Europe's Terrorist War at Home

From Ayaan Hirsi Ali, at WSJ, "Learn from Israel, end the open-borders policy, and dig in for a long war of ideas against Islamists":

As long as Muslims say IS has nothing to with Islam or talk of Islamophobia they are a part of the problem.

— Ayaan Hirsi Ali (@Ayaan) November 15, 2015

French President François Hollande declared the Nov. 13 terrorist attack in Paris an “act of war” by Islamic State, and he was right, if belated, in recognizing that the jihadists have been at war with the West for years. Islamic State, or ISIS, is vowing more attacks in Europe, and so Europe itself—not just France—must get on a war footing, uniting to do whatever it takes militarily to destroy ISIS and its so-called caliphate in Syria and Iraq. Not “contain,” not “degrade”—destroy, period.

But even if ISIS is completely destroyed, Islamic extremism itself will not go away. If anything, the destruction of ISIS would increase the religious fervor of those within Europe who long for a caliphate.

European leaders must make some major political decisions, and perhaps France can lead the way. A shift in mentality is needed to avoid more terror attacks on an even bigger scale and the resulting civil strife. Islamic extremists will never succeed in turning Europe into a Muslim continent. What they may well do is provoke a civil war so that parts of Europe end up looking like the Balkans in the early 1990s.

Here are three steps that European leaders could take to eradicate the cancer of Islamic extremism from their midst...

Keep reading.

Deals on Office Products (BUMPED)

At Amazon, Shop Black Friday Office Deals.

Plus, from Daniel Byman, Al Qaeda, the Islamic State, and the Global Jihadist Movement: What Everyone Needs to Know.

William McCants, The ISIS Apocalypse: The History, Strategy, and Doomsday Vision of the Islamic State.

Erick Stakelbeck, ISIS Exposed: Beheadings, Slavery, and the Hellish Reality of Radical Islam.

Lawrence Wright, The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11.

Europe's Dangerous Refugees

At Der Spiegel, "Paris Attacks: How Great Are the Terror Dangers Posed by Refugees?":

It has now been confirmed that one of the Paris suicide bombers reached Europe disguised as a refugee. Security officials had long felt that such a scenario was unlikely. How big is the risk?

It hasn't taken long for the French authorities to begin learning details as to who was behind Friday night's terrorist attacks in Paris. Several of perpetrators, officials learned over the weekend, are from France, with two having most recently lived in Brussels and two more residing just outside of the French capital. Investigators believe that a 27-year-old Belgian man named Abdelhamid A. was the coordinator of the attacks, which cost the lives of at least 132 people at multiple sites in Paris on Friday evening.

One piece of news regarding the attackers, however, has received a particularly large amount of attention. Not far from the corpse of one of the suicide bombers, a Syrian passport was found. On Monday, French authorities confirmed that the attacker traveled with the passport into the European Union via Greece as a refugee.

The discovery would seem to confirm the fears of many in Germany and Europe that terrorists are among the hundreds of thousands of refugees currently streaming into Europe.

According to a report on Greek radio, a second attacker may also be suspected of having traveled to northern Europe via Turkey and Greece. Thus far, however, there hasn't been an official statement given regarding the second case.

At the moment, only the following is known: The finger prints of the attacker who blew himself up in front of the Stade de France stadium on Friday evening match those taken of the man as he traveled into Greece carrying a Syrian passport. The man, identified on the passport as Ahmad Almohammad, arrived in Greece at the beginning of October via the island of Leros, authorities say. Police officials say that the young man was registered there along with a group of 69 refugees. As part of the registration procedure, his fingerprints were taken, officials said.

On Oct. 7, the 25-year-old, who called himself Ahmad Almohammad, entered Serbia from Macedonia and continued on to Croatia and Austria. The Serbian Interior Ministry issued a statement saying that he was not armed when he traveled through Serbia. According to French justice officials, however, the passport that he was carrying was falsified and had been prepared in Turkey. The confirmation that an attacker traveled into the EU as a refugee confirms a scenario that security officials had long thought possible, but unlikely. After all, Islamic State hardly needs to send assailants into Europe as refugees in order to carry out terrorist attacks on the Continent. Hundreds of Islamists from Germany, along with thousands from other European countries are currently in IS-held regions of Syria and Iraq of their own free will. Because they possess citizenships of European countries, they can return whenever they like. French officials said on Monday that at least three of the suspected attackers had spent time in Syria since the end of 2013 and subsequently returned to France.

In addition, there are large numbers of extremists who grew up in Europe and are prepared to take part in violent attacks here. The attacks in Paris at the beginning of this year on the editorial offices of the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo and on the Jewish supermarket Hyper Casher demonstrate as much. So too does the subsequent attack in Copenhagen, which saw a jihadist who had grown up in Denmark shoot two people to death.

Intended to Mislead?

But there remain a number of open questions. The true identity of the man who traveled into Greece as a refugee with the falsified passport isn't yet known. There are many possibilities. One is that he wasn't a Syrian at all. He may have been an Islamist known to European security officials and who had joined the Islamic State in Syria. For such an Islamist, it may seem easier to enter Europe as a refugee under an assumed identity -- because Syrians who arrive in Europe are almost guaranteed of being granted refugee status.

But there are other questions as well. Why, for example, was the attacker carrying a passport at all? It looks as though Islamic State wanted the passport to be found, which would play into the hands of Islamic State, which has claimed responsibility for the Paris attacks, in two ways. First, it would increase fears in the West due to the large numbers of refugees currently arriving, and it would further divide European society. Secondly, it would discredit the refugees themselves. For Islamic State, refugees are traitors for fleeing the country rather than joining Islamic State for the establishment of a Caliphate.

The passport also raises questions when it comes to the coordination of the terror attacks as well. Most of the attackers were French, that much has become clear. As such, it wasn't a fake refugee who brought terror to Europe. The chief coordinator is thought to be a Belgian man. It is unclear how an attack could have been prepared and organized with an attacker who had only been in Europe for a few weeks. But here too, the available information is sketchy. On Monday, the French government said that the attacks appear to have been planned in Syria...

Keep reading.

CNN just reported that six of the eight attackers traveled to Syria, so I'll be looking for more information on that. Stay tuned.

American Colleges Are Reaping the Progressive Whirlwind

A roundup on campus fascism, from Ed Driscoll, at Instapundit.

ADDED: From William Jacobson, at Legal Insurrection, "Anti-Israel students target UT-Austin Israeli Studies prof after disrupting his speech."

French Authorities Name Belgian National Abdelhamid Abaaoud as Mastermind of #ParisAttacks

At the Guardian UK, "Abdelhamid Abaaoud named as alleged mastermind of Paris terror attacks."

More at WaPo, "Raids spread across France and Belgium amid manhunt for suspects."

Reports: Salah Abdeslam Arrested in Belgium #ParisAttacks

At London's Daily Mail, "Fugitive 'blood brother' 'is arrested in Belgium after fleeing building with his hands in air as police fired tear gas'."

It's going to be a big news day.

After the Fall of the Roman Empire, #ParisAttacks Should Be Warning to the West

From Niall Ferguson, at the Times of London, "Like the Roman empire, Europe has let its defences crumble."

And ungated, at the Australian, "Paris attacks: fall of Rome should be a warning to the West":

I am not going to repeat what you have already read or heard. I am not going to say that what happened in Paris on Friday night was unprecedented horror, for it was not. I am not going to say that the world stands with France, for it is a hollow phrase. Nor am I going to applaud Francois Hollande’s pledge of “pitiless” vengeance, for I do not believe it. I am, instead, going to tell you that this is exactly how civilisations fall.

Here is how Edward Gibbon described the Goths’ sack of Rome in August 410AD: “ ... In the hour of savage licence, when every ­passion was inflamed, and every restraint was removed ... a cruel slaughter was made of the ­Romans; and … the streets of the city were filled with dead bodies ... Whenever the Barbarians were provoked by opposition, they ­extended the promiscuous massacre to the feeble, the innocent, and the helpless …”

Now, does that not describe the scenes we witnessed in Paris on Friday night?

Keep reading.

And beware complacency.

France's President Lied, Frenchmen Died

At FrontPage Magazine, "It’s time to tell the truth about the migrant crisis."

Cal State Long Beach Vigil for Nohemi Gonzalez (VIDEO)

Via Ruptly:



Earlier, "Cal State Long Beach Student Nohemi Gonzalez Killed in #ParisAttacks (VIDEO)."

Keep it Moving, No Islamists to See Here

The left's response to the Paris attacks has been unreal, even more than usual.

Here's just one snapshot, from Matt Labash, at the Weekly Standard:

As a committed, long-standing Twitter detractor, I’ve exhaustively bashed the social networking site for all imaginable crimes, and even unimaginable ones.  But through the gift of hindsight, I admit giving Twitter short-shrift in one department: it tends to work like they say old age does, concentrating your quirks, tics and psychopathologies, making you yourself, only more so.  This is generally not a good thing. Unless you like watching people foul the bed. (And I do!)

Last night, during one of the most widespread, bloodiest terror attacks in European history, it was Dean Obeidallah’s turn. For those unfamiliar with the social-justice comic (a self-cancelling proposition), Daily Beast columnist, and American-Muslim host of XM’s The Dean Obeidallah Show, there, I’ve just familiarized you. His overriding mission, however, is spreading the gospel of the Religion of Peace ®, to combat those who unfairly stereotype Islam as being the Religion of Pieces.

 “I want to be your Muslim friend,” Obeidallah’s written, “so if you don’t have one, follow me on Twitter.”

Since I’m not on Twitter, I couldn’t make new friends with Obeidallah. But as the death toll in Paris kept climbing, I could read his feed. Which was not unlike watching a mental breakdown unspool in real time. Obeidallah started innocuously enough, keeping the victims in his prayers...

Keep reading (tweets are embedded at the piece).

A real meltdown. Pathetic.

Wake Up, Mr. President

At WSJ:

President Obama on Sunday promised to “redouble” U.S. efforts against Islamic State, which shows he isn’t deaf to the political impact of Friday’s murderous assault in Paris. But why should anyone believe him? After years of dismissing the rising terror threat, Mr. Obama needs an epiphany if he doesn’t want to be remembered as the President who allowed radical Islam to spread and prosper.

“It is an act of war that was waged by a terrorist army, a jihadist army, by Daesh [the Arab name for Islamic State], against France,” said French President François Hollande on Saturday, in words that met the moment. Contrast that to Mr. Obama, who on Friday morning told ABC News that “we have contained” Islamic State. Some are saying Mr. Obama is guilty of bad timing, but the truth is worse: The remark is what he believes, or at least what he has wanted Americans to believe.

***
The Paris massacre should mark the end of that self-deception. Jimmy Carter shed his illusions about the Soviet Union after its invasion of Afghanistan in 1979, and Mr. Obama needs a comparable rendezvous with reality. This will be harder for Mr. Obama, a man of great ideological vanity, but perhaps the prospect of defeat for his party in 2016 will force him to see the world more clearly.

For seven years Mr. Obama has used the unpopularity of the Iraq war as a shield for his retreat from antiterror leadership and the Middle East. His periodic drone strikes and his most notable security success, the Osama bin Laden raid, obscured the jihadist danger growing in the wake of America’s departure from Iraq and abdication in Syria.

Mr. Obama also deposed Moammar Gadhafi in Libya but then did almost nothing to help Libyans restore order. Americans saw a glimpse of the gathering storm in the terror attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, but the White House blamed it on an obscure video.

Now Americans can see clearly the spreading infection from Islamic State and a resurgent al Qaeda. It isn’t merely a regional threat, as Mr. Obama once claimed. Its offshoots have spread into North Africa across the Middle East to Afghanistan. The civil war in Syria has spawned a refugee crisis that has descended on Europe and may have provided cover for at least one of the Paris jihadists.

Islamic State also isn’t the “jayvee” terror team, as Mr. Obama once claimed...

Keep reading.

And flashback, "The World Will Blame President Obama If Iraq Falls."

Pre-Dawn Counterterrorism Raids Launched Across France — #ParisAttacks #Toulouse

Telegraph UK is reporting, "Paris attacks: Pre-dawn anti-terror raids launched across country • French jets unleash 'massive' airstrike on Isil in Raqqa • Europe-wide manhunt for suspect on run."

And at the Guardian UK, "Paris attacks: anti-terrorism raids across France as hunt for Salah Abdeslam continues – live":

What we know about the anti-terrorism raids

Information is still patchy but here is what we have gathered from French media reports:

French police are hunting Salah Abdeslam and others believed to have been involved in orchestrating the attacks on Paris on Friday.
It is not certain that the raids in the early hours of Monday morning are directly linked to the attacks on the capital.

Raids are reported to have taken place in Toulouse, Grenoble, Jeumont (on the French-Belgian border), and the Paris suburb of Bobigny.

Reports say at least three people have been arrested in Toulouse, and weapons possibly seized, with further arrests in Grenoble.
In Jeumont, streets were closed off around a building that was being searched. Searches were also carried out in homes in Bobigny.

*****

Anti-terrorism raids and the hunt for suspects

French police continue to hunt for Salah Abdeslam – believed to be one of three brothers involved in Friday night’s attack, who is on the run – and others thought to have been involved in orchestrating the attacks on Paris on Friday.

Overnight raids have taken place in Toulouse, Grenoble, Jeumont (on the French-Belgian border), and the Paris suburb of Bobigny. It is not certain that the raids in the early hours of Monday morning were directly linked to the attacks, but they were carried out under the national state of emergency declared by president François Hollande.

Several arrests have been reported across the locations, with buildings searched. Weapons were reportedly seized in Toulouse...

ADDED:

My colleague Kim Willsher in Paris has more on the overnight raids:

French police and gendarmes carried out a series of raids across the country overnight. From early reports it appears most were part of a general “preventative” anti-terrorist swoop as part of the country’s state of emergency and not directly linked to the search for the perpetrators of the Paris attacks.

The decree made by the French council of ministers at an emergency meeting after the Paris attacks, relating to the first paragraph of the 1955 law on a “state of emergency”, which gives the authorities extraordinary powers to order home searches “day or night”.

In Toulouse, French media reported a “preventative operation” in and around the area that was home to Mohamed Merah, known as the “ride-by killer” who gunned down several soldiers, then attacked children at a Jewish school, murdering a a total of seven people over several days before dying in a police shoot-out in 2012.

At least three people have been taken into police custody. Reports say these were “administrative searches” on properties as part of a general anti-terrorist operation and not part of the Paris attack investigation. Police seized “illegal substances” including cannabis, and one weapon.

In Grenoble and around, Le Dauphiné Libéré newspaper is reporting that units of gendarmes carried out an anti-terrorist operation at around 15 sites during which “more than half a dozen people were arrested and arms seized”. The paper said the operation, which lasted an hour, was part of a national swoop.

Another local newspaper in the north of France in the Pas de Calais region is reporting a raid at the town of Jeumont near the border with Belgium. Reports suggest gendarmes in “around 50 vans” swooped on the town, but it is not known whether the raid is directly linked to the Paris attacks, or being carried out as part of a general operation in France.

There was another overnight operation by gendarmes at Bobigny a suburb of Paris. Again details are sketchy...

More, "Paris attacks: French police launch raids as military strikes Isis in Syria."

Disagreement Over Whether France Could Have Prevented #ParisAttacks

The blame game.

See Politico, "The blame game begins in France":

PARIS — French commentators and experts weighed in Sunday with critical assessments of the government’s handling of the fight against terror in recent months, focusing on shortcomings in its understanding of the threat leading up to Friday’s attacks.

While some argued that French authorities had underestimated the terrorist threat to France by failing to respond to it as an all-out war, others claimed the attacks may have been caused by the country’s get-tough policies at home and abroad.

“It was a war. A real war. We knew it, but in the end, we preferred to turn a blind eye,” wrote Alexis Brézet, managing editor of the right-leaning Figaro newspaper, in a column on the front page of a special edition on the terror attacks.

Vincent Desportes, a retired army general who headed one of France’s must prestigious military schools, said in an interview with L’Obs that the country was facing a war “which targets France, our values, our lifestyle, our liberties.”

He said, “Unfortunately, France did not want to recognize this state of war.”

Brézet, Desportes and other commentators focused on what they called numerous shortcomings in France’s handling of the anti-terror fight after the attacks on the Charlie Hebdo newspaper in January.

Brézet referred to “numerous alerts,” but noted that several counter-terrorism measures had not been implemented, including surveillance of radical imams. He also decried the lack of surveillance of people who had traveled to Syria and returned to France, as well as the “short-sighted diplomacy” which “pretends — rightly so — to fight Daesh in Syria, but refuses stubbornly to support its main adversary, Russia, because it supports [Syrian President Bashar] al-Assad’s regime.”

Desportes called on France to rethink its priorities in the fight against terrorism and improve its military strategy.

“We will certainly need to withdraw from some external operations,” said Delportes. “We need to redeploy forces on French soil, and better use them on the ground.”As long as Western countries cling to political correctness, afraid to hurt the feelings of Muslims, then folks can forget about defeating Islamism. It's all of a package. You gotta go all in, or forget about it.

While Europe Slept

From Bruce Bawer, While Europe Slept: How Radical Islam is Destroying the West from Within.

Obama Releases 5 Yemeni Guantánamo Inmates to United Arab Emirates

See?

Nothing's going to change. Nothing.

At AoSHQ, "Obama Orders Five Gitmo Detainees Released to United Arab Emirates."

Also at WaPo, "Pentagon transfers 5 Yemenis being held at Guantanamo Bay to UAE."

New York Daily News Posts Graphic Photo of #ParisAttacks on Front Page

Lots of folks were outraged, apparently, but I think they did the right thing.

From yesterday morning, at Twitchy, "‘L’HORREUR’: Tomorrow’s New York Daily News cover shows the true horror of Paris [Warning: graphic photo]."

An early look at tomorow's front page: More than 150 people killed in Paris terror attacks https://t.co/HyxABfpk4w pic.twitter.com/DFVxOsnSpS

— New York Daily News (@NYDailyNews) November 14, 2015

On Location: Ezra Levant Reports from France on #ParisAttacks (VIDEO)

He's such a good man, and it's great to see him reporting from Paris.

U.S. Malls, Stadiums Boost Security After #ParisAttacks (VIDEO)

The NFL's especially taking a second look at security.

An interesting clip, at ABC News, "Assessing Vulnerability of Americans In Wake of Paris Attacks."

Paris Attacks Undercut Western Hopes of Containing Extremists

Containment's obviously not working. If the West is going to do something, leaders need to get off their asses. I'm not optimistic in that regard.

At WSJ:

WASHINGTON—The consecutive terror attacks that killed 224 people on a Russian charter plane Oct. 31 and well over 100 in Paris on Friday have undercut what remained of Western hopes of containing extremists, a goal sought through years of faltering wars in Syria, Iraq, Yemen and Libya.

A day before the Paris attacks, President Barack Obama sounded an optimistic note about the campaign against Islamic State forces in Iraq and Syria. “I don’t think they’re gaining strength,” the president told ABC News in an interview Thursday. “From the start our goal has been first to contain, and we have contained them.”

Now that French President François Hollande has blamed Islamic State for the attacks Friday in Paris, world leaders are certain to take a new look at the extremist movement.

Many parts of the world, particularly in the Middle East, are in a state of chaotic and deadly upheaval, with weak or nonexistent governments creating huge voids for terror networks to flourish. U.S. military planes have peppered parts of Syria and Iraq with drone strikes, killing senior Islamic State officials. Islamic State computer wizard Junaid Hussain was killed by a drone strike in Syria in August. A separate drone strike is believed to have killed a British citizen known as Jihadi John in the same city just this week.

But even after dozens of such strikes, the terror attacks continue. They have emanated from cells within Islamic State as well as terror groups stretching from North Africa, across the Middle East, to South Asia. And they often are of such scale that intelligence agencies and police forces are left dumbfounded and searching for answers.

Militants killed 17 people in France in January, most of them employees of satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo, in a brutal slaying that raised fears about what radical Islamic militants could do after returning from war-torn areas like Yemen and Syria.

In Turkey, more than 100 people were killed by twin suicide blasts Oct. 10 at a peace rally in Ankara, with Islamic State the main suspect. On Thursday, more than 40 died in a Beiruit suburb in a double suicide bombing for which Islamic State claimed responsibility.

The midair breakup of a Russian passenger jet late last month, while still under investigation, is believed to have been a rare mass casualty event caused by a bomb on a plane. And the attacks Friday night in Paris came after the country had ramped up its surveillance laws and devoted more resources to tracking citizens returning from Iraq and Syria.

The U.S. and Western countries have spent billions of dollars trying to disrupt terror networks in Iraq, Syria, Yemen and Libya, but the war seemingly has countless fronts...

Keep reading.

Yeah, well, it's full spectrum terror. See, "Islamic State Shows Mastery of 'Full-Spectrum Terrorism'."

Paris Attackers Linked to Belgium Suburb Where the Authorities Have 'Lost Control' (VIDEO)

At the Telegraph UK, "Two of the Paris attackers and at least three other people involved linked to a heavily-Muslim suburb of Brussels where the authorities admit they have 'lost control'":

Two of the Paris attackers – and at least three other people involved – are linked to a heavily-Muslim suburb of Brussels where the authorities admit they have “lost control.”

The neighbourhood of Molenbeek, which has been involved in many previous terror attacks, was last night emerging as a key centre of the plot. Belgian prosecutors said that one of the seven killers who died in Paris had been identified as a Frenchman living in Molenbeek, which is described by one expert as “the capital of political Islam in continental Europe.” A second attacker lived in or close to the district.

As a wave of new arrests was made in the area on Sunday, Belgium’s interior minister, Jan Jambon, admitted to VRT television that “we don’t have control of the situation in Molenbeek at present” and said the authorities needed to “clean up” the area...

Keep reading.

Destroy the ISIS Caliphate

From Daniel Greenfield, at FrontPage Magazine, "We can either fight ISIS in our cities or in their cities."

And at Instapundit, "MICHAEL GOODWIN: It’s time for Obama to make a choice: Lead us or resign."

'Desert Drizzle': Obama's Antiseptic Bombing Campaign Won't Defeat Islamic State

Remember from back in January, "Obama's Pathetic Bombing Campaign Hasn't Stopped Expansion of Islamic State in Syria."

This is a common theme, and we'll be returning to it again and again, until the U.S. faces a Paris-style attack on the homeland.

See David Deptula, retired U.S. Air Force general, at USA Today, "We can't stop the Islamic State with a 'Desert Drizzle'":

Is it going to take the equivalent of the Paris bombings here, before Obama takes decisive action against the Islamic State?

Is it going to take the equivalent of the Paris bombings — or worse — in the United States before President Obama takes decisive action against the Islamic State?  Secretary Kerry stated last week that President Obama “has directed every member of his national security team to pick up the pace and move forward with ideas for degrading and defeating Daesh more rapidly, more completely and permanently.” That should not be difficult given that last month the president’s plan resulted in only 4 strikes a day in Syria. That is pathetic. For comparison, the number of air strikes during Desert Storm averaged over 1200 a day. The current operation in Syria is more appropriately named “Desert Drizzle.”

We have it within our capacity to destroy the Islamic State leading to the elimination of their sanctuary for terror. However, to do so will require moving beyond the current anemic, pinprick air strikes, to a robust, comprehensive use of airpower — not simply in support of indigenous allied ground forces, but as the key force in taking down the Islamic State. It will require focusing on the Islamic State as a government, not an insurgency, and for Central Command and their subordinate task force to stop fighting the last war, and start the serious use of airpower....

The moral and strategic menace of the Islamic State warrants the optimal application US air power until the group is decomposed as an effective entity. A more robust and comprehensive air campaign over the past year could have reduced the slaughter of thousands of innocents at the hands of the Islamic State. It would have prevented the migration of terrorists out of Syria, some of who may have been involved in the attacks in France.

Rapid and devastating air attacks can still liquidate the capacity of the Islamic State to wage war and prevent the spilling of more blood. Overwhelming and focused attacks to crush the Islamic State — not episodic, antiseptic bombing — will also send a signal that the US has the will, power and resolve to confront other regional threats.

The danger of attempting to conduct ‘immaculate warfare’ by over-constraining the application of airpower is self-defeating, as it perpetuates the misperception that airpower is incapable of accomplishing what it is actually very capable of delivering under the laws of war — the rapid disintegration of the Islamic State.

It is admirable that Operation Inherent Resolve air operations in the past year plus have produced precise attacks with the fewest possible number of civilian casualties. However, humanity, justice, and civilization demand that the restrictions that are delaying and inhibiting the means to halt the evil of the Islamic State be removed, and that we optimize our asymmetric advantage of airpower...

G20 Summit Shifts Focus to Terrorism After #ParisAttacks (VIDEO)

Well, everybody's going to talk a tough game, but not much is going to change. Perhaps there'll be an uptick in airstrikes --- France already seems more determined in that regard --- but the Obama administration's current overall policy will remain in effect. Despite calls to "degrade and destroy" Islamic State in past statements, frankly the administration's going to be lucky if it steps up already weak containment efforts.

At USA Today, "Obama vows at G-20 summit to hunt down Paris terrorists":

ANTALYA, Turkey — President Obama joined other world leaders for a summit at this Mediterranean resort Sunday, vowing to join French authorities in hunting down the terrorists responsible for the worst attack on Paris since World War II.

"The skies are darkened by the horrific attacks that took place in Paris,” Obama declared after meeting with Turkish President Recep Erdogan ahead of the opening of a two-day meeting of leaders representing the world's top 20 economies. "We stand in solidarity with them in hunting down the perpetrators of this crime and bringing them to justice.”

“The killing of innocent people based on a twisted ideology is not just an attack on France, not just an attack on Ankara, but an attack on the civilized world," Obama said, referring to Friday night's Paris attacks that killed 129 people, and bombings in the Turkish capital in October that killed more than 100.

Obama and Russian President Vladimir Putin met for 35 minutes off to the sides of the summit, the White House said. The two leaders mentioned the progress in Syria talks in Vienna, including the areas of agreement outlined in the International Syria Support Group's statement of Nov. 14.

"Specifically, President Obama and President Putin agreed on the need for a Syrian-led and Syrian-owned political transition, which would be proceeded by U.N.-mediated negotiations between the Syrian opposition and regime as well as a cease-fire," the White House said. "As the diplomacy continues, President Obama welcomed efforts by all nations to confront the terrorist group ISIL and noted the importance of Russia's military efforts in Syria focusing on the group."

Obama said he and Erdogan, the summit's host, discussed fortifying the borders between Syria and Turkey, redoubling efforts to bring about a peaceful end to the four-year civil war in Syria and eliminating the Islamic State, the radical group that claimed responsibility for the Paris attacks.

The Syrian war has unleashed millions of refugees, most winding up in Turkey and raising concerns that Islamic State terrorists may be among those crossing into Turkey and migrating from there to Western Europe. That concern has been heightened by the discovery of a Syrian passport near the body of one of the Paris terrorists.

Obama said the United States stands with Turkey and Europe in reducing the flow of migrants there. Hundreds of thousands of them have entered Europe this year...

France Launches 'Massive' Airstrikes Against Islamic State in Raqqa, Syria (VIDEO)

At London's Daily Mail, "BREAKING NEWS: French launch series of 'massive' air strikes on Isis targets in Raqqa including jihadi recruitment centre and training camp."

Holly Holm Knocks Out Ronda Rousey in Stunning UFC 193 Title Upset (VIDEO)

I saw all the bloody, swollen photos of Ronda Rousey's face last night on Twitter and I thought the photos were retouched.

But no. She got her face punched in by Holly Holm! It was major, wow!

At the Los Angeles Times, "Ronda Rousey is knocked out by Holly Holm in UFC title fight":

After belting Rousey with a left hand to the head that turned the former champion, leaving her awkwardly exposed as she stood from a slip, Holm followed with a knockout left kick to the right side of Rousey's head.

With the previously unbeaten Rousey briefly unconscious on the canvas, Holm unleashed a couple hammer punches toward the face that caused referee Herb Dean to stop the fight 59 seconds into the second round.

Holm expressed a look of awe as the groggy Rousey awoke and was aided to a stool placed in the middle of the octagon at Etihad Stadium, where a shocked crowd estimated at more than 60,000 looked on along with a pay-per-view audience expected to surpass 1 million.

"I'm trying to take it in, but it's crazy," Holm said in the octagon after the massive upset that ranks with Matt Serra's stunning victory over former welterweight champion Georges St-Pierre and Chris Weidman's knockout of longtime middleweight champion Anderson Silva...

Also, "Holly Holm cashes in her life's work to shock Ronda Rousey," and "Ronda Rousey has earned right to rematch with Holly Holm, UFC president says."

Sunday Afternoon Gisele Rule 5

I just noticed this Rule 5 post from January 2014, "Sexy Saturday Rule 5."

The lovely Gisele was the headlining babe, and she's on Twitter.

New Update LIVE in https://t.co/COjTu9gcR1 - Lace Choker pic.twitter.com/TbTqUxWgVX

— Gisele (@xoGisele) November 13, 2015

Kate Hudson Posts Tight Bikini Photo to Instagram

She's such a good lady.

At Fox News, "Kate Hudson flaunts bikini bod on Instagram."

#ParisAttacks: Chaos Grips French Capital After False Reports of Gunfire (VIDEO)

Here's the dramatic headline at the Telegraph UK, "Paris attacks: Chaos and fear grips French capital after false reports of gunfire send people 'running for their lives' • Death toll rises to 132 as suspect still on run."

And check the Other McCain, "TERROR MANHUNT: French Authorities Seeking Accomplices of Islamic Killers."

Obama Administration to Accelerate Importation of Syrian 'Refugees' to the United States

Great.

Talk about a fundamental transformation. Obama wants to transform the U.S. into a stronghold for Islamic jihad (and that's as if we haven't been Islamicized enough already, sheesh).

At the CBC, "Syria refugee crisis: U.S. opens centres to speed vetting":

The Obama administration is moving to increase and accelerate the number of Syrian refugees who might be admitted into the United States by opening new screening outposts in Iraq and Lebanon, administration officials told Reuters on Friday.

The move comes after President Barack Obama pledged in September to admit an additional 10,000 Syrian refugees in 2016, torn by four years of civil war and disorder.

The U.S. State Department confirmed the plans to open a refugee settlement processing centre in Erbil, Iraq, before the end of 2015, and to resume refugee processing in Lebanon in early 2016, said spokeswoman Danna Van Brandt.

The White House would not say how many additional refugees it may take in beyond the 10,000, but two senior administration officials said they are seeking ways to increase the number.

Suitable for resettlement

"We want to be in a place where we can push out really ambitious goals," said one of the officials, who spoke to Reuters on the condition of anonymity.

The State Department runs nine screening centres worldwide that serve as meeting points for refugees and U.S. Department of Homeland Security employees who have to decide who is suitable for resettlement in the United States.

The additional centres will double the number available to refugees in the Middle East.

Most Syrians are now screened for potential U.S. resettlement at centres in Istanbul and Amman, Jordan. The new centres are designed to "increase the channels" the United States has for reaching Syrian refugees, the official said.

Amid a tide of refugees in Europe, some congressional Democrats and refugee advocates say the United States should do more for Syrians who often make dangerous journeys to lands where they have no home or means of employment.

However, some Republicans have raised concerns that allowing more Syrians into the United States jeopardizes national security.

Well, allowing more Syrians just might "jeopardize national security," considering especially that one of the French jihadists was a refugee from Syria.

But remember, during his Cairo speech Obama said it was his job to defend against any and all criticism of Islam. He'd rather look out for the jihadists than he would Americans.

Islamic State Shows Mastery of 'Full-Spectrum Terrorism'

At the Telegraph UK, "Paris attacks: Isil have shown their mastery of the full spectrum of terrorism":

Analysis: In the space of 13 days, Isil destroyed a Russian airliner, bombed Beirut and brought carnage to Paris, inflicting a combination of attacks unmatched by any terrorist group.

Among the many terrible facts about the bloodshed in Paris, one stands out. No terrorist group has ever previously inflicted the combination of attacks claimed by Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (Isil).

The carnage in Paris must be placed alongside other recent events for its real significance to become clear. True enough, Isil’s claims of responsibility should always be treated with caution, but if they are accurate, then consider what its operatives have inflicted in the space of just 13 days.

Since Oct 31, Isil has destroyed a Russian passenger plane over Egypt, wrecked a street in Beirut using two suicide bombers, and brought terror to Paris by carrying out near simultaneous assaults on at least six separate targets across the capital.

If its claims are true, Isil has carried out three complex acts of mass murder in three different countries – spread across two continents - in less than a fortnight. Along the way, its terrorists have killed 393 people from nations as disparate as Lebanon, Ukraine, France and Russia.

When David Cameron said that events in Paris showed Isil's appetite for “mass casualty attacks” and a “new degree of planning and coordination”, he was making the point in mild terms. There is simply no precedent in the modern history of terrorism for the rapid succession of havoc that Isil appears to have wrought.

The group’s recent attacks are unique in several respects. The fact that they happened quickly and in far flung countries is important, but not, in itself, decisive. Al-Qaeda never actually struck three targets in three countries in 13 days, but Osama bin Laden’s followers might have been capable of doing as much their heyday before 2001 – provided, that is, we are talking about the kind of bomb attacks that the network had made its speciality.

What makes Isil’s onslaught unique is how different the three operations were – and how each demanded a particular range of skills.

Most terrorist groups come to specialise in one method of bloodshed. Under bin Laden’s leadership, al-Qaeda developed a near obsession with destroying civil airliners - a compulsion that reached its apogee on September 11 – or planting large bombs in unsuspecting capitals. For the first two decades of its existence, Hamas concentrated almost exclusively upon carrying out suicide bombings in Israel.

The events of the last fortnight appear to demonstrate that Isil has mastered all of these black arts and more. The destruction of the Russian airliner showed that its operatives can subvert airport security and infiltrate explosives on board a passenger plane.

The deaths of 41 people in Beirut last Thursday once again displayed Isil’s ability to inflict a tragically familiar brand of terrorist attack, namely a double suicide bombing in a Middle Eastern capital.

And then came Paris. On Friday night, Isil’s terrorists used automatic weapons and bombs to carry out an assault which appeared to owe as much to the “urban guerrillas” of 1970s Europe as to the Islamist brand of nihilism.

Four decades ago, young Germans and Italians joined the Red Brigades or the Baader-Meinhof gang and fought gun battles in city streets. They took hostages and murdered passers-by, causing Italians to use the term "Years of Lead" for that era of their history, so named because of the empty bullet casings that lay scattered in the streets after every incident.

Isil’s terrorists followed a similar modus operandi in Paris, except that they focused solely upon killing innocent bystanders - not police officers or government officials - and their murderous exertions were ended only by their own deaths.

But the conclusion is unmistakable: when it comes to destroying a plane, taking hostages, dispatching suicide bombers to Beirut, or running amok in a European capital, Isil’s operatives can do all of the above in quick succession. They have shown their mastery of the full spectrum of terrorism in a way that no group – not even al-Qaeda - has ever done before...

More.

Cal State Long Beach Student Nohemi Gonzalez Killed in #ParisAttacks (VIDEO)

There's no escaping global jihad.

At the Long Beach Press-Telegram, "CSULB student from El Monte killed in Paris attacks."

Caught Between Internal and External Terror Threats, France Struggles to Cope (VIDEO)

Well, I guess that's putting it bluntly.

And it's going to get worse before it gets better. That's for sure.

At the Washington Post:

Two weeks ago, France’s top spy arrived in Washington for urgent meetings with his counterparts at the CIA and other agencies on the war in Syria and the rapidly morphing terrorist threat emanating from the Islamic State.

“We have now two kinds of threats,” Bernard Bajolet, the head of the French spy service, said in a rare public appearance during his visit. There is an “inside threat,” he said, speaking of young radicalized French residents, but “in addition to that we have the threat from outside, either through terrorist actions which are planned [and] ordered from outside or only through fighters coming back to our countries.”

The attacks Friday in Paris showed how these twin threats are converging on France like a vise, putting extraordinary pressure on security services that have long been regarded as among the most capable in Europe but now seem overwhelmed by a surge in plots tied to Islamist terrorist groups.

French and U.S. intelligence services were scrambling Saturday to make sense of the still-emerging details about an attack that involved eight militants launching assaults on targets scattered across the French capital, leaving at least 129 people dead.

But a flurry of related arrests outside France and clues suggesting that at least one of the gunmen recently entered Europe through Greece seemed to bolster French President François Hollande’s description of the attack as one that was “prepared, organized and planned from outside the country by the Islamic State, but with help from inside.”

If so, the attack appears to have been a hybrid of the threat streams cited by the French spy chief last month, as well as an alarming evolution of the objectives and tactics employed by the Islamic State.

“They’re exploiting a seam in France,” said a senior U.S. official with access to classified information about the attacks and the Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL. “This could be ISIL-inspired” or involve “trained fighters from ISIL coming back to France,” the official said. “I’m not sure it makes much of a difference. ISIL feeds on this chaos.”

More.

Don't Forget Your Thanksgiving Shopping

At Amazon, Thanksgiving Store.

And get ready for Christmas, Bestselling Books in Military History.

Plus, stay warm, Lasko 754200 Ceramic Heater with Adjustable Thermostat.

WATCH: Video Shows Police Shootout with Terrorists Outside Bataclan Theater — #ParisAttacks

Paris isn't going to be the same --- not for long time, if ever.

See William Jacobson, at Legal Insurrection, "Will we always have Paris? Maybe not."

At watch, via CNN:

New Kelly Brook Photos

At What Would Tyler Durden Do, "Kelly Brook Headlines Ping Pong."

And at London's Daily Mail, "Bust-ing out! Curvy Kelly Brook shows off her VERY generous cleavage in sexy low-cut dress as she steps out for restaurant launch party."

Great Fun Tonight 😘😘😘 pic.twitter.com/hYW8At4DMN

— Kelly Brook (@IAMKELLYBROOK) November 12, 2015

Sneak Peek: Sports Illustrated Swimsuit 2016 (VIDEO)

Here's a lovely break from all the French jihad blogging, via Theo Spark.

Paris Attack Was Work of 3 Teams, An 'Act of War' by Islamic State, France Says (VIDEO)

You've got huge banner headlines running at the New York Times.

It's major.

See, "Three Teams of Coordinated Attackers Carried Out Assault on Paris, Officials Say; Hollande Blames ISIS":

PARIS — Three teams of Islamic State attackers acting in unison carried out the terrorist assault in Paris on Friday night, officials said Saturday, including one assailant who may have traveled to Europe on a Syrian passport along with the flow of migrants.

“It is an act of war that was committed by a terrorist army, a jihadist army, Daesh, against France,” President François Hollande told the nation from the Élysée Palace, using an Arabic acronym for the Islamic State. “It is an act of war that was prepared, organized and planned from abroad, with complicity from the inside, which the investigation will help establish.”

As the death toll rose to 129 — with 352 others wounded, 99 of them critically — a basic timeline of the attacks came into view.

The Paris prosecutor, François Molins, said the attackers were all armed with heavy weaponry and suicide vests. Their assault began at 9:20 p.m. Friday, when one terrorist detonated a suicide bomb outside the gates of the soccer stadium on the northern outskirts of Paris. It ended at 12:20 a.m. Saturday when the authorities stormed a concert hall, the Bataclan. One attacker there was killed; two others detonated suicide vests. Inside the hall, 89 people, who had been listening to a rock band, had been shot to death.

The man with the Syrian passport — which Greek officials said had been registered at the Aegean island of Leros on Oct. 3 — was 25, and died at the stadium. Another assailant, who died at the concert hall, was 29 and a native of Courcouronnes, about 20 miles south of Paris. He had a criminal record and was known to be involved in extremist Islamic ideology, Mr. Molins said.

The hunt for possible accomplices of the terrorists gained steam on Saturday. Officials in Belgium announced three arrests, one of them linked to a rental car found in Paris. In Germany, the police were exploring whether a man they arrested last week with weapons in his car and his GPS navigator set for Paris was linked to the attacks. But it remained unclear how a plot of such sophistication and lethality could have escaped the notice of intelligence agencies, both in France and abroad.

Mr. Hollande declared three days of national mourning, and said that military troops would patrol the capital. France remained under a nationwide state of emergency.

Mr. Hollande vowed to “be unforgiving with the barbarians from Daesh,” adding that France would act within the law but with “all the necessary means, and on all terrains, inside and outside, in coordination with our allies, who are, themselves, targeted by this terrorist threat.”

The attacks, and the possibility that the Islamic State was to blame, promised to further traumatize France and other European countries already fearful of violent jihadists radicalized by the conflicts in Syria and elsewhere...

Keep reading.

Scale of #ParisAttacks Underscores Global Threats

The free flow of people across borders is going to be a thing of the past --- or at least it should be, if Europeans wake up.

At the Wall Street Journal, "Paris Attacks’ Scale Underscores Global Threats":

The sophistication, resources and scale of Friday’s attacks in the heart of Paris underscored to officials across the globe that the challenges of containing extremist violence have reached a new level, and that the calculus of the Western effort against terrorism had fundamentally changed.

European governments in the past few months have sought various means to guard against national security threats, with some erecting barbed-wire fences to stem the flow of migrants, while others, including France, devoted hundreds of millions of euros to strengthening electronic surveillance systems.

Friday’s attacks highlight the weakness of those strategies in a world where global extremism flows across nations. It also raises questions about transnational agreements on open-border travel that have been a bedrock of modern Europe. In his first comments to the nation after the attack, French President François Hollande announced the closing of his country’s borders.

French authorities didn't immediately name a culprit, but the nature of the attacks left little doubt they were the work of a well-organized terrorist group. A French official said Friday the attacks were “unfortunately well-prepared and coordinated.” The apparent use of explosives and the likelihood that a significant number of people were involved were particularly alarming to U.S. counterterrorism officials.

At the same time, officials in several countries have voiced strong suspicions that the recent downing of a Russian passenger plane over Egypt was the work of a terrorist bomb. If Islamic State or another terrorist group is blamed for that attack, in addition to Friday’s carnage, pressure could increase to ramp up the war on such terrorist organizations to a new level.

That could include more pressure on Western countries to step up the military intervention in Syria. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization doesn't have a formal role in strikes against Islamic State, although members of the alliance are taking part in the U.S.-led coalition...

More.

More, at Time, "ISIS Attack on Paris Suggests a Change in Strategy."

Pianist Plays 'Imagine' Outside Bataclan Theater After #ParisAttacks (VIDEO)

Political idealism was one of the leading causes of World War II. But then, leftists never learn.

As Ann Coulter tweeted last night, "HOW DID THIS HAPPEN? French people ran onto the street with signs that said, 'Je Suis Charlie'! Why didn't that stop this?"

Idealism is nice, especially during a time of enormous crisis. But folks can sing "Imagine" until the cows come home, and it's not going to solve Europe's jihad problem. Halting the wave of Islamic migration would be the first start, and then repatriating Muslims to their home countries after that. You can't keep taking Muslims without importing Islamic jihad. Until the Europeans learn that lesson, their goose will be cooked.

Bono and U2 Lay Flowers at the Bataclan Theater — #ParisAttacks

They're good guys.

Bono and the members of U2 lay flowers at the Bataclan Theatre by @JeffJMitch pic.twitter.com/7JA7u6TiER

— Bette Lynch (@BetteMLynch) November 14, 2015

Paris Attacks Deepen Debate About Migration Crisis in Europe; Critics Reassert Security Concerns

Following-up from yesterday, "Angela Merkel's Future in Doubt as She Faces Coup After Her Own Party Criticises Asylum Policies."

At WSJ, "Paris Attacks May Unsettle EU’s Debate on Migration":

BERLIN—The attacks in Paris stunned Europe and deepened one of the European Union’s greatest crises: the tide of migration from the war-torn Middle East and elsewhere sweeping in from across the Mediterranean.

In Germany, the attacks quickly galvanized opponents of Chancellor Angela Merkel’s open-door policy, with critics saying that it had become clearer than ever that the migrants from the Middle East represented a grave security threat. In Poland, a country that had already opposed Ms. Merkel’s stance, leading politicians doubled down and warned they wouldn't honor an earlier agreement to take in refugees.

Ms. Merkel has been under intensifying fire for months for opening Germany’s doors to refugees, a posture that many critics say has helped touch off a tide of migration into Germany numbering as many as 10,000 a day.

As of Saturday afternoon, it remained unclear whether the attacks were perpetrated by homegrown terrorists or people who entered France from abroad. Nevertheless, they quickly offered fodder for critics who said that Germany and Europe couldn’t manage the influx of migration from the Middle East.

In a sign of how much the Paris attacks may unsettle the EU-wide debate on migration, politicians in Poland quickly tied the attacks to Ms. Merkel’s policies. The incoming minister in charge of European affairs, Konrad Szymanski, said the country’s new, conservative government, to be sworn in on Monday, wouldn’t honor its predecessors’ commitment earlier this fall to take in about 7,000 people as part of an EU-wide plan to redistribute migrants across the bloc.

“Decisions of the European Council that we’ve criticized regarding the resettlement of refugees and immigrants to all EU countries are still binding law of the EU,” Mr. Szymanski wrote in an article posted online. “But faced with the tragic events in Paris we don’t see political possibilities for its enforcement.”

Keep reading.

"Frank Bruni of the New York Times tut-tuts against 'The Exploitation of Paris'..."

That's all the lefties are doing, tut-tuting against the so-called "reactionary right."

See Ed Driscoll, at Instapundit, "FREUD CALLED IT DISPLACEMENT":

Frank Bruni of the New York Times tut-tuts against “The Exploitation of Paris,” in a piece that could easily have been written by doing a find-and-replace search of a thousand different Times articles written immediately after 9/11. (A period in which the Times was utterly obsessed with the terrorist dangers of all-male golf courses). Along the way, Bruni name-checks Roger Simon, PJM’s boss emeritus...

More.

Plus, a real heads-scratcher, at Jihad Watch, "Salon: “After Paris, let’s stop blaming Muslims and take a hard look at ourselves”."

Leftism is a mental disorder. Seriously.

William McCants, The ISIS Apocalypse

Check out Will McCants, The ISIS Apocalypse: The History, Strategy, and Doomsday Vision of the Islamic State.

He's also got a piece up at Politico, "How ISIL Out-Terrorized Bin Laden":

Brutality and doomsday visions have made ISIL the world’s most feared terrorist group....

The Islamic State’s brutality and its insistence on apocalypse now and caliphate now set it apart from al-Qaeda, of which it was a part until 2014. We’re used to thinking of al-Qaeda’s leader Osama bin Laden as the baddest of the bad, but the Islamic State is worse. Bin Laden tamped down messianic fervor and sought popular Muslim support; the return of the early Islamic empire, or caliphate, was a distant dream. In contrast, the Islamic State’s members fight and govern by their own version of Machiavelli’s dictum “It is far safer to be feared than loved.” They stir messianic fervor rather than suppress it. They want God’s kingdom now rather than later. This is not Bin Laden’s jihad...

More.

Ann Coulter: 'Donald Trump was elected president tonight...'

At the Hill, "Coulter after Paris attacks: 'Trump was elected president tonight'." (Careful the autoplay videos at the click through.)

Ann Coulter took to Twitter on Friday night to respond to the Paris terror attacks, saying that “Donald Trump was elected president tonight.”

The conservative commentator tweeted a series of reactions to the attacks that left more than 120 dead, calling for “no more Muslim immigration.” She also targeted recent U.S. college student protests, as well as American gun and immigration laws and proposals.

Coulter ended her string of Tweets with: “They can wait if they like until next November for the actual balloting, but Donald Trump was elected president tonight.”

Actually, I think the more narrow political issue will be the fight against Islamic jihad, rather than the larger border security problem, which is more a question of illegal immigration from Latin America. But if Trump plays it right, he could score significant political points.

Trendy Warm Chunky Soft Stretch Cable Knit Slouchy Beanie Skully Hat

Heh. It's a best-selling item at Amazon.

But so is the Ergodyne N-Ferno 6823 Wind-proof Hinged Balaclava, Black, which seems a bit less wistful.

And ICYMI, from Erick Stakelbeck, ISIS Exposed: Beheadings, Slavery, and the Hellish Reality of Radical Islam.

The Migrant Jihad Has Begun in Paris

From Robert Spencer, at FrontPage Magazine, "At least one jihad attacker was a 'refugee'. Will European leaders reconsider their migrant policy?":

That didn’t take long: one of the Islamic State (ISIS) jihadis who murdered at least 160 people in Paris on Friday held a Syrian passport and passed through Greece in October. In October, he was a “refugee” seeking asylum in Europe from the Syrian war zone; in November, he was murdering French civilians for the Islamic caliphate. The Migrant Jihad has begun.

French and European authorities can’t say they weren’t warned. Last February, the Islamic State boasted it would soon flood Europe with as many as 500,000 refugees. And the Lebanese Education Minister recently said that there were 20,000 jihadis among the refugees in camps in his country. Meanwhile, 80% of migrants who have recently come to Europe claiming to be fleeing the war in Syria aren’t really from Syria at all.

So why are they claiming to be Syrian and streaming into Europe? An Islamic State operative gave the answer when he boasted in September, shortly after the migrant influx began, that among the flood of refugees, 4,000 Islamic State jihadis had already entered Europe. He explained their purpose: “It’s our dream that there should be a caliphate not only in Syria but in all the world, and we will have it soon, inshallah.” These Muslims were going to Europe in the service of that caliphate: “They are going like refugees,” he said, but they were going with the plan of sowing blood and mayhem on European streets. As he told this to journalists, he smiled and said, “Just wait.”

A year before that the Islamic State issued a call for jihad murders of French civilians: “If you can kill a disbelieving American or European – especially the spiteful and filthy French – or an Australian, or a Canadian, or any other disbeliever from the disbelievers waging war, including the citizens of the countries that entered into a coalition against the Islamic State, then rely upon Allah, and kill him in any manner or way however it may be.”

Then after the attacks the Islamic State issued a statement claiming responsibility for them, and warning: “Let France and all nations following its path know that they will continue to be at the top of the target list for the Islamic State and that the scent of death will not leave their nostrils as long as they partake in the crusader campaign, as long as they dare to curse our Prophet (blessings and peace be upon him), and as long as they boast about their war against Islam in France and their strikes against Muslims in the land of the Caliphate with their jets, which were of no avail to them in the filthy streets and alleys of Paris. Indeed, this is just the beginning. It is also a warning for any who wish to take heed.”

So war was declared, and acts of war carried out – and the response has been drearily predictable. German Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere was swift to try to dissociate the Paris attacks from the migrant influx into Europe: “I would like to make this urgent plea to avoid drawing such swift links to the situation surrounding refugees.” Alas for de Maiziere, there was the inconvenient fact of that Syrian “refugee” who pass through Greece on his way to jihad in Paris.

Meanwhile, Barack Obama was true to form, not mentioning Islam or Muslims in his statement on the Paris attacks, and not giving a hint that it was his precipitous and politically motivated withdrawal from Iraq that created the vacuum that allowed for the rise of the Islamic State. Indeed, the Islamic State could end up being the most significant legacy of the Obama Administration. Obviously American troops couldn’t have stayed in Iraq forever, and the Iraq project from its beginnings was based on false assumptions about Islam, ignoring its political, supremacist and violent aspects; but Obama’s hasty and ill-thought out withdrawal took into account none of the realities on the ground: the Sunni/Shi’ite divide, the Iranian influence in Baghdad, the Sunnis’ unwillingness to participate in the Baghdad government and the Shi’ites’ refusal to allow them to do so in any significant way, and more. France today is paying the price for the willful ignorance and short-sightedness of Obama and his administration...

Continue reading.

European Authorities Scramble to Identify Suspects in #ParisAttacks (VIDEO)

Authorities found a Syrian passport on the body of one of the Paris attackers.

And see the Los Angeles Times, "Authorities scramble to identify suspects in Paris terror attacks":

Authorities across Europe moved Saturday to identify possible accomplices to seven attackers who unleashed a series of shootings and bombings across Paris, with Belgian authorities announcing they had made several arrests.

A spokeswoman for Belgian Justice Minister Koen Geens told reporters that authorities had arrested "several suspects," though it was not clear what connection, if any, they had to Friday's attacks in Paris.

Geens said the arrests came after a rental car with Belgian license plates was seen close to the Bataclan theater in Paris, the scene of some of the worst violence, on Friday night, the magazine De Standaard reported.

French authorities identified one of the dead terrorists as a Frenchman, about 30 years old, who had previously been tracked by authorities in connection with his Islamic radical activities, France Info radio reported.

Meanwhile, French media reported that a Syrian passport was found near one of the dead terrorists after a bomb attack at a soccer game at the Stade de France, the national stadium just north of Paris, though it had not been established that the passport belonged to the attacker.

It appeared the passport holder had crossed into the European Union through the Greek island of Leros in October.

“We announce that the passport holder had passed from Leros on Oct. 3. where he was identified based on EU rules," Greek Citizen Protection Minister Nikos Toskas said in a statement, according to the Associated Press.

"We do not know if the passport was checked by other countries through which the holder likely passed."

Toskas added: “We will continue the painstaking and persistent effort to ensure the security of our country and Europe under difficult circumstances, insisting on complete identification of those arriving.”

More.

WATCH: Graphic Video Shows Hostages Escaping from Bataclan Concert Theater — #ParisAttacks

Le Monde's Daniel Psenny took the video, via CNN:

The World's Most Dangerous Ideology

Here's Raymond Ibrahim, for Prager University.

This clip went up last month, but it's ever so timely, considering.

Angela Merkel's Future in Doubt as She Faces Coup After Her Own Party Criticises Asylum Policies

She was on thin ice well before last night's Paris attacks.

I don't know if she can stay in office much longer.

At the Telegraph UK:

Angela Merkel’s political future is being questioned for the first time in Germany as divisions continue to grow in her government over her “open-door” refugee policy.

Guests on a popular television political talk show debated the possibility of a coup against the German chancellor from within her own party.

The discussion came as civil servants at the government refugee agency warned identity checks for Syrian asylum-seekers were ineffective and open to abuse by economic migrants and terrorists.

Wolfgang Schäuble, the finance minister, warned that Germany was facing an “avalanche” of refugees set off by a “careless skier”.

And Thomas de Maiziere, the interior minister, twice acted unilaterally to introduce stricter controls on Syrian asylum-seekers without informing Mrs Merkel...

More.

And earlier, at Der Spiegel, "The Lonely Chancellor: Merkel Under Fire as Refugee Crisis Worsens."

So Where'd the Paris Jihadists Get Their Kalashnikovs?

Well, there's a huge black-market weapons pipeline from Eastern Europe. Thousands of AKs are confiscated by authorities every year.

At the Daily Beast, "This is How AK-47s Get to Paris."

Erick Stakelbeck: ISIS Exposed

Some reading on Islamic State.

From Erick Stakelbeck, ISIS Exposed: Beheadings, Slavery, and the Hellish Reality of Radical Islam.

President Obama Tells George Stephanopoulos: Islamic State's Not 'Gaining Strength' (VIDEO)

From just this morning, on Good Morning America.

The Orwellian Obama.

Islamic State's "contained."

Inside the Bataclan Concert Hall — #ParisAttacks

At the New York Times, "‘Scene of Carnage’ Inside Sold-Out Paris Concert Hall":

PARIS — The band had been playing to the crowd at one of this city’s most popular music venues, The Bataclan, for about an hour. The 150-year-old music hall was sold out for the show by the American group Eagles of Death Metal.

Suddenly, four men brandishing AK-47 assault rifles entered the hall. There were shouts of “Allahu akbar” just before the gunmen opened fire, and for about 20 minutes there was carnage.

Witnesses said the attackers also threw grenades into the crowd.

“When they started shooting, we just saw flashes,” a witness named Gwen told French BFM-TV. “People got down on the ground right away. It was all dark.”

In the scramble to survive, people climbed into the upper boxes of the hall, or cowered under seats. The musicians quickly fled the stage.

“It was a scene of carnage,” Julien Pearce, a radio reporter who was inside The Bataclan, told Europe 1 radio.

The music hall can seat up to 1,500 people, but it was unclear how many were inside when the attack began. Some of the spectators managed to escape out back exits, but for minutes the gunmen shot unimpeded.

Benjamin Cazenoves posted an update on Facebook from inside the theater: “Alive. Just some cuts. Carnage. Bodies everywhere.”

Mr. Pearce told CNN that he saw two of the men enter and begin to fire randomly. He said the gunmen wore black and said nothing. They simply fired indiscriminately into the crowd. Mr. Pearce said that when he walked out into the street, he saw 25 bodies on the ground.

“It lasted for 10 minutes, 10 minutes, 10 horrific minutes when everybody was on the floor covering their heads and we heard so many gunshots, and the terrorists were very calm, very determined, and they reloaded three or four times their weapons,” Mr. Pearce said.

At around 10 p.m. the gunmen began rounding up survivors, holding them as hostages as dozens of police officers massed outside. For more than two hours a tense standoff prevailed, with more and more police arriving at the scene, enlarging the tense perimeter around the music hall in the city’s 11th Arrondissement...

More.

PREVIOUSLY: "The Horror in Paris."

Jackie Johnson's Chilly Overnight Forecast

It's been cold overnight across the Southland.

Here's Jackie, via CBS News 2 Los Angeles:

The Horror in Paris

At the Wall Street Journal, "Europe’s worst attack since Madrid requires a new antiterror resolve":

Paris endured one of the worst terror assaults in history Friday night, with scores murdered in coordinated attacks at multiple sites, including a restaurant, a concert hall, a soccer stadium and the Les Halles food market. President François Hollande declared a national state of emergency and closed France’s borders. “This is horror,” he said in a televised address. It’s also our world today.

Though no group had claimed responsibility for the attacks, Islamic State (ISIS) didn’t wait long to celebrate. “O crusaders we are coming to you with bombs and rifles,” tweeted one unofficial ISIS propagandist, according to the Vocativ news site. “Wait for us.” Witnesses report hearing cries of “Allahu Akbar” along with gunfire. A woman at the Bataclan concert hall told the Journal that the attackers wore black-and-white kaffiyehs as they sprayed the crowd with gunfire. One hundred mostly young people are reported to have died in the hall.

Big cities are vulnerable targets, as the world learned with the November 2008 attacks in Mumbai. There nine Islamic terrorists murdered 164 people in two hotels, a cafe, a train station and a Jewish center. They shut down a city of 18 million people in minutes.

According to one report, a terrorist captured by French police at the concert hall claimed the attacks were in retaliation for France’s participation in attacks on ISIS targets in Syria. If so, the political calculation may be to reprise al Qaeda’s 2004 train bombings in Madrid, on the eve of a Spanish election. The attacks, which left 191 commuters dead, led to the defeat of José María Aznar’s conservative Partido Popular, which supported the war in Iraq, and the election of the antiwar Socialists.

We doubt the French will draw the same lesson when it comes to fighting ISIS in Syria or anywhere else. The jihadist war against France is decades-old. France’s domestic intelligence services have spent years attempting to keep track of an ever-expanding list of radical French Islamists, and nobody should be surprised if Friday’s attackers turn out to be names on that list. Paris would not be out of bounds to consider some combination of preventive detentions and, if necessary, renditions to foreign countries. Civil libertarians will object, but civil liberty is also a function of security, and right now Paris has neither.

These attacks are another dreadful reminder that the West’s collective failure swiftly to defeat ISIS in its Syrian and Iraqi heartland has allowed this jihadist infection to spread—into Afghanistan, Turkey, Sinai and North Africa...

That's for sure.

The battlefield's creeping west, and with alacrity.

Keep reading.

President Obama's Statement on the Paris Attacks (VIDEO)

He's being criticized for his standard, cowardly political correctness.

At Gateway Pundit, "OBAMA Makes Statement on Bloody Paris Terrorist Attacks — WON’T MENTION ISLAM."

Here's the text of the White House statement, "Statement by the President on the Situation in Paris":

THE PRESIDENT:  Good evening, everybody.  I just want to make a few brief comments about the attacks across Paris tonight.  Once again, we’ve seen an outrageous attempt to terrorize innocent civilians.  This is an attack not just on Paris, it’s an attack not just on the people of France, but this is an attack on all of humanity and the universal values that we share.

We stand prepared and ready to provide whatever assistance that the government and the people of France need to respond.  France is our oldest ally.  The French people have stood shoulder to shoulder with the United States time and again.  And we want to be very clear that we stand together with them in the fight against terrorism and extremism.

Paris itself represents the timeless values of human progress.  Those who think that they can terrorize the people of France or the values that they stand for are wrong.  The American people draw strength from the French people’s commitment to life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness.  We are reminded in this time of tragedy that the bonds of liberté and égalité and fraternité are not only values that the French people care so deeply about, but they are values that we share.  And those values are going to endure far beyond any act of terrorism or the hateful vision of those who perpetrated the crimes this evening.

We’re going to do whatever it takes to work with the French people and with nations around the world to bring these terrorists to justice, and to go after any terrorist networks that go after our people.

We don’t yet know all the details of what has happened.  We have been in contact with French officials to communicate our deepest condolences to the families of those who have been killed, to offer our prayers and thoughts to those who have been wounded.  We have offered our full support to them.  The situation is still unfolding.  I’ve chosen not to call President Hollande at this time, because my expectation is that he’s very busy at the moment.  I actually, by coincidence, was talking to him earlier today in preparation for the G20 meeting.  But I am confident that I’ll be in direct communications with him in the next few days, and we’ll be coordinating in any ways that they think are helpful in the investigation of what’s happened.

This is a heartbreaking situation.  And obviously those of us here in the United States know what it’s like.  We’ve gone through these kinds of episodes ourselves.  And whenever these kinds of attacks happened, we’ve always been able to count on the French people to stand with us.  They have been an extraordinary counterterrorism partner, and we intend to be there with them in that same fashion.

I’m sure that in the days ahead we’ll learn more about exactly what happened, and my teams will make sure that we are in communication with the press to provide you accurate information.  I don’t want to speculate at this point in terms of who was responsible for this.  It appears that there may still be live activity and dangers that are taking place as we speak.  And so until we know from French officials that the situation is under control, and we have for more information about it, I don’t want to speculate.

Thank you very much.

The gunmen were wearing keffiyehs, and shouting "Allahu Akbar!", but we wouldn't want to "speculate" about this "heartbreaking situation."

Keep clutching those pearls, in other words.

PREVIOUSLY: "Footage of the #Bataclan Siege — #ParisAttacks (VIDEO)."

Footage of the #Bataclan Siege — #ParisAttacks (VIDEO)

Via Sky News:



PREVIOUSLY: "Paris Attacks Remind Us the Free Is World at War with Brutal Terrorist Groups."

Paris Attacks Remind Us the Free Is World at War with Brutal Terrorist Groups

From Nile Gardiner, at the Daily Signal:

Tonight’s horrific series of terrorist attacks throughout Paris have sent shockwaves across Europe and the world.

According to media reports, dozens of people have been killed so far in multiple attacks on several locations in the French capital, including a restaurant near the Place de la Republique, and the Stade de France, home of the French national soccer team. Some of the attacks are reported to have been suicide bombings.

In addition, up to a hundred people were taken hostage by terrorists at the Bataclan concert venue. The French government has declared a state of emergency, deployed troops to the streets of Paris, and has closed the country’s borders.

In terms of sheer scale, this could be the largest terror attack on Western soil since the 9/11 attacks on the United States in 2001.

While it is too early to determine the exact identity of the terror group responsible for these atrocities, the attacks are consistent with the kind of mass casualty attacks that have been carried out in the past by Islamist terrorists in London, Madrid, Istanbul, and most recently in Paris itself, with the Charlie Hebdo massacre in January this year.

It also comes in the wake of last week’s explosion on board a Russian airliner flying from Egypt to St. Petersburg, which US and British authorities believe was a terrorist attack. According to the London Daily Telegraph, gunmen shouted “Allahu Akbar” in one of tonight’s Paris attacks.

There is speculation that the terror attacks are a direct response by the Islamic State to the US drone strike against Jihadi John in Raqqa, Syria yesterday. While it is unlikely that ISIS would have the capability to launch such a well-coordinated attack within such a short time frame, it is possible that ISIS could have been planning such an attack on Paris for some time, and decided it launch it today for propaganda reasons to give the impression that this is immediate retaliation for the Jihadi John strike...

Actually, nearly 200 were murdered in the Madrid terror bombings in 2004, but today's Paris attacks may turn out to have been even bloodier. Things are still unfolding. Certainly a large-scale coordinated attack like this, in a major Western capital, marks a major turning point. Mumbai can happen anywhere at this point.

Previous blogging here and here.

Paris Terror Attacks — Updates

Following-up, "France Declares State of Emergency as Terror Attacks Leave Scores Dead (VIDEO)."

Sky News has a streaming video here, "Sky News Live."

More at Telegraph UK, "Paris shooting: Scores killed and injured after 'Kalashnikov and grenade attacks' across French capital with dozens of hostages taken..."

At least 100 dead at the concert hall.

And at the Wall Street Journal, "Paris Under Siege; Attackers Kill Dozens."

More at Legal Insurrection, "LIVE VIDEO AND UPDATES: Terror in Paris, Borders Closed, Curfew."

DEVELOPING.