Center for Security Policy president Frank Gaffney finds himself increasingly isolated from the mainstream Republican party. Last year, Gaffney was barred from CPAC after accusing Suhail Kahn, who directed Muslim outreach efforts for the Bush White House, and anti-tax activist Grover Norquist of being moles for the Muslim Brotherhood. And last month, Edward Meese, a former Reagan administration Attorney General and Ronald Reagan Chair in Public Policy at the Heritage Foundation, slammed Gaffney and his allies for disparaging Muslim Americans “solely because of their religion or their background when there’s no basis for it.”

But Gaffney, who has said “it is now public knowledge that nearly every major Muslim organization in the United States is actually controlled by the MB [Muslim Brotherhood] or a derivative organization,” doesn’t hold much credibility with the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).

As part of a September 2010 Senate Homeland Security committee hearing, “Nine Years After 9/11: Confronting The Terrorist Threat To The Homeland,” the FBI issued written responses to questions posed by committee members. Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT) issued the following question to the FBI (see page 123-123 in the PDF):

LIEBERMAN: What is your perspective on the Center for Security Policy’s recent report entitled “Shariah: The Threat To America”?

FBI: The FBI believes the report underestimates the United States Government’s (USG) level of knowledge and understanding of the activities taking place in the United States and overstates the threat posed by those activities. The report also fails to note that some of the threats were disrupted by the USG and are no longer viable, and it makes unsubstantiated assertions regarding limitations on our ability to respond to ongoing threats. Among other reasons, this may be because the report relies on outdated information.

David Yerushalmi, a coauthor of the report and CSP’s general counsel, is the author of the model “anti-Sharia” legislation introduced in over twenty states. As the “anti-Sharia” movement spreads across the country, members of communities facing the Islamophobia campaigns led by Yerushalmi and Gaffney — both of whom are discussed in the Center for American Progress’s report, “Fear Inc.: The Roots Of the Islamophobia Network” — should note that the FBI largely disregarded their report as making “unsubstantiated assertions” and relying “on outdated information.”

In the latest of its quarterly reports on the Iranian nuclear program (PDF), the U.N. nuclear watchdog said that Iran is expanding its uranium enrichment capacity and has not provided IAEA inspectors with an explanation for a significant quantity of missing nuclear material.

The report, which comes on the heels of two days of talks between International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) inspectors and Iranian officials, details how IAEA personnel were denied access to the Parchin military facility and failed to get answers about the role of foreign experts in Iran’s nuclear research:

The Agency is unable to provide credible assurance about the absence of undeclared nuclear materials and activities in Iran, and therefore to conclude that all nuclear material in Iran is in peaceful activities.

The new report reiterated the IAEA’s concerns — stated at length in its Novermber 2011 report — about Iranian non-compliance, particularly as it relates to possible nuclear weapons work, referring again to “serious concerns regarding possible military dimensions to Iran’s nuclear programme.”

“There’s nothing that’s really unexpected,” said Peter Crail, a nonproliferation analyst with the Arms Control Association, in an interview with ThinkProgress. The Iranians are “sort of steadily moving ahead.”

He noted that though latest generation centrifuges were reported as installed for the first time, they were in early stages of development and Iran appeared to still be tinkering with earlier generation centrifuges. “This (report) was more of a standard update of where the program is,” he said. “As expected, they are still making progress in installing things, but there’s no massive expansion or breakthrough development.”

While the IAEA again raised concerns about lack of access, expanding production, and a quantity of unaccounted for nuclear material, the report doesn’t indicate Iran is any closer to deciding on building a nuclear weapon. The absence of such an assertion is in line with reported U.S. intelligence estimates and statements by top military and intelligence officials.

Since the November report, the greatest change in Iran’s nuclear program, according to inspectors, has been the stepped up enrichment of uranium. The Natanz nuclear facility is now operating 52 cascades — each containing 170 centrifuges — up from 37 in November, and the Fordow facility is now refining Uranium to a 20% concentration with almost 700 centrifuges.

In January, Iran informed the IAEA of revisions in its intentions at the Fordow enrichment plant to include enrichment to 5 percent, in addition to the 20 percent enrichment that can be more easily upgraded to weapons-grade fissile material. “I’m not clear exactly what that means,” said ACA’s Crail. “But if Fordow isn’t dedicated only to 20 percent (enrichment), it also may suggest that they are willing to halt 20 percent because they are hedging with the facility by doing two types of production.”

The IAEA also raised concerns about 19.8 kilograms of unaccounted for uranium “related to conversion experiments carried out by Iran between 1995 and 2002.” The discrepancy in measurement amounts was previously reported, but Iran again refused to answer questions about the missing quantity. Asked in the February meetings between the IAEA and Iran, the new report said, Iran stonewalled:

Iran indicated that it no longer possessed the relevant documentation and that the personnel involved were no longer available… The discrepancy remains to be clarified.

Diplomats told the Associated Press the quantity could be enough to work on weapons. ACA’s Crail said, however, it wasn’t “nearly enough” yet to actually make a bomb, though “because it’s in uranium metal form it may be useful for carrying out warhead R&D (research and development).”

The report will likely raise tensions between Iran and the West over the former’s nuclear progress, which it insists is for peaceful purposes.

Our guest blogger is Laura Heaton, the Writer-Editor for the blog, Enough Said

Just six months remain before the Somali Transitional Federal Government’s time is up to ready the country for more permanent governing structures and institutions after more than 20 years of civil war. Marking the start of that countdown, British Prime Minister David Cameron convened a high-profile conference today in London to map out plans for concluding the transition and rally support for the many costly initiatives currently underway inside Somalia.

The conference also comes at a significant moment militarily in the long war. African Union peacekeepers, working alongside the army of the Transitional Federal Government, or TFG, have chalked up some important recent victories against Somalia’s al-Qaeda linked al-Shabaab militia. Shabaab still controls large swaths of central and southern Somalia, but A.U. peacekeepers and the TFG now hold the capital of Mogadishu. While the threat from Shabaab has morphed—from street battles to guerrilla tactics like roadside bombs—and is far from defeated, control of Mogadishu carries significant value because it’s the place where all Somali interests and grievances converge.

“For decades, the world focused on what we could prevent from happening in Somalia—conflict, famine, terrorism,” said Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who represented the United States in London. “Now, we are focused on what we can build.”

But what’s the good of a ‘transition’ that primarily focuses on surface-level tasks—in and of themselves no small feat in Somalia—like replacing the current leaders and building more representative, streamlined institutions? To Somalia expert Ken Menkhaus, such a process would produce little more than new names and faces but with “the same frustrating outcome.”

“Changes in political leadership and decision-making structures will have limited effect if no effort is made to weaken the political cartels and networks that work behind the scenes in Somalia to divert funds and stymie effective rule of law,” Menkhaus, a professor at Davidson College, wrote in a briefing paper published by the Enough Project today.

After seven years and with little to show for its tenure, the TFG has provided ample illustrations of how not to garner support for Somalis or build institutions and credibility to extend security and services beyond the limited areas controlled by foreign peacekeepers and government-aligned armed groups. The past several years have also showcased the apparent lack of understanding by many international-led efforts of the necessity for an inclusive, transparent process to ensure that Somali people—long wary of outside interventions—feel represented.

The delegates at today’s conference broadly acknowledged these pitfalls, firmly noting that “there must be no further extensions” of the TFG’s mandate and of the need to “spend more time on the ground in Somalia in order to work more closely with Somalis on the challenging tasks ahead.”

Moving beyond Somalia’s big day in the spotlight, international efforts to prepare for the end of the transition in August 2012 and pave the way for a government with a stabilizing effect on the country will have to strike a balance between keeping an eye on the calendar and encouraging dialogue and inclusivity to ensure Somali initiative and buy-in.

“Back-room deals and decisions driven by expediency and deadline-induced panic have been the norm over the past two decades of diplomacy in Somalia and have consistently produced failure,” wrote Menkhaus. Certainly, with just six months to go, the temptation to look for shortcuts will be strong.

Meanwhile, the London conference appeared to be a motivating factor for the United Nations Security Council to approve an African Union proposal to expand the AU’s peacekeeping mission in Somalia, raising the troop strength from 12,000 to nearly 18,000. After deliberating the expansion since December, the Security Council signed off on the plans yesterday, which, with a price tag of about $300 million, more than doubles the mission’s current budget. This move, too, consolidates pressure on the TFG and its successor. As peacekeepers from an array of African countries risk their lives to roll back al-Shabaab, the Somali government must be ready to quickly step in and fill the void.