Myth vs Fact #139

This previous installment was reposted, with edits, on another blog. Since it contains vital information presented with extreme clarity, I am republishing it.  Here you will find two ahadith including a quote from 2:195, which confirm each other. You will also find further confirmation in Ibn Kathir’s Tafsir, which is linked.  Pay close attention to the emphasized text.

Myth	Fact
Islam: Religion of peace.	Abu Dawud Book 14, Number 2506: Narrated AbuAyyub: AbuImran said: We went out on an expedition from Medina with the intention of (attacking) Constantinople. AbdurRahman ibn Khalid ibn al-Walid was the leader of the company. The Romans were just keeping their backs to the walls of the city. A man (suddenly) attacked the enemy. Thereupon the people said: Stop! Stop! There is no god but Allah. He is putting himself into danger. AbuAyyub said: This verse was revealed about us, the group of the Ansar (the Helpers). When Allah helped His Prophet (peace_be_upon_him) and gave Islam dominance, we said (i.e. thought): Come on! Let us stay in our property and improve it. Thereupon Allah, the Exalted, revealed, “And spend of your substance in the cause of Allah, and make not your hands contribute to (your destruction)“. To put oneself into danger means that we stay in our property and commit ourselves to its improvement, and abandon fighting (i.e. jihad). AbuImran said: AbuAyyub continued to strive in the cause of Allah until he (died and) was buried in Constantinople.
Tafsir	The Command to spend in the Cause of Allah

Abandoning Jihad for agriculture will lead to your destruction (eternal damnation).  This is confirmed by :
Abu Dawud Book 23, Number 3455:

Narrated Abdullah ibn Umar:

I heard the Apostle of Allah, (peace_be_upon_him) say: When you enter into the inah transaction, hold the tails of oxen, are pleased with agriculture, and give up conducting jihad (struggle in the way of Allah). Allah will make disgrace prevail over you, and will not withdraw it until you return to your original religion.

These ahadith prove beyond doubt that Islam is aggressively martial, not peaceful.  I have given you the fact and the means to verify it in the Qur’an, hadith and tafsir.  Please do not hide this light under a bushel, copy this post, paste it into an email, and broadcast it, urging the recipients to forward it.

Myth vs Fact

Myth	Fact
Islam: Religion of peace.	9:44 Those who believe in Allâh and the Last Day would not ask your leave to be exempted from fighting with their properties and their lives, and Allâh is the All-Knower of Al-Muttaqûn (the pious – see V.2:2). Tafsir:  1

Tell It As It Is!!!

I have a standing search for articles about the Moderate Muslim Majority Rejecting Terrorism. Today the search reported this article, from which I have excerpted two brilliant gems of idiocy.

More Muslims reject violence

By John Bersia

August 2, 2007

“Overall, majorities in 15 of 16 Muslim publics surveyed say that suicide bombings can be rarely or never justified,” according to the report. Bangladesh, Indonesia, Jordan, Lebanon and Pakistan registered the most impressive drops, compared to 2002 numbers.

Every Muslim who loudly and consistently condemns acts of violence by those who distort the true meaning and purpose of Islam, including bin Laden, deserves praise.

    So, suicide bombings ain’t justified. Whoopie!!! Why didn’t the Pew Global Attitudes Project survey attitudes toward bombings, shootings, knifing and rocket attacks that do not involve the death of the perpetrator?  Oh, but they condemn attacks on innocent civilians! Great! Only Muslim civilians are innocent.  Disbelievers are Kuffar: rebels against Allah; najis, not innocent. Our abode is Hell and its every Muslim’s duty to send us there.

    Exactly who are those who “distort the true meaning and purpose of Islam” ?  What is the true meaning and purpose of Islam?  The meaning is surrender.  The purpose is the personal empowerment and emolument of Muhammad and his Caliphs.

    “Moderate Muslims” swear that aggression, genocide and terrorism are haram; they have no place in Islam. Should we believe them, or should we believe Allah and his Messenger?  What did Allah and his Messenger say about this subject?

• 2:216 Jihâd (holy fighting in Allâh’s Cause) is ordained for you (Muslims) though you dislike it, and it may be that you dislike a thing which is good for you and that you like a thing which is bad for you. Allâh knows but you do not know.
• 8:39 And fight them until there is no more Fitnah (disbelief and polytheism: i.e. worshipping others besides Allâh) and the religion (worship) will all be for Allâh Alone [in the whole of the world ]. But if they cease (worshipping others besides Allâh), then certainly, Allâh is All-Seer of what they do.
• 9:29 Fight against those who (1) believe not in Allâh, (2) nor in the Last Day, (3) nor forbid that which has been forbidden by Allâh and His Messenger (4) and those who acknowledge not the religion of truth (i.e. Islâm) among the people of the Scripture (Jews and Christians), until they pay the Jizyah with willing submission, and feel themselves subdued.
• Sahih Bukhari Volume 1, Book 8, Number 387:
  Narrated Anas bin Malik:
  Allah’s Apostle said, “I have been ordered to fight the people till they say: ‘None has the right to be worshipped but Allah.’ And if they say so, pray like our prayers, face our Qibla and slaughter as we slaughter, then their blood and property will be sacred to us and we will not interfere with them except legally and their reckoning will be with Allah.” Narrated Maimun ibn Siyah that he asked Anas bin Malik, “O Abu Hamza! What makes the life and property of a person sacred?” He replied, “Whoever says, ‘None has the right to be worshipped but Allah’, faces our Qibla during the prayers, prays like us and eats our slaughtered animal, then he is a Muslim, and has got the same rights and obligations as other Muslims have.”

The “Moderate Muslims” tell us that the lesser Jihad is haram. Allah said that it is ordained for Muslims.Allah said fight them until only Allah is worshiped; until they submit and pay tribute.  Muhammad said that he was “ordered to fight the people” until they submit, when their blood and property will become sacred to Muslims. Muhammad declared open season on us!

• 3:151 We shall cast terror into the hearts of those who disbelieve, because they joined others in worship with Allâh, for which He had sent no authority; their abode will be the Fire and how evil is the abode of the Zâlimûn (polytheists and wrong­doers).
• 8:12 Remember) when your Lord inspired the angels, “Verily, I am with you, so keep firm those who have believed. I will cast terror into the hearts of those who have disbelieved, so strike them over the necks, and smite over all their fingers and toes.“
• 33:26 And those of the people of the Scripture who backed them (the disbelievers) Allâh brought them down from their forts and cast terror into their hearts, (so that) a group (of them) you killed, and a group (of them) you made captives.
• 33:27 And He caused you to inherit their lands, and their houses, and their riches, and a land which you had not trodden (before). And Allâh is Able to do all things.
• Bukhari Volume 4, Book 52, Number 220: …”I have been made victorious with terror (cast in the hearts of the enemy), and while I was sleeping, the keys of the treasures of the world were brought to me and put in my hand.“…

So terror is haram? Why then did Allah sanctify and command it? Why did Muhammad practice it? Why did Muhammad brag about it?

• 8:67 It is not for a Prophet that he should have prisoners of war (and free them with ransom) until he had made a great slaughter (among his enemies) in the land. You desire the good of this world (i.e. the money of ransom for freeing the captives), but Allâh desires (for you) the Hereafter. And Allâh is All-Mighty, All-Wise.
• Abu Dawud Book 38, Number 4390:
  Narrated Atiyyah al-Qurazi:
  I was among the captives of Banu Qurayzah. They (the Companions) examined us, and those who had begun to grow hair (pubes) were killed, and those who had not were not killed. I was among those who had not grown hair.

So genocide is haram:  “made a great slaughter”?  Muhammad had 800 prisoners of war and their adolescent sons decapitated. Yeah, right: genocide is haram in Islam!

What should Muslims do about it? Let us consult the standard handbook of Islamic law: Reliance of the Traveler to see what the Caliph should do.

• O-9.8: The Objectives of Jihad
  The caliph (o-25) makes war upon Jews, Christians, and Zoroastrians (N: provided he has first invited them to enter Islam in faith and practice, and if they will not, then invited them to enter the social order of Islam by paying the non-Muslim poll tax (jizya, def: o-11.4) -which is the significance of their paying it, not the money itself-while remaining in their ancestral religions) (O: and the war continues) until they become Muslim or else pay the non-Muslim poll tax (O: in accordance with the word of Allah Most High,
  “Fight those who do not believe in Allah and the Last Day and who forbid not what Allah and His messenger have forbidden-who do not practice the religion of truth, being of those who have been given the Book-until they pay the poll tax out of hand and are humbled” (Koran 9.29),

That’s awful! Lets get a second opinion!

• Al-Shafi’i (God have mercy on him) said: “The least that the imam must do is that he allow no year to pass without having organised a military expedition by himself, or by his raiding parties, according to the Muslims’ interest, so that the jihad will only be stopped in a year for a (reasonable) excuse.”

I call for genuine Moderate Muslims who reject conquest, genocide and terrorism to publicly proclaim the above cited ayat & ahadith to be the result of Satanic influence [22:52],  null & void; neither to be believed nor carried out. I call for them to sign and promote the Moderate Muslim Majority Rejecting Terrorism   petition. I call for the Grand Mufti at Al-Azhar to issue a fatwa forbidding the practice of Lesser Jihad, genocide and terrorism; abjuring the above cited ayat & ahadith and fiqh. I call upon CAIR, ISNA, MPAC, FMCAT & AIFD   to do the same.

Last, but not least, I call on the elected leadership of this nation to quit spewing feces such as President Bush spewed at the American Legion Convention:

The murderers and beheaders are not the true face of Islam; they are the face of evil. They seek to exploit religion as a path to power and a means to dominate the Middle East. The violent Islamic radicalism that inspires them has two main strains.

Islam, as preached and practiced by Muhammad, is the true face of evil. Muhammad created Islam for the purpose of accruing wealth, income, power and sex slaves. That’s what Islam is. That’s what Islam does. It is not hijacked, distorted nor perverted. Neither is it moderate nor radical; it is Islam.  I disrespectfully demand that those who lead us, those who seek to lead us and those who claim to educate & inform us  quit spewing feces and acknowledge objective factual reality.

Idealistic Dreaming

Losing My Jihadism

I evolved. So can Islam.

By Mansour al-Nogaidan –

[Since I was unable to find a way to add my comments at the Post, I am sharing them with you in this blog.]

The above cited article appeared in the Washington Post. It appears to be related to On Faith: Muslims Speak Out.

Mansour al-Nogaidan relates how he evolved from Salafi to peace loving, tolerant moderate. Implicitly recognizing that Allah’s word does not change, al-Nogaidan wants to re-interpret it. Of course he overlooks the fact that Muhammad exemplified its true interpretation.

I am aware of only one hook on which to hang a faint hope.

22:52. Never did We send a Messenger or a Prophet before you, but; when he did recite the revelation or narrated or spoke, Shaitân (Satan) threw (some falsehood) in it. But Allâh abolishes that which Shaitân (Satan) throws in. Then Allâh establishes His Revelations. And Allâh is All-Knower, All-Wise:

If al-Nogaidan can successfully attribute the bulk of Surahs 2 & 4 and all of 8, 9 & 48 and sundry violent ayat along with them to Satanic interference, and convince the Ulema of the accuracy of that attribution, then there may be some hope.

It appears that al-Nogaidan was writing in good faith. Use the link above to read his words for yourself.  Then click on the On Faith link and witness the spewing malicious malarkey. Note: comments are enabled there. I let Tony Blair have a piece of my mind.

Ted Supports Jihad

Jihad and Kennedy

Ted Kennedy’s Jihad
By Jennifer Verner
FrontPageMagazine.com | May 31, 2004

While Senator Ted Kennedy, D-MA, has always been unhinged, his performance since the beginning of the Iraq War shows that he is becoming increasingly irresponsible, irrational, and dangerous.In a ranking member of the Senate Judicial and Armed Services Committees during a time of war, this kind of behavior poses a danger to national security. Case in point, Kennedy’s recent remarks at the Brookings Institute: “In our open society, it is essential to distinguish vigorous debate over honest differences of opinion from the repeated use of false and misleading arguments to persuade the American people. Integrity is the lifeblood of democracy. Deceit is a poison in its veins.”

As his eight-term record shows, Kennedy’s definition of “honest” has not changed since his failed attempt to have his smarter friend take his Spanish final at Harvard. His father was a notorious mob associate, Nazi sympathizer and predatory womanizer who tyrannically micro-managed the lives of his children. His mother spent much of her life either at Mass or obsessively pinning notes to everything in sight. And Ted? The runt of the litter. A puckish dumpling of a boy who was never expected to make good, until fate left him the last son standing. Then, with a slip of a wheel greased by booze, all presidential hopes and expectations were washed away in the waters of Chappaquiddick. And the dark days weren’t over by a long shot.

 

The death of Mary Jo Kopechne heralded two decades of Kennedy-generated tabloid fodder. Drug overdoses, failed marriages, rape trials, baby-sitter sex scandals, all capped by the tragic death of America’s beloved John Jr.: Aeschylus and Euripides would strain to come up with a better plot.

 

Perhaps the realization that he would never become president freed Kennedy to speak his leftist mind. Judge Robert Bork had a taste of Kennedy’s venom in the 1980s. During the Supreme Court nomination process, Kennedy stated that although the judge had abandoned his most “Neanderthal” views, his appointment would result in an America where “women would be forced into back alley abortions, blacks would sit at segregated lunch counters” and “rogue police would break down citizen’s doors.”

 

Judge Bork is not the only jurist Kennedy has branded with knuckle-dragging status. Last fall, he re-cycled his “Neanderthal” slur on respected Bush appointees Priscilla Owen, Janice Rogers Brown and Carolyn Kuhl. (At least he didn’t use that other “N” word like former Klansman Robert Byrd—a man Kennedy equated with the founding fathers on the Senate floor last April Fool’s day. Unfortunately, the salute was no joke.)

 

It was also apparently not false and misleading, in Senator Kennedy’s mind, to delay the appointment of Judge Julia Gibbons in an alleged attempt to throw the 6th Circuit Court in the University of Michigan Affirmative Action case. What’s wrong with Elaine R. Jones, president of the NAACP and an interested party, asking her friend Senator Kennedy to keep a conservative judge off the court until the case was decided? Ted Kennedy won’t say. When asked for a comment at a press conference in April, he left the room. He may not be able to evade the question for much longer; the Senate Ethics Committee has received three complaints concerning the matter.

 

As damaging as they are, Kennedy’s unethical partisan antics on the Judiciary Committee pale when compared to the palpable harm he has done to national security over the years. The only surprise in Ted Kennedy calling Iraq “George W. Bush’s Vietnam” was that he waited as long as he did. It is one of his oldest, most worn-out rhetorical stand-bys—a known crowd pleaser for the hard-line Democrat base. In 1985, when the Reagan administration requested aid for the Contras, Kennedy couldn’t resist evoking the “Gulf of Tonkin” resolution. The Panama invasion didn’t last long enough to be compared to Vietnam. Instead, the removal of Manuel Noriega represented “long-term damage to our foreign policy, to our ability to work with other nations in Latin America, and our goal of achieving lasting democracy in the region.” Kennedy predicted that George Bush Sr.’s aggressive actions made the Sandinistas shoe-ins for the Nicaraguan election in February of 1990. He was dead wrong. As soon as the Nicaraguan people had a chance, they booted Fidel wannabe Daniel Ortega from power by a 14-point majority.

 

Kennedy went beyond Vietnam in the debate before the first Gulf War. According to the senator, the casualties in Southeast Asia would seem slight when compared with Desert Storm. And the liars in the Bush administration knew it beforehand. “The 45,000 body bags the Pentagon has sent to the region are all the evidence we need of the high price in lives and blood we will have to pay,” said Kennedy. And when the war ended in a matter of days, as predicted, he never apologized to the President for his paranoid insinuations and over-the-top fear-mongering. Instead, in typical Kennedy noblesse oblige fashion, he sponsored millions of dollars in resolutions granting extended medical benefits to reservists, child care for military personnel, deferred student loans and mental health services for military children. But forget about funding the B-2 stealth bomber, which would have given those troops the tools they needed in war; Kennedy voted to kill funding on that project.

 

By October 2003, in the debate over the authorization of the use of force in Iraq, Kennedy had again gone over-the-top. Abu Nidal was listed in the Baghdad phone book, the Iraqi regime backed Palestinian jihadist organizations with millions of dollars, and Mohamed Atta was seen meeting with members of Iraqi intelligence. And what about Ansar al-Islam and Abu-Musab al-Zarqawi? Insignificant details according to Kennedy. Saddam had no links al-Qaeda. Invading Iraq would harm our efforts to hunt down Osama Bin-Laden. A “unilateral” rush to war would only make our allies hate us, inflame the Arab masses, and de-rail the war on terror.

 

According to Kennedy, a war on Saddam might also cause an unprecedented humanitarian crisis with an estimated 900,000 refugees, a pandemic and an environmental disaster as Saddam lit the oilfields on fire. Kennedy even quoted General Joseph Hoar, who warned that when urban warfare broke out in Baghdad, the U.S. could run through “battalions a day at a time” and that the fighting would look like “the last fifteen minutes of ‘Private Ryan.’” Not once in the debate did Senator Kennedy, the great progressive heart of the Democratic Party, mention the continued suffering of the Iraqi people under Saddam Hussein and the corrupt Oil for Food program.

 

As usual, history disproved Kennedy’s Cassandra-like predictions. A country of 25 million has been liberated at a cost of 788 American lives. But the process of restoring civil society to a nation brutalized by thirty years of totalitarian rule has not been easy. As expected, Ted Kennedy has taken political advantage of every bump in the road. By September 2003, Kennedy was claiming that the Iraq war was “a fraud made up in Texas to give Republicans a political boost.” In a December speech in Austin before the Texas Civil Rights Project, Kennedy claimed that Bush’s Iraq policy was enough “to make the Statue of Liberty weep.” Oh really, Senator? Tell it to Iraq’s five million Kurds.

 

In January 2004 at Washington’s Mayflower hotel, flanked by the grieving parents of a soldier killed in action and a disabled veteran, Kennedy fingered the real villain in America’s unjust war against Saddam—Paul Wolfowitz. Paul Wolfowitz, with his “misguided ideology” had been scheming to remove Saddam since President Bush Sr. decided not to invade Baghdad. According to Kennedy, “the President and his senior aides began the march to war in Iraq in the earliest days of the administration, long before the terrorists struck this nation on 9/11.” Should Kennedy be surprised that the Bush administration had a “plan?” It would have been irresponsible for any presidential administration not to be prepared. Support for regime change in Iraq had been a matter of public law since 1998.

 

In April, Kennedy finally played his trump card. George Bush had become Richard Nixon, and Iraq was Vietnam. “It is said that truth is the first casualty of war,” said Kennedy at the Brookings Institute. “But this administration’s dubious and devious behavior is not limited to war and peace.”

 

It would be wishful thinking to expect Ted Kennedy to support a Republican president in war. But is it asking too much for the Senator to make sure his allegations are reality based? Americans are outraged when al-Jazeera broadcasts rabid anti-American propaganda to the Arab street. Yet, what should we expect when the grand old man of the Democratic Party is feeding them sound bites? Slinging specious, unsubstantiated charges at the Bush administration erodes American credibility, props up anti-Americanism worldwide, inflames fanatical elements in Arab world and endangers American lives. Is it just a by-product of “vigorous, honest debate” to Senator Kennedy when Shiite thug Muqtada Al-Sadh picks up on his empty Vietnam analogy and uses it as an excuse to slaughter American soldiers?

 

And it just keeps getting worse. On May 10th , even before essential hard facts were known about the homemade pornographic images from Abu-Ghraib, Senator Kennedy gave the world the following assessment: “On March 19, 2004, President Bush asked: ‘Who would prefer that Saddam’s torture chambers still be open?’ Shamefully, we now learn that Saddam’s torture chambers reopened under new management, U.S. management.” It would be unfair to place any blame for the gruesome, sadistic murder of Nicholas Berg on Senator Kennedy’s shoulders, just as it was unfair of Senator Kennedy to deal out responsibility for the actions of few sick rogues on President Bush and Secretary Rumsfeld.

 

What is plain, however, is that by claiming that prison abuse results from administration policy without a shred of proof to back up the charge, Kennedy sets up a dangerous form of moral equivalency that helps to recruit terrorists and justifies the heinous, inhumane actions of al-Zarqawi in the psychotic minds of Islamofascists. Even Kennedy’s protégé, John Kerry, now sees a need to distance himself from his number one cheerleader. In an interview on the morning following the outrageous remarks, Kerry reassured America that he did not approve of the way Kennedy had “framed” the situation.

 

Ted Kennedy is right. Deceit is poison in the veins of democracy. He should know. The man honored as a senior statesman at the beginning of George W. Bush’s administration for his bi-partisan efforts to improve America’s educational system is now, in a time of grave national crisis, spreading a brand of partisan political poison that would shame Honey Fitz’s dirtiest back-room ward heeler. His speeches have become the ravings of a man who has lost touch with the moral implications of his actions. Senator Kennedy, before you harm America any further, please get help.

On Their Way

Breaking News?

Breaking News? Breaking News? Breaking News? To whom is it “breaking news”? Good grief.

“We” have been saying this for a long time now and “they” are already here…hello?

Anyway, the Lame Stream Media is usually behind the rest of us that are already more than informed and “in touch”.

ABC News:

Al Qaeda Cell in the U.S. Or On Its Way, According to New Intel

Brian Ross Reports:

Senior U.S. intelligence officials tell ABC News new intelligence suggests a small al Qaeda cell is on its way to the United States, or may already be here.

 

The White House has convened an urgent multi-agency meeting for Thursday afternoon to deal with the new threat.

Top intelligence and law enforcement officials have been told to assemble in the Situation Room to report on:

 

–what steps can be taken to minimize or counter the threat,

 

–and what steps are being taken to harden security for government buildings and personnel.

 

“It suggests they have information that the cell or cells coming this direction want to attack a government facility,” Brad Garrett, a former FBI agent and ABC News consultant, said.

 

Law enforcement officials say the recent failed attacks in London have provided important new clues about possible tactics.

And officials say the London attackers use of the Internet left important clues that are being used to decode other e-mails that had initially been deemed unimportant but are now taking on new significance.

A senior administration official said the level of concern of a new terror attack is now higher than it has been in some time, and the meeting this week in the situation room is one of a number that have been convened in light of the new intelligence and what happened in London.

Listen to Secretary Chertoff’s remarks to the Chicago Tribune.

E-Jihadists

E-Jihadists Take Advantage of Net Technology — Good and Bad

from ZDNet

The arrest of the so-called “jihadist James Bond” is putting the spotlight on how terrorists are using the Internet. Like other criminals, terrorists are taking advantage of zombie techniques, but they’re also simply putting the amazing capabilities of Google and Web 2.0 startups to nefarious use, TechNewsWorld reports.

Many experts quoted in the story reason that terrorists must be using the Internet. “We know criminals are exploiting technology to further their criminal activities, and there’s no reason to believe terrorists aren’t taking advantage of those same technologies,” FBI spokesperson Paul Bresson said. But there’s precious little real information on how they’re using it.

“The story of the presence of terrorist groups in cyberspace has barely begun to be told,” Gabriel Weimann, senior fellow at the United States Institute of Peace (USIP) and professor of communication at Haifa University in Israel, concludes in a 2004 report on the subject.

“When policymakers, journalists and academics have discussed the combination of terrorism and the Internet, they have focused on the overrated threat posed by cyber-terrorism or cyber-warfare and largely ignored the numerous uses that terrorists make of the Internet every day,” he explains.

Defense Dept. researchers estimate there are 5,000 radical websites. “Most are chat rooms, and some are used for command and control using some sort of coded language,” said Frank Preston, a researcher with the University of Wisconsin.

The United States Institute of Peace, an organization created by Congress in 1984, categorized terrorists’ uses of the Internet into eight categories: psychological warfare; generating publicity and disseminating propaganda; data mining; fund-raising; recruitment and mobilization; networking; sharing information; and planning and coordination.

“The United States and many of its core allies have traditionally thought of intelligence gathering — or the ability to collect information on an adversary, analyze it and share it — as the providence of developed nations,” Gartner’s Herbert Strauss explained. “But the Internet provides the ability to do all of those things, and it’s available for bad guys as well as good.”

Among the Internet goodies terrorists may be putting to use:

• Google Earth, which provides must of the detail needed to plan an attack.
• Online video games like “Quest for Bush,” in which players fight Americans and proceed to different levels including “Jihad Growing Up” and “Americans’ Hell.”
• YouTube, which unwittingly hosts radical manuals and speeches. “Just look under the term ‘Halaqa’ for a sampling,” says UW’s Preston.
• Music videos, such as “Dirty Kuffar” (nonbelievers), with rap music and images of Muslims being killed by Americans.
• Online education, which takes the form of virtual training camps. According to the Department of Homeland Security, these “(reach) a much wider audience and (limit) the intelligence communities’ abilities to track individuals transiting into these camps.”

Terrorists borrow the bad stuff, too.

“Organizations with sloppy server monitors are often ‘zombied’” — or taken over remotely — “for jihadist purposes,” Preston said. “E-jihadists,” as he calls them, then use these zombie servers to host their training manual.

Of all the nefarious purposes terrorists use the Internet for, data mining and identity theft by those seeking entry into other countries are perhaps the most insidious of all.

“One Internet user’s sloppy handling of personal data could become a passport for a jihadist,” Preston explained.

Written by Barbara – Visit Website

Second Chances

Second Chances…Michael Yon Reporting

Folks, if this doesn’t touch your hearts, you surely must be an empty hearted fool.

Second Chances

General David Petraeus visits Baqubah.

 

When distinguished visitors come to almost-where the action is, it can be disruptive to the point of wasteful. I’ve heard commanders grumble all over Iraq about the steady streams of VIPs who, while intending to be seen observing operations, instead seize the mechanics with their clumsy footprint. These are called “dog and pony shows.”

 

But on D+18, when a most important “visitor” came to Baqubah, not only did he not seem to cause a hiccup, but everyone I talked with was happy to see him. General Petraeus came to Baqubah on 7 July 2007, amid practically zero fuss.

 

The day wasn’t much different from any other. Mine began with an unrelated mission with the Brigade Deputy Commander, from which we returned around noon. General Petraeus had lunch with commanders, followed by a couple of interesting briefings that the tag-along press—there for only those few hours—were allowed to attend.

 

After the briefings, General Petraeus headed downtown to an area where many of the buildings had been made into bombs. Most VIPs will not dare leave base, but the top generals and command sergeant majors in this war all roll into danger taking their chances with getting blown sky-high.

 

When I wrote the dispatch “Be Not Afraid,” I thought at least dozens of soldiers might be killed when we attacked on 19 June, and that hundreds might be wounded. After years of experience, the terrorists had prepared Baqubah to an extent greater than either Fallujah or Ramadi had been. During one of the briefings Saturday, General Petraeus mentioned that Baqubah was probably the most rigged city of the entire war. Another officer at the briefing said there is so much explosives residue in Baqubah that the bomb dogs get confused.

 

Since the beginning of Arrowhead Ripper—with the loss of one 3-2 SBCT soldier killed in action—troops found more than 130 bombs planted in ambush, about two dozen buildings rigged to explode, and more than half a dozen car bombs. (That’s only the beginning.) Yet street by street, house by house, step by step, the infantry soldiers cleared most of Baqubah, working under intensely stressful conditions. They cleared block by block, no place to sleep but the ground, no showers to wash away the sweaty grit of war. This combat-experienced brigade outsmarted the enemy. I’d like to say more, but the enemy will get no help from these pages.

 

Saturday, while riding in a Stryker to where General Petraeus was checking out the ground situation, I met Robert Reid [right] from the Associated Press. Mr. Reid seemed to take interest in the information about the graves I reported recently, taking notes while we drove into Baqubah. Mr. Reid would later email that he has been a journalist for nearly 40 years, having first come to Iraq in 1982.

 

As the soldiers clear Baqubah of the enemy and its deadly trappings, the people here are coming forward and talking. Some Iraqis worry that the US will leave Baqubah too soon, only to have al Qaeda return and start dealing retribution to “collaborators.” That may explain why so many Iraqis here are offering useful information that helps save American lives and keeps al Qaeda out.

 

The fourth update for what I call “The Battle for Baqubah” described a mission to a village about 3.5 miles from the military base where I—and varying numbers of journalists (now down to one photographer)—stay while covering Operation Arrowhead Ripper. No journalists came along when I accompanied American soldiers to the abandoned village whose nearby palm groves offered the overpowering stench of decaying human flesh. I photographed and videotaped Iraqi and American soldiers as they disinterred the remains of adults and children. In one grave, soldiers recovered the heads of decapitated children, some with still partially recognizable remnants of flesh and hair. When I left the village, the digging was still ongoing, but I had seen and heard enough for the update I published the next day.

 

Thinking that the reporters here or their editors back home might have been scared off the topic of mass graves, I offered my source material. These included map coordinates, names of Iraqi and US Army officials, my photographs and videotape, and even, in the end, permission to take what I’d written and photographed and use that free of charge.

 

Today, there are indications that the massacre might be much bigger than what I initially reported in “Bless the Beasts and Children.” Shortly after I published “Bless the Beasts and Children,” I asked a local Iraqi official about the village and the graves. The Diyala Provincial councilmen, Abdul Jabar, went on video explaining why he believes that there might be hundreds of people buried in the area, and he said the correct spelling is actually al Ahamir. (Most Iraqis’ names seem to have variant spellings.)

 

Watch the interview here:
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Meanwhile, “Baqubah Update 05-July 2007” seems to have generated a dust storm of doubts. That dispatch focused on the emerging presence of Iraqi government leaders in Baqubah—both behind the scenes and actually working hard, as well as out front maintaining high visibility—stepping up to get their city operating again.

 

The situation under al Qaeda had degenerated on all levels. Although Diyala is Iraq’s breadbasket, it has been 10 months since a food shipment arrived here. Fuel is at a near standstill; the lights are mostly off; and water flow is better measured by drip rate than cubic liters per second.

 

With dispatches in the works for these topics, the 5-July update was more a chronicle of my observations of the long overdue and very much welcome emergence of Iraqi political leaders from out of hiding. During a meeting, an Iraqi official in the room—who asked to remain anonymous—provided a narrative of how al Qaeda took control of Baqubah and much of Diyala Province. The paragraph that generated controversy follows:

The official reported that on a couple of occasions in Baqubah, al Qaeda invited to lunch families they wanted to convert to their way of thinking. In each instance, the family had a boy, he said, who was about 11 years old. As LT David Wallach interpreted the man’s words, I saw Wallach go blank and silent. He stopped interpreting for a moment. I asked Wallach, “What did he say?” Wallach said that at these luncheons, the families were sat down to eat. And then their boy was brought in with his mouth stuffed. The boy had been baked. Al Qaeda served the boy to his family.

Every syllable I wrote about this reported incident was in that paragraph, which offers no opinion about the veracity of his words.

 

Mr. Abdul Jabar had lived near the al Hamari village. He had more details about what happened there, and he was willing to go on the record. The reported incidents, wretching though they were and are, were reported “as is.”

 

When context is other people’s children

 

As I write these words just a few miles from the graves I saw, the resulting controversy about whether what the man said was true, or whether his words should have been written if the writer couldn’t verify them, seems precious. There is no imaginary line of credulity that al Qaeda might cross should it go from beheading children to baking them.

 

No unnamed Iraqi stringer claimed that al Qaeda had taken over Baqubah. Al Qaeda said this through the press. I sit writing these words in Diyala Province just a short drive from where the self-proclaimed leader of al Qaeda in Iraq was killed by a bomb delivered by a US warplane. Al Qaeda: the organization that gleefully bragged about murdering roughly 3,000 people by smashing jets full of civilians into buildings and earth. Al Qaeda in Iraq: who proudly broadcast their penchant for sawing off the heads of living breathing people, and in such a manner as to ensure lots of spurting blood and gurgles of final pain, in some cases with the added flourish of the executioner raising up the severed head and squealing excitedly.

 

These are the same terrorists I often come face to face with: not on television or in magazines, but on bloodstained streets ablaze with human carnage. I remember the charred corpse of a small Iraqi boy. I remember the wailing Iraqi parents and countless other scenes that I am likely to see again and again. Back in 2005, terrorists here were intentionally attacking children. I shot the photo below on a day when they drove a car bomb through a crowd of children who had run out to American soldiers on patrol.

 

Many soldiers say this photograph symbolizes this war for them. It certainly has become emblematic for me.

 

In the more than two years since that awful day in May 2005, I’ve witnessed innumerable instances of the work of terrorists of many stripes. One clear indicator of just how bad a terrorist group is, is when battle-hardened soldiers—and writers like me who travel with them—don’t find it hard to believe a story which purports that al Qaeda had baked a child and set his roasted body out as the main course at a lunch for his parents.

 

People at home might find it incredible, improbable, even impossible. Yet here in combat with al Qaeda, the idea is no more improbable-sounding than someone saying “The chicken crossed the road.” Maybe the chicken crossed the road. Maybe not. The veterans I’ve been talking with here have no difficulty imagining the chicken crossing the road, or al Qaeda roasting kids. Sickening, yes. Improbable, no.

 

Stringers

 

Many look to mainstream media for “verifiable” news from Iraq, as if all those who work for established publications must by definition practice their profession with some basic level of talent and dedication. Not to unfairly single out the Associated Press—who have had some reporters in Iraq, like Tony Castenada, who produced fair and accurate reports—but the AP’s Director of Media Relations, Paul Colford, went on the record for Confederate Yankee about why the AP had not picked up the story of the Al Hamari gravesites, with a statement that seems to indicate they place a high value on reliable sources:

“With regard to Michael Yon, the Iraqi police and the U.S. military—to our current knowledge—have issued no statements to the AP about 10-14 bodies being found on June 29 in a village outside Baquba, even though the military, according to Mr. Yon’s online account, were involved in the discovery.”—Paul Colford

To see what the AP might have by way of reliable, mainstream, news resources, on the morning of 07 July, I asked Talal, an Associated Press stringer in Baqubah, if he had heard about the Al Hamari murders, and our conversation went something like this:

“Yes,” answered Talal.
“How many had been killed?” I asked.
“35,” answered Talal. Not “about 35”, but precisely 35.
“How do you know?” I asked.
“A medic at the Baqubah hospital told me,” Talal said.
“What was the medic’s name?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” answered Talal.
“You didn’t ask?”
“No,” he said. Talal said a doctor told him the same thing, but that he did not know the doctor’s name. He had not asked. Besides which, Talal said, the doctor and the medic were afraid to give their names.
“How were the people killed?” I asked.
“They were shot,” answered Talal as he motioned shooting with a pistol.
“Did you tell someone at AP headquarters in Baghdad?” I asked.
“Yes,” answered Talal.
“Who did you tell?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” answered Talal.

Captain Baker, who was commanding the Iraqi Army soldiers at al Hamari that day, was a primary source of information. I videotaped this interview as his soldiers were still digging up remains nearby:

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In all fairness to Talal, he is extremely busy doing the most dangerous job in Iraq: Iraqi journalist. It takes extreme courage, and I see Talal all over the place. I did a mission with him today on 9 July. On today’s mission, Talal told me about how two nights ago when he did a mission with Iraqi Army and American soldiers, they started walking at about midnight, trying to sneak up on al Qaeda. They sneaked for six hours, he said, and caught about 30 of them sleeping. Talal said his feet and legs still hurt from the weight of the body armor.

 

Clearly, context like this is not well-served by the adversarial frame of “mainstream-versus-alternative-news.” Reporting from this war is deadly serious business. Deadly for the reporters, but how they report can also be deadly for us all. Writing is only an honorable profession when done honorably. In a market-driven media, cheap stringers who are usually hard to fact-check fit the low-cost model. I do not know what Talal reports and so make no comment on his reporting. But I will say that Talal is intelligent and extremely courageous, and apparently does not sleep much because I see him all over Baqubah.

 

On the subject of credit given where it’s due, Robert Reid from the Associated Press was out there Saturday on the ground with General Petraeus, taking notes. It remains to be seen what will come of those, but at least he made them. The times are different for everyone who dares to report on this war. Including Talal. Including Robert Reid. Including Michael Gordon and Alexandra Zavis and Michael Yon. The bloggers who demand fairness and truth are auditing what we write, but the market ultimately determines how much of any kind of reporting about this war ever gets placed before consumers.

The Ground Truth

LTC Fred Johnson

A couple weeks ago, LTC Fred Johnson told me a story about General Petraeus. Back when LTC Johnson was Captain Johnson, and General Petraeus was Colonel Petraeus, Colonel Petraeus was Captain Johnson’s new commander. They were doing a live-fire exercise at a range at Fort Campbell when a young soldier named Specialist Terrence Jones tripped and accidentally fired his weapon while conducting a live-fire assault. The bullet from Specialist Jones’ weapon struck Colonel Petraeus, slamming through his chest and taking a piece of his back on the way out. Petraeus fell to the ground, bleeding out of his mouth. He nearly died. We could have lost one of the most important and influential military leaders in generations to a mistake. To a professional misstep.

 

The best that Captain Johnson and Specialist Jones might have hoped for was a painless end to their military service. I asked LTC Fred Johnson about the story of his own soldier shooting David Petraeus, and I asked how it could be that Johnson was still in the military. Johnson looked me in the eye and said something like, “Mike. You know what Petraeus did?”

 

“What?” I asked.

 

“He gave me a second chance.”

 

Fred Johnson actually got picked up for promotion early.

 

“But what happened to the young soldier?” I asked, thinking surely there had to be a consequence. Conventional wisdom stipulates that for balance to be restored after accidentally shooting and nearly killing a superior officer, a sacrifice of some magnitude is necessary. A soldier just can’t shoot a commander in the chest and walk away. There is no such thing as an “accidental discharge.” Unplanned bullet launches are called “negligent discharges.” As in negligent homicide.

 

LTC Johnson answered something like, “Mike, you won’t believe how Jones was punished. Petraeus sent Jones to Ranger School.”

 

I couldn’t believe my ears! That’s a punishment that a lot of young soldiers dream about, even though Ranger School is a very difficult course. But after thinking on it awhile, I realized it probably explains why LTC Johnson sometimes says, “I believe in second chances.”

 

Fred Johnson said it just the other day. He said it to me, “When someone gives you a second chance, you should pass it along.”

One Never Knows

FBI Wary Of Threat To Goldman Sachs

The FBI is investigating anonymous threats against Goldman Sachs contained in handwritten letters to the investment firm warning that “hundreds will die.” More..

 

Be wary but ever so vigilant there, fellas!  Look what happened in London!

Follow-Up On The Medical Terrorist Ring

In a previous post here, Spree gave us an excellent run down on the recent London failed terrorist attacks and the “missing nuke” stuff in Canada.

Today in the NY Post: OSAMA BLESSED BRIT PLOT

July 7, 2007 — The three car-bomb attempts in Britain were carried out with the approval of Osama bin Laden, it was reported yesterday.

“It was an established fact from Day 1 that al Qaeda was behind this and it was planned by its followers in Great Britain with bin Laden’s blessing,” a senior foreign intelligence source told The Times of London.

Bilal Abdullah was formally charged with conspiracy yesterday, making him the first suspected plotter to be charged, British officials said. He was to appear in court today.

Abdullah, an Iraqi-trained doctor, was the passenger in the flaming SUV that rammed into Glasgow’s international airport terminal last Saturday.

Abdullah, 27, is one of eight foreigners working for Britain’s National Health Service hospitals who are suspected of being members of an al Qaeda sleeper cell responsible for the attacks at the airport and a day before in central London.

“Other individuals arrested by the police in connection with the bomb attacks remain in custody pending a charging decision,” said prosecutor Susan Hemming.

“I have now made the decision that there is sufficient evidence and authorized the charging of Bilal Abdullah with conspiracy to cause explosions following incidents in London and Glasgow” on June 29 and 30, she said.

Details have emerged to show that Abdullah seems to be the key link between the suspects.

He had links to radical Islamic groups on the database of MI5, Britain’s intelligence service, security officials said.

“This is an international investigation now,” British Prime Minister Gordon Brown said after speaking with Australian PM John Howard. Australian officials are holding one of the suspects and probing at least five other doctors working in Australian hospitals.

Abdullah used to berate others at the University of Cambridge for not being devout enough Muslims. He teamed up there with Mohammed Asha, a brilliant neurosurgeon who was arrested last Saturday.

Asha and another suspected member of the cell made inquiries in the last year about working in the United States, the FBI said yesterday.

The two men contacted the Philadelphia-based Educational Commission for Foreign Medical Graduates but apparently did not take the test for foreign medical-school graduates, FBI spokeswoman Nancy O’Dowd said. With Post Wire Services

From Right Truth:

It’s “logical to watch anything that happens in the UK as a potential precursor to future threats against U.S.,” says Thomas P.M. Barnett and I agree with him completely. We need to always be on watch, ever evaluating our procedures, watching what the terrorists are saying in ‘chatter’, on websites, and in videos.

Canon Andrew White, a senior Anglican priest who works in Baghdad, was talking to an al-Qaeda leader, and he was told “Those who cure you are going to kill you.”

… he met the man privately with a translator and sheik after holding talks with Sunni Muslim tribal and religious leaders April 18 in the Jordanian capital, Amman. He meets regularly with extremists in an attempt to calm Iraq’s sectarian violence.He said religious leaders told him the man was an al-Qaida leader who traveled from Syria to the meeting. The man, an educated Iraqi in his 40s and dressed in Western clothes, warned of attacks on Britain and the United States, White said.

“It was like meeting the devil,”(source)

Prime Minister Gordon Brown said there will be increased scrutiny of foreigners recruited for their skills, including doctors coming to work for the National Health Service.

Before September 11, 2001, the ‘chatter’ mentioned boxcutters. Today the chatter is talking about ‘hand grenades’ going off in places like New York. I think suicide bombers, or IED’s, grenades, are probably more likely than terrorist doctors in the United States.

And the Leftinistra say what, again?

UPDATE! 

Is it CLEAR yet to the naysayers and the politically correct dingledorfs and the multiculturalist whiners?

Judas Priest, people, wake the HELL UP!! Video is here…

 

From the Blotter:

Go to Sprees for the analysis:

Has anyone seen recent reports of that old rock group the monkeys? As I was reading Spree’s take, and watching the news at the same time, all I could think of was:

Just plug in “Jihadis” or “suicide bombers” whenever you see the word “monkees”.

Just plug in the word “murdering” whenever you see the word “singing”.

 

Here we come, walkin’
Down the street.
We get the funniest looks from
Ev’ry one we meet.
Hey, hey, we’re the Monkees
And people say we monkey around.
But we’re too busy singing
To put anybody down.

 

We go wherever we want to,
do what we like to do
We don't have time to get restless,
There's always something new.
Hey, hey, we're the Monkees
And people say we monkey around.
But we're too busy singing
To put anybody down.

We're just tryin' to be friendly,
Come and watch us sing and play,
We're the young gneration,
And we've got something to say.

Any time, Or anywhere,
Just look over your shoulder
Guess who'll be standing there

Hey, hey, we're the Monkees
And people say we monkey around.
But we're too busy singing
To put anybody down.

(break)

Hey, hey, we're the Monkees
And people say we monkey around.
But we're too busy singing
To put anybody down.

We're just tryin' to be friendly,
Come and watch us sing and play,
We're the young gneration,
And we've got something to say.

Hey, hey, we're the Monkees
Hey, hey, we're the Monkees
[repeat and fade]

extra verse:

Hey, hey, we're the Monkees,
You never know where we'll be found.
so you'd better get ready,
We may be comin' to your town.

 

NO PUNS INTENDED

 

UPDATE!! Remember this?

Teams of al Qaeda-trained suicide bombers were dispatched to the United States and Europe from an Afghan camp 10 days ago, ABC News reported last night.

About 300 would-be bombers – including boys as young as 12 – were ordered to carry out attacks in Britain, Canada, Germany and the United States, the report said.

A Pakistani journalist invited to attend the camp took pictures of a Taliban commander congratulating graduates on June 9, ABC News said.

“These Americans, Canadians, British and Germans come here to Afghanistan from faraway places. Why shouldn’t we go after them?” the commander, Mansoor Dadullah – whose brother was killed by U.S. forces last month – can be heard saying on tape.

U.S. intelligence officials dismissed the graduation ceremony as “aggressive and sophisticated propaganda.” But Richard Clarke, a former counterterror expert in the Clinton and Bush White Houses, said the threat should be taken seriously.

“It doesn’t take too many who are willing . . . and able to slip through . . . to the United States or England [to] cause a lot of damage,” he said.

More than 100 people have been killed in three days of clashes between NATO and the Taliban in southern Afghanistan, Afghan officials said.