Tunisia: Constituent Assembly Debates Arab-Muslim Identity in Constitution
By Wafa Ben Hassine, 21 February 2012
The drafting of Tunisia’s new constitution began today with discussion of what will be perhaps one of the most divisive issues in Tunisian politics: the constitutional definition of the country’s national identity.
The first article of Tunisia’s current constitution currently names the language of the country as Arabic and its religion as Islam. With an Islamist party, Ennahda, in power, the question is whether this will be enough to define the religious orientation of Tunisia’s juridical future.
Sadok Bel Aid, Former Dean of the Faculty of Law at the Free University of Tunis, and a specialist in constitutional law, believes that Ennahda has moderated its position with regards to the religious content of the preamble. While previously, according to Bel Aid, members had wished for a reference to an Islamic source for Tunisian law, the party seems to have reached a consensus now that some version of the current first article would be sufficient.
However, from the onset of the meeting it was clear that reaching agreement concerning Tunisia’s national identity would be no small task. Hajer Azaiez, the commission’s vice-rapporteur and a member from Ennahda, casually mentioned, “We are already all in agreement with Islam being the official religion, and Arabic the official language. Why don’t we discuss the rest of preamble?”
This statement received a quick response from Taher Hmila, a representative from the centrist Congress for the Republic (CPR) party, who replied, “No – we are not. We cannot do that. We, as a republic and state, cannot have an official religion. We want to be consistent with the republican form of government.”
Issam Chebbi, a representative from the Progressive Democratic Party (PDP), later proposed including references to religion and language in the body of the constitution instead of the preamble or general principles. Maya Jeribi, secretary general of the PDP, agreed with Chebbi’s proposition.
The Congress for the Republic (CPR) party, which has formed an alliance with Ennahda and the center-left Ettakatol party, seemed to be in agreement that a reference to Islam within the opening clauses of the constitution was not a foregone conclusion.
Rafik Telili, a member of the CPR, argued that the preamble should affirm the state’s civic character. “We need to make it clear that minorities will be protected. We need to say that our relations with Jews, for example, are peaceful,” he said.
Another member from the CPR, Mabrouka Mbarek, suggested that the constitution use a declaration of human rights as the preamble’s point of reference instead of ‘Islamic values,’ since it would hold more collective weight. “The revolution was triggered because of socioeconomic constraints, not religious values. Freedom of religion is only one facet of their demands,” she said.
Bel Aid did not believe that foregoing any reference to religion in the preamble to Tunisia’s constitution was a plausible proposition in a country that is ninety-nine percent Sunni Muslim. However, he felt that the religious character of the definition could indeed be softened.
“I think we could have a reference that mentions religion in light of our history, a ‘light’ version of the formulation that wouldn’t erase it. You know, even in America, on the dollar bill you have ‘In God We Trust,” said Bel Aid.
While the preamble of a constitution has a largely symbolic value, it can set the tone and color of the document to follow. The preamble of France’s constitution, for example, makes reference to the 1789 “Declaration of the Rights of Man” and establishes the states as secular. In light of recent controversies in the country concerning secularism, such as the ban on the niqab (a full-body Islamic veil), that clause would seem significant.
“Preambles can have a certain ideological value, and a certain political value, but also a certain juridical value,” said Bel Aid. He explained that, if worded properly, preambles could be “creative” of principles to follow in the constitution and could act as a guide for future disputes concerning the document’s interpretation.
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Comment: See how much more chastened and sober is the tone adopted by the reporter, Wafa Ben Hassine, from what she wrote in January 2011, just after Ben Ali had been forced out of the country, leaving behind much of his loot. She no doubt has come to better understand (she is Tunisian-American, and the full threat to secularism was not something she understood in January 2011, as Tunisian secularists who have to watch like hawks those who wish to slowlly, insidiously, remove the constraints on Islam, and make Tunisia into...well, into Egypt, if not even worse) the battles that are about more than a phrase here and a phrase there.
BESA Center Perspectives Paper No. 166, February 21, 2012
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY: There seems to be a lot of psychological warfare at play in the approach of international leaders to the Iranian nuclear conundrum. Public statements of various tones and intensity have of late been made by Israeli, American, European, and even Iranian policymakers. Yet, mixed messages are continuously being broadcast and international powers remain disunited on how to halt Iran’s nuclear program. It is unsurprising then that all of this “talk” has led to no action.
Senior policymakers in the US, Israel, Iran and Europe are frequently making public statements on the struggle to stop Iran’s nuclear program. But few of the leaders actually mean or believe their own declarations and each pronouncement is contradicted by the next, resulting in increased confusion and inconsistency. The only party not confused by all of this, apparently, is Iran. It doesn't believe that anybody is serious about really stopping its nuclear program.
Consider these contradictory assertions: US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta recently estimated that Israel will attack Iran sometime between April and June this year. But US President Barack Obama said almost immediately afterwards that Israel has not yet made the decision to strike. US Chairman of the Joint Chiefs General Martin Dempsey, who visited Israel recently, insinuated that there are no understandings or coordination between Israel and the US and that he doesn't know if Israel would inform the US ahead of a possible attack on the Iranian nuclear infrastructure. Obama, however, says that coordination between Israel and the US has never been better.
It looks like a tug of war is occurring. When one policymaker pulls too hard, like Panetta and Dempsey, another one tugs back from the other end, as did Obama when he tried to moderate the statements.
Obama says that no option may be ruled out, including military action, but that this measure should only be used as a last resort. His administration believes that diplomacy and severe sanctions against Iran’s oil exports should be given a chance. Obama fears that an Israeli strike this summer would be premature and disruptive to sanctions, and would entangle the US in a new war too close to the upcoming presidential elections.
On the other hand, the threat of military action is needed to convince reluctant powers, such as Russia and China, that heavier sanctions are the only way to prevent a strike against Iran – a strike they agree would be a terrible disaster.
In Israel, there is disagreement regarding a possible strike on Iran and its timing. It is unclear whether the recent, more militant statements by Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, Defense Minister Ehud Barak, and Minister of Strategic Affairs Moshe "Bogie" Ya'alon are intended to increase pressure on the international community to undertake more extreme measures against Iran, or if they reflect a determination to prevent Iran from becoming a nuclear power by all means.
Israel is much more skeptical than the US and the EU about the ability of sanctions – even the heaviest sanctions – to stop the Iranian nuclear race. It believes that covert operations targeting scientists and facilities may delay Iran’s aspirations. However, recent leaks by US officials that point to Israel as the perpetrator of various assassinations and explosions reveal little coordination between the two allies. Seemingly, the US is concerned with possible Iranian terrorist retaliations against American targets, and is saying: "It isn't us, it is them."
In response to planned harsher sanctions, Iran declared it would seal off the Strait of Hormuz, though it backed down after the US said that it would reopen the strait by force. A senior Iranian official said that in light of Israel’s planned attack Iran should undertake a preemptive counterstrike and run terrorist attacks throughout the world. Yet, another Iranian official said that Iran was willing to return to the negotiating table with the US and Europe. If harsher sanctions were imposed and Iran closed the strait, the US would most likely use force not only to reopen the strait but also to destroy Iran's nuclear facilities. If the Iranian leadership is rational, it is bluffing on this issue and wouldn't close the Strait of Hormuz.
Most states agree that Iran shouldn't be permitted to acquire nuclear weapons. They disagree, however, on how to achieve this outcome. Russia and China have ruled out completely any military strike, claiming that its consequences would be far worse than any possible outcome of a nuclear Iran. Russia and China have also opposed severe sanctions and called only for negotiations. European leaders have also opposed a military strike, but declared that only severe sanctions may prevent it. At the same time they have decided to apply these new, harsher sanctions only in July. If Iran is really close to the production of a nuclear weapon, such sanctions will be futile. Furthermore, severe sanctions can be effective only if all the major powers, including Russia and China, impose them.
The US and EU have offered to negotiate with Iran but, in return, demanded the freezing of uranium enrichment. Iran has rejected this condition, which means they are only interested in negotiations that would give them more time to complete the building of nuclear bombs.
In a recent New York Times op-ed, Dennis Ross, the former Obama staffer who continues to consult with the administration, indeed argued that the time is ripe to resume talks with Iran. Iran likely will interpret this as a sign of American weakness and use this opening to avoid more sanctions while edging closer to obtaining a nuclear weapon.
Ross and other senior American and European officials have argued that the existing sanctions are already working by imposing hardships on the Iranian government and people, thus opening a path for diplomacy. However, their mistake is this: To be really effective it is not enough just to create hardships. To be effective, the government of Iran must conclude that the cost inflicted by the sanctions threatens its survival and is greater than the benefits of becoming a nuclear power. This hasn't yet happened.
The only thing that might influence the Ayatollahs to alter their nuclear plans is a combination of credible military threats and severe sanctions. But, when the military threat is made to appear very vague – due to mixed and contradictory statements by world leaders – and when the decision to impose tough sanctions on Iran is delayed by months and doesn't include some of the superpowers, Iran can be expected to continue to develop its nuclear weaponry without too much worry or disruption.
Unfortunately, the West is not yet truly determined to halt the Iranian nuclear weapons program.
NEW DELHI: Students of the Women's College in Aligarh Muslim University are waging a bitter struggle for a facility their counterparts in other institutions would take for granted-access to the university's central library.
Now, in a concession to these undergraduate women students, AMU has decided provided them online access to the catalogue of books.The varsity says the girls can choose the books which would then be issued and delivered to them.
The 100-year-old Women's College, a constituent of AMU-a central university which had built a reputation for an enlightened social outlook-is housed in the fortress-like enclosure of Abdullah Hall. Except for professional courses, this is the only college providing undergraduate education to women in the university.
The women boarders of the hall are not allowed out of the college campus except on Sundays, so membership of the university library is ruled out for them. Even day scholars of the college are not allowed into the library, considered one of the best in Asia.
According to university officials, the rule is in place to avoid overcrowding of the library. It refuted charges of gender discrimination, saying postgraduate women students had access to the library.
Times View
It is shocking that a place of learning as respected and well-established as Aligarh Muslim University should discriminate against female students in prohibiting them access to the library. The fact that it is a central university only makes it all the more unacceptable. The notion of segregating boys and girls in an institution of higher learning and that too in the place that is supposed to be the repository of knowledge - the library - has no place in a modern society and the government certainly should not be party to the continued existence of such practices. This should not be viewed as an issue of religious sensibilities but one of gender rights. The government should demand immediate access for all girl students to the library.
McCain not in Egypt to 'negotiate' release of rights' workers but to affirm support for sovereignty
February 20, 2012
U.S. Sen. John McCain said Monday that democracy and rights groups operating in Egypt are doing nothing to violate Egyptian sovereignty or meddle in the country's internal affairs, but the U.S. will work with the country's leaders to resolve a conflict arising out of the arrests of workers from several foreign-based organizations.
McCain, traveling with four U.S. senators to Egypt on a trip that was scheduled before the workers were prevented from leaving the country, said he's "confident that people of good faith -- in this country, our country and many others -- can and will find an acceptable resolution to the present situation."
In a statement made after a business conference, McCain said the U.S. lawmakers did not come to negotiate an agreement, but to reaffirm "the support of the United States, and the Congress in particular, for the sovereignty and aspirations of the Egyptian people," and to express a "strong desire to cooperate, as partners and friends, with the new democratic government."
Ties with Egypt have been strained since the government referred 16 Americans and 27 others to a criminal trial in a politically charged case against foreign-funded pro-democracy groups. Cairo is charging that the NGOs illegally distributed foreign funds and ran unregistered organizations.
On Saturday, Egyptian judicial authorities announced the workers will face trial on Feb. 26, a move that suggested a diplomatic resolution will not be reached.
Washington has threatened to cut $1.5 billion in aid over the spat. McCain chairs the International Republican Institute -- one of four U.S.-based groups under investigation -- and is also the top Republican on the Senate Armed Services Committee.
McCain told ABC's "This Week" that "this is a serious situation," and he and the other senators wanted to explain the implications, though not make threats that "could be nonproductive."
On Monday he said the majority of the workers in the organizations are Egyptian and they are doing work that "seeks to support these Egyptian partners in pushing for the rule of law, free elections, a free media, respect for the human rights of all people and other core principles of a democratic society."
"This assistance has been all the more important because of certain laws that have limited the freedom of Egyptian non-governmental organizations to work on behalf of their own civil society and democratic aspirations," he said..
McCain said the nature of America's partnership with Egypt is changing a year after the ouster of Hosni Mubarak but stressed that the two countries "must remain friends."
"Now Egyptians have the chance to turn the page from the Mubarak era and write a new chapter in the great history of their sovereign nation. That is for Egyptians, and they alone, to do. And as Egyptians continue in their journey of democratic development, America will continue to stand with you, as a partner and as a friend," he said.
A group of 11 men plied girls as young as 13 with drink and drugs so they could use them for sex 'several times a day', a court heard today.
The five girls, who were aged between 13 and 15 when the alleged abuse began, were passed around by the men 'who acted together to sexually exploit the girls', a trial at Liverpool Crown Court was told.
The offences are said to have happened in and around Rochdale, Greater Manchester, in 2008 and 2009. All the girls were from broken homes and one was in care.
Liverpool Crown Court heard that some of the girls were raped and physically assaulted and some were forced to have sex with 'several men in a day, several times a week' The court was told that some of the defendants paid the girls and took payments from other men to whom they supplied the girls for sex.
Kabeer Hassan, 24, Abdul Aziz, 41, Abdul Rauf, 43, Mohammed Sajid, 35, Adil Khan, 42, Abdul Qayyum, 43, Mohammed Amin, 44, Qamar Shahzad, 29, Liaquat Shah, 41, and Hamid Safi, 22, are on trial at Liverpool Crown Court charged with conspiracy to engage in sexual activity with children under the age of 16.
Amin, from Rochdale, denies sexual assault. Shah and Safi, from Rochdale, each denied two counts of rape and Safi has also pleaded not guilty to trafficking. Aziz, Khan, Safi and the 59-year-old (who cannot be named for legal reasons. WHY NOT!!!!!) are remanded in custody. Qayyum, from, Rochdale, and the rest of the defendants are on bail.
The court heard the men knew each other and that two of them worked in the takeaways Tasty Bites and the Balti House, both in Market Street in the Heywood area of Rochdale. Four of the other men worked as cab drivers at local taxi firms, one was a student and four were jobless.The men were known to the girls by nicknames such as 'Master' and 'Tiger'
One girl, who was 13 when the alleged abuse began, told police that the men she met were 'friends' who looked after her and 'her number would be passed around amongst the Pakistani men in her area'. She told police: 'When you've got Asian friends, number gets passed and they pass it to their friends. And they pass it to their friends, end up with a massive circle... everyone's got it.'
One 13-year-old victim fell pregnant to one of the defendants and had the child aborted, the jury was told.
In December 2008 a 13-year-old girl fell pregnant to Adil Khan, who later denied even knowing her, despite police having DNA proof he was the baby's father.
The court heard that it was 'common knowledge' among the defendants that (one particular) girl was 15 and that Abdul Aziz would give her lifts to school while Abdul Rauf asked the other older girl if she 'knew anyone younger'.
Read it all – these were vulnerable girls with no one to protect them and hence easy prey.
Too late now. I wonder what the death toll will be at the end of this new riot season. Will we have to rebuild everything they burn down? Will President Obama personally apologize? Will it make any difference?
Here's the milder version of the English translation of what Khomeini wrote, the one most favorable to him. It's still pretty bad.:
22-One of things which will cause an animal to be Haram, although it was originally Halal, is a human having sex with it and ... because of this work (sodomizing the animal) its meat and the meat of its lamb which will be born after sodomizing will all be Haram, along with its milk, wool, and hair.
23- If the animal which someone had sex with is an edible animal like a sheep, cow, or camel it should be killed (Zebh) and burned. If it is one of the animals which is not usually eaten but is used for riding and transportation, like a horse or donkey, it should be taken out of the city and sold in another city.
Kujtim Nicaj, who lived and worked at the Rye Colony apartment complex in Rye, N.Y., until his arrest, is also charged with burglary.
Nicaj's lawyer, Steven Davidson, says his 41-year-old client is "humiliated" by the charges, which he denies, and is worried about providing for his wife and two kids.
The police say Nicaj allegedly broke into the tenant's apartment with a key on Feb. 8 and sodomized the dog.
The newspaper, quoting authorities, says the incident was captured on a "nannycam" set up by the tenant, who had suspected that someone had been entering the apartment.
Gunmen from the Islamist al-Shabaab militia have routinely abducted teenage girls to work as servants on the frontline and forced them to marry fighters, according to a new report documenting the abuse of children in Somalia's civil war.
The report by Human Rights Watch also found that as fighting has intensified over the past two years, al-Shabaab has increasingly targeted boys as young as 10 for action on the frontline to join its dwindling ranks. Whole classrooms have been forced at gunpoint to leave school and fight.
Girls who resisted capture can face the most appalling consequences, Human Rights Watch found. A 16-year-old girl who refused to marry an al-Shabaab commander who was three times her age was killed by his men and beheaded. Her head was brought back to the school as a warning to others. "They assembled all of the girls and said 'this is an example of what will happen if you misbehave'," a teacher at the school told Human Rights Watch
A 19-year-old student from the Bakara district of the capital Mogadishu described how girls were taken from his school. Girls were taken at gunpoint. One girl said she could not go and al-Shabaab shot her in the forehead in front of my class. They said that she was a spy for the government. She was 19 years old," he said.
The forced marriage campaign by the al-Qaeda affiliate is part of its effort to impose its harsh version of Sharia on every aspect of the personal lives of women and girls, according to Human Rights Watch. The report depicts a nightmarish world where the childhoods of boys and girls are effectively ended at the barrel of a gun and in the short time it takes heavily armed fighters to force children from their classrooms and on to waiting trucks.
Though al-Shabaab is guilty of the worst abuses, the Western-backed Transitional Federal Government (TFG) does not escape censure however. Researchers were repeatedly told that TFG forces have also recruited children though without using the same dire coercive tactics.
Pat Buchanan has just lost his job as a commentator at MSNBC, one to which he believed he had a god-given claim, and his firing has confirmed him in his belief that The Lights Are Going Out In The Gardens Of The West:
Here's today's telling internet headline:
Buchanan: Western civilization on its last legs
He doesn't understand that he, crude and rude Pat Buchanan, is not only emblematic of, but a considerable part of, the problem. His "upholding of Western civilization" business is comical. He's an admirer of the Dulles Brothers, and of Joseph McCarthy. For years he was a stout defender of John Demjanjuk. He's a babbitt in his tastes, and offers a succession of right-wing bromides as his worldview. He has a coarse and uncultivated mind. He is badly educated. He has not earned the right to speak about something he calls "Western civilization."
But he has lost a large part of his most comfortable income. And that upsets him. That puts him in mourning for his life. He is, after all, a lifetime defender of privilege, and especially of his privilege. And the loss of that last mouthing-off gig, like nothing else on earth, confirms Pat Buchanan in Pat Buchanan's belief that "Western civlization is on its last legs."
Reverend Franklin Graham says President Obama has “given Islam a pass,” including ignoring atrocities against Christians in the Muslim world — so much so that the evangelist says he cannot “categorically” say Obama is not a Muslim.
In a stunning interview with MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” on Tuesday, the renowned Christian leader and son of Billy Graham expressed shock that President Obama was doing little to protect Christians across the Muslim world against a wave of persecution.
MSNBC’s liberal hosts were flummoxed by Graham’s strong rebuke of Obama, and queried if Graham believed the president to be a Christian.
“You have to ask that of President Obama,” Graham shot back. “You can ask me do I believe you’re a Christian. I think people have to ask Barack Obama. He's come out saying he's a Christian. So I think the question is, what is a Christian?”
Graham said he asked Barack Obama about his faith when he was first running for president.
Graham related their conversation: “He said that he was working on the south side of Chicago in the community and they asked him what church he went to.
"He said I don’t go to church. Then they said if you are going to work in our community you have to join one of the churches. Then, of course, he joined Reverend Jeremiah's church. So that's what his answer to my question was.”
Again queried about Obama’s faith, Graham repeated: “You have to ask him. I cannot answer that question for anybody. All I know is I'm a sinner and that God has forgiven me of my sins because I put my faith and trust in Jesus Christ.”
Graham added that he accepts President Obama’s claim he’s a Christian at face value, but said ultimately only God knows his heart.
He did note that Obama has shown strong empathy toward Muslims and the president has an Islamic background.
“Under Islamic law, under Shariah law, Islam sees him as a son of Islam, because his father was a Muslim, his grandfather was a Muslim, his great-grandfather was a Muslim,” Graham said.
“So under Islamic law the Muslim world sees President Obama as a Muslim, as a son of Islam. That's just the way it works. That's the way they see him.”
Asked if believed Obama was “categorically not a Muslim,” Graham said, “I can't say categorically because Islam has gotten a free a pass under Obama.”
Graham noted that Obama’s Middle East policies have helped Islamists while hurting Christian minorities through the region.
“We see the Arab spring, and coming out of the Arab spring, the Islamists are taking control of the Middle East. And people like [Hosni] Mubarak was a dictator, but he kept the peace with Israel and the Christian minorities in Egypt were protected.
“Now those Christian minorities throughout the entire Arab world are under attack. A Newsweek magazine cover story last week [was about] was the massacre of Christians in the Islamic world. From Europe all the way through the Middle East to Africa into East Asia, Muslims are killing Christians.
“The president can come out and make a statement demanding that if these countries do not protect their minorities, no more foreign aid from the United States. They are not protecting the minorities. The society in these Islamic countries is not protecting the Christians anymore.
Graham added: “And hopefully the people that are in power are going to protect the minorities, and Christians in the Muslim world are the minority. Egypt is like 13 million in the minority. Nigeria is 80 some million, but they're still a minority.
“These Christians are having their churches burned. They're being raped. Women are being raped. They're being murdered. Because under sharia law Muslims can take a Christian's property, take a Christian’s life, can take his daughter. And this is what is happening. The governments are not able to protect the minorities in the society. And they're unwilling to protect them. If a government is not going to protect the minorities, we should not give them one dollar of U.S. aid.”
Graham claimed Obama is doing little to nothing to help persecuted Christians.
“And he's got the power of the White House,” Graham complained. “He could be speaking to these countries right now, demanding that they protect the Christians in those countries. He’s been quiet about it.
“We have an aid station in Southern Sudan. The Sudanese dropped bombs on it right before Christmas. We have a Bible school. Just two weeks ago the Sudanese air force dropped eight bombs on that Bible school. Why doesn't the president come out and try to bring peace to the Sudan?”
While the focus of the media is on the continuing turmoil verging on Civil War in Syria with daily casualty reports, little has been discussed about Syria’s vast arsenal of unconventional weapons falling into the wrong hands. That is until an article appeared today in the new Times of Israel by Lenny Ben-David, “Syria’s arsenal of unconventional weapons must be destroyed”.
Ben-David, a former Israeli diplomat in Washington, noted the concerns about Syria’s unconventional warfare capabilities learned from his service in the IDF during the Scud threat from Iraq under the late Saddam Hussein:
An Iraqi attack was not the main threat we learned about in basic training. Instead, Syria’s unconventional weapons were the doomsday weapons every new Israeli soldier was warned about. A very ominous percent of Syrian artillery shells, bombs, and missile warheads were armed with Sarin, mustard gas, or VX, we were told.
Ben-David discusses his personal dealings with firms a decade ago involved with the destruction in Libya of the late Gaddafi’s unconventional weapons and contrasts that with Syria’s Assad:
In 2003, Libya’s Dictator Muammar Gaddafi renounced the use of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and invited western nations to destroy his country’s stockpiles. Long-range missiles were destroyed, and chemical and nuclear programs were dismantled. It still took several years before Qaddafi finally shipped his highly enriched uranium out of his country for destruction.
But despite Qaddafi’s shedding of WMD, mustard gas stocks were reportedly found after the tyrant’s fall. And his armories were ransacked, resulting in MANPADS being smuggled into Gaza in recent months.
What motivated Qaddafi to destroy his WMD? Some analysts believe that he came to the prudent decision when he saw the crushing of Saddam Hussein after Western countries (only) suspected him of developing WMD.
In Syria, however, no such flash of temporary sanity is likely to dawn on President Bashar Assad. He is fighting for his survival, and those weapons are his ace in the hole. His “Samson complex” –- “if you take me out, I’ll take you all down with me.”
Public reports claim that Syria has hundreds of long-range Scud B, C and D (the North Korean No-Dong) missiles, and dozens of launchers. Some of the missiles are equipped with cluster-bomb warheads suitable for dispersion of chemical weapons. The reports list the bases where the missiles are stored as well as those bases where chemical and biological weaponization is carried out. Indeed, some of the chemical warfare activity is done in cooperation with Iran, which provides training and the equipment.
Persistent reports over the last decade suggest that [the late] Saddam Hussein smuggled elements of his WMD programs to Syria.
We had written as early as December 2007 on Syria’s vast bio-warfare establishment and its threat to Israel and the West if these unconventional weapons fell into terrorist hands, especially Hezbollah and Hamas –see “Syria's Bio-Warfare Threat: an interview with Dr. Jill Dekker”.In August 2011, we also probed the Syrian capability to deliver unconventional weapons in our discussion of“The Iranian Missile Threat.”
Last year in an exchange of email on this topic, Prof. Barry Rubin called the 2007 NER Syrian bio-warfare expose, “breathtaking”.
We noted at the time in our interview with Dr. Jill Dekker the threat to Israel and even here in the US if Syria’s unconventional weaponry fell into terrorist hands:
Dr. Dekker’s answers give a foreboding picture of how large and refined the Syrian bio-warfare programs are and how little Western Intelligence knows about how the programs were developed. The potential exists for a significant WMD threat in the Middle East and the West, especially, against America. Syria is a proxy ally of Iran, North Korea (DPRK) and terror groups such as Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad and Hamas. Thus, the supply of bio-weapons and delivery platforms that could results in mass casualties makes it a real and present danger.
Note this exchange with Dr. Dekker on the incorporation of Syria’s advanced bio-warfare capabilities into its defense system:
Gordon: What have your investigations revealed about the level of commitment and investment in Bio-warfare programs by the Syrian military establishment?
Dekker: Contrary to how the US State Department and other agencies tend to downplay the sophistication of the Syrian biological and nuclear programs, they are very advanced. Syria has always had the most advanced chemical weapons program in the Middle East. The US and other western agencies have in a sense been distracted by this, but their biological programs and the “concept of use” are robust. Syria’s biological weapons capability today is closely tied to the former and current Soviet and Russian programs respectively, the DPRK, Iran and the former Iraq regime. A major concern is their strategic concept of use - which has gone from one of ‘special weapons’ to incorporation into their ‘conventional arsenal.’
[. . .]
Syrians cannot reach parity with US and Israeli conventional weapons. However, they view their bio-chemical arsenal as part of a normal weapons program. This is a huge shift in thinking by the Syrian military. It means they condone the use of biological pathogens as 'offensive' weapons. NATO and the United States should be very concerned about that re-designation.
Then there is this about the threat to the IDF:
Gordon: How much of a threat is the Syrian Bio-warfare capability to Israel and US forces in the Middle East, e.g. Iraq?
Dekker: Syria poses an immediate and imminent threat to the United States and Israel. The most likely use of their biological weapons arsenal against Israel would be to reduce IDF fighting forces prior to an attack on the Golan. It’s conceivable they could incapacitate the IDF for a few days even with non-lethal pathogens or repetitively weaken civilians in Lebanon, where the water supplies are unprotected. This could be an optimum use of their bio-arsenal. That might not be as catastrophic as some fear, but it would be very effective. Obviously, there are more serious scenarios one can imagine in terms of deniability, if they have produced vaccines to protect their military and maybe their civilians against more lethal strains of virus such as smallpox.
And this comment about the relative lack of US understanding about Syria’s bio-warfare capabilities:
Gordon: How much does the US Bio-warfare establishment and intelligence community know about the Syrian Bio-warfare threat?
Dekker: It is similar to the US negligent underestimation and denial that the Soviets had a massive biological weapons program. The US Intelligence Community negligently underestimates and denies the sophistication of the Syrian biological weapons programs which is very unfortunate. I think it has been very difficult for the US Intelligence Community to procure knowledgeable sources due to internal institutional problems. Former US Ambassador to the UN, John Bolton has tried since 2001 to warn the US about the threat the Syrian biological weapons programs poses. His warnings have fallen on deaf ears. I hope Israel is helping the United States because it would appear the US is really not up to this challenge.
Ben-David’s concerns reflect those of Dr. Dekker from our 2007 interview. The issue is what Israel can do about destroying these unconventional warfare caches in Syria? This is especially concerning given the question of whether the Assad regime can survive via bloody repression of its people. Even more sinister elements like the Muslim Brotherhood leaders of the Syrian National Council could control the country should Assad be toppled. Perhaps this discussion may be part of the agenda when PM Netanyahu meets with President Obama in early March during the upcoming AIPAC Washington Policy conference.
On January 29, 2012 the Holocaust Memorial Resource & Education Center of Florida (HMREC) co-hosted an event with Sunni Imam Muhammad Musri of the Islamic Society of Central Florida. The event was; BESA – Albanian Muslim Rescuers During the Holocaust.
The Albanian “Bektashi” Muslims who saved 2,000 Jews during World War 2 were awarded the title, “Righteous Among the Nations” by the State of Israel. Righteous Among the Nations is an honorific title awarded to recognize non-Jews who risked their lives saving Jews from extermination by the Nazis.
The Albanian “Bektashi” Sufi Muslims have earned a place in history exemplifying the goodness within the human soul of man that we should all strive to equal in our daily lives.
Fast forward to 2011, it is now the Bektashi that need saving from the hands of the Sunni’s, Wahhabbis, Arabs, and Pakastani Islamists according to an article written by Stephen Schwartz, June 6, 2011 at the Center For Islamic Pluralism.
Shpetim Mahmudi teaches at the University of Tetovo and belongs to the Bektashi order of Sufi mystics. In a 2008 interview with Michael Totten, Mr. Mahmudi explains how the Sunni’s & Wahabbi Muslims make the Bektashi’s lives a living hell.
“Serious trouble started three years ago when they broke gravestones,” he said. “They didn’t respect our saints. They also broke pictures of Imam Ali on the walls, and of the world head of the Bektashis. They cut the pictures with knives. They think we are too close to Christianity, in part because of the pictures and candles.” The Wahhabis hate candles. Then the Sunnis came in and occupied the tekke saying “ This is Muslim territory”
‘Mahmudi’s place of Sufi worship – his tekke – is under assault by radical Sunnis who have seized most of the sprawling ancient Ottoman compound by force, converted portions of it for their own use, and desecrated its graves and its shrines.”
“They (Sunni’s) attacked us again on the 5th of May,” he said. “They ripped down our Bektashi flag. They broke the spindles on the shrine here and stole the donation box. And they threatened the dervish.”
Many Alevi Bektashis lost their lives when attacked by Sunni right-wing extremists at Kahramanmaraş in 1978, and at Sivas in 1993. Since the 1980s, Alevi Bektashi villagers have come under growing pressure to improve their material lot by abandoning support for left-wing politicians and resistance to Sunni Islam. (Encyclopedia.com Bektashis)
We pulled into the parking lot of the Holocaust Memorial Center on a beautiful Sunday afternoon, knowing this event was a celebration of the Albanians’ heroic deeds during World War 2, we wanted to film and memorialize the event.
Upon entering the venue, Mr. Campbell was immediately stopped by Officer Harris of the Maitland Police Department and told he would need permission from Pam Kancher, Executive Director of the Holocaust Memorial Center, to film the event that was advertised as free and open to the public.
Ms. Kancher told Mr. Campbell that no filming of the event would be allowed. We were also told that if we asked any questions perceived as negative towards Imam Musri we would be escorted out of the building. Somewhat shocked by Ms. Kancher’s overtly hostile and rude behavior I asked her where this hostility and hatred was coming from.
Ms. Kancher said that she had received threatening phone calls, emails, and even death threats from people all over the country regarding this event. Ms. Kancher even accused me of sending her a “threatening” e-mail and calling her office. Knowing that I never sent Ms. Kancher an e-mail or spoke to her, I asked her to produce my “threatening” e-mail. Of course she never did this and refused to apologize for the false accusation and slander.
I told Ms. Kancher these were extremely serious charges and I asked her to produce all the names of people who threatened her. Pam Kancher came back with one e-mail that was not at all threatening, and a letter written by me to the Heritage, a local Jewish paper, which the e-mailer had apparently sent her. That was all Pam Kancher would produce. I told Ms. Kancher she needs to prosecute anyone who threatened her to fullest extent of the law.
I instructed Pam Kancher to file a formal complaint for the threatening e-mails and death threats with the two Maitland Police Officers who were within earshot of our conversation. Ms. Kancher, did nothing when her legal obligations as Executive Director of the Holocaust Memorial Center should require her to file all threats with the proper authorities. Pam got even more furious when I told her The Heritage will be printing my letter to the editor.
On a visit to Paris' main meat market on Tuesday morning, President Sarkozy rejected the claims of far-right Front National leader Marine Le Pen that all meat consumed in the Ile-de-France region is halal, without consumers being aware.
Le Pen made her claim at the weekend when she said the meat distributed in France's most populous region, which includes the capital, is "exclusively" halal. She added that "all the abattoirs in the Ile-de-France sell halal meat, without exception." Le Pen was repeating claims made in a TV documentary in which François Hallepée, the head of Ile-de-France cattle breeders, said all abattoirs in the region were slaughtering according to Muslim ritual.
President Sarkozy made an unscheduled early morning visit to the Rungis food market outside Paris on Tuesday morning where he said Le Pen's claims were "groundless. . . We eat 200,000 tonnes of meat every year in the Ile-de-France and only 2.5 percent is halal," he said.
MOSCOW – It was an Ice Age squirrel's treasure chamber, a burrow containing fruit and seeds that had been stuck in the Siberian permafrost for over 30,000 years. From the fruit tissues, a team of Russian scientists managed to resurrect an entire plant in a pioneering experiment that paves the way for the revival of other species.
The Silene stenophylla is the oldest plant ever to be regenerated, the researchers said, and it is fertile, producing white flowers and viable seeds.
The experiment proves that permafrost serves as a natural depository for ancient life forms, said the Russian researchers, who published their findings in Tuesday's issue of "Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences" of the United States.
"We consider it essential to continue permafrost studies in search of an ancient genetic pool, that of pre-existing life, which hypothetically has long since vanished from the earth's surface," the scientists said in the article.
Canadian researchers had earlier regenerated some significantly younger plants from seeds found in burrows.
Svetlana Yashina of the Institute of Cell Biophysics of the Russian Academy Of Sciences, who led the regeneration effort, said the revived plant looked very similar to its modern version, which still grows in the same area in northeastern Siberia.
"It's a very viable plant, and it adapts really well," she told The Associated Press in a telephone interview from the Russian town of Pushchino where her lab is located.
She voiced hope the team could continue its work and regenerate more plant species.
The Russian research team recovered the fruit after investigating dozens of fossil burrows hidden in ice deposits on the right bank of the lower Kolyma River in northeastern Siberia, the sediments dating back 30,000-32,000 years.
The sediments were firmly cemented together and often totally filled with ice, making any water infiltration impossible -- creating a natural freezing chamber fully isolated from the surface.
"The squirrels dug the frozen ground to build their burrows, which are about the size of a soccer ball, putting in hay first and then animal fur for a perfect storage chamber," said Stanislav Gubin, one of the authors of the study, who spent years rummaging through the area for squirrel burrows. "It's a natural cryobank."
The burrows were located 125 feet below the present surface in layers containing bones of large mammals, such as mammoth, wooly rhinoceros, bison, horse and deer.
Gubin said the study has demonstrated that tissue can survive ice conservation for tens of thousands of years, opening the way to the possible resurrection of Ice Age mammals.
"If we are lucky, we can find some frozen squirrel tissue," Gubin told the AP. "And this path could lead us all the way to mammoth."
Japanese scientists are already searching in the same area for mammoth remains, but Gubin voiced hope that the Russians will be the first to find some frozen animal tissue that could be used for regeneration.
"It's our land, we will try to get them first," he said.
The so-called "revolutions" or, rather, much-hyped uprisings in various Arab countries, supposedly the result of a keen desire for "democracy" and "freedom" (the vaguest word in the language) are said not to be "complete." But the desire to overturn a local thief (sometimes merely fantastically greedy, as Ben Ali had become, sometimes completely insane, as Qaddafy had been for some time, sometimes merely the thick-necked, stolid, not-very-intelligent member of a system, as in Egypt where Mubarak was simply top dog in the corrupt military regime that had ruled Egypt since 1952), was mainly fury at the ruler and his courtiers, and a desire by others to get their share of the loot, that is the national wealth that in not every, but in almost every, Arab country, flows from access to, or control of, poltical power. Oil and gas revenues in some cases, aid from non-Muslims in others, and the kind of contracts -- for a car-distribution monopoly, or a telecom company -- that can only be obtained by those who are related to, or supporters of, and supported by, those in power.
The "Arab Spring" cannot ever be completed, if by completed one means the attainment of something like Western-style democracy. And nothing particularly good will come of it, or should naively continue to be expected, for the Lesser Despotism of those local rulers and their courtiers, may be overturned, with a great deall of media-generated excitable enthusiasm in the uncomprehending West, can be undone. Qaddafy can be killed, Ben Ali sent into Saudi exile, Mubarak be laid flat on a sickbed which is now routinely wheeled into court, Saleh can finally relinquish power, and some can claim, while waiting and expecting to see the Alawites fall in Syria, that that would "only leave Bahrain" as the place where the 'Arab Spring'" "has been foiled."
But underneath the Lesser Despotism of those despots -- Ben Ali, Qaddafy, Mubarak, Saleh -- remains, and must always remain for most of the local population, the mental substrate of the Greater Despotism, that is of Islam. It is the Greater Despotism, that is Islam, which encourages slavish obedience to authority (the authority of Islam and of Muhammad), remains and not only remains, but is even stronger. The failure of Muslims to understand their own reality, the source of their own economic disarray, political violence and agression and inability to compromise, the social disharmony that only leads to mass expulsions or mass misery, their intellectual and moral primitiveness is understandable. To see Islam steadily and whole, and to realize that it has been responsible for what many Arabs and Muslims keep thinking can only be righted by "more Islam" for "Islam is the solution" -- it's not possible for them to do this. It would be too upsetting.
But a few people, such as Ataturk, did see this, and did push through programs not to eliminate but to constrain Islam. But Ataturk was a thoughtful war hero, who could do what he liked, and as Turkey had lost its empire and was in a ruinous condition, Ataturk's attempt to rescue Turkey from too much Islam -- at a time when advanced people in the Muslim world saw its weakness and disarray, and correctly understood that the problem lay with Islam, though most were not as intelligent and ruthless and farseeing as Ataturk, who understood that Islam could not be "reformed" but it could be constrained, and thanks to that constaining, a secular class might come into being large enough to protect, so Ataturk thought, the conditions which allowed the very secularism of which that secular class was the beneficiary.
It's what Bourguiba tried to in Tunisia, under very particular conditions. For Bourguiba basked in the glory of having led Tunisia to (political) independence from France, but he never wanted intellectual dependence from what he understood -- what intelligent and thinking Tunisian could not -- that France had a superior culture, and part of that superiority was the absence of Islam. Bourguiba, and those with him, were aided by Tunisia's physical and cultural proximity to France, and to the mental opening to the West that the French language, and the possiblity of French education (with French teachers being sent from France to Tunisia), gave to the Tunisian intellectual elite.
But where is the new Bourguiba? Where is the new Ataturk? It is not "the people" who will be able to constrain Islam, but only a ruthless group of single-minded and enlightened despots. "Democracy" in lands overwhelmingly inhabited by people who are primitive, and kept primitive --with all the aggression, violence, conspiracy-theories, inability to compromise -- by the very Islam that they keep thinking they need still more of, when what they need is less. And a Westren world that keeps misunserstanding, because it refuses to learn about, Islam, will continue to misapprehend the nature of the tremors and upheavals among Arab Muslim peoples, and be enthusiastic about all the wrong things.
What would someone who wished Muslims well do? Such a person, in the West, would never cease to make clear that he understood, and would continue to speak about, and act on his conviction, that Islam was responsible for the miseries of Muslim Man, and responsible too, wherever large numbers of Muslims had been allowed to settle, for other miseries, brought to non-Muslims by the large-scale presence of Muslims, "refugees" from Islam who, unlike refugees from Nazis and Communists, bring Islam, devotedly, with them.
CAIRO, Feb 20, 2012 (AFP) - The Arab Spring that reshaped the region's political landscape has entered a second year, marked by fragile transitions and the empowerment of Islamists in a region still trying to find its way.
From Tunisia to Cairo, and from Tripoli to Damascus, profound changes have swept the Arab world, leaving it facing myriad political, social, security and religious challenges.
This “tsunami” has “moved tectonic plates and will provoke aftershocks that will lead to pre-democratic states in the best case,” said Antoine Basbous, who heads the Paris-based Observatory of Arab Countries.
Ousting dictators such as Tunisia's Zine El Abidine Ben Ali and Egypt's Hosni Mubarak “proved to be the easy part of change,” said Ibrahim Sharqieh of the Brookings Institute in Doha.
Tunisia -- where the Arab Spring was born -- today appears the most advanced in its transition after having in October elected a constituent assembly, dominated by the Islamist party Al-Nahda.
Egypt's parliamentary elections also propelled Islamists to the centre stage of politics, with the parties of the powerful Muslim Brotherhood and the Salafi movements grabbing almost three-quarters of seats in parliament.
But the Arab world's most populous nation is still ruled by an unpopular military and regularly shaken by deadly unrest. Presidential elections are expected in May or June.
A year after anti-regime protests kicked off in mid-February 2011, Libya is going through heavy turbulence despite the rebels' victory over the forces of Moamer Kadhafi who was killed in October.
Syria which plunged into anti-regime protests in March last year remains steeped in violence.
“Syria is at a critical point,” said Nabil Abdel Fattah, a political analyst with the Al-Ahram Centre for Political and Strategic Studies in the Egyptian capital.
The situation there “risks creating waves of instability in the region, like in Lebanon, Israel, Iraq, Turkey or Jordan,” its neighbouring states, he told AFP.
In Yemen, President Ali Abdullah Saleh's 33-year-rule finally comes to an end this week when his deputy takes over in a referendum-like poll, marking Yemen as the first Arab country where an uprising has led to a negotiated settlement.
Bahrain's Shiite-led uprising which was launched a year ago has been stifled, but tensions remain high in the small kingdom run by Sunnis.
“The revolutions have not been complete in any of the countries in which they have been taking place,” said Samer Shehata, Middle East expert at Georgetown University in Washington.
Often launched by young activists using all the resources the Internet has to offer, the Arab revolts have paved the way for Islamist movements, once repressed or even banned in several countries.
“The main actors for change have been the youth. The first beneficiaries have been the Islamists because they are structured and because they have deep roots in society, unlike the youth who have not had time to organise,” Basbous said.
“This should not be seen as a threat to democracy, at least for now,” said Sharqieh, pointing to the fact that the Islamist movements have shown “values of partnership and collaboration.”However others are concerned about the double talk of the Islamist movements.
They “try to present a moderate image of political Islam, to encourage tourism and foreign investment... but the reality is different, many voices are very conservative,” said Abdel Fattah.
“To succeed, the Islamists must practice realism and Islam, and abandon the slogan 'Islam is the solution',” said Basbous.
A little more information on his co-defendants from the Guardian
Briton Jermaine Grant, who has been charged with possessing explosives and planning an attack in Kenya, will have to wait until 9 May for his trial because evidence seized during his arrest has been sent to Britain for analysis, a Kenyan court has heard.
Grant, 29, from Newham, east London, appeared on Monday in a small, packed and sweltering courtroom in Mombasa, alongside two men and a woman, identified as Grant's wife, who were arrested with him in the coastal city in December.
Grant, Warda Breik Islam, whom he married just days before his arrest, Fouad Abubakar Manswab and Frank Ngala have all been charged with possessing explosives and planning to cause loss of life in Kenya, which has been on high alert since its troops entered neighbouring Somalia last October to pursue the Islamist rebels of al-Shabaab.
The defendants all pleaded not guilty in a first court appearance on 13 January.
"What I understand from the police is that [the exhibits] were sent to Britain for [scientific] examination," prosecutor Jacob Ondari told the Guardian after Monday's court appearance. He said he did not know which institution in Britain was carrying out the tests.
A court charge sheet listed the items seized as acetone, hydrogen peroxide, ammonium nitrate, sulphur, lead nitrate, batteries and wire. It also said Grant used the aliases Ali Muhammad Ali and Peter Joseph.
Ondari also said that before the trial proceeds, he wanted to request police protection for two Kenyan witnesses, who said they had been threatened.
Grant's lawyer Chacha Mwita said he was disappointed by the decision to adjourn, and alleged the prosecution was using delaying tactics to tie his client, who is already serving a concurrent two-year sentence for illegally entering Kenya, to other incidents not before the Mombasa court.
He said there was no need for the evidence to be sent to Britain as it had already been analysed by Kenyan experts. "I believe we have qualified analysts … we don't need to rely on our former colonial masters," he told the court.
Grant has been charged separately in Nairobi on multiple counts after an incident near the border between Kenya and Somalia in 2008. . . Media reports at the time said he and two others were trying to sneak into Somalia disguised as women.
Security sources in Nairobi say that when Grant was detained, he had plans for hotels and restaurants in Nairobi, where security is very tight at public places like shopping malls and restaurants after multiple warnings of possible terrorist attacks.
Abubakar Manswab and Breik Islam have been released on bail, but Ngala is still being held as he could not meet the bail terms.
Israel’s mammoth offshore natural gas fields estimated at over 26 trillion cubic feet are coming on stream in 2013 creating the first of several royalty streams of income from the exclusive economic zone in the Levant Basin. Couple that with the onshore development of oil shale deposits in the Shefla Basin with an estimated 250 billion barrels and Israel becomes a world class energy provider. One of the payoffs is the creation of a Sovereign Wealth Fund potentially surpassing that of the Gulf Emirates and Singapore in the coming decade. We noted the potentially significant and far reaching geo-resource political implications in our December 2011 NER article, “Will Israel Win the Energy Prize in the Levant Basin?”:
The other implications of these offshore energy developments by Israel would be its ability to export natural gas beyond its needs and the creation of a Sovereign Wealth Fund (SWF) akin to that of other hydro-carbon producing nations. Both the Israel Strategies.com and UBS analyses address these questions:
Israel’s potential natural gas industry could help the country meet its domestic demand without having to increase energy-related imports. Furthermore, Israel may be able to export natural gas by around 2017—bringing in approximately $3 billion per year to start and $6 billion per year from 2020 to 2030. Overall there could be a significant swing in the current account picture as a result of the development of an export-oriented natural gas program.
UBS estimates that this [Sovereign Wealth Fund could rise to $42.5 billion by 2030 and could earn a 5% rate of return.
That significant economic dividend became a palpable reality yesterday with the announcement of Israel’s Sovereign Wealth Fund by the Netanyahu government in Jerusalem. Today’s Jerusalem Post noted this development in a report,”Cabinet outlines plan for sovereign wealth fund “:
The cabinet announced its plan Sunday to create a sovereign-wealth fund from future natural gas and oil royalties which will invest in education, and protect the country in times of national emergency. Ministers will vote on details of the plan in the coming weeks.
A committee consisting of officials from the Prime Minister’s Office, Finance Ministry and Bank of Israel released its own findings at the cabinet meeting, recommending that around half of the state’s royalties from gas and oil be deposited into the fund.
The committee recommended using the fund to invest in global markets, and allocating a portion of the profits to government-approved education and defense projects. It advised that the Bank of Israel manage the fund under treasury supervision, and be used to provide loans as insurance in the event of war, economic crisis, natural disaster or other catastrophes.
[. . ]
Prime Minister Netanyahu said in his opening remarks at the weekly cabinet meeting that it would be years before the state reaps the dividends of natural gas finds, but that when the time finally arrives it will amount to a great deal.
Netanyahu added that he and Energy Water Resources Minister Uzi Landau examined during a visit to Cyprus last week the possibility of the two countries developing joint natural-gas export facilities.
In our NER article on Israel’s energy prize, we noted its geo-political significance:
. . . by cannily recognizing the substantial economic gains from its oil and gas discoveries in the Levant basin and co-development projects with both Greece and Cyprus, Israel has enabled a geo-political shift that comes once in a generation. It has illustrated that candid comment of Eisenhower-era Secretary of State John Foster Dulles: “The United States of America does not have friends; it has interests.” However, the Obama Administration has given this issue scant attention, perhaps signalling that it doesn’t have America’s best energy interests in mind when it comes to support of Israel. The economic advantages of having a non-Islamic country in control of vast energy resources in the Middle East by dint of technological and entrepreneurial acumen has apparently not dawned on the West Wing of the White House. It has in both Athens and Nicosia. It may hopefully also dawn on the EU Commission in Brussels seeking secure deliveries of natural gas to provide future power needs for its collective industrial infrastructure. The geo-political realities of what Israel has unearthed should define relations between Washington and Jerusalem. Those realities should also figure prominently in foreign affairs issues to be debated in the 2012 Presidential campaign.
The announcement of Israel’s Sovereign Wealth Fund becomes an important card for Netanyahu to play in any discussions with President Obama, when they meet in Washington during the upcoming AIPAC Annual Policy Conference in early March.
If ;you click on the link you will see a photo of the victim, a very pretty Persian woman, sans hijab. - CM
'A man who could not break his wife's spirit with his fists stabbed her in front of 300 people as a final act of control, a court has heard.
'A jury yesterday heard Zialloh Abrahimzadeh's murder of his wife, Zahra, was so premeditated that police found a passport and Iranian immigration papers waiting in his car.
Sooo - not a spur-of-the-moment crime passionelle as one sometimes encounters in non-Muslim lands. - CM
'Sandi McDonald, prosecuting, said the killing was vengeance on a woman who found the courage to leave her abuser.
"For years, Abrahimzadeh had used his anger, his fists, his feet and his belt to punish and control his wife and, at times, his family", she said.
Just as Islam permits and prescribes. Quran 4: 34 - "As for those [women - CM] from whom you [that is, the man - CM] fear disobedience, admonish them, and send them to beds apart, and beat them. Then if they obey you, take no further action against them". And if they still do not obey...what 'further action' might be expected, after a thrashing? It appears that in Mr Abrahimzadeh's case, he deemed that his wife's continuing refusal to submit - indeed, her flight from his abuse - warranted a public execution. - CM
"This is the case of a man who lost control of his family and, as a consequence, hunted his wife down to punish her and make her pay the consequence of her actions."
'Abrahimzadeh, 57, in the Supreme Court, has pleaded not guilty to one count of murder.
As we shall see, he stabbed her in the back, eight times, in front of 300 people. And he says he is not guilty of murder. One can only assume that he does not regard the killing as murder, but as the just and proper execution of a criminal female. Pour encourager les autres. - CM
'Opening the trial, Ms McDonald said Zahra died at the Adelaide Convention Centre on March 21, 2010. She said that was the culmination of years of abuse that began in 1997, when the couple and their children moved to Australia.
"He was controlling, domineering, regularly resorted to verbal abuse and to violence.
"He said he would rather go to jail than have...one of his family ruin his reputation".
'Reputation'. In other words, the so-called 'honor' of the malignantly narcissistic Mohammedan male, that 'honor' which is gained and maintained only by being seen - by other Mohammedan males - to be always and everywhere the unchallenged and absolute master of all his female chattels. - CM
'After a 2009 fight in which Abrahimzadeh tried to use a knife, Zahra and the children took out restraining orders.
They appealed beyond the Ummah or Mohammedan Mob, looking to the non-Muslim law and its representatives for help. And that, doubtless, filled this Mohammedan male with even greater fury. - CM
'On the night of her murder, Zahra and her eldest daughter were attending a Persian New Year celebration.
'Ms McDonald said they were surprised to see Abrahimzadeh among the 300 people in attendance, and alerted security.
I would like to know who among the 300 guests, or who among their 'friends' and relations in the Ummah, had told Abrahimzadeh where to find his wife. And security were just not quick enough. - CM
'As Zahra was sitting at a table...Abrahimzadeh ran up behind her and repeatedly stabbed her in the back. He did not even stop as she fell to the floor...she didn't have a chance to defend herself."
'Ms McDonald said Zahra died from eight stab wounds.
Overkill - as so often with 'honor' murders, as Phyllis Chesler has observed in several classic articles on the subject. - CM
'Police later discovered a roll of newspaper n his jacket, serving as a sheath for the knife, and paperwork, including a completed visa application for Iran, in the car he had used.
The trial continues".
Now for what the ABC made of it. There are some useful extra snippets of information in this report from Candice Marcus.
'Husband killed wife in front of 300 guests, court told.
More accurately: Muslim Husband Killed Separated Wife in Front of 300 Guests..."
'A man (a Persian Muslim man - CM) accused of stabbing his wife to death at a crowded function at the Adelaide Convention Centre has gone on trial for murder.
'The prosecution said he was a violent and abusive husband who wanted to make his wife pay for leaving him.
'The South Australian Supreme Court heard Zialloh Abrahimzadeh went to the Convention Centre with a knife hidden under his jacket.
'His wife Zahra was there with one of their daughters for a Persian New Year's Eve celebration in 2010.
'The court heard she became concerned for her safety when she saw her estranged husband arrive.
'Prosecutor Sandi McDonald ( a woman - how this Mohammedn must be fuming at being had up in court, with a female kuffar lawyer prosecuting him for killing his wife, whom he deeply believed deserved to die for the unpardonable sin of not wanting to go on living under the blows of his boot and his fist - CM) said Abrahimzadeh waited until his wife was looking in her handbag, then stabbed her in the back, continuing his attack when she fell to the ground.
'The court heard people nearby wrestled the knife from him, but the victim had been stabbed eight times.
I wonder whether there is security camera footage of the whole thing as it happened? Not to mention the possibility that people were recording the function itself, taking pictures of the guests, etc. - CM
'The prosecution said Abrahimzadeh allegedly was heard to say, "She's mine, she's done a shameful thing", and "You betrayed me", before the woman was stabbed repeatedly in front of 300 guests.
She had 'outed' him as a violent husband, to the non-Muslim authorities from whom she had sought help; she had refused to suffer meekly in silence, allowing him to abuse her at will behind closed doors without complaint as a 'good' Muslim wife should have done. And so - he punished her, by execution. 'She's mine'. Although she had left him, and they were separated, it seems he saw her precisely as Islam would teach him to see her: as an owned thing, an object, as tilth, chattel, like a slave or a domestic animal. - CM
'Ms McDonald told the jury a restraining order had been imposed on the accused less than two weeks before the attack because of his history of domestic violence towards his wife and children.
"He used his anger, his fists, his feet and his belt to punish and control his wife and at times his family", she told the hearing.
'The court heard the couple's three children will give evidence for the prosecution".
Unfortunately, it is unlikely that Candice Marcus the ABC reporter, or for that matter, any member of the Australian judiciary involved in the trial, let alone members of the jury, will have read Phyllis Chesler's magisterial studies of how Muslim 'honor' murders differ from the kind of 'crime passionelle' or domestic killings that happen in non-Muslim western countries, nor will they have read Spengler's lapidary discussion of the peculiar theologico-legal paradigm that underpins and justifies those murders. They will not, therefore, know all that they need to know, in order to understand what was going on in that household, and why that man would feel entitled to execute his wife in a vicious multiple stabbing attack in front of 300 witnesses, and yet - in court - plead innocent of murder.
And so, just in case Ms Marcus or others covering or involved with this case may one day come across this discussion, I will provide the links.
Here is the redoubtable Jewish-American feminist and psychologist Phyllis Chesler, writing for the Middle East Quarterly in 2009: "Are Honor Killings Simply Domestic Violence?"
"More than the Koran's sanction of wife-beating (which I have quoted verbatim above - CM), the legal grounds on which the Koran sanctions it reveals an impassable gulf between Islamic and Western law.
"The sovereign grants inalienable rights to every individual in Western society, of which protection from violence is foremost.
"Every individual stands in direct relation to the state, which wields a monopoly of violence.
"Islam's legal system is radically different; the father is a 'governor' or 'administrator' of the family, that is, a little sovereign within his domestic realm, with the right to employ violence to control his wife and children.
'That is the self-understanding of modern Islam spelled out by Muslim-American scholars (and doubtless shared by Islamic scholars in Australia, if only we knew where to look and how to read their pronouncements - CM) and it is incompatible with the Western concept of human rights.
"The practice of wife-beating, which is found in Muslim communities in Western countries, is embedded too profoundly in sharia law to be extracted.
"Nowhere to my knowledge has a Muslim religious authority of standing repudiated wife-beating as specified in Surah 4: 32 [or 4: 34] of the Koran, for to do so would undermine the foundations of Muslim society.
'By extension, the power of the little sovereign of the family can include the killing of wayward wives and female relations.
'Execution for domestic crimes, often called 'honor killing' is not mentioned in the Koran, but the practice is so widespread in Muslim countries - the United Nations Population Fund estimates an annual toll of 5,000 (and that, I am sure, is a major underestimate, as these killings tend to be covered up rather than reported - CM) that it is recognized in what we might term Islamic common law.
"Muslim courts either do not prosecute so-called honor killings, or prosecute them more leniently than other crimes. Article 340 of Jordan's penal code states, "He who discovers his wife or one of his female relatives committing adultery and kills, wounds, or injures one of them, is exempted from any penalty". Syria imposes only a two-year prison sentence for such killings. Pakistan forbids them but rarely punishes them...
"I can find no record of a recognised Muslim authority repudiating wife-beating".
And that is why this Muslim man, who murdered his wife in front of multiple witnesses in order to punish her for 'shaming' him by exposing him as a bad husband and leaving him and seeking help from non-Muslim authorities, could stand in an Australian court and claim that he was innocent of murder. Conditioned by Islam, by the Islamic world-view, he simply does not see what he did, as being murder. He - so he thinks, his conscience seared by Islam , his ego swollen by a monstrous sense of entitlement- was merely asserting his authority by executing a rebel and traitor.
However, he forgot he was not in Jordan, or Pakistan, or Iran, or any other part of dar al Islam where a man can appoint himself judge, jury and executioner and kill his female chattels on the flimsiest of pretexts, and get away with it. He is in Australia, where what he did is - I think, rightly and properly - defined as murder, and I sincerely hope that the jury will have enough sense to ignore any whining and weaselly appeals to 'culture' as a mitigating factor in his violent abuse and ultimate murder of his wife, and will find him Guilty and put him away for life.
Just a pack of MOMAs in one of Sydney's most heavily Islamified suburb, doing what such roving packs of MOMAs so very often do: attempted robbery and attempted murder of a lone victim.
Of course, the first report I encountered of this nasty little incident - in the ABC - did not give a description of the perps, but something about the shape of the crime - the mob attack, the back-stabbing - and its location - Lakemba - set my thumbs a-pricking, and a quick google turned up the NSW police media release with the oh-so-telling information that the 'men' were 'of Mediterranean/ Middle Eastern appearance' (MOMAs as some Aussies are wont to sardonically refer to them).
The Sydney Morning Herald report which you will find here
also primly omits this all-important data but the Telegraph, bless them, were less mealy-mouthed. Somehow I suspect that if these robbers and would-be murderers are caught, they are unlikely to be Italo-Australian Catholics, Greek-Australian Eastern Orthodox, Copts, Assyrian Christians, or Jews...I would bet good money there were...MUSLIMS.
And so, to the ABC report, first, followed by the police news release, so you can see what I mean.
'An 18 year old man was stabbed in the back as he was robbed by a gang of men in Sydney's south-west last night.
'Detective Inspector John Betell says the teenager was attacked while walking through Lakemba (that is, through heavily-Islamised Lakemba - CM) about 9:00 PM.
The Sydney Telegraph had a picture of the victim. I can't find his name anywhere - they may well be suppressing it for his own safety - but I wouldn't be surprised if he were non-Muslim Australian. - CM
"He was approached by a group of between 10 to 20 maleswho threatened him for his phone and wallet. The victim refused and was subsequently attacked by this group", he said.
Cowardly, gutless thugs, they do so love to mob a lone victim: like hyenas, or the bandar-log in Kipling's Jungle Book. Ten or twenty men attacking one. Despicable. - CM
"At some stage during the assault the victim received what we believe to be a stab wound in the upper right side of his back by what appears to be a small type of knife".
'The teenager sought help from a nearby fire station and was taken to St George Hospital with non-life threatening injuries.
'Police are appealing for witnesses after a man was stabbed in Lakemba overnight.
'About 9 pm yesterday (Sunday 19 February) an 18 year old man was walking west along Lakemba Street when he was approached by a group of 10 to 20 men.
Note that these are described as men, not youths or boys. Adult men. Up to 20 of them, bailing up just one man. - CM
'The men demanded he give them some of his property.
'He refused and was attacked by the group.
'During the incident the 18 year old was stabbed in the back with a knife.
'The group of men told the man to leave and he attended a nearby Fire and Rescue NSW station where police were called.
'The man was taken to St George Hospital for treatment. His injury is not considered life threatening.
But whoever stabbed him in the back was trying to kill him. This is attempted murder, not just robbery. - CM
'Police from Campsie Local Area Command located a crime scene which investigators examined.
'The group of males have been described to police as being of Mediterranean/ Middle Eastern appearance.'
'Anyone who may have witnessed the incident or anyone with information relating to this group of males is urged to contact Campsie Police Station...".
If it was an attack on a lone non-Muslim man by a group of Muslim men in an area that is rapidly becoming a no-go area for anybody except Muslims, I doubt that any Muslim who witnessed the attack is going to rat on fellow members of the Mob. Let's hope there were non-Muslim witnesses.
Sydney's Daily Telegraph, to do them credit, retained the all-important description of the suspects, and even has a photo of the young victim, which you will see if you click on the link. - CM
I am not quoting their report, as it is word-for-word from the police media release I've already quoted. What matters is that they reproduce verbatim the description of the attackers:
'The group of males have been described to police as being of Mediterranean/ Middle Eastern Appearance".
Men of Middle Eastern/ Mediterranean Appearance, engaging in major crime.
MOMAs.
And so very often when caught they turn out to have names like...Mohammed. - CM
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