No Single Answer

"The Canadian Museum For Human Rights, run by wealthy children of settlers, decided local Indigenous people's heritage does not deserve the same respect as their own ancestors and history.. [It is] a decision rooted in cultural superiority, arrogance and privilege ... The CMHR was constructed with the same Eurocentric arrogance that stole peoples' lands, food sources and eventually their children; Eurocentric arrogance that determines that their pet projects are more worthy of public funds than affordable housing and justice for missing and murdered Indigenous women."
Kimlee Wong, Rabble.ca

There's a boatload of spiteful hate, a balance on the scales of rewriting history to suit the sourly venomous victim culture so popular with the left of today; the other side of the balance is its vitriolic spewing at the Canadian Museum For Human Rights whose purpose is to highlight human rights, using the 20th Century atrocity called the Holocaust as the epitome of the destruction of basic human rights: the right to exist, in its genocidal approach to cleansing the world of Jews.

Acclamation for the accomplishment of planning and building such an edifice dedicated to improving the lot of humans among other humans has trickled in from all manner of sources. Condemnations have thundered in from predictable sources, from the Ukrainian Canadian Congress, from disgruntled aboriginals, from Palestinians, from Canadians for Genocide Education protesting that the museum was built on "stolen" aboriginal land.


The elevation of one horrific mass atrocity (the Holocaust) over all other seemingly similar attempts to wipe out an ethnic, tribal, religious group has soured many people and groups with their own particular ax to grind on the purpose and usefulness of the museum. "There is no single answer" is the mantra of the museum, to accommodate all the complaints, doubts and concerns about its function and presentation.



Close to equal space is given over to the other victims of Nazi persecution and ghoulish brutality as that portrayed for Jews, with representation of homosexuals, Romani, the disabled, Jehovah's Witnesses and political activists all given their due through their suffering from genocidal totalitarianism. Controversy about the aboriginal content lies mostly, it would appear, in that there are no direct affirmations of what First Nations contend; that Canada has engaged in a genocide against them.

"Until this is rectified, we'll support the museum from a distance", huffed a hip hop band, enraged over the "misrepresentation and downplay of the genocide that was experienced by Indigenous people in Canada by refusing to name it genocide." This, from a tribal community that holds its members who marry outside the fold are committing miscegenation, committing themselves to the racist inclination to isolate and condemn, to refuse to allow mixed marriage entry to reserve land.

The five noted genocides; the Holocaust, Rwanda, Srebrenica, Armenia and the Holodomor, are all represented, but the Ukrainian Canadian Congress is insulted that the Jewish genocide gets top treatment and the panel on Stalin's forced starvation of Ukrainians was located too close to public toilets, which was, presumably, where the Holocaust presentation should logically have been situated.



The museum's provision of an opportunity for "an immersive, interactive experience that offers both the inspiration and tools to make a difference in the lives of others", appears to have inspired many to kvetch and moan that their very dear-to-their-hearts tragedy has not been sufficiently addressed. It addresses issues as disparate, but reflective of human rights as genocide, slavery, suffrage, health care, labour rights.

A "Garden of Contemplation" with winding paths and gentle pools of water offers space for reflection on what museum-goers have seen, leaving them to indulge in peaceful reflection. What more could be found wanting?

Asylum Seekers?

Two men, Mohamma Yasin Ataye, 22, and Mohd Naweed Samimi, 24, went missing in action from a group of Afghan police officers training with the Drug Enforcement Administration in Quantico, Virginia, while on a side trip to Washington on September 13. They're there, in the United States, on trust, having been completely vetted, according to U.S. Central Command. On a spur-of-the-moment whimsy these trusted and cleared Afghans made their way to Buffalo, N.Y. where they were discovered five days later.

The DEA explained that the men had been especially selected to participate in the training program put on by the administration since they were among "the best and brightest" in their country. They were, after being apprehended in Buffalo where they explained they were searching for family, returned to Afghanistan in the wake of the balance of the class of 29 other police officers who had completed their five-week training program, three days earlier.

According to Rusty Payne, a spokesman for the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration "They were held and returned. They were not a security threat, not a danger. They were not armed. They were just looking for a better life". And whoops! that doesn't represent the only such little incident of wayward entrants to North America. Another three, this time with the Afghanistan National Army, disappeared while in a training program in Massachusetts.

They were detained in the process of attempting to cross the border into Canada. They were then held in the custody of the Canada Border Services Agency. Their point of attempted entry was the Rainbow Bridge, connecting Niagara Falls, New York, and Niagara Falls, Ontario. The Massachusetts State Police aided in their search, and they are now awaiting questioning by U.S. authorities. There are, of course, entirely legitimate processes of claiming refugee status, or emigrating from country B to country A.

Major Jan Mohammad Arash, Captain Mohammad Nasir Askzada and Captain Noorullah Aminyar were taking part in a U.S. joint military exercise at a Cape Cod military base. "There is a lot of speculation within the military that they may be trying to defect", ventured Governor Deval Patrick. "They were vetted by the military. They were cleared by the military", the governor told reporters. No one suspects, evidently they posed a public danger.

They were participating in a U.S. Central Command Regional Co-operation training exercise at Joint Base Cape Cod, having arrived at Camp Edwards on September 11, last seen at the Cape Cod Mall in Hyannis. Doesn't everyone go to the Mall? The exercise, involving over 200 participants from Tajikistan, Pakistan, Kazakhstan, Afghanistan and Mongolia, along with the United States, was scheduled to conclude on Wednesday. It was the Saturday before that the three were reported missing.

There were no immediate comments from the Pentagon, however. These missing men were senior military officers who had received clearance by the U.S. State Department, to enable them to participate in the joint military training exercises. Not that anyone might fail to commiserate with anyone seeking a better life, preferring to leave Afghanistan and migrate elsewhere, preferably somewhere in North America.

And they were vetted, after all. No one appears to have mentioned the frequent deadly trusted-and-vetted Afghan police and military working closely with their U.S. military mentors on training exercises who suddenly took it into their heads to raise their U.S.-issued weapons at the very NATO military mentors they were training with, and killing them.

"Since 2007, an estimated 80 NATO service members were killed by Afghan security forces, according to an Associated Press tally, which is based on Pentagon figures released in February. More than 75 percent of the attacks have occurred in the past two years.
Sixteen NATO service members — 18 percent of the 84 foreign troops killed so far this year — have been shot and killed by Afghan soldiers and policemen or militants disguised in their uniforms, according to the AP tally."                                CBS News 2012

Killing Disbelievers

"If you can kill a disbelieving American or European -- especially the spiteful and filthy French -- or an Australian, or a Canadian, or any other disbeliever from the disbelievers waging war, including the citizens of the countries that joined a coalition against the Islamic State, then rely upon Allah, and kill him in any manner or way however it may be."
"You will not feel secure in your bedrooms. You will pay the price when this crusade of yours collapses, and therefore we will strike you in your homeland, and you will never be able to harm anyone afterwards."
"Oh believer, do not let this battle pass you by wherever you may be. You must strike the soldiers, patrons and troops of the tyrants. Strike their police, security and intelligence members."
Abu Mohammed al-Adnani, spokesman, Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant

The man is basking in glory, he has his brilliant moment of fame for the jihadis and the ecstatic supporters of the ISIS/ISIL psychopaths. His moment of infamy in the opinion of horrified members of civil society, on the other hand. But no matter, attention has been focused on the man, just as it is focused on the depraved fantasies of the Islamic State whose agenda incorporates grisly crucifixions, beheadings, rape, mass murder and torture. They have become celebrities from Hell.

Spokesman for the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant Abu Mohammed al-Adnani...YouTube/AFP/Getty

The rhetoric represents a dictionary elaborately conceived to reflect the values of civil society, in the process turning them inside out. Those responding to stomach-churning atrocities are the belligerents, while the perpetrators of the atrocities are performing their duties to their faith, misunderstood by the West, and victimized by the West which seeks conflict with the courageous warriors of Islamic fanaticism.

"We are currently in the process of examining these laws [Government of Canada] and examining other means we may have to monitor and to take action against both organizations [Islamic State of Iraq and Al-Sham and the al-Qaeda Khorasan Group] and individuals who may undertake activities that are potentially threatening to Canadians."
"We are continuing our dialogue with our allies to identify ways we can assist in responding to what is a genuinely serious threat."
Prime Minister Stephen Harper

The 42-minute Arabic audio harangue recently released by ISIS online by its media arm, Al-Furqan appeared on extremist sites for easy access to their audience. The message it contains, according to security experts, should not be dismissed merely as propaganda. That it does represent propaganda aggrandizing the fanatical Islamists is undeniable; that the slick social media messaging of ISIL/ISIS has aided its recruitment drive in the West, is also undeniable.


^{Isil fighters during a parade in Raqqa, Syria (AP)}

Its actual potential as a threat level, perhaps less well perceived, let alone received. "This type of possibility is not just a threat, but a genuine risk. It's something that needs to be taken seriously", cautioned Christian Leuprecht, security expert at the Royal Military College of Canada and Queen's University. Canada has committed to playing a role in the mission led by the United States to destroy ISIL/ISIS's and al-Qaeda's capabilities with the assistance of allies, including those in the Middle East.

Canada's involvement in this mission to destroy the Islamic State and equally threatening al-Qaeda groups like al Nusra does put it in the bull's eye of terrorist response. "They have been capable (of recruiting) young people without speaking directly to them face to face. If they've been capable ... through the Internet to reach them, I wouldn't be surprised that they convince some of these people that, instead of travelling to the Middle East, to stay here and simply attack us here", stated Michel Juneau-Katsuya, former Canadian intelligence officer now with his own cybersecurity company.

Which then speaks to the government's response to those Canadian Muslims who have left the country to go abroad to fight as mujahadeen in North Africa and the Middle East. Those who have been identified by Canadian intelligence will have had their passports revoked. Which effectively leaves them stranded in the sense that without a passport legitimizing their claim to citizenship, they will be able to travel nowhere. They must then remain where they are, dedicated to jihad.



Now we need to complete the circle, in a sense. What has also been revealed is that Canadian Muslims who have exhibited an interest in travelling to fight as jihadis elsewhere in the world and who have been detained by intelligence services have also had their passports revoked. And then we're stuck with them in Canada. Who needs them? Return their passports until they have reached their foreign destination, then revoke them.

Presumably they won't be missed by the Canadian Islamic community, either. "Any invitation to commit acts of terrorism ... is both wholly un-Islamic and deeply repulsive to Canadian Muslims, as it is to all of Canada", reads a statement from the National Council of Canadian Muslims. Of course, they're not saying they aren't prepared to welcome them back to the fold.

Turkey’s Erdogan Abruptly Cancels Scheduled Meeting With Jewish Leader in New York

September 23, 2014 

Author:

Dave Bender

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Tayyip Erdogan, President of Turkey.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on Monday abruptly canceled a planned meeting with World Jewish Congress (WJC) leader Ronald Lauder in New York, according to a report appearing in the Turkish Today’s Zamen newspaper.

Erdoğan, who arrived in the United States on Monday for the 69th United Nations General Assembly session, refused to agree to a request to move the meeting with the influential advocacy group to later that evening, according to the private Doğan news agency, citing sources from Erdoğan’s entourage.

A WJC official told The Algemeiner on Tuesday that their group was “not commenting on this story.”

The English-language Turkish newspaper the Daily Sabah reported on the planned meeting and noted that Erdoğan “has previously vowed to protect the rights of the Jewish community in Turkey and has asserted that the government will never let the Jewish people in Turkey get hurt.”

But this summer, during Israel’s Operation Protective Edge, Erdoğan had accused the Jewish state of committing “genocide” and waging “terrorism” against the Palestinians. Erdoğan also said Israel’s “barbarism has surpassed even Hitler’s” and dismissed the possibility of normalizing relations with Israel.

Under his leadership, Turkish newspapers have printed columns calling on Turkish Jews to apologize for Israeli actions.

In July, Erdoğan agreed to return the “Profile of Courage” award he had received from the American Jewish Congress in 2004 for working to help bring peace to the Middle East and his commitment to protect the Jewish community in Turkey.

Erdoğan is scheduled to hold several meetings with world leaders during the week-long assembly session, among them US President Barack Obama, and UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.

While Israel has avoided criticizing Turkey and hoped to renew rocky ties in the four years since the infamous Gaza flotilla debacle, now Prime Minister Netanyahu’s government is emphasizing Ankara’s ties to terrorist activities in the Middle East – including support for Hamas, one of Israel’s main adversaries, NRG News reported in early September.

“Qatar and Turkey support Hamas and are members of the UN. Turkey is also a member of NATO,” Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon recently said at the 14th International Conference of the Institute for Counter-Terrorism at the Interdisciplinary Center Herzliya.

Dispensing with political niceties, Ya’alon demanded the international community draw a unified moral line in the sand against terrorism.

“The foreign terrorist headquarters of Hamas sits in Istanbul. Salah Aruri is the man sitting there. Where is the world? When we talk about the war on terror, it starts with whether we’re choosing to ignore this kind of phenomenon, countries which sponsor terrorism and terrorist activity without hiding it,” Ya’alon charged.

Top US General Says Arab Role in Islamic State Airstrikes Was Crucial

By Associated Press | September 23, 2014

 

WASHINGTON— Combined U.S.-Arab airstrikes at the heart of the Islamic State group’s military strongholds in Syria achieved their strategic aim of showing the extremists that their savage attacks will not go unanswered, the top American military officer said Tuesday.

The U.S. and five Arab nations attacked the Islamic State group’s headquarters in eastern Syria in nighttime raids Monday using land- and sea-based U.S. aircraft as well as Tomahawk cruise missiles launched from two Navy ships in the Red Sea and the northern Persian Gulf.

“We wanted to make sure that ISIL knew they have no safe haven, and we certainly achieved that,” Army Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said in an interview with a small group of reporters as he flew to Washington after a weeklong trip to Europe. ISIL is an alternate acronym for the Islamic State group whose fighters swept across much of Iraq this summer.

U.S. officials said five Arab nations either participated in the airstrikes or provided unspecified support. They were Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Bahrain, Jordan and the United Arab Emirates. Dempsey said their role was indispensable to the U.S. goal of showing that the battle to degrade and defeat the Islamic State group is not just a U.S. fight.

“I can’t overstate” the importance of the Arab role, he said. He called it an unprecedented coalition with Arab states and said the partnering has set the stage for a broader international campaign against the extremists.

Dempsey said the five Arab nations’ agreement to join in the airstrikes came together quickly; as recently as Sunday he told reporters that more Arab participation was needed before President Barack Obama would sign off on the strategic air campaign.

“Once we had one of them on board, the others followed quickly thereafter,” he said, adding that the partnership came together over the past three days. “We now have a kind of credible campaign against ISIL that includes a coalition of partners.”

Several hours after the Pentagon announced the airstrikes against Islamic State targets, U.S. Central Command said American warplanes also launched eight airstrikes “to disrupt the imminent attack plotting against the United States and Western interests” by a network of “seasoned al-Qaida veterans” — sometimes known as the Khorasan Group — who have established a haven in Syria. It provided no details on the plotting.

Central Command said that separate bombing mission was undertaken solely by U.S. aircraft and took place west of the Syrian city of Aleppo. It said targets included training camps, an explosives and munitions production facility, a communication building and command and control facilities.
The airstrikes against Islamic State targets were carried out in the city of Raqqa and other areas in eastern Syria. The strikes were part of the expanded military campaign that Obama authorized nearly two weeks ago in order to disrupt and destroy the Islamic State militants, who have slaughtered thousands of people, beheaded Westerners — including two American journalists — and captured large swaths of Syria and northern and western Iraq.

The airstrikes began around 8:30 p.m. EDT. Central Command said the U.S. fired 47 Tomahawk cruise missiles from aboard the USS Arleigh Burke and USS Philippine Sea, operating from international waters in the Red Sea and the northern Persian Gulf. U.S. Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps fighter jets, drones and bombers also participated.

Syria’s Foreign Ministry said the U.S. informed Syria’s envoy to the U.N. that “strikes will be launched against the terrorist Daesh group in Raqqa.” The statement used an Arabic name to refer to the Islamic State group.

At a conference on Sept. 11 with Secretary of State John Kerry, key Arab allies promised they would “do their share” to fight the Islamic State militants. The Obama administration, which at a NATO meeting in Wales earlier this month also got commitments from European allies as well as Canada and Australia, has insisted that the fight against the Islamic State militants could not be the United States’ fight alone.

Russia’s foreign ministry warned Tuesday that what it called “unilateral” air strikes would destabilize the region. “The fight against terrorists in the Middle East and northern Africa requires coordinated efforts of the entire global community under the auspices of the U.N.,” the foreign ministry said in a statement.

Activists said the airstrikes hit targets in and around the Syrian city of Raqqa and the province with the same name. Raqqa is the Islamic State group’s self-declared capital in Syria.

Rami Abdurrahman, who heads the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, told The Associated Press, “There is confirmed information that there are casualties among Islamic State group members.”

He added that missiles also targeted the towns of Tabqa, Ein Issa and Tel Abyad, as well as the village of Kfar Derian, which is a base for the al-Qaida-linked Nusra Front, a rival of the Islamic State group.

Another activist, Mohammed al-Dughaim, based in the northern Syrian province of Idlib, confirmed that several airstrikes hit Kfar Derian in the early hours of Tuesday. He said there were civilians among the casualties.

An amateur video posted online Tuesday shows explosions going off at night in an open area, blasts that are said to be from coalition airstrikes. The narrator in the video is heard saying that the footage shows the “bombardment of the Kfar Derian village.”

The head of the main Western-backed Syrian opposition group, Hadi Bahra, welcomed the commencement of airstrikes in Syria.

“We have called for airstrikes such as those that commenced tonight with a heavy heart and deep concern, as these strikes begin in our own homeland,” he said in a statement. “We insist that utmost care is taken to avoid civilian casualties.”

Dempsey repeatedly stressed the importance of having Arab participation and said it needs to extend beyond direct military roles to assisting in an international effort to undercut finances, recruiting and ideological support for the Islamic State group.

“What we’re talking about now is the beginning of an air campaign,” he said, adding that it must lead to what he called “the other air campaign” — an effort to fill public airwaves across the Muslim world with arguments for why the extremists must be defeated.

“These leaders now need to — and will — take on the responsibility to explain to the populace of the Arab-Muslim world why we’re doing what we’re doing so that we can strip away the cloak of religious legitimacy that ISIL has wrapped itself in,” he said.

In a speech Sept. 10, Obama vowed to go after the Islamic State militants wherever they may be. His military and defense leaders told Congress last week that airstrikes within Syria are meant to disrupt the group’s momentum and provide time for the U.S. and allies to train and equip moderate Syrian rebels.

The U.S. military has been launching targeted airstrikes in Iraq since August, focusing specifically on attacks to protect U.S. interests and personnel, assist Iraqi refugees and secure critical infrastructure. Last week, as part of the newly expanded campaign, the U.S. began going after militant targets across Iraq, including enemy fighters, outposts, equipment and weapons.

To date, U.S. fighter aircraft, bombers and drones have launched about 190 airstrikes within Iraq.
Urged on by the White House and U.S. defense and military officials, Congress passed legislation late last week authorizing the military to arm and train moderate Syrian rebels. Obama signed the bill into law Friday, providing $500 million for the U.S. to train about 5,000 rebels over the next year.

The militant group, meanwhile, has threatened retribution. Its spokesman, Abu Mohammed al-Adnani, said in a 42-minute audio statement released Sunday that the fighters were ready to battle the U.S.-led military coalition and called for attacks at home and abroad.
___
Burns reported from aboard a U.S. military aircraft. Associated Press writers Zeina Karam, Julie Pace and Matthew Lee in New York, Josh Lederman in Washington and Bassem Mroue in Beirut contributed to this report.

Gov., Boston police: No reason to believe city part of 'jihad pipeline'

Stoughton man accused joining ISIS, spreading messages on social media

www.wcvb.com/news

BOSTON —The federal government is targeting Boston and two other American cities to shut down what they are calling the U.S.-jihad pipeline to ISIS in an attempt to stop Americans from joining the terrorist organization, ABC News reported Monday.

• Official: Mass. man may be key in ISIS social media blitz
  

  An American college graduate from Boston, who has been on the run from the FBI for years, is suspected of joining ISIS and leveraging his computer skills to spread the Iraqi terror group's propaganda on social media, a senior law enforcement official told ABC News.
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But local officials said they have no reason to believe Boston is part of a Jihad pipeline.
Gov. Deval Patrick said he didn't believe Boston was a terrorist breeding ground, saying, "It's not fact yet."

"We get regular confidential and classified briefings on the intelligence that's available to all the intelligence forces, and there isn't any reason to for me to believe, or for the experts to believe, that Boston is a terrorist breeding ground," he said.

Efforts to shut down the pipeline will focus on Boston, Minneapolis and Los Angeles; cities where a number of young recruits for ISIS training originated.

Boston Police Commissioner William Evans told Team 5's Karen Anderson that Boston's involvement in the program has been in the works for months and there is no increased threat.
"Boston was chosen because of our ability to build partnerships in the community. That's why we were selected. We have a long history of community policing and the federal government recognizes that," Evans said.

"The U.S. Attorney’s Office is marshaling a national pilot project aimed at countering violent extremism using prevention and intervention-based approaches. The Boston region was selected for the strength of our existing relationships, community engagement and community oriented policing programs," U.S. Attorney Carmen Ortiz said in a statement.

Ahmad Abousamra, a dual American-Syrian citizen, was born in France but grew up in Stoughton and attended Xaverian Brothers Catholic High School in Westwood before transferring to Stoughton High School during his senior year.

Abousamra has been on the run from the FBI for years, and is suspected of joining ISIS and using his computer skills to spread ISIS' messages on social media, according to ABC News.

ISIS released new videos in which they are calling on Muslims to kill people in countries that belong to the anti-ISIS, United States-led coalition.

"If you can kill a disbelieving American or European, especially the spiteful and filthy French, or an Australian, or Canadian or any other disbeliever, then rely upon Allah, and kill him in any manner or way however it may be,' an ISIS spokesman said.

U.S. officials said Monday that confronting the threat from ISIS is now of the highest urgency, ABC News's Brian Ross reported.

"We are working very closely with our international partners to try and mitigate this threat," White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said. "And to try and keep eyes on individuals and to monitor their movements."

Turn of the Tide

"People are afraid of the air strikes, that they might be used as human shields or be bombed."
"Many people fled to the countryside or to Turkey. I can't say how many went but in my lane there are just 15 families left."
"When small planes for reconnaissance appear the jihadists hide. They even lock the doors of their headquarters. They also remove their families, their women and children, outside Raqqa."
Abu Mohammed, activist, Raqqa, Syria

"The people here don't want ISIL but they also don't trust America. If the U.S. is really against ISIS why did they turn a blind eye to Bashar al-Assad? He is a terrorist who bombs us."
Raqqa resident

"The ISIL threat is exaggerated. They are just fighters who won  battle because the other side just had light weapons. Moreover, they don't have public support."
Raqqa resident

"Two days ago, they left their main headquarters, and they moved to live inside our civilian neighbourhoods. They took over all the houses abandoned by their inhabitants, such as the houses of the Christians, former officials and people who left the city. They also use the poorer houses as stores for weapons."
Unnamed Mosul resident

AP Photo   Islamic State fighters parade with a missile, Raqqa, Syria

When ISIS took control of Raqqa and made it their headquareters, they initiated public executions soon after their takeover. There  they also indulged in mass beheadings of captives. This has not endeared them to the citizens of the city who had mostly welcomed the law and order they brought with them, originally. So there's some level of disgruntlement at their presence. And no small amount of satisfaction that recent bombings by France and the U.S. has suddenly made ISIS jihadis less visible in Raqqa.

Islamic State of Iraq and Al-Sham fighters are now mounting barricades, increasing checkpoints and booby-trapping roads that lead to Mosul, according to residents. Fearing the pledged U.S. air strikes and a land-based counter-offensive in both Iraq and Syria, residents living under ISIS rule are now witnessing a melting away of their fear. Scores of men in an ISIS training camp and an arms depot nearby Mosul were killed on Thursday and Friday, resulting from French and American air strikes.

Nothing sobers the victorious quite like the prospect of losing themselves to unplanned-for death. This, despite their boasts of martyrdom and how much they love death and fantasize their entrance as martyrs to Paradise. Command and control centres in Mosul and Raqqa have been evacuated. The courageous warriors of the Islamic State have begun using Yazidi women captives as "human shields". 

Kurdish Peshmerga in Iraq in the north and Iraqi army and Iranian-sourced militia forces have stabilized front lines nearer to Baghdad. While the jihadists had big gains to their triumphant credit in the summer, the last month has seen a loss of territory, along with control of the Mosul Dam returning to the government, as well a handful of towns and villages. Feeling more secure in Raqqa, headquarters has been set up by ISIS in the ornate former governor's palace.

If the ISIS jihadis are concerned about the air attacks hitting them, well so are the residents. While ISIS disperses its military vehicles and men to prevent them from becoming easy targets, the residents can only await the outcome of what they feel might occur, hoping against hope they will be spared the fate meant for the jihadists.

Local acrtivist Abu Mohammed remains in Raqqa, though as an activist ISIS has put a price on his head. In Mosul where local alliances with Sunni leaders fed up with the Iraqi government's treatment of Iraqi Sunnis had aligned themselves with ISIS, suddenly the risk of assassination of ISIS leaders is on their minds. Reports of local anti-ISIS hit squads attacking the rabidly fanatical ISIS leaders have been heard repeatedly.

According to Mosul residents, four ISIS fighters were killed last week, with some of the assassins taking advantage of ISIS's insistence that women wear niqabs and cloaks. Gearing themselves with these full body coverings gave the assassins the advantage to get close up and personal enough to kill their ISIS adversaries.

There remains residual support in both Mosul and Raqqa for ISIS, but opinion has turned. Abu Mohammed who operates the "Raqqa is being slaughtered silently" website protesting against both the jihadis and the Assad regime, stated that 20% of the population continued their support of ISIS, the rest divided about whether they support; U.S. intervention.

Gifted: Social Media

"They definitely have an electronic army behind them."
Ray Kafity, vice-president, FireEye for the Middle East, Turkey and Africa

"It's hard to wage a war with ideas online. When we talk about monitoring or controlling social media it is like trying to control air, and this of course is hard."
Abdulaziz Al-Mulhem, spokesman, Saudi Ministry of Information and Culture

"The most important thing is to be there.And that's something that I really do encourage governments to do, not to leave the space but to enter the space."
Elizabeth Linder, Facebook

The Isil post encourages would-be attackers to target Times Square in New York Photo: Alamy

Hard to believe, the power and prestige and contactability inherent in social media. The very idea that everyone has to have an on-line presence, to personally engage themselves with a site like Facebook so that anyone interested can look them up, assess their presence, establish contact -- or not -- and buy into the culture of social-visibility without which life is not complete, is hard enough to understand for anyone with an ounce of brains and commonsense. But that businesses, corporations, government entities, and now terror groups also indulge is mind-boggling.

But in a celebrity-obsessed, entitled-me ingrained culture, that appears to be a natural accommodation or resignation to what's popular and which social-contract expectations are to be met. If you're not on Facebook, why then you simply don't exist. Countries like Saudi Arabia and other Gulf State and Middle Eastern countries have yet to clue in to that little factoid made urgently important because of the influence it has on the public consumption of ideas and presence.

Evidently, its wrongwrongwrong to shut oneself out of the experience. I Facebook therefore I am. Well, it seems to work for Islamist terrorists. Through Twitter and Facebook and other social media sites without which contact no self-respecting individual can now afford to exist, propaganda is circulated and recruits to such important causes as Islamist responses to 'Islamophobia', Jews and Crusaders would not be as hugely possible as is turning out to be.

Militants from the al-Qaida-inspired Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) taking aim at captured Iraqi soldiers Photo: AP

Want to experience the thrill of witnessing a real, live beheading, and actually handling the results? Sign on, as pious Muslims determined to prove to Allah the Merciful that it wasn't only Prophet Mohammad who was capable of growing the worldwide ummah by violent conquest. It's the sole, reliable way to get the message across. Feel drawn to adventure with a soupcon of danger just to make the thrill all that more exciting come on down and we'll outfit you in this nifty black gear and train you in explosives-production and the art of sawing off heads.

Here's what doesn't appear to work: Saudi Arabia's council of religious scholars last week issued an Arabic statement through the state-operated news agency firmly denouncing terrorism, calling on citizens to support the fight against groups like the Islamic State and al-Qaeda. They're not the only religious authorities evidently who have committed in this way. Sunni Muslim authorities in Egypt have also issued similar government-backed statements. The kicker being, of course, that wealthy Sunnis in Egypt and Saudi Arabia have encouraged and funded these Islamists.

But does the message work? Are people hearing it and being convinced? Seems not. On the other hand, there's the Islamic State group with its slick media arm producing videos with interviews, graphics and jihadist hymns in the background, produced with Arabic and English subtitles. As entertainment it's unparallelled. Where else in quasi real-time can you see a beheading, an interview explaining its necessity, and an invitation to join the courageous Islamist jihadis awaiting your presence?

Connection: The use of the word 'geezer' in the translation of al-Adnani's description of John Kerry is yet more evidence of strong ties between Britain and Isis, according to an expert

Jihadis now tweet live from the field of combat, offering real-time updates and at the same time quipping knowledgeably with both detractors and supporters on line. They're beyond mere cool. Thousands of foreign fighters who have joined the Islamic State, drawn to it from cyberspace, have brought their Internet skills with them, and they're most helpful in the use of social media for fundraising.



This undated file image posted on Aug. 27, 2014, by the Raqqa Media Center of the Islamic State group, which has been verified and is consistent with other AP reporting, shows a fighter of the Islamic State group waving their flag from inside a captured government fighter jet following the battle for the Tabqa air base, in Raqqa. (AP Photo/Raqqa)

According to Fadi Salem, Dubai-based, and a researcher on Internet governance in the Arab world, the response of governments in the Middle East has been to "control, block and censor as much as possible", she pointed out. "Very few governments viewed this [social media] as an opportunity rather than a risk." Iraq's government, for example shut off access to the Internet when the ISIS group swept across the country's north and west, including Mosul

Despite blocking mobile messaging apps and social media platforms, Iraq's authorities had failed in their efforts, to block seven websites allied with or supportive of the Islamic State group, revealed a study by The Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto. As swiftly as old accounts are reported and removed, new ones crop up. Facebook claims to have 71 million active monthly users in the Middle East with youth between 15 and 29 making up 70% of users in the Arab region.

The U.S. State Department launched a "Think Again Turn Away" campaign on YouTube, Facebook and Twitter with Arabic and English video reflecting the style of al-Qaeda and the Islamic State. The popularity of that effort pales in comparison to that of the Islamic State's videos with its images of mass shootings and beheadings succeeding in striking fear into the minds of those it targets and engaging the admiration of those it appeals to on the basis of its fighters' bravery and piety.

The 55-minute video Flames of War featuring images of exploding tanks and wounded American soldiers appears to be a runaway success. Idealizing the fanatical Islamists as "warriors", and appealing to the sensibilities of the adventurous and alienated youth in Islam's far-off reaches in Europe and North America. None of the videos rate the popularity of the beheadings of two American journalists and a British aid worker, however.

Just so very compelling, enticing the persuaded to go and join in the war games and to try to outdo one another in proudly fanciful atrocities.

Pakistan's Nuclear Reassurances

"The assurances Pakistan has given the world about the safety of its nuclear program will be severely tested with short-range and sea-based systems, but they are coming."
"A cardinal principle of Pakistan's nuclear program has been: 'Don't worry, we separate warheads from launchers.' Well, that is very hard to do at sea."
Michael Krepon, co-founder, Stimson Center, global security think-tank, Washington

"We are on our way, and my own hunch is within a year or so, we should be developing our second-strike capability."
Shireen Mazari, nuclear expert, former director, Institute of Strategic Studies, Islamabad think-tank

"We continue to urge all nuclear-capable states to exercise restraint regarding nuclear and missile capabilities. We continue to encourage efforts to promote confidence-building and stability and discourage actions that might destabilize the region."
Jen Psaki, spokesperson, U.S. State Department

Taliban fighters appear to be looking at an unexploded bomb from a downed Pakistani F-16 jet. The Taliban claimed they shot down the jet with a surface-to-air missile on Friday. Photo/TheBlaze

That reassurance and about fifty cents could get you a package of bubble gum. As reassurances go, Pakistan's have never withstood much scrutiny. Its covert drive to possess nuclear weapons because its hated neighbour India used all the means at its disposal to become a nuclear power, drove Pakistan to succeed in that endeavour, and go a little further when its chief nuclear scientist took the trouble to share nuclear formulae with other Islamic countries in the belief that anything widely shared in the West should be shared in the Southeast as well.

North Korea, Iran, Libya for starters all gained hugely by this largesse on the part of Pakistan. And the world has since become a much less safe place. Even without the threat of nuclear proliferation, thanks to the surging Islamist tide of jihadi terrorists the world sits now on a powder keg. And Pakistan has endowed the world with more than its share of the jihadis who threaten peace and stability not only in Afghanistan but within Europe where so many have settled, seeking haven and turning against those countries that responded.

Pakistan gave firmly 'reliable' assurances to the United States and NATO allies that it was with them in the 'war on terror', while its intelligence services and its military were rife with Islamists well integrated and supportive of non-state Islamist militias, including the Afghan Taliban. The Taliban were given cross-border shelter in Pakistan while the government swore fealty to its allies fighting terrorism. At Abbottabad, the bin Ladens found refuge in their compound hard by a military officer training academy.

Pakistan, officially now battling its own Taliban and hill tribes' insurgencies, is in perpetual danger of losing control of its various nuclear facilities existing close to areas where those tribal Islamists rule and occasionally run amok. And in this volatile region of the world, where millions of Pakistanis live in endemic poverty, where the government hasn't the material or institutional wherewithal to offer humanitarian aid to tens of thousands of poor Pakistanis flooded out of their homes and their farms, there is ample funding for expanding the nuclear military presence.



Pakistan looks forward to achieving a sea-based missile capacity, and expanding its tactical nuclear warheads. It has become a high priority to develop nuclear missiles to be fired from a navy ship or submarine, to give Pakistan "second-strike" capability should a catastrophic nuclear 'exchange' destroy land-based weapons. And who, other than neighbour India against whom Pakistan continues to agitate and plot offences, might be the cause of such an exchange?

India, which hasn't been known to support terrorist groups to advance into Pakistan's cities to launch terrorist attacks killing hundreds of innocent civilians as was done with Pakistani military assistance in 2008 with the carnage that took place in Mumbai. Pakistan refuses to surrender the mastermind of the Mumbai attack, claiming that as a Pakistani nothing has been definitely proven, and he is free to do whatever he wishes.

This country that is overwhelmed by the presence of fanatical Islamists is set to launch itself into updating of its nuclear capabilities. Anti-government protests in the capital have taken the current government of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif toward total collapse. And Pakistan and India have been shooting artillery shells across their border, enlarging the risk of yet another war. But short-range missiles carrying a small warhead, easy to transport, remain an urgent goal.

Prime Minister Sharif cited "evolving security dynamics in South Asia", as reason for Pakistan to develop "a full spectrum deterrence capability to deter all forms of aggression", when aggression and violence emanates from Pakistan itself, not from any outside source. Next in line appears to be the development of nuclear warheads for deployment from the Indian Ocean, from warships or from one of the country's five diesel-powered navy submarines.

Pakistan Navy is the first force in Indian Ocean Region to have submarines equipped with air-independent propulsion. PHOTO: SXC.HU

The country's Naval Strategic Force command overseeing nuclear weapons, is prepared to launch serious nuclear strides toward fulfillment of this latest of Pakistan's brilliant moves to make its region more stable, safer and dedicated to peace.

"I see no objection": UN adopts report praising Qatar's human rights record after UN Watch lists objections

UN Watch BriefingLatest from the United Nations  Vol. 504  |  September 22, 2014

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"I see no objection": UN adopts report praising Qatar's human rights record after UN Watch lists objections                                                                  Click here for video Intervention by UN Watch Executive Director Hillel Neuer in debate over UN Human Rights Council report on Qatar’s human rights record, September 19, 2014 Thank you, Mr. President. Today we ask: Does the cause of human rights support — or object to — the adoption of today’s UN Human Rights Council report on Qatar’s human rights record? Let me read from the report: “China appreciated the efforts expended by Qatar to promote and protect human rights.” “Bangladesh praised Qatar for the progress made in empowering women.” “Iran commended Qatar on its integrated social development, and for improving the situation of women.” “Sudan applauded the steps taken by Qatar.” “Turkey commended the progress achieved by Qatar in human rights.” Mr. President, no less than 78 out of the 84 country statements in this report offer praise for the human rights record of Qatar. That’s over 90 percent. Yet the truth, Mr. President, is the opposite. Let us be clear: The truth is that the 1.4 million migrant workers in Qatar object to this report because they are dying at the rate of one a day from inhuman conditions. At the current pace, more than 4,000 migrant workers will die to build the infrastructure for Qatar’s 2022 World Cup. The truth is that the women of Qatar object to this report because they are denied basic rights to equality, for example denied the right to be elected to the Shura legislative council. The truth is that journalists and aid workers who are abducted by the ISIS terrorist group and face beheading object to this report. In the words of Germany’s development aid minister, Gerd Mueller, from August 20th: “Who is financing these troops? Hint: Qatar.” The truth is that the Palestinians, Israelis ,and other victims of Hamas war crimes — their exploitation and targeting of civilian populations, mosques, hospitals and schools — object to this report. As one Arab diplomat said to the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies (FDD), as quoted in its testimony before the U.S. Congress, “Qatar finances Hamas strongly.” Mr. President, for all of these reasons, let me be clear: the victims of human rights abuse around the world object to the adoption of this report.  Thank you, Mr. President. [...] President of UNHRC Session: May I now propose that the Council adopt the decision of the UPR on Qatar as appears on screen. I see no objection. The decision is adopted.

ISIS: Terrorist Army

"[ISIS is a] terrorist army [blending] medieval ideology] with modern weapons."
"We must also reject their nihilistic worldview wherever we find it."
(Mother of all classic understatements) Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird, United Nations Security Council

"We are not by any means the leading contributor of foreign fighters to Syria, even though the dozens that are there and the 130 that are abroad [with other extremist groups] is a disturbing number for all Canadians. But we want to ensure that Canada's good name is not besmirched by these people any more than it already has been and that Canadians are protected."
"You [Islamic offenders] will cease being a Canadian because behaviour of this kind [dual nations convicted of terrorism] is incompatible with the duties and responsibilities of [Canadian] citizenship."
"[Integrating of immigrants] ...tends to create a very high level of allegiance and loyalty to Canada among the vast majority of immigrants, and we should be proud of that."
"But the pull of this poisonous ideology from the Gulf, from some of the centres of preaching, Pakistan and elsewhere, where it's really anchored, is strong. And it's transmitted by the Internet. So despite our success on immigration and settlement, we can't ignore this challenge."
Citizenship and Immigration Minister Chris Alexander, Ottawa, Canada

SITE    ISIS has released a video showing a masked gunman standing before captured Syrian troops digging their own graves. After speaking in what sounded like North American — possibly Canadian —English, he appeared to help execute the kneeling prisoners with a handgun.

Confirmed: Canada has revoked a number of passports from those Immigration Minister Alexander's department has assessed through intelligence as having travelled to join extremist groups in Syria and Iraq. As well as some who had not yet left Canada, but intended to travel abroad to the volatile areas to enlist themselves as foreign jihadi fighters in the cataclysmic battle of violent jihad intent on triumphing over the West in its journey toward a global caliphate.

"Yes, I think it's safe to say that there are cases of revocation of passports involving people who've gone to Syria and Iraq already. I just don't want to get into the numbers." While those identified by the removal of their passports and the privilege of being Canadian alarm him by their decision to join ISIS, he remains satisfied that Canada's numbers of aspiring jihadis are minuscule in comparison to the numbers of immigrants who have migrated from Muslim countries to become part of Canada's community of communities.

Measures to halt the flow of aspiring foreign fighters to both those countries, however, require strategies to compellingly use measures that will prove to be useful in turning the situation around to Canada's benefit. By isolating and removing access for return to those who have made such a fateful choice, Canada is protected from their return and the potential for them to practise within the country that has given them haven, the deadly techniques they have learned and practised abroad.

An hour-long propaganda video released by ISIS just hours earlier to the interview, appeared an effort to dissuade the mounting of an international military campaign against ISIS. Earlier, shorter, and hugely graphic videos of appalling cruelty and brutality have been responsible for persuading the international community that it should become involved in the battle against the criminally psychopathic Islamists; they may learn by this that they can't have it both ways.

In the chilling tape released on Friday, ISIS line up the Syrian soldiers captured during an attack on an airbase in Raqqa
- See more at: http://www.coloradonewsday.com/news/regional/77371-does-isis-have-a-u-s-jihadist-in-its-ranks-masked-man-with-american-accent-is-star-of-isis-latest-propaganda-film-flames-of-war.html#sthash.lvxopJHR.dpuf

Islamic State terrorists shooting Syrian prisoners at airbase in Raqqa

In the chilling tape released on Friday, ISIS line up the Syrian soldiers captured during an attack on an airbase in Raqqa
- See more at: http://www.coloradonewsday.com/news/regional/77371-does-isis-have-a-u-s-jihadist-in-its-ranks-masked-man-with-american-accent-is-star-of-isis-latest-propaganda-film-flames-of-war.html#sthash.lvxopJHR.dpuf

The new video featured a masked gunman and captured Syrian troops digging their own graves. After an announcement in North-American-accented (Canadian) English, the gunman standing watch over the prisoners took part in the execution of the kneeling prisoners, with the use of his handgun. Making it all the more imperative that Canada take these heretofore unthinkable measures of depriving a Canadian citizen of national identity through passport certification and re-entry to Canada.

Existing regulations make it lawful for officials to revoke or deny a passport with the evidence presented. "When law enforcement and security agencies provide us with that evidence, as they have done, we are able to act ... in multiple cases ... against those attempting to join extremists in Syria."

Safeguarding the Western Public

"When I go home to West Virginia, my people say, 'What do you expect to be done that will be different from what we have done in that region of the world for thirteen years?"
"If money or military might hasn't changed it what makes you think you can change it now?"
"[America spent $20-billion to build up a 250,000-man army in Iraq] and the first time they were tested they turned tail and ran, turned over the arsenal that we equipped them with and now it is being used against us."
"The only thing that I know we're sure of is that the training [of 'moderate' rebels in Syria] and those weapons will probably be used against us in the future given everything that's happened in the past."
"How can I go home to West Virginia and make sense out of this at all?"
U.S. Senator Joe Manchin, Democrat

Fighters from Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant pictured marching in Syria [AP]

"Define the enemy for me."
Ted Poe, Texas Republican

"I call them the Enemy of Islam because that's what they are."
Secretary of State John Kerry

"Are they the enemy of the United States?"
Ted Poe

"They are the enemy of humanity. [The war will last] however long it takes [to defeat them]."
John Kerry

U.S. President Barack Obama said that support from both Republicans and Democrats "shows the world that Americans are united" in combating the Islamic State group. Evan Vucci/Associated Press

"The regrettable reality is that to mount the kind of attacks which ISIL in Syria and in Iraq has in mind for Australia, all you need is a determined individual who will kill without compunction, a knife, an iPhone and a victim."
Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott

The reliably trenchant Islamist jihadists most certainly do represent themselves as the 'enemy of humanity', and they do so as as passionately engaged Islamist psychopaths. They do so, responding to the dictates of the Koran that it is fundamentally incumbent upon Muslims to surrender to the faith by embarking on a number of imperatives; one is the hajj, in memory of the hegira undertaken by the Prophet Mohammad, the second is jihad, and the two are inextricably intertwined.

Present-day jihadis are merely replicating in modern history what the Prophet Mohammad embarked upon in ancient history, by the sword persuading reluctant tribes to surrender - to Islam, the religion he constructed through an intimate conversation with Allah. To claim, as Barack Obama and his secretary of state are so delicately fond of doing -- lest they insult the Muslim ummah, much less the American Muslim demographic that Islam as a religion of peace has spawned violent jihad -- that terrorist jihadis do not express Islamic tenets, is to be deliberately obtuse.

American lawmakers in a majority-approving vote (78-22 Senate, 319-108 House) gave the president the power to train and equip what is described as 'moderate' Syrian rebels whom the administration appears to hope to be able to persuade to turn their conflict from that of attempting to destroy the regime of President Bashar al-Assad, to that of a response to what they hold to be a far more dangerous regime threatening Syria and Iraq and the entire Middle East.

The recruitment, according to General Martin Dempsey, chairman of the US. Joint Chiefs of Staff, should take about five months, the training an additional eight months. What further atrocities might the Islamic State wreak in that period of time, given their lightning-swift and successful march on Mosul? On the other hand, it is indeed Muslims who should meet Muslims in the battle for control of Muslim territory, allegiance and power.

The minute that Western military engages directly in ground conflict as opposed to helping to train national troops, is the minute that the entire Muslim community choruses the brutalities imposed upon Muslims by the West. The response, rather to face the intractable brutality of organized psychopathy threatening "humanity" and its most dearly held values of the sanctity of human life, is that of encouraging, aiding, training, arming and standing back.

Those who oppose the deadly carnage of fanatical Islam must be as determined to bring them to heel as the Islamists are to revel in Islamist-approved slaughter.

Once again France has dispatched its fighter jets as it did on its own in Mali, to destroy Islamic State logistics depots. France has stated it will restrict its air forays to Iraq and not venture into Syria. Leaving Syrian air strikes to the United States which has vowed it will launch them there, bypassing the authority of the Syrian president who had felt confident that he would finally gain recognition of legitimacy in his own war against Syrian Sunni citizens and rebels alike.

And managing to courageously withstand the verbal assault of Moscow insisting that the territorial integrity of Syria must be respected, for to do otherwise would represent a violent assault on all the international norms of legitimate state behaviour. That accusation should have been the clue for a bit of riotous hilarity on the part of the Western alliance.

Taking the experience of Australia as a template for the near future, where armed police have been authorized to take over security at Parliament House in Canberra in reflection of Australian Islamic State terrorists having instructed supporters in Australia to attack the building and members of the government, the United States will certainly exercise a need to react similarly.

And through that process perhaps create a more suitable arms-length relationship with their favoured Islamist group, the Muslim Brotherhood.