Jennifer Rowland

Este archivo solo abarca los artículos del autor incorporados a este sitio a partir del 1 de diciembre de 2006. Para fechas anteriores realice una búsqueda entrecomillando su nombre.

MundoOriente Próximo,

A gruesome snuff video that has garnered more than 180,000 views on YouTube underlines just how grim the Syrian conflict has become.

This video appears to document one of the worst kinds of war crimes: The summary executions of wounded men. (Warning: The scenes are extremely graphic.)

Several paramilitaries in battle fatigues armed with automatic weapons -- some speaking Arabic in distinctive Lebanese accents -- pull wounded men out of the back of a van and drop them on to the ground, then shoot them in their heads at point-blank range.

As they shoot their victims, some of the paramilitaries seem almost giddy with excitement.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoAméricaMundoOriente Próximo, ,

Mientras contemplan una acción militar contra  Siria, los miembros del Congreso y funcionarios del gobierno de Barack Obama deben, entre otras cosas, tomar en cuenta cuál sería el efecto de un ataque de los Estados Unidos contra el régimen de Bachar al Asad en el ya complicado, incluso venenoso, estado de las relaciones entre suníes y chiítas en la región.

Tres de los principales estados suníes, Arabia Saudita, Turquía y  Emiratos Árabes Unidos, ya han ofrecido sus activos militares en caso que ocurra un ataque de  EE.UU.

La semana pasada, el presidente Hassan Rouhani dijo que el gobierno chiita iraní y su aliado Rusia trabajarían en una "cooperación amplia" para proteger a Siria.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoAméricaInternacionalTerrorismo Internacional,

The man charged Wednesday with attempting to blow up the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, the latest alleged jihadist to be charged in a law enforcement sting, may or may not have had the capability to create a major terrorist incident. But if his case follows the pattern of other similar sting operations, what is clear is that he faces very long odds in court.

Quazi Mohammad Rezwanual Ahsan Nafis, a 21-year-old Bangladeshi from Queens, is accused of plotting to detonate a 1,000-pound bomb outside the Federal Reserve building in Manhattan.

Sounds pretty terrifying. But as acting Assistant FBI Director Mary Galligan explained, "It is important to emphasize that the public was never at risk ...…  Seguir leyendo »

ReflexionesIslam y Mundo Árabe

On November 2, 2004, Dutch filmmaker Theo van Gogh was bicycling to work in Amsterdam when he was shot eight times at close range. He died instantly, but in a fit of rage, his assailant, Dutch-Moroccan Mohammed Bouyeri, also attempted to cut off his head with a machete.

Bouyeri killed van Gogh because of a short film he had recently produced with Somali-born Dutch politician Ayaan Hirsi Ali that criticized Islam's treatment of women.

The film showed verses of the Quran projected onto the bodies of several naked young women. It was a film designed to provoke. And it did. Ali subsequently went into a self-imposed exile in the United States.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoAméricaMundoOriente Próximo, , , ,

Last week, a U.S. drone attack killed 19 suspected Taliban militants at a compound in North Waziristan on the Afghan border, according to Pakistani intelligence officials.

Dawn, a leading English-language Pakistani newspaper, later reported that the drone actually launched two separate strikes, the second of which occurred "when tribesmen were still carrying out rescue work," and killed an additional three people.

It was unclear whether the three were civilians or militants. If they were civilians, the incident would run counter to a marked decline in reports of civilian deaths in Pakistan caused by CIA drone strikes.

The New America Foundation has been collecting data about the drone attacks systematically for the past three years from reputable news sources such as the New York Times and Reuters, as well as Pakistani media outlets such as the Express Tribune and Dawn.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoAméricaMundoOriente PróximoInternacionalTerrorismo Internacional, , ,

On Sunday a missile launched from a U.S. drone struck a house in Pakistan's remote tribal agency of North Waziristan, killing eight suspected militants, most of whom were loyal to the Pakistani Taliban commander, Hafiz Gul Bahadur. Bahadur has reportedly overseen multiple attacks against NATO troops in Afghanistan.

While the CIA drone war against al Qaeda in Pakistan is well known and is even, on occasion, publicly acknowledged by senior Obama administration officials, the strike against Bahadur's fighters is part of a lesser-known campaign to target Pakistani militants, who are less able to pose a threat to the U.S. homeland. This represents an expansion of the drone program that was overseen by President Barack Obama's administration.…  Seguir leyendo »