CBS News Reporter Lara Logan Sexually Assaulted by Freedom Loving Egyptian Mob

Come for the freedom! Oh, and that infidel babe over there. Let's celebrate deposing Mubarak with a good old-fashioned gangrape!

Savages.

On Friday February 11, the day Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak stepped down, CBS correspondent Lara Logan was covering the jubilation in Tahrir Square for a "60 Minutes" story when she and her team and their security were surrounded by a dangerous element amidst the celebration. It was a mob of more than 200 people whipped into frenzy.

In the crush of the mob, she was separated from her crew. She was surrounded and suffered a brutal and sustained sexual assault and beating before being saved by a group of women and an estimated 20 Egyptian soldiers. She reconnected with the CBS team, returned to her hotel and returned to the United States on the first flight the next morning. She is currently in the hospital recovering.

CHILLAX: DNI James Clapper Says Muslim Brotherhood is "Largely Secular"

Geez, even the buffoons in the White House felt compelled to intervene as Director of National Intelligence deadpanned that the Muslim Brotherhood is "largely secular".

Yep. And, did you further know that the Village People are "largely straight"? True story!

Let's look at the bright side: At least we know Clapper is aware that something is going on in Egypt - and he didn't even need Diane Sawyer to fill him in this time.

The 'Stache was not impressed though.



h/t: Weasel Zippers. Cross-posted.

Second Worst President Evah Weighs In On Egypt Mess

I know this will make all of us breathe a little easier. Former president Jimmy Carter is noted saying to his Sunday school class that the events in Egypt right now are the most troubling since he left office in 1981.

Former President Jimmy Carter says the political unrest and rioting in Egypt is an earth-shaking event and that Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak probably will have to leave office.

Carter's remarks were made to the Sunday school class he teaches at Maranatha Baptist Church in Plains.

The former president, who brokered a peace agreement between Israel and Egypt in 1978, called the unrest the most profound situation in the Middle East since he left office in 1981.

Hmmm, yeah I guess if you don't count the assassination of then Egyptian president Anwar Sadat, which occurred after Carter left office. Mr Carter of course has been granted unofficial immunity from members of the press for many of the idiotic statements he makes. Carter did broker the historic peace agreement between Israel and Egypt in 1978, which led to the assassination of Sadat and the elevation of Mubarak to president.

Billy's brother also is noted as saying that Mubarak had become too politically corrupt over his time in office. Yeah that is really going to help calm things down if it is picked up by the less savory characters participating in the protests in Egypt.

Psst, how many of ya'll knew that Ayam al-Zawahiri, Al Queda's second in command and the Blind Sheik Omar Rahman, who is currently in prison for the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center were arrested, interrogated and subsequently released in connection with the assassination of Sadat.

Seems we keep coming back to the same cast of characters.

As far as being the most profound event in the Middle East since he left office, I guess so if you don't exclude Desert Storm, Hezbollah's growing influence in the region, and that nasty bit of business with the Iranian hostages who languished under your leadership but when that cowboy Reagan took office magically were released.

I guess in Jimmy's senile mind nothing has happened in the 30 something years since he held the reins of power on the other hand in a sense he is right since the Iranian Revolution, which did occur under his time in power is probably the worst thing to happen and has been the genesis for much of the trouble we are experiencing today.

'ElBaradei Won't Do. He Doesn't Have the Experience Here and He's a Little Weak'

A little weak, indeed. Not to mention a craven opportunist and a stooge for the Iranians. Yet for some reason this tool is being foisted upon the world as possibly the next leader of Egypt, or at least a transitional figure. Be very leery.

Egyptians on the streets of Cairo said on Monday they had reservations about opposition leader Mohamed ElBaradei, who has offered to act as transitional leader to prepare Egypt for democratic elections.

ElBaradei, former head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), returned to Egypt on the eve of the protests which swept the country on Friday, when tens of thousands of people called for the overthrow of President Hosni Mubarak.

Awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his work with the IAEA, ElBaradei and the powerful Muslim Brotherhood said on Sunday he had a mandate from opposition groups to make contact with the army and negotiate a government of national unity.

At least one opposition party, the Arab nationalist Karama Party of Hamdin Sabahi, has rejected ElBaradei outright as a transitional figure, saying he was trying to jump on the bandwagon of the popular uprising.

ElBaradei joined protesters at the hub of anti-Mubarak protests in central Cairo on Sunday.

ElBaradei, 68, began overt opposition to Mubarak on his return to Egypt in February 2010 and won a widespread following among the young and the middle classes.

But the Egyptian authorities harassed his supporters and ElBaradei lost much credibility through his long absences abroad. The official media tried to ridicule him, saying he knew nothing about Egypt and had no political experience.

Some elements of the government's campaign appear to have stuck. "ElBaradei won't do. He doesn't have the experience here and he's a little weak," said Khaled Ezzat, 34, an information technology engineer who had joined the evening vigil in Tahrir Square.

Omar Mahdi, a sales manager, said: "I'm not convinced by ElBaradei, even as a transitional figure, he hasn't really been present in the country."

Some of the protesters objected to ElBaradei on the grounds that he was too close to the United States, despite the frictions between him and the U.S. administration over the Iranian and Israeli nuclear programs when he was head of the U.N. nuclear watchdog body.

"ElBaradei's positions toward other Arab countries, and toward Iran and North Korea, were not neutral... So I don't find him very acceptable," said Walid Abdel-Mit'aal, 36, who works for a public sector company.

"He would follow Mubarak in the same policies and would take U.S. aid," he added, reflecting an anti-American strand which was largely absent in the first four days of protests.

ElBaradei's cosmopolitanism -- he lived abroad for years and speaks fluent English -- may be an advantage among some Egyptians but it is also a source of suspicion among others.

Hard to believe people are suspicious, huh?

Update: Need another reason to be leery of ElBaradei? He's gets a tongue-bath from Mike Lupica today. That should really worry anyone with a clue.

Instapundit links. Thanks!

What's With the Shark Attacks Off Egyptian Waters? Mossad, Of Course

It just doesn't get any dumber than this.

Egyptian officials say they have not ruled out the possibility that a fatal shark attack in Sinai on Sunday could have been a plot by the Mossad.

“What is being said about the Mossad throwing the deadly shark [in the sea] to hit tourism in Egypt is not out of the question, but it needs time to confirm,” South Sinai Gov. Muhammad Abdel Fadil Shousha was quoted as saying by the Egyptian state news site egynews.net.

Israeli officials said the claims were too ludicrous to comment on. Israel has issued an advisory warning against travel to Sinai due to plots against Israelis by terrorist groups linked to al-Qaida.

The fatal shark attack in the Red Sea off the coast of the resort town of Sharm e-Sheikh killed a German tourist, just days after four Russians were mauled by sharks and Egypt declared that the waters were safe.

Experts said that despite announcements that Egypt had caught the shark, the one actually responsible for the maulings was still on the loose.

There's actually more likely reasons.

The attacks have prompted speculation about what could have caused the whitetip’s savage behaviour.

Possible triggers are overfishing,driving the sharks into shallower water to search for food, or tourists feeding the predator, causing it to associate humans with food.

Other theories include livestock carcases being dumped into the water after the Muslim festival of Eid last month.

Update: Via Carl in Jerusalem, we've got a photo of one of the sharks.

Good Walls Make Good Neighbors

"We have started construction along our borders not to appease anyone but to protect our nation from terrorist plots..."

No, those words were not spoken by Janet Nincompoop or any living Democrat in Congress. Instead those are the words of President Mubarak of Egypt in response to their plans to further security on their Gazan border and to further restrict the smuggling of arms by the Bedouin tribes to the Palestinians.

These are not the Bedouins of Hollywood. These are simply Middle Eastern arms dealers whose services are sold to the highest bidder. They don't ride across the desert on camels, but rather in 4 wheel drive all terrain vehicles bristling with armament.

Recently they are starting to have a lot of heartburn with Egypt who is cracking down on the smuggling taking place across the border with Gaza. The Egyptians concerns are well founded since these arms find their way into the arms of the terrorists, who don't care who they attack, just so long as they kill something to justify their existence and manage to blame it on Israel.

"If a war ever happens between Egypt and Israel, you'll find us taking up arms against the Egyptians," adds another smuggler, Ibrahim. The others concur.

Most pop culture media try to portray these Bedouins as some sort of Robin Hoods of the desert, but that is just their attempt to romanticize the notion of wandering caravans of camels traversing vast expanses of the desert eking out a living.

"We like Israel more [than Egypt] because there's justice," says Ibrahim, a young cement smuggler. "If you are a person living inside Israel, you live better than you would in Egypt, without any smuggling," he says. "They don't let you just sit on the street ... And Israel would never arrest your wife and father if you are the one wanted by the state."

African Muslims Fleeing To Israel

Africans, mostly Muslim, are fleeing their war torn countries on the African continent and seeking asylum in Israel. In order to get there however they have to cross the Sinai desert in Egypt where many are shot and killed.

Why not just settle in Egypt and live among their Muslim brothers? Very simply it is because in the Muslim world they are not accepted. There is a very big dislike for African Muslims among the Middle Eastern Muslims. They view them as little more then slaves.

Beyene is one of almost 17,000 people currently seeking asylum in Israel. Over the past two years, as routes to Europe through Libya and Morocco have closed off or become more difficult to traverse, thousands of migrants have headed to Israel. But the route, which usually takes them from the Horn of Africa through Egypt's Sinai region and then across the border, has its own dangers. In Europe, coast-guard patrols might try to turn back boats full of refugees and asylum seekers, or detain people only to send them home later. The luckiest ones may end up being accepted for asylum and then dispatched around Europe.

In Egypt, the response can be more immediate. Nongovernmental organizations such as the Hotline for Migrant Workers and the African Refugee Development Center say that Egyptian border police have shot dead several hundred migrants seeking to cross the border into Israel for work and asylum over the past few years. "From both Israeli soldiers and refugees who crossed the border we can tell for sure that the Egyptians almost always shoot, they shoot to kill and very often they hit the asylum seekers," says Sigal Rozen of Hotline, an independent group that helps asylum seekers in Israel. At the Israeli cemetery in Hazor, Rozen points to 25 graves marked "Anonymous." "These were asylum seekers," she says, "who were shot by the Egyptians and died from their wounds in Israel."

Egypt cites security concerns, and that argument carries a certain amount of weight, but even the ones that they accept into their country are either then routed to Europe or subjected to such harsh treatment that they have no option but to continue their flight.

But that's unlikely to stop people trying. For 25-year-old Adam Khamise, who fled the war-torn Sudanese province of Darfur and arrived in Israel in July 2007, the choice was clear. "In Egypt I was always being harassed by the police and I wasn't allowed to work. So how could I make money to buy food?" In Israel, Rozen says, asylum seekers may be turned down for work permits, but a majority finds work, because "officials turn a blind eye." Khamise says there was another reason for his journey. He decided to head for Israel after learning about the Holocaust. "The story of the Jewish people is similar to ours in Darfur, where we are being persecuted as Muslims. That's why I thought Israel would protect us."

The wars being waged in Africa are to a large degree Muslim on Muslim, however there are those exceptions where they are truly Christian on Muslim, so while Christians can not wash their hands of some of the violence on the African continent, they are not the main instigators.

This is just further evidence however of the charity of Muslims and how they always talk about being accepting of others and a religion of peace, their actions always betray them.

'We Put a Sweet Date in Mr. Obama's Mouth and a Message in His Ear'

Here you thought the American media was syrupy sweet with their mindless Obama worship. They've got nothing on the Egyptians.

For the Islamic holy month of Ramadan, Egyptian fruit sellers have named their best dates of the year after President Barack Obama in a sweet tribute to the American leader for his outreach to the Muslim world.

Dates are a traditional food for Ramadan — which begins Saturday in most of the Islamic world — since the Prophet Muhammad is said to have used them to break the month's sunrise-to-sunset fast each evening.

In Egypt, shops have created a new tradition of naming their best and worst dates to catch attention and boost sales — giving a little reflection of the political mood.

Obama's vault to the top of the Egyptian date-scale comes after he delivered a landmark address in Cairo in June, saying he wants to improve American ties with Muslims around the world. Those ties were deeply strained under his predecessor, George W. Bush, who was widely resented in the Arab world — and whose name was given to the worst quality dates in Egypt in past Ramadans.

"We love Obama and so we named our best dates for him," said Atif Hashim at his busy shop in downtown Cairo.

Huge barrels in his shop were piled with "Obama" dates, selling for just under $2.50 a pound ($5 a kilogram). For an additional dollar, there is an even better date, labeled on a sign as "Super Obama."

"We put a sweet date in Mr. Obama's mouth and a message in his ear," Hashim said. "Please help to bring peace to the world. We have a lot of hope in you."

I'm going to be ill.

Egyptian Man Bobbitizes Himself

Seems to me maybe getting really drunk would be a better idea to get over something like this. But no, the guy goes and chops off his member.

A 25-year-old Egyptian man cut off his own penis to spite his family after he was refused permission to marry a girl from a lower class family, police reported Sunday.

After unsuccessfully petitioning his father for two years to marry the girl, the man heated up a knife and sliced off his reproductive organ, said a police official.

The young man came from a prominent family in the southern Egyptian province of Qena, one of Egypt's poorest and most conservative areas that is also home to the famed ancient Egyptian ruins of Luxor.

The man was rushed to the hospital but doctors were unable to reattach the severed member, the official added citing the police report filed after the incident.

The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak with the press, added that the man was still recovering in the hospital.

Seems to me marriage of any kind is pretty much unlikely now.

Hot Air links. Thanks!

Swine Flu Fear Grips Egypt, Pigs Hardest Hit

Nothing like a calm, reasoned response to the flu outbreak.

Egypt began slaughtering the roughly 300,000 pigs in the country Wednesday as a precaution against swine flu even though no cases have been reported here, infuriating farmers who blocked streets and stoned vehicles of Health Ministry workers who came to carry out the government's order.

The measure was a stark expression of the panic the deadly outbreak is spreading around the world, especially in poor countries with weak public health systems. Egypt responded similarly a few years ago to an outbreak of bird flu, which is endemic to the country and has killed two dozen people.

At one large pig farming center just north of Cairo, scores of angry farmers blocked the street to prevent Health Ministry workers in trucks and bulldozers from coming in to slaughter the animals. Some pelted the vehicles with rocks and shattered their windshields and the workers left without killing any pigs.

"We remind Hosni Mubarak that we are all Egyptians. Where does he want us to go?" said Gergis Faris, a 46-year-old pig farmer in another part of Cairo who collects garbage to feed his animals. "We are uneducated people, just living day by day and trying to make a living, and now if our pigs are taken from us without compensation, how are we supposed to live?"

Most in the Muslim world consider pigs unclean animals and do not eat pork because of religious restrictions. One Islamic militant Web site carried comments Wednesday saying swine flu was God's revenge against "infidels."

Pigs are banned entirely in some Muslim countries including Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates and Libya. However in other parts of the Muslim world, they are often raised by religious minorities who can eat pork.

Good News: Norks to Get 3G Network; Bad News: Nobody Has Cell Phones

No, we can't hear you now.

An Egyptian company said it will launch 3G mobile telephone service in North Korea on Monday, after winning the contract to build the advanced network in a country where private cell phones are banned.

Under the terms of the deal reached in January, Orascom Telecom will invest $400 million in network infrastructure and license fees over the first three years to develop the network. Orascom said it was the first foreign telecommunications company to be awarded a North Korean commercial telecommunications license.

It was not clear what restrictions, if any, would be imposed on the network, which provides data capabilities as well as phone services. Ordinary North Koreans are forbidden from having cellular phones, and the government maintains strict controls over Internet access.

Orascom has said it intends to cover the North Korean capital, Pyongyang, and most of the major cities during the first year of service. North Korea, one of the world's poorest countries, is pushing hard to give its capital city a facelift — a makeover coinciding with the 60th anniversary of the communist nation founded in September 1948.

Good luck with that makeover.

Joys of Islam, Part 856: Almost Half of Egyptian Wives Beaten

This would normally be considered a world calamity, but since they're beaten in the name of the Religion of Peace, it barely gets noticed. Imagine the reaction if it was reported that half of American wives were beaten. This elicits stifled yawns.

Almost half of married Egyptian women have been physically abused by their husbands, a study by the government statistics centre said on Wednesday.

The study by CAPMAS said that 47 percent of women between the ages of 15 and 49 reported being victims of domestic violence and seven percent said a spouse raped them, state news agency MENA reported.

Domestic violence is punishable under Egyptian law, but police are reluctant to intervene in something that is considered a private matter, said an Egyptian women's rights activist.

"If a woman complains, it would be considered a crime. But if she doesn't, the husband won't be punished," Nahed Abu el-Qumsan, head of the Egyptian Centre for Women's Rights, told AFP.

The National Association of Gals were unavailable for comment.

'We Have Arrested a Large Number of Boys Who Were Flirting With Girls'

Installment No. 4,863,928 on the joys of Islam. C'mon now, busted for flirting? Damn, I wouldn't last a day over there.

EGYPTIAN police have rounded up hundreds of teenage boys in Cairo in a day-long crackdown on sexual harassment.

"We have arrested a large number of boys who were flirting with girls," Cairo's police director Faruq Lashin said.

About 400 teenagers, aged between 15 and 17, were arrested on Wednesday and will be brought before a judge, he said.

Police targeted teenagers in front of schools, universities and along the Nile's banks, he said.

The teenagers were expected to be fined, a police official said.

Women's rights groups in Egypt have long campaigned against sexual harassment and assault in Cairo, accusing police of ignoring the phenomenon.

On Monday, a Cairo court jailed a teenager for one year for sexually assaulting two women.

Another teenager, a 17 year old, is facing trial on the same charge.

At least 34 men were arrested after they allegedly assaulted women in an affluent Cairo neighbourhood during a Muslim holiday in January.

Such convictions are relatively rare in Egypt, which does not have a law defining sexual harassment, but a court in October sentenced a man to three years in jail for groping a woman.

OK, obviously anyone physically harassing and assaulting women need to be dealt with, but they might want to clarify the difference between sexual assault and flirting. Oh, and they want want to have a chat with these imams who say it's OK to rape women.

Egyptian Pol Busted in Beheading

Sounds like a really swell guy.

Maybe the investigative journalists at the Daily Kos can tell us how she deserved it.

An Egyptian lawmaker and business tycoon was arrested yesterday for the savage murder of a Lebanese pop star, Egypt's chief prosecutor said.

Hisham Talaat, a lawmaker from the ruling party of President Hosni Mubarak, is accused of paying a former-cop hit man $2 million to kill Suzanne Tamim.

The beautiful singer was found decapitated in her Dubai apartment in July, chief prosecutor Abdel-Maguid Mahmoud told The Associated Press.

The shocking crime prompted a media ban in Egypt last month, following reports that high-profile Egyptian figures were involved.

Several Egyptian papers complained that the government was using the ban to protect big businessmen who have been playing an increasingly prominent role in the authoritarian president's rule.

Talaat, a senior member of Mubarak's National Democratic Party, was reportedly being considered for a Cabinet post.

His businesses include real estate and tourism developments in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf.

He owns several companies and is involved in the construction of upscale suburbs around Cairo.

Authorities said a former police officer, Mahmoud el-Sukkary, was paid to follow Tamim from London to Dubai, where he bought a knife to kill her.

El-Sukkary made his way into the singer's home pretending to be a real-estate agent, then stabbed her to death and beheaded her, he said.

Arab media has speculated that Talaat, a married father of three, was romantically involved with Tamim, but Mahmoud did not indicate a motive.

Berkeley, Egypt, and Journalism students

Anybody else see the delicious irony in this situation. A journalism student from the University of CA at Berkeley was arrested in Egypt while trying to photograph a demonstration. He has been released but look at the advice he was given from some of his Egyptian friends.

In the meantime, his Egyptian friends, mostly anti-government bloggers, sent him advice, telling him to stay calm and to be an "American bitch."

The student in question is James Karl Buck, a graduate student at the University of California at Berkeley. I wonder if he was looking for some Marines, or did he see the irony of what Code Pink is doing at home versus his experience.
Unfortunately some of life's best lessons are lost on the people of Berkeley.

Arabs Suffering from Americanophobia

Clearly this is a mental disorder of some kind for which they should seek treatment. Though considering most of the media and Democrat Party also hate this country, I can't say I'm too surprised by these numbers.

Eight out of 10 Arabs have an unfavorable view of the United States and only six percent believe the U.S. troop build-up in Iraq in the last year has worked, said a poll of six Arab countries released on Monday.

The poll by the University of Maryland and Zogby International, also found most Arabs did not see U.S. foe Iran as a threat and they sympathized more with Hamas in the Palestinian Territories than U.S.-backed Fatah.

"There is a growing mistrust and lack of confidence in the United States," said Shibley Telhami, a University of Maryland professor in charge of the annual poll.

The survey canvassed the opinions of about 4,000 people over the past month in Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Morocco, Jordan, Lebanon and the United Arab Emirates. It has a margin of error of about 1.6 percent.

Of those polled, 83 percent had an unfavorable view of the United States and 70 percent had no confidence in the superpower.

I wonder how long it will take for some idiot Democrat to cite this poll as evidence the world hates us?

Meanwhile, in a related development, a new poll released today by JWF Associates reveals 98% of the American public hate pollsters, wish they would go live in some Arab country and just STFU.

Dutch film wins award at Egyptian Film Festival

Well, not the one by Geert Wilders, that;s for sure, but still a Dutch film won an award at The International Cairo Film Festival

The International Cairo Film Festival jury awarded a children's short, "Doggie" the Golden Cairo for Short Features, less than two weeks after banning Dutch entries because of far-right politician Geert Wilders' film, which portrays the Koran as a "fascist book."

I don't have a clue what the film is about and the rest of the story just delves into the "Fitna" controversy and makes mention of the arrest of two suspects who apparentely planning to kill the cartoonist Kurt Westergaard.

Hamas Comedians Set Terms For Ceasefire

These Hamas clowns may have a future in stand-up comedy.

Hamas publicly set its terms on Wednesday for a ceasefire with Israel, calling for an end to Israeli raids in Palestinian territory and a reopening of Gaza border crossings.

Egypt has been trying to broker a truce that would also end Gaza rocket attacks against Israel by militants from Hamas and another Palestinian group, Islamic Jihad.

"There must be a commitment by Israel, to end all its aggression against our people, assassinations, killings and raids, and lift the (Gaza) siege and reopen the crossings," Hamas' Gaza leader Ismail Haniyeh said in a speech.

A ceasefire deal, he said, should be "reciprocal, comprehensive and simultaneous" and apply both to the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip and the West Bank.

"We will not abandon you, our people in the West Bank," Haniyeh said. "Aggression against you is aggression against us."

There was no immediate Israeli comment on Haniyeh's remarks.

They were too busy laughing.

Meanwhile, some lovely leftwing activists thought outside a Nazi resistance museum in France was a good place to call for Israel to be erased.

President Shimon Peres encountered some not so pleasant left-wing protestors on Wednesday during a visit to a museum on Nazi resistance groups during World War II in the French city of Lyon as part of his official state visit to the European country.

Some far left activists held a demonstration at the museum where they dubbed Peres and Israel "criminal," called for Israel "to be erased," and said "the resistance in Gaza is legitimate."

Sick people.

No Cries of Apartheid as Egypt Builds Wall at Gaza Border

They're not stupid and certainly don't want a repeat of the breach fiasco from last month.

Egypt is building a stone and cement wall on its sensitive frontier with the Gaza Strip to block Palestinians from again breaching the border to circumvent an Israeli-led blockade, security sources said on Thursday.

Egyptian workers were removing a barbed wire barrier and replacing it with a 3 metre high wall along the frontier with Hamas-run Gaza, Egyptian witnesses in the border town of Rafah said. Three kilometres of the new wall was already complete.

"The new wall will help Egypt better secure its border with Gaza," an Egyptian security source told Reuters, speaking on customary condition of anonymity.

"The wall that the Palestinians destroyed during the breaching of the Egyptian border was of a low height and easy to breach." The source would not say if the new wall would be built over the entire length of the 14 km Egypt-Gaza border, or only in specific places.

Of course when the Israelis do it, the terror sympathizers call it apartheid.

It will be curious to see what the lunatics have to say about Egypt's actions.

Odds are there will be silence.

Meanwhile, Israel is urged to open border crossings.

Double standard, anyone?

In other news out of Gaza, Mike at the Monkey Tennis Centre notes a horrifying development that no doubt has St. Pancake spinning in her grave. Although the question remains whether you can spin if you've been flattened.

For the past few years Palestinian sympathisers and Israel haters have been waging a campaign against US construction equipment maker Caterpillar, on the grounds that it builds the D9 earthmovers used by the Israeli Defence Forces.

Campaigners say the IDF uses the bulldozers to illegally demolish Palestinian homes. The IDF says it uses them to demolish buildings used by terrorists as firing positions, and to dismantle booby-traps and fill in weapons-smuggling tunnels.

A D9 famously ran over and killed the flag-burning US activist Rachel Corrie in Gaza in 2003, spawning an entire canon of sub-standard poetry and drama. The pro-Palestinian International Solidarity Movement claimed she was 'murdered' while trying to protect Palestinian homes, producing a series of contradictory and apparently faked photos to support their claims. (HT for that last link Israel Matzav.)

The UN, naturally, is being urged to condemn Israel.

Hey, we're dealing with the UN. I don't think they need any cajoling.

Finally, we've reach a grim milestone.

Terror-Trained 'Activists' Now In Gaza

It appears the breach from Gaza into Egypt earlier this month served some purposes beyond the Palestinians loading up on smokes and high-def televisions.

It also allowed some Al Qaeda and some more nefarious activists to infiltrate back into Gaza.

Yes, even YNet is now calling them activists.

I guess considering they're actively trying to murder Israelis, perhaps it's being used properly, huh?

Trained terror activists and al-Qaeda operatives have recently entered the Gaza Strip through the breached border with Egypt, head of the IDF's Intelligence Branch Maj.-Gen. Amos Yadlin said Tuesday.

In a briefing to the Knesset's Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, Yadlin stated that "the breaching of the border along the Philadelphi route has enabled Hamas to bring back to Gaza activists that were sent to undergo training in Syria and Iran, including snipers, explosives experts and engineers."

According to Yadlin, al-Qaeda operatives have also managed to infiltrate Gaza before Egypt resealed the border.