More on the Chemical Attack Doctor - "He was visibly upset when the execution of the hostages was called off."

Tweet

Dr. Shajul Islam is now soliciting funds "to buy gas masks"

A few days ago, I reported on Dr. Shajul Islam, the Syrian-based British doctor who had been the point man for describing the recent Syrian "chemical attack" and its aftermath to the Western media. Though virtually no major news outlets had mentioned it, Dr. Islam had spent time in a British prison on charges of aiding a Jihadi group, and was subsequently barred from practicing medicine in the UK.

But Islam was now a sort of media darling, leading the campaign to urge the West to "care" and "do something" about alleged Assad atrocities in Northern Syria.

(I should correct the record here on one thing. I reported that Islam had been accused of "aiding ISIS." He was actually formerly accused of collaborating with al-Qaeda or an affiliate of al-Qaeda. Later he would be sought for questioning on the whereabouts of ISIS member "Jihadi John.")

The next day, Breitbart had an article that added some details to the story.

Islam had been accused of collaborating in the kidnapping of two Western journalists in Northern Syria by Jihadists affiliated with al-Qaeda. The charges were dropped only after the two main witnesses - the journalists - failed to appear.

Breitbart reports why they failed to appear. It turns out that one of them - British journalist John Cantile - had been kidnapped again, this time by ISIS. (He was kidnapped with U.S. journalist James Foley, who would later be beheaded in an ISIS propaganda video.) The other witness - Dutch journalist Jeroen Oerlemans - declined to testify for fear he would endanger Cantile's life.

Oerlemans would later be shot dead by ISIS fighters while covering the war in Libya.

Most ghoulish is Breitbart's reporting of Cantile's earlier testimony about encountering Dr. Islam, while being held captive.

“When he told me he was an NHS doctor, I thought it was weird,” Cantlie told the Daily Mail in 2012.

“This is a man who has taken an oath to save people and help them, and here he is walking around with a Kalashnikov and preaching Shariah law. There are not any doctors who I know that do that.

“He clearly believed in what he was doing but to follow something to that extreme is the disturbing thing. He was visibly upset when the execution [of two other hostages] was called off.”

Apparently, Dr. Islam's current stay in Syria is being funded to the tune of over £50,000, by a "charity" group - UK Action for Refugees.

Meanwhile, John Cantile is still in captivity, reportedly alive but forced to narrate and appear in ISIS propaganda videos. He has looked increasingly haggard and unhealthy and was last seen in a video that appears to have been made in the besieged city of Mosul.

On its slick website, featuring photos of brave doctors, white helmeted rescuers and smiling children holding hands, UK Action for Refugees claims that it was "founded on the simple principle of people helping people."

Meanwhile, it is supporting and funding an expat Jihadi agent, complicit in kidnapping and murder.

Outside of a few "conservative" outlets, such as Breitbart, no one in the Western media has mentioned Shajul Islam's past or challenged his veracity. But, as we all know, military action has already been taken against Assad - action that appears to have been at least partly motivated by information provided by Dr. Islam and his associates.

Just because a claim is wreathed in propaganda from evil and dishonest men doesn't mean that it's necessarily false. But it is a good indication that it may not be true.

BREAKING: Primary Spokesman and Source for Syria Chemical Attack Narrative - a Muslim British Doctor Now Working in Syria - Had Been Imprisoned in the UK for a Year on Charges of Aiding Jihadists

Tweet

Dr. Shajul Islam was charged with terrorism related offenses and stripped of his license to practice in the UK

The primary spokesman on the ground for the story that Syrian president Bashar Assad attacked his own citizens with chemical weapons - a doctor and British citizen named Shajul Islam - had been imprisoned in the UK in 2012-13, charged with aiding Syrian rebels in the kidnapping of Western journalists.

After the charges were dropped due to the unexplained failure of the witnesses to appear in court, Islam was sought by British authorities for allegedly having information on the whereabouts of ISIS member "Jihadi John." Islam was later stripped of his authority to practice medicine in the UK by the General Medical Council.

I added "BREAKING" to the post title because this information has gone generally unmentioned in current reporting by the media, even as Islam's interviews and tweets have served as one of the main sources for the story of the alleged chemical attack. However, Islam's purported links to al-Qaeda and ISIS, as well as those of at least two of his brothers were well-reported by the British media at the time.

Here are a number of stories on the attack from the New York Post, the Daily Mirror and the Daily Telegraph, featuring Dr. Islam as one of the primary sources (and in one case, the only primary source). None of them reference his past:

Dad cradles dead twins after Syrian gas attack 

"I can show you the evidence again and again but the world doesn't care" plea from British doctor treating Syria 'gas' victims 

Syria 'chemical attack': 11 children among at least 58 people reported killed in alleged regime strike on Idlib

And here are some of Islam's recent tweets that have been prominently featured in those accounts. He currently has 10.2k followers, including many news organizations.

But the possible links of Islam and his family to "Jihadi John" were written about in August, 2014. Here are three articles from the Daily Mail, the Telegraph and Breitbart:

Does this NHS doctor hold the key to identifying 'Jihadi John'? East London medic once accused of kidnapping journalists in Syria probed with his brother as hunt for world's most wanted man intensifies

Net closes on 'Jihadi John' as London pair probed

NHS Doctor With Family Jihad Ties Sought in 'Black Beatle' Beheading Search

Whatever you think about what actually happened a few days ago in Northern Syria, the scene of an alleged gas attack that has alternately been described as featuring chlorine gas, nerve gas and sarin, it is notable that Shajul Islam has turned up right in the middle of it.

From the Daily Mail, last July:

'Russia airstrikes are killing women and children… but MISSING ISIS': Struck off Brit NHS doctor accused of kidnapping Western hostages is treating bomb victims in Syria

• Shajul Islam, who was arrested for kidnapping journalists is back in Syria
• The NHS doctor and his brother were released after the case collapsed
• He spoke to US journalist in Idlib, northwest Syria about constant airstrikes
• Said there is a serious shortage of doctors and hospitals are bombed daily

A British doctor struck off by the NHS who was accused of kidnapping Western journalists has fled to Syria and is treating bomb victims, including jihadis.

Shajul Islam was arrested and charged with kidnapping two journalists in 2012 but was released after the trial collapsed when neither of the prosecution's witnesses were able to give evidence.

Dr Islam had always protested his innocence, saying he went to Syria to use his medical skills to treat victims of the civil war.

Now he has appeared in a video filmed in Idlib, in northern Syria, where he claims to be providing medical help to the victims of Syrian and Russian airstrikes.

Islam, from East London, who qualified at the University of London and worked as a doctor at St Bart's hospital, is currently removed from the medical register after a fitness to practise hearing at the General Medical Council in March.

After the criminal case against him collapsed, and he was found not guilty, he faced close monitoring by the security services.

The video published on YouTube yesterday for citizen journalist site On the Ground News, shows Islam wearing hospital scrubs and a stethoscope.

He tells American journalist Bilal Abdul Kareem that he is one of very few foreign doctors treating civilians injured in air strikes in north Syria.

Asked why he has come to Syria, Islam replies: 'I'm a doctor. There's a serious shortage of doctors. Anyone who is a doctor needs to be here. I don't understand why anyone who is sitting in England or Europe or America isn't here.'

According to a GMC report, a secret tribunal panel heard the disciplinary case against Islam in March this year and banned him for misconduct. The hearing was held in private so the details of the misconduct are not publically known.
Islam told Kareem that the situation in Syria was 'crazy'.

'You can't imagine the number of casualties and we don't have enough doctors to look after them,' he said.

'From my perspective 80 per cent of the victims are women and children. The air strikes are not hitting terrorists they are hitting innocent civilians. Imagine you are sleeping at home with your family and you are hit by an airstrike.

'Whole families are being wiped out while they are sleeping. We are seeing on a daily basis 10, 20, 30 people being killed by these air strikes. I want you to picture this: your family, your loved ones, your wife being killed.'

Islam blamed the Syrian and Russian governments for the deaths, adding: 'They are killing civilians, the Syrian government, the Russian and any other government that is working with them is aiding in killing civilians here.'

He said that he was based close to Idlib where the rebel alliance and some jihadi groups are holding out against a joint Syrian and Russian bombardment.

Islam described how air strikes had recently destroyed the main hospital in Idlib had been destroyed: 'The main hospital was hit and taken out of action, including the CT scan and the intensive care unit. ....serious trauma patients requiring CT scan have to travel a further hour away.'

He said that for many of his patients their injuries were so serious there is nothing the doctors can do for them.

Asked what was the emotional toll on him he told the journalist: 'Of course we are human beings and it is very difficult to deal with but we have no choice because we are limited in numbers of staff. We have to function 24/7 - it's not a shift thing.

'We stay in the hospital 24 hours for four days at a time and I have to be ready to respond to patients at any time from the air strikes,' he said.

UN officials reported that Idlib's national hospital was targeted by an airstrike on May 30, killing two dozen people including children.

Airstrikes on the city and the surrounding area including Binnesh and Jisr al-shoughour, which was taken by Al-Qaeda linked Jabhat al-Nusra have intensified with reports of entire families being wiped out.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights has documented several air raids across the province in the past week - in one instance killing eight people, who were mostly women and children.

At the time of his 2012 prosecution Shajul Islam, then 28, and a second man, Jubayer Chowdhury, then 24, were the only alleged British jihadists charged with kidnapping Westerners in Syria.

The pair — held in high security Belmarsh prison — walked free from court after all charges were dropped.

At the start of the hearing in November 2013, prosecutor Mark Dennis QC told the court that all evidence against the brothers rested on the two victims, who were unable to be called, and therefore could not proceed with the case.

A verdict of not guilty was recorded for the charge of kidnapping.

Media reports later suggested Islam may have held the key to the then unknown identity of Jihadi John, who was later unmasked as Mohammed Emwazi.

"You're like, f**k this." The Obama/Clinton Policies in Syria Aren't a Failure, They're a Fraud

Tweet

Who are these guys, again?

I assume one of the reasons the Trump/Pence campaign isn't talking about this is because many Republicans themselves bought into the fraud and were even partly responsible for it, quickly identifying Assad as the primary villain in Syria and then continuing to double down on that beyond all reason.

From SOFREP News by way of Consortiumnews and Creeping Sharia:

US Special Forces sabotage White House policy gone disastrously wrong with covert ops in Syria (Jack Murphy, SOFREP News):

“Nobody believes in it. You’re like, 'Fuck this,’” a former Green Beret says of America’s covert and clandestine programs to train and arm Syrian militias. “Everyone on the ground knows they are jihadis. No one on the ground believes in this mission or this effort, and they know they are just training the next generation of jihadis, so they are sabotaging it by saying, ‘Fuck it, who cares?’” 

“I don’t want to be responsible for Nusra guys saying they were trained by Americans,” the Green Beret added. A second Special Forces soldier commented that one Syrian militia they had trained recently crossed the border from Jordan on what had been pitched as a large-scale shaping operation that would change the course of the war. Watching the battle on a monitor while a drone flew overhead, “We literally watched them, with 30 guys in their force, run away from three or four ISIS guys.” 

How the US Armed-up Syrian Jihadists ("Alistair Crooke", Consortiumnews): 

In a detailed report, US Special Forces Sabotage White House Policy gone Disastrously Wrong with Covert Ops in Syria, Jack Murphy, himself a former Green Beret (U.S. Special Forces), recounts a former CIA officer having told him how the “the Syria covert action program is [CIA Director John] Brennan’s baby …Brennan was the one who breathed life into the Syrian Task Force … John Brennan loved that regime-change bullshit.” 

Murphy states bluntly: 

“distinguishing between the FSA and al-Nusra is impossible, because they are virtually the same organization. As early as 2013, FSA commanders were defecting with their entire units to join al-Nusra. There, they still retain the FSA monicker, but it is merely for show, to give the appearance of secularism so they can maintain access to weaponry provided by the CIA and Saudi intelligence services. The reality is that the FSA is little more than a cover for the al-Qaeda-affiliated al-Nusra. … 

“The fact that the FSA simply passed American-made weaponry off to al-Nusra is also unsurprising considering that the CIA’s vetting process of militias in Syria is lacklustre, consisting of little more than running traces in old databases. These traces rely on knowing the individuals’ real names in the first place, and assume that they were even fighting-age males when the data was collected by CTC [Counterterrorism Centre] years prior.” 

Nor, confirms Murphy, was vetting any better with the 5th Special Forces operating out of Turkey: 

“[It consisted of] a database check and an interview. The rebels know how to sell themselves to the Americans during such interviews, but they still let things slip occasionally. ‘I don’t understand why people don’t like al-Nusra,’ one rebel told the American soldiers. Many had sympathies with the terrorist groups such as Nusra and ISIS.” 

Others simply were not fit to be soldiers. “They don’t want to be warriors. They are all cowards. That is the moderate rebel,” a Green Beret told Murphy, who adds: 

“Pallets of weapons and rows of trucks delivered to Turkey for American-sponsored rebel groups simply sit and collect dust because of disputes over title authorities [i.e. Presidential authorities] and funding sources, while authorization to conduct training for the militias is turned on and off at a whim. One day they will be told to train, the next day not to, and the day after only to train senior leaders. Some Green Berets believe that this hesitation comes from the White House getting wind that most of the militia members are affiliated with Nusra and other extremist groups.” 

Murphy writes: 

“While the games continue on, morale sinks for the Special Forces men in Turkey. Often disguised in Turkish military uniform, one of the Green Berets described his job as, ‘Sitting in the back room, drinking chai while watching the Turks train future terrorists’ … 

“Among the rebels that U.S. Special Forces and Turkish Special Forces were training, ‘A good 95 percent of them were either working in terrorist organizations or were sympathetic to them,’ a Green Beret associated with the program said, adding, ‘A good majority of them admitted that they had no issues with ISIS and that their issue was with the Kurds and the Syrian regime.’” 

What Damascus Looks Like, Four Years After the Arab Spring

Tweet

Not all of Damascus looks like this but much of it does.

This is the Jobar neighborhood, close to the center of the city. Before the Syrian Civil War it was home to 300,000 residents, though the area looks larger than that figure would imply, with utter devastation seemingly stretching as far as the eye can see.

The photographs were recently taken by a Russian drone and re-posted in a number of news sites including the Daily Mail. There is also a haunting aerial video on RT News.

Note the dishes. I assume that means there are people (fighters?) still living there.

At one point Jobar also had a thriving Jewish community centered around the ancient Eliyahu Hanavi Synagogue (not to be confused with the Eliyahu Hanavi Synagogue in Alexandria, which has apparently been partially closed down). During the war, the synagogue was allegedly first looted and burned by Al-Qaeda and the Free Syrian Army. It was then mostly destroyed--by the government (according to the rebels) or the rebels (according to the government).

The Jobar area is still contested, with Islamist forces dug into a network of tunnels, though the government may now have the upper hand.

For what it's worth.

Whatever one thinks of the refugee crisis, this at least provides some perspective on it. Some of the residents were killed. Some joined one of the warring factions. But presumably, most of them simply fled.

Go Russia? Putin to Send 150,000 Troops to Wipe Out ISIS

Tweet

Our hero?

EDIT (3:15 PM CST): I think this is an interesting story, but the reports should be taken with a grain of salt, especially the first. There is no doubt that Putin is dialing things up in Syria. Whether or not this will end with 150,000 Russian troops on the ground is another question.

British newspapers, including the Daily Express have been closely following one  of the most extraordinary developments of the post-cold war world. It's hard to see how the military defeat (by anyone) of this murderous Muslim movement can fail to be a good thing. On the other hand, replacing ISIS militants with Russians and, if recent reports are to be believed, Iranians and Chinese is troubling for all sorts of obvious reasons. President Barrack Obama's weakness, incompetence and pro-Muslim sympathies have created a vacuum whose full impact is only now becoming fully apparent.

But if I were a normal human being, lying low in Palmyra or Raqqa,desperately hoping to live through the ISIS nightmare, guess who I would be rooting for right now?

There is ample fodder for the hopes and fears of everyone here.

October 5, by Scott Campbell:

End of ISIS? Putin 'sending 150,000 soldiers to Syria to WIPE OUT evil Islamic State' 

Vladimir Putin is preparing to send 150,000 troops to Syria in a bid to wipe out the evil Islamic State once and for all. 

The Russian leader is reportedly mounting an enormous military mission to take control of the terror group's stronghold of Raqqa. 

The city is the self-declared capital of ISIS in Syria and is patrolled by as many as 5,000 jihadi members. 

Putin is set to mobilise 150,000 reservists who he conscripted into the military earlier this week. 

An insider revealed: "It is very clear that Russia wants to sweep up the west of the country, taking Raqqa and all the oil and gas resources around Palmyra. 

"This is fast becoming a race to Raqqa – to secure the oil fields they need to cleanse the region of insurgents, and the IS capital is vital to do that." 

It comes a day after Russian jets obliterated nine ISIS outposts in just 24 hours using bunker-busting bombs. 

Russian jets pounded terrorist targets and blew up a command centre, potentially killing dozens of fighters. 

Confirming the successful raids, Andrei Kartapolov from the Russian army vowed to ramp up the pressure, saying: "We will not only continue strikes... We will also increase their intensity." 

And Russian Defence Ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov said: "Over the past 24 hours, Sukhoi Su-34 and Su-24M fighter jets have performed 20 sorties and hit nine Islamic State installations. 

“A bunker-busting BETAB-500 air bomb dropped from a Sukhoi Su-34 bomber near Raqqa has eliminated the command post of one of the terror groups, together with an underground storage facility for explosives and munitions. 

"These and other highly exact means of attack in recent days have been used to target objects of Islamic State terrorists. 

"Command posts, stores of weapons and oil products, workshops where weapons of suicide bombers are made." 

Meanwhile a terrorism expert revealed to Express.co.uk that ISIS have vastly exaggerated their military strength and called on Western leaders to launch a co-ordinated fightback which would obliterate the hate group. 

Dr Afzal Ashraf said ISIS has become its own worst enemy with its campaign of terror against the West, which has prompted an international backlash. 

He said: "This mythical state will disappear in a matter of hours once the international community decides to act. 

"It won't take very long at all to drive them, if not out of all of Iraq or Syria, then certainly the majority of their territories. 

"They will hide in towns, but I would say do not to follow them as they would use innocent civilians as human shields."

October 6, by Nick Gutteridge:

. . . Putin sends in his most ruthless special forces killers to finish off jihadis 

VLADIMIR Putin has dispatched his most elite special forces team to Syria to hunt down and wipe out Islamic State (ISIS) militants. 

The Russian supremo ordered the deployment of soldiers from his fearsome Spetsnaz unit to root out and eliminate packs of fleeing jihadis. 

A battalion of elite paratroopers also ghosted into the war-torn country this week as Putin ramps up his assault on the Islamist fanatics and rebel forces fighting to topple dictator Bashar al-Assad. 

The deployment of the Spetsnaz - the elite of the elite in Russia's army who have to undergo a gruelling training programme to earn their stripes - is the latest example of the megalomaniac leader's ruthless determination to shore up the rule of his close ally. 

It is especially significant because many of the men have a deep hatred of jihadis from their time fighting in Chechnya's bloody civil war, when Islamist fanatics battling for independence carried out frequent atrocities against Russian citizens. 

Amongst the world's most efficient killers, they will now be tasked with mercilessly hunting down and slaying ISIS fighters and are also expected to play a role rooting out terrorist strongholds to be targeted by Russian bombers. 

The move comes after it emerged that Putin is set to send 150,000 troops to Syria to wipe out the evil hate group once and for all. 

His jets have waged a merciless bombing campaign against the jihadis in recent weeks, blitzing more than 50 facilities including a key command centre and a suicide belt factory. 

A military source told the Mirror: “They are extremely aggressive and highly trained. 

“They are there to mop up after air strikes, call in air strikes, go on extremely covert missions against rebels and ultimately wipe them out. 

“And they will not be as accountable as British or US special forces. They are there for one reason, to wipe out anyone threatening Assad. By any means. And by doing that they will be consolidating Russia’s position on the Med and in the Middle East.” 

It is believed that ISIS has already suffered crushing losses due to airstrikes and defections, with a leading terror expert telling Express.co.uk that they are now so weakened they could be defeated in a matter of hours. 

Putin began his aerial assault in Syria last week, with Russia launching dozens of airstrikes against ISIS and "other terrorist groups". 

However, Western leaders have reacted furiously to the intervention after intelligence suggested that hardly any of the raids have been targeted against ISIS. 

Putin is keen to shore up the rule of brutal dictator al-Assad, a long time ally whose power is threatened by rebel pro-democracy groups including the Free Syrian Army.

Extended Family of British Labour Politician (Including Two Women and Four Children!) Nabbed at Turkish Border Attempting to Join ISIS

Tweet

"Hey, kids, let's all hop in the station wagon and join ISIS!"

What is WRONG with these people?

Okay, just for the sake of argument, let's stipulate that Islam is a "religion of peace" and that the Muslim community while perhaps containing a small percentage of "extremists" (like any religious community, we are told), is fundamentally peaceful.

I don't believe that for a moment, but again, let's stipulate it. The Muslim community is no different than, say, the Christian community or the Jewish community.

Well, in that case, there is a madness sweeping it.

The arrested women above is carrying a one year old in her arms. That's right, a one year old.

What would cause an extended family of three men, two women and four children--either British citizens or permanent residents--to pick up everything and leave their market town in the Midlands to fly 1,000 miles to join up with a ferocious terrorist army in the scrabbly dessert?

What?

One of the men, Waheed Ahmed, was the son of a Rochdale council member, and was studying at university. His father, Wakil Ahmed expressed "shock" and said his son was "a good Muslim." The captured group included the senior Mr. Ahmed's aunt, two male cousins, the wife of one of them and at least two of her children.

"I don’t believe my son was on his way to join Islamic State. I was shocked, worried and extremely upset," said Mr. Ahmed, who recognized his son's photo in the newspaper.

Ah, wayward kids. It could happen to anyone.

A few weeks ago, also in Britain, three teen-age girls--straight-A students, according to some reports--also picked up everything and headed to join ISIS in Syria. Cameras show them walking together through the airport, like they're going on a school trip.

This isn't the Spanish Civil War. It's a reality show on the Disney Channel.

Speaking of the Spanish Civil War, the same Daily Mail article reports that it is now estimated that 2,000 Britons have journeyed to Syria or Iraq to fight with ISIS. That's at or close to the number that joined the Spanish Republicans in 1936-39.

I don't know whether that includes the one year olds.

For more on this story, read today's article in the Daily Mail.

Muslim Terrorist Attacks on Christians: A Global Comparison

Tweet

Dogo Nahawa Massacre, Nigeria, 2010: Over 500 Christians--mostly women and children--are hacked to death by Muslim attackers screaming "Allah Akbar!"

The always useful Religion of Peace website has compiled a running list of Muslim terrorist attacks on Christians since 9/11. As of the end of March it lists 1,242 attacks in 51 countries and territories, totaling 9,161 deaths and 12,003 injuries. It's a morbid subject, obviously, but it's also important. I believe the authors try to stick to a consistent and fair methodology. Here are some notes on it:

1. Tens of thousands of 21st century Christians have been martyred for many reasons and by numerous hostile groups--including members of various non-Christian religions and anti-Christian ideologies--but only attacks by Muslims are counted.
2. Only attacks on Christians where they were almost certainly singled out and targeted as Christians are counted. Thus, few of the most well-known Muslim terrorist attacks are counted--since the victims of those attacks were for the most part targeted indiscriminately.
3. The list includes some personal actions--a Muslim father murdering his daughter because she converted to Christianity--religiously motivated attacks by lone or unaffiliated attackers, mob actions, premeditated attacks by recognized terrorist groups and war crimes by quasi-military units.
4. Due to reporting and other considerations it no doubt leaves out many other occurrences, ranging from more personal attacks to quasi-military actions.
5. The list does not include attacks or human rights violations by governments.
6. 87% of the attacks involved at least one fatality and 48% involved at least two fatalities.
7. For the most part, each attack was labeled by country, though there are a few exceptions--attacks in the Muslim areas of the Russian Federation are broken out by territory and there are a few non-national territories included, such as Kosovo and the Palestinian Authority.
8. There are no links on the site's list but each attack is easily verifiable due to the inclusion of a date and a relatively unique description of the event.

We put together a summary of the data, based on recorded casualties, ranking the results by % of total casualties per country, and by % of total casualties by country controlling for population:

Total Casualties by Number and % of Total:

Nigeria 11,377 54%
Egypt 1,601 8%
Iraq 1,541 7%
Pakistan 1,223 6%
Syria 1,220 6%
Indonesia 1,032 5%
Philippines 934 4%
Lebanon 346 2%
Sudan 311 1%
Kenya 305 1%
Bangladesh 251 1%
Central African Republic 226 1%
Somalia 120 1%
Ethiopia 109 1%
Other 568 3%

% of Total Casualties by Country, Controlling for Population:

Lebanon 19%
Nigeria 16%
Syria 12%
Central African Republic 11%
Iraq 11%
Egypt 4%
Philippines 2%
Somalia 2%
Kenya 2%
Sudan 2%
Libya 2%
Pakistan 1%
Israel 1%
Kosovo 1%
Liberia 1%
Indonesia 1%
Palestinian Authority 1%
Macedonia 1%
Saudi Arabia 1%

Tentative Conclusions:

1. Much of this is not a surprise. That Nigeria tops the list, accounting for over half of the total casualties, is not unexpected.
2. However, it might be a surprise that, controlling for population, Lebanon is even more dangerous.
3. Virtually all of the casualties are in the Middle East, Africa and South and South East Asia--areas that to one extent or another are not fully covered by Western media.
4. Population is total population, not total Christian population. Thus, for example, Pakistan is almost certainly a more dangerous place for Christians than the numbers might indicate.
5. All attacks since 9/11 are given equal weight. I suspect that some areas--Syria and Iraq--would appear much more dangerous if only recent results were counted.

The number of Christians killed and injured on this list is horrific, and as a Catholic I have no doubt that many of the dead were and will be recognized as martyrs. But it is notable and perhaps odd that virtually none of the Christians killed were public personalities. For example, I believe the list includes only one bishop and very few well-known priests, ministers or Christian laymen. (One exception might be the Orthodox priest Daniel Sysoev, murdered in 2009, who became locally famous in Russia for evangelizing within the Moscow Muslim community.)

By contrast, there have been numerous well-known non-Christians and atheists murdered, including the Bangladeshi bloggers cited in the previous post, the Charlie Hebdo journalists, and the Dutch anti-Islam figures Pym Fortune and Theo van Gogh. And of course there are a number of others, such as Salmon Rushdie, who have lived for many years under the threat of death.

Why this is the case is a question I hope to answer in another post. It almost certainly reflects well on the bravery of some contemporary atheists. And by the same token probably reflects badly on the current state of organized Christianity and the Catholic Church, especially in Western countries.

If atheists, such as Oyasiqur Rahman are willing to sacrifice their lives to tell the truth about a violent, tyrannical and soul destroying religion, where are, say, the Catholic priests and bishops? And where is the Pope, or is he too busy bragging about riding in a used car?

Holiday in the Caliphate

Tweet

Allah Über Alles

After Jello Biafra from an original idea by Brian Renninger

So, you been to school
For a year or two
And you know you've seen it all
On Mommy's tab
Thinkin' you're real fab
Downtown your kind don't crawl

Play ethnicky rap
To parade your snap
On your three grand iMac Pro
Bragging that you feel
How the homeless are so real
And the barrios have soul

It's time to taste what you most fear
Axe Spray will not help you here
Brace yourself, my dear:

It's a holiday in the Caliphate
It's tough, dude, but it's life
It's a holiday in the Caliphate
Don't forget to pack a wife

You're a Cat in the Hat
You scurry like a rat
You want everyone to be like you
Write irony
On your Twitter feed
And post a photo of your new tattoo

Well, you'll be wearing
An orange suit
I hear they're all the rage
Make videos
To say your last hellos
Then you're burned alive in a cage

Now you can go where people submit
Now you can go where they blow up sh*t
What you need, a bit

Is a holiday in the Caliphate
Where women dress in black
A holiday in the Caliphate
Where you'll convert or crack

Islam, Islam, Islam Islam (etc.)

And it's a holiday in the Caliphate
Where to Allah you will kneel
A holiday in the Caliphate
Where the homeless are so real

ISIS Fighters are the New International Brigadistas

Tweet

Oh darn. She had such a bright future in England.

From 1936 to 1939, during the Spanish Civil War, 2,000-4,000 Britons went to fight for the Republicans--the anti-Franco forces that eventually lost. The standard narrative is that these were the good guys. George Orwell, Stephen Spender and all that. The standard narrative is wrong.

Read Homage to Catalonia, especially the first section. Orwell, who would become famous for describing a totalitarian Hell in his 1984 a few years later, described a totalitarian Hell in Barcelona. But here he was in favor of it:

Practically every building of any size had been seized by the workers and was draped with red flags or with the red and black flag of the Anarchists; every wall was scrawled with the hammer and sickle and with the initials of the revolutionary parties; almost every church had been gutted and its images burnt. Churches here and there were being systematically demolished by gangs of workmen. Every shop and café had an inscription saying that it had been collectivized; even the bootblacks had been collectivized and their boxes painted red and black. Waiters and shop-walkers looked you in the face and treated you as an equal. Servile and even ceremonial forms of speech had temporarily disappeared. Nobody said 'Señor' or 'Don' or even 'Usted'; everyone called everyone else 'Comrade' and 'Thou', and said 'Salud!' instead of 'Buenos días'. Tipping was forbidden by law since the time of Primo de Rivera; almost my first experience was receiving a lecture from a hotel manager for trying to tip a lift-boy. There were no private motor-cars, they had all been commandeered, and all the trams and taxis and much of the other transport were painted red and black. The revolutionary posters were everywhere, flaming from the walls in clean reds and blues that made the few remaining advertisements look like daubs of mud. Down the Ramblas, the wide central artery of the town where crowds of people streamed constantly to and fro, the loudspeakers were bellowing revolutionary songs all day and far into the night. And it was the aspect of the crowds that was the queerest thing of all. In outward appearance it was a town in which the wealthy classes had practically ceased to exist. Except for a small number of women and foreigners there were no 'well-dressed' people at all. Practically everyone wore rough working-class clothes, or blue overalls, or some variant of the militia uniform. All this was queer and moving. There was much in it that I did not understand, in some ways I did not even like it, but I recognized it immediately as a state of affairs worth fighting for. Also I believed that things were as they appeared, that this was really a workers' State and that the entire bourgeoisie had either fled, been killed, or voluntarily come over to the workers' side; I did not realize that great numbers of well-to-do bourgeois were simply lying low and disguising themselves as proletarians for the time being.

Again, remember, this was written by someone on their side.

Change "workers" to "Muslims", the hammer and sickle to the crescent and star, and you will have something a bit like Raqqa, the capital of the new ISIS "Caliphate":

"Inside the city, the signs of destruction are obvious on some government buildings and homes,"...FSA brigades and civil society activists tried to change street names in Raqqa. Tal Abyad Street, the city's most popular, was renamed after martyr Ali al-Babinsi. However, people keep using the old name. In any case, very few people know its official name in city records, which is al-Qunaytirah Road. Martyr Basel al-Assad Street was turned into Colonel Hussein Harmoush Street and al-Jalaa or "Clock" Roundabout became Freedom Square. "Mr. President Square" is now Martyrs’ Square, but people on both sides call it after the nearby fire station. Civil society activists had also painted some of the city's statues with the colors of the "revolutionary flag." However, ISIS removed the "flag of infidels" and raised its banners everywhere...Alaa Jubran, a resident of Raqqa who was there on a recent visit, told Al-Akhbar, "Street vendors do not occupy the city's sidewalks anymore. ISIS established a popular market in the city center. It was equipped to include the vendors and traveling salesmen, banning them from using the streets." ISIS transferred the busy Friday market next to Raqqa's old wall, a historical site, and moved moved market day to Thursday so it would not distract people from attending Friday prayers in the mosque. It also created a consumer protection office and imposed monthly payments on commercial establishments, in return for sanitation, electricity, water, and phone services. At a later stage, this will be extended to civilians to ensure the continuity of services. Two signs in particular are hanging in shop windows. "Sisters, please do not remove the niqab inside the shop," said one. The other announced that "work stops 10 minutes before prayers." Prayer rooms were established in public venues and streets become almost empty before prayer times, save for ISIS’ patrols...The Islamist Traffic Police is on every street and market, wearing the same uniform, conducting traffic, and issuing tickets. Inside official buildings and facilities, the staff is committed to serving the citizens. Emergency vehicles of the water and electricity departments are rushing to fix problems all the time. On the other hand, the recently created Islamic Services Authority supervises state institutions. The Accounts Bureau monitors the markets, sales operations, applying sharia, and holding violators accountable. The official weekend is now on Thursday and Friday. 

The Spanish Civil War featured the highest proportion of Catholic priests, brothers and nuns murdered or driven into exile of any anti-Catholic eruption in history. And the Republicans didn't just go after the living religious. One of their favorite pastimes was to dig up the bodies of priests and nuns and put them on display in front of Churches. Sometimes they would waltz with the corpses.

See, God has no power over us, we can waltz with corpses.

Charming.

ISIS doesn't dig up corpses (as far as I know). They just smash archeological artifacts.

And kill Christians.

Charming.

One other difference, of course, is that the International Brigadistas fought against God. The ISIS Brigadistas fight to support a false God. What's better? Unfortunately, the results are somewhat similar.

As a number of British news sources have reported, for example, here and here, the number of Britons joining ISIS is on track to match the number joining the Spanish Republicans in the 1930's.

Barcelona, 1936. Raqqa, 2015. It's, you know, so romantic.

Or as someone once said of another totalitarian Hell, "It's tough, kid, but it's life."

"Don't forget to pack a wife."

Why are so many attracted to this sort of thing?