Wake-Up Call

Few Americans born before September 11, 2001, will readily accept the explanation that the three Palestinian-American men caught with hundreds of prepaid cell phones and pictures of the Mackinac Bridge were simply trying to make money and doing a bit of sightseeing. And Americans will be glad that accepting this explanation wasn’t the first instinct of law enforcement authorities either. Authorities have charged the men with providing support for terrorist acts and surveillance of a target for terrorist purposes. All persons arrested in America are, as a matter of law, innocent until proven guilty.The cell phone buyers may well be found innocent.But in respect of war policy, the prudent thing to do at the moment is to treat these arrests as but the latest wake up call to a danger among us.The apparent plot on Michigan’s Mackinac Bridge – a landmark structure that is one of the world’s biggest suspension bridges – follows a run of apparently thwarted attacks. Last week two Dearborn men – Osama Abulhassan and Ali Houssaiky – were arrested in a car filled with prepaid cell phones, more than $10,000 in cash, and instructions relating to Royal Jordanian Airlines passenger and baggage information. Last week there was also the thwarted British aircraft plot. There are those who immediately cry wolf at the arrests. Supporters of the arrested men claim the cell phones were just part of a money-making scheme and self-described civil libertarians are fidgeting about racial profiling.What alerted authorities in the Mackinac Bridge and Dearborn cases was the number of prepaid cell phones. Prepaid cell phones are used by terrorists as electronic triggers for bombs. Such phones set off the 2004 terrorist bombs at Madrid. Prepaid cell phones are also favored means of communication by terrorists as they’re hard to trace and tap.Add to that pictures of a bridge or airport plans and any law enforcement not asleep at the job would be reaching for the handcuffs.Rallies have been held in metro Detroit in support of Hezbollah – a group officially listed as a terrorist group by the State Department. Federal agents are reportedly monitoring Hezbollah’s presence in the area. Rep. John Dingell told a Detroit television station that “I don’t take sides for or against Hezbollah or for or against Israel” in the current conflict. The chairman of the House subcommittee on terrorism and non-proliferation, Rep.Edward Royce, told United Press International that “We’re seeing a pattern of activities on the border and elsewhere,” indicating “a renewed operational focus by Hezbollah on getting their people in over the border, between the ports of entry.”Fundraising in America for Hezbollah is on the rise. Newsweek reports of “a handful of money scams uncovered across the country in recent years bearing Hizbullah’s fingerprints. Though the revenues are not huge, the cases together underscore a daunting reality: one of the most proficient terrorist groups in the world has at least a small web of operatives in America who, prosecutors believe, are loyal to Hassan Nasrallah.”We don’t take this to mean, as some on the left do, that prosecuting the war in Iraq and Afghanistan has made us more vulnerable at home. But for as long as the war is on it will be important to cover the homefront when advancing in battle. The administration has been opposed all along the way in doing this by the same types who opposed the war to liberate Iraq. These types have opposed every Bush administration effort to protect the homeland, from the Patriot Act, to the NSA’s wiretapping program intercepting terrorist communications, through to the Treasury’s efforts to monitor terrorist transactions. One can be sure that these types will be the first to jump up and down and point fingers at the Bush administration if, God forbid, another terrorist attack happens on American soil. The cell phone arrests provide a timely reminder to America of the broader threat that most certainly exists at home.

Wake-Up Call

Wake-Up Call

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