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The self-described “Jihad Jane” who thought her blond hair and blue eyes would let her blend in as she sought to kill an artist in Sweden is a rare case of an American woman aiding foreign terrorists and shows the evolution of the global threat, authorities say.

The suburban Philadelphia woman, Colleen R. LaRose, is accused in the indictment filed Tuesday of actively recruiting fighters, as well as agreeing to murder the artist, marry a terrorism suspect so he could move to Europe and martyr herself if necessary.

LaRose is “one of only a few such cases nationwide in which females have been charged with terrorism violations,” said U.S. Department of Justice spokesman Dean Boyd.

LaRose, 46, of Pennsburg but with close ties to south Texas, has been held without bail since her Oct. 15 arrest in Philadelphia.

Authorities said the case shows how terrorist groups are looking to recruit Americans to carry out their goals.

“Today’s indictment, which alleges that a woman from suburban America agreed to carry out murder overseas and to provide material support to terrorists, underscores the evolving nature of the threat we face,” said David Kris, assistant attorney general for national security.
LaRose had targeted Swedish cartoonist Lars Vilks and had online discussions about her plans with at least one of several suspects apprehended over that plot Tuesday in Ireland, according to a U.S. official speaking on condition of anonymity because the official wasn’t authorized to discuss details of the investigation.

A U.S. Department of Justice spokesman wouldn’t confirm the case is related to Vilks, who angered Muslims by depicting the Prophet Muhammad with the body of a dog.

The indictment charges that LaRose, who also used the name Fatima LaRose online, agreed to kill the target on orders from the unnamed terrorists she met online, and traveled to Europe in August to do so. Court documents don’t say whether the person was killed, but LaRose was not charged with murder.

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Jihad Jane, No Color Terror

Did the world learn anything from the Holocaust? Did its victims and their progeny? These are questions that have been raised about the situation of the Palestinians.

In both the Holocaust and in the treatment of Palestinians by Zionist Jews, we see similar factors at play—fear, which justifies attack, desensitization to violence, the rise to authority of elements which in the past were seen as beyond the pale, extremist elements which in the past were disparaged.

The Jewish philosopher Martin Buber wrote of the I-thou relationship as being a binding of soul to soul, a deep and personal intimacy. He contrasted that with the I-it relationship, where the Other is dehumanized—the Jew in Nazi Germany, the Palestinian in Israel/Palestine.

Nazi ideology identified whole categories of people as untermenschen. Jews were characterized as rich capitalists bleeding the German people and simultaneously as Communists threatening the stability of society.

Anti-Arab prejudice is widespread in Israel. Palestinians are seen as threatening, wanting to drive the Jews into the sea. They are seen as bloodthirsty and primitive. “Us or them.”

In the Holocaust, beginnings resembled the lynch mob atmosphere—Kristallnacht. Then things settled down again, but the discrimination and eventually the atrocities grew, with the leadership of the society carrying on what had previously been mass behavior in a now formal program. This picture omits the conflict between the new Nazi élite and the old conservative Junker élite, but that left the Junkers deprived of their status.

The situation in Israel/Palestine involves a Zionist Jewish tough-guy self-image.

Zionists talk of the New Jew, no longer subservient. The New Jew is aggressive. Most likely, he is blond and blue-eyed.

There are two sides to the New Jew, the Jewish knight and warrior. On the one hand, there is the principle that he fights according to all the rules—Purity of Arms.

On the other, there are incidents in which the unsavory element commits unspeakable acts—Deir Yassin and the murder of Count Folke Bernadotte, for example. But these acts are, it is argued, acts of the uncouth—Irgun and the Stern Gang.

Now, however, the former leaders of these formations and members of their political party offspring are in charge of the country.

The Palestinians are untermenschen, whose homes can be stolen (as in Jerusalem) or destroyed (in the Occupied Territories).

The anti-Palestinian depredations of fanatical young settlers are semi-restrained by authorities, but on the other hand the Israeli government has secretly and illegally funded the proliferation of settlements that even it describes as illegal.

The depredations include attacks on children going to school, attacks on farmers and destruction of their olive trees, theft of farm animals and other property, etc.

Is there a difference between the Nazis and the Israelis? To pose the question is to answer it. There is a considerable difference.

While Palestinians have been robbed, ghettoized, and mistreated, the magnitude of the Holocaust has certainly not been replicated. And while virtually the entire political and social structure in Nazi Germany engaged in the effort to destroy the Jews, the situation in Israel is not remotely similar.

The ideology of “Purity of Arms” has had a certain hold. Thus, some Israeli soldiers who served in Operation Cast Lead in Gaza became involved in an organization, Breaking the Silence, which issued a booklet detailing the inhumane nature of that military campaign—shoot-first-and-ask-questions-later examples of senseless killings induced by a combination of fear and excitement, use of human shields, reports of rabbis to the troops demonizing all Palestinians, use of white phosphorus.

In Germany, a few brave churchmen stood up against Hitler. In Israel, opposition to repression of the Palestinians is more significant. Even the children of former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert have resisted the racist onslaught. One of his sons refused military service in the Territories and left the country. Another son left before entering the military. A daughter takes part in pro-Palestinian demonstrations.

Bottom line: We all need to avoid the I-it syndrome. We need to be the one voice in the crowd that says no.

We need to refuse to abandon our humanity because of fear, and we need to look beyond the fear to the reality.

We need to say no to the new Holocaust against the Palestinians by Zionist Jews in Israel/Palestine.
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The Holocaust, old and new

By: Afshan Khan

Any news browser you log on or any newspaper you turn, all you see is Muslims around the world are being killed in such a large number and so often that we do not even bother to stop and think. We have long stopped counting the bodies as if it is an insignificant norm. They are just animals at slaughterhouse. Only time human deaths make big splashing news and arouse big outcry is the non-Muslims death. As if, certain human lives are more precious than others.

When 21-century history in general and Muslims history in particular is being written in blood, there is vast conspiracy going around the world against Muslims and Islam. People who are hiding behind the charade of democracy and freedom are constantly propagating to demonize Islam and Muslims. Whether the Wilders from Netherland are threatened by insignificant Muslims minority in Netherlands;Dutch anti-Islam politician creates stir in UK or it is every other internet posting which is full of hatred and intolerance towards Muslims. Wilder wants the complete assimilation of Muslims in Duch Christian’s society. He declares that Muslims are not welcome in Netherlands if they do not leave their way of life, which is Islamic way of life. He knows very well by his hate speeches and motive he is not winning Muslim hearts. He knows very well that he is encouraging the extremist forces on all sides and to be truthful that is what his goal is. If Wilders of our times are sincere and have some courage then they should take the right action, put a total ban on immigration and stop buying oil from them, but don’t attack their harmless ritual of five times a day prayers. Islam is the only religion, which is still trying to preserve its true self, its moral values unlike other religions. This is a tragedy of our Modern times where Western powers want every human being in every corner of the world cloned in their mirror image. Their motto is; western values should be adhered by all.

One would think world powers came to realization after hundreds of years of bloody wars and exploitative era of colonialism, where they annihilated many of great cultures and civilizations of the world. One would think we have come to conclusion that diversity is the key for the vibrancy of life and Universe. We need to work towards preservation of diversities and multi culturalism. Alas! That is proved not to be true. Western powers are still in a constant war to assimilate the whole world in their image. If any body objects, they are against freedom and democracy.

Having said that we cannot afford to overlook the flaws of Muslims societies. Whether it is poverty, lack of education, lack of representation in the governance, lack political sovereignty in some parts of the world, and of course every ones favorite Muslim women’s emancipation. These are the key issue, which needed to be resolved through reformation not wars. These reforms have to come from within the Muslim society.
The resolution for all these conflicts lies in education, which can be promoted through pen not drone.

(CNN) — Adam Gadahn, an American spokesman for al Qaeda, has been arrested in Pakistan, a senior Pakistani government official source told CNN.

The official said Gadahn was arrested Sunday in Karachi.

Gadahn, also known as Azzam the American, routinely posts lengthy videos on Islamist online forums. He was born in California.

In December, he released a video message in English offering condolences to “unintended Muslim victims” killed in attacks in Afghanistan, Pakistan and elsewhere. It was a rare example of al Qaeda offering condolences to the families of those killed in the group’s own attacks.

In 2006, he was indicted on charges of treason and providing material support to terrorists. The U.S. government has offered a $1 million reward for information leading to his capture. In a 2008 video, he renounced his U.S. citizenship and destroyed his passport.

Earlier Sunday a video was released showing Gadahn praising an Army major of Palestinian descent who is charged with shooting other soldiers at Fort Hood, Texas. The mass shooting “lit a path” for other Muslim service members to carry out such attack, Gadahn said in the video, which was posted Sunday on Islamist web sites.

“I believe that defiant Brother Nidal is the ideal role model for every repentant Muslim in the armies of the unbelievers and apostate regimes,” Gadahn says in English.

Maj. Nidal Hasan, an Army psychiatrist and a U.S.-born citizen, is charged with 13 counts of premeditated murder in the November 5 shootings at Fort Hood and 32 counts of attempted premeditated murder. Hasan is eligible for the death penalty.

“The Mujahid brother Nidal Hasan is a pioneer, a trailblazer and a role model who has opened a door, lit a path and shown the way forward for every Muslim who finds himself among the unbelievers and yearns to discharge his duty to Allah and play a part in the defense of Islam and Muslims.”

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American al Qaeda Adam Gadahn, arrested in Pakistan

Washington (CNN) — A narrowly passed committee measure that recommends the United States recognize the 1915 killings of ethnic Armenians in Ottoman Turkey as genocide will likely not get a full vote in the House of Representatives, according to a senior State Department official.

The official said Friday that the State Department has an understanding with House leadership on the issue, and, “We believe it will stop where it is.”

The measure passed 23-22 in the House Foreign Affairs Committee on Thursday.

In response, Turkey ordered its ambassador to the United States home for “consultation,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Burak Ozugergin told CNN.

The nearly century-old issue has placed both Congress and the White House in the middle of a political minefield, balancing moral considerations with both domestic and international concerns.

The Obama administration had urged the House Foreign Affairs Committee not to pass the resolution, warning it could damage U.S.-Turkish relations and jeopardize efforts to normalize relations between Turkey and its neighbor Armenia. The two do not share formal diplomatic relations.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told reporters Friday that “the Obama administration strongly opposes the resolution that was passed by only one vote in the House committee, and we’ll work very hard to make sure it does not go to the House floor.”

State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley told reporters ahead of the vote that the United States was concerned about the impact the vote could potentially have on U.S.-Turkish relations. Turkey, among other things, is considered a strong American ally and is home to a critical U.S. air base.

Armenia’s foreign minister, Edward Nalbandian, said his country highly appreciates the committee’s vote. “This is another proof of the devotion of the American people to universal human values and is an important step toward the prevention of the crimes against humanity,” he said. The Armenian National Committee of America said the passage of the measure shows that “Turkey doesn’t get a vote or a veto in the U.S. Congress.”

Turkish officials vehemently oppose the measure.

“Turkey is saddened by the bill that has been accepted in the Foreign Affairs Committee today [Thursday],” Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s Web site said.

“We condemn this bill that accuses the Turkish nation of a crime it has not committed. The people who support this bill have adopted a wrong and unfair attitude, ignoring the differences of opinion of expert historians and historical facts. The bill has been prepared with tangible historical mistakes regarding the 1915 incidents and with a completely subjective attitude,” the statement said.

A Turkish Foreign Ministry spokesman recently issued a public warning that passage of a resolution labeling the World War I killings as genocide “would harm U.S.-Turkish relations.” Turkish officials have also warned that passing the resolution could hurt a historic agreement aimed at normalizing relations between Turkey and Armenia, and efforts to reopen their long-closed border.

“It would harm the normalization process,” spokesman Ozugergin said. “And it is wrong. The substance is also wrong.”

Turkey officially denies a genocide took place in the last days of the crumbling Ottoman Empire. Ankara instead says that Muslim Turks and Christian Armenians massacred each other on the killing fields of World War I.

Historians have extensively documented the Ottoman military’s forced death-march of hundreds of thousands of ethnic Armenians into the Syrian desert in 1915. Every April 24, Armenians worldwide observe a remembrance day for those killed.

The killings decimated the Armenian population in what is modern-day eastern Turkey.

The government in the Armenian capital of Yerevan and influential Armenian diaspora groups have been urging countries around the world to formally label the events of 1915 “genocide.”

“I don’t pretend to be a professional historian,” Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Howard Berman, D-California, said ahead of Thursday’s vote. “But the vast majority of experts … agree that the tragic massacres of the Armenians constitute genocide.”

Rep. Gary Ackerman, D-New York, acknowledged that Turkey is an “important, strong [and] necessary ally of the United States.” But “overriding all of that,” he said, “is the issue of justice and the issue of history. … History has to be righted.”

Opponents of the resolution had expressed sympathy toward the victims of the 1915 killings, but said current political concerns took priority.
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Official: Armenian genocide resolution unlikely to get full House vote

WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama is trying to persuade a weary public and wavering Democrats to get behind his frantic, late-stage push on health care, while Republicans dig in and demand starting from scratch after a year’s worth of work.

“Now, despite all the progress and improvements we’ve made, Republicans in Congress insist that the only acceptable course on health care is to start over. But you know what? The insurance companies aren’t starting over,” Obama said in his weekly radio and Internet address Saturday.

“I just met with some of them on Thursday, and they couldn’t give me a straight answer as to why they keep arbitrarily and massively raising premiums — by as much as 60 percent in states like Illinois. If we do not act, they will continue to do this.”

Republicans were not swayed.

“It’s not too late: We can, and we must, stop this government takeover of health care,” said Rep. Parker Griffith, a retired physician and a first-term congressman from Alabama who switched parties in December and delivered the GOP message.

The competing addresses underscored the urgency behind Obama’s last-ditch push for immediate health care reform. Without a victory — and quickly — Democrats move into a fast-approaching election season without a major, tangible accomplishment that affects voters’ pocketbooks. And with a chasm remaining between the two parties, Democrats considered passing the overhaul with votes just from their party.

That process would let the 59 Senate Democrats declare victory with a simple majority instead of a 60-vote count. It also would allow Obama’s team to get back to talking about the economy, which has shed more than 8 million jobs since the recession began.

Obama is pleading with Democrats to overcome divisions to seize a historic moment to remake the health care system during this election year. The White House wants to pass a health care overhaul and then campaign on it. Voters will pick candidates to serve 36 Senate seats; the entire House is up for re-election.

White House officials hope the immediate changes in the health overhaul would be enough to satisfy voters’ expectations — and Democratic lawmakers who were hardly unified in support of the plan.

If Democrats pass the plan, voters would find greater consumer protections and a ban on discriminating against customers with previous ailments. Small businesses would receive a tax credit this year, insurance companies would no longer be able to drop patients’ coverage if they become sick, and plans would be required to offer free preventive care to customers.

Griffith said leaders of the Democratic Party he left last year were missing the point.

“For them, health care reform has become less about the best reforms and more about what best fits their ‘Washington knows best’ mentality — less about helping patients and more about scoring political points,” he said. “This is no idle observation. I’ve witnessed it firsthand.
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Obama turns up heat for health care overhaul plan

About 5,000 left-wing activists and Palestinians gathered Saturday to protest the eviction of four Palestinian families in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood of East Jerusalem.

Protesters carried Palestinian flags and chanted “Stop the destruction of homes” and “There is no sanctity in an occupied city.”

Despite the heavy police presence, the demonstration has remained peaceful.

For the past six months, a group of independent left-wing activists have demonstrated every Friday in the East Jerusalem neighborhood, protesting the takeover of Palestinian homes by groups of Israeli settlers.

Last week, the demonstrators asked Jerusalem police for permission to hold a large rally in the street leading to a contested house, to protest against the settlers and show solidarity with the Palestinian residents of the neighborhood.

The police refused to authorize the rally and instead approved a much smaller gathering at a soccer field situated 300 meters from the home. The demonstrators said that the field is surrounded by a wall, it cannot be seen from the outside and is entirely cut off from the area near the contested home, which is the main focus of the protest.

Supreme Court justices were highly critical of the Jerusalem police decision this week after they refused the request by demonstrators.

“The police are taking the right to demonstrate 30 years backward,” Supreme Court President Dorit Beinisch said during deliberations.

The justices ruled that 300 demonstrators would be allowed to approach the contested house at the conclusion of the rally.

Jerusalem District police commander, Aharon Franko, was asked to appear before the justices and said that the the contested house is in “one of the most explosive locations.” He explained that “not a day goes by when there are not confrontations, fighting and stone throwing.”

Police said that closing off the street, as the demonstrators would like, would make it difficult for worshippers to make their way to the nearby tomb of Simon the Just (Shimon HaTzadik).

At the start of Saturday’s rally, Palestinian director and playwright Samih Jabarin criticized demonstrators who arrived at the rally carrying Israeli flags with the word “peace” on them, saying the only solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is one bi-national state.

However, one of the rally’s organizers said, “It is important to clarify that we have people of all stripes here, supporters of a bi-national state and supporters of two states for two peoples. But we are all united against the ‘Judaization’ of East Jerusalem.

The Palestinians, who want to make East Jerusalem the capital of a future state, say the property belongs to them.

Some 200 right wing activists held a counter demonstration nearby, although police managed to keep the peace between the two groups of protesters, Israel Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said.

Earlier Saturday, three men were injured in clashes between Palestinians and Israeli soldiers in the northern West Bank village of Burin.

The clashes erupted when soldiers stopped a group of Palestinians trying to approach a Jewish settlement, an Israeli military spokeswoman said.

Palestinians residents said the settlers were trying to bathe in a water cistern in their village.

Palestinians hurled rocks at the soldiers who responded with tear gas and rubber-coated steel pellets.

Tensions have been high in the West Bank since Israel declared last month it would add two contested shrines there to its national heritage list.
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Thousands of protesters rally against Jewish presence in E. Jerusalem

LONDON – Anti-fascist demonstrators scuffled with police Friday in a protest against Dutch politician Geert Wilders, who brought his film denouncing Islam and the Quran to Britain’s august House of Lords.

Wilders, riding an electoral wave in the Netherlands based on his anti-immigration populism, screened the film to about 60 people, including a half-dozen peers, in a wood-paneled committee room in Parliament. Outside dozens of protesters jeered and chanted “Fascist thugs off our streets!”

The visit, and the controversy surrounding it, added to Wilders’ visibility as he heads into a national election campaign with his popularity soaring and polls predicting that his come-from-nowhere Freedom Party will be among the two largest in the next Dutch parliament.

His party scored a stunning success in local elections this week, winning one city outright and placing second in another. But because his party is new and lacks a national organization, it declined to field candidates in nearly 400 other town hall races.

The protest by Unite Against Fascism was countered by a rival demonstration further down the River Thames of more than 100 people from the English Defense League, a self-described “counter-jihad” movement with links to Britain’s far-right.

Police wrestled with anti-fascist protesters trying to block a street in front of the Parliament building, piling many of them into a double decker bus. By early afternoon, police on foot, on horseback and on motorcycles seemed to outnumber the protesters.

Jack Kavanagh, a 21-year-old from Ireland, was one of the people pulled out of the crowd, said he was trying to block the pro-Wilders crowd from approaching Parliament. He expressed scorn for Wilders, calling his movie “racist tripe.”

Wilders had been invited to show his film in Britain a year ago by an ultraconservative member of the upper house, but the Home Office barred his entry into the country as a potential threat to public security. Wilders defied the ban, flew into Heathrow Airport only to be turned back, prompting a minor spat between Britain and the Netherlands.

He later successfully challenged the ban in a British court and visited in October, when he was greeted by a small group of Islamists chanting: “Allahu Akbar!”

Wilders, 46, has denounced the Quran as an “evil book” and a fascist work that should be outlawed, just as Hitler’s manifesto “Mein Kampf” cannot be sold in the Netherlands. He has urged the halting of immigration from Muslim countries, and says Muslims already living in Holland must accept its law, its culture and its way of life — or they should leave.

At a London news conference after the screening, Wilders again described Islam as a “totalitarian ideology” and the prophet Muhammad as a “barbarian, a mass murder and a pedophile.”

He said he had hopes of becoming prime minister after the June 9 election, although Dutch political analysts say it is unlikely he could garner a majority coalition if his party emerged the largest.

If elected, he said, he would close all Islamic schools, ban construction of new mosques, and expel Dutch Muslim criminals if they held dual citizenship.

Wilders’ untempered language against Islam brought charges against him for “hate speech,” a little-enforced crime subject to a maximum one-year jail sentence and fine. He appealed to have the case dismissed, saying his remarks were not against Muslims but rather against Islam, and were protected by freedom of speech. Last month the court ruled against the objection, but is yet to set a trial date.

He has been under permanent police protection since his life was threatened in 2004 by the Muslim radical who killed filmmaker Theo van Gogh. His name was in a note pegged with a knife to van Gogh’s lifeless chest.

Immigration has been a central theme of Dutch politics since 2002, when the maverick political leader Pim Fortuyn raised what had until then been a largely taboo subject. Fortuyn was assassinated by an animal-rights activist before the election.

Wilders describes himself as a libertarian and rejects comparisons with right-wing European politicians such as Jorg Haider in Austria and Jean-Marie Le Pen in France.

He began his political career as a speech writer, town councilman and member of parliament for the centrist pro-business Liberal Party, but left in 2004 over its readiness to accept Turkey into the European Union. His new party won nine seats in the 150-member Dutch parliament in 2006, and polls predict he may triple that number in the June elections.

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Dutch anti-Islam politician creates stir in UK