Uncle Jay Explains Nov 10, 2008

Another great short video. It’s amazing how he can cover the highlights of the week’s news in 3 minutes when the networks can’t do it in 7 days. Just click on the title above.

Press Conference: Coalition to Stop Sharia

by Jeffrey Imm

November 6, 2008 - Washington DC: The Coalition to Stop Sharia held a press conference at the National Press Club to oppose actions by the U.S. Treasury Department today to hold a course titled "Islamic Finance 101" to "train" government employees on Sharia-Compliant Finance (SCF). The coalition, consisting of diverse groups with a shared interest in fighting Islamic supremacism, called for the U.S. Treasury Department to either cancel the training course this afternoon or to provide education on the full Islamic supremacist nature of Sharia.

Representative speakers for the coalition at the press conference included Frank Gaffney – Center for Security Policy, Robert Spencer – JihadWatch.org, Dan Pollak - Zionist Organization of America, Wendy Wright – Concerned Women for America, Faith J.H. McDonnell – The Institute on Research and Democracy, Kyle Scheindler of the Endowment for Middle East Truth (EMET), Jim Boulet of English First, and Warren Mendelson of the Unity Coalition for Israel.

Frank Gaffney described the Coalition to Stop Sharia as a group, assembled in just the past several days in reaction to the Treasury SCF training and other events, as an "interfaith, non-partisan group of individuals and organizations that have decided that this is the time to begin contesting seriously a seditious program that authoritative Islam describes as Sharia. We have come together to call attention to and to counter the insinuation of Sharia into our society and those of other freedom loving people through various means, both stealthy and nonviolent and through the use or threat of the use of force."

Frank Gaffney described the efforts to expand Sharia-Compliant Finance as a threat "aimed at the very heart of the American economy." He noted as efforts to combat Sharia have gained ground that the proponents of Sharia have renamed Sharia-Compliant Finance as "Islamic finance," "ethical finance," or "structured finance." Mr. Gaffney pointed to the efforts by the Center for Security Policy in studying Sharia-Compliant Finance that has resulted in a legal memorandum by David Yerushalmi titled "Shari'ah's Black Box: Civil Liability and Criminal: Exposure Surrounding Shari'ah-Compliant Finance." Sen. Jon Kyl reviewed David Yerushalmi's report and Sen. Kyl wrote SEC Chairman Chris Cox, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, and Attorney General Michael Mukasey asking them to respond to this report.

To date, only SEC Chairman Cox and Fed Chairman Bernanke have responded, but Frank Gaffney stated that "it is instructive that neither Chairman Cox nor Chairman Bernanke has addressed the fundamental question which is what is Sharia and why is it a problem that we have people who are promoting Sharia which is a seditious conspiracy to bring about the overthrow of the United States government and for that matter those of other secular democracies around the world in favor of a global theocracy under Sharia."

Mr. Gaffney also recommended a publication distributed at the press conference entitled "Sharia, Law and 'Financial Jihad': How Should America Respond?" that was co-sponsored by The McCormick Foundation and The Center for Security Policy.

Regarding the U.S. Treasury Sharia-Compliant Finance training course, Frank Gaffney stated that "its purpose seems unmistakable in the complexion of the speakers all of whom it appears support Sharia-Compliant Finance, none of whom it appears is prepared to talk to these government official about what Sharia is and what constitutes as a result – the problems with a financial program designed to advance this seditious conspiracy." Mr. Gaffney also referenced comments by the United Kingdom's Archbishop of Canterbury stating that Sharia would need to be tolerated in the UK, which were based on existing support for Sharia-Compliant Finance in the UK.

Mr. Gaffney stated that "we are determined not to let that happen here, and we are challenging the Treasury Department in its efforts to promote Sharia and Sharia-Compliant Finance." He also noted that the Treasury trainers include advocates of Sharia-Compliant Finance and are benefiting from that industry. He called for the Department of Treasury to have another course on Sharia "where people are allowed to talk about what Sharia is, why it is seditious, and why its manifestations in the form of Sharia-Compliant Finance must be opposed, not supported, not abetted, not implemented, especially as seems entirely possible the purpose of the Treasury Department is to use its new found leverage in the financial markets to do that kind of promotion inside our financial industry which is now owned by the Federal Government or is being influenced by the $700 billion being dangled in front of the industry."

Robert Spencer, author of Stealth Jihad and leader of JihadWatch.org, told the press conference that there has been a history of those who have sought to integrate Sharia into America's political policies. He provided the example of Harvard University's Noah Feldman as "one of the leading proponents of Sharia finance and of the spread of Sharia norms in framing of the Iraqi constitution as well as the spread of the idea of the acceptability of Sharia in the west." Mr. Spencer pointed to Feldman's New York Times magazine column on Shariah, which has been widely distributed and reprinted around the world. Mr. Spencer points out that Noah Feldman never addresses how Sharia "treats women and non-Muslims and that is getting to the heart of what is problematic about it and indeed seditious about it in many ways."

Robert Spencer pointed out "the accommodation to the norms of Islamic law that goes under the name of Sharia cannot be separated from the accommodation of Islamic law in general. Sharia financial provisions are not in any sense within Islam juridically or in any other sense separate from or separable from the larger aggregate of Islamic laws." He continued "according to authoritative Islamic jurisprudence, the entirety of the provisions of Sharia that have been dictated by the Islamic holy book (the Qur'an), and Islamic traditions (the Sunna) and agreed upon by the principal scholars of all of the principal schools of Islamic law are all considered the laws of God himself, are not negotiable, are not subject to compromise or to mitigation." "Therefore in accepting the principle that Islamic law must be the subject of special accommodation in the financial sector, the Treasury Department has set a precedent that will allow for the assertion and the acceptance of the principle that Islamic law must be the subject of special accommodation in other sectors of American society as well. This is an extremely dangerous precedent to set for a large number of reasons. In its classic and authoritative formulations, formulations that have never been seriously challenged by modernist reforms and are extremely unlikely to be so challenged given the nature of their authority within Islamic theology and law, Sharia is at variance with numerous core principles of American society, including the principles of freedom of speech, freedom of conscience, and the equality of rights of all people before the law. Sharia institutionalizes discrimination against women and non-Muslims. It denies the right of the human person to make the choice to hear to what he has come to believe in good conscience is the truth. It muzzles its own critics and the critics of the Islamic religion and even forbids dispassionate analysis of how Islamic texts and teachings are being used by Islamic Jihadists to justify violence and Islamic supremacism, and to gain recruits for violent and supremacist Islamic groups."

Robert Spencer then referenced 20th century Shariah activist and writer Sayyid Abul A'la Maududi (aka Mawdudi), whose writings have been collected in "Jihad in Islam." Mr. Spencer then quoted Maududi's comments that:

"Islam wishes to destroy all States and Governments anywhere on the face of the earth which are opposed to the ideology and programme of Islam regardless of the country or the Nation which rules it. The purpose of Islam is to set up a State on the basis of its own ideology and programme, regardless of which Nation assumes the role of the standard bearer of Islam or the rule of which nation is undermined in the process of the establishment of an ideological Islamic State."

"Islam does not intend to confine this revolution to a single State or a few countries; the aim of Islam is to bring about a universal revolution."

Robert Spencer indicated that such Sharia revolutionary thinking "strikes directly and explicitly, and not apologetically, against secular government or the idea of government where there is not establishment of a religion." He further addressed Sharia activist Maududi's commentary on the Qur'an that called for subjugation of Jews and Christians under Islamic law, and added that Maududi demanded that non-Muslims have absolutely no right to wield "the reins of power in any part of God's earth," and if they do then according to Maududi, "the believers" are responsible for dislodging them from such power using any means possible.

Robert Spencer stated that "this revolution has also come to the United States and is advancing here." He referenced the objective of International Muslim Brotherhood in undermining the United States, as has been previously stated in a Muslim Brotherhood memorandum, admitted in evidence during the first Holy Land Foundation terror finance trial, where the Muslim Brotherhood calls for "eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within and 'sabotaging' its miserable house by their hands and the hands of the believers so that it is eliminated and Allah's religion is made victorious over all other religions." Robert Spencer also pointed out that this same Muslim Brotherhood memorandum also lists numerous Islamic groups, many of which are active in America today and viewed by many as "moderate," were to be involved in such infiltration of America. Many of these groups also support Sharia finance.

As an example of the challenge to America with such Islamic supremacist thinking, Robert Spencer also referenced ISNA Board member Ihsan Bagby who has stated: "we [Muslims] can never be full citizens of this country... because there is no way we can be fully committed to the institutions and ideologies of this country." Mr. Spencer stated that this type of thinking will only continue to grow with the accommodation to Sharia finance and Sharia norms. He views this as "the assumption that Islamic law is superior to American law and must one day supplant it." Mr. Spencer views that the U.S. Treasury Department's Sharia finance training, without providing the ideological background on what Sharia is and the threat it poses to human rights, will only "provide support for this kind of assumption." He stated that "Americans, both Muslim and non-Muslim, deserve better," and referenced that many Muslims came to America to escape the same Sharia that it now is finding once again America. He concluded that "Americans, Muslims and non-Muslims, who saw our nation brutally and gratuitously attacked on September 11, 2001 by adherence of the idea that Islamic law must be imposed over the entire world, they deserve better. Women deserve better. All free people deserve better." Mr. Spencer also called for the U.S Treasury to open an investigation into what Sharia means and intends to do, to provide full understanding to those being trained regarding Sharia Compliant-Finance. He also called for the U.S. Treasury to curb the spread of Shariha Compliant-Finance in our nation's financial institutions.

Dan Pollak of the Zionist Organization of America stated that his organization joins the coalition "to oppose the imposition of Sharia-Compliant financing on the American financial system." He stated that Sharia scholars "who determine where investments can be made in Sharia financing" have been united in condemning Israel and "all interactions with Israelis and Jews." Mr. Pollak pointed out that the U.S. Treasury Department should speak to the U.S. Department of Justice as it is "against U.S. law for any company to participate in the Arab-sponsored boycott of Israel." He further stated that the "division of a world where only Sharia is the guiding principle is actually the root of Arab-Israeli conflict," condemning the "intolerance of Sharia and the hatred it breeds."

Mr. Pollak implored that "our Constitutional guarantee of freedom of religion does not and should not allow for imposing Sharia on the U.S. financial system... the American people must become aware of the strategies of our enemies as well as their tactics." He further stated that "they mean to fundamentally change the paradigm of the West as a tolerant and liberal place to observe any religion without compulsion."

Faith McDonnell of The Institute on Religion & Democracy (IRD) also spoke out against Sharia-Compliant Finance. Within her organization, Ms. McDonnell is the Director, Religious Liberty Program and Church Alliance for a New Sudan. Faith McDonnell stated that "the Center for Security Policy has defined Sharia as 'authoritative Islam's theo-political-religious program for establishing a global theocracy.'" She indicated concerns that "such a theocracy does not come about through the use violent jihad alone. Islamists also use the less obvious forms of jihad, such as the economic jihad of Sharia-Compliant Finance."

From her organization's experience as advocates for religious liberty around the world, she stated that "the IRD has seen the devastating effects of Sharia on Muslims and non-Muslims alike. Particularly egregious has been the imposition of Sharia as well as the brutal backlash against those who resist, on Christians in Sudan, Nigeria, Pakistan, Egypt, Iraq, Somalia, and elsewhere. And we have seen the use of stealth jihad in these nations, as well." Ms. McDonnell stated that "we fear that Sharia-Compliant Finance is only an entry level course in a much broader program of Sharia, the end goal of which is to supplant modern constitutionalism with archaic and undemocratic Islamic theocracy."

Regarding her experience in the challenges in Sudan, Mr. McDonnell pointed to Sharia finance representing a new form of Jihad against freedom.

She stated that:

"The Islamist government in Sudan was finally forced into a peace agreement in 2005 that stopped its genocidal jihad against the Christians, followers of traditional religions, and Muslims who resisted Sharia. Immediately they began a financial jihad, backed by the same Arab governments who backed the genocide. They are currently seducing Southern Sudanese desperate for education, healthcare, employment, and infrastructure with Islamic-financed schools, hospitals, roads, and mosques. Those who have been paying with their lives to resist the jihad of bombs and bullets are in danger of succumbing to the jihad of money."

She called for "those responsible within the United States government to examine the evidence that if they submit to Sharia-Compliant Finance at any level, they are putting the United States in far greater danger than an economic crisis."

Kyle Scheindler of the Endowment for Middle East Truth (EMET) also spoke against Sharia-Compliant Finance, opposing "this act of dhimmitude by the U.S. Treasury Department that is represented by the Islamic Finance 101 meeting," and due to the recent bailouts and acquisitions, "the U.S. Treasury has a responsibility to U.S. taxpayers greater than it has possessed at any time prior to Alexander Hamilton."

He stated that "it is supremely ironic that the Treasury Department government agency responsible for prosecuting charities which fund Islamic terrorism is now considering a financial system which will mandate banks and investment products donate to those charities. Those donations will be directed by Sharia advisory boards brimming with individuals who belong to organizations that are unindicted co-conspirators" in the Holy Land Foundation terror finance retrial.

Jim Boulet of English First also joined in the condemnation of Sharia-Compliant Finance, issuing a written statement that read "in multicultural America, no one wishes to draw lines between reasoned dissent and what is effectively an effort to overthrow the American way of life." He referenced the "The Basics of the Political System in Islam" as stating that "Islam is a 'total way of life.'" Mr. Boulet stated that this ideology recognized "no separation of church and state," and "once America's financial systems is intertwined with the Islamic system of finance, other demands can be expected, demands which will transform American society." He also challenged those supporting Sharia Compliant-Finance to consider the impacts on single women seeking to have financial independence.

Wendy Wright of Concerned Women for America also shared her concerns regarding Sharia-Compliant Finance. She stated that Sharia law's "intention is to control society," and expressed concerns that "accommodating Sharia through our financial system legitimizes a world view and life style that promotes the subjugation of women, the killing of infidels, the denial of human dignity, and the imposition of cruel and inhumane practices."

She challenged the representatives of the U.S. Treasury Department sponsoring the Sharia finance training to clarify what aspects of Sharia they seek to encourage in America society: "that husbands can use physical force against their wives, the early forced marriage of a girl as young as nine, that men can have multiple marriages and multiple wives, that men can have the right of custody of children and mothers have no rights of custody, that homosexuals should be stoned to death, that women accused of bringing dishonor to male relatives should be killed."

Wendy Wright stated that the "intellectuals at the Treasury Department need a shot of common sense. You can't play with fire and not get burned, and you can't accommodate Sharia without affecting society with its inhumane practices."

Warren Mendelson of the Unity Coalition for Israel also spoke to indicate his organization's support for the Coalition to Stop Sharia. He indicated that America's financial challenges leaves it vulnerable to "schemes being advanced to put our financial house in order with SCF which has the potential for far-reaching consequences more dangerous than we face today. We would make a grave mistake to adopt SCF. It is incumbent on all of us to gain a clear understanding of exactly what Sharia law means and how it will impact not only financial state of affairs but also the consequences that conflict with our Constitutional rights."

He further stated that Sharia "requries non-Muslims to live as dhimmis, second-class citizens... and be treated in a brutal and demeaning way... it mandates discrimination against women and non-Muslims, demands the murder of homosexuals, adulterers, and apostates, and requires violent jihad against all infidels, including Christians, Jews, Buddhists, and others." He continued that "Sharia law is seditious because it calls for the violent overthrow of governments like the United States and the replacement of democratic Constitutional law with its own bureaucratic code." He indicated that the nations practicing Sharia law today are "some of the most oppressive regimes in the world."

He pointed out that Sharia Compliant-Finance works by "returns on investments from companies that must be purified partially by donating a portion of their profits to charity. Charities that receive these donations are selected by Sharia experts who are members of an oversight board. There are allegations that some of the profits support major Muslim organizations suspected of having ties to terrorism." He further referenced the ongoing Holy Land Foundation retrial, as well as the Benevolence International Foundation "was closed in 2001 for allegedly supporting Islamic terrorism." He indicated that "some analysts are concerned that Islamic banking will open Western financial institutions to help further the broader Islamic agenda.. and pour in the billions and billions of petrodollars into the financial systems of the Western world."

Frank Gaffney also read a statement from coalition partner, Dr. Zuhdi Jasser, President of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy.

This statement included the following comments:

"Make no mistake, Sharia-Compliant Finance is neither about religion nor about God. It is about Islamist control and collectivization of Muslims against the West and free markets. SCF systems are nothing more than a ruse to give transnational Islamist movements and their controlling Muslim theocrats an economic power base. Attempts to appease requests by Islamists to provide so-called SCF are misguided. SCF provides sanction of a dangerous separatist economic system which incubates Islamist ideology among Muslims and keeps them apart from the general population. Islamist theocrats exploit Western deference to religious freedom in order to lay the foundations of a system which feigns religion in order to control the economic decisions of Muslims and non-Muslims alike. SCF allows governments and banks to empower Islamist theocrats who really only want to control Muslim economics rather than actually stimulate the open economic freedom of Muslims. This is the difference between theocracy and liberty, instead of lay citizens controlling their own economic transactions, the invisible hand becomes the hand of the Islamist cleric."

The Coalition to Stop Sharia also provided an expanded list of organizations that support their cause, which to date includes leaders of 25 organizations:

1. ACT for America - Brigitte Gabriel, President
2. American Center for Democracy - Rachel Ehrenfeld, President
3. American Islamic Forum for Democracy - Dr. Zuhdi Jasser, President
4. Center for Security Policy - Frank J. Gaffney, Jr., President
5. Christian Solidarity International - Father Keith Rodderick, Washington Representative
6. Committee on the Present Danger - Chet Nagle
7. Concerned Women for America - Wendy Wright, President
8. Endowment for Middle East Truth - Sarah Stern, President
9. English First - Jim Boulet, Jr. Executive Director
10. Family Security Matters - Carol Taber, founder
11. Florida Security Council - Tom Trento, President
12. Geostrategic Analysis - Peter Huessy
13. High Frontier - Hank Cooper, Chairman
14. Institute for the Study of Islam and Christianity - Patrick Sookhdeo, Director and Marshall Sana, Director of Communications
15. Institute on Religion & Democracy, Religious Liberty Program - Faith J. H. McDonnell, Director
16. Jewish Action Alliance
17. Jihadwatch.org, a project of the David Horowitz Freedom Center - Robert Spencer, renowned author and expert on Sharia law, Director
18. Let Freedom Ring - Colin Hanna, President
19. Society of Americans for National Existence - David Yerushalmi, President
20. Tradition, Property and Family - C. Preston Noelle III
21. Traditional Values Coalition - Andrea Lafferty, Executive Director
22. United American Committee
23. Unity Coalition for Israel - Esther Levens, President
24. Women United - Beth Gilinsky, President
25. Zionist Organization of America - Morton Klein, National President

In addition, the Anti-Jihad League of America supports the cause of this group in fighting Sharia and Islamic supremacism.

Fear No Evil.

FamilySecurityMatters.org Contributing Editor Jeffrey Imm, formerly of the FBI, has his own counterterrorism research web site at UnitedStatesAction.com and is a part of the Anti-Jihad League of America.

EMP – The Next Iranian Strategic Threat to U.S. Mainland?

by Dr. Walid Phares

As the transition teams are working to update the President-elect and his national security advisors on the many challenges awaiting the new Administration, the threat environment for the near and medium future is widening as new strategic menaces are anticipated. One of these threats should affect national security planning for years to come.

Over the past seven months, I have been interacting with U.S. Homeland Security and European defense officials and experts on the next potential threat to the West, more particularly against mainland America. The signature of that strategic menace is EMP, or electro magnetic pulse - a weapon of the future but already available in design, construction and possible deployment. As eyes are focused on the Iranian nuclear threat, and as we began recently to understand that missile advances are as important as fissile material development, private sector projects and some in the defense world are now paying attention to what can cause a wider circle of damage to the U.S. and thus be more crippling to U.S. national security.

In short, and I borrow from Project Shield America - http://shieldamerica.org/ - an electromagnetic pulse (EMP) attack could be triggered by a nuclear warhead detonated at high altitude over America. The resulting, devastating blast would create an EMP, a shockwave that could "cripple military and civilian communications, power, transportation, water, food, and other infrastructure." Even if a high-altitude EMP kills nobody at first, it would paralyze a large section, if not most of, of the United States. The lingering practical and economic effects would take anywhere from hours to years to resolve: when secondary effects are considered, such as the unavailability of food, an EMP could be even deadlier than a direct nuclear strike against the mainland. Indeed, Rep. Roscoe Bartlett has written: "Where the terrorist airliner attacks of 9/11 killed thousands, a terrorist EMP attack could indirectly kill millions and conceivably cause the permanent collapse of our entire society." Unable to access food or water, most Americans could starve to death.

By understanding how fundamental and irreversible the reliance of the United States is on electronics for every aspect of its citizens' lives (all of our food and water plants are run by electricity which would be destroyed), we realize how this makes the U.S. extremely vulnerable to this particular emerging threat. And this raises the issue of identifying the point of origin of such a menace. Many indicators direct us to Iran. In previous articles on the Counterterrorism Blog and other outlets, I have focused on the missile threat as a dossier by itself, independent from the nuclear file for a rational reason: missiles can be used to deliver nuclear weapons, but also other weapons, including chemical and biological ones. In the case of Hezbollah's mini war of July 2006 with Israel, large rockets and small missiles were conceived as classical but were strategically aimed at chemical sites as well. Hence the missile threat is diverse. In the case of an EMP weapon system, we need to look at Iran's missile capability from the perspective of delivering a blow - not just to Israel or U.S. and Western targets in the region - but also across large bodies of water too.

Geopolitical projections, including developments which may take place in Iraq and Afghanistan, tell us that Iran may find itself free from constraints to equip itself with long range missiles able to reach the U.S. mainland at some point in the near future, not only from mainland Iran, but also from other locations closer to America, including from the hands of terrorist forces in the open seas and elsewhere.

As a result of these geopolitical considerations, I believe it is urgent for the defense and counterterrorism communities to increase the level of study and effort in this emerging field of strategic threats and begin a public awareness campaign to educate citizens in this regard.

FamilySecurityMatters.org Contributing Editor Dr. Walid Phares is the Director of the Future Terrorism Project at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies and a visiting scholar at the European Foundation for Democracy. He is the author of The Confrontation: Winning the War against Future Jihad.

Terrorism: What's Coming - The Mutating Threat

(Compiler's note: A 76-page study worthy of your review. Must read. Click on the title above for the full report.)

by The Memorial Institute for the Prevention of Terrorism (MIPT) is a non-profit, nationally
recognized think tank creating state-of-the-art knowledge bases and sharing information
on terrorism.

....A more ominous change was taking place at the same time. Terrorism was becoming bloodier. More terrorist incidents resulted in fatalities rather than purely symbolic violence, more incidents resulted in multiple fatalities, and in more incidents, it was clear that the terrorists were determined to kill as many people as possible. In part, the escalation reflected the continuing need to command attention, which, in a crowded terrorist field, required more spectacular violence. In part, it reflected the brutalization of the terrorists themselves. The self-imposed constraints that had discouraged terrorists from wanton bloodshed were eroding. But the escalation also reflected the replacement of terrorists who had political agendas with terrorists who were inspired by religious ideology and were therefore beyond considerations of morality and earthly politics.

This change was also apparent in terrorist tactics. Increased security and international cooperation among governments (largely fostered by self-interest) had gradually reduced the number of terrorist hijackings. Better security, hard-line government policies, and a greater willingness to use force in barricade situations reduced the number of hostage seizures and kidnappings, except those for cash ransoms. But terrorist motivations played a role too. Direct coercion was being replaced by threatening to kill hostages if demands were not met. ....

A Look at Terrorist Behavior: How They Prepare, Where They Strike

(Compiler's note: This is a must read article. )

by Brent Smith, Ph.D.

Timothy McVeigh, the Sept. 11 hijackers and Eric Rudolph all had something in common — they selected targets hundreds of miles from where they lived. McVeigh wandered the Midwest living as a transient before making his bomb in Herington, Kan., and driving 250 miles south to blast the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City. The Sept. 11 hijackers traveled hundreds of miles to their targets. And Rudolph drove nearly 300 miles from Murphy, N.C., to bomb an abortion clinic in Birmingham, Ala.

For local police departments searching for ways to stop terrorist acts before they occur, this does not bring much comfort. When looking at these attacks, officers might get the impression that there is not much they can do about terrorism other than improving physical security at high-risk targets.

But were these infamous terrorists typical?

Although we know a great deal about the behavior of traditional criminals, little information has been available about terrorists. Are they much different from conventional criminals, who tend to commit their crimes close to home?[1] Research has shown that traditional criminals are spontaneous, but terrorists seem to go to great lengths preparing for their attacks — and may commit other crimes while doing so. How long does this planning take? And do different types of terrorist groups vary in preparation time?

To help answer these questions, the National Institute of Justice (NIJ) launched a series of projects to explore patterns of terrorist behavior.[2] In the first of these projects, a panel of experts[3] was assembled to examine 60 case studies involving terrorist incidents in the U.S. during the past 25 years.[4] These cases involved the four major types of U.S. terrorist groups: left wing, right wing, single issue and international.[5],[6],[7] The panel — including this author — looked at the homes of the terrorists, the locations of planning and preparation, and the sites of the terrorist incidents to discover whether any patterns emerged.

What we learned was intriguing: The cases of McVeigh, the Sept. 11 hijackers and Rudolph are actually unusual. In fact, we found that most terrorists live close to their selected targets, and they engage in a great deal of preparation — some over the course of months or even years — that has the potential of coming to the attention of local law enforcement.

Terrorists Think Globally but Act Locally

Exhibit 1. Distance From Terrorist Residence to Target (All Groups)
View larger image

We studied:

• Ten attacks by international groups that involved 93 preparatory acts.
• Fourteen attacks by right-wing groups that involved 55 preparatory acts.
• Twenty-nine attacks by environmental groups that involved 80 preparatory acts.
• Six attacks by left-wing groups that involved eight preparatory acts.

According to our analysis, almost half (44 percent) of all terrorists examined lived within 30 miles of their targets. (See Exhibit 1. Distance From Terrorist Residence to Target (All Groups).) When the types of terrorist groups are examined separately, however, the findings are much different.

International terrorists lived relatively near their targets, whereas right-wing terrorists lived in rural areas but selected targets reflecting the "pollutants of urban life" in nearby cities.

Terrorists most commonly prepared for their attacks with surveillance and intelligence gathering, robberies and thefts to raise funding for the group, weapons violations, and bomb manufacturing. Again, most of these behaviors took place relatively near their homes, which, in turn, were close to the targets. Terrorists may stay close to home because of new immigration status, lack of transportation, lack of knowledge of the urban landscape or a desire to avoid attention. Among single-issue terrorists in particular, 71 percent of the preparatory acts occurred within 12 miles and 92 percent within 28 miles of the target. This finding may also be attributed to the use of "uncoordinated violence" tactics by these environmental and anti-abortion extremists, which often results in local targeting by "lone wolves" sympathetic to the cause.

A separate follow-up NIJ project[8] that analyzed the distance between more than 250 environmental and international terrorists' homes and their targets confirmed the earlier preliminary findings that their spatial patterns are fairly similar. The analysis found that about half of the environmental terrorists and nearly three-fifths of the international terrorists lived within 30 miles of their targets. (See Exhibit 2. Distance From Environmental Terrorist to Target and Exhibit 3. Distance From International Terrorist Residence to Target.) Sixty-five percent of the environmental terrorists and 59 percent of the international terrorists prepared for their attacks within 30 miles of their target sites.

Exhibit 2. Distance From Environmental Terrorist Residence to Target
View larger image

Exhibit 3. Distance From International Terrorist Residence to Target
View larger image

Although the terrorists studied committed most of their preparatory offenses near their homes, they conducted robberies, burglaries and thefts much farther away — an average of 429 miles from home. This suggests that most environmental and international terrorists live near the selected target and conduct surveillance and other general preparation near their homes and the eventual location of the attack. Major crimes to procure funding for the group — like thefts, robberies and burglaries — however, are intentionally committed many miles away to avoid drawing attention to the group's location and target choice.

The Terrorist's Timepiece

Table 1. Cumulative Percentage of Preparatory Acts Over Time
View larger image

We found that preparations generally began less than six months before the attack and ended with a flurry of actions a day or so before. This pattern varied by group type. Single-issue and right-wing terrorists engaged in substantially less preparatory crime over a shorter period — once again, most likely reflecting the use of "leaderless resistance" and lone-wolf strategies. The planning cycle of international terrorists tended to be longer. (See Table 1. Cumulative Percentage of Preparatory Acts Over Time.)

In our follow-up study, we took a closer look at the specific patterns of international and environmental terrorists by placing the preparations for all incidents on a time line. For instance, we examined the 21 incidents attributed to the environmental terrorist group known as "The Family," which was responsible for the Vail, Colo., ski resort arson in 1998 and many attacks against Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management buildings from 1996 to 2000. The Family consisted of at least 16 people. Unlike most environmental terrorists who use uncoordinated violence and lone-wolf strategies, the group's actions were more spontaneous than other environmental cases, with a short preparation period and little extended planning. Eighty-five percent of their known preparation activities — typically, inspection of the target, purchase of bomb-making items from local stores and identification of a staging area a short distance from the target — occurred within six days of the planned attack. An explosive device was assembled at the staging area a day or so before the incident and then delivered to the target. Participants usually returned to the staging area to destroy any evidence.

International terrorists, on the other hand, engaged in nearly three times as many preparatory acts per incident as their environmental counterparts. This may be due to the larger number of people usually involved in international incidents, the size and scope of the planned incident or simply a longer planning cycle. Comparing the 10 international terrorist incidents that occurred on American soil,[9] we found that the average planning cycle for international terrorists was 92 days, as opposed to 14 days for environmental terrorists. Averages can be misleading, however, because of significant outliers, such as the multiyear planning cycle of the Islamic extremists seeking to destroy New York City landmarks in the mid-1990s. Whereas environmental terrorists committed an overwhelming majority of their preparatory activities in the week before the incident, international terrorists took up to six months to prepare.

Arming Police With Knowledge

For law enforcement agencies, the implications of these patterns are significant. Committing an act of terrorism will usually involve local preparations. Although much of this conduct will not necessarily be criminal, early intelligence may give law enforcement the opportunity to stop the terrorists before an incident occurs. Knowledge of the threat — for example, understanding how long environmental or international terrorists prepare for their attacks — will affect the manner in which local officials respond. Identifying preparatory actions by environmental extremists may signal that an attack is imminent, whereas similar behavior by an international group might suggest that an attack is still several months away.

Understanding that most terrorists "act locally" can be important to know as investigative agencies seek to prevent terrorism and arrest perpetrators. These local patterns may be used by agencies to more efficiently patrol known, high-risk target areas and gather intelligence on suspected actions within a specific distance from potential targets. As we continue to deepen our understanding of the relationship among the location of the terrorist's home, terrorist preparation activities and the target, this growing knowledge should help officers prevent and respond to attacks.

NIJ Journal No. 260, July 2008
NCJ 222900

About the Author

Brent Smith is a professor of sociology and criminal justice at the University of Arkansas. A student of terrorism for nearly 30 years, he created the American Terrorism Study in 1988 with assistance from the FBI. Smith currently serves as director of the Terrorism Research Center (TRC) in Fulbright College at the University of Arkansas. He was assisted on the projects discussed in the article by Kelly Damphousse, professor of sociology and associate dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Oklahoma; Jackson Cothren, assistant professor of geosciences and affiliate of the Center for Advanced Spatial Technologies at the University of Arkansas; and Paxton Roberts, research associate at TRC. Back to the top.

Go to Interagency Coordination: A Case Study of the 2005 London Train Bombings.

Notes

[1] Wright, R., and S. Decker, Burglars on the Job: Streetlife and Residential Break-ins, Boston: Northeastern University Press, 1994; Wright, R., and S. Decker, Armed Robbers in Action: Stickups and Street Culture, Boston: Northeastern University Press, 1997; and Reppetto, T. A., Residential Crime, Cambridge: Ballinger Publishing, 1974.

[2] "Pre-Incident Indicators of Terrorist Group Activities," NIJ Grant # 2003-DT-CX-0003; "Geospatial Analysis of Terrorist Activities: The Identification of Spatial and Temporal Patterns of Preparatory Behavior of International and Environmental Terrorists," NIJ Grant # 2005-IJ-CX-0200; and "Terrorism in Time and Space," NIJ Grant # 2006-IJ-CX-0037.

[3] The members of the panel and their areas of expertise were: Ron Arnold, environmental terrorism; Steve Chermak, right-wing terrorism; Kelly Damphousse, terrorism database management; William Dyson, domestic and international terrorism; Mark Hamm, right-wing terrorism; Robert Heibel, left-wing terrorism; Austin Turk, terrorism and political violence theory; and the author, Brent Smith, domestic and international terrorism.

[4] Cases were selected primarily from the American Terrorism Study, a project that involves data collection on all persons indicted as a result of an FBI "terrorism enterprise" investigation as defined by the attorney general guidelines for domestic and international terrorism investigations.

[5] Left-wing terrorist groups generally refer to those that adhere to a "forward-looking" ideology, one that advocates a political or social system that has not existed before in the U.S. Typically associated with extreme liberalism, examples include the May 19th Communist Party, the Weather Underground and the Black Liberation Army.

[6] Right-wing terrorist groups generally refer to those that adhere to a "backward-looking" ideology, one that advocates a return to a political or social system that is perceived to have existed previously in the U.S. Typically associated with extreme conservatism, examples include the KKK, white supremacy groups like the Aryan Nations or groups like the Sheriff's Posse Comitatus that oppose centralized federal power.

[7] Like the name implies, single-issue terrorist groups advocate on behalf of a particular political or social issue, such as anti-abortion or the environment.

[8] "Geospatial Analysis of Terrorist Activities," NIJ Grant # 2005-IJ-CX-0200.

[9] Temporal data on international terrorists are limited due to the small number of international incidents that have taken place in the U.S. Because of the FBI's success in disrupting plots, the number of cases is small.

Beware this Saudi deal to help bail out Britain. It comes with a devastating IOU

from Winds of Jihad

With all eyes fixed upon the political excitements in the U.S, few have paid much attention to a trip made by the Prime Minister several thousand miles in the opposite direction.

A week ago Gordon Brown, accompanied by his new best friend the Business Secretary Lord Mandelson, went cap in hand to Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states to ask them to help bail out the stricken economies of the West by pumping billions into the International Monetary Fund.

Close: King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia meeting Prime Minister Gordon Brown in October last year.

It is more than a little strange that the British Prime Minister should have apparently taken it upon himself to speak on behalf of the IMF. But the real concern is that asking for help from Saudi Arabia is not like tapping your friendly neighbourhood bank manager for a bigger overdraft.

No, this loan comes with a devastating IOU — nothing less than a big slice of control over Britain and the West by a regime at the heart of the attempt to bring about the Islamisation of the free world.

Granted, this country is facing a truly grave financial crisis. But does this mean we should remortgage the future of the West to those whose most radical elements are
actively engaged in seeing it destroyed?

More from Melanie Phillips…

• MELANIE PHILLIPS: One more celebrity cocaine confession - and the shameful truth about the great drugs disaster 02/11/08
• MELANIE PHILLIPS: Gloating cruelty, foul vulgarity and a shameful BBC 27/10/08
• Labour have said the unsayable on migration. But do they really have the guts to crack down?20/10/08
• MELANIE PHILIPS: Everyone is out to destroy Palin - but it’s Obama’s past we should examine12/10/08
• MELANIE PHILLIPS: We must never let Brussels turn Holocaust denial into a crime 05/10/08
• MELANIE PHILLIPS: Shed no tears for this Labour stooge who forgot how to police 03/10/08
• MELANIE PHILLIPS: The police, the Crown, and now the army - who will the Planet Equality zealots target next? 28/09/08
• Now our intellectuals think the old and frail have a ‘duty to die’, we are on the path to barbarism21/09/08
• VIEW FULL ARCHIVE

Alarming

I have long been concerned by Britain’s
failure to acknowledge the true nature of the threat from global Islamism. This latest move is yet more alarming evidence of that process.

Saudi Arabia is at the root of the Islamic onslaught against the West. It is Saudi’s Wahhabi form of Islam which, along with its Shi’ite counterpart in Iran, aims to restore the dominance of Islam in the world and destroy rule by ‘unbelievers’.

It is Saudi money which has fuelled the enormous spread of Wahhabi mosques, preachers and educational institutions in this country, delivering the message of holy
war and radicalising countless thousands of British Muslims.

And it is this Saudi ideology which was the inspiration for Al Qaeda.

True, Al Qaeda turned upon Saudi itself on account of its ties with the U.S. As a result, Saudi regards Al Qaeda as its mortal enemy, and as such co-operates with Britain and the U.S in combating it.

But sometimes, to rephrase the old adage, our enemy’s enemy is not actually our friend, but our enemy as well.

Saudi Wahhabism seeks to conquer the West through a pincer movement comprising violence on the one hand and cultural infiltration and takeover on the other.

At the very least, Saudi Arabia speaks with the most lethal of forked tongues, and we should actively be seeking to diminish its influence over our affairs.

But instead our Prime Minister is effectively offering it yet more opportunity to control us.

Mr Brown claimed he did not want such investment to be used to gain political influence. But Lord Mandelson blurted out the truth when he acknowledged that the Saudis and other Gulf states would expect a bigger role in global institutions in return.

Takeover: The Islamic world has already bought Manchester City football club.

This should be enough to chill the British marrow. Islamic influence is already spreading in Britain and the West, way beyond Muslim communities themselves.

The Islamic world is buying a financial stake in increasing numbers of Western institutions. Among its latest acquisitions are Manchester City Football Club, which was sold to the ruling family of Abu Dhabi, and Barclays Bank, which has secured an almost £6 billion capital injection from Abu Dhabi and Qatar.

Extremist Islamist ideas are also being spread through Islamic study centres attached to our universities. According to Professor Anthony Glees, eight universities — including Oxford and Cambridge — have accepted more than £233.5 million from Saudi and Muslim sources since 1995, spreading radicalism and helping create within Britain two separate identities and sets of allegiance.

‘Bribery’

Shockingly, Saudi blackmail has also forced Britain to suspend its own rule of law by ditching the bribery investigation into the arms deal between Saudi Arabia and BAE systems, in response to an explicit threat made by the Saudi authorities that, if the case continued, ‘British lives on British streets’ would be at risk.

Those aren’t my words, they are from Britain’s former ambassador to Saudi Arabia, Sir Sherard Cowper-Coles.

Thus, the Islamists are already pulling British strings through the supremely manipulative combination of the threat of violence and the lure of unbridled wealth.

Apparently oblivious to all this, however, Mr Brown has pledged to make London the global centre of Islamic banking. Accordingly, Britain’s major banks are eagerly embracing sharia finance, on the basis that it is a source of vast wealth.

What they fail to realise is that sharia is also a project for Islamising society, and wherever it is embraced it will use its position to do precisely that. The assumption is that sharia banking — which has at its heart the prohibition of interest — accords with ancient Islamic religious principles. Not so.

Sharia banking was devised by mid-20th century Islamist ideologues specifically to further their strategy for global Islamic rule by creating separate administrative systems.

Muslims are required to donate a proportion of their income to charity, including the money that goes through the sharia banking system.

Yet in many instances, the clerics deciding where this ‘charity’ money should go are
the spiritual godfathers of terror, such as Sheik Yusuf Qaradawi, who supports suicide bombing in Iraq and Israel, and Sheik Muhammed Taqi Usmani, who has admitted h ran a madrassa that supported the Taliban, yet who sits on the sharia supervisory board of the Dow Jones Islamic Index Fund.

It’s no surprise, then, that many charitable donations end up being channelled straight into terrorist organisations such as Hamas and Hezbollah.

But apart from being a global money-laundering exercise for terrorism, sharia banking is also a beachhead in the attempt by radical Islam to infiltrate British and Western society.

‘Seductive’

The key point is that sharia does not recognise the superior authority of the secular law of the land.

Sharia financial institutions may not be making this clear — they don’t want to frighten people away — but at some future time they may do so. This is how they will endeavour to spread sharia beyond their own territory.

There are already examples of sharia regulations over-riding commercial decisions. Citibank, for example, launched the Saudi American Bank (SAB) in Jeddah and Riyadh. In 1980, the Saudis abruptly seized the SAB, denied Citibank all future profits and ordered it to train Saudi staffers because the bank was judged insufficiently Muslim.

When trillions of pounds and dollars become locked into Islamic banking and Saudi and other Islamic institutions, who will be in a position to argue with the Islamists when they finally call in their IOUs?

But our politicians and financiers seem blind to this prospect — because they are mesmerised by the seductive prospect of so much wealth.

Moreover, the British establishment does not believe that what we are being subjected
to is a religious war. That is why their response to the steady encroachment of Islamic radicalism in our society is so weak.

And that is why I fear the British Prime Minister is in danger of selling this country to those who are intent upon undermining our most treasured freedoms.

More than giving hostages to fortune, he is enabling fortune itself to hold
Britain hostage.