FDD

Kristol v. Fukuyama (CM)

Some excerpts:

From Copenhagen to Samara, the radical Islamists are on the offensive. From Tehran to Damascus, the dictators are trying to regain the upper hand in the Middle East. From Moscow to Beijing, the enemies of liberal democracy are working to weaken the United States. Across the world, the forces of terror and tyranny are fighting back. Are we up to the challenge?

It's not clear that we are. Many liberals, here and in Europe, long ago lost the nerve to wage war--or even to defend themselves--against illiberalism. Parts of the conservative movement now seem to be losing their nerve as well. In response to an apparent clash of civilizations, they would retrench, hunker down, and let large parts of the world go to hell in a hand basket, hoping that the hand basket won't blow up in our faces.

Remember: The United States of America and its allies--regimes that seek to embody, or at least to move towards, the principles of decent, civilized, liberal democracy--did not seek this war. But we are at war, and we could lose it. Victory is not inevitable.

Does that make Bush-supporting, liberal-democracy-promoting, Iraq-war-defending neoconservative "Leninists," as Francis Fukuyama has recently charged? No. Does it mean we believe--as Fukuyama defines Leninism--that "history can be pushed along with the right application of power and will"? Does it mean that history does not automatically move in the right direction, that justice does not necessarily or easily prevail? Yes. …

[I]t would be nice if we lived in a world in which we didn't have to take the enemies of liberal democracy seriously--a world without jihadists who want to kill and clerics who want to intimidate and tyrants who want to terrorize. It would be nice to wait until we were certain conditions were ripe before we had to act, a world in which the obstacles are trivial and the enemies fold up. Unfortunately, that is not the world we live in. …

Moral seriousness in this case means political seriousness. Insist on going ahead with the ports deal so that Arab governments who have stood with us in the war on terror are not told to get lost when one of their companies acquires port management contracts in the United States. Make a real effort to destabilize Ahmadinejad in Iran. Do what it takes to defeat Zarqawi and secure Iraq. Stand with Denmark, and moderate Muslims, against the radical mob. This is no time for dishonorable retreat. It is time for resolve--and competence.

The rest of his piece is here.

What You Don’t Know Can Hurt You (CM)

And here’s why more study is needed:

“Citing broad gaps in U.S. intelligence, the Coast Guard cautioned the Bush administration that it was unable to determine whether a United Arab Emirates-owned company might support terrorist operations, a Senate panel said Monday.”

More here.

Defining Terrorism Down (CM)

From an editorial in The New Republic:

The tragedy is that Kadima and Hamas are in the ascendant at the same time. At the very moment that the Israelis have achieved a new consensus about withdrawing from territories and abandoning settlements and establishing borders and acquiescing in the creation of Palestine, the Palestinians have achieved a new consensus of the antithetical sort and have elected, by a significant majority, a movement that stands brazenly for theocracy and terrorism and the destruction of Israel. The contradiction could not be sharper or more disheartening. 

The democratic legitimacy of the Hamas victory says nothing about the moral and historical legitimacy of the Hamas program. It is important to be clear about this: The results of free and fair elections can also be opposed. Hamas does not represent a radical nationalism. It represents a religious nationalism. The Palestinians now have an Islamist leadership. Worse, a jihadist leadership: Hamas has been in the forefront of the suicide bombings of recent years, and of the sanctification of suicide bombings. These are not extremists; these are killers, and the  ideological instructors of killers. Yes, yes, Hamas also presides over institutions of social welfare and despises  corruption. So what? This is the oldest of fascist alibis. The probity of Hamas is an authoritarian probity. Are  they to be admired because they will murder but will not steal? ...

[O]ne hears over and over that the rise of Hamas is a perverse kind of good news, because power breeds  responsibility. But the history of the Middle East, and of many other regions of the world, has demonstrated the opposite. Again and again, power has bred irresponsibility. Consider Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in Iran. And consider, too, Khaled Mashal, the exiled leader of Hamas, who was in Tehran this week arranging for Iranian assistance. What drove Mashal into Ahmadinejad's arms was not Israeli or U.S. policy. It was a deep political and philosophical affinity. They are made of the same stuff; and it is not the stuff of which we are made.

More here.

A Peek at the Iranian Playbook (BM)

In today's Wall Street Journal, AEI's Michael Rubin argues that Iran is using the same tactics in Iraq that it developed in Lebanon with Hezbollah:

While journalists concentrate on the daily blood, Iraqis describe a larger pattern which U.S. officials have failed to acknowledge let alone address: Step-by-step, Iranian authorities are replicating in Iraq the strategy which allowed Hezbollah to take over southern Lebanon in the 1980s. The playbook -- military, economic and information operation -- is almost identical.

One of those tactics, Rubin says, is to recruit hearts and minds to terrorism and extremism through mass media channels:

The final part of Hezbollah's strategy is information warfare. Since 1991, it has used al-Manar TV to spread its message. Iran founded Al-Alam for the same purpose and succeeded in beginning three months before the U.S.-funded Iraqi Media Network commenced broadcasts. Well-endowed, al-Alam provided cars and video cameras to students, making them correspondents and promising rewards to those providing footage embarrassing to the U.S. mission.

It's worth noting that Hezbollah's Al-Manar television was set up with an explicit goal of recruiting terrorists and inspiring acts of violence.  One high ranking official candidly admitted that the station intends to "help people on the way to committing what you call in the West a suicide mission."

FDD, through our Coalition Against Terrorist Media, has been instrumental in removing al-Manar from eight satellites around the world.  As a result, Al-Manar can no longer promote terrorism in the United States, Canada, South and Central America, Asia, and Australia.  It still broadcasts throughout Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa  via two satellites:  ARABSAT in Saudi Arabia and Nilesat in Egypt.

Iran supplies al-Manar with a large portion of its operating budget.  In addition, al-Manar has traditionally received some money from corporate sponsors, though those dollars/euros/yen/etc. have begun to dry up after after CATM started alerting major corporations to al-Manar's support for terrorism. 

Last week, Secretary Rumsfeld argued that the U.S. needs to rethink its efforts to win the global airwaves.  Part of that strategy must be countering Iranian-funded terrorist media.  And it should include some tough steps to put an end to al-Manar's international broadcasts.  More on what can be done here.

A Jihad Window at the Emirates Gate? (WP)

The controversy about the UAE-based company projected to take over operations in a number of US seaports, quickly –and unfortunately- dove into domestic politics. The issue was turned into trusting or not the will and the capacity of the Government, particularly the executive branch to “secure the nation against Terrorists.” And once the debate mutates into investigating the intentions of the policy makers –particularly the President and his assistants – regarding the prosecution of the War on Terror, most of the exchange diverts to “politics” instead of “policies.” The seaports management issue at this point is framed by some more like a Ports-Gate affair rather than a rational examination of a strategic security matter a la 9/11 Commission. Unfortunately the immediate politicization of national security, with its ramifications on the grounds of leadership credibility, of I-told-you-so, and of I-know-better, hurts the greater vision of the debate. Let’s try to address the UAE affair in a calm, fair and systematic analysis.

The parties engaged in the debate introduced a number of arguments which complicated the understanding by the public of the core-issue. Here are a few and my comments.

How Islamist Totalitarianism Views the West

The latest FDD backgrounder looks at how Islamic Totalitarianism views the West.  Given the stakes at play in Iraq, it's useful to keep these statements in mind as we debate future policies in the region.

Good News From Iraq

While the headlines focus on sectarian violence and the possibility of civil war, it's nice to have news like this to remind us that the story in Iraq is never as simple as the media and politicians would have you believe...

From the AP:

Al-Qaida in Iraq’s leader in northern Baghdad was killed in a raid Friday, the U.S. military said.

The military identified Abu Asma, also known as Abu Anas and Akram Mahmud al-Mushhadani, as an explosives expert with close ties to important car bomb manufacturers in Baghdad.

He died in a northern Baghdad raid conducted by coalition forces with the help of Iraqi police, a military statement said.

Not only has a major terrorist leader been taken out, the raid was carried out with the help of Iraqi police.  What's the chance of this story making the headlines of the evening newscasts?

Don't Blame Democracy

Cliff May discusses the advancement of democracy in his latest Scripps Howard column.

The Danger Zone - Every Sunday, 9pm

This week's Danger Zone lineup is available here.

Last week's episode is available for podcast here.

The Politically Correct vs. the Politically Ridiculous

Andy McCarthy examines both sides of the port debate in today's National Review Online.

Fighting the Media War

The point has been made before, by FDD and by many others, but it bears repeating:  the war on terrorism is very much a war of ideas and the battlefield is the global airwaves and mass media.  How we engage on that terrain is an issue that deserves both the highest level of attention from our leaders and thoughtful analysis of where and how we are being outmaneuvered by terrorists who have proven to be masters of both destruction and public relations.

Donald Rumsfeld does both in this op-ed in today's Los Angeles Times:

The standard U.S. government public affairs operation was designed primarily to respond to individual requests for information. It tends to be reactive, rather than proactive, and it operates for the most part on an eighthour, five-days-a-week basis, while world events — and our enemies — are operating 24/7 across every time zone. That is an unacceptably dangerous deficiency.

In some cases, military public affairs officials have had little communications training and little, if any, grounding in the importance of timing, rapid response and the realities of digital and broadcast media. Let there be no doubt that the longer it takes to put a strategic communications framework into place, the more we can be certain that the vacuum will be filled by the enemy and by hostile news sources who most assuredly will not paint an accurate picture of what is actually taking place.

We have become somewhat more adept in these areas, but progress is slow.

In Iraq, for example, the U.S. military command, working closely with the Iraqi government and the U.S. Embassy, has sought nontraditional means to provide accurate information to the Iraqi people in the face of an aggressive campaign of disinformation.

Yet this has been portrayed as inappropriate: for example, the allegations of "buying news." The resulting explosion of critical media stories then causes all activity, all initiative, to stop. Even worse, it leads to a "chilling effect" among those who are asked to serve in the military public affairs field.

Improving our efforts will likely mean embracing new institutions to engage people around the world. During the Cold War, institutions such as the U.S. Information Agency and Radio Free Europe proved to be valuable instruments for the United States. We need to consider the possibility of new organizations and programs that can serve a similarly valuable role in the war on terror.

Although the enemy is increasingly skillful at manipulating the media and using the tools of communications to its advantage, it should be noted that we have an advantage as well. And that is, quite simply, that truth is on our side. Ultimately, the truth wins out.

Strange Bedfellows (CM)

Conservative William Bennett and liberal Alan Dershowitz do not agree often They do agree today that the Western press has failed to stand up for freedom and against intimidation.

We two come from different political and philosophical perspectives, but on this we agree: Over the past few weeks, the press has betrayed not only its duties but its responsibilities. To our knowledge, only three print newspapers have followed their true calling: the Austin American-Statesman, the Philadelphia Inquirer and the New York Sun.  What have they done? They simply printed cartoons that were at the center of widespread turmoil among Muslims over depictions of the prophet Muhammad. These papers did their duty.

The entire oped is here.

Read more notes & comments in this week's e-newsletter.

Global Jihad Monitor

This week's Global Jihad Monitor is now available.

Two stories of special note that you might have missed:

• A website run by Hamas' armed wing (the Izz el-Deen al-Qassam brigades) admitted this week for the first time that Hamas has received money and training from the Iranian backed Hezbollah terror group.  Hamas has long denied such connections.
• French authorities believe anti-Semitism was behind the kidnap, torture, and killing of a Jewish store clerk by a Muslim gang.

There is lots more in the full Monitor.

Ports in a Storm (CM)

The Wall Street Journal has a powerful editorial this morning on the controversy over an Arab-owned firm's bid to manage American ports.

Key argument:

Dubai Ports World would be managing the commercial activities of these U.S. ports, not securing them. There's a difference. Port security falls to Coast Guard and U.S. Customs officials. "Nothing changes with respect to security under the contract," Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said yesterday. "The Coast Guard is in charge of security, not the corporation." ...

Critics also forget, or conveniently ignore, that the UAE government has been among the most helpful Arab countries in the war on terror. It was one of the first countries to join the U.S. container security initiative, which seeks to inspect cargo in foreign ports. The UAE has assisted in training security forces in Iraq, and at home it has worked hard to stem terrorist financing and WMD proliferation. UAE leaders are as much an al Qaeda target as Tony Blair.

The editorial is here.

UN Freefall

Since September of 2001, the United Nations approval rating in the U.S. has plummeted from 77 percent to 48 percent, its lowest level in more than 15 years (this according to this PEW Research poll).  You can almost overlay this graph on top of Claudia Rosett's continuous flow of articles exposing UN corruption and hypocrisy.

Anyone wondering how low the UN can fall should read Claudia's latest on UN's Food-for-Nukes here.

And this Wall Street Journal editorial on the UN's bungled attempt to reform its laughable Human Rights Commission:

"Ambassador John Bolton has made it clear to his U.N. colleagues that the current proposal is not something the Bush Administration can endorse. That's a stand that will surely burnish his reputation in certain liberal circles as an "obstructionist." But fake reform is worse than no reform at all, and whatever else might be said of the current system, it at least has the virtue of being discredited.

"The world can certainly wait a few months more to get the human-rights agency that genuine human-rights victims deserve. The fact that the U.N. is incapable of providing one is yet another reminder of what ails the organization, especially under its current management."

The Cartoons, Islam, and the West (Andy McCarthy)

Is there such a thing as a "moderate Muslim"?  No, says Mansoor Ijaz, one of America's most thoughtful commentators on developments in the Islamic world (among many other things) in this morning's Los Angeles Times.  There is, Mansoor argues, only one brand of Islam, and it is one that jihadists have betrayed and the American media have missed an opportunity -- in the current cartoon controversy -- to portray accurately.

I don't agree with all of Mansoor's analysis, but that's not the point right now.  This is an important op-ed and it deserves to be read and considered on its own merits.  It's a great starting point for a badly needed discussion.  Find it here.

Hamas-Tehran Axis Continued

Last week, FDD released this backgrounder on Hamas and Iran's long history of close connections.

According to this report today, Hamas has gone back to their old friends in Tehran for: 1.) more money, and 2) advice on how to run the Palestinian Authority.

UPDATE:  "Hamas' political leader in exile said Tuesday that Iran will have a 'major role' in Palestinian affairs. "  More here.

BREAKING: Lebanon's Parliament Calls for Lahoud's Resignation

According to AFP:

Leaders of the anti-Syrian camp which holds the majority of seats in Lebanon's parliament on Thursday called on President Emile Lahoud to resign by March 14.

They called on the pro-Syrian president "to resign immediately and will give him until March 14", in a statement issued after the leaders of the majority group held a meeting in Beirut.

They called on MPs of the parliamentary majority to sign a petition calling
for the ouster of Lahoud.

The deadline of March 14 referred to the date of a massive rally 11 months ago held to commemorate the killing of former premier Rafiq Hariri. Almost one million people, or one in four of Lebanon's population, took part.

More as it becomes available...

Update: See new details in the comments section...

Global Jihad Monitor

The latest Global Jihad Monitor is available on the FDD website.  It features stories about deaths in Pakistan and Afghanistan due to attacks against Shiites celebrating the Ashura festival, new details about an al-Qaeda plot against western targets, and an update on the status of the investigation into the Madrid bombings, amongst other stories.

Blood Libel

While accusations of Jews using the blood of Christians and Muslims for religious ceremonies is shockingly common in the modern Middle East, it is rare to find similar demonization tactics used against Muslims.

It was quite surprising therefore to hear the statements of two suicide bombers that were recently posted on a Hamas web site.  This video, posted after Hamas' recent electoral victory, includes the video-will of two suicide bombers who blew themselves up at the Karni crossing at the end of 2004.  The statement of one of the bombers, Idham Ahmed Majala, would be par for the course if he was speaking about Jews.  But Majala's statements are about Muslims themselves:

"My message to the hated Jews: There is no God but Allah," Majala says. "We will hunt you everywhere, when you wake and when you sleep. We are a blood-drinking people and we know that there is no better blood than Jewish blood.

"We will not leave you alone until we quench ourselves with your blood and we will quench the thirst of our children with your blood. We will not rest until you leave the lands of the Muslims."

I don't think Israelis could come up with a better way to demonize Hamas if they tried.

The Cartoon Intifada Continues

"Were the Danish cartoons 'an unnecessary affront'? Did those who reprinted them 'cheer the vulgar and the stupid'?" Cliff May and Hugh Hewitt debate these questions at the "Opinion Duel."

"Terrorism, like fascism, is a matter of taste" (CM)

Barry Rubin's oped should be required reading.

More Notes & Comments available in this week's e-newsletter.

This week's Danger Zone Available for Download

This week's episode is available for podcast.

Claudia Rosett's Secret Valentine

FDD Journalist-in-Residence Claudia Rosett's work exposing the UN Oil-for-Food scandal has won her many admirers...but could it be...?

Thanks to Kathryn Lopez at The Corner for bringing to our attention.

You can find Chris Muir's Day by Day strip on the web here -- and forward on to a friend.

Dispatches from the Danger Zone: North Korea & Viagra? (RWC)

A good article in the NY Post by Peter Brookes, author of "A Devil’s Triangle: Terrorism, WMD and Rogue States” caught my eye. 

Brookes says the North Korean government is running a serious and successful organized crime syndicate, a subject I have been hammering for some time.

Brookes makes the point that North Korea, and its strange and isolated leader Kim Jong Il, are actively involved in crime as a factor in their national economic policy.   

Brookes quotes a former US State Department Asia expert as saying that profitable crime has been consciously incorporated into North Korea’s foreign policy. And it has been a real “cash cow”. 

Pyonyang is so successful at crime, using their foreign embassies, diplomatic pouches, security officers and state trading companies, that its income now approaches North Korea's legitimate export income.

North Korea has used its land to grow poppies for opium while an estimated two million North Koreans have needlessly starved from a lack of edible crops. 

Committed to Fighting Terrorism

Patrick Stethem is the brother of murdered naval officer Robert Stethem, who was savagely beaten and executed by Hezbollah terrorists during the 1985 hijacking of TWA flight 847.  His murderer, Mohammad Ali Hammadi, was recently released by Germany and returned to Lebanon. 

Patrick sends us the following thoughts on his brother’s death, America’s fight against Militant Islamist terrorists and the war on terror:

On the morning of May 24, 1985, I met my older brother, Rob, at a restaurant in our hometown.  He was deploying to Nia Makri, Greece for three weeks.  We spoke about the work he and his team would perform while in Greece.  We talked about my plans to join the Navy later that year.  He advised me, as he always had, as my older brother and as my friend.  We made plans to get together upon his return.  Rob traveled frequently with the Underwater Construction Team.  UCT deployments occur often, but are typically rather short in duration.  This trip was to be no different.  In that he was only deploying for three weeks, this was certainly not an occasion for a grand farewell.  And, yet, this time, we did hug each other goodbye. 

I did see Rob again over four weeks later.  His lifeless body, encased in a flag draped coffin was flown to Andrews Air Force Base.  My family and I were there to receive Rob, as were then Vice President George Bush and Mrs. Bush.  The events that occurred over those four weeks took my brother’s life and changed mine.

Two Views of Hamas

"U.S. and Israelis Are Said to Talk of Hamas Ouster" -- headline in today's New York Times.  Read the story here.

"Russian President Vladimir Putin said he was considering inviting the leaders of Hamas to Moscow for talks, and almost immediately, and predictably, the French pronounced this a wonderful idea." -- from Richard Cohen's column in today's Washington Post.

The rest of Cohen's column is here, but this line nails it:

"Putin, I think, would not have been quite so quick to extend a welcome to the Chechen rebels he considers to be terrorists, but the murderers of Jews are apparently a different matter."

Setting the timer on Iran

Here's an interesting question from a recent Pew Research Center poll of Americans:

"Which is your greater concern when it comes to dealing with Iran's nuclear program -- that we will take action too quickly, or that we will wait too long?"

Act Too Quickly: 34%

Wait Too Long: 53%

Unsure: 13%

Though not surprising when you consider that the poll also found that 82% believe Iran would likely give nuclear weapons to terrorists, 72% think it would be likely to attack Israel, and 66% feel that it would likely attack the the U.S. or Europe.

For more poll results, click here.

Iranian Reports

More disturbing news from Iran this weekend:

Reuters reports this morning:

Iran has resumed some uranium enrichment work, a first step toward making fuel for atomic reactors or bombs, in defiance of a vote reporting Tehran to the U.N. Security Council, diplomatic sources said on Monday.

On Saturday, radical Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad delivered another threat against Israel and the West, this time at a government-orchestrated rally to mark the 27th anniversary of the Iranian Revolution, the Bangkok Post reports:

"Do the removal of Israel before it is too late and save yourself from the fury of regional nations," the ultra-conservative president said. He once again called the Holocaust a "fairy tale" and said Europeans have become hostages of "Zionists" in Israel.

As we reported here recently, polls by FDD and our partner organization, the European Foundation for Democracy, show that large majorities of Americans and Europeans believe that Iran is a grave threat.  These polls found substantial support on both sides of the Atlantic for a coordinated military strike targeting Iran's nuclear facilities if the regime's Militant Islamic leadership rejects diplomacy.

Planning for such a last-resort strike is underway, the Sunday Telegraph (UK) reported yesterday:

Strategists at the Pentagon are drawing up plans for devastating bombing raids backed by submarine-launched ballistic missile attacks against Iran's nuclear sites as a "last resort" to block Teheran's efforts to develop an atomic bomb.

Secretary Rice declined to deny the story, the New York Sun reports, but said that diplomacy will continue:

When asked about the latest story in the London Telegraph, which said the Pentagon's planning involved deploying B-52 bombers from America for the sorties, Ms. Rice said, "The President never takes any of his options off the table. People shouldn't want the President of the United States to take options off the table. But there is a diplomatic solution to this. Now that we are in the Security Council, there are many steps that the Security Council can take, authority that the Security Council has, to help enforce IAEA requirements on Iran."

Should Free People Tolerate Intolerance?

Andy McCarthy, Cliff May and Mark Holzer grapple with this and other questions in a FrontPage Magazine symposium hosted by Jamie Glazov at FrontPage.

West Bank Withdrawal? (ANDY McCARTHY)

Is the current Israeli administration of Acting Prime Minister Ehud Olmert planning a withdrawal from the West Bank -- and is that plan being spurred by demographic assumptions that are badle flawed?  Aaron Klein is asking in this recent report from World Net Daily, here.

What Fuse Ignited the Riots?

M. Zhudi Jasser, a "devout moderate Muslim" who served as a Navy physician for 11 years and who was the recent target of a hate-filled cartoon, offers his thoughts in today's NRO:

As many this week have said, this is not about cartoons. This all got me thinking about what drives people. I was born in America, raised a Muslim and a conservative. I have long struggled with what it is that makes my own reflexive passions, and my primary mission, so different from those of the mobs and even from so many of my Muslim neighbors in America. What is the fuse that, once ignited, turns normal people into a mob clamoring for Islam and often for blood?

His full story is here.

Jasser is chairman of the Arizona-based American Islamic Forum for Democracy.  Read more from him here and here.

The Goal of the Cartoon Intifada? (CM)

Charles Krauthammer argues that it's to "impose upon the West, with its traditions of freedom of speech, a set of taboos that is exclusive to the Islamic faith. These are not defenders of religion, but Muslim supremacists trying to force their dictates upon the liberal West. ...

"The mob is trying to dictate to Western newspapers, indeed Western governments, what is a legitimate subject for discussion and caricature. The cartoons do not begin to approach the artistic level of Salman Rushdie's prose, but that's not the point. The point is who decides what can be said and what can be drawn within the precincts of what we quaintly think of as the free world.
    
"The mob has turned this into a test case for freedom of speech in the West. The German, French and Italian newspapers that republished these cartoons did so not to inform but to defy -- to declare that they will not be intimidated by the mob.
    
"What is at issue is fear. The unspoken reason many newspapers do not want to republish is not sensitivity but simple fear. They know what happened to Theo van Gogh, who made a film about the Islamic treatment of women and got a knife through the chest with an Islamist manifesto attached.
    
"The worldwide riots and burnings are instruments of intimidation, reminders of van Gogh's fate."

The rest of the column is here.

Patriot Act Compromise Makes Re-Authorization Likely (ANDY McCARTHY)

A deal has been struck between the Bush administration and some of the senators whose civil liberties concerns had mired the Patriot Act in a logjam.  (The Act has been temporarily extended twice since 16 of its most crucial provisions were first scheduled to sunset on Dec. 31, 2005.)

The compromise is targeted at two mechanisms for compelling information:  an order from the FISA court compelling business records (Patriot Act Section 215, often called the "library records" provision even though that is a misnomer), and the so-called "National Security Letter" (NSL) by which the FBI can compel production of certain information without a court order and without consulting with a Justice Department attorney.

Under the compromise, recipients of a Sec215 order or an NSL will now be able to consult an attorney without notifying the government that they have done so (or otherwise identifying the attorney).  The government, of course, had been concerned about attorneys obstructing terrorism investigations by revealing the fact that information has been sought (something the recipient is not allowed to do -- on which more in a moment).  The deal does not leave the government without a remedy -- it may still get the name of the lawyer by grand jury subpoena if there actually is a leak that obstructs justice.

The deal also permits recipients of 215 orders and NSLs to challenge the non-disclosure requirement after a year.  Of course, most people will file no such challenge (since most people would be willing to help the government investigate potential terrorism even if the law didn't require it).  But even where nondisclosure is challenged, it is expected courts will uphold it if the government can show exposure would hurt an investigation, hurt foreign relations, or endanger the safety of any person.

Finally, the compromise permits the FBI to use NSLs to compel information from libraries only if those libraries provide electronic services (e.g., Internet and email access).  The government can still seek information if libraries do not provide such services, but then it must proceed by a 215 order from the FISA Court, not by NSL.

These accommodations are extremely reasonable -- they don't harm security in any material way, but they promote renewal of the Patriot Act which is crucial to national security.  It's a good deal, and hopefully it will break the logjam.

The Danger Zone - Every Sunday, 9pmEST

This week's Danger Zone lineup is here.

Last week's episode is now available for podcast here.

The Cartoon Intifada

Cliff May's latest Scripps Howard column discusses the cartoon riots and answers the question, "why are they doing it?"

Staging an Intifada (CM)

Amir Taheri tells how it was done.

Except:

[T]he whole rigmarole was launched by Sunni-Salafi groups in Europe and Asia, with Ahmadinejad and his Syrian vassal, President Bashar al-Assad, belatedly playing catch-up. …

In December, a group of Danish Muslim militants filled their suitcases with photocopies of the cartoons and embarked on a tour of Muslim capitals. …

The Danish Muslim group also did something dishonest — it added a number of far more derogatory cartoons of the Prophet to the 12 published by the Jyllands-Posten newspaper, and misled its interlocutors in Muslim capitals into believing that all had appeared in the Danish press. …

[Al Jazeera’] chief Islamist televangelist, Yussuf al-Qaradawi (an Egyptian preacher who is also a friend of Ken Livingstone, the mayor of London), was all too keen to issue a "fatwa" to light the fuse. He then mobilized his network of Muslim Brotherhood militants in Europe to attack the cartoons and claim, falsely, that images were not allowed in Islam and that the Danish paper had violated "an absolute principle of The Only True Faith."

Thus the call for Jihad received its supposed "theological" green light. (Ironically, the section of the brotherhood headed by al-Qaradawi is financed by the European Union as a non-governmental organization.)

As the first rent-a-mob crowds appeared on global TV screens, Ahmadinejad realized that here was a cow worth milking.

For Denmark is set to assume the rotating presidency of the U.N. Security Council — at the very time that the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) is expected to refer Iran to the Security Council and demand sanctions. What better, for Tehran's purposes, than to portray Denmark as "an enemy of Islam" and mobilize Muslim sympathy against the Security Council?

To regain the initiative from the Sunni-Salafi groups, Ahmadinejad quickly ordered a severing of commercial ties with Denmark, thus portraying the Islamic Republic as the Muslim world's leader in the anti-Danish campaign.

Syria was next to jump on the bandwagon, again for mercenary reasons. The United Nations wants Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and five of his relatives and aides, including his younger brother, for questioning in the murder of Lebanon's former premier, Rafiq al-Hariri. …

As with Iran's nuclear program, the Syrian dossier will reach the Security Council under Danish presidency. To portray Denmark as "an enemy of the Prophet" would not be such a bad thing when the council, as expected, points the finger at Assad and his regime as responsible for a series of political murders, including that of Hariri. …

Tehran and Damascus have launched a diplomatic campaign to put the issue of "protecting religions against blasphemy" on the Security Council agenda. If that were to happen, issues such as Iran's quest for the atomic bomb and Syria's murder machine in Lebanon might be pushed aside, at least as far as world public opinion is concerned. …

[T]he overwhelming majority of Muslims, even if offended by cartoons which they have not seen, have stayed away from the street shows put on by the radicals and the Iranian and Syrian security services. …

The Muslim crowds that have demonstrated over the cartoons seldom exceeded a few hundred; the Muslim segment of humanity is estimated at 1.2 billion. …

The Danish Muslim gang who lied by adding cartoons that had never been published has done more damage to the Prophet and to Islam than the 12 controversial cartoonists of Jyllands-Posten.

The fight between Denmark and its detractors is not between the West and Islam. It is between democracy and a global fascist movement masquerading as religion.

More here.

More on the Cartoons

FDD Academic Fellows J. Peter Pham and Michael Krauss take on both the "kowtowing" of the West and the "hypocrisy" of the violent protesters in their new Tech Central Station commentary.

Counterfeit Cartoons (CM)

“Danish Muslim leaders who have been touring the world explaining how offensive the cartoons are have actually added three cartoons to the original twelve: one depicting Mohammed as a paedophile demon, one of him with the snout of a pig, and another of a praying Muslim being sodomised by a dog.

"The origin of the extra three cartoons is unknown, but they are sure to stir up a bit of hatred. Which, of course, is the whole point.”

More at MediaWatchWatch.

Also check out Gateway Pundit.

The Cartoonesque Jihad - Part Two (WP)

This piece was authored in conjunction with the presentation of Phares' new book Future Jihad at the European institutions.

“Cartoon Jihad” was the title of a piece by American leading cartoonist Daryl Cagle posted on January 10, in which he warned about the explosion to come . The term was coined since around the world, especially in a series of investigations by German daily Der Spiegel. The term itself is a reverse of the campaign mobilized by the critics of the cartoons. While Islamic groups and governments have escalated their protests, many of which in violent forms, and accused the “caricaturists-perpetrators” of waging a cultural war against Islam, artists and their supporters responded by disseminating the initial drawings and drawing more. The latter claimed a political war is being waged by the Islamists against cultural democracy and Jihadi terror is being staged against media. On al Jazeera, commentators and guests are now accusing the whole West of launching an all out “crusade” against everything Islamic, while in return, Jihad-critics are accusing the ideological movement worldwide of being behind all urban intifadas against the West not just the Denmark cartoon violence. In the Italian press and across the continent, dots are being connected between the Hijab uprising in France, the Van Goh assassination in Holland, the French so-called youth intifada, the Australian beach clashes, and other “moves” within the West. By the day fault lines are emerging between the two camps and unspoken sentences are piling up. Historians may well realize few years from now, that the Denmark’s drawings were only the straw that broke the camel’s back between the two ideological worlds: Pluralist Democracy and Islamic Fundamentalism.

But as Europe and the World are witnessing the widening of the Cartoon Jihad and its mutation into multiple levels of diplomatic, political, intellectual, militants and terror actions and activities, the investigation of the core issue is still in progress: What did the Danish cartoonists really breach? Where is the red line within Islam and under whose responsibility the protest fall? What is the real aim of the “protesters” and are they one group or more? Is the West responding right and is it really unified in this matter? Multiple questions I will attempt to address, as I continue to interact with European legislators, experts, think tanks in Vienna, Brussels, London and Paris. The bottom line now is the bigger picture not those little drawings. The consensus cannot be clearer with regards the grand principles: Freedom of speech cannot be reversed by any ideology that doesn’t believe in the latter’s value. And at the same time, hurting the core feelings of any religion, including Islam, is acceptable by coexistence standards. But the question is this: Is it really about the drawings themselves or between the drawers of cartoons and the drawers of fatwa? Let’s examine this..

Global Jihad Monitor

This week's Global Jihad Monitor is now available.  It includes stories on the "cartoon-riots," the escape from a Yemeni prison of 13 al-Qaeda members (including the mastermind of the attack on the USS Cole), Israeli responses to attacks by Islamic Jihad and Hezbollah, and much much more.

Who Says You Can't Draw Pictures of Muhammed? Who Says Muslims Can't Laugh at Religion? (CM)

Not Amir Taheri. He writes:

There is no Quranic injunction against images, whether of Muhammad or anyone else. When it spread into the Levant, Islam came into contact with a version of Christianity that was militantly iconoclastic. As a result some Muslim  theologians, at a time when Islam still had an organic theology, issued "fatwas" against any depiction of the Godhead. That position was further buttressed by the fact that Islam acknowledges the Jewish Ten Commandments--which include a ban on depicting God--as part of its heritage. The issue has never been decided one way or another,  and the claim that a ban on images is "an absolute principle of Islam" is purely political. Islam has only one  absolute principle: the Oneness of God. Trying to invent other absolutes is, from the point of view of Islamic theology, nothing but sherk, i.e., the bestowal on the Many of the attributes of the One.

The claim that the ban on depicting Muhammad and other prophets is an absolute principle of Islam is also refuted by history. Many portraits of Muhammad have been drawn by Muslim artists, often commissioned by Muslim rulers. ...

Now to the second claim, that the Muslim world is not used to laughing at religion. That is true if we restrict the Muslim world to the Brotherhood and its siblings in the Salafist movement, Hamas, Islamic Jihad and al Qaeda. But these are all political organizations masquerading as religious ones. They are not the sole representatives of Islam, just as the Nazi Party was not the sole representative of German culture. Their attempt at portraying Islam as a sullen culture that lacks a sense of humor is part of the same discourse that claims "suicide martyrdom" as the highest goal for all true believers.

The truth is that Islam has always had a sense of humor and has never called for chopping heads as the answer to satirists. ..

Islamic ethics is based on "limits and proportions," which means that the answer to an offensive cartoon is a cartoon, not the burning of embassies or the kidnapping of people designated as the enemy. Islam rejects guilt by association. Just as Muslims should not blame all Westerners for the poor taste of a cartoonist who wanted to be offensive, those horrified by the spectacle of rent-a-mob sackings of embassies in the name of Islam should not blame all Muslims for what is an outburst of fascist energy.

The essay is here.

Omar Weighs In (CM)

On the IRAQ THE MODEL blog, Omar observes:

"I swear that 90%+ of the protestors in Muslim countries have not seen the cartoons and do not know the name of the paper and when I say that I'm sure of it because I have access to the web 24/7 and I spent a really long time searching for the cartoons and couldn’t find them until a friend emailed me a link and.

"You know that those cartoons were published for the 1st time months ago and we here in the Middle East have tonnes of jokes about Allah, the prophets and the angels that are way more offensive, funny and obscene than those poorly-made cartoons, yet no one ever got shot for telling one of those jokes or at least we had never seen rallies and protests against those infidel joke-tellers.

"What I want to say is that I think the reactions were planned to be exaggerated this time by some Middle Eastern regimes and are not mere public reaction.

"And I think Syria and Iran have the motives to trigger such reactions in order to get away from the pressures applied by the international community on those regimes.

"However, I cannot claim that Muslim community is innocent for there have been outrageous reactions outside the range of Syria's or Iran's influence but again, these protests and threats are more political than religious in nature.

"One last thing, even if the entire EU apologizes it won't change a thing; fanatics in our countries here had always considered the west their infidel arrogant crusader enemy and no apology no matter how big or sincere can change that."

There's more here.

More Cartoon Commentary

Cliff May and Andy McCarthy -- along with many friends of FDD -- have participated in a running forum on National Review Online.  Cliff's comments are here.  Andy's are here.

Claudia Rosett has a separate piece today on NRO here.

Dispatches from the Danger Zone: Secret Prisons? (RWC)

The Council of Europe's investigation into whether the CIA has run secret prisons in Eastern Europe has turned up no evidence they ever existed.  This, according to their recently released “interim report.”

That doesn’t mean the prisons didn't exist, or don’t exist, just that the 46-member council couldn’t locate them, probably because they couldn’t locate their hind-quarters with two hands.

They began this “investigation” in response to a Washington Post story a few months ago that claimed the CIA had detention centers for terrorism suspects in eight countries, some of them in Eastern Europe.  So? This is a surprise?  Well some folks don’t like the idea of secretly detaining suspected terrorists or even proven terrorists.  Many of those people question the raison d’etre for the Global War on Terror.  They believe it is not really necessary, or, in many instances, they just hate George Bush so thoroughly they seek to find transgressions for which to blame him. 

The Proposed New UN Human Rights Council: a Disaster (ANDY McCARTHY)

That is the conclusion of the Hudson Institute's invaluable Anne Bayefsky in a piece published yesterday on National Review Online.  She argues that acquiescing in its creation would mean squandering of the meager political will for reform of the universally discredited UN Human Rights Commission, and urges the State Department to prevent the charade, under the guise of "reform," rather than go along for the ride.  Read the piece here.

The Tehran-Hamas Terror Axis (Jon Snow)

Iran has sought to export their concept of Militant Islamism throughout the Muslim world since their 1979 Revolution.

With the recent election of Hamas in the Palestinian elections and extremist President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad leading Iran toward the development of nuclear weapons and threatening to destroy Israel and the West, the active links between Iran and Hamas are more dangerous than ever.

Information on this worrisome Terror Axis is explored in my latest FDD backgrounder, The Tehran-Hamas Terror Axis, which is now available on the FDD web site.

The Cartoon Offensive - Part One (WP)

"In my religion" said Imam abu Laban, leading Muslim cleric of Denmark , “drawing images of Prophet Muhammad is forbidden.” In my country, said the editor in chief of Jyllands Posten “there is a freedom of press.” The BBC TV forum was attempting to educate its vast public worldwide about the Cartoon drama. Unfortunately, the debate left viewers in greater disarray. The anchor seemed to ignore why theological Cartoons are offensive to Muslims to start with, but also missed why secular democracies are clashing with their antithesis. World media, and behind them their respective Governments have been reacting to television images rather than to direct knowledge. The crisis of the “offensive cartoons” has in fact become a “cartoons offensive.” Here is why.

FDD's Andy McCarthy on Lou Dobbs

FDD Senior Fellow Andy McCarthy is scheduled to be on CNN's Lou Dobbs Tonight this evening.  Topics are the NSA's terrorist surveillance program and the Defense Department's Able Danger project.

The Clinton Administration's View of "Renunciation" (ANDY McCarthy)

In a series of questions in anticipation of today’s Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on the NSA’s terrorist surveillance program, Chairman Arlen Specter suggested to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales that President Bush might be bound by what the Senator took to be President Jimmy Carter’s “explicit renunciation,” in signing the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), “of any claim to inherent Executive authority to conduct warrantless domestic surveillance.”

The Justice Department has convincingly rebutted this suggestion in the answers it provided last Friday to Sen. Specter’s questions – specifically, answer number 6, which demonstrates that renunciation is not merely unsound as a legal theory but also counter-factual in the case of President Carter and FISA. (Speaking at the time for the Carter administration, Attorney General Griffen Bell unambiguously testified that Carter was in no way renouncing his inherent authority by acceding to FISA).

It is interesting to note, though, that the

Clinton

administration took an even more aggressive position on this question of “renunciation.” Speaking for the Reno Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel, then-Assistant Attorney General Walter Dellinger argued that Presidents were not only unaffected and unrestricted by their predecessors’ positions. Dellinger said that Presidents were not even bound by their own positions – or even bound to defend or execute provisions that they themselves had signed into law. Here’s how Dellinger put it in his formal 1994 OLC opinion, provided as guidance to the Clinton White House (italics are mine):

The fact that a sitting President signed the statute in question does not change this analysis [i.e., that if, in Dellinger’s words, “the President believes that an enactment unconstitutionally limits his powers, he has the authority to defend his office and decline to abide by it.”] The text of the Constitution offers no basis for distinguishing bills based on who signed them; there is no constitutional analogue to the principles of waiver and estoppel. Moreover, every President since Eisenhower has issued signing statements in which he stated that he would refuse to execute unconstitutional provisions. … As we noted in our memorandum on Presidential signing statements, the President "may properly announce to Congress and to the public that he will not enforce a provision of an enactment he is signing. If so, then a signing statement that challenges what the President determines to be an unconstitutional encroachment on his power, or that announces the President's unwillingness to enforce (or willingness to litigate) such a provision, can be a valid and reasonable exercise of Presidential authority." Memorandum for Bernard N. Nussbaum, Counsel to the President, from Walter Dellinger, Assistant Attorney General, Office of Legal Counsel at 4 (Nov. 3, 1993) [underlining in original]. (Of course, the President is not obligated to announce his reservations in a signing statement; he can convey his views in the time, manner, and form of his choosing.) Finally, the Supreme Court recognized this practice in INS v. Chadha, 462 U.S. 919 (1983): the Court stated that "it is not uncommon for Presidents to approve legislation containing parts which are objectionable on constitutional grounds" and then cited the example of President Franklin Roosevelt's memorandum to Attorney General Jackson, in which he indicated his intention not to implement an unconstitutional provision in a statute that he had just signed.

Id.

at 942 n.13. These sources suggest that the President's signing of a bill does not affect his authority to decline to enforce constitutionally objectionable provisions thereof.

In accordance with these propositions, we do not believe that a President is limited to choosing between vetoing, for example, the Defense Appropriations Act and executing an unconstitutional provision in it. In our view, the President has the authority to sign legislation containing desirable elements while refusing to execute a constitutionally defective provision.

Here, it is worth remembering that President Bush recently signed a defense appropriations bill rather than veto it over the McCain amendment on interrogation practices. In so doing, the President issued a signing statement qualifying that the McCain amendment would only be enforced in a manner consistent with the President's responsibilities as commander-in-chief. Although, at the time, many administration critics assailed the signing statement qualification procedure, Dellinger’s analysis illustrates that it was entirely consistent with the

Clinton

administration’s views on executive power.

More on Presidential Power (ANDY McCARTHY)

In my last post, I made an error linking to the 2000 opinion by the Clinton Justice Department.  The correct link is here.

Presidential Power Shouldn't Depend on Who Is President (ANDY McCARTHY)

Several former Clinton administration officials are among the group of "scholars of constitutional law and former government officials" who last week submitted a letter to Congress, posted on the New York Review of Books website, arguing that President Bush had acted illegally by authorizing the NSA to intercept al Qaeda communications into and out of the United States without complying with FISA -- i.e., the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, a statute passed by Congress and signed by President Jimmy Carter in 1978.  FISA purports to limit the President's constitutional authority to collect foreign intelligence and protect national security by requiring permission from a federal judge before eavesdropping may be done on suspected international terrorists and spies -- something routinely and properly done without court-order prior to FISA's enactment. 

But one of those former officials, Walter Dellinger, appears to have had a far different view of presidential power back in 1994 -- when he was the Assistant Attorney General in charge of the Clinton Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel.  Then, in a formal opinioin provided to the White House -- when the issue was President Clinton's constitutional prerogatives -- Dellinger wrote:  "The President has enhanced responsibility to resist unconstitutional provisions that encroach upon the constitutional powers of the Presidency." 

This shift is only one aspect covered in an important letter submitted to Congress last night by Bryan Cunningham, who was intimately involved in national security matters as an attorney in both the Clinton and Bush administrations (in the NSA, CIA and DOJ).  The letter can be found here, at the website of Bryan's lawfirm in Colorado(www.morgancunningham.net).  The letter comprehensively demonstrates that since the founding of our Nation, the federal courts and presidential administrations of both parties have held the President of the United States to have plenary authority in matters bearing on foreign intelligence collection.  Separation of powers principles developed since the founding strongly support this view.  It was, the letter demonstrates, a position strongly defended by the Clinton administration -- just as the Bush administration is defending it now.

The Senate Judiciary Committee will conduct a hearing into the Bush administration's terrorist surveillance program on Monday.  Hopefully, it is becoming clear that the position the administration is taking in defense of its creation of a wartime early-warning system that seeks to prevent a repeat of 9/11 is not only legally appropriate; it is also far from novel. 

Meanwhile, Dellinger's 1994 OLC opinion is here, and worth reading in full.  It is an aggressive defense of presidential power -- and, for what it may be worth, an entirely appropriate one in my view.  Also worthy of consideration is a 2000 opinion by the Clinton Justice Department, which argues that the President is free to ignore certain provisions of the criminal wiretap statute to the extent they would limit access of the intelligence community to eavesdropping information that might be important to national security.

Krauthammer on Hamas (CM)

“[T]he Hamas victory in the Palestinian elections is being called a disaster. On the contrary. It is deeply clarifying and ultimately cleansing. If the world responds correctly, it will mark a turning point for the better. ..

“It is time to stop infantilizing the Palestinians. As Hamas leader Khaled Meshal said at a news conference four days after the election, ‘The Palestinian people have chosen Hamas with its known stances.’ By a landslide, the Palestinian people have chosen these known stances: rejectionism, Islamism, terrorism, rank anti-Semitism and the destruction of Israel in a romance of blood, death and revolution....

The world must advise the Palestinian people that if their national will is to embrace Hamas -- its methods and its madness -- then their national will is simply too murderous and, yes, too depraved for the world to countenance, let alone subsidize.

“The essential first lesson of any newborn democracy is that national choices have national consequences. A Hamas-led Palestine, cut off entirely, will be forced to entertain second thoughts.”

The rest of the essay is here.