"Islam is emerging as the cultural and economic Superpower of the 21st Century"

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?

German jihad plot suspect on the run in Britain

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.

McCain: US founded on Christian principles, shouldn't have Muslim president

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.

Fitzgerald: Every government official, every FBI agent, every DHS bureaucrat should have Raymond Ibrahim's book

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.

And so they do: they offer the texts of Islam, passages from the Qur'an and stories from the Hadith, unchanged by a jot or tittle, the very same passages and stories that are part of Islam, and have been read, and are known, by Muslims all over the world. There is no "European Islam" or "American Islam," as some fondly believe, or somehow, illogically, think magically comes into being once Muslims are physically present on the soil of Europe or America.

Having realized that the Arabic versions of what Bin Laden and others say remained largely untranslated, and therefore unknown to Western policy-makers and the Western public, Ibrahim took on the task of translation, and mass divulgation, himself. Before Raymond Ibrahim (an Arabic-speaking non-Muslim) came along, apparently, none of our "loyal" and "moderate Muslim" Arabic-speaking scholars in colleges, or universities, or employed by the government, saw fit to discuss, much less translate, those texts. Apparently none, before Raymond Ibrahim performed his indispensable service, felt a responsibility to undertake the task themselves, and thereby to better inform Infidels (the very Infidels whom some of them have, as their professions, a duty to advise on the nature of Muslim terrorism and its sources) of what it is that menaces them now, and indeed, menaces them permanently, for Muslims are taught to think of themselves in a permanent state of war -- though not always active warfare -- with Infidels, until such time as Islam everywhere dominates and Muslims rule, everywhere.

The communiques and tapes made for Western audiences are, Ibrahim noticed, not at all like the tapes made by terrorists for fellow Muslims as recruiting tools. Those tapes, those writings, are full of standard Islamic doctrines, well-known passages from the Qur'an, "authentic" Hadith from the collections of Bukhari and Muslim. They are intended to motivate those who, out of laziness or self-interest, have become "bad" Muslims and are not sufficiently inspired to participate directly in violent Jihad, or are not "bad" Muslims but merely those who fully support the efforts of the "good" (i.e., violent) Muslims through donations of money, or through attempts to block Infidel efforts to successfully monitor or even head off those who do engage in terrorism. Terrorism, for these Muslims, is not terrorism at all. It is merely a form of qitaal, combat, and when directed at Infidels -- as opposed to fellow Muslims -- it is perfectly acceptable, unless of course any resulting harm to Muslims and to Islam renders it counter-productive. This is a merely practical objection to some kinds of terrorism, and not a moral one.

Raymond Ibrahim's book of translated documents by Bin Laden and other terrorists, The Al-Qaeda Reader, has been published in paperback. Every government official, every FBI agent, every DHS bureaucrat should have a copy.

Fatah: You're gay. Hamas: No, you're gay

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.

Detroit: Anti-Jewish, anti-Christian fliers found on cars

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.

Politicians on online hit list

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.

Has Islamic terrorism arrived on Maldives?

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.

Misunderstanders of Islam kill police captain in Thailand

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.

Fitzgerald: Frederick Kagan's severe mental confusion

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.

Furthermore, when Fred Kagan writes in the same My Weekly Standard piece that "Muslims have lived in states with temporal rulers for most of their history," what should one make of it? The observation is banal, and means less than it appears to mean, or that Fred Kagan apparently thinks it means. We all know that ayatollahs have not ruled over Iran, nor muftis in Egypt and Arabia. So what? The distinction between "temporal" and "spiritual" that is made in Christianity is not made in Islam. It is misleading to call the rulers of Muslim lands "temporal rulers," for it sets up a temporal-spiritual opposition that does not exist in Islam, but that Kagan apparently believes does exist and means something. It doesn't. Since the Muslim ruler of a Muslim land is always more than merely a "temporal ruler," the only requirement he must fulfill is to be a good Muslim. Furthermore, Fred Kagan's use of the word "states" also worries, for it evokes misleading thoughts of the non-Muslim nation-state -- "lands" is better at keeping out such notions.

Kagan needs to spend six months reading. But he doesn't have time. He's too busy advising Senator McCain and writing his articles for My Weekly Standard and The Wall Street Journal, on why and how America, if it only stays the course, is surely "winning in Iraq." That he never feels the obligation -- never -- to describe exactly what constitutes "winning in Iraq" and how it would help with efforts to stem the worldwide Jihad and its many instruments, shows the frivolousness and ignorance that nowadays is so widespread, not least in official or semi-official Washington, as to serve as a universal protection against the kind of criticism that matters -- the unanswerable kind that appears here at Jihad Watch and in very few other places.

It's disheartening. And frightening. It is as if Jay Leno's Jaywalkers had all acquired Ph.D.s and were now installed in think-tanks all over Washington. Which has, indeed, happened.

Misunderstander of Islam kills 30 on Kabul bus

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."

Fitzgerald: How politicians can avoid missteps

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.

Take, for example, the supposedly "tough" performance of Columbia University President Lee Bollinger, who still has yet to inform himself about Islam. Despite the tongue-lashing he inflicted on Ahmadinejad (and here fortiter in re, suaviter in modo, might have been just the ticket) he became helpless, nearly tongue-tied, when it came to answering back Ahmadinejad when he made his absurd remarks about, for example, Israel. Was it a surprise to Bollinger that that would have been raised? Was he unable to rise to the occasion and to show up the idiocy of the claim, a claim so common that Bollinger should have fully anticipated it, that "the poor 'Palestinians' should not have to pay for the Holocaust"? For god's sake. Someone well-informed, particularly in dealing with the theme of the rights of non-Arabs -- Jews and Persians and Armenians and Copts to start with -- in the Middle East, should have been standing right next to Bollinger at that moment. Bollinger was also given, on a platter, a chance to discuss Persian history and the successful Persian effort to prevent the arabization and cultural and linguistic imperialism of the Arabs, that has been such a feature of islamization worldwide. His doing so would have amazed not just Ahmadinejad, but would have deeply shaken up Iranians back in Iran, and caused them to think. But Bollinger seems only interested in protecting himself, and no doubt preserving the loyalty of alumni. Has he lost the ability to study and think, in the heady rise to the top? Perhaps he can reacquire that skill. It may inspire some of the undergraduates.

And now Virginia Governor Kaine has had to rethink, and so too has the man he was about to appoint, a man whom Robert Spencer has debated and has tapes of those debates, and can easily show that Esam Omeish lies. He denies that death is the punishment prescribed for apostasy in Islam, with textual authority. He has also admitted that he looks forward to the extension of Shari'a across the United States. Had he been appointed and that information come out and been widely distributed -- and it would have been -- it would have inflicted severe political damage, rightly, on Governor Kaine. There is no need for this, anymore than there was a need for Mayor Menino, without knowing a thing about Islam, a few years ago to enthusiastically support the building of that deplorable mosque, with all the behind-the-scenes below-market sale of city land and the Saudi connection and the BRA employee who, as far as is known, may still be on the BRA payroll. I know many people who have because of that permanently lost any enthusiasm they might have had for Mayor Menino.

For god's sake, did no one think to do a little googling? Or to check, say, with "The Investigative Project" or with "Jihad Watch" to see if there was anything about Mr. X that might, just might, be the kind of thing the governor or mayor or Congressman deciding whom to hire for his staff, would have liked to have known in advance? Or if not those sources, then others -- just something so that one is fully alerted to the real views, not the feigned ones that may be expressed, or the evasions of taqiyya-and-tu-quoque that by now we are all getting so used to, and that must be seen right through, and if not by the Great and Good of this earth themselves, then by members of their staffs, whose duty it is to guide and protect them from such blunders that, in the end, might prove fatal for those who commit them, in one way, and fatal in quite another, much grimmer way, for those who in brief (or, alas, not so brief) authority presume to instruct and protect.

Do your homework, for god's sake. Do it.

Iran's Parliament Signs Resolution to Label CIA, Army as 'Terrorist Organizations'

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?

Paging Mr. Orwell: New Taliban Constitution would ban "un-Islamic thought"

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.

Afghan president offers Taliban a place in government for peace deal

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.

US Army recovers bodies of tortured, murdered Sunni couple in Baghdad

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.

Fitzgerald: Seven Questions for Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, Prime Minister of Malaysia

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?

4. Your predecessor, Mahathir Mohamed, famously gave an address to the Organization of Islamic Conference in which he told a crowd of enthusiastic delegates that Muslims must learn to rival the West in their scientific attainments, but the only attainments to which he made reference were those of military technology. There was no mention of any encouragement of Muslim study of the nature of the atom, or of the structure of DNA, or of fractals, or how the brain works, or anything at all that might be described as science for its own sake. There was only mention of military technology, of weaponry. Why do you think that was?

5. Chok Tok On, Prime Minister of Singapore, in a speech he gave in Washington a few years ago, said this:

Terrorism is a generic term. Terrorist organisations such as the Tamil Tigers in Sri Lanka or ETA in Spain are only of local concern. The virulent strain of Islamic terrorism is another matter altogether. It is driven by religion. Its ideological vision is global. It is most dangerous. The communists fought to live, whereas the jihadi terrorists fight to die and live in the next world.

My perspective is formed by our own experiences in Southeast Asia, which post 9/11 has emerged as a major theatre for terrorist operations. In December 2001, Singapore arrested 15 people belonging to a radical Islamic group called the Jemaah Islamiyah [JI]. They were plotting even before 9/11 to attack American and other Western interests in Singapore. In August 2002, we arrested another 21 members of this group. Malaysia, the Philippines, Indonesia, and Thailand have also made many arrests of terrorists.

The JI regional leadership spanned Indonesia, Singapore, Malaysia, and the southern Philippines. Its tentacles even probed into Australia. JI’s objective was to create a Daulah Islamiyah, an Islamic state in Southeast Asia. This was to be centred in Indonesia but would include Malaysia, southern Thailand, Southern Philippines, and, inevitably, Singapore and Brunei.

But the most crucial conclusion our investigations revealed was this: the existence of a transregional terrorist brotherhood of disparate Southeast Asian groups linked by a militant Islamic ideology to each other and to al Qaeda. Whatever their specific goals, these groups were committed to mutual help in the pursuit of their common ideology: they helped each other with funds and support services, in training, and in joint operations.

In 1999, JI formed a secret caucus called the Rabitatul Mujahadeen, meaning Mujahadeen Coalition, to bring together various militant Southeast Asian Islamic groups. Between 1999 and 2000, Rabitatul Mujahadeen met three times in Kuala Lumpur. It was responsible for the bombing attack against the Philippine ambassador to Indonesia in Jakarta in August 2000. The brain behind the attack was Hambali, the link man between Southeast Asian terrorism and al Qaeda. Fortunately, he is now under arrest.

But the threat remains. It stems from a religious ideology that is infused with an implacable hostility to all secular governments, especially the West, and in particular the U.S. Their followers want to recreate the Islam of seventh century Arabia, which they regard as the golden age. Their ultimate goal is to bring about a caliphate linking all Muslim communities. Their means is jihad, which they narrowly define as a holy war against all non Muslims, whom they call “infidels.”

The Arabs call this religious ideology salafi. Our experience in Southeast Asia is not without wider relevance because of what the salafis themselves believe. This is what one of them, an Algerian named Abu Ibrahim Mustafa, has said:

“The war in Palestine, in Afghanistan, in Iraq, in Algeria, in Chechnya, and in the Philippines is one war. This is a war between the camp of Islam and the camp of the Cross, to which the Americans, the Zionists, Jews, their apostate allies, and others belong. The goal of this war, which they falsely called a war on terror, is to prevent the Muslims from establishing an Islamic state...”

Likewise, JI’s ultimate goal is a caliphate, by definition not confined to Southeast Asia. The dream of a caliphate may seem absurd to the secular mind. But it will be a serious mistake to dismiss its appeal to many in the Islamic world, though the majority do not believe in killing and dying for it.

But there are radicals and militants who do. The terrorist brotherhood in Southeast Asia and its links to al Qaeda were first forged through the struggle against the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. Ibrahim Maidin, the leader of the Singapore JI cell, underwent military training in Afghanistan in the early 1990s. His encounters with the mujahadeen deeply impressed him. Maidin wrote several letters to the Taliban Supreme Leader Mullah Mohammed Omar and to Osama bin Laden. He asked whether Mullah Omar was to be regarded as the caliph of the Islamic World. After returning to Singapore, Maidin arranged for JI members to visit Afghanistan and to undergo training there.

When one of those convicted of the October 2002 Bali bombings was sentenced to death, he thanked the prosecutors and said that this would bring him closer to God and “the death penalty would mean nothing except strengthening my faith.”

Islamic militancy is not new to Southeast Asia. But what is new is this type of fanatical global ideology (including the phenomenon of suicide bombers) that has been able to unite different groups and lead Southeast Asian groups to subordinate local interests to the broader struggle.
Ibrahim Maidin has confessed to a senior Singapore intelligence officer that, in retrospect, he had made the mistake of moving too quickly and should have waited for Malaysia, Indonesia, the southern Philippines, and Singapore to become an Islamic state before acting against U.S. interests. But he still believes that his side would ultimately win. He also said that as long as the U.S. was “doing things against the Muslims”, the JI would continue to attack the U.S.

From our experience in Southeast Asia, I draw three principal conclusions that I believe have a wider relevance.

First, the goals of these terrorists make the struggle a zero sum game for them. There is no room for compromise except as a tactical expedient. America may be the main enemy, but it is not the only one. What Osama bin Laden offered Europe was only a “truce,” not a lasting peace. The war against terrorism today is a war against a specific strain of militant Islamic terrorism that wants, in effect, a “clash of civilizations” or, in the words of the Algerian I earlier quoted, “a war between the camp of the Islam and the camp of the Cross.”

The JI has tried to create the conditions for Christians and Muslims in Southeast Asia to set against one another. In December 2000, it attacked churches in Indonesia, including one church in an Indonesian island off Singapore. It has sent its members to fight and stir up trouble in Ambon against Christians. At the trial of those responsible for the Bali bombing of October 2002, one of the defendants, Amrozi, dubbed by the media as the “smiling terrorist,” said that he was not sorry for the Westerners killed in the Bali attacks. He said, “How can I feel sorry? I am very happy, because they attack Muslims and are inhuman.” In fact, he wished “there were more American casualties.” What was most chilling is that this hatred is impersonal.

One of those we detained in Singapore was a service engineer with an American company. He confessed that he actually liked his American friends and bosses. He was nevertheless involved in targeting American interests. We have a sense that he had struggled with this. He eventually decided to testify against the spiritual leader of JI, Abu Bakar Bashir, but only because he felt betrayed by Bashir’s denial of the very existence of the JI organization which Bashir headed and to whom he and other members had sworn allegiance.

And just as Osama bin Laden is trying to drive a wedge between Europe and America, in Southeast Asia, JI was plotting to do the same thing by blowing up the pipelines that supply water from Malaysia to Singapore. The JI knew that water from Malaysia is a matter of life and death for Singapore. They knew that race and religion have historically been the major fault lines within and between both countries. The JI’s intention was to provoke a conflict between Singapore and Malaysia and portray a “Chinese Singapore” as threatening a “Muslim Malaysia,” and use the ensuing confusion to try and overthrow the Malaysian government and establish an Islamic state in Malaysia.

That particular plot failed. The governments of Singapore and Malaysia could not have allowed it to succeed. We know only too well what is at stake.

The favorite tactic of terrorists of all stripes has always been to try to provoke a backlash to serve their cause. When news of the JI arrests broke, my immediate concern was to maintain social cohesion in Singapore. Singapore is a multi-racial society with a 15 percent Muslim population. They are well integrated in our schools, housing estates and the workplace. Nevertheless, misunderstandings could easily arise. We met with Muslim leaders in a number of closed door sessions to share details of the investigations and to explain that the arrests were not targeted against the Singapore Muslim community or Islam.

Would you agree with the assessment of Prime Minister Chok Tong On?

6. Singapore has a very rigorous legal regime covering Da’wa, with strict requirements that all new converts to Islam be immediately reported to the government. Why do you suppose that is? Do you understand what concerns prompted the democratic government of Singapore to enact such legislation?

7. Your name is “Abdullah Ahmad Badawi.” Would you find strange if the Prime Minister of the Congo were named Anthony Ashley Cooper, or possibly Lord Palmerston? Do you find anything of note, as a Malay, that you bear an Arab name? Or do you find nothing strange in the linguistic and cultural pressures for arabization that accompany, and have always accompanied, islamization?

New York City cabbies lose court battle over "anti-Muslim" GPS

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.

Algeria: Jihadists kill 6 security force officers

"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.

Will the 12th Imam cause war with Iran?

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.

Malaysian PM: Western nations misunderstand Islam

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.'

Omeish says he is victim of "smear campaign," remarks "taken out of context"

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?

Hamas: We have 400 jihad martyrdom attackers ready

"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....

House, Senate call for Iran's Revolutionary Guards to be designated as a "foreign terrorist organization"

"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.

Buy more shorts: Rice says nations must fight climate change like terrorism

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.

Florida Muslim student admitted he made video on how to use remote-controlled bombs against American soldiers

"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.

Virginia governor "examining" videos of Muslim Brotherhood front group leader Omeish advocating "the jihad way"

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.

Bush: Chirac "thinks he's Mr. Arab"

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".

German interior minister cites detonators from Syria, Pakistani operatives in foiled jihad plot

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."

"Experts" ponder threat posed by Mohamed and Megahed

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.

Cleveland: Meet the new imam, same as the old imam

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 (thanks to Jeffrey Imm) 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."

John Esposito to address New Jersey DHS

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.

Leader of Muslim Brotherhood Front Group Appointed to Virginia Commission on Immigration

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.

Iraq: Shiite female militias 'kill Sunni Muslim women'

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".

"It's difficult to remove the tarnish of twisted interpretations of terrorists from what Islam means"

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."

Australian jihadist calls for revolutions, coups to impose Islamic law

"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."

Suspect in Oregon jihad plot extradited to the U.S.

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.

Playing pretend with Glenn Beck

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.

Poll: Americans More Negative on Islam

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.

Six Syrians detained in Panama after suspicious behavior on plane

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."

Message to PC police: We have a responsibility to monitor U.S. Mosques

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.

Thai jihadists murder another Buddhist schoolteacher

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.

A fan of Ahmadinejad outside Columbia University

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):