Is this the final chapter for Jews in France?
It's come to this: The leader of the Jewish community in Marseille, France, has advised his constituents
not to walk around outside with kipot (skullcaps) on their heads.
The president of the Marseille Israelite Consistory, Zvi Ammar, said that it was an "exceptional decision".
"Life is more sacred than anything else. We are now forced to hide a
little bit," he told the AFP, adding that the move made him "sick to the
stomach".
The teacher escaped with only minor injuries. His attacker, aged 15, was caught soon after fleeing and arrested.
The teen later claimed to have been acting in the name of Daesh, the Arabic acronym for the Islamic State group.
“He said several times he was acting in the name of Isis, because
Muslims in France were dishonouring Islam and French soldiers were
protecting Jews,” said Marseille prosecutor Brice Robin.
Also today, a Jewish communal leader in Paris was found
stabbed to death in his apartment.
A Jewish councilman was found dead in his apartment on Tuesday morning,
prompting French media speculation of a racially motivated killing.
Alain
Ghozland of the Parisian suburb of Créteil was found by his brother,
who checked in on the city councillor after he failed to show in
synagogue the previous evening.
While a police source who spoke
with Metro News admitted that it was “too early to know the cause of
death,” Ghozland was reportedly found with stab wounds and bruising. His
apartment appeared to have been ransacked and his car was missing from
its spot outside.
The victim, whose father helped found the local
Jewish cultural association, was active in Jewish affairs and his death
has shaken his coreligionists, according to the French newspaper.
He
was described by the Conseil Représentatif des Institutions Juives de
France (CRIF), the umbrella organization representing French Jewry, as
“a prominent leader of the local Jewish Community.”
“People are upset. They do not know what to think and ask a lot of questions,” one relative was quoted as saying.
And last week marked the
anniversary of the attack on the
Hyper Cacher supermarket in Paris, which was the icing on the cake of a week in which mass murder was committed in the name of Islam at the offices of the satirical magazine
Charlie Hebdo.
Sorry but I don't understand why the flow of immigration from France to Israel isn't a wave. Why would any Jew want to stay there?
Labels: Charlie Hebdo, French anti-Semitism, Islamic terrorism, Marseille, Paris, Paris terror attacks
'Never has the threat been so high'
French Prime Minister Manuel Walls says that
five Islamist attacks have been foiled in France since January's attacks on the Charlie Hebdo office and on a Paris Kosher supermarket.
French police
have thwarted five attacks, including a suspected plan to target
church-goers foiled in recent days, since the Islamist killings at a
satirical weekly and Jewish food shop in January, Prime Minster Manuel
Valls said on Thursday.
"Never has the threat been so
high," Valls told France Inter radio, noting the fact that hundreds of
French nationals were now in Syria where they risked being radicalized.
Valls
was speaking a day after authorities said they had arrested a
24-year-old Algerian national in Paris suspected of the murder of a
woman at the weekend and an aborted plan to launch an armed attack on at
least one church.
These people don't seem to get that first they come for the Jews, but it never ends there.
Labels: Charlie Hebdo, French anti-Semitism, Islamic terrorism, Paris
French soldiers attacked outside Jewish Community Center
Three French soldiers were
attacked by a knife-wielding assailant on Tuesday outside the Jewish Community Center they were guarding in Nice, France (Hat Tip:
Lance K).
Two of the servicemen were injured. Both were treated at the scene. Police sources said the soldiers' lives were not in danger.
President Francois Hollande issued a statement condemning what he
called a "criminal act" and promised the incident would be investigated.
The soldiers were on patrol outside the Jewish center as part of
stepped-up security measures in France following last month's attacks in
Paris on the offices of the Charlie Hebdo satirical magazine and a
kosher grocery that left 20 people dead, including the attackers.
City authorities said that the attacker had an identity card with the
name Moussa Coulibaly. The family name, relatively common among people
of Malian descent, is the same as that of Amedy Coulibaly, who killed a
policeman and four Jewish shoppers in last month's attack on the kosher
grocery in Paris. Police said the two apparently were not related.
According to police, French security services questioned Moussa
Coulibaly after he traveled to Turkey on a one-way ticket in late
January. Turkish police blocked him from traveling along a route used by
jihadi fighters from Europe to join Islamic extremist groups fighting
in Syria and Iraq and returned him to France.
It's not ending.... Time to make aliya while you still have the option.
Labels: Charlie Hebdo, European anti-Semitism, France, French anti-Semitism
'Palestinians' protest Charlie Hebdo, Steimatsky's to sell it in Israel but backed off special event
'Thousands' of 'Palestinians' turned out at protests in Judea and Samaria today. This time, they're protesting the selling of the Mohammed satirizing French magazine
Charlie Hebdo.
Thousands of
Palestinians rallied in the occupied West Bank on Saturday to protest
against the publication of cartoons depicting the Prophet Mohammad in
French satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo.
Simultaneous demonstrations
were held in the cities of Ramallah and Hebron less than three weeks
after Islamist gunmen shot dead 12 people in the Paris office of Charlie
Hebdo, which has repeatedly featured cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad.
...
"France is the mother of terrorism. America is
the mother of terrorism," the protesters chanted. They carried
black-and-white banners which read "There is only one God and Mohammad
is his messenger."
The protests
were called by the Islamist Tahrir Party, which advocates the
establishment of an Islamic Caliphate in Muslim countries.
"We
have taken to the streets in order to demand Muslim armies act the way
France and the West deserve in response to the repeated offences against
the Prophet, peace be upon him," said Baher Saleh, a member of the
party.
Steimatsky's, the largest bookstore chain in Israel, has sold Charlie Hebdo for years, and says that they will continue to do so. But after 'warnings' from an 'Israeli Arab' Knesset member, they have canceled a special event that was planned to promote the current issue, and say that they will
sell it online instead.
Following the threats
and warnings, the book seller backtracked on its decision to hold the
launch event at its flagship store. "Steimatzky decisively supports in
freedom of expression. The company has sold the magazine for years and
will continue to do so. However, the firm has decided the sale of the
specific issue will not occur at a special event in our store, but be
held online starting Monday at 5 pm."
In a letter to the prime minister, [MK Masoud] Ganaim said, "Steimatzky intends
to distribute images which hurt the Prophet Mohammed. This is a very
serious, dangerous, and stupid step. This is not freedom of expression
but a hard hit on the holiest of holies to Muslims, which will bring
about unrest and anger among the Arabs and Muslims in the country… and
no one can predict the results."
The Arab legislator urged the rightwing leader to stop the
distribution of offending magazine. "I hereby appeal to your sense of
honor; please personally intervene to prevent Steimatzky from
distribution the magazine and the damaging images of the Prophet
Mohammed, lest the Israeli government and Steimatzky be responsible for
every consequence."
It will be interesting to see whether the Arabs will try to build on their 'success' to bar the sale of Charlie Hebdo altogether.
Labels: Charlie Hebdo, Islamic terrorism, Israeli Arab
The jihad in France has only just begun
In case anyone thinks that last Sunday's demonstration in Paris means that France is
ready to fight against jihadists....
The event gathered nearly four million people,
but seeing in it a mobilization against terrorism, jihad and
anti-Semitism would be a mistake. Leaders of "anti-Zionist" left-wing
organizations that support Hamas were present. Ministers of states financing jihadist terrorism, and even genocide, were also there.
The Ambassador of Saudi Arabia attended, shortly after his nation had just finished flogging Raif Badawi,
a young Saudi blogger accused of "insulting Islam," with the first
fifty lashes of his sentence of 1000 lashes plus 10 years in prison, for
practicing the most gentle free speech. Badawi is now being flayed
alive -- "very severely," the lashing order said. He has 950 lashes to
go.
Turkey, which hosts part of the leadership of the genocidal Hamas organization, was there. Turkey has also jailed more journalists than any other country, including Iran and China.
Mahmoud Abbas, the president of a Palestinian unity government, which includes Hamas and directly supports jihadist terrorism as well as genocide, was at the forefront -- smiling. Binyamin Netanyahu, Prime Minister of Israel, was initially not invited. He came anyhow.
French officials let him know that he was not welcome and not to speak.
He spoke anyhow. As a sign of disapproval, French officials left the
Grand Synagogue of Paris during the ceremony for the dead Jews, before
Netanyahu's speech.
The President of the populist National Front, Marine Le Pen, was also not included. She is silent. She is sure a coming explosion will happen, and that she will receive more votes.
The slogans in the demonstration spoke of "free speech" and the need
to "live together." Signs saying "I am Charlie" were everywhere. Signs
saying "I am a Jew" ["Je suis Juif"] were rare.
No signs or
slogans mentioned jihad or the need to combat jihad or terrorism: the
watchword was that these subjects should be shunned. No signs or slogan
mentioned anti-Semitism or the real cause of jihadist attacks:
caricatures of Mohammed, considered by Koranic law to be blasphemous.
Those subjects had to be abandoned.
Few French Muslims came -- the tiniest drop in a huge ocean -- and
the television cameras immediately homed in on them. They were
interviewed and stated their only concern: "Avoid stigmatization of the Muslim community!"
Prime Minister Manuel Valls had told journalists he was "afraid" for
Muslims. Two days later -- and only two days later -- on January 13, he said
that "France is at war against terrorism, jihadism and radical Islam."
He added immediately that one of his priorities was to fight mercilessly
against "Islamophobia."
This reminds me of George Bush in the aftermath of 9/11 saying that 'you're either with the terrorists or against them,' while insisting that Islam is a 'religion of peace.' It muddles (and muddies) reality. For those of you who don't get it yet, here's a dose of reality.
Anyone who watches television and sees what is happening in many
Muslim countries has to be doubting that Islam is peaceful. Most Muslim
"experts" invited to speak are familiar with Islam, familiar with the
internet and familiar with what is going on in many Muslim countries --
but they lie. Almost all of them are militants, imams, Muslim scholars.
Most of them are members of Islamic organizations. Many belong to the
French branch of the Muslim Brotherhood, and the French have just
obligingly given them a platform.
The idea that Muslims have to be integrated was discussed many times
-- in vain. The absence of integration has worsened decade after decade.
"Experts" invited to speak about integration were forcefully lying too.
Those who knew the truth and could tell it were kept away.
More than 750 no-go zones exist in the country, all under the sway of gang leaders and radical imams.
More than 60% percent of inmates in French prisons are Muslim.
And future Amedy Coulibalys, Cherif Kouachis, Mohamed Merahs and Mehdi
Nemmouches are radicalized every year before going off to train for
jihad in Syria or Yemen.
Terrorism experts say
that dozens of jihadists are preparing attacks in France alone, and
that more deadly attacks will take place. They stress that many
terrorist sleeper cells exist in the country. France is a country where
gun ownership by ordinary citizens is forbidden. So most people are
powerless against aggressors, as tens of thousands of guns are hidden in
basements.
But to the New York Times, the fact that 60% of the prison population is Muslim has nothing to do with Muslims or Islam.
They're blaming France.
The
profiles of the three attackers — Amedy Coulibaly and the brothers
Chérif and Saïd Kouachi — are an indictment of the decades-long failure
of France to address long-festering alienation and exclusion among too
many Muslim immigrants and their French-born children. Unemployment is
as high as 40 percent among youths
in France’s disadvantaged neighborhoods. All three attackers grew up in
poverty. Chérif Kouachi and Mr. Coulibaly spent time in prison. All
ultimately found deadly purpose in Islamist terrorism.
Prison
was the crucible of their radicalization. There are five million to six
million Muslims in France, less than 10 percent of the total
population, but 60 percent of France’s prison inmates are of “Muslim
culture or religion,” according to a report presented to France’s
National Assembly. It was in prison that Mr. Kouachi and Mr. Coulibaly
met the Qaeda recruiter Djamel Beghal. To stem recruiting by Islamist
extremists in prisons, the government of President François Hollande has
announced it will seek to isolate identified Islamist proselytizers
from other prisoners.
There
is also the problem of France’s secularism. A ban on head scarves in
public schools and on full-face veils feels to many Muslims like an
unfair constraint on their religious freedom. Some also find it hard to
accept that blasphemy is not a crime in France, and that Charlie Hebdo
and other publications have a right to satirize religious leaders. Some
students in French schools with large immigrant and Muslim populations
refused to participate
in the national minute of silence following the Charlie Hebdo attack
because they objected to what they had heard about the magazine’s
depictions of the Prophet Muhammad.
The New York Times objects to blasphemy? That's a good laugh. Too bad they don't object to it when the targets are Jews or Christians - only when they're Muslims.
And if it were only France that had this problem, there might be an argument here. But in country after country across Europe and elsewhere, Muslims have specifically made the effort not to integrate into wider society. They're certainly within their rights to do that. But they then cannot be heard to complain (or to have others complain on their behalf) that they're not being integrated. Because the same thing that is going on in France is going on in England, Belgium, Germany and several other countries.
In the meantime, most French citizens disagree with the high and might New York Times:
French Jews could see on January 11 that Prime Minister Netanyahu was
not welcome, while Abbas and other supporters of jihad were celebrated.
They see how speaking ill of Israel blows through the mainstream media
and feeds increasing Jew-hate. They see the French parliament vote for
the creation of an admittedly genocidal "Palestinian State."
They see that they are unarmed and that the soldiers in the streets
will not be there forever. They see that jihadists are preparing more
attacks. They see no-go zones grow increasingly turbulent. They see what
is happening in prisons. They see that the French justice system gives
short terms to jihadists and releases them quickly. They see that the
government cannot stop mass riots and has no way to prevent more
attacks. They see that if just Jews had been targeted in recent attacks,
no protests would have taken place. Each year they see more Jews leave the country. Seven thousand left for Israel in 2014, and the Jewish Agency for Israel expects 15,000 this year.
The Muslim population is largely silent, except in the heavily-Muslim
suburbs, where those who support Coulibaly and the Kouachi brothers can
speak without risking arrest. Those who speak officially in the name of
the French Muslim community explain that Islam is not the threat, that the real culprits are those who "insult Islam," and that "the main victims" are Muslims.
The rest of the French population is not convinced. Several polls show that more that 70% of the French think Islam is incompatible with democracy and Western civilization; those polls predate the recent attacks.
The only thing everyone agrees on is that this month's terror attacks in France are only the start, and much bigger explosions are coming.
Read the whole thing.
Labels: Charlie Hebdo, France, Islam, Islamic terrorism, Jews, liberal media bias, New York Times
Scared?
Mark Steyn on
this week's Charlie Hebdo cover.
The cover of this week's Charlie Hebdo (right) shows Mohammed
shedding a tear and holding up a "Je suis Charlie" sign under the
headline "Tout est pardonné" - all is forgiven. The illustration is
unclear: Is Mohammed forgiving the secular leftie blasphemers? Or are
the secular lefties forgiving Mohammed and his murderous believers? The Commentator devotes an editorial to the subject, and finds it "a strange cover" symbolic of "western confusion". On the other hand, Paul Berman in The Tablet thinks "uncertainty lends majesty".
When skilled persons who have never shied away from clarity produce a
work whose meaning is unclear, then it is reasonable to assume the
unclearness is itself the meaning. The surviving staff at Charlie Hebdo
have undergone a week of surreal hellishness, in which their senior
colleagues have been murdered for publishing images of Mohammed, and the
world is professing its solidarity and egging them on to prove that nothing has changed. In other words, they're expected to produce new images of Mohammed, which may well get them murdered, too.
...
So, for all the viral hashtags and Helen Mirren wearing a pencil
brooch to the Golden Globes and George Clooney declaring "Je suis
Charlie", what's left of the staff at Charlie Hebdo nevertheless
got the message: You're still on your own. We'll send you a supportive
Tweet, but that's it. Murderous-rage-wise, we'd rather you remained the
focus. Hey, but we're all really looking forward to next week's
controversial cover!
I prefer the fellows who just state upfront that Charlie Hebdo
was asking for it to Dame Helen and untold millions all waving pencils,
and none of 'em with any lead in 'em. Imagine being at the editorial
meeting with the empty chairs, and understanding, even as millions
around the world profess to be your new best friend, that you're still
the lonesomest guy in town.
They did a Mohammed cover because they had to. But it certainly has
an uncharacteristic passivity. And it feels like one for the road.
Read the whole thing. Sadly, I think he's spot-on.
Labels: Charlie Hebdo, freedom of the press, Islamic terrorism, Islamophobia, Mark Steyn
A 'Palestinian' rips Hollande for inviting Abu Mazen
An anonymous 'Palestinian' has written a letter to French President Francois Hollande criticizing Hollande for inviting '
moderate' '
Palestinian' President
Mahmoud Abbas Abu Mazen to participate in this past Sunday's
Paris unity march.
Second, I want to apologize to Your Excellency for not revealing my
true identity. After you read my letter, you will realize why people
like me are afraid to reveal their real identity.
I decided to write to you this letter after hearing my president, Mahmoud Abbas, declare that you had invited him to attend the anti-terror rally in Paris earlier this week.
Like many Palestinians, I see President Abbas's participation
in a rally against terrorism and assaults on freedom of speech as an
act of hypocrisy -- a condition that is not alien to Palestinian
Authority leaders.
In fact, many Palestinians nearly fell off their chairs upon seeing
their president march in the front row of a rally in your capital, in
protest against terrorism and assaults on freedom of the media.
President Abbas's participation in the rally is an insult to the
victims of the terror attacks. It is also an insult to Western values,
including freedom of expression and democracy.
Your Excellency, myself and other journalists living under the rule
of the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank were the first to be
offended by the invitation you extended to President Abbas to attend the
anti-terror rally.
Undoubtedly, you are unaware of the fact that Abbas is personally
responsible for punishing Palestinian journalists who dare to criticize
him or express their views in public. Of course, Your Excellency, we
cannot blame you for being unaware of this assault on public freedoms
because the mainstream media, including French newspapers and magazines,
deliberately turn a blind eye to these practices. Every day we see that
the Western media does not care about such violations unless they are
committed by Israel.
That is why, Your Excellency, you are probably unaware of the cases
of several Palestinian journalists who have been arrested and
intimidated by President Abbas's security forces over the past few
years. Yes, this is the same Abbas who came to Paris to express his
condolences over the brutal killing of the Charlie Hebdo journalists.
The most recent example of Abbas's crackdown on Palestinian
journalists occurred shortly before Your Excellency phoned President
Abbas to invite him to Paris. The case involves my female colleague, Majdolin Hassouneh, who was detained for "extending her tongue," or insulting, President Abbas.
Your Excellency, please allow me to tell you that you are completely
mistaken if you ever thought that President Abbas and his Palestinian
Authority are tolerant toward satire or any form of criticism. And of
course, you haven't heard of the Palestinian Authority's decision to cancel the only popular satirical show on Palestine TV, Watan ala Watar (Country on a String).
The show was forced off the air in 2011 because President Abbas
believed it had "crossed a line" by mocking his top officials in
Ramallah. This is the same Abbas who came to Paris to protest the
massacre at the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo.
...
Undoubtedly, now Palestinians like me will now pay a heavier price
because President Abbas has been emboldened by his participation in the
Paris rally. President Abbas will now step up his assaults on public
freedoms because he knows that the international community will only see
photos of him marching together with Your Excellency and other world
leaders in defense of freedom of expression.
By extending the invitation to President Abbas, you have caused
damage to Palestinians like me who have been hoping that someone --
maybe even a leader like you -- would finally expose the dictatorship of
the Palestinian Authority for what it is. President Abbas's
participation in the Paris rally is a severe blow to people like me who
are genuinely opposed to terrorism and suppression of free speech.
Your Excellency, now that the damage has already been done, all that
is left for people like me is to beg you to take all what I have said
into account in your future dealings with President Abbas. Please do not
hesitate to raise these issues with President Abbas the next time he
requests your support for the creation of an independent Palestinian
state. Otherwise, France will be helping to establish another corrupt
and repressive Arab dictatorship -- one that glorifies and rewards
terrorists no different from those who carried out the Paris attacks.
Finally, Your Excellency, I hope that by now you understand the reason why I am too scared to reveal my identity.
Sincerely,
A Palestinian Journalist with No Name or Voice
Read the whole thing. If only the West would listen....
Labels: Abu Mazen, Charlie Hebdo, France, Francois Hollande, freedom of the press, human rights, Islamic terrorism, Palestinian Authority, Paris
French Prime Minister Manuel Valls blasts anti-Semitism
French Prime Minister Manuel Valls made a blistering speech to his country's national assembly on Tuesday, in which he blasted his countrymen's lack of response to anti-Semitism, vowed to fight jihad, and even took on France's anti-Semitic comedian Dieudonne.
Here's one English translation video I managed to find.
Let's go to the videotape.
And here are some more
highlights.
In his speech, Valls was explicit that the “first question that has
to be dealt with clearly is the struggle against antisemitism.”
“History has taught us that the awakening of antisemitism is the
symptom of a crisis for democracy and of a crisis for the Republic. That
is why we must respond with force,” Valls said. Recalling a series of
antisemitic outrages in France in recent years, such as the abduction,
torture and murder of the young Parisian Jew Ilan Halimi in 2006, the
murder of three small children and a rabbi by an Islamist gunman at a
Jewish school in Toulouse in 2012, and the rape of a young Jewish woman
during an antisemitic assault on a Jewish home in the Paris suburb of
Creteil in December 2014, Valls asserted that these and other incidents
“did not not produce the national outrage that our Jewish compatriots
expected.”
“How can we accept that in France, where the Jews were emancipated
two centuries ago, but which was also where they were martyred [during
the Nazi Holocaust] 70 years ago, that cries of ‘death to the Jews’ can
be heard on the streets?” Valls asked, the indignation in his voice
steadily rising. “How can we accept that French people can be murdered
for being Jews? How can we accept that compatriots, or a Tunisian
citizen whose father sent him to France so that he would be safe, is
killed when he goes out to buy his bread for Shabbat?”
Valls observed that there “is a historical antisemitism that goes
back centuries.” But, he added, “there is also a new antisemitism that
is born in our neighborhoods, coming through the internet, satellite
dishes, against the backdrop of loathing of the State of Israel, which
advocates hatred of the Jews and all the Jews.”
Implored the French Prime Minister: “It has to be spelled out – the
right words must be used to fight this unacceptable antisemitism.”
Valls emphasized an additional point that he has made repeatedly over
the last few days: that a France shorn of its Jewish community would no
longer be France. “This is the message we have to communicate loud and
clear,” he said. “How can we accept that in certain schools and colleges
the Holocaust can’t be taught? How can we accept that when a child is
asked, ‘who is your enemy,’ the response is ‘the Jew?’ When the Jews of
France are attacked, France is attacked, the conscience of humanity is
attacked. Let us never forget that.”
The speech was also an opportunity for Valls to directly confront
Dieudonné M’Bala M’bala, the anti-Semitic French provocateur infamous
for devising the “quenelle,” an inverted Nazi salute, as well as for his
frequent mocking of the Holocaust. Yesterday, the French authorities
confirmed that Dieudonné, along with 53 other defendants, had been
arrested for offenses including hate speech, antisemitism, and
glorifying terrorism.
Refusing to mention the self-styled comedian by name, Valls spoke of
“the indignity of a serial hater having a full house on Saturday night,
when the country was mourning for what happened [at the HyperCacher
market] in Porte de Vincennes.” As the National Assembly rose in a
standing ovation for the Prime Minister, Valls thundered, “Let us never
pass over these matters in silence, and let justice be implacable with
those who preach hate. And I say that emphatically here at the National
Assembly.”
Too late?
Labels: Charlie Hebdo, Dieudonne, European Jews, France, French anti-Semitism, Islamic terrorism, Manuel Valls
Paris terror cell had 8-10 members, international flavor
Said and Cherif Kouachi, the two terrorists who carried out the Charlie Hebdo terror attack in Paris, and Amedy Coulibaly, who murdered a police officer during the week, and four Jews at the Hyper Cacher supermarket on Friday afternoon, were part of an
8-10 member terror cell that had an international flavor.
Here is what has been reported so far from the investigation and by witnesses interviewed by police and the media:
--
Said and Cherif Kouachi carried out the attack on the magazine shortly
before noon Jan. 7 after forcing a cartoonist arriving for a staff
meeting to open the ground-floor entrance with her security key card.
The brothers -- hooded, clad in black and carrying assault rifles --
proceeded to the editor's office and methodically shot and killed editor
Stephane Charbonnier, his police bodyguard and seven staffers. A
visitor to the office, a maintenance man and a police guard at the
entrance were also killed.
-- Said Kouachi, 34, had traveled to Yemen in 2011 for weapons training
by militants of the Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula affiliate, or
AQAP. Cherif Kouachi, 32, had been radicalized in prison while serving
time for a 2008 conviction on terrorism-related charges for recruiting
fighters for the insurgency against U.S. forces in Iraq. The younger
Kouachi met the third gunman involved in last week's terror spree, Amedy
Coulibaly, while in jail after his initial arrest in the recruitment
case in 2005, the Associated Press reported.
-- The three gunmen slain in police operations on Friday were known to
international security monitors and were all on the U.S. and British
no-fly lists that bar air travel by suspected terrorists. The Kouachi
brothers told bystanders at the magazine attack that they were aligned
with AQAP and Coulibaly can be seen pledging allegiance to the Islamic
State extremist group in a video that surfaced on the Internet after his
death.
-- Said Kouachi returned from Yemen in 2011 with $20,000 provided by
AQAP to help finance the attacks carried out last week, CBS News
reported Tuesday. French police union spokesman Christophe Crepin told
journalists in Paris that an international hunt is on for several
suspects in the funding of the operations.
-- Coulibaly, 32, shot
and killed a policewoman in the Montrouge area of Paris a day after the
magazine attack and set off a car bomb in Villejuif in an attempt to
divert security forces searching for the Kouachi brothers, the AP said
it was told by a French police source.
-- The brothers and Coulibaly belonged to a terror cell that
consisted of eight to 10 members, including Coulibaly's companion,
26-year-old Hayat Boumeddiene. She and at least five other suspected
accomplices may still be at large, police told the AP.
-- Turkish
authorities have disclosed that Boumeddiene appears to have traveled to
Istanbul on Jan. 1 and crossed into Syria ahead of the terrorist
strikes. Police were searching around Paris on Tuesday for a Mini Cooper
registered to Boumeddiene.
-- A Frenchman of Haitian origin,
Fritz Jolie Joaquin, was taken into custody in Bulgaria on Jan. 1 as he
attempted to cross into Turkey at the Kapitan Andreevo border crossing, a
prosecutor in the Bulgarian capital, Sofia, reported Monday. European
authorities issued an arrest warrant for Joaquin, 28, on Monday in
connection with reports he kidnapped his 3-year-old son and was
intending to travel to Syria. Police have said they believe Joaquin is a
relative of the Kouachi brothers.
There's more.
Read the whole thing.
Labels: al-Qaeda, Charlie Hebdo, France, Islamic terrorism, Paris
MSNBC surprised at White House refusal to call Paris terror attacks 'Islamic extremism'
I don't know why anyone should be surprised at this - it's completely consistent with the Obama administration's pandering approach to anything Islam.
But on MSNBC's Morning Joe they're surprised.
Let's go to the videotape.
Summary
here.
Labels: Barack Hussein Obama, Charlie Hebdo, France, Islam, Islamic anti-Semitism, Islamic terrorism, Obama's friends, Paris
Al-Qaeda in Yemen takes responsibility for Charlie Hebdo attack
Al-Qaeda in Yemen has taken responsibility for the terror attack on the offices of
Charlie Hebdo in Paris last week.
Al Qaeda in Yemen
claimed responsibility for the attack on French satirical newspaper
Charlie Hebdo, saying it was for insulting the Prophet Mohammad,
according to a video posted on YouTube.
"As for the blessed Battle of
Paris, we, the Organisation of al Qaeda al Jihad in the Arabian
Peninsula, claim responsibility for this operation as vengeance for the
Messenger of God," said Nasser bin Ali al-Ansi of the Yemeni branch of
al Qaeda (AQAP) in the recording.
Don't hold your breath waiting for someone to come after them like George Bush went after Osama Bin Laden after the World Trade Center attack. It won't happen.
Labels: al-Qaeda, Charlie Hebdo, France, Islamic terrorism, Paris
Why is this religion different than all the other religions?
I'm sure you've all noticed that the media treat Muslims differently than anyone else. Daniel Greenfield points out that as soon as there's a Muslim terror attack (is there any other kind?), the media immediately trots out '
fear of an anti-Muslim backlash' stories.
The massacre at Charlie Hebdo was quickly followed by a massacre at a
kosher supermarket and somewhere in between them the Islamic State in
Nigeria had wiped out the populations of sixteen villages.
With so many Muslim attacks crowded together, the media had no choice
but to take a deep breath and dive in with its “Muslim backlash”
stories.
The Voice of America ran its “Muslims fear backlash” piece while the
bodies were still warm. The Los Angeles Times rushed out its “Muslims
fear backlash” story before the Kosher supermarket massacre. It quoted
the Muslim spokesman for the National Observatory Against Islamophobia
asserting that it is Muslims who suffer after such attacks. Muslims
however weren’t the ones who suffered. The four dead Jews at a Kosher
supermarket did the suffering at the hands of a Muslim gunman.
While Muslim murderers were still prowling France for victims, the
media was making the story about the perpetrators, not the victims.
...
Is it really a backlash that Muslims fear or a moral reckoning?
In the rush to make bigots like Walid the victims, instead of the
actual men and women being murdered in the name of his violent ideology,
the hard questions about the connection between the historical Islamic
anti-Semitism bandied about by Dawud Walid and the modern massacres of
Jews go unasked.
...
The root cause of Islamic violence is Islam. Everything else, from poverty to YouTube videos, is subsidiary at best.
The cries of “Islamophobia” and the claims of a backlash silence the
victims of Muslim terror and encourage social blindness to the next
Muslim attack against Jews, Christians, Atheists, Hindus, Buddhists and
countless others.
The Muslim backlash story is a great media tradition that dates back
to at least September 11. While the streets of downtown Manhattan were
still streaked with the ashes of the dead, the media began running
stories about Muslims who were changing their clothes and putting up
American flags out of fear that the maddened patriotic rabble would
shortly begin massacring Muslims.
The mass anti-Muslim riots after September 11 never materialized;
just as they never materialized after the Sydney Siege in Australia or
the latest Muslim massacres in France.
...
It is that sense of self-pitying Muslim victimization that leads easily
to Muslim violence. Violence is often sanctioned by victimhood. That
Muslims believe themselves to be the victims is nothing new. The Nazis
also believed that they were the victims. So did the Muslim killer in a
Kosher supermarket who claimed that ISIS, with its mass rapes and
genocidal campaign, was the victim of French intervention.
Why does the media treat Islam differently? Dennis Prager says it's
political correctness.
Why did the Muslim terrorists go to a Jewish grocery? This is not a
riddle. We all know. But some in the media pretended they didn’t. During
the attack, a reporter for Sky News, one of the largest
English-language news services in the world, said on Fox News: “Whether
it was targeted specifically for its religious connotations it is
difficult to know.”
Is there one reader of this column who thought it “difficult to know” whether the Muslim terrorists targeted a Jewish grocery? Why would someone presumably intelligent say something so obviously stupid? In order to protect Islam.
Just
as so many in the media and government did after Major Nidal Hasan’s
murder of 13 fellow soldiers at Fort Hood. They found it difficult to
ascertain if religion was a factor in his murders, despite his yelling
“Allahu akbar” while shooting, despite his listing himself as a “Soldier
of Allah” on his Facebook page, and despite many other affirmations of
Islamism.
A New York Times writer blamed it on Major
Hasan’s “snapping” (in an article titled “When Soldiers Snap”). Chris
Matthews said “it’s unclear if religion was a factor in this shooting.”
NPR correspondent Tom Gjelten explained that Hasan, though never in
combat, may have suffered from “pre-traumatic stress disorder.”
And the U.S. Department of Defense classified the Fort Hood shootings
as acts of “workplace violence,” not terror, let alone Islamic terror.
Perhaps
the most egregious example of a society’s elites treating Islam
differently from all other religions took place in the U.K. Between 1997
and 2013, at least 1,400 girls, as young as eleven years old, in the
small English city of Rotherham (population 275,000), were repeatedly
gang-raped and treated as sex slaves. The U.K. government acknowledged
that these atrocities were allowed to go on due to the fact the
perpetrators were British Pakistanis and the girls were white. No one
was allowed to say that at the time. The author of a 2002 report
identifying Pakistanis as the perpetrators and organizers of the
Rotherham gang rapes and sex slavery was sent to diversity training.
Finally, why won’t the New York Times print even one Charlie Hebdo
cartoon? Twelve people were slaughtered over those cartoons; are the
caricatures not newsworthy? Of course they are. But they satirize Islam,
and that is not allowed.
Here’s the ultimate irony. These PC professors and news media who treat
Islam so much better than any other religion are literally Islamophobic.
They really fear Islam.
But what is it they fear about Islam? Is it just the violence? No. It's the fact that Islam proves over and over again that learning to empathize with the 'other' doesn't make them change their behavior. That means that the conflict between Islam and non-Islamic society cannot be resolved. The PC media elites (and the Left) cannot admit that there is any problem in society that they cannot resolve.
Labels: anti-Islamic backlash, Charlie Hebdo, France, Islam, Islamic terrorism, Islamophobia, mainstream media, Paris, political correctness
WaPo prints Charlie Hebdo cover
You have to give credit to the mainstream media where credit is due. The Washington Post has
printed the cover of the Charlie Hebdo magazine which will be released on Wednesday.
The Charlie Hebdo cover — in which a tearful caricature of Muhammad
is shown below the phrase “Tout est pardonné,” or “All is forgiven” — was posted Monday night in Comic Riffs,
a Post blog. The cover cartoon shows the turbaned, bearded figure
holding a sign saying “Je suis Charlie,” or “I am Charlie,” the global
rallying cry following an attack on the French publication last week
that left 12 dead in Paris.
Washington Post Executive Editor
Martin Baron approved publication of the image on The Post’s blog and in
the newspaper. It is apparently the first time a Muhammad depiction has
appeared in The Post’s news columns. Baron said last week that
the paper’s policy was to avoid publication of material that is
“deliberately” offensive to religious groups but said Monday that the
new Charlie Hebdo cartoon did not meet that criterion.
“We’ve
never maintained that simply publishing an image of Muhammad itself was
offensive,” Baron said. “Our policy has been to avoid publication of
material that is pointedly, deliberately or needlessly offensive to
members of religious groups. That remains our policy, but this doesn’t
fall into that category.”
Charlie Hebdo’s attorney, Richard
Malka, told a French radio station that the new issue — to be published
Wednesday — would contain images of Muhammad. “We will not give in,” he
said. ‘The spirit of ‘Je suis Charlie’ means the right to blaspheme.”
Read the whole thing.
Meanwhile, the London Telegraph has published the ravings of Islamist preacher Anjem Chaudhary who called the Charlie Hebdo cover '
an act of war.'
Any image of Mohammed is considered blasphemous by Muslims, and Anjem
Choudary, an extremist preacher, described the latest Charlie Hebdo as “an
act of war”.
He said: “I'm sure there's someone somewhere who will take the law into his
own hands. It's inevitable.”
Mr Choudary, a lecturer in Shariah law who was arrested and bailed in
September as part of an investigation into Islamist terrorism, said the
magazine’s publishers “know exactly what they're doing and they know the
reaction of the Muslims. It's blatant provocation.
“It’s not just a cartoon…it's insulting, it's ridiculing, it's provoking. I
think it's an act of war, quite frankly.”
What could go wrong?
Labels: Charlie Hebdo, Eurabia, Islamic terrorism, Londonistan
The first thing we do: We blame the Jews
I suppose this was inevitable. The Daily Beast is reporting that Muslims interviewed in the Paris suburbs, and in the 19th arondissement where the Kouachi brothers live, are
blaming the Jews for last week's terror attacks.This is from the Daily Beast.
But even though the flags of Algeria, Morocco, and Tunisia were
flying at the rally in Place de la République and Muslims were well
represented among the marchers Sunday, Boular said the attacks in Paris
were part of a plot masterminded by Jewish conspirators.
“The Kalashnikovs, the identity cards the [killers] supposedly left
behind, it was all staged,” said Boular, as his friends nodded in
agreement. “It was a conspiracy designed by the Jews to make Muslims
look bad. We’d rather just stay where we are.”
No use arguing. No
use pointing out that one of the terrorists murdered four Jews.
Conspiracy theories have their own unassailable logic, and this is a
world apart from the displays of unity in Paris after the carnage of
last week. French newspapers reported that some students in these
neighborhoods—as well as other heavily Muslim areas near cities like
Lille—refused to participate
in Thursday’s national moment of silence for the victims of the terror
attacks. One teacher said up to 80 percent of his students didn’t want
to observe the silence, and some said they supported the attackers. “You
reap what you sow,” a student who refused the moment of silence told
his teacher in reference to the terrorists’ victims, according to Le Figaro.
...
Another young man of French-Algerian descent interviewed outside a
gas station in the Saint-Denis suburb reacted angrily to a reporter’s
presence and demanded to know her religion. “The worst thing is to be
atheist,” he said.
The man, who gave his named as “Mohamed,” also
said he was a devout Muslim but then changed his demeanor and added,
grinning, that he was also “a delinquent.” Then he said he was a drug
dealer and without prompting, invited the reporter into the (also very
clean) gas station to show an array of hashish for sale in broad
daylight on a shelf next to the ATM.
He also called the Paris terrorist attacks “un complot,”
or conspiracy, and launched into a lengthy explanation of the “magical
Jews” behind it. They were not ordinary Jews, he said, but a “hybrid
race of shape shifters” who have extraordinary abilities. “They know how
to get in everywhere,” he said. “They are master manipulators.”
What might be the scariest part about this story is the fact that most of those interviewed are second and third generation immigrants. Apparently, living in the West has had absolutely no influence on their thought processes. I know that there's a lot of anti-Semitism in France, but I find it hard to believe that most Frenchmen would even seriously consider the possibility that last week's events were brought about by a 'Jewish conspiracy.'
Labels: Charlie Hebdo, conspiracy theories, France, Islamic anti-Semitism, Islamic terrorism, Paris
LeMonde finds a sense of humor
They found something else too. I wonder how many other important mainstream media outlets are going to publish anything from Charlie Hebdo. Hint: The New York Times won't.
Neither did CNN (Hat Tip:
Hot Air).
Labels: Charlie Hebdo, CNN, Islamic terrorism, mainstream media, New York Times
Wednesday's Charlie Hebdo: A million copies and more Mohammed cartoons
Charlie Hebdo is publishing a new magazine on Wednesday. More than one million copies will be distributed (I think I saw somewhere that their normal run is 45,000) and it will feature
cartoons of Mohammed (Hat Tip:
Memeorandum).
The next edition of Charlie Hebdo, out on Wednesday with a million-copy print
run, will "naturally" contain cartoons of Prophet Mohammed, along
with jibes against politicians and religions across the board, said the
stricken weekly's lawyer.
Richard Malka was among the first to call for the magazine to continue
functioning after nine of its contributors, including famed cartoonists Cabu
and Wolinski and its publishing director, Charb, were gunned down last
Wednesday by Chérif and Saïd Kouachi.
When asked whether that meant more cartoons of Mohammed, which have been a
regular feature in the magazine until last Wednesday's attack, he replied: "Naturally."
"We will not give in otherwise all this won't have meant anything,"
he told France Info radio on Monday, which broadcast from the magazine's
heavily guarded temporary offices at Libération newspaper.
"Humour without self-deprecation isn't humour. We mock ourselves,
politicians, religions, it's a state of mind you need to have."
"The Charlie state of mind is the right to blaspheme," he went on.
The magazine will be translated into 16 languages. Wow.
Labels: Charlie Hebdo, Islamic terrorism, Mohamed
Holder: US 'still doesn't know' which group behind Paris attack
Eric Holder, the moron President Hussein Obama sent to Paris as the US representative in Sunday's mass march, told CNN on Sunday that the United States '
still doesn't know' what group is behind the Paris attack.
Attorney
General Eric Holder said Sunday that "we don't have any credible
information" yet on whether a terrorism organization sponsored the
attack in Paris -- and if so, which one.
Al
Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, which Holder said "remains the most
dangerous of the al Qaeda cells," has claimed responsibility for the
attack on the satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo.
...
"We don't have any credible information, at least of yet, to indicate
who was responsible -- who sponsored this act. That is clearly one of
the things that we have to make a determination of," he said.
Because Muslims never commit terror attacks? What could go wrong?
Labels: al-Qaeda, Charlie Hebdo, Eric Holder, Islamic terrorism, morons, Paris
Obama: 'I want the people of France to know the US stands with you... on the golf course'
No further comment needed. But in case you're wondering how Abu Bluff got into the front row (on your right):
Labels: Barack Hussein Obama, Charlie Hebdo, France, golf, Islamic terrorism, Paris
German newspaper firebombed for running Charlie Hebdo cartoons
The German newspaper Hamburger Morgenpost was
firebombed overnight for running Charlie Hebdo cartoons (Hat Tip:
Memeorandum).
With security services on high
alert after a killing spree in Paris by Islamic extremists, police in
the northern German port city of Hamburg said no one was injured in the
blaze at the headquarters of the regional daily Hamburger Morgenpost,
which caused only slight damage.
"Rocks and then a burning object were thrown through the window," a police spokesman told AFP.
"Two rooms on lower floors were damaged but the fire was put out quickly."
The
Hamburger Morgenpost, known locally as the MOPO, had splashed the
Charlie Hebdo cartoons on its front page after the massacre at the Paris
publication, running the headline "This much freedom must be possible!"
So is the world standing up to radical Islam in Paris today? Not really. Today's march is all about shows and symbolism. Really standing up would require acknowledging that for many Muslims, Islam is nothing but a cult that justifies murder.
And for those who have forgotten, three of the 9/11 hijackers, including leader Mohamed Atta, came from Hamburg.
Labels: Charlie Hebdo, France, Germany, Hamburg, Islam, Islamic terrorism, Paris
