“While New York has long been militant Islamist terror’s No. 1 target, it has also increasingly become the main U.S. source of the challenge,’” Judith Miller judges in a FOX News take on a Big Apple seemingly ridden with homegrown terrorists — and see her City Journal essay on “New Yorkistan.” A Swedish woman says one of two would-be New Jersey jihadists was on his way to Egypt to marry her and study Arabic, not kill Americans, The Bergen County Record’s Nick Clunn recounts. “Feel like a loser? Never cool at school? Not much luck with women? Become a jihadist!” New York Daily News columnist Michael Daly leads in re: the evolution of these two latest would-be terrorists. The FBI launched a “secret, tightly run operation of military precision” targeting the pair back in October 2006, a Newark Star-Ledger team backgrounds.
Feds: President Obama’s proposed $400 million in humanitarian aid for Gaza Palestinians “could be one of the most serious breaches of U.S. terror law that we’ve seen since 9/11,” FOXBusiness’ David Asman denounces. Confirmation hearings for nominated director of national intelligence James R. Clapper Jr. “are likely to focus as much on the powers of the office as on its next occupant,” The Washington Post’s Walter Pincus analyzes. A House-proposed WMD Prevention and Preparedness Act would require DHS and other agencies to develop enhanced security rules for researching deadly bio-agents, Global Security Newswire’s Martin Matishak mentions — as The Wall Street Journal’s Peggy Noonan decries federal unreadiness “to ensure public safety and security in the event of a WMD incident.”
Homies: DHS’s Coast Guard on Friday “issued a request from vendors, scientists, government laboratories and nonprofits for ideas on how to stop, contain and clean up” the disastrous Gulf oil spill, Government Executive’s Robert Brodsky reports — as the Los Angeles Times’ Richard Simon sees the Coasties also ordering BP to plug the damned leak already. FBI deputy John Pistole impressed Senate Commerce solons in the first of two confirmation hearings in his bid to fill the long-vacant TSA chief’s chair, Homeland Security Today’s Mickey McCarter handicaps. Salon’s Alex Pareene, meanwhile, slags Mark Krikorian’s halfhearted retraction of a mistaken National Review posting saying the allegedly euphemism happy Obama administration would be revamping ICE into the “Homeland Security Investigations” agency.
Know nukes: A federal lab in Nevada “would gather some of the first critical information that could affect the lives of millions in the aftermath of a nuclear terrorist attack in an American city,” The Associated Press recently spotlighted. “House homeland overseers agree with a commission’s prediction that by 2013 terrorists will launch an attack somewhere in the world using a weapon of mass destruction,” Cybercast News Service notes — as Agence France-Presse quotes a Pentagon official’s admission that “the thing that keeps me awake at night is a nexus between terrorism and massive destruction,” and Reuters hears Iran’s nuclear chief promising construction of a new uranium enrichment plant just days after U.N. approval of new sanctions. A squadron responsible for maintaining some 2,000 nuclear weapons at a New Mexico base has been recertified after failing an inspection in January, The Air Force Times relays.
Bugs ‘n bombs: According to Scientific American, a booming market in counterfeit botox for cosmetics treatments “could put a deadly biological weapons agent in the wrong hands,” The New York Times passes along. “Why do we get so exercised when nearly 3,000 Americans die on 9/11, but remain relatively indifferent to the nearly 40,000 Americans who die every year in traffic accidents?” a Foreign Policy posting ponders. “Seventy years ago, Japan’s bio-attacks killed hundreds of thousands. The effects linger today,” City Journal, once more, spotlights. Across the pond, two Liverpool streets were cordoned off for four hours after a passerby found a shoebox-sized package with “anthrax” written on the side, the Echo informs — while AFP has Canadian authorities late last week ruling out terrorism in a mysterious massive purchase of explosive ammonium nitrate fertilizer.
Close air support: Officials tell the Journal-Constitution that more lenient screening procedures for airline employees at Atlanta’s airport enabled a Delta attendant to carry a gun aboard the first leg of a round-trip flight to Indianapolis. “TSA has 80 body scanners in use at U.S. airports and hopes to jump to 450 by the end of the year. The peek-a-boo rollout is well under way,” The Wall Street Journal leads — while aviation security experts alert the L.A. Times that the machines may miss items that metal detectors catch. The Christmas day bomber passed through trace screening apparently because he never actually touched his explosives, FOX News learns. Passengers had to endure delays at Melbourne Airport’s Qantas domestic terminal after a security breach forced authorities to evacuate the area, The Herald Sun says — as The Times of India sees New Delhi’s air hub evolving a new system by which security response to any threat will be managed by a single agency.
Courts and rights: Unannounced checkpoints, random street closings and police choppers will safeguard the trial opening today of four men accused of plotting to bomb Bronx synagogues, The Poughkeepsie Journal curtain-raises. A federal judge has delayed trial for seven North Carolina terror suspects by nearly a year to give lawyers more time to review more than 750 hours of recordings and 30,000 pages of documents, The Raleigh News & Observer notes. Access given to Indian investigators to question a Chicago man accused in the 2008 Mumbai massacre is “historic in the nature of security cooperation,” The Washington Times quotes the U.S. ambassador to India.
Over there: An ex-senior Afghan Talibanite says Pakistani security forces are harboring its leader, Mullah Omar, in Karachi, Iran’s Press TV relays — while the L.A. Times learns that Pakistani intel not only funds and trains Taliban insurgents, but also maintains representation on their leadership council, and Newsweek questions the strategic wisdom of the CIA’s gunning for Omar as a bin-Laden-esque “high-value target.” In a bid to spur possible reconciliation, meanwhile, the U.N. is hastening efforts to remove certain Taliban leaders from an international terrorist blacklist, The New York Times tells. Russia’s announcement last week of the arrest of militant chief Ali Taziyev could be a devastating blow to the insurgency in the North Caucasus, Foreign Policy, again, posits. At least nine civilians and officers were killed after a suicide bomber drove a truck into the barracks of an elite Algerian police unit, Al Jazeera relates.
Qaeda Qorner: The Russian secret service “has no information confirming” that Osama bin Laden is dead, The Moscow News notes — while The St. Petersburg (Fla.) Times sees cops arresting a transient claiming to be “bin Laden’s right hand man,” and Britain’s Daily Mail profiles the surrogate mom supposedly gestating the terror icon’s grandchild.Young Brit Muslims, meantime, are being groomed by al Qaeda for a Mumbai-style attack on U.K. targets, NDTV quotes the MI5 agency. “Combating the increasing threat of al-Qaeda-in-the-Arabian-
Taking a new look: “In an attempt to convince an anxious populace that his legislative agenda is working and that everything is going to be all right, President Obama embarked on a 50-state, 30,000-town tour Monday during which he plans to gaze assuredly into the eyes of each American citizen, one at a time,” The Onion reports. “ ‘I know a lot of people out there are nervous. They’re worried about unemployment, the oil spill in the Gulf, and whether or not I am making the right choices in Washington,’ Obama said during a rally at Rockland District High School. ‘To those Americans, I offer you this inspiring, confident gaze.’ Obama then stepped down from his podium, walked into the 2,000-person audience, and peered comfortingly into each person’s eyes. After taking 45 minutes to methodically work his way from the front row all the way to the balcony, and punctuating each look with a gentle pat on the shoulder, Obama returned to the stage, collected himself, and addressed the silent group before him. ‘There,’ he said. ‘All better.’”
