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Tag: terrorist attacks
Benghazi Panel Continues Interviews, Surpasses Length Of 9/11 Inquiry

Benghazi Panel Continues Interviews, Surpasses Length Of 9/11 Inquiry

By Anita Kumar, McClatchy Washington Bureau (TNS)

WASHINGTON — The committee investigating the fatal attacks in Benghazi, Libya, will interview several high-profile Obama administration officials this week, including former CIA Director David Petraeus and former Defense Secretary Leon Panetta.

Petraeus will testify Wednesday behind closed doors, the committee said. His appearance will be followed by Charlene Lamb, former deputy assistant secretary of state for international programs for diplomatic security on Thursday; Panetta on Friday and Jeremy Bash, former Defense Department chief of staff on Jan. 13.

The committee interviewed former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, now the Democratic front-runner for president, in public in October.

“The American people and the families of the victims deserve to know the truth about what happened before, during and after the 2012 Benghazi terrorist attacks, and we must do everything we can to prevent similar tragedies from happening in the future,” Committee spokesman Matt Wolking said.

As of Wednesday, the House Select Committee on Benghazi has been in existence for 609 days, surpassing the length of time the 9/11 Commission took to investigate the terrorist attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people on Sept. 11, 2001.

“Instead of following the bipartisan model set by the 9/11 Commission, which brought our entire nation together after we were attacked by terrorists, Republicans created a highly partisan Select Committee with an unlimited budget to attack their political opponents,” said Rep. Elijah Cummings of Maryland, the committee’s top Democrat. “Republicans continue to drag out this political charade closer to the 2016 presidential election, and the American taxpayers continue to pay the price.”

The committee has proven more costly than permanent panels on intelligence, veterans affairs, ethics and small business, according to the Committee on House Administration, which collects monthly expenditure reports from each committee. Democrats even have a website constantly calculating the cost of the committee: more than $5.5 million as of Wednesday.

Democrats charge that the panel is “one of the longest, least productive and most partisan investigations in congressional history,” surpassing the investigations of Hurricane Katrina, the attack on Pearl Harbor, the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, Iran-Contra and Watergate.

The Republican-controlled committee was formed in May 2014 to examine U.S. government policies that may have contributed to the attacks that killed four Americans, including the U.S. ambassador, and the response of the Obama administration, including Clinton.

Seven other congressional committees and the bipartisan independent Accountability Review Board already have looked into the assault. Nearly all of them criticized the Clinton State Department for insufficiently addressing security issues at the diplomatic facility in Benghazi.

In 2015, the committee conducted interviews with 64 witnesses, including 53 who had never been interviewed by a congressional committee, according to Republicans. It has reviewed roughly 100,000 pages of documents from various departments and agencies, most of them never before seen by a congressional committee, they say.

Wolking said the committee is still waiting to receive documents from the State Department and the CIA and for witnesses to be made available for interviews. It expects to release a report with recommendations within the next few months.

©2016 McClatchy Washington Bureau. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

Photo: Central Intelligence Agency via Wikimedia Commons

 

Plan For Virginia Mosque Becomes Target Of Anti-Muslim Backlash

Plan For Virginia Mosque Becomes Target Of Anti-Muslim Backlash

By Noah Bierman, Tribune Washington Bureau (TNS)

SPOTSYLVANIA COUNTY, Va. — The zoning meeting, in a community room packed beyond capacity, was intended to focus on traffic, lighting and parking impacts from a proposed building.

But the building in question was a new mosque — and the meeting occurred four days after the terrorist attacks in Paris.

A thickly built man interrupted the discussion about stormwater runoff, saying to the small group of Muslims in the crowd, “Nobody wants your evil cult,” and “Every one of you are terrorists. I don’t care what you say. I don’t care what you think.”

The unidentified man pledged to do everything in his power to block the mosque, jabbing his finger toward one of the mosque’s trustees, a civil engineer leading the presentation, according to a video posted by the Free Lance-Star of Fredericksburg.

Many groaned. But there was enough applause — and enough other comments like it — to shut down the meeting under orders of a sheriff’s deputy, and to shock the small Muslim community near historic Fredericksburg.

The incident is one of a growing number that have put American Muslims on the defensive since the attacks Nov. 13 in France. Bullets were fired at a mosque in Connecticut. Feces were smeared on an Islamic house of worship in Texas. A fake bomb was left at another in northern Virginia.

“We always see a certain amount of backlash” following an overseas Islamist terrorist attack, said Corey Saylor, who monitors anti-Muslim incidents for the Council on American-Islamic Relations. “This time, however, it’s getting fueled by people who are exploiting it for political purpose. … That is essentially pouring gasoline on an already burning fire.”

President George W. Bush pointedly visited a mosque after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks to defuse similar tensions. By contrast, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump has asserted that, contrary to evidence, thousands of American Muslims in New Jersey cheered after the attacks. Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas, another GOP candidate, has said that only Christian refugees from Syria should be allowed to resettle in the U.S.

The mayor of Roanoke, Va., a Democrat, spoke favorably about Japanese internment camps during World War II to buttress his position that Syrian refugees should be blocked from entering the country.

The incident over the mosque near Fredericksburg was striking in its bluntness. Samer Shalaby, the engineer and trustee for the Islamic Center of Fredericksburg who bore the brunt of the negative comments, said he was saddened by the number of people who came to applaud the hateful comments. “I was kind of stunned,” he said.

The Cairo native said he moved here three decades ago after attending George Washington University, when there were only four Muslim families in the area. The community grew to include many professionals and small-business owners, some of whom drive about 55 miles to jobs in Washington, he said.

The community has grown more diverse, but the large Confederate flag waving near the highway exit is a reminder that the past remains in full view.

In 2000, the Muslim community built a small mosque, a spare brick building with two basketball hoops in front, across from a Goodwill store in the sprawling suburbs near downtown Fredericksburg. The mosque hardly stands out amid the strip malls, looking more like a house than a house of worship.

But the membership, now between about 250 and 300 families, feels cramped during Sunday school and other large gatherings, Shalaby said. The new building, which would be built on a 10-acre plot a few blocks away, would fit about 350 people, he said.

Shalaby said he had never experienced discrimination here. In retrospect, he believes the timing of the meeting was poor. He and other leaders have tried to emphasize their ties to the community, including work to feed the hungry and help the homeless.

In fact, members of the mosque said they had heard from hundreds of supporters, including local Christian and Jewish clergy, who have offered support.

Greg Bundrick, a retired social worker, drove 19 miles to tell the imam in person that he did not approve of the ugly words delivered at the meeting.

“It was wrong. It’s important for me to stand up and say how wrong it was,” he said, standing in the small office next to the sanctuary.

Imam Sherif Shehata gave Bundrick a hug and a piece of chocolate from a box the mosque kept on hand for well-wishers.

Swalha Craig, a Kenya native whose American-born husband converted to Islam, said she has never felt overt discrimination but does sense some sideways glances directed at her head scarf. Still, even after the frightening meeting, she considers this home.

“I got married here,” said Craig, who works as a part-time office manager for the mosque. “I love it here.”

©2015 Tribune Co. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

Photo: Samer Shalaby, trustee for the Islamic Center of Fredericksburg, Va., on November 23, 2015. (Noah Bierman/Tribune Washington Bureau/TNS)

As Many As 27 Killed In Attack On Mali Hotel; 6 Americans Among Scores Freed

As Many As 27 Killed In Attack On Mali Hotel; 6 Americans Among Scores Freed

By Robyn Dixon, Alexandra Zavis and Soumaila Guindo, Los Angeles Times (TNS)

BAMAKO, Mali — Suspected Islamist gunmen stormed a luxury hotel in the Malian capital of Bamako early Friday, killing as many as 27 people and taking scores of hostages during a daylong siege.

Gunfire and explosions continued late into the afternoon, as security forces surrounded the Radisson Blu hotel and conducted a floor-by-floor rescue operation.

Television footage from inside the building showed Malian troops in full combat gear escorting terrified guests from the building, some of them injured. A body lay at the foot of a staircase, covered with a brown blanket.

By early evening, state-run Malian TV was reporting that 18 bodies had been found and no more captives were being held. But a United Nations official told The Associated Press that 27 bodies had been counted during an initial search, 12 in the basement and 15 on the second floor.

Three gunmen were killed during the operation, a Malian security official told reporters at the scene. It was not immediately clear if others remained holed up inside.

A local Islamist extremist group, Al Mourabitoun, said it carried out the attack in coordination with al-Qaida’s local affiliate. If true, it would appear to be another deadly assault on French interests after last week’s bombing and shooting rampage in Paris. France has taken a leading role in the fight against Islamist militants in Mali and other former colonies in West Africa.

The hotel, which is popular among foreign visitors, was seen as a prime target for extremists in Bamako but was lightly secured. There were 140 people, including 30 staff members, inside when the attack happened at about 7 a.m., according to the Malian presidency.

The gunmen drove up to the hotel at the same time as a car with diplomatic plates and opened fire on it, according to Malian officials. Two hotel guards were reported killed in the initial barrage.

The assailants then stormed into the lobby yelling “Allahu Akbar,” or “God is great,” and went room-to-room looking for guests, local news reports said. Some who could recite Quranic verses were later freed, military officials told the AP.

At least six Americans were among those freed or who fled on their own, according to Col. Mark R. Cheadle, a spokesman for the United States Africa Command.

“A small group of U.S. forces have helped move civilians to secure locations as Malian forces work to clear the hotel of hostile gunmen,” Cheadle said.

American forces in Mali, a former French colony, routinely help the French military with intelligence gathering, aerial refueling and other missions.

One of the hotel’s residents, Guinean singer Sekouba Bambino Diabate, told Reuters he heard the attackers speaking English.

“I heard them say in English, ‘Did you load it?’ ‘Let’s go,’ ” Diabate said after he was freed.

Malian authorities dismissed initial reports that the attackers arrived at the hotel in a car with diplomatic plates, saying that they drove up to the hotel at the same time as a car with diplomatic plates and opened fire on it.

The assault came amid a deteriorating security situation in Mali, with Islamist militant groups from the north increasingly infiltrating the south and launching attacks.

Al Mourabitoun has claimed responsibility for previous attacks, including a March attack on a Bamako restaurant that killed two French nationals, a Belgian and two Malians.

The group is led by Mokhtar Belmokhtar, an Algerian militant blamed for a major assault on an Algerian natural gas facility in 2013 in which 39 foreign hostages were killed.

France intervened in Mali in early 2013 after al-Qaida-linked militias seized more than half the country in 2012. The groups included al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb, Ansar Dine and the Movement for Justice and Unity in West Africa , or MUJAO, which imposed a harsh form of Islamic law across the region.

France saw the conquests as a direct threat, with extremist groups gaining a stronghold on France’s back doorstep, within easy striking distance of Europe.

The French intervention force, with 4,500 troops, swiftly drove militant groups out of Mali’s major cities. France scaled back in August 2014, merging the Mali operation with one operating across five countries in the region.

However, Operation Barkhane, consisting of 3,000 forces, is spread too thinly to contain the increasing militant attacks, experts say.

A 10,000-strong United Nations force is also stationed in Mali but has not been focusing on the terrorist threat. Mali’s own army remains poorly equipped and unable to secure the country’s vast desert territory without outside help.

One of the five major groups active in the country, MUJAO, reportedly declared allegiance to Islamic State in May, several months after Nigerian militant group Boko Haram joined with the group.

French officials have expressed concern that other groups could do the same following reports that an Islamic State envoy traveled to northern Mali recently for meetings with leaders of the local al-Qaida affiliate, Ansar Dine, and others.

French President Francois Hollande pledged to help and sent an elite paramilitary unit to Bamako.

In recent months, Malian militant groups have switched focus from attacking military targets in the north to threatening civilian targets in central and southern Mali.

The country has seen several deadly attacks this year. In August, gunmen attacked a hotel in the town of Sevare, killing 13 people. There also have been attacks on security posts in Bamako and at a U.N. residence.

September saw an attack near Mopti that killed two police officers and two civilians.

Another militant group, the Guardians of Jihad, recently issued death threats against foreign journalists in Mali, particularly from France, warning them to leave the country.

(Times staff writers Dixon reported from Johannesburg and Zavis from Los Angeles. Special correspondent Guindo reported from Bamako. Staff writer W.J. Hennigan in Washington contributed to this report.)

(c)2015 Los Angeles Times. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

A Malian police officer stands guard in front of the Radisson hotel in Bamako, Mali, November 20, 2015. REUTERS/Joe Penney

Bill Clinton On Sept. 10, 2001: ‘I Could Have Killed’ Osama bin Laden

Bill Clinton On Sept. 10, 2001: ‘I Could Have Killed’ Osama bin Laden

By Michael Muskal, Los Angeles Times

Former President Bill Clinton told an audience in Australia that he could have had terrorist leader Osama bin Laden killed, but chose not to, because it would have meant significant collateral damage to innocent women and children in Afghanistan.

Speaking the day before the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the United States, Clinton told businessmen he had a shot at Bin Laden, whose al-Qaida organization was responsible for the attacks that left about 3,000 dead at the World Trade Center, Washington, D.C., and in western Pennsylvania.

“I’m just saying, you know, if I were Osama bin Laden … He’s a very smart guy. I spent a lot of time thinking about him. And I nearly got him once,” Clinton said in the audio recording from the meeting, according to a Sky News Australia report this week.

“I nearly got him. And I could have killed him, but I would have to destroy a little town called Kandahar in Afghanistan and kill 300 innocent women and children, and then I would have been no better than him.”

“And so I didn’t do it,” the former commander in chief says.

Hours after Clinton spoke of his role in the 1998 decision to not attempt to kill Bin Laden, the 2001 terror attack was underway in the United States.

The latest recording is more than just a historical irony or a sad footnote. There have long been complaints in some conservative quarters about Clinton’s actions in failing to neutralize Bin Laden.

It is also probably not a coincidence that there has been deeper looks at the Clinton administration’s actions as his wife, Hillary Rodham Clinton, appears more likely to seek the presidency herself. Recently, for example, some Republicans have castigated the former president for his relationship with an intern as a way of discrediting the Democrats’ meme that the GOP is waging a war on women.

The 1998 incident was previously known but the tape is the first known recording of Clinton speaking about the decision. The Australian recording was made by a local official who told Australian news outlets it was made with permission of the former president.

Bin Laden had been a target for U.S. officials for his role in the 1998 bombings of U.S. embassies in Tanzania and Kenya. The U.S. government launched missile strikes in August 1998, but Bin Laden was not injured.

By December 1998, intelligence indicated that Bin Laden was staying at the governor’s residence in Kandahar, according to the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States, otherwise known as the 9/11 Report, released in 2004. According to the report, the missed chance made some lower-level officials angry, but later information showed that Bin Laden had left his quarters.

“The principals’ wariness about ordering a strike appears to have been vindicated: Bin Laden left his room unexpectedly, and if a strike had been ordered he would not have been hit,” the commission wrote.

U.S. officials again considered a missile strike against Bin Laden in May 1999 — but decided not to act because the intelligence seemed unclear. The situation was complicated by the accidental bombing of the Chinese embassy in Belgrade during the NATO war against Serbia, the commission said.

“This episode may have made officials more cautious than might otherwise have been the case,” the commission’s report stated.

Bin Laden was eventually killed in a 2011 raid by U.S. Special Forces in Pakistan.

The Clinton Foundation did not respond to requests for comment.

AFP Photo/Esther Lim

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