Welcome! Our goal at Winds of Change.NET is to give you one power-packed briefing of insights, news and trends from the global War on Terror that leaves you stimulated, informed, and occasionally amused every Monday & Thursday. In addition, we also have our in-depth Iraq Report today.

Today’s Winds of War briefing is brought to you by Bill Roggio and evariste of Discarded Lies.

Top Topics

• Happy Memorial Day to those in the United States! Here is a fitting tribute to our men and women who have served (Windows Media format) - and here are a set of Memorial day posts and resources, including our updated directory of ways to support the troops.

• The Zarqawi roundup. He’s dead. He’s just fine. He’s in Iran or is he surrounded in Iraq? Where might he go if he is wounded? The reports are all over the place, but it seems clear he has been wounded, perhaps seriously. This may result in infighting as various factions struggle for ascendancy. Bill looks at the potential successors.

• The health of Saudi Arabia’s King Fahd is reported to be improving. Belmont Club looks at the failures of successive administrations’ policy towards the Saudi government. Victor Comras states the US continues to send mixed signals about the Saudi’s participation in the war.

• The citizens of France have rejected the referendum on joining the European Union. But does ‘non’ mean ‘oui’? Belmont Club has more. Austin Bay says its time for a new NAFTA.

• In what may portend major policy shifts, a high-level internal review in the Bush administration may lead to broadening the anti-terror effort from killing Al Qaeda leaders to dealing with the rise of a new generation of loosely-affiliated terror leaders.

• NATO’s Rapid Response Force is quickly becoming a force to reckon with.

Other Topics Today Include: Iran roundup, Iran set to resume nuclear bomb; A look at the political process in Lebanon; Fleet surge; Hamas still building bombs; CIA cyberwar simulation; Los Zetas; Algerian Jihad; new Crisis in store for southern Sudan; Pakistani bomb blast kills 20; Indonesia bomb kills 22; Schapelle Corby; Protests in China; Terrorist bases in Europe; ETA Arnaldo Otegi; Russian power; Japanese hostage Akihiki Saito murdered.

Read the Rest…

Authorities said Sunday that Rafiq Abdus Sabir , 50, a Boca Raton physician, and Tarik Shah, 42, a self-described martial arts expert in New York, conspired to treat and train terrorists. Both are American citizens.

Both men were scheduled to be arraigned Tuesday in federal court, Shah in New York and Sabir in Florida, according to a news release from U.S. Attorney David Kelley in Manhattan.

It was not immediately clear who would represent them in court. If convicted, each man faces a maximum sentence of 15 years in prison and a fine of up to $250,000.

The one-count complaint claims the men allegedly took an oath pledging their allegiance to Al Qaeda. The government said the men engaged in multiple recorded conversations with a confidential source and an FBI agent posing as an Al Qaeda operative.

Read more..

More here

Two bombs exploded Saturday at a busy market in central Indonesia, killing at least 22 people and wounding 40 others in a volatile area marred by years of inter-religious fighting, Vice President Jusuf Kalla said.

The blasts occurred in the morning at a market in Sulawesi island’s Christian-dominated town of Tentena, said Police Maj. Riky Naldo, the deputy chief of police in nearby Poso town. More than 90 percent of Indonesia’s 210 million people are Muslims.

Two policemen were among the wounded, Naldo said

.

Read more…

A homicide bombing Friday at a Muslim shrine near Pakistan’s capital killed at least 12 people and wounded dozens, officials said. Witnesses said they counted at least 20 bodies.

The motive for the attack was not immediately clear, but this Islamic country has a long history of violence between Sunni and Shiite Muslims .

Hundreds of Shiites were gathered at the Bari Imam shrine on the outskirts of Islamabad for a religious festival when the bomb went off.

“About 12 people have been killed and it seems to have been a suicide attack,” said Information Sheikh Rashid Ahmed . He said the death toll may rise.

An Associated Press photographer at the scene counted at least 20 bodies, many of them in pieces. An intelligence official said at least 20 were killed and 150 were wounded.

Read more…

Update: Reports have updated the death toll to 20

Welcome! Our goal at Winds of Change.NET is to give you one power-packed briefing of insights, news and trends from the global War on Terror that leaves you stimulated, informed, and occasionally amused every Monday & Thursday. Thursday’s Winds of War briefings are given by me, Colt, of Eurabian Times.

TOP TOPICS

• Is Zarqawi wounded? Bill and Dan look at what his condition might be, and where he might have gone, as well as the repercussions of his death.

• Mystery Achievement has a translation of an Italian article, in which Iyad Allawi claims that Zawahiri was invited to Iraq in 1999.

• Operation Charm Offensive Towards Islamists. The U.S., now, not just the Europeans.

Other Topics Today Include: Iran diplomatic wrangling; Egypt’s reforms; Hezbollah admits to rocket arsenal; PA rejects prisoner release offer; Hitler to run in PLO elections; Syria quits co-operation with U.S.; Zarqawi guys nabbed; Iraq legalises alcohol; Roggio analyses; Hezbollah in the U.S.; U.S. looking to protect Europe from Islam; central America terror alert a false alarm; ETA bomb wounds 50+; Bosnian police chief retracts 3/11 detonator claim; E.U. improving Hezbollah, Hamas ties; petrol bombs thrown at Syrian embassy in Berlin; three dead civilians in Kashmir; Taliban commander caught; Thai A-Q teacher and students arrested; Taylor recieves A-Q cash; West Africa a potential al-Qaeda base; and much more.

Read the rest…

Yahoo/AP

A powerful car bomb exploded in Madrid Wednesday after a warning call from the armed Basque separatist group ETA, police said, in the latest of a string of attacks since Spain's prime minister offered talks with the group if it renounces violence.

Eighteen people were slightly injured, said Beatriz Martin, the city's emergency medical department spokeswoman. The explosion occurred around 9:30 a.m. in a working-class district north of the Spanish capital.

Police cordoned off the area where the bomb went off after an anonymous caller to the Basque newspaper Gara, which often serves as a mouthpiece for ETA, said a bomb would explode inside a Renault van.

...

The blast was the sixth blamed on ETA since Zapatero announced earlier this month he was willing to hold talks with the separatist group if it renounced its decades-old campaign of violence.

Other Commentary:

Diggers Realm
Speed of Thought

Finding Palestinians (particularly the Jordanian variety) among al-Qaeda is nothing new, but over the last two days it seems that the network’s infrastructure in Gaza has finally organized into a distinct group according to media reports. Called Jundallah, the majority of its members consist of former Hamas and Islamic Jihad members who decided that the other groups were “too moderate” for their liking.

Jundallah, not surprisingly, denies any connections to al-Qaeda but does adopt a far more strident line with respect to carrying out attacks on US targets (Hamas usually tries to skirt this issue with a “Maybe we will, maybe we won’t” kind of approach) and refuses to accept any kind of truce or cease-fire with Israel.

To be fair, accusations about al-Qaeda activity in the Gaza Strip are nothing new - Sharon mentioned them in 2002 following the failed attack on the El Al airliner in Mombasa, Kenya, but the general consensus at the time had been that whatever infrastructure the network had in the area was pretty spread out, in large part because most Palestinian Islamists who would normally be attracted al-Qaeda tend to join Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and the al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades instead for a variety of reasons. Now that all of the major terrorist groups seem more interested in establishing and securing their own power base post-Arafat rather than attacking Israelis, al-Qaeda appears to have been able to exploit the situation by recruiting any disaffected members who happen to cross their path.

Read the Rest…

Welcome! Our goal at Winds of Change.NET is to give you one power-packed briefing of insights, news and trends from the global War on Terror that leaves you stimulated, informed, and occasionally amused every Monday & Thursday.

Today’s Winds of War briefing is brought to you by Bill Roggio of the fourth rail and evariste of Discarded Lies. Also have a look at Andrew and Joel’s Iraq Report.

Top Topics

Welcome! Our goal at Winds of Change.NET is to give you one power-packed briefing of insights, news and trends from the global War on Terror that leaves you stimulated, informed, and occasionally amused every Monday & Thursday.

Today’s Winds of War briefing is brought to you by Bill Roggio of the fourth rail and evariste of Discarded Lies. Also have a look at Andrew and Joel’s Iraq Report.

Top Topics

• Chester has a visual chart of the suspicious circumstances around the 3/11 Madrid investigation. See also Barcepundit’s translations of the expose articles and Chrenkoff with the fast link roundup. This is looking really, really suspicious.

• Venezuela’s Chavez wants nukes?

• Japan a superpower in waiting? Austin Bay doesn’t see why not. And is China’s military spending 70% higher than reported? RAND Corporation thinks so. Other experts disagree - and say it’s 200-400% higher. See also Winds’ China roundup post.

• Islamists have taken control of a border town in Uzbekistan. Dan Darling has more. The Uzbek death toll may top 1000, says GatewayPundit, who has an excellent roundup. Glenn Reynolds has lots of stuff on Uzbekistan. Instapundit nemesis StrategyPage basically say, point blank, the bad guys won this one.

Other Topics Today Include:
no more incentives for Iran; Iran tries Russia enrichment ploy; Saudis repeal gravity, boil ocean, eradicate terrorism; Palestinian population numbers; port security; surprise Vegas terror drill; illegal immigrants in sensitive positions held; South Africa cracks down on mercenaries; Congo secessionists;US space ambitions; women in combat; Zarqawi poised to supercede Bin Laden; Bush asks IRA to disarm; Spain suing ETA for peace; Russian espionage in the UK and much more…

Read the Rest…

From Reuters:

A small bomb believed to have been planted by the Basque separatist group ETA exploded next to the home of a Basque businessman on Sunday, causing no injuries, police said.

A second bomb was defused in a park, also in the town of Zarautz, near San Sebastian, Basque regional police said in a statement.

The bomb that exploded damaged a wall separating the home from the railroad tracks but the man’s family escaped unhurt, police said.

It was the second time in eight days ETA had planted bombs with both incidents linked to its charging of a “revolutionary tax”, a form of extortion against businesses in the Basque region of northern Spain, state radio said.

(First published at Barcepundit)

In a rare break of protocol, a report by The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has been made public which details how the organisation told US authorities of detainee allegations of Koran misuse from early 2002 to mid 2003.

It says that they believe action was taken by the Americans after mid 2003 because reports of desecration of the holy Islamic book ceased after that. ICRC representatives have frequently visited the camp since it was established in early 2002.

Perhaps coincidentally, a memo released on January 19, 2003 by the Defence Department gave guidelines as to how the Koran should be handled and inspected at Guantanamo, including places where it should not be placed including toilets and floor.

Still early on this breaking story, and it’s probably nothing, but:

Three people were treated on Thursday for possible contamination by an unidentified white powder, New York police said.
The three walked into a Brooklyn hospital about 9 p.m. with an envelope containing the substance and told hospital staff they feared they had been exposed, police said.

The substance was unidentified and under investigation, police said.

The patients were being treated at Wyckoff Heights Medical Center, police said.

Police sources said doctors at the hospital emergency room reported the people showed no signs of anthrax contamination, which can be deadly, and that they were expected to be released.

WNBC-TV just showed the HazMat crews, which are investigating the substance. The woman who brought in the envelope is still under quarantine. The other two do not appear to have been exposed to anything.

An Alitalia jet en route from Milan to Boston was being diverted to Bangor, Maine, on Tuesday because the name of a passenger on board matched that of a person on the U.S. government’s no-fly list, officials said.

Flight 618 was due to arrive in Boston at 1:03 p.m., Alitalia spokeswoman Marta-Marie Lotti said.

It was the second time in less than a week that a Boston-bound European flight was diverted to Bangor. On Thursday, an Air France flight from Paris landed there because someone on board had a same name and birth date nearly the same as a person on the government’s list of suspected terrorists.

Read more…

Welcome! Our goal at Winds of Change.NET is to give you one power-packed briefing of insights, news and trends from the global War on Terror that leaves you stimulated, informed, and occasionally amused every Monday & Thursday. In addition, we also have our in-depth Iraq Report today.

Today’s Winds of War briefing is brought to you by Bill Roggio of the fourth rail and evariste of Discarded Lies.

Top Topics

• Nathan Hamm has kindly assembled a briefing on the situation in Uzbekistan: Early Friday morning, gunmen stormed Andijon’s prison freeing 2,000 prisoners, including 23 men charged with belonging to a banned Islamic group who were at the center of protests that began May 10. During the day on May 13, about 10,000 people gathered in Andijon’s central square where troops opened fire on the crowd killing more than 200 people. First-hand reports describe a city under siege. The city is calm now, though unrest continues in two towns on the border with Kyrgyzstan. Though it is still unclear whether or not those who seized government buildings were protesters or militants taking advantage of the situation, the primary concerns of those who were protesting throughout the week are economic.

• Blogosphere counter-terror expert Dan Darling offers further analysis re: what’s going on in Uzbekistan.

• The Qu’ran abuse story reported by Newsweek has been retracted. This false story has cost over 16 lives and sparked numerous riots in the Muslim world. No one will riot when copies of Newsweek are flushed this week.

• Haitham al-Yemeni, the reported successor to captured al Qaeda commander Abu Farraj al-Libbi, has been reported to have been killed in a strike by a US Predator in Pakistan. The Pakistani government denies this, however. Musharraf is claiming al Qaeda in Pakistan has been broken by al-Libbi’s capture. Right…

Other Topics Today Include: Enriching Iran; US interferes in Iran; Is/Hezb deathmatch; Saudi democracy in action; Yemeni cell jugged; Egypt just says no to the Muslim Brotherhood; Airplane!; Fake badges and visas; Flight turned away; Somolia still a mess; UN causes rape, pilliage, plunder in Darfur; LPG tanker recovered; The Rising Sun?; US interferes in Myanmar; Kashmiri presents; Bomb Thailand; Nork’s Nukes; Ocalan’s unfair trial; US interferes in former Soviet republics; Basque bombs; The perils of al Qaeda middle managers; Osama bracketed; another Zarqawi aide detained, and much much more…

Read the Rest…

American fighter jets flattened a suspected insurgent safe house near the Syrian border, the U.S. military said Friday, as hundreds of U.S. troops searched remote desert villages house by house for followers of Iraq’s most wanted militant leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi .

American forces have met little resistance since the first two days of Operation Matador , aimed at clearing a region believed to be a haven for foreign fighters slipping over the border from Syria , the military said in a statement Friday. American intelligence indicates the insurgents are either in hiding or have fled the region, U.S. Capt. Jeffrey Pool said in the statement.

Villagers reached by telephone Friday said gunmen still roamed some areas and they continued to receive U.S. shelling.

Read more…

Welcome! Our goal at Winds of Change.NET is to give you one power-packed briefing of insights, news and trends from the global War on Terror that leaves you stimulated, informed, and occasionally amused every Monday & Thursday. Thursday’s Winds of War briefings are given by me, Colt, of Eurabian Times.

TOP TOPICS

• Operation Matador - a major U.S. operation near the Syrian border. Joe has links. Chester is live-blogging it.

• Are Saudi oil installations rigged for destruction? Daniel Pipes comments.

• The ethnic rifts in al-Qaeda, and how our guys are exploiting it.

• A hand grenade was thrown at President Bush in Georgia. It did not explode.

• The Madrid bombers were trained in al-Qaeda camps in Bosnia.

Other Topics Today Include: Iran to restart enrichment; sanctions?; Hezbollah crushes revolt; Egyptian nuclear program?; PLO hasn’t policed up arms; PLO may need $7.7b; priority shifts in Iraq; Anbar governor kidnapped; 2 Saudi cops shot, wounded; Feds check terror link to ID bust; ‘would-be bomber’ released; Muslim who breaches British security for fun…; Chechen threatens more attacks; terror alert in Cyprus; North Korea threatens more plutonium harvesting; 23 dead jihadis in Afghanistan; Pakistani clerics voice support for Osama; Bush administration’s shame in Darfur; Somali sheikh wants Islamic state; and much more.

Read the Rest…

Welcome! Our goal at Winds of Change.NET is to give you one power-packed briefing of insights, news and trends from the global War on Terror that leaves you stimulated, informed, and occasionally amused every Monday & Thursday.

Today’s Winds of War briefing is brought to you by Bill Roggio of the fourth rail and evariste of Discarded Lies. Also be sure to check out Andrew’s Iraq Report and Arthur’s Good News From Iraq briefings.

Top Topics

• The arrest of senior al Qaeda commander Abu Farraj al-Libbi, a result of good, old-fashioned spycraft by the CIA’s clandestine service, may have created a “cascading effect”. 18 more members of his network were immediately arrested in the last 48 hours, and he appears to be singing like a canary. Or maybe he’s not. Speaking of singing like a canary, Zarqawi’s driver has been quite helpful as well. Pakistan may be conducting a purge of its military in the wake of his capture, as a junior minister underscored that Musharraf’s life was in constant danger. Meanwhile, on Friday 5000 terrorist sympathizers rallied to protest these developments and burn George W Bush in effigy. While there are question on al_Libbi’s rank in al Qaeda, US intelligence services did not confuse him with Anas al-Liby.

• Has a jihad begun in Nigeria? The buried lede in this Washington Times story on the Catholicism and Islam in Nigeria is that Nigerian newspapers have been abuzz with reports that a jihad is being prepared in the North. A Taliban-like group is already active, and 400 men claiming to be under Osama bin Laden’s orders attacked a Christian village in broad daylight, slaughtering worshippers in a church and committing other atrocities. America’s former ambassador to Nigeria thinks the country has become Al Qaeda’s new Afghanistan.

• Russia’s back in the Middle East, big time. Putin’s whirlwind tour led to promises to support Egypt for the Security Council, sell missiles to Syria, support Iran’s nuclear project, and use the Quartet to outmaneouvre US influence on the Israeli-Palestinian peace process.

Other Topics Today Include:
Euros want US to offer Iran more carrot; Pakistan’s Alberta restiveness Iranian fueled?; US kills 100 in a major operation on Syrian border; Iraqis learned IED tech from forgotten US Army manual; EMS departments shortchanged; Texas border county sheriffs warn on terror migrants; FBI too slow to hire analysts; local enforcement of federal immigration law; West African instability; regime change Libya; Zarqawi terror camps in Kenya and Somalia; MILF to help Flips hunt down Abu Sayyaf; Russians foil plot; Sino-Japanese relations still fragile; Russia-Georgia conflict over bases; did US sink Kursk?; setbacks for China’s economic espionage effort; colorful Spanish trial for 9/11 defendants; US kills 20 Taliban; 6 ETA attacks thwarted, ETA suspected of stealing bomb stuff; hawwala and charities targeted for regulation and reform by Arabs; Negroponte moves fast; EURCOM cmdr sees resumption of mil. ties with Libya; Marines may be in battle with bad body armor; Israel shut out of JSF; technical underpinnings of EMP weapons and much more.

Read the Rest…

Explosions blamed on ethnic rebels tore through two crowded supermarkets and a convention center in quick succession in Myanmar’s capital on Saturday, killing at least 11 people and wounding more than 160, state television reported.

The blasts occurred over a 10-minute period starting in the afternoon at the convention center in western Yangon , where a Thai trade fair was being held, then at two City Mart supermarkets in northern sections of the city.

State television blamed several ethnic rebel groups, including the Karen National Union and the Shan State Army (search), for the attacks, calling the perpetrators “terrorists” who were acting “with the objective of disrupting stability and tranquility.”

Authorities shut down markets across the capital because of security concerns after the explosions.

Read more…

Police say they have found fragments of an explosive device after a blast outside the UK consulate in New York.

The early morning explosion shattered windows in the building, which also houses other offices, but there were no reports of people being injured.

Police are at the scene and have sealed off the area around the building on Third Avenue, in Manhattan.

The explosion came as millions of voters in the United Kingdom went to the polls to elect a government.

Read more…

AP reports two explosions, not one. They happened at 3:50 am - no injuries occurred.

Update: ABC news reports …

Two small makeshift grenades exploded outside the British Consulate early Thursday, causing slight damage to the building but injuring no one, officials said.

The blasts occurred at 3:50 a.m. as voters were going to the polls in Britain. In London, Britain’s Foreign Office said there were no provisions for Britons to vote at overseas consulates.

Police spokesman Noel Waters said the grenades had been placed inside a cement flower box outside the front door of the midtown Manhattan building that houses the consulate.
Top Stories

After piecing together the shrapnel, police determined the devices were toy grenades that had been filled with gunpowder. Officers estimated that one was the size of a pineapple; the other the size of a lemon.

Blog GOP in the City has more.

Gothamist has more, including photos.
————
Updates 5:45 pm

UN says staffer questioned in blast

The United Nations said one of its staff was being questioned by New York police in connection with a blast outside the British consulate earlier on Thursday.

A UN spokesman said the unnamed employee was a “person of interest” in the initial investigation into the overnight explosion of two small grenades, which damaged the New York office building housing the consulate.

NY blast by UK consulate may have Middle East link

[P]olice chief Raymond Kelly told reporters he was also looking at another possible target — a board member of Caterpillar Inc. who works in the building. The company sells bulldozers used by Israel to raze Palestinian homes.

Kelly noted there had been an April 13 protest outside the building by a group called Jews Against the Occupation.

On its web site, the group describes itself as a group of “American Jews (who) reject the Israeli government assertion that it is ‘necessary’ to subjugate Palestinians for the sake of keeping Jews safe.”

A spokesman for Caterpillar could not immediately be reached.

—-

The UN employee has been released

Abu Farraj al-Libbi , a senior Al Qaeda suspect wanted in two attempts to assassinate President Gen. Pervez Musharraf, has been arrested in Pakistan, the government said Wednesday.

Al-Libbi, a native of Libya with a $1 million bounty on his head, was arrested earlier this week, Information Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed told The Associated Press.

“This is a very important day for us,” Ahmed said. He would provide no details on where al-Libbi was captured, or where he is being held.

Read more…

Former Soviet prisoner of conscience Natan Sharansky is currently one of the world’s most influential politicians. His book, The Case for Democracy, has had a major impact on global Mideast policy. Which makes his resignation from Ariel Sharon’s government a key event. Here, in his own words, is why he’s leaving (Hat Tip: our Cairo correspondent Tarek Heggy):

bq.. “Dear Mr. Prime Minister,

I am writing to inform you of my decision to resign as Minister of Diaspora Affairs and Jerusalem.

As you know, I have opposed the disengagement plan from the beginning on the grounds that I believe any concessions in the peace process must be linked to democratic reforms within Palestinian society. Not only does the disengagement plan ignore such reforms, it will in fact weaken the prospects for building a free Palestinian society and at the same time strengthen the forces of terror.

Will our departure from Gaza encourage building a society where freedom of speech is protected, where independent courts protect individual rights, and where free markets enable Palestinians to build an independent economic life beyond government control? Will our departure from Gaza end incitement in the Palestinian media or hate- filled indoctrination in Palestinian schools? Will our departure from Gaza result in the dismantling of terror groups or the dismantling of the refugee camps in which four generations of Palestinians have lived in miserable conditions?

Read the Rest (plus our analysis)…

A hidden weapons cache exploded in northern Afghanistan on Monday, killing 28 people and injuring more than 70, officials said.

The weapons were stored in Bashgah, a village in Baghlan province 75 miles north of Kabul, Interior Ministry spokesman Latfullah Mashal said. The cause of the blast was not known.

“It’s damaged the whole village, including the mosque and six houses,” Mashal said.

Read more…

Note: Also available at the “Opinion Journal” and Chrenkoff. Big thanks, as always, to James Taranto, Joe Katzman, and everyone else supporting this project.

Sometimes, a simple story can better encapsulate the essence of a situation than dozens of learned articles and reports. This is one such story:

They practice on concrete rather than on grass, and their kit is far from uniform, but Afghanistan’s premier women’s football team is looking forward to making history this summer when it plays its first international match.

Even before they step onto the pitch at the Banuwan women’s competition in Iran in August, the women of Kabul Selected will have overcome more obstacles than most athletes.

The team has been playing in organised leagues for a little more than a year. When they began, most training took place behind closed doors. While they still lack the amenities available to male players, the best players from the capital’s 12 girls’ teams have moved into the open.

The team is now practicing next to the grass pitch of Kabul Athletic Stadium, where the Taliban used to conduct their public executions - making one wonder whether, perhaps, God is a woman, after all.

Just as it reveals the triumphs, the story also illustrates the challenges facing Afghanistan and its people: lingering discrimination and the need to maintain the struggle against ingrained conservative attitudes, lack of resources and an all too slow flow of foreign assistance. But positive development should not be overshadowed by negativity; Afghanistan has had enough of it for the past quarter of a century. The difference now is the unparalleled range of opportunities opening to Afghans, and the fact that with some much needed and generous help they are starting to make the better tomorrow happen. Below are some of their stories from the past month.

• Society
  
• Reconstruction
  
• Humanitarian Aid
  
• The Coalition Troops
  
• Security

Welcome! Our goal at Winds of Change.NET is to give you one power-packed briefing of insights, news and trends from the global War on Terror that leaves you stimulated, informed, and occasionally amused every Monday & Thursday. In addition, we also have our in-depth Iraq Report today.

Today’s Winds of War briefing is brought to you by Bill Roggio of the fourth rail and evariste of Discarded Lies.

Top Topics

• The co-opting of pirates by al Qaeda should come as no surprise. We ought to pay attention, though - many high piracy areas are also key chokepoints for the world economy. The Fourth Rail offers a comprehensive briefing on the issue, with maps.

• The protection racket: Qatar is paying off al Qaeda to prevent them from attacking the small and vulnerable nation.

• Seven are wounded in multiple terrorist attacks in Cairo, Egypt. A man detonated a bomb, while two women shot up a tourist bus; all three are dead. The Egyptian government has arrested 226 suspects.

Other Topics Today Include:

• Do the Iranians want regime change?; EU-3/Iran nuke talks collapse; Iranian nukes scares Russia; Israel gets bunker-busters; Abbas’ “iron fist”; The Saudi’s strategic shift?; Saudis whip terrorism (wink-wink); Chavez, Castro heart the “Axis of Subversion”; Akbar gets death; GIA leader bagged; AU commits to Darfur; Tired Taliban; Tough times in Jammu and Kashmir; Norks’ missiles; European arrest roundup; The Balkan beat; ETA on the move; Death to Sweden; Kofi’s lynchers; CEOs VIPs for AQ; Osama kicks it? Nope; and much, much more…

Read the Rest…