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A new face of Al Qaeda emerges in Lebanon (Fatah al-Islam is Not Arafat's Fatah)
International Herald Tribune ^ | 3/15/2007 | Souad Mekhennet and Michael Moss

Posted on 05/21/2007 8:15:38 PM PDT by Pyro7480

TRIPOLI: Deep in a violent and lawless slum just north of this coastal city, 12 men with their faces shrouded by black and red-and-white scarves drilled with Kalashnikovs.

In unison, they lunged in one direction, turned and lunged in another. "Allahu Akbar," the men shouted their praise to God as they fired their machine guns into a wall.

The men belong to a new militant Islamic organization called Fatah al-Islam, whose leader, a fugitive Palestinian named Shakir al-Abssi, has set up operations in a refugee camp here where he is training fighters and spreading the ideology of Al Qaeda.

He has solid terror credentials. A former associate of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the Qaeda leader in Mesopotamia who was killed last summer, Abssi was sentenced to death in absentia along with Zarqawi in the 2002 assassination of an American diplomat in Jordan, Laurence Foley. Just four months after arriving here from Syria, Abssi has a militia that intelligence officials estimate at 150 men and an arsenal of explosives, rockets and even an antiaircraft gun.

During a recent interview with The New York Times, Abssi displayed his makeshift training facility and his strident message that America needs to be punished for its presence in the Islamic world....

(Excerpt) Read more at iht.com ...


TOPICS: Foreign Affairs; Front Page News; News/Current Events; War on Terror
KEYWORDS: alqaeda; banislam; fatahalislam; islam; lebanon; muhammadsminions
Al Qaeda's New Front in Lebanon (Dr. Walid Phares

Fight on, Lebanon--"Fatah al-Islam" wages Syria's war by proxy

BBC: Scores killed in Lebanon fighting

1 posted on 05/21/2007 8:15:41 PM PDT by Pyro7480
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To: Dajjal; NYer; Convert from ECUSA; Coleus

Ping!


2 posted on 05/21/2007 8:16:06 PM PDT by Pyro7480 ("Jesu, Jesu, Jesu, esto mihi Jesus" -St. Ralph Sherwin's last words at Tyburn)
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To: Pyro7480

How is this different from the terror group Arafat ran? They both want to kill as many Jews and Americans as possible.


3 posted on 05/21/2007 8:20:13 PM PDT by pnh102
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To: Pyro7480

I suppose Paleo Paul will blame us for these guys too....


4 posted on 05/21/2007 8:22:28 PM PDT by misterrob (Yankees Suck!)
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To: pnh102

It’s a splinter group. Apparently Arafat’s Fatah wasn’t Islamist enough for the founders of Fatah al-Islam.


5 posted on 05/21/2007 8:23:07 PM PDT by Pyro7480 ("Jesu, Jesu, Jesu, esto mihi Jesus" -St. Ralph Sherwin's last words at Tyburn)
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To: Pyro7480

Al Qaeda - Franchises available.


6 posted on 05/21/2007 8:28:51 PM PDT by Nachoman (Sarcasm. Just one of many services I provide.)
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To: Pyro7480

If this animal had a hand in assassinating an American diplomat in Jordan, and is now in Syria and Lebanon with the help of their governments, we need to retaliate.


7 posted on 05/21/2007 9:08:20 PM PDT by Senator Goldwater
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To: Pyro7480

global jihad bump


8 posted on 05/21/2007 9:32:19 PM PDT by Dajjal
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To: Pyro7480

A little ‘Allahu Akbar’ here and a little ‘Allahu Akbar’ there and pretty soon we’re talking real jihad.


9 posted on 05/21/2007 10:13:11 PM PDT by DancesWithBolsheviks (Demands, marches and media sob stories diminish my compassion.)
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To: Pyro7480

if the Lebanese continue to kill them, we will know that a lesson was learned the last time. Arafat (Jimmy Carter’s and Bill Clinton’s friend) destroyed Lebanon. Regardless of what happened then, the Christian population has always been the key in Lebanon, and they are dwindling.


10 posted on 05/22/2007 4:30:57 AM PDT by cdcdawg
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To: cdcdawg
Even “Moderate” Muslims are fleeing the area. With over 2 million refugees leaving Iraq and now Lebanon, enemy acquisition will get even easier; until Syria and Turkey seal off their borders.
11 posted on 05/22/2007 4:34:22 AM PDT by corlorde (New Hampshire)
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To: Pyro7480; Patrick_k

Lebanese soldiers secure the entrance to the Palestinian refugee camp of Nahr Al-Bared in northern Lebanon as smoke is seen billowing from a bombed area inside the camp, 21 May 2007. Islamist guerrillas who have been locked in three days of ferocious gunbattles with Lebanese troops said they would observe a unilateral ceasefire amid mounting concern over civilians caught up in the conflict.(AFP/Ousama Ayoub)

Lebanon Confronts a Fierce Adversary

12 posted on 05/22/2007 6:01:49 AM PDT by NYer ("Where the bishop is present, there is the Catholic Church" - Ignatius of Antioch)
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To: pnh102

Arafat was a slimy murderous weasel but the choice Israel faced was working with a devil they knew, or facing a devil they didn’t know. Arafat and Israel BOTH had reasons to resist the al Qaeda-inspired radical islamofascists.

Looks like they are making a widening overt move to establish a front on Israel’s border by taking over Lebanon. Bring it on. Godspeed to the Lebanese people who once again have been invaded by human locusts and God help Israel.

And someone send Nancy Pelosi back to Syria to use diplomacy to settle this issue...I’m sure no one has thought of or tried this...(sarc)


13 posted on 05/22/2007 6:32:13 AM PDT by silverleaf (Fasten your seat belts- it's going to be a BUMPY ride.)
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To: NYer

The title lacks some precision.

It did not “emerge”. It was present before the year 2000. on New Year’s eve 1999-2000, the Lebanese Army conducted a search and destroy operation in the mountains 10-15 miles east of the actual operations zone. A few dozens of Al-Qaeda operationals were taken into custody. The Syrian Army was still occupying Lebanon.

In July 2005, after the Syrian withdrawal, the newly elected parliament which generated this present government, granted these people amnesty and released them.

We saw them in action once again rampaging inside the Christian Quarters of Ashrafieh in Beirut on Feb. 5, 2006, on the occasion of Mohammed’s drawings. Between 150 and 200 were arrested then released gradually after some important “political” pressures were exerted on the judiciary.

Now their appellation has changed from Jund E Sham in Saida to Fatah Al Islam in the North.

The same political authorithy which granted them amnesty in 2005 and released them in 2006 is shy in taking the political decision to eradicate them. The government decision of Monday evening has comes retroactively after a first meeting on Sunday evening failed to take any decision. The Army had already deployed a mech brigade and entered operational activities since Sunday morning.

The ceasefire broke down at 1435 hours local time after the relief and press convoy came under fire when they entered the camp from the South after crossing the Lebanese Army lines.


14 posted on 05/22/2007 7:17:18 AM PDT by Patrick_k
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To: NYer

P.S. The black smoke in the picture comes from a torched gaz station on the southern outskirts of Nahr El Bared.


15 posted on 05/22/2007 7:35:11 AM PDT by Patrick_k
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To: 2ndMostConservativeBrdMember; afraidfortherepublic; Alas; al_c; american colleen; annalex; ...

.


16 posted on 05/23/2007 5:48:52 PM PDT by Coleus (Woe unto him that call evil good and good evil"-- Isaiah 5:20-21)
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