More details emerging about that Inauguration day terror scare

We told you about this at the time of Obama’s inauguration, but this week the AP has reported more details on how things went down in the situation room at the White House  just as the transition of power from Bush to Obama was occuring.  According to AP, it seems there was much scrambling going on.  Just how serious was the threat from Somali terrorists that some action would go down that day?

As people crowded into the capital for Barack Obama’s inaugural celebration, senior counterterrorism officials huddled in the White House situation room, frantically trying to unravel intelligence about a possible attack on Washington.

By Tuesday afternoon, as Obama took the oath of office, the threat of a terror plot by the Somalia-based al-Shabab organization had been debunked, but the flurry of activity underscored growing worries about this Islamic militant group.

“I think they are a serious problem, and I don’t think that we should be glib and take it lightly,” said Theresa Whelan, deputy assistant secretary of Defense for African Affairs. “Are they the ones that are going to plan the next major terrorist attack in the United States and carry it out? Probably not. But could they provide some of the foot soldiers for it? Yes.”

Only foot soldiers?  Ms. Whelan, you underestimate the Somalis at your peril.

U.S. counterterrorism officials say they detect a disturbing pattern, one that mirrors al-Qaida methods and could spawn homegrown insurgents and suicide bombers in the U.S.

Counterterrorism officials suspect that al-Shabab is recruiting young men from Somali communities in Minnesota and other Midwestern states, luring them back to their home country for terror training and creating cells of fighters who could travel to other countries, including the United States, to launch attacks.

Officials don’t know if Somalis who have left the country are returning.  Homeland Security has the intelligence framework in place to know that and I suspect they do.  I suppose the larger question is, will they tell the public if these men do return?

And, darn,  it just occured to me that since the FBI is in AG Eric Holder’s Justice Department and they are running the investigation in cities with significant Somali populations, are they sharing their information with agencies like the TSA (Transportation Security Administration) in Homeland Security?  

U.S. officials aren’t sure who is recruiting for al-Shabab, or whether recruits trained in Somalia have been returning to the United States. That uncertainty increased the concerns about the inaugural weekend intelligence reports. Counterterrorism officials described the time as tense as they faced a threat that appeared to grow in credibility as the hours passed.

Furthermore, Ms Whelan who is quoted extensively here is in yet another department—the Defense Department.  I hope this isn’t evolving into a government terrorist investigation (like how 9/11 happened) where walls between agencies with knowledge of the Somalis in the US are firmly in place.  Indeed yet another agency knows a whole bunch about who is and who isn’t in the US, and that is the US State Department.  I sure hope they have some interagency working groups on the subject.

Whelan, who has been a senior policy adviser on African issues at the Pentagon for 14 years, said the al-Shabab threat is complex and evolving, potentially becoming more serious as al-Qaida or other Islamic ideologues try to make inroads into the Somali communities in the U.S.

“There has been a lot of movement back and forth (to Somalia) for a long time, and that leaves us open to the potential that weaknesses will be exploited by those that have jihadist aims,” she said. “We need to be very careful because we have seen that we are internally vulnerable because of the Somali Diaspora.”

And how did we get this large Somali Diaspora in the US?   Ask the State Department and the volags busy lobbying for more Africans to resettle in your town!

Lets see how much of this story Senate hearings might reveal!

The al-Shabab threat also has attracted attention in Congress, where the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee is planning to hold a hearing on the rise of al-Shabab.

Crowd of conservatives cheers Geert Wilders in Washington

Update March 2nd:   You can watch the whole event yourselves on Youtube, go to Jihad Watch here and then follow links to Atlas Shrugs for more on this historic evening.

 

Ann and I had a great treat last night. We went into Washington along with my husband to hear Geert Wilders speak and joined hundreds of fans of free speech in cheering him for his courage and conviction in standing up for western civilization. The event was at the same site as CPAC (Conservative Political Action Conference) but not of CPAC, as the organizers of that event show remarkably little interest in jihad and matters of free speech that involve Islam. It was sponsored by the David Horowitz Freedom Center,  Atlas Shrugs, Jihad Watch, and Dr. Andrew Bostom.

We’ve seen Wilders on TV and on the Internet, but we wanted to see him in person. And it was worth the long drive and the parking hassles. He is very elegant and very tall, and imposing in a soft-spoken and genial, even sweet, way.  It is awful to realize that he is under a double threat — death threats from jihadist Muslims, and an upcoming prosecution for hate speech from his own Dutch government.  He lives under constant guard. How he can be so calm under those conditions is a mystery; I noticed the same thing about Ayaan Hirsi Ali.

Wilders’s main message was that western civilization is better than other ways of life and we need to defend it. But not only are Europeans not defending their own culture, but they define as hate speech attempts to contrast it favorably with, say, Islamic culture. He quoted Ronald Reagan’s speech at the British Parliament in 1982, where he spoke of communism as the evil empire and said it’s important not to avoid threats but to face up to them (I’m writing this from memory; the words are not exact).

I’ve read a number of accounts saying that Wilders wants to ban the Koran, and pointing out the inconsistency of this with his stated support of free speech. Even conservatives fall for this. I knew they were idiots, and of course Wilders made it clear that he is simply pointing out that under the Netherlands’ hate speech laws (or are they EU laws? I’m not sure), if Mein Kampf can be banned then the Koran should be banned too. He is completely opposed to all hate speech laws, and wants for the whole world the kind of protections for speech that we enjoy under our First Amendment. (At least we enjoy them as of today; who knows what is coming down the pike?)

Wilders referred to his exclusion from the U.K. and said he was thankful for our immigration officials. He said he feels at home in the United States.

Pamela Geller of Atlas Shrugs spoke of how Wilders’s cause is also our cause; her account of the event is here, with a picture of the crowd. Also Robert Spencer and Dr. Andrew Bostom had good things to say. And Fitna was shown – Wilders’s short film that got him into all this trouble in the first place. For some reason I had never watched it in its 16-minute entirety; it’s quite stunning and if you haven’t seen it I recommend you click on the link.

The room was jam-packed and apparently many were turned away. Security was supposed to be tight and we saw some people being wanded, but somehow we were just waved in. Maybe it’s obvious how wholesome and innocent Ann and I and my husband are. There were a lot of young people in the audience, CPAC attendees most likely, and they were very responsive to Wilders’s speech, cheering and booing loudly at every appropriate moment. (Jay Nordlinger has noted that hissing is a leftist thing (last item, here,) and I’m glad to say there wasn’t a hiss to be heard, only hearty boos at, for instance, Wilders’s mention of the U.K. government refusing him admittance.) 

Robert Spencer has an account of Wilders’s appearance before the National Press Club earlier yesterday. Our previous posts on Wilders are here. And an interesting article about Wilders’s place in the political world is here. The authors seem to be far to the left and misrepresent him in many respects, especially in calling him tied to the ”far right” and misinterpreting his call to ban the Koran, but provide a lot of information so I’m putting in the link. I think they believe it quite damning to associate him with “neo-conservatives.”

Last, here is a link to the Geert Wilders Defense Fund. Wilders’s court case in the Netherland will cost him big bucks. If he loses he will go to prison. I can hardly think of a worthier cause to support. Think of it this way: Every dollar you give is a vote for western civilization.

Update: More accounts at Atlas Shrugs from people who attended.

Wanting a favor, Ethiopian refugee sends Obama HIV-infected blood

Fox news reports:

A man from President Obama’s hometown of Chicago has been arrested for allegedly sending Obama and his staff envelopes containing HIV-infected blood, in the hopes of killing or harming them.

It’s only the second time ever that HIV-infected blood has been sent with malicious intent through the U.S. mail system, a spokesman for the U.S. Postal Inspection Service said.

In the weeks leading up to Obama’s inauguration, Saad Hussein, an Ethiopian refugee in his late 20s, sent an envelope addressed to “Barack Obama” to offices of the Illinois government in Springfield, Ill., according to court documents. 

The envelope contained a series of curious items, including a letter with reddish stains and an admission ticket for Obama’s election-night celebration in Chicago’s Grant Park. Court documents said Hussein, who takes drugs to treat a mental illness, later told FBI agents he is “very sick with HIV” and cut his fingers with a razor so he could bleed on the letter.

I wondered at first why he would want to harm Obama. I thought all foreigners loved Obama. (Except the people of Macedonia, who, I’m told, were the only Europeans to prefer John McCain to Obama.) It turns out Hussein does like Obama. He just wanted something from him: help from the government and tickets to the inauguration. Maybe someone should have told him that in America it is not the custom to send somebody your infected blood if you want a favor.

Hussein, who has never held a job in the three years he’s been in the United States, was arrested last month….[He] is currently being detained in a Chicago correctional facility.  A judge ordered he receive a mental examination to see if he’s fit for trial, but as of two weeks ago the court couldn’t locate a translator to conduct the examination, according to court documents.

Earlier the article said his brother acted as translator during an interview with FBI agents.  But the guy needs more help than anybody is providing.  He’s been here three years and hasn’t had a job. He’s mentally ill. He doesn’t speak English well enough to have a mental exam without a translator.  And he doesn’t keep his mental illness to himself.

This is not the first time law enforcement officials have had to take Hussein into custody. He was arrested by police in 2006 after starting a fire in the middle of a crowded Chicago intersection. When officers arrived on the scene, he was waving the Koran in the air and yelling”Allah Akbar,” or “God is Great” in Arabic. Court documents say he was transported to a hospital, where he called President Bush a terrorist and criticized American foreign policy. He was not formally charged, but he did spend time in the mental health unit of the hospital.

I hardly know what to comment. I imagine he’s not the only refugee with mental problems, considering what most of them have gone through, but we don’t hear much about that aspect of refugee resettlement. What can be done with him? I hope he has some family besides his brother. But getting him English lessons and a job might help orient him a little in reality. 

Note how much the guy seems to resemble members of ANSWER and other radical groups. I’ve always thought they were mentally ill.

CAIR wants AG Holder to go after “Muslim-bashers”

The Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) has written to Attorney General Eric (we are a nation of cowards) Holder to ask that he go after Muslim-bashers and presumably shut them up.    I was interested to see that two cases of so-called bashing listed in their letter to Holder are ones we have written about here recently.

You will remember that CAIR was found to be an unindicted co-conspirator in the government’s HolyLand trial which involved terrorist funding.    Their press statement yesterday begins:

A prominent national Islamic civil rights and advocacy group today called on Attorney General Eric Holder to protect the right of American Muslims to participate fully in the political process and to practice their faith without fear of government intrusion.

The Washington-based Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) issued that appeal following a number of recent government-related incidents targeting Islam, American Muslim lobbying efforts, American mosques, and Muslim religious practices.

Two of the cases they cite of “bashing” include the story we reported on two weeks ago when a retired FBI agent visited Shelbyville, TN and briefed local law enforcement about radical Islamic activities in the US.

And, of course the missing Somali youth case in Minnesota, as we reported last week, has brought the crybabies out to complain about FBI profiling.   But, what the heck, since Somalis are missing, who better to ask for help in finding them than their fellow Somalis.

I don’t have enough time today to do this justice, so go read the rest of their letter and learn about all the interesting cases of  supposed ‘Islamophobia’ cited by CAIR.

Somalis don’t like dogs and other things you need to know about your new neighbors

Update Feb. 28th:   The Star Tribune published an editorial yesterday about the open house at the Minneapolis mosque that is under suspicion (discussed below).   It’s your typical, ho-hum, editorial about how we must all come together, but read it anyway.

 

A couple of articles came across my desk yesterday that I’m throwing together here because both involve a stepped-up campaign to help Americans understand our ever-expanding Somali Muslim population.   The first is about a documentary film that follows the lives of two families resettled in the US from camps in Kenya.    The filmmaker is Anne Makepeace, so I think you know where this is going.

I’ve just pulled this little bit from the article in BU Today (Boston University) to get your attention!   Dogs are considered in the top ten dirty things in Islam right along with urine, feces, dead bodies and pigs.  Families taking in Somalis should have been briefed about the Muslim prohibition about dogs.

…. there’s also a scene when the family going to Atlanta first gets there, and the hosts who take in the family want the kids to pat the dogs, so they’ll be friendly. But the hosts did not know that some Muslims don’t touch dogs. So the kid quickly touches the dog, because he’s pressured to do it. When that clip was seen on the Internet, the child was teased by his classmates, so his mother wanted me to take it out of the film. But it was too late — PBS already had it, and it was about to be broadcast.

Watch the brief film clip from the documentary because it gives a little view into the “education” received by refugees from the International Organization for Migration (IOM) before the refugees depart Africa.  There is a discussion about what is “rape” in the US.   Is it rape to force one’s own wife to have sex against her will, NO! answer the men and all the Somali women answer, yes!

Skipping out to Minneapolis

In the wake of FBI Director Mueller’s speech this week about the Somali missing men, the Abubakar As-Saddique Islamic Center opened its doors to the community to show that the Somali Muslims are welcoming, want to be a part of the Minneapolis community and to assure the public they were not involved in any way with indoctrinating the missing youths.

The public relations campaign is working judging from responses like this one in the Star Tribune.  I thought it was funny though how the reporter put the following paragraphs together.  One of Abubakar’s ‘worshipers’ kills himself and 30 others in a suicide attack in Somalia and it’s all about prejudice, huh!

Henry Lippman, whose daughter lives in the neighborhood, came from St. Paul.

“I’m Jewish,” he said. “I grew up recognizing prejudice. I thought it was important to show support. … I know there has been prejudice against this community and particularly this center.”

Rumors connecting the mosque to the missing men surfaced late last fall when news broke about the death of Shirwa Ahmed, a Somali immigrant from Minneapolis who returned to Somalia and killed himself in a suicide attack in October. Ahmed, and some of the other Somali men from Minneapolis who disappeared had spent time at, or had ties to Abubakar, sources in the Somali community have said.

It is believed that the source is none other than Somali community mouthpiece Omar Jamal, NOT the big bad FBI or prejudiced Americans.  Even the families of the missing youths say their “chidren” spent all their free time at the mosque.  And, someone had to arrange for (and pay) their plane tickets out of the country.

The Star Tribune puff piece goes on:

Standing at the head table in the wedding hall, Hurre (mosque director) minced no words.

He said the disappearances are a tragedy that has left families and friends reeling. But a second tragedy is the “finger-pointing” and implication that the mosque was behind their disappearance.

“This mosque has nothing do with … Somali politics or indoctrination or recruiting or helping to return these young people to Somali,” he said.

Earlier Wednesday, Hurre said mosque leaders have talked among themselves and are convinced nobody on staff influenced the young men.

The article goes on to say that mosque leaders will soon be meeting with the FBI.  Funny, this has been going on since late November and that hasn’t happened yet.

And, one final note, CAIR and the mosque invited Mueller to attend this ‘open house’ but notice was too short for Mueller’s busy schedule.

Rohingya illegal aliens to be returned to Burma, maybe

This is an update on the international conflict swirling around the fate of Rohingya Muslim boatmen (no women and children in these boats) arriving by the hundreds on the shores of Thailand and Indonesia.

Burma (Myanmar) says it will take any back who can prove they originated in Burma while still claiming they have no Rohingya Ethnic minority.   From the Bangkok Post:

The Burmese government says it is ready to welcome people who can prove they are Bengalis born in Burma, but it does not accept that the Rohingya boat people are a Burmese ethnic minority group, Foreign Minister Kasit Piromya said on Friday.

Meanwhile, everyone else, including CNN here, say they will be not treated humanely if they go back to Burma (although we don’t know if they even originated in Burma or in Bangladesh where hundreds of thousands of Rohingya are thought to live).

Scores of boat people who fled Myanmar and are now in Thailand are to be sent back despite human rights groups’ concerns they could be tortured or killed upon return.

“They will have to be sent back, according to our law,” Thailand’s Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva told CNN. “They are entering the country illegally. We do what they would do.”

The 12 boys and 66 men who arrived are among thousands of members of the Rohingya minority who have fled Myanmar, formerly known as Burma, because of persecution and in search of a better life.

Of course none of these news sources ever mention the Thai government’s concern that these Rohingya Muslims are arriving to join the jihad in Southern Thailand discussed (here) yesterday at Jihad Watch.

To catch up on this issue, read our Rohingya Reports category.  We have written 66 posts on the subject over the last year.  Note there is a lobbying campaign underway to resettle Rohingya in the West, some have already arrived in the UK and Canada.

Beheader said headless wife can’t reach paradise

Update March 14th:  Beheader pleads not quilty, at Jihad Watch here.

Daniel Pipes, Middle East scholar and anti-jihad fighter, has a column today on the New York State beheading case with a new piece of information. He writes:

A reliable source informs me – and this is breaking news – that the police found Muzzammil repeatedly told his wife that she had no right, under Islamic law, to divorce him. They also quote him stating that Aasiya, because beheaded, cannot reach paradise.

Presumably this is why he beheaded her.  After all, what’s the point of killing a wife who dishonors you if she’s going to go right to paradise? And it makes clear why beheading is a favorite method of killing by jihadists. Remember Daniel Pearl, among many others? 

I remember as a child hearing once in a great while about kidnappings or gruesome murders and being frightened and haunted by them. I feel somewhat like that now about this case; maybe that’s why I keep writing about it. I never heard of beheading as a child, except in folk tales. Probably the only Muslims in Philadelphia in the 1940s and 1950s were foreign students at the University of Pennsylvania, and I doubt they were adherents of Sharia.

Pipes also brings up the question of whether this is an honor killing or generic domestic violence:

Did Aasiya die in a crime of passion or to reinstate a family’s reputation? Was the violence generic or specifically Muslim? The Islamic Society of North America opts for domestic violence while the National Organization for Women‘s New York State chapter sees an honor killing.

The crime at Bridges TV fits neither model exactly, suggesting we need more information to determine its exact nature. But as the forces of political correctness inevitably bear down to exclude an Islamic dimension to the murder, the motive of family reputation must be kept alive. Enough with the pleasant deceits – time has come to utter hard truths about Bridges TV.

If you want to read more deeply into the issues raised by this case, a previous column by Pipes has many facts about the case, a review of Muslim reactions, and a discussion of honor killings. And an older column, continuously updated, follows the fortunes of Bridges TV, the cable channel the murderer and his wife founded.

How Obama won — and will continue to get his way

The American Thinker has a brilliant article today on Obama’s strategy for winning the election, with a diagram that will blow your mind. “How He Did It: A Diagrammatic Analysis Analysis of the Obama Campaign,” by Paul Shlichta, begins this way:

“All issues are political issues, and politics itself is a mass of lies, evasions, folly, hatred, and schizophrenia.” —George Orwell.

The audacity and speed with which Obama railroaded the stimulus bill through Congress took Republicans by surprise. It shouldn’t have; it was a logical extension of his campaign tactics.

.

Like the spear-carrying soldiers of Ethiopia, overwhelmed by Mussolini’s tanks and poison gas in 1936, the Republicans simply don’t know what hit them in last year’s election. Some felt that they had conducted an old-fashioned 20th century campaign while Obama mounted the first truly information-age 21st century political blitzkrieg. Others blame the blatant media bias, the race issue, or the unprecedented scale of fund raising and spending.

.

The first month of Obama’s regime has provoked a similar bewilderment. A dazed Congress hastily authorized a huge document, filled with hidden booby traps like RAT, that none of them had actually read, let alone comprehended. Republicans are now cowering in corners, wondering what atrocity will come next.

.

In order to fight back we need to analyze how he did it, the author says. He explains his diagram, which is very complex because Obama’s strategy is complex. So far, Republicans don’t seem to have a clue how to counteract this strategy, which is understandable. As Schlicta says, it’s spear-carriers versus tanks. I hope the chart and the explanation get circulated far and wide, and some smart conservatives figure out what to do.

.

The alternative is to wait until Obama fails — the economy collapses and/or we undergo major terrorist attacks. But even then, you can just see Obama blaming it on his opposition and positioning himself as the One who will save the country. Obama learned well from Alinsky, but he is miles past him now.

.

In Refugee Resettlement Watch’s little corner of the political world, I predict huge increases in refugee quotas. Whatever is destabilizing and disruptive, that’s the way he will go.

.

Comment worth noting: Refugee agency neglect

This is a comment received last night from reader Mark.  We have heard this story over and over again.  Many of  the volags (federal taxpayer-funded contractors) are not taking care of the refugees in their charge and indeed are often not fulfilling their contracts with the government which require they provide refugees with adequate clothing among other things.

I met an Iraqi refugee couple today and I’m glad they were allowed to come here because the wife worked as an English teacher and was threatened for supporting foreigners. The family however was not given any clothes by their resettlement agency other than some jackets. She showed me the jacket she was given and it doesn’t fit her. We are in a very cold state and these people have no winter coats, no hats, no gloves, no scarves, and no boots. She was lucky to find a job that starts next week, but she has to take a bus and walk 5 blocks each way. She said she has already fallen down twice on the ice. I told her to call her refugee resettlement agency caseworker, but she said the caseworker doesn’t return messages. Tomorrow the windchill factor will be negative 20-30.

How many of you reading this know how easy it is to find second hand winter clothing?  I bet you have many extra winter jackets in your own closets.  If this family had a church or other group sponsoring them, just them, they would have their needs met.   These volags often even discourage such sponsorship as we saw in Waterbury, CT last year.

Now this is a story from New Paltz, NY that helps make my point.  Read it here.  There is no mention of a refugee agency involved.  This Iraqi family will probably make it because they have two American families who have taken them under their wings.

For new readers:  You might want to visit a post I wrote in January—Refugees 101—where we call for a complaints hot line for refugees like the one mentioned by Mark.

Add Texas (Texas!) to the list of states where Iraqis are not finding work

I just last night told you again that Refugees International is still pushing for us to resettle 105,500 Iraqi refugees in the US this fiscal year!  Now, here comes news that Texas has become state number 16 in our list of states* with unhappy Iraqi refugees (that we know of!).  We thought Texas was one of the few US states not in dire economic circumstances yet.

From the Houston Chronicle:

Rand Hikmat-Mahmood, an Iraqi refugee who arrived in Houston with her husband and 13-year-old son five months ago, is weighing one of the most difficult decisions of her life.

She is considering packing up her family and returning to Iraq.

“The economic situation is very difficult here,” she said. “We cannot find jobs.”

It’s getting worse.   And, the State Department and Office of Refugee Resettlement consider Houston a “preferred community.”

Refugees from across the globe are discovering a difficult economic reality in much of America, including Houston, according to multiple resettlement organizations. Caseworkers in Houston are dealing with a major influx of refugees while faced with a smaller pool of available jobs for them.

“We are feeling the consequences of the downturn in the economy, like everyone else is,” said Oleg Jolick, refugee resettlement director for the Catholic Charities of the Diocese of Galveston-Houston. “The trend is worsening.”

Refugees keep coming.

While the economy is declining, the number of refugees is increasing. The Houston area is considered a major destination for refugees in large part because of the availability of jobs, affordable housing and the warm climate.

Catholic Charities expects to resettle 700 refugees and Cuban parolees this year, up from 600 last year. YMCA International Services has already resettled about 200 refugees since the start of the fiscal year in October, compared with 187 in all of last year. The organization estimates it may settle 600 this year.

This (below) is such a crock.  It is not always a choice between living on welfare in the US or dying!  Obviously this Iraqi woman, the subject of this article, is not fearful of dying if she returns to Iraq.  She and her also well-educated husband should be cared for in the region, if not in Iraq, by the Iraqi government so that they will be able to help Iraq re-build when the time comes.

This is how these government contractors, like Catholic Charities, sell refugee resettlement to the public by offering up this false choice.

While some critics have questioned why the State Department continues to settle refugees in tough economic times, refugee organizations said the U.S. government cannot turn away people fleeing persecution.

“Refugee resettlement is a humanitarian effort of the government, and the role is first-and-foremost to protect people’s lives and take them from the situation where their life is in danger to where their life is not in danger anymore,” Jolick said. “Even with all of these problems, even with all of this economy and all of this uncertainty, they’re still better off here than they were where they were.”

The reality is that Jolick would be on the unemployment rolls himself if the State Department spigot was turned off for awhile due to our economic woes.   Don’t let them fool you, the flow could be slowed.  The numbers were dramatically cut immediately following 9/11, they could be cut again.

Indeed the refugee program will be seriously damaged in the eyes of the public if tent cities begin to spring up around US cities as was mentioned in Boise, ID recently.

Reforms needed:

One final thought, I bet this family doesn’t have its own sponsor, a church or other such group that is looking out for them.  Some of these families’ transitions might not be so challenging if we went back to that system of resettlement.

* Texas becomes state number 16 in our parade of states with no jobs and unhappy Iraqi refugees. The 15 others are: Arizona, Maryland, New Hampshire,Virginia, New York, Michigan, Ohio, Georgia, Idaho, Connecticut, New Mexico, California, Utah, North Carolina and Washington. See our Iraqi refugee category for all these stories and more.