Mar 11 2006
Crack Down In Middle East
Given the events in Pakistan and Iraq and now Lebanon, it seems there is a push going on to round up a lot of the terrorist cells. And maybe nab some big names finally.
Lebanese security sources revealed Saturday that they discovered a terror network which was responsible for firing rockets at Israel, the Lebanese daily A-Saffir reported.
According to the article, a cell comprised of both Palestinian and Lebanese terrorists had amassed large quantities of weapons for use against Israeli targets.
According to the reports in Lebanese newspapers, the cell was led by a Palestinian who had strong ties to al-Qaida.
Among the weapons found in the cell’s possession were mortars, missiles capable of hitting Israel, and explosive materials. The cell’s leader would be tried, Lebanese sources said, in a Beirut military court.
Interesting.
We are having a crackdown on gangs here:
Imigration and Customs Enforcement–called ICE is having a crackdown:
“During a two-week enforcement action, federal agents from the Department of Homeland Security’s U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) arrested 375 gang members and associates in 23 states in a joint effort with law enforcement agencies nationwide. This is Operation Community Shield’s latest action, which has yielded 2,388 gang arrests in its first year. ”
http://www.ice.gov/graphics/index.htm
Here is an article:
http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/03/10/gang.arrests/
SNIP
Saturday, March 11, 2006
WASHINGTON (CNN) — The Bloods, Crips, Disciples and an increasingly popular street gang known as MS-13 were among the gangs targeted in a Department of Homeland Security operation over the past two weeks that yielded 375 arrests of wanted members in 23 states, the department announced Friday.
What makes Operation Community Shield different from other crackdowns is that federal authorities for the first time are using immigration and customs authorities in an attempt to dismantle what they call “transnational, violent street gangs,” according to DHS.
DHS launched the operation last year after immigration officials dubbed the street gang Mara Salvatrucha, or MS-13, as “one of the largest and most violent street gangs in the country.” (Watch DHS announce the fruits of its latest crackdown on gang violence — 6:01)
Immigration and Customs Enforcement learned that many of the MS-13 members were foreign born — usually from El Salvador, Honduras or Guatemala — and in the country illegally, according to a DHS news release.
ICE’s inaugural crackdown in February and March 2005 netted the arrests of more than 100 MS-13 members, and two months later, ICE expanded the operation to include all street and prison gangs with foreign-born members.
ICE even captured IEDs and components at the border. This is the ICE magazine:
http://www.ice.gov/graphics/news/insideice/articles/InsideICE_030806_Web1.htm
SAN ANTONIO—Assistant Secretary Julie L. Myers announced on February 3 that ICE agents and other officers assigned to the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) Border Enforcement Security Task Force (BEST) in Laredo, Texas, had seized materials for improvised explosive devices (IEDs) and large quantities of automatic and semiautomatic weapons, ammunition, narcotics and cash.
On January 27, BEST task force officers from ICE, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the Laredo Police Department executed a search warrant at a location in Laredo. The search revealed two completed IEDs and materials for making approximately 33 more IEDs. Agents found 300 primers, 1,280 rounds of ammunition, five grenade shells, nine pipes with end caps, 26 grenade triggers (14 with fuses and primers attached), 31 grenade spoons, 40 grenade pins, 19 black powder casings, as well as 65 firearm magazines, a silencer and other firearms components.
It’s not just the Pakistan-Afghan border. This is the Mexican border.
This is the main paper of Pakistan. Al Jazeera is doing some interesting things.
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=20063\12\story_12-3-2006_pg1_2
Sunday, March 12, 2006
Arab-American woman takes on the mullahs
By Khalid Hasan
WASHINGTON: A Syrian-American Muslim woman doctor has received several death threats after criticising in a television interview the Muslim clerics, holy warriors and political leaders who she said had “distorted†the teachings of the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) and the Quran for 14 centuries.
Dr Wafa Sultan, a 47-year-old psychiatrist living outside Los Angeles, was interviewed on Al Jazeera Television about three weeks ago. According to a report in the New York Times, she is being hailed by some as a “fresh voice of reason†and by others as a “heretic and infidel who deserves to dieâ€. Her interview has had a million hits on the Internet and has been circulated through email to countless people. She said that the world’s Muslims, whom she compares unfavourably with the Jews, have “descended into a vortex of self-pity and violenceâ€. What is happening today is “a battle between modernity and barbarism, which the forces of violent, reactionary Islam are destined to loseâ€.
“I believe that our people are hostages to our own beliefs and teachings,†she told the New York Times in an interview. “Knowledge has released me from this backward thinking. Somebody has to help free the Muslims from these wrong beliefs.â€
Speaking of the Holocaust, she said: “The Jews have come from the tragedy and forced the world to respect them, with their knowledge, not with their terror; with their work, not with their crying and yelling. We have not seen a single Jew blow himself up in a German restaurant, destroy a church, protest by killing people.
“Only the Muslims defend their beliefs by burning down churches, killing people and destroying embassies. This path will not yield any results. The Muslims must ask themselves what they can do for humankind, before they demand that humankind respect them.â€
The American Jewish Congress has invited her to speak in May at a conference in Israel. “We have been discussing with her the importance of her message and trying to devise the right venue for her to address Jewish leaders,†according to Neil B Goldstein, executive director of the Jewish group.
She is now working on a book with titled ‘The Escaped Prisoner: when God is a monster’.
“I have reached the point that doesn’t allow any U-turn. I have no choice. I am questioning every single teaching of our holy book,†she has said.
Dr Sultan began her writing on an Islamic reformist website which caught the attention of Al Jazeera. She was invited to debate an Algerian cleric last July, during which she questioned the religious teachings that prompt young people to commit suicide in the name of God. “Why does a young Muslim man, in the prime of life, with a full life ahead, go and blow himself up?†she asked. “In our countries, religion is the sole source of education and is the only spring from which that terrorist drank until his thirst was quenched.â€
According to the New York Times report, “Her remarks set off debates around the globe and her name began appearing in Arabic newspapers and websites. But her fame grew exponentially when she appeared on Al Jazeera again on February 21, an appearance that was translated and widely distributed by the Middle East Media Research Institute.â€
Dr Sultan said: “It is a clash between two opposites, between two eras. It is a clash between a mentality that belongs to the Middle Ages and another mentality that belongs to the 21st century. It is a clash between civilisation and backwardness, between the civilised and the primitive, between barbarity and rationality.†She said she no longer practised Islam. “I am a secular human being,†she said.