Hours after the broadcast of an interview in which Gen Musharraf claimed that the US and its allies would fail in their “war on terror” without the support of Pakistan and the Inter Services Intelligence (ISI), the senior police officer in charge of the investigation into the bombings dropped a diplomatic bombshell.
Mumbai police commissioner AN Roy said the ISI began planning the July attack in March and later provided training to the Islamic militant group, Lashkar-e-Taiba, that carried it out.
What’s more distressing is that this public accusation seems to be based on rather dubious evidence.
Mr Roy said many of the suspects had been trained to resist interrogation and that investigators had managed to elicit the information only by drugging them with a “truth serum”.
To be honest, despite the constant tensions between India and Pakistan, I would be extremely surprised to find out that Pakistan’s government was behind the Mumbai bombings. I doubt that they would risk a full blown war that could eventually involve a nuclear exchange. That is not to say, though, that no members of the Pakistani government were involved.
At the present time, though, I’m doubtful that the truth will be known. In the meantime, let’s hope that tensions between the two countries don’t spiral out of control as a result of this accusation.
JEDDAH, 30 September 2006 — For years comedy has been used to satirize the state or society in the Arab world. It is said to be the only way to criticize the systems in the region without having to spend a night or two in lockups. More than two decades have passed since Syrian icon Dareed Laham starred in his hit motion picture “The Border”. In the film, Laham criticized Arab-style bureaucracy in a production that has become a landmark for the modern history of political satire in the Middle East.
Today, Arabs can get a little relief from the sometimes-frustrating realities of politics and society by watching “Tash Ma Tash,” which first appeared on Saudi TV during Ramadan 14 years ago.
“Tash Ma Tash” is somewhat of a phenomenon in the Middle East. It’s one of the most widely viewed TV programs during the month of Ramadan, popular for its ascerbic attacks on the status quo. What’s somewhat surprising (at least to those who have little knowledge of Saudi Arabs) is that it is a Saudi production, in Arabic, and so clearly for domestic consumption.
One episode this year satirized the recruitment of terrorists, having the would-be terrorists compete in an “American Idol” type show. You can imagine how well that went down in some quarters. This Arab News article talks about some other episodes as well as about audience reaction. It’s pretty hotly debated.
Do read the whole piece, particularly if you think of Saudi Arabia as monolithic in its beliefs. Or if you think Muslims–even conservative, Wahhabi, Saudi Muslims–are incapable of saying “No!” to terrorism.
Even better, than saying “No!”, the show mock those who seek to use religion to promote terrorism. Mockery is one of the sharpest pens there is, particularly in an honor-based society. The fact that this program is seen by millions of Muslims, throughout the Arab world and Europe, should put paid to some of the Islamophobia. But I’m not holding my breath, unfortunately.
TNOYF has the return of the BeeGees. V the K always has the best pictures at Caption This!
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House Majority Leader John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) told The Washington Post last night that he had learned this spring of inappropriate “contact” between Foley and a 16-year-old page. Boehner said he then told House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.). Boehner later contacted The Post and said he could not remember whether he talked to Hastert.
It was not immediately clear what actions Hastert took. His spokesman had said earlier that the speaker did not know of the sexually charged online exchanges between Foley and the boy.
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) took the House floor last night to demand an investigation into the Foley matter. But Boehner headed her off, calling on the House to refer the matter to the ethics committee, which the House promptly voted unanimously to do.
[...]
Rep. Rodney Alexander (R-La.), who sponsored the page from his district, said he had learned of some of the online exchanges from a reporter some months ago and passed on the information to Rep. Thomas Reynolds (R-N.Y.), chairman of the House Republican campaign organization, the Associated Press reported. Alexander said he did not pursue the matter further because “his parents said they didn’t want me to do anything.” [emphasis mine]
John Aravosis alleges that the leadership knew even earlier and asks:
Tell me why Denny Hastert shouldn’t be forced to immediately resign. They left your kids with this man AFTER they knew what he was doing. They let him stay in the GOP leadership. They let him remain the chair of the child sex offender caucus. Jesus Christ.
Fair questions all. Due process might explain keeping things close to the vest and exercising every caution in making sure Foley was in fact guilty of this conduct before letting word get out. I’m at a loss to explain why he was allowed to remain in charge of making laws to protect our children. Absent some incredibly good explanation, Hastert and Boehner need to go.
The deputy leader of al-Qaida called President Bush a failure and a liar in the war on terror in a video statement released Friday, and he compared Pope Benedict XVI to the 11th century pontiff who launched the First Crusade.
“Can’t you be honest at least once in your life, and admit that you are a deceitful liar who intentionally deceived your nation when you drove them to war in Iraq,” Ayman al-Zawahri said in a portion of the video released by the Washington-based SITE Institute.
Al-Zawahri also criticized Bush for continuing to imprison al-Qaida leaders in prisons, including al-Qaida No. 3 Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the alleged Sept. 11 mastermind who was captured in Pakistan in March 2003. “Bush, you deceitful charlatan, 3 1/2 years have passed since your capture of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, so how have you found us during this time? Losing and surrendering?” he said, according to the SITE Institute.
“What you have perpetrated against Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and the other Muslim captives in your prisons and the prisons of your slaves in Egypt, Jordan, Pakistan and elsewhere is not hidden from anyone, and we are a people who do not sleep under oppression and who do not abandon our revenge until our chests have been healed of those who have aggressed against us,” the Virginia-based IntelCenter quoted the message as saying. “And we, by the grace of Allah, are seeking to exact revenge on behalf of Islam and Muslims from you and your soldiers and allies.”
Al-Zawahri, the deputy to Osama bin Laden, accused the United States and its agents of torturing Muslim prisoners seized across the Middle East. “Your agents in the Arabian Peninsula, Yemen, Egypt, Jordan, Iraq, Pakistan and Afghanistan have captured thousands of the youth and soldiers of Islam whom you made to taste at your hands and the hands of your agents various types of punishment and torture,” al-Zawahri said, according to the IntelCenter. “But we, by Allah’s grace, are taking revenge on their behalf daily from your troops and the troops of your allies and agents in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iraq, the Arabian Peninsula and all Muslim countries from Indonesia to Morocco, and moreover, on your own soil every day.”
Aside from the part about the pope, this speech could have been given by Howard Dean, Harry Reid, or Teddy Kennedy. It’s also eerily remniscient of the video released by Osama bin Laden days before the 2004 election.
UPDATE: The post was a tongue-in-cheek reaction written hastily before I departed for an evening engagement. Obviously, there are snippets of this speech–the death to America stuff–that the Democrats wouldn’t say.
Anyone who reads this site on a regular basis knows that I’m not in the “Democrats hate America” camp. Still, it is striking how much of Zawahri’s remarks are standard talking points from the opposition party: The business about Bush being a “failure” and a “liar,” the emphasis on Abu Ghraib, Iraq as a rallying cry for Muslim outrage, and so forth.
A gay couple from Rhode Island has the right to marry in Massachusetts because laws in their home state do not expressly prohibit same-sex marriage, a judge ruled Friday.
Wendy Becker and Mary Norton of Providence argued that a 1913 law that forbids out-of-state residents from marrying in Massachusetts if their marriage would not be permitted in their home state did not apply to them because Rhode Island does not specifically ban gay marriage.
Superior Court Judge Thomas Connolly agreed. “No evidence was introduced before this court of a constitutional amendment, statute, or controlling appellate decision from Rhode Island that explicitly deems void or otherwise expressly forbids same-sex marriage,” he ruled.
Although the ruling allows same-sex couples from Rhode Island to get married in Massachusetts, the Massachusetts court has no power to ensure that Rhode Island recognizes such marriages. No other states are affected.
The ruling is rather bizarre. Presumably, if same-sex marriage were legally permissible in Rhode Island, Becker and Norton could save themselves a trip to Massachusetts, not to mention court costs, and just get married in Rhode Island.
Saying he was “deeply sorry,” Congressman Mark Foley (R-FL) resigned from Congress today, hours after ABC News questioned him about sexually explicit internet messages with current and former congressional pages under the age of 18.
A spokesman for Foley, the chairman of the House Caucus on Missing and Exploited Children, said the congressman submitted his resignation in a letter late this afternoon to Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert.
[A]ccording to several former congressional pages, the congressman used the Internet to engage in sexually explicit exchanges.
They say he used the screen name Maf54 on these messages provided to ABC News.
Maf54: You in your boxers, too?
Teen: Nope, just got home. I had a college interview that went late.
Maf54: Well, strip down and get relaxed.
Another message:
Maf54: What ya wearing?
Teen: tshirt and shorts
Maf54: Love to slip them off of you.
And this one:
Maf54: Do I make you a little horny?
Teen: A little.
Maf54: Cool.
The language gets much more graphic, too graphic to be broadcast, and at one point the congressman appears to be describing Internet sex.
Federal authorities say such messages could result in Foley’s prosecution, under some of the same laws he helped to enact.
“Adds up to soliciting underage children for sex,” said Brad Garrett, a former FBI agent and now an ABC News consultant. “And what it amounts to is serious both state and federal violations that could potentially get you a number of years.”
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Mike Boyer observes, “I can only imagine that there is a cold chill in the air over at the WaPo newsroom this afternoon. After being scooped once again on a story about one of its own scribes, the Post is scrambling to catch up with the New York Times, which this morning outed the most important revelations of Bob Woodward’s new book, State of Denial.”
It’s an interesting quandry that newspapers find themselves in when their correspondents sign book contracts. The publishers quite naturally expect to control the timing of information release, which prevents the reporter-authors from handing their papers an automatic scoop. The result, frequently, is that someone under no obligation to the publisher beats them to the punch.
UNC lawprof Eric Muller posts about Michelle Malkin, a lot, on his blog, Is That Legal?
Yesterday’s installment is a rather inexplicable rant saying that her recent syndicated column criticizing Charlotte Church’s transition from Christian rock teen queen to 20-year-old skank is hypocritical because–brace yourself!–Malkin wore a bikini and went to parties in 1992 and he has photos to prove it.
Aside from being absurdly illogical, Muller’s argument is rather weakened by the fact that the photos of Malkin are rather obvious forgeries.
Malkin is urging Muller’s firing from UNC and AllahPundit suggests a libel suit and/or retaliation in like fashion.
While I’ve defended the likes of Ward Churchill, William Woodward, Juan Cole, Joseph Woolcock, and many other professors and their rights to express views I find objectionable without incurring professional penalties, Muller’s obsessiveness and dishonesty are worrisome. Thinking nutty things is within the bounds of academic freedom; cyber-stalking is not.
UPDATE: Muller posted an update a few minutes ago atop his post:
UPDATE, 3:00 p.m.: It appears that I was mistaken when I linked to the picture on flickr below, which I believed to be a picture of Michelle Malkin. I regret my error, and I apologize to Michelle Malkin for it. She has asked that I leave the post up — indeed, she has reprinted it — and so I will do as she wishes.
A decent gesture but the post itself, on the heels of some other bizarre ones about Malkin’s personal life, is still not what one would expect from someone in Muller’s position.
