Useless Fort Hood Leaves Americans Unprotected

Townhall.com
by Diana West

Do you believe in 'radical Islam'?" the famous Dutch parliamentarian Geert Wilders once asked me.

The occasion was a banquet last summer at the Reagan Library outside of Los Angeles where later that evening Wilders would receive a Hero of Conscience award from the American Freedom Alliance. I would have the honor of introducing him. "What did you say?" I could barely hear him over the speaker at the podium elaborating on the perils of, yes, "radical Islam."

"'Radical Islam,'" he repeated. "Do you think there is 'radical Islam,' or only 'Islam'"? Me, I'm an "only Islam" kind of gal, as I told him. Who am I to argue with Muslims ranging from terror-cleric Abu Qatada to Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan? Erdogan is particularly interesting as a democratically elected Islamic leader who eschews all word-modifiers of Islam including "moderate," the adjective the media often applies to his AKP political party. "These descriptions are very ugly," Erdogan said in 2007. "It is offensive and an insult to our religion. There is no moderate or immoderate Islam. Islam is Islam, and that's it." Erdogan has also bluntly rejected descriptions of Turkey itself as an example of "moderate Islam," saying last April: "It is unacceptable for us to agree with such a definition. Turkey has never been a country to represent such a concept. Moreover, Islam cannot be classified as moderate or not."

I mention this now because after the fireworks over Scott Brown's U.S. Senate victory in Massachusetts have died down, we will have to return to the same, old, equal parts humdrum and deadly wrangle over how to think, talk about and grapple with Islam in what remains a post-9/11 world.

Two related events took place just as the Massachusetts miracle sucked the oxygen from non-election news excepting Haiti coverage. First, the Pentagon report on the Fort Hood massacre came out. It is 86 pages long and doesn't mention the words "Muslim," "Islam," "jihad," "Sharia" (Islamic law), "Koran" -- despite the fact that we know, among other things, that the killer, who initiated his massacre with a cry of "Allahu Akbar," was a Muslim inspired by Islam to perform an act of jihad as sanctioned by Sharia derived from the Koran.

These facts, however, rate official silence. So what else is new? From the Bush years to the present, see-no-Islam denial has turned U.S. government attempts to assess and discuss national security issues into Kabuki gibberish, a perpetual exercise in make-believe that the core doctrines and traditional institutions of Islam -- not "radical Islam," not "Islamism," not other aliases -- pose no threat to the core doctrines and traditional institutions of the non-Islamic Free World. Naturally, mum's the Pentagon word over jihad at Fort Hood. Or, rather, "self-radicalization" is the word. It is mentioned more than a dozen times in the report.

I can't imagine a greater dereliction of duty than this failure of U.S. government leaders to recognize, articulate and defend against what in military parlance is known as the "enemy threat doctrine." But this dereliction, this failure will trigger no investigations or court proceedings on how and why our leaders consistently mask, soft-soap and otherwise fail to assess and repel the existential threat posed by the imposition or accommodation of these same Islamic doctrines.

Talk about irony: Within days of the report's release, one of the few politicians in the world who understands, articulates and fights the imposition and accommodation of these same Islamic doctrines went on trial in the Netherlands for doing exactly that.

I refer again to Geert Wilders, now enmeshed in a Kafkaesque court trial in which the Dutch government is subverting its own democratic institutions -- namely, freedom of speech and the will of the people -- in an effort to shut down Wilders and his political opposition to the Islamization of the Netherlands. The government's case rests on Wilders' increasingly successful efforts to win support for his anti-Islamization program from the Dutch people through speeches, writings and the short film "Fitna" (easily viewable online) -- a body of work that only a tyrannical, Islamically correct government could designate as "evidence" of a crime.

How Dutch government officials must envy America's Sharia-compliant public servants who willingly generate see-no-Islam blather such as the Fort Hood report.

They can have it.

The Jihad Decade Cometh……………………..

By Pamela Geller

As we look back on the past ten years, it is clear that we are now entering a post-American decade. How did it all go so wrong so quickly?

The year 2000 kicked off with the Democrat ruse of a “stolen election” — this from the racketeering party of ACORN — but thankfully, it was not stolen after all. George W. Bush took the reins, but soon thereafter came the culmination of all the Islamic attacks on the U.S. during the Clinton years. Islam’s fatwa on the West during the Clinton administration came home to New York and Washington on September 11th.

And while the Bush Doctrine (you are either with us or against us) was the right approach, the well dressed jihadists that Islamists like Grover Norquist ushered into the White House after 9/11 managed to sabotage the best strategy to fight Islamic jihad. The cowboy swagger set against the whole fantasy about the hijacking of Islam and the “religion of peace” nonsense was irreconcilable. It confused people. And it led to the marginalization and even dismissals of brave men and women who evaluated and exposed the jihadist ideology in our government agencies. Who can forget the case of counter-jihad expert Steve Coughlin, the Pentagon’s most knowledgeable specialist on Islamic Law and jihad terrorism? The Pentagon ended the career of its most effective analyst at the behest of a Muslim aide, Hesham Islam, within the office of Deputy Defense Secretary Gordon England. Islam scholar Andrew Bostom observed that Couglin’s firing was symptomatic “of the intellectual and moral rot plaguing our efforts to combat global jihadism.”

In February 2009, former Bush administration official Douglas Feith told me that that kind of rot is systemic. He recalled that an Office of Strategic Influence was created within his Pentagon office to fight the ideological war — but then “somebody leaked — well, leaked, no. No, somebody lied to the New York Times and gave a report saying that this Office of Strategic Influence was intending to lie to foreign journalists. And the New York Times ran a front-page story saying that. It caused a big imbroglio that resulted in the shutting down of this office. I don’t think the U.S. government has recovered to this day from that fiasco, because every time anyone suggested creating an office to really deal with jihadist ideology in a systematic or strategic way at the Pentagon, people would say, oh, no, we are not going to have another Office of Strategic Influence problem.”

And so the drip, drip, drip of jihad continued through the last decade. We became more paralyzed, impotent, and deceived. Meanwhile, the Leftist/Islamic alliance, a deadly marriage between the Democratic Party and their propaganda handmaidens in the mainstream media, engaged in daily beatings of Bush and his administration.

Removing Saddam Hussein was good. There is no way around that powerful truth. But why stop there? Removing Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as well would have been even better. But Bush lost his mojo in 2006. The relentless pounding by the Left, Israel’s halfhearted performance in the war with Hezb’allah in the summer of 2006, and the loss of the House and the Senate in November 2006 all contributed to the rout.

But what really led to the downfall of Bush’s leadership was the falsity of his premise. He wanted to believe, like Condi and Powell and the soft diplomacy crowd, that Islam would negotiate with the West. Islam cannot negotiate. Yet still the West continues its pursuit of the impossible, despite great risk. This is a function of the Western mind. These people think it inconceivable that talk can’t solve anything and everything, that war is an indelible part of the human condition. But it is. War is as much in the makeup of man as sex, food, art, love, all of it.

And wars must be fought. They will not disappear, but we will.

Of course, we know this. But the Left, our in-house enemy, demonizes any war that America chooses to fight. The egregious, horrible crimes of Mao, Stalin, bin Laden, Che, Lenin, Pol Pot, Ahmadinejad, et al, which are so heinous and so enormous, are in their terrible minds a historical footnote. They become cultural icons for the “radical chic.” Cold-blooded monsters have co-opted our country.

And so successful was the Left at infiltrating our government, schools, and institutions that eight years after the most heinous attack on American soil, we elected an icon of our mortal enemy. A Kenyan, Indonesian, third-worldish boulevardier with as much understanding of the American experience as any foreign national. Don’t call me a racist for calling him what he is — I am not interested in the color of his skin, but in the content of his character. His lack of experience in all relevant areas to the office of the president is breathtaking. And his bowing to Islam and our enemies worldwide is disastrous.

Bush’s premise was false, but Bush was a patriot. Bush loved America, and he protected America, even if he refused to see the enemy for who and what it was. It was no accident that America was safe for eight years post-9/11. Eight years of safety is cracking apart now under a weak and pro-Islamic president. The jihadi attacks on America in 2009 were staggering. And it has only just begun. Dismantling the Bush protections against jihad and launching attacks on Americans, bloggers, tea partiers, town hallers, patriots, and vets is incomprehensible — and if I hadn’t lived through it, I wouldn’t believe it possible.

I pray that America examines the Left decade and takes stock. It was the appeasement of the Left that destroyed the foundations of this country. We must rebuild them. The advancement of Islam would never have been possible — could never have happened — without our surrender to the Left. The real war is against the Leftist/Islamic alliance.

This is a fighting year.

Pamela Geller is the editor and publisher of the Atlas Shrugs website and is former associate publisher of the New York Observer. She is the author (with Robert Spencer) of the forthcoming book The Post-American Presidency: The Obama Administration’s War on America (Simon and Schuster).

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Egypt's Steel Wall: An Attempt to Placate the U.S.?

Middle East Terrorism

By: Allison Kaplan Sommer

Egypt's decision to wall off Gazan tunnels is being condemned across the Arab world.

A Middle Eastern country is building a massive thick steel wall as a barrier between themselves and a Palestinian regime. The country is being condemned for its actions across the Arab world, denounced by Islamist figures like Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah, and facing angry demonstrations at its embassies around the world.

Signs with the president’s face daubed with a Star of David are waved, and furious slogans are chanted. The new construction project, written about critically in the world press as “choking” Gaza, has been dubbed the “iron wall” and the “wall of shame.”

Sound familiar? Nothing new? In fact, the situation is very new. The country that is being berated and condemned is not Israel. The wall is being build by the Egyptian government to separate territory controlled by Egypt and the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip.

Israel is routinely charged with inhumanely and heartlessly fencing off Palestinian Gazans in a “prison,” despite the fact that Egypt’s official crossing to Gaza is also clamped shut, with the exception of a few days each month. But with the construction of this new wall, Egypt is taking some powerful hits from within the Arab world.

The wall being constructed is designed to stop the flow of smuggling between Egypt and Gaza through the border town of Rafah, an underground economy that is not limited to — but certainly includes — major weaponry and ammunition being stockpiled for terrorist attacks and to help Hamas rearm for the next war between Gaza and Israel. Along with the weaponry brought in to replace the stockpiles decimated in Operation Cast Lead, millions of dollars worth of other commerce flows through the tunnels on a daily basis. Everything from food, to gasoline, to machinery, to farm animals. The tunnels are a major source of revenue for Hamas, which charges a premium for the construction and use of the tunnels and puts a tariff on any goods that are brought in.

The planned 10 kilometer-long wall will include steel sheets that will reach 60 meters underground — an attempt to cut off the tunnels and the commerce that flourishes there. In addition to weaponry, the tunnels are also a conduit for terrorists, both reasons that the tunnels themselves were targeted in Operation Cast Lead.

Construction of the wall began in early December, with the Egyptian government doing its best to keep news of it quiet for as long as possible. By mid-December, it became impossible to hide such a massive project, and news of the construction broke and began to spread. Even as reports began appearing in the media, Egypt refused to acknowledge its existence.

An AP article dramatically described the construction in the same judgmental terms normally reserved for accounts of Israel’s building of barriers:

A jackhammer pounded large steel beams side by side into the sandy soil on the Egyptian side of Gaza’s border, putting in place an underground wall that could shift the balance of power in this volatile area. Once completed, the steel barrier would cut off blockaded Gaza’s last lifeline.

In the wake of the media attention, demonstrations condemning the Egyptian action have ensued, beginning in Jordan, where an organization of unions and professional associations protested construction of the wall. Some 150 people gathered outside the Egyptian embassy in Amman earlier this month and burned photos of President Hosni Mubarak. The photos depict Mubarak with a Star of David stamped on his forehead.

There was a similar scene at the Egyptian embassy in Lebanon, organized by an Islamist party loyal to Hezbollah and Nasrallah. And like the efforts against Israel’s wall, political activity is spreading to Europe, al-Jazeera reported:

A galaxy of Italian human rights organizations and dignitaries warned that the steel wall being built on the Palestinian-Egyptian borders would equalize Egypt with Israel in its blockade on the Gaza Strip.

In a letter to be handed Thursday to the Egyptian ambassador in Rome, the Italian organizations and figures said that Egypt has the right to take measure to protect its borders, but the blockade and starvation of Gaza people would not lead to stability in the region or give Egypt prestige and dignity.

The letter warned that Egypt’s wall would spread hatred between nations and would serve Israel alone, adding that it would cause a deep pain to the free peoples of the world.

Certainly, Egypt is not taking such a controversial measure out of affection for or a desire to protect Israel from Hamas in Gaza. Clearly, it is doing so out of self-interest. The Hamas regime in Gaza may not be as direct a threat to Egypt as they are to Israel, but tied as closely as they are to those who would destabilize the current regime in Egypt and replace it with a fundamentalist Islamist regime, they are far from trusted allies as far as Egypt is concerned. Gaza would be a conveniently located base for groups to organize and launch attacks. (Currently, Egypt is trying 26 men charged with planning attacks inside their country, linked with Hezbollah.) Therefore, Egypt has no interest in seeing Gaza loaded with powerful weaponry.

The most public battleground that the controversy over the wall is being played in is the Islamic religious world. “Dueling fatwas” are being handed down, as clerics loyal to Hezbollah and Hamas and those connected to the Egyptian government argue as to whether the wall deserves the Islamic stamp of approval, or Islamic condemnation. A group of clerics affiliated with the government, the Islamic Research Council of Al-Azhar University, declared:

It is one of Egypt’s legitimate rights to place a barrier that prevents the harm from the tunnels under Rafah, which are used to smuggle drugs and other (contraband) that threaten Egypt’s stability. … Those who oppose building this wall are violating the commands of Islamic law.

A harsh backlash ensued in the wake of this ruling — led by clerics from inside Al-Azhar itself and then echoed by other Arab clerics. For now, officials like Egypt’s Foreign Minister Ahmad Abu-al-Ghayt are continuing to do their best to avoid addressing the issue when asked by reporters about the steel wall. Sounding defensive, the Egyptian minister declared:

Constructions Egypt is carrying out is to defend itself and defend its national security. This means the right of self-defense. … The secrets of the Egyptian state will not be material discussed on satellite TVs or the press.

The wall critics accuse Egypt of taking the step to placate the United States. Egypt’s blind eye to the smuggling activity has been costly in terms of its relationship with the United States, jeopardizes the millions of dollars in aid received by the regime, and has cast doubt as to whether Egypt can play the broker role it seeks in the Mideast peace process.

Cynics suggest that Egypt is playing for maximum advantage by building a wall to please the Americans and Israelis now. Later, once it is completed, there will be a wink to Hamas as they quickly construct new tunnel routes circumventing the wall, which will presumably silence the criticism in Islamist circles and allow Egypt to continue its tightrope act — balancing Western diplomatic respectability and Middle Eastern street credibility.

Allison Kaplan Sommer

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

Note: Photo of tunnel on border added by BeeSting