Egypt: Muslim stabs security guard who prevented him from entering a church

Posted July 16, 2017 by danmillerinpanama
Categories: Coptic Christians, Egypt, Islam and Christians, Islamophobia
Tags: , , ,

Egypt: Muslim stabs security guard who prevented him from entering a church, Jihad Watch, , July 16, 2017

(Please see also, Slaughtered Christians “A Viable Target”? — DM)

Imagine the outcry if a Christian had stabbed a guard who prevented him from entering a mosque. But you won’t hear anything about this. If you asked 100 people on the street which was a bigger problem, “Islamophobia” or the Muslim persecution of Christians, most would likely say “Islamophobia.” This testifies to the relentlessness of the “Islamophobia” propaganda campaign in the West.

“Knifeman attacks Egypt church guard, arrested: Police,” AFP, July 16, 2017 (thanks to Maged):

CAIRO (AFP) – An Egyptian Muslim stabbed and wounded a security guard after being prevented from entering a church in the Mediterranean city of Alexandria on Saturday (July 15), a senior police official told AFP.

The man was quickly subdued by the guard and others who rushed to help and is being questioned, the official said.

The incident came days after Egypt’s Christian minority leaders said they were suspending some activities such as conferences and religious trips for security reasons.

Islamic State group jihadists have killed dozens of Coptic Christians in church bombings and shooting attacks in Egypt since December, and have threatened further attacks….

CCTV footage of the incident showed a man wearing earphones and with a bag trying to enter the church when he was called back by a guard who asked to check the bag.

The man took out a knife and slashed the face of the guard, who quickly recovered to subdue his attacker with the help of others….

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Slaughtered Christians “A Viable Target”?

Posted July 16, 2017 by danmillerinpanama
Categories: Islam and Christians, Islam and terrorism
Tags: ,

Slaughtered Christians “A Viable Target”? Gatestone Institute, Raymond Ibrahim, July 16, 2017

Muslim Persecution of Christians, March 2017

According to a report in the Christian Post, Christians displaced by Islamic attacks at the hands of Boko Haram terrorists are being denied food and vital assistance at camps run by local Muslim organizations. As many as 1.8 million people in Nigeria are currently facing starvation. “They will give food to the refugees, but if you are a Christian they will not give you food. They will openly tell you that the relief is not for Christians.” — Bishop William Naga, who fled his home in the Borno state, Nigeria.

A Pakistani government want-ad for street sweepers states that applicants must be Hindu, Christian or Shia — anyone but the dominant Sunni Muslim population – illustrates the way in which minorities are prevented from earning a living wage.

A sophomore at Rollins College in Florida was suspended for challenging a Muslim professor’s assertion that the crucifixion of Jesus never took place, and that his disciples never believed he was God. After the incident, during a Middle East Humanities class, the straight-A student was graded an “F” on a major essay.

The uptick in often lethal persecution of Christians in Muslim regions has caused many Christian leaders to appeal for aid. Canon Andrew White, the prominent minister known as the “Vicar of Baghdad” told Fox News in March, “If there is anything I can tell Americans it is that your fellow brothers and sisters are suffering, they are desperate for help,” he said. “And it is not just a matter of praying for peace. They need a lot – food, resources, clothes, everything. They need everything.”

White also went as far as to say that Christianity in Iraq, where it has been since the times of the apostles, is finished.

As Fox News reported:

“Thirty years ago, there were approximately 1.4 million Christians in Iraq. The number dwindled to around 1 million after the fall of Saddam Hussein in 2003, and a year ago it was estimated that there were less than 250,000 left. Numbers have continued to decline as families flee, and today even approximate figures are difficult to obtain.”

According to a Vatican Radio report, Nigerian Catholic Bishop Joseph Bagobiri responded to “the recent atrocities of Fulani [Muslim] Cattle herdsmen…, which resulted in the deaths of thousands of Christians and the destruction of property worth millions of Naira,” by calling on all Christian denominations to implement counter measures against the “systematic elimination of Christianity in the northern part of Nigeria.”

One source said that in one of these assaults, two of the victims “had their eyes plucked out.” A survivor of another said, “The sad thing is that these Fulanis have been attacking our communities, and no one is doing anything about it.”

Commenting on the “horrific attacks” on Coptic Christians in Egypt between December 2016 and March 2017 — during which 40 “innocent children, women and men had their lives brutally and tragically ended for no other reason except that they are Christians” — Coptic Bishop Anba Angaelos of the United Kingdom said the slaughter has “gone largely unnoticed by the international community.” He continued:

“In our fast moving world that is filled with so much news of tragedy, war and death, it is all too easy for atrocities to become ‘incidents,’ and for individuals suffering them to become mere statistics, very quickly pushed aside by the next item of news. In the eyes of the perpetrators they are a viable target, and in the eyes of the world they become a regrettable phenomenon; yet what is actually left behind is traumatized individuals, families and communities that have lost loved ones, living the reality of themselves being targeted.”

A report released in early 2017 by Open Doors — a non-denominational mission supporting persecuted Christians in over 60 countries — reveals:

  • “Islamic extremism” remains the dominant force responsible for the persecution of Christians in 40 of the 50 worst nations;
  • Nine out of the 10 worst nations for Christians have a Muslim majority (with North Korea being the only non-Islamic exception);
  • In the 21 (18 of which are Muslim-majority) worst nations for Christians, “100 percent of Christians experience persecution”;
  • 1,329 churches have been attacked, damaged, or destroyed, mostly in Muslim-majority nations;
  • Muslim Somalia is now the second worst nation for Christians, who are executed instantly if their faith is discovered, or even rumored;
  • In Nigeria — where more Christians have been slaughtered by Muslims than possibly in any other nation — the killing of Christians went up by 62 percent;
  • The nation where the most violent and sexual attacks on Christians take place – Muslim-majority Pakistan — rose to the number four spot on the list of the worst countries for Christians.

Accounts of widespread Muslim persecution of Christians to surface in the month of March include, but are not limited to, the following:

Muslim Slaughter of Christians

Nigeria: A Christian mother and her three children — aged four, five and nine — were “hacked to death by unknown assailants within a church premises” in Muslim-majority Lagos State. The incident occurred around 3 a.m., “when the woman and her children had gone to the ‘Holy Land’ part of a Cherubim and Seraphim church. Their bodies were seen “in a pool of blood by some worshipers,” who arrived at the church later in the morning. The three children died inside the church. Their mother died an hour after making it to the hospital. Police said they were still seeking a motive.

Somalia: Assassins dispatched by the militant Islamic group Al Shabaab — “The Youth” — invaded the home of a clandestine Christian family during the night, and murdered the 35-year-old wife and mother, along with her 11-year-old son, as they slept. The 38-year-old husband and father was shot in the chest and survived. His three other young children escaped through the back door of the house and also survived. According to the account of the man of the house, the four gunmen shouted “Allahu Akbar” [“God is great”] and said they “cannot allow the defiling of our religion with a foreign, Western religion.”

Somalia is widely considered the second worst nation for Christians. There, the mere suspicion or accusation that someone is secretly living as a Christian can lead to a public execution.

Pakistan: After refusing to work on Sunday, as his Muslim employer demanded he do, a 20-year-old Christian sanitation worker was killed in a drive-by shooting by two assailants on motorcycles. The victim’s family attorney said that the employer had warned the worker that he would face “dire consequences” if he did not comply, and threatened to “cut off his legs and riddle his body with bullets” for defying his order. “Many Muslims find it hard to accept refusal by a ‘lowly’ Christian,” a Christian rights activist said. “This is not the first time a Christian sanitary worker has been killed or subjected to violence for refusing to comply with unjust demands of persons from the Muslim majority.”

Muslim Attacks on Christian Missionaries and “Apostates”

Philippines: A 70 year-old Irish nun living on the island of Mindanao — notorious for its separatist, extremist Muslim population — was attacked by a masked assailant who beat her so badly that she required surgery. Sister Kathleen Melia, who has spent more than 30 years serving the Philippines, was locking up her convent on March 1, when a masked man covered her mouth with his hand, and began to punch her.

Uganda: A Muslim who discovered that his 21-year-old daughter had converted to Christianity beat her up and threw her out of the house. When she fled to her pastor for sanctuary, her father contacted the police and accused the church leader — a married father-of-six — of having abducted her and turning her into a “human sacrifice.” Police immediately arrested the pastor, a former Muslim and well-known sheikh, who embraced Christianity in 2003. Since then, he has lost his job; his first wife left him; his extended family beat and disowned him; an aunt tried to poison him with insecticide; and one of several Islamic attacks on his home left one of his daughters dead. During his interrogation, the pastor explained that the girl he allegedly “sacrificed” was not only still alive, but taking a tailoring course. When located by police, the young woman confirmed her pastor’s version of events, saying that her father had vowed to “fight hard until we destroy everything [the pastor was] doing.”

Iran: Two Christian converts, a mother and son, were arrested in their home and taken to an unknown location. During the raid, bibles and other books on Christian theology were confiscated.

Another convert to Christianity, imprisoned since 2013 for working in a house church and orphanage, has been denied urgent health care a heart defect, “drastic” weight loss, weakness and depression.

A five-year prison sentence issued to a Christian convert — for allegedly “forming a group in order to disrupt national security” — was confirmed by the Revolutionary Court. Human rights activists involved in his case say, however, that the convict “is in prison only for his [Christian] beliefs.”

Malaysia: A pastor accused of attempting to convert Muslims to Christianity — a crime in Malaysia — was abducted in what was seen on closed-circuit TV to be a professional job, and is feared dead, due to no ransom having been demanded, and despite the family’s offer of reward money to anyone with information on the case.

Muslim Attacks on Churches

Central African Republic: Muslim converts to Christianity were attacked by a Muslim mob while worshiping at a Central Africa church. Brandishing swords and iron bars, the mob shouted “Allahu Akbar” [“Allah is the greatest”], while destroying the church and ripping off its roof. They then stabbed the pastor and beat up members of the congregation. This was one of at least three Muslim attacks on churches in the Central African Republic between January and March of 2017.

Indonesia: The government shut down three churches, two Protestant and one Catholic, on the grounds that it “cannot guarantee their safety” after intimidation by a radical Muslim group. “We are struggling for our right to worship,” a church leader lamented. Possibly emboldened by the government’s action, hundreds of Muslims demonstrated in front of the Santa Clara Church in Bekasi, and called on the mayor to revoke the church’s permits. After the mayor said he would not do so, “even if I am shot,” protesters hurled rocks and bottles at the police, and tried to force their way into the church. Police used tear gas to disperse the mob. This violence is part of a reportedly growing trend of intolerance, particularly against Christians, in Indonesia.

Iraq: A church in Mosul was turned into a religious police base by ISIS, which desecrated it with Islamic graffiti and damaged the stone cross above its front door. According to a report by NDTV:

“Not a single crucifix, or statue of Jesus Christ or the Virgin Mary has survived in the building’s nave, from which all mark of Christianity has been methodically removed… Terrorists have scribbled their noms de guerre on the church’s walls, and a large chandelier has been dumped in the yard.”

Most Christian churches in and around Mosul, Iraq were desecrated or destroyed by ISIS. Pictured: The heavily damaged bell tower of Saint John’s Church (Mar Yohanna) in the town of Qaraqosh, near Mosul, on April 16, 2017. (Photo by Carl Court/Getty Images)

Muslim Discrimination against and Hostility towards Christians

Egypt: A Muslim man sexually harassed and attempted to slit the throat of a Christian woman on a busy street, in broad daylight. Passersby intervened, holding the perpetrator until authorities arrived. The woman was rushed to a hospital and survived.

In addition, the brother of an 18-year-old Christian girl who was abducted earlier this year learned that his sister had been given a new Muslim identity and was being held by security services. When the family approached the national security headquarters and demanded that she be set free, authorities denied knowledge of her whereabouts. As family and friends proceeded to protest, singing Christian hymns, the police responded with violence, wounding several participants.

Nigeria: According to a report in the Christian Post, Christians displaced by Islamic attacks at the hands of Boko Haram terrorists are being denied food and vital assistance at camps run by local Muslim organizations. As many as 1.8 million people in Nigeria are currently facing starvation. Bishop William Naga, who fled his home in the Borno state, said, “They will give food to the refugees, but if you are a Christian they will not give you food. They will openly tell you that the relief is not for Christians.” A human rights activist elaborated:

“Christians often get pushed to the back of the line. Because Muslims are the majority there, even non-extremist Muslims, some of their neighbors are typically going to get preferential treatment by those providing food and assistance because of their Muslim faith.”

Pakistan: A Muslim family falsely accused their 15-year-old Christian maid and her father of stealing, after the girl fell ill with appendicitis and could not work until she recuperated. The father and daughter were arrested and are now engaged in a legal battle to prove their innocence.

A Pakistani government want-ad for street sweepers states that applicants must be Hindu, Christian or Shia — anyone but the dominant Sunni Muslim population – illustrates the way in which minorities are prevented from earning a living wage. When minority groups protested, officials responded by saying the word “Shia” was added by mistake, as they are still considered Muslims.

A Pakistani prosecutor reportedly has been blackmailing Christians facing trial — over the lynching of two men suspected of bombing two churches – to convert to Islam in exchange for their acquittal. One lawyer said that the prosecutor’s office has used this tactic before, but that it was “simply ignored.”

United States: A sophomore at Rollins College in Florida was suspended for challenging a Muslim professor’s assertion that the crucifixion of Jesus never took place, and that his disciples never believed he was God. After the incident, during a Middle East Humanities class, the straight-A student was graded an “F” on a major essay. When he confronted the professor about this, she filed a complaint with the school, claiming he made her feel “unsafe.”

The student recounted that one day, the professor led a discussion about the application of Sharia Law, and a Muslim in the class said gays and adulterers should be beheaded. No action was taken against that person, however.

A week after the student contacted a lawyer, his suspension was lifted.

About this Series

While not all, or even most, Muslims are involved, persecution of Christians by Muslims is growing. The report posits that such Muslim persecution is not random but rather systematic, and takes place irrespective of language, ethnicity, or location.

Raymond Ibrahim is the author of Crucified Again: Exposing Islam’s New War on Christians (published by Regnery with Gatestone Institute, April 2013).

Previous reports

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These are the 27 Republicans Who Voted Against Studying Islamic Terror

Posted July 16, 2017 by danmillerinpanama
Categories: Islamic terrorism, Republican Party, Republican principles, Republicans and Trump, Trump agenda, Trump and climate change, Trump and Islamic terrorism, U.S. Military and climate change
Tags: , , , , , , ,

These are the 27 Republicans Who Voted Against Studying Islamic Terror, The Point (Front Page Magazine), Daniel Greenfield, July 16, 2017

Faso, Buchanan, Paulsen, David, Comstock, Katko, Reichert, Walden, Costello, Meehan and others had previously joined another Dem push to kill another amendment to end the exploitation of the military to push Global Warming.

Those conservatives outraged that a Republican majority isn’t getting anything done ought to remember that this is what a chunk of that majority looks like.

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Congressman Franks introduced an amendment to study the strategic implications of Islamic doctrines in counterterrorism.

Specifically it would have required “the Secretary of Defense to conduct strategic assessments of the use of violent or unorthodox Islamic religious doctrine to support extremist or terrorist messaging and justification.”

Like a number of other conservative amendments, it was defeated with the complicity of Republicans. Here are the Republicans who joined with Democrats to vote it down.

No   R   Amash, Justin MI 3rd
No   R   Sanford, Mark SC 1st
No   R   LoBiondo, Frank NJ 2nd
No   R   Fitzpatrick, Brian PA 8th
No   R   Young, Don AK
No   R   Hill, French AR 2nd
No   R   Buchanan, Vern FL 16th
No   R   Curbelo, Carlos FL 26th
No   R   Upton, Fred MI 6th
No   R   Trott, Dave MI 11th
No   R   Paulsen, Erik MN 3rd
No   R   Faso, John NY 19th
No   R   Katko, John NY 24th
No   R   Collins, Chris NY 27th
No   R   Turner, Michael OH 10th
No   R   Joyce, David OH 14th
No   R   Stivers, Steve OH 15th
No   R   Russell, Steve OK 5th
No   R   Walden, Greg OR 2nd
No   R   Costello, Ryan PA 6th
No   R   Meehan, Patrick PA 7th
No   R   Dent, Charles PA 15th
No   R   Comstock, Barbara VA 10th
No   R   Newhouse, Dan WA 4th
No   R   Ros-Lehtinen, Ileana FL 27th
No   R   Reichert, David WA 8th
No   R   Lewis, Jason MN 2nd

The amendment failed 217 to 208. 27 Republicans joined 190 Democrats to kill it.

Some names on the list aren’t surprising. Justin Amash’s views on terrorism aren’t news. Or surprising. He’s also about the only guy with an R after his name who flirts with Dem fantasies of impeaching Trump.

Florida was overrepresented among the Republican anti votes. As was New York. Three anti votes came from Ohio and four from Pennsylvania. Michigan’s presence here is no surprise. South Carolina’s is.

Faso, Buchanan, Paulsen, David, Comstock, Katko, Reichert, Walden, Costello, Meehan and others had previously joined another Dem push to kill another amendment to end the exploitation of the military to push Global Warming.

Those conservatives outraged that a Republican majority isn’t getting anything done ought to remember that this is what a chunk of that majority looks like.

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Nothing is sacred

Posted July 16, 2017 by danmillerinpanama
Categories: Desecration of holy sites, Israeli Arabs, Israeli security, Palestinian incitement, Palestinian rioters, Palestinian terrorists, Palestinians and Islam, Temple Mount
Tags: , , , , , , ,

Nothing is sacred, Israel Hayom, Dr. Reuven Berko, July 16, 2017

(Please see also, Temple Mt. opens in stages amid terror probe. — DM)

The Palestinians, a new people without any heritage of their own country or capital city, are appropriating Al-Aqsa mosque, which is holy to all Muslims, for political leverage and claiming that Israel is scheming to destroy it. The shooting attack on the Temple Mount on Friday, in which two Israeli policemen were murdered, reminded us all that in the doctrine of Islamist terrorist, no Islamic site is sacred.

Going back to the riots that raged before the establishment of the state, the Palestinians treated the Temple Mount as a “religious trigger” that could be used to whip the masses into a fury of violence against the Jewish community. Every time the Palestinians are in trouble, they go back and turn up the flames at the Temple Mount with the lie — of which Hamas, the Palestinian Authority, and the Islamic Movement in Umm al-Fahm (the outlawed Northern Branch) are so fond — that Israel is planning to topple Al-Aqsa.

While Israel is using the best methods at its disposal to secure Al-Aqsa, the Palestinians treat the mosque in a contemptuous, subversive manner, using is as a nexus for religious incitement to terrorism against Israel, the goal being the damage and casualties that would result from an apocalyptic religious conflict between Islam and Judaism. The terrorist attack on the Temple Mount, which put the mosque and the worshippers who were there in danger, shows the Palestinians’ destructive attitude toward Islamic holy sites, as well as how they thumb their noses at Jordan’s role as supervisor of the Temple Mount mosques.

Sites holy to the three Abrahamic religions are subject to endless fakery, destruction, and debasement, which include the intentional wreckage of Solomon’s Stables and the Temple Mount compound; fires set at Joseph’s Tomb; cemeteries being desecrated and antiquities being stolen; terrorists taking control of the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem and using it as a toilet; attacking the Christian community that remains in Bethlehem; Qassam rockets being fired at Jerusalem from Gaza during Operation Protective Edge in the summer of 2014.

Since the Palestinians are the pioneers of terrorism, global terrorism has adopted their legacy of hijacking airplanes, blowing up hotels and cafes, suicide terrorist attacks, and terrorist stabbings and car ramming. The religious propaganda created by the Muslim Brotherhood and taught by Palestinian religious leader Abdullah Yusuf Azzam, who was a mentor to al-Qaida, has also been passed on to the Islamic State and its operatives. This is the murderous doctrine that Sheikh Raad Salah and his friends in the Islamic Movement in Umm al-Fahm, as well as the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem Sheikh Muhammad Hussein and the former grand mufti, Sheikh Ekrima Sabri, feed to their loyal flock.

The Palestinians’ destructive way of treating their holy sites and their use of them as safe haven and as bases from which to launch terrorist attacks bear the fingerprints of the Muslim Brotherhood, which are also found on the Islamic State in the Middle East and outside it. That same “Islamic Stateness” that grew out of the terrorists from Umm al-Fahm (the Islamic Movement) is what motivated the bombing of churches and mosques full of worshippers in Egypt, Iraq, and Syria, and the wholesale demolition of historical gems like Buddha statues in Afghanistan, the Great Mosque of al-Nuri in Mosul, and the Palmyra ruins. While all that was happening, UNESCO was taking a break.

The Palestinians, tragically, are doing our work for us in the eyes of the world. Their way of proving “nationality” and “repentance” is to murder Jews. Weapons are found in the hands of Arab civilians and criminals who exploit their Israeli citizenship. Terrorism on the Temple Mount is a wake-up call, but we must not generalize, and it’s too soon to move the security fence to the west of Umm al-Fahm. We need to take care of those behind the incitement and open the Mount to worshippers as soon as possible. At the same time, Israel secures holy sites in Jerusalem as a sovereign entity and allows freedom of religion and upholds the status quo. It would be stupid and evil to make the mistake of thinking that Israel will give up its capital and abandon its holy sites to Palestinian terrorists and hooligans.

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Temple Mt. opens in stages amid terror probe

Posted July 15, 2017 by danmillerinpanama
Categories: Arab nations, Israeli security, Palestinan terror at Temple Mount, Terror tunnels
Tags: , , ,

Temple Mt. opens in stages amid terror probe, DEBKAfile, July 15, 2017

Pressure on Israel from the Arab world to reopen Temple Mount and its mosques for Muslim prayer without delay has been strongly countered by the Israeli police and security authorities. They need more time to complete their investigation of the scene of the terror attack, Friday, July 14, in which two Israeli officers on guard were shot dead and a third injured. The three Israeli Arabs who committed the murders were shot dead in the subsequent firefight outside the Dome of the Rock.

The Israeli government also decided that the shrine, which is sacred to three monotheistic faiths, needs better security installed before it is judged safe for worship and visits.

On Saturday, Washington came to the aid of the investigation. Strongly condemning the “heartbreaking act of terror on Temple Mount,” the White House press secretary added: “The attack forced the government of Israel to temporarily close the Temple Mount/Haram al Sharif to conduct its investigation,” said the statement. “Israel has assured the world that it has no intention to alter the status of this holy site, a decision which the United States applauds and welcomes.”

Saturday night, the Netanyahu government Saturday nevertheless ordered Temple Mount opened Sunday “in stages” –  which gives the police and security authorities a little breathing space.

The police have been combing through the “scene of terror,” to reconstruct the crime and discover the secret arms caches hidden there. This undertaking is vast, complex and exceptionally sensitive.

The Temple Mount surface platform is 150,000 sq. meters in area with nine ancient open gates. It stands atop 13 historic periods of construction and destruction, each of which has left layer upon layer of mostly unexplored tunnels, pipes, caves, pits, shafts and debris. Even archeologists working there for decades and the clerical staff of the Waqf authority in charge of Muslim rites there can’t claim to have explored all the warrens hidden under the paved surface.

It is also suspected that there may be secret underground channels running under the Temple Mount wall and leading outside the compound.

The police are meanwhile keeping their cards very close to their vests. They have detained some Waqf officials on suspicion of a connection with the terrorists, without releasing figures, and discovered a quantity of firearms. But the cops, unfamiliar with this unique ancient site, don’t know what they will find. They are after information about the identities of the party which instructed them to hide the two rifles and pistols used by the terrorists and said when they should be handed over. In short, whether a terrorist network exists on Temple Mount.

Relatives of the three terrorists, who belonged to the same clan in the Israeli Arab town of Umm al-Fahm, have been detained in search of information about how they came to perform the first act of terror by Moslems on Temple Mount. Most of the town and other parts of the Arab population are hostile to the investigation.

Israeli Arab community leaders, including their 13 parliamentarians, have refused to condemn the attack, willing only to voice regret for all the deaths inflicted Friday, including the three assailants.

This was resented not only by Israelis at large, but most bitterly by the Druze community, which buried two of its sons, Hail Stawi, 30, from Maghar and Kamil Shanan, 22, from Hurfeish both in northern Israel. They were shot to death while guarding the holy site.

The Temple terror investigation has exposed troubling animosities in Israeli Arab society.

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Assess This

Posted July 15, 2017 by danmillerinpanama
Categories: 2016 elections and Russia, Great Trump - Russia conspiracy, Leaks, Media and Hillary Clinton, Media and leaks, Media and Russia, Media and Trump, Putin and Hillary Clinton, Putin and Trump
Tags: , , , , , , , ,

Assess This, Power Line, Scott Johnson, July 15, 2017

Even this “eyes only” document must have left ambiguity about Putin’s “audacious objectives.” There is a rather big difference between the objective of damaging Hillary Clinton and the objective of defeating her. Given the unidentified sources of the leaks behind this revelation, however, one would have to be a fool to take the contents of the report or the validity of its assessments on faith.

One should think that the credibility of former government officials who betray their oaths to leak such information would be in question. Color me cynical. For whatever reason, however, the Post expresses no reservations regarding the credibility of these officials.

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Did Putin prefer Trump in the presidential election of 2016? According to the intelligence report dated January 6, 2017, Putin not only preferred Trump to Clinton. He mounted a so-called influence campaign to put him over. The report is posted online here.

Issued under the auspices of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, the report is based on the intelligence and assessments of the CIA, the FBI and the NSA. The report as released constitutes the “declassified version of a highly classified assessment that has been provided to the President and to recipients approved by the President.”

The authors of the declassified version of the report state that their conclusions “are all reflected in the classified assessment,” although “the declassified report does not and cannot include the full supporting information, including specific intelligence and sources and methods.” Our own ability to evaluate the report is necessarily limited by what has been disclosed to the public.

The report conforms to the line put out by Hillary Clinton’s communications team in the immediate aftermath of Clinton’s shocking loss. Perhaps that is a coincidence, or perhaps the Clintonistas were on to something.

The report also comports with the line peddled by former Obama administration officials who frequently retailed politicized “narratives” manufactured to support counterintuitive administration policies. See, for example, the long Washington Post article “Obama’s secret struggle to punish Russia for Putin’s election assault.”

The former Obama administration officials feeding the Post feel free to blow such highly classified information as the administration’s putative cyber efforts against Russia. Trump administration officials decried the leaks to Adam Kredo for his Washington Free Beacon article on the subject.

The Washington Post article contains hints of the “highly classified” information that was omitted from the declassified version of the report. According to the Post, in August 2016 the CIA hand delivered an “eyes only” report “drawn from sourcing deep inside the Russian government that detailed Russian President Vladi­mir Putin’s direct involvement in a cyber campaign to disrupt and discredit the U.S. presidential race.”

The Post continued: “The intelligence captured Putin’s specific instructions on the operation’s audacious objectives — defeat or at least damage the Democratic nominee, Hillary Clinton, and help elect her opponent, Donald Trump” (emphasis added).

Even this “eyes only” document must have left ambiguity about Putin’s “audacious objectives.” There is a rather big difference between the objective of damaging Hillary Clinton and the objective of defeating her. Given the unidentified sources of the leaks behind this revelation, however, one would have to be a fool to take the contents of the report or the validity of its assessments on faith.

One should think that the credibility of former government officials who betray their oaths to leak such information would be in question. Color me cynical. For whatever reason, however, the Post expresses no reservations regarding the credibility of these officials.

The Post’s long article reminded me of the dialogue Woody Allen wrote for his voiceover spy parody What’s Up, Tiger Lilly? at the point where one character shows spy hero Phil Moscowitz a printed floor plan and explains: “This is Shepherd Wong’s home.” Moscowitz asks: “He lives in that piece of paper?” In the Post story, the lowdown on Putin lives in the piece of paper stuffed into the envelope transmitted by courier from the CIA to President Obama under extraordinary handling restrictions.

If we turn back to the declassified report to arrive at our own conclusions, we are underwhelmed by the presentation. It is, shall we say, thin.

Referring to the agencies’ finding that Putin ordered an “influence campaign” to help Trump win the election — a finding the agencies say they hold “with high confidence” — the Russian American journalist Masha Gessen (no friend of Trump) put it this way in her hilariously derisive account posted on January 9 at the site of the New York Review of Books:

A close reading of the report shows that it barely supports such a conclusion. Indeed, it barely supports any conclusion. There is not much to read: the declassified version is twenty-five pages, of which two are blank, four are decorative, one contains an explanation of terms, one a table of contents, and seven are a previously published unclassified report by the CIA’s Open Source division. There is even less to process: the report adds hardly anything to what we already knew. The strongest allegations—including about the nature of the DNC hacking—had already been spelled out in much greater detail in earlier media reports.

But the real problems come with the findings themselves….

The report is so poorly written that it makes for painful reading. Gessen makes this point and advances her analysis as well:

Despite its brevity, the report makes many repetitive statements remarkable for their misplaced modifiers, mangled assertions, and missing words. This is not just bad English: this is muddled thinking and vague or entirely absent argument. Take, for example, this phrase: “Moscow most likely chose WikiLeaks because of its self-proclaimed reputation for authenticity.” I think, though I cannot be sure, that the authors of the report are speculating that Moscow gave the products of its hacking operation to WikiLeaks because WikiLeaks is known as a reliable source. The next line, however, makes this speculation unnecessary: “Disclosures through WikiLeaks did not contain any evident forgeries.”

Or consider this: “Putin most likely wanted to discredit Secretary Clinton because he has publicly blamed her since 2011 for inciting mass protests against his regime in late 2011 and early 2012, and because he holds a grudge for comments he almost certainly saw as disparaging him.” Did Putin’s desire to discredit Clinton stem from his own public statements, or are the intelligence agencies basing their appraisal of Putin’s motives on his public statements? Logic suggests the latter, but grammar indicates the former. The fog is not coincidental: if the report’s vague assertions were clarified and its circular logic straightened out, nothing would be left.

Gessen observes at one point: “That is the entirety of the evidence the report offers to support its estimation of Putin’s motives for allegedly working to elect Trump: conjecture based on other politicians in other periods, on other continents—and also on misreported or mistranslated public statements.”

Along with disparaging comments on Trump, Gessen concludes that the report “suggests that the US intelligence agencies’ Russia expertise is weak and throws into question their ability to process and present information[.]” I won’t try to summarize Gessen’s devastating assessment of the report. You really have to read the whole thing.

Power Line readers are probably already familiar with Andy McCarthy’s invaluable assessment of the report in his NRO column “Missing from the intelligence report: The word ‘Podesta.’” It too is necessary reading.

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Canada’s Multi-Million-Dollar Pay-Out to a ‘Foreign Terrorist Fighter’

Posted July 15, 2017 by danmillerinpanama
Categories: Canada and Islamic terrorists, Omar Khadr
Tags: ,

Canada’s Multi-Million-Dollar Pay-Out to a ‘Foreign Terrorist Fighter’ Gatestone Institute, Ruthie Blum, July 15, 2017

It is bad enough to describe a teenager who set out to “kill as many Americans as possible” in this way. It is far worse that he is a free — and still very young — man, paid not only respect by the government whose values he was raised to abhor, but millions of dollars, to boot. If anything serves to encourage other terrorists to leave North America and Europe to fight in the Middle East, it is stories such as this one.

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“Has any soldier who fought FOR Canada ever received as generous a reward as this soldier who fought against us?” — Canadian Senator Linda Frum.

In 2003, Khadr confessed to throwing the grenade that killed U.S. Special Forces Sgt. 1st Class Christopher Speer and caused Sgt. 1st Class Layne Morris to lose an eye. Years later, he retracted his confession, claiming it had been extracted under duress. In fact, it was part of a plea deal that enabled him to be extradited to Canada to serve the rest of his sentence there.

“There was a Canadian flag flying along with the American flag at our base there, so it’s quite a thing that now Canada is giving millions to a guy who would attack a compound where Canadians were serving. I don’t see this as anything but treason. As far as I am concerned, Prime Minister Trudeau should be charged.” — Sgt. 1st Class Layne Morris, who lost an eye from the grenade thrown by Omar Khadr.

The government of Canada recently issued an official apology — and acknowledged awarding an “undisclosed” sum of money — to Toronto-born Islamist terrorist Omar Khadr for his “ordeal” at the U.S. military base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and “any resulting harm” he was caused by the “torture” (specifically, sleep deprivation, solitary confinement and threats) that led to his confession.

On July 7, Canadian Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland and Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness Ralph Goodale released a statement announcing the “hope that this expression, and the negotiated settlement reached with the Government, will assist him in his efforts to begin a new and hopeful chapter in his life with his fellow Canadians.”

The civil settlement was reached with Khadr, 30, who was 10 when his family returned to the Middle East, and 15 when he was arrested fighting in Afghanistan with al Qaeda and the Taliban, the terrorist organizations to which his father was affiliated — on the basis of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

In 2003, Khadr confessed to throwing the grenade that killed U.S. Special Forces Sgt. 1st Class Christopher Speer and caused Sgt. 1st Class Layne Morris to lose an eye. Years later, he retracted his confession, claiming it had been extracted under duress. In fact, it was part of a plea deal that enabled him to be extradited to Canada to serve the rest of his sentence there.

With news of the large settlement he received — 10,500,000 Canadian dollars (approximately USD $8,000,000) — he gave an extensive interview to CBC’s Power & Politics host Rosemary Barton, in which he said he thinks that the apology from the Canadian government “restores a little bit my reputation here in Canada, and I think that’s the biggest thing for me.” He declined to comment on having just received multi-millions in tax-free dollars.

He also had the effrontery to say that he just wants “to be a normal person” and finish his nursing degree to help under-served communities. “I have a lot of experience with… and appreciation of pain,” he explained, expressing only sorrow that the Speer and Morris families consider him responsible for their own pain.

Amid harsh criticism against the Liberal government by opposition Conservatives and members of the public outraged that their tax dollars are going to a convicted terrorist, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau responded to reporters’ questions on the matter during a press conference marking the July 8 close of G20 summit in Hamburg.

Trudeau said that the settlement had nothing to do with Khadr’s 2002 actions on the battlefield in Afghanistan, but rather with the fact that his rights had been violated. This is precisely what the Canadian Supreme Court ruled in 2008 and 2010, after Khadr’s lawyers sued for damages.

Trudeau added that the Charter of Rights and Freedoms protects all Canadians, “even when it is uncomfortable. When the government violates any Canadian’s Charter rights, we all end up paying for it.”

Meanwhile, Goodale tried to evade responsibility, by casting aspersions on the previous government, headed by Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper, in power when Khadr was returned to Canada in 2012 to serve the remainder of his prison sentence for five counts of war crimes. Goodale accused Harper of having “refused to repatriate Mr. Khadr or otherwise resolve the matter.”

In spite of the fact that Khadr was arrested and detained when Liberal governments were in power in Canada, Goodale was referring to appeals during Harper’s tenure — which began in 2006 — by Canadian Liberal and human rights lawyers to “bring Omar Khadr home.”

In 2008, former Canadian Justice Minister Irwin Cotler wrote:

“I join other scholars and associations of jurists in calling for Omar Khadr to be transferred into the custody of Canadian law enforcement officials, to be afforded due process under Canadian law, with prospects for appropriate rehabilitation and integration.”

Cotler also stated,

“Admittedly, the Khadr family has emerged, as some have put it, as synonymous with terrorism. But, the test of the rule of law is not its application in the easy cases, but its retention in the unpopular ones… Omar Khadr, a child victim, should now be afforded the justice denied him all these years, however unpopular and unpalatable his case may appear to be.”

In response to Goodale’s implication that had it not been for the previous government, the current one would not have been forced to apologize to and pay Khadr, Harper immediately took to social media, writing:

The government today attempted to lay blame elsewhere for their decision to conclude a secret deal with Omar Khadr. The decision to enter into this deal is theirs, and theirs alone, and it is simply wrong. Canadians deserve better than this. Today my thoughts are with Tabitha Speer and the families of all Canadian and allied soldiers who paid the ultimate price fighting to protect us.

Canadian Senator Linda Frum railed against the settlement, tweeting: “Has any soldier who fought FOR Canada ever received as generous a reward as this soldier who fought against us?”

Given Khadr’s family history, Frum’s fury is justified.

As the New York Post reported, Khadr is the son of a Palestinian mother and an Egyptian father (Ahmed Khadr), who had strong ties to the Muslim Brotherhood, and became one of Osama bin Laden’s loyal lieutenants. After 9/11, Ahmed Khadr was placed on the FBI’s most-wanted list in relations to the attacks. He was arrested in Pakistan in 1995 on suspicion of financing the suicide bombing at the Egyptian Embassy in Islamabad, in which 16 people were killed. Protesting his innocence, he went on a hunger strike, and the Canadian government, then headed by Liberal Prime Minister Jean Chrétien, rallied behind him.

While on a trade mission to Pakistan, Chrétien appealed to Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, and a few months later, Ahmed was released from prison and sent back with his family to Toronto. However, according to the New York Post, the Khadr clan soon returned to Pakistan, where Ahmed Khadr resumed his connections with al Qaeda and the Taliban. Young Omar Khadr not only met with the leaders of these terrorist groups, but lived with his parents and siblings in the bin Laden family compound, attending al Qaeda training camps, which his father — who was killed in 2003 — partly funded.

The report continued:

“A month before he joined an al Qaeda cell in 2002, Omar was sent by his father for private instruction in explosives and combat… [where he] learned to launch rocket-propelled grenades and became skilled at planting improvised explosive devices that were used to blow up US armored vehicles in Afghanistan.”

In his interrogation about the incident that led to his arrest and subsequent incarceration at Guantanamo, Omar Khadr said he had been on a suicide mission “to kill as many Americans as possible.”

In this still image taken from a video found in the rubble of the compound where Omar Khadr was captured on July 27, 2002, a 15-year-old Khadr constructs an improvised explosive device. (Courtesy U.S. Defense Operations/Wikimedia Commons)

This did not prevent the U.S. military from flying an ophthalmologist to the Bagram Air Base — where was being treated for wounds he sustained while fighting American and Canadian soldiers — to save his eyes and keep him from going blind.

Nor did it cause Omar to experience gratitude on the one hand, or remorse on the other. On the contrary, as military court documents revealed, when he was informed that Speer had died, he said he “felt happy” for having murdered an American. He also said that whenever he remembered killing Speer, it would make him “feel good.”

According to a report in the Globe and Mail, the Toronto lawyer representing Morris and Tabitha Speer — who won a default judgment in 2015 in the U.S. against Omar for $134 million – began proceedings to contest the Canadian government’s settlement and prevent it from going forward.

It is clearly too late for that; the money has already been transferred to Omar. Furthermore, the transaction was done swiftly and “quietly,” to make legal action by taxpayers in Canada or the Morris and Speer families in America virtually impossible.

Morris is understandably angry and hurt. “The fact is Chris Speer and myself were fighting with Canadians in Afghanistan,” he said.

“We were alongside the PPCLI (Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry). There was a Canadian flag flying along with the American flag at our base there, so it’s quite a thing that now Canada is giving millions to a guy who would attack a compound where Canadians were serving. I don’t see this as anything but treason… As far as I am concerned, Prime Minister Trudeau should be charged.”

Thus far, the administration in Washington has remained silent on Khadr pay-out, which came to light during the weekend of the G20 summit in Germany, where U.S. President Donald Trump heaped praise on his Canadian counterpart.

Trump even opened his speech at a World Bank event to promote and finance women entrepreneurs in developing countries by declaring: “We have a great neighbor in Canada and Justin [Trudeau] is doing a spectacular job… Everybody loves him, and they love him for a reason…”

This assertion, given the information that has since emerged about Khadr case, was unfortunate. Far more ironic under the circumstances, however, was the “Statement on Countering Terrorism,” signed by the leaders of the G20.

Its 21 clauses include a commitment to “address the evolving threat of returning foreign terrorist fighters … from conflict zones such as Iraq and Syria and remain committed to preventing [them] from establishing a foothold in other countries and regions around the world,” and to “facilitate swift and targeted exchanges of information between intelligence and law enforcement and judicial authorities… [to] ensure that terrorists are brought to justice.”

Such words are empty without actions to back them up. Omar Khadr is a classic example of a “foreign terrorist fighter.” Yet the Canadian legal system categorized him — in Cotler’s words — as a “child victim, [who] should… be afforded the justice denied him all these years.”

It is bad enough to describe a teenager who set out to “kill as many Americans as possible” in this way. It is far worse that he is a free — and still very young — man, paid not only respect by the government whose values he was raised to abhor, but millions of dollars, to boot. If anything serves to encourage other terrorists to leave North America and Europe to fight in the Middle East, it is stories such as this one.

The Trump administration must call Trudeau to task for this perversion, and offer an immediate and very public apology to Khadr’s American victims, who did not receive a penny for their patriotic sacrifice.

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Cartoons and Video of the Day

Posted July 15, 2017 by danmillerinpanama
Categories: Humor
Tags:

Andrew Klavan via YouTube

 

H/t Wattsupwiththat

 

H/t Vermont Loon Watch

 

H/t Power Line

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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UNHCR: Number of Venezuelans Applying for Asylum in 2017 Has Soared

Posted July 15, 2017 by danmillerinpanama
Categories: Asylum seekers, Venezuelan dictatorship, Venezuelan economy
Tags: , ,

UNHCR: Number of Venezuelans Applying for Asylum in 2017 Has Soared, Latin American Herald Tribune, July 15, 2017

GENEVA – Asylum requests lodged by Venezuelan citizens so far in the first half of 2017 have almost doubled the number recorded during the whole of the previous year, the United Nations refugee agency said on Friday.

Some 27,000 Venezuelans applied for asylum in countries around the world during 2016, but in just the first six months of 2017, the figure had soared to 52,000, the UNHCR said in a statement, adding the principal destination for fleeing citizens were the United States, which received 18,300 asylum seekers, Brazil (12,960), Argentina (11,735) and Spain (4,300).

“The above figures represent only a fraction of the total number of Venezuelans who may be in need of international protection, as many do not register as asylum seekers, despite the fact that many have indicated that they fled because of violence and insecurity, as well as an inability to meet daily subsistence needs,” the UNHCR warned.

The refugee agency said that although many Venezuelans who have fled their country enjoyed temporary residence in South American countries because of a tradition of solidarity in the continent, bureaucracy and other obstacles to being granted asylum meant many remained in an irregular situation.

The UNHCR was working with authorities in neighboring Colombia, where an estimated 300,000 Venezuelans were estimated to be seeking refuge, as well as in Trinidad and Tobago (40,000) and Brazil (30,000), in order speed up registrations and provide basic humanitarian aid.

The UNHCR said it was concerned by the activities of armed groups and gangs exploiting fleeing Venezuelans.

Indigenous communities displaced along Venezuela’s border with Brazil and Colombia were also at risk of having their human rights breached, the UN body said.

The UNHCR urged all concerned States to protect the rights of Venezuelans and draw up measures to facilitate their asylum applications.

It also called on Venezuelans seeking refuge abroad to register as asylum seekers through the appropriate official channels.

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Operative who commissioned anti-Trump dossier to testify next week before Congress

Posted July 14, 2017 by danmillerinpanama
Categories: "Trump dossier", U.S. Congress
Tags: ,

Operative who commissioned anti-Trump dossier to testify next week before Congress. Washington Times, Dan Boylan, July 14, 2017

U.S President Donald Trump speaks during a press conference with French President Emmanuel Macron at the Elysee Palace in Paris, Thursday, July 13, 2017. Trump will be the parade’s guest of honor to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the U.S

Thus far, Fusion GPS has refused to disclose the identity of political clients who financed the anti-Trump dossier — a line of questioning likely to cause major sparks to fly next week.

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The founder of the Washington political opposition-research firm that commissioned the anti-Donald Trump dossier will testify next Wednesday before the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Glenn Simpson, one of the Russian election-meddling saga’s most mysterious and sought-after characters, will answers questions from a committee that has pressed for his appearance since early this spring.

In 2015, Mr. Simpson’s firm, Fusion GPS, hired former British intelligence agent commissioned Christopher Steele to compile opposition research on then-candidate Trump. For months Mr. Steele’s salacious 35-page dossier of unverified information was cited by Democrats as the reason for a special commission to investigate Mr. Trump and his aides for a supposed role in Russia’s hacking of Democratic Party email servers.

Three men — Mr. Trump’s attorney, a campaign volunteer and a tech company CEO — have publicly said the parts about them in the dossier are fiction. A Russian diplomat whom Mr. Steele accused of wrongdoing also called the dossier a fantasy.

Mr. Simpson, who founded Fusion GPS in 2009, worked previously for Roll Call newspaper and the Wall Street Journal.

Iowa Sen. Charles E. Grassley, chairman of the Judiciary committee, was the driving force behind securing Mr. Simpson’s testimony. Thus far, Fusion GPS has refused to disclose the identity of political clients who financed the anti-Trump dossier — a line of questioning likely to cause major sparks to fly next week.

On Wednesday, the Senate Judiciary Committee, which is scheduled to explore enforcement of the Foreign Agents Registration Act, will also hear testimony from British-American businessman Bill Browder.

Mr. Browder has called Mr. Simpson a “professional smear campaigner.”

Before the Trump dossier, Fusion GP worked on efforts to repeal the Magnitsky Act, a law enacted by the Obama administration in 2012 to punish Russian officials responsible for the death of Russian lawyer and whistleblower Sergei Magnitsky in a Moscow prison in 2009.

Magnitsky served as an attorney for Mr. Browder.

Mr. Grassley also said this week that he wants to hear testimony from former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort, who is not currently on Wednesday’s witness list.

Mr. Grassley told CNN Thursday the committee has also requested Donald Trump Jr. testify before the committee.

News in Washington this week was dominated by revelations that the younger Mr. Trump met with a Russian lawyer while his father campaigned for the presidency. He said he met with the lawyer, Natalia Veselnitskaya, because he thought she had negative information to divulge about his father’s opponent, Hillary Clinton.

Mr. Trump said that instead of discussing Ms. Clinton, Ms. Veselnitskaya instead discussed the Magnitsky Act.

It is not publicly known if Ms. Veselnitskaya had any interactions with Fusion GPS.

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