RUTHFULLY YOURS

Imagine that a hostile nation – say, North Korea – fires a nuclear-tipped missile at the United States. The missile detonates in the upper atmosphere above a major American city such as Los Angeles, releasing a cascade of charged electrons that damages and destroys all technology and electrical systems within line-of-sight of the explosion. Vital infrastructure on the country’s Western seaboard is incapacitated. Large swathes of California and parts of Nevada lose power. Stores, social services and emergency functions that rely on electricity begin to break down, as disorder spreads and the death toll climbs.

Such a scenario isn’t the plot of the latest Hollywood blockbuster, although it well could be. It is, rather, the projected outcome of a man-made electromagnetic pulse (EMP) event of the type that a growing number of America’s adversaries are capable of creating.

Of course, the phenomenon of EMP is not new. It was first discovered well over half-a-century ago as an unintended byproduct of U.S. nuclear testing in the 1940s. Nevertheless, over the decades, a lasting solution to this challenge has proven elusive, for at least two reasons.

The potentially catastrophic consequences of an EMP event have made the issue a difficult one to broach, as a matter of public policy. Debates over the probability of such an occurrence, meanwhile, has led more than a few observers to minimize the associated risk – and to ridicule those who argue for preparedness.

Yet such complacency is ill-advised. The threat of electromagnetic pulse is both real and potentially devastating. More than a dozen years ago, in 2004, the congressionally-mandated Commission to Assess the Threat to the United States from Electromagnetic Pulse (EMP) Attack, colloquially known as the EMP Commission, concluded that the damage caused by an EMP to the United States “could be sufficient to be catastrophic to the nation.” Moreover, given America’s lack of protection against the phenomenon, the commission noted, “our current

The Islamic State is promoting a forthcoming sequel to its most infamous movie that threatened America at the beginning of the caliphate, with the new trailer showing fire raining down on several U.S. cities before America is engulfed in a fireball.

ISIS’ official al-Hayat Media Foundation didn’t give a release date for “Flames of War II: Until the Final Hour,” but distributed the trailer extensively across many open media platforms including YouTube and Google Drive.

The teaser begins with a rapid-fire montage of fiery battle scenes that appear to be from Iraq or Syria.

The focus then shifts to the United States, with columns of fire raining down on Los Angeles, Florida, New York, Texas and Nevada, labeled on a U.S. map.

ISIS appeared to be referring to the San Bernardino Christmas party attack in 2015, the 2015 attempted attack at a “Draw Muhammad” event in Garland, Texas, the 2016 Orlando nightclub attack, this Halloween’s Manhattan bike path attack, and the Las Vegas mass shooting at the beginning of October. The terror group continues to claim gunman Stephen Paddock as their own Abu Abdul Bar al-Amriki, yet have not released evidence to back up the claim; authorities have maintained they have discovered no terrorist links as a motive remains elusive). CONTINUE AT SITE

It has come to light that as director of the FBI, Robert Mueller, who is currently the special counsel looking for any dirt he can find on Donald Trump, presided over the 2012 removal of all counterterror training materials of any mention of Islam and jihad in connection with terrorism. Since then, our law enforcement and intelligence officials have been blundering along in self-imposed darkness about the motivating ideology behind the jihad threat. This, it turns out, was Mueller’s doing.

In February 2012, the Obama Administration purged more than one thousand documents and presentations from counter-terror training material for the FBI and other agencies. This material was discarded at the demand of Muslim groups, which had deemed it inaccurate or offensive to Muslims.

This purge was several years in the making, and I was – inadvertently – the one who touched it off. In August 2010, when I gave a talk on Islam and jihad to the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force — one of many such talks I gave to government agencies and military groups in those years. While some had counseled me to keep these talks quiet so as to avoid attracting the ire of the Hamas-linked Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the possibility of that pressure seemed to me to make it all the more important to announce my appearances publicly, so as to show that the U.S. government was not going to take dictation from a group linked to Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood.

Those who had urged silence were proven correct, however, for the Obama administration was indeed disposed to take dictation from CAIR. CAIR sent a series of letters to Mueller and others demanding that I be dropped as a counter-terror trainer; the organization even started a “coalition” echoing this demand, and Jesse Jackson and other Leftist luminaries joined it.

At the FBI, Mueller made no public comment on CAIR’s demand, and so it initially appeared that CAIR’s effort had failed. But I was never again invited to provide counter-terror training for any government agency, after having done so fairly regularly for the previous five years. CAIR’s campaign to keep me from taking part in counter-terror training was, of course, not personal. They targeted me simply because I told the truth, just as they would target anyone else who dared do so.

Although Mueller was publicly silent, now we know that he was not unresponsive. And the Islamic supremacists and their Leftist allies didn’t give up. In the summer and fall of 2011, the online tech journal Wired published several “exposés” by far-Left journalist Spencer Ackerman, who took the FBI to task for training material that spoke forthrightly and truthfully about the nature and magnitude of the jihad threat.

An ISIS supporter released a poster of Santa Claus on the group’s social media haunts. The poster shows Santa overlooking Times Square with a case of dynamite at his side.

In the image, the New York streets are filled with pedestrians at nighttime and Santa carries a bulky red sack.

“We meet at Christmas in New York… soon,” reads the text on the image.

It follows propaganda posters making holiday threats toward Europe, with a hand holding a bloody knife before a market in the neighborhood of the Eiffel Tower and a black-clad jihadist standing over Santa on London’s Regent Street.

The threat also comes as the ISIS-supporting Wafa’ Media Foundation has released numerous threats against the holiday and against the Vatican. In a message to fellow jihadists last week, the group noted that “the crusaders’ feast is approaching.”

In another instance, Wafa’ circulated a poster depicting a vehicle moving toward the Vatican with a cache of weapons, vowing “Christmas blood.”

ISIS followers have favored attacks during the holiday season, with the 2015 attack on a San Bernardino County Christmas party by Syed Rizwan Farook and Tashfeen Malik as well as last December’s truck attack on the Berlin Christmas market by Anis Amri.

And a 2016 video released by the Al-Furat Media Foundation, an official media affiliate of the Islamic State, portrayed a suicide bomber striking Times Square.

That video opened with the tag “USA” in the upper corner and shots of an unseen person assembling a bomb to put in a suicide vest. The person buttons up a blue shirt, straps on the bomb belt, and zips up a dark brown leather jacket to conceal it. He’s wearing a stainless steel wristwatch that reads 9:25.

That was followed by scenes of Times Square and the torso of the leather-jacketed man walking along the street. A TGI Friday’s sign is shown.

In a close-up of the man with no location shown, he’s pulling the ring on his detonator.

It appeared to be mock-up footage from an Al-Jazeera segment, with the network’s logo fuzzed out but still discernible. News footage was then shown of the ABC News building banner in New York scrolling a headline about the November 2015 Paris attacks.

The video then showed Orlando nightclub bomber Omar Mateen along with closeups of the weapons he used in the June 12 attack on the Pulse nightclub: a Sig Sauer MCX .223 caliber rifle and Glock 17 9 mm. CONTINUE AT SITE

The jihadist who killed eight New Yorkers and wounded twelve others in a truck attack along the West Side Highway’s pedestrian path has been indicted on potential death-penalty charges by a federal grand jury in lower Manhattan.

Highlighting the 22 charges announced by the Justice Department on Tuesday are eight counts of murder in aid of racketeering, each of which carries a potential death sentence. There are, in addition, twelve counts of attempted murder in aid of racketeering, each having a ten-year maximum prison term. The indictment further alleges that Saipov provided material support to the Islamic State (ISIS), a designated terrorist organization under federal law. That charge carries a potential sentence of life imprisonment because Saipov’s material support resulted in murders. Finally, there is also a charge of violently damaging an automobile with reckless disregard for human life.

The indictment, as expected, is a marked improvement on the complaint that supported Saipov’s federal arrest three weeks ago. The complaint did not charge the racketeering offenses and relied heavily on the problematic vehicle-damage charge. As I explained at the time:

The criminal complaint is only the first step in the case, really just a means of keeping Saipov detained without bail, not the formal indictment on which he will ultimately be tried. When that indictment is filed, I am hopeful it will include charges of murder in aid of racketeering. This offense (section 1959) is a capital crime, prohibiting murder (as well as other violent crimes) committed “for the purpose of gaining entrance to” a racketeering enterprise. ISIS clearly qualifies as such an enterprise under federal law (under section 1961, it is a group of individuals associated in fact — even though not a legal entity — and it engages in acts of murder, among other depravities). Further, even if Saipov was not a member of ISIS before his killing spree, he was patently seeking entry into the network . . . and he succeeded in getting it. ISIS branded him “one of the caliphate soldiers” in its claim of responsibility.

Prosecutors from the Southern District of New York (SDNY) are now relying on this potentially capital offense. It is important to note, however, that they have not yet filed a notice of intent to seek the death penalty.

Sofian Zakkout, President of the Miami, Florida-based American Muslim Association of North America (AMANA), likes to air out his extremist view in public, regularly posting his bigoted and radical provocations onto social media. This month has been no exception, as he has taken to Facebook to belittle the members of the Jewish community with a post that refers to them as “fucking Jews.” Though many of Zakkout’s Muslim colleagues and acquaintances may sympathize with him, this should be alarming to the people who serve with him on local anti-crime boards.

On November 10th, AMANA President Sofian Abdelaziz Zakkout promoted on his personal Facebook page a video with the following description in Arabic: “The opening of the al-Aqsa Mosque after pressure on Israel. Praise be to Allah. Spread the video to beat the fucking Jews.”

Israeli authorities had restricted access to the mosque, following the July 14th murder of two Israeli police officers by three Palestinian gunmen, at the entrance to the mosque. In late July, the mosque was reopened to all Palestinians.

Zakkout had taken the video from a Facebook page, which goes under the name ‘Campaign for the Victory of al-Aqsa Mosque.’ The site actively promotes Hamas and glorifies knife and vehicle-ramming attacks perpetrated by Palestinians against Israeli civilians. It publishes Hamas announcements of terrorist attacks and features a large number of Hamas-related images, including different photos of Hamas founder Ahmed Yassin, Hamas suicide bomber Reem Riyashi, and toddlers dressed in Hamas garb.

The site also features much anti-Semitic content. One photo on the site depicts three Orthodox Jewish men sitting and reading; a description on the side in Arabic labels the three “the descendants of the Jewish pigs.” Another photo portrays a Hamas member waving a flag with the statement next to him in Arabic, “Khaybar, Khaybar, O Jews, Muhammad’s army will return.” The threatening slogan is in reference to the Saudi Arabian city of Khaybar, where Muhammad’s disciples attacked and enslaved the city’s Jewish inhabitants, in the year 629.

It makes perfect sense that Zakkout would share a video from this particular site, as he too embraces both Hamas and anti-Semitism.

Marathon runners in Boston, Orlando revellers, strollers on the Promenade des Anglais, pop concert patrons in Manchester and, most recently, New York cyclists are victims of Islamic terror. They are also victims of politicians and media enablers who refuse to acknowledge the blindlingly obvious.

Evil has many faces. The recent mass shootings in Las Vegas and in the church in Sutherland Springs in Texas are stark reminders of that. The motives of Stephen Paddock and Devin Kelley remain unclear at this stage. Whether they will ever be brought to light in a conclusive way I don’t know.

The explanation of mental illness is often a first port of call in these kinds of cases. For the most part, that seems to me to be superficial. Anyone who callously murders men, women and children as though they are vermin is undoubtedly unbalanced. This is true whether or not they’ve ever been treated or incarcerated for mental illness. The question to be answered is what else is going on?

Sometimes, the ‘what else’ is clear. When the IRA planted bombs in public places no-one was in doubt about motive, even if those culpable were certifiable maniacs. Motive is central to closure as it is often to prevention.

Motive can come down to personal aggrievement. Disturbingly, that might have been the case for Paddock and Kelley. That remains to be unravelled. What did not require unravelling was the motive of IRA bombers. They openly stated their motive. Equally, those who massacre in the name of Allah are not shy about their motive. And here perspective is required to confound the news cycle.

Those who kill for idiosyncratic personal reasons are in a quite different and much less threatening category than those who systematically kill for a cause. Kelley’s church shooting on November 5, in which he killed 26 people and injured another 20, is horrific on any scale. However, it should not at all supplant in our minds Sayfullo Saipov mowing down cyclists in a rented truck in Lower Manhattan on October 31, killing eight and injuring eleven.

The reason is clear. Saipov’s crime is one of over 30,000 similarly motivated crimes since 9/11. All of these crimes are acts of Islamic terrorism. All form part of a global jihad committed to the establishment of a global Islamic caliphate. This is international serial killing on steroids.

It requires no unravelling of motive. Simply read the Koran. What it requires is resolute combatting. But how? Our political leaders are quislings. Most of them anyway.