Paket Haji dan Umroh Murah di Jakarta Hubungi 021-9929-2337 atau 0821-2406-5740 Alhijaz Indowisata adalah perusahaan swasta nasional yang bergerak di bidang tour dan travel. Nama Alhijaz terinspirasi dari istilah dua kota suci bagi umat islam pada zaman nabi Muhammad saw. yaitu Makkah dan Madinah. Dua kota yang penuh berkah sehingga diharapkan menular dalam kinerja perusahaan. Sedangkan Indowisata merupakan akronim dari kata indo yang berarti negara Indonesia dan wisata yang menjadi fokus usaha bisnis kami.
Paket Haji dan Umroh Murah di Jakarta Alhijaz Indowisata didirikan oleh Bapak H. Abdullah Djakfar Muksen pada tahun 2010. Merangkak dari kecil namun pasti, alhijaz berkembang pesat dari mulai penjualan tiket maskapai penerbangan domestik dan luar negeri, tour domestik hingga mengembangkan ke layanan jasa umrah dan haji khusus. Tak hanya itu, pada tahun 2011 Alhijaz kembali membuka divisi baru yaitu provider visa umrah yang bekerja sama dengan muassasah arab saudi. Sebagai komitmen legalitas perusahaan dalam melayani pelanggan dan jamaah secara aman dan profesional, saat ini perusahaan telah mengantongi izin resmi dari pemerintah melalui kementrian pariwisata, lalu izin haji khusus dan umrah dari kementrian agama. Selain itu perusahaan juga tergabung dalam komunitas organisasi travel nasional seperti Asita, komunitas penyelenggara umrah dan haji khusus yaitu HIMPUH dan organisasi internasional yaitu IATA.
10 Orang Yang Meninggal
Dengan Cara Aneh
Banyak kita baca maupun saksikan cara-cara meninggal kebanyakan orang-orang
di sekeliling kita. Ada yang meninggal karena sakit, ada yang karena kecelakaan, ada yang bunuh
diri, ada juga karena pembunuhan. Berikut ini kita akan menyaksikan beberapa orang yang meninggal
dengan cara yang tidak lazim alias aneh, lain daripada yang lain. Pastinya kisah-kisah berikut
dapat memberikan gambaran betapa anehnya mereka saat menghadapi kematian.
10 Orang Yang Meninggal Dengan Cara Aneh
Banyak kita baca maupun saksikan cara-cara meninggal kebanyakan orang-orang
di sekeliling kita. Ada yang meninggal karena sakit, ada yang karena kecelakaan, ada yang bunuh
diri, ada juga karena pembunuhan. Berikut ini kita akan menyaksikan beberapa orang yang
meninggal dengan cara yang tidak lazim alias aneh, lain daripada yang lain. Pastinya kisah-
kisah berikut dapat memberikan gambaran betapa anehnya mereka saat menghadapi kematian.
1. Isadora Duncan, (27 Mei 1877 s.d 14 September 1927)
Isadora Duncan merupakan seorang penari yang lahir di San
Fransisco. Ia meniti karirnya sebagai penari di Paris dan membuka tiga sekolah tari. Namanya
pun diukir di pintu masukThéâtre des Champs-Élysées. Isadora Duncan
mati ketika scarf (Syal atau selendang) nya tersangkut di roda mobil yang ditumpanginya, dan
mencekiknya sehingga dia mati seketika. The New York Times menulis tentang kematiannya sebagai
berikut:
“The automobile was going at full speed when the scarf of h2
silk began winding around the wheel and with terrific force dragged Miss Duncan, around whom it
was securely wrapped, bodily over the side of the car, precipitating her with violence against
the cobblestone street. She was dragged for several yards before the chauffeur halted, attracted
by her cries in the street. Medical aid was summoned, but it was stated that she had been
strangled and killed instantly.” 2. Christine Chubbuck, (24 Agustus
1944 s.d 15 Juli 1974)
Christine Chubbuck merupakan seorang penyiar
“Suncoast Digest” yang merupakan salah satu program pada channel WXLT-TV di daerah
Sarasota, Florida pada saat itu.
Christine saat itu membacakan berita nasional selama 8
menit sebelum mendadak terjadi kerusakan pada “tape reel” nya. Christine tidak
peduli akan hal itu, ia kemudian berkata pada kamera yang menyorotnya:
“In keeping with Channel 40’s policy of bringing you the latest in blood and guts,
and in living color, you are going to see another first: an attempted suicide.”
Artinya adalah “Sesuai dengan kebijakan Channel 40’s membawa anda
terbaru dan ketekunan dalam darah, dan warna dalam hidup, Anda akan melihat lain dari yang
pertama: percobaan bunuh diri”
Setelah itu ia mengeluarkan pistol
revolver dari bawah mejanya, dan memposisikannya di samping telinga kirinya, lalu menembak
dirinya sendiri. Dia lalu terjatuh di depan kamera. Beberapa penonton menelepon 911 dan studio
itu untuk menanyakan apakah itu bener-benar terjadi. Faktanya adalah, dia benar-benar menembak
kepalanya dan mati saat itu juga. 3. Francis Bacon, (22 Januari 1561 s.d 9
April 1626)
Francis Bacon adalah seorang filsafat dan ilmuwan. Ia adalah salah seorang ilmuwan yang
mati akibat eksperimennya sendiri. Pada tahun 1625, ia mendadak mendapat sebuah ide.
“Mengapa harus mengawetkan makanan dengan garam seperti yang dilakukan orang biasanya?
” Dia kemudian pergi membeli seekor ayam dan mulai menumpukkan salju ke dalamnya.
Eksperimen itu ternyata gagal, ayamnya tidak membeku. Karena cuaca pada saat itu begitu dingin,
tiba-tiba dia terkena pneumonia. Francis Bacon lalu memanggang dan memakan ayam itu. Kali ini
dia juga gagal. Akhirnya matilah ia.
4. Attila the Hun,
(406 s.d 453)
Attila The Hun adalah salah satu
ahli strategi, penguasa, dan penjahat besar yang menguasai Asia pada tahun 450 masehi. Ia
dikenal akan kebiasaan makan dan minumnya yang aneh. Attila pastilah berpikir bahwa malam
pernikahannya pantas dirayakan, ia kemudian menikahi seorang gadis muda bernama Ildico. Pada
tahun 453, ia makan dan minum terlalu banyak, dan dari hidungnya mulai keluar darah. Terlalu
mabuk untuk peduli, ia terus menerus mimisan sampai dia mati.
5. Aeschylus, (525/524 BC s.d 456 BC)
Aeschylus adalah seorang seniman yang karyanya masih bisa
diingat hingga kini. Ketika ia mengunjungi Gela di pulau Sicily, terjadilah hal yang tidak
biasanya. Seekor burung elang menjatuhkan seekor kura-kura pada kepala botak Aeschylus. Mungkin
saja elang tersebut menyangka kepala Aeschylus adalah sebuah batu, hingga ia bermaksud
memecahkan batok kura-kura dengan menjatuhkannya tepat di kepalanya. Karena faktor ketinggian
dan kerasnya benturan, maka matilah Aeschylus. Beberapa catatan mengatakan bahwa elang itu
menyangka kepala botak Aeschylus adalah telur.
6. King
Adolf Frederick of Sweden, (14 Mei 1710 s.d 12 Februari 1771)
Raja
Adolf yang biasa dikenal dengan sebutan King Adolf Frederick of Swedenmerupakan raja Swedia dari
tahun 1751 hingga 1771. Ia dikenal dengan nama “the king who ate himself to death”.
Pada tanggal 12 Februari, 1771, setelah memakan lobster, caviar, sauerkraut, herring panggang,
dan meminum champagne, ia bukannya berhenti, tapi malah melanjutkan makan dengan hidangan
penutup kesukaannya, Semla (sebuah pudding tradisional yang disajikan dalam mangkuk dengan susu
panas). Satu porsi sudah cukup, namun 14 porsi itu sungguh berlebihan. Ia mati beberapa saat
kemudian karena masalah pencernaan.
7. Tycho Brahe, (14
Desember 1546 s.d 24 Oktober 1601)
Tycho
Brahe terkenal sebagai seorang ahli kimia dan astronomi. Brahe memprionirkan pengamatan tentang
gerakan planet-planet sesuai dengan hukum gravitasi Newton.
Tycho Brahe juga dikenal
mempunyai kantung kemih yang kecil dan lemah, sehingga ketika ia hendak buang air kecil di
tengah-tengah pesta penting, ia terpaksa menahannya. Untuk memperburuk keadaan, ia malah minum
banyak banyak, dan akhirnya kantung kemihnya meledak didalam tubuhnya dan membuatnya mati. Perlu diketahui, di adat kebiasaan masyarakat saat itu, meninggalkan
sebuah pesta merupakan perilaku yang tidak beradab, mungkin itulah yang menyebabkan Tycho Brahe
menahan kencingnya di tengah-tengah pesta. Ada debat yang mengatakan bahwa dia mati karena
hyponatremia (kekurangan kadar sodium dalam darah), dan ada yang mengatakan dia mati karena
keracunan merkuri. 8. Grigori Rasputin, (22 Januari 1869 s.d 29 Desember1916)
Mungkin inilah orang tertangguh di seri cerita kali ini.
Grigori Rasputin adalah seorang berkebangsaan russia yang merupakan pewaris Prince Aleksey,
yang mempunyai banyak musuh. Banyak yang menginginkan dia mati.
Saat
percobaan pembunuhan yang dilakukan oleh musuhnya, pertama-tama, dia diracun dengan sebuah racun
yang cukup kuat untuk membunuh 3 orang (Sianida), namun nampaknya racun tersebut tidak
berpengaruh pada Rasputin, maka mereka menyelinap dari belakang dan menembaknya di kepalanya.
Seharusnya Rasputin sudah mati, tapi ternyata tidak… ketika salah seorang pembunuhnya
mengecek detak nadinya, Rasputin malah balik mencekik pembunuhnya. Lalu Rasputin pun berhasil
melarikan diri.
Pembunuhnya kemudian melayangkan sebelum berhasil mengejarnya.
Lalu mereka membacok dan memukulnya, kemudian melemparnya ke sebuah sungai beku yang dingin.
Setelah mati dan diotopsi, ternyata hasilnya adalah Rasputin mati karena tenggelam. 9. Sharon Lopatka, (20 September 1961 s.d 16 Oktober 1996)
Sharon Lopatka adalah seorang
pengusaha internet di Maryland USA, yang dibunuh oleh Robert Frederick Glass. Mula-mula, Sharon
memasang iklan seks di situs pribadinya Ia mencari dan meminta seorang sukarelawan yang
bersedia untuk menyiksa dan membunuhnya sebagai sebuah pemenuhan nafsu seksual. Akhirnya ia
menemukan Robert Glass. Mereka saling bertukar email dan setuju untuk bertemu di North Carolina.
Glass menyiksanya selama beberapa hari sebelum akhirnya mencekiknya dengan sehelai benang
nilon. Glass kemudian divonis pembunuhan sukarela.
10. Bernd
Jürgen Brandes
Semuanya bermula dari seorang yang bernama Armin Meiwes,
seorang jerman yang menderita kelainan. Ia adalah seorang Biseksual yang memasang sebuah iklan
di internet mencari seorang biseksual lain yang bersedia untuk dimakan olehnya. Tulisannya
adalah sebagai berikut:
“looking for a well-built 18 to 30-year-old to
be slaughtered and then consumed”.
Setelah banyak balasan yang tidak
serius, akhirnya Bernd Brandes mengkontak Meiwes. Mereka kemudian bertemu di villa kecil di
Roteburg, pada Natal 25 December 2001. Apa yang terjadi adalah, Meiwes memotong penis Brandes
dan keduanya berusaha untuk memakannya. Pertama-tama, Brandes memaksa Meiwes agar meiwes
menggigit putus penisnya, namun hal itu tidak berhasil, maka ia pun menggunakan pisau. Mereka
memasak penis tersebut sebelum memakannya. Kemudian Barnes dibunuh dan bagian-bagian tubuhnya
disimpan dalam rumahnya sebagai cadangan makanan selama 10 bulan. Semua proses itu di rekam
dalam video pribadi.
Meiwes akhirnya ditangkap dan dijatuhi hukuman 8 setengah
tahun di penjara. Meiwes percaya bahwa ada sekitar 800 kanibal di jerman.
Polisi belum temukan dugaan aliran sesat dalam kasus Dedeh
Satreskrim Polres Cimahi terus akan mendalami Dedeh Uum Fatimah yang berusia (38) tahun ibu tersangka pembunuh anaknya, Aisah Fany yang berusia (2,5) tahun yang ditenggelamkan ke dalam toren atau penampungan air. Termasuk dugaan aliran sesat dalam diri Dedeh.
Satreskrim Polres Cimahi terus akan mendalami Dedeh Uum Fatimah yang berusia (38) tahun ibu tersangka pembunuh anaknya, Aisah Fany yang berusia (2,5) tahun yang ditenggelamkan ke dalam toren atau penampungan air. Termasuk dugaan aliran sesat dalam diri Dedeh.
Pasalnya ibu tiga anak ini sama sekali tidak menyesali perbuatannya. Dedeh justru menyesal tidak menghabisi dua anak lainnya dalam insiden tersebut.
"Belum kita temukan, kita masih dalami kita juga geledah rumahnya tapi belum bisa kita simpulkan," kata Kapolres Cimahi AKBP Erwin Kurniawan , Jumat (14/3).
Dedeh saat ini masih terus dalam pemeriksaan intensif penyidik Polres Cimahi. Tes kejiwaan juga sudah dilakukan untuk dapat memastikan apakah terganggu atau tidak.
"Sudah hari Rabu kemarin di tes kejiwaan, hasilnya paling satu minggu baru keluar, jadi belum bisa kami simpulkan," paparnya.
Diberitakan sebelumnya, Dedeh ini dengan sadis tiba-tiba menenggelamkan anaknya sendiri yang masih balita ke dalam toren air di rumahnya di Kampung Cijengjing, Desa Kertamulya, Kecamatan Padalarang, Kabupaten Bandung Barat pada Selasa (11/3) lalu. Pelaku nekat menghabisi nyawa anaknya saat tidur pulas. Dedeh membunuh anaknya sendiri karena ingin mengirimnya ke surga.
As Vice Moves More to TV, It Tries to Keep Brash Voice
The live music at the Vice Media party on Friday shook the room. Shane Smith, Vice’s chief executive, was standing near the stage — with a drink in his hand, pants sagging, tattoos showing — watching the rapper-cum-chef Action Bronson make pizzas.
The event was an after-party, a happy-hour bacchanal for the hundreds of guests who had come for Vice’s annual presentation to advertisers and agencies that afternoon, part of the annual frenzy for ad dollars called the Digital Content NewFronts. Mr. Smith had spoken there for all of five minutes before running a slam-bang highlight reel of the company’s shows that had titles like “Weediquette” and “Gaycation.”
In the last year, Vice has secured $500 million in financing and signed deals worth hundreds of millions of dollars with established media companies like HBO that are eager to engage the young viewers Vice attracts. Vice said it was now worth at least $4 billion, with nearly $1 billion in projected revenue for 2015. It is a long way from Vice’s humble start as a free magazine in 1994.
But even as cash flows freely in Vice’s direction, the company is trying to keep its brash, insurgent image. At the party on Friday, it plied guests with beers and cocktails. Its apparently unrehearsed presentation to advertisers was peppered with expletives. At one point, the director Spike Jonze, a longtime Vice collaborator, asked on stage if Mr. Smith had been drinking.
“My assistant tried to cut me off,” Mr. Smith replied. “I’m on buzz control.”
Now, Vice is on the verge of getting its own cable channel, which would give the company a traditional outlet for its slate of non-news programming. If all goes as planned, A&E Networks, the television group owned by Hearst and Disney, will turn over its History Channel spinoff, H2, to Vice.
The deal’s announcement was expected last week, but not all of A&E’s distribution partners — the cable and satellite TV companies that carry the network’s channels — have signed off on the change, according to a person familiar with the negotiations who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the talks were private.
A cable channel would be a further step in a transformation for Vice, from bad-boy digital upstart to mainstream media company.
Keen for the core audience of young men who come to Vice, media giants like 21st Century Fox, Time Warner and Disney all showed interest in the company last year. Vice ultimately secured $500 million in financing from A&E Networks and Technology Crossover Ventures, a Silicon Valley venture capital firm that has invested in Facebook and Netflix.
Those investments valued Vice at more than $2.5 billion. (In 2013, Fox bought a 5 percent stake for $70 million.)
Then in March, HBO announced that it had signed a multiyear deal to broadcast a daily half-hour Vice newscast. Vice already produces a weekly newsmagazine show, called “Vice,” for the network. That show will extend its run through 2018, with an increase to 35 episodes a year, from 14.
Michael Lombardo, HBO’s president for programming, said when the deal was announced that it was “certainly one of our biggest investments with hours on the air.”
Vice, based in Brooklyn, also recently signed a multiyear $100 million deal with Rogers Communications, a Canadian media conglomerate, to produce original content for TV, smartphone and desktop viewers.
Vice’s finances are private, but according to an internal document reviewed by The New York Times and verified by a person familiar with the company’s financials, the company is on track to make about $915 million in revenue this year.
It brought in $545 million in a strong first quarter, which included portions of the new HBO deal and the Rogers deal, according to the document. More of its revenue now comes from these types of content partnerships, compared with the branded content deals that made up much of its revenue a year ago, the company said.
Mr. Smith said the company was worth at least $4 billion. If the valuation gets much higher, he said he would consider taking the company public.
“I don’t care about money; we have plenty of money,” Mr. Smith, who is Vice’s biggest shareholder, said in an interview after the presentation on Friday. “I care about strategic deals.”
In the United States, Vice Media had 35.2 million unique visitors across its sites in March, according to comScore.
The third season of Vice’s weekly HBO show has averaged 1.8 million viewers per episode, including reruns, through April 12, according to Brad Adgate, the director of research at Horizon Media. (Vice said the show attracted three million weekly viewers when repeat broadcasts, online and on-demand viewings were included.)
For years, Mr. Smith has criticized traditional TV, calling it slow and unable to draw younger viewers. But if all the deals Vice has struck are to work out, Mr. Smith may have to play more by the rules of traditional media. James Murdoch, Rupert Murdoch’s son and a member of Vice’s board, was at the company’s presentation on Friday, as were other top media executives.
“They know they need people like me to help them, but they can’t get out of their own way,” Mr. Smith said in the interview Friday. “My only real frustration is we’re used to being incredibly dynamic, and they’re not incredibly dynamic.”
With its own television channel in the United States, Vice would have something it has long coveted even as traditional media companies are looking beyond TV. Last year, Vice’s deal with Time Warner failed in part because the two companies could not agree on how much control Vice would have over a 24-hour television network.
Vice said it intended to fill its new channel with non-news programming. The company plans to have sports shows, fashion shows, food shows and the “Gaycation” travel show with the actress Ellen Page. It is also in talks with Kanye West about a show.
It remains to be seen whether Vice’s audience will watch a traditional cable channel. Still, Vice has effectively presold all of the ad spots to two of the biggest advertising agencies for the first three years, Mr. Smith said.
In the meantime, Mr. Smith is enjoying Vice’s newfound role as a potential savior of traditional media companies.
“I’m a C.E.O. of a content company,” Mr. Smith said before he caught a flight to Las Vegas for the boxing match on Saturday between Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Manny Pacquiao. “If it stops being fun, then why are you doing it?”
Ex-C.I.A. Official Rebuts Republican Claims on Benghazi Attack in ‘The Great War of Our Time’
WASHINGTON — The former deputy director of the C.I.A. asserts in a forthcoming book that Republicans, in their eagerness to politicize the killing of the American ambassador to Libya, repeatedly distorted the agency’s analysis of events. But he also argues that the C.I.A. should get out of the business of providing “talking points” for administration officials in national security events that quickly become partisan, as happened after the Benghazi attack in 2012.
The official, Michael J. Morell, dismisses the allegation that the United States military and C.I.A. officers “were ordered to stand down and not come to the rescue of their comrades,” and he says there is “no evidence” to support the charge that “there was a conspiracy between C.I.A. and the White House to spin the Benghazi story in a way that would protect the political interests of the president and Secretary Clinton,” referring to the secretary of state at the time, Hillary Rodham Clinton.
But he also concludes that the White House itself embellished some of the talking points provided by the Central Intelligence Agency and had blocked him from sending an internal study of agency conclusions to Congress.
“I finally did so without asking,” just before leaving government, he writes, and after the White House released internal emails to a committee investigating the State Department’s handling of the issue.
A lengthy congressional investigation remains underway, one that many Republicans hope to use against Mrs. Clinton in the 2016 election cycle.
In parts of the book, “The Great War of Our Time” (Twelve), Mr. Morell praises his C.I.A. colleagues for many successes in stopping terrorist attacks, but he is surprisingly critical of other C.I.A. failings — and those of the National Security Agency.
Soon after Mr. Morell retired in 2013 after 33 years in the agency, President Obama appointed him to a commission reviewing the actions of the National Security Agency after the disclosures of Edward J. Snowden, a former intelligence contractor who released classified documents about the government’s eavesdropping abilities. Mr. Morell writes that he was surprised by what he found.
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“You would have thought that of all the government entities on the planet, the one least vulnerable to such grand theft would have been the N.S.A.,” he writes. “But it turned out that the N.S.A. had left itself vulnerable.”
He concludes that most Wall Street firms had better cybersecurity than the N.S.A. had when Mr. Snowden swept information from its systems in 2013. While he said he found himself “chagrined by how well the N.S.A. was doing” compared with the C.I.A. in stepping up its collection of data on intelligence targets, he also sensed that the N.S.A., which specializes in electronic spying, was operating without considering the implications of its methods.
“The N.S.A. had largely been collecting information because it could, not necessarily in all cases because it should,” he says.
Mr. Morell was a career analyst who rose through the ranks of the agency, and he ended up in the No. 2 post. He served as President George W. Bush’s personal intelligence briefer in the first months of his presidency — in those days, he could often be spotted at the Starbucks in Waco, Tex., catching up on his reading — and was with him in the schoolhouse in Florida on the morning of Sept. 11, 2001, when the Bush presidency changed in an instant.
Mr. Morell twice took over as acting C.I.A. director, first when Leon E. Panetta was appointed secretary of defense and then when retired Gen. David H. Petraeus resigned over an extramarital affair with his biographer, a relationship that included his handing her classified notes of his time as America’s best-known military commander.
Mr. Morell says he first learned of the affair from Mr. Petraeus only the night before he resigned, and just as the Benghazi events were turning into a political firestorm. While praising Mr. Petraeus, who had told his deputy “I am very lucky” to run the C.I.A., Mr. Morell writes that “the organization did not feel the same way about him.” The former general “created the impression through the tone of his voice and his body language that he did not want people to disagree with him (which was not true in my own interaction with him),” he says.
But it is his account of the Benghazi attacks — and how the C.I.A. was drawn into the debate over whether the Obama White House deliberately distorted its account of the death of Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens — that is bound to attract attention, at least partly because of its relevance to the coming presidential election. The initial assessments that the C.I.A. gave to the White House said demonstrations had preceded the attack. By the time analysts reversed their opinion, Susan E. Rice, now the national security adviser, had made a series of statements on Sunday talk shows describing the initial assessment. The controversy and other comments Ms. Rice made derailed Mr. Obama’s plan to appoint her as secretary of state.
The experience prompted Mr. Morell to write that the C.I.A. should stay out of the business of preparing talking points — especially on issues that are being seized upon for “political purposes.” He is critical of the State Department for not beefing up security in Libya for its diplomats, as the C.I.A., he said, did for its employees.
But he concludes that the assault in which the ambassador was killed took place “with little or no advance planning” and “was not well organized.” He says the attackers “did not appear to be looking for Americans to harm. They appeared intent on looting and conducting some vandalism,” setting fires that killed Mr. Stevens and a security official, Sean Smith.
Mr. Morell paints a picture of an agency that was struggling, largely unsuccessfully, to understand dynamics in the Middle East and North Africa when the Arab Spring broke out in late 2011 in Tunisia. The agency’s analysts failed to see the forces of revolution coming — and then failed again, he writes, when they told Mr. Obama that the uprisings would undercut Al Qaeda by showing there was a democratic pathway to change.
“There is no good explanation for our not being able to see the pressures growing to dangerous levels across the region,” he writes. The agency had again relied too heavily “on a handful of strong leaders in the countries of concern to help us understand what was going on in the Arab street,” he says, and those leaders themselves were clueless.
Moreover, an agency that has always overvalued secretly gathered intelligence and undervalued “open source” material “was not doing enough to mine the wealth of information available through social media,” he writes. “We thought and told policy makers that this outburst of popular revolt would damage Al Qaeda by undermining the group’s narrative,” he writes.
Instead, weak governments in Egypt, and the absence of governance from Libya to Yemen, were “a boon to Islamic extremists across both the Middle East and North Africa.”
Mr. Morell is gentle about most of the politicians he dealt with — he expresses admiration for both Mr. Bush and Mr. Obama, though he accuses former Vice President Dick Cheney of deliberately implying a connection between Al Qaeda and Iraq that the C.I.A. had concluded probably did not exist. But when it comes to the events leading up to the Bush administration’s decision to go to war in Iraq, he is critical of his own agency.
Mr. Morell concludes that the Bush White House did not have to twist intelligence on Saddam Hussein’s alleged effort to rekindle the country’s work on weapons of mass destruction.
“The view that hard-liners in the Bush administration forced the intelligence community into its position on W.M.D. is just flat wrong,” he writes. “No one pushed. The analysts were already there and they had been there for years, long before Bush came to office.”