UK: Muslim man strangles, stabs, and slits throat of "petite" 19 year-old Catholic girl

Robert Spencer Talk

By Aisha Akhtar

Director of jihadwatch.org and author of eight books, Robert Spencer, gave a lecture: "Stealth Jihad: What it Means and Why it Matters." His talk reflected a history of the Muslim Brotherhood, and how their activities have extended to bring destruction to the Western world.

Why invite Spencer to speak? "It should have every American of every stripe trying to understand the causes and motivations for the aggression and animosity directed towards us and our allies," said Alexander Chamessian, President of the Enduring Freedom Alliance and Editor-in-chief of "The Patriot".

"Robert Spencer offers one compelling analysis of the problem, although he does not offer the only one," said Chamessian.

"It is painfully clear that terrorism poses a grave threat to the West and in particular to the United States; with 9-11, the Madrid bombing, and countless other acts that were carried out under the banner for the destruction of the West," he adds.

Spencer has made numerous appearances on campuses all around the nation, stirring much controversy over Islam and its tolerance of the West.

"It's an ongoing puzzle of how any of this is controversial because everything I will tell you tonight, I will give you a source for," said Robert Spencer.

"Mr. Spencer's words may not have been as controversial as it might have seemed, but he sowed the seeds of hatred and paranoia against Muslims across Stony Brook's campus," said sophomore Ibrahim Khwaja.

"Some might find what Mr. Spencer says hard to swallow. This is no reason to discount or disregard what he has to say," said Chamessian. "Attempts to silence him under guides of "hate speech" are almost as frightening as the terrorists are to all of us and the Americans who so greatly cherish our right to the freedom of speech."

Spencer began his lecture by saying, "Probably everyone that is here tonight is because you are interested in justice and protecting the rights of individuals and particularly individuals who are threatened." He continued to give a history of how the Western rights have been, and continue to be, attacked.

In 1928, in Egypt, the Muslim Brotherhood was founded by "Hassan al-Banna, because he believed an important element of Islam was not being put into practice by Muslims around the world and he was determined to fix that," said Spencer. This non-existent practice is political Islam, where states needed to follow the Sharia, or Islamic law, for political purposes.

Spencer says that the brotherhood formed as a result of the changes in the Turkish government.

Founder of modern secular Turkey, [Mustafa Kemal] Atatürk, wanted to create, in Turkey, after World War I, a state according to western European, "western secular government," said Spencer, "in which religion would play a role in society, but the government would not be organized according to religion but would be separate from the government, which was not seen anywhere in the Islamic world."

"He removed secular Islam in Turkey by above-all removing the caliphate," said Spencer. "So those like Hassan [al-Banna] and others founded the Muslim brotherhood to bring back political Islam, and called upon all Muslims to encompass Islam as a way of life."
Spencer talked about the current plans of the brotherhood. He quotes Muhammad Akram, a sheikh of Islamic Sufism, and a writer/interpreter of sharia; "the Muslim brotherhood must understand that their work in America is a kind of grand plot in eliminating and destroying the western civilization."

Spencer said that there were documents uncovered at the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development, a charity organization. A trial followed.

"Documents mapped out a general strategy for how the Muslim brotherhood was going to proceed in the United States," said Spencer, "what's interesting about these trials are the larger initiatives that are going on within these organizations and individuals who are active."

Spencer listed organizations that were linked with the Muslim Brotherhood and their cause, one of which is the Muslim Student Association, located on campuses across the country. The MSA was founded by the brotherhood in 1963.

"I find that regardless of whether you're the director of Jihad Watch and an author of over 300 articles and 8 books on Jihad and Islamic Terrorism, or just a typical student or faculty member attending an event hosted in the Student Union building, the best kind of awareness you can offer to anyone interested in discovering what Muslims are really doing on college campuses, is by actually taking the time to attend an event run by Muslims on a college campus- especially at a campus that you're going to lecture at," said Omar Shareef, Vice President of the Muslim Student Association.

"It's interesting that the first outreach event the MSA had was a fast-a-thon, an event uniting Muslims with non-Muslims to experience hunger and help the poor, while this event promotes disunity and paranoia of innocent people," said junior Haseena Sahib.
Islam has laws that cover every aspect of life. "This is the vision of Islamic law, sharia," said Spencer, "Unfortunately this contradicts some human rights that have hithered to prevail, including freedom of speech, freedom of conscience, and equality of all rights of people before the law."

"Freedom of conscience, declared by the UN declaration of human rights in Article 18, a person should be able to change his religion or to have no religion at all," said Spencer, "Muslim brotherhood wants to put an end to that."

He only mentions how a specific few Muslims threaten it even though there are many things in today's world that do the same," said freshman Hamna Zafar, "Yet if anything, The Patriot Act threatens our rights more than anything; our right to privacy has been greatly limited since it has been passed by the American government, and yet Spencer claims that Islam or Muslims are trying to limit our rights?"

"Do I say that every Muslim is following the same agenda? No, that would be rather stupid." said Spencer, "Many Muslims don't have the interest to conquest Europe or the West, but the appeal is made to them under the purity of Islam."

Mr. Spencer's thesis really resonated with me, as I feel that extremism in all ways of life (be them religious or not) can be dangerous," said senior Kevin Ankney, "Unfortunately, it is difficult to not seem hypocritical when condemning extremism while condoning moderation, especially in matters of faith, since everyone is "entitled" to believe what he/she wants. It is a constant balancing act we must play."

Spencer believes that fundamental rights can be taken away from people, and they will not even know that it is happening. "I think it is an initiative that is being proceeded with stealth, and not by some covert activity," said Spencer. This brings us to Spencer's point on 'stealth' jihad.

"Things are going on in the ways you would not notice," said Spencer. Spencer gave the example of the cab system that was implemented at the Minneapolis- St. Paul International Airport. At the airport, cabs were color-coded for those that would carry passengers with alcohol, and those that would not.

"The idea that the brotherhood is trying to put forward is that the Islamic law and American law are in collision with one another and it's the American law that has to give way," said Spencer. This is one of the examples Spencer gave to show that stealth jihad is making progress.

Another example is the Swift & Co. meat packing industry in Nebraska and Colorado. During the month of Ramadan, Muslim workers requested to open their fast, at the appropriate time. Therefore, break times were switched and the other workers had to work longer hours to compensate for the alternative break time.

"To offer one group rights the other doesn't have is to go completely against American rights that were earned by the civil rights movement and I'm going to oppose that," said Spencer.

"I was impressed by the conviction with which he asserts that the Stealth Jihad movement is making progress within Western civilization," said Ankney, "However, I would've liked to hear a few more tangible examples to illuminate this assertion. At the very least, Mr. Spencer's fear of this movement has intrigued me to the point where I want to investigate it in more detail."

"In the specific case of taxi drivers trying to follow a detail of their religion that they had previously, and most still, ignore, never, I think, in a million years would this escalate into a larger scale adoption of Sharia law in this country," said senior Zachary Kurtz, "The economics of the thing simply wouldn't allow it."

'Gruesome' evidence emerges in terrorism trial

from ABC.net

The trial of five Sydney men on terrorist-related charges has been told they possessed gruesome material supporting violent jihad.

The court heard the men were preparing for an attack in which the killing of children was considered permissible.

When police arrested the five accused men, who have pleaded not guilty, in November 2005 they seized books, hard drives, video, sound recordings and other documents.

The Crown today described the haul as quite gruesome, while outlining the contents in chilling detail.

"Beheadings and military training are obligatory," the court heard.

According to the Crown, there were constant references to the Koran in some of the documents.

"Martyrdom is the ticket to victory and the entrance into paradise in the hereafter," the documents read.

The five, who cannot be identified for legal reasons, sat quietly and occasionally passed notes to their lawyers.

It was alleged each owned material which preached the virtues of killing non believers to "fight in a manner designed to strike terror in the hearts of the enemy" and "in certain circumstances it is permissible to kill children, especially if they are in the way of the pursuit of violent jihad."

The Crown case says the accused were inspired by Sheikh Abdullah Yusuf Azzam, who is credited with a revival of violent jihad in the 20th century.

It was his teaching that one hour spent fighting for Allah is worth 70 years praying at home.

Jurors in the trial were told that other material encouraged slaying the infidel.

"The greatest medicine we can apply to the brothers of the monkeys and pigs was to perform suicide operations," the court heard.

"There's no other technique which strikes as much terror in their hearts or shatters their spirit as much."

The prosecutions suggested the accused had carefully selected their reading matter and video tapes to prepare themselves for violent jihad in Australia.

Georgetown Academic Unaware of Global Muslim Brotherhood Key Facts

Global Muslim Brotherhood Daily Report

The Investigative Project has reported on significant gaps in knowledge about the global Muslim Brotherhood on the part of Georgetown academic John Esposito, perhaps the best known U.S. academic supporter of the Brotherhood. According to the report Esposito, testifying in the retrial of the Holy Land Foundation terrorism financing case, was unaware of the connections between the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR), the Holy Land Foundations, and Hamas and was unable to recall his last meeting with CAIR even though it was only three months ago:

…on cross examination, Esposito either didn’t remember or didn’t know about documented links between HLF and other groups he has worked with and Hamas. One of those groups is the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR). When asked by defense attorney Nancy Hollander if he was familiar with CAIR, Esposito described it as a “religious-oriented mainstream group” that worked on issues of discrimination against Muslims. He confirmed he had over a period of time met with senior CAIR officials, including Nihad Awad, Ibrahim Hooper, and “another person based in California in the Bay area.” That person, he later said, turned out to be CAIR co-founder and chairman emeritus Omar Ahmad. CAIR is an unindicted co-conspirator in the HLF case. In his cross examination by federal prosecutor James Jacks, Esposito said that he had attended a handful of CAIR events in the past 15 years. But he struggled to identify the last time he attended a CAIR event. It was three months ago in Dallas, Jacks said. He’s also scheduled to speak at a CAIR fundraiser in Tampa later this month. Although Esposito was a featured speaker at the Dallas event in August, he said he was unaware that the funds raised at the event went to the Muslim Legal Defense Fund, a nonprofit group set up to raise money to pay defense attorney’s fees in the HLF trial. That wasn’t his only appearance at a Dallas CAIR event. A year earlier, Esposito offered his wholehearted support for CAIR and its wishes to see the defendants set free in the HLF case, “Let me begin by saying that CAIR is a phenomenal organization….The main reason I decided to come was because of how I see the situation with regard to both the Holy Land Fund and the way government recently handled the situation and also to show solidarity not only with the Holy Land Fund, but also with CAIR.”

CAIR is an important part of the U.S. Muslim Brotherhood that had its origins in the Hamas infrastructure in the U.S.

The report goes on to note that Esposito, despite describing himself as a “Muslim Brotherhood expert” could not identify the Egyptian Brotherhood’s motto and appeared to deny that global Muslim Brotherhood leader Youssef Qaradawi was anti-Semitic. Also, despite Esposito’s position on the board of the publication of the United Association for Studies and Research (UASR), he claimed to be unaware of the connection between the UASR director and Hamas even though those connections had been raised by the media since at least August 1995.

The report goes on to note Esposito’s lack of knowledge concerning the recently released memo of the U.S. Muslim Brotherhood calling for the destruction of Western civilization.

Jacks showed Esposito an internal Palestine Committee memo from 1991 outlining “the General Strategic Goal for the Group in America” and asked Esposito whether he was familiar with the document. Esposito said he had “read the document but had not done an analysis of it or studied it.” Jacks then read out the section on page 21, describing the Muslim Brotherhood’s role in America as a “Civilization-Jihadist process… 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.” Esposito said he didn’t remember reading that section in the document. He then challenged the memo’s authenticity, saying “We do no know the source” but became silent when Jacks pointed out the author’s names appears on it. The author, Mohamed Akram was listed on the document and Akram was a member of UASR, Jacks said

Esposito, the head of Georgetown’s Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding, has been a long-time supporter of the global Muslim Brotherhood and has espoused views consistent with Brotherhood doctrine. He has served on the advisory boards of Muslim Brotherhood/Hamas-linked organizations such as the Institute of Islamic Political Thought in the U.K. and the United Association for Studies and Research in the U.S. and has defended global Muslim Brotherhood leaders such as Youssef Qaradawi. Saudi prince Alaweed bin Talal donated $20 million to the Center for Muslim Christian Understanding at Georgetown, headed by Dr. Esposito.

Article printed from The Global Muslim Brotherhood Daily Report: http://globalmbreport.com.

America Must Not Own a Sharia-Based Financial Business

by Jeffrey Imm

As Americans we generally have choices as to what we own, especially when such ownership of financial support is against the values defined by United States as a nation. However, on November 10, 2008, the Federal Reserve and the Treasury Department decided that they were going to use American taxpayer money to buy ownership in something against America's values of equality and liberty – by purchasing ownership in a company with a Sharia-Compliant Finance (SCF) based business.

As an American taxpayer, you are now a part owner in a business that promotes the Islamic supremacist Sharia ideology – whether you like it or not. Your tax dollars today are now being used for own part of a company with a Sharia-based business. This is the same Sharia ideology that was used by the Taliban in Pakistan today to murder a woman for adultery, the same Sharia ideology that was used to murder a 13-year-old girl last week who was raped in Somalia, and the same Sharia ideology supported by the Taliban, al Qaeda, and Islamic supremacists around the world. It is an ideology that is against the inalienable human rights of equality and liberty. It is an ideology that even the British courts have called "discriminatory."

But on November 10, 2008, the Federal Reserve announced that "it will purchase $40 billion of newly issued AIG preferred shares," which, as AP reports, will give "taxpayers an ownership stake in the company."

The Federal Reserve Board and the Treasury Department apparently believe that American taxpayers owning part of company with a business that promotes an Islamic supremacist ideology that is against equality, against liberty, and in support of discrimination, is a good thing for the American taxpayer.

Do you want to own a Sharia-based financial business promoting Islamic supremacism?

I first wrote about this subject on October 3, 2008 in an article titled "America Must Not Bail Out Sharia Finance." In that article, I pointed out how on September 16, 2008 that the Federal Reserve extended an $85 billion loan to AIG, and that the U.S. government was going to "receive a 79.9% equity interest in AIG." Less than a week after your government's September 16 bailout of AIG, AIG's Sharia-based business announced further expansion.

AIG's Takaful division has been selling Sharia-based insurance for over two years with a stated goal to sell such Sharia financial instruments in the United States. AIG SunAmerica, AIG Financial Services Corp, and other divisions of AIG also are dealers in Sharia mutual trusts.

Now part of this $85 billion loan to AIG (reducing it to $60 billion) has been converted into $40 billion of ownership of AIG stock – your ownership of AIG. AIG's business includes its Takaful Sharia-based insurance business, its divisions promoting Sharia finance and Sharia mutual trusts. You own it. That's where your tax dollars are going today.

The decision to buy this $40 billion of AIG stock was made based on the bailout authorized under the "Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008" (H.R. 1424). According to Section 104 of the legislation, "Financial Stability Oversight Board," it is the responsibility of the U.S. Treasury Secretary, the Chairman of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, the Director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, the Chairman of the Securities Exchange Commission, and the Secretary of Housing and Urban Development to ensure that policies enacted under this legislation are "in the economic interests of the United States."

How is it in the economic interests of the United States to own part of a corporation with a business based on promoting a discriminatory ideology, that is against equality, and that is against liberty? How is it in the economic interests of the United States to own part of business that supports an Islamic supremacist practice that has been used to fund Jihad?

Why wasn't the first priority of considering a bailout to AIG two months ago a prerequisite that AIG must first divest itself of its Sharia-based businesses that promote Islamic supremacism? Why should one dollar (let alone $85 billion) go to any company who owns a business that promotes a supremacist ideology? The federal government was not confronted on this in mid-September 2008. Now, the government has interpreted Americans' silence on issue to be acquiescence. So now, incredibly, today you as a taxpayer own part of an Islamic supremacist Sharia-based financial business. Do you want to? Do you think this is proper for American's tax dollars?

Moreover, this may not be the end of such absurdities by the U.S. Treasury Department and the Federal Reserve. On November 6, 2008, the U.S. Treasury Department featured a training class for government employees to learn more about Sharia Finance, entitled "Islamic Finance 101," which a coalition of groups and individuals against Sharia have protested.

Imagine if such "finance" dealings had involved any other identity-based supremacist ideology – white supremacist, black supremacist, Aryan supremacist. Can you imagine the U.S. government funding with your tax dollars a business promoting white supremacism or any other supremacist ideology? More troubling, could you imagine the U.S. federal government owning part of a business that promotes white supremacism or any other supremacist ideology? It would be a front page news story on every one of the major mainstream media outlets. There would be protests in the streets. There would be demands for the immediate resignation of those responsible.

But when your federal government purchases stock to own part of a business promoting Islamic supremacist ideology, it is not even a news story. There are no rallies. There are no demands for resignations. Such disgraceful, undignified silence is a dark day in America.

What type of federal government does America have that does not understand that supremacism is un-American? Fundamentally, absolutely, unequivocally un-American. What type of federal government does not understand that America was founded on and is based on the inalienable human rights of equality and liberty? What type of federal government leaders do we have that drive past the words hammered in marble that "All Men Are Created Equal," and don't understand the concept?

What American leaders and the American people must never forget is that the words "All Men Are Created Equal," does not come with any caveats or disclaimers. It is not "All Men Are Created Equal," except when it is inconvenient, unpopular, might upset supremacists, might raise the price of oil, or if we can just look the other way. The words are uncompromising. There is no Sharia exception, there is Islamic supremacist exception. There are no exceptions to the inalienable human right that "All Men Are Created Equal" - to all men and women. We hold these truths to be self-evident. We declare this as fundamental to the identity of the United States of America.

American human rights groups, American civil rights groups, and patriotic Americans everywhere have to take a stand on this latest disgrace. Our national honor has been besmirched long enough with those calling for "engagement" or "reconciliation" with Islamic supremacists. Now this latest indignity - American taxpayer dollars are funding the ownership of a company with a business in promoting Islamic supremacism.

We need to call for the following:
(a) The American people must call for the immediate freeze of all American taxpayer funds to AIG until it divests of its Sharia financial businesses.
(b) The American federal government must give AIG an ultimatum to divest itself of its Sharia business or the America federal government must divest all ownership in AIG.
(c) Those in the American federal government responsible for the bailout and purchase of AIG stock must resign, including the U.S. Secretary of the Treasury and the Federal Reserve Board Chairman.
(d) Leaders in the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives must lead a national investigation into Sharia-Compliant Finance (SCF) and Sharia financial businesses in America to end their ability to promote the Islamic supremacist ideology in America.

To that end, I ask you to support this petition that calls for the U.S. federal government to "end U.S. ownership" of Sharia-based financial businesses; the Anti-Jihad League of America will ensure that the Federal Reserve Board, the U.S. Department of Treasury, and our elected representatives see your support on this petition.

Fear No Evil.

[Postscript - see also Sources documents for additional reading and background information.]

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

The Ultimate Counterterrorism Weapon

by Douglas Farah

In the day-to-day discussions and actions to combat terrorism, particularly radical Islamist terrorism, we generally agree that it will be a long struggle that could last generations. I agree.

But it is useful to step back and realize there is a powerful weapon that we CAN use to great effect. Both presidential candidates agreed on it, and it is long overdue: that is to decrease our consumption of oil so that our money does not flow to those who want to destroy us.

The effects have already been dramatic, as this IHT article describes. Two regimes that pose direct threats to U.S, Latin American and Middle Eastern stability – Iran and Venezuela – are teetering on the edge of severe financial meltdowns because oil prices have dropped.

A third country that is increasingly willing to deal with rogue regimes – Russia – is also hard hit, although not to the degree of Iran and Venezuela. Saudi Arabia’s ability to fund the propagation of Wahhabi extremism and intolerance will also be curtailed if the prices stay down.

Why? Because these regimes conservatively built their budgets, including the expansionary weapons purchases, on oil averaging $80 to $90 a barrel. When it falls below that, particularly to where it has been recently, they are forced to choose between their expansionist and militarist dreams, and feeding their own people.

Both Obama and McCain focused on the fact that we spend billions of dollars buying oil from regimes that hate us and have a radically different view of what the world should look like than most of its neighbors. Both viewed the issue of energy independence as a matter of national security. While differing on the margins over where to drill and the priority given nuclear energy, the campaigns, representing candidates supported by about 96% of the voting population, were in agreement.

The choices are stark. Iran wants a Shiite theocracy, which puts it at odds not only with the West, but with the Sunni regimes. It cannot finance its nuclear program, its massive expansion into Latin America or terrorist groups such as Hezbollah and Quds Force, without oil money. It has nothing else.

Venezuela wants a 21st century view of socialism and one party rule. Without oil money, Chávez cannot join Iran in pushing and financing the broad anti-democratic agenda he has established.

Bankrupting the enemy by cutting diminishing it export revenues is not a long-term proposition. It is happening now, with no formal policy in place to do this. And, unless policies are rapidly enacted to keep consumption low, the prices will inevitably rise again.

If the Obama administration can move quickly on this front, he will take a dramatic anti-terrorism action with no military or diplomatic actions needed.

There is a down side, at least in Venezuela. As oil revenues shrink, the Chávez government can replenish its coffers from the drug trade. It can survive, but it won’t because we are legally importing his products.

No mercy for jailed Border Patrol agent

There's no mercy for a former U.S. Border Patrol agent who remains behind bars for shooting a fleeing drug suspect. ....

Ramos and Compean are serving 11- and 12-year prison sentences, respectively, after a jury convicted them of violating federal gun laws and covering up the shooting of a drug smuggler as he fled back to Mexico after driving across the border with 743 pounds of marijuana in February 2005. U.S. Attorney Johnny Sutton's office gave the smuggler, Osbaldo Aldrete-Davila, immunity to serve as the government's star witness and testify against the border agents.

The agents were convicted of assault, discharge of a weapon in the commission of a crime of violence, tampering with an official proceeding and deprivation of civil rights.

The court affirmed all convictions except for tampering with an official proceeding, which it vacated and remanded for resentencing.

The bulk of their sentences, however, stem from a mandatory 10-year minimum sentence imposed by Congress for anyone convicted of discharging a weapon in the commission of a crime. ....

U.S. 'must oppose' Islamic 'anti-defamation' demands

A Heritage Foundation expert warns that the U.S. will need to maintain active opposition to plans for "religious anti-defamation" laws both within its borders and on an international scale, or face consequences.

In a report published on the foundation's website, Steven Groves said the U.S. "must remain wary of continuing efforts by U.N. member states to gain wider acceptance of the 'defamation of religions' concept."

Proponents "will continue to push the 'defamation of religions' agenda at the U.N. Human Rights

Council, the U.N. General Assembly, and at other international forums such as the April 2009 Durban Review Conference," he warned. .... By Bob Unruh

London fundraisers linked to stoning of 13-year-old

LONDON – Britain's MI6 intelligence service has identified a group that raises funds with impunity in London as the organization whose militia members in Somalia imposed a death sentence on a 13-year-old rape victim, according to a report from Joseph Farah's G2 Bulletin.

Known as the Shabaab, the ruthless militia is designated as a terrorist organization by the U.S. State Department. The group's leadership was targeted by missile strikes earlier this year. ....

Iran test-fires new missile, Israel within reach

By Zahra Hosseinian

TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iran said it test-fired a new generation of surface-to-surface missile on Wednesday and that the Islamic Republic was ready to defend itself against any attacker.

Iran's latest missile test followed persistent speculation in recent months of possible U.S. or Israeli strikes against its nuclear facilities, which the West suspects form part of a covert weapons program, a charge Tehran denies. ....

SICK SURVEILLANCE: GOOGLE REPORTS FLU SEARCHES, LOCATIONS TO FEDS

GOOGLE will launch a new tool that will help federal officials "track sickness".

"Flu Trends" uses search terms that people put into the web giant to figure out where influenza is heating up, and will notify the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in real time!

GOOGLE, continuing to work closely with government, claims it would keep individual user data confidential: "GOOGLE FLU TRENDS can never be used to identify individual users because we rely on anonymized, aggregated counts of how often certain search queries occur each week."

Engineers will capture keywords and phrases related to the flu, including thermometer, flu symptoms, muscle aches, chest congestion and others.

Dr. Lyn Finelli, chief of influenza surveillance at CDC: "One thing we found last year when we validated this model is it tended to predict surveillance data. The data are really, really timely. They were able to tell us on a day-to-day basis the relative direction of flu activity for a given area. They were about a week ahead of us. They could be used... as early warning signal for flu activity."

Thomas Malone, professor at M.I.T.: "I think we are just scratching the surface of what's possible with collective intelligence."

Eric Schmidt, GOOGLE's chief executive vows: "From a technological perspective, it is the beginning."

Developing...

Charities and Terrorism

(Compiler's note: One of the features of Shariah-Compliant Finance is that financial institutions who participate in it may well be helping to finance terrorism through monies contributed to Islamic charities. As the article below reveals, some of these so-called “legitimate” charities have been funding and continue to fund terrorism. rca)

by Phil Leggiere

New paper examines how Al Qaeda uses moderate Muslims to ‘microfinance” terror

Terrorist networks and organizations have many “underground” means of financing themselves, from drug smuggling to cybercrime. As challenging as these clandestine methods are to globally eradicate, an equally vexing problem is how to shut-off jihadist funding siphoned off from so-called “legitimate” charities.

Addressing that problem, according to Tolga Koker Department of Economics and Carlos Yordan Department of Political Science Drew University, means addressing the question of why tens of thousands of Muslims who are not terrorists and often opposed themselves to terrorism nonetheless support the work of charities that support jihadist operations. Their new paper , titled Microfinancing Terrorism: A Study in Al Qaeda Financing Strategy, published Tuesday by the Social Science Research Network, tries to do just that.

Although new banking and financial regulations may have made it difficult for terrorist groups to move funds around the world, the authors argue, these groups have be quite resourceful in finding ways to adapt to the new regulatory environment and to undermine it.

“For terrorist networks,” they write, “ especially those informed by jihadist ideologies, one source of finance is Muslims’ religious donations to Islamic charities. Although Al Qaeda and its affiliates have employed other funding mechanisms, individual donations are a key source of financing because it is a steady flow of funds.

Charities, according to the report, have been a fundamental part of Al Qaeda’s financial Infrastructure, not only helping Al Qaeda raise funds, but allowing it to move funds across national boundaries and hide the transfers from financial regulators.

Though some charities, according to the authors knowingly and actively supported Al Qaeda’s efforts, “most were not aware that al Qaeda operatives working for these charities or that they were siphoning off thousands of dollars to fund terrorist activities and to build Al Qaeda’s global network, which supported jihadist struggles in Chechnya, the Balkans, Kashmir, Afghanistan, Central Asia, and Southeast Asia.”

"Given that Al Qaeda and other groups fund most of their activities through donations, collected by Islamic charities, why would Muslims provide funds to these organizations," the authors ask.

The answer, the authors conclude, is that "social pressure forces moderate Muslims to publicly support the work of charities that may provide assistance to Al Qaeda or groups inspired by a jihadist worldview."

As they explain it, an individual will comply with social pressures and donate funds to a charity that may supports jihadi causes if he perceives it as critical to his reputation and public recognition as a “practicing” Muslim. Given the primacy of charitable donations in the culture and status system of Muslim communities the need to maintain reputation in this sphere is a powerful force, one that Al Qaeda has been able to tap.

“Microfinancing jihadi charities has a snowballing effect,’ they write. “A Muslim who previously refrained from donating to Islamic charities is likely to find himself in a position to provide some funds to religious organizations if he constantly observes his fellow acquaintances’ donations. As a bigger portion of Muslims are yielding to social pressures to contribute extra monies to jihadi charities, al Qaeda and other groups informed by jihadi goals will secure more funds to run their violent operations.”

The reputational model of charitable behavior, the authors believe, has strong implications for policy and counter-terror strategy.

“ The model implies,” they say, “ that identifying first and then publicly exposing such charities may help pious Muslims, especially those with high expressive drive to sincerely voice their concern among their communities. Encouraging individual donors with high threshold to voice their opinion against violence may create a snowballing effect deterring others from contributing to possible jihadi charities.”

“More importantly,” they conclude, “ finding ways to decrease reputational benefits is crucial in curbing the financial resources flowing terrorist networks. However, this is not an easy task. It needs the involvement of secular charities to provide several basic services that were considerably diminished with the neo-liberal polices since the 1980s in Muslim countries and elsewhere. Strictly regulated foreign aid to secular charities may help in this regard.”

The ultimate goal of this campaign of cultural outreach will be “making contribution to jihadi charities unpopular, and hence, changing the direction of social pressure from donating monies to such charities to avoiding such organization will have a paramount effect in the fight against terrorism. This is a long-term goal which is not feasible in the very short run since it asks for major revisions in world politics of which the jihadi charities are by-products.”

Veteran's Day Letter

(Compiler's note: Friends,

Every year, on Veteran's Day, a fellow Marine friend forwards this letter which he wrote to another buddy several years ago. It's pretty gruesome in parts, emotioanlly powerful, so be warned, but it as a letter I look forward to reading each Veteran's Day, and I thought you'd want to see it too.

Happy Veteran's Day, and, in the words of Captain Miller in Saving Private Ryan, "Remember this". )

I was at Camp Lejeune , N.C. on Thursday for business. Every time I go down there I stop at the Beirut Memorial to pay my respects to the Marines who were killed in Lebanon . I always go there very early in the morning so I am sure to be alone as I visit the Memorial.

The Beirut operation was and still is largely a mystery to most people. It was simply not discussed among Marines like previous or subsequent Marine Corps operations were. Most folks believe that only the 241 Marines and sailors who were killed in the BLT HQ blast are listed on the wall. Not true, there are a few dozen more that were killed in firefights and by shelling both before and after the BLT tragedy. Many more Marines survived to wear Purple Hearts for gunshot and shrapnel wounds received in Beirut . This fact is relatively unknown by most people, Marines included.

There is a friend and TBS/IOC classmate of mine, 2nd Lt. George Losey, listed on the wall. George and his platoon sergeant were both killed during a mortar and artillery attack at the Beirut airport in August of 1983. I went to his funeral and was greatly affected by it. It was especially heartbreaking to see George's grandfather grieve at the sight of his grandson as he lay dead at such a tender age. One can only imagine what he was thinking. It was one of the saddest scenes I have ever witnessed.

Also listed is Sgt Manuel Cox, a squad leader in Golf Co., 2/8. Sgt Cox was an immigrant from somewhere in South America . He came to the battalion from what is now the School of Infantry where he was a very popular instructor. All of the young Marines in the battalion knew him from the school and were simply in awe of him.

Sgt Cox and his squad were put on an isolated Observation Post west of the Beirut airport. Our battalion’s (2/8) first big scrap in Beirut took place in early December of 1983. It lasted about three hours, on and off. The local Shiite militia apparently decided it was time to see what the new Marine unit had in the way of testosterone. They found out rather quickly that the rules had changed. The battalion shot everything; small arms, artillery, mortars, tank main gun rounds, and even TOW and Dragon missiles (normally used against armored vehicles, they proved to be very effective when shot at enemy gunners in distant buildings!).

I received a radio message from the airport informing me that they were engaged in a pitched fire-fight and warning me to be alert for attacks on my position, which was isolated several miles away in a very bad sector of West Beirut . I tuned a couple of spare radios to the frequencies used by Sgt Cox’s company and the Battalion Command Posts. For the next few hours, I sat in the dark on the roof of a building and listened to Marines I knew fight for their lives. It was evident from the radio traffic that Sgt Cox's position was really catching hell. Judging by the ferocity of the attack on his observation post, I believe the Shiites wanted to kill everyone there and take the weapons, ammo, etc., for their own use.

During the entire fire-fight Sgt Cox conducted himself in a manner that was simply awesome. The entire airport could hear him on the radio talking back to his Company CP. He called for and adjusted artillery fire, mortars, gave fire commands to his gunners; the whole deal. Sgt Cox and his Marines fought like hell that night. I have no doubt that they inflicted heavy casualties among their attackers. Someone had about an hour of the radio traffic on a tape recording. I always thought that they should have sent the tape to Squad Leader School and The Basic School, where the instructors could tell the students, "OK, listen to this. Here's how Marines should be led while in combat!”

As luck would have it, the last enemy mortar round of the night hit the roof of the building that Sgt Cox was on. It killed him and seven other Marines. Some of the M-203 gunners were wearing grenade vests and their extra rounds detonated. The rooftop position had been turned into a scene of utter carnage. The Company CP sent a lone, incredibly brave Marine, L/CPL Clayburn, down to Sgt. Cox’s position to assess the situation. He crawled about 300 meters on his belly as the Shiites attempted to shoot him. They actually shot through one of the canteens on his cartridge belt; he was very lucky not to take a round in his body. He got to Sgt Cox’s position, saw the gore and left in a panic for the Company Command Post. When he arrived back at the Company CP his Lieutenant asked, "Clayburn, did you remember to bring back the crypto gear?” He had not and the look on his face said it all. There was no way he wanted to have to make another trip to Sgt Cox’s position. The Lieutenant said, "Let's go back and get it". They both departed for Sgt. Cox’s position and it was the same shooting gallery as L/CPL Clayburn’s first trip.

When they reached Sgt Cox’s position, the Lieutenant, by his own admission, was badly shaken by what he saw. The dead Marines were in really bad shape; none remained in one entire piece. The Lieutenant found Sgt Cox’s body. The last time he had seen Sgt Cox two days prior he was passing out cigars celebrating the birth of his child. He respected and admired Sgt Cox and the loss of this fine Marine greatly affected him.

Whenever I look at Sgt Cox’s name on the wall of the Beirut Memorial I always think about the devastated family he left behind. He was posthumously awarded the Bronze Star Medal for Valor. Throughout the remainder of my career, whenever I heard the term NCO or Squad Leader or Marine Sergeant, I always thought of Sgt Cox as the standard to measure everyone else by. What a Marine. What a loss.

The hardest name to look at is that of Edward J. Gargano. He was a Corporal assigned to the Dragons platoon. He had been assigned to support my company in the Grenada operation and had moved with my platoon at times.

In January of 1984, Corporal Gargano was told to bring up a squad of Marines from the airport to the temporary U.S. Embassy site where my platoon was. The helicopter landing zone was a large parking lot on the Mediterranean coast. Though it was not an ideal landing zone, we used it on and off because we had no other alternatives. It was located in a very dangerous West Beirut neighborhood, so we went loaded for bear every time we went down there.

The first helo landed on that fateful day and the Marines ran out and took cover behind a stone wall at the edge of the LZ. As the second helo touched down all hell broke loose. I was on top of a building and saw several RPG's streaking by the helicopters, heard the sound of automatic weapons fire and saw green and red tracers zipping around in every direction. Most of my positions were under small arms fire and I could tell that the Marines were returning the same.

A Marine next to me pointed at the LZ and said, “Sir, look!” I saw a Marine laid out in the open. I could see that bullets were hitting all around him. I then saw a Marine run about 75 yards to the wounded man. As he ran the enemy fire increased in volume and I saw bullets hitting the ground inches behind him. I could see tracers flying all around him. It was exactly like those war movies we watched as kids where the good guy always seems to outrun the bullets. The Marine reached down and scooped up the wounded man in one motion and started back to safety. Once again tracers were zipping around everywhere. I saw shrubbery and tree branches falling next to the LZ as bullets cut them away as the enemy tried to hit the Marines as they returned to a safe position.

Amazingly, PFC Gorham (the rescuer) was not hit during his heroic run to retrieve his wounded buddy, nor was Cpl Gargano. Cpl Gargano, however, had been hit earlier by a bullet (7.62). PFC Gorham was running the show at this point and he called me for a MedEvac helo and remembered to request that it go to another landing zone that was down the road a bit and not in the line of fire. His presence of mind and coolness under fire will remain with me for as long as I live. He was just a kid, maybe a year out of high school. But on that day, his actions were those from which legends are made!

I would estimate that the entire rescue of the Cpl Gargano took perhaps less than two minutes, but I remember it like a slow motion NFL highlight film. No matter how many times I recall this event, it always plays in my mind in the same exact slow motion manner.

By the time I linked up with Cpl Gargano he was unconscious and was probably already dead. As we worked on him trying to get him breathing via CPR, massive amounts of blood came out of his mouth and nose with each thrust of the Doc’s hands; it was obvious that the bullet had hit his heart or aorta. I think we all knew what the deal was, but the Doc and other Marines continued to at least try to do something.

The tactical situation faded quickly and quiet returned to the area. The radios were booming with traffic as we tried to assess if there were any other casualties. The Doc came over and told me that Corporal Gargano was dead. I had the radio-man call the Battalion CP and change the MedEvac from priority to routine, as I did not want to cause the MedEvac helo to risk flying into a hot LZ now that there was no chance of saving his life.

Evidently the MEU staff was getting micro-managed from Washington and they wanted specifics about where Corporal Gargano had been hit. I went back to Cpl Gargano to verify the specific location of his wound. I was alone at this point with his body and I lifted his shirt up and had to roll him over to get to the wound. Sure enough, just below his right armpit there was a jagged hole about as big as a dime, with no exit wound. As I moved him I could hear blood sloshing around inside his lungs and stomach; the bullet must have really torn things up inside of him.

To this day I remember how young and fresh faced he looked. He looked so peaceful, as if he was asleep. I had done a lot of thinking since the October 23^rd suicide truck bombing of the BLT Headquarters and had read the stories about all of the shattered families back home. I thought of Corporal Gargano’s parents back in the states and could only imagine what this was going to do to them.

The only thing that I could think of to do was to reach down and give his face the caress that his mother would never be able to. I said a prayer, returned to my Marines and did my best to look composed and give them the direction they desperately needed. I don't know how well I pulled it off, but inside, my heart was aching with sadness.

A week later Newsweek magazine ran a short story on Cpl Gargano's death. The article contained a recruit picture of him in his Dress Blue uniform. I saved that article and for the rest of my career I kept it in my office. I would put it in a spot that caused me to look at it at least once a day. It always helped me keep things in perspective and to remember just how ugly our profession can be. Occasionally, other Marines would see me looking at the picture and they would ask me about it. I used to tell them that the picture reminded me of why I was a Marine and of the great responsibility I had to the parents and families of the Marines entrusted to me.

Rarely does a day go by that I do not think of that event. For better or worse, it shaped a great deal of who I was as a Marine and how I approached my role as a leader of the finest men I have ever known. Sorry to ramble so, Tom. The month of October always brings back memories of those days.

Semper Fi,

Mike

The night we waved goodbye to America... our last best hope on Earth

by Peter Hitchens

Anyone would think we had just elected a hip, skinny and youthful replacement for God, with a plan to modernise Heaven and Hell – or that at the very least John Lennon had come back from the dead.

The swooning frenzy over the choice of Barack Obama as President of the United States must be one of the most absurd waves of self-deception and swirling fantasy ever to sweep through an advanced civilisation. At least Mandela-worship – its nearest equivalent – is focused on a man who actually did something.

I really don’t see how the Obama devotees can ever in future mock the Moonies, the Scientologists or people who claim to have been abducted in flying saucers. This is a cult like the one which grew up around Princess Diana, bereft of reason and hostile to facts.

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The night America changed: Barack and Michelle Obama in Chicago

It already has all the signs of such a thing. The newspapers which recorded Obama’s victory have become valuable relics. You may buy Obama picture books and Obama calendars and if there isn’t yet a children’s picture version of his story, there soon will be.

Proper books, recording his sordid associates, his cowardly voting record, his astonishingly militant commitment to unrestricted abortion and his blundering trip to Africa, are little-read and hard to find.

If you can believe that this undistinguished and conventionally Left-wing machine politician is a sort of secular saviour, then you can believe anything. He plainly doesn’t believe it himself. His cliche-stuffed, PC clunker of an acceptance speech suffered badly from nerves. It was what you would expect from someone who knew he’d promised too much and that from now on the easy bit was over.

He needn’t worry too much. From now on, the rough boys and girls of America’s Democratic Party apparatus, many recycled from Bill Clinton’s stained and crumpled entourage, will crowd round him, to collect the rich spoils of his victory and also tell him what to do, which is what he is used to.

Just look at his sermon by the shores of Lake Michigan. He really did talk about a ‘new dawn’, and a ‘timeless creed’ (which was ‘yes, we can’). He proclaimed that ‘change has come’. He revealed that, despite having edited the Harvard Law Review, he doesn’t know what ‘enormity’ means. He reached depths of oratorical drivel never even plumbed by our own Mr Blair, burbling about putting our hands on the arc of history (or was it the ark of history?) and bending it once more toward the hope of a better day (Don’t try this at home).

I am not making this up. No wonder that awful old hack Jesse Jackson sobbed as he watched. How he must wish he, too, could get away with this sort of stuff.

And it was interesting how the President-elect failed to lift his admiring audience by repeated – but rather hesitant – invocations of the brainless slogan he was forced by his minders to adopt against his will – ‘Yes, we can’. They were supposed to thunder ‘Yes, we can!’ back at him, but they just wouldn’t join in. No wonder. Yes we can what exactly? Go home and keep a close eye on the tax rate, is my advice. He’d have been better off bursting into ‘I’d like to teach the world to sing in perfect harmony’ which contains roughly the same message and might have attracted some valuable commercial sponsorship.

Perhaps, being a Chicago crowd, they knew some of the things that 52.5 per cent of America prefers not to know. They know Obama is the obedient servant of one of the most squalid and unshakeable political machines in America. They know that one of his alarmingly close associates, a state-subsidised slum landlord called Tony Rezko, has been convicted on fraud and corruption charges.

They also know the US is just as segregated as it was before Martin Luther King – in schools, streets, neighbourhoods, holidays, even in its TV-watching habits and its choice of fast-food joint. The difference is that it is now done by unspoken agreement rather than by law.

If Mr Obama’s election had threatened any of that, his feel-good white supporters would have scuttled off and voted for John McCain, or practically anyone. But it doesn’t. Mr Obama, thanks mainly to the now-departed grandmother he alternately praised as a saint and denounced as a racial bigot, has the huge advantages of an expensive private education. He did not have to grow up in the badlands of useless schools, shattered families and gangs which are the lot of so many young black men of his generation.

If the nonsensical claims made for this election were true, then every positive discrimination programme aimed at helping black people into jobs they otherwise wouldn’t get should be abandoned forthwith. Nothing of the kind will happen. On the contrary, there will probably be more of them.

And if those who voted for Obama were all proving their anti-racist nobility, that presumably means that those many millions who didn’t vote for him were proving themselves to be hopeless bigots. This is obviously untrue.

Yes we can what?: Barack Obama ran on the ticket of change

I was in Washington DC the night of the election. America’s beautiful capital has a sad secret. It is perhaps the most racially divided city in the world, with 15th Street – which runs due north from the White House – the unofficial frontier between black and white. But, like so much of America, it also now has a new division, and one which is in many ways much more important. I had attended an election-night party in a smart and liberal white area, but was staying the night less than a mile away on the edge of a suburb where Spanish is spoken as much as English, plus a smattering of tongues from such places as Ethiopia, Somalia and Afghanistan.

As I walked, I crossed another of Washington’s secret frontiers. There had been a few white people blowing car horns and shouting, as the result became clear. But among the Mexicans, Salvadorans and the other Third World nationalities, there was something like ecstasy.

They grasped the real significance of this moment. They knew it meant that America had finally switched sides in a global cultural war. Forget the Cold War, or even the Iraq War. The United States, having for the most part a deeply conservative people, had until now just about stood out against many of the mistakes which have ruined so much of the rest of the world.

Suspicious of welfare addiction, feeble justice and high taxes, totally committed to preserving its own national sovereignty, unabashedly Christian in a world part secular and part Muslim, suspicious of the Great Global Warming panic, it was unique.

These strengths had been fading for some time, mainly due to poorly controlled mass immigration and to the march of political correctness. They had also been weakened by the failure of America’s conservative party – the Republicans – to fight on the cultural and moral fronts.

They preferred to posture on the world stage. Scared of confronting Left-wing teachers and sexual revolutionaries at home, they could order soldiers to be brave on their behalf in far-off deserts. And now the US, like Britain before it, has begun the long slow descent into the Third World. How sad. Where now is our last best hope on Earth?

The Unreported War

from Strategy Page

Cyber Wars are already underway, but the practitioners are doing it covertly, lest there is a conventional counterattack. Nuclear weapons have kept the major nations from going to war with each other for the past half century. That will probably continue. But Cyber War provides an opportunity to fight an anonymous war against another nation, without leading to physical violence on a large scale. But only if your don't make the target nation really, really mad. This is a delicate balancing act.

This has been done in the past, largely by quietly supporting opposition or terrorist groups in enemy nations. The key here is hiding your tracks. The earliest signs of this was the highly damaging Code Red virus of 2001, which apparently came from China. The origin of the virus was traced back to China, but China denied any responsibility and got away with it.

China, unlike other nations hostile to America (North Korea, Cuba, Iran), has a large and growing Internet presence. China has thousands of skilled Internet programmers, and has admitted it is putting together military units for developing and using cyberweapons. So the next time there are tensions between the United States and China, there will be an outbreak of nasty, and hard to trace, Cyber War attacks on the United States. The only problem China faces with this approach is that if its weapons hit other nations as well, and China were found out, the diplomatic backlash would be damaging. Even if attacks only made against United States and were not traced back to China, China would still be the chief suspect. It would be a case of China being the only nation with the motive and means. Of course, China could always slip Iran or North Korea some choice cyber weapons and wait for those nations to take a shot at America. And the Chinese are no doubt aware that America could launch its own anonymous cyber attack on China. You wouldn't be able to hide the effects of such a covert war, nor the scrambling of diplomats to bring the undeclared war to an end. Meanwhile, China is content to use Cyber War tools mainly for espionage. So do many other nations.

These undeclared, and unofficial, Cyber Wars have been going on for over a decade now. And the tools available to the attackers are becoming more powerful. What's behind this are several dozen gangs that undertake large scale criminal operations on the Internet. Most people see the results in the form of spam email (over 70 percent of all email is spam) and operations that secretly take over personal and business PCs, so these computers can secretly transmit spam, or huge quantities of bogus messages that shut down targeted web sites (DDOS, or distributed denial or service attacks). The gangs also specialize on finding all manner of secret, or sensitive, information, and selling it. Intelligence agencies are often eager buyers.

It appears that China and Russia, or at least their security services, have made deals with some of the gangs. It works like this. If the secret police want some Internet based spying done, or a DDOS attack unleashed on someone, the gangs will do it, or help government Cyber War organizations do so. In return, the gangs have a safe haven. The gangs have to refrain from major operations against the country they are in, but most of the targets are in the West (that's where most of the money is). Of course, no one will admit to this sort of thing. But criminal gangs working for the secret police is an ancient practice in these two countries, something that goes back centuries.

Secure in their safe havens, some of these gangs are now going after the commercial services that try and control spam, DDOS attacks and all manner of computer crime. The gangs obviously have an interest in trying to interfere with these security companies, and are apparently feeling secure enough from retribution, and prosecution, to do so.

The U.S. is the main target for the Internet based espionage, and has not yet come up with a way to get the foreign hackers to stop. American officials don't want this stuff in the media either, because the losses are embarrassing, as is the lack of an effective plan to halt the plundering. Occasionally, some details leak out, like the military asking Congress for permission to use more aggressive methods in going after the cyber spies. This quiet war could have enormous implications for any future conventional conflict. The Chinese are going after military technology, and it's not always obvious what they've got, and what they haven't. This increases the probability of some nasty, and painful, surprises when the shooting starts.