359 'People Were in Pieces!'

In this mailing: Raymond Ibrahim: 359 'People Were in Pieces!' Peter Huessy: The Difficult Road to Defense 359 'People Were in Pieces!' Sri Lanka: Islamist Terror on Easter by Raymond Ibrahim  •  April 25, 2019 at 5:00 am         "We are a peace-loving community in this small city, we had never hurt anyone, but we don't know from where this amount of hate is coming. This city has become a grave with blood and bodies lying around.... Since the past three years, we don't know why, but we see an extremist's mindset developing among the Muslims. I know many good Muslims, but there are also a lot who hate us, and they have never been so before. It is in these three years that we see a difference." — A Christian man who survived the bombing of St. Sebastian's Church in Sri Lanka. In 2017, in Egypt, Islamic terrorists bombed two Coptic Christian churches during Palm Sunday mass, which inaugurates Easter week, murdering 50 people and wounding 120. On Easter Sunday 2016 in Pakistan, an Islamic suicide bomber detonated near the children's rides of a public park where Christians were known to be congregated and celebrating; over 70 people -- mostly women and children -- were murdered and nearly 400 wounded. On Easter Sunday 2012 in Nigeria, Islamic terrorists bombed a church, murdering at least 50 worshippers. The Easter Sunday terror attack in Sri Lanka -- which in its death toll eclipses all previous Muslim attacks on Christians during Easter -- is a reminder that if the Islamic State is on the retreat in the Middle East, the hate-filled ideology to which it and like-minded Muslims adhere continues to spread, finding new recruits and new victims around the globe. Pictured: St. Sebastian's Church in Negombo, Sri Lanka, after it was bombed during Mass on Easter Sunday -- one of three churches and four hotels bombed on April 21 in a coordinated attack, in which Islamic terrorists murdered 359 people. (Photo by Stringer/Getty Images) On Easter Sunday, April 21, Islamic terrorists launched a bombing campaign on Christians in Sri Lanka; the current death toll is 359, with hundreds more people wounded. Eight separate explosions took place, at least two of which were suicide bombings: three targeted churches celebrating Easter Sunday Mass; four targeted hotels frequented by Western tourists in connection with Easter holiday; and one blast in a house, which killed three police officers during a security operation. At least 39 foreigners -- including citizens of the United States, Britain, Australia, Japan, Denmark and Portugal -- were among the slain. Continue Reading Article The Difficult Road to Defense by Peter Huessy  •  April 25, 2019 at 4:00 am         Ronald Reagan expressed opposition to the policy of détente, and stated that Soviet leaders "reserve unto themselves the right to commit any crime, to lie, to cheat... and we operate on a different set of standards." "Missile defense is now seen as a key, critical part of strategic deterrence," because it is imperative to place uncertainty in the mind of an enemy force about its ability to achieve its objectives. — U.S. Air Force Lieutenant General (ret.) Henry ("Trey") Obering, former director of the Missile Defense Agency Taken as a whole, missile defense today not only defends America's homeland, but protects U.S. allies, assets and military forces abroad. Pictured: The U.S. Navy guided-missile destroyer USS Fitzgerald launches an SM-3 interceptor missile as part of a joint ballistic missile defense exercise in the western Pacific Ocean, on October 25, 2012. (U.S. Navy photo/Released) In 1983, when U.S. President Ronald Reagan launched the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI), also known as Star Wars -- a research program aimed at developing missiles to protect Americans from a Soviet nuclear attack -- he was accused of engaging in "red-scare tactics." At the root of the criticism was the assumption that the nuclear balance between the Soviet Union and the United States could only remain stable if both sides adhered to the doctrine of Mutual Assured Destruction (MAD). That doctrine led to the ratification in 1972 of the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty, which prohibited the deployment of missile defenses by both the U.S.S.R. and the U.S. beyond a minimal amount of interceptors. Continue Reading Article