Al Qaeda, Gitmo & National Security

AIM Column | By Bethany Stotts | March 9, 2010

For some, the question remains: Is the conflict over closing Guantanamo a Republican vs. Democrat issue, or one with national security implications?

Are the Obama Administration's actions putting Americans at increased risk of a terrorist attack? Keep America Safe and its board members argue that it is.

A recent ad released by KAS questions the loyalties of "The Al Qaeda 7," the seven unnamed Department of Justice lawyers who have either represented terror suspects, worked on related cases, in some cases, advocated for detainees.

In a February 18 letter to Senator Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, Assistant Attorney General Ron Welch wrote (pdf) that "To the best of our knowledge, during their employment prior to joining the government, only five of the lawyers who serve as political appointees in those components represented detainees, and four others either contributed to amicus briefs in detainee-related cases or were otherwise involved in advocacy on behalf of detainees." He refused to give the names of the unknown seven, but just days after the KAS ad, on March 3, Fox News identified them and outlined their history. "An extensive review of court documents and media reports by Fox News suggests many of the seven lawyers in question played only minor or short-lived roles in advocating for detainees," writes Mike Levine for Fox News. "However, it's unclear what roles, if any, they have played in detainee-related matters since joining the Justice Department."

On March 2nd Josh Gerstein at Politico reprinted a quote by Center for American Progress' (CAP) Ken Gude which condemns the KAS ad as "pure McCarthyism." "This is plainly unacceptable in the United States...Condemnation is not sufficient. This is pure McCarthyism," Gerstein quotes Gude.

For some, the question remains: Is the conflict over closing Guantanamo a Republican vs. Democrat issue, or one with national security implications? Ben Smith of Politico took the former tack with the KAS ad. "A co-founder of [Keep America Safe], Debra Burlingame, has been attacking the Justice lawyers for months, and the new assault comes as congressional Republicans signal that they're likely to step up attacks," he writes.

However, the Obama Administration has already acknowledged "systemic failure" surrounding the intelligence gathered on Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the alleged Christmas Day bomber. "Yes, there were some human errors, but those errors were not the primary or fundamental cause of what happened on December 25th," said John Brennan, the Administration's counterterrorism advisor, according to a transcript released January 7 by the White House. "Rather, this was a systemic failure across agencies and across organizations," Brennan said.

Liz Cheney, speaking at this year's Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), condemned what she termed Brennan's and Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano's "incompetence." (The latter is widely known for her assertion that "the system worked" with regards to the aftermath of the failed Christmas Day bombing.)

"Now there's no polite way to put this but that kind of incompetence gets people killed and yet no one has been held accountable," said Cheney, daughter of former Vice President Dick Cheney, who made a surprise appearance during her speech. Liz Cheney is one of three board members of Keep America Safe. She then went on to explain the connections between the Little Rock and Fort Hood shootings and the failed Christmas Day bombing. Namely, she pointed out, all three have ties to Yemen.

"During the presidential transition the Bush counterterrorism team briefed the Obama team about the threat from Yemen and what we were doing to address the threat," Liz Cheney said at CPAC. An article by McClatchy Newspapers in late 2008 described a "major obstacle" to then President-elect Obama's plans to close Guantanamo Bay: "The Bush administration has transferred hundreds of Guantanamo prisoners to the custody of their home countries, but it's been unable to win assurances from Yemen-whose approximately 100 prisoners are the largest group still jailed at Guantanamo-that the men, if they're returned, won't pose a threat to the United States," wrote Shashank Bengali for McClatchy Newspapers on November 13, 2008. "Yemeni officials say they're ready to try many of the men and imprison those who are convicted, but they complain that U.S. officials refuse to share evidence with them," Bengali later added.

In June 2009 the Little Rock shooter, Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad, killed one soldier and wounded another outside an Army recruiting office, reported James Dao and David Johnston for the New York Times that month. Muhammad would later send a hand-written letter (pdf) to his judge which identifies himself as "affiliated with Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula," AQAP, and a "Member of Abu Basir's Army," reported Dao for the NY Times in January. "This was a Jihad!" he writes in a note marked January 12. "Attack on infidel forces. [sic] That didn't go as plan [sic]. Flat out Truth."

"In September the President's own counterterrorism advisor, John Brennan, traveled to Saudi Arabia where he was briefed, personally, by Mohammed bin Nayef, the head of Saudi intelligence," said Liz Cheney at CPAC. She said that "...there have been press reports that intelligence sources believe the bombs may have been made by the same bomb-maker in Yemen." The NEFA Foundation provides a translated statement (pdf) in which, they say, AQAP takes credit for the Saudi assassination attempt.

Then, in November, Major Nidal Malik Hasan entered Fort Hood, allegedly murdering 13 and wounding 30 others. Cheney noted at CPAC that Major Hasan had "ties to the same cleric in Yemen who trained the Christmas Day bomber," namely, Anwar al-Awlaki.

According to a translation provided by the NEFA Foundation, Al-Awlaki told Al Jazeera in an interview released December 23, 2009 that "A Muslim is not allowed to work in the American Army unless he intends to walk the steps of our Brother Nidal." Asked whether he recruited Major Hasan, al-Awlaki responded that he "did not recruit Nidal Hasan, but America did with its crimes and injustice, and this is what America does not want to admit," according to the NEFA Foundation.

The day before Christmas, on December 24, 2009, news outlets such as Al Jazeera and Reuters had reported that cleric al-Awlaki was thought to be among the dead from an air raid in Yemen. The Associated Press reported on Christmas day that a relative of al-Awlaki told the AP that the cleric was still alive.

CBS reported last month that Abdulmutallab told federal investigators that cleric al-Awlaki "directed him to carry out the attack..." That same month cleric al-Awlaki said in an Al Jazeera interview that he did not issue a fatwa for Abdulmutallab's action but he "support[s] what Umar Farouk has done after I have been seeing my brothers being killed in Palestine for more than 60 years, and others being killed in Iraq and in Afghanistan."

Liz Cheney pointed out at CPAC that the Obama Administration announced that it sent six Yemeni Guantanamo detainees back to their home country shortly before Christmas. The Department of Justice news release, dated Dec. 20, 2009, indicates that twelve Guantanamo detainees were transferred to their home countries: six to Yemen, four to Afghanistan, and two to Somalia.

Ironically, a January report from the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations indicates that it was researching al Qaeda's activities in Yemen and Somalia shortly before the failed Christmas Day bombing. "Law enforcement and intelligence officials told the Committee staff in interviews in December in Yemen and other countries in the region that as many as 36 American ex-convicts arrived in Yemen in the past year, ostensibly to study Arabic," it states. "The officials said there are legitimate reasons for Americans and others to study and live in Yemen, but they said some of the Americans had disappeared and are suspected of having gone to Al Qaeda training camps in ungoverned portions of the impoverished country."

In addition, "Similar concerns were expressed about a smaller group of Americans who moved to Yemen, adopted a radical form of Islam and married local women." The report says that so far there is "no evidence" that any of these Americans "have undergone training" but "they [officials]" indicated they were on "heightened alert because of the potential threat from extremists carrying American passports and the related challenges involved in detecting and stopping homegrown operatives." It states, "The staff interviews were conducted just before the failed Christmas Day plot."

It is useful also to note that AQAP's deputy "is a Saudi citizen who was released from Guantanamo in November 2007," under the Bush Administration, and that he completed a Saudi rehabilitation program and then "slipped south into Yemen and returned to militancy."

Let us hope that the 12 Guantanamo detainees transferred to their home countries last December do not follow suit.

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Bethany Stotts is a Staff Writer for Accuracy in Academia, and can be contacted at bethany.stotts@academia.org

Meet the DOJ Lawyers Who Defended Terrorist Detainees

TheWeeklyStandard.com

BY Thomas Joscelyn

March 3, 2010 8:19 PM

As the controversy heats up over the DOJ lawyers who once represented, or advocated on behalf of, al Qaeda and Taliban members, it is worth taking a quick look at their body of work.

Neal Katyal is now the principal deputy solicitor general. Previously, Katyal was a law professor and represented Salim Hamdan before the Supreme Court. The finding for Hamdan: The court ended up throwing out the military commission system as it was first established by President Bush. Congress then had to reauthorize the military commissions.

Katyal’s defenders have been quick to advocate on his behalf, claiming he is talented lawyer. Maybe so, but let’s look at his handling of the Salim Hamdan case, which was a victory for his client.

Hamdan is an admitted bodyguard and driver for Osama bin Laden. He swore allegiance to his master and faithfully served him from 1996 to 2001 -- as al Qaeda was plotting multiple acts of terror, including the September 11 attacks.

Katyal has called Hamdan a "simple driver." But Hamdan was not a "simple driver." He was captured with two SA-7 shoulder-fired missiles in his trunk while driving to a battlefield in Afghanistan. (See below.) Moreover, only the most trusted al Qaeda personnel would be allowed to serve bin Laden for so long -- protecting the terror master as he plotted to kill thousands of civilians.

It is troubling that Katyal would dismiss the seriousness of an al Qaeda agent’s record out of hand.

Katyal has made some other questionable comments about Hamdan and the military commissions as well. In a piece for Slate in December 2007, Katyal started off by lamenting the fact that Hamdan was not being tried in a regal Washingtonian court, but instead in a “rickety courtroom at Guantanamo.” Katyal then compared Hamdan to your average green-card holder in America. Of the military commissions he wrote:

These trials are not “equal justice”: For the first time since equality was written into our Constitution, America has created one criminal trial for “us” and one for “them.”The rules for the Guantanamo trials apply only to foreigners—the millions of green-card holders and five billion people on the globe who are not American citizens. An American citizen, even one who commits the most horrible and treasonous act (such as the detonation of a weapon of mass destruction), gets the Cadillac version of justice—a criminal trial in federal court. Meanwhile, a green-card holder alleged to have committed a far less egregious offense gets the beat-up Chevy: a military commission at Guantanamo. Before that commission, that noncitizen will have few of the very rights America has championed abroad, and he can be sentenced to death.

Katyal is flat out wrong when he says that the Bush administration’s military commissions were the “first time” America has attempted to dispense “justice” in such a manner. Military commissions (tribunals) have a long history in this country dating back to the founding. The Obama administration is even using them to try Gitmo detainees.

What’s worse is that Katyal didn't seem to understand that the “them” are al Qaeda. And only someone who cannot tell the difference between us and our terrorist enemies would compare al Qaeda members to “green-card holders.”

There is nothing wrong, in principle, with Katyal being a staunch critic of military commissions – the commissions certainly have their flaws. For example, Katyal’s own client received a ridiculously lenient sentence (basically amounting to time-served of five years plus a few months) after being found guilty of providing material support to al Qaeda. But Katyal went way beyond rational criticism of the system. In the same piece in which he compared his al Qaeda client to “green-card holders,” Katyal wrote: “The judges, to make matters worse, are military officers who have been hand-picked for this task. Some even said in speeches before being chosen that the Guantanamo system is fair and legal.”

The horror! Note that this same system, which was supposedly rigged to keep detainees locked up forever, basically freed Hamdan outright.

In his Slate piece, Katyal also lamented: “The trial in Guantanamo is explicitly proceeding based on the administration's belief that a detainee has no constitutional rights…”

Do “war on terror” detainees deserve full constitutional rights? My hunch is that most Americans would say no. And, ironically, so has Neal Katyal, when it comes to the detainees held at Bagram. Katyal has reportedly defended the indefinite detention of terrorist suspects as a member of the Obama administration.

This speaks well of Katyal as it shows he is capable of making a responsible national security argument. Katyal’s defenders say he has always seen a difference between Bagram and Guantanamo because, well, one is at an airbase in Cuba and the other is the middle of a warzone in Afghanistan.

But leave it to a lawyer to argue that the Constitution is under assault if detainees are tried by a military commission in Cuba, while everything is just fine if (all else equal) they are held indefinitely without habeas rights in Afghanistan.

One other note about Katyal: He has lamented the slow pace at which the military commissions moved during the Bush years. And they certainly did move at a snail’s pace. But as Time magazine has reported, Katyal helped build “a defense that delayed Hamdan's military tribunal for years as it gradually made its way through the courts.” That is, those delays are owed, in large part, to Katyal’s handiwork

Another one of the DOJ lawyers who has advocated on behalf of detainees is Jennifer Daskal, who was a human rights activist. It is not clear why Daskal’s résumé qualifies her for a position working on detainee legal questions.

One of the detainees Daskal advocated for is Omar Khadr -- who allegedly threw a hand grenade that killed an Army medic. Another one of the DOJ lawyers named in recent press accounts worked on behalf of Khadr for a time as well

Prior to joining the DOJ, Daskal was one of the human rights lawyers who openly urged President Obama to stop the military proceedings against Omar Khadr, calling him a “child soldier.”

Khadr was neither a child, nor a soldier, at the time he reportedly killed an Army medic. Khadr comes from a known al Qaeda family dedicated to Osama bin Laden. He was trained in al Qaeda camps and served a senior member of al Qaeda. There is even a video of Khadr manufacturing and placing IED's in Afghanistan. Khadr is a terrorist, not a soldier.

Khadr was 15 years old when he was taken into custody and is in his early 20s today. We regularly try 15 year olds for crimes as adults in America. Moreover, Khadr only survived the raid he fought in because Army medics, other than the one he probably killed, saved his life. Khadr wouldn’t even be alive today if it weren’t for them. (For more on Daskal see Meghan Clyne’s New York Post column.)

Other lawyers now at the DOJ worked on the historic Boumediene case. That case established the Gitmo detainees' right to challenge their detention in habeas corpus hearings. In effect, the habeas proceedings have taken sensitive national security and detention questions out of the hands of experienced military and intelligence personnel, and put them into the hands of federal judges with no counterterrorism training or expertise. That lack of experience shows. For example, in one recent decision a federal judge compared al Qaeda's secure safe houses (where training, plotting and other nefarious activities occur) to “youth hostels.” The habeas decisions are filled with errors of omission, fact, and logic.

Still other lawyers did work on behalf of these well known terrorists: Jose Padilla (an al Qaeda operative dispatched by senior al Qaeda terrorists to launch attacks inside America in 2002), John Walker Lindh (the American Taliban), and Saleh al Marri (who 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed sent to America on September 10, 2001 in anticipation of committing future attacks).

Now, we don’t know what assignments these lawyers have taken on inside government. But we do know that they openly opposed the American government for years, on behalf of al Qaeda terrorists, and their objections frequently went beyond rational, principled criticisms of detainee policy.It is one thing to raise legal objections to detainee policy. It is quite another to compare a known al Qaeda member to your average “green-card holder,” or to claim that Omar Khadr’s rights as a “child” have been abused.

Holder Stacks Justice Department with Jihadists' Lawyer

It keeps coming back to the same disturbing question: whose side is the Obama administration on?

Holder admits nine Obama Dept. of Justice officials worked for terrorist detainees, offers no details By Byron York

Attorney General Eric Holder says nine Obama appointees in the Justice Department have represented or advocated for terrorist detainees before joining the Justice Department. But he does not reveal any names beyond the two officials whose work has already been publicly reported. And all the lawyers, according to Holder, are eligible to work on general detainee matters, even if there are specific parts of some cases they cannot be involved in.

Holder's admission comes in the form of an answer to a question posed last November by Republican Sen. Charles Grassley. Noting that one Obama appointee, Principal Deputy Solicitor General Neal Katyal, formerly represented Osama bin Laden's driver, and another appointee, Jennifer Daskal, previously advocated for detainees at Human Rights Watch, Grassley asked Holder to give the Senate Judiciary Committee "the names of political appointees in your department who represent detainees or who work for organizations advocating on their behalf…the cases or projects that these appointees work with respect to detainee prior to joining the Justice Department…and the cases or projects relating to detainees that have worked on since joining the Justice Department."

In his response, Holder has given Grassley almost nothing. He says nine Obama political appointees at the Justice Department have advocated on behalf of detainees, but did not identify any of the nine other than the two, Katyal and Daskal, whose names Grassley already knew. "To the best of our knowledge," Holder writes,

during their employment prior to joining the government, only five of the lawyers who serve as political appointees in those components represented detainees, and four others either contributed to amicus briefs in detainee-related cases or were otherwise involved in advocacy on behalf of detainees.

Holder says other Obama appointees, like Holder himself, came from law firms which represented detainees but did no work on behalf of the terrorist prisoners. But other than Katyal and Daskal, Holder does not reveal any names of any Obama appointees, nor does he mention the cases they worked on.

And what are they recused from, anyway? Very little. Holder writes that Katyal has not worked on any Guantanamo detainee matters but has participated in litigation involving detainees who continue to be detained at Bagram Airfield, Afghanistan and in litigation involving [Ali Saleh Kahlah] al-Marri, who was detained on U.S. soil." As for Daskal, "she has generally worked on policy issues related to detainees," Holder writes. "Her detainee-related work has been fully consistent with advice she received from career department officials regarding her obligations."

As for everyone else, Holder lists no names and no cases, but in a paragraph filled with modifiers, he makes it clear that all the lawyers who had advocated for detainees are free to work on general detainee matters.

Read it all.

Posted by Pamela Geller on Tuesday, February 23, 2010 at 10:02 AM

Petraeus backs closing Guantanamo, limits on harsh interrogation

By Carol Rosenberg | Miami Herald

Army Gen. David Petraeus, the Pentagon's top commander of forces in Afghanistan and Iraq, said Sunday he still supports closing the prison camps at Guantanamo and is not troubled by President Barack Obama's inability to do so by a Jan. 22 deadline.

Petraeus, answering questions on NBC's "Meet the Press", also said he did not believe that the use of Bush-era harsh interrogation tactics on captives taken in the ongoing U.S. military offensive in Afghanistan against the Taliban would produce better intelligence.

Petraeus said his experience with the 82nd Airborne Division was that you stick with the U.S. Army Field Manual and rely on the Geneva Conventions in handling war prisoners both because it's the ethical thing to do and because the blowback from using other techniques serves as a recruiting tool for the enemy.

He called episodes of detainee abuse, such as those captured in soldiers' photos at Abu Ghraib in Iraq, "non-biodegradable," meaning they never go away.

Rather, he said he supported the systematic emptying of the prison camps at the U.S. Navy base in Guantanamo in a "pragmatic and sensible manner" -– while the United States decides where to send and how to hold the last prisoners there. As of Sunday, the Pentagon had 192 detainees at Guantanamo -– about a dozen of whom the Obama administration had concluded could face either military or civilian trials.

Petraeus had a hand in writing the Army Field Manual's doctrine for interrogation techniques, which he has said are "completely in line with the Geneva Conventions."

Note: It is the duty of Petraeus to follow the Commander-in-Chief i.e. Obama and therefore, he would not disagree with the closing of Gitmo. However, most patriots in America foresee great harm to our country by allowing Terrorists released into the civil courts, given attorneys and having their "rights" read to them during a time of war. BeeSting

British Court Jeopardizes Intelligence Ties Between U.K., U.S.

Thursday, February 11, 2010

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LONDON — Intelligence ties between London and Washington have been jeopardized by a British court's disclosure that a terrorism suspect was beaten and shackled in U.S. custody, diplomats and security officials said Wednesday.

Fears in the United States that Britain can no longer be trusted with secrets is prompting an urgent assessment of relations between the allies and — according to some sources — has already slowed the flow of sensitive information from the U.S.

Britain's Court of Appeal on Wednesday authorized the release of a previously secret summary of CIA documents detailing the treatment of former Guantanamo Bay detainee Binyam Mohamed. Mohamed was arrested in Pakistan in 2002 and, according to the British court, subjected to "cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment by the United States authorities."

Foreign Secretary David Miliband fought for two years to block publication of the seven-paragraph summary, insisting that would violate a long-standing rule that nations don't disclose intelligence shared by their allies.

The White House said Wednesday the British court's judgment "will complicate the confidentiality of our intelligence-sharing relationship.

Experts warn the ruling could hurt Britain's ability to defend itself against terrorism, and represents the most serious challenge to intelligence cooperation since double agents during the Cold War.

The court's ruling has also raised new questions about whether British spies were complicit in torture.

In a rare public statement — his first since October — MI5 director Jonathan Evans used an opinion article in the Daily Telegraph newspaper to stress the importance of British intelligence ties to Washington, insisting the relationship has saved lives in the U.K.

"We cannot protect the U.K. without the help and co-operation of other countries. The U.S., in particular, has been generous in sharing intelligence with us on terrorist threats; that has saved British lives and must be protected," Evans wrote, in Friday's edition. "We must hope, for our own safety and security, that this does not make them less ready to share intelligence with us in the future."

The released document is a judge's summary of 42 classified documents shared by the CIA with MI5 — Britain's domestic spy agency — during Mohamed's questioning in Pakistan in May 2002. Evans acknowledged it described "unacceptable actions," but rejected claims his agency had been complicit in the detainee's alleged torture.

Experts say that — following the disclosure — allies may no longer trust British assurances that intelligence information will be kept secret.

"I suspect that for some while at least, the U.S. authorities are going to be much less generous with the material they share and much more calculating about protecting their own interests," said Nigel Inkster, a former assistant chiefof Britain's MI6 overseas spy agency.

Some British diplomats say restrictions on the information shared with London by Washington are already in place. The officials, who demanded anonymity to discuss intelligence issues, said the U.S. would never withhold details on threats to life, but American officials probably are already withholding some information they would have shared before.

"This is more serious than the Cambridge spy ring, this is more serious than Robert Hanssen," said Bob Ayers, a London-based former U.S. intelligence officer. "This has the potential to be far more damaging."

Hanssen was an FBI agent caught in 2001 selling secrets to Russia. The Cambridge spy ring was a group of upper-class Britons who spied for the Soviet Union from the 1930s, exposing details of colleagues stationed overseas.

Any change in trans-Atlantic ties risks seriously undermining British counterterrorism efforts, experts say.

Inkster said that, to the best of his understanding, there isn't a single major British counterterrorism operation over the last decade that hasn't benefited from "game changing" assistance from U.S. agencies.

"The government has to think about the long term implications of the damage to trust in a relationship that has been pretty crucial to U.K. security over many years," he said.

Mohamed's case also focused scrutiny on MI5's insistence that it doesn't collude in torture.

In a draft judgment, the Court of Appeal accused the agency of withholding information from ministers and the judiciary, disregarding human rights and failing to disavow harsh interrogation techniques.

A paragraph containing the criticisms was removed from the final judgment after the intervention of government lawyer Jonathan Sumption, who argued in a letter to the three appeal judges that the claims were unsubstantiated.

"They will be read as statements by the Court that the security service does not in fact operate a culture that respects human rights or abjures participation in coercive interrogation techniques," Sumption wrote.

Evans said claims about the conduct of MI5 were "so far from the truth that it couldn't be left unchallenged," and said he expected extremists would seek to exploit the criticism.

"For their part our enemies will also seek to use all tools at their disposal to attack us. That means not just bombs, bullets and aircraft but also propaganda," the spy chief wrote.

Lawyers acting for Mohamed - along with media organizations, including The Associated Press, who demanded the seven-paragraph summary be released - said they were unaware Sumption had been in contact with the judges. They said they plan to complain to the courts about his actions.

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Keeping Khalid Sheik Mohammed Out of Civilian Courts

Keeping Khalid Sheik Mohammed Out of Civilian Courts

by Rep. Frank Wolf (more by this author)

Posted 02/05/2010 ET

Earlier this week, I introduced bipartisan legislation, H.R. 4556, with Senator Lindsey Graham to prohibit the use of Department of Justice funds for a civilian trial for 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheik Mohammed and his co-conspirators in the U.S. However, it would still allow for a military commission at Guantanamo Bay or on a secure military base inside the U.S. This is a reasonable approach that allows the administration to try these murderous terrorists in an appropriate military commission.

Although our approach should be common sense, last November Attorney General Eric Holder unilaterally announced that Khalid Sheik Mohammed and his four co-conspirators would be tried in the heart of New York City in a civilian trial. The attorney general did not consult with any local leaders, including New York City Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly or Mayor Michael Bloomberg. If he had, he would have better understood the dangers and cost of this approach.

First, the security implications of holding such a trial in the heart of New York City, or any urban center, expose the areas to an unnecessary security threat. These detainees would not be transferred to a “supermax” facility, as the administration has implied, but to a less secure, local jail for years during this trial. This is the same local jail where Mahmud Salim, charged with participating in the 1998 U.S. Embassy bombings in East Africa, stabbed prison guard Louis Pepe in an escape attempt. Despite efforts to secure the jail and the courthouse, the continued danger of holding a high-profile terrorist in New York City for an extended period seems ill conceived in light of recent terrorist plots against American citizens.

Upon reviewing the costs and security concerns from the New York City Police Department last week, Mayor Bloomberg stated, “It would be great if the federal government could find a site that didn't cost a billion dollars, which using downtown [New York City] will. [The trial] is going to cost an awful lot of money and disturb an awful lot of people.” Shortly thereafter, most local, state, and congressional leaders from the New York region withdrew their support and encouraged the attorney general to reverse this decision.

In light of this collapsing support from local leaders for the trial, I am concerned that the Obama Administration is now “venue shopping” for a new city to hold this trial. According to press reports, the attorney general is now reviewing alternate sites in New York, Pennsylvania, and Virginia, among other places. This approach is no less dangerous, costly and disruptive to other communities under consideration than it was for New York City.

Late last fall, I offered an amendment to the fiscal year 2010 appropriations legislation that would have prohibited funding for this and other civilian trials in the U.S.. As ranking Republican on the House Commerce-Justice-Science Appropriations Subcommittee, which funds the Justice Department, I have fought administration efforts over the last year to transfer and even release Guantanamo Bay detainees into the U.S. Unfortunately, my amendment was defeated on a party-line vote as members tried to wrap up their end-of-year votes before the Christmas break. The vote attracted little attention from the national media, which was singularly focused on the outcome of the Senate health care bill.

However, following the failed Christmas Day airliner attack and the administration’s mismanagement of the interrogation of alleged terrorist Umar Farouk Abdulmatallab, new questions were raised about the plans for the a New York City trial. Around the same time, it became known that the security costs for the trial would well exceed $250 million per year and could reach an estimated price tag of $1 billion or more. The election of Senator-elect Scott Brown in Massachusetts further prompted New York’s political leadership to reevaluate their support for this increasingly unpopular and unnecessary trial.

The legislation Sen. Graham and I have introduced provides an opportunity for members of Congress to send a clear message to the attorney general that urban, civilian courthouses are not the appropriate venues for terrorism trials. I will also offer this legislation as an amendment to appropriations legislation that comes before my committee this year to continue to let the attorney general know that this plan is too much of a threat to public safety and security.

Mr. Wolf, a Republican, represents the 10th District of Virginia in the U. S. House of Representatives.

Obama's phony spending freeze It’s Gitmo Time

By Daniel Greenfield Saturday, January 30, 2010
CanadaFreePress.com

So Obama had his big State of the Union television debut, or what would have been a bigger television debut, if he had actually hoarded his appearances, instead of constantly delivering televised addresses to the nation, Castro style. Obama did manage to get viewers to tune in, who usually tuned him out, but he still couldn’t manage to even equal his own stimulus plan address less than a year ago. To say nothing of matching Bush’s State of the Union addresses.

This was the moment that Obama should have been hoarding his TV time for, instead of squandering it on constant appearances. The result was a much weaker impact than intended. Obama needed this speech to rebound from the collapsing health care bill and poor poll numbers. But instead he went on a fumbling offensive, trying to juggle an attempt to sell his attempt to capitalize on the new post-brown populism, blame Bush for everything, introduce a new phase of spending plans while claiming to be trying to cut the deficit, and appeasing the left by throwing out Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, a candy reform he had been saving for the progressives for a while now.

Obama’s speech as expected was low on responsibility. Consider the following—

One year ago, I took office amid two wars, an economy rocked by severe recession, a financial system on the verge of collapse and a government deeply in debt. Experts from across the political spectrum warned that if we did not act, we might face a second depression. So we acted immediately and aggressively. And one year later, the worst of the storm has passed.

The worst of the storm of course has not passed. But more to the point, Obama “credits” the expert with the responsibility for his own actions.

Yet the “experts” were not running the country, he was. It’s one of many examples from Obama’s SOU in which he refuses to follow Truman’s “The Buck Stops Here” doctrine. Instead it stops with the experts.

So I know the anxieties that are out there right now. They’re not new. These struggles are the reason I ran for president. These struggles are what I’ve witnessed for years in places like Elkhart, Ind., and Galesburg, Ill.

Predictable rust belt shoutouts, complete with an attempt to claim that the problem is old… yet it required sudden dire action when he took office. Yet it’s better now, but still bad. Except it’s not so bad, except when it was under Bush.

Logical consistency never was one of Obama’s virtues.

For these Americans and so many others, change has not come fast enough. Some are frustrated; some are angry

This echoes the progressive meme, most famously put out by Howard Dean and Paul Krugman, that what Americans really want from Obama is more aggressive socialism, not less.

They are tired of the partisanship and the shouting and the pettiness. They know we can’t afford it. Not now.

Actually the polls show that most people want more partisanship, which is one reason Brown won.

Our most urgent task upon taking office was to shore up the same banks that helped cause this crisis. It was not easy to do. And if there’s one thing that has unified Democrats and Republicans, it’s that we all hated the bank bailout. I hated it. You hated it. It was about as popular as a root canal.

But when I ran for president, I promised I wouldn’t just do what was popular — I would do what was necessary. And if we had allowed the meltdown of the financial system, unemployment might be double what it is today. More businesses would certainly have closed. More homes would have surely been lost.

Also we might be ruled by Godzilla. I mean there’s no proof otherwise, so it’s safe to say that without bailing out the banks (who by a complete coincidence were some of Obama’s biggest donors), Godzilla would be ruling over us today.

If you don’t believe me, just ask Paul Krugman.

And that’s it folks. The SOU mixed borrowed references to an American history that Obama doesn’t give a damn about, a lot of references to the plight of plain ordinary folks he doesn’t give a damn about (both essentially cut and paste from Presidential speeches for decades now) with a belligerent defense of his programs and hefty doses of Blame Bush (for at least one of those programs).

This was less a speech than it was the psychic equivalent of Lonesome Rhodes from A Face in the Crowd screaming to an empty hall, “Tell me you love me. I’ll make you love me.” Obama isn’t quite there yet, but he’s well on the road to it. His public speeches have gotten pissier and more bitter. And they leave a bitter taste in the audience’s mouth, even when it seems like he’s saying most of the right things.

This SOU was clearly the product of a lot of rushed focus groups and advisers, smacked off too many cooks and was delivered by a man who pretended to be angry over the state of things in America, but was all too obviously angry at his own falling popularity. Even as he was working to appease contradictory groups, while making a new series of false promises and defending his own record, the emperor’s clothes had come off.

The AP fact checked some of Obama’s speech and found some major issues. And mind you, not too long ago wire service fact checking used to be reserved for Obama’s critics. And even his supporters have grown tired of hearing the “hope” ladled out. Because the only hope from Obama comes from those who have given to him and gotten back taxpayer money in return

Give and Get. That’s the Chicago way.

But there’s Dem panic all around. The panic is reaching as far as Feingold and Murray. Today I chatted briefly with Marty Lamb, who is working to replace McGovern. And the smell of blood in the water has forced even the left to move right.

Bloomberg, Schumer and Gillibrand, who repeats whatever Schumer tells her to say, even if it contradicts what she said last week, are now all against the terror trials being held in New York. In return Obama decided to slap New York across the face by refusing to support health funding for those suffering from health issues after 9/11.

The state’s two senators and 14 House members met with Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius just hours before President Obama implored in his speech to the nation for Congress to come together and deliver a government that delivers on its promises to the American people.

So the legislators were floored to learn the Democratic administration does not want to deliver for the tens of thousands of people who sacrificed after 9/11, and the untold numbers now getting sick.

“She made it clear that the administration does not support any kind of funding mechanism that goes into the bill,” said Bronx Rep. Eliot Engel.

“I think it’s fiscal restraint… but you know what? They find money for everything else, they need to find money for this,” Engel said. “We were attacked because we’re a symbol of our country.”

McMahon was furious that caring for the heroes of Sept. 11 would take a back seat to anything but military funding.

“I thought there was a complete lack of understanding of the issue by the secretary and quite frankly, I did not expect that lack of compassion and failure to understand the urgency of the issue.”

Victims and advocates of 9/11 families are similarly stunned.

Lorie Van Auken, whose husband died on 9/11 and who supports the White House in its push to try the terrorists in New York, was crestfallen at the news.

“I thought that these people would be taken care of. I would have expected better from this administration,” Van Auken said, adding that she thought it sends the wrong message to all of America’s would-be heroes that the government won’t be there for them.

They shouldn’t have been floored, since

A. Obama’s phony spending freeze will never involve cutting the things he cares about or needs for political reasons. By contrast 9/11 funding is an easy target.

B. This is a warning to New York Democrats not to mouth off over the KSM trials.

Today the Daily News, a generally liberal tabloid, penned an angry editorial reading “Get the hell out of here: No terror trial in city, but send funds for WTC sick”

The precipitous and ill-conceived nature of Attorney General Eric Holder’s plan to try the 9/11 masterminds in Manhattan Federal Court appears to have dawned on President Obama. Yesterday, the White House ordered a search for another trial venue.

The right answer would be to convene a military tribunal at the one place fully outfitted for the occasion: Guantanamo Bay.

Obama needs only to switch Khalid Shaikh Mohammed to a military tribunal and then to direct the savings into programs for the 9/11 sick.

Failing such a reversal, Congress needs to take command. Long Island Rep. Pete King got the ball rolling with a bill barring the Justice Department from holding terror trials in civilian courts.

That type of measure may be the only salvation. Mayor Bloomberg has come around to urging that the trial be taken somewhere else. And so have New York’s duo of late-to-the-ramparts senators, Chuck Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand.

Imagine, too, the rude awakening suffered Wednesday by those two along with Reps. Carolyn Maloney, Jerry Nadler, Eliot Engel, Michael McMahon and 10 additional members of New York’s congressional delegation.

There they were, loyal Obama Democrats, who were sure their fellow loyal Obama Democrats would reverse the funding denials of the vanquished Bush administration. There they were, supporters of civilian terror trials.

And there they were, stiffed by Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, who said, nope, there would be no long-term funding because, you know, these are tough times.

But there would be money to turn lower Manhattan into an armed camp for the duration - assuming Obama ponies up for the security rather than dumping the costs on the NYPD.

The latest site for the KSM trial would seem to be Governor’s Island, which is close to New Jersey, leading that state’s lawmakers to get in on the act.

The Tri-State area is not happy with Obama. And the turnaround isn’t even limited to the local area. Diane Feinstein has backed up New York Democrats on this.

Only Obama’s buddy, mayor of the hellhole that Newark turned into, Cory Booker, says he wants the trials in Newark.

Now the Post is claiming an anonymous administration source has said that Obama may be willing to retreat on the KSM trial, and conduct a military tribunal in Gitmo… if the backlash gets strong enough.

It’s a sign of desperation and a sign of the times, that the Obama Admin might be willing to send a brother back to Gitmo, instead of giving him the full ACLU works blocks away from the site of Ground Zero.

In Israel, Haaretz is reporting that Netanyahu may be offering Mitchell more concessions, such as the release of more Fatah terrorists from prison and the removal of more roadblocks… both of which will lead to more terrorist attacks and dead Israelis.

It’s a symptom of how broken the political system is, that 17 years after Oslo, Israel is still on the same broken track of appeasing terrorists.

Meanwhile Pinny (Pinchas) Cohen, a presumed descendant of the original Pinchas, tossed two sneakers at the Israeli Supreme Court’s left wing head judge, Dorit Beinish.

Naturally this has led to loving depictions of the martyrdom of Dorit, who had her eyeglasses broken. Depictions that have not been lavished on Israelis murdered because of the Supreme Court’s favoritism toward terrorists. And the left wing press has eagerly seized on the sneaker throw to begin screaming about a “culture of incitement” (left wing code for criminalizing criticism of left wing public officials), because a mentally unstable man threw sneakers at a corrupt judge.

Haaretz already penned an op ed blaming that same culture of incitement and demanding stronger measures, while praising the court. The repulsive Mazuz latched on to it as part of a “wave of attacks”. Apparently there was a wave of sneaker hurlings we were not aware of. In a comic farce, the Chief Justices convened to proclaim their support for Beinish (support against what? A 52 year old man who threw sneakers at her and was promptly arrested?) and issued a statement saying;

“The chief justices see this incident as one that undermines a national symbol and as an insult to the entire legal establishment, which represents one of the pillars of democracy in the State of Israel.”

This kind of anti-democratic lunacy in response to a minor incident can only be the work of people who have had insufficient shoes thrown their way. The legal authorities are demanding a long prison sentence for Pinny Cohen, a man who is rather obviously mentally unstable, but whose cry that Dorit Beinish is corrupt, was quite true.

But the same people so worried about a chief justice’s broken eyeglasses couldn’t give a damn about Israeli children being murdered by the very terrorists they set free.

If you still feel any sympathy for the terrible tragedy of Dorit Beinish’s broken eyeglasses, consider some who will pay a much higher price for her actions on behalf of terrorists.

Driving instructor Eli Cohen, a 30-year-old father, was killed in 2000 after his car was sprayed with bullets. Though shot multiple times, he survived long enough to drive to the nearest settlement before he lost consciousness and crashed.

There have been no fatal sniper attacks since the highway was closed to Palestinians in 2002, but risks are ever-present. Almost daily, youths throw stones at passing cars.

Last week, Israeli police say, they found a hidden explosive device by the side of the road.

Memories of the Jewish blood spilled on this highway have led some Israelis, including family members of those killed, to come out strongly against reopening the road to Palestinians.

Saying last week’s ruling turns a drive down Highway 443 into a game of Russian roulette, some conservative lawmakers are moving to annex the highway to Israel.

Days after the ruling, posters began appearing along the road, taking aim at Israel’s Supreme Court chief, Dorit Beinisch. “Dear Driver, Beware,” the signs read. “Beinisch is endangering your life on Route 443.”

Meanwhile in the US German Automaker Audi unveiled its “Green Police” ads in which a fake police officer warns people not to use more than one napkin for the sake of the environment.

The ad itself is obnoxious and petty enough to almost qualify as a parody of environmentalism. Worse since there are actual police forces with that name, some may be confused into thinking that the ad represents a legitimate warning from a law enforcement agency and so qualifies as intimidation.

But just to make Audi’s green fascism that much more appalling, the name was also used by a Nazi Jew hunting unit.

But you have to admire Audi for putting the fascism in environmentalism so well. What a way to get ready for the Superbowl.

In other news, renowned left wing revisionist historian Howard Zinn died of a vast military industrial conspiracy against his heart. In lieu of flowers, mourners are asked to make kissy faces to Hugo Chavez.

The President of Pakistan is on a black goat killing spree to protect him from evil magic.

Mr Zardari, who rose to power after the assassination of his wife, former prime minister Benazir Bhutto, in late 2007, has become increasingly unpopular and faces a range of problems from Islamist militancy to a stagnant economy and political rivalry.

Luckily stagnant economies are easily fixed with a little goat killing.

Incidents like this should serve as an education to anyone who still doesn’t understand that a Muslim country may have some technology, but it’s still stuck in the dark ages. Now pardon me while I go kill some goats to improve the economy.

Atlas continues her dedicated investigation of the Auschwitz blueprints. It’s a quite important issue because it helps expand our knowledge of the Mufti’s, at the time the leader of Muslims in Israel, collaboration in the Holocaust.

The report concluded that the Grand Mufti both supported and encouraged “the Nazi program of extermination of the Jews.” Captured records revealed that he had accompanied Adolf Eichmann to visit the gas chambers at Auschwitz and helped to put an end to negotiations being carried out by the Nazis to ransom Jews; the Mufti insisted they be liquidated. Writing to Himmler, the Mufti accused him and Joachim von Ribbentrop of being too lenient, since they had allowed some Jews to flee Germany. “If such practices continue,” the Mufti was quoted, “it would be “incomprehensible to Arabs and Moslems and provoke a feeling of disappointment.”

The Mufti wanted a Nazi invasion in order to exterminate the Jews in Israel. But he wanted the extermination of Jews to even take place in Europe. A common theme in Muslim propaganda is that they’re being punished for the Holocaust, which had nothing to do with them.

The hell it didn’t.

Daniel Greenfield Most recent columns

Daniel Greenfield is a New York City based writer and freelance commentator. “Daniel comments on political affairs with a special focus on the War on Terror and the rising threat to Western Civilization. He maintains a blog at Sultanknish.blogspot.com.

Daniel can be reached at: sultanknish@yahoo.com

Friday Afternoon Roundup - A New Year, a New Terror

by: Daniel Greenfield a/k/a Sultin Knish

Barely has 2010 begun and we've already had multiple terror arrests, one after another. And then we've had multiple arrests that aren't even being described as terror related.

Just today, we've had two more arrests out of New York of friendly religion of peace folks. Only a few days before that, a Palestinian Arab Muslim who owns a mosque was taken off a plane for shouting that he wanted to kill Jews. The media however is dismissing it as nothing more than a drunken incident. Debbie Schlussel has video footage of his court appearance.

The latest Pentagon report shows that the Gitmo terror returnee rate is up to 20 percent. And again, those are only the ones the Pentagon knows about. Worse yet many of the returnees from Gitmo are actually playing key roles in Al Queda, particularly in Yemen. This is significant because liberal pundits and lawyers often made the argument that these were small fry who just happened to come to Afghanistan and wanted nothing more than to go home.

Well they came home and began the Jihad all over again. Which naturally those same pundits and lawyers claim was only attributable to how much we humiliated them at Gitmo.

Then there was the Westergard ax attack, a shooting in a church in Egypt and all the usual roundup of terrorist attacks in areas in Afghanistan, Russia's Islamic republics, Israel, Kashmir and all the other parts of the world that Muslims have turned into a war zone.

All in a matter of a few days.

The sobriquet, tiny minority of extremists has become an obvious joke. And Muslims insist on reminding those who forget of the consequences of ignorance.

And the Tolerance March of Death continues. In Malaysia, tensions are overflowing because non-Muslims are daring to use the word Allah.

The absurdity of Muslim hypocrisy on the subject is that Muslims routinely demand that Allah be translated as god in the West, assuring us that it's a universal idea. But at home Muslims demand to be the only ones with the right to use Allah. What this translates to is an attempt to monopolize the very idea of god, as being the property of only Islam.

And that is the endgame for the blasphemy laws being passed in Europe as well. We haven't gone all the way yet, even in Michigan a man who posted anti-Islamic cartoons isn't actually being charged. Not because the politicians don't want him charged, but because the laws don't actually exist. Yet.

Investigators say the man told them that Muslims are "anti-Christian" and that he found the images online and thought it would be "cool" to post them on utility poles in the St. Cloud area.

"While I do not condone the crude and distasteful messages which the suspect in this case attempted to convey, criminal prosecution under the statutes available to this office would not be successful,"

Kendall wrote that the cartoons were political speech, and that the suspect was educating people rather than threatening them.

Petersen told the paper he had not decided on whether to file other charges.

And so for now the man isn't headed to jail. For now.

Side note: Muslim claims that IDF dogs are trained to attack anyone shouting Allahu Akbar, a cry commonly used by terrorists just before they begin their slaughter.

The opening of the Burj Khalifa in Dubai has gotten the usual stars and spangles coverage, while no one in the media has bothered to examine Dubai's virtual slavery in the construction industry. Or just how much of the money being spent was based on investor gullibility.

There is naturally no coverage of the fact that the UAE is an Islamic tyranny. That it sponsors terrorism. That in Dubai a female British tourist was arrested after being raped.

The 23-year-old Londoner says she was attacked by a waiter in a hotel toilet after celebrating her engagement to her boyfriend with drinks, The Sun reports.

But after she admitted drinking alcohol and sharing a hotel room with her fiancé, police in the strict Islamic state arrested her for "illegal drinking" outside licensed premises and having sex outside marriage.

Her 44-year-old fiancé, also from London, was charged with the same offences. Both were thrown in police cells by officers who paid little heed to the rape.

The devastated couple are understood to be on bail awaiting trial and have had their passports confiscated. They could be jailed for up to six years if found guilty of the illicit sex charge.

British embassy officials in the desert emirate are helping them.

A diplomatic source said: "There have been some truly appalling injustices in Dubai but this one tops the lot.

"A desperate, distressed rape victim went with her boyfriend to report the attack to police. And both wound up behind bars.

"The police and authorities in Dubai have shamed themselves by yet again displaying a breathtaking lack of compassion and humanity."...

Her attacker, who is understood to be Syrian, is believed to have denied rape. He claimed the Briton consented but has also been charged with "illegal sex".

That of course is how Muslim countries have effectively legalized rape. And tourists foolish enough to try and deal with the Emirati police, which despite the glittering architecture, is just a bunch of thugs employed by the desert rat sheikhs running Dubai, get a one way trip to a jail cell.

The British embassy officials, whose main function there is visiting trafficked Ukranian prostitutes and promoting business deals with British companies will of course "help out". After enough helping out, which will consist of them crawling on their knees before the sons of desert bandits and suggesting delicately that English ignorance of Islam's fair and honest laws may create a negative image for Dubai, the couple will be expelled to England, the rapist will not be charged with anything (nor is this the first time he likely did something like this) and foreign tourists will once again get a lesson they will soon forget about not visiting Islamic countries.

Despite all this, there is of course no talk of boycotting Dubai. Andrew Sullivan who demands that US troops invade Israel to create a Hamas state, isn't concerned about a dictatorship where a few percent control a labor work force that comprises much of the country.

Naturally not.

Dubai is an illusion and a lie created to attract Western tourists and investors. It is a modernist facade built on a primitive and backward fundamentalist society that trades oil and luxuries to the very infidels it despises, repaying them with Jihad and oppression.

Beneath the skyscrapers, Dubai is no more modern than Cairo or Karachi.

United Arab Emirates--Dubai just opened the ultimate trophy building -- the world's tallest skyscraper, which soars a neck-craning 2,717 feet into the air -- but just try getting there from the airport.

Your polite, epaulette-wearing cabdriver screeches down a 12-lane highway and -- with the tower in plain sight -- he goes miles past it, leading you to wonder whether he's lost his way or is ripping you off. Only when he finally reaches an interchange and then doubles back to the tower do you realize what's going on: Dubai wins no medals for urban planning....

At ground level, the fronds are packed with high-priced villas while the stemlike road leading to them is lined with monolithic rows of hulking apartment buildings. These look as though they were designed by architectural refugees from East Germany who added a few Islamic touches.

Multiply this gap between image and reality a hundredfold and you have the Dubai that was taking shape before the global recession of 2008 and the emirate's debt crisis. It is a city of isolated enclaves, lacking convenient connections to one another, and brutal linear strips, exemplified by the eyesore high-rises along the emirate's main drag, a superwide highway called Sheikh Zayed Road.

All of Dubai is one great big Potemkin village.

Meanwhile Guliani's comments have stirred up a storm.

First up Daniel Friedman points out the false AP Headline on the story.

Here's the headline and lede of an AP top story being carried verbatim by the media across the country this morning:

Giuliani: Obama 'turned the corner' on terrorism

WASHINGTON – Former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani said Friday he believes President Barack Obama "turned the corner" on understanding the nature of terrorism when he publicly declared the U.S. at war.

Here's video of the full "Good Morning America" interview with Giuliani that the AP purports to be referencing, which ABC News titles, Rudy Giuliani Criticizes Terror Trial.

The Washington Post's Jonathan Capehart went another route by questioning Giuliani's patriotism. (Remember when liberals were boiling mad at even the idea of anyone questioning their patriotism?)

In a post titled, "Rudy Giuliani fails citizenship test", Capehart proves that

A. He doesn't know what a citizenship test is

B. Compares anyone who criticizes Obama to an Al Queda terrorist

"But anyone who dabbles in the irresponsible chatter that Obama and his administration couldn't care less about protecting Americans is, like an al-Qaeda foot soldier"

Now this is a fantastic quote because when conservatives said things like this a few years back about groups that actually worked to undermine America and help terrorists... such as anti-war protesters (a group that includes Obama) and the ACLU... they were accused of fascism and McCarthyism.

But McCarthyism is cool at the Washington Post when it's Capehartiasm.

And in a citizenship competition between Giuliani and Jonathan Capehart, whose only contribution is being one of Obama's many barely distinguishable bootlickers, does he really think he's going to win?

The only thing significant here is that the Obama media is very predictably redefining patriotism as support for anything Obama does.

Moving on with the roundup now, Debbie Schlussel points out that the CIA bomber was actually a Palestinian Arab, though of course most of Jordan is Palestinian Arab.

But after Nidal Malik Hasan and Mansor Mohammad Asad, Balawi makes 3.

In NJ, Rabbi Shmuley Boteach, who I'm not a fan of but is correct in this case, is battling Libya.

Rabbi Shmuley Boteach, best known as the author of Kosher Sex, lashed out on Tuesday at a US congressman who was quoted as saying residents of Englewood, New Jersey, should be "good neighbors" to a Libyan diplomat planning to move to the New York City suburb.

Boteach accused Rep. Steve Rothman of brokering a closed-door deal for Libya to buy a mansion in Englewood in 1982.

Coming a day after the Democratic congressman issued his own press release criticizing Boteach, the rabbi fought back, asking: "Will he really defend the right of an envoy of a terror-sponsoring government to live in our midst, spending millions of dollars on his home while refusing for more than a quarter of a century to pay even one dollar in taxes?"

In an interview with the New Jersey Jewish Standard, Rothman said: "The George W. Bush administration reestablished diplomatic relations with the Libyan government and removed Libya from the list of state sponsors of terrorism... Up until this moment the Englewood police chief has advised me that he sees no problem in allowing the ambassador and his wife and children to occupy the residence. And so, I hope everyone will be appropriately good neighbors."

Sure. Shouldn't we be good neighbors with a terrorist state. Shocking from Steven Rothman, a Democratic congressman with a lifetime rating of 82.54% with Progressive Punch.

Meanwhile since there is a small cottage industry dedicated to claiming that Jews had it great under Islamic rule before the creation of the State of Israel, two small tastes of what religious freedom for Jews looks like under Islam, at a time when there are virtually no Jews living anymore under Islamic rule.

Israelis make pilgrimage to rabbi's tomb in Egypt

Hundreds of Israelis came to Egypt earlier this week for an annual pilgrimage to the tomb of a 19th-century Jewish holy man in Egypt's Nile Delta, airport officials said...

In past years, Egypt limited the number of pilgrims visiting the tomb of Rabbi Yaakov Abuhatzeira near the Mediterranean port city of Alexandria. But Israeli newspapers reported that President Hosni Mubarak accepted a request from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu when he visited Egypt last week to allow unlimited numbers.

Since Egypt and Israel signed a peace treaty in 1979, Jewish devotees, mostly of Moroccan origin, have been flocking to the site for a ceremony at his tomb. But Egypt has limited the numbers of pilgrims. In 2001, a Court in Alexandria ruled to ban the ceremony after complaints by opposing groups.

Some residents claim the shrine is not the tomb of a Jew.

Egypt guards the stone tomb, which stands in a small chamber, and allows visitors only for the January anniversary of Abuhatzeira's death.

The tomb is a vestige of Egypt's once-prosperous Jewish community. Jews in Egypt go back to the time before Moses. And by the founding of Israel in 1948, they numbered about 80,000 people. But the Arab-Israeli wars, and the resentment and expulsions that they engendered, have reduced Egypt's Jews to about 60 people, living in Alexandria and Cairo, according to the Israeli embassy.

By contrast, mind you, Israel has allowed Muslims to regularly maintain mosques built over Jewish holy sites in the cave of the patriarchs at Hevron and at the Temple Mount.

Secondly over in Iraq, Muslims are doing to the tomb of the Prophet Ezekiel, exactly what they do to every holy site they get their hands on. Tearing it apart and replacing it with a mosque.

Early reports that Iraq plans to retain the Jewish nature of the Tomb of the Prophet Ezekiel are apparently false. Sources in Baghdad say that the government plans to turn it into a mosque and erase all Jewish markings

Since then, however, reports have surfaced that the government is actually planning to build a mosque there, including removing the ancient Hebew inscriptions that adorn the site. Some reports say that all or some of the lines of Hebrew script have already been erased...

Shelomo Alfassa, Director of Justice for Jews from Arab Countries, reports that Islamic political parties have pressured the government to remove the Jewish inscriptions. He quotes the Iraqi news agency Ur News as reporting that the writing and ornamentations “are being (or have been) removed… under the pretext of restoring the site.”

Alfassa quotes sources to the effect that Iraq’s Antiquities and Heritage Authority “has been pressured by Islamists to historically cleanse all evidence of a Jewish connection to Iraq - a land where Jews had lived for over a thousand years before the advent of Islam.”...

Though well over 100,000 Jews lived in Iraq a few decades ago, this number has now been decimated to no more than eight, Prof. Moreh said. “There are others,” he added, “but they barely know that they are Jews; in many cases, their parents did not tell them.”

Alfassa concludes: “Iraq - the Biblical Mesopotamia -is almost as rich in Jewish history as the Land of Israel. The tomb of the prophet Ezekiel dates back to the Babylonian exile in the sixth century BCE. It was there in Iraq that Abraham discovered monotheism, and it is where the prophets Ezra, Nehemiah, Nahum, Jonah and Daniel are all buried.”

Continuing the roundup, Jerry Gordon at Red County looks at another unforeseen development produced through Muslim immigration to America. Clan warfare.

Yesterday, two Somali Cousins , owners of a corner grocery and Halal market in the Seward section of South Minneapolis, and a customer were savagely killed. ...

Given the backdrop of the Al Shabaab recruitment of Somali émigré youths and recent indictments of 14 persons of interest by federal prosecutors in Minneapolis, one might speculate that the violence of clan warfare that has torn apart Somalia might have also spread to America. Could that be the unmentionable motive behind the Seward section Somali murders in Minneapolis? From the comments in the news conference by Minneapolis Police Chief Dolan are any indication, perhaps the ‘other agencies’ involved might be the FBI Counterterrorism task force. We also speculate whether the unsaid specter of clan warfare may behind killings and gang activities in other major Somali émigré communities in the US.

Ted Belman at Israpundit posts a speech asking reasonably enough why we fund NGO's in the first place.

I’m certainly not opposed to the existence of groups that denounce the neo-liberal agenda, run radical boot camps, declare carbon holidays in the name of God or think Israel is the worst country on Earth. I just don’t think they should do it with our money. If they’ve got causes they believe in, good for them. Just let them pay for it themselves, like the rest of us.

Ah but that's where the wealth redistribution comes into the picture.

Finally for those in the LA Area, Children of Jewish Holocaust Survivors will be holding an important panel discussion on the Goldstone report featuring Richard Landes of Augean Stables and Omri Ceren of Mere Rhetoric, as well as the Israeli Deputy Consul General in LA (see full notice here at the CJH site)

The Jewish State in 2009 is under attack from the broadest and most sustained delegitimization campaign since before the founding of the modern Jewish State, bringing together journalists, academics, jihadists, diplomats, totalitarian thugs, and human rights activists in a coordinated effort to erode Israel's freedom to defend itself. The widely criticized Goldstone Report, accused Israel of war crimes during its defensive Cast Lead operation while ignoring Hamas' deliberate use of its own population as human shields, and downplaying the role of almost a decade of documented rocket attacks on Israeli civilians from Gaza, is at the center of this global anti-Israel campaign.

The panel will explore the flaws in the Report, the potential consequences of its implementation, and the responses of its critics.

Considering that a clause in the Goldstone report could open the door to international sanctions, as was recently reported in the Jerusalem Post, that makes such an event all the more important.

Note: The above article is from Sultan Knish blog. From NY to Jerusalem, Daniel Greenfield Covers the Stories Behind the New. Daniel Greenfield, a blogger and columnist born in Israel and currently living in New York City. I am a contributing editor at Family Security Matters. My columns regularly appear at Family Security Matters, IsraeleNews and daily at the Canada Free Press, as well as on occasion at Act for America and at Front Page Magazine. My op eds have also appeared in the Jewish Press. To read more about Daniel Greenfield, please visit his most informative, up to the minute blog at the website of this article!

Presentation vs. Taste: Why Barack Obama is cooking up disaster in the War on Terror

By Paul Ibbetson

There is little doubt that my pallet is not as refined as my liberal friends’ and I have always found it hard to watch the gourmet shows where hours are spent meticulously preparing complex dishes that then cover about three inches of the plate. I guess you can say that while the crème de la crème is still waiting for their single mouthful of Lobster and Prawn Mornay, I will be finishing the last bites of a full plate of steak and potatoes.

However, there is one very practical thing that can be learned from the fancy dishes tossed about from those exotic chefs of iron and that is the value of presentation. It is undoubtedly true that we eat first with our eyes. It is this use of presentation to the American people, our enemies, and our allies in the war on terror by the Barack Obama administration that I wish to discuss now.

Barack Obama, since becoming president, has gone on a quest to improve what he states is a negative world image of America. To do this he has ordered the closing of Guantanamo Bay despite not having a plan for where to relocate the prisoners of that facility. The President has also, without qualification, pronounced this country a land of torturers with its use of advanced interrogation techniques and now the administration poises itself to make 9-11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed the most well-known terrorist recruiter in the world by way of a lengthy public show trial.

While all this is taking place, the Obama administration solidifies a transition back to the pre-9/11 reactive criminal justice style of opposition to terrorism. If we put the actions of Barack Obama in the war on terror on the plate of reality, how is he presenting America to those that want to kill us? Is there any doubt left in this great nation that Obama is inviting terrorists to our doorstep through these actions?

While American soldiers continue to fight abroad, Obama’s months of indecision to send the requested troops to Afghanistan in combination with a public troop withdrawal date sends a clear message that this administration is not in the fight. The Homeland Secretary’s attempt to change the word “terrorism” into “man-caused disasters” shows our enemies that we have less of a desire to get away from promoting the politics of fear to the world, and more that this administration operates within the politics of the frightened when it comes to facing radical Islamic terrorism. When U.S. Army Major Nidal Malik Hasan, you know, the guy whose business cards read “soldier of Allah,” killed American soldiers on American soil, Barack Obama’s first words were that we should not be quick to come to judgment. When Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the terrorist who attempted to blow up Northwest Flight 253 is caught, instead of screaming the war cry that Americans won’t stand for this, the news is prosaic with statements that the unfortunate happening was an isolated incident in combination with Homeland Security Secretary Napolitano’s mild concern over the event and praise for post-event procedures.

The bottom line is that presentation matters, and Barack Obama would do well to embrace the Reagan philosophy of “Peace through Strength” before it is too late. To those who are put out over the idea of having to hold their bowels one hour before airport landings or being made to parade in front of full-body scanners, projecting their little naked selves at the airport, all I can say is this, “you ain’t seen nothing yet.” As the Obama administration continues to present America as a country unable to hear, speak, or think about bringing the fight to the terrorists, frequent flyers should prepare themselves for future cavity searches with their names on them and much, much more.

The answer is as obvious as a poorly cooked Lobster and Prawn Mornay, well, more like a poorly cooked T-bone; this administration cannot handle the heat of the kitchen when it comes to fighting radical Islamic terrorists and those that aid them. While Obama twiddles and vacillates on the issue of fighting and destroying an enemy that is not going to stop, we, the American people, will be forced to eat every un-tasty dish in the form of suffering the consequences of presenting a weak front in the war on terror.

Paul Ibbetson Most recent columns

Paul A. Ibbetson is a published author and lecturer on the Patriot Act. He is a former Chief of Police of Cherryvale, Kansas, and member of the Montgomery County Drug Task Force. Paul is the author of the book “Living Under The Patriot Act: Educating A Society” and is the host of the award winning radio show the “Conscience of Kansas” on the wildcat 91.9 f.m wildcat919.com ibbetsonusa.com.

Barack Obama: Pretending to Be Presidential

So which one is right? Is Cheney overstating the situation, or is President Obama in denial?

By John Lillpop Saturday, January 2, 2010

Former Vice President Dick Cheney ruffled a good many elitist feathers recently when he accused the president of pretending that America is not at war. Cheney’s words were immediately challenged by the same fellow who took three days to make a public statement about the terrorist incident on Flight 253 this Christmas Day.

So which one is right? Is Cheney overstating the situation, or is President Obama in denial?

It may be the latter, considering other similar positions taken by President Obama. Namely:

* Islam is a religion of peace: 9.11, the Fort Hood slaughters, and Flight 253 are but isolated examples

* Shutting down GITMO will eventually persuade Muslim fanatics to give up IEDs and suicide bombings

* Janet Napolitano was the most qualified person in all of America to be Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security

* The “Bush Recession” is over, although his sky-high unemployment numbers continue to linger

* Working as planned: The trillion dollar stimulus which was supposed to create or save 3-4 million jobs

* Spending additional trillions of dollars is absolutely essential in order to reduce the federal deficit

* Adding 30 million to the ranks of the insured will cut overall medical costs, reduce the deficit, improve the quality of care and will not result in higher taxes

* 250 million Christians live here; however, America is not a Christian nation

* Hillary Clinton is perfectly content to be Secretary of State and has no aspirations for higher elective office

* Amnesty for 20 million illegal aliens has nothing whatsoever to do with growing the base of the Democrat party

* The Obama administration “saved the US economy” from falling into a devastating depression

* “Unprecedented breakthrough” and “meaningful agreement” were produced at the Global Warming conference in Copenhagen

* ClimateGate is a vast right wing conspiracy designed to embarrass Al Gore and Barbara Boxer

* Winning the war in Afghanistan is a top priority, provided that the troops can be brought home at least one year ahead of the 2012 election

* Reading terrorists captured on the battle field their Miranda rights will convince the Mullahs of Iran to shut down all of their 10,000 enrichment centrifuges

* All problems currently vexing America originated with former President George W. Bush

And the number 1 pretense of all: Barack Obama’s first year in office merits a B+!

John Lillpop Most recent columns

John W. Lillpop is a recovering liberal. “Clean and sober” since 1992 when last he voted for a Democrat. Pray for John: He lives in the San Francisco Bay Area, where people like Nancy Pelosi are actually considered normal!.

John can be reached at: satirebylillpop@yahoo.com

US sends 12 Gitmo detainees to their home nations (AP)

WASHINGTON — The U.S. has transferred a dozen Guantanamo detainees to Afghanistan, Yemen and the Somaliland region as the Obama administration continues to move captives out of the Cuban facility in preparation for its closure.

The Justice Department said Sunday that a government task force had reviewed each case. Officials considered the potential threat and the government's likelihood of success in court challenges to the detentions.

Over the weekend, four Afghan detainees were transferred to their home country. Two Somali detainees were transferred to authorities in Somaliland, the semi-autonomous northern region of Somalia. Six Yemeni detainees also were sent home.

The Justice Department said that since 2002, more than 560 detainees have departed the military prison in Cuba and 198 remain.

The Justice Department identified those sent home as:

_Afghans Abdul Hafiz, Sharifullah, Mohamed Rahim and Mohammed Hashim.

_Somali detainees Mohammed Soliman Barre and Ismael Arale.

Yemenis Jamal Muhammad Alawi Mari, Farouq Ali Ahmed, Ayman Saeed Abdullah Batarfi, Muhammaed Yasir Ahmed Taher, Fayad Yahya Ahmed al Rami and Riyad Atiq Ali Abdu al Haf.

The administration has announced that five detainees will be tried in a New York federal court and more are likely to be tried in this country.

Up to 100 detainees will be sent to a nearly empty prison in Thomson, Ill.

In Rome, state-run and private television stations said a third Tunisian detainee from Guantanamo Bay is being moved to Italy to face international terrorism charges for having allegedly recruited fighters for Afghanistan.

Private TG5 identified the man as 40-year-old Moez Ben Abdelkader Fezzani, also known as Abou Nassim, and said he was expected to land Sunday night at Milan's Malpensa airport. A prosecutor confirmed Fezzani's name on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media.

President Barack Obama says he won't set a new deadline for closing the Guantanamo Bay military prison, but does expect the facility to shut down sometime next year.

The administration has abandoned the January 2010 deadline Obama set for closure soon after taking office. Obama has said he realized that things move more slowly in Washington than he expected.

Copyright © 2009 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.