11-01-2024  1:49 pm   •   PDX and SEA Weather

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NORTHWEST NEWS

African American Alliance On Homeownership Turns 25, Honors The Skanner Cofounder Bernie Foster

AAAH's executive director Cheryl Roberts recalls how the efforts of Bernie Foster led to an organization that now offers one-on-one counseling for prospective home buyers, homebuyer education, foreclosure prevention services, estate planning, assistance with down payments and more.

Police Say Fires Set at Ballot Boxes in Oregon and Washington Are Connected; ‘Suspect Vehicle’ ID'd

Surveillance images captured a Volvo stopping at a drop box in Portland, just before security personnel nearby discovered a fire inside the box. That fire damaged three ballots inside, while officials say a fire at a drop box in nearby Vancouver, Washington, early Monday destroyed hundreds of ballots.

Two Major Affordable Housing Developments Reach Milestones in Portland

Both will provide culturally specific supportive services to residents. 

Washington State AG and Ex-Sheriff Face off in Governor's Race

Former U.S. Rep. Dave Reichert is trying to become Washington’s first GOP governor in 40 years. But he faces a difficult hurdle in the Democratic stronghold against longtime Washington Attorney General Bob Ferguson, a darling of liberals for his many lawsuits against the Trump administration. 

NEWS BRIEFS

Oregon Department of Education Releases Cell Phone Policy Guidance

ODE recommends creating policies to limit or reduce cell phone use during the school day. ...

Metro, Central City Concern and Partners to Mark Affordable Housing Complex Grand Opening With Halloween Celebration

Meridian Gardens will offer 85 single room occupancy and studio apartments to people who are in substance use disorder recovery and...

Oregon MESA Expands with Two New Regional Centers in Washington County and Lane County

“Our regional partners are embedded in the communities MESA serves, bringing a wealth of local knowledge and expertise. Regional...

Historic Seattle Black Church Hosts "Bring Your Ballot to Church" Event to Mobilize Voters

As Seattle's oldest African American-founded church, FAME carries forward the legacy of Black churches as centers of civic engagement...

Statement Regarding Ballot Box Incident in Vancouver, WA

While an investigation is ongoing, we believe some ballots were damaged. We are confident the Clark County Auditor’s Office will...

Ballot-sorting machine woes slow count in Oregon county with pivotal US House race

OREGON CITY, Ore. (AP) — Problems with a ballot-sorting machine are slowing the vote tally in a suburban Portland county that was also plagued by counting issues in 2022 and is home to a key congressional race this year. The sorter in Oregon's third-largest county, Clackamas, began...

He’s fast, feisty and could play Quidditch. Meet the bat that won a beauty contest

ASHLAND, Ore. (AP) — A winged creature from Oregon was crowned this year’s winner Thursday in an annual bat beauty contest put on by the Bureau of Land Management. On Halloween, which was also the last day of International Bat Week, a hoary bat with a feisty personality named...

Many top players from one-bid leagues left for bigger schools. Here are some of the best who stayed

Identifying the top returning players in the era of the transfer portal is trickier than ever. Now that players can transfer without having to sit out a season, mid-major and low-major programs have essentially become farm systems for power-conference teams. Players who earn...

Miller rushes for 2 TDs, No. 15 Alabama picks off 3 passes in 34-0 win over No. 21 Missouri

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. (AP) — Jamarion Miller rushed for two touchdowns and No. 15 Alabama's defense had three interceptions in a 34-0 victory Saturday over No. 21 Missouri, which played most of the game without starting quarterback Brady Cook. The Crimson Tide (6-2, 3-2 Southeastern...

OPINION

The Skanner News 2024 Presidential Endorsement

It will come as no surprise that we strongly endorse Vice President Kamala Harris for president. ...

Black Retirees Growing Older and Poorer: 2025 Social Security COLA lowest in 10 years

As Americans live longer, the ability to remain financially independent is an ongoing struggle. Especially for Black and other people of color whose lifetime incomes are often lower than that of other contemporaries, finding money to save for ‘old age’ is...

The Skanner Endorsements: Oregon State and Local Ballot Measures

Ballots are now being mailed out for this very important election. Election Day is November 5. Ballots must be received or mailed with a valid postmark by 8 p.m. Election Day. View The Skanner's ballot measure endorsements. ...

Measure 117 is a Simple Improvement to Our Elections

Political forces around the country have launched an all-out assault on voting rights that targets Black communities. State legislatures are restricting voting access in districts with large Black populations and are imposing other barriers and pernicious...

AFRICAN AMERICANS IN THE NEWS

With carbon capture boom, a wariness in historic Louisiana Black community over more pollution

ELKINSVILLE, La. (AP) — A dispute over a planned ammonia plant near a historic Black town in southeastern Louisiana ratcheted up a notch Friday with a challenge to the state's approval process. The battle over the plant is occurring despite the fact that part of the impetus to...

North Dakota state park will no longer be named for Civil War general who fought Native Americans

BISMARCK, N.D. (AP) — A North Dakota state park will no longer be named after a Civil War-era general who led attacks that killed hundreds of Native Americans. Sully Creek State Park, in the rugged Badlands near Medora, is now Rough Rider State Park, the state Parks and Recreation...

Hakeem Jeffries chooses calm over chaos as Democrats work to win the House majority

PALMDALE, Calif. (AP) — This election, he has warned, is about the economy. Freedom. Stopping Project 2025 and the MAGA extremes. And, after the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol, it's about democracy. And yet, Hakeem Jeffries, in line to make history as the first...

ENTERTAINMENT

Samuel L. Jackson lauded at MoMA film benefit by close family and friends

NEW YORK (AP) — The Museum of Modern Art was filled with expletives and laughter Wednesday evening as Samuel L. Jackson’s family and friends celebrated the actor and director’s storied career of box office hits, larger-than-life characters and explosive one-liners at the annual film benefit. ...

A playwright in Africa hopes to break the cultural silence on rape

BAMAKO, Mali (AP) — Under a spotlight in an otherwise dark room, Oliva Ouedraogo held up a piece of fabric that looked stained with blood. “Long live the girl!” she cried, her voice competing with the loud hum of a generator. Ouedraogo was starring in her own play —...

Music Review: Muna frontwoman Katie Gavin makes her solo debut with folky, evocative 'What A Relief'

On “What a Relief,” the debut solo album from Katie Gavin, the Muna frontwoman tackles love, family and selfhood through folk and country twang that departs from the band's usual dance-forward pop. Don't worry, this isn't the end of Muna — the trio of Gavin, Naomi McPherson and...

U.S. & WORLD NEWS

Prison work assignments used to lure and rape female inmates. Guards sometimes walk free

HUNTINGTON, W.Va. (AP) — It was after midnight when she crept down the narrow, dimly lit stairs carrying a bag...

Deaths of 10 newborns shake millions' trust in Turkey's health care system

ANKARA, Turkey (AP) — The mother thought her baby looked healthy when he was born 1.5 months early, but staff...

Army looking into shoving allegations involving the general who heads US Central Command

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Army's Criminal Investigation Division is looking into allegations that the four-star...

Brazil judge gives 2 former cops long sentences for the 2018 murder of leftist icon Marielle Franco

RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — A judge on Thursday handed down long sentences to two former police officers for the 2018...

Taiwanese driver recounts his narrow escape during Typhoon Kong-rey

TAIPEI, Taiwan (AP) — A ride-hailing driver recounted Friday how he had narrow escape when a huge tree smashed...

Australian judge rules senator broke race law by telling rival legislator to return to Pakistan

MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — An Australian judge ruled Friday that anti-immigration party leader Sen. Pauline...

David Rising the Associated Press

HAMBURG, Germany (AP) -- After 9/11, it was the men who went to radicalized mosques or terror boot camps who were seen as the biggest terror threat. Today, that picture's changed: Authorities are increasingly focusing on the lone wolf living next door, radicalized on the Internet - and plotting strikes in a vacuum.

The March fatal shooting of two American airmen in Frankfurt by a Kosovo Albanian. The bomb plot on Fort Hood, Texas, soldiers - possibly inspired by the 2009 shooting rampage on the Texas Army post. The foiled attack on Fort Dix, New Jersey, by a tiny cell of homegrown terrorists.

These Islamic terror plots share something in common with Anders Behring Breivik, the Norway killer who hated Muslims. They are the work of extremists who are confoundingly difficult to track because they hardly leave a trace.

In today's transformed security landscape, authorities and experts say, the 9/11 plotters would surely have been caught.

It's widely believed that these days there's no way a cell involving 19 hijackers and an extensive support network could have plotted attacks in a Hamburg mosque, trained in terrorist camps in Afghanistan, and took flight lessons in the United States without being picked up by countertenor operations.

And President Barack Obama said in a CNN interview on Aug. 16 that a "lone wolf" terror attack in the U.S. is more likely than a major coordinated effort like the Sept. 11 attacks.

Western authorities have infiltrated major jihadist groups, planting moles, eavesdropping on chatter, keeping tabs on radical mosques, and carrying out regular terror sweeps. Some say the tough measures have eroded civil liberties.

But lone wolves or small homegrown cells that blend into the general population present a more slippery challenge.

"The biggest threats are people working alone or in very small groups," a senior German intelligence official told The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter.

"So it's not important whether we have 40 or 50 or 60 followers of the jihad (under observation) ... that doesn't really make much of a difference. The question is are there some that we don't know but who are planning it?"

Modern technology is also making things harder for authorities.

As extremists adapt to the anti-terror crackdown, they have taken more advantage of the Internet to cloak their communications and recruit new attackers.

"Before, people were recruited in mosques where you'd hear speeches - Finsbury Park or Baker Street" in London, French anti-terrorism judge Marc Trevidic told the AP. "Then that totally stopped. Today, there is not a single case where group members weren't recruited on the Internet."

"The ability to self-indoctrinate online is a big concern, because not being in a group complicates our task of surveillance," he said. A terrorist group, he said, "is easier to monitor, moves around and has meetings."

That's what led to the first successful attack on German soil by an Islamic extremist, in which a 21-year-old Kosovo Albanian allegedly gunned down two American airmen outside the Frankfurt airport in March.

Arid Uka, a 21-year-old Kosovo Albanian who grew up in Frankfurt is accused of opening fire at the city's airport on a busload of U.S. airmen on their way to Afghanistan, killing two and injuring two others.

According to the indictment, Uka was radicalized over time by jihadist propaganda he saw on the Internet, and the night before the act had watched a video that purported to show American atrocities in Afghanistan; it was actually a clip from a film. The investigation turned up no connections with any terrorist organization.

"He was a single person acting alone radicalized through jihadi Internet propaganda," prosecutors' spokesman Marcus Koehler told the AP at the time of the indictment. "That shows, in the opinion of the federal prosecutors office, how dangerous jihadist propaganda on the Internet is."

In recent years, al-Qaida and other terrorist organizations have been increasingly targeting people like Uka - using radicals who grew up in Western countries to make videos in their native languages urging people in their home or adoptive countries to take up jihad.

A series of German-language videos were posted on the Internet before 2009 elections in Germany promising attacks - which never happened - and U.S.-born cleric Anwar al-Awlaki's sermons have turned up on the computers of nearly every homegrown terror suspect in the United States.

Al-Awlaki allegedly exchanged e-mails with the U.S. Army psychiatrist accused of carrying out the 2009 shootings at the Fort Hood military post in Texas. Prosecutors also say an al-Awlaki sermon on jihad was among the materials - including videos of beheadings - found on the computers of five men convicted in December of plotting attacks on the Fort Dix military base in New Jersey.

"It was from 2003 to 2008 that we saw this rise in power of the tool of the Internet: first as propaganda, then to send messages and do recruiting," said the French judge, Trevidic.

Now, he said, "everything is done on the Internet, with more and more sophisticated methods, and we've had the possible difficulty because we were dealing with a young generation that understands the Internet by heart."

Last month, another U.S. serviceman was arrested for allegedly plotting to detonate bombs at restaurants frequented by soldiers in Killeen, Texas, next to Fort Hood. The bomb-making materials were found in his motel room and some in a backpack, according to court documents. Pfc. Naser Abdo was caught only when a Texas gun shop clerk alerted authorities after finding the suspect acting strangely in his store.

In the 2007 Fort Dix case, wiretaps helped authorities find out about the deadly plot to attack the base. Suspects Mohamad Shnewer, Serdar Tatar, and brothers Dritan, Eljvir and Shain Duka, were convicted in December 2008 of conspiring to kill U.S. military personnel.

Terrorists have also been exploiting voice-over-Internet systems like Skype - which are much more difficult for authorities to track, the German intelligence official said.

"It's easier to follow someone to find out which flat they are meeting in, than to find out information in the jungle of passwords and voice-over-Internet technical communication," he said.

In the three-day 2008 siege in Mumbai, India, that killed 166 people, the attackers' handlers eschewed conventional phones for voice-over-Internet telephone services, according to authorities.

The gunmen also examined the layout and landscape of the city using images from Google Earth, which provides satellite photos for much of the planet over the Internet.

But when the attacker is acting alone there is no communication to pick up at all. In the Norway attack, Anders Behring Breivik has claimed to belong to a shadowy group of modern-day crusaders against Islam, with cells all over Europe, but prosecutors have said all signs are that he acted alone.

"The biggest threat today ... is the lone wolf, the lone bomber like we saw in Oslo," said Rolf Tophoven, director of the Essen-based Institute for Terrorism Research and Security Policy. "If you radicalize yourself in your own house, in your own workroom, then nobody can control you."

But even Breivik would have done things that could have alerted authorities, the German official said.

"It's more difficult to find out about those people but of course we are not really helpless so we can still find them, even if it is a lone wolf," he said.

"If you look at Norway you still have a trail - he had to get the explosives, he had to get the weapon, he had to train with the weapon, he had to get the explosives into the city.

"So even if a terrorist is alone he needs some logistical preparation so we have to be more aware of those tracks, and the Internet is one of them, one of the most important."

---

Jamey Keaten in Paris and Paisley Dodds in London contributed to this report.

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