By Matthew Vadum ——Bio and Archives--September 30, 2015
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"The IS want to kill... all non-believers and apostates and enslave their women and children. All Shiites, Yazidi, Hindus, atheists and polytheists should be killed," he [wrote separately]. "Hundreds of millions of people are to be eliminated in the course of this religious 'cleansing.'" "All moderate Muslims who promote democracy, should be killed. Because, from the IS perspective, they promote human laws over the laws of God. "This also applies to - after a successful conquest - the democratically-minded Muslims in the Western world."Todenhöfer covered some of the same ground in January when he spoke to Al Jazeera about what he experienced while living with the jihadists.
"I always asked them about the value of mercy in Islam," but "I didn't see any mercy in their behavior," he said. "Something that I don't understand at all is the enthusiasm in their plan of religious cleansing, planning to kill the non-believers‚Ķ They also will kill Muslim democrats because they believe that non-ISIL-Muslims put the laws of human beings above the commandments of God."Todenhöfer was appalled at how "willing to kill" the jihadists were. "They were talking about [killing] hundreds of millions. They were enthusiastic about it, and I just cannot understand that." According to the Daily Mail, when Todenhöfer arrived in Islamic State-controlled territory, the terrorists took away the mobile phones that he and his son, who worked as his cameraman, had brought with them. He had spent months communicating with the group over Skype before it granted him permission to enter its territory. As he explained:
Of course I'd seen the terrible, brutal beheading videos and it was of course after seeing this in the last few months that caused me the greatest concern in my negotiations to ensure how I can avoid this. Anyway, I made my will before I left. People there live in shellholes, in barracks, in bombed-out houses. I slept on the floor, if I was lucky on a plastic mattress. I had a suitcase and a backpack, a sleeping bag.As one might expect, Todenhöfer isn't exactly a fan of the U.S.-led Global War on Terror, which in the eyes of some gives his words extra weight. As an elected member of the Bundestag from 1972 to 1990, he was the Christian Democratic Union's parliamentary spokesman on disarmament, according to German broadcaster Deutsche Welle (DW). "In 1980, he paid a visit to Soviet-occupied Afghanistan--the first of what would become many visits to crisis regions. Over time, he became a committed pacifist and critic of the US wars in Iraq and Afghanistan." Meanwhile, an American lawmaker warned that President Obama's cavalier approach to U.S. border security and insistence on importing thousands of Syrian refugees will help Islamic State in its quest to terrorize Americans. "I don't think that the United States needs to have an open-door policy--this Obama policy--that is going to allow ISIS to come into our country, set up bases of operation illegally at the taxpayers' expense," U.S. Rep. Brian Babin (R-Texas) said. Babin also blamed Obama for the bloody mess in Syria. "I think that his weak, vacillated foreign policy and his decisions and him drawing the red line and then doing nothing after the red line is crossed by [Syrian dictator Bashar al-] Assad has created this entire situation." Increasing the quota for Syrian refugees beyond Obama's current limit of 10,000 is a "terrible and unwise idea," the congressman said. Retired U.S. Air Force Lt. Gen. James Clapper, the administration's director of national intelligence, has warned that Islamic State operatives are hiding among the millions of Syrian refugees heading to Europe and the U.S. And a report from Breitbart News yesterday served as a unsettling reminder of the consequences of President Obama's refusal to secure America's porous border with Mexico: EDINBURG, Texas -- One illegal immigrant has been formally charged with capital murder and another is expected to be charged soon in connection with the execution of two men and the burning of the victims' corpses in Texas. The two jailed illegal immigrants are said to be members of a fearsome gang called the Tri-City Bombers which has been tied to multiple massacres and high profile murders in the past. This week, investigators with the Hidalgo County Sheriff's Office arrested 22-year-old Edwin Adrian Salinas for his suspected role in the case. Authorities had initially arrested him on unrelated drug charges, but once in custody, homicide detectives were able to link him to the double murder. Like illegal aliens, Islamic State terrorists don't use official border crossings.
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Matthew Vadum, matthewvadum.blogspot.com, is an investigative reporter.
His new book Subversion Inc. can be bought at Amazon.com (US), Amazon.ca (Canada)
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