Posted on 12/17/2006 4:03:30 PM PST by DAVEY CROCKETT
http://www.b92.net/eng/news/globe-article.php?yyyy=2007&mm=02&dd=18&nav_category=117&nav_id=39690
B92 News Globe World
Iran and Syria, joint anti-US front, says Assad
18 February 2007 | 13:07 | Source: DPA
Tehran -- Syrian President Bashar al-Assad vowed to continue with Iran their joint front against the United States.
Iran's state television IRIB quoted Assad as saying Washington was seeking to weaken the front, but Iran and Syria would forcefully continue maintaining it.
Assad termed his two-day visit to Tehran and talks with Iranian officials as 'one of my most successful state visits.'
The Syrian president and his Iranian counterpart Mahmoud Ahmadinejad issued a joint statement calling on the US to withdraw its forces from Iraq to enable the Iraqi government to return peace and stability to the country.
The two presidents also called for the Middle East to be turned into a nuclear-free zone, demanding Israel's nuclear disarmament.
Assad and Ahmadinejad also called for all signatories of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty to have the right to pursue civil nuclear technology, and termed any discrimination in this as unacceptable.
The two leaders also welcomed the political deal by rival Palestinian factions Fatah and Hamas, and hoped it would lead to unity among Palestinians.
Ahmadinejad told reporters the summit had been 'very fruitful' and said Tehran-Damascus ties were progressing.
Assad also met Sunday with Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who constitutionally has the final say on all state affairs.
Khamenei said Iran and Syria had important roles to play in preventing US and Israeli conspiracies against the Islamic world aimed at sowing discord among Muslims.
He further told Assad said that the US would eventually be the 'main loser' in the region, especially as US President George W. Bush had even lost support within his own party over his Iraq policies.
http://www.ynetnews.com/Ext/Comp/ArticleLayout/CdaArticlePrintPreview/1,2506,L-3366738,00.html
Iran 'fakes' US photos
American blogger says Fars News Agency used Photoshop to clone 'evidence' of US weapons
Yaakov Lappin
An Iranian state news agency used the Photoshop program to manipulate photos in order to try and back up claims that the US was behind a spate of bombings in southeast Iran , a popular American blog said. .
On Sunday, Fars said in a report that terrorists using "US-gifted arsenals" were behind the bomb blasts
Bomb Blasts
11 dead in Iran bomb attack on elite force / AFP
In unprecedentd attack, car bomb rips through bus carrying members of Iran's elite Revolutionary Guards in sensitive southeastern border province
Full story
which killed 11 members of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards last week.
The report claimed terrorist arsenals "have been confiscated" in police raids, and included an image with a red circle drawn around bullets with a USA tag on them. US dollars were also visible in the photograph.
"The weapons that the terrorists have used are US and British made. Moreover, the arrested terrorist agents have confessed that they have been trained by English-speaking people," a senior Iranian official was quoted as saying.
'Elements cloned over and over'
But an American blogger was quick to point out that the image has been manipulated. Little Green Footballs, the weblog of Charles Johnson, who was the first to call attention to manipulated photos by Reuters during the Lebanon war , said his readers tipped him off "to a blatant Photoshop fraud in an article claiming to have discovered US weapons in Iran."
"A close look (actually, you don't have to look that closely) shows that many elements of this picture are cloned over and over," Johnson added.
The blogger reproduced a flashing animation created by one of his readers, showing that grenades, money stacks, demolition charges, cans, and ammunition boxes have all been cloned in the image.
The Fars report went on promise that "relevant documents, photographs and film footages showing that the explosives and arsenals used in the attack were American would be presented to the public and media in the near future."
http://www.ynetnews.com/Ext/Comp/ArticleLayout/CdaArticlePrintPreview/1,2506,L-3367186,00.html
Hamas accuses US of 'sowing sedition' among Palestinians
Hamas Deputy Political Leader Moussa Abu Marzouk on Monday accused the United States of ''sowing sedition'' among the Palestinian public.
Abu Marzouk, told a Palestinian rally at the Yarmouk refugee camp in Syria that US policy was based on ''sowing sedition among the peoples and states of the region through dividing the Middle East into two camps: A moderate camp and a non-moderate one.'' (AP)
http://www.ynetnews.com/Ext/Comp/ArticleLayout/CdaArticlePrintPreview/1,2506,L-3367193,00.html
Iranian refugee free after spending nearly 3 years in church sanctuary
An Iranian man who spent nearly three years in sanctuary in a Vancouver church before being arrested over the weekend was unexpectedly granted his permanent resident status by Canadian officials on Monday. The Canada Border Services Agency released Amir Kazemian from custody after Citizenship and Immigration officials granted him residency on humanitarian and compassionate grounds.
Kazemian, 41, who claimed he had been tortured in Iran, had been living in the church since June 2004 when he sought sanctuary from a deportation order. (AP)
http://www.ynetnews.com/Ext/Comp/ArticleLayout/CdaArticlePrintPreview/1,2506,L-3366953,00.html
IDF says Hizbullah is back to pre-war capability
Military Intelligence estimates Shiite group has succeeded in restoring war readiness
Hanan Greenberg
The Shiite group Hizbullah has succeeded in rehabilitating its forces, a senior army official said Monday.
Hizbullah is now almost at the same strength as it was before last summer's war, he said.
Speaking to the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee Brigadier General Yossi Baidatz, the head of the Military Intelligence's Research Division, softened his assessment when contradicted by Defense Minister Amir Peretz who charged that Hizbullah's strength cannot be measured and that Baidatz was referring to the group's potential.
Committee members slammed Baidatz's inconsistent testimony and referred the issue to a subcommittee where discussions are held behind closed doors.
Likud MK Silvan Shalom said Baidatz retracted on his initial assessment because he had been "shocked" by his words.
"In any case, there is no doubt that (UN) Resolution 1701 is terrible and failed completely. Hizbullah continues to arm, the kidnapped soldiers have not returned," said Shalom, referring to the UN Resolution that ended 34 days of fighting between Hizbullah and Israel.
Turning his attention to Syria, Baidatz said Damascus is upgrading its military arsenal for fear of confrontation with Israel. "Syria is undergoing a process of military strengthening. The Syrians are worried about a military confrontation with Israel and they do not want to initiate that," he said.
Peretz says relations with Olmert are fine
Peretz told committee members that his relations with Prime Minister Ehud Olmert were fine, wishing he was able to meet his family as many times as he meets the prime minister.
Amid reports that his relations with the prime minister had deteriorated, Peretz told the committee that, "Last month I met with Prime Minister Olmert 20 times ... I wish I had met my family as frequently."
Last week Olmert told the committee that his relations with Peretz were "sound."
There have been reports in the Israeli media that Olmert was on the verge of firing Peretz.
Amnon Meranda contributed to this report
http://www.ynetnews.com/Ext/Comp/ArticleLayout/CdaArticlePrintPreview/1,2506,L-3367095,00.html
Nasrallah depressed, researchers say
Lebanese terror group leader’s speeches, TV appearances lack usual zeal and charisma, behavioral researchers say, adding that criticism directed toward Nasrallah from Syria, Lebanon may be cause of his misery
Hanan Greenberg
Hizbullah leader Hassan Nasrallah is suffering from some form of depression, Israeli behavioral researchers said.
Beirut Rally
Nasrallah: We're transporting weapons without Israel's knowledge / Roee Nahmias
Hizbullah secretary-general speaks at Beirut rally, says organization secretly transporting weapons, willing to fight alongside Lebanese troops in case of conflict with Israel
Full Story
The experts, who examined Nasrallah’s patterns of behavior during recent public appearances and compared it to his conduct in the past, said if their assertion was correct it would be difficult to predict the Hizbullah chief’s actions in the future.
According to the researchers, Nasrallah’s current speeches and TV appearances lack the usual zeal and charisma.
The researchers said Nasrallah’s depression may be the result of criticism directed at him from Lebanon and Syria.
Israeli security establishment officials refused to comment on the researchers’ conclusion, but did say that Nasrallah may attack Israel for the very reason that he feels threatened and unsure of himself.
Other officials, on the other hand, said these may be the first signs of decline in Hizbullah’s status.
http://www.ynetnews.com/Ext/Comp/ArticleLayout/CdaArticlePrintPreview/1,2506,L-3367150,00.html
Following the Christian money trail
Evangelical Christians donate USD 37 million in 2006, most to Israel but some to Jews in the former Soviet Union
Yaakov Lappin
Last month, the US-based International Fellowship of Christians and Jews (IFCJ) said it donated some $37 million in aid to Israel and the Jewish people in 2006 – $20 million of which were given during last summer’s war with Hizbullah.
The IFCJ channels millions of dollars to Israel every year, the sum total of donations by evangelical Christians who believe that the return of the Jewish people to Israel signals the coming of "the last days," fulfilling a prophecy they say will hasten the "second coming" of Jesus Christ.
IFCJ founder and president, Rabbi Yechiel Eckstein, said this Christian aid was divided into four categories: Aliyah (immigration to Israel), absorption of immigrants, fighting poverty and security.
"There is a further division of funds between Israel, and the rest of the world, mainly the (Jewish community in the) former Soviet Union," he added, speaking by phone from his Chicago headquarters.
Eckstein also named three programs, "Wings of Eagles, Immigration and Absorption, and Isaiah 58," all of which "raise money to fight poverty and help children in the former Soviet Union."
The fourth program, the Guardians of Israel, is aimed at fighting poverty and helping improve security within Israel, Eckstein explained.
"Around $7.5 million - $8 million went to the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee, based in New York, which gives to the elderly and children," Eckstein continued. "Habad or individual rabbis in the former Soviet Union received another couple of million," he said, adding, "All of this is paid with Isaiah 58 money, the poverty program in the former Soviet Union."
"Roughly $8 million -$9 million went to elderly Jewish people in former Soviet Union for their basic needs," Eckstein said.
Returning to donations destined for Israel, Eckstein said: "Then we have the aliyah component which is the Jewish Agency. Last year (2006) we gave roughly $6 million to $7 million to the Jewish Agency. The donations went to around 200 different programs in over 115 cities in Israel."
'All money goes to charity'
The IFCJ founder also said well-known private aliyah programs such as Nefesh B'Nefesh could not have existed without these contributions. "We gave them, in their first year, $2 million to start them off,” Eckstein said. He added: "Frankly, when they got the money, they were embarrassed. From a public relations view, they didn't want to share the credit with Christians. So it tends to be dropped from their agenda."
Other funds go to "social programs all over Israel, such as shelters for battered Haredi women," Eckstein added.
A further $2 million went to the “Yuli Tamir lunch program," aimed at giving kindergarten children from disadvantaged homes a meal," Eckstein said.
He added: "Some $115,000 were channeled to the Bedouin town of Rahat in Negev."
"Every once in while something new arises, like the terror attack on the synagogue in Turkey, demanding funds," Eckstein said.
Eckstein emphasized that the "money is not given directly to any place, but rather, the IFCJ works with the programs, and with institutions such as the Ministry of Education, Ministry of Absorption, Ministry of Interior."
"But we don't give them money. We give it to charity," Eckstein said. "Everything is done through charity."
The IFCJ founder also complained over the lack of awareness of IFCJ funds. "Sometimes it's a desire on the part of a group or nation to have its own identity. It's not necessarily because the source is Christian," he added.
Most of the time, Eckstein said, organizations were shy to admit to receiving Christian aid due to "their own desire to promote themselves."
Problems on both ends
In the evangelical world, Rabbi Eckstein also faces problems. A glance at the Evangelical Ministry Watch website (LINK: http://www.ministrywatch.org/mw2.1/F_SumRpt.asp?EIN=363256096 ) shows that he has come under criticism by evangelicals for attempting to stop missionizing attempts by evangelicals among Jews.
"There is… an abiding and seemingly irreducible tension that marks IFCJ's mission," Ministry Watch said. "That tension is accounted for by two factors: Evangelical Christianity's non-negotiable belief that Jesus of Nazareth is the Jewish Messiah and only Savior of the world, who must be proclaimed and defended as such by his followers… (and) the unequivocal rejection of Jesus as Messiah and Savior by Judaism and Jewish people in general, and by Rabbi Eckstein in particular.
“What makes this issue relevant to IFCJ's mission is Rabbi Eckstein's public censures of evangelistic activity among Jewish people. This has led some conservative Christians to believe that association with Eckstein compromises the Gospel," the website said.
"Eckstein has gone so far as to say that evangelization efforts directed towards Jews is based upon 'anti-Semitic prejudices,' tantamount to 'spiritual genocide,' and that such efforts stem from either pure arrogance or a deep ignorance," it continued.
http://www.ynetnews.com/Ext/Comp/ArticleLayout/CdaArticlePrintPreview/1,2506,L-3367198,00.html
Troops suspected of arms trade
Six IDF soldiers arrested under suspicion of involvement in weapons’ sales, drugs smugglings through Egypt border
Hanan Greenberg
Six southern command soldiers were arrested Monday by the military police for their suspected involvement in drug deals and weapons sales.
The soldiers were taken in for questioning at the Central Unit for Special Investigations in Jaffa, and are expected to arrive at the southern command’s military court for a preliminary hearing on Tuesday.
A military source said that the extent of the affair was still unknown, but assured that others involved would also be arrested as more evidence in the case was revealed. The military police was investigating possible connections between the suspects and civilian sources.
The investigation began after southern command officials suspected unusual activity amongst soldiers serving at the border. Military police investigators raided the suspects’ unit Sunday morning, and arrested the six; five regular officers and one non-commissioned officer.
A military source refused to say whether the six soldiers were suspected of aiding criminal or terror sources near the border. “At this stage I can only say they certainly weren’t helping with IDF operations at the border and were operating in ways opposite to what their assignments required.”
Apparently, all of the suspected soldiers served in combat units. Some of them were Bedouin soldiers whose job was to thwart terror threats and expose smuggling attempts.
A military source said that this was the time for the IDF to “take a thorough look at the different sectors that serve in sensitive positions”.
Bird Flu articles and links:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070219/ap_on_bi_ge/bird_flu_groceries
http://www.commentarymagazine.com/contentions/index.php/schiffren/160
The Muslim Lobby
Europe's democracies have changed dramatically in recent years in
response
to Islamic population growth, growth fueled by immigration and birth
rates
substantially higher than local norms. Great Britain, France, Italy,
and
other nations have been forced to accommodate the needs and preferences
of
their Islamic citizens, often at the expense of the global conflict
with
radical Islam.
Can it happen here? Suppose that the writer Mark Steyn is right to
argue
that "demographics are destiny." What number of Muslims, agitating for
their
self-defined interests and agendas, would constitute a critical mass in
the
U.S.? At what point would American politicians feel compelled to take
up
their cause?
The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the Muslim American
Society (MAS), and the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) all
worked
overtime this past election cycle to create the impression that, in
American
politics, Muslims are now a force to be reckoned with. They were
especially
emphatic about the country's growing Muslim population-some 8 million
souls,
in their oft-repeated estimates.
continued.
http://www.opendemocracy.net/globalization/islam_4334.jsp#
Sunni, Shi’a and the “Trotskyists of Islam”
Fred Halliday
9 - 2 - 2007
The tensions between Islam's two major traditions are rooted more in current geopolitics than in differences of faith, says Fred Halliday.
The conflict now besetting the middle east is, like all major international conflicts, multidimensional. It involves not just one major axis of violence (Israel/Arabs, United States/terrorism, west/Iran) but several overlapping conflicts that draw states and armed movements into their arena. The major concern of strategists and analysts remains the polarisation between the US and its foes in Iraq and, increasingly, in Iran. But there is another important, ominous, conflict accompanying these that has little to do with the machinations of Washington or Israel, and is less likely to be contained by political compromise: the spread, in a way radically new for the middle east, of direct conflict between Sunni and Shi'a Muslims.
Many generalisations and simplifications accompany the whole issue of Sunni and Shi'a Islam. In the aftermath of the Iranian revolution, when Ayatollah Khomeini produced a radical, populist, third-world rhetoric that denounced the west and the "golden idols" or taghut who served imperialist interests in the region (among them the Shah of Iran, Anwar Sadat, Saddam Hussein, and the Gulf rulers), it was claimed by many that Shi'ism, the belief of around 10% of all Muslims, was inherently militant.
Unlike the Sunni, who had historically accepted the legitimacy of Islamic rulers, the caliphs, and who paid their clergy from state funds, thereby controlling them, the Shi'a refused to accept the Muslim credentials of their rulers and produced a clergy, paid for by the subscriptions of the faithful, that were closer to the people and so more radical.
I recall a conversation with Ibrahim Yazdi, the first foreign minister of the Islamic Republic of Iran (who after Ayatollah Khomeini's death spent years under virtual house arrest in Tehran). As he sat under the enormous chandeliers of what had been the Shah's foreign ministry, he exclaimed with pride: "We are the Trotskyists of Islam!"
The logic of Yazdi's characterisation - with its echoes of the Russian revolutionary leader's theory of "permanent revolution" - was to spread Iran's radical anti-imperialism across the region: a force far superior, in his view, to the then vacillating as well as pro-Soviet ideology of the secular left.
Much of this was simplistic and one-sided: like all bodies of religious text and tradition, Shi'a and Sunni beliefs are liable to many interpretations. Iran has chosen, however, to put a militant stamp on its beliefs and, in a revolution that has far from run its course, to promote these values across the Muslim world. Today, this international radicalism of the Iranian revolution has come to be an explosive force in the middle east: directed on one side against the United States, but in a dangerous inflaming of communal relations, against Sunni Muslims as well.
The paths of conflict
This communal conflict is evident most of all in Iraq. What began in 2003 as a largely Sunni and former Ba'athist rising against the American forces and their Iraqi allies had by mid-2006 developed into a multi-sided conflict in which Sunni and Shi'a forces were in conflict with the Americans but also increasingly with each other. By early 2007 it is estimated that up to 2 million people have been displaced by the war, equally divided between those fleeing to other parts of Iraq and those forced into exile.
This Iraqi sectarian war has echoes - if the consequences are as yet far less bloody - elsewhere in the region:
* in the Gulf states, notably Kuwait and Bahrain, where relations between the Shi'a and Sunni populations of these states (respectively a quarter and a half of the total population) have worsened
* in Lebanon, where the forward advance of Hizbollah during and after the summer 2006 war led to worsened relations with the Sunni population, although not - even amid political tumult - to direct conflict
* in Palestine, where there are no Shi'a, supporters of Fatah nonetheless took to denouncing the supporters of Hamas as "Shi'a" on account of the movement's links to Iran.
In Syria matters are less overt, but it is no secret that for decades the Sunni majority of the population had resented rule by an Alawi elite of Shi'a origin, represented in the Ba'ath party, who had controlled the country since 1963. The one direct challenge to the Ba'athists by the Sunni, in the form of a Muslim Brotherhood insurrection centred on the city of Hama, was crushed with great brutality by Hafez al-Assad's forces in 1982; but two decades later, the Muslim Brotherhood have regained considerable influence in the country, especially amongst the Sunni middle classes. The movement would be the main beneficiary of any fatal crisis of the Bashar al-Assad regime.
Against this background it was not surprising that some Arab leaders - notably those of Egypt, Jordan and Saudi Arabia - began to warn of the dangers of the advance of Iranian and Shi'a power and to present themselves as a "moderate" Muslim bulwark against the advance of the revolutionary Shi'a alliance.
At the level at which it has been developing in 2006 and early 2007, it is possible to envisage this conflict between Sunni and Shi'a as becoming the dominant regional fracture in the ensuing period - especially amidst a withdrawal, at whatever pace, of American forces from Iraq.
In such conditions, there are many analysts or propagandists who resort to the notion that this sectarianism is a "deep structure", reflecting a latent atavism that has long underlain the politics of the region. The implication is that the overt violence of 2006-07 involves the emergence to the surface of deep and ever-present, hatreds. (Similar arguments about "ancient ethnic hatreds" were heard repeatedly in the context of the wars in Yugoslavia, Sri Lanka, and Northern Ireland).
However, another analysis is more persuasive. This sees the Sunni-Shi'a conflict as essentially a recent development, a product of the middle-east political crisis in recent decades and, in the case of Iraq, of the spiral of violence released by the United States invasion of 2003. In this perspective, the origins of the conflict - and more generally of the Arab-Persian conflict - lie not in ancient hostility and grievance, but in the modern history of the region; in particular, the ways in which the twin revolutions of Iraq (1958) and Iran (1979) set in motion rivalry and insecurity between states and peoples that exploded first in the Iran-Iraq war of 1980-88, and again, inside Iraq, from 2003.
The twist of modernity
At the same time, two cautionary observations are in order. First, in terms of religious belief there is no deep divide, because there is little to be divided about. The actual religious, theological, distinctions between Sunni and Shi'a are small, far less than those between Catholics and Protestants within Christianity.
They revolve not so much around questions of belief or even interpretation of holy texts, but around rival claims to legitimacy and succession in the aftermath of the Prophet Mohammed's death in 632 CE, with Sunni favouring the "successors" or "caliphs" and Shi'a seeing succession in the prophet's son-in-law Ali, the latter's son Hussein, and those who come after them.
The death of Hussein at the battle of Karbala (661) at the hands of the Umayyad caliph Yezid is taken as the founding moment of Shi'ism, to which all later historical legitimation, and annual mourning ceremonies, refer. One of the major complaints of Sunni against Shi'a is that preachers in the latter's mosques curse the early successors of the prophet, the caliphs revered by Sunni. But this 7th-century division does not account for the major conflicts of the Islamic world then or later, in a way that wars between Catholic and Protestant were to do in early-modern Europe.
There were, moreover, forms of coexistence and interaction between the two which find little parallel in Europe. These include widespread intermarriage (in Iraq as elsewhere), and the use even of places of worship associated with one confession by followers of the other group. The Sayyidna al-Hussein mosque in Cairo, built by the Fatimid medieval Shi'a dynasty that ruled Egypt at the time is also revered by Sunni; the Umayyad mosque in Damascus, the most historically important in the Sunni world, has a section devoted to the commemoration of Hussein, to which Shi'a visitors from Iran regularly make pilgrimage.
Second, actual and direct conflict between Sunni and Shi'a (as distinct from suspicion and communal difference) has until recently been remarkable by its absence. What is more evident is differential political loyalty between the communities, in relation to (for example) Arab nationalism, secularism, or the Iranian revolution. It has moreover, been possible to identify particular Muslim ruling elites as either Sunni or Shi'a: Sunni in most cases, but Shi'a in Iran, Yemen, and Syria.
Yet even here, where a sectarian element clearly entered into the distribution of power, it did not spark a revolt based on sectarianism itself. Thus the Kurds in Iran are mainly Sunni, a fact that no doubt contributed to their resistance to the Shi'a state created by Khomeini after 1979. In Iraq, the Shi'a rose up in 1991 against Saddam, but this was in conjunction with the Kurds, on a mainly national political basis - and even as Saddam replied by crushing the uprising under the slogan La Shi'a Ba'ad al Yaum (No Shi'a From Today). In the case of Iraq, the Sunni monopoly was partly broken once before 2003, in the person of the first president after the revolution of 1958, Abd al-Karim Qasim, who was half Sunni, half Shi'a, but seen as favouring the latter.
Where it has occurred in recent decades, overt conflict and sectarian violence between Sunni and Shi'a originated first not in the Arab world or Iran, but further east, in Pakistan and Afghanistan. In the former, its encouragement became in the 1970s part of the ideology of militant Sunni groups associated with guerrilla action in Kashmir, and later in Afghanistan, to promote hostility to Shi'a; from the 1980s onwards there were regular attacks on Shi'a mosques in different parts of Pakistan. In the Afghan wars of the 1980s and 1990s, the militant Sunni groups who dominated the mujahideen came to attack the Shi'a community of Afghanistan as enemies of their cause (see "America and Arabia after Saddam", 13 May 2004).
This radical Sunni rhetoric charged that, because they worshipped the shrines of imams and other holy men, the Shi'a were defectors from the monotheism of Islam and, in effect, "polytheist". Indeed in some bizarre versions, the term for polytheist, moshrik ("one who shares") came to be used as a synonym for "communist", in the sense of someone who shared property in common.
The final twist in this saga involved the creation of a cult, by the Taliban in Afghanistan, of the 10th-11th-century leader Sultan Mahmud, a man whose main claim to fame was that he had invaded India "a hundred times": his grave in Ghazni was used as a shrine for young Taliban soldiers being sent to fight Shi'a, where, they were told, Sultan Mahmud "was killing communists, even in the time of the prophet". Such ideological invention and redefinition is central to the contemporary conflict of Sunni and Shi'a. It involves the use on both sides of terms of abuse and historical delegitimation that, while they have historical precedent, have needed to be recreated as bearers of modern identity and confrontation.
The worst of all
Modernity, and the use of communal or religious differences for contemporary political ends, are however no barrier to the spread of hatred and violence. These fires, once lit, can destroy forms of coexistence that have existed for centuries. This is clearly the case in the "war of elimination" in Baghdad today (a city from which, it may be recalled, the Jewish community who had lived there for over two millennia experienced a mass exodus in the early 1950s).
Moreover, while at the beginning states may seek to control such sectarian loyalties, as both Iran and Saudi Arabia have done, such control may not last: today Iran has much less influence over the Shi'a of Iraq than it had three or ten years ago. How far these flames will spread is anyone's guess, but it would seem that the invasion of Iraq has set off a dangerous dynamic that could affect much of the region. The US and its allies are certainly wondering which way the Arab and Sunni world will jump in the event of an attack on Iran.
Some may take comfort from the dire warning that issued from a conference of Sunni and Shi'a clergy recently held in Qatar. As representatives of each side promised to stop preaching suspicion of the other, and Shi'a committed themselves to stop cursing the caliphs, a prominent Iraqi cleric warned that if this conflict were to continue, the direst of all consequences would follow: namely that young people in the Muslim world would be tempted ... to turn to secularism.
Copyright © Fred Halliday,
http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/story.html?id=6d287ed6-d849-46ad-89ce-bc
69ef936c53&k=21927
Canada court says bin Laden employee can be freed
OTTAWA (Reuters) - A Canadian court decided on Thursday that an
Egyptian man
who worked for al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden should be released even
though the court concluded he had perjured himself and had probably
engaged
in terrorism.
Federal Court Justice Richard Mosley ruled that the suspect, Mohamed
Zeki
Mahjoub, still posed a danger to Canadian society but that this threat
could
be neutralized by the imposition of what he said would amount to house
arrest.
Mahjoub has been held without trial since 2000 on a security
certificate --
which allows the indefinite detention of suspects if they are deemed a
security threat -- and has engaged in years of legal battles with the
government over attempts to deport him.
Justice Mosley agreed with Mahjoub, "on a balance of probabilities,
that he
will not be removed from Canada within a reasonable time" and should be
released from detention until a final decision is made.
Mahjoub admits to having worked for bin Laden in Sudan in the 1990s but
denies any terrorist activities.
continued...........
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/02/18/wmadrid18.xm
l
Terror suspect claimed compensation payout for daughter's bomb death
By Graham Keeley in Madrid
Last Updated: 12:25am GMT 18/02/2007
According to the heart-rending account set out in his compensation
claim,
Abdennari Essebar was just another victim of the indiscriminate
brutality of
Islamic terrorism.
A Moroccan-born resident of Spain, his stepdaughter Sanae, 13, was one
of
dozens of Muslims killed in the al-Qaeda train bombings in Madrid on
March
11, 2004, which claimed 191 lives and left nearly 2,000 injured in
Europe's
worst terrorist atrocity.
In his official statement to the authorities, Essebar, 41, told how he
frantically searched for Sanae among the wounded in Madrid's
overflowing
hospitals, only to learn that she had suffered fatal injuries.
Yet as officials in Madrid processed his claim for £267,000 - the
standard
award to parents who lost a child in the bombings - routine police
checks
devised to screen out fraudsters raised suspicions of a different kind.
Leads thrown up during the frenzied manhunt for the bombers suggested
that
while Essebar might well have been a doting parent, he was also
involved in
the same kind of Islamic fanaticism that had claimed his stepdaughter's
life.
After investigations which included secretly tape-recording his
telephone
conversations, detectives arrested the former civil servant on
suspicion of
helping to recruit suicide bombers for the anti-American terror in
Iraq.
He is alleged to have carried out his duties on behalf of a terrorist
cell
before and after the death of his daughter. Last week, as the trial
began of
29 people accused of the bombings, Essebar languished in jail, awaiting
his
trial that is due to begin later this year.
Yet his wife, Jamilah Ben Salah, who was Sanae's natural mother, says
her
husband could not have been involved in the sort of activity that would
have
harmed his "beloved" daughter.
Fighting back tears as she protested his innocence during an interview
with
The Sunday Telegraph, she said: "It's impossible my husband would have
worked with terrorists.
"He was good friends with my daughter. Though she was not his daughter,
he
thought of her as his own. He taught her English. They played on the
computer. Do you think if he had anything to do with this I would be
going
to see him every week in prison?"
She spoke as the trial of the bombers, which opened on Thursday at a
maximum
security court on the outskirts of Madrid was hearing the first
testimony in
proceedings that are expected to last up to five months.
Psychologists were on hand to help survivors and victims' relatives
cope
with the trauma of reliving the terrorist attack, in which they have
come
face to face with the alleged plotters for the first time.
If found guilty, seven defendants face sentences of almost 40,000 years
each
for planning and carrying out the attacks.
Essebar, who was a civil servant in the transport department in
Morocco, met
his wife in 2002. They married soon afterwards and moved to Spain. A
little
later, Essebar became deeply religious, joining the established Islamic
community in Madrid that is peopled mainly by Moroccans, Algerians and
Tunisians.
Police arrested Essebar after they established alleged links to another
Moroccan said to be involved in terrorism.
Transcripts of tapes made by police of conversations between Essebar
and the
second man were obtained by the Spanish investigative magazine
Interviu.
They allegedly reveal Essebar talking with his accomplice about
committing a
suicide bombing in Iraq, in which police allege Iraq is referred to in
code
as "France" and the suicide bombing referred to as "working as a taxi
driver".
In one extract, Essebar allegedly says: "You want to go to France?" His
accomplice replies: "If God wants. I don't like building. Working as a
taxi
driver is better."
Essebar has denied the charges. So far, however, his wife's public
pleas of
innocence appear to have fallen on deaf ears in Spain, where the scale
of
the bombings has left a lasting sense of national trauma. She said that
despite her own bereavement, she had been shunned by support networks
set up
to help victims of the attack.
3rd Generation Terrorists Learning From Mistakes
http://www.realcities.com/mld/krwashington/16645727.htm
New generation of terrorists cyber-inspired, -trained
COLOGNE, Germany - Sitting on a platform bench in Cologne's cavernous
main
station watching his alleged co-conspirator step onto a train, the
young
Lebanese who's accused of plotting the deadliest terrorist attack in
Germany's history finished his orange juice, stood up to throw the
container
in a recycling bin and rolled a heavy case toward Platform 4.
His junior partner, Jihad Hamad, 19, had just stowed a suitcase that
contained enough explosives to rip a train car to shreds on the
regional
train, which was headed to the Rhine valley tourist haven of Koblenz.
Now it was Youssef Mohammed el Hajdib's turn. The 21-year-old weaved
through
the crowded station and boarded the double-decker North Rhine-Westfalia
Express, bound for the industrial center of Dortmund to the north.
Video
cameras captured both men boarding with the bags.
To cause maximum damage, the bomb-makers had diverted slightly from the
instructions they'd obtained from a Web site that police said had
al-Qaida
connections. They'd crammed both suitcases with explosives and stuffed
any
empty space with plastic bags of food starch, which they thought would
cover
survivors of the blast with a burning, oily coat.
That, police later said, was a "beginner's mistake." In their attempt
to
increase the destruction from the bombs, they'd made the charges "too
fat."
By not leaving any space for air, they'd suffocated their bombs.
The two Lebanese disembarked before the timers ignited the fuses, which
failed to ignite the charges.
Railway employees discovered the suitcases later that evening and
turned
them in to lost-and-found offices. Each case contained 3 } gallons of
propane in metal canisters, a little more than a gallon of gasoline in
plastic mineral-water bottles and a small alarm clock, timed to
detonate at
2:30 p.m. as the crowded trains neared Koblenz and Dortmund.
German police think that 400 passengers would have died if the bombs
had
detonated, making it the deadliest terrorist attack in German history.
Terrorism investigators around Europe see a lesson in this failed
attempt at
mass murder and in other failed or thwarted terrorist plots in recent
years.
While U.S. and British intelligence officials think that al-Qaida has
regrouped in the mountains of Pakistan and is again capable of and
intent on
launching mass attacks around the globe, investigators in Britain,
Germany
and France are convinced that there's a broader terrorist threat
against
Europe. They're tracking thousands of suspected terrorists whom they
say are
planning mass murder.
Unlike the Sept. 11 plotters, the new wave of terrorists - the
so-called
third generation terrorists - are dreaming up, planning, funding and
attempting attacks on their own, without international support.
The first generation of al-Qaida terrorists were Osama bin Laden and
other
veterans of the jihad in Afghanistan against Soviet occupiers during
the
1980s. After the Soviet Union withdrew its troops, they turned their
attention to the West, which they believed was corrupting and bullying
the
Islamic world.
The hijackers who flew passenger jets into the World Trade Center in
New
York and the Pentagon in Washington were typical of the second
generation:
professional, educated men, chosen and directed by Osama bin Laden,
trained
in the Afghanistan camps and financed by the al-Qaida network.
But the third generation has learned its hatred from television and its
tactics from the Web, according to the experts. Its only connections to
al-Qaida are Web sites and a shared anti-West philosophy. Its
practitioners
go online to find inspiration as well as practical advice, such as how
to
build a bomb.
The result has been a number of duds. "The new generation is not
professional. They build bombs that don't explode," said Rolf Tophoven,
one
of Germany's most respected terrorism experts and the co-director of
the
Institute for Terrorism Research and Security Policy in Essen.
Still, he noted, studies of bombings in the Palestinian territories
indicate
that a "completely professional suicide bomber" - able to construct a
bomb
and conduct an attack - "can be created in three weeks."
He added that he expects the number of attacks to be high in the coming
years, and over time he expects this generation to learn from the
mistakes
now being made.
Dame Eliza Manningham-Buller, the director general of Britain's MI6
Security
Service, said in November that Britain was tracking 1,600 individuals
and
more than 200 groups thought to be involved in terrorism. Germany is
investigating 200 suspected terrorist plots.
The two London commuter attacks in July 2005 are a prime example. The
attackers were local; most were second-generation residents, products
of
British schools and middle-class homes, though with family links to
Pakistan. In the first attack, on July 7, four suicide bombs killed 52
morning commuters. In the second, two weeks later, four young men stood
on
subways and a bus, shouted praise to Allah and attempted to detonate
backpack bombs, which fizzled.
Last summer, British police arrested two dozen men - mostly British
Muslims
of Pakistani background - accused of plotting to blow up 10
trans-Atlantic
jets en route to the United States. The alleged plotters, most of whom
lived
in the London area, are suspected of planning to sneak liquid
explosives
onto the planes and build bombs during the flights. Police said that as
many
as 4,000 people could have died if the plot had succeeded.
In northern Europe, few cases have had more impact than one on Nov. 2,
2004.
A previously unknown Muslim Dutch citizen shot filmmaker Theo van Gogh,
the
great-grand-nephew of artist Vincent van Gogh, from his bicycle during
his
morning commute. The killer, Muhammad Bouyeri, 27, claimed that van
Gogh's
film "Submission," about violence against Muslim women, made him an
enemy of
Islam.
After knocking him to the sidewalk on a Dutch street, Bouyeri - raised
in
Amsterdam, but proud of his Moroccan heritage - slit van Gogh's throat
with
a knife, then put a page of Quranic verses on the knife and plunged the
blade into van Gogh's chest. Police think that Bouyeri radicalized
online,
then joined Al Tahweed Mosque in Amsterdam, where he helped form the
Hofstad
Network, a Dutch terrorist group.
There have been many others. Magnus Ranstorp, an anti-terrorism expert
at
the Swedish Defense College, estimates that "about 40 serious plots"
have
been broken up in Europe since September 2001.
Last November, Norwegian police bugged the car of a 29-year-old
Pakistani-Norwegian whom they suspected of having fired shots at an
Oslo
synagogue. They said they heard three other men and him - all of whom
had
criminal records - discussing plans to bomb the U.S. and Israeli
embassies.
The men - all younger than 30, two of Pakistani backgrounds, one of
Turkish
background and one Norwegian - were arrested, though it wasn't known
whether
they were close to carrying out the plot.
Police also have reported breaking up terrorist plots in Denmark,
Italy,
Spain, France, Turkey and Greece.
Tophoven said the plotters were European citizens or residents, usually
Muslim and children of immigrants, and generally young.
Herbert Landolin Mueller, who's considered the top expert on Islamic
terrorist organizations with the German equivalent of the National
Security
Agency, thinks that governments are overly focused on highly organized,
international terrorism.
"People want to believe that there are terror cells, awaiting
awakening, all
within a central terrorist organization," he said. "But the Islamic
movement
is simply people who want to belong, people from the wealthy, middle
class
and lower classes. All attempts to define them are futile. Again, look
at
the attempted train bombing in Germany."
In that bombing attempt, investigators said that the two Lebanese men -
both
in Germany on student visas, one about to start a combined
computer-electronics engineering program in Kiel, the other not yet
enrolled
at a college - told them that their plot was motivated by the Danish
cartoon
controversy that started in autumn 2005 over a collection of cartoons
depicting the Prophet Muhammad, which were reprinted in Germany. The
two
hadn't attracted any suspicion before the attempt, police said. They're
now
in jail awaiting trial on terrorism charges.
Mueller thinks that many citizens would feel more comfortable if
attacks
emanated from a centralized terrorist organization, because that
implies
that the terrorists have been identified and the threat can be managed.
Mueller thinks that the terrorism threat is as great as ever, but far
more
diverse and impossible to track. He considers the successful bombings
in
London and Madrid, Spain, as examples of the danger of homegrown,
cyber-motivated and cyber-trained terrorists.
Bob Ayers, a former chief of the U.S. Department of Defense Information
Systems Agency who's now an expert on security matters with Chatham
House, a
London research center, warned against dismissing the idea of central
control.
"Al-Qaida is the spiritual head, the moral base of the movement," he
said.
"Do not make the mistake and believe that these are stupid people. They
are
not. In the West, too often people want to see them as backwards,
uneducated, living in caves and filled with nothing but hatred."
His view has support among U.S. and British intelligence experts. But
many
say that the nature of the terrorism threat is not either/or - either
under
central direction or self-radicalized. It can be both, with a central
organization influencing untrained people online and through mosques
that
are friendly to their views. Ayers thinks that's what's happening.
"Remember, the people lighting the fuse on the suicide bomb are always
foot
soldiers, highly expendable," he said. "The real concerns are those
convincing the foot soldiers it's a good idea to kill themselves
carrying
out an attack."
Third wave terrorists will improve their professionalism, experts
agree.
Jean-Louis Bruguiere, who heads France's anti-terrorism efforts, said
that
while many were flying under investigative radar, others were becoming
bold.
His biggest worry is residents who've attached themselves to Islamic
jihadism, and have gone to Iraq to learn more about how to run an
insurgency.
Generally, the numbers of those who are leaving Europe for Iraq aren't
thought to be large; experts think that five to 10 from Germany have
made
the trip, for example. And most of those who go are expected to die in
fighting. But if even a few return, the experts worry about their
impact.
"We have found a few returning, not many," Bruguiere said recently.
"More
than 10, fewer than 20. We know of as many as 100 who have left for
Iraq."
They're particularly dangerous because not only will they bring back
know-how but they'll also have hero status to young recruits, Bruguiere
said.
That, Germany's Mueller thinks, is bad news for Europe.
"There will be future attacks, in many, many places," he said. "And
those
who carry out these attacks will not be known to law enforcement before
the
attack, but will have been leading very innocent lives."
http://news.scotsman.com/international.cfm?id=263812007
Suicide bomber kills 15 in courtroom
GUL YOUSAFZAI IN QUETTA
A BOMBER killed 15 people, including a judge, in a courtroom in the
Pakistani city of Quetta yesterday in the latest in a series of suicide
blasts to send shudders throughout the country.
Television footage from the wrecked courthouse showed emergency
services
walking through pools of blood, collecting belongings, and body parts
and
torn clothes could be seen all around.
Intelligence officials have attributed other attacks to sectarian Sunni
militants linked to al-Qaeda and groups operating from tribal areas
that are
regarded as hotbeds of support for the Taliban.
Police made a string of arrests last week, including two suicide bomb
teams
caught in southern Pakistan. But the bomb in Quetta exploded while a
lower
court was in session. A senior judge and six lawyers were among those
killed.
"According to our reports a man entered the room and blew himself up,"
said
Baluchistan province chief minister Jam Mohammad Yousuf. "It could be a
continuation of what is happening in other parts of the country."
At least 25 people were injured with six in a critical condition.
The suicide attacks started after an army air strike on a militant base
in
South Waziristan tribal region in mid-January.
Including the death toll from Quetta, nearly 45 people have been killed
in
bomb attacks since then, as militants have sought to destabilise
President
Pervez Musharraf's government and weaken his resolve to confront the
Taliban, al-Qaeda and their allies.
Police arrested two suicide bomb teams in southern Sindh province on
Friday,
and identifed them as factions of Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, a Sunni Muslim
sectarian militant group that has established ties with al-Qaeda.
One team of three militants was captured after a gunfight in the
southern
city of Karachi, and another team of three was caught in the evening
boarding a train at Sukkur, 515 km (321 miles) north-east of the port
city.
"We found explosives, splinters, circuits and jackets used in suicide
bombings, as well as Jihadi literature on them," said district police
officer Mazhar Nawaz.
Police said the militants arrested in Karachi and Sukkur had been
planning
attacks on Pakistan's Muslim Shi'ite minority at the end of the holy
month
of Muharram, which falls in the first week of March.
On Thursday, police arrested two members of Laskar-e-Jhangvi in
Rawalpindi,
the garrison town next door to Islamabad.
http://www.gulfnews.com/world/Pakistan/10105136.html
Over 3,000 Pakistanis in jails overseas
Islamabad: Over 3,000 Pakistani nationals have been detained in 17
countries
for travelling on fake passports and other documents, many of them
duped by
travel agents. Five of them are languishing in Indian jails.
In view of the seriousness of the problem, the Pakistan Government is
making
efforts to check this in coordination with Iran, Turkey and Greece.
Analysts say the problem has been long-standing and has been on the
increase
in that there is no real estimation of how many Pakistanis, like other
South
Asians, leave their countries seeking greener pastures but are cheated
by
unscrupulous travel agents and job racketeers.
Minister of State for Interior Khusro Bakhtiar told the National
Assembly on
Friday that 3,004 Pakistanis were languishing in 17 countries'
detention
centres.
This item is available on the Militant Islam Monitor website, at http://www.militantislammonitor.org/article/id/2727
Imam of Salt Lake City Islamic Center arrested on charges of aggravated spousal abuse including knife throwing and death threats
February 18, 2007
MIM: Worth noting that Shuaib -ud-Din was arrested on the same day that Sulejman Talovic went on his rampage in the local shopping mall which was a block away from the Al Noor mosque where his father and he sometimes prayed.
Religious figure arrested
Shuaib-ud Din faces three charges over allegations of abuse filed by his wife
By Jason Bergreen
The Salt Lake Tribune
Salt Lake Tribune
Article Last Updated:02/14/2007 01:29:29 PM MST
http://www.sltrib.com/ci_5223658
West Valley City police arrested Shuaib-ud Din on Tuesday on suspicion of felony aggravated assault and two misdemeanor charges related to domestic violence allegations made by his wife in January.
The former religious leader at the Khadeeja Mosque was arrested about 1 p.m. outside a home in Murray near 1200 West and Saddle Bluff Drive (6795 South), said police Capt. Tom McLachlan. It is believed the imam was staying there after returning from Chicago to appear for a protective-order hearing Feb. 5 in 3rd District Court.
At that hearing, the imam was granted supervised visitation with his children and was allowed to worship at the West Valley City mosque, where he was the imam for more than seven years.
Din's attorney, Albert N. Pranno, said his client denies all the allegations his wife cited in a protective order she filed Jan. 16.
The Feb. 5 hearing marked the first public appearance for Din since he was fired by the mosque Jan. 15 in the wake of the abuse allegations. At that time, criminal charges had yet to be filed.
But on Friday, the Salt Lake County Attorney's Office filed the three charges against Din in 3rd District Court. He was charged with aggravated assault, a third-degree felony, as well as simple assault and domestic violence in the presence of a child, both class B misdemeanors.
The charges stem from allegations made by Ayesha Siddiqa Din, Din's wife, accusing him of slamming her head into a freezer at their home Jan. 2 and beating and kicking her in front of one of their two children. The next day, Din allegedly threw a knife at her in the home and threatened to kill her if she spoke about the abuse, court documents say.
Friends of Ayesha Siddiqa Din took her to West Valley City Police Department headquarters Jan. 13, 11 days after the assault was said to have occurred. There, she told investigators that Din had abused her throughout their seven-year marriage. The Din's wife does not speak English, so a family friend interpreted for her.
Din was booked into the Salt Lake County jail Tuesday at 5:51 p.m. His bail was set at $50,000.
A court commissioner appointed a guardian ad litem for the couple's children, ages 5 and 6. The Utah Division of Child and Family Services was conducting its own investigation into the abuse allegations when the police filed their case.
jbergreen@sltrib.com
This item is available on the Militant Islam Monitor website, at http://www.militantislammonitor.org/article/id/2727
This item is available on the Militant Islam Monitor website, at http://www.militantislammonitor.org/article/id/2724
Bosnia linked terror plot : Danish court jails one releases three for planning attacks aimed at forcing Iraq pullout
February 18, 2007
Denmark sentences man in Bosnia related terror plot
February 2007
http://www.b92.net/eng/news/comments.php?nav_id=39667
COPENHAGEN -- The court found Abdul Basit Abu Lifa guilty of involvement in a terror plot uncovered in Bosnia in October 2005 with the arrest of two men allegedly preparing to carry out a terror attack.
The pair, Swedish national Mirsad Bektasevic and Abdulkadir Cesur, a Turk living in Denmark, were convicted by a Bosnian court last month of planning an attack aimed at forcing foreign troops to pull out of Iraq and Afghanistan. The exact target of the plot remains unclear.
In the Danish case, police arrested Abu-Lifa and the three other defendants on Oct. 27, 2005, after a tip from the Bosnian police. Investigators used records of mobile phone calls and Internet chats to link the defendants in Denmark to the Bosnian plot.
A jury in the Eastern High Court said Thursday there was enough evidence to prove that all four defendants were involved in the plot, but the three-judge panel disagreed and overturned the verdicts against all but Abu-Lifa.
Under Danish law, judges have the right to overturn any decision made by the jury.
"It is very, very rare that this happens," said Thorkild Hoeyer, the defense attorney for one of the freed defendants, Elias Ibn Hsain.
Prosecutors had demanded at least eight years in prison for Abu-Lifa, a Danish citizen of Palestinian descent, but the judges handed him a seven-year sentence, citing his young age.
Imad Ali Jaloud, who prosecutors said was the leader of the group, was kissed and hugged by family members and friends outside the court room. He refused to speak to media as he left.
Another acquitted defendant, Adnan Avdic, cried quietly inside the packed courtroom after it became clear he would be released.
Abu-Lifa's lawyer, Anders Boelskifte, said they had not yet decided whether to appeal against the ruling.
This item is available on the Militant Islam Monitor website, at http://www.militantislammonitor.org/article/id/2724
http://www.militantislammonitor.org/article/id/2726
Sudden Jihad Syndrome in SLC :Muslim Forum in Utah lied about shooter's background - policeman's killing of Talovic "Youthful Islamic Chivalry"
February 18, 2007
The Muslim Forum Utah revised their first press release after deliberately lying that Talovic "might be a gypsy" and "never attended any mosque". A 2/17/07 an updated version reads "he attended mosque several times". The obvious attempt to hide Talovic's Muslim background is an ominous sign that the law enforcement is being deceived by the Muslim community which may know much more then they are telling.
According to some accounts Sulejman Talovic shouted "Allahu Akhbar" three times during the shootout with the police before he was killed. This was never written about in the media. Surely those who were present in the mall would have clearly heard these shouts.
Here is a link to the video: http://mypetjawa.mu.nu/archives/186558.php
According to a Serbian news report Sulejman's father was in the Bosnian Muslim Army:
"Sulejman and his mother walked to Srebrenica, and from there were later evacuated by a U.N. convoy," he said.
"Suljo, the father, headed over the mountains and forests with his comrades as well. Many left the village, but only a few made it."
Many mujahedeen from Muslim states came in Bosnia to fight in 1992-95 war and committed monstruous atrocities against Serb civilians.
http://www.serbianna.com/news/2007/01212.shtml
MIM: Suljo Talovic has consistently told the press that he has no idea where his son got the guns and made the bizarre statement that "someone must have put him up to the shootings" which further indicates a jihadist motive and that he must know something which would be of great interest to the investigation.
Suljo Talovic, Father of Shooter: "Somebody got (the guns)…and maybe (they were) training him and tell(ing) him (to), ‘go shoot somebody.'"
Question: So you think that somebody influenced him maybe to do this?
Suljo Talovic: "Yeah. I think somebody."
http://www.ksl.com/?nid=148&sid=900025
MIM: According to a Deseret News reporter who spoke several times to the family and also put in a pitch for anyone who wanted to donate for the killer's Muslim burial in Bosnia. A fund was also set up to help the family. http://deseretnews.com/dn/view/0,1249,660196147,00.html
The immigrant from Bosnia spoke in broken but eloquent English.
"I am very sorry for everybody who has died," he said. "I apologize for everybody. I'm so sorry."
He said he never saw the young man with a gun and doesn't know where he got the weapons.
"I need, I ask like, I need for my information: Who give him guns and bullets and everything?" he said.
The family on Wednesday arranged for their son's body to be picked up at a mortuary. It is to be sent to Bosnia for a funeral. The father will fly back to bury him, and the family is in need of donations.
"I feel sorry for everybody. I have no heartbeat. I am crying for everybody, not only for my son. For everybody!" Suljo Talovic said.
He repeatedly insisted that he had never seen his son with a gun. He said he did not know where his son got the weapons and ammunition.
"I think somebody's behind him, somebody's trailing him," he said.
Asked to explain what that meant, his sister, Ajka Omerovic, said, "He wants to tell you that he thinks there is somebody who push him to do that." Does he have any idea who? "No, really, no. We want to find out, just like you guys, all other people," she said.
http://deseretnews.com/dn/view/0,1249,660196195,00.html
MIM: Also significant is that Talovic's family seems to have no idea of when and how Sulejman learned to shoot but asserts that someone 'put him up to it'. Obviously many Bosnian Muslim male refugees over age 30 in Utah had military training like Talovic's father and engaged in combat so the likelihood of his having received 'military/jihad" training from a former Mujahideen is very possible.
An eyewitness in Utah reported that one of Talovic's uncles was arrested by the police.
Talovic's father Soljo attended mosque and told the media that his wife had had "a heart attack" after hearing the news that her son was the mall killer. Why wasnt he in the hospital tending to her and had she been hospitalised at all?
Sabira Talovic grieves in the doorway of her home in Salt Lake City. (Michael Brandy, Deseret Morning News)
MIM: This picture from the Desert Evening News shows Sabira Talovic (the killers mother) in the doorway of their home -2/16/07 displaying her grief to the cameras.
She obviously made a remarkable less then 48 hour recovery from the heart attack her husband said she suffered when being told of her son' rampage
.Her husband's nonchalant reference to her condition (while attending his mosque) also makes it appear that both the Talovics and the Muslim Community are prone to calculated exaggeration and media savvy theatrics.
Suljo Talovic said he and his wife are still trying to cope with Monday's events. He said his wife, Sabira, suffered a heart attack about 5 a.m. Tuesday, three hours after police informed them their son was the Trolley Square shooter. http://www.sltrib.com/news/ci_5248199
About 4:30 a.m. Tuesday, police officers came to the home. A police officer "says what happen: your son shoot," the father said.
The news was so shocking that Sabira Talovic had to be hospitalized. "She like almost die," he said.http://deseretnews.com/dn/view/0,1249,660196195,00.html
"...An Iraqi member of the mosque, offered a sermon that touched on the tragedy.
Kergaye called the shooting "a low point for us Muslims."
After the services, a somber Suljo Talovic thanked the community for its support.
"I'm so happy for these people, Utah people," he told the Tribune. "They bring flowers to my door."
http://www.sltrib.com/news/ci_5248199
In the 2/ 17/07 press release Babak aka "Bobby" Darwish, the founder of the Muslim Forum and website owner had no choice but to acknowledge that Talovic "went to mosque" several times after the killers father was interviewed attending one.
The community is obviously hiding much more then then fact that Talovic went to mosque. A look at their activities shows that they are a Saudi funded hard core Wahhabist enterprise which has sucessfully infilitrated into all areas of public and political life and is relentlessly exploiting the welcome afforded them by the predominantly Mormon population.
At the Al Noor Mosque Talovic's father said how "happy"" he was that the community has brought him flowers.He also claimed that his wife had had a heart attack -yet a picture of her in the local newspaper shows her standing wailing in a doorway and one wonders why he is not at her side in a hospital if that is really the case.
One mosque member epitomised the socio pathology of the Islamist world view when he told a journalist after the killings:"A low point for us Muslims" expressing no concern or sympathy for the killers victims.
"Muslim men and boys from Pakistan, Egypt, Sudan, Afghanistan and other countries as Tariq Kergaye, an Iraqi member of the mosque, offered a sermon that touched on the tragedy.
Kergaye called the shooting "a low point for us Muslims."
After the services, a somber Suljo Talovic thanked the community for its support.
"I'm so happy for these people, Utah people," he told the Tribune. "They bring flowers to my door."
http://www.sltrib.com/news/ci_5248199
In a 2005 article about Muslims in Nadeen Ahmed the president of the Islamic Society of Greater Salt Lake and head of the IQRA organisation clearly stated that the infidels were expected to show due dhimmitude towards Muslims and know that there purpose on earth is to serve and accomodate their demands and needs. ( complete text below).
"We have very close contact with the mayors, the governor and all agencies in the government. It's good to have a good, open relationship, so they can know how to meet our needs better," he said.
(Last summer, when Cpl. Wassef Ali Hassoun from West Jordan, a practicing Muslim, was thought to be captured in Iraq, an outpouring of care and concern was poured out upon his family - and light was placed upon the Muslim community.
(Note that article fails to mention that Ali Hassoun went AWOL and pretended to have been kidnapped because he didnt want to fight fellow Muslims in Iraq) Even negative publicity can be used for da'wa purposes as long as the spotlight is on Islam:
"The increased awareness of the community [due to the staged kidnapping story] may help Ahmed fulfill his vision of integrating the faith more into Utah.
"We are trying to show ourselves in the community as part and parcel of the Salt Lake community," Imam Din said. (Note that a month ago Imam Din fled SLC with the help of community members and is presently in hiding in Chicago because he was to be brought up on charges of aggravated spousal abuse).
According to Islamo chauvinist Babak aka "Bobby" Darwish, the policeman who killed Talovic was actually performing a "Futuwa" Youthful Act of Islamic Chivalry" only because he might have killed members of the Muslim community as well. For his part Officer Hammond will be surprised to learn that by upholding his police duties to the community he was actually performing an Islamic religious act.
This item is available on the Militant Islam Monitor website, at http://www.militantislammonitor.org/article/id/2723
Mall killers father "happy" for community bringing flowers to his door -fellow mosque goers call shootings "a low point for us Muslims"
February 17, 2007
Talovic's body to go back to Bosnia
By Nate Carlisle
and Russ Rizzo
The Salt Lake Tribune
Salt Lake Tribune
Article Last Updated:02/17/2007 12:57:37 AM MST
The body of Sulejman Talovic - who shot nine people at Trolley Square, killing five - has been released to his family.
The Talovic family is preparing to transport the body to Bosnia-Herzegovina for burial, his aunt said Friday.
Ajka Omerovic said her family is trying to complete paperwork to facilitate the overseas burial. She said the body, which is in a mortuary, will be transported "hopefully next week."
Talovic's family, who were forced from their hometown in 1993 at the height of the Bosnian war, emigrated to the United States in the late 1990s. The gunman's father, Suljo Talovic, has said he wants to bury his only son in Tuzla, which is Bosnia's most ethnically diverse city.
Suljo Talovic's friends, who spoke to him after a Friday afternoon prayer service at Salt Lake City's Al-Noor mosque, said he was still trying to figure out arrangements for sending his son's body back to Bosnia.
The cost of transporting a body to the Balkans is approximately $5,000, said Travis Greenwood, director of Larkin Mortuary, which is not handling arrangements for Talovic's body.
Suljo Talovic said he and his wife are still trying to cope with Monday's events. He said his wife, Sabira, suffered a heart attack about 5 a.m. Tuesday, three hours after police informed them their son was the Trolley Square shooter.
At the mosque Friday, Suljo Talovic sat on his feet among about 90 other Muslim men and boys from Pakistan, Egypt, Sudan, Afghanistan and other countries as Tariq Kergaye, an Iraqi member of the mosque, offered a sermon that touched on the tragedy.
Kergaye called the shooting "a low point for us Muslims."
After the services, a somber Suljo Talovic thanked the community for its support.
"I'm so happy for these people, Utah people," he told the Tribune. "They bring flowers to my door."
On Friday, police revealed no new clues about what motivated Sulejman Talovic to kill.
The only clues to date are a tumultuous childhood - he was 5 when his family became victims of "ethnic cleansing" - followed by a difficult adjustment to life in Utah as a refugee.
The Tribune reported Thursday that he was prosecuted in juvenile court at age 10 and 12 for rock-throwing and knife-wielding incidents. He also reportedly threatened his landlord with a knife.
And KSL-Radio reported Friday that Talovic violated school rules when he looked up AK-47s on the Internet in November 2004, after which he dropped out of school and went to work to help support his family.
Talovic apparently had no close friends and lacked a social support network.
Nedim Mustafic, 17, also a Bosnian refugee, said he never knew Talovic well but noticed a change in him over the past few years.
Speaking outside the mosque, Mustafic said Talovic was "more energetic" when he was younger. He had grown quiet of late.
"He didn't talk much," Mustafic said. "But he seemed like a down-to-earth person."
Bosnians in Utah, most of whom are Muslim as a result of the Ottoman Empire's historic rule over the Balkans, fear Talovic's actions will lead to persecution.
Talovic, Mustafic said, "was an individual who had problems, and he didn't deal with them well."
Though Suljo Talovic is a regular at the Al-Noor mosque, other regulars said they didn't know Sulejman Talovic. Through his broken English, Halim Huremovic, 73, weighed in to say that incidents such as the Trolley Square shooting are unheard of in Bosnia.
"Never, never, never," said Huremovic, now a U.S. citizen, who praised his new homeland. "Salt Lake City, the people, this government - it's nice, nice, nice, nice people."
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* JESSICA RAVITZ contributed to this story.
* Zions Bank has established two accounts, one in injured mother Carolyn Tuft's name and the other in her 15-year-old daughter's name, Kirsten Hinckley, a Brighton High sophomore who died. Donations can be made at any Utah branch.
* Zions Bank also has created a fund for injured A.J. Walker, 16. Donations may be made in care of his mother, Vickie Walker.
* To honor victim Vanessa Antrobus Quinn, a scholarship fund has been created. Donations can be made to the Vanessa Quinn Memorial, account No. 9031592, accepted at any America First Credit Union branch; or c/o Eagle Savings, 6415 Bridgetown Rd., Cincinnati, OH 45248. Checks should be made to: Eagle Savings/Vanessa Antrobus Quinn Scholarship Fund.
* Chase Bank, where Teresa Blair Ellis worked as an assistant manager in the West Valley City branch, has set up a memorial fund to be directed by her family. Donations can be made at any branch office in her name.
* The family of Brad Frantz has set up a trust fund for his 3-year-old daughter, Deijah Isabel O'Neill. Donations, which should be made using the child's full name, can be made at any U.S. Bank branch.
* A fund has been established to help defray medical expenses of Stacy Hanson, who was critically injured in the Trolley Square shootings. To contribute to the fund, which is under Hanson's name, contact Zions Bank.
* Wells Fargo Bank has established the Trolley Square Memorial Fund to benefit the families of all of the shooting victims. Donations can be made at any Utah branch.
This item is available on the Militant Islam Monitor website, at http://www.militantislammonitor.org/article/id/2723
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