MB in France

All governments try to prevent "leaks" because they all keep secrets from citizens. A report on the activities of the Muslim Brotherhood in France was recently leaked to a "newspaper of record," Le Figaro.

Intended only for top government officials, the report claims "that the Muslim Brotherhood has built an extensive ideological infrastructure in France--not through violence, but through schools, charities, mosques, and soft power."  Its goal is to infiltrate civil society "under the guise of religious and educational activities." (Image)

 

The Brotherhood's French network includes 21 private schools (3 are state-funded), 815 Quranic schools ("66,000 minors are taught to see themselves as part of a global Muslim community in moral and cultural opposition to Western secularism"), and hundreds of mosques. A core concept is the hatred of Jews. 

None of this is illegal. It's a patient, gradual takeover which takes years. Will the French ultimately comply? 

That depends. How do they feel about being colonized?

from "How the Muslim Brotherhood is Capturing Europe"

Remember them

We who lived through that time will never forget the terrible attack on America on 9-11-2001 playing out in real time on our tv's. I remember a radio announcer saying, "We're in a war with somebody." At the time, no one knew who that was.

Families who lost somebody that day keep memories of their loved ones. A wife remembers that day in this post from 2018:

Deena Burnett said of her husband Tom, "He just felt that whatever God's plan was for him, it had something to do with the White House and was going to impact a lot of people."

On September 11, 2001, Tom was on Flight 93. He and three others determined to "do something" when terrorists took over the airplane to use it as a weapon against the United States. 

It is thought that the terrorists planned to crash the plane into the White House. Tom and the others formed a plan to gain control of the cockpit, but somehow the plane crashed in a Pennsylvania field. Tom's God-given destiny was to help save the White House from Islamic terror.

"Tom Burnett’s strength was problem solving: it was practically a job description for the COO of a medical technology firm. Working the problem is what he did best, his wife says... and that day was no exception:

"Deena Burnett: He was very busy. He was taking down information. He was planning what they were going to do. And he was not interested in reviewing his life or whispering sweet nothings into the telephone, I assure you. He was problem solving, and he was going to take care of it and come on home."

He grew up in Bloomington MN and is buried at Fort Snelling National Cemetery.

Left behind

Back in August, as the date approached when allied military would leave Afghanistan, about 123,000 civilians were successfully evacuated by U.S. and coalition aircraft.

But thousands of Afghans who wanted to get out didn't make it. Those who worked for the U.S. military are in trouble, but they're not the only ones.

The American University of Afghanistan was established in 2007 with $160 million funding from the U.S. Agency for International Development. The president, Ian Bickford, fled when the Taliban took the country and then the university was "shuttered." Another American investment abandoned and left for the Taliban.

Students of AUAF gathered at a safehouse on the 29th, rode busses to the airport, and waited seven hours for clearance - only to be rejected by airport officials. AUAF emailed 600 students: “I regret to inform you that the high command at HKIA in the airport has announced there will be no more rescue flights.”

photo

More bad news: AUAF also gave their names to the Taliban around the airport.

A sophomore spoke for the students, “We are all terrified. There is no evacuation. There is no getting out."

from Yahoo! News

Taliban win 2

 (cont'd from yesterday's post)

General Petraeus, former top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, says the situation is a disaster, that the country will be a sanctuary for Al-Qaeda and Islamic State after the Taliban take control. 

It's a disaster for one group more than any other: people who helped the U.S. Imagine their desperation now that the Taliban has power. America's military made them safe for 20 years but now they're pulling out, leaving our Afghan allies to the mercy of barbarians. One of them says, "We are all living in fear."

Some, about 640 persons, managed to get to the airport and onto a U.S. military cargo plane.

photo

Others flooded the roads and headed for the border.

(cont'd tomorrow)

Taliban win

Yesterday the Taliban stormed into Kabul, the capital and largest city of Afghanistan. They're re-taking the country after U.S.-led forces removed them 20 years ago. They're now the "champions of the jihadi movement because they pushed out the United States." (Video below.)

"Already today [Sunday] thousands of Al-Qaeda and Taliban prisoners were freed from jail." (Video below.)

Thousands of panicked citizens took to the highways and the airport. Some raced to the bank to take out their savings before the city is lost.

Taliban return 2

 (cont'd from yesterday's post)

The Taliban last held power around the turn of the century, banning music and television, preventing girls from studying after puberty, and not allowing women to leave home without an escort. Kabul's soccer stadium was re-purposed for public executions. In 2006, Kabul's American University had one woman in its 51 students. 

Now the U.S. and its allies are leaving Afghanistan after two decades of fighting Islamic extremism, but the Taliban is regaining the power it lost during the war. They control about half the districts in the country.

photo

Reports say that they're killing civilians in Spin Boldak, and executing Afghan officers who recently surrendered. A former government official says that the Taliban brags that they defeated the U.S. and made it negotiate an exit.

"[Y]ou can see why the Biden administration—like the Trump administration before it—wants out. But we should be clear-eyed about what this means. Afghanistan will return to brutality, and the world will have to cope with the consequences."

from AEI

Taliban return 1

Taliban stories from Afghanistan were featured in our headlines years ago. We're going to wish they stayed in the past because they're back, bringing death and destruction with them.

According to Wikipedia, Islamic "mujahideen" fought the U.S.S.R.'s invasion and occupation of Afghanistan back in 1979, aided and trained by Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and the U.S. Some of them eventually founded and led the Taliban movement.

photo

Their own power and ideology were driven rough-shod over all other traditions. In 2001 they aimed their missiles and weapons at two historic, gigantic Buddha statues carved into the hillside almost 2000 years ago. The heritage of other people is nothing to them.

Murder and destruction of anything in their way was typical. They never disbanded and now they're back. Panic is rising in Afghanistan.

(cont'd tomorrow)

Kenya attack

The Kenya Defense Force and the US military are working together to defeat terrorist attacks, like the one reported in yesterday's post when one soldier and two civilians were killed at the camp in Kenya last Sunday.

 "US Africa Command -- which is responsible for military relations with nations on the continent -- said Africa Command and Kenya Defense forces repelled the attack."

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Al-Qaeda affiliate al-Shabaab claimed to be responsible for Sunday's attack, but they more commonly target civilian Christians.

Nine Christians traveling by bus in December were ordered to recite the Islamic creed. When they didn't do it, they were "paraded out of the bus and shot dead at close range by those believed to be Al-Shabaab militants."

"In 2018, Fredrick Ngui Ngonde and Joshua Ooko Obila were killed in a similar manner for declining to recite the Islamic creed along the Garissa Masalani road."

"In 2015, 148 students at Garissa University were killed by gunmen while the Muslim students were freed."

There are incidents where non-extremist Muslims have tried to defend Christians. In at least one case, that individual suffered the same punishment.

Violence

Every life is precious, so the world is following the story of 12 boys and a soccer coach who were trapped two weeks ago in a Thailand cave. Attempts at rescue have so far saved eight.

Every life is precious, so why is the world not following the story of thousands of Nigerian citizens who are frequently attacked - and die - in their own country? It's been happening for years (look at posts under the Nigeria label). 

“That 6,000 Christians, ‘mostly children, women and the aged,’ have been butchered in just the first six months of this year is a reminder of how violence only escalates when left unchecked. That is the story of the Muslim persecution of Christians in Nigeria.”

photo: stream

"In what the Christian Association of Nigeria is calling a pure genocide, 238 more Christians were killed and churches desecrated by Muslims last week in the west African nation. This brings the death toll of Christians to [over] 6,000 since the start of 2018."

(cont'd tomorrow)

Sweden crime

from NYTimes, "Hand Grenades and Gang Violence Rattle Sweden's Middle Class"

Sweden has enjoyed a low crime rate for many years, but the Swedish crime rate is rising. 

"Weapons from a faraway, long-ago war [Bosnia] are flowing into immigrant neighborhoods here, puncturing Swedes’ sense of confidence and security . .  [G]ang-related assaults and shootings are becoming more frequent, and the number of neighborhoods categorized by the police as “marred by crime, social unrest and insecurity” is rising.

"Illegal weapons often enter Sweden over the Oresund Bridge, a 10-mile span that links the southern city of Malmo to Denmark. When it opened, in 2000, the bridge symbolized the unfurling of a vibrant, borderless Europe, but in recent years it has been more closely associated with smuggling, of people, weapons and drugs.

Daniel Zuniga, a Stockholm suburb resident, died a month ago because he picked up an M-75 hand grenade lying in the street. It was packed with plastic explosive and 3,000 steel balls. His wife, bicycling with him, was blown to the ground and injured.

Paulus Borisho was near the hand grenade explosion and says, "I am afraid for Europe."

Afghanistan #2

(cont'd from yesterday's post)

American troops, regional forces (Northern Alliance), and allies together have been fighting Al-Qaeda and the Taliban since shortly after the September 11, 2001, attack on America. By December 2001, the Taliban seemed to collapse. By 2003 U.S. troops were down to 8,000 and it looked like the major fighting was over.

But by February of 2009 American presence had climbed to 37,000. U.S. Pres. Obama declared that we would withdraw in 2011 and sent more military. Five months later, we had about 68,000 troops in Afghanistan, and then he committed 30,000 more in December.

Plans and discussions centered for years on how to make Afghanistan secure and self-sustaining, and our troops were drawn down. The Taliban re-gained strength. By 2017 it controlled about a third of the country. 

In January of this year Taliban violence escalated, and Pres. Trump sent more troops. At this time our service members in Afghanistan number around 14,000.

So that's a short summary to roughly answer the question, what's going on in Afghanistan?? It's taken from the Council on Foreign Relations.

"The Taliban have nowhere to hide,” the commander of American troops in Afghanistan, U.S. Army Gen. John Nicholson, said [3 weeks ago]. “There will be no safe haven for any terrorist group bent on bringing harm and destruction to this country.”

(NATO photo)

Afghanistan #1

We are still at war in Afghanistan. We've had troops there since fall of 2001, only weeks after the 9-11 attack on America. Just in 2017, "almost 3,500 civilians were killed and 7,500 injured in extremist attacks and military strikes."

But those civilian deaths are down 9% compared to the number from 2016. According to this article, America's military are saving lives with their presence in the country. 

"The Taliban is responsible for more than 40 percent of the casualties, according to the U.N., while ISIS and other terrorist groups continue to kill and maim innocent people in Afghanistan as well."

"One Taliban commander who will no longer be able to murder Americans and Afghans is Khan Said Sajna. According to Voice of America, the Pakistani Taliban confirmed the terrorist’s death in a recent U.S. drone strike in a remote area of Afghanistan near the Pakistani border."

(cont'd tomorrow)

More attacks

Nigeria has been suffering the attacks of Boko Haram, an Islamic extremist terrorist group, for eight years. Over 20,000 people have been killed and thousands have been kidnapped, following the pattern of ISIS.

photo: newafricabusinessnews,com

Last year the Nigerian government claimed to have crushed the group, but another 19 have been killed. Victims included members of a civilian self-defense force and some people in mourning for them, plus another 23 wounded, all in a string of attacks this summer.

"Boko Haram has increasingly used girls and young women to carry out attacks on marketplaces, checkpoints and other targets. Some young women who escaped extremist group have said girls are drugged and forced to carry out suicide missions."

Rialto Bridge

It might survive for its 1000th birthday.  Originally built of wood in the 1100's over the Grand Canal in Venice, Italy, the picturesque Rialto Bridge was rebuilt of stone in 1591.

Whether it would survive throughout history was never in question - until now. Only good Italian police work saved it a week ago from Islamic extremist barbarians.

photo: stream.org

#PrayforBerlin

A German market full of Christmas foods and decorations would be fun at this time of year - normally. This Berlin market was normal yesterday until someone barreled through shoppers and merchandise stands with a truck, killing twelve.

photo: stream.org

Now heavily armed police stand guard in the Christmas market and a beautiful tradition has been poisoned.

Looks like the U.S. State Department was right to warn about this a month ago when they called for caution "in markets and other public places, saying extremist groups including Islamic State and al-Qaida were focusing “on the upcoming holiday season and associated events.”

Islamic growth

(cont'd)

So Islam and Christianity are predicted to grow (in contrast to other religions) over the next few decades. Islam will grow faster. Why? That CNN article gives two reasons.

One easy answer is that Muslim women have more children. Birth rates in The West have been tumbling for years, but birth rates in the Middle East, Africa, and some parts of Asia are still well over replacement rate.

Second, conversion out of Islam may be dangerous, even illegal in some nations. In Christianity, there's no penalty to change your mind.

So that's what the article said. But there's another obvious factor chilling the growth of Christianity in some parts of the world: genocide of Christians in the name of Islamic extremism, as recognized by both the European Union and the United States government.

Return good

Minority Christians living in Syria, that hotbed of civil war and danger, are still trying to live as Jesus would want them to live:

"A good man brings good things out of the good stored up in his heart . ."

"[W]hile ISIS is inspiring mass murderer, the Syrian Orthodox archdiocese of Aleppo is feeding poor Muslim families during the month of Ramadan. "

This is the archdiocese whose Archbishop was kidnapped by radical Islamists in 2013 and is presumed dead.

Islamic calm

Islamic State (IS) seeks to overwhelm, kill, or enslave Christians and other minority religions in the Middle East. Hundreds of thousands have had to leave their homes and run for their lives. Who knew there were great numbers of Christian believers in Syria and Iraq? I didn't.

When we hear news of militant Islamic attacks happening in other parts of the world too, it seems like Islam itself is at war with everyone. So different news , like the following, is just a bit of good news:

Last month the biggest Muslim organization in the world hosted a meeting of 300 Muslim leaders in Indonesia, where they denounced extremism and encouraged living in peace with other religions.

Back in January, 200 Muslim leaders met and put out the " Marrakesh Declaration: a 750-word document calling for religious freedom for non-Muslims in majority-Muslim countries." It declares that Muslims should "go beyond mutual tolerance and respect, to providing full protection for the rights and liberties to all religious groups in a civilized manner that eschews coercion, bias, and arrogance."

Target is 2%

Pakistan is only 2% Christian, but apparently that tiny number is intolerable to Islamic extremists in the Pakistani Taliban. A group has claimed credit for killing 74 people and injuring 362 on Easter, "saying it had targeted Christians"  (in the process killing and injuring many others).

At least 24 of the murdered were children. Christian father Sohail had brought four of his kids and his wife to the park for the day, and was buying ride tickets when the suicide bomber detonated. "My six-year-old is in critical condition and is in surgery," he said.