ÿþ<html> <head> <meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html;charset=iso-8859-1"> <title>OnlineColumnist®.com: Putin Punishes Georgia</title> <meta name="generator" content="Adobe GoLive 4"> <style type="text/css"> .style3 { height: 26px; } .MsoNormal {} h1 {margin-bottom:.0001pt; page-break-after:avoid; font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; font-weight:normal; text-decoration:underline; text-underline:single; margin-left: 0in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 0in; } .style4 { font-size: large; font-weight: bold; font-family: Arial; } .style6 { text-decoration: underline; } .style7 { font-size: x-large; font-weight: bold; } </style> </head> <body bgcolor="white" vlink="black"> <center> &nbsp;<table cool width="624" height="2719" border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" gridx="16" showgridx gridy="16" showgridy> <tr height="79"> <td width="133" height="118" rowspan="2" valign="top" align="left" xpos="0"> <a href="aboutdiscobolos.html"><img height="110" width="62" src="images/discobolos.logo.transp.gif" border="0"></a></td> <td width="7" height="118" rowspan="2"></td> <td width="482" height="79" colspan="2" valign="top" align="left" xpos="140"><img height="75" width="450" src="images/banner.GIF"></td> <td width="1" height="118" rowspan="2"></td> <td width="1" height="79"><spacer type="block" width="1" height="79"></td> </tr> <tr height="39"> <td width="182" height="39"></td> <td width="300" height="39" valign="top" align="left" xpos="322"><a href="aboutdiscobolos.html"><img height="14" width="267" src="images/divisionofNEW.GIF" border="0"></a></td> <td width="1" height="39"><spacer type="block" width="1" height="39"></td> </tr> <tr> <td width="624" colspan="6" valign="top" align="left" xpos="0" class="style3"> <table border="0" width="100%" bgcolor="black" cellspacing="0"> <tr> <td> <table border="0" width="100%" bgcolor="#99ffcc" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="4"> <tr> <td align="center"> <div align="left"> <a href="index.html"><font face="Arial,Helvetica,Geneva,Swiss,SunSans-Regular" size="2"><strong> HOME</strong></font></a><font face="Arial,Helvetica,Geneva,Swiss,SunSans-Regular" size="2"><strong> &#8226; <a href="articlesindex.html">ARTICLES</a> &#8226; <a href="books.html">BOOKS</a> &#8226; <a href="teflon.html"> THE </a><a href="teflon.html">TEFLON</a><a href="teflon.html"> REPORT</a> &#8226; <a href="mailto:letters@onlinecolumnist.com"> REACTIONS</a> &#8226; <a href="aboutdiscobolos.html">ABOUT DISCOBOLOS</a></strong></font></div> </td> </tr> </table> </td> </tr> </table> </td> </tr> <tr height="2"> <td width="133" height="2">&nbsp;</td> <td width="489" height="2576" colspan="3" rowspan="2" align="left" xpos="133" content valign="top" csheight="2573"> <p class="style4">&nbsp;</p> <p class="style4">Suicidal Brainwashing</p> <p><b><font face="Arial,Geneva,Helvetica">by John M. Curtis</font></b><font face="Arial,Helvetica,Geneva,Swiss,SunSans-Regular"><b><a href="books.html"><br> </a></b></font><font face="Arial,Helvetica,Geneva,Swiss,SunSans-Regular"><b> (310) 204-8700</b></font></p> <p><font size="2" face="Arial,Helvetica,Geneva,Swiss,SunSans-Regular"><i>Copyright Jan.. 9, 2010<br>All Rights Reserved. </i></font>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; </p> <bAbout the Author</u> <p class="MsoNormal"> &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<span class="style7">W</span>hen Sirhan Bishara Sirhan, a 24-year-old Palestinian born in Jerusalem but raised in the States since age 12, assassinated Robert F. Kennedy June 5, 1968, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was back in the headlines.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">&nbsp; </span>Exactly one year earlier, Israel began June 5, 1967 what was known as the Six-Day War, ending June 10, 1967, when Israeli Defense Forces repelled Arab armies of Jordan, Syria and Egypt, supported by Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Morocco and Tunisia.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">&nbsp; </span>When the dust settled, Israel had taken Egypt s Gaza Strip and Sinai Peninsuala, Syria s Golan Heights and Jordan s West Bank, land now called  occupied territories.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">&nbsp; </span> While Sirhan regarded himself a Christian, he admitted his blinding hatred of RFK for his support of Israel.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">&nbsp; </span>Much was made by Siran s defense counsel about his alleged  mental illness, causing a break with reality that led to the assassination.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">&nbsp;&nbsp; </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"> <![if !supportEmptyParas]>&nbsp;<![endif]><span style="mso-tab-count:1">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; </span>While RFK s murder was regarded as a political assassination, Sirhan gave the first clues of the Arab extremism that would come not from Christians but a growing Muslim majority, stymied by corrupt and failed governments.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">&nbsp; </span>Fast forwarding 42 years later, a 33-year-old Jordanian doctor Humam Khalili Abu Mulai al-Balawi, walked into to CIA headquarters Dec. 30, 2009 at Forward Operating Base Chapman near Khost along the Afghan-Pakistan border and blew himself up, killing seven CIA officers and a Jordanian intelligence official.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">&nbsp; </span>What makes the al-Balawi situation so exceptional was his medical education.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">&nbsp; </span>Unlike al-Balawi, most suicide bombers are younger and less educated.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">&nbsp; </span>While al-Qaeda leaders come from wealthy families, like Saudi Arabian Osama bin Laden or his Egyptian lieutenant Ayman al-Zawahiri, they don t volunteer for suicide missions.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> <![if !supportEmptyParas]>&nbsp;<![endif]><span style="mso-tab-count:1">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; </span>Al-Balawi was recruited in prison by the Jordanian Security Directorate, looking to infiltrate al-Qaeda.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">&nbsp; </span> Since graduating a Turkish medical school in 2002 and returning to Jordan to practice medicine, al-Balawi was involved with jihadists Web sites operating under the <i>nom de plume</i> Abu Dajana al-Khorasani.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">&nbsp; </span> When will my words drink from my blood.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">&nbsp; </span>I feel my words have expired, and to those who preach jihad, I advise you not to fall into my dilemma and nightmare I have that I may die one day in my bed. . . said al-Balawai shortly before his suicide bombing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">&nbsp; </span>Jordanian and CIA officials looked the other way while al-Balawi promised himself as a suicide bomber.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">&nbsp; </span> Balawi s radical involvement eluded Jordanian and U.S. security, permitting him without clearance to enter CIA Forward Operating Base Chapman.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">&nbsp; </span>His suicide bombing raised questions of Taliban or al-Qaeda infiltration.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> <![if !supportEmptyParas]>&nbsp;<![endif]><span style="mso-tab-count:1">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; </span>What al-Balawi and Sirhan had in common was neither their Muslim faith nor the different societies in which they grew up but their paranoia, hatred and fanaticism that led them to commit murder.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">&nbsp; </span>Sirhan wanted to avenge the death of Palestinians by murdering Kennedy, a political symbol of Zionist sympathy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">&nbsp; </span>New reports about al-Balawi indicate he idolized Osama bin Laden, the terrorist mastermind of Sept. 11, whose criminal enterprise has attracted disenfranchised Muslims seeking jihad and immortality.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">&nbsp; </span>His Internet postings should have alerted Jordanian and U.S. intelligence that he was radicalized and dangerous.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">&nbsp; </span>U.S. and Jordanian spy agencies, blindly pursuing leads to infiltrate al-Qaeda, ignored al-Balawi s radical roots, opening the door to his Christmas Day massacre.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">&nbsp; </span>CIA and Jordanian officials had every obvious clue that al-Balawi was a dangerous terrorist.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> <![if !supportEmptyParas]>&nbsp;<![endif]><span style="mso-tab-count:1">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; </span>When mass murderers borrow a cause or political ideology they re somehow glamorized by the news media.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">&nbsp; </span> There s no real difference between serial killers or mass murderers like Charles Manson, the leader of a doomsday cult called the  Manson Family that targeted the rich-and-famous when his followers struck Aug. 9, 1969 murdering director Roman Polanski s eight-and-a-half-month pregnant wife actress Sharon Tate, hairstyling-entrepreneur Jay Sebring and coffee heiress Abigail Folger.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">&nbsp; </span>While Manson didn t wield the knife, he was convicted of murder June 25, 1971.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">&nbsp; </span>Bin Laden and al-Zawahiri don t sacrifice themselves, only direct others like al-Balawi to commit mass murder.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">&nbsp; </span>On closer inspection, Manson and al-Balawi share the same hatred and paranoia that leads them to murder.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">&nbsp; </span> Religious or secular ideology provides convenient excuses to psychotic killers.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> <![if !supportEmptyParas]>&nbsp;<![endif]><span style="mso-tab-count:1">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; </span>Looking at the bigger picture, cult leaders, mass murderers and Islamic terrorists have a lot in common, joined at the hip by their paranoia, hatred and feeble justifications for committing homicide.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">&nbsp; </span>There s nothing more legitimate about Islamic extremists over garden-variety serial killers and mass murderers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">&nbsp; </span> I never want to be in Gaza more than not or to become a suicide bomber who would drive a taxi that would take as many Jews to hell as I can, al-Balawi wrote in a recent Web posting, unfortunately too late for the CIA to save itself from a premeditated rampage.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">&nbsp; </span>Manson, too, felt justified sending his programmed assassins out to massacre his innocent bystanders.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">&nbsp; </span>Defining serial killing or mass murder as  terrorism or  jihad doesn t change its criminality.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">&nbsp; </span>Calling Islamic killers  martyrs tortures logic and does nothing to advance the understanding of how educated people commit heinous crimes.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> <![if !supportEmptyParas]>&nbsp;<![endif]><span class="style6">About the Author </span> </p> <p class="MsoNormal"> <b>John M. Curtis</b> writes politically neutral commentary analyzing spin in national and global news.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">&nbsp; </span>He s editor of OnlineColumnist.com and author <i>of <a href="books.html">Dodging The Bullet</a></i> and <i><a href="books.html">Operation Charisma</a></i>.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"> &nbsp;</p> </td> <td width="1" height="2576" rowspan="2"></td> <td width="1" height="2"><spacer type="block" width="1" height="2"></td> </tr> <tr height="2574"> <td width="133" height="2574" valign="top" align="left" xpos="0"><img height="172" width="111" src="images/johninframe3.jpg"></td> <td width="1" height="2574"><spacer type="block" width="1" height="2574"></td> </tr> <tr height="1" cntrlrow> <td width="133" height="1"><spacer type="block" width="133" height="1"></td> <td width="7" height="1"><spacer type="block" width="7" height="1"></td> <td width="182" height="1"><spacer type="block" width="182" height="1"></td> <td width="300" height="1"><spacer type="block" width="300" height="1"></td> <td width="1" height="1"><spacer type="block" width="1" height="1"></td> <td width="1" height="1"></td> </tr> </table> <table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="2" width="597"> <tr> <td><font size="1" face="Arial,Geneva,Helvetica"> <hr noshade size="1"> </font><a href="index.html"><font face="Arial,Helvetica,Geneva,Swiss,SunSans-Regular" size="2"><strong> Home</strong></font></a><font face="Arial,Helvetica,Geneva,Swiss,SunSans-Regular" size="2"><strong> || <a href="articlesindex.html">Articles</a> || <a href="books.html">Books</a> || <a href="teflon.html">The Teflon Report</a> || <a href="mailto:letters@onlinecolumnist.com"> Reactions</a> || <a href="aboutdiscobolos.html">About Discobolos</a></strong></font> <div align="left"> <p><font size="1" face="Arial,Helvetica,Geneva,Swiss,SunSans-Regular">This site designed, developed and hosted by the experts at</font><font size="2" face="Arial,Helvetica,Geneva,Swiss,SunSans-Regular"> <a href="http://www.cmeonline.net" target="_blank"><img height="30" width="138" src="images/cmelogoANIM.gif" border="0" align="absmiddle"></a></font></p> </div> <p><font size="2" face="Arial,Helvetica,Geneva,Swiss,SunSans-Regular">©1999-2005 <a href="aboutdiscobolos.html"> Discobolos Consulting Services, Inc.</a><br> (310) 204-8300<br> All Rights Reserved. </font></td> </tr> </table> </center> </body> </html>