Posts
Saturday, September 12, 2009
U.S. Gives Afghan Prisoners New Rights
'Obama fibbed: Illegals to get free medical care in ERs'
Betraying our dead
Hundreds of thousands march on U.S. Capitol to protest government spending
12 Year Old Yemeni Girl Dies in Childbirth
A government study found that 80% of Yemeni women marry prior to 19, and a quarter marry between 10-14 years old. A recent initiative to raise the marriage age to 17 was opposed by a block of religious hard liners who said a minimum marriage age contravened Sharia law.
SEYAJ PRESS RELEASE: On Friday, September 11, 2009, the girl child (Fawzia Abdullah Yusuf) aged 12 years died of complications in childbirth. SEYAJ confirmed that Fawzia of Hodeidah Governorate died after days of hard labor. She was transferred to the hospital where doctors were unable save her life.Fawzia left school in the fourth grade and was married at 11 years of age. Her family suffers from severe poverty and her father has renal failure. At the age of 12, she conceived a child.
According to the SEYAJ volunteers, such incidents occur repeatedly and many young girls in the region die from early childbirth. However, there is little statistical data because the deaths are not monitored and documented.
The absence of laws in force settings the minimum age of marriage makes local officials powerless to prevent the marriage of children, especially female, or to punish their parents and avert the catastrophic consequences of early marriage.
Sanaa - Saturday September 12, 2009
SEYAJ Organization for Childhood Protecting
Website: www.seyaj.org
SEYAJ is a very good organization that advocates for Yemeni children in a variety of terrible situations. SEYAJ has a hotline but they are overwhelmed. Sometimes they save the kids. For others like Fawzia, the best we can say is at least someone is reporting her death. I think Fawzia's baby died too, but the release was unclear. Rest in peace, little angels.
China buying up North American oil U.S. access to energy threatened by 'green' objections
The Chinese – and soon Middle East interests – are preparing to buy up oil resources in North America even as "green" interests threaten to short-circuit U.S. access to the same energy, according to a report from Joseph Farah's G2 Bulletin.
While the U.S. State Department has issued a permit for a multibillion-dollar pipeline to carry crude oil from Canada's tar sands to U.S. refineries, environmental groups are threatening to impede its construction. Some are trying to delay the project for years by putting it in the middle of the court system.
Meanwhile, the Chinese are in the process of spending billions of dollars to develop the resource and possibly deny the U.S. a secure strategic source of oil.
Environmentalists are upset over the approval of the pipeline, saying the Obama administration has reneged on its commitment to reduce pollution emissions by endorsing what the "green" interests described as the "environmental catastrophe" of tar sands.
The proposed 1,000-mile crude oil pipeline would run between Hardisty, Alberta, Canada, and Superior, Wis.
While the environmental battle rages in the U.S., the Chinese, and soon the United Arab Emirates, will be spending billions of dollars to lay claim to the Canadian tar sands themselves.
The Chinese are investing in lands that contain the valuable resource, thereby controlling access to it.
The resource is in Canada's Alberta province. In the United States, similar tar sands are concentrated primarily in eastern Utah, mostly on public lands. Tar sands in Utah are estimated to hold from 12 to 19 billion barrels.
But due to political concerns at the federal, state and local levels in the U.S., opponents have worked to prevent tapping into the oil from tar sands, citing low-carbon emission requirements. According to energy experts, however, there is no difference in oil once it goes through the refining process.
The Chinese, who are scouring the world for available oil to meet the demands of their burgeoning population, have made an initial $2 billion investment in a 5-billion barrel reserve of what the U.S. refers to as "dirty oil."
However, energy experts are uncomfortable with the idea that a secure energy resource for the U.S. may be allowed to go to Chinese and Middle East ownership.
PetroChina will make the initial down payment for the tar sands at the MacKay River and Dover tar sands projects owned by Canada's Calgary-based Athabasca Oil Sands Corp. The project is expected to cost around $20 billion. Considered the world's most valuable oil company, PetroChina will also provide some financing for Athabasca which controls some 1.3 million acres of tar sands.
Given the investment to build the capability to extract the oil from the tar sands, energy experts believe that oil extraction efforts will only remain viable if crude oil prices remain above $80 a barrel.
To date, much of China's investment in oil has been in conventional oil reserves, with only small investments in oil sands.
Similar to China, the government of the United Arab Emirates has shown interest in the tar sands as an investment, even though it has almost 10 percent of the known global oil reserves.
Gazprom Chair Predicts Return to $100 Oil
BY MARC CHAMPION
MOSCOW -- OAO Gazprom Chairman Alexei Miller forecast Saturday that oil prices will again spike through $100 per barrel due to speculation in oil futures markets.
Speaking to a group of Russia experts known as the Valdai Club, Mr. Miller said that Gazprom used goverment forecasts for its own budgets and planning, but that in his view oil would break $100 again ....Bush and Obama: A Counterterrorism Comparison
by Emily Witt
As president-elect in late 2008, Barack Obama promised to “regain America’s moral stature in the world” by ending some of the Bush administration’s most controversial counterterrorism policies.
So with President Obama nearly two-thirds through his first year in office, what exactly has changed? Abusive interrogations have been banned, but renditions to other countries will continue. The prison at Guantanamo Bay has been ordered closed, but that hasn’t proven easy to do. Meanwhile, prisoners at the Bagram air base in Afghanistan — even those detained in other countries -- can still be held without charge. Memos on CIA interrogation practices have been released, but the details of some programs are still smothered in the name of national security.
In sum, there are clear differences between Bush and Obama, but some policies have stayed the same. (Our earlier comparison involving national-security lawsuits likewise found similar positions.) Here’s our rundown of the differences and the similarities.
Due to a production error, the introduction to this chart was published with copy from a previous comparison involving national security issues and has since been updated with the correct copy. ....
Sixth Minnesota jihadist, an American convert to Islam, killed in Somalia
We have heard a lot about Somalis returning from Minnesota to Somalia to wage jihad. But this is the first account of an American convert to Islam going there to wage jihad. This is clear evidence that it is the Islamic jihad ideology, not nationalism or tribal loyalty, that is the motivating factor involved in these cases. "Sixth Minn. man reportedly dies in Somalia," by Laura Yuen for Minnesota Public Radio, September 11 (thanks to all who sent this in):
America Hiroshima Plotter Adnan Shukrijumah,”Jaffar The Pilot” Is On The Move
One of the world’s most wanted terrorists, with a $5 million bounty on his head and a suspected desire to attack the United States with nuclear weapons, has been traveling across the Middle East recently with relative impunity, courtesy of a Saudi diplomatic passport, a U.S. intelligence source tells The Daily Beast.
Five-foot-four Adnan Gulshair el Shukrijumah was selected after 9/11 by Osama bin Laden to be the terror group’s next Mohamed Atta for any second wave of attacks on America. The Saudi-born el-Shukrijumah was the son of a radical Muslim cleric who moved his family to the U.S. in 1985 and settled eventually in Miramar, Florida, a Fort Lauderdale suburb. There he became friends with José Padilla, who was later arrested as an “enemy combatant,” and also with Mandhai and Shueyb Mossa Jokhan, who were jailed for plotting to blow up Florida power plants, a National Guard armory, and Jewish businesses. Adnan attended flight schools in Florida and Oklahoma, and within al Qaeda was dubbed Jafar al-Tayyar (“Jafar the Pilot”).
As a 22-year-old in 1997, Adnan participated in an "English as a Second Language" class. The FBI obtained a videotape of him giving a presentation to the class about how to jumpstart a car. His fluency in English worried FBI analysts, since it meant he could more easily slip in and out of western countries without possibly raising a red flag that a heavily accented Middle Easterner might.
Four months before 9/11, Adnan, who had by then become a naturalized American, also obtained an associate’s degree in computer engineering from Broward Community College. According to published reports, he had accumulated at least five passports, including one from Saudi Arabia, and had traveled in the months leading up to 9/11 to the Caribbean and Panama, where intelligence officials believe he met with other al Qaeda members.
For the longest time, American intelligence did not know the real identity of Jafar the Pilot. An FBI file was mistakenly opened in one of Adnan’s aliases, Mohammed Sher Mohammed Khan. The first detainee to give up any information about him was Abu Zubaydah, sometime after May 2002, maybe even as late as August when Zubaydah was waterboarded. He told his interrogators that Jafar the Pilot would deliver a so-called American Hiroshima, an ambitious plan to detonate dirty bombs (conventional explosives filled with radioactive material) inside America. But Zubaydah did not know Jafar’s real name. It wasn’t until interrogators got hold of Khalid Sheik Mohammad—who had met Adnan in Pakistan—that they discovered he had been a Florida resident for 16 years. U.S. military officials realized they had been finding Adnan’s name in “pocket litter”—documents and scraps taken from prisoners and dead al Qaeda soldiers—but did not know who he was.After identifying him, the U.S. government put a $5 million reward on his head. In 2004, Attorney General John Ashcroft and FBI Director Robert Mueller named Adnan as one of seven al Qaeda members planning terrorist attacks for that summer or fall. Ashcroft alleged that Adnan had personally scouted targets in New York City and the Panama Canal. In 2007, the New York Post broke the news that Adnan was "al Qaeda's operations leader on a nuclear terror plot targeting the United States" stating that bin Laden had picked him "to detonate nuclear bombs simultaneously in several U.S. cities."
A senior CIA intelligence analyst told The Daily Beast that the agency had tracked Adnan “somewhere in late spring to early summer” on several trips in the Middle East. On those travels, he used an alias—which the analyst did not disclose—and traveled with relative impunity on a Saudi diplomatic passport.The news of Adnan’s travels was alarming to the American intelligence community because it had previously concluded he was in Pakistan, coordinating the fight against Western forces in Iraq and Afghanistan. A U.S. counterterrorism official summarized to me the mainstream U.S. intelligence view: “It is generally believed that El Shukrijumah stays in the tribal areas of Pakistan—where he probably thinks he’s more secure—and does not travel abroad.”
According to the same analyst, who disclosed the discovery of Adnan’s travels on a Saudi diplomatic passport, the CIA requested “offline” that the State Department make an official inquiry of the Saudis about the passport to determine its authenticity. The CIA provided the State Department both the passport number and the alias. According to the CIA analyst, the State Department refused, telling the agency that its information was “not reliable enough” to question the Saudis.
When contacted for on-the-record statements, the CIA declined to comment. A State Department official told me, “It would be inappropriate for the department to comment about the reliability (or not) of the information you have been provided on the activities of the CIA.” The Saudi Embassy ignored telephone calls and emails seeking a comment, as well as information about their own checks and controls over the issuance and use of diplomatic passports. Nor would the Saudis disclose the number of diplomatic passports they have issued—said to be very large since many of the several thousand royal family members prefer to travel with them.
The last official Saudi statement about Adnan is from a September 5, 2003, press release in which the Washington embassy said that he was “not a Saudi citizen.” In the short statement, the ministry of interior announced “that Shukrijumah is not, and never has been, a Saudi citizen. His father, Gulshai El Shukrijumah, worked in Saudi Arabia for 27 years as an expatriate employee until 1986 when the family moved to the United States. The father did not have Saudi citizenship. His son, Adnan El Shukrijumah, is also not a Saudi citizen and if he is traveling using a Saudi passport, then he has obtained it and is using it illegally.”
“It’s better when some like el-Shukrijumah stays contained in the tribal areas of Pakistan and Afghanistan,” says the CIA analyst who provided the information about his travels. “It’s when he starts moving again that everyone starts to take notice.”
Gerald Posner is The Daily Beast's chief investigative reporter. He's the award-winning author of 10 investigative nonfiction bestsellers, ranging from political assassinations, to Nazi war criminals, to 9/11 and terrorism. He lives in Miami Beach with his wife, the author Trisha Posner.
Insiders sell like there's no tomorrow
The Ultimate 9/11 Attack:
The Ultimate 9/11 Attack:
A Report From the EMPACT America Conference
in Niagara, New York
By Guy Rodgers, ACT! for America Executive Director
Dear Robert,
Eight years ago today is a day none of us will ever forget. If you’re like me, you recall exactly what you were doing and where you were when you learned that jets had been flown into the World Trade Center.
This was an act of jihad. This was also an act of asymmetrical warfare, where an enemy with far fewer weapons and the means to attack us was still able to inflict a deadly wound.
But our Islamist enemies are not content with the amount of destruction caused by that act of asymmetrical warfare.
Last May we sent you a series of emails announcing our plans to address the threat of an EMP (electromagnetic pulse) attack on America. An EMP attack can be triggered by just one nuclear weapon detonated above our atmosphere. Optimally deployed, such an EMP attack could knock out as much as 70% of America’s electrical grid. Not just for days – but for weeks, even months.
Were this to happen, the consequences for America would be devastating. The congressionally authorized EMP commission estimated that millions and millions of Americans would die – of thirst, starvation, disease, and lawlessness. Imagine the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, extended across much of our country, and lasting for months.
One component of our plan to address this threat was our participation with EMPACT America in its first-ever conference entitled “Protecting America Against Permanent Continental Shutdown from Electromagnetic Pulse.”
I am composing this email in a hotel in Niagara, New York, while the conference is still underway. I’m doing so, to coincide with the eighth anniversary of the terrorist attacks of 9/11, because Brigitte Gabriel and I are determined that you, our members, understand and appreciate the seriousness of the threat, that it is the ultimate in jihadist asymmetrical warfare, and so that we can join together to take constructive action to defend ourselves.
When we sent you the EMP emails in May, some of our members emailed us expressing skepticism about the EMP threat. Some of the emails were, frankly, derisive, accusing us of having been misled by some sci-fi “fantasy.”
I can understand why some who hear about this would respond this way. The very concept of life ending as we know it is difficult to come to terms with. Not surprisingly, our tendency is to ignore, deny or disbelieve that something so indescribably devastating could happen to us.
However, if you were sitting here at this conference, if you had any doubts, you would realize, as we do, that this is no sci-fi fantasy (how I wish it were!), and that enemies like Iran are in fact testing the necessary launch technology to detonate a nuclear weapon over our atmosphere. Experts I talked to here believe Iran will have, in as little as two years, both the nuclear weaponry and the launch and satellite technology to literally “drop” a nuclear weapon from a satellite over America, and detonate it above our atmosphere.
Dozens of experts, and I don’t use that term lightly, from across the fields of science, energy, education, law enforcement, counter-terrorism, and the private sector are here. One of the speakers, for instance, was the winner of the “Lord Kelvin Medal in Electromagnetic Physics.” Another was a former CIA Director…another a former Chairman of the National Intelligence Council…another the former Director of the Defense Nuclear Agency.
You get the picture.
These are not people who cry wolf, engage in whimsical fantasies or who put their careers and credibility on the line touting untested theories. They were not provided honorariums as an incentive to come speak at this conference. Some provided information that until the middle of the last decade had been classified by the Department of Defense. These experts are deadly serious about the fact that we are in grave danger – not only from a nuclear weapon-triggered EMP, but from an EMP triggered by solar magnetic storms, and they are doing everything they can to warn us so we can take action before it’s too late.
There have been prior instances over the past 150 years of solar magnetic storms burning up telegraph lines and causing other damage to the infrastructure that existed at that time. The disruption to society back then was minimal, however, because when these solar phenomena occurred, America was not totally dependent on electricity and electronics as we are today.
In other words, even if our jihadist enemies were unsuccessful in triggering an EMP attack with nuclear weaponry, natural solar phenomena could well cause the same devastation.
Regarding our jihadist enemies, Brigitte delivered a powerful address on the ideology of radical Islam – specifically, the messianic vision of Iran’s “mullahcracy” for the return of the “Mahdi,” the 12th imam. These mullahs believe they can help usher in the return of the Mahdi by instigating worldwide chaos.
What better way to do so, with limited weaponry in the ultimate act of asymmetrical warfare, than with a nuclear-triggered EMP attack? Given their apocalyptic vision they have every incentive to make every effort possible to bring us to our knees through an EMP attack.
To read a transcript of Brigitte’s general session address, please click here.
Prior to 9/11, most Americans did not believe something as horrific as the destruction of the World Trade Center could be visited on our nation by Islamic terrorists. The 9/11 Commission concluded that America did not see 9/11 coming because we “lacked imagination.” We cannot afford such a lack of vision when it comes to the prospect of an EMP attack.
Over the next several weeks we will, when appropriate, provide you additional information and action alerts about the EMP threat. I urge you to pass them along to your friends and family and help us raise the level of awareness – and thus prospects for action – with enough time to spare before the unthinkable happens.
I would like to close with a question I asked in one of the emails we sent to you in May. If America devotes the resources to defending itself against an EMP attack, and it never occurs, what’s the worst thing that happens? On the other hand, if we don’t, and it does…?
Guy Rodgers
Executive Director, ACT! for America
www.actforamerica.org
