Map update

NATO has launched an offensive in the Baluchi Valley, and Pakistan has launched one in Mohmand Agency. I'm currently working on showing the districts in the rest of Pakistan. Ghazni still needs to be updated.

Also, what will hopefully be my final semester at Berkeley has begun.

Look on my works ye mighty and despair!

(Click for full size image.)

At long last, Tʜᴇ Mᴀᴘ is complete.

Due to the narrow width of Blogger's columns, I'm almost certainly going to have to migrate to WordPress.

Crunch time

Sorry for the extreme dearth of posts; this is end of the semester crunch time. I'm working pretty much full time on my cartography final project, which is to be the first of the long awaited Afghanistan maps for this site.

Pakistan tribes attack Taliban

Tribal volunteers in Pakistan have threatened to destroy the house of Maulvi Omar, a senior Pakistani Taliban spokesman, in the north of the country.

The volunteers surrounded Omar's house on Monday and also said that the homes of other Taliban supporters would be targeted.

The threats are part of a crackdown on the Taliban some tribes people are launching in the Bajaur Agency.

The volunteers' commander says they have 20,000 men ready to carry out the campaign and that they are not asking for any government help.

Kamal Hyder, Al Jazeera's correspondent in Islamabad, said that a military operation in Bajaur had made it the scene of heavy fighting and displaced tens of thousands of people from the area.

"[This] caused considerable anger at both the, so called, Taliban in the region for destabilising the region, and the military coming.

"That disillusionment now seems to have turned against the fighters who have been fighting the military."

Hyder said that the locals have been burning the houses of senior commanders who have allied themselves to the Taliban and surrounded the house of Omar.

"There was some desperate attempts by the pro-Taliban elements to try and prevent the destruction of Maulvi Omar's house, but the tribals have said that they will go ahead anyway."

However, Hyder said that Afghan refugees and some Afghan commanders in the area were still attempting to resist the tribal volunteers.

Rocket attack

The attacks came a day after opposition fighters fired rockets at the home of a politician in Pakistan's North West Frontier Province, bordering Afghanistan.

Two rockets damaged three homes in the town of Marden on Sunday.

The rockets failed to hit the home of Amir Haider Khan Hoti, the North West Frontier Province's chief minister and the intended target.

No one was injured in the attack. Hoti was said to be in Peshwar, the provincial capital, at the time.

Mian Iftikhar Hussain, the provincial information minister, said: "We expect more such incidents."

"They are not going to be stopped here. We are facing a war-like situation."

The strike followed a number of attacks targeting politicians in the lawless border area.

A suicide bomber detonated a bomb outside the house of a leading pro-government politician last week, killing four people.

Via Al Jazeera.


Comment:

This is only one example of a number of tribal activities currently underway against the Taliban.

In other news, I have finally found highly detailed maps of the border region, which I am working on integrating into a single very high quality reference map.

'US drone' fires on Pakistan target

A suspected US drone aircraft has left at least eight people dead in northern Pakistan, while dozens of suspected fighters have been killed in the Bajaur region, Pakistani officials say.

The drone aircraft on Friday fired on a house near Miran Shah, the main town in the North Waziristan tribal region, leaving another 10 people injured.

North Waziristan, seen by the US as a safehaven for supporters of the Taliban and al-Qaeda, is part of a belt of tribally governed territory where Pakistan's government has little control.

Residents said two missiles were fired at a former government school where suspected fighters and their families were living in Tul Khail village, 5km east of Miran Shah.

Those killed were members of Al Badar, the armed Afghan group of veteran leader Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, according to an unnamed Pakistani official.

Heykmatyar is an Afghan leader who fought against Soviet occupation in the 1980s and against the Taliban in the 1990s. He reportedly allied with the deposed group after the US-led invasion of Afghanistan in 2001, demanding the withdrawal of foreign forces.

US tensions

Friday's missile attack brings to five the number of such raids in the past two weeks.

Thirty-eight people, including women and children, have been killed in the past week's missile attacks.

Both the US military and the CIA operate drone aircraft armed with missiles of the type believed to have killed two senior al-Qaeda commanders in Pakistani territory earlier this year. Pakistan says it does not have missile-equipped drones.

Tensions between the US and Pakistan have further risen after a raid last week in which helicopter-borne US commandos landed in Pakistan's South Waziristan - the first known incursion into Pakistan by US troops since the 2001 invasion of Afghanistan.

Ashfaq Kayani, Pakistan's military chief, on Wednesday denounced the apparent US raids, saying unilateral actions risked undermining their co-operation.

He warned that "the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the country will be defended at all cost. No external force is allowed to conduct operations inside Pakistan."

A day later, The New York Times reported that George Bush, the US president, had secretly approved orders in July to allow US special forces to carry out ground assaults inside Pakistan without the approval of the Pakistani government.

Bajaur fighting

Concurrent with the attack in North Waziristan, Major Murad Khan, a Pakistani military spokesman, announced 32 fighters had been killed, as well as two soldiers, over the last day during violence in the Bajur region.

Pakistani officials say hundreds of fighters have been killed there during a week-long offensive, which has forced 500,000 people to flee their homes. Officials acknowledge that civilian have been killed and villages badly damaged in the fighting.

Rehman Malik, the Pakistani interior minister, had previously announced a government ceasefire with fighters in Bajaur and other tribal areas in honour of Ramadan, the Muslim month of fasting.

Via Al Jazeera.


Comment:

First off, a note on the article itself. As is mentioned, only militants were killed in the raid. Nevertheless, Al Jazeera decided to include a picture of a wounded child, the explanation given being that "Earlier air raids, which have killed and wounded civilians, have angered Pakistanis." This is blatantly biased, the sort of thing I'd expect from FOX, and if it continues I may have to reconsider using Al Jazeera as my primary news source.

As for the raid, ordinarily I would not have objected to it, because if Pakistan wants to claim that it has sovereignty over Waziristan, then it needs to actually exercise that sovereignty. However, it has now begun to do just that. With Pakistan finally taking the threat from TTP seriously, there is no need for us to intervene directly. Doing so, especially against their expressly declared wishes, is foolish.

Apologies on not posting more often. I have my hands full with my Persian lit. class.

Pakistan halts fighting for Ramadan

Pakistan has announced a suspension of military operations against fighters in the tribal regions during the month of Ramadan, the Muslim holy month of fasting.

But a senior official said on Saturday that security forces would respond if attacked.

Rehman Malik, an interior ministry official, said that security forces would suspend operations from Sunday night for the month of Ramadan, which ends at the beginning of October.

"If militants take any action the security forces will respond with full force," Malik told reporters in the eastern city of Lahore.

"It is not a ceasefire," he stressed, "if they fire a single bullet we will respond with 10 bullets."

Military campaign

Violence has intensified in Pakistan in recent weeks with the military battling armed groups in three different parts of the country's northwest.

Troops backed by helicopter gunships and heavy artillery have for weeks been pounding what they say are pro-Taliban and al-Qaeda strongholds in the area, killing more than 560 people, according to officials.

The US says that al-Qaeda and Taliban fighters are based in sanctuaries in northwest Pakistan's ethnic Pashtun tribal areas on the Afghan border.

The suspension of military operations comes a day after Pakistan's army said it had killed 40 fighters in an air strike that targeted a rebel stronghold in the country's Swat region.

Deteriorating security in Pakistan has coincided with a faltering economy and political upheaval, with the resignation of Pervez Musharraf, Pakistan's president, last week.

That was quickly followed by a split in the ruling coalition.

Via Al Jazeera.

Comment:

Hopefully the Taliban will pause the fighting, but I doubt it.

In other news, I have recently begun a course on cartography, so my eternal dream of having a good map depicting the current situation in Afghanistan at a glance will hopefully become a reality.

Thousands flee Pakistan tribal belt

Around 135,000 residents have fled a Pakistani tribal area bordering Afghanistan to escape ongoing clashes between troops and pro-Taliban fighters, officials said.

Half of the population of some villages in the Bajaur tribal district had reportedly moved on Thursday.

There have also been reports that fighters were stopping people from leaving some areas.

"We have around 135,000 people who have left their homes there," said Habibullah Khan, the additional chief secretary for the Federally Administered Tribal Areas.

Rising death toll

"We have directed officials in adjoining districts to provide shelter, food and health care to the migrating families. We are setting up more camps to help these people just like refugees."

More than 460 suspected fighters and 22 army troops, have died since Pakistani forces started military operations in Bajaur a week ago, officials say.

Abdul Rehman Malik, the head of Pakistan's interior ministry, said intelligence sources claim that about 3,000 fighters remain in the northwestern region of Bajaur. He also said they included Pakistanis, Afghans and Central Asians.

Malik also vowed to "wipe out" the fighters.

Witnesses said that thousands of families had arrived in Shabqadar, a small town adjoining the tribal belt. Local residents and welfare groups were raising funds and cooking food for them, they said.

Local residents in the Mammoond area of Bajaur have said that pro-Taliban fighters had banned people from migrating, saying that if they left the area it would be a sign of defeat.

[More]

Comment:

Bajaur is (or at least was) one of the Taliban's principal strongholds in Pakistan.

I'm back from vacation.

Al-Qaeda's chemical 'expert' dead

Abu Khabab al-Masri, described as al-Qaeda's chemical and biological weapons expert, has been killed with three other fighters in a suspected US bombing in Pakistan's border region last week.

Al-Masri, who carried a $5m bounty on his head, had been earlier identified as the likely target of the attack on a house in Pakistan's South Waziristan region, a tribal area bordering Afghanistan, according to Pakistani officials.

An al-Qaeda statement posted on a variety of websites on Sunday said al-Masri, referred to as the chemical "expert", had left behind him a generation of students who would avenge his killing.

The statement, signed by al-Qaeda's leader in Afghanistan, Mustafa Abu al-Yazid, named three other fighters killed alongside al-Masri on July 28. It said some of their children also died.

Abdel Bari al-Atwan, editor-in-chief of al-Quds Al Arabi newspaper, said al-Masri "represented the old guard of al-Qaeda, so it is going to be very difficult to replace him".

"This was a huge success for the Americans in their pursuit of al-Qaeda leaders," he said.

"Al-Qaeda usually replace these people in this situations, but actually, they won't have the people with the determination and expertise of this man.

"He managed to experiment a lot with chemical and biological weapons in the Tora Bora area.

"Maybe he has disciples, but there's no one with his skills. He knows the ideology of al-Qaeda very well and I don't believe he will be easily replaced by other people."

Senior bomb maker

Al-Masri, a 55-year-old Egyptian chemist, was regarded as one of the group's senior bomb makers.

The statement said he had left behind him a generation of so-called students who would avenge his killing.

On Saturday, a Pakistani Taliban spokesman denied a US media report that Ayman al-Zawahri, al-Qaeda's deputy leader, had been wounded or killed in what was believed to be the same US missile strike that killed Masri.

Al Jazeera's Zeina Khodr, reporting from Kabul, said: "Afghanistan is seeing the worst violence since the Taliban was ousted in 2001.

"The killing of Masri also comes at a time when there have been increasing reports that a number of al-Qaeda fighters are now infiltrating into Afghanistan and working here alongside the Taliban."

Ahmed Rashid, the Pakistani journalist and author, told Al Jazeera: "Masri has left behind a new generation of people that he did train."

"It is quite possible that his death could spark retaliation outside the region ... inside the region, in Afghanistan and in Pakistan, we are seeing an all-out offensive."

Via Al Jazeera.

Comment:

This is good news. Chief bomb maker is a very high level position.

On a personal note, later today I'm leaving to visit with family in Maine for a few weeks.

False Alarm

It wasn't al-Masri after all.

Al Jazeera has more info, if you're interested.

Al-Zawahiri: 'Iraq war a failure'

Ayman al-Zawahiri, al-Qaeda's deputy leader, has in a new audiotape said that the US occupation of Iraq has brought only "failure and defeat".

The authenticity of the recording posted on a website late on Thursday could not be independently verified, but it appears to be the second recording in April by al-Zawahiri.

Al-Zawahri, considered to be the network's chief strategist, said that building Iraq as a "fortress of Islam" is the "most important duty" for Muslims.

Passing on problem

Marking the fifth anniversary of the US invasion of Iraq, al-Zawahiri said that the administration of George Bush, the US president, is passing on a "problem" to the president's successor by guaranteeing that a heavy foreign military presence stays in Iraq for the rest of Bush's term. Following the advice of General David Petraeus, the US' senior commander in Iraq, to delay troop withdrawals, the current total of 160,000 soldiers is scheduled to shrink to about 140,000 by the end of July.

"The truth is that if Bush keeps all his forces in Iraq until doomsday and until they enter hell, they will only see crisis and defeat by the will of God", al-Zawahiri said. Al Jazeera's Owen Fay in Baghdad reported: "What is interesting is the timing [of the message] in so far as it relates to the attacks that have been going on here ... It came just after an attack on a funeral, it came two days after a series of bombing attacks across the country that have been blamed on al-Qaeda in Iraq. "The question that people are asking right now, is whether the al-Qaeda leadership in Iraq is reacting to events that have taken place here or if they are directing a new campaign." The deputy al-Qaeda leader also blasted the Awakening Councils, groups comprising Sunni fighters who switched sides and started to work with the US to pacify predominantly Sunni areas of Iraq.

'Liberating' Jerusalem

In Thursday's tape, al-Zawahiri also said a fight to liberate Jerusalem would be launched from Iraq, reiterating earlier statements attributed to Osama bin Laden, the leader of al-Qaeda. In the latter part of the recording, al-Zawahiri decried the "exploitation of Muslims" in Egypt. Citing riots over rising bread prices, he said that those who are "starving the people of Egypt" are the same as those "who are denying food to the people of Gaza", connecting the two as "part of a Zionist-American plot to humiliate the Muslim nation".

Via Al Jazeera.



Comment:

That last part is especially interesting (to me, anyway). I have been following the food crisis, which I have come to think of as the Rebelyon (from the Haitian Rebelyon an Viv!, "Long live the Revolution!"), because I strongly suspect that it will be to the 2010's what terrorism has been to the 2000's. It is interesting to see al-Qaeda begin to stick its tentacles into it.

In other news, I am strongly considering moving this blog to Word Press, and making it more general. Thoughts?

Six men face 9/11 charges

The US government has announced charges against six Guantanamo Bay detainees over the September 11 attacks, including alleged mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. The charges are the first from the court at Guantanamo alleging direct involvement in the 2001 attacks and the first in which the US has sought the death penalty.

"These charges allege a long-term, highly sophisticated, organised plan by al-Qaeda to attack the US," said Brigadier General Thomas Hartmann. In a transcript released by the Pentagon last year, Mohammed was quoted as saying he planned the attacks in New York and Washington in 2001 and others.

Last week the US admitted it had used the controversial waterboarding interrogation method to extract Mohammed's confession. The procedure is widely considered to be torture and human rights groups have strongly condemned it. The military judge hearing the cases would decide on the admissability of evidence obtained under duress, Hartmann said. The full charges against the six are conspiracy, murder in violation of the laws of war, attacking civilians, attacking civilian objects, intentionally causing serious bodily injury, destruction of property, terrorism, and material support for terrorism.

Military tribunals

Apart from Mohammed, the other men include Ramzi bin al-Shibh, who was captured in Pakistan in 2002. The rest are Mohammed al-Qahtani, Ali Abd al-Aziz Ali, known as Ammar al-Baluchi and a nephew of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, al-Baluchi's assistant Mustafa Ahmad al-Hawsawi, from Saudi Arabia, and Waleed bin Attash, reportedly from Yemen. The tribunals at the US military facility in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba are the first US war tribunals since World War Two. They were established after the attacks to try non-US captives whom the Bush administration considers "enemy combatants" not entitled to the legal protections granted to soldiers and civilians. However, if convicted and sentenced to death, any execution could take years to carry out as the sentence would have to be examined by civilian appeals courts, the New York Times reported. Hartmann said the trials would be "as completely open as possible" and that the defendants and their legal teams would even see the classified evidence against them. "There will be no secret trials. Every piece of evidence, every stitch of evidence, every whiff of evidence that goes to the finder of fact, to the jury, to the military tribunal, will be reviewed by the accused," he said. About 275 detainees remain at the facility, about 80 of whom the US hopes to try. Clive Stafford Smith, a human rights lawyer who has represented Guantanamo detainees, told Al Jazeera that neither military tribunals nor the death penalty should be considered in these cases. "Mohammed has announced he wants to be a martyr and to execute him merely makes him a martyr and fulfills his wishes," he said. "I think the United States is going to loose an awful lot of support from its allies in the West who are very strongly opposed to the death penalty."

'Confession'

Mohammed, a Pakistani national of Kuwaiti descent, was arrested in Pakistan in March 2003 and handed over to the United States. He is alleged to have been the "Number Three" in the al-Qaeda network after Osama Bin Laden and Ayman Zawahiri.

Mohammed is reported to have also confessed to the 1993 bombing of New York's World Trade Centre, the bombing of a nightclub in Bali, Indonesia, and an attempt to down two American aeroplanes using shoe bombs. The alleged al-Qaeda operations chief is also said to have confessed to the murder of US journalist Daniel Pearl in Pakistan in February 2002. "I was responsible for the 9/11 operation from A to Z," he was quoted in the Pentagon transcript as saying. However, Mohammed's reported confessions remain controversial after the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) said that he, along with two other al-Qaeda suspects, had been waterboarded, an interrogation "technique" which simulates drowning. The other two suspects were were Abu Zubaydah and Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri. Almost 3,000 people died in the September 11 attacks, in which 19 hijackers crashed four planes into the World Trader Center in New York City, the Pentagon building in Washington DC and a field in the state of Pennsylvania.

Via Al Jazeera.


Comment:

Finally. The timing of this probably has something to do with the coming election, but I don't care. It's high time justice is done.

The list of defendants is interesting. I would expect Khalid Sheikh Muhammad and Ramzi bin al-Shibh, as well as the other "twentieth hijacker", Muhammad al-Qahtani, but I was not familiar with the other three. And where is Abu Zubaydah? I somehow suspect he's being saved for later on in the campaign, but it could be they just don't want to give him up yet.

In the coming days I plan on posting profiles on each of these men.

Also, my replacement laptop should be arriving sometime today.

Top al-Qaeda leader 'killed'

Abu Laith al-Libi, a leading al-Qaeda member in Afghanistan, has been killed, a website often used Islamist groups said. The Ekhlaas.org site said on Thursday that al-Libi had "fallen as a martyr", without giving further details.

It was not immediately clear if al-Libi's death was linked to a suspected US missile strike that killed up to 13 foreign fighters in Pakistan's North Waziristan region this week.

The attack had targeted second or third tier al Qaeda leaders, according to residents in the tribal area. A western official said on Thursday that there are "strong indications" that al-Libi, has been killed. "Indications are at this point that Abu Laith al-Libi is dead," the official said. "They are very strong indications." The official, who asked not to be identified, would provide no details on where or how al-Libi was killed. Tribesmen in in Pakistan's North Waziristan region had said a deputy of al-Libi had been staying there and was among the dead, according to an intelligence official. Al-Libi, a Libyan, appeared with Ayman al-Zawahri, al Qaeda second-in-command, in a video issued in November to announce that a Libyan Islamist group had joined the organisation. Islamist websites have carried messages from al-Libi, including one in May in which he said al Qaeda in Afghanistan was willing to exchange prisoners with Britain and other Western countries.

Via Al Jazeera.


Comment:

This is good news. Al-Libi is thought to have been the person who organized last February's attack on a base Dick Cheney happened to be in. I would wax eloquent about the precise nature of his role within the al-Qaeda organization, but unfortunately all of my notes on that subject are on my laptop, which is still in the repair shop.

France to get military base in UAE

Nicolas Sarkozy has signed a deal with the United Arab Emirates for France to establish its first permanent military base in the Gulf. The agreement reached on Tuesday will make France one of the first Western countries other than the United States to have a permanent base in the region. The planned facility will be able to house up to 500 personnel. During his visit to Abu Dhabi, the latest stop on his tour of the Gulf, Sarkozy was also expected to conclude a deal with his Emirati counterpart, Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed al-Nahyan, on nuclear co-operation that could be worth up to $6 billion. France already has long-standing military co-operation accords with countries in the Gulf, including the Emirates and Qatar.

[More]

Comment:

Osama bin Laden must be apoplectic. He rails and rails away at the presence of foreign infidel Crusader-Zionist forces in the Arabian Peninsula, and not only are they still there, the evil unbelieving French kafirs, who had participated in most if not all of the original Crusades, are setting up shop. Poor Sammy.

Closer to home, my laptop is still in the shop, and is now expected to be there until the 23rd, which means I'll probably be getting it back sometime in July. Until then, my ability to post will remain very limited.

I'm still here...

...but my laptop is not. It should be back from the shop within a week or so, when normal posting will resume.

P.S. Windows Vista is evil.

Al-Zawahri: Annapolis a 'betrayal'

Ayman al-Zawahri, al-Qaeda's second-in-command, has purportedly condemned Arab leaders who attended the recent US-sponsored Middle East conference in the US city of Annapolis.

In an audiotape posted on the internet, a voice said to be that of al-Zawahri labelled the talks a "betrayal" to Palestinians.

Al-Zawahri said: "The Annapolis meeting was held to turn Palestine into a Jewish state."

"The tsar of Washington, the crusader, brought together 16 Arab countries and their paralysed league [as well as] Amr Moussa, the secretary-general, to sit at a table with the Israelis."

He also denounced the government of Hosni Mubarak, the president of Egypt, saying he had turned the country into a "base to supply the crusader war on Muslims and Islam."

The message was the 15th tape or video released by al-Zawahri this year, following an audiotape released in November in which he criticised Muammar Gaddafi, the Libyan leader, and announced that fighters in Libya were joining ranks with al-Qaeda.

However, the latest 20-minute statement has not been independently verified.

Via Al Jazeera.


Comment:

The "tsar" of Washington. Now there's an interesting choice of words. Is al-Qaeda perhaps trying to emphasize its roots in the Afghan jihad? I'll have to keep an eye out for any future references.

Closer to home, it's crunch time here at UC Berkeley. If I don't seem to be posting as much, it's because I'm trying to memorize the spelling of Cuauhtémoc in preparation for my final.

I am still alive

This is just to let everyone know that I haven't dropped of the face of the Earth. I've been extremely sick for the last few weeks, but am beginning today with a renewed sense of hope that I'll be feeling better soon (by which I mean I'm actually awake this morning).

There seem to have been a number of very important events in the War on Terror while I was unconscious, not least of which has been Musharaf's suspension of the constitution, but as it's still a bit of a task for me successfully use a keyboard I'll keep things relatively short. Musharaf's using the War on Terror as an excuse for granting himself omnipotence is clearly nonsense, unless the Taliban has been infiltrating Pakistan's supreme court. As for any effects that this will have upon the real war, that's kind of hard for me to say right now, though bear in mind I am still partially in hibernation. It's clearly not going to win him the love and admiration of the people, that's for sure, but it might also upset the US enough to alter the current dynamic. What all, if anything, this means will have to wait for some time when I'm a little bit more awake.

Speaking of waiting, I believe I've mentioned, or at least alluded to, a post I was preparing on al-Qaeda's internal organization that would have been up a week or two ago if the Horrible Death Plague of Deadly Doom hadn't descended upon me. It's still not ready, of course, but in the course of my research for it I did come across Khalid Sheikh Muhammad's testimony for the trial of Zachrias Moussaoui. It's fascinating reading, and can be accessed here.

NES 10

I am currently taking the class NES 10 (Introduction to the Near East) at UC Berkeley, and am going to be using some of the posts on this site for the diary we are supposed to be keeping. Such posts will be tagged "NES-10", so that it will be easy to call them all up. I will also be giving the graduate student instructor the dates of the posts.

Speaking of the GSI, he requested that I give some indication that I am indeed the author of this weblog, since the name appearing beneath each post is not the one he was expecting. As he surmised in an email he sent me, "Sergei Andropov" is a screen name, which I have been using for quite some time. It's a take-off of "Pickup Andropoff", the fictitious Russian chauffeur mentioned in the end credits of the radio show Car Talk. Anyway, consider this the confirmation.

Progress is being made

As those of you who have been following this blog for some time know, it has long been an objective of mine to provide maps showing the various incidents in Afghanistan. I am pleased to report that significant progress towards this goal has been made, and I have successfully created a rudimentary base map of the region, as shown above. Now all that needs to be done is devising a way to depict the incidents themselves, and I have been making progress here, too (although not as much).

The above image was produced with the Maya Personal Learning Edition using NASA's Blue Marble satellite imagery and data from the same agency's World Wind DEM.

Update

This is just a brief update to let readers (if any) know that I have not forgotten about my blog. I've been fairly busy lately, but will hopefully do a real post in the near future.

The Heartbeat of War

In creating and maintaining this site, I have come to a better understanding of why news organizations cover the war so little. The daily bombings, suicide attacks, ambushes and mortar fire are the heartbeat of the war. They occur with such regularity that you expect them to occur. It's like they're one long event, rather than innumerable single ones. When you hear of one, you don't think to yourself, "Aha, something has just happened," you think, "Aha, something is continuing to happen." Since they seem like one event that is merely continuing, it's difficult to think of them as "news," since news is, by its very definition, new. No journalist wants to write the same story over and over again.

Unfortunately, this mindset, which I have found myself to be falling into, is deeply flawed. Each new attack is happening for the first time. Each person who dies had been alive before; each shattered world had been intact. This is not some endlessly repeating cycle. When a bomb goes off, something new is happening, and as it is new, it is also news. We must never forget that.

It is with this in mind that I have added a news feed. Even if an attack is not mentioned here in the main blog, it will still be in the sidebar, reminding us of fresh lives lost.

In other news, three more NATO soldiers were killed by a roadside bomb yesterday, and the Apostasy again demonstrated its pure and unsullied love of Islam by bursting into a mosque and shooting seven people even as they prayed to God, as they had been commanded to do in the Glorious Qur'án. Three people were thusly martyred, and the other four will for the rest of their lives bear the scars inflicted on them by those who war against God. With each such martyrdom, each civilian cut down for no reason other than pure malice, the true nature of the Apostasy is made even more evident to the rest of the world.

Speaking of which, this is a story that must be told.