Week in Review

DoctorZin provides a review of this past week's [8/07-8/13] major news events regarding Iran. (The reports are listed in chronological order, not by importance)

Iran's Nuclear Program.

• Reuters reported that Iran is not worried about being referred to the UN Security Council.
• Iranian blogger, Windsteed, Iran Hopes discussed recent arguments in the Iranian press that Iran is no longer a bound to the Non-proliferation Treaty.
• The Sunday Times UKreported that Iran signaled a confrontation with the West yesterday by rejecting the European Union's offer.
• The International Herald Tribune reported that Iran on Sunday reiterated plans to resume uranium conversion this week, possibly as soon as Monday.
• The Times UK reported Iran Nuclear Plant restarts processing Uranium.
• Dow Jones Newswires reported that Germany urged Iran to consider carefully European Union proposals and to avoid "miscalculations" of its interests.
• The Telegraph UK reported that Iran must be forced to give up nuclear weapons.
• Tehran Times reported that Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani said Iran is in a powerful position in view of its resources, geographical location and scientific capability; this power should be introduced to the people and those who favor the Islamic Revolution worldwide.
• Arutz Sheva reported that Prime Minister Ariel Sharon stated the security of the nation and its citizens remains of paramount importance and we cannot permit situations to reach the red line. We must take into consideration the recent developments in Iran, he added.
• Reuters reported that Iran, a signatory of the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), would drop all its international nuclear pledges if its atomic facilities were attacked.
• Reuters reported that U.N. inspectors have arrived at a uranium conversion plant in Iran to install surveillance equipment and oversee the removal of seals as Tehran prepared to resume work there.
• The Telegraph UK reported that Britain formally protested to Iran over the smuggling of sophisticated explosives into Iraq.
• Chicago Sun Times reported that the White House won't seek sanctions for Iran -- yet.
• Reuters reported on Iran's unsealing of parts of an uranium processing plant.
• The Financial Times reported that Iran and the main western powers stepped back from an immediate confrontation over Tehran’s nuclear program.
• The Times UK reported on the response by the U.S. and EU3 to Iran's hardline position on the nuclear deal.
• The Washington Post in an editorial said, Now there is no further room for obfuscation, and no further reason to give Iranians the benefit of the doubt: The real aim of the Iranian nuclear program is nuclear weapons, not electric power.
• The Wall Street Journal reported that the nuclear talks have hit an impasse with both Iran and North Korea and the Bush administration officials hope their willingness to take negotiations this far has won new credibility.
• International Herald Tribune reported that the EU3 were close to obtaining consensus for a resolution at the United Nations nuclear agency that would place a September deadline for Iran to resume suspension of its nuclear program.
• The Sun Times reported that Iran resumed full operations at its uranium conversion plant Wednesday, as Europe and the United States struggled to find a way to stop the Islamic republic.
• The Washington Times reported that U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan urged Iranian and European negotiators to avoid escalating the impasse over Tehran's nuclear program.
• Reuters reported that a draft resolution submitted to the U.N. nuclear watchdog says Iran must resume the full suspension of all nuclear fuel related activities.
• The Washington Post reported Iran rejects IAEA's call to suspend nuclear work.
• BBC News reported that the situation with Iran is more a case of crisis delayed rather than crisis averted.
• Politics.co.uk reported the British Foreign Office has once again urged Iran to suspend its uranium conversion activity and return to the negotiating table.
• Reuters reported French Foreign Minister Philippe Douste-Blazy said on Friday that negotiations were still possible with Iran.
• The Guardian reported that the IAEA Resolution is a poor outcome for EU diplomacy toward.
• IranMania published the text of resolution by IAEA on Iran's nuclear plan.
• Islamic Republic News Agency reported that Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani on Friday dismissed the resolution of the IAEA Board of Governors on Iran's peaceful nuclear program as very tyrannical.
• Xinhuanet reported that four more inspectors from the IAEA arrived in Iran to monitor Iran's nuclear activities.
• MosNews reported Moscow supported the decision of the IAEA, urging Iran to resume its moratorium on nuclear fuel production.
• The Associated Press reported that the Iranians are pushing ahead on the construction of a heavy-water reactor.
  

Akbar Ganji's hunger strike: Nearing the end.

• Reuters reported that Shirin Ebadi urged her client, dissident journalist Akbar Ganji, to end a 58-day-old hunger strike.
• Eli Lake, The NY Sun reported on Ganji's transformation from revolutionary to dissident.
• Reuters reported on Iranian dissident Ganji is still on hunger strike.
• Max Boot, LA Times said Ganji deserves to become as famous as Nelson Mandela, Andrei Sakharov, Vaclav Havel, Aung San Suu Kyi and other dissidents who put their lives on the line against injustice.
• Reuters reported that dissident Iranian journalist Akbar Ganji has broken his eight-week-old hunger strike. Later denied by other new reports.
• The Boston Globe reported that Iranian journalist Akbar Ganji has been on a hunger strike for the past 62 days and the ultraconservatives are trying to manipulate the international news media.
• Reporters Without Borders reported that six more Nobel laureates have called for the immediate and unconditional release of Iranian journalist Akbar Ganji.
• ReleaseGanji.net published Ganji's wife statements after her house was stormed by Iranian security forces.
• Reuters reported that around 250 supporters of Akbar Ganji, the Iranian dissident journalist who has been on hunger strike for 63 days, held a peaceful protest at the hospital.
• IranMania.com reported that the wife of leading Iranian dissident Akbar Ganji pleaded to be allowed to see him on his hunger strike for a 64th day.
• BBC News reported that German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder has warned the US to back away from the possibility of military action against Iran.
  

The unrest against the regime spreads in Iran.

• Reuters reported that two people have been killed, eight injured and 145 arrested in unrest among the Kurds of western Iran.
• Iran Focus, an MEK website, reported that Iran's State Security Forces have been on heightened alert on Sunday in the Kurdish town of Bukan.
• SMCCDI reported on the general strike has started to paralyze northwestern Iran.
• KurdishMedia reported on the escalating crisis in Iran’s north-west Kurdish regions that has left at least 20 dead and numerous wounded and imprisoned.
• SMCCDI reported that a bank was set ablaze, with a Molotov Cocktail, in the central City of Abadeh located near Shiraz.
• SMCCDI reported new clashes in northwestern Iranian cities, saying scattered but violent clashes opposed some of the Sannandaji and Mahabadis residents.
• Iranian Students News Agency reported that many female teachers blocked the streets leading to the Islamic Parliament in a protest. SMCCDI also published a report.
• Reporters Without Borders condemned the current crackdown on Iran's Kurdish journalists.
• SMCCDI reported tens of inmates have been injured during a riot at the Abadan penitentiary located in southwest Iran.
• SMCCDI reported scattered and violent clashes rocked, today, several areas of the northwestern City of Oroomiah.
• Iran Focus reported on clashes in Iran’s holy city of Qom.
• The NY Times reported the unrest in Iran's Kurdish region has left 17 dead; hundreds wounded.
• Rancher, RedState.org said in light of Bush's promise to stand with the Iranian people, Don't the Kurds in Iran count as Iranian people?
• Iran Focus reported that more than a dozen protestors arrested in Ahwaz, southern Iran, during a demonstration in July were sentenced to serve prison time and will be flogged in public.
  

Increasing violence inside of Iran.

• Gooya News reported that the infamous Judge Mortezavi was threatened with death.
• SMCCDI reported that an Islamist judge was able to escape from an ambush Sunday night in northern Tehran. Fazli-Nejad who's known for his role in crackdown on Iranian bloggers was on his way home when he was attacked by armed assailants.
• SMCCDI reported a heavy explosion rocked parts of southern Tehran.

Ahmadinejad becomes President.

• Payvand News reported that Iran's Foreign Ministry Spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi told the U.S. not to make a "big mistake" by denying visa to Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
• Iran Focus, an MEK website, reported that women will not be included in the cabinet of Iran‚’s new hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
• Yahoo News reported that Iran's new president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, called for closer cooperation with Syria in the face of pressure on both countries from the United States.
• Islamic Republic News Agency reported that Ali Larijani is to become the new Supreme National Security Council (SNSC) Secretary.
• Reuters reported that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Tuesday he had new ideas to resolve its nuclear standoff with the West and was ready to continue talks with the European Union.
• San Francisco Chronicle reported Bush saying that Iran's new president will likely come to N.Y.
• Iranian blogger, Mehrdad Sheibani, Rooz Online reported that the Iranian Parliament has a constitution reform bill to consolidate power in a few appointed centers.
• Petition to President George W. Bush: Denouncing Ahmadinejad's U.N. Visit.
• CNN claimed a CIA report has determined with "relative certainty" that Iran's new president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, was not involved in the taking of U.S. hostages.
• Iranian blog Rooz Online reports that many political leaders are refusing to join the Ahmadinejad administration, including Rafsanjani's sons.
  

Iran's Troublemaking.

• Axis Information and Analysis reported that despite the menacing statements by the confidant of the new Iranian President, it is unlikely that Tehran will attack Baku.
• CNN News reported that Donald Rumsfeld said the weapons recently confiscated in Iraq were clearly, unambiguously from Iran.
• Dow Jones Newswires reported that the U.K. has lodged a complaint with the Iranian government after bomb-making supplies were smuggled over the Iranian border into Iraq.
• Patrick Devenny, FrontPageMagazine applauds the mainstream media have finally begun to highlight the role played by Iran in fueling the insurgency in Iraq.
• The Guardian UK reported Britain yesterday described as "unacceptable" the smuggling of weapons from Iran into Iraq.

U.S. Policy on Iran.

• CBS reported that President Bush had a meeting with his defense and foreign policy teams on Thursday at his ranch and discussed Iran.
• BBC News reported that US President George W Bush said he still has not ruled out the option of using force against Iran, after it resumed work on its nuclear program.

The Iranian Military.

• EurasiaNet provided a briefing on the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) and its expanding role in Ahmadinejad's government.
• The Jerusalem Post reported that Iran said it has improved the range and accuracy of its Shihab-3 missile, saying the weapon can strike targets as far away as 2,000 kilometers with an accuracy of within one meter.
• Rooz Online published the words of admiral Ali Shamkhani in his farewell address as he leaves the Department of Defense. The words of 1979 put the priority on the deprived while its foreign manifestation is the challenging the bullies.

Human Rights/Freedom of the press inside of Iran.

• World Peace Herald reported on the U.S. Helsinki Commission, which just held a hearing titled, "The Iran Crisis: A Transatlantic Response."
• Iranian blogger, Omid Memarian, Rooz Online discusses the new administration's war on the NGO's.
• Iranian blog Rooz Online reported that Iranian lawyers are threatening a protest.

Iran and the International community.

• Kuwait News Agency reported on the visit Sunday of Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad to Tehran saying it is of great importance.
• The Telegraph UK reported that Israel is preparing to deal with Iran's N-plants, if need be.
  

Must Read reports.

• Canada Free Press took issue with Jimmy Carter's statements against U.S. policy and reminded us of his contribution to our current problems with Iran.
• The Washington Times in an editorial, discussed The Washington Post's dubious slant on Iran.
• Rooz Online reported that Ansar-e Hezbollah called for a slaughter the Iranian opposition.
• Caroline Glick, The Jerusalem Post delivered sobering evidence that the U.S. is retreating in the war on terror.
• Ilan Berman, The Wall Street Journal reported that Ukraine's government is heading into dangerous diplomatic waters in a deal with Iran.
• Stefania Lapenna, Tech Central Station writes that Iran is ripe for revolution, but the regime has so far succeeded in diverting the world's attention from this.
• Iranian blog, Rooz Online remembers that Ayatollah Khomeini once told of a fable that they see parallels to Iran's current regime.

The Experts.

• Amir Taheri, The NY Post reported that the row over Iran's alleged nuclear ambitions is not the cause of the current tension in relations between Iran and the major Western powers. The real cause is that Iran intends to reshape the Middle East.
• Amir Taheri, The NY Post takes a serious look at Ayman al-Zawahiri's latest message.
• Victor Davis Hanson reminds us that we need to listen to the words of radical Islamists. He quotes them directly and lets them speak for themselves.
  

Photos and cartoons of the week.

• Rooz Online a cartoon: Big chair or small president.
• Rooz Online a cartoon: the nuclear pressure on the new president.
• Rooz Online a cartoon: on situation of journalists in Iran today.
• Cox & Forkum's cartoon on recent Iranian nuclear crisis, Table for None.
• Farsnews photos of Iranian workers gathered in front of Majles to voice their anger on mistreatment of workers and low salaries.
• Rooz Online photo's of hundreds of Ganji supporters outside his hospital.
• Cox & Forkum cartoon on Iran's nuclear crisis.
  

And finally, The Quote of the Week.

MemriTV.org reported that the Chief Iranian negotiator, Hosein Musavian, said:

The negotiations with Europe bought us time to complete the Esfahan UCF Project.

Saturday's Daily Briefing on Iran

DoctorZin reports, 8.13.2005:

Unrest in Iran's Kurdish Region Has Left 17 Dead; Hundreds Wounded

The NY Times:

Unrest has rocked Iran's northwestern region of Kurdistan in recent weeks leading to the deaths of more than a dozen civilians and several members of the country's security forces. READ MORE

Finally, the NY Times notices the Kurdish unrest.

Here are a few other news items you may have missed.

• IranMania.com reported that the wife of leading Iranian dissident Akbar Ganji pleaded to be allowed to see him on his hunger strike for a 64th day.
• Xinhuanet reported that four more inspectors from the IAEA arrived in Iran to monitor Iran's nuclear activities.
• Rancher, RedState.org said in light of Bush's promise to stand with the Iranian people, Don't the Kurds in Iran count as Iranian people?
• MosNews reported Moscow supported the decision of the IAEA, urging Iran to resume its moratorium on nuclear fuel production.
• Iran Focus reported that more than a dozen protestors arrested in Ahwaz, southern Iran, during a demonstration in July were sentenced to serve prison time and will be flogged in public.
• World Peace Herald reported on the U.S. Helsinki Commission, which just held a hearing titled, "The Iran Crisis: A Transatlantic Response."
• The Associated Press reported that the Iranians are pushing ahead on the construction of a heavy-water reactor.
• CNN claimed a CIA report has determined with "relative certainty" that Iran's new president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, was not involved in the taking of U.S. hostages.
• Victor Davis Hanson reminds us that we need to listen to the words of radical Islamists. He quotes them directly and lets them speak for themselves.
• Iranian blog, Rooz Online remembers that Ayatollah Khomeini once told of a fable that they see parallels to Iran's current regime.
• Iranian blogger, Omid Memarian, Rooz Online discusses the new administration's war on the NGO's.
• Iranian blog Rooz Online reports that many political leaders are refusing to join the Ahmadinejad administration, including Rafsanjani's sons.
• Iranian blog Rooz Online reported that Iranian lawyers are threatening a protest.
• BBC News reported that German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder has warned the US to back away from the possibility of military action against Iran.
• And finally, another The Arizona Republic cartoon on Iran's nuclear crisis.

Unrest in Iran's Kurdish Region Has Left 17 Dead; Hundreds Have Been Wounded

The NY Times:

Unrest has rocked Iran's northwestern region of Kurdistan in recent weeks leading to the deaths of more than a dozen civilians and several members of the country's security forces. READ MORE

The protests are the largest in Iran since the 1979 Islamic revolution, when Kurdish rebels seeking autonomy fought government forces. Last Sunday, shops in more than a dozen Kurdish towns closed their doors to protest what Kurds regard as discrimination by the government in Tehran and hundreds of people were arrested.

Human Rights Watch reported that 17 people had been killed in three weeks of violence in several towns. A Kurdish group, the Democratic Party of Iranian Kurdistan, posted on Web sites the names of people it said were the victims. It said more than 200 people had been injured. Four members of Iranian security forces were killed near Oroumieh, a northwestern city, the ISNA news agency reported.

Dozens of activists have been arrested, among them Roya Toloui, a prominent advocate for women's rights, several human rights groups said. The authorities reportedly arrested her at her home in Sanandaj on charges of disturbing the peace and "acting against national security." Two Kurdish newspapers were also shut down. The government is very sensitive about hints of ethnic strife in the country. It has refused to release detailed information about the scale of the turmoil except for several random reports about attacks on government buildings during demonstrations.

The unrest erupted after security forces killed Shivan Qaderi on July 9 in the city of Mahabad. Pictures of the young man's body suggested he had been tortured, and were widely distributed and broadcast on satellite television channels. The government said Mr. Qaderi was a hooligan and accused him of moral and financial violations.

The Kurds said he was a political activist. Human Rights Watch, citing reports from Kurdish groups, said Mr. Qaderi was shot in public; the government has not commented on the circumstances surrounding the death. "The incident triggered the unrest but there were other elements to it," said Jalal Jalalizadeh, a former Kurdish member of Iran's Parliament. "Kurdish people have fundamental demands but the government has ignored them. More turmoil can erupt again over other reasons."

Nearly 6 million of Iran's 67 million people are Kurds, most of them Sunni Muslims in a country dominated by Shiites.

According to the Constitution, Sunnis cannot run for president. In protest, many boycotted the presidential election of June 24 and the turnout was less than 20 percent in some cities in Kurdish areas. Many Kurds say they now worry about their future under the new president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who was supported by conservative parties.

Kurds are also barred from teaching the Kurdish language at schools and face restrictions in publishing Kurdish literature. They say they face discrimination in employment and university admissions. Kurdish cities are among the least developed in the country with the highest levels of unemployment. Kurds have also been discouraged from forming their own political parties.

Iranian Kurds have not sought independence since the 1979 Islamic revolution, which overthrew Shah Reza Pahlavi and brought Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini to power, but they have demanded greater autonomy, democracy and freedoms.
However gains won by Kurds in neighboring Iraq have brought hope that some of them can be duplicated in Iran.

"Iranian Kurds now believe they have to struggle to have the similar social and cultural freedoms that Kurds of Iraq have," said Mr. Jalalizadeh, the former member of Parliament. After the 1991 Persian Gulf war, when the British and American forces protected Iraq's Kurdish region from Saddam Hussein's government, the Kurds on the two sides of the border increased their contacts.

Furthermore, five Kurdish satellite television channels, whose programs can be received all through the region, are helping to strengthen Kurdish identity.
One satellite channel, ROJ TV, played an instrumental role in mobilizing people in the recent protests. It announced news about the protests and statements by political parties.

The worst violence broke out in the city of Saqqez on Aug. 3, where the Interior Ministry acknowledged two people were killed and 142 people were arrested. A senior official said government buildings and banks were damaged.

Kurdsat, an Iraqi Kurdish satellite channel based in Sulaimaniyah, Iraq, reported that thousands of troops were deployed to put down the protest and as many as 1,200 people were arrested. Human Rights Watch reported that 11 people were killed.

Calm reportedly returned to the Kurdish cities late this week after Kurdish members of Parliament appealed to the protesters.

"The number of casualties and deaths also convinced people that they were paying a high price in the violence," said Khaled Tavakoli, a political activist and journalist in Sanandaj, whose election to Parliament in 2000 was overturned when a conservative watchdog body ruled his votes void. "But people are very proud of the unity that was displayed in different cities."

Finally, the NY Times notices the Kurdish unrest.

Wife pleads to see Iran dissident, Akbar Ganji

IranMania.com:

The wife of leading Iranian dissident Akbar Ganji pleaded to be allowed to see him Saturday as he maintained his hunger strike for a 64th day despite her appeals for him to end it before it is too late, AFP reported.

"I know he is in a terrible condition and I am worried sick about him," said Massoumeh Shafii, who has not been allowed to visit her husband for two weeks. READ MORE

"I plead with the judiciary officials to let me see him so that I can ask him to stop his strike," she told AFP.

"Patients and prisoners can have visitors. This is inhumane."

Shafii said she could not confirm reports that her husband had been transferred to the intensive care unit of the Tehran hospital where he is confined as neither she nor other family members had been allowed to visit him.

Ganji launched his death fast in protest at his prison conditions. He was trasnferred from prison to hospital last month due to his deteriorating health.

He was sentenced to six years in prison in 2001 after he wrote articles implicating several regime officials in the murders of opposition intellectuals and writers.

More IAEA inspectors arrive in Iran

Xinhuanet:

Four more inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) arrived here Saturday to monitor Iran's nuclear activities, the semi-official Mehr news agency reported. READ MORE

The inspectors are due to visit Iran's various nuclear sites including the Isfahan Uranium Conversion Facility, and hold talks with officials of the Iranian Atomic Energy Organization, the report said.

They will also present their findings to IAEA Director General Mohamed ElBaradei for a report on Sept. 3 on Iran's compliance to the latest IAEA resolution adopted on Thursday, the report added.

On Monday, a group of inspectors arrived at Iran's uranium conversion facilities in the central city of Isfahan to install surveillance equipment, which allows the IAEA to supervise Tehran's performances after its resumption of sensitive nuclear activities.

Iran restarted part of the facilities soon after the inspectors finished installing some of the equipment Monday afternoon. Regardless of warnings of the European Union (EU) and the United States, Iran unsealed and fully restarted Isfahan facilities on Wednesday.

The IAEA Board of Governors on Thursday approved a resolution on the Iranian nuclear file, which voices "serious concern" over Iran's recent resumption of uranium conversion activities and urges Iran to "re-establish full suspension of all enrichment-related activities."

The resolution also requests ElBaradei to provide a comprehensive report on the implementation of Iran's Non-Proliferation Treaty Safeguards Agreement and the resolution by Sept. 3.

Iran has rejected the resolution as politically motivated and tyrannical but voiced readiness to continue talks with the EU and cooperation with the IAEA.

Iran suspended enrichment activities last November under an agreement reached with the European trio of Britain, France and Germany in Paris one month earlier, but insisted that the suspension be a "voluntary and temporary move" for confidence building and subject to resumption under Tehran's will.

The EU trio has been trying but in vain to persuade Iran to permanently halt uranium enrichment activities in order to provide objective guarantees that its nuclear research will not be used for military purposes.

The United States accuses Iran of developing nuclear weapons secretly, a charge denied by Tehran.

Our friends the Kurds

Rancher, RedState.org:

President Bush in his last State of the Union speech had this to say:

And to the Iranian people, I say tonight: As you stand for your own liberty, America stands with you.

I can't tell! Don't the Kurds in Iran count as Iranian people? Civil demonstrations and protests in Iran's north-west Kurdish regions has Iranian troops and Islamic vigilantes cracking down with brutal force resulting in scores dead. What, you haven't heard this? The MSM for whatever reason really haven't given this much coverage. READ MORE

While media access to Iran is limited by the Mullahs, Kurdish and Iranian opposition sources are available but ignored. Shahin B. Sorekli at KurdishMedia asks:

Why is it that the shooting of an Israeli or Palestinian (although unfortunate and sad) is shown over and over by TV channels such as BBC and CNN, leave Al Jazira TV aside, while the shooting of at least 13 Kurds and several large demonstrations in the Kurdish regions of Iran remain unmentioned?

That question answers itself, you can't blame Jews, Bush, the military, or even America for this. If those factors don't apply then expect more coverage of the latest Abu Grahaib allegations than on what is actually happening to the Kurds.

We expect as much from the MSM. But the Bush administration hasn't had much to say either. For a little background Gerald A. Honigman gives an historical account of how Britain, whose Navy was switching from coal to oil, gave in to it's WWI Arab allies, abandoning Jewish, Kurdish, and Sudanese national aspirations. The resulting Balkanization of these Middle Eastern countries leaves us with large ethnic minorities in those Arab countries and the resulting atrocities used to subjugate and suppress those minorities. In the case of the Kurds, we're talking about Syria, Turkey, Iran, and Iraq. Turkey is allegedly an ally, although when we needed them they told us to kick rocks. We don't want to anger Turkey by supporting Kurds, they are a persecuted minority in Turkey and support of Kurds elsewhere might encourage Turkish Kurds to fight for their basic human rights. Can't have that. Likewise Iraq. The U.S. and Britain are pressuring the Kurds to compromise on Kirkuk and federalism. Basically we are asking the Kurds to give up the autonomy they have had since GWI and hope a Shi'ite controlled government later gives it back. Same with the historic capital of Southern Kurdistan, the oil rich region of Kirkuk. The Kurds recognize that they need constitutional protection from Shi'ite majority tyranny. But Bush doesn't want to rock the boat, hoping that this region that has never seen Democracy will eventually put national interests ahead of religious and tribal loyalties. He's hoping the Democrats will do the same. A hopeless hope on both accounts.

Along with Israel the Kurds are our greatest allies in the Middle East. But just as we expect Israel to bend over backwards in dealing with their enemies we expect the Kurds to do the same. It's time instead to support our allies and tell our enemies to kick rocks. Iraq doesn't stand much of a chance as long as Syria, Iran, and Iran's favorite terrorist organization Hammas continue as they are. Support for the Kurds in all of the countries that are trying to keep them down is in our best interest, and no more so than in Iran.

Michael Ledeen gives us some insight on why politicians will turn a deaf ear on information that they don't want to have to act on. Mr. Ledeen was present at a meeting in 2001 in Rome with Manucher Ghorbanifar, an Iranian expatriate who provided information to the Pentagon. "That meeting produced very high-quality information that we did not have, which, according to American armed forces in Afghanistan, saved American lives," Mr. Ledeen has said. However, the CIA and State Department took steps to shut down the information channel. Later Rumsfeld gave orders that Pentagon officials were forbidden to talk to Iranians, period.

This is similar to the "Able Danger" affair where the 911 hijackers were identified in 1999 by a classified military intelligence unit. Ledeen says:

We have two cases where life-saving information was available, but the system refused to accept it, because the political considerations were more important.

In the Weldon story, the administration didn't want to know about terrorist groups operating inside the United States.

In the Rome story, they didn't want to know about Iranian groups killing Americans. In the first case, we'd have had to act against sleeper cells, which is a very nasty business. In the second case, we'd have had to act against the biggest terror sponsor in the Middle East, another can of worms. Better to pretend we didn't know, hope that nothing terrible would happen, and concentrate on career advancement.

Atlas Shrugs has some graphic pictures of the atrocities the Mullahs are inflicting on Kurdish children!

Russia Tells Iran to Halt Nuclear Fuel Work, Continue Dialogue With IAEA

MosNews:

Russia has called for ’de-escalation’ of tensions and for dialogue over Iran’s decision to resume nuclear fuel work, local media reported.

Moscow supported the decision of the UN nuclear watchdog — the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) — urging Iran to resume its moratorium on nuclear fuel production, the Foreign Ministry said in a statement. READ MORE

“Having supported this resolution, we believe it is essential to create conditions for a de-escalation of the situation and a return to the path of negotiation,’ the ministry said.

Dialogue should aim to ”reach a solution that in the end meets Iranian interests,“ the ministry said, while boosting trust of Iran’s nuclear intentions. ”Russia for its part is ready to use all means to help the development of the situation along this path.“

Iran has flatly rejected the IAEA’s resolution, saying it has the right to produce nuclear fuel. The head of Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization called the heavy-water reactor offer a ”joke.“

”We have developed this capability. The heavy-water project today is a reality,“ Gholamreza Aghazadeh, who is also vice president, was quoted by AP as saying on state-run television. ”This knowledge belongs to Iran. Nobody can take it from us. As they (Europeans) see Iran’s determination, they will be forced to show flexibility and accept it.“

Iran says the heavy-water reactor will have a range of peaceful applications. Iran intends to use the facility in the pharmaceutical, biological and biotechnological fields as well as in cancer diagnosis and control.

The 40-megawatt heavy-water reactor could produce enough plutonium for a nuclear weapon each year, an amount experts commonly say is 8.8 pounds.

Meanwhile, the Iranians are pushing ahead on another track — construction of a heavy-water reactor that Iran says will be used only for peaceful purposes but which could also produce plutonium for a nuclear bomb.

Iran to flog dissidents for anti-government protest

Iran Focus: an MEK website.

More than a dozen protestors arrested in the oil-rich city of Ahwaz, southern Iran, during a demonstration in July were sentenced to serve prison time and to be flogged in public, Iran’s state-run news agency reported on Thursday. READ MORE

A court in Ahwaz sentenced the 15 individuals to flogging and jail time for “creating mayhem and disrupting public order”.

They had all been arrested during anti-government protests on July 27 and were accused of setting tyres on fire in the street and throwing stones at government buildings and vehicles belonging to the State Security Forces.

There were heavy clashes between government forces and protesters in Ahwaz during the final week of July.

The city’s local state-run radio urged residents to stay at home as security forces imposed curfew on the areas of the city inhabited by ethnic Arabs.

Protestors chanted anti-government slogans and demanded an end to the government’s “ethnic cleansing” policy.

Ahwaz, provincial capital of Khuzistan, is home to Iran’s ethnic Arab population and has been a hotbed of anti-government demonstrations.

Dozens of people were reportedly killed in week-long clashes between mainly ethnic Arab protesters and security forces in Ahwaz and several other cities in Iran’s Khuzistan province in April. The strategic area contains much of Iran’s oilfields.

Iran human rights in crisis

World Peace Herald:

In response to ongoing developments in Iran, the U.S. Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe, also called the U.S. Helsinki Commission, held a hearing titled, "The Iran Crisis: A Transatlantic Response," to examine the continuing pattern of serious human rights violations in Iran and consider how to formulate an effective trans-Atlantic response. The hearing is part of a series to explore emerging threats to countries in the region of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe. Iran shares borders with several OSCE participant states: Armenia, Azerbaijan, Turkey, and Turkmenistan and also borders Afghanistan, an OSCE Partner for Cooperation.

Commission Chairman Sen. Sam Brownback, R-an., focused squarely on the deteriorating human rights climate in Iran: "Across the border, Iran's human rights record is dismal and getting worse. The Iranian regime employs all of the levers of power to crush dissent, resorting in every form of persecution, even so far as execution. No effort is spared to silence opposition." READ MORE

"Freedom denied" sums up the regime's approach to fundamental human rights across the board, observed Brownback, "the tyrants in Tehran time and time again have shown a zeal for crushing outbreaks of free thought. Having come down hard on vestiges of independent media, the regime has pursued those who sought refuge on the Internet as a domain for democratic discussion."

Commission Co-Chairman Rep. Christopher H. Smith, R-N.J., drew attention to the extensive economic ties between many European countries and Iran, suggesting such interests influence policy toward Tehran. Smith also questioned the effectiveness of existing UN human rights structures and the need for major reform of the system.

Jeff Gedmin, director of the Aspen Institute Berlin, testifying before the commission, noted the paradigm shift in U.S. foreign policy following the 9/11 terrorist attacks: "It's changed our thinking about democracy, not only for the moral reasons, but because, as the president and others have said, the old realism, the old stability sort of policies didn't keep us safe, either. They weren't fully moral, and they didn't keep us safe."

Gedmin urged a more assertive approach toward Iran that would link the security approach and the human rights and democracy approach, and warned against concentrating on the former to the exclusion of the latter. Gedmin called for ensuring that promotion of democracy is part of any dialogue with the regime, while admitting that European commercial interests could complicate matters.

In his testimony, Tom Melia, deputy executive director of Freedom House, focused on the dynamics of democracy promotion more generally and efforts to foster related U.S. and European cooperation through the Trans-Atlantic Democracy Network initiative involving senior government officials and NGO activists from both sides of the Atlantic. He admitted there are a variety of European perspectives on how best to encourage democratic change, contrasting "the more traditional Western European officials around Brussels and the newly arrived officials from Central and Eastern Europe....who are willing to be strong allies."

Citing the recently released report "How Freedom is Won," Melia noted that broad civic engagement can speed democratic reform and that the absence of opposition violence in the struggle for change ultimately enhances the prospects for consolidation of democracy. Turning to Iran, he noted the June 17 elections in that country "are not about filling the offices that matter in Iran."

Goli Ameri, co-founder of the Iran Democracy Project, addressed the complexities faced by Iranian-Americans who have thrived in the freedom and opportunity offered in the United States, and who hope that such liberties will be seen in Iran itself. She explained some of the differing approaches advocated within the community:

"In my experience, there are three different views on U.S. policy towards Iran amongst Iranian-Americans. One group believes that the U.S. needs to take an active role and make regime change an official U.S. policy. The second group believes that freedom from decades of oppression can only come from the Iranian people themselves without any type of outside involvement."

Ameri continued, "In my travels, the majority of Iranian-Americans I met have a third, more considerate way in mind. They speak as concerned citizens of the United States and independent of political opposition groups or extremist political doctrines. They care about U.S. long-term interests as much as they care for their compatriots in Iran...Iranian-Americans support the promotion of a civil society and a civil movement in Iran. However, they want to ascertain that the format of support does not hurt the long-term security and interests of the United States, as well as not sully the mindset of the Iranian people towards the United States."

Ameri emphasized that Iranian-Americans, "differentiate between support for civic organizations and support for opposition groups, with the latter being of zero interest."

Karim Lahidji, an Iranian human rights activist since the late 1950s who fled Iran in 1979, pointed to contradictions that exist within the Islamic Republic of Iran, including the "farce" that the regime is somehow based on popular sovereignty. He noted that "power itself is dual in the sense that, on one hand, there is this (unelected) supreme guide, who is kind of a Superman, who supersedes over the other branches of government" and exercises "100 percent real executive power."

Under the current structures in place in Iran, Lahidji stressed, "the underlying and governing principle, it's not equality. It is discrimination that really rules" in which "the rights of the common citizen are different from the rights of Muslims, or the rights of non-Muslims are different from the rights of Muslims. Women don't have the same rights as men. But common people don't have the same rights as the clergy." He concluded, "under the present constitution, any reform of the power structure in the country that would lead to democracy or respect of human rights is impossible."

Manda Ervin, founder of the Alliance of Iranian Women, focused on the daily difficulties facing the average Iranian, including rising unemployment, unpaid workers, and other hardships that have spawned manifestations of civil disobedience that are in turn repressed by security and paramilitary forces. Hunger strikes and sit-ins by university students and journalists are common and are met with repression by the authorities.

Citing arrests of activists, including members of the Alliance of Iranian Women, Ervin stated, "The regime of Iran practices gender apartheid and legal abuse of children. The constitution of this regime belongs to the 7th century and is unacceptable in the 21st century." In an impassioned conclusion Ervin said, "the people of Iran need our support, our moral support, our standing in solidarity with them. They don't want words any more. They don't trust words. They want actions. They want United States and Europe to stand together against the regime of Iran."

(Ronald J. McNamara is International Policy Director of the United States Helsinki Commission, an independent federal agency, that monitors and encourages progress in implementing provisions of the Helsinki Accords. The Commission, created in 1976, is composed of nine Senators, nine Representatives and one official each from the Departments of State, Defense and Commerce.)

Iran Pushes Ahead on Construction of a Heavy-water Reactor

Ali Akbar Dareini, The Associated Press:

As the U.S. and Europe struggle to stop Iran's uranium development, the Iranians are pushing ahead on another track -- construction of a heavy-water reactor that Iran says will be used only for peaceful purposes but which could also produce plutonium for a nuclear bomb. READ MORE

It will take at least another four years for Iran to complete the reactor, making it a less immediate worry for the West than the uranium program, parts of which are either in operation or ready to go at a moment's notice.

But ultimately, the heavy-water reactor could prove more dangerous, since bombs made with plutonium are smaller and easier to fit onto a ballistic missile.

In a comprehensive package aimed at reining in Iran's nuclear program, Europe proposed that it give up the heavy-water project in return for a light-water reactor, seen by arms control experts as easier to monitor to ensure it's not being used for weapons.

Iran -- which says its nuclear program is peaceful -- rejected the entire package this week. The head of Iran's Atomic Energy Organization called the heavy-water reactor offer a "joke."

"We have developed this capability. The heavy-water project today is a reality," Gholamreza Aghazadeh, who is also vice president, said on state-run television. "This knowledge belongs to Iran. Nobody can take it from us. As they (Europeans) see Iran's determination, they will be forced to show flexibility and accept it."

While Iran has agreed to suspend parts of its uranium program as a gesture in negotiations with Europe, it has repeatedly rejected European calls for it to freeze the heavy-water project, which is moving full steam ahead.

"Work has not been halted there even for a day, allowing Iran to constantly advance its heavy-water project," lawmaker Rasoul Sediqi Bonabi told The Associated Press on Friday. Bonabi, a nuclear scientist, said Iran developed the plant because the world would not give it "a drop of heavy water."

Iran says the heavy-water reactor will have a range of peaceful applications. Iran intends to use the facility in the pharmaceutical, biological and biotechnological fields as well as in cancer diagnosis and control.

Iran insists its nuclear program is aimed only at producing electricity, but the United States accuses it of secretly intending to build nuclear weapons. Europe is trying through negotiations to persuade Iran to give up technology that can be used for military purposes and limit its program to possessing reactors using fuel provided from abroad.

The 40-megawatt heavy-water reactor could produce enough plutonium for a nuclear weapon each year, an amount experts commonly say is 8.8 pounds.

The reactor -- ringed with anti-aircraft guns as are all of Iran's nuclear facilities -- is being built at the foot of a mountain in the deserts outside the small town of Khondab, 60 miles northwest of the central city of Arak.

Construction began in 2004 and is expected to be completed by 2009. Most Iranian nuclear facilities have portions built underground to protect them from airstrike -- and Aghazadeh suggested that an underground portion may be built at Khondab as well.

"This knowledge belongs to us. It (the knowledge) won't be destroyed if attacked. Equipment could also be moved under the mountain," he said.

A plant next door began producing heavy water for the reactor last year, using water from the nearby Qara-Chai River. It produces 16 tons of heavy water a year, putting it on track to have the 90 tons needed by the time the reactor is finished.

Inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency, the U.N. nuclear watchdog, visited the Khondab facility in February 2003.

North Korea followed a similar two-track process in its nuclear program, which it overtly says aims to produce weapons. In 1994, it signed a deal with the United States freezing its plutonium program, but in 2003 it was discovered that North Korea was secretly building a uranium program.

Nuclear weapons can be produced using either plutonium or highly enriched uranium as the explosive core. Either substance can be produced in the process of running a reactor.

Uranium is enriched by turning the raw ore into gas, which is then spun in centrifuges. If it is enriched to a low level, it can be used as fuel for a reactor; at a high level, it can be used for a bomb.

Iran's enrichment program is at an advanced stage, with thousands of centrifuges ready to start working. While Iran is continuing its suspension of enrichment, it ended its freeze this week on the first step in the process -- turning raw uranium into gas -- bringing a sharp rebuke from Europe.

Reactors fueled by enriched uranium use regular -- or "light" -- water as a "moderator" in the chain reaction that produces energy. The Khandub reactor, however, uses "heavy water," which contains a heavier hydrogen particle. That allows the reactor to run on natural uranium mined by Iran, forgoing the expensive process of enrichment.

The spent fuel from a heavy-water reactor can be reprocessed to extract plutonium for use in a bomb.

Sources: CIA finds Iranian president likely not hostage-taker

CNN:

A CIA report has determined with "relative certainty" that Iran's new president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, was not involved in the taking of U.S. hostages 26 years ago, three government officials told CNN on Friday. READ MORE

The officials insisted on anonymity, saying they did not want to speak for the CIA about its report.

Another U.S. official said the tone of the report is that there is no evidence to date that the new Iranian president was among those who held U.S. diplomats hostage.

The officials cautioned that the analysis is not final.

Two former hostages told CNN they remain certain Ahmadinejad was involved in plotting the takeover of the U.S. Embassy in Tehran in 1979, in which 52 hostages were held for 444 days.

The two also said they saw the man they identify as Ahmadinejad many times while they were held, and that he appeared to be in a supervisory role.

A senior State Department official said the government is defining "hostage-taker" as someone who was "involved in the planning, execution and conduct" of taking people captive.

The dispute over what role Ahmadinejad may or may not have played has immediate significance, as the Bush administration considers whether to grant him a visa to attend a coming U.N. meeting in New York.

President Bush said Thursday that while the investigation continues, "We have an agreement with the United Nations to allow people to come to meet, and I suspect he will be here to meet at the United Nations."

After Ahmadinejad appeared on television and in newspapers celebrating his victory in last month's election, several former hostages held at the U.S. Embassy between 1979 and 1981 said he was one of their captors.

Ahmadinejad and other Iranian officials denied the allegation.

Ahmadinejad's official biography says that as a student, he was a member of the Office for Strengthening Unity, the student organization that planned the embassy takeover.

It does not say he was an organizer of the seizure.

The biography said he was involved with the group while a student at the University of Science and Technology.

Two weeks ago, a CIA analysis of a photograph of one of the hostage-takers determined that the man was not Ahmadinejad.

William Daugherty, a former CIA officer living in Savannah, Georgia, told CNN he remains certain that Ahmadinejad was involved in the takeover.

"I can name at least five times that I know I saw him," Daugherty said. He said those times were in the first 19 days of the takeover, "before I was put into solitary (confinement)."

He said Ahmadinejad seemed to be among a group of leaders.

"If he planned the takeover -- it was spectacular, it worked -- do you really think he wouldn't at least go?" said Daugherty, adding that Ahmadinejad "humiliated our country (and) seriously harmed our families."

"This is very inconvenient for the Bush administration. It's also embarrassing for them," he said.

"You're either with us or you're with the terrorists," said Daugherty, referring to something President Bush has often said. "This guy's a terrorist. If the Bush administration grants him a visa, then their whole antiterrorism policy falls apart."

Don Sharer, a former hostage who was a naval attache at the embassy, said he remains "99 percent" sure Ahmadinejad was involved.

He said he saw him "four or five" times while in captivity.

"Every once in a while I saw him escorting some mullahs coming through," he said. "He had a gun. ... He was just not there to walk through. He appeared to be in a supervisory role, the way the guard reacted to him."

Sharer, who lives in Bedford, Indiana, also believes Ahmadinejad should not receive a visa. "Heck no," he said, adding that Ahmadinejad broke international treaties.
Neither Daugherty nor Sharer recalled hearing Ahmadinejad referred to by name while they were in captivity.

The State Department has been conducting interviews with some former hostages over the past week. Most of the former hostages have said Ahmadinejad was not present during the hostage-taking, two U.S. government officials said.
Daugherty said he has spoken to the CIA, and heard from the State Department for the first time this week.

A senior State Department official said the department began to interview some former hostages this week because some hostages complained the CIA had not yet approached them.

The words of radical Islam speak for themselves

Victor Davis Hanson:

"You will find that the Jews were behind all the civil strife in this world. The Jews are behind the suffering of the nations.”

When and where did that venom come from? READ MORE

This last May — and out of the hateful mouth of a prominent Palestinian cleric, Sheik Ibrahim Mudeiris. He was broadcast on a Palestinian Authority station.

The televised Sheik finished with an even more frightening thought: “The day will come when everything will be relieved of the Jews — even the stones and trees which were harmed by them…The stones and trees will want the Muslims to finish off every Jew.”

Nothing could be clearer than that promise of another holocaust — and promised explicitly on state-run Palestinian television, a public megaphone of the Palestinian Authority, itself the beneficiary of past and apparently promised future American financial aid.

Still, don’t hold your breath that the passive/aggressive sheik is about to lead a pan-Islamic army a few miles across the border to “finish off every Jew,” since he might then end up like Sheik Ahmed Yassin, whose threats of death earned him instead an early paradise.

Throughout this war we have an understandable, if ethnocentric, habit of ignoring what our enemies actually say. Instead we chatter on, don’t listen, and in self-absorbed fashion impart our own motives for their hatred. We live on the principles of the Enlightenment and so worship our god Reason, thus assuming that even our adversaries accept such rational protocols as their own.

So they talk on and on of beheading, suicide bombing, another holocaust, and blowing thousands of us up, while we snooze, now and again waking in the midst of a war to regurgitate Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo Bay, flushed Korans, the abusive Patriot Act, and the latest quip of Donald Rumsfeld.

But again keep quiet, and listen to radical Islam.

Take the August 4 declaration of al Qaeda’s second in command, Dr. Ayman al-Zawahiri. He promises even “more destruction” for London, and tells us precisely why.

Many in the West assume that those mass murders were payback for the United Kingdom’s presence in Iraq, even though its troops are mostly confined to non-Wahhabi areas in the south.

But no, the Dr. instead lists a number of grievances beyond Iraq that justify his terrorist cadres murdering innocents. One complaint, for example, is “Stopping the robbing of our oil and resources.”

Examine that gripe carefully.

Oil is now at record highs. I just filled up with regular gas at $2.89 on a California interstate. It costs the Middle East about $3-4 a barrel to pump petroleum that was discovered, developed, and marketed for the Gulf autocracies through hated Western expertise — and is now selling at over $60. Despite Zawahiri’s rants, billions of poor the world over are being price gauged to enrich a Muslim world flush with petrodollars.

And some of those obscene profits have ended up in coffers of Zawahiri himself. Indeed, his al Qaeda blackmailers depend on recycled petrodollars from Gulf State sheikdoms. Nothing either he or bin Laden has ever done themselves warrants the type of cash that flowed into al Qaeda’s banks — a con operation that extorted oil dollars from autocratic price gougers who in turn got their revenues largely from inventive and productive Indians, Chinese, and Westerners.

Zawahiri next went on to cite, “Stopping your support for the corrupt and corrupting leaders.”

Did the terrorist Dr. read the text of Condoleezza Rice’s June 20 address in Cairo? There she rightly repudiated past American realpolitik that blinked at Arab dictatorships, and then prodded Arab governments to democratize?

Or maybe it was precisely that fresh support for democracy that grieves Zawahiri?

For clarification of al Qaeda’s ideas about democracy, we can turn to Abu Musab Al Zarqawi, the spiritual leader of the terrorists in Iraq. He recently warned that, “We have declared a fierce war on this evil principle of democracy and those who follow this wrong ideology.”

That pathological hatred of democracy was also amplified in the latest al Qaeda video of August 10: “Democracy, human rights, and freedom are all but hollow illusions, with which they tranquilize inhabitants.”

Western critics of America’s attempt to introduce democratic reconstruction in Iraq should ask why al Qaeda is so furious at the effort. The answer is clear: Radical Islam can no longer blame the United States for propping up dictators, but instead is terrified that there is a third choice — the people’s freedom — between creepy strongmen and even creepier pre-modern theocrats.

But back again to the good Dr. Zawahiri, who had still more complaints beyond oil and corrupt leaders that explain why he, of course, plans on more murdering of Westerners.

“What you have you seen, O Americans, in New York and Washington and the losses you are having in Afghanistan and Iraq, in spite of all the media blackout, are only the losses of the initial clashes.”

And we know precisely what were our perceived pre-September 11 wrongs that caused “New York and Washington” since Dr Zawahiri’s boss, bin Laden himself, spelled them out in a 1998 fatwa.

“The ruling to kill the Americans and their allies — civilians and military — is an individual duty for every Muslim who can do it in any country in which it is possible to do it, in order to liberate the al-Aqsa Mosque and the holy mosque [Mecca] from their grip.”

Note that bin Laden omits any reference to American efforts to save Muslim Kuwait (a war in which in vain he also volunteered to fight against Saddam Hussein), to save Balkan Muslims (which his own mujahadeen had failed utterly to do), or to stop the Soviet killing of Afghan Muslims (a war in which his resistance counted on American arms to save his fellow Muslims).

The constant theme of this envious and insecure motor mouth? Americans saved Muslims, while bin Laden’s minions talked big, but couldn’t do much against much stronger Baathist Iraqis, godless Soviets, and nationalist Serbs.

September 11 was the promised answer to bin Laden’s fatwa. Later when America withdrew all troops from the land of Mecca, his death promises increased rather than ceased.

Remember that Dr. Zawahiri lists both Afghanistan (his former headquarters) and Iraq in the same breath as reasons for his attacks to come. We in our civil discord tend to distinguish the two theaters; al Qaeda in its unity does not.

So as we try to assess the causes of Islamists’ venom toward the West, it seems wiser to listen to what they say rather than what we say they say.

If we would do that, we would conclude that the hatred of radical Islam is fed by envy, frustration, and pride — and thus existential: They despise Americans for who we are.

That’s why al Qaeda must constantly find new grievances, whether the West Bank, Israel itself, Jews, oil prices, troops in Saudi Arabia, Oil-for-Food, Afghanistan, or Iraq.

Indeed, the latest two-hour training video is little more than cut-and-paste from the Michael Moore Left and hand-me-downs from Euro anti-globalist radicals. Thus America, al Qaeda assures us, “seeks to ravage the entire globe for the interest…of corporate companies,” and so kills the sons of Islam “in Palestine, Afghanistan, the Balkans, Indonesia, the Caucuses, and elsewhere.”

Apparently about three billion Europeans, Asians, Russians, and Indians have been picking on poor suicide bombers and terrorists, who, in fact, are incognito environmentalists bent on stopping corporate exploitation of Mother Earth.

Yet there is one and only one legitimate objection of the crackpot radical Islamists that rings true: We in the West don’t listen to them when they promise us our deaths.

We should. They are yelling as loud as they can to tell us something that we don’t really want to hear.

Laptop Update

First, for our regular readers, I apologize that the news reports coming out here have been delayed. The system I have to work on presently required a lot of work yesterday just to keep it running. It is extremely slow but appears to be more stable now. Once I am able to purchase a new laptop, the reports should be much easier to post.

Since our call for help, we have received just over $1,300 and are closing in on the $2000 needed to purchase a new laptop with the warranties needed to keep this work humming. So we are getting closer to our goal and hope to make a purchase soon. Please be patient.

If you can help spread the word about our need or make a contribution now, it would be greatly appreciated.

The best way to contribute is to use PayPal with the link below.

Your support has been more than encouraging. Thank you all for your support.

I will be publishing a list of contributors later.