Category Archives: Failed foreign policy

Disneyworld Discriminates Against Americans

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October 2014 – Disney CEO Bob Iger is one of eight co-chairs of the Partnership for a New American Economy, a leading group advocating for an increase in the H-1B visa cap. Last Friday, this partnership was a sponsor of an H-1B briefing at the U.S. Capitol for congressional staffers. The briefing was closed to the press.

One of the briefing documents handed out at the congressional forum made this claim: “H-1B workers complement – instead of displace – U.S. Workers.” It explains that as employers use foreign workers to fill “more technical and low-level jobs, firms are able to expand” and allow U.S. workers “to assume managerial and leadership positions.”

The document was obtained by Norman Matloff, a computer science professor at the University of California at Davis and a longtime critic of the H-1B program. He posted it on his blog.
From the perspective of five laid-off Disney IT workers, all of whom agreed to speak on the condition of anonymity, Disney cut well-paid and longtime staff members, some who had been previously singled out for excellence, as it shifted work to contractors. These contractors used foreign labor, mostly from India. The laid-off workers believe the primary motivation behind Disney’s action was cost-cutting.

“Some of these folks were literally flown in the day before to take over the exact same job I was doing,” said one of the IT workers who lost his job. He trained his replacement and is angry over the fact he had to train someone from India “on site, in our country.”

Disney officials promised new job opportunities as a result of the restructuring, and employees marked for termination were encouraged to apply for those positions. But  the workers interviewed said they knew of few co-workers who had landed one of the new jobs.

Employees said the original number of workers laid off back in October was more than several hundred. But the Disney source put that number lower, saying approximately 135 IT workers lost their jobs.

It gets worse.

Pink Slips at Disney. But First, Training Foreign Replacement
Disney executives said that the layoffs were part of a reorganization, and that the company opened more positions than it eliminated.

But the layoffs at Disney and at other companies, including the Southern California Edison power utility, are raising new questions about how businesses and outsourcing companies are using the temporary visas, known as H-1B, to place immigrants in technology jobs in the United States. These visas are at the center of a fierce debate in Congress over whether they complement American workers or displace them.

According to federal guidelines, the visas are intended for foreigners with advanced science or computer skills to fill discrete positions when American workers with those skills cannot be found. Their use, the guidelines say, should not “adversely affect the wages and working conditions” of Americans. Because of legal loopholes, however, in practice, companies do not have to recruit American workers first or guarantee that Americans will not be displaced.

Too often, critics say, the visas are being used to bring in immigrants to do the work of Americans for less money, with laid-off American workers having to train their replacements.

Read much more here.

Insanity at the UN, Votes to Legitimize Hamas

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Appears there are no more terrorists, while ISIS is a JV squad, Hamas is not a bench-warmer either. The United Nations, a twisted organization and our very own ambassador, Samantha Power appears to care less herself.

UN Committee on NGOs voted to grant the Palestinian Return Centre observer status

The London-based PRC is affiliated with Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood and has played an important role in the campaign to delegitimize Israel.

Overview

1.   On June 1, 2015, the 19-member UN Committee on NGOs voted to give the London-based Palestinian Return Centre (PRC) non-governmental observer status. The vote still needs authorization from the United Nations Economic and Social Council  (ECOSOC), to which the Committee is subordinate. If authorization is given the PRC will have UN observer status which includes certain privileges, including access to UN facilities, the ability to participate in deliberations and UN committee and the use of the UN logo.

2.   The PRC said in an announcement that 12 countries had voted in favor (ten of which were China, Iran, South Africa, Turkey, Pakistan, Cuba, Azerbaijan, Venezuela, Mauritania and Kenya), three voted against (Israel, the United States and Uruguay), and three abstained (Russia, Nicaragua and Greece). According to the announcement, the vote was held after a process that lasted five years. The PRC rejects Israel’s accusations of terrorism, claiming it is an independent, non-political body (Palestine-info.info, June 2, 2015).

3.   The PRC is a center for Palestinian anti-Israeli propaganda, established in London in 1996. It is affiliated with Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood, and some of its senior figures have been Hamas activists who sought refuge in Britain. It was founded on the premise of its rejection of the Oslo Accords and its determined, strong denial of the State of Israel’s right to exist. Its main concept is the “right” of the Palestinian refugees and their descendants to return to the homes they abandoned in 1948, as a tool to destroy Israel and sabotage any possible peace process. The PRC holds intensive anti-Israeli propaganda activities in Britain, Europe and other countries around the globe and plays an important role in networks participating in the international campaign to delegitimize Israel.

4.   Its clear affiliation with Hamas led to its being outlawed in Israel five years ago. On December 27, 2010, the Israel Security Agency said in a statement that on December 5, 2010 Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak had signed an order outlawing the PRC as an unlawful association because it was affiliated with the Hamas movement. The statement also noted that the PRC served as a coordinating organizational arm of the Hamas movement in Europe, and that its activists, who were senior Hamas figures, were working to promote the Hamas’ objectives in Europe and were in direct contact with Hamas senior figures, including movement heads in Damascus.[1]

Selections from the Overview of the ITIC Study of the PRC Issued on March 30, 2011[2]

1.   The PRC was established in London in 1996, based on rejection of the Oslo Accords and everything they symbolized. Its founder and head ideologue was apparently Salman Abu Sitta, whose family was originally from Beersheba and fled to the Gaza Strip. He was an independent member of the Palestinian National Council between 1974 and 1993. The PRC’s activity centers around disseminating and inculcating the message that all Palestinian refugees have the “right to return” to Israel (estimated by the PRC at five million).[3] Their return to Israel is represented as a “sacred” personal and collective “right,” allegedly anchored in international law, which no one can bargain with or cede.

2.   The demand for the return to Israel of millions of refugees is regarded by the PRC not only as a tested method to sabotage every peace process, but as an important component in a long-range strategy which will eventually lead to a change in the demography of the State of Israel as the Jewish national state and serve its overall goal of establishing an Islamic Palestinian state in all of “Palestine.” Focusing on the “right of return” is the common denominator of many organizations and individuals around the globe that reject a Zionist Israel, and it is used extensively in the propaganda serving the campaign to delegitimize Israel. Those who employ it ignore the fact that after the State of Israel was founded many Jews were either expelled or fled from the Arab countries.

3.   Since its inception the PRC has been affiliated with Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood in Britain (the center of the Muslim Brotherhood’s political, media and economic activities in Europe). The PRC is careful not to openly state its strong affiliation with Muslim Brotherhood-style extremist Islam, but ITIC information and large amounts of circumstantial evidence support its affiliation.

4.   For example, the PRC’s radical Islamic ideology and political agenda are identical with those of the Muslim Brotherhood; members of the PRC’s board of trustees and senior functionaries have had roles in various Muslim Brotherhood-affiliated institutions in Britain; the PRC participates in anti-Israeli activities also attended by prominent activists from the Muslim Brotherhood and other groups and organizations; Zaher al-Birawi, a senior PRC figure, is program director and chief presenter of London’s Muslim Brotherhood-affiliated Al-Hiwar TV channel; an Egyptian jurist named Subhi Saleh, a Muslim Brotherhood member of the Egyptian parliament till 2010, was at the same time an associate PRC member.

5.   Three members of the PRC’s board of trustees are Hamas activists who found refuge in Britain in the 1990s. They do not admit to affiliation with Hamas, in ITIC  assessment to avoid complications with British law. Prominent among them are Zaher al-Birawi, chairman of the PRC’s board of trustees; Majed al-Zeer, PRC general director; and Sheikh Majdi Akeel, a member of the PRC’s board of trustees.[4]

6.   These three Hamas activists are involved in extensive anti-Israeli activities aimed at providing Hamas with ideological, political and practical support. For example, Zaher al-Birawi was active in dispatching convoys to the Gaza Strip through George Galloway’s organization, Viva Palestina, with the political goal of strengthening the de facto Hamas administration. Majed al-Zeer participated in anti-Israeli events in Europe and in Damascus that included support of Hamas, its political agenda and its strategy of terrorism. Sheikh Majdi Akeel is an activist of Interpal, which sends money to Hamas, and accompanied one of the Viva Palestina aid convoys to Hamas in the Gaza Strip.[5] In addition to those three, according to ITIC information Arafat Madi Shukri, PRC executive director, is also a Hamas activist who lives in Britain and is the chairman of the ECESG (a European umbrella network which sends flotillas to the Gaza Strip).

7.   Additional conclusions about the PRC’s nature and modus operandi revealed in the study (March 2011):

1)  The PRC’s view of the so-called “right of return” of the Palestinian refugees is the following: The return of the Palestinians to Israel is a “right” and not a demand, according to PRC claims. Adherence to the “right of return” promotes the final goal of the restoration of all of the land of “Palestine,” from the Mediterranean Sea to the Jordan River, and the establishment of an Islamic Palestinian state to replace the State of Israel. The return of all the Palestinian refugees to Israel and to the places and houses in which they lived in 1947-8 is, according to PRC claims, “a basic personal and collective right” and a “sacred right” anchored (according to PRC claims) in international treaties[6]   and the holy books of the three monotheistic religions. Thus, according to the PRC, no one has the right to waive the “right of return” or to reach a compromise regarding the partial return of the Palestinians. In consequence, the PRC rejects outright any peace process, ties the hands of the Palestinian Authority, which negotiates with Israel for the Palestinians, and advocates Hamas’ strategy focusing on the “liberation of Palestine” through jihad and “resistance” [i.e., terrorism and violence] rather than political negotiations.

2)  PRC support for terrorism and terrorist organizations: To avoid complications with the British authorities, the PRC is generally careful, especially when issuing statements in English, not to explicitly support terrorist activities and terrorist organizations such as Hamas and Hezbollah. In statements in Arabic however, aimed at Arab-Muslim target audiences, the PRC is less careful and often expresses solidarity with the Palestinian terrorist campaign (“the Al-Aqsa intifada”), Hamas’ path of jihad and the Hamas leadership. For example, at its annual European conferences, which the PRC has been organizing since 2003, Ismail Haniya, a senior Hamas figure, has delivered speeches three times. The conferences support the path of “resistance” and jihad (i.e., terrorism), and praise the shaheeds, the wounded and the imprisoned of the terrorist organizations. The PRC’s publications support jihad and the “resistance,” and glorify the terrorist shaheeds who died during Palestinian terrorist campaign, especially Hamas founder and leader Ahmed Yassin. In addition, the PRC organized a campaign to express solidarity with the Al-Aqsa intifada;[7]  Majid al-Ziyad, a senior PRC figure, participated in the conference in Damascus in November 2008, which supported the “culture of resistance” [i.e., the culture of terrorism]. Interviewed by Al-Jazeera TV on May 29, 2010, he stressed the need for “military resistance” [i.e., terrorism] inside “Palestine.” Dr. Daud Abdullah, another senior PRC figure, participated in the conference in Istanbul in 2009 and signed a declaration in support of the path of jihad (“the Istanbul Declaration”).[8]

3)  Overview of PRC activities:

A.     Since its establishment, the PRC has been prominent among the anti-Israeli organizations engaged in intensive propaganda activities aimed at inculcating the idea of the “right of return” and defaming Israel by representing it as an “apartheid state.” The PRC also seeks to turn Israel into a pariah state by accusing it of the “ethnic cleansing” of the “Palestinian” population, both in the past and present (the PRC even issued a book entitled The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine). The PRC’s vicious anti-Israeli propaganda campaign is waged in Britain, continental Europe and other countries around the globe.

B.     The PRC has three main target audiences in Britain: British politicians, especially in Parliament, where it is primarily in contact with members of the Labour Party; university students, among whom PRC activists participate in events related to the conflict and deliver anti-Israeli speeches; and the British public in general, especially the social and cultural elite. PRC activists attend Jerusalem Day and Nakba Day events, react publicly to developments in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and hold demonstrations and rallies in London and other cities in Britain. In addition, the PRC holds conferences, workshops and seminars. It produces movies, issues various publications and runs a Palestinian cultural center in London.

C.     Since 2003 [as of the 2011 study] the PRC has held an annual anti-Israeli European conference called “the Annual Palestinians in Europe Conference.” The conferences are attended by PRC activists, representatives of the Arab and Muslim communities in Europe, Hamas and Muslim Brotherhood activists and representatives of the European funds and foundations which finance Hamas. Their agenda and themes focus on inculcating the idea that the so-called “right of return” is “sacred,” and that no Palestinian can waive it. The conferences negate the right of the State of Israel to exist, strongly oppose the peace process and support the path of jihad and “resistance” (i.e., terrorism). Ismail Haniya, [at the time] head of the de facto Hamas administration in the Gaza Strip, delivered video-conferenced speeches at three of the conferences because he was banned from entering certain European countries (where Hamas is considered a terrorist organization).

D.     On the international scene the PRC participates in conferences dealing with the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and the issue of the refugees, including conferences organized by the United Nations. The PRC exploits the venues as convenient forums for defaming Israel as an “apartheid country” and a “racist country,” and for spreading propaganda for the “right of return.” Senior PRC activists and their activities were prominent at the UN’s Durban Conference in 2001, which served as a platform for attacks on Israel’s legitimacy and a hate campaign directed against it.

4)  Formulating media strategy to attack Israel’s legitimacy: At the third annual conference, held in Vienna in 2005, the PRC formulated a media strategy to inculcate the concept of the “right of return” and to undermine the legitimacy of the State of Israel in various broad target audiences in Europe. The following tactics were agreed upon by the conference workshops: stressing the “value of justice” (a term easily accepted by the European ear) as a tool for creating a sense of European solidarity with the Palestinian demand to return the refugees to Israel; using short, easy-to-remember slogans; using publications of New Historians; increasing the number of demonstrations; stressing the distinction between Judaism and the “Zionist Project,” etc. The decisions made at the conference were important and relevant because they are implemented to this day by the PRC and other anti-Israeli organizations participating in the global campaign to delegitimize Israel.

5)  Funding the PRC and its extensive activities: As opposed to other organizations participating in the global campaign to delegitimize Israel, the PRC maintains a vast physical presence. Establishing it, maintaining it and funding its extensive network demand, in ITIC assessment, extremely large financial resources. The PRC claims it is funded by donations from people who believe in its goals. However, in ITIC assessment, even if it cannot be proved, the PRC has other sources of funding at its disposal.

8.   Senior PRC figures, among them Hamas activists, hold positions in other groups and organizations which spread anti-Israeli propaganda, transfer funds to Hamas and dispatch flotillas and land convoys to the Gaza Strip. Some of the organizations are affiliated with the Muslim Brotherhood and one with the British far left. The PRC’s senior figures are deeply involved with both the ECESG and Viva Palestina, two organizations which make significant contributions to the flotilla and land convoy projects to the Gaza Strip. For example, Dr. Arafat Madi Shukri, the PRC’s executive director, is also chairman of the ECESG, a European umbrella network which sends flotillas to the Gaza Strip. Majed al-Zeer is also apparently involved in ECESG activity. Zaher al-Birawi, a Hamas activist, is chairman of the PRC board of trustees, the spokesman (and in ITIC assessment also a kind of liaison person with Hamas) of the convoys organized by Viva Palestina, (the organization of far left former British MP George Galloway.[9]) In addition, two senior PRC activists, Ghusan Faour and Hamas activist Sheikh Majdi Akeel, are key figures in Interpal, a British fund which is an important component in Hamas’ international fundraising efforts and was outlawed both in the United States and Israel.

Note: The above information and conclusions were relevant and updated in March 2011. Personnel or organizational changes may have been made in the, but in ITIC assessment the fundamental goals and character of the PRC have not basically changed.

Pres. Study Directive Still Classified, Brotherhood

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By Bill Gertz – – Wednesday, June 3, 2015

President Obama and his administration continue to support the global Islamist militant group known the Muslim Brotherhood. A White House strategy document regards the group as a moderate alternative to more violent Islamist groups like al Qaeda and the Islamic State.

The policy of backing the Muslim Brotherhood is outlined in a secret directive called Presidential Study Directive-11, or PSD-11. The directive was produced in 2011 and outlines administration support for political reform in the Middle East and North Africa, according to officials familiar with the classified study.

Efforts to force the administration to release the directive or portions of it under the Freedom of Information Act have been unsuccessful.

Gulf News in the Middle East reports the same in 2014.

US document reveals cooperation between Washington and Brotherhood Studies commissioned by the president concluded that the US should back ‘moderate Islamists’ in the region

Dubai: For the past decade, two successive US administrations have maintained close ties to the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, Tunisia, Syria and Libya, to name just the most prominent cases. The Obama administration conducted an assessment of the Muslim Brotherhood in 2010 and 2011, beginning even before the events known as the “Arab Spring” erupted in Tunisia and in Egypt.

 

The President personally issued Presidential Study Directive 11 (PSD-11) in 2010, ordering an assessment of the Muslim Brotherhood and other “political Islamist” movements, including the ruling AKP in Turkey, ultimately concluding that the United States should shift from its longstanding policy of supporting “stability” in the Middle East and North Africa (that is, support for “stable regimes” even if they were authoritarian), to a policy of backing “moderate” Islamic political movements. To this day, PSD-11 remains classified, in part because it reveals an embarrassingly naïve and uninformed view of trends in the Middle East and North Africa (Mena) region. The revelations were made by Al Hewar centre in Washington, DC, which obtained the documents in question. Through an ongoing Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit, thousands of pages of documentation of the US State Department’s dealings with the Muslim Brotherhood are in the process of being declassified and released to the public. US State Department documents obtained under the FOIA confirm that the Obama administration maintained frequent contact and ties with the Libyan Muslim Brotherhood.

 

At one point, in April 2012, US officials arranged for the public relations director of the Libyan Muslim Brotherhood, Mohammad Gaair, to come to Washington to speak at a conference on “Islamists in Power” hosted by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. A State Department Cable classified “Confidential” report says the following: “Benghazi Meeting With Libyan Muslim Brotherhood: On April 2 [2012] Mission Benghazi met with a senior member of the Muslim Brotherhood steering committee, who will speak at the April 5 Carnegie Endowment `Islamist in Power’ conference in Washington, D.C. He described the Muslim Brotherhood’s decision to form a political party as both an opportunity and an obligation in post-revolution Libya after years of operating underground.

The Brotherhood’s Justice and Construction Party would likely have a strong showing in the upcoming elections, he said, based on the strength of the Brotherhood’s network in Libya, its broad support, the fact that it is a truly national party, and that 25 per cent of its members were women. He described the current relationship between the Brotherhood and the TNC (Transitional National Council) as `lukewarm.’” Another State Department paper marked “Sensitive But Unclassified (SBU)” contained talking points for Deputy Secretary of State William Burns’ scheduled July 14, 2012 meeting with Mohammad Sawan, the Muslim Brotherhood leader who was also head of the Brotherhood’s Justice and Construction Party. The document is heavily redacted, but nevertheless provides clear indication of Washington’s sympathies for the emergence of the Muslim Brotherhood as a major political force in the post-Gaddafi Libya. The talking points recommended that Secretary Burns tell Sawan that the US government entities “share your party’s concerns in ensuring that a comprehensive transitional justice process is undertaken to address past violations so that they do not spark new discontent.” The Burns paper described the Libyan Muslim Brotherhood: “Prior to last year’s revolution, the Muslim Brotherhood was banned for over three decades and its members were fiercely pursued by the Gaddafi regime.

 

The Libyan Muslim Brotherhood (LMB) returned to Libya last year after years in exile in Europe and the United States, selected new leadership and immediately began to plan for an active role in Libya’s political future.” After a redacted section, the document continued, “The LMB-affiliated Justice and Construction party, led by Misratan and former political prisoner under Gaddafi Mohammad Sawan, was created in March 2012. Sawan himself was not a candidate in the elections but wields significant influence as the head of the largest political party and most influential Islamist party in Libya.” The July 14 meeting was attended by both Secretary Burns and Ambassador Christopher Stevens. On September 11, 2012, Ambassador Stevens and three other American diplomats were killed in a premeditated terrorist attack on US mission and CIA facilities in Benghazi. An undated State Department cable revealed further courting of the LMB and its Justice and Construction Party. “Mohammad Sawan, Chairman of Justice and Construction Party, received yesterday at his office in Tripoli, Ambassadors of US, UK, FR and IT. The Ambassadors requested the meeting to get acquainted with the party’s position on the current events in Libya, the Government, the Party’s demand to sack the Prime Minister, the Constitution, GNC lifetime arguments, dialogue initiatives and Party’s assessment of political and security situation in Libya and the region. During the meeting, which took an hour and a half and attended by Mohammad Talb, party’s International Relations officer, and Hussam Naeli, acting liaison officer, Sawan explained that the Government has not been able to achieve any success in the core files such as security and local government, which both are under the direct supervision of the Prime Minister. Such a failure resulted in the lack of security, continuous assassinations, kidnappings, crimes, smuggling and attacks on public and private property, halt oil exports and disruption of water and electricity supply. Sawan stressed that a solution is possible and the party presented a clear solution, but the Government is not in harmony. He added we are responsible only for ministries that we take part in.”

 

The State Department cable noted that “On their part, the Ambassadors praised the active role of the Party in the political scene and confirmed their standing with the Libyan people and Government despite its weaknesses and they are keen to stabilize the region… At the end of the meeting, Sawan thanked his guests and all stressed the need to communicate. The guests affirmed that they will assist through Libyan legitimate entities as they did during the revolution.”

What is it About Terrorism and Boston?

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ISIS is threatening “lone wolf” attacks against the FBI, police officers, government officials, and “media figures” in America, according to a new warning issued by federal officials. A Joint Intelligence bulletin from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the FBI as sent to law enforcement agencies across the United States.

An Islamic State spokesman recently recorded an audio message which reportedly urged lone wolf ISIS supporters in all Western nations to attack “soldiers, patrons, and troops” along with “police, security, and intelligence members.” The ISIS recording informed their supporters in America and the United Kingdom that they did not need to ask for “advice” or perhaps, permission, from anyone prior to initiating such an attack, because such strikes are considered “legitimate.”

An English translation of the ISIS message was posted to a jihadi forum in late September, according to NBC News. The terrorism threat recording was attributed to Islamic State spokesman Abu Muhammad al-Adnani. During the same time period an ISIS supporter published a document on an “ISIS-dominated web forum” that called for both lone wolf “operations” and “open source jihad” against a list of “potential targets” that also include the same demographic.

The ISIS bulletin also informed Islamic State supporters that they should conduct attacks on United States overseas targets with little warning. “Because of the individualized nature the radicalization to violence process it is difficult to assess triggers that will contribute to HVEs [homegrown violent extremists] attempting acts of violence,” the bulletin also added.

iSLAMISTS IN BOSTON ARE LISTENING

In Boston Shooting, Islamists Damn First, Ignore Facts Later

IPT News

Virtually everything Islamist activists in the United States claimed about Tuesday’s fatal shooting of terror suspect Usaama Rahim in Boston appears to have been debunked within 24 hours.

Authorities say they shot Rahim, 26, after he repeatedly lunged at them with a military-style knife as they tried to question him. The skepticism was fueled by online posts by Rahim’s brother, Imam Ibrahim Rahim. His claims, which fueled the immediate and reflexive condemnation of the Boston police and FBI, turned out to be wrong. Usaama Rahim was not shot in the back. He was not on the telephone with his father when he was shot. Law enforcement did back up and give Rahim several opportunities to end the confrontation peacefully.

Officials showed the surveillance video proving this to a group of Boston community leaders Wednesday. “We’re very comfortable with what we saw,” said Urban League President Darnell Williams. While those who saw the video say it was too grainy to see the knife, a Boston Globe photograph shows a long knife being removed from the scene.

In a criminal complaint unsealed Wednesday afternoon, FBI Special Agent J. Joseph Galietta wrote that Rahim bought an Ontario Spec Plus Marine Raider Bowie fighting knife and an SP6 Spec Plus Fighting Knife from Amazon in the past week.

In conversations recorded by the FBI, which had Rahim under constant surveillance for months, Rahim and a friend discussed beheading someone outside the state of Massachusetts. That changed in a 5 a.m. telephone call Rahim made to friend David Wright Tuesday morning. He said he no longer was interested in beheading the target previously discussed.

“I’m just going to ah go after them, those boys in blue,” Rahim allegedly said in the recorded conversation. “Cause, ah, it’s the easiest target and, ah, the most common is the easiest for me…”

Wright then advised Rahim to destroy his computer and smartphone “Because, at the scene, at the scene, CSI will be looking for that particular thing and so dump it, get rid of that. At the time you are going to do it, before you reach your destination you get rid of it.

That suggestion prompted the complaint against Wright charging him with conspiring to obstruct an investigation. Once arrested, Wright waived his Miranda rights and verified agents’ beliefs that cryptic conversations they heard between Wright and Rahim were about plots to kill people.

When Rahim pulled the knife Tuesday and officers told him to drop it, Rahim replied, “you drop yours,” Galietta wrote.

Thus far, none of the activists who jumped to an erroneous conclusion Tuesday, who unrealistically expected a full accounting of the incident within hours, have acknowledged their error.

Arab American Association of New York Executive Director Linda Sarsour minimized statements by Boston religious and political activists who reviewed the video of the Rahim shooting. “If you haven’t seen the video of killing of #UsaamaRahim, don’t talk to me about it,” she wrote on Twitter. “I don’t know what it shows or doesn’t show. Questions still remain,” she wrote in a separate post.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), which routinely criticizes counter-terror investigations as unjust and rooted in prejudice, issued a news release seeking an “independent and thorough” investigation, saying it has a “duty to question every police-involved shooting to determine if the use of deadly force was necessary, particularly given the recent high profile shootings of African-American men.”

If history is a guide, CAIR won’t accept the findings no matter what. It sought, and obtained, an independent investigation into the 2009 shooting of Detroit imam Luqman Abdullah.

In 2010, CAIR asked for, then rejected, investigations by the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, the Dearborn Police Department and Michigan attorney general’s office after an imam was shot and killed after he fired on a K9 dog leading an FBI SWAT team.

Video from that investigation shows Imam Luqman Abdullah, who preached that followers should not go peacefully if police came for them, tried to run away as agents moved in to arrest him. He refused their orders to lie down, lurked behind a corner and kept his hand hidden despite repeated instructions to show them.

CAIR’s Michigan director dismissed the DOJ investigation as “superficial and incomplete” and continues to cite the incident as an example of FBI excessive force and mistreatment of Muslims.

It sought, and obtained, an independent investigation into the 2013 shooting in Orlando of Ibragim Todashev, a friend of Boston Marathon bombers Tamerlan and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev.

Investigations by the Justice Department and an independent Florida state attorney conclude that Todashev, a “skilled mixed-martial arts fighter,” tried to attack agents shortly after acknowledging having “some involvement” in a 2011 triple homicide in Massachusetts also under investigation in connection with the Tsarnaevs. Todashev reportedly heaved a coffee table, striking an FBI agent in the head before grabbing a five-foot-long metal pole over his head “with the end of the pole pointed toward [the FBI agent] as if intended to be used to impale rather than strike.” The agent shot him three times, but Todashev again tried to charge, prompting the agent to fire three or four more shots, killing Todashev.

The Justice Department review reached the same conclusions. It noted that Todashev’s half-written confession was found at the scene. “The last sentence that Todashev wrote on the tablet of paper specifically related conduct by him that acknowledged complicity in the crime,” the DOJ report said.

“The only person who can contradict the government’s narrative is now dead and the investigation into his death relied on evidence gathered by agents of the same agency involved in his death,” CAIR-Florida official Hassan Shibly said. Shibly, an attorney, is now involved in filing a wrongful death claim against the FBI.

He did not comment on Tuesday’s shooting in Boston, and Shibly did post an acknowledgement that the video shows Rahim was not shot in the back as claimed.

CAIR Michigan chapter leader Dawud Walid, who posted comments skeptical about law enforcement, made no direct statement about the new disclosures Wednesday after the activists spoke about what the video showed. Earlier, he lumped Rahim in with Abdullah adn Todashev. San Francisco chapter official Zahra Billoo challenged someone who urged restraint in pre-judging the situation and dared to mention the rule of law.

So far, all the emerging information backs up law enforcement claims about Rahim and debunked the Islamist narrative. But the damage here may be immeasurable. The inaccurate information plays right into the hands of ISIS and other radical Islamist recruiters. The reckless, false narrative fuels the notion of the West’s alleged war on Islam, that Muslims must wage attack to protect the lives of their brethren.

That is the ideology that motivated the terrorists responsible for the Fort Hood shooting and the Boston Marathon bombing, among others.

CAIR and other Islamists say they are merely asking questions. Next time, perhaps they can at least wait for an autopsy before spreading false, inflammatory gossip.

Could Sweden Force Hillary to Drop WH Race?

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The summary below is very long, but it explains in detail the machinery a the U.S. State Department, the backroom deals, the quid pro quo, the collusion and global relationships that circle around favors and money and power.

Bill Clinton’s foundation cashed in as Sweden lobbied Hillary on sanctions

Bill Clinton’s foundation set up a fundraising arm in Sweden that collected $26 million in donations at the same time that country was lobbying Hillary Rodham Clinton’s State Department to forgo sanctions that threatened its thriving business with Iran, according to interviews and documents obtained by The Washington Times.

The Swedish entity, called the William J. Clinton Foundation Insamlingsstiftelse, was never disclosed to or cleared by State Department ethics officials, even though one of its largest sources of donations was a Swedish government-sanctioned lottery.

As the money flowed to the foundation from Sweden, Mrs. Clinton’s team in Washington declined to blacklist any Swedish firms despite warnings from career officials at the U.S. Embassy in Stockholm that Sweden was growing its economic ties with Iran and potentially undercutting Western efforts to end Tehran’s rogue nuclear program, diplomatic cables show.

“Sweden does not support implementing tighter financial sanctions on Iran” and believes “more stringent financial standards could hurt Swedish exports,” one such cable from 2009 alerted Mrs. Clinton’s office in Washington.

Separately, U.S. intelligence was reporting that Sweden’s second-largest employer, telecommunications giant Ericsson AB, was pitching cellphone tracking technology to Iran that could be used by the country’s security services, officials told The Times.

By the time Mrs. Clinton left office in 2013, the Clinton Foundation Insamlingsstiftelse had collected millions of dollars inside Sweden for his global charitable efforts and Mr. Clinton personally pocketed a record $750,000 speech fee from Ericsson, one of the firms at the center of the sanctions debate.

Mr. Clinton’s Swedish fundraising shell escaped public notice, both because its incorporation papers were filed in Stockholm — some 4,200 miles from America’s shores — and the identities of its donors were lumped by Mr. Clinton’s team into the disclosure reports of his U.S.-based charity, blurring the lines between what were two separate organizations incorporated under two different countries’ laws.

The foundation told The Times through a spokesman that the Swedish entity was set up primarily to collect donations from popular lotteries in that country, that the money went to charitable causes like fighting climate change, AIDS in Africa and cholera in Haiti, and that all of the Swedish donors were accounted for on the rolls publicly released by the U.S. charity.

The foundation, however, declined repeated requests to identify the names of the specific donors that passed through the Swedish arm.

A spokesman for Mrs. Clinton’s 2016 presidential campaign declined comment.

When Mrs. Clinton became President Obama’s secretary of state in 2009, she vowed to set up a transparent review system that would ensure any of her husband’s fundraising or lucrative speaking activities were reviewed for possible ties to foreign countries doing business with her agency, insisting she wanted to eliminate even the “appearance” of conflicts of interests.

But there is growing evidence that the Clintons did not run certain financial activities involving foreign entities by the State Department, such as the Swedish fundraising arm and the Clinton Giustra Sustainable Growth Initiative based in Canada, or disclose on her annual ethics form the existence of a limited liability corporation that Mr. Clinton set up for his personal consulting work.

The ethics agreement the Clintons signed in 2009 with the State Department stated that if a foreign government chose to “elect to increase materially its commitment, or should a new contributor country elect to support” Mr. Clinton’s charitable causes, “the Foundation will share such countries and the circumstances of the anticipated contribution with the State Department designated agency ethics official for review.”

The foundation spokesman said Mr. Clinton’s team had nothing to hide about the Swedish entity and set it up solely to take advantage of changes in Swedish law in 2011 that allowed some of the country’s lucrative lotteries to direct their charitable giving to the American-based Clinton Foundation.

The spokesman said Mr. Clinton’s team believed the Nationale Postcode Loterij and the Swedish Postcode Lottery, two of the biggest contributors to the Swedish fundraising arm, were privately owned and unrelated to the Swedish government.

Both lotteries are owned by the private firm Novamedia, but they are closely regulated by the Swedish government, and the Postcode Lottery’s top manager is approved and regulated by the Swedish government, according to interviews and documents.

According to Novamedia’s 2014 annual report, the Swedish Postcode Lottery’s managing director “is also the Lottery Manager appointed by the Swedish Gambling Authority. The Swedish Gambling Authority, which grants the lottery license, collaborates closely with the Lottery Manager and supervises the lottery.”

About half the funds collected by the foundation’s Swedish arm in 2011 and 2012 came from lottery enterprises tied to Novamedia.

“The Clinton Foundation is a philanthropy, period,” foundation spokesman Craig Minassian told the Times. “We’ve voluntarily disclosed our more than 300,000 donors on our website, including those from Sweden. In fact, support from the Swedish Postcode Lottery has helped give millions of people access to HIV/AIDS treatment, lifted tens of thousands of rural farmers out of poverty, helped rebuild Haiti after the devastating earthquake and made it possible for cities and countries to reduce their carbon output by millions of tons. The truth is, when organizations like this support the Clinton Foundation, they do want something in return: they want to see lives improved through our work.”

Familiar patterns and storylines?

Those who have followed or investigated the Clintons over their three decades of power in Washington say the Swedish episode uncovered by The Times fits a familiar pattern of ambiguous transparency promises and fundraising carried out through cutouts that targeted foreigners with business interests before the U.S. government.

“They were very effective in being able to obfuscate what they were doing through cutouts and how they were raising their money,” said retired Rep. Dan Burton, a Republican who chaired the main House investigative committee in the late 1990s that probed many of the Clintons’ activities ranging from travel office firings and Whitewater investments to Asian fundraising.

The latter investigation disclosed an extensive 1996 Clinton fundraising operation that rewarded donors with White House coffees, access to top officials and nights in the Lincoln Bedroom despite the Clintons’ promise to run the most ethical administration in history. It also proved that illegal foreign money went to the Democratic Party from the likes of Johnny Chung, a fundraiser who admitted taking $300,000 from a Chinese military officer and giving it to Democrats, and James Riady, who pleaded guilty to routing foreign funds through a network of “straw donors” who enriched the Clinton campaign and Democratic Party while collecting political favors for his companies.

“[The Clintons] understood it’s easy to raise money when you solicit people who had business pending before the government,” Mr. Burton said. “The information that established this pattern was substantial, coming from both friends and adversaries around the world who knew they could gain access to the president and his administration and they could get things done if they were willing to pony up the money.”

Fundraising in Sweden as sanctions debate raged in U.S.

At the time of Mr. Clinton’s foray into Swedish fundraising, the Swedish government was pressing Mrs. Clinton’s State Department not to impose new sanctions on firms doing business with Iran, including hometown companies Ericsson and Volvo.

Mrs. Clinton’s State Department issued two orders identifying lists of companies newly sanctioned in 2011 and 2012 for doing business with Iran, but neither listed any Swedish entities.

Behind the scenes, however, the U.S. Embassy in Stockholm was clearly warning the State Department in Washington that Sweden’s trade was growing with Iran — despite Swedish government claims to the contrary.

“Although our Swedish interlocutors continue to tell us that Europe’s overall trade with Iran is falling, the statements and information found on Swedish and English language websites shows that Sweden’s trade with Iran is growing,” the U.S. Embassy wrote in a Dec. 22, 2009, cable to the State Department that was released by WikiLeaks. The cable indicates it was sent to Mrs. Clinton’s office.

At the time of the warning, Mrs. Clinton was about a year into her tenure as Mr. Obama’s secretary of state and the two were leading efforts in Washington to tighten sanctions on Iran.

The Swedes were resistant to new sanctions, telling State Department officials repeatedly and unequivocally that they were worried new penalties would stifle the business between its country’s firms and Tehran. At the time, Iran was Sweden’s second-largest export market in the Middle East after Saudi Arabia.

“Behind the Swedish government’s reluctance to support further sanctions in Iran, especially unilateral European measures, is a dynamic (though still fairly small) trade involving some of Sweden’s largest and most politically well-connected companies: Volvo, Ericsson and ABB to name three,” the U.S. Embassy wrote in one cable to Washington.

Several top Swedish officials made the case against proposed U.S. sanctions in successive meetings in 2009 and 2010, according to classified cables released by WikiLeaks.

“[Swedish] Sanctions coordinator [Per] Saland told us that Sweden does not support implementing tighter financial sanctions on Iran and that more stringent financial standards could hurt Swedish exports,” one cable reported. Other cables quoted Swedish officials as saying they were powerless to order banks in their country to stop doing business with Tehran.

Sweden’s foreign trade minister, Ewa Bjroling, met with State officials and said even though her government was obeying all existing United Nations and European Union sanctions, “Iran is a major problem for the GOS (Government of Sweden) because Swedish businesses have a long-standing commercial relationship in the trucks and telecom industries.”

Eventually, Swedish Foreign Affairs Minister Carl Bildt — Mrs. Clinton’s equal on the diplomatic stage — delivered the message personally to top State Department officials, who described him as “skeptical” about expanded Iran sanctions.

“Overall, I’m not a fan of sanctions because they are more a demonstration of our inability than our ability,” Mr. Bildt was quoted as telling State officials in a cable marked “secret.”

When Mr. Obama planned to meet with Swedish Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt in late 2009, the State Department described Sweden as having been a behind-the-scenes obstructionist to new Iran sanctions. “Sweden has hampered EU efforts to impose additional sanctions,” a State Department memo to the president warned.

Swedish government officials declined to address their back-channel overtures to Mrs. Clinton’s department. “Discussions leading to decisions on sanctions are internal and should remain so,” said Mats Samuelsson, a spokesman with the Swedish Embassy in Washington. “Sweden fully implements all U.N. and EU sanctions by which Sweden is bound.”

A pass to telecommunications companies?

The U.S. is allowed to penalize foreign firms — even if they are incorporated in countries that are U.S. allies  under the Iran Sanctions Act (ISA). Beginning in 2010, the Obama administration stepped up U.S. efforts to use ISA authorities to discourage investment in Iran and to impose sanctions on companies that insisted on continuing their business with Iran, according to a Congressional Research Service (CRS) report.

The State Department is required to report to Congress on ISA matters, which should be done every six months. The State report typically covers U.S. diplomatic concerns over which companies and countries may be interfering with U.S. policy by continuing their investments in Iran — much like the concerns that were coming out of Stockholm.

However, the State Department was slow in delivering its reports to Congress and placing them in the Federal Register as required by Section 5e of the ISA, which drew the concern of lawmakers that State wasn’t moving fast enough on making its sanction recommendations prior to the 2011-2012 formal announcements.

In February 2010, Mrs. Clinton testified before the House Foreign Affairs Committee that the State Department’s ISA preliminary review was completed in early February and that some of the cases reviewed “deserve more consideration” and were undergoing additional scrutiny. The preliminary review, according to the testimony, was conducted, in part, through State Department officials’ contacts with their counterpart officials abroad and corporation officials.

That preliminary review hasn’t been made public, and the first like-report was posted to the Federal Registrar in 2012 with no company names specifically mentioned.

Current State Department officials and outside experts who advised the department on Iran sanctions told The Times that Sweden, and more specifically Ericsson, was a matter of internal discussion from 2009 to 2011 before new sanctions were finally issued. “The Ericsson concerns were well-known, but in the end many of the sanction decisions were arbitrary and often involved issues beyond the actual business transactions,” one adviser directly involved in the talks told The Times, speaking only on the condition of anonymity because he was describing private deliberations.

U.S. intelligence officials told The Times that they kept the Obama administration apprised of Ericsson’s activities inside Iran, including the fact that the Swedish firm had provided Iran’s second-largest cellular provider with location-based technology to track customers for billing purposes. The technology transfer occurred in late 2009, shortly after Tehran brutally suppressed a pro-democracy movement in that country, the officials said.

U.S. intelligence further learned that Ericsson in 2010 discussed with Iran’s largest cellular firm providing tracking technology that could be used directly by Iranian security authorities but never formally pursued the contract, officials said.

State officials declined to say whether Ericsson ever appeared on any preliminary sanctions lists, but they described a process for each sanction decision that involved input from the Treasury Department, the CIA, the Commerce Department and State. During those deliberations, there was a propensity to give extra consideration to companies promoting telecommunications technology inside Iran, the officials explained.

The reason, one official said, was that these companies were seen to be providing something that might help average Iranians stay in contact with the rest of the world. More specifically, the official said, such technology might help them circumvent the draconian censorship measures being taken by Tehran’s government.

Swedish trade with Iran continued undeterred.

Swedish-based Ericsson and Volvo continued their business in Iran during this heightened period of scrutiny — even as other international companies started ending their relationships.

Ericsson has sold telecommunications infrastructure and related products to three Iranian firms: MCCI, MTN IranCell and Rightel. Volvo is the leading heavy truck company in Iran. U.S. senators have specifically raised concerns about the technology Ericsson was providing to Iran.

The company told The Times that it did, in fact, provide a location-based customer-tracking hub to MTN IranCell in 2009 but that it did not believe the system could be misused by Iranian security authorities to track dissidents because its location tracking wasn’t real-time and instead was aimed at facilitating billing.

“We have sold a location-based charging (LBC) to MTN IranCell,” Ericsson spokeswoman Karin Hallstan said. “LBC is used by operators all over the world as a market segmentation tool in order to charge customers differently depending on where they are located. Ericsson is unaware of authorities in any country using LBC as an active monitoring tool, not least as typically this is not open to real-time analysis.”

The company said it also pitched a tracking system specifically for Iran’s security agencies to mobile operator MCCI to determine the scope of their requirements. But it never bid or won such a deal, company officials said.

Ericsson, for its part, believes the sale of telecommunications equipment in Iran may foster a democratic state — and help human rights issues.

“Ericsson strongly believes telecommunication contributes to a more open and democratic society, and we believe that the people of Iran have gained from having access to this technology,” Ms. Hallstan said.

The telecommunications giant didn’t make any contributions to the Swedish fundraising entity set up by Mr. Clinton, but it did pay the former president a record $750,000 for a speech in Hong Kong in November 2011, just weeks after Mrs. Clinton released the first sanctions list that excluded Ericsson and other Swedish firms.

“The investment was significant but should be seen in light of [Mr. Clinton‘s] perceived crowd pull, the location (far to travel to Hong Kong) and an engagement that spanned two days,” Ms. Hallstan said. “The conversation regarding Iran that you refer to had no impact on this decision and was not considered by the event team.”

Ms. Hallstan said Ericsson started paying an annual membership fee to the Clinton Global Initiative in 2010 and is supporting a joint effort with Refugees United to help missing families reconnect with loved ones.
The company says it intends to continue pursuing opportunities with Tehran.
“Ericsson intends to continue to engage with existing customers and explore opportunities with new customers in Iran while continuously monitoring international developments as they relate to Iran and its government,” Ms. Hallstan said. “As a company present in 180 countries, we are sometimes asked to provide factual input regarding countries we operate in.”
After the U.S. announced its sanctions list in 2011 and 2012 — which included no Swedish companies — the Clinton Foundation Insamlingsstiftelse saw an uptick in its fundraising, from about $3 million in 2011 to $9 million in 2012 to $14 million in 2013, according to data released by the Swedish Svensk Insamlings Kontroll.
Two months after the second sanctions list was released, Mrs. Clinton made her first trip to Sweden as secretary of state to attend a Climate & Clean Air Coalition forum.
Setting up the Insamlingsstiftelse
When Mr. Clinton set up his Swedish fundraising arm in 2011, he turned to one of the former first family’s longtime confidants: Mrs. Clinton’s former Arkansas law partner Bruce Lindsey.
The entity was essentially a fundraising shell, having no employees or contractors in Sweden, and it was governed by a board with six directors: Mr. Clinton’s two close aides in retirement, Doug Band and Mr. Lindsey; the foundation’s chief financial officer, Andrew Kessell; Swedish lawyer Jan Lombach; German media mogul Karl-Heinz Kogel; and British financier Barry Townsley.
Mr. Townsley was a public figure in the 2006-2007 “pay for peerage” scandal that rocked the British government and tarnished the reputation of Tony Blair months before he left office as prime minister.
A House of Commons report concluded that Mr. Townsley, a successful stockbroker and generous philanthropist, provided a 1 million pound loan in 2005 to the ruling Labor Party and received a peerage nomination from Mr. Blair’s government. Mr. Townsley eventually declined the peerage appointment, saying the publicity had intruded on his privacy. He and other businessmen who made similar loans and were nominated for peerages were never charged with any wrongdoing, but the controversy tarnished Mr. Blair’s tenure.
Mr. Townsley told The Times that Mr. Clinton called him personally to ask him to serve on the Swedish entity’s board, and there were never any issues raised with him about the British patronage scandal.
He described himself as “a non-exec director,” saying he never got paid, never raised any money, never attended any functions for the Swedish entity and didn’t even get financial reports about the group’s activities.
He said he did not believe the past controversy in Britain should have any bearing on his relationship with the Clintons, which began in 1999. “There was nothing to it, and the investigation went away. Nothing to be investigated,” Mr. Townsley said.
The incorporation documents for Clinton Foundation Insamlingsstiftelse say “fundraising is the Swedish foundation’s only purpose,” and its annual reports show a total of $26 million raised since 2011. The Swedish documents disclose only a few sources of incoming donations, with the largest being the Nationale Postcode Loterij with about $5 million donated in 2012 and 2013 and the Swedish Postcode Lottery with about $4 million donated in that same time frame.
Mr. Clinton set up the Clinton Foundation Insamlingsstiftelse to become a direct recipient of the funds from the Swedish Postcode Lottery, rather than having to go through an intermediary organization to get the contributions, according to a Clinton Foundation official.

“Under Swedish lottery legislation, an organization must be registered in Sweden to receive funds directly from the Swedish Postcode Lottery,” said Roger Magergard, a spokesman for the lottery.
He added: “The partnership with Clinton Foundation Sweden is ongoing. The Swedish Postcode Lottery has 53 beneficiaries, and the cooperation with all organizations continues until either the beneficiary or the lottery decides to end the cooperation.”
In 2011, Sweden changed its giving laws to allow “little-brother” foundations, such as the Clinton Foundation Sweden, to operate in the country and broadened the issues those foundations could collect money for, explained Filip Wijkstrom, a director at the Stockholm School of Economics, who has studied Swedish foundations and nonprofits.
That same year, Sweden changed its tax laws so that individuals could get small tax breaks on their charitable contributions and companies could deduct some donations as business expenditures.