by Florian Flade
“The hero of Khorasan Zaid Saleh al-Hourani, known to everyone as Abu Musab al-Hourani”, the beginning of a short biography of a Jordanian Jihadist fighter killed in Afghanistan reads. The article about Al-Hourani was posted on Jihadist Internet forums recently and gives a rare insight into the situation of foreign fighters in Afghanistan these days.
“Abu Musab al-Hourani”, a resident of Amman, from a Jericho family, allegedly was a close aid to former Iraqi Al-Qaida leader Abu Musab az-Zarqawi and recruited about 30 other Jordanians to Jihad in Iraq. In Jordan al-Hourani was imprisoned for 5 years because of his terrorist activities.
In 2010 he traveled to Pakistan and joined the mujaheddin in the tribal areas. Pictures released with his biography are showing Abu Musab al-Hourani in the Pakistani tribal agency of Orakzai. “He took part in operations targeting the Pakistani military”, the biography reads. Al-Hourani was wounded during the fighting in Pakistan, both in battle with Pakistani troops (on his leg) and in CIA drone strikes (again his leg) but recovered from the injuries. Continue reading
Tag Archives: Afghanistan
Mystery death on Skype: What killed US captain in Afghanistan?
The captain, a chief nurse who deployed to Afghanistan in March, was speaking with his wife via Skype when he pitched forward. The Army is investigating but does not suspect foul play.
By Anna Mulrine, Staff writer / May 7, 2012
It is a mystery gripping the US military: What caused a US soldier at a base in Afghanistan to die during a video chat with his wife?
Capt. Bruce Kevin Clark, of Spencerport, N.Y., is pictured in an undated U.S. Army photo obtained by Reuters May 7.
Courtesy of U.S. Army/Reuters
Capt. Bruce Kevin Clark was speaking via Skype with his wife Susan Oreliana-Clark on May 1 when he was “suddenly knocked forward,” according to statement released by his wife on Sunday.
“There was no sign that CPT Clark was in any discomfort, nor did he indicate any alarm,” her statement noted.
Yet she did notice a disturbing detail after her husband collapsed forward out of the view of the computer’s video camera: “The closet behind him had a bullet hole in it.”
Oreliana-Clark promptly called family members and tried to reach military officials as the Skype chat feed continued and her husband did not respond to her voice.
“The Skype link continued for approximately two hours as CPT Clark’s family and friends stateside and in theater worked feverishly to send help.”
After two hours, military officials and Mrs. Clark say, two military personnel arrived in Clark’s room in Afghanistan “and appeared to check his pulse,” according to the Clark family statement.
His wife, who had been working “feverishly” to reach military officials, was “provided no details about his condition” by the troops who arrived on the scene.
Cultural Sensitivity As A Weapon
Image via Wikipedia
March 1, 2012: As foreign troops reduce their numbers in Afghanistan over the next two years, American Special Operations Forces (commandos and Special Forces) will increase their activity because these troops will advise Afghan soldiers, and be available to carry especially tricky missions. The U.S. Army Special Forces will be particularly effective because they know the languages and cultures in Afghanistan.
The effort to train the new Afghan soldiers and police required that thousands of troops and civilians (usually former military) be brought in. These have been of limited effectiveness because of language and cultural barriers. Normally, the U.S. Army Special Forces handles training of foreign armies, and they are expert at it. Special Forces troops have the advantage of knowing the language and culture of the foreign troops they train. One lesson that was quickly learned was that, while you can teach these foreign recruits through an interpreter, it helps a lot if you get up to speed on the local culture. The Special Forces provided some of their people to help train the American trainers on that point, but over the past seven years, a body of information and “lessons learned” has been collected, and used to help train the trainers. One of the more important lesson learned was that, even if you don’t speak the language, spend as much time as possible with your trainees. That means eating with them, and living very close to their barracks. Be available at all hours, and keep a good translator handy at all times.
The cultural awareness picked up in Iraq has not always proved useful in Afghanistan. For example, in Iraq a knowledge of the history of the Iraqi army, and respect for that, proved very useful. The Iraqis were particularly proud of how they held off the Iranians during the 1980s, and making positive references to that paid off. No mention of the two wars they had with the Americans. They already knew all about that, and don’t want to hear any more. The Afghans, on the other hand, have no sense of their army having been defeated by the United States, since everyone looks on the defeat of the Taliban as a group effort by the Afghan people and Americans to chase out some religious fanatics. But at the same time, Afghans have no particular pride in any “Afghan Army.” The only military organizations Afghans admire are tribal or warlord militias that won some battles in the past (often against another Afghan tribe). Continue reading
Bulletin Of The Oppression Of Women
Our latest Bulletin of news and events regard!ing the oppression of women under Islam is now available. You can find archived issues here.
A Saudi court sentenced a local man and his girl friend to 50 lashes each and ordered him to wash 10 dead people after they were caught in a car parked in a deserted place under the cover of night.
The judge also sentenced the man to 15 days in prison and ordered him to memorize 10 Koran verses and 100 sayings by the Prophet Mohammed, according to Sabq newspaper.
***
In Saudi Arabia, girls and women are shut out of competitive sports, according to a just-released report by Human Rights Watch.
There are no national teams for women, and physical education for girls does not exist in state schools (although it does in private schools). Fitness clubs open to women are few and costly. Many of the swimming pools and running tracks that did exist for women were closed by the government in 2009 for being unlicensed, leaving women to search out gyms operating under the radar or to exercise at home.
Shakila, 8 at the time, was drifting off to sleep when a group of men carrying AK-47s barged in through the door. She recalls that they complained, as they dragged her off into the darkness, about how their family had been dishonored and about how they had not been paid.
It turns out that Shakila, who was abducted along with her cousin as part of a traditional Afghan form of justice known as “baad,” was the payment.
Although baad (also known as baadi) is illegal under Afghan and, most religious scholars say, Islamic law, the taking of girls as payment for misdeeds committed by their elders still appears to be flourishing. Shakila, because one of her uncles had run away with the wife of a district strongman, was taken and held for about a year. It was the district leader, furious at the dishonor that had been done to him, who sent his men to abduct her.
[ . . .]
“Despite being denounced by the United Nations as a “harmful traditional practice,” baad is pervasive in rural southern and eastern Afghanistan, areas that are heavily Pashtun, according to human rights workers, women’s advocates and aid experts. Baad involves giving away a young woman, often a child, into slavery and forced marriage. It is largely hidden because the girls are given to compensate for “shameful” crimes like murder and adultery and acts forbidden by custom, like elopement, say elders and women’s rights advocates.
Read the rest here.
The honor/shame belief system of the mid-East is the engine that drives the oppression of women in these cultures. Islam is the fuel that provides the machine with its power.
An Iranian born professional belly dancer, Farahnaz Raboudan, now living in Canada, talks about her art, its age limitations, and what she found on her last trip to Egypt.
Born in Tehran, Raboudan danced at parties and birthdays as a child. Her family fled Iran in 1989, 10 years after the Islamic revolution.
“Among other rules, women had to wear much more conservative clothing after the revolution and there has been no public belly dancing since then,” she says.
[ . . .]
Just back from Egypt — considered by many to be the longtime centre of belly dancing — Raboudan says the Muslim Brotherhood is dropping the curtain on belly dancing.
“It’s sad,” she says. “I fear Egypt will go the way of Iran. Fortunately, there are many Muslims in Edmonton who understand and enjoy belly dancing.”
Read the article here.
For those of you who have never had the pleasure of seeing a belly dance, here is a video of the best belly dancer in the world, Tito Seif, who happens to be a man, dancing with one of his students! Here is another video of the Classical Egyptian style belly dance by Zaheea.
Singing and dancing are disputed by various Islamic sects. However, even some of the most fundamentalists in Saudi Arabia and Pakistan allow dancing at celebrations when it is gender specific and men dance with men, and women dance with women. Also, some Muslims say that it is permissible for wives to dance for their husbands. Here’s a typical discussion about these arts.
Young Danish women with immigrant backgrounds – most of them Muslim – continue to flock to private clinics across the country to have their ‘virginity’ restored for a few thousand kroner.
Several years after the little-known procedure became a topic of political debate, doctors are reporting that demand for hymenoplasty operations has not decreased.
Doctors who perform these operations have come under sharp criticism for legitimising the procedure and thereby protecting what critics say is the chauvinism and oppression that underlies the demand that new brides must be verified virgins.
“I don’t have any scruples about helping. The important thing is that these girls have good lives moving forward. You could call it my form of foreign aid,” Dr Christine Felding, who performs 30 to 40 hymenoplasty procedures each year, told Berlingske newspaper.
The procedure involves reconstructing the hymen – the membrane that partially covers the opening to the vagina, and which is presumed to tear and bleed the first time a woman has sexual intercourse. The doctor literally sews bits of the vaginal lining together to narrow the opening. It takes a little over an hour and is done under local anaesthesia. Felding charges 5,000 kroner. Other doctors charge as much as 12,000 kroner.
Felding estimates that three or four women with immigrant backgrounds call her each week asking about the procedure. Most of them, she said, are frightened about what will happen if their fiancés or their families find out that they are not virgins.
Women have been known to suffer rejection, public shaming and even violent retribution at the hands of men in their own families if there is a lack of ‘proof’, in the form of a bloody bed sheet, on the wedding night.
It is more cultural than religious. If the bride is not a virgin and does not bleed on the wedding night, it is a big shame on the family. There have been honour killings in extreme cases,” Dr Magdy Hend, a UK surgeon who performs several hymenoplasties a week, told the UK tabloid Daily Mail.
Doctors in the UK, France, Germany and Belgium also report that the procedure is highly sought after in Muslim communities. The irony, as Time magazine’s Bruce Crumley writes, is that “the increase in the procedure reflects the growing emancipation of women from tradition-rooted communities, but also the ongoing male oppression signified by the obsession with female virginity.”
Read the rest here.
(h/t to NewEnglishReview)
Deaf Mute Girl Kept as a Sex Slave in Britain
A woman allegedly imprisoned in a cellar, raped and kept as a virtual slave while a child was stabbed in the stomach for smiling, a jury was told.
The woman, who is deaf and unable to speak, is said to have been subjected to years of abuse after being trafficked into Britain from Pakistan. It is alleged that she was locked in a cellar by Ilyas Ashar, 83, and his wife Tallat Ashar, 66, at their home on Cromwell Road in Eccles, Salford, and forced to sew, wash, cook and clean without pay.
Deaf mute girl allegedly kept in a cellar in Eccles was raped and treated as slave, court told. A jury at Manchester Minshull Street Crown Court was told she slept on the cellar’s concrete floor without access to a toilet until she was rescued by police in June 2009.
She is also said to have been regularly beaten, repeatedly raped and assaulted. The couple are on trial and deny any mistreatment.
Read more here.
Afghan woman burnt to death in Iran
The charred body of an Afghan refugee, allegedly killed by her in-laws in neighbouring Iran, was brought to southwestern Nimroz province, the victim’s father said on Monday.
Abdul Basir told Pajhwok Afghan News his daughter was burnt by her mother-in-law and husband in Iran’s Sistan Baluchistan province five days ago. She had been sprinkled with gasoline before being set on fire, the father alleged.
Basir, who is currently living in Iran, said her daughter was married to a young boy of an Afghan refugee family a year ago. But her mother-in-law would always encourage her son to rough up his wife.
Read more here.
(h/t to the thereligionofpeace.com)
What links these stories? The answer is: the ideology of Islam.
Restrictions Easing on Women in Combat
(Julie Jacobson, File/AP Photo)
By Luis Martinez | ABC News – 14 hrs ago
The Pentagon on Thursday will propose rule changes that will allow more women to formally serve in jobs closer to the front lines.
Defense officials say as many as 14,000 positions could be opened up, though the restrictions on women serving in infantry combat units will remain in place.
The rule change reflects the ongoing reality that in a decade of war in Iraq and Afghanistan, women were already dying in combat with the blurring of the traditional definition of front lines. Nearly 300,000 women have served in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and 144 of them have died in those conflicts.
The rule change is included in a report required by Congress as part of last year’s Defense Authorization Bill that has been overdue for months. The new rules likely will not go into effect until the summer if Congress raises no objections to the change.
Women will still be barred from serving in infantry combat units, defense officials say, but the changes will formally open up new positions at the combat battalion level that, until now, have been off limits.
Pakistan Security Brief – January 26, 2012
Image via Wikipedia
Interior Minister Rehman Malik says eight suicide bombers are likely in Islamabad; Security is enhanced in Islamabad and Rawalpindi after terror threats; Kidnapped American aid worker is “alive and in good health;” Seven foreigners kidnapped in Pakistan in past six months; Haqqani Network publishes guidelines for militants; Six Frontier Corps soldiers killed by Baloch rebels; Troops kill 20 militants in Kurram Agency; Head of Landi Kotal chapter of Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Fazl (JUI-F) shot dead; Pakistan offers harsh response to NATO report; Pakistan denies obstructing UN Conference on Disarmament; Thousands of supply trucks crowding Karachi port due to closed NATO supply routes; Pakistan’s Foreign Office says U.S. sanctions do not cover Pak-Iran gas pipeline; Pakistan ranked 151 of 179 countries in 2011 World Press Freedom Index; Lawyers observe a strike over killing of three Shia lawyers; Pakistani prime minister’s former media coordinator sentenced to three years in prison for fraud; Parliamentary Committee on National Security summons Mansoor Ijaz on February 10.
Militancy
- Over the last four days, four threats have “been received from the Tehrik-e-Taliban [Pakistan (TTP)]– two for Rawalpindi and Islamabad and two for the rest of the country.” On Thursday, Interior Minister Rehman Malik revealed intelligence reports that “eight suicide bombers have entered the twin cities of Islamabad and Rawalpindi.” According to The News, a “high-level meeting” was held in the Ministry of Interior to address the terrorist threats. Chaired by Malik, the meeting “reviewed law and order and security situation of the federal capital.” The leadership decided to enhance the security of all officials and sensitive federal buildings, as well as to develop a “fresh plan of deployment” for the Ranger units.[1]
- According to McClatchy Newspapers, Warren Weinstein, the 70-year-old American aid contractor who was kidnapped in Pakistan on August 13, is “alive and in good health.” Weinstein is being held in North Waziristan by Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, a Pakistani al Qaeda affiliate. In an interview last week, a ranking Pakistani militant said that Weinstein “is being provided all available medical treatment, including regular checkups by a doctor and the medicines prescribed for him before he was plucked.” According to a security analyst in Islamabad with Pakistani militant contacts, “Weinstein’s captors had no plans to harm him,” but will “use him as a bargaining chip in negotiations with the Pakistani authorities.”[2]
- In the past six months, seven foreigners have been kidnapped in Pakistan, “highlighting the security threat in the country and hampering aid efforts.” According to The Associated Press, “Islamist militants, separatist rebels or regular criminals are suspected in the abductions, with motives ranging from ransom, publicity or concessions from the U.S. or Pakistani governments such as prisoner releases or a halt to army operations.” Aine Fay, chairman of the Pakistan Humanitarian Forum representing 42 international aid groups operating in Pakistan, expressed her concern for those that have been kidnapped, as well as the “ability of the NGOs to carry out the work.”[3] Continue reading
Pakistani Intelligence Officials Say Local Taliban Leader May Be Dead
Associated Press
ISLAMABAD—Intercepted militant radio communications indicate the leader of the Pakistani Taliban was killed in a recent U.S. drone strike, Pakistani intelligence officials said on Sunday, but a Taliban official denied the report.
Associated Press
In this Oct. 4, 2009 file photo, Pakistani Taliban chief Hakimullah Mehsud arrives to meet with media in Sararogha of Pakistani tribal area of South Waziristan along the Afghanistan border.
The report coincided with sectarian violence—a bomb blast in eastern Pakistan that killed 14 people in a Shiite religious procession.
The claim that the Pakistani Taliban chief was killed came from officials who said they intercepted a number of Taliban radio conversations. In about a half a dozen intercepts, the militants discussed whether their chief, Hakimullah Mehsud, was killed Jan. 12 in the North Waziristan tribal area. Some militants confirmed Mr. Mehsud was dead, and one criticized others for talking about the issue over the radio.
Karzai says he’s met with Afghan insurgent faction
Jan 21, 4:16 PM EST
KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — Afghan President Hamid Karzaisaid Saturday that he personally held peace talks recently with the insurgent faction Hizb-i-Islami, appearing to assert his own role in a U.S.-led bid for negotiations to end the country’s decade-long war.
AP Photo/Musadeq SadeqKarzai made the announcement hours before he met with American special representative Marc Grossman to discuss progress and plans for bringing the Taliban insurgency into formal talks for the first time.
“Recently, we met with a delegation from Hizb-i-Islami … and had negotiations,” Karzai told a meeting of the Afghan parliament. “We are hopeful that these negotiations for peace continue and we will have good results,” he added.
Karzai’s statement was a reminder that any negotiations to end Afghanistan’s war will be more complex than just talking to the Taliban’s Pakistan-based leadership, headed by Mullah Mohammed Omar. The two other main insurgent factions in the country have their own leaders and agendas.
Panetta: Troops in Graphic Video Will be Punished
Defense Secretary Leon Panetta today condemned the viral video that appears to show four Marines urinating on three corpses in Afghanistan, saying “those found to have engaged in such conduct will be held accountable to the fullest extent.”
Panetta ordered the Marine Corps and Marine Gen. John Allen, the top U.S. and NATO Commander in Afghanistan, to investigate the video.
Marine Corps officials said they had not yet verified the origin or authenticity of the video that started circulating early Wednesday upon release on You Tube and TMZ. Investigators from the Naval Criminal Investigative Service have started to investigate the case.
“I have seen the footage, and I find the behavior depicted in it utterly deplorable. I condemn it in the strongest possible terms,” Panetta said. “This conduct is entirely inappropriate for members of the United States military and does not reflect the standards or values our armed forces are sworn to uphold.”
SOUTH ASIA INTELLIGENCE REVIEW Weekly Assessments & Briefings
Volume 10, No. 27, January 9, 2012
Data and assessments from SAIR can be freely published in any form with credit to the South Asia Intelligence Review of the
South Asia Terrorism Portal
ASSESSMENT
- PAKISTAN: Blind Spot in FATA – Tushar Ranjan Mohanty
- INDIA: Andhra Pradesh: A Deepening Calm – Fakir Mohan Pradhan
- INDIA: Tripura: Mopping Up – Giriraj Bhattacharjee
Blind Spot in FATA
Tushar Ranjan Mohanty
Research Associate, Institute for Conflict Management
Pakistani authorities had been flaunting their success in forging a ‘peace accord’ among various factions of the Taliban at a Shura-e-Muraqba (Council for Protection), a joint five-member council formed by the Afghan Taliban and the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), along with other Pakistani militant outfits, on January 2, 2012. The establishment claimed that the TTP had agreed to end attacks against Pakistani Security Forces (SFs). Afghan Taliban ‘commander’ Mullah Mohammad Omar had put pressure on militant groups in Afghanistan and Pakistan to form the new grouping to end targeting of Pakistani SFs and, instead, to focus attention on United States (US)-led troops in Afghanistan. Later, all Jihadi (holy war) groups, in consultation with Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan (the shadow Taliban Government for Afghanistan) decided to set up a committee to resolve differences among various factions and step up support for the war against Western forces in Afghanistan. A statement issued in the form of a pamphlet to the media in Waziristan after the meeting declared, “All Mujahideen — local and foreigners — are informed that all jihadi forces, in consultation with Islamic Emirate Afghanistan, have unanimously decided to form a five-member commission. It will be known as Shura-e-Muraqba.”
- Image via Wikipedia
Dissent was, however, quickly in evidence, as the TTP declared that, while it would end attacks against civilian targets in Pakistan, its campaign against the Pakistani SFs would continue. The day after the Shura-e-Muraqba deal, TTP spokesman Ehsanullah Ehsan told the media, “Yes, we signed an accord with three other major Taliban groups of Maulvi Nazeer, Hafiz Gul Bahadur and an Afghan Taliban faction, to avoid killing of innocent people and kidnapping for ransom, but we did not agree with them to stop suicide attacks and our fight against Pakistani Security Forces.” He added, further, “for us, Pakistan is as important as Afghanistan and, therefore, we cannot stop our activities here.”
Lest any ambiguity remained regarding their intentions, on January 5, 2012, TTP militants executed 15 Frontier Constabulary (FC) personnel in the Mir Ali area of North Waziristan Agency (NWA) in Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) on January 5, 2012. The bullet-ridden bodies, thrown on a hill in the Mir Ali Sub-district, were spotted by tribesmen in the morning. The victims, who had been guarding the boundary between FATA and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP), had been taken hostage on December 23, 2011, in a pre-dawn attack by TTP militants on their post in Mullazai area of Tank District in KP.
