LCCC ENGLISH DAILY NEWS BULLETIN

LCCC ENGLISH DAILY NEWS BULLETIN
August 29/12

Bible Quotation for today/
1 Corinthians 13/1-13/ Love/"1 If I speak with the languages of men and of angels, but don’t have love, I have become sounding brass, or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy, and know all mysteries and all knowledge; and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but don’t have love, I am nothing. If I dole out all my goods to feed the poor, and if I give my body to be burned, but don’t have love, it profits me nothing. Love is patient and is kind; love doesn’t envy. Love doesn’t brag, is not proud, doesn’t behave itself inappropriately, doesn’t seek its own way, is not provoked, takes no account of evil; doesn’t rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. 8 Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will be done away with. Where there are various languages, they will cease. Where there is knowledge, it will be done away with. For we know in part, and we prophesy in part; but when that which is complete has come, then that which is partial will be done away with. 11 When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I felt as a child, I thought as a child. Now that I have become a man, I have put away childish things. 12 For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I will know fully, even as I was also fully known. But now faith, hope, and love remain—these three. The greatest of these is love.

Latest analysis, editorials, studies, reports, letters & Releases from miscellaneous sources
A Disturbing Event, The American Conservative Union Embraces an Islamist/by Raymond Ibrahim/FrontPage Magazine/August 28/12
Tripoli’s permanent ordeal/By:Hazem Saghiyeh/Now Lebanon/August 28/12

Iran forced to backtrack on guided nuclear tour for NAM leaders and Ban
DEBKAfile Exclusive Report August 28, 2012/
Tehran was forced to eat crow and backtrack on its ploy for winning international recognition for its nuclear program by showing Non-Aligned Summit leaders and UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon around its nuclear sites. The tour was planned for Wednesday, Aug. 29. It would have been a mockery of US-promoted nuclear diplomacy, International Atomic Energy Agency’s criticism and Israeli threats by circumventing them all to claim recognition of its nuclear program by the 120-member NAM and the UN Secretary in person.
However, debkafile reports that Washington intervened Tuesday and “advised” NAM participants as well as Ban to turn Tehran down on its nuclear tour, which was to have included the suspected nuclear-related explosives testing lab at Parchin. “It is the IAEA that should have been given access to Parchin,” said a Western diplomat in Vienna.
Iran’s foreign ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast Tuesday, Aug. 28, consequently contradicted the Dep. Foreign Minister’s offer to show Non-Aligned Organization’s leaders meeting in Tehran around its nuclear installations and the Fars official news agency’s announcement Aug. 25 of the tour.
debkafile’s Iranian and intelligence sources report exclusively that Tuesday, Iran’s leaders were still arguing over which NAM leaders to invite for the nuclear tour and whether to focus on a single nuclear site or split the visitors up into small groups to tour several installations. Revolutionary Guards commander Gen. Ali Jafary and the head of the Nuclear Energy Commission Dr. Fereydoun Abbasi Davani argue the case of showcasing (the presumably sanitized) Parchin to the entire group and the UN Secretary to impress upon them the peaceful nature of Iran’s nuclear program. Majlis Speaker Ali Larijani and Foreign Minister Ali-Akbar Salehi urge splitting the visitors up into groups for going around uranium enrichment facilities in Natanz and Isfahan, the reactor at Bushehr and also Parchin. A comprehensive tour would win all parts of the nuclear program international validity, they say.
It will be up to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khameini, as usual in the Islamic Republic of Iran, to pick sides. Some sources in Tehran say he is considering leading the nuclear tour in person, which would be a rare public appearance for him at an international forum. debkafile’s Washington sources report that Iran’s maneuvers catch US Undersecretary of State Wendy Sherman in the middle of a new low-profile bid to solicit the support of Moscow and Middle East powers for fresh US-Iranian dialogue to resolve the nuclear controversy. The Obama administration will only be able to watch helplessly as its unceasing effort to solve the Iranian nuclear crisis by international diplomacy is confronted with dozens of world leaders and the UN Secretary touring the sites forbidden to the nuclear watchdog. It will also be a nasty smack in the face for Prime Minister Netanyahu who asked Ban Ki-moon not to attend the NAM summit in Tehran and was snubbed.

Israeli Vice Prime Minister Moshe Ya'alon: Iran must decide - nuclear bomb or survival
Gilad Morag Published: 08.28.12, 20:10 / Israel News /During memorial ceremony for Burgas terror victims, vice premier says world must fight 'radical Islamist terror funded by Tehran'
"Iran must not be allowed to develop nuclear weapons. We must act together, determinedly and firmly, with all the means at our disposal in order to (achieve this goal)," Vice Prime Minister Moshe Ya'alon said Tuesday during a commemoration ceremony for the victims of the terror attack in Burgas, Bulgaria.
The ceremony, which took place in Sofia's main synagogue opened with a moment of silence for the victims. Bulgaria's president and the Israeli ambassador were among the dignitaries who attended the event. Jewish community leaders and the bereaved families were also on hand. The enlightened western nations must join hands and fight the radical Islamist terror," Ya'alon said while accusing Iran of funding and arming the terrorists.This terror is occasionally carried out by (Iran's) proxy – the murderous Hezbollah organization. Its objective is to destroy western culture, expand the Islamic revolution and wipe Israel off the map," the vice premier told the ceremony. "The Iranian leaders are serious in their intentions. This is why they are developing a military nuclear program, which has reached very advanced stages, and they can use this deadly weaponry – also through terror attacks in different locations across the globe," he said. "We mustn't sweep the reality under the carpet. We should impose harsher sanctions and not be under the illusion that we are dealing with a conventional regime. We mustn't take any option off the table. And, before it is too late, we must force the violent, tyrannical Iranian regime to face a dilemma: A bomb or survival." Addressing the terror attack, Ya'alon said "dozens were targeted only for being Jewish and Israeli. Each and every one of them was an entire universe – a life story cut short."
"The murderers will reach every corner of the planet and will not hesitate to murder whoever comes in their path. Other than wanting to kill without distinction, they also try to sabotage the relations between Israel and the world's enlightened countries, but they will not succeed," he added.

Bkirki Rejects Proportional Representation Based on 13 Districts
Naharnet /28 August 2012/Bkirki spokesman Walid Ghayyad revealed on Tuesday that the seat of the Maronite church rejects the new proportional representation draft law that was approved by the cabinet earlier this month. “Bkirki rejects the draft law that divided the country into 13 districts because all the Lebanese failed to agree on it,” Ghayyad told al-Joumhouria newspaper.
He pointed out that Bkirki aims at reaching an electoral law that fairly represents all the Lebanese. “The Bkirki committee will continue to exert efforts to find the appropriate proposal which would be applicable” and approved by all parties, Ghayyad noted. The committee that is made up of the four major Christian parties – the Free Patriotic Movement, the Lebanese Forces, the Phalange and Marada movement - was formed under Patriarch Beshara al-Rahi to draft a law that guarantees the best representation for Christians. However, it failed to agree on an appropriate proposal. The government’s draft-law that is based on proportional representation and 13 electoral districts was also criticized by al-Mustaqbal movement and the Progressive Socialist Party. Concerning relations between Bkirki and the regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad, Ghayyad stressed that “there has been no direct contacts between the two.” He denied that Bkirki has relations with the regime “as Bkirki doesn’t go beyond the state and holds no personal relations with foreign countries.” Ghayyad told the daily that Christians in Syria are experiencing similar sufferings as the rest of the people. Many members of Syria's Christian clergy have been supportive of Assad, a member of the minority Alawite community, because of concerns that Islamists could take power in the multi-faith country.
Around 7.5 percent of Syria's 20 million inhabitants are Christian.

Samaha’s Bodyguard, Driver Testify in Bombings Plot
Naharnet/ 28 August 2012/Military Examining Magistrate Judge Riyad Abu Ghida heard on Tuesday the testimonies of ex-Minister Michel Samaha's bodyguard and driver over the bombing attacks plot.
Bodyguard Ali Mallah and driver Fares Barakat, who were arrested for questioning on Aug. 9 and later released, testified to Abu Ghida on the transfer of explosives from Syria in an attempt to carry out bombings in northern Lebanon. Samaha’s lawyer Sakhr al-Hashem met with the former minister at the headquarters of the military police. Meanwhile, Abu Ghida summoned al-Joumhouria newspaper’s editorial director Charles Jabbour and manager Khalil Abu Antoun to hear their testimonies as witnesses for publishing the transcript of Samaha’s confessions.
But the session was postponed to next Tuesday. Samaha was arrested by the Internal Security Forces Intelligence Branch during a raid on his house on Aug. 9. The former minister, Syrian National Security Bureau head Ali Mamlouk and a Syrian officer identified as Brig. Gen. Adnan were accused on Aug. 11 of plotting to assassinate political and religious figures in Lebanon and carry out terrorist attacks.

Political Prisoner Returns after 27 Years, Confirms More Lebanese Held in Syria
Naharnet /28 August 2012/The recent release of a Lebanese man who had been detained in Syria in the past 27 years brought back to the spotlight the issue of the Lebanese who went missing during Lebanon’s 1975-90 Civil War. The media identified the man as 49-year-old Yaacoub Chamoun, who was seized in the eastern city of Zahle, and later moved to several Syrian prisons during his incarceration, including the notorious Mezze, Saydnaya and Tadmor prisons. Chamoun was also placed in solitary confinement for four years. He was later transferred to a civilian prison and was able to secure his release by paying millions in cash through a powerful Syrian lawyer. The release of Chamoun in July proved that Syrian authorities were still detaining Lebanese political prisoners despite claims that they had set all of them free. The Assad regime has long denied holding any prisoners of conscience, but on four different occasions between 1976 and 2000 has released Lebanese who had been held in Syrian prisons. The man confirmed to LBCI TV network that there are Lebanese political prisoners in Syrian jails and said he had encountered five of them but he refused to name them for fears that the revelation would do them harm. The head of the committee of Lebanese political detainees in Syrian jails, Ali Abu Dehen, told An Nahar daily that a former prisoner had been sent to meet Chamoun and inquire him about other Lebanese. But the committee failed in getting any additional information , Abu Dehen said. The civil war has claimed the lives of at least 150,000 people. For over 21 years, more than 600 families -- Lebanese and Palestinian -- have demanded authorities reveal the fate of the thousands believed to have disappeared at the hands of Syrian troops who entered Lebanon shortly after the outbreak of the war.

Sanctions, UN reform top Tehran summit agenda
August 28, 2012 /Condemnation of "unilateral" actions – particularly sanctions on Iran and other nations – and a demand for greater say in UN decision-making dominated talks in Tehran on Tuesday preparing for a Non-Aligned summit later this week. Foreign ministers from Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) states were holding two days of discussions to prepare the ground for the summit, which will gather dozens of heads of state and government on Thursday and Friday. Other issues to be covered included a call for the creation of a Palestinian state based on 1967 borders, and an appeal for nuclear disarmament, particularly in the Middle East, as a path to world peace, according to draft documents before the ministers. Combating terrorism, and upholding human rights and development were also included. A working document made available on Iran's official NAM website said one of the general principles being upheld was strengthening solidarity with NAM members "living under colonial or alien domination or foreign occupation, and with those experiencing external threats of use of force, acts of aggression or unilateral coercive measures."
Elsewhere, it detailed those themes, for instance calling on members to refuse to follow "unilateral economic sanctions" on NAM states.
More than 50 foreign ministers were involved in the discussions, according to Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Ramin Mehmanparast. They were building on work done in the two preceding days by lower-ranking officials and experts. "Today we are at a time in which, without exaggeration, international relations are quite sensitive," Egypt's deputy foreign minister, Ramzy Ezzeldin Ramzy, said as he opened the ministerial meeting before officially handing over the rotating NAM presidency to Iran. "The meeting is providing a more advanced look at [global] developments by reinforcing cooperation among developing countries and international organizations," he said. Iran is portraying this week's summit as a blow to US-led efforts to isolate it internationally. It is expected to brandish any summit agreements slamming sanctions or affirming a right to nuclear energy as validation of its position in its worsening stand-off with Washington over its atomic activities. The NAM is a 120-member organization founded in 1961, at the height of the Cold War, by nations considering themselves independent of the US-led Western bloc or the then-Soviet Union. It represents nearly two-thirds of the UN's 193 member states, accounting for much of the developing world. It has also generally taken on an anti-US bent, as evidenced by the fact Russian and Chinese delegations – but no US ones – were invited to observe the Tehran summit, and the language used in documents that often criticizes US policies on NAM members Iran, Cuba and “Palestine”. Overall, the NAM seeks greater accountability from the UN Security Council and a greater weight for the UN General Assembly – where it is strongly represented – in making global decisions. UN chief Ban Ki-moon will be attending the Tehran summit, in a customary observer role, despite criticism from the United States and Israel.-AFP

Tripoli’s permanent ordeal
Hazem Saghiyeh, August 27, 2012
Any observer of the history of major crises since Lebanon’s independence in 1943 will note that Tripoli has always been the greatest stage for these crises and one of its greatest victims.
National explosive situations often started in the capital of the North and were often resumed in it after smoldering in other Lebanese regions.
This was often justified by Tripoli’s geographical location, as it is close to Syria and lies to the south of the Palestinian refugee camps of Beddawi and al-Bared. This was added to its sectarian structure based on a substantial Christian and Alawite presence along with the Sunni majority. One must not forget, of course, the poverty characterizing the city, especially in its inner neighborhoods, which expressed their anger and tension buildup on many occasions. However, there is something to Tripoli that is seldom mentioned and that makes it an incubator for sectarian, national and social flare-ups: This is the crisis relationship between Tripoli and Lebanon, which kept the city caught between narrow civil and sectarian loyalty on the one hand, and broader Arabist and Islamist trends on the other hand.
We know that then-Tripoli leader Abdel Hamid Karami was the last Lebanese politician to acknowledge the “Lebanese entity” and that Beirut and Mount Lebanon politicians always dealt with Tripoli as a “less” Lebanese foreign body. In turn, elder Tripoli natives remember an incident of extreme significance, which illustrates the intricate relation between narrow subnational loyalty and supranational ideological rhetoric. The clearest expression of how the “nationalist issue” was exploited in order to further local designs lies in what happened on March 4, 1947 in the city. On that day, Tripoli native Fawzi al-Qaweqji came to the city from his exile in Germany. Qaweqji had played a key role in the 1936-39 events in Palestine and the 1941 events in Iraq before establishing the “Salvation Army”, which called for honoring him as a “nationalist hero.” However, the conflict between the Karami and Moqaddam families, which competed to honor him, led to 18 people being killed and 48 others wounded.
This prompted the Syrian regime to use Tripoli and some of its inhabitants to further its schemes, much like the Palestinian resistance had done before.
It is worth mentioning that most of the destruction that can still be seen in the city results from the 1980s war between Hafez Al-Assad and Yasser Arafat.
In the midst of this mayhem, the “city” receded in favor or neighborhoods and alleys. Traces of progress and development that occurred in Tripoli between 1943 and 1975 disappeared in favor of signs of retardation, the most potent example of which was Sheikh Saeed Shaaban. Tripoli will always sit on glowing embers as long as its inhabitants do not settle this issue once and for all. This is far more than a right political position, such as supporting the Syrian revolution, or a wrong one, such as opposing it. It is an essential question that transcends all eras and positions.
**This article is a translation of the original, which first appeared on the NOW Arabic site on Sunday August 26, 2012

Syrian army pounds eastern districts of Damascus
August 28, 2012 /Syria's army pounded the eastern belt of Damascus before dawn on Tuesday after opening a new front east of the capital, a watchdog said, adding that 60 people were killed in the province the previous day. The violence followed a bloody Monday in which 190 people – 116 civilians, 40 rebels and 34 soldiers – were killed across Syria, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.The Britain-based watchdog reported fierce shelling overnight on the capital's eastern neighborhoods of Zamlaka, Qaboon, Jubar and Ein Tarma.
On Monday, rebels from the Free Syrian Army claimed to have downed a military helicopter in the district of Qaboon during heavy shelling and fierce fighting that also engulfed nearby Jubar as well as several towns outside the capital. After launching a major offensive on the southwestern belt of Damascus last week which, according to the opposition, included a massacre in the town of Daraya, a rebel commander told AFP that the army's new focus was the Ghuta area in the countryside east of Damascus. The Syrian Revolution General Council, an activist network on the ground, said that regime forces on Tuesday shelled the eastern suburbs of Harasta and Irbin.It reported shells being fired from Harasta to the nearby town of Irbin as helicopters hovered overhead.
"The sound of explosions prevails in the [Harasta] town center and warplanes are seen over the skyline," the SRGC said, adding that smoke could also be seen rising from the nearby Qaboon district.
Meanwhile, the Observatory reported that another seven unidentified bodies were found in the town of Daraya, southwest of Damascus, while 14 others were discovered elsewhere in the province.
More than 330 bodies have been found since Sunday in Daraya, after President Bashar al-Assad's troops launched a ferocious five-day onslaught of shelling, summary executions and door-to-door raids, according to activists. State media said the operation had "purified terrorist remnants" in Daraya, while pro-government television Al-Dunia said "terrorists" had carried out the killings.
The Observatory says more than 25,000 people have been killed since an uprising against Assad broke out in March last year. The figures are impossible to verify due to restrictions on the media.-AFP

Car blast kills several at Damascus funeral, state TV reports
August 28, 2012/A car bomb killed 12 people at a funeral in the mainly Druze and Christian suburb of Jaramana on the southeastern outskirts of the Syrian capital on Tuesday, state television reported.
"Another 48 people were wounded, many critically, in a terrorist car blast that targeted a funeral procession in Jaramana," it said. "At around 3 pm, a funeral procession was making its way to the cemetery, when a car parked on the side of the road exploded, killing and injuring many people," an army official told AFP. The funeral was held for two supporters of the government of President Bashar al-Assad who were killed in a bomb attack on Monday, the Britain-based Observatory said.
The force of the blast completely destroyed the facade of one building, while others suffered heavy damage, an AFP photographer reported.
State media blamed rebel fighters for the bombing, which came amid an intensified bombardment by government troops of eastern districts of Damascus that shelter some of the Free Syrian Army's best organized battalions. But the opposition Syrian National Council accused Assad's regime of staging the bombing against its own supporters in a bid to divert attention from the killings of hundreds of people during an army assault last week on a largely Sunni Muslim suburb of the capital. "The regime wants to cover up for its massacres," SNC spokesman George Sabra said, alluding to the deaths in the town of Daraya that sparked an international outcry. "It also wants to punish residents of Jaramana—who are of mixed religious backgrounds—for welcoming people who were displaced from nearby towns." Sabra told AFP by telephone "The regime's fingerprints are clear," charged Sabra, himself a Christian. "The regime does not want anyone to welcome refugees from other cities. And it wants to turn the revolution... into a bloody civil war fought along sectarian lines." Some 80 percent of Syrians are Sunni Muslim, while around 10 percent belong to Assad's Alawite community, five percent are Christian, three percent Druze and one percent Ismaili. The opposition draws much of its support from the Sunni majority, who have borne the brunt of the government's deadly crackdown.-AFP

Cautious calm follows tension in Ain al-Hilweh refugee camp
August 28, 2012 /Cautious calm reigned over the Ain al-Hilweh refugee camp following tension linked to a row earlier in the day, the National News Agency reported on Tuesday. According to the report, the tension came following an armed dispute which led to the injury of former Fatah Commander Mounir al-Maqdah’s bodyguard.Ain al-Hilweh Palestinian refugee camp is situated in the southern Lebanese city of Sidon. -NOW Lebanon

Up to 200,000 Syrians might seek refuge in Turkey, UNHCR says
August 28, 2012 /The office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) on Tuesday said that 200,000 Syrians might seek refuge in Turkey, hours after Ankara warned that it could not host over 100,000 refugees.UNHCR chief spokesperson Melissa Fleming aid that “the increase in the number of Syrians arriving in Turkey has been dramatic,” Reuters reported.
"We are already looking at potentially up to 200,000 and are working with the Turkish government to make the necessary plans," spokesperson Sybella Wilkes told Reuters.
“The figure would include the more than 74,000 Syrian refugees already registered in Turkey, which is building at least five new camps in addition to the existing nine.”
Earlier on Tuesday, a Turkish official told AFP on condition of anonymity that “the Turkish government announced it could handle no more than 100,000 Syrians, and [that Ankara] propose[s] creating safe zones inside Syria to accommodate the fleeing people.”This month has seen mass arrivals from Syria as the fighting has intensified between President Bashar al-Assad's loyalist troops and rebel forces in the northern city of Aleppo, some 50 kilometers south of the border.-NOW Lebanon

Change and Reform bloc: Syrian crisis shouldn’t turn Lebanon into ‘burning arena’
August 28, 2012 /The Change and Reform bloc said after its weekly meeting on Tuesday that Lebanon should not be turned into a “burning arena as a result of the events in Syria.”
“[We] underscore the importance of not turning Lebanon into a burning arena as a result of the events in Syria,” Change and Reform bloc MP Alain Aoun said in a statement issued following the meeting.
The statement also said that its leader MP Michel Aoun had “warned against what has occurred in Tripoli to implicate Lebanon and [its northern city] in Syria’s [crisis].”
Regarding the request to lift the parliamentary immunity of Future bloc MP’s Mouin al-Merhebi, Aoun said that the criticism waged against Justice Minister Shakib Qortbawi was “political.”
“The justice minister forwarded the request to parliament the moment it reached him, since he has got no right to [keep a hold on the issue]… there has been no previous requests [received by Qortbawi] for lifting the immunity of [Merhebi],” he added. The National News Agency reported last week that the parliament’s General Secretariat received a written request from Qortbawi calling for lifting Merhebi’s parliamentary immunity “following a lawsuit filed against him for attacking the Lebanese army.” Earlier in August, Defense Minister Fayez Ghosn signed a lawsuit against Merhebi, which was transferred to the attorney general’s office, according to Al-Akhbar newspaper. The lawsuit was filed by the Lebanese army for fiery statements made by the lawmaker against the military institution.
-NOW Lebanon

Crackdowns on Christians Increase Across Laos
By Ryan Morgan
08/28/2012 Washington, D.C. (International Christian Concern) – International Christian Concern (ICC) has learned that cases of persecution against Lao Christians have steadily increased across the country in 2012. In the first six months of 2012 ICC reported on fifteen separate incidents of Christian persecution in Laos, the same amount reported in all of 2011.
In the most recent incident reported last week, a village church leader in the country’s central Bolikhamsai Province was arrested after local officials became upset with the number of villagers converting to Christianity. The church leader, Mr. Bountheung, was told that he and 300 other villagers must renounce their Christian beliefs “in exchange for the right to continue living in the village.”
Mr. Bountheung was also ordered to sell his home and leave the village within a week. The details are unclear, but it appears that Mr. Bountheung was either unable or unwilling to sell his home and was subsequently arrested.
This latest incident comes on the heels of earlier reports this summer in Savannakhet Province and Laung Namtha Province of Lao Christians being threatened with expulsion and fired by their employers for their religious beliefs.
The crackdown in Savannakhet Province, which derives its name from Savanh Nakhone, or “city of paradise,” also involved the forced closure of at least four churches over the course of several months earlier this year. One of these churches had been operating since the mid-1960’s but was ostensibly shut down for lacking proper building permits, despite the fact that it was constructed ten years before the current Lao government came to power.
Laos, which has earned a reputation among tourists as Southeast Asia’s most “laid-back” nation, has been ruled by the Communist Lao People’s Revolutionary Party since 1975. The Party passed legislation in 2002 (Decree 92) that makes various religious activities legal, but requires government permission to be obtained beforehand. Acquiring such permission can be extremely difficult, if not impossible. Christian leaders report that this law is often used to prevent services from taking place or the construction of new churches.
Despite this, stories have emerged of Lao Christians who remain defiant in the face of government and community pressure to renounce their faith. A report earlier this month described one church leader in Savannakhet Province who responded to official calls to renounce his faith by stating “God is real. When we believe, we are healed from sickness and immediately delivered from the possession of evil spirits…we cannot deny the reality of God’s power.”

Nigerian Government Official Arrested Following Church Attacks
By Jonathan Racho /08/28/2012 Washington, D.C. (International Christian Concern) – Nigerian police arrested a government official after gunmen killed 19 Christian worshippers and two soldiers in the central Nigerian town of Otite, Kogi State on August 6. The police arrested Yahaya Karaku, Special Advisor to the governor of Kogi State, after he was suspected of involvement in an attack at Deeper Life Church. The pastor of the church was among the victims. “I am not surprised by involvement of a government official. There are people in government that are involved in killings of Christians. But their days are numbered. They will be exposed. We are praying,” said a Nigerian church leader in an interview with ICC. The arrest of the government official is another indication of the possible infiltration of radical Muslims in the Nigerian government structure. In his speech at a Nigerian church on January 8, Nigeria’s President Goodluck Jonathan, a Christian, said that his government has been infiltrated by members of Boko Haram.Nigerian Christians have been coming under relentless attacks from members of Boko Haram, the Islamic radical group. This year alone, the radicals have killed over 200 Christians in a series of attacks in northern Nigeria. The group fights to establish an Islamic state throughout Nigeria.

US “understands family's disappointment” in Israel suit
August 28, 2012/The United States said Tuesday that it understood the disappointment of late US activist Rachel Corrie's family after an Israeli court cleared the military of any responsibility for her death.
The United States declined to comment further over the case in its close ally, saying the family had a right to appeal. Corrie was killed by an army bulldozer in 2003 as she tried to stop the demolition of a Palestinian home. "We understand the family's disappointment with the outcome of the trial," State Department spokesperson Victoria Nuland told reporters, saying that US authorities "reiterate our condolences" over the death."Under Israeli law, the family has the right to appeal the verdict, and we've seen reports that they are considering doing that, so we will see how this proceeds going forward," Nuland said. "It's probably not productive to get into the middle of a legal process that may be ongoing," she said. Judge Oded Gershon concluded that the army did not show negligence and that the 23-year-old activist died of "an accident she brought upon herself."The verdict outraged Corrie's family and a British peace activist who witnessed her death first-hand said it was "inconceivable" that the driver of the bulldozer did not see her.-AFP

Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi visit spells cautious Iran-Egypt shift
August 28, 2012 /Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi, by visiting Iran this week, aims to distance himself from three decades of chilly ties and cautiously pursue a more agile diplomacy than his predecessor Hosni Mubarak. Egypt's first Islamist and freely elected president is headed for Tehran to hand over the rotating leadership of the Non-Aligned Movement at a summit on Thursday and Friday.
The visit will last a "few hours," his spokesperson Yassir Ali said, and only summit-related issues will be raised.
"No other topic is expected," he said, ruling out discussions on a resumption of diplomatic relations with Iran, severed after the 1979 Islamic revolution which installed a theocracy opposed to Egypt's peace treaty with Israel. Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi said last week he hoped the two countries would resume diplomatic ties, currently at the level of low-key interest sections in each other's country.
"Morsi's visit will give a big push towards normalization [of] Egyptian-Iranian relations", said Elsayed Amin Shalby, director of the Egyptian Council for Foreign Affairs think-tank.
But "a four-hour visit can't make a breakthrough," he added.
A distinct warming in ties with Tehran would anger the United States, which has been pushing to isolate and sanction the Islamic republic over its controversial nuclear program.
It would also antagonize Sunni monarchies in the Gulf that accuse Iran of trying to destabilize their oil-rich region, and on which Egypt partially relies for aid to revive its battered economy after its 2011 uprising. Morsi himself hails from the Muslim Brotherhood, a Sunni movement which has had an ambivalent stance towards Shiite Iran.
Mubarak, who ruled for three decades before his overthrow in February 2011, positioned himself alongside the United States and other countries hostile to Iran's influence, which extends to the Hamas rulers of Gaza in Egypt's back yard. Before its downfall, Mubarak's government even accused Tehran of trying to destabilize his regime, which gave way after the uprising to military rule and then Morsi's election last June. Morsi appears set on taking a different tack, while sending reassuring messages to the Gulf states. His first foreign visit after his election was to Saudi Arabia, Iran's main rival in the region.
Egypt's diplomatic line will be "more agile and active," leaving behind the "stagnation" under Mubarak's rule, Morsi's spokesperson Ali said before the president left for China en route to Iran.
"We are not in competition with any country," he said. The conflict in Syria, where US- and Gulf-backed rebels are trying to unseat President Bashar al-Assad, Iran's closest regional ally, has given Morsi an opportunity to reach out to Tehran. Tehran has welcomed his proposal of a regional committee to find a solution to the Syrian crisis including Egypt, Iran, Saudi Arabia and Turkey, although Morsi himself has called for Assad to step down."If this group succeeds, Iran would be part of the solution and not the problem," Ali said.-AFP

Syria's non-violent opposition groups seek end of fighting
August 28, 2012 /Some 20 non-violent Syrian opposition parties and movements said in a meeting in Damascus on Tuesday that they seek to establish a democratic regime without resorting to arms.
"We are faced with two sides that use violence, but weapons only lead to attrition," said Raja Nassar, who coordinated the gathering. Syria's 17-month uprising started off as a peaceful revolt, but was faced with such brutal repression that it turned into a bloody armed insurgency against the regime of President Bashar al-Assad. Opposed both to the regime and to the rebel Free Syrian Army, the movements said they were organizing a conference in September to call for "democratic change that preserves the unity of the nation and social peace.""The regime has unleashed almost all its force on the ground, and has been unable to defeat the armed opposition, which for its part has yet to win a single victory," veteran dissident Nasser told journalists. The parties and movements taking part in the gathering are opposed to both the main opposition coalition – the Syrian National Council – and the FSA, which have consistently called for international intervention against the regime. More than 25,000 people have been killed since the outbreak of the revolt in March last year, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.-AFP

Bibi's own "tree limb"
Hussein Ibish , August 28, 2012
Over the past few years it was frequently alleged, not least by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, that the Palestinian leadership had climbed out onto various political “tree limbs.” The implication was that on issues such as the settlement freeze, Palestinian leaders adopted rhetorical positions that were not in keeping with their real strategic options and hadn't allowed themselves sufficient room to climb down. As a consequence, it was suggested, they were stuck with unworkable policies.
But now Netanyahu appears to have climbed out onto a tree limb of his own regarding the Iranian nuclear program. Netanyahu, his Defense Minister, Ehud Barak, and their subordinates have raised the level of rhetoric regarding Iran to the point where they appear to have left themselves with few palatable alternatives.
Israel's military option seems to carry considerably more costs than benefits. The idea that Israel could achieve much on its own, given its limited conventional long-distance firepower, is extremely doubtful. It could certainly do significant damage to the program and set it back by a number of years, but it might also have the counterintuitive effect of redoubling Iranian determination to actually seek a nuclear deterrent. And it might rally Iranians around the otherwise highly unpopular ruling faction.
Under the present circumstances, international support for such a unilateral action, including from the United States, seems virtually nonexistent. An upcoming report from the International Atomic Energy Agency, which is expected to find that Iran has secretly installed hundreds of new centrifuges at an underground enrichment facility near Qom, has only underscored the divisions between Washington and Tel Aviv. Israel claims the report vindicates its dire warnings. By contrast, an unnamed “senior administration official" told the New York Times the United States considers this information to be “not a game changer.” Some of this disagreement can be attributed to the obvious gulf between the American position that Iran must not be allowed to possess a nuclear weapon and the Israeli view that Iran must not allowed to become capable of producing one.
If it were to strike Iran alone—and without prior permission from, and coordination with, the United States—Israel would probably be testing its "special relationship" with the Americans more strongly than at any time in recent decades. The strains would be even greater if the United States found itself drawn into a difficult or protracted conflict with Iran and its proxies, especially if this was widely regarded by American citizens and policymakers as involuntary and premature.
There's always the chance that a limited Israeli strike might draw a limited Iranian response, with both sides seeking to attenuate their behavior in order to keep the Americans out. But even if both sides were to begin with that caution in mind, events could quickly spiral out of control. And there's no guarantee that Iran's reaction would be cautious, given the enormity of the provocation.
For these reasons, a critical mass seems to have formed in Israel against such an attack, including President Shimon Peres, most of the defense and military establishments, and a solid majority of the public.
However, if they decide not to take military action after all their bluster, Netanyahu and Barak could find themselves in the unenviable situation of creating a “paper tiger” impression of Israel, appearing to be a power that speaks loudly but carries a small stick.
Moreover, their alarmist rhetoric has made the development of a workable containment strategy regarding a nuclear Iran very difficult to justify. But this is almost certainly the most intelligent response to a difficult situation. If containment can work with a nuclear North Korea, it can certainly work with Iran. And the dangers of that approach must be weighed against the risks of any unilateral military action.
The Obama administration, too, has created a rhetorical framework that logically culminates in military action if an agreement with Iran cannot be achieved. But the American red line might be one the Iranians can learn to live with—at least for a time—if it takes them to the brink, but not over the line, of nuclear weapons power status. And if they can't—and the United States sticks with its position that it will not tolerate the emergence of a nuclear Iran—unlike Israel, the Americans certainly possess the conventional firepower to severely damage, and not just dent, Iran's nuclear ambitions. In that case, the United States would be acting in its own interests and according to its own timetable, not Israel's.
Netanyahu and Barak could throw the dice by attacking Iran in what would be one of the riskiest gambles in recent history. Or they could accede to everyone else's better judgment. Either way, Israel's leaders have left themselves only a set of options, all of which carry a considerable cost.

A Disturbing Event, The American Conservative Union Embraces an Islamist
by Raymond Ibrahim/FrontPage Magazine
August 27, 2012
http://www.raymondibrahim.com/12197/a-disturbing-event
The conservative movement appears to be at a crossroads in its approach to the threat of Islamic supremacism—not only abroad but at home. Does the emergence of the Muslim Brotherhood as the dominant force of the "Arab Spring" bode ill for America? Or is the Brotherhood merely another "political actor" as the Obama administration would have us believe? Is Huma Abedin, Hillary Clinton's Deputy Chief of Staff, a potential security risk worth investigating, as Representative Michele Bachmann and four conservative congressmen have suggested? Or is the mere raising of this question a witch-hunt, as Senator John McCain and Speaker John Boehner and numerous Democrats maintain?
A few months ago, these questions reached another flashpoint in an unlikely setting. The incident took place at an irregular board meeting of the American Conservative Union, an organization usually intent on keeping wobbly Republicans honest. The rump group in attendance — several key board members told Frontpage they were not even aware the meeting had been called – voted "unanimously" to dismiss long-standing accusations against two ACU board members. The accusations had been made by Center for Security Policy head, Frank Gaffney. Their focus was on the activities of Grover Norquist and Suhail Khan, two prominent ACU board members, whom Gaffney claims are influential agents of Islamist agendas. The ACU's dismissal of Gaffney's claims was contained in a memo written by attorney Cleta Mitchell, who called them "reprehensible" — terms no less damning than McCain's slap down of Michele Bachmann.
Frank Gaffney is a former defense official in the Reagan administration and first made these claims public in 2003 in an article, "A Troubling Influence," which was published on this site. In introducing the article, Frontpage editor David Horowitz acknowledged that Norquist had played an important role in the conservative movement, but also described Gaffney's claims as "the most disturbing that we at frontpagemag.com have ever published." He further characterized them as "the most complete documentation extant of Grover Norquist's activities in behalf of the Islamist Fifth Column."
The Frontpage article documented Norquist's links to supporters of Hamas and other Islamist organizations dedicated to "destroying the American civilization from within" in the words of a Muslim Brotherhood document. These figures included Abdurahman Alamoudi—who is currently serving a lengthy sentence for his involvement in a terrorist plot—and Sami Al-Arian, who was the finance head of Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ), a terrorist organization responsible for over a hundred suicide bombings in the Middle East. Before Alamoudi and Al-Arian were arrested, Norquist and Khan served as key facilitators between them and the Bush White House. Now that both have been convicted of terrorist activities, there can no longer be any doubt that they were working on behalf of America's terrorist enemies.
Among the Norquist-sponsored initiatives furthering the Islamist agenda, according to Gaffney, was his effort to abolish the use of classified national defense intelligence evidence in terrorism cases. Islamist organizations and Norquist himself typically refer to this as "secret" evidence and suggest that the use of it offends the Constitution. But as former U.S. attorney Andrew McCarthy explains, the cases in which it is normally used are immigration proceedings, not criminal prosecutions. Unlike American citizens, aliens do not have the right to be in the United States in the first place, and should not be able to force disclosure of the nation's defense secrets as the price tag for demanding that they leave. Sami Al-Arian was the prime-mover of the "secret evidence" campaign, which he launched to protect his brother-in-law, a member of his terror network, from a pending deportation.
In addition, Gaffney charges, Norquist used his own organization, Americans for Tax Reform, to circulate and promote a letter from Republican Muslims attacking conservatives opposed to the controversial "Ground Zero Mosque." He also campaigned to protect the Iranian regime from sanctions, from its domestic opposition, and from military action against its nuclear program—all the while demanding draconian cuts in U.S. defense spending.
The other subject of Gaffney's concerns is Suhail Khan, a Norquist protégé with longstanding personal and professional ties to a variety of Islamist movements. Khan's father, the late Mahboob Khan, was a prominent member of the Muslim Brotherhood and one of the founders, in the 1960s, of the Muslim Students Association, the cornerstone of the Brotherhood's American infrastructure. As Daniel Greenfield documents in his pamphlet, Muslim Hate Groups on Campus, the Muslim Students Association has been instrumental in indoctrinating young Muslims in Islamist ideology, and has an alarming legacy of senior members—Anwar Awlaki most prominent among them—graduating to positions of prominence in al-Qaeda and other terrorist networks. In the 1980s, Mahboob Khan was instrumental in creating an MSA spinoff, the Islamic Society of North America or ISNA. ISNA became so deeply enmeshed in the funding of Hamas that it was named by federal prosecutors as an unindicted co-conspirator in the trial of the Holy Land Foundation. [For more information on how the Muslim Brotherhood has targeted the United States for subversion, see Robert Spencer's pamphlet, Muslim Brotherhood in America.]
Suhail Khan's mother, Malika Khan, was a close partner in her late husband's work, and is a long-time leader of another Brotherhood front, the Council on American Islamic Relations(CAIR), which was created out of the Brotherhood's Hamas-support network. Its parent organization was also an unindicted co-conspirator in the Holy Land Foundation trial. Malika Khan currently serves on the Executive Committee of CAIR's San Francisco chapter, which distinguished itself in 2011 by promoting a conference that urged Muslims not to co-operate with FBI investigations.
These familial activities are not incidental because Suhail has publicly embraced his parents' "legacy," and done so before Brotherhood audiences. Despite this background and thanks to Grover Norquist's patronage, Suhail was able to gain access to the Bush 2000 campaign, and was then appointed to a position in the Bush administration. According to Gaffney, while working at the White House, Khan helped craft and disseminate deceptive notions such as "Islam means peace," al-Qaeda "hijacked" Islam, and jihad is only a "personal struggle," never a holy war against infidels.
In 2001, Khan appeared on a platform with about-to-be-convicted terrorist and top Muslim Brotherhood figure, Abdurahman Alamoudi. The setting was an American Muslim Council conference in Washington. Alamoudi is the founder of the Council, and once explained to a Brotherhood audience: "I think, if we are outside this country, we can say 'O Allah, destroy America.' But once we are here, our mission in this country is to change it…."
A video tape of the 2001 event shows Alamoudi heaping praise on Suhail and his father (see here from 5:38 on). At the time, Khan was serving as the Muslim gatekeeper in the White House Office of Public Liaison, a role he used to afford access to Muslim Brotherhood guests. Introducing him, Alamoudi expressed the hope that Khan was preparing for higher office:
We have with us a dear brother, a pioneer, somebody who really started political activism in the Muslim community …. When it was a taboo for the Muslim community, no doubt about it. When Suhail Khan started not too many people were aware that we had to do something…. Some of you saw him today in the White House, but inshallah soon you will see him in better places in the White House, inshallah. Maybe sometime as vice-president soon, inshallah. Allahu Akbar!
The terrorist, Alamoudi, also had praise for Suhail's father:
Suhail Khan is the son of a dear, dear brother who was a pioneer of Islam work himself. Many of you know his late father … who was part of all kinds of work … Suhail inherited from his father not only being a Muslim and a Muslim activist, but also being a Muslim political activist. [emphasis added]
After effusively thanking Alamoudi for these words, Suhail said: "Many of you, of course, knew my father. He was someone who dedicated his life to the community and I've always felt that I have to work in the same—those footsteps."
The footsteps of Mahboob Khan have been traced to some un-reassuring places. Shortly after 9/11, the Washington Post reported that Mahboob Khan had played host to Ayman Zawahiri, then second in command to Osama bin Laden, who had entered the U.S. in the mid-nineties to obtain funds and recruits for al-Qaeda. One of his stops was at the al-Noor Mosque in California, a mosque founded by Mahboob Khan.
After 9/11, Suhail Khan had to give up his role at the White House as a result of the fallout from his Brotherhood associations. Yet with the support of Norquist, he managed to land on his feet and was given a political appointment in the Office of the Secretary of Transportation.
Aside from Khan's multiple Islamist connections, Gaffney charges he has also been actively engaged in agendas championed by the Brotherhood, including trying to undo the statute making material support for terror a crime. That law was put into place in part because large sums of zakat—Islamic "charity" monies – were regularly going to fund the terrorist activities of Hamas and al-Qaeda.
Is there validity, then, to Gaffney's charges? In discussing Gaffney's original article, David Horowitz told me:
What disturbed me most—and ultimately persuaded me that Frank was on to something—was the fact that Grover didn't respond to Gaffney's charges although I invited him to do so in Frontpage. Then when I caught up with Grover at a CPAC conference, and said he really needed to answer the charges, he brushed me off saying he didn't have time—he was "too busy with the revolution," were the words he used, a reference to his conservative crusades. Then I spoke to Suhail, who had called me to complain about the claims Frank had made about his father. In this conversation, Suhail flat out denied them, saying his father was only a member of the mosque rather than its founder, and that he couldn't remember an event with Zawahiri. When I asked Frank for his sources for these claims, he sent me the Washington Post article, which described Mahboob Khan's role in founding the mosque and hosting Zawahiri. I sent this to Suhail for a reply, but never heard from him again. That made me realize there was something to be concerned about.
Khan was not so reticent—or in such denial—about his father's Muslim Brotherhood activities when he appeared before audiences of the faithful, however. At a 1999 conference of the Islamic Society of North America, Suhail told those in attendance:
It is a special honor for me to be here before you today because I am always reminded of the legacy of my father, Dr. Mahboob Khan, an early founder of the Muslim Students Association in the mid-nineties and an active member of the organization through its growth and development in the Islamic Society of North America.
Despite these disturbing manifestations of Khan's allegiances, Norquist sponsored Suhail to become a member of the board of the American Conservative Union in 2010. At this point, Gaffney's concerns intensified. With Grover's help, the Muslim Brotherhood was infiltrating the very heart of the conservative movement. By this time, however, Gaffney's access to the ACU's audiences was restricted. Because of his charges against Norquist, a very powerful member of the ACU Board, Gaffney had long since been barred from speaking at its annual CPAC gathering. But Horowitz, who was not a Washington insider like Gaffney, was a different story, and he was invited to keynote the 2011 CPAC conference. Horowitz used the occasion to address the issues raised by Norquist's activities and Khan's presence on the ACU Board, and to put them in historical context:
Over the last ten years, the influence of the Brotherhood has spread throughout our government. There is nothing new in this sad reality. In 1938, Whittaker Chambers attempted to warn President Roosevelt that one of his White House advisers, Alger Hiss, was a Soviet agent. When Roosevelt was given Chambers' information, he laughed and disregarded it. Alger Hiss remained as the president's adviser until the House Un-American Activities Committee flushed him out….
Frank Gaffney has been the courageous bringer of the bad news about Grover Norquist and Suhail Khan to the board of the American Conservative Union. Many good conservatives on the board have refused to believe the evidence of Suhail Khan's Brotherhood allegiances and agendas. They are of the opinion that Suhail's public appearances with Alamoudi and the Muslim Brotherhood fronts took place a decade ago, and that he doesn't promote violent agendas. I understand this. My parents were Communists in the heyday of Stalin. The Party's slogan was not "Bring on the dictatorship of the Proletariat" or "Revolution Now." But that is what they believed. The slogan of the Communist Party was "Peace, Jobs and Democracy."
The ACU's response to Horowitz's remarks was to withdraw his invitation to speak at CPAC events, although he had been a regular speaker over many years.
Earlier this year, Gaffney and his organization put together a ten-part video course called "The Muslim Brotherhood in America: The Enemy Within." Featured in the course were the roles played by Norquist (Parts 3-7) and Khan (Part 4) in promoting and enabling Brotherhood influence operations. The Khan segment includes a clip (starting at 4:28) from the speech that Khan gave at a 1999 ISNA conference. In the speech, Khan embraces the well-known Muslim Brotherhood ethos:
The earliest defenders of Islam would defend [against] their more numerous and better equipped oppressors, because the early Muslims loved death—dying for the sake of Allah Almighty—more than the oppressors of Muslims love life. This must be the case when we are fighting life's other battles [i.e., politics]. What are our oppressors going to do with people like us? We are prepared to give our lives for the cause of Islam. I have pledged my life's work, inspired by my dear father's shining legacy, and inspired further by my mother's loving protection and support, to work for the umma.
This is classic jihadist rhetoric. ("We love death, the U.S. loves life; that is the big difference between us," explained Osama bin Laden in one of his fatwas.) In effect, Khan praised history's earliest jihadists, portraying them as "defenders" and their victims as "oppressors," just as al-Qaeda does in its present-day fatwas. Khan used the same language that glorifies "martyrdom" (or suicide-attacks) on behalf of Islam. ("Death in the service of Allah is our highest aspiration" is part of the Muslim Brotherhood motto.) Khan then praised his father's Muslim Brotherhood "legacy," and pledged his life's work to the Muslim umma, which translated means the "Islamic nation."
Are these remarks merely a "youthful" indiscretion? Horowitz, whose biography makes him something of an authority on second thoughts, answered the question during his keynote address at the 2011 CPAC event:
As for the question of whether Suhail Khan believes now what he openly said then, my answer is this: When an honest person has been a member of a destructive movement and leaves it, he will feel compelled to repudiate it publicly and to warn others of the dangers it poses. This is a sure test of whether someone has left the Muslim Brotherhood or not.
Suhail Khan has never repudiated his father's Muslim Brotherhood legacy or the patronage of the convicted terrorist, Abdurahman Alamoudi. Nor has he disavowed his praise for Islamic martyrdom, nor has he taken steps to warn his fellow Americans of the Islamist threat posed by his past and present associates (part 4 of Gaffney's videos documents Khan's continuing involvement with Mohamed Magid, Muzammil Siddiqi, Nihad Awad and other top Muslim Brotherhood figures and organizations.) Instead, he has denied that the Muslim Brotherhood even operates in America.
On September 21, 2011, the ACU finally took up the issue of Gaffney's charges. The occasion was an unusual meeting of the ACU board, which normally meets only twice a year—in Washington and via teleconference. This particular meeting took place in Orlando, Florida, where an ACU event was being held. Because of the unusual venue, far away from ACU headquarters, most of the ACU board members did not attend, including several whom Frontpage talked to who had not been informed of the meeting and who were not in sympathy with its result. When the rump board met, they voted unanimously to adopt a resolution that dismissed Gaffney's charges out of hand, and declared their "complete confidence in the loyalty of Suhail Khan and Grover Norquist to the United States," and "welcome[d] their continued participation in the work of ACU and of the American conservative movement." In adopting this resolution, the board members also declared that they "profoundly regret and reject as unwarranted the past and on-going attacks upon their patriotism and character."
In making its decision, the board appears to have relied entirely on a memorandum provided by one of its members, Cleta Mitchell, a well-known and widely admired conservative lawyer. Despite the sweeping conclusions of her memorandum, Mitchell addressed the specifics of only one of Gaffney's many findings, while categorically dismissing them all, asserting that: "There is absolutely nothing contained in any of the materials [presented by Gaffney] that in any way linked Suhail (or Grover) to such ["Muslim extremist"] organizations or their activities."
The one specific that Mitchell took issue with was an unlikely one given her categorical statement. This was the video of Khan's 1999 address to the Islamic Society of North America featured in Gaffney's video course. ISNA is the principal Muslim Brotherhood organization in the United States; it was founded by Suhail Khan's own parents; and it was before this audience that Khan spoke in the ritualistic language of the Muslim Brotherhood about how Muslim warriors love death more than their opponents love life, about his devotion to the Muslim nation, and his readiness to die for Allah. Mitchell dismissed his comments in these words: "Yet, even in that speech, there is nothing that suggests Suhail is unpatriotic or subversive. The clip from the speech is simply (in my view) rhetoric that is, quite frankly, meaningless in terms of substantiating any of Mr. Gaffney's allegations."
But is it meaningless to paraphrase the motto of the Muslim Brotherhood to a meeting of the most important Muslim Brotherhood organization in the United States, and embrace it as one's own aspiration?
Mitchell rests her case against Gaffney and in behalf of Khan on a single point: "Suhail was subject to FBI background checks and cleared to work directly for the President and Vice-President? How would the FBI have 'missed' ties to such groups if those ties existed?"
In fact, as Gaffney observes—under the right circumstances, and with the right sponsors—it would have overlooked them quite easily: "The fact that Suhail Khan received a security clearance during his time in government is an indictment of the clearance process, not evidence that his background is problem-free: Ali Mohammad—Osama bin Laden's 'first trainer' and longtime al-Qaeda operative—also went through a background check and received a security clearance to work with the federal government. Major Nidal Hassan, the Fort Hood killer, not only obtained a clearance, he was even promoted from captain to major despite his monitored communications with al-Qaeda leader Anwar Awlaki, and the fact that in the course of his military education, he announced during a lecture that it was the duty of Muslims under Sharia to kill infidels preparing to attack other Muslims (i.e., U.S. soldiers awaiting deployment to Afghanistan)."
Horowitz agrees. He points to the fact that Huma Abedin, Hillary Clinton's Deputy Chief of Staff, has a top security clearance, notwithstanding the undisputed fact that her closest family members have been Muslim Brotherhood leaders and that for twelve years prior to being hired by the State Department, she worked for an Islamist organization founded and run by Abdullah Omar Naseef, a top funder of Osama bin Laden and the al-Qaeda network, and a Muslim Brotherhood eminence.
Given these well-known facts, Khan's security clearance seems a pretty thin reed on which to base so sweeping a dismissal of Gaffney's concerns, let alone refer to them as "reprehensible." To understand her position better, I tried to interview Mitchell, but she declined to comment, saying by email "I am precluded from talking to anyone about this because of the confidentiality provisions of the boards on which I serve which have been dealing with Frank Gaffney issues."
That confidentiality, however, had been already breached when someone on the ACU board leaked the details of its Orlando meeting and the contents of Mitchell's letter—and leaked them not to conservatives but to the left-wing organization "ThinkProgress." One of the things I wanted to ask Mitchell was how she thought this letter might have been leaked and by whom (Norquist? Khan?). Accompanying ThinkProgress's release of the Mitchell letter was this summary on its website of what had transpired:
Gaffney … was unanimously condemned by the one of the most powerful conservative organizations in America, as two documents obtained exclusively by ThinkProgress this week show. Last September, the board of the American Conservative Union (ACU), which puts on CPAC and includes top leaders of various factions of the conservative movement, unanimously passed a resolution (read it here) condemning the "false and unfounded" attacks Gaffney had made against Norquist and Khan, both board members, after having another board member, Cleta Mitchell, look into Gaffney's serious charges of sedition and abetting an enemy. In a letter to the ACU board (read it here), Mitchell, a prominent and very conservative attorney, said that after reviewing the "evidence" Gaffney presented (including a lengthy PowerPoint presentation and DVDs video laying out the case against Norquist and Khan), she found his "ceaseless war" to be "reprehensible."
Another issue I wanted to ask Mitchell about was what she thought of the fact that her sweeping memo along with the leak had given powerful ammunition to the Brotherhood and its agents in their campaign to silence critics of Islamism. ThinkProgress had previously published a "report" on "Islamophobia" (following an earlier one by CAIR on the same subject). As David Horowitz and Robert Spencer demonstrate in their pamphlet, Islamophobia: Thought Crime of the Totalitarian Future, Islamophobia is a term actually invented by the Muslim Brotherhood to silence its critics. The ThinkProgress report on Islamophobia attacked a dozen leading conservative critics of the Islamic jihad (also singled out by CAIR), including Frank Gaffney, as "bigots" and "racists." Future editions of the report and future left-wing attacks will undoubtedly draw on the testimony of ACU board.
When asked about these events, Gaffney noted the irregular nature of the board meeting that condemned him, and deplored its lack of due-diligence that led to its categorical dismissal of the readily available evidence. He stated:
By acting solely on the basis of Mitchell's defamatory and superficial memorandum, and then through the deliberate leak to a Soros-funded leftwing organization, the leadership of the American Conservative Union has discredited itself and given ammunition to those who want to prevent legitimate inquiries into Islamist influences in Washington.
This seems a more than reasonable concern. Since many prominent ACU board members were not present to conduct this auto-da-fé, there appears to be ample basis for it to seek a second opinion in regard to the case of Grover Norquist and Suhail Khan. Should it fail to do so, the ACU board will simply reinforce suspicions that it has been successfully infiltrated and subjected to an influence operation by those opposed to everything for which the conservative movement stands.

Canada Marks Anniversary of Assassination of Turkish Diplomat
August 27, 2012 - Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird today issued the following statement on the occasion of the 30th anniversary of the assassination of Colonel Attila Altikat, military attaché at the Turkish embassy in Ottawa: “On behalf of all Canadians, I would like to renew our expression of deep sympathy to the Colonel’s family and friends, as well as to the Government of Turkey and the Turkish people.
“We continue to condemn such violence as a means of furthering political objectives.
“Canada reiterates its commitment to working with its Turkish partners to combat terrorism in all its forms.”
The only foreign diplomat to be killed in an act of international terrorism on Canadian soil, Colonel Altikat was assassinated on the morning of August 27, 1982, on his way to work in Ottawa. Canada remains committed to bringing the perpetrators to justice.