Abdulkarim al-Khaiwani is a Yemeni Journalist who is facing a death sentence for his love of democracy while the bombers of the USS Cole go free. Viva la Yeman! Read more and see photos below.

Abdulkarim al-Khaiwani

Abdulkarim al-Khaiwani is a respected Yemeni Journalist who has been tried and is awaiting sentencing in Yeman. He was charged and found guilty of insulting the president and demoralizing the military. He is facing a probable death sentence.

Armies of Liberation has the details.

Al-Khaiwani was badly beaten during his arrest in June 2007. His daughter, six year old Ebba, was slapped by police so hard that she fell unconscious. After Al-Khaiwani’s arrest and release on bail, he was kidnapped and badly beaten again. The US State Department issued a statement from DC noting his abduction pointed to, disturbing trend of intimidation and harassment of Yemen’s journalist community.

Al-Khaiwani was charged on July 4 with aiding the rebel movement by publishing war news. As you may know, the war in Sa’ada has been called a state sponsored genocide with strong parallels to the Sudan. I published photos of the damage in Sa’ada caused by indiscriminate (or deliberate) government bombing. I interviewed rebel spokesman Yahya al-Houthi, and posted it. (This website is now banned in Yemen.) By the standard of ‘demoralizing the military’, I’d also be subject to the death penalty if I was in Yemen. So would half of the bloggers here in the US.

It is embarrassing that these human rights abuses go on in the world while our little wee activists think they are being brave by stomping on flags or preaching hate to like-minded parishioners from a pulpit. It is embarrassing because the people who protest against the government of the United States would never have the courage to do anything near as brave as Abdulkarim al-Khaiwani who is protesting a government that does not allow it.

Then there is Yemeni. The thugs who bombed the USS Cole during the Clinton administration (pre-9/11) have been released from prison. Yet, they may very well put al-Khaiwani to death for insulting their president.

You can help. Pressure from on-line journalists can help. Armies of Liberation has the links to a petition that you can sign right now to help save al-Khaiwani’s life. I hope you’ll take a moment. It means a life. It is something you can do to actually help save a life and further the cause of democracy in a region that is torn apart with theocracies of the worst sort.

Nicki at The Birthplace of the Process of Illogical Logic is keeping track of the posts on the subject. Let her know if you write about this so you can be included. The more that is written, the more difficult it is for the Yemeni government to put Abdulkarim al-Khaiwani to death.

Sign the petition.

Abdulkarim al-Khaiwani - Photos

General David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker are testifying in front of the Senate Armed Services Committee and Foreign Relations Committee right now. The proceedings have already been interrupted twice by protesters in the chambers.

As anyone can expect, the democrats are intent on finding any way they can to prove that we have or are being defeated in Iraq and need to surrender. As it is with any televised session of this kind the Senators are preening and posturing for the cameras.

You probably remember that the last time General Petraeus testified in front of this committee, last September, he was treated with less respect than would be expected for someone of his standing. In fact, Senator Hillary Clinton stated that his comments required ‘a willing suspension of disbelief’. Moveon.org took out a full page ad in the New York Times to insult Petraeus. Even right now a Senator told Petraeus that the surge was poorly planned and has been poorly executed.

Never mind that it has been working. Never mind that Sadr has called for a cease fire even with his attempts to reestablish himself with violence in Iraq and the continued interference of Iran and Syria. Never mind that we have an enormous investment in seeing this battle through to victory both for ourselves and for the world that we leave our children. The democrats still seem intent on seeing us surrender. Nancy Pelosi has already given Petraeus the message that there had better be a negative report today.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell hopes that Petraeus is going to get a better reception today and that the Senate will not embarrass themselves as badly as they did last time. To that end, he has set up a place online where people can express their gratitude for what Petraeus has accomplished in Iraq. All you have to do is fill in your name and add your comments. It only takes a minute to show that the entire country is not of the opinion of those who yell the loudest.

Go to Senator McConnell’s page and leave your comments of support here.

h/t Hot Air

The Bush administration plans to announce next week that U.S. soldiers’ combat tours will be reduced from 15 months to 12 months in Iraq and Afghanistan beginning later this summer, The Associated Press has learned.

The decision, expected to get final, formal approval in the days ahead, comes as Gen. David Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, prepares to deliver a progress report to Congress next week on the improved security situation there. He is also expected to make recommendations for future troop levels.

A senior administration official said Friday that plans are to deploy soldiers for 12 months, then give them 12 months rest time at home. Exactly which units would be affected is not yet clear. The official spoke on condition of anonymity ahead of the announcement.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates made the decision to extend deployments from 12 to 15 months last year, because that was the only way the Army could provide enough troops for the Bush-ordered military buildup aimed at quelling the violence in Baghdad.

Ever since, Gates; Gen. George Casey, Army chief of staff; and Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, have said they wanted to go back to 12 month tours as soon as possible.

Casey has pushed shorter deployments to reduce the strain on troops battered by long and repeated tours in Iraq and Afghanistan. But that goal has been hindered by the security demands in Iraq.

Officials have been publicly tightlipped in recent days about the move to reduce the tours.

Gates said Friday he expected a decision by President Bush “fairly soon” on the Army’s proposal. But he also cautioned that cutting troops’ time on the battlefront will impose limits on what the military can do in the future.

“So I think the bottom line is, we’re all still looking at that. But I think we’ll have a better idea of what we think we can do, what we ought to do, in the fairly near future,” Gates told reporters Friday.

What the future holds for troops in Iraq will become clearer when Petraeus goes before congressional committees Tuesday.

I am so glad they are doing this. Fifteen months is just too long. A 12 month tour is much more reasonable when the guys are looking at multiple deployments.

read more | digg story

Lara Logan was there as U.S. troops responded to insurgent attacks on Baghdad’s heavily fortified Green Zone.

Iraq’s Prime Minister, Nuri Al-Maliki, has suspended his attacks on the insurgent groups that have been fighting the government there for days now. Moktada al-Sadr is still causing trouble in Sadr City and is calling for protests. The thing is, Sadr had pulled back and now al-Maliki is backing off. Is this any way to fight a war????

Now the U.S. has to go back in and get control of the situation … AGAIN! al-Sadr’s been causing trouble for years so one has to wonder why he’s still drawing breath. I would think that at some point we’d learn a lesson or two from history. You can’t win the peace until you’ve won the war. We tried to skip a step there. Lets win the war, THEN try to win the ‘hearts and minds’ of the people.

Pat Condell discusses the film Fitna, the islamic reaction to it, the threats of violence and the dhimmitude of the west under the treat of islamic violence.

You can DIGG this here.

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This is not surprising news, but its certainly not what was hoped for.

(CNN) — After nearly four years of hoping, waiting and praying, an Ohio family learned Sunday their missing son died in Iraq.

“It hurts — it really hurts. You go through four years of hope,” said Carolyn Maupin, whose son, Staff Sgt. Keith Matthew Maupin, was captured by insurgents in April 2004.

“It’s like a letdown to me. I’m trying to get through that right now.”

His father, Keith Maupin, said military officials informed the family Sunday afternoon that the remains of the 24-year-old Army reservist had been identified.

“Every parent knows the possibility exists that they may have to face the death of their child when they volunteer to go to war,” he said. “However, those who are fortunate make peace with that and support their soldier, because they enlisted at their own free will.”

A Defense Department official also confirmed the identification, saying Maupin’s remains were found last week but DNA results just came in.

Maupin, who was 20 at the time of his capture, and another soldier, Sgt. Elmer Krause, 40, were captured by insurgents April 9, 2004, after their convoy came under attack near Baghdad International Airport. A week later, Maupin was shown on a videotape, surrounded by several armed masked men.

“My name is Keith Matthew Maupin,” he stated in the video. “I am a soldier from the First Division. I am married with a 10-month-old child. I came to liberate Iraq, but I did not come willingly because I wanted to stay with my child.”

Krause’s body was found two weeks later.

Later that summer, Al-Jazeera aired a videotape purportedly showing the execution of Maupin, but U.S. officials haven’t confirmed the identity of the person on the tape.

The U.S. Army continued to promote Maupin, who was a private first class in the Army Reserves at the time of his capture, to sergeant and then staff sergeant as they searched for him.

Three U.S. troops remain missing in the five-year-old Iraq war: Pvt. Byron W. Fouty and Spc. Alex R. Jimenez have been missing since their military convoy was raided west of Mahmoudiya May 12.

Spc. Ahmed K. Altaie disappeared October 23, 2006, and his status was changed to “missing-captured” nearly two months later.

I saw Sgt. Maupin’s mother on television this morning. She tearfully said that she was just happy that Matt was able to finally come back to America, even though its not the way they wanted him to come home.

I’m so sorry for Sgt. Maupin’s parents and family. I’m so sorry for whatever he had to go through. There just aren’t words ……

Related:

• My name is Matt Maupin - Please remember my face
• Wednesday Hero - SSgt. Keith Matt Maupin
• Where is Private First Class Keith Matthew Maupin?

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There’s just a big brouhaha going on because of the Geert Wilders film, Fitna. Obviously, a lot of people saw that coming and many people and groups tried to stop it from being released from the get-go.

I watched the film and saw acts of terrorism committed by islamic jihadists against the West and Western interest. The film didn’t exaggerate the atrocities and in fact barely scratched the surface of the outrageous behavior of the jihadists. So what’s the problem? The problem apparently is that we are not supposed to acknowledge that jihadists are jihadists. I guess we are supposed to pretend the are a loving group of people who are just badly misunderstood.

Or …. as a few commenters on my previous post have pointed out … we should all just admit that America is the big bad bully in the world and its all our fault for everything the Jihadists do around the world to anyone who does not submit to their will.

I don’t think I’ll do that, thank you very much. The jihadists have made no secret of their goal of destroying us and to pretend that is not true is akin to Chamberlain declaring that Hitler wasn’t so bad after all and there’d be peace in his time. He was wrong and the people who excuse the behavior of these evil doers are just as wrong and are part of the problem.

Its hard to blame the commenters and the ‘moderate muslims’ who refuse to condemn this behavior or who even defend the behavior. After all, look what happens to any muslims who DO speak out against jihadists in the name of islam … if they aren’t murdered they have to go into hiding. Just ask Ayaan Hirsi Ali what happens to muslims who speak out.

The jihadists are pulling out all the stops to intimidat the West into suppressing any information being distributed to the people that reminds them of the atrocities committed in the name of islam.

Its hard for me to believe how badly we are being played. On the one had they openly tell us they will destroy us and make no secret that they are developing the technology and weapons that can and will do just that. The examples of this are almost endless. And still we pretend that they are not a threat and would rather blame ourselves than name the enemy what he really is.

When did we become such cowards????? It is certainly not our heritage to be cowardly, yet we seem to have lost our will to protect our own interests. We tsk-tsk about beheadings, but then are outraged when someone reminds us that the ones doing the beheadings are islamic. Some even feel sorry for them when they are killed by our Troops!

Here’s a little bit of what’s going on now …..

I already posted that the courageous European Union has condemned the movie. They even went so far as to state the the whole concept of free speech is probably over-rated. Oh yeah? Tell our Founding Fathers that and every man who has died in every war defending our freedoms. COWARDS!

Muslim nations condemn Dutch Koran film

Geert Wilders, leader of the anti-immigration Freedom Party, launched his short video on the Internet on Thursday evening, prompting an al Qaeda-linked website to call for his death and increased attacks on Dutch soldiers in Afghanistan.

“The correct Sharia (Islamic law) response is to cut (off) his head and let him follow his predecessor, van Gogh, to hell,” a member of Al-Ekhlaas wrote on the al-Qaeda affiliated forum, according to the SITE Institute, a U.S.-based terrorism monitoring service.

The 57-nation Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC) said: “The film is solely intended to incite and provoke unrest and intolerance among people of different religious beliefs and to jeopardize world peace and stability.” [If they didn't blow up people, fly planes into buildings, behead people and kill anyone who disagrees with them they wouldn't be subjected to films about what they do. They are who jeopardize world peace and stability, not a film about what they do.]

Of course the UN had to weight in ….

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon condemned the film as “offensively anti-Islamic” and U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Louise Arbour said it was “hateful.”

Its not surprise that Iran disapproves …

Iran called the film heinous, blasphemous and anti-Islamic, and Indonesia, the world’s most populous Muslim nation and a former Dutch colony, said it was an “insult to Islam, hidden under the cover of freedom of expression.”

Network Solutions suspended the website that Geert Wilders had reserved to publish his film.

An American network provider Sunday said it had suspended a website that Dutch MP Geert Wilders had reserved to post his anti-Islamic film, which has sparked wide condemnation and fears of a backlash.

LiveLeak removed the video because of threats to their staff. Their statement is here. Gates of Vienna has a list of sites on which you can still see the video. You can view it at Jawa, LGF, Pat Dollard, Atlas Shrugs and Menorah Blog.

Dutch Leftists Apologize to Islam. They have their problems there too.

PoliGazette has two reviews of Fitna.

Others posting: Fausta’s Blog, Phyllis Chesler, The Psychotic Core, Wake Up America!, Sister Toldjah, Michelle Malkin, Powerline, Flopping Aces, Eddie Bear, The Spanish Pundit

More at Tailrank and memeorandum

This is the long anticipated movie about islam from Dutch MP Geert Wilder. The movie depicts recent acts of terrorism against Western society by islamic jihadists as related to verses from the Koran. We have been ‘protected’ from the images that so shockingly illustrate the acts of the jihadists against us. The images are graphic, bloody and hard to look at. Its the ugliness of islam and its impact on our society.

Islamofascists have tried to keep this film from being published. They are upset that the West might see them for what they really are. They will and do claim this isn’t islam. They claim this is racist and prejudicial. They claim it will give islam a bad name. I submit that if islam doesn’t want to be seen this way they should take control of their own society. I islam doesn’t like being depicted as violent and cruel bloody savages who are intent on conquering the world, then they should stop acting like violent and cruel bloody savages who are intent on conquering the world.

These acts are their acts, not ours. These are things done in the name of islam. When will we quit pretending we are somehow responsible for what they do?

**Warning** - Graphic acts of violence and the results of those acts. Some of this video is very difficult to watch. - **Warning**

Fitna in English

Previous:

• Wilders Film To Air, Dutch Government Terrified
• Geert Wilders and the Islamization of Europe

The kind of creeps who write for the Huffington Post are never above making cheap political points at the expense of fallen soldiers: Nico Pitney: A Mosaic: 4,000 Americans Dead - Politics on The Huffington Post.

read more | digg story

I posted a short little snippet of this a while ago and called it good … for a minute. It just flew all over me, but I was going to let it go at that one little bit and a referral to the original article. But you know me, I can’t let it go. It just blows me away that these people who call for the murder of our Troops do so openly and without one second of consequence to themselves.

They are cowards. They cover their faces and march in protests in places like Portland where they don’t have to worry about snipers or roadside bombs. They don’t have to worry about dictators making them disappear for their sedition and treason. They don’t have to look into the eyes of their enemies. They don’t have to look into the eyes of those that they seek to bring down. They don’t have to look into the eyes of someone who is trying to kill them.

They can go home and go to bed and not realize the damage they do. They are just out having a good time with their classmates. Just another day out for a good time trying to bring down the government of the United States.

Just another day having a good time, hiding their faces, and calling for the death of MY SON.

They take for granted that people like you and me will just sit and steam about their outrageous and cowardly behavior. They know we aren’t likely to come looking for them nor will we gun them down. Its a safe shot for them. They can walk around with their signs in Portland with the sure knowledge that they are perfectly safe. They will sleep in their warm beds tonight and attend their classes tomorrow to assist them in whatever career they will enter to further their Capitalistic dreams of material wealth. They will sleep in safety while OUR sons don’t sleep. When our sons can sleep they are awakened by bombs, mortars and being literally jolted out of their beds. Our sons sleep fitfully, if at all, because the enemy lurks just out of sight waiting for any opportunity they can to take the lives of our sons. That is why I choose not to just sit and steam about these protesters calling for the deaths of your sons and mine.

God help me, I despise them. I despise them for their cowardice. I despise them for their disloyalty to our nation. I despise them for their lack of understanding of the fortunes they inherit simply by accident of birth. I despise them because they have no idea what they are doing.

The men and women that they are asking Soldiers to FRAG are our sons and daughters. While they are out chanting and covering their disgusting cowardly faces, our sons and daughters are fighting people with REAL guns and a REAL will to kill them. This isn’t a GAME. This isn’t a GAME for the men and women who are fighting an enemy determined to kill them in a land as foreign to our way of life as you can get.

Here’s a clue you little wussy snotty-nosed pimply-faced prissy wimps. We have an all volunteer army so WHAT IS IT YOU THINK YOU ARE PROTESTING? You are free to go about your little meaningless lives and pursue your dreams of driving Beamers under our Capitalistic system without any interference from the unpleasantness on the other side of the world because you apparently weren’t raised with ONE SINGLE OUNCE of a sense of responsibility to your OWN FREAKING COUNTRY. You worthless pieces of the lowest form of scum.

You have NOTHING to be protesting because your small little lives aren’t being disrupted. Go back to class. Go drink wine and eat cheese in the park and discus the philosophy of Marxism with your intellectually enlightened elitist latte liberal friends and leave the work of this nation to people who can deal with real life. You can’t. You’ve proved it over and over. You have nothing worthwhile to contribute and are only a weight the rest of us have to carry around.

You call for the death of our Officers. Do you know who the Officers are?? They are our sons. You are calling for the death of MY SON!!! YOU PIECES OF STINKING ROTTING TRASH. You think you have no blood on your blood soaked hands because you haven’t got the guts to do anything but run your ridiculously filthy mouths. I don’t even wish you dead - so why do you wish my son dead? Do you even THINK about what you are saying or are you really just that evil/misguided/stupid/silly?

Now shut up, sit down, suck on your bong, cry to your mamas about how everybody is unfair to you and let the adults run the freaking nation.

Photos and notes on the protests at Gateway Pundit.

Once again, the anti-war movement show their true colors. Gateway Pundit has a series of photos from Indymedia of the anti-war protests in Portland showing posters calling on troops to kill their officers. Indefensible.

read more | digg story

Others with opinions about this: Vocal Minority, The McGehee Zone, Instapundit, Marooned In Marin

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In a bid to continue to give the illusion that he remains relevant, bin Laden and/or his al-Qaeda surrogates are releasing a new tape to threaten us all on the anniversary of the first day of the Battle of Iraq.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden is expected to release a new message, the U.S.-based terrorism monitoring service SITE Institute said on Wednesday.

The message is entitled, “The Response Will Be What You See, Not What You Hear,” SITE said in a release.

It said an announcement of the pending message was posted on Wednesday, the fifth anniversary of the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, by the administrator of the al Qaeda-affiliated Al-Ekhlaas Internet forum.

The message would appear to the first by bin Laden since November 29, 2007, when he urged European countries to end military participation with U.S. forces in the Afghan conflict.