From The American Thinker:
September 30, 2010
Is there a biblical clue in the Stuxnet virus?
Rick Moran
Did the creator(s) of the Stuxnet virus currently attacking Iranian computers leave a clue about their origins?
This New York Times piece is compelling:
Deep inside the computer worm that some specialists suspect is aimed at slowing Iran's race for a nuclear weapon lies what could be a fleeting reference to the Book of Esther, the Old Testament tale in which the Jews pre-empt a Persian plot to destroy them.
That use of the word "Myrtus" - which can be read as an allusion to Esther - to name a file inside the code is one of several murky clues that have emerged as computer experts try to trace the origin and purpose of the rogue Stuxnet program, which seeks out a specific kind of command module for industrial equipment.
Not surprisingly, the Israelis are not saying whether Stuxnet has any connection to the secretive cyberwar unit it has built inside Israel's intelligence service. Nor is the Obama administration, which while talking about cyberdefenses has also rapidly ramped up a broad covert program, inherited from the Bush administration, to undermine Iran's nuclear program. In interviews in several countries, experts in both cyberwar and nuclear enrichment technology say the Stuxnet mystery may never be solved.
There are many competing explanations for myrtus, which could simply signify myrtle, a plant important to many cultures in the region. But some security experts see the reference as a signature allusion to Esther, a clear warning in a mounting technological and psychological battle as Israel and its allies try to breach Tehran's most heavily guarded project. Others doubt the Israelis were involved and say the word could have been inserted as deliberate misinformation, to implicate Israel.
Israel certainly has the technical expertise to launch such a virus but some experts believe they may have needed some help in penetrating the Iranian networks so completely. This was no attack on isolated systems but rather a broad based penetration of entire networks requiring more assets than the Israelis may possess, as well as requiring specific intelligence about how these networks interacted.
Whatever or whoever is behind it, the Stuxnet attack represents a whole new ballgame in cyber-warfare.
Posted at 10:31 AM
Thursday, September 30, 2010
Representative Gregory Meeks (D-NY) Scolded Immigration Officials For Questioning A Terror-Linked Scholar
From Creeping Sharia:
NY Dem scolded immigration officials for questioning terror-linked Muslim scholar
Posted on September 30, 2010 by creeping
via US Rep. Gregory Meeks scolded immigration officials for questioning a terror-linked Muslim scholar – NYPOST.com.
US Rep. Gregory Meeks scolded immigration officials for questioning a Muslim scholar whose nonprofits have been linked to financing terrorism.
The Queens Democrat contacted federal agencies — finally appealing to then-Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff — asking why Anwar Hajjaj faced “unwarranted scrutiny” when he returned to the United States from trips abroad through JFK Airport.
Meeks described Hajjaj as a “highly regarded” professor of Islamic studies who leads Friday Muslim prayers at the Capitol.
Meeks said Hajjaj was “a pioneer in distance-based learning of Islam” through the American Open University in Virginia, according to a copy of the Sept. 30, 2006, letter to Chertoff, which was obtained by The Post under a Freedom of Information Act request.
But The Post has learned Hajjaj also headed the Taibah International Aid Association, a charity that has been accused of funding Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda. The group was co-founded by Abdullah A. bin Laden, Osama bin Laden’s nephew, who has been investigated for his ties to groups that have funded al Qaeda and Hamas.
Hajjaj is also director of another Virginia-based nonprofit, the World Assembly of Muslim Youth International, or WAMY. It was also founded by bin Laden’s nephew and said to support al Qaeda. The group’s 2005 federal tax form, the most recent available, is signed by Hajjaj, who is listed as director.
Steven Emerson, executive director of the Investigative Project on Terrorism, said WAMY has been a financial and ideological supporter of Islamic terrorist organizations. A WAMY publication lists people who have attacked Israelis as “heroes of Palestine” and referred to Jews as “humanity’s enemies,” according to a 2003 affidavit by a customs special agent.
Both organizations are named as defendants in several ongoing civil lawsuits filed on behalf of families of 9/11 victims.
A 2004 complaint filed in one of the suits alleges that although Taibah “purports to be a humanitarian organization, the Taibah International Aid Association furthers the aims and materially supports Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda.”
Hajjaj is not specifically named as a defendant in the suit, but the complaint does say Taibah’s directors and officers, including Hajjaj, are material sponsors and co-conspirators of al Qaeda and international terrorism.
The complaint says WAMY, founded in Saudi Arabia in 1972, has been identified by the FBI as a suspected terrorist organization since 1996.
In a decision in the lawsuit made last week, US District Court Judge George Daniels refused to dismiss WAMY as a defendant, saying the allegations against the group are “sufficient to demonstrate that they are knowingly and intentionally providing material support to al Qaeda.”
Hajjaj was not arrested when he entered JFK after visiting the Middle East, but was pulled aside and questioned.
Meeks defended his letter: “As a member of Congress and a proud New Yorker who deeply feels the loss of all families afflicted by the 9/11 attacks, my No. 1 priority is to do everything in my power to ensure the safety and security of all Americans.
“At the same time, I also adamantly believe that securing our homeland must be done without risking the unfair or discriminatory treatment of any in our society as is our constitutional duty. To that end, several years ago it was brought to my attention that several Muslim American citizens faced what they felt was undue scrutiny from Department of Homeland Security officials at many US airports, including JFK.
“I sent letters to inquire about the treatment of two Muslim American citizens in particular that felt they were treated unfairly at US ports of entry.”
Hajjaj, 65, told The Post that he was routinely harassed and sometimes missed flights when he traveled to and from Saudi Arabia for the pilgrimage to Mecca.
“It was an awful experience under the Bush administration,” he said. “Now under Obama, I have no complaints.”
He said he asked Meeks to write a letter on his behalf. He said he knew the Democratic lawmaker through Jameel Aalim-Johnson, Meeks’ chief of staff from 2006 to early 2008.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Meeks is no stranger to Islamic terrorists – he has brought them to Capitol Hill before. His understudy, Jameel Alim Johnson, founded the Congressional Muslim Staffers Association (CMSA) we have documented numerous times, primarily for converting Capitol Hill into a mosque every Friday and being the pseudo-Muslim employment agency for the Obama administration. From a previous post:
The founder of the Congressional Muslim Staffers – Jameel-Aalim Johnson, former chief of staff to Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-NY) – has been involved in inviting terror-linked individuals to speak on Capitol Hill in the past:
Why is a powerful congressman trying to pave the way for terror-linked speakers to appear on Capitol Hill?
The event, originally scheduled for August 11, would have taken place in the Cannon House Building Caucus Room had it not been for the last minute discovery of the terror-linked speakers that the DC-based Peace and Justice Foundation had invited to participate.
According to an article in The Muslim Link, the scheduling of the August conference had been handled by the chief-of-staff for Congressman Gregory Meeks (D-NY6), Jameel Alim Johnson.
More from YidwithLid, Why Does NY Congressman Meeks Hire Terrorist-Linked Staffers?
And, related from The Lid:
Sunday, September 19, 2010
Why Does NY Congressman Meeks Hire Terrorist-Linked Staffers?
According to the NY Post, Congressman Gregory Meeks scolded immigration officials for questioning a Muslim scholar whose nonprofits have been linked to financing terrorism. Meeks sent the DHS a letter asking why Anwar Hajjaj faced "unwarranted scrutiny" when he returned to the United States from trips abroad through JFK Airport.
Meek's letter ignored the fact that Hajjaj is accused of having terrorist connections. For example, he headed the Taibah International Aid Association, a charity that has been accused of funding Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda. The group was co-founded by Abdullah A. bin Laden, Osama bin Laden's nephew, who has been investigated for his ties to groups that have funded al Qaeda and Hamas. But that is only part of the story. What the NY Post isn't telling you is Meek's has this nasty habit of hiring staffers with terrorist ties, Specifically Jihad F. Saleh (who just left his job with Meeks two weeks ago) and Jameel Aalim- Johnson (former Chief-of Staff)
Jihad F. Saleh, a top congressional aid to U.S. Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-NY), helping fulfill the legislative goals established by CAIR founder and former chairman Omar Ahmad, who wanted increased Muslim “influence with Congress,” by using Muslims on Capitol Hill “to pressure Congress and the decision makers in America” to shift U.S. foreign policy. (P. David Gaubitz and Paul Sperry, The Muslim Mafia, p. 183) Saleh is not just a Congressional staff point man, though. He has been working closely with national CAIR official and convert Corey Saylor to increase the Muslim Congressional presence through the CAIR-backed Congressional Muslim Staffers Association (CMSA).
Jameel Aalim- Johnson, who was Meek's Chief of Staff until 2008 founded the CMSA, Saleh was a key member. Immediately after 9/11, the group began holding Friday afternoon prayer services on Capitol Hill, to lead their prayers they chose Anwar al-Aulaqi, the same al-Qaeda backed "holy man," now hiding in Yemen, who was associated with the massacre at Fort Hood, the attempted underwear bomber last Christmas, and the attempted Time Square bombing. The video below of Anwar al-Aulaq delivering a sermon to the CMSA in 2002 while he was still in the US is from the Investigative Project on Terror.
According to the book The Muslim Mafia (page 185) , Salah is spearheading an effort to bring terrorist sympathizers into the US Government.
Saleh has been conducting seminars for “Muslim Professionals” in order to “capitalize’ on the change in the oval office, and “ensure that Muslim Americans are prominent in the Obama administration”. Unbeknownst to most Washington insiders, Saleh has been collecting resume’s from Muslim Brotherhood front groups such as CAIR and ISNA. Over three hundred resume’s were bound and sent to the Obama administration, in the hopes of placing more moles into governmental positions. The White House has already hired one of the people from the resume book, Dalia Mogahed, an Egyptian born, veiled Muslim, who is now charged with briefing President Obama what Muslims want from the US.
CAIR was an unindicted co-conspirator in the Holy Land Foundation Terrorist funding case and as recently as this past March, the FBI reaffirmed this group's terrorist ties. The ISNA was also identified by the Justice Department at the Holy Land Foundation terrorism financing trial as an unindicted co-conspirator and part of the international terrorist organization the Muslim Brotherhood, when they balked at that designation the FBI released the documents to prove the groups association.
Why is a key congressional staffer, such as Jihad Saleh working with terrorist organizations such as CAIR or ISNA. Another question is why is a congressional Chief of Staff introducing a Congressman to terrorist-linked Muslim scholar? According to the Post article referenced above, Anwar Hajjaj was introduced to Meeks through Democratic lawmaker through Jameel Aalim-Johnson.
In 2007 Aalim-Johnson was involved in some controversy because he tried to run a conference in a Capitol Hill Caucus Room which included terror-linked speakers Originally scheduled to be held at the Caucus Room in the Cannon House Office Building on Capitol Hill, the conference had to be moved to Maryland at the last minute because the Sergeant-at-Arms, the officer responsible for security on Capitol buildings, declined to approve the Conference. The conference is the first part of a two part project for the Foundation, which is planning a major march in Washington after Ramadan.
Salaakhan states that he had confirmed the availability of the Cannon Caucus room with Jameel
Johnson, chief of staff for Congressman Gregory Meeks (D-NY). Salaakhan said that at about 2 pm Friday, August 10, he got a call from Meeks’ office stating that the Sergeant at Arms had concerns about the conference, and would not allow it to take place unless Rep. Meeks attended the event. Johnson responded by telling Salaakhan that this appeared to him to be the red-flagging of a Muslim group and that the Sergeant-at-Arms request that Rep. Meeks be at the conference was “unusual and unfair.”
What was "unusual and unfair" was the speakers invited to attend the conference were involved in terrorist organizations:
One of the scheduled speakers for the Capitol Hill Muslim Mobilization Conference was Anisa Abd El Fattah, a longtime former employee and past president of the United Association for Studies and Research (UASR), which one convicted terrorist leader described as "the political command for HAMAS in the United States." The organization was one of the US-based organizations found liable in a $156 million federal court judgment in the death of an American teenager killed in a Hamas suicide attack in Israel.
Fattah was the subject of a recent Pajamas Media article describing her covert attempts to be appointed to the Columbus (OH) Public School Board. Fattah has also co-authored two books with the current spokesman for Hamas, Ahmed Yousef, and was a longtime consultant to terrorist leader Abdurahman Alamoudi. Alamoudi was convicted of conspiring with the Libyan government to kill Crown Prince Abdullah, the Saudi royal heir at the time and now the king of Saudi Arabia.
Meeks responded to his letter defending the terrorist-connected Muslim scholar by telling the NY Post,
"As a member of Congress and a proud New Yorker who deeply feels the loss of all families afflicted by the 9/11 attacks, my No. 1 priority is to do everything in my power to ensure the safety and security of all Americans.
If Meeks truly believed that his number one priority is to ensure the safety and security of all Americans, maybe he should take a little more care in picking his staff. Because based on Jihad F. Saleh and Jameel Aalim- Johnson, because either the Congressman doesn't care about the safety of the country or he simply doesn't do any research on who he hires.
And, related from The Blaze:
NY Congressman Helped ‘Jihad Flier’ After Airport Interrogation
Posted on September 19, 2010 at 6:45pm by Scott Baker Print » Email » Depending on who you ask, Anwar Hajjaj is either a distinguished scholar, or a close ally of Osama bin Laden. Non-profit groups connected to Hajjaj have been accused of funneling cash to terrorist.
A few years ago Hajjaj was stopped by immigration officials at JFK Airport as he returned from a trip to the Middle East. This apparently bothered Hajjaj. And not just him.
The New York Post is reporting today that US Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-NY) intervened on Hajjaj’s behalf:
The Queens Democrat contacted federal agencies — finally appealing to then-Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff – asking why Anwar Hajjaj faced “unwarranted scrutiny” when he returned to the United States from trips abroad through JFK Airport.
Meeks described Hajjaj as a “highly regarded” professor of Islamic studies who leads Friday Muslim prayers at the Capitol.
Meeks said Hajjaj was “a pioneer in distance-based learning of Islam” through the American Open University in Virginia, according to a copy of the Sept. 30, 2006, letter to Chertoff, which was obtained by The Post under a Freedom of Information Act request.
Weasel Zippers calls this another sign that, “The leftist-Islamist alliance continues to be as strong as ever.”
The Post report details some of the allegations Hajjaj-related groups:
The Post has learned Hajjaj also headed the Taibah International Aid Association, a charity that has been accused of funding Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda. The group was co-founded by Abdullah A. bin Laden, Osama bin Laden’s nephew, who has been investigated for his ties to groups that have funded al Qaeda and Hamas.
Hajjaj is also director of another Virginia-based nonprofit, the World Assembly of Muslim Youth International, or WAMY. It was also founded by bin Laden’s nephew and said to support al Qaeda. The group’s 2005 federal tax form, the most recent available, is signed by Hajjaj, who is listed as director.
Read the full Post report here.
Further, YidWithLid is now asking why Rep. Meeks seems to have a pattern of hiring “terrorist-linked” staffers:
What the NY Post isn‘t telling you is Meek’s has this nasty habit of hiring staffers with terrorist ties, Specifically Jihad F. Saleh (who just left his job with Meeks two weeks ago) and Jameel Aalim- Johnson (former Chief-of Staff)
The Lid report in full can be found here.
To the Post report, Rep. Meeks is reponsding this way:
“As a member of Congress and a proud New Yorker who deeply feels the loss of all families afflicted by the 9/11 attacks, my No. 1 priority is to do everything in my power to ensure the safety and security of all Americans.
“At the same time, I also adamantly believe that securing our homeland must be done without risking the unfair or discriminatory treatment of any in our society as is our constitutional duty. To that end, several years ago it was brought to my attention that several Muslim American citizens faced what they felt was undue scrutiny from Department of Homeland Security officials at many US airports, including JFK.
“I sent letters to inquire about the treatment of two Muslim American citizens in particular that felt they were treated unfairly at US ports of entry.”
NY Dem scolded immigration officials for questioning terror-linked Muslim scholar
Posted on September 30, 2010 by creeping
via US Rep. Gregory Meeks scolded immigration officials for questioning a terror-linked Muslim scholar – NYPOST.com.
US Rep. Gregory Meeks scolded immigration officials for questioning a Muslim scholar whose nonprofits have been linked to financing terrorism.
The Queens Democrat contacted federal agencies — finally appealing to then-Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff — asking why Anwar Hajjaj faced “unwarranted scrutiny” when he returned to the United States from trips abroad through JFK Airport.
Meeks described Hajjaj as a “highly regarded” professor of Islamic studies who leads Friday Muslim prayers at the Capitol.
Meeks said Hajjaj was “a pioneer in distance-based learning of Islam” through the American Open University in Virginia, according to a copy of the Sept. 30, 2006, letter to Chertoff, which was obtained by The Post under a Freedom of Information Act request.
But The Post has learned Hajjaj also headed the Taibah International Aid Association, a charity that has been accused of funding Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda. The group was co-founded by Abdullah A. bin Laden, Osama bin Laden’s nephew, who has been investigated for his ties to groups that have funded al Qaeda and Hamas.
Hajjaj is also director of another Virginia-based nonprofit, the World Assembly of Muslim Youth International, or WAMY. It was also founded by bin Laden’s nephew and said to support al Qaeda. The group’s 2005 federal tax form, the most recent available, is signed by Hajjaj, who is listed as director.
Steven Emerson, executive director of the Investigative Project on Terrorism, said WAMY has been a financial and ideological supporter of Islamic terrorist organizations. A WAMY publication lists people who have attacked Israelis as “heroes of Palestine” and referred to Jews as “humanity’s enemies,” according to a 2003 affidavit by a customs special agent.
Both organizations are named as defendants in several ongoing civil lawsuits filed on behalf of families of 9/11 victims.
A 2004 complaint filed in one of the suits alleges that although Taibah “purports to be a humanitarian organization, the Taibah International Aid Association furthers the aims and materially supports Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda.”
Hajjaj is not specifically named as a defendant in the suit, but the complaint does say Taibah’s directors and officers, including Hajjaj, are material sponsors and co-conspirators of al Qaeda and international terrorism.
The complaint says WAMY, founded in Saudi Arabia in 1972, has been identified by the FBI as a suspected terrorist organization since 1996.
In a decision in the lawsuit made last week, US District Court Judge George Daniels refused to dismiss WAMY as a defendant, saying the allegations against the group are “sufficient to demonstrate that they are knowingly and intentionally providing material support to al Qaeda.”
Hajjaj was not arrested when he entered JFK after visiting the Middle East, but was pulled aside and questioned.
Meeks defended his letter: “As a member of Congress and a proud New Yorker who deeply feels the loss of all families afflicted by the 9/11 attacks, my No. 1 priority is to do everything in my power to ensure the safety and security of all Americans.
“At the same time, I also adamantly believe that securing our homeland must be done without risking the unfair or discriminatory treatment of any in our society as is our constitutional duty. To that end, several years ago it was brought to my attention that several Muslim American citizens faced what they felt was undue scrutiny from Department of Homeland Security officials at many US airports, including JFK.
“I sent letters to inquire about the treatment of two Muslim American citizens in particular that felt they were treated unfairly at US ports of entry.”
Hajjaj, 65, told The Post that he was routinely harassed and sometimes missed flights when he traveled to and from Saudi Arabia for the pilgrimage to Mecca.
“It was an awful experience under the Bush administration,” he said. “Now under Obama, I have no complaints.”
He said he asked Meeks to write a letter on his behalf. He said he knew the Democratic lawmaker through Jameel Aalim-Johnson, Meeks’ chief of staff from 2006 to early 2008.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Meeks is no stranger to Islamic terrorists – he has brought them to Capitol Hill before. His understudy, Jameel Alim Johnson, founded the Congressional Muslim Staffers Association (CMSA) we have documented numerous times, primarily for converting Capitol Hill into a mosque every Friday and being the pseudo-Muslim employment agency for the Obama administration. From a previous post:
The founder of the Congressional Muslim Staffers – Jameel-Aalim Johnson, former chief of staff to Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-NY) – has been involved in inviting terror-linked individuals to speak on Capitol Hill in the past:
Why is a powerful congressman trying to pave the way for terror-linked speakers to appear on Capitol Hill?
The event, originally scheduled for August 11, would have taken place in the Cannon House Building Caucus Room had it not been for the last minute discovery of the terror-linked speakers that the DC-based Peace and Justice Foundation had invited to participate.
According to an article in The Muslim Link, the scheduling of the August conference had been handled by the chief-of-staff for Congressman Gregory Meeks (D-NY6), Jameel Alim Johnson.
More from YidwithLid, Why Does NY Congressman Meeks Hire Terrorist-Linked Staffers?
And, related from The Lid:
Sunday, September 19, 2010
Why Does NY Congressman Meeks Hire Terrorist-Linked Staffers?
According to the NY Post, Congressman Gregory Meeks scolded immigration officials for questioning a Muslim scholar whose nonprofits have been linked to financing terrorism. Meeks sent the DHS a letter asking why Anwar Hajjaj faced "unwarranted scrutiny" when he returned to the United States from trips abroad through JFK Airport.
Meek's letter ignored the fact that Hajjaj is accused of having terrorist connections. For example, he headed the Taibah International Aid Association, a charity that has been accused of funding Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda. The group was co-founded by Abdullah A. bin Laden, Osama bin Laden's nephew, who has been investigated for his ties to groups that have funded al Qaeda and Hamas. But that is only part of the story. What the NY Post isn't telling you is Meek's has this nasty habit of hiring staffers with terrorist ties, Specifically Jihad F. Saleh (who just left his job with Meeks two weeks ago) and Jameel Aalim- Johnson (former Chief-of Staff)
Jihad F. Saleh, a top congressional aid to U.S. Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-NY), helping fulfill the legislative goals established by CAIR founder and former chairman Omar Ahmad, who wanted increased Muslim “influence with Congress,” by using Muslims on Capitol Hill “to pressure Congress and the decision makers in America” to shift U.S. foreign policy. (P. David Gaubitz and Paul Sperry, The Muslim Mafia, p. 183) Saleh is not just a Congressional staff point man, though. He has been working closely with national CAIR official and convert Corey Saylor to increase the Muslim Congressional presence through the CAIR-backed Congressional Muslim Staffers Association (CMSA).
Jameel Aalim- Johnson, who was Meek's Chief of Staff until 2008 founded the CMSA, Saleh was a key member. Immediately after 9/11, the group began holding Friday afternoon prayer services on Capitol Hill, to lead their prayers they chose Anwar al-Aulaqi, the same al-Qaeda backed "holy man," now hiding in Yemen, who was associated with the massacre at Fort Hood, the attempted underwear bomber last Christmas, and the attempted Time Square bombing. The video below of Anwar al-Aulaq delivering a sermon to the CMSA in 2002 while he was still in the US is from the Investigative Project on Terror.
According to the book The Muslim Mafia (page 185) , Salah is spearheading an effort to bring terrorist sympathizers into the US Government.
Saleh has been conducting seminars for “Muslim Professionals” in order to “capitalize’ on the change in the oval office, and “ensure that Muslim Americans are prominent in the Obama administration”. Unbeknownst to most Washington insiders, Saleh has been collecting resume’s from Muslim Brotherhood front groups such as CAIR and ISNA. Over three hundred resume’s were bound and sent to the Obama administration, in the hopes of placing more moles into governmental positions. The White House has already hired one of the people from the resume book, Dalia Mogahed, an Egyptian born, veiled Muslim, who is now charged with briefing President Obama what Muslims want from the US.
CAIR was an unindicted co-conspirator in the Holy Land Foundation Terrorist funding case and as recently as this past March, the FBI reaffirmed this group's terrorist ties. The ISNA was also identified by the Justice Department at the Holy Land Foundation terrorism financing trial as an unindicted co-conspirator and part of the international terrorist organization the Muslim Brotherhood, when they balked at that designation the FBI released the documents to prove the groups association.
Why is a key congressional staffer, such as Jihad Saleh working with terrorist organizations such as CAIR or ISNA. Another question is why is a congressional Chief of Staff introducing a Congressman to terrorist-linked Muslim scholar? According to the Post article referenced above, Anwar Hajjaj was introduced to Meeks through Democratic lawmaker through Jameel Aalim-Johnson.
In 2007 Aalim-Johnson was involved in some controversy because he tried to run a conference in a Capitol Hill Caucus Room which included terror-linked speakers Originally scheduled to be held at the Caucus Room in the Cannon House Office Building on Capitol Hill, the conference had to be moved to Maryland at the last minute because the Sergeant-at-Arms, the officer responsible for security on Capitol buildings, declined to approve the Conference. The conference is the first part of a two part project for the Foundation, which is planning a major march in Washington after Ramadan.
Salaakhan states that he had confirmed the availability of the Cannon Caucus room with Jameel
Johnson, chief of staff for Congressman Gregory Meeks (D-NY). Salaakhan said that at about 2 pm Friday, August 10, he got a call from Meeks’ office stating that the Sergeant at Arms had concerns about the conference, and would not allow it to take place unless Rep. Meeks attended the event. Johnson responded by telling Salaakhan that this appeared to him to be the red-flagging of a Muslim group and that the Sergeant-at-Arms request that Rep. Meeks be at the conference was “unusual and unfair.”
What was "unusual and unfair" was the speakers invited to attend the conference were involved in terrorist organizations:
One of the scheduled speakers for the Capitol Hill Muslim Mobilization Conference was Anisa Abd El Fattah, a longtime former employee and past president of the United Association for Studies and Research (UASR), which one convicted terrorist leader described as "the political command for HAMAS in the United States." The organization was one of the US-based organizations found liable in a $156 million federal court judgment in the death of an American teenager killed in a Hamas suicide attack in Israel.
Fattah was the subject of a recent Pajamas Media article describing her covert attempts to be appointed to the Columbus (OH) Public School Board. Fattah has also co-authored two books with the current spokesman for Hamas, Ahmed Yousef, and was a longtime consultant to terrorist leader Abdurahman Alamoudi. Alamoudi was convicted of conspiring with the Libyan government to kill Crown Prince Abdullah, the Saudi royal heir at the time and now the king of Saudi Arabia.
Meeks responded to his letter defending the terrorist-connected Muslim scholar by telling the NY Post,
"As a member of Congress and a proud New Yorker who deeply feels the loss of all families afflicted by the 9/11 attacks, my No. 1 priority is to do everything in my power to ensure the safety and security of all Americans.
If Meeks truly believed that his number one priority is to ensure the safety and security of all Americans, maybe he should take a little more care in picking his staff. Because based on Jihad F. Saleh and Jameel Aalim- Johnson, because either the Congressman doesn't care about the safety of the country or he simply doesn't do any research on who he hires.
And, related from The Blaze:
NY Congressman Helped ‘Jihad Flier’ After Airport Interrogation
Posted on September 19, 2010 at 6:45pm by Scott Baker Print » Email » Depending on who you ask, Anwar Hajjaj is either a distinguished scholar, or a close ally of Osama bin Laden. Non-profit groups connected to Hajjaj have been accused of funneling cash to terrorist.
A few years ago Hajjaj was stopped by immigration officials at JFK Airport as he returned from a trip to the Middle East. This apparently bothered Hajjaj. And not just him.
The New York Post is reporting today that US Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-NY) intervened on Hajjaj’s behalf:
The Queens Democrat contacted federal agencies — finally appealing to then-Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff – asking why Anwar Hajjaj faced “unwarranted scrutiny” when he returned to the United States from trips abroad through JFK Airport.
Meeks described Hajjaj as a “highly regarded” professor of Islamic studies who leads Friday Muslim prayers at the Capitol.
Meeks said Hajjaj was “a pioneer in distance-based learning of Islam” through the American Open University in Virginia, according to a copy of the Sept. 30, 2006, letter to Chertoff, which was obtained by The Post under a Freedom of Information Act request.
Weasel Zippers calls this another sign that, “The leftist-Islamist alliance continues to be as strong as ever.”
The Post report details some of the allegations Hajjaj-related groups:
The Post has learned Hajjaj also headed the Taibah International Aid Association, a charity that has been accused of funding Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda. The group was co-founded by Abdullah A. bin Laden, Osama bin Laden’s nephew, who has been investigated for his ties to groups that have funded al Qaeda and Hamas.
Hajjaj is also director of another Virginia-based nonprofit, the World Assembly of Muslim Youth International, or WAMY. It was also founded by bin Laden’s nephew and said to support al Qaeda. The group’s 2005 federal tax form, the most recent available, is signed by Hajjaj, who is listed as director.
Read the full Post report here.
Further, YidWithLid is now asking why Rep. Meeks seems to have a pattern of hiring “terrorist-linked” staffers:
What the NY Post isn‘t telling you is Meek’s has this nasty habit of hiring staffers with terrorist ties, Specifically Jihad F. Saleh (who just left his job with Meeks two weeks ago) and Jameel Aalim- Johnson (former Chief-of Staff)
The Lid report in full can be found here.
To the Post report, Rep. Meeks is reponsding this way:
“As a member of Congress and a proud New Yorker who deeply feels the loss of all families afflicted by the 9/11 attacks, my No. 1 priority is to do everything in my power to ensure the safety and security of all Americans.
“At the same time, I also adamantly believe that securing our homeland must be done without risking the unfair or discriminatory treatment of any in our society as is our constitutional duty. To that end, several years ago it was brought to my attention that several Muslim American citizens faced what they felt was undue scrutiny from Department of Homeland Security officials at many US airports, including JFK.
“I sent letters to inquire about the treatment of two Muslim American citizens in particular that felt they were treated unfairly at US ports of entry.”
Pakistan Closes NATO Supply Route After Latest U.S. Cross-Border Attack
From The Long War Journal:
Pakistan closes NATO supply route after latest US cross-border attack
By Bill RoggioSeptember 30, 2010
Pakistan has shut down NATO's primary lifeline into Afghanistan today after Coalition forces conducted another cross-border strike while engaging in hot pursuit of Haqqani Network fighters.
Pakistani security officials claimed that three members of the paramilitary Frontier Corps were killed after Coalition helicopters crossed the Afghan border into the tribal agency of Kurram, and "shelled the area for about 25 minutes," Reuters reported. "Three of our soldiers manning a border post were killed and three wounded.”
The International Security Assistance Force confirmed that its helicopters briefly crossed the border and attacked "what it believed was a group of insurgents attempting to fire mortars at a Coalition base in the border area of Dand Patan district, Paktia province."
"An ISAF air weapons team was called to provide fire support and engaged the suspected insurgents' firing position, located inside Afghanistan along the border area," the press release stated. "ISAF aircraft did enter into Pakistani airspace briefly as they engaged this initial target."
The ISAF helicopters then came under "effective small arms fire from individuals just across the border in Pakistan."
"Operating in self defense, the ISAF aircraft entered into Pakistani airspace killing several armed individuals," the press release continued.
ISAF noted that an investigation into the incident was being looked into, and offered an apology to Pakistan even though it hasn't been confirmed whether Pakistani troops were indeed killed.
"ISAF conveys our sincere condolences to the Pakistani military and the families of those who were killed or injured," the statement concluded.
Pakistan's Frontier Corps is known to provide support and cover to Taliban fighters crossing into Afghanistan to engage ISAF and Afghan forces.
Pakistan moved quickly to close the border after today's incident, and questioned whether NATO is an enemy or an ally.
"We will have to see whether we are allies or enemies," Interior Minister Rehman Malik told The Associated Press.
Today's cross-border incident is the third since Sept. 25, when ISAF helicopters twice engaged Haqqani Network forces as they fled across the border from Khost into North Waziristan. More than 50 Haqqani Network fighters were reported killed in the strikes.
Pakistan has reacted angrily to the recent cross-border attacks, and yesterday threatened to take military and other action to halt the raids.
"We will not allow anyone in any case to interfere in Pakistan's territory and if this continues, we will adopt all the set measures including military action," Malik told reporters. "I assure you we are quite capable of defending our homeland."
The closure of the NATO supply lines is not likely to last long. Pakistan reaps billions of dollars a year in profits for allowing more than 70 percent of ISAF's supplies to travel through Pakistani territory.
Over the past four years, the Taliban have targeted ISAF's supply lines along the two main routes that pass through the Khyber Pass in the north and the Chaman border crossing in the south in Baluchistan. The Taliban have been destroying fuel tankers in Baluchistan on a near-daily basis, and routinely hit convoys in Khyber.
Pakistan objects to cross-border raids from Afghanistan
With respect to the recent cross-border raids, ISAF has maintained that it legitimately attacked Taliban forces as part of an existing policy of hot pursuit of enemy fighters.
US forces pursued the Taliban into Pakistan "after following the proper rules of engagement under inherent right of self defense," Master Sergeant Matthew Summers, an ISAF spokesman, told The Long War Journal on Sept. 26.
But a spokesman at Pakistan's Foreign Office rejected reports that such an agreement between ISAF and Pakistan exists, and said the incursions are a violation ISAF's mandate.
“These incidents are a clear violation and breach of the UN mandate under which ISAF operates,” spokesman Abdul Basit said in a statement released by the Foreign Office, according to AFP.
“There are no agreed 'hot pursuit' rules," Basit continued. "Any impression to the contrary is not factually correct. Such violations are unacceptable. In the absence of immediate corrective measures, Pakistan will be constrained to consider response options."
Background on agreement on cross-border activities between ISAF and Pakistan
Although the Pakistani Foreign Office denied the existence of any agreement that permits ISAF forces to enter Pakistan while in hot pursuit of Taliban fighters, the details of such an agreement have been known for years. In August 2007, The Associated Press released the text of the agreement.
The agreement between ISAF and Pakistan stipulated the following: US forces must be engaged with the Taliban or al Qaeda as they cross into Pakistan and US forces should not penetrate more than six miles into Pakistani territory. Also, US forces may enter Pakistan if they have identified the location of Osama bin Laden, Ayman al Zawahri, or Mullah Omar.
The US has pursued Taliban fighters across the border multiple times. Two of the most high-profile incidents occurred in 2008. The first took place in June 2008, when US troops pursued a Taliban force from Kunar into Pakistan's tribal agency of Mohmand, and killed 11 fighters. The Pakistani government claimed that the US killed Frontier Corps troops, but the US released video of the incident showing the Taliban being targeted as they fled from Kunar into Mohmand. Pakistan's paramilitary Frontier Corps is known to support the Taliban in Afghanistan.
The second incident took place in Khyber in November 2008, when US forces launched rocket attacks and ground strikes into the Tirah Valley, a known haven for al Qaeda, the Taliban, and the Lashkar-e-Islam. Seven people were reported killed and three were wounded in the strikes.
The US also launches covert airstrikes using unmanned Predators and Reapers against al Qaeda and the Taliban in Pakistan's tribal areas.
The Pakistani government officially protests the covert strikes but quietly approves. Twenty-one such strikes have been launched inside Pakistan this month; all but three have taken place in North Waziristan.
Read more: http://www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2010/09/pakistan_closes_nato.php#ixzz114smppQR
Pakistan closes NATO supply route after latest US cross-border attack
By Bill RoggioSeptember 30, 2010
Pakistan has shut down NATO's primary lifeline into Afghanistan today after Coalition forces conducted another cross-border strike while engaging in hot pursuit of Haqqani Network fighters.
Pakistani security officials claimed that three members of the paramilitary Frontier Corps were killed after Coalition helicopters crossed the Afghan border into the tribal agency of Kurram, and "shelled the area for about 25 minutes," Reuters reported. "Three of our soldiers manning a border post were killed and three wounded.”
The International Security Assistance Force confirmed that its helicopters briefly crossed the border and attacked "what it believed was a group of insurgents attempting to fire mortars at a Coalition base in the border area of Dand Patan district, Paktia province."
"An ISAF air weapons team was called to provide fire support and engaged the suspected insurgents' firing position, located inside Afghanistan along the border area," the press release stated. "ISAF aircraft did enter into Pakistani airspace briefly as they engaged this initial target."
The ISAF helicopters then came under "effective small arms fire from individuals just across the border in Pakistan."
"Operating in self defense, the ISAF aircraft entered into Pakistani airspace killing several armed individuals," the press release continued.
ISAF noted that an investigation into the incident was being looked into, and offered an apology to Pakistan even though it hasn't been confirmed whether Pakistani troops were indeed killed.
"ISAF conveys our sincere condolences to the Pakistani military and the families of those who were killed or injured," the statement concluded.
Pakistan's Frontier Corps is known to provide support and cover to Taliban fighters crossing into Afghanistan to engage ISAF and Afghan forces.
Pakistan moved quickly to close the border after today's incident, and questioned whether NATO is an enemy or an ally.
"We will have to see whether we are allies or enemies," Interior Minister Rehman Malik told The Associated Press.
Today's cross-border incident is the third since Sept. 25, when ISAF helicopters twice engaged Haqqani Network forces as they fled across the border from Khost into North Waziristan. More than 50 Haqqani Network fighters were reported killed in the strikes.
Pakistan has reacted angrily to the recent cross-border attacks, and yesterday threatened to take military and other action to halt the raids.
"We will not allow anyone in any case to interfere in Pakistan's territory and if this continues, we will adopt all the set measures including military action," Malik told reporters. "I assure you we are quite capable of defending our homeland."
The closure of the NATO supply lines is not likely to last long. Pakistan reaps billions of dollars a year in profits for allowing more than 70 percent of ISAF's supplies to travel through Pakistani territory.
Over the past four years, the Taliban have targeted ISAF's supply lines along the two main routes that pass through the Khyber Pass in the north and the Chaman border crossing in the south in Baluchistan. The Taliban have been destroying fuel tankers in Baluchistan on a near-daily basis, and routinely hit convoys in Khyber.
Pakistan objects to cross-border raids from Afghanistan
With respect to the recent cross-border raids, ISAF has maintained that it legitimately attacked Taliban forces as part of an existing policy of hot pursuit of enemy fighters.
US forces pursued the Taliban into Pakistan "after following the proper rules of engagement under inherent right of self defense," Master Sergeant Matthew Summers, an ISAF spokesman, told The Long War Journal on Sept. 26.
But a spokesman at Pakistan's Foreign Office rejected reports that such an agreement between ISAF and Pakistan exists, and said the incursions are a violation ISAF's mandate.
“These incidents are a clear violation and breach of the UN mandate under which ISAF operates,” spokesman Abdul Basit said in a statement released by the Foreign Office, according to AFP.
“There are no agreed 'hot pursuit' rules," Basit continued. "Any impression to the contrary is not factually correct. Such violations are unacceptable. In the absence of immediate corrective measures, Pakistan will be constrained to consider response options."
Background on agreement on cross-border activities between ISAF and Pakistan
Although the Pakistani Foreign Office denied the existence of any agreement that permits ISAF forces to enter Pakistan while in hot pursuit of Taliban fighters, the details of such an agreement have been known for years. In August 2007, The Associated Press released the text of the agreement.
The agreement between ISAF and Pakistan stipulated the following: US forces must be engaged with the Taliban or al Qaeda as they cross into Pakistan and US forces should not penetrate more than six miles into Pakistani territory. Also, US forces may enter Pakistan if they have identified the location of Osama bin Laden, Ayman al Zawahri, or Mullah Omar.
The US has pursued Taliban fighters across the border multiple times. Two of the most high-profile incidents occurred in 2008. The first took place in June 2008, when US troops pursued a Taliban force from Kunar into Pakistan's tribal agency of Mohmand, and killed 11 fighters. The Pakistani government claimed that the US killed Frontier Corps troops, but the US released video of the incident showing the Taliban being targeted as they fled from Kunar into Mohmand. Pakistan's paramilitary Frontier Corps is known to support the Taliban in Afghanistan.
The second incident took place in Khyber in November 2008, when US forces launched rocket attacks and ground strikes into the Tirah Valley, a known haven for al Qaeda, the Taliban, and the Lashkar-e-Islam. Seven people were reported killed and three were wounded in the strikes.
The US also launches covert airstrikes using unmanned Predators and Reapers against al Qaeda and the Taliban in Pakistan's tribal areas.
The Pakistani government officially protests the covert strikes but quietly approves. Twenty-one such strikes have been launched inside Pakistan this month; all but three have taken place in North Waziristan.
Read more: http://www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2010/09/pakistan_closes_nato.php#ixzz114smppQR
Germans, Britons Linked To Europe Plot Killed In Recent U.S. Predator Strike
From The Long War Journal:
Germans, Britons linked to Europe plot killed in recent US Predator strike
By Bill RoggioSeptember 30, 2010
A screen shot from an Islamic Jihad Group video that shows the training of children for jihad. Image courtesy of The Jawa Report.
Eight Germans and two Britons were killed in the same airstrike that killed an Islamic Jihad Group commander who trained Europeans to carry out attacks in England, France, and Germany.
The eight Germans and two Britons, who were involved in the recently exposed plot to conduct Mumbai-like attacks in Europe, are said to have been killed in one of the two Sept. 8 airstrikes in the Datta Khel area in North Waziristan, a known safe haven and command and control center for al Qaeda and allied terror groups.
The 10 Europeans are thought to have been killed in the same strike that killed Qureshi, a commander in the Islamic Jihad Group (IJG), a splinter faction of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU). Qureshi is believed to have been helping to train and facilitate the European plot, which is said to involve Mumbai-like terror assaults of armed suicide bombers in major European cities, a US intelligence official told The Long War Journal.
Qureshi was described by AKI as a commander who "used to receive foreigners especially the Germans in North Waziristan and then train them and resend them to their country of origins."
The Islamic Jihad Group is based out of the Mir Ali region and maintains close ties with al Qaeda leader Abu Kasha al Iraqi, and with North Waziristan Taliban commander Hafiz Gul Bahadar, who controls the Datta Khel region. The IJG is known to operate a 'German Taliban village' in Waziristan. The IJG is a Specially Designated Global Terrorist organization. Both the IJG and IMU are al Qaeda affiliates that operate in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Central Asia.
A Pakistani intelligence official said that the 10 Europeans killed in the Sept. 8 strikes were communicating with their support cells in Germany and London, and have been tracked for months.
"They have been making calls to Germany and London," the official told The Associated Press. "They have been talking about and looking for facilitators and logistics they need there to carry out terror strikes."
One of the Britons was identified as Abdul Jabbar, who originated from the district of Jhelum in Pakistan's Punjab province. Multiple Pakistani terror groups, including Jaish-e-Mohammed, Lashkar-e-Taiba, and Laskar-e-Jhangvi, are active in Punjab. These groups receive the support of Pakistan's military and intelligence establishments.
Rashid Rauf, the elusive Jaish-e-Mohammed and al Qaeda operative, may be involved in the plot in Britain, a senior US intelligence official told The Long War Journal. Rauf and senior al Qaeda leader Matiur Rehman, who is said to hold the "rolodex" of jihadists who have passed through terror camps in Pakistan and Afghanistan, were the architects of the 2006 London airline plot. Rauf escaped Pakistani custody under very suspicious circumstances and was thought to have been killed in a Predator strike in 2008, but his death was never confirmed. US intelligence officials have told The Long War Journal that they believe Rauf is alive, and Rauf's family has denied he is dead. [For more on Rashid Rauf, see LWJ report, Al Qaeda operative Rashid Rauf survived US strike.]
Another link to the Uzbek terror groups' involvement in the European terror plot is the arrest of Ahmed Sidiqui, a German from Hamburg. Sidiqui, a member of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, was captured in the Afghan north in July and has since provided information on the terror plot. Sidiqui also said that the al Qaeda-linked Haqqani Network, which is based in North Waziristan and operates in eastern and northern Afghanistan, was involved in the European terror plot.
Sidiqui had attended the Taiba mosque in Hamburg, which was home to several of the 9/11 plotters under its previous name -- Al Quds. German authorities closed the Taiba mosque on Aug. 12 [see LWJ report, Longtime al Qaeda operative runs mosque closed by German authorities].
Coalition Special Operations Forces dramatically stepped up operations against the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan immediately after Sidiqui's capture in July. Multiple IMU commanders have been killed or captured in the northern Afghan provinces of Kunduz, Baghlan, and Takhar since July. Many of these commanders had integrated their operations with the Taliban in northern Afghanistan, and some held senior positions in the Taliban’s shadow government. [See LWJ report, Coalition continues pursuit of IMU commanders in the Afghan north.]
For more on the terror plot in Europe, see LWJ report, European terror plot begins to unravel.
Read more: http://www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2010/09/germans_britons_link.php#ixzz114mYb6hi
Germans, Britons linked to Europe plot killed in recent US Predator strike
By Bill RoggioSeptember 30, 2010
A screen shot from an Islamic Jihad Group video that shows the training of children for jihad. Image courtesy of The Jawa Report.
Eight Germans and two Britons were killed in the same airstrike that killed an Islamic Jihad Group commander who trained Europeans to carry out attacks in England, France, and Germany.
The eight Germans and two Britons, who were involved in the recently exposed plot to conduct Mumbai-like attacks in Europe, are said to have been killed in one of the two Sept. 8 airstrikes in the Datta Khel area in North Waziristan, a known safe haven and command and control center for al Qaeda and allied terror groups.
The 10 Europeans are thought to have been killed in the same strike that killed Qureshi, a commander in the Islamic Jihad Group (IJG), a splinter faction of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU). Qureshi is believed to have been helping to train and facilitate the European plot, which is said to involve Mumbai-like terror assaults of armed suicide bombers in major European cities, a US intelligence official told The Long War Journal.
Qureshi was described by AKI as a commander who "used to receive foreigners especially the Germans in North Waziristan and then train them and resend them to their country of origins."
The Islamic Jihad Group is based out of the Mir Ali region and maintains close ties with al Qaeda leader Abu Kasha al Iraqi, and with North Waziristan Taliban commander Hafiz Gul Bahadar, who controls the Datta Khel region. The IJG is known to operate a 'German Taliban village' in Waziristan. The IJG is a Specially Designated Global Terrorist organization. Both the IJG and IMU are al Qaeda affiliates that operate in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Central Asia.
A Pakistani intelligence official said that the 10 Europeans killed in the Sept. 8 strikes were communicating with their support cells in Germany and London, and have been tracked for months.
"They have been making calls to Germany and London," the official told The Associated Press. "They have been talking about and looking for facilitators and logistics they need there to carry out terror strikes."
One of the Britons was identified as Abdul Jabbar, who originated from the district of Jhelum in Pakistan's Punjab province. Multiple Pakistani terror groups, including Jaish-e-Mohammed, Lashkar-e-Taiba, and Laskar-e-Jhangvi, are active in Punjab. These groups receive the support of Pakistan's military and intelligence establishments.
Rashid Rauf, the elusive Jaish-e-Mohammed and al Qaeda operative, may be involved in the plot in Britain, a senior US intelligence official told The Long War Journal. Rauf and senior al Qaeda leader Matiur Rehman, who is said to hold the "rolodex" of jihadists who have passed through terror camps in Pakistan and Afghanistan, were the architects of the 2006 London airline plot. Rauf escaped Pakistani custody under very suspicious circumstances and was thought to have been killed in a Predator strike in 2008, but his death was never confirmed. US intelligence officials have told The Long War Journal that they believe Rauf is alive, and Rauf's family has denied he is dead. [For more on Rashid Rauf, see LWJ report, Al Qaeda operative Rashid Rauf survived US strike.]
Another link to the Uzbek terror groups' involvement in the European terror plot is the arrest of Ahmed Sidiqui, a German from Hamburg. Sidiqui, a member of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, was captured in the Afghan north in July and has since provided information on the terror plot. Sidiqui also said that the al Qaeda-linked Haqqani Network, which is based in North Waziristan and operates in eastern and northern Afghanistan, was involved in the European terror plot.
Sidiqui had attended the Taiba mosque in Hamburg, which was home to several of the 9/11 plotters under its previous name -- Al Quds. German authorities closed the Taiba mosque on Aug. 12 [see LWJ report, Longtime al Qaeda operative runs mosque closed by German authorities].
Coalition Special Operations Forces dramatically stepped up operations against the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan immediately after Sidiqui's capture in July. Multiple IMU commanders have been killed or captured in the northern Afghan provinces of Kunduz, Baghlan, and Takhar since July. Many of these commanders had integrated their operations with the Taliban in northern Afghanistan, and some held senior positions in the Taliban’s shadow government. [See LWJ report, Coalition continues pursuit of IMU commanders in the Afghan north.]
For more on the terror plot in Europe, see LWJ report, European terror plot begins to unravel.
Read more: http://www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2010/09/germans_britons_link.php#ixzz114mYb6hi
Terror Suspect Was White House Guest And Recipient Of $500,000 In Taxpayer Funds
From Big Government:
Terror Suspect Was White House Guest and Recipient of $500k in Taxpayer Fundsby Jim Hoft
Last Friday FBI agents raided the homes of far left activists in Chicago and Minneapolis who are linked to the Marxist FARC terrorists and Islamic radicals as part of a terrorism investigation.
The home of radical Hatem Abudayyeh in Chicago was raided in the terror sweep.
Radical Hatem Abudayyeh protested against Israel in Chicago in January 2009. (Daylife)
Hatem Abudayyeh is the executive director of the Arab American Action Network (AAAN). Hatem Abudayyeh has been with the Arab American Action Network (AAAN) since 1999, and was appointed Executive Director in 2003. The Arab American Action Network was founded by former PLO operative and close Obama family friend Rashid Khalidi. Obama was a director of the Woods Fund from 1994 through 2001, when the board approved a $40,000 grant to the Arab American Action Network.
In 2003 Barack Obama was an honored guest at a dinner sponsored by the AAAN for former PLO-operative Rashid Khalidi. During the dinner a video was taken that shows Barack Obama celebrating with members of this Palestinian group who are openly hostile towards Israel. Barack Obama even gave a toast to a Rashid Khalidi at this going away party. The LA Times will not release the video from this Jew-bashing dinner.
Not only was Hatem Abudayyeh’s radical organization given $40,000 by Barack Obama and the Woods Fund but his organization also collected nearly half a million in taxpayer money.
http://abclocal.go.com/wls
ABC Local reported:
When FBI agents raided the Chicago home of Hatem Abudayyeh last Friday, they took his laptop computer and paper records, anything with the word “Palestine” on it, according to the man’s attorney.
Federal search warrants indicate that authorities are looking for connections between terrorist organizations in the Middle East and South America and certain anti-war leaders and organizations in the U.S.
As executive director of the Arab American Action Network in Chicago, Mr. Abudayyeh is a well-known advocate for immigrant rights. When federal officers raided his North Side home last week, along with residences in Minneapolis, they were looking for funding links between Abudayyeh and the radical Islamic group Hamas that took power in the Gaza Strip three years ago.
Even as Abudayyeh is under investigation by a federal grand jury, city of Chicago records obtained by the ABC7 I-Team show that his Arab American Action Network has received thousands of dollars in city grants: as much as $457,000 since 1998. According to city officials, the money was intended for an after-school program for high-risk students who struggle with English.
So how did that happen?
And would someone in the Obama Administration explain what Abudayyeh was doing in the White House this year?
Hat Tip Steve H.
This deserves an explanation.
Debbie Schlussel has much more on this radical here and here.
September 28, 2010, - 2:06 pm
“Redistribution”: FBI-Raided Abudayyeh Funded HAMAS While Being Funded BY Chicago
By Debbie Schlussel
Yesterday, I gave you the exclusive scoop about Chicago-based Palestinian Muslim “activist” and terrorist-financier Hatem Abudayyeh, who was raided by the FBI and whose many anti-war activist friends were subpoenaed for information on money they gave to Abudayyeh and the PFLP, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, as well as its connection to FARC, the South American terrorist group. In my piece, I noted Abudayyeh’s many close Islamic terrorist relatives and that Abudayyeh and his organization (Arab American Action Network) get hundreds of thousands of dollars (actually, millions, if you add it up) in U. S. taxpayer funding. Well, now, the mainstream media and some of the mainstream conservative media have “caught up,” noting without credit to me (of course) that Abudayyeh gets a ton of tax funding. Chicago media are also reporting that Abudayyeh was using PFLP to fund HAMAS.
When federal officers raided his North Side home last week, along with residences in Minneapolis, they were looking for funding links between Abudayyeh and the radical Islamic group Hamas. . . .
Even as Abudayyeh is under investigation by a federal grand jury, city of Chicago records . . . show that his Arab American Action Network has received thousands of dollars in city grants: as much as $457,000 since 1998. According to city officials, the money was intended for an after-school program for high-risk students who struggle with English. . . .
In 2001, Abudayyeh and several others filed a lawsuit against the city, seeking the freedom to wear traditional Arab headwear during Michigan Avenue protests. The case was settled. Terms unknown.
Please. We know the terms. The terms were: they got what they wanted, their lawyers got well-paid, and they got money, too. That’s always how it works with these Muslim activists and our weak pandering politicians and public officials. ‘Cuz ya know it ain’t no security hazard to have a bunch of open supporters of Islamic terrorism marching down the streets with their faces completely covered by keffiyeh’s, right? For security reasons, the only headwear we need regulate is the real, seldom-used Klan hood, not the Muslim version. Yeah, that’s the ticket.
Maybe conservatives don’t want to admit that Abudayyeh got a ton of money from the Bush administration, a policy which the Obamaniks are simply continuing. Hey, if the “national security/counterterrorism Prez” can do it, why not Obama? Sorry, but I don’t miss Bush yet. And if you do, see a doctor.
Your tax dollars at work. Your money essentially laundered through him to HAMAS, in the guise of English tutoring for illiterate Muslim illegal alien kiddies. Some tutoring probably took place, but as we all know, money is a fungible good, and these grants allowed him to use more money that he, himself, raised for HAMAS via PFLP and FARC.
So, how long until Abudayyeh is indicted . . . assuming the feds have the guts, and that’s a big assumption. They did nothing against this guy I’ve been complaining about since before 9/11. Don’t look for fast action now.
But if they do act, it’s too little, too late. How many innocent people were murdered courtesy of HAMAS funds he helped raise?
I’ve written about Abudayyeh in the past. Where were the Chicago “investigative reporters”? Busy pandering to him. How funny that they’ve now discovered the guy who was blatantly supporting Islamic terrorism right in their backyard, but were looking the other way and kissing his ass for most of the last decade.
I wish I could say that after all these years and all the damage and mass murder he’s funded, supported, and enabled, that the chickens are coming home to roost. But it’s more like the roost is home to an utter chicken.
September 27, 2010, - 4:14 pm
EXCLUSIVE – Who is Hatem Abudayyeh?: Meet the FBI-Raided Palestinian “Activist” & Terrorism Financier
By Debbie Schlussel
While I was away for the Jewish holiday, last week, the FBI raided the homes of several Midwestern “anti-war activists,” including Hatem Abudayyeh, the head of the Chicago-based Arab American Action Network. Subpoenas served on the activists sought information on payments made to Abudayyeh and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), the Islamic terrorist group which has been responsible for several homicide bombings in Israel, as well as the murder of Israeli Tourism Minister, Rehavam Ze’evi. I’m not surprised at all by this and wondered what took so long, as I’ve been following Abudayyeh for years, know a lot of inside dirt on the guy, and once spoke to him and members of his Muslim-dominated tax-funded Arab welfare agency (AAAN), as part of an undercover investigation into Medicaid fraud with which I was working with the FBI. The guy is clearly working with Islamic terrorists and helping aid the extremist Muslim infiltration into America, and he’s been doing so for years.
Here’s what you don’t know about Hatem Abudayyeh, and you won’t read in any press accounts:
* Hatem Abudayyeh’s two brothers-in-law were Palestinian Islamic terrorists from El Jib, in the so-called “West Bank.” One of them martyred himself in Israeli prison where he was sent after being convicted of terrorist acts during the Intifada (the Palestinian uprising). Another brother-in-law, Jihad Saadeh, has been a terrorist leader in the Palestinian youth terrorist movement. He spent three years in an Israeli prison for his terrorist activities.
* Abudayyeh’s Palestinian parents founded the first Arab (actually, MUSLIM-DOMINATED) community center in Chicago, and the family’s vocal support for Islamic terrorist groups goes back decades.
* Abudayyeh’s wife, Naima Saadeh, met Abudayyeh when his parents sent him to “Palestine” to choose a wife. Her brothers are the terrorists identified above. Ms. Saadeh is a graduate of Al Quds University a/k/a Terrorist U. Her mother goes by the name “Um Mujahed”–Mother of the Jihad Fighter. She works and has worked for two decades in Dar Al-Tiffil orphanage, an orphanage which houses some of the children of Palestinian “martyrs” a/k/a terrorists.
* In a completely frightening development, Abudayyeh’s wife, Ms. Saadeh, works in a Chicago-area Jewish community center daycare. Wanna trust your kid with her? Only if you’re a moron.
* A documentary about Abudayyeh and his wife showed Abudayyeh repeatedly denouncing America while he was in the so-called West Bank looking to marry Saadeh. His statements were typical of those who hate America and support Islamic terrorism, a description that perfectly fits Abudayyeh.
* Abudayyeh’s agency, which receives a good deal of taxpayer money, is involved in helping pregnant Muslim aliens come to America to have their babies here and obtain birthright citizenship, courtesy of Medicaid. During an investigation in which I was involved, I phoned Abudayyeh and his staff and they assured me that they could arrange for me–posing as a pregnant illegal alien Muslim woman–to illegally get Medicaid and phony Social Security numbers so that I could have my fictional baby here courtesy of the U.S. taxpayer and obtain citizenship for my yet-to-be-born child. In addition to this, Abudayyeh’s agency is also heavily involved in helping Muslim illegal aliens infiltrate the United States.
* As I’ve noted on this site before, a fundraising dinner hosted by Abudayyeh, to raise money for his agency, featured a Milwaukee youth dance troupe, Sanabel Al-Quds, which features simulated beheadings of American, British, and Israeli soldiers in its performances.
* Abudayyeh’s wife, Ms. Saadeh has said,
I don’t want to live in America, I don’t want to have an American passport, I don’t want to have a green card. I just want to have my Palestinian ID and that’s it, because Palestine still lives inside of me, so I don’t feel any loyalty to here [America].
Hey, just like hubby. Sadly, she’s given birth for him, and can now teach her progeny the same hate she and her husband have for the country where they live, the same hate her terrorist brothers had.
Hatem Abudayyeh and his wife have made trips back to El Jib, the Palestinian Islamic terrorist hotbed. What did they do there? Whom did they see? How much money did they take to Islamic terrorists from the PFLP? Was Saadeh’s surviving terrorist brother involved?
And where the heck has the FBI been for the last 10 years, since 2000, while Abudayyeh has been openly involved in all of this?
Well, better late than never. But how many innocent people died because of Hatem Abudayyeh’s PFLP terrorist funding . . . while the FBI waited and stalled?
Terror Suspect Was White House Guest and Recipient of $500k in Taxpayer Fundsby Jim Hoft
Last Friday FBI agents raided the homes of far left activists in Chicago and Minneapolis who are linked to the Marxist FARC terrorists and Islamic radicals as part of a terrorism investigation.
The home of radical Hatem Abudayyeh in Chicago was raided in the terror sweep.
Radical Hatem Abudayyeh protested against Israel in Chicago in January 2009. (Daylife)
Hatem Abudayyeh is the executive director of the Arab American Action Network (AAAN). Hatem Abudayyeh has been with the Arab American Action Network (AAAN) since 1999, and was appointed Executive Director in 2003. The Arab American Action Network was founded by former PLO operative and close Obama family friend Rashid Khalidi. Obama was a director of the Woods Fund from 1994 through 2001, when the board approved a $40,000 grant to the Arab American Action Network.
In 2003 Barack Obama was an honored guest at a dinner sponsored by the AAAN for former PLO-operative Rashid Khalidi. During the dinner a video was taken that shows Barack Obama celebrating with members of this Palestinian group who are openly hostile towards Israel. Barack Obama even gave a toast to a Rashid Khalidi at this going away party. The LA Times will not release the video from this Jew-bashing dinner.
Not only was Hatem Abudayyeh’s radical organization given $40,000 by Barack Obama and the Woods Fund but his organization also collected nearly half a million in taxpayer money.
http://abclocal.go.com/wls
ABC Local reported:
When FBI agents raided the Chicago home of Hatem Abudayyeh last Friday, they took his laptop computer and paper records, anything with the word “Palestine” on it, according to the man’s attorney.
Federal search warrants indicate that authorities are looking for connections between terrorist organizations in the Middle East and South America and certain anti-war leaders and organizations in the U.S.
As executive director of the Arab American Action Network in Chicago, Mr. Abudayyeh is a well-known advocate for immigrant rights. When federal officers raided his North Side home last week, along with residences in Minneapolis, they were looking for funding links between Abudayyeh and the radical Islamic group Hamas that took power in the Gaza Strip three years ago.
Even as Abudayyeh is under investigation by a federal grand jury, city of Chicago records obtained by the ABC7 I-Team show that his Arab American Action Network has received thousands of dollars in city grants: as much as $457,000 since 1998. According to city officials, the money was intended for an after-school program for high-risk students who struggle with English.
So how did that happen?
And would someone in the Obama Administration explain what Abudayyeh was doing in the White House this year?
Hat Tip Steve H.
This deserves an explanation.
Debbie Schlussel has much more on this radical here and here.
September 28, 2010, - 2:06 pm
“Redistribution”: FBI-Raided Abudayyeh Funded HAMAS While Being Funded BY Chicago
By Debbie Schlussel
Yesterday, I gave you the exclusive scoop about Chicago-based Palestinian Muslim “activist” and terrorist-financier Hatem Abudayyeh, who was raided by the FBI and whose many anti-war activist friends were subpoenaed for information on money they gave to Abudayyeh and the PFLP, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, as well as its connection to FARC, the South American terrorist group. In my piece, I noted Abudayyeh’s many close Islamic terrorist relatives and that Abudayyeh and his organization (Arab American Action Network) get hundreds of thousands of dollars (actually, millions, if you add it up) in U. S. taxpayer funding. Well, now, the mainstream media and some of the mainstream conservative media have “caught up,” noting without credit to me (of course) that Abudayyeh gets a ton of tax funding. Chicago media are also reporting that Abudayyeh was using PFLP to fund HAMAS.
When federal officers raided his North Side home last week, along with residences in Minneapolis, they were looking for funding links between Abudayyeh and the radical Islamic group Hamas. . . .
Even as Abudayyeh is under investigation by a federal grand jury, city of Chicago records . . . show that his Arab American Action Network has received thousands of dollars in city grants: as much as $457,000 since 1998. According to city officials, the money was intended for an after-school program for high-risk students who struggle with English. . . .
In 2001, Abudayyeh and several others filed a lawsuit against the city, seeking the freedom to wear traditional Arab headwear during Michigan Avenue protests. The case was settled. Terms unknown.
Please. We know the terms. The terms were: they got what they wanted, their lawyers got well-paid, and they got money, too. That’s always how it works with these Muslim activists and our weak pandering politicians and public officials. ‘Cuz ya know it ain’t no security hazard to have a bunch of open supporters of Islamic terrorism marching down the streets with their faces completely covered by keffiyeh’s, right? For security reasons, the only headwear we need regulate is the real, seldom-used Klan hood, not the Muslim version. Yeah, that’s the ticket.
Maybe conservatives don’t want to admit that Abudayyeh got a ton of money from the Bush administration, a policy which the Obamaniks are simply continuing. Hey, if the “national security/counterterrorism Prez” can do it, why not Obama? Sorry, but I don’t miss Bush yet. And if you do, see a doctor.
Your tax dollars at work. Your money essentially laundered through him to HAMAS, in the guise of English tutoring for illiterate Muslim illegal alien kiddies. Some tutoring probably took place, but as we all know, money is a fungible good, and these grants allowed him to use more money that he, himself, raised for HAMAS via PFLP and FARC.
So, how long until Abudayyeh is indicted . . . assuming the feds have the guts, and that’s a big assumption. They did nothing against this guy I’ve been complaining about since before 9/11. Don’t look for fast action now.
But if they do act, it’s too little, too late. How many innocent people were murdered courtesy of HAMAS funds he helped raise?
I’ve written about Abudayyeh in the past. Where were the Chicago “investigative reporters”? Busy pandering to him. How funny that they’ve now discovered the guy who was blatantly supporting Islamic terrorism right in their backyard, but were looking the other way and kissing his ass for most of the last decade.
I wish I could say that after all these years and all the damage and mass murder he’s funded, supported, and enabled, that the chickens are coming home to roost. But it’s more like the roost is home to an utter chicken.
September 27, 2010, - 4:14 pm
EXCLUSIVE – Who is Hatem Abudayyeh?: Meet the FBI-Raided Palestinian “Activist” & Terrorism Financier
By Debbie Schlussel
While I was away for the Jewish holiday, last week, the FBI raided the homes of several Midwestern “anti-war activists,” including Hatem Abudayyeh, the head of the Chicago-based Arab American Action Network. Subpoenas served on the activists sought information on payments made to Abudayyeh and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), the Islamic terrorist group which has been responsible for several homicide bombings in Israel, as well as the murder of Israeli Tourism Minister, Rehavam Ze’evi. I’m not surprised at all by this and wondered what took so long, as I’ve been following Abudayyeh for years, know a lot of inside dirt on the guy, and once spoke to him and members of his Muslim-dominated tax-funded Arab welfare agency (AAAN), as part of an undercover investigation into Medicaid fraud with which I was working with the FBI. The guy is clearly working with Islamic terrorists and helping aid the extremist Muslim infiltration into America, and he’s been doing so for years.
Here’s what you don’t know about Hatem Abudayyeh, and you won’t read in any press accounts:
* Hatem Abudayyeh’s two brothers-in-law were Palestinian Islamic terrorists from El Jib, in the so-called “West Bank.” One of them martyred himself in Israeli prison where he was sent after being convicted of terrorist acts during the Intifada (the Palestinian uprising). Another brother-in-law, Jihad Saadeh, has been a terrorist leader in the Palestinian youth terrorist movement. He spent three years in an Israeli prison for his terrorist activities.
* Abudayyeh’s Palestinian parents founded the first Arab (actually, MUSLIM-DOMINATED) community center in Chicago, and the family’s vocal support for Islamic terrorist groups goes back decades.
* Abudayyeh’s wife, Naima Saadeh, met Abudayyeh when his parents sent him to “Palestine” to choose a wife. Her brothers are the terrorists identified above. Ms. Saadeh is a graduate of Al Quds University a/k/a Terrorist U. Her mother goes by the name “Um Mujahed”–Mother of the Jihad Fighter. She works and has worked for two decades in Dar Al-Tiffil orphanage, an orphanage which houses some of the children of Palestinian “martyrs” a/k/a terrorists.
* In a completely frightening development, Abudayyeh’s wife, Ms. Saadeh, works in a Chicago-area Jewish community center daycare. Wanna trust your kid with her? Only if you’re a moron.
* A documentary about Abudayyeh and his wife showed Abudayyeh repeatedly denouncing America while he was in the so-called West Bank looking to marry Saadeh. His statements were typical of those who hate America and support Islamic terrorism, a description that perfectly fits Abudayyeh.
* Abudayyeh’s agency, which receives a good deal of taxpayer money, is involved in helping pregnant Muslim aliens come to America to have their babies here and obtain birthright citizenship, courtesy of Medicaid. During an investigation in which I was involved, I phoned Abudayyeh and his staff and they assured me that they could arrange for me–posing as a pregnant illegal alien Muslim woman–to illegally get Medicaid and phony Social Security numbers so that I could have my fictional baby here courtesy of the U.S. taxpayer and obtain citizenship for my yet-to-be-born child. In addition to this, Abudayyeh’s agency is also heavily involved in helping Muslim illegal aliens infiltrate the United States.
* As I’ve noted on this site before, a fundraising dinner hosted by Abudayyeh, to raise money for his agency, featured a Milwaukee youth dance troupe, Sanabel Al-Quds, which features simulated beheadings of American, British, and Israeli soldiers in its performances.
* Abudayyeh’s wife, Ms. Saadeh has said,
I don’t want to live in America, I don’t want to have an American passport, I don’t want to have a green card. I just want to have my Palestinian ID and that’s it, because Palestine still lives inside of me, so I don’t feel any loyalty to here [America].
Hey, just like hubby. Sadly, she’s given birth for him, and can now teach her progeny the same hate she and her husband have for the country where they live, the same hate her terrorist brothers had.
Hatem Abudayyeh and his wife have made trips back to El Jib, the Palestinian Islamic terrorist hotbed. What did they do there? Whom did they see? How much money did they take to Islamic terrorists from the PFLP? Was Saadeh’s surviving terrorist brother involved?
And where the heck has the FBI been for the last 10 years, since 2000, while Abudayyeh has been openly involved in all of this?
Well, better late than never. But how many innocent people died because of Hatem Abudayyeh’s PFLP terrorist funding . . . while the FBI waited and stalled?
Hamburg Mosque Tied To 9/11 Hijackers Tied To Recent Terror Plot Against Europe Also
From The Long War Journal:
9/11 hijackers’ mosque tied to recent terror plot against Europe
By Thomas JoscelynSeptember 30, 2010
Al Qaeda operative Mamoun Darkazanli ran the notorious Al Quds Mosque in Hamburg, Germany. AFP photo.
The recently uncovered terror plot against European cities, which was to involve attacks similar to the November 2008 attack in Mumbai, is tied to the same Hamburg mosque that was attended by some of the 9/11 hijackers.
The purported plot was discovered during the interrogation of a German citizen named Ahmed Siddiqui, who attended the Taiba mosque in Hamburg. The Taiba mosque gained infamy under its former name -- Al Quds. Al Qaeda’s Hamburg cell for the 9/11 operation frequented the Al Quds mosque, where they were indoctrinated in the ways of jihad.
Siddiqui’s ties to Taiba were previously reported by Der Spiegel. In a Sept. 6 piece titled, “Hamburg Islamist Speaks of Threat of Attacks in Germany,” Der Spiegel reported that American forces had detained a German of Afghan descent named “Ahmad S.” in Kabul.
During interrogations at the US base in Bagram, Ahmad S. spoke “extensively about attack scenarios in Germany and neighboring European countries.” His full name was not known at the time, but "Ahmad S." is Ahmed Siddiqui.
Der Spiegel reported that Siddiqui was among a “total of around a dozen” terror suspects who disappeared from the Hamburg mosque during a “short period of time in 2009.” The dozen suspects, including Siddiqui, “moved in circles close to Hamburg's Taiba mosque” and are suspected of training in terrorist camps along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border.
Siddiqui’s arrest in July 2010 may explain why the Taiba mosque was closed just weeks later in early August 2010. German authorities allowed the mosque to remain open for years, despite its numerous ties to terrorism and extremism. Then, suddenly, authorities raided and closed the mosque.
Siddiqui has ties to al Qaeda’s Hamburg cell. According to Der Spiegel, Siddiqui regularly drove Mounir el Motassadeq’s father to the jail where Mounir is imprisoned for visits. Mounir is serving a 15-year sentence in a German prison for his involvement in the 9/11 attacks. Der Spiegel noted that Siddiqui “also went on vacation with Motassadeq's family in Morocco” in 2002 and “worked at the Hamburg airport,” just as Mounir Motassadeq did.
The imam
One of the more significant connections between Siddiqui and the 9/11 plotters may be the imam who ran the Al Quds-Taiba mosque: Mamoun Darkazanli.
Western intelligence agencies have long known that Darkazanali is an al Qaeda operative. [See LWJ report, Longtime al Qaeda operative runs mosque closed by German authorities.]
The imam has repeatedly avoided being brought to justice, however.
Darkazanli first popped up on the CIA’s radar in 1993 when a man carrying false passports and counterfeit money was arrested in Africa and Darkazanli’s phone number was found in his possession. Authorities failed to assemble a case against Darkazanli at the time. That same year, ironically, he purchased a ship named “Jennifer” for Osama bin Laden.
Darkazanli garnered the FBI’s attention in 1998 after al Qaeda’s bombings in Kenya and Tanzania. The FBI found Darkazanli’s contact information in the address book of Wadi el Hage, Osama bin Laden’s personal secretary. The bureau also learned that Darkazanli had power of attorney over a bank account owned by Abu Hajer al Iraqi, who is one of al Qaeda’s founding members and was a senior member of bin Laden’s organization at the time. Abu Hajer al Iraqi (whose real name is Mamdouh Mahmud Salim) was arrested in Germany and extradited to the US for his involvement in the embassy bombings.
Darkazanli’s ties were scrutinized again in March 1999 when US officials learned he was in contact with a student named “Marwan.” The student turned out to be Marwan al-Shehhi, one of the 9/11 hijackers.
Indeed, there is considerable evidence that Darkazanli and another Syrian named Mohammed Zammar were heavily involved with al Qaeda’s Hamburg cell. The pair, who are veterans of the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood, likely played an important role in indoctrinating and financing the 9/11 hijackers.
Prior to 9/11, American authorities pressured the Germans to clamp down on Darkazanli. But German laws did not prohibit his involvement with a foreign terrorist organization at the time. After 9/11, the US and UN quickly added Darkazanli and his import-export business to the list of al Qaeda-affiliated entities.
Spanish officials sought Darkazanli’s extradition in 2004 and 2005. They accuse Darkazanli of being involved with the al Qaeda cell in Madrid that was responsible for the March 11, 2004, train bombings. Darkazanli is a longtime compatriot of Imad Yarkas, who was one of Osama bin Laden’s chief points of contact in Europe prior to 9/11 and ran the Madrid cell.
Darkazanli’s extradition to Spain was blocked by a German court, however. The Germans found that the EU arrest warrant issued by Spain violated Germany’s constitution. Darkazanli was allowed to go free – avoiding justice once again.
All of this raises the possibility that Darkazanli was involved in the most recent terror plot against Europe. It would not be surprising to learn that authorities are investigating any ties between Darkazanli and Siddiqui.
Darkazanli’s mosque has been the epicenter for terrorist plotting before, including the most devastating terrorist attack in history.
Read more: http://www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2010/09/911_hijackers_mosque.php#ixzz114bcfZDf
9/11 hijackers’ mosque tied to recent terror plot against Europe
By Thomas JoscelynSeptember 30, 2010
Al Qaeda operative Mamoun Darkazanli ran the notorious Al Quds Mosque in Hamburg, Germany. AFP photo.
The recently uncovered terror plot against European cities, which was to involve attacks similar to the November 2008 attack in Mumbai, is tied to the same Hamburg mosque that was attended by some of the 9/11 hijackers.
The purported plot was discovered during the interrogation of a German citizen named Ahmed Siddiqui, who attended the Taiba mosque in Hamburg. The Taiba mosque gained infamy under its former name -- Al Quds. Al Qaeda’s Hamburg cell for the 9/11 operation frequented the Al Quds mosque, where they were indoctrinated in the ways of jihad.
Siddiqui’s ties to Taiba were previously reported by Der Spiegel. In a Sept. 6 piece titled, “Hamburg Islamist Speaks of Threat of Attacks in Germany,” Der Spiegel reported that American forces had detained a German of Afghan descent named “Ahmad S.” in Kabul.
During interrogations at the US base in Bagram, Ahmad S. spoke “extensively about attack scenarios in Germany and neighboring European countries.” His full name was not known at the time, but "Ahmad S." is Ahmed Siddiqui.
Der Spiegel reported that Siddiqui was among a “total of around a dozen” terror suspects who disappeared from the Hamburg mosque during a “short period of time in 2009.” The dozen suspects, including Siddiqui, “moved in circles close to Hamburg's Taiba mosque” and are suspected of training in terrorist camps along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border.
Siddiqui’s arrest in July 2010 may explain why the Taiba mosque was closed just weeks later in early August 2010. German authorities allowed the mosque to remain open for years, despite its numerous ties to terrorism and extremism. Then, suddenly, authorities raided and closed the mosque.
Siddiqui has ties to al Qaeda’s Hamburg cell. According to Der Spiegel, Siddiqui regularly drove Mounir el Motassadeq’s father to the jail where Mounir is imprisoned for visits. Mounir is serving a 15-year sentence in a German prison for his involvement in the 9/11 attacks. Der Spiegel noted that Siddiqui “also went on vacation with Motassadeq's family in Morocco” in 2002 and “worked at the Hamburg airport,” just as Mounir Motassadeq did.
The imam
One of the more significant connections between Siddiqui and the 9/11 plotters may be the imam who ran the Al Quds-Taiba mosque: Mamoun Darkazanli.
Western intelligence agencies have long known that Darkazanali is an al Qaeda operative. [See LWJ report, Longtime al Qaeda operative runs mosque closed by German authorities.]
The imam has repeatedly avoided being brought to justice, however.
Darkazanli first popped up on the CIA’s radar in 1993 when a man carrying false passports and counterfeit money was arrested in Africa and Darkazanli’s phone number was found in his possession. Authorities failed to assemble a case against Darkazanli at the time. That same year, ironically, he purchased a ship named “Jennifer” for Osama bin Laden.
Darkazanli garnered the FBI’s attention in 1998 after al Qaeda’s bombings in Kenya and Tanzania. The FBI found Darkazanli’s contact information in the address book of Wadi el Hage, Osama bin Laden’s personal secretary. The bureau also learned that Darkazanli had power of attorney over a bank account owned by Abu Hajer al Iraqi, who is one of al Qaeda’s founding members and was a senior member of bin Laden’s organization at the time. Abu Hajer al Iraqi (whose real name is Mamdouh Mahmud Salim) was arrested in Germany and extradited to the US for his involvement in the embassy bombings.
Darkazanli’s ties were scrutinized again in March 1999 when US officials learned he was in contact with a student named “Marwan.” The student turned out to be Marwan al-Shehhi, one of the 9/11 hijackers.
Indeed, there is considerable evidence that Darkazanli and another Syrian named Mohammed Zammar were heavily involved with al Qaeda’s Hamburg cell. The pair, who are veterans of the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood, likely played an important role in indoctrinating and financing the 9/11 hijackers.
Prior to 9/11, American authorities pressured the Germans to clamp down on Darkazanli. But German laws did not prohibit his involvement with a foreign terrorist organization at the time. After 9/11, the US and UN quickly added Darkazanli and his import-export business to the list of al Qaeda-affiliated entities.
Spanish officials sought Darkazanli’s extradition in 2004 and 2005. They accuse Darkazanli of being involved with the al Qaeda cell in Madrid that was responsible for the March 11, 2004, train bombings. Darkazanli is a longtime compatriot of Imad Yarkas, who was one of Osama bin Laden’s chief points of contact in Europe prior to 9/11 and ran the Madrid cell.
Darkazanli’s extradition to Spain was blocked by a German court, however. The Germans found that the EU arrest warrant issued by Spain violated Germany’s constitution. Darkazanli was allowed to go free – avoiding justice once again.
All of this raises the possibility that Darkazanli was involved in the most recent terror plot against Europe. It would not be surprising to learn that authorities are investigating any ties between Darkazanli and Siddiqui.
Darkazanli’s mosque has been the epicenter for terrorist plotting before, including the most devastating terrorist attack in history.
Read more: http://www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2010/09/911_hijackers_mosque.php#ixzz114bcfZDf
Pakistan's Mainstreamed Jihadism And The Times Square Bombing Plot
from The American Thinker:
September 30, 2010
Pakistan's Mainstream Jihadism and the Times Square Bomb Plot
Andrew G. Bostom
The New York Post is reporting today (9/30/10) that Faisal Abbasi, an employee at Pakistan's state-run Council of Islamic Ideology, which advises on Islamic affairs, has been detained for playing an allegedly significant role in assisting the failed New York Times Square car bomber, Faisal Shahzad. According to the Post,
The suspect [Abbasi] accompanied, the Pakistan-American bomber, to Pakistan's northwest to meet militant leaders...The secretary general of the council [the Council of Islamic Ideology] confirmed Abbasi had worked there but had been on "vacation" for the last three months.
A September 2005 report on Pakistan's Council of Islamic Ideology (CII) by Militant Islam Monitor included this revelation about the groups' embrace of classical, aggressive jihad doctrine:
Jehad [Jihad] is no defensive war!...[T]he Council for Islamic Ideology in Islamabad declared that it was wrong to label jehad as a defensive war alone. The truth according to CII was that jehad could be offensive as well. According to Nawa-e-Waqt , the CII stated that Western propaganda against jehad had pushed it into the background, but everyone should be grateful to Afghanistan for having revived it. It said that the greatest act of piety was participation in jehad and one cause of the decline of the Muslims was their abandonment of it.
Faisal Abbasi's "vacation" notwithstanding, the CII's own self-proclaimed ideology, is in turn consistent with what Pakistan's political, military, and clerical leadership have openly espoused since the 1979 publication of Brigadier S.K. Malik's The Quranic Concept of War.
Under "President" Zia-ul-Haq's patronage, the mainstream Pakistani text on jihad warfare by Malik, was published in Lahore, originally in 1979. Malik's treatise was endorsed in a laudatory Foreword to the book by his patron, Zia-ul-Haq, as well as a more extended Preface by Allah Buksh K. Brohi, a former Advocate-General of Pakistan. This text-widely studied in Islamic countries, and available in English, Urdu, and Arabic-has been recovered from the bodies of slain jihadists in Kashmir, for example.
Brigadier Malik emphasizes how instilling terror is essential to waging successful jihad campaigns -- like those acts of jihad terror we are witnessing, daily, around the globe.
Terror struck into the hearts of the enemies is not only a means, it is the end in itself. Once a condition of terror into the opponent's heart is obtained, hardly anything is left to be achieved. It is the point where the means and the end meet and merge. Terror is not a means of imposing decision upon the enemy (sic); it is the decision we wish to impose upon him...
"Jehad," the Quranic concept of total strategy. Demands the preparation and application of total national power and military instrument is one of its elements. As a component of the total strategy, the military strategy aims at striking terror into the hearts of the enemy from the preparatory stage of war...Under ideal conditions, Jehad can produce a direct decision and force its will upon the enemy. Where that does not happen, military strategy should take over and aim at producing the decision from the military stage. Should that chance be missed, terror should be struck into the enemy during the actual fighting.
...the Book [Quran] does not visualize war being waged with "kid gloves." It gives us a distinctive concept of total war. It wants both, the nation and the individual, to be at war "in toto," that is, with all their spiritual, moral, and physical resources. The Holy Quran lays the highest emphasis on the preparation for war. It wants us to prepare ourselves for war to the utmost. The test of utmost preparation lies in our capability to instill terror into the hearts of the enemies.
Or consider the work "Islam and Modernism," written by a respected modern Pakistani Muslim scholar, Justice Muhammad Taqi Usmani. Mr Usmani, sat for 20 years as a Shari'a judge in Pakistan's Supreme Court (His father was the Grand Mufti of Pakistan). Currently Usmani is deputy of the Islamic Fiqh (Jurisprudence) Council of the Organization of the Islamic Conference -- the major international body of Islamic nations in the world, and serves as an adviser to several global Sharia-based Islamic financial institutions. Thus he is a leading contemporary figure in the world of mainstream Islamic jurisprudence. Mr. Usmani is also a regular visitor to Britain. During a recent visit there, he was interviewed by the Times of London, which published extracts from Usmani's writings on jihad, Saturday, September 8, 2007. The concluding chapter of Usmani's "Islam and Modernism" was cited, and it rebuts those who believe that only defensive jihad (i.e., fighting to defend a Muslim land deemed under attack or occupation) is permissible in Islam. He also refutes the suggestion that jihad is unlawful against a non-Muslim state that freely permits the preaching of Islam (which, not surprisingly, was of some concern to The Times reporter, Andrew Norfolk!)
For Mr Usmani, "the question is whether aggressive battle is by itself commendable or not." "If it is, why should the Muslims stop simply because territorial expansion in these days is regarded as bad? And if it is not commendable, but deplorable, why did Islam not stop it in the past?" He answers his own question as follows: "Even in those days . . . aggressive jihads were waged . . . because it was truly commendable for establishing the grandeur of the religion of Allah." Usmani argues that Muslims should live peacefully in countries such as Britain, where they have the freedom to practice Islam, only until they gain enough power to engage in battle.
Usmani explodes the myths that the creed of offensive, expansionist jihad represents a distortion of traditional Islamic thinking, or that this living institution is somehow irrelevant to our era. More ominously, mainstream Islamic legists like Mr. Usmani, mainstream Islamic military theorists, epitomized by Brigadier S.K. Malik, and mainstream Islamic government advisory groups such as Paksitan's Council of Islamic Ideology motivate and validate the murderous acts of jihadism committed (or attempted) by pious Muslims, including Faisal Abbasi and Faisal Shahzad.
Posted at 06:48 PM
September 30, 2010
Pakistan's Mainstream Jihadism and the Times Square Bomb Plot
Andrew G. Bostom
The New York Post is reporting today (9/30/10) that Faisal Abbasi, an employee at Pakistan's state-run Council of Islamic Ideology, which advises on Islamic affairs, has been detained for playing an allegedly significant role in assisting the failed New York Times Square car bomber, Faisal Shahzad. According to the Post,
The suspect [Abbasi] accompanied, the Pakistan-American bomber, to Pakistan's northwest to meet militant leaders...The secretary general of the council [the Council of Islamic Ideology] confirmed Abbasi had worked there but had been on "vacation" for the last three months.
A September 2005 report on Pakistan's Council of Islamic Ideology (CII) by Militant Islam Monitor included this revelation about the groups' embrace of classical, aggressive jihad doctrine:
Jehad [Jihad] is no defensive war!...[T]he Council for Islamic Ideology in Islamabad declared that it was wrong to label jehad as a defensive war alone. The truth according to CII was that jehad could be offensive as well. According to Nawa-e-Waqt , the CII stated that Western propaganda against jehad had pushed it into the background, but everyone should be grateful to Afghanistan for having revived it. It said that the greatest act of piety was participation in jehad and one cause of the decline of the Muslims was their abandonment of it.
Faisal Abbasi's "vacation" notwithstanding, the CII's own self-proclaimed ideology, is in turn consistent with what Pakistan's political, military, and clerical leadership have openly espoused since the 1979 publication of Brigadier S.K. Malik's The Quranic Concept of War.
Under "President" Zia-ul-Haq's patronage, the mainstream Pakistani text on jihad warfare by Malik, was published in Lahore, originally in 1979. Malik's treatise was endorsed in a laudatory Foreword to the book by his patron, Zia-ul-Haq, as well as a more extended Preface by Allah Buksh K. Brohi, a former Advocate-General of Pakistan. This text-widely studied in Islamic countries, and available in English, Urdu, and Arabic-has been recovered from the bodies of slain jihadists in Kashmir, for example.
Brigadier Malik emphasizes how instilling terror is essential to waging successful jihad campaigns -- like those acts of jihad terror we are witnessing, daily, around the globe.
Terror struck into the hearts of the enemies is not only a means, it is the end in itself. Once a condition of terror into the opponent's heart is obtained, hardly anything is left to be achieved. It is the point where the means and the end meet and merge. Terror is not a means of imposing decision upon the enemy (sic); it is the decision we wish to impose upon him...
"Jehad," the Quranic concept of total strategy. Demands the preparation and application of total national power and military instrument is one of its elements. As a component of the total strategy, the military strategy aims at striking terror into the hearts of the enemy from the preparatory stage of war...Under ideal conditions, Jehad can produce a direct decision and force its will upon the enemy. Where that does not happen, military strategy should take over and aim at producing the decision from the military stage. Should that chance be missed, terror should be struck into the enemy during the actual fighting.
...the Book [Quran] does not visualize war being waged with "kid gloves." It gives us a distinctive concept of total war. It wants both, the nation and the individual, to be at war "in toto," that is, with all their spiritual, moral, and physical resources. The Holy Quran lays the highest emphasis on the preparation for war. It wants us to prepare ourselves for war to the utmost. The test of utmost preparation lies in our capability to instill terror into the hearts of the enemies.
Or consider the work "Islam and Modernism," written by a respected modern Pakistani Muslim scholar, Justice Muhammad Taqi Usmani. Mr Usmani, sat for 20 years as a Shari'a judge in Pakistan's Supreme Court (His father was the Grand Mufti of Pakistan). Currently Usmani is deputy of the Islamic Fiqh (Jurisprudence) Council of the Organization of the Islamic Conference -- the major international body of Islamic nations in the world, and serves as an adviser to several global Sharia-based Islamic financial institutions. Thus he is a leading contemporary figure in the world of mainstream Islamic jurisprudence. Mr. Usmani is also a regular visitor to Britain. During a recent visit there, he was interviewed by the Times of London, which published extracts from Usmani's writings on jihad, Saturday, September 8, 2007. The concluding chapter of Usmani's "Islam and Modernism" was cited, and it rebuts those who believe that only defensive jihad (i.e., fighting to defend a Muslim land deemed under attack or occupation) is permissible in Islam. He also refutes the suggestion that jihad is unlawful against a non-Muslim state that freely permits the preaching of Islam (which, not surprisingly, was of some concern to The Times reporter, Andrew Norfolk!)
For Mr Usmani, "the question is whether aggressive battle is by itself commendable or not." "If it is, why should the Muslims stop simply because territorial expansion in these days is regarded as bad? And if it is not commendable, but deplorable, why did Islam not stop it in the past?" He answers his own question as follows: "Even in those days . . . aggressive jihads were waged . . . because it was truly commendable for establishing the grandeur of the religion of Allah." Usmani argues that Muslims should live peacefully in countries such as Britain, where they have the freedom to practice Islam, only until they gain enough power to engage in battle.
Usmani explodes the myths that the creed of offensive, expansionist jihad represents a distortion of traditional Islamic thinking, or that this living institution is somehow irrelevant to our era. More ominously, mainstream Islamic legists like Mr. Usmani, mainstream Islamic military theorists, epitomized by Brigadier S.K. Malik, and mainstream Islamic government advisory groups such as Paksitan's Council of Islamic Ideology motivate and validate the murderous acts of jihadism committed (or attempted) by pious Muslims, including Faisal Abbasi and Faisal Shahzad.
Posted at 06:48 PM
Mullen: Military Suicides An "Emergency"
From The Upshot and Yahoo News:
Thu Sep 30, 1:04 pm ET
Mullen: Military suicides an ‘emergency’
By Liz Goodwin
Buzz up!26 votes Share
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EmailPrint..By Liz Goodwin liz Goodwin – Thu Sep 30, 1:04 pm ET
Navy Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said Wednesday that the military is facing a suicide crisis. "The emergency issue right now is suicides. We had five suicides in the Army last weekend," he told reporters.
Mullen said that the struggle to prevent military suicides will on get tougher as huge numbers of soldiers return to bases after multiple deployments. Last week, four suicides were reported at Texas' Ft. Hood base, including a murder-suicide. The suicide rate on the base is four times the national average, according to the New York Times. The overall Army suicide rate hit record levels over the summer.
"Dealing with [post-traumatic stress disorder], dealing with the injuries, dealing with just the overall pressures that so many have dealt with for so long," Mullen said, "I think we're going to see a growth in that before we see a decline."
An Army report, however, found that almost 80 percent of the suicides were committed by soldiers who had not been deployed more than once. The report blamed commanders who ignored warning signs among their soldiers.
Military experts released a study to the Defense Department last month charging that anti-suicide efforts are failing. Soldiers are afraid to seek mental health treatment for fear of it negatively affecting their careers, they say.
(Photo: Mullen/AP.)
Thu Sep 30, 1:04 pm ET
Mullen: Military suicides an ‘emergency’
By Liz Goodwin
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EmailPrint..By Liz Goodwin liz Goodwin – Thu Sep 30, 1:04 pm ET
Navy Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said Wednesday that the military is facing a suicide crisis. "The emergency issue right now is suicides. We had five suicides in the Army last weekend," he told reporters.
Mullen said that the struggle to prevent military suicides will on get tougher as huge numbers of soldiers return to bases after multiple deployments. Last week, four suicides were reported at Texas' Ft. Hood base, including a murder-suicide. The suicide rate on the base is four times the national average, according to the New York Times. The overall Army suicide rate hit record levels over the summer.
"Dealing with [post-traumatic stress disorder], dealing with the injuries, dealing with just the overall pressures that so many have dealt with for so long," Mullen said, "I think we're going to see a growth in that before we see a decline."
An Army report, however, found that almost 80 percent of the suicides were committed by soldiers who had not been deployed more than once. The report blamed commanders who ignored warning signs among their soldiers.
Military experts released a study to the Defense Department last month charging that anti-suicide efforts are failing. Soldiers are afraid to seek mental health treatment for fear of it negatively affecting their careers, they say.
(Photo: Mullen/AP.)
Spain Arrests U.S. Citizen On Charges Of Financing Terrorism
From Jihad Watch:
Spain arrests U.S. citizen and Misunderstander of Islam for financing jihad
Former resident of Texas. One wonders if, when he was there, everyone who knew him assumed that he was a "moderate," and that it would be "Islamophobic" even to consider any other possibility. "Spain arrests American al-Qaida suspect," by Daniel Woolls for Associated Press, September 29 (thanks to JCB):
MADRID - Spanish police have arrested a U.S. citizen of Algerian origin who is suspected of financing al-Qaida's North African affiliate, the Interior Ministry said Wednesday.
Mohamed Omar Debhi, 43, was arrested Tuesday in the town of Esplugues de Llobregat near Barcelona. His arrest is not connected to terrorism alerts this week in France and Britain and is just a coincidence, a ministry official said on condition of anonymity in line with ministry rules.
Debhi is suspected of laundering money and sending some of it to an associate in Algeria, Toufik Mizi, to be passed on to cells of al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb, a ministry statement said. Mizi is wanted in Spain after eluding a police raid in 2008.
The ministry said Debhi used bank transfers or human couriers to send Mizi amounts in excess of euro60,000 ($80,000), although it did not specify how much was sent altogether.
The statement said Debhi was "linked to crimes of financing terrorism in the Sahel for al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb," referring to the vast stretch of sub-Saharan territory where the terror organization has kidnapped several Europeans and other Westerners in recent years....
The Interior Ministry official said Debhi at one point lived in Texas in a town with the postal code 77450. That corresponds to the town of Katy, near Houston. The ministry had no immediate information on when Debhi obtained U.S. citizenship, the official said.
Posted by Robert on September 29, 2010 6:20 AM
Spain arrests U.S. citizen and Misunderstander of Islam for financing jihad
Former resident of Texas. One wonders if, when he was there, everyone who knew him assumed that he was a "moderate," and that it would be "Islamophobic" even to consider any other possibility. "Spain arrests American al-Qaida suspect," by Daniel Woolls for Associated Press, September 29 (thanks to JCB):
MADRID - Spanish police have arrested a U.S. citizen of Algerian origin who is suspected of financing al-Qaida's North African affiliate, the Interior Ministry said Wednesday.
Mohamed Omar Debhi, 43, was arrested Tuesday in the town of Esplugues de Llobregat near Barcelona. His arrest is not connected to terrorism alerts this week in France and Britain and is just a coincidence, a ministry official said on condition of anonymity in line with ministry rules.
Debhi is suspected of laundering money and sending some of it to an associate in Algeria, Toufik Mizi, to be passed on to cells of al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb, a ministry statement said. Mizi is wanted in Spain after eluding a police raid in 2008.
The ministry said Debhi used bank transfers or human couriers to send Mizi amounts in excess of euro60,000 ($80,000), although it did not specify how much was sent altogether.
The statement said Debhi was "linked to crimes of financing terrorism in the Sahel for al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb," referring to the vast stretch of sub-Saharan territory where the terror organization has kidnapped several Europeans and other Westerners in recent years....
The Interior Ministry official said Debhi at one point lived in Texas in a town with the postal code 77450. That corresponds to the town of Katy, near Houston. The ministry had no immediate information on when Debhi obtained U.S. citizenship, the official said.
Posted by Robert on September 29, 2010 6:20 AM
Recent Strikes In Pakistan Driven By Newly-Discovered Plot; Pakistan Threatens End Of Protection For Supply Lines, Military Forces
From Jihad Watch:
Recent strikes on Pakistan driven by newly uncovered jihad plot; Pakistan threatens end of protection of supply lines, military force
Pakistan won't do what its leaders promised, and is determined to ensure no one else does.
Apparently we're just supposed to sit back, trust duplicitous Pakistan, and get attacked again. It seems Pakistan would like that a great deal, at least until Islamabad is lost to the very jihadists it has collaborated with in the name of sticking a finger in the eye of the U.S. and India.
Priorities. "Terror plot in Europe prompted drone strikes," by Paisley Dodds for the Associated Press, September 29:
LONDON - Security officials said Wednesday a terror plot to wage Mumbai-style shooting sprees or other attacks in Britain, France and Germany is still active and that recent CIA strikes in Pakistan were aimed at al-Qaida operatives suspected in the threat.
One must wonder if the rash of high-profile alerts and arrests initiated by Dutch and Swedish authorities lately are related to this heightened state of vigilance on the part of European security. They clearly are not taking any chances.
The plot was still in its early stages and not considered serious enough to raise the terror threat level, officials said. Still, the Eiffel Tower in Paris was briefly evacuated Tuesday -- the second time in two weeks because of an unspecified threat -- and French police were on alert.
France has reported an imminent threat of attacks, including a possible strike by a female suicide bomber.
A heavy police presence was seen Wednesday around Buckingham Palace, Trafalgar Square and Big Ben. Victoria Station was briefly evacuated after an unusual smell was reported.
"This plot was in its embryonic stages," a British government official told The Associated Press, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of his work. He said the plot had preoccupied the security community more than other recent threats, but did not merit changing the security threat level from severe to critical.
Some details about the plot came from Ahmed Siddiqui, a German citizen of Afghan background who was captured in Afghanistan in July, a U.S. official said. [...]
Siddiqui was apparently on his way back to Europe when he was captured.
U.S. intelligence had heard of the European plot about a month ago and was monitoring the people involved, according to two U.S. officials. The CIA recently stepped up airstrikes from unmanned aircraft in northern Pakistan, in part to disrupt the plot.
However, a British government official said that while the drone strikes were thought to have disrupted the planning of the attacks, the operation was still considered active. He spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of his work.
The Obama administration has intensified the use of drone-fired missiles in Pakistan's border area. This month there have been at least 21 attacks -- more than double the highest number fired in any other single month
And Pakistan's threats. First: "Pakistan threatens NATO "it will stop protecting U.S. and NATO supply lines to Afghanistan"," by Kimberly Dozier and Chris Brummitt for the Associated Press, September 28:
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan -- Pakistan has told NATO leaders it will stop protecting U.S. and NATO supply lines to Afghanistan if foreign aircraft stage further cross-border attacks against fleeing militants, security officials said Tuesday.
If carried out, such a threat would have major consequences on the war in Afghanistan as well as on Pakistan's relationship with the United States, which is vitally important for both nations. Analysts said there was little or no chance of Islamabad carrying though with it, however.
It was also a clear sign of Pakistani unease at the attacks on Saturday and Monday by NATO aircraft against militants in its northwest tribal areas and a reminder of the leverage the country has in its complicated alliance with Washington....
And the military threat. "Pakistan threatens action over NATO incursions," by Nasir Habib for CNN, September 29:
Islamabad, Pakistan (CNN) -- Pakistan's foreign minister said Wednesday his country may use military force to stop violations of its territory.
"We will not allow anyone in any case to interfere in Pakistan's territory and if this continues, we will adopt all the set measures including military action," Rehman Malik told reporters. "I assure you we are quite capable of defending our homeland."...
Not against jihadists, clearly.
Posted by Marisol on September 29, 2010 4:23 PM
Recent strikes on Pakistan driven by newly uncovered jihad plot; Pakistan threatens end of protection of supply lines, military force
Pakistan won't do what its leaders promised, and is determined to ensure no one else does.
Apparently we're just supposed to sit back, trust duplicitous Pakistan, and get attacked again. It seems Pakistan would like that a great deal, at least until Islamabad is lost to the very jihadists it has collaborated with in the name of sticking a finger in the eye of the U.S. and India.
Priorities. "Terror plot in Europe prompted drone strikes," by Paisley Dodds for the Associated Press, September 29:
LONDON - Security officials said Wednesday a terror plot to wage Mumbai-style shooting sprees or other attacks in Britain, France and Germany is still active and that recent CIA strikes in Pakistan were aimed at al-Qaida operatives suspected in the threat.
One must wonder if the rash of high-profile alerts and arrests initiated by Dutch and Swedish authorities lately are related to this heightened state of vigilance on the part of European security. They clearly are not taking any chances.
The plot was still in its early stages and not considered serious enough to raise the terror threat level, officials said. Still, the Eiffel Tower in Paris was briefly evacuated Tuesday -- the second time in two weeks because of an unspecified threat -- and French police were on alert.
France has reported an imminent threat of attacks, including a possible strike by a female suicide bomber.
A heavy police presence was seen Wednesday around Buckingham Palace, Trafalgar Square and Big Ben. Victoria Station was briefly evacuated after an unusual smell was reported.
"This plot was in its embryonic stages," a British government official told The Associated Press, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of his work. He said the plot had preoccupied the security community more than other recent threats, but did not merit changing the security threat level from severe to critical.
Some details about the plot came from Ahmed Siddiqui, a German citizen of Afghan background who was captured in Afghanistan in July, a U.S. official said. [...]
Siddiqui was apparently on his way back to Europe when he was captured.
U.S. intelligence had heard of the European plot about a month ago and was monitoring the people involved, according to two U.S. officials. The CIA recently stepped up airstrikes from unmanned aircraft in northern Pakistan, in part to disrupt the plot.
However, a British government official said that while the drone strikes were thought to have disrupted the planning of the attacks, the operation was still considered active. He spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of his work.
The Obama administration has intensified the use of drone-fired missiles in Pakistan's border area. This month there have been at least 21 attacks -- more than double the highest number fired in any other single month
And Pakistan's threats. First: "Pakistan threatens NATO "it will stop protecting U.S. and NATO supply lines to Afghanistan"," by Kimberly Dozier and Chris Brummitt for the Associated Press, September 28:
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan -- Pakistan has told NATO leaders it will stop protecting U.S. and NATO supply lines to Afghanistan if foreign aircraft stage further cross-border attacks against fleeing militants, security officials said Tuesday.
If carried out, such a threat would have major consequences on the war in Afghanistan as well as on Pakistan's relationship with the United States, which is vitally important for both nations. Analysts said there was little or no chance of Islamabad carrying though with it, however.
It was also a clear sign of Pakistani unease at the attacks on Saturday and Monday by NATO aircraft against militants in its northwest tribal areas and a reminder of the leverage the country has in its complicated alliance with Washington....
And the military threat. "Pakistan threatens action over NATO incursions," by Nasir Habib for CNN, September 29:
Islamabad, Pakistan (CNN) -- Pakistan's foreign minister said Wednesday his country may use military force to stop violations of its territory.
"We will not allow anyone in any case to interfere in Pakistan's territory and if this continues, we will adopt all the set measures including military action," Rehman Malik told reporters. "I assure you we are quite capable of defending our homeland."...
Not against jihadists, clearly.
Posted by Marisol on September 29, 2010 4:23 PM
Military Physicians Oppose Abortion Mandate
From The National Catholic Register and Alliance Defense Fund:
Military Physicians Oppose Abortion Mandate
Share by RICH DALY, REGISTER CORRESPONDENT 09/30/2010 Comments (3)
Dr. David Stevens, CEO of the Christian Medical Association, is among those voicing opposition to the Obama administration's proposal to allow abortions at military facilities.
WASHINGTON — Christian physicians in the U.S. military are concerned that Congress may soon vote to require them and their colleagues to participate in elective abortions at U.S. military bases domestically and overseas.
The highly controversial provision is included in the annual bill that directs spending for the Department of Defense.
The bill, which was rejected by all 41 Republican senators in September due to concerns over the military abortion provision and other controversial items it included, will be brought up for another vote after the midterm elections.
So Christian physicians and their pro-life allies are gearing up for another fight.
Dr. David Stevens, CEO of the Christian Medical and Dental Associations, a group of 17,000 clinicians, launched a renewed outreach and educational effort toward senators in late September after Democratic leaders revealed they planned another vote on the defense bill during the so-called lame-duck session following the Nov. 2 election. Among their chief concerns is the fact that the abortion provision, which would roll back a 1996 law that banned the use of military facilities and personnel for elective abortions, is that it lacks conscience protections for physicians who morally object to abortion.
“In the military, when you get an order, you follow it,” Stevens said. “It’s very difficult to opt out of the abortion process in a military setting.”
More than 250 active-duty physician members of the Christian Medical and Dental Associations wrote to senators in August stating that the elective-abortion provision would endanger their ability to follow both their Hippocratic Oath and Judeo-Christian ethics.
“It’s just a situation they shouldn’t have to be placed in,” said Mary Harned, counsel at Americans United for Life. “These are clinicians and facilities that are intended to save the lives of members of the military, not perform abortions.”
Although the military does offer conscience protections for military doctors, the possibility of politically driven repercussions for those who refused was raised the last time the issue came up under a president who supported abortion.
In 1993, President Bill Clinton required the military to offer elective abortions in all of its facilities and thousands of military physicians signed a petition stating that they would not participate in those “procedures.”
Some pro-abortion Democratic leaders in Congress viewed this as insubordination and were considering action when the 1994 elections occurred and swept pro-life Republicans into control of Congress, recalled pro-life advocates.
Supporters of the measure counter that the existing conscience protections in the military code offer sufficient protection for military clinicians who do not want to participate in abortions. For them, the primary issue is one of access.
“Women in the military should have access to the same quality care available to women in our country,” said Nancy Keenan, president of NARAL Pro-Choice America, in a written statement. “Signing up to serve in the armed forces shouldn’t cause women to lose health-care options if they’re stationed overseas.”
Election Impact Possible
The next Senate vote on the measure is expected to be a party-line vote — just as the first vote on the measure was — unless the majority leader, Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., accedes to Republican requests to drop the abortion language and other controversial provisions.
The outcome of that vote also could be affected by close Senate races in Delaware, Illinois and Colorado, where the winner will be seated immediately after the election, instead of the following January. All of those seats are held by Democrats, and any Republican wins would expand their one-vote margin to maintain a filibuster majority.
Filibustering the entire bill is the best hope to block the abortion provision, according to pro-life advocates, because a pro-abortion majority in the Senate is expected to block any votes to remove the abortion language.
The critical nature of such votes on the overall bill led Americans United for Life to base its annual score on a member of Congress’ pro-life record, in part, on that vote. One Democratic senator who fell short of that pro-life score was Sen. Robert Casey Jr. of Pennsylvania, who joined all Democrats in voting to advance the defense bill.
“Senator Casey opposes the military-facilities provision,” noted Larry Smar, communications director for Casey. “As a pro-life senator, he does not believe that elective abortions should be performed on military bases that are entirely taxpayer-funded.”
Smar would not say whether Casey would support it if the abortion language remained. National Right to Life gives Casey a 42% pro-life score on its website.
Meanwhile, pro-life advocates both inside and outside the Senate are pushing for Reid to drop the abortion language before bringing the measure back after the election.
“The pro-life position is to not approve the bill until the abortion provision is taken out,” said Douglas Johnson, legislative director at the National Right to Life Committee. “If [Casey] would say to Reid that he was withholding his support until this provision was taken out, then that would make a big difference.”
As a stopgap, pro-life advocates are holding out hope that any bill that passed the Senate containing the abortion mandate would be changed when it was melded with the House-passed version, which does not contain any such language. The meeting to combine the two defense bills also would be led by Rep. Ike Skelton, D-Mo., chairman of the Armed Services Committee, whose spokeswoman described as “very pro-life.” National Right to Life gives Skelton a 66% pro-life rating.
Rich Daly writes from Washington
Military Physicians Oppose Abortion Mandate
Share by RICH DALY, REGISTER CORRESPONDENT 09/30/2010 Comments (3)
Dr. David Stevens, CEO of the Christian Medical Association, is among those voicing opposition to the Obama administration's proposal to allow abortions at military facilities.
WASHINGTON — Christian physicians in the U.S. military are concerned that Congress may soon vote to require them and their colleagues to participate in elective abortions at U.S. military bases domestically and overseas.
The highly controversial provision is included in the annual bill that directs spending for the Department of Defense.
The bill, which was rejected by all 41 Republican senators in September due to concerns over the military abortion provision and other controversial items it included, will be brought up for another vote after the midterm elections.
So Christian physicians and their pro-life allies are gearing up for another fight.
Dr. David Stevens, CEO of the Christian Medical and Dental Associations, a group of 17,000 clinicians, launched a renewed outreach and educational effort toward senators in late September after Democratic leaders revealed they planned another vote on the defense bill during the so-called lame-duck session following the Nov. 2 election. Among their chief concerns is the fact that the abortion provision, which would roll back a 1996 law that banned the use of military facilities and personnel for elective abortions, is that it lacks conscience protections for physicians who morally object to abortion.
“In the military, when you get an order, you follow it,” Stevens said. “It’s very difficult to opt out of the abortion process in a military setting.”
More than 250 active-duty physician members of the Christian Medical and Dental Associations wrote to senators in August stating that the elective-abortion provision would endanger their ability to follow both their Hippocratic Oath and Judeo-Christian ethics.
“It’s just a situation they shouldn’t have to be placed in,” said Mary Harned, counsel at Americans United for Life. “These are clinicians and facilities that are intended to save the lives of members of the military, not perform abortions.”
Although the military does offer conscience protections for military doctors, the possibility of politically driven repercussions for those who refused was raised the last time the issue came up under a president who supported abortion.
In 1993, President Bill Clinton required the military to offer elective abortions in all of its facilities and thousands of military physicians signed a petition stating that they would not participate in those “procedures.”
Some pro-abortion Democratic leaders in Congress viewed this as insubordination and were considering action when the 1994 elections occurred and swept pro-life Republicans into control of Congress, recalled pro-life advocates.
Supporters of the measure counter that the existing conscience protections in the military code offer sufficient protection for military clinicians who do not want to participate in abortions. For them, the primary issue is one of access.
“Women in the military should have access to the same quality care available to women in our country,” said Nancy Keenan, president of NARAL Pro-Choice America, in a written statement. “Signing up to serve in the armed forces shouldn’t cause women to lose health-care options if they’re stationed overseas.”
Election Impact Possible
The next Senate vote on the measure is expected to be a party-line vote — just as the first vote on the measure was — unless the majority leader, Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., accedes to Republican requests to drop the abortion language and other controversial provisions.
The outcome of that vote also could be affected by close Senate races in Delaware, Illinois and Colorado, where the winner will be seated immediately after the election, instead of the following January. All of those seats are held by Democrats, and any Republican wins would expand their one-vote margin to maintain a filibuster majority.
Filibustering the entire bill is the best hope to block the abortion provision, according to pro-life advocates, because a pro-abortion majority in the Senate is expected to block any votes to remove the abortion language.
The critical nature of such votes on the overall bill led Americans United for Life to base its annual score on a member of Congress’ pro-life record, in part, on that vote. One Democratic senator who fell short of that pro-life score was Sen. Robert Casey Jr. of Pennsylvania, who joined all Democrats in voting to advance the defense bill.
“Senator Casey opposes the military-facilities provision,” noted Larry Smar, communications director for Casey. “As a pro-life senator, he does not believe that elective abortions should be performed on military bases that are entirely taxpayer-funded.”
Smar would not say whether Casey would support it if the abortion language remained. National Right to Life gives Casey a 42% pro-life score on its website.
Meanwhile, pro-life advocates both inside and outside the Senate are pushing for Reid to drop the abortion language before bringing the measure back after the election.
“The pro-life position is to not approve the bill until the abortion provision is taken out,” said Douglas Johnson, legislative director at the National Right to Life Committee. “If [Casey] would say to Reid that he was withholding his support until this provision was taken out, then that would make a big difference.”
As a stopgap, pro-life advocates are holding out hope that any bill that passed the Senate containing the abortion mandate would be changed when it was melded with the House-passed version, which does not contain any such language. The meeting to combine the two defense bills also would be led by Rep. Ike Skelton, D-Mo., chairman of the Armed Services Committee, whose spokeswoman described as “very pro-life.” National Right to Life gives Skelton a 66% pro-life rating.
Rich Daly writes from Washington
Assassinating Americans, Secretly
From Campaign For Liberty:
Assassinating Americans, Secretly
By Jacob Hornberger
View all 73 articles by Jacob Hornberger
Published 09/30/10
Printer-friendly version
The Justice Department's motion to dismiss the ACLU's lawsuit in the Anwar al-Awlaki case confirms, once again, that when it comes to civil liberties, the Obama administration is no different from the Bush administration, and in fact is arguably much worse.
The al-Awlaki case involves President Obama's order authorizing his military and paramilitary forces (i.e., the CIA) to assassinate al-Awlaki, an American citizen. The proposed assassination is being justified under the Bush-Obama "war on terrorism."
No warrants. No grand jury indictments. No jury trials. No due process of law. Simply, assassination.
The assassination power now being wielded against al-Awlaki isn't limited to him. The U.S. military and the CIA can now assassinate any American they want. All they need is the president's authorization; and, according to him, he doesn't have to answer to anyone, including Congress and the courts.
Moreover, this omnipotent power to take out Americans is not limited to Americans living overseas, as al-Awlaki is doing. Remember the point that Bush made, which Obama has enthusiastically embraced: that the entire world, including the United States, is the battlefield in the perpetual, worldwide "war on terrorism" that the U.S. Empire is waging.
That means that the president now has the power to label any American he wants right here in the United States as a terrorist and issue the order to his forces: "Take him out, now, with bullets, bombs, or drones."
Does Obama need congressional authority before he assassinates Americans? Nope. The notion is that, like Bush, he's engaged in a real war, just like World War I or World War II and, therefore, he has the authority to kill Americans who, he claims, are supposedly fighting on the other side.
There's at least one big problem, however, with the Bush-Obama formulation of their "war on terrorism": Terrorism is a federal crime. It's on the books as a federal crime. It's listed in the U.S. Code as a federal crime.
Thus, it's not surprising that dozens of terrorism cases have been brought in the federal courts. Why wouldn't they be? Since the U.S. Code, which defines federal criminal offenses, lists terrorism among the many federal crimes, it stands to reason that suspected terrorists are brought to court to face federal terrorism charges.
As I have long pointed out, however, what the Bush administration did after 9/11 is simply announce that federal officials now had the option of treating terrorism as either a federal crime or as an act of war, whichever way they want to go.
As I have also long pointed out, not only does the Constitution not permit such an option to be exercised, it would be difficult to find a better example of a violation of the rule of law and equal treatment under law than that. Either terrorism is a crime (which it is) or it's an act of war (which it is not). To permit U.S. officials to choose one way or the other is the epitome of arbitrary, discretionary, ad hoc, totalitarian power.
Does an American have the right to secure judicial review to prevent his assassination? Not according to Barack Obama.
The ACLU sued on behalf of al-Awlaki's father seeking a federal court injunction against the assassination. Barack Obama ordered his Justice Department to seek an immediate dismissal of the suit.
His justification? The "state secrets doctrine," a doctrine found nowhere in the Constitution. Obama is arguing that to permit the suit to continue would mean that people would learn the details of his assassination program and the standards by which Americans and others are targeted for assassination. That would jeopardize national security, says Obama.
So there you have it. We now live in a country in which the military and the CIA can now assassinate Americans, on authorization of the president, who doesn't have to explain to anyone the standards for such assassinations.
That's what now passes for a "free" country -- the omnipotent, non-reviewable power of the ruler and his military and paramilitary forces to assassinate their own people.
Exactly who are the masters and who are the servants in such a society?
Jacob Hornberger is founder and president of The Future of Freedom Foundation
Assassinating Americans, Secretly
By Jacob Hornberger
View all 73 articles by Jacob Hornberger
Published 09/30/10
Printer-friendly version
The Justice Department's motion to dismiss the ACLU's lawsuit in the Anwar al-Awlaki case confirms, once again, that when it comes to civil liberties, the Obama administration is no different from the Bush administration, and in fact is arguably much worse.
The al-Awlaki case involves President Obama's order authorizing his military and paramilitary forces (i.e., the CIA) to assassinate al-Awlaki, an American citizen. The proposed assassination is being justified under the Bush-Obama "war on terrorism."
No warrants. No grand jury indictments. No jury trials. No due process of law. Simply, assassination.
The assassination power now being wielded against al-Awlaki isn't limited to him. The U.S. military and the CIA can now assassinate any American they want. All they need is the president's authorization; and, according to him, he doesn't have to answer to anyone, including Congress and the courts.
Moreover, this omnipotent power to take out Americans is not limited to Americans living overseas, as al-Awlaki is doing. Remember the point that Bush made, which Obama has enthusiastically embraced: that the entire world, including the United States, is the battlefield in the perpetual, worldwide "war on terrorism" that the U.S. Empire is waging.
That means that the president now has the power to label any American he wants right here in the United States as a terrorist and issue the order to his forces: "Take him out, now, with bullets, bombs, or drones."
Does Obama need congressional authority before he assassinates Americans? Nope. The notion is that, like Bush, he's engaged in a real war, just like World War I or World War II and, therefore, he has the authority to kill Americans who, he claims, are supposedly fighting on the other side.
There's at least one big problem, however, with the Bush-Obama formulation of their "war on terrorism": Terrorism is a federal crime. It's on the books as a federal crime. It's listed in the U.S. Code as a federal crime.
Thus, it's not surprising that dozens of terrorism cases have been brought in the federal courts. Why wouldn't they be? Since the U.S. Code, which defines federal criminal offenses, lists terrorism among the many federal crimes, it stands to reason that suspected terrorists are brought to court to face federal terrorism charges.
As I have long pointed out, however, what the Bush administration did after 9/11 is simply announce that federal officials now had the option of treating terrorism as either a federal crime or as an act of war, whichever way they want to go.
As I have also long pointed out, not only does the Constitution not permit such an option to be exercised, it would be difficult to find a better example of a violation of the rule of law and equal treatment under law than that. Either terrorism is a crime (which it is) or it's an act of war (which it is not). To permit U.S. officials to choose one way or the other is the epitome of arbitrary, discretionary, ad hoc, totalitarian power.
Does an American have the right to secure judicial review to prevent his assassination? Not according to Barack Obama.
The ACLU sued on behalf of al-Awlaki's father seeking a federal court injunction against the assassination. Barack Obama ordered his Justice Department to seek an immediate dismissal of the suit.
His justification? The "state secrets doctrine," a doctrine found nowhere in the Constitution. Obama is arguing that to permit the suit to continue would mean that people would learn the details of his assassination program and the standards by which Americans and others are targeted for assassination. That would jeopardize national security, says Obama.
So there you have it. We now live in a country in which the military and the CIA can now assassinate Americans, on authorization of the president, who doesn't have to explain to anyone the standards for such assassinations.
That's what now passes for a "free" country -- the omnipotent, non-reviewable power of the ruler and his military and paramilitary forces to assassinate their own people.
Exactly who are the masters and who are the servants in such a society?
Jacob Hornberger is founder and president of The Future of Freedom Foundation
Activity Had To Cease When FBI Conducted A Hamas Operative On A Tour Of The Top Secret NCTC
From Big Peace:
FALLOUT: ‘Plugs had to be pulled on our system’ to clear Hamas operative to tour Top-Secret NCTC, ‘The NCTC has Kifah Mustapha on the highest watch list we have’
Posted by Patrick S. Poole Sep 30th 2010 at 7:31 am in Featured Story, Islamic extremism
Comments (57)The fallout continues in response to my Big Peace article filed on Monday concerning a known Hamas operative and unindicted co-conspirator in the largest terrorism finance trial in U.S. history who was given a VIP tour of the top-secret National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC) and the FBI training center at Quantico as part of a six-week FBI Citizen Academy arranged by the FBI Chicago Field Office.
Now a Homeland Security official (requesting anonymity for fear of retaliation by superiors) has contacted Big Peace saying that “the plugs had to be pulled on our system” in order to allow Kifah Mustapha to enter the NCTC and that “the NCTC has Kifah Mustapha on the highest watch list we have. There’s no way from a systems point-of-view that this could be an accidental oversight, unless they didn’t bother checking at all as they are required to do.”
The DHS official added, “It’s as if we haven’t learned anything from twenty years of reaching out to the wrong people in the Muslim community.”
My report on Monday was prompted by a WLS ABC7-Chicago story over the weekend by news anchor Ben Bradley describing his participation in the FBI’s Citizen Academy with Kifah Mustapha. As I noted then, curiously absent from Bradley’s story was any mention of his Hamas travel partner’s terror-tied background. Even more curious, ABC7 had aired an investigative report back in March about Mustapha, along with several subsequent reports about his de-certification by the Illinois State Police as a Muslim chaplain after failing a background check. Mustapha is currently suing the State Police claiming discrimination with the help of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), identified by FBI Special Agent Lara Burns during the 2008 Holy Land Foundation trial as a Hamas front group.
What makes Bradley’s silence about Kifah Mustapha’s activities in support of Hamas all the more odd is that one of his own ABC7 colleagues, Chuck Goudie, published an editorial three weeks before Bradley’s story aired contrasting the Illinois State Police’s de-certification of Mustapha and the FBI’s open embrace of the Hamas operative.
Mustapha’s terrorist support activities are laid out in court documents filed by federal prosecutors in the Holy Land Foundation case:
- Kifah Mustapha was personally named unindicted co-conspirator (#31) in the case, identifying him as a member of the Muslim Brotherhood’s Palestine Committee that federal prosecutors say was formed to raise money for Hamas and was “committed to the globalization of Islam and violent jihad.”
- Holy Land Foundation records confiscated by the FBI indicate that he was a longtime employee of the group and was paid more than $154,000 between 1996 and 2000 when the group’s financial support for Hamas was at its peak.
- FBI Agent Lara Burns testified during the trial that Mustapha was a member of the notorious Al-Sakhra Band sponsored by the Holy Land Foundation and the Islamic Association for Palestine (another Hamas front group that was the parent group to CAIR) that regularly featured songs about murdering Jews and glorifying Hamas. The leader of the singing group, Mufid Abdelqader, was convicted and sentenced to 20 years in prison.
- In a deposition in a civil case filed against the Holy Land Foundation and other Islamic groups by the parents of a Chicago teenager murdered by Hamas at a bus stop in Israel (the groups were found liable in a $156 million judgment), Mustapha admitted that he was the registered agent for the Holy Land Foundation’s Illinois office. His Chicago-area office was specifically named by the U.S. Treasury when the group was listed as a specially designated global terrorist group in December 2001.
- The Bridgeview Foundation, the mosque where Mustapha is presently an imam, was identified by the Chicago Tribune in 2004 as a national hot-spot for Hamas fundraising and terrorist support.
The stark contradiction of the NCTC placing an individual on a terror watch list (as represented by the Homeland Security official we spoke with yesterday) based on evidence collected by the FBI and presented by federal prosecutors in a terrorism financing trial, and then being granted access to that same top-secret NCTC facility by the same FBI, is is painfully obvious.
But it should be noted that this is not the first time that Kifah Mustapha has been granted access to secure areas accessible only to Homeland Security personnel.
In June 2006, Mustapha was part of a group led by CAIR-Chicago officials that was given a behind-the-scenes tour of Chicago’s O’Hare Airport, one of the busiest airports in the nation. A report of the tour is still available on the CAIR-Chicago website, as are pictures featuring Mustapha at the secure area event hobnobbing with TSA officials.
As the Homeland Security official we spoke with noted, the U.S. Government has a very poor historical record in the “Annals of Outreach“:
- As I reported here at Big Peace earlier this month, the Congressional Muslim Staff Association invited Al-Qaeda cleric Anwar Al-Aulaqi to lead prayers on Capitol Hill after 9/11. Video of Al-Aulaqi preaching to congressional staffers was included in the 2002 documentary, “Muhammad: Legacy of a Prophet”. Al-Aulaqi was spiritual advisor to at least two of the 9/11 hijackers, and has been the inspiration for the Ft. Hood massacre, the Christmas Day Underwear Bomber, and the attempted Times Square bombing. He is currently subject to a kill or capture order signed by President Obama.
- In 1991, the first Muslim cleric to offer opening prayers in Congress, Siraj Wahhaj, was later named an unindicted co-conspirator in the 1995 “Day of Terror” trial of “Blind Sheikh” Omar Abdel-Rahman. The Blind Sheikh was sentenced to life in prison. Wahhaj served as a character witness for the defense during the trial. After NYC Mayor Bloomberg was told of Wahhaj’s past after meeting with the imam last year, Bloomberg later apologized for taking the meeting.
- The most prominent Muslim leader during the 1990s and immediately following 9/11 was Abdurahman Alamoudi, who was appointed a “goodwill ambassador” to the Middle East by the U.S. State Deparment and was the point man for establishing the Muslim chaplain program for the Defense Department. Alamoudi was the most frequent Muslim visitor in the White House during the Clinton Administration, and was courted by then-presidential candidate George W. Bush in the 2000 election. Alamoudi also bankrolled, along with large contributions from well-heeled donors in the Middle East, the establishment of the Islamic Institute by GOP activist Grover Norquist and Alamoudi acolyte Khaled Saffuri. But Alamoudi is currently serving a 23-year prison sentence after his conviction in an international plot led by Libyan intelligence to assassinate Saudi Crown Prince (now King) Abdullah in 2003. The U.S. Treasury Department later identified Alamoudi as a top Al-Qaeda fundraiser in America, saying that “the September 2003 arrest of Alamoudi was a severe blow to al Qaida, as Alamoudi had a close relationship with al Qaida and had raised money for al Qaida in the United States.”
- Helping Alamoudi hand-pick and train the Muslim chaplain corps for the Defense Department was Taha Jaber Al-Awani, chairman of the Fiqh Council of North America. However, his organization, the Graduate School of Islamic and Social Sciences, was raided by the FBI in 2002. Al-Awani was later named by federal prosecutors as “Unindicted Co-Conspirator #5″ in the terrorism trial of Palestinian Islamic Jihad leader Sami Al-Arian.
- Muzammil Siddiqi met with President Bush just days after 9/11, which prompted the media to ask questions about his service as a translator for the Blind Sheikh just two months before the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, where the Blind Sheikh exhorted Siddiqui’s congregation to violent jihad, and statements Siddiqi made prior to 9/11 warning of the “wrath of God” falling on the U.S. One former Secret Service agent, noting Siddiqui’s close association with Alamoudi, told Fox News, “the intelligence community has known for sometime the association of Dr. Muzammil Siddiqi, and Mr. Alamoudi and their association with terrorist organizations.”
- Earlier this year, a military contractor was suspended and an Army criminal investigation opened after Louay Safi was invited to speak on Islam to troops departing for Afghanistan at Ft. Hood less than a month after Army Maj. Nidal Hasan killed 13 soldiers. Safi was on base at Ft. Hood during the massacre. As noted by my colleague Andy McCarthy, Safi had been caught on federal wiretaps talking with Sami Al-Arian about President Clinton’s designation of Palestinian Islamic Jihad as a terrorist organization and its impact on Al-Arian’s U.S. operations. Safi was also named in a federal affidavit by U.S. Customs Special Agent David Kane in applying for a federal warrant as part of the Operation Greenquest terror finance investigation, during which Safi’s office was raided by the FBI. Rowan Scarborough has also reported on statements made by Safi encouraging violence against unbelievers and advocating for armed jihad.
With the VIP tour given to Kifah Mustapha, however, the U.S. government may have reached a new low. This story is developing, and we’ll provide Big Peace readers additional updates as we can.
FALLOUT: ‘Plugs had to be pulled on our system’ to clear Hamas operative to tour Top-Secret NCTC, ‘The NCTC has Kifah Mustapha on the highest watch list we have’
Posted by Patrick S. Poole Sep 30th 2010 at 7:31 am in Featured Story, Islamic extremism
Comments (57)The fallout continues in response to my Big Peace article filed on Monday concerning a known Hamas operative and unindicted co-conspirator in the largest terrorism finance trial in U.S. history who was given a VIP tour of the top-secret National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC) and the FBI training center at Quantico as part of a six-week FBI Citizen Academy arranged by the FBI Chicago Field Office.
Now a Homeland Security official (requesting anonymity for fear of retaliation by superiors) has contacted Big Peace saying that “the plugs had to be pulled on our system” in order to allow Kifah Mustapha to enter the NCTC and that “the NCTC has Kifah Mustapha on the highest watch list we have. There’s no way from a systems point-of-view that this could be an accidental oversight, unless they didn’t bother checking at all as they are required to do.”
The DHS official added, “It’s as if we haven’t learned anything from twenty years of reaching out to the wrong people in the Muslim community.”
My report on Monday was prompted by a WLS ABC7-Chicago story over the weekend by news anchor Ben Bradley describing his participation in the FBI’s Citizen Academy with Kifah Mustapha. As I noted then, curiously absent from Bradley’s story was any mention of his Hamas travel partner’s terror-tied background. Even more curious, ABC7 had aired an investigative report back in March about Mustapha, along with several subsequent reports about his de-certification by the Illinois State Police as a Muslim chaplain after failing a background check. Mustapha is currently suing the State Police claiming discrimination with the help of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), identified by FBI Special Agent Lara Burns during the 2008 Holy Land Foundation trial as a Hamas front group.
What makes Bradley’s silence about Kifah Mustapha’s activities in support of Hamas all the more odd is that one of his own ABC7 colleagues, Chuck Goudie, published an editorial three weeks before Bradley’s story aired contrasting the Illinois State Police’s de-certification of Mustapha and the FBI’s open embrace of the Hamas operative.
Mustapha’s terrorist support activities are laid out in court documents filed by federal prosecutors in the Holy Land Foundation case:
- Kifah Mustapha was personally named unindicted co-conspirator (#31) in the case, identifying him as a member of the Muslim Brotherhood’s Palestine Committee that federal prosecutors say was formed to raise money for Hamas and was “committed to the globalization of Islam and violent jihad.”
- Holy Land Foundation records confiscated by the FBI indicate that he was a longtime employee of the group and was paid more than $154,000 between 1996 and 2000 when the group’s financial support for Hamas was at its peak.
- FBI Agent Lara Burns testified during the trial that Mustapha was a member of the notorious Al-Sakhra Band sponsored by the Holy Land Foundation and the Islamic Association for Palestine (another Hamas front group that was the parent group to CAIR) that regularly featured songs about murdering Jews and glorifying Hamas. The leader of the singing group, Mufid Abdelqader, was convicted and sentenced to 20 years in prison.
- In a deposition in a civil case filed against the Holy Land Foundation and other Islamic groups by the parents of a Chicago teenager murdered by Hamas at a bus stop in Israel (the groups were found liable in a $156 million judgment), Mustapha admitted that he was the registered agent for the Holy Land Foundation’s Illinois office. His Chicago-area office was specifically named by the U.S. Treasury when the group was listed as a specially designated global terrorist group in December 2001.
- The Bridgeview Foundation, the mosque where Mustapha is presently an imam, was identified by the Chicago Tribune in 2004 as a national hot-spot for Hamas fundraising and terrorist support.
The stark contradiction of the NCTC placing an individual on a terror watch list (as represented by the Homeland Security official we spoke with yesterday) based on evidence collected by the FBI and presented by federal prosecutors in a terrorism financing trial, and then being granted access to that same top-secret NCTC facility by the same FBI, is is painfully obvious.
But it should be noted that this is not the first time that Kifah Mustapha has been granted access to secure areas accessible only to Homeland Security personnel.
In June 2006, Mustapha was part of a group led by CAIR-Chicago officials that was given a behind-the-scenes tour of Chicago’s O’Hare Airport, one of the busiest airports in the nation. A report of the tour is still available on the CAIR-Chicago website, as are pictures featuring Mustapha at the secure area event hobnobbing with TSA officials.
As the Homeland Security official we spoke with noted, the U.S. Government has a very poor historical record in the “Annals of Outreach“:
- As I reported here at Big Peace earlier this month, the Congressional Muslim Staff Association invited Al-Qaeda cleric Anwar Al-Aulaqi to lead prayers on Capitol Hill after 9/11. Video of Al-Aulaqi preaching to congressional staffers was included in the 2002 documentary, “Muhammad: Legacy of a Prophet”. Al-Aulaqi was spiritual advisor to at least two of the 9/11 hijackers, and has been the inspiration for the Ft. Hood massacre, the Christmas Day Underwear Bomber, and the attempted Times Square bombing. He is currently subject to a kill or capture order signed by President Obama.
- In 1991, the first Muslim cleric to offer opening prayers in Congress, Siraj Wahhaj, was later named an unindicted co-conspirator in the 1995 “Day of Terror” trial of “Blind Sheikh” Omar Abdel-Rahman. The Blind Sheikh was sentenced to life in prison. Wahhaj served as a character witness for the defense during the trial. After NYC Mayor Bloomberg was told of Wahhaj’s past after meeting with the imam last year, Bloomberg later apologized for taking the meeting.
- The most prominent Muslim leader during the 1990s and immediately following 9/11 was Abdurahman Alamoudi, who was appointed a “goodwill ambassador” to the Middle East by the U.S. State Deparment and was the point man for establishing the Muslim chaplain program for the Defense Department. Alamoudi was the most frequent Muslim visitor in the White House during the Clinton Administration, and was courted by then-presidential candidate George W. Bush in the 2000 election. Alamoudi also bankrolled, along with large contributions from well-heeled donors in the Middle East, the establishment of the Islamic Institute by GOP activist Grover Norquist and Alamoudi acolyte Khaled Saffuri. But Alamoudi is currently serving a 23-year prison sentence after his conviction in an international plot led by Libyan intelligence to assassinate Saudi Crown Prince (now King) Abdullah in 2003. The U.S. Treasury Department later identified Alamoudi as a top Al-Qaeda fundraiser in America, saying that “the September 2003 arrest of Alamoudi was a severe blow to al Qaida, as Alamoudi had a close relationship with al Qaida and had raised money for al Qaida in the United States.”
- Helping Alamoudi hand-pick and train the Muslim chaplain corps for the Defense Department was Taha Jaber Al-Awani, chairman of the Fiqh Council of North America. However, his organization, the Graduate School of Islamic and Social Sciences, was raided by the FBI in 2002. Al-Awani was later named by federal prosecutors as “Unindicted Co-Conspirator #5″ in the terrorism trial of Palestinian Islamic Jihad leader Sami Al-Arian.
- Muzammil Siddiqi met with President Bush just days after 9/11, which prompted the media to ask questions about his service as a translator for the Blind Sheikh just two months before the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, where the Blind Sheikh exhorted Siddiqui’s congregation to violent jihad, and statements Siddiqi made prior to 9/11 warning of the “wrath of God” falling on the U.S. One former Secret Service agent, noting Siddiqui’s close association with Alamoudi, told Fox News, “the intelligence community has known for sometime the association of Dr. Muzammil Siddiqi, and Mr. Alamoudi and their association with terrorist organizations.”
- Earlier this year, a military contractor was suspended and an Army criminal investigation opened after Louay Safi was invited to speak on Islam to troops departing for Afghanistan at Ft. Hood less than a month after Army Maj. Nidal Hasan killed 13 soldiers. Safi was on base at Ft. Hood during the massacre. As noted by my colleague Andy McCarthy, Safi had been caught on federal wiretaps talking with Sami Al-Arian about President Clinton’s designation of Palestinian Islamic Jihad as a terrorist organization and its impact on Al-Arian’s U.S. operations. Safi was also named in a federal affidavit by U.S. Customs Special Agent David Kane in applying for a federal warrant as part of the Operation Greenquest terror finance investigation, during which Safi’s office was raided by the FBI. Rowan Scarborough has also reported on statements made by Safi encouraging violence against unbelievers and advocating for armed jihad.
With the VIP tour given to Kifah Mustapha, however, the U.S. government may have reached a new low. This story is developing, and we’ll provide Big Peace readers additional updates as we can.
Pakistan Cuts Off NATO Supply Route
From Common Dreams.org:
Published on Thursday, September 30, 2010 by Al Jazeera English
Pakistan Cuts Off NATO Supply Route
Lorries prevented from crossing into Afghanistan in apparent retaliation for recent deadly cross-border NATO raid.
Pakistan has blocked a vital supply route for international forces in Afghanistan in apparent retaliation for an alleged cross-border helicopter raid by NATO troops that killed three Pakistani frontier soldiers.
A Pakistani motorcyclist rides past a parked truck carrying NATO supplies on the outskirts of Peshawar. Pakistan shut down the main land route for NATO supplies into Afghanistan Thursday, accusing the alliance's helicopters of killing Pakistani soldiers in a fourth cross-border attack this week. (AFP/A. Majeed)
Over the weekend, NATO helicopters fired on targets in Pakistan at least two times, killing several suspected fighters they allegedly pursued over the border from Afghanistan.
Pakistan's government protested against the attacks, which came in a month during which there have been an unprecedented number of drone missile attacks in the country's northwest.
Pakistan also threatened to stop providing protection to NATO convoys if the military alliance's helicopters attacked targeted inside Pakistan again.
Kamal Hyder, Al Jazeera's correspondent in Islamabad, said on Thursday that there are reports of 100 NATO supply lorries already being held up at the Torkham border post in retaliation for the earlier cross-border NATO raids.
"A NATO convoy had been moving through Khyber Pass, but the trucks were turned back from entering the Khyber region," he said. "We are also told that the CIA chief [Leon Panetta] in Islamabad has been addressing this issue."
Our correspondent also said that the Pakistani government is making quite a big noise about it. Pakistan said that ISAF [the NATO-led force] and NATO must respect the mandate under which they are operating. They are expressing deep concerns that, despite the fact that [ISAF] knew where these positions were, they still went ahead."
Critical supply route
Khyber is on the main NATO supply route through Pakistan into Afghanistan, where more than 152,000 US international troops are fighting the Taliban.
This supply route is critical for non-military supplies for ISAF: it is reported that up to 250 vehicles a day cross the Pakistan border into Afghanistan as part of the NATO supply chain. Pakistan's relations with NATO are already strained over the intensifying drone attacks in the border regions.
Rehman Malik, the Pakistani interior minister, said of the border incident: "We will have to see whether we are allies or enemies."
A permanent stoppage of supply vehicles would place massive strains on NATO and hurt the Afghan war effort.
Speaking from Kabul, Sue Turton, Al Jazeera's correspondent, said on Thursday that NATO had launched an investigation into the reports.
"Initial reports said that [the ISAF helicopters] didn't encroach on Pakistani air space. NATO claims it carried out the attack on the Afghan side of the border. If they do want to cross the border, which coalition forces say they often do in self-defence, they usually get in touch with their Pakistani counterparts beforehand, if not during the operation," she said.
NATO has said previously that it has the right to self-defence. The multinational force has on at least one other occasion acknowledged mistakenly killing Pakistani security forces stationed close to the border.
The surge in suspected Taliban activity inside Afghanistan and apparent increased willingness by NATO to attack targets on the border, or just inside Pakistan, could be a sign the international forces are losing patience with Pakistan.
The country has long been accused of harboring Afghan Taliban fighters in its lawless tribal regions.
Source: Al Jazeera and agencies
© 2010 Aljazeera.net
Published on Thursday, September 30, 2010 by Al Jazeera English
Pakistan Cuts Off NATO Supply Route
Lorries prevented from crossing into Afghanistan in apparent retaliation for recent deadly cross-border NATO raid.
Pakistan has blocked a vital supply route for international forces in Afghanistan in apparent retaliation for an alleged cross-border helicopter raid by NATO troops that killed three Pakistani frontier soldiers.
A Pakistani motorcyclist rides past a parked truck carrying NATO supplies on the outskirts of Peshawar. Pakistan shut down the main land route for NATO supplies into Afghanistan Thursday, accusing the alliance's helicopters of killing Pakistani soldiers in a fourth cross-border attack this week. (AFP/A. Majeed)
Over the weekend, NATO helicopters fired on targets in Pakistan at least two times, killing several suspected fighters they allegedly pursued over the border from Afghanistan.
Pakistan's government protested against the attacks, which came in a month during which there have been an unprecedented number of drone missile attacks in the country's northwest.
Pakistan also threatened to stop providing protection to NATO convoys if the military alliance's helicopters attacked targeted inside Pakistan again.
Kamal Hyder, Al Jazeera's correspondent in Islamabad, said on Thursday that there are reports of 100 NATO supply lorries already being held up at the Torkham border post in retaliation for the earlier cross-border NATO raids.
"A NATO convoy had been moving through Khyber Pass, but the trucks were turned back from entering the Khyber region," he said. "We are also told that the CIA chief [Leon Panetta] in Islamabad has been addressing this issue."
Our correspondent also said that the Pakistani government is making quite a big noise about it. Pakistan said that ISAF [the NATO-led force] and NATO must respect the mandate under which they are operating. They are expressing deep concerns that, despite the fact that [ISAF] knew where these positions were, they still went ahead."
Critical supply route
Khyber is on the main NATO supply route through Pakistan into Afghanistan, where more than 152,000 US international troops are fighting the Taliban.
This supply route is critical for non-military supplies for ISAF: it is reported that up to 250 vehicles a day cross the Pakistan border into Afghanistan as part of the NATO supply chain. Pakistan's relations with NATO are already strained over the intensifying drone attacks in the border regions.
Rehman Malik, the Pakistani interior minister, said of the border incident: "We will have to see whether we are allies or enemies."
A permanent stoppage of supply vehicles would place massive strains on NATO and hurt the Afghan war effort.
Speaking from Kabul, Sue Turton, Al Jazeera's correspondent, said on Thursday that NATO had launched an investigation into the reports.
"Initial reports said that [the ISAF helicopters] didn't encroach on Pakistani air space. NATO claims it carried out the attack on the Afghan side of the border. If they do want to cross the border, which coalition forces say they often do in self-defence, they usually get in touch with their Pakistani counterparts beforehand, if not during the operation," she said.
NATO has said previously that it has the right to self-defence. The multinational force has on at least one other occasion acknowledged mistakenly killing Pakistani security forces stationed close to the border.
The surge in suspected Taliban activity inside Afghanistan and apparent increased willingness by NATO to attack targets on the border, or just inside Pakistan, could be a sign the international forces are losing patience with Pakistan.
The country has long been accused of harboring Afghan Taliban fighters in its lawless tribal regions.
Source: Al Jazeera and agencies
© 2010 Aljazeera.net
Friday, September 24, 2010
What We Should Have Done To Afghanistan In Response To 9/11
Mk53 thermonuclear weapons that could only be carried by B-52s would have been especially nice.
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