Pride of Lions, Part 9

In Part 8, we looked at how Al Qaeda and other Islamic terrorist groups are coordinating their efforts to target France for unrest. We also considered in Part 5 and Part 6 how France may be moving in the direction of a civil war.

In Part 7, we looked at how British mosques serve as a forum for the spread of hatred and calls for violence among radical elements of the Islamic community against infidel cultures.

It is not just Muslims being radicalized by some elements within their mosques; as we also saw in Part 6, there is a deliberate effort on the part of Islamic terrorists to recruit "lily whites", who are people with no prior connection to Islam or to terrorism, for conversion to Islam and deployment as terrorists in the jihad against the infidel world.

Now we consider Salmond backs plans for Islamic faith school by Murdo MacLeod, Political Correspondent, May 18, 2008:

SCOTLAND'S first state-funded Islamic school could get the go-ahead within months after First Minister Alex Salmond declared he was "sympathetic" towards the controversial move.

Campaigners are planning to submit a detailed proposal for the faith school to Glasgow City Council within two months and officials last night confirmed they would consult on the proposal.

But former Scottish education minister Sam Galbraith condemned the move as a "retrograde step", arguing that it would be bad for the Muslim community by hindering integration.

Do the opinionmakers and leaders within the Muslim community want Muslims to integrate - or to dominate?

Scotland has around 43,000 Muslims, about 18,000 of them in Glasgow. While there are more than 100 Islamic schools south of the border, both private and state-supported, Scottish Muslims have so far failed to establish a faith school and some in the community question whether it is a good idea in an age of increased ethnic and religious tension.

Scotland has more than 400 publicly funded Roman Catholic schools as well as three state-supported Scottish Episcopalian schools and a publicly funded Jewish school.

A spokesman for Salmond said: "We are very much sympathetic to the idea. The First Minister is supportive. He thinks that faith schools are a good thing and they make a great contribution to Scotland. The issue is whether there is a sustainable demand for them.

"We would expect a local authority to react positively where there is a sustainable case."

After failing in a previous campaign, a group of Muslim community leaders in Glasgow is preparing a case for at least one school, which they will present in about two months' time. They are gathering names of families who they think will want to send their children to an Islamic school.

A spokesman for the campaign said: "We're working on things right now so that we can present a strong case to the authority – to show that we are united behind this and that there are enough of us so that the case is obviously sustainable."

Glasgow City Council said it would consider any reasonable plan that parents could come up with. A spokeswoman for council leader Stephen Purcell said: "Basically, if the parents come forward with a sustainable plan, both financially and educationally, we will consult on that plan."

We now consider some background regarding that Glasgow situation, reviewing Glasgow Opposes Muslim School, dated Sun., Oct. 29, 2006 / Shawal 7, 1427:

CAIRO — Senior education officials in the Scottish city of Glasgow oppose the establishment of a state-funded Islamic school though other faith communities in the second largest city in the country have their own, according to a secret memo made public on Sunday, October 29.

The document, obtained by the Scotland on Sunday newspaper under the Freedom of Information legislation, cites "serious concerns about an inclusive education for Muslims in the city beyond faith and the social isolation of Muslim children within the city."

It adds that senior officials at Glasgow City Council had written to the head of the authority's education committee, Margaret McCafferty, about their reservations.

"Why would we assume that a state-funded Muslim school would not see the same problems that the privately funded Iqra Academy in Glasgow experienced and was subsequently closed by Her Majesty's Inspectors of Education?"

The academy was closed down in 2003 after inspectors had accused its administration of devoting too much time to Islamic subjects and maltreating girls.

A Muslim school that maltreated girls - imagine that!

We pause this article for a moment to look at the next segment of the The Gina Khan Interview - Part Two:

Q: Was your husband taken in by any Islamist teachings?

I had been a victim of domestic abuse and polygamy myself. The first time my husband slapped me after I questioned him he said "don't question my authority - in our religion you are not allowed. I'm your husband."

After divorce I made a promise to him that I would raise the issue of polygamy in the community and expose the consequences Muslim women silently endure, a woman would rather see her husband burn on a pyre than take on another wife. I stated that it wasn't him I was after. I was after the true kafirs - the extreme Islamists who advocate the practices that taught him that he could slap a woman across the face and take on another wife in the name of Islam. Backward practices must be erased. What happened in the 7th century or 18th century can't be continued in the 21st century. Women have a right to their full humanity as full human beings.

He wasn't a bad person; he had been forced into an arranged marriage with a cousin. Our children were ostracised from his family as a consequence of it not working out.

Polygamy destroys the soul of a woman. I knew polygamy wasn't beyond him. In any case our love story had ended. Polygamy and forced marriages destroy the lives of both men and women. Children often pay the price for broken homes and witness escalating domestic violence and oppression. The British Government hesitates in stamping it out - not wanting to instigate racial tensions; they should show some backbone because right now we are suffering.

Q: Surely local religious leaders step in and help women out, as would say a vicar or parish priest?

Not one mullah or leader of any mosque locally has ever done anything progressive for the emancipation of Muslim women, let alone help them out when they are divorced and lone mums. No one is addressing these issues seriously.

My children have been hit several times around the head in the local mosque and I was treated like an outcast - as if my stigma of being a lone mother was deserved. They wanted me to think that it was my entire fault - that I was mad not to have conformed to their ideologies. This hurt my kids - it felt like we were being punished.

"Not one mullah or leader of any mosque locally has ever done anything progressive for the emancipation of Muslim women, let alone help them out when they are divorced and lone mums."

"My children have been hit several times around the head in the local mosque".

We now continue with Glasgow Opposes Muslim School:

Although the letter, which carries the initials of Glasgow's director of education Ronnie O'Connor, is dated December 15 of last year, a source close to the council told the newspaper that the position of officials remains unchanged.

Keep in mind that that article was from October, 2006, so it refers to a letter from late 2005.

Muslims have been pressing for a state-funded Islamic school in Glasgow, which allows Roman Catholic and Jewish schools.

Education chiefs had for the past year met their calls with promises and sweet talk.

"Our education services will consult on the general principal of creating a Muslim school if a well developed proposal and widespread community support comes forward," Deputy Education Convener Gordon Matheson had said.

Misplaced

Muslim leaders in Scotland criticized officials for not coming public with their concerns.

"It's disappointing that they haven't raised these concerns with us up to now, the issue has always been one of proving the demand, which we are confident we can do," said Osama Saeed, the Scottish spokesman for the Muslim Association of Britain (MAB).

Not coming public with what concerns? That females might be "maltreated" in a Muslim school?

What would happen to any public official who might dare to suggest that? There would be cries of Islamophobia at least, if not calls for that official's death. I mean, just try drawing a cartoon about the Islamic community, and see what happens!

Opposition councilors also criticized officials for keeping their stance secret and failing to meet the needs of the Muslim minority in Scotland, estimated at some 50,000 people.

"It is wrong to keep these concerns hidden. They should be aired," said John Mason, leader of the Scottish National Party (SNP).

"I'm also uncomfortable with the idea of telling the Muslim community that it is up to them to come up with a plan."

Saeed also dismissed the officials's concerns as misplaced.

"The concerns are completely misplaced, studies of pupils from Islamic schools in England have shown that they are more tolerant and open than those not in Islamic schools," he said.

A British government study published by the Independent newspaper on October 21 found that white students are less tolerant and are a barrier to integration than their Muslim peers.

Commissioned by the Home Office, the Lancaster University study found that nearly a third of white students believed one race was superior to another.

Sure - Islamic schools are more tolerant - more progressive, perhaps?

From Teacher accuses Islamic school of racism, by Alexandra Frean, Education Editor, dated April 15, 2008:

A former teacher at an Islamic school, who alleged that it taught an offensive and racist view of non-Muslims, has been awarded £70,000 by an employment tribunal after winning his case for unfair dismissal.

Colin Cook told the tribunal in Watford that pupils were taught from Arabic books that likened Jews and Christians to "monkeys" and "pigs" at The King Fahad Academy, which is funded and run by the Saudi Arabian Government.

Saudi support for a curriculum "that likened Jews and Christians to 'monkeys' and 'pigs'." Imagine that!

The tribunal ruled that Mr Cook, a British Muslim, was unfairly dismissed from his £36,000-a-year post at the school in Acton, West London, in December 2006 after blowing the whistle on systematic cheating at a GCSE exam.

The panel found that the school created a "smokescreen" to try to justify his dismissal after 18 years' unblemished service.

It awarded Mr Cook £58,800 in compensation for loss of earnings and £10,500 for injury to feelings. But it rejected his claim that the school discriminated against him on racial grounds.

Mr Cook told the hearing that after leaving the school another member of staff gave him extracts from an Arabic textbook, which encouraged students to believe that all religions other than Islam were worthless.

The books referred to "the repugnant characteristics of the Jews". Another passage said: "Those whom God has cursed and with whom he is angry, he has turned into monkeys and pigs. They worship Satan."

Mr Cook alleged that the books were spreading race hatred. "They should not be brought into this country and they should not be used in this country," he said.

The school denied ever teaching any form of racial hatred and insisted that the offending passages in the books were "misinterpreted" and were never used in class. But it later got rid of the books.

The Religion of Peace is always "misinterpreted" and "taken out of context".

The school was established in 1985, with the aim of providing a high-quality education acceptable to the Saudi and British authorities for the children of Saudi diplomats and other Muslim families in London.

Some of the children of the jailed extremist clerics Abu Hamza al-Masri and Abu Qatada are pupils at the school, which charges fees of up to £1,500 per year for day students.

Mr Cook alleged that in June 2006 staff wrongly allowed pupils to refer to heavily annotated course books during an English language GCSE exam.

The tribunal was told that when he suggested that the school might be trying to cover up his allegations, a senior colleague told him: "This is not England. It is Saudi Arabia."

Mr Cook then took his complaints direct to the Edexcel exam board.

Mr Cook of Feltham, West London, taught English as a second language at the school. Giving evidence to the tribunal, he said that some pupils "talked as if they did not live in London at all".

Complete with oppression of women?

Next stop - honor killings? (Oh, I'm sorry - it's the UK; "honour killings".)

What was that about "a 'retrograde step'"?

When he queried how Abu Hamza and Abu Qatada could be paying school fees when they were said to be on benefits, he was told to mind his own business.

He also claimed the school was seen as an extension of the Saudi Embassy rather than part of Britain, with Saudi teachers even enjoying diplomatic immunity.

The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia - our ally in the War on Terror.

Mr Cook's solicitor, Lawrence Davies, said: "Safeguards under English law were thrown out of the window when Mr Cook was sacked.

"This school must learn that it is not the Saudi way or the highway. The tribunal has upheld justice and protected the whistle-blower."

The tribunal panel was not required to rule on Mr Cook's allegations about the school's curriculum. But in its judgment, it said it had considered Mr Cook to be a "truthful witness".

As he was a respected teacher, with an 18-year unblemished record, it ruled that the impact of his dismissal had been "nothing short of life-changing" for Mr Cook. He had received a "harsh punishment for doing what he thought was the right thing to do", it concluded.

Mr Cook said last night: "I have been accused by people at the school and outside the school of lies and distortion. The school inferred that I had endangered pupils with my allegations.

"The evidence speaks otherwise. I told the truth all along. Islam teaches peace and honesty. Hopefully, my accusers will now realise that I acted justly and for the good of the school."

No one at the school was available to comment.

"Islam teaches peace and honesty."

For someone like Gina Khan, perhaps Islam is a religion of peace that teaches these things.

But, for the elite of the Arabian peninsula, Islam has always been a vehicle for conquest and imperialism.

Stay tuned to Stop Islamic Conquest as Pride of Lions continues.

Pride of Lions, Part 8

In Part 7 we looked at the radicalization of the mosques in the United Kingdom to get an idea how ethnic groups get turned into jihadis. We now continue from Part 6 looking at the situation in France, reviewing France's Ramadan Uprising - a Ticking Bomb for Europe from November 7, 2005:

The violent riots spreading across France took several worrying directions Sunday night, Nov. 6, and Monday. The mostly Muslim gangs of youths began surging out of the immigrant suburbs to invade town centers; they fired their first gunshots at policemen; the number of torched cars peaked to 1,400; and disturbing new slogans were hurled, depicting Paris as "Baghdad-on-the Seine" and their campaign as the start of Europe's Ramadan Intifada.

A single slogan made a mockery of president Jacques Chirac's efforts of the last three years to distance France from President George W. Bush's Iraq war. Furthermore, the French government's helplessness in quelling the trouble is encouraging other European communities to follow suit - in Denmark, Belgium, Spain and Sweden, for starters.

The Israelis have been dealing with "intifadas" long enough to understand that the jihadists respect strength and consider cultural sensitivity to be bywords for weakness and indecisiveness, which they take as an invitation to press ahead with their violence.

Chirac, after lying low for 10 days, finally called an emergency security meeting in Paris Sunday, Nov. 6. He then promised arrests, trials and punishment for those who "sow violence or terror" across France. But politics as usual held him back from instituting tough measures or naming those responsible for the violence, let alone deploying the necessary forces. French police are still under orders not to open fire unless fired on first. No names have been released of ringleaders despite several hundred arrests.

Saturday, Nov. 5, as the disorders went into their second week, the French prosecutor-general Yves Bot said he had detected an organized hand and a strategy behind the riots. Witnesses reported vehicles without number-plates distributing petrol bombs. A fuel bomb factory was in fact discovered Sunday in Paris with 150 bottles and gallons of gasoline ready to distribute to the bands of arsonists. Also found there were masks to hide rioters’ faces. In Clichy-sour-Bois, where the accidental electrocution of two teenagers in flight from the police ignited the first protests, residents said: This is just the beginning.

There are plenty of indications that the riots are not simply spontaneous outbursts of frustration by disadvantaged youths of North and black African descent, but centrally organized mayhem, an "intifada" activated by Muslim networking.

It is one thing to have many of these thugs merely playing off the same sheet of music that they all keep hearing preached in their mosques, along the lines of what we touched on regarding the UK in Part 7. But, one wonders how much time these thugs spend in their local mosques. Well, here we are seeing that organizers of the intifada will bring Acme Instant Jihad kits, complete with Molotov cocktails, to the appropriate neighborhoods - all you need to supply for your intifada is the thugs!

The Chirac-de Villepan government, trying to live down interior minister Nicolas Sarkozy's provocative pledge to deal with what he called "scum," is not acknowledging this. Because they refuse to recognize the rampage for what it is, they are withholding the forces required to restore order and so letting the danger get out of hand. Police, firemen and paramedics are no match for a fast developing civil war. The army will have to be brought in at some point, preferably sooner rather than later. For a start, marksmen need to be posted to pinpoint the ringleaders and the bottle-bomb wielders targeting cars, schools, shops, warehouses and public buildings.

France's leaders, like the British and Dutch, are clinging to the hope that sympathetic dialogue with moderate Muslims will calm the street, despite all the evidence that radical, activist Muslims do not heed established Islamic authorities. On Nov. 6, the Union of Islamic Organizations in France, UOIF, issued a fatwa forbidding Muslims to seek "divine grace" by blindly attacking private and public property and urging meditation and calm.

First of all, perhaps the jihadists are heeding "established Islamic authorities" - just not the same ones the government recognizes.

But, there is another aspect to this, a more important point.

The following night, bands of marauding Muslim youths extended their areas of attack from outlying city districts to urban centers and started shooting at police officers.

The controlling hand, far from being legitimate Muslim authority, is beginning to emerge as the very organization that has for several years been recruiting young fighters in French Muslim ghettos fight al Qaeda’s wars against the West in Afghanistan, Bosnia, Iraq and other sectors.

On February 20, 2004, DEBKA-Net-Weekly and DEBKAfile were first to reveal the extent of al Qaeda's penetration of West Europe. They turned up French intelligence statistics which estimated that "al Qaeda had recruited in France between 35,000 and 45,000 fighters and was organizing them in military-style units. They meet regularly for training in the use of weapons and explosives, combat tactics and indoctrination and are controlled from local and district command centers under the organization's national French command."

"In Germany, Al Qaeda’s numbers are estimated at 25,000 to 30,000 men."

Today, French counter-terror sources are willing to admit, albeit on the quiet and not for attribution, that those clandestine terrorist cells may well be at the bottom of the current riots. They note the history of the Palestinian uprising, which kicked off in 1987 with stones and petrol bombs, only to evolve into a suicidal terrorist war by the late nineties. They fear this process may be beginning - not just in France but in the rest of Europe too, that the covert nucleus of trained and indoctrinated Islamic terrorists al Qaeda buried inside Europe is being turned against the continent, starting in France.

We now consider more background related to the jihad in France, as we examine GSPC Joins al-Qaeda and France Becomes Top Enemy by Kathryn Haahr, dated September 26, 2006:

Al-Qaeda deputy Ayman al-Zawahiri's recent September 11 threat to France, coupled with al-Qaeda's official integration with the Algerian Salafist Group for Call and Combat (GSPC), is significant for two principal reasons. First, from al-Qaeda's perspective, it is a formal alliance with an "out-of-area" Islamist group to specifically engage in jihad against Europe and elsewhere. Secondly, the GSPC's merger with al-Qaeda formalizes the GSPC's participation in al-Qaeda terrorist-related activities against Western targets. This development brings the GSPC to the counter-terrorism debate in a different way than before. The GSPC-al-Qaeda integration portends increased opportunities for al-Qaeda to recruit European jihadists for ongoing terrorist operations in the West and the Middle East and signifies the potential for an increased operational tempo by the two organizations against French and Western targets.

This intifada in France is not an aberration, nor is it an isolated incident. The more important point mentioned above is this: the Islamic extremist snake has bitten into the House of War, declaring jihad on infidel and takfir alike - especially, as we have seen and will see again, on women - and refuses (perhaps is unable?) to retract its fangs.

Al-Qaeda's threat to France raises the stakes for French counter-terrorism officials, especially given al-Zawahiri's September 11 designation of France as "prey" in the global jihad (Le Figaro, September 14). It is not surprising that France is the target for future terrorist attacks: France remains the GSPC's preference for terrorist operations due to the legacy of the 1990s and the GIA's violent struggle against the Algerian government as well as its targeting of France (the GSPC is a splinter group of the GIA). Moreover, various French foreign and domestic policies have caused France to lose its "neutrality" and make it a target for terrorism: participation in Desert Storm; participation in the international force in Lebanon, which Islamist groups view as a joint U.S.-Israeli operation to protect Israel's position in the Middle East; and laws to regulate Islamic religious symbols in schools, such as headscarves. Al-Zawahiri said that the "blessed union" of al-Qaeda and the GSPC should "be a source of chagrin, frustration and sadness for the apostates [of the regime in Algeria], the treacherous sons of [former colonial power] France," and urged the group to become "a bone in the throat of the American and French crusaders" (Le Monde, September 18; Libération, September 19).

Do you recall from Part 6 how we keyed in on the connection to Algeria amongst the jihadists of the French intifada?

According to the French minister of the interior, France is under a "vigilance absolute," and the threat level was raised and will remain so indefinitely (Le Monde, September 18). Moreover, it is not insignificant that there is an active and large Muslim community in France. In February 2005, for example, the French domestic intelligence agency, Renseignements Généraux, estimated that there are about 5,000 sympathizers and militants in France part of the Salafi-Jihad, grouped around 500 hard-core individuals (Radio France Internationale, September). The French Ministries of Defense and Interior said that France will enact specific counter-terrorism actions to deal with the threat, but will design the policies to not intentionally "provoke the Islamists" (http://www.algerie-dz.com, September 19). According to a September 2005 report produced by the French Antiterrorist Coordination Unit, France was considered a prime target for terrorist groups inspired by Islamism, most notably from combatants from Maghreb countries trained to undergo terrorist operations by the GSPC (Le Figaro, September 19; El Watan, September 20). In 2005, the GSPC singled out France as its "enemy number one," and in August of the same year appealed to Muslims living in France to attack those officials linked to the Algerian regime living in France (Radio France Internationale, September 14).

There are many wonderful, decent people in the Islamic world. The problem is not Muslims; the problem is Islam, combined with the foreign support for extremism, which turns jihadists into proxies.

As you read Islamic texts and their calls for jihad, you begin to understand how the extremists have such an ample supply of ammunition in their ideological war to radicalize Islamic communities, and this, then, makes every Islamic community in the West a cause for concern - is it a place where extremist violence is propagated? - is it a ticking time bomb of violent intifada? "Moreover, it is not insignificant that there is an active and large Muslim community in France."

The key is the foreign support these communities receive - Saudi (and other) sponsorship of terrorism and militant extremism builds upon opportune passages in Islamic texts, and while some elements in the Middle East actively encourage the jihad, other elements in the Middle East - our "friends in the War on Terror" - wage a duplicitous proxy war for imperialistic conquest of infidel lands, while our own leaders are too foolish to see it, too corrupt to acknowledge it, or both (Obama, Bush, Cheney, McCain, Clinton - categorize them yourself).

Numerous terrorist operations in Europe planned by individuals identified as belonging to the GSPC indicate that the group has an agenda to expand its range of operations to new battlefronts where al-Qaeda has been active. In May, for example, it threatened to attack "American military bases in Mali and Niger," and planning for these operations was taking place "in Algeria and in Mauritania" (Terrorism Focus, May 17). The GSPC certainly calculated that a partnership with al-Qaeda would increase the GSPC's appeal to Algerians to continue fighting the Algerian government, which in turn would enhance the organization's continued existence. In addition, integrating with al-Qaeda elevates the GSPC into a new hierarchical international position, one that will increase its Salafi Islamist appeal to European Muslims. The GSPC has been an established actor in Europe's North African network of Salafi Islamists, which have supported jihadi activities in Algeria, Iraq and in Europe, and is active in recruiting from the North African and Muslim communities in European countries.

For al-Qaeda, partnering with an organization that has actively tried to overthrow an apostate government through terrorism lends a certain "state" legitimacy to al-Qaeda. The GSPC contributes to al-Qaeda's ongoing objective to significantly mobilize global Muslim support for its agenda, a development in which al-Qaeda has not completely succeeded. As al-Qaeda's operational capabilities around the world have diminished, a partnership with a Salafi Islamist group might provide al-Qaeda with more manpower and other resources, including access to possible targets in Europe and elsewhere. Due to the GSPC's network of recruitment cells throughout Europe—many of which have been disrupted and its members detained in recent years—al-Qaeda can conceivably draw upon new European Muslim recruits for jihad in Iraq, Europe and elsewhere.

Nice - a strategic partnership among terrorists. Osama bin Laden is certainly a businessman.

The integration of the two organizations was very calculated and should be taken seriously. The unique capabilities of each group—propaganda techniques, recruitment activities and technical means to conduct a variety of terrorist operations—are now doubled. Foremost, the GSPC specializes in attacks against military targets and its training of potential recruits for activity in Iraq would certainly be important in helping al-Qaeda find technically qualified commandos who understand the nature of attacking convoys, military quarters, etc. Moreover, the GSPC is known to train terrorist recruits from other countries in North Africa, notably Tunisians, Libyans, Moroccans and Mauritanians. A second consideration is assessing the impact of the merger: is al-Qaeda trying to strengthen itself by formalizing partnerships with selected Islamist groups, or is it an indication of a weakening organization that needs to rely on regional jihadi groups for personnel and materiel?

Consideration should be applied to what the merger means for al-Qaeda's evolving ideology, as well as its propaganda activities to continue to portray itself as the ideological leader of global Islamist movements. Similarly, command-and-control implications for al-Qaeda are important since the integration could give GSPC leadership figures the authority to plan and execute terrorist attacks in Europe as well as in other regions. A possible evolution of leadership authority could result in al-Qaeda remaining "in charge" of Iraq, Saudi Arabia and Gulf countries, whereas the GSPC could be the head of all Europe and Africa operations. An additional factor is the implications for al-Qaeda and GSPC fundraising activities as it could result in an integration of networks that are devoted to financing terrorism operations.

The GSPC's new political agenda of international terrorism and integration into the worldwide jihad is one which supports al-Qaeda's view of a worldwide conflict between "true" Muslims and the "Zionist-crusader alliance," exactly the characteristic that the GSPC now attributes to France. Most importantly, the formal alliance portends strengthening Europe as a battleground, and likely will engender more sympathy for Iraq and other causes, potentially attracting more European Muslims to the global Salafi-Jihad.

The question now remains: does this Islamic extremist snake have the ability to swallow its prey, or will it instead die trying?

Stay tuned to Stop Islamic Conquest as Pride of Lions continues.

Pakistan's Undercurrents and Eddies, Part 1

At my post on Benazir Bhutto's Assassination, a commentator, Keshav, left a link to an article entitled Monster she created came back to take her life, 29 Dec 2007. I reproduce that article here in its entirety, with comments:

NEW DELHI: It was the year 1996. Benazir Bhutto as prime minister of Pakistan had asked Pervez Musharraf, then her Director General of Military Operations, to rehabilitate Al-Qaida chief Osama bin Laden in Jalalabad from Sudan.

Bin Laden, who had shifted base to the African country after the Afghan war, had been thrown out by Khartoum after intense American pressure. Musharraf brought the Al-Qaida mastermind to Jalalabad, a city in eastern Afghanistan, and rehabilitated him.

That, a decade later, Al-Qaida should claim responsibility for Bhutto's assassination marks not just a cruel irony, it also underlines once again the risk of Frankenstein's monster turning upon the master.

This is a recurring theme with Al Qaeda.

These terrorists, collectively known by different names, including the term "Arab-Afghan Mujahideen", were originally backed by the United States in the 1980's. The Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan at the end of 1979, and a little over a year later Ronald Reagan was inaugurated as the fortieth President of the United States, with a former Director of Central Intelligence as his V. P.; this set the stage for a proxy war in Afghanistan, where the United States could finally do to a communist superpower a little of what had been done to us in Vietnam.

Afghanistan is land-locked, and was at the time bordered on the north by republics of the USSR, and on the west by Iran, now hostile after the Islamic revolution that had recently unseated the Shah. It was hard to reach for the US, but to the south was Pakistan, which had for some time been considered a US ally in checking Soviet ambitions in the region; together with Turkey and the Shah's Iran, Pakistan and the United States had been members of the Central Treaty Organization, or CENTO. Modeled on the successful North Atlantic Treaty Organization, and originally including Iraq (but initially not the US), CENTO, defunct by the early 1980's, had been an attempt to establish a barrier of strong nations to the Soviet Union's south -- protecting critical oil resources and shipping lanes, and linked to NATO.

As such, Pakistan, with its long and lawless border with Afghanistan, was the perfect place for the US intelligence services to establish a base for holy war against the Kremlin. Working with the Pakistanis, the US helped arm and organize the Mujahideen, which included Arabs from the Middle East, who came complete with the financial backing of petrodollars.

Since Pakistan was a sovereign nation with strong allies, the Soviets could not violate Pakistan's borders without risk. Pakistan offered a safe haven for the Afghan Mujahideen, their Arab brothers, and their sponsors. Ten years after its invasion, the Soviet Union pulled out of Afghanistan. Ultimately, the USSR collapsed, in part because of problems in Soviet society that were caused or exacerbated by the Afghan war.

After the liberation of Afghanistan from Soviet occupation, many of the Afghani warriors retired from jihad; however, many of the Arab holy warriors stayed. With their financial backing from the Middle East, especially from Saudi Arabia, with their extensive intercourse with Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) and their ties to Washington, and with their love of jihad, these Arab-Afghan Mujahideen evolved into what would later be a world class problem: their members helped brutalize fighting in the Balkans from the early 1990's until the present day, and their members formed the cadre for what would later be called Al Qaeda.

Bhutto's return to Pakistan this year may have been marked with her claim to wipe out terrorism, but the fact remains that it was her interior minister, Major General (retd) Naseerullah Babar, who played a key role in raising the Taliban and consolidating Al-Qaida in Afghanistan. The reason: a desire to secure strategic depth by controlling Pakistan's western border, and to have a say in future Afghanistan affairs.

Pakistan's western border lies in the province of Balochistan, bordering not just Iran, but including much of Pakistan's border with Afghanistan, as well. Its ethnic balance was disrupted by an influx of refugees from Afghanistan, now making Pashtuns roughly equal in the province's population with the Baloch.

(By the way: with a population of over 162 million, a little more than half that of the United States, Pakistan ranks sixth in population among the world's nations, behind China, India, the United States, Indonesia and Brazil.)

Balochistan is the location of Gwadar, where a major Sino-Pakistani project is underway to develop port facilities (see The Islamic Bomb, Part 2, where I touched on this).

The present day terrorism in India, and now turning on Pakistan, can, to an important extent, be traced to that fateful decision taken by the Bhutto government.

Taliban soon became host to a menacing jihadi conglomerate — the Qaida-led International Islamic Front (IIF) — the components of which included anti-India gangs like Lashkar-e-Toiba, Harkat-ul-Mujahideen, which later became Jaish-e-Mohhamed, HuJI and others.

The objective of the group was to establish Sharia rule in this important region of Asia, and it was determined to go to any length, even acquire weapons of mass destruction, to realise it.

Two things are important to keep in mind here.

First is that these Arab-Afghan Mujahideen got their start with Pakistani and US intelligence agencies, and still maintain extensive ties with Pakistan's ISI, many of whose members sympathize with their extremist agenda. Through narcotics trafficking and other organized crime activities, they are also connected to corrupt elements in the Pakistani government, as well as in the US government, as I repeatedly address in this blog.

This heroin trafficking at first was a way to further destabilize the Soviet Union, by generating an enormous social problem among the civilian population at home and among Soviet troops in Afghanistan by getting them hooked on heroin; the sale of heroin also provided a way of funding the holy war against Moscow. But, as with the Arab-Afghan Mujahideen themselves, when the war ended, the Afghanistan-based heroin trafficking lived on; it became a scourge on the world scene, attaining a life of its own, complete with its own set of rules and objectives.

And this brings me to the second thing to keep in mind: just as the heroin trafficking attained a life of its own, so did the Arab-Afghan Mujahideen movement attain its own life and life's mission -- it is no longer under the control of the ISI, and certainly not of the US intelligence community; it has become a monster, a threat to the entire world, infidel and Muslim alike.

After the collapse of Taliban post-9/11, this terror infrastructure led by bin Laden moved to Pakistan, and has added to the radicalisation which has claimed so many innocent lives, including that of the former prime minister. A look at the history of militancy in the subcontinent also brings out the fact that Islamic fundamentalism is a direct result of the efforts of hardline Sunni groups to subdue Shias, Ahmadias and others.

Fundamentalist Sunni outfits like Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistan (SSP), which went after Shias, enjoyed the patronage of influential sections of the Pakistan establishment.

There was an overlap of objectives, of course. Former Pakistan president General Zia-ul-Haq, follower of Deobandi sect of Sunnis, set up SSP in 1979 to not only counter the Shias but marginalised pro-democracy forces seeking an end of his brutal military regime.

Some of the radical elements of the SSP parted ways and formed Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ) in 1996. LeJ, which is suspected to have carried out the attack on Bhutto at the behest of Al-Qaida, is nothing but the armed wing of SSP like Jaish-e-Mohamed and HuJI which had also branched out of SSP. The connections of all jihadi groups with each other are obvious whether they are fighting in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq or India.

This is another key point: in this context, there is no such thing as "our" Mujahideen and "their" Mujahideen. Pakistan's ISI organizes, trains, equips and supports militants who wage jihad against India in the Kashmir region. But, once in the world of jihad, these same militants are just as likely to battle Russian, Serbian, Israeli or American infidels -- until we all either convert to Islam, "pay the jizya with willing submission, and feel [ourselves] subdued", or have been sent to the eternal fires.

As I stated in Benazir Bhutto's Assassination:

Pakistan's ISI was behind this one. Al Qaeda was probably a bunch of witting dupes, and Mushy is likely a dupe-after-the-fact.

The implication here is that the ISI also has a life of its own, and that it does not necessary take orders from "President" Mushy. Many ISI people are undoubtedly very professional and dedicated to Pakistan, and follow the lawful orders of their lawfully appointed superiors. Some of those may have an issue with Mushy's seizure of power.

Regardless, in the ISI there are also rogues who are linked to jihadism and organized crime, and Bhutto, while certainly not free of curruption herself, may have been a serious threat to terrorists and narcotraffickers.

Interview with No Sharia, Part 2

We continue from Part 1 our interview with No Sharia. Questions are numbered, and No Sharia's answers are in italics.



14) In your answer to Question 5, you indicate that anti-Semitism is due to "left leaning journalists". Why do you associate anti-Semitism with left-leaning journalists? In other words, what causes you to have that impression? Why, in your opinion, are "left leaning journalists" anti-Semitic?

The journalists in e g Sweden belong to the left to a large extent. They are not only social democratic but many vote for the former communist party. They are against the market economy, the US and therefore also against Israel. In reality many detest the West because the West defeated socialism, and now they think they can defeat the West by the help of muslim immigration. They hate the fact that the West has a superior system. Their beloved system –socialism - was revealed to have been a sham, and they hate that. So they sympathize with the Palestineans and with arabs who critizize the west. They have taken over the arguments of the Palestineans. Their so-called anti-sionism seems in reality often be anti-Semitism even if they never will admit that.

They don't understand that the Palestinean problem has been held unsolved intentionally by Arab governments for 60 years in order for those to have a scapegoat and be able to blame others for their own shortcomings. Antisemitism fulfills the same function, and during the last decades it has been based more and more on islam which in itself is antisemitic.

15) In your answer to Question 4, you state that Christianity is treated by the media "with indifference or concealed contempt". In Question 6, you indicate that non-Christian religions, other than Judaism and Islam, are treated "with indifference or some respect owing to their not being Christian". These answers indicate a distinct anti-Christian public bias. Is this accurate? Why would this be so? Please explain, for an audience that is not familiar with Sweden, the cultural dynamics that have resulted in this.

Yes I think it is accurate. The journalists are seldom religious and they often seem to despise religion. Christianity was earlier connected with what they interpret as a class society which they as socialists naturally abhor. They are Marxists and the church historically belongs to the oppressors.

16) In Question 9, you state: "I suspect that some members of the government may be willing to sacrifice freedom of expression etc in order to appease muslims". The implication of the word "appease" is that there is a problem, presumably with violence associated with the Muslim community. Is that accurate? What information or evidence can you offer to support that? Is this first-hand (i.e., something that you have witnessed or experienced), is it second-hand (i.e., something a friend or relative of yours witnessed or experienced, and then told you about), or how far removed is this information?

You mentioned violence; I didn't so I don't need to present any evidence for just that.

Political violence has not started yet in Sweden besides that many rapes performed by muslims sometimes seem to have a religious undertone. The behaviour of those muslims is probably accepted by many other muslims because they are in Dar al-Harb – Europe - and the women dress in the wrong way anyway.

However, the demonstrations around the world regarding the cartoons and "rondell" dogs seem to have made the politicians apprehensive and very cautious. Their knowledge about islam is so shallow that they may believe that by suppressing some human rights they will satisfy the muslims. They don't understand that muslim organizations use the salami tactics. I judge the states of mind of politicians from what they say in the media and from their decisions.

17) In Question 6, you indicate that Islam is treated "both critically and with multicultural lies". This seems related to your answer from Question 9, quoted in Question 16 above. Please elaborate. What is stated about Islam publicly that is accurate, and what is stated publicly that is inaccurate? By whom? Why?

The lie that islam is a religion of peace and tolerance is repeated by politicians and journalists too often. Nobody dares to talk about the real islam which now takes over the muslim world everywhere. The moderate Islamic variants in some countries are now revealed to just be just local cultural phenomena which have no basis in the religious doctrine. So the moderate variants retreat when the real islam appears and takes over the mosques and muslim organizations (helped by oil money, of course).

They don't dare to talk about how muslims look at non-muslims and their view of the superiority of muslims. They don't dare to talk about human rights generally in the muslim countries and what it may mean for us. They don't dare to talk about the long-term plans of muslims for introducing sharia in Europe. What they can critizise is e g the treatment of women by muslim men but they don't do much about it.

What we need is a proactive nontolerance of all crimes against women by muslims. And we need to define new crimes: (1) religious hate crimes i e crimes based on and caused by religon and (2) crimes against integration.

18) Following the thread of Questions 16 & 17, and in light of your answer to Question 9, do you perceive an effort on the part of the government to cover up violence and criminal acts perpetrated by people associated with Islam? If so, is it merely ambiguously labeled, but with its existence acknowledged? Or is it buried as if it never occurred? Why would this be happening?

It is in many cases buried deep. Media generally don't talk about the religion of criminals even when the crime evidently is based on religion. The reason they conceal these facts is basically that they want the immigration to continue so that the social democrats will get a permanent majority on its side. So they don´t want to give any arguments to those who want to stop the immigration of muslim fundamentalists.

Why the non-socialistic government keeps quiet is surprising. Probably the reason is that the non-socialistic parties increased their shares of the immigrant vote in the last election and that the government wants Turkey getting into the EU. They think that a stand against muslim immigrants regarding any issue will weaken them in these two respects.

Another weaker reason is that they don't know how to handle the issue. They behave like children; by not talking about it they think it will go away.

However, when a terrorist act will be committed by a muslim the media will label it as such but they will draw no conclusions. The media and the intelligentia have betrayed their functions in the society. They shall upheld [should uphold -- YD] the standards in society regarding rationality and logic, and also intellectually protect the society and human rights. They fail miserably in both respects.

19) Following up to Question 18, are there other criminal acts that are covered up? For example, acts associated by other religious or political groups? If so, how do you know that and why do you perceive that? What do you feel might be the reason for this, and why do you think it is a reason?

No, I don't think so. The acts by nazi and extreme leftist groups are published by the media, and the government sees no advantages in not talking about such atrocities. Regarding these groups, the media find no difficulty in talking about the underlying ideology. It is only regarding islam that they can never discover a connection between the ideology - a religion – and the crime.

20) In Question 8, you indicate that there is a political elite. In Question 12, you indicate that political leaders adopt some policies, specifically regarding immigration, that do not reflect the will of the people. Why do you feel that the people do not support such policies? Why does the political elite ignore the will of the people they govern? How can they get away with it?

The opinion polls indicate a hardening attitude towards muslim immigration and illegal behaviour of immigrants. Government policies don't reflect that.

If you have a smaller group which reacts against a government policy, and a large group – the Swedish population – which really doesn't care, the smaller group can influence the politicians. That's one of the reasons for the opportunism of the government. But now a growing part of the population starts to care and that will hopefully cause a change in the behaviour. The government can't get away with ignoring the issues, if the people care about them and it affects the opinion polls.

The social democrats cannot be expected to do the right thing. The people didn't want them so they try to create another people. They will protect immigration with teeth and nails in order to arrange a new permanent majority in the future. They risk the future of the nation of Sweden in order to win political goals.

21) Also in Question 12, you indicate that "the press and other media are in effect controlled by left leaning journalists". Why do you state that?

Journalists cannot be fired if those dismissals are not a part of a program to save the economy of the newspaper. So the journalists and the editors are to a great extent the newspaper. They tend to recruit people who have the same opinions as they have. The exception regards the economy pages of a newspaper.

So the number of promotions and recruitments of non-socialistic journalists will certainly be held down. However, regarding higher positions where the management of the newspaper has a larger influence, this power of the journalists diminishes distinctly. But the power to influence what is written in all the articles is real power. Journalists push the multicultural agenda meaning that all cultures have the same value but that the western civilization is worse than most.

22) Related to Questions 20 and 21, how did the situation develop wherein there is a political and media elite in Sweden that is not responsive to the people? What are your thoughts on that?

The media have always been to the left. After the Berlin wall, the socialists among them (the large majority) seem not to have accepted that they were wrong all their lives and that their chosen ideology was pure shit. Now they – like communist and social democratic politicians - try to put new life into socialism and take back the political initiative by protecting a huge immigration. Muslim immigrant voters will overwhelmingly vote for socialistic parties. The former communists and the socialdemocratic party will protect the immigration. The reason for the passivity of the non-socialistic parties were commented upon in q. 20. They have yet not understood the real issues and the great danger of the muslim immigration.

23) In Question 13, you indicate that the native Swedes who live in areas with concentrations of Muslim immigrants are anti-Muslim as well as anti-Islamist. Please define what you mean by the terms "anti-Muslim" and "anti-Islamist". You also indicate that native Swedes outside those areas share those feelings as well. Why is that? What makes you believe there are such feelings? And, did they have such feelings before Muslim immigrants arrived, or have these feelings developed since Muslim immigrants arrived? Please explain.

To be Anti–islamist is to be against Islamism i e radical, political islam. To be Anti-muslim is to understand that there really is no moderate islam and that moderates sooner or later can easily and rapidly develop into radicals and islamists. They just have to be better muslims (according to the doctrine). It may also mean that one doesn't like the attitudes of people from the Middle East who don't have the same view as we regarding any human rights.

I said that people outside these muslim-dominated areas start to have a similar view but just start. The reason is an increased understanding of the muslim culture and of islam: honour killings, the attempts of muslims to suppress all critique of islam, their contempt for Western human rights, what the muslims say about political issues etc.

It is said – and it is a basis of multiculturalism — that if we know more about each other we like each other more and will become more tolerant. That is totally false. The more people know about islam, the worse opinion they will have of that religion. And if they know the truth they will want to prevent all muslim immigration and resist all attempts to introduce sharia in Sweden. In a decade the peoples of Europe will – owing to the anti-jihadist movement – know much more about the important theological issues. The conflicts between muslims and non-muslims will then increase rapidly (also see my prognosis of the political development of Europe). The path of Europe is set. It points towards civil war if we don't implement the strong anti-islamist policies (or similar) which I have defined.


No Sharia is an author at Islam Watch. The prognosis No Sharia refers to, and No Sharia's other writings, can be found there on No Sharia's page.

I hope you will read those writings, because when we next catch up with No Sharia, we will be asking questions about them. If you have a question you would like to submit to No Sharia, please leave it in the comments, or submit it to me via email, with the words "Question for No Sharia" in the subject line, and I will pass the question along.

Please note that since the content of emails is generally considered confidential, I will pass your question along, but not your email address. Similarly, you will only get back the answer to your question and any related comments, and no one's email address but my own. However, unless you specifically state otherwise, the question will be assumed to be publishable on the blog; similarly, unless No Sharia specifically states otherwise, the answer will be assumed to be publishable on the blog as well.

The Islamic States of America?

From Half a Billion “Americans”? by Srdja Trifkovic, August 31, 2007 (minor typos have been edited out of the text):

The latest report from the Center for Immigration Studies on how immigration may impact the future size of America’s population has been released. Their findings are based on the Census Bureau projections, and show that if immigration continues at current levels, the U.S. population will increase from 301 million today to 468 million in 2060—a 167 million (or 56 percent) increase. New immigrants and their descendants will account for 105 million (or 63 percent) of that increase.

The report says that, at the moment, approximately 1.6 million legal and illegal immigrants settle in the United States each year and 350,000 leave, resulting in net immigration of 1.25 million. The total projected growth of 167 million would exceed the current total population of Central America (41 million), the Caribbean (37 million) and Egypt (79 million). The 105 million from immigration by itself is equal to the present population of Mexico.

The immigration statistics that Dr. Trifkovic cite here factor in illegal immigration, and, to be accurate, they should.

Even those staggering figures are based on the assumption that immigration levels will remain static. Net immigration has been increasing for the past half-century, however, and there are no signs that the trend is changing. If it continues, the increase caused by immigration may well be higher than the projected 105 million—taking us easily to an America of half a billion people five decades from now.

Notice also that Dr. Trifkovic here calls attention to the change in the rate at which immigrants are arriving; that rate has been accelerating, but the Census Bureau projections apparently are not factoring that in?

On the other hand, if the annual level of net immigration was reduced to 300,000—which can be done if the political will is present—future immigration would add 25 million people to the population by 2060. That would be some 80 million fewer than the current level would add.

Enforcing existing immigration laws would have quite an impact.

But, as Dr. Trifkovic so astutely points out, there is the question of political will.

If El Presidente Jorge "My Way or the Highway" Arbusto doesn't have the will to enforce them, do you think President Hillary would?

By the way... why won't Washington enforce the laws and seal our borders?

One of the most interesting findings of the report is that immigration does not have an impact on the overall aging of this country’s population—which is a key argument used by the proponents of open-door policy. In reality,

At the current level of net immigration (1.25 million a year), 61 percent of the nation’s population will be of working age (15 to 66) in 2060, compared to 60 percent if net immigration were reduced to 300,000 a year. If net immigration was doubled to 2.5 million a year it would raise the working-age share of the population by one additional percentage point, to 62 percent, by 2060. But that level of immigration would create a U.S. population of 573 million, double its size in the 2000 Census.

Yes, that is interesting.

Why is it significant?

Some countries have found themselves in an entitlement crisis. They have promised government subsidies and pensions to people, especially retirees, even as birthrates have gone down. Consequently, they have created a problem -- not enough people in the work force to pay for the pensions of the retirees, plus the subsidies for those of working age who don't work.

Does any of this sound familiar?

Their solution is to open up the doors of the nation, and import immigrants.

But, some of these immigrants get generous government aid, and have no need to work.

Absent the need to work, if the culture of these immigrants does not instill in them a desire to work, then they become an added drain on those who do work.

If, in addition to that, they do not integrate into the host society, but rather adopt a hostile, even predatory, attitude towards their new home, then you really have a problem.

If, on top of that, the host culture is too "politically correct" to say anything about the developing problem, you have a recipe for disaster.

Does any of this sound familiar?

The report does not tackle the national security aspect of the problem. The number of Muslim immigrants in the united States is growing more than twice as fast as the already rampant total. Growth of overall immigration since 1970 has been 300 percent, but growth of immigration from the Middle East over the same period has been 700 percent—from under 200,000 in 1970 to 1.5 million in 2000. In 2005, more people from Muslim countries became legal permanent U.S. residents—almost 100,000—than in any year in the previous two decades. More than 40,000 of them were admitted legally in 2005, the highest annual number since the terrorist attacks, according to data on 22 countries provided by the Department of Homeland Security.

Why is it that specifically Muslim immigration is addressed in the context of national security?

On current form, in 2010 the expected number of immigrants from the Middle East alone will exceed 2,500,000. Lavishly financed by Saudi and other Middle Eastern oil money, an intricate jihadist infrastructure has come into being to cater to this large and growing community. The number of mosques and Islamic centers stands at around two thousand and keeps growing. The total number of mosques increased 42 percent between 1990 and 2000, compared with a 12 percent average increase for the evangelical Protestant denominations, and a two percent average increase among old-line Protestant, Roman Catholic and Orthodox groups.

There's Saudzilla! Establishing an infrastructure for its version of the Religion of Peace....

Notice how Saudi Arabia will not even allow so much as a Bible in the Kingdom.

How's about some reciprocity, Your Majesty?

That would fly in the face of the obvious goal: Arab Imperialism superimposed on Islamic Imperialism. Saudi Arabia is doing a high-finance version of what the Arabs did so many centuries ago when they swept out of the depths of the Arabian Peninsula under the banner of Allah: Arab Colonialism.

The figures for immigration from the Middle East are already matched, and are likely to be exceeded, by the number of Muslim immigrants from the Indian Sub-Continent (Pakistan, India, Bangladesh). Currently Muslims account for one-tenth of all naturalizations, and their birth rates exceed those of any other significant immigrant group.

In order to be effective, these Muslim immigrants have to be Saudified and Wahhabized. This is why, in the global plan, Saudi Arabia funds mosques not just in the West, but in South Asia and elsewhere, as well.

Far from enhancing America’s “diversity,” the coming deluge threatens to impose a numbing Third-World sameness, to eradicate the remnants of this country’s identity, and to demolish what survives of her special character. On current form, not only will English-speaking Americans of European origin become a minority in their own country half a century from now, but they will share an increasingly overpopulated, polluted, lumpenproleterized, culturally unrecognizable country with tens of millions of actual or potential jihadists and their accomplices, aiders and abettors.

The concern here does not seem to be those immigrants who come here and work, and who integrate into, or at least are friendly to, American society... in short the concern does not seem to be those immigrants who appreciate their share of the Land of Opportunity.

The concern is those who come here essentially to take over and take (unfair) advantage.

Whether this colossally criminal idiocy can be stopped, and how, is open to doubt. The cultural-Marxist ruling class sees self-annihilation of peoples with a historical memory and a cultural identity as the key to its revolutionary project. The founders of the United States rebelled against King George for sins far lighter than those of which our rulers are culpable.

"colossally criminal idiocy" -- heh.

King George....

The problem is the new King George, and the previous King Bill.

How's about Queen Hillary?


The Islamic States of America? -- It will never happen here.

You can bet on that.

The Eight-Hundred-Pound Gorilla

There's a recent article in The Jamestown Foundation's Global Terrorism Analysis that helps serve to describe the threat we are facing, and the consequences of not "taking the bull by the horns" to deal with it.

The article appeared earlier this month, and provides background to a terrorist attack that occurred in Yemen early in July. The article is entitled Yemen Faces Second Generation of Islamist Militants, by Gregory D. Johnsen. I reproduce it here in its entirety, with my comments (as usual - heh):

The July 2 suicide attack in Marib, which killed eight Spanish tourists and two Yemeni drivers, painfully illustrated the degree to which Al-Qaeda in Yemen has reorganized itself into an effective force (Terrorism Focus, July 10). The Yemeni government was caught largely unaware by the attack, as it believed the al-Qaeda threat had been neutralized. Yet, while the government managed to deter one generation of militants, it neglected to maintain the initiative through the second generation. This second generation of fighters, many of whom have spent time in Iraq, coalesced around the leadership of some of the 23 men who escaped from a political security prison in Sanaa in February 2006 (Terrorism Focus, February 7, 2006). The government attempted to negotiate for the surrender of many of these escapees, 10 of whom have turned themselves in, but much of its resources over the past few years have been devoted to ending the al-Houthi revolt in the north, which it determined was a more immediate threat (Terrorism Focus, July 31).

There is some background here that needs to be addressed.

A discussion of the July 2 terrorist attack itself can be found here. Basically, however, in that article the analysts argue that there is a schism among Al Qaeda in Yemen between the "old guard" who feel that a de facto truce is appropriate, and young radicals, a "second generation" who seek to prosecute the jihad more rigorously. These younger mujahideen have received experience and radicalization in Iraq; here's the key quote from that article:

The new generation of militants, many of whom were radicalized in Iraq, is determined to carry out attacks in Yemen. This represents a sharp break from the old guard, who have advised their younger members to have patience and allow for negotiations with the Yemeni government to continue. The old guard is also concerned that any attacks within Yemen will lead to a government crackdown on its leadership, much like what happened in the aftermath of the USS Cole attack in 2000 and the September 11 attacks in 2001 (al-Ghad, July 4).

Readers of my blog know that a major source of the problems in Iraq is Saudi Arabia: Saudi volunteers, Saudi know-how and Saudi funding. Since no one will deal with this source of terrorism at the source, in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, the war in Iraq drags on.

Understanding that militant Saudi Wahhabism is a threat to them, both because of their Shiite Islam, which the Wahhabis hate with a passion, and because of old power politics between Saudi Arabia and their own country, I cannot help but wonder if the Iranians are merely acting out of self-preservation when they support terrorists in Iraq. They are not only tying up American forces, but they are offsetting Saudi influence. The situation is so dire, that I characterize non-Wahhabi Muslims and US and allied military forces as Riders on the Storm, having a common enemy: Saudi-funded hatred.

Continuing now with Yemen Faces Second Generation of Islamist Militants:

Yemen did, however, react quickly in the aftermath of the suicide attack. It arrested a handful of suspects in the days following the attack and, on July 4, it killed Ahmad Baysawani Duwaydar, an Egyptian it claimed masterminded the strike (Terrorism Focus, July 10). Yet, after a more thorough investigation, the government modified its claims, and released the details of the 11-man cell it said was behind the attack (26th of September, August 2). Duwaydar's role in the report was reduced to providing material support to the other members of the cell. Among the suspects were three of the 23 escapees, including the head of Al-Qaeda in Yemen, Nasir al-Wuhayshi. Yemen also identified the suicide bomber as Abdu Muhammad Said Ruhayqah, a 21-year-old who was living in the Sanaa neighborhood of Musayk, which has become known over the past few years as a haven for Islamic militants.

Yemen responded to the most recent threat from al-Qaeda by renewing tribal alliances it had established in 2001 and 2002 to counter the militants. On August 5, three days after Yemen revealed the make-up of the cell, President Ali Abdullah Saleh traveled to Marib and al-Jawf to meet with tribal leaders and ask for their assistance in combating al-Qaeda (al-Sharq al-Awsat, August 6). This was reminiscent of a similar trip Saleh made in late 2001, after more than a dozen soldiers were captured during a failed attempt to arrest two suspects in Marib. The early morning raid Yemen launched on an al-Qaeda hideout three days later demonstrates the success of the negotiations.

Getting the local people to "buy in" to the government's program is important. Generally, people do need to feel they have some power to influence their government's course of action; in the absence of that, there is more support for terror.

Notice what I am saying here: "in the absence of that, there is more support for terror." The terrorism will still be there, regardless; these fanatics hate us, and, according to their ideology, they will go to heaven for trying to kill us. And, this "us" is all-inclusive, since the radical terrorists don't discriminate: they hate anyone who doesn't agree with them.

But, I am trying to draw attention to the surrounding people: they have the options of 1) assisting the government against the terrorists, 2) passively looking on and doing nothing, or 3) assisting and covering for the terrorists. The government's program is aimed at getting them away from the second two options, and toward the first.

The raid, which took place in the border region between Marib and al-Jawf governorates, resulted in the deaths of all four al-Qaeda suspects. Three of the suspects—Ali Ali Nasir Doha, Naji Ali Salih Jaradan and Abd al-Aziz Said Jaradan—were wanted in the March assassination of Ali Mahmud Qasaylah, the chief criminal investigator in Marib, as well as for their role in the July 2 attack (Terrorism Focus, May 22). The fourth suspect was Amar Hasan Salih Haryadan, an 18-year-old from the Mahashimah tribe in al-Jawf. According to Yemen's Interior Ministry, Haraydan had been recruited to be another suicide bomber in an upcoming attack that Al-Qaeda in Yemen was planning (al-Motamar.net, August 9).

And, success! However...

Attacks on army checkpoints, government buildings and an electrical sub-station the following day in Marib appear to be retaliatory strikes by the suspects' relatives and not a response from al-Qaeda. The attacks did little damage, but they do illustrate some of the problems the Yemeni government must navigate as it attempts to dismember al-Qaeda. This is not simply a two-sided battle between the government and Al-Qaeda in Yemen, but rather one of multiple and shifting alliances among a variety of different actors. The murky world of tribal loyalties and militant Islamism in the region has led Arafat Madabish, a Yemeni journalist, to label it "Maribistan" in an unflattering comparison to Pakistan's Waziristan (al-Tagheer.com, August 9).

Consistent with the theory that the people need to buy in to the government's policy, those who disagree with it fought back as they could, but these seemed to be amateurs, and their attacks somewhat ineffective. With a little work, the government might be able to get those same people to prevent radicalist terror attacks to begin with, or at least to not react violently when an attack occurs and the government has to respond.

That's all nice in theory. But, what are we not talking about here?

If Yemen is to succeed in dismantling this second generation of al-Qaeda-like militants, it must have significant tribal assistance. Saleh's August 5 meeting was an important step, but a consistent and ongoing effort is necessary if Yemen does not want to face a third generation of militants.

Geographically, Yemen is on one side, and Iraq is on the other; what we are not talking about here is the eight-hundred-pound gorilla that sits in the middle of the peninsula fomenting all of this by spreading its hateful version of Islam, by spreading terrorist know-how, by supplying jihadi volunteers, and by funding the whole show with petrodollars.

This gorilla is a best friend of President Bush, and until somebody in the White House has the honesty and integrity to deal appropriately with Saudzilla, Yemen will be just another Rider on the Storm.

Bush's Kosovo Policy

Chronicles Magazine is an interesting site. One of the reasons I like it so much is because it features the work of Dr. Srdja Trifkovic. Dr. Trifkovic is of Serbian heritage, and is very well-educated and articulate. He has a particularly good handle on Eastern European affairs, though I find that his articles are well worth reading, regardless of what topic he writes about; he does his research, and develops his points logically, using clear and appropriate analogies.

Dr. Trifkovic has a fairly recent article entitled The President’s Painted Corner. Please go to the link and read it; as always, Dr. Trifkovic's article is most excellent.

In his article, Dr. Trifkovic addresses the policy of the current Bush Administration to promote the independence of Kosovo.

My readers my not be familiar with the background and significance of Kosovo, and it is beyond the scope of this article to address that in depth. Briefly, however, Kosovo is now a mainly ethnic Albanian/Muslim area in Serbia. In that respect, it is somewhat akin to certain regions of the United States, in that the United States is predominantly an English-speaking, Protestant country, which has regions with significant Spanish-speaking, Catholic minorities. However, generally speaking, those two groups in the United States get along reasonably well; this has certainly not been the case between the 1) Slavic and Orthodox Christian Serbs and the 2) ethnic Albanian and Muslim people in Kosovo.

In the fourteenth century, Kosovo was the scene of a big battle between the Serbs and invading Muslim armies. In that respect, a comparison with the Alamo, scene of a battle between Texans seeking independence from Mexico and the Mexican Army under Santa Anna, is somewhat useful.

It should be emphatically noted, however, that such comparisons only serve up to a point; again, relations between the "anglos" and the "latinos" in America are not bad, relations between the United States of America and the United Mexican States are generally good, and, in any case, any historical animosities are neither as deep nor as old as they are in the Balkans.

For a little more background on Kosovo, you may wish to begin with the Wikipedia article.

I have reproduced here some excerpts of Dr. Trifkovic's article, along with my comments:

It is not prudent for the United States to insist that Kosovo should and will become independent—as President George W. Bush did in Tirana last June, followed by similar sermons from Dr. Rice and her aides on an almost daily basis—even as it is obvious that Russia will veto any attempt to achieve that goal through the U.N. Security Council, and even as the European Union is increasingly reluctant to participate in any scheme to bypass the United Nations. Statements by U.S. officials that Kosovo’s independence is “inevitable” are a classic case of irresponsible policymakers painting themselves into a corner on a peripheral issue, and then claiming that the issue had morphed into a test of American resolve.

Never mind that it is not prudent -- which, as we will see, it is actually quite foolish -- but why would we want to?

Keep that question in mind as you consider this topic: Why does the Bush Administration insist that Kosovo become independent?

A mature, self-confident and globally hegemonistic “hyperpower” would never allow Kosovo to become such a test for three reasons.

Quite apart from its historic, cultural, moral, and legal aspects, the issue of who controls the southern Serbian province is perfectly irrelevant to American interests. It is a small, land-locked piece of real estate, of dubious “objective” value, away from all major Balkan transit corridors, and not nearly as rich in natural resources as both Serbs and Albanians like to imagine. If Kosovo were to disappear tomorrow, no ordinary American would be able to tell the difference.

Okay, no reason there to insist on Kosovo's independence from Serbia....

The change of Kosovo’s status against the will of Belgrade, in addition to being a clear violation of international law, would set a precedent potentially detrimental to U.S. interests. To enable an ethnic minority to secede from an internationally recognized state on the grounds of that minority’s numerical preponderance in a given locale would open a Pandora’s box of claims all over the world, not least among Russian speakers in the Crimea, parts of Estonia and Latvia, northern Kazakhstan, and eastern Ukraine. It could also affect the future of Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and perhaps even California, when Mexicans achieve a simple majority in those states. (The question is indeed “when,” not “if.”) State Department officials Nicholas Burns and Daniel Fried still insist that no precedent would be set by creating an independent Kosovo, but they cannot control reality, and their assurances are nonsensical.

There Dr. Trifkovic outlines some serious counterincentives.

If a group of people can simply move in to an area, and continue arriving until members of that group become a majority in that area, and then have an internationally-recognizable claim to independence from the country to which they immigrated, that would really cause some problems.

Sweden would become "balkanized", places in France would no longer belong to France, and, as Dr. Trifkovic alludes to, the United States might quickly no longer be united.

The Muslim world will not be appeased by Kosovo today any more than it was appeased by Bosnia a decade ago. America will not earn any brownie points among the world’s “Jihadists of all color and hue” (to borrow a phrase from Rep. Tom Lantos) for creating a new Muslim state in the heart of Europe. Albanian “gratitude” would prove as valuable to America today as it has, over the years, to Fascist Italy, Nazi Germany, Soviet Russia, and Communist China. On the other hand, the failure to create an independent, internationally recognized Kosovo would be yet another sign that Emperor Bush has no clothes and that America has no sureness of touch. Furthermore, favoring the imposition of a “solution” from the outside against the will of one of the parties could set a dangerous long-term precedent for Israel.

Danger to Israel by imposing a solution from the outside....

But, what's this about no "brownie points" for America among the world's jihadists?

Well, those guys are so mean, they hate themselves -- literally.

But, what about certain other elements in the Islamic world?

Is there anyone in the Islamic world to whom Bush hopes to endear himself? Anyone whose policies he seems to further? Anyone that he is exceptionally close to, both in business dealings and on a personal level?

Our policy is not sensible. It panders to the aspirations of a small and primitive, yet shrewdly opportunistic, polity with territorial pretensions against all of her neighbors. President George W. Bush declared in Tirana last June that America is committed to Kosovo’s independence, and he was greeted almost as enthusiastically as Benito Mussolini, Nikita Khrushchev, and Chou En-Lai had been greeted by the Albanians over the decades. As Nicholas Stavrou noted in the National Herald, Mr. Bush reflects the Albanians’ talent for choosing patrons who fulfill three criteria: They must be big enough, far enough, and willing to offend the interests of Albania’s neighbors:

President Bush’s venture into the Balkan tinderbox is nothing short of a blatant provocation aimed at two nations that stood side by side with the United States in two wars, Serbia and Greece. It is part and parcel of a neo-conservative agenda, formulated by the same gang that produced the Iraq war . . . and threatens to engulf the Middle East into a regional conflagration. The ultimate goal, of course, is the conversion of Russia into a first class enemy. The new Cold War warriors view the Balkans as a “logical extension of the Middle East” that ought to be part of a new arrangement that would facilitate integration of Islamic and non-Islamic cultures. Russia, in their view, cannot be trusted with any role in their nefarious schemes to “modernize” Islam and redefine the Middle East as a “region that starts in the Persian Gulf and ends in Sarajevo.”

Serbia and Greece, two nations that have historically been on the front lines against violent Islamic expansion, the kind Osama bin Laden advocates....

And President Bush, who made the comment:

"Every nation, in every region, now has a decision to make: Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists."

is siding with Kosovo, whose links to Islamic mafia and Islamic terrorists are well-known.

Our policy is perfectly sensible. We just need to (forgive me for using this over-used buzz-phrase) "connect the dots."

It is plainly irrational to insist on Kosovo’s independence, with all the risks such a policy entails, while the United States faces so much other “unfinished business” around the globe. The list is well known and depressing. Iraq is a disaster, and there is no light at the end of the tunnel. Afghanistan is a lesser calamity only when compared with Iraq. Any solution to the challenge presented by Iran will depend on Washington’s ability to have Russia on its side as a partner, which is impossible if Moscow’s concerns over Kosovo are treated as illegitimate. Russia is also an essential partner in helping control Kim Jong Il and devising a sustainable long-term energy policy for the Western world.

Insisting on Kosovo's independence is only irrational if you are concerned about US national security -- or the national security of Serbia, France, the United Kingdom, Italy, etc.

In short, Kosovo is an asymmetric issue. Mr. Bush cares about it only as it relates to U.S. “credibility.” The second greatest blunder of his presidency may result from his willingness to accept the assurances of inherited Clintonite bureaucrats of Mr. Burns’ ilk, who have insisted that the Serbs will cave in and that the Russians will budge.

If push comes to shove, Mr. Bush will face Moscow all alone. There is a great deal of dissent in Europe, from Madrid to Athens to Bucharest and Bratislava, but not even those Europeans who are nominally pro-independence—notably, the Germans—would sacrifice a single day’s supply of natural gas over Albanian claims. By contrast, this is, for Serbia, an existential issue and, for Russia, a litmus test of her ability to be a great power once again.

The most important reason the United States should not support Kosovo’s independence is and always has been cultural and civilizational; but trying to explain that to the chief executive who is fanatically supportive of a blanket amnesty for tens of millions of illegal aliens in the United States is as futile as trying to reform Islam.

George W. Bush has painted himself into a tight corner in the Balkans, and he will get a bloody nose if he does not relent. That is bad news for the church-burning Albanian Muslims of Kosovo, and bad news for their heroin-financed lobby in Washington, but it is very good news for America and the civilized world.

Saudi Arabia has been pouring a great deal of resources into Islamic communities in the Balkans.

The Saudis have been financing mosque construction and renovation, they have been training mullahs and sending them to the Balkans....

The Saudis sent mujahideen to the Balkans in the 1990's; although their holy warriors were of little use on the battlefield, they had a great impact committing atrocities against the infidels, and increasing the level of brutality in that war, provoking Serb reactions. Saudi "freedom fighters" (terrorists) even managed to irritate the Croats, who were Muslim allies against the Serbs -- so much so, that on at least one occasion the Croats were pulling troops off the lines facing the Serbs, and putting them on the lines facing the mujahideen!

The Saudis have a vested interest in Kosovo becoming independent from Serbia. They also have a vested interest in seeing that precedent set, so other lands that have growing Muslim minorities can some day have their Muslim enclaves demand independence from the nations to which the places where they live now belong.

That would mean the dismemberment of Sweden, Norway, Italy, the United Kingdom, France, Holland, Denmark, Spain, Canada and the United States, to name a few Western nations.

Russia (Chechnya!), China (Ningxia, Gansu, Xinjiang!!), India (Kashmir!!!) and other countries would not be immune, either.

And Bush is furthering this goal -- although whether deliberately or through incompetence remains to be legally established.

Allahu Akbar, Mr. President!

Counterjihad on the Italian Front

A recent article at The Jamestown Foundation Global Terrorism Analysis by Kathryn Haahr, entitled Italy's Underground Islamist Network, discusses counterterrorist operations in Italy.

I reproduce it here in its entirety along with some of my own comments; numbers in brackets refer to footnotes in the original.

In late July, Italian police announced that they had arrested three Moroccans in a counter-terrorism operation codenamed "Hammam." The operation was aimed at breaking up a terrorist cell believed to be affiliated with al-Qaeda and with proven connections to Moroccan Islamic Combat Group (GICM) members tied to the March 11, 2004 terrorist attacks in Madrid. Police reportedly are still looking for a fourth accomplice who may have fled Italy. The three, the imam of the Ponte Felcino Mosque, Perugia Province, and his two aides, had stored 60 chemical substances (including nitrates, acids and cyanide) in the mosque's cellar, the majority of which were of high toxicity and of the type to fabricate explosive artifacts (EuropaPress.es, July 21; Corriere Della Sera, July 21-23; La Vanguardia, July 21). The imam used the mosque to proselytize radical Islam and to train young men in the use of arms, explosives and toxic substances in terrorist operations. Police uncovered propaganda films and documents downloaded from the internet, used to instruct the recruits on how to prepare poisons and explosives, pilot a Boeing 747 and send encrypted messages (El Pais, July 22; Corriere Della Sera, July 23; La Stampa, July 23; Las Provincias, July 23).

Officers of the Italian Division for General Investigations and Special Operations (DIGOS) and the Central Office for General Investigations and Special Operations (UCIGOS) also reported that they discovered maps of aqueducts in Umbria—which they surmise might have been targets for potential poisoning attempts—as well as pictures of Rome's Fiumicino Airport. Investigations to date lay no doubt that the Ponte Felcino mosque was a "school of terrorism, embedded within a system of small cells that act autonomously," according to Carlo de Stefano, director of UCIGOS (El Pais, July 22). In a related development, police searches of the Perugia mosque led them to another imam in Pierantonio, a small village in Perugia Province, who had a map with five or six cities marked. These activities led the Muslim World League chairman, Mario Scialoja, to say that Italy is now "full of dangerous fundamentalists" and argue for an official register of imams in Italy (La Stampa, July 22).

Two things jump out at me from these two paragraphs.

First, terrorists were using a mosque -- an internationally recognized and protected place of worship -- for training and preparation of violent criminal acts (although some of these mosques may not have official recognition; read on).

We really need to stop treating these terrorists as "somebody's freedom fighters" and recognize them for the violent criminals that they are. They claim to have a political agenda, and some of them may be sincere about their political agenda, but this is premeditated mass murder that they were planning. That murder would likely have been of defenseless civilians. Let's not glorify these guys, as the PC Left does, by trying to see some greater cause that they are killing for.

Let me put it another way: George Washington never used a church to prepare for attacks on civilians, and he never would have tolerated either the abuse of the place of worship, or the targeting of non-military personnel. One man's freedom fighter most certainly is not another man's terrorist; terrorists are criminals, plain and simple.

The other thing that jumps out at me is how the Islamic community, in this case Mario Scialoja, chairman of the Muslim World League, is denouncing this and calling for "an official register of imams in Italy"!

This is the correct approach for the Islamic community to take. Muslims can't police their own mosques any better than to discourage radical criminal activity, report it to the police, and demand official action.

To begin with, the decent people in the Islamic community are working for a living, they show up to pay their respects to their Creator, and find their mosque full of criminals arming and preparing for mass murder. It is completely unreasonable to expect a few decent Muslims to confront these criminals on their own, and, if they did, people would be calling them vigilantes.

Moreover, however, if Muslims should fail to report such activity and seek official help in dealing with it, then they become complicit in the criminal acts that follow, and earn the suspicion of the surrounding community. If Muslims are to live peacefully in the non-Muslim countries where they are, then they have a duty to cooperate with the authorities to help police their mosques and communities.

Significance of Perugia as a Jihadi Epicenter

The recent activity in Perugia demonstrates the reach of Salafi Islamism from northern Italy into the south. Most known "jihadi" activity by Salafi Islamists has centered in Milan, Lombardy Province, and Turin, Piemonte Province. There are an estimated 20 Islamic centers, cultural institutions and associations in Piemonte, and circa 15 in Lombardy. Perugia reportedly has five Islamic centers, cultural institutions and associations.

The most significant aspect of radicalization in Italy is Salafi Islamism's espousal of radical activities, namely recruiting for global jihad in sermons and outreach activities at official and unofficial mosques. The Italian intelligence services --in close coordination with the Spanish, German and Dutch counter-terrorism authorities -- now believe that the majority of Islamists in Italy -- most espousing radical jihad -- are connected to North African radical groups (predominantly the GSPC and GICM) and to Ansar al-Islam, an organization primarily based in the Kurdish areas of Iraq. To date, Islamists have increased their presence in the regions of Piedmont, Tuscany, Umbria and Liguria. Turin and Milan are the epicenters for jihadi activities, but other cities and towns show indications of Islamist activities. A distinct development for Italy is the appearance of Islamist enclaves in parts of major cities --particularly Milan and Turin -- in which Islamist traditions, doctrine and lifestyles frequently challenge Italian legal laws (abuse against women, espousal of holy war against "infidels") and social norms [1].

When you hear Salafi, you need to make a connection to Wahhabi. When you hear Wahhabi, you need to make to make a connection to Riyadh and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. If you have a different take on that, please leave a comment!

It is also noteworthy that many Muslims are happy to live in the relative freedom of the West. As indicated in the end of the preceding paragraph, these concepts of honor killings, veils over the faces of women, and so on, are generally imported -- from Saudi Arabia. Once the Salafis/Wahhabis show up (with their inevitable Saudi backing), there goes the Muslim and surrounding neighborhood.

A case study is Turin, Piemonte, which has become a "Kabul of the Piemonte" due to its history of Islamist imams calling on its faithful to support Osama bin Laden and to engage in jihad against the infidels. Most of the Muslims in the Turin area are Moroccans. In 2005, Italian police detained three Moroccans, believed to be members of GICM, for planning attacks in Italy and abroad, and for recruiting extremists to fight in Afghanistan and Iraq (El Mundo, May 18, 2005). In April 2007, prosecutors in Turin were scheduled to start investigating Mohammed Kohaila, the imam at the Cottolengo mosque, for calling on Muslims to hate Christians and Jews and praying for their deaths. According to media group AKI on April 3, "the DVD portraying Kohaila's sermon was filmed with a hidden camera by a faithful attending the prayers on behalf of a news program on state broadcaster RAI's second channel, Annozero."

According to information as of January 2007, there are 258 mosques officially registered with the Interior Ministry, but their number may be much larger due to their rapid growth (La Stampa, January 5). The oldest mosque is the one in Rome, which belongs to the Islamic Cultural Center of Italy, Italy's oldest Muslim organization; it is the only mosque to have a special recognition as "ente di culto" (entity for religious worship). All Islamic centers function as places of worship and have sites for libraries, Quranic schools and bookstores [2].

Please note that it was "a faithful" and not an infidel who filmed this rabid nutter calling for the death of us kuffar.

Cultural Aspects of Islam and Islamism in Italy

There is no general culture of a global jihad movement among Italian Muslims, which likely can be attributed to the fact that Islam in Italy is not monolithic since no one ethnic group predominates. While groups such as the Muslim Brotherhood and a few foreign imams have given verbal and spiritual support to violent jihadi groups, most Muslim organizations do not espouse militant Islam. However, the exportation to Italy of new forms of Islamist movements and ideologies, especially Salafi Islamism, has introduced Middle Eastern and North African Islamist imams, their radical ideologies and their militant Islam activities. This new brand of Salafism, coined Salafi-Jihadis by the French scholar Gilles Kepel, exhorts Muslims to engage in jihad. These "new" ideologies, coupled with the allure of defending the plight of the global ummah, have begun to alter the cultural reference points for Italian Muslims. These subtle exogenous factors, combined with various indigenous cultural characteristics that this author defines as "Cultural Variables," appear to be transforming traditional cultural reference points for Italian Muslims, which could lead to an increased attraction to Islamism.

What is the plight of the global ummah that needs defending?

The plight is that some leaders in the Arab and Muslim communities want Palestinian Arabs to have an issue with Israel, so they keep them in densely populated areas along Israel's border with no economic development.

The plight is that these leaders blame infidels for their own corrupt and foolish shortcomings, and preach hatred and jihad as a solution to the problem.

If Saudi Arabia would invest half as much in industrial development and the economy of Muslims in the Middle East as it spends trying to convince Muslims to kill infidels, there would be no plight. The plight is that Saudi Arabia and others spread a hateful brand of Islam with their petrodollars, and invest in terrorism.

Existing empirical research on Islam in Italy demonstrates that the process of Islamization in Italy has increased since the early 1990s, while simultaneously younger generations of Italian Muslims have become more oriented toward socio-religious perspectives and positions versus the more traditional socio-economic platforms of the first generation [3]. Sociological studies demonstrate that for the majority of Muslims, the sense of not being represented at the national level increases their sense of "vulnerability," and they thus look to alternative sources of authority who can better protect their religious and socio-economic interests -- unfortunately, organizations such as Union of Muslim Students in Italy, which are influenced by Wahhabi tendencies and are linked to the Muslim Brotherhood, are filling this void. Some of the cultural variables affecting attitudes and behavior among Italian Muslims include: a sense of social inclusion; a sense of alienation due to negative Italian media attitudes toward Muslims; increasing Salafi and Wahhabi influences in make-shift mosques and the power of foreign Islamist imams; internet sites that exhort Muslims to support the global jihad against the infidel; and, the diffused meaning of Muslim identification when ethnicity no longer matters as it did for the first generation -- ethnicity is now global and they think and act globally as opposed to locally. Sociological and political studies of mosques, the imams preaching in mosques and Muslim families indicate that these cultural variables are prominently manifested in the sermons of radical imams seeking to influence the attitudes and behavior of young Italian Muslims.

That's a tough one, because the broader community is going to be suspicious of Muslims if all they see are jihadis and terrorists; as long as that suspicion remains, the decent people in the Islamic community will have a hard time gaining political power to allow them to offer an alternative to jihadis and terrorists.

Looking to the Future

Since the September 11 attacks, Muslims have felt pressure to declare their rejection of radical Islam and to adhere to European values. The interaction between Muslim immigrants from diverse countries, cultures and ideologies could facilitate the robustness of the doctrine of jihadi views: if the sense of alienation stemming from social difficulties (unemployment, living in a "foreign" society such as Italy) in individual ethnic Muslim communities in Italy were to accentuate, one could see the development of minorities of disaffected Muslim youth (male and female) accepting Islamist ideas, especially that of the "non-territorial Islamic state" espoused by Islamist groups and al-Qaeda. It is unclear to what extent the appeal of new radical trends is resonating within ethnic Muslim communities, such as Salafi Islamism, but this is an area that bears serious research. Certainly, the continuing absence of a unified/centralized Islamic leadership is not helpful to this situation. Italian journalist Magdi Allam alluded to this problem in his 2002 book, "Bin Laden in Italy: Travels in Radical Islam," in which he identifies several personalities that he defines as Islamist (such as the director of the Union of Islamic Communities in Italy, or UCOII, as well as the imams of the Turin, Milan, Bologna and Naples mosques) and their radical impact on Italian Muslims.

Well, we need to find out "to what extent the appeal of new radical trends is resonating within ethnic Muslim communities" and consider shutting off its well-funded source.

Intra-ethnic tensions, which already play out in the competition between various Islamic and Islamist organizations, could cause a splintering between groups and their followers. Although Arab and South Asian Muslim organizations and influences are nowhere as prevalent as they are in the United Kingdom, the appearance of new groups, such as Jamaat-e-Islami, should be studied. Moreover, the strengthening of Muslim Brotherhood organizations and ideologies is something to be observed. Organizational rivalries are evident in the emergence of two types of Islam, each of which has its adherents: an Islam of the mosques (organizations such as UCOII, which represents numerous Islamic mosques throughout Italy), and Islam of the "state" (the ICI in Milan, and other mosques that receive foreign state funding from Saudi Arabia). The friction between Islam of the mosques and Islam of the "state" is that those mosques that receive foreign state funding tend to have a fundamentalist orientation, such as toward Saudi Arabia and the Muslim Brotherhood—this tension is visible in the politics of each Muslim organization [4].

"Intra-ethnic tensions" -- again, these jihadis are perhaps more of a danger to Muslims who fail to accept the criminal ideology that the jihadis preach, than they are to infidels.

Read this part again: The friction between Islam of the mosques and Islam of the "state" is that those mosques that receive foreign state funding tend to have a fundamentalist orientation, such as toward Saudi Arabia and the Muslim Brotherhood—this tension is visible in the politics of each Muslim organization [4].

Foreign state funding for terrorism
is
state sponsorship of terror.

President George W. Bush, Thursday, September 20, 2001:
"Every nation, in every region, now has a decision to make: Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists."

President Bush, since you refuse to deal with your buddies in Saudi Arabia who sponsor terror, then you are with the Saudis, and, using your own logic, that means that

You are with the terrorists.

Conclusion

The existence of Salafi networks and cells, and their proven connections to other cells throughout Europe, are in and of themselves worrisome because they could not exist without a minimum amount of sympathy and support from the general population in which they live and operate. Perugia, like Turin and other cities, can be viewed as a laboratory in which competing ideologies (reform Islam vs. Salafi Islamism) are playing out. Deeper studies should explore the context in which immigration might be inducing an Islamist shift and the underpinnings of religious belonging.

We need to investigate and get a handle on how much sympathy there is for terrorists and criminals, but mostly, we need to deal with the state sponsors of terror -- all of them!