[News] Obama Adds 675 Million Muslims To The US Terrorism List

[Anti-Imperialist News]

Obama Adds 675 Million Muslims To The Ultimate US Terrorism List

By Franklin Lamb
http://countercurrents.org/lamb050110.htm

05 January, 2010
Countercurrents.org

Beirut: However President Obama is judged on various subjects for his 
first year in office, he has already made history in the way that 
neither his predecessor nor any other leader has ever managed.

On January 3, 2010, the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) 
issued new security directives to all United States and international 
air carriers with inbound flights to the U.S. effective January 4, 
2010. The TSA press release sought to assure the traveling public: 
"The new directive includes long-term sustainable security measures 
developed in consultation with law enforcement officials and our 
domestic and international partners."

At midnight Washington DC time, January 3, it went into effect and 
placed 675,000,000 (675 million) more Muslims and Arabs on yet 
another 'Terrorism 'list. Also added were Nigerian and Cuban 
Christians but they were not the target.

675 million is the approximate total number of people on the new list 
from the ten "prone to terrorism Countries" as the Washington Post 
called them this morning, or "terrorist leaning countries "according 
to Fox news, (Sudan, Afghanistan, Algeria, Iraq, Lebanon, Libya, 
Nigeria, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Somalia and Yemen) and the four 
current" State sponsors of Terrorism" ( Iran, Syria, Libya and Cuba).

All 675 million of these citizens are subject to being watched, 
patted down, and full body scanned under arrangements calling for 
'intense screening' by the national airlines who would like to 
transport them to the US. As with the new H. R. 2278 Congressional 
initiative against satellite TV providers, the airlines flying from 
or via the 14 countries will have to enforce the new stringent 
security measures or themselves risk losing their lucrative US 
bi-lateral landing rights and potentially, end up on yet another US 
Special Global Terrorism facilitator list.

In addition to the approximate 675 million covered by the new 
measure, with the average birth rate of these countries being 
approximately 45 live births per 1000 per year, it means that more 
than 17,000,000 newborns will join the new US T list even before 
their first gulp of their mommy's milk. And every subsequent years 
worth of new 'T babies'.

The new list initiative is enough to warm Dick Cheney's heart, 
reputed as he is to have never seen an Muslim or Arab (except those 
he does business with) he didn't want terrorized by a listing or 
other means, but the international rebellion against this latest US 
War on Terrorism initiative has begun.

As this report is being prepared, Nigeria has just weighed via media 
reports reaching Beirut around noon on 1/5/09 and its government has 
demanded that their 150,000,000 (150 million) citizens be immediately 
scratched from the new T list of 14 countries singled out for special 
treatment. Nigeria Information Minister Dora Akunyili announced today 
that" Nigeria, Africa's most populous nation, did not accept the new 
Terrorism list and we do not have a history of terrorism and such a 
move could not be justified. It is unfair to include 150 million 
Nigerians on the US list for tighter screening because Nigerians do 
not have terrorist tendencies.

It's no secret these days that anyone who even looks like they could 
be Arab or Muslim is already on a 'mental US Terrorism watch list' 
evidenced by reports of some passengers deciding not to board flights 
after observing Hijab wearing females or Abaya wearing Muslin or Arab 
men looking at them. What often happens according to airport security 
officials is that non Muslims sometimes stare at Muslims trying to 
detect something unusal or suspicious about them and then the Muslims 
stare back wondering why they are being stared at and both parties 
become paranoid.

The Lebanese, bless them all, ever alert to foreign intrigues, and 
were among the first objecting to being placed on the new US T list.

On Sunday night's (1/3/09) late and wild van ride back to Beirut from 
Beital in the now frigid and frequently bitterly cold and windblown, 
Bekaa Valley of Lebanon, this observer got an ear full. Our driver, 
by appearance, down to the "Akek" (Amber) ring on his little finger, 
neatly trimmed short beard, black wool jacket and black baseball cap, 
was a Hezbollah guy. Fellow passengers were accepting as "Abass" 
treated us to his new CD of Resistance music, (again and again!), 
including the popular songs "Haydar, Hayder" and "Oh Hussein!", and 
the catchy " Ali, Ali!" (Ali was the cousin and son in law of the 
Prophet Mohammad who Shia Muslims believe should have been the first 
Khalifa (successor) of the Prophet rather than Abu Bakr and his line 
including Omar (the second Khalifa) and Othman (the third Khalifa). 
In important respects, from this succession argument grew the 
Shia-Sunni conflict now deeply splitting Islam. On the van, it was a 
party atmosphere among the fifteen or so passengers most of whom were 
returning from week-end visits to their families with Bekaa toting 
delicacies of one kind or another. Van users, including this one, 
prefer Hezbollah drivers on the Beirut-Bekaa run because they know 
every pot hole on the route over the West Lebanon Mountains, don't 
try to overcharge riders, are unfailingly polite to the elderly and 
infirm-assisting them on and off the vans, and perhaps most 
importantly, these guys drive like bats fleeing hell, which cuts 
travel time by about one-third.

But those probably most grateful for riding with drivers like 'Abass' 
are those whose documents might not be quite in order or they just 
might be carrying contraband of some sort. For them our driver was 
golden because drivers like him are routinely waived thru various 
check points en route once their affiliation is noticed. One can't 
help wondering what would happen if a US 'profiling' system was in 
place and a van was pulled over by a Pennsylvania State trooper named 
Lawrence and his flashing red light, for ID and luggage inspection or 
just to sniff inside the vehicles quickly rolled down windows. Would 
the van still have passengers traveling to Beirut or would he ask to 
share a smoke?

The friendly young man sitting next to me opened a carry on case and 
while not wanting to appear snoopy, one could not help noticing that 
it was packed with filled honey comb and softball sized clumps of 
Red-bud Hashish (known locally by Western clients as 'H & H', with 
sometimes the prized honey fetching more than the Red-bud) two 
ancient Bekaa products. Appreciated from before Roman times each 
harvest achieved bumper crops this year. The near record yield was 
recorded despite a couple of DEA funded 'photo op' anti-drug 'raids' 
last summer that the locals laugh at. The chatty kid told me lots of 
couriers make at least twice weekly Baalbek trips.

One Baalbek young lady, a member of the large Jaafar clan ( which 
producers some of Hezbollah's best fighters) , studying Journalism at 
Beirut's American Lebanese University (LAU), commented to this 
observer after our driver took a music break to tune in the news, 
"Oh, your country just added 14 more Muslim countries to another 
airplane Terrorism list. Mabrouk!"

This opened an animated discussion of the ways things are going these 
days between the Obama administration whose sweet words last spring 
have become the source for scowls and ridicule in Lebanon due to deep 
disappointment and, once more dashed hope of America becoming an 
honest broker in the region --and of course, the various US Terrorism lists.

A teen ager from the back of the van sing-songed "Wouldn't it be 
easier just for you Americans to put the whole world on your 
terrorism list and then let everyone on the planet convince you they 
should be taken off?" And another smart alec grinned: "Or you could 
just stop giving Israel weapons to kill and terrorize us and then 
there would be no need for any terrorist lists at all? " Within two 
seconds, not more, an old woman who must have been in her 80's, 
wrapped in an Ashoura black covering, and who appeared to be sound 
asleep, lifted her head and shouted "Enshallah! (God willing!) and 
returned her head forward to slumber. With that sage intervention the 
van erupted and shook in laughter.

The strongest reaction came from 'Mustapha' who appeared to be some 
sort of Salafist recently arrived from the gulf. Claiming to have 
friends in Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, he expressed a strong 
opinion and with anger in his voice:

"Does your government think Muslims with self respect and who value 
the Koran will allow his family especially his wife and his daughters 
to be body scanned? He would rather die. This will not happen. One 
phone call and your Embassy in Lebanon will close faster than the one 
in Yemen. I think sometimes that you Americans have no idea about 
these latest aggressions against Muslims? Are you out of your minds? 
We are a peaceful people with a few extremists doing some crasy 
things but only in response to crimes against us like in Palestine. 
Stop provoking us and leave us and our lands!"

Will frequent flyers start to Glow?

As Mustapha expressed, Muslims and Arabs find the full-body scanner 
treatment abhorrent and they will likely oppose in strongly. In this 
they are not alone with many questions being raised from cost 
(approximately $ 200,000 each or 10 more expensive that the usual 
metal detectors) to questions whether such devices would have even 
detected the type of bomb allegedly used on Christmas Day in Detroit.

While the Israel Defense Industries has announced a crash program to 
build and distribute quickly a cheaper and improved full body scanner 
(FBS) version, the stock of American Science & Engineering, a US 
company that makes the full body scanners skyrocketed after Christmas 
and hit $82 dollars per share on 1/4/09, up from around $ 42 this 
summer.UK companies like L-3 Communications and Qinetiq hope to fend 
off competitors in landing quick orders. Qinetiq announced yesterday 
that it can perfect a "stand-off" full body scanner to reduce privacy issues.

Former Bush Homeland Security director, Michael Chertoff admitted to 
NPR the other day that he is in the hunt for contracts for his new 
consulting firm, while denying that his advocacy of fbs when he held 
his post is a conflict of interest. Janes Weekly claims the fbs are 
here to stay.

There are many critics of FBS including claims that it tends to fry 
hearing aids, and sends massive doses of ionizing x-rays radiations 
to the thyroid and breast areas. Others insist dogs are more 
effective and much cheaper.

Dr. John Gofman, Professor Emeritus of Molecular and Cell Biology, 
University of California, a leading U.S. expert on the biological 
effects of X-radiation has concluded after exhaustive research that 
there is NO SAFE DOSE-LEVEL of ionizing radiation. His studies 
indicate that radiation from medical diagnostics and treatment is a 
causal co-factor in 50 percent of America's cancers and 60 percent of 
our ischemic (blood flow blockage) heart disease. He stresses that 
the frequency with which Americans are medically X-rayed "makes for a 
significant radiological impact."

Privacy Issues

The rapid introduction of full body scanners at British airports 
threatens to breach child protection laws which ban the creation of 
indecent images of children. Terri Dowty, of Action for Rights of 
Children, in London claims that the scanners could breach the 
Protection of Children Act 1978, under which it is illegal to create 
an indecent image or a "pseudo-image" of a child.

The ACLU and similar civil liberty organizations in England and 
Europe are waging a campaign against fbs on privacy grounds some 
arguing that the images created by the machines are so graphic they 
amount to "virtual strip-searching" and have called for safeguards to 
protect the privacy of passengers involved. US and European Child 
porn laws are applicable in the view of some lawyers and there is 
growing concern that TSA type at airports around the World do not 
commit offences under child pornography laws or sell to the likes of 
the National Enquirer, the UK Sun, NY Post etc. full body scan images 
of celebrities, movie stars and others. Some governments are 
expressing concern that images could end up on the Internet.

A 12-month trial at Manchester, England airport of scanners revealed 
naked images of passengers including their genitalia and breast 
enlargements only went ahead last month after under-18s were exempted.

According to a US Congressional source, the Obama administration's 
new list is meant to parry the coming expected rampage from the likes 
of Russ Limbaugh. Already some conservatives such as retired 
Lieutenant General Thomas McInerney who wants to get young Muslim men 
naked in the worst way. The former US Air Force general's comments 
during a recent Fox News broadcast. "We've got to go to more than 
just the normal process that they're talking about now," he opined on 
Saturday. "We have got to go to very; very strict screening and we've 
got to use profiling. And I mean, be very, very serious about the 
profiling. If you are an 18-28-year-old Muslim man, then you should 
be strip searched. If we don't do that, there's a very high 
probability that we're gonna lose an airliner."

The Obama administration has expressed for months an interest in 
revamping the Terrorism lists and who is on them who should not be. 
Now is the time to rethink the whole T list concept. They can 
boomerang and cause many more problems than they were constructed to 
prevent. The Obama administration should proceed on a case by case 
basic with people suspected of planning violence. It should 
immediately scrap the latest 675, 000,000+ Mega Special Global 
Terrorism List and try good works rather than threats and serial 
humiliations to build trust and friendship among Muslims and Arabs 
who are identical to ourselves in what they are working to accomplish 
in life for their loved ones.

Franklin Lamb is doing research in Lebanon. He is reachable at 
fplamb at gmail.com.








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