Sudan Jihad forcing Islam On Christians, Using Rape and Killing

Monday, March 4, 2002 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- FAITH UNDER FIRE Sudan jihad forces Islam on Christians Women refusing to convert gang-raped, mutilated, says relief worker

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted: March 4, 2002 1:00 a.m. Eastern By Art Moore -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- © 2002 WorldNetDaily.com Sudan's militant Muslim regime is slaughtering Christians who refuse to convert to Islam, according to the head of an aid group who recently returned from the African nation. The forced conversions are just one aspect of the Khartoum government's self-declared jihad on the mostly Christian and animist south, Dennis Bennett, executive director of Seattle-based Servant's Heart told WorldNetDaily.

Villagers in several areas of the northeast Upper Nile region say that when women are captured by government forces they are asked: "Are you Christian or Muslim?"

Women who answer "Muslim" are set free, but typically soldiers gang-rape those who answer "Christian" then cut off their breasts and leave them to die as an example for others.

Bennett says these stories are corroborated by witnesses from several tribes in the region. Upon returning to the U.S., he wrote a letter to influential members of Congress and activists.

"After witnessing once again the situation on the ground there," Bennett wrote, "I must ask 'How long will the United States government allow the Government of Sudan to continue its jihad against the Black African Christians of South Sudan?'"

Backed by Muslim clerics, the National Islamic Front regime in the Arab and Muslim north declared a jihad, or holy war, on the south in 1989. Since 1983, an estimated 2 million people have died from war and related famine. About 4.5 million have become refugees.

Sudan's holy war against the south was reaffirmed in October by First Vice President Ali Osman Taha. "The jihad is our way, and we will not abandon it and will keep its banner high," he said to a brigade of mujahedin fighters heading for the war front, according to Sudan's official SUNA news agency. "We will never sell out our faith and will never betray the oath to our martyrs."

The U.S. House of Representatives adopted a resolution finding that Khartoum is "systematically committing genocide," but current legislation that would impose sanctions has been stalled. The Sudan Peace Act is opposed by both the White House and Wall Street.

Sanctions in the House version of the bill target oil revenues that Khartoum is using to fuel its war effort. Bennett, with 20 years experience in international risk management and banking, said he was the first to probe the link between oil and jihad that is now documented and publicized by human rights groups. His research began in 1996 when he asked: If you're the government of Sudan and you're broke, how are you paying for your war?

In his letter urging action by the U.S., he points out that Sudan's military continues to decorate and promote known war criminals such as Commander Taib Musba, who in the mid-1980s killed an estimated 15,000 unarmed, civilian, ethnic Uduk Christians.

In 1986, Musba entered the Uduk tribal capital of Chali and declared to its Christians: "You are all going to convert from Christianity to Islam today, because here is what's going to happen to you if you don't."

Musba then killed five church leaders in front of the gathered villagers. When they refused to convert, he began killing unarmed men, women and children. Some were herded at gunpoint into a hut then run over by a 50-ton, Soviet-made tank.

He also herded groups of about a dozen people into a hut, where he asked the first person "Do you renounce Jesus Christ?" Anyone who refused was killed by a three-inch nail driven into the top of the head. The U.N. high commissioner for refugees granted the Uduks international refugee status in 1992 after investigating the atrocities, but almost as many died during the six years they waited for the declaration.

Islam also is forced on Sudanese in the Muslim north. Security police in Khartoum are pursuing a local convert to Christianity who went into hiding three weeks ago to escape arrest and possible death, the Compass Direct news service reports. Aladin Omer Agabni Mohammed, who left Islam 11 years ago to become a Christian, is subject to the death penalty under Sudanese criminal law for "apostasy." According to a church leader, two other converts face a similar situation.

Forced starvation Bennett says that in addition to the more immediate, readily apparent atrocities taking place, there is a slower, less perceptive persecution that is equally deadly. Forced starvation is one of the primary tools of the Khartoum regime, he says. When government forces attack a Christian village, they kill everyone they catch, but those who flee lose everything necessary for survival.

"The government comes in and burns the crops, burns grain stored if there was any excess, burns houses down," Bennett said. "Now you have only the clothes on your back, no tools, no cooking pots, no buckets for water, and you have to run two days through the bush in 115-degree temperatures in order to escape." In the arid wilderness, escapees try to survive on tree leaves and stagnant, dysentery-infested water. If a women is breastfeeding, her milk dries up, Bennett said, and the baby starts dying. Small children, just weaned, also start dying.

"But all the family has to do is change their name to Muhammad or Ramadan, convert to Islam and walk the two days back to the government of Sudan who will care for them," he said. Last year, the government of Sudan burned all the crops in the area where Bennett's group works. "There wasn't anything to harvest," he said. "Literally we saw people eating roots and tree leaves. It's like eating the nutritional properties of cardboard. It's enough to put something in your stomach but not enough to feed you."

A food drop came from the U.N. World Food Program, he said, "but they never came in to do an assessment; they just dropped it from the air." As the "hungry season" approaches – the rainy period of June, July and early August – emergency food supplies become critical. Servant's Heart believes it will need to feed 50,000 people in its area during that time.

Slavery as tool of terror Slavery is another tool of the National Islamic Front regime, though Bennett says it is not known in the northeast Upper Nile region, mainly because of lack of transportation. Western Bahr El Ghazal is one location where it persists because the railroad line allows captured men, women and children to be taken to slave markets in the north. "If you want to end systematic slavery, blow up the train line and keep it blown up," Bennett said.

The ongoing controversy surrounding slave redemption – the practice of buying freedom promoted by some humanitarian groups – arose again in the past week when the Irish Times and Washington Post published exposes acknowledging the existence of slavery in Sudan but alleging that fake slave redemption is taking place. Bennett respects the work of groups buying back the slaves, but he believes it is inevitable that some will be conned. Engaging in the practice is a matter of individual conscience, he says. "Anytime you have tens of thousands of American dollars coming into an area you've got potential problems of corruption," Bennett said. He says the "jury is still out" on whether it fuels the market by increasing demand. "Slave-taking would still be happening even if nobody was buying back slaves," he said. "Maybe not to the full extent."

But he believes it's important to keep in mind that taking slaves is "just one more facet of the jihad against the civilian population" in southern Sudan. The methods may vary in different parts of the country, but the aim is the same.

"In the Uduk tribe, Taib Musba drove three-inch nails into people's heads," he said. "In northeast Upper Nile, they are gang-raping women and cutting off their breasts; in western Bahr El Ghazal, they are capturing women and selling them as slaves."

Sudan Jihad forcing Islam On Christians, Using Rape and Killing
History repeats itself. We don't learn.....
Go out and rent this movie:

KHARTOUM, starring Charleton Heston, is a Grand, Historic, Sweeping Epic with a cast of thousands.
Does history repeat itself? I first saw this movie years ago. After the first terrorist bombing of the World Trade Center in the mid-1990's, when Osama Bin Laden first declared a "jihad" against the United States, I was reminded of the movie. Osama Bin Laden is the spitting image of the "Mahdi", played by Lawrence Olivier. The parallels are uncanny. Believing that he was "the predicted one" spoken of by the prophet Muhammad to bring the sword against infidels and convert the world to Islam, the Mahdi sprung up from the deserts of the Sudan in 1883 to organize a Holy War against the British Empire and all Christendom. A century later, Bin Laden also sprung up from the Sudan (he was expelled from Sudan in 1996 and his assets there seized). In fact, recall when then U.S. President Bill Clinton bombed the aspirin factory there in an attempt to annihilate Bin Laden - in Khartoum! To understand what is taking place in the world today, this movie is a must see. I would highly recommend it for high school and college students, as well as adults desiring to make sense of what drives the radical Islamic jihadists. This movie reveals that their radical mindset is nothing new - it was alive and well in 1883 much the same as today. Besides being a true story, Khartoum is a gripping tale of good versus evil, full of action, battles, and edge of your seat suspense and intrigue. If you haven't seen Khartoum, do it now. It's a TOP 10 for sure.

THE OIL CONNECTION

According to investigators commissioned by Canadian and British NGO’s, whose findings are summarised in the “Report of an Investigation into Oil Development, Conflict and Displacement in Western Upper Nile, Sudan” (October 2001):

“The new (Government of Sudan military) strategy in Western Upper Nile, is both more violent and more territorially focused (i.e. in the oil concessions), involving co-ordinated attacks on civilian settlements in which aerial bombardment and raids by helicopter gunships are followed by ground attacks from government-backed militias and government troops. These ground forces burn villages and crops, loot livestock and kill and abduct people – mainly women and children.”

The report calculates that over 200 000 people have lost their homes in the Oil regions of Western Upper Nile since the Canadian oil company, Talisman, entered in 1998.

“Since 1999, a consortium made up of Talisman of Canada, Petronas of Malaysia, the China National Petroleum Corporation and Sudapet of Sudan has been pumping oil. Production is about 220,000 barrels a day, enough to increase the government’s annual official military budget to $327 million this year, according to the International Monetary Fund.”

BIN LADEN AND SUDAN

Various reports continue to reveal an on-going pattern of co-operation and links between Osama Bin Laden, his Al-Qaeda network and the National Islamic Front regime in Khartoum.

“The National Islamic Front (NIF) political and security apparatus is intact, as are the NIF’s and the international Islamicists control of the economy. Many of those running terrorist training are still in security and ministerial jobs. So, well informed Sudanese doubt that the NIF will hand much of value to US investigators. The NIF is as Islamic as its friends Osama and the Taliban. This regime believes in what it does. Any concession is intended only to protect the greater cause. Secondly, any major betrayal would be suicidal, just as dangerous as holding free elections.” (Africa Confidential, 28 September 2001).

The FBI has confirmed that Mohamed Atta, who piloted one of the commercial aircraft into the World Trade Center, “wired money to Mr Bin Laden’s former paymaster in Sudan, Shaykh Sai’iid el Masry, also know as Mustafa Muhammad Ahmad, on the eve of the terrorist attacks” (Ottawa Citizen, 12 October 2001).

The Citizen goes on to report that testimony in the trial of four men convicted for the embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania reveals: “Shaykh Sai’id (Mustafa Muhammad Ahmad) controlled the Bin Laden financial network in Sudan through a company called Taba Investments, and used profits from related Sudanese banks and businesses to finance and cloak terrorist training.”

The Citizen noted that British prime minister, Tony Blair, publicly disclosed in a report tabled in the British Parliament that: “these Bin Laden companies were key assets in the Al-Qaeda terrorist campaign. Since 1989, Osama Bin Laden has established a series of (Sudanese) businesses to provide income for Al-Qaeda, and to provide cover for the procurement of explosives, weapons and chemicals, and for the travel of Al-Qaeda operatives.”

Ali Mohamed, who pleaded guilty of conspiracy in the 1998 East African embassy bombings, has said: “he (Mohamed) arranged security for a meeting in the Sudan between Hezbollah’s chief and Bin Laden. Hezbollah provided explosives training for Al-Qaida and Islamic Jihad, Mohamed said, while Iran supplied Egyptian Jihad with weapons and used Hezbollah to supply explosives.” (Associated Press, 12 October 2001).

“Tens of millions of the $100 million provided by Bin Laden to the Taliban since he arrived in Afghanistan from Sudan in 1996 has been directly traced to Bin Laden entities through banking and other transfers.” These transfers would certainly have involved the Taba Investments Company and Al-Shamal Bank in Khartoum, which received $50 million in start-up capital from Bin Laden when he was in Sudan. (The Washington Post, 11 October 2001).

A unit of Islamic mujahedeen in Bosnia has been financed by Bin Laden “by means of small convoys of recruits from the Arab world through his businesses in Sudan.” (The Los Angeles Times, 7 October 2001).

Aldy el-Attar, a 53-year old surgeon in Neu-Ulm in Germany, met separately both with alleged hijacker Mohamed Atta and Mamdouh Mahmud Salim, an alleged financier for Osama Bin Laden’s al-Qaeda network. El-Attar travelled frequently between Germany and Sudan. (The Washington Post, 9 October 2001).

“United States investigators believe they have found the ‘smoking gun’ linking Osama Bin Laden to the 11 September terrorist attacks, with the discovery of financial evidence showing money transfers between the hijackers and a Bin Laden aide in the United Arab Emirates.” (The Guardian, 1 October 2001). The man at the centre of the financial web is believed to be Sheikh Saeed, also known as Mustafa Mohamed Ahmad, who worked as a financial manager for Bin Laden when the Saudi exile was based in Sudan, and is still a trusted paymaster in Bin Laden’s al-Qaida.

While in Sudan, Bin Laden bought his own bank, the Al Shamal Islamic Bank, with a handful of Sudanese partners linked to the Islamic regime in Khartoum. Bin Laden and his followers built up an intricate financial network based on Islamic practices, and dozens of ‘charities’ raising money for Jihad from the rich and faithful around the Gulf.
(The Guardian, 1 October 2001).

“Sudanese leaders agreed in 1998 to use their embassy staff in New York, London and Rome to raise funds for Osama Bin Laden, according to documents from the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS). The documents, filed in Federal Court, also claim the Sudanese agreed to arrange for diplomatic credentials for Bin Laden followers, allowing them unfettered travel around the world. The alleged agreement was struck between Bin Laden’s top aide, Dr. Ayman-Al-Zawahri, and ‘Sudanese Islamic leaders’ the CSIS brief said.” (The National Post, Canada, 28 September 2001).

According to a senior police official, fresh evidence gathered by them has revealed that Ismail, the first secretary in the Sudanese embassy, was not only operating as a conduit of Osama Bin Laden in the Capital (New Delhi) but was also trying to recruit more operatives for subversive activities in India. (Hindustan Times (New Delhi), 30 September 2001).

Accordingly, Freedom Quest, in its Sudaninfo, concludes: “There is overwhelming evidence that Sudan has very much continued in the business of supporting world terrorism generally, and Osama Bin Laden and al-Qaeda in particular. It forces the obvious question: how likely is it that this regime will be revealing of its own activities in ‘co-operating’ with the US in the sharing of intelligence on terrorism? We can be sure that revelations will continue to emerge about the role of Khartoum and the National Islamic Front regime in supporting international terrorism. Certainly the requisite callousness has long been demonstrated in their brutal conduct of the war against the South, where the terrorist bombing of innocent civilians is the standing order of the day. In turn, if the US is not willing to look honestly at the context for the ‘intelligence’ it is presently receiving from Khartoum, it will be hard to have confidence in either the acuity of our intelligence agencies, or the moral foundation of our ‘war on terrorism’.”

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