Major terrorist plot broken up by Germans

The arrests were made because it appeared that attacks were imminent. The US base at Ramstein was a primary target along with Frankfurt International Airport. BERLIN - Three militants from an Islamic group linked to al-Qaida were planning "massive" bomb attacks against Americans in Germany when an elite antiterrorist unit raided their small-town hideout after months of police surveillance, officials said Wednesday. Prosecutors said the suspects — two German converts and a Turkish citizen sharing a "profound hatred of U.S. citizens" — had military-style detonators and enough material to make bombs more powerful than those that killed 191 people in Madrid in 2004 and 52 commuters in London two years ago. [...] Germany's elite GSG-9 anti-terrorist unit arrested two of the suspects Tuesday at a vacation home in Oberschledorn, a town of some 900 people in central Germany. A third suspect fled through a bathroom window, but was caught about 300 meters (yards) away, authorities said. [...] During the first part of the year, they acquired 12 containers of 35 percent hydrogen peroxide solution, which officials said can easily be combined with other material to make explosives. As a token of the intense surveillance by German police, prosecutors said that during the investigation they were able to replace the dangerous peroxide in the containers with a harmless solution without the knowledge of the suspects. The containers were first kept in a garage in the Black Forest region in southern Germany. Subsequently, one of the three rented a vacation cottage in Oberschledorn under a false name on Aug. 17. On Sept. 2, the two other suspects joined him there with the intention, officials said, of making bombs using detonators and electrical components they had obtained. Police decided to move in when the suspects moved one of the containers to the cottage, fearing an attack could be in the offing. The more than 700 kilograms (1,500 pounds) of peroxide could have made a bomb with the explosive power of some 550 kilograms (1,200 pounds) of dynamite. "This would have enabled them to make bombs with more explosive power than the ones used in the London and Madrid bombings," Joerg Ziercke, head of the Federal Crime Office, Germany's equivalent of the FBI, said at the news conference. Terrorists love to mark important anniversaries (like 9/11) with more death and destruction, so we were probably less than a week away from a massive terrorist attack. Hopefully, German officials can use information obtained from these would-be terrorists to take down other terrorist organizers in teh al Qaeda food chain.

More than 10,000 terrorists killed or captured since surge began

Hugh Hewitt's been replaying the speech the president made earlier today in Kansas City. The entire MSM is hammering Dubya's for his comparison of Iraq to WWII and Vietnam, but they're missing a key bit of info (or conversely you could say that once again the administration isn't communicating our successes in Iraq again): More than 10,000 terrorists killed or captured since January. Here's the text from Dubya's speech today: There is one group of people who understand the stakes, understand as well as any expert, anybody in America -- those are the men and women in uniform. Through nearly six years of war, they have performed magnificently. (Applause.) Day after day, hour after hour, they keep the pressure on the enemy that would do our citizens harm. They've overthrown two of the most brutal tyrannies of the world, and liberated more than 50 million citizens. (Applause.) In Iraq, our troops are taking the fight to the extremists and radicals and murderers all throughout the country. Our troops have killed or captured an average of more than 1,500 al Qaeda terrorists and other extremists every month since January of this year. (Applause.) We're in the fight. Today our troops are carrying out a surge that is helping bring former Sunni insurgents into the fight against the extremists and radicals, into the fight against al Qaeda, into the fight against the enemy that would do us harm. They're clearing out the terrorists out of population centers, they're giving families in liberated Iraqi cities a look at a decent and hopeful life. Our troops are seeing this progress that is being made on the ground. And as they take the initiative from the enemy, they have a question: Will their elected leaders in Washington pull the rug out from under them just as they're gaining momentum and changing the dynamic on the ground in Iraq? Here's my answer is clear: We'll support our troops, we'll support our commanders, and we will give them everything they need to succeed. (Applause.) So let's do the math: 1,500 dead or captured terrorists x 8 months = 12,000 dead or captured terrorists These are the type of word problems math teachers should be giving to their students. As of right now, there are 716 articles at Google news, referencing the president's speech. Any guesses on how many lead with the "More than 10,000 dead"? Or even worse, check out the Freudian slip at ABC (via Ace and Hot Air): Iraq like Vietnam - Bush's new talking point...

Jose Padilla found guilty

MIAMI, Florida (CNN) -- The jury in the Jose Padilla terror trial has found the American guilty of conspiracy to support Islamic terrorism overseas. Padilla's two co-defendants, Adham Hassoun and Kifan Jayyousi, were also found guilty on the three counts as charged: conspiracy to murder, kidnap, and maim people in a foreign country, conspiracy to provide material support for terrorists, and providing material support for terrorists. The verdict came after less than two days of deliberations, according to a U.S. District Court official. Sentencing is set for December 5th and he faces a maximum sentence of life in prison. Prosecutors played 70 intercepted phone calls for the jury, 7 of which actually included Padilla's voice. FBI specialists testified that the calls were conducted in code of course and when translated revealed that Padilla was discussing travelling overseas to fight with Islamic militants in Saudi Arabia and Afghanistan. I'm sure the leftie moonbats are all weeping into their no foam, soy lattes for this "freedom fighter" wannabe terrorist. We here at Cake or Death will chalk it up to good security and prevention of the deaths of thousands of Americans. Score one for the good guys! UPDATE @ 11:55am - Oh and then there's this damning piece of evidence (Thanks to Hot Air for the reminder) that the leftwing moonbats would like you to forget: The key piece of physical evidence was a five-page form Padilla supposedly filled out in July 2000 to attend an Al Qaeda training camp in Afghanistan, which would link the other two defendants as well to Usama bin Laden’s terrorist organization. The form, recovered by the CIA in 2001 in Afghanistan, contains seven of Padilla’s fingerprints and several other personal identifiers, such as his birthdate and his ability to speak Spanish, English and Arabic. Oops. But why let perfectly good things like facts get in the way of a freedom fighter wannabe terrorist?

Terrorists using cheese in attack dry runs

In a blatant display of disregard for the welfare of perfectly good cheese, terrorist splodeydopes are using hunks of fine cheddar and brie cheeses in the place of, say, C4 on 9/11 style dry runs. WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Police across the country should be on the lookout for what could be "dry runs" for a terrorist attack, the Transportation Security Administration advised after series of suspicious incidents occurred at U.S. airports. An unclassified advisory, sent July 20 from TSA to law enforcement agencies, raised the possibility that recent activity could be "pre-attack security probes." [...] The advisory details four incidents from the past 11 months in which screeners found unusual objects with items that could mimic bomb components in passengers' checked or carry-on bags. In one case last September, a couple in Baltimore, Maryland, checked a plastic bag with a block of processed cheese taped to another plastic bag containing a cell phone charger. Earlier this month in San Diego, California, a passenger checked a bag containing two ice packs covered in duct tape. The ice packs had clay in them instead of the normal blue gel. In the name of all good cheeses everywhere, contact your elected officials! Something must be done to prevent further harm to the fine cheeses of this great nation! Oh, and the people too... hate to see something bad happen to them either...

Saudis arrest 172 in airplane terror plot

They're saying this plot was at the zero hour. Even scarier then that is how extremely well funded these psychos were. Times Online - Police in Riyadh say that they have arrested Islamic militants who were being trained as pilots to fly suicide attacks on Saudi Arabia’s oil fields. The Saudi interior ministry issued a statement saying that the 172 detainees held in raids today were involved in plots to carry out suicide atttacks against “public figures, oil facilities, refineries ... and military zones". Some of the planned targets were outside the Saudi kingdom. “They had reached an advance stage of readiness and what remained only was to set the zero hour for their attacks,” Brigadier Mansour al-Turki, an interior ministry spokesman, told the Associated Press news agency. “They had the personnel, the money, the arms. Almost all the elements for terror attacks were complete, except for setting the zero hour for the attacks.” The ministry did not say that the militants would fly aircraft into oil refineries, as the 9/11 hijackers flew planes into buildings in New York and Washington, but it said in a statement that some detainees had been “sent to other countries to study flying in preparation for using them to carry out terrorist attacks inside the kingdom”. The militants also planned to storm Saudi prisons to free the inmates, the statement said. In their crackdown, the police seized large quantities of weapons, explosives and money. More than 120 million riyals (US$32.4 million) had been seized in the operation, one of the largest sweeps against terror cells in the kingdom. Wow. It makes me wonder though, suppose this plot had been fully executed, assuming the targets were strictly located in the Saudi kingdom, how would that change the perception of the world toward the GWOT, toward the Bush adminstration, and to the US/west in general? Saudi Arabia says they're an ally, but in reality they're no major help. If the Saudis were devestated by several suicide air attacks, the US is instantly there with aid and any military support they request. Saudi Arabia immediately moves away from the terrorist groups and their politics and begins to vigorously pursue them, ostracizing them from the majority of society. Perhaps the marginalized terrorists begin to lash out more like their bastard Iraqi insurgent brothers; they're not part of the solution for the country so they turn to the only option they have: cowardly acts of violence and murder. World opinion can't hammer Arabs for trying to police and protect themselves, so as an Arab nation takes the point (even if only for the moment) in the fight against terrorism, the world supports them, re-legitimizing the GWOT and strengthening Iraqi resolve and our position in it. Bush is once again the maverick cowboy trying to police the world. Of course excellent intelligence, surveillance, and police work went into preventing these planned attacks, no doubt saving thousands of lives. So I guess we'll never know how the world would react because the MSM sure as hell won't pay this story any attention.

Peace committed Palestinians fire barrage of rockets into Israel

That's how much they support the peace process. JERUSALEM, April 24 — The military wing of Hamas fired a barrage of rockets and mortar shells from Gaza into Israel today for the first time since the Palestinian faction committed to a cease-fire in November. A spokesman for the military wing in Gaza, who identified himself only as Abu Obeideh, declared the truce over. But more moderate political figures from Hamas who participate in the Palestinian unity government, including Prime Minister Ismail Haniya, said they were making efforts to preserve the cease-fire. And a spokesman for the Hamas movement in Gaza, Ismail Radwan, stopped short of calling off the cease-fire, saying today’s attacks were “a natural response to Israeli aggression and violations of the truce in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.” Over the weekend, Israeli forces killed up to nine Palestinians, mostly militants in the West Bank, in the course of military operations and confrontations. The November cease-fire agreement pertained only to Gaza. Palestinian leaders have asked to extend it to the West Bank, but Israeli officials have said that it must be implemented properly in Gaza first. Smaller Palestinian factions like Islamic Jihad, which rejected the cease-fire, have continued firing rockets at Israel on an almost daily basis. On. a. daily. basis. And the Paleswinian government terrorists wonder why there are confrontations at checkpoints. Maybe it because the Israeli government takes Paleswinian slime killing its citizens seriously. What a novel concept. What kind of response would you expect from a government after enemies sworn to the complete obliteration of not only the Israeli state, but the Jewish people as well, fire over 100 rockets and mortars into your cities. I'd say bombing begins in 10 minutes, but that's just me.

This is the type of scum that our troops are dealing with in Iraq

And for leftist moonbat like Michael Moore, he can say the Iraqis insurgents are the new minutemen. Well, I'm sorry but I don't remember George Washington using children to get close to the British and then killing them the same as he would kill his enemy. VOA - A senior U.S. military officer says insurgents in Iraq used two children to help them pass a coalition checkpoint in Baghdad in recent days, and then detonated a car bomb, killing the children. The officer reported the incident during a news conference at the Pentagon, and VOA's Al Pessin reports. Major General Michael Barbero says this is the first time he has heard of insurgents using what he called this brutal and ruthless technique. "We saw a vehicle with two children in the back seat come up to one of our checkpoints, get stopped by our folks, the children in the back seat lowered suspicion, we let it move through," he said. "They parked the vehicle, the adults ran out and detonated with the children in the back." And somehow the coalition forces, who are trying to stop this kind of senseless murder get lambasted by the anti-war freaks and the MSM as the bad guys. That's f*cked up.

More good results from Gitmo

As much as liberal weenies have complained about Gitmo and how we're violating the civil rights of the prisoners there, we continue to get good results in the form of confessions for attacks perpetrated against the United States and if we're getting confessions, I'm sure we're getting actionable intel as well. And here's the latest. Waleed bin Attash, a prisoner at Gitmo just confessed to planning and purchasing materials for the attack on the USS Cole and the two attacks on our African embassies. You remember, those attack on US sovereign territory, before we invaded Iraq and deposed Saddam, before Afghanistan and the removal of the Taliban, before the GWOT, before 9/11; way back when al Qaeda was at war with us even though we'd done nothing to provoke them besides exist. Now of course we're at war with them and the liberal world condemns us for it, but that's another story... WASHINGTON — Waleed bin Attash, a suspected key al-Qaida operative, confessed to plotting the bombings of the USS Cole and two U.S. embassies in Africa, according to a Pentagon transcript of a hearing at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. More than 200 were killed in the simultaneous attacks on the embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998. And 17 sailors were killed and dozens injured when suicide bombers steered an explosives-laden boat into the guided missile destroyer Cole on Oct. 12, 2000. "I participated in the buying or purchasing of the explosives," bin Attash said when asked what his role was in the attacks. "I put together the plan for the operation a year and a half prior to the operation, buying the boat and recruiting the members that did the operation." The point of this and the previously released transcript, is an effort by the military to determine whether several Gitmo detainees can be classified as enemy combatants in which case we'd be able to hold them indefinitely. I vote for indefinitely. How about you?

California state employees' pensions are funding terrorists

Beyond the fact that their pensions will eventually bankrupt the state, the California Public Employees' Retirement System (CalPERS) system invests in companies that do business with terrorists. Double trouble... The California Public Employees' Retirement System, the largest U.S. pension fund, and the state teachers' fund would have to unload shares in companies including BNP Paribas of France, Siemens AG of Germany and Eni SpA of Italy. ``Who's funding terrorism? It sure as hell shouldn't be our public employees,'' said Joel Anderson, a Republican assemblyman from El Cajon who introduced the measure. ``When you're looking at the war on terrorists, this is one of the best weapons we have -- just defunding them.'' Anderson estimated his legislation would affect $24 billion worth of investments. [...] Calpers and the California State Teachers' Retirement System control $388 billion in investments. The legislation would affect overseas-based companies, since U.S. businesses are already mostly barred from trading with the countries on the State Department list: Iran, Sudan, Cuba, North Korea and Syria. Some might say these companies can't be that bad, can they? BNP Paribas has current investments in Iran valued over $2 billion including directly lending cash to the Iranian government (and they still can't seem to pay back the Russians for their nuclear technology). And on top of that BNP was probed by British intelligence for its involvement in the Iraq Oil for Food scandal. Siemens AG is a leading telecommunications company that has done billions on dollars of work in Iran on their cell phone and fixed line networks. They also did business with Saddam's regime in Iraq selling him devices called lithotripters. These devices were designed for medical purposes but their electric switches can be used as nuclear detonators (think that will come up in the Plame hearings?). Eni SpA, an energy company, currently has $4 billion in investments in Iran with stakes in Iran's oil fields of up to 60%. They continue to help Iran develop their extnesive oil reserves. There are some 400 companies that do business with nations that sponsor terrorism. The Center for Security Policy has a list of the 12 worst offenders. Siemens AG is #1 on that list; BNP Paribas is #4 and Eni SpA is # 6. Other companies you may have heard of that are on their Dirty Dozen list are Alcatel SA, Statoil ASA, Stolt Nielsen, Technip Coflexip, Hyundai, Total SA, Lundin Petroleum, Oil & Natural Gas Corp. Ltd., and PetroChina. Considering all this CalPERS and CalSTRS representatives currently have no position other than to say that they don't invest directly in Iran. That's brilliant. I'm still in shock that Saddam was sold technology that could easily be used as triggers for a nuclear weapon...

Senate Republicans stand firm and block the Democrats attempt to force troop withdrawal

The only Republican that broke ranks and voted with the Dems was Sen. Gordon Smith of Oregon. WASHINGTON, March 15 — The Senate on Thursday rejected a Democratic resolution to withdraw most American combat troops from Iraq in 2008, but a similar measure advanced in the House, and Democratic leaders vowed to keep challenging President Bush to change course in Iraq. Go to Complete Coverage » The vote in the Senate was 50 against and 48 in favor, 12 short of what was needed to pass, with just a few defections in each party. It came just hours after the House Appropriations Committee, in another vote largely on party lines, approved an emergency spending bill for Iraq and Afghanistan that includes a timeline for withdrawal from Iraq. The House will vote on that legislation next Thursday, setting the stage for another confrontation. [...] The Democratic resolution in the Senate would have redefined the United States mission in Iraq and set a goal of withdrawing American combat troops by March 31, 2008, except for a “limited number” focused on counterterrorism, training and equipping Iraqi forces, and protecting American and allied personnel. The House measure set a withdrawal deadline of Sept. 1, 2008. Good work Senate Republicans blocking the Democrats proposal. Setting a set date for withdrawal is like giving the terrorists a date after which they can do whatever they want. It's like Aussie Prime Minister Howard had said about a possible presidential Democratic victory in '08: "If I were running al-Qaeda in Iraq, I would put a circle around March, 2008, and pray as many times as possible for a victory, not only for Obama, but also for the Democrats." Whatever date we set for withdrawal, I'm sure the terrorists' calendar would have a big circle around that date. But cheer up Democrats. Your party finally did a couple things right. They finally had an original idea, and they actually tried to enact policy based on that idea. Sure it was about as wrong an idea as they could have possibly come up with, but at least it's more than the pointless anti-Bush blather that they usually rely on.

Al Qaeda #3 confesses to plotting 9/11 attacks plus dozens more

We'd suspected as much for years, but I won't turn down a flat out confession... Washington, D.C. (AHN) - Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, long suspected as the chief architect of the Sept. 11 terror attacks, confessed to masterminding those attacks and dozens more during a U.S. military hearing held Saturday at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, according to a transcript released Wednesday by the Department of Defense. "I was responsible for the 9/11 operation, from A to Z," says Mohammad. In a meandering series of admissions, Mohammad claims full or partial responsibility for nearly 30 terror actions, including the 1993 World Trade center bombing, a blast at an Indonesian nightclub, the attempt by Richard Reid to use shoe bombs on an airliner over the Atlantic, and the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks that brought down the World Trade Center towers and damaged the Pentagon. On the edited transcript, Mohammad, a key aide to Osama bin Laden, also admits being the principal behind plots to assassinate Pope John Paul II and Presidents Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton. I bet this guy is a wealth of good intel and I hope they get all that they need from him in a timely manner now that he appears willing to cooperate. But what's slightly more interesting in this piece, beyond the confession, is this little quote. [...] Towards the end of his statement, Mohammad compared himself to a patriot, saying that "if now we were living in the Revolutionary War and George Washington he being arrested through Britain, for sure he, they would consider him enemy combatant." Hmmmm... Now where have we seen that comment before? What liberal idiot has compared the terrorists to the minute men? Hmmmm... I wonder... UPDATE @ 3:19pm: Mohommad also claims he personally beheaded Daniel Pearl too.

Iraq cracks down on terrorist imports from Iran and Syria

They closed the borders. Maybe America has something to learn from Iraq... Iraq is closing its borders with Iran and Syria as part of a security crackdown to attempt to rein in violence. The new measures were announced by the Iraqi official in charge of the security plan, Lieutenant-General Abboud Qanbar. "We have decided to close two Syrian and four Iranian border posts for 72 hours," he said. "The Iranian border post of al-Sheeb will reopen partially after one week and fully after 60 days, other border posts will remain closed until further notice." A government official said an announcement would be made when the frontiers had been closed. Iraqis making and executing policies. That's a good sign. There is a lot of border to watch there though. Hopefully they can keep an eye on enough of it to keep Iranian and Syrian influences out of Iraq.

It's always fun mixing it up with dissenting, anonymous commenters...

This person wasn't exactly a troll, but did their best to cover their tracks... So I thought I'd post their original comment as well as my repsonse. It's so much easier to read when you don't have to scroll through those tiny Haloscan comments windows... I stumbled across you blog. it's so fascinating to read a conservative perspective on war. The problem I have with Iraq war is the number of Iraqi deaths. The fucked up situation in Iraq wasn't created by Americans...it happened way before all of that with the division of the Ottoman empire...the formation of a multi-tribed nation state later living under a dictator... the problems are complex but why are American troops in there trying to liberate a country and killing so many people in the process? THere's this paternalistic attitude that only Americans can save these people because they are too uncivilised to govern themselves. They support unpopular governments that promote the American agenda. While the idea of saving a country from an evil dictator is noble (and Hollywood) the reality is the dictator is dead, there are more people dying. What is being gained from this war? Meanwhile North Korea has nukes, and after seeing what happened in Iraq I'm sure more countries will be nuking up to protect themselves. The only country that has ever dropped a nuke on a civillian population is us. More people will die for nothing. So many in Iraq already have. An American life is not worth more than an Iraqi life. All life is equal. You people amaze me with your over simplification of issues. I guess it makes the world an easier place to live in. Have a nice life. - Interest A fabulous comment, no? So here's my reply... Hey, thanks for stopping by. Other perspectives are always welcome here. I can appreciate your concern for the Iraqi civilian casualties, and I agree that the problem in Iraq (and the Middle East in general) is based on issues and hatreds centuries old. We are coming into this fight a bit late... And that's about where my agreement with you ends. 99% of civilians killed in Iraq were murdered by the insurgents in an effort to break the spirit of not just Americans, but Iraqis as well. They're certainly not being killed by US troops. All you have to do is read any newspaper or tune to any news program to see the latest car bomb at a market, mosque, or recruitment center. And since you appear to by confused by who's who over there, our guys are the ones wearing uniforms, in jeeps, holding guns. You know... normal soldiers. The bad guys are hiding among the innocent, using them as shields, blowing them up in an effort to blackmail us. What I love about the liberal perspective is how they make the terrorists moral equivalents to our troops. They kill civilians, we kill terrorists. Apparently that's a distinction only those not blinded by their liberal hate can recognize. As far as the popularity contest, you'd prefer be the main priority of the US government, the Iraqi government is only unpopular with the insurgents. The average Iraqi was thrilled at the chance to vote on their leadership. Just see the poll turnouts. And they're damn thankful we ignored the rest of the world and helped free them from the oppressive, genocidal, murderer that had been ruling their country. As far as North Korea and their nukes, you've got a great example of what happens when you ignore the rest of the world and rely 100% on diplomatic efforts. Kim Jong Il flat out lied to Clinton, signed the nuclear proliferation treaty, and then went ahead with his nuclear programs anyway. We didn't attack NK, or anywhere nearby that made him fear for the safety of his nation. Evil dictators don't need an excuse for their nuclear agendas, and saying they'd only pursue nukes because we are in the region is a gross, childish oversimplification. Sure we've got nukes and yes we've used them and we did so to force the hand of an adversary unwilling to surrender. How long should we have let that war drag on? That of course brings us to your million dollar question, why are we there? How's national security, global war on terror, and freeing an oppressed people strike you? And wouldn't you know it, that also shows that we value Iraqi life just as much as we value American life. We value it so much that we're sending our own sons and daughters there, risking their lives for the lives of Iraqis. Some might even argue we're valuing the lives of the Iraqis more than our own. Regardless, it certainly doesn't prove we don't value Iraqi lives. So when you're done oversimplifying things with your pacifist hopes and dreams that we ought to be trying to make a world were all problems are solved with hugs and puppy dogs, I'll be having a nice life. In reality. Anyone want to add something? Feel free to leave a comment! And hopefully, in the next couple days, I'll get a chance to repsond to a global warming email I got. This guy didn't like the little Al Gore image over on the left... So check back soon for that!

Lest we forget that terrorism and specifically al Qaeda aren't limited to Iraq

I think we're so focused on our own problems and issues in Iraq and to a lesser extent in Afghanistan, that we're losing the bigger picture. Terrorism is still a major threat in the world and al Qaeda, and their evil spawn sub-groups, is still the foremost perpetrator of terrorist attacks around the world. Playfuls - Seven people were killed, five of them soldiers, in separate attacks by terrorist groups in Algeria over a 48-hour period, local media reported Tuesday. Four soldiers and a local policeman were killed early Monday in a mortar attack on a military base at Batna, 435 kilometres east of the capital Algiers. In the ensuing reprisal, Algerian troops killed about 10 members of the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC), a terrorist group associated with al Qaeda, in a sweeping operation in the region around Batna. In addition, one Algerian soldier was killed and another injured during a battle with suspected Islamist terrorists at Ain Kechra, some 550 kilometres east of Algiers. In related news, a former fighter for Algerian independence was found dead at a fake military roadblock erected by Islamic insurgents at Boumerdes, 50 kilometres east of Algiers. Terrorism isn't just a threat to Iraqis, it's a worldwide threat, and worldwide includes us. The MSM focuses all their attention on Iraq and can't seem to see anything outside of Iraq like the above al Qaeda terrorist attack in Algeria. Or what about this story about terrorist gangs in the Netherlands. Or a similar story from Toronto. Or Sri Lanka. Or Yemen. So don't forget to ignore the rest of the world, and remember America is the root of all problems great and small. If only we got out of Iraq and Afghanistan, all terrorism would stop immediately, and peace would reign over the world... Nevermind the millions of people freed from oppressive regimes that used torture, rape, murder, and genocide as basic tools for governing... But that's not what's important to the anti-war crowd. War is bad. War for oil. War for Halliburton. Give peace a chance and all the other lame slogans that are nothing more than cheap, meaningless soundbites. So if you're tired of people who don't think beyond their three word soundbite directing policy for the nation, go take the pledge. Tell Congress that war is tough, but the only way we'll lose this one is if we give up, so grow a set of brass ones and do what it takes to win the war. We already invested so much, why give up part way through? All that does is invalidate all that has been accomplished, abandon a fragile, new democracy, and make the sacrifice our soldiers have made pointless. Sign the pledge.

Palestine calls for ceasefire with itself

I wonder if they had to bring Jimmy Carter in the broker this deal... Gaza City, Jan 30, 2007 (AFP) – The Palestinian ruling party Hamas and its rivals Fatah late Monday called a joint ceasefire after four days of vicious factional fighting left 33 people dead, the territories’ foreign minister said. […] The ceasefire statement also called for militants loyal to both parties to release hostages they have taken from each side over recent days. [Minister Mahmud] Zahar added that Haniay and Abbas would meet soon to relaunch a dialogue. The call came after the worst violence since Hamas won a landslide election a year ago. The unrest torpedoed on and off talks to broker power-sharing agreement and sparked Arab diplomatic efforts to appease the disturbances. Where else is 4 days of fighting, taking hostages, and 33 dead just another week of poltics as usual? And people wonder why this Palestinian blogger has just about given up, resorting to approving of Israeli military intervention. Israel poising to respond on Eilat attack, it could be by the aerial bombardment and artillery, or perhaps they will try to assassinate Palestinian resistance leaders, what a ironically, we really want that to happen quickly, it might be the only solution to stop the bloody fighting between brothers in the Gaza Strip. “They said that the shedding of Palestinian blood is a red line, which has happened to them, the Red waldem become everywhere in the streets, hospitals and houses of Gaza, what remains of taboos that they talked about! [...] It's defective to reach such thinking, to call Israel to stop this shameful chapter in the chapters of the Palestinian case, if there is case still after all that has already happened and is happening. So Israel, be merciful and stop the killing! Just go in a bomb the hell out of Gaza. It's the only solution. They said it... not me...

Zawahiri says elections are for the birds. Blowing up people is the way to go

That's what he told Palestinians. Nevermind that they elected Hamas into their government. They should stick to what they do best. Car bombs at pizza parlors. Dec. 20 (Bloomberg) -- Al-Qaeda's second in command, Ayman al-Zawahiri, urged Palestinians to reject elections and wage Islamic holy war to "liberate Palestine," warning that attempts to form a national unity government will fail. "Any road other than jihad will only lead to loss and failure," al-Zawahiri said in a videotaped message broadcast today on the Qatar-based al-Jazeera television channel. "Anyone trying to liberate the land of Islam through elections based on secular constitutions or on decisions to surrender Palestine to the Jews will not free a grain of sand," he said. Jihad is the only way. The sad thing is they'll keep the jihad as long as 40% of the population continues to be teenage boys, and as long as they hate the Jews more than they love their children (as the famous quote goes...). How else to you convince someone to commit suicide for you...

Did the 6 Imam's removed from a US Airways flight stage the whole thing?

Investors Business Daily has this interesting take on the story... By most accounts, the six bearded men were behaving suspiciously at a time when airports were on high alert for sky terror during the holidays. "There were a number of things that gave the flight crew pause," an airline spokesman said. According to witnesses and police reports, the men: • Made anti-American statements. • Made a scene of praying and chanting "Allah." • Asked for seat-belt extensions even though a flight attendant thought they didn't need them. • Refused requests by the pilot to disembark for more screening. Also, three of the men had only one-way tickets and no checked baggage. Police had to forcibly remove the men from the flight, whereupon they were taken into custody. A search found no weapons or explosives, and they were released to continue on their journey. Within hours, the men enlisted a Muslim-rights group to make a stink in the press, insisting they were merely imams returning home from an Islamic conference in Minneapolis. They say they were "harassed" because of their faith. But were they victims or provocateurs? Read the whole article. There's too many coincidences in this story with previous alleged terrorist funding, radical mosques supporting islamofacists, and previously filed racial-profiling lawsuits for this to have been happenstance. All you've got to do is connect the dots... UPDATE 11/28/06 @ 5:01pm: Hot Air took some time to connect those dots for us...

Lebanon cancels Independence day celebrations

In the wake of yesterday's assassination of Pierre Gemayel and attempted assassination of Michel Pharaon, today became a day of sorrow as opposed to the joyous occassion it should have been. Lebanon canceled Independence Day celebrations and people huddled around televisions to watch the live broadcast Wednesday of dignitaries paying last respects to a Christian politician whose assassination threatened to push the country's political crisis into wider violence. [...] Pierre Gemayel, the minister of industry, was killed Tuesday when two cars blocked his vehicle at an intersection in the suburbs of Beirut and an assassin shot him numerous times through a side window. His killing - the fifth murder of an anti-Syrian figure in Lebanon in two years - immediately drew condemnation from all quarters. Prime Minister Fuad Saniora and Pierre's father and former president Amin Gemayel received calls from national leaders around the world including of course George Bush and Pope Benedict. Thousands of mourners filled the streets to mourn with the Gemayel family...

What to do with Iran...

It's funny to see this coming from the LATimes, but it's an op-ed that basically says diplomacy's failed, start bombing Iran. So if sanctions won't work, what's left? The overthrow of the current Iranian regime might offer a silver bullet, but with hard-liners firmly in the saddle in Tehran, any such prospect seems even more remote today than it did a decade ago, when students were demonstrating and reformers were ascendant. Meanwhile, the completion of Iran's bomb grows nearer every day. Our options therefore are narrowed to two: We can prepare to live with a nuclear-armed Iran, or we can use force to prevent it. Former ABC newsman Ted Koppel argues for the former, saying that "if Iran is bound and determined to have nuclear weapons, let it." We should rely, he says, on the threat of retaliation to keep Iran from using its bomb. Similarly, Newsweek International Editor Fareed Zakaria points out that we have succeeded in deterring other hostile nuclear states, such as the Soviet Union and China. Go figure... the MSM runs around in circles screaming "the sky is falling, the sky is falling." I don't know that I'd totally throw in the towel on revolutionary elements within Iran, but time is short. If that's still an option, something needs to happen there fast. Besides that, our options are bleak if we continue to put all our eggs into the diplomacy basket. Do we simply sit back and hope Israel can take out all of Iran's reactors? If that fails we're faced with a nuclear Iran, and what Koppel fails to realize is that this would be more than just a cold war. Iran would be more than willing to pass a nuke off to a terrorist group. Why else could they want an Iranian, Saif Adel, to take bin Laden's place as al Qaeda's leader? That'd certainly be convenient, wouldn't it? And what about the power shifft in the region? Israel's nuclear program is probably the only reason they still exist, along with their willingness to pre-emptively strike at those attempting to develop nukes. Would a nuclear Iran send Iraq's fledgling democracy into a tailspin? And Syria could easily hop on the coat tails of their nieghbor. Syria's going to continue to get bolder as we continue to wring our hands, so we'll get more demands from Syria, like their current demand for a timetable of our withdrawal from Iraq. Should we take bets on what Iran wants to discuss with this summit they've invited Syria and Iraq to? They say it's about the sectarian violence, but if you take what Ahmadinejad tells you at face value, I've got some great beach front property in Arkansas I'd love to sell you. I'd like to keep the "bombing Iran back to the stone age" option on the shelf, but we're painting ourselves into a corner here...

Al Qaeda leader in Iraq takes credit for Rumsfeld's resignation

Why is it so hard for Americans to believe that the Iraqis are closely watching what we do here at home, including our elections? BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- A purported audio recording by the leader of al Qaeda in Iraq vows to step up the group's fight against the United States, saying, "We haven't had enough of your blood yet." The recording was posted Friday on an Islamist Web site and the speaker is identified as Abu Hamza al-Muhajer, successor to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. Al-Muhajer is also known as Abu Ayyub al-Masri. "Come down to the battlefield, you coward," the speaker says on the recording, which CNN cannot independently confirm as the voice of al-Muhajer. Calling President Bush a "lame duck" the speaker tells Bush not to "run away as your lame defense secretary ran away," referring to Donald Rumsfeld, who resigned Wednesday. [...] The speaker on the tape vows that al Qaeda in Iraq will not stop its jihad "until we sit under the olive trees in Rumiya after we blow up the wicked house known as the White House." He says the first phase of the jihad is now over, and that the next phase -- building an Islamic nation -- has begun. "The victory day has come faster than we expected," he says. "Here is the Islamic nation in Iraq victorious against the tyrant. The enemy is incapable of fighting on and has no choice but to run away." And being that we're in a "lame duck session" on top of Rumsfeld's resignation, America needs to take note that our actions at home are being monitored by the terrorists, and they're taking their cues from us. Rumsfeld's resignation is seen as a retreat. The Republican's loss in the midterm election is seen as weakness. America take note. We are under surveillance...