Google Earth reveals secret history of US base in Pakistan

(Compiler's note: Must read. Obviously our technology is being shared with our enemies. Why ....?)

by Jeremy Page - TimesOnline

The Shamsi airbase in 2006 with three drones apparently visible

Image :1 of 2

The US was secretly flying unmanned drones from the Shamsi airbase in Pakistan's southwestern province of Baluchistan as early as 2006, according to an image of the base from Google Earth.

The image — that is no longer on the site but which was obtained by The News, Pakistan's English language daily newspaper — shows what appear to be three Predator drones outside a hangar at the end of the runway. The Times also obtained a copy of the image, whose co-ordinates confirm that it is the Shamsi airfield, also known as Bandari, about 200 miles southwest of the Pakistani city of Quetta.

An investigation by The Times yesterday revealed that the CIA was secretly using Shamsi to launch the Predator drones that observe and attack al-Qaeda and Taleban militants around Pakistan's border with Afghanistan.

US special forces used the airbase during the invasion of Afghanistan in 2001, but the Pakistani Government said in 2006 that the Americans had left and both sides have since denied repeatedly that Washington was using Pakistani bases. Pakistan has also demanded that the US cease drone attacks on its tribal area, which have increased over the last year, allegedly killing several “high-value” targets as well as many civilians.

The Google Earth image now suggests that the US began launching Predators from Shamsi — built by Arab sheiks for falconry trips — at least three years ago.

The advantage of Shamsi is that it provides a discreet launchpad within minutes of Quetta — a known Taleban staging post — as well as Taleban infiltration routes into Afghanistan and potential militant targets farther afield.

Google Earth's current image of Shamsi — about 100 miles south of the Afghan border and 100 miles east of the Iranian one — undoubtedly shows the same airstrip as the image from 2006.

There are no visible drones, but it does show that several new buildings and other structures have been erected since 2006, including what appears to be a hangar large enough to fit three drones. Perimeter defences — apparently made from the same blast-proof barriers used at US and Nato bases in Afghanistan — have also been set up around the hangar.

A compound on the other side of the runway appears to have sufficient housing for several dozen people, as well as neatly tended lawns. Three military aviation experts shown the image said that the aircraft appeared to be MQ1 Predator unmanned aerial vehicles — the model used by the CIA to observe and strike militants on the Afghan border.

The MQ1 Predator carries two laser-guided Hellfire missiles, and can fly for up to 454 miles, at speed of up to 135mph, and at altitudes of up to 25,000ft, according to the US Air Force website www.af.mil

The News reported that the drones were Global Hawks — which are generally used only for reconnaissance, flying for up to 36 hours, at more than 400mph and an altitude of up to 60,000ft. Damian Kemp, an aviation editor with Jane's Defence Weekly, said that the three drones in the image appeared to have wingspans of 48-50ft.

“The wingspan of an MQ1 Predator A model is 55ft. On this basis it is possible that these are Predator-As,” he said. “They are certainly not RQ-4A Global Hawks (which have a wingspan of 116ft 2in).”

Pakistan's only drones are Italian Galileo Falcos, which were delivered in 2007, according to a report in last month's Jane's World Air Forces.

A military spokesman at the US Embassy in Islamabad declined to comment on the images — or the revelations in The Times yesterday.

Major-General Athar Abbas, Pakistan's chief military spokesman, was not immediately available for comment. He admitted on Tuesday that US forces were using Shamsi, but only for logistics.

He also said that the Americans were using another air base in the city of Jacobabad for logistics and military operations. Pakistan gave the US permission to use Shamsi, Jacobabad and two other bases — Pasni and Dalbadin — for the invasion of Afghanistan in October 2001.

The image of the US drones at Shamsi highlights the extraordinary power — and potential security risks — of Google Earth.

Several governments have asked it to remove or blur images of sensitive locations such as military bases, nuclear reactors and government buildings. Some have also accused the company of helping terrorists, as in 2007, when its images of British military bases were found in the homes of Iraqi insurgents.

Last year India said that the militants who attacked Mumbai in November had used Google Earth to familiarise themselves with their targets. Google Street View, which offers ground-level, 360-degree views, also ran into controversy last year when the Pentagon asked it to remove some online images of military bases in America.

3 to 4.3 Billion Barrels of Technically Recoverable Oil Assessed in North Dakota and Montana’s Bakken Formation—25 Times More Than 1995 Estimate—

(Compiler's note: This is a must read. The source of this news and these comments is from a friend:

The U. S. Geological Service issued a report in April ('08) that only scientists and
oil men knew was coming, but man was it big. It was a revised report (hadn't been updated since '95) on how much oil was in this area of the western 2/3 of North Dakota ; western South

Dakota ; and extreme eastern Montana ..... check THIS out:

The Bakken is the largest domestic oil discovery since Alaska 's Prudhoe Bay , and has the potential to eliminate all American dependence on foreign oil. The Energy Information Administration (EIA) estimates it at 503 billion barrels. Even if just 10% of the oil is recoverable... at $107 a barrel, we're looking at a resource base worth more than $5.3
trillion.

'When I first briefed legislators on this, you could practically see their jaws hit the floor. They had no idea.' says Terry Johnson, the Montana Legislature's financial analyst.

'This sizable find is now the highest-producing onshore oil field found in the past 56 years.' reports, The Pittsburgh Post Gazette. It's a formation known as the Williston Basin , but is more commonly referred to as the 'Bakken.' And it stretches from Northern Montana, through North Dakota and into Canada . For years, U. S. oil exploration has been considered a dead end. Even the 'Big Oil' companies gave up searching for major oil wells decades ago.

However, a recent technological breakthrough has opened up the Bakken's massive reserves... and we now have access of up to 500 billion barrels. And because this is light, sweet oil, those billions of barrels will cost Americans just $16 PER BARREL!

That's enough crude to fully fuel the American economy for 41 years straight.

2. And if THAT didn't throw you on the floor, then this next one should - because it's from TWO YEARS AGO! U. S. Oil Discovery- Largest Reserve in the World! Stansberry Report Online - 4/20/2006

Hidden 1,000 feet beneath the surface of the Rocky Mountains lies the largest untapped oil
reserve in the world is more than 2 TRILLION barrels. On August 8, 2005 President Bush mandated its extraction.

They reported this stunning news: We have more oil inside our borders, than all the other proven reserves on earth. Here are the official estimates:

- 8-times as much oil as Saudi Arabia

- 18-times as much oil as Iraq

- 21-times as much oil as Kuwait

- 22-times as much oil as Iran

- 500-times as much oil as Yemen

- and it's all right here in the Western United States .

HOW can this BE? HOW can we NOT BE extracting this? Because the environmentalists and others have blocked all efforts to help America become independent of foreign oil!

James Bartis, lead researcher with the study says we've got more oil in this very compact area than the entire Middle East -more than 2 TRILLION barrels untapped. That's more than all the proven oil reserves of crude oil in the world today, reports The Denver Post.

Don't think 'OPEC' will drop its price - even with this find? Think again!

It's all about the competitive marketplace, - it has to.

Got your attention/ire up yet? Hope so! Now, while you're thinking about it .... and hopefully P.O'd, do this:

3. Pass this along. If you don't take a little time to do this, then you should stifle
yourself the next time you want to complain about gas prices .. because by doing NOTHING, you've forfeited your right to complain.
----------------------------------------------
Now I just wonder what would happen in this country if every one of you sent this URL to every one in your address book. )



from U.S. Geological Survey Newsroom -- Released: 4/10/2008

Reston, VA - North Dakota and Montana have an estimated 3.0 to 4.3 billion barrels of undiscovered, technically recoverable oil in an area known as the Bakken Formation.

A U.S. Geological Survey assessment, released April 10, 2008 shows a 25-fold increase in the amount of oil that can be recovered compared to the agency's 1995 estimate of 151 million barrels of oil.

Technically recoverable oil resources are those producible using currently available technology and industry practices. USGS is the only provider of publicly available estimates of undiscovered technically recoverable oil and gas resources.

New geologic models applied to the Bakken Formation, advances in drilling and production technologies, and recent oil discoveries have resulted in these substantially larger technically recoverable oil volumes. About 105 million barrels of oil were produced from the Bakken Formation by the end of 2007.

The USGS Bakken study was undertaken as part of a nationwide project assessing domestic petroleum basins using standardized methodology and protocol as required by the Energy Policy and Conservation Act of 2000.

The Bakken Formation estimate is larger than all other current USGS oil assessments of the lower 48 states and is the largest "continuous" oil accumulation ever assessed by the USGS. A "continuous" oil accumulation means that the oil resource is dispersed throughout a geologic formation rather than existing as discrete, localized occurrences. The next largest "continuous" oil accumulation in the U.S. is in the Austin Chalk of Texas and Louisiana, with an undiscovered estimate of 1.0 billions of barrels of technically recoverable oil.

"It is clear that the Bakken formation contains a significant amount of oil - the question is how much of that oil is recoverable using today's technology?" said Senator Byron Dorgan, of North Dakota. "To get an answer to this important question, I requested that the U.S. Geological Survey complete this study, which will provide an up-to-date estimate on the amount of technically recoverable oil resources in the Bakken Shale formation."

The USGS estimate of 3.0 to 4.3 billion barrels of technically recoverable oil has a mean value of 3.65 billion barrels. Scientists conducted detailed studies in stratigraphy and structural geology and the modeling of petroleum geochemistry. They also combined their findings with historical exploration and production analyses to determine the undiscovered, technically recoverable oil estimates.

USGS worked with the North Dakota Geological Survey, a number of petroleum industry companies and independents, universities and other experts to develop a geological understanding of the Bakken Formation. These groups provided critical information and feedback on geological and engineering concepts important to building the geologic and production models used in the assessment.

Five continuous assessment units (AU) were identified and assessed in the Bakken Formation of North Dakota and Montana - the Elm Coulee-Billings Nose AU, the Central Basin-Poplar Dome AU, the Nesson-Little Knife Structural AU, the Eastern Expulsion Threshold AU, and the Northwest Expulsion Threshold AU.

At the time of the assessment, a limited number of wells have produced oil from three of the assessments units in Central Basin-Poplar Dome, Eastern Expulsion Threshold, and Northwest Expulsion Threshold. The Elm Coulee oil field in Montana, discovered in 2000, has produced about 65 million barrels of the 105 million barrels of oil recovered from the Bakken Formation.

Results of the assessment can be found at http://energy.usgs.gov.

For a podcast interview with scientists about the Bakken Formation, listen to episode 38 of CoreCast at http://www.usgs.gov/corecast/.

Obama Secretly Backed "Shariah Law For Peace" Deal With Taliban

by Gateway Pundit

The Telegraph, via ROP, is reporting the Team O actually backed the "sharia law for peace" deal announced in Pakistan this week.

American officials have privately backed Pakistan's "Sharia law for peace" deal with Taliban militants in the Swat Valley despite publicly criticising it as a "negative development".

The deal, under which Sharia law will be introduced in the Malakhand and Kohistan districts of Pakistan's North West Frontier Province if Taliban militants end their armed campaign in the Swat Valley, has been met with alarm by Nato chiefs and British and American officials.

Nato fears the deal would create a new "safe haven" for extremists, said a spokesman on Tuesday night, while a statement from Britain's High Commission in Islamabad said: "Previous peace deals have not provided a comprehensive and long-term solution to Swat's problems. We need to be confident that they will end violence, not create space for further violence."

President Barack Obama's special envoy to Pakistan and Afghanistan voiced the greatest concern about the strength of Taliban militants in Swat as he ended his first visit to the region since taking up his post.

"I talked to people from Swat and they were, frankly, quite terrified. Swat has really deeply affected the people of Pakistan, not just in Peshawar but in Lahore and Islamabad," he said, while a Defence Department official described the deal as a "negative development".

On Tuesday night however, US officials in Islamabad privately backed the deal as an attempt to drive a wedge between Swat's Taliban, which is focused on its demand for Sharia law, and the al-Qaeda-linked Taliban led by Baitullah Mehsud, the notorious commander who controls much of North and South Waziristan and other tribal areas along the Afghan border.

While they expressed fears that the deal might yet be sabotaged by some Swat Taliban militants who support al-Qaeda, they said that if successful, the deal would break up the alliance between the two groups, which has caused alarm throughout Pakistan and in Washington.

Of the two Taliban groups, Mehsud's is the most feared – he has been accused of masterminding the assassination of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto and trained Osama bin Laden's son as one of his commanders – but it is the alliance with Swat Taliban leader Maulana Fazlullah which alarmed Pakistanis in the country's main metropolitan centres.

Fazlullah, who is known as "Maulana Radio" for the illegal FM stations he uses to broadcast his latest fatwas and justify recent Taliban murders, is the son-in-law of Maulana Sufi Muhammad, the leader of Tehrik-e-Nifaz-e-Shariat-e-Mohammadi (TNSM), who once led thousands of militants to fight US forces in Afghanistan. Mr Muhammad has negotiated the Sharia law deal with local government officials and was on Tuesday night meeting Maulana Fazlullah to finalise their ceasefire.

Some senior Pakistan People's Party leaders have privately condemned the deal as "surrender", but government sources last night said it needed to bring peace to the valley, so that girls could return to school and business return to normal.

So how well is this sharia for peace deal working in Pakistan?

Under Obama's watch Pakistan took steps for Sharia Law in 7 states this week.
It's not enough...

The chief of the outlawed outfit Tehrik-e-Nifaz-e-Shariat-e-Mohammadi(TNSM) Maulana Sufi Muhammad left for Swat to hold talks with Taliban in February 2008 after the Pakistani government released him from prison. He was able to convince the government to set up sharia law in the region this week.

But, the Islamists are already saying they want to spread their shariah law to the whole world.

Is this what Team Obama calls a success?

Ruling stops transfer of 17 from Gitmo to U.S.

WASHINGTON - A U.S. appeals court reversed a ruling Wednesday that would have transferred 17 Guantanamo Bay detainees, none of whom are labeled enemy combatants, to the United States. ....

Tax troubles for president's chief of staff

There could be tax troubles on the horizon for White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel, who reportedly has lived rent-free in Washington for five years but hasn't paid taxes on the imputed income from that, according to reports. ....

Obama approves aerospace system for Syria

... Government sources said Obama directed the Commerce Department to approve the export of U.S. components for Syria's fleet of Boeing

747 aircraft. The sources said a Saudi defense company would supply and install the components in the aging Syrian dual-use aircraft.

The Commerce Department has not confirmed the approval. Boeing, however, acknowledged that Commerce approved an export license for Syria on Feb. 2. ....

Cold, Premeditated, Ritual Murder. The Honor Killing of Aasiya Z. Hassan. Part Two

Was Aasiya Z. Hassan the victim of an honor murder or was this simply a form of domestic violence? Did her husband kill her in an act of spontaneous passion or was her death carefully premeditated?

Yesterday, I published my study: “Are Honor Killings Simply Domestic Violence?” in Middle East Quarterly. To the best of my knowledge, it is the first such study of its kind. You may read it in full HERE. It will be out in hardcopy at the beginning of March. ....

Is Iran seeking the capacity to destroy western civilization?

(Compiler's note: An absolutely must read item.)

by Israel Matzav

Caroline Glick's column in today's JPost deals mostly with the ballistic missile threat to Israel from Syria, Iran and Hezbullah. I recommend that you read the whole thing. I could have made at least two more posts out of it (on on Hezbullah's capacity and one on Iron Dome), but I'd like to focus a different item that she discusses, because it doesn't only threaten Israel. It threatens civilization as we know it.

AFTER YEARS OF denial, today even US intelligence agencies acknowledge that Iran's ballistic missile program is part and parcel of its nuclear program. While most Israeli observers have devoted their energies to assessing the destructive capacity of a direct nuclear attack against the tiny country, and to the various delivery mechanisms - from the Shihab-3 missiles to Syrian Scuds to Hizbullah or Hamas death squads - that Iran could field against it in the event of a nuclear attack, the fact of the matter is that Iran has an indirect option for using nuclear weapons to attack Israel that would likely be more destructive than a direct nuclear attack. And it is an option that Iran can wield not only against Israel, but against every country in the world.

An electromagnetic pulse or EMP attack is an indirect nuclear attack. It has the capacity to destroy a target country's electricity grids and so revert a post-industrial, technology-based country such as Israel or the US to a pre-industrial condition [There is video below that explains this. It's apparently not as far-fetched as it sounds. CiJ]. If an aggressor launches a nuclear device of whatever size and detonates it above the atmosphere and in the line of site of its target country, the x-rays and gamma rays emitted by the blast will cause an electromagnetic pulse, or wave a million times stronger than the strongest radio wave. That wave, which comes in three successive stages, will destroy a country's electrical grids and through them, its ability to function.

In 2000, concern about the EMP threat in the US caused Congress to mandate the formation of a commission comprised of the leading US experts on the issue to study it. The EMP Threat Commission's 2004 report warned that the effect an EMP attack would have on the US's national infrastructures "could be sufficient to qualify as catastrophic to the nation."

As Frank Gaffney, President of the Washington-based Center for Security Policy, explained in his 2006 book War Footing, by destroying a country's electrical power systems, an EMP will destroy its economy since it will wipe out its banking system. All vehicles that operate with electronic systems - that is all vehicles made since the mid-1970s - would be rendered inoperable. Telecommunications would end. A country's ability to store food through refrigeration would end. Its ability to transport water and pump gasoline would also end.

Since almost no one would be killed in the immediate aftermath of an EMP attack, a threat of retaliation against the aggressor country would lack credibility because such an option would be politically unpalatable. But while an EMP attack would not kill many people directly, it would kill millions of people indirectly. As Gaffney notes, by wiping out a country's ability to support itself, an EMP attack would cause mass starvation and disease.

The threat of an EMP attack was not taken seriously by US military planners during the Cold War because they were concerned with the primary Soviet threat to annihilate the US and its allies by launching several thousand nuclear warheads against them. But as nuclear and missile technology has proliferated in the post-Cold War period, and more technologically primitive countries get their hands on missiles and limited nuclear capabilities, the threat of an EMP attack has become far more acute.

In Iran's case, the mullahs have signaled clearly through both word and deed that they find the option of attacking their enemies with an EMP attack attractive. An article published in Iran's security journal Nashriyeh-e Siasi Nezami in 1999 identified an EMP attack as a way to defeat the US as a military power and as a state. Then too, as William Graham, who headed the US's EMP commission explained in an interview with World Net Daily last year, Iran is openly building the capacity to carry out such an attack. Last year, Iran described a ship-launched test of its Shihab-3 missile in the Caspian Sea as "successful" in spite of the fact that like an EMP, the missile detonated in mid-launch. [This test is described further below. CiJ].

More disturbingly, Iran's successful satellite launch earlier this month makes clear that the mullahs now have the technological capacity to effectively wipe out Western civilization. Three to five nuclear bombs of any size, launched into space on satellites and detonated above the US, Europe and Asia would send Western civilization back to the 19th century. Last week Iran announced it is building seven more satellites. Yet rather than recognize that once its nuclear arsenal is online Iran will represents a threat to all nations, the West ignored the significance of the satellite launch.

The US's EMP commission's report explained that to defend against such an attack, it is necessary to build redundant electrical systems and have difficult-to-build replacement parts like turbines on hand to replace ones destroyed by such an attack. Since the report was published, the US has made some modest progress in that direction.

Caroline goes on to point out that Israel has not made any progress on the issue, but that's not what I want to discuss. I want to show you that the EMP threat is credible and that Iran is apparently pursuing it. And it won't just threaten Big Satan and Little Satan. Islam is stuck in the 8th century. It can catch up - or it can pull the rest of the world back to its level.

In a Washington Times article in 2006, Frank Gaffney described Iran's interest in pursuing an EMP threat.

In fact, there is reason to believe the Iranian regime is working toward a capability that could destroy America as we know it. A blue-ribbon commission's report to the Congress last year (http://empcreport.ida.org/) found a single nuclear weapon detonated in space high above the United States could unleash an immensely powerful electromagnetic pulse (EMP). An EMP wave a million times stronger than the most powerful radio transmitter would damage or destroy the electrical grid and unshielded electronic devices upon which our society utterly depends. The effect (visualized in a short video available at www.WarFooting.com [this link no longer works, but I have video below. CiJ) could be "catastrophic" -- possibly reducing America from a 21st century superpower to a pre-industrial society in the blink of an eye.

Iranian missile tests -- including firing a Scud missile off a ship and flying the new Shahab 3 missile in a profile apparently designed to deliver a weapon into space -- suggest the mullahs seek an EMP capability. The sort of death and destruction such an attack might precipitate seem consistent with the apocalyptic vision of Shi'ite extremists, who believe such conditions the prerequisite for a messianic age ushered in by the arrival of the "12th imam."

Here are a short video and a slightly longer one that explain the EMP threat. Let's go to the videotape.



Here's the second video. Note that this video was made in 2007, so the maker was obviously wrong about there being a nuclear war that year. I'm not an expert on the science, but it certainly sounds plausible to me. Let's go to the videotape.



If you think it far-fetched to say that Iran is after such a bomb, please consider this post from Pastorius.

In testimony before the House Armed Services Committee and in remarks to a private conference on missile defense over the weekend hosted by the Claremont Institute, Dr. William Graham warned that the U.S. intelligence community “doesn’t have a story” to explain the recent Iranian tests.

One group of tests that troubled Graham, the former White House science adviser under President Ronald Reagan, were successful efforts to launch a Scud missile from a platform in the Caspian Sea.

“They’ve got [test] ranges in Iran which are more than long enough to handle Scud launches and even Shahab-3 launches,” Dr. Graham said. “Why would they be launching from the surface of the Caspian Sea? They obviously have not explained that to us.”

Another troubling group of tests involved Shahab-3 launches where the Iranians "detonated the warhead near apogee, not over the target area where the thing would eventually land, but at altitude,” Graham said. “Why would they do that?”

Graham chairs the Commission to Assess the Threat to the United States from Electromagnetic Pulse (EMP) Attack, a blue-ribbon panel established by Congress in 2001.

The commission examined the Iranian tests “and without too much effort connected the dots,” even though the U.S. intelligence community previously had failed to do so, Graham said.

“The only plausible explanation we can find is that the Iranians are figuring out how to launch a missile from a ship and get it up to altitude and then detonate it,” he said. “And that’s exactly what you would do if you had a nuclear weapon on a Scud or a Shahab-3 or other missile, and you wanted to explode it over the United States.”

Does Iran want to destroy western civilization? Probably. Is it seeking the means to do so? Judge for yourself. An awful lot of credible people apparently think so.

This is a far greater crisis than 'global warming.' And unfortunately, it's not one that the Hopenchange administration in Washington is going to be eager to face.

Former FBI special agent: Every major Muslim organization in the U.S. is controlled by the Muslim Brotherhood

by Jihad Watch

Man of courage

A former FBI special agent sounds the alarm about the stealth jihad. The Muslim Brotherhood is dedicated in its own words to "a kind of grand Jihad in 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 God's religion is made victorious over all other religions."

"Islamic subversion alleged by speaker," by Brian Mosely for the Shelbyville Times-Gazette, February 17 (thanks to Weasel Zippers):

A former FBI special agent told law enforcement and Homeland Security personnel that a network of Islamic organizations are working to incrementally implement Islamic law in the United States.

During a presentation at the Bedford County Emergency Management Agency, former FBI agent John Guandolo briefed members about groups such as the Muslim Brotherhood, which he claims is working with other Islamic groups to slowly implement Shariah, also known as Islamic law, which encompasses all areas of life.

Guandolo worked in the FBI since 1996, including nine years as a member of its SWAT team. After 9/11, he worked in the Bureau's Washington Field Office's Counterterrorism Division, developing expertise concerning Al Qaeda, Muslim Brotherhood organizations and the Islamic movement in the U.S.

He now works with Stephen Coughlin, former Islamic Expert for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, to advise leaders at the federal level and also brief local law enforcement about the Islamic threat at home.

Coughlin was fired from his position with the Joint Chiefs following a report revealing opposition to his work by officials within the office of Deputy Defense Secretary Gordon England, according to a Washington Times report dated Jan. 4, 2008.

Coughlin had run afoul of a key aide to England, Hasham Islam, who accused him of being a Christian zealot or extremist "with a pen," according to defense officials, the report states.

Muslim Brotherhood

Every major Muslim organization is controlled by the Muslim Brotherhood, the former FBI agent said, which he said was formed to overthrow America and establish Islamic law.

"They're having great success of implementing Shariah law, I could give you a thousand examples," Guandolo said.

He said small concessions like installing foot baths, and colleges forced to have separate swimming times for Islamic men and women so not to offend Muslims, are other parts of the strategy.

But Guandolo said that federal leadership is reluctant to act against these Islamic organizations due to political correctness and the threats of lawsuits.

He said that Muslim groups will demand concessions on matters by saying, "You have to do this; you have to do this or I will be offended."

"The solution to this is you," Guandolo said. "If you are looking to DHS, the FBI and Congress to solve this ... you're going to be woefully disappointed."

Indeed. Read it all.

Putin Warns American Democrats Against Socialism (Video)

by Gateway Pundit

"We must not revert to isolationism and unrestrained economic egotism... Excessive intervention in economic activity and blind faith in the state's omnipotence is another possible mistake. True, the state's increased role in times of crisis is a natural reaction to market setbacks. Instead of streamlining market mechanisms, some are tempted to expand state economic intervention to the greatest possible extent... In the 20th century, the Soviet Union made the state's role absolute. In the long run, this made the Soviet economy totally uncompetitive. This lesson cost us dearly. I am sure nobody wants to see it repeated."

Russian Prime Minister Vladamir Putin
Opening ceremony of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland
January 28, 2009

This is really pathetic.
Even Russian President Vlad Putin is warning the US against socialism:


You know things are out of control when Communist China is lecturing democrats on protectionism and now the former head of the KGB is lecturing US democrats against socialism.
The Right Perspective and Pat Dollard reported:

Russian Prime Minister Vladamir Putin has said the US should take a lesson from the pages of Russian history and not exercise “excessive intervention in economic activity and blind faith in the state’s omnipotence”.

“In the 20th century, the Soviet Union made the state’s role absolute,” Putin said during a speech at the opening ceremony of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. “In the long run, this made the Soviet economy totally uncompetitive. This lesson cost us dearly. I am sure nobody wants to see it repeated.”

Sounding more like Barry Goldwater than the former head of the KGB, Putin said, “Nor should we turn a blind eye to the fact that the spirit of free enterprise, including the principle of personal responsibility of businesspeople, investors, and shareholders for their decisions, is being eroded in the last few months. There is no reason to believe that we can achieve better results by shifting responsibility onto the state.”

Putin also cautioned the US against using military Keynesianism to lift its economy out of recession, saying, “in the longer run, militarization won’t solve the problem but will rather quell it temporarily. What it will do is squeeze huge financial and other resources from the economy instead of finding better and wiser uses for them.” Putin’s comments come in sharp contrast to Russia’s own military buildup and expansion.

Unfortunately, the Democrats did not listen.

KYC COMPLIANCE OVERVIEW

from World-Check

Know Your Customer (KYC) compliance regulation has proved to be one of the biggest operational challenges banks, accountants, lawyers and similar financial service providers worldwide have had to overcome.

World-Check, the industry standard KYC compliance solution, provides an overview of KYC compliance and its origins, and outlines the compliance mandate as applicable to banks, accounting firms, lawyers and other regulated financial service providers – not just in the UK, Europe and the USA, but all around the world. Relied upon by more than 3,000 institutions worldwide, this KYC database solution provides effective legal and reputational risk reduction.

Why “Know Your Customer?”

The 9/11 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Centre revealed that there were sinister forces at work around the world, and that terrorists activities were being funded with laundered money, the proceeds of illicit activities such as narcotics and human trafficking, fraud and organised crime. Overnight, the combating of terrorist financing became a priority on the international agenda.

For the financial services provider of the 21st century, “knowing your customers” was no longer a suggested course of action. Based on the requirements of legislative landmarks such as the USA PATRIOT Act 2002, modern Know Your Customer (KYC) compliance mandates were created to simultaneously combat money laundering and the funding of terrorist activities.

What is Know Your Customer (KYC)?

Know Your Customer, or KYC, refers to the regulatory compliance mandate imposed on financial service providers to implement a Customer Identification Programme and perform due diligence checks before doing business with a person or entity.

KYC fulfils a risk mitigation function, and one its key requirements is checking that a prospective customer is not listed on any government lists for wanted money launders, known fraudsters or terrorists.

If preliminary KYC checks reveal that the person is a Politically Exposed Person (PEP), for example, Advanced Due Diligence must be done in order to ensure that the person’s source of wealth is transparent, and that he or she does not pose a reputational or financial risk in terms of their finances, public positions or associations. Beyond customer identification checks, the ongoing monitoring of transfers and financial transactions against a range of risk variables forms an integral part of the KYC compliance mandate.

But to understand the importance of KYC compliance for financial service providers better, its origins need to be examined.

Origins of Know Your Customer (KYC) compliance

The arrival of the new millennium was marred by a spate of terrorist attacks and corporate scandals that unmasked the darker features of globalisation. These events highlighted the role of money laundering in cross-border crime and terrorism, and underlined the need to clamp down on the exploitation of financial systems worldwide.

Know Your Customer (KYC) legislation was principally not absent prior to 9/11. Regulated financial service providers for a long time have been required to conduct due diligence and customer identification checks in order to mitigate their own operation risks, and to ensure a consistent and acceptable level of service.

In essence, the USA PATRIOT Act was not so much a radical departure from prior legislation as it was a firmer and more extensive articulation of existing laws. The Act would lead to the more rigorous regulation of a greater range of financial services providers, and expanded the authority of American law enforcement agencies in the fighting of terrorism, both in the USA and abroad.

In October 2001, President George W. Bush signed off the USA PATRIOT Act, effectively providing federal regulators with a new range of tools and powers for fighting terror financing and money laundering. During July 2002, the US Treasury proceeded to introduce Section 326 of the PATRIOT Act, a clause that removed some key burdens for regulators and added significant enforcement muscle to the Act.

What 9/11 changed, in essence, was the extent to which existing legislation was being implemented. Using the provisions of the earlier anti-terrorism USA Act as a foundation, it included the Financial Anti-Terrorism Act, which allowed for federal jurisdiction over foreign money launders and money laundered through foreign banks. Significantly, it is this anti-terror law that would make the creation of an Anti Money Laundering (AML) programme compulsory for all financial institutions and service providers.

Section 326 of the USA PATRIOT Act dealt specifically with the identification of new customers (“CIP regulation”), and made extensive provisions in terms of KYC and the methods employed to verify client identities.

In accordance with this piece of updated KYC legislation, federal regulators would hold financial institutions accountable for the effectiveness of their initial customer identification and ongoing KYC screening. Institutions are required to keep detailed records of the steps that were taken to verify prospective clients’ identities.

Although current KYC legislation does not yet demand the exclusion of specific types of foreign-issued identification, it recommends the usage of machine-verifiable identity documents. The ability to notify financial institutions if concerns regarding specific types of identification were to arise, combined with a risk-based approach to KYC, proved to provide a robust mechanism for addressing security concerns.

Effectively, the risk-based approach to customer due diligence grants regulated institutions a certain degree of flexibility to determine the forms of identification they will accept, and under which conditions.

KYC compliance: Implications for banks, lawyers and accounting firms

The KYC compliance mandate, for all its positive outcomes, has burdened companies and organisations with a substantial administrative obligation. Additionally, KYC compliance increasingly entails the creation of auditable proof of due diligence activities, in addition to the need for customer identification.

In order to meet KYC compliance requirements, financial institutions must:

• Verify that customers are not or have not been involved in illegal activities such as fraud, money laundering or organised crime
• Verify a prospective client’s identity
• Maintain proof of the steps taken to identify their identity
• Establish whether a prospective customer is listed on any sanctions lists in connection with suspected terrorist activities, money laundering, fraud or other crimes.

World-Check: A one-stop risk intelligence solution for KYC compliance

World-Check, as the world’s leading provider of highly structured risk intelligence, offers financial services providers a comprehensive solution for meeting their KYC compliance requirements.

Featuring a downloadable Data-File for the automated batch screening of entire client bases, and Online Service, the web-based equivalent that allows for the individual screening of persons or entities from any PC or laptop worldwide, it is the KYC and AML intelligence solution of choice for more than 2,500 institutions worldwide. Boasting 47 of the world’s 50 largest banks as clients, with an annual client renewal rate of more than 97% for the last 7 years, the facts speak for themselves.

World-Check allows for the creation of electronically verifiable proof of due diligence, and also enables institutions to check machine-readable passports for authenticity using Passport-Check.

UNDERSTANDING MONEY LAUNDERING

from World-Check

Defining money laundering and identifying the full scope of money laundering practices is the critical first step in creating an effective anti money laundering framework within a financial organisation.

As the leading global provider of risk intelligence solutions for Anti Money Laundering (AML) compliance purposes, World-Check supplies 47 of the 50 largest banks in the world with a highly structured database of heightened-risk entities and individuals. Collated from hundreds of thousands of credible data sources in the public domain, the database coverage includes a range of risk categories from money laundering and fraud to terrorism and corruption.

Read on for an overview of money laundering and the processes involved in the laundering of illicit funds, or find out more about how the World-Check AML intelligence solution can help your organisation meet its regulatory obligations.

What Is Money Laundering?

Essentially, money laundering refers to all actions and procedures intended to change the identity of money made from criminal activities in order to create the impression that the money has a legitimate source.

Money laundering, loosely defined, is the transactional processing or moving of illicitly gained funds (such as currency, cheques, electronic transfers or similar equivalents) towards disguising its source, nature, ownership or intended destination and/or beneficiaries. The desired outcome of this process is “clean” money that can be legally accessed or distributed via legitimate financial channels and credible institutions.

Money laundering scams abound, yet they all have a single goal in common: to create the illusion that illicitly generated funds have a legal source. As such, the challenge for Anti Money Laundering (AML) legislation is to cover loopholes as quickly and effectively as possible.

What drives money laundering?

Money laundering, as a rule of thumb, is driven by a criminal imperative aimed at generating profits in an illegal fashion. Such proceeds of organised crime, fraud or embezzlement exists “outside” a country’s legitimate financial system.

The money laundering process aims to camouflage such funds or financial assets by passing it through multiple accounts and shell companies (an illicit process referred to as “money laundering”) towards either totally obscuring the original source, or towards associating the funds or assets with a source that looks legal. If the laundering process is successful, the launderer gains access easily accessible funds that looks legitimate, and can be moved around with ease.

Why exactly is money laundering a problem?

The socio-economic effects of money laundering are crippling: Illicit funds generated from criminal activities such as gun running, drug and human trafficking and other forms of organised crime is laundered into clean currency, and in turn used to fund new criminal operations or expand existing ones. This translates into more drug trafficking and dealing, more illegal firearms, more violent crimes, and – most disconcertingly – more international terrorism.

Left unchecked, money laundering can undermine the integrity of entire financial systems, and embroil individual financial institutions in share-crippling financial scandals.

Moreover, the amounts of money generated from criminal activities and laundered throughout the world amount several billions of dollars – up to as much as 5% of the global GDP. This gives the beneficiaries of money laundering a lot of muscle, and certainly enough means to threaten political stability worldwide.

In essence, regulatory compliance seeks to curb this criminal proliferation by holding financial systems providers and banking institutions accountable for the financial activities of the clients they deal with. Money laundering poses a very real threat to the reputation and financial well-being of banks, law firms, accountants and asset management houses around the world, as these institutions are often unwitting accomplices in the laundering of dirty money.

Anti Money Laundering (AML) compliance post-9/11

Since the 9/11 attacks in the United States, AML and Anti Financing of Terrorism (ATF) compliance requirements for banks, law firms, accounting firms, asset management houses and similar financial service providers have been expanded significantly. The USA Patriot Act, BASEL II Act and Wolfberg principles, for example, serve as a framework for standardising Anti Money Laundering (AML) compliance and Know Your Customer (KYC) due diligence mandates.

Find out more about Anti Money Laundering (AML) laws and their implications for regulated service providers.

Entities such as the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), Wolfsberg Group and Basel Committee are key drivers of the regulatory policy-making process, and are closely involved in the standardisation and enforcement of related compliance mandates.

How does money laundering work?

There exists a plethora of ways in which illicit funds can be laundered, yet the following example provides a good basic illustration of the thinking underlying the process:

A drug dealer may own a restaurant or bar, or be in cahoots with a partner that does. Proceeds from their drug dealing then gets paid into this reputable business, along with other regular trading income.

The launderers then open up additional service businesses or supply companies to serve the business or enterprise where money is initially placed. These service entities then issue invoices, which the restaurant settles by means of cheque payments. By increasing the amount of businesses interacting by means of such transactions, and by moving the money around internationally, the criminal origins of the money is effectively obscured, if not fully concealed. The successful laundering enriches the directors and/or the shadowy interests they represent.

Forensic auditors would need to spend months – if not years – retracing each step, hence such investigations are generally not undertaken unless the amount of money being laundered is substantial, or the nature of the crimes being funded is heinous.

The beneficiaries of such money laundering scams and syndicates are often high net-worth individuals and entities, and in turn they become highly sought after as private banking clients. They then tend to gain access to legitimate investment opportunities and privileged high-end investment funds, making apprehending them even harder.

To this end, Anti Money Laundering (AML) legislation and the regulatory bodies enforcing compliance endeavour to close money laundering loopholes on an ongoing basis. This is achieved by expanding the existing money laundering definition and AML compliance requirements, and by holding banks, law firms, asset managers and accounting houses accountable for their compliance performance.

For banks, AML compliance is by no means a new challenge, yet recent world events have prompted the critical reassessment and expansion of existing compliance regulations. The number of industries being regulated in terms of AML compliance, KYC regulation and AFT compliance has also increased substantially.

The 3 stages of money laundering

Essentially, there are three primary (though often overlapping) stages in the money laundering “spin cycle”:

• The placement stage
• The layering stage
• The integration stage

Money Laundering: The Placement Stage

During the placement stage, the hard currency generated by the sale of drugs illegal firearms, prostitution or human trafficking, etc. needs to be disposed of, and is deposited in an institution or business. Expensive property or assets may also be bought.

Money Laundering: The Layering Stage

During the layering stage, money launderers endeavour to separate illegally obtained assets or funds from their original source. This is achieve by creating layer upon layer of transactions, by moving the illicit funds between accounts, between businesses, and by buying and selling assets on a local and international basis until the original source of the money is virtually untraceable.

The more transactional layers are created, the more difficult it becomes for an auditor to trace the original source of illicit funds, and thus anonymity is achieved.

Money Laundering: The Integration Stage

Upon successful completion of the financial layering process, illicit funds are reintroduced into the financial system, as payment for services rendered, for example. By this stage, illegally obtained funds closely resemble legally generated wealth.

Depending on the money laundering mechanisms available to the launder, these three steps may overlap. Whether the money laundering process starts with a deposit or a purchase, the methods will invariable entail layers of shape-shifting transaction aimed at distancing the funds or assets from their source origins. The further this transactional distance becomes, the “cleaner” the laundered money appears.

World-Check, the global leader in risk intelligence, offers financial service providers a comprehensive risk intelligence solution aimed at meeting Anti Money Laundering (AML) compliance and Know Your Customer (KYC) regulatory requirements.

"Singapore’s Zero-Tolerance Approach to Counter the Financing of Terrorism" by Dr. Rohan Gunaratna, Head, International Centre for Political Violence

Traditionally, investigations of acts of crime and terrorism take place after they have been committed. With the increase in the lethality of terrorism, governments should prevent acts of violence though proactive investigations. Realizing the adverse impact an attack in Singapore will have on its global reputation as a safe destination for trade, commerce and investment, government invested significant resources strengthening its preventive capabilities.

How is new Terrorist Group in Gaza funded?

Reports yesterday that two rockets were fired into Israel by a previously obscure terrorist organisation known as the Brigades of Hizballah in Palestine, who has claimed responsibility, raises the question; how is this organisation funded, and what are the financial avenues through which money to support its activities flows? How the alleged Iranian sponsor gets the cash into the Palestinian territories is a mystery**, but the mere rumour that such is happening is enough to raise the level of risk for any financial institution in the region that is still passing funds of Iranian origin through third parties, enroute to unknown destinations. When Iranian funds are covertly transferred into the Palestinian territories, US regulatory sanctions, and even terrorist financing charges filed in US courts, are a real threat to the participants.

UN Updates Consolidated List of Al-Qaeda & Taliban

The United Nations Security Council Resolution 1267 Committee has updated its list of Al-Qaeda, Taliban and associated individuals and entities. The Consolidated List is available on the UN website.

Defeating Terrorist Support Structures After Mumbai - Part III

by John Solomon

This is the third report of a three-part series addressing the terrorist structures involved in the November 2008 Mumbai attacks.The first report provided an initial summary of the attacks with an emphasis on operational support.

The second report examined the structure of Jamaat-ud Dawa (JuD), the non-profit arm of Lashkar e-Tayyiba (LeT), the terrorist group believed to be responsible.

This report addresses the vulnerabilities that LeT/JuD exploited in the private and public sectors. In addition, the article assesses whether JuD will survive the ban the UN imposed on it on 10 December 2008....

California Lawmakers Face Lockdown as Budget Falters in Senate

By Michael B. Marois and William Selway

Feb. 17 (Bloomberg) -- California lawmakers failed to reach agreement on how to eliminate a $42 billion budget shortfall as Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger prepares to shut down hundreds of public works projects and fire thousands of state workers.

Senate President Darrell Steinberg, a Democrat, plans to lock lawmakers in the capitol unless they pass a $40 billion package of tax increases, spending cuts and bond sales today. The bills, backed by the Republican governor and by Democrats, remain one Republican vote short. ....

Re-evaluation of National Security Ordered

By ERIC SCHMITT

WASHINGTON — The homeland security secretary, Janet Napolitano, is re-evaluating the largest federal program for testing the country’s ability to respond to terrorist attacks, one of several Bush administration initiatives she has ordered to come under review.

As governor of Arizona, Ms. Napolitano sent a searing two-page letter to her predecessor as secretary, Michael Chertoff, complaining that a $25 million national exercise in October 2007, which she and 23,000 other federal, state and local emergency workers participated in, was too expensive, too long in planning and “too removed from a real-world scenario.”

Now, in her first weeks as head of the Homeland Security Department, Ms. Napolitano has ordered a review of that program and several others, including cybersecurity, a strategy for protecting the border with Canada, and the vulnerability of power plants and other critical infrastructure.

The directives implicitly raise questions about how well the Bush administration prepared the nation’s defenses against a terrorist attack. But they also reflect what homeland security analysts say is Ms. Napolitano’s desire to apply her practical experiences as a border-state governor to several important homeland security policies.

Her pointed comments on the emergency preparedness exercise, which she repeated last month at her Senate confirmation hearing, offer a glimpse into how Ms. Napolitano may retool one the centerpieces of the Bush administration’s domestic security architecture.

“If we’re going to be doing these kinds of things, and they are valuable, the underlying philosophy is a good one, but they need to be in my view streamlined,” Ms. Napolitano told the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs last month.

Ms. Napolitano’s frustration with the system in place for rehearsing responses to natural disasters and terrorist attacks has struck a chord among state and local emergency managers, many of whom have long complained that the Homeland Security Department and its crisis-response component, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, have failed to consult fully with local communities in disaster planning.

“If we’re going to do these exercises, D.H.S. needs to collaborate to a greater extent with local governments so we’re not wasting resources, we’re not spinning our wheels and we’re making the country safe,” said Russell Decker, emergency manager for Allen County, Ohio, who is also president of the International Association of Emergency Managers, which comprises 4,300 state and local agencies.

Congress is also eager to ensure that lessons learned from each exercise are broadly disseminated.

“If you participate in an exercise, you want to know its strengths and weaknesses,” said Representative Henry Cuellar, Democrat of Texas, who heads the House homeland security subcommittee that oversees emergency preparedness.

It will not take long to put Ms. Napolitano’s new thinking to the test. FEMA is completing plans for the next major exercise, scheduled for late July. Agency officials were reluctant to reveal too many details, but emergency planners in Arkansas, Louisiana, New Mexico, Oklahoma and Texas will be tested on how well and how quickly they detect a terrorist plot that begins with a mock attack in Europe and continues with a simulated strike against the United States from plotters infiltrating the border from Mexico.

The exercise this year, for the first time, focuses on preventing a potential attack, not just responding to a crisis, federal officials say.

Emergency planners say they have already taken Ms. Napolitano’s criticisms to heart, improving federal coordination with state and local partners in planning the disaster drill this summer, increasing the frequency of national exercises to every year from every two, cutting costs to encourage wider participation and providing feedback within 90 days to participants on what went well and what did not.

“Most of them were already on the radar scope in one way, shape or form,” said Steve Saunders, a retired Army National Guard major general who is an assistant FEMA administrator overseeing the national exercise division, “but her letter helped crystallize, I think, some of the things we needed to do.”

Mr. Saunders said he expected some changes as a result of the review ordered by Ms. Napolitano, but he cautioned in an interview, “don’t mess around” significantly with this year’s exercise or drills on the drawing board for 2010 and 2011 that will simulate an improvised nuclear bomb attack and a catastrophic earthquake.

Mr. Saunders said states and localities had already started budgeting for those exercises. “If we start shifting near-term activities,” he said, “it becomes fairly problematic.”

Sean Smith, the Homeland Security Department spokesman, said it was too soon to predict what Ms. Napolitano would decide, but added, “Her experiences with this were less than ideal, and it is something she will be reviewing.”

In addition, the Government Accountability Office, the investigative arm of Congress, is conducting a review of FEMA’s emergency preparedness programs, including the national-level exercises, that will be completed by the end of April.

States and cities routinely conduct emergency preparedness drills. Specialists in domestic security agree that it is also essential to hold large-scale national emergency exercises to test how federal, state and local officials and emergency personnel work together to prevent or deal with terrorist attacks.

Congress directed the government in 1998 to carry out a national exercise program, formerly called Topoff for the “top officials” who participate. There have been four major exercises since then, simulating chemical, biological and nuclear attacks. The exercises now also include foreign partners, like Britain and Canada.

Specialists in domestic security say Ms. Napolitano offers a new perspective to the program.

“She brings to the table real-world experience as a governor, as a person responsible for implementing these programs where the rubber hits the road,” said David Heyman, director of the domestic security program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

Ms. Napolitano’s unhappiness with the program stems from her participation in the five-day October 2007 exercise, which simulated a dirty-bomb attack against Phoenix; Portland, Ore.; and Guam. It was planned to test how well federal, state and local officials responded to such a cataclysm.

Within days after the exercise wrapped up, Ms. Napolitano complained to Mr. Chertoff that federal officials never contacted top Arizona emergency officials during the drill, did not involve her as much as she said she would have been during a real disaster, and gave participants too much advance information about the drill.

“When you have months to prepare for an exercise and you know the exact scenario being contemplated,” Ms. Napolitano said, “a large part of the exercise’s value is lost.

Obama Plans Dramatic Changes to Reduce Nuclear Arsenal

By: Dave Eberhart

If he has his way, President Barack Obama will dramatically change the nuclear weapons policy of the U.S. – leaving behind Cold War doctrine and looking to a model of a minimal nuclear arsenal -- just ominous enough to do the job of deterrence.

Obama may be mired in the economic stimulus debate, but the clock is also relentlessly ticking on some volatile policy decisions regarding the nation’s aging nuclear arsenal – the stuff of that deterrence. Foreign nations, friend and foe, are poised to discover Obama’s nuclear agenda, while some critics within the U.S. are fearful that the new president will go too far, too fast....

U.S. intelligence report projects possible collapse of Palestinian Authority

from World Tribune.com

WASHINGTON — The U.S. intelligence community has raised the prospect of the collapse of Fatah and the Palestinian Authority.

The report, titled "Annual Threat Assessment of the Intelligence Community," said Hamas, in the aftermath of its war with Israel in early 2009, has intensified the threat to the PA.

The report warned that both Fatah and the PA were split over such issues as a successor to chairman Mahmoud Abbas

as well as government reforms. The report said Hamas planned to exploit the divisions within Fatah and could challenge the PA over the next year.

"Disagreement between Fatah and Hamas about a range of issues such as the timing of national elections

and formation of a unity government could lead Hamas to challenge the legitimacy of Abbas's government and will remain obstacles to Fatah-Hamas reconciliation," the report said.

The PA has also been threatened by the increasing divisions within the ruling Fatah movement in the West Bank. The report said the battle between Fatah's old guard and younger members has blocked plans to convene the movement. Abbas's term had been scheduled to expire in January 2009.

"These internal conflicts threaten to fracture the party and damage its prospects in the run-up to PA presidential and legislative elections in 2009 or early 2010," the report said. "There is no consensus among Fatah officials regarding a replacement for President Abbas, who has not groomed a successor, and no potential leader has gained Fatah's full support."

The Hamas threat has been enhanced by Iranian financing, training and weapons since 2006.

"Hamas and the Palestinian Authority are engaged in an intense competition, with both sides seeking to emerge from the conflict in a stronger political position, but relations between the two organizations have been further embittered by the crisis," the report said.

Obama promises Palestinians he'll protect 'biblical heartland'

By Aaron Klein

President pledges to protest Jewish housing developments ....Obama is said to favor Israel withdrawing from nearly the entire West Bank.

Israel recaptured the West Bank in the 1967 Six Day War. The territory, in which about 200,000 Jews live, is tied to Judaism throughout the Torah and is often referred to as the biblical heartland of Israel.

The book of Genesis says Abraham entered Israel at the West Bank city of Shechem (Nablus) and received God's promise of land for his offspring

He was later buried with the rest of the biblical patriarchs and matriarchs, except for Rachel, in Hebron's Tomb of the Patriarchs. The West Bank's Hebron was site of the first Jewish capital.

The nearby West Bank town of Beit El – anciently called Bethel, meaning "house of God" – is where Scripture says the patriarch Jacob slept on a stone pillow and dreamed of angels ascending and descending a stairway to heaven. In the dream, God spoke directly to Jacob and reaffirmed the promise of territory. Earlier, God had promised the land of Israel to Abraham at Beit El. In Exodus, the holy tabernacle rested just north of Beit El in Shiloh, believed to be the first area the ancient Israelites settled after fleeing Egypt.

British Muslim student killed 20 in suicide bomb attack in Somalia

By Daily Mail Reporter

A university student who became a suicide bomber in Somalia is believed to be the first of a new wave of British-based Islamic terrorism.

The 21-year-old reportedly blew himself up at a military checkpoint killing up to 20 soldiers in the southern Somali town of Baidoa.

Raised in Britain, the unnamed bomber dropped out of a business studies course at Oxford Brookes University to travel to his country of origin in October 2007.

A member of al-Shabaab, a youth militia fighting to impose Islamic Sharia law, the man, from Ealing, recorded a martyrdom video before his trip imploring fellow British Somalis to follow his example.

In the video he says: 'Oh my people, know that I am doing this martyrdom operation for the sake of Allah.

'I advise you to migrate to Somalia and wage war against your enemies. Death in honour is better than life in humiliation.'

The bomber, whose family still lives in London, is the first reported case of a Somali based in Britain carrying out terrorist acts in the east African country.

However it is unclear whether British security services are aware of the case, which happened when the Somali prime minister was staying at a hotel near the checkpoint.

Jihadist websites claimed more than 20 Ethiopian soldiers were killed. The same group was reported to have killed six aid workers in December.

The killings come amid warnings that dozens of Islamic extremists have returned to Britain from terror training camps in Somalia.

MI5 director-general Jonathan Evans has raised concerns that Somali-trained militants could be plotting to carry out attacks in Britain or attempting to attract new recruits.

Yassin Omar and Ramzi Mohammed, two of the four men convicted of the failed July 21 2005 London Underground bombings, came to Britain as asylum seekers.

The Somali community in Britain numbers around 250,000, the largest in Europe, with the bulk of those coming to the country as refugees within the last 20 years.

Peter Neumann, a terrorism expert at the Centre for the Study of Radicalisation at King's College London, said: 'The numbers I hear (going from Britain to Somalia) are 50, 60 or 70 but in reality we don't know.

'You don't need big numbers for terrorism. Somalia will never become another Pakistan, but that does not mean it is not a threat.'

Ethiopian forces occupied parts of Somalia in 2007 after ousting the Union of Islamic Courts (UIC) from the capital, Mogadishu.

The Ethiopians withdrew last month as part of a peace deal agreed between the government and moderate Islamists, leaving African Union peacekeepers and Somali soldiers - although many believe that they will not be able to keep advancing extremists at bay.

More than 16,000 people have been reported killed in the past two years.

Keyes: President 'has something to hide' about eligibility

By Bob Unruh

Alan Keyes, a 2008 presidential candidate who now is a plaintiff in one of the many lawsuits seeking to verify whether Barack Obama qualifies under the U.S. Constitution's requirements to occupy the Oval Office, says the tactics adopted by lawyers for the president confirm there is an issue for the courts to investigate.

Alan Keyes, who was the candidate of the American Independent Party, cited a recent exchange with lawyers representing Obama in which they warned they might seek monetary penalties against those raising the question of Obama's eligibility under the Constitution's requirement that the president be a "natural born" citizen.

"It confirms the common sense suspicion that he won't act forthrightly in this matter because he has something to hide," Keyes wrote on his blog after WND reported the warning about "sanctions" was raised by Obama's defense lawyers.

The onetime U.S. ambassador explained on his posting that those raising questions over Obama's elibigility – so far – have simply been ignored by courts.

"In effect, the courts are refusing the admit plaintiffs on this matter into the courtroom, thereby denying them justice," he wrote. "Madison wrote, 'Justice is the end of government. It is the end of civil society. It will be pursued either until it be obtained or until liberty be lost in the pursuit.'"

"The denial of justice is thus a despotic act that violates the basis not only of just government, but of civil society itself," Keyes wrote.

Obama voluntarily placed himself in the position of being asked to provide his information, he said.

"Given the Constitutional requirement, the only fact citizens need to justify their suit is the fact that Obama ran for president. He asked to be chosen, and therefore must answer the eligibility question," Keyes wrote,

Where's the proof Barack Obama was born in the U.S. or that he fulfills the "natural-born American" clause in the Constitution? If you still want to see it, join more than 240,000 others and sign up now!

"In the final analysis if the courts refuse to respect the Constitution, they are not the judges of their own action. The people must ultimately decide. Which is why I and others will use every outlet to inform them of the injustice being done not just to individuals but to the sovereign people as a whole," Keyes said.

WND has reported on multiple legal challenges that have alleged Obama does not meet the "natural born citizen" clause of the U.S. Constitution, Article 2, Section 1, which reads, "No Person except a natural born Citizen, or a Citizen of the United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the Office of President."

Some claim he was not born in Hawaii, as he insists, but in Kenya. Obama's American mother, the suits contend, was too young at the time of his birth to confer American citizenship to her son under the law at the time.

Other challenges have focused on Obama's citizenship through his father, a Kenyan subject to the jurisdiction of the United Kingdom at the time of his birth, thus making him a dual citizen. The cases contend the framers of the Constitution excluded dual citizens from qualifying as natural born.

Several details of Obama's past have added twists to the question of his eligibility and citizenship, including his family's move to Indonesia when he was a child and on what nation's passport he traveled to Pakistan in the '80s, as well as conflicting reports from Obama's family about his place of birth.

The Keyes case is being handled largely by Gary Kreep of the United States Justice Foundation, but others playing a key role in the legal actions include Orly Taitz of California as well as Philip Berg, both of whom already have had their arguments rejected as not worthy of hearing by the U.S. Supreme Court.

In a commentary on the dispute, Keyes wrote that the suggestion of sanctions "confirms Obama's ruthless determination to destroy anyone who continues to seek the information the Constitution requires.

"Why should they demand penalties against citizens who are simply seeking the enforcement of the Supreme Law of the Land? It is simply because their persistence runs contrary to the will of a supposedly popular demagogue? This smacks of tyrannical arrogance. That Obama thus signals his intent to bring financial ruin on those who won't accept his cover-up of the circumstances of his birth is a tactical escalation," Keyes said.

"As one of the targets of this escalation, I need no more convincing proof of the ruthless disposition so far successfully masked by his empty rhetoric of hope and change. Obviously he means to offer hope only to those willing to surrender their most basic rights. To any who insist on questioning his actions, he offers the drastic change of ruin and destruction. So be it. We shall be among those who learn firsthand the meaning of the sacrifices made by the Founders of our free republic, as they pledged and gave up their lives, their fortunes and the world's esteem," Keyes said.

The legal sanctions being sought are not the only obstacle facing those who say they want to investigate the truth of Obama's eligibility. Four state lawmakers in Tennessee recently agreed to act as plaintiffs in a case being assembled by Taitz, and immediately were attacked by columnist Gail Kerr in the Nashville Tennessean, who compared their plan to "a resolution honoring the Easter Bunny for doing such a great job with the annual colored egg delivery system."

The columnist wrote that Obama's campaign already has released documentation of his birth.

"They put it on their Internet site. Obama's mother was a U.S. citizen. His father was from Kenya. The man was born on Aug. 4, 1961, in Hawaii. That, fellows, is a state. As in the 'United STATES of America.' It counts. See?" Kerr wrote.

Critics, however, have pointed out that the "Certification of Live Birth" posted by the Obama campaign and cited by various "truth" organizations is not the same as a birth certificate, and in fact under Hawaii law at the time was granted to babies who were not born in Hawaii.

Taitz wrote that her supporters should send "flowers, candy, banners, appreciation cards, teddy bears with big love sign and thank you sign to these courageous lawmakers: Eric Swafford, Glen Casada, Stacey Campfield and Frank Niceley."

The suggestion for sanctions came after Kreep sought records from Occidental College about Obama's attendance there.

The lawyer for the college, Stuart W. Rudnick of Musick, Peeler & Garrett, urgently contacted Fredric D. Woocher of Strumwasser & Woocher.

"This firm is counsel to Occidental College. The College is in receipt of the enclosed subpoena that seeks certain information concerning President-Elect Barack Obama," he wrote via fax. "Inasmuch as the subpoena appears to be valid on its face, the College will have no alternative but to comply with the subpoena absent a court order instructing otherwise."

Within hours, Woocher contacted Kreep regarding the issue, telling him, "It will likely not surprise you to hear that President-elect Obama opposes the production of the requested records.

"In order to avoid the needless expense of our bringing and litigating a Motion to Quash the subpoena, I am writing to ask whether you would be willing to agree voluntarily to cancel or withdraw the subpoena."

Woocher warned, "Please be advised, in particular, that in the event we are forced to file a motion to quash and we prevail in that motion, we will seek the full measure of monetary sanctions provided for in the Code of Civil Procedures."

Here is a partial listing and status update for some of the cases over Obama's eligibility:

• Philip J. Berg, a Pennsylvania Democrat, demanded that the courts verify Obama's original birth certificate and other documents proving his American citizenship. Berg's latest appeal, requesting an injunction to stop the Electoral College from selecting the 44th president, was denied.
  


• Leo Donofrio of New Jersey filed a lawsuit claiming Obama's dual citizenship disqualified him from serving as president. His case was considered in conference by the U.S. Supreme Court but denied a full hearing.


• Cort Wrotnowski filed suit against Connecticut's secretary of state, making a similar argument to Donofrio. His case was considered in conference by the U.S. Supreme Court, but was denied a full hearing.


• Former presidential candidate Alan Keyes headlines a list of people filing a suit in California, in a case handled by the United States Justice Foundation, that asks the secretary of state to refuse to allow the state's 55 Electoral College votes to be cast in the 2008 presidential election until Obama verifies his eligibility to hold the office. The case is pending, and lawyers are seeking the public's support.


• Chicago attorney Andy Martin sought legal action requiring Hawaii Gov. Linda Lingle to release Obama's vital statistics record. The case was dismissed by Hawaii Circuit Court Judge Bert Ayabe.
  
  
• Lt. Col. Donald Sullivan sought a temporary restraining order to stop the Electoral College vote in North Carolina until Barack Obama's eligibility could be confirmed, alleging doubt about Obama's citizenship. His case was denied.
  
  
• In Ohio, David M. Neal sued to force the secretary of state to request documents from the Federal Elections Commission, the Democratic National Committee, the Ohio Democratic Party and Obama to show the presidential candidate was born in Hawaii. The case was denied.
  
  
• In Washington state, Steven Marquis sued the secretary of state seeking a determination on Obama's citizenship. The case was denied.
  
  
• In Georgia, Rev. Tom Terry asked the state Supreme Court to authenticate Obama's birth certificate. His request for an injunction against Georgia's secretary of state was denied by Georgia Superior Court Judge Jerry W. Baxter.


• California attorney Orly Taitz has brought a case, Lightfoot vs. Bowen, on behalf of Gail Lightfoot, the vice presidential candidate on the ballot with Ron Paul, four electors and two registered voters.

In addition, other cases cited on the RightSideofLife blog as raising questions about Obama's eligibility include:

• In Texas, Darrel Hunter vs. Obama later was dismissed.
  
  
• In Ohio, Gordon Stamper vs. U.S. later was dismissed.
  
  
• In Texas, Brockhausen vs. Andrade.
  
  
• In Washington, L. Charles vs. Obama.
  
  
• In Hawaii, Keyes vs. Lingle, dismissed.

WND senior reporter Jerome Corsi had gone to both Kenya and Hawaii prior to the election to investigate issues surrounding Obama's birth. But his research and discoveries only raised more questions.

The governor's office in Hawaii said there is a valid certificate but rejected requests for access and left ambiguous its origin: Does the certificate on file with the Department of Health indicate a Hawaii birth or was it generated after the Obama family registered a Kenyan birth in Hawaii, which the state's procedures allowed at the time?

Veterans May Have Been Exposed to Contaminants When Getting Colonoscopies, Clinic Says

By Bill Poovey

VA Clinic Warns of Possible Contaminant Exposure

Chattanooga, Tenn. (AP) - Thousands of patients at a Veterans Administration clinic in Tennessee may have been exposed to the infectious body fluids of other patients when they had colonoscopies in recent years, and now VA medical facilities all over the U.S. are reviewing their own procedures. ....