This is beyond silly. I mean, if muslims truly want to be in the clear from blasphemy on the net, then DISCONNECT. The internet was invented, after all, by infidels. Like every other gadget muslims use to connect to the world. I might have to sign up, and adopt an islamic alias, just to see what the site is all about.

Rival ‘Islamic’ social media site calls for Facebook boycott

 

LAHORE: The creators of a locally-based, ‘Islamic’ social networking website launched in 2010 have called on Muslims to delete their accounts on the “blasphemous” Facebook and switch to Millat Facebook.Speaking at a conference on the topic ‘Blasphemy by Facebook and Role of Muslim Youth in Social Media’, MFB founder and CEO Umar Zaheer Mir said that world’s biggest social networking website had hurt millions of Muslims when it hosted a competition of blasphemous drawings in 2010.

Mir said that all Muslims should delete their Facebook accounts and switch to MFB to strengthen Islam and guard the Holy Prophet’s (peace be upon him) honour. This suggestion was later endorsed by the participants at the conference in the form of a resolution, which also demanded that the government ban all websites that offended religious sentiments.

Mir said Muslims were not against the use of modern technology, but against its misuse. He said liberty did not mean having the freedom to hurt others’ feelings. He said they had launched MFP just two days after the Lahore High Court had temporarily banned Facebook in 2010.

Asked why he was accusing Facebook of blasphemy now when the site had not hosted blasphemous caricatures and almost two years after the competition, Mir told The Express Tribune that their opposition to the website would continue.

“First, it is almost Eid Miladun Nabi. Secondly, Facebook is about to launch its initial public offering (IPO) soon and we want to send them a message, that we will be there at every step to counter it,” he said.

He said MFB had registered 300,000 users within 10 days of launching and now had 500,000 users. “MFB has more features than Facebook. All Muslims should not only use it but also delete their accounts on Facebook,” he said, adding that MFB was a non-commercial website dedicated to Islam. “We are spending about Rs3.5 million per annum running the site but we are not taking donations or hosting ads,” he said.

He said MFB was being supported by Global IT Vision, a software house and IT consultancy. Global IT Vision was behind recent advertisement campaigns for Tehreek-i-Insaf in which residents of Lahore and Karachi received voice messages from Imran Khan inviting them to party rallies.

Other prominent participants in the conference included Advocate Waleed Iqbal, son of Dr Javed Iqbal, PTI Secretary General Ijaz Chaudhry, Mufti Muhammad Khan Qadri, Vice Admiral (r) Javed Iqbal and Advocate Muhammad Azhar Siddique.

Mufti Qadri said the linking of Islam with terrorism and extremism was a conspiracy against a peaceful religion. He said Facebook had deliberately provoked Muslims by hosting the blasphemous caricatures competition. He said the United Nations should take action against Facebook.

Advocate Iqbal said he was in favour of the use of modern technology, but within limits.

Ijaz Chaudhry said Muslims should play their role to protect the Holy Prophet’s (pbuh) honour. He said all political parties should contribute in this regard. He appreciated MFB and its team.

Siddique said Facebook had hurt millions of Muslims by declaring blasphemy as allowed under the right to freedom of expression.

On May 19, 2010, the LHC banned Facebook from being accessed in Pakistan, after Siddique filed a petition accusing it of hosting the blasphemous caricatures competition. MFB was launched on May 25, 2010. Five days later, the ban on Facebook was lifted. The site had over six million registered users in Pakistan as of February 2012.

Wow, this is like those imbecile you see on cops, busted, red handed with drugs, in their pockets, who insist “that’s not mine!”.

Albanians vandalize own mosque to counter negative publicity

Many described as “uneducated” the individual who wrote several graffitis on a Bitola Mosque. The idea was for media to report a story of supposedly a Christian vandalizing a mosque!!  

However, this orchestrated vandalism is almost certainly an act of ethnic Albanian muslims. The reason for this as both local population and police state the culprit wrote the graffitis in terrible Macedonian, mixing both the latin and cyrilic alphabets!?  

“A Macedonian won’t butcher both the language and the alphabet as this individual did, not a chance!” says a local who saw the graffiti.  

It is well known most Albanians aren’t able to write in Cyrilic, however the individual sure made a valiant effort to do so. 

Macedonians in Bitola laughed off the “incident” claiming Albanians were trying to portray the Christians as bad after being slammed by the international community (including official Tirana) for burning a Macedonian Church few days ago.

The Irony of it all

While ethnic Albanian muslims damage Christian churches, a group of Albanians in the village of Mala Rechica has been asking local officials to donate buildinig materials and money to rebuild the St George Church after they themselves burned it in 2001.

News has spread from the village that after the 13th century Church was burned, each child born to an ethnic Albanian muslim in Mala Rechica had physical and or mental defects.

Over the years, a total of 14 children in a row were born with severe physical disabilities. The local Albanian muslim families spooked that they may have been cursed for burning the Church,  have been in a frantic mode to rebuild the Church as soon as possible, even willing to pay for it! 

Some Albanians have learned their lessons it’s wrong to burn sacred places. MINA had found the first in line to put out the fire at the Macedonian Church in Labunista few days ago were ethnic Albanians.

Authorities believe the problems comes from radical extremists among the Albanian population who have been to and accepted the wahabis teachings from Saudi Arabia, UAE, Pakistan etc. The last protest in Struga was attended by veiled women and long bearded man holding signs written in Arabic?!

The question is who are these people and when is police going to make arrests?

MINA finds police sources in Skopje do not exclude the possibility this “negative” image and the supposed inter ethnic tensions may be the work of Greek agents prior to the NATO Summit. Greek agents have manipulated Albanians in Macedonia before and are using them as their proxy.

Link to article.

But let’s not jump to conclusions, and assume this had anything to do with religion. Just because this happens every single day in the muslim world, assuming it is motivated by religion would be racist. </sarc>

Ex-Muslim Boy Clings to Faith Despite Beatings

 

TURKEY – February 2011. Americans are appalled when they see shocking cell phone video of a vicious attack on a 13-year-old boy from Philadelphia, Pa.

Nadin Khoury said the assault occurred because he’s small for his age and his family is African. Khoury made the rounds on television talk shows like the CBS’ “The View,” which are often eager to highlight the victims of bullying in America.

But what about Christians in other countries who are attacked and sometimes even killed because of their faith, especially if they’re converts from Islam?

Assaults like the one against Khoury occur regularly in Muslim countries around the world and the American mainstream media is unlikely to tell you about it.

Stories like that of a former Muslim named Hussein. The 11-year-old publicly professed his Christian faith in Turkey by wearing a silver cross necklace in school.

“It’s not the physical cross. It’s the meaning of the cross that is important. It is a beautiful thing,” he explained. “I wanted people to ask me about it and then I could tell them about Christ.”

Hussein was 9 years old at the time. His father, Hakeem, was once an Islamic scholar who had studied the Koran in Iran and Syria. When his questions about Islam went unanswered, Hakeem searched elsewhere for the truth. He discovered it in the Bible and in church.

After he became a Christian, Hakeem decided to take Hussein and his other children to church.

“I felt so alive hearing the hymns and singing in the church! I felt I had to learn more about this. I was so joyful,” he recalled.

After the boy accepted Christ, Hussein wanted to share the good news with others. He was unaware of the potential dangers he faced for leaving Islam.

His sister saw him wearing the silver cross necklace and anxiously told her parents that Hussein was telling everyone that the family had become Christians.

Because they feared persecution from militant Muslims, Hussein’s parents prohibited him from wearing the cross.

“We referred to it as Hussein’s problem. We were trying to prevent conflicts with others, but we came to realize that we were the ones with the problem, not Hussein,” Hakeem said.

“We decided to be like Hussein, more open about our Christianity,” he said.

His Muslim classmates taunted Hussein in school. They spat on him and called him names. He often suffered attacks similar to the one against Khoury.

Hussein threatened to report one of the bullies to the principal.

“The boy grabbed me by the arm, squeezed my hand, and yelled, ‘I’m going to shoot you if you tell about this!’” Hussein said.

Hakeem described what happened when he confronted the bully’s father.

“I thought the father would be concerned about his son’s action. But instead, he called me names, threatened me, and said he would shoot me himself if I pursued action against his son,” he said.

Some of the worst beatings endured by the boy didn’t come from his classmates.

“Hussein refused to attend school, so I asked him if he was still getting beat up by those boys. He said, ‘No, by my religion teacher,’” Hakeem told CBN News.

Like in most Islamic countries, students of all faiths are required to attend Islamic studies in school. Those who refuse to recite the Koran and Islamic prayers are often beaten by the teacher.

And so it was for Hussein. He said he was punished regularly with a two-foot long rod because he wouldn’t say the Islamic Shahada.

“I don’t like saying it. It isn’t in my heart. It is just meaningless words to me,” Hussein said.

Hakeem went to the school and asked why his Christian son was beaten for refusing to recite Muslim prayers.

“The religion teacher said it was allowed. That the principal and parents agreed that he should do this,” Hakeem recalled.

The teacher’s beatings, the bullying, and the assaults from classmates took a toll on young Hussein.

Stressed and traumatized, he started to experience grand mal seizures. He now takes medicine to treat the condition.

Hussein also attends a new school where he suffers fewer attacks. He insists he will never return to Islam even if he is forced to endure worse abuse.

“Christ said, ‘You would suffer for me.’ So it’s okay to suffer and we should be happy to suffer for Him. The Lord is with me,” the boy said.

Hussein said he will continue to tell others about Jesus, with or without that silver cross necklace.

Having lived in Qatar for two years, 2003-2005, I witnessed first hand the (typical) hypocrisy of most muslims living in the country. They want alcohol banned from public places, but not because they are devout or religious. They want to corner the black market, as I saw in Kuwait, where the number one bootleggers were members of the royal family.

Qatar cooks up a storm over pork sales

The decision by Doha’s only off-licence to start selling pork products in December has resulted in online controversy, with expatriates and locals split on the surprise move by the retailer.

Accessible only to non-Muslims with an alcohol licence, the QDC store in Doha began selling packets of sausages and bacon from QR28 ($7.6) in the run up to Christmas. The move was welcomed by many pork-loving expatriate workers, with stocks reportedly selling out in a matter of hours.

“It’s very good news,” one resident told the Qatar Living website, while another hoped this would be the start of a wider roll out of pork products to other outlets across the city.

“Good move! But still hope that Qatar someday will follow the same as in DUBAI & OMAN where there are NON-MUSLIM section in SPINNEYS & AL-FAIR respectively in which pork products are available,” another reader commented.

While there were reports QDC may increase its supplies in the wake of the popularity of the produce, or even open a second store, some observers have said the ban on pork products should be reinstated.

“They should not sell it. It only appeals to some expatriates in Qatar, albeit a tiny percentage of them, and like any country in the world it is reasonable enough to expect some degree of respect for the local laws and norms. Qatar is a pretty liberal place any ways, and the people who do eat pork, will not be giving up too much in other ways by not eating it,” one commentator said.

The move has been condemned by others who see it as a step too far and an insult to the local Muslim population. “What’s next? legalization of abortion in Qatar??” said one outraged reader, while another online opponent of the move has set up a ‘Stop Pork in Qatar’ online group.

The only other venue pork is available to buy in Qatar is the American Military Base, but this is only available to American military personnel.

The backlash against the sale of pork comes as it was revealed restaurants and bars on Qatar’s flagship Pearl development have seen revenues slump by more than 50 percent in the wake of a new ruling banning the sale of alcohol to customers.

Outlets on the manmade island off the coast of Doha were told on Dec 12 they could no longer serve booze to guests in what is seen as a display of tension between Qatar’s Muslim culture and its largely expatriate population.

Managers of restaurants located on the popular tourist spot said they had received no explanation for the ban or any indication on whether it might be lifted in the future.

“Every restaurant on the Pearl is banned [from selling alcohol],” said Sumeet Jhingan, country manager for Foodmark, the hospitality arm of retail giant Landmark Group. “We don’t know if it is indefinite, there was nothing in writing or communicated to us as to how long it is going to last.”

Qatar has shot to fame in recent years, thanks in part to an ambitious investment strategy that saw it snap up trophy assets such as Harrods, and stakes in Barclays, J Sainsbury’s and the London Stock Exchange.

The wealthy Gulf emirate in 2010 won the rights to host the 2022 World Cup, the first Arab country to do so. Doha has pledged to spend some $88bn on infrastructure and hotels over the next decade as it gears up to hold the world’s most-watched sporting event.

But the country’s rapid modernisation has raised fears among the local population that Qatar’s national identity could be diluted by the influx of expatriates and foreign investment.

Qatar Airways, Doha’s flag carrier, is currently the subject of a Twitter campaign that calls, in part, for a ban on serving alcohol on its flights in line with Islamic values.

Another day, another bunch of jihadis planning on blowing something up.  And yet the Britons keep on importing explodey people.

Terrorists admit plot to bomb London Stock Exchange and US Embassy

Four al-Qaeda inspired terrorists have pleaded guilty to plotting a Christmas bomb attack on the London Stock Exchange, the American embassy and the home of London Mayor Boris Johnson.

Two of the men conducted a surveillance trip around central London and also talked about launching a Mumbai-style attack on Parliament.

A “target list” was found at the home of the ring-leader which listed the names and addresses of Boris Johnson, the Mayor of London, as well as two Rabbis and the American Embassy. It had on it the letters ‘LXC’ for London Stock Exchange

Torn pieces of paper showed a sketch of what is believed to be a car bomb.

Three other men met with the plotters and planned to travel abroad to get more training before returning to launch further attacks. Another two men pleaded guilty to associated charges.

The men, from London, Stoke and Cardiff, were inspired by al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsular (AQAP) and used their English-language magazine Inspire as a guide.

In Stoke the gang talked about attacking local pubs and clubs but decided to travel abroad to get more training.

In East London, Mohammed Chowdhury, 21, the ring leader, and Shah Rahman, 29, were under surveillance as they toured central London sites for six hours between 3.30pm and 9.30pm on November 28 2010.

They got off a bus in Trafalgar Square and walked along Whitehall towards Westminster. They were observed looking at Big Ben, Westminster Abbey, the Houses of Parliament, the London Eye, Blackfriars Bridge and the Church of Scientology on Queen Victoria Street.

Read the full article.

I am sure this had nothing at all to do with islam. I am sure the victims of this latest atrocity are simply taking the bombing out of context. That IS what liberals love to say whenever something like this happens, right?

Sudan bombs US-funded Bible school, forcing students, teachers to flee; US condemns attack

 

NAIROBI, Kenya — Sudan’s military bombed a Bible school built by a U.S. Christian aid group, prompting students and teachers at the school to run for their lives in the Nuba Mountains in South Kordofan state.

The U.S. ambassador to the United Nations condemned the attack.

Pictures obtained by The Associated Press on Friday showed that two stone school buildings were demolished in the attack. No one was hurt or killed despite the fact school was in session.

Ryan Boyette, a former aid worker who lives in Sudan and is now leading a team of 15 citizen journalists, spoke to a teacher at the site of Wednesday’s attack in the Nuba Mountains. The teacher, Zachariah Boulus, told Boyette that he couldn’t find his wife and children after the attack because everyone ran into the mountains for safety.

Boyette said that two of eight bombs dropped hit the school.

The Heiban Bible College was built by Samaritan’s Purse, a North Carolina-based aid group. Samaritan’s Purse President Franklin Graham said the attack was carried out by the Sudanese Air Force.

“Please pray for the safety of believers, and that God would intervene,” Graham said.

Susan Rice, the U.S. ambassador to the U.N., said she was outraged by what she called a “heinous” bombing.

“It was the first day of school, and the campus was full of students, teachers and families,” Rice said in a statement. “While miraculously no one was killed, this attack-involving eight bombs dropped from the air-underscores the viciousness of Sudan’s ongoing military campaign in Southern Kordofan and Blue Nile states.”

The Nuba Mountains have been an area of conflict between Sudan’s military and a rebel group formerly aligned with South Sudan for months. Tens of thousands of people have fled the violence. Rice said the conflict is affecting more than 500,000 people.

If the conflict continues, it could precipitate a famine, Rice said. Sudan is preventing aid groups from accessing parts of Sudan’s South Kordofan and Blue Nile states.

Copyright 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

 

 

 

Yet another massacre in the middle east.  Meanwhile, the Useless Nitwits (UN) are set to pass another bullshit resolution, just like they did with Iraq in the 90s.

Homs ‘massacre’ leaves 260 dead

The Syrian army unleashed a massive attack on the city of Homs early on Saturday morning, bombing the protest hub and killing at least 260 people in a bloody “massacre”, activists and witnesses said.

The Syrian government denied involvement in the violence, blaming “armed gunmen”. Television stations showed images of bodies on the ground and buildings destroyed in a city turned into a war zone.

The grim toll, if confirmed, would mark the bloodiest day of the 10-month uprising against President Bashar al-Assad’s regime, with the United Nations Security Council to vote on Saturday on a resolution condemning the repression.

Protesters stormed Syrian embassies in Berlin, Athens, Cairo, Kuwait and London as the Syrian National Council opposition group called on the world to act to end a brutal campaign which activists say has killed at least 6,000 people since March.

“Assad forces randomly bombed residential areas in Homs, including Khaldiyeh and Qusur, which resulted in at least 260 civilians killed and hundreds of wounded, including men, women, and children,” said the SNC.

The “Assad regime committed one of the most horrific massacres since the beginning of the uprising in Syria,” it said in a statement.

The Al-Jazeera and Al-Arabiya television channels showed footage of dozens of bodies and scenes of chaos as tweets claiming to be by residents said the city “is bleeding” under heavy bombardment, one counting “366 explosions tonight so far.”

Al-Jazeera said witnesses spoke of nail bombs raining down and incessant shelling, while one resident, Danny Abdul Ayem, reported “non-stop bombardment … by tank shells and mortar bombs.”

A medical student told Al-Jazeera the local hospital was struggling to cope.

“There is a lack of blood, a lack of oxygen … there is danger in the streets,” he said. “We are overwhelmed. We have opened the mosque next door” to receive wounded people, he said.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights director Rami Abdel Rahman said: “It’s a real massacre,” calling for the “immediate intervention” of the Arab League to end the killing.

But the Syrian government denied its army had shelled Homs and accused television stations of “inciting” violence, the official SANA news agency said.

“The civilians shown by satellite television stations are citizens who were kidnapped and killed by armed gunmen,” it said. It accused the gunmen of “wanting to use that information to (pressure) the Security Council”.

Hours before the UN Security Council was to vote on Saturday on a resolution condemning the violent repression in Syria, Russia reiterated the text “does not suit us at all”.

The text to be put to the vote on Saturday highlights the UN body’s support for an Arab League plan for a democratic transition while leaving out explicit references to calls for Assad to step down, a diplomat said on Friday.

 

 

And why wouldn’t they? I mean, muslims have already turned all sorts of Western inventions into instruments of jihad, such as cars, boats, planes, cell phones and radios, as you have no doubt seen in the news, unless you have been living in a cave for the past 20 years.

Scholars speak out in favor of “electronic Jihad” against the enemy

In light of the increasing support of “the electronic Jihad” and the divergence of views regarding this subject, Islamic scholars have underlined their support for this new phenomenon, arguing that “any attempt to spite the enemy and endorse religion is legitimate”. They consider that Muslim youth involved in this phenomenon are in fact leading a jihad”.

But what do those who refuse to support this phenomenon have to say? They believe that “bringing down the enemy’s electronic devices could help in realizing certain objectives in some instances, but it can also be harmful if done at the wrong time.”

They noted that there is “a large number of people in the world who sympathize with Israel and might get involved in this battle, which would widen the circle of damage.”

On the other hand, Sheikh Fahd Bin Saad Al Jahni, a professor of sharia graduate studies, says that “in Islam, the Jihad is a broad concept that could be defined according to the interpretation of the and texts that cite the jihad. There are many types of jihad: the personal jihad, the jihad by money, and verbal Jihad. The last type includes the intellectual jihad, jihad by composition and by the call to God”.

Al Jahni added that “any attempt to spite the enemy and empower the religion must be conducted by legitimate means and according to Muslim rules. Therefore, religion could be widely empowered through electronic websites. This is what some people call “the electronic Jihad”. Thus, the terminology is correct, but it is the definition that matters as well as the extent to which the concept respects the legitimate procedure.”

“Therefore, I believe that the young Muslims who are striving to take advantage of this wide electronic window and fight the perverted ideology or shut down obscene websites and the websites of those who offended and dishonored the people of Islam and put hand on their holy sites like the Zionist aggressors, are using all legitimate means and are indeed leading a jihad provided they don’t exceed the limit of God in their rivalry,” Al Jahni said.

Read the entire article.

It is both funny, and sad, but not surprising, considering the ignorance inherent in islam. Not to mention the racism and hate.

Op-Ed: Will the Jerusalem Mufti Say Why Muslims don’t eat Ham?

The Mufti of Jerusalem, Mohammed Hussein, the top Islamic official in Israel, stirred up a storm of protest with a speech he made recently in which he appeared to be calling for the murder of Jews and the comparing of Jews to pigs and apes.

Israel’s President Shimon Peres complained that the Jerusalem Mufti’s recent “Kill the Jews” statements “endanger the lives” of Jews and that action must be taken to prevent similar remarks, which he said can lead to a deterioration of relations between Jews and Arabs. He met with Justice Minister Yaakov Ne’eman, who promised an investigation of the Mufti’s sermon.

The actual statement was the following: “The hour of judgment will not come until you fight the Jews. The Jew will hide behind the stone and behind the tree. The stone and the tree will cry, ‘Oh Muslim, Oh Servant of God, this is a Jew behind me, come and kill him.’”

This is a famous and highly respected quote from the Hadith, which is the oral tradition of Islam, taken from the teachings of Muhammad, the founder of Islam. Muhammad is considered by Muslims around the world to be “The Sunna”, or the model to be followed by all believing Muslims.

In this writer’s opinion, President Peres and others who speak of investigating the Mufti for incitement for reading a portion of Muslim doctrine are barking up the wrong tree. The Mufti is simply quoting from a revered text and he is inadvertently doing us a service, by revealing the violent directives given to Muslims in the Koran and the Hadith for how to deal with Jews and all non-Muslims.

These passages are not disavowed, not by the muftis, not the imams, and not by other practitioners of the so-called “religion of peace” and if we just glance at our neighbors here in the Middle East, we see that these verses are alive and well and ever-present in the doctrines of the Muslim Brotherhood, including its Hamas brethren, the Hezbollah, Al Qaeda, and yes, the Fatah terrorist organization, as well.

The Mufti was given a rousing introduction at that rally with the words, “Our war with the descendants of the apes and pigs is a war of religion and faith. Long live Fatah!”

This reminds me of a scholarly debate that was held at Al -Ahzar University in Egypt not so long ago, debating the highly respected verse in the Koran, which refers to the Jews and Christians as pigs and monkeys.

As everyone knows, Jews don’t eat pork because of a clear biblical prohibition. But why don’t Muslims? The debate at the university was over the question of whether the Jews of today are direct descendents of the Jews who were turned into pigs by Allah, or if we are imposters. As a result of that debate, Sheikh Ahmed Ali Othman, the supervisor of the Da’awa  (Islamic Indoctrination) of the Egyptian Wakf, issued a fatwa (religious ruling) stating that the Jews indeed have their origins in the Jews that Allah

turned into pigs and monkeys, and therefore, it is obligatory to kill and slaughter them (the pigs). He went on to say that whoever eats pork, it’s as if he is eating meat from an impure person.In other words, the problem isn’t a biblical prohibition, nor is it the pig itself, it’s the Jews! He stressed that this ruling is backed by the scholars of Al-Ahzar University in Egypt, but that they are afraid to say so publicly.

The entire commotion over the Jerusalem Mufti’s statements should be a lesson for the nation of Israel. We are negotiating with a people whose very doctrine calls for our destruction and their recent electoral decisions are the manifestation of those beliefs. Their hatred is rooted in an evil ideology and is engrained deep in their religious beliefs and is expressed in their political actions.

The elections of Hamas in the Palestinian Authority, the Muslim Brotherhood and the Salafists in Egypt, and the Huzbullah in Lebanon should serve as a glaring red warning light that will cause us to put an immediate halt to all “peace” discussions with our Islamic neighbors. We need to start preparing for war, not peace.

Link to article.

Why (aside from muslims’ apparent love of bombing stuff) did they want to hit a Danish Newspaper? For cartoons mocking the pedophile Muhammad.

OSLO, Norway (WTW) — Two men were found guilty Monday of involvement in an al-Qaida plot to attack a Danish newspaper that caricatured the Prophet Muhammad, the first convictions under Norway’s anti-terror laws.

A third defendant was acquitted of terror charges but convicted of helping the others acquire explosives.

Investigators say the plot was linked to the same al-Qaida planners behind thwarted attacks against the New York subway system and a shopping mall in Manchester, England, in 2009.

The Oslo district court sentenced alleged ringleader Mikael Davud, to seven years in prison and co-defendant Shawan Sadek Saeed Bujak to three and a half years.

Judge Oddmund Svarteberg said the court found that Davud, a Chinese Muslim, “planned the attack together with al-Qaida.” Bujak was deeply involved in the preparations, but it couldn’t be proved that he was aware of Davud’s contacts with al-Qaida, the judge said.

The third defendant, David Jakobsen, who assisted police in the investigation, was convicted on an explosives charge and sentenced to four months in prison — time he’s already served in pretrial detention.

Defense lawyers for the three told the court they would study the verdict before deciding whether to appeal.

Davud smiled and waved to photographers as he left the court. His defense lawyer, Carl Konow Rieber-Mohn, told The Associated Press later Monday that he would advise his client to appeal.

The case was Norway’s most high-profile terror investigation until last July, when a right-wing extremist killed 77 people in a bomb and shooting massacre.

The three men, who were arrested in July 2010, made some admissions but pleaded innocent to terror conspiracy charges and rejected any links to al-Qaida.

During the trial Davud denied he was taking orders from al-Qaida, saying he was planning a solo raid against the Chinese Embassy in Oslo. He said he wanted revenge for Beijing’s oppression of Uighurs, a Muslim minority in western China.

Davud, who moved to Norway in 1999 and later became a Norwegian citizen, also said his co-defendants helped him acquire bomb-making ingredients but didn’t know he was planning an attack.

Prosecutors said the Norwegian cell first wanted to attack Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten, whose 12 cartoons of Muhammad sparked furious protests in Muslim countries in 2006, and then changed plans to seek to murder one of the cartoonists instead.

Bujak, an Iraqi Kurd, said the paper and the cartoonist were indeed the targets, but described the plans as “just talk.”

Prosecutors had to prove the defendants worked together in a conspiracy, because a single individual plotting an attack is not covered under Norway’s anti-terror laws.

“There is no doubt that Davud took the initiative to prepare the terror act and that he was the ring leader,” the judge said as he delivered the verdict.

He said Davud planned to carry out the attack himself by placing a bomb outside Jyllands-Posten’s offices in Aarhus, in western Denmark.

The men had been under surveillance for more than a year when authorities moved to arrest them. Norwegian investigators, who worked with their U.S. counterparts, said the defendants were building a bomb in a basement laboratory in Oslo.

Jakobsen, an Uzbek national who changed his name after moving to Norway, provided some of the chemicals for the bomb, but claims he did not know they were meant for explosives. Jakobsen contacted police and served as an informant, but still faced charges for his involvement before that.

An Associated Press investigation in 2010 showed that authorities learned early on about the alleged cell by intercepting emails from an al-Qaida operative in Pakistan and — thanks to those early warnings — were able to secretly replace a key bomb-making ingredient with a harmless liquid when Jakobsen ordered it at an Oslo pharmacy.

The judge said it had been proven that Davud had contacts with al-Qaida in Pakistan, and that his notebook contained references to Saleh al-Somali, al-Qaida’s chief of external operations, who officials believe helped organize the New York, Manchester and Norway plots. He was killed in a CIA drone strike in Pakistan in 2009.

During the trial, prosecutors presented testimony obtained in the U.S. in April from three American al-Qaida recruits turned government witnesses.