200 Women, Children rescued from the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ

Source
April 6, 2008 11:12 a.m. EST

Eldorado, TX (AHN)-- Some 200 women and children have been evacuated from the West Texas retreat owned by polygamist leader Warren Jeffs since Friday, but local authorities are still on the lookout for other members,including the 16-year-old girl whose abuse complaint triggered the massive operations.

Allison Palmer, assistant district attorney for the 51st Judicial District, said state troopers, child protection services and emergency personnel came in prepared for the worst case scenario since searching the temple presented a possible point of contention with the sect members, who don't allow nonbelievers inside.

Fortunately the days-long effort ended with neither injuries or violence. Authorities and Child Protective Service workers have begun interviewing the 46 young women and 137 children who have been removed from the complex so far. CPS official Marleigh Meisner said 18 of the children have been placed in state care because they either had been abused or were in imminent danger of abuse.

"We're really, really trying to be aware that their whole world has changed. We're trying to be sensitive to the fact that we've taken them from their surroundings," Meisner told the Houston Chronicle in an interview.

Also on Saturday, a San Angelo-based prosecutor said a man named in a Texas search and arrest warrant was being questioned by police in another state.

The warrant was issued after authorities received reports that the man had married the now 16-year-old girl who tipped the CPS off on the plight of women living inside the YFZ ranch. The girl is said to have an 8-month-old baby.

On Friday, police and the CPS served warrants at the 1,700-acre property located 160 miles northwest of San Antonio, following the girl's complaint.

The ranch, named Yearning For Zion, houses members of the 10,000-strong Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. It has been led by 52-year-old Warren Jeffs since 2002. The group is one of several that broke away after the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints renounced polygamy in 1890.

Jeffs is currently imprisoned in Kingman, Arizona, awaiting trial on charges of being an accomplice to four counts of incest and sexual conduct with a minor.

He was sentenced on similar charges in November to two consecutive sentences of five years to life in prison in Utah.

Mayawati jealous of Rahul's successful visits: Congress

The Congress on Monday hit back at BSP chief Mayawati for her allegation that Rahul Gandhi takes bath with a "special soap" after his visit to Dalit homes, saying she was "jealous" and "scared" of the "extremely successful" visits of the young leader.

"I might not use such language as some other person or party. They are jealous and scared of the extremely successful visits of Rahul Gandhi," AICC spokesman Abhishek Singhvi told reporters.

"Instead of shedding crocodile tears for such groups, Rahul Gandhi has shown true concern for them," he said.

In a new low in the war of words with Congress, the UP Chief Minister claimed that Gandhi takes bath with a "special soap" after his visits to Dalit homes.

"I don't want to react in the same idiom and make the same choice of words which have been used because I don't believe in this. I believe that in democracy there must be dignity of discourse," Singhvi said.

He said if Gandhi's "extremely successful" 'yatras' is causing alarm and "stomachache" to someone or some political party, then "I could only say it reflects their own inherited insecurity and does not have anything to do with Rahul Gandhi, who in a very candid, sincere, and an open person."

Let's worry about Islamofascism : Kanchan Gupta (Pioneer)

Daily Pioneer

The resolution adopted by Muslim theologians representing the various schools of Islam at the All-India Anti-terrorism Conference organised by Darul Uloom, Deoband, 'denouncing' terrorism but condoning radical Islam's ghastly excesses, apart from remaining silent on Islamist terrorism in India which continues to extract a terrible price, is of a piece with the Observatory Report on Islamophobia released by the Organisation of Islamic Conference at its recent meeting in Dakar, Senegal. Both documents seek to justify manufactured Muslim rage and lay the blame for the resultant death and destruction at the doors of everybody else but Muslims.

It is ironical that Darul Uloom, Deoband, should have taken it upon itself to preach to others the virtues of tolerance - Deobandis are known for neither tolerating others or their faith nor allowing Muslims the freedom to subscribe to modernism and its attendant values. Indeed, Deobandi madarsas at home and abroad, especially in Pakistan, are known to breed Islamofascists whose dark thoughts and darker deeds generate Islamophobia against which the OIC has demanded an international law. Of course, Islamofascism must remain unrestrained and Islamofascists must be allowed the right to practice their ideology of hate. To contest this would amount to Islamophobia, and Islamophobes, as we have now been told, have no right to exist. So, like the proverbial lamb, we should meekly surrender to our slaughter. The least we can do is believe the bogus declaration issued by mullahs who gathered at Darul Uloom, Deoband.

Here's a confession: There was a time of innocence when I believed in the thesis that there is more than one Islam. There were those with whom you could swap ideas, share jokes and even the cup that cheers. A decade later, during which time I spent three years in Cairo and travelled more than once into the heart of Islam - well, almost, since non-Muslims are not allowed beyond Jeddah, the gateway to Mecca and Medina - I stand converted to the view that any talk of there being a moderate Islam or Islam as a religion of peace merely because of the salutation sa'laam is so much bunkum.

In any event, the ummah sees Islam as a religion that demands absolute submission, which is not really the same as a religion that is predicated on peace and equality. And although the Quran does not stress on compulsion, it does not overflow with kindness towards those who do not submit to god's will either. The best they can hope for is to be protected by a treaty (dhimmah), which in this day and age would mean unlimited appeasement, and the privileges of the dhimmi are purchased by paying jiziya apart from humiliating conditions of subservience, for instance communal budgeting and a 'Muslim first' policy, as is being done in our country.

The manufactured rage over Pope Benedictine's comments at a German university about how the Sword of Islam cleared the way for Islam's march beyond Arabia - he was quoting from an obscure Byzantine text - revived memories of the late Aurobindo Ghosh (he spent his last years waging an intellectual battle against Islamofascism from his perch in Texas) and his painstaking research to prove that Islam and peace never co-existed; that the sword of Islam is as much a reality today as it was in the distant past. In a sense, he was right, as much as the Byzantine text the Pope quoted is correct in pitilessly stating a fact that we tend to overlook in our zeal to draw distinctions between moderate and fanatical Islam to cover up for the crimes of the latter more than anything else.

Indeed, India's history records this fact in the most lurid colours. The mass slaughter of Hindu men and enslavement of Hindu women and children, the destruction of Hindu antiquities and temples (of which the best examples are Somnath, Ayodhya, Kashi and Mathura), the brutal efforts to efface Hindu tradition and the rapacious means adopted to expand the frontiers of Islamic rule - Jadunath Sarkar and RC Majumdar have chronicled how Muslim invaders, and later those who sat on the masnad of Delhi, were relentlessly engaged in waging jihad against Hindus - are too well-known to require elaboration.

The bloodletting in Jammu & Kashmir, the ethnic cleansing of the Valley to lay the foundation of Nizam-e-Mustafa, the bombings in Mumbai and elsewhere, the persecution of Hindus in Bangladesh and Malaysia by preachers of fanatical Islam who have now come to dominate the centrestage of politics in those countries and the pathetic, craven approach of accommodation and concession adopted by the political class of India which was, and continues to be, reluctant to confront the truth, should fashion any honest critique of Islamism and highlight its fascist character. This is not about indulging in Islamophobia, which so agitates the OIC and its cheerleaders, but about coming to grips with the true dimensions of Islamofascism, which should be of over-riding concern for those who believe in freedom and cherish the values of modernism that collectively form the foundation of free and plural societies.

Yes, there will be strident criticism and staunch opposition to any attempt to expose Islamofascism for what it is. And the most strident criticism and the staunchest opposition will not come from the OIC and the mullahs of Darul Uloom, Deoband, but from those who wilfully ignore facts to foist fiction which encourages bigoted hate mongers to typecast those who are appalled by Islamofascism as Islamophobes. The protest will primarily come from two quarters:

• The Lib-Left intelligentsia, which continues to labour under the self-perpetuating myth that all of Islam is a religion of peace and only an insignificant, fringe minority is to be blamed for distorting the great faith that was born in the sterile sands of Arabia; and,

• The so-called moderate Muslims who till now have skilfully used doublespeak to position themselves as representatives of the ummah, more so in liberal democracies. Their status is now seriously threatened by those who have no hesitation in acknowledging the true nature of Islam both as a faith and a weapon of subjugation.

Those who believe in liberty and freedom of thought need not fear either. Being charged with Islamophobia is a small price to pay for securing our future.

Police: Girl Dies After Parents Pray for Healing Instead of Seeking Medical Help

Article

WESTON, Wis. — An 11-year-old girl died after her parents prayed for healing rather than seek medical help for a treatable form of diabetes, police said Tuesday.

Everest Metro Police Chief Dan Vergin said Madeline Neumann died Sunday.

"She got sicker and sicker until she was dead," he said.

Vergin said an autopsy determined the girl died from diabetic ketoacidosis, an ailment that left her with too little insulin in her body, and she had probably been ill for about 30 days, suffering symptoms like nausea, vomiting, excessive thirst, loss of appetite and weakness.

The girl's parents, Dale and Leilani Neumann, attributed the death to "apparently they didn't have enough faith," the police chief said.

They believed the key to healing "was it was better to keep praying. Call more people to help pray," he said.

The mother believes the girl could still be resurrected, the police chief said.

Telephone messages left at the Neumann home by The Associated Press were not immediately returned.

The family does not attend an organized church or participate in an organized religion, Vergin said. "They have a little Bible study of a few people."

The parents told investigators their daughter last saw a doctor when she was 3 to get some shots, Vergin said. The girl had attended public school during the first semester but didn't return for the second semester.

Officers went to the home after one of the girl's relatives in California called police to check on her, Vergin said. She was taken to a hospital where she was pronounced dead.

The relative was fearful the girl was "extremely ill, dire," Vergin said.

The girl has three siblings, ranging in age from 13 to 16, the police chief said.

"They are still in the home," he said. "There is no reason to remove them. There is no abuse or signs of abuse that we can see."

The girl's death remains under investigation and the findings will be forwarded to the district attorney to review for possible charges, the chief said.

The family operates a coffee shop in Weston, which is a suburb of Wausau, Vergin said.

Just horrible. Not feeding a child is abuse. Not properly clothing a child is abuse. Keeping a child confined is abuse. Not seeking medical attention for your child when they are ill/dying, Abuse or no abuse? High time we start using our brains.

Banana newspaper (Times of India) defies common sense

Rape slur: Army officers recalled from Congo (Times of India - Banana Newspaper Update)

Quote:

NEW DELHI: In a major embarrassment to India's proud peacekeeping record, three army officers have been recalled from their posting with the Indian contingent deployed in Congo, as part of the UN peacekeeping mission (MONUC) there, for allegedly indulging in "misconduct and inappropriate behaviour". Sources said defence minister A K Antony has asked army chief General Deepak Kapoor to take "strict action" against the three officers, a lieutenant colonel and two majors, who will be returning to India on March 24, if the ongoing inquiry into the incident proves the allegations. The three officers, who were on a holiday in South Africa, were detained by the police there on March 12 after a 20-year-old woman initially accused of them of raping her at Plettenberg Bay in Pretoria. While the rape charge proved to be false, with the woman later withdrawing her allegation, sources said the three officers had displayed "grossly inappropriate behaviour" during the episode. "It caused India considerable embarrassment when news of the incident came to light during a meeting with a South African delegation on defence cooperation in New Delhi," said a source. {Can ToI publish names rather than relying on anonymous sources? Consider this, my sources tells me that christian/jihadi symphatizers rule the roost at the ToI editorial team.}

How can this be a rape slur if the woman has withdrawn her complaint? Same news but different newspaper and a different headline.

Probe ordered but SA woman withdraws rape charge against Armymen - Daily Pioneer Pioneer News Service | New Delhi Union Defence Minister AK Antony has ordered an enquiry into reported allegation by a South African woman that she was raped by three Indian Army officers when they were holidaying in Pretoria. The three officers, including a Lieutenant Colonel and two Majors, have rejoined duty in Congo as part of the Indian contingent of the UN peacekeeping mission as the South African police reportedly did not find any substance in the allegation, sources said here on Tuesday. The South African woman, who accused the three officers who were holidaying in Pretoria, of rape on March 9 withdrew her complaint and the local police also managed to arrest one person who tried to snatch the bag carried by one of the officers, sources said.

Indians blinded looking for vision of Mary

Indians blinded looking for vision of Mary


Published: March 11, 2008 at 6:40 PM
Print story Email to a friend Font size:KOTTAYAM, India, March 11 (UPI) -- Reports in India of a miraculous image of the Virgin Mary in the sky have led about 50 people to blind themselves by staring at the sun.

The visions are said to appear over the former home of a hotel owner in the Kottayam area in southeast India, The Daily Telegraph reported. One hospital in the district reported 48 patients had been admitted with burned retinas since last week, the British newspaper reported.

Churches have warned their congregations that looking at the sun will cause permanent blindness and have told them the supposed miracle is not one.

Before moving out, the hotel owner reportedly had also claimed to have statues of the Virgin Mary that cried honey and bled oils and perfumes.

Pandit Population in Valley Shrinks to 4000

Srinagar, March 17, KONS:

A noted Kashmiri Pandit leader, Moti Koul of the Kashmir Sangharsh Samiti, today held the state government responsible for what he termed as the pathetic condition of the community, and declared that the situation was not conducive for the Pandits’ return to the valley.

Addressing a press conference here, Koul said that no attention had been paid to the condition of Pandits living as migrants in different states for the past 18 years.

He said that the Pandit population in the valley had been 20,000 ten years ago, but had now shrunk to a mere 4000.

“Only 200 Pandits were recruited into the government service during the past 17 years. And there is no one to care for the half-burnt Pandit houses, broken down temples and untended lands,” he said.

“The present situation is not conducive for the return of the Pandit community to the valley,” he said.

“The community faces difficulties in livelihood, accommodation and economic matters. Their ancestors had constructed many temples which have been reduced to ruin. The government has paid no attention towards the Pandits’ half-burnt homes, run-down temples and abandoned lands for the past 18 years,” he said.

“There is no one to listen to the travails of the Pandits,” he said.

Koul said that the migration of the Pandits was a serious issue, and that the government had taken no steps for their rehabilitation.

Link

Taslima flees Islamic death threats

Truly a moment of shame. Well done to our dhimmi hijda's in the Government of India. Pranab Mukherjee and UPA have 'won'. By the way, where are all ear-jarring, loud mouth 'seculars', 'freedom of expression' peddlers, gone into hiding?
I propose a solution:
1. Burn the constitution and use it as a toilet paper.
2. Next time someone talks about secularism or freedom of expression, shove a foot in his mouth and give him a sound thrashing.
I'm appalled.

From correspondents in New Delhi
March 20, 2008 12:05am

Article from: Agence France-Presse

BANGLADESHI writer Taslima Nasreen has left India after being hounded into hiding by death threats from Islamic extremists, her publisher and friends say.

"Taslima Nasreen flew out of New Delhi this afternoon to Europe for medical treatment,'' her publisher Sibani Mukherjee said.

She said Nasreen had asked her not to reveal the author's exact destination.

Close friends also told said she had left India, and some Indian television stations reported that Nasreen was headed for Canada.

Nasreen was forced to flee Bangladesh in 1994 after radical Muslims accused her of blasphemy over her novel Lajja (Shame') - which depicts the life of a Hindu family persecuted by Muslims in Bangladesh.

The 45-year-old gynaecologist-turned-author - whose predicament is similar to that of Indian-born British author Salman Rushdie - had been seeking permanent residence in India, where she moved after spending time in Europe and the United States.

But New Delhi had stalled the request, fearful of a backlash from the country's 140 million-plus Muslims, and has given the openly atheistic author only six-month visas.

The writer was forced to flee the West Bengal state capital of Kolkata, which she adopted as home in 2004, in November after receiving death threats from radical Indian Muslims and had since been living in hiding in New Delhi under Indian government security protection.

The Indian Government said it had no immediate comment on Nasreen, who also holds a Swedish passport.

The writer said on Tuesday that she hoped to leave for France or Denmark for medical treatment, saying the months in isolation had sent her blood pressure soaring and affected her heart and eyesight.

"I am living like a caged bird,'' she said. "I've become very weak. My eyesight is on the wane. I fear I will become blind unless I move out of here and get my eyes treated.''

Nasreen said she was shadowed at all times by intelligence personnel, was not allowed to see friends, denied timely medical treatment and was living under "virtual house arrest".{Wah, Mr Pranab Mukherjee...jihadis roam the streets while your govt goes after soft targets}

She had sought to go back to Kolkata but the West Bengal State Government said it did not want her back, fearful her return would stir more trouble.

In a statement on Tuesday, Nasreen said Indian authorities had "constantly pressured me mentally to leave the country".

"I was determined I would not leave this country. When they saw it was pointless trying to destroy my mind, they attempted to destroy my body. In this they succeeded by ruining my health, which leaves me with no other alternative but to leave this country,'' she said.

The Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party, the main opposition, has accused the Congress-led Government of forcing Nasreen to leave India because it is worried about losing Muslim voter support with just over a year to go before national elections.

Pseudo secularism at work (ToI style)

ABVP men vandalise Arts dept over history course

ABVP had similarly staged a demonstration in front of the V-C's office against parts of the history syllabus of the BA Programme, which they said made objectionable references to the Ramayan and its characters.

Said Maya John, member of the group, Krantikari Yuva Sangathan: "The rally will be a protest against communalisation of the university and the attack on academic freedom."

Another one from todays(Feb 26, '08) paper but hidden inside the pages is another contradictory but delectable piece.

India voices protest against Mohammed cartoons (No link, from ToI's e-paper page 16)

As outrage over the republication of controversial Danish cartoons spread across the Muslim world, India strongly opposed posting of these cartoons of Prophet Mohammed on YouTube. In a statement, the MEA said, “Hurting of sentiments of any community under the guise of freedom of expression is unacceptable.” TNN

ManMohan rewards Jihadis

Extra-extra, our PM has lost his mental balance and sanity-check is recommended.

PM to reward jihadis

The Pioneer Edit Desk

Indians to foot the bill

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh does not cease to amaze even the most cynical of his critics. Mr Singh's decision to reward the families of jihadis killed by security forces in Jammu & Kashmir is the latest manifestation of his 'Muslims first' policy of appeasing fanatics while debasing the Indian state. During a visit to Jammu & Kashmir last year, he had admonished jawans and officers, who have been keeping separatists at bay by paying a terrible price in terms of loss to life and limb, and sternly told them that he would not tolerate "human rights abuses". Such touching concern for 'human rights', of course, has never been expressed by Mr Singh when innocent men, women and children are butchered by those for whom his heart bleeds so profusely. jihadis are ruthless and rabid; they owe allegiance to groups that promote mass murder in the name of Islam; they are often trained and armed by Pakistan's ISI; they are inspired by the fetid ideology preached by madmen like Osama bin Laden and his psychopathic admirers, among them Maulana Masood Azhar; they have nothing but contempt for secular, democratic India; and, they repudiate everything that this nation stands for. Death is their just desserts. To reward their families, therefore, makes no sense, unless the Prime Minister wants to send out the message that it pays to wage jihad against India. This may fetch him popularity among jihadis -- now there is added incentive for them to indulge in their cruelty apart from the promised pleasures of heaven -- but it can only repulse those who do not subscribe to their warped faith and see no merit, religious or otherwise, in the slaughter of innocent people.

Contrary to what the Prime Minister has claimed, this largesse for the families of jihadis is not about creating a "new future in Jammu & Kashmir". It is about pandering to those elements in Kashmiri society who shamelessly flaunt their support for Pakistan and rejoice every time our security forces suffer loss of lives or Hindus are killed. Since the promised reward comes in an election year, it is also an attempt to garner Muslim votes, although, as this newspaper has stressed more than once, appeasing jihadis and fanatics in the guise of 'Muslim welfare' is grossly unfair to India's Muslims because an overwhelming majority of them have nothing to do with those who rob the Prime Minister of his sleep. What makes Mr Singh's decision particularly loathsome is the official neglect and apathy that have reduced lakhs of Kashmiri Pandits, forced to flee their homes in Kashmir Valley by those whom he now wishes to reward, to penury and worse in their own country. Last year the Prime Minister decided, against the advice of the Army, to pull out troops from their billets and camps in Kashmir Valley just because the separatists wanted it so. As if that were not bad enough, he now wants to 'compensate' the deaths of those waging war against India. What's next on Mr Singh's agenda? To reward criminals who die in police encounters? That would be a logical extension of his appalling 'new future' doctrine. This decision has to be rescinded; the Government of India cannot be held hostage to the remarkable proclivities of someone who has clearly lost sight of what is good for the nation. The public exchequer is not meant for underwriting an accidental Prime Minister's outrageous policies. Much as Mr Singh may find this difficult to believe, India is not Tughlaq raj.