MFS - The Other News

                          Morning Posting.

• Obama's Judges Blocked At Historic Rate. As the first congressional session of Obama's presidency draws to a close, what began as a slow process of confirmation has ballooned into a full-blown judicial crisis. The Senate has overseen the slowest pace of judicial staffing in at least a generation, with a paltry 39.8 percent of Obama's judges having been confirmed, according to numbers compiled by Senate Democrats. Of the 103 district and circuit court nominees, only 41 have been confirmed. By this time in George W. Bush's presidency, the Senate had confirmed 76 percent of his nominees. President Clinton was working at a rate of 89 percent at this point in his tenure.The slow pace of confirmations has led to a federal judiciary with nearly one in eight seats empty, as a foreclosure crisis fueled by rampant fraud floods the courts.Hmmmm....Now i'm wondering why?Read the full story here.

• ‘Nazism, Islam shared common enemies - the Jews'.Nazis promised grand mufti of J'lem Haj Amin al-Husseini leadership of Palestine after slaughter of its Jews, according to US report.A newly released report by the US National Archives details the close collaborative relationship between Nazi leaders and the grand mufti of Jerusalem, Haj Amin al-Husseini, indicating that Nazi authorities planned to use Husseini as their leader after their conquest of Palestine.Husseini was paid handsomely by the Nazis for his efforts, recruited Muslims for the SS and was promised that he would be made Palestine’s leader after its Jewish population of 350,000 had been murdered.Husseini, who died in Beirut in 1974, was apparently paid 50,000 marks per month, and 80,000 additional marks a month for living expenses, according to a contract with the Germans. This was a time when a German field officer typically earned 25,000 marks a year.“SS leaders and Husseini both claimed that Nazism and Islam had common values as well as common enemies – above all, the Jews,” the report states.In fall 1943, it says, Husseini went to the Croatia, a German ally, to recruit Muslims for the Waffen-SS.During that trip he told the troops of the newly formed Bosnian-Muslim 13th Mountain Waffen-SS division that the entire Muslim world ought to follow their example,” the report states.This evidence “is significant in light of Husseini’s lenient postwar treatment,” the report notes. Husseini was allowed to flee to Syria after the war despite enough evidence to bring him to trial as a war criminal.Hmmmm....Seems history is catching up with the Arafat's uncle?Read the full story here.

• Indonesia seeks jail for 'blasphemous' American.INDONESIAN prosecutors on Tuesday sought a seven-month jail term for a US retiree accused of blasphemy after he allegedly pulled the plug on a mosque loudspeaker during a prayer reading.The Aug 22 incident in the middle of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan resulted in retired Californian engineer Gregory Luke, 64, needing a police escort from his home on Lombok island as a mob tore it to pieces around him.Prosecutors said Luke had blasphemed against Islam, the dominant religion in Indonesia, when he allegedly barged into the mosque to complain that a nightly Ramadan prayer reading was too loud.'We recommend a sentence of seven months' jail as he is guilty of blasphemy and committing an act of hatred,' prosecutor Baiq Nurjanah told a court in Praya, Lombok.She said the maximum sentence of five years in jail was not being sought because the defendant, who runs a guesthouse for tourists on the island, had 'expressed regret of his act'.Wearing a sarong, polo shirt and black Muslim hat, Luke asked the judges for the lightest sentence possible and apologised for his 'wrongdoing'. 'I apologise for my wrongdoing in the mosque. Hmmmm....Obama "Indonesia is an example of tolerance."Read the full story here.

• Eddie Crespo won't be charged with a hate crime for alleged beating of Queens imam.Hate crime charges were dropped against an off-duty MTA Bridges and Tunnels officer accused of attacking a Queens imam in the subway, prosecutors said Tuesday."He stopped a fight. He did what he was trained to do," said Crespo's lawyer, Arnold Keith. "He's a hero.""We're extremely disappointed," said Hassan Ahmad, a lawyer representing Peterson, who has a criminal history.Prosecutors charged that Crespo, a five-year MTA officer, joined Melendez in the attack, but defense attorneys argued that Crespo tried to break up a fight sparked by a bump, not bigotry.Read the full story here.

• Lakin facing jail time for guilty plea at start of 'birther' court-martial.Even if Lt. Col. Terrence Lakin can prove that the president isn’t an American citizen, the 17-year soldier will still be going to jail.Lakin, an Army physician who refused deployment to Afghanistan earlier this year because he believes Barack Obama cannot legally be president, will face up to 18 months in prison and dismissal from the service after pleading guilty Tuesday to charges of refusing his immediate commanders’ orders during his protest of the president.The guilty plea won’t erase Lakin’s bid to challenge the president’s legitimacy in court. Those charges dealt with secondary issues, not his direct refusal to deploy.His attorneys were expected to challenge that issue later in the proceedings, although the military judge hearing the case already has placed tight restrictions on how far she’ll let them go.A group of about 30 birthers attended Tuesday’s hearing, handing out leaflets with a picture of Obama labeled “usurper” and “ineligible.”At the hearing, Lakin told the court that he still believes that questions surround Obama’s presidency but that he should not have refused to meet with his superiors and report to Fort Campbell, Ky., while making his protest.“I was praying and soul searching,” he said. “I believed there was a question that needs to be answered to ensure a valid chain of command. But I had asked every question, done everything else I could short of disobeying orders, without success.”If convicted of the remaining charges, Lakin could face up to three years in prison.Hmmmm....Or he could be rewarded with a medal for valor one day?Read the full story here.

• HT:IslaminEurope.Netherlands: Modern Dutch Muslim women can't find suitable partners.Free newspaper Sp!ts reports that it is becoming increasingly difficult for Dutch Muslim women to find suitable husbands.The current generation of young Dutch Muslim women are often quite well-educated and open-minded compared to most of their potential spouses, many of whom do not want a 'modern' wife.In addition, arranged marriages are going out of fashion. Nermin Altintas, the Turkish-Dutch director of the Yasmin foundation in The Hague, says: "Men and women are increasingly left to their own devices to find potential partners. This can be really difficult when you are not in the habit of going to discos and bars. It is increasingly rare for parents to find you a husband. One of the few possibilities of meeting men is at weddings."Hmmmm.....Perhaps change faith?Read the full story here.

• HT:FaithFreedom.Western Woman: Wanna be Muslim’s Wife? Here’s Your Crash-Course!A Muslim man is asking for your hand in marriage, and you have [madly] fallen in love with his bronze Middle Eastern complexion. He seems to be intelligent, romantic, handsome, kind of rich, well-educated and well-mannered, too! He shows deep love and affections towards you. Showers his unlimited attentions, caresses; he really really cares for you and your heart flutters when you hear his voice or when you are near him…. You are attracted to him like to none other!So, what more can a woman ask for in life? This most eligible bachelor is also a Muslim!“There will be no problems”, he will say, adding: “you can keep your religion, I will keep mine”. It is indeed true that Islam does allow a Muslim man to marry a Christian woman [infidel]. But is it true that there will be no problems in such a marriage?To answer this question, a Western [infidel] woman has to examine what it is like to be a Muslim’s wife?Here's is a ‘Crash Course’ on being a Muslim wife. All Western infidel women must familiarize with it before marrying a Muslim.They say, “Love is blind”. But I, however, hope that this message will serve as an eye-opener for you.Hmmmm.....Perhaps they should include it in the school education programs?Read the full story here.

• HT:TheAmericanDream.16 Nightmarish Economic Trends To Watch Carefully In 2011.If you only watch the "economic pundits" on television, it can be very confusing to figure out exactly what is happening with the U.S. economy. One pundit will pull out a couple statistics that got a little bit better over the past month and claim that we have entered a time of solid recovery. Another pundit will pull out a couple statistics that got a little worse over the past month and claim that we are headed for trouble. So what is the truth? Well, if you really want to get a clear idea of what is really going on you have to look at the long-term trends. There are some economic trends which just keep getting worse year after year after year, and it is those trends that tell the real story of the decline of our economic system.As you examine the long-term trends, you quickly come to realize that the U.S. is trapped in an endless spiral of debt, the middle class is being wiped out, the U.S. dollar is being destroyed and America is rapidly becoming a post-industrial wasteland.Posted are 16 nightmarish economic trends to watch carefully in 2011. It is becoming exceedingly apparent that unless something is done rapidly we are heading for an economic collapse of unprecedented magnitude.... Thousands of our factories, millions of our jobs and hundreds of billions of dollars of our national wealth continue to be shipped overseas. In 1985, the U.S. trade deficit with China was 6 million dollars for the entire year. In the month of August alone, the U.S. trade deficit with China was over 28 billion dollars. Nobel economist Robert W. Fogel of the University of Chicago is projecting that the Chinese economy will be three times larger than the U.S. economy by the year 2040 if current trends continue.Now read the rest here.

• Indonesian state stops sending maids to Saudi.An Indonesian state which supplies nearly 70 per cent of Saudi Arabia’s demand for domestic workers, has decided to halt sending maids to the Gulf kingdom following reports of abuse of two maids from the southeast Asian country.In comments published by the Saudi Okaz newspaper on Wednesday, the governor of West Nusa Tenggara said his state had completely stopped sending any housemaids to Saudi Arabia to put pressure on Jakarta to organise the recruitment of Indonesian domestic helpers in the kingdom.The ban, which began this week, will continue unless the federal government responds to the state’s demand,” Zain Al Abdeen Majedi said.Nearly two million housemaids work in Saudi Arabia, the largest Arab economy and the world’s oil superpower.Hmmmm....Finally!Read the full story here.

• Kosovo's prime minister was 'a mafia boss who stole human organs from Serb prisoners and sold them for profit'.The prime minister of Kosovo ran a mafia-style crime ring that murdered Serbs and sold their kidneys on the black market, according to a report published yesterday.Civilians detained by the Kosovo Liberation Army in the late 1990s were allegedly shot dead in northern Albania so their organs could be extracted and sold.These atrocities took place after the war in Kosovo had ended in 1999, according to the report, prepared for Europe's premier human rights watchdog. Dick Marty, of the Council of Europe, took more than two years to compile his findings and claimed that there were a number of detention facilities in Albania, including a 'state-of-the-art reception centre for the organised crime of organ trafficking'.Kosovo's current Prime Minister Hashim Thaçi is alleged to have headed the KLA-led Drenica Group in 1999 which organised beatings, murders and the organ-selling.‘Thaçi and these other Drenica Group members are consistently named as “key players” in intelligence reports on Kosovo's mafia-like structures of organised crime,' wrote Mr Marty.The prosecution has alleged that Kosovo surgeon Lutfi Dervishi is the ringleader of the group. A Belgrade-based daily newspaper, Blic, has claimed that Dervishi is also linked to the KLA's alleged kidnapping and killing of Serb civilians for their organs.Marty says some of those involved in the recent case, were also allegedly involved with the organ harvesting in Albania. He declined to elaborate, so as not to hamper the EU-led legal proceedings in Kosovo.The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe will debate the report in Strasbourg on Jan. 25, the council said.Read the full story here.

• Tragedy on Christmas Island: 50 asylum seekers - including babies - feared dead after boat is smashed against razor sharp cliffs in 'huge seas'.Up to 50 people are feared dead after a boat filled with desperate asylum-seekers crashed into cliffs and overturned near an island off the west Australian coast today.The screams of people thrown into the water could be heard by residents on Christmas Island as rescue boats sped to the wrecked vessel.The wooden boat, which is believed to have set off from Indonesia carrying about 80 asylum seekers, smashed into the cliffs near Flying Fish Cove on the north of the Island resulting in what authorities said were an 'unknown number of dead'.A number of people were rescued in the aftermath of the incident. 'It is heart-stopping,' said one resident who saw people struggling in the wild sea. 'It's carnage, a terrible tragedy.'The sea is awash. None of us can get out to rescue them from the shore. It took a customs boat ages to get to them.'The screams of people in the water were so loud that residents heard them above the sound of the sea crashing against the rocks.'Christmas Island councillor Kamar Ismail said the asylum seekers appeared to be mostly of Middle Eastern origin. A doctor confirmed most of the survivors were of Iraqi and Iranian nationality.Read the full story here.

• HT:MichelleMalkin.Reid warns: We’ll stretch this lame-duck out until Jan. 5 if we have to.The big buzz in Washington this afternoon is over Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s warning to colleagues that they’ll be working right up until Christmas — and perhaps beyond. Word is that he’ll try to keep the Senate in session until the very last seconds before the new Congress opens on January 5, 2011.This means more time to pass all the last-ditch political pay-offs and massive expansions of government power, including DADT, the DREAM Act, and a little-noticed land grab omnibus bill.One commenter, who picked a page at random (877), found that the bill has designated $350 million to create a new “San Francisco Bay Restoration Program.” Others have noted that $413,000 have been appropriated for peanut research in the deep South and nearly $250,000 for virus free wine grapes in Washington State…According to Sen. John McCain’s office, the legislation includes 6,488 earmarks totaling nearly $8.3 billion. In a speech from the floor of the Senate, McCain blasted the bill, asking is his colleagues if they had been “stricken with amnesia.”Hmmm.....Another land grab bill?Read the full story here.

• HT:NewZeal.Video : "The 12 Days of Winter" Read and see the full story here.

• HT:TheCaucus.The Man Who Took On Obama Health Care — and Won One Round.Kenneth T. Cuccinelli II, Virginia’s attorney general, is quick to cite the legal basis for challenging President Obama’s signature legislative achievement: Congress has no power to punish people who choose not to buy private health insurance, he says.A federal judge on Monday agreed with him, ruling that parts of the health care reforms Mr. Obama championed violate the Constitution. Mr. Cuccinelli sued the federal government on behalf of Virginia.“I wouldn’t have brought a case like this if it didn’t have legal merit,” he said in an interview with The Caucus. He added that he had turned away plenty of activists urging him to sue the federal government in other areas. “My answer is usually, ‘no.’ I don’t get to sue just because I don’t like something.”But it doesn’t take long for Mr. Cuccinelli to acknowledge that his motivations are not purely legal. The onetime state senator is a conservative Republican who has long sought to shrink government, limit federal powers and trumpet state rights.“When I ran in 2009, I talked rather bluntly, as I do, about what I perceived to be the imbalance between the power of the federal and state governments,” he said. “We have a battle over the fundamentals of our country. How much power are we going to give this federal government?”The bottom line, he said: “It’s about liberty and it’s about protecting the Constitution.”If he sounds like a Tea Party activist, he says it’s no surprise, though the Tea Party didn’t exist when Mr. Cuccinelli, who is from the Virginia suburbs outside of Washington, was running for office.“On the issues the Tea Party cares about, I land right in their bull’s-eye,” Mr. Cuccinelli says. But he quickly adds: “I was doing that long before there was a Tea Party. I’m glad they are there, and I’m glad they are independent. It would be a mistake to become part of the Republican Party.”Mr. Cuccinelli says he is “very encouraged” by the judge’s ruling Monday, though he says he recognizes the case has a long way to go.Hmmmm....The founding Fathers would be proud!Read the full story here.

• HT:IMRA.Saudi visit to Gaza planned.El-Arish, Egypt (Ma’an) -- Egyptian authorities are preparing to welcome a Saudi delegation headed by Prince Turki bin Abdul Aziz Al-Sabah, which is expected to arrive Wednesday.The delegation will bring medical aid to the besieged enclave, Ma'an's El-Arish correspondent reported.The Saudis have informed Egyptian authorities that two planes will arrive Wednesday morning. Egypt agreed to allow the delegation into Gaza through the Rafah crossing, officials said.Hmmm....For those interested who's Prince Turki bin Abdul Aziz Al-Sabah?Prince Turki was fired as the chief of Saudi intelligence following 9/11, because of the "embarrassing" connection to bin Laden.To much activity in Gaza if you ask me.How long before the U.N. recognises the Palestinian state?Read the full story here.

• Obama plans 2011 staff makeover.President Barack Obama has delayed the most significant staff shuffle of his presidency until after New Year’s — but the changes may be more sweeping than anticipated and could include the hiring of high-profile Democrats defeated in the midterms.Obama’s thinking on other specifics of his reconfigured West Wing — as well as a new campaign operation and Democratic National Committee structure — is largely unknown. But changes are expected across the administration, with familiar faces moving into new roles, both inside and outside the White House, and some unfamiliar ones joining the ranks.“It’s harder to get his time on it” during the lame-duck session, a senior administration official said of Obama. “I think he’ll think about a lot of this on vacation.”the restructuring of the Obama administration remains a mystery even to some of the president’s closest aides, which is making some in the West Wing nervous. “It’s ‘Waiting for David,’” one aide joked about Plouffe, referring to Samuel Beckett’s “Waiting for Godot.”
  Hmmm.....Correction... if he go's on vacation?Read the full story here.

• Netherlands: Ahmadiyya Muslim community threatened by radical Muslims.The small Ahmadiyya Muslim community in the Netherlands is fearful about the actions of radical Muslims.The Mobarak Mosque in The Hague recently installed security cameras.Nur L. Verhagen, Ahmadiyya spokesman said that this year they received two letters calling them 'kaffirs' [apostates] of Islam and Wajibul-Qatl [to be killed]. Also, he said, pamphlets were distributed in England this spring calling Ahmadi Muslims ‘heretics, to be killed'.“We do not want conflict,” says Ahmadiyya spokesman. “But we have to be careful about such potential violence in the Netherlands as we are threatened in England.”Since [the constitutional aments in] 1974, the Ahmadiyyas are no longer regarded as Muslims according to the Pakistani law.The Dutch Imam Abdul Jabbar Van de Ven called for the Ahmadiyya for the utmost care and avoidance of any conflict.“The Ahmadiyya community opposes any and all forms of extremism,” Imam Jabbar said.Hmmm....Islam the religion of peace.Read the full story here.

• Indonesia: Ahmadiyya mosque confiscated, demolished.Hundreds of people demolished Al Mubarak Mosque, at Selabinta Street, Panjalu Sub-Village, Warnasari Village, Sukabumi County/District, Friday, Dec. 12.The mob action was conducted after Deputy Clerk of the Court, the Confiscator from Religious Court of Sukabumi District, A. Djudairi Rawiyan, S.H., announced the decree of execution on land and mosque which had been used for worship by Jamaat Ahmadiyya.The Al Mubarak Mosque action was conducted by the Confiscation Team of Religious Court of Sukabumi, at 9.00am. The team was accompanied by dozens of police officers from Sukabumi City Police Department, to conduct the decree implementation on mosque which is normally used by Jamaah Ahmadiyya previously.To avoid mayhem during the decree implementation, the police stood guard around the location. Because of the apparatus’ quick response, the action was conducted smoothly.The mosque demolition was conducted under the implementation decree on case No.77/Pdt G/2008/PA CBD, Religious Court of Sukabumi District on Waqaf Land stated that the land and mosque are revoked from the control of the defendants.As a result, the Religious Court handed over the waqaf land and the mosque to the execution petitioner.Hmmm...It seems that the only Branch of Islam that advocates a peaceful Jihad is being eradicated?Obama :"Indonesia is an example of religious tolerance". Read the full story here.

• HT:IMRA.Saudi lauds Brazil,Argentina O.K. to Palestinian state.QUOTE: The Saudi statement did not mention Uruguay" Saudi Arabia on Monday[13 Dec] praised the recognition of the Palestinian state by Brazil and Argentina, calling it major advance in international support for Palestinian rights.The council of ministers praised both South American nations for recognising the state of Palestine based on 1967 borders, government spokesman Abdulaziz Khoja told the official SPA news agency after the weekly council meeting.He "stressed that this step represents a major development in international support for the legitimate rights of the Palestinian people," SPA reported.Khoja also warned against continued Israeli demolition of Palestinian homes in the occupied West Bank and Jerusalem, "and called on Arab and Muslim nations to take a firm stance against such violations which increase instability in the region and the world”, SPA said.Brazil, Argentina and Uruguay all announced their recognition of the Palestinian state in the first week of December following the collapse of efforts to resume direct peace talks between the Palestinians and Israelis.The failure of the negotiations, just three weeks after they were launched in early September, came after Israel refused to halt construction in Jewish settlements in the West Bank.The Saudi statement did not mention Uruguay.Hmmm....What will  Obama do in the UN when the question of a Palestinian state comes up?Read the full story here.

• HT:DanielGreenfield.For the Price of a Barrel of Oil.Following in the footsteps of Chavez and Castro, Argentina and Brazil's regimes have declared that they recognize Abbas' Palestinian Authority "as a free and independent state within the borders defined in 1967". The Palestinian Authority is of course neither free nor independent. It's a dictatorship that refuses to hold free elections. Or any kind of elections at all. It has neither freedom of speech nor freedom of religion. Or any kind of freedom at all. Nor is it independent. The Palestinian Authority is funded by the United States and the EU. It has no economy. The only notable employers are the Palestinian Authority itself (subsidized wholly by foreign donors), the UNRWA (subsidized wholly by foreign donors) and Israel. If Brazil and Argentina had declared that the Bronx was now a free and independent state, it would have more credibility, because the Bronx has more of a local economy and a higher standard of human rights, than Arafat's old Fatah gangsters do.While everyone from the Obama Administration down to Thomas Friedman screams at Israel to give those senile terrorists their own state, they willfully refuse to see that Abbas, Fayad and the rest of the gang, can't even run the territory that they already have. Abbas whined last week, "I cannot be the president of a non-existent Authority as long as Israeli occupation of the West Bank continues."Behind all the lies and anger, is the dark hand of Islam. The age old grip of Muslim bigotry and genocidal fury directed at an ancient minority that dared to proclaim its independence. The Muslim world is well on its way to destroying Lebanon's religious diversity. The entire Palestinian state project has nearly wiped out Israel's Christians. But its real target are the Jews. And from North to South America, and across the Atlantic, much of the world is all too eager to aid the genocidal aims of that policy. What the Muslim world could not gain through war, it intends to gain through the dirty hands of infidel politicians who will sell their civilization and their souls for the price of a greasy barrel of oil.Hmmm....This says it all,they have no honor!Read the full story here.

• HT:JIDF.Dept. of Homeland Security Wakes Up to Islamic Terrorist Facebook Threat.We've been saying this, and on this, for a long time. It's well documented on our site, as over two years ago, we were the first to infiltrate and take control of Islamic terrorist groups on Facebook, after Facebook neglected to take action and remove them. We even spoke to top Facebook officials who seemed to excuse and rationalize their existence as "legitimate political discourse".Terrorist groups are using Facebook to share operational information and to target, recruit and radicalize members of the general public, according to a Department of Homeland Security report obtained by FoxNews.com.The DHS report, "Terrorist Use of Social Networking Sites: Facebook Case Study," notes while terrorists have been using social networking sites for quite some time, their strategies for exploiting Facebook have evolved and that they have learned "the inherent value in exploiting a non-ideological medium."Read the full extend of the problem (infiltation) here.

• TSA X-Ray Machines Easily Fooled, Researchers Find.Any would-be terrorist can easily outsmart the ubiquitous backscatter scanners found in major airports around the world, two scientists say.The Transportation Security Administration's X-ray backscatter scanners have been the center of a widespread controversy, following concerns from privacy advocates that they take nearly naked photos of people. The trade-off is improved security, of course. Yet Leon Kaufman and Joseph W. Carlson, two physics professors at the University of California, San Francisco offer a stark conclusion: They can be easily duped, according to a recent paper published in the Journal of Transportation Security."It is very likely that a large (15–20 cm in diameter), irregularly-shaped, cm-thick pancake with beveled edges, taped to the abdomen, would be invisible to this technology -- ironically because of its large volume, since it is easily confused with normal anatomy," the researchers said in the paper. Kaufman and Carlson conclude that some types of foreign objects can be reliable detected only if they are packed outside the sides of the body, and some well hidden items would be impossible to see even with the scanner. "It is also easy to see that an object such as a wire or a box-cutter blade, taped to the side of the body, or even a small gun in the same location, will be invisible," the paper notes.Hmmmm....Or perhaps they could be efficient in twenty years once Michelle her nutrition plan is working and we're all skinny?Read the full story here.

• Hamas: We won't recognize Israel.Speaking at mass rally in Gaza to celebrate Hamas' 23rd anniversary, Haniyeh says group won't recognize Israel but will accept state within '67 borders. US envoy meets Abbas, says America committed to creation of Palestinian state.Tens of thousands of Hamas supporters gathered in the Gaza Strip Tuesday to celebrate the organization's 23rd anniversary.During the rally, Palestinian Prime Minister in Gaza Ismail Haniyeh addressed the crowds and declared: "We will not recognize Israel." Haniyeh urged the Palestinian Authority to put an end to all negotiations and security cooperation with the Jewish state. He added the group would accept "a Palestinian state with full sovereignty in the 1967 borders, with Jerusalem as its capital."In reference to the Israeli moratorium, Mitchell said he expected to face many obstacles, but added that the US Administration is determined to achieve its goal – an independent Palestinian state living peacefully alongside Israel.Hmmm....Why even bother,there's way to much Palestinian and Islamic hatred towards Israel to ever achieve peace?Read the full story here.

• HT:AstuteBloggers.Germany becomes the first Western nation to go afternjihadis on a sedition charge.German authorities on Tuesday mounted raids against two Islamist groups suspected of seeking to overthrow the government and establish a religious state, the Interior Ministry said. The searches targeted homes and religious schools linked to Salafist jihadist group Invitation to Paradise (EZP) in the northwestern cities of Braunschweig and Mönchengladbach, and the Islamic Cultural Center Bremen (IKZB) in northern German port."The EZP and the IKZB are accused of opposing the constitutional order with the aim of replacing it in Germany with an Islamic religious state," the ministry said in a statement.The raids were part of a long-running investigation against the groups and had no link to warnings of potential impending terrorist attacks issued last month by Interior Minister Thomas de Maizière, it added.The groups reject parliamentary democracy and believe that Islamic law should replace the constitution, the ministry said.This is the correct course of action. It is about time a Western government attacks Islam for what it is; an attempt to overthrow our Republics and replace them with another form of Government.Sharia law is the Constitution of the State of Saudi Arabia, the home of Mecca, and the center of the Islamic world.Sharia law is the law of the land in multiple Muslim nations.Every Muslim nation in the world has major political parties dedicated to establishing Sharia as the law of the land.Sharia, with it's punishment of death for "Apostates" (people exercising their Freedom of Conscience) is absolutely incompatible with the Western Tradition, with normative Western Human Rights, and with the laws of the land of all Western nations.Conclusion: SHARIA IS SEDITION.Germany gets it right.When will the United States wake up from it's slumber?Read the full story here.

• Pakistan: Islamists Systematically Killing Teachers Who Violate Sharia Law by Teaching Mixed Genders.Islamic extremists are systematically targeting teachers in Pakistan’s Baluchistan province. Their crime is to teach children of both sexes in violation of Sharia.According to a report by Human Rights Watch (MRW) on the issue, at least 22 teachers were killed in the province between January 2008 and October 2010.Despite its vast mineral resources, Baluchistan remains Pakistan’s most impoverished province. It is also the stage of an insurgency by local nationalists seeking independence as well as the home of religious extremists. Both groups are involved in the attacks on teachers, Human Rights Watch said.“If such killings and intimidation does not stop, the future is bleak, not just for Baluchistan’s children, but for prosperity and progress to ever reach the province,” said Ali Dayan Hasan, senior Human Rights Watch researcher in South Asia.Like in post-Soviet Afghanistan, Muslim clerics funded by Saudi Arabia teach religious hatred and push young people to take justice in their own hands against a government that is increasingly unable to maintain even a semblance of secular neutrality.Read the full story here.

• The babies he left behind... but was the Stockholm suicide bomber radicalised by his wife?On the eve of his 29th birthday, he blew himself up in what Stockholm authorities say was a bungled bid to kill up to 100 and maim another 500 innocent victims.His widow Mona Thwany, now in hiding with her children in Luton while the family home is searched by police - has denied any knowledge of his plan.But last night her grandmother told the Daily Mail that it was Miss Thwany who introduced Abdulwahab to radical Islam, which was to transform him from beer-drinking disc jockey to suicide bomber.Maria Nedelcovici said her granddaughter became a religious fanatic around the time of the September 11 bombings in America in 2001. When she married, her husband followed her lead, swapping jeans and spiky hair for flowing robes and a beard.Mrs Nedelcovici wept as she told the Mail in her home in southern Romania: ‘Mona turned her husband into an extremist. She is the only one to blame. Mona had the power to stop him but she refused. She should have known better.’Sources in Sweden, where he grew up, confirmed yesterday that Abdulwahab had changed dramatically since setting up home in Luton in 2001.Mona Thwany’s lips are painted bright red, and she wears a clinging top with a plunging neckline.Smiling broadly for the camera with dark hair flowing over her shoulders, she looks very much a glamorous Western wife.It is a rare departure from her usual appearance. The widow of suicide bomber Taimour Abdulwahab, in hiding while the three-bed semi she shared with her husband in Luton is scoured by forensic officers, is rarely seen without a veil covering her face.Her Romanian grandmother Maria Nedelcovici last night told how Miss Thwany was radicalised on a trip to North Africa and in turn, introduced her husband to radical Islam.Speaking moments after being told of Abdulwahab’s suicide mission, tearful Mrs Nedelcovici cried out: ‘Why did you do this Mona?’ She said she and other relatives warned her granddaughter that her conversion to radical Islam would destroy her family.But Miss Thwany refused to change her ideas, she claimed - and in June of this year she and her husband went on to name their only son Osama, the same name of Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.‘From all of the names in the world Mona had to choose Osama,’ said Mrs Nedelcovici.
  Hmmmm....Sounds like a bit more scrutiny of the grieving widow would not be misplaced.Read the full story here.

• HT:Memri.Footage of Woman Receiving Lashing at Khartoum Police Station; Khartoum Governor Abd Al-Rahman Al-Khadhr Justifies Punishment, But Complains that Her Face Was Exposed by the video makers. Warning: Extremely Graphic Images.Source.

• IDF Launches First NBC Defense Battalion.The IDF has officially launched its first battalion specifically trained for dealing with the aftermath of nuclear/biological/chemical (NBC) attacks, named Yanshuf ('Owl'). An NBC unit by the same name has existed for a long time, according to the IDF website, but it has not been recognized as a full-fledged battalion until now....The new battalion was officially launched last week with Yanshuf's first battalion-level exercise. Yanshuf's companies drilled scenarios in which chemical warheads hit open spaces and and urban environments. They also rehearsed cooperation with a team from the Engineering Unit for Special Operations (Yahalom)......IDF Ground Forces Commander, Major General Sami Turjeman congratulated the new battalion's soldiers and hinted at the reason for the unit's upgraded status: concern over a possible confrontation with Syria...."We are here in the southern Golan Heights," he told the soldiers. "Not far away from us, the Syrians are preparing various capabilities that we need to prepare for. Our job is not to prepare for the conventional events but for the extreme scenarios, and Yanshuf Battalion is the spearhead of the [NBC] defense element...""... in the unlikely event Obama, Mitchell and Clinton don't bring us peace," he added.Hmmm....Talk about peace,but prepare for war.Read the full story here.

• HT:Reason.Assange's Extremist Employees.Why is WikiLeaks employing a well-known Holocaust denier and his disgraced son?It is worrying enough when journalists, either by accident or design, consort with vulgar figures like Shamir. But it has now been revealed that Israel Shamir, when he is not accusing Assange’s accusers of setting CIA honey traps, works with WikiLeaks in an official capacity.According to reports in the Swedish and Russian media, the broad strokes of which have been confirmed by a WikiLeaks spokesman, Shamir serves as the group’s content aggregator in Russia, the man who “selects and distributes” the cables to Russian news organizations, according to an investigation by Swedish public radio. In the newspaper Expressen, Magnus Ljunggren, an emeritus professor of Russian literature at Gothenburg University, outlined Shamir’s close ties to WikiLeaks and his position “spreading the documents in Russia.” (The article is illustrated with a picture of Assange and Shamir in an unidentified office.)During an appearance on Echo Moskvy radio, Yulia Latynina, a reporter at the independent newspaper Novaya Gazeta, wondered “What does it mean that Assange is allowing himself to be represented by an extremist?” Latynina also found that the Kremlin-friendly paper working with Shamir to promote the WikiLeaks material had already published “outright lies” Shamir claimed were supported by leaks. According to Latynina, Shamir faked a cable related to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s speech to the United Nations, which supposedly showed collusion amongst those who walked out of the talk in protest. That he would invent such a cable is perhaps unsurprising, considering Shamir has previously written an encomium to the “brave and charismatic leader” of Iran.So let us quickly recap the foulness of Shamir’s political views. As I noted last week, he has called the Auschwitz concentration camp “an internment facility, attended by the Red Cross (as opposed to the US internment centre in Guantanamo),” not a place of extermination. He told a Swedish journalist (and fellow Holocaust denier) that “it’s every Muslim and Christian’s duty to deny the Holocaust.” The Jews, he says, are a “virus in human form” and the Protocols of the Elders of Zion is real.But wait, there’s more!Hmmmm.....Transparancy or Treason?Read the full story here.

• HT:BloggerBase.Terror attacks imminent say former Israeli agent.Terror attacks will occur soon according to Juval Aviv, a former Israeli intelligence officer on whom the movie "Munich" was based.Juval Aviv gave intelligence (via what he had gathered in Israel and the Middle East ) to the Bush Administration about 9/11, a month before it occurred. His report specifically said they would use planes as bombs and target high profile buildings and monuments. Congress has since hired him as a security consultant.Now for his future predictions. He predicts the next terrorist attack on the U.S. Will occur within the next few months.Forget hijacking airplanes, because he says terrorists will NEVER try and hijack a plane again as they know the people onboard will never go down quietly again.. Aviv believes our airport security is a joke -- that we have been reactionary rather than proactive in developing strategies that are truly effective. Aviv recently created/executed a security test for our Congress, by placing an empty briefcase in five well-traveled spots in five major cities. The results? Not one person called 911 or sought a policeman to check it out.. In fact, in Chicago , someone tried to steal the briefcase!In comparison, Aviv says that citizens of Israel are so well 'trained' that an unattended bag or package would be reported in seconds by citizen(s) who know to publicly shout, 'Unattended Bag!' The area would be quickly & calmly cleared by the citizens themselves.Unfortunately, America hasn't been yet 'hurt enough' by terrorism for their government to fully understand the need to educate its citizens or for the government to understand that it's their citizens who are, inevitably, the best first-line of defense against terrorism.Every strategy we have is reactionary. Hmmm.....And that's why we're going to get hurt again,we can't put ourselves in the shoes of the terrorist or at least follow his thought process.We don't even dare to name the enemy!Read the full story here.

• Red Cross Abandons Afghan Employee After He’s Arrested For Converting to Christianity And Charged With Apostasy.International Christian Concern (ICC) has learned that the Red Cross in Afghanistan (ICRC) has not intervened on behalf of a long-term employee who was arrested and imprisoned because he is Christian. This, despite that the Red Cross mandate includes “visiting prisoners” and “helping victims of conflict and internal violence, whoever they are.”Sayed Mossa worked 15 years in ICRC’s orthopedic department in Kabul assisting amputees. In late May, footage of Muslim converts to Christianity being baptized was aired in Afghanistan. The broadcast triggered nationwide protests and a government-led crackdown against Christians. On May 31, being a Muslim convert to Christianity, Mossa was arrested by security officers working with the Ministry of Interior.Aid workers in Kabul immediately contacted the Red Cross after hearing of the arrest. “The Protection office told us that Mossa will be visited like the others and that we must not interfere with their job. We are not his family and they will not tell us anything. We told them that he has been sexually abused and his condition has deteriorated badly, but nothing could move them,” said a friend of Mossa’s who inquired about his safety. When Mossa’s wife asked for help, the Red Cross paid her Mossa’s salary, but reportedly said they would not intervene to liberate her husband. It was two months before Mossa’s wife had heard where he was being held. She was not notified by the Red Cross, but by a released prisoner who had served time with Mossa.In a final meeting with Reto Stocker, head of the Red Cross in Kabul, Mossa’s friends were again told that ICRC is neutral and would not intervene. They were also asked to not make the case public.In another breach of the Red Cross’ mission, they refused to deliver hundreds of letters addressed to Mossa. Westerners organized the letter-writing campaign to both encourage the Christian and to publicly display the international community’s concern over his plight. “They won’t deliver the letters to Sayed. The Red Cross does not have the right to keep the letters from him. It’s their responsibility to ensure he receives letters written to him via the Red Cross address,” said an aid worker in Kabul who helped organize the campaign.Hmmmm.....What has become of this world?Read the full story here.

• And now for something completely different.Ripley’s Believe it or Not.Ripley’s Believe it or Not has asked to publish one of my photos in their next book. This photo was made in Sangin, Afghanistan during the last time I was with British forces. Sangin is the most dangerous place in the country. The enemy is good and the fighting is serious. The area freaks out some people. Sangin is a courage tester and every mission I half expected would be my last. Over a hundred British soldiers were killed in the area and now our Marines are well on the way to top that. Sangin brings no-kidding combat. Helicopters land on small bases at night without lights. A few minutes walk from where this photo was made, another helicopter was shot out of the sky apparently with an RPG. Many nights, when the helicopters land, the rotors glow due to the Kopp-Etchells Effect.The photographs I made of the Kopp-Etchells Effect at Sangin have been seen in many countries around the world, and soon will be published in Ripley’s Believe it Or Not. You are welcome to download a copy for a single personal use only.Read and see the full story here.HT:BigPeace.