Tag Archive for: ISIS

California Muslim stabber was on terror watch list, had Islamic State flag

If the information in this report is true, then Merced County Sheriff Vern Warnke was deliberately lying when he told the media that this attack had nothing to do with Faisal Mohammad’s Islamic faith. What is the motive of these people?

When it comes to Islamic jihad attacks, virtually all public officials downplay the Islamic aspect, obfuscate the motive, and often lie outright, all to protect Islam. What has made Islam sacrosanct so that no matter how high the stack of bodies gets, no matter how many atrocities are committed in its name and in accord with its teachings, the one thing we must not do at all costs is identify the root cause properly?

“Were Law Enforcement Leaders and UC Chancellor Aware of Threat by Terrorsits [sic]/Extremists to Attack UC Merced?,” by Matthew Gonzales, Merced TV News, November 7, 2015 (thanks to Joe):

…From the information I have gathered, the suspect was indeed not only on the FBI’s terrorist watch list but he was also on a national watch list and had been one of the topics of discussion at a recent FBI briefing to Merced County law enforcement leaders. According to recently obtained information, about 6 months ago the FBI held a terrorist/extremist briefing with Merced County law enforcement leaders. At this meeting several suspected terrorist with ISIS links were said to be here in Merced County. Names and photos were presented including one of Faisal Mohammad. Based on the FBI’s own analysis and a number of people on the terrorist watch list that are in the area they projected an attack at the UC Merced campus. Though they were not absolutely certain of the attack on the UC they did feel that there was enough information for them to be here if it did.

According to my sources the UC Chancellor was also briefed on the potential threats.

A witness who wishes to remain anonymous stated that they had seen what appeared to be a picture of an ISIS flag which was pulled out of the suspect’s pocket. Two of my law enforcement sources have verified that this is in fact true and that the UC Chancellor along with the FBI and DHS have instructed our local media and our local law enforcement leaders to feed the current narrative that FM was a disgruntled student instead of what he actually was… an extremist Muslim bent on attacking American students in the name of ISIS. And their reasoning for not informing Merced County residents or our out-of-town students and their parents about these potential threats to their lives? According to all three law enforcement sources the information was withheld because it would be bad for business. Protecting four innocent people’s lives and the truth was bad for business….

The last thing one of my law enforcement sources said before she hung-up was, “ISIS is here, Matt, and this is no longer a safe community. This info needs to be made public to the people of Merced County to be aware of the d anger signs.” I think she’s right because we have the right to know to be able to protect ourselves and our families from this impending danger.

RELATED ARTICLE: Michigan: Majority Muslim city council elected, “Today we show the Polish and everybody else”

Who planned the Ankara Peace Rally Bombings?

Twin simultaneous bombings ripped through a crowd of opposition supporters and Kurdish activists at an Ankara peace rally today killing 97, maiming and injuring over 246. The bombings occurred just a few weeks before a snap election scheduled for November 1st.  There is suspicion that the Turkish President couldn’t have wished for a more timely mishap.  It comes before an election he called to try and eliminate the Kurdish minority HDP party and return his AKP  party to its previous super majority.  You may recall the Suruc bombing in July that killed 33 socialist youths affiliated with the HDP that kick started the PKK uprising in southeastern Turkey. That was used as a pretext for Erdogan’s subsequent counter terrorism campaign and air assault on both Syrian Kurdish YPG and PKK bastions in northern Iraq. The better to condition the US request for Turkish clearance of the use of Incirlik air base for the flagging air assault campaign against ISIS in both Syria and Iraq. It is not without coincidence that he PKK today called for a temporary truce before the looming election.  The conventional wisdom is, as in the Suruc case , that it was possibly the work of ISIS. However, there may have been other Islamist contenders for this latest terrorist spectacle in Turkey.  Recall that the Muslim Brotherhood affiliate, the IHH, an ally of the AKP regime, supplied funds and weapons to opposition Islamist groups in Syria.

Watch this ReutersTV video of the Ankara Peace Rally bombings.

Our usually astute  European observer of things Turkish drew attention  in a conversation following the Ankara blasts  that daily polls taken by Erdogan show that his standing has slipped . Thus, indicating that his quest for conversion of the currently ceremonial post of President in Turkey to an executive one with broad powers may be out of reach. Moreover, our colleague indicated that the opposition in the Ankara parliament, including Republican, Nationalist and the Kurdish HDP parties, are united against AKP supremacy.  In fact, he said, the parliament is rarely convened in Ankara by the caretaker government. He also noted that when he viewed Turkish television coverage of the Ankara  bombing incident there were HDP flags and banners  prominent in the footage along with those of trade union groups. However, following the deadly blast, he observed that footage somehow disappeared from Turkish television news reports.

With the dramatic entry of Russia in the Syrian fray both Erdogan’s and Obama’s vain hopes for control of the situation have been eclipsed. Calls for establishment of both no-fly zones and safe havens by the Turkish and US Congressional and Presidential hopefuls appear to be wishful thinking.  Russian President Putin has thrown in his lot with Iran  propping  up the besieged Syrian President Bashar Assad who controls less than one sixth of his country.  Thus, the suspicion is today’s Peace rally bombings might not been perpetrated by PKK, known Marxist terrorist groups or ISIS. That leaves the question of whether Islamists groups allied with Erdogan and the AKP may have been complicit in the bombings?  In the dictatorial regime of Erdogan with a chastened prosecution and judiciary, the answers to these questions may not emerge with any perfunctory forensic investigation by Turkish authorities.

Screen-Shot-2015-10-10-at-10.42.31-PM-800x594The Washington Post (WaPo) report described the grisly and chaotic scene following the bombings, “Blasts kill scores at peace rally in Turkey in sign of worsening instability.”   Note in these excerpts how the Turkish PM Davutoglu asserts this bombing was aimed as disrupting what passes for democracy in this NATO ally and other commentators immediately suspect ISIS.

Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said Saturday there were “strong indications” the attack was carried out by suicide bombers, although there was no immediate claim of responsibility. He said the target was Turkish unity, democracy and stability.

“Early indicators would point to ISIS as the culprit,” said Soner Cagaptay, director of the Turkish research program at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. Either way, “this could well be Turkey’s 9/11,” Cagaptay said. “This is simply the worst terror attack in Turkish history.”

The United States also condemned the twin bombings as a terrorist attack. “It is particularly important at this time that all Turkish citizens recommit to peace and stand together against terror,” the State Department said in a statement.

The demonstrators, mobilized by a coalition of Turkish trade unions, had gathered outside Ankara’s main [train] station hours earlier to chant, wave banners and flags and call for peace. The crowd included a mix of Kurdish and leftist Turkish activists, local media reports said.

A video circulated on social media showed demonstrators linking arms to perform a traditional dance before a fiery explosion erupted in the background, sending the crowd into a panic. It was unclear whether that explosion was from the first or the second bomb detonated outside the station.

Images from the scene showed dazed and bloody demonstrators clinging to one another in the aftermath of the blasts. Bodies, some of them dismembered, lay on the street, covered with flags protesters had brought to the march.

Tensions between police and demonstrators flared following the explosions, after activists accused security forces of blocking ambulances arriving to treat the injured. Turkey’s pro-democracy activists say they are fed up with a state that is quick to crack down on dissenters but cannot keep its own citizens safe from terrorists.

In a live television broadcast, Turkish Interior Minister Selami Altinok said in response to a reporter’s question that he would not resign because there had been no security breach.

Still, Turkish authorities announced a news blackout on images showing the moment of each blast, gruesome or bloody images or “images that create a feeling of panic,” according to the Associated Press. The agency also reported that social media users in Ankara were unable to access Twitter after the blast.

Turkey, which media watchdog groups say has one of the world’s worst records on press freedom, often blocks access to Twitter and other sites for content the government deems inappropriate.

EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared in the New English Review. The featured image is of Turkish Peace Rally protesters dancing moments before deadly bombings in Ankara. Source: Reuters TV.

California Dreaming: Two Muslims try to join the Islamic State

“According to the document, on the last Friday of April, after prayer services at a mosque in Orange County, Elhuzayel and Badawi spoke enthusiastically about Islamic State….She had described her son as ‘Muslim, but not very religious, just normal.’ Over the last year, he had become more observant, frequently attending Friday prayer services at a mosque in Anaheim.”

Are these mosques being investigated? Is what they teach being closely monitored by people who know what they’re looking for, and aren’t in thrall to the “Islam is a religion of peace” propaganda? Or would that be “Islamophobic”?

“O.C. men accused of trying to join Islamic State are charged with financial crimes,” by Richard Winton, Los Angeles Times, October 7, 2015 (thanks to Darcy):

Two Orange County men accused of conspiring to aid Islamic State militants fighting in Iraq and Syria are now facing additional charges involving bank fraud and financial aid crime.

A new indictment revealed Wednesday accuses Anaheim residents Nader Elhuzayel, 25, and Muhanad Badawi, 24, of a series of financial crimes. Elhuzayel is accused of 25 counts of bank fraud, and Badawi is charged with federal financial aid fraud.

In April and May, Elhuzayel got cash through a scheme to defraud three different banks, according to the indictment, which says he deposited stolen checks into his personal checking accounts and then withdrew cash at Orange County branch offices and ATMs.

Badawi is charged with using his federal financial aid to buy a plane ticket to Turkey for Elhuzayel.

The indictment also includes preexisting charges of providing material support to a foreign terrorist organization, Islamic State. Both men have pleaded not guilty to the original charges.

Federal authorities said the men drew the attention of counter-terrorism agents with inflammatory comments on social media, prompting an investigation that led to their arrests last month. They are due back in court July 6 and are scheduled to go to trial July 28. Details of a call between the two men before their capture were contained in an FBI agent’s affidavit.

According to the document, on the last Friday of April, after prayer services at a mosque in Orange County, Elhuzayel and Badawi spoke enthusiastically about Islamic State. It says one proclaimed a wish to join the group and die a martyr on a battlefield.

Although Yemen was attractive for its natural beauty, the men agreed they would prefer to fight in Syria, the document said. It said they talked about drinking wine together in the paradise that awaited them after they were killed. Federal agents said they overheard the conversation….

Elhuzayel and Badawi are accused of setting in motion a plan for Elhuzayel to travel to the Middle East and fight for Islamic State. Agents from a counter-terrorism task force intercepted Elhuzayel at Los Angeles International Airport before he boarded a plane bound for Turkey last month. Badawi was taken into custody at an Anaheim gas station, an FBI spokeswoman said….

Elhuzayel’s mother, Falak, has previously called the allegations against her son “impossible.” Speaking on the phone before her son’s initial court appearance, Falak Elhuzayel described her son as “a very good kid — not the kind of person who would fit into this kind of category.”

She said she and her husband dropped their son off at LAX the day of his arrest and confirmed he was preparing to board a flight to Istanbul and continue on to Israel. The family, she said, is Palestinian and her son was traveling to visit relatives in the West Bank.

That evening, federal agents raided the room at the Crystal Inn motel in Anaheim where Nader Elhuzayel had lived with his parents since the family declared bankruptcy and lost their house two years ago.

Falak Elhuzayel said a team of agents upended the room in the search for evidence and asked her why her son had purchased a one-way ticket. She said she told them that he had decided to buy a return ticket later because he did not know how long he would stay in the West Bank.

She had described her son as “Muslim, but not very religious, just normal.” Over the last year, he had become more observant, frequently attending Friday prayer services at a mosque in Anaheim, she said. But she insisted it was impossible that he’d slipped into extremism. He was, she said, “a simple, gullible, nice kid.”

If convicted, Nader Elhuzayel faces up to 30 years imprisonment on each bank fraud count and Badawi faces up to five years imprisonment on the financial aid fraud count. Each man also faces up to 15 years in prison if convicted of providing material support to Islamic State.

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Islamic State claims Chris Harper Mercer mass slaughter

There is no indication that Chris Harper Mercer, who murdered thirteen people at Umpqua College, was acting on behalf of the Islamic State, or was even a Muslim at all. But that hasn’t stopped the Islamic State from claiming credit for his murders. After all, they want to “strike terror into the hearts of the enemies of Allah” (Qur’an 8:60), and one way they can do that is by appearing to be stronger than they are. And they must have loved the bit about how he singled out Christians, as they do.

“‘ISIS’ Claims Chris Mercer Harper [sic] Umpqua College Shooting,” by Sam Prince, Heavy

Chris Harper Mercer. The tweet was sent out by @K_H_O00, but the account has since been suspended by Twitter for terrorist propaganda. A screen cap can be seen below:

chris harper mercer, chris mercer, chris harper mercer umpqua community college, chris harper mercer oregon, chris harper mercer roseburgh shooting, shooter chris harper mercer, chris harper mercer oregon shooting, toby reynolds, egg man oregon, toby reynolds umpqua community college shooter, toby reynolds roseburg, toby reynolds shooter, toby reynolds shooting, roseburg shooting, umpqua community college shooting, umpqua community college shooter, umpqua shooting, umpqua shooting suspect, umpqua community college gunman, oregon community college shooter, oregon community college shooter dead, umpqua community college shooter gunman name, isis, islamic state

The tweet screen cap lacks a time stamp but the phone screen cap states “4:07 p.m.” The tweet reads:

Again #Oregon #USA #WashingtonDC #IslamicState #ISIS #USA

A meme that states “Slay Americans” in front of a man being beheaded is also visible….

RELATED ARTICLES:

Umpqua Gunman Chris Harper Mercer Hated Religion Online

“Non-religious” Oregon gunman targeted Christians, had Muslim friend who praised “the brave Mujahideen heroes”

Israel: Muslims murder Jewish couple in front of their children

Raymond Ibrahim: Muslim History vs Western Fantasy: The ‘Refugee Crisis’ in Context

EDITORS NOTE: According to reliable sources Chris Harper Mercer went to Umpqua College to slaughter Christians. Mercer asked students if they were a Christian, if the student answered yes, Mercer shot them in the head. The Islamic State’s primary opponents are People of the Cross, Christians. This appears to be a case of the enemy of my enemy is my friend.

U.S. Muslim is top Islamic State Commander

How did a Muslim from the U.S. come to have the understanding that taking sex slaves and fighting for the Islamic State was his Islamic privilege and duty? After all, we’re constantly told that the Islamic State has nothing to do with Islam, and that Muslims in the U.S. all reject its view of Islam. So was Abu Abdullah “radicalized on the Internet”? If so, why was the peaceful, benign Islam that he supposedly learned in mosques in the U.S. not able to withstand challenge from a twisted, hijacked version of Islam that is so un-Islamic that even non-Muslims like John Kerry and the U.S. Catholic Bishops can spot its un-Islamic character a mile away?

Also, as you read this poor girl’s story, think of what awaits the young women in Europe and the U.S., if the feckless policies of their governments aren’t reversed, quickly.

“EXCLUSIVE – Revealed, AMERICAN jihadi is ‘top ISIS commander’: Yazidi slave reveals that she was beaten and held captive by US citizen who directs attacks and keeps vial of poison to kill himself if he is caught,” by Jay Akbar, Mailonline, September 29, 2015:

A Yazidi slave girl has claimed the high-ranking ISIS commander who held her prisoner was a white American who directed the terror group’s attacks and received personal letters from its leader.

Nada, 19, told MailOnline that US citizen Abu Abdullah al-Amriki (the American), 23, boasted about how beautiful women from all over the world wanted to join him in Syria and that he always kept a vial of poison on him – in case he was captured in battle.

She was bought by the ISIS emir – or local leader – at a slave auction in Islamic State’s de-facto capital of Raqqa, Syria, in October.

The tall, pale man with black hair and short beard bought nine girls in total but sold seven of them on.

Nada was taken to one of his ‘many’ heavily-guarded houses in Manbij, Aleppo, where she lived with the other Yazidi girl and her son.

The teenager, who is now in America, told her harrowing story to the US government after escaping with her captor’s phone. Her fellow Yazidi hostage, known as ‘Bazi’, is also in the country – she will give evidence against Abu Abdullah to Congress and wants the FBI to press charges against him.

MailOnline cannot independently verify these claims and Nada said she has never seen his picture before on videos or images released by ISIS.

She said Abu Abdullah was a very important figure in Islamic State and a stream of armed balaclava-clad militants from all nationalities visited the house.

She said: ‘Many guests were coming and he was always explaining things to them. He was drawing maps of the fighting. He was telling everyone how to fight, about how to make an ambush.

‘He was always ordering people to move and how to make a plan. He always carried a pistol and an AK47.

‘There were also sniper rifles in the house, lying around. He also carried a policeman’s stick which he used to beat me and the boy [another prisoner] with. He also slapped the boy.

‘They didn’t let me enter the room when they were talking. They only let me enter the room when they were talking tea to them.’

Nada described the wiry commander, who spoke Arabic badly, as a ‘nervous’ man who doused himself in strong perfume and yelled at her constantly.

He was so frightened of being captured that he always kept a vial of poison in his pocket, so he could commit suicide if his enemies ever took him alive.

One group of four men – who were always masked – visited Abu Abdullah regularly to bring him letters from ISIS’s leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, said the woman.

Nada said: ‘If Abu Abdullah was not at home, I’d have to sign for it. I was just receiving it and putting it in his room.

‘The mail contained letters and the envelope was from Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. The masked man who brought the mail from al-Baghdadi talked in English.

Abu Abdullah, who converted to Islam around four years ago and has many different identities, told Nada that he regularly travels to the United States to see his family, but there is no way to verify his sensational boast.

She said: ‘He showed me pictures of his family – he had a girl and a boy. He said his family were not around, that they were far away.’

Nada was captured in the northern Iraqi city of Tal-Afar, around 32 miles from Sinjar, in around August 2014.

The terror group abducted more than 500 Yazidi women and young girls and slaughtered 5,000 as its fighters stormed through the region.

ISIS views Yazidis, whose religion includes elements of Christianity and Islam, as ‘devil-worshippers’.

The extremists take the females as their personal sex slaves and execute the men who do not convert to their twisted brand of Islam.

The teenager was taken to Manbij, a north-Syrian town which earned the nickname ‘little London’ because of the high numbers of British jihadists who live there.

Manchester twins Salma and Zahra Halane, 17, are thought to live in the town where English and German are commonly spoken.

Danish charity worker Ahmad Walid Rashidi, who was held captive in Manbij for over a month, met a blue-eyed British fighter in its police station.

He told the Sunday Times: ‘It’s like a little London or a little Berlin. Manbij is definitely the most foreign-influenced place in Syria.’

Rashidi, 23, said foreign fighters were paid around £20 a month and received free food and medicine, while jihadi brides got a £2 allowance.

During Nada’s 20-day captivity, the American jihadi also showed her pictures and footage of American girls who he claimed were coming to Syria to join ISIS.

She said: ‘There were beautiful girls or women from everywhere, from every country – he showed me them.

‘He said: “They are free and they want to come and join us, so why is it that you want to leave? Why do you want to run away? This is a good country.”

‘Abu Abdullah told me that I and the other girl will have a long life with him as servants – and our children will grow up to be jihadis like them.’

The ‘other girl’ was a Yazidi known only as Bazi, 20, who was held hostage alongside Nada after she was abducted during the ISIS assault on Sinjar in August 2014.

Bazi told CNN that Abu Abdullah would pray and wash himself before he raped her and how she pleaded with him not to touch Nada.

She said: ‘The first time he raped me, he tried to rape the other girl who was with me but I told him since I felt I’m already raped, I don’t want the other one [to be raped].

‘So I became responsible for the other one. I told him to treat her as a servant for him, because he was sheikh, an emir, so he would just have her as a servant. I convinced him the whole time until we were able to escape from his house.’

Bazi’s physical description of Abu Abdullah matched Nada’s and she also claims he told her about visiting his family in America but, again, the claims cannot be independently confirmed.

The American terrorist and his ‘team of bodyguards’ beat them after each of their five failed escape attempts. He once prevented Bazi from seeing her son for an entire week, Nada told MailOnline.

One day, when Abu Abdullah and his guards went to battle in northern Iraq, Nada stole his phone and ran to another house in Manbij.

She said: ‘When they were away fighting in Kobani, me and the other girl broke the door and left with the boy.’

They kept a low profile until the Assayish – police from the Kurdish Regional Government (KRG) – came to rescue her.

She gave Abu Abdullah’s phone to the KRG, who interviewed her and took her to a refugee camp in northern Iraq.

Here, she was interviewed by US government officials who visited the settlement and showed her pictures of another American jihadi who went by the nom-de-guerre, Abu Zeyd.

She said: I recognized it. Abu Zeyd was a beautiful man – he had long blond hair, and no facial hair. But I don’t know who he is. They had no pictures of Abu Abdullah.’…

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Revealed: Russia’s Great Game in the Middle East

It was a bizarre turn of events at the opening of the UN General Assembly in New York on the 70th Anniversary of the world body.  President Obama gave a speech lambasting Putin’s Russia over its seizure of Crimea and  invasion of eastern Ukraine violating the country’s sovereignty. However, he paid court to Russia and China for supporting the  Iran nuclear pact unanimous approved  by the UN Security Council poised to release tens of billions in sequestered funds as of December 15, 2015. He  questioned Russia’s sudden military presence in western Syria building a military complex to bolster the Assad regime.  A regime that rained barrel bombs causing the deaths of 250,000. A regime ethnically cleansing the country’s Sunni population sending millions to displaced persons camps in Turkey, Jordan and Lebanon and hundreds of thousands in flight to the EU.  The President got warm applause over his rapprochement with Cuba.

Putin, when he had his turn at the rostrum accused the U.S., without naming it, of causing the rise of the Islamic State through its invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan,  ultimately creating a Sunni supremacist Caliphate.  Following Putin Iranian President Rouhani  had his turn at the rostrum in the Assembly hall. He made the astounding proposal that an international alliance including Russia, Iran, Syria and Iraq  combat terrorism in the Middle East.  A proposal that Rouhani  said should be confirmed in another Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action akin to the Iran nuclear pact.  He noted the nuclear pact  was  concluded  “without the impediment of the Zionist enterprise”, meaning Israel.  Witness  the cheek of President Rouhani   of Iran  suggesting  a new Shia alliance in the Middle East, plus Russia welcoming  the US to join in fighting Sunni Supremacist  Islamic State.

What was on display at the UN was the supplanting  of the U.S. in the new great game of the Middle East by  Russia.  It was enough to make one’s head spin with these sudden turns  of events. It made the U.S., look like a “JV team “struggling  to keep up.

The usually astute Shoshana Bryen, senior director of the Washington, DC-based  Jewish Policy Center  was asked  by this writer during the September 27, 2015 Lisa Benson Show why  these developments occurred so suddenly.  She said that  Putin’s Russia like all great powers do when they are confronted by a vacuum, especially one that threatens its national  interests.  Thousands of Jihadists have left Chechnya, Dagestan, and Tartarstan in Russia attracted by the Salafist  Islamic doctrine of the Islamic State as a declared Caliphate.  Thus  Putin’s objective is to “bottle” up these Sunni Jihadists in Syria and Iraq.  Putin admitted as much in a CBS 60 Minutes interview with Charlie Rose  Sunday evening when he said:

More than 2,000 fighters from Russia and ex-Soviet republics are in the territory of Syria. There is a threat of their return to us. So instead of waiting for their return, we are better off helping Assad fight them on Syrian territory.

Watch the CBS 60 Minutes Charlie Rose interview with Russian President Putin:

When Lisa Benson asked Bryen about  where Iran’s proxy Hezbollah stood in these developments, she  replied  Hezbollah “had not been an efficient fighting force in Syria.  Further, she commented that Russian presence in Syria is meant to actually limit Hezbollah’s  involvement, perhaps  to a defensive role “in the Alawite enclave.”  Moreover, she noted  that Putin is not interested  in a war with Israel ,suggesting that the meeting with Netanyahu  in Moscow was  to coordinate means to avoid conflict. However, Bryen  noted  Putin has another interest in the region, “control over the flow of gas to Europe” being developing offshore in Israeli, Egyptian,  and Lebanese fields.  Bryen thinks there is ‘no evidence’ of Russian presence on the Syrian frontier on Israel’s Golan Heights.  Notwithstanding a spate of rocket and mortar attacks on the Golan responded to by the IDF this past weekend that Israeli Minister of Defense Ya’alon thinks were ordered by Iran.  We shall soon see whether Putin’s gamble pays off.  Or results in another graveyard  like Afghanistan  rout of the Soviet 40th Army in 1989.

We could see this  thunder clap about to occur in the run up to the UN General Assembly session.  We had the Russian announcement of  military aid and mission to be established in the Alawite bastion of Latakia province.  Included were  the building of expanded landing fields to accommodate Ilushin cargo aircraft  and squadrons of  Mig and Sukhoi fighters, transiting from Russia to Syria  via Iran and Iraqi airspace. Then there was the announcement of Black Sea fleet maneuvers in the eastern Mediterranean Sea.  In late July, following the UN endorsement of the Iran deal, Revolutionary Guards Quds Force Commander  Qasem Soliemani in Moscow  met with Putin and  Russian Defense Minister Shogui. Those discussions were  ostensibly to expedite deliveries of Russian advanced air defense systems, but  in reality to plan for Russian direct involvement with Iranian forces . In May , we witnessed an alleged US ally, Iraqi Premier Haidar al-Abadi traveling to Moscow  to obtain additional fighter  deliveries to aid in the battle against the Islamic State. Meanwhile, President Obama had committed 3, 500 American military trainers to assist  the  Iraqi National Security forces  to recover Anbar province and  Mosul. Abadi, our alleged ally in the coalition against ISIS,   brought in Russian military advisors to link  up with   Soliemani  directing  Iraqi Shia militia forces.

The unkindest  cut of all was the announcement  on the eve of the UN General Assembly of a joint intelligence and security operations center in Baghdad sharing  information among Russia, Iran, Syria and Iraq.

There was  also evidence that the U.S. led coalition strategy in Syria and Iraq “defeating and degrading” ISIS had collapsed.  That was reflected  in testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee by CENTCOM commander, Gen. Lloyd Austin who told Senators that  the $500 million program to train Syrian opposition fighters had failed ignominiously. We had spent $40 million training and equipping 60 candidates, who signed waivers that they were to fight ISIS, not Assad. 40 of those surrendered their weapons and joined Al Qaeda affiliate jabhat al Nusra.    If that wasn’t  enough, we had the roiling scandal of a revolt by CENTCOM  intelligence analysts who requested a Pentagon Inspector General  investigation into why assessments were being prettied up by superiors  to present a misinformed picture to the President and National Security Staff that we were succeeding in the air campaign without US boots on the ground.  That was further depicted in testimony by ex-CIA director, retired Army General Petreaus , who  testified  before the same Senate Armed Services Committee  recommending establishing   no fly zones, sanctuary havens in country and deploying  Special Forces teams.  Add to that the failure of the Obama White House to honor its commitment to supply  Syrian Kurdish YPG  and Iraqi Kurdish Peshmerga forces with updated weapons, ammunition and equipment.  The Kurds are  being attacked by Turkish air force fighters.  To cap things off, retired Marine Gen. John Allen, coordinator of the  Coalition effort,  resigned after a year of service.  As former Defense Intelligence Agency  head, retired Army General Michael Flynn observed, this is what you get when you “politicize intelligence”. The President suggested in his UN address  that the Islamic State   “violent extremism , distorts ”the true meaning of the Islamic faith.”

Russian may have “frozen” the Syrian conflict in a stalemate.  The U.S. finds itself suddenly on the sidelines, largely, by its own “red lines”. Now with Russia’s direct involvement in Syria and Iraq, we will soon find out if ISIS is vanquished or remains a growing global threat. Such are the rules of The Great Game that in the 19th Century pitted imperial Czarist Russia against the British Empire.

EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared in the New English Review.

Turkey Aiding the Islamic State by Establishing a Buffer Zone in Syria to Punish Kurds

The Daily Beast has a report today, that Erodgan is threatening to establish  a buffer zone in Northern Syria, the better to halt the successful Syria Kurdish advance against ISIS, “Turkey Plans to Invade Syria, But to Stop the Kurds, Not ISIS”. These developments followed Erdogan’s remarks last Friday night at a Ramadan break-fast Iftar dinner saying that he would never accept a Kurdistan state comprised of southeastern Turkey and adjacent Northern Syria. The Daily Beast article noted the unease of Turkish military about this latest diktat by the figurehead President whose Islamist AKP party was defeated by a minority of Kemalist, Nationalist and a Kurdish secular party:

In a speech last Friday, Erdogan vowed that Turkey would not accept a move by Syrian Kurds to set up their own state in Syria following gains by Kurdish fighters against the so-called Islamic State, or ISIS, in recent weeks. “I am saying this to the whole world: We will never allow the establishment of a state on our southern border in the north of Syria,” Erdogan said. “We will continue our fight in that respect whatever the cost may be.” He accused Syrian Kurds of ethnic cleansing in Syrian areas under their control.

Following the speech, several news outlets reported that the president and Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu had decided to send the Turkish army into Syria, a hugely significant move by NATO’s second biggest fighting force after the U.S. military.  Both the daily Yeni Safak, a mouthpiece of the government, and the newspaper Sozcu, which is among Erdogan’s fiercest critics, ran stories saying the Turkish Army had received orders to send soldiers over the border. Several other media had similar stories, all quoting unnamed sources in Ankara. There has been no official confirmation or denial by the government.

The government refused to comment on the reports. Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said “the necessary statement” would be issued after a regular meeting of the National Security Council, which comprises the president, the government and military leaders, this Tuesday.

The reports said up to 18,000 soldiers would be deployed to take over and hold a strip of territory up to 30 kilometers deep and 100 kilometers long that currently is held by ISIS. It stretches from close to the Kurdish-controlled city of Kobani in the east to an area further west held by the pro-Western Free Syrian Army (FSA) and other rebel groups, beginning around the town of Mare. This “Mare Line,” as the press calls it, is to be secured with ground troops, artillery and air cover, the reports said. Yeni Safak reported preparations were due to be finalized by next Friday.

There has been speculation about a Turkish military intervention ever since the Syrian conflict began in 2011. Ankara has asked the United Nations and its Western allies to give the green light to create a buffer zone and a no-fly area inside Syria in order to prevent chaos along the Turkish border and to help refugees on Syrian soil before they cross over into Turkey. But the Turkish request has fallen on deaf ears.

Remember Obama saying that he wished there were more Islamist leaders like AKP Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in the Arab ummah of the Middle East. Erodgan’s threatening to invade Syria to build a buffer zone to do what,protect shrines of ancient Ottoman Sultans. We bet he’s mad at the Kurdish HDP party, that together with the Kemalist CHP and Nationalist HNP, thwarted his dream of becoming the Sultan of a neo-Ottoman empire with the minority parties copping a plurality of votes in the June 7th parliamentary elections. He’s also mad at the plucky Syrian Kurds for beating back the ISIS in a string of victories this month. This despite bloody raids by ISIS on both Kobani and Hasakah that were beaten back.

Those Kurdish actions may have cut off the main route for those foreign fighters that Turkey gives a wink and a nod to backed by funds and assistance from the infamous Muslim Brotherhood global IHH charity, You remember IHH? They backed the infamous 2010 Free Gaza Flotilla Mavi Marmara incident infamy. We wrote about IHH caught sending cash and weapons from Turkey into Syria for brothers in AQ and, ahem, ISIS. We bet the Turkish military isn’t so keen to do Erdogan’s bidding given their NATO membership and because the 45 days aren’t up to see if a ruling minority government can be formed or a new election is called so that Erdogan might return his Premier, Ahmet Davutoglu to power with a super majority.

Since the Obama White House doesn’t want to give the Syrian Kurds perhaps U.S. Rep. Trent Franks (R-AZ) and Senate Armed Forces Committee Chairman Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) can put the squeeze on Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter to release those quality weapons from the U.S. War Reserve Stock already positioned in Israel. Perhaps this Daily Beast report may be a clarion call to action to deliver the quality weapons fro both Syrian Kurds and Iraqi Peshmerga to push back ISIS. They are the only boots on the ground doing this successfully. I’ve said my piece and more in a forthcoming July NER article with the apt title “Empowering Kurdistan”. watch for its release on Tuesday June 30th.

EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared in the New English Review. The featured image is of female Kurdish fighters prepare to fight to the death to defend their homes against the Islamic State.

No Strategy. No Clue.

The Wednesday, June 10 Wall Street Journal headline at the top of the page was “Obama Set to Expand Troops in Iraq.” We were 589 days into the two terms Barack Hussein Obama has served in the office of President of the United States and he is as clueless now as he was when he arrived on January 20, 2009.

“President Barack Obama is poised to send hundreds more American advisers to a new base in a strategic Iraqi region to help devise a counterattack against marauding Islamic State militants, U.S. officials said Tuesday, a shift that underscores American concern over recent battlefield losses.” It’s 450 “trainers.”

We have had losses because (1) Obama was elected on a promise to end the conflict in Iraq and (2) reelected by pulling out troops to the point that the remaining Iraqi troops—Shiites in the south—decided it wasn’t worth dying for their leaders. Can’t say I blame them, but dying at the hands of ninth century Islamic fanatics is the fate that threatens the entire Middle East, not just Iraq or what’s left of it.

This is how we lost the war in Vietnam. There was a time when Americans utterly destroyed their enemies on the battlefield. In the latter half of the last century, starting in Korea, we forgot how to do that and why that’s how wars are won.

In all candor, like a lot of Americans, I went back and forth about the Mideast conflicts. Looking back, I think George H.W. Bush showed remarkable insight when, after driving Iraq’s Saddam Hussein out of Kuwait, he stopped at the border and came home. George W. had the notion he could somehow introduce democracy to the region. He couldn’t and it will likely never really occur there because Islam is the only law and it has kept the region ignorant, backward, and under the thumb of tyrants for centuries.

The Islamic State troops must be stopped at some point, but Obama is not the President who will do it. Whatever U.S. backed combat occurs will be just enough to present enough television news images to convince the gullible that progress is being made.

Obama arrived in office without any strategy and has spent the last six and a half years “muddling through” as the British say. He and the Democratic Party had only one goal; to win the elections. After that, they wanted to “fundamentally transform” the greatest nation on planet Earth. They have largely made a mess out of everything they touched from ObamaCare to Common Core.

There’s a reason why Obama will send more troops and that’s because every one of our allies has told him that, if the U.S. does not again assert its role of global leadership, they are not going to cooperate with him in a thousand different ways.

Our allies in the Mideast have told him they lack the military strength (and will) to conduct any kind of war with ISIS. The U.S. and much of the rest of the world cannot afford to sit by and let the enormous oil wealth and reserves of the Mideast come under the control of ISIS.

So, once again we read headlines about U.S. troops returning to the Mideast.

What that means is that the 2016 elections are more critical to the future of the nation than all previous ones.

I think Americans, liberals, conservatives and independents alike have had more than enough of President No Strategy. I think there are enough older Americans who remember and take pride in a nation that was unabashedly the world’s leader in the pursuit of peace and democracy. And I think that the thirty percent or so of brain-dead liberals are not sufficient to affect the outcome of a 2016 election devoted to restoring the nation’s economy and leadership.

It can be done. John F. Kennedy was on his way to doing so. Reagan did so. In 590 days from now, we can begin to do so again.

© Alan Caruba, 2015

RELATED ARTICLE: President Obama’s Failed ISIS Strategy in Iraq

Why is Boston the Hub of Violent Islamic Extremism?

Boston terror hub Hi Res jpeg

For a larger view click on the image.

When we posted on ISIS-Inspired terrorism in Boston and vicinity, we wrote:

Two news stories have suddenly brought attention to ISIS-inspired terrorism in Boston and vicinityOne involved ISIS –inspired suspects plotting to behead police officers resulting in one killed in a shooting incident and two others arrested by Boston area police. The second involves the death of an American citizen in an air attack in Iraq’s Anbar province who was technically educated and radicalized at Mosques in the Boston area. He fled the US to ultimately become one of the top leaders in ISIS running their highly effective social media propaganda arm.

The second story demonstrated why, in the opinion of colleague Ilya Feoktistov of Americans for Peace and Tolerance (APT), the Boston area has nurtured dangerous Jihadis fomenting violent “Islamic” extremism.  We included in our post a YouTube video with APT Research Director Feoktistov interviewed on these emerging story on New England Cable News (NECN) with particular attention to the late  ISIS top social media expert, Ahmad Abousamra, a dual Syrian American citizen and educated computer science professional who fled to join the Islamic State.  Feoktistov connected the dots between Ahmad’s father, Dr. Abdulbadi Abousamra, an endocrinologist, who established a network of Muslim Brotherhood controlled mosques radiating from the Islamic Society of Boston Cultural Center, including the Islamic Center of New England in suburban Sharon, Massachusetts.  We noted the father recruiting Mohammed Hafiz Masood, a Pakistani Imam with radical extremist vie to become the Imam at ICNE. Masood had family connections to the Pakistani terrorist group Lashkar-e-Taiba  that perpetrated the 2008 Mumbai Massacre. The Imam may have been responsible for radicalization of Islamic State top social media expert, the late Ahmad Abousamra.  Masood, who graduated from Boston University with a degree in Economics, was subsequently deported to Pakistan for immigration visa violations.

Watch the NECN interview with APT Research Director Feoktistov:

During the NECN interview, a poster of a dozen Muslim Brotherhood (MB) extremists connected with both the ISBCC, its affiliated Cambridge Mosque was flashed on screen to make a point of “connecting the dots”.  The APT graphic displays those members and trustees of the ISBCC and ICNE who were trustees or Members of the MB and ISIS, convicted or killed or still at large.  The Cambridge Mosque, affiliated with ISBCC, was attended by convicted terrorism felons including Pakistani Al Qaeda bio warfare expert, Aafia Siddiqui, Tarek Mehanna and the Chechen refugee Tsarneav Brothers who perpetrated the Boston Marathon Bombing.

 Our colleague, Jonna Bianco of the Tennessee Task Force on National and Homeland Security (TTFNHS) sent our post on the Boston web of violent Islamic extremism via email to every member of the Tennessee Assembly with this   statement:

Ladies and Gentlemen:

The incident yesterday is its own Security Brief.  If measures are not currently being taken to deal with these kinds of “connect the dots” dangers, we will be experiencing the same sorts of incidents right here in our state.  These same organizations exist in Tennessee connected to some of these same people. You should read this article and note how the people who lead and protect bad actors are not poor people just needing a job.  The father of the ISIS leader killed recently overseas is an Endocrinologist.  The ISIS leader himself had a degree in Computer Science.  These folks do not need jobs.  They need deportation papers, if not prison for material support of terrorism in the United States.  We have some of the same people right here in our state.

If you think this is much ado about nothing, then please contact the Task Force for a personal Security Briefing.  We’ll show you a lot of ‘nothing.’

Ms. Bianco and colleagues at the TTFHNS found the evidence of violent extremist jihadism spawned by the Muslim Brotherhood mosque network in Boston, with evidence of connections to the Islamic State, compelling enough to notify all state legislators in Tennessee.  Other likeminded groups should consider sending this post to every legislator in their respective home states.  FBI Director James Comey should task every Joint Terrorism Task Force across the country to investigate extremist Mosques and Imams.  Especially Muslim Brotherhood controlled Mosques indoctrinating American Muslim youths to join up and fight with the Islamic State, only to return and wreak havoc in our midst.

RELATED VIDEO:

EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared in the New English Review.

Islamic State Inspired Terrorism in Boston

Two news stories have suddenly brought attention to ISIS-inspired terrorism in Boston and vicinityOne involved  ISIS –inspired suspects plotting to behead police officers resulting in one killed in a shooting incident and two others arrested by Boston area police. The second involves the death of an American citizen in an air attack in Iraq’s Anbar province who was technically educated and radicalized at Mosques in the Boston area.   He  fled the US to ultimately become one of the top leaders in ISIS running their highly effective social media propaganda arm.

Fox News reported the shooting death early Tuesday of 26 year old Usaama Rahim, an assailant, who threatened Boston Police officers with an 8 inch knife in an attempted beheading plot. It is believed to be ISIS-inspired terrorism. Rahim and two others were under surveillance by the Joint Terrorism Task Force and the FBI  in Boston.  Fox Newsreported that Rahim was hired in 2013 as a security guard at the Islamic Cultural Center of Boston (ISBCC) controlled by an affiliate of the Muslim Brotherhood, the Muslim American Society.   The Cambridge Mosque affiliated with ISBCC was attended by convicted terrorism felons including Pakistani Al Qaeda bio warfare expert, Aafia Siddiqui, Tarek Mehanna and the Chechen refugee Tsarneav Brothers who perpetrated the Boston Marathon Bombing.

Fox News noted the other suspects involved in the plot to behead police officers:

Authorities arrested another suspect, David Wright, in connection with the case, police said.

“We believe the intent was to behead a police officer,” one official told The Boston Globe. “We knew the plot had to be stopped. They were planning to take action Tuesday.”

Rahim, Wright and an unidentified third person met Sunday on a Rhode Island beach to discuss plans, the affidavit, which was released Wednesday, said. Wright, who waived his Miranda rights, told the FBI the plans included an attack on a victim in another state, the court papers said. Hours prior to the shooting, Rahim told Wright he had changed plans and was going to “go after” the “boys in blue,” the court papers said.

“I’m going on vacation right here in Massachusetts. I’m just going to  go after them, those boys in blue,” Rahim said in the phone conversation, according to the affidavit. Authorities believe the word “vacation” stood for violent jihad in their conversations. Wright encouraged him to delete any information on his cell phone or computers, the affidavit said. Wright is accused of conspiring with Rahim to impede the investigation and faces up to five years in prison if convicted.

The affidavit said one of the officers outside the CVS instructed Rahim to drop his weapon and Rahim responded, “You drop yours.”

Tuesday, the Boston Herald reported the death in Iraq  of a top ISIS social media expert on the FBI’s ten most wanted  terrorist list, 33 year old Ahmad Abousamra, a dual Syrian/American citizen from Stoughton, Massachusetts.  Abousamra wasoin the FBI’s Most Wanted Top Terrorist lists. He was killed in an air attack in Anbar province apparently along with another American national.  According to the Boston Herald report:

Abousamra was raised in Stoughton and attended Xaverian Brothers High School in Westwood but left to graduate from Stoughton High school in 1999.

He studied computer science for three semesters at Northeastern University between 1999 and 2001, a school spokeswoman said. Abousamra graduated from the University of Massachusetts Boston with a degree in computer science in December 2006, the school confirmed.

Abousamra, who was a co-defendant of convicted Sudbury terrorist Tarek Mehanna, had federal charges pending in Boston on conspiring to provide material support to terrorists, conspiring to murder American soldiers abroad and making false statements to authorities.

Mehanna, 31, a former pharmacist, is serving a 17-year sentence at the federal penitentiary in Marion, Ill.

Watch this Boston Herald video on the FBI hunt for Abousamra:

Abousamra’s father Abdulbadi Abousamra (Abousamra Sr.) was an endocrinologist at Massachusetts General Hospital who was actively engaged in establishing a network of Mosques in the Metropolitan Boston area that brought in a number of radical extremist Imams. A Truth Revolt report in 2014 by Ilya Feoktistov of Americans for Peace and Tolerance  noted:

Abdulbadi Abousamra, Sr. served as a president or board member of several mosques, Islamic schools, and Muslim political organizations in Massachusetts from the mid-1990s. In fact, he is still the president of an Islamic elementary school in Sharon, MA. Abousamra Sr. had used his leadership position in multiple Boston Islamic institutions to import extremist and terrorist-affiliated imams to Boston. One of these imams, Hafiz Masood, appears to be the one who radicalized his son, Ahmad Abousamra (Abousamra Jr.).

Until 2007, when Abousamra Jr. was first questioned by the FBI over a plot to provide assistance to Al Qaeda in Iraq and  massacre shoppers at the Emerald Square Mall in North Attleboro, MA, his father, Abousamra Sr., was vice-president of the Boston branch of the Muslim American Society (MAS Boston). According to federal authorities, the Muslim American Society was created to be “the overt arm of the Muslim Brotherhood in America.” MAS Boston operates the largest Islamic center in the Northeast, the Islamic Society of Boston Cultural Center (ISBCC). The Boston Marathon bombers attended the ISBCC’s sister mosque in Cambridge. Both mosques have a long history of Islamic extremism and terrorism.

In 1994, Abousamra Sr. joined the Islamic Center of New England (ICNE), another Muslim organization that runs two mosques in the Boston suburbs of Quincy and Sharon. By 1998, he became its president.  Abousamra Sr.’s passion lay with influencing the religious education of the Center’s youth. He personally founded two schools at the ICNE: the Islamic Academy of New England elementary school in 1999 and the Al Noor Academy secondary school in 2001 – the latter with $100,000 in seed money he received from the Islamic Society of Boston. Even though Abousamra Sr. left the country shortly after the FBI put a bounty on his son, he is still the president of the Islamic Academy of New England.

Enter the Radical Imam with connections to the 2008 Mumbai Massacre terrorist group:

In 1998, Abousamra Sr. hired Mohammed Hafiz Masood to be the new Imam at the Islamic Center of New England and a teacher at the Islamic Academy of New England. At that time, Masood was in the United States illegally.

Mohammed Hafiz Masood was deported for immigration violations. After his deportation, it turned out Masood was not an ordinary radical.

Masood is the brother of Pakistani terrorist Hafiz Saeed, who founded and runs Lashkar-e-Taibah (LeT), one of the largest and most violent terrorist groups in Pakistan, and who has a $10 million FBI bounty on his head. Saeed’s terror group is responsible for the 2008 Mumbai massacre, which targeted India over the conflict in Kashmir and left 166 people dead.

After the Mumbai massacres, The Times of India reported that Masood was using his status as Imam at the Islamic Center of New England to raise funds and recruit local Massachusetts Muslims for Lashkar-e-Taibah. Now living in Pakistan, Masood has become the spokesman of his brother’s terror group.

The radical Imam’s son turned informant leading to the  arrest of Abousamra and Tarek Mehanna:

Hafiz Masood’s son, Hassan Masood, allegedly conspired in terrorist plots with Abousamra Jr. He turned informant and testified against Abousamra Jr. and his captured co-conspirator, Tarek Mehanna. According to Muslim community members, Tarek Mehanna and Abousamra Jr. were “thick with Masood” and had been radicalized by his preaching.

The Tarek Mehanna/Abousamra Jr. partnership and Mehanna’s subsequent arrest has spawned a popular radical movement that lobbies, among other things, to free Tarek Mehanna from prison. It is called the Tarek Mehanna Support Committee – and it has a large presence in Boston. Many of its members are former students of Hafiz Masood.

Watch this NECN interview with Ilya Feoktistov  of Americans for Peace and Tolerance on the Abousamra MAS radical connections in Boston:

This is a cautionary tale to show how sophisticated members of the Muslim Brotherhood (MB)  immigrated to  the US to create networks of mosques. Mosques controlled by MB affiliates  to engage immigrant radical Imams to educate young  American Muslims  in  Da’wa – the call to extremist Salafist Jihad ensnaring them into a life of Islamic Terrorism.

EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared in the New English Review. The featured image is of Dr. Abdulbadi Aboulsamra and son the late Ahmad Aboulsamra, an Islamic State top leader.

Anthrax Released: Should we be concerned?

US Army Dugway Proving Ground Main GateThe abrupt news that live anthrax samples  had been shipped from the U.S. Army Dugway proving ground to laboratories in the U.S., an air base in South Korea and possibly Australia came as a reminder to Americans and the world that biological warfare  training exercises might lead to troubling inadvertent releases. Fortunately, 22 military personnel exposed at the south Korean  airbase are being treated with the antibiotic Cipro. However, this latest release of a BW agent has caused both the U.S. Army bio-warfare directorate and the CDC to review safety precautions, packaging and procedures for the transmission of possible live anthrax spores and why samples had not been made inert?

The BBC reported that the U.S. military has ordered a review of how it handles anthrax after discovering more cases of live samples being accidentally sent to labs:

Live anthrax samples were believed to have been sent to a total of 24 labs, in 11 U.S. states as well as South Korea and Australia, the Pentagon said.

The Pentagon says that there is no known risk to the general public.

Experts in bio-safety have heavily criticized the lapse and called for improved precautions.

Symptoms of anthrax exposure include skin ulcers, nausea, vomiting and fever, and can cause death if untreated.

News of the live shipments first emerged on Wednesday, as the U.S. said it had accidentally shipped live anthrax spores from Utah to labs in Texas, Maryland, Wisconsin, Delaware, New Jersey, Tennessee, New York, California and Virginia, as well as an air base in South Korea.

Those shipments took place between March 2014 and April 2015, a U.S. official said, according to Reuters.

On Friday, the Department of Defense said it had identified “additional inadvertent live anthrax shipments”, including a suspect sample sent to Australia from a batch of anthrax from 2008.

It is not clear when that sample was shipped to Australia.

The military has ordered all of its labs that have previously received inactive anthrax samples to test them. In addition it is advising all labs to cease working with these samples until told otherwise.

Shortly after 9/11, the American public concern over bio-terrorism was raised  by the release of Anthrax in powdered form in letters sent to members of Congress and randomly to private persons. 22 persons were sickened, 5 died, the U.S. Senate building was shut down and inspected.  Anthrax exists naturally, but more powerful variants have been developed synthetically by dual use laboratories in rogue states like Iran, North Korea and Assad’s Syria.  Bio-warfare laboratories have been established by Al Qaeda and ISIS has been rumored to have obtained access to materials in Syria, as well. Remember the arrest in Afghanistan, prosecution and conviction in the U.S. of Brandeis University and MIT trained scientist, “Lady Al Qaeda”, Aafia Siddiqui .  There is also evidence that Iran’s terrorist proxy, Hezbollah may have been transferred BW capabilities and agents  by Syria that could be deployed against America’s ally , Israel and globally through major transportation nodes in Europe.

Jill Bellamy van Aalst(3)

Dr. Jill Bellamy

We asked Dr. Jill Bellamy, noted expert on biological warfare and threat reduction about this latest incident.  We have published articles by Dr. Bellamy on Syrian, Hezbollah, Al Qaeda and Iranian BW programs in both the NER and our blog the Iconoclast.

She commented:

Clearly from a bio-safety perspective this is a very serious breach of protocol and demands a full and transparent investigation. As anyone who works with inactivated anthrax would be routinely vaccinated with AVA, exposure from a clinical perspective is probably not as much of a concern as the general public may believe. Of course if anyone outside military labs the live anthrax was sent to and persons who have not been routinely vaccinated were exposed, this would be concerning. I would worry about the time frame from exposure. It appears from the reports that we are talking about several weeks or months during which the anthrax was shipped. It is probably a good sign that none of the labs has reported a laboratory acquired disease or LAD. If exposure is known Cipro (ciprofloxacin hydrochloride) is given for inhalation anthrax and usually a 60 day course is advised. The lab workers in these labs  would surely  have all been vaccinated, so how much of a health risk it poses is debatable.

The bio-safety side is more worrying. CDC and a number of other labs have previously had exposures from the accidental handling of live anthrax. There are very stringent regulations in place for the shipping and transport of live agents. It is doubtful there was any risk to public health during the transport as this would be handled by the military. What is more problematic is that the research done  at US Army labs and Dugway proving ground  are critical to national security.  Incidents like this feed an uninformed section in non-proliferation circles who then call for the closing of these labs or hype the danger they pose to the general public. It makes it more difficult to assure the public that such labs are a vital aspect to protecting citizens from BW attacks and ensuring vaccines and therapeutic countermeasures are available and stockpiled in the event of a deliberate attack. Hopefully this is an incident we will learn a great deal from in terms of bio-safety training, protocols and bio-security.

EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared in the New English Review. The featured image is of  microscopic anthrax spores. Source: Reuters.

Defeating ISIS: A Biblical View of America’s Role [Part 3]

PART THREE: 

HIGHLIGHTS OF PART TWO

Part two explained from scripture that God’s love of people and His hatred of evil are inseparable and presented what should be the natural and necessary response of righteous men and women who wish to live in a world of justice, compassion, and order.  Part two also cited studies that identify the large majority of Americans as Christians of some “brand” and who, basically, concur with the moral principles of the bible. Let’s now consider the immediate and necessary role for America to play in quickly stopping the rapidly advancing Nazis of our time (to which millions have people have chanted for 70 years, “Never again!)

Read Part 1 and Part 2.

RESPONDING AS A NATION: THE POWER OF THE ARAB COUNTRIES, THE NEW COALITION OF ARAB NATIONS, AND THE RESPONSIBILITY OF AMERICA

On a larger scale, just as ungodly nations were destroyed in the Old Testament, the ungodly “world scale gang-bangers” need to be destroyed.  In Old Testament times, there was one situation in which God specifically told the Israelites not to pray for the enemy: “Do not pray for the well-being of this people” (Jeremiah 14:11).  Similarly, in the New Testament, Jesus did not pray for Satan.  ISIS is not simply the radical arm of Islam that establishes Sharia and devises even more cruelty than is conceived by the policies of these laws (cutting off limbs, executing women who have been raped, etc.).  The mission of ISIS is purely demonic and in this writer’s opinion, the “soldiers” (given: this is an insult to the word “soldier”) of ISIS are either demonically oppressed or possessed.

Because America is ultimately threatened in the not too distant future, we must participate in pushing back the forces of evil.  The evil has spread too far around the world already, and it’s already present here in America (see Parts I and II for more information).  We’ve already seen an Islamic extremist military psychiatrist murder many soldiers at Ft. Hood, many people killed in the Boston marathon, a woman’s head severed while she was at work in a factory in Moore, Oklahoma, and more horrors right here in our homeland.  Whether we like it or not, America is already “in the thick of things.”  The battle exists not only half-way around the world, but in America.

Also, whether it was right or wrong to seek to establish democracy in Afghanistan and Iraq, we committed to help the people of these countries live in freedom.  Formerly known as Mesopotamia, Iraq is the very cradle of Christianity (and is now nearly devoid of Christians).  How much more should we now rescue those who suffer the backlash of our abandonment?  Psalm 82:4 says, “Rescue the weak and needy; deliver them from the hand of the wicked.”  Do you remember when thousands of joyful Iraqi’s proudly held their ink stained thumbs in the air, indicating that they had just voted?  We have left almost all of them to be driven from their homes or to be struck down by the swords of ISIS.

It is way past time for our leaders to map out and enact a clear strategy to defeat our enemies.  We could have stopped ISIS by leaving 15,000 troops in Iraq, but our president chose not to do that (our military leaders advised against this action).  We could have stopped them as they left Syria.  We could have stopped them as they marched from city to city in Iraq.  Iraq isn’t exactly covered with forests and canyons to protect them from our sight.  In Desert Storm, we discovered how easily we destroyed forces of evil with such basic weaponry as A-10 jets (while some people questioned if these planes could be useful at all).  Of course, presently A-10’s are being decommissioned right here in my hometown of Tucson, Arizona, where many of our A-10’s are based.

Also, we chose to ensure the downfall of Gaddafi without helping to stabilize Libya, predictably enabling the Muslim Brotherhood to come to power.  In fact, America sent tanks, fighter jets and millions of dollars to the Muslim Brotherhood.

We could have stood our ground when Assad crossed our president’s “line in the sand,” leaving more room for the terrorists to gain ground.  Of course, these and many other examples of non-action have proven the disastrous consequences of America’s continual abdication of world leadership.

Fortunately, people as evil as the ISIS terrorists are “like the chaff which the wind driveth away” (Psalm 1:1).  But it is probable that righteous men and women must do their part in this life before the Lord executes final judgment in the life to come.  Hopefully, the civilized world will unite around strong leadership, which we pray will emerge (and discussed soon).

First to lead the fight was the King of Jordan, and America is giving a billion dollars to Jordan over the next two years.  Even China is giving aid to fight ISIS.  Saudi Arabia has over 200,000 active duty personnel with 75,000 soldiers, the fourth largest military budget in the world (52 billion per year), and has just agreed to take the lead in an Arab coalition to fight ISIS.  This coalition is only in the planning stages and will not be formed in time to save Yemen.  But at least many countries of the Middle East are beginning to clean up their own mess.  Certainly, the Saudis have a more immediate investment in seeing the defeat of ISIS.  Of course, in doing so, they come against Iran, as well, which is a necessary course of action.

The Egyptian Armed forces is reported to have more than 468,500 active personnel, in addition to 800,000 personnel available in reserve and over 400,000 paramilitary personnel making it one of the largest armies in the world (Wikipedia).

Jordan has the fifth most militarized nation in the world with 100,000 active military personnel and nearly 65,000 active reserves.  They will contribute to the coalition.  However, there are internal problems that have kept these countries from working well together.  But if these countries used even half of their forces, ISIS could be destroyed very quickly.

Strong leadership has not yet emerged from the United States.  How strong will be the leadership of Saudi Arabia has yet to be seen.  Of course, God has allowed the present circumstances for a reason, but that does not let America or any nation off the hook from standing up for righteousness against an evil enemy.  Especially an enemy that has designs upon our own nation (indeed, this is its foremost goal).   While the Arabs are forming a coalition, America could act now.  America could immediately provide strong leadership and take much stronger action than it is taking.  Of course, even if victory is quickly achieved, it will take at least a generation to defeat other forms of terrorism around the world, and in this writer’s view, battles against evil will never cease until the return of Christ (see the last chapter of the Book of Revelation).

It’s never too late to take leadership and then turn it over to Arab coalition, should that coalition prove effective.  Keep in mind that the number one responsibility of our government is the security of Americans and that America is presently “in the thick of things” right here on our own soil (see Parts I and II for more details).  Keep in mind that a great threat to America exists at this very moment and the time for decisive action is passing quickly.  Eight miles from the border of Texas is an ISIS training camp.  The State Dept. denies that this is true, but offers no proof of this denial.

Whether you believe we must individually forgive these particular enemies or not is irrelevant to the needed action.  Forgive and love our enemies all you want to, personally.  That’s what Jesus commands.  But our nation must help to stop the senseless murder and rapid advance of darkness, just as the world should have stopped Hitler and could easily have stopped him early in his campaigns.

America must lead the execution of thorough judgment upon ISIS, upon all Islamic terrorists (including upon those that have been released from GITMO and from the jail that released the present leader of ISIS), and upon any other mutation of terrorism that threatens our national security.

Do we need boots on the ground?  We need Arab boots. That’s for certain.   One biblical objection to this suggestion to join with the Arabs is that in biblical times, whenever the armies of Israel joined with ungodly nations, no good came of it.  But these Islamic theocracies are not technically our “enemies.”  As with all the Arab nations, they violate human rights as a way of life, and they persecute women in heinous ways.  Therefore, they are not ideal allies.  Yet considering that these nations are not our enemies and considering how easy it would be for them to defeat ISIS with the right leadership, it seems incumbent upon the United States to provide this leadership.  Such leadership would include providing air power, weaponry and Intel on the ground.  If this leadership proves to be necessary only temporarily, all the better.  Aligning with the Arab nations is no different than aligning with China and Russia to defeat Germany in WWII.  Some people believe that we should withdraw entirely from the Middle East.  We already see how our abdication of leadership has affected Russia, China, and Iran, as well as how this show of apathy and cowardice has affected our allies.  Further or continued abdication would continue to erode the trust of any nation that we can still call an ally.   Also, as already mentioned, whether America likes it or not, we are truly in the middle of the fight right now with terror cells in every state.  As smoke rises in the Middle East, we can provide leadership there – now – or we can exponentially increase our efforts to combat evil in America in the future.

Joining with Iran would be the height foolishness.  That would be the clear equivalent of God’s injunction in the Old Testament to not unite with our enemies.  Yet this is what America seems to be doing!  Iran is the #1 supporter of terror in the world and chants of “death to America” continue to ring in the darkness that covers that land.  Presently, Iran’s Middle East direct influence extends into Iraq, Syria, and Yemen.  Is it any wonder that Arab nations that are friendly to the United States are drawing closer to Israel, hoping that help can come from that nation?  Saudi Arabia has even offered a corridor through their nation for Israel to attack Iran.

Iran would easily defeat ISIS, but it would also add to its territory.  In fact, as America does little, the Shia fighters of Iran are taking the lead.  These Shia militias are quickly eclipsing the Iraqi forces in importance in Iraq.  The result of letting Iran take the lead will likely be to firmly establish Iran as the dominant force in Iran, doubling their territory while on their way to create nuclear weapons in the near future.  Providing help to the Arab nations, primarily in the form of leadership, would press Iran back out of the picture and help to preserve religious liberties in Iraq, helping Iraqis to regain ground lost when American pulled out the 15,000 troops.

Putting his own life in danger, Egypt’s President El Sisi has spoken directly to the leaders of Islam, advocating for them to stand up against Islamic fanaticism and also advocating for Arab boots on the ground.  El Sisi took the stand of a righteous man.

Can America provide air power, Intel on the ground, and weaponry?  Of course.  America could easily take the lead in the battle to defeat ISIS.   Our efforts to merely “contain” ISIS are not working.  Can we airlift those in danger out of Iraq and other nations in order to save them?  We have done this with over a thousand Muslims, as well as with many Syrians, even bringing many of them to America.  With the Syrians that we’ve brought to America, we haven’t even attempted to separate the oppressed from the oppressors.  Why not airlift Christians and those of other faiths out of harm’s way?

Is it worth it to stand up against the darkness?  Here’s another way to ask the same question (biblically): “Is it worth it to live for Jesus, rather than let darkness rule the globe, resulting in the murder of millions of Christians and millions upon millions of people of many faiths and cultures?”  Christians and tens of thousands of people of other faiths are presently being slaughtered.

Pacifism is not advocated in the bible.  Powerful action is not optional.  It’s what defeated the Third Reich and with God’s help – and only with God’s help – it’s what will defeat Islamic terrorism and all forms of terrorism.  I say “only with God’s help” because without God’s favor, Israel was consistently subjugated by other nations.  With God’s favor Israel could not be defeated even by “giants.”  As Psalm 127:1-2 says, “Except the Lord builds the house, they labor in vain that build it.”  America will have victory over any evil only to the extent that the nation turns to God as her strength.  Therefore, from a biblical point of view, God’s believing church in America must call out to Him and pray for the heavens to open in order for God’s power to flow through (2 Chronicles 7:14).  From a biblical point of view, and in the belief of this writer, only through such spiritual warfare will the necessary earthly battle turn in America’s favor.   Keep in mind that as posited in the many scriptures above, love of God goes hand in hand with hatred of evil; and it’s the hatred of evil – this outrage against mass extinction of innocents – that will undergird the passionate pursuit to rid the world of pure evil.  As Bernie Goldberg said recently, “When outrage dies, a piece of humanity dies with it.”   An upsurge of love of God in America, therefore, will greatly help to ignite outrage and necessary action.

While praying for our nation to turn to God, action against the enemies of civilization must be taken quickly.   Of course, believers in Christ know that He will someday go to war against Satan to bring last day’s events to a conclusion.  Until the return of the conquering Messiah, His expectation, I believe, is that Christians and righteous men and women of all faiths will protect their brothers and sisters around the world, as well as in their own countries.  Therefore, fighting Satan in these times agrees with scripture, just as the natural manifestation of righteousness is to hate evil and to love and protect innocent lives.  Leviticus 19:16 says, “Do not do anything that endangers your neighbor’s life.”  How much more should we stand up for the lives of millions of innocents, including the lives of fellow Christians, and including the lives of our own families?  Let’s remember that Jesus was not a peacekeeper; He was a peacemaker.

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Defeating ISIS: A Biblical View of America’s Role [Part 2]

PART TWO

HIGHLIGHTS OF PART ONE

We learned on April 2, 2015 that 148 Christian students were killed at a college campus in Kenya, some of whom were beheaded.  We learned in the same month that another 30 Christians were singled out for massacre in Ethiopia.  As with the 21 Coptic Christians, Christians were separated for slaughter from those of other faiths.  As with other pogroms by ISIS, many of our leaders will not acknowledge that these Christians were killed by Islamic terrorists or even that it’s Christians who are targeted.  Presumably, out of fear to name the enemy, the terrorists often go unidentified (and for other obvious PC reasons), as does the religion of the murdered (PC does not favor the defense of Christians, at present).   Imagine if George Washington had refused to state that the enemies of the revolutionaries were the soldiers of King George III of England.  Imagine if the faith of almost every signer of every major document upon which America is founded were not a Christian, what would this nation look like, if it still existed?

Part One addressed the extermination of tens of thousands of innocents by ISIS, the justification of these horrors by the Islamic terrorists, and some of what America and the Arab world is presently doing to fight the barbarians.

Let’s address the importance of both loving people and hating evil while responding as righteous men and women.  Based on this scriptural foundation, Part Three will offer a plan of action for America.

To read Part 1 click here.

LOVING PEOPLE AND HATING EVIL

The bible speaks to this conundrum.  Let’s first consider that if we cannot separate God’s hatred of evil from His love of people, the answer seems to be that we should fight against evil, as we did in WWII.

We know that God is “one God.”  God cannot be divided into parts.  For example, we cannot separate God’s justice from His mercy, or His hatred of evil from His love of people.  All of God is everywhere.  He is indivisible.  Therefore, the more God transforms our character into His image, the more we will both love justice and hate evil.  Proverbs 8:13 states, “The fear of the Lord [standing in awe of God] is to hate evil.”  Many other scriptures state that God’s essence is love.  From this essence naturally proceeds hatred of evil.  If we love God and the tens of thousands of present day innocent martyrs, we must also hate evil. Psalm 85:10 & 13 states that God’s love, faithfulness, righteousness and peace are inseparable and that His righteousness “goes before him.”  Psalm 89:14 combines God’s justice with His righteousness, love, and faithfulness.

Although no one knows what the present policy of America toward worldwide terrorism is (our lack of a clear policy is an embarrassment), the policy seems to be to “contain” evil.  This strategy is not aimed at stopping or destroying the threat of the mass murder of millions upon millions.  To most Arab nations’ dismay, we are negotiating with Iran that will surely obtain nuclear weapons, right behind the nearly completed rockets that can deliver nuclear bombs to the USA.  We have already given Iran what it values most: time; and we have no policy toward Syria, except to renege on our commitments to fight Assad.

If a group of gang-bangers were murdering people in your neighborhood, would you call the police?  Romans 13 supports calling the police, as such peacemakers are ultimately appointed by God for our safety.  Hebrews 11:34 even speaks of heroes who “waxed valiant in fight, turned to flight the armies of the aliens.”  These heroes led the destruction of cultures that sacrificed their children in the fire to gods of wood and stone.

Citing a proverbial saying, Jesus told us to be “wise as serpents and innocent as doves,” (Matthew 10:16), meaning we must discern the poison in the snake while preserving the simplicity of the dove (Adam Clarke).  What is called for with ISIS is to not be naïve, regarding the poison of the snake.  As Proverbs 4:18 advises, we are to “guard our hearts” with all diligence.  And Romans 13 states that our own rulers are established by God to be His representatives who do “not bear the sword for nothing” (vs. 4).  Our policemen and, by implication, our armies are for our protection.  The Constitution of the United States agrees.

We know that Jesus had the discernment to know when to outwardly love and when to vehemently defend and protect.   Christ declared that the converts of the hypocritical religious teachers of His day were “twice the sons of hell” as were they, the teachers, (Matthew 23:15).  Christ hated the demons that He cast out.  And though He taught us to “turn the other cheek,” when He was struck at His illegal trial, He said, “Why did you strike me” (John 18:23)?  Christ was not naïve, nor was he afraid of confrontation.

Because of the evil in the world, in His human form Christ was a “man of sorrows.”  Today He weeps for those who suffer at the hands of the terrorists (see Isaiah 63:9).  I believe that He even weeps for the terrorists until He finally turns them over to a “reprobate mind” (Romans 1:28), which I believe has been now been done with, at least, most of the terrorists.  I’ve seen some former terrorists, now turned Christians, interviewed, allowing that not all terrorists have been turned over to a permanently depraved mindset.  At this point, if Christ does not weep for them, we also need not weep.

Therefore, we see that at the same time that Christ loved people, He hated evil.  Christ was the most loving and most joyful man that ever lived.  He performed His first miracle at a wedding and celebrated life.  As the voice of wisdom personified states in Proverbs 8:30-31, so believed Christ: “I was filled with delight day after day, rejoicing always in his presence, rejoicing in his whole world, and delighting in mankind.”    Yet He must have spent hours weaving the whip with which he drove the financial schemers out of the temple, as zeal for God’s house “consumed” Him (John 2:15-17).  Therefore, it is possible for all of us to continue to celebrate life and the wonders of God’s creation while feeling the pain of God’s oppressed and rendering justice upon those who have inflicted it.  Several scriptures speak of evil people falling into the pit that they have dug for others, and Proverbs 1:18 states, “These men lie in wait for their own blood; they waylay only themselves!”  If Christians can hasten their doom in order to rescue and protect themselves, all the better.  The Old Testament is full of accounts of believing Jews destroying nations that sacrificed children to their false gods.  The barbarians are training young children to pull the trigger on innocent captives, as we’ve seen on the news.  These children will never even graduate from elementary school, let alone adopt a value system of respect for all people.  From a neurological point of view, their brains are literally being wired for murder and little else.

Based on Christ’s love of people and hatred of evil, it is likely that Christ would condone all efforts to stop the murder of innocents.  Even if all world events fall into a pattern to bring about end time events or into other unknown purposes of God, because we cannot fully understand the pattern or His purposes, we must live our lives one day at a time and respond to evil as righteous men and women have responded since the world began.

THE RESPONSE OF RIGHTEOUS MEN AND WOMEN

The Apostle Paul said in Philippians 2:9 that we are to love people, but we are to love with wisdom and knowledge, not being naïve.  There is a horrific and ultimate destination for evil doers where “the fire is not quenched” (Mark 9:48).  Clearly, there is also a time and season for all things, a time to kill and a time to heal (Ecclesiastes 3:1, 3).

As alluded to in Part I, in Romans 1:28, the Apostle Paul states that God gave some people over to a “depraved” or “reprobate mind.”  In the realm of sin, the atrocious acts that we witness via television are the “end of the line.”  The ISIS terrorists who call themselves warriors for Muhammad are evil incarnate and are probably closer to the edge of hell than even Paul could have imagined.  All or almost all of them have been given over to a reprobate mind.

Psalm 73:18 speaks of evil people standing on a “slippery slope.”  Jesus refers to those who do not build the foundation of their lives on Him as building on “sinking sand” (Matthew 7:26).   He also said that way to destruction is a broad road, but the way to eternal life is down a narrow road and through a small gate (Matthew 7:13).  The barbarians are traveling down the broad road to eternal destruction.

Peter said that God did not spare from hell the angels that rebelled; nor did He spare the evil people in Noah’s day, nor the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah.  Peter even described false teachers as “brute beasts, creatures of instinct, born only to be caught and destroyed, and like beasts they too will perish” (2 Peter 2).  Again, hear this: Peter says that some people are “born to be destroyed.”  This from one of Christ’s most devoted and loving disciples.  One of the most famous representatives of Christ in the history of the world.  A man of love and peace.

Jesus, our loving Lord and Savior, stated that in His time, all sin would be forgiven except “blasphemy against the Holy Spirit” (Matthew 12:31).  There are debates about what this sin is, and I have an opinion.  But my opinion doesn’t matter in this discussion.  Whatever the sin was (or is) could not exceed the sin being committed by the most ruthless barbarians ever known in history, savages that put to death the followers of Christ, Jews, Muslims of slightly different beliefs, and people of any other faith than theirs.

Psalm 1:6 says, “For the Lord knows the way of the godly, but the way of the ungodly shall perish.”  There is no doubt.  Even Jesus and the New Testament that emphasize the grace and love of God speak clearly to the need to combat evil, unless otherwise individually spoken to, as God does speaks to each of us individually, e.g., you may be chosen for martyrdom (John 10:4, 27).  For more scriptures that point us to the same conclusion, see Part I.

Innumerable surveys and polls are available on the Internet.  A recent ABC News poll concluded that 83% of all Americans identify themselves as Christian.  A 2014 Gallup survey stated that 76% identify themselves as Christians.  In 2013 80% of Americans thought the bible was “sacred literature” (down from 86% in 2011; 8% thought the Koran was sacred) (Barna study, 2013).  Whatever brand of Christianity Americans subscribe to (and there is a wide variety, indeed, with many not attending church), the morality represented by Christian beliefs is still the bedrock of what many would say makes America “good,” in spite of its many flaws.  Therefore, one can argue that the response of righteous men and women is dictated by the scriptures already cited.

RESPONDING AS INDIVIDUALS

What about our attitude as individuals?  If someone is chosen for martyrdom, God would want us to forgive our murderers, as He forgave His murderers on the cross.  Also, consider the relatives of the victims.  Will they find inner peace in any other way except through forgiveness?  Of course not.  Nevertheless, when the killer of their son or daughter is executed or falls in battle, these same relatives might obtain some satisfaction, knowing that God’s justice has been accomplished.

The best course of action in regards to our personal vengeance is to leave it alone.  Romans 12:17 says, “Leave room for God’s wrath; vengeance is mine, says the Lord.”  If we don’t “leave room” for God’s wrath, but execute our own personal judgment, we risk that God’s judgment may not prevail or, perhaps, will be less severe.  This point of view is proposed by Proverbs 24:17, which states, “Do not gloat when your enemy falls; when he stumbles, do not let your heart rejoice, or the Lord will see and disapprove and turn his wrath away from him.”  Most of us would prefer that evil doers suffer God’s judgment, rather than our own.  Again, on an individual basis, scripture seems to teach forgiveness, along with trust in God.  If we trust in God, His justice will be accomplished.  Therefore, as individuals we are to forgive our enemies, especially as God supernaturally enables us to do so.  I’ve seen relatives of murdered sons and daughters many times speak on the news of forgiveness.  This does not discount that some men have been personally called to fight against ISIS, having no affiliation with any nation.  In fact, I’ve also seen one such mercenary interviewed on cable news, and I’ve seen ads on the Internet, seeking to recruit mercenaries.  See several websites that suggest how you might help to rescue Christians who face starvation and extinction.

RELATED VIDEO: A message to the Islamic State from The People of the Cross

Texas Muslim Shooters’ Profile: Elton Simpson and Nadir Hamid Soofi

Elton Simpson and Nadir Hamid Soofi, both suspects killed in the Garland, Texas jihad attack have been identified from the Arizona vehicle registrations and driver photo IDs. Simpson, 30, and Soofi, 34 were roommates in a central Phoenix condominium. The Phoenix condominium was the subject of an FBI and police bomb squad investigation early this morning

Simpson was the author of the tweets sent just before the attack. He has been the subject of an FBI terrorism investigation since 2006 and was convicted in a Federal Court trial in 2011 for material support for terrorism, an attempt to travel to Somalia to Join Al Shabaab. One of the two perpetrators is alleged as having connections to CAIR, the self-styled Muslim civil rights group, an affiliate of the Muslim Brotherhood.

 ISIS in a series of tweets,  sent prior to the May 3rd Muhammad Art Contest sponsored by Pam Geller’s American Freedom  Defense Initiative,   inspired brothers  in the U.S. to undertake an attack on the event. ISIS social media claimed responsibility for the attack in which both perpetrators were killed and a security officer slightly injured. The pre-event ISIS tweets doubtless increased the security arrangements at the AFDI event. A purported Muhammad Art contest  that featured a speech by Dutch Freedom Party leader, Geert Wilders and appearances by Rep. Louie Gohmert, Geller and Robert Spencer and others.  200 attendees were in lockdown following the attack and vehicles impounded as evidence in the crime scene. The event was webcast yesterday by the team from The United West led by Tom Trento.

Trento will discuss his experience at the Garland, Texas Muhammad Art Contest event with this writer and Mike Bates, co-host of “Your Turn” on 1330am WEBY, Northwest Florida‘s Talk Radio.  You may listen live here.

Heavy.com has compiled a dossier on the perpetrators of last night jihad attack in Garland, Texas, “Elton Simpson: 5 Fast Facts You Need to Know.”  The article reported:

Elton Simpson has been identified as one of the two gunmen who opened fire Sunday night outside the Muhammad Art Exhibit and Contest in Garland, Texas. An unarmed security guard was shot, but survived with a non-life-threatening wound, before Simpson and his accomplice were killed by police.

Simpson, 30, and the other gunman, his roommate, 34-year-old Nadir Hamid Soofi, are from Phoenix, Arizona.

Simpson was “well known” by the FBI and was the subject of a previous terror investigationABC News reports. He and Soofi were armed with assault rifles and wearing body protection, police said. They exchanged fire with a Garland police officer armed with handgun.

Simpson’s father, Dunston Simpson, told ABC News, “We are Americans and we believe in America. What my son did reflects very badly on my family,” adding that his son “made a bad choice.”

WFAA reports that FBI agents were searching the gunmen’s Phoenix, Arizona home.

Police also remain at the scene of the shooting, and have been examining the gunmen’s car. They were concerned about explosives being hidden inside it.

[…]

The FBI began investigating Simpson in 2006, when they began recording conversations he was having with an informant. He was arrested in 2010.

According to court records, Simpson received a sentence of three years probation in 2011 after he was found guilty of making a false statement to the FBI.

Simpson told FBI agents he had not talked with others about traveling to Somalia, when he in fact had talked to others about traveling to the African country, according to court documents. Judge Mary H. Murguia found there wasn’t enough evidence to support the FBI’s claim that the travel was related to terrorism. He had elected for a trial by the judge, rather than a jury.

The FBI had claimed that Simpson was traveling to Somalia to engage in “violent jihad.” The FBI claimed he was planning to travel to Africa to join the al-Shabaab terror group, which has since been responsible for the deadly Kenyan terror attacks at the Nairobi mall and Garissa University.

Simpson’s probation ended in 2014.

The Volokh Conspiracy blog wrote about the case in 2011, calling it a “partial government victory / partial defeat.”

Read the court order explaining why Simpson was found guilty:

According to court documents, Simpson was born in Illinois and then moved to Phoenix, Arizona, where he “converted to the Muslim religion at a young age.”

His attorney during the 2010 trial, Kristina Sitton, told ABC News that Simpson was on the no-fly list and the FBI had tried to convince him to cooperate with them, including after his conviction. Sitton said she thought Simpson was “harmless,” according to ABC News:

He grew up the most normal guy. Just a normal high school guy… Converting to Islam seemed like a good thing for him. He had been going down a bad path and then he found Islam. He never struck me as someone who would do this sort of thing. I’m not a bleeding heart, I’m a Republican. I’ve seen some pretty bad guys and he seemed pretty normal.

Simpson was working at a dentist’s office in Arizona, but had been on vacation prior to the shooting, his father told ABC News. Dunston Simpson said he last spoke to his son three weeks ago, but they “had not much to talk about, because we had some very serious differences.” Dunston Simpson said Elton was a “good kid.”

Here are some items from the Heavy.com dossier on Nadir Hamid Soofi, “Nadir Hamid Soofi: 5 Fast Facts You Need to Know”:

According to his Facebook page, Soofi spent a considerable amount of time with his little brother. He’s a graduate of the University of Utah and the International School of Islamabad in Pakistan. His page also shows multiple posts featuring Palestinian and anti-police propaganda. Frequently, he posts the phrase “Eid Mubarak” meaning celebration to the blessed. Soofi was the owner of Effinity Solutions, a carpet cleaning business in Phoenix. In July 2013, he called himselfa “newbie to the carpet cleaning industry.”

[…]

AZ Family reports that the two gunmen lived at an apartment on 19th Avenue and Thunderbird Road (above) in Phoenix. The day after the shooting, FBI agents, some clad in bomb squad gear, searched the apartment. The car they drove to the attack in Garland was registered in Arizona. The car, a 2008 Chevrolet Cobalt, was owned by Soofi. He tried to sell it back in March 2015 for nearly $9,000.

Police said prior Soofi’s name being released that the two had gone to the event with the intention of killing people. Both were armed with assault rifles. Garland cops stopped short of calling the attack a terrorist incident.

EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared in the New English Review. The featured image is of Elton Simpson and Nadir Hamid Soofi perpetrators of Garland, Texas attack on May 3, 2015.

ISIS: The Threat to America — an interview with Erick Stakelbeck

51u4HXtekULWhen we reviewed Erick Stakelbeck’s latest book, ISIS Exposed: Beheadings, Slavery and the Hellish Realities of Radical Islamwe wrote:

Tens of thousands of young Muslims across the ummah from Minneapolis in the U.S., the UK, France, Germany, Russia and even China have been drawn like bees to the holy beehive of the self-declared Caliphate which espouses Islamic purification through ethnic and religious cleansing.

Stakelbeck addressed an important question about why the large unassimilated Somali émigré community in Minneapolis has become the U.S. hub for Al Qaeda and now ISIS recruitment. The shift of Somali émigré young men from traveling to Somali to join Al Shabaab to join ISIS occurred in the last two years facilitated by the ease of travel to Turkey to enter Syria and the attraction of building a Caliphate based on pure Islam.

On April 20, 2015 six Somali émigré young men in their late teens and early 20’s were arrested and indicted by the U.S. Attorney in Minneapolis for material support to the Islamic State or ISIS. According to the WSJ report:

All six charged Monday had been arrested Sunday. Four appeared in Federal Court in St. Paul, Minnesota—Adnan Farah, Zacharia Yusuf Abdurahman, Hanad Mustafe Musse and Guled Ali Omar—with their court appointed lawyers. Two others appeared in a San Diego court—Mr. Daud and Mohamed Abdihamid Farah—where they were arrested after driving from Minneapolis. They were ordered held pending a detention hearing.

A seventh Abdi Nur was separately charged as a recruiter as he successfully traveled to Syria to join and fight for ISIS. It is believed that email exchanges and calls with Abdi Nur, who successfully traveled in May 2014 to Syria may have provided the evidence for the charges in the indictment of material support for terrorism. The FBI was able to connect Nur who were indicted, Daud and Yusuf, because of a police report of an accident involving the vehicle driven by Yusuf.

Somali émigré Abdirahman Sheik Mohamud from the second largest Somali community in the U.S., Columbus, Ohio was indicted on federal terrorist charges following his return from Al Qaeda training in Syria. The indictments announced by the US Attorney in Minneapolis capped a 10 month investigation. The Wall Street Journal report on this latest development, illustrated the resourcefulness of those indicted. Some used student loans to purchase airline tickets to travel to Turkey to enter Syria and join ISIS. The two detained in San Diego were caught trying to enter Mexico from which they intended to travel to Turkey and hence to Syria. Two had traveled by bus from Minneapolis only to be arrested at New York’s JFK Airport.

This is the latest story of how the U.S. humanitarian refugee program, controlled by the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, flooded this major Midwestern community with 100,000 East Africa Muslims. Many of them failed to assimilate into American culture with radical Mosques recruiting dozens of native born jihadists to fight and die for first al Shabaab in Somalia and now for ISIS in Syria. We have written about this repeatedly since 2008. Somali refugees came to the Twin cities with the assistance of voluntary agencies  paid by the State Department and Department of Health and Human Services Office of Refugee Resettlement to process them, provide cash assistance, Medicaid and receive a green card  leading to eventual citizenship. All while many of these Muslim émigrés rejected American values, instead seeking to impose their Sharia law on the host non-Muslim community.

Erick Stakelbeck aired his version of this story, March 17, 2015 on CBN’s The Watchman“Minneapolis- the U.S. Capital of ISIS.” Stakelbeck knows the Somali émigré terror recruit story and how our humanitarian refugee program played a major role in creating the radical Muslim environment in these communities that indoctrinated and recruited these youths. He visited the areas that have the look and feel of Mogadishu in Minnesota. He spoke with frustrated Somali community and former law enforcement officials about the futility of trying to divert these youths from a likely dead end that have befallen dozens who preceded them. He delved  into what attracts these young American Somali and other Muslim émigrés and converts to follow this delusional self destructive jihadist cause.

There have been Mexican and U.S. intelligence reports of possible ISIS presence in Mexico adjacent to the West Texas and New Mexico borders. Late in April 2015 there was a general intelligence alert by the Department of Homeland Security, Transportation Safety Administration. Rep. Michael McCaul (R-TX), Chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, issued a statement saying the Obama administration “is far behind the curve in scaling up programs to counter domestic radicalization, and it has struggled to explain to Congress whether it has a strategy to combat terrorist travel.” He went on to say:

The potential for ISIS infiltration into the U.S. is great, especially from Europe, which U.S. extremists are using as a transit hub to join ISIS and al-Qaida.

Against this background we invited Erick Stakelbeck for an interview about the ISIS threat to America:

Mike Bates overlooking Kotel and Dome of the Rock Mosque on Temple Mount 3-2014.jpg

Mike Bates

Mike Bates: Erick Stakelbeck, welcome to Your Turn.

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Erick Stakelbeck

Stakelbeck:  Thanks Mike. Great to be with you.

Bates:  And joining me is Jerry Gordon, senior editor of The New English Review and his blog The Iconoclast.  Welcome, Jerry.

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Jerry Gordon

Jerry Gordon:  Glad to be back, Mike.

Bates:   Erick, what is the difference between ISIS, ISIL, and the Islamic state?

Stakelbeck:   You know, Mike that is a great question. When I was writing this book, ISIS Exposed, my wife actually said, “Hey, include a distinction in there, because I’m confused about it.” Here’s how to break it down. ISIS stands for the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria. Most people use ISIS.  President Obama, interestingly enough, uses the term ISIL, which means the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant.

Now, Mike, here’s the significance. When you call it ISIS, you’re just giving it Iraq and Syria. That’s bad enough. But when you include ISIL, the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, the Levant is a huge area.  It’s not just Iraq and Syria. It’s Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Lebanon, and, yes, Israel. So when you call ISIS, ISIL, you’re actually empowering them and giving them more territory than they actually hold. So it’s a head-scratcher why President Obama would use the term ISIL.

Bates:  Well, I don’t have to scratch my head. I think I know. It’s because he’s not a friend of Israel and he wants Israel to be ultimately controlled by ISIL. Speaking of President Obama, most of the world first learned of the Islamic State in 2014. When did the President first learn of it?

Stakelbeck:  Mike, at least he knew in late 2012, early 2013, the stirrings were there. ISIS was gaining territory by a lot of victories in Syria, number one, and building their ranks, number two. Foreign fighters from around the world were flocking to Syria to join up with this group. At, the end of the day, in December 2011, President Obama, against the advice of all of his top generals, withdrew every last US soldiers from Iraq. Mike, once he did that, you had Al-Qaeda in Iraq expanding, despite being crushed by the troop.

Soon as the US troops left, Al-Qaeda in Iraq rose from the ashes, and began a wave of suicide bombings and assassinations of Iraqi leaders. All of a sudden, they were strong again in Iraq. They spread their tentacles next door into Syria. Now you have the monster that we have today, ISIS. President Obama gets intelligence reports across his desk every day. He knew. But in my book, I document how people on both sides of the political aisle were warning him. Former diplomats, military leaders were warning him, “Look, this group, ISIS, it’s gaining in strength.  We need to do something.”

Then in January 2014, ISIS roars into Fallujah, where our troops expended so much blood and treasure in the battles there. Shortly thereafter, President Obama went on national TV and called ISIS the “JV team of terrorism.” So a lot of responsibility for this lies squarely with him.

Gordon:  Erick, tens of thousands of foreign Muslim young men and women have been attracted and left their countries, including the US, UK, and other around the globe, to join ISIS. What is so compelling about the Islamic State?

Stakelbeck:  This is a great point. I think, number one, it is the ideology. ISIS has a well-defined jihadist ideology behind the success they’ve had. They now control 35,000 square miles of territory in the heart of the Middle East. That is an area the size of Great Britain. Not only that, they’ve declared a caliphate, a global Islamic State.  That is what every Islamist has wanted for the past century. Now ISIS is doing it in a bold and audacious way.

So success breeds attraction, number one. Number two the ideological message, jihad, caliphate also breeds attractions. Number three, ISIS is a different beast because of their use of social media and propaganda:  Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube. ISIS and its supporters around the world send out 90 tweets per minute. That’s astounding. Their propaganda and their social media arms are controlled by Westerners who were born and raised there who know our culture and know exactly how to connect to an English-speaking audience. Not only that, ISIS spends hundreds of thousands of dollars on these slickly produced propaganda videos that look like a Hollywood action flick.

The days of Osama bin Laden in a cave in front of a green screen droning on in Arabic for an hour are long gone. ISIS is on the cutting edge. They’re very savvy. And on Twitter they use Hollywood movie references, hip-hop music references, anything to connect with young people here in the West. And they’re doing it to great effect. At least 180 US citizens have traveled overseas to join the caliphate, and up to 5,000 Western Europeans, Brits, French, Germans, have left to go join ISIS. And the fear is, obviously that one day, they will return home.

Bates:  Where does ISIS get its funding? This is not a cheap operation.

Stakelbeck:  No. This is the richest terrorist movement in history, Mike, and they get their funding in a few ways.  Number one, just old-fashioned conquest. Look, when they conquered Mosul, the second largest city in Iraq back in June 2014, they seized the Mosul Central Bank, with over $400 million in assets. And, again, when they seize a town, a city, a village, they demand tribute from the conquered people. That’s an Islamic tradition. They demand tribute. That’s another way.

Then you have the illicit oil trade where ISIS is very active in the oil black markets in Turkey, Iran, and Lebanon. They’re making up to $2 million, maybe even $3 million a day with this black market oil. Remember, ISIS has seized oil fields in Syria and Iraq. Another way they’re doing it is by seizing antiquities in places like Nineveh. Now they destroy these ancient biblical sites, but they also take some of the antiquities, and they sell them on the black market as well.

Last way they’re doing it, there is something called the golden chain in the Persian Gulf region. That is where these wealthy folks in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Oman, and the Emirates fund jihad around the world. And these individual donors are pouring money into ISIS as well.

Gordon:  Erick, in your book, you draw attention to US folks who depart for the Islamic State. You call Minneapolis “the hub” attracting those individuals. Recently, we had like seven Somali émigré young men who were indicted in places like Columbus, Ohio, San Diego, and Minneapolis. Why is that the case?

Stakelbeck:  I think, number one, Jerry, the main reason that’s the case is because Minneapolis and St. Paul, the Twin Cities in Minnesota are a nice place to live. They have the largest Somali Muslim population in all of North America. Some 100,000 Somali Muslims live in Minneapolis and St. Paul. That will probably shock a lot of people. The problem is they’re not assimilating. They are not integrating. I spoke to Somali community leaders there who said, “Look, we have a big problem because they’re not becoming part of the American fabric.” This has been the fear when you’re letting, mass numbers of immigrants into the country and they’re not assimilating, you have a big problem. We see this in Western Europe where we have many more Muslim immigrants coming to Germany, France, Britain, they’re not assimilating. They’re setting up almost self-segregating enclaves – I’ve been in these neighborhoods – where they don’t feel British.

They don’t feel French or German, and I fear we have a similar situation going on right now in the Somali communities in the United States. You have a pipeline going from these communities in Minnesota to Iraq and Syria.  You’ve had dozens of young people – US citizens – traveling overseas to join the jihad out of Minnesota. If they return home, you have battle hardened and battle-tested, radicalized, fanatics in your midst.

The Mall of America, the largest shopping mall in the United States is right outside of Minneapolis. So you have the potential for some real damage. When you mentioned the seven Somali young men arrested recently, an Obama administration official said, “We have a terror recruitment problem –” I’m paraphrasing – “in the Twin Cities.”

Bates:  Erick, is the US government doing anything to prevent the return of these jihadis to the United States after fighting with Islamic state? Are we doing anything to stop this threat from entering the US at either the Southern or Northern borders?

Stakelbeck:  Mike, nothing on the southern border. As to what the government is doing anything to prevent it is unclear.  Jeh Johnson, the Department of Homeland Security chief, said recently that we already had about 40 US citizens return who were fighting with ISIS overseas. They’re back.

He said, “Look, we’re trying to monitor them, but you can’t know what everyone’s doing.” This is the Department of Homeland Security chief. So, can people slip through the cracks? Absolutely. Think back to Paris in January 2015 where two brothers had trained with Al-Qaeda in Yemen. They returned to France and they carried out a horrific terror attack there. That can also happen here.

Our system is not foolproof, and people can come back and slip through the cracks. What I would do if I knew someone left to join ISIS – and our government knows who’s going in many cases – is revoke their citizenship and do not allow them back into the United States. It’s as simple as that. “You are no longer a US citizen.  You’re not welcome in this country. And if you do try to enter this country, you’ll be thrown in jail.” That is the logical solution.

Bates:  Isn’t that a constitutional matter? I realize  that ISIS, isn’t a nation, but if they take up arms for another nation, we can revoke their citizenship legally.

Stakelbeck:  ISIS is declared a state, so in their eyes they’re a nation. As to your point about the border, Mike, one of the most chilling passages in my book was a conversation I had with a former CIA clandestine service officer. He told me, “Erick, the thing that keeps me up at night is the possibility of an ISIS jihadist carrying a, a biological or a chemical weapon over our southern border, or our northern border for that matter, and setting it off in a US city.”

You know, it’s been 13-1/2 years since 9/11, and that southern border in particular is more wide open than ever before. And you can’t sustain yourself long term as a nation state if you refuse to secure your borders.

Gordon:  Erick, we’ve had recent intelligence reports indicating that ISIS camps may have been established in Mexico near the US border in Texas and New Mexico. How much of a threat is that?

Stakelbeck:  I’m trying to verify those reports.  I talked to one source who was kind of skeptical. He said, “Look, if the Mexican government knows that there are ISIS camps in their country, what are they doing about it, or why hasn’t anything been done about it yet? This is obviously an imminent threat if these camps exist.” That is an interesting take on it.

It has been a little tough to verify. You know we had one report from Judicial Watch, with a lot of unnamed sources. A lot of times you use unnamed government sources. But unnamed, Mexican officials? That is the kind of report where absolutely like you; it raised my eyebrow big time because the southern border is a massive concern over possible ISIS infiltration. But that kind of report is one I would double and triple check, verify and footnote extensively because that is a serious allegation. Would I doubt it? No. The southern border is so porous and you have these drug cartels that control the Mexican side who have no allegiance to anyone other than the almighty dollar.

Would they work with Islamic terror groups? Absolutely. Have they worked with Islamic terror groups? Probably. It’s a disaster waiting to happen. And eventually, God forbid, if terrorists enter through the southern border, our government will have some tough questions to answer from the American people to say the least.

Gordon:  The other folks who have had experience on the southern border are the Iranians. A few years ago, we had the story about a drug cartel hooking up with an Iranian American in Texas involved with an attempted assassination of the Saudi ambassador in Washington.

Stakelbeck:  The Iranians, Jerry, this is another facet. If I look at the two-headed monster that we’re confronting right now in the Middle East, ISIS and Iran, to me, Iran is the bigger threat long term and possibly short term, depending on when they acquire the bomb, a nuclear weapon.

The Iranians, through Hezbollah in particular, have an extensive network throughout Latin America in our hemisphere. Now in terms of Iran’s nuclear weapons program, why should every American care? Right now Iran is not only developing nuclear weapons, they’re developing intercontinental ballistic missiles, ICBMs, that could reach the United States.

You only develop ICBMs for one reason, to mount them with a nuclear warhead. Now why would Iran do that?  Why would Iran be developing missiles that can reach the United States? It’s simple, because they still consider us, although the Obama administration’s tripping over itself to embrace them and work with them – the Iranian regime considers America the great Satan. Just two weeks ago, the Supreme Ruler of Iran led chants of “Death to America,” in a rally in Tehran.

If we think Iran has changed its spots, we’re kidding ourselves. We have a bull’s eye on our back coming out of Tehran.

 Bates:  Why didn’t the Obama administration stop ISIS when they left Syria and went into Iraq when they were on the open roads and could have easily been taken out? And combined with that, do you advocate the United States military putting troops on the ground to stop ISIS from advancing?

Stakelbeck:  Why did  the Obama administration do nothing? Because he’s a do-nothing guy, in general. He’s  watched as the Middle East has burned. If you dig deeper with President Obama, he’s more focused on domestic things. He wants to fundamentally transform America in his words. Sadly, he seems to be succeeding in at least some ways. It’s almost like an operation of chaos around the world over the past six and a half years. However, I don’t think he’s naïve.

The Middle East is on fire, and he sees America and Israel as forces not for good, but for bad in Middle East.  We have been imperialist occupying powers that have oppressed Muslims around the world, and now we’re getting our just deserts. We are trying to level the playing field, and he seems content to hand over the Middle East and North Africa to radical Islamists. I think that’s pretty clear. Whether it is the Muslim Brotherhood or the Iranian regime.

And all that will happen is for him to manage the ISIS problem until he leaves office. To answer your second question, we don’t need a heavy footprint on the ground, but we do need some ground presence. Think back to 2001 in Afghanistan where we had US Special Forces, the CIA, on the ground working with the Northern Alliance. They routed the Taliban.

We can do the same thing today in Iraq and Syria. We don’t need tens of thousands of American troops. What we need are our elite forces on the ground leading the way. We have the Kurds who are fierce fighters, who are pro-American, who want to get in the fight. We have  Syrian Christians. We have some Iraqi tribes that don’t like ISIS. All of them are begging for leadership from the leader of the free world, and we’re MIA.

Again, it doesn’t take a heavy footprint. We could lead the fight. They’re not – they can’t do it themselves. But we need some kind of US ground presence. You can’t do it through limited air strikes alone. If you’re intention is truly to crush this group – and make no mistake, we need to crush ISIS like the German and Japanese war machines were crushed during World War II before this movement metastasizes any further. It is already spreading throughout the region and it is here in the west.

If we really wanted to crush ISIS, if we’re serious, we need to do it now. I don’t think we’re serious. I don’t think the West is serious. I think we’re going to be in for some serious trouble down the road and, God forbid, maybe in the short term because of our lack of will. This is a Winston Churchill moment. The only man, in my view, who is answering the call, is the Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu. Yet the West, instead of embracing him, siding with him, is shunning him.

Bates:  Yes, that is a shame. Many more questions, not enough time to ask them. The name of the book is ISIS Exposed: Beheadings, Slavery, and the Hellish Reality of Radical Islam. It’s written by Erick Stakelbeck.  You can learn more at www.ErickStakelbeck.com. Erick Stakelbeck, thank you for joining us. Jerry Gordon and I will continue the conversation.

Stakelbeck:  Thank you for having me.

Bates:  Erick Stakelbeck touched on a large growing émigré Muslim population in the United States. Why is the Obama administration admitting such a large number of Muslim refugees?

Gordon:  When the congress passed the Refugee Act of 1980, they gave the keys to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees who establishes allotments for providing asylum. The State Department and the Office of Refugee Resettlement at the Department of Health and Human Services administers it with the consent and approval of Congress. These humanitarian refuges may receive an eventual US citizenship. So we’re put in the quandary when émigré Somali Muslim young men are caught and arrested for joining ISIS.  They are US citizens and received all kinds of benefits under the Refugee Act. The total program cost for the US refugee program at both the federal and the state levels is staggering.  It is estimated at more than $12  to $20 billion a year. And remember there are more refugees on the way from Syria.

Bates:  Man, talk about a Trojan horse.

Gordon:  Absolutely.

Bates:  The enemy is being allowed in the gates. Thanks so much for joining us. If you want to find Jerry Gordon online, he’s the senior editor of The New English Review and his blog The Iconoclast. You can find him online at www.newenglishreview.org. The name of that book that we were discussing earlier, ISIS Exposed: Beheadings, Slavery, and the Hellish Reality of Radical Islam by Erick Stakelbeck.

Listen to the 1130 am WEBY interview with Erick Stakelbeck of CBN’s “The Watchman,” here and here.

EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared in the New English Review. Also see Jerry Gordon’s collection of interviews, The West Speaks.