‘A hero cabbie who took on the Glasgow Airport terror suspects told yesterday how he booted one of them in the privates.
Alex McIlveen, 45, kicked the man, whose body was in flames, so hard that he tore a tendon in his foot.
But he said last night: “He didn’t even flinch. I couldn’t believe he didn’t go down.’
‘A Mickey Mouse lookalike who preached Islamic domination on a Hamas-affiliated children’s television program was beaten to death in the show’s final episode Friday.
In the final skit, Farfour was killed by an actor posing as an Israeli official trying to buy Farfour’s land. At one point, the mouse called the Israeli a “terrorist.”
“Farfour was martyred while defending his land,” said Sara, the teen presenter. He was killed “by the killers of children,” she added.’
‘A terrorist watch list compiled by the FBI has apparently swelled to include more than half a million names.
Privacy and civil liberties advocates say the list is growing uncontrollably, threatening its usefulness in the war on terror.
The bureau says the number of names on its terrorist watch list is classified.
A portion of the FBI’s unclassified 2008 budget request posted to the Department of Justice Web site, however, refers to “the entire watch list of 509,000 names,” which is utilized by its Foreign Terrorist Tracking Task Force.’
‘F-16s intercepted a small plane after officials misinterpreted a phrase uttered by the pilot as his aircraft flew over military airspace: “hostile takeover.”
The pilot was talking about business, the plane’s owner said. But a frantic air traffic controller couldn’t confirm that because the pilot had turned off his radio, said Maj. Roger Yates of the Clay County Sheriff’s Department.
Within minutes, federal aviation authorities scrambled the fighter jets to intercept the plane Monday evening just outside of Oklahoma City and escort it to the Clay County airport near Mosby.
Once it was on the ground, more than a dozen armed federal agents and tactical deputies surrounded the plane. Federal authorities, who interviewed the pilot for two hours, said Tuesday that there was no threat to anyone and no charges would be filed.’
‘CIA and FBI agents hunting for al Qaeda militants in the Horn of Africa have been interrogating terrorism suspects from 19 countries held at secret prisons in Ethiopia, which is notorious for torture and abuse, according to an investigation by The Associated Press.
Human rights groups, lawyers and several Western diplomats assert hundreds of prisoners, who include women and children, have been transferred secretly and illegally in recent months from Kenya and Somalia to Ethiopia, where they are kept without charge or access to lawyers and families.
The detainees include at least one U.S. citizen and some are from Canada, Sweden and France, according to a list compiled by a Kenyan Muslim rights group and flight manifests obtained by AP.’
‘The CIA has dismissed a Council of Europe report alleging that it ran secret jails for terror suspects in Europe after the 11 September attacks.
A CIA spokesman said the report was biased and distorted, and that the agency had operated lawfully.
Swiss Senator Dick Marty, who wrote the report, said secret CIA prisons “did exist in Europe from 2003 to 2005, in particular in Poland and Romania”.
The charge was denied by both Polish and Romanian officials.’
Followup to Secret CIA jails hosted by Poland, Romania.
‘A European investigator said on Friday he had proof Poland and Romania hosted secret prisons for the Central Intelligence Agency in which it interrogated top al Qaeda suspects using methods akin to torture.
Swiss senator Dick Marty said Poland housed some of the CIA’s most sensitive prisoners, including Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who says he masterminded the September 11, 2001, attacks on the United States that killed almost 3,000 people.
“There is now enough evidence to state that secret detention facilities run by the CIA did exist in Europe from 2003-2005, in particular in Poland and Romania,” Marty said in a report for the Council of Europe human rights watchdog.’
‘An alleged plot to blow up fuel tanks and pipelines at New York’s JFK airport had little chance of success, according to safety experts, who have questioned whether the plot ever posed a real threat.
US authorities said Saturday they had averted an attack that could have resulted in “unfathomable damage, deaths, and destruction,” and charged four alleged Islamic radicals with conspiracy to cause an explosion at the airport.
But according to the experts, it would have been next to impossible to cause an explosion in the jet fuel tanks and pipeline. Furthermore, the plotters seem to have lacked the explosives and financial backing to carry out the attack.
John Goglia, a former member of National Transportation Safety Board, said that if the plot had ever been carried out, it would likely have sparked a fire but little else, and certainly not the mass carnage authorities described.’
Followup to JFK plotters courted backing for plot in Caribbean, South America.
‘The legal front of the US government’s “war on terror” suffered a stunning reversal Monday when military judges threw out prosecution charges against a Canadian-born foot-soldier for Al-Qaeda and Osama bin Laden’s ex-driver.
The surprise rulings regarding Toronto native Omar Ahmed Khadr, 20, and Yemeni-born Salim Ahmed Hamdan, 36, threatened to torpedo the government’s pursuit of Guantanamo Bay terror suspects through new-look military tribunals.
In both cases, the judges found that they had no jurisdiction to proceed with trials as neither Khadr nor Hamdan had been classified as “unlawful enemy combatants” as required by a 2006 act of Congress.
Murder and other charges levied against Khadr were dismissed by Colonel Peter Brownback. Late in the evening, Navy Captain Keith Allred threw out charges of conspiracy and material support for terrorism against Hamdan.’
‘US officials said Saturday the suspects nabbed in a foiled Islamic terrorist plot to blow up New York’s main international airport courted support in South America and the Caribbean, including from Jamaat Al Muslimeen, which failed at a bold 1990 coup bid in Trinidad.
Four suspected Islamic extremists, including Abdul Kadir, a former member of Guyana’s parliament, were charged with conspiring to blow up jet-fuel supply tanks and pipelines at John F. Kennedy airport, the US Department of Justice said.
The plot had links to international terrorist cells in the Caribbean as well as South America, but was foiled well before it could be carried out, US Justice officials added.’
‘Director Mike Figgis spent longer at LAX airport than intended. He’d arrived in Los Angeles, along with half the acting and directing world, for what is known as ‘pilot season’, when the big studios try out new scripts, directors and actors in a two-week frenzy of auditions and career make-or-breaks. When Figgis was being grilled by airport immigration, he was asked the purpose of his visit. Unthinking and tired after a long flight, Mike replied: ‘I’m here to shoot a pilot.’ After five hours in an interrogation cell (yes, really), he finally made it into town.’
‘Turkey’s top general said Thursday his army — which has been massing troops on the border with Iraq — was prepared to attack separatist Kurdish guerrillas in a cross-border offensive.
Gen. Yasar Buyukanit said the military was ready and awaiting government orders for an incursion, putting pressure on the government to support an offensive that risks straining ties with the United States and Europe and raising tensions with Iraqi Kurds.
“As soldiers, we are ready,” Buyukanit said at an international security conference in Istanbul.
Although the United States has branded the guerrillas a terrorist organization, Washington fears that Turkish military action could destabilize northern Iraq — the most stable part of the war-torn country. Washington is also concerned that supporting Turkey in an incursion could alienate the pro-American Iraqi Kurds.’
‘Claims of terrorism represented less than 0.01 percent of charges filed in recent years in immigration courts by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, according to a report issued Sunday by an independent research group.
This comes despite the fact the Bush administration has repeatedly asserted that fighting terrorism is the central mission of DHS.
The Transactional Records Action Clearinghouse said it analyzed millions of previously undisclosed records obtained from the immigration courts under the Freedom of Information Act.
Of the 814,073 people charged by DHS in immigration courts during the past three years, 12 faced charges of terrorism, TRAC said.
Those 12 cases represent 0.0015 percent of the total number of cases filed.’
‘The Memorial Day holiday means it’s a day on the water with the family.
Chuck Singleton does what he can to makes sure his kids are safe out here. The concern is who else is out there.
“You don’t know where they come from,” said Singleton. “You know, they could load up with a bomb or whatever and come right out here.”
With thousands of boats on the waterways, the worry is the recreational boat is now a Homeland Security threat.’
‘Iran is secretly forging ties with al-Qaida elements and Sunni Arab militias in Iraq in preparation for a summer showdown with coalition forces intended to tip a wavering US Congress into voting for full military withdrawal, US officials say. [..]
The official said US commanders were bracing for a nationwide, Iranian-orchestrated summer offensive, linking al-Qaida and Sunni insurgents to Tehran’s Shia militia allies, that Iran hoped would trigger a political mutiny in Washington and a US retreat. “We expect that al-Qaida and Iran will both attempt to increase the propaganda and increase the violence prior to Petraeus’s report in September [when the US commander General David Petraeus will report to Congress on President George Bush’s controversial, six-month security “surge” of 30,000 troop reinforcements],” the official said.’
‘A British judge admitted on Wednesday he was struggling to cope with basic terms like “Web site” in the trial of three men accused of inciting terrorism via the Internet.
Judge Peter Openshaw broke into the questioning of a witness about a Web forum used by alleged Islamist radicals.
“The trouble is I don’t understand the language. I don’t really understand what a Web site is,” he told a London court during the trial of three men charged under anti-terrorism laws.
Prosecutor Mark Ellison briefly set aside his questioning to explain the terms “Web site” and “forum.” An exchange followed in which the 59-year-old judge acknowledged: “I haven’t quite grasped the concepts.”
Violent Islamist material posted on the Internet, including beheadings of Western hostages, is central to the case.’
These people have put a scary mask on a sheep. Every time it tries to join the herd they become terrified and run away.
(1.5meg Flash video)
‘As many as five or six U.S. air marshals are now assigned to each U.S.-bound flight from airports in Frankfurt, London and Manchester, England, because of fears terrorists might attempt a coordinated series of mid-air explosions, law enforcement officials tell the Blotter on ABCNews.com.
“We’re afraid someone in the back is going to mix something or light something up, so air marshals are being placed strategically through the plane,” said one senior law enforcement official with direct knowledge of the stepped-up security.
The stepped-up security on flights out of Britain’s Heathrow, Gatwick and Manchester airports began about two weeks ago, based on intelligence reports that another al Qaeda hijacking plot was in the making, the officials said.’
‘Staff members of an elementary school staged a fictitious gun attack on students during a class trip, telling them it was not a drill as the children cried and hid under tables.
The mock attack Thursday night was intended as a learning experience and lasted five minutes during the weeklong trip to a state park, said Scales Elementary School Assistant Principal Don Bartch, who led the trip.
“We got together and discussed what we would have done in a real situation,” he said.
Story continues below ↓advertisement
But parents of the sixth-grade students were outraged.’
‘American soldiers discovered a girls school being built north of Baghdad had become an explosives-rigged “death trap,” the U.S. military said Thursday.
The plot at the Huda Girls’ school in Tarmiya was a “sophisticated and premeditated attempt to inflict massive casualties on our most innocent victims,” military spokesman Maj. Gen. William Caldwell said.
The military suspects the plot was the work of al Qaeda, because of its nature and sophistication, Caldwell said in an interview with CNN’s Wolf Blitzer.
The plot was uncovered Saturday, when troopers in the Salaheddin province found detonating wire across the street from the school. They picked up the wire and followed its trail, which led to the school. Once inside, they found an explosive-filled propane tank buried beneath the floor. There were artillery shells built into the ceiling and floor, and another propane tank was found, the military said.’
‘A Jetstar call centre operator was allegedly told the budget airline had “just created a terrorist” after it charged excess baggage fees to a disgruntled Brisbane passenger.
Denis William Malizani, 30, of Morayfield in Brisbane’s north, was yesterday charged with making a threat to destroy an aircraft after being told he had to pay the baggage fee while checking in for a flight to Adelaide on April 26. [..]
He allegedly rang Jetstar’s call centre at a later stage and became “aggressive” when he was referred to the operator’s supervisor to further discuss the fees.
Prosecutor Clive Porritt said Malizani had told the operator “I will take it fucking further. I will tell you what I’ll do – I’ll blow up your fucking aircraft. You’ve just created a terrorist.”‘
‘Several classrooms at Des Moines Area Community College were evacuated after college officials became nervous about a suspicious package.
College officials called police and postal inspectors after the box was delivered Thursday. What they found inside wasn’t a bomb it was a box containing 500 condoms.
The package was sent to a teacher of a human sexuality class, and was sent by a person who had been a previous speaker at the class, said Rob Denson, the college’s president.’
‘More than a fifth of the approximately 385 prisoners at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, have been cleared for release but may have to wait months or years for their freedom because U.S. officials are finding it increasingly difficult to line up places to send them, according to Bush administration officials and defense lawyers.
Since February, the Pentagon has notified about 85 inmates or their attorneys that they are eligible to leave after being cleared by military review panels. But only a handful have gone home, including a Moroccan and an Afghan who were released Tuesday. Eighty-two remain at Guantanamo and face indefinite waits as U.S. officials struggle to figure out when and where to deport them, and under what conditions.
The delays illustrate how much harder it will be to empty the prison at Guantanamo than it was to fill it after it opened in January 2002 to detain fighters captured in Afghanistan and terrorism suspects captured overseas.’
‘David Hicks was a bumbling wanna-be who would have been a “total liability” for al-Qaeda in any terrorist attack.
In a scathing critique, Hicks’s US military prosecutors have privately described the convicted Australian as a man of “no personal courage or intellect” who rolled over as soon as he was questioned.
And they have undermined the Australian Government’s portrayal of Hicks as a dangerous terrorist by admitting that his crimes were relatively minor compared with those of his fellow inmates at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba.’
‘It’s got suicide bombers, political kidnaps and intercontinental war. It’s got filthy propaganda, rampant paranoia and secret treaties…
… and the Axis of Evil is a spinner in the middle of the board. You can fight terrorism, you can fund terrorism, you can even be the terrorists. The only thing that matters is global domination – err, liberation.’
‘[..] If you look at history, you can see that there is essentially a blueprint for turning an open society into a dictatorship. That blueprint has been used again and again in more and less bloody, more and less terrifying ways. But it is always effective. It is very difficult and arduous to create and sustain a democracy – but history shows that closing one down is much simpler. You simply have to be willing to take the 10 steps.
As difficult as this is to contemplate, it is clear, if you are willing to look, that each of these 10 steps has already been initiated today in the United States by the Bush administration.’
‘Suspected members of extremist groups have signed up as school bus drivers in the United States, counterterror officials said Friday, in a cautionary bulletin to police. An
FBI spokesman said, “Parents and children have nothing to fear.”
Asked about the alert notice, the FBI’s Rich Kolko said, “There are no threats, no plots and no history leading us to believe there is any reason for concern,” although law enforcement agencies around the country were asked to watch out for kids’ safety.’
Hooray for contradicting yourself four times in two paragraphs, and trying to scare people in the process.
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