Category Archives: U.S.A.
U.S. supports role for ‘non-secular’ groups in Egyptian government
Mercury News:
By Paul Richter and Peter Nicholas
Los Angeles Times
WASHINGTON–The Obama administration said Monday for the first time that it supports a role for groups such as the Muslim Brotherhood, a banned Islamist organization, in a reformed Egyptian government.
The organization must reject violence and recognize democratic goals if the U.S. is to be comfortable with it taking part in the government, the White House said. But by even setting conditions for the involvement of such “non-secular” groups, the administration took a surprise step in the midst of the crisis enveloping Egypt for the past week.
The statement was an acknowledgment that any popularly accepted new government would probably include groups that are not considered friendly to U.S. interests, and a signal that the White House is prepared for that probability after 30 years of reliable relations with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak.
Monday’s statement was a “pretty clear sign that the U.S. isn’t going to advocate a narrow form of pluralism, but a broad one,” said Robert Malley, a Middle East peace negotiator in the Clinton administration. U.S. officials have previously pressed for broader participation in Egypt’s government.
The Bush administration pushed Mubarak for democratic reforms, but a statement in 2005 by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice did not specifically address a role for Islamists.
“This is different,” said Malley, now with the International Crisis Group. “It has a real political edge and political
meaning.”White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said a reformed government “has to include a whole host of important non-secular actors that give Egypt a strong chance to continue to be (a) stable and reliable partner.”
Gibbs said the U.S. government has had no contact with the Muslim Brotherhood because of questions over its commitment to the rule of law, democracy and nonviolence. But the Brotherhood is not listed on U.S. terrorism lists, as are the Hamas and Hezbollah organizations.
His remarks came after a White House meeting at which administration officials briefed outside Middle East experts, leaving some of the participants with the impression that the administration was not counting on Mubarak to remain in power.
The Muslim Brotherhood is the largest and best-organized Egyptian opposition group, with an estimated 600,000 members, many of them educated, middle-class men. It has disavowed terrorism and violence, but its inclusion in any government would likely be deeply controversial among U.S. allies, especially in Israel, because it advocates tearing up Egypt’s peace treaty with the Jewish state.
Its members run for elective office as independents. It won 20 percent of the seats in parliament in 2005. But in elections in November, Brotherhood members didn’t win a single seat in balloting that was tainted by allegations of fraud.
In addition to its political efforts, the Muslim Brotherhood runs social and economic programs that help fill the gaps in Egypt’s public services. It rejects the possibility of a woman or a Christian being president of Egypt, and would press for stricter adherence to Islamic codes.
U.S. conservatives such as former House Speaker Newt Gingrich have warned about its rise, and many draw comparisons to the 1979 Islamic revolution in Iran. But others contend that fears of the Brotherhood, which has been suppressed for decades by the Egyptian government, are overstated.
FLORIDA PROFESSOR AND MOSQUE LEADER PLEADS GUILTY TO TALLAHASSEE ATTACKS
ANTI-HATE GROUP, WHOSE CHAIRMAN WAS VICTIM OF ATTACKER, SAYS BASSEM ALHALABI UNFIT TO TEACH FAU’S STUDENTS
(Tallahassee, FL) In a plea agreement filed earlier this week, Bassem Abdo Alhalabi, an associate professor at Florida Atlantic University (FAU) and a director for the Islamic Center of Boca Raton (ICBR), admitted guilt to two separate attacks taking place in Tallahassee, Florida on March 11, 2010 (See ‘Assault on Muslim Capitol Day’).
Alhalabi, a former research assistant for Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) terrorist Sami al-Arian, had been charged with one count of battery on Americans Against Hate Chairman Joe Kaufman and one count of assault on cameraman J. Mark Campbell. The attacks took place approximately one hour from each other.
The first attack was on Kaufman, after he was coming out of a meeting with the Florida Attorney General’s office, in the Rotunda (lobby) of the State Capitol Building.
At the time of the attacks, Alhalabi was participating in an event sponsored by United Voices for America (UVA), a political lobby group of CAIR-Florida, headed by former Executive Director of CAIR-Tampa Ahmed Bedier.
A warrant was issued for Alhalabi’s arrest on March 19th. He was taken into custody on March 22nd and released from prison on March 23rd.
According to the plea agreement, which was secured by Leon County Assistant State Attorney Tiffany Cruz, Alhalabi will have to perform community service and take an anger management course.
This was not the first time Alhalabi became in trouble with the law. In June 2003, the U.S. Department of Commerce found Alhalabi guilty of illegally shipping a $13,000 military-grade thermal imaging device to Syria, a state sponsor of terrorism.
Joe Kaufman stated, “With everything that Bassem Alhalabi has been involved in – from his association with terrorists to his illegal exporting activities and now to his physically violent confrontations – it is high time that FAU part ways with this radical. Alhalabi is a danger to others and should not be trusted around any university’s students.”
Americans Against Hate (AAH) urges all those concerned to immediately contact Florida Atlantic University (FAU). Click here for contact details.
Joe Kaufman is available for interview. E-mail: in**@******************te.org.
WASHINGTON POST MEGA BLUNDER: MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD INSPIRED BY THE YMCA
The Village People: So were we!
So YMCA inspred them, not the Nazis, thanks for clearing that one up Wa-Po. No mention of the Nazis funding the Great Arab Uprising from 1936-1939, boosting MB ranks from 200 to 200,000? Grand research! According to the WaPo:
Muslim Brotherhood says it is only a minor player in Egyptian protests
WA-PO: “Inspired by the YMCA when it was founded in 1928, the Muslim Brotherhood has been under a ban since 1948, and its real size is difficult to gauge. The group was brutally repressed by President Gamal Abdel Nasser in the 1950s and 1960s. Since then, it has at times been propped up as a foil – especially for Western audiences – with periodic crackdowns that have sent many of its members to prison.”
Obviously, many of their actions as well as the rhetoric and the slogans used in this antisemitic campaign were clearly taken over from Nazi Germany. The Brotherhood, however, included Islamic roots of hatred against Jews as well. They used and disseminated a quotation from the Koran that Jews are to be considered ‘the worst enemy of the believers.’ In addition, they evoked old stories of the early history of Islam by pointing to the example set by Mohammed who, as legend has it, succeeded not only in expelling two Jewish tribes from Medina during the 7th century, but killed the entire male population of the third tribe and sold all the women and children into slavery. And they stressed (and still consider) Palestine as an Islamic territory (‘‘Dar al-Islam“) where Jews should never be allowed to govern a single village let alone an entire state.
H/T: DG
Governor of Hawaii is one of them crazy, tin foil hat ‘birthers’ it seems.
Arizona “honor killing” trial set to start
By David Schwartz REUTERS.COM
PHOENIX | Sun Jan 23, 2011 9:08am EST
PHOENIX (Reuters) – An Iraqi immigrant is due to begin trial on Monday to face charges he murdered his daughter by running her over with a Jeep because he believed she was too Westernized.
Opening arguments are scheduled to begin in Maricopa County Superior Court in the case of Faleh Hassan Almaleki, accused of what prosecutors say was an October 2009 “honor killing” over his daughter’s behavior.
Police say he crashed his Jeep Laredo into his 20 year-old daughter, Noor Almaleki, and her boyfriend’s mother, as the two walked across a parking lot in the Phoenix suburb of Peoria. The daughter died two weeks later; the mother recovered.
The 50-year-old Almaleki faces life in prison if convicted by the 12-member jury.
He is charged with first-degree murder, attempted murder, aggravated assault and two counts of hit and run.
A spokesman for the Maricopa County Attorney’s Office declined comment on Friday. Jeff Kirchler, Almaleki’s public defender, did not respond to a message left with his office.
Almaleki told detectives and witnesses that he was angry at his daughter because she was “too Westernized,” and he felt she was defying Iraqi and Muslim values, said Jay Davies, a spokesman for the Peoria Police Department.
The daughter had shunned an arranged marriage, and was living with her boyfriend and his mother, police said.
The United Nations has documented honor killings in Egypt, Iraq, Turkey and other countries, but the practice of killing a family member — often a woman or a girl — over perceived shame is relatively rare in the United States.
Following his daughter’s death, Almaleki fled to Mexico and later to London, where he was taken into custody upon his arrival. He is being held on $5 million bail.
(Editing by Alex Dobuzinskis and Jerry Norton)
9/11 mastermind slaughtered Daniel Pearl.
From The Ottawa Citizen
September 11 mastermind blamed for Pearl murder
BY BEN FARMER, THE DAILY TELEGRAPH
JANUARY 20, 2011 5:37 PM
© Copyright (c) The Daily Telegraph
The journalist Daniel Pearl was beheaded by Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the self-confessed mastermind of the September 11 terrorist attacks, according to a newly-released FBI forensic test.
The analysis, which matched veins on Mohammed’s hand with one in the video of Mr Pearl’s murder, has been disclosed after a three-year independent investigation into the killing. It casts further doubt on the conviction of the Briton Omar Sheikh for the murder, which was filmed and put on the Internet.
The Pearl Project concludes Pakistani authorities “knowingly used perjured testimony” to pin the murder on the former public schoolboy.
Mr Pearl was kidnapped in the Pakistani port of Karachi on January 23, 2002 while researching Islamic militants and four weeks later a video of his execution was delivered to American officials.
While Sheikh and the other three convicted of the killing were involved in the kidnapping, they were not in the room when the Wall Street Journal reporter was murdered, the inquiry found.
He had been seized and held in a “multifaceted, at times chaotic conspiracy” involving at least 27 men from three militant groups. Only 14 of those have been arrested and Mr Pearl’s actual murderers are unlikely to face trial.
After his kidnap, he was handed to an al-Qaida gang led by Mohammed, a strategist for the terrorist network, who killed him. The inquiry by academics, journalists and students involved hundreds of interviews with American and Pakistani officials.
Mohammed was captured in March 2003 and confessed to masterminding the 9/11 attacks. The al-Qaida number three is being held in Guantanamo Bay military prison and has also previously confessed that he beheaded Mr Pearl.
Doubts have surrounded the confession, because it may have been extracted under “water boarding” torture.
The Pearl Project found Michael Dick, an FBI investigator, used video of Mr Pearl’s beheading to create stills of the hand of his masked killer.
The photographs were shared with CIA colleagues holding Mohammed, who used a forensic technique called “vein matching” to determine the hands belonged to the same man.
One reported: “The photo you sent me and the hand of our friend inside the cage seem identical to me.” Both the CIA and FBI use the mathematical modelling technique, though it is not considered as reliable as fingerprinting.
The investigation found Sheikh, who studied mathematics at the London School of Economics, orchestrated the kidnap, but was sidelined when Mohammed became involved.
The conspirators were “inept, plagued by bungling plans, a failure to cover their tracks, and an inability to operate cameras and computer equipment”.
Sheikh was sentenced to death in July 2002 for murder and kidnapping and three others were given life terms. Their appeals have stalled.
Rai Basheer, a defence attorney, said the prosecution was delaying the process because it knew it would lose on appeal.
© Copyright (c) The Daily Telegraph
DOJ PRESS RELEASE SHOWS FBI’S NEW POLITICALLY CORRECT LOGO
DOJ AND FBI: SO WHAT IF ETHNIC EUROPEANS ARE TYPE CASTED AS TERRORISTS, THEY ARE THE LEAST LIKELY TO CRY FOUL.
An anonymous source sends in the following:
“Have a look at the DOJ press release. The story, in itself, is most important. However, it might be worth while to focus on the FBI-NYPD Joint Terrorism Task Force logo that appears at the bottom of the release. The facial features represented on the logo’s character might suggest that authorities are no longer ravaged by political correctness – where ethnic Europeans are concerned. If my impression is right, this selective extension of respect and consideration is unacceptable.
Now what would happen if the FBI chose another character, more representative of the terrorists currently wreaking havoc upon society, not only in the US, but around the world? KGS
Powerful bomb found on the MLK route in Spokane Washinton.
Terrorism is terrorism and clearly that is what this was meant to be. It seems under reported to me considering how they say this backpack might be powerful enough to take down a building. But then a local Ottawa High school, Glebe I believe it was, has had two bomb scares that required a full evacuation this week and it wasn’t reported anywhere.
It seems to take a lot more than this to make for news these days.
STRATFOR: Possible Parcel Bomb In New York
U.S.: Possible Parcel Bomb In New York STRATFOR
January 19, 2011
Police are investigating a possible parcel bomb at a commercial Israeli bank in New York, according to a New York Police Department spokesman, CNN reported Jan. 19. X-ray imaging revealed the potential device in a large envelope at a New York branch of Bank Hapoalim. According to a law-enforcement source, the letter was addressed to a bank employee. Emergency vehicles have arrived at the building, located in Manhattan, as investigators try to determine the contents of the package.
U.S: Suspicious Package Is A Greeting Card – NYPD
January 19, 2011
The New York Police Department (NYPD) said a suspicious package sent to an Israeli commercial bank in Manhattan turned out to be a greeting card from a headhunting firm, AP reported Jan. 19. The package was considered suspicious because X-ray imaging detected wires and a battery.
Israeli chess player banned from Los Angeles Chess match
This tip just in, no link yet. The Chess Society of LA have disqualified an Israeli competitor because “They do not take players from a terrorist state”
Looking for links. Hope to have some soon. Tip is rock solid though.
Islamic prostitution ring of white Kufar girls not just in England
How did I miss this? Nov 2010
AZ SHOOTING HAS POLITICAL CONNECTION: A VICTIM THREATENS TEA PARTY MEMBER WITH DEATH
Interesting, the only politically motivated threats to violence connected to the Arizona shooting, comes from one a man (most likely a Lefty) shot at the mass murder incident at the Safeway shopping center which left a large number of people dead and wounded. KGS
[Fuller took a picture of Humphries and shouted, “You’re dead.”]
Tucson shooting victim detained at taping of TV special
The gathering for “After the Tragedy: An American Conversation Continued,” to be shown as a special edition of “This Week” Sunday, included witnesses, first responders, victims and heroes of the Jan. 8 mass shooting that killed six and wounded 13 others, including Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, D-Ariz.
Local officials and others also packed St. Odilia’s Catholic Church in northwest Tucson, where the show was taped.
KGUN reported that Fuller took exception to comments by Republican state Rep. Terri Proud and Tucson Tea Party spokesman Trent Humphries.
Fuller was in the front row and apparently became upset when Humphries suggested that any conversations about gun control should be delayed until all the dead were buried, KGUN reported.
Fuller took a picture of Humphries and shouted, “You’re dead.”
Some media reports said Fuller kept booing and making other remarks before deputies escorted him from the church.
David Horowitz: The Socialist roots of the current US administration
STRATFOR: Shooter identified
January 8, 2011 STRATFOR.COM
The suspect allegedly responsible for shooting U.S. Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords has been identified as 22-year-old Arizona native Jared Loughner, AP and NBC reported Jan. 8. A second man thought to be connected to the shooting has been arrested at Thornydale and Magee roads in Tucson, while a third man is being sought by the authorities