Community Magazine November 2009

“This is Mohammad… If there is no check on the freedom of your words, then let your hearts be open to the freedom of our actions.” This ominous message is not exactly what visitors to Community Magazine’s web- site (www.communitym.com ) expected to see when they visited our homepage on Thursday afternoon, August 27th. But the thinly veiled threat, along with a video of a bearded man at a podium espousing Muslim ideals, is precisely what they got, thanks to a successful hacking by a group calling itself “Knigdom [sic] Islamic Morocco.” In contrast to the vast majority of Muslims throughout the world who seek peaceful coexistence, a small percentage of radical Islamists wage Jihad with the West – in one form or another. And this high pro- file and ever growing segment may have already won the first battle against free expression. Virtual Terror According to the FBI, the webjacking of CommunityM.com is but one of hundreds of attacks each month by off-shore Islamist groups bent on disrupting internet sites that promote pro-Israel policies or warn of the dangers of fundamentalist Islam. Possible motives behind the specific targeting of Community include the fact that the maga- zine’s audience hails mostly from Arabic countries, and the large Muslim popula- tion in Brooklyn, where the publication is centered. The attack was not believed to be connected to any of the previous Islamist threats that have been directed at the magazine – the most serious of which was an email threatening to “bring Jihad on you,” after publication of a May 2007 cover story entitled “Your Personal War on Terror”. That same week, the website of IDT, a successful, Jewish-owned global technology company, fell victim to a cyber invasion. As reported by Yeshiva World News, the hacked page featured an image of the Iranian flag and a threat concerning the company’s alleged policy towards Iranian Virtual Visa cards. Last winter, during the Gaza War launched by Israel in response to the endless shell- ing of its southern cities, hackers seized control of the website of Israeli radio sta- tion 102 FM. Users who clicked on one of the site’s icons were treated to a message condemning Israel’s military actions, call- ing for Israel’s destruction, and warning of continued attacks on Israeli internet sites. The page also featured photographs of burn- ing U.S. and Israeli flags, and of injured Palestinian children. In that same month, Islamists hijacked several blogs on the craft- marketer.com server, replacing the content of the invaded pages with anti-Israel and anti- U.S. vitriol. And a group operating under RICHARD ZAFRANI How Islamist intimidation is not-so-subtly dictating what’s allowed in American media 32 COMMUNITY MAGAZINE