There has been yet another terrorist attack in Cairo, Egypt. This time two veiled women shot up a tourist bus. Perhaps the more interesting of the terrorist attacks in Cairo though was a man who jumped off a bridge and then blew himself up right before he hit the ground.

CAIRO, Egypt – Two veiled women shot at a tour bus, and a man — the brother of one shooter and the fiance of the second — blew himself up as he leapt off a bridge during a police chase Saturday. All three attackers died and seven people, four of them foreigners, were wounded in an apparent revival of violence against Egypt’s vital tourism industry.

[snip]

The two women who carried out the shooting attack were identified as Negat Yassin, the bomber’s sister, and Iman Ibrahim Khamis, his fiancee, both in their 20s. They carried out the shooting on the tourist bus in revenge for Yassin’s death, then shot themselves, the ministry said. Women are not known to have carried out past attacks in Egypt.

Two militant groups posted Web statements claiming responsibility for the twin attacks — the Mujahedeen of Egypt and the Abdullah Azzam Brigades. Neither claim’s authenticity could be verified.

This attack is very bizarre and speaking of a bazaar, the attack in which Egyptian authorities believe these three were part of was the bombing of a bazaar in Cairo earlier this month. Egyptian authorities believe the bomber in today’s bridge jump scene was part of the plot and ran from authorities because of his earlier actions.

There were no deaths in any of the attacks, but as to be expected, there were a handful of people injured. It remains to be seen if today’s attacks indicate terrorist groups will continue to target Egyptian tourism which is vital to Egypt’s economy.

Heh.

HAVANA (Reuters) – The leaders of Cuba and Venezuela relished their roles as Washington’s bad boys in Latin American on Friday and vowed to build a socialist alternative to U.S. policies in the hemisphere.

President Fidel Castro and the younger and equally loquacious Hugo Chavez mocked Bush administration charges that their burgeoning partnership threatens to undermine democracy in Latin America.

“I’m realizing that your friendship is hurting my image,” Castro joked to Chavez during a meeting with hundreds of free trade opponents from across the Americas.

Perhaps I should not laugh at Chavez’s plight towards a more socialistic country since Venezuela has considerable wealth in oil reserves which constitute 20 percent of U.S. imports, but I can’t help it. Chavez indicates he wants to move Venezuela to a more socialistic government using Cuba as a representative of how to do it. Chavez and the Venezuelan people should look at Cuba in a different light. It’s not all roses for Castro.

Hat tip: Wes Roth

Today’s Quote of the Day is not a quote, rather a short excerpt from the Khaleej Times discussing the terms insurgents versus what they really are, terrorists.

Dear readers, Al Jazeera has made a name for itself in the past few years, but I feel there are times and situations when the TV channel stretched matters a bit too far. For instance, it was wrong when it projected those who perpetuated violence in Iraq in the last several months as insurgents, a term that has some popular appeal.

Insurgents are those who fight for the country and its people against governments that act against the will of the people. Insurgents never kill their own citizens; insurgents do not destroy the wealth of their own country; and insurgents do not kill policemen the way the men of Iraq’s newly trained police force are killed. These policemen are not part of the soldiers of the old dictatorial regime. They are men drawn from among the ordinary people. Why kill them?

This article also goes into the rumors that Qatar will privatize Al Jazeera which is worth a read. What about the term militants as used frequently by the Associated Press? Afterall they term members of Ansar al-Sunnah which executed six Sudanese truck drivers as militants. Militants?

It should be noted yet again on this site, that most members of Al Qaida in Iraq are in fact not Iraqi therefore they are not fighting for their country rather to create a country of their own under Sharia Law.

It appears that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi has taken yet another page out of the book of Osama Bin Laden and released an audio tape threatening the United States. Yes, nothing new but a new medium.

“You, Bush, we will not rest until we avenge our dignity,” the voice said. “We will not rest while your army is here as long as there is a pulse in our veins.”

Last I checked, it’s hard to rest for someone who is having to move from house to house every few hours which is exactly what Zarqawi is having to do. It’s also hard to rest when you are plotting to kill innocent Iraqis on their way to work, on their way to school and while they are shopping like Zarqawi and Al Qaida in Iraq has been doing for close to two years now.

There’s more and a bit of a different interpretation of the above line.

According to Zarqawi, the American war in Iraq has been a failure and as a consequence, fear forced “the American enemy to open a dialogue with the mujahideen….” The message calls for Muslim brothers to refuse capitulation to this “deceit” and continue to carry out jihad against American forces, stating: “Attack from your bases with the help of God. Don’t let a convoy pass. Convert their nights to days.”

Specifically addressing President George W. Bush, calling him a “Dog of the Byzantines,” Zarqawi promises: “Your decisions will not be fulfilled. Your army will not enjoy a good and satisfactory life, as long as we have live veins and pulses of the heart. We are coming with the help of Allah.”

A failure? That all depends on what our goals in Iraq were. Considering Iraq is on the way towards a full Democratic government I could hardly call that a failure. Speaking of a group failing though, Al Qaida in Iraq failed to start a civil war like they have tried repeatedly by attacking Shiite religious holidays. They failed to prevent national elections. They failed to prevent a new cabinet being formed in Iraq. They have failed to push out the United States or any other Coalition members against their own accord. There is a failure in Iraq, but that failure goes by the name of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.

It appears that Google is on the verge of changing it’s search engine capabilities to weigh a news organization’s credibility to garner a higher search ranking.

The new search engine would rate news organisations according to the authority of their reports, New Scientist reports today. At present, the Google news search engine ranks entries by the number of times that a report refers to the search term typed-in or places the most recent items first. Articles from large news organisations with considerable authority, such as the BBC, are not given any more weight that less reliably sourced items.

I’m not sure how they could do this, but expect CBS to be on page 30 from here on out.

Communists on a “consensus” . . .

“Any reform proposal shy of 90 percent or greater support and endorsement can hardly qualify as a consensus proposal,” [Chinese UN Ambassador] Wang said.

To put that in perspective, there are 12 member countries to the UN Security Council. That would mean 11 of those countries would have to agree to the reform in order for China to be happy with the outcome. One should remind China that the UN operates under a more Democratic model than their Communist country and in a Democratic model one country does not rule all.

According to CNN, a source has relayed information that the three Romanian journalists held hostage in Iraq are still alive despite the captors’ insistence they would be killed without a suitable negotiation for their release. The time period in which this group demanded negotiations take place expired yesterday.

Romania had appealed to the abductors to extend a Wednesday 1600 GMT deadline by which they would kill the three unless the staunch U.S. ally withdrew its 800 soldiers from Iraq.

The government has not said whether it would pull out despite increasing public pressure and calls by the opposition to save Prima TV reporter Marie Jeanne Ion, 32, cameraman Sorin Miscoci, 30, and Romania Libera daily journalist Ovidiu Ohanesian, 37.

“The three are alive and Romanian authorities have asked for the early release of Marie Jeanne Ion, hoping for sensitivity because she is a woman,” a source close to the Romanian authorities involved in solving the crisis told Reuters.

As I’ve said here before, I believe this to be a kidnapping for ransom and that the intention of this group which took the quartet hostage does not want to kill them. That said however, it still does not mean the group will not sell the hostages to a terrorist group which could execute them for propoganda purposes.

Yet another milestone in the new Democratic Iraq. Only one day after Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari submitted his pick for an Iraqi cabinet, Iraq’s parliament has ratified the picks.

Lawmakers earlier said the Cabinet would include 17 Shiite Arab ministers, eight Kurds, six Sunnis and a Christian. Among them were six women, responsible for seven portfolios, according to Thursday’s announcement.

President Jalal Talabani and his two vice presidents signed off on the list before Thursday’s historic vote.

Shiites make up 60 percent of Iraq’s 26 million people. The Kurds make up 20 percent, and the Sunni Arabs, who largely stayed away from the elections either in boycott or for fear of attacks, are roughly 15 percent to 20 percent.

There are still two parliament positions to be filled and if these positions are filled as representative of the Iraqi population like the other 32 postions were, expect the later two to be Shiites. Regardless of whether or not al-Jaafari submitted his picks due to pressure from the United States to finally do so to help curb the insurgency, this is a historic day for Iraqis and Democratic-loving people accross the Middle East.

Blogging will be light today because it is my birthday, the big 2-7, and I’ve got work and other engagements to tend to. That does not mean that ITB is closed for the day, rather that I will not be posting my usual amount of posts.

In an effort to keep my readers engaged, I offer the following video of a terrorist attack in Iraq found on a radical Islamic message board by a tipster. I would not say the video is graphic, but then again I’ve seen so many of these that I’ve almost grown apathetic to these types of attacks.

I said ‘almost.’ This one is different than many of the other IED attacks that I’ve seen in that we hear the terrorists call out the now familiar Allah Akhbar but we also hear them laugh away. It appears to me to be a group of Iraqis investigating a strange object in the road while at least two terrorists are recording their moves and readying the bomb. Following the first explosion, more Iraqis run to the scene in order to help out their fallen compatriots only to have the terrorists readying up another explosion all the while laughing. It is truly disturbing that the terrorists are targeting innocent Iraqis in the first place, but also that they laugh while killing and/or maiming ten or more Iraqis.

You may view the video here. With that said, please bare with me today and I will post when I can.

In a bit of a follow up to my previous post detailing two different conclusions from the exact same report regarding a possible move of WMDs from Iraq to Syria in the days leading up to the start of the war in Iraq, The Independent is now reporting why Charles Dueffler had to cut short his investigation into if the alleged WMDs were transfered to Syria which is outlined in the report.

The American who led the hunt for Iraq’s missing weapons of mass destruction has revealed that the investigation was cut short after he was targeted by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the militant leader in an attack that left two people dead. The head of the Iraq Survey Group, Charles Duelfer, has reported that his investigation into the possible transfer of WMD to Syria had been wound up because of the “declining security situation”.

But, in an interview with The Independent, Mr Duelfer said that Zarqawi had claimed responsibility for the car-bomb attack on his convoy on 6 November 2004. “A car-bomb tried to get me and my follow car,” Mr Duelfer said. “Two of my guards were killed and one was badly wounded. My hearing’s not been right since.”

I am not prepared to argue whether or not Iraq had WMDs and if they did they were transfered to Syria. I have done so in the past regarding satellite images showing 18 trucks moving to Syria days prior to the invasion. Furthermore, one could argue why Charles Dueffler was targeted in the first place and draw several conclusions based upon where a good portion of terrorists enter Iraq from and where the Saddam loyalist leadership is believed to be based. Again, I will not do that because frankly any assertions either way would be nothing more than rumormongering.

I feel the time has expired for me to try to assert any position and frankly it matters not in the grand scheme of things. It does however matter that some in the media elite have tried to spin the conclusions of the report to whichever means suits their fancy.

Dueffler also responded to The Independent regarding the alleged pressure upon him to both find WMDs in Iraq or find a direct link that there were WMDs in Iraq that were possibly moved to Syria in which The Independent reports Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has asserted in the past.

“There was political interest, but that’s not the same as political pressure,” he said. “There was a desire on the part of capitals to find WMD. It would have made everyone’s life much easier. But the view was: let the chips fall where they may.”

While the case is not closed on whether any WMDs were moved to Syria prior to the start of the war, though in all probability we will never know the conclusive truth, the case should be shut on any type of political pressure conspiracy theories in which several media outlets have thrown out there which reasonably have originated in certain Democrats’ political camps.

Sure, public perception manilpulation is a mainstay of the press, in fact one could say it is their sole purpose (influencing public perception does not have to be editorializing the news rather it can be simply informing the public), however each time I see multiple articles on the exact same news story with completely different points stressed and hiding certain other fact it does disgust me. I do admit that I feel the need to stress certain points as well, but I also feel that I have done a pretty good job in both relaying contradictory points and exposing my pre-existing beliefs. The media does not do either well.

Rusty Shackleford, wrote a post on this matter yesterday that pretty much sums much of this information up. His conclusion is similar to mine in that the jury is on an extended leave on whether or not any WMDs were sent West into Syria.

Update:
Following more on the political aspect of suspected WMDs in Iraq, former CIA Director George Tenet now says he regrets using the words “slam dunk” refering to the CIA’s belief Iraq had WMDs.

“Those were the two dumbest words I ever said,” Tenet told about 1,300 people at a Kutztown University forum Wednesday.

[snip]

Tenet, who left the CIA in July after seven years as director, also said apathy toward terrorism — including congressional restrictions and budget and personnel cuts — had sapped U.S. intelligence efforts for most of the last decade.

“The atrophy was tremendous,” said Tenet, 52. “We were nearly bankrupt.”

As argued on this site multiple times, following the conclusion of the Cold War, U.S. intelligence was gutted of funds leaving the country vulnerable to attack. Yet again the words of Tenet disprove those same Democratic talking points that were commonplace during this past election cycle and sadly still come out from time to time today.