Wednesday August 22, 2007
The Viral Spread of Explosive Technologies in the Land of Jihad
One of the most alarming things about the new transnationalism among terrorist groups is the rapid ability to transfer knowledge and technology, both through the the Internet and through individual training.
The crossover of technologies is not new, and we know from public records in the trials from the 1998 bombing of the U.S. Embassies in East Africa that al Qaeda and Hezbollah met in Sudan to exchange information and training.
But what is making the current situation different is that, instead of having to travel and hold clandestine meetings to trade information and methods, much of the information can now be transferred in the blink of an eye or the touch of a computer key.
Military sources say that the switching from low tech Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs) to high tech back to low tech is mirrored almost in real time between insurgents in Iraq and those fighting in Afghanistan.
This suggests a tight network that is able to communicate efficiently, with enough decentralization so anyone can work on solutions without going through a bureaucratic decision-making process.
Every advance the U.S. troops make in detecting and blocking the explosive devices is almost immediately circumvented by insurgents in one place or the other, and the solutions, like patches to holes in the Internet, are passed back and forth.
So too are the new, ever more deadly technologies to improve the lethal impact of car bombs and other explosive devises that together account for almost three-quarters of U.S. and allied casualties in the both theaters of conflict.
This was one of the points I was trying to make in my previous posting: The borders that once existed no longer do, and the decentralized nature of the groups seeking to hurt us-whether criminal or terrorist, make attacking them a challenge we are still largely unprepared to meet.
With decentralized networks, sort of like Napster in the music world or Skype in the computer/telecommunications world, once a technology is invented to solve a certain problem, it is put out there with no strings attached. People can take it, improve it, merge it, and it belongs to no one and everyone.
It flows to terrorists and criminals alike, because they swim in the same waters.
This is one of the great challenges of these conflict theaters. We are fighting as centralized units, geared still toward traditional combat postures and functioning as if we were fighting a conventional army.
In reality we are fighting a viral network that can be disrupted, hurt, but which has a regenerative capacity that is only limited by the number of people wanting to wage jihad against us.
The answer has to be to radically rethink the military strategy in these types of war. Otherwise, we limit ourselves to avoiding defeat, without the chance of victory.
The crossover of technologies is not new, and we know from public records in the trials from the 1998 bombing of the U.S. Embassies in East Africa that al Qaeda and Hezbollah met in Sudan to exchange information and training.
But what is making the current situation different is that, instead of having to travel and hold clandestine meetings to trade information and methods, much of the information can now be transferred in the blink of an eye or the touch of a computer key.
Military sources say that the switching from low tech Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs) to high tech back to low tech is mirrored almost in real time between insurgents in Iraq and those fighting in Afghanistan.
This suggests a tight network that is able to communicate efficiently, with enough decentralization so anyone can work on solutions without going through a bureaucratic decision-making process.
Every advance the U.S. troops make in detecting and blocking the explosive devices is almost immediately circumvented by insurgents in one place or the other, and the solutions, like patches to holes in the Internet, are passed back and forth.
So too are the new, ever more deadly technologies to improve the lethal impact of car bombs and other explosive devises that together account for almost three-quarters of U.S. and allied casualties in the both theaters of conflict.
This was one of the points I was trying to make in my previous posting: The borders that once existed no longer do, and the decentralized nature of the groups seeking to hurt us-whether criminal or terrorist, make attacking them a challenge we are still largely unprepared to meet.
With decentralized networks, sort of like Napster in the music world or Skype in the computer/telecommunications world, once a technology is invented to solve a certain problem, it is put out there with no strings attached. People can take it, improve it, merge it, and it belongs to no one and everyone.
It flows to terrorists and criminals alike, because they swim in the same waters.
This is one of the great challenges of these conflict theaters. We are fighting as centralized units, geared still toward traditional combat postures and functioning as if we were fighting a conventional army.
In reality we are fighting a viral network that can be disrupted, hurt, but which has a regenerative capacity that is only limited by the number of people wanting to wage jihad against us.
The answer has to be to radically rethink the military strategy in these types of war. Otherwise, we limit ourselves to avoiding defeat, without the chance of victory.
POSTED BY DOUGLAS FARAH
Monday August 20, 2007
The Growing Criminal/Terrorism Nexus
One of the truly alarming global developments, particularly since the 9/11 attacks, is the growing nexus between organized, transnational criminal groups and terrorist networks.
In a thought-provoking Outlook piece in the Washington Post, Misha Glenny correctly notes the growing role of the poppy trade in Afghanistan in financing the Taliban, as well as attempts at eradication driving recruits to the armed insurgency.
The same holds true in Colombia and elsewhere, where the vast profits reaped by drug traffickers who control transnational shipping networks are enhanced by cutting security deals with terrorist organizations.
As Glenny correctly observes:
_The collapse of communism and the rise of globalization in the late 1980s and early 1990s gave transnational criminality a tremendous boost. The expansion of world trade and financial markets has provided criminals ample opportunity to broaden their activities. But there has been no comparable increase in the ability of the Western world to police global crime._
_International mobsters, unlike terrorists, don't seek to bring down the West; they just want to make a buck. But these two distinct species breed in the same swamps. In areas notorious for crime, such as the tri-border region connecting Paraguay, Brazil and Argentina, or in the blood-diamond conflict zones such as Sierra Leone and Liberia, gangsters and terrorists habitually cooperate and work alongside one another._
This, of course, allows both sides access to the the strength of the other networks, with minimal risk to itself. And, if one part of the structure is hurt, the entire structure can simply move on, usually with minimal damage.
One may not agree with Glenny's conclusion on legalization, but the point that current policy, executed over almost 4 decades, has failed, is forcefully made.
I was reading the piece as I was diving into The Starfish and the Spider: The Unstoppable Power of Leaderless Organizations, fascinating look at how the new types of criminal/terrorist networks thrive on decentralization.
As a starfish can reconstitute itself out of almost any part that is severed, and has no real, centralized brain but a series of nerve impulses that guide its movements, so terrorist groups and criminal groups often thrive when deprived of centralized leadership.
This is especially true if the organization is made up of volunteers who want to be there, and are willing to carry on the enterprise (religious, terrorist, business etc.) when others are cut down.
This was certainly true some of the big stories I covered, particularly the Medellin and Cali cartels in Colombia. While the key individual leaders were killed or captured, the amount of cocaine produced never dropped, and ultimately surpassed the amount being produced by centralized groups.
This leads to deeply-troubling scenarios, because so much emphasis, both here and abroad, has focused on decapitating the leadership, rather than dealing with the network as a network.
Decapitation is often the key strategic objective, because our entire system is geared toward fighting organizations with a strict hierarchy, as our organizations are. While the military is incredibly efficient at defeating other armies, the struggle, as we see in Iraq and elsewhere, is when the enemy is a leaderless group of committed individuals, each acting autonomously to inflict damage.
These groups are free to innovate, recruit and attack as anyone in the group chooses to, rather than having to wait for orders. Targets of opportunity can be seized, the feelings of other allied groups can be ignored and leaders are followed because the followers want to follow that leader, not because they are forced to.
Any one piece of the leaderless network can reconstitute itself with little difficulty, without waiting around for someone to give an order and for that order to move down the chain of command.
Clearly, it seems, there are better and worse individuals within the network, and taking out the really good ones takes something of a toll. And leaderless groups are not highly efficient. But they survive.
If you have a system of enterprising freelance operations acting on impulses (the urge for profit, the urge to carry out attacks, the urge to acquire weapons etc.), these impulses will overlap. The actions will be taken to benefit all parties, and the networks can thrive with no one person making the important decisions.
This strikes me a perhaps the most dangerous mutation that both organized crime groups and terrorist groups (particularly Islamist terror groups, who seem more adept at moving through nerve impulses, without specific orders, than most), can take.
Successfully countering these groups and their growing reach will require a radical new assessment of both strategy and tactics in the military, intelligence community and law enforcement. But that will require a willingness to dump old assumptions and paradigms, something that has not really happened since 9-11.
In a thought-provoking Outlook piece in the Washington Post, Misha Glenny correctly notes the growing role of the poppy trade in Afghanistan in financing the Taliban, as well as attempts at eradication driving recruits to the armed insurgency.
The same holds true in Colombia and elsewhere, where the vast profits reaped by drug traffickers who control transnational shipping networks are enhanced by cutting security deals with terrorist organizations.
As Glenny correctly observes:
_The collapse of communism and the rise of globalization in the late 1980s and early 1990s gave transnational criminality a tremendous boost. The expansion of world trade and financial markets has provided criminals ample opportunity to broaden their activities. But there has been no comparable increase in the ability of the Western world to police global crime._
_International mobsters, unlike terrorists, don't seek to bring down the West; they just want to make a buck. But these two distinct species breed in the same swamps. In areas notorious for crime, such as the tri-border region connecting Paraguay, Brazil and Argentina, or in the blood-diamond conflict zones such as Sierra Leone and Liberia, gangsters and terrorists habitually cooperate and work alongside one another._
This, of course, allows both sides access to the the strength of the other networks, with minimal risk to itself. And, if one part of the structure is hurt, the entire structure can simply move on, usually with minimal damage.
One may not agree with Glenny's conclusion on legalization, but the point that current policy, executed over almost 4 decades, has failed, is forcefully made.
I was reading the piece as I was diving into The Starfish and the Spider: The Unstoppable Power of Leaderless Organizations, fascinating look at how the new types of criminal/terrorist networks thrive on decentralization.
As a starfish can reconstitute itself out of almost any part that is severed, and has no real, centralized brain but a series of nerve impulses that guide its movements, so terrorist groups and criminal groups often thrive when deprived of centralized leadership.
This is especially true if the organization is made up of volunteers who want to be there, and are willing to carry on the enterprise (religious, terrorist, business etc.) when others are cut down.
This was certainly true some of the big stories I covered, particularly the Medellin and Cali cartels in Colombia. While the key individual leaders were killed or captured, the amount of cocaine produced never dropped, and ultimately surpassed the amount being produced by centralized groups.
This leads to deeply-troubling scenarios, because so much emphasis, both here and abroad, has focused on decapitating the leadership, rather than dealing with the network as a network.
Decapitation is often the key strategic objective, because our entire system is geared toward fighting organizations with a strict hierarchy, as our organizations are. While the military is incredibly efficient at defeating other armies, the struggle, as we see in Iraq and elsewhere, is when the enemy is a leaderless group of committed individuals, each acting autonomously to inflict damage.
These groups are free to innovate, recruit and attack as anyone in the group chooses to, rather than having to wait for orders. Targets of opportunity can be seized, the feelings of other allied groups can be ignored and leaders are followed because the followers want to follow that leader, not because they are forced to.
Any one piece of the leaderless network can reconstitute itself with little difficulty, without waiting around for someone to give an order and for that order to move down the chain of command.
Clearly, it seems, there are better and worse individuals within the network, and taking out the really good ones takes something of a toll. And leaderless groups are not highly efficient. But they survive.
If you have a system of enterprising freelance operations acting on impulses (the urge for profit, the urge to carry out attacks, the urge to acquire weapons etc.), these impulses will overlap. The actions will be taken to benefit all parties, and the networks can thrive with no one person making the important decisions.
This strikes me a perhaps the most dangerous mutation that both organized crime groups and terrorist groups (particularly Islamist terror groups, who seem more adept at moving through nerve impulses, without specific orders, than most), can take.
Successfully countering these groups and their growing reach will require a radical new assessment of both strategy and tactics in the military, intelligence community and law enforcement. But that will require a willingness to dump old assumptions and paradigms, something that has not really happened since 9-11.
POSTED BY DOUGLAS FARAH
Friday August 17, 2007
CAIR's Amicus Brief and Due Dilligence
No one likes to see their dirty laundry and inner workings laundered in public. Which may at least partially explain CAIR's somewhat heated amicus brief in the Holy Land trial.
So CAIR alleges that the Justice Department is part of a "trend of the demonization of all things Muslim," among many other charges, and that its reputation has been damaged, perhaps beyond repair.
CAIR writes that its inclusion as an unindicted co-conspirator is "particularly insidious and ironic as CAIR is an organization dedicated to fostering acceptance of Muslims in American society and protecting the civil liberties of all Muslim-Americans.
The result of the public labeling of CAIR as an unindicted co-conspirator has resulted in significant inflammatory retorts from the American media, significantly impairing the main mission of CAIR to foster understanding and acceptance of Muslims in American society."
Such mudslinging from an organization that claims that its primary purpose is to foster understanding might raise some eyebrows.
But the amicus brief fails to address one of the underlying premises of the case, in my non-lawyerly opinion: that while those individuals on trial are directly charged with aiding the financing of terrorism, they are part of a much larger, Muslim Brotherhood-dominated structure of organizations with overlapping memberships, acknowledged front groups and specific tasks. A fundamental task of this structure, according to the exhibits filed by the prosecution, is to help Hamas, an acknowledged, organic part of the Muslim Brotherhood.
Article Two of the Hamas Charter states the following:
"The Islamic Resistance Movement is one of the wings of the Muslim Brotherhood in Palestine. The Muslim Brotherhood Movement is a universal organization which constitutes the largest Islamic movement of modern times. It is characterized by its deep understanding, accurate comprehension and its complete embrace of all Islamic concepts of all aspects of life, culture, creed, politics, economics, education, society, justice and judgement ,the spreading of Islam, education, art, information, science of the occult and conversion to Islam."
A fairly straightforward statement, one has to admit. Yet it is not illegal to belong to the Muslim Brotherhood, which also makes it challenging to understand why these groups have long tried to keep that affiliation out of the public eye.
Perhaps it is because if they defined their mission publicly as one of their leaders does privately in an assessment of the role of the Muslim Brotherhood in America, the doors to the Pentagon, White House, State Department, Justice Department etc. would not swing open in quite the same way. Here is the Explanatory Memorandum on the General Strategic Goal of the Group in North America it is again, in case you missed it:
"The Ikhwan (Muslim Brothers) must understand that their work in America is a kind of grand Jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within and sabotaging its miserable house by their hands and the hands of the believers so that it is eliminated and God’s religion is made victorious over all other religions."
A little tough to spin in the PR machine, that one.
The underlying premise here is what, I believe, moved the DOJ to name the unindicted co-conspirators. It is not the smear campaign CAIR alleges, but rather the most expedient and possibly sole way to get evidence introduced from other members of the Muslim Brotherhood network, into the trial.
Some final thoughts:
Muslim charities are constantly trying to outsource their due diligence back to the government, asking the government to give them a list of good charities where donations are no problem. The government does this in reverse, by providing a list of bad charities in the designation process – and telling them that this is unquestionably more efficient because surely there are more good charities than bad.
However, when a charity is designated, CAIR generally jumps into the public arena with a claims it is a misuse of power. The charity sues, DOJ wins- a 100 percent success rate so far.
Despite this history, the Islamic charities continue to push for a list of good charities. Treasury decided to issue a document called "Voluntary Best Practices for Charities." Some in DOJ fought this, feeling it would result in the claim that a mechanical application of the practices implies immunity, and will therefore frustrate efforts to promote more due diligence rather than less. Then it was universally panned by the charities as unhelpful.
Here, the government files something in court that is customary, and generally required when a criminal defendants obtains a bills of particulars in a federal case. CAIR then files a brief, claiming it is "unprecedented." But we should be used to CAIR's claims by now.
So CAIR alleges that the Justice Department is part of a "trend of the demonization of all things Muslim," among many other charges, and that its reputation has been damaged, perhaps beyond repair.
CAIR writes that its inclusion as an unindicted co-conspirator is "particularly insidious and ironic as CAIR is an organization dedicated to fostering acceptance of Muslims in American society and protecting the civil liberties of all Muslim-Americans.
The result of the public labeling of CAIR as an unindicted co-conspirator has resulted in significant inflammatory retorts from the American media, significantly impairing the main mission of CAIR to foster understanding and acceptance of Muslims in American society."
Such mudslinging from an organization that claims that its primary purpose is to foster understanding might raise some eyebrows.
But the amicus brief fails to address one of the underlying premises of the case, in my non-lawyerly opinion: that while those individuals on trial are directly charged with aiding the financing of terrorism, they are part of a much larger, Muslim Brotherhood-dominated structure of organizations with overlapping memberships, acknowledged front groups and specific tasks. A fundamental task of this structure, according to the exhibits filed by the prosecution, is to help Hamas, an acknowledged, organic part of the Muslim Brotherhood.
Article Two of the Hamas Charter states the following:
"The Islamic Resistance Movement is one of the wings of the Muslim Brotherhood in Palestine. The Muslim Brotherhood Movement is a universal organization which constitutes the largest Islamic movement of modern times. It is characterized by its deep understanding, accurate comprehension and its complete embrace of all Islamic concepts of all aspects of life, culture, creed, politics, economics, education, society, justice and judgement ,the spreading of Islam, education, art, information, science of the occult and conversion to Islam."
A fairly straightforward statement, one has to admit. Yet it is not illegal to belong to the Muslim Brotherhood, which also makes it challenging to understand why these groups have long tried to keep that affiliation out of the public eye.
Perhaps it is because if they defined their mission publicly as one of their leaders does privately in an assessment of the role of the Muslim Brotherhood in America, the doors to the Pentagon, White House, State Department, Justice Department etc. would not swing open in quite the same way. Here is the Explanatory Memorandum on the General Strategic Goal of the Group in North America it is again, in case you missed it:
"The Ikhwan (Muslim Brothers) must understand that their work in America is a kind of grand Jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within and sabotaging its miserable house by their hands and the hands of the believers so that it is eliminated and God’s religion is made victorious over all other religions."
A little tough to spin in the PR machine, that one.
The underlying premise here is what, I believe, moved the DOJ to name the unindicted co-conspirators. It is not the smear campaign CAIR alleges, but rather the most expedient and possibly sole way to get evidence introduced from other members of the Muslim Brotherhood network, into the trial.
Some final thoughts:
Muslim charities are constantly trying to outsource their due diligence back to the government, asking the government to give them a list of good charities where donations are no problem. The government does this in reverse, by providing a list of bad charities in the designation process – and telling them that this is unquestionably more efficient because surely there are more good charities than bad.
However, when a charity is designated, CAIR generally jumps into the public arena with a claims it is a misuse of power. The charity sues, DOJ wins- a 100 percent success rate so far.
Despite this history, the Islamic charities continue to push for a list of good charities. Treasury decided to issue a document called "Voluntary Best Practices for Charities." Some in DOJ fought this, feeling it would result in the claim that a mechanical application of the practices implies immunity, and will therefore frustrate efforts to promote more due diligence rather than less. Then it was universally panned by the charities as unhelpful.
Here, the government files something in court that is customary, and generally required when a criminal defendants obtains a bills of particulars in a federal case. CAIR then files a brief, claiming it is "unprecedented." But we should be used to CAIR's claims by now.
POSTED BY DOUGLAS FARAH
Wednesday August 15, 2007
The Role of the Quds Force in the Revolutionary Guard
Today's Washington Post brings the welcome news that the Bush administration is about to designate Iran's Revolutionary Guard as a terrorist entity.
The Guard is certainly, in a broad sense, an agent of terror despite being directly and organically part of a state apparatus.
While the Guard itself is heavily involved in businesses, internal repression and security, the al Quds (Jeruselem) Force is a much small cadre of senior Guard leaders who can call on special Guard units if it needs boots on the ground activities. For a good overview, see this somewhat dated but look at Hezbollah and its state ties.
According to U.S. and European intelligence friends, the Quds Force is the group that made the decision to allow senior al Qaeda operatives into Iran, as well as Osama bin Laden's son, Sa'ad. The group also allowed many family member of al Qaeda to exit Afghanistan through Iran in 2001, including at least one of bin Laden's wives.
The al Quds Force is not always operating with the full knowledge and consent of the central government, nor do its leaders appear to be accountable to either the central command of the Revolutionary Guard or the civilian government.
The Force seems to be the interlocutor between the Iranian military apparatus and al Qaeda, a relationship that has waxed and waned over time. Despite the strong hatred that often exists between Shi'ite and Sunni groups, they can, on occasion, work together.
Jamal al-Fadl, the key al Qaeda defector who was instrumental in our understanding of al Qaeda, has described in open court the admiration that Bin Laden felt for Imad Fayez Mugniyah, a senior Hezbollah military planner and close ally of Iran.
Mugniyah was a pioneer in the use of truck bombs (in Beirut), something al Qaeda emulated in its 1998 attacks on two U.S. embassies in East Africa.
It is also the Quds Force, which controls Iran's military acquisitions and determines what military hardware goes to both the Shi'ite militias in Iraq as well as what goes to Hezbollah in Lebanon.
This role as the gatekeeper makes targeting the multiple front groups operated by the Force potentially important, depending on the level of intelligence that exists on its financial structure.
Among the top Iranian al Quds Force leaders are the following:
General Qassem Soleimani, commander of the Force.
Through Soleimani the al-Quds Force plays an important role in Hezbollah’s operational contingency planning for military escalation against Israel, in outlining its implementation and in determining relevant levels of response by Hezbollah. The significance of this, is that the Iranians are instrumental in planningHezbollah’s operational-terrorist pursuits, and capable of triggering regional deterioration whenever they see fit.
Mohammad Baqer Zolqadr, the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) deputy commander. According to the statement of a senior Iranian intelligence defector in German court documents, Mohammad Baqer Zolqadr met in December 2003 with Sayf al-Adel, one of the senior al Qaeda operatives residing in Iran.
Deputy Minister of Defense for procurement Ahmed Vahidi was one of the pioneers within the Quds Force who is reported to have a long-standing relation with Ayman Zawahiri, Bin Laden's chief deputy, dating to the 1990s when al Qaeda was based in Sudan. His role in military procurement makes him a key figure both for the Force and within the government.
So, all in all, a good decision and one that should bring some benefit in slowing down the Iranian/Hezbollah terrorist apparatus.
The Guard is certainly, in a broad sense, an agent of terror despite being directly and organically part of a state apparatus.
While the Guard itself is heavily involved in businesses, internal repression and security, the al Quds (Jeruselem) Force is a much small cadre of senior Guard leaders who can call on special Guard units if it needs boots on the ground activities. For a good overview, see this somewhat dated but look at Hezbollah and its state ties.
According to U.S. and European intelligence friends, the Quds Force is the group that made the decision to allow senior al Qaeda operatives into Iran, as well as Osama bin Laden's son, Sa'ad. The group also allowed many family member of al Qaeda to exit Afghanistan through Iran in 2001, including at least one of bin Laden's wives.
The al Quds Force is not always operating with the full knowledge and consent of the central government, nor do its leaders appear to be accountable to either the central command of the Revolutionary Guard or the civilian government.
The Force seems to be the interlocutor between the Iranian military apparatus and al Qaeda, a relationship that has waxed and waned over time. Despite the strong hatred that often exists between Shi'ite and Sunni groups, they can, on occasion, work together.
Jamal al-Fadl, the key al Qaeda defector who was instrumental in our understanding of al Qaeda, has described in open court the admiration that Bin Laden felt for Imad Fayez Mugniyah, a senior Hezbollah military planner and close ally of Iran.
Mugniyah was a pioneer in the use of truck bombs (in Beirut), something al Qaeda emulated in its 1998 attacks on two U.S. embassies in East Africa.
It is also the Quds Force, which controls Iran's military acquisitions and determines what military hardware goes to both the Shi'ite militias in Iraq as well as what goes to Hezbollah in Lebanon.
This role as the gatekeeper makes targeting the multiple front groups operated by the Force potentially important, depending on the level of intelligence that exists on its financial structure.
Among the top Iranian al Quds Force leaders are the following:
General Qassem Soleimani, commander of the Force.
Through Soleimani the al-Quds Force plays an important role in Hezbollah’s operational contingency planning for military escalation against Israel, in outlining its implementation and in determining relevant levels of response by Hezbollah. The significance of this, is that the Iranians are instrumental in planningHezbollah’s operational-terrorist pursuits, and capable of triggering regional deterioration whenever they see fit.
Mohammad Baqer Zolqadr, the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) deputy commander. According to the statement of a senior Iranian intelligence defector in German court documents, Mohammad Baqer Zolqadr met in December 2003 with Sayf al-Adel, one of the senior al Qaeda operatives residing in Iran.
Deputy Minister of Defense for procurement Ahmed Vahidi was one of the pioneers within the Quds Force who is reported to have a long-standing relation with Ayman Zawahiri, Bin Laden's chief deputy, dating to the 1990s when al Qaeda was based in Sudan. His role in military procurement makes him a key figure both for the Force and within the government.
So, all in all, a good decision and one that should bring some benefit in slowing down the Iranian/Hezbollah terrorist apparatus.
POSTED BY DOUGLAS FARAH
Monday August 13, 2007
A Worthwhile Reminder of the Stakes With Saudi Arabia
The official Saudi sponsorship of religious intolerance is not unknown, but every once in a while it is good to remember exactly who we are dealing with.
This is especially true in the case of Saudi-supported charities and organizations operating in the United States, who portray themselves as the face of tolerant Islam.
My most recent reminder was from the official website of Saudi Airlines, outlining what infidels can take into the country.
Tucked away in the Customs Regulations section is this:
_A number of items are not allowed to be brought into the Kingdom due to religious reasons and local regulations. These include alcoholic beverages, pork and pork products, prohibited drugs and narcotics, firearms, explosives, edged weapons and pornographic materials._
_Items and articles belonging to religions other than Islam are also prohibited. These may include Bibles, crucifixes, statues, carvings, items with religious symbols such as the Star of David, and others._
Let's think about that for a moment. NOTHING representing another religion is even ALLOWED IN THE COUNTRY. This is not just a ban on proselytism, and goes far beyond virtually any place on the planet.
This is almost a casual, throwaway line in the middle of routine regulations. Yet we treat the Saudi government as an entity with whom we are willing to do business, including the selling them billions of dollars of weapons to perpetrate this narrow, discriminatory theology and policy.
Now look at the other side. Saudi-funded groups across Europe and the United States are now routinely demanding (and seeking to gain through legal action) special privileges for their members here.
The right to a separate public school (New York), the right to refuse transport to those carrying alcohol and other items (Minnesota) and countless other efforts by Muslim Brotherhood-related groups carrying out the plan of peaceful conquest of the United States.
Individuals, towns and states are paying millions of dollars in legal fees (those who choose to fight rather than cave) to fight giving these groups privileges and exceptions that no other religion here enjoy, or should enjoy.
CAIR, ISNA and other groups claiming to speak for the Muslim world continually raise the specter of "Islamophobia" and discrimination when anything is said about their now-well documented ties to the Muslim Brotherhood, Hamas and other things they have so long denied. Interesting that there has been so little attention paid by any of these groups to true discrimination, hate and bigotry by the country that has been one of their patrons for decades.
It is truly a mind-boggling set of circumstances, brought home by those two small paragraphs on an official government website. I do not travel with a Bible, crucifix or other religious symbols. But I would like to think I could if I wanted to.
Perhaps we should agree to those conditions of travel if we can ban all symbols of Islam here. Or perhaps we should simply refuse to do business with that type of government until there is some semblance of religious tolerance.
Won't happen, of course, but it useful, at least to me, to remember why fighting the Brotherhood and its groups in this country is so important. They are not agents of tolerance, but agents of the worst form of intolerance, bigotry and hatred, made worse, not better, by the fact much of it is state sponsored.
The very least we should do is refuse to do any sort of business with Islamist groups that do not publicly renounce funding from a government whose official policy is that of hatred and intolerance.
This is especially true in the case of Saudi-supported charities and organizations operating in the United States, who portray themselves as the face of tolerant Islam.
My most recent reminder was from the official website of Saudi Airlines, outlining what infidels can take into the country.
Tucked away in the Customs Regulations section is this:
_A number of items are not allowed to be brought into the Kingdom due to religious reasons and local regulations. These include alcoholic beverages, pork and pork products, prohibited drugs and narcotics, firearms, explosives, edged weapons and pornographic materials._
_Items and articles belonging to religions other than Islam are also prohibited. These may include Bibles, crucifixes, statues, carvings, items with religious symbols such as the Star of David, and others._
Let's think about that for a moment. NOTHING representing another religion is even ALLOWED IN THE COUNTRY. This is not just a ban on proselytism, and goes far beyond virtually any place on the planet.
This is almost a casual, throwaway line in the middle of routine regulations. Yet we treat the Saudi government as an entity with whom we are willing to do business, including the selling them billions of dollars of weapons to perpetrate this narrow, discriminatory theology and policy.
Now look at the other side. Saudi-funded groups across Europe and the United States are now routinely demanding (and seeking to gain through legal action) special privileges for their members here.
The right to a separate public school (New York), the right to refuse transport to those carrying alcohol and other items (Minnesota) and countless other efforts by Muslim Brotherhood-related groups carrying out the plan of peaceful conquest of the United States.
Individuals, towns and states are paying millions of dollars in legal fees (those who choose to fight rather than cave) to fight giving these groups privileges and exceptions that no other religion here enjoy, or should enjoy.
CAIR, ISNA and other groups claiming to speak for the Muslim world continually raise the specter of "Islamophobia" and discrimination when anything is said about their now-well documented ties to the Muslim Brotherhood, Hamas and other things they have so long denied. Interesting that there has been so little attention paid by any of these groups to true discrimination, hate and bigotry by the country that has been one of their patrons for decades.
It is truly a mind-boggling set of circumstances, brought home by those two small paragraphs on an official government website. I do not travel with a Bible, crucifix or other religious symbols. But I would like to think I could if I wanted to.
Perhaps we should agree to those conditions of travel if we can ban all symbols of Islam here. Or perhaps we should simply refuse to do business with that type of government until there is some semblance of religious tolerance.
Won't happen, of course, but it useful, at least to me, to remember why fighting the Brotherhood and its groups in this country is so important. They are not agents of tolerance, but agents of the worst form of intolerance, bigotry and hatred, made worse, not better, by the fact much of it is state sponsored.
The very least we should do is refuse to do any sort of business with Islamist groups that do not publicly renounce funding from a government whose official policy is that of hatred and intolerance.
POSTED BY DOUGLAS FARAH