But US Muslims are still complaining that law enforcement dares to give their communities heightened scrutiny, even though there are terrorist groups within.

U.S. intelligence and law enforcement authorities are discovering new home-grown cells of Islamist radicals in the United States that draw inspiration and moral support from al Qaeda, officials said on Tuesday.

Like local terrorism cells that have recently come to light in Canada and Europe, officials said the groups are comprised of disaffected young men in their teens and 20s who rely on the Internet to try to organize and plan potential attacks on the U.S. homeland.

Concern about attacks inside the United States gathered pace after the arrest earlier this month in Canada of 17 men -- all Canadian citizens or residents -- accused of planning al Qaeda-inspired attacks across densely populated southern Ontario.

Scott Redd, director of the National Counterterrorism Center, said in a written statement to the Senate that the emergence of home-grown terrorist groups is posing "real challenges" for U.S. authorities despite law enforcement successes at disrupting potential attacks.

"We are grappling with a whole new set of questions: what forces give rise to this violent ideology in immigrant communities that may appear otherwise to be quite well assimilated? ... What signs should we be looking for to try to draw early warning of potential problems?" the statement said.

In later oral testimony, Redd said home-grown cells were a new domestic phenomenon for which the FBI and law enforcement agencies had no "baseline" for measuring the scale of the problem.

Redd declined to discuss details with senators in public but cited recent arrests of terrorism suspects in California and Georgia.

"That's three in a little over a year, and there are obviously other investigations ongoing," Redd told the committee.

The problem seems to be endemic to the Muslim community. That is not a statement based upon hate or bias -- it is based upon the facts that are presenting themselves. That means there is an obvious need to give greater scrutiny to and devote more resourses to investigating Muslim individuals and groups.

These terrorist cells are not appearing at St. Bridget's Catholic Church, Beth Israel Synagogue, or the local Hindu orBuddhist temples. They are being found in mosques and other Muslim groups. They are generally composed of young Muslim men. So lets look at those most likely to be terrorists, and do so openly and unapologetically.

And if the Muslim community wants the heightened scrutiny to stop, they can drop a dime on each and every individual who they see exhibiting the militant tendencies that are signs of potential involvement in such activities. And if they cannot bring themselves to do that, then they had better get used to heightened scrutiny of every Muslim.

After all, we are in a fight for national and cultural survival. This is no time to worry about the sensitivities of those whose communities are rife with terrorists.

Posted by: Greg at 11:09 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
Post contains 502 words, total size 3 kb.