Ingrid Mattson and the U.S. Muslim Engagement Project

While warning Jews of the great "perils" of allying with Christian fundamentalists, Ingrid bint Mattson is also busy making Americans complacent towards the threat of radical Islam. "Ingrid Mattson and the 'U.S. Muslim Engagement Project,'" by Cinnamon Stillwell for Campus Watch, October 1 (thanks to Jeffrey Imm):

Ingrid Mattson, director of the Macdonald Center for the Study of Islam and Christian-Muslim Relations at Hartford Seminary and president of the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA), has been all over the news lately.

Mattson was one of the speakers at an interfaith gathering at the Democratic National Convention in August, and now word comes that she's a member of the "leadership group" for the U.S. Muslim Engagement Project. The latter consists of a bipartisan coalition of American leaders from a variety of backgrounds, which, as described at its website, seeks to form "a clear and strong consensus on a strategy to enhance U.S. and international security by working more intensively and directly on the underlying causes of tension with key Muslim countries and communities."

While this would appear to be a laudable goal, Mattson's background and viewpoints demonstrates that she is hardly a suitable candidate for involvement.

As ISNA president, Mattson presides over an organization with troubling ties to the Muslim Brotherhood, one of the unindicted co-conspirators in last year's Hamas terrorism financing case, U.S. v. Holy Land Foundation. In the course of the trial, a Muslim Brotherhood document outlining a strategy for "destroying…Western civilization from within," making "Allah's religion…victorious over all other religions," and listing ISNA, among other allegedly mainstream Muslim-American organizations, as "friends" in this effort came to light.

Mattson has a long history of defending Wahhabism and Sharia law, expressing anti-American and anti-democratic viewpoints, downplaying concerns over Islamic terrorism in the U.S. and worldwide, claiming women's rights are protected in Islam, besmirching Israel and its "rightwing Christian" supporters, placing loyalty to Islam above loyalty to the U.S., and teaching jihadist literature in her courses.

Mattson's influence as a professor at Hartford Seminary is cause enough for concern. But her potential influence on public policy, and that of other problematic Middle East studies professors, is even more worrisome.

One thing's for sure: her involvement in the "U.S. Muslim Engagement Project" raises serious questions about its intent. So does the participation of Dalia Mogahed, executive director of the Gallup Center for Muslim Studies and co-author with Georgetown professor John Esposito of the highly criticized, Who Speaks for Islam? What a Billion Muslims Really Think.

Engagement with the Muslim world is necessary, but doing so through the intermediaries of soft jihad defeat the purpose. Perhaps that's the point.

A road paved on reality

Caroline Glick , THE JERUSALEM POST

Listening to the news in Israel these days, it is hard to escape the feeling that the Israeli political discourse has become dangerously irrelevant. Take Iran for example. On Tuesday, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad told the heads of UN member states, "The dignity, integrity and rights of the European and American people are being played with by a small but deceitful number of people called Zionists. Although they are a minuscule minority, they have been dominating an important portion of the financial and monetary centers as well as the political decision-making centers of some European countries and the US in a deceitful, complex and furtive manner."

Ahmadinejad then promised that Israel will soon be destroyed - for the benefit of humanity.

For these remarks, he received enthusiastic applause from the world leaders gathered at the UN General Assembly.

And how has Israel responded? It hasn't done anything in particular. And it has no intention of doing anything in particular.

This point was made clear to the public on Wednesday when Israel's new UN ambassador, Gavriela Shalev, gave an interview to Army Radio. While bemoaning Ahmadinejad's warm reception, she said that the world leaders were probably just being diplomatic. She noted that many of their ambassadors say nice things about Israel to her in private.

Israel's woman at the UN devoted most of her interview to defending the UN. In fact, she said she believes it is her duty not simply to defend Israel to the world body, but to defend the UN to Israelis. As she put it, her job is "correcting the UN's image in the eyes of the people of Israel."

Shalev's appointment to the UN was the work of Foreign Minister - and would-be prime minister - Tzipi Livni. And her view of her role as Israel's ambassador is strictly in keeping with what Livni perceives as the job of Israel's top diplomats. They are the world's emissaries to Israel.

Livni has spent the better part of the past three years at the Foreign Ministry telling us that the UN is our friend, the Europeans are our friends and that the Americans and Europeans and the UN will take care of Iran for us. The Palestinians are also our friends.

As anti-Semitic forces grow throughout the world, Livni has not communicated one single policy for defending Israel abroad that doesn't involve the kindness of strangers. Her response to Ahmadinejad's speech was a case in point.

The one thing the woman who believes that she has the right to lead the country without being elected by anyone thinks that Israel should do in response to Ahmadinejad's call for our physical destruction is to object to Iran's bid to join the UN Security Council. Livni's only concrete response to Ahmadinejad's promise to annihilate us was to issue a directive to Israel's embassies telling our diplomats to ask their host governments not to support Iran's bid for Security Council membership.

Livni doesn't actually think Iran is Israel's greatest challenge. The Palestinians are. And as far as she is concerned, giving the Palestinians a state by handing over Judea and Samaria (and Jerusalem, although she never says it outright), as quickly as possible is Israel's most urgent task. We need a two-state solution and we need it NOW, she says.

Neither Livni nor her colleagues in Kadima, Labor and Meretz, nor her supporters in the Israeli media ever bother to acknowledge the troublesome, inconvenient fact that the Palestinians don't want a state. They want to destroy our state.

This basic fact was made clear - yet again - on Tuesday.

On Tuesday, Livni took time out of her busy schedule of political meetings with Labor, Shas and Meretz leaders with whom she is attempting to build a government without being elected by anyone, to meet with Fatah's chief negotiator Ahmed Qurei. Although Livni refused to tell us what she talked about, she promised that progress was made toward the urgent imperative of forming a Palestinian state.

But Qurei was not so enthusiastic. In fact, he was contemptuous of Livni and of the very notion of peaceful coexistence between the Palestinians and Israel. After the negotiating session, Qurei told Reuters that if the talks toward an Israeli surrender of Judea, Samaria and Jerusalem collapse, the Palestinians will renew their terror war against Israel. In his words, "If the talks reached a dead end, what do we do? Capitulate? Resistance in all its forms is a legitimate right."

Just to make sure he understood Qurei properly, the reporter asked whether that meant that the Palestinians would renew their suicide bombing campaign against Israelis. Qurei responded, "All forms of resistance."

We have been here, of course, a million times before. This is the same threat that Yassir Arafat and his men have made - and implemented - repeatedly since signing the Oslo Accords with Israel 15 years ago. They use terror and negotiations in tandem to squeeze Israel into giving away more and more of its land. And it works.

When Livni heard about Qurei's remarks, she called him and reportedly told him that they were unacceptable. So he said he was taken out of context. No skin off his back.

He knew Livni wouldn't do anything. At the same time that Livni said his remarks were unacceptable, she pledged to continue negotiating Israel's surrender of Judea, Samaria and Jerusalem with him for as long as she remains in power.

Today, Livni and her colleagues in Kadima, Labor, Meretz and Shas are working fervently toward forming a new government that will continue holding irrelevant but dangerous negotiations with the Palestinians and the Syrians, and pretending that Iran's nuclear weapons are not going to be used against Israel. They argue that we need the "political stability" that they can provide us in this dangerous time.

The Israeli media gives these fantasies their full support. Indeed, anyone who notices that the world is sitting back and allowing Iran to acquire nuclear weapons or points out that the Palestinians don't want a state is immediately shot down as an alarmist and an extremist.

This national discourse - which has been the only one permitted in the country since the advent of the "peace process" with the PLO 15 years ago - is Israel's Achilles' heel. Until the general public is set clear on the reality of the world confronting the country, there is no chance that Israel will take the necessary steps to defend itself and ensure that it survives.

Understanding this basic fact, former IDF chief of General Staff Lt.-Gen. (res.) Moshe "Bogie" Ya'alon has taken it upon himself to tell the Israeli public the truth about the world we live in. Ya'alon is a rare bird among Israel's current pantheon of luminaries. He is an honest man who lives by his principles, and he doesn't bend them, ever.

Last week Ya'alon published a book called The Longer Shorter Road in Hebrew. Ya'alon, whose tour of duty as chief of Staff was unceremoniously cut short by former prime minister Ariel Sharon in June 2005 due to his trenchant opposition to Sharon's planned withdrawal of IDF forces and Israeli civilians from the Gaza Strip, has written a book that sets out the facts of life clearly, credibly and passionately.

The book's title is derived from a speech that Ya'alon's commander, Yoram Ya'ir, gave to his officers during the First Lebanon War. Ya'ir explained that short-cuts are not necessarily better than long roads. In fact, it is often better to take the longest route. As Ya'ir put it, "There is a long road that is short and there are short roads that are long."

Ya'alon uses Ya'ir's point to demonstrate that the Israeli Left's insistence on peace "now" and a solution to the Arab-Israel conflict "now" has placed Israel on a strategic trajectory that has brought it, and will continue to bring it only bloodshed and danger. Israel's enemies in the Palestinian Authority, Lebanon, Syria and Iran view Israel's insistence on finding immediate solutions to the threats it faces as a sign that Israeli society is collapsing.

As a consequence, every step that Israel has made toward appeasing its neighbors - from recognizing the PLO and bringing Arafat and his legions into Judea, Samaria and Gaza; to retreating from Lebanon in 2000 and Gaza in 2005; to failing to properly prosecute the Second Lebanon War in 2006; to doing nothing to combat Hamas's regime in Gaza since 2007; to embracing the false paradigm of peace at Annapolis last November - has strengthened their conviction that Israel can and will be destroyed.

Ya'alon also dwells on the moral collapse of Israel's political and media elite and that collapse's adverse impact on the senior command echelons of the IDF. The abandonment of Zionist values and public and private integrity by our politicians and media has cast and kept Israel on a path of self-delusion, where the only thing that matters is immediate gratification. Politicians promise the public "hope" based on illusions of peace-around-the-corner to win their votes. The media support the politicians' lies both because of the media's post-Zionist ideological uniformity and due to their refusal to acknowledge that their populist demands for peace "now" have brought Israel only war and danger.

Ya'alon's book is part memoir and part polemic. He reminds Israelis of what it is about us that makes us a great people, worthy of our land and privileged to defend it. At the same time, he chastises our failed leaders who have tricked the public into following a strategic path that endangers us. His book's greatest contribution is not in providing a set path forward, but in courageously and unrelentingly explaining the reality that surrounds us today and in showing the public how it is that we have arrived in our current predicament.

In exposing himself, his values and his beliefs to the public, and juxtaposing his own leadership experience and personal integrity with the corruption and weakness of our political and intellectual leaders, Ya'alon is telling the public in a very clear way that there is an alternative to defeatism and self-delusion, and that he - and we the public - represent that alternative, that "longer shorter road."

Livni, Defense Minister Ehud Barak and their colleagues on the Left in the Knesset and the media insist that we not take that longer road to security and peace. In fact, they deny that it even exists. They attempt to convince us that elections are unnecessary by arguing that there is no difference between political parties today, because their short cut to defeat is the only path available to us.

It must be fervently hoped that Ya'alon will soon enter the political fray. Like the Likud under Binyamin Netanyahu, Ya'alon is proof positive that Livni and her cronies are lying. There are great differences between those that would lead us and the paths they would take.

And the only road to safety is the long road that is paved on reality.

caroline@carolineglick.com

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FBI Prevents Agents from Telling 'Truth' About 9/11 on PBS

Jeff Stein | October 1, 2008

The FBI has blocked two of its veteran counterterrorism agents from going public with accusations that the CIA deliberately withheld crucial intelligence before the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks. FBI Special Agents Mark Rossini and Douglas Miller have asked for permission to appear in an upcoming public television documentary, scheduled to air in January, on pre-9/11 rivalries between the CIA, FBI and National Security Agency.

The program is a spin-off from The Shadow Factory: The Ultra-Secret NSA from 9/11 to the Eavesdropping on America, by acclaimed investigative reporter James Bamford, due out in a matter of days.

The FBI denied Rossini and Miller permission to participate in the book or the PBS "NOVA" documentary, which is also being written and produced by Bamford, on grounds that the FBI "doesn't want to stir up old conflicts with the CIA," according to multiple reliable sources.
Bamford, contacted by phone, said he could not comment because his publisher has embargoed his new book for release around Oct. 10.

The author of two other ground-breaking books on the NSA, Bamford also said his general policy is not to discuss his negotiations for interviews with intelligence agencies.

Pre-9/11 intelligence mishaps have been generally attributed to bureaucratic screw-ups -- a "failure to connect the dots," exacerbated by spy agency rivalries.

But Rossini and Miller, who were assigned to the CIA-run Counterterrorist Center during the run-up to the 9/11 attacks, are prepared to describe on camera how the CIA blocked them from sharing crucial intelligence with FBI headquarters - and then later pressured them not to tell the truth to investigators.

The first allegation is not entirely new, having been reported by author Lawrence Wright in his 2006 book, The Looming Tower: Al Qaeda and the Road to 9/11, among other places.

But what is new is that Rossini and Miller -- who still hold sensitive jobs in the FBI, and are identified here for the first time -- are prepared to say publicly that, under pressure from the CIA, they kept the full the truth from the Justice Department's Inspector General, which looked into the FBI's handling of pre-9/11 intelligence in 2004.

"There was pressure on people not to disclose what really happened," said sources close to the IG investigation.

Rossini, in particular, is said to have felt threatened that the CIA would have him prosecuted for violating the Intelligence Identities Protection Act if he told the IG investigators what really happened inside the CTC.

CIA officials were in the room when he and Miller, as well as a sympathetic CIA officer, were questioned.

The IG investigators showed them copies of CTC intelligence reports and e-mails.

But the FBI agents suddenly couldn't remember details about who said what, or who reported what, to whom, about the presence of two al Qaeda agents in the U.S. prior to the 9/11 attacks,

The IG investigators were suspicious.

Indeed, their report, which used pseudonyms for the CIA and FBI agents its interviewed -- Rossini and Miller were called "Malcolm" and "Dwight," a CIA analyst was dubbed "Eric" -- hinted at a cover-up.

"When we interviewed all of the individuals involved about the CIR [Current Intelligence Report] they asserted that they recalled nothing about it," it said

The focus of the IG was what the CIA had witheld about the movement of two al Qaeda operatives, Nawaf al-Hazmi and Khalid al-Mihdhar, from Malaysia to the U.S. in early 2000.

Dwight told the OIG that he did not recall being aware of the information about Mihdhar, did not recall drafting the CIR, did not recall whether he drafted the CIR on his own initiative or at the direction of his supervisor, and did not recall any discussions about the reasons for delaying completion and dissemination of the CIR. Malcolm said he did not recall reviewing any of the cable traffic or any information regarding Hazmi and Mihdhar. Eric told the OIG that he did not recall the CIR.

Subsequently, Rossini and Miller were not subpoenaed by the 9/11 Commission to tell what they knew, even though sources say they were eager to do so.

But he and Miller did come clean during an internal FBI investigation, which remains under wraps.

Sources with direct knowledge of the FBI's internal probe say that the agents provided the bureau with unadulterated versions of their CTC experiences, including orders they were given by the center's then-Deputy Director, Tom Wilshire, to withhold intelligence about the movement of al Qaeda operatives into the country from the FBI.

When the agents asked permission to tell that same story on television, the FBI initially agreed, but then cancelled at the last moment, two sources involved in the deliberations said, with the explanation that it didn't want to risk inflaming the CIA.

The FBI's top spokesman, Assistant Director John Miller, did not address that issue directly.

But he said that the FBI had withheld permission for the agents to be named in various reports on 9/11 intelligence out of security and privacy concerns.

"These questions were examined extensively by several independent agencies and commissions," he said via e-mail Wednesday.

"It was determined that the two FBI employees would not be named in those reports because they continue to hold sensitive positions in the FBI as well as Privacy Act issues regarding current and former personnel."

Agent Douglas Miller has said that he doesn't have "a rational answer" to explain why the CIA blocked him from sharing information with the bureau, particularly a report of such obvious magnitude about al Qaeda operatives in the U.S. He speculated that CIA officials at the CTC were annoyed that he had encroached on their territory.

A CIA spokesman, Paul Gimigliano, ridiculed the allegations.

"I have every reason--every reason--to believe that's complete garbage," he said in a brief telephone interview. "Not only did the 9/11 Commission look at the matter in detail, but former Director George Tenet wrote about it at some length in his book."

But the Justice Department Inspector general contradicted Tenet's assertion that the CIA shared its intelligence on al Qaeda operatives in a timely fashion with the FBI.

"We reviewed whether this information was in fact passed to the FBI by the CIA, and based on the evidence, concluded that while the CIA passed some of the information about Mihdhar to the FBI, it did not contemporaneously pass the information about Mihdhar's U.S. visa to the FBI," the IG report said.


"We concluded it was not disclosed by the CIA until late August 2001, shortly before the September 11 terrorist attacks."

Another intelligence source said the CIA feared that if FBI headquarters learned of the suspects' arrival in the U.S., it would try to arrest them -- and bust up a sensitive CIA operation to penetrate al Qaeda.

Mihdhar and Hazmi were plotting an attack outside of the United States, the CIA believed, and wanted the FBI to stay clear of them.

"They said it has nothing to do with the FBI, the next attack will be in Southeast Asia," said a source familiar with the details. "They said, 'It's none of your business.'"

Rossini and other FBI counterterrorism agents were furious, according to a knowledgeable source. The FBI is responsible for investigating domestic-based plots.

"They're here!" Rossini protested to his CTC bosses. "It is FBI business."

The IG report criticized Douglas Miller ("Dwight") for not ignoring CIA objections and sending his crucially important report on Mihdhar to FBI headquarters.

But Miller, who held the relatively low rank of GS-12 at the time, told investigators that it was unthinkable for him to violate the orders of his CTC superiors. He would have been fired, "sent home," he told them.

Miller would be happy to give CIA officials the benefit of the doubt in a television interview, he has told friends, conceding that there may have been good reasons for their decisions that he was not aware of.

He has described the CTC as place filled with dedicated professionals who were "America's lowest paid professional workers on an hourly basis," for all the pressure-packed time they spent trying to detect terrorist plots.

But unless the FBI changes its mind, he'll have to keep that story to himself.

Tags: 9/11, al Qaeda, CIA, Counterterrorist Center, CTC, Douglas Miller, FBI, George Tenet, Glenn A. Fine, information sharing, Inspector General, intelligence, James Bamford, John Miller, Justice Department, Lawrence Wright, Looming Tower, Mark Rossini, Paul Gimigliano, Shadow Factory

Civil Fights: When violence replaces democracy

Evelyn Gordon , THE JERUSALEM POST

There has been a spate of attacks by settlers on both soldiers and Palestinians recently. This is not random violence, but calculated policy: The goal, activists say, is to "exact a price" whenever part of a settlement or outpost is dismantled, in the hope of persuading the authorities that dismantling settlements is not worth the cost. While only a minority of settlers supports this tactic, the number is growing, and defense officials believe the violence will only escalate.

This is something no society can tolerate, and better law enforcement is clearly part of the necessary response. Yet law enforcement alone cannot solve the underlying problem - which is that growing numbers of settlers have justifiably concluded that democratic action is pointless, leaving violence as the only rational option.

IF THAT sounds outrageous, consider the following: In 1993, the Knesset approved the Oslo Accords, even though Yitzhak Rabin won election promising no negotiations with the PLO. But the ensuing surge in terror disillusioned many Oslo supporters, thus rightists saw a real chance of defeating Oslo 2 in 1995. So they did exactly what good democrats are supposed to do: They lobbied Shas and Labor MKs, and succeeded in garnering enough votes for victory - until Rabin, thumbing his nose at the rules, openly bought two MKs elected on a far-right slate, thereby securing a 61-59 majority. And since the offered bribe (a ministry and deputy ministry, with all attendant financial benefits) was illegal at the time, he then used his newly purchased majority to amend the law so he could pay up.

Worse, this perversion of democracy enjoyed monolithic support from journalists, leftist MKs, academics and other self-proclaimed champions of the rule of law. The lesson was obvious: Playing by the democratic rules is pointless, because the other side has no qualms about scrapping them whenever they prove inconvenient.

It is no accident that the worst incident of political violence in Israel's history, Rabin's assassination, occurred a mere month later. If democratic alternatives are blocked, violence becomes the only recourse. And someone will inevitably take it.

FAST FORWARD to the 2003 election, when Labor championed a unilateral withdrawal from Gaza and the Likud's Ariel Sharon campaigned against this idea. Again, rightists did what good democrats are supposed to do: They threw themselves into electing Sharon. And they succeeded: The Likud won by a landslide. Yet 11 months later, Sharon U-turned and adopted Labor's platform.

Nevertheless, he offered a democratic escape route: an internal party referendum. So rightists again did what good democrats are supposed to do: They canvassed door-to-door among Likud members.

And they won again: Though polls predicted an easy victory for Sharon, his plan lost by a 60-40 margin.

But Sharon ignored his party's verdict, despite having pledged to honor it. He also refused to submit his plan to any broader democratic test - new elections or a national referendum. And of course, these decisions were cheered by the left's self-proclaimed champions of democracy.

Thus the right won two democratic victories, the 2003 election and the Likud referendum, only to see both prove worthless.

Once again, the lesson was clear: Playing by the democratic rules is pointless.

After Sharon junked the referendum results, rightists protested by blocking roads around the country. That, while illegal, is a time-honored Israeli tradition. The Histadrut, for instance, blocked roads nationwide for months to protest the emergency economic program in 2003; disabled activists demanding increased funding once paralyzed the entire capital by blocking major roads. Yet neither union activists nor the disabled were ever arrested.

Anti-disengagement protesters, however, were arrested in droves, and routinely jailed for lengthy periods. Here, too, the lesson was clear: Rightists will be jailed for using tactics that other protesters can use with impunity. In short, democracy is not a level field, so playing on it is pointless.

LEFTISTS FREQUENTLY charge that even if all the democratic rules were honored, settlers would not accept an adverse outcome. That may be true for a tiny minority, but certainly not for the vast majority - as was proven during Ehud Barak's premiership.

Barak won election in 1999 by promising a unilateral withdrawal from Lebanon and final-status negotiations with the Palestinians. He duly quit Lebanon in May 2000; two months later, he offered sweeping concessions to the Palestinians at Camp David.

Clearly, he had a democratic mandate for both withdrawal and negotiations. Moreover, the Knesset for once did its democratic job properly. By forcing him to call new elections, it enabled the public to approve or reject the specific concessions he made at Camp David, and later at Washington and Taba.

And, miracle of miracles, there was virtually no violence, though rightists opposed both withdrawal and negotiations.

Faced with a true democratic mandate and a true democratic ratification process, settlers honored the rules of the democratic game.

Unfortunately, Barak's term was the exception. And while Rabin's term could have been a one-time aberration, Sharon's term proved that it was not.

Thus growing numbers of settlers, especially the young, no longer believe in the democratic process - and with cause. What is the point of winning elections or referenda if the results will simply be ignored? What is the point of lobbying Knesset members if any successes can be overturned by vote-buying?

It is probably too late to change the minds of those fomenting the current violence. But if we do not want their ranks to keep swelling, we must restore the younger generation's faith in democracy.

Legislation - such as a bill now heading for final reading that mandates a referendum, elections or a two-thirds Knesset majority before ceding sovereign territory - is vital to this effort. But changing the country's political culture is equally vital. And that will only happen if all the journalists, academics, jurists and MKs who so loudly proclaim their devotion to democracy stop whitewashing its perversion in the name of "peace" and instead demand that the rules be respected, even if that results in setbacks for their side.

Otherwise, we are liable to witness an ever-expanding circle of violence that no amount of law enforcement will be able to suppress.
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"Idiocy"

Arlene Kushner

After two days of Rosh Hashana, with heart-felt prayer and deep contemplation, I have returned to my computer to find more of the same from Olmert -- as if he haunts us and we can never quite be done with him. It is certainly not what I hoped to return to, but his comments must be answered, and so I do this posting now... Put simply, Olmert granted a "farewell" interview to Yediot Ahronot, which has made press in several places. He warns us that if we want peace with the Palestinians we must leave most, if not all, of the West Bank (i.e., Judea and Samaria) and eastern Jerusalem.

The Palestinians won't settle for less, you see. So we have to do the compromising, the surrendering of what is ours.

It boils down, again, to the question of who needs this agreement. Olmert behaves as if we must have it, and thus must give them what they want -- which is exactly the wrong position to take. They have to want it, and, as it is, there is precious little evidence that they do.

I will not belabor here what we would get in return for surrendering all that Olmert suggests we give up. I've covered that ground a hundred times before and undoubtedly will a hundred times again. Olmert says we will get "peace." I say that we will get terrorism that makes the Kassams coming out of Gaza seem like child's play. Hamas is breathing down Abbas's neck, and he is powerless to enforce any agreement. The entire thought of negotiating with him is unmitigated nonsense.

What Olmert does is not only advance a position that weakens us from a security position, he also weakens our sense of ourselves, and of our rights. He is a destructive force.

Allow me here to simply quote Olmert with regard to the fact that the Palestinians don't meet our readiness to compromise: "Unfortunately, the Palestinians don't have the necessary courage, strength, internal determination, will or enthusiasm."

With this he makes the argument for giving them nothing. And yet he persists. Idiocy.

~~~~~~~~~~

Unfortunately, he continues to represent a danger, although a diminishing one. He talks about "finishing the job" (i.e., negotiations) before leaving office. This is grandstanding: A deal is not going to be struck before he leaves office, even if that is a few months away. If he were to put his signature to something of an partial nature -- outlining what had been agreed to so far -- it might be binding down the road. That shouldn't be permitted to happen, because he is now heading an interim government that the attorney general has cautioned to act with "restraint." Besides which, that would require the Palestinians to also sign off on progress, and this they do not intend to do, whatever the calls from the likes of negotiator Saeb Erekat now for Olmert to put something on paper.

Abbas has made a comment, however, that he hopes Olmert's statements are a "deposit" for the next government. Therein, too, lies a danger -- that the Palestinians will demand that any future negotiations be based on what Olmert said, even if it was not in writing.

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Some of us have been in synagogue the last couple of days, and some of us have been having meetings. Reportedly, Livni and Mofaz have had their first meeting since the primaries. What, if anything was promised to Mofaz is not clear. What amuses me is that the meeting was referred to as "clandestine." How clandestine if it was being reported in the news?

Livni and Barak also met. But the word here is that Labor's demands are not being met and that no progress was made in forming that coalition.

~~~~~~~~~~

The US Defense Department, I am pleased to note, has agreed to sell the Israeli Air Force 25 F-35 stealth-enabled Joint Strike Fighters.

According to the Post, a Pentagon official has said that "the sale of the stealth jets to Israel was essential to American national interests and was meant to ensure that Israel maintained its qualitative edge over armies of neighboring countries."

This is a plane that is not only stealth, it can hover, and land vertically and take off vertically is lightly loaded and in a few hundred feet if fully loaded.

~~~~~~~~~~

I wrote recently about violence that is being presumed -- without solid evidence -- to be from the right wing here, and I alluded briefly to the left-wing bias in this country. Evelyn Gordon has written a very powerful and painful piece on this subject, that tells it absolutely straight. I urge you to read it. She has addressed an issue that has been too much hidden:

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1222017417894&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

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see my website www.ArlenefromIsrael.info

Wind of War from Syrian and Iranian.

Radar-guided missile positions were prepared and an early warning station have since been deployed on the 7,800-foot Mt. Sannine by Hizballah at the behest of Iran and Syria, which are capable of monitoring and threatening US Sixth Fleet movements in the eastern Mediterranean and Israel Air Force flights under the 'watchful' eyes of UN. At the same time, Iran and Syria are rapidly rearming Hezbollah terrorists in southern Lebanon, in preparation for the next assault on Israel, while an international peacekeeping force has failed to carry out a U.N. mandate to disarm the Shi'ite terror group. CIA director Michael Hayden said the destruction of the Syrian reactor - as a result of intelligence collaboration with a "foreign partner" (it is 'forbidden' to mention Israel) who first identified the facility's purpose - spoiled a project "that could have provided Syria with plutonium for nuclear weapons. (This action by the IDF has removed the threat of a nuclear-armed Syria!)

While many 'friends' of Israel are against military action against Iran's nuclear sites, news was revealed by the former UN weapons inspector David Albright several months ago, that Iran had the blueprints for making a nuclear warhead that could fit onto its Shehab-3 missiles. (In spite of numerous explicit statements made by high-ranking Iranian officials, many 'friends' of Israel are still 'unconvinced' of Iran's intentions!)

Russian Rear Adm. Andrei Baranov disclosed that 10 Russian warships are already anchored at the Syrian port of Tartus. The Russians are making no secret of their intention of using their naval presence in Syrian ports as a deterrent to a possible Israeli air strike against Syria. The Russian state-run company, Atomstroiexport, that is building Iran's first nuclear plant declared that by year's end the company will take steps that will make the launch of the Bushehr plant "irreversible." (Russia, which used to be USSR, has clearly re-entered the 'big game' of international politics and is assuming its traditional position!)

(The Muslim enemies of Israel are getting ready for another war. They need to win only one war in order to commit the second Holocaust and destroy Israel, which they had planned but failed to achieve during each war since 1948! Other 'friends' of Israel are willing facilitators of those attempts and for 60 years have been systematically disallowing the Jewish state to decisively defend itself militarily and political to end this charade of duplicity!)

Iran is Progressing Fast Towards a Nuclear Bomb (…which, according to frequent and clear declarations made by the Iranian leadership, is going to be used against Israel!) Brig. Yossi Baidatz, the director of research at Israeli military intelligence (AMAN), surprised the Israeli cabinet on Sunday Sept. 21, with a new evaluation of Iran's nuclear timetable. Tehran has already stocked one-third or even half the quantity of enriched uranium needed for a nuclear bomb. He warned the ministers that Iran is dashing at top speed towards a nuclear weapons capability and nothing stands in the way of its headlong advance, including international sanctions.

UN Applauded to Genocidal Maniac from Iran. "The most striking thing was that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad got a round of applause after his awful speech," the consul-general in New York, Assi Shariv, commented the day after the Iranian president's addressed the UN General Assembly.

Food for Thought: Condoleezza Rice has proclaimed that the basis for the negotiations was an Israeli withdrawal to the pre-1967 lines, including from east Jerusalem. I suggest, that the League of Nations resolution of 1922, which allocated all Palestine, including Jordan, as a land allocated for the creation of the Jewish state, Eretz-Israel, would be better basis for the negotiations! After all, most countries in the region have been created based on this Mandate system. Why had Israel been singled out for special treatment? - Steven Shamrak

Desperate Criminal and Traitor. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said in an interview published on Monday that Israel must withdraw from nearly all of the West Bank (Judea and Samaria) and East Jerusalem to attain peace (like it was 'attained' in Gaza) with the (so-called: who are they and who are their representatives - Hamas or Fatah?) Palestinians. (This deceitful 'peace lover' hopes that by 'making history' he'll be able to avoid criminal prosecution or time in jail!)

Unfriendly Behaviour of a Friend. The United States has begun training a second battalion of security forces loyal to chairman Mahmoud Abbas. Israeli opposition leaders have charged that the "police forces" serve as a cover for a military army for the PA. (Must Israel start training Al Quida 'security forces '?)

Saudi Brainwash American Students. Sarah Stern, who heads EMET, Endowment for Middle East Truth think-tank, says the Saudi Arabians are using their petrodollars to make major inroads into the American educational system. Stern said the Saudis are making use of a clause in the little-known Higher Education Law called Title VI to train teachers from kindergarten through 12th grade with an anti-American, anti-Israel bent. (I wonder, how much do the Saudis 'invest' in financing other US 'educational' programs: 'supporting' student unions in universities, journalists' 'subsidies' and 'benefits' for politicians in Washington? And, why is nothing done to stop the enemy ideological intrusion?)

Blame Israel for Everything. An Arab social welfare group known as "Samed" has accused Israel of encouraging drug use among Arab youth living under the Palestinian Authority and Arab citizens of Israel. According to Samed, there are at least 60,000 Arab drug users living in areas controlled by the Palestinian Authority. In addition, 29 percent of Israeli drug users are Arab, while Arabs make up only 18 percent of the general population. (Arabs produce and distribute 90% of world heroin supply. It is only logical that some of them are using the fruit of their labour!)

After Israel, Full Scale Civil War. Last week members of the Doghmush clan were killed by Hamas in Gaza City. The clashes began after a Hamas police officer was killed during an arrest at the clan's compound on Monday. The Doghmush clan is affiliated with the Al-Qaeda, the Abbas-led PA government and the local Army of Islam group that kidnapped IDF Staff Sgt. Gilad Shalit in June 2006. (Only their common hatred toward Israel is preventing the internal hate of the multi-cultural 'Palestinian' society from bursting out!)

Quote of the Week: "We do not have the right to let the barbarians triumph, because defeat at the other end of the world will come at the cost of a defeat on the territory of the French Republic" - French President Nicolas Sarkozy, about fight against terrorism in Afghanistan - Guess what, Israel has been fighting the same "barbarians" for 60 years with her hands tied behind her back by France and others! Why is it 'acceptable' that Israel can be defeated by the same enemies?

Kadima's Fake Uproar. Israel conveyed its displeasure to Washington over "highly inappropriate" public remarks reportedly made by US Consul General Jacob Walles that it had agreed to start negotiations with the Palestinians over Jerusalem. (There is a US-Palestinian-Israeli agreement not to go public with what is being discussed by the negotiators - It is adverse publicity not the fact of negotiation of Jerusalem's surrender to her enemies, which worries the leadership of Kadima! They do not care about abuse of democracy and betrayal of public trust! And what right does the United States have to 'negotiate' the surrender of another state's capital? In retaliation, Israel must "start negotiations with" Mexico about surrender of California, Texas and other states!)

Blackmail to Talk. PA negotiator Qureia said that "resistance in all its forms is a legitimate right" and that violence could erupt if talks with Israel are stalled. (The PA has no interest in establishing or even talking about real peace with Israel. The "talk for the sake of talk" provides the terrorist entity international legitimacy. And the self-hating Kadima government is only happy to oblige!)

Hands that Feed the Terror. The United States and the European Union (EU) have offered to give the Palestinian Authority (PA) another $265 million to bail out the PA for the time being. The international community last December pledged $7.7 billion in aid for the PA.

One Day of the Religion of Peace.

Islamic terrorists have carried out more than 11915 deadly terror attacks since 9/11 (thereligionofpeace.com). This is one of the multitude of blood-stained days - September 22, 2008:

Narathiwat, Thailand - A Buddhist man and his teenage son are shot and beheaded by Religion of Peace militants.

Jerusalem, Israel - Fifteen Israelis are injured when an Arab driver goes on a rampage.

Swat, Pakistan - Four local soldiers are killed by a Fedayeen suicide bomber.

Mogadishu, Somalia - Over forty people, including a woman and her five children, are killed by mortar fire during two al-Shabab terrorist attacks.

Peshawar, Pakistan - Suspected Islamists shoot a driver to death and kidnap a passenger.

Uruzgan, Afghanistan - A woman and a 12-year-old are among six civilians blown to bits by Taliban bombers.

All of this and more is conveniently justified by the words of the Prophet (Sahih Bukhari, 4:52:65): "He who fights that Allah's Word (i.e. Islam) should be superior, fights in Allah's Cause." (No ambiguity here, quite clear instruction!)

'The Longest Campaign of the Long War'

In an interview with SPIEGEL, General David Petraeus, until recently commander of the American forces in Iraq and future head of the US Central Command, discusses his new job, progress in Baghdad and how lessons from Iraq may apply to the escalating situation in Afghanistan.

US and Iraqi soldiers sit together as they guard the newly opened Mithaq swimming pool in Baghdad's Sadr City: "The level of violence is considerably down."
REUTERS

US and Iraqi soldiers sit together as they guard the newly opened Mithaq swimming pool in Baghdad's Sadr City: "The level of violence is considerably down."
SPIEGEL: General, on Oct. 31, 2008, you will take over as the new head of the United States Central Command (CENTCOM), which coordinates the deployment of the US Armed Forces to the most diverse regions in the world. You will be in charge of such difficult countries as Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran, Pakistan, Egypt, Lebanon ...

Petraeus: ... Yes, and don't forget Yemen, where there are also extremist elements, as we saw recently.

SPIEGEL: Saudi Arabia is on the list, too. Petraeus: The situation there has improved tremendously. Over the last four years they have done a superb job in their fight against al-Qaida. As you may recall, our embassy in Jedda (in Saudi Arabia) was overrun some four years ago and a number of foreign workers went home because of violence against them. Even the Interior Ministry in Riyadh was hit. Since then, the Saudis have employed a very intelligent and comprehensive approach to counter al-Qaida, including precise operations based on good intelligence, changes in their corrections facilities, superb strategic communications programs and a host of other initiatives -- all of which, together, have helped Saudi Arabia achieve impressive results in their fight against extremists.

SPIEGEL: Many countries on your list are less successful. How are you approaching your new job?

Petraeus: Soberly, and I truly mean that. I'm approaching it with a coldly realistic appraisal and a keen awareness of the challenges.

SPIEGEL: Is that the attitude you are taking with you from Iraq, where you were in charge of the Central Command for 19 months? Recently, while the rest of the world was stunned by the progress in Iraq, you almost sounded like the greatest skeptic.

Petraeus: There has, indeed, been very substantial progress in Iraq over the past year -- violence is down by 80 percent, civilian deaths by about the same, and so on. Nonetheless, US Ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker and I have repeatedly sought to emphasize that the progress in Iraq is fragile and also, possibly, reversible. Having said that, it might be a bit more durable now than it was a few months ago when we last testified together before Congress. In fact, the Iraqi Council of Representatives just passed the provincial elections law and that is very important because it represents the kind of broad consensus that is necessary in the Iraqi system. As you know, according to the constitution, the Presidency Council has to approve all legislation that is passed by the Council of Representatives. This means that the Kurdish president and his Sunni and Shia vice-presidents all have to approve legislation; this means, of course, that each of them thus has a veto. Thus, without a reasonable degree of consensus there are clear limits on what it is that can be done.

SPIEGEL: But how stable has Iraq become as a country?

Petraeus: Ambassador Crocker and I, as well as our bosses, are cautious about this -- properly so, we believe. We have had innumerable surprises along the way in Iraq and we have made mistakes along the way as well. The appropriate assessment is therefore one that reflects a degree of caution when it comes to Iraq.

SPIEGEL: Has experience turned you into a pessimist?

Petraeus: I am neither a pessimist nor an optimist. I am a realist, and the reality in Iraq is that it has been very hard and it continues to be hard. We should accept and acknowledge that even as we recognize that the improvements in the security situation are allowing us to reduce another 8,000 US forces over the next four months -- reductions that, again, reflect an assessment that there has been significant progress and that the Iraqi forces are indeed shouldering more of the burden.

SPIEGEL: How strong are the enemies of the new Iraq?

Petraeus: There is still a level of violence. Al-Qaida in particular remains dangerous, and there is some residual militia and special group presence. There are still between 20 and 30 attacks per day, still periodic car bombs and still loss of innocent civilians. However, the level of violence is down considerably from last June, when there were some 180 attacks a day and civilian (and military) losses were considerably higher.

SPIEGEL: Do you still see the threat of a civil war between Sunnis and Shiites?

Petraeus: I think that is much less likely and this a remarkable fact. The level of sectarian violence was horrific in the winter of 2006-2007. There were, for example, over 50 dead bodies every 24 hours in Baghdad alone in December 2006 just from sectarian violence.

SPIEGEL: One of the great miracles in all this is the behavior of Moqtada al-Sadr, who for some time now has kept his Mahdi Army quiet.

US General David Petraeus: "I am coldly realist."
AP

US General David Petraeus: "I am coldly realist."
Petraeus: It was not a miracle at all. It is very easily explained. The Sadr movement’s reputation was tarnished badly by the actions of the militia that bear the Sadr name. The Shiite population came to reject the militia as it no longer needed militia protection from al-Qaida. Elements of the militia were extorting money from shopkeepers, they were kidnapping for ransom, they were linked to the killing of two southern governors and three police chiefs and they caused reprehensible violence in the whole city of Karbala in August 2007. Al-Sadr realized that his movement was on the verge of the worst possible situation -- popular rejection -- and he declared a cease-fire. The same followed the violence precipitated by the militia and so-called special groups in March and April of this year, when those elements sustained very significant losses in terms of leaders and fighters -- and was, again, in jeopardy of being rejected by the people. Al-Sadr really had no logical alternative.

SPIEGEL: And the Sunnis, on the other hand, were bribed into cooperation, as Bob Woodward writes in his new book "The War Within"?

Petraeus: That's not completely accurate. I will tell you what we have done. The Sunni Arabs began to realize that they had made a huge mistake by not voting in the election of 2005 and by not being part of the new Iraq. They had reasons for this: They were effected by the disestablishment of the military and by de-Baathification (the dismantling of Saddam Hussein's party) in winter 2007-2007. They increasingly recognized that their future lay in being part of the solution rather than a continuing part of the problem. But they couldn't reject al-Qaida without our provision of security. So we took care of their security, we moved into their neighborhoods, we protected their tribal leaders who led the rejection of al-Qaida. And then we cleared many of their towns and cities and rural areas of al-Qaida Iraq and other insurgents, sometimes with their help, but often without it. And once their areas were clear, many of them sought to help us keep them secure -- and, over time, we began hiring them to man checkpoints and help keep their areas clear. You know, we had money for emergency reconstruction programs, and this seemed a wise investment -- as reconstruction is not possible without security -- and they helped to maintain it.

'In Afghanistan, You're not Rebuilding, You're Building'

SPIEGEL: Hardly anyone disputes that there has been great progress in Iraq. On the contrary, you have been credited with a huge success. And now they want you to repeat this success in Afghanistan?

Petraeus: (laughs) I was hoping to run this interview out before we got to that question ...

SPIEGEL: Do you think it is possible that you could also get that far in Afghanistan?

Petraeus: First, let me say that this has never been about one person. Progress in Iraq has always been about teams of people and teams of teams -- and ultimately about young men and women, Iraqi as well as people from the coalition. There are some ideas that will translate from Iraq to Afghanistan and there are many that will not. The first lesson of counterinsurgency, in fact, is that every situation is truly unique, has its own context, its own specific set of factors -- and you have to understand that context in enormous detail to be able to craft a sound and comprehensive approach. In Iraq 18 months ago, I often envied the commander in Afghanistan, truly. Now, Iraq has gone from being on the brink to being on the mend, and it clearly has some big advantages. It has enormous oil reserves, it has virtually untapped natural gas resources. It also has water, many Iraqis are well-educated and it has considerable infrastructure.

SPIEGEL: Afghanistan is the opposite in many ways.

Graphic: Coalition war dead
DER SPIEGEL

Graphic: Coalition war dead
Petraeus: In many respects you're right. In Afghanistan you are not rebuilding, you are building. There is very limited infrastructure and extreme terrain, with deserts in the south and mountains so high in some areas that helicopters don't even fly well at a certain altitude because the air becomes so thin. The country has a serious problem of illiteracy, especially after so many years of war and Taliban rule. It has other enormous challenges as well, including a political system that is still very much developing, although there has been some progress in the past several years. There is also a growing insurgency threat from al-Qaida, the Taliban and other extremist elements, some of which comes from the tribal areas of Pakistan, as well as from the Northwest Frontier province and Baluchistan. The ISAF commander, General David McKiernan, calls it a syndicate. Given the cross-border threats, you have to approach the situation as a region, not as one country or the other.

SPIEGEL: Is the new government in Pakistan determined to go after the insurgents in the tribal areas?

Petraeus: The first official statements of President Asif Ali Zardari's new government have been firm and robust. Pakistan is obviously a renewed democracy.

SPIEGEL: Isn't stability more important than democracy for a country like Pakistan?

Petraeus: Both would be best, of course. As you may have heard, several of us met with General Kayani and we got the impression that Pakistan increasingly recognizes the extremists in western Pakistan as an existential threat to their country. They are very keen to carry out the operations themselves. And there's significant effort on the part of the US and other countries to provide assistance that can enable Pakistan to do just that.

SPIEGEL: The US Air Force recently conducted several strikes against terrorist camps on Pakistani soil. But that can only happen with the permission of the government in Islamabad, right?

Petraeus: There is recognition on both sides that the extremist threat has been causing significant problems, including of course the Marriot hotel bombing. There is renewed commitment and close dialogue with the new government to act against the extremists.

SPIEGEL: Nonetheless, you still don't have enough troops in Afghanistan.

Petraeus: That's correct. Although US forces have been increased from some 21,000 to about 31,000 over the past two years and a number of coalition countries have also increased their forces, there still are not sufficient troops.

SPIEGEL: Former ISAF commander Dan McNeill, who led the troops until this summer, has said that under the current doctrine, 400,000 troops would be needed on the ground to bring peace to the country.

Petraeus: The question is always how you get the number of troops needed. They do not have to be coalition forces. We also have to expand the training program for the Afghan National Army and the national police, in particular. and Defense Secretary Robert Gates has already announced support for a significant increase in the Afghan army. Meanwhile, there will also be additional help provided to the local police, as they are the most vulnerable personally, especially when one thinks of their families.

US and British soldiers inspect the site of a suicide car bomb attack in Kabul, Afghanistan on Aug. 11, 2008: "A growing insurgency threat."
DPA

US and British soldiers inspect the site of a suicide car bomb attack in Kabul, Afghanistan on Aug. 11, 2008: "A growing insurgency threat."
SPIEGEL: What adds to your difficulties as you enter your new position is that elections are taking place everywhere -- in Iraq, in Afghanistan and of course back home. The next president will be under enormous pressure due to the current economic crisis, and voters will be asking themselves why the US spends so much money in remote countries like Afghanistan instead of investing it at home.

Petraeus: Well, let's remember that the reason we are there is that we have vital interests in Afghanistan, hugely important national interests, as do the other countries involved.

SPIEGEL: Where does this interest lie?

Petraeus: First and foremost is to not allow the reestablishment, if you will, of an extremist sanctuary that can export the kind of terror that ended up with terrorists taking down the World Trade Center and plowing into the Pentagon and a field in Pennsylvania. That's the point: We started this war because the Sept. 11 attack came from this area. And we do not fight alone, but with some 40 allies who share that view.

SPIEGEL: How long will it take to win this fight, according to your cold realism?

Petraeus: I did a week-long assessment in 2005 at (then Defense Secretary Donald) Rumsfeld's request. Following our return, I told him that Afghanistan was going to be the longest campaign of what we then termed "the long war." Having just been to Afghanistan a month or so ago, I think that that remains a valid assessment. Moreover, the trends have clearly been in the wrong direction.

SPIEGEL: As long as there aren't enough troops available on the ground, you have to stick with air raids, which again and again results in the loss of civilian lives.

Petraeus: There is very careful examination of that ongoing. The employment of close air support has recently been reviewed by General McKiernan. And he has put out instructions with considerable clarity about the employment of air support in a manner that strives very hard to avoid civilian casualties. There is enormous concern about this issue in Afghanistan right now, and we obviously don't want it to cause problems for the Afghan government, President Hamid Karzai and the Afghan people. In fact, we want them to support our efforts on their behalf and not see us as unwelcome occupiers. So the task is to reduce civilian casualties while still not hesitating to respond to enemies who are trying to kill our soldiers.

SPIEGEL: What do you expect from the NATO allies?

Petraeus: It is not up to the US Central Command to expect something, it is up to the NATO command. Secretary Gates suggested the other day that the allies can contribute in many ways, not just in the provision of significantly larger numbers on the ground. They can provide additional financial and equipment support for the Afghan National Army, for example, or for reconstruction and capacity building efforts.

SPIEGEL: In Iraq you kept saying that "money is ammunition."

Petraeus: Money can be a very important form of "ammunition," although we should never forget that when you're being shot at the most important ammunition is real ammunition.

SPIEGEL: General, we thank you for this interview.

Interview conducted by Ullrich Fichtner and Gerhard Spörl.

A little perspective-please:Yet Freedom

Tony Blankley
Wednesday, October 01, 2008

There is nothing new under the sun. The United States has endured major financial panics in 1837, 1873, 1893, 1907, 1929, 1933 and now in 2008. Most of these economic events had ideological and political consequences -- as well as the inevitable economic play-outs. And if history is any guide, contrary to the hope of some and the fear of others, this is not the end of capitalism as we have known it. But it is true that usually, major economic events have had political as well as economic consequences. For instance, the panic of 1893, which in some ways is similar to the current panic, was caused by overbuilding and sloppy financing of the railroads. The 1880s enjoyed dramatic economic expansion, which led to dangerous speculation. Once the railroad bubble burst, there was a run on the banks, a contraction of credit, and European investors demanded gold for payments, which forced the reduction in the value of the dollar.

Unemployment went from 3 percent in 1892 to 18 percent in 1894 -- not returning to single digits (6.5 percent) until 1899. Many out-of-work middle-class citizens failed to meet their mortgage obligations, abandoned their homes, and moved west. That was the end of the Gilded Age. After years of close presidential elections, McKinley's decisive victory in 1896 -- fought out over economic issues -- brought on political realignment and the beginning of the Progressive era. With the exception of President Woodrow Wilson from 1913-1921 (who won in 1912 only because Teddy Roosevelt split the Republican vote), Republicans controlled the White House from 1897-1933.

If economic events affect politics, it is also true that political events often have economic consequences. For example, the fall of the Soviet Union two decades ago deeply compromised the credibility and appeal of government-managed economies. As a result, throughout the world -- and particularly in the United States -- the past two decades have seen deregulation and a respect for market forces flourish. Not only Marxists but also conventional big-government democratic liberals in the West consistently lost the policy arguments to those of us who argued for a more vigorous, deregulated and freewheeling capitalism.

Those abiding and ever-true principles of economics will be tainted for a while by recent economic events. Now waiting in the grass to leap up and champion the cause of anti-free markets are the left two-thirds of the Democrats here in America, our mainstream media, the socialists and regulators in Europe, and the Mussolini-style corporatists in Russia, China and perhaps in America, too.

We had a taste of this urge for fierce regulatory recrudescence Sunday evening with the words of Democratic Rep. Rahm Emanuel, who warned, in calculated tones of inflamed class resentment, that once the Democrats save the day, they will ensure the end of deregulated markets (although after leaving Clinton's White House staff, he took a position at the investment bank Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein in Chicago, where he worked from 1999 to 2002 and reportedly earned $18 million).

Last December, in somber rather than triumphant tones, leading conservative economic commentator Martin Wolf, of the British Financial Times warned, "What is happening in credit markets today is a huge blow to the credibility of the Anglo-Saxon model of transactions-oriented financial capitalism." As Wolf's further words have been characterized, when the crisis hits (as it now has), "That will certainly mean the end of the neoliberal consensus that has dominated politics for almost a generation." Or, as Newsweek's Howard Fineman wrote recently in more informal words, "The era of cowboy capitalism has died, largely of self-inflicted wounds."

I don't take those words as prophecy, but they are certainly shrewd warnings of the political things that may come. And it is true that it is harder this week than it was last week to argue persuasively for pure free-market principles if one has endorsed the $700 billion bailout and partial nationalization of the credit industry. (And I do emphatically endorse the bailout as the only available and preferable alternative to the calamitous economic status quo.)

So in the months and years to come, it falls to those of us who advocate for free markets to persist in making our case. It is true that momentary events likely will cloud the public's judgment and provide nefarious opportunity for statists and other political hustlers. But it is also the truth, which is vouchsafed by any fair reading of history, that excessive regulation and taxation -- which means political management of private property and previously free markets -- are inherently corrupt and inefficient. Prosperity and the dignity of human freedom are two sides of the same coin. It is an old lesson that now must be retaught and relearned. And it shall be.



Copyright © 2008 Salem Web Network. All Rights Reserved.

Comment: So, we have seen worse situations-however, the media and the Democrats know this can be the fatal blow to the Republicans.Step back for a moment. Ten days ago we were told we must have immediately, 48 hours, a "save the finance health of the world" or else! It is Oct. 1, people are still doing business, credit is still available, even for the individual and small business owner. Yes, it is tighter today, as it should be given what we are learning about credit policies. We were told the market would crash to 8000 or less-but it was up nearly 500 points Sept. 30.The initial bill was awful, I thank those who had the courage to stand up and say so. If the bill was so good, the democrats could have passed it without a single Republican vote-the democrats control the House and do not need a Republican vote. The truth is the bill stunk-it "earmarked" 20 billion dollars for a voter registration group-good grief! The Democrats talking points included a message on class warfare disguised as "we are looking out for the average American. They insisted that CEO severance packages be limited. fact: if you added up all the severance packages the total would be less than 1% of the 700 billion price tag-my goodness politicians, work on the other 99% first rather than making it appear that you care so much. After all, if you did care, you would have passed this the first time around, last week-95 of your democratic party members voted nea! Why? You know the answer.

Syrian bombing investigation: Wait, maybe it wasn't the Zionists...

Whoops. One shouldn't expect much in the way of apologies from the Syrian media or Foreign Ministry for the rush to judgment.

An update on this story. "Syria says radical Islam behind Damascus blast," by Ali Waked for YNet News, September 29: Government newspaper Tishrin reports initial investigation revealed fundamental organization responsible for car bomb killed 17 people in Syrian capital

Ali Waked
Published: 09.29.08, 09:12 / Israel News

An initial investigation into Saturday's fatal attack in Damascus revealed that a radical Islamic organization was responsible for the car bomb which killed 17 people.


The government newspaper Tishrin reported Monday that Syrian security officials believe the booby-trapped car was brought into Syrian territory a day before the attack through the country's border with a neighboring Arab state. The paper did not mention the name of the other country.

A number of radical Islam activists were arrested after the explosion. The Tishrin report indicates that Islamic elements outside Syria were behind the attack which shocked the country and followed a series of assassinations on Syrian soil.


Syrian papers on Sunday hinted at foreign involvement in the car bombing. So far, no organization has claimed responsibility for the attack and the Syrian government has refrained from clearly pointing the finger at anyone.


Saturday's 200 kilogram car bomb near a Syrian security complex on the southern outskirts of the capital was the biggest – and deadliest – attack to occur in the country since the 1980s when authorities fought an uprising by Muslim militants.


The government-owned daily al-Thawra claimed in an editorial Sunday that recent attacks in Syria were planned outside the country, but did not mention any names.


However, the comment came a week after Syria massed thousands of troops north of its borders with neighboring Lebanon. Syria says the deployment is meant to curb smuggling, but President Bashar Assad has warned recently that "extremist forces" were operating in northern Lebanon and destabilizing his country.


He was apparently referring to Sunni militants who have clashed for months with pro-Syrian gunmen in the northern Lebanese city of Tripoli.



Tishrin said the bombing was carried out by some parties it said were angered by Syria's "victorious return to the international arena after the desperate attempts to isolate, besiege and punish it."



The Associated Press contributed to this report

Melanie Phillips: "The leaders of the democracies are...burying their heads in the sand"

Robert Spencer

The perceptive and courageous Melanie Phillips here discusses a phenomenon that Hugh and I have discussed at Jihad Watch several times over the years: that the mainstream parties in Europe are either mute or complicit in the face of the threat of the Islamization of the continent, and have thus left the anti-jihad resistance to be in some cases championed by Europe's most noxious elements: neo-Nazis, neo-fascists, and white supremacists. Phillips also points out that the situation is further complicated by the fact that the mainstream media and the governing elites brand anyone who opposes Islamic supremacism and the Islamization of Europe as a neo-Nazi. This makes it extremely difficult for Americans to determine just who is a real neofascist and who isn't, and thus whom should be supported and whom should be opposed. Some commentators absurdly complicate matters further by branding those who doubt that a particular group is actually neofascist as neofascists themselves.

And in fact, her Spectator article is itself a case in point. The accompanying photo, which I have placed above, is of Hans-Christian Strache, the Austrian politician whose party Phillips here states is "neo-Nazi." It seems that this picture was chosen to accompany Phillips' article because in it Strache is making the Nazi salute. But is he? It looks more to me as if he is gesturing to make a point -- his hand is not held stiffly the way it is in the actual Nazi salute.

But maybe I just don't know enough about Nazi salutes. There is also apparently another picture in which Strache seems to be making a "three-fingered Nazi salute" -- an animal I have not previously encountered. But in any case, the claim that Strache is a neo-Nazi doesn't rest only on these disputed gestures. According to the article to which Phillips links, some of Strache's supporters are "jackbooted skinheads." This in itself doesn't prove that Strache himself is a neo-Nazi -- anyone can attract unwanted supporters (cf. Hamas' endorsement of Obama). But there is more:

1. Video exists of Strache in fatigues. The Guardian says: "He has been filmed in forests, carrying arms and wearing paramilitary fatigues in the company of banned German neo-Nazis." He says, however, that he was playing a game.

2. The Guardian also says: "He was photographed apparently giving a three-fingered neo-Nazi salute - though he says he was ordering three beers."

3. Again according to The Guardian, "when he sued the Vienna news weekly Profil for defamation, the court ruled that Strache could fairly be said to display 'an affinity to national-socialist thinking.'" But he maintains: "I was never a neo-Nazi, and never will be" -- and the court's ruling could be an example of Phillips' observation that anyone who opposes the Islamization of Europe is branded a neo-Nazi.

4. Perhaps most damning of all: according to the TimesOnline, "police film his public appearances because supporters of Mr Strache have, in the past, made the Hitler salute or displayed Nazi insignia, which is illegal in Austria - under a law that Mr Strache is seeking to ban."

He is trying to ban a law against displaying Nazi insignia, and some of his followers make the Hitler salute -- that seems open and shut. As for the followers making the Hitler salute, he could be a Nazi and attract Nazi followers -- or, alternatively, he could be attracting followers he doesn't want and doesn't approve of. As for Strache's attempts to get the ban on Nazi insignia overturned, Trend News says this: "He has called for the repeal of an Austrian law banning National Socialist activities. 'A democracy must be able to deal with moronic and crazy ideas,' Strache argued last week." So he is framing this as a freedom of speech issue -- and indeed, when I support the right of the Revolutionary Communist Party or the Council on American-Islamic Relations to spew their propaganda in the U.S., that doesn't make me a Revolutionary Communist or a CAIR op. It makes me a believer in free speech.

So we have the prospect of a man accused of being a neo-Nazi saying that National Socialism is "moronic and crazy" and denying that he ever was or ever will be a neo-Nazi. Of course, maybe he is lying -- he wouldn't be the first or the last politician to lie about his true sentiments -- and maybe his explanations of this evidence are flimsy rationalizations. I don't know where Strache really stands. But the old Nazis were never coy or deceptive about their taste for totalitarianism and hatred for Jews, and while actual neo-Nazis have every reason to be deceptive about their true affinities in today's Europe, when the elites brand everyone who opposes unrestricted Muslim immigration as a neo-Nazi, even in the face of the demographic jihad, the situation becomes extremely muddled.

Real neo-Nazis in Europe and everywhere else should be always and everywhere opposed by all decent people. The devilish difficulty is in figuring out who the real neo-Nazis actually are, and who are anti-jihadists who are being falsely accused.

"The distant sound of breaking glass," by Melanie Phillips in The Spectator, September 29:

We should all be shuddering at the news from Austria where neo-Nazi parties, including the Freedom Party led by Hans-Christian Strache (pictured) have emerged as the biggest parliamentary block. It’s awful not just because it’s Austria, that cradle of Nazism which shows yet again that its terrible past remains its present. It’s because the implications are much wider for the whole of Europe – and are unlikely to be recognised before the danger spirals into the unspeakable.

A small correction: Hitler was born in Austria, but Austria was not the cradle of Nazism. Nazism was born in Germany -- which is not to deny that many, if not most, Austrians ultimately became enthusiastic about it.

These parties campaigned on an anti EU integration and anti-Muslim platform. Their success is due to the enormous feeling among the people of Europe against, on the one hand, the destruction of their powers of self-government and their assimilation into the undemocratic Euro superstate, and on the other the threat to western culture from Islamist conquest. On both of these seismic issues, the leaders of the democracies are either burying their heads in the sand or are actively bringing them into being. With no democratic party addressing these concerns and instead demonising legitimate nationalist feeling as ‘racist’, xenophobic’ or ‘Islamophobic’, people are turning to parties which truly are racist, anti-foreigner, anti-Muslim, anti-Jew and sometimes, indeed, neo-Nazi, but which are exploiting this political vacuum just as all such parties have always exploited other vacuums in leadership.

This presents a nightmarish prospect in which, if the democratic parties of Europe continue to demonise legitimate aspirations to maintain national cultures against undemocratic and anti-democratic forces, more and more people will be drawn to these parties – see the sophisticated pitch by and increasing support for the BNP in Britain, and social disorder will rise.[...]

The awful thing is that, as the far-right advances and social disorder increases – as it will -- muddled liberals and malign leftists will blame these political and social calamities on ‘the far right’. As a result, the steady encroachment of Islamism will proceed apace -- and anyone who objects will also be demonised as ‘the far right’. The rise of the neo-Nazis will thus turn the defence of democracy toxic. There is therefore a danger that the only people who will be fighting the Islamic fascists and in defence of the nation against the supranational supremacists will be the fascists....

UPDATE: Jihad Watch reader Maryatexitzero has posted below a link to a Jerusalem Post article that says that Strache "has aligned his party with the Iranian regime and vehemently opposes sanctions designed to force a suspension of the Islamic Republic's nuclear program." As I noted in a follow-up comment below, this not only constitutes good grounds to consider him a neo-Nazi indeed, but is a solid reason in and of itself to oppose him. Thank you, Mary.

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Who’s Sleeping More Deeply — Europe or America?

Bruce Bawer
Pajamas Media

In my 2006 book While Europe Slept, I expressed concern about the will of Europeans to defend their freedoms in the face of the continent’s Islamization. I contrasted them in this regard with Americans, for whom, I argued, freedom is a living reality for which they are willing to fight and to sacrifice. My book came out in the midst of the Danish cartoon crisis. And during that crisis I saw things in Europe that — quite frankly — surprised and impressed me. I saw the editors of a Danish newspaper, Jyllands-Posten, stand up for freedom of expression in the face of worldwide rioting, vandalism, and murder by Muslims and contempt on the part of foolish Westerners. I saw a Danish prime minister, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, in defiance of the UN, the EU, and most of the “international community,” stand by that newspaper and refuse to meet with Muslim ambassadors who were out to intimidate his country and to force Sharia-like restrictions on Western liberties. I saw the people of Denmark, in overwhelming numbers, stand behind their prime minister in his refusal to yield to jihad. And I saw major newspapers across Europe reprinting the Jyllands-Posten cartoons in acts of free-speech solidarity.

I don’t mean to paint too rosy a picture. The Danish response wasn’t perfect. Not a single newspaper in Britain reprinted the cartoons. And both the Swedish and Norwegian governments provided textbook cases of cowering dhimmitude. But none of that was really a surprise. What did surprise, and disappoint, me was the American political and media establishment. Both Bill Clinton and George W. Bush condemned the Jyllands-Posten cartoons out of hand. The State Department denounced them too, and only reversed itself after getting an earful from the Danish government, one of its few allies in Iraq. In the entire United States of America, exactly one major newspaper, the Philadelphia Inquirer, reprinted the cartoons. And while the major broadcast networks, as well as CNN, Fox News, and MSNBC, reported extensively on the cartoon riots, none of them ever showed the cartoons at all.

A big part of the reason for this dismaying American response to the cartoon affair is, of course, that Islamization hasn’t progressed as far in America as in Europe, and there’s consequently an incredible level of ignorance in America both about what’s really going on in Europe and about the very nature of Islam. In the current presidential campaign, only a small portion of the electorate seems to think that the war with jihadist Islam is a major issue. The one candidate who understood best what we’re up against, and who took it most seriously, Rudy Giuliani, was ridiculed across the political spectrum for being obsessed with 9/11 — as if the events of that day had been some kind of fluke or accident that has virtually no meaning for us today.

In depressing numbers, in short, Americans seem not to grasp the lessons of 9/11 — which should hardly be a surprise, considering how many journalists and politicians keep repeating that the terrorists are betraying a great and peaceful religion, that jihad means doing good works, and so on. A while back, in response to rumors that Barack Obama is a closet Muslim, New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof argued that it would be a matter of utter indifference if the president of the United States were a Muslim. Of the hundreds of people who commented on this article on the Times website, the overwhelming majority applauded Kristof for his extraordinary courage in standing up to Islamophobia. Only a tiny handful of readers noted that there are, in fact, good reasons for free people to be concerned about the possibility of a U.S. president with a devout commitment to Islamic theology and law. The American media that do report honestly on the less attractive truths about Islam, moreover, tend to be media that people are encouraged to look down upon.

Make no mistake: if Europeans are, on average, more aware than Americans of the realities of Islam, it’s no thanks to their media but rather because they can see with their own eyes what’s going on around them. Yet many of them feel cowed — not only by Muslims but by politically correct politicians and media — into keeping their opinions to themselves, and feel powerless to prevent what now seems to many of them, in any event, inevitable. In other words, fatalism has taken hold.

In While Europe Slept I also contrasted European and American approaches to immigration. Ever since the Muslim influx began some decades ago, European countries have encouraged the newcomers to retain their cultural identity, to live apart from mainstream society, and to become clients of the welfare state. America, by contrast, has traditionally expected immigrants to learn English, to get a job, and to obey the law, and if they do so they’re every bit as American as anyone else. I didn’t argue in While Europe Slept that America was invulnerable to Islamization, but I did suggest that — thanks to this very dramatic difference both in the general public’s attitudes toward immigrants and in government immigration policy — America stood a far better chance than Europe did of seeing Muslim newcomers turn into loyal citizens rather than enemies within. I think I had a valid point there, though if I were writing the book today I’d probably be somewhat less sanguine about America’s ability to integrate absolutely everyone into its melting pot. I might also be less sanguine, I’m afraid, about the endurance of Americans’ love of freedom in an age of poisonous multicultural relativism.

I do feel, however, that there’s one very important difference between America and Europe when it comes to resisting cultural jihad, and that is this: that in America, a large proportion of the people who recognize the threat of Islam and who are determined to resist it are consciously fighting for freedom — for, that is, the principles articulated in the Declaration of Independence, Constitution, and Bill of Rights. In many parts of Western Europe, this kind of certainty and unanimity about freedom — simple freedom — as a first principle can be discouragingly hard to come by. The blogger Frank Martin has written about a teenage tour guide at a World War II battlefield in the Netherlands who told him that the Allied soldiers who fell there had been “fighting for bridges, how silly that they would all fight for something like that.” Somebody like that boy, who didn’t grasp that those soldiers had died for the very freedom that he had taken for granted his whole life, is incapable of standing up for freedom against Islamofascism. Yes, there are Europeans who realize that the opposite of Islam is indeed human freedom. But in Europe, with its checkered history of fascism and socialism, there are also all too many people on the right who are mounting the barricades in the name not of freedom but of ethnic identity, cultural tradition, or religion, and all too many on the left whose cri de coeur is not individual liberty but the welfare state.

Meanwhile Europe’s cultural elites are dominated by people who seem likely to continue to smile upon Islamization right up till the moment they’re stoned to death. At a recent Norwegian conference on integration, the Swedish government representative was asked: “Is Swedish culture worth preserving?” “Well,” she replied dismissively, “what is Swedish culture?” To people like that, European culture is a void waiting to be filled with something, and that something might as well be Islam. Granted, things aren’t quite that bad in the U.S. — not even at the New York Times. Yet to an extraordinary extent, the political and cultural elites on both sides of the Atlantic are in sync in their denial of the reality we’re up against.

This was driven home to me a few months ago when I took part in a day-long conference in Washington, D.C., about the America/Europe relationship. Nearly all the participants and audience members, I gathered, were Americans or Europeans who worked in the diplomatic corps. The day was crammed with panel discussions, and from early morning until late in the afternoon we talked about nothing but America and Europe. Yet aside from me, only one other person even mentioned Islam. And he did so in the most indirect way, as if he were bringing up something indelicate. Everybody present seemed to share an unspoken understanding that this subject was off limits. Indeed, pretty much everybody seemed to agree that Europe is doing great — that it’s moving from strength to strength — and that America should be more like it in every way.

How I even got invited to such a conference I have no idea. In any case, everything I said was dismissed out of hand. One genial fellow who seemed desperate to correct my folly and bring me into the tent came up to me after my talk and said, almost pleadingly, “But don’t you think that the real problem is not Islam but Islamophobia?” And on the panel that followed my talk, a retired diplomat with decades of experience (and a masterly command of the art of condescension) mentioned in a tone of both wonder and whimsy that I wasn’t alone in my peculiar affliction; even Walter Laqueur — the distinguished octogenarian historian of Europe whom the retired diplomat, as his tone made clear, had once, but no longer, held in high esteem — had written a book making the same bizarre arguments I was making! But neither this retired diplomat nor anyone else was willing to entertain the possibility that if both Laqueur and I, and many others, had made certain arguments, there might actually be something in them; no, it was as if, in their eyes, we had all simply been bitten by some exotic bug or contracted some mysterious new infection or had giant alien pods placed under our beds while we were sleeping.

Among those who are considered experts on Europe, or on transatlantic relations, that patrician diplomat’s attitude is ubiquitous. Tony Judt, in Postwar, his acclaimed 2005 book on Europe since 1945, pronounced the continent in magnificent health and all but ignored Islam. Timothy Garton Ash, in his 2004 book Free World, did the same, only pausing briefly on pages 197 and 198 to admit parenthetically that addressing Europe’s Islamization is “the single most urgent task of European domestic politics in the next decade” — after which he amazingly returned to pretending, as he had on the preceding 196 pages, that Europe’s most urgent tasks lie elsewhere. Meanwhile one book after another on the America-Europe relationship has contended that it’s America that’s the problem — that America is out of step with the world and needs to get back into line, pronto. In the title of Clyde Prestowitz’s 2005 book, America is a “rogue nation” because it refuses to go along and get along with the rest of the planet under the wise auspices of the UN. I don’t know exactly how to characterize or understand this mass self-deception, this determination to cling to an illusion of the West in which the ongoing Islamization of Europe simply is not a factor; it would appear to be rooted partly in confusion, partly in cowardice, partly in careerism — and partly, I think, in a perhaps not entirely conscious conviction that some truths are just too sensational to speak without sounding hysterical, too repulsive to be honest about without sounding (to some ears) vulgar and bigoted, and too challenging to face without being utterly overwhelmed by the scale and the horror of it all.

What happens to the West will depend, in large part, on what happens to this pervasive self-denial and to those men and women of power and influence who cling to it as if to a life raft in a raging sea. Will Europeans who have faced the facts manage to gain power and turn things around before Europe passes the point of no return in its gradual surrender to Sharia? Will the European elites collaborate to realize Nicolas Sarkozy’s dark dream of a Mediterranean Union and develop it in the same ominous way in which the EU itself was developed, steadily compromising individual freedom and representative democracy — and leaving America increasingly out in the cold? Or will the next president of the U.S. be someone who is every bit as eager to appease Islam as the archbishop of Canterbury, resulting in a strong transatlantic alliance devoted not to the joint preservation of freedom but to the joint pursuit of dhimmitude? I’m sorry to say that a year or so ago, when it looked as if the major-party presidential candidates would be Rudy Giuliani and Hillary Clinton — the former of whom obviously gets it, and the latter of whom, I suspect, does so as well — I was considerably more hopeful on this score than I am now.

Dayton Daily News scrubbing stories about spurious anti-Muslim "hate crime"

An important message from Patrick Poole updating this story:

The Dayton Daily News has been walking back their coverage of the so-called mosque incident this weekend. The initial article on Saturday was "Chemical irritant empties Islamic Society of Greater Dayton's mosque": http://www.daytondailynews.com/n/content/oh/story/news/local/2008/09/27/ddn092608evacweb.html

Then on Sunday the story was "Islamic Society baffled by incident at worship service":

http://www.daytondailynews.com/n/content/oh/story/news/local/2008/09/28/ddn092808islamicweb.html

Then yesterday they walked all the way back, "Police: No evidence of hate crime at local mosque":

http://www.daytondailynews.com/n/content/oh/story/news/local/2008/09/29/ddn092908mosquefoloweb.html

But if you follow any of those three links, they take you to the exact same article -- the last one. The previous two stories have been scrubbed from the website.

Flaming the fires of kafirphobia. I'm hoping to have a copy of the incident report tomorrow. Will forward details.

PS: This isn't the first Muslim hate crime hoax in the Dayton area.

Here is a Google Cache link for the first scrubbed story, and here is a Google Cache link for the second.

What is the Dayton Daily News trying to hide?

For posterity's sake, and in an attempt to keep whoever is doing this from getting away with whitewashing the record, here are the texts of both spurious stories:

Chemical irritant empties Islamic Society of Greater Dayton's mosque By Kyle Nagel Staff Writer Saturday, September 27, 2008

DAYTON — Baboucarr Njie was preparing for his prayer session Friday night, Sept. 26, when he heard children in the Islamic Society of Greater Dayton coughing. Soon, Njie himself was overcome with fits of coughing and, like the rest of those in the building, headed for the doors.

"I would stay outside for a minute, then go back in, there were a lot of kids," Njie said. "My throat is still itchy, I need to get some milk."

Njie was one of several affected when a suspected chemical irritant was sprayed into the mosque at 26 Josie St., bringing Dayton police, fire and hazardous material personnel to the building at 9:48 p.m.

Someone "sprayed an irritant into the mosque," Dayton fire District Chief Vince Wiley said, noting that fire investigators believe it was a hand-held spray can.

According to fire dispatch communications, a child reported seeing two men with a white can spraying something into a window. That child was brought to the supervising firefighter at the scene.

Wiley would not discuss that report, but said the investigation has been turned over to police. Police were not commenting.

The 300 or so inside were celebrating the last 10 days of Ramadan with dinner and a prayer session, but the prayer session was interrupted so those suffering from tearing, coughing and shortness of breath could receive treatment.

Wiley said an adult and juvenile were taken to area hospitals and others had their eyes or faces washed on the scene. He did not know how many people were treated at the scene.

Ismail Gula, ISGD secretary, said people were praying during the weekly service when some in the audience began to cough and experience breathing troubles, then left the building. Once outside, several of them called 911, Gula said.

Tarek Sabagh, a member of the ISGD board, wasn't present when the incident occurred.

He said his daughter called and told him to stay away because of the possibility of remaining fumes. Sabagh arrived shortly after and watched from the mosque's steps as members were allowed back inside about 11 p.m. to collect belongings.

"It's very disturbing," Sabagh said. "Something like this has never happened before."

Sabagh said members moved to a Beavercreek school to finish their prayer session as police continued to investigate.

"I don't know if people will have the feeling of trust to come back tomorrow or next week or next month," Sabagh said. "I don't know how people will feel."

Ramadan is the ninth month of the Muslim calendar. During the month, Muslims fast (do not eat) from sunrise to sunset. In the evening and in the morning before the sun comes up, they eat small meals. During this month, they take extra time for family, inner reflection, and spiritual growth.

Contact this reporter at (937) 225-7389 or knagel@DaytonDailyNews.com.

And:

Islamic Society baffled by incident at worship service By Doug Page Staff Writer Sunday, September 28, 2008

DAYTON — The Muslim community gathered Sunday, Sept. 28, 48 hours after an unknown irritant disrupted worship at the Islamic Society of Greater Dayton.

"We were in the midst of the Fifth Prayer when people started coughing," said Ismail Gula, the society's secretary.

Gula said the building was evacuated and the service to break the daily fast of Ramadan continued at a nearby facility.

He said he had no idea what might have caused the incident. "It might be anything," he said.

Gula said he had received many calls of support from Christians and Jews over the weekend.

When Dayton fire and emergency personnel arrived at 26 Josie St. on Friday night, they noticed an odor. HAZMAT workers checked the structure for pepper spray and other irritants, but found nothing.

Police said they were continuing their investigation.

Also on Sunday, members of several Dayton religious groups were scheduled to view and discuss a DVD about Islamic radicalism mailed to some area homes and circulated with newspapers here and around the country.

"Obsession: Radical Islam's War Against the West," was a paid advertising insert in the Dayton Daily News, Springfield News-Sun, Hamilton JournalNews and Middletown Journal, all owned by Cox Ohio Publishing, on Monday, Sept. 22. It appeared in more than 70 other newspapers nationwide.

The Rev. Gary Percesepe, executive director of Greater Dayton Christian Connections, characterized the DVD as "fanning the flames of fear and prejudice against Muslims, with the potential to inspire hate crimes."

Contact this reporter at (937) 225-2290 or dpage@DaytonDailyNews.com.