AP: Israel's self-defense against jihad flotilla "tarnishes its image," notes with skepticism that jihad flotilla attacked first

AP: Israel's self-defense against jihad flotilla "tarnishes its image," notes with skepticism that jihad flotilla attacked first
Palestinian jihad propaganda -- as we have come to expect from AP. Nothing here, of course, about how jihad flotilla participants were celebrating a massacre of Jews by Islam's prophet Muhammad. "Israeli commandos storm aid flotilla; 9 killed," by Amy Teibel and Tia Goldenberg for AP, May 31:

JERUSALEM -- Israeli naval commandos stormed a flotilla of ships carrying aid and hundreds of pro-Palestinian activists to the blockaded Gaza Strip on Monday, killing nine passengers in a botched raid that provoked international outrage and a diplomatic crisis.
Dozens of activists and six Israeli soldiers were wounded in the bloody predawn confrontation in international waters. The violent takeover dealt yet another blow to Israel's international image, already tarnished by war crimes accusations in Gaza and its 3-year-old blockade of the impoverished Palestinian territory.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanhayu canceled a much-anticipated meeting with President Barack Obama in Washington on Tuesday in a sign of just how gravely Israel viewed the international uproar. In Canada, Netanyahu announced he was rushing home.

Israel said it opened fire after its commandos were attacked by knives, clubs and live fire from two pistols wrested from soldiers after they rappelled from a helicopter to board one of the vessels. Late Monday, it released a grainy black-and-white video that it said supported its version of events.

Reaction was swift and harsh, with a massive protest in Turkey, Israel's longtime Muslim ally, which unofficially supported the mission. Ankara announced it would recall its ambassador and call off military exercises with the Jewish state.

The U.N. Security Council scheduled an emergency meeting later Monday to hear a briefing on the incident, said Lebanon's Deputy Ambassador Caroline Ziade, whose country holds the council presidency. The Arab League called for a meeting to discuss the issue Tuesday in Cairo....

Posted by Robert on May 31, 2010 8:34 AM | 5 Comments
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5 Comments
fscarn | May 31, 2010 8:44 AM | Reply
Once again, Muslims, the ever-faithful adherents of Islam the religious cult of provocation, makes aggressive provocations upon others who would simply prefer to leave matters well enough alone. Then those provocateurs claim victim status when others, recognizing their murderous intentions, protect themselves.

CateLaurel | May 31, 2010 9:01 AM | Reply
What happened to this flotilla was so predictable. Wasn`t this relief aid organized by the Muslim Brotherhood? Regardless of whether or not there were weapons on board, they wanted a bloodbath as a set-up to get the international community up in arms against Israel. People are so naive they just might fall for it.

Paul Murphy | May 31, 2010 9:06 AM | Reply
Did the UN Security Council have an 'emergency debate' on the murder of over 80 'heretics' and 'apostates' by Sunni Muslims in Pakistan last week? No!

Why does the Security Council feel the need to debate Israel's actions at least once before each breakfast? Has it got anything to do with the 150 and more Islamic and Muslim states in the UN and the Islamic organisations which are part of the UN? Has it got anything to do with 1,500 years of Western anti-Semitism and its new incarnation - anti-Zionism?


Paul Murphy | May 31, 2010 9:12 AM | Reply
We can guarantee that this will be a major news item today and even over the next week. The Western media usually chronicles every broken finger and upset stomach which the Israelis cause the long-suffering and deeply pacifist Palestinians. Every inch of the situation well be cried over by naive left-liberals and utilised by far leftists in their obsessive anti-Israel campaign.

So as soon as the media hungrily get hold of a single Muslim on the ship being lightly spanked by an Israeli soldier, many will instantly conclude that this is yet another Evil Zionist mission to exterminate every Muslim on the planet. I bet leftists are going crazy with their FaceBooks at this very moment. Bless them.

It is almost as if the Turki Foundation wanted this to happen so they could milk it dry in the Western media and elsewhere. Indeed this ‘Israeli crime’ was probably forecasted weeks ago. So it is no surprise that many Muslims have already showed their predictable anger and starting demonstrating. In fact, they started to do so about five minutes after the event occurred. It was almost as if they already knew what was going to happen. Um.

And surprise, surprise! The Turkish government called for an emergency meeting at least two minutes after the Israelis boarded the ships. The increasingly Islamist Government is slowly falling in the Muslim line of compulsory anti-Zionism. Chomsky will have finished his book about this ‘outrage’ and ‘gross act of pure evil’ by Friday. Symposiums in American universities will begin early next week.

Who was behind the reprimanded flotilla? Some nice Muslims? Our very own George ‘look no panties’ Galloway and his Viva Palestina? No. It was the Turki Foundation (IHH). Want to know something about it? (The BBC won’t tell you.) It is a radical Islamic organisation which is a major component in Hamas’s worldwide funding machine. And like all other radical Islamic organisations, it hates infidels and sometimes even hates the wrong kind of fellow Muslim. More precisely, it likes those who kill Jews (Hamas, Hezbollah, etc.) and it also likes to spread the anti-Semitic psychosis around the Muslim and leftist world.

Of course the shipment was only full of flower petals, Superman magazines and white doves. Oh yes. It was also highly likely to have contained explosives, Kal Iranian-made, long-rage Fajr-5 missiles. But only to be used self-defensively by destroying Israeli kindergartens and pizza houses. How do we know this? Because a hell of a lot of similar shipments have contained weapons and explosives heading for Hamas and other nice and peaceful Islamist groups.

It’s certain that the Turki Foundation, and the other Islamists aboard, were planning on violence. Indeed they wanted violence. They had already said that they ‘fully intend to go to Gaza regardless of any intimidation of threats of violence against us’. They are only doing their Islamic duty against the Jews! Also, the Israelis, when aboard, were immediately attacked with knives, daggers and cudgels. Instead of killing the Islamists outright, the Israelis chose to use tear gas against the enemy. Al Jazeera also reported that gun shots were heard on the boats.

We can be deeply cynical, but nevertheless accurate, and say that these ‘aid convoys’, whether run by Islamist militants like the Turki Foundation or, well, by IslamoTrot militants like Viva Palestina, are not really about supplying the death camps of starving Palestinians with food and other much-needed supplies (such as long-range rockets which can go deep into Israel). They are primarily, or even exclusively, about propaganda and publicity. And my God! How they are successful at this!

The reason for my Zionist cynicism and evil is this. It is possible that the Gaza Strip is not actually suffering a real ‘humanitarian crisis’ at all since the Palestinians are already being supplied by the Evil Zionist Empire that is Israel. Indeed any journalists who care to see will realise that hundreds of Israeli trucks daily supply the Gazans with food and other needies - but not, sadly, offensive weapons. That’s where the Turki Foundation may well come in.

I don’t suppose it matters to leftists and anti-Zionists that international law allows states like Israel to ask suspicious boats to identify themselves. They are only interested in the times when Israel supposedly goes against international law, which seems to be every day, according to these Israel Watchers.

poetcomic1 | May 31, 2010 9:37 AM | Reply
Alinsky Playbook international version. It has all become as ritualistic and stylized as Kabuki theater. What is sickening is the role of the MSM.

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'Leaving Islam' Bus Ads Run in NYC

Move aside pro-atheist and Christian bus ads. A new ad targeting former Muslims has joined the religious bus ad campaigns in New York City.

Some 30 city buses began in mid-May to display an ad that reads: “Leaving Islam? Fatwa on your head? Is your family threatening you?” The ad directs people to the website www.refugefromislam.com.

Opponents of the ad say it promotes an anti-Muslim message and seeks to draw people away from the faith.

But supporters of the campaign say it is meeting a real need to provide resources for Muslims who want to leave the faith.

“As an ex-Muslim I know a lot of converts who are persecuted for leaving Islam,” wrote Sabatina James, a prominent Muslim background believer living in Germany, to The Christian Post. She is living under police protection because of death threats on her life for leaving Islam. James has moved 16 times since 2001 to avoid physical harm from Muslim family members and friends.

“Thousands of converts are being tortured and killed every year,” she stated. “The campaign is not only applying religious freedom but is very necessary for us ex-Muslims.”

In her bestselling book My Fight for Faith and Freedom, James shares how she had no one to turn to after her family learned that she had converted to Christianity. In a recent interview with The Christian Post, James said when Muslims make a decision to follow Jesus Christ they do so knowing they will be persecuted by their family.

Pamela Geller, the conservative activist behind the bus ad, said the campaign is not meant to offend Muslims but to support those who have already made the decision on their own.

“It’s not targeted at practicing Muslims,” said Geller, who heads the organization Stop Islamization of America, to The Associated Press. “It doesn’t say ‘leave,’ it says ‘leaving’ with a question mark.”

The same ad can be seen on the side of dozens of Miami buses. It started appearing in late April but was temporarily pulled by the Miami-Dade Transit to reconsider if it is offensive to Islam. The ads were later reinstalled on Miami buses.

But in Detroit, where there is a large Muslim community, the ad is meeting greater obstacles. The Detroit-area transportation authority refused to allow the ad to appear on its buses.

The Thomas More Law Center, a non-profit law firm based in Ann Arbor, Mich., filed a federal lawsuit on Thursday against the Suburban Mobility Authority for Regional Transportation on behalf of the ad’s sponsors. The plaintiffs maintain that the transportation agency violated the rights of free speech and the Equal Protection clauses in the U.S. Constitution.

“In Detroit, government officials grant atheists the right to express a view that God does not exist, not worrying about offending Christians,” said TMLC senior trial counsel Robert Muise. “Yet, these same politically correct officials censor speech that might offend Muslims. Such blatant discrimination is offensive, and it violates our Constitution.”

The “Leaving Islam?” ad on New York City buses is scheduled to run for about a month
http://www.christianpost.com/article/20100529/leaving-islam-bus-ads-run-in-nyc/index.html

'I am a Muslim by faith…. a Christian by spirit….a Jew by heart….and above all I am a human'

Written by Dr. Tawfik Hamid
Egypt for Christ
25 May 2009



I was born a Muslim and lived all my life as a follower of Islam. After the barbaric terrorist attacks done by the hands of my fellow Muslims everywhere on this globe, and after the too many violent acts by Islamists in many parts of the world, I feel responsible as a Muslim and as a human being, to speak out and tell the truth to protect the world and Muslims as well from a coming catastrophe and war of civilizations.

I have to admit that our current Islamic teaching creates violence and hatred toward Non-Muslims. We Muslims are the ones who need to change. Until now we have accepted polygamy, the beating of women by men, and killing those who convert from Islam to other religions.

We have never had a clear and strong stand against the concept of slavery or wars, to spread our religion and to subjugate others to Islam and force them to pay a humiliating tax called Jizia. We ask others to respect our religion while all the time we curse non-Muslims loudly (in Arabic) in our Friday prayers in the Mosques.

What message do we convey to our children when we call the Jews ”Descendants of the pigs and monkeys“.. Is this a message of love and peace, or a message of hate?

I have been into churches and synagogues where they were praying for Muslims. While all the time we curse them, and teach our generations to call them infidels, and to hate them.

We immediately jump in a ‘knee jerk reflex’ to defend Prophet Mohammed when someone accuses him of being a pedophile while, at the same time, we are proud with the story in our Islamic books, that he married a young girl seven years old (Aisha) when he was above 50 years old.

I am sad to say that many, if not most of us, rejoiced in happiness after September 11th and after many other terror attacks.Muslims denounce these attacks to look good in front of the media, but we condone the Islamic terrorists and sympathise with their cause. Till now our ‘reputable’ top religious authorities have never issued a Fatwa or religious statement to proclaim Bin Laden as an apostate, while an author, like Rushdie, was declared an apostate who should be killed according to Islamic Shariia law just for writing a book criticizing Islam.

Muslims demonstrated to get more religious rights as we did in France to stop the ban on the Hejab (Head Scarf), while we did not demonstrate with such passion and in such numbers against the terrorist murders.

It is our absolute silence against the terrorists that gives the energy to these terrorists to continue doing their evil acts. We Muslims need to stop blaming our problems on others or on the Israeli/Palestinian conflict. As a matter of honesty, Israel is the only light of democracy >>, civilization, and human rights in the whole Middle East.(URL added by yours truly)


We kicked out the Jews with no compensation or mercy from most of the Arab countries to make them “Jews-Free countries” while Israel accepted more than a million Arabs to live there, have its nationality, and enjoy their rights as human beings. In Israel , women can not be beaten legally by men, and any person can change his/her belief system with no fear of being killed by the Islamic law of ‘Apostasy,’ while in our Islamic world people do not enjoy any of these rights…I agree that the ‘Palestinians’ suffer, but they suffer because of their corrupt leaders and not because of Israel.

It is not common to see Arabs who live in Israel leaving to live in the Arab world. On the other hand, we used to see thousands of Palestinians going to work with happiness in Israel , its ‘enemy‘. If Israel treats Arabs badly as some people claim, surely we would have seen the opposite happening.

We Muslims need to admit our problems and face them. Only then we can treat them and start a new era to live in harmony with human mankind. Our religious leaders have to show a clear and very strong stand against polygamy, pedophilia, slavery, killing those who convert from Islam to other religions, beating of women by men, and declaring wars on non-Muslims to spread Islam.

Then, and only then, do we have the right to ask others to respect our religion. The time has come to stop our hypocrisy and say it openly: ‘We Muslims have to Change‘.

contact Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg n preventing a Mosque being built on Ground O

On Wed, 5/26/10, Samira Tamer wrote:


From: Samira Tamer
Subject: mosque at ground 0
To: "Samira Tamer"
Date: Wednesday, May 26, 2010, 7:16 PM



This is an ACTION ALERT! Please take a moment and contact Mayor Bloomberg. We all must do our part in preventing a Mosque being built on Ground O
Here is the info:

http://www.nyc.gov/portal/site/nycgov


Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg can be reached by phone: 311. By fax: (212) 788 8123. By email: http://www.nyc.gov/html/mail/html/mayor.html.
Community Board One can be reached by phone: (212) 442 5050. By fax: (212) 442 5055. By email: man01@cb.nyc.gov. Their street address is: 49-51 Chambers Street Room 715, New York , NY 10007-1209 .

9/11 Families Speak Out Against “Ground Zero Mosque”

9/11 Families Speak Out Against “Ground Zero Mosque”

Stand with the victims; Please sign our petition


Dear Morris,

Today the organization 9/11 Familes for a Safe & Strong America issued the media release below, opposing the proposed mosque at “ground zero.”

As of 8:30 this morning over 27,000 people have signed our petition urging Mayor Michael Bloomberg and other New York elected officials to oppose this mosque at “ground zero.”

Have you and everyone you know signed it yet? If yes, we thank you!

If not, please take a couple minutes to add your name (only your name and state will be included on the petition), and forward the petition to everyone you know.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

9/11 Families Reject Towering Mosque Planned for Ground Zero Site New York, May 24, 2010 -- 9/11 Families for a Safe & Strong America (9/11 FSSA) adamantly rejects the plan for a mosque to be built atop a planned 15-story structure that would tower over the site where nearly 3,000 people were killed by Islamic terrorists.

According to the project's leader, Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, the mosque and "Muslim-led community center" is to be called the Cordoba House, named after the historic period when the Islamic Caliphate in Cordoba ruled much of Europe and non-Muslims lived as second-class citizens under Islamic rule.

Victims' families view the imam's expressed plan to "leverage" the mosque's proximity to Ground Zero to engage in proselytizing and to "grow the Muslim community," as shockingly insensitive to the history of the site where their loved ones were slaughtered in the worst terrorist attack by extremist Muslims in America's history; following the attack, 20,000 body parts were recovered in a nine-month operation to remove 1.8 million tons of rubble from Lower Manhattan.

"Imam Rauf is a Muslim cleric who, immediately after 9/11, blamed the attacks on U.S. treatment of Muslims, asserting that Osama Bin Ladin was 'made in the U.S.A,'" said Debra Burlingame, co-founder of 9/11 FSSA, whose brother was the pilot of the American Airlines flight which was hijacked and crashed into the Pentagon. "We do not accept the Cordoba organization's view that we need Imam Rauf to lecture us about religious tolerance in a city still dealing with the consequences of the attack that he claims we brought on ourselves."

Last Monday, representatives of 9/11 FSSA met with Sharif El-Gamal, owner and CEO of Soho Properties, the corporation that purchased the two buildings where the mosque will be built at 43-45 Park Place, and asked him to name the investors in the mosque project. Mr. El-Gamal refused, citing the advice of his attorneys, stating that "this is private property" and that "we can build this 'as of right.'" The property was purchased with $4.85 million in cash.

Imam Rauf is now publicly stating in a professionally-organized PR campaign that the building will be a community center, "not a mosque." However, Mr. El-Gamal showed 9/11 FSSA members architectural renderings in which a mosque, located on the top floor of the 15-story building, would have a commanding view of the entire Ground Zero neighborhood.

Equally troubling is the fact that, while the stated purpose of the project is to engage in interfaith dialogue and cultural egalitarianism, Imam Rauf embraces Shariah, the Arabic word for Islamic law, a sociopolitical system of jurisprudence based upon the Koran which supersedes man-made law and which rejects the Constitutional doctrine of the separation of church and state. Islamic countries that embrace Shariah and political Islam are known for brutal policies that discriminate against women, gays, and religious minorities. Shariah law is entirely incompatible with the Equal Protection clause of the 14th Amendment and would violate 1st Amendment protections of speech, assembly and the free exercise of religion.

We feel that the attempt to use our loved ones' deaths and the painful legacy of 9/11 still felt by New Yorkers to engage in a campaign to reverse America's core doctrine of religious freedom -- and to do so under the guise of interfaith understanding -- is a gross insult to the memory of those who were killed on that terrible day.

9/11 Families for a Safe & Strong America asks concerned Americans -- regardless of race, color, creed, or ethnic origin--to join us in denouncing this effort to chip away at America's bedrock principle of religious freedom.

www.911familiesforamerica.org

Killings of Egypt’s Christians Escalate In Ghastly Slaughter Nearly Ignored in the West

Written by YOUSSEF IBRAHIM
The New York Sun



On January 6, the Orthodox Christmas for millions of Egyptian Christians, gunshots rang from a drive-by car, killing 7 parishioners exiting evening mass. The Nagaa Hamadi Church Massacre, as it became known, left 26 seriously injured in the small southern town.

During the funerals, greater mayhem erupted. In surrounding towns and villages some 3,000 Muslims broke into Coptic properties, agricultural plots, and businesses, looting and setting fires to shops. Across the country churches were burned. It took Egypt’s police three days to show up and six weeks to arrest a single culprit.
As it has become customary, the government described the attack as ‘’an individual incident’’, another dispute among villagers. The phrase has become so habitual in describing attacks on Christians over the past 40 years, it is used as a practical joke.

In reality The Nagaa Hamadi Church Massacre was the latest spike in a 40-year-long campaign of killing and violence against of Egypt’s estimated 12 million Christians, known as Copts It’s a campaign that is all the more ghastly for the fact that it has been largely ignored by the world of elite opinion. Yet in the past 40 years, the numbers of victims has soared to well more than 20,000, if the count includes those killed, wounded, dispossessed, or otherwise harmed, according to human rights groups.

In that period, Copts started to flee Egypt, and at least 2 million, mostly members of the upper and middle classes, now reside abroad. Within Egypt, the Coptic community has continued to grow, but nowhere as rapidly as the Muslim communities, whose numbers have soared, in line with a birth rate that is far above that of the Copts.

The word Copt refers to Egyptians whose ancestors embraced Christianity in the first century after Christ. It has its origins in ancient languages of Pharos to denote ‘’original Inhabitant’’ or simply ‘’Egyptian’’. Copts are part of the Eastern Orthodox Church that ranges widely from Ethiopia to Russia. In the Arab world however, they constitute the largest Christian minority.

In the 14 centuries since Muslim Arabs invaded Egypt, those who remained Copts were descendents of Egyptians who resisted conversion to Islam. Indeed they refer to themselves as the country’s founders and Egypt was a Coptic nation in the first seven centuries of Christianity.

Since, they have suffered cycles of persecutions that ebb and flow as Muslim rulers succeed one another.

By and large the Copts enjoyed a golden period of tolerance starting the1860s. It came to an abrupt end when a group of army officers, led by Colonel Gamal Abdel Nasser overthrew the monarchy and took power in 1952. Under the officers’ rule, but especially starting in the early 1970s, a systematic campaign, with evident government acquiescence, was set in motion to reduce Christians to second class citizens.

“Egypt has witnessed confessional tensions over the centuries involving attacks on Copts, but they were never as intense and widespread as they have been since the 1970s,” Moheb Zaki, a former managing director of the Ibn Khaldun Center, a nonprofit organization that supports democracy and civil rights in Egypt and the Middle East, told this reporter.

Writing in the Wall Street Journal yesterday, Mr. Zaki asserted that “the violence of the last few years is more like a purge, as waves of mob assaults have forced hundreds, sometimes thousands of Christian citizens to flee their homes. In each incident the police, despite frantic appeals, invariably arrive after the violence is over.” The Ibn Khaldun Center was founded by the Egyptian Human Rights activist Saad Eddin Ibrahim, who was jailed by the Mubarak regime and now is living in exile in America.

Copts have been eliminated from all senior positions in government administrations, the army, the police, the security services, and top echelons of the vast public sector. In the educational sector once largely endowed with Christian leadership, there are virtually no Christians left. Out of Egypt’s 17 government-owned and administered universities which have a total of 71 presidents and 274 vice presidential jobs, there is one Coptic Christian dean and one Christian Vice President.

Egypt stands out for a number of reasons. It is, with 81 million citizens, the most populous Arab nation, the second largest recipient, after Israel, of American financial and military aid, and the intellectual leader of the Arabs. Since 1979 America has given Egypt well more than $ 60 billion and totally re-equipped its entire army with advanced weapons.

In that same period, successive governments especially those of Anwar Sadat, who took power in 1970, and Hosni Mubarak, who acceded in 1981, refined a system of “Islamization” across the whole society that includes a calculated marginalization of Christians.

Sadat referred to himself as “The Believer President,” coming to power with an extensive Islamist agenda. He welcomed the return from exile in Saudi Arabia of hundreds the banished Muslim Brotherhood leadership and released thousands of them from Egyptian jails. In those jails they fundamentalists were replaced with secularists, socialists and many Christian activists.

Sadat cancelled Egypt’s secular constitution designating Sharia Islamic Law instead as the source of all legislation. By September 1981, after ten years of power, he had stripped the Coptic Pope, Shenouda III, leader of the Christian community, of all authority, banishing him to a desert monastery and ordered the arrest of some 125 Coptic clergy and lay activists along with hundreds of secular Muslims.

Ironically, a month later, in October of 1981, militant Islamist army officers assassinated Sadat, as he reviewed a military parade. Hosni Mubarak, a former air force commander and Sadat’s vice president, stood next to him when he died along with 25 others on the reviewing stand.

Mr. Mubarak moved immediately to strike a deal with the Islamists in return for their subtle agreement to retain a dynastic rule for his family. The covenant turned over to Islamists control in media, education, and government administrations in return for allowing Mr. Mubarak’s rule to go on unchallenged, setting the stage for the Rais, as Egyptians call their leaders, to prepare for his son, Gamal, to succeed him. As part of the deal, this Rais agreed to feed Egypt’s Christians to the growing Islamic beast.

In the Wall Street Journal article of Tuesday, Mr. Zaki related, among other things, that this year alone witnessed several attacks by roving bands of Muslims. In the run-up to Nagaa Hamadi, a mob of several tens of thousand Muslims gathered in the Mediterranean city of Marsa Matrough, after an imam exhorted them to cleanse it of “infidel Christians.” They went onto ten hours of rampage that burned or destroyed 18 Christian homes and 23 shops, as well as 16 cars, as 400 Copts barricaded themselves in their church, where they stayed for those hours, until the frenzy died out.

Last year saw a dozen such attacks. Typically the police show up after the damage is done. The government-controlled press describes consistently individual incidents. Equally typically, the Egyptian government, bans publication of the full scale of assaults on Christians, even in the single Coptic weekly that is allowed to publish.

As a result accurate statistics are slow to surface. But NGOs and Human Rights groups record dramatic heap of ruined lives, expropriated lands, and injured, wounded, homeless and killed. Weekly reports surface of kidnapped Christian girls, who are raped and — to save their honor — forced of convert to Islam and marry their rapists. The government only intervenes to prevent the girls from leaving their marriage or reverting back to Christianity. Altogether these attacks add up to around 10,000 since 1971.

It is a narrative of persecution that keeps piling on. Higher and upper middle class Coptic Christians responded by immigrating in huge numbers. Today these immigrant Copts form a nascent Diaspora that is moving to political activism. It is estimated to number between 2 million to 3 million spread over Canada, Australia and the USA. My extended family and I are among those who are in America.

But the bulk of ordinary Egyptian Christians, who number at least 12 million and possibly as many as 14 million, remain trapped in Egypt. The government does not permit census numbers to be released insisting in unofficial statements for well over two decades now, that Copts do not number more than 8 to 9 millions.

Huckabee: Pamela Geller on the 911 Mosque at Ground Zero

Pamela Geller speaks out against the triumphalist mosque planned near Ground Zero on the Mike Huckabee show last night.
The 9/11 Mosque’s Peace Charadeby Pamela Geller
By Pamela Geller and Robert Spencer

A massive fifteen-story mosque and Islamic Center going up in what was once the shadow of the World Trade Center claims to offer “the opposite statement to what happened on 9/11.” The Center organizers, the America Society for Muslim Advancement (ASMA), have worked hard in the media to portray themselves as Islamic moderates working for peace on the exact spot where their belligerent coreligionists perpetrated murder and mayhem in the name of their religion. But the words and deeds of the leader of the effort, the Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, suggests a more ominous reality: Abdul Rauf is a master of deceptive, Orwellian use of language, manifesting a deep contempt for non-Muslims and full accord with the supremacist goals of the 9/11 hijackers.



So anxious were they to secure the location at Ground Zero that a Muslim real estate company paid $4.85 million in cash for the building, with part coming from Abdul Rauf’s other Islamic group, the Cordoba Initiative. It is unnerving – the deliberate speed and anxiousness that the leader of the American Society for Muslim Advancement has demonstrated in working to open a mosque at the gaping wound of Ground Zero. He claims that it will heal that wound. But how will it do that? How will a mosque, the place where jihadis go for spiritual sustenance, at Ground Zero help stop jihad terrorism? Even the name of the initiative – Cordoba – speaks volumes. While Islamic Spain is held up today as a proto-multiculturalist paradise, in reality non-Muslims there suffered under the discrimination prescribed in Islamic law for dhimmis, non-believers who were subjugated as inferiors and denied equality of rights.

ASMA seems to have deliberately sought a connection to Ground Zero for their new mosque site. Muslims are already conducting daily prayers on the site, an old Burlington Coat Factory outlet where, according to Abdul Rauf, “a piece of the wreckage fell.”


The group purports to come in peace, although it declined to send a representative to discuss the initiative with one of us on Mike Huckabee’s show on Fox News Saturday. This was after one of us confronted Islamic apologist Michael Ghouse on Sean Hannity’s radio show on Friday, exposing the insensitivity and unsavory aspects of the 9/11 Mosque project. Abdul Rauf’s group gave this statement to Huckabee:

For over a decade, the Cordoba Initiative and American Society for Muslim Advancement have worked tirelessly to build bridges with other faiths, while condemning violence, extremism, and prejudice of any sort. Our mission is to be a beacon of hope, peace, understanding and harmony to those who join us in condemning hatred and violence of any kind. Too often the question arises of why moderate, peace-loving Muslims do not speak out. We cannot think of a more wonderful expression of our religion than the Cordoba House, where American Muslims stand together with our fellow citizens to condemn extremism and terror. It is a project to honor those who were harmed on September 11th. It is a project to proclaim our patriotism to this country and to stand side-by-side all men and women of peace.

How does building a giant mosque at Ground Zero address the problem of moderate Muslims not speaking out against terrorism? How does this mosque honor those who were “harmed” – i.e., brutally murdered — on September 11? Whom does a mosque at 9/11 really honor: the Americans who lost their lives, or the jihadis who murdered them?

It’s no wonder that many have greeted such words with skepticism, seeing the Ground Zero mosque as a demonstration of supremacism and triumphalism. Debra Burlingame of 9/11 Families for a Safe and Strong America, whose brother died in the Pentagon on 9/11, declared: “This is a place which is 600 feet from where almost 3,000 people were torn to pieces by Islamic extremists. I think that it is incredibly insensitive and audacious really for them to build a mosque, not only on that site, but to do it specifically so that they could be in proximity to where that atrocity happened.”

There is ample support for the idea that this Islamic Center is an insult to the victims of the 9/11 attacks. Throughout Islamic history, wherever they have conquered, Muslims have converted non-Muslim houses of worship into mosques and built mosques on the holy sites of other religions. The Dome of the Rock, built on the site of the Temple in Jerusalem, the Umayyad Mosque in Damascus built over the Church of St. John the Baptist, and the Aya Sofya mosque in Istanbul, formerly the grandest church in Christendom, are three notable examples among a great many. While at Ground Zero the mosque is not being built over the site of a synagogue or church, the same pattern of conquest and supremacism is in evidence: the World Trade Center site was a symbol of American economic power; the 9/11 Mosque is a symbol of the conquest of that power.

Abdul Rauf’s own statements, rather than allay such concerns, actually give credence to this view. He has blamed the West, rather than Islamic jihadists, for terrorism on several occasions. He has said, according to Australia’s Sun-Herald, that “the US and the West must acknowledge the harm they have done to Muslims before terrorism can end.” He has also claimed that “Western active involvement in shaping the internal affairs of Islamic societies have contributed to the creation of terrorism done in the name of Islam.”

In other words, stop fighting back. Let the jihadis do as they please.

Abdul Rauf has also called Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams’ endorsement of the implementation of Sharia courts in Britain “forward thinking” – despite Sharia’s denial of basic freedoms including the freedom of speech, freedom of conscience, and equality of rights of all people before the law. He has called upon Barack Obama to emphasize “the commonality of Western and Islamic values,” claiming that “if the United States lives up to the values in the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights and if Muslims can live up to the principles of Islamic law, then we will find we have fewer points of conflict and more common ground.” Then all will be well: “Muslims no longer will fear Western domination and the West no longer will fear Islamic expansion.”

Does Abdul Rauf really think that the devaluation of a woman’s testimony and the institutionalized discrimination against non-Muslims, both mandated by Sharia, are really compatible with the Bill of Rights? Does he really think that stoning people to death for adultery or amputating their hands for theft are compatible with the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition of cruel and unusual punishments?

Whatever he thinks of those elements of the Constitution, he doesn’t appear overly fond of the freedom of speech. Abdul Rauf has compared the West unfavorably to the Islamic world, since the West “protects the right to say anything, no matter how insensitive or scandalous,” while Islamic cultures “balance freedom of expression with respect for elders, traditions and modesty. The idea of respect and honor to elders is deeply ingrained in their psyches.” He has criticized the Swiss ban on minarets as a restriction on religious freedom, without saying a word about the severe restrictions on non-Muslim religious practice in Islamic states such as Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Iran, and Sudan.

In many of his public statements, Abdul Rauf is patently dishonest. After the Fort Hood jihad massacre, he claimed that the shootings were “against the laws of Islam” – a claim that looked ridiculous and deceitful after Fort Hood shooter Nidal Hasan’s writings came to light, explaining (with copious references to the Koran) the Islamic requirement to wage war against infidels. If Hasan was wrong and Abdul Rauf right about Islam, Abdul Rauf, as a leading American “moderate,” could have and should have seized the opportunity to explain exactly how, so as to allay the legitimate concerns of non-Muslims and emphasize to Muslims in America how and why they should be unreservedly patriotic Americans. He did not.

Abdul Rauf also has unsavory associations with pro-Sharia groups. Journalist Alyssa A. Lappen reports that “whenever Feisal first considered building a mosque across from Ground Zero, he had the idea firmly in mind by 2004, when he wrote What’s Right with Islam. The book was translated into many languages. In Indonesia’s Bahasa, its title translates as “The Call from the WTC Rubble.” Rauf promoted the book in December 2007 at a Kuala Lumpur gathering of Hizb ut Tahrir — an organization banned in Germany since 2003, and also outlawed in Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Egypt, Tunisia, Turkey, and Saudi Arabia, among other places — and ideologically akin to the MB. Both seek to replace the U.S. Constitution with Islamic law (sharia), and eventually impose Islam and sharia law worldwide.” The “MB” is the Muslim Brotherhood, an international Islamic organization from which come Al-Qaeda and Hamas. The Brotherhood is dedicated in its own words, according to a captured internal document, to “eliminating and destroying Western civilization from within.”

Is that Feisal Abdul Rauf’s agenda as he works to build his massive Islamic Center at Ground Zero? It certainly seems so. That’s why our new group, Stop Islamization of America, is holding a rally against the 9/11 Mosque on June 6 in lower Manhattan. 9/11 families and freedom fighters including ex-Muslim human rights crusader Nonie Darwish and ex-slave Simon Deng will be speaking – and stating matters more honestly than Feisal Abdul Rauf ever has.

Pamela Geller is the editor and publisher of AtlasShrugs.com; Robert Spencer is the director of JihadWatch.org. They are the coauthors of The Post-American Presidency: The Obama Administration’s War On America (coming July 27 from Simon & Schuster).

Mosque at Ground Zero

http://my.nowpublic.com/world/mosque-ground-zero
http://bikyamasr.com/wordpress/?p=12895 Mosque at Ground Zero in n New York by the Cordoba Initiative is creating controversy. Extremists in the US are opposing a plan to build a mosque in the proximity of ground zero, saying that it denotes Islamization of the US. The worst thing is that the Islamophobic organizations opposing the plan to build the mosque shows that their objection is not just for the mosque but is actually for the Muslim community and the religion of Islam.

Qordoba Initiative, the organization behind plan to built the mosque that will be merely 13 storey high is a private property and there is no reason why someone should oppose the construction of the mosque.

But rabid anti-Islamic forces are bent upon doing it.

But I don’t thing that beyond mere rabble rousing these organizations can actually stop the construction of the grand mosque and a well established community center.

Petition from ACT to stop the Ground Zero Mosque – 9/11 mosque at the Twin Towers site said

Imagine the American response in 1950 if the Japanese government sought to erect a shrine to its World War II Emperor in Pearl Harbor, right next to the sunken wreckage of the USS Arizona.

Would “outrage” be strong enough to describe the response?

Fast forward to 2010.

Less than nine years after the worst terrorist attack on American soil in our history, an imam who blames America for the 9/11 attack wants to construct a 13 story mosque and Islamic center 600 feet from “Ground Zero.”

This is an outrage!

Public opinion forced many New York officials, as well as officials in the Obama administration, to reconsider locating a civilian trial for Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the mastermind of 9/11, in New York.

Now we need a tidal wave of public opinion to flood New York officials telling them that allowing a mosque to be built at ground zero is a slap in the face of the thousands of families who lost loved ones in that Jihadist attack.

This is why ACT! For America is launching a nationwide petition that he will deliver to New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, urging him and other New York officials to oppose the building of this mosque in this location.

9/11 survivors and their families are in disbelief at the insensitivity being expressed by Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf and his supporters who want this mosque at ground zero.

They are astonished that an imam who endorses sharia law, the same law system that motivated the Jihadists to blow up the World Trade Center, would be so brazen as to erect a mosque at ground zero.

There are many other places such a mosque could be located.

What’s more, guess what day they are planning for the grand opening of the mosque?

September 11, 2011: the 10th year anniversary of the Jihadist atrocity.

ENOUGH IS ENOUGH! This grotesque symbolism, this spitting in the face of the families of the victims of 9/11, is going too far!

As an American citizen I hope the American administration will confiscate the funds allocated to building this mosque and convert it to the budget for rebuilding the World Trade Center in New York and prevent the building of a mosques in the US. There is no real need for them and also because of the seriousness of being a breeding ground for extremist ideology of terrorism and hatred of the other and practiced public preaching, which is an assault on the freedom of others and their religion.
comments
1.NicoleB, Egypt May 21st, 2010 7:16 PM :

It took me awhile to grasp if the author is actually in favor or against this project.

Anyhow, …., thanks for bringing this to my attention.
Not sure many people outside of New York (or even inside) know about this ‘idea’.

2.txlady706 May 22nd, 2010 12:17 AM :

Sharia is a LAW.
A country can’t be run by 2 sets of laws for 2 factions of different people.
The Constitution is a LAW.
One has to CHOOSE.
Islam may be a religion, but it REQUIRES adherence to SHARIA as part of it.
Muslims should renounce SHARIA if they choose to stay in the US
replyJoshArizona
at 20:46 on May 21st, 2010

If this mosque is built on private property, without public funds or governmental favoritism. Then it fits perfectly under the 1st Amendment.

Would people be so upset if it were a Christian church or a Jewish synagogue?

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances. - First Amendment of the United States Constitution


1 replyRory Cripps
at 09:42 on May 22nd, 2010

Josh: I think that you're missing the point. Those that want to build the mosque couldn't care any less about America or the first amendment. They merely see it as another triumph over the infidels if in fact it is allowed to be constructed. Ask yourself this: Do you really believe that the location for the mosque is appropriate if in fact the proponents of the mosque had any respect for those that died on 9/11? Of course not!


0 replyFlysolo (not verified)
at 00:39 on May 24th, 2010

How about a Multidenominational church?

1 reply78t k kidwai
at 23:07 on May 21st, 2010


Why a mosque can not be built on a private property is another question and any objection to construction of a mosque is absurd.But why Muslim community all over the world is so backward?That is a question of importance and relevance.Do we need grand mosques or good universaties?Modern education or only Madarsas where Islamic education,confined to Arabic,Quran, Hadith and Islamic history,is imparted?Islam has been reduced to tokenism of rituals,the practice of true Islam -that is justice and social equality and opposition to all forms of exploitation-has been abandoned.The Muslims rulers deliberately misused religion,and so much so that it was distorted and then tailored to suit their vested interests to hoodwink the masses.Cordoba organisation won't serve Muslims by constructing a mosque.The total construction cost may run into millions of dollars and that can be utilised for a better and more constructive purpose.To sum up: grand,beautifully built mosques,as we find in Saudi Arabia and other Muslim countries,are not going to help the community move forward in any direction.Masjid(mosque)is any place where Muslims bow their heads to God.


2 replytxlady706 (not verified)
at 08:19 on May 22nd, 2010

The twin towers were violently destroyed on sept 11, 2001. Americans died and Muslims rejoiced. We didn't round up the Muslims and send them packing. All the terroristic attacks have been conducted by Muslims. Extremists or NOT. At this site, they want to being to erect a new CALIPHATE. The name alone, harkens back to the history of CONQUERING and establishing the Islamic Caliphate. As a JEW, this is very sickening. How dare you speak with such flippant adoration. The Muslim world, even in the more moderate countries, has declared war on the Judao - Christian world. There are people in the world that choose to harm other people. Brother against brother, however, this is not ONE person. This is a whole of a people, that want nothing, but to impose their own way of life on others. They USE our system of DEMOCRACY, because the system has become corrupt. The TRUTH speakers that once permeated society (in the west) have been silenced, through political correctness and over 1/2 a century of corruption in our schools and prisons. Now, they ( the corrupters ) enter our political systems, which they have literally purchased. The Muslims contribute money to the schools to teach the doctrine of Islam. They buy our industries and financial institutions. They purchase our lands and establish SHARIA law in whole towns. SHARIA is a LAW. A country CAN'T sustain very long, if 2 laws are permitted to exist along side each other. The most oppressive will be the winner, as has been the case throughout history. The Cordoba Initiative is THAT exactly. It's a Muslim flag being raised on top of a site where Americans (civilians - sheep to the slaughter) were slain by the attack that MUSLIMS called WAR. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C%C3%B3rdoba,_Spain"It was captured in 711[3] by a Muslim army: in 716 it became a provincial capital, depending from the Caliphate of Damascus; in Arabic it was known as قرطبة (Qurṭuba). In May 766, it was elected as capital of the independent Muslim emirate of al-Andalus, later a Caliphate itself. During the caliphate apogee (1000 AD), Córdoba had a population of roughly 400,000 inhabitants,[4] though estimates range between 250,000 and 500,000."

0 reply78t k kidwai
at 10:10 on May 22nd, 2010


The TWIN TOWERS were brought down by Bush Bin Satan's team which included Coward Chenny,Clown Rumsfled and of course son of a Luciferian.
The 9/11 truth movement has exposed the conspiracy hatched by Bush Bin Satan,son of Luciferian Bush Sr.,with scientific evidence,eye witness accounts.Both the volumes of 9/11 and American Empire are must reading for those who want to know the truth about 9/11.

What Isabella and Fernando did to the Jews and Muslims of Spain,read history.(Although guys like you prefer to distort history,not read it).


1 replyRory Cripps
at 09:33 on May 22nd, 2010

Extremists in the US are opposing a plan to build a mosque in the proximity of ground zero, saying that it denotes Islamization of the US. The worst thing is that the Islamophobic organizations opposing the plan to build the mosque shows that their objection is not just for the mosque but is actually for the Muslim community and the religion of Islam.
NO "MOSQUES" next to 9/11 Memorial Site - NO Cordoba House (mosque)
You have the unmitigated gall to call Americans that oppose the construction of a mosque near ground zero extremists? After all the murder and mayhem that your brethren have committed in the name of Allah?



0 reply78t k kidwai
at 09:36 on May 22nd, 2010

Rory,the kind of language you use I guess you got out of the bed on the wrong side.If ignorance is bliss to you,no one can help.

0 reply3YankeeJim
at 10:11 on May 23rd, 2010

I read the comments and think everyone has made some good points. In my opinion, building a mosque near the Twin Tower location is politically insensitive at least. Freedom of religion and freedom from religion is alive and well in America. I would suggest the organizers find another location for the mosque.


0 reply78t k kidwai
at 07:16 on May 24th, 2010

YJ,I fully agree with you.As I stated in my earlier post that mosque is not required at all at any location.Organizers can utilize huge funds earmarked or collected for mosque construction to promote goodwill and understanding among various religious communities.

The latest developments in the issue of proselytizing in Alexandria in northern Egypt

The latest developments in the issue of proselytizing in Alexandria in northern Egypt
That in fully twelve o'clock and a half after midnight, the start on Sunday, 05/22/2010 Time of Alexandria in northern Egypt ... After the prosecution investigation for more than eight hours have been converted to Christianity accused of proselytizing to the building of the State Security LAID again to their work files and then will be transferred to the Department of Ameriya to display the first officer and detective from the department released the first Ameriya
It should be noted that in the very fourth yesterday afternoon of Friday, 21/05/2010 Maj. Mahmoud Mahdi and some of his detectives undercover of the Police Service of State Security Investigation Branch western Amiriya Alexandria in northern Egypt, the arrest of Reverend Majid, Bushra responsible for service Alivtqadat care church Evangelical Battarien and his wife, sister, let them Ayyad, a group of servants and maids and two from the land of the commandment Almmsyahyat kilobytes 21-22 Ajmi line after Hanoville area during their lack of some Christians who are in the region have been arrested on each of:
1 - Fr human Faltas Maged Abdul Quddus (35 years), a resident in the same place, who was arrested when
2 - His wife is sister to allow Ayad Salama (32 years) and have a daughter (9 years) and son (5 years)
3 - Brother Samir Majali Samuel (46 year) works contractor, businessman and lives in the same area
4 - Brother Inspirational dream, and a gift (56 year), and the Speaker of the accounting department of social security area of Amiriya and live in the same area has had open-heart surgery since have passed out more than once during their detention in State Security
5 - Sister Margaret Subhi Menkerios (47 year) employee and patient Balcansr (cancer) and under treatment Balkimucirbe
6 - Mary PhD (67 years) has been arrested while passing in front of a police car in spite of a lack of knowledge and his pastor, simply because she was wearing a cross on her chest
7- Sister Hanna intellectual survival (65 year) is the guest of Minya with relatives in the same area and were going to the church the time of her arrest she was sick infarction, coronary artery and feet swollen
Where to live all of this area and they compile each other to go to church together, have been transferred to the building of the Police Service of State Security Investigation Branch Ameriya in Alexandria, after being insulted countless by the rule of the leading Mahmoud Mahdi edited record of the conditions of No. 4830 Council 2010 forth administrative department Amiriya first as of today, as the sovereignty of the work exhibits the record straight in an annex to the Gospels and nine books on the miracles of the Lord Jesus Christ did not allow the leading masters of lawyers access to them or even see the actions or the charges against them
Strangely, that Mr. Col. J. morphological Director, Office of the Police Service of the security of States LAID had claimed during his address to a senior official of the Evangelical Church that one of the priests, a holy father (k) and priest of the Church Mary Coptic Orthodox Agami Obotalat is the one who gave him filed against those arrested because of fear for the people of the transformation of the Evangelical Church When he felt the presence of the officer not to credibility lies that relate the request of Major gallant Mahmoud Mahdi for bringing three Muslim neighbors arrested and take the pledge for them to attend to the prosecution to testify on the accused that they were give them glad tidings in the Lord Jesus Christ was brought into the record Kmgni them and those Muslim brothers are:
1 - Haj Mohamed Mostafa Mohamed Abd El Aal (the owner of a supermarket next to the area Aloasip Rev. Majed human) has seen the men good-neighborliness and the oath that he will not say except the truth
2 - Mr. Mohamed Adel Abdel-Kader Marina (Officer Ministry of Awqaf in Alexandria, who is also in the same region) and insisted that does not say except the truth
3 - Mr. Ali Abdul Jalil on (factor) and lives in the same area
And ask in our confusion about what will return to these officers at the disclosure of the spirit of hatred and discord between the communities relate to each other and revenue Segnoh Gentlemen, state security officers from driving a wedge between the citizens and for those who use the method of divide and conquer?
Why at this particular time?
Will bring you any news the first Powell and promise you that we will do the work of a detailed report on the case until we put the truth in front of everyone
http://www.egypt4christ.com/english/59-human-rights/952-the-latest-developments-in-the-issue-of-proselytizing-in-alexandria-in-northern-egypt-.ht

Coptic Christians Voicing Frustration With White House As Persecution Widens in Egypt

The leaders of Coptic Christians, whose community is facing growing persecution in Egypt, say they have been unsuccessful in efforts to gain a hearing from the White House or other parts of the Obama administration.

Heightened persecution of Egypt’s 12 million Christians coupled with growing power and prestige of their Coptic Diaspora in America and Australia is leading to new political efforts here. Educated and skilled Egyptian Copts who migrated in large numbers in recent decades are talking to Congress, organizing lobbies, and making other efforts to be heard.

They say they are frustrated by the current administration in Washington, particularly after President Obama’s overture to the Muslim world via a speech at Cairo. In the speech Mr. Obama President apologized for America’s misdeeds to Muslims, stating that he came “to seek a new beginning between the United States and Muslims around the world.” Coptic leaders say that even while reaching out to Muslims the administration has turned a deaf ear to the pleas Arab Christian minority in the very country where he delivered his apology to Muslims.

“The Obama administration’s benign neglect of Arab Christians, is putting freedoms and human rights in the whole Middle East at risk,” is the way it was put in an interview with the Sun by the president of the U.S. Copts Association, Michael Meunier, who is headquartered in Washington “Friendships with Muslims has been the Obama Administration’s opening theme from his first day in office and in that famed Cairo speech in which he extended a hand to all Muslims in partnership.”

Mr. Meunier added that that the president’s failure to speak as extensively about the persecution of Arab Christians was a departure from American policy and a grave error. “We have no problems with American friendships with Islam and Muslims, but it cannot be accomplished at the expense of our rights as Egyptian Christians and Arab Christians, and as the very lives of our people there are endangered,” Mr. Meunier told the Sun.

One area of complaint by the Copt community is a law banning the repair or construction of churches without a “presidential decree.” The measure, known as the Hamayuni Law, is based on an 1856 Ottoman decree but was rarely enforced in Egypt under the monarchial dynasty overthrown by army officers in 1952.

Indeed, until the coup that put Gamal Abdel Nasser in power in 1952, Christian communities in Egypt — including Catholics, Protestants, Armenians, Greeks and Italians in addition to the Copts — enjoyed a climate of moderate Islam as the country westernized itself.

Because Christianity in Egypt is so ancient, preceding Islam by seven centuries, the country is a repository of multiple centuries-old churches, part of its international cultural heritage. As attractions for tourists, they rival the Pharos heritage. Those churches benefit somewhat as tourist sites, getting a measure of protection by the state. Elsewhere in Egypt, smaller, ordinary churches are burning. Because of the Hamayuni Law, the churches that are attacked or burned down remain gone.

Copts say they are down to 2,524 churches now, down from more than 3,000 churches in the early 1950s. The bigger problem is not only that of systematic destruction of churches but the inability to replace the losses and build more to keep up with the normal growth of the Christian population.

The squeeze has become bad enough that Copts have often have to travel far distances outside of their towns for religious services for baptism, marriage, funerals, and regular mass.

Since 1971 only 37 “presidential decrees” were issued to build new churches and a further 34 decrees for menial repairs or refurbishments, including absurd things like replacing broken windows, across all of Egypt.

Both the regimes of Presidents Al Sadat and Mubarak revived the Hamayuni Law, refusing or ignoring applications by Christians to repair, rebuild or erect churches. Egypt’s parliament, which is led by Mr. Mubarak’s National Party, has refused multiple proposals to write off the law or cancel it. Christian landowners need official permits to build a church. Muslims, by contrast, need no such permissions from the state, the presidency, or the government to build mosques anywhere in Egypt.

As a result, thousands new mosques, some starting as nothing more than storefront shops, have been established over the past 30 years. Most were funded with Saudi money. As the expansion of Islamic houses of prayer proceeds in Egypt , Christians there remain frozen in place.

Sectarian outbursts, which always end up in attacks on churches, are diminishing their numbers. Nagaa Hamadi is close to Luxor the fabled capital of ancient Egypt where several dynasties of Pharos ruled, a place replete with splendid ancient sites and a region of the Deep Nile Valley South, where millions of Coptic Christians live and work as merchants, landowners and businessmen.

Attacks on those Coptic Christians and their shops in Luxor, as well as in major cities like Cairo and Alexandria, are now monthly occurrences. Their employees are mugged, robbed, stabbed, and occasionally shot and killed, while their establishments are damaged or destroyed. The Islamists’ objective is to drive Copts out of the business of tourism and commerce,

That objective is voiced openly by advocates of the Moslem Brotherhood, who voice the ambition in weekly sermons, as well as over the airwaves by such broadcasters as the Qatari Al Jazeera and the Suadi Al Arabia television networks. Both networks keep a large contingent of reporters in Cairo and carry a stream of anti-Christian speeches and news programming. Anti-Christian exhortations are far from discreet; they are made openly on loud speakers in mosques on Fridays across Egypt, even in Christian neighborhoods.

Imams routinely urge Muslims to boycott Christians in business and social gatherings, cross the street to avoid mingling with them, refrain from shaking hands with them, or joining them in business ventures.

Much of this is reported and written about in the press, including in the government owned Al Ahram, the largest Arab daily newspaper, which has a contingent of liberal writers. The Coptic church routinely files complaints to the police. Yet to date, such complaints have been largely ignored. The government has been either unable, or unwilling, to challenge, stop, or question radical imams.

Luxor itself came to the world’s attention in November 1997, but only when Islamists massacred 62 Swiss tourists in a bloody attack. The ongoing dispossession and massacres of thousands of Egyptian Christians in and around the rest of Egypt, has yet to receive much attention, while the government dismisses each attack as an “individual incident.”

By Youssef Ibrahmim
www.nysun.com

Ground Zero Mosque: A Cultural Center or Islamization?

Voice of the Copts
This past week, just a few months prior to the anniversary of the 9/11 tragedy, the Planning Commission of lower Manhattan has approved the construction of a $100 million mosque near the site of Ground Zero.
The 13-floor building, as reported by The New York Times a few days ago, will reach the height of one hundred feet. The group sponsoring the project has said that the city and its population would benefit from its purpose as a cultural center which will work to bring harmony between Islamic culture and New Yorkers.
The mosque will be constructed in a city still bleeding from one of the worst civilian attacks since WW II and still suffering with the sad memory of the destruction of the World Trade Center and the loss of almost three thousand lives. In almost nine years New Yorkers and all Americans still wait to see the replacement of the destroyed towers, but instead we find ourselves with a proposed Islamic cultural center, which for some will be nothing more than a landmark and a memorial to the victory of Bin Laden and company as a sample of Islamic Jihad against Western infidels.
As a professional architect I wonder why the Planning Commission of lower Manhattan decided to keep its residents uninformed about a project in this sensitive location with such purpose and proportion. A project of this size would normally need an in-depth urban study and infrastructure planning. The location for construction of an Islamic cultural center in very close proximity to the disaster area of Ground Zero where less than nine years ago two commercial airliners carrying innocent passengers were hijacked by Muslims from Saudi Arabia and Egypt and flown into two office buildings is not a mistake or coincidence and, at the very least, insensitive to Americans.
Aren't we the least bit suspicious of this desired harmony when so far not even one public condemnation or demonstration of remorse has been made by Muslims and Arab leaders regarding this barbaric act? In fact the only reports we do have are to the contrary with Arabs and Muslims around the world celebrating the success of this attack on the United States. Furthermore, all Americans have suffered the offensive rumors spread by Arabs which claim the origin of the 9/11 attacks to be an inside job by our own FBI or the American Jews -- insulting our intelligence and humiliating the victims and their families in this insidious form of denial.
Let us not forget as well that New York City Mayor Giuliani refused to accept a donation of ten million dollars from a Saudi Prince as a pledge to rebuild whatever was destroyed by Arab terrorists (his own fellow citizens) in lower Manhattan. It is now important that New Yorkers and all Americans remember the reason for the former Mayor's rejection of this offer along with the Prince's statement against U.S. policyin favor of Israel.
Giuliani proved to America and the whole world that freedom is priceless and that money means nothing next to the integrity of our free country where no manipulation of our foreign or our domestic policies will be tolerated. By using his heart in a moment of great courage, Giuliani gave the whole world a lesson in confronting Arab hypocrisy. At a time when Americans were in a state of shock, the insensitivity of such an offer by the Saudi Prince was counteracted by the American spirit embodied in Giuliani's wholesale rejection of money coming from the same source as the attackers in order to dictate their own agenda and buy our sovereignty.
Recently The New York Times reported a statement made by an Imam indicating that the intended cultural center would bring "a new discourse in the relationship between the United States, New York City, and the Muslim world." One only needs to look at the current situations in Muslim-majority countries today where non-Muslim minorities suffer human rights violations sanctioned under Shariah law which dominates the constitutions of those nations. The reality of a supremacist system within Islamic culture should be enough to preclude any dialogue with those who live by the U.S. Constitution and subscribe to the modern culture of New York City.
Which Islamic organization in America, Europe or Arab-Muslim country condemned the recent attacks in Upper Egypt where innocent people were killed leaving their church on the Eastern Christmas Eve? Where are the Islamic voices opposing and protesting the persecution, oppression and discrimination in their own homelands in countries such as Egypt, Sudan Nigeria and Iraq, to name just a few? Islamic actions, not words, are what Americans need to heed, and we must be cautious toward what we are being told by those whose actions are lethal around the world.
Respect for human rights is a fundamental principle that governs our free democratic society, but not so in Arab-Islamic countries. In the West religion is a personal issue and the right of every citizen to practice - a private matter between an individual and their God. How is it possible to have discourse between our culture which is based on such freedoms and a culture which is based on the goal to make their religious precepts their legal system and government even in other non-Muslim countries? A few days ago in an interview published in Kul-al-Arab, a weekly newspaper in Israel, a Knesset Member, Imam Masoud Ganaim, was calling to replace the state of Israel with an Islamic Caliphate. (http://voiceofthecopts.org/en/news/replace_israel_with_islamic_caliphate.html
This kind of remark shows the true nature of Islam today, and yet we allow ourselves as Americans to be told that we need to have discourse with those who espouse ideas antithetical and detrimental to the basic precepts of free democratic societies in the world, including the United States of America. What more as Americans are we to understand that we can't already see for ourselves? Leaders of Islam and the Cordoba Institute must first prove to us that they demonstrate the same openness to co-exist with those of all other faiths and beliefs in the nations where Islam dominates.
The free world has already allowed the most egregious actions to take place, such as; the placement of Iran onto the UN Commission for Women's Rights, the FIFA reversal of the banning of the hijab worn in Olympic games, and the Egyptian sponsorship of the UN Religious Defamation Act, to name just a few in recent days. Shall we add to this list the building of an Islamic mega-center at the sacred site of Ground Zero as if the teachings consistent with the forces that caused this tragedy will not be taking place inside?
If New York is in need of a new cultural center in the heart of the Ground Zero community it should be built and run by those who stand up for freedom, human rights, tolerance and the love of humanity. New Yorkers have been the ones to open their hearts and receive immigrants who come from around the world to seek a better life and share in our freedom - the kind of freedom which those who seek to build this project know nothing about.

Voice of the Copts

EGYPT: Upcoming TV series angers Muslim Brotherhood

Written by Amro Hassan
Los Angeles Times
18 May 2010


Muslim Brotherhood founder Hassan al-Banna

An upcoming television series about the early days of the Muslim Brotherhood, Egypt's largest opposition and religious movement, is angering many group members, including the son of founder Hassan al-Banna.

The series called "Al Gama'a" ("The Group") is written by prominent scriptwriter Waheed Hamed and directed by Mohamed Yassin. It has been in production for nearly two years and is expected to be broadcast by Egyptian public television during the upcoming holy month of Ramadan in August.

Hamed has previously revealed that his script will focus on the first and most influential 20 years in the life of the Brotherhood as well as the biography of its founder. Nonetheless, Brotherhood leaders, who worry the series will be government propaganda against them, criticized Hamed for not allowing the group to review a copy of the script and to double-check historical facts.

"The main problem is Hamed's unwillingness to consult any of the group's leaders, who have been members long enough to know our history, while he was writing the script," Mohamed Habib, former Brotherhood deputy leader, has said.


Ahmed Seif el Islam al-Banna echoed Habib's quotes, saying that he "will not accept any production that deals with his father's life without verifying all the historical facts included."

Al-Banna said he would sue Hamed if the series slanders his father. There is no love lost between Hamed and the Brotherhood, especially since the writer has described the group and other Islamist organizations as leaning toward violence and serving their own interests in the name of religion.

Brotherhood members are troubled that Hamed's script might similarly defame their movement. Some suggested that it was no coincidence Egypt's public television would be showing the series less than two months before parliamentary (People's Assembly) elections. The Brotherhood, an outlawed political organization whose members ran as independents, controls about 20% of parliament.

"Both the ministers of information and culture are behind endorsing this production, which aims to defame the Brotherhood," said Brotherhood member Mohsen Radhi.

Hamed refuted claims that the series was sponsored by the government, stressing his confidence on the credibility of the sources and documents he relied on while writing the script: "If the Brotherhood has such a clean history as some of them claim, then why are they so afraid of my script even before it is shown?" he said.

Egypt’s Persecuted Christians

May 18, 2010
The Wall Street Journal

Violence against Copts is on the rise and all but ignored by the state.

A few weeks ago in the coastal city of Marsa Matrouh, an enraged mob of some 3,000 angry Muslims gathered after Friday prayers. After the mosque’s imam exhorted them to cleanse the city of its infidel Christians, called Copts, they went on a rampage.The toll was heavy: 18 homes, 23 shops and 16 cars were completely destroyed, while 400 Copts barricaded themselves in their church for 10 hours until the frenzy died out.

This was only the latest of more than a dozen such attacks during the past year, including in the village of Kafr El-Barbary on June 26, the town of Farshout on Nov. 21, and the village of Shousha on Nov. 23. Then came Naga Hamadi, where passengers in a drive-by car fired at random into Christians leaving a Coptic Christmas service on Jan. 6. The massacre killed seven and left 26 seriously wounded.

Although the Copts have long been the target of sporadic attacks, the violence of the last few years is more like a purge, as waves of mob assaults have forced hundreds, sometimes thousands of Christian citizens to flee their homes. In each incident the police, despite frantic appeals, invariably arrive after the violence is over. Later the injured are coerced by the special security police forces into accepting “reconciliation” with their attackers, in order to avoid the prosecution of the guilty. No Muslim to date has been convicted for any of these crimes.

The state’s lack of regard for the Copts has encouraged anti-Christian feelings among many Muslims in all walks of life. Even Al-Azhar, the world’s preeminent Sunni Islamic institution, has contributed its share to this widespread hostility by publishing a pamphlet declaring the Bible a corrupted document and Christianity a pagan religion.

Al-Azhar’s textbook for its high-school students, called “Al Iqna’,” states that killing a Muslim is punishable by death, but if a Muslim kills a non-Muslim he is not subject to capital punishment since the superior cannot be punished for killing the inferior (p. 146). It also states that the blood money (compensation for manslaughter) rates for a woman is half that for a man, but for a Christian or Jew it is one third that of a Muslim (p. 187); and that there can be no stewardship (such as a superior in work) of a non-Muslim over a Muslim (p. 205).

Thus the hundreds of thousands of Azhar schools, which are monitored by the state, indoctrinate and then discharge annually into Egyptian society hundreds of thousands of young Muslims with an ideology of intolerance, contempt and hatred toward Copts (and even more intensely toward Jews).

Egypt’s Christian Copts, about 12% of the population, have long been subject to customary and official discrimination. No church, for example, can be built or even repaired without a presidential decree. Copts are excluded from the intelligence and security services because they are deemed a security risk. This discrimination springs from a belief deeply grounded in the social psyche of the ruling elite and large sectors of the Muslim community that it is unreasonable in an Islamic society to expect strict equality between Muslims and the infidels.

In effect, the Copts today are treated as dhimmis-the age-old inferior status of Christian and Jewish minorities in Muslim lands. Dhimmi status is no longer legalized but continues to operate as a traditional social norm. Thus, for example, an individual offense by a dhimmi against a Muslim warrants retribution for the entire dhimmi community.

Despite the long-standing suffering of the Copts, the Egyptian government cynically insists that there is no sectarian problem and brands as traitors those who draw international attention to the Copts’ plight. So far the United States and the rest of the Western democracies, despite repeated Coptic appeals, have done little besides calling upon the Egyptian regime to foster greater tolerance.

But the dhimmi status of the Copts will not be changed by sweet persuasion. It will only change by persistent domestic struggle supported by vigorous international pressure. The Copts do not demand the tolerance of Muslims but equal rights with them.

Mr. Zaki is a former managing director of the Ibn Khaldun Center, a nonprofit organization that supports democracy and civil rights in Egypt and the Middle East.

Sudan and Egypt to cooperate on water treatment

The Company for Drinking Water and Sewage in the governorate of Beheira and the Drinking Water Authority of the Sudanese Red Sea state signed a joint cooperation agreement seeking to improve water quality and increase water production in the Sudanese state through Egyptian expertise.

The agreement was signed as the Egyptian government is preparing to implement the model used by the Beheira company to purify and treat water throughout Egypt.

This implementation model follows the company’s successful use of mechanized meter reading systems, payment collection and the development of an innovative pneumatic pump system for water purification. The International Organization for Standardization awarded the company five certificates of compliance for meeting water compatibility and occupational safety standards under a plan adopted by Mahmoud Mansour, chairperson of the board of directors.

The company plans to replace the current water meters with electronic meters, which will allow for readings that are more accurate and the elimination of human error.

Recently, the company implemented the “Life Cycle Assessment” program to analyze the effects of water treatment on the environment. The program tracks water as it moves through the plant and measures water loss and energy consumption during treatment, with the intent of maximizing plant efficiency and minimizing its environmental impact.

The company recently began employing video-equipped robotic vehicles that navigate sewage pipes to perform maintenance work, therefore eliminating the need for street-level repair work.

Islamists Dominate Egyptian Army

JERUSALEM — The Middle East Newsline reports that the Egyptian Army has come under the steady domination of Islamists. Egyptian sources said Islamists have risen to mid- and high-level ranks in the army and navy. They said many of these officers pressure their soldiers to demonstrate a devotion and observance to the Muslim religion regardless of their faith.

“There is an acceptance in most of the military that fundamentalist Islam is legitimate and becoming the dominating trend,” a source familiar with the Egyptian military said.

The sources said the Islamist trend in the military began in the Egyptian Navy during the 1990s. They said the Islamic influence spread to the army and included pressure on non-Muslims to convert.

The Islamist officers were said to have reached senior levels of the army. They sources said the officers have pressed for greater access to mosques, additional time for prayer and ritual as well as decreasing tolerance for secular and non-Muslim soldiers.

The main victims of the Islamization of military have been Coptic Christians, said to comprise about eight percent of Egypt’s population.

Coptic soldiers have reported Islamist harassment, beatings and pressure to convert.

In August 2009, a Coptic soldier was said to have shot himself amid pressure from Islamist officers in his unit. The body of Mubarak Zakaria, 22, was found badly bruised in what the sources said reflected severe beating and torture.

“My son sustained multiple gunshot wounds, and what the prosecutor told me is illogical,” Zakaria’s father, Masoud, said.

The sources said the Islamist pressure on Coptic soldiers to convert has become widespread. In most cases, they said, the Copts have refused to report the pressure in fear of reprisals.

The Egyptian Air Force has been deemed the last military service not dominated by fundamentalist Islam. But the sources said they expected the air force would be soon a target by creeping Islamization.

The sources said the regime of President Hosni Mubarak has ignored complaints of Islamization in the military. In many cases, they said, Islamist officers were also avoiding their counterparts in Western militaries.

In 2006, another Coptic soldier, identified as Hani Seroufim, was found dead after he refused orders by his commanding officer to convert to Islam.

The sources said the army claimed that Seroufim had drowned, but his body contained evidence of torture.

“They finally have realized that the crimes against them are not individual incidents but rather crimes against humanity planned by the Egyptian state itself,” Coptic writer Magdi Khalil said.

By David Bedein
www.thebulletin.us

Egypt emergency law linked to poll abuse

Rights groups warn Egyptian emergency law may be used to influence outcome of elections.
CAIRO - Egyptian human rights groups on Thursday protested over the renewal of a decades-old emergency law, fearing it could be used to influence the outcome of elections in Egypt over the next two years.

The Egyptian Organisation for Human Rights and the Arab Centre for the Independence of the Judiciary, in a joint news conference, condemned parliament’s renewal of the law in a government-backed vote on Wednesday.

Non-governmental organisations “fear that the (two-year) renewal… was decided so as to be used during the elections” for parliament later this year and in a 2011 presidential poll, said the rights group’s Hafez Abu Saada.

Nasser Amin of the Arab Centre said the government had “retained all the measures allowing the executive to restrain” demonstrations and to carry out arrests on the basis of suspicion alone.

Some 10,000 people, most of them Islamic activists but also secular opposition figures, are being held under the terms of the emergency legislation in force since president Anwar Sadat’s assassination in 1981, said Abu Saada.

Thirteen other NGOs, in a joint statement, voiced alarm over the renewal, despite pledges that the new state of emergency would be limited to the fight against terrorism and its financing and to combat drug-related crimes.

“In practical terms, this means more emergency in Egypt, more arrests, more restrictions on liberties and more obstruction of the law and constitution,” they warned.

“We believe there is a clear connection” between the renewal of the emergency law “and the series of elections slated in the country over the next two years.”

The controversial law, which gives police wide powers of arrest, suspends constitutional rights and curbs non-governmental political activity, was backed by a majority of MPs in Egypt’s 454-member parliament.

Egypt refuses to make concessions on Nile water

Nile expert says Egypt will object to any project agreed by upstream African countries that affects its share.
By Samer al-Atrush - CAIRO

Egypt is refusing to relinquish a drop of its legal right to the lion’s share of Nile river water, despite demands from other African countries for a more equitable sharing agreement.

Following years of barren negotiations, seven upstream African countries — Ethiopia, Tanzania, Uganda, Kenya, DR Congo, Rwanda, Burundi– are on Friday expected to push forward with a new water-sharing deal to replace an agreement that gives Egypt and Sudan majority control of the water flow.

Egypt has repeatedly cited its “historical” right on the river which provides the country of 80 million people with 90 percent of its water needs.

The upstream countries want to be able to implement projects, in consultation with Egypt and Sudan, but without Egypt being able to exercise the veto power it was given by a 1929 colonial-era treaty with Britain.

A 1959 agreement between Egypt and Sudan — following Sudan’s independence in 1956 — allocated 55.5 billion cubic metres of the Nile to Egypt, and 18.5 billion to Sudan, a combined total of 87 percent of the Nile flow.

Egypt’s water needs are expected to exceed its supply by 2017, according to a government report last year.

“Egypt is exerting efforts with leaders of the upstream countries to persuade them to delay the agreement,” said Hani Raslan, a Nile expert with the Ahram Centre for Political and Strategic Studies.

“The only way out of the problem is cooperation,” he added.

Raslan said that the Nile Basin Initiative — a basin countries umbrella group funded by the World Bank — had studied 22 projects including energy projects, saving lost water and irrigation.

“Unilateral signing will abort these projects. And Egypt will object to any project that affects its share,” Raslan said.

Egypt says it is still hoping to negotiate, failing that it has threatened legal action.

“If certain countries of the Nile Basin sign an agreement without consensus, Egypt will insist that all countries respect international law,” Foreign Minister Ahmed Abul Gheit told a local newspaper on Saturday.

“If necessary, we will treat this in the adequate legal way,” he said, adding that his country’s water rights were a “red line.”

The outcome of the next meeting could unravel the 10-year-old Nile Basin Initiative, which the World Bank credits with helping keep the countries talking with each other on quotas.

Raslan says that an agreement on May 14 that excluded Egypt and Sudan would bring an end to the initiative, a message Abul Gheit says has been delivered to the basin countries.

“Egypt has been careful to affirm to the Nile Basin countries and donors that opening the door to signing the agreement means the end of negotiations and an announcement that the Nile Basin Initiative has failed,” he said.

Egypt has proposed to help manage its African partners’ water resources, and vowed to better make use of its own.

But Egyptian diplomats say the African countries will have a hard time financing large projects if there is no consensus among the Nile countries.

Cairo “will not accept the construction of any project in the Nile basin that could affect its water resources,” Abul Gheit said.

Some observers say Egypt is not serious about negotiating.

“Egyptians are behaving with the Africans the way they accuse Israel of behaving with the Palestinians: they say they are ready to negotiate but without committing to the difficult issues,” one western diplomat said on condition of anonymity.

And Egypt insists that the Africans have other sources of water.

“Egypt only has water coming from the river. The Africans have it from the rains,” one Egyptian diplomat said.

Guns found in US professor’s luggage by Egypt customs

Police in Egypt have arrested an Egyptian-American academic discovered to have several weapons in his luggage as he arrived on a flight from the US.

Officials said they saw the man, named as Mohammed Ibrahim Marei, a professor of botany, “behaving nervously” as he waited to pass through customs.

In his bags they found two handguns, 250 bullets, several swords, daggers and knives.

He had arrived on an Egyptair flight from New York to Cairo.

The authorities said they had launched an investigation, it was reported.

It was not immediately clear how the man was able to get through security in New York and board the plane.

The Jihadists’ Deadly Path to Citizenship

The Jihadists’ Deadly Path to Citizenship

Dear Morris,

Michelle Malkin’s column below documents the ways jihadists are exploiting our visa and citizenship laws. This includes sham marriages, where jihadists marry an American citizen in order to gain citizenship.

The book Lightning Out of Lebanon documents how terrorists in a cell in Charlotte, North Carolina, used marriage as a means to achieve citizenship and further their efforts to fund the terrorist organization Hezbollah.

This problem is now being examined closely by some Members of Congress and is likely to be an issue they discuss with our participants at our National Conference & Legislative Briefing June 27 – 29. Have you registered yet? Are you considering attending or would like more information?

Click here to learn more about our lineup of speakers, special discounted hotel rates that will save you up to 40% on accommodations, and a listing of events associated with the conference.





The Jihadists' Deadly Path to Citizenship By Michelle Malkin

http://www.JewishWorldReview.com |
America's homeland security amnesia never ceases to amaze. In the aftermath of the botched Times Square terror attack over the weekend, Pakistani-born bombing suspect Faisal Shahzad's U.S. citizenship status caused a bit of shock and awe. The Atlantic magazine writer Jeffrey Goldberg's response was typical: "I am struck by the fact that he is a naturalized American citizen, not a recent or temporary visitor." Well, wake up and smell the deadly deception.

Shahzad's path to American citizenship — he reportedly married an American woman, Huma Mian, in 2008 after spending a decade in the country on foreign student and employment visas — is a tried-and-true terror formula. Jihadists have been gaming the sham marriage racket with impunity for years. And immigration benefit fraud has provided invaluable cover and aid for U.S.-based Islamic plotters, including many other operatives planning attacks on New York City. As I've reported previously:

— El Sayyid A. Nosair wed Karen Ann Mills Sweeney to avoid deportation for overstaying his visa. He acquired U.S. citizenship, allowing him to remain in the country, and was later convicted for conspiracy in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing that claimed six lives.

— Ali Mohamed became an American citizen after marrying a woman he met on a plane trip from Egypt to New York. Recently divorced, Linda Lee Sanchez wed Mohamed in Reno, Nev., after a six-week "courtship." Mohamed became a top aide to Osama bin Laden and was later convicted for his role in the 1998 United States embassy bombings in Africa that killed 12 Americans and more than 200 others.

— Embassy bombing plotter Khalid Abu al Dahab obtained citizenship after marrying three different American women.

— Embassy bombing plotter Wadih el Hage, Osama bin Laden's personal secretary, married April Ray in 1985 and became a naturalized citizen in 1989. Ray knew of her husband's employment with bin Laden, but like many of these women in bogus marriages, she pleaded ignorance about the nature of her husband's work. El Hage, she says, was a sweet man, and bin Laden "was a great boss."

— Lebanon-born Chawki Youssef Hammoud, convicted in a Hezbollah cigarette-smuggling operation based out of Charlotte, N.C., married American citizen Jessica Fortune for a green card to remain in the country.

— Hammoud's brother, Mohammed Hammoud, married three different American women. After arriving in the United States on a counterfeit visa, being ordered deported and filing an appeal, he wed Sabina Edwards to gain a green card. Federal immigration officials refused to award him legal status after this first marriage was deemed bogus in 1994. Undaunted, he married Jessica Wedel in May 1997 and, while still wed to her, paid Angela Tsioumas (already married to someone else, too) to marry him in Detroit. The Tsioumas union netted Mohammed Hammoud temporary legal residence to operate the terror cash scam. He was later convicted on 16 counts that included providing material support to Hezbollah.

— A total of eight Middle Eastern men who plotted to bomb New York landmarks in 1993 — Fadil Abdelgani, Amir Abdelgani, Siddig Ibrahim Siddig Ali, Tarig Elhassan, Abdo Mohammed Haggag, Fares Khallafalla, Mohammed Saleh, and Matarawy Mohammed Said Saleh — all obtained legal permanent residence by marrying American citizens.

A year after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, homeland security officials cracked a massive illegal alien Middle Eastern marriage fraud ring in a sting dubbed "Operation Broken Vows." Authorities were stunned by the scope of the operations, which stretched from Boston to South Carolina to California. But marriage fraud remains a treacherous path of least resistance. The waiting period for U.S. citizenship is cut by more than half for marriage visa beneficiaries. Sham marriage monitoring by backlogged homeland security investigators is practically nonexistent.

As former federal immigration official Michael Cutler warned years ago: "Immigration benefit fraud is certainly one of the major 'dots' that was not connected prior to the attacks of September 11, 2001, and remains a 'dot' that is not really being addressed the way it needs to be in order to secure our nation against criminals and terrorists who understand how important it is for them to 'game' the system as a part of the embedding process."

Jihadists have knowingly and deliberately exploited our lax immigration and entrance policies to secure the rights and benefits of American citizenship while they plot mass murder — and we haven't done a thing to stop them.