Soldiers of Islam successfully mount attack against latest foe

.... Teachers


http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/asiapcf/11/25/thailand.ap/index.html
Teacher slayings shut Thai schools
POSTED: 3:49 a.m. EST, November 25, 2006
BANGKOK, Thailand (AP) -- Hundreds of schools in Thailand's restive south will shut their doors in response to increasingly vicious attacks by suspected Muslim insurgents against teachers and schools, an official said Saturday.

The closure, which begins Monday, affects all 336 primary and secondary schools in the province of Pattani, where two teachers were fatally shot by suspected insurgents in the past two days.

In one of the killings, attackers shot a school principal Friday, and then set his body on fire. The principal became the 59th teacher or school official killed in three years of violence, said Bunsom Thongsriprai, president of the Teachers' Association in Pattani.

"Teachers can't bear what has happened," Bunsom said. "They are paranoid, worried and afraid." He said the province's schools, which teach about 100,000 students, will reopen when teachers feel safe.

More than 1,800 people have died from violence in Thailand's three southernmost, Muslim-majority provinces -- Yala, Pattani and Narathiwat -- since an Islamic insurgency flared in January 2004.

Teachers have always been occasional targets, seen by insurgents as representatives of the government and easy targets. But recently, teachers and schools have been attacked on an almost daily basis.

On Thursday, 96 schools across Yala were ordered closed as a safety precaution after a school was burned down the day before. It was one of several schools in the province recently targeted by arsonists.

The Yala schools were initially scheduled to reopen Monday but school authorities have decided to keep them closed until further notice, said Sanya Suwannapho, head of the Association of Teachers in Yala province.

Thailand's new military-installed government has pledged to make peace in the south a priority, and reverse the hardline policies of former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, who was ousted in a Sept. 19 coup.

Defense Minister Boonrawd Somtat said Friday that insurgents had stepped up violence to keep residents from accepting new peace overtures from the authorities.

"They have intensified violent attacks to intimidate and terrify people," Boonrawd said, adding that the shadowy groups behind the violence have not accepted government offers to hold talks.

 

Insurgents shoot, burn teacher alive
http://www.bangkokpost.net/breaking_news/breakingnews.php?id=114451
(Bangkokpost.com)

Insurgents shot a Pattani province school director before setting his car on fire and killing him inthe flames on Friday afternoon after classes, police said.

Officers said Anand Chaidej, director of a school in Sai Buri district of Pattani, was shot in his pick-up while he was driving out of school this afternoon.

After firing shots at the victim, insurgents set his pick-up on fire, burning Mr Anand who was still alive but wounded inside the truck.

In Yaha district of Yala, a bomb went off at 4 p.m. today at a food stall located at the entrance of Wat Yaha Pracharam. The blast wounded several bystanders, one of them seriously.

 

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/category/story.cfm?c_id=500838&ObjectID=10413099

Disembowelled and murdered for teaching girls

Thursday November 30, 2006
By Kim Sengupta

GHAZNI - The gunmen came at night to drag Mohammed Halim away from his home, in front of his crying children and his wife begging for mercy.

The 46-year-old schoolteacher tried to reassure his family that he would return safely.

But his life was over.

He was partly disembowelled and then torn apart with his arms and legs tied to motorbikes. The remains were put on display as a warning to others against defying Taleban orders to stop educating girls.

Halim is one of four teachers killed in rapid succession by the Islamists at Ghazni, a strategic point on the routes from Kabul to the south and east which has become the scene of fierce clashes between the Taleban and United States and Afghan forces.

The day we arrived an Afghan policeman and eight insurgents died during an ambush in an outlying village. Rockets were found, primed to be fired into Ghazni city during a visit by the American ambassador a few days previously. But, as in the rest of Afghanistan, it is the civilians who are bearing the brunt of this murderous conflict.

At the village of Qara Bagh, Halim's family is distraught and terrified. His cousin, Ahmed Gul, shook his head. "They killed him like an animal. No, no. We do not kill animals like that. They took away a father and a husband, they had no pity. We are all very worried. Please go now, you see those men standing over there? They are watching. It is dangerous for you, and for us."

Fatima Mustaq, the director of education at Ghazni, has had repeated death threats, the notorious 'night letters'. Her gender, as well as her refusal to send girls home from school, has made her a hate figure for Islamist zealots. "I think they killed him that way to frighten us, otherwise why make a man suffer so much? Mohammed Halim and his family were good friends of ours and we are very, very upset by what has happened. He came to me when the threats first began and asked what he should do. I told him to move somewhere safe. I think he was trying to arrange that when they came and took him."

The threats against Mushtaq also extend to her husband Sayyid Abdul and their eight children. "When the first letters arrived, I tried to hide them from my husband. But then he found the next few. He said we must stand together. We talked, and we decided that we must tell the children, so that they can be prepared. But it is not a good way for them to grow up."

During the Taleban's rule she and her sister ran secret schools for girls at their home. "They found out and raided us. We managed to persuade them that we were only teaching the Koran. But they spied and found out we were teaching algebra. So they came and beat us. Can you imagine, beating someone for teaching algebra."

- INDEPENDENT

 

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/061202/photos_wl_pc_afp/38b333f8c5e8cd1187fbdec21a58abd1


A Thai soldier inspects a classroom which was set on fire by Islamic militants in Narathiwat province. Suspected Islamic militants have killed three people and torched two schools in Thailand's Muslim-majority southern

 

fnord.

 

And they're coming to get you next, poin.

 

Kudos to these Islamists. They seem to be successfully smashing these brutal war-criminal teachers and their reign of terror.

 

They are also doing a bang-up job on the evil Buddhists

http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2006/12/02/asia/AS_GEN_Thailand_Southern_Violence.php
4 Buddhists shot dead in Thailand's restive south

The Associated Press
Published: December 2, 2006
BANGKOK, Thailand: Four Buddhists were shot dead Saturday in Buddhist-majority Thailand's restive, Muslim-dominated south, as the government warned it may have to change its strategy to counter the rising violence.

A gunman posing as a customer whipped out a gun and shot a 59-year-old food vendor in Pattani province in front of dozens of horrified bystanders, police Lt. Wichathon Timkrom said.

In nearby Yala province, gunmen killed a 34-year-old truck driver as he rode his motorcycle with his wife, Police Lt. Prasom Laungphu said. His wife was not hurt.

Two other Buddhists were shot dead Saturday in Narathiwat province, police said. Gunmen fired into a grocery store in Rueso district, killing its owner Wanna Ongananurak, 35, and a second woman who was as yet unidentified, police said.

Thailand's military-installed government has pledged to make peace in the south a priority, and to reverse the hardline policies of former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawtra, who was deposed by a coup Sept. 19.

But with daily killings continuing unabated, Prime Minister Surayud Chulanont said on Saturday the government may have to change course if the situation does not improve.

"My government is insisting on a peaceful solution to resolve the problem, but if the situation is not improved in (the) next three months, the government may have to adjust the strategy," Surayud said, without elaborating.

More than 1,800 people have died from violence in predominantly Buddhist Thailand's three southernmost, Muslim-majority provinces — Yala, Pattani and Narathiwat — since an Islamic insurgency flared in January 2004.

 

All because Nancy Pelosi passed over Alcee Hastings as House Intelligence Committee Chairman

 

dexter,

You make some good points. I think we should send a military force to Afghanistan and crush the Taliban.

 

Just make sure they are read their Miranda Rights before questioning. Remember to get those Search Warrants before seizing any bomb making material. They are alos entitled to a reason bond after arrest.