Posted on 07/18/2006 10:58:12 AM PDT by BigFinn
One thing is lost in all the press coverage of the whining Americans who went to Lebanon of their own accord and now want us to pick up the tab to get them out.
THE MAJORITY OF AMERICANS IN LEBANON ARE HEZBOLLAH SUPPORTERS.
Most of them are Shiite Muslims, many of whom hold dual U.S. and Lebanese citizenship. Many are anchor babies born here to Muslims in the U.S. illegally. Some are illegal aliens who became citizens through rubber-stamping Citizenship and Immigration Services (and its INS predecessor) coupled with political pressure by spineless politicians.
Of the 25,000 American citizens and green-card holders in Lebanon, at least 7,000 are from Dearborn, Michigan, the heart of Islamic America, and especially Shia Islam. These 7,000 are mostly Shi'ite Muslims who openly and strongly support Hezbollah. Ditto for many of the rest of the 25,000 that are there.
Many of the 7,000 plus Detroiters in Lebanon are active in Dearborn's Bint Jbeil cultural center (the Lebanese American Heritage Club also features mostly Hezbollah fans). Bint Jbeil is a Hezbollah-dominated city in the South of Lebanon, a frequent destination of Hezbollah leader Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah, who is very at home there. Bint Jbeil is a frequent source of shellings on Northern Israel.
Bint Jbeil natives now living in our country so strongly support Hezbollah that they got Republican Congressman Joe Knollenberg (and his then top staffer, Paul Welday) and then-U.S. Senator Spencer Abraham to give Hezbollah forces in Southern about $86 million of our tax money, no strings.
Given this information, and the fact that several Shi'ite Muslim Lebanese U.S. citizens from Dearborn have been indicted and/or convicted of laundering money to Hezbollah, is it a good idea to rush to bring 25,000 such persons back to the U.S. at a time when Hezbollah is at war against our strongest U.S. ally? Does the fact, that Hezbollah numerous times--and especially now--has announced veiled and not-so-veiled intentions to attack Americans on U.S. soil, make the case to quickly bring these terror-sympathizing Americans back to U.S. soil? Many are individuals whose activity should have mandated prosecution and jail-time. But they are free because a spineless U.S. Attorney, Stephen Murphy III, and equally weak federal law enforcement chiefs of Michigan FBI and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) who pander to them.
These are people who hold U.S. citizenship but support a group that murdered over 300 U.S. Marines and civilians, some through torture; a group that is part of the Al-Qaeda network; a group that is training insurgent terrorists against our troops in Iraq and giving them IEDs to blow them up; a group that worked with Qaeda to bomb the Khobar Towers. Americans who support this group are not American. They merely possess the proper paperwork.
And they are very dangerous. One of them, Lola Elzein--a student at the University of Michigan-Dearborn and an officer of the Hezbollah-supporting Arab American PAC--threatened my life and that of my family members because I've written about the group's Detroit-area's extremist Hezbollah sympathizers. Hezbollah's violence has already arrived in America, and we don't need to pay to transport 25,000 of its sympathizers back to our shores.
Wile the government has announced it will charge these individuals for the expensive transport out of Lebanon to Cyprus back to the U.S., they feds say they will accept IOUs for that transport. Think we'll get the money back? Just ask the Katrina aid administrators.
Do you want your tax dollars to subsidize Hezbollah supporters' return to America? Are these the kind of U.S. citizens we badly need back in our country at this time?
Should Hezbollah supporters be transported on a ship named for one of the most heroic events in U.S. history, the U.S.S Iwo Jima? Should U.S. tax dollars fund the charter of commercial ships to transport the rest of these terror-sympathizers?
The instant answer from all freedom-loving Americans to these questions should be a loud "NO."
These people went to Hezbollah-dominated Lebanon of their own accord. And they were safe there because they support the terrorist group. Now, their fortune has changed. Tough.
It is not the responsibility of U.S. taxpayers to rescue terrorist-supporters who voluntarily went to a dangerous area . . . just because their whines are loud and annoying.
We are picking up the tab for this unfortunate rescue. U.S. funds used to rescue terrorist-sympathizers--YOUR TAX DOLLARS AT WORK.
So is America too slow to get these undesirable U.S. citizens out of Lebanon? On the contrary, not slow enough.
Essentially it's determined by the laws of the "other" country, not the US. I believe Canada would consider your husband a Canadian citizen unless he took action in Canada to renounce his citizenship, if he can. If that's true, in the context of an article like this he'd hold dual citizenship. Same with an American going to Canada. Becoming a Canadian citizen doesn't constitute a renouncement of American citizenship. The draft dodgers of the 60s-70s would have loved that. I suspect a lot of these people consider themselves Lebanese.
There's also the issue of people who are dual citizens by birth (i.e., they meet the legal requirements for citizenship in two countries simply because of where they were born and the nationalities of their parents).
You're right. When he travels to Canada, he can get into Canada with his Canadian passport....however, he can't get back into the US without his naturalization papers or his American passport.
Bulldozer fodder.
ann coulter wannabe
Anyone who is a supporter of Hezbollah, Syria, Iran, or any of the other sundry Mussie groups, Citizen of the US or not, should be required to forfeit their Citizenship and line up for deportation.
Leave those in Lebanon, IN Lebanon. They got what they wanted, now leave them there.
Exactly. But based on her past columns, this is not a journalist who cares any more about facts than Dan Rather does.
I know Debbie Schlussel and have always had a high regard for her scholarship, writings, investigative work, and achievements. She has been on the ball about Islamofascist infiltration and influence in this country, and has done us all a great service by exposing them, especially Sami Al-Arian.
Given the influence of liberals, communists, and Islamofascists and their supporters, don't you think she has a lot to be perpetually indignant about?
Well then leave their a&&es there.
Except we don't pay for the evacs. The evacuees are billed.
I heard some dufus from Dearborn, claiming to be American actually support hezbollah on a CNN interview....took the cnn info babe by surprise....
Oh, really? Still never heard of her.
Limbaugh reading this article now. Will be interested in hearing his comments.
Liberals need them back here. Elections coming up.
FOX said yesterday that any American evacuations were not going to recognize dual citizenship.
If they're supporters of Hezbollah, we should keep a (legal) eye on them. But, unless they commit a crime, the have as much right to be here as you or I do.
I read on a thread earlier (wish I could find it) that congress had passed a bill sometime ago that the US doesn't pay for evacuations. They'd better stick to that.
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