Romney sounded Presidential this morning...he has a plan to address this and other issues in the middle east....Obama is just the same old, same old incompetent idiot he has been for the past three and one half years.
US officials investigate whether strike on Benghazi post 'coordinated,' timed for 9/11 anniversary
Published September 12, 2012 FoxNews.com
U.S. officials are investigating whether the murder Tuesday of the U.S. ambassador to Libya Christopher Stevens and three other American officials was a "coordinated" strike timed for the 11th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks -- and not the result of a protest against an anti-Islam film.
A senior administration official told Fox News they are exhaustively investigating every angle of the attack in Benghazi, and an earlier assault on the U.S. Embassy in Cairo, Egypt, and there are early signs the Benghazi assault may have been planned. The official cautioned, though, that the administration has not jumped to any conclusions about what happened, saying it would be "premature" to do so.
But current and former U.S. lawmakers, and others, claimed Wednesday that the attack looked like a coordinated strike.
"Absolutely, I have no doubt about it. It was a coordinated, military-style, commando-type raid," House Intelligence Committee Chairman Mike Rogers told Fox News. Based on his own briefings, Rogers said "military movements" were involved.
"This was a well- planned, well-targeted event. No doubt about it," Rogers said. He said the Al Qaeda-linked Imprisoned Omar Abdul Rahman Brigades is one group being looked at by officials.
Pete Hoekstra, former chairman of the House intelligence committee, told FoxNews.com the attack appeared to have the markings of an Al Qaeda or Al Qaeda-affiliated strike.
"We've been talking for years about the desire of Al Qaeda, radical jihadists to celebrate the anniversary of 9/11," he said. "All my background, all of the conversations that I've had over the last 18 hours lead many people to believe that this was just more than a mere coincidence."
Hoekstra noted that the supposed protesters -- purportedly angry over a film that ridiculed Islam's Prophet Muhammad -- didn't attack in Tripoli. They attacked in Benghazi, "where it so happens our ambassador is." And they happened to be "fully armed and fully equipped," he said.
Hoekstra noted that Al Qaeda chief Ayman al-Zawahri had recently released a video calling on militants to attack Americans in revenge for the killing of an operative in Pakistan. The message said his "blood is calling on you, inciting you to fight and kill the crusaders."
Hoekstra said the film may have been just a cover to carry out such an attack.
Two intelligence officials also said the attack looked "coordinated."
London-based think tank Quilliam reached the same conclusion, saying the Benghazi strike appeared to be a "well-planned terrorist attack that would have occurred regardless of the demonstration (over the film)."
Also, the brother of Zawahri was nearby during the separate protest at the American Embassy in Cairo on Tuesday.
A few lawmakers on Capitol Hill appeared skeptical of the film explanation. "The timing of this on the eleventh anniversary of 9/11 is more than just coincidence," Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla., said in a statement.
The FBI is investigating the attack and the deaths of American personnel. A U.S. military aircraft is expected to leave from Libya soon with the wounded and bodies of the dead aboard.
President Obama, meanwhile, condemned the "outrageous and shocking" attack Wednesday, as he and other officials vowed to "bring justice" to the killers while moving quickly to bolster security in Libya and at other diplomatic posts.
"Make no mistake. Justice will be done," Obama said, speaking from the Rose Garden alongside Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
Obama and Clinton both condemned the killers, while stressing that the U.S. bond with the Libyan government would not suffer as a result.
"Make no mistake. We will work with the Libyan government to bring justice to killers who attack our people," Obama said, adding: "There is absolutely no justification to this type of senseless violence. None."
Stevens was killed Tuesday night when he and a group of embassy employees went to the consulate to try to evacuate staff. The protesters were firing gunshots and rocket-propelled grenades.
Obama and Clinton offered new details Wednesday about the chaotic aftermath. They said some Libyans tried to fight to defend the U.S. post while it was under attack, even carrying Stevens' body to a hospital. The Libyan doctor who treated Stevens also told The Associated Press that he died of severe asphyxiation, apparently from smoke inhalation, and that he tried for 90 minutes to revive him. There continue to be conflicting reports about the circumstances of Stevens' death.
Clinton, speaking from the State Department, called the tragedy "an attack that should shock the conscience of people of all faiths."
Obama, in a statement Wednesday morning, said he's directed the administration to provide "all necessary resources" to support security for U.S. personnel in Libya and to increase security at diplomatic offices around the world.
The White House and Congress ordered flags to be flown at half-staff in the wake of the tragedy. The House also held a moment of silence for the victims Wednesday afternoon.
The State Department identified one of the other three Americans killed as Foreign Service Information Management Officer Sean Smith, a husband and father of two who had worked for the State Department for 10 years. The U.S. government is still notifying the next of kin for the other two individuals killed, and has not identified them.
Stevens was appointed as ambassador to Libya in May 2012.
He served as a special representative to the Libyan Transitional National Council during the revolution in 2011, and as the deputy chief of mission from 2007 to 2009.
U.S. officials remain on alert for violence at other diplomatic posts.
Fox News' Catherine Herridge, Ed Henry and Bret Baier and FoxNews.com's Judson Berger and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
This is what a real President should sound like....He's the only one that really has a clue about whatps really going on...
Obama sending Mixed Messages at Best...He just CAN'T resist apolgizing for and scolding the United States....Just more leading from behind....
Obama condemns embassy attackers, critics of Islam in statement
Published: 9:14 AM 09/12/2012 By Neil Munro
President Barack Obama on Wednesday “strongly condemned” the Islamist attack that killed four American diplomats in Libya, but he also used the same statement to condemn Americans’ criticism of Islam.
“While the United States rejects efforts to denigrate the religious beliefs of others, we must all unequivocally oppose the kind of senseless violence that took the lives of these public servants,” he said in a 7:21 a.m. statement.
The attack in Libya came as Islamists also broke into the U.S. embassy in Egypt, and marks the growing clout of popular Islamist groups following the U.S.-backed removal of those countries’ authoritarian governments.
Obama’s two-sided message came only a few hours after Gov. Mitt Romney accused him of sympathizing with the Islamists who attacked the U.S diplomatic sites on the 11th anniversary of the September 11, 2011 attack by other Islamists that killed 3,000 Americans.
“I’m outraged by the attacks on American diplomatic missions in Libya and Egypt,” Romney said. But, he added, it “is disgraceful that the Obama Administration’s first response was not to condemn attacks on our diplomatic missions, but to sympathize with those who waged the attacks,” said his late-night Sept. 11 statement.
Romney’s sharp statement came after news reports revealed that the Cairo embassy tried to appease a planned Sept. 11 protest which was called by Islamists who oppose any criticism of Islam in any country.
The Islamist protesters occupied part of the embassy, and tore down the U.S. flag. They said they were angry about a movie being shot in California that highlights many damaging statements and actions attributed by orthodox Muslims to Islam’s 7th century prophet, Muhammad.
Shortly before the protest began, the embassy condemned the movie’s Californian producers for “abuse” of the United States Constitution’s First Amendment.
“The Embassy of the United States in Cairo condemns the continuing efforts by misguided individuals to hurt the religious feelings of Muslims — as we condemn efforts to offend believers of all religions,” said the embassy statement.
That statement was reportedly repudiated late last night by a White House official. “The statement by Embassy Cairo was not cleared by Washington and does not reflect the views of the United States government,” an administration official said, according to Politico.
However, Obama has previously condemned U.S. critics of Islam.
In 2011, Islamists in northern Afghanistan went on a rampage and murdered several locals and aid-workers after a U.S. pastor, Terry Jones, burned a copy of the Koran book. Earlier, the President of the United States used the power of his office to deter the pastor of the little-known church in Florida from burning copies of the Koran book.
“The idea that we would burn the sacred texts of someone else’s religion … is contrary to what this nation is founded upon, and my hope is that this individual prays on its and refrains from doing it,” Obama said during a September 2010 press conference in the White House.
“We’ve got an obligation to send a very clear message [to Americans that this kind of behavior or threats of action put our young men and women in harms way … this is a way of endangering our troops, our sons and daughters, fathers, mothers, husbands and wives,” he insisted, without condemning people who threaten to kill Americans if their favored books are burned.
In recent years, Islamists have threatened and attacked numerous critics of Islam. For example, Seattle cartoonist Molly Norris went underground in 2010 after Islamists threatened her for urging cartoonists to defy Islamic objections to the ridicule of Islam’s prophet, Muhammad. In 2012, an American Muslim convert was sentenced to 11 years in jail for threatening to attack the producers of the “South Park” cartoon.
Around the Mediterranean, the growing role of popular Islamist movements is eclipsing the threat posed by the non-government al-Qaida Islamist group, and seems set to spur many conflicts with the U.S.
However, the attacks on the embassies may also create difficulties for Obama’s reelection, just as the rise of Islamists in Iran during President Jimmy Carter’s term helped cause his loss in the 1980 election. Carter did not oppose the Iranian Islamists’ power grab, and they subsequently took hostage the staff of the U.S. embassy in Tehran.
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