Free Republic

CAIRO (AFP) — In a potential blow to themed resorts from Vegas to Tokyo, Egypt is to pass a law requiring payment of royalties whenever its ancient monuments, from the pyramids to the sphinx, are reproduced. Zahi Hawass, the charismatic and controversial head of Egypt's Supreme Council of Antiquities, told AFP on Tuesday that the move was necessary to pay for the upkeep of the country's thousands of pharaonic sites. "The new law will completely prohibit the duplication of historic Egyptian monuments which the Supreme Council of Antiquities considers 100-percent copies," he said. "If the law is passed then it...

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia — Muslim-majority Malaysia's first astronaut will get guidelines allowing flexibility in praying in zero gravity and eating space meals under Islamic rules, the country space chief said Monday. **snip** Malaysia held a forum for Islamic scholars in April 2006 to discuss problems Muslim space travelers might face, such as pinpointing the Saudi holy city of Mecca, which Muslims are expected face when they pray five times a day. The guideline booklet, published this month, says the direction should be determined "according to the capability" of the astronaut. **snip**

Airport officials said Friday they will consider setting aside a private area for prayer and meditation at the request of imams concerned about the removal of six Muslim clerics from a US Airways flight last week. Steve Wareham, director of Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport, said other airports have "meditation rooms" used for prayers or by passengers who simply need quiet time. A group of Somali clerics met with airport officials Friday and said they would attract less attention if they had a private area for prayer. Devout Muslims pray five times daily, facing the holy city of Mecca. "When we...

U.S. Muslims outraged after imams kicked off plane By Michael Conlon 27 minutes ago Muslim leaders expressed outrage on Tuesday after six imams were removed from a commercial airline flight in Minnesota for what they said was nothing more than trying to say evening prayers. "They were treated like terrorists ... humiliated," said Abu Hannoud, civil rights director for the Arizona chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, who said the men were taken off the US Airways flight in handcuffs. He said the men were still trying to find a flight back to Phoenix where most are affiliated with...

An al-Qaida-linked extremist group warned Pope Benedict XVI on Monday that he and the West were "doomed," as protesters raged across the Muslim world to demand more of an apology from the pontiff for his remarks about Islam and violence. The Mujahedeen Shura Council, an umbrella organization of Sunni Arab extremist groups that includes al-Qaida in Iraq, issued a statement on a Web forum vowing to continue its holy war against the West. The authenticity of the statement could not be independently verified. The group said Muslims would be victorious and addressed the pope as "the worshipper of the cross"...

Just in. I am looking at a picture of the WTC with smoke pouring out of the western tower. Looks like a huge amount of damage. Debris raining down on people in the street.

Here are some links from the FR archives in observance of the fifth anniversary of 9/11/2001 - Threads list of several breaking news items - Latest Articles The first post reporting the attacks by OldEconomyBuyer - World Trade Center Posted on the first anniversary - Associated Press newswire - September 11, 2001 - Chronology of news alerts, bulletins and flashes

With the smoke still rising from the ruins of the al-Qaida camps in Afghanistan, intelligence agents and journalists from all over the world were already combing through the rubble in an attempt to uncover information on the nature and quality of the training the camps' roughly 20,000 graduates had received. (snip) After losing its training camps, al-Qaida went on the offensive. By 2003, the entire "Encyclopedia" was suddenly available on the Internet. Thousands of illustrated pages containing bomb-building instructions, in-depth rules on how to encode information and extensive details on organizing terrorist cells were suddenly available -- in Arabic --...

CAIRO, Egypt — The fighting between Israel and Hezbollah exposed divisions across the Arab world, not only between Shiites and Sunnis but also between Arab governments and their citizens. Key Arab allies of the United States, predominantly Sunni countries such as Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Egypt, fear the rising power of Shiites in the region: Hezbollah militants who virtually control southern Lebanon, Iraq's majority Shiite government, and — most worrisome — the Shiite theocracy that has run Iran for decades. Yet many ordinary people, Sunnis as well as Shiites, are cheering the Lebanese guerrillas because of their willingness to stand...

BOOKS of hate promoting suicide bombings, anti-Australian conspiracies and racism can be freely sold in the Muslim community after a ruling that they don't breach sedition laws. The material, found by The Daily Telegraph in Lakemba and Auburn bookstores last year, was judged by federal authorities not to incite violence in the first known test of anti-terrorism laws. Police Commissioner Ken Moroney said last night he felt uneasy about the continuing threat posed by such material remaining on the streets. But he said NSW Police would abide by the "qualified and considered legal opinion" offered by the Commonwealth Director of...

This past Good Friday, a man entered Mar Girgis Church in Alexandria, Egypt, and stabbed one worshipper to death and wounded two others. He then went to another church and stabbed three other Christians. The events in Alexandria were a reminder of the, at best, tenuous status of Christians in the Islamic world. The Egyptian government immediately dismissed the possibility that animus toward Christians played a role in the attacks. Egypt’s Interior Ministry said that the attacker suffered from “psychological disturbances.” How convenient. Egyptian Christians, known as Copts, did not buy it, and for good reason: Police officials had a...

"Individual Islamists may appear law-abiding and reasonable, but they are part of a totalitarian movement, and as such, all must be considered potential killers.” I wrote those words days after 9/11 and have been criticized for them ever since. But an incident on March 3 at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill suggests I did not go far enough. That was when a just-graduated student named Mohammed Reza Taheri-azar, 22, and an Iranian immigrant, drove a sport utility vehicle into a crowded pedestrian zone. He struck nine people but, fortunately, none were severely injured. Until his would-be murderous...

I have this simple question that no one seems to want to answer. Thankfully, the five-alarm debacle that was the lucrative deal to permit a company wholly owned by the United Arab Emirates to manage stevedoring operations at several U.S. ports has been averted. Backstage pressure induced the UAE to withdraw, avoiding further, immense embarrassment to President Bush, who inexplicably raised the stakes of this blunder by threatening a veto — his first, and what a bizarre cause to take that maiden voyage over. The end has unleashed another torrent of censorious caterwauling from the “Let’s Make a Deal” Right...

March 10, 2006 -- Mayor Bloomberg yesterday all but fired Imam Umar Abdul-Jalil as head of ministerial services at the city's Department of Correction. But no honor accrues to the mayor: He had no choice. Abdul-Jalil was iced after The Post revealed a series of hate-laced public remarks from the imam last year. "We know that the greatest terrorists in the world occupy the White House," Abdul-Jalil was caught on tape saying. He insisted Muslims are being "set up" - jailed just because they're Muslims and tortured in government prisons. "Zionists" are manipulating the news.

SYDNEY (AFP) - Australia is considering a plan to "de-programme" Islamic militants held in jail despite criticism by a rights group saying it amounted to brainwashing. Police Commissioner Mick Keelty proposed the idea, saying the technique involved using respected imams or people previously connected with militant organisations to convert extremists to more moderate views. Foreign Minister Alexander Downer said that while "re-programming isn't the phrase I would use", the idea would be considered as it had been implemented successfully in Europe, the Middle East and Indonesia. "Those governments have made an attempt to persuade extremists and terrorists who have been...

Since 9-11, I've received numerous letters like this recent one: "What can be done to help educate people on the dangers that radical Islam poses to Western civilization? I don't think this ideological conflict will go away." No, it won't. It is likely to be for the first half of the 21st century what the Cold War was for the last half of the 20th -- a long, subtle struggle with occasional days of fire. How to educate folks? Use of all media will be needed, but here's a list of books I've read and found useful. There are many...

THE torture and murder of a young Jewish man in Paris triggered outrage among Jewish leaders yesterday as the Government sought to prevent the affair from inflaming emotions in the Muslim-dominated housing estates of France. Dominique de Villepin, the Prime Minister, and his ministers promised that justice would be done after the parents of Ilan Halimi, 23, who was held captive for three weeks on an immigrant estate, accused the police of playing down the anti-Semitic motives of his kidnappers. Voicing the anger felt among the Jewish population, Radio Shalom, a station in Paris, said that M Halimi had “been...

Mr. Moderator: I realize this is a vanity, but this is a question that I've never seen really raised here on Free Republic either by article or by vanity and I don't think it should be relegated elsewhere until it is thrashed about on Jim's main board. I've been a Freeper since 2000, so please honor this one request. What were the Muslims before the Prophet? Riots everyday against non-muslim institutions because of, primarily, a series of cartoons. As a nation that was founded upon Judeo-Christian ideals, but one that also founded upon the philosophy of accepting all religions as...

Srinagar, February 10: Nearly two dozen black-veiled Muslim women stormed gift and stationery shops Friday in Kashmir, burning Valentine's Day cards and posters to protest a holiday they say imposes Western values on Muslim youth. No one was hurt in the half-dozen or so incidents, and police cordoned off the area to prevent the women from marching through Srinagar's main shopping district to continue their ransacking. The women were from the Kashmiri Islamic group Dukhtaran-e-Millat, or Daughters of the Community, Kashmir's only women's separatist group, whose members are also known for their fiercely conservative social views. "We will not let...

When the Ayatollah called for the execution of Salman Rushdie upon publication of The Satanic Verses, only a few commentators - most notably John le Carré - said Rushdie brought the whole thing on himself by creating a work of art which he should have known would offend Muslims. This time around, a disturbing number of people who should know better are siding with the rampaging mob, like Simon Jenkins in The Times (column title: "These cartoons don't defend free speech, they threaten it"). Nobody has an absolute right to freedom. Civilisation is the story of humans sacrificing freedom so...

PALESTINIAN recognition of Israel was a mistake that needs correction, a senior Hamas leader said, as the group faces pressure from Europe and the US to recognise the Jewish state. The militant Islamist group will not consider recognising Israel while the status of the country's borders remains unclear and millions of Palestinian refugees are not unable to return to their homes, the group's deputy political leader said. "We believe that there was a mistake that happened in the past and this (recognition of Israel) in particular must be corrected," Moussa Abu Marzouk told reporters in Cairo without giving further details....

We are all Danes now, as Paul Belien, editor of the Brussels Journal said in his editorial this week. Or we should be. Because today Denmark is taking a beating for us all, fighting for press freedoms that can mean the difference between democracy and totalitarianism, between free speech and terror, between sleeping at night and being afraid of the knock on the door, between light and despair. And that tiny democracy is doing so under threat of economic sanctions -- and death for its citizens and those of other Western countries where news media have rallied to the defence...

Here's a video clip of an extraordinary exchange between one of CNN International's anchors and the Muslim Council of Britain, Abdurahmen Jafar. Skirting around the fact that there has been an "extreme" and "violent" response is naive. Anchor: It seems that has taken on a life of it's own. I mean you see in some Palestinian territories, for instance, in Gaza, where Europeans are being told to stay indoors, that they're at risk. And it's kind of taken on this dimension, that seems, from the outside, violent. Instead of a thoughtful response, Jafar says the publication of the cartoons is...

JERUSALEM - A Palestinian man stabbed five people on a minibus in central Israel, killing one woman before passengers subdued him, police and witnesses said. Police said the attack in the central Israeli city of Petach Tikva was politically motivated, but did not elaborate. They said the attacker came from the West Bank, but it was unclear how the he had entered Israel. Witnesses said the attacker stood up while the bus was moving and began stabbing passengers. "He jumped on people and started to stab them," said one witness, who gave only his first name, Benny. Other witnesses said...

The uproar in the Islamic world over Danish cartoons lampooning the prophet Muhammad reminds us that much of that world misunderstands what democracy means. A Danish paper published the 12 cartoons in September. One showed the prophet with a turban made of explosives; in another, he greets a line of suicide bombers in heaven with the words "Stop, stop, we have run out of virgins." The drawings have inspired protests from Muslim presidents, Arab boycotts of Danish goods, Pakistani demonstrations that torched the Danish flag, and calls by Gaza imams to sever the hands of the artists. In the Muslim...

Several terror groups have targeted Danish citizens and issued warnings. Intelligence services in Denmark are concerned An Al-Qaeda affiliated terror group issued a grim warning to Danish citizens on Thursday: 'You will see your own blood as an answer, and that is revenge from our prophet,' the Abu Hafs al-Masri Brigade, which has been active in Iraq, wrote to a London-based homepage. Another group based in England, Al Ghurabaa, called for a demonstration in front of the Danish embassy in London. Two extremist groups in the Palestinian occupied territories also issued warnings to citizens from Denmark, as well as Norway...

I received an email tonight that epitomizes various tendencies we have seen many times before. A Muslim writes in telling me that he has been very "docile," that he does not support Osama, but now my actions have driven him around the bend. And what exactly have I done now? Why, it's worse than bombing a village "to get osama's deputy": I have defended the cartoons of Muhammad and published them at my website. This is a common displacement of responsibility. Of course, it rings hollow. If he has really been a peaceful fellow, he will be able to put...

Last week, Muslims marched in the centre of London chanting "Freedom go to Hell!" There could be no more graphic illustration of the paradox at the heart of the cartoon row. These protesters were exercising - and in many cases abusing - the freedom of protest and freedom of assembly that are foundation stones of British democracy. Yet, even as they exploited these hard-won liberties, they were calling for them to be abolished. This newspaper would not have published the cartoons of Mohammed at the centre of this controversy, images which we regard as vulgar and fatuously insulting. But -...

STATEMENT BY THE PRESS SECRETARY The United States condemns in the strongest terms the burning of the Danish and Norwegian Embassies in Damascus, Syria today, which also damaged the Chilean and Swedish Embassies. The Government of Syria's failure to provide protection to diplomatic premises, in the face of warnings that violence was planned, is inexcusable. The State Department has told the Syrian Ambassador that Syria must act decisively to protect all foreign embassies and citizens in Damascus from attack. We will hold Syria responsible for such violent demonstrations since they do not take place in that country without government knowledge...

Denmark and Norway have urged their citizens to leave Syria, after the embassies of both countries in Damascus were set on fire. Several thousand Syrian demonstrators set both embassies alight in protest at the publishing of cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad by newspapers in several European countries. Police fired teargas to disperse the protesters. Norwegian Foreign Minister Jonas Gahr Stoere said he had telephoned his Syrian counterpart, Faruq al-Shara and told him 'this was completely unacceptable'. He added that Mr al-Shara 'had distanced himself from the attack, and he apologised'. Meanwhile, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said his government should consider...

TEHRAN (AFP) - Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has ordered the cancellation of economic contracts with countries where the media have carried cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed, the ISNA news agency reported. The report said the hardline president had ordered the creation of an official body to respond to the cartoons, saying the regime "must revise and cancel economic contracts with the countries that started this repulsive act and those that followed them." The presidential decree also condemned Saturday the "the insult by certain Western media of the prophet which shows the hatred towards Islam and Muslims of the Zionists who...

With so many memorial sites, graphics, photos, videos, flash movies, etc. proliferating on the internet since the 9-11 attack on America, it is almost impossible to keep track of them all. The purpose of this thread is to provide a convenient archive for posterity. Use this thread to post links to any sites you have found particulary memorable or that would be of interest to other FReepers. (Please post your comments and the links only to save bandwidth).

CONDI UPS ANTE ON CRESCENT-KISSING – SAYS ISLAM’S A RELIGION OF PEACE AND LOVEGrassTopsUSA Exclusive CommentaryBy Don Feder While I never imagined Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to be a conservative, I used to think she was vaguely connected to reality.  Her October 25th speech at an Iftaar dinner (marking the end of Ramadan) disabused me of that notion.  It was an exercise in crescent-kissing to put even her boss to shame. Upping the ante on Western Muslim mania, madam secretary promoted Islam from religion of peace to “religion of love and peace.” (You always hurt the ones you love?)...

Islamabad, October 25: Cashing on the devastation inflicted by the October 8 earthquake, Islamists in Pakistan have termed the temblor as ‘God's wrath’ on the country for the decision to desert Taliban and back the American ‘invasion’ of Afghanistan. Riaz Hussain Pirzada, a treasury member belonging to the ruling Pakistan Muslim League-Q, but considered close to Islamist alliance Muthahida Majlis Amal (MMA), told the National Assembly yesterday that the quake was ‘god's wrath’ for Pakistan's support of the US campaign. God was also ‘angry’ with Pakistan because "we welcomed the holy month of Ramzan by rigging the last phase of...

Congress Urged to Recognize the Beginning of Ramadan By Susan Jones CNSNews.com Senior Editor September 26, 2005 (CNSNews.com) - An Islamic advocacy group is urging American Muslims "and other people of conscience" to contact their elected representatives and urge them to sign a House resolution recognizing the upcoming fast of Ramadan -- and commending Muslims for their faith. The Council on American-Islamic Relations calls the resolution an important tool for encouraging dialogue between Muslims and their elected officials, as well as enhancing understanding of the Islamic faith. The resolution, which expresses the opinion of Congress, mentions threats and attacks directed...

Hamas Friday Sermons in Abandoned Gaza Settlements on Al-Jazeera TV : "We Can Liberate All of Palestine From the Mediterranean to the Jordan River" The following are excerpts from Hamas Friday sermons and military parades in abandoned Israeli settlements in Gaza. The footage aired on Al-Jazeera TV on September 16, 2005. TO VIEW THIS CLIP VISIT: http://memritv.org/search.asp?ACT=S9&P1=858. We Do Not Distinguish Between 1940s and 1960s Lines Sheikh Nazzar Rayan: "The vanquishing of the enemy in Gaza does not mean that this stage has ended. We still have Jerusalem and the pure West Bank. We will not rest until we...

Islam is the brainchild of a psychopath and fear is the main tool of domination used by all psychopaths. Muhammad used fear to manipulate people and to make them do what he desired. Fear is the most powerful controlling force. If someone puts a gun to your head, you would do anything. It is fear that makes you do it. Islam is a fear-based doctrine. It’s not knowledge-based; it’s fear-based. People with weaker personal characters, those who have least control over their rebellious selves, find Islam very effective. They want someone put a big fear in them and Islam does...

SOMERSET, Pa. -- A Somerset County preacher vowed to fight the design of the Flight 93 National Memorial, insisting that the crescent pathway used in the design is a symbol of Islam. "This is a memorial to the terrorists who killed those people, not a memorial to the folks who died there innocently," said the Rev. Ron McRae, leader of the Bible Anabaptist Church near Jerome, about 55 miles southeast of Pittsburgh. "The crescent is as much connected to Islam as the cross is to Christianity," said McRae of Conemaugh Township, also listed as director and founder on the Web...

SKY News is reporting that Scotland Yard has arrested the 4th bomber(Bus bomber) in Rome.

I recently set out to learn more about Islam. I had no agenda at the time except to broaden my knowledge on the subject. What I have learned sickened me. I had previously been accepting of the notion that Islam was a peaceful religion and that the Muslim terrorists who inflict so much pain and death around the world represented a fringe element outside of mainstream Islam. I was wrong. The Islamic deity, Allah, is a false god. While the term "Allah" does indeed carry the same meaning as "God," Mohammed's Allah is nothing more than a construct of a...

The following letter was sent by a Baptist Minister to the head of the 'moderate' Muslim Council of Britain a few days ago in the wake of the terror campaign on London transport. Dear Sir Iqbal Sacranie, BBC2 NewsNight: ‘The teachings of Islam are very, very clear.’ I was very surprised to hear your public statement before the whole nation, which would therefore include Her Majesty’s Government and the Church, that the teachings of Islam condemn and forbid acts of violence such as the odious acts that were carried out last Thursday. I would, as a community leader, find it...

FOUR friends from northern England have changed the face of terrorism by carrying out the suicide bombings that brought carnage to London last week. It emerged last night that, for the first time in Western Europe, suicide bombers have been recruited for attacks. Security forces are coming to terms with the realisation that young Britons are prepared to die for their militant cause. Three of the men lived in Leeds and the immediate fear is that members of a terrorist cell linked to the city are planning further strikes. The mastermind behind the attacks and the bombmaker are both still...

An Iranian court has sentenced a man to have his eyes surgically removed for a crime he committed as a teenager 12 years ago. Amnesty International has condemned the sentence, reported in the Iranian daily Etemaad, but local human rights groups say these unusual punishments are hardly ever executed. Reformists and dissidents fear human rights could suffer under the new administration of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, but they believe the new abuses will be political crackdowns. Punishments such as stoning have become much less common, since Iran's Islamic judiciary agreed to suspend such sentences as part of a human rights dialogue with...

The Muslim Brotherhood has struggled for more than 75 years to impose radical Islam on the nation. Successive regimes — British, Royal, Nasserite and most recently that of Hosni Mubarak — have, in their own autocratic ways, successfully kept the organization under wraps. Today’s MB leadership has adopted a moderate face, including even saying Coptic Christians are welcome as members, but the Brotherhood remains true to its Islamist core beliefs. Islamism can be defined as a movement that seeks control of government, establishment of Islam as the state religion, and imposition and enforcement of Shari’a law. The Muslim Brotherhood, established...

What steps should Western border agencies take to defend their homelands from harm by Islamists? In the case of non-citizens, the answer is simple: Don't let Islamists in. Exclude not just potential terrorists but also anyone who supports the totalitarian goals of radical Islam. Just as civilized countries did not welcome fascists in the early 1940s (or communists a decade later), they need not welcome Islamists today. But what about one's own citizens who cross the border? They could be leaving to fight for the Taliban or returning from a course on terrorism techniques. Or perhaps they studied with enemies...

Muslim countries are set to launch the first Islamic satellite, which will be used for Moon sightings to help decide accurate dates for religious holidays and festivals, the world's largest Muslim body says. The 57-nation Organisation of the Islamic Conference says it plans to launch a 30 million Saudi Riyals (A$10.2 million) satellite within two years to take pictures of the Moon and establish lunar calendar dates. The Islamic calendar is a twelve-month lunar calendar and the beginning of any month is marked by the first appearance of the crescent Moon, or Hilal. Although the rise of the crescent Moon...

The gallery that was to host an Islamic prayer service led by a woman next Friday has pulled out in the face of mounting threats, including one promising to "blow you up."But organizers said the were determined to go ahead with plans to challenge the Islamic prohibition against women leadind mixed-sex prayers. After scrambling to find a new venue, they said late Friday that they had decided to limit participants to an invitation-only list for security reasons, but to broadcast the event on the Internet and through the media.'snip"Organizers seemed taken aback by mounting threats, especially against the backdrop of...

In Islam, lying or omissions for the 'greater good,' according to a strict or radical Islam/Islamist philosophy is not only acceptable, it is holy and blessed work. It is called al-Takeyya (or al-Taqiyya) and is a strategy outlined in the Hadiths and supported by various interpretations of some of the Suras in the Koran. We have just seen it in action and most people never even caught the whiff of mental ether the Islamists were pouring into the airways of the already comatose and choking non-Islamist world. Al-Takeyya is a policy whereby a Muslim may lie, deceive or omit critical...

PORTLAND — The FBI knows of "jihadists" who have trained in terrorist camps in Afghanistan and are now living in Oregon, the agency's Oregon chief said in an interview with The Associated Press yesterday. "We don't have an imminent threat that we're aware of. But I will say this: We have people here in Oregon that have trained in jihadist camps in bad areas. In the bad neighborhoods of the world," said FBI Special Agent in Charge Robert Jordan. Asked what he meant by "bad neighborhoods," he said Afghanistan, as well as several other countries he would not specify. During...

Lead story - Friday January 21, 2005 PAKISTAN : ENRAGED MUSLIM CHOPS OFF CHRISTIAN’S ARM Death threats force victim into hiding. Shahbaz Masih January 21 (Compass) -- A young Christian shopkeeper in Pakistan’s Punjab province had his arm chopped off by a Muslim customer who became enraged during a disagreement over a TV rental. Shahbaz Masih, 22, was approached last November 28 by a customer wanting to rent a television set from his video shop in Talwandi, a little village near Chak Jhumra in Faisalabad district. When Masih declined the request, his customer, a 26-year-old butcher named Ahmed Ali,...