AMERICA = FREEDOM

 

The United States Navy Veterans Association presents...   THE WAR ON TERROR NEWSTAND The War on Terror Newstand is an American original. Since its inception in 2001 with articles appearing on the Homeport Page, this Newstand has provided incisive analysis and the hardest talk with different points of view to the American people, all free of charge, without paid advertisements and without staff people who think they're here to be part of the parade instead of merely to report on it.
"Come the three corners of the world in arms, And we shall shock them."  - Shakespeare, King John, v. 7, 1596     The United States of America has defeated all its enemies...all of them...before. All of these people, despite their claims to the contrary, are mortal.... And we will defeat our current adversaries the same way...and it will be on a day and at a time of our choosing, not theirs. *************** "No action planned against the United States by our enemies is inevitable, unless our inaction makes it so." -President Ronald Reagan There are four parts, this Association points out, to Professional Intelligence: (1) Intelligence Gatherers: Collect the Information.  (Just the "truth;" we don't care what DCI Casey used to say; rumors need to be tracked down and verified; remember that if it's garbage in, it's garbage out). (2) Intelligence Analysts: Analyze the Information. (No "B.S.") (3) Intelligence Disseminators: Distribute the Information (to everyone who needs to know including, if necessary, the public.) (4) Decisionmakers: Act on the Information in an effective, timely and preventive way. It's easy to say. It's harder to do. And we also point out a very common problem... the NSA can intercept every telephone call in the world if they want, but if there aren't enough analysts to read real time every bit of that raw data (physically impossible) and then, and simultaneously, pass the items of importance on to an intelligence disseminator to make sure it gets to the right political decisionmaker immediately (bureaucratically impossible), the  mere acquisition of that raw data wasn't worth very much in the first place.  The USG and its Intelligence Community  have got to work harder to get closer to those "impossible" goals. *************** The United States Navy Veerans Association has some news for the so-called "Al Aqsa Martyrs'Brigade" in Palestine. The real martyrs' brigade does not consist of some murderous militants trying to blow up women and little girls in Israel. The real Martyrs' Brigade is 3,000 strong, and lives in the Heaven of God, the real God, not your hideous god, but the God of all our fathers, who created Abraham to be the father of all nations. They stand together steadfast there in the victory phalanx of the archangels, and at their front stands an American firefighter from New York City. And in his left hand, he holds, with a broken haft, a bloodied, but rising American Flag.  And in his right he holds God's terrible swift sword. All of these souls are asking us, those who are alive and breathing, simply, for Justice Triumphant. We shall not deny them.  *************** "The only guarantee of victory is to attack." - Sun-Tzu A statement repeated, this Association was glad to see, by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld on the PBS-TV News Hour with Jim Lehrer on 5-22-02. *************** We'd like to remind our viewers of a scene in a very good pre-9-11 movie starring Harrison Ford as the President, called "The President's Plane Is Missing." In it terrorists hijack Air Force One and shoot the National Security Advisor dead. One of the terrorists then puts a cocked .45 caliber pistol to the head of the First Lady, as her young daughter watches, and threatens America. It is a situation today, post-9-11, any American, man or woman, can identify with. The First Lady says, simply: "We will never negotiate." All of us need to adopt her attitude. We don't care what your local sheriff says, all of these terrorists, foreign and domestic, including your local drug dealer, murderer and violent criminal (who are the real criminals in America [not the folks speeding at 10 mph over the limit] need to be stood up to with the same defiance that fictitional First Lady showed: We don't care how many of you there are or how many guns you have; we don't care how many anti-Americanisms you preach in your local bar on Saturday night to your homeboys. We are the United States of America, and we will never back down. Not to you. Not to anybody. As Harrison Ford says in this movie, "If you give a mouse a cookie, he wants the milk." *************** "The one thing this country has learned since 9-11 is that it's O.K. for our kids to be patriotic" -Tony Orlando God Bless You, Tony. *************** ***************    "The policy of this Newstand is very simple - to tell the truth and, in the process, to support the Rebirth of American Patriotism." *************** The United States Navy Veterans Association current Mission Statement, as it relates to this Newstand, says that the purposes of the Association shall include: "The provision of nonpartisan education, news and analysis pertaining to the value of the goals of the Association, and other issues of interest to veterans, service members and the patriotic public." ***************   A July 2002 Pew Poll showed 66% of Americans don't understand international news. In the areas of the War on Terror and National Security, this Association tries to make that news understandable to the average American in pithy written reports people can chronologically refer to time and time again. This Association also believes that we are the only media group that brings that news in text format to the average patriotic American in a daily report which is accurate, reliable, understandable, researchable and which, all at the same time, presents that news from a truly American standpoint. ...And none of that news presentation detracts in the slightest degree from the Association's charitable programs for service members, veterans, their families, or from our legislative and policy agenda programs.  ********************   We Americans have a noisy democracy in which people, this Association included, and politicians, all filled with strong hearts, and good souls, aggressively put forward their competing ideas to move America forward. All these Americans, we should remember in our political discourse, are patriots. And that in the way our democracy works, with all its conflicts, we are defined as a people. And that definition sets us apart from all the hoochy-koochy dictatorships of the world, and the views of men like Usama bin Laden as to how government should work. And that our democracy, not in spite of our debate, but because of it, still makes us the last best hope of man on this planet.   ********************				USN@NavyVets.org          We continue this Newstand with chronological entries beginning May 15, 2002, following the last entry on this Newstand on our Homeport Page. For that prior history of the War on Terror, click here: "WE ARE NOT SAFE." Before World War II, we thought we were safe here. We were "across two oceans" and they couldn't get at us. Pearl Harbor changed all that. And so did 9-11. We are not safe here. The world is a small place nowadays and people like Al Quaida can threaten us any day they like. We need to stand up for America as never before. The best defense is a good offense, and those who threaten us should know, that we will take their war to them, wherever they may be. We never will be safe as long as fundamentalist anti-American Islamic terrorism is permitted to breed in any corner of this globe.  As of early May 2002, it is the opinion of the Association that we have been insufficiently aggressive in carrying out the War on Terror outside Afghanistan, and against the approximately 100 Al Quaida cells still carrying on their preparations within the United States.   "We are not safe." -Conclusion of the U.S. 9/11 Commission, July, 2004 Our words were posted above on this Newstand on May 15, 2002. You may ask yourselves, as we have asked ourselves, where they got their words from. 5-15-02: We point out that ground combat is still going on in Afghanistan between Operation Enduring Freedom Forces and Al Quaida. CENTCOM Commander Tommy Franks said today the War in Afghanistan is "far from over." See our prediction, Veterans' Issues Newstand on our Homeport Page, 1-24-02. 5-27-02: The Tunisian president, Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, has just re-elected himself (he's ruled Tunisia since 1987), by reason of a government-rigged referendum, for another 10 years minimum. This guy is a strange bird. He is clearly anti-Islamic fundamentalist, and that drives him. Zine is westernized, but he is not necessarily pro-U.S. He rules Tunisia as a dictator would. The westernized population of Muslim Tunisia, on the tip of North Africa due west of Libya, basically likes the guy, which would remain true even if Zine allowed free elections. The Association doubts he would let Tunisia be used, even temporarily, for U.S. bases, but the Administration could try a little bit more to bring him into the fold. 5-29-02: The military (the "National Liberation Front" - NLF) rules another of Tunisia's neighbors, Algeria, and also stages rigged elections there to keep themselves in power, most recently in May 2002, where the rigged results said they won 52% of the vote. The Algerian junta, like Zine in Tunisia, is driven by keeping down Islamic fundamentalism, and that is good, but they have killed 10,000 Muslim fundamentalists per year for the past ten years to keep themselves in power. The Algerian junta, for domestic reasons, like Zine, is not likely to jump on board any USG driven train against Saddam or against Islamic terrorism aimed at the U.S. but, as with Zine, the USG should try to get as much help out of them as we can. The overall situation for a democratic, pro-U.S. government in Algeria, unlike Tunisia, is bleak. 5-30-02: The Bush Administration announces other changes to FBI guidelines. Only to prosecute terrorism, the Bureau can now (this may come as a surprise to you) view things "in plain sight," including surfing the net, attend political and religious (read: Muslim) events, and look over your shoulder at a public library. As opposed to totalitarian changes made by CAPS II and new American DMV regulations, which this Association opposes, we support these FBI changes simply because the old guidelines, in the name of preventing racial, political, religious and ethnic profiling, tied one hand of the FBI behind their backs in investigating and preventing America's greatest threat, Islamic terror. Unlike the shotgun approach of CAPS II and the DMV proposals aimed at all Americans, these FBI changes are targetted specifically like a rifle shot at the Islamic terrorists in our midsts, and that is what is reasonable about them. 6-5-02: On the same note as our 5-30-02 story (ethnic profiling against foreigh Islamics), the Justice Department announces that "high risk" foreigners visiting the U.S. may be fingerprinted, photographed and tracked in accordance with an INS law on the books since 1952. As we've said many times on this Newstand, we need to single out foreign Islamics, in which case this new policy makes eminent good sense. See also our 9-15-01 Recommendations to the Nation on our Homepage Guestbook. But fingerprinting needs to be followed through on, and that requires manpower and resources, and probably will be mostly ineffective since most of the suicidalists sent here by terrorist groups don't have criminal records when they arrive and, after they carry out their terrorist acts, they're already dead, nevertheless this is probably a small step in the right direction. Fear of ethnic profiling (and specific targetting), when it comes to travel, does two substantially negative things to Americans at the same time: First, it precludes America from prioritizing our limited law enforcement resources on the real threat; Second, it invites foreign countries to deceitfully, and tit-for-tat, manipulate the War on Terror to harass innocent Americans from travelling to their countries, in violation of what should be known as those Americans' freedom of travel. RELATED STORIES DEALING MORE GENERALLY WITH INTERNAL CHANGES TO THE STRUCTURE OF AMERICAN LAW ENFORCEMENT CAN BE FOUND ON THE NSI NEWSTAND. 6-6-02: Philippine troops locate and raid the Abu Sayef camp where the Burnhams are being held. [WOT 1-9-02]. Martin Burnham is killed; Gracia Burnham is freed, but injured. Four Abu Sayef were killed. No U.S. combat troops participated in the raid itself. The new President of the Philippines Macapagal: "We will not stop until Abu Sayef is finished." That's what we want too, Madam President. On the same day, official efforts to recover bodies from the WTC cease. Of approximately 2800 people murdered there on 9-11, approximately 1800 bodies have not been recovered. Most of those probably never will be. Never forget, America. 6-7-02: The Association has learned that Mohammed Atta, the chief 9-11 hijacker, actually applied for a $650,000 Department of Agriculture loan for a large crop-duster (no flight plans required) to load up with "insect poison" in every available square foot (as this Association has said befor on this Site, these guys have chutzpah, but they know that for many years now, the average foreigner in the U.S. could [and can] get at least a $50,000 interest-free loan to start things like convenience stores from some U.S. Government agency, while the average natural-born American could not get scratch from those same agencies.) During the course of his pre-9-11 DA loan application interview, Atta expressed interest in Pentagon pictures on the wall, Seattle and the Dallas Cowboys Stadium in Irving. 6-10-02: The USG announces the arrest May 8 in Chicago, as he was returning on a flight from Europe where he met with Al Quaida operatives, of Brooklyn-born Chicago resident Jose Padilla, 31, a.k.a. Abdullah Al Mujahadir ("the Immigrant"). Padilla is currently being held as an enemy combatant at the Charleston Naval Weapons Station. The USG believes he was in the last stages of a plan to explode a dirty radioactive bomb in Washington, D.C. Padilla had converted to Islam earlier while incarcerated on a number of violent crime charges. It has long been the opinion of this Association that there are too many of these prison mullahs preaching anti-American politics in our prisons, in the guise of religion, and converting these young, impressionable inmates not to a faith in God but, rather, a faith in anti-American Islamic terror. Paddilla's arrest, as a preventive matter, marks a success for the incremental Bush Administration anti-terror steps we have talked about here on the NSI and WOT Newstands, and also refects on specific warnings this Association has put out on those two Newstands as to what Al Quaida is planning next. Americans should remember that AL Gama'a tried to take down the WTC in 1993 and failed, but that Al Quaida did just that in 2001.   6-11-02: Assuming we use U.S. Navy carriers for air strikes to overthrow Saddam, Navy officials have told this Association those air strikes would not be effective enough unless we are assisted by, at a minimum, air strike bases in Turkey, Kuwait and Qatar, assuming the Saudis and Bahrainis refuse us permission for air strikes from their soil, as now seems likely to the Association. Although Navy sources have told this Association that confidentially, other intelligence sources have opined that Saddam could be overthrown and replaced without that specific assistance, but at a higher cost in U.S. troop casualties on the ground. Our intelligence staff predicts that history will repeat itself and that, given sufficient air strike "softening up' operations, Saddam's army, during an invasion, will cut and run, and he will be overthrown. What comes thereafter in Iraq is entirely a new political question for the United States Government.  *************** STAY TUNED BELOW. ***************         **************************** THE REALLY, REALLY BAD BOYS OF FOREIGN, JIHADIST AND ANTI-AMERICAN TERROR: THESE GUYS SHOULD BE FEATURED NON-STOP ON AMERICA'S MOST WANTED. Hamas, Bamas, Sha-mas. Having trouble keeping those Arab and Muslim terrorist groups straight in your own mind? Most Americans are. So the Association is bringing you here, as of October, 2004, as a special feature, an updated GLOSSARY OF THE MAJOR ARAB AND ISLAMIC TERRORIST ORGANIZATIONS Our use of the phrase terrorist organizations is the Association's usage without regard to which government may or may not currently be calling these organizations "terrorist." No states are included in this list. For a list of terrorist states, see WOT, 1-24-02. There are around 300 major non-state organizations in the world which could probably and legitimitely be called "terrorist," inasmuch as they use terror as a major and fundamental weapon, as well as a sub-ideology, to promote their cause, e.g. the drug-dealing FARC in Colombia [WOT, 2-24-02], as opposed to movements which are merely revolutionary in nature (an important difference), but we have space enough only to include here the major Arab and Islamic players as of date, so keep your eyes on these guys. Groups are arranged under their topical headings by order of importance, including rankings by current threat and activity levels. AL QUAIDA AND ITS MAJOR FOREIGN LINKS (IRAQ BASED TERROR IS LISTED SEPARATELY): Al Quaida ["The Base"] : - Fanatical Islamic group (a group of groups), headed by Usama bin Laden   (DPOB: 1955; Jidda, Saudi Arabia). Murderously dedicated to the military, political and economic destruction of the United States, and the death of every American male and every Jew, and the establishment of a unified Muslim state "which follows the rules of the Caliphs." ["Caliphs" in Arabic simply means the descendants of the chiefs of Muhammed the Prophet who, after the death of Muhammed, did in fact, in the name of Islam ("Islam" means "Submission to the Will of Allah" in Arabic) conquer one city and territory after another: Baghdad, Damascus, Persia, North Africa, Jerusalem, Spain and eventually the Eastern Roman Empire.]  Cells operating worldwide today include the U.S., Europe, Bosnia, Chechnya, Tajikistan, Georgia, Somalia, Yemen, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Kosovo, Philippines, Algeria and Eritrea. If you can read Arabic, you can intelligibly access some of Al Quaida's Internet message forums, monitored round the clock by U.S. intelligence, by clicking here, here or here.  If you want to see this Islamist-fascist bin Laden in action in English in his latest video (2006), along with one of his American born treasonous Al Quaida co-members, reminiscing about the 9/11 attack, click here. Sayed bin Laden, the son of Usama bin Laden, the Association has learned, is poised to take over Al Quaida, should anything happen to his father. There is a theory among criminologists that violent crime, as a gene, is inheritable. If ever there were a bunch of poster boys for that theorem, it's the males of the bin Laden family. Many of them still roam the world unhindered and at large as some of its richest citizens, defensive of what bin Laden is still doing.   Taliban [" The Seekers"] : - Former fanatical Islamic fundamentalist government of Afghanistan, headed by Mullah Omar, overthrown by U.S. and Afghan forces in 2004.   The Taliban provided protection for Al Quaida training and operations. The Taliban was first formed in 1994 in Kandahar by graduates of Pakistani madrasas (See, WOT 12-28-01). Vanguards of Conquest [Islamic Jihad]: - Extremely violent offshoot of Al-Gama'a [See Egyptian Terror], headed by Dr. Ayman al-Zawahiri, still Usama bin Laden's right-hand man as of date. Primarily Egyptian membership, but operates worldwide. Part of Al Quaida. Specializes in assassinations. Platform includes killing all American males, all Jews, establishment of a world radical Islamic state. When these guys say "Conquest," that's exactly what they mean: the conquest of the entire world by one unified militantly fundamentalist Islamic theocracy. Jamat-e-Islami : -Pakistan's version of the Taliban movement (see, Taliban), primarily active in Indian-controlled portions of Kashmir.   Chechen Liberation Movement: The Chechen Liberation Movement is an amalgam of three or more guerilla movements, each with their own military units. One is clearly Arab in nationality, foreigners who have been inserted into Chechnya and Russia by Al Quaida supporters to carry out terrorism against Russia. The movement dates back to 1990, and seeks an independent and Islamist Chechnya. In 1994, the Russians began sending troops into Chechnya, largely destroying its capital, Grozny, in 1995. Russian occupation of Chechnya continues into 2004, with over 100,000 Russian troops there as of that year, as do growing terror attacks by the pro-Chechen units, especially within the heart of European Russia. As of 2004, with their increasing and substantial murders of Russian schoolchildren, opera goers and subway travellers, all "soft targets," the animals who run this group, and all of its component parts, including the Al Quaidists among them which had been placed on this list previously, in the opinion of the Editors of this Newstand, crossed a distinct line between "independence" and "guerilla" movements into the clearcut territory of Islamist  terrorism. Abu Sayef : -Islamic extremist para-military group operating in the southern Philippines. Split from the Moro National Liberation Front in 1991. About 900 armed soldiers, extremely violent, specializes in kidnapping   and murdering Westerners.  Previously funded by Gaddafi's Libya. Some members trained with Al Quaida. Abu Sayef operations commander, Abu Zabayef, was killed in waters off Mindanao after a firefight with Philippine Army Counter-Terrorism troops on 6-20-02. According to Philippine Army counterinsurgency sources as of the Summer of 2003, this group may be breaking up and re-forming under the name of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front. Under whatever name, these people are not going to go away until every last one of them is eradicated, age and gender exceptions not accepted. They consitute a mortal threat to every American living in, or travelling to, the Philippines, and to American economic interests in the Philippines, and that alone would be a justification for the United States to drive them off the face of the earth. Their existence also consitutes a deadly and imminent threat to the natural freedoms of every decent citizen of the world, Filipinos included.   Islamic Jama'a aka Al Jama'a aka Jama'a al Islamiya (Islamic Group): - The Indonesian Islamic Jama'a is headed by Abu Bakr Bashir (born August, 1938), ("The current U.S. President [George W. Bush] is the very worst President ever.") . Bashir was released in 2006 from a prison term he weas serving for his role in the Bali tourist bombings. At his sentencing in 2005, he pronounced:"God will destroy his enemies." (He means the U.S.)   The organization bases itself on the Egyptian al-Gama'at al Islamiya, which specializes in targetting western tourists for murder. Islamic Jama'a was responsible for the Bali tourist bombings reported on this Newstand.  Tourism means a lot of national income to many third world governments which are friendly to the United States, and therefore are despised by Muslim terrorists. Moreover, the tourist target is a soft target. As a parenthetical remark, we should mention that many, if not most of the jihadist terrorist groups target tourism, not just because it is a soft target but also, equally because their belief systems are based on a throwback to a 13th Century Caliphate state, where Western infkuences, any Western influence, was not welcome. If jihadists like the Taliban , Saddam or any of the others mentioned in this Glossary actually seized power anew, one of the first things they would probably do in "their" country would be to ban or restrict the free movement of people across their borders. This is because all these groups have one paramount fear: the free movement of ideas. Islamic Jama'a seeks a multinational fanatical Islamic state encompassing Indonesia, Malaysia and the southern Philippines (a "Caliphate" state). Jama'a buried into the school system during the Suharto years, calling themselves the oppressed majority, so they are not going to disappear with the execution of one or two of their top leaders. They may disappear when the Indonesian people as a whole get tired of routine terror bombings on their islands and in their tourist centers.   IRAQ BASED TERROR   Al Quaida in Iraq: Formerly called, simply, Jihad, as well as Ansar al Islam, this group now seeks to serve as an umbrella group, as of 2007, for professional Islamic fundamentalist terrorists from any country, with the goal of killing Coalition soldiers in Iraq (currently offering $500 for each U.S. soldier killed) and the expulsion of those Forces from Iraq. While Islamic in nature, the group is an amalgam of Saddamites, Sunnis, Shi'ites and Al Quaida operativeswho easily might, and probably would, turn on each other, when and if the U.S. decides to leave Iraq and, by "leave," we mean U.S. Forces. One of its key subgroups is the Mujahedeen Shura Council, which has 15 combat brigades and two suicide brigades. About half of the Mujahedeen Shura Council terrorists are non-Iraqis. Regardless of whether they are mentioned in the Glossary elsewhere as groups belonging to Iraqi based terror, the following groups in Iraq, as of 2008, have ties to or are associated with, the political wing of the Mujahedeen Shura Council: Society of the True Believers, Army of the Prophet's Companions, Al-Fatihin Army, Knights of Monotheism, Army of the Abrahamic Tradition, Islamic Army in Iraq, Mujahedeen Army, Ansar al-Sunnah Army and the 1920 Revolution Brigades. Al Quaida in Iraq's  head, as of June 2006, after the killing of the animal who formerly headed this group by U.S. Forces, is Abu Ayyub Al-Masri an Egyptian member of Al-Gama'a (see below, Egyptian based terror) since at least 1992, and a bomb expert.   Mahdi Army: Loyal to Shiite leader Muqtada al-Sadr. Armed insurgents throughout Iraq openly targetting U.S. troops. Probably about 60,000 armed operatives as of 2007. Islamic Army in Iraq: Major Sunni terrorist group, a mix of tribal leaders and officials of the Saddam Hussein regimes, with 13 brigades. Responsible for attacks on U.S. Forces, Shi'ites, hostage takings and hostage murders. Its splinter groups include the Al-Rashideen Army,  the Mujahedeen Army (which operates against British and Australian Forces in southern Iraq), the Al-Fatihin Army and the Jihad Factions of Iraq.   Islamic Resistance Front: Major Nationalist Sunni  terror group with a propaganda arm; stages frequent attacks against U.S. and distributes videos of them. Opposes suicide bombings, the use of foreign fighters and the killing of Shi'ites. 1920 Revolution Brigades: A nationalist Sunni terror group named for Iraq's nationalist revolution. Aims  attacks against the U.S. and the Iraqi government, but avoids outright attacks on Shi'ites. Also opposes suicide bombings and the use of foreign fighters. Imam Ali bin-Abi Talib Jihadi Brigades: Shiite group vowing to kill occupying troops and to assassinate members of the U.S. backed Iraqi government.   Al-Awdah ["The Return"]: Ex-intelligence officers under Saddam who seek restoration of a Baathist regime. Located in northern Iraq.   Iraqi Resistance Islamic Front: Warns against Jewish conspiracies in Iraq.   National Front for the Liberation of Iraq: Concentrated in northern Iraq. Armed insurgents.   Iraqi National Islamic Resistance: Armed terrorists vowing to kill all foreigners in Iraq.   Al Quds: Local militias, often Baath Party loyalists.   Special Security Organization: Ethnic Sunni group loyal to Saddam and based around Tikrit, Hawuija and Samarra. Ansar Al Sunnah: One of the most extreme Sunni terrorist groups, comprised of Kurdish Sunnis, with 16 brigades. Anti-American, but also anti-Shiite and anti-pro-government Kurds. Uses extreme brutality.   PALESTINIAN-BASED TERROR PLO [Palestinian Liberation Organization]: - The Palestinian nationalist umbrella group (a group of groups) which represents all groups seeking an independent Palestinian state. Founded in 1964, it's Chairman is Mahmoud Abbas, appointed in 2004 after the death of the PLO's founding Chairman, Yasser Arafat. Abbas was a former Palestinian Authority prime minister foisted on Arafat by the USG as a moderate "third force" willing to accept the Bush Administration's roadmap to peace in the Mid-East. He later resigned when Arafat would not cede authority over the Palestinian security forces to him. This Newstand is watching current events closely  to see if we can remove  the PLO from this Glossary of Terrorist Organizations.  Palestinian Authority:    - The current name of the government, set up by agreement between Israel and the PLO, to administer certain responsibilities in designated areas in Gaza and the West Bank.  Its first president was Yasser Arafat (1929-2004).  Its second president (head of state) is Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen). See above, under PLO. This Newstand will not remove the Palestinian Authority from its Glossary until the PA takes definitive and successful steps to destroy all Palestinian armed militant anti-Jewish organizations within its borders, and not just to negotiate with them as equals. When that occurs the PA will come off the Glossary. Not sooner, not later. Al-Fatah: - Palestinian political movement headed titularly by  Farouk Kadoumi, a part of the PLO. 8,000 members. Sponsors terrorist activities in Israel. Funded by Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, other Persian Gulf states. Has received heavy arms from Iran, China and North Korea. In a surprising moderate move, in November, 2004, Fatah nominated PLO president and moderate Mahmoud Abbas as its candidate for the elective office of President of the Palestinian Authority. Abbas believes Palestinian security forces should be used more aggressively within the  Palestinian territories to quash armed militants seeking to carry out terrorist activities against Israel. Tanzin: -Tanzin was Arafat's private militia in the West Bank and Gaza. They provide suicide bombers to Al Aqsa, and fund those suicide bombers over Arafat's signature. Al Aqsa Brigades -Major part of Al Fatah sponsoring suicide bombers in Israel. Specializes in recruiting children and teenagers. Also see, Tanzin. Hamas: - Part of the PLO; holds the prime ministership (head of government) of the Palestinian Authority; founded 1967.  Primarily responsible for politically organizing the Intifada ("uprising") against Israel in the West Bank and Gaza. Hamas runs clinics, groceries and terror schools on the West Bank.  The terror arm is called the Izzidene al Qassam Brigades. They provide money, lots of it, to the families of every barbarian terrorist who is killed, along with a video of the thug bragging about his or her planned murders. The two long time leaders of Hamas, Sheikh Ahmed Yasin    ( "Sheikh" is merely a title in Arabic), and Abdel Aziz Rantisi, both of whom were killed by Israeli security forces in 2004, were vicious murderers and anti-Semites, who openly preached death to Israel and the killing of all Jews worldwide. The new leader of Hamas after the death of Yassin and Rantisi, is Khaled Mashaal, a hard-line ideologue sheltered by Syria, funded by Iran, who is in control of the money flow to Hamas. Hamas  is financially bankrolled by Iran, private donors throughout the Arab world, and by phony charity fronts they have operated for years in the U.S. soliciting from the public without any questions being asked, until 2001, by U.S. law enforcement. Mossad, Israel's intelligence service, actually participated in the creation of Hamas in its earliest days, in trying to funnel disparate Islamic radicals into discrete groups on the theory they would be more easily controllable that way. It was a theory that backfired, badly.  Hamas still refers to Israel's 1947 war of independence as "Al Nakhba," the catastrophe. Hamas won a majority in the Palestinian Authority parliament in 2006, as this Newstand predicted they would, and formed the government.   Palestinian Islamic Jihad: This is the Palestinian branch [Al-Jihad al-Islami] of Islamic Jihad, headed, as of 2004, by Ramadan Abdullah Shallah, a personal friend of, and former co-worker with, Dr. Sami Al Arian of the University of South Florida, who raised major funding for the organization in the United States. Its intellectual roots lie more with the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood than with Al-Gama'a.  The Islamic Jihad’s ideology blended Palestinian nationalist ideas with themes ‎drawn from three other sources: the ideology of the Muslim Brethren; patterns of ‎activity of the militant Islamist groups in Egypt; and, uniquely among Sunni ‎movements, the teachings of Ayatollah Khomeini, the Shi`i leader of the Islamic ‎revolution in Iran. The latter theme has established a strong operational and finacial linkage between Palestinian Islamic Jihad and Hezbollah.‎ According to the Islamic Jihad, a proper reading of the Koran and an ‎understanding of history would lead to the conclusion that Palestine is the focus ‎of the religio-historical confrontation between the Muslims and their eternal ‎enemies, the Jews. The Muslims represent the forces of truth (haq) while the ‎Jews (and Christians) embody the forces of apostasy (batil). In the context of ‎this confrontation, the Palestine problem is the core of a Western offensive that ‎began with Napoleon’s invasion of Egypt in 1798 and reached its climax in 1918 ‎with the disintegration of the Ottoman Empire, which had symbolized Islamic ‎unity. According to this view, Palestine was always the focus of Western ‎imperialist designs and was meant to serve as a launch pad to take over other ‎Muslim territories. Palestinian Islamic Jihad holds the allegiance of about 4% of the Palestinian population.Its military and terror arm is the Al Quds Brigade.  Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine [PFLP]: -Strongest Marxist-Leninist group, founded in 1967 by George Habash, within the PLO. Still openly promotes the destruction of Israel by force. LEBANESE-BASED TERROR Hezbollah ["Party of God]: - Radical Shiite (Shii'a is an Iranian-based sect of Islam) group in Lebanon from 1982 on, financed and directed by the Iranian mullahs with assistance from Syrian intelligence. Thousands of members, over one million sympathizers in Lebanon. Blew up the USMC barracks at Beirut Airport in 1982. Dedicated to the destruction of Israel and the removal of all Western influence (the "Great Satan") from the Islamic world. Sponsors schools and charities, but 100% violent; uses suicide attacks, kidnappings, murder, truck bombs, and tactical military assaults on Israeli Army positions.   Hezbollah Sheikh Nasrullah Although formerly a rival of Al Quaida, they began getting together with the latter as of 2002 to share intelligence and to act in concert. Hezbollah has raised so many funds for itself worldwide, it even has its own television station, Al Manar.  Abu Nidal Organization [a.k.a. Black September]: - Several hundred plus militia in Lebanon. Funded by Syrian intelligence. Currently headed by Sabri al-Banna; split from the PLO (considered by Black September to be too moderate) in 1974. Its original head, Abu Nidal, died mysteriously in Baghdad, where he had sought refuge, in August, 2002. Probably something to do with a dispute with saddam. To Saddam, violence was politics, and politics was violence. EGYPTIAN-BASED TERROR Al-Gama'a ["The Group"] [Al Gama'at al Islamiya] , [Jama'a Islamia,(Islamic Group)]: - Egypt's pre-eminent Islamic extremist group, headed by the blind Sheikh Umar Abd al-Rahman    (in prison in the U.S.). Seeks to overthrow the Egyptian government and replace it with a Taliban-like state. Thousands of hard-core members in Cairo, Alexandria (particularly among unemployed graduates and students) and throughout rural Egypt; millions of sympathizers in Egypt. Funded by Iran, probably others. Some former members were part of the 9-11 hijackers. Close links to Al Quaida. Gama'a murdered President Anwar Sadat of Egypt in 1981 and attempted to blow up the World Trade Center in 1993. Recent pamphlets in 2002 put out by Al Gama'a members in prison in Egypt denouncing Islamic terror are phony, paid for by the Mubarak government. Al-Gama'at al-Islamiya has particularly strong strength in the Al Minya, Asyu't, Qina and Soha governates of southern Egypt, which are so popular with western tourists. Armed attacks on those tourists have become a specialty of this group since 1992. Muslim Brotherhood: - Egypt's oldest radical Islamic movement, founded in 1928. Anti-Zionist to the core, dedicated to the overthrowal of Israel. Responsible in part for the overthrowal of Egypt's monarchy in the 1950's and the installation of Gamal Abdel Nasser as President, whom the Brotherhood later turned on for being too secular. Thousands of members and hundreds of thousands of sympathizers throuhout the Arab world still today. Has a slightly more literary and intellectual bent than some of the other more pro-active Egyptian-based groups. Their current platform calls for breaking Egyptian ties with Israel; denouncing the U.S. (and its current $2 billion in annual aid to Egypt); and sending Egyptian soldiers to fight as guerillas in Palestine against Israel. It is today gaining strength in membership among the young, rich, intellectually oriented Egyptian elite.      Editors' Note: You may see "new" groups not mentioned here claimng responsibility in the news for brand new acts of terrorism. These people have a habit, going back many years, of creating new names for themselves to give the illusion there are more of them than there are. Trust us, as of 2006, 90% of all Islamist terrorist acts in the world can be traced back to one or more of the groups mentioned here.  MISCELLANEOUS ARABIC TERRORIST VOCABULARY Abu: When used in a man's name, is a nickname known as a kunya in Arabic. It means "father of" and is followed by the first name of the firstborn son. This epithet is currently widely used by terrorists to create pseudonyms for themselves. Fedayeen: simply means militia, or a militia, or militiaman or men. Intifada: "Uprising," commonly used to refer to Palestinians throwing stones at, and shooting, Israelis in the West Bank and Gaza. Mujahaddin: "Soldier of God," a term commonly associated with Afghan fighters who opposed the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in the 1980's. ***************  THE ORIGINS OF ISLAM   The Prophet Muhammed, the founder of Islam - which means 'submission to the will of God' -  was born in Mecca, in Arabia, in 570 A.D. In about 610, he said he began to receive revelations from God and in 613 he began preaching to the public in Mecca. Later, his revelations were written down to form the Koran. These revelations pronounce, among other things, that there is only one God, that the figures of the Old and New Testaments were prophets of a sort, but that Muhammed is the only true prophet of God, that women are to be subjugated to man ('plough into them as ye will, like they were chaffs of wheat'), and that Islamic law should govern all aspects of public and private, social and economic, religious and political life, for all men and women everywhere, from the beginning of time to the end of time. Muhammed and his followers were forced to flee from Mecca in 622 because of disputes with Mecca's chamber of commerce. Muhammed's adherents recaptured Mecca by military force in 629, and Islam began to spread as a religious and political force, a force it still is today. By 733 A.D. Islam had spread in an arc extending from Spain to India. ********************************** MODERATION IN THE KORAN There are two verses - only two verses - in all the Koran, which condemn killing, and only one verse which condemns 'slaying' explicitly. It is these verses that the Bush Administration,  people like the Editors of USA Today, and moderate Muslims gamble on when they appeal to Muslims to condemn and stand against radical jihadists. Here these two short verses are: "Guide us away from the path of anger...."; and "Slaying is never justified - other than in cases of murder or for those who do mischief in the land...." [Emphasis added.] The Muslim world is, in fact, in 2006, totally fragmented as to what Islam is, or should be, but there are millions of Muslims in the world who believe in moderate Islam, as opposed to radical Islam, fundamentalist Islam, or jihadist Islam. ***************************** WHERE THE MUSLIMS ARE, 2006: Arab countries   284 million Sub-Saharan Africa   254 million Pakistan and Bangladesh   230 million Afghanistan   23 million Indonesia   196 million Remainder of Southeast Asia   30 million India    133 million China   133 million Iran   65 million Turkey   62 million Azerbaijan   49 million Russia   27 million European Union   10 million (out of 400 million total population) Latin , Central and South America   2 million U.S. and Canada   10 million (out of 330 million total population)    ************************************ NUMBER OF ADHERENTS FOR MAJOR RELIGIONS, 2006: Christianity   2.1 billion Islam   1.5 billion Hinduism   900 million Buddhism   376 million Sikhism   23 million Judaism   14 million ************************************