Professor de história comenta a actuação da administração Obama face à revolução no Egipto

Veja também este postal de há dias.

Irmandade Muçulmana: o inimigo a temer

Texto integral.
Destaco:
«To this day, the Brotherhood’s motto remains, “Allah is our objective, the Prophet is our leader, the Koran is our law, Jihad is our way, and dying in the way of Allah is our highest hope. Allahu akbar!” Still, our see-no-Islamic-evil foreign-policy establishment blathers on about the Brotherhood’s purported renunciation of violence — and never you mind that, with or without violence, its commitment is, as Qaradawi puts it, to “conquer America” and “conquer Europe.” It is necessary to whitewash the Ikhwan’s brutal legacy and its tyrannical designs in order to fit it into the experts’ paradigm: history for simpletons. This substitute for thinking holds that, as Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice famously told an Egyptian audience in 2005, America has too often opted for stability rather than freedom. As a result, the story goes, our nation has chosen to support dictators when we should have been supporting . . . never mind that.

But we have to mind that. History is rarely a Manichean contest between good and evil. It’s not a choice between the pro-Western shah and Iranian freedom, but between the shah and Khomeini’s ruthless Islamist revolution. It’s not a choice between the pro-Western Musharraf and Pakistani freedom, but between Musharraf and a tense alliance of kleptocratic socialists and Islamists. Back in the 1940s, it was not a choice between the British-backed monarchy and Egyptian freedom, but between the monarchy and a conglomeration of Nasserite pan-Arab socialists, Soviet Communists, and Brotherhood Islamists. And today, the choice is not between the pro-American Mubarak and Egyptian freedom; it is a question of whether to offer tepid support to a pro-American dictator or encourage swift transition to a different kind of tyranny — one certain to be a lot worse for us, for the West at large, and for our Israeli ally: the Muslim Brotherhood tempered only, if at all, by Mohamed ElBaradei, an anti-American leftist who willfully abetted Iran’s nuclear ambitions while running the International Atomic Energy Agency.

History is not a quest for freedom. This is particularly true in the Islamic ummah, where the concept of freedom is not reasoned self-determination, as in the West, but nearly the opposite: perfect submission to Allah’s representative on earth, the Islamic state.»

Ministério da Administração interna dos EUA pondera aceitar sugestão dos muçulmanos

A sugestão é esta: em vez de serem revistadas nos aeroportos norte-americanos, as mulheres muçulmanas revistam-se a si próprias.

Pura sandice, da perigosa.

Amplify’d from www.jihadwatch.org

The Department of Homeland Security needs to clarify its position here without delay. CAIR advised Muslim women in the press release quoted here that:

"Instead of the pat-down, you can always request to pat down your own scarf, including head and neck area"...

Two facts should be self-evident to demonstrate how outrageous this idea is. First, the whole point of being searched by someone else is to find concealed objects. A "self-pat-down" clearly defeats that purpose and is a completely unacceptable lapse in security. Let's remember the stakes here: if something goes wrong in air security in the wrong place at the wrong time, people die. There is enough margin for error in the system already without adding this variable.

Secondly, the fact that Napolitano could even be considering such a measure highlights a double standard for special treatment that would not be considered for any other religious group, but is extended to Muslims without a second thought. What is going on here is a politically correct sort of anti-profiling: by all appearances, the air security apparatus bends over backwards to profile Muslims as not being a threat, in a way that it does not strive to reassure other demographic groups in the traveling public.

We are told time and again that Muslims in America just want to be treated like everyone else. Ergo, if you want equal treatment as a Muslim woman, participate in your social responsibilities equally even when it is awkward or inconvenient, rather than acting like some kind of demigoddess whose head and neck are untouchable by sullied human hands in the screening line. Your head and neck are as human as that of the next non-Muslim lady in line who is no more thrilled to be there than you are.

But let's remember why we're standing there waiting with our shoes in a plastic bin, and why so many security procedures have come into being in the first place: Islamic jihadists keep trying to bring down our planes, more and more with explosives concealed on their bodies.

"Napolitano considering allowing Muslim women to pat themselves down at Airports!" by Jack Minor for the Greeley Gazette, November 17 (thanks to C.):

With the holidays fast approaching, the Transportation Safety Agency has announced new security procedures requiring passengers selected for secondary screening to go through a machine that produces a full body scan producing a nude but grainy, black and white image. Passengers choosing to opt out of the scan will face a full body pat.

The problems these security measures pose should be discussed in the interest of the entire traveling public, pilots, and flight attendants, and not as the problem of one group.

The head of Homeland Security has indicated the government is considering the request of an Islamic organization that has suggested Muslim women be allowed to pat themselves down during a full body search that is part of new enhanced procedures at airports.

Since implementing the procedures, numerous complaints have arisen that the search is not a "pat-down" but rather feeling and grabbing along a person's genitalia and other areas until they meet resistance. Critics have said the pat-downs would be considered sexual assault if performed elsewhere.

The TSA defends the procedures as necessary in light of last years "underwear bomber" and the recent issues involving printer cartridges being used in an attempt to blow up cargo planes.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations, CAIR, has expressed concern with the TSA over the regulations and recommended special procedures for dealing with Muslim women. The organization issued a travel advisory for Muslims over the procedure.

In the advisory CAIR advises all Muslims to contact them and file a complaint with the TSA if they experience any "disturbing incidents" with the new procedures and they feel they have been unfairly singled out for screening.

It goes on to make special recommendations for Muslim women wearing a hijab covering their face. The advisory says women are to inform the officer they are only to pat down the head and neck and says "They should not subject you to a full-body or partial body pat-down." They also recommend that women should be permitted to pat themselves down and "have the officers perform a chemical swipe of your hands."

Barack Obama's Homeland Security Czar, Janet Napolitano, is considering changes to the procedures to address the issues raised by CAIR.... Read more at www.jihadwatch.org

See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/fp9x

A suposta coascendência de Abraão

Os muçulmanos, em modo de taqiyya ou simplesmente ignorantes sobre a sua religião, e os não-muçulmanos, quase sempre ignorantes - das espécies de ignorância a mais perniciosa, porque se supõe informada -, falam de uma suposta coascendência espiritual abraânica entre islão, judaísmo e cristianismo. De acordo com essa tese, as três seriam religiões abraânicas e esta ascendência espiritual comum seria um ponto de contacto a explorar no sentido de chegar a um clima mais pacífico de convivência entre os fiéis das três religiões.

O problema é que a tese é falsa: o islão é descendente de Abraão mas de um modo bastante diferente do judaísmo e do cristianismo.
Quem expõe as diferenças brilhantemente é Jaques Ellul, de quem já falámos aqui, num livro onde aborda o que chama "os três pilares do conformismo", a saber, para além da referida suposta coascendência, que são três "religiões do livro" e três "religiões monoteístas".

Mas a entrada infra trata apenas da primeira questão (não a esgota) e não das outras.

Concluo concordando com Marisol: não vale a pena fazer aproximações baseadas em falsidades, ou seja, construir em solo arenoso. Acrescento que o ponto de contacto com os muçulmanos hão-de ser as suas qualidades humanas, enquanto não corrompidas pela religião que professam.

Amplify’d from www.jihadwatch.org

This year's Eid greetings say, in part:

On Eid, Muslims around the world will commemorate Abraham's willingness to sacrifice his son, and distribute food to those less fortunate -- a reminder of the shared values and the common roots of three of the world's major religions.

Less informed Americans will read that and recall the account of Abraham's willingness to sacrifice Isaac, Abraham's son by Sarah and a Biblical patriarch of the Jewish people. On the other hand, in one of its efforts to demote Jews in its Islamic supremacist ordering of life, the universe, and everything, the Qur'an holds that the son in this account was not Isaac, but Ishmael. That's a rather significant jab at "the common roots of three of the world's major religions."

Does this mean Obama is a practicing Muslim behind the White House walls and the mask is slipping? No.

But it is noteworthy in that it is sloppy. If it is intentional, it is disingenuous. If it is unintentional, it is alarmingly bumbling. In either case, it is symptomatic of a policy based on a glossing over of differences, and on lofty but false assumptions of common values, and compatible ideals of human rights and dignity. And the rest of that paragraph only continues to demonstrate all of those issues.

Utterly ignoring Islam's teachings on the subjugation of women and non-Muslims, cruel and unusual punishments prescribed in the Qur'an, the death penalty for apostasy, and other abuses that hold many Muslim societies in arrested development and threaten human rights in the West does not make those teachings go away. Nor does it do away with the widespread human suffering caused by them.

Wishful thinking is an alarming basis for policy, whether economic, diplomatic, or for national security. And as the old military adage cautions: "Hope is not a method." Read more at www.jihadwatch.org

See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/fkh3

De questione Dei

A todos os nossos lectores (a um especialmente) que não acreditam em Deus:

«Ricardo Araújo Pereira e a questão de Deus

Intervenção de Ricardo Araújo Pereira na mesa-redonda «Deus: questão para Crentes e não-Crentes, organizada pela comunidade da Capela do Rato (Lisboa).

Ricardo Araújo Pereira e a questão de Deus (1) from Pastoral da Cultura on Vimeo.

1.ª parte: "Para nós, ateus, a morte é um sono sem sonhos e nós continuamos com um mau perder em relação a isso. Não é fácil. E por isso, onde é que eu vou buscar conforto? À Bíblia (não sei se já ouviram falar). Especialmente a um dos meu livros favoritos, que é o do Eclesiastes."



Ricardo Araújo Pereira e a questão de Deus (2) from Pastoral da Cultura on Vimeo.

2.ª parte: "[No livro do Eclesiastes] o tempo e o acaso acontecem a todos por igual. Era uma óptima pessoa – morreu. Era uma péssima pessoa – morreu também. (...) Eu juntei uma enorme fortuna – morri. Eu adquiri imenso conhecimento – morri a seguir. Eu fui muito bom para o meu semelhante – morri. Fui péssimo para o meu semelhante – morri também.” (...) “O trabalho de humorista é fazer as pessoas rirem-se do facto de, por mais maquilhagem que ponham na cara, é àquele estado que vão chegar.”


Ricardo Araújo Pereira e a questão de Deus (3) from Pastoral da Cultura on Vimeo.

3.ª parte e última parte: "O momento em que se perde o filho é o único, acho eu, do qual o riso está completamente ausente. Penso muitas vezes na questão de fazer rir as pessoas que perdem um filho."»

Alguém a Quem rogar?

«I Want Your Money»

Via Extrême Centre, ficamos a saber que está prestes a estrear um filme norte-americano sobre as ruinosas políticas orçamentais do presidente Obama. Segundo a mesma fonte, parte da equipa de produção deste filme fez questão de manter o anonimato, uma vez que, num meio tão ideologicamente uniforme como o de Hollywood, fazer um filme crítico de Obama pode ter como consequência não ser contratado.
Fique com o trailler:

Descubra as diferenças

A segunda citação é da Declaração de Independência dos EUA. De quem será a primeira? Será de alguém que crê em Deus, seja o Deus de Abraão, Isaque e Jacob, seja o deus de Mafoma? Será simples hipocrisia ou taqiyya?

Amplify’d from www.creativeminorityreport.com

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, endowed with certain inalienable rights: life and liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” Read more at www.creativeminorityreport.com

See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/au1s

Obama confidencia ser muçulmano

Esta é daquelas entradas que me expõe a ser acusado de estar a delirar, de estar louco de ódio ou raiva ao ponto de interpretar delirantemente os sinais que nos vão chegando dos EUA. Não me importo de correr esse risco, porque segui muito de perto a campanha presidencial americana em 2008, li muito sobre a história pessoal e política de Obama, vi como os media se escusaram de cumprir o seu dever de investigar a fundo o candidato e de informar os norte-americanos. Embora nada de concreto e incontestável se pudesse dizer de Obama que desaconselhasse em absoluto a sua eleição ― apesar da sua visão socialista e idealista/pós-modernista da sociedade fosse alarmante ―, ficou da campanha uma impressão, logo confirmada desde o início da presidência, de que não se podia confiar neste homem. Leio hoje esta entrada do Atlas Shrugs, na qual se dá conta de um relato do embaixador egípcio nos EUA segundo o qual Obama lhe terá dito que «é muçulmano, que é filho de um muçulmano, neto de um muçulmano, que todos os seus irmão no Quénia são muçulmanos e que é simpatizante da causa islâmica» (tradução nossa). Desafio os leitores a ler a referida entrada do Atlas Shrugs e a escrutinar por si próprio a lista de acontecimentos relevantes para este caso que Pamela Geller. É, de facto, uma história em que é difícil acreditar. Mas será impossível? Da entrada de Geller, colo apenas a citação Raymond Ibrahim sobre taqiyya:

«Al-Tabari's (d. 923) famous tafsir (exegesis of the Koran) is a standard and authoritative reference work in the entire Muslim world. Regarding 3:28, he writes: "If you [Muslims] are under their [infidels'] authority, fearing for yourselves, behave loyally to them, with your tongue, while harboring inner animosity for them. … Allah has forbidden believers from being friendly or on intimate terms with the infidels in place of believers — except when infidels are above them [in authority]. In such a scenario, let them act friendly towards them." Regarding 3:28, Ibn Kathir (d. 1373, second in authority only to Tabari) writes, "Whoever at any time or place fears their [infidels'] evil may protect himself through outward show." As proof of this, he quotes Muhammad's close companion, Abu Darda, who said, "Let us smile to the face of some people [non-Muslims] while our hearts curse them"; another companion, al-Hassan, said, "Doing taqiyya is acceptable till the Day of Judgment [i.e., in perpetuity].»

Para compreender melhor o alcance da doutrina da taqiyya, não deixe de ler o artigo de Raymond Ibrahim no Middle East Quarterly (aqui em francês).

«Onde fica Jerusalém Oriental?»

Nas últimas semanas foi tema quente o estulto e hipócrita incómodo da administração Obama supostamente causado pela intenção do município de Jerusalém de construir um complexo habitacional, alegadamente numa "zona da cidade disputada pelos palestinianos" ― a propósito desta expressão, diga-se que todo o território de Israel se encontra numa zona disputada pelos palestinianos, razão que os leva a rejeitar sistematicamente as proposta para o estabelecimento de dois estados: pretendem um só estado, muçulmano, judenrein (purificado de judeus) e com os cristãos subjugados, à semelhança do que acontece hoje nos territórios sob a autoridade palestiniana; um estado palestiniano, do rio (Jordão) ao mar (Mediterrâneo). Onde se situa, então, Ramat Shlomo (רמח שלםה) o local do absurdamente controverso projecto habitacional? É ver e confirmar noutras fontes, se não se acredita no disparate. Repare-se, a talhe de foice, na localização um outro projecto, igualmente controverso há alguns meses, o de Gilo (גלה).

«We’ve heard a lot of talk about “Arab East Jerusalem” and how upset the Obama administration is about Israel building in it. The only problem is, the building that Israel announced last week is NOT East Jerusalem – Ramat Shlomo is North Jerusalem! And six months ago, the Obama administration was yelling about Gilo – that is in South Jerusalem. So, is the Obama administration trying to make Israel look bad by distorting the truth? Take a look at this map of Jerusalem, courtesy of the Jerusalem Centre for Public Affairs, of Jordanian East Jerusalem before Israel won the land back in 1967. Ramat Shlomo is clearly directly north of the city, and Gilo is southwest of the city.»

Map of Arab East Jerusalem, 1948-1967. Note the locations of Israel's construction, far from East Jerusalem.

In Middle East Facts Weblog, sítio a seguir.

Incompetência ou malevolência?

Charles Krauthammer, no National Review Online, sobre o incidente burocrático transformado em crise diplomática, e de como isso ocorreu:

«Why did Pres. Barack Obama choose to turn a gaffe into a crisis in U.S.-Israeli relations? And a gaffe it was: the announcement by a bureaucrat in the Interior Ministry of a housing expansion in a Jewish neighborhood in north Jerusalem. The timing could not have been worse: Vice President Joe Biden was visiting, Jerusalem is a touchy subject, and you don’t bring up touchy subjects that might embarrass an honored guest. But it was no more than a gaffe. It was certainly not a policy change, let alone a betrayal. The neighborhood is in Jerusalem, and the 2009 Netanyahu-Obama agreement was for a ten-month freeze on West Bank settlements excluding Jerusalem. (...) Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu did not know about this move (...). Nonetheless the prime minister is responsible. He apologized to Biden for the embarrassment. When Biden left Israel on March 11, the apology appeared accepted and the issue resolved. The next day, however, the administration went nuclear. After discussing with the president specific language she would use, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton called Netanyahu to deliver a hostile and highly aggressive 45-minute message that the Biden incident had created an unprecedented crisis in U.S.-Israeli relations. Clinton’s spokesman then publicly announced that Israel was now required to show in word and in deed its seriousness about peace. Israel? Israelis have been looking for peace — literally dying for peace — since 1947, when they accepted the U.N. partition of Palestine into a Jewish state and an Arab state. (The Arabs refused and declared war. They lost.) Israel made peace offers in 1967, in 1978, and in the 1993 Oslo peace accords that Yasser Arafat tore up seven years later to launch a terror war that killed a thousand Israelis. Why, Clinton’s own husband testifies to the remarkable courage and vision of the peace offer made in his presence by Ehud Barak (now Netanyahu’s defense minister) at the 2000 Camp David talks. Arafat rejected it. In 2008, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert offered equally generous terms to Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas. Refused again. In these long and bloody 63 years, the Palestinians have not once accepted an Israeli offer of permanent peace, or ever countered with anything short of terms that would destroy Israel. They insist instead on a “peace process” — now in its 17th post-Oslo year and still offering no credible Palestinian pledge of ultimate coexistence with a Jewish state — the point of which is to extract preemptive Israeli concessions — such as a ban on Jewish construction in parts of Jerusalem conquered by Jordan in 1948 — before negotiations for a real peace have even begun. Under Obama, Netanyahu agreed to commit his center-right coalition to acceptance of a Palestinian state; took down dozens of anti-terror roadblocks and checkpoints to ease life for the Palestinians; assisted West Bank economic development to the point where its GDP is growing at an astounding 7 percent a year; and agreed to the West Bank construction moratorium, a concession that Secretary Clinton herself called “unprecedented.” What reciprocal gesture, let alone concession, has Abbas made during the Obama presidency? Not one. Indeed, long before the Biden incident, Abbas refused even to resume direct negotiations with Israel. That’s why the Obama administration has to resort to “proximity talks” — a procedure that sets us back 35 years to before Anwar Sadat’s groundbreaking visit to Jerusalem. And Clinton demands that Israel show its seriousness about peace? Now that’s an insult. So why this astonishing one-sidedness? Because Obama likes appeasing enemies while beating up on allies? (...) Or is it because Obama fancies himself the historic redeemer whose irresistible charisma will heal the breach between Christianity and Islam or, if you will, between the post-imperial West and the Muslim world — and has little patience for this pesky Jewish state that insists brazenly on its right to exist, and even more brazenly on permitting Jews to live in its own ancient, historic, and now present capital?»

Recúo da Administração Obama no julgamento de terrorista?

Segundo reporta o Jihad Watch, a Administração Obama parece preparar-se para recuar na decisão de julgar Khalid Sheik Mohammed em tribunal comum. Boas notícias:

White House: Hey, let's try the 9/11 jihadis in military tribunals

Great idea! Why didn't anybody think of it before? "White House reconsiders holding terror trials in civilian court," by Julian E. Barnes and Christi Parsons for the Los Angeles Times, March 5 (thanks to Mackie):

The White House is considering an end to its effort to prosecute the suspected Sept. 11 plotters in a civilian court and may send them instead before military tribunals, in an apparent retreat from President Obama's pledge to overhaul the Bush administration's detention policies.

Last year, the Obama administration announced it would try Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and others in federal court in New York. That step came after Obama overhauled interrogation policies and ordered the shutdown of the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

But safety concerns about the trial have grown, and support for holding the trial in New York has eroded.

"It is politically untenable," said one official, speaking on condition of anonymity because a decision had not been made. "No place wants to hold a trial."...

Anjo caído?

Via Dusseldorf Blog, via Creeping Sharia.

Martírio copta

Phillys Chesler, em mais um bom artigo publicado no Pajamas Media, dá voz aos coptas martirizados - além de fazer referência a outros dramas correntemente em curso nos quais os muçulmanos são algozes e outros (hindus, sikhs, outros cristãos, animistas) vítimas. De passagem, constato que também Chesler chama a Obama "Príncipe da Paz".

«(...) Jacob Keryakes, a Coptic Christian, (joined by Caroline Labib Doss), spoke movingly about the plight of Coptic Christians in Egypt. Although honor killings are on everyone’s minds right now (including mine), Keryakes described the harrowing situation for Coptic Christian girls and women in the streets of Egypt. Unveiled women are routinely harassed, cursed, fondled, assaulted. Judy Bachrach wrote a piece about this for which she interviewed me. It is a good piece and strongly confirms what Keryakes said. However, he went further. He said that “probably 100%” of Egyptian Christian women are harassed because they don’t wear the veil. They are called “whore,” insulted, spat on – and that’s if they’re lucky. The unlucky ones have their faces burned with acid. (...)

“The unlucky ones are abducted, forced to convert to Islam, and then forcibly married to Muslim men. They are abducting girls as young as thirteen and fifteen. It is against Egyptian law to marry without parental permission at such young ages. In one case, where President Mubarak actually intervened, the two abducted girls were found, forced to appear on television and forced to say that they had married of their own free will and were happy with the arrangement.”

In other words, even the President dared not uphold Egyptian law against the will of the Islamist majority or the Islamist mullacracy.

Keryakes and Labib-Doss both said that “Copts in America have become more politically active in the past ten years because of the proliferation of satellite channels geared to a Coptic audience.” Also, it is simply too dangerous for Coptic priests to expose or intervene in such matters without risking death themselves; priests and male Christians are often kidnapped, tortured, crucified, and beheaded. Yes, in Egypt. The country which America has given more than $60 billion to since 1979.

Keryakes said that the Coptic bishop in the United States can’t speak freely about the persecution of his co-religionists in Egypt; if he did so, there would be a backlash against Copts in Egypt. The safest champions of their cause are people who are not part of the Coptic Church. “We are witnessing a silent genocide of Christians in Egypt.”

(...)

Keryakes: “When Americans think of the Middle East, they think of the Palestinians. This needs to change. Fifty years ago, most of the professionals, doctors, and businessman in Egypt were Copts. Now, government discrimination has changed all that so now Muslims are the majority in those fields. Al Azhar is now a government-funded university and not just a madrasa, and of course it accepts only Muslims.” Christians are the most persecuted minority in the Middle East.

He is right of course—except, I would add, that Israeli Jews are also under the most profound siege and, were it not for the Israeli armed forces, would long ago have been “driven into the sea.” (...)»

Commander in Chief

Uma cronologia da actuação da administração Obama, e do próprio, ao atentado falhado do dia de Natal:

Keep America Safe: "100 Hours" from Keep America Safe on Vimeo.

Via Hot Air.

Mudança na qual podemos acreditar (3)

Michael Ramirez Cartoon

Via Hot Air.

Alta traição (2)

Sobre a decisão de julgar Khakid Sheikh Mohammed em processo civil:

«''This is a prosecutorial decision as well as a national security decision," President Barack Obama said last week about the attorney general's announcement that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and other al Qaeda operatives will be put on trial in New York City federal court.

No, it is not. It is a presidential decision—one about the hard, ever-present trade-off between civil liberties and national security.

Trying KSM in civilian court will be an intelligence bonanza for al Qaeda and the hostile nations that will view the U.S. intelligence methods and sources that such a trial will reveal. The proceedings will tie up judges for years on issues best left to the president and Congress.

Whether a jury ultimately convicts KSM and his fellows, or sentences them to death, is beside the point. The treatment of the 9/11 attacks as a criminal matter rather than as an act of war will cripple American efforts to fight terrorism. It is in effect a declaration that this nation is no longer at war.

(...) KSM and his co-defendants will enjoy the benefits and rights that the Constitution accords to citizens and resident aliens—including the right to demand that the government produce in open court all of the information that it has on them, and how it got it. Prosecutors will be forced to reveal U.S. intelligence on KSM, the methods and sources for acquiring its information, and his relationships to fellow al Qaeda operatives. The information will enable al Qaeda to drop plans and personnel whose cover is blown. It will enable it to detect our means of intelligence-gathering, and to push forward into areas we know nothing about.

This is not hypothetical, as former federal prosecutor Andrew McCarthy has explained. During the 1993 World Trade Center bombing trial of Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman (aka the "blind Sheikh"), standard criminal trial rules required the government to turn over to the defendants a list of 200 possible co-conspirators.

In essence, this list was a sketch of American intelligence on al Qaeda. According to Mr. McCarthy, who tried the case, it was delivered to bin Laden in Sudan on a silver platter within days of its production as a court exhibit.

Bin Laden (...) could immediately see who was compromised. He also could start figuring out how American intelligence had learned its information and anticipate what our future moves were likely to be.

(...)

KSM's lawyers will press hard to reveal intelligence secrets in open court. Our intelligence agents and soldiers will be the ones to suffer.»

Via The Corner.

Alta traição

Em artigo na National Review Online, Andrew McCarthy reexpõe a sua tese, já defendida em postal anterior, mas explicitada com mais riqueza de pormenores e clareza de argumentos (no fundo, a diferença entre um postal num blogue e um artigo numa revista de referência).

«The decision to bring Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four other top al-Qaeda terrorists to New York City for a civilian trial is one of the most irresponsible ever made by a presidential administration. That it is motivated by politics could not be more obvious. That it spells unprecedented danger for our security will soon become obvious. The five 9/11 plotters were originally charged in a military commission. Military commissions have been approved by Congress and the courts. Eleven months ago, the jihadists were prepared to end the military case by pleading guilty and proceeding to execution. (...) The Obama Justice Department teems with experienced defense lawyers, many of whom (themselves personally or through their firms) spent the last eight years volunteering their services to America’s enemies in their lawsuits against the American people. As experienced defense lawyers well know, when there is no mystery about whether the defendants have committed the charged offenses, and when there is controversy attendant to the government’s investigative tactics, the standard defense strategy is to put the government on trial. That is, Pres. Barack Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder, experienced litigators, fully realize that in civilian court, the Qaeda quintet can and will demand discovery of mountains of government intelligence. They will demand disclosures about investigative tactics; the methods and sources by which intelligence has been obtained; the witnesses from the intelligence community, the military, and law enforcement who interrogated witnesses, conducted searches, secretly intercepted enemy communications, and employed other investigative techniques. They will attempt to compel testimony from officials who formulated U.S. counterterrorism strategy, in addition to U.S. and foreign intelligence officers. As civilian “defendants,” these war criminals will put Bush-era counterterrorism tactics under the brightest public spotlight in American legal history. This is exactly what President Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder know will happen. And because it is unnecessary to have this civilian trial at all, one must conclude that this is exactly what Obama and Holder want to see happen. (...)»

A decisão de julgar Khalid Sheikh Mohammed em processo civil, ao criar condições para a divulgação pública de informação dos serviços secretos, colocando em risco toda a sua estrutura operacional, configura um crime de alta traição: Obama e companhia preparam-se para pôr à disposição dos terroristas presos e dos seus representantes legais informação confidencial e crítica para a defesa face à ameaça terrorista. Para além disso, põe a anterior administração no banco dos réus. Obama mata dois coelhos com uma cajadada. Ganha o terrorismo islâmico e alegra-se a esquerda progressista e suicida. Perde a segurança dos EUA e do mundo.

Mudança na qual podemos acreditar (2)

E, ao que consta, nem o fez convenientemente. Para além do mais, o Imperador não retribuiu o cumprimento, o que já havia ocorrido com o Rei da Arábia Saudita. Tem o que merece.

Mudança na qual podemos acreditar

Obama volta a quebrar um protocolo com 233 anos e faz uma vénia ao Imperador do Japão. No Hot Air, Ed Morrissey comenta:

«(...) American Presidents do not bow to royalty. In fact, heads of state do not bow or genuflect to each other in the normal course of diplomacy. At least, they didn’t until this amateur came into office and failed to learn from the first time he did it. (...)»

Obama parece inclinar-se a demonstrar subserviência perante a aristocracia mundial. Recorde-se a vénia ao rei da Arábia Saudita, que teve a agravante de ser feita ao chefe de estado de um regime islamita totalitário, opressor, onde as mulheres são cidadãos de segunda, assim como os não-muçulmanos que não têm liberdade religiosa. Com esta vénia, estes gestos podem ser interpretados como acções concretas de Obama para mostrar respeito no contexto da estratégia diplomática que tem implementado de assumir uma atitude expiatória dos supostos crimes americanos da história, narrativa tão ao gosto do progressismo esquerdista. Seja como for, uma desgraça.

Exéquias das vítimas de Fort Hood (2)

Outra perspectiva, mais crítica, sobre o discurso de Obama:

«The violence at Fort Hood, President Obama told mourners on Tuesday, was "incomprehensible." The "twisted logic that led to the tragedy," he reiterated, may be "too hard to comprehend." (...) [T]he Obama administration is suffering a willful failure of comprehension. What exactly is so hard to comprehend? Fort Hood jihadist Maj. Nidal Hasan made his means, motives and inspiration all too clear for those willing to see and hear. In his 2007 slide presentation to fellow Army doctors on "The Koranic World View As It Relates to Muslims in the Military," Hasan spelled it out: "We love death more then (sic) you love life!" Hasan exposed the deadly tension between his adherence to Islam and his service in the U.S. military. Slide 11 stated: "It's getting harder and harder for Muslims in the service to morally justify being in a military that seems constantly engaged against fellow Muslims." Slide 12 cited Koranic sanctions for killing fellow believers. And Hasan made clear he wasn't alone among Muslim soldiers who "should not serve in any capacity that renders them at risk to hurting/killing believers unjustly." (...)»

Malkin vê nas palavras de Obama, onde eu vi reconhecimento implícito de uma motivação religiosa, uma tentativa de negar essa possibilidade por ser alegadamente imcompreensível e irreligiosa em si mesma.