The news feed is light tonight. Maybe most of our tipsters are away for Independence Day weekend — even the European ones.
The big story of the day concerns a suicide bombing in Baghdad by the Islamic State that killed at least 120 people and wounded several hundred more. Meanwhile, a suicide bomber blew himself up outside the American consulate in Jeddah. Two security guards were wounded, but the bomber was the only fatality.
In other news, a young man from Virginia on a visit to Manhattan stepped on an explosive device in Central Park and blew off his foot. At first the explosion was said to be from a firework, then later an “experimental explosive”. Now it is being called a “homemade bomb”, and the case has been turned over to the FBI.
To see the headlines and the articles, click “Continue reading” below.
Thanks to Dean, DV, Frontinus, KS, Lola, LP, MM, The Observer, UA, Upananda Brahmachari, Van, and all the other tipsters who sent these in.
Notice to tipsters: Please don’t submit extensive excerpts from articles that have been posted behind a subscription firewall, or are otherwise under copyright protection.
Caveat: Articles in the news feed are posted “as is”. Gates of Vienna cannot vouch for the authenticity or accuracy of the contents of any individual item posted here. We check each entry to make sure it is relatively interesting, not patently offensive, and at least superficially plausible. The link to the original is included with each item’s title. Further research and verification are left to the reader.
Man Injured by Homemade Explosive in Central Park
NEW YORK (RNN) — A man was injured by a homemade explosive device in New York’s Central Park on Sunday.
The man was climbing on rocks in the park when he stepped on what officials called an experimental device. A New York City Fire Department representative said the man suffered a “partial amputation” of one of his legs.
He was taken to Bellevue hospital and is in stable condition following surgery.
Deputy Chief John O’Connell of the New York Police Department said the device appeared to have been in the park as part of an experiment and was not related to terrorism…
He said the man who was injured and his two friends were not suspected to have been involved in the device’s creation.
| — Hat tip: Dean | [Return to headlines] |
Man Loses Foot After Stepping on Explosive in Central Park
A man had his foot blown off in Central Park after stepping on something that exploded, possibly a firework, police sources said.
The man had been climbing some rocks with two friends at east 68th Street and 5th Avenue when he stepped on the object, the sources said.
The group had been visiting the Big Apple for the Fourth of July, according to witnesses.
Sources said the injured man was transported to Bellevue Hospital with an apparent amputation…
| — Hat tip: Dean | [Return to headlines] |
Man Shot Dead After Attempting to Drive Through Nevada Chicken Wing Festival, Police Say
A man who tried to run over an officer as he attempted to drive into a crowded chicken wing festival on Sunday was shot to death after crashing his vehicle, police said.
The silver mini-van driven by the man tried to get past a barricade in front of the annual Biggest Little City Wing Fest around 1:30 p.m. local time before swerving toward a police officer who was on foot, authorities told Fox Reno.
Washoe County sheriff’s spokesman Bob Harmon told the television station that the officer shot the man after it crashed into a vendor.
Police say the suspect, who they have not identified, was taken to a nearby hospital, where he died.
No officers or bystanders were injured.
Witnesses reported hearing multiple gunshots and seeing officers try to cut the van off.
The Reno Gazette Journal newspaper reported that witness Steven Parks, a vendor for Jax Kettle Korn, said he saw several police officers on foot attempted to cut off the vehicle so they could shoot into the passenger side of the van. Parks said he then heard multiple gunshots.
“You see these things in the movies, and know to get down,” he told the newspaper…
| — Hat tip: Lola | [Return to headlines] |
‘Our Worst Nightmare’: New Legal Filings Detail Reporting of Rolling Stone’s U-Va. Gang Rape Story
Rolling Stone journalist Sabrina Rubin Erdely spent five months investigating a shocking claim of a gang rape at a University of Virginia fraternity, and the 9,000-word account of the brutal attack published online on Nov. 19, 2014, sent a tremor through the Charlottesville campus and beyond.
Then, on Dec. 5, at 1:54 a.m., Erdely sent an e-mail to the magazine’s top-tier editors, Will Dana and Sean Woods, with a simple subject line: “Our worst nightmare.”
The body of the message detailed how Erdely no longer trusted the primary source for the most striking anecdote in her article: a U-Va. junior named “Jackie,” who told Rolling Stone that she had been raped by seven men, while two others watched, during a date function at the Phi Kappa Psi fraternity house in 2012. She wrote that as questions arose about the tale, she tried to have Jackie help her verify the identity of her assailant, and “it spiraled into confusion.”…
| — Hat tip: LP | [Return to headlines] |
Ted Cruz Chews Out Jeh Johnson Over DHS ‘Purge’ of ‘Jihad, ‘ ‘Islam’ References in Terror Reports
Texas Sen. Ted Cruz used a Senate Judiciary Committee oversight hearing on Thursday to relentlessly question Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson on the “purging” of Islam-specific language from terrorism reports.
The Republican senator spent nearly 10 minutes asking why the Obama administration has adopted a “systematic policy” of “scrubbing” words like “jihad,” “Muslim,” and “Islam” from its counterterrorism materials.
“The FBI counterterrorism lexicon uses the word ‘jihad’ zero times. The national intelligence strategy of 2009 uses the word ‘jihad’ zero times,” Mr. Cruz said. “The strategic implementation plan to prevent violent extremism of 2011 uses the word zero times. The national intelligence strategy in 2014 uses the word zero times.”
Mr. Cruz then referenced DHS whistleblower Phil Haney, who said more than 800 Customs and Border Control documents in 2009 were “ordered modified, scrubbed, or deleted to remove references to jihad or the Muslim Brotherhood or other similar references.”
In response to the senator’s question as to the accuracy of Mr. Haney’s testimony, Mr. Johnson replied, “I have no idea. I don’t know who Mr. Haney is. I wouldn’t know him if he walked in the room.”
The two men then argued over whether or not it is merely a “semantic difference” to “erase references to radical jihad” in intelligence reports.
Mr. Johnson warned that officials could not effectively “build bridges” if they offend Islamic communities, while Mr. Cruz said the ability to prevent terrorist attacks requires precise language.
“Because of this effort — scrubbing your law enforcement material of any acknowledgment of radical Islamic terrorism — when you see the red flags of radical Islamic terrorism, you do not follow up on them effectively. We have terrorist attack after terrorist attack after terrorist attack that could have been prevented but for this administration’s willful blindness,” Mr. Cruz said.
“I think that our people are smart enough to identify potential terrorist behavior whether you call it Islamic or extremist or anything else,” Mr. Johnson countered.
| — Hat tip: MM | [Return to headlines] |
Ted Cruz Exposes Arrogance, Incompetence, of Obama’s Anti-Terror Failure
The encounter between Senator Ted Cruz and Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson over the “scrubbing” of Islamic terminology and Islamist networks from federal anti-terror plans was terrifying to watch — because it showed that President Barack Obama’s appointees are a clique of arrogant, disdainful and gullible amateurs.
Cruz began his June 30 cross-examination by noting the high incidence of important Islamic terminology, such as “jihad,” “Muslim,” and “Islam,” in older anti-terror documents like the 9/11 Commission Report, versus zero mentions of jihad in contemporary documents — even those specifically concerned with combating “violent extremism.”
Cruz then referenced the testimony of DHS whistleblower Philip Haney, who said references to jihad, and the leading role of Muslim Brotherhood organizers and clerics, had been scrubbed from over eight hundred federal documents.
Johnson’s attitude was shockingly blase as he admitted he had no idea whether Haney’s account was accurate. He acted like a spoiled teenager who wouldn’t get off the sofa to do his chores. “No, I have not taken the time to investigate what Mr. Haney said …[and] it makes no difference to me ,” Johnson told Cruz.
After waving off several Cruz questions with lazy assertions that he has no idea what’s going on in his own department, Johnson started to brag about how many drone strikes he approved to kill assorted desert-roving “extremists” — as if the problem of domestic jihadis could be solved by whacking Toyota trucks in eastern Syria.
Johnson then tried serving up cliches about how the administration can ignore the reality of Muslims beliefs but still somehow persuade imported older Muslims to hand their angry young Muslim sons over to the FBI for imprisonment. “If we, in our efforts here in the homeland, start giving the Islamic State the credence they want, to be referred to as part of Islam, or some form of Islam, we will get nowhere in our efforts to build bridges with Muslim communities — which we need to do, in this current environment right now, that includes homegrown violent extremists,” said Johnson, so repeating the delusion of cultural harmony that is the foundation of the administration’s “Countering Violent Extremism” domestic anti-jihad strategy.
“They all tell me that ISIL has hijacked my religion,” Johnson claimed, without any hint of recognition that the foreigners might not be telling the truth. “And it’s critical that we bring these people to our side to do this.”
“You’re entitled to give speeches other times,” Cruz interrupted him. “My question was whether you were aware that the [Brotherhood] information has been scrubbed” from federal databases.
| — Hat tip: DV | [Return to headlines] |
France: Anti-Free Speech Laws Force Right-Wing Activists Into Hiding Abroad
Right wing activists are being forced into hiding abroad as a result of France’s oppressive laws against free speech.
Le Monde reports that a number of right wingers have been pressured to flee France to avoid arrest for “hate” speech. The newspaper notes that many of these are administrators of websites in the “fachosphere”. “Facho’ is slang, in France, for “fascist’.
It describes the “fachosphere” as a “cloud of very active websites, blogs and forums which do their best to preach the “patriotic’ word on the web”. Le Monde says such websites “are hosted abroad, with the scarcely concealed objective of escaping French justice.”
France aggressively pursues cases of alleged “hate” speech. French icon Brigitte Bardot has been on trial five times for insulting Muslims and “inciting hatred”. On one of these occasions she was convicted just for “decrying the loss of French identity and tradition due to the “multiplication of mosques while our church bells fall silent for want of priests”.
| — Hat tip: Frontinus | [Return to headlines] |
Facebook’s Zuckerberg Has Blood of Slain Israeli Teen on His Hands
A top Israeli minister on Saturday lambasted Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg for allowing Palestinian incitement and hate speech to run rampant on his social media site. Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan (Likud) charged that Facebook hinders Israeli police efforts to catch terrorists, and declared that Zuckerberg has “some of the blood” of slain Israel teenager Hallel Yaffa Ariel on his hands.
Ariel, 13, was stabbed to death on Thursday by a Palestinian terrorist as she lay asleep in her bedroom in the West Bank settlement of Kiryat Arba. In another terror attack Thursday, two people were stabbed in Netanya. On Friday, a yeshiva head was killed and his wife and children were injured when their family car came under gunfire from a passing vehicle and overturned, south of the West Bank city of Hebron.
Israel has repeatedly blamed incitement in the Palestinian Authority for the attacks which have claimed the lives of 34 Israelis since October 1, 2015. Four people with foreign nationalities have also been killed in the attacks which have included stabbings, shootings, car-rammings and a suicide bombing.
Speaking to Channel 2 TV, Erdan called on Israelis to flood Zuckerberg with demands to clamp on down on the abuse of Facebook by terrorists and their supporters.
| — Hat tip: KS | [Return to headlines] |
Bomber Killed: Two Police Wounded in Blast Outside U.S. Consulate in Jeddah
A suicide bomber was killed and two other people wounded in a blast outside the U.S. consulate in Saudi Arabia’s second city of Jeddah early on Monday, state TV said, the first bombing in years to attempt to target foreigners in the kingdom.
The attacker parked his car outside a hospital near the consulate at about 2.15 am and shortly afterwards his device detonated, killing him and lightly wounding two security men nearby, it said, quoting a security spokesman.
Three further blasts rocked the location of the bombing, a witness told Reuters, as police carried out what appeared to be controlled explosions near the site.
A video sent by the witness showed police taking cover behind vehicles and covering their ears before an explosion sounded.
Reuters could not immediately reach officials to give more details. A photograph on the Sabq news website showed what appeared to be the remains of a man lying next to a taxi…
| — Hat tip: UA | [Return to headlines] |
More Than 120 Killed in Islamic State’s Worst Ever Bomb Attack in the Iraqi Capital
At least 121 people died as a suicide car bomb blew up in a busy shopping street in central Baghdad in the early hours of Sunday morning, many burning to death as subsequent fires consumed cafes and stores in the Islamic State’s worst single attack on the Iraqi capital.
Another 212 people were injured in the bombing in the Karrada neighborhood, according to a senior Health Ministry official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to release the information. He said he expected the death toll to climb, as many suffering from burns were in critical condition….
| — Hat tip: Van | [Return to headlines] |
Red Alert: Indian Muslims Are Getting Intensive is Training for Suicide Attacks in India
GOI must start Intensive training for Indian citizen to combat IS expedition in India. Otherwise, Hindu Organisations must take the charge.
Upananda Brahmachari | HENB | New Delhi | July 3, 2016:: It’s a very alarming report as published in TOI (Sunday July 3) under this headline: “IS training Indians for suicide attacks, says French jihadi”. The impending terror situation in India may be more fatal than the Holey Artisan bakery attack in Dhaka just occurred on Friday last.
Neeraj Chauhan of TNN reports: “The assessment of intelligence agencies that Indian youths joining Islamic State (IS) are not considered good fighters as compared to those from other countries may not be completely accurate, if the terror outfit’s propaganda video and disclosures made by a French national arrested in Paris last year are to be believed.
Last month, US-based private SITE Intelligence Group had said that IS had launched a new propaganda video that showed a large group of Kalashnikov-wielding jehadis, allegedly from India, fighting against the Syrian forces in Homs province. The video is part of the outfit’s propaganda on foreign fighters in their ranks. The intelligence group said the video on Indian fighters was aimed at recruiting more jehadis to fight against the Syrian forces.
‘It points to the fact that Indians are probably part of their killing squads and might have traveled to some countries along with other foreign fighters, though there is no concrete evidence to suggest that yet,’ said a senior officer, who didn’t wish to be quoted.
French national Reda Hame, who was arrested in August 2015 upon his arrival from Syria after being trained by Islamic State, told investigators that while in Syria, he was kept in a dormitory where he saw some Indians along with Russians and Chechens, apart from few Chinese and an American. Hame was hired by IS’s external operations wing, managed by caliphate’s spokesperson Abu Muhammad al-Adnani, which western intelligence agencies say is tasked to train foreign fighters for fidayeen (suicide) attacks”. Read Full Report Here.
If this report amounts its half of the truth, the terror situation in India is cropping up a devastating stage if not controlled in advance. Earlier, the ISIS mouthpiece Dabiq or their internet propagators Amaq news agencies unearthed their various Jihadology concerned to attack upon India…
| — Hat tip: Upananda Brahmachari | [Return to headlines] |
Pauline Hanson to Become a Senator After Her Win: Federal Election 2016
PAULINE Hanson is back.
After 18 years in the wilderness, the controversial One Nation leader is heading to the Senate, where she will quite possibly hold the balance of power.
You may not agree with her, but you can’t ignore her any longer.
In her previous incarnation, Hanson was all about stopping “Asian” immigration. Today, she has turned her focus to the dangers of Islam, Shariah law and the “racket” of Halal certification.
Here’s a quick guide to One Nation’s four key policies…
| — Hat tip: The Observer | [Return to headlines] |
Sex May Spread Zika Virus More Often Than Researchers Suspected
An outbreak of the Zika virus in the continental United States could begin any day now. But while there is plenty of discussion about mosquito bites, some researchers are beginning to worry more about the other known transmission route: sex.
Intimate contact may account for more Zika infections than previously suspected, these experts say.
The evidence is still emerging, and recent findings are hotly disputed. All experts agree that mosquitoes are the epidemic’s main driver.
But two reports now suggest that women in Latin America are much more likely to be infected than men, although both are presumed to be equally exposed to mosquitoes.
The gender difference appears at the age at which sexual activity begins, and then fades among older adults…
| — Hat tip: Dean | [Return to headlines] |
Happy 4th of July! Independence Day. The news, as usual, is bad, but. . . we can still cook burgers on the grill and at least think about independence.
Baron and Dymphna, thank you for your good work! May it continue. It’s getting ever more difficult to find the truth these days.