Upcoming shows
Real News

NOW ON AIR
Now On Air

Alex Jones – Info Wars

12:00 pm 4:00 pm



Maga First News

Upcoming Shows

Join The MAGA Network on Discord

0 0

Nadler: Executive Privilege Can't Be Asserted to Cover 'Wrong Doing'

Executive privilege cannot be used to hide wrongdoing and any attempt by the White House and President Donald Trump to block parts of special counsel Robert Mueller's report from Congress or the public would not be "right" nor "successful," according to House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y.

"The president must personally assert executive privilege, and I do not believe it exists here at all because, as we learned from the [former President Richard] Nixon tapes case, executive privilege cannot be used to hide wrongdoing," Nadler told NBC's "Meet the Press."

". . . The president may try to assert it, may try to hide things behind it, but I don't think that's right or [would] be successful."

Rep. Nadler referred to the unanimous 1974 Supreme Court ruling on the Nixon tapes that rejected executive privilege overriding the judicial process.

President Trump has reportedly weighed using executive privilege to review classified material not related to any indictment legal proceeding, merely the public release of potentially politicized material that is not used in review criminality.

"Congress must get all the information and the evidence that the Department of Justice may have in order to exercise our function of being able to hold the president accountable," Nadler told host Chuck Todd. "If we don't do that, if we can't do that the president is effectively above the law."

Source: NewsMax Politics

0 0

Afghan forces battle Taliban for 5th day in western province

Afghan forces have launched an operation to drive back the Taliban four days after the insurgents attacked and besieged an army compound in the western Badghis province.

Col. Qais Mangal, a Defense Ministry spokesman, said Monday that at least 12 security forces have been killed in the last 48 hours, bringing the overall death toll to more than 40. Dozens more have been wounded. Mangal says dozens of insurgents have been killed and wounded by air and ground forces.

A provincial council member said last week that around 600 Afghan security forces were trapped inside the base, running low on ammunition, food and water. There was no immediate update on their numbers or condition.

The Taliban effectively control half the country and launch daily attacks on the army and police.

Source: Fox News World

0 0

IRS fails to meet congressional deadline for Trump tax returns

General view of the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) building, with the partial quote
FILE PHOTO: A general view of the U.S. Internal Revenue Service (IRS) building, with the partial quote "taxes are what we pay," in Washington May 27, 2015. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst

April 23, 2019

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A deadline for the U.S. Internal Revenue Service to turn President Donald Trump’s tax returns over to a congressional tax oversight committee expired on Tuesday without lawmakers receiving the documents, a committee aide said.

The outcome, which was widely expected, could prompt Democrats who control the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee to subpoena the documents, as an opening salvo in what many expect to be a lengthy court battle that might have to be settled by the U.S. Supreme Court.

(Reporting by David Morgan; Editing by Lisa Shumaker and Peter Cooney)

Source: OANN

0 0

Americans arrested in Haiti with weapons: media

A man rides a bike in front of a main Haitian police station, where a group of foreign nationals including Americans are detained after finding them armed with semi-automatic weapons after a week of anti-government protests in Port-au-Prince
A man rides a bike in front of a main Haitian police station, where according to local media a group of foreign nationals including Americans armed with semi-automatic weapons were detained, after anti-government protests, in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, February 18, 2019. REUTERS/Ivan Alvarado

February 18, 2019

PORT-AU-PRINCE (Reuters) – Haitian police arrested a group of foreign nationals including Americans armed with semi-automatic weapons, Haitian newspapers reported on Monday, adding to uncertainty in the poor Caribbean country after more than a week of anti-government protests.

Haitian newspaper Le Nouvelliste reported that seven foreigners and a Haitian were in the group that was picked up by the police on Sunday night. Police found rifles, pistols, drones and satellite phones in their vehicle, the paper said.

Other media said several of the men were U.S. citizens and one was Serbian.

Since Feb. 7, thousands of demonstrators have called for President Jovenel Moise to resign and for an independent probe into the whereabouts of funds from the PetroCaribe agreement, an alliance between Caribbean countries and OPEC member Venezuela.

(Reporting by Frank Jack Daniel; Editing by Tom Brown)

Source: OANN

0 0

UBS to stick to dividend, capital returns plan after French verdict

FILE PHOTO: A man walks past a UBS logo projected on a screen in Singapore
FILE PHOTO: A man walks past a UBS logo projected on a screen in Singapore, January 14, 2019. REUTERS/Feline Lim/File Photo

February 22, 2019

LONDON (Reuters) – UBS plans to stick to its proposed dividend for 2018 despite a 4.5 billion euro ($5.10 billion) hit from a French tax ruling that the bank has appealed, CEO Sergio Ermotti said on Friday.

“There is no intention to deviate from our proposed 2018 dividend of 0.70 Swiss francs ($0.6994) per share,” Ermotti said in a call discussing the ruling’s implications with investors and analysts.

“In respect to the outlook for our capital returns beyond the financial year 2018, we remain committed to our policy,” he said, adding that included increasing the group’s dividend by a mid- to high-single digit percentage each year and returning any excess capital, mainly through share buybacks.

(Reporting by Brenna Hughes Neghaiwi in London, editing by John Miller in Zurich)

Source: OANN

0 0

USC fires athletics director, water polo coach amid college admissions bribe scandal

The University of Southern California (USC) has fired two employees who allegedly accepted enormous bribes in exchange for facilitating the acceptance of dozens of students, the school has said in an official statement.

Donna Heinel, senior associate athletics director, and Jovan Vavic, men’s and women’s water polo head coach, were axed following an investigation into college admissions that saw such celebrities as Lori Loughlin and Felicity Huffman arrested on federal charges on Tuesday.

“We understand that the government believes that illegal activity was carried out by individuals who went to great lengths to conceal their actions from the university,” USC said, according to its paper the Daily Trojan. “USC is conducting an internal investigation. Donna Heinel and Jovan Vavic have been terminated and the university will take additional employment actions as appropriate.”

Two more USC athletics employees, women's soccer coaches Laura Janke and Ali Khosroshahin, were indicted, though it is not known yet if they have been fired as a consequence.

Heinel, 57, is accused of accepting a $500,000 bribe from Loughlin, who rose to fame on the popular family sitcom "Full House." Loughlin and her husband were both charged with bribing officials to get their daughter, YouTube "influencer" Olivia Jade Giannulli, into the school.

Senior associate athletics director Donna Heinel and men’s and women’s water polo head coach Jovan Vavic were let go from their positions following an investigation into college admissions that saw celebrities like Lori Loughlin and Felicity Huffman arrested on federal charges on Tuesday

Senior associate athletics director Donna Heinel and men’s and women’s water polo head coach Jovan Vavic were let go from their positions following an investigation into college admissions that saw celebrities like Lori Loughlin and Felicity Huffman arrested on federal charges on Tuesday (Getty)

Vavic, also 57, is accused of accepting a $250,000 bribe in exchange for declaring two students as recruits for his water polo team in order to get them into USC.

The school's statement added detail on the fired employees' alleged crimes, which spanned at least four years. They are accused of connections to a sprawling admissions bribery scheme led by William Rick Singer.

“On multiple occasions between 2014 and 2018, Singer’s clients made payments of more than $1.3 million to USC accounts controlled by Heinel, typically an account for the USC Women’s Athletic Board,” the documents read. “Singer also entered into a sham consulting agreement with Heinel. … In exchange for the bribe payments, Heinel helped facilitate the admission of more than two dozen students as recruited athletes.”

Singer, through his charitable organization, is accused of receiving $25 million in bribes since 2011 to help the children of wealthy and influential parents gain entry to elite universities including Stanford, Yale and USC. On Tuesday, he pleaded guilty to four charges against him and admitted to his crimes. "All of these things, and many more things, I did," he said, according to CNN.

"I created a side door that would guarantee families would get in."

Records indicate that fake profiles were created to label both of Loughlin's daughters as women's crew recruits, despite having no history of rowing athletically or being listed currently as on the USC women's crew team. Olivia Jade Giannulli, left, Isabella Giannulli, right

Records indicate that fake profiles were created to label both of Loughlin's daughters as women's crew recruits, despite having no history of rowing athletically or being listed currently as on the USC women's crew team. Olivia Jade Giannulli, left, Isabella Giannulli, right (Chris Pizzello/Invision/AP, File)

According to records, Singer allegedly made payments to Vavic for students to be listed as members of the water polo team and gain entry to the university, but never participated in any sports. Vavic was reportedly taken into custody in Honolulu on Tuesday.

A similar situation may have been in play with Loughlin's daughter Olivia, who is among students for whom fake profiles were allegedly created to allow her to appear as an athletic recruit. Fake profiles were said to have been created to label both of Loughlin's daughters as women's crew recruits, though they had no history of rowing athletically and weren't listed as current members of the USC women's crew team.

According to court documents, things began to fall apart for Singer's organization when a counselor became suspicious about her admission based on her crew involvement, because she did not play the sport. This apparently led to a public confrontation between the counselor and Loughlin's husband, designer Mossimo Giannulli, leading Heinel to leave him a voicemail asking that such an occurrence not happen again.

Loughlin's daughter Olivia currently attends USC and documents her time there on her YouTube page, which has nearly two million subscribers. In one video, she said she "really doesn't care about school," and wanted to go to attend parties and game days.

At least 50 high -profile business owners, celebrities and prominent coaches were charged on Tuesday in connection to the bribery sting, which U.S. Attorney Andrew Lelling has labeled the “largest college admissions scam ever prosecuted by the Department of Justice.”

Source: Fox News National

0 0

Fighting Fakes Was a Big Reason Behind Amazon's Big Vendor Purge

Amazon.com Inc. on Saturday hinted that fighting counterfeits was a reason for its sudden and unexplained purge of thousands of vendors that sowed panic among long-time suppliers.

The company selectively reinstated some accounts, apologizing for “any inconvenience” caused by the “temporary pause” in orders, according to communications reviewed by Bloomberg. It encouraged those reinstated to enroll in “brand registry,” a tool to help brands knock counterfeit products off the platform.

The communication sheds further light on why Amazon abruptly canceled routine merchandise orders from thousands of its long-time suppliers over the past two weeks.

Amazon’s web store includes a mix of inventory. The company buys some products directly from wholesalers and resells it in a traditional retail model. Other goods come from independent merchants who post their inventory on Amazon and give the company a commission on each sale, similar to EBay Inc.’s online marketplace model or a consignment shop.

The two models complement one another, making sure Amazon has an ample supply of must-have products at competitive prices and giving it a bigger inventory than you’d find at a nearby store.

An Amazon spokeswoman declined to comment, beyond sending the statement that the company issued Wednesday: “We regularly review our selling partner relationships and may make changes when we see an opportunity to provide customers with improved selection, value and convenience.”

The Cleaner, the Better

A key challenge has been maintaining relationships with brands who complain counterfeit products flourish on Amazon’s free-wheeling marketplace. Counterfeiters can take advantage of Amazon’s system which is designed to let merchants post products quickly and easily after setting up accounts online.

“It’s all about further cleaning, which are some measures we are happy to see,” said Ryan Craver, CEO of Commerce Canal, which helps more than 50 brands sell products on Amazon. “The cleaner the marketplace, the better the sales integrity and product integrity.”

Amazon wants to make sure it is only buying inventory directly from brand owners. Other product suppliers are being pushed to Amazon’s marketplace, which is a more profitable model for Amazon and less risky than buying goods outright.

In recent years, Amazon has increasingly prioritized its marketplace. More than half of all products sold on Amazon in 2018 came from marketplace merchants, and revenue-providing services to those merchants are growing at double the pace of revenue from the online store.

Online marketplaces can offer greater selection than even the biggest of stores. Walmart Inc., Target Corp. and Best Buy Co. are all copying Amazon’s marketplace model to increase online sales. Amazon will generate e-commerce revenue of $317 billion this year, representing 52.4 percent of all online sales in the U.S., according to EMarketer Inc.

Source: NewsMax America

NOW ON AIR
Now On Air

Alex Jones – Info Wars

12:00 pm 4:00 pm



Tiger woods celebrates after winning the 2019 Masters
FILE PHOTO: Golf – Masters – Augusta National Golf Club – Augusta, Georgia, U.S. – April 14, 2019 – Tiger Woods of the U.S. celebrates on the 18th hole after winning the 2019 Masters. REUTERS/Lucy Nicholson

April 26, 2019

Tiger Woods is sending a message that he thinks he still has enough left, emotionally and physically, to win three more major championships to tie Jack Nicklaus’ record 18 titles.

Speaking to GolfTV in his first sit-down interview since the Masters, Woods said he has taken some time off since his victory at Augusta National, which still doesn’t feel real.

“Honestly, it’s hard to believe,” Woods said. “I was texting one of my good friends last night … that I couldn’t believe that I won the tournament. That it really hasn’t sunk in. I haven’t started doing anything. I’ve just been laying there. And every now and again, I’ll look over there on the couch and there’s the jacket.”

That’s the fifth green jacket for the 43-year-old Woods, who hadn’t won a major tournament since the 2008 U.S. Open. Along the way, four back surgeries, a divorce and other personal issues derailed him.

He said he has been spending time with his children – daughter Sam, 11, and son Charlie, 10 – who weren’t born when their father was the most dominant golfer on the planet.

“They never knew golf to be a good thing in my life and only the only thing they remember is that it brought this incredible amount of pain to their dad and they don’t want to ever want to see their dad in pain,” Woods said. “And so to now have them see this side of it, the side that I’ve experienced for so many years of my life, but I had a battle to get back to this point, it feels good.”

He said he hopes – maybe expects — they’ll see this side again.

And no one will take Woods for granted at the PGA Championship at Bethpage Black Course on Long Island, N.Y., which starts May 16.

Woods said he’ll be ready for a course he already conquered once in a major: the 2002 U.S. Open.

“I’m doing all the visual stuff, but I haven’t put in the physical work yet. But it’s probably coming this weekend,” he said.

Before Woods encountered health and personal problems, it was expected that topping Nicklaus’ major mark was “when” and not “if.” Then the certainty went away, but Woods thought he still had a chance.

“I always thought it was possible, if I had everything go my way. It took him an entire career to get to 18, so now that I’ve had another extension to my career – one that I didn’t think I had a couple of years ago – if I do things correctly and everything falls my way, yeah, it’s a possibility. I’m never going to say it’s not.

“Now I just need to have a lot of things go my way, and who’s to say that it will or will not happen? That’s what the future holds, I don’t know. The only thing I can promise you is this: that I will be prepared.”

–Field Level Media

Source: OANN

Listen to https://magaoneradio.net and Listen Daily! Don't Forget to Share Click a Link Below!

Maria Butina, the Russian woman who was accused of being a secret agent for the Russian government, was sentenced to 18 months in prison Friday by a federal judge in Washington after pleading guilty last year to a conspiracy charge.

Butina, who has already served nine months behind bars, will get credit for time served and can possibly get credit for good behavior, the judge said. She will be removed from the U.S. promptly on completion of her time, the judge added, and returned to Russia.

MARIA BUTINA, ACCUSED RUSSIAN SPY, PLEADS GUILTY TO CONSPIRACY

An emotional and apologetic Butina said in court Friday she is “truly sorry” and regrets not registering as a foreign agent.

“I feel ashamed and embarrassed,” she said, adding that her “reputation is ruined.”

Butina has been jailed since her arrest in July 2018. She entered the court Friday wearing a dark green prison jumpsuit and spoke in clear English, with a slight Russian accent.

“Please accept my apologies,” Butina said.

Butina’s lawyer, Robert Driscoll, said after the sentencing they had hoped for a “better outcome,” but expressed a desire for Butina to be released to her family by the fall.

Prosecutors had claimed Butina used her contacts with the National Rifle Association and the National Prayer Breakfast to develop relationships with U.S. politicians and gather information for Russia.

Prosecutors also have said that Butina’s boyfriend, conservative political operative Paul Erickson, identified in court papers as “U.S. Person 1,” helped her establish ties with the NRA.

WHO IS MARIA BUTINA, THE RUSSIAN WOMAN ACCUSED OF SPYING ON US?

In their filings, prosecutors claim federal agents found Butina had contact information for people suspected of being employed by Russia’s Federal Security Services, or FSB, the successor intelligence agency to the KGB. Inside her home, they found notes referring to a potential job offer from the FSB, according to the documents.

Investigators recovered several emails and Twitter direct message conversations in which Butina referred to the need to keep her work secret and, in one instance, said it should be “incognito.” Prosecutors said Butina had contact with Russian intelligence officials and that the FBI photographed her dining with a diplomat suspected of being a Russian intelligence agent.

Fox News’ Jason Donner, Bill Mears, Greg Norman and the Associated Press contributed to this report.

Source: Fox News Politics

Listen to https://magaoneradio.net and Listen Daily! Don't Forget to Share Click a Link Below!

An official Sri Lankan police Twitter account was deleted after it misidentified an American human rights activist as a suspect in the country’s Easter Sunday terrorist attacks.

On Thursday, police posted the names and photos of six people that they said were at-large suspects in the bombings that killed more than 250 people.

However, one of the names on the list was Muslim U.S. activist Amara Majeed, who quickly tweeted that she had been falsely identified.

“I have this morning been FALSELY identified by the Sri Lankan government as one of the ISIS terrorists that committed the Easter attacks in Sri Lanka. What a thing to wake up to!” she wrote.

SRI LANKA AUTHORITIES SAY EASTER ATTACK LEADER KILLED IN ONE OF NINE HOTEL BOMBINGS

She wrote in a follow-up tweet that the claim was “obviously completely false” and asked social media users to “please stop implicating and associating me with these horrific attacks.”

“And next time, be more diligent about releasing such information that has the potential to deeply violate someone’s family and community,” she continued.

Later, she wrote an update saying police apologized for wrongly mistaking her as a suspect.

Police said in a statement: “However, although one of the released images was identified as one Abdul Cader Fathima Khadhiya in the information provided by the CID, the CID has now informed that a) the individual whose image was labeled as Abdul Cader Fathima Khadiya is not in fact Abdul Cader Fathima Khadiya b) the individual pictured is not wanted for questioning c) Abdul Cader Fathima is the correct name of the suspect wanted by the CID.”

On Friday, the account, @SriLankaPolice2 was deleted with no explanation. Police did not release more information regarding the mistake.

Majeed, who founded “The Hijab Project” when she was 16 years old, told the Baltimore Sun that it was hurtful to be linked to the attacks.

“Sri Lanka is my motherland,” the Brown University student said. “It’s very painful to be associated with [the bombings].”

CLICK HERE FOR THE FOX NEWS APP

Mohamed Zahran, the suspected leader of the attacks which targeted six hotels and churches, killed himself in a suicide bombing at the Shangri-La hotel. Police also said they had arrested the second-in-command of the group, called National Towheed Jamaat. Catholic churches in Sri Lanka canceled all Sunday Masses until further notice over concerns that they remain a top target of Islamic State-linked extremists.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Source: Fox News World

Listen to https://magaoneradio.net and Listen Daily! Don't Forget to Share Click a Link Below!

DNA Force Plus

Limited Advanced Release

149.95

119.96

DNA Force Plus is finally here! Now you can support optimal energy levels while adapting your body to handle the daily bombardment of toxins to overhaul your body’s cellular engines with a fan-favorite formula.

https://www.infowars.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/dna-210.jpg

https://www.infowarsstore.com/dna-force-plus.html?ims=jbdoh&utm_campaign=IWL-DNAForcePlus-20%25off-Widget&utm_source=Infowars+Widget&utm_medium=Banner&utm_content=Widget-DNFP-20%25off

https://www.infowarsstore.com/dna-force-plus.html?ims=jbdoh&utm_campaign=IWL-DNAForcePlus-20%25off-Widget&utm_source=Infowars+Widget&utm_medium=Banner&utm_content=Widget-DNFP-20%25off

DNA Force Plus

149.95

119.96

DNA Force Plus is finally here! Now you can support optimal energy levels while adapting your body to handle the daily bombardment of toxins to overhaul your body’s cellular engines with a fan-favorite formula.

https://www.infowars.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/dna-210.jpg

https://www.infowarsstore.com/dna-force-plus.html?ims=jbdoh&utm_campaign=IWL-DNAForcePlus-20%25off-Widget&utm_source=Infowars+Widget&utm_medium=Banner&utm_content=Widget-DNFP-20%25off

https://www.infowarsstore.com/dna-force-plus.html?ims=jbdoh&utm_campaign=IWL-DNAForcePlus-20%25off-Widget&utm_source=Infowars+Widget&utm_medium=Banner&utm_content=Widget-DNFP-20%25off

DNA Force Plus

149.95

119.96

DNA Force Plus is finally here! Now you can support optimal energy levels while adapting your body to handle the daily bombardment of toxins to overhaul your body’s cellular engines with a fan-favorite formula.

https://www.infowars.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/dna-210.jpg

https://www.infowarsstore.com/dna-force-plus.html?ims=jbdoh&utm_campaign=IWL-DNAForcePlus-20%25off-Widget&utm_source=Infowars+Widget&utm_medium=Banner&utm_content=Widget-DNFP-20%25off

https://www.infowarsstore.com/dna-force-plus.html?ims=jbdoh&utm_campaign=IWL-DNAForcePlus-20%25off-Widget&utm_source=Infowars+Widget&utm_medium=Banner&utm_content=Widget-DNFP-20%25off

DNA Force Plus

149.95

119.96

DNA Force Plus is finally here! Now you can support optimal energy levels while adapting your body to handle the daily bombardment of toxins to overhaul your body’s cellular engines with a fan-favorite formula.

https://www.infowars.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/dna-210.jpg

https://www.infowarsstore.com/dna-force-plus.html?ims=jbdoh&utm_campaign=IWL-DNAForcePlus-20%25off-Widget&utm_source=Infowars+Widget&utm_medium=Banner&utm_content=Widget-DNFP-20%25off

https://www.infowarsstore.com/dna-force-plus.html?ims=jbdoh&utm_campaign=IWL-DNAForcePlus-20%25off-Widget&utm_source=Infowars+Widget&utm_medium=Banner&utm_content=Widget-DNFP-20%25off

DNA Force Plus

149.95

119.96

DNA Force Plus is finally here! Now you can support optimal energy levels while adapting your body to handle the daily bombardment of toxins to overhaul your body’s cellular engines with a fan-favorite formula.

https://www.infowars.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/dna-210.jpg

https://www.infowarsstore.com/dna-force-plus.html?ims=jbdoh&utm_campaign=IWL-DNAForcePlus-20%25off-Widget&utm_source=Infowars+Widget&utm_medium=Banner&utm_content=Widget-DNFP-20%25off

https://www.infowarsstore.com/dna-force-plus.html?ims=jbdoh&utm_campaign=IWL-DNAForcePlus-20%25off-Widget&utm_source=Infowars+Widget&utm_medium=Banner&utm_content=Widget-DNFP-20%25off

DNA Force Plus

149.95

119.96

DNA Force Plus is finally here! Now you can support optimal energy levels while adapting your body to handle the daily bombardment of toxins to overhaul your body’s cellular engines with a fan-favorite formula.

https://www.infowars.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/dna-210.jpg

https://www.infowarsstore.com/dna-force-plus.html?ims=jbdoh&utm_campaign=IWL-DNAForcePlus-20%25off-Widget&utm_source=Infowars+Widget&utm_medium=Banner&utm_content=Widget-DNFP-20%25off

https://www.infowarsstore.com/dna-force-plus.html?ims=jbdoh&utm_campaign=IWL-DNAForcePlus-20%25off-Widget&utm_source=Infowars+Widget&utm_medium=Banner&utm_content=Widget-DNFP-20%25off

Source: InfoWars

Listen to https://magaoneradio.net and Listen Daily! Don't Forget to Share Click a Link Below!
FILE PHOTO: Sri Lankan Special Task Force soldiers stand guard in front of a mosque as a Muslim man walks past him during the Friday prayers at a mosque, days after a string of suicide bomb attacks on Easter Sunday, in Colombo
FILE PHOTO: Sri Lankan Special Task Force soldiers stand guard in front of a mosque as a Muslim man walks past him during the Friday prayers at a mosque, five days after a string of suicide bomb attacks on Catholic churches and luxury hotels across the island on Easter Sunday, in Colombo, Sri Lanka April 26, 2019. REUTERS/Dinuka Liyanawatte/File Photo

April 26, 2019

By Tom Lasseter and Shri Navaratnam

KATTANKUDY, Sri Lanka (Reuters) – Mohamed Hashim Mohamed Zahran was 12 years old when he began his studies at the Jamiathul Falah Arabic College. He was a nobody, with no claim to scholarship other than ambition.

Zahran and his four brothers and sisters squeezed into a two-room house with their parents in a small seaside town in eastern Sri Lanka; their father was a poor man who sold packets of food on the street and had a reputation for being a petty thief.

“His father didn’t do much,” recalled the school’s vice principal, S.M. Aliyar, laughing out loud.

The boy surprised the school with his sharp mind. For three years, Zahran practiced memorizing the Koran. Next came his studies in Islamic law. But the more he learned, the more Zahran argued that his teachers were too liberal in their reading of the holy book.

“He was against our teaching and the way we interpreted the Koran – he wanted his radical Islam,” said Aliyar. “So we kicked him out.”

Aliyar, now 73 with a long white beard, remembers the day Zahran left in 2005. “His father came and asked, ‘Where can he go?’.”

The school would hear again of Mohamed Zahran. And the world now knows his name. The Sri Lankan government has identified him as the ringleader of a group that carried out a series of Easter Sunday suicide bombings in the country on April 21.

The blasts killed more than 250 people in churches and luxury hotels, one of the deadliest-ever such attacks in South Asia. There were nine suicide bombers who blew apart men, women and children as they sat to pray or ate breakfast.

Most of the attackers were well-educated and from wealthy families, with some having been abroad to study, according to Sri Lankan officials.

That description does not, however, fit their alleged leader, a man said to be in his early 30s, who authorities say died in the slaughter. Zahran was different.

INTELLIGENCE FAILINGS

Sri Lanka’s national leadership has come under heavy criticism for failing to heed warnings from Indian intelligence services – at least three in April alone – that an attack was pending. But Zahran’s path from provincial troublemaker to alleged jihadist mastermind was marked by years of missed or ignored signals that the man with a thick beard and paunch was dangerous.

His increasingly militant brand of Islam was allowed to grow inside a marginalized minority community – barely 10 percent of the country’s roughly 20 million people are Muslim – against a backdrop of a dysfunctional developing nation.

The top official at the nation’s defense ministry resigned on Thursday, saying that some institutions under his charge had failed.

For much of his adult life, Zahran, 33, courted controversy inside the Muslim community itself.

In the internet age, that problem did not stay local. Zahran released online videos calling for jihad and threatening bloodshed.

After the blasts, Islamic State claimed credit and posted a video of Zahran, clutching an assault rifle, standing before the group’s black flag and pledging allegiance to its leader.

The precise relationship between Zahran and Islamic State is not yet known. An official with India’s security services, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said that during a raid on a suspected Islamic State cell by the National Investigation Agency earlier this year officers found copies of Zahran’s videos. The operation was in the state of Tamil Nadu, just across a thin strait of ocean from Sri Lanka.

“LIKE A SPOILED CHILD”

Back in 2005, Zahran was looking to make his way in the world. His hometown of Kattankudy is some seven hours’ drive from Colombo on the other side of the island nation, past the countless palm trees, roadside Buddha statues, cashew hawkers and an occasional lumbering elephant in the bush. It is a town of about 40,000 people, a dot on the eastern coast with no clear future for an impoverished young man who’d just been expelled.

Zahran joined a mosque in 2006, the Dharul Athar, and gained a place on its management committee. But within three years they’d had a falling out.

“He wanted to speak more independently, without taking advice from elders,” said the mosque’s imam, or spiritual leader, M.T.M. Fawaz.

Also, the young man was more conservative, Fawaz said, objecting, for instance, to women wearing bangles or earrings.

“The rest of us come together as community leaders but Zahran wanted to speak for himself,” said Fawaz, a man with broad shoulders lounging with a group of friends in a back office of the mosque after evening prayers. “He was a black sheep who broke free.”

Mohamed Yusuf Mohamed Thaufeek, a friend who met Zahran at school and later became an adherent of his, said the problems revolved around Zahran’s habit of misquoting Islamic scriptures.

The mosque’s committee banned him from preaching for three months in 2009. Zahran stormed off.

“We treated him like a spoiled child, a very narrow-minded person who was always causing some trouble,” said the head of the committee, Mohamed Ismail Mohamed Naushad, a timber supplier who shook his head at the memory.

Now on his own, Zahran began to collect a group of followers who met in what Fawaz described as “a hut”.

At about that time, Zahran, then 23, married a young girl from a small town outside the capital of Colombo and brought his bride back to Kattankudy, according to his sister, Mathaniya.

“I didn’t have much of a connection with her – she was 14,” she said.

Despite being “a bit rough-edged”, Zahran was a skilled speaker and others his age were drawn to his speeches and Koranic lessons, said Thaufeek. He traveled the countryside at times, giving his version of religious instruction as he went.

Also, Zahran had found a popular target: the town’s Sufi population, who practice a form of Islam often described a mystical, but which to conservatives is heresy.

Tensions in the area went back some years. In 2004, there was a grenade attack on a Sufi mosque and in 2006 several homes of Sufis were set afire. Announcements boomed from surrounding mosques at the time calling for a Sufi spiritual leader to be killed, said Sahlan Khalil Rahman, secretary of a trust that oversees a group of Sufi mosques.

He blamed followers of the fundamentalist Wahhabi strain of Islam that some locals say became more popular after funding from Saudi Arabia, the birthplace of Wahhabism, flowed to mosques in Kattankudy.

It was, Rahman said, an effort “to convert Sufis into Wahhabis through this terrorism”. Rahman handed over a photograph album showing charred homes, bullet holes sprayed across an office wall and a shrine’s casket upended.

ONLINE RADICAL

It was an ideal backdrop for Zahran’s bellicose delivery and apparent sense of religious destiny.

He began holding rallies, bellowing insults through loudspeakers that reverberated inside the Sufis’ house of worship as they tried to pray.

In 2012, Zahran started a mosque of his own. The Sufis were alarmed and, Rahman said, passed on complaints to both local law enforcement and eventually national government offices. No action was taken.

The then-officer in charge of Kattankudy police, Ariyabandhu Wedagedara, said in a telephone interview that he couldn’t arrest people simply because of theological differences.

     “The problem at the time was between followers of different Islamic sects – Zahran was not a major troublemaker, but he and followers of other sects, including the Sufis, were at loggerheads,” Wedagedara said.

Zahran found another megaphone: the internet. His Facebook page was taken down after the bombings, but Muslims in the area said his video clips had previously achieved notoriety.

His speeches went from denouncing Sufis to “kafirs”, or non-believers, in general. Zahran’s sister, Mathaniya, said in an interview that she thought “his ideas became more radical from listening to Islamic State views on the Internet”.

In one undated video, Zahran, in a white tunic and standing in front of an image of flames, boomed in a loud voice: “You will not have time to pick up the remains of blown-up bodies. We’ll keep sending those insulting Allah to hell.”

“HARD TO TAKE”

Zahran spoke in Tamil, making his words available to young Muslims clicking on their cellphones in Kattankudy and other towns like it during a period when, in both 2014 and 2018, reports and images spread of Sinhalese Buddhists rioting against Muslims in Sri Lanka.

In 2017, Zahran’s confrontations boiled over. At a rally near a Sufi community, his followers came wielding swords. At least one man was hacked and hospitalized. The police arrested several people connected to Zahran, including his father and one of his brothers. Zahran slipped away from public view.

That December, the mosque Zahran founded released a public notice disowning him. Thaufeek, his friend from school, is now the head. He counted the places that Zahran had been driven away from – his school, the Dharul Athar mosque and then, “we ourselves kicked him out, which would have been hard for him to take”.

The next year, a group of Buddha statues was vandalized in the town of Mawanella, about five hours drive from Kattankudy. There, in the lush mountains of Sri Lanka’s interior, Zahran had taken up temporary residence.

“He was preaching to kill people,” said A.G.M. Anees, who has served as an imam at a small mosque in the area for a decade. “This is not Islam, this is violence.”

Zahran went into hiding once more.

On the Thursday morning before the Easter Sunday bombings, Zahran’s sister-in-law knocked on the door of a neighbor who did seamstress work near Kattankudy. She handed over a parcel of fabric and asked for it to be sewn into a tunic by the end of the day.

“She said she was going on a family trip,” said the neighbor, M.H. Sithi Nazlya.

Zahran’s sister says that her parents turned off their cellphones on the Friday. On Sunday, when she visited their home, they were gone.

She does not know if Zahran arranged for them to be taken somewhere safe. Or why he would have carried out the bombing.

But now in Kattankudy, and in many other places, people are talking about Mohamed Hashim Mohamed Zahran.

(Reporting by Tom Lasseter and Shri Navaratnam; Additional reporting by Sanjeev Miglani, Shihar Aneez and Alasdair Pal; Editing by John Chalmers and Alex Richardson)

Source: OANN

Listen to https://magaoneradio.net and Listen Daily! Don't Forget to Share Click a Link Below!

Listen to https://magaoneradio.net and Listen Daily! Don't Forget to Share Click a Link Below!
Current track

Title

Artist