Archive for the 'War on Terror' Category
Mahdi Army loses again
Posted in MEDIA BIAS!, War on Terror on May 10th, 2008 by gatordougFollowers of rebel cleric Muqtada al Sadr agreed late Friday to allow Iraqi security forces to enter all of Baghdad’s Sadr City and to arrest anyone found with heavy weapons in a surprising capitulation that seemed likely to be hailed as a major victory for Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki.In return, Sadr’s Mahdi Army supporters won the Iraqi government’s agreement not to arrest Mahdi Army members without warrants, unless they were in possession of “medium and heavy weaponry.”
The agreement would end six weeks of fighting in the vast Shiite Muslim area that’s home to more than 2 million residents and would mark the first time that the area would be under government control since Saddam Hussein was toppled in 2003. On Friday, 15 people were killed and 112 were injured in fighting, officials at the neighborhoods two major hospitals said.
It also would be a startling turnaround in fortunes for Maliki, who’d been widely criticized for picking a fight with Sadr’s forces, first in the southern port city of Basra and then in Sadr City.
Exit question what does it take for the media to accept good news from Iraq? Ed Morrissey poses some great questions too
First the media declared Basra a military disaster, then complained that Maliki didn’t achieve victory quickly enough for them. Then they predicted disaster for Maliki and the US when they turned their attention to Sadr’s biggest power base, sure that a civil war would break out that would undo the gains achieved under the surge — gains they mostly ignored in the first place. They started toting up combat deaths and opined that Bush’s strategy had failed.
Today’s gripe is so absurd as to be comical. Maliki “picked a fight” with an armed militia that gets its funding and support from another country. The Mahdi Army conducts attacks against the government, runs protection rackets in territory it controls, and imposes its own laws on the terrorized populations in those areas. Let me ask McClatchy this: did Rudy Giuliani “pick a fight” with the Mafia in the 1980s? Maliki had tried for years to get Sadr to disband his gangs, but in the end Sadr either couldn’t or wouldn’t do it, and the Iraqi government had to end their rebellious activities and the Iranian hegemony they produced.
Now that Sadr has surrendered Sadr City, he has no more points of refuge outside of Iran. How about the media? What will be their point of refuge?
Where indeed? In their pit of denial perhaps?
Great News! Islam embraces technology!
Posted in Culture, War on Terror on May 8th, 2008 by gatordougWell, as long as technology allows a husband to divorce his wife by texting three times that he is dumping her. Progress, Sharia style
Getting a quickie divorce has taken on a whole new meaning in Malaysia after it was decided that a man can divorce his wife with a text message.The government’s adviser on religious affairs, the man who counsels Malaysia’s Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad, said as long as the message was clear and unambiguous it was valid under Islamic Sharia law. “SMS is just another form of writing,” Dr Abdul Hamid Othman was quoted by the New Straits Times daily newspaper as saying.The decision follows a Malaysian court’s ruling on Thursday in favour of a man who served divorce on his wife via a text message.
UPDATE! Maybe Islam isn’t evolving after all. Michelle Malkin reports that Muslims in England are infected with Muslim Outrage Syndrome, MOS, over evil billboards showing women in bikinis.
A COUNCILLOR today called for more control over advertising posters in “culturally sensitive” areas of Birmingham.
Coun Talib Hussain made his plea after a billboard on the corner of Sydenham Road and Golden Hillock Road, in predominantly Muslim Sparkbrook, was defaced.The hoarding, close to mosques in Anderton Road and Golden Hillock Road and visible to parents and children walking to Montgomery Primary School, promotes Matalan’s new swimwear range and features three scantily-clad models.
The models have been covered in thick white paint to conceal bare flesh.
Coun Talib Hussain (Ind, Sparkbrook) criticised the vandalism but said it was a result of the lack of action from city council bosses. He said: “I condemn the people that did this but at the same time it’s wrong for companies to put that kind of advert in sensitive wards.
“I have received complaints on a number of occasions not to put adverts like that in Sparkbrook. “The city council should not give permission to advertising like that in these wards. “Having families seeing naked pictures does not bring the community together, it provokes things.”
The vandalism is similar to a spate of attacks in 2005 and 2006 by a group called Muslims Against Advertising
The advertising watchdog has confirmed that increasing numbers of posters are being torn down or painted over in predominantly Islamic areas.A website giving advice on how to vandalise billboards and listing potential targets has been set up by a group calling themselves Muslims Against Advertising (MAAD).
The campaign has gathered momentum since the Advertising Standards Authority banned an underwear advert from being sited near mosques.
Advertisements for perfume, hair dye, bras and television programmes are among those that have been attacked. Photographs of semi-dressed women are the most frequently targeted, with the offending body parts painted over or ripped off.
A poster advertising the Channel 4 programme Desperate Housewives is the most recent target; the images of two scantily-clad actresses have been torn from an East London billboard but three fully-dressed characters were left intact. Adverts bearing Dove’s “Real Women” adverts — six ordinary women pictured in their underwear — were painted over at several locations last year.
MAAD, based in Birmingham, gives an index of defaced adverts in the city, including Levi’s, Wonderbra, PaddyPower, a radio station and a strip club. It says on its website that it believes in “direct action” and “has paint and isn’t afraid to use it”, adding: “There is no longer any need to cringe as you walk past a sleazy poster, we’ll improve it.”
Assbackwardsness!
Big surprise Hezbollah training Iraqi militias in Iran
Posted in War on Terror on May 5th, 2008 by gatordougThis should surprise no one at all if it proves to be true. Hezbollah is our enemy, they always have been and always will be.
An American official said the account of Hezbollah’s role was provided by four Shiite militia members who were captured in Iraq late last year and questioned separately.
The United States has long charged that the Iranians were training Iraqi militia fighters in Iran, which Iran has consistently denied, and there have been previous reports about Hezbollah operatives in Iraq.
But the Americans say the reports of Hezbollah’s role at the Iranian camp offer important details about Iranian assistance to the militias, including efforts Iran appears to be making to train the fighters in unobtrusive ways.
Material from the interrogations was given to the Iraqi government, along with other data about captured Iranian arms, before it sent a delegation to Tehran last week to discuss allegations of Iranian aid to militia groups.
Pakistani Taliban threatens tribesmen who do not grow beards
Posted in War on Terror on May 5th, 2008 by gatordougOh goody, the backasswardsness of Sharia again. What is their rallying cry? Death to shavers?
A PAKISTANI Taleban leader has warned local tribesmen to grow beards within the next two months in accordance with Islamic teachings or face harsh punishment, residents said on Monday. The threat came amid an apparent increase in incidents of militants trying to enforce Islamic Sharia law in Pakistan’s tribal belt bordering Afghanistan, where the new government is trying to make peace with hardliners.
‘Men must grow beards and stop shaving within the next two months,’ residents quoted senior Taleban commander Maulvi Faqir Mohammad as telling dozens of people at a mosque in Khar, the main town in Bajaur tribal district.
Beards were mandatory under the harsh Taleban regime which ruled Afghanistan from 1996 to 2001 as part of a strict morality code that also made women wear the all-encompassing burka and outlawed music and other entertainment.
‘It is un-Islamic to shave beards. Harsh punishments will be awarded to all violators,’ added Mohammad, the central vice chief of the Tehreek-e-Taleban Pakistan (Pakistan Taleban Movement) and also a Muslim cleric.
Well, I guess the strategy of appeasement has not served Pakistan well after all. Once again, a nation which wishes to remain sovereign cannot abide terrirists or those that would seize governmental power.
London Times: US planning surgery for Iran?
Posted in War on Terror on May 3rd, 2008 by gatordougSurgery, as in surgical strikes?
The US military is drawing up plans for a “surgical strike” against an insurgent training camp inside Iran if Republican Guards continue with attempts to destabilise Iraq, western intelligence sources said last week. One source said the Americans were growing increasingly angry at the involvement of the Guards’ special-operations Quds force inside Iraq, training Shi’ite militias and smuggling weapons into the country.
Despite a belligerent stance by Vice-President Dick Cheney, the administration has put plans for an attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities on the back burner since Robert Gates replaced Donald Rumsfeld as defence secretary in 2006, the sources said.
However, US commanders are increasingly concerned by Iranian interference in Iraq and are determined that recent successes by joint Iraqi and US forces in the southern port city of Basra should not be reversed by the Quds Force.
“If the situation in Basra goes back to what it was like before, America is likely to blame Iran and carry out a surgical strike on a militant training camp across the border in Khuzestan,” said one source, referring to a frontier province.
Scalpel please!
Iraqi’s starting to “despise” Mahdi Army
Posted in War on Terror on May 3rd, 2008 by gatordoug“Originally the Jaish al Mahdi (Mahdi Army) in our area used to deceive people by using the name of the religion to do their purposes,” said Dhia, Hassan’s executive officer. “They were all corrupted. They have history in crime, robberies, murders, rapes and all kinds of bad things. They even reached the level of kidnapping people and demanding ransoms just because they have money. It didn’t matter if he is Shia or Sunni; just because he has money. They gave a bad reputation for Islam.”
American officials assert that the final factor that has improved security is the citizenry’s fatigue with violence and the militias.
“They’re still intimidated by [the Mahdi Army], but they’re tired of them,” said Thornburg.
In the past the Mahdi Army commanded local support because of the need for security in a vacuum and intimidation tactics. But as security improved and other forces are gaining prominence, support for the Mahdi militia in Rusafa is evaporating.
“Right now because of the fighting Sadr City, people have started to despise [the Mahdi Army] because of the situation they created,” said “Rammie,” an Army interpreter raised and living in Rusafa. “People have started to know the truth of [the Mahdi Army] as kidnappers, killers, car-jackers and agents of the Iranian government. But the recent fighting against the [Iraqi security forces] means they are also against the government. They are not trying to just fight the invasion forces as they claim, but they fight whoever interferes with their mafia activity.”
Positive trends continue.
Marines launch assault in Afghanistan
Posted in War on Terror on April 29th, 2008 by gatordougU.S. Marines in helicopters and Humvees flooded into a Taliban-held town in southern Afghanistan’s most violent province early Tuesday in the first major American operation in the region in years.
Several hundred Marines pushed into the town of Garmser in predawn light, stretching NATO’s presence into an area littered with poppy fields and classified as Taliban territory.
U.S. commanders say Taliban fighters have been expecting an assault and have been setting up improvised explosive devices in response. It wasn’t known how much resistance the Marines would face in Garmser, where the British have a small base on the town’s edge but whose main marketplace is closed because of the Taliban threat
The Mahdi Army disappearing?
Posted in War on Terror on April 29th, 2008 by gatordougIs this the end of the line?
After a month of fighting, the Mahdi Army has disappeared from the streets of Basra, the largest city in the south. The army and police are everywhere, and people are providing information on where Mahdi Army personnel are hiding out, and the locations of their weapons caches. Up north, in the Sadr City section of east Baghdad, the Mahdi Army is still fighting hard. But the army and police have the upper hand, and are pushing the Shia militiamen back block by block. Mahdi Army leader Muqtada al Sadr has responded by threatening to order his men to go after American troops if the government does not back off. That’s won’t work, because the Mahdi Army is not particularly skillful, and not very united either. He recently ordered his troops to stop fighting Iraqi soldiers and police, and concentrate on the Americans. The Iraqi security forces have not reciprocated, and continue coming after the Mahdi Army.
The dozen or so factions of the Mahdi Army vary in their loyalty to Sadr, or to political solutions. Several of the Mahdi Army factions are basically criminal gangs masquerading as religious zealots. Sadr denies he is a pawn of Iran, but as Mahdi Army houses are captured, more Iranian weapons and equipment show up, as well as religious propaganda from Iran. Iraqi president Maliki has told Sadr that the offensive would halt if the Mahdi Army surrenders all its weapons, stops attacking, or trying to infiltrate (by joining) the security forces, and hands over members wanted for crimes. So far, Sadr refuses, probably because many of his followers would turn on him if he tried. But Sadr also realizes that the Iraqi soldiers and police are capable, eventually, of grinding the Mahdi Army into nothingness. Another month or so of fighting and the Mahdi Army will be no more.
Excellent news from Iraq. The Iraqis are cleaning up their own garbage it would seem. Sadr can threaten to order attacks on America troops but that will not help him at all.Note as well, the amount of evidence, as in weapons, pointing towards Iran.
Video-Jimmy Carter being, Jimmy Carter
Posted in War on Terror on April 28th, 2008 by gatordougThe video is at Hot Air. Watch it and be amazed at how clueless Carter really is.
MSM finally gets around to reporting progress in anti al-Qaeda PR
Posted in MEDIA BIAS!, War on Terror on April 28th, 2008 by gatordougOnly four days after the story broke
The top White House terrorism expert thinks some gains are being made in the worldwide public relations battle against al-Qaeda, as the administration and its overseas allies press efforts to show that Osama bin Laden’s network is killing Muslim civilians rather than defending its interests.“More and more Muslim and Arab populations — [including] clerics and scholars — are questioning the value of al-Qaeda’s program,” Juan Carlos Zarate, deputy assistant to the president and deputy national security adviser for combating terrorism, said Wednesday at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.
The efforts he described are in line with plans that Michael E. Leiter, director of the National Counterterrorism Center, discussed in February before the same organization. Leiter, who is responsible for strategic communications planning in the fight against terrorism, said the goal is “to prevent the next generation of terrorists from emerging.”
One approach, he said, is “to show that it is al-Qaeda, not the West, that is truly at war with Islam.”
Last week, Zarate echoed that theme. He said al-Qaeda “should be revealed as themselves being at war with Muslims, especially those who do not believe as they do or subscribe to the al-Qaeda agenda.”
Zarate cited an Egyptian Islamic group, which includes former jihadist leaders, that recently published a series of books “highly critical of jihadists and al-Qaeda.” He did not say who promoted or paid for the books, but in undertaking this program, Zarate said, “credible voices, outside of the U.S. government,” had to carry the messages.
H/T Hot Air
Creeping Sharia
Posted in War on Terror on April 27th, 2008 by gatordougIslam divides the world into two parts. The part governed by sharia, or Islamic law, is called the Dar al-Islam, or House of Submission. Everything else is the Dar al-Harb, or House of War, so called because it will take war—holy war, jihad—to bring it into the House of Submission. Over the centuries, this jihad has taken a variety of forms. Two centuries ago, for instance, Muslim pirates from North Africa captured ships and enslaved their crews, leading the U.S. to fight the Barbary Wars of 1801–05 and 1815. In recent decades, the jihadists’ weapon of choice has usually been the terrorist’s bomb; the use of planes as missiles on 9/11 was a variant of this method.
What has not been widely recognized is that the Ayatollah Khomeini’s 1989 fatwa against Satanic Verses author Salman Rushdie introduced a new kind of jihad. Instead of assaulting Western ships or buildings, KhoÂmeini took aim at a fundamental Western freedom: freedom of speech. In recent years, other Islamists have joined this crusade, seeking to undermine Western societies’ basic liberties and extend sharia within those societies.
The cultural jihadists have enjoyed disturbing success. Two events in particular—the 2004 assassination in Amsterdam of Theo van Gogh in retaliation for his film about Islam’s oppression of women, and the global wave of riots, murders, and vandalism that followed a Danish newspaper’s 2005 publication of cartoons satirizing Mohammed—have had a massive ripple effect throughout the West. Motivated variously, and doubtless sometimes simultaneously, by fear, misguided sympathy, and multicultural ideology—which teaches us to belittle our freedoms and to genuflect to non-Western cultures, however repressive—people at every level of Western society, but especially elites, have allowed concerns about what fundamentalist Muslims will feel, think, or do to influence their actions and expressions. These Westerners have begun, in other words, to internalize the strictures of sharia, and thus implicitly to accept the deferential status of dhimmis—infidels living in Muslim societies.
Call it a cultural surrender. The House of War is slowly—or not so slowly, in Europe’s case—being absorbed into the House of Submission.
Never surrender, never submit! God above made us free, and let us resolve to never revoke His gift.
Obama says he will back Patraeus promotion
Posted in War on Terror on April 27th, 2008 by gatordougThe Messiah wants to cut and run ASAP, BUT, he has high praise for the job General Patraeus has done in Iraq
“Yes,” Obama told “Fox News Sunday” when asked if, as a senator from Illinois, he would approve Petraeus. “I think Petraeus has done a good tactical job in Iraq.”Obama has said he would start pulling out more troops as soon as he became president.
“My hope is that Petraeus would reflect that wider view of our strategic interest,” he said on “Fox News Sunday.”
“I will listen to General Petraeus given the experience that he has accumulated over the last several years,” Obama said. “It would be stupid of me to ignore what he has to say.”
“It would be my job as commander in chief to set the mission, to make the strategic decisions in light of the problems that we’re having in Afghanistan, in light of the problems that we are having in Pakistan, the fact that al Qaeda is strengthening,” Obama said.
Hmmm, he thinks Patraeus has done a god job, but STILL wants to leave Iraq ASAP? An action Patraeus has warned against? Does this sound like sound judgement?
The Iraqi Army saves Basra
Posted in War on Terror on April 25th, 2008 by gatordougHmmm, as you read this story understand its signifigance. Basra is living in freedom, no more Shia militias oppressing the people there, and focus on WHO freed that city. The Iraqi Army did!
Young women are daring to wear jeans, soldiers listen to pop music on their mobile phones and bands are performing at wedding parties again.
All across Iraq’s second city life is improving, a month after Iraqi troops began a surprise crackdown on the black-clad gangs who were allowed to flourish under the British military. The gunmen’s reign had enforced a strict set of religious codes.
Yet after three years of being terrified of kidnap, rape and murder – a fate that befell scores of other women – Nadyia Ahmed, 22, is among those enjoying a sense of normality, happy for the first time to attend her science course at Basra University. “I now have the university life that I heard of at high school before the war and always dreamt about,” she told The Times. “It was a nightmare because of these militiamen. I only attended class three days a week but now I look forward to going every day.”
She also no longer has to wear a headscarf. Under the strict Islamic rules imposed by the militias, women had to cover their hair, could not wear jeans or bright clothes and were strictly forbidden from sitting next to male colleagues on pain of death.
Laugh of the day! NY Slimes a week behind bloggers!
Posted in MEDIA BIAS!, War on Terror on April 24th, 2008 by gatordougAll the news that is fit to get scooped on! Hats off to Hot Air!
A week ago, I noted that the Sunnis that had left Nouri al-Maliki’s government last year in a huff had decided to return. A week later, the New York Times has reported on it, making it true. The Tawafiq has recognized the efforts of Baghdad to release low-level detainees and disarm the Shi’ite militias, two of their major complaints, although the Times just can’t seem to get over the Basra-defeat meme that has been so obviously disproven
Al Qaeda is not hip with Jihadis anymore?
Posted in War on Terror on April 24th, 2008 by gatordougAQ is soooooo yesterday! Al Qaeda increasingly faces sharp criticism from once-loyal sympathizers who openly question its ideology and tactics, including attacks that kill innocent Muslims, according to U.S. intelligence officials, counter-terrorism experts and the group’s own communications. A litany of complaints target Osama bin Laden’s network and its affiliates for their actions in Iraq and North Africa, emphasis on suicide bombings instead of political action and tepid support for, or outright antagonism toward, militant groups pressing the Palestinian cause. … Such rifts have been emerging for several years, but they have become increasingly contentious lately, in cyberspace and on the streets of some Arab countries. In addition to Zawahiri, Al Qaeda leaders, including Bin Laden himself, have gone on a public relations offensive. In October, Bin Laden asked followers for forgiveness for the deaths of civilians in Iraq.
CIA: North Korea and Syria had nuclear ties
Posted in War on Terror on April 23rd, 2008 by gatordougHopefully this will put a stop to the White House’s plans to ease sanctions on Lil Kim’s Stalinist regime over his quest for nukes.
CIA officials will tell Congress on Thursday that North Korea had been helping Syria build a plutonium-based nuclear reactor, a U.S. official said, a disclosure that could touch off new resistance to the administration’s plan to ease sanctions on Pyongyang.
The CIA officials will tell lawmakers that they believe the reactor would have been capable of producing plutonium for nuclear weapons but was destroyed before it could do so, the U.S. official said, apparently referring to a suspicious installation in Syria that was bombed last year by Israeli warplanes.
Iraq makes more progress
Posted in War on Terror on April 22nd, 2008 by gatordougThis will help further the relationship between Maliki’s government and Sunnis. Add this to Maliki taking on Shiite Militias, and you can see a strengthening of trust between Maliki and Sunnis. A VERY IMPORTANT step forward!
Ghafur was among 122 detainees released from an Iraqi-run prison in Sulaimaniyah and given their freedom at a ceremony here Monday as part of the largest wave of prisoner releases since the war began. The Iraqi government set them free to reintegrate men into society who were accused of relatively minor crimes, and ease the strains on a prison system operating well beyond its capacity. ….
Most of those released were Sunnis who had been low-level army officials or former members of Saddam Hussein’s Baath Party. They were among thousands of Iraqis who were arrested without charges by coalition and Iraqi forces. The discharges signal “a return to some sense of normalcy,” said U.S. Army Col. David Paschal, commander of the 1st Brigade Combat Team of the 10th Mountain Division, who attended the ceremony. “At some point, the fighting must stop.”…
The prisoners are being freed under an amnesty law passed by Iraq’s parliament in February. More than 52,400 detainees in government custody have applied for their freedom. Of those, nearly 78%, or more than 40,000, were granted amnesty. More than one in five, though, were denied because they are being held for crimes not covered by the law. These include killing, kidnapping, rape, embezzling government funds, selling drugs and smuggling antiquities.
The amnesty law does not cover more than 23,000 Iraqis who are in U.S. custody. Still, Air Force Capt. Rose Richeson, spokeswoman for coalition detainee operations, says nearly 8,000 detainees held at two coalition detention centers have been released since September, an average of 52 a day. “It is reasonable to expect that rate of release will continue,” she said.
Another important benchmark met. If this trend continues, Iraq might be on the road to stability.
H/T Hot Air
Ah, another Obama supporter!
Posted in War on Terror on April 21st, 2008 by gatordougJawa has the scoop on this porker who claims NOT TO SUPPORT TERRORISM! Yeah right!
Video-Terrorist swine meet an Apache!
Posted in War on Terror on April 21st, 2008 by gatordougYour pick-me-up for Monday night!
Do I smell bacon? Why yes, yes I do! What is it about seeing Jihads vaporized that makes me smile?
H/T Jawa!
The People’s Cube OWNS Worst President EVER!
Posted in War on Terror on April 21st, 2008 by gatordougI love this!
After finishing Habitat for Hamsters in San Francisco, President Jimmy Carter went on to start a new Habitat for Hamas project in Gaza, building new homes for families whose homes were destroyed by Israeli bulldozers in retaliation for suicide bombings.Jimmy Carter says he feels “quite at ease” working with Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal. I’ve been meeting with Hamas leaders for years, I find them to be peace-loving people, and they are just misunderstood by bigoted Americans. If Israel would dismantle their system of Apartheid, and meet all the demands of Hamas, everyone could live in peace and harmony. |
Michelle Malkin: Jimmy Carter delivering Hamas’s mail
Posted in The scurge of PC, War on Terror on April 21st, 2008 by gatordougYou have to love Michelle Malkin, unless of course, you are a morally-retarded Leftist like The Worst President EVER!
Jimmy Carter is touting his Hamas-hugging accomplishments. The jihadi do-badders have generously allowed kidnapped Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit to write a letter to his parents, which Carter has gallantly volunteered to deliver it. Shalit’s father responded appropriately by deriding Carter as a postman for Hamas.
What a tool.
Carl in Jerusalem recommends this vid clip of Fox News’s Reena Ninan putting the dhimmi in his place.
Michelle, you rock!
Sec. Rice mocks Sadr as a coward!
Posted in War on Terror on April 20th, 2008 by gatordougIf this were pro wrestling, Rice would just call Sadr a Yellow-bellied-egg-sucking-dog!
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice mocked anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr as a coward on Sunday, hours after the radical leader threatened to declare war unless U.S. and Iraqi forces end a military crackdown on his followers. Rice, in the Iraqi capital to tout security gains and what she calls an emerging political consensus, said al-Sadr is content to issue threats and edicts from the safety of Iran, where he is studying. Al-Sadr heads an unruly militia that was the main target of an Iraqi government assault in the oil-rich city of Basra last month, and his future role as a spoiler is an open question.
“I know he’s sitting in Iran,” Rice said dismissively, when asked about al-Sadr’s latest threat to lift a self-imposed cease-fire with government and U.S. forces. “I guess it’s all-out war for anybody but him,” Rice said. “I guess that’s the message; his followers can go too their deaths and he’s in Iran.”
Is Afghanistan stuck on stupid?
Posted in War on Terror on April 20th, 2008 by gatordougIt seems so, at least some lawmakers there want to resurrect draconian laws that restrict basic freedoms. People need liberty, it is their natural condition, yet some Assbackwards lawmakers are stuck in the 12th century
Shafi Samandari thought the days of the Taliban would never come back. “I love listening to music and going to wedding parties,” the Kabul resident says. “After the Taliban was toppled, I was sure that we could start living normally again.”
The Taliban may not be returning anytime soon, but if some Afghan lawmakers have their way, Taliban-era laws will once again reign over the country. Last week, a group of members of parliament (MPs) put forth draft legislation that would ban T-shirts, loud music, women and men mingling in public, billiards, video games, playing with pigeons, and more – all regulations from the notorious Taliban era.
The move is the most recent attempt by religious conservatives to restrict “un-Islamic influences.” Many observers say it’s the latest sign of growing Talibanization in Afghanistan.
The draft law comes a week after members of parliament voted to ban wildly popular Indian soap operas from airing on Afghan channels.
The programs, emotional dramas featuring forbidden trysts, family intrigue, and Hindu imagery – drew the ire of conservatives and religious figures.
In January, Afghan journalist Perwiz Kambakhsh was put on death row for downloading an article from the Internet that questioned women’s roles in Islam. Mr. Kambakhsh, who was convicted by an Islamic court, is scheduled to appeal in the coming weeks.
Al Qaeda #2 calls for more Jihad
Posted in War on Terror on April 20th, 2008 by gatordougAl-Ikhlas and other Islamist websites posted an audio message by Al-Zawahiri, produced by Al-Sahab, titled “Five Years after the Invasion of Iraq; Decades of Oppression by the Tyrant.” Al-Zawahiri states that the Democrats in the U.S. are deceiving their voters when they promise to withdraw U.S. troops from Iraq by forming an understanding with Iran. This understanding, he says, is meant to allow the Americans to focus on fighting Al-Qaeda and the Taliban in Pakistan and Afghanistan, but will in fact only “only serve Iran’s interests in the region and add fuel to the fire.”
He concludes by urging Muslims to take to the streets, and to turn their mosques, schools, factories and universities into centers of support for jihad and resistance.
I cannot wait till we kill that pig.