San Bernardino shooting: At least 14 people killed

...let's conduct a thought experiment. Imagine for a moment that a top notch investigative reporter from Mars was given 24 hours to come up with what motivated the San Bernardino terrorists to do what they did on Dec. 2. Here is what the putative Martian would have had to work with upon disembarking on Planet Earth, hours after the shooting stopped:

The male perpetrator of the terrorist act, Syed Rizwan Farook, had worshipped for years at a mosque in San Bernardino called Darul Uloom (also spelled Dar Al-Uloom) and at another mosque with the same name in Riverside. He/she would have also found out that an Islamic organization called Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) had scheduled a press conference just hours after the carnage. Seemingly not much to go on, but more than enough for the experienced investigator to put two and two together.

In the United States, their first organization called Islamic Circle of North America (ICNA) was set-up as early as 1968 as an offshoot of the Muslim Student Association (MSA) and chartered in 1971. It pretends to be a grassroots Muslim organization, but a look at its literature and bylaws reveals an organization dedicated to the establishment of the worldwide Muslim state (caliphate) and imposing sharia law by means of jihad. News sources have revealed that the male perpetrator's mother, Rafia Farook, was an active member of ICNA. ICNA also holds its yearly conferences in conjunction with the Muslim American Society (MAS), a Muslim Brotherhood organization, which was recently declared terrorist by the government of the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

Which brings us to CAIR, which is the next stop on our Martian's investigation route and the second American Islamic organization to be declared terrorist by the UAE. So who is CAIR and why did they call a press conference with a relative of terrorist Syed Farook in attendance just hours after the shooting stopped?

CAIR is a direct descendent of the Islamic Association of Palestine (IAP), an organization founded specifically for the purpose of funding and advancing the cause of the designated Muslim Brotherhood terrorist organization, Hamas, in the United States. That CAIR continued to support not only Hamas, but also the extensive radical Islamist networks in America in which it became a major player is beyond doubt. Much of this support is documented in extensive USG-provided documentation at the Holy Land terrorist financing trial, where CAIR was designated an unindicted co-conspirator and the FBI banned any cooperation with it. There is, further, extensive information of CAIR officials convicted and jailed for terrorism-related crimes.

So why the press conference? For CAIR, which had gotten away with bamboozling media and government countless times, this was simply another necessary, and in this case perhaps imperative, exercise in damage control. Imperative, because it is almost certain that CAIR's pointman, Hussam Ayloush, and his ilk knew who the perpetrators were, knew the family and just how radical they were. Otherwise, how were they able to get a close relative to attend the press conference, while refusing to say anything just hours after the incident. It has now also become known that the terrorists were quite popular in the Muslim community. A celebration of their Saudi marriage in the Riverside mosque in August 2014 was attended by 300 friends.

Predictably, this is not what we heard from CAIR. Instead, we were told that "as far as the family knew, there were no strong political or religious views either way," but Farook had been ‘teased' by colleagues for his beard, so ‘workplace rage' or ‘mental instability' were certainly possible and, besides, as Ayloush further asserted, American policy is at least partly to blame for fueling extremism. We further learned that Farook's mother lived upstairs and therefore couldn't possibly know that the apartment had been turned into an armory and a workshop for pipebombs. And, if that's not enough, Farook's terrorist wife Tafsheen had been "a typical housewife" of the "sweet innocent kind" who was "assimilating fine."

What does then our Martian investigation teach us about the threat of radical Islam to the United States. First and foremost, that it has existed long before ISIS and such like terror groups appeared and will likely continue to exist long after they disappear. It is a fact that most of the Islamic establishment in this country, as exemplified by CAIR, ISNA, Darul Uloom and people like Muzammil Siddiqi, is in the hands of enemies of the United States and everything it stands for.

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Alex Alexiev is IASC's Senior Fellow for Eurasia Affairs. He has more than 35 years of analytical experience in U.S. national security as a senior analyst and project director. He has directed numerous research projects for the Department of Defense, Office of Net Assessment, U.S. Army Intelligence, USAF intelligence, DIA, CIA, and other U.S. Government agencies, and has testified before Congress numerous times. He is the author of several books and myriad monographs and articles on national security issues.

The other FBI terrorist specialist mentioned in this thread, John Guandolo, is still giving anti-terrorism training to government agencies. Whenever he is scheduled to conduct a training course, CAIR immediately pressures them to cancel his job appointment. I wonder why, eh?

John Guandolo resigned from the FBI in 2009 before he could be investigated for misconduct. (He had had an improper sexual relationship with a confidential source.)

As you could perhaps recognise, I was responding to your "other FBI terrorist specialist".

Regarding the Clarion Project:... In my experience with extremist propaganda (of whatever stripe) I often find that sources cited don't exist, have been misrepresented, or are untrustworthy.

The Clarion Project invites everyone to join in the very real need to promote support for Islam’s peace-loving adherents.

San Bernardino shooter Malik sent extremist Facebook messages in 2012

ABC News reported earlier this month that Johnson decided against ending a policy blocking officials from reviewing social media accounts for visa applicants. A former Homeland Security official told the network that under a secret policy, immigration authorities were not allowed to do social media screenings

A senior Democratic congressman is calling for stepped-up monitoring of social media accounts belonging to people coming into the country through various visa programs, in response to the terrorist attack in San Bernardino, Calif.


Israel, a prominent member of President Obama's own party, joined a bipartisan group that said the U.S. is not doing enough to scrutinize Twitter and Facebook for signs of imminent terror threats.

The New York lawmaker was one of 47 House Democrats to back the bill, which Obama threatened to veto. The House passed the legislation by an overwhelming margin. But it was left out of the year-end omnibus spending package, and the Senate has yet to take action on the measure.

Israel said the attack shows more must be done to monitor the online activity of foreign travelers. "She was actually using social media to advance really violent views, and we didn't pick that up," Israel said of Malik. "That's a mistake and it has to be corrected."

Philip Haney, former investigator for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), claims that he was investigating Syed Farook’s mosque, but that the State Department and Homeland Security shut his investigation down over concerns of racial profiling.

Haney revealed this bombshell on national TV and said that Farook’s mosque was a central point of his investigation. But a year into the investigation, Haney said they got a visit from the State Department and the Homeland Security Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties, who said that tracking these groups was problematic because they were Islamic.

Haney’s investigation included two radical groups that both Farook and Malik were involved with. That would have cast more light on them and may very well have stopped them before the attack. Haney said that a few years ago he notified Congress and the DHS Inspector General about the investigation being terminated. Haney said the DHS retaliated against him by pulling his security clearance, which prevented him from continuing as an investigator.

Haney said they got a visit from the State Department and the Homeland Security Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties, who said that tracking these groups was problematic because they were Islamic.

Mass extermination with the use of stationary facilities has worked as well for those with a similar train of thoughts as yours.

Who Listens To Secular Muslims?

by Tarek Fatah:

Some of us secular Muslims are the canaries in the mine that can smell the dangerous poison that could destroy society, but is anyone listening to the voices of reason from secular and liberal North American or Indian Muslims?

The problem is that the Islamist victimhood agenda works very well among guilt-ridden liberal Americans or naïve members of the Inter-faith industry who are quick to buy into the false propaganda of Islamophobia.

Frustrated by the hoodwinking of America by Islamists, two Muslim women took to the Washington Post to protest this bizarre infatuation US liberals have developed towards the symbols of Islamism. Instead of paying heed to these two brave Muslim American women, they were widely rebuked by the leadership of Islamic organisations in America.

One would have hoped that after the latest Islamic terror attack in America by the husband-wife team of Syed Rizwan Farook and Pakistan-born Tashfeen Malik, US Islamic organisations would recognize it was time to condemn ‘jihad’ itself and to stop playing victim. However, that was too much to ask for.

Within days of the IS-inspired jihadi massacre, the Islamic Circle of North America (ICNA) along with other American Islamist organizations such as the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) got together under the umbrella of the US Council of Muslim Organizations (USCMO) that hosted a National Muslim Leadership Summit on Sunday, 20 December, in Washington, DC area.

After the two-day session, the coalition did not renounce the doctrine of ‘armed jihad’ that feeds Islamic terrorism nor did it call for taking politics out of American mosques. Instead USCMO flexed its electoral muscle, deciding to conduct “a drive to register one million voters prior to the 2016 presidential election”.

Reacting to the formation of this new alliance of Islamists in America, Dr. Zuhdi Jasser, an ex-US Navy officer who founded and heads the American Islamic Forum for Democracy told Fox News: “CAIR may condemn the acts and means of radical violent Islamists, but no one should be fooled for a moment that CAIR's singular fixation on stoking the flames and raising funds off the exaggerated narrative that Muslims are under siege by 'bigoted Americans' … They are feeding the global movement against America.” He was right.

A cleric speaking on behalf of the San Bernardino mosque that terrorist Syed Rizwan Farook attended finds himself under heavy scrutiny after his take on events leading up to the deadly attack earlier this month was found to be wanting. Cleric Roshan Zamir Abbassi told reporters at a press conference that he didn’t know Farook any better than he knew them.

But phone records and other evidence uncovered by agents suggest otherwise, according to the New York Post. That evidence includes at least 38 text messages over a two-week span in June between Abbassi and Farook.

Members of the mosque say Farook was a regular and had been showing up three times a week to pray and study for two years. They also say he memorized the Koran at the facility, which requires learning Arabic — Abbassi teaches Arabic.

Abbassi also claimed that he never met Farook’s jihadi bride, Tashfeen Malik.

But others who worshiped at the mosque counter that claim.

The Post reported that a longtime mosque member who claimed to have prayed “shoulder to shoulder” with Farook said the Dar-al-Uloom mosque prepared a chicken-and-rice dinner to celebrate the couple’s wedding last year — a celebration that mosque leadership reportedly attended.

Speaking to press, family attorney, David Chesley said Farook’s family doubt the accuracy of information released by law enforcement agencies.

"There were a lot of questions drawn with Sandy Hook and whether or not that was a real incident or not."

Regarding the weapons cache cops found at the family home which included more than 1,400 rounds of ammunition and 12 pipe bombs, Chesley said: ‘Obviously, these things were found there, how they got there we don’t know.’

The FBI has questioned the cleric, Roshan Zamir Abbassi, about his phone communications with Farook — including a flurry of at least 38 messages over a two-week span in June, coinciding with the deadly Muslim terrorist attack on two military sites in Chattanooga, Tenn.

Abbassi recently posted a message on Facebook condemning the United States and other Western nations for their Mideast policies, arguing they are equally guilty of violence to achieve political and religious goals. His mosque’s Web page features a video claiming that the San Bernardino shooting was carried out by the US government in a “false flag conspiracy,” and that Farook and Malik were “patsies” assassinated “by government-sponsored perpetrators.”

Farook studied the ultra-orthodox Islamic sect Tablighi Jamaat. US officials say the cult, with 50,000 members, is rife with jihadists, and jihadi groomers are recruiting at mosques in at least 10 states.

“We have significant presence of Tablighi Jamaat in the United States,” said Assistant FBI Director Michael Heimbach, “and we have found that al Qaeda used them for recruiting.”