Related: Waziristan War Report
"Insurgent ambush, bombs kill at least 13 in Pakistan" by Griff Witte, Washington Post | May 29, 2009
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan - Insurgents used an array of tactics to kill 13 people across northwestern Pakistan yesterday, ambushing police officers with small-arms fire, detonating explosives planted in a crowded market, and attacking security checkpoints with suicide bombers.
Please see: Tortured Logic and related links for why I no longer believe in "Al-CIA-Duh" or anything else the agenda-pushing, war-promoting, Zionist AmeriKan war press has to report about Muslims!!
Most of the deaths occurred in Peshawar, the largest city in the northwest, and security forces appeared to be the targets of much of the violence. The attacks marked the second consecutive day that extremists have used a combination of gunfire and explosives to terrorize a major Pakistani city. The tactics echo two South Asian gun-and-bomb strikes in recent years - the Mumbai siege late last year and the assassination of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto in December 2007.
Related: AmeriKan MSM Pinning Mumbai on Pakistan Patsies
Amerikan MSM Fingers Israel for Mumbai Attacks
The AmeriKan MSM Lying About Bhutto's Assassination
Benazir Bhutto Was Killed By Snipers
Musharaff's Government Claims Bhutto was NOT SHOT
Benazir Bhutto's Assassination and What Really Happened
What Got Benazir Bhutto Killed?
U.S. Doubts "Al-CIA-Duh" Assassinated Bhutto
Did the CIA Kill Benazir Bhutto?
Did Condi Rice Get Benazir Bhutto Killed?
Western Intelligence Knows Al-Qaeda Didn't Kill Bhutto
And now you have your official Zionist version boiled down into a paragraph.
The style of this week's strikes suggests that insurgents are becoming more sophisticated in launching coordinated attacks requiring pinpoint timing and that they are prepared to unleash their full arsenal to undermine a government they see as a tool of the United States.
Taliban fighters have turned their guns against Pakistan in recent years; the Pakistani Army has responded in recent weeks with a major campaign in the Swat Valley, where the Taliban had taken charge. Government officials suggested yesterday that the Peshawar attacks were a response to the military offensive.
The attacks in the northwest followed an assault on a police building and intelligence agency office in the eastern city of Lahore on Wednesday that killed as many as 30 people. The Taliban asserted responsibility for that attack, and government officials were quick to blame the group for yesterday's attacks as well.
Police said the violence began late in the afternoon with the explosion of a bomb that had been planted on a motorbike in the Khyber Bazaar in central Peshawar.... As emergency workers and police responded to the first blast, a second bomb exploded in the Qissa Khwani Bazaar.
This SOOOO STINKS like FALSE-FLAGS, folks!
With chaos breaking out in the narrow, smoke-filled alleys between the shops, insurgents stationed on the rooftops opened fire on police below. For more than an hour, the police and commandos battled the insurgents, trading gunfire as shopkeepers and customers ran for cover.
The attacks killed eight people and injured dozens more. Two of the attackers were killed, and two others were taken into custody. Minutes after police secured the bazaars, a suicide bomber attacked a checkpoint on the outskirts of the city. Three soldiers were killed in that attack.
Later in the evening, a suicide bomber detonated explosives at a checkpoint outside a hospital in the northwestern city of Dera Ismail Khan. The explosion killed two people, and an intense exchange of fire followed, officials said.
Hey, maybe it is all true; however, I'll need to see it somewhere else. If you think I'm buying the accounting of the lying, Muslim-hating, war-promoting Zionist AmeriKan MSM, you are new to the blog.
Of course, one day later, we are winning!!!!
"Pakistani Army retakes largest town in Swat Valley; Taliban shift tactics, bomb sites in cities" by Alex Rodriguez, Los Angeles Times | May 31, 2009
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan - Although the Pakistani military claimed victory in a key Taliban stronghold in the beleaguered Swat Valley yesterday, the government found itself hunkering down against a new battlefront - a bombing campaign in the country's cities....
So they can turn the people against them after Pakistan's government worked so hard to send 'em fleeing? Doesn't make sense, unless....
Bombers struck in three Pakistani cities last week. On Wednesday in Lahore, gunmen attacked a building housing local police and Pakistani intelligence agents before detonating explosives in a van, killing 27 people.
A day later, attackers set off bombs on motorcycles parked outside busy markets in Peshawar, the largest city in northwest Pakistan, and attacked police with gunfire. At least six people were killed in that attack and more than 50 injured. That night, suicide bomb attacks killed four police officers on the outskirts of Peshawar and two people in the northwest city of Dera Ismail Khan.
As a result, security was tightened in Islamabad, the capital, and other major cities. In Peshawar, a pall of fear hung over the city as Pakistanis avoided mosques and bazaars. Schools and colleges were shut down, and extra police patrolled the streets....
WTF is this, just a rehashing of the previous days? Yup, it turns up in the war-promoting paper though, while so many other areas are ignored.
Pakistani officials have acknowledged they cannot stop Taliban fighters from escaping the fighting. Authorities say fleeing Taliban fighters have been shaving off their beards and losing themselves among the masses of refugees streaming into tent camps set up near Mardan, Peshawar, Karachi, and Islamabad.
Yes, the the government's "squalid tent cities."
Since the military offensive to oust the Taliban out of Swat and surrounding regions began, more than 1,200 militants have been killed and 79 others have been captured, Abbas said. He added that 81 Pakistani troops have died in the fighting and did not release any figures on civilian casualties. The military's claims about the offensive cannot be verified because the government greatly restricts journalists from entering the conflict zone.
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I include the photo of fleeing people because of the COLOR!!
It is AMAZING to me because MOST of what we see when it comes to Pakistan and the "Talibans" is a DUSTY, DRY, DESERT CLIMATE amongst the ROCKS!!
Sort of reminds me of the old AmeriKa propaganda put out on the Soviets. Did you know there was never a sunny day in the former Soviet Union? Always cloudy and gray from what I saw on my MSM newscasts!
WASHINGTON - US missile attacks and Pakistan's military advances in and around the Swat Valley have unsettled Al Qaeda and punctured its sense of invulnerability in Pakistani mountain sanctuaries, US military and intelligence officials say.
Sigh. Yup, 'Al-CIA-Duh," yup. Better not be any "terrorist" attacks then!
The dual disruption offers potential opportunities to ferret out and target the extremists, and it has sparked a new sense of possibility amid a generally pessimistic outlook for the Afghanistan-Pakistan conflict.
Related: Obama's Linkage
While Al Qaeda remains "a serious, potent threat," a US counterterrorism official said, "they've suffered some serious losses and seem to be feeling a heightened sense of anxiety - and that's not a bad thing at all."
Then they are going to lash out, right?
The offensive in Swat against its Taliban allies poses a dilemma for Al Qaeda, a senior military official said. "They're asking themselves 'are we going to contest' " Taliban losses, he said, predicting that Al Qaeda will have to undertake more open communication on cellphones and computers, even if only to gather information on the situation in the region. "Then they become more visible," he said.
Pfffft! From the caves?
Did you know the Boston Globe Hears Dead People?
It remains unclear whether US intelligence and Pakistani ground forces can capitalize on such opportunities. Chances to intercept substantive Al Qaeda communications or to take advantage of the movement of individuals are always fleeting, according to several officials of both governments, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss counterinsurgency operations.
What CRAP!! What ABSOLUTE CRAP posing as "news!"
Since last fall, US missile attacks from Predator drones have eliminated about half of 20 US-designated "high-value" Al Qaeda and other targets along Pakistan's border with Afghanistan, US and Pakistani officials said. But the attacks have also killed civilians, stoking anti-American attitudes in Pakistan that inhibit cooperation between Islamabad and Washington....
Yeah, right, they ain't cooperating. Sure killing enough of their own people for us anyway!
Judging by reports from the region through late April, the Obama administration authorized approximately four or five Predator attacks a month, continuing a pace set by the Bush administration in August.
Yup, NO CHANGE! From ONE MASS-MURDERER to the NEXT!!!
The CIA, which does not publicly acknowledge the attacks, operates the aircraft, chooses the targets - ideally with the cooperation of Pakistani intelligence on the ground - and has White House authority to fire the missiles without prior consultation outside the intelligence agency.
So much for Pakistani sovereignty, huh?
A senior Pakistani official said the rate has not diminished in recent weeks, although "you don't hear so much about it" because the strike areas have been more isolated.
Yeah, THANKS, newspapers!
"There are better targets and better intelligence on the ground," the Pakistani official said. "It's less of a crapshoot."
Which means we slaughtered a whole bunch of innocents before!
But hey, we turned a corner and the people ar for it!
A second US military official agreed, saying, "We're not getting civilians, and not getting outrage beyond the usual stuff."
The "usual stuff?"
Meanwhile, the Pakistanis have expanded their military offensive. Hours after the military reported it had taken Swat Valley's biggest city, Mingora, fighting broke out in South Waziristan, a stronghold region for the Taliban and Al Qaeda, The New York Times reported. A Pakistani military spokesman said that region will be the next front in the offensive.
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Well, I stand corrected; MSM poress tells me we are winning so it must be so!!!!
ISLAMABAD - Pakistani forces early today freed dozens of students and teachers held hostage by Taliban militants in northwestern Pakistan, Pakistani military officials said.
The hostages had been part of a convoy ambushed yesterday by the militants. That attack was part of a string of militant actions in Pakistan's tribal belt that the army believes is partly aimed at distracting the military from its offensive against the Taliban in the Swat Valley. The militants were said to have been armed with rockets, grenades and automatic weapons.
There were no immediate reports of casualties in either the ambush of the convoy or the rescue of the hostages. Major General Athar Abbas said today that at least one hostage was still missing. He said the militants planned to take the captives to South Waziristan. No other details were released.
Details were still emerging early today about what exactly happened in North Waziristan. Originally as many as 500 people were believed to have been abducted, but about 200 students were later found to be safe. Police official Meer Sardar said the abduction had occurred about 20 miles from Razmak Cadet College. The victims were leaving the school area after they were warned to get out in a phone call from a man they believed to be a political official, Sardar said, citing accounts from a group of 17 who managed to escape. Local media, however, reported that the group was leaving because their school vacation had started.
Translation: They just shot the MSM cover story lie to shit!
About 30 buses, cars, and other vehicles were carrying the students, staff, and others when they were stopped along the road by a large group of gunmen in their own vehicles, according to a school employee who was among those who escaped. He said the vehicle he was riding in happened to be behind a truck on the road and it was able to slip away unnoticed.
Blackwaters?
The employee requested anonymity out of fear of Taliban reprisal. He said the assailants carried rockets, Kalashnikovs, hand grenades, and other weapons. He estimated about 400 captives were initially taken. North and South Waziristan are major Al Qaeda and Taliban strongholds bordering Afghanistan. They are roughly 150 miles from the Swat Valley, where Pakistani soldiers and Taliban militants have been fighting for weeks.
Clashes in the past three days in South Waziristan have killed at least 25 militants and nine soldiers. In the latest attack, reported by the army yesterday, militants fired rockets at troops, killing two. The fresh fighting is fueling speculation that a month after re-igniting its battle against Taliban militants in Swat, the military will widen the offensive to South Waziristan. But Abbas said yesterday that for now, troops on the ground were simply reacting to attacks, not opening a new front.
"This is all to divert attention," from the Swat fighting, Abbas said. With its hands full in Swat, opening a front in South Waziristan now would be risky for the military. Known for its harsh terrain, reticent tribes, and porous border with Afghanistan, as well as its history of limited federal government oversight, South Waziristan would probably be a tougher test for Pakistan's armed forces than Swat. The region also is the main base for Pakistani Taliban chief Baitullah Mehsud.
There is that dead guy again.
The tribal areas also are the suspected hideouts of Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden and his deputy, Ayman al-Zawahri.
Pffft! Gotta get that dead guy in the piece, too, huh?
Abbas said major towns and cities in the Swat Valley would probably be cleared of Taliban fighters in a matter of days. The military has already recaptured Mingora, Swat's main urban center. But many of the estimated 4,000 militants in the valley were believed to have fled to the hills, and Abbas said clearing those rural areas could take months.
Another problem with tackling South Waziristan is that it would exacerbate an already massive humanitarian challenge facing the country: up to 3 million people displaced by the fighting. Already, large numbers of families have begun leaving South Waziristan amid rumors of an imminent operation.
There is going to be 5 million refugees soon!
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And now they are letting "terrorists" go:
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan - A Pakistani court ordered the immediate release yesterday of the founder of a banned militant group that is believed to be behind last year's terrorist attacks in Mumbai. India swiftly denounced the decision, saying it demonstrates that Pakistan is not serious about cracking down on home-grown radical Islamic terror groups.
Well, if you saw my links above you know all about Mumbai.
The decision came six months after Pakistan placed Hafiz Sayeed, founder of Lashkar-i-Taiba, under house arrest. Lashkar is suspected of masterminding the November siege in Mumbai, which left more than 160 people dead. Sayeed's lawyer said yesterday that the Lahore High Court had ruled there was insufficient evidence to continue holding him.
That's because THEY KNOW who REALLY DID IT!
Outside the courthouse, the decision was greeted by cheers and chants of "God is great!" from Sayeed's supporters. In India, officials expressed deep displeasure.
"We are unhappy that Pakistan does not show the degree of seriousness and commitment that it should to bring to justice perpetrators of the Mumbai terror attack," Indian home minister P. Chidambaram told reporters in New Delhi.
Why don't YOU LOOK INTO IT?
After all, it was HINDU NATIONALISTS who were the agents on the ground!
Analysts on Indian television stations slammed the move throughout the day, saying it was typical of Pakistani "catch and release" programs for terrorists.
Tell it to the Saudis.
Sayeed, 59, is the leader of Jamaat-ud-Dawa, a group that he says is a charity but that the United Nations considers a front for Lashkar. Pakistan banned Jamaat late last year, under heavy international pressure. It has lately reemerged under yet another name, Falah-i-Insaniat, and has been providing assistance to some of the 3 million Pakistanis displaced by the army's battle with the Taliban in the Swat Valley.
Then THEY AIN'T TERRORISTS whatever they are!
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A displaced Pakistani man held his baby at a refugee camp near Pershawar yesterday. (Emilio Morenatti/ AP)
Wow, what an awesome photo!!!
PESHAWAR, Pakistan - Pakistani tribesmen seeking revenge for a deadly mosque bombing attacked militant strongholds for a second day yesterday, while the country's Taliban leader faced rare denunciation from within insurgent ranks.
Capitalizing on the anti-Taliban sentiments, the military's top spokesman exhorted all Pakistanis to rise up against militants wherever they found them. Pressure is increasing on militants who have held sway in parts of Pakistan's northwest, with the army already bearing down in an offensive on their onetime stronghold in the Swat Valley region. Talk has now turned to the possibility of another operation against Al Qaeda and Taliban fighters in the nearby tribal belt along the country's border with Afghanistan.
In the most striking example of growing anti-Taliban sentiment, up to 1,600 tribesmen in the Upper Dir district formed a civilian militia force to fight militants they hold responsible for last Friday's suicide bombing that killed at least 33 people in a packed mosque. Such militia are known in Pakistan as lashkars.
Surge is working, huh?
The group cleared three villages of Taliban fighters Sunday and focused yesterday on two more villages that are known Taliban strongholds, said Khaista Rehman, a local police chief.
"The lashkar has destroyed 25 homes of Taliban commanders and their fighters in various villages," Rehman told The Associated Press by phone. "The Taliban had set up their offices in those villages but the local residents and the lashkar have attacked them, and we hope the lashkar will succeed."
At least 13 militants were killed and two tribesmen wounded in two days of fighting, said Nawaz Khan, another police official. Officials blamed Friday's mosque bombing in the town of Haya Gai on the Taliban, saying they were angry that local tribesmen had resisted them moving into the area, where minor clashes between the two sides occurred for months.
That doesn't seem to be the way to win them over, does it?
Besides, I DO NOT BELIEVE "Taliban" are blowing up their mosques with their brothers, cousins, and relatives inside. But CUI BONO, readers?
Army chief spokesman Major General Athar Abbas urged civilians to consider the kind of rule the Taliban was trying to impose - they stand accused of whippings and beheadings in the name of Islamic law in Swat - and join the fight against them.
Yeah, about the beatings and beheadings, CUI BONO?
"Citizens should ponder upon the way of life they are introducing, if that is acceptable to us," Abbas told the News1 television network. "If not, they have to raise a voice against them, they have to rise against them."
Which also explains the resistence to occupation!
A recent wave of violence across Pakistan blamed on militants appears to be creating tensions within the country's Taliban leadership. Qari Zainuddin, the leader of a Taliban faction in South Waziristan, yesterday denounced Pakistani Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud for recent attacks that have killed civilians.
Well, that sure makes sense!
So it IS CIA ASSETS raising a ruckus after all!
"Whatever Baitullah Mehsud and his associates are doing in the name of Islam is not a jihad, and, in fact, it is rioting and terrorism," Zainuddin told The Associated Press. "Islam stands for peace, not for terrorism."
Washington strongly backs the Swat offensive, and officials have said privately they would like Pakistan to follow up by launching an operation in nearby South Waziristan.
Don't worrry, they are getting aroud to it!
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ISLAMABAD, Pakistan - A massive truck bomb exploded outside a luxury hotel in northwestern Pakistan's provincial capital last night, killing 11 people and injuring at least 50, officials said.
Gees, talk about DEJA-VU: The Zionist AmeriKan MSM's Pakistan Cover Story
Of course, the U.S. wanting to buy it for a military base had nothing to do with it.
Won't fetch as much $ now, will it, cui bono?
The attack marked the latest salvo by insurgents who have vowed to avenge an army offensive in the nearby Swat Valley, and it underscored their ability to strike at some of the country's most heavily fortified targets.
You verify that, MSM?
Peshawar's Pearl Continental Hotel had been considered an oasis of relative security in a city that has become a front line in the battle between the Pakistani government and radical Islamist groups such as Al Qaeda and the Taliban.
Oh, STINKOLA!!!!!!!
The hotel, a local landmark, had been popular among foreigners, including aid workers who have been using it in recent weeks as a base for their efforts to assist the more than 2 million Pakistanis displaced from their homes by the fighting in Swat.
Gets STINKIER the MORE you read!
The bomb, hidden beneath kitchen supplies and estimated to contain more than 1,000 pounds of explosives, caused one section of the hotel to collapse and destroyed more than 30 vehicles, said Shafqatullah Malik, an assistant police chief.
That's ONE HELL of a BOMB, 'eh?
US Embassy spokesman Lou Fintor said there was no indication that any Americans had been injured or killed.
STINK!
US government personnel had been prohibited from the hotel because of security concerns.
STINK, STINK!
Just last week, the embassy issued a warning to Americans to avoid Peshawar altogether.
Oh, STINK-A-DOODELEY!!!!
The city has come under increasing strain as the Pakistani Taliban has strengthened, and bombings there have become a regular occurrence.
WTF? I thought the people hated them!
The Pearl Continental, part of a chain of five-star Pakistani hotels, is one of the only hotels in Peshawar that caters to foreign visitors and well-to-do Pakistanis. It is located in one of the most heavily fortified areas of the city, set near a cluster of government buildings, including a courthouse, the provincial chief minister's house and a major military base.
The stench is overwhelmingly gagging!!
How five-stars, etc, only get hit in dark-skinned peoples' countries, 'eh?
The State Department has been negotiating to buy the hotel and convert it into a consular building in Peshawar, which is the capital of North-West Frontier Province and the largest city in the region. That deal has not been completed.
Oh, what a COINKYDINK, 'eh? Price on that property just went down!
Pakistani television networks broadcast images of dazed hotel guests and workers evacuating the building, many covered in dust and some with bloodied faces. The blast demolished the hotel's kitchen, and security guards and kitchen staff appeared to have constituted a large share of the injured, according to hospital officials.
Police and an intelligence official at the scene reported that two vehicles were involved in the attack. First, a
Two hotel security guards were taken into custody for questioning, police officials said. An intelligence officer investigating the site said that three to five assailants had been involved. The attack conjured memories of a blast at the luxury Marriott Hotel in Islamabad last September, killing more than 50 people.
Can you say INSIDE JOB?!
Insurgents have launched a string of attacks in Pakistan in recent weeks that Taliban spokesmen have said are revenge for the army's offensive in Swat. The deadliest attack, against a police headquarters and an office of Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence agency, killed 30 people in the eastern city of Lahore. Peshawar shopping markets and a movie theater have also been targeted.
Government officials have indicated that an operation in the Taliban haven of South Waziristan is next, and yesterday the army shelled targets near that mountainous tribal region.Yeah, but it is the "TERRORISTS," "SUICIDERS," and CAR BOMBS that get all the PRINT!
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