Free Republic

A senior American counter-terrorism official has declared that the demise of al-Qa'eda is in sight because its failure to adapt its violent ideology and tactics has provoked growing dissent across the Islamic world. The uprising by Sunni tribes against al-Qa'eda in Iraq, protests in northern Africa against suicide bombings and dissent from clerics and former terrorists have put the group's leadership on the defensive as never before, said the official. "If al-Qa'eda maintains its current state of play of attacking civilians and Muslims, and continuing to not change its philosophy, it will start to fizzle." He said the end of...

(IsraelNN.com) Sources in the Prime Minister's Bureau estimated Friday that the United States may act against Iran before President George W. Bush's term is over, Army Radio reported. The sources said that in the closed door meetings between Bush and Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, the two discussed the possibilities of action against Ahmadinjad's regime, among other subjects. According to the sources, President Bush said that the Iranian problem had to be met with a "radical solution" – one that will have a beneficial effect upon the entire Middle East, and bring about a change in the behavior patterns of Hizbullah...

Senior U.S. and Pakistani officials tell NBC News that Wednesday’s Predator attack on a village in northwest Pakistan was not insignificant, that a “high-value target … an Arab” was among those killed. U.S. officials believe the unnamed target was planning attacks outside Pakistan, “so we nailed him,” in the words of one.

The Department of Defense announced today its recruiting and retention statistics for the active and reserve components for the month of April. Active Duty Recruiting:April Monthly:All services met or exceeded recruiting goals for the month of April (below) and have surpassed goals for fiscal year 2008 to date.April 2008:Army Accessions:5,681 Goal:5,650 101%Navy Accessions:2,905 Goal:2,905 100%Marine Corps Accessions:2,233 Goal:1,577 142%Air Force Accessions:2,435 Goal:2,435 100%Active Duty Retention. Army, Navy, and Marine Corps met or exceeded their active duty retention objectives. Reserve Forces Recruiting: April Monthly. All six reserve components have met or exceeded accession goals through April 2008. April 2008: Army National...

An radical jihadist Web site has announced that a new message from al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden is forthcoming. A banner announcing the message says he will address the 60th anniversary of Israel. His message is titled, "The reasons for the struggle in the remembrance of the 60th anniversary of the rising of the occupier nation of Israel." Developing...

There is something unique about what has come to be called the War on Terror. In this conflict, as the U.S. government struggles to defeat the enemy and keep our people safe, it is up against not only those who overtly and unambiguously seek to destroy us. It also confronts those prepared to reveal classified information and programs, even when that makes it harder to vanquish our foes and protect this country. The latter fall into four principal categories: • Some call themselves "journalists" who work for traditional news organizations, notably the New York Times. On occasion, they win Pulitzer...

War On Terror: The U.S. has been releasing Gitmo terrorists only to see them rejoin the jihad and kill again. The blood of their victims is on the hands of the ACLU.Abdullah Salim Ali al-Ajmi is the latest Gitmo grad set free to murder again. The Kuwaiti man was captured fighting with the Taliban and al-Qaida in Afghanistan and sent to Cuba before being released into the custody of the Kuwaiti government. Kuwait wasted no time freeing al-Ajmi, part of the powerful al-Ajmi tribe of merchants, along with four other repatriated Gitmo detainees. Al-Ajmi, in turn, crossed the border into...

Federal employees could have the option of taking their pension dollars out of companies working in countries that sponsor terrorism, under a Senate bill that follows a trend among state government pension plans over the last two years. The bill being crafted by Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) likely will be introduced within the next two months, said a Lieberman spokesman. It will affect the federal pension fund, called the Thrift Savings Plan (TSP). The proposal follows the lead of 19 states that have passed or are considering initiatives to completely divest public employee pension money from foreign companies doing business...

The American people have heard President George W. Bush and his spokespersons say many times that the U.S. government does not engage in torture. Whether Bush was believed or not is another story -- especially in light of the photographic evidence of the abuse of prisoners in Abu Ghraib, the prison near Baghdad. It’s understood that many of the photos are too sadistically graphic to be made public. Still, the official U.S. denials of torture continued until earlier this month when Bush acknowledged in an interview with ABC-TV that he knew about and approved “enhanced interrogation” of detainees, including “waterboarding”...

Thousands of Somalis took to the streets Sunday to protest a US bombing that killed a man said to be Al-Qaeda's chief in the country, and 11 other people, organisers and residents said. The protest took place at Dhusamareb, a trading post of about 100,000 people, 400 kilometres (250 miles) north of the capital Mogadishu, where Thursday's attack took place. Abdirasak Moalim Ahmed, one of the organisers of the protest, said that in the days since the attack, people had been vomiting. "We believe the Americans used poisonous bombs," he said. The US air strike killed at least 12 people...

THE REAL NEWS of April played second fiddle to the presidential campaign, the pope's visit to America, and the Texas polygamy case. more stories like thisThe death toll for the US military in Iraq hit 49 in April, making it the deadliest month since September, according to the Associated Press. Around Iraq, at least 1,080 Iraqi civilians and security personnel were killed last month, an average of 36 a day, according to the AP tally. While that's down from March's total of 1,269, or an average of 41 per day, those casualties certainly don't add up to a stable Iraq....

Almost eight years after al-Qaeda nearly sank the USS Cole with an explosives-stuffed motorboat, killing 17 sailors, all the defendants convicted in the attack have escaped from prison or been freed by Yemeni officials. Jamal al-Badawi, a Yemeni who helped organize the plot to bomb the Cole as it refueled in this Yemeni port on Oct. 12, 2000, has broken out of prison twice. He was recaptured both times, but then secretly released by the government last fall. Yemeni authorities jailed him again after receiving complaints from Washington. But U.S. officials have so little faith that he's still in his...

This is a FReeper made video based off the Al Qaeda document found and posted here at Free Republic by Jveritas. I plan to post it also at Googlevideo and Liveleak. I will present these links as they become available.

KHARTOUM (Reuters) - Al Jazeera journalist Sami al-Haj returned home to Sudan on Friday after more than six years in the U.S.-run Guantanamo Bay prison, urging Washington to respect human rights and branding torture as terrorism. Haj said he and the other Guantanamo detainees had been subjected to all kinds of torture, but the worst had been when his jailers insulted Islam or desecrated the Koran in front of prisoners. "Security and human rights are inseparable issues -- you cannot have one without the other," he told Reuters in an interview. "Human rights are not only for times of peace...

U.S. mulls Guantanamo closure as Bush term nears end Fri May 2, 2008 2:01pm EDT By Sue Pleming WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Bush administration could announce plans by the end of its term in January to close Guantanamo prison and an upcoming Supreme Court ruling might be the impetus for this, senior U.S. officials and experts say. The government is under international and domestic pressure to close the prison, which opened at the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay on Cuba in January 2002 to house terrorism suspects caught after the invasion of Afghanistan. "A decision could be made in...

U.S. Wary Of Small Boat Terrorism As boating season approaches, the Bush administration wants to enlist America's 80 million recreational boaters to help reduce the chances that a small boat could deliver a nuclear or radiological bomb somewhere along the 95,000 miles of U.S. coastline and inland waterways. According to an April 23 intelligence assessment obtained by The Associated Press, "The use of a small boat as a weapon is likely to remain al Qaeda's weapon of choice in the maritime environment, given its ease in arming and deploying, low cost, and record of success." While the United States...

U.S. war planes killed an Islamist rebel said to be al Qaeda's leader in Somalia and at least a dozen other people on Thursday in Washington's biggest blow against an insurgency raging since 2007. The rebels said Aden Hashi Ayro -- who led al Shabaab militants blamed for attacks on government troops and their Ethiopian allies -- died in the first major success for a string of U.S. air-strikes on Somali insurgents in the last year. "Infidel planes bombed Dusamareb," Shabaab spokesman Mukhtar Ali Robow told Reuters by phone, referring to a town in central Somalia, where body parts lay...

Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (Md.), the House Democrats’ point man in negotiations on an overhaul of intelligence surveillance law, is keeping his eye on conservative Blue Dog Democrats who might defect on the issue under Republican pressure. The topic has reached a critical point because surveillance orders granted by the director of national intelligence and the attorney general under the authority of the Protect America Act begin to expire in August. If Congress does not approve an overhaul of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) by Memorial Day, intelligence community officials will have to prepare dozens of individual surveillance warrants,...

WASHINGTON, April 29, 2008 – The United States and its allies are making progress in Afghanistan, but there is a long, tough road ahead, President Bush said during a White House Rose Garden news conference today.The Taliban and its al-Qaida allies continue to fight in Afghanistan and want to re-impose an “incredibly dark” regime in the country, the president said. The recent Taliban assassination attempt on Afghan President Hamid Karzai is their latest attempt to retrieve their failing campaign, he added. “It's very important for the American people to remember what life was like in Afghanistan prior to the...

The following is being issued by the Republican National Committee:April 29, 2008 Chairman Howard DeanDemocratic National Committee430 S. Capitol St., S.E.Washington, D.C. 20003 Re: DNC's Use of "Fahrenheit 9/11" Footage in "100" Ad Dear Chairman Dean: I write regarding the Democratic National Committee's (DNC) advertisement attacking Senator John McCain titled "100," which was released on Sunday, April 27, 2008. As you are already aware, and as has been widely reported, the DNC's ad is troubling for at least two reasons. First, its message is factually false; the DNC is deliberately misleading American voters. Second, it constitutes an illegal excessive in-kind...

Home-grown 'champion of Islam' Stewart Bell, National Post April 25, 2008 TORONTO -Naeem Muhammad Khan wants everyone to "Support Our Troops," but he's not talking about the Canadian Forces in Kandahar. From his apartment in Toronto, Mr. Khan has been posting messages on the Internet calling Osama bin Laden a "hero" and "champion of Islam." The 23-year-old fundamentalist's online logo combines the black Taliban flag and the outline of an AK-47 above the "Support Our Troops" slogan. Between sips of iced coffee at Tim Hortons, Mr. Khan explained that he is a supporter of the Taliban, as well as other...

Details of the 15-Point Draft Agreement between Taliban Commander Baitullah Mehsud and the Pakistani GovernmentBy: Tufail Ahmad * On March 25, 2008, Yousuf Raza Gilani of the Pakistan People's Party was sworn in as prime minister of Pakistan. His government is advocating dialogue with the Taliban, as is the secular government of the North WestFrontierProvince. Recently, following an understanding, the Taliban commander in Pakistan's tribal region of Waziristan, Baitullah Mehsud, distributed a pamphlet directing the Taliban to shun all provocative activity that could threaten law and order in the region. [1] Baitullah Mehsud heads militants from his Mehsud tribe in...

The government of Iran continues to supply weapons and other support to extremists in Iraq, despite repeated promises to the contrary, and is increasingly complicit in the death of U.S. soldiers, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff said Friday in a stark new assessment of Iranian influence. The chairman, Admiral Michael Mullen, said he was "extremely concerned" about "the increasingly lethal and malign influence" by the government of Iran and the Quds Force of Iran's Revolutionary Guards, a special force that aids and encourages Islamic militants around the world. The Quds Forces in Iran were created during the...

The president's nomination of generals David Petraeus and Raymond Odierno to take command of U.S. Central Command and Multinational Force-Iraq, respectively, was obviously the right decision. By experience and temperament and demonstrated success, both men are perfectly suited to these jobs. Given the political climate in Washington, however, their nominations are likely to be attacked with the same tired arguments war critics used to try to drown out reports of progress in Iraq during the recent Petraeus-Crocker hearings. So before the shouting begins again, let us consider in detail one of the most important of these arguments: that no one...

War On Terror: Caving to Muslim pressure groups, the Bush administration has banned the term "jihadist" to define the enemy. Islamic terrorists will now be known as "violent extremists." Our war on radical Islam has been hamstrung by political correctness from the start. First, we couldn't call the campaign to strike back at al-Qaida a "crusade" because Muslims found it historically offensive. Then we couldn't define the enemy as "Islamic terrorists" because it insulted Islam — even though it accurately described the Muslims committing murder and mayhem in the name of Islam. To appease critics, we narrowed the terminology, confining...

New research suggests political freedom and geographic factors contribute significantly to causes of terrorism, challenging the common view that terrorism is rooted in poverty. "There is no significant relationship between a country's wealth and level of terrorism once other factors like the country's level of political freedom are taken into account," says Alberto Abadie, public policy professor at Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government. Abadie's review of the World Market Research Centre's Global Terrorism Index found no clear correlation between terrorism and poverty. Abadie's research was funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF). The finding comes despite several international meetings...

Carrier launches are astonishing events. The plane is moved to within what seems like a bowling alley's length of the bow. A blast shield larger than any government building driveway Khomeini-flipper rises behind the fighter jet, and the jet's twin engines are cranked to maximum thrust. A slot-car slot runs down the middle of the bowling alley. The powered-up jet is held at the end of its slot by a steel shear pin smaller than a V-8 can. When the shear pin shears the jet is unleashed and so is a steam catapult that hurls the plane down the slot,...

Iraq: Democrats insisted the surge couldn't succeed. When it did, they claimed it failed because Iraqis weren't using the "political breathing space" it provided. In fact, Iraq's ongoing political progress is stunning.Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki has been called an incompetent incapable of achieving consensus in a country that has never known representative government. The nation he tries in vain to run, we've been told for years now, is in a state of civil war. The only thing President Bush accomplished in invading it, they say, was to send American troops into a hopeless quagmire. But speaking Tuesday in Kuwait to...

BERLIN, Germany (CNN) -- A German warship was involved in fending off Monday's pirate attack on a Japanese tanker near the coast of Somalia, a spokesman for the German armed forces said Wednesday.

FRIDAY HARBOR, San Juan County — The people of the San Juan Islands tend to be independent sorts, espousing a do-it-yourself, leave-me-be ethos as natural and ever-present as the tide. But for many of the 17,000 people of this island county, the normal rhythms of small-town life have hit a dissonant chord lately. A couple of months ago, the U.S. Border Patrol began occasional "spot checks" of every vehicle and passenger arriving in Anacortes off state ferries, the lifeline between these islands and the mainland. For some here, it seems like a good idea or, at worst, a minor inconvenience....

Islamist uprising kills 81 in Somalia By Mike Pflanz in Nairobi Last Updated: 3:06am BST 21/04/2008 Fresh fighting between Islamist insurgents and Somali government troops in Mogadishu has killed at least 81 people in two days, witnesses reported yesterday. A wounded man is brought to hospital in Mogadishu A further 119 wounded civilians and soldiers were being treated in hospital after a weekend of mortar attacks and small-arms battles. "There was a lot of fighting we could hear on Saturday, mostly guns and grenades, then much more today," said a doctor contacted by telephone yesterday at the Save Our Souls...

In the summer of 2005, the Bush administration confronted a fresh wave of criticism over Guantánamo Bay. The detention center had just been branded “the gulag of our times” by Amnesty International, there were new allegations of abuse from United Nations human rights experts and calls were mounting for its closure. The administration’s communications experts responded swiftly. Early one Friday morning, they put a group of retired military officers on one of the jets normally used by Vice President Dick Cheney and flew them to Cuba for a carefully orchestrated tour of Guantánamo. To the public, these men are members...

Family and friends waited in anticipation at Volk Field Saturday to welcome home the troops of the Wisconsin National Guard Troop E, 105th Cavalry.  Roschelle Easterday, wife of Troop 1SG Paul Easterday, can't wait to see her husband, who's been gone almost a year fighting in Iraq. "We're pretty excited to see each other.  It's been a long time and the rest of his family's here as well and we're pretty excited," says Easterday.     Soldiers from the Troop E, 105th Cavalry saw significant action while stationed in Iraq, which made some family members nervious at times.  "If I don't get in touch with...

Army officials have told the parents of Sgt. Matt Maupin that some of the Iraqis believed to be responsible for their son’s capture four years ago are in custody, the Cincinnati Enquirer reported Thursday. “I know that there are at least two who are supposed to be put on trial, if they haven’t been already,” Keith Maupin, father of the Ohio soldier, told the Enquirer. Maupin’s remains were found March 20 in Iraq by U.S. soldiers, nearly four years after he was captured in a convoy attack near the Baghdad airport. Keith Maupin and the soldier’s mother, Carolyn Maupin, left...

More Emergency Prep Could Be Done, Experts Tell Senate -- Concerned that not enough attention is being paid to the risk of a nuclear attack, a Senate committee yesterday looked at the consequences of such a terrorist strike in Washington -- and said that more could be done to save lives. A hearing, called by the Committee on Homeland Security and Government Affairs, featured charts showing the horrific effects of a small nuclear device detonating near the White House. It was the panel's third session in recent months on the threat of a nuclear explosion. "The scenarios we discuss today...

GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip - Gaza's worst day of violence in a month, in which at least 20 Palestinians and three Israeli soldiers died, appeared to jeopardize Egypt's efforts to mediate a Middle East cease-fire. Wednesday's death toll was the highest since a broad Israeli military offensive in early March that killed more than 120 Gazans, including dozens of civilians. Since then, Israel and Gaza's Hamas rulers appeared to be honoring an informal truce, though punctuated with Palestinian rocket attacks, some Israeli airstrikes and minor border skirmishes. That changed suddenly on Wednesday, with no apparent trigger - indicating that the...

The commander of forces in far western Iraq said April 15 the enemy his Marines and their Iraqi counterparts now confront is in disarray -- a smattering of foreign malcontents ruled by local thugs with little community support. Disillusioned foreigners from Yemen, Algeria, Syria and Saudi Arabia are coming to Iraq with dreams of "jihad" in fewer numbers than they were a year ago, arrive under-equipped and are poorly led once they infiltrate the province. "These are very often young to middle aged males who are kind of malcontents and misfits from their society," said Col. Patrick Malay, commander of...

For nations as well as for individuals, both winning and losing can be habit-forming. How many people have you heard say that America lost in Vietnam — and so what? In 1979, the Iranian mullahs seized our embassy and took our diplomats hostage and we made them pay no price — and so what? In 1983, Hezbollah, Iran’s Lebanese proxy, bombed the U.S. Marine barracks in Lebanon and we did nothing much — and so what? Ten years later, we retreated from Somalia — and so what? The World Trade Towers were bombed for the first time that same year...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Authorities have seen no signs of al Qaeda trying to insert operatives into the United States from Mexico, but the militant group has considered doing so, a U.S. intelligence official said on Friday. The comments by Charles Allen, Homeland Security undersecretary for intelligence and analysis, could undercut one argument by advocates in and out of government for get-tough tactics to fight illegal crossings at the southern U.S. border -- that they are needed to fight terrorism. In contrast, at least one Islamist militant has been caught trying to enter the United States by land to attempt an...

Today the President met with General David Petraeus, Commander of the Multi-National Force-Iraq, and U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker at the White House. The President also delivered a speech on the Iraq War in the Cross Hall of the White House. Fact Sheet: The Way Forward in Iraq Later in the day the President departed from the White House to spend the weekend in Crawford.Pray for President Bush -- Day 2765 Today Secretary of Defense Robert Gates and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Michael Mullen testified before the Senate Armed Services Committee on Capitol Hill. The...

Bush administration officials from Vice President Dick Cheney on down signed off on using harsh interrogation techniques against suspected terrorists after asking the Justice Department to endorse their legality, The Associated Press has learned. The officials also took care to insulate President Bush from a series of meetings where CIA interrogation methods, including waterboarding, which simulates drowning, were discussed and ultimately approved. A former senior U.S. intelligence official familiar with the meetings described them Thursday to the AP to confirm details first reported by ABC News on Wednesday. The intelligence official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not...

BALAD, Iraq – Iraqi Security Forces, advised by U.S. Special Forces, detained two suspected al-Qaeda in Iraq improvised explosive device cell members and one insurgent cell leader in separate operations April 8 and 9.In Ramadi, the Anbar Counterterrorism Directorate conducted an operation to capture members of an AQI IED cell operating out of the Albu Faraj area of Ramadi.The cell is accused of multiple attacks against Iraqi and Coalition forces including an IED attack March 25.The group also owned an IED cache found by the Albu Faraj Iraqi Police March 30. Two cell members were detained during the operation.In Mosul,...

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Defense Secretary Robert Gates has signed deployment orders that will send U.S. military trainers to Pakistan this summer, CNN has learned. Their mission: To teach Pakistan Frontier Corps units counterinsurgency skills critical to fighting the Taliban and al Qaeda. Several Pentagon and military officials confirmed the order has been signed although it has not been publicly announced. The deployment will be small -- just about two dozen troops who will stay through the spring of next year, according to the officials. All of this is the first step in a long-term U.S.-Pakistani military program on counterinsurgency cooperation....

KABUL (AFP) — More than 2,000 US marines recently deployed in Afghanistan to support a NATO-led military campaign against Islamic rebels have began operations in the country's restive south, the unit said Thursday. The 2,300-strong US Marine Expeditionary Unit was part of Washington's recent contribution to the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) efforts to quell a resurgent Taliban insurgency. "The last of the 24th Marine Expeditionary Unit's Marines and Sailors are arriving and the unit is beginning operations after weeks of flowing personnel and equipment here," the unit said in a statement. "The Marines have begun their operations in...

US Ambassador Ford Fraker said in Sakaka that his country aims to double the number of student visas issued to Saudis. “Currently there are 15,000 Saudi students in the US,” he said during an event on Sunday with local business leaders to an audience at the Al-Jouf Chamber of Commerce and Industry. “We aim to increase their numbers to 30,000 over the next five years.” Fraker said Saudi Arabia should bolster its English-language programs because it is generally required for Saudis seeking to pursue higher studies in the US. Fraker also stressed the need for popularizing English teaching programs because...

The Munich-based energy and electrical giant Siemens has with "high likelihood" delivered sophisticated data surveillance systems to Iran, an Austrian investigative journalist disclosed in a public broadcast ORF report on Monday. Speaking from Vienna, journalist Erich Moechel told The Jerusalem Post that he was "99 percent certain" that "Monitoring Centers," used to track mobile and land-line phone conversations, had been sent to Iran. These systems could enable the Iranian intelligence service to document conversations between Israel and Iran and "build a communication profile." According to Moechel, the technology can show "how many telephone conversations over the last 10 years between...

A TOP counter terrorism cop has warned: "Al-Qaeda has re-written the manual of attack and the name of the game now is mass murder." Det Chief Supt Tony Porter painted a bleak picture of the threat from Muslim extremists when he addressed business leaders at a conference on security in Manchester. But the head of Counter Terrorism Unit at Greater Manchester Police also spoke of his `optimism for the future' and his desire to make the region `the most hostile environment you can imagine' for terrorists. The top detective warned delegates at the start of his speech he would outline...

The war over Iraq – not to be confused with the conflict actually taking place there – is back in the headlines. This week's report to Congress by America's top two emissaries in Baghdad, Gen. David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker, will provide a backdrop for the momentous decisions to come concerning whether and how to pursue victory in Iraq. Before the politicians and their constituents make such decisions about where we go from here, they should be sure to ground themselves in the facts about how we got to this point. After all, as George Santayana put it, "Those...

Data from the Defense Intelligence Agency indicates that enemy-initiated attacks on U.S. troops, Iraqi security forces and Iraqi civilians peaked in October 2006, the month leading up to the U.S. midterm elections. At the time, Vice President Dick Cheney said the insurgents were "very sensitive to the fact that we've got an election scheduled" and were trying to "break the will of the American people." Democrats, who cast the 2006 midterm election as a referendum on Iraq, ended up taking control of both the House and the Senate. The DIA data shows that between November 2006 and May 2007, attacks...

KABUL (AFP) — Afghan and NATO forces killed 15 Taliban insurgents in separate raids in southern Afghanistan, where police also captured a senior Taliban commander, officials said Sunday. Ten Taliban militants were killed in a joint operation by Afghan and NATO-led forces in Zhari district of Kandahar province on Saturday, the defence ministry said in a statement. Another five rebels were killed in a similar operation in another part of the district, it said. In Kandahar city, police arrested Taliban commander Abdul Jabar, who served as deputy to captured militant leader Mullah Mansoor Dadullah, the interior ministry said. The ministry...