 Equal-opportunity jihad, and more evidence of the magnitude of the ongoing threat from Yemen.
"Alert: Female Suicide Bombers May Be Heading Here from Yemen," by Richard Esposito, Rhonda Schwartz, and Brian Ross for ABC News, January 22: American law enforcement officials have been told to be on the lookout for female suicide bombers who may attempt to enter the United States, law enforcement authorities tell ABC News. One official said at least two of them are believed to be connected to al Qaeda in Yemen, and may have a non-Arab appearance and be traveling on Western passports. The threat was described as "current" but not imminent, said the official. "They have trained women," said former White House counter-terrorism official Richard Clarke, an ABC News consultant. Separately, Britain raised its terrorism threat level to "severe," its second-highest level, days before London hosts major international meetings on how to deal with militancy in Afghanistan and Yemen. Britain's threat level had been labeled "severe" for several years before being lowered last summer to "substantial." American officials say a U.S. air strike on Christmas Eve against suspected al Qaeda training camps is believed to have killed many, but not all, of a group of suicide bombers being trained in Yemen. The man accused of attempting to explode a bomb on Northwest flight 253, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, told FBI agents there were a number of other people who trained with him in Yemen. "There are others who are still out there who have been trained and who are clean skins -- that means people who we do not have a record of, people who may not look like al Qaeda terrorists, who may not be Arabs, and may not be men," said Clarke. The alert comes during a week in which American law enforcement officials described an "unusually high" number of people on the no-fly list attempting to board flights to or in the United States. Six on No-Fly List Stopped in 48 Hours At least six people on the no-fly list were denied boarding in a 48-hour period between Saturday and Monday this week, according to the officials. [...] "What we don't know is whether this is because everyone is doing a better job of enforcing the no-fly list, or because the list has been expanded, or because the terrorists are attempting to probe our security," said ABC News consultant Clarke.... Read it all. With thanks to JihadWatch 
 Applying double standards by requiring of [Israel] a behavior not expected or demanded of any other democratic nation" is anti-Semitism. For over 46 years, Turkey has knocked on Europe's door requesting membership in the European Union. The Europeans, however, have been in no rush to invite a Muslim country into their midst, even if it is the most westernized and most democratic Muslim country in the Middle East.
To add to it, Turkey is already a strategic partner in NATO and nearly 3 million of its citizens are peaceful and productive immigrants/guest workers in Europe. Joining the EU, however, demands of Turkey far-reaching political and social reform "on the ground" and "10 to 15 years of negotiations" while the Turks prove democratic changes are "irreversible." On the other end, U.S. [and the Quartet] yardsticks for the Palestinian Arabs, a hostile society demanding statehood, amount to praise for fabricated non-existent reforms and call to abandon the required incremental progress as clearly stated in the "goal-driven Roadmap." The end to violence and democratic reform, that Palestinians have yet to begin, is tolerable by the U.S. administration -- all in order to forge the way for the establishment of a Palestinian state within two years, one which will endanger the very survival of a free and democratic Israel and the rest of the free world. Comparison of the goals and the ramifications of each: The Turks' goal is membership in the European Union - a political alliance that the Europeans have already stated will have an iron-clad reversibility clause for Turkey if it fails to live up to its commitments. The Palestinians' goal is sovereignty as a State - status for which there is no reversibility mechanism if 'Palestine' turns into a rogue state - the kind of polity the U.S. is currently grappling with in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Iran, North Korea, Yemen and elsewhere. Logically, the yardsticks of judging readiness and maturity should be at least equal, if not more stringent for the Palestinian Arabs, a society that consciously and purposely sacrifices its own youth for political gain and tactical advantage, with a leadership that champions the murder of Jews and suicide bombers. Freedom House, a non-sectarian organization founded by Eleanor Roosevelt to monitor civil rights around the world, appraised the Palestinian Authority with the lowest possible rating in its 2009 survey - deeming it "Not [a] Free" society.
At that level political rights and civil liberties are absent or virtually nonexistent, and people experience severely restricted rights of expression and association - all as a result of the extremely oppressive nature of the regime. These "realities on the ground" are totally ignored by the EU and the U.S. in their effort to advance immediate Palestinian statehood. Requiring Israel to cede parts of its land in favour of the Palestinians' empty promises, while their Charters call for the dismantling of the Jewish State, is "applying double standards by requiring of Israel a behavior not expected or demanded of any other democratic nation." Hudson New York
 Too much innocent blood has been spilled in the name of Islam. It is time the madness came to an end, writes Aijaz Zaka Syed* Terrorism, they say, is the weapon of the weak. But in our case it has become the weapon against the weak. The use of suicide is not something invented by Muslims. It's perhaps as old as homicide. Japan's harakiri comes to mind. But perhaps no people have suffered from it, and because of it, as much as Muslims have in recent years. So what drives a suicide bomber? And what kind of cause, however noble, makes you kill innocent people peacefully going about their day-to-day business -- people who haven't harmed anyone and pose no threat to anyone? And how can these faceless men, whatever their motives, ever think they would be forgiven, let alone rewarded, in the next life for their despicable acts against the defenceless? Is this what Islam really preaches and stands for? If not -- as we all know it doesn't -- why aren't our religious scholars, leaders and wise men raising a storm and doing more to stop these mad men bent on tarnishing the image of a noble faith and its billion plus followers? I have struggled with these questions every time innocent people are killed in a terror attack or suicide bombing. And these questions have been troubling me again since the mind- numbing attacks on a Muharram procession in Karachi and a volleyball match in Pakistan's north last week. The unparalleled scale of the attack on the Ashura procession in Karachi -- Pakistan's financial/commercial capital and political nerve centre -- has shaken a country that has long been used to daily mayhem of this kind. Nearly 50 people were killed and 500 injured in the Karachi attack. But more than the loss of lives, it is the devastation wreaked on the country's biggest city that day that will haunt Pakistan for a long time to come. Thousands of businesses, shops and commercial establishments were destroyed in no time, incurring losses worth billions of dollars. And the attack on the heavily attended volleyball match in the troubled Northwest killed 75 villagers, and left scores maimed. None of those watching the match or attending the Muharram procession had anything to do with the Western wars in Afghanistan-Pakistan or Iraq. They had no sympathy or affiliation whatsoever with the United States and the West. Then why have they been targeted? More importantly, what have the planners and perpetrators of these devastating attacks against unsuspecting bystanders achieved? But whoever said there is any higher purpose or noble objective behind all this madness? There's no method in the madness. This is an all-consuming monster that does not distinguish between friends and foes. In fact, paradoxical as it may sound, more Muslims than non-Muslims have been killed in macabre attacks carried out in the name of Islam. As regular readers would know, this humble hack has been doing his bit -- for what it's worth -- to question, critique and confront the big powers have been playing in the Middle East and Arab/Muslim world for centuries, and has gone to great lengths to point out repeatedly why US and Western policies are to blame for much of the mess you see in the Muslim world today, from Palestine to Pakistan. I have also religiously underscored the fact that groups like Al-Qaeda have been birthed and fuelled by Western double standards and unjust, callous policies in the Muslim world. And that even in the face of increasing threats from extremist groups and evidence of a clear link between cause and effect, the West has tenaciously refused to address, review and change its fundamental policies in the greater Middle East region. But that's another story altogether. Western actions cannot be an excuse for the kind of extremist violence that is being visited on Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iraq and elsewhere. Why are innocent people -- almost all of them Muslims -- being made to pay for Western policies and sins? And how does it help the "cause" of these so-called defenders of Islam when they target innocent Muslims, and non-Muslims for that matter? This death cult is the ultimate injustice and calumny against a faith that celebrates peace, reason, moderation and justice in all spheres. Why, Islam literally means peace! So what kind of Islam do these lunatics think they believe in when they send young, impressionable 13-year-olds who haven't even experienced what life is to die? The Karachi attack and the terror strike on the volleyball match are only the most recent instances of crimes committed in the name of a great faith. Pakistan's recent history, and that of the Middle East, is replete with such vile and craven crimes against humanity. Tens of thousands of innocent Muslims -- and non-Muslims -- have died in this mindless violence targeting bazaars, mosques, schools, hospitals... you name it. True, the self-styled "coalition of the willing" has visited a great deal of horror on Iraq and Afghanistan. But we are not any less injured by nihilists who kill and murder with impunity in our name. Let's face it: Some of the worst crimes against Muslims have been committed in the name of Islam by people who claim to be our defenders and champions. In fact, they are worse than the West because they pretend to be our friends and allies before they hunt us from within. If the invaders of Iraq and Afghanistan are not our friends, the folks who live in our midst to kill us from within like a cancer are not our friends either. This is the reality Muslims have to confront, and confront it now, before it's too late. And this is the message we have to send across Muslim lands and around the world. I do not know how many people, especially Muslims, paid attention to this year's hajj sermon. Addressing the white sea of three million pilgrims from around the world in Mecca, and by extension the larger Muslim world, Grand Mufti Sheikh Abdel-Aziz Al-Sheikh used unusually strong language to draw attention to the issue that has become the bane of the Islamic world. While Islamic scholars, including those leading prayers at the most sacred mosque on the planet, have been talking about the growing cult of the suicide bomber and warning against extremism, this is the first time anyone has condemned the menace with such force and in such unequivocal terms.
Warning Muslims around the world against the extremists, the grand mufti termed the spectre of terror and suicide attacks as "the curse of Muslim lands". He singled out the extremism and the death cult of suicide attacks as the "most serious problem" facing the Muslim community today. This is the message that has to be taken far and wide with the force and conviction with which it was delivered. This is a matter of life and death, literally. Religious scholars, politicians, intellectuals, the media and ordinary Muslims have to come together, deploying all resources and means at their disposal to free ourselves of this stigma distorting the real, pristine image of Islam before the world. Too much innocent blood has been spilled and too many innocents have died in the name of our faith. It's time to say enough is enough! Please, not in our name! For God's sake, not in our name! * The writer is opinion editor of Khaleej Times . Al-Ahram Weekly
 by Lt.Col.Ralph Peters
Our terrorist enemies are out-thinking us. It’s not only embarrassing, but deadly. The Taliban’s latest innovation was on display again last week, when a suicide bomber, reportedly garbed in an Afghan army uniform, killed seven Americans, including a CIA mission chief. The terrorists are “inside the wire.” Everywhere. From eastern Afghanistan to Texas. And we’re stalled. For all of our wealth, technology and power, our enemies have the strategic and psychological initiative. The low-tech nature of most reported combat in our recent conflicts obscures the advent of four powerful innovations in warfare. Unfortunately, three of those revolutionary techniques belong to our enemies. The single breakthrough we’ve exploited has been Unmanned Aerial Vehicles — UAVs, commonly known as “drones.” They’re a terrific stand-off targeting tool. Our enemies, though, have mastered new forms of the tactical fight — with strategic effects. They still lose every classic firefight, but they are pioneering the means to win without directly confronting our combat troops. The first terrorist and insurgent innovation of this conflict era was the bulk employment of suicide bombers, dirt-cheap weapons with a high probability of success — the poor man’s precision arsenal. Their second innovation was another cheap-but-powerful tool, the Improvised Explosive Device, the IED or roadside bomb. We still can’t beat it. Then, over the last year or so, we’ve seen the ever more frequent use of their most insidious psychological weapon: the suicide assassin disguised as “one of ours.” This is an anti-morale nuke. Our linchpin effort in Afghanistan is the development of Afghan security forces. (The Obama Doctrine: “When they stand up, we’ll run like hell.”) And building up the Afghan army and police relies on trust between our trainers and advisers and “their” Afghans — as well as between Afghans themselves. Last year, we saw incident after incident in which a Taliban cadre within the Afghan security forces gunned down our officers at meetings (the Brits took a really bad hit), turned their weapons on our combat troops or, most devastatingly, blew themselves up when we embraced them as comrades. Don’t let this weapon’s low-tech nature fool you. This is the big one. President Obama’s desperate “strategy” for Afghanistan relies on building trust — between Afghans and their government, but above all on the security front. Our enemies have done what we refuse to do. They’ve analyzed the problem objectively and engineered ruthless solutions. And we won’t even block their Internet sites. We make up fairy tales about the power of development projects to deter religious fanatics. We impose rules of engagement on our troops that protect our enemies. We ground our air power. We grant terrorists “legal” rights with no basis in existing law. And our enemies do whatever it takes to win. I want to see every one of those enemies dead. But I have to acknowledge their commitment, their maddened courage and their genius at waging war for peanuts. Our troops in the field know all too well what a self-imposed mess we’re in. But the gulf between our grunts and their generals is immense and growing wider. It’s a (literally) bloody disgrace that our ragtag enemies innovate faster and more effectively than our armed forces and the legion of overpaid contractors behind them. They ask themselves, “What works?” We ask ourselves what the lawyers will say. The crucial difference? Our enemies believe in victory, even if we don’t. Exile Street
 A GOD WHO HATES
The Courageous Woman Who Inflamed The Muslim World Speaks Out Against The Evils of Islam
BY: WAFA SULTAN
Reviewed by: FERN SIDMAN
In the immediate aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attack on the United States, it became abundantly clear to the Western world that there was a new and pernicious nemesis in town.
Radical Islamic suicide bombers had jolted us out of our torpor as we confronted the stark and frightening realization that our cherished democratic values, principles, code of ethics and very lifestyle were in existential danger.
In order to eradicate the visceral feelings of resentment of Muslims that were ruminating in the psyches of Americans and other westerners; the media, along with those in academic and "politically correct" circles initiated a campaign of "re-education".
Extolling the virtues of the religion called Islam, they put forth the notion that Islam is a genuine religion of peace; a religion that places a sacred value on the sanctity of life. We were told that only a few extreme "radical Jihadists" belonging to an obscure organization called Al Qeada were responsible for tainting and maligning the purity of Islam.
Wafa Sultan, an ex-Muslim dissident from Syria, offers a wholly different take on this sophistical premise in her shocking new book, "A God Who Hates" (St. Martin's Press - 2009) as she portrays a searing portrait of Muslim culture. The subtitle of the book describes Sultan as "the courageous woman who inflamed the Muslim world" as she "speaks out against the evils of Islam."
The reader is left with no doubt that Sultan is way more than a doughty and intrepid advocate of the truth, but a woman who is willing to place her life in mortal danger in order to preserve, protect and defend Western civilization as we know it. She raises the narrative to a highly profound level as she essentially reveals that, contrary to popular opinion, it is not a few "radical Jihadists" who are guilty of distorting otherwise warm and fuzzy Islamic precepts, but rather the culprit in engendering this kind of vitriolic hatred and bloodlust is none other than the Koran itself, along with the paradigm of the prophet Muhammad and the "god" known as Allah.
She refers to Islam, as "the ogre" as she explores the psychological roots of a nomadic people who invented this religion in order to assuage their own paralyzing fears and overwhelming feelings of desperation and helplessness.
Wafa Sultan knows from whence she speaks. Having grown up in a devoutly Muslim home in Syria, she recalls her very personal stories of the barbarism of Islam and how it impacted on her and her family. Being born female in a Muslim culture that enforces a male hegemony, Sultan recalls the humiliating degradation imposed on her grandmother, mother and sisters who were virtual slaves to their husbands and their fathers.
Contempt and loathing for women as inherently inferior beings permeates the Muslim world as is evidenced in today's alarming escalation of "honor murders" in which Muslim men brazenly murder their womenfolk for alleged transgressions of Sharia law.
Women's inhumanity to other women is also discussed here as Sultan tells us of the abusive treatment of daughter-in-laws by their own mother-in-laws who punish them in the same way that they themselves were tormented as young brides. Education for girls and women in Islamic society was sorely lacking and discouraged in order to keep them locked in a permanent state of servility. Their treatment of children is also spotlighted as abusive as the Koran mandates that they mete out corporal punishment to their children who do not pray or adhere to the tenets of Islam.
Sultan herself was fortunate in a sense. She was educated as a physician in Syria and her headstrong, independent nature compelled her to extricate herself from the draconian dictates of an oppressive religion. Moreover, as a physician in Syria she takes note of the glaring inequities of medical care as it pertains to gender. Dr. Sultan viewed Muslim men as anathema but as luck would have it, she met an educated man who respected her. After their marriage they made their way to the United States where she now raises her children and practices medicine in the Los Angeles area.
Citing a gamut of Koranic verses and providing concrete historical evidence dating back to the 7th century, Sultan proves that the predicate for Islam is unadulterated fear, violence, hatred of the other, theft and murder. From the genesis of the Islamic movement, the author informs us of Arab nomadic tribes raiding one another in bloodthirsty rampages that left sheer devastation in their wake.
Describing the terror and desolation that the Arab peoples felt so acutely during centuries of desert dwelling, Sultan tells us that the fear of dying in the arid and harsh desert from hunger, thirst, illness and the always imminent attack by another tribe created an anxious and violent nation whose sole objective was daily survival at all costs. Says the author, "Arabs who lived in the environment that gave birth to Islam were powerless in the face of the challenges presented by this environment, which threatened their lives and their welfare.
Because they felt so helpless they felt a need for forcefulness and created a god who would fulfill this need. When the Arab male lost his power he felt the need for a forceful god. And so he created a forceful god in the image of his need - but this god was not powerful."
Thus, the religion of Islam instills a hatred of the infidel, "the other" and anyone who does not subscribe to the tenets of their bellicose belief system. History has recorded that scores of heinous murders of Christians, Jews, Hindus, Sikhs were perpetrated by the hands of Allah's followers. Because their god is described in the Koran as "The Harmer:, "The Avenger", "The Compeller" and "The Imperious", it is Sultan's view that the Islamic people have internalized such labels and have sought to emulate the rudimentary character of their deity.
Brutal savagery towards anyone they perceive to be a threat and even against one another is one of the modalities through which Muslims actualized these "godly" traits. She describes the prophet Muhammad as a man bereft of moral authority; a pedophile and a purveyor or violence and falsehood; He gives his tacit approval to his followers to continue on the trajectory of "holiness" by engaging in hostile acts of religious zealotry, without regard for human life.
Offering eclectic insights into Muslim culture, Sultan tells us that because Islam is so riddled with strife, negativism and banal hatred it's language readily reflects this all encompassing disposition. As such, Muslims do not speak in a calm and reasoned manner but rather are vocally strident; resorting to constant shrieking, yelling, bellowing and shouting while engaging in acrimonious, ad hominem attacks against those who they are purportedly conversing with.
And that, of course, segues into a chapter called, "Who is that woman on Al Jazeera?". As a world renowned essayist, Dr. Sultan's opinions were well known through the Arab and Muslim countries. For that reason, the Al Jazeera television network invited her to debate a domineering Islamic cleric on the topic of "the connection between Islamic teachings and terrorism." It was in this venue that Dr. Sultan, having been denied the right to express herself or given enough time to state her case by the male moderator, did so anyway in an erudite and eloquent fashion without raising the volume of her voice; in contrast to her adversary who engaged in ear popping dialogue.
Given the last few seconds of the show to conclude her thoughts, Dr. Sultan was once again interrupted by the clergyman but this time told him in no uncertain terms to "Be quiet! It's my turn!". This kind of rejoinder is considered common parlance to us Westerners who enjoy watching television debates but these few words sent shock waves throughout the Muslim world. "I uttered this sentence without realizing it would open a new chapter in Arab and Muslim history. Never in the history of Islam has a woman clearly and forcefully asked a Muslim man to be quiet because it was her turn to speak", says Dr. Sultan.
Throughout this engrossing and compelling book, Sultan generously heaps praise on her adopted country. She acknowledges her appreciation for the plethora of rights, individual freedoms and liberties that she has enjoyed in the United States for the last 21 years.
She urges America to stand strong in the face of the proliferation of global radical Islam and suggests that it confront the burgeoning threat to our civilization that "the ogre" represents in a pro-active fashion. "I love America as few people do" says Sultan, and "my love for it makes me feel concern for it. I do not want any danger to threaten the safety or beauty of this country that rescued me from my fears and fed me when I was hungry. America, to put it very briefly indeed, is my freedom." 
 Police have identified children as young as seven being groomed for terrorism, with some expressing a wish to become suicide bombers. Up to 10 primary school pupils, aged between seven and 10, have been placed on a government outreach programme for individuals considered at risk of being radicalised and turning to violence. Some have taken inspiration from jihadi websites or after viewing extremist material in Islamic bookshops. One child was referred to the programme by his teacher after writing on a school book: “I want to be a suicide bomber.” At least 228 people, mostly teenagers and young men aged 15-24, have been referred to the anti-terrorism Channel project after being singled out as “potentially vulnerable to violent extremism”. “For people to be identified there have to be distinct changes in behaviour and warning signs,” said Craig Denholm, deputy chief constable of Surrey police who oversees the programme. “We assess each one on its own merits. There is a very small number of children aged seven, eight and nine.” The Channel project was launched after the 7/7 suicide attacks in London in 2005, when 52 commuters died. It is run by the Home Office and the Association of Chief Police Officers, but also involves schools, social workers and youth workers. Those displaying “concerning behaviour” are monitored by police, their parents are alerted and some are provided with mentors with moderate views. “The programme is not appropriate for people who are dangerous or have passed over into violent extremism,” said Denholm. “The whole purpose is to persuade.” Community policing tactics have been used in an attempt to divert them from an extremist path. Some of the children are offered “diversionary” activities, such as football coaching, or are sent on outdoor adventure courses to try to integrate them into mainstream society. Times Online
 One of the most visible leaders of an Al Qaeda-affiliated terrorist militia in Somalia spent a year in Toronto ingratiating himself into the Somali immigrant community as a convert to Islam.
Omar Hammami – known to followers as Abu Mansour "Al-Amriki" (the American) – ate at Somali restaurants and prayed in Somali mosques.
He married a Toronto woman of Somali origin and had a daughter with her.
Then, after learning Somali ways, he left to join the Horn of Africa's top terror group, Al-Shabab, to wage Islamic jihad and recruit other foreign nationals to the cause, say former friends and relatives speaking publicly of the terrorist's Toronto connections for the first time.
"He betrayed us," says a former friend who worked with Hammami at a Weston Rd. pizzeria. "For a man to be saying that, Islamically, it is okay to be killing innocent people – and yesterday you fed him bread and welcomed him into your houses – it kind of shatters you."
Five ethnic Somali men disappeared from Scarborough this fall, all friends believed recruited into Al-Shabab. Three are said by family associates to have since phoned home from Somalia. No direct connection to Hammami is known but in the Somali community his Internet postings are notorious.
On a 2008 recruitment video, referring to one of his dead fighters, Hammami says, "We need more like him.
"So if you can encourage more of your children and more of your neighbours, anyone around, to send people like him to this jihad, it would be a great asset for us."
A least 20 young men have left Minneapolis, Minn., for Al-Shabab in the last 18 months. One of them is confirmed to have blown himself up with a car bomb in the Somali port town of Bosasso. Five others are said by relatives to be dead.
Other young men have left from Boston, Columbus, San Diego and Seattle. Others have joined from Australia and the United Kingdom.
The suicide bomber who killed three government ministers and at least 16 others at a graduating ceremony for doctors and engineers last month in Mogadishu was recruited from Denmark.
Hammami himself is said to have been wounded in fighting late last year.
Al-Shabab's stated goals are to take power from the fragile government backed by African Union troops and turn Somalia into an Islamic state friendly to Al Qaeda. Ultimately, its leaders say, the aim is to establish a global Islamic state.
"We are striving to establish the Islaamic Khilaafah from East to West," Hammami writes in an Internet posting of Jan. 8, 2008, "after removing the occupier and killing the apostates."
For Torontonians, al-Shabab recruitment presents another terrifying possibility: A fanatic returns to explode himself in a crowd.
Or as RCMP Commissioner William Elliott put it in October: "The potential follow-on threat is Somali-Canadians who travel to Somalia to fight and then return, imbued with both extremist ideology and the skills necessary to translate it into direct action."
Omar Hammami is 25 years old. He grew up in Daphne, Ala., just outside Mobile.
His mother is Baptist by religion. His father is Shafik Hammami, a Syrian-born engineer with the Alabama transportation department and president of the Islamic Society of Mobile. Reached by phone last week, he refused comment.
Although Hammami grew up Baptist, he converted to Islam in the late 1990s while attending Daphne High School.
"He had tons of friends," fellow student Shellie Brooks told Fox News four months ago, "and of course things changed a bit when he converted because his beliefs changed."
In September 2001, Hammami had just started computer science studies at the University of South Alabama – and been elected head of the Muslim Student Association – when Al Qaeda launched its suicide attacks on the United States....
Read it all here.
 Why are we so bad at detecting the guilty and so good at collective punishment of the innocent?
It's getting to the point where the twin news stories more or less write themselves. No sooner is the fanatical and homicidal Muslim arrested than it turns out that he (it won't be long until it is also she) has been known to the authorities for a long time. But somehow the watch list, the tipoff, the many worried reports from colleagues and relatives, the placing of the name on a " central repository of information" don't prevent the suspect from boarding a plane, changing planes, or bringing whatever he cares to bring onto a plane. This is now a tradition that stretches back to several of the murderers who boarded civilian aircraft on Sept. 11, 2001, having called attention to themselves by either a) being on watch lists already or b) weird behavior at heartland American flight schools. They didn't even bother to change their names. In my boyhood, there were signs on English buses that declared, in bold letters, "No Spitting."
At a tender age, I was able to work out that most people don't need to be told this, while those who do feel a desire to expectorate on public transport will require more discouragement than a mere sign.
But I'd be wasting my time pointing this out to our majestic and sleepless protectors, who now boldly propose to prevent airline passengers from getting out of their seats for the last hour of any flight. Abdulmutallab made his bid in the last hour of his flight, after all. Yes, that ought to do it. It's also incredibly, nay, almost diabolically clever of our guardians to let it be known what the precise time limit will be.
Oh, and by the way, any passenger courageous or resourceful enough to stand up and fight back will also have broken the brave new law. For some years after 9/11, passengers were forbidden to get up and use the lavatory on the Washington-New York shuttle. Zero tolerance! I suppose it must eventually have occurred to somebody that this ban would not deter a person who was willing to die, so the rule was scrapped. But now the principle has been revisited for international flights. For many years after the explosion of the TWA plane over Long Island (a disaster that was later found to have nothing at all to do with international religious nihilism), you could not board an aircraft without being asked whether you had packed your own bags and had them under your control at all times.
These two questions are the very ones to which a would-be hijacker or bomber would honestly and logically have to answer "yes." But answering "yes" to both was a condition of being allowed on the plane! Eventually, that heroic piece of stupidity was dropped as well. But now fresh idiocies are in store. Nothing in your lap during final approach. Do you feel safer? If you were a suicide-killer, would you feel thwarted or deterred? More at Slate
 From CAN: Radical Muslim gangs whose members aspire to be suicide bombers have formed in Birmingham in England’s West Mislands County, the Sunday Mercury reports. The new gang, called Bang Bang Taliban, is known for creating YouTube videos with rap songs performed by the group’s members. The report says the members are mostly Asians and are connected to another gang called the Burger Bar Boys. “They’re threatening rivals with violence and talking about becoming suicide bombers,” the Sunday Mercury quoted one anonymous community worker as saying.
Police Chief Superintendent Tom Coughlan is optimistic that the problem can be tackled, surprisingly claiming that the Bang Bang Taliban and Burger Bar Boys gangs could be squashed in a few years. The report quoted another advisor to the government as describing Coughlan’s statement as “strangely naïve.” Muslim gang activity in the United Kingdom caused a huge stir in 2006 when Asian gang members killed a 15-year old boy in Glasgow for no reason. The attack was launched as a reprisal for a fight in a nightclub that was not related to the victim. The boy was kidnapped, at which point witnesses heard him screaming, “I’m only 15, what did I do?” The boy was driven 200 miles away, stabbed, beaten, and then burnt alive. The body was dropped back off in Glasgow. Three of the murderers fled to Pakistan. British prisons are becoming home to quickly-growing Muslim gangs as well. The Observer reported in May that a secret government reported warned that the gangs were taking control of maximum-security prisons. World Threats
 And the UN passes the “Defamation of Religions” Resolution. I was just about to shut my computer down when I realized that there are two breaking news items that I just have to share with you. First, according to NBC and ABC journalist Mark Schone, “Zawahiri’s Wife Releases Statement, Tells Women They Can Be Suicide Bombers.” What’s this? The twisted triumph of feminism, Islamist-style?
Women have been suicide killers before. Palestinians have forced/manipulated women as well a men into killing themselves as a way to kill Israeli civilians; various Muslim groups in Iraq and Iran, as well as the Tamil Tigers have also forced/manipulated women to become suicide killers. Why is Al-Qaeda’s Zawahiri allowing one of his four (or more) wives to take such an active public role? And, why now? Omaima Hassan , Zawahiri’s wife, first reminds women that their primary role is that of bearing and breeding a jihadic fighter’s sons. She counsels women to support jihad by keeping the warrior’s secrets and his home, and by wearing hijab. She also disapproves of women going out without a male escort or guide. But then, in an unconfirmed report, she goes further. According to Schone: “Hassan also suggests that women can become suicide bombers, which she refers to as "martyrdom missions." This is certainly different from what her husband said in 2008, in a “two-hour recorded interview posted on a web site.” Zawahiri, who is believed to be in Pakistan, insisted “that Al Qaeda did not have women members, and that the role of women in jihad was limited to taking care of the children of fighters and maintaining their homes.” One conclusion: Watch out for suicide bombers wearing burqas. The second piece of breaking news concerns the vote just taken at the United Nations.
According to L. Bennett Graham, Legislative and International Programs Officer at the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, the “Defamation of Religions” resolution passed the General Assembly in New York earlier today. It did so “by a vote of 80 in favor, 61 against, and 42 abstentions. As a matter of comparison, last year’s General Assembly passed the resolution by a vote of 86 in favor, 53 against, and 42 abstentions (in other words, the difference in last year’s votes was 33, this year it was only 19).
In 2006, 111 countries were voting in favor of this resolution. So despite another loss, the momentum continues to go against this concept.” Schiff thanks his supporters and all those who are “taking a stand for the freedom of conscience, thought, and religion…Our combined hard work continues to pay off, and while the issue of ‘defamation of religions’ continues to threaten the entire concept of human rights, we are confident that civil society’s voice will be fundamental in defeating this flawed concept and will ultimately bring a better understanding of freedom around the world. There is still plenty of work to be done between now and March, when we expect the resolution to come up again before the Human Rights Council in Geneva.” Let me understand this. Al Qaeda wants burqa wearers, both male and female, to blow us all up but the UN does not want us to say that such killers have anything to do with Islam or Islamic jihad (or with anyone’s interpretation of Islam), lest we commit a thought crime. I say: Shout it from the rooftops, set it to music, add it to our textbooks, teach our children.
As has been said: Silence=Death. Phyllis Chesler
 SAN'A, Yemen — Authorities say military operations targeting Al Qaeda hideouts and a training camp in Yemen have left up to 34 suspected militants dead, including four would-be suicide bombers, and led to the arrest of 17 others. Provincial security official Saleh el-Shamsy said airstrikes followed by a ground operation targeting a training camp in Abyan province south of San'a killed 30 suspected militants. Separately, the Interior Ministry said operations were carried out also Thursday in areas outside San'a, killing four would-be suicide bombers and arresting 17 suspected militants. The suicide bombers were in the Arhab district northeast of the capital. Yemen is troubled by a weak central government and a growing Al Qaeda presence. FoxNews
 Osama bin Laden's terror network has perfected the art of masking its unpopular agenda with a recruitment pitch that can hook just about anyone. Last week, five young men from northern Virginia and Washington, D.C., were arrested in Pakistan, alleged to have been eager volunteers for a terrorist-linked militant group in a region rife with insurgency.
The facts remain sparse so far, but this would not be the first time since the Sept. 11 attacks that Americans have left their country to heed al Qaeda's call to arms. These men, however, look different -- at least from the outside. The FBI explained that the five don't fit the typical profile of a militant supporter of al Qaeda, the Christian Science Monitor reported. They were from the middle class, educated, and not visibly marginalized from American society. Their grievances were not readily apparent. In fact, these men fit exactly the profile that the FBI and the world should now come to expect: no profile at all. A militant's profile lies not in his age, race, culture, or education; anyone can join or be adopted by the al Qaeda network, the only prerequisite being a willingness to accept the group's radical, cult like ideology.
So if there is a lesson to be learned from these recent arrests, it is that profiling won't work. We need something better. According to family members and those who knew them, the five were hooked in by radical messages of precisely the sort that al Qaeda is known for. They are thought to have watched the militant rhetoric on YouTube, enough to encourage them to take the trip abroad. Across the world, al Qaeda encourages could-be recruits to do exactly the same -- to become muhajiroun or "émigrés" who move away from non militant communities, families, and friends to join the brotherhood of armed jihadists. Indeed, one of the young men abandoned his career in dental school; another left his family only a farewell video promising to defend Islam. Such a desertion seems at first unfathomable. But al Qaeda succeeds because, for more than two decades, the network has waged a successful information campaign that pushes its message out to the world as effectively asymmetrical as its use of suicide bombers on the battlefield. Al Qaeda has dominated the battlefield of the soul among the disaffected, disenfranchised, and dissatisfied.
It promises action instead of discussion. It avows to defend Islam through suicide bombings and mass murder. (Recovered jihadists are often horrified to learn, with the help of mainstream clerics, that they have been duped by a fantastical corruption of Islam, best called bin Ladenism.) More at Foreign Policy
 SUICIDE bombers struck at the heart of middle-class Kabul yesterday, killing at least eight people and wounding dozens near the home of a former vice-president and a hotel popular with Westerners. The blast occurred metres from the Heetal hotel in the diplomatic district of Wazir Akbar Khan and just hours before President Hamid Karzai was to open an anti-corruption conference. More than 200 delegates, including foreign officials, were gathered at the nearby Foreign Ministry for the three-day meeting, which is a response to demands from Western allies for greater accountability and transparency in Afghanistan's central administration. But officials yesterday said they believed the target of the attack was former vice-president Ahmed Zia Massoud, brother of anti-Taliban hero Ahmad Shah Massoud, who was killed by al-Qa'ida two days before the attacks on the US on September 11, 2001. The latest blast comes as the US prepares to deploy the first of 30,000 additional troops to Afghanistan to boost the Western allied offensive against Islamic insurgents there. Shortly after the attack, Mr Karzai told the conference the explosion had badly damaged Massoud's house and killed two of his guards. Defence Ministry spokesman General Mohammad Zahir Azimi confirmed the strike killed four men and four women and wounded at least 40. An Afghan intelligence official in charge of security for the hotel said no guests were injured and the hotel suffered only minor damage, although windows in nearby buildings were shattered. The Heetal hotel is owned by the son of former Afghan president Burhanuddin Rabbani, who was deposed by the Taliban in 1996. An English student at Kabul University who witnessed the blast said he saw a black four-wheeled drive vehicle near the hotel. "It drove very slowly to the checkpoint" of the hotel, and then it blew up," Hamayun Azizi, 22, said. The bombing has ended a relatively quiet few weeks in the capital, which suffered rolling rocket strikes and suicide blasts following the August presidential polls. The last major attack was almost one month ago on the US-run Camp Phoenix military base on the outskirts of the city. The Australian
 From CAN: Up to five Somalis living in Canada disappeared earlier this month and the authorities are investigating whether they have joined the ranks of the Al-Shabaab terrorist group in Somalia, The National Post reports.
The individuals are believed to have flown together to Kenya, which borders the East African country currently suffering from a civil war.
“As you know, we have one of the largest Somali diaspora communities in the Western world,” the newspaper report quoted William Elliott, the Commissioner of the Royal Canadian Mountain Police, as saying during an October 30 presentation. “The potential follow-on threat, from a Canadian and RCMP [Royal Canadian Mountain Police] perspective, is Somali-Canadians who travel to Somalia to fight and then return, imbued with both extremist ideology and the skills necessary to translate it into direct action.” The National Post reports that if the group has indeed joined the terrorist forces in Somalia, they wouldn’t be the first Canadians to do so.
A businessman in Toronto was killed in 2008 fighting Ethiopian troops that had intervened in the conflict, and a “handful” of others had also joined the fight. Somali-Americans have also gone to Somalia to join al-Shabaab, at least two of which have since died in the conflict, including one who became the first American suicide bomber.
Press reports indicate that as many as 20 Somali-Americans have disappeared in the Minneapolis area and are believed to have gone to Somalia. World Threats
 A great development. The Saudis have a long way to go on the path to human rights and religious moderation, but the condemnation by the Saudi Grand Mufti, Sheikh Abd Al-Aziz Bin Abdallah Aal Al-Sheikh on November 26 does some great good. He condemns terrorism, and says that suicide bombings have damaged Islam. Notice that he doesn’t say suicide bombings are only bad in some circumstances. This a blanket condemnation that leaves no wiggle room for justifiers of the action.
 RELATIVES of the 52 people killed in the 7/7 London bombings reacted with anger yesterday after they were told the inquests will also include the legal examination of the deaths of the four suicide bombers who killed them. Lady Justice Hallett, the specially appointed coroner, said that the long delayed hearings would also cover the deaths of Mohammad Sidique Khan and his accomplices.
Graham Foulkes, whose son David, 22, died in the attacks, told The Times: "She told us that the inquests will have to include the bombers because it was the same event. I'm absolutely gutted about that. I hadn't expected that at all."
The families were also upset to learn that the inquests, to be held next year, could take place in partial secrecy under controversial new legislation and that they were not necessarily entitled to legal aid to appoint lawyers.
Representatives of some of the families were called to a meeting with Lady Hallett, an Appeal Court judge, in London and they emerged with concerns that she had been unable to answer many questions. The families have campaigned unsuccessfully for a public inquiry into the bombings to answer questions about what security services knew of Khan and his fellow terrorists.
 Palestinians will not launch a new uprising against Israel despite their frustration at the deadlock in US-sponsored peace efforts, President Mahmoud Abbas said on Monday. Israel has rejected US calls to freeze settlements in the West Bank, and Abbas - eyeing the internal challenge from Hamas - has refused to yield on this core demand and revive negotiations. But Abbas made clear that Palestinians do not want to see a repeat of their 2000-2005 intifada, which was spearheaded by gunmen and suicide bombers and met a crushing Israeli military response. "God forbid that we should come to a new intifada. The Palestinian people are not thinking about launching a new intifada," he told reporters during a visit to Argentina. "The Palestinian people are only thinking about the road toward peace and negotiations and no other path. We will not go back to an intifada because we have suffered too much." Abbas' visit comes a week after President Shimon Peres met with President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner in Buenos Aires and asked her to mediate in the Middle East peace process. Fernandez and Abbas criticized Israel's announcement last week of plans to build 900 new homes in the settlements. Argentina's president also asked the United States to step up its involvement in the peace process. "To build peace, besides finding common ground and respect for international law, we need to have the will for peace," Fernandez said. "I think this is a key element and that the United States sincerely can do more than what it's doing now regarding this." During a visit to Brazil last week, Abbas and President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva also condemned the Israeli settlements and demanded the creation of an independent Palestinian state.
 What does it take to make Islam bashers mend their ways? Why don’t these folks come to their senses and see Islam as a religion of peace and praise the God of Abraham for continuing his beneficence on humanity by sending Muhammad to guide and humanize us? Why is it that some people keep criticizing a religion that has nearly 1.5 billion followers throughout the world? Now, if this faith was indeed what its detractors claim it is, wouldn’t these masses of people see through it and dump it? Didn’t our very own President go around the Muslim heartland and sing the praises of Islam at every stop? Didn’t he bow with great deference to the King of Islam in Saudi Arabia? Didn’t he proudly proclaim Islam as the faith of his dear and near kindred?
Didn’t he, time and again, tell us that Islam is indeed the religion of peace? Didn’t he with his captivating oratory skills cite passages from the Quran to show how reverent he was toward this religion? Didn’t he appoint a raft of “devoted” Muslims to sensitive and high posts in government?
Even ignoring the President’s behavior and pronouncements, we have numberless others in the know such as politicians, media experts, academics and what nots who keep preaching to us that Islam is indeed a sanctified religion wrongly vilified by a bunch of hatemongers.
After all, its very name means peace. How could anyone possibly have anything but praise for a religion called peace? What is more precious than peace?
Exacerbated, the champions of the religion of peace bemoan: what does it take to convince the detractors of Islam to stop their unceasing effort to present a distorted image of this wonderful world-encircling religion?
Well, just a few problems that makes taking the President’s remarks and actions, as well as all the other Islamic apologists and know-it-alls, difficult.
* Claiming “Islam” means “peace” is fraudulent to begin with. Islam is an Arabic word. And the word for peace in Arabic is “solh,” and not Islam. Islam is derived from the root word “taslim,” which means submission or surrender. Hence, Islam’s true name, surrender, is in fact most descriptive of what it is: total, unconditional submission and surrender of the individual and the community to the will and dictates of Allah as revealed by his “rasool,” messenger, Muhammad.
* Further proof of the fraudulent nature of billing Islam as a religion of peace is the irrefutable fact that Muhammad himself led his followers during his lifetime in 78 battles, only one of which was defensive in nature
* Perusing the religion of peace’s holy book, the Quran, taken by Muslims as the literal revelation of Allah, reads more like a manual of intolerance and war than a divinely-revealed prescription from a benevolent God for a life of brotherhood and peace.
Quran 2:216 "Warfare is ordained for you, though it is hateful unto you; but it may happen that you hate a thing which is good for you and it may happen that you love a thing which is bad for you. Allah knoweth, you knew not."
Quran 8:65 "O Prophet exhort the believers to fight. If there be of you 20 steadfast, they will overcome 200 and if there be of you a 100, they shall overcome a 1000, because the disbelievers are a folk without intelligence"
* Deeds speak louder than words. From its very inception, Islam was a movement of violence.
Violence both within its ranks as well as against the non-Muslims has been the unceasing practice. The minute Muhammad died, jockeying for power among his disciples led to numberless murders and battles. The faith of peace never saw peace even within its own ranks and never allowed the rest of the world any peace at all by lashing out to other lands near and far.
* A quick scan of the daily news shows the adherent of the religion of peace engaged in unspeakable acts of mayhem and murder in much of the world.
There is hardly any need to allude to them here. But the Islamists have an answer for that too.
Islam is not responsible, they say. It is only a bunch of opportunists who commit these acts for their own political and economic objectives.
We are to believe that those daily suicide bombers explode their vests in the midst of marketplaces, funeral processions, and even mosques are doing so to further their own personal agenda. More at Amil Imani
 THIS week the world marks the 20th anniversary of the Berlin Wall's fall. Thirty-five years ago an event with global ramifications likewise occurred. On November 13, 1974, Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat famously addressed the UN General Assembly. Carrying a gun and an olive branch, Arafat appealed not to let the olive branch fall from his hand. Arafat's speech signified that the Palestinians had moved in international eyes from being a group of stateless refugees to a legitimate national movement.
Whether Arafat intended it or not, his statement also signposted two dichotomous directions for the Palestinians. One was the road to peace and reconciliation with Israel via mutual compromise and a two-state solution. This path would be encapsulated in the 1993 Oslo accord that led to the establishment of the Palestinian Authority, and almost resulted, via the American-auspiced 2000-01 negotiations, in the creation of a Palestinian State. The other was the unbending war of terror and violence reflected in suicide bombings and rocket attacks to achieve the destruction of Israel. Notably they did not endorse a compromise two-state solution that recognised the legitimate claims of Israelis and Palestinians. Rather, they simplistically constructed the Israeli-Arab conflict as an extension of the struggle between Western colonialism and the Third World, and recommended the elimination of the Israeli side of the conflict. Anti-Zionist fundamentalists captured the pro-Palestinian agenda. In 1974 and again in 1975, the extremist-influenced Australian Union of Students, passed motions calling for the elimination of the state of Israel and its replacement by a democratic secular state of Palestine. The latter term was a disingenuous euphemism for an ethno-religious Islamic Arab state, given that most Palestinian Muslims are highly religious. The motions were rejected by Australian students, but this did not deter the fundamentalists. The fundamentalist agenda cooled following the PLO's implicit recognition of Israel in 1988. However the outbreak of the second intifada in September 2000 produced a renewal of the inflammatory rhetoric from the far Left. The higher the tide of violence perpetrated by the Palestinians, the greater the fury and blame directed at the Israeli victims.
The March 2002 attacks provoked the Israeli invasion of the leading West Bank cities in an attempt to destroy the terror networks, and stop the carnage. Yet the first Australian petition for an academic boycott of Israel initiated by a small clique of Australian academics after this invasion in May 2002 was directed at the victims of terror. Another group condemned Deputy Prime Minister Julia Gillard's visit to Israel last June. The petition signatories seemed oblivious to the fact that more than one million Arabs are citizens of Israel; that the Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip overwhelmingly demand an Arab state rather than a Jewish-Arab entity, and that most Arab states ethnically cleansed their Jewish populations over 50 years ago. No exposure of the infantile slogans of the fundamentalists obviates the need for Israel to promote rather than undermine the olive branch solution. More and more Israelis and diaspora Jews understand that Israel will not only have to freeze West Bank settlements, but eventually dismantle at the very least all settlements east of the security barrier.
Equally the Palestinians will have to make concessions that facilitate peaceful relations. This means finally accepting that the 1948 refugees will only return to the Palestinian state and not to Israel. The fundamentalists of course will never accept this win-win plan. Such is the nature of black-and-white revolutionary socialism. But their all-or-nothing demands for a similarly coercive utopia will bring only tragedy to the Palestinians. Philip Mendes is the co-editor of Jews and Australian Politics (Sussex Academic Press, 2004). Nick Dyrenfurth is the co-editor of Confusion: the Making of the Australian Two-Party Political System (forthcoming with Melbourne University Publishing). Source: The Australian
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Equal-opportunity jihad, and more evidence of the magnitude of the ongoing threat from Yemen.
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