MEMRI to Track Down & Shutdown Jihadist Websites in the U.S

In a briefing issued on Thursday, the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI) stated that Islamic terrorist and anti-Western Jihad websites are numerous and growing in the United States, and they are helping to communicate with and inspire the actions of Islamic fundamentalist terror groups such as al Qaeda who are seeking ways to carry out more terror strikes on U.S. soil.

Recent terror strike attempts like those that were planned against Fort Dix in New Jersey and against JFK International Airport, as well as the attempted car bombing in London and the attack on Heathrow airport in Glasgow, all have connections to Islamic fundamentalist websites that belong to Al-Qaeda as well as to other, related organizations, noted MEMRI to the news media.

As part of its Islamist Website Monitor Initiative that has been in place for several years and already monitors over 60 websites that are responsible for organizing and calling for terrorist attacks against the West, MEMRI will begin a stepped-up program to seek out and shutdown that type of website in the United States.

The presence and spread of that type of website in American territory gives the terrorists better resources for recruitment, cell placement, and attack initiative against Americans.

Democratic Representative Gary Ackerman of New York, Chairman of the House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on the Middle East and South Asia, and Republican Representative Mike Pence of Indiana, Ranking Member of the Subcommittee on the Middle East and South Asia, organized the briefing.

Critics of this type of monitoring say that programs like the one MEMRI will carry out lead to the curtailing of individual freedoms and rights and abuses by the federal government. They say that it is not always easy to distinguish between a website that is merely critical of U.S. foreign policy and overseas actions and one that is truly advocating or organizing terrorist attacks, and that those who are doing the monitoring will inevitably err on the side of conservatism and assume "guilty until proven innocent".