Syrian Rebels Threaten Nasrallah if he Continues to Support Assad

by Israel Hayom Staff and The Associated Press

Rebels call Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah a "criminal," say they know how to reach him • Your era has practically ended, rebels tell Nasrallah • Car bomb kills at least 53 people near the Baath Party headquarters in Damascus.

Syrian rebels have threatened to attack Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah if he continues to support Syrian President Bashar Assad. Photo credit: AFP

Syrian rebels have threatened to attack Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah if he continues to aid the regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad.

A message published on Thursday by the Joint Command of the Free Syrian Army said that Nasrallah was not immune from attack and that the rebels knew how to reach him.

In the message, Nasrallah was referred to as a "criminal." 

Addressing Nasrallah, the message said "your era has practically ended."

"Anyone who dares to attack our people and our land will pay a hefty price," the message said. 

Citing opposition sources, Al-Arabiya reported that rebels have shelled Hezbollah positions in Syria and Lebanon in response to Hezbollah support for the Assad regime. 

Also on Thursday, a car bomb exploded near Syria's ruling party headquarters in Damascus, killing at least 53 people and scattering mangled bodies among the blazing wreckage on one of the bloodiest days in the capital since the uprising began almost two years ago.

Elsewhere in the city, two other bombs struck intelligence offices, killing 22, and mortar rounds hit the Syrian military's central command, activists said.

Syrian state media said the car bombing near the Baath Party headquarters and the Russian Embassy was a suicide attack that killed 53 civilians and wounded more than 200, with children among the casualties. 

Anti-regime activists put the death toll at 61, which would make it the deadliest Damascus bombing of the revolt that began in March 2011.

Israel Hayom Staff and The Associated Press

Source: http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_article.php?id=7485

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

CAIR's Walid: Silent on Jihad, Sows Fear of Law Enforcement

by IPT News


FBI agents are devils lurking online to entrap young Muslims in bogus terrorist plots, a leading Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) official told a group of Michigan youngsters earlier this week.

Dawud Walid, director of CAIR's Michigan chapter, lectured area youth on Monday about his belief that FBI agents are waiting to set them up through informants. He wants the message to reach a broader audience, posting the audio online and promoting it on his Twitter feed.

Noting the 48^th anniversary of Malcolm X's assassination this week, Walid told the youth audience that history is riddled with spies who betray their own, from Malcolm X to the Islamic prophet Mohammed's companions, to Judas among Jesus' apostles.




Today, "you have agent provocateurs and people who are acting as informants that are trying to further their careers, to get out of trouble, to get arrests, try to set people up," Walid said. "And guess the No. 1 group of people who are targeted by these FBI agent provocateurs? Does anyone have a guess? Muslims."

That may be true specifically in terms of counter-terrorism cases. But a quick search of news stories from the past week shows informants and undercover agents are used in sting operations almost daily in cases involving drugs, prostitution, online child sex predators and more.

But Walid's talk, at just less than 15 minutes, had no room for context. He also devoted no time to warning the youngsters that they need to be wary of actual extremists and their message. He described hearing from a woman who said the FBI offered to help her with an immigration problem if she created a Facebook page supporting the Somali Islamist group al-Shabaab.

The group is responsible for killing dozens of people in bombing attacks. It directly recruits young Somali men living in America.

"What are you waiting for O' youth?" an official says in one online recruiting video. "If you do not fight Jihad today then when will you? O Muslim youth, free your brothers from the darkness of oppression and the brutality of the enemy blows. Search for death and you will attain life. Come to jihad, you will gain honor in this life and the next."

More than 20 young Somalis reportedly left the Minneapolis area to join the group, with several dying. One, Shirwa Ahmed, became the first known American suicide bomber. It also is suspected of killing some of those Americans after they tried to leave the group.

Walid mentioned none of this to his youth audience. Rather, he cast doubt on Shabaab's terrorist designation.



"Have you all heard of al-Shabaab?" he asked. "Shabaab literally means 'youth' in Arabic, as-Shabaab al-Muslimeen is a group in Somalia that's been involved in a lot of fighting and our government calls them a terrorist organization."

Walid offered no warning about online content glorifying violent jihad, be it from al-Shabaab or in videos from American-born al-Qaida cleric Anwar al-Awlaki. Though he was killed in a 2011 drone strike, Awlaki's online sermons continue to influence would-be terrorists. Walid's speech made no attempt to tell the youngsters why such a message was wrong and should be shunned.

The only threat he described is from law enforcement. Informants play to young Muslims' emotions, Walid said, lamenting the deaths of Muslims in Pakistan, Afghanistan and elsewhere. For example, "'look at what's going on in France, and America's helping the French government in Mali, and look what's going on with the Muslims in Mali.' Trying to get people, primarily youth, excited," Walid said.



"And then once one of the youth gets excited and says something back over the Internet and then goes to meet someone to have a conversation to do something, then guess what happens? The FBI comes and says 'Gotcha!' Now I'm serious. This has happened. Many times. So my advice to you is that [if] anyone strange comes into the masjid, or on your Facebook page or Twitter, and tries to get you excited about wanting to do something against the United States government or something overseas, you should be very careful. You should tell your parents the situation immediately and they should contact me at CAIR. Because nine times out of 10 the person who is trying to influence you over Twitter or over Facebook is not even a real extremist. It's someone who's with the government that's trying to set you up."

In addition to indicating that contact from "a real extremist" would be unremarkable, Walid grossly mischaracterizes law enforcement counter-terrorism stings.

It is language he has used before.

"The FBI, by using informants acting as agent provocateurs, has recruited more so-called extremist Muslims than al-Qaida themselves," he said in December 2010. In a separate speech to CAIR-Connecticut's annual banquet that same month, he described FBI "agent provocateurs" taking advantage of "emotional people," "getting them excited," "giving them plots" and then "after they push the people," saying "gotcha!"

With this, Walid continues his long history of blatantly mischaracterizing law enforcement actions. He spent more than a year arguing that agents murdered a peaceful Detroit imam as they tried to arrest him for weapons violations and conspiring to sell stolen goods. The imam refused repeated orders to lie down and surrender peacefully, and video shows that hid behind a corner clutching a handgun as agents approached. He fired his gun first, killing an FBI canine. Walid refused to accept the facts even after two investigations cleared the agents.

The terrorism Walid criticizes start with people who voluntarily offer their support for jihad and express interest in meeting people who can help make that happen. Earlier this month, a federal jury in Portland convicted Somali immigrant Mohamed Mohamud after he tried to detonate what he thought was a car bomb outside a crowded Christmas tree lighting ceremony in 2010. The bomb was rendered inert by FBI agents investigating Mohamud.

Evidence showed Mohamud wrote four articles for Jihad Recollections, an online magazine, and posted on other jihadi web sites before the FBI stepped in. He chose the target, bypassing suggestions he serve the cause through non-violent means.

Similarly, a Virginia man thought he was going to detonate a suicide bomb inside the U.S. Capitol a year ago, only to be arrested by FBI agents as he walked alone toward the building with what he thought was a live bomb-vest. Amine El-Khalifi felt a religious duty to act because of his belief the United States was waging a war on Muslims. His "motivation was simply to do what he thought God called him to do," his public defender said at El-Khalifi's sentencing.

While Walid and his colleagues at CAIR decry such law enforcement intervention, a former FBI agent who is Muslim sees them as vital in protecting innocent lives.

"As you can't prosecute someone just for professing a desire to kill Americans, and you can't read minds to determine if they really intend to carry out their threats, either you wait to see if the real al Qaeda gets in contact—and hope you can track them—or you intercede," former agent Ali Soufan wrote in a recent Wall Street Journal book review. "Most Americans would no doubt prefer the latter option to taking a serious gamble with civilian lives."

Count Walid among the minority. He sees Soufan, who participated in undercover terrorism stings, as a devil to young Muslims.

"This is in Islam. Shayatin – devils – they're not just in spirit they're also in men. But guess what? Shayatin can be as white as a piece of paper but shayatin can also be as black as coal. There are shayatin in many colors. Some of them are Chinese, some of them are Arab. Some of them are black. Some of them are Bengali. All types of shayatin. So we have to be on guard and ask Allah (SWT) to protect us from the shayatin amongst the jinn (spirits) and the men."


IPT News

Source: http://www.investigativeproject.org/3929/cair-walid-silent-on-jihad-sows-fear-of-law

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

Falls Church, Va: Local Imam Calls For Armed Jihad

by John Rossomando


Sheik Shaker Elsayed, the imam of the Dar al-Hijrah Mosque in Falls Church, Va., advocated armed jihad before an Ethiopian Muslim group gathered at T.C. Williams High School in Alexandria, Va. last week.

"Muslim men when it is a price to pay, they are first in line," Elsayed said in comments seen on a YouTube video found by the Creeping Sharia blog. "They are the first in the prayer line. They are the first in the zakat (charity) line. They are the first in the hajj line. They are the first in the clean-up line. They are the first in the community-service line. They are the first in jihad line. They are the first in the da'wa line."

"But they are last if anything is being distributed, unless it is arms for jihad," Elsayed said. "We are the first to rush and run to defend our community and defend ourselves. The enemies of Allah are lining up; the question for us is, 'Are we lining, or are we afraid because, because they may call us terrorists.'"

Being called "terrorists" should not matter to Muslims because non-Muslims are being called terrorists anyway, Elsayed said.

"You are a terrorist because you are a Muslim," Elsayed said. "Well give them a run for their money. Make it worth it. Make this title worth it, and be good a Muslim."

Elsayed then told Muslims to accept peace when they receive peace, but to fight back when their families, communities, nations and dignity come under attack.

He has been Dar al-Hijrah's imam since 2005. Law enforcement officials have described the mosque as being "associated with Islamic extremists" and "operating as a front for Hamas operatives in U.S.

Elsayed's comments contradict statements he made in a 2005 interview on National Public Radio.

"I believe there is no apology for terrorism. We condemned it; we condemned it on 9/11, I personally signed a paper on behalf of the organization I worked for at that time and sent it everywhere to the press. I spoke with the press," Elsayed said.

This isn't the first time Elsayed has endorsed terrorism. He denounced calling terrorists "suicide bombers, homicide bombers, or murderers, or killers" in a December 2002 speech.

"To decide that this man is a martyr or not a martyr, it is a pure religious matter," Elsayed said. "Nobody who is not Muslim has any right to decide for us, we the Muslims, whose is a martyr or another. We as Muslims will decide that. It is in-house business."

His name also appears in a 1991 Muslim Brotherhood document detailing the group's plan to wage a non-violent civilization jihad to destroy "Western civilization from within."


John Rossomando

Source: http://www.investigativeproject.org/3928/dar-al-hijrah-imam-calls-for-armed-jihad

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

Mordechai Kedar: The Arabs in Israel - Part I

by Mordechai Kedar
 

Read the article in the original עברית
Read the article in Italiano (translated by Yehudit Weisz, edited by Angelo Pezzana)

This is the first in a series of articles on the Arab sector in Israel. We intend to bring to the reader the historical background and the position of the twenty percent of the population of Israeli society that does not share the Zionist dream, but are citizens with equal rights. We will deal with obligations of these citizens later in the series. 

These issues are politically charged, and represent contradicting narratives, one Jewish, and the other, Arab. The question we will deal with is not what the Jews think about the issues, but rather what are the prevailing opinions within the Arab sector. First, it should be noted that just as there are differences of opinion within the Jewish sector, there are variances in the Arab sector, and attitudes towards the Jewish sector, the state and its institutions not only differ, but often are even polar opposites.

We begin with a description of the Arab population in Israel. To start with, I will say that there is no such thing in Israel as one "Arab sector", rather there are several Middle Eastern populations, some of which are not Arab, and they differ one from another in religion, culture, ethnic origin and historical background; therefore they do not constitute one cohesive sector. Parenthetically, it is debatable whether there is one cohesive Jewish sector in Israel. Therefore, when we use the terms "the Arab sector" and "the Jewish sector", it will be only for the sake of simplicity.

Ethnic Division

Within the Arab sector in Israel there are a number of ethnic groups who differ from each other in language, history and culture: Arabs, Africans, Armenians, Circassians and Bosnians. These groups usually do not mingle with each other, and live in separate villages or in  separate neighborhoods where a particular family predominates. For example: the Circassians in Israel are the descendants of people who came from the Caucasus to serve as officers in the Ottoman army. They live in two villages in the Galilee, Kfar Kama and Reyhaniya, and despite their being Muslim, the young people do not usually marry Arabs.
The Africans are mainly from Sudan. Some of them live as a large group in Jisr al-Zarqa and some live in family groups within Bedouin settlements in the south. They are called "Abid" from the Arabic word for "slaves". The Bosnians live in family groups in Arab villages, for example, the Bushnak family in Kfar Manda. 

The Armenians came mainly to escape the persecution that they suffered in Turkey in the days of the First World War, which culminated in the Armenian genocide of 1915. 

Cultural Division

In general, it can be said that the Arab sector is divided culturally into three main groups: urban, rural and Bedouin. Each one of these groups has its own cultural characteristics: lifestyle,  status of a given clan, education, occupation, level of income, number of children and matters connected to women, for example polygamy (multiple wives), age of marriage, matchmaking or dating customs and dress. The residents of cities - and to a great extent also the villagers - see the Bedouins as primitive, while the Bedouins see themselves as the only genuine Arabs, and in their opinion, the villagers and city folk are phony Arabs, who have lost their Arab character.

The Arabic language expresses this matter well: the meaning of the word "Arabi" is "bedouin", and some of the Bedouin tribes are called "Arab", for example "Arab al-Heib" and "Arab al-Shibli" in the North.

The Bedouins of the Negev classify themselves according to the color of their skin into "hamar" (red) and "sud" (black), and Bedouins would never marry their daughters to a man who is darker than she is, because he does not want his grandchildren to be dark-skinned. Racist? Perhaps. Another division that exists in the Negev is between tribes that have a Bedouin origin, and tribes whose livelihood is agriculture (Fellahin), who have low status. A large tribe has a higher standing than a small tribe.

Religions and Sects

The Arab sector in Israel is divided into Muslims, Christians, Druze and 'Alawites. The Christians are subdivided into several Sects: Orthodox, Catholic and Protestant, and among the Muslims, there is a distinct sect of Sufis, which has a significant presence in Baqa al-Gharbiya. There is also an interesting Salafi movement in Israel, which we will relate to later. The Islamist movement is organized along the lines of the Muslim Brotherhood and we will dedicate significant space to it in this series.

The religion of the Druze is different from Islam, and Muslims consider the Druze to be heretics. Because of this, the Druze are supposed to keep their religion secret, even from each other, and therefore most are "juhal" (ignorant - of religious matters) and only a small number of the elder men are "aukal" (knowlegable in matters of religion"). In the modern age there have been a number of books published about the Druze religion. 

The 'Alawites in Israel live in Kfar Ghajar, in the foothills of the Hermon and some live over the border in Lebanon. They are also considered heretics in Islam, and their religion is a blend (syncretism) of Shi'ite Islam, and Eastern Christianity and ancient religions that existed in the Middle East thousands of years ago. Their principle concentration is in the mountains of al-Ansariya in northwest Syria, although some are in Lebanon and some migrated southward and settled in Ghajar. The meaning of the word Ghajar in Arabic is "Gypsy", meaning foreign nomads with a different religion. In Syria the 'Alawites have ruled since 1966. The family of Asad is part of this heretical Islamic sect , and this is the reason for the Muslim objection to 'Alawite rule in Syria since according to Islam, not only do they not have the right to rule, being a minority,  but there is significant doubt as to whether they even have the right to live, being idol worshipers.

Migration to Israel

Some parts of the Arab sector are communities that have lived in the land now called the State of Israel [Translator's note: we will henceforth refer to this area as the Land] for hundreds of years, but a significant part is the offspring of immigrants who migrated to the Land mainly in the first half of the  twentieth century, especially after 1882, when Petach Tikva was established. Many people from neighboring lands migrated to the Land at that time in order to work in the Jewish farming communities. Many migrated from Egypt even before, in order to escape from being impressed into forced labor as the Suez canal was being dug. This is how the al-Masri,  Masarwa and Fiumi families as well as many others came to the Land, with names that testify to their Egyptian source. Other families have Jordanian names (Zarkawi and Karaki, for example), from Syria (al-Hourani, Halabi) from Lebanon (Surani, Sidawi, Trabulsi) and from Iraq (al-Iraqi).

The Arabic dialect spoken by most of the Bedouins in the Negev is a Saudi-Jordanian dialect, and because of their familial ties to tribes living in Jordan, when the Bedouins become involved in matters of blood-vengeance, they escape to family members who live in Jordan. The connection between Arab families in Israel with groups in neighboring countries should not be surprising, because until 1948 the borders of Israel were not hermetically sealed, and many Arabs of "Sham" (Greater Syria) wandered into the Land almost totally unimpeded, following their flocks and the expanding employment opportunities .

Traditional vs. Modern

The division between traditional and modern outlooks exists in each of the other groups, meaning that in each group indicated above there is a subdivision: those who are more connected to the tradition of the group and those who are less connected. Among the young, one sees more openness and less adherence to group tradition, and it can be assumed that the young of the next generation will generally adhere  even less to group's traditions. This is obvious among the Bedouin groups, because among the young there are more than a few who challenge the socially accepted ways of the Bedouin.

Education also plays an important role in the changing attitude toward tradition, because Arab academics are usually less linked to social tradition and the framework of the clan and live more within the framework of nuclear families (father, mother and children). They also tend to move to more open areas such as mixed cities (Acre, Ramla and Lod) and even to Jewish cities, such as Be'er Sheva, Karmiel,  and Upper Nazareth) and adopt a modern life-style. 

The shift to the city is also connected to a change in the source of livelihood - there are more in the independent professions and less in agriculture - a change that was due partly to the confiscation of the lands of absentees after the War of Independence.

Division by Gender

As in every other society in the world, there is tension between men and women among the groups that make up the Arab sector in Israel.  Tension exists regarding issues of gender such as the rights of women to learn, to work, to choose a mate, freedom of behavior, the age of marriage and number of children. The tension between men and women that exists in the Bedouin groups is different from that which exists in the villages and the cities, because of the difference in exposure to the Jewish sector, in education and methods of earning a livelihood that exist between the various segments of the Arab sector.

Basic Differences between the Jewish and Arab sectors

Beyond the religious dividing line in Israel that differentiates Jews and non-Jews, another basic division exists between the Jewish and Arab sectors in their approach - in general - to the state. For most of the groups within the Jewish sector, the State of Israel fulfills two roles: one is the political and governmental embodiment of the aspirations of the Jews to return to themselves and regain the independence and sovereignty over the Land of their fathers that was stolen from them after the destruction of the Second Temple. The symbols of the state are Jewish, such as the national anthem, which includes the words "the Jewish soul yearns", the flag which represents the prayer shawl, the Shield of David and the seven-branched menorah, the Hebrew language is the official language of the state, on the Jewish holidays, the governmental institutions are closed, and thus the state bears Jewish genes. 

The second role of the State of Israel in the eyes of most Jews is functional: to provide its citizens with security, employment, livelihood, health, education, roads, bridges and social services.

For the Arab sector, the first role does not exist; the State of Israel is not the embodiment of their diplomatic and political dreams. The national anthem is not their hymn, the symbols of the state are not their symbols, and our Independence Day is their "Nakba" (disaster). The second role as well, the functional, is only partially fulfilled by the state in matters of education, planning, roads and infrastructure. One may argue about the causes and reasons, but the facts are clear: How many Arab Members of the boards of directors of government companies are there? How may Arab judges are there in the High Court? What is the proportion of Arabs in the academic staff of universities?

But on the other hand, one cannot ignore the phenomenon of "reverse discrimination" either: laws of planning and building, that are observed almost fully within the Jewish sector, are very loosely observed within the Arab sector, especially in the Bedouin sector in the Negev. How many thousands of buildings have been built in the Negev without building permits on land that does not belong to Bedouins? How is it that there are no sidewalks in Um al-Fahm and the distance between the buildings is about the width of the cars?

Another example of reverse discrimination exists in the area of marriage: if a Jew dares to marry a woman before he has completed the process of divorce from his present wife he will find himself behind bars, like the singer Mati Kaspi. But if an Arab marries a second, third or fourth wife, the state pays a monthly children's allowance for each wife separately and without asking too many questions. 

Another case of discrimination in favor of Arabs exists in the area of housing: in the Jewish sector about ninety percent are residents of apartments and about ten percent live in private houses. In the Arab sector the picture is the reverse: more than ninety percent live in private homes, and less than a tenth live in apartments.

But the characteristic that most unites the Arab sector in Israel is the environment that they live in: All the Arabs in the world live in one of two situations: Either in dictatorships in their homeland, or in dictatorships in the diaspora. There is almost no Arab community in the world that lives in its homeland for tens of years in a truly democratic state. The Arab citizens of Israel are the only Arab group that lives on its land (especially if you ignore the lands from which they originated) in a democratic regime that honors human rights and political freedoms. This is the reason that Arabs outside of Israel envy the Arab citizens of Israel and call them "Arab al-Zibda", or "whipped cream Arabs".


===============

Dr. Kedar is available for lectures

Dr. Mordechai Kedar (Mordechai.Kedar@biu.ac.il) is an Israeli scholar of Arabic and Islam, a lecturer at Bar-Ilan University and the director of the Center for the Study of the Middle East and Islam (under formation), Bar Ilan University, Israel. He specializes in Islamic ideology and movements, the political discourse of Arab countries, the Arabic mass media, and the Syrian domestic arena.

Translated from Hebrew by Sally Zahav with permission from the author.

Additional articles by Dr. Kedar

Source: The article is published in the framework of the Center for the Study of the Middle East and Islam (under formation), Bar Ilan University, Israel. Also published in Makor Rishon, a Hebrew weekly newspaper.

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the author.

The Endgame for the Destruction of the United States

by Daren Jonescu

See also Part One:  Total Destruction of the U.S.: An Interview with Larry Grathwohl and Part Two: American Education: Rotting the Country from the Inside

In Part 1 of this interview with former FBI operative Larry Grathwohl, we addressed the goals and methods of the Weatherman organization and debunked recent attempts to dismiss their words and activities as "youthful folly" or "typical of those days."  In Part 2, we discussed the continuity of purpose connecting the murderous radicalism of the Weather Underground leadership with the progressive education and social justice advocacy of the "mature," "respectable" Ayers, Dohrn, Machtinger, Boudin, and others.

Here in the final installment, I ask Grathwohl about the alarming cognitive dissonance of today's Middle America in the throes of the "fundamental transformation" promised by Barack Obama, facilitated by the progressive education and legal establishments, and put into practice by federal agency appointees, colleges of education, union leaders, and bureaucrats with established leftist pedigrees.

As an example of this dissonance, consider an American colleague of mine here in Korea: a friendly, down-to-earth, educated family man in his early thirties, and a teacher by profession.  On the eve of the 2012 election, I asked him whether it bothered him that Barack Obama had been so strongly endorsed by the Communist Party.  He said he had never heard of that.  When I explained that the Party's official endorsement cited Obama's signature policy initiatives as the surest means to achieving socialism in America, and that CPUSA leaders were actively campaigning for Obama in swing states, my colleague fell silent for a moment, and then said, matter-of-factly, "It doesn't really bother me; I guess it might bother me if Obama were endorsing the Communist Party, but if they're endorsing him, it doesn't matter."

I leave you with that thought, by way of introduction to Part 3 of my conversation with Larry Grathwohl.

DJ: The Communist Party USA has officially endorsed and vocally supported President Obama, and his administration has included several people with well-known Marxist or Maoist views and affiliations.  And yet most people, including many so-called conservatives, shy away from this entire subject area, and they practically run for the hills when anyone mentions Bill Ayers, re-education camps, or communism in connection with current political events.  

Why do you think there is such discomfort among Americans, including supposed conservatives, when confronted with this issue?

LG: To answer this question in a word, I would say "political correctness."  Today we live in a world where people are afraid to discuss issues of importance due to a concern that they might say something wrong.  We have a society where people can be condemned for being on the wrong side of an issue, especially if you're in a position where you could be labeled as a racist or an individual who has no sensitivity towards those who are in some way in need.  Today, [concern about] Marxism is out of vogue, and the Chinese are our friends and are lending us money in order for our government to continue to exist.  How can you question this?  Conservatives are afraid of being labeled as mean or uncaring and want to maintain a civil image in the midst of this chaos and confusion.  Senator McCain during the 2008 presidential campaign refused to confront Barack Obama regarding his ties to Bill Ayers the unrepentant terrorist.  When others brought up the possibility of Obama's connection to the Muslim world, McCain became angry and turned away.  By doing so, he negated any possibility of forcing the two-year member of the Senate to explain his sympathetic positions towards Islamic terrorism and the domestic terrorism that his friend Bill Ayers had participated in [during] the '70s and the '80s. 

Basically, this is the problem we face today.  If you criticize the president for any of his policies, you are racist, and your argument ends.  There aren't defenses for these kinds of accusations, and it completely eliminates any possibility of discussion and compromise.  This works wonderfully for the Democrats and their policies, and it puts the Republicans and conservatives in very un-defensible positions.  The bravery or whatever you care to call it simply no longer exists [when] people who are involved in the political process are more concerned with the next election than they are with what's best and right for America.  I often wonder what would've happened during the Revolutionary War if people of this stature were to be the ones we were dependent upon to defeat the British.  I wonder if this tendency can be overcome or eliminated.

DJ: How frustrating is it for you, having seen what you have seen, to encounter this kind of reluctance from people who should be your allies?

LG: While I do have some allies, which includes those who have the courage to speak the truth and to stand up for what's right, the fact is that it is extremely frustrating that people are simply unable to recognize the truth when it is presented to them along with the evidence which exists in the WU's activities, writings, and continued attack on our institutions.  As for me, the frustration is simply a greater motivation to accomplish my mission of enlightening people as to the true goals and objectives of the WU and the means that they used in their attempt to achieve the destruction of the United States.

DJ: Many people dispute President Obama's claim that Bill Ayers was just "a guy in my neighborhood."  And Ayers himself has spoken of being ecstatic when Obama was elected in 2008.  What connection or consistency do you see between the goals and/or methods pursued or promoted by the WU and those pursued and promoted by the Obama administration?

LG: The goals and objectives of these two individuals are the same.  Bill Ayers tried first to destroy this country through violence.  Having failed, the WU determined to accomplish this through the system and in my opinion Barack Obama was recruited as a means to accomplish this goal. ...

The connections between Barack and Bill include having shared an office for at least three years in Chicago, being co-members on two boards in which Barack was the chairman, and one of which was called the Annenberg Challenge[, which] was charged with the dissemination of approximately $100 million to educational institutions in the Chicago area.  Bill Ayers has been associated with the writing of Barack's book, Dreams from My Father, through content analysis, and on three occasions Bill has admitted that he wrote this book and then later retracted his comments.  It would seem apparent to me that individuals who have been this closely associated through many years have a common knowledge [of] one another's political aims and goals.  This can only mean that they are in agreement, and while Bill has utilized the educational system to further his objective, Barack Obama has chosen politics.  Keep in mind that Barack Obama's first political fundraiser was held at Bill's and Bernardine's home while Barack was running for the Illinois state legislature.  This is his first fundraiser, and Bill and Bernardine are involved -- can there be any doubt as to the extent of the relationship that exists between these individuals?

Obama is in the process of attacking all institutions of our society and government, [including] the First Amendment by stating that it's the conservative media that keeps the Republicans from negotiating with him; the Second Amendment [through] his attempts to impose restrictions on gun ownership, procurement of ammunition, and whatever other means he can devise; and lastly, there is his attack on the freedom of religion by trying to impose birth control and abortion under the Obama health care act on churches who run such institutions as hospitals, schools, rests homes, and other services.

DJ: You have spent a good portion of your life trying to warn Americans about the specific intentions of the young leftist radicals of the late 1960s.  How do you answer people who might say that those leftists are older now, their radical days are in the past, and there is no longer anything to worry about from them?

LG: The fact is, Bill Ayers and many of his comrades from those days of strategic sabotage in the underground movement have not changed their goal or their purpose.  Bill has made this very clear in his book, Fugitive Days, in which he makes no apology for the death and destruction the WU were responsible for and even seems to revel in what he perceives as the glory of the revolution.  In his book Underground, Mark Rudd also makes no apologies for his activities and even admits prior knowledge to the bomb factory in Greenwich Village in which three members of the WU were killed.  He states that Terry Robbins had told him of the purpose of their bomb creations and that they were to be used at Fort Dix, New Jersey during an enlisted men's dance and at the officers' club.  These bombs were adulterated with fence staples and roofing nails, whose purpose can only be to inflict as much death and injury as possible.  There are many other individuals from the WU who have written books and also regret only that they did not succeed or that they didn't do enough.  Some individuals were involved in a Brinks armored car robbery during which two policemen and a Brinks guard were killed.  Kathy Boudin is no longer behind bars, but her husband, accomplice David Gilbert, is still in jail and writing books about love and the revolution and has many supporters [who are] trying to get him released to this very day.

It simply cannot be said that these people have allowed the last three or four decades to change their political beliefs or political goals.  Instead, they have been involved with the Occupy Wall Street movement and the encouragement of young people to defy authority and to create as much chaos and turmoil as possible.  Bill has actually attended Occupy meetings during which he instructed individuals on how to accomplish the most destruction of property and confrontation with authority and in a way that makes it appear as if they are the victims.  This I know for a fact, as people who are friendly to me and have attended some of these meetings have reported these facts.

Van Jones, who was appointed as the green jobs czar by President Obama, is very active [in the] political movement in the Bay Area, particularly in Oakland and Berkeley.  He has associations with Bill Ayers and has attended Occupy meetings in which they were both in attendance. 

It is simply impossible to conclude that any of these people have in any way, shape, or form been influenced to change their political beliefs or their goal and objectives by the passage of time.  They still believe that the United States is the root of all evil and must be destroyed, whatever it takes.  Innocent lives or genuine disagreement is not a qualification for being spared, and it is my belief that Bill and people who follow Bill are consumed with this hatred for this country and a desire to be in control of life and death, and this may be the underlying reason for the personality disorders they obviously suffer from.

Author's concluding note: Larry Grathwohl provides powerful witness to the hatred the Weathermen bear for the United States as founded, and their utter disregard for human life in pursuing their transformative agenda.  I do not believe that Grathwohl's perspective is infallible any more than I believe that of anyone else.  I do believe, however, that he speaks sincerely, and from a deep understanding of the minds and hearts of the Weather Underground radicals.  

Rational observers know that Ayers's relationship with Obama is much more developed than either man has publicly acknowledged.  And it is undeniable that these two progressive "reformers" have achieved a degree of mainstream success and influence in their respective fields of endeavor, education, and politics that would have been inconceivable a hundred years ago, when Ayers's educational role model, John Dewey, was beginning progressivism's long march through the souls of America's children.  A century of progressive schooling made Barack Obama's presidency possible.  In turn, with a president openly bent on transforming America according to a collectivist "social justice" agenda, public education itself, under the leadership of Ayers and his colleagues, may reveal itself ever more fully as the socialist indoctrination center Dewey could only dream and scheme of.  

As Grathwohl warns, Ayers is urging followers to see that they are "very close to accomplishing their mission of changing America forever."  The circle envisioned by early Western progressive intellectuals such as Antonio Gramsci is almost complete: government schools prepare the souls of men for subservience and dependency, and the progressive intelligentsia churn out attractive demagogues to appeal to this forcibly debased population's need for a provider.  Eventually, all that is preserved of the history of modern liberty will be the veneer of democracy masking the tyrannical structure beneath, as an emasculated humanity "freely chooses" its own slave masters.

Daren Jonescu

Source: http://www.americanthinker.com/2013/02/the_endgame_for_the_destruction_of_the_united_states.html

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

Israel and the Sad History of Jewish Property Rights

by Benjamin Manaster


 

After reading Jan Gross’s “Golden Harvest,” the Polish historian’s ground breaking study of the Holocaust, I began to understand what for so long had perplexed me — how it is that so many people feel impelled to weigh in on the affairs of Israel and the Jews.    While murder and mayhem remains a constant in the world, no other nation attracts so much critical attention.  (The United Nations has passed far more resolutions with respect to the state of Israel than the rest of the world combined.) And in a remarkable display of moral hubris, the heirs and descendants of those who extinguished their Jewish populations in the forties have felt themselves entitled to render moral judgment on the survivors and their progeny.

Jews for millennia were spurned as Christ-killers and heretics by Church and Mosque respectively and denied standing in the communities where they lived.  While rejecting Judaism itself, the Christian Church laid claim to the Jewish Bible, which it annexed, abridged, and renamed the “Old Testament.”  And over time the Christian world came to regard as patrimony whatever else the Jews possessed. (Islam in its ascendance picked up where Christianity left off.) To this day the mainstream Protestant churches in America stand foursquare with Fatah and Hamas, averring the Palestinian cause and condemning Israel.  Jew killing has never been a moral problem for them, but the Jewish claim to the land of Israel disturbs them deeply.

Landless for two thousand years, dependant on the reticence of peoples ill-disposed toward them, Jews survived precariously, lorded over by gentile “hosts” in societies that were variously hostile.  When so inclined, their hosts would confiscate their property, issuing and enforcing decrees against them. Subject to the will and whim of others, Jews remained dependant on their sufferance and largesse.  As tenant farmers and as tradesmen, they owned only what was allotted them, allotments that could be reduced or removed, dispossessing them at will.  At times dispossession would encompass their very existence – witness the Crusades, the Inquisition, innumerable pogroms, and, ultimately, the Shoah.   A sense of entitlement seems to have passed into the DNA of formerly host societies, and continues in altered form until this day – e.g., the violent hostility of the Arab/Persian world which remains at war with Israel and the turpitude of Western nations who support or excuse it.    Even in our own time, Europeans afford themselves a privileged position with respect to Jewish interests, threatening and cajoling Israel to redistribute its property to its enemies.

Financially reliant on petro-dollars, the West in its cupidity has chosen to appease the Arabs and support them in their conflict with Israel, no matter that Arab hatred of the Christian West runs second only to their Jew hatred.  Islam’s jihadist ambitions and its utter rejection of a Jewish or Christian presence in the Middle East are inconvenient truths suppressed to win favor with the Arabs for their oil money.

But in spite of their great wealth, Arab societies are in a shambles, and, who better to blame for it than Jews?  At the heart of the Arab-Israeli conflict are generations of impoverished refugees living shiftless lives on United Nations handouts for more than sixty years.  They are portrayed as victims, no more responsible for themselves than children.  (A comparable number of Middle Eastern Jews fled persecution in their home countries and found refuge in Israel where they were absorbed and integrated into the fabric of the country.)  The wealthy Arabs states, without the least diminution in their lavish lifestyle, could have transformed the condition of their poor relations but chose instead to “drive the Jews into the sea.” Oil rich Arabia dwarfs Israel physically and economically, but it is Israel that is held responsible for Arab poverty, just as Jews for centuries were held responsible for crises in the West.  The “Zionist Entity” with its “settlements” is the moral culprit, and justice demands that, “like a cancer,” it be cut out. The benighted ways and terroristic activities of the Arabs are excused or rationalized away.  Israel’s refusal to cede its heartland is “the main obstacle to peace.”

A nomadic people, Arabs for centuries moved hither and yon throughout the Middle East.  Only with the arrival of the British and the development of a Jewish homeland did some claim an identity related to the sparsely populated area called “Palestine,” originally a Roman appellation.  The wealthy Arab states, which deflect dissent by inveighing against Israel, decry the suggestion that a place for their brethren could be found elsewhere in the vast land mass of the Middle East.

From his research, Gross learned that the nations (primarily Poland in his work but all of Europe by implication) regarded the existential situation of the Jews as theirs to determine.    Those to whom Jews were required to answer, be they German or Pole or Russian or Ukrainian or Italian or Greek or Spanish or Turk (to name some of the more significant actors in their long and tragic history), could deny them acceptance and remove whatever security they enjoyed.  Indeed, their status could be altered at will, even when they had been living in a locale for centuries.  Whatever the Jews possessed could be taken and they themselves sent packing.  Without moral or legal standing, their possessions could be absorbed as common property.  The host giveth, the host taketh.

Gross illustrates this point with examples from the war years in Poland where Jews were often blackmailed by their so called protectors – Poles who, for their own reasons, hid them.   According to his research, extortion for safe keeping was not at all exceptional.  The major motivation of “benefactors” was to gain access to the hidden property of Jewish victims.  (It was an axiom of belief that even the most impoverished of Jews had hidden away riches.)  And when Jews resisted their demands, their Polish protectors took umbrage — threatened them with violence or betrayal to the Germans.  Since the Jews were doomed and defenseless, their stubborn hold out was denying Poles their due.  Polish Jews were favoring the Germans over their fellow countrymen.  And, for many Europeans, Jewish “intransigence” is a source of consternation to this day.  They are much displeased when “shitty little Israel” will not jump at their command.

Of course, not all Europeans are hostile and certainly the majority of the American people hold Israel in high esteem — a loyal friend who shares their deepest values.  But Europeans generally, as well as Arab sympathizers in this country, demand that Judea (from which the Jews derive their name) and Samaria — lands documented in the holy books of both Judaism and Christianity, and recorded in the annals of history as theirs for three thousand years — be surrendered to their enemy. For its recalcitrance, Israel is threatened with economic reprisals and denounced in international forums.  Some Europeans regard the very existence of Israel as an injustice — an insult to their moral sensibilities.  They embrace the Arab narrative with respect to “Palestine,” a narrative that denies the historic connection of Jews to their ancient land. Wars and mass murders committed by the Arabs give them no pause.   Like Poles, Ukrainians, and Baltic people in the forties, so-called peace organizers support these self-confessed killers and organize public protests on their behalf.  Jews must surrender the land, i.e. the real property of their people.  Refusal, their critics claim, is pointless.  Surrender is inevitable.  Israel will perish if it does not give way.  (They know what’s best for Jews.  They always have.)   The land in question, including much of Jerusalem and its environs, will be redistributed to “displaced Arabs” who have been dealt a perceived injustice.  Under certain circumstances, Jews might be permitted to retain a small portion of their ill-gotten gain.  (When a gain is Jewish, it is ill-gotten by definition.)

In the star chamber of world politics, the privileges of ownership are available to some and not others — Israel in particular.  Its de-legitimization by the Left, abetted often by Jewish leftists, fits well with the Left’s disparagement of property rights in general.  Arab failure, in repeated attempts, to destroy Israel and rid the region of its Jewish presence elicits their sympathy.  Immersed in relativism and empathetic to all forms of failure, they accept Palestinian Arab claims ipso facto and dismiss those of the Israelis.   Israel’s improbable success and contributions to the world at large make it all the more troubling in their eyes.  Though the existential threat to it from Iran grows by the day, it fails to arouse their concern.   Jewish tragic history has been relegated to a footnote and deemed no longer relevant, Jewish survival a parochial anomaly with no place on their “universal” agenda.  The success of capitalist Israel, thriving in the face of worldwide opposition, adds insult to the injury suffered by the Arabs.  For the Left, pacifism, gay marriage and unlimited abortion occupy the moral high ground.  Jewish land is an oxymoron, a Zionist pipedream, internationally condemned to requisition and redistribution by the United Nations.  Alas, the “holy land” belongs neither to Jew nor Arab, but is the common property of any and all people.


Benjamin Manaster

Source: http://frontpagemag.com/2013/benjamin-manaster/israel-and-the-sad-history-of-jewish-property-rights/

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

The Ahmadinejad—Azhar Row Escalates

by Waleed Abdul Rahman


Cairo, Asharq Al-Awsat—Statements by Ahmed Mousavi, Iranian presidential adviser and Director of the Haj and Pilgrimage Organization (HMO), on President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s recent visit to Cairo provoked serious controversy in Egypt earlier this week. Mousavi was talking about the contentious meeting that took place between Iranian President Ahmadinejad and Al-Azhar Grand Sheikh Ahmed Al-Tayeb against the backdrop of the 12th Organization of the Islamic Cooperation (OIC) Conference in Cairo.


Mousavi’s statements were published on Iran’s Fars News Agency’s Arabic language website on Wednesday under the headline “Unpublished details on the president’s discussions with Al-Azhar professors.” It contained a different account of the contentious meeting to the one reported in the Egyptian press between the Iranian president and Al-Azhar Grand Sheikh, and the equally difficult press conference that followed this closed-door meeting.

Fars News Agency quoted Mousavi as saying, “Following the end of the Iranian delegation’s meeting with the Al-Azhar Grand Sheikh, the Iranian president had not been scheduled to hold a press conference.”

The Iranian presidential adviser, who accompanied Ahmadinejad on the Cairo trip, revealed, “When we left the meeting we were confronted by a crowd of journalists. I was standing next to the president during the press conference in case he needed any translation . . . During the press conference I felt that everything was orchestrated and there were those who wanted to reveal what was discussed during the Al-Azhar meeting in order to embarrass the president.”

Al-Azhar issued an official statement yesterday responding to Mousavi’s allegations. The statement read, “Al-Azhar has a single viewpoint and discourse and transparency is our guide. The allegation that this press conference was a surprise is not correct, and the Iranian chief protocol office or ambassador could have acted to clarify the nature of this press conference to the journalists. This is the business of the Iranian delegation, and Al-Azhar, which is well aware of the rights of guests and Islamic manners, has nothing to do with this.”

Iranian complaints regarding the press conference seem to focus on the person of Al-Azhar spokesman Sheikh Hassan El-Shafei, who represented Grand Sheikh Al-Tayeb. However, the Al-Azhar statement stressed that “The meeting took place with absolute sincerity and transparency and the press conference took place in the same spirit and President Ahmadinejad shook Dr. Hassan El-Shafei’s hand.”

However Mousavi opined that this press conference was an attempt to raise the issue of Sunni—Shiite problems and the Syrian crisis, adding “this led us to threaten to walk out of the press conference if contentious issues were raised in public.”

The Al-Azhar statement revealed, “The Iranian president expressed a desire to visit Al-Azhar and meet with Grand Sheikh Dr. Ahmed Al-Tayeb and a group of senior scholars. Following the meeting the visiting president and his entourage, including the chief protocol officer, were told that the Grand Sheikh does not take part in press conferences and that his senior adviser, Hassan El-Shafei, would be representing him. Both the chief protocol officer and the president accepted this and they—the Iranian delegation and El-Shafei—went to the press conference together.”

Asharq Al-Awsat attempted to contact members of Al-Azhar’s Senior Scholars committee, but they refused to comment on Mousavi’s allegations.

A source within Al-Azhar, speaking to Asharq Al-Awsat on the condition of anonymity, revealed the real reason behind the Iranian delegation’s anger. The source said, “The Iranian President resented Dr. Hassan El-Shafei’s criticism of Iran’s desire to spread Shiism in Egypt.”

He added, “Ahmadinejad and El-Shafei entered a private conversation and the Al-Azhar Grand Sheikh’s adviser spoke candidly, saying: We feel sadness about what we always hear regarding insults towards the Companions of the Prophet and the mothers of the believers and this is something that we completely reject.’”

The source revealed that El-Shafei criticized Tehran’s desire to promote Shiism in Egypt, characterizing Egypt as a historical “bastion of Sunni Islam.”

The Al-Azhar source also informed Asharq Al-Awsat, “El-Shafei continued his strong words until Ahmadinejad interrupted him in Arabic, saying: We agreed on unity and fraternity.”

He said, “The real reason for the Iranian president’s anger is his objection to the statement issued by Al-Azhar which was published in local and international media outlets . . . this is the same statement that was read out by El-Shafei and which included the points of contention raised by the Grand Sheikh during his meeting with Ahmadinejad.”

The Al-Azhar source added, “This should have been a closed-door meeting with nobody knowing what was discussed. Some have described these points of contention as the ‘four no’s', namely non-interference in Gulf affairs, including respecting Bahrain as a sisterly Arab state, rejecting Shiite expansionism in Sunni states, putting an end to the bloodshed in Syria and ensuring that it becomes safe and secure, and granting the Sunnis in Iran their complete rights.”

The source also revealed that Ahmadinejad was angered by the number of satellite television channels present immediately after his meeting with the Al-Azhar Grand Sheikh, adding that the Iranian delegation was not expecting to hold such a large press conference. The Al-Azhar source claimed that Ahmadinejad thought that his meeting with Al-Tayeb would be followed by a small-scale press conference where the talk would focus on Egyptian – Iranian relations.

Following this contentious meeting and press conference at Al-Azhar, Ahmadinejad visited Cairo’s Al-Hussein mosque where he was confronted by a number of Egyptian and Syrian protesters, of of whom attempting to hit him with a shoe.

However Mousavi told Fars News, “I and other members of the delegation did not see anybody trying to throw a shoe (at Ahmadinejad), but we enjoyed a standing ovation from the Egyptians during our visit of some districts such as the Ras Al Hussein district.”

He added, “The only protester we saw was one reporter at a gathering at the Iranian embassy where Ahmadinejad was present, however this is normal.”

The Iranian presidential adviser stressed, “In any case, the Iranian delegation’s visit to Egypt was very useful and constructive.” He emphasized, “In my point of view, the message of the Islamic Republic of Iran reached the ears of the Egyptian people during our visit.”



Waleed Abdul Rahman

Source: http://www.asharq-e.com/news.asp?section=1&id=32969

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.

Iranian Terror Plots Against Israelis Exposed in Nigeria, Cyprus

by Amir Mizroch and News Agencies

The two disrupted terror plots are the latest in a string of attacks, some foiled, others not, hatched by Iran against Israeli targets around the globe, including in India, Bulgaria, Thailand, Kenya and Azerbaijan • Hezbollah agents use Australian, Canadian, Swedish passports to travel in Europe.

The attack in Burgas, Bulgaria. Are similar attacks in the making in Cyprus?

Photo credit: AFP 

Two Iranian-backed terror cells were exposed in Nigeria and Cyprus this week, shedding more light on Iran's global terrorist activities against Israel and other Western targets.

The two disrupted terror plots are the latest in a string of plots, some foiled, others not, hatched by Iranians against Israeli targets around the globe, including in India, Bulgaria, Thailand, Kenya and Azerbaijan. 

Nigeria's secret police said Wednesday they broke up a terrorist group backed by "Iranian handlers" who wanted to assassinate a former military ruler and gather intelligence about locations frequented by Americans and Israelis.

The State Security Service, responsible for domestic spying in Africa's most populous nation, offered no details about who controlled and bankrolled the group. However, it said it had arrested three suspected terrorists, including the group's leader, before they could launch attacks.

The leader's "lieutenants successfully conducted surveillance and gathering relevant data ... [for] possible attacks," secret police spokeswoman Marilyn Ogar said, reading from a statement. "He personally took photographs of the Israeli culture center in Ikoyi, Lagos, which he sent to his handlers."

The service identified the leader as Abdullahi Mustaphah Berende, a 50-year-old leader of a local Shiite sect in Ilorin. Ogar said Berende was arrested along with two other suspected members, while another remained at large.

Berende first traveled to Iran in 2006 and studied at an Islamic university, said Ogar. He later returned in 2011 and learned how to use Kalashnikov assault rifles and pistols, as well as making and detonating homemade explosives, she said.

Ogar identified high-level targets of the group as former military ruler Ibrahim Babangida and former Sultan of Sokoto Ibrahim Dasuki, an important Islamic leader in Nigeria. The group also conducted surveillance on USAID, the U.S. Peace Corps and other targets, she said.

Berende also received some $30,000 in cash to fund the group's planned operations.

Ogar did not take questions, nor did she elaborate on the statement. It remains unclear how close the group was to actually making any attack.

Nigeria, home to more than 160 million people, is largely divided into a Christian south and a Muslim north. Nigeria's Muslims are predominantly Sunni, though there is a Shiite community in the country. Iran has backed Shiite groups in Nigeria in the past.

Iran has previously been involved in police actions in Nigeria. In 2010, authorities at Lagos' Apapa Port found a hidden shipment of 107 mm artillery rockets, rifle rounds and other weapons from Iran. The shipment was supposedly bound for Gambia. A Nigerian and an Iranian with alleged ties to Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps face criminal charges over the shipment.

Meanwhile, a man being tried on allegations that he planned attacks on Israeli tourists in Cyprus has admitted to being a member of Hezbollah and staking out locations frequented by Israelis, his lawyer said Wednesday. 

Lawyer Antonis Georgiades said that Hossam Taleb Yaacoub, a dual Swedish-Lebanese citizen traveling on a Swedish passport, told a court in Cyprus that he had come to the country on business with no plan to harm anyone. But Yaacoub, 24, also admitted that an unidentified man in Lebanon, where Hezbollah is based, gave him the "mission" of recording flight arrivals and bus routes of Israeli tourists and checking out a hospital parking lot.

Yaacoub's admissions follow accusations that Hezbollah was behind the July 2012 bombing in Burgas, Bulgaria, that killed five Israeli tourists and a local driver. Authorities in Cyprus have been reluctant to link the Cyprus case to the attack in Bulgaria, but both have fed concerns about terror activity in Europe. According to reports, the Hezbollah terror cell in Burgas used Australian and Canadian passports to travel into and out of Europe. 

Georgiades said Yaacoub acted alone in Cyprus and that instructions had been given to him "in complete secrecy" by a man whose face he had not seen. The lawyer said that while his client's actions might raise suspicions, there was no hard proof that Yaacoub had been planning an attack.

Cyprus police arrested Yaacoub last July, several days before the Bulgarian bombing.

Yaacoub pleaded not guilty to eight charges, including conspiracy and consent to commit a criminal offense and participation in a criminal organization. According to police, Yaacoub initially faced 17 terrorism and terrorism-related charges, but prosecutors dropped any reference to terrorism in the new charges without explanation.

According to notes explaining the charges, prosecutors say Yaacoub knowingly conspired with others to "abduct a person for the purpose of subjecting him to harm or attacking him to cause grievous bodily harm" and was prepared to carry out missions around the world on the orders of others against Israeli citizens.

Yaacoub is alleged to have carried out his surveillance and recording of movements between November 2011 and January 2012, and in the first week of July 2012.

The European Union, of which Cyprus is a member, has not formally designated Hezbollah as a terrorist organization and has resisted pressure from the U.S. and Israel to do so, arguing that such a move could destabilize the fragile government in Lebanon and contribute to instability in the Middle East.

The support of Hezbollah, a powerful political and guerrilla Shiite Muslim movement that is armed and funded by Iran, is vital to the authority of Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati.

Meanwhile, the Persian Gulf kingdom of Bahrain has accused Iran's Revolutionary Guard of setting up a militant cell to assassinate public figures in Bahrain and attack its airport and government buildings.

Bahraini authorities said on Sunday they had arrested eight Bahrainis in the group, with links to Iran, Iraq and Lebanon.

The kingdom, base for the U.S. Navy's Fifth Fleet, has been in political turmoil since protests erupted there in 2011, led by majority Shiite Muslims demanding an end to the Sunni monarchy's political domination, and full powers for parliament.

Bahrain has accused Shiite Iran of fueling the unrest, an accusation Tehran has consistently denied.

Amir Mizroch and News Agencies

Source: http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_article.php?id=7453

Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.