Islam - Current Day - Rocket Blows-Up Children in Home; Islam Restarting Armenian Genocide; Links to Muslim Horror Stories

Three children among five civilians killed in rocket attack

outside Baghdad airport

28 Sep 2020

Baghdad International Airport. © Reuters / Thaier al-Sudani

Two women and three children were killed when two Katyusha rockets struck a residential area near Baghdad airport on Monday, Iraq’s military has said, in what were the first civilian casualties in months from attacks in the city.

The rockets apparently targeted the airport but ended up hitting a nearby home, which was completely destroyed. Besides the five fatalities, two children were also severely wounded in the attack.

The strike came from the Iraqi capital's al-Jihad neighborhood, the military said in a statement. It described the incident as a “cowardly crime” by “gangs” looking to sow chaos and to terrorize the population.

Iraqi PM Mustafa al-Kadhimi has ordered that those who fired the rockets be brought to justice, the statement read.

Rocket attacks have intensified in Iraq in recent weeks, targeting the US embassy in Baghdad, American troops and the airport.

Washington has blamed Shia militias with links to Iran, who have intensified their activities after Tehran’s top military commander, Qassem Soleimani, was assassinated in a US drone strike outside Baghdad airport in January.

The deteriorating security situation has prompted the US to threaten to shut down its Baghdad embassy altogether if Iraqi authorities won’t deal with the militias.

Preparations for the withdrawal of diplomatic staff were being made at the US mission in Baghdad over the weekend, American and Iraqi sources told Reuters.

Armenia braced for LONG WAR in Nagorno-Karabakh, PM Pashinyan's adviser warns saying Turkey behaves like ‘regional terminator’

28 Sep 2020 

FILE PHOTO © RIA Novosti / Ilya Pitalev

The ongoing fighting over the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region is unlikely to end quickly, a top Armenian official has warned. He said Yerevan is preparing for a protracted conflict, not least because of Turkey’s role in events.

“We are preparing for a long-term war. Why? Because, I say it again, the main player here is not Azerbaijan but Turkey,” Vagarshak Harutyunyan, a senior adviser to Armenia’s Prime minister Nikol Pashinyan told a Latvian YouTube channel on Monday. 

Turkey, a close partner for Baku but a historical foe for Yerevan, is “directly involved” in the conflict over Nagorno-Karabakh, an ethnic Armenian-populated landlocked enclave within Azerbaijan. Fierce fighting erupted on the disputed region’s borders on Sunday, with both Armenian and Azeri troops using heavy weaponry, large-caliber artillery, and combat aircraft in the clashes.

Harutyunyan, formerly Armenia’s Defense Minister, spoke of the universal conscription call-up recently issued in his own country as well as Nagorno-Karabakh, indicating that he wasn’t convinced the conflict will end any time soon.

The duration of the war will depend on many factors: on how the hostilities will proceed, [and] on the reactions of the international community.

The PM’s aide has further criticized Turkey, suggesting it is using Azerbaijan and “push[ing] it towards war in order to achieve its geopolitical goals in this region.” Ankara “behaves like a regional terminator, and is practically at war with all of its neighbors,” Harutyunyan opined.

Earlier, Baku denounced allegations of Turkish involvement in the crisis. “There is no foreign interference,” Azerbaijan’s Foreign Minister Jeyhun Bayramov told Russia’s RIA Novosti news agency.

Turkey has vocally supported Baku since the border fighting started, with top officials pulling no punches when it came to blaming Armenia for escalating the conflict. Earlier on Monday, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said the Armenian “occupation” of Nagorno-Karabakh – which he described as “Azerbaijani land” – must end to secure peace in the region.

So far, there has been no proof presented of any material support provided by Turkey. However, Yerevan claims Turkey had transported some 4,000 Syrian militants to Azerbaijan to help it gain the upper hand in Nagorno-Karabakh. Baku brushed aside these allegations, accusing its arch-enemy of funneling Syria-based “ethnic Armenian militants” into the region.

It's been a century since the Turkish Ottomans murdered, or drove 1.5 million Armenians from their homeland. It seems Erdogan thinks that is long enough - time to resume. He probably hates that there are Christians living in the midst of what was once the Ottoman Empire. I believe he has ideas on restoring that Islamic empire with himself as Caliph. However, he is not getting any younger and may be in a mood to rush things. 

Armenia was the first nation to adopt Christianity as a state religion, an event traditionally dated to AD 301.

The predominant religion in Armenia is Christianity. Its roots go back to the 1st century AD, when it was founded by two of Jesus' twelve apostles – Thaddaeus and Bartholomew – who preached Christianity in Armenia between AD 40–60. Wikipedia

I don't suppose they could just trade Nagorno-Karabakh for the Nakhchivan Region?

Also see 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 7th and 8th posts on Today's Global Pervs and Paedos List for more stories of Islamic Insanity. 

War on Christianity - French Christians Disappear in Baghdad

4 aid workers with French charity Christians of the Middle East disappear in Baghdad

By Leah MarieAnn Klett, Christian Post Reporter|

A woman and children walk through Khazir refugee camp on April 15, 2017 near Mosul, Iraq.

Getty Images/Carl Court

Four members of the French nongovernmental organization Christians of the Middle East, a charity that seeks to "help Christian communities remain (in the region) and rebuild," have disappeared while working in Baghdad.

The four members of the charity went missing near the French embassy in the Iraqi capital on Jan. 20, Christians of the Middle East director Benjamin Blanchard said at a news conference in Paris on Friday, France 24 reports.

Three of the disappeared workers are French and one is Iraqi, he added. There have been no ransom demands, and the charity has asked that their identities remain concealed for security reasons.

The charity has been working with persecuted Christians in Iraq since 2014 when Islamic State jihadists seized the predominantly Christian province of Mosul, displacing tens of thousands. The group is also active in the Iraqi Kurdish capital Arbil, where many Christians sought refuge.

The missing workers were in Baghdad "to renew their visas and register the association with Iraqi authorities," Blanchard said, and were due to inspect the group's activities in the city, including the opening of a new school.

They left their hotel by car for a meeting "which posed no problem," Blanchard said, describing the men as "experienced staff members who have been working with us for years" and who had "perfect knowledge of conflict zones.”

On Twitter, Christians of the Middle East shared photos of people from around the world who've gathered to pray for the missing workers’ safe recovery.

“Today, we will offer to God Our Father, a Special Mass, for the safety and the return of Our Beloved Four Brothers. We gather all of our hearts, minds, souls, and prayers for ONE INTENTION: THE SAFE RETURN TO OUR FOUR BELOVED BROTHERS,” reads one update.

The secular news outlet AFP, which is partly funded by the French government, claims that the Christian organization is "fiercely critical of Islam, portraying it as a threat to Christianity in the Middle East."

I get the impression that this is a surprise to AFP - that Islam is a threat to Christianity? They will probably see this kidnapping, if that's what it is, as retribution for their criticism, rather than as confirmation that their criticism is perfectly justified.

The humanitarian aid workers' disappearance comes as kidnappings have become commonplace in Iraq, according to persecution watchdog group International Christian Concern. The group reports that America's military presence in Iraq has also become increasingly unwelcome following a U.S. drone strike that killed Qasem Soleimani, the Iranian Quds Force commander, alongside Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, deputy commander of Iran-backed militias in Iraq known as the Popular Mobilization Forces, and five others in Baghdad on Jan. 3.

Soleimani, was a known terrorist who was responsible for numerous terrorist attacks worldwide as well as the killing of Iranians, Iraqis, U.S. allies and the killing over 600 U.S. soldiers and wounding of thousands of others over two decades. Other countries had tried to kill Soleimani before President Trump authorized the operation. 

Iran has infiltrated the Iraqi government and military in an attempt to push out the U.S. and other foreign influences.

"The extent to which Iran has managed to infiltrate Iraq’s political and military establishment was revealed in November 2019, when 700 pages containing secret intelligence cables were leaked to two U.S. media organizations. They describe a carefully conceived plan, going back to 2014, for Iran’s ministry of information and security, along with the Quds Force, to expand Iran’s influence inside Iraq, and to identify and run sources at the most senior levels of government. The aim was to keep the country pliant and aligned to Iran’s objectives," The Jerusalem Post reports. 

"The leaked cables reveal that Iranian intelligence officers co-opted much of the Iraqi government’s cabinet, infiltrated its military leadership, and even tapped into a network of sources once run by the CIA," the Post adds. 

Along with exerting it's influence in the Iraqi government and military, Iranian-backed militias in Iraq, such as an armed group known as Kataib Hezbollah, have also been carrying out terrorist attacks, such as a Dec. 27 rocket attack on an Iraqi military base where U.S. troops are stationed. 

“As a result, all foreigners working in Iraq are at a grave security risk," International Christian Concern. notes. “For Christians, the risk is even greater. Following ISIS, Iraqi Christians have come to rely upon foreign aid. For those working in humanitarian aid, and for those receiving, the environment is an increasingly dangerous one.”

Earlier this month, Chaldean Catholic Patriarch of Baghdad, Louis Raphael Sako, called on Christians and Muslims in Iraq to pray for their leaders. 

In his homily, Sako described the situation in Iraq and the Middle East as a “volcano about to erupt” and urged Christians to pray and push to avoid further escalation of the ongoing tensions, noting that innocent people will be the fuel for such “fire.”

Open Doors USA ranks Iraq at No. 15 on its World Watch List of 50 countries where it's most difficult to be a Christian. According to the group, although the Islamic State terror group has lost territory in Iraq, their ideology remains and has influenced society. Many of the militants, it says, “have simply blended back into the general population.”

The Farhud: The Massacre that Ended Iraq’s 2,600-Year-Old Jewish Community?

BY EMANUEL MILLER

Honest Reporting

Arab nationalists raise knives in the air during the Farhud

The unprovoked massacre of Jewish men, women, and children in Baghdad in 1941 known as “The Farhud” is perhaps the most significant event in the final chapter of the history of Iraqi Jewry. Read on to learn more about the episode, and make sure to check out this article describing how and why the Jewish community in Iraq came to an end.

Up until midway through the 19th century, the Iraqi Jewish community was one of the oldest continuous communities in the world and the oldest such community outside of Israel, with a proud history spanning over 2,600 years. Today, fewer than ten Jews remain in the country. 

While there are many reasons for the decimation of this community, one event in particular stands out: The Farhud, the unprovoked massacre of Jewish Iraqis by their fellow compatriots in a frenzy of nationalist, pro-Nazi rage.

A Brief History of the Jewish Community in Iraq

The experiences of the Jewish people in Iraq over history were varied, with periods of persecution and horrific attacks, as well as times of relative calm and somewhat tolerable conditions. Although there had been numerous instances of violence against Jews during their long history in the land under various regimes, including pogroms, decrees ordering the destruction of synagogues in Iraq, and occasional forced conversion to Islam, by the end of the 19th century, conditions were significantly better, although still far from perfect.

Under centuries of Islamic rule, Jews were subjugated and classified as dhimmi (‘protected person’) and were required to pay taxes, sometimes exorbitantly high. Failure to do so could result in death, or the death of a community representative. As the Ottoman empire began to crumble, however, reforms introduced led to Jews receiving a greater degree of equality, a process hastened by the subsequent era of British colonialism.

During the 19th century, Baghdad emerged as a strong Jewish and economic center as the influence of the Jewish families of Aleppo, who had dominated the Jewish communities of the Middle East over the previous century, waned. The Iraqi Jewish population grew so rapidly that by 1884, there were 30,000 Jews in Baghdad. By 1900, the number had risen to 50,000, with Jews representing over a quarter of the city’s total population.

From 50,000 to 10 in one century. That is a hostile environment! Please go to Honest Reporting for the rest of this article. 

Iraqi Teen Terrorist Convicted of 2017 London Train Bombing

By Sara Shayanian

An injured woman is aided by an emergency officer at the Parsons Green Underground Station in London after a bombing on September 15, 2017. File photo by Will Oliver/EPA-EFE

UPI -- An Iraqi teenager was convicted Friday of attempted murder for bombing a crowded London underground train last summer.

Ahmed Hassan, 18, was found guilty after a trial at which he said he didn't intend to injure anyone with the bomb. He told jurors the bombing was an effort to get attention, and that he'd been "very bored, very depressed, very confused."

Hassan was arrested in September after his bomb injured 29 passengers on a subway during rush hour at the Parsons Green station in London.

Hassan said he'd been influenced by action films and wanted to be a fugitive. Prosecutor Alison Morgan called him "calculated and clever."

"You can be sure it was not an act of attention-seeking or boredom," Morgan said. "This was someone who wanted to cause death and damage and make good his escape."

Both Hassan's parents died when he was a child, and prosecutors said he blamed Britain for his father's death during an airstrike on Baghdad.

"The prosecution rely heavily on motive in this case and point to evidence that Mr. Hassan was angry. He blamed the coalition for his father's death. He had been killed by a bomb in Iraq," judge Justice Haddon-Cave said.

"He was angry at the continued bombing of his country by the U.K. It was suggested he had a deep down hate of this country."

Hassan said he'd been abducted by the Islamic State in Iraq and "trained on how to kill." The 18-year-old said he then made his way to Britain via Istanbul, Paris and Calais as a stowaway.

Hassan later said he made up the story of his kidnapping in an attempt to win sympathy and stay in Britain.

So, in all probability, he was trained by IS on how to kill, but it was completely voluntary. The effects of Bush's insane attack on Iraq will continue to haunt the western world for many years to come.

ISIS Uses Dolls as Booby-Trap Bombs to Attack Mass Shia Pilgrimage

Just in case you weren't sure that ISIS is evil incarnate, they are now targeting children

© Dado Ruvic / Reuters

All the dolls were discovered in Husseiniya, a suburb northeast of Baghdad,
according to the Kuwait News agency (KUNA).

Iraqi forces prevented a major Islamic State (previously ISIS/ISIL) attack as they found and disabled 18 booby-trapped dolls with explosives inside just north of the capital Baghdad. The plot targeted Shia Muslims going on an upcoming religious pilgrimage.

The diabolical plan was to scatter all the dolls alongside the road between Baghdad and Karbala during the Arbaeen pilgrimage, which is a Shia Muslim annual religious observance.

Millions of Shia Muslims walk the path every year. In 2014, there was a new record number of pilgrims, totaling 17.5 million people.

Arbaeen is the end of the 40-day mourning period following the anniversary of the death of the grandson of the Prophet Mohammed, Imam Hussein.

Authorities asked residents to report any suspicious objects.

Is bombing campaign working?
Countries have been cracking down on terrorist plots following an escalation of ISIS activity around the world.

Earlier in the week, Kuwait uncovered an international cell that supplied Islamic State with weapons bought in Ukraine, as well as funds and new recruits. Six members were arrested but four others, including Australian-Lebanese nationals, remain on the run abroad.

Meanwhile, northern and western Iraq have been engulfed in violence as Islamic State fighters strive to take over more territory. The extremist group has also resorted to brutal crimes against ethnic and religious communities, including Shias, Sunnis, Kurds, and Christians.

Baghdad also had an upsurge in attacks, as at least 26 people died and dozens other were wounded on November 13, as ISIS claimed responsibility for explosions in the city.

How well is the bombing campaign working? Attacks increase, ethnic brutality increases, IS trying to expand to new territory - doesn't sound like they are hurting a lot for the billions of dollars of bombs being dropped on them. Mind you, the bomb suppliers are making a killing!

Popularity of 'Putin the Shiite' Sky High in Iraq

AFP 
By Jean-Marc Mojon with Raji Nasser in Najaf

Iraqi artist Mohammed Karim Nihaya touches up a painting of Russian
President Vladimir Putin in his studio in the Karada district of Baghdad

Baghdad (AFP) - Russian President Vladimir Putin's bullish entry into the Syrian conflict has worked wonders for his popularity in neighbouring Iraq, where some await "Hajji Putin" like a saviour.

Sitting at his easel in his central Baghdad workshop, painter Mohammed Karim Nihaya touches up a portrait of Putin he copied from the Internet.

"I have been waiting for Russia to get involved in the fight against Daesh," he says, referring to the Islamic State group that last year declared a "caliphate" straddling Iraq and Syria.

"They get results. The United States and its allies on the other hand have been bombing for a year and achieved nothing," the bespectacled artist says.

The US-led coalition has had some successes in helping Iraqi forces reconquer territory lost to IS in 2014 but overall the campaign has also suffered setbacks.

Russian warplanes began bombing targets in Syria on September 30 and on Wednesday Moscow ramped up its air war, unleashing cruise missiles from the Caspian Sea.

Putin leaving Elysee Palace in Paris AFP Photo

Some of them crossed Iraqi airspace and many here, especially among the Shiite majority, would welcome a bit of Russia's firepower on home soil as a much-awaited game-changer.

Only a fraction of Russian air strikes in Syria may have been destined for IS but Mohammed, a young jobless man outside the painter's shop, does not let statistics cloud his enthusiasm.

"We don't want the international coalition, we want only Russia and we will slaughter a sheep to welcome them," he says.

Some Iraqis see Moscow -- which has staunchly backed Damascus and Tehran in recent years -- as a more natural ally than the United States, which occupied the country for eight years.

Putin's patented leadership brand of bare-chested antics and cold determination is a also hit in Iraq, where the cult of the strong leader is alive and well 12 years after Saddam Hussein's ouster.

On social media, many have already made him an honorary citizen, with one widely circulated joke even detecting phonetic evidence of Iraqi antecedents in the Russian president's name.

It goes like this: Putin's father was an Iraqi grocer from the Shiite south, near Nasiriyah, who introduced figs ("tin" in Arabic) to local markets and thus became known as "Abu Tin".

After World War II, he moved to the Soviet Union, married "a blonde Russian girl" and named their son Abdulamir. That proved a bit of a mouthful for locals who Russianised it into Vladimir.

The apocryphal nature of the story appears lost on some Facebook users, who have embraced "Putin the Shiite" and even replaced their profile pictures with a portrait of the Russian strongman.

A Russian warship launches a cruise missile in the
Caspian Sea during a strike against Islamic State

"We should give Putin Iraqi and Syrian citizenship because he loves us more than our own politicians," says Mohammed al-Bahadli, a student walking on a street in the Shiite shrine city of Najaf.

"Muslims bomb us because we are Rafidha," says Saad Abdullah, who owns a convenience store in Najaf, employing a term which means "rejectionists" and is used by IS to refer to Shiites.

"Meanwhile Putin, who is an Orthodox man, is defending us.... Maybe he really is a Shiite and we didn't know about it," he says before flashing a huge smile.

Taxi driver Ali al-Rammahi says Putin is the only reason he hasn't already joined the thousands of Iraqis fleeing the country to knock on Europe's doors.

"I thank Putin because he convinced me to stay in Iraq... Hajji Putin is better than Hussein Obama," he says, using the title given to Muslims who have performed the pilgrimage to Mecca.

"Putinmania" has also gripped some of Iraq's politicians, creating some confusion over Baghdad's stance on a Russian intervention.

Hakim al-Zamili, the head of parliament's defence committee and a leader in a Shiite militia that once fought US forces, has suggested Baghdad has decided to request Russian air strikes.

Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi, who is supported by the West, has been more equivocal but has not ruled out enlisting Russia's help.

Moscow recently increased its footprint in Iraq by joining a coordination cell set up in Baghdad to pool intelligence on IS fighters with non-coalition members Syria and Iran.

Thousands Flee Ramadi as 500 Slaughtered by ISIS

Show of strength: ISIS flags line the streets of Ramadi as a procession of
militants - riding on Toyota Land Cruisers - parade through the city

MailOnline
ISIS militants have held a twisted victory parade after taking the key city of Ramadi in an orgy of violence and beheadings - and the extremists could march on the Iraqi capital Baghdad within the next month.

Mutilated bodies scatter the streets of the 'Gateway of Baghdad', where Islamic State slaughtered around 500 and forced nearly 25,000 to flee their homes over the last few days.

Now ISIS has released images of militants celebrating, children wielding automatic weapons and a fleet of pick-up trucks carrying its jubilant fighters through the blood-stained streets of Ramadi.

Shi'ite fighters have already launched a counter-offensive to recapture the city, but these kinds of tactics play straight into Islamic State's grand plan to spark all-out war in the region, according to the Middle East director of counter-terrorism think-tank RUSI.

Islamic State militants are already marching east towards the Habbaniya army base - around 20 miles east of Ramadi - where a column of 3,000 Shi'ite paramilitaries are amassing, witnesses and a military officer has said.

And if ISIS manage to reach Baghdad, it would be 'utter carnage', Professor Gareth Stansfield told MailOnline.

Surrounded: ISIS already has control of Fallujah which is on Baghdad's doorstep
and has now conquered the strategically important city of Ramadi further west.
It has Sunni support to the south of the Iraqi capital and is waging battles
with security forces in the north to effectively 'surround' Baghdad

Parade: After slaughtering 500 people and forcing over 8,000 from their homes,
ISIS triumphantly drive through Ramadi (pictured) in a fleet of pick-up trucks

Sick: One twisted image released through Islamic State's social media channels
shows a small child carrying what appears to be a mortar shell in Ramadi -
after their victory in the city

Innocence lost: ISIS has released pictures showing its militants - and young
followers (pictured) - celebrating the capture of Ramadi as Shi'ite militias
prepare a counter-offensive to retake the city

He said: 'If ISIS turn up in great numbers in Baghdad, it will be an absolute slaughter between Sunni's and Shia's there.

'They [ISIS] are now having so many successes, and moving so quickly, that Baghdad is under very real threat from ISIS forces outside Baghdad and also the ISIS terror cells inside Baghdad as well.

'We're in for a very long summer of fighting in Iraq and ISIS could make their move [on Baghdad] in the next month. Taking Ramadi will... make the Shia militia in Baghdad even more radicalised and more dangerous.

'And this is what ISIS wants, it wants it to come out and have sectarian scrap which forces all the Sunni's to go towards ISIS. 

This is just one way that moderate Muslims can be manipulated into joining radical Islam. When push comes to shove, and it will, moderate Muslims in Europe will join jihad, then all hell will break loose.

'If they had any opportunity to enter Baghdad, they would do. But it will be more and more difficult for them to do it because Baghdad is a military stronghold of the Shia militia.'

And if they manage to actually take Baghdad, which is predominantly Shia but has some Christian regions, Professor Stansfield says 'there would be massacres to the scale we haven't seen since the Mongol empire in the 13th Century'. 

The UN said tonight that close to 25,000 people have fled Ramadi after militants attacked the city.

The question is, where are they going? Ramadi has been surrounded by ISIS for months. Where can they go?

United States-led airstrikes have stepped up raids against the Islamists, conducting 19 strikes near Ramadi over the past 72 hours at the request of the Iraqi security forces, a coalition spokesman said.

And as fighting rages in and around the city, Islamic State fighters are also taking on Iraq's military and tribal groups in the north.