins."

The Justice Department said in response that its participation at the Labor Day weekend meeting was part of "outreach efforts ... to educate the public about how the department works to protect religious freedom, voting rights, economic opportunity, and many other rights."

Mr. Caughlin warned in his memo that such outreach "can cause those responsible for its success to so narrowly focus on the outreach relationship that they miss the surrounding events and lose perspective."

"This could undermine unity of effort in homeland security, lead to potential for embarrassment for the [U.S. government] and legitimize threat organizations by providing them domestic sanctuary."

No war of Ideas

Sen. Joe Lieberman pressed senior U.S. intelligence and security officials this week on what the Bush administration is doing to counter the ideology of Islamic extremism domestically and internationally.

The answer from the top officials: Not much.

Mr. Lieberman, chairman of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, said during a hearing Monday that a war of ideas is needed to counter Islamic extremists.

"Because this is a war, but it is ultimately a war against, and with, an ideology that is inimical to our own values of freedom and tolerance and diversity," the Connecticut independent said.

FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III revealed during the hearing that the FBI has no counterideology response other than its "outreach" to Muslim-American communities so they "understand the FBI" and address "the radicalization issue," he said.

Asked whether the FBI has a responsibility to wage a battle of ideas within U.S. Muslim-American communities, Mr. Mueller said: "You put that where I would say no, that it would not be our responsibility for any religion to engage in the war of ideas."

The FBI's responsibility, he said, is "to explain that once one goes over the line and it becomes not a war of ideas but a criminal offense, this is what you can expect, and to elicit the support of those in whatever religious community to assist us in assuring that those who cross that line are appropriately investigated and convicted."

The comment shows that despite the creation of a dedicated FBI intelligence-gathering branch, the bureau remains limited to investigation and law enforcement.

Retired Vice Adm. Scott Redd, head of the National Counterterrorism Center who has a strategic operational role in countering terrorism, said one of the "four pillars" of the U.S. war strategy is the "war of ideas," but he noted that there is no "home office" for that effort in the United States.

Retired Vice Adm. Mike McConnell, director of national intelligence, said the intelligence community does not conduct any battle of ideas against terrorists in the United States unless there is a foreign connection.

Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff also said nothing is being done domestically to battle Islamist extremist ideas. The department's incident management team, he said, is focused on civil rights or civil liberties — not fighting terrorists' ideology.

Ain't that the truth. Where is the new Radio Free Europe, where is the new Voice of America, to broadcast into the Islamic world against the jihad ideology?

Fighting the war of ideas -- that is the primary focus of my new book. But I see hardly anyone else working in this area.

1938 Alert, and an update on this story from the Associated Press:

North Koreans were in Syria and Damascus may have had contacts with "secret suppliers" to obtain nuclear equipment, a senior US nuclear official said Friday.

Andrew Semmel, acting deputy assistant secretary of state for nuclear nonproliferation policy, did not name the suppliers, but said there were North Koreans in Syria and that he could not exclude that the network run by disgraced Pakistan nuclear scientist A.Q. Khan may have been involved.

Semmel was responding to questions about an Israeli air strike in northern Syria last week.

Neither side has explained what exactly happened, but a US government official confirmed that Israeli warplanes were targeting weapons from Iran and destined for Hizbullah in Lebanon.

The Washington Post reported Thursday that Israel had gathered satellite imagery showing possible North Korean cooperation with Syria on a nuclear facility.

Semmel, who is in Italy for a meeting Saturday on the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, said that Syria was certainly on the US nuclear "watch list."

"There are indicators that they do have something going on there," he said. "We do know that there are a number of foreign technicians that have been in Syria. We do know that there may have been contact between Syria and some secret suppliers for nuclear equipment. Whether anything transpired remains to be seen."

"So good foreign policy, good national security policy, would suggest that we pay very close attention to that," he said. "We're watching very closely. Obviously, the Israelis were watching very closely."

Asked if the suppliers could have been North Koreans, he said: "There are North Korean people there. There's no question about that. Just as there are a lot of North Koreans in Iraq and Iran."

Asked if the so-called Khan network, which supplied nuclear technology to Iran, Libya and North Korea, could have been involved, he said he "wouldn't exclude" it.

They have condemned terrorism, you see, but "a matching response had not been forthcoming." Instead, there is a growing "religious intolerance and xenophobia in the west" -- not like in the Islamic world! And what are they doing to help Muslims de-link Islam from terrorism? On that point they are silent.

And here we're told that the OIC condemned "forced religious conversions by majority religious groups, attacks of places of worship, restriction on the display of religious symbols and erosion of rights of parents to ensure moral education for their children." Great -- that, condemnations of violence and terror, and a buck will get you a cup of coffee. Have they condemned Islamic supremacism? The imperative to subjugate unbelievers by violent or peaceful means? What do you think?

"OIC urges de-linking Islam from terrorism," from KUNA (thanks to Twostellas):

GENEVA, Sept 13 (KUNA) -- The Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC), told the Human Rights Council (HRC) Thursday that the report of the Special Rapporteur on freedom of religion or belief called for stronger denunciation of violence by Muslim leaders in order to "de-link" Islam from terrorism. Representing the OIC, Pakistani diplomat Marghoob Saleem Butt said that there had been many such denunciations and a matching response had not been forthcoming. "The ever-growing incidents of religious intolerance and xenophobia in the west were taking the world far from its aim of religious and cultural harmony. The OIC condemned forced religious conversions by majority religious groups, attacks of places of worship, restriction on the display of religious symbols and erosion of rights of parents to ensure moral education for their children, " the diplomat added.

Meanwhile, what the OIC really wants is restriction of Western freedom of expression:

The representative of the OIC stressed that the Islamic countries deplored States that linked freedom of belief with freedom of expression and opinion in order to shrug off responsibility. "Unrestricted and disrespectful enjoyment of freedom of expression was contrary to the spirit of peaceful dialogue. Equating religions with extremist terrorism was dangerous and it was essential to de-link terrorist acts from the right to peacefully follow one's faith," the diplomat added. The representative of the OIC said efforts were needed to eliminate intolerance and discrimination, including through education and interfaith dialogue.

I would guess that the Finnish establishment is beside itself with glee over this development, for they take it as evidence that Muslims are assimilating, joining the political process, becoming responsible Finnish citizens. But look at the party program: "The Finnish Islamic Party platform supports a ban on alcohol sales, the option for Muslim children to be excused from school music classes and outings to swimming pools, legal status for ritual animal killing and male circumcision, and the eventual introduction of shari'a law in Finland."

Most Finns, like most Westerners, have no idea what Sharia has in store for them. It involves a lot more than "preventing crime" -- it involves the institutionalized subjugation of non-Muslims and women. The Finns would no doubt now consign such an idea to "racism" and "Islamophobia." But they will find out soon enough what Sharia really involves.

"Islamic party forms in Finland," from Catholic World News (thanks to Josephine):

Helsinki, Sep. 12, 2007 (CWNews.com) - Europe's first Islamic political party has formed in Finland.

The Finnish Islamic Party plans to collect 5,000 signatures in order to qualify for official registration by the end of the year. Counting on support from the 55,000 Muslims living in Finland, the party anticipates some success in next year's municipal elections as well as in the 2011 parliamentary elections. Party spokesman Abdullah Tammi acknowledged to reporters that to date the party has enrolled only a few dozen members.

The Finnish Islamic Party platform supports a ban on alcohol sales, the option for Muslim children to be excused from school music classes and outings to swimming pools, legal status for ritual animal killing and male circumcision, and the eventual introduction of shari'a law in Finland. Tammi added that the purpose of Sharia law was to prevent crime.

Tiny Minority of Extremists Update. From AFP:

ISLAMABAD (AFP) - Al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden is more popular in Pakistan than President Pervez Musharraf, according to a poll released Wednesday.

Nearly three-quarters of Pakistanis also oppose unilateral US military action against Islamic insurgents in Pakistan's tribal areas, said the poll for Terror Free Tomorrow, a US-based organisation.

The survey "may help explain why Osama bin Laden remains at large in Pakistan and why both al-Qaeda and the Taleban have regrouped there", the group said in a statement.

Uh huh.

It said it polled 1,044 people across Pakistan between August 18 and August 29.

Military ruler Musharraf, facing the biggest political crisis of his eight years in power and increasing pressure from Washington to tackle extremism, is the biggest in from the poll.

It said his approval rating was 38 per cent behind 46 per cent for bin Laden, the architect of the September 11, 2001 attacks who is believed to be hiding on the Pakistan-Afghanistan border.

Bin Laden's ratings jumped to 70 per cent in the Islamist-ruled North West Frontier Province.

An anniversary gift for 9/11, evidently from Oman. From FFI admin Doubting Thomas, in a message posted at JihadChat (thanks to buraq_is_dead):

Yes, the server was hacked by someone using an IP from Oman... Although the hacker had only been in the server for about 40 minutes when I discovered it, he'd already made a number of changes, and was attempting to gather information. There was no option but to shut down the server.

Immediately after stopping the server, we ordered a complete reinstall of the operating system from the datacenter. This should be completed soon, and then I will begin reinstalling the services needed for a webserver. After this, I will begin restoring the sites. Like last time, I expect this to take at least a week. With a little luck, the main site may be up this weekend, and then Ali can post an article about this.

Islamic Tolerance Alert: "Islamic Sharia Scholars Call for Applying Apostasy Punishment and Enacting a Law Criminalizing Inter-Faith Marriages," by Ahmed al-Beheri for Almasry Alyoum (thanks to Suzy):

Some participants in the symposium on 'Apostasy Punishment: Problems and Answers', called for the need to enact a law banning and criminalizing inter-faith marriage to overcome the problems that could occur between Muslims and Copts as a result of this marriage.

In his speech at the symposium organized by the cultural committee of the Syndicate of Journalists the day before last, Dr Mohamed Kamal Imam, Professor and Chairman of the Islamic Sharia Department at the Faculty of Law of the University of Alexandria, said why do not we pass a law expressly prohibiting marriage between followers of different faiths, especially in Egypt, so that to eliminate the problems that could occur because of this marriage and set off tension between Muslims and Christians.

He stressed that there is no contradiction between Allah's words: "Then whosoever will, let him believe, and whosoever will, let him disbelieve" and "There is no compulsion in religion" on the one hand and the punishment of apostasy in Islam, because the first case – according to him – deals with the belief and carrying out punishments.

Kamal pointed out that Islam is a universal religion that realistically recognizes other religions and allows Muslims to marry non-Muslims and that it is the only religion that permits this, but enacting a law preventing matrimony between Muslims and followers of other religions would eliminate many problems.

Dr. Nasr Farid Wasel, former Egypt Mufti, said that all scholars agree that the punishment for rejecting Islam is punishable by death, because Islam did not sanction apostasy, because it did not force or coerce any one into embracing Islam, therefore a renegade must either repent or be condemned to the punishment of apostasy, because it is the right of Allah, the Almighty.

According to all scholars, from the days of the foremost companions and their followers until this time, the punishment for apostasy was sanctioned to preserve the rights and the unity of the community and therefore non-application of this punishment leads to disunity. Allah the Almighty said: "And verily this Brotherhood of yours is a single Brotherhood, and I am your Lord and Cherisher: therefore fear Me (and no other)".

He pointed out that Islamic Sharia is the practical application of all acts of the people in life, for both Muslims or non-Muslims, and that it took into account every detail of the conditions of human life from birth till one meets his God, explaining that the practice of Sharia was in the area of general issues concerning the rights of God or the people, namely the 'punishments', as the scholars put it, which have been enacted to protect the rights of God and His servants.

"Whoever embraces Islam out of his own volition has made a contract with Allah and with the group, therefore he has no right to revoke it, because he embraced Islam after becoming fully convinced and he should bear the responsibility of his decision", said Wasel.

Read it all.

A third-year medical student -- which fact recalls the recent Doctors' Plot in the UK, and the news that came out at that time of large-scale attempts by jihadists to recruit doctors and other professionals.

But let us not rush to judgment. Maybe he was hunting squirrels.

Video here (thanks to Ray).

Coverage is very sparse. Here is a story from the thrice-weekly Press & Guide, "Man with AK-47 assault rifle arrested after leaving Dearborn's Hemlock Park":

DEARBORN - Houssein Zorkot, a 26-year-old Dearborn resident, was arraigned Tuesday in 19th District Court on multiple felony charges, including carrying a dangerous weapon with unlawful intent — a five-year felony.

Zorkot, a third-year medical student at Wayne State University, was allegedly armed with an AK-47 assault rifle and dressed in black clothing with camouflage paint covering his face when he was arrested Saturday in Hemlock Park.

According to police, Zorkot was observed attempting to leave the park in a black SUV after officers had received reports of a man carrying a rifle in the area. He was placed under arrest and is scheduled to undergo a preliminary examination at 9 a.m. Sept. 21 in 19th District Court.

Zorkot has also been charged with one count of possession of a loaded firearm in a motor vehicle and one count of felony firearm. He remains in custody on a $1 million bond (cash, no 10 percent).

Striking out at the rampant Islamophobia displayed by ancient Buddhist carvings, the irrepressible iconoclasts of the Taliban have attempted to continue the work they began when they blew up the Buddhas of Bamiyan. Oh, what fun they'll have in Europe!

"Attack on giant Pakistan Buddha," from the BBC (thanks to John):

Suspected pro-Taleban militants have tried to blow up an ancient carving of Buddha in north-west Pakistan.

The statue, thought to date from the second century BC, sustained only minimal damage in the attack near Manglore in remote Swat district.

The area has seen a rise in attacks on "un-Islamic" targets in recent months.

This is the first such attack in Pakistan and is reminiscent of the Taleban's 2001 destruction of the giant Buddhas at Bamiyan in Afghanistan.

Dynamite

Officials and witnesses in Swat said armed men arrived in the area on Monday night.

"Militants drilled holes in the rock and filled them with dynamite and blew it up," provincial archaeology department official Aqleem Khan told Reuters news agency.

"The explosion damaged the upper part of the rock but there was no damage to the image itself."

Did he have a camera or didn't he?

Compare:

"Man On Terrorism Watch List Suspected Of Taking Bridge Photos," from NBC10.com :

BLAIRSTOWN, N.J. -- A man whose name is on a terrorism watch list and suspected of taking photos of a bridge between Pennsylvania and New Jersey was questioned and released after authorities determined he did nothing wrong.

The man had pulled over to the side of the road on Monday, the day before the sixth anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks. State police responded to a call reporting that a man who appeared to be Middle Eastern was photographing the Interstate 80 bridge over the Delaware River.

New Jersey State Police Capt. Al Della Fave said the man, whose identity was not released, did not have a camera and was simply looking at the bridge while his wife fed their infant child.

"He said he was looking for a safe place to pull over so his wife could feed the baby," Della Fave said. "The trooper asked him, 'What about the pictures you were taking?' He said, 'What do you mean? I wasn't taking any pictures."'

The trooper contacted state and federal authorities, who quickly determined that the man's name appears on a terrorism watch list. Neither Della Fave nor Roger Shatzkin, a spokesman for the New Jersey Office of Homeland Security, could say why the man's name was on the list.

The trooper asked for and received permission to search the man's car. No camera was found in the car or the surrounding area, and the man was permitted to go on his way, police said....

"Man taking photos of I-80 bridge found to be on terror watch list," from AP (thanks to Alida:

STROUDSBURG, Pa. -- The Monroe County district attorney says a man on a terrorism watch list was discovered taking photos of the Interstate 80 bridge crossing the Delaware River.

District Attorney E. David Christine tells The Morning Call of Allentown that police talked with the man Monday, but didn't detain him. Christine says the man told police he was taking pictures for fun while on vacation. Christine says authorities didn't learn that the man was on the FBI watch list until later.

The man's name wasn't immediately released.

The man was taking pictures from the New Jersey side of the bridge.

So a New Jersey State Police Captain says he had no camera, and a district attorney says he did, but he was just taking pictures for fun.

Do you get the impression that someone is not being entirely forthcoming about this incident?

If anyone has any more information, please send it in.

1938 Alert. "U.S. Confirms Israeli Strikes Hit Syrian Target Last Week," by Mark Mazzetti and Helene Cooper for the New York Times (thanks to all who sent this in):

WASHINGTON, Sept. 11 — After days of silence from the Israeli government, American officials confirmed Tuesday that Israeli warplanes launched airstrikes inside Syria last week, the first such attack since 2003.

A Defense Department official said Israeli jets had struck at least one target in northeastern Syria last Thursday, but the official said it was still unclear exactly what the jets hit and the extent of the bombing damage.

Syria has lodged a protest at the United Nations in response to the airstrike, accusing Israel of “flagrant violation” of its airspace. But Israel’s government has repeatedly declined to comment on the matter.

Officials in Washington said that the most likely targets of the raid were weapons caches that Israel’s government believes Iran has been sending the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah through Syria. Iran and Syria are Hezbollah’s primary benefactors, and American intelligence officials say a steady flow of munitions from Iran runs through Syria and into Lebanon....

One Bush administration official said Israel had recently carried out reconnaissance flights over Syria, taking pictures of possible nuclear installations that Israeli officials believed might have been supplied with material from North Korea. The administration official said Israeli officials believed that North Korea might be unloading some of its nuclear material on Syria....

Syria’s president, Bashar al-Assad, has said that if Israel is not willing to resume negotiations for the return of the Golan Heights, which Israel captured in the 1967 Arab-Israeli war, the alternative would be to try to regain the territory by force....

The nation-state is meaningless to a good Muslim, to the precise extent that he takes his Islam seriously. It exists; he needs its passport. He wants, in the case of the Infidel nation-state, to enjoy all the fruits of that state -- the fruits that are produced because it is the creation of Infidels, and is well-run, productive, and has stability and the rule of law. The "refugee," or rather immigrant, generally comes from one of an assortment of badly-run Muslim countries where despots are the natural order, given how Islam inculcates the notion that political legitimacy is to be located elsewhere than in "will of the people."

Listen carefully to Muslim rhetoric in this country. It is always not-quite-what-it-seems-to-be: we hear, for example, the phrase "we are here to stay." What does that mean? Is that a rousing sign of loyalty to the American political and legal system? Or is it, rather, an aggressive and defiant expression -- we're here, we're not going anywhere, and we will do exactly as we please, in putting relentless pressure on the American legal and political system, on its educational system, on its social understandings, and will never give up, and don't think about trying to stop us -- because "we're here to stay."

We've done a lot.

We've spent $880 billion -- more than the total cost of all the wars, save World War II, that the United States has ever fought.

In Iraq we have built schools, hospitals, roads, protected oilfields and repaired those that are damaged. We have handed out packets of money: stacked it high on pallets, handed it out like confetti ("I can't believe we are paying these people not to shoot at us" as one soldier was quoted in The Washington Times). It was not enough, you see, to assure ourselves that Saddam Hussein did not possess weapons of mass destruction or programs that were close to manufacturing such weaponry. (The Americans did not realize that his intent was to fool Iran, not the United States, into thinking that he did possess such weapons -- and apparently they still don't realize that). Now that it is in the Shi'a thrall -- the thrall of Maliki and the greatly-misunderstood Al-Sistani (see "Mugged by Reality" by John Agresto) -- is Iraq now, in the scheme of things, less or more likely to be a force for "secularism"? Is it less or more likely to be such a force now that both kinds of Islam, Sunni and Shi'a, have been given a boost at the expense of the secularism? Secularism was, admittedly, thin but at least permitted, for reasons having to do with the political calculations of the outnumbered Sunnis who ruled over Iraq. It was allowed to develop, though not encouraged as, for example, it was encouraged by Ataturk or the Shah of Iran.

Final Exam:

Passage #1:

Another of the group, Yu Jung-hwa, described how she thought she was going to die.

"The most difficult moment, when I had a big fear of death, was when the Taleban shot [a] video.

"All 23 of us leaned against a wall and armed Taleban aimed their guns at us, and a pit was before me.

"They said they will save us if we believe in Islam. I almost fainted at the time and I still cannot look at cameras," she said.

Passage #2:

Qur'an 2.256: "There is no compulsion in religion."

--------------------------------------------------------------------

Discuss Passages #1 and #2. You may bring in any additional knowledge you may have from your other reading on the 1350-year history of Islam. For this you may touch on:

Jihad, the struggle against Infidels who put up resistance to the spread and dominance of Islam, is a central and permanent duty imposed on Believers by the texts and tenets of Islam. Sometimes it can be fulfilled as a collective duty, where some participate actively and the rest merely lend support. Some circumstances require a Believer to participate individually and directly, and not merely to support, in any number of ways, others who might participate.

Jihad does not employ terrorism alone, or even mainly. Qitaal, or military combat, was always the traditional and most obvious way that Islam was spread. And what we correctly identify as "terrorism" is what most Muslims would describe as a form of qitaal. As for the other instruments of Jihad, they have proven in modern circumstances far more effective than qitaal.

Terry Davis says that "the fact is that Europe and its values are indeed under threat, but the danger is not coming from Islam. Our common European values are undermined by bigots and radicals, both islamists and islamophobes, who exploit fears and prejudice for their own political objectives."

Moral equivalence of the first water. "Islamophobes" are not flying planes into buildings. They are not predicting their conquest of Europe. They are not physically attacking people who do not conform to their code of conduct.

"Islamophobia"? Stop blowing things up in the name of Islam, and it will disappear. That Terry Davis would ignore all this and equate these two is unconscionable.

"Europe is threatened by bigots - not by Islam," from the Council of Europe (thanks to all who sent this in):

Statement by Terry Davis, Secretary General of the Council of Europe, on the march “Against the Islamisation of Europe” today in Brussels

Strasbourg, 11.09.2007 - European values are under threat, say the organisers of a protest march under the banner “Against the Islamisation of Europe” which was due to place today in Brussels in spite of the ban by the city Mayor. The fact is that Europe and its values are indeed under threat, but the danger is not coming from Islam. Our common European values are undermined by bigots and radicals, both islamists and islamophobes, who exploit fears and prejudice for their own political objectives.

The self-proclaimed defenders of European values say that the Mayor has violated their rights under the European Convention on Human Rights. The freedom of assembly and the freedom of expression are indeed essential preconditions for democracy, but they should not be regarded as a licence to offend. I will not enter into the discussion about whether the march should have been allowed or not, but I note that the protesters’ reading of the Convention is selective to say the least. It is very important to remember that the freedom of assembly and expression can be restricted to protect the rights and freedoms of others, including the freedom of thought, conscience and religion. This applies to everyone in Europe including the millions of Europeans of Islamic faith, who were the main target of today’s shameful display of bigotry and intolerance.

"...the freedom of assembly and expression can be restricted to protect the rights and freedoms of others, including the freedom of thought, conscience and religion."

Noted: freedom of assembly and expression are on the ropes in Europe. It will be ironic when those whose freedom of thought, conscience and religion Terry Davis is intent on protecting begin to restrict his own freedom of thought, conscience and religion, and that of his friends.

I guess they really hated her disastrous "comeback" performance the other day.

Certainly Britney Spears and Madonna would do well to retire to convents and leave us alone. But killing them seems a bit...extreme. Of course, being pious Muslims, first they will invite them to accept Islam.

Seriously, this is an important point, since Dinesh D'Souza and others believe that if we did clean up pop culture, the jihad would end. I think this ignores the fact that the jihad existed before the advent of today's corrupt pop culture. Note also that the Qur'an and Islamic tradition and law specify that Jews and Christians must be fought and subjugated -- Jews and Christians, not "corrupt" or "immoral" Jews and Christians.

Sharia Alert: "Terrorists: We'll cut off head of 'prostitute' Britney Spears," from WND (thanks to Rosie):

Muslim terrorist leaders threatened to forcibly convert Britney Spears and Madonna to Islam and warned if they resist, their heads would be cut off for "spreading Satanic culture," according to a new book released today.

The threats, recorded on audio, come as Madonna is due to arrive in Israel Wednesday to celebrate the Jewish new year with fellow Kabbalah practitioners.

"If I meet these whores I will have the honor – I repeat, I will have the honor – to be the first one to cut the heads off Madonna and Britney Spears if they will keep spreading their satanic culture against Islam," said Muhammad Abdel-Al, spokesman and senior leader of the Popular Resistance Committees terror organization.

The Committees, largely based in the Gaza Strip, has carried out thousands of rocket attacks against Jewish population centers and scores of shootings and bombings. It is suspected of bombing a U.S. convoy in Gaza in 2003 and took credit for a rocket attack yesterday that hit an Israeli military base wounding 69 – the largest casualty number of any Palestinian rocket attack.

[...]

Abu Abdullah, a senior member of Hamas' so-called "military wing" is quoted in "Schmoozing" describing what his group would do with Madonna and Spears if jihad groups took over the U.S.:

"At the beginning, we will try to convince Madonna and Britney Spears to follow Allah's way. But I honestly don't think they will follow. If they persist with their whoring music, we will prevent them by force. I don't think that I can be in the same place with these singers. They might be killed if they do not respect our laws."

The Committees' Abdel-Al accused Madonna and Spears of "spreading this culture by the Americans as part of the war against Islam."

"If these two prostitutes [Madonna and Spears] keep doing what they are doing, we of course will punish them. First we will call them to join Islam. But if they keep what they are doing ... we can stone them or even we can kill them if they keep ... tempting men in order to put them far from Islam. ... A prostitute woman must be stoned or must be eighty times hit with a belt."

Abdel-El said even before Islam takes over America he would personally kill Madonna and Spears if he ran into them. He boasted he would "be the first one to cut the heads of Madonna and Britney Spears."

Don't fight back! If you just lie down and let yourself be conquered and subjugated, all will be well. That's essentially the message here. And the views expressed here are by no means unique to the Arabs; they are quite common in the U.S. also. Rashwan's statement, "Al-Qaeda has changed from a medium-sized group to a big network; it has become a franchise and a model for potential self-recruiting terrorists," is absurd on numerous ways. For one thing, the group already demonstrated in the 1990s a capacity to attack on an international level. But even worse is the idea that the U.S. response to 9/11, being responsible for a buildup, is therefore wrong in itself. Certainly, as we have often argued here, it has not been pursued as it should have, but the answer is decidedly not to make no response at all. Imagine an article in 1943 tut-tutting that the U.S. response to Pearl Harbor had led to the Japanese Navy growing from a medium-sized to a large force.

By Samia Hosny for DPA (thanks to all who sent this in):

Cairo - Some six years after the September 11 terrorist attacks in New York and Washington, many in the Arab world say the US-led "war on terror" is spurring terrorism everywhere and that the world is less safe as a result.

The resurgence of al-Qaeda is blamed by many Arabs on the United States, with recent foiled bomb plots in Germany, deadly terror attacks in Algeria, the latest video release by Osama bin Laden as well as the undiminishing daily violence in Iraq and Afghanistan winning yet more converts to this viewpoint.

"The world is much worse than it was before the war on terror," said Egyptian terrorism expert Dia Rashwan. The US-led campaign "created two main hotbeds for terrorism: Iraq and Afghanistan," Rashwan says.

According to Rashwan, the war on terror has given the al-Qaeda network and its ideological brethren ammunition to legitimize their terror ideology and continue their media campaign for the hearts of Muslim youths.

"Al-Qaeda has changed from a medium-sized group to a big network; it has become a franchise and a model for potential self-recruiting terrorists," Rashwan says.

The apparent failure of US strategy in Iraq combined with a comeback of the Taliban in Afghanistan are creating a general feeling of "schadenfreude" in the Arab world.

Da'wa: the intensive course. "Some kidnappers threatened us with death at gunpoint to force us to follow them in chanting their Islamic prayer for conversion."

More on this story. "S Koreans told 'convert or die,'" from the BBC (thanks to all who sent this in):

A group of South Koreans held hostage by Taleban militants in Afghanistan have said they were beaten and ordered at gunpoint to convert to Islam.

At a news conference in Seoul, the former captives also said they were made to work "like slaves" during their six-week ordeal.

Twenty-one members of the group were freed last month following an agreement between South Korea and the captors.

Two of the hostages - all Christian aid workers - had already been killed.

Beaten and kicked

The former hostages said they feared for their lives at times when their captors turned violent.

"We were beaten with a tree branch or kicked around. Some kidnappers threatened us with death at gunpoint to force us to follow them in chanting their Islamic prayer for conversion," said Jae Chang-hee.

"I was beaten many times. They pointed a rifle and bayonet at me and tried to force me to convert."

He said the group "lived like slaves. We had to level the ground for motorbikes, and get water and make a fire".

Another of the group, Yu Jung-hwa, described how she thought she was going to die.

"The most difficult moment, when I had a big fear of death, was when the Taleban shot [a] video.

"All 23 of us leaned against a wall and armed Taleban aimed their guns at us, and a pit was before me.

"They said they will save us if we believe in Islam. I almost fainted at the time and I still cannot look at cameras," she said.

"The attacks planned according to this for the end of 2007 were directed against the U.S. air base at Ramstein as well as U.S. and Uzbek consular facilities in Germany."

"Germany: Islamic militants designated as terror group claim responsibility for foiled attacks," from The Associated Press (thanks to all who sent this in):

BERLIN: An Islamic militant group has claimed responsibility for a foiled bomb plot that targeted the American military facility at Ramstein and sought to force the closure of an air base that supports Germany's mission in Afghanistan, the German government said Tuesday.

The Interior Ministry, which is responsible for police and internal security, said the Internet announcement by the Islamic Jihad Union was being treated as genuine by government security experts. Three men were arrested Sept. 4 on suspicion of planning massive bombings against U.S. and other facilities in Germany.

The ministry said the attacks were aimed at pressing Germany to close its air base in Termez, Uzbekistan. The base near the Uzbek-Afghan border provides logistical support for the roughly 3,000 German troops serving as part of NATO'S international security force in Afghanistan.

"In an Internet appearance, the Islamic Jihad Union has taken responsibility for the foiled attacks in Germany and addresses the arrests of Sept. 4, 2007," the ministry statement said. "The attacks planned according to this for the end of 2007 were directed against the U.S. air base at Ramstein as well as U.S. and Uzbek consular facilities in Germany."

German officials had previously said the bombings targeted bars and discotheques frequented by Americans as well as airports, but that they were not sure of the exact targets.

Fighting them over here so we don't have to fight them over there. "Iraqis captured en route to U.S.," by Kelly Hearn for the Washington Times (thanks to Kemaste):

LIMA, Peru — Ten Iraqi citizens with forged passports and documents are in a Peruvian prison after an apparent bid to enter the United States on a flight to Los Angeles, officials here say.

An 11th Iraqi man thought to be part of the group is at large.

One of the men arrested is thought to have links to al Qaeda, said Peruvian National Police Col. Roberto Lujan, who is leading the investigation....

Col. Lujan rejected a theory that the men could be Chaldean Christians, a group said to frequently attempt entry to the United States on claims of religious persecution in Iraq.

"These people were not part of a group," he said. "Besides the brothers, they did not even know each other."

One man was arrested while clutching a flag of unknown origin. A photo shows the flag to have a white background with four squiggly blue and red lines converging onto a four-pointed light blue symbol that is similar to those found on Chaldean flags.

On the sixth anniversary of the September 11 attacks, an unsurprising but no less appalling report on how much the Saudis haven't done to cut off funds to jihad groups.

"U.S.: Saudis Still Filling Al Qaeda's Coffers," by Brian Ross for ABC News' The Blotter:

Despite six years of promises, U.S. officials say Saudi Arabia continues to look the other way at wealthy individuals identified as sending millions of dollars to al Qaeda.

"If I could somehow snap my fingers and cut off the funding from one country, it would be Saudi Arabia," Stuart Levey, the under secretary of the Treasury in charge of tracking terror financing, told ABC News.

Despite some efforts as a U.S. ally in the war on terror, Levey says Saudi Arabia has dropped the ball. Not one person identified by the United States and the United Nations as a terror financier has been prosecuted by the Saudis, Levey says.

"When the evidence is clear that these individuals have funded terrorist organizations, and knowingly done so, then that should be prosecuted and treated as real terrorism because it is," Levey says.

Among those on the donor list, according to U.S. officials, is Yasin al Qadi, a wealthy businessman named on both the U.S. and U.N. lists of al Qaeda financiers one month after the 9/11 attacks.

Al Qadi, who has repeatedly denied the allegations, remains free, still a prominent figure in Saudi Arabia.

[...]

While the Saudi embassy had no comment regarding Levey's specific allegations, a spokesman did note that after the Sept. 11 attacks, the country took prompt action and "required Saudi banks to identify and freeze all assets relating to terrorist suspects and entities per the list issued by the United States government." The statement went on to say that "Saudi banks have complied with the freeze requirements and have initiated investigations of transactions that suspects linked to Al Qaeda may have undertaken in the past."

Speaking of "allies":

U.S. officials say they are equally frustrated with what they call the empty promises of Pakistan to go after al Qaeda's sanctuaries in their country.

Pakistan says it is willing to take action if the U.S. provides details.

"If they had specific information, they should share it with us, and we would go after them," Pakistani Ambassador to the U.N. Munir Akram told ABC News.

Or, the targeted camps might mysteriously disappear.

When asked whether the U.S. can trust his country, Ambassador Akram said, "Well, if the U.S. doesn’t trust Pakistan, how can Pakistan be an ally of the U.S.?"

A question echoed by many in the U.S.

Yes, indeed.

How about something like this? Would that be okay to go forward? And of course, the epithet "far-right" is tossed about freely as an attempt to discredit the organizers of the parade and their message.

Meanwhile, jihadists in Belgium, the rest of Europe, and elsewhere continue to plot the overthrow -- whether by violence or legal coercion -- of secular, democratic systems. And police are sent out in force instead to stop people on the dreaded "far right" from saying something authorities find unpleasant.

"Police arrest 2 far-right Belgian leaders at anti-Islam 9/11 protest," from the International Herald Tribune:

BRUSSELS, Belgium: Police arrested two leaders of a Belgian far-right party Tuesday for staging an illegal protest against the "Islamization of Europe," six years to the day after the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington.

Police scuffled with some of the 200 people who converged on two squares in the EU district of Brussels to protest against what they perceived as the rise of Islam as a significant political force across Europe. Officers handcuffed two leaders of the far-right Flemish Interest Party, which is very critical of Muslim immigrants, and took them away in police vans.

Protesters sought to use the Sept. 11 anniversary to point out that Islam threatens democracy and the rule of law in Europe.

The demonstration was initially planned by Stop Islamization of Europe, a loose alliance with roots in Germany, Britain and Denmark, which had predicted that 20,000 people would come to Brussels from all over Europe.

Brussels Mayor Freddy Thielemans banned the protest last month, calling SIOE an inflammatory group and its proposed demonstration a threat to public order. An appeals court upheld the ban Aug. 29.

Only 200 or so protesters showed up Tuesday for a protest lasting only 30 minutes. The demonstrators faced more than 100 police, backed up by water cannons and helicopters, who closed off streets around the EU headquarters.

Are they more afraid of the protest, or that certain offended members of the populace might use it as a pretext to stage an attack?

"We support the goals of the demonstration to protest against the lack of freedom of expression in this country," said Frank Vanhecke, the head of the Flemish Interest Party, before he was bundled off to the police station. "And we also we fully agree that the rise of Islam in Europe poses a risk to our values."

"Turkish police foil bombing in capital," by Selcan Hacaoglu for the Associated Press:

ANKARA, Turkey - Authorities thwarted a bombing, possibly timed to coincide with the sixth anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks, as police found and defused more than 600 pounds of explosives Tuesday in a minibus parked near an Ankara market.

Turkey, a U.S. ally in the fight against global terrorism, has increased security on the anniversary of the 2001 attacks in the United States.

Sniffer dogs discovered the blue minibus at a multistory parking garage near an open food market. Its license plate was stolen from another vehicle, and the owner tipped police, the state-run Anatolia news agency said.

"A possible disaster has been prevented," Gov. Kemal Onal said as he announced the discovery at the site. Anatolia said a witness alleged that an unidentified man parked the vehicle around 6 a.m., saying he had brought goods to sell at the market.

Police evacuated houses and cordoned off the area, and explosive experts defused the bomb in three hours, Police Chief Ercument Yilmaz said.

Yilmaz did not reveal details of the bomb, but Turkish media citing other police sources said sacks of explosives were found, speculating that it could be ammonium nitrate or cheap fertilizer, an ingredient used to make bombs.

Suicide bombers linked to al-Qaida hit Istanbul in 2003 with truck bombs — containing ammonium nitrate-based bombs — killing 58 people in attacks that targeted two synagogues, the British Consulate and a British bank. In February, a court sentenced seven people to life in prison for the bombings.

Begin boilerplate:

Turkey, a predominantly Muslim but secular country is a key NATO ally that provides vital support to U.S. operations in Afghanistan and Iraq through Incirlik Air Base in southern Turkey, one of the most important U.S. military assets in the region.

End boilerplate.

"Ankara's Sept. 11 has been prevented," private NTV television said on its Web site.

"Bin Laden wants 'caravan' of martyrs," by Lee Keath for the Associated Press:

CAIRO, Egypt - Osama bin Laden urged sympathizers to join the "caravan" of martyrs as he praised one of the Sept. 11 suicide hijackers in a new video that emerged Tuesday to mark the sixth anniversary of the attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon.

Al-Qaida traditionally issues a video every year on the anniversary, with the last testament of one of the 19 hijackers involved in the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks. This year's video showed hijacker Waleed al-Shehri addressing the camera and warning the U.S.: "We shall come at you from your front and back, your right and left."

The new message, which AP Television News obtained from the IntelCenter monitoring group in suburban Washington, came days after the world got its first current look at bin Laden in nearly three years, with the release of a video Saturday in which the terror leader addressed the American people.

Later in the day it appeared on militant Web sites, with a note from al-Qaiada's media production wing al-Sahab saying it was intentionally sent to television stations before being placed on the Internet.

It begins with an audiotape introduction by bin Laden. While his voice is heard, the video shows a still image of him, raising his finger. In the image, bin Laden has the same dyed-black beard and the same clothes — a white robe and cap and beige cloak — that he had in Saturday's video.

But it was not known if the audiotape was recently made. In the past, al-Qaida has used footage and audio of bin Laden taped long ago for release later.

In the tape, bin Laden praised al-Shehri, saying he "recognized the truth" that Arab rulers were "vassals" of the West and had "abandoned the balance of (Islamic) revelation."

"It is true that this young man was little in years, but the faith in his heart was big," he said.

"So there is a huge difference between the path of the kings, presidents and hypocritical Ulama (Islamic scholars) and the path of these noble young men," like al-Shehri, bin Laden said. "The formers' lot is to spoil and enjoy themselves whereas the latters' lot is to destroy themselves for Allah's Word to be Supreme."

"It remains for us to do our part. So I tell every young man among the youth of Islam: It is your duty to join the caravan (of martyrs) until the sufficiency is complete and the march to aid the High and Omnipotent continues," he said.

At the end of his speech, bin Laden also mentions the al-Qaida leader in Iraq, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who was killed in an U.S. air strike there. Al-Zarqawi followed in the footsteps of al-Shehri and his brothers who "fulfilled their promises to God."

"And now it is our turn," bin Laden says.

This is curious, especially in light of bin Laden's dyed beard, and its connotations in Islamic tradition of preparing for jihad. In saying that it is "our turn," is he looking to dodge accusations that he sends others to die while he hides in caves? Or is he somehow anticipating his own "martyrdom?"

After bin Laden speaks, the video of al-Shehri appears. Al-Shehri — one of the hijackers on American Airlines Flight 11, which hit the World Trade Center — is seen wearing a white robe and headscarf, with a full black beard, speaking in front of a backdrop with images of the burning World Trade Center.

[...]

"As for our own fortune, it is not in this world," he said. "And we are not competing with you for this world, because it does not equal in Allah's eyes the wing of a mosquito."

Al-Shehri warned Muslims who strayed to return to their religion and deplored the state of those who abandoned Muslim holy war, or jihad.

"The condition of Islam at the present time makes one cry ... in view of the weakness, humiliation, scorn and enslavement it is suffering because it neglected the obligations of Allah and His orders, and permitted His forbidden things and abandoned jihad in Allah's path," he said.

An implication that even though what they did was wrong, their cause was right -- they should have just emulated Gandhi in their quest to impose a Sharia state and subjugate non-Muslims. "Archbishops uses 9/11 to defend religion," by Jonathan Petre in the Telegraph (thanks to WriterMom):

The Archbishop of Canterbury used the eve of the anniversary of the September 11 attacks on America yesterday to defend religion against claims that it promotes division and violence.

Dr Rowan Williams said that although Islam and Christianity had histories scarred with violence, they carried the “seeds of non-violence and non possessive witness.”

Jihad, or holy war, could nowadays be interpreted as a “struggle of the heart” rather than the defence of the Muslim community against its enemies, he said.

He added that both faiths could offer society an ideal of peaceful co-existence despite their violent histories because they were guided by beliefs that transcended human conflict.

The Archbishop’s lecture to a Christian Muslim Forum conference in Cambridge follows mounting criticism of religion as dangerous and destablising.

But Dr Williams argued that religion should not be judged by the failures of its adherents but on its vision of a social order that is “without fear, oppression, the violence of exclusion and the search for scapegoats”.

He compared the “act of nightmare violence” six years ago, when extremists flew aeroplanes into the twin towers in New York, with the birth of Mahatma Gandhi’s non-violent protest movement on September 11, 1906, in Johannesburg.

He said that Gandhi’s movement showed it was possible to reject a response to oppression that “simply mirrors what has been done by the oppressor.”

Now it has been six years. The global jihad proceeds apace, with well over 9,000 deadly attacks carried out in the course of those six years by believers in the proposition that "Islam must dominate, and not be dominated." Yet we are no closer as a society to recognizing how exactly to combat this foe, and our responses flail wildly -- witness this report that prisons have removed Jewish and Christian books from their libraries so as to allow them, within today's suffocating multiculturalist ethos, to remove also books advocating jihad violence and Islamic supremacism.

This is just one small example of a large-scale misallocation of resources and time that results from our fear and inability to say plainly that we are engaged in a defensive action against a global jihad, and that therefore we will unapologetically and forthrightly take action against the jihadists and their ideology without having to pretend that it is not a Muslim problem, or that Judaism and Christianity have exactly the same problem today.

American Muslim advocacy groups have made it impossible to take such a stand by adopting a spurious victim status that has enabled them to claim -- and enabled the claim to be accepted -- that sensible anti-jihad measures and investigations are "anti-Muslim." Instead of inviting and participating in an open investigation of the roots of the jihad ideology of Islamic supremacism in core Islamic texts and teachings, so as to work with people of good will toward finding positive ways to neutralize the ability of jihadists to use those texts to recruit terrorists and incite violence, they have cowed the establishment media (liberal and conservative) and government officials into thinking that such investigations manifest "Islamophobia" and bigotry.

Six years after 9/11, the jihad proceeds apace, and the UN investigates...Islamophobia.

Want to end Islamophobia? End violent attacks committed by Muslims in the name of Islam. I guarantee that Islamophobia will then vanish utterly.

Six years after, the fact that such elementary common sense is not taken for granted, but reviled and dismissed, does not bode well for the continuation of this conflict, as continue it surely will. Unless we begin to speak clearly about what we are facing and who is making us face it, the jihadists will continue, as they do now, to take advantage of our willful ignorance.

This is a premier example of how we suffer from not be able to define properly the nature of the conflict. We are afraid to affirm the value of our own civilization. We are afraid to say that Christianity is a religion of peace and Islam isn't, and so have to make these outlandish gestures to appease the god of multiculturalism and relativism.

"Prisons Purging Books on Faith From Libraries," by Laurie Goodstein for the New York Times (thanks to Seymour Paine):

Behind the walls of federal prisons nationwide, chaplains have been quietly carrying out a systematic purge of religious books and materials that were once available to prisoners in chapel libraries.

The chaplains were directed by the Bureau of Prisons to clear the shelves of any books, tapes, CDs and videos that are not on a list of approved resources. In some prisons, the chaplains have recently dismantled libraries that had thousands of texts collected over decades, bought by the prisons, or donated by churches and religious groups.

Some inmates are outraged. Two of them, a Christian and an Orthodox Jew, in a federal prison camp in upstate New York, filed a class-action lawsuit last month claiming the bureau’s actions violate their rights to the free exercise of religion as guaranteed by the First Amendment and the Religious Freedom Restoration Act.

Traci Billingsley, a spokeswoman for the Bureau of Prisons, said the agency was acting in response to a 2004 report by the Office of the Inspector General in the Justice Department. The report recommended steps that prisons should take, in light of the Sept. 11 attacks, to avoid becoming recruiting grounds for militant Islamic and other religious groups. The bureau, an agency of the Justice Department, defended its effort, which it calls the Standardized Chapel Library Project, as a way of barring access to materials that could, in its words, “discriminate, disparage, advocate violence or radicalize.”

Ms. Billingsley said, “We really wanted consistently available information for all religious groups to assure reliable teachings as determined by reliable subject experts.”

But prison chaplains, and groups that minister to prisoners, say that an administration that put stock in religion-based approaches to social problems has effectively blocked prisoners’ access to religious and spiritual materials — all in the name of preventing terrorism.

“It’s swatting a fly with a sledgehammer,” said Mark Earley, president of Prison Fellowship, a Christian group. “There’s no need to get rid of literally hundreds of thousands of books that are fine simply because you have a problem with an isolated book or piece of literature that presents extremism.”...

Yep.

He is very likely correct in this, although it is hard to see how any course will not have devastating consequences at this point. The all-important question is, Which set of devastating consequences are we willing to accept so as to ensure our national security most effectively and stem the advance of the global jihad most definitively? From Thomson Financial:

WASHINGTON (Thomson Financial) - US war commander General David Petraeus warned a 'premature' withdrawal of US troops from Iraq would be 'devastating.'

'A premature draw-down of our forces would likely have devastating consequences,' Petraeus said at a crucial hearing of the House of Representatives Armed Services and Foreign Affairs committees.

The four-star general said that though the 168,000 US troop number in Iraq could start to be reduced to and beyond levels which existed before the current troop surge, further decision on force numbers could not be made until next March.

'In my professional judgment, it would be premature to make recommendations on the pace of such reductions at this time,' Petraeus said.

The overlooked aspect of Osama's latest video. From FrontPage (news links in the original):

"I invite you to embrace Islam,” says Osama bin Laden in his latest videotape. Most analysts take this as pious window-dressing and focus on what they believe to be the more substantive points of his message: his comments on the war in Iraq, his critique of capitalism, the similarity of much of what he says to Democratic Party talking points, and the like. But in fact the invitation to Islam is the heart, and the most revealing aspect, of bin Laden’s entire statement.

The chief reason for this, of course, is because in traditional Islamic law, the invitation to Islam must precede an attack on non-Muslims. The Islamic prophet Muhammad makes this clear, directing Muslims to issue this invitation first, and if the unbelievers refuse, to invite them to enter the Islamic social order as second-class dhimmis, and if they refuse both, to go to war with them:

Fight in the name of Allah and in the way of Allah. Fight against those who disbelieve in Allah. Make a holy war, do not embezzle the spoils; do not break your pledge; and do not mutilate (the dead) bodies; do not kill the children. When you meet your enemies who are polytheists, invite them to three courses of action. If they respond to any one of these, you also accept it and withhold yourself from doing them any harm. Invite them to (accept) Islam; if they respond to you, accept it from them and desist from fighting against them....If they refuse to accept Islam, demand from them the Jizya [the poll tax on non-Muslims]. If they agree to pay, accept it from them and hold off your hands. If they refuse to pay the tax, seek Allah's help and fight them. (Sahih Muslim 4294)

Tablighi Jamaat sets out to clear up misconceptions about Islam. By Andrew Norfolk in the TimesOnline (thanks to Kemaste):

A Muslim group that wants to open a giant £100 million mosque in London has set its sights on “winning the whole of Britain to Islam”.

Tablighi Jamaat aims to build an Islamic complex near to the site of the 2012 Olympic stadium, with a mosque for 12,000 people, by far the largest religious building in Britain.

The organisation, which has millions of followers worldwide, insists that it is a peaceful, apolitical revivalist movement that promotes Islamic consciousness among individual Muslims. However, intelligence agencies have cautioned that the group’s ability to fire young men with a zeal for Islam acts as a staging post, for some, along a path that leads to jihadist terrorism.

Kafeel Ahmed, the Indian doctor who died from burns last month after trying to set off a car bomb at Glasgow Airport, is the latest in a line of terrorists for whose initial radicalisation Tablighi Jamaat has been blamed. The group (literally, the preaching party) belongs to the ultra-conservative Deobandi school of thought within Sunni Islam, whose adherents run more than 600 of Britain’s 1,350 mosques.

In recent days The Times has exposed the virulently anti-Western creed of some British Deobandis who preach that non-Muslims are an evil and corrupting influence. Their defensive, isolationist approach to life in Britain is shared by many British supporters of Tablighi Jamaat.

One leading advocate, Ebrahim Rangooni, has said that the movement seeks to “rescue the ummah [the global Muslim community] from the culture and civilisation of the Jews, the Christians and [other] enemies of Islam”. Its aim, he wrote, is to “create such hatred for their ways as human beings have for urine and excreta”.

Mr Rangooni has also given warning to parents that non-Muslim schools “turn humans into animals” and that sending a Muslim child to a British college “is as dangerous as throwing them into hell with your own hands”.

Representatives of Tablighi Jamaat refused to attend a public meeting on Friday to discuss plans for the “mega mosque” in West Ham, even though the debate was organised by a Muslim group.

Tablighi Jamaat was founded in 1926, in India, by a Deobandi scholar, Muhammad Ilyas, who wanted to raise Islamic awareness among rural Muslims in south Asia. He promised them that by obeying Islamic laws and following the example of the Prophet Muhammad in their personal lives they would one day “dominate over non-believers” and become “masters of everything on this earth”.

Ishaq Patel, Tablighi Jamaat’s first amir (leader) in Britain, is said to have been on pilgrimage in Mecca when Ilyas’s successor gave him a long-term mission to win “the whole of Britain to Islam”.

Yoginder Sikand, a Muslim expert on the movement, says that its ethos of “social and cultural separatism and insularity” seeks “to minimise contacts with people of other faiths”.

The self-segregation that this encourages is evident in Dewsbury, West Yorkshire, where the group has its European headquarters. The Tablighi Jamaat complex – housing its large Markazi mosque and a Deobandi seminary called the Islamic Institute of Education - is based in the Savile Town area, which has an 88 per cent Asian population. The overwhelming majority of its 5,000 residents are Muslims from Pakistan or the Gujarat region of India and some, at home and at work, have little contact with nonMuslims.

It was on the advice of a Tablighi Jamaat scholar that Aishah Azmi, a Dewsbury teaching assistant, refused to remove her full-face veil in the class-room while helping young children who were learning to speak English.

Mr Sikand says: “There is little doubt that the sense of cultural separatism and heightened [Islamic] identity consciousness fostered by Tablighi Jamaat can be taken advantage of by more assertive Islamist groups that have a more explicit political agenda.”

One of the suicide bombers who attacked London in July 2005, Shehzad Tanweer, studied at the Deobandi seminary in Dewsbury and Mohammad Sidique Khan, the leader of the 7/7 terror plot, was a regular worshipper at the adjoining mosque. Richard Reid, the shoe bomber, was said to have been influenced by Tablighi Jamaat, several of whose adherents were also among those arrested last year over an alleged plot to blow up transatlantic airliners.

Shabbir Daji, a trustee and secretary of the Tablighi Jamaat mosque in Dewsbury, told The Times that the movement’s aim was “unity among all humanity”. He said that it had no hidden agenda. “We never come out on demonstrations against the Government,” he said. “Our aim is to make each and everyone . . . a better Muslim.”

Including you and me, whether we like it or not.

Hitchcock he ain't

Osama the black-dyed impresario announces his next production -- one that will inconvenience the growing ranks of "9/11 was an inside job" types. "Al-Qaida promises 9/11 hijacker video," from AP :

CAIRO, Egypt - Al-Qaida said Monday that it will release a new video of Osama bin Laden presenting the last testament of one of the Sept. 11 suicide hijackers, marking the sixth anniversary of the attacks.

The announcement from the terror group's media arm came only days after bin Laden appeared in his first video in three years, giving an address to the American people, lecturing them to abandon capitalism and democracy and convert to Islam.

The announcement came in a banner advertisement posted on an Islamic militant Web site where al-Qaida often releases messages and was signed by al-Sahab, the media arm of bin Laden's al-Qaida terror network.

"Coming soon, God willing, the testament of the attacks on New York and Washington, Abu Musab Waleed al-Shehri, presented by Sheik Osama bin Laden, God preserve him," the banner read. It showed an image of bin Laden wearing the same black beard and clothes as in the most recent video.

V. 104 of Sura 4 continues the martial theme of the previous section, telling Muslims not to weaken in pursuit of the enemy. Bulandshahri explains: “While the disbelievers (kuffar) will be subjected to the unending torment and distress in the abysses of Hell, the Muslims shall be rejoicing in the bliss and comforts of Heaven (Jannah), without the slightest worries and concerns. The disbelievers (kuffar) cannot aspire for these stages as these are promised exclusively to the Muslims. For this reason the Muslims have a much stronger incentive to fight and should do so with greater zest and zeal.”

Verses 105-116 direct Muslims to judge by the Qur’an (v. 105); excoriate hypocrites and warn against sin (vv. 107-112); and remind Muhammad of Allah’s protection, telling Muslims to obey him (vv. 113-116). In warning Muslims not to follow any path “other than the believer’s way,” v. 115 is a principal foundation for the Islamic legal concept of ijma, consensus. This is the idea that once the Islamic community has agreed on a matter, it can be sure that Allah has guided it to the truth. Ibn Kathir explains: “the Ummah [community] of Muhammad is immune from error when they all agree on something, a miracle that serves to increase their honor, due to the greatness of their Prophet.” Unfortunately, this idea can impede Islamic reform: when the community reaches consensus on an issue, the understanding of it becomes generally fixed. This is true, although few Islamic spokesmen in the U.S. will admit it, of the ideology of Islamic supremacism that mandates warfare against and the subjugation of unbelievers: because this is something that all the schools of Islamic jurisprudence agree on, it will be very hard to dislodge.

A few pictures from yesterday's United American Muslim Day Parade in New York City, with thanks to Urban Infidel and LGF. Much more at Atlas Shrugs.

Enjoy that subversive latte. "Iran steps up crackdown against "immoral" activity," from Agence France-Presse:

TEHERAN - Iran is pressing on with one of its toughest moral crackdowns in years, warning tens of thousands of women over slack dress, targeting “immoral” cafes and seizing illegal satellite receivers, local media reported on Monday.

The Iranian police launched the crackdown in April in a self-declared drive to “elevate security in society” that encompassed arrests of thugs, raids on underground parties and street checks of improperly dressed individuals.

Reza Zarei, commander of police in Teheran province, said that since the drive began police in his region have handed out 113,454 warnings to women found to have infringed Iran’s strict Islamic dress rules.

“Of these 1,600 cases have been given to the judiciary” for further investigation, he said.

He added that 5,700 people — including 1,400 men — have been sent to “guidance classes” on how to behave in society.

Zarei said police have been targeting billiard halls and coffee shops — the latter hugely popular in Teheran as a meeting place for men and women — as certain establishments promoted immorality.

“One of the main grounds for the creation of social and ethical crimes are billiard halls and coffee shops,” he said.

The student news agency ISNA and the Kargozaran newspaper quoted Zarei as saying that police had shut down 3,000 coffee shops and billiard halls although the official IRNA news agency said the establishments had merely been given warnings.

“I am pleased to have carried out this plan to elevate security in society,” Zarei said.

Watching satellite television is illegal in the Islamic republic as it is deemed to spread decadence and has long been the target of periodic crackdowns by the police.

Zarei said police had closed down 68 warehouses selling satellite equipment, seized 27,000 receivers and arrested 535 people linked to the underground industry.

Some reformists in Iran have argued that the authorities would be better off combating poverty or traffic rather than moral laxity but conservatives have applauded the police for seeking to restore revolutionary Islamic values.

Ah, but dealing with poverty or traffic would require action more substantive than minding other people's business.