Posted on 02/26/2007 4:18:14 PM PST by DAVEY CROCKETT
No one to counter Chavez In a region where the leading ideology is Bolivarianism, there is not one leader positioned to offer a better idea for a brighter future.
Commentary by Sam Logan for ISN Security Watch (23/02/2007)
For over two decades, the prevailing ideology in Latin America was neo-liberalism, a Washington-born idea that claimed the power of open markets would lift the regions poor from misery. It did not, and corruption ran rampant.
While democracy still remains strong, resentful voters ushered in a new generation of neo-populist leaders touting a new idea: a form of socialism, called Bolivarianism, that has slowly but surely become the loudest and most prevalent ideology.
Bolivarianism is anti-capitalist, supports nationalization, regional trade with like-minded countries and above all, suggests that a country should rely on itself or fellow socialist states, not imperialist powers, as a source of the economic growth that will lift all from poverty. It is a sort of refurbished socialism that is not a guiding light for the future.
Latin America cannot readily absorb the economic shock of open markets, nor can it get bogged down in the trappings of old socialist ideas. A blended ideology must be promoted, but the problem is that no one is strong enough to counter Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, the leader of Bolivarianism.
Chavez calls it Socialism for the 21st Century. Cuba's Fidel Castro passed him the torch. Leaders around the region pay homage to their own past as socialist upstarts through hugging and laughing with Chavez on the international stage while taking care of often pro-capitalist, neo-liberal business at home.
Brazilian President Luis Inacio Lula da Silva is a perfect example. He has the leftist background and eye for fiscal conservatism to become a great ideological counterweight to Chavez. His politics represent an ideal blend for the region. But his politically weak position at home and strong voices from his own left deter any would be shouting match with Chavez.
Within a week after winning his second term in office, Lula visited Chavez for a photo opportunity on a bridge linking both countries. That was in November, and it looks like Lulas administration will remain bogged down until March as he struggles to get past his partys sordid past and form a working cabinet willing to share the same table.
Argentina of the past could have been a counter weight to the Bolivarian ideology. But since Nestor Kirchner has come to power, Argentina has become a Venezuelan puppet.
Chavez has literally bought the support of his southern neighbor with over US$3 billion in purchases of Argentine debt. The most recent purchase occurred on 16 February, when Venezuela dumped another US$750 million into Argentine government coffers.
Colombian President Alvaro Uribe has the politics to promote an ideological battle with Chavez. Colombia has been a model of economic growth through a mixture of neo-liberal policies and social programs. But Uribe has serious problems.
Political allies are falling like dominos due to links with former paramilitary leaders. And if Uribe took the time to speak out for neo-liberalism and against Chavez, he would be dismissed as another of Washington's puppets. Colombia is a top recipient of US aid.
The only other leader who could take up an ideological fight with Chavez is Mexican President Felipe Calderon. He has the right politics and his country has a history of not blindly supporting the US. Voting against the US invasion of Iraq at the UN is a clear indication. But Calderon won on the thinnest possible mandate. His opposition controls enough seats in the Mexican Congress to block any unwanted initiative, and his focus is on Mexican organized crime, not on verbal sword play with Chavez.
Finally, the US has launched a diplomatic offensive in the region. This is to be a year of engagement, but the US president is clearly obsessed with the war in Iraq, not with putting a muzzle on Venezuelas leader for the sake of the regions future. Washington is doubly discredited, first for promoting an ideology that clearly did not work, and second for doing nothing about it.
Latin America needs an independent leader willing to stand up to Chavez, but that leader does not exist on the regions geopolitical map. Bolivarianism will continue to seep into the minds and hearts of millions across Latin America. Chavez and his pool of allies will control the headlines until the next round of presidential elections tell the world how the region has embraced this new ideology.
As Chavez puts it, Socialism for the 21st Century is just getting started. If that is true, then he will continue to trumpet his ideology until Latin Americans learn, the hard way, that Bolivarianism did not carry them much farther from poverty than neo-liberalism. Disillusionment with reality may then spread faster than hope for the future.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Sam Logan is an investigative journalist who has reported on security, energy, politics, economics, organized crime, terrorism and black markets in Latin America since 1999. He is a senior writer for ISN Security Watch based in Brazil.
The views and opinions expressed herein are those of the author only, not the International Relations and Security Network (ISN).
Iran Regards UK Embassy Note as ‘Apology’
Persian Press: Mottaki Tells MPs Government Regards UK Embassy Note as ‘Apology’
Report citing Fars News Agency: “Details of Capture, Release of British Sailors According to Foreign Minister Mottaki”
Originally published on 4/9/2007 by Farhang-e Ashti in Persian
In the meeting of the Majles National Security and Foreign Policy Committee, the minister of foreign affairs offered a report on the process of the capture and release of the British invading service personnel.
According to the Fars News Agency, after the end of the meeting of the Majles National Security and Foreign Policy Committee yesterday, Committee Secretary Kazem Jalali stated that Manuchehr Mottaki had offered a report on the capture and release of the British sailors in the meeting. He added: “Mr. Mottaki mentioned that, on Friday 3 Farvardin [ 23 March], two British boats entered Iranian waters after inspecting an Indian merchant ship. They were arrested by the effective action of our country’s coast guard.” He quoted Mottaki as stating: “Since the very beginning, a special committee to follow up the case was formed in the Foreign Ministry and the necessary measures were taken. In the absence of the British ambassador to Tehran, the British deputy head of mission was summoned to the Foreign Ministry and notified about the event. On the one hand, the British summoned our ambassador to London; on the other hand, they tried to take measures against Iran in the UN Security Council and to use the European Union to put Iran under pressure.
“Until 11 Farvardin [ 31 March], England tried to create an adverse psychological atmosphere in the international arena and follow the case through non-bilateral and international channels. However, when this psychological pressure did not have any effect on Iran, they changed their tone and followed the case through international relations channels, which was evaluated as a positive step by Iran. From the beginning, the Islamic Republic of Iran announced that this case could be solved without any pressure and in a bilateral manner.”
Jalali continued to quote Mottaki and stated: “In an official note, the British Embassy notified that such a measure would not be repeated and the nature of using the expression of “not repeated” was regarded as a kind of admission of trespassing and an apology.”
: Tehran Farhang-e Ashti in Persian — Moderate reformist daily, began publishing in February 2003; originally licensed to and managed by Mehdi Shamshirian, is currently licensed to Sherkat-e Nashr-e Andisheh-ye Mehr and managed by Abdollah Abdus
The author of this piece, Ghazal Omid a pro-Mullah apologist, passing below our guard by a plaintive book where she describes herself being molested/raped by a male family member, has been misleading us for some time.
She had the Mullah flag insignia posted on her wesite at the top left until protests by Alan of AntiMullah at her duplicity alarmed her and she removed the centerpiece of the Mullah “Allah” emblem.
Glenn Beck naively uses her opinions and so do some other Media that cannot distinguish among the good guys and the pro-Mullah adherents who have wormed their way into Media circles.
Abbas Fakhravar, until recently reportedly her boyfriend, the very “so-called” student leader who never had a student card issued in his name ever in Iran, also spreads disinformation and gathers intelligence.
Sorry Michael L., you have not read the same abstracts from his file in Iran and I mean you no disrespect. Quite the contrary, have a high esteem for you. But you have been taken for quite a ride by this person sent to infiltrate us. Nor are you the the only one.
Any opinion about how to handle Iran of Ghazaleh Omid should be taken with a huge grain of salt. Specially when it insists that an attack on Iran would serve the Mullahs.
What crock! And a much used Mullah talking point.
http://www.myrtlebeachonline.com/mld/myrtlebeachonline/news/breaking_news/17077577.htm
Four arrested in Ocean Blvd., Socastee shootings
Three shot by the beach, one at gas station
By Lisa Fleisher, Josh Hoke and Jonathan Tressler
The Sun News
Police arrested four men Friday evening who they say went on a shooting spree across Horry County.
Police say the men, who have not yet been charged, shot three men on Ocean Boulevard at around 6:30 p.m. on Friday and later shot a man in Socastee.
Police stopped a burgundy Ford F-150 pick-up truck Friday night that matched witnesses’ descriptions in both shootings.
They arrested four men who were in the truck, bringing three to J. Reuben Long Detention Center and the fourth to the Department of Juvenile Justice.
Police are not releasing any names.
The men are suspected of shooting three men on Ocean Boulevard right at the former Myrtle Beach Pavilion site.
The men were driving southbound and began arguing with pedestrians at about 6:30 p.m., Myrtle Beach Police Capt. Joe Vella said. They then fired a number of shots.
One victim suffered serious injuries and was taken to Grand Strand Regional Medical Center, Vella said. The other two victims did not sustain life-threatening injuries.
At 10 p.m., police went to a Kangaroo gas station at Forrest Brook Parkway and S.C. 616 in Socastee, where they found one man shot in the lower back, according to a police statement.
The man was treated at Grand Strand Regional Medical Center and released.
The victim said he was making a phone call outside the store when the four men demanded money from him. One of the men shot him after he refused.
“The people involved are definitely the shooters for us and the Myrtle Beach situation,” Horry County police spokesman Bob Carr said.
The shootings come nearly one year after Myrtle Beach police officers shot and killed a Chester man, near where the Ocean Boulevard shooting on Friday occurred. It is a popular tourist area that had begun to congest on Friday as shots rang out.
“It’s unfortunate that it’s happened, and hopefully this is not an indication of anything else,” Myrtle Beach Mayor John Rhodes said.
One of the Ocean Boulevard victims, a 17-year-old from Hornell, N.Y., was talking to his mother on his cell phone as he walked north on Ocean Boulevard when he was shot, said Joey Testani, who said he was his cousin.
The teenagers were in Myrtle Beach with dozens of other Hornell high school seniors for spring break. A handful of them gathered on Ocean Boulevard after the shooting.
The victims were walking north along the sidewalk between Eighth and Ninth avenues North when the suspects pulled up beside them, yelled an expletive at the group and began firing, police and witnesses said.
“It happened so quick,” said Damon Harris, who was riding a few cars behind the suspects’ vehicle. “What made me realize it was a gun and not fireworks was that we could smell gunpowder. It was like I could see blasts of fire coming out of the vehicle.”
New York native Josh Nichols said he was happy he was walking in front of the victims and not behind them.
“If we were behind them we’d probably be on the ground, too,” he said. “I’ve never seen anything like this before in my life.”
Witnesses said they heard between four and seven shots, including Leo Vaknin, who works in a shop near the incident scene.
“I heard about six or seven of them,” he said. “I heard the shots and came out here. I could see [the victims] creeping, moving and trying to get up.”
Opinions were mixed about how Friday’s shootings might affect business and traffic along Ocean Boulevard as the season heats up.
“People like to see violence. It’s like in a fight, where people egg it on, you know? It’s sad, really,” said Matan Perets, who works in a Boulevard shop.
Mark Alan, who works across the street, said, “Nobody wants to hang out where people are getting shot. That’s just common sense.”
Contact LISA FLEISHER at 626-0317 or lfleisher@thesunnews.com.
Thank you for sharing your knowledge, we would not have known with out it.
So many are not what they pretend..........and they get paid for their stories, it is not fair.
Ping to 5082, it goes with 5069....
Fars has given us the truth of the people in the report.
http://www.int.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click_id=2024&art_id=nw20070330095958111C256441
Teen saves busload of schoolchildren
Sydney - A 16-year-old Australian girl seized the wheel of a Greyhound bus full of schoolchildren early Friday after the driver passed out, preventing it crashing into a dry creek bed, police said.
Laura Simpson, who does not have a driving licence, prevented disaster as the bus started to leave the road near the rural south-eastern town of Muckadilla.
A total of 38 children were heading home for holiday when the driver began to feel faint in the pre-dawn hours and attempted to pull the coach over to the side of the road before he blacked out, the Australian Associated Press reported.
Simpson was sitting three seats behind the driver and leapt into action as the bus hit a road sign.
“The bus started to run off the road with a bit of a jolt and a bang, and she looked across at the driver and said he was blue and looked stiff,” Laura’s mother Megan Simpson said.
“So she leapt over to see what on earth was happening, because they were heading for the scrub at this point. There was a river... up in front of them.
“His (the driver’s) eyes were rolling back in his head and he had his foot on the accelerator. She grabbed the wheel and kept the bus straight.”
Simpson said Laura managed to wake the driver, who eventually lifted his foot off the accelerator and pulled the bus to a halt before passing out again.
“We’re just lucky she was quick thinking and just acted,” said Simpson. “Like bush kids, she’s been driving since she was about 10 or 11 around the place, but she’s never experienced a bus.”
The children used mobile phones to call an ambulance for the driver, who was taken to hospital, then waited four hours on the roadside for a replacement driver to arrive.
Police Inspector Graham Coleman described Laura’s actions as heroic and said she would be nominated for a bravery award. - Sapa-AFP
Published on the Web by IOL on 2007-03-30 09:59:58
[Thought we met this young Hero...........May God always protect her, she is special...granny]
Suicide Bombers Span World, Classes of Potential Terrorists
PBS Online NewsHour
Originally Aired: April 13, 2007
Analysis
Copyright ©1996-2007 MacNeil/Lehrer Productions. All Rights Reserved
http://www.pbs. org/newshour/ bb/terrorism/ jan-june07/ suicidebombers_ 04-13.html
Suicide bombers make the news almost daily in Iraq, but the tactic has long been employed elsewhere around the world. NewsHour analysts explain how recruitment for suicide bombers has become easier and why people would kill themselves for a cause.
Analysis: Don’t underestimate Syria’s military
Yaakov Katz, THE JERUSALEM POST Apr. 12, 2007
www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1176152784337&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
While the Knesset heard about potential scenarios for reaching peace
with
Damascus on Thursday, senior defense officials warned of an
unprecedented
military buildup in Syria and said that prevailing in a war with
Israel’s
northeastern neighbor would not be as simple as some might have been
led to
believe.
Following the Second Lebanon War, IDF Military Intelligence noticed a
change
within the Syrian military. Syria feels empowered by Hizbullah’s
surprising
success last summer and Damascus now believes it can use Hizbullah-like
tactics in a future confrontation with Israel and possibly even defeat
the
once-thought-to-be invincible IDF.
“For years we thought that the IDF had a clear upper hand over Syria’s
military,” a top official told The Jerusalem Post. “After the war in
Lebanon
we now know that this assumption was not accurate.”
Syria has emphasized missile development in recent months. According to
Western sources, Syria has the ability to independently manufacture
Scud
missiles, and it has 300 of them deployed just north of the
demilitarized
zone in the Syrian part of the Golan Heights.
A division of some 10,000 troops is responsible for operating the
missiles,
which include an small number of Scud D’s with a range of 700
kilometers and
said to be capable of carrying nonconventional warheads. Syria has
close to
30 launchers for its Scud missiles, according to foreign sources.
Syria keeps the projectiles in bunkers at several locations; most are
in a
valley near Hama, where it has built a missile electronic and assembly
facility.
Syria has a massive military divided into 12 divisions and totaling
close to
400,000 soldiers at full mobilization.
One of the divisions is made up of 10,000 elite commandos, a formidable
force that would serve as Syria’s first line in an offensive against
the
IDF.
Since the Second Lebanon War, Syria has established new commando units
and
is said to have increased urban and guerrilla warfare training.
“Syria saw the difficulty the IDF had during the fighting inside the
southern Lebanese villages and now the military there wants to draw us
- in
the event of a war - into battles in built-up areas where they think
they
will have the upper hand,” explained a source in the IDF Northern
Command.
Over the last year, the Syrian military has made only two major
acquisitions: a number of advanced Russian anti-aircraft systems called
Stretlets. It has not received new fighter jets, tanks or armored
personnel
carriers for a number of years.
According to Yiftah Shapir - a researcher with the Institute for
National
Security Studies at Tel Aviv University - the Syrian military plans to
use
short-range Katyushas alongside the long-range ballistic Scuds in any
future
conflict with Israel.
“Syria was impressed by Hizbullah’s strategic success, with its use of
small
rockets and Israel’s inability to neutralize them,” Shapir said. “This
is a
weapon that is not traditionally used in conventional wars, but can
be.”
While Ibrahim “Abe” Suleiman - the Syrian national who appeared before
the
Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense
Committee on Thursday - might be right in his prediction that peace
between
Israel and Syria is possible, war, officials said, was no longer
impossible.
Both militaries have raised their level of alert along the border and
while
the IDF has increased its presence on the Golan Heights - mostly with
troops
who are training - the Syrians have also moved units as well as
military
infrastructure closer to the border.
In satellite images broadcast this week on CBN News in the US, reporter
Chris Mitchell revealed Syria’s three major missile sites. One site -
referred to as the “heart” of Syria’s missile program - is in Hama,
where a
weapons factory is surrounded by more than 30 hardened concrete bunkers
that
house multiple launchers and missiles. In just minutes, experts said,
these
launchers could deliver more than a ton of nonconventional warheads
anywhere
in Israel.
Another missile site near Homs contains a previously undisclosed
chemical
warhead facility where a drive-through building leads to a facility
where
warheads are installed on ballistic missiles.
These images do not necessarily indicate that Syria plans to attack
Israel,
but they do send a clear message to the IDF and the Israeli leadership:
Do
not underestimate us.
The Barzani Chameleon
by Kamal Said Qadir
Middle East Quarterly
Spring 2007
http://www.meforum.org/article/1681
On September 11, 1961, Iraqi Kurds under the leadership of Mulla Mustafa Barzani, founder of the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) and father of the current Kurdish president Masoud Barzani, rose in rebellion against Iraq’s central government. Kurds often portray the event as spontaneous.[1] It was not.
A declassified KGB document suggests Soviet involvement in the Kurdish rebellion was part of a Kremlin plan to disrupt Western interests in the Third World. The Kurds provided fertile ground for Soviet intrigue because of Barzani’s ties to Soviet authorities.[2] After the collapse of the Mahabad Republic in Iran, Barzani took refuge in the Soviet Union.
On July 29, 1961, KGB chairman Alexander Shelepin suggested to Nikita Khrushchev, the secretary general of the Soviet Communist Party, to have Barzani (code-named Ra’is, Arabic for president) “activate the movement of the Kurdish population of Iraq, Iran, and Turkey for creation of an independent Kurdistan.” If successful, the rebellion could disadvantage not only the United States and Great Britain but also U.S. allies Turkey and Iran.[3]
After the Kurdish rebellion began, the KGB sought to further exploit the situation:
P. [Peter] Ivashutin to the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. September 27, 1961, St.-199/10c, 3 October 1961, TsKhSD, fond 4, opis 13, delo 85, ll. 1-4.
In accord with the decision of the CC CPSU of 1 August 1961 on the implementation of measures favouring the distraction of the attention and forces of the USA and her allies from West Berlin, and in view of the armed uprisings of the Kurdish tribes that have begun in the North of Iraq to: 1) use the KGB to organize pro-Kurdish and anti-[Abdul Karim] Kassem protests in India, Indonesia, Afghanistan, Guinea, and other countries; 2) have the KGB meet with Barzani to urge him to “seize the leadership of the Kurdish movements in his hands and to lead it along the democratic road,” and to advise him to “keep a low profile in the course of this activity so that the West did not have a pretext to blame the USSR in meddling into the internal affairs of Iraq”; and 3) assign the KGB to recruit and train a “special armed detachment (500-700 men)” drawn from Kurds living in the USSR in the event that Moscow might need to send Barzani “various military experts (Artillerymen, radio operators, demolition squads, etc.)” to support the Kurdish uprising.[4]
While the Ivashutin document refers only to Barzani’s relationship with the KGB in the run-up to and wake of the 1961 rebellion, other declassified material suggests ties between the Barzani family and Soviet authorities to have a long history.[5] In 1973, though, the KGB severed its relationship with Barzani after the Baath Party and Iraqi Communist Party formed a tenuous alliance and Baghdad established close military and economic ties with the Soviet Union.[6] Deprived of Soviet support, Barzani allied himself more closely with the United States, Iran, and Israel. However, in 1975, Henry Kissinger pulled the rug out from the Kurdish rebellion when he brokered a border and non-interference pact between Iran and Iraq. Mulla Mustafa Barzani took refuge in the United States where he died in 1979.[7]
How is this episode relevant today? Switching alliances is part of the Barzani family political culture, intertwining survival and power with Kurdish nationalism. Between 1980 and 1988, Masoud Barzani allied himself with Iran in its fight against Saddam, even as the revolutionary authorities in Iran turned their guns on Iranian Kurds. After long hostility to Turkey, in 1992, he allied with Ankara in its fight against the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (Partiya Karkerên Kurdistan, PKK); in 1996, he allied with Saddam Hussein against rival Kurdish leader (and current Iraqi president) Jalal Talabani. In the wake of Iraq’s liberation in 2003, Barzani has portrayed himself as a U.S. ally. For how long, though, remains unclear.
Kamal Said Qadir is an Iraqi Kurdish writer based in Vienna, Austria. He was detained by KDP security forces on October 26, 2005, for criticizing corruption within the KDP and was released months later after an international campaign.
[1] Masoud Barzani, Al-Barzani wa al-Haraka at-Taharurya al-Kurdya. Al-Juz ath-Thalith: Thawrat Aylol, 1961-1975 (Erbil: Matbaat Al Tarbia, 2002), pp. 21-41.
[2] Pavel Sudoplatov and Anatolii Sudoplatov with Jerrold L. Schecter and Leona P. Schecter, Special Tasks: The Memoirs of an Unwanted WitnessA Soviet Spymaster (Boston: Little, Brown and Co., 1994), pp. 259-64.
[3] Christopher Andrew and Vasili Mitrokhin, The Mitrokhin Archive II: The KGB and the World (London: Allen Lane, 2005), p. 175.
[4] Reproduced in Vladislav M. Zubok, Spy vs. Spy: The KGB vs. the CIA, 1960-1962 (Cold War International History Project Bulletin), Fall 1994, pp. 22-33.
[5] For more about the history of the Barzani family, see Ayob Barzani, Al-Muqawama al-Kurdya wa al-Ihtilal, 1914-1958 (Geneva: Editions Orient-Realites, 2002), pp. 35-59.
[6] See, for example, “Kurdish Efforts to Recruit International Support,” declassified CIA document, Mar. 29, 1972; Oles M. Smolansky with Bettie M. Smolansky, The USSR and Iraq: The Soviet Quest for Influence (Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 1991), pp. 79-80.
[7] Smolansky, The USSR and Iraq, pp. 76-98.
To receive the full, printed version of the Middle East Quarterly, please see details about an affordable subscription.
Printer-friendly version
* Other items from the Spring 2007 Middle East Quarterly
* Other items in category Iraq
* Other items in category Russia/Soviet Union
* Other items in category History
Going back to the days of the Soviets, when in doubt IâÂÂve had this thought that cleared up everything. And it is that as a rule of thumb, IâÂÂd say, that which the Left or its apologist squeal about and say that we must not do, what the US and free world must not ever do, is something we must do since it is in our interest to do it. The reason this rule works so well is the obvious fact that our squealing Lefties, and now Islamo-terrorist apologists, do not wish for us to succeed. In the past, they were often in the pay of the Soviets or ideologically aligned so closely with Marxism and its idiotic self-serving claptrap, monocausal explanation about class struggle that they were eager to work against the US and especially against Republican presidents. Today, it includes residual anti-capitalism of anile academics, anti-American-religious prejudice of Hollyweird and Europe, anti-anti-terrorism zealotry of the pacifistic girlie man, and, sadly even, âI told you soâ isolationism of the Buchananite xenophobic bigots who fear democracy that reaches a demographic beyond Anglos, Scots, and Irish.
Thanks for the ping!
Would it be possible for you to add me to your ping list?
Hey Granny see you need a new thread. Send me an email I will start ASAP.
MUCH LOVE AND GREAT BIG HUGS
j
BEAUTIFUL.
THX.
You are welcome.
I thought you would understand it.
LOL, I knew you would show up sooner or later.
While you were writing to me, I was looking for a survival article that would work for the next thread, seems all I find tonight is links to survival subjects and even considered that.
There has been so much in the news lately about the threats of nuclear and bio-hazards and unsafe foods.
Tomorrow is another day.
[the name of the man who jumped from the Empire State Building]
[snipped]
Police identified the man as Moshe Kanovsky, a lawyer in his 30s.
More than 30 people have committed suicide at the Empire State Building since it opened in 1931, including a 21-year-old man in February 2006. The skyscraper reaches 1,454 feet to the top of its lightning rod.
http://eye-on-the-world.blogspot.com/2007/04/australia-canberra-cleric-praises.html
Friday, April 13, 2007
Australia: Canberra cleric praises jihadists
And our countries are infested with this vermin.
(Herald Sun) THE most senior Muslim cleric in Canberra has praised Islamic jihadists in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Mohammed Swaiti yesterday called on God to grant victory to mujahideen (Muslim holy warriors) worldwide, The Weekend Australian newspaper reports.
God grant victory to the mujahideen in his name in all places, Sheik Swaiti called out twice in Arabic over a microphone at Abu Bakr mosque in Yarralumla in front of about 500 worshippers.
God grant victory to mujahideen in Palestine, and Chechnya and Kashmir and Afghanistan and Iraq.
While Sheik Swaiti translated his sermon into English for non-Arabic-speaking members, the imam of Canberra’s only mosque omitted the praise for Islamic jihadists in the English version. [...]
http://eye-on-the-world.blogspot.com/index.html
Friday, April 13, 2007
Pennsylvania: Islamic Center Hit By Fire; Synagogue Offers Prayer Space
I don’t think anything like that would happen if it was the other way around.
(WNEP) Fire damaged a house of worship and until they know what started it, investigators are treating it as a crime scene.
Firefighters were called to an Islamic mosque near Pottsville just after midnight. Investigators now want to rule out anything suspicious first.
State troopers brought in a specially-trained dog that can detect if anything flammable was used to start the fire at the mosque near Pottsville. The dog did not smell any accelerants.
Because the fire was in a house of worship, as a matter of routine, federal investigators are notified, including the FBI.
Inside the building, run by the Islamic Society of Schuylkill County, a fire marshal examined a storage room near the kitchen. That is where they believe the fire started.
“I never expected this. I’m shocked as is every member of the Muslim community,” said Shiraz Mansoor of the Islamic Society. [...]
(R&H) Later Wednesday, members of the mosque and community center were offered places to worship at the Mechanicsville Fire Company and the Oheb Zedeck Synagogue Center, Pottsville, and Imam Shiraz Mansoor, leader of the mosque, said he was grateful for the offers. [...]
Digg it!
Posted by Watcher on Friday, April 13, 2007
http://www.thenews.com.pk/daily_detail.asp?id=51305
Third edition of Red Book on terrorists
By our correspondent
The Crime Investigation Department (CID) has published the third addition of Red Book of terrorists wanted by the Pakistan Government in terrorism cases.
In the latest addition names of terrorists, having affiliations with banned religious organisations and Al-Qaeda involved in terrorist acts including attacks on the prime minister, corps commander and US consulate, have been mentioned.
SP Fayyaz Khan said that the Red Book contains names of at least 51 terrorists wanted by the government, which has placed a head money on most of them.
Most of the terrorists have affiliations with organisations including Al-Qaeda, Lashker-I-Jhangvi, Hizbul Mujahideen, Harkat-ul-Mujahideen, Sipah Mohammed, Sipah-I-Sahaba and others.
The Red Book contains the names of most wanted terrorists including Qari Zafar, Mati-ur-Rehman, Shahab, Hammad, Kashif, Saud Memon and two activists of the Jeay Sindh, Shafi and Khalil Khaskehli wanted in bomb blast case.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.