The Enemy Within

The Middle East Media Research Institute ^ | July 19, 2007 | Unattributed

[gpapa]

Where Are the Islamist/Jihadist Websites Hosted, and What Can Be Done about It?

Today, in a briefing on Capitol Hill hosted by Rep. Gary Ackerman (D-NY), chairman of the House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on the Middle East and South Asia and Rep. Mike Pence (R-IN), ranking member of the Subcommittee on the Middle East and South Asia, MEMRI's president Yigal Carmon spoke about Islamist/Jihadi websites.

The briefing was based on a study prepared by MEMRI which highlighted the fact that all Islamist/Jihadi websites are hosted directly or through subservers by Western - primarily American - Internet Service Providers (ISPs). The study also discussed the question of what can be done about it, and stressed the fact that most - if not all - ISPs do not know what is the content of the websites they are hosting, due to the language gap, since most of these websites are in Arabic.

During the briefing, MEMRI announced that it is taking upon itself a public service - offering ISPs that want to know about the content of the sites they are hosting information regarding those sites within 7-10 days, so they can make an informed decision on whether they want to continue hosting these sites.

[Erik Latranyi]

Two reasons to leave Islamic websites alone:

1) I don’t want the federal gov’t controlling websites other than kiddie porn.

2) Islamic websites and the ISPs are wonderful sources of intelligence for us!

[Cat loving Texan]

Very good points.

[Philistone]

The websites are convenient propaganda tools. The real communication goes on in Yahoo chat rooms.

I was in Yahoo Physics chat room last year and roughly half of the posts were in Arabic.

As a joke, I wrote “My, my, look at all the terrorists.”

I was immediately flamed, but roughly half the Arabic posters left within about 15 seconds.

When I pointed that out to the person who flamed me he wrote “Dang! Maybe you were right.”