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YOUR ANTIQUE MEDIA: Islamic Terror Attack in Orlando Completely Unrelated to Islamic Terror

The mainstream media are desperate to distract from the facts of the Orlando shootings, choosing instead to blame Republicans and conservatives for the deaths of 49 individuals at a gay bar called Pulse. In reality, the attacks were perpetrated by an American-born Islamic jihadist who pledged allegiance to the Islamic State during the attack, and had in the past “boasted of ties to the terrorist groups Hezbollah and Al Qaeda.”

Instead of discussing the ramifications of terror worldwide and in our midst, the liberal media have reignited their quest for new gun control legislation and have sought to blame this attack on Republicans in general, and presumptive Republican candidate Donald Trump in particular.

Omar Mateen’s “bullets and the blood he left behind that early morning were a reminder that in many corners of the country, gay and transgender people are still regarded as sinners and second-class citizens who should be scorned,” wrote The New York Times editorial board in a scathing piece aimed squarely at Republicans. They write that the “precise motivation for [Mateen’s] rampage remains unclear.”

“So far this year, more than 200 anti-L.G.B.T. bills have been introduced in 34 states,” writes the Times editorial board, focusing on the politics of Trump and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY). “The 49 people killed in Orlando were victims of a terrorist attack. But they also need to be remembered as casualties of a society where hate has deep roots.”

As Bernard Goldberg notes, this editorial is completely ridiculous. “If the killer were Christian the Times would have connected the dots and concluded he was driven by his religion,” he writes. Yet the Times failed to mention Islam or ISIS when discussing an Islam-inspired attack on U.S. soil.

“So, he [Mateen] was a gay Muslim Democrat,” notes Jim Treacher for The Daily Caller. “He hit the trifecta of victimhood.” Mateen belonged to too many minority groups, so many that liberals claim at all costs that he cannot be blamed for his own actions. “That means it has to be the gun’s fault, and the NRA’s fault, and the GOP’s fault, and Christians’ fault, and white people’s fault,” writes Treacher.

The Times editorial is not a reflection of the paper’s denial of jihadist terror. Rather, it is a deliberate attempt to deflect blame from the very ideology that repeatedly spawns this sort of activity, and the Times has to know that.

From Nidal Hasan, to the Boston Bombers, the Underwear bomber, the San Bernardino shooting, and now Orlando, the perpetrators of these attacks have drunk from the same poisonous well of sharia-compliant jihadist ideology demanding death to the infidels. Many warnings were ignored or overlooked in these cases. It doesn’t matter whether these were lone wolf terrorists or ISIS-inspired: all of these attacks were carried out in the name of Islam. Obviously, the overwhelming majority of Muslims would never consider committing such an act, and are opposed to such actions.

But it is ludicrous to claim that these attacks have little or nothing to do with Islam, or come from a bastardization of that faith. After all, Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi has a Ph.D. in Koranic studies from Iraq’s Saddam University for Islamic Studies. These attacks clearly originated from a jihadist interpretation of Islam.

The media should be asking how the Obama administration, once again, has failed to protect Americans from another Islamic attack. According to the Daily Beast, Mateen was placed on two FBI watch lists, but the FBI’s 10-month investigation into his activities was closed after no terror ties or plans were discovered. In fact, Mateen was the subject of three different FBI investigations from 2013 to 2015, and they always came up empty.

Clarice Feldman, writing for American Thinker, pointed out that “Internal operating instructions of the FBI limited the amount of time they could keep watch on him and both the local and federal authorities were paralyzed by fear of being dubbed Islamophobic. So chilling accounts by his fellow workers were discounted as the result of prejudice, and a report by a local gun shop that he’d tried without success to purchase ‘body armor and bulk ammunition from the store’ was ignored.”

Also, the security company, G4S, that Mateen worked for from 2007 until the night of his terrorist rampage, should be called before Congress for its actions regarding how it handled concerns about his fitness for the job as an armed security guard. G4S is a British-based company that has contracts with the U.S. government to guard airports, most of our nuclear facilities, and to transport illegal aliens to sanctuary cities and other locations, once they have crossed over into the U.S.

According to NBC News, FBI Director James Comey said that “colleagues said Mateen claimed to have family connections to terror groups al Qaeda and Hezbollah, and that he hoped law enforcement would raid his home ‘so he could martyr himself.’” Yet as a result, his employer simply moved him to a less sensitive job. They didn’t take away his company-issued service weapon, a .38 handgun, nor did they fire him. In fact, while the company filed a psych evaluation form with the State of Florida to pass Mateen for firearm clearance, the doctor whose name was on the form says he was never evaluated, certainly not by her. The company now claims it was done by a different, unnamed doctor.

President Obama’s lack of passion over the victims was striking when he first discussed the attack. But when he was criticized by Trump, Obama became passionate and angry, and explained why using the term “radical Islam” was nothing but a talking point—which is why he doesn’t use it.

“So there is no magic to the phrase of radical Islam. It is a political talking point. It is not a strategy,” said Obama. “And the reason I am careful about how I describe this threat has nothing to do with political correctness and everything to do with actually defeating extremism.”

However, as National Review’s Andy McCarthy writes, the point of using the term “radical Islam” is not to convince or deter Islamic radicals—it is to understand our own mindset and identify “whether we understand what we are fighting.”

“Sharia supremacists have their own civilization and cultural norms by which they judge themselves,” argues McCarthy. “They couldn’t care less what we think.”

Al-Baghdadi is convincing to Muslims around the globe because he understands the Koran and preaches an ideology derived from the Muslim faith. Yet the Obama administration has worked to cleanse the FBI counter-terrorism analytic lexicon of words such as “Muslim, Islam, Muslim Brotherhood, Hamas, and sharia.”

Obama administration officials continue to blindly ignore the ongoing threat of jihadists. “One month after the San Bernardino terrorist attack that left 14 innocent people dead, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson told advisors that right wing extremists pose just as much of a threat to the country as Islamic extremists.”

And just days before the Orlando attack, the Homeland Security Advisory Council cautioned the Department of Homeland Security that it should avoid terms such as “jihad,” “sharia,” and “takfir.”

Political correctness, whether by the media or by administration officials, is not going to protect American citizens from future terrorists. Both the NRA and the ACLU believe further reforms to the terrorist watch list, such as a way to redress inclusion on the list, are still necessary. But the discussion about gun rights—and using the list to prevent potential terrorists from accessing guns—is a distraction from the greater threat of Islamic terror.

Future terrorists will find a way to access guns regardless of the law. The Obama administration is well on its way to issuing green cards to over one million immigrants from majority-Muslim countries before he leaves office. Is anyone confident in the vetting process for all of these people? If the Obama administration and the complicit media continue to deny the real cause of terror, many more Americans will fall victim to terrorists like Omar Mateen. (For more from the author of “YOUR ANTIQUE MEDIA: Islamic Terror Attack in Orlando Completely Unrelated to Islamic Terror” please click HERE)

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Orlando Massacre 911 Tapes Are Revealed, Scrubbed of References to Islam

The Obama administration on Monday released redacted transcripts of Omar Mateen’s 911 calls — sanitizing any and all references to ISIS made by the self-proclaimed radical Islamist terrorist.

Even though authorities have made no secret that Mateen invoked ISIS as his motive for slaughtering 49 people inside a gay nightclub in Orlando last week, 911 transcripts released by the FBI awkwardly worked around mentioning the terror group.

“In the name of God the merciful, the beneficial (in Arabic),” Mateen said during his call at about 2:35 a.m. on June 12.

“Praise be to God, and prayers as well as peace be upon the prophet of (Arabic). I let you know, I’m in Orlando and I did the shootings.” (Read more from “Orlando Massacre 911 Tapes Are Revealed, Scrubbed of References to Islam” HERE)

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7 Ways US Can Prevent Another Orlando Attack

In the wake of the Orlando terrorist attack, the Obama administration has been quick to blame gun control laws. This is because the administration refuses to admit its policies to defeat the Islamic State have failed.

Islamist terror attacks within the U.S. have dramatically increased within the past year—with Orlando being the 22nd instance of Islamist terrorism in the U.S. since 2015. This is out of 86 plots since 2001.

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Gun control will not stop this rise in Islamist terror attacks, and the president is wrong to suggest so. To stop these attacks and defeat radical Islamism, the U.S. needs to defend the U.S. homeland and combat terrorism abroad.

We must maintain essential counterterrorism tools to help law enforcement and intelligence agencies find and stop terrorists before they attack.

Here are seven policies that will help prevent another Orlando:

1. Combat Terrorism Abroad and Deny ISIS Territorial Gains

So long as the Islamic State, also known as ISIS, maintains territory in Afghanistan and Iraq, it will be a persistent terror threat.

Rolling back—and defeating—ISIS requires a global approach in which the U.S. leads a multipronged, multination effort that seeks to deny ISIS the ability to hold territory. This will disrupt its recruitment of foreign fighters, and will counter its destructive ideology.

One part of the solution must be military. ISIS derives much of its cachet and legitimacy from its success. Driving ISIS from its conquered territories will undermine the group’s legitimacy in the eyes of aspiring jihadists, thereby hurting its ability to recruit.

2. Shut Down the Foreign Fighter Pipeline

In order to defeat terrorism abroad, the U.S. must lead an international effort to deny ISIS territorial gains and shut down the foreign fighter pipeline. While military victory would undermine ISIS’ legitimacy, the U.S. must also improve intelligence capabilities to identify potential recruits and preempt Islamist violence.

This requires hard intelligence work and even closer coordination between countries to identify suspicious travel. This includes pushing allies to take greater intelligence and security measures that reflect the global nature of the threat.

The U.S. should make greater use of state and local law enforcement, both as intelligence sources and as intelligence users.

3. Ensure That the FBI Regularly Shares Information

The FBI must share information with state and local law enforcement—treating state and local partners as critical actors in the fight against terrorism.

State, local, and private sector partners must send and receive timely information from the FBI. Despite the lessons of 9/11 and other terrorist plots, the culture of the FBI continues to resist sharing information with state and local law enforcement.

4. Expand Active Shooter Threat Training Across the Country

Mass shootings in busy areas will always be a threat given America’s free society. Since state and local law enforcement officers will be the first to respond, training for active shooter events should be expanded through existing programs such as the Active Shooter Threat Training Program and corresponding instructor training program.

5. Community Outreach Remains a Vital Tool

The U.S. should facilitate strong community outreach and policing. Such capabilities are key to building trust in local communities, especially in high risk areas. If the U.S. is to thwart Islamist terrorist attacks successfully, it must do so by putting effective community outreach operations at the tip of the spear.

6. Maintain Essential Counterterrorism Tools

Support for important investigative tools is essential to maintaining the security of the U.S. and combating terrorist threats. Legitimate government surveillance programs are also a vital component of U.S. national security and should be allowed to continue.

7. Counter Islamist Ideology

The U.S. needs a strong, proactive counterterrorism policy in order to prevent future terrorist attacks like Orlando. We cannot afford to play politics when national security is at stake. The U.S. must do more both at home and abroad in order to uproot and defeat Islamist terrorism. (For more from the author of “7 Ways US Can Prevent Another Orlando Attack” please click HERE)

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Gun Shop Reported ‘Suspicious’ Orlando Shooter to FBI

Robbie Abell, owner of a Florida gun shop, says he alerted authorities that a suspicious man had come in asking about body armor. Five weeks later, Omar Mateen – equipped with weapons he bought at a different shop after Abell’s employees refused to sell to him – killed 49 people and injured as many at Pulse night club in Orlando.

The Wall Street Journal quotes Abell as telling them that his store, Lotus Gunworks of South Florida, “shut him down on all sales” after be began asking bizarre questions about body armor and bulk ammunition. “The questions he was asking were not the normal questions a normal person would be asking… He just seemed very odd,” Abell said. The armor Mateen asked about is not traditionally available to civilians.

Abell noted that he made a phone call during his time in the store, and appeared to be speaking in Arabic. Mateen is from an Afghan family, and his father – a prolific pro-Taliban Youtuber – is known to speak at least two Afghan languages, Dari and Pashto. Mateen’s wife, Noor Salman, identifies as “Palestinian,” which would make her a likely Arabic speaker. She has confessed to shopping for weapons with Mateen.

Abell says his store alerted authorities to the suspicious man, though he did not say which authorities– whether he spoke to local police, FBI, or Homeland Security. Local CBS 12 notes that Abell’s store appeared to be following the procedures “in line with the FBI’s push for people to ‘see something, say something,‘ if they witness anything that makes them feel uncomfortable.” (Read more from “Gun Shop Reported ‘Suspicious’ Orlando Shooter to FBI” HERE)

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Orlando Shooting Witness Explains Why He Held Club’s Door Shut During Escape

One of the first witnesses interviewed after the shooting in Orlando Sunday said he and another witness held closed a small exit door in an apparent attempt to prevent the shooter from following their group into an alleyway.

Luis Burbano, an actor based in Orlando, explained the scene of the crime in two interviews with Fox News Channel and ABC News. Burbano said he was in the club while the shooting was ongoing for “no more than a minute, minute and a half.”

Burbano claimed he and a group of around 20 people were able to escape through a small side alley for employees just outside the main building. As the sounds of gunshots began to get closer and closer, Burbano and another witness held closed a small door. Burbano said the entire group was “crammed” in the alley while trying to escape through a hole in a fence.

“We went to this alleyway which led for only employees and … me and this random guy tried blocking the door, cause at that point, like I said, the bullets were getting louder and closer so we blocked this door,” Burbano told ABC News.

“And we did hear banging, and I pray it wasn’t anyone trying to escape, because I would forever feel guilty, but at that point there was about 20 people in front of us crammed in this little alleyway with a big hole in one of the fences and just trying to topple over, just trying to … escape, just run.” (Read more from “Orlando Shooting Witness Explains Why He Held Club’s Door Shut During Escape” HERE)

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The Orlando Massacre Is Just the Beginning

What is the greatest lesson of the Orlando massacre, where a Muslim shooter killed at least 50 people at a homosexual night club—an event that is now considered the deadliest terrorist attack on U.S. soil since the September 11 attacks of 2001? It’s that such an attack had to happen—and is destined to happen again. Why? Because the surest way of seeing an act occur repeatedly—say a terrorist attack—is to repeat all the same steps that precipitated and paved the way for it in the first place.

Consider: the shooter, Omar Mir Seddique Mateen, was “quite religious” and a pious Muslim (he attended mosque and prayed regularly); he clearly saw himself as a jihadi killing evildoers—he “recited prayers to Allah during the attack,” pledged this act to the Islamic State, and the latter claimed it—officialdom, as usual, is trying to obfuscate the Islamic role.

Despite all of the above and the fact that ISIS has repeatedly executed homosexuals, often videotaping it (see here), “FBI Special Agent Ron Hopper said the bureau was still working to determine whether sexual orientation was a motive in the Orlando attack.”

President Obama said what he often says after a Muslim goes on a rampage in the name of Islam: it’s still too early to know the “precise motivations of the killer.” Instead, Obama exploited the jihadi massacre as a springboard for his own gun-ban agenda, saying that access to “very powerful weapons very quickly” is “a problem regardless of their motivations.”

Still others are going as far as to blame this jihadi attack on American Christians and conservatives: “You know what is gross — your thoughts and prayers and Islamophobia after you created this anti-queer climate,” ACLU staff attorney Chase Strangio tweeted.

Then there’s the deliberate incompetence: Obama’s own purge of training materials and language deemed “hurtful” to Muslims is being cited as partially responsible for the FBI dropping the ball—so that the FBI would never “ever have guessed a LGBT club [would] be a target of an terrorist attack” Mateen was even on the FBI’s radar as a “person of interest” in 2013 and 2014—yet was free to buy guns and go on a murderous rampage in 2016.

Indeed, in this case at least, it appears that Islamophobia trumped homophobia: “Gilroy, a former Fort Pierce police officer, said Mateen frequently made homophobic and racial comments. Gilroy said he complained to his employer several times but it did nothing because he was Muslim.”

Finally, as with every Islamic terror attack on U.S. soil, the media is again warning against that notorious wave of “reprisals” against the Muslim community that never manifests. Florida officials were quick to invite a Muslim cleric to address the media and “preempt a possible backlash against the Muslim community” (as opposed to the other Muslim cleric who openly taught in Orlando that Islam commands the execution of homosexuals). The Guardian “courageously” proclaimed, “Let’s not give in to fear after the Orlando shooting.”

Similarly, the head of the Jewish LGBTQ group, who expressed fears of a backlash against Muslims, redundantly pointed out that “We should remember not to blame all members of any other religion or political ideology for what one person does”—an admonition that fails to address who or what we should blame when countless upon countless members of one religion constantly and always engage in violent behavior.

To the careful observer, all of these reactions from liberals, leftist media, and the Obama administration are par for the course whenever a jihadi terror attack occurs on American soil: stout denial of any connection between the attack in question and Islamic teachings; cynically exploiting the attack to demonize conservatives, gun advocates, and “homophobic” Christians; and cries that any scrutiny into Islam is tantamount to a “backlash” against Muslims.

And it’s because all these reactions are standard that many more Islamic terrorist attacks are destined to occur on American soil. (For more from the author of “The Orlando Massacre Is Just the Beginning” please click HERE)

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