Reader’s links for November 3, 2017

Daily Links Post graphic

In order to preserve the flow of conversation about various posted items, and also in order to make it easier for visitors to find the list of related links being shared by other readers, regulars and interested parties in one place, each day a post is automatically created at a minute past midnight ET.

This way, under the various posts of the day, conversation can take place without as much ‘noise’ on the various links and articles and ideas in the main posts and all the news links being submitted can be seen under these auto-posts by clicking on the comments-link right below these ones.

Thank you all for those that take the effort to assist this site in keeping the public informed. Below, typically people can find the latest enemy propaganda, news items of related materials from multiple countries and languages, op-eds from many excellent sites who write on our topics, geopolitics and immigration issues and so on.

About Eeyore

Canadian artist and counter-jihad and freedom of speech activist as well as devout Schrödinger's catholic

121 Replies to “Reader’s links for November 3, 2017”

  1. Richard: When you think the left can’t get any siller or stupider they prove you wrong

    Buzzfeed Condemns Harvey Weinstein – For Only RAPING White Women

    A feminist at Buzzfeed isn’t explicitly outraged that Harvey Weinstein raped women… but, instead, that he only chose to rape white women and girls.

    “Buried beneath the sickening story of Harvey Weinstein’s abuse is another story — the problem of casting women by their f**kability — and who that leaves out,” bemoaned Buzzfeed’s Senior Culture Writer Bim Adewunmi.

    Yes, in an unbelievable turn of events, Adewunmi fumed that ‘Handsy’ Harvey had not exploited, assaulted, or raped minority women. Apparently, one of her problems with the slime-ridden mogul was that his victims just weren’t diverse enough.

    Read more at http://americanactionnews.com/articles/buzzfeed-calls-harvey-weinstein-racist-for-only-raping-white-women#7lgP13U0bo8wffYE.99

  2. Italian DESTROYS lies that Brexiteers are racist
    Make Britain Great Again
    Make Britain Great Again

  3. Spate of Arrests for Members of American Jihadi Cult
    Home > World > Pakistan > Spate of Arrests for Members of American Jihadi Cult

    The past half-year has been turning sour for a U.S.-based jihadist cult with a terrorist history that claims to be establishing “peaceful” Islamic villages across America. The group is being affected by multiple arrests of its members while it prepares for the impending death of its leader in Pakistan.

    Since May, five reported members and associates of Muslims of America (MOA) have been arrested for crimes ranging from murder to illegal weapons possession to running illicit drugs to forgery. MOA used to be known as Jamaat ul-Fuqra.

    While it’s not clear that any of these illegal acts were directed by the group’s leadership or directly connected to MOA’s communes, previous arrests and declassified documents show that the U.S. government believes MOA and its leadership in Pakistan use revenue from drug sales and engage in extensive trafficking of firearms.

    https://clarionproject.org/spate-arrests-plague-american-jihadist-cult/

  4. Greek officials deplore racist attack on Afghan family home (abcnews, Nov 3, 2017)
    http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/greek-officials-deplore-racist-attack-afghan-family-home-50915415

    “Greece’s government has condemned an attack on the Athens home of an Afghan refugee family whose son made news after being picked to carry the Greek flag at a school parade.

    The windows of the family’s apartment were broken by stones in Friday’s pre-dawn attack, which government officials, political parties and the U.N. refugee agency denounced as racist.

    The family’s 11-year-old son had drawn the lot for the traditional honor of carrying the flag at a parade last week remembering the country’s entry into World War II. The Education Ministry has ordered an investigation into why the boy ended up instead carrying a sign with the name of his primary school.

    Racist attacks have increased during Greece’s financial crisis, and a Nazi-inspired nationalist party entered parliament in 2012.”

  5. EU says Turkey must respect ‘presumption of innocence’ (abcnews, Nov 3, 2017)
    http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/eu-turkey-respect-presumption-innocence-50911338

    “The European Union says Turkey must respect the “presumption of innocence” principle in its prosecution of a businessman and activist accused of attempting to overthrow the government.

    Osman Kavala was detained last month for alleged connections to U.S.-based cleric Fethullah Gulen, whom Turkey blames for a failed military coup last year. Kavala was charged with crimes against the state this week.

    Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has called Kavala “Turkey’s Soros,” a reference to American billionaire George Soros.

    Soros’ Open Society Foundations have funded education, health, justice and media projects around the world.

    Pro-government media in Turkey accuse Kavala of engaging in anti-government conspiracies.

    EU spokeswoman Maja Kocijancic said Friday that the public rhetoric about Kavala “cast serious doubt on the respect of due process and the presumption of innocence.””

  6. Trump says military hitting ISIS ’10 times harder’ after NYC attack (abcnews, Nov 3, 2017)
    http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/trump-military-hitting-isis-10-times-harder-nyc/story?id=50907689

    “President Donald Trump suggested today that the United States military will hit the terrorist group ISIS “10 times harder” after a driver killed eight people on a bike path in lower Manhattan Tuesday.

    The suspect, Sayfullo Saipov, was allegedly inspired by ISIS videos, according to the criminal complaint filed against him. He was charged Wednesday with providing support to ISIS.

    President Trump referred to Saipov as “an animal” this morning as he took questions from reporters before departing for Hawaii and a 13-day, five-nation tour of Asia.

    “When we have an animal do an attack like he did the other day on the west side of Manhattan, we are hitting them 10 times harder,” Trump said. “They claimed him as a soldier – Good luck. Every time they hit us [and] we know it’s ISIS, we hit them like you folks won’t believe.”

    It’s unclear what military action, if any, Trump has authorized specifically in response to the New York City attack.

    A spokesman for the Pentagon would only say that the U.S. military continues to strike ISIS “hard and often.”

    “We have, and we will continue to strike ISIS hard and often, along with Al-Qaeda and other affiliated or like-minded violent extremist organizations wherever they are globally. We are fighting and killing ISIS in operations in Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Afghanistan, Philippines, Niger, Nigeria, Somalia, the Sinai in Egypt and wherever these groups emerge,” Maj. Adrian Rankine-Galloway told ABC News….”

    • “…We are fighting and killing ISIS in operations in Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Afghanistan, Philippines, Niger, Nigeria, Somalia, the Sinai in Egypt and wherever these groups emerge…”

  7. US conducts 1st airstrikes against ISIS in Somalia (abcnews, Nov 3, 2017)
    http://abcnews.go.com/International/us-conducts-1st-airstrikes-isis-somalia/story?id=50915413

    “The United States military has conducted its first airstrikes against ISIS in Somalia, where the U.S. typically strikes against the al Qaeda-affiliated al Shabaab, according to a U.S. official.

    “In coordination with the Federal Government of Somalia, U.S. forces conducted two separate airstrikes against ISIS, in northeastern Somalia on Nov. 3, killing several terrorists,” said a statement from U.S. Africa Command (Africom).

    “The first strike occurred at approximately midnight local Somalia time with the second separate strike occurring at approximately 11 a.m. local Somalia time,” the statement added. “We are currently assessing the results of the strike.”

    These are the first American military strikes against ISIS, which has developed a small presence in the Horn of Africa.

    The airstrikes were carried out under the authorities given to U.S. Africa Command in March by President Donald Trump.

    Those authorities enabled offensive airstrikes in Somalia. Until then, U.S. airstrikes could only be used in self-defense situations on behalf of Somali and African Union troops.

    The main target of U.S. airstrikes in Somalia is al Shabaab, which operates in southern and central Somalia.

    The airstrikes were first reported by local press in Somalia.

    “U.S. forces will continue to use all authorized and appropriate measures to protect Americans and to disable terrorist threats,” read the Africom statement. “This includes partnering with AMISOM and Somali National Security Forces (SNSF); targeting terrorists, their training camps and safe havens throughout Somalia, the region and around the world.””

  8. How Google, Facebook and other tech giants are fighting ISIS online (abcnews, Nov 3, 2017)
    http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/google-facebook-tech-giants-fighting-isis-online/story?id=50917421

    “Over the past year, the tech giants have come under fire for not doing enough to fight ISIS’s digital army on their own turf. Now Google, Jigsaw and Facebook are experimenting with new ways to use algorithms and the latest open source technology to try to pull potential ISIS recruits back from the edge before it’s too late.

    An initiative called the redirect method, which launched six months ago in the United States, uses Google’s not-so-secret weapon: Algorithms that target ads designed specifically for you.

    “The Redirect Method, put simply, is a way of using advertising to counter and prevent extremism and terrorism,” said Ross Frenett, a director at Moonshot CVE, the company working with Google on the project. “So someone types in ‘I want to join jihad into Google…’ we’ve placed an advertisement into the top of that search which is asking them a simple question. ‘Do you want to join the struggle? Find out more here.’”

    The video may look like ISIS content, but it has a very different message. For example, it may show what life is really like in the caliphate, how ISIS is failing militarily and people are struggling. Another video could talk about the heartbreak left behind — such as innocent children being killed.

    Another type of ad may come up too — a simple banner asking if you’re struggling, feeling lost or overwhelmed.

    “We’ve found that those individuals looking for extremist content are disproportionately likely to click on messaging related to mental health,” Frenett told ABC News.

    Surprisingly, despite Google’s huge wealth, the redirect project is funded by a small private foundation called Gen Next.

    “I think government and the private sector have to work together to solve this problem,” said Adnan Kifayat, head of Global Security Ventures at Gen Next.

    After years at the White House and State Department, Kifayat is convinced that the U.S. government cannot be a credible partner in creating counternarratives. “What we need are more companies and more philanthropists like Gen Next to get into this fight and say, ‘Yes … this is our battle as well. This is not someone else’s battle. It’s not going to happen elsewhere unless we take it on ourselves.”

    Facebook is going one step further. Instead of pushing counternarrative content that individuals may or may not click on, Facebook is about to launch “One to One” – a direct online intervention model with real-life people trying to engage with potential recruits before they become violent.

    “The linchpin to recruitment is really in the one-to-one engagements that happen between recruiters and at-risk individuals,” said Sasha Havlicek, the cofounder and CEO of a London think tank called the Institute for Strategic Dialogue. “Right now nobody’s reaching out to those individuals except for ISIS, except for those who would recruit them in. What we try to do is essentially step into that void and compete with that kind of attention and outreach to individuals who are often very lost, very angry and engage with them.”

    The key, Havlicek said, is finding the right person to intervene and begin an online conversation.

    “We’re identifying thousands of individuals who are expressing support for violent extremist groups, and then we are pairing those individuals up with intervention providers that have a real chance of shifting the course of their radicalization trajectories,” she explained.

    Reaching out are former extremists, counselors and survivors of terrorism who are trained to connect with potential recruits on a personal basis — people like Colin, who survived a terrorist attack at a Tunisian beach resort hotel in June 2015.

    “How I survived I don’t know,” Colin told ABC News in an exclusive interview. “I was lying on a beach with sunglasses on with my wife on holiday. Everyone around you gets killed.”

    Thirty-nine people on the beach that day were killed when a single gunman opened fire on tourists lounging in the sun. “I heard what I thought was fireworks,” Colin said. “I looked up and my wife was running. I felt a bullet pass under my arm, felt the velocity. I got shot a few times – only flesh wounds. I swam out to sea.”

    Eventually Colin was reunited with his wife. Back in London he went to speak to a local imam because “I didn’t want to spend the rest of my life thinking every Muslim I met was a terrorist … I wanted to try to stop anything like this from happening again.”

    He was approached by ISD to join the One to One program, using his personal story to reach out to potential terrorists like the one who almost killed him.

    “I was so scared when I made first contact, I imagined him sitting in his room with an AK-47, but that never happened,” Colin said.

    Since then, Colin has made contact with over two dozen extremists online, sometimes messaging them for several hours. “It’s been very helpful to me. I had to face my fears,” he said. “I think it can help stop terrorism. That’s why I do it. Just talking to them and asking right questions and right dialogue. “

    Colin said several people he spoke to wanted to leave the country and go fight. He doesn’t know for certain that he changed their minds, but he said at least he tried.

    This is an excerpt of a conversation Colin said he had in May 2017 with a potential American ISIS recruit whom he was trying to dissuade.

    Here’s a sample of their message exchange, with Colin identified as “intervention provider” and the potential recruit as “identified user.”

    Intervention provider: “Islam is such a peaceful religion and way of life. I respect your religious beliefs.”

    Identified user: “The definition of Islam, being a religion of peace, is wrong.”

    Intervention provider: “Really?”

    Identified user: “Although it endorses peaceful interactions with everyone. But Islam, as in its own meaning is about submitting your will to Allah, the Lord of Universe, with completeness, and we ought to do what he commands. If he asks us to behave nicely, we do it. If he asks us to feed poor, we do it.”

    Intervention provider: “Does he tell you to kill innocent people?”

    Identified user: “And if he asks us to wage war against those, who fight Islam, fight laws of Islam, kill Muslim, we do it.”

    “We’ve identified tens of thousands of extremists expressing violent sentiment,” said Havlicek. “We have performed interventions in the U.K., in the United States and in Australia. I’d say about a third of those interventions have happened in the United States already.”

    “There is no silver bullet, but we believe that this area of programming is the missing link in terms of addressing the challenge of radicalization,” she added. “We will not beat this problem without direct interventions, both offline and online. This is the only way we walk people back from the edge in terms of violence.””

  9. BBC Hates White People (Daily Brexit)
    Make Britain Great Again
    Make Britain Great Again

    Yo Donkeyman
    This is a few days old, but I think you need to see it mate,

  10. Man Charged With FGM: Only Second Prosecution in British History, 31 Years After Ban Introduced (breitbart, Nov 3, 2017)
    http://www.breitbart.com/london/2017/11/03/man-charged-fgm-second-case-31-years/

    “A man in London has been charged with female genital mutilation (FGM) in what is only the second case of its kind in the UK, despite the practice having been illegal for 31 years, and dozens of new cases being discovered by health authorities every day.

    The 49-year-old, who is reported to be from Africa, is accused of carrying out the procedure on a child between 2010 and 2013. If the prosecution succeeds, it will be the first conviction for FGM in Britain, where it has been banned since 1985.

    He will appear at Woolwich crown court on Friday facing two charges alleging that he “excised, infibulated or otherwise mutilated the whole or part of the labia minora” of a young girl, which according to the Daily Mail took place between 2010 and 2013.

    In addition to the charges under the Female Genital Mutilation Act 2003, the south London resident is also charged with two counts of wounding with intent, and three separate counts of child cruelty.

    Hundreds of thousands of women in Britain are thought to be living with the consequence of FGM, with the extent of the problem revealed earlier this year when analysis of NHS data showed the health service either treats or discovers new cases every hour in England.

    Since FGM was first banned legislation against the practice, which is performed mainly in Africa and the Middle East, has been strengthened — with taking a child abroad to have the procedure made a criminal offence in 2003.

    And, since 2015, healthcare professionals, teachers and social care workers have been legally required to notify police when they discover cases in which FGM appears to have been carried out on a girl who is under 18.

    While Britain’s failure to successfully prosecute a single case of FGM has been branded a “national scandal”, hundreds of people have been convicted in France for carrying out the procedure.

    Earlier this year, Breitbart London reported that the European nation’s zero-tolerance approach towards the practice saw more than 100 people jailed by 2014, in dozens of high-profile cases which were brought to court.”

  11. UK ‘Loses’ 56,000 Migrants Due for Deportation, Including Over 700 Ex-Cons (breitbart, Nov 3, 2017)
    http://www.breitbart.com/london/2017/11/03/uk-loses-56000-migrants-due-deportation-including-700-ex-cons/

    “Amber Rudd’s Home Office has lost track of some 56,000 migrants who were supposed to be deported, including over 700 criminals.

    The situation was exposed by Chief Inspector of Borders and Immigration David Bolt, the Telegraph reports.

    Bolt, a veteran of MI5, the National Criminal Intelligence Service, and the Serious Organised Crime Agency, noted that of roughly 80,000 foreign nationals scheduled for deportation and required to check in regularly with officials, 55,974 are so-called declared absconders.

    This means their “whereabouts are unknown and all mandatory procedures to re-establish contact with the migrant have failed”.

    Bolt further noted that there is “little evidence” the authorities are taking any action to locate the vast majority of these individuals…”

  12. VIDEO – Bret Baier: FBI Sources Believe Clinton Foundation Case Moving Towards “Likely an Indictment”

    Fox News Channel’s Bret Baier reports the latest news about the Clinton Foundation investigation from two sources inside the FBI. He reveals five important new pieces of information in these two short clips

    1. The Clinton Foundation investigation is far more expansive than anybody has reported so far and has been going on for more than a year.

    2. The laptops of Clinton aides Cherryl Mills and Heather Samuelson have not been destroyed, and agents are currently combing through them. The investigation has interviewed several people twice, and plans to interview some for a third time.

    3. Agents have found emails believed to have originated on Hillary Clinton’s secret server on Anthony Weiner’s laptop. They say the emails are not duplicates and could potentially be classified in nature.

    4. Sources within the FBI have told Baier that an indictment is “likely” in the case of pay-for-play at the Clinton Foundation, “barring some obstruction in some way” from the Justice Department.

    5. FBI sources say with 99% accuracy that Hillary Clinton’s server has been hacked by at least five foreign intelligence agencies, and that information have been taken from it.

    Transcript:

    BRET BAIER: Breaking news tonight — two separate sources with intimate knowledge of the FBI investigations into the Clinton emails and the Clinton Foundation tell Fox the following:

    The investigation looking into possible pay-for-play interaction between Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and the Foundation has been going on for more than a year. Led by the white collar crime division, public corruption branch of the criminal investigative division of the FBI.

    The Clinton Foundation investigation is a, quote, “very high priority.” Agents have interviewed and reinterviewed multiple people about the Foundation case, and even before the WikiLeaks dumps, agents say they have collected a great deal of evidence. Pressed on that, one sources said, quote, “a lot of it,” and “there is an avalanche of new information coming every day.”

    Some of it from WikiLeaks, some of it from new emails. The agents are actively and aggressively pursuing this case. They will be going back to interview the same people again, some for the third time.

    As a result of the limited immunity deals to top aides, including Cheryl Mills and Heather Samuelson, the Justice Department had tentatively agreed that the FBI would destroy those laptops after a narrow review. We are told definitively that has not happened. Those devices are currently in the FBI field office here in Washington, D.C. and are being exploited.

    The source points out that any immunity deal is null and void if any subject lied at any point in the investigation.

    Meantime, the classified e-mail investigation is being run by the National Security division of the FBI. They are currently combing through former Democratic Congressman Anthony Wiener’s laptop and have found e-mails that they believe came from Hillary Clinton’s server that appear to be new, as in not duplicates.

    Whether they contain classified material or not is not yet known. It will likely be known soon. All of this just as we move inside one week until election day.

    Baier gives more details to Fox News Channel’s Brit Hume.

    Transcript:

    BRET BAIER: Here’s the deal: We talked to two separate sources with intimate knowledge of the FBI investigations. One: The Clinton Foundation investigation is far more expansive than anybody has reported so far… Several offices separately have been doing their own investigations.

    Two: The immunity deal that Cheryl Mills and Heather Samuelson, two top aides to Hillary Clinton, got from the Justice Department in which it was beleived that the laptops they had, after a narrow review for classified materials, were going to be destroyed. We have been told that those have not been destroyed — they are at the FBI field office here on Washington and are being exploited. .

    Three: The Clinton Foundation investigation is so expansive, they have interviewed and re-interviewed many people. They described the evidence they have as ‘a lot of it’ and said there is an ‘avalanche coming in every day.’ WikiLeaks and the new emails.

    They are “actively and aggressively pursuing this case.” Remember the Foundation case is about accusations of pay-for-play… They are taking the new information and some of them are going back to interview people for the third time. As opposed to what has been written about the Clinton Foundation investigation, it is expansive.

    The classified e-mail investigation is being run by the National Security division of the FBI. They are currently combing through Anthony Weiner’s laptop. They are having some success — finding what they believe to be new emaisls, not duplicates, that have been transported through Hillary Clinton’s server.

    Finally, we learned there is a confidence from these sources that her server had been hacked. And that it was a 99% accuracy that it had been hacked by at least five foreign intelligence agencies, and that things had been taken from that…

    There has been some angst about Attorney General Loretta Lynch — what she has done or not done. She obviously did not impanel, or go to a grand jury at the beginning. They also have a problem, these sources do, with what President Obama said today and back in October of 2015…

    I pressed again and again on this very issue… The investigations will continue, there is a lot of evidence. And barring some obstruction in some way, they believe they will continue to likely an indictment.

    https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2016/11/02/fbi_sources_tell_fox_news_indictment_likely_in_clinton_foundation_case.html

  13. “He’s Trump” / Song Parody: ‘Lump – Presidents of the USA’
    Free Press of Kekistan
    Free Press of Kekistan

    WTH!
    I can’t sleep
    bummer,
    hope this musical meme raises a few smiles

  14. Yo Donkeyman, I’ve got to meme till I fall asleep mate

    Bill C-16 Song / Jordan Peterson Tribute – Goo Goo Dolls Parody
    Free Press of Kekistan
    Free Press of Kekistan

  15. Antifa Parody (“Mad World” Parody w/ZDL) – & KYK Update
    Free Press of Kekistan
    Free Press of Kekistan

  16. BREITBART – H.R. McMaster Avoids Islamic Terrorist Label Again, Calls Manhattan Jihadist a ‘Mass Murderer’

    (New York) H.R. McMaster, President Trump’s embattled national security adviser, referred to the Islamic terrorist suspect in Tuesday’s deadly jihadist attack in Lower Manhattan as among a grouping of “mass murderers.”

    This despite reports that the suspect, Sayfullo Saipov, left behind a note declaring that the attack was perpetuated in the name of the Islamic State. And witnesses heard Saipov shout “Allahu Akbar!,” Arabic for “Allah is great,” during the terrorist assault.

    McMaster has a history of minimizing the radical Islamic nature of such attacks. Only last month, he labeled the September 11, 2001, Islamic terrorist attacks “mass murder attacks,” instead of calling them acts of terrorism. This reporter previously exposed numerous other instances of McMaster minimizing the Islamic motivations of radical Muslim terrorists.

    The latest incident came during a White House press briefing on Wednesday, when a reporter posed the following question to McMaster:

    I know we’re focused on the Asia trip here, but I just wanted to talk for a second about the President weighing in on the man who’s been charged with mowing down pedestrians in New York City. He called for the death penalty. Have there been any conversations in the White House about how that could complicate prosecutors’ efforts, and even help the defense claim that this person can’t get a fair trial?

    McMaster replied (emphasis added):

    What the President wants is to secure the American people from this threat and from mass murderers like this, murderers like this. And so what he’s asked us for are options to take a look to assess if our tremendous law enforcement teams and our judicial system has all the tools they need to be able to combat this threat to the American people.

    So what we owe him now is we owe him options — you know, options to take a look at to see if this is the time to reassess, change our capabilities in this area and the area of law enforcement in particular.

    Watch McMaster’s remarks here:

    https://twitter.com/CBSNews/status/926149293475495938

    http://www.breitbart.com/jerusalem/2017/11/03/h-r-mcmaster-avoids-islamic-terrorist-label-again-calls-manhattan-jihadist-a-mass-murderer/

  17. Sound of Social Justice – (Simon Garfunkel Parody Cover Song)
    Free Press of Kekistan
    Free Press of Kekistan

  18. Uzbek Sister Of NYC Suspect Fears Saipov ‘Brainwashed,’ Pleads For Time And ‘Fair Trial’

    A sister of New York City terror suspect Sayfullo Saipov has told RFE/RL from their native Uzbekistan that her family believes the 29-year-old was “brainwashed” and has pleaded with U.S. authorities to give him “time” and a “fair trial.”

    Umida Saipova, 27, offered condolences to the families of the victims of the October 31 rampage in which Saipov is accused of plowing a pickup truck through a bike path in Manhattan, killing eight people and leaving around a dozen others injured.

    “My mother says she didn’t notice any sign of [radicalization] when she visited him in the U.S. twice,” Saipova said of 50-year-old Muqaddas Saipova, who was last in the United States to visit her son earlier this year. “My mother said she would have brought him back to Uzbekistan had she noticed anything.”

    Saipov was shot in the abdomen and apprehended by police, reportedly after fleeing the rented truck, which authorities say contained messages expressing support for radical Islamist group Islamic State (IS). The perpetrator was said to have shouted, “Allahu akbar,” as he left the scene of the attack.

    The incident was the deadliest terrorist attack on New York City since Al-Qaeda militants slammed hijacked passenger jets into the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in 2001, killing more than 2,600 people.

    Prosecutors reported that Saipov said he was inspired by IS and “felt good about what he had done,” even demanding to hang an IS banner in his hospital room.

    ‘IS Soldier’

    IS on November 3 declared in an article in the group’s weekly newspaper that “one of the soldiers of the Islamic State attacked a number of crusaders on a street in New York City,” according to the SITE Intelligence Group. The group called the attacker a “soldier of the caliphate.”

    Informed in Tashkent of her brother’s reported request to hang the IS flag in the hospital, Saipova said “there was no sign” of a problem.

    “We don’t know who has brainwashed him,” Saipova said, speaking in Uzbek by telephone. “We don’t know his circumstances. We don’t know. Perhaps he’s become part of some organized group.”

    She added: “I don’t know, honestly, how long it will take for his head to get rid of that poison, but I’m sure he will come to his senses, God willing.”

    But she acknowledged that the family had been alarmed at one point after Saipov’s 2013 marriage to see an image of him with a full beard in the style of some extreme religious elements.

    “When we first time saw him on Skype with a beard, we got scared, honestly. We were terrified,” she said. “I cried and called him and asked him why.”

    Saipova said her brother told her about having been stopped in his car and mugged, and said he grew a beard to appear older and “to scare them.”

    ‘Normal’ Conversation

    The family had a “normal” conversation with her brother, a permanent legal U.S. resident since 2010, one day before the attack in New York, she said.

    “I spoke with him by the phone a day before,” Saipova told RFE/RL. “He was in a good mood. It was a usual, good conversation.”

    He had told them he was eating his mother’s “favorite pastry” on his way to pick up a client at the airport, she said.

    Saipov worked as an Uber driver in the New Jersey area for about six months before the attack.

    Saipova said she was prepared to travel to the United States to speak with her brother in hopes of discovering what might have driven him to violence.

    The criminal complaint filed with an injured Saipov present in federal court on November 1 said that the accused had waived his right to remain silent or have an attorney present in speaking to investigators from his Manhattan hospital bed.

    New York Governor Andrew Cuomo suggested Saipov was radicalized after he arrived in the United States from Uzbekistan in 2010 via the U.S. Diversity Visa Immigrant Program, known as the green-card lottery.

    ‘Message To Trump’

    In the hours after the attack, U.S. President Donald Trump tweeted out calls for “the NYC terrorist” to be sent to Guantanamo, the military facility in Cuba where U.S. officials have kept designated “enemy combatants” since 9/11.

    But Trump later cited “something appropriate about keeping him in the home of the horrible crime he committed” and suggested the process “should move fast. DEATH PENALTY!”

    “We don’t think he should be given the death penalty immediately,” a crying Saipova told RFE/RL. “We are hoping for a fair trial. We are ready to go there, if it’s possible, to talk to him.”

    She urged U.S. authorities to “give him a bit more time,” adding, “Please pass my message to Trump, if possible.”

    Both of Saipov’s parents and an uncle were said be undergoing questioning by authorities in Uzbekistan, and Saipov’s sister said on November 3 that the family “still doesn’t know where” her father and uncle “are now.”

    She said her mother had returned to their Tashkent-area home on November 3 from the hospital, where she was taken to be treated for what Saipova described as “shock.”

    Later efforts on November 3 to contact Umida Saipova by telephone or at the home on the outskirts of Tashkent were unsuccessful.

    https://www.rferl.org/a/new-york-terror-attack-uzbek-saipov-sister-brainwashed-trial/28833491.html

  19. UK: Tommy Robinson launches book ‘Why Muslims Kill For Islam’, protesters attend event

    Tommy Robinson, whose real name is Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, held a launch of his new controversial book ‘Why Muslims Kill For Islam’, in Manchester, Friday.

    Supporters attended the event, where Robinson, the former English Defence League leader, was joined by the German Lutz Bachmann, founder of the PEGIDA movement.

    A group of protestors from the United Against Facists (UAF) organised an opposition rally in the city. More than 50 police officers were at the scene of the book launch. There were no incidents reported.