August 01, 2007, 0:00 a.m.

Silently Martyred
Missionary blood spills, the world yawns.

By Michelle Malkin

The blood of innocent Christian missionaries spills on Afghan sands. The world watches and yawns. The United Nations offers nothing more than a formal expression of “concern.” Where is the global uproar over the human-rights abuses unfolding before our eyes?

For two weeks, a group of South Korean Christians has been held hostage by Taliban thugs in Afghanistan. This is the largest group of foreign hostages taken in Afghanistan since Operation Enduring Freedom began in 2001. What was their offense? Were they smuggling arms into the country? No. Inciting violence? No. They were peaceful believers in Christ on short-term medical and humanitarian missions. Seventeen of the 23 hostages are females. Most of them are nurses who provide social services and relief.

Over the past few days, the bloodthirsty jihadists have demanded that South Korea immediately withdraw troops from the Middle East, pay ransom and trade the civilian missionaries for imprisoned Taliban fighters. The Taliban leaders have made good on threats to kill the kidnapped Christians while Afghan officials plead fecklessly that their monstrous behavior is “un-Islamic.”

Two men, 29-year-old Shim Sung-min and 42-year-old Pastor Bae Hyeong-gyu, have already been shot to death and dumped in the name of Allah. Bae was a married father with a nine-year-old daughter. According to Korean media, he was from a devout Christian family from the island province of Jeju. He helped found the Saemmul Church south of Seoul, which sent the volunteers to Afghanistan.

Across Asia, media coverage is 24/7. Strangers have held nightly prayer vigils. But the human-rights crowd in America has been largely AWOL. And so has most of our mainstream media. Among some of the secular elite, no doubt, is a blame-the-victim apathy: The missionaries deserved what they got. What were they thinking bringing their message of faith to a war zone? Didn’t they know they were sitting ducks for Muslim head-choppers whose idea of evangelism is “convert or die”?

I noted the media shoulder-shrugging about jihadist targeting of Christian missionaries five years ago during the kidnapping and murder of American Christian missionaries Martin and Gracia Burnham in the Philippines. The silence is rooted in viewing committed Christians as alien others. At best, there is a collective callousness. At worst, there is outright contempt — from Ted Turner’s reference to Catholics as “Jesus freaks” to CBS producer Roxanne Russell’s casual insult of former GOP presidential candidate Gary Bauer as “the little nut from the Christian group” to the mockery of GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s Mormon faith.

Curiously, those who argue that we need to “understand” Islamic terrorists demonstrate little effort to “understand” the Christian evangelical missionaries who risk their lives to spread the gospel — not by sword, but through acts of compassion, healing and education. An estimated 16,000 Korean mission workers risk their lives across the globe — from Africa to the Middle East, China, and North Korea.

These are true practitioners of a religion of peace, not the hate-mongers with bombs and AK-47s strapped to their chests who slay instead of pray their way to martyrdom.

© 2007 CREATORS SYNDICATE, INC.

National Review Online

$10 Million Fire at Spokane Fuel Depot a likely act of Muslim terrorists in U.S.

Submitted by admin on Wed, 2007-08-01 10:26. U.S. News

Douglas J. Hagmann, Director

Fire followed surveillance of facility by men of “Middle Eastern” appearance

1 August 2007: For the last few years, the Northeast Intelligence Network - in both print and in radio broadcasts and interviews - has identified oil and gas facilities as prime targets of Muslim terrorists present within the U.S. For just as many years, federal authorities have continued to deny the existence of “any credible threats [by Islamic terrorists to oil and gas targets]” inside the United States. Such denials have been continually issued by federal authorities despite substantial evidence that many such facilities across the United States have been photographed, videotaped, sketched, and subjected to surveillance by men of Middle Eastern appearance. Many incidents of surveillance have been detailed in the HQ INTEL-ALERT Private Intelligence Report, a subscription based investigative report published by the Northeast Intelligence Network. Now, investigators are looking at a likely nexus between Islamic terrorist activities and a fire that destroyed the Whitley Fuel Warehouse, 2733 N. Pittsburg Road, Spokane, Washington on Monday, July 23 2007. That blaze, which started about 5:30 p.m., caused an extensive neighborhood evacuation as well as environmental damage. The fire was reportedly started near a tanker truck and spread to other trucks and barrels filled with petroleum products. Smoke from the fire could be seen throughout Spokane and as far away as Post Falls, Idaho.

Photo courtesy of KXLY TV Channel 4

Federal officials are interviewing witnesses who observed two men of Middle Eastern appearance, described as having beards and wearing turbans, driving a white vehicle in a suspicious manner around the Petro Card Fuel facility located near the intersection of Sprague and Haven in southeast Spokane prior to the fire at the Whitley Fuel Warehouse. An employee at the Petro Card fuel facility was in the company’s yard when he spotted two men in a vehicle checking out the Petro Card fuel distribution center. The employee reported the incident, and the information then provided to the FBI. Although nothing happened at Petro Card, the Whitley Fuel Depot was set ablaze a short time later, causing an estimated $10 million in damages.

Photo courtesy of KXLY TV Channel 4

The American Petroleum Institute is advising its members that fuel yards make an attractive terrorist target because of "the importance of petroleum to national security and the economy, and the industry is a cornerstone of capitalism and western culture.” Meanwhile, surveillance of strategic locations – including oil and fuel depots and other vital assets of our infrastructure, continue to be the subject of surveillance by men frequently described as appearing to be Middle Eastern.

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