Major Hasan’s Islamist Life – by Daniel Pipes

As the Pentagon and Senate launch what one analyst dubs “dueling Fort Hood investigations,” will they confront the hard truth of the Islamic angle?

Despite encouraging references to “violent Islamists” by Sen. Joseph Lieberman (Democrat of Connecticut), chairman of the Homeland Security Committee, there is reason to worry about a whitewash of the massacre that took place on Nov. 5; that is just so much easier than facing the implications of a hostile ideology nearly exclusive to Muslims.

Indeed, initial responses from the U.S. Army, law enforcement, politicians, and journalists broadly agreed that Maj. Nidal Hasan’s murderous rampage had nothing to do with Islam.

Barack Obama declared “We cannot fully know what leads a man to do such a thing” and Evan Thomas of Newsweek dismissed Hasan as “a nut case.”

But evidence keeps accumulating that confirms Hasan’s Islamist outlook, his jihadi temperament, and his bitter hatred of kafirs (infidels). I reviewed the initial facts about his record in an article that appeared on Nov. 9 but much more information subsequently appeared; here follows a summary. The evidence divides into three parts, starting with Hasan’s stint at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center:

• He delivered an hour-long formal medical presentation to his supervisors and some 25 mental health staff members in June 2007, the culminating exercise of his residency program at Walter Reed. What was supposed to be on a medical topic of his choosing instead turned into a 50-slide PowerPoint talk on “The Koranic World View As It Relates to Muslims in the U.S. Military” that offered such commentary as “It’s getting harder and harder for Muslims in the service to morally justify being in a military that seems constantly engaged against fellow Muslims” and the “Department of Defense should allow Muslims [sic] Soldiers the option of being released as ‘Conscientious objectors’ to increase troop morale and decrease adverse events.” One person present at the presentation recalls how, by the time of its conclusion, “The senior doctors looked really upset.”
• Hasan informed at least one patient at Walter Reed that “Islam can save your soul.”
• So apparent were Hasan’s Islamist proclivities, reports National Public Radio, that key psychiatry authorities at Walter Reed met to discuss if he was psychotic. One official told colleagues of his worries “that if Hasan deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan, he might leak secret military information to Islamic extremists. Another official reportedly wondered aloud to colleagues whether Hasan might be capable of committing fratricide,” recalling Sergeant Hasan Akbar’s 2003 rampage.

Then followed Hasan’s record at Ft. Hood:

• His supervisor, Captain Naomi Surman, recalled his telling her that as an infidel she who would be “ripped to shreds” and “burn in hell.” Another person reports his declaring that infidels should be beheaded and have boiling oil poured down their throats.
• In his psychiatric counseling sessions with soldiers returned from Iraq and Afghanistan, Hasan heard information he considered tantamount to war crimes. As late as Nov. 2, three days before his murderous spree, he tried to convince at least two of his superior officers, Surman and Colonel Anthony Febbo, about the need legally to prosecute the soldiers.
• Hasan routinely signed his e-mails with “Praise Be to Allah.”
• He listed his first name as Abduwalli, rather than Nidal, in the e-mail address in his official Army personnel record. ‘Abd al-Wali is an Arabic name meaning “Slave of the Patron,” where Patron is one of God’s 99 names. It is not clear why Hasan did this, but Abduwalli could have been a nom de guerre, this being a common practice among Palestinians (Yasir Arafat even had two them – Yasir Arafat and Abu Ammar).

Finally, Hasan’s extracurricular activities revealed his outlook:

• He designed green and white personal business cards that made no mention of his military affiliation. Instead, they included his name, then “Behavior Heatlh [sic] Mental Health and Life Skills,” a Maryland mobile phone number, an AOL e-mail address, and “SoA (SWT).” SoA is the jihadi abbreviation for Soldier of Allah and SWT stands for Subhanahu wa-Ta‘ala, or “Glory to Him, the Exalted.”
• He wore Pakistani clothing and sent money to Pakistan. Noting his apparent lack of ties to Pakistan as well has his abundance of disposable income, his money probably went to support jihadi groups.
• Hasan contacted jihadi web sites via multiple e-mail addresses and screen names.
• He traded some 10-20 e-mails with Anwar al-Awlaki, Al-Qaeda recruiter and fugitive from U.S. justice who was Hasan’s spiritual leader at two mosques, Masjid Al-Ribat Al-Islami in San Diego and the Dar al-Hijrah Islamic Center outside Washington, D.C. Awlaki acknowledges becoming Hasan’s confidant, speculates that he may have influenced Hasan’s evolution, and praises Hasan for the massacre, calling him a “hero” who “did the right thing” by killing U.S. soldiers before they could attack Muslims in Iraq and Afghanistan.
• Hasan had “more unexplained connections to people being tracked by the FBI,” other than Awlaki, including some in Europe. One official characterized these as “Islamic extremists if not necessarily al Qaeda.”
• Duane Reasoner Jr., the 18-year-old Muslim convert whom Hasan mentored in Islam, calls himself a “extremist, fundamentalist, mujhadeen, Muslim” who outspokenly supports Awlaki, Osama Bin Laden, the Taliban, Omar Abdur Rahman (the blind sheikh) and Adam Gadahn (Al-Qaeda’s top American figure).

These symptoms in the aggregate leave little doubt about Hasan’s jihadi mentality. But will the investigations allow themselves to see his motivation? Doing so means changing it from a war on “overseas contingency operations” and “man-caused disasters” to a war on radical Islam. Are Americans ready for that?

Mr. Pipes (www.DanielPipes.org) is director of the Middle East Forum and Taube distinguished visiting fellow at the Hoover Institution of Stanford University.

FPM

Deadly denial

by Lt. Col. Ralph Peters

As President Obama belatedly appears at Fort Hood today, will he dare to speak the word "terror?"

He won't use the word "Islamist." If he mentions Islam at all, it'll be to sing its praises yet again.

We've already learned that Islamist terrorist Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan attended the Northern Virginia mosque of Imam Anwar al-Aulaqi, a fiery al Qaeda supporter who later fled the United States. We know that Hasan's peers, subordinates and patients repeatedly raised red flags that his superiors suppressed. We know he was a player on Islamist-extremist Web sites. The FBI's uncovering one extremist link after another.

But to call this an act of terrorism, the White House would need an autographed photo of Osama bin Laden helping Hasan buy weapons in downtown Killeen, Texas. Even that might not suffice.

Islamist terrorists don't all have al Qaeda union cards in their wallets. Terrorism's increasingly the domain of entrepreneurs and independent contractors. Under Muslim jurisprudence, jihad's an individual responsibility. Hasan was a self-appointed jihadi.

Yet we're told he was just having a bad day.

Our politically correct Army plays along. Chief of Staff Gen. George Casey won't utter the word "terrorism." The Forces Command Public Affairs Office guidance for officers never mentions "Islam" or "terror," leaving you unsure whether there was a traffic accident down at Fort Hood, or maybe an outbreak of swine flu.

Meanwhile, the media try to turn Hasan into a victim. A sickening (and amateurish) Washington Post article portrayed him as a poor, impoverished minority living in a $320-a-month rathole apartment and driving a down-market car -- as if the squalor made him a terrorist.

Squalor he chose to live in, by the way: As a major drawing added professional pay for his medical credentials, plus his benefits, Hasan made a six-figure income. And he was single, without college loans or medical bills. Has anybody asked where the money went? I'll bet a chunk of it disappeared in cash donations to hard-core Islamist causes. Will a single journalist track the missing bucks?

It gets worse: On Sunday evening, a ranking officer in Hasan's medical chain of command raced to cover her butt. Asked why the killer was promoted to major after receiving career-killer performance reviews at Walter Reed, the officer claimed that Hasan faced the same promotion board requirements as everyone else.

Liar, liar, uniform on fire: A dirty big secret in our Army has been that officers' promotion boards have quotas for minorities. We don't call them quotas, of course. But if a board doesn't hit the floor numbers, its results are held up until the list has been corrected. It's almost impossible for the Army's politically correct promotion system to pass over a Muslim physician.

Sen. Joe Lieberman, one of the few lawmakers willing to whisper the word "terrorism," needs to call the officers who sat on Hasan's promotion board before the Senate, put them under oath, then ask if Hasan made major because of minority-quota requirements.

This corrupt (and now deadly) affirmative-action system does a severe disservice to the bulk of minority officers, who make the grade on quality and professionalism. It leaves other officers wondering if the new guy who just showed up in the unit is a "real" officer or an affirmative-action baby.

Ditto for our government's unwillingness to take on Muslim extremists on US soil. Blathering about freedom of religion, we foster hate speech. By protecting the fanatics, we betray the peaceful majority of our Muslim citizens, leaving them afraid to speak out, since the feds shield the fanatics in charge of their mosques and communities.

Let's be clear: Maj. Hasan's terrorism should not result in a witch hunt against Muslim service members. But soldiers who happen to be Muslims must be subject to the same level of scrutiny and discipline as those of other faiths.

Just as we'd expect the Army to get rid of a disruptive white supremacist, we need to cashier anyone who espouses violent Islamist extremism -- as Maj. Hasan did, again and again.

We won't. Because Islamist terrorism doesn't exist. Just ignore the dead and ask our president.

Ralph Peters' latest book is "The War After Armageddon."

Source: NYPost

Would a Jihadi by Any Other Name Smell as Foul?

The terminology we use to describe our enemy in the war on terror matters a lot. A spirited debate is underway among specialists and in the press.

An op-ed published Monday in the New York Times entitled "What do you call a Terror(Jihad)ist?", by P.W. Singer and Elina Noor, attempts to defend the recent State Department memo advising government personal to refrain from using theologically-laden terms-"jihadi," "mujahidin," "caliphate," "Islamo-fascism," "salafi," "wahhabi," "ummah"-when describing Islamic radicals and their motives. Instead, generics-"terrorists," "extremists"-should suffice. Read more ...

Source: American Thinker

New State Department lexicon forbids use of the words "jihad" or "jihadist"

By Robert Spencer

A reliable source has informed me that Condoleeza Rice has approved a new lexicon for State Department usage, absolutely forbidding the use of the terms "jihad" and "jihadist" by any State Department official.

The argument, of course, is the old Streusand/Guirard claim that by using the word jihad, we're validating the jihadist claim to be waging jihad. Of course, it's ridiculous to think that the U.S. State Department carries any validating authority within the Islamic world to determine what is Islam and what isn't. This would be the first time that unbelievers have set the meaning of Islamic theology for Muslims.

Also, the claim is that by using the word "jihad," we are insulting the peaceful Muslims who are waging the daily jihad of the struggle against sin, the struggle against the dirty dishes, etc. And that's great, if that's what any Muslim actually believes is the sum and substance of jihad, but it is an understanding of jihad that is at odds with the Qur'an, the Sunnah, and all the schools of Islamic jurisprudence. Will Muslims be insulted by a reference to other Muslims using the traditional primary meaning of jihad? Answer: probably. But that doesn't negate the traditional status of that meaning, or the influence of that traditional view in the Islamic world.

I will publish more information on this when possible.

Source: Jihad WatchCondoleezza Rice
Latest recipient of The Dhimmi Award

Hamas's Approach to Jihad: Start 'em YoungThe group takes a patient approach to deriving political support from religious conviction.

By Dan Murphy

Gaza City, Gaza - As a weapon in its struggle with Israel, Nahool the Bee doesn't look like a particularly threatening addition to the Hamas arsenal. He doesn't even have a stinger.

But what the bright yellow star of "Tomorrow's Pioneers" on Hamas-owned Al Aqsa television lacks in muscle he makes up for in fervor. Speaking in a recent episode, Nahool vowed to help take back Jerusalem from the "criminal Jews" and expressed his hope that he and all of his listeners would grow up to become holy warriors.

The show, along with paramilitary-style summer camps for Gazan boys, reveal a key element in Hamas's long-term strategy.

Like Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood, which spawned Hamas, the group takes a patient approach to tapping religious conviction to build political support. It is the movement's youth focus, critics say, that sets it apart from Hamas's rival, Fatah, which controls the West Bank and enjoys US and Israeli support. Read more ...

Source: Christian Science Monitor

A New, Younger Jihadi Threat EmergesTerrorism experts say radical groups are targeting teenagers as young as 14.

By Marc Perelman

Casablanca, Morocco - With a greeting that was as telling as it was macabre, Imane Laghriss dropped her satchel on the table of a trendy coffee shop here recently.

"It's stuffed with explosives, watch out!" snapped the young woman, echoing the grim humor commonly heard among Moroccan teenagers. But Ms. Laghriss's remark carried with it a degree of stark reality.

Four years ago, she and her twin sister, Sanae, were arrested for planning to blow themselves up inside Morocco's parliament. They were 14 at the time. The two were sentenced to five years in jail in 2003. After serving 18 months and nearly two years in a juvenile center, they are now free. Read more ...

Source: Christian Science Monitor
H/T: The Intelligence Summit