We Remember

Throwing Israel Under A Bus

Global Jihad Linked to Flotilla

Israeli defense officials now say dozens of passengers who were aboard the Turkish ship Mavi Marmara, the scene of a bloody showdown with Israeli commandos Monday, are suspected of having connections to terrorist organizations. The Israeli Army says it's identified 50 passengers on the ship with terrorist links.

It's known the flotilla of 6 ships was in part organized by the IHH group in Turkey, which reportedly has links to Al Qaeda. And three members of Yemen's Parliament, from the Islah Party, were also among the more than 600 activists detained by Israel after ships refused to stop for Israeli patrol boats and were boarded by Israeli Navy SEALs who eventually opened fire, killing 9 people. The Islah party is also said to have shadowy links to Al Qaeda. Both groups certainly support the Hamas organization in Gaza.

Israel believes the larger danger is that Turkey, a NATO ally, is becoming a foe of the U.S. and Israel. Israel's intelligence Chief, Meir Dagan, told top government ministers here that Turkish President Recip Tayyip Erdogan has "a dream of returning Turkey's dominance through going down the Islamic hall." He cites Turkey's warmer relations with the Palestinians and Hamas, and improving relations with Syria, Iran and others. Dagan described a new anti-Israel coalition. Turkey facilitated the flotilla and the Marmara is Turkish-flagged.

When Israeli commandos lowered themselves onto the deck of the Marmara they met a violent mob armed with bats, steel bars, knives -- and even guns ripped from Israeli troops who were beaten to the point they feared for their lives. Four of the Israelis were set upon, stabbed and shot, and are still in the hospital. Why then did Israel then send its Naval commandos down to the Marmara, armed mainly with paintball guns, into what was clearly much more than a mission of crowd control? The answer is Israeli commanders now admit it was a case of "bad equipment, bad tactics, and bad intelligence."

Had the team boarding the ship not been lowered one by one to be quickly overwhelmed by violent activists, had they been trained in crowd control, the outcome may have been much different, spared the bloody ending that now has the international community in uproar.

Even close allies are under pressure. U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has been wobbling between supporting Israel's right to defend its borders against Hamas smuggling and the need to show sympathy for 1.5 million Palestinians under a 3-year blockade struggling to get everything from medical supplies to food. Clinton won't condemn the blockade, even though Israel itself is increasingly questioning keeping it in place, considering that Hamas manages to smuggle arms from underground tunnels in Egypt regardless.

The defense official's claim a portion of the activists aboard the 6 ships had such serious links to extremist groups raises more questions about who in Israel ultimately approved the bungled plan to board the ships. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's inner cabinet is said to be fuming about not being consulted on the actual details of the raid and is demanding answers now. Israel's political leaders and top generals are trying to avoid taking responsibility for the "fiasco at sea," as one newspaper headline screamed here this week.

A top general told Israel's Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee this week that Israeli commandos also used some "gray" tactics at sea on the other 5 ships, an indication they may have somehow disabled engines on the ships. But they decided not to do the same to the Marmara, the large cruise ship where most of the activists were, fearing they would create another kind of humanitarian problem by stranding hundred of activists at sea without food and water and creating a different kind of spectacle.

There are now two more ships on course to attempt to run the Israeli blockade on Gaza, arriving sometime later this week. This is a war for world opinion and Israel knows it. But an army source told me "we will also do everything necessary to stop these ships too." Israel still believes the blockade is necessary at any cost. But the price Israel is paying is still being tallied internationally in terms of weakened support in Europe and even in America.

Robocop's Comment:



According to the UN and American Libtards, these are "activists". Reality, Hamas is a terrorist organization, associated with the very people the United States is at war with. We routinely confront terrorists in international waters. Obama is throwing Israel, our best ally in the Middle East, under a bus. He has the practice.

Public Service Message 05.19.10

LINK

BLOG

Let's Wise Up About Who and What We Are Fighting

Fox News

Just as there is “organized crime,” there is “organized terror.”

The presidents of the United States and Afghanistan have met. Can the strained relations between the two allies be repaired? Or will the American public’s patience with the difficult US and allied counter insurgency war against terrorism unravel? Much is at stake. Particularly whether we know our enemy and how to defeat it.

Entrenched in the public’s mind is the idea that Al Qaeda and Usama Bin Laden were behind the World Trade Center attacks of September 11. Like that attack, we think loose bands of individual terrorists remain the real threat we face, such as the Times Square bomber. So Americans rightly ask “Why are we in Afghanistan and Iraq?” And “Why don’t we just treat this like a law enforcement issue? With good police work we can stop the attacks before they happen.”

Let’s look at some facts first:

1. The Taliban were created in Afghanistan by the Pakistani ISI and the Saudi government five years after the Soviets left;

2. Al Qaeda [in Afghanistan]…was just one element in a "poisonous coalition of Pakistani and Arab intelligence agencies; impoverished young students bused to their deaths as volunteer fighters from Pakistani religious schools; exiled Central Asian Islamic radicals; ... and wealthy sheikhs and preachers who jetted in from the Persian Gulf”;

3. Al Qaeda camps in Afghanistan were established in territory controlled by Hizb-i-Islami, Party of Islam. An Iraqi intelligence document, dated January 25, 1993, found by Americans in Iraq, states that “Iraqi intelligence established ties with Hizb-i-Islami in 1989 and had a direct relationship to its head and to which it provided financial support”; from these camps and from these state sponsors spawned the attacks of 9/11.

That was then. What about now?

1. Just as North Korea now ships weapons to Syria and Syria ships Scud missiles to Hezbollah, so do Gulf financiers now fund the terror groups in Afghanistan; so does Iran provide arms stockpiles to these same terrorists; so does the illicit narcotics trade combine criminal cartels and terror groups into a cooperative syndicate seeking power and money;

2. Much of the organized terror we face in Iraq is financed by ex-Baathists from Saddam’s regime, given sanctuary by the Syrian government, and recruits suicide bombers from the mosques and madras’s of North Africa;

3. In sum, just as there is “organized crime”, there is “organized terror.” And Iraq and Afghanistan are both countries in which the “terror masters” seek to establish their power and from which to organize and attack us.

We used to know this. For example, during the Reagan administration, it was widely understood that “organized terror” was largely the result of Soviet support and that of often allied states such as Libya, North Korea, Iraq, Iran and Syria and their associated terror groups. The attacks in Beirut and over Lockerbie were linked to Syria, Iran and Libya. The World Trade Center attack of 1993 was linked to Saddam Hussein. The Berlin disco bombing to Libya.

Iran is now described by our own State Department as the world’s premier state sponsor of terrorism. A recent DOD report said Iran is supplying tons of weapons to terror groups in Afghanistan and Iraq. A year ago, the city of New York indicted a major Chinese company for selling missile and nuclear weapons technology to Iran.

In a lawsuit against the Saudi government, American survivors of the attacks on 9/11 demanded to be made whole. The U.S. government, in the form of Supreme Court nominee Kagan, acting as President Obama's Solicitor General, argued that the case should not be heard even if evidence proved that the Saudis helped Al Qaeda. The U.S. argued it would interfere with U.S. foreign policy: “…the princes are immune from petitioners’ claims” because of “the potentially significant foreign relations consequences of subjecting another sovereign state to suit.”

Amazingly, this “let ‘em off the hook” policy does not only apply to the Saudis. Legislation passed by the House and Senate sanctions firms doing energy business with Iran—a key sponsor of terror. But the administration wants exceptions created for China and Russia. And sanctions efforts at the U.N. are likewise too often watered down, allowing nation state “suspects” such as Iran to go free.

Yet law enforcement is pursuing those who financed the Times Square “bomber.” Why not those who financed 9/11 and who finance terror today? Shouldn’t we keep our eye on the ball?

Organized terror is the major tool of rogue regimes and their allies in seeking hegemony in various regions of the world. Terror groups can be created, controlled or penetrated by regimes and intelligence services. Attacks may look as if committed by “lone wolf” terrorists or small, loose bands of bad guys.

The Middle East happens to be the center of the world’s supply of oil and gas. He who controls this region of the world controls our economic destiny. The establishment of totalitarian Islam is but one means to that end. Getting America out is the first step.

So if we are going to fight, we have to understand who we are fighting, whether in Afghanistan or Iraq, or here at home. We should understand that terror groups are often run by what Michael Ledeen calls “the terror masters.” And they together are part of “organized terror,” what Claire Sterling 30 years ago described as “The Hydra of Carnage”, the Soviet spawned terrorism we knew at the time as the Baader Meinhof, Black September, Red Brigades, FMLN, the PLO, and the IRA. As Yogi Berra said, welcome to the past, “it’s deja vu all over again.”

Muslim Terrorists Crossing US/Mexican Border

Right Wing Extremist Linked To Time Square Bombing Attempt

NOT REALLY. LOL But I bet that headline gave all visiting Libtards a twitch.

How about...

Pakistani Taliban Behind Times Square Bomb Plot, Officials Say

The investigation into the Times Square bomb plot has revealed that the Pakistani Taliban were behind the failed attack, top Obama administration officials said Sunday.

The investigation into the Times Square bomb plot has revealed that the Pakistani Taliban were behind the failed attack, top Obama administration officials said Sunday.

Despite conflicting claims over the past week from military and law enforcement officials, as well as Taliban leaders, Attorney General Eric Holder and White House counterterrorism adviser John Brennan said that authorities now believe suspect Faisal Shahzad acted at the direction of the Taliban in Pakistan and was probably funded by them.

Brennan told "Fox News Sunday" that Shahzad had "extensive interaction" with the group, which he described as virtually "indistinguishable" from Al Qaeda. He said investigators believe the suspect was trained by the militant network.

"It looks as though he was operating on behalf of the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan," he said. "This is a group that is closely aligned with Al Qaeda. It has a murderous agenda similar to Al Qaeda, they train together, they plan together, they plot together. They're almost indistinguishable."

New York law enforcement officials initially said they did not have evidence to support claims made by the Pakistani Taliban that they were responsible for the attempted attack. The Taliban later reversed their claim.

Gen. David Petraeus also previously described Shahzad as a "lone wolf" merely inspired by Pakistani militants in a statement to The Associated Press.

But Holder said Sunday that investigators have found solid links back to Pakistan. He said on NBC's "Meet the Press" that the Taliban were "intimately involved" in the plot.

"We've now developed evidence which shows that the Pakistani Taliban was behind the attack," he said on ABC's "This Week." "We know that they helped facilitate it. We know that they probably helped finance it, and that he was working at their direction."

Shahzad, a U.S. citizen of Pakistani descent, was arrested Monday in connection with the plot.
Holder said investigators have found no evidence to suggest that the Pakistani government, which he described as cooperative in the investigation, had any prior knowledge of Shahzad's plans.