Egypt: Car explodes outside Copt Church ~ 21 dead ~ New Years Eve Mass

(AINA) -- The car explosion that went off in front of Saints Coptic Orthodox Church in Alexandria killed 21 and injured 96 parishioners who were attending a New Year's Eve Mass. According to church officials and eyewitnesses, there are many more victims that are still unidentified and whose body parts were strewn all over the street outside the church. The body parts were covered with newspapers until they were brought inside the church after some Muslims started stepping on them and chanting Jihadi chants (video showing dead bodies and limbs covered with newspapers in the street).

According to eyewitnesses, a green Skoda car pull up outside the church shortly after midnight. Two men got out , one of them talked shortly on his mobile phone, and the explosion occurred almost immediately after they left the scene. On the back of the Skoda was a sticker with the words "the rest is coming" (video of car explosion and Muslims shouting "Allah Akbar").

It was reported that the bomb, locally made, had 100KG of explosives in addition to having nails, glass and iron balls inside. The strength of it not only caused glass panes to be shattered in all the neighborhood, but also made body parts fly into the building's fourth floor, and to the mosque facing the church.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility but officials hastily blamed either Al-Qaida or the Israeli Mousad of being behind the blast, but none of them mentioned the Egyptian state security which is viewed by Copts as the real culprit.

To clear his security forces of negligence, the Minister of Interior said that the blast was an "individual" case, caused by a single suicide terrorist detonating his vest, and has nothing to do with an exploding car. The governor of Alexandria claimed the attack as being aimed at Muslims and Christians alike.

After the blast, traumatized Copts were angered by chants of "Allah Akbar" from Muslims and began hurling stones at the mosque. Immediately security forces which were absent during the car blast and the ensuing events, appeared and starting shooting tear gas at the Copts, and they in turn hurled stones at them, said an eyewitness. Fifteen Copts were rounded up from their homes by the authorities.

After Friday prayers On December 31 and in front of Al Kayed Gohar Mosque in Alexandria, Salafi Muslims held the 17th in the series of demonstrations against the Coptic Church and its Pope Shenouda, repeating the Iraqi Al-Qaeda threats against Egypt's Coptic Church, demanding the release of the two priests' wives, Wafaa Constatine and Camilia Shehata, whom they claim had converted to Islam but were being held against their will by the church in monasteries (AINA 11-12-2010).

Following the massacre of the congregation at Our Lady of Deliverance Church in Baghdad on October 31 2010, Al-Qaida threatened the Coptic Church and demanded the release of Muslim women held by the church, else Christians everywhere would be their target. As a result Egyptian authorities supposedly stepped up protection around Copt places of worship after President Mubarak said he was committed to protecting the Christians "faced with the forces of terrorism and extremism".

"Security should know that those who demonstrated are the hand of Al-Qaida in Egypt," said Hany el-Gezeiry, head of Copts4Egypt. "They should have arrested them to investigate who was behind them. They want to destroy Egypt from inside and the government kept quiet, giving them a free hand to do what they wanted. I believe Al-Qaida achieved what it wanted."

El-Gezeiry asks why this Skoda vehicle was allowed to park in front of the church in an area cordoned off by security, when it was known that Al-Qaeda had already announced its intention of carrying out criminal acts against churches.

Eyewitnesses confirmed that security forces guarding the church withdrew nearly one hour before the blast, leaving only four policemen and an officer to guard such a big church and nearly 2000 people attending the midnight mass. "Normally they would have waited until the mass was over," said el-Gezeiry. He also commented on the Muslim's schadenfreude at the massacre at the church, who were heard chanting "Allah Akbar."

"Is this a victory?" He asks. "Whoever saw this fire and people dying and body parts all over the place and could still chant 'Allah Akbar' is a terrorist."

On January 6 2010, just before the Christmas Eve Massacre in Nag Hammadi, security withdrew its forces from guarding the church a couple of hours before the shooting of the Coptic congregation took place.

Attorney Mamdouh Nakhla, Head of Al-Kalema Human Rights Center, wondered if state security is an accomplice or just too cowardly to confront the Islamists in Egypt who carried out the Church massacre. "The crime is local and those who committed it are known, in addition there was a demonstration on the same day using the same rhetoric like al-Qaida. The Al Mujahedeen website threatens to repeat the attack in more churches. The site has addresses of churches and even how to make a bomb. Does security not know about it?"

"Anyone who says that it was a foreign or Israeli plot is trying to play down the crime and is trying to clear those murderers of this massacre, and I consider them their accomplices," said Nakhla.

Nakhla said that he was preparing a complaint to be presented to President Mubarak asking for the resignation of Interior Minister Habib el Adly for failing in his duty of protecting the Copts, and for not telling the truth by saying that it was a suicide attack by one individual, when everyone could see the detonated car, just to clear his security personnel of the responsibility of letting the Skoda park in front of the church. "This 100KG bomb could not have been transported by one individual as the Interior Minister wants us to believe."

On January 1, the funeral of the 21 people killed in the church massacre took place at St. Mina's Monastery in King Mariout, 50 km from Alexandria. It was attended by representatives of the President, Minsters, the governor of Alexandria, as well as nearly 10,000 Copts who traveled from Alexandria. After the funeral, the Copts, angry with the governor of Alexandria, shouted "resign" and "we do not want you."

By Mary Abdelmassih
http://www.aina.org/news/20110101232613.htm

STUPID PARENTS #3.

"AW, COME ON DAD, IT WAS MY CHRISTMAS PRESENT. PLEASE STOP PLAYING POKER AND LET ME READ MY HARRY POTTER BOOK."

Teahadist-Republicans - treason, unpatriotic and totally immoral

What these Tehadist-Republicans have up their sleeve is nothing short of treason, lack of patriotism and a disregard for the American people’s well-being.

If you think you saw obstructionism and downright sabotage directed at the President, Democrats and the country in general in the past two years…prepare yourself for what is in store. The Teahadist-Republicans have a few more tricks up their sleeve and it should prove disastrous for America.

Conservatives have a legislative agenda for 2011 that will hurt your ability to get or keep a job, your neighborhood's ability to recover from the recession and this country's ability to regain its footing in the global economy.

To keep conservatives from enacting policies that will kill a nascent economic recovery, progressives will have to organize against these top 10 economy killers.

Isaiah J. Poole writes: that these are the top ten Ways The Right Will Wreck The Recovery

1. Repeal of health-care reform.

2. Diminish the federal government's ability to support job-creation.

3. Slash federal infrastructure spending.

4. Dismantle Medicare (and give seniors "vouchers")

5. Undo financial reform, and let the predators run.

6. Support Big Oil and kill green jobs.

7. Don't just cut government waste; cripple government.

8. Amp up the insecurity in Social Security.

9. Starve public education.

10. Don't ask the rich to help reduce the deficit; ask low-income Americans instead.

“If the wealthy aren't being asked to sacrifice something, guess who is. Social Security is the lifeline for America's elderly, but even though it adds nothing to the deficit it is at the forefront of proposals for cutting it. Medical programs for the poor, the Making Work Pay program, and so many other things the government does for our people are the first things suggested by the well-to-do who dominate the inside-the-Beltway commissions and commentariat.”

All of the motivation is pure partisanship, placing the Republican Party’s agenda before family, state and country…and it is simply an agenda that says they want President Obama to only serve one term.

Read more: http://www.ourfuture.org/blogs_chrono/*

WHY 1/1/11 FREAKS US ALL OUT.

If you type in 11:11 to Google you get an amazing 280M hits. For years now people have believed that they have been seeing this number sequence on a regular basis.
Numerologists believe that things linked to the time 11:11 appear more often than can be explained by chance or coincidence, this belief is related to the concept of synchronicity. The number eleven is important in numerology, as it is the first of the Master Numbers.
New Agers believe that it signals a spirit presence and it has mystical powers.


There are sites devoted to 11:11, with people sharing their experiences. A film has even been made to freak us out too.


So where did 11:11 mania start?


The biggest influence of 11:11 mania is ex-Israeli paratrooper, spoonbender, watch stopper and friend of Michael Jackson, Uri Geller, who has been running his website for years discussing the subject. It could be said however that Uri's examples of the 11:11 phenomenon on world events are examples of nonsense reasoning and confirmation bias.


I did notice that while they were showing "Big Brother" you always saw what the housemates had been doing at 11:11 in the highlights show.

So why is 11 a creepy number?


Well, the big event that got everyone going was of course 911. After all the structures themselves were a big 11. If you factor in that the other target was the biggest pentagram in the world you've got your occult/magical connection.

The date of the attack: 9/11 – 9 + 1 + 1 = 11

The first plane to hit the towers was American Airlines Flight AA11. A is the 1st letter in the alphabet so we have again 11:11.

American Airlines Flight 11 - had 11 crew - 2 pilots and 9 flight attendants .

These are just examples. There are loads of sites you can go to if you really want to get freaked out.


World War I ended with an Armistice on November 11, 1918, which went into effect at 11:00 am, the 11th hour on the 11th day of the 11th month of the year. Armistice Day is still observed on November 11 of each year. 11:11.


Apollo 11 was the first manned spacecraft to land on the Moon, even though they had to change the number sequence to make sure it was an 11.


Dr Who has been reincarnated 11 times.


There are 11 spacetime dimensions in M-theory.


There are eleven players in a football team, also in football, internationally, a penalty kick is referred to as the German "Elfmeter" because the penalty spot is 11m from the goal line. That's probably why England can't score them.


Being only one hour before midnight, the eleventh hour means the last possible moment to take care of something, and often implies a situation of urgent danger or emergency. So let's look forward to 2012.
Anyway, I took the precaution of writing this on 2/1/11, so we seem to be over the worst of it. So happy new year everyone.

IT CAN’T HAPPEN IN AMERICA

That is what we used to say in Cuba in 1958

Disturbing as this may sound to you, we are heading in a similar direction. I see all the signs of something that is unpleasantly familiar: the mob mentality, the intimidation, the loss of the power of the vote, the greed, the lies and exaggerations and worst of all the division that exists among Americans.

I would dismiss it and say that it is a temporary condition caused by the frustration of harsh economic times. I could discount it to mean that people are misinformed and are not willing to think for themselves. I could also say that these Teahadist-Republicans are easily misled and will believe anything Fox News tells them…but you see, the problem is more complex than that.

On the one hand we have an oligarchy that is leading them to defend their interests even though these members of the mobs don’t have a pot to piss in or a window to throw it out of. On the other hand we have a country deeply divided by the ignorant-superstitious religious fanatics, the hard-core racist-white supremacist and the rest of us who are progressive liberals or just middle of the road centrists...which seems to be where most Americans are.

What WISEACRE of the daily KOS says about FASCISM:

“When you don't have any say-so in your government, and your representatives don't represent their constituents, and everything is done in secret and no one is accountable, THAT feels like fascism. When you don't feel respected as a citizen with human rights, but more like some asset to bleed to death for the benefit of credit card companies, insurance companies, and banks, WHICH feels fascist.

Fascism isn't in the angry mobs; it's in the structure that makes mobs angry. To me, the Tea Party people are angry conservative populists who have been tricked into blaming liberal scapegoats so they won't notice the plutocrats robbing them blind. As a middle-road populist who loves this country and its ideals, just as much as any conservative, if not more, I wish we could figure out how to somehow find some common ground with others who want the rule of law to apply to the government and the plutocracy, who resent being a resource for exploitation, and who want their damned representatives to represent them.”

As a fourteen year old just finding out about the world and how things worked, I lived in Cuba just about the time Castro came to power; there I witnessed the mobs in the streets, looting the homes and businesses, intimidating people and then coming in to “confiscate” private property. Then there were the horrific firing squads...”PAREDON, PAREDON” was what the crowds were shouting.

One of the favored FASCIST tactics; one who the Castro brothers learned well, was that of manipulating the ignorant crowds and making them go to intimidate a foe. Anyone who opposed the REVOLUTION was labeled a “gusano” (worm) and was either summarily done away with or had a mob of people bused in to stand in front of their houses and yell obscenities and throw manure and the government provided the buses, gave the workers the morning off and maybe either some lunch or snack. This is what is called intimidation by mobs. It worked!

Kristallnacht

Backtrack to the Bush years and we find that President Bush quickly labeled anybody who was opposed to the war as “terrorists and unpatriotic” and we then get to those dark, nightmarish August days during the Congressional recess when the insurance companies invested millions upon millions of dollars to create “grassroots” organizations that would go to town hall meetings and disrupt the civil discourse and attempts by elected officials to be in touch with constituents.

We have also seen how for two years the Republican lawmakers have done absolutely nothing to correct or help clean up the financial and economic mess they created. It is as if it never happened and not only do they obstruct any attempts to fix the problem but they are fervently working towards making President Obama a one term President.

Today marks the anniversary of the Cuban Revolution ascent to power. I thought it would be a good idea to do this post because it has been since 1959 that our equivalent of the Tea Party took power and look at the shape Cuba is in right now more than fifty years later. And we used to say “IT CAN’T HAPPEN IN CUBA” so now I hear: “IT CAN’T HAPPEN IN AMERICA” and I stare into the emptiness of the distance and remember those days of my adolescence.

SOURCE: http://wiseacre.dailykos.com/

PHOTO SOURCE: http://www.newser.com/story/40435/kristallnacht-remnants-found-near-berlin.html

http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/images/brokewin.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Holocaust/kristallnacht.html&usg=__gfgxIZy736k6PgsAdgN2lwBxprU=&h=370&w=459&sz=29&hl=en&start=0&sig2=tuVbwb-_xPiw3Y42_sTaGw&zoom=1&tbnid=eNJorZztQj7PrM:&tbnh=159&tbnw=186&ei=cx0fTbeCLYWClAfn6KTOCw&prev=/images%3Fq%3DPhotos%2Bof%2BKristallnacht%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DX%26biw%3D1008%26bih%3D571%26tbs%3Disch:1&um=1&itbs=1&iact=hc&vpx=311&vpy=190&dur=679&hovh=202&hovw=250&tx=82&ty=72&oei=cx0fTbeCLYWClAfn6KTOCw&esq=1&page=1&ndsp=8&ved=1t:429,r:1,s:0

NOT JUST IMPUNITY…THESE SOBs GOT AWAY WITH BONUSES AND PARACHUTES WORTH BILLIONS

Does anybody know why these people aren't in jail?

Two years before the financial crisis hit, Merrill Lynch confronted a serious problem. No one, not even the bank’s own traders, wanted to buy the supposedly safe portions of the mortgage-backed securities Merrill was creating.

Bank executives came up with a fix that had short-term benefits and long-term consequences. They formed a new group within Merrill, which took on the bank’s money-losing securities. But how to get the group to accept deals that were otherwise unprofitable? They paid them. The division creating the securities passed portions of their bonuses to the new group, according to two former Merrill executives with detailed knowledge of the arrangement.

The executives said this group, which earned millions in bonuses, played a crucial role in keeping the money machine moving long after it should have ground to a halt.

“It was uneconomic for the traders”—that is, buyers at Merrill—“to take these things,” says one former Merrill executive with knowledge of how it worked.

Within Merrill Lynch, some traders called it a “million for a billion”—meaning a million dollars in bonus money for every billion taken on in Merrill mortgage securities. Others referred to it as “the subsidy.” One former executive called it bribery. The group was being compensated for how much it took, not whether it made money.

The group, created in 2006, accepted tens of billions of dollars of Merrill’s Triple A-rated mortgage-backed assets, with disastrous results. The value of the securities fell to pennies on the dollar and helped to sink the iconic firm. Merrill was sold to Bank of America, which was in turn bailed out by taxpayers.

What became of the bankers who created this arrangement and the traders who took the now-toxic assets? They walked away with millions. Some still hold senior positions at prominent financial firms.

Really, this is the main point: the Randian free market profiteers like to say that, well, justice was served because Merrill Lynch failed and paid the price for poor decisions. The problem is that Merrill Lynch is not a person and has not suffered. All the people who took these bribes still got to walk away with their ill-gotten millions and are in many cases still employed by other financial firms, meaning that the disincentive for failure never trickled down. The free market is kind of broken here, don't you think?

I’m waiting for the New York Times to run a sob story on how the crashed economy has affected these guys. Like maybe they had to fire one of the gardeners and give up the $3000 lunches and it makes them very depressed. Perhaps it was more severe than that…they had to give up their third home in the Hamptons…oh, the unfairness, oh the shame of it all! To actually have to give up something for having fucked millions of people and send the country into financial ruin.

And we have many of them to thank; but the one who started it was one of the worst Presidents we ever had.

SOURCE: http://www.dailykos.com/