MIDDLE EASTERN PEOPLE ARE ALL MEMBERS OF ISIL (MEDIA LIES)

#Egypt

MIDDLE EASTERN PEOPLE ARE ALL MEMBERS OF ISIL (MEDIA LIES):

NATIVE OF EGYPT ADMITS SOME MUSLIMS ARE BAD PEOPLE.

Meet EMAD.

EMAD is a nice, friendly guy from EGYPT.

He has lived in the United States for 8 years, and is now a business owner in NYC.

Does EMAD look like a member of the  brutal Terrorist organization ISIL?
If you saw EMAD lying injured by the side of road, would you help him?

Is it fair for the mainstream Media to portray all people from the MIDDLE EAST as Blood Thirsty, Anti-American Killers?

Are DEMOCRATS placing American citizens in great danger by refusing to admit that some MUSLIMS (not all) are practicing RADICAL ISLAMIST ideology?

Even EMAD admits that some MUSLIMS are Bad people, just as some CHRISTIANS are Bad people.

~ In nations with significant Muslim populations, much disdain for ISIS

Recent attacks in Paris, Beirut and Baghdad linked to the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) have once again brought terrorism and Islamic extremism to the forefront of international relations. 

According to newly released data that the Pew Research Center collected in 11 countries with significant Muslim populations, people from Nigeria to Jordan to Indonesia overwhelmingly expressed negative views of ISIS.

One exception was Pakistan, where a majority offered no definite opinion of ISIS. The nationally representative surveys were conducted as part of the Pew Research Center’s annual global poll in April and May this year.

In no country surveyed did more than 15% of the population show favorable attitudes toward Islamic State. And in those countries with mixed religious and ethnic populations, negative views of ISIS cut across these lines.

In Lebanon, a victim of one of the most recent attacks, almost every person surveyed who gave an opinion had an unfavorable view of ISIS, including 99% with a very unfavorable opinion. Distaste toward ISIS was shared by Lebanese.

Sunni Muslims (98% unfavorable) and 100% of Shia Muslims and Lebanese Christians.

Israelis (97%) and Jordanians (94%) were also strongly opposed to ISIS as of spring 2015, including 91% of Israeli Arabs. 

And 84% in the Palestinian territories had a negative view of ISIS, both in the Gaza Strip (92%) and the West Bank (79%). 

Six-in-ten or more had unfavorable opinions of ISIS in a diverse group of nations, including Indonesia, Turkey, Nigeria, Burkina Faso, Malaysia and Senegal.

Post Sources:  YouTube, Pew Research

AL QAEDA & MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD Regaining Control Of The MIDDLE EAST (They Are NOT "On The Run"!)

#ALQAEDA

AL QAEDA & the MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD is gaining Strength in the MIDDLE EAST.

I thought in 2012 while on the campaign trail Pres OBAMA claimed "AL QAEDA was on the run".





ARTICLE: "The Muslim Brotherhood, Back In A Fight To Survive"


They hide in safe houses on the outskirts of this city, talk only fleetingly on cellphones and avoid the cafes where they used to meet. Heavy scarves obscure their identities when they venture out to join protests.


The leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood, now outlawed, have adjusted to life underground, even while hundreds of their fellow members have been arrested in this city since the military deposed President Mohamed Morsi, a Brotherhood leader, and the Egyptian government branded the group a terrorist movement.

Yet, rather than crack and disintegrate under the pressure, members say, the group has fallen back on the organizational structure that sustained it for decades as a banned and secretive movement. It is becoming more decentralized, but also more cohesive and rigid, as its members abandon activities like preaching and social work and shift their attention to a virtually singular goal: resistance to the military-backed government.

Their focus, many Brotherhood members say, is a protracted, grinding struggle.

“There is a vision of a political confrontation that can go on for years,” said one leader, a 33-year-old architect in Fayoum, an Islamist stronghold. He, along with other members, spoke in a cafe for a time, but changed locations after suspecting the employees were eavesdropping.

“This is our persistence stage,” he said. “We are trying to stand up as long as we can.”

The Brotherhood’s endurance so far all but ensures that Egypt will continue to be troubled by civil conflict. And it raises further doubts about the government’s attempts to extinguish a movement that has resisted such efforts since its founding more than 80 years ago and that draws support from hundreds of thousands of members and millions of affiliates and sympathizers throughout the country.

Although leaders of the group say they remain committed to protests to express their activism, some members said that many of its sympathizers were increasingly talking of violence.

“I know people who are not Muslim brothers who say, ‘We’ll get your rights back for you,’ ” said Ramadan Fadel, a 27-year-old member in Fayoum who said that an acquaintance had told him that people were ready to take up arms to protect the group.

In places like Mansoura, north of Cairo, where the Brotherhood’s footprint is smaller, there was less talk of confrontation than of survival, beginning with the difficulty of attracting new recruits. “Who would want to undergo this repression?” asked a doctor who lives just outside the city and who wanted to remain anonymous for fear of reprisals.

Some members described the conflict as a zero-sum game between the military and the Brotherhood. Underscoring the perils of that conflict, at least 13 people were killed on Friday during Brotherhood marches throughout the country in some of the deadliest clashes in months.

“Our backs are against the wall,” the doctor said. The military, he added, “has left us only one path.”

After the ouster of Mr. Morsi, the few government ministers who spoke of reconciliation complained that the Brotherhood was unyielding in its demands, even as hard-liners escalated a crackdown on the movement, killing hundreds of protesters and imprisoning almost every senior leader. Now the hawks are ascendant, no one talks of compromise and officials openly accuse the Brotherhood of carrying out deadly and spectacular attacks on the security services, even when unrelated militant groups claim responsibility for such attacks.

Last week, for instance, Interior Minister Mohamed Ibrahim, a government hard-liner, accused the Brotherhood of conspiring to carry out “hostile schemes” over the years with “extremist factions,” including Palestinian militants.

In reality, though, the roots of the government’s problems are much closer to home.

In cities like Mansoura, the doctor said, members have continued to attend the small, weekly “family” meetings that are considered the most critical building blocks of the organization, and the wellspring of the brotherhood’s cohesion and its ideology.

In many neighborhoods in Fayoum, campaign posters for Mr. Morsi still hang on the walls, evidence of the futility of the government’s campaign, Brotherhood members say.

For now, Brotherhood members in Fayoum said they were concentrating on replenishing their ranks, reaching out to new recruits while trying to coax lapsed, older members into more active service. Four of the members, including a senior leader, detailed the movement’s strategy, speaking on the condition of anonymity because they feared drawing further attention from the authorities.

Efforts to keep the movement alive began after Mr. Morsi’s ouster in July, the members said, when leaders appointed deputies, who in turn appointed their own deputies, to ensure a continuity of leadership as the crackdown on protests intensified. As thousands of Islamists from across the country demonstrated in Cairo for the return of Mr. Morsi, meetings were held in the squares where the protests occurred, near the Rabaa al-Adawiya mosque and at Cairo University.

When the authorities stormed the squares on Aug. 14, killing hundreds of protesters, the Brotherhood faced its greatest organizational crisis, the members said. “It took about 15 days to absorb the shock, and get back to our grass roots,” said one member, a 26-year-old veterinarian. “Now we’re expanding.”

Still, a growing pressure on the Brotherhood has forced adjustments. Meetings are now held in private homes, and members approach security checkpoints and attend protests assuming they will be arrested. Some of the protests have become more like flash mobs, with demonstrators scattering quickly to avoid a heavy security response.

Some of the older Brotherhood leaders, for whom living under repression had become a way of life, boasted about the movement’s tenacity.

But for younger members, facing the wrath of the state was still a shock. Mr. Fadel, the 27-year-old, said he had become terrified of being singled out as a member of the Brotherhood by people on the street. His family has also pressured him to leave the movement.

Having been wounded by birdshot during protests, he said, he had prepared himself for the likelihood that he would be killed. “For now I see no future,” he said. “I fear for my family.”

With the group’s narrow focus on survival, there was little talk about the long-term direction of the movement, or the mistakes during Mr. Morsi’s time in power, a tenure that ended with millions of angry Egyptians on the streets demanding his ouster. The Brotherhood members talked about a few “errors” but mostly complained about what they said were conspiracies that doomed their rule.

Their official demand, that the military takeover be reversed, has not changed since July. On the horizon were nothing but protests and some unspecified type of resistance that the leaders in Fayoum promised to unveil on Jan. 25, the anniversary of the 2011 uprising against President Hosni Mubarak.

In Mansoura, where a bombing last month was followed by retaliatory violence against the Brotherhood, the members of the movement have faced greater difficulties. The doctor said he and other members had learned to live by new rules.

“Don’t stand in the street together for too long,” the doctor said. “If you have money, gold or documents that are important for you or the Muslim Brotherhood, take them to a relative or a friend you trust.”

“We’re now placed in the same boat,” he said. “We must be tighter together than we were before, so the crisis passes.”


Sources: Fox News, NY Times, Youtube

Hosni Mubarak: Dead Or Alive? Muslim Brotherhood New Egyptian Dictatorship

Conflicting reports about whether Mubarak has died

Reports conflicted Wednesday over whether the 84-year-old former president of Egypt, Hosni Mubarak, was clinically dead.

The state-run Middle East News Agency, citing medical sources, said he was declared clinically dead shortly after arriving late Tuesday at a military hospital in Cairo, where he had been taken after suffering a stroke and cardiac arrest earlier in the day.

But Gen. Mamdouh Shaheen, a member of the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces, told CNN, "He is not clinically dead as reported, but his health is deteriorating and he is in critical condition."

Mubarak was taken by helicopter to the military hospital in the Maadi suburb of Cairo, Shaheen said. "He had a heart attack and his heart stopped and he was saved by electric shocks, then placed on respirator," he said. "His pulse is 40.

He then got a brain clot. He is NOT clinically dead as reported but his health is deteriorating and he is in critical condition."

And Mubarak's lawyer, Fareed El Deeb, told CNN, "He has been in a coma for hours now. He has had water on the lungs for 10 days now and his blood pressure is down today, which obstructed his breathing and forced doctors to put him on a respirator.

He was given medicine intravenously to relieve the brain clot, and electric shocks were used to revive him but there was no substantial response.

He is not dead as reported."

El Deeb added that Mubarak's wife, Suzanne, was at his side. He blamed SCAF for not having moved Mubarak last week from the prison to the hospital.

Adel Saeed, the official spokesman of the Egyptian prosecutor, had said earlier, "We were informed by prison authority that Mubarak's heart has stopped and they used electric shocks and CPR to resurrect him. He is now on an artificial respirator and doctors from the armed forces and International Medical Center will inspect him."
Nile TV reported that Mubarak had suffered a stroke.

He was taken from Tora prison hospital to Maadi military hospital, El Deeb told CNN.

"He has suffered a stroke, but he is not dead."

The prosecutor and the military council denied Mubarak had been moved.

His health had been reported in decline since he was ousted as president of Egypt in February 2011 and found guilty of charges related to the killings of hundreds of anti-government demonstrators during the revolution.

Last week, an Interior Ministry spokesman said he was comatose; the spokesman said he suffered from high blood pressure, irregular heartbeats and difficulty breathing.
"We should be skeptical," said Fouad Ajami, a senior fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution.

"There's a great Arab expression I like and it asks the following question: When you're told that someone is dead, you say, 'Is he dead and buried, or just dead?' I think we are in the middle of this kind of situation."

"Clinically dead is not a phrase that is commonly used, but when it is used, what it usually means is that someone is brain dead," said CNN Senior Medical Correspondent Elizabeth Cohen. "In the United States, we would call this person dead because they have no brain activity."

Meanwhile, crowds jammed Tahrir Square once again on Wednesday. But their focus this time was not on Mubarak. Instead, it was on the power grab by the Egyptian military, which last week issued a constitutional decree that stripped the position of president of much of its power after a top court dissolved the parliament.

Those moves were followed by the nation's first presidential election, which pitted Muslim Brotherhood candidate Mohammed Morsi against Mubarak's former prime minister, Ahmed Safik. Final results have not been announced.

"It's a media stunt to divert attention from the constitutional decree," said Taha Shaker, a demonstrator in the square. "If he's really dead, it won't make a difference. We've started a sit-in and won't leave unless the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces leaves unconditionally."

"I've come from far away. I'm not leaving until Morsi swears the oath in front of the legitimately elected parliament," said demonstrator Sayed Ahmed. "I don't care about Mubarak. These are games played by the intelligence services."

"If he's really dead, its God's will," said Nasser Shaaban, another demonstrator. "I would hope he lives to see the new president."

Outside Maadi Military Hospital, shortly before midnight Tuesday, there was no additional security. Instead, there were a few policemen outside the main gate and two military police inside the gate. Across the street perhaps a half-dozen journalists sat on the curb smoking cigarettes.




Muslim Brotherhood claims victory in Egyptian presidential vote

The Muslim Brotherhood declared that its candidate won Egypt's historic presidential election this weekend, making the claim hours after openly challenging the nation's military rulers over its dissolution of parliament.

With several million votes still to be counted, the state-run Al-Ahram news website around 4:15 a.m. Monday showed the Brotherhood's Mohamed Morsi leading with about 5,648,000 votes compared with about 4,705,000 for opponent Ahmed Shafik, who served as Egypt's last prime minister in the waning days of Hosni Mubarak's regime.

Yet the Islamist group, citing what it said were all-but-complete official numbers released to its representatives at polling stations nationwide, asserted that Morsi had won by capturing 52.5% of the overall vote.

The official vote count was scheduled to be finished at some point Monday, with final results to be announced Thursday.

Whoever they declare the winner will become the North African nation's first president since Mubarak, who was ousted in a wave of popular unrest last year after three decades in power.

The next president will wade into a country with a political system mired in controversy, confusion and confrontation, much of it due to events over the past week.

Egypt has no constitution in place, though military rulers have vowed to appoint a 100-person panel to craft such a document.

And a court ruling just days before the runoff appeared to invalidate an Islamist-dominated legislative body and then saw the military swiftly move to dissolve that parliament ahead of the election.

But the Muslim Brotherhood, whose Freedom and Justice Party had won a majority of legislative seats, is bucking this act to dissolve parliament.

Mahmoud Ghozlan, a spokesman for the Islamist group, called the move "unconstitutional" and said parliamentary speaker Mohamed al-Katatni will convene legislators on Tuesday.

"This parliament was chosen by 30 million voters over a period of three months, and the legislative power was handed to (lawmakers) chosen by the people," Ghozlan said.
"It is unconstitutional to dissolve it."

And Hussein Ibrahim, a Brotherhood member and majority leader in the legislature, insisted Sunday that parliament "has not been dissolved," according to a report from the state-run Al-Ahram news agency.

Vowing the Brotherhood won't "give it to a coup d'etat," Ibrahim said while casting his vote in Alexandria that military rulers must respect a March 30 constitutional declaration that gives only "the people" the authority to dissolve parliament.

The Supreme Council of the Armed Forces, meanwhile, issued a new constitutional declaration Sunday night detailing some powers that the new president will hold, but gave little indication it was budging on the state of parliament.

After being sworn in, the new president will set the date for parliamentary elections and can pardon and appoint government officials and ambassadors to foreign countries.

But the military leadership stated that legislative power, as well as control of the national budget, will remain in its hands until a new parliament is elected.

The Brotherhood "strongly rejected" the military declaration about parliament on its official Twitter feed. The group also said that the constitutional panel picked by parliament will hold its first meeting Monday to begin drafting a constitution, in defiance of the military council.

There's also plenty of dispute over the validity of this weekend's presidential runoff vote, which Shafik and Morsi's campaigns accusing each other of election fraud.

A wild election weekend for Egypt, France and Greece

Turnout appeared sluggish Sunday at some polling stations in Cairo, where streets were mostly quiet despite what many Egyptians viewed as moves last week by military leaders, who have ruled the country since Mubarak was forced out in February 2011, to hold on to power. Some voters may have stayed home because of sweltering heat, officials told the state-run Al-Ahram newspaper.

As of 4 p.m. Sunday in Egypt, 40% of the nation's 50 million eligible voters had cast ballots, according to Farouk Sultan, the head of Egypt's Supreme Presidential Election Commission. In the first round of voting last month, 46% of voters participated.

Officials have reported few voting irregularities in the second round of elections, Sultan said.

To protect the balloting process, authorities went so far as to camp outside polling stations overnight during the runoff. At one station designated for women in Cairo, guards slept on the doorstep.

The Supreme Presidential Electoral Committee approved licenses for 53 organizations to observe the elections, including at least three international groups -- the U.S.-based Carter Center, the South Africa-based Electoral Institute for Sustainable Democracy in Africa and the Arab Network for Monitoring of Elections.

Yet Shafik's campaign filed "several complaints" with Sultan's commission, alleging the Muslim Brotherhood committed "systemic violations."

Specifically, they accused the Islamist group's supporters of bribing voters with "large sums of money and food" to back Morsi, as well as using "intimidation, threats and violence against supporters of candidate Ahmed Shafik." The former prime minister's camp also said it "filed more than 100 official complaints accusing the Brotherhood of ballot rigging and stuffing."

"The Muslim Brotherhood's systematic election violations prove how the (group) does not believe in freedom of choice and democracy unless this democracy brings them to power," Shafik's campaign said in a statement. "The organized and persistent election fraud by the Muslim Brotherhood proves they ... only talk the talk and never walk the walk of liberal democracy."

In a statement on its website, the Brotherhood flatly denied what it called "false reports being circulated" and urged election officials to promptly investigate what it called "games and plots." It also accused "the rival candidate's supporters (of) paying cash bribes to some voters," among other allegations.

Outside the city, in Giza, Mohammed Gamea cast his ballot for Morsi even as he questioned whether the election was fairly handled.

"I don't believe the Egyptian presidential elections are fair to begin with," he said Sunday morning. "The military council, assisted by the elections committee, tried everything to stall and influence the process, from disqualifying previous candidates before the first round -- not to mention the negative campaigns against Morsi -- while keeping quiet about Shafik."

"But despite all (this), I don't believe that there has been any electoral fraud. The ballots will determine what is next for Egypt."

The real obstacle to democracy in Egypt

Some disgruntled voters launched a campaign to invalidate ballots, said Mohamed Ghoneim, the founder of a group that marked "X" on the names of both Morsi and Shafik, thereby nullifying their vote.

Among the boycotters was Mohamed Khamees, who said he lost sight in his left eye from a police beating in Tahrir Square during the early 2011 protests.

"If I give this country for the Brotherhood hands, there is not going to be any more Egypt, it will be destroyed," he told CNN. "And if I give it to someone from the old system, it looks like we did nothing."


View Larger Map


Sources: CNN, Youtube, Google Maps

Saif al-Adel Is Al-Qaeda's New Leader; Supposedly

According To Recent News Reports Saif Al-Adel, A Young Egyptian Man, Has Been Crowned Al-Qaeda's New Leader. Supposedly.

Let's See, Osama Was Killed Like 2 Weeks Ago & Al-Qaeda Has Filled His Shoes Already?

With An Egyptian?

I Thought Al-Zawahiri Would Be Tapped As Al-Qaeda's New Leader.

I Wonder If Al-Adel Is A Member Of The Muslim Brotherhood Or A Jihadist.

So Perhaps This Decision Reveals Who Was REALLY Behind The Movement/ Uprising To Kick Hosni Mubarack Out Of Office Back In February.

Or Is This Report About Saif Al-Adel Being Named As Osama's Replacement Nothing More Than A Farce, In Al-Qaeda's Attempt To Confuse CIA Officials & Get More Money For The Organization Via Creating Another Global "War On Terror"?

Who Knows??

I Just Know That I Will Continue To Pray & Plead The Blood Of Jesus Over America, My Family & The Obama Administration.

And I Would Advise The Rest Of American Citizens To Pray As Well.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Egyptian Saif al-Adel now acting leader of al Qaeda, ex-militant says


An Egyptian who was once a Special Forces officer has been chosen "caretaker" leader of al Qaeda in the wake of Osama bin Laden's death, according to a source with detailed knowledge of the group's inner workings.

Al Qaeda's interim leader is Saif al-Adel, who has long played a prominent role in the group, according to Noman Benotman. Benotman has known the al Qaeda leadership for more than two decades. He was once a leader of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG), a militant organization that used to be aligned with al Qaeda, but in recent years renounced al Qaeda's ideology.

Benotman told CNN that based on his personal communications with militants and discussions on jihadist forums, al-Adel, also known as Muhamad Ibrahim Makkawi, had been chosen interim chief of al Qaeda because the global jihadist community had grown restive in recent days about the lack of a formal announcement of a successor to bin Laden.

According to Benotman, this was not a decision of the formal shura council of al Qaeda, because it is currently impossible to gather them in one place, but was rather the decision of six to eight leaders of al Qaeda in the Afghanistan-Pakistan border area. Al-Adel was already one of the top leaders of the group.

However, Benotman said, the choice of an Egyptian may not sit well with some Saudi and Yemeni members of al Qaeda, who believe bin Laden's successor should come from the Arabian Peninsula, a region that is holy to all Muslims. Bin Laden was from a wealthy Saudi family.

The presumed successor to bin Laden is his long-time deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri, who is also Egyptian. Benotman, who has long been a reliable source of information about al Qaeda, said the temporary appointment of al-Adel may be a way for the leadership to gauge reaction to the selection of someone from beyond the Arabian Peninsula as the group's leader.

Al-Adel fought the Soviets in Afghanistan during the 1980s. After the fall of the Taliban in the winter of 2001 he fled to Iran. According to senior Saudi counterterrorism officials, from there al-Adel authorized al Qaeda's branch in Saudi Arabia to begin a campaign of terrorist attacks in the Saudi kingdom that began in Riyadh in May 2003, a campaign that killed scores.

Some reports in the past year have suggested that al-Adel had left Iran for Pakistan.

Pakistan announces key al Qaeda arrest

One of the key issues that al-Adel has to reckon with now is the fallout from the large quantities of sensitive information that was recovered by U.S. forces at the compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan, where bin Laden was shot on May 2. That information is likely to prove damaging to al Qaeda operations.

The selection of an interim leader allows al Qaeda to begin the process of collecting allegiance, or baya, from al-Qaeda affiliates such as the Yemen-based al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula and the North Africa-based al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb.

Baya was a religious oath of allegiance to bin Laden rather than to the organization itself, in the same way that Nazi Party members swore an oath of fealty to Hitler rather than to Nazism. That baya must now be transferred to whomever the new leader of al Qaeda is going to be, which is likely to be al-Zawahiri, given his long role as bin Laden's deputy.

However, there is scant evidence that al-Zawahiri has the charisma of bin Laden, nor that he commands the respect bordering on love that was accorded to bin Laden by members of al Qaeda.

Now that bin Laden is dead there is a real opportunity for the Taliban to disassociate itself from al Qaeda, as it was bin Laden who, sometime before the 9/11 attacks, swore an oath of allegiance to Taliban leader Mullah Omar as the Amir al-Muminin, "commander of the faithful," a rarely invoked religious title that dates from around the time of the Prophet Mohammed.

Mullah Omar could now take the position that the new leader of al Qaeda does not need to swear an oath of allegiance to Omar as commander of the faithful.

Such a move would satisfy a key condition for peace talks with the U.S. and Afghan governments: that the Taliban reject al Qaeda, something that they have so far not done.

Al-Adel has been involved in militant activities since the late 1980s, according to an interview with him published in spring 2005 in the Arabic-language London-based daily Al-Quds al-Arabi.

In the article, written by Fuad Husayn, a Jordanian journalist and writer, al-Adel recalled that he was detained for militant activities in Egypt on May 6, 1987.

"The case pertained to the assassination attempt against ex-Egyptian Interior Minister Hasan Abu-Basha. ... I was then a colonel in the Egyptian Special Forces," he said.

Al-Adel also has been involved for years in anti-American activities, other sources indicate.

Mohamed Odeh, one of the bombers of the U.S. Embassy in Kenya in August 1998, told FBI interrogators that in 1993 he was ordered by al-Adel to go to Somalia to link up with local tribes and train them to fight and attack U.S. forces who were then serving there in a humanitarian mission to feed starving Somalis.

And a British-Ugandan, Feroz Ali Abbasi, who had trained in an al-Qaeda training camp in Afghanistan before 9/11, recalled in a memoir that Adel instructed him and other recruits to fight U.S. forces around Kabul or in the southern city of Kandahar during the American invasion of Afghanistan in the fall of 2001

In the interview published in Al-Quds al-Arabi, al-Adel also explained al Qaeda's motivations for the 9/11 attack: "Our main objective, therefore, was to deal a strike to the head of the snake at home to smash its arrogance."

After the fall of the Taliban, Adel recalled that he and other members of al-Qaeda found refuge in Iran: "We began to converge on Iran one after the other," he said. "...We began to rent apartments for the fraternal brothers and some of their families. The fraternal brothers of the group of Gulbuddin Hekmatyar" -- an Afghan militant then living in exile in Iran who is now a leader of the insurgency in Afghanistan -- "offered us satisfactory help in this field. They provided us with apartments and some farms that they owned."

But Al-Adel said that the Iranians subsequently arrested a large number of these "brothers."

Sources: CNN, MSNBC, Youtube

Pres. Obama Won't Hold His Tongue In Speech To Middle East (Will Be On Twitter)

Huffington Post----

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia -- In his latest push for an open dialogue with the Muslim world, President Barack Obama on Wednesday sought the counsel of King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia and put the finishing touches on a highly anticipated speech about United States' relationship with followers of Islam.

The president travels to Egypt on Thursday to deliver the address that aides say will encourage a stronger partnership between Americans and Muslims while touching on a broad range of hot-button issues, including violent extremism, the threat of a nuclear Iran, and efforts to root out suspected terrorists in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Aides say Obama also will acknowledge that the Isreali-Palestinan conflict has been an important source of tension and passion while voicing his views on what all sides need to do to end the standoff.

In a briefing for reporters, Obama speechwriter Ben Rhodes offered a preview of the address:

The President really sees this as an opportunity to continue a dialogue he's had since his inauguration -- you saw that in his Al Arabiya interview, in his Nowruz message, in his speech in Turkey, among other things -- to really start a new chapter of engagement between the United States and Muslim world.


Now, the foundation of that engagement as he sees it is the ability to engage each other on the basis of mutual respect and mutual interests. And in that light, he feels it's important to speak very openly and candidly about the very full range of issues that have caused some tensions between the United States and the Muslim world, and then also present a great deal of opportunity for partnership in the future.

To begin with, I think he'll take on directly some of the misperceptions that may have emerged as well as some of the differences that have emerged. I think he'll acknowledge the need for us to get to know each other better. As he has said, he'll, for instance, discuss the relationship between Islam and America within America, particularly in light of the contributions of American Muslims.

But then what he will do is really go through in a very thorough way a broad range of issues that have been at the forefront of the agenda: violent extremism and the threat that it poses, and what America has done in response; the ongoing conflict in Afghanistan and Pakistan and what we're doing there, and what we hope to do in the future in partnership with Afghans and Pakistanis. He'll discuss Iraq, both what we have done there and what we are doing in the future, again, to transition to Iraqi responsibility for Iraq. He'll discuss of course the Israeli-Palestinian issue and the broader Arab-Israeli issue, and acknowledging the fact that this has been a very important source of tension and passion for people of all faiths within this region and around the world, and he will discuss in some detail his view of the conflict and what needs to be done to resolve it. He will discuss both what that means in terms of Israelis and Palestinians and the United States and the Arab states, as well.

Then there's a broader set of issues that have also been -- or presented both causes for tension in the past but partnership in the future that have to do with areas such as democracy, human rights, and related issues to that. And so I think you'll see a forthright discussion in those areas.

And finally, though, the President is very committed to the positive partnerships that can be developed not just on the issues that I just discussed, where he thinks there's actually a very broader convergence of interests than has often been acknowledged or is often reflected in the debate, but also on issues that really matter in people's lives, in terms of economic development, in terms of education, in terms of health, in terms of science and technology; and the fact that as he said in Turkey, this can't just be what we're against; it has to be what we're for and what we can do together. And I think you'll see some concrete steps towards developing partnerships in these areas so that we can deepen engagement between the United States and Muslim communities, and point towards opportunity for all of our people.

Before heading to Cairo, Obama opened his Mideast trip with a visit to Abdullah, the monarch of a country that's home to Islam's two holiest sites in Mecca and Medina.

"The United States and Saudi Arabia have a long history of friendship," Obama said as he visited the monarch's desert horse farm. The U.S. president called Abdullah wise and gracious, adding: "I am confident that working together that the United States and Saudi Arabia can make progress on a whole host of issues of mutual interest."

In turn, Abdullah expressed his "best wishes to the friendly American people who are represented by a distinguished man who deserves to be in this position."

Earlier, the king greeted Obama at Riyadh's main airport with a ceremony when the new U.S. president arrived after an overnight flight from Washington. Each country's national anthem was played, the Saudi national guard was on hand and there was a 21-gun salute. Obama and Abdullah then sat together in gilded chairs, sipped cardamom-flavored Arabic coffee and chatted briefly in public before retreating to hold private talks.

Around the same time Air Force One touched down in the country, pan-Arab Al-Jazeera Television broadcast a new audio tape from Osama bin Laden in which he threatened Americans and said Obama inflamed hatred toward the U.S. by ordering Pakistan to crack down on militants in Swat Valley and block Islamic law there.

White House press secretary Robert Gibbs dismissed the recording, saying: "I don't think it's surprising that al Qaida would want to shift attention away from the president's historic efforts and continued efforts to reach out and have an open dialogue with the Muslim world."

With Abdullah alongside him, Obama told reporters: "I thought it was very important to come to the place where Islam began and to seek his majesty's counsel and to discuss with him many of the issues that we confront here in the Middle East."

In Riyadh, the president was talking to Abdullah about a host of thorny problems, from Arab-Israeli peace efforts to Iran's nuclear program. The surge in oil prices also was on the agenda. And, Obama also was looking for help from Saudi Arabia on what to do with some 100 Yemeni detainees locked up in the Guantanamo Bay prison. The Obama administration has been negotiating with Saudi Arabia and Yemen for months to send them to Saudi terrorist rehabilitation centers.

During a pre-trip interview with the BBC, Obama set the tone for his swing through the Middle East, saying: "What we want to do is open a dialogue."

In Cairo, Obama is set to deliver the speech that he's been promising since last year's election campaign _ aiming to set a new tone in America's often-strained dealings with the world's 1.5 billion Muslims.

Many of those Muslims still smolder over Iraq, Guantanamo and unflinching U.S. support of Israel, but they are hoping the son of a Kenyan Muslim who lived part of his childhood in Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim country, can help chart a new course.

Aides cautioned that Obama was not out to break new policy ground in his Cairo speech, which follows visits to Turkey and Iraq in April and a series of outreach efforts including a Persian New Year video and a student town hall in Istanbul. And they said the president is not expecting quick results, even though the speech will be distributed as widely as possible.

Officials said Obama also wouldn't flinch from difficult topics, whether it's the Iraq and Afghanistan conflicts, the goal of a Palestinian state or democracy and human rights. Obama has been criticized for setting the address in Egypt, where President Hosni Mubarak has jailed dissidents and clung to power for nearly three decades.

The White House is going to extraordinary lengths to make sure the speech is heard throughout the Muslim world.

Gibbs said the speech will be posted on the White House Web site, along with links to fully translated transcripts in 13 languages. He said it also will be posted on social networking Web sites like Facebook, My Space and Twitter.

In addition, Gibbs said the State Department is registering callers from around the world who want to receive text messages about speech while it's being delivered and provide feedback, which will be posted on the department's Web site.


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Sources: Huffington Post, MSNBC, Day Life, Google Maps

Osama Bin Laden's New Message Dispels Rumors Of His Death, Proves He's Threatened By Pres. Obama (Audio)

"Let the American people prepare to continue to reap what has been planted by the heads of the White House in the coming years and decades." Osama Bin Laden, 2009



MSNBC----

CAIRO - A day before President Barack Obama is to deliver a speech here seeking goodwill with the Islamic world, al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden tried in a new message Wednesday to convince Muslims they should hate him.

The message was the second from al-Qaida in as many days criticizing Obama, a PR offensive that analysts said shows the terrorist organization worries the new president will succeed in improving America's image in the Muslim world and undermine the group's jihad, or holy war.

"Obama's election is just about the worst thing that could have happened to these guys," said Tom Sanderson, a terrorism expert at the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies. "They knew right away that his election undermined a key part of their argument that the U.S. was anti-Islamic, that the U.S. was racist."

Obama met on Wednesday with Saudi King Abdullah during the first leg of his Mideast tour. Obama's speech at Cairo University on Thursday is part of a campaign to prove he differs from former President George W. Bush, whose invasion of Iraq and aggressive counterterrorism tactics stoked Muslim ire and helped al-Qaida rally support.

Al-Qaida has tried to counter that message by painting Obama as no different from Bush, highlighting U.S. involvement in the conflicts in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iraq.

Bin Laden says Obama inflamed hatred

In his audiotape, aired on Al-Jazeera television, bin Laden said Obama has inflamed hatred toward the U.S. by ordering Pakistan to crack down on militants and block Islamic law there.

He claimed U.S. pressure led to a campaign of "killing, fighting, bombing and destruction" that prompted the exodus of a million Muslims from the Swat Valley in northwest Pakistan. He was referring to a Pakistani military campaign against the Taliban that began in April, an indication the tape was made since then.

"Obama and his administration have sown new seeds to increase hatred and revenge on America," bin Laden said. "The number of these seeds is equal to the number of displaced people from Swat Valley."

Bin Laden did not specifically mention Obama's speech in his message. Al-Jazeera did not say how or when the tape was obtained, and its authenticity could not be immediately verified, though a senior U.S. official told NBC News they have to listen to the Bin Laden tape and are presuming it to be the al-Qaida leader. The offical points out that for all the speculation about bin Laden being alive or dead, "there's never been a fake bin Laden tape."

On Tuesday, al-Qaida's deputy leader, Ayman al-Zawahri, said in an audio message that Obama's upcoming speech would not change Muslim sentiment because of the "bloody messages" the U.S. military is sending in Afghanistan and Iraq.

White House press secretary Robert Gibbs, in Saudi Arabia with Obama, said al-Qaida wants "to shift attention away from the president's historic efforts ... (to) have an open dialogue with the Muslim world."

Obama popular in Mideast

Obama is popular in the Middle East, in part because of his friendly words toward Islam, his promises to withdraw from Iraq and his own personal background. Still many Arabs also remain skeptical how deeply he will change U.S. policy, which they see as biased toward Israel.

Sanderson said Obama's approach could make it harder for al-Qaida to recruit supporters and raise money.

"It starts to tighten up avenues for them for finance, for people, for information," said Sanderson.

Al-Zawahri used racial slur

Al-Zawahri has been critical of Obama since his election, even releasing a message that referred to Obama as a "house negro," a slur for a black subservient to whites. Bin Laden has been more sparing in his criticism, and his harsh rhetoric in Wednesday's message could indicate he has become more concerned about Obama's impact.

"They have been trying to present him as a continuation of the old policies and discredit him," Jeremy Binnie, an analyst with Jane's Terrorism and Insurgency Center in Britain, said. "I think to a certain extent that it shows they are worried by this guy."

Obama's decision to deliver his speech in longtime ally Egypt highlights one of al-Qaida's frequent propaganda points — the alliances between the U.S. and repressive Arab governments.


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Sources: MSNBC, CNN, Day Life, Reuters, Vancouver Sun, Google Maps