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Dismissing this murderous act as the work of “a lone madman” ignores a more detailed study of the killer’s motivation…

A few years ago, the respected Cambridge scholar T J Winter, also known by his Muslim name of Abdal Hakim Murad, gave a fascinating lecture to Humanities staff and students at the University of Leicester. The title was “Islam and the threat of the West”, turning on its head the more usual – then and now – “Islam and the threat to the West”.

It was a novel approach, which, in a nutshell, illustrated that, historically, aggression has been directed more from Europe to the Muslim world than the other way round. His evidence for such a view was impeccably sourced.

I thought about Abdal Hakim’s talk this morning as I read the reports coming in of the dreadful bombing and shooting in Norway wherein, of course, there was speculation that these two events were “Islamic-terror related”. No doubt we will learn more over the coming days, but the early signs are, in fact, that the perpetrator was a “blond, blue-eyed Norwegian” with “political traits towards the right, and anti-Muslim views”. Not surprisingly, the man’s intentions were neither linked to these “traits”, nor to his postings on “websites with Christian fundamentalist tendencies”. Any influence “remains to be seen”; echoes of Oklahoma 1995.

Interestingly, this criminal is described by one unnamed Norwegian official as a “madman”. He may well be, but this is one way that the motivations for heinous crimes can be airbrushed out of the story before they have the chance to take hold in the popular imagination.

Closing the book

In 1969, for example, Denis Michael Rohan, an Australian Christian who set fire to Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem, was dismissed as a “madman” and sent for psychiatric treatment; end of story. The right-wing fundamentalists plotting to destroy the mosque, and the nearby Dome of the Rock, lived to fight another day. I suspect that that is what will happen with the Norwegian bomber/shooter; his right-wing links and Christian fundamentalist contacts will be dismissed as irrelevant. This, we will be told, was the work of a “deranged” person “acting independently”. Ergo, the only organised “terror threats” to civilisation are still “Islamic-related” and the focus of anti-terror legislation and efforts must remain in the Muslim world and on Muslim communities in Europe and the USA.

If we allow this to happen, we will be doing the world a great disservice, not least because the new right is on the rise across the West – and Oklahoma was proof that its followers are capable of immense destruction.

Neo-Nazi immigrants from Eastern Europe have even been active in Israel where the government, while deploring such far-right activity in its midst is actually edging ever more to the far-right on a daily basis. Ministers advocate the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians in order to purify Israel as a “Jewish state”; precious human rights for which the world has struggled are overridden in the name of “state security”; criminals in uniform are allowed to get away, quite literally, with murder.

All of this takes place with the collusion of Western governments which are themselves showing right-wing tendencies towards double-speak on matters of respect and tolerance for minorities. If you are even remotely “different” in Europe today, especially if you are a Muslim, you are eyed with suspicion and must go out of your way to “prove” your loyalty to a state which, if the truth was made known, would get rid of you if only it had the guts to pass the necessary legislation to do so. In some cases, such legislation is virtually in place in the guise of “anti-terror” measures.

All of this is backed by a vociferous and influential right-wing media which supports Israel right or wrong – and a pro-Israel lobby which acts as if it is untouchable. Given the political context across the West, it probably is.

Attacks against the left

It is significant that the target of the Norwegian “madman” appears to have been the left-leaning Labour Party, both in Oslo and on the island where the shootings took place. Across Europe, the left has been forming alliances with Muslim groups to fight fascism and racism of all kinds, and it cannot be a coincidence that The politics of multiculturalism in the new Europe, a collection of essays from across the continent, published in 1997, concluded almost without exception that “the challenge” facing Europe was the presence of large Muslim communities in “our” midst. Anyone who claims therefore, that the perpetrator’s “right-wing traits” and “anti-Muslim views”, or even links with “Christian fundamentalist” websites are irrelevant is trying to draw a veil over the unacceptable truths of such “traits” and expecting us to believe that right-wing ideology is incapable of prompting someone towards such criminality.

Of course, that idea is nonsensical. Right-wing ideology was behind the Holocaust; it has been behind most anti-Semitism and other racism around the world; the notion of Europe’s and Europeans’ racial superiority – giving cultural credibility to the far-right – gave rise to the slave trade and the scramble for Africa leading to untold atrocities against “the Other”; ditto in the Middle and Far East. Ironically, it is also far-right Zionism – far from the socialist myths of Zionist pioneers in the 1930s and before – which has been behind the ethnic cleansing of Palestine throughout the 20th century, right up to today, as a specific policy to be pursued – by military means if necessary.

This is well-documented and yet ignored by our political masters. In the context of the latest apparently far-right atrocities in Norway, it is equally ironic that the word in English for a traitor who collaborates with an enemy power stems from Major Vidkun Quisling who ruled Norway on behalf of Nazi Germany during the Second World War.

We dismiss this “madman” as a one-off “not linked to any international terrorist organisations” at our peril. If nothing else, history has shown us that such ideologies are trans-national across and beyond the West, with catastrophic effects on the rest of the world. We have been warned.

By Ibrahim Hewitt

23 July 2011

Al Jazeera

Education and media consultant Ibrahim Hewitt is the chair of trustees of the Palestinian Relief and Development fund and is Senior Editor of the Middle East Monitor. He is also a trustee of Creative Arts Schools Trust.

Source: http://english.aljazeera.net/indepth/opinion/2011/07/2011723135619293955.html

The Post reports:

A massive explosion rocked a government district in Norway’s capital Friday, killing seven people and injuring many more, and a shooter at a political convention on an island north of Oslo appeared to have inflicted more casualties, in incidents police are treating as connected, a police spokesman said.

Thomas Joscelyn explains at the Weekly Standard Web site:

Just one year ago, authorities in Oslo broke up an al Qaeda-directed bomb plot that originated in northern Pakistan. Good intelligence, including intercepted emails between an al Qaeda planner and the Oslo cell, prevented the plotters from assembling and launching their bomb. . . .

Oslo was not as fortunate today. . . .

We don’t know if al Qaeda was directly responsible for today’s events, but in all likelihood the attack was launched by part of the jihadist hydra. Prominent jihadists have already claimed online that the attack is payback for Norway’s involvement in the war in Afghanistan.

Moreover, there is a specific jihadist connection here: “Just nine days ago, Norwegian authorities filed charges against Mullah Krekar, an infamous al Qaeda-affiliated terrorist who, with help from Osama bin Laden, founded Ansar al Islam – a branch of al Qaeda in northern Iraq – in late 2001.”

This is a sobering reminder for those who think it’s too expensive to wage a war against jihadists. I spoke to Gary Schmitt of the American Enterprise Institute, who has been critical of proposed cuts in defense and of President Obama’s Afghanistan withdrawal plan. “There has been a lot of talk over the past few months on how we’ve got al-Qaeda on the run and, compared with what it once was, it’s become a rump organization. But as the attack in Oslo reminds us, there are plenty of al-Qaeda allies still operating. No doubt cutting the head off a snake is important; the problem is, we’re dealing with global nest of snakes.”

It would be a good opportunity, in light of this attack and talk about huge cuts in defense, to take a look at the recent testimony of former Missouri senator Jim Talent (now advising Romney) on defense spending. He told the House Budget Committee on July 7:

There is unquestionably a cost to sustaining military strength, and the Budget Committee must take that cost into account. But there is also a price to be paid for weakness; it can be very substantial and if the Committee is going to budget honestly you must take that into account as well. The upshot is that in the last two decades, the combination of increased deployment, reduced force structure, and under-funded procurement and modernization has caused a decline in America’s military capability. In the late 1970s, America’s military “hollowed.” Now it is stressing and rusting; inventories are aging and increasingly out of date technologically. The Navy has fewer ships than at any time since 1916. The Air Force inventory is smaller and older than at any time since the service came into being in 1947. The Army has missed several generations of modernization, and many of its soldiers are on their fourth or fifth tour of duty in Iraq or Afghanistan. The Reserves have been on constant mobilization and are under stress; many vital programs, such as missile defense, have been cut; the space architecture is old and needs to be replaced; and in the past two years, no fewer than 50 modernization programs have been ended.

Some irresponsible lawmakers on both sides of the aisle — I will point the finger at Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.), who sits on the Senate Armed Services Committee and yet backed the Gang of Six scheme to cut $800 billion from defense — would have us believe that enormous defense cuts would not affect our national security. Obama would have us believe that al-Qaeda is almost caput and that we can wrap up things in Afghanistan. All of these are rationalizations for doing something very rash, namely curbing our ability to defend the United States and our allies in a very dangerous world.

By Jennifer Rubin

22 July 2011

The Washington Post

Tripoli, Libya: Briefly noted below are five recent instances of undisputed NATO bombings on Libyan civilians selected because they still among the most frequently discussed by residents of Tripoli.

On May 13, 2011, a peace delegation of Muslim religious leaders having arrived in Breda to seek dialogue with fellow Sheiks from the east of Libya was bombed at 1 a.m. in their guesthouse by two MK 82 bombs. Eleven were killed instantly and 14 were seriously injured. NATO claimed the building housed a “Command and Control Center.” All witnesses and the hotel owner have vehemently denied this claim. This observer interviewed the leader of the delegation, Shiek Khalad Ali on three occasions, seeking details. He is recovering from shrapnel wounds to his right leg and confirms the eye-witness accounts. NATO has offered the families compensation.

During the early morning of June 20, 2011, 8 missiles and bombs targeted the home of Khaled Al-Hamedi and his parents and family. Fifteen family members and friends were killed including Khaled’s pregnant wife, his sister and three of his children. NATO said it bombed the home because it was a military installation of some kind. Witnesses, neighbors and independent observers deny there was ever any military installation or troop presence on the property.

In late June, 2011 on the main road west of Tripoli a public bus with 12 passengers was hit by a TOW missile killing all the passengers. NATO claimed that public buses are being used to transport military personnel. Foreign observers, including this one, unanimously aver that they have not seen military personnel in Tripoli, including tanks, APC’s or even military equipment. Local police provide security in the cities and neighborhood watch teams cover the suburbs.

On June 6, 2011, at 2:30 a.m. the central administrative complex of the Higher Committee for Children in central Tripoli, two blocks from this observer’s hotel, was bombed with a total of 12 bombs/rockets. The complex housed the National Downs Syndrome center including its records and vital statistics office, the Crippled Women’s Foundation, the Crippled Children Center, and the National Diabetic Research Center.

On June 16, 2011 at 5 a.m. NATO bombed a private hotel in central Tripoli, killing three and destroying a restaurant and Shisha smoking bar.

According to doctors from the Sirte Central Hospital, and the Libyan Lawyers Group representing the victims of NATO atrocities, who spoke during a briefing on 7/8/11, numerous health issues have resulted from NATO’s attacks.

Among these are an increase of strokes among the general population from five to twenty per month, a 300 per cent increase in diabetes and high blood pressure from February 15 to June 15, 2010 compared with the the same four month period in 2011.

Miscarriages in Libya are up dramatically according to the Prelate of the Catholic Church in Libya, Giovanni Innocenzo Martinelli, one of the most popular religious leaders in this 99.5% Sunni Muslim country, who informed visitors that in one day at the Green Hospital in Tripoli, following NATO bombing runs in mid March, 2011, there were 50 miscarriages and forty deaths. These statistics were confirmed during a meeting with this observer on 7/5/11 by Dr. Mohamed Milhat, cardiac specialist at the Libyan British Medical Center who described the large increase in the number of citizens complaining of stress-related illnesses.

History will judge NATO harshly for its crimes. Hopefully the citizens of every NATO member state will work to end its mission so as to protect the civilian population of Libya.

By Franklin Lamb

09 July, 2011

Countercurrents.org

Franklin Lamb is doing research in Libya and can be reached c/o fplamb@gmail.com

Contrary to popular belief, most terrorist attacks in Europe are the work of extremist nationalists.

Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh chose to attack a federal government building for reasons that will make sense only to many violent nationalists, such as Anders Behring Breivik [GALLO/GETTY]

With the death toll nearing 100, Anders Behring Breivik has been arrested and charged with Norway’s worst act of terrorism. His lawyer has indicated that Breivik had planned the attack for some time and would explain in court on Monday why he thought his act of terrorism was necessary.

After a predictable and revealing knee-jerk response by security experts interpreting the massacre at a Labour Party summer camp on Utoya island and a car bomb attack on a government building in Oslo as the work of Muslims inspired or directed by al-Qaeda, it transpires that the real culprit in the case was more likely to be motivated by anti-Muslim sentiment.

Significantly, early reports reveal Breivik’s admiration for bigoted groups such as the English Defence League and Stop the Islamification of Europe, which campaign against Muslims and the building of mosques. Similarly, Geert Wilders’ Freedom Party in Holland appears to win Breivik’s approval because it seeks to protect Western culture from a growing threat of so-called “Islamification”.

While we must await the outcome of police investigations and court proceedings before reaching any firm conclusions about Breivik’s motivation, it will nevertheless be instructive to begin an analysis of a violent extremist nationalist milieu in Europe and the US, and its dramatic shift towards anti-Muslim and Islamophobic thought since 9/11. To be sure, this will certainly be more relevant than an analysis of al-Qaeda terrorism.

At the outset, however, Breivik may have to explain to outsiders why he did not choose to bomb a mosque instead. Surely, for the violent nationalist confluence he represents, that would have been a direct hit on the enemy. Instead, by choosing to attack a government building and a Labour Party summer school, Breivik is drawing attention to what many fringe nationalists see as the political failure of mainstream and left-wing politicians to confront the Muslim threat. So-called appeasers of the “Islamification of Europe” have become as hated as Muslim activists and therefore face the same kind of attacks.

Terrorism is propaganda, not just violence

In addition, Breivik can claim to have followed a long tradition of terrorism target selection that is intended to send a strong message to politicians in an attempt to persuade them to change policy. As leading terrorism scholar Alex Schmid reminds us, terrorism is a form of communication that “cannot be understood only in terms of violence”. Rather, he suggests, “it has to be understood primarily in terms of propaganda” in order to penetrate the terrorist’s strategic purpose.

Breivik appears to understand Schmid’s analysis that terrorism is a combination of violence and propaganda. “By using violence against one victim,” a terrorist “seeks to coerce and persuade others”, Schmid explains. “The immediate victim is merely instrumental, the skin on a drum beaten to achieve a calculated impact on a wider audience.” This is certainly the kind of rationalisation that perpetrators of political violence have adopted in many contexts in pursuit of diverse political causes for decades.

Many extremist nationalists in Norway, the rest of Europe, and North America will be appalled by Breivik’s resort to terrorism and in particular his target selection. However, Breivik is likely to argue that he has sent a powerful and coercive message to all politicians in the West that will help put the campaign against the “Islamification of Europe” at the top of their agenda.

Crucial, therefore, for Breivik that he should explain his purpose as publicly as possible so that it is not misunderstood or misinterpreted. He is therefore very likely to want the widest possible audience to know why he has chosen to adopt the established tactic of terrorism so as to win an opportunity to deliver a political message. His innocent victims, he might think, are necessary collateral damage in a war that has to be won.

Breivik may hope that others will take inspiration from his act and seek to emulate him. Terrorism may be repulsive to many who share Breivik’s bigoted anti-Muslim views, but it is a tactic that only requires a small number of adherents to achieve its purpose, whatever the cause. So if even only a handful follow his route, Breivik will count that as a success.

Whether he was acting alone or in concert with others, Breivik stands apart from a significant number of other violent nationalists in the West who share his hostility towards Muslims – but whose plans to commit acts of terrorism have so far failed to reach such deadly fruition. Breivik, by contrast, has demonstrated the skills that are necessary to plan and execute acts of terrorism of any kind, especially crucial when bombs and firearms are involved.

Nationalist terror plots in the UK

In the UK, for example, there have been important convictions in recent years of violent nationalists before they have been able to carry out terrorist attacks.

Robert Cottage, a former British National Party candidate, was jailed in July 2007 for possessing explosive chemicals in his home. The cache was “described by police at the time of his arrest as the largest amount of chemical explosive of its type ever found in this country”.

Martyn Gilleard, a Nazi sympathiser, was jailed in June 2008 after police found nail bombs, bullets, swords, axes and knives in his apartment, as well as a note in which he had written: “I am so sick and tired of hearing nationalists talk of killing Muslims, of blowing up mosques, of fighting back … the time has come to stop the talk and start to act.”

Then there is Nathan Worrell, a “neo-Nazi described by police as a ‘dangerous individual’, who hoarded bomb-making materials in his home, and was found guilty in December 2008 of possessing material for terrorist purposes and for racially aggravated harassment”.

And one Neil MacGregor pleaded guilty to “threatening to blow up Glasgow Central Mosque and behead a Muslim every week until every mosque in Scotland was closed”.

As Mehdi Hasan, editor of the New Statesman, has pointed out, figures compiled by Europol, the European police agency, suggest that the threat of Islamist terrorism is minimal compared with “ethno-nationalist” and “separatist” terrorism. According to Europol, in 2006, one out of 498 documented terrorist attacks across Europe could be classed as “Islamist”; in 2007, the figure rose to just four out of 583 – less than one per cent of the total. By contrast, 517 attacks across the continent were claimed by – or attributed to – nationalist or separatist terrorist groups, such as ETA in Spain.

More recently, on January 15, 2010, Terence Gavan, a former soldier and British National Party member, was convicted of manufacturing nail bombs and a staggering array of explosives, firearms and weapons. It was, Mr Justice Calvert-Smith said, the largest find of its kind in the UK in modern history. The fact that David Copeland used nail bombs to deadly effect in London in 1999 makes this an especially disturbing case. Gavan had previously pleaded guilty to 22 charges at Woolwich Crown Court:

“Police discovered 12 firearms and 54 improvised explosive devices, which included nail bombs and a booby-trapped cigarette packet, at the home Gavan shared with his mother. He told detectives he had ‘a fascination with things that go bang’, the Old Bailey heard. After the case, head of the North East Counter Terrorism Unit David Buxton said Gavan posed a significant risk to public safety. ‘Gavan was an extremely dangerous and unpredictable individual,’ he said. ‘The sheer volume of home-made firearms and grenades found in his bedroom exposed his obsession with weapons and explosives … Gavan used his extensive knowledge to manufacture and accumulate devices capable of causing significant injury or harm.”

Unlike Lewington, Gavan is reported as having specifically Muslim targets in mind. In particular, he is reported to have planned to “target an address he had seen on a television programme that he believed was linked to the July 7 bomb attacks in London”. In one hand-written note he explained: “The patriot must always be ready to defend his country against enemies and their governments.” Again, like Lewington, he would have posed a threat to Muslim communities throughout the UK, especially those areas such as Bradford and East London most popularly associated with large Muslim populations.

Finally, it is only necessary to recall the circumstances of the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995 to be reminded of extremist nationalists’ bomb-making capacity and target selection. Timothy McVeigh was able to utilise skills and contacts he acquired in his US military service to build and detonate a bomb that killed 168 victims, injured 680 others, destroyed or damaged 324 buildings within a sixteen-block radius, destroyed or burned 86 cars, shattered glass in an additional 258 nearby buildings, and caused at least $652m worth of damage.

With minimal help, McVeigh was able to inflict more harm and damage with one bomb than four suicide bombers in London operating under an al-Qaeda flag in London ten years later.

Significantly, McVeigh attacked a federal government building for reasons that will make perfect sense to a number of violent extremist nationalists – most especially Anders Behring Breivik.

Dr Robert Lambert is Co-Director of the European Muslim Research Centre at the University of Exeter and Lecturer at the Centre for the Study of Terrorism and Political Violence at the University of St Andrews. He is co-author of Islamophobia and Anti-Muslim Hate Crime: UK Case Studies and author of Countering al-Qaeda in London, which will be published by Hurst in September 2011.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily represent Al Jazeera’s editorial policy.

By Robert Lambert

24 July 2011

Source: Al Jazeera

The uncompromising response of the Arab regimes to calls for transition to democracy lies in the political character, history and ideology of each country.

Lumping them together in a monolithic idea of Islam is a mistake. Arab-socialist Syria is a political dynasty ruled by a Shi’a minority; monarchical Bahrain is ruled by a Sunni minority. Mubarak’s Egypt and Gadhafi’s Libya sought to become political dynasties until the rise of each country’s popular Opposition. Sunni Saudi Arabia operates on a political ideology which involves a mixture of puritan Islam and tribalism. Yet they all share a similar deafness to the popular protests whose voices are ringing in these countries and, via the media, around the globe. Realistically, once people have stood up for change, it is difficult to satisfy them with half-hearted dialogue and reforms or bribes; they can only be repressed for a time. In this age, there is little option for authoritarian regimes but to open up to people’s representation in state matters.

The diversity in the Muslim world is also reflected in the situations of women in different political settings and social cultures. During the heyday of Arab nationalism, republican regimes like Algeria, Tunisia, Egypt and Libya liberated their women from traditionalism only to re-cage them in the grinding wheels of economic hardship, political seclusion and authoritarianism. Meanwhile the Islamic monarchies enclosed women within the confines of the house in the name of religion – or more accurately tribalism.

Today, the social roles of Muslim females range from the convention-free lives of women of the upper economic classes posing as “liberated”, to their middle-class counterparts battling to improve their economic condition through a struggle for education and employment, to those women of the lower class who struggle just to survive and are forced into poverty and even the sex industry.

Most of the problems of Muslim women are rooted in and shaped by local cultures into which Islam spread as a religion. For example, the continuing practice of female circumcision in Islamised Egypt goes back to the time of the Pharaohs; the custom of honour killing in Pakistan and Afghanistan is rooted in the social practice of clan and kinship loyalties; while the donning of the burqa – face veil – dates back to feudal Persian culture. All of these (plus other) practices have survived under Islam. Muslim scholars both female and male are unanimous that there is no injunction in the Quran to cover the face – it only recommends modest dressing and right demeanor for both men and women. In fact, each woman should have the freedom to wear or not wear the hijab – head scarf – according to her conscience. Benazir Bhutto once aptly remarked, “The time has come when we within the Muslim world need to realise that each of us has a right to interpret religion as we wish, and we do not need clerics or the state to tell us how to worship.”

Islam came as a liberating force for the Arab women who, during pre-Islamic days, were subjugated to female infanticide and slavery.

The Quran describes the reaction of a pre-Islamic father upon hearing the news of the birth of daughter as follows: “When news is brought to one of them, of the birth of a female child, his face darkens, and he is filled with inward grief! With shame does he hide himself from his people, because of the bad news he has had! Shall he retain it or bury it in the dust? What an evil choice they decide on?” (Quran 16: 58-59). In such a context, the Quran emphasised gender equality (33: 35). Islam gave women dignity, status, the right to marry the man of their choice, rights to keep their earnings, inheritance, property, and rights to divorce.

Today, the Muslim women of Africa and Southeast Asia are more liberated than those in the Middle East and South Asia. But again, the condition of the former is not yet ideal – they, too, have their problems. There have emerged several women’s groups in the Muslim world that seek to address women issues. Some call for a modern reinterpretation of Islamic jurisprudence pertaining to women’s matters – asking for gender equality and challenging patriarchy. Such groups can be either connected to or independent of mosques. There are upper-class-based feminists groups that seek to model Muslim societies along secular-liberal lines.

On the other side of the divide there are also reactionary religious groups led by men who interpret Islam for women in such a way as to restrict their mobility and support patriarchy in the name of religion. Such reactionary groups obscure the important role models of woman. The wives and daughters of the Prophet Muhammad were teachers of men in religious, social, economic and political matters. For example, Ayesha, a wife of the Prophet who led a political rebellion against Caliph Ali has been removed from memory or concealed through fatwas – religious rulings – written by male religious scholars.

The Arab Spring brought Muslim women onto the streets to demand political representation and gender equality and interestingly, in the case of Saudi Arabia, the right to drive cars! This is not the case in the rest of the world’s 56 Muslim countries. Making up about 50 per cent of the protest movements, Arab women are demanding freedom from the hegemony of Western and local cultural codes, poverty, illiteracy and injustice. Egyptian and other women factory workers seek freedom from debt, exploitation and sexual harassment. They seek representation, good governance and transparency in state matters. In post-revolution Egypt, women are continuing with their struggle to see to it that their protests and sacrifices were not in vain. Even the Muslim Brotherhood has become more inclusive of women. In the ongoing protests from Egypt to Iran, young women in their mid-20s have even sacrificed their lives for freedom and to express their resistence to autocrats.

Middle Eastern rulers and members of the international community who have not yet offered their full support for the Arab Spring cannot afford to ignore Muslim women’s push for freedom and the right to political representation. Muslim women have been engaging in a long internal struggle for social, economic and political freedom and mobility amidst various cultural settings. They cannot be abandoned to fight alone, they deserve support from both within and without, and as human beings they have a right to freedom as members of a globalising and interdependent civilisation.

Imtiyaz Yusuf is professor of Islamics and Religion at Assumption University’s Graduate School of Philosophy and Religion

By Diane V. McLoughlin

27 July, 2011

Countercurrents.org

Diane V. McLoughlin is a writer and peace activist.

Tripoli, Libya: At ten a.m. Tripoli time on 6/28/11 the Libyan Ministry of Health made available to this observer its compilation entitled “Current Statistics Of Civilian Victims Of Nato Bombardments On Libya, (3/19/11-6/27/11).

Before releasing their data, which will be made public this afternoon, it was confirmed by the findings of the Libyan Red Crescent Society and also by civil defense workers in the neighborhoods bombed, and then vetted by researchers at Tripoli’s Nassar University.

As of July 1, 2011, military casualties have not been officially released by the Libyan armed forces.

In summary, the MOH compilation documents that during the first 100 days of NATO targeting of civilians, 6121 were killed or injured. The statistical breakdown is as follows: 3093 Men were injured and 668 were killed. Women killed number 260 and 1318 injured. Children killed number 141 and 641 injured.

Of those seriously injured 655 are still under medical care in hospitals while 4,397 have been released to their families for outpatient care.

NATO claims that private apartments and homes, schools, shops, factories, crops, and warehouses storing sacks of flour were legitimate military targets are not believed by anyone here in Libya and to date NATO has failed to provide a scintilla of evidence that the 15 civilians, mainly children and their aunts and mothers, who were torn to pieces by 8 NATO rockets in the Salman neighborhood last week were legitimate military targets.

Tripoli’s 3,200 neighborhoods, independently of the Libyan Armed Forces, are intensively preparing for the possibility that NATO forces or those they are seen as increasingly arming and directing, might invade the cosmopolitan greater Tripoli area during the coming weeks or months.

This observer has had the opportunity to visit some of these neighborhoods the past couple of nights and will continue to do so. As noted earlier, contrary to some media reports by the BBC, CNN and CBS Tripoli’s neighborhoods during the cool evenings with wafting sea breezes, are not tense, “dangerous for foreigners and in control of trigger happy soldiers or militias.” The latter assessment is nonsense. Americans and others are welcomed and their presence appreciated. Libyans are anxious to explain their points of views, a common one of which is that they are not all about Qaddafi but about protecting the family, homes, and neighborhoods from foreign invaders. A majority does support the Qaddafi leadership which is what they received with their mother’s milk, but nearly all emphasize that for them and their friends it is very much about defending their revolution and country first. They appear to this observer to be very well informed about the motives of NATO and those countries that are intensively targeting their leader and their officials without regard to civilians being killed. It’s about oil and reshaping African and the Middle East.

Sitting and chatting with neighborhood watch teams is actually an extremely enjoyable way to learn about and to get to know the Libyan people and how they view events unfolding in their country. It certainly beats hanging out at the bar at the hotel where the western press crowd often gather their journalistic insights and pontificate about what “the real deal is” as one told me the other day. I could not figure out much that he was talking about.

On the evening of 7/1/11 as many as one million, five hundred thousand Libyan citizens are expected to gather at Tripoli’s Green Square to register their resistance to NATO’s intensifying civilian targeting blitz. Some western journalists will not attend this news event because they are afraid of potential danger or their stateside bureaus are suggesting they stay away “so as not legitimize the gathering” What has become of orientalist journalism?

The neighborhoods in Libya are preparing for a ground invasion and to confront directly the invaders with a plan that one imagines would not be unfamiliar to a General Giap of Vietnam or a Chinese General Lin Peio, being a massive peoples defense. It has been organized with a house by house, street by street defense plan for every neighborhood and will include all available weaponry.

The defenders are not military although many of the older ones had done one year compulsory service following high school. Their ranks include every able bodied woman and man from age 18 to 65. Younger or older will not be refused.

They are organized into 5 person squads once they complete their training. It works like this: Anyone over 18 years of age can report to his neighborhood “Tent”. Knowing virtually everyone in the area, the person will make application and will be vetted on an AK-47, M-16 or other light arm.

Depending on her/his skill level he will be accepted and given a photo ID that lists the weapons the applicant qualified on. If he needs more training or is a novice it is provided at the location which includes a training area, tent with mattresses for sleeping, a make shift latrine and canteen.

The basic training for those with no arms experience, including women, is 45 days. Past that, the commitment is four months. Each accepted individual is issued a rifle (normally an AK-47 “Klash” along with 120 rounds of ammo.) Each individual is asked to return in one week to discuss their training and show that they did not waste their bullets which cost around one dollar each. If approved, they will be issued more.

Those who begin their duty work one eight hour shift. Women tend to work during the day when kids are in school but I have seen many women also on the night shift. Most men have regular jobs and proudly explain than they volunteer one work shift daily for their country. They appear to be admired by their neighbors.

I agreed not to describe other weapons that will be used if NATO appears besides rifles, grenades, booby-traps, rocket propelled grenades (RPG’s) but they appear formidable.

But besides preparing for armed defense of their families and homes and neighbors, these neighborhood volunteer civil defense teams explained to me what their main work involves. When an area is bombed, they quickly help the residents exit their bombed building, get medical help on the scene for those who need it, help the families assure the frightened children that things are OK, make notes of needed repairs, provided temporary shelter nearby if needed, and countless tasks the reader can imagine would be required.

Each check point becomes a neighborhood watch security center for the community. Cars are cursorily checked, usually just the trunk. Often the drivers are known to the security forces, many of whom are university students, because they are also from the area. Occasionally a car will stop and a citizen will exit and deliver a tray of fruit or pastries or a pot of Libyan soup etc. A very congenial social atmosphere.

Because NATO has been increasing its bombing of these civilian manned checkpoints, about 50 of which are along the road from the Tunisian border to Tripoli, the neighborhood watch teams are now operating without lights at night. Those on night duty have each been issued one of those small heavy duty five inch mini flashlights with has a powerful beam. This observer was presented one as a souvenir and can attest to its fine quality.

They are civilian because they are volunteers and the regular policemen and women have in large numbers joined an army unit hidden elsewhere toward the east.

In addition to its current problems, NATO will face another major one if they decide to invade Western Libya.

By Franklin Lamb

Fresh diplomatic efforts are under way to try to end Libya’s bloody civil war, with the UN special envoy flying to Tripoli to hold talks after Britain followed France in accepting that Muammar Gaddafi cannot be bombed into exile.

The change of stance by the two most active countries in the international coalition is an acceptance of realities on the ground. Despite more than four months of sustained air strikes by Nato, the rebels have failed to secure any military advantage. Colonel Gaddafi has survived what observers perceive as attempts to eliminate him and, despite the defection of a number of senior commanders, there is no sign that he will be dethroned in a palace coup.

The regime controls around 20 per cent more territory than it did in the immediate aftermath of the uprising on 17 February.

The main obstacle to a ceasefire, so far, has been the insistence of the opposition and their Western backers that Colonel Gaddafi and his family must leave Libya. But earlier this month Mustafa Abdul Jalil, the leader of the Transitional National Council, stated that the dictator can remain in the country if he gives up the reins of power.

The French President, Nicolas Sarkozy, had wanted to declare victory in a Bastille Day speech on 14 July. Soon after this date, the country’s Defence and Foreign Ministers pressed the case for a negotiated settlement.

The UK, which appeared to have been taken by surprise at the French volte-face, tried to maintain a tough line. But that has also changed in the last 48 hours, with first Downing Street and then the Foreign Secretary William Hague saying that Colonel Gaddafi may after all be allowed to remain in his homeland. Mr Hague said the UK would support whatever agreement was reached by the two sides in Libya.

Many senior British military officers have been less than enthusiastic about the Libyan mission, questioning its direction, and privately complaining that it is a distraction from unfinished business in Afghanistan. David Cameron’s attempts to censure commanders who have raised concerns about fighting two wars while resources are being cut back has also led to growing dissatisfaction.

The UN envoy to Libya, Abdul Elah al-Khatib, had met opposition leaders in Benghazi before flying to Tripoli.

Meanwhile, the Libyan regime, which had offered an unconditional ceasefire a month ago, with senior members indicating that Colonel Gaddafi would be eased out, appears to have hardened its position, with officials maintaining that Nato bombing must stop before any talks can be held and demanding the release of Libyan assets frozen by the international community.

It remains unclear how a peace deal would be policed. Nato countries are adamant that they do not want to put boots on the ground, while Alain Le Roy, the UN’s head of peacekeeping operations, has stated that the organisation only has limited manpower. The rebel administration is wary of involving African Union forces, holding that many of the governments of member states were clients of the Gaddafi regime.

* The Lockerbie bomber Abdelbaset al-Megrahi, who was released from prison in Scotland almost two years ago in the expectation that he would die within three months, has attended a pro-Gaddafi rally in Libya.

Megrahi was seen in a wheelchair in Libyan state television footage said to have been broadcast live. A presenter introduced him and said the conviction for blowing Pan Am Flight 103 out of the sky over Lockerbie in 1988 was a “conspiracy”. He served eight years of a 27-year sentence for the attack, which killed 270 people.

By Kim Sengupta, Defence Correspondent

Wednesday, 27 July 2011

Independent.co.uk

The man accused of the killing spree in Norway was deeply influenced by a small group of American bloggers and writers who have warned for years about the threat from Islam, lacing his 1,500-page manifesto with quotations from them, as well as copying multiple passages from the tract of the Unabomber.

In the document he posted online, Anders Behring Breivik, who is accused of bombing government buildings and killing scores of young people at a Labor Party camp, showed that he had closely followed the acrimonious American debate over Islam.

His manifesto, which denounced Norwegian politicians as failing to defend the country from Islamic influence, quoted Robert Spencer, who operates the Jihad Watch Web site, 64 times, and cited other Western writers who shared his view that Muslim immigrants pose a grave danger to Western culture.

More broadly, the mass killings in Norway, with their echo of the 1995 bombing of the federal building in Oklahoma City by an antigovernment militant, have focused new attention around the world on the subculture of anti-Muslim bloggers and right-wing activists and renewed a debate over the focus of counterterrorism efforts.

In the United States, critics have asserted that the intense spotlight on the threat from Islamic militants has unfairly vilified Muslim Americans while dangerously playing down the threat of attacks from other domestic radicals. The author of a 2009 Department of Homeland Security report on right-wing extremism withdrawn by the department after criticism from conservatives repeated on Sunday his claim that the department had tilted too heavily toward the threat from Islamic militants.

The revelations about Mr. Breivik’s American influences exploded on the blogs over the weekend, putting Mr. Spencer and other self-described “counterjihad” activists on the defensive, as their critics suggested that their portrayal of Islam as a threat to the West indirectly fostered the crimes in Norway.

Mr. Spencer wrote on his Web site, jihadwatch.org, that “the blame game” had begun, “as if killing a lot of children aids the defense against the global jihad and Islamic supremacism, or has anything remotely to do with anything we have ever advocated.” He did not mention Mr. Breivik’s voluminous quotations from his writings.

The Gates of Vienna, a blog that ordinarily keeps up a drumbeat of anti-Islamist news and commentary, closed its pages to comments Sunday “due to the unusual situation in which it has recently found itself.”

Its operator, who describes himself as a Virginia consultant and uses the pseudonym “Baron Bodissey,” wrote on the site Sunday that “at no time has any part of the Counterjihad advocated violence.”

The name of that Web site — a reference to the siege of Vienna in 1683 by Muslim fighters who, the blog says in its headnote, “seemed poised to overrun Christian Europe” — was echoed in the title Mr. Breivik chose for his manifesto: “2083: A European Declaration of Independence.” He chose that year, the 400th anniversary of the siege, as the target for the triumph of Christian forces in the European civil war he called for to drive out Islamic influence.

Marc Sageman, a former C.I.A. officer and a consultant on terrorism, said it would be unfair to attribute Mr. Breivik’s violence to the writers who helped shape his world view. But at the same time, he said the counterjihad writers do argue that the fundamentalist Salafi branch of Islam “is the infrastructure from which Al Qaeda emerged. Well, they and their writings are the infrastructure from which Breivik emerged.”

“This rhetoric,” he added, “is not cost-free.”

Dr. Sageman, who is also a forensic psychiatrist, said he saw no overt signs of mental illness in Mr. Breivik’s writings. He said Mr. Breivik bears some resemblance to Ted Kaczynski, the Unabomber, who also spent years on a manifesto and carried out his mail bombings in part to gain attention for his theories. One obvious difference, Dr. Sageman said, is that Mr. Kaczynski was a loner who spent years in a rustic Montana cabin, while Mr. Breivik appears to have been quite social.

Mr. Breivik’s declaration did not name Mr. Kaczynski or acknowledge the numerous passages copied from the Unabomber’s 1995 manifesto, in which the Norwegian substituted “multiculturalists” or “cultural Marxists” for Mr. Kaczynski’s “leftists” and made other small wording changes.

By contrast, he quoted the American and European counterjihad writers by name, notably Mr. Spencer, author of 10 books, including “Islam Unveiled” and “The Truth About Muhammad.”

Mr. Breivik frequently cited another blog, Atlas Shrugs, and recommended the Gates of Vienna among Web sites. Pamela Geller, an outspoken critic of Islam who runs Atlas Shrugs, wrote on her blog Sunday that any assertion that she or other antijihad writers bore any responsibility for Mr. Breivik’s actions was “ridiculous.”

“If anyone incited him to violence, it was Islamic supremacists,” she wrote.

Mr. Breivik also quoted European blogs and writers with similar themes, notably a Norwegian blogger who writes under the name “Fjordman.” Immigration from Muslim countries to Scandinavia and the rest of Europe has set off a deep political debate across the continent and strengthened a number of right-wing anti-immigrant parties.

In the United States, the shootings resonated with years of debate at home over the proper focus of counterterrorism.

Despite the Norway killings, Representative Peter T. King, the New York Republican who is chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, said he had no plans to broaden contentious hearings about the radicalization of Muslim Americans and would hold the third one as planned on Wednesday. He said his committee focused on terrorist threats with foreign ties and suggested that the Judiciary Committee might be more appropriate for looking at non-Muslim threats.

In 2009, when the Department of Homeland Security produced a report, “Rightwing Extremism,” suggesting that the recession and the election of an African-American president might increase the threat from white supremacists, conservatives in Congress strongly objected. Janet Napolitano, the homeland security secretary, quickly withdrew the report and apologized for what she said were its flaws.

Daryl Johnson, the Department of Homeland Security analyst who was the primary author of the report, said in an interview that after he left the department in 2010, the number of analysts assigned to non-Islamic militancy of all kinds was reduced to two from six. Mr. Johnson, who now runs a private research firm on the domestic terrorist threat, DTAnalytics, said about 30 analysts worked on Islamic radicalism when he was there.

The killings in Norway “could easily happen here,” he said. The Hutaree, an extremist Christian militia in Michigan accused last year of plotting to kill police officers and planting bombs at their funerals, had an arsenal of weapons larger than all the Muslim plotters charged in the United States since the Sept. 11 attacks combined, he said.

Homeland Security officials disputed Mr. Johnson’s claim about staffing, saying they pay close attention to all threats, regardless of ideology. And the F.B.I. infiltrated the Hutaree, making arrests before any attack could take place.

John D. Cohen, principal deputy counterterrorism coordinator at the Department of Homeland Security, said Ms. Napolitano, who visited Oklahoma City last year for the 15th anniversary of the bombing there, had often spoken of the need to assess the risk of violence without regard to politics or religion.

“What happened in Norway,” Mr. Cohen said, “is a dramatic reminder that in trying to prevent attacks, we cannot focus on a single ideology.”

By Scott Shane

July 24, 2011

Sorce: The New York Times