The Rise of Islam

[HisDaughter]

I believe that Islam is our danger.  That Islam will be the "One World Religion" or die trying.  I believe that it will be a revived "Ottoman Empire" and not a revived "Roman" empire or the EU, that the antichrist will come from and more specifically, Turkey.  I forget exactly where I first got that idea, but it was years ago.  After having read the books, "The Islamic Antichrist" and "God's War On Terror", I am convinced that it is so, and a bit surprised that I was right or at least not alone in what I suspected.  I would suggest to you that you read these books and see for yourselves.  If you don't want to, then it only takes a look at the news and current events around the world and in our own United States to come to the same conclusion.  Islam is growning and spreading at an alarming rate.  I cannot give you all the evidence here because of time and space and so I encourage you to research this for yourselves.

Much love to all of you in the name of our LORD Jesus,

Grammyluv

[HisDaughter]

Iranian Video Promotes Islamic Mahdi To Return Soon

newsmax.com

A feature-length documentary film, produced by a top adviser to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, claims that the cataclysmic events that will usher in an era of Muslim world domination are about to begin, triggered by actions launched by Iran and its Lebanese ally, Hezbollah.

Iran's Ahmadinejad repeatedly talks about the coming of the 12th imam, a Muslim messianic figure whose “reappearance” will make Islam victorious over the entire world.

He begins every public speech — including his yearly address to the United Nations — with a prayer that his actions will “hasten the return” of the 12th imam.

Now former Revolutionary Guards officer Reza Kahlili, who defected to the West after spying on behalf of the CIA inside Iran for more than a decade, has obtained a bootlegged copy of a new film made by Ahmadinejad’s office that lays out the Iranian president’s scenario for how the end times will begin.

It won’t be pretty for Israel, the United States, or U.S. allies in the Middle East.

The feature-length documentary film produced under the direct supervision of Ahmadinejad’s top adviser and chief of staff, Esfandiar Rahim Mashaei, claims that the cataclysmic events that will trigger the return of the Mahdi are about to start.

It all begins with the death of King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, revolts in Egypt and Yemen, and ends with Ahmadinejad and Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah leading Muslim armies to conquer Jerusalem.

The film, called “The Coming Is Upon Us,” is now being shown at Revolutionary Guards and paramilitary Bassij Corps bases around Iran, and will soon be released in an Arabic-language edition for mass distribution in the Arab world.

“Their intention is to incite further uprisings with the hopes of motivating Arabs to overthrow U.S.-backed governments, with the final goal of the annihilation of Israel and Allah’s governance of the world,” Kahlili tells Newsmax.

The film uses classic Muslim texts to convince the faithful that this scenario of Muslim world government, led by Iran, was foretold in the Koran and the Hadith, the sayings of the Prophet Muhammad.

It might appear innocuous — like those Christian and Jewish end-times scholars who reach deep into the world of Biblical prophecy for clues as to the exact date of the second coming of Jesus — except that the Iranians are not telling the faithful to prepare their souls for salvation: they are telling them to gird up for the coming battle with the infidel.

Early on, the film identifies the trigger that will set off the torch of this Muslim end times scenario. “Whoever guarantees the death of King Abdullah [of Saudi Arabia], I will guarantee the imminent reappearance of the Mahdi,” the film states, purporting to quote Muslim scripture.

“The Coming Is Upon Us” is not about prayer or redemption. It is about war.

To a backdrop of militarist pictures of Iranian leaders with crowds of Hezbollah fighters and driving music, the film claims that a nation “from the East” will rise up to prepare the way for the reappearance of the Mahdi.

That nation, of course, is Iran.

“This is their plan, and it’s coming right from the horse’s mouth,” Kahlili tells Newsmax. “They are claiming to have discovered all of these clues in Islamic scriptures, so this is not just a political plan, but a claim to absolute truth.”

Signs of the end times abound, the film states.

These include: great earthquakes, sedition, and the rise of evil world leaders (depicted are George W. Bush, President Obama, Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu, German Chancellor Merkel, among others).

Even worse: “Women will rid themselves of the Hijab,” the Islamic head covering many young Iranian women threw off during anti-government protests in 2009. “Adultery will become common. Men will dress like women. Men will content themselves to men and woman to woman.”

But the film goes beyond the standard condemnation of cultural depravity the Islamic Republic of Iran’s leaders commonly toss off when discussing the West.

It presents Islamic scripture as a treasure map leading to the end times, and claims to have the key to unlock its secrets.

Kahlili has made a 28-minute version of the film available on his blog, along with English subtitles.

The film claims that the Hadith “map” leading up to the reappearance of the Mahdi includes the following way-points:

The United States and Western colonial powers will invade Iraq
A revolution will take place in Yemen, and the “first soldiers” of the Mahdi will reach Mecca from Yemen
The people of Egypt “will rise up against their ruler”
Jews will re-establish a government in Palestine, and the Muslims will be “separated from one another and be disunited”
King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia will die, ushering in a final period of unrest and conflict with Israel that will lead directly to the Mahdi’s return

The film is nothing short of a declaration of war, an Iranian version of Hitler’s “Mein Kampf,” which after all in German means “my struggle” or “my jihad.”

The key figure in this Iranian end-times scenario is a mythical descendent of the Prophet Muhammad named Seyed Khorasani, who will deliver the flag of Islam into the hands of the 12th imam in person.

He will be the leader of the “people of the East,” and will have “a strong army in order to be victorious in the intense wars to take place before the Coming.”

The film claims explicitly that this leader is none other than Ayatollah Khamenei, the Supreme Leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran.

The film claims that Iran has become militarily so powerful that during a recent meeting with Israeli leaders, U.S. Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, announced that “the option of a military confrontation [with Iran] is no longer possible.”

“The pursuit of nuclear bombs by the radicals ruling Iran is directly connected to this belief, as war, chaos, and lawlessness must engulf the world to pave the way for Imam Mahdi’s reappearance,” Kahlili says.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BjpuuQTU4co&feature=player_embedded

[david749]

Thanks for the post grammyluv.


I read somewhere that a country needs about 2.1 children born per family to maintain the population. 


The European countries are around 1.6.  Eventually if this birthrate where to continue, the countries would just pass out of existence over time.  The man and the wife would not be replacing themselves. 


The birthrate for Moslems is around 8.0 per family.  They could eventually take over the world without even a shot being fired.  I feel however that God will intervene before such a thing happens.

[HisDaughter]

Thanks for the post grammyluv.


I read somewhere that a country needs about 2.1 children born per family to maintain the population. 


The European countries are around 1.6.  Eventually if this birthrate where to continue, the countries would just pass out of existence over time.  The man and the wife would not be replacing themselves. 


The birthrate for Moslems is around 8.0 per family.  They could eventually take over the world without even a shot being fired.  I feel however that God will intervene before such a thing happens.

Yes, I read that myself with the stats for all of the countries.  Wish I would've kept it.  Maybe I'll run across it again.  Also while Antichrist will "try" to take over the whole world, he will not succeed in taking every nation.  There will still be some that war with him and that will fight against him in the end in help of Israel.  I just hope that we are one of them.

[nChrist]

Yes, I read that myself with the stats for all of the countries.  Wish I would've kept it.  Maybe I'll run across it again.  Also while Antichrist will "try" to take over the whole world, he will not succeed in taking every nation.  There will still be some that war with him and that will fight against him in the end in help of Israel.  I just hope that we are one of them.

I share your thoughts. I honestly think that the Christians would have to be gone and out of the way before the US could go against Israel. We know what the future holds for Israel.

[Soldier4Christ]

I share your thoughts. I honestly think that the Christians would have to be gone and out of the way before the US could go against Israel. We know what the future holds for Israel.

If not gone at least diminished in our abilities to stop it from happening. Right now we have a whole lot of different things going against us. Many of these are doing so from within our own borders and from within our own government. We have known muslim terrorists filling positions within our government from homeland security all the way to the Pentagon and the White House. A number of our cities are already taken over by some of them and at least one state that is pretty much in their control also. It isn't just the muslims that we are fighting against. Other groups are joining in force with them such as La Raza and drug lords with so many of our own citizens actually supporting these groups. Our current administration is supporting those in the ME, even providing them with weapons and financial support, that intend to go against Israel. There is even rumor to the effect that our current admin plans to divide Israel into two nations using force to do so if it needs to.

[HisDaughter]

If not gone at least diminished in our abilities to stop it from happening. Right now we have a whole lot of different things going against us. Many of these are doing so from within our own borders and from within our own government. We have known muslim terrorists filling positions within our government from homeland security all the way to the Pentagon and the White House. A number of our cities are already taken over by some of them and at least one state that is pretty much in their control also. It isn't just the muslims that we are fighting against. Other groups are joining in force with them such as La Raza and drug lords with so many of our own citizens actually supporting these groups. Our current administration is supporting those in the ME, even providing them with weapons and financial support, that intend to go against Israel. There is even rumor to the effect that our current admin plans to divide Israel into two nations using force to do so if it needs to.

We even have muslims in charge of Home Security for Pete's sake!  I pray we can get Obama out next year before it gets worse.  I agree that in order for the U.S. to strike Israel, the Rapture would've had to happen first.

[Soldier4Christ]

We even have muslims in charge of Home Security for Pete's sake!  I pray we can get Obama out next year before it gets worse.  I agree that in order for the U.S. to strike Israel, the Rapture would've had to happen first.

Anything prior to that would most likely cause us to also be in a major civil war.

[nChrist]

Anything prior to that would most likely cause us to also be in a major civil war.

I think that our Union of States is hanging by a thread anyway. Considerably more than half of the States are already at the breaking off point. Our Federal Government has become a TYRANT that commonly does illegal and Unconstitutional acts. Sadly, our Federal Government has become the enemy within.

[HisDaughter]

From Moscow to Mecca - fundamentalist Islam takes a stronger hold
economist.com

Only the call to prayer disturbs the morning air in the small Dagestani village of Novosasitli. Dogs do not bark here. All “unclean” animals have been exterminated. Apart from an occasional counter-terrorist raid, life is quiet. People leave their houses unlocked; there has not been a theft for years. A few weeks ago two women were killed—but they were fortune-tellers, or, according to local men, witches.

Most women wear the hijab. Alcohol is forbidden, polygamy common. Officials rarely come by, but life in the village is more orderly than in much of the rest of Dagestan. The locals have built a school extension for the growing number of children. Some of the money came as a zakat—a mandatory charitable contribution by the better-off to the poor, as required by the Koran. Disputes are settled by imams.

The village is home to Abdurakhim Magomedov, a charismatic spiritual leader of Islamic fundamentalists and the first translator of the Koran into the local language. “Fifteen years ago, only half the people in Novosasitli wanted to live by sharia law. Today everyone in the villages wants it,” he says. To achieve this, he adds, Dagestan needs to be free.

Last summer, after a few young women were kidnapped from the village, a community group set up a checkpoint and a night watch. But last month a military truck with ten gunmen came and smashed the checkpoint. If this was an attempt to draw Novosasitli into Russia’s orbit, it achieved the opposite, increasing the tension that is tearing apart not only Dagestan but the whole north Caucasus—and, with it, Russia.

Russian rule has always been tenuous there. The territory, which stretches from the Black Sea to the Caspian, was colonised late and was never fully integrated into Russia’s empire. Its Muslim peoples enjoyed considerable autonomy, both religious and cultural, until the Bolsheviks took over—whereupon the Caucasus was so modernised and Sovietised that when the Soviet Union fell only Chechnya declared its independence.

Two wars later Chechnya is relatively stable under President Ramzan Kadyrov, a former rebel whose patron is Vladimir Putin, Russia’s prime minister. Grozny, Chechnya’s once-ruined capital, is now a surreal place boasting several skyscrapers, the largest mosque in Europe, chandelier-lit streets and a Putin Prospect. The president enjoys something of a personality cult: official licence-plates carry his initials, and banners outside schools thank him for “taking care of our future”. Yet Chechnya is virtually a separate state, where women must wear headscarves in public and the sale of alcohol is restricted.

Violence has spread from Chechnya to other north Caucasus republics and beyond. Outsiders notice it only when suicide-bombers blow themselves up on the Moscow metro or at the capital’s international airport. Yet parts of the north Caucasus are in a state of simmering civil war. Statistics are unreliable, but by the estimates of Memorial, a human-rights organisation, at least 289 Russian soldiers and policemen were killed last year and 551 wounded. About the same number died in 2009—more than Britain has lost in Afghanistan over the past ten years.

On paper, all five predominantly Muslim republics (Dagestan, Chechnya, Ingushetia, Kabardino-Balkaria and Karachaevo-Cherkessia) are part of a single administrative district. On the ground, however, they are separated by borders and checkpoints fortified by sandbags and machineguns. Crossing from one republic to another feels like crossing a national frontier. Taxi-drivers from Dagestan prefer not to venture into Chechnya.

Each of the republics has its own political set-up and is unhappy in its own way, but the root of the problem, say experts, is shared: the de-legitimisation and crumbling of the Russian state and its inability to rule by law. In much of the north Caucasus corruption has eroded the very basis of the state, which performs almost none of its functions and is seen as a source of disorder and violence rather than security.

This also holds true in the rest of Russia, but the north Caucasus has a strong alternative to Russia’s political system: Islam, which now unites all the Muslim republics. Whereas the first Chechen war in 1994 was fired by nationalism and separatism, the second war (which echoes still) had a strong religious dimension. The leader of the Islamist rebels, Doku Umarov, has proclaimed himself emir of north Caucasus.

Sufis v Salafis

The failures of the Russian state and the compensating role of Islam are particularly noticeable in Dagestan, the most religious, populous and complex of all the north Caucasian republics. It is double the size of Chechnya and consists of several dozen ethnic groups, most with their own language.

The conflict in Dagestan, however, is not between ethnic groups but between Sufism, a traditional form of Islam which includes local customs and recognises the state, and Salafism, which rejects secular rule and insists that Islam should govern all spheres of life. As Alexei Malashenko, an expert on Islam at the Carnegie Moscow Centre, puts it: “The goal of building a pure Islamist state might be a Utopia, but the struggle for it can be infinite.”

Salafism started to spread in Dagestan only after the Soviet collapse, partly as a reaction to the tame, officially recognised local version of Islam. (Raising a vodka shot to Allah used to be standard practice in the Caucasus, says Mr Malashenko.) Tension escalated in the late 1990s when Islamist radicals took over two villages in Dagestan, declaring sharia law and chasing away both local government and the police.

Sufi leaders, who had exercised a virtual monopoly over religious life in Dagestan and enjoyed official backing after the end of Soviet rule, saw the rise of Salafism as a threat. Local officials, many of whom were Sufis, started to put pressure on Salafis, forcing their spiritual leader out of Dagestan. In August and September 1999 Shamil Basayev, the leader of the Chechen fighters, and Amir Khattab, who was born in Saudi Arabia, led two armies into Dagestan, triggering the second Chechen war.

“I told Basayev that Dagestan was not ready for jihad, but he did not listen,” says Mr Magomedov, the Islamist leader. Indeed, most people in Dagestan resented the intruders. They treated the Russian army as a liberating force, and backed it with local volunteers. Sharia villages were cleared of radicals and the parliament of Dagestan passed a law forbidding extremism and Wahhabism, although it did not define either.

Sufi leaders used Basayev’s invasion to see off Salafis as a whole. In effect, the state took sides in a religious war. Wahhabism became synonymous with terrorism. Anyone who practised Salafism was outlawed by the authorities. Torture, disappearances and killings became commonplace. Bearded men from villages such as Novosasitli were driven to Chechnya by federal forces, only to be found dead a few days later. In Novosasitli soldiers publicly tore up copies of the Koran.

cont....

[HisDaughter]

cont....

“The terror was conducted by the state, and in response [the insurgents] turned to counter-terrorism,” says Mr Magomedov, who himself has been arrested and tortured several times. His views are moderate compared with those of radical Salafis, who blow up shops selling alcohol and plant bombs on beaches. He does not condone the bombing at Moscow airport because it does nothing to advance Islam. But he has nothing against attacks on the army or security services, if they are engaged in a war against Islamist fundamentalists.

Although the insurgents use Salafism as their ideology, not all Salafis are rebels. The number of insurgents is estimated by experts at 500 men, plus 600-800 part-timers, across the whole north Caucasus. They draw their main strength not from numbers or even ideology, but from the failures of the Russian state and its injustices. Attacks on policemen and the army in Dagestan have doubled in the past year. They are met with popular indifference, if not approval.

Leaving Friday prayers in GroznySalafis have adopted the rhetoric of human rights and built up a mood of political protest, whereas the Sufis have been tainted by their association with a brutal and corrupt state, explains Nadira Isaeva, the 32-year-old Salafi editor of Chernovik, an independent newspaper. “The Sufi leaders have no active civil position,” she says, “but they control vast financial assets, including tourist companies that sell haj tours to Mecca.”

The result of all this has been a surge in Salafism. Ten years ago only 10% of people in Novosasitli were Salafis. Today at least 50% are, and almost all the young embrace it. Many of them have studied in Egypt and Syria, and speak Arabic.

A country of strongmen

A new local government appointed by the Kremlin last year tried to ease pressure on the fundamentalists, allowing them to practise Salafism without being arrested for it. Rizvan Kurbanov, the deputy prime minister in charge of security, says his first step was to visit a Salafi mosque and talk to its spiritual leaders, including Mr Magomedov. But the government is worried about giving Salafis equal access to services or allowing them political representation, partly for fear of a backlash from mainstream imams.

Trying to claw back some credibility, the government has cracked down on casinos (which operated openly despite a previous ban) and set up a commission to help former rebels adapt to a peaceful life. It has even talked about an amnesty for those who are willing to lay down their arms. But as Mr Magomedov argues, the people who need an amnesty are those who are accused of extremism simply because of their faith, not their actions.

Examples abound. Last year a group of young bearded Salafi men drove to the mountains for a picnic, stopping on the way in a small town where they were attacked by local Sufists. The police, many of whom are Sufis, joined in, beating them up so brutally that one of them died. “While the authorities are trying to entice former rebels back to normal life, their own subordinates are pushing another 100 into the hands of the rebels,” says Ms Isaeva.

Police violence is not restricted to the fight with the Islamists, either. A 14-year-old boy was tortured and crippled by the police after being wrongly accused of stealing a drill. Sapiat Mag Omedova, a petite female lawyer who was thrown out of a police station and ended up with concussion, has been accused of attacking four burly policemen. None of these cases led to police bosses being punished. The police force, which is 20,000 strong, is barely controlled by the Dagestani government.

Mr Kurbanov says it is not in his power to fire a police chief, since both the police and security services answer to Moscow. That is not the only reason. Unlike Chechnya, Dagestan is a state of semi-autonomous districts controlled by local strongmen who are backed by a local police chief and often by an imam. Said Amirov, the wheelchair-bound mayor of Makhachkala, who has survived at least 15 assassination attempts, is considered to be as powerful as the president of the republic. An attempt by the president or his team to cleanse a particular police department is seen as a declaration of war against a powerful vassal.

The balance between regions and clans is fragile. Saigidpasha Umakhanov, the mayor of Khasaviurt, a town close to the Chechen border, is a charismatic strongman who led local armed resistance to Basayev in 1999. “There is no one in the republic who could dislodge me,” he boasts. “Only the president of Russia.” If he himself were to die, “at least I would die like a real man—not like some bastard with a bowed head.” The prospect of death is real enough: a vast computer screen on his desk displays input from multiple CCTV cameras.

As a powerful regional leader, Mr Umakhanov sneers at Magomedsalam Magomedov, who was appointed Dagestan’s president without consultation with local strongmen. “He is not an independent player. The oligarchs in Moscow interfere in his decisions.” The scrapping of regional elections by Mr Putin in 2004 has eliminated peaceful channels for political competition, only making places like Dagestan more explosive. Mr Umakhanov says the only way out of this paralysis is direct elections. He is not alone in feeling that way. Most Russians want to elect their regional governors. This is precisely what the Kremlin fears, as it would mean the loss of guaranteed political support from puppets in the regions.

Unable to offer any unifying idea or the rule of law, the Kremlin tries to compensate with injections of money. Corruption is so rampant that, at best, the funds get siphoned off; at worst, they are used for terrorism. The Dagestani economy is 80% subsidised by the Russian government, but there is little to show for it apart from a few seaside villas and lavish weddings for the rich—at which guests may sport gold-plated revolvers bulging in their jeans.

As for the rest of the Dagestanis, they are left with potholed roads, derelict farms and factories, a polluted sea and a grim landscape dotted with houses half-built or half-ruined. Free education and health care are myths. The rate of TB is one of the highest in Russia. Jobs, exam grades and university diplomas are all for sale.

In this region, Russian identity has been hollowed out. As one young man puts it, “The only thing that makes me Russian is a note in my passport. I can’t get a job in Moscow or even a mortgage, because I come from Dagestan.” Radicalisation of young people is increasing, both in the north Caucasus and in Moscow. The main slogan of the ultra-nationalists who rioted in Moscow recently was “gotcha1 the Caucasus”. Radicals in the Caucasus feel the same way about the Russian state.

Mr Putin came to power pledging to fight the centrifugal forces in Russia. After more than a decade of his rule, the risk of disintegration is greater than ever. The Kremlin has no strategy to prevent it. And the biggest threat to Russia’s territorial integrity comes not from Dagestan or any other part of the north Caucasus, but from the Russian state itself. As a young man in Novosasitli remarks: “There is no future for Dagestan inside Russia now because Russia itself is fraying at the seams.”

[HisDaughter]

Sunni/Shiite Civil War Feared As Pakistan Prepares To Send Troops To Saudi Arabia
wnd.com

Pakistan is prepared to move two army divisions into Saudi Arabia to protect the kingdom in the event of any outbreak of trouble, such as what has happened in Bahrain, Yemen, Egypt, Libya and other Middle East and North African nations, informed sources say in a report from Joseph Farah's G2 Bulletin.

It also is ready to help recruit ex-Pakistani military personnel for Bahrain's national guard, the sources report.

The sources said the decision was reached reluctantly, but it puts Sunni Islam-majority Pakistan alongside other Sunni Muslim partners, Saudi Arabia and Bahrain, in a move that apparently is intended to assure that Sunni Islam remains dominant in the Arab world.

The perception is that the influence of Shiite Islam-dominated Iran is on the rise.

Ironically, Pakistan and Iran have had a history of close political, economic and military relations. Their relationship was so close that Pakistan's A.Q. Khan, known as the father of the Pakistani nuclear bomb, provided nuclear assistance to Iran.

Given Iran's nuclear ambitions, sources say the alignment of nuclear-armed Pakistan with a broad Sunni Muslim bloc of countries by offering the two army divisions to Saudi Arabia is designed to blunt the "emerging Shiite crescent in the Middle East."

As a further show of support to Saudi Arabia, Pakistan has organized and recruited some 1,000 ex-army personnel for service in the national guard of Bahrain.

Bahraini King Hamad bin Isa al-Khalifa recently requested troops from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates to put down increasingly violent demonstrations by the Shiites, who make up some 70 percent of the population. Saudi Arabia and the UAE each recently sent some 1,000 troops and logistical support to Bahrain.

Khalifa and Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz accuse Iran of fomenting the demonstrations with the idea of taking over the island country between Iran and Saudi Arabia in the Persian Gulf.

"The recent political upheaval in the Arab world from North Africa and now engulfing the Gulf region monarchial kingdoms has shaken the very fundamentals of the underpinnings of United States security framework in the Gulf region," according to Subhash Kapila of the South Asia Analysis Group.

"The United States security architecture in the Gulf region rested on the continuance of existing autocratic U.S.-friendly monarchies presiding over the oil riches of this region," he said.

"Herein emerges Pakistan army's strategic indispensability and strategic utility to both the United States and Saudi Arabia in securing the status-quo in the Gulf region for all of them," he added.

[HisDaughter]

Al Qaeda Capitalizing on 'Arab Spring' to Build Power and Shore Up Weaknesses
foxnews.com

Stunned by the secular Arab rebellions that have toppled some of the Middle East’s most enduring dictators, Al Qaeda and other violent Muslim extremists are struggling to capitalize on the upheavals that have reshaped the political map of the Middle East.

While counterterrorism officials, scholars and analysts disagree about the likely impact of the “Arab Spring” protests on efforts to combat terrorism, many agree that Islamic jihadis face both enhanced peril and opportunities in the coming months.

Many also agree that eliminating the political vacuums the upheavals have created is vital to preventing Al Qaeda, its affiliates, and those it inspires from becoming more powerful.

“The key ingredient is political stability in the region,” said Jean-Louis Brugruiere, a leading French investigating judge charged with counterterrorism efforts who now tracks jihadi financial operations for the European Union.

“The faster existing and new Middle Eastern governments fill political power vacuums and restore stability,” he said in an interview on Wednesday, “the less of a threat the violent Islamists will pose.”

Initially, the breath, depth, and effectiveness of the protest movements promoted largely by young, liberal, secular reformers seemed to shock Al Qaeda into silence.

Osama Bin Laden has issued no public statement or communiqués about the political protests since their inception two months ago, said Jarret Brachman, a leading counterterrorism analyst and the author of “Global Jihadism.”

“At first, we heard almost nothing from senior Al Qaeda core figures. They seemed to be reeling,” he said. Then last month, Ayman al-Zawahri, Bin Laden’s deputy, issued an audio statement that was defensive and pleading in tone, Brachman said.

“He was almost pleading with Egyptians to embrace Islam and reject the United States and democracy,” he added, and he also tried claiming credit for having ousted President Hosni Mubarak by arguing that Washington was willing to abandon Mubarak because of the Sept. 11 attacks. Brachman called the Zawahri message “unconvincing and predicable.”

A more upbeat spin on the upheavals came late last month from Anwar al-Awlaki, the Yemeni-American cleric and top propagandist for Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, or AQAP, which American counterterrorism officials consider the most dangerous Al Qaeda affiliate.

In a four-page essay in their online magazine “Inspire” titled, “The Tsunami of Change,” Awlaki argued that the protests, by having broken the “barriers of fear” and by ousting seemingly immutable dictators who protected “American imperial interests” in the region, would work to Al Qaeda’s longer-term political advantage.

The dictators whom Al Qaeda most loathed and feared were now gone. The ensuing wars and political turmoil in such states as Libya and Yemen, where Awlaki is said to be hiding, would enable Al Qaeda militants to recruit, train and organize in such open spaces, he wrote.

That seems to be happening in some Arab states where political transitions are under way or being contested. But experts caution that since each state is so different, the militant Islamists’ prospects must be evaluated on a case-by-case basis. Yemen is the state of most immediate concern.

Fox News reported this week, citing a Yemeni official, that a group called the Aden-Abyan Islamic Army had taken control of the historical capital of Abyan, the main foothold for AQAP where American and Yemeni counterterrorism activities have been focused.

AQAP was said to have declared the province an “Islamic Emirate” that would henceforth be governed by Islamic law. Also, AQAP and other Islamic militants in the area were said to have surrounded a smaller military company that had to withdraw because the Yemeni Army was unable to send them reinforcements.

Christopher Boucek, an expert on Islamic movements at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, in Washington, called President Ali Abdullah Saleh’s decision to reposition counterterrorism units fighting AQAP back to the capital in Sana to protect his regime a major setback for U.S./Yemeni counterterrorism efforts.

So, too, he said in an interview, was the prospect not only of Saleh’s ouster, which U.S. officials are said to now consider inevitable, but also that of his son, nephews, and many of the counterterrorism officials with whom Americans have been working to fight AQAP and other jihadis.

“They’ll have to build all new relationships,” said Boucek. “Under-governed space in Yemen is increasing by the day. Chatter among terrorists is reportedly growing, and it’s about time for them to try to mount another operation,” he said.

Last winter, AQAP sent two sophisticated mail bombs in American cargo planes that were intercepted and disarmed. Boucek is equally gloomy about counterterrorism efforts throughout the region.

“The Islamists are among the most patient and most disciplined of the political players,” he said. “A couple of years down the road, victory will go to the opposition that is the best organized.”


cont....

[HisDaughter]

cont....

In Egypt, he said, “we focused on Tahrir Square and not on the back-street mosques. But they are likely to be best at capitalizing on the political opening,” Boucek asserted.

Although the army, traditionally a bulwark of anti-Islamist fervor, is in charge of the political transition in Egypt, attacks have recently increased on Christians and other minorities, allegedly conducted by ultra-conservative “Salafis,” or Muslim militants focused on religion rather than politics.

Deposed President Hosni Mubarak permitted them to flourish as a counter-weight to the equally conservative Muslim Brotherhood, believed to be the largest and best organized Muslim opposition group in the country.

The Salafis have denied carrying out the attacks, but analysts say they have become increasingly assertive in demanding that Egypt remain an “Islamic” nation and in fighting efforts to reduce the role of Islam in the public arena.

Recently, Islamists cut off the ear of a Christian in the southern city of Qana because he was said to have had a relationship with a Muslim woman, which Muslim fundamentalists consider “haram,” or forbidden by the Koran. Last week, according to IPT News, run by Islamic expert Steven Emerson, one man was killed and eight others injured in the village of Kasr el-Bassil when Salafists attacked the owner of a liquor store, which the most observant Muslims also shun.

In the city of Monufiya, Emerson reported, dozens of Salafis stormed the house of a woman who was accused of being a prostitute. Her furniture was reportedly burned in the street. In Libya, where NATO-backed rebels have been battling the 40-year regime of leader Muammar al-Qaddafi, the situation is even more complex, with each side accusing the other of ties to Islamic terrorists and radicals.

According to Emerson and the Wall Street Journal, Libyan rebel leader Abdel-hakim al-Hasidi has said that around two dozen of his troops had fought American troops in Iraq. But he called them “patriots and good Muslims,” not “terrorists.” So, too, he insisted were members of Al Qaeda, since they had also “resisted foreign invasion.” Nor is Al-Hasidi, an influential Islamic preacher who spent five years at a training camp in eastern Afghanistan, the only militant within rebel ranks. His field commander is Salah al-Barrani, a former fighter from the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, which was formed in the 1990s by jihadis returning from Afghanistan and who continued fighting the Qaddafi regime until a truce was arranged between them.

Spokesmen for the Libyan rebel national transition council deny that these militant Islamists play a leadership role in the rebellion. They are supported by French activist Bernard-Henri Levy, among others, who helped persuade French President Nicolas Sarkozy to recognize the rebels rather than Qaddafi’s government in Tripoli. There was “no evidence,” Henri Levy said this week, that Al Qaeda or militant Islamists had a “significant presence” in rebel ranks.

American military officials, too, have downplayed the Islamist threat from the rebels, saying in recent testimony on Capitol Hill that they detected only “flickers” of an Al Qaeda presence in eastern Libya where the rebellion is based.

In interviews, other intelligence officials maintained that Qaddafi’s regime has long-standing connections to secular and Islamic terrorist groups that continue to threaten western interests. One official who asked not to be quoted said there was evidence that Qaddafi was paying Tuaregs, nomadic Berbers who live in Libya and roam throughout North Africa, as mercenaries, and that they were selling anti-aircraft missiles, machine guns and other weapons to Al Qaeda.

Much of the think-tank community in Washington seems divided between optimists and pessimists over whether Al Qaeda and the most dogmatic Muslim militants will ultimately benefit from the Arab upheavals.

Pessimists believe that the protests and reform movements that have ousted longstanding dictators who were nonetheless staunch American allies and partners in counter-terrorism efforts are inevitably destined to be hijacked by the more disciplined, ruthless Islamists, especially given the lack of civil institutions, the rule of law, or culture of tolerance in so many Arabs states.

Others remain cautiously optimistic.

James Dobbins, a former ambassador who runs the International Security and Defense Policy Center at Rand, concedes that the upheavals will inevitably disrupt some intelligence cooperation and links among security services in the short run. But he argues that Al Qaeda and like-minded groups are likely to be undermined by the political opening of autocratic states in which political dissent was routinely crushed.

“As peaceful and legal outlets for dissent and the pursuit of Islamic programs open up,” he said, “it will diminish the perceived need to engage in violent activity.” Polls show that support among Arabs for Al Qaeda and such militants has been steadily declining for several years, he added. Their popularity was likely to fall further, he said, “if you have a shot at achieving your goals without violence.”

While Washington and its allies had to remain vigilant about terrorist threats, he said, there was reason to believe that the Arab Spring protests would eventually work to Al Qaeda’s disadvantage.

“Their narrative has been utterly disrupted,” he said. “The dictators they sought to replace have been ousted, and not by them or their violence.”

While representative governments would most probably reflect the will of a majority of their citizens for a more “Islamic” government, such policies would not necessarily jeopardize good relations with Washington, he asserted.

“The most Islamist state in the Middle East is Saudi Arabia,” said Dobbins, “and they’ve been a strong ally of America’s.”

But Saudi Arabia, the pessimists counter, is also the country of origin of most of the 19 hijackers in the 9/11 attack. While many Israelis have expressed concern about whether militant anti-Israeli Islamist forces would be the ultimate beneficiaries of the Arab spring rebellions, Maj. Gen. Amos Yadlin, who resigned late last year as head of Israelis military intelligence, was also more optimistic than many of his peers.

In a lecture last week at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, he argued that “a democratic Middle East” was “good for Israel.”

“Democracies rarely go to war,” he said. Israel could not remain indifferent to the values that had brought the Egyptian people to Tahrir Square -- a desire for “freedom, justice, rule of law and democracy,” he added.

“Even if, in the short run, it may be more dangerous,” he said, “in the long run I believe it’s a very, very positive process that we should support.”

A senior New York Police Department intelligence analyst pointed to at least one short-term benefit of the upheavals: Home-grown Islamic radicals in America, too, had been stunned and shaken by the protests and the loss of what he called their “narrative of oppression.”

Like their counterparts in the Middle East, he said, they have been distracted and, for the moment, paralyzed by shock.

“Like all of us,” the official said, “they’ve been glued to their TV sets.”

[HisDaughter]

Obama's faith adviser helped craft 'perfect Islamic state'
Shariah project scrubbed from Internet, sought to 'implement' Muslim caliphate
wnd.com

JERUSALEM – Dalia Mogahed, appointed to President Obama's faith advisory council, was a partner in an Islamic project whose stated goal was to "define, interpret and implement the concept of the Islamic State in modern times," WND has learned.

The project was founded and directed by Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, the controversial Muslim cleric behind the proposed 13-story, $100 million Islamic cultural center and mosque two blocks from Ground Zero in New York City.

Besides her role on the White House Advisory Council on Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships, Mogahed is also on the advisory council of the Department of Homeland Security. She testified before the Senate on engagement with the Muslim community.

Together with Rauf, Mogahed was a leading voice in the Leadership Group on U.S.-Muslim Engagement, which issued a 153-page recommendation paper, obtained and reviewed by WND, that calls for dialogue with Hamas.

The consensus focused on improving America's relationship with Muslims globally, with many of the recommendations later reportedly being adopted by the Obama administration. Former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright and Dennis Ross, Obama's Mideast envoy, also served on the Leadership Group that released the recommendation paper.

The paper specifically called on the U.S. to engage opposition parties in Egypt, including the Muslim Brotherhood. It set the boundaries for dialogue with Hamas if the Islamist terror group renounced violence. Also, the paper called on the U.S. to immediately engage Hamas using intermediaries in hopes of moderating the group.

Mogahed, meanwhile, is a senior analyst and executive director of the Gallup Center for Muslim Studies, where she led what has been described an unprecedented survey of Muslims worldwide, including in the U.S. and Europe.

The survey was the basis for a 2008 book she co-authored, "Who Speaks for Islam? What a Billion Muslims Really Think."

Mogahed's Gallup survey concluded only 7 percent of the world's Muslims are political radicals and that the majority support democracy.

Other Gallup findings under Mogahed concluded that Muslims and Americans are equally likely to reject attacks on civilians as morally unjustifiable. Large majorities of Muslims would guarantee free speech if it were up to them to write a new constitution, the survey claimed.

'Sister' Mogahed and Shariah Islamic state

WND has learned that Mogahed and the Gallup survey provided key data for Rauf's "Shariah Index Project ," which sought, according to its own mission, to "define, interpret and implement the concept of the Islamic State in modern times."

The project at one time was featured on the website of Rauf's Cordoba Initiative, which is the group behind the so-called Ground Zero mosque. However, after the mosque issue was highlighted in the news media, the Shariah Index Project, a sister project of Cordoba, was scrubbed from Rauf's website.

The website BigPeace.com previously uncovered the scrubbed section of the Cordoba website that detailed the Shari'ah Index Project.

"Imagine: a Perfectly Islamic State," said the deleted section of Cordoba's website.

The website described how Mogahed's Gallup division helped to refine the principals of the Shariah Index, which was to serve as the basis for the "perfect Islamic state." The website stated representatives from Gallup also joined in a phone conversation to help craft the principles.

Further, Jasser Auda, a Qatari professor who is one of the personalities behind the Shariah Index Project with Rauf, described Mogahed's involvement in providing key data that helped formulate the Shariah Index plan to map out an Islamic state, even referring to Obama's faith adviser as "sister Mogahed."

In an interview about the Shariah Index Project with OnIslam.com, an Islamic news portal associated with Muslim Brotherhood leader Youssef Qaradawi, Auda stated, "Our sister Dalia Mugahed – at that time she was the head of the Muslim societies branch, now she is in Abu Dhabi leading the same project on Muslim societies in a different project."

Continued Auda, "At that time in Washington she was leading the Muslim societies index, and she gave us according to an agreement between Gallup, Cordoba and the Prime Minister of Malaysia office, gave us (Shariah Index Project) the data for three years, through which we came up with some conclusions based on asking people."

In her role on Obama's faith council, Mogahed reportedly offers recommendations to the U.S. president on how faith-based organizations can best work with government to solve society's toughest challenges.