THE DAILY BLADE: The Terrorists Are Testing Us
One well-known terrorist MO is to perform dry runs of a complex operation involving several co-conspirators. A "dress rehearsal" accomplishes three important goals:
† Identifies and irons out unforeseen obstacles;
† Tests the effectiveness and vigilance of the machines and manpower that are supposed to detect and deter these plots; and
† Encourages "security fatigue" with numerous false cries of "wolf" in the hope that a real threat is ignored or overlooked.
The Washington Times reports that security experts believe the spate of airline-security incidents since the London "liquid bomb" arrests – which included disruptive passengers, bomb threats scrawled on air-sickness bags and anonymous bomb threats made by phone – are meant to reduce the level of scrutiny that passengers and their carry-on bags are currently subject to:
Laura Mansfield, a counterterrorism consultant and Arabic translator, says many of the incidents involve terrorist sympathizers hoping to divert attention from actual terrorists moving forward with real plots.
"There is a combination of things going on. They are trying to get the threat level reduced by creating a bunch of false alarms so people will be complacent. It's also a strategy of red herrings and disinformation," she said. …
Miss Mansfield said that although the terrorists pay no attention to anniversary dates, recent activity and the release of several tapes indicate that Islamic militants want badly to strike the U.S. before this upcoming September 11.
An example of sympathizer involvement Miss Mansfield cited is a 2004 campaign in which in an Islamist Web site urged Muslim tourists to distract law enforcement by videotaping landmarks, nuclear plants, water-treatment facilities and infrastructure on their vacations.
"The police cannot be everywhere. If they are watching you, then they may not be watching our real projects," said the posting, which also noted that those participating could not be arrested for the activities.
"The distractions are going well," the site reported. "The Americans are chasing those with video cameras believing them to be terrorists. That permits us to do our preparations undetected."
Last year, Miss Mansfield visited a mosque in Georgia that advertised an English and Arabic session on God and family. She attended the Arabic session where a man identified as Khaled recounted a New York flight. He and his friends acted suspicious and made simultaneous restroom runs to frighten passengers.
"He laughed when he described how several women were in tears, and one man sitting near him was praying," Miss Mansfield later wrote in an account of that meeting on her personal Web site.
"As the meeting drew to a close, the imam gave a brief speech calling for the protection of Allah on the mujahedeen fighting for Islam throughout the world, and reminded everyone that it was their duty as Muslims to continue in the path of jihad, whether it was simple efforts like those of Khaled and his friends, or the actual physical fighting," Miss Mansfield wrote.
Call me Ishmael (Part II)
Columnist Diana West asks whether forced conversion is now the terror tactic du jour among Islamofascists, and why the media – including Fox News – is mute in the face of this latest assault on Western freedom and individuality:
I can't think of another hostage to jihad forced into Islam -- not even Daniel Pearl or Nicolas Berg, and not the U.S. Embassy hostages in Tehran a quarter century ago.
Is this incident a tip-off to a new level of traditionally (once upon a time) inviolate Westerners? In the "conversion" video, we see such abuse as the American and the New Zealander sit, costumed in Arabic robes … Holding up a symbolic first finger, they read their lines in both Arabic and English, proclaiming their "new" faith, declaring their "new" names - Khaled and Ya'aqob - and calling on President Bush and Prime Minister Blair to do likewise. …
The most shocking thing about the Centanni-Wiig "conversion: is the silence that has followed. …
Even Fox's Greta van Susteren, a tabloidesque host who never met a bodily fluid she couldn't elaborate on, went delicate on us the other night, failing, in a one-hour "exclusive" interview with the two men, to ask a single question about their religious ordeal - presumably at their request.
Why? Who or what is served by shutting up? Only forces of coercion - a word which, after all, implies the nullification of individual will. Which means this is one case where silence isn't golden and ignorance isn't bliss. They are dangerous and dumb.
Update
Illegal Immigration Rallies Fizzle
Illegal immigrants and their supporters marched in several cities nationwide on Labor Day, but in numbers that were a fraction of those in April and May. In Phoenix, for instance, there were 100,000 marchers in April, but just 900 today. And this time, there were also 100 anti-illegal immigration demonstrators, according to The Associated Press:
Michelle Dallacroce, founder and president of Mothers Against Illegal Aliens, said the government has sold out its people in not adequately confronting illegal immigration.
"These people are violating our laws, and they are taking away what belongs to Americans," Dallacroce said. "They come down here on our Labor Day and march on our Capitol. It makes me want to vomit."
Construction worker Jose Lopez said he came to the rally as a way to protest the unfair treatment of immigrants.
"(The counter-protesters) think what they want, but they are more illegal than we are," Lopez said. "They come from Europe. We come from the Americas."
Dems – who aren’t too proud to garner the votes the deceased, felons, homeless people and Alzheimer patients in nursing homes who "sign" already filled-out absentee ballots – would love to obliterate one key distinction between legal and illegal immigrants. The former have the Constitutional right to vote, the latter do not.
Despite signs reading, "Today We March, Tomorrow We Vote," these rallies are not translating into appreciable numbers of new Hispanic voters – that is citizens who are over the age of 18 and have the right to vote but, for whatever reason, never did before. A review of voter registration rolls by The Associated Press in Chicago, Denver, Houston, Atlanta and other large cities in which huge demonstrations had been held earlier this your found "no sign of a new voter boom that could sway elections. There was a rise in Los Angeles, where 500,000 protested in March, but it was more of a trickle than a torrent."
This being the case, The Stiletto wonders why Republican Party elites are bending over backwards to pander to the apparently illusory Hispanic vote by backing amnesty for illegal aliens who flout our laws the moment they step foot across the border without the US government’s sanction, and who continue their disrespect for our laws by using forged drivers’ licenses and by stealing people’s Social Security numbers.
Comments