Who’s keeping the terror myth alive?
By Maidhc Ó Cathail
17 August 2010
Maidhc Ó Cathail argues that, “with the hunt for the elusive bin Laden having already cost thousands of lives and trillions of dollars, perhaps Americans should demand conclusive proof that Israel hasn’t conned them into fighting a phoney ‘war on terror’”.
In the trigger-happy post-9/11 world, the favoured way to instigate a war is to demand that the designated “evildoer” prove a negative.
Iraq was invaded because it couldn’t prove that it didn’t have weapons of mass destruction. Iran is under constant threat of attack unless it can demonstrate that it’s not seeking nuclear weapons. And now Pakistan is being chastised for allegedly harbouring Osama bin Laden – who in all probability has been dead and buried for eight years.
Questioning Pakistan’s willingness to pursue bin Laden and other Al-Qaeda leaders, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton last year told a group of Pakistani editors: “I find it hard to believe that nobody in your government knows where they are and couldn’t get them if they really wanted to.” And in a recent interview with Fox News, Clinton charged that “elements” of the Pakistani government know where bin Laden is hiding.
But what if bin Laden is not hiding in Pakistan? What if he’s been dead since December 2001? How then does Islamabad prove that some of its government officials are not concealing his whereabouts?
17 August 2010
Maidhc Ó Cathail argues that, “with the hunt for the elusive bin Laden having already cost thousands of lives and trillions of dollars, perhaps Americans should demand conclusive proof that Israel hasn’t conned them into fighting a phoney ‘war on terror’”.
In the trigger-happy post-9/11 world, the favoured way to instigate a war is to demand that the designated “evildoer” prove a negative.
Iraq was invaded because it couldn’t prove that it didn’t have weapons of mass destruction. Iran is under constant threat of attack unless it can demonstrate that it’s not seeking nuclear weapons. And now Pakistan is being chastised for allegedly harbouring Osama bin Laden – who in all probability has been dead and buried for eight years.
Questioning Pakistan’s willingness to pursue bin Laden and other Al-Qaeda leaders, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton last year told a group of Pakistani editors: “I find it hard to believe that nobody in your government knows where they are and couldn’t get them if they really wanted to.” And in a recent interview with Fox News, Clinton charged that “elements” of the Pakistani government know where bin Laden is hiding.
But what if bin Laden is not hiding in Pakistan? What if he’s been dead since December 2001? How then does Islamabad prove that some of its government officials are not concealing his whereabouts?
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While the mainstream media rarely if ever question the belief that bin Laden is still alive, some cracks have been appearing in the consensus. In a 11 September 2009 piecein Britain’s Daily Mail, Sue Reid wondered: “What if everything we have seen or heard of him on video and audio tapes since the early days after 9/11 is a fake – and that he is being kept ‘alive’ by the Western allies to stir up support for the war on terror?”
An even more prominent sceptic is UPI Editor-at-LargeArnaud de Borchgrave whose 26 July 2010 commentaryentitled “Elvis bin Laden” may herald a new consensus. Sifting much the same evidence as Reid, the “legendary journalist” stated that “some key intelligence officials are taking bin Laden’s reported demise seriously”.
Both articles cited experts who have studied the post-December 2001 audios and videos and concluded they are fakes.
In 2007, Switzerland’s Dalle Molle Institute for Artificial Intelligence, which does computer voice recognition for bank security, found that the voices on recordings after mid-December 2001 differed clearly from earlier recordings of bin Laden.
Professor Bruce Lawrence, head of Duke University’s religious studies department and the foremost bin Laden expert, noted in a 2007 book the inconsistency between the increasingly secular language of the audios and videos and bin Laden’s earlier distinctive religious speech.
Assessing the evidence, Angelo M. Codevilla, a former US intelligence officer who studied Soviet disinformation techniques during the Cold War and a professor of international relations at Boston University, wryly concluded that “Elvis Presley is more alive today than Osama bin Laden”.
So, if bin Laden is as dead as Elvis, who’s been faking all those scary threats in his name?
According to US and British intelligence officials, Al-Qaeda’s media wing, Al-Sahab Foundation for Islamic Media Publication, has been run since 2001 by Adam Gadahn, a California-born convert to radical Islam who now goes by the name Azzam al-Amriki.
Gadahn found his way to the Islamic Society of Orange County while living with his grandfather, Carl Pearlman, a board member of the Anti-Defamation League. Ostensibly a civil rights organization set up to fight anti-Semitism, the ADL is “little more than a de factoadjunct of the Israeli government” which has even been caught spying on American critics of Israel.
Adam’s parents changed their surnames to Gadahn in the mid-1970s. The name refers to the Biblical warrior Gideon who, with the aid of trumpets and clay jars, defeated Israel’s enemies.
As Antiwar.com editor Justin Raimondo put it, Adam Gadahn is “an awfully odd figure, whose sudden evolution from a nice Jewish boy into Osama bin Laden’s Goebbels is just a little hard to take”.
Equally hard to take is the means by which the public learns of bin Laden’s latest pronouncements.
Both articles cited experts who have studied the post-December 2001 audios and videos and concluded they are fakes.
In 2007, Switzerland’s Dalle Molle Institute for Artificial Intelligence, which does computer voice recognition for bank security, found that the voices on recordings after mid-December 2001 differed clearly from earlier recordings of bin Laden.
Professor Bruce Lawrence, head of Duke University’s religious studies department and the foremost bin Laden expert, noted in a 2007 book the inconsistency between the increasingly secular language of the audios and videos and bin Laden’s earlier distinctive religious speech.
Assessing the evidence, Angelo M. Codevilla, a former US intelligence officer who studied Soviet disinformation techniques during the Cold War and a professor of international relations at Boston University, wryly concluded that “Elvis Presley is more alive today than Osama bin Laden”.
So, if bin Laden is as dead as Elvis, who’s been faking all those scary threats in his name?
According to US and British intelligence officials, Al-Qaeda’s media wing, Al-Sahab Foundation for Islamic Media Publication, has been run since 2001 by Adam Gadahn, a California-born convert to radical Islam who now goes by the name Azzam al-Amriki.
Gadahn found his way to the Islamic Society of Orange County while living with his grandfather, Carl Pearlman, a board member of the Anti-Defamation League. Ostensibly a civil rights organization set up to fight anti-Semitism, the ADL is “little more than a de factoadjunct of the Israeli government” which has even been caught spying on American critics of Israel.
Adam’s parents changed their surnames to Gadahn in the mid-1970s. The name refers to the Biblical warrior Gideon who, with the aid of trumpets and clay jars, defeated Israel’s enemies.
As Antiwar.com editor Justin Raimondo put it, Adam Gadahn is “an awfully odd figure, whose sudden evolution from a nice Jewish boy into Osama bin Laden’s Goebbels is just a little hard to take”.
Equally hard to take is the means by which the public learns of bin Laden’s latest pronouncements.
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“Almost every statement by Osama bin Laden published on the internet ... is first made public by SITE and IntelCenter,” according to a Spiegel Online profile of Rita Katz, Josh Devon and Ben Venzke, who founded the two companies that supposedly track al-Qaeda online.
SITE co-founder Rita Katz is an Iraqi-born Jew, whose father was publicly hanged in Iraq after the 1967 War as an Israeli spy. Katz, who served in the Israel Defence Forces, tries to downplay the significance of her background but is not always successful. “When you grow up in a place like Iraq,” she told Spiegel, “you understand maybe a little bit about how Arabs think, and also what they are capable of.”
When Neal Krawetz, a researcher and computer security consultant, analysed a 2006 Al-Qaeda video of Ayman al-Zawahiri, Al-Qaeda’s supposed second in command, for alterations and enhancements, he discovered that the Al-Sahab and IntelCenter logos had been added at the same time.
Attempting to make light of the understandable suspicions that the “terror trackers” are working for Israeli intelligence, the Spiegel article jokes: “And the conspiracy theoriespontificating that SITE and IntelCenter shoot the bin Laden videos themselves will continue to exist in the future. And Katz, Venzke and Devon will continue to see the humour in such theories: Yep, this is Mossad headquarters. Exactly!”
But with the hunt for the elusive bin Laden having already cost thousands of lives and trillions of dollars, perhaps Americans should demand conclusive proof that Israel hasn’t conned them into fighting a phoney “war on terror”.
When Neal Krawetz, a researcher and computer security consultant, analysed a 2006 Al-Qaeda video of Ayman al-Zawahiri, Al-Qaeda’s supposed second in command, for alterations and enhancements, he discovered that the Al-Sahab and IntelCenter logos had been added at the same time.
Attempting to make light of the understandable suspicions that the “terror trackers” are working for Israeli intelligence, the Spiegel article jokes: “And the conspiracy theoriespontificating that SITE and IntelCenter shoot the bin Laden videos themselves will continue to exist in the future. And Katz, Venzke and Devon will continue to see the humour in such theories: Yep, this is Mossad headquarters. Exactly!”
But with the hunt for the elusive bin Laden having already cost thousands of lives and trillions of dollars, perhaps Americans should demand conclusive proof that Israel hasn’t conned them into fighting a phoney “war on terror”.
Maidhc Ó Cathail is a widely published writer based in Japan. To read more of his writing, go to Maidhc Ó Cathail: Writing and Analysis.
12 opmerkingen:
Terug in de tijd: ITV's This Week 1988: Beating the Palestinians over Rabin's 'break the bones policy'.
Riat Katz in de link naar de New Yorker: "When you grow up in a place like Iraq, you understand maybe a little bit about how Arabs think, and also what they are capable of."
Ze woonde daar tot haar zesde. Toen dertig jaar in Israel, tot 1997. Toch ook een tijdje opgroeien. Dus ik verwacht: "When you grow up in a place like Israel, you understand maybe a little bit about how Jews think, and also what they are capable of."
Creepy mens.
eGast
Wat wel heel creepy is; die zogenaamde linkse progressieve lobbyisten die op antiracismesites zitten om via omwegen het een af te zwakken en het ander te versterken. Laatste tijd al wat over gelezen op internet. Wie weet hier meer van? Zou goed passen bij de laatste PRtrend w.b. homocampagnes.
anzi
Wetenschappelijk bezien is het onmogelijk voor een zesjarig kind om werkelijk te weten 'hoe Arabieren denken'. Voor zover iemand zou kunnen samenvatten hoe hele bevolkingen 'denken'. Hoewel, bij de Hitlerjugend zullen ze ongetwijfeld ook geweten hebben 'hoe Joden denken'.
Het geeft eerder aan dat mevrouw een antisemitische (Arabierenhaat) opvoeding heeft gehad, en dat ze nooit in staat is geweest om eigen morele analyses te maken over mensen.
@anzi "die zogenaamde linkse progressieve lobbyisten"
Ik schud uit de mouw: Daphne Meijer op krapuul.nl en haar weblog kandigol.wordpress.com
Zowiezo iedereen die zich genoodzaakt voelt om steeds weer te roepen dat hij "links" is vind ik verdacht.
Tja, Meijer en de symbolische boot met intellectuelen. Wat moet je daar nog over zeggen? Vond het trouwens wel een illustratief voorbeeld.
anzi
The IDF has said the photographs do not reflect common practice.
Denk het ook niet, als je deze herinneringskiekjes ziet, mag je je afvragen wat er niet op de foto staat.
Rights groups: Controversial photos are 'the norm'
By Liel Kyzer and Anshel Pfeffer
Rights groups: Controversial photos are 'the norm'
By Liel Kyzer and Anshel Pfeffer
The photos posted on Facebook and showing Israel Defense Forces soldiers next to handcuffed and blindfolded Palestinian detainees represent the norm, not the exception, human rights organization Breaking the Silence said yesterday. Rights groups: Controversial photos are 'the norm'
By Liel Kyzer and Anshel Pfeffer
The photos posted on Facebook and showing Israel Defense Forces soldiers next to handcuffed and blindfolded Palestinian detainees represent the norm, not the exception, human rights organization Breaking the Silence said yesterday. The IDF has said the photographs do not reflect common practice.
lees verder Haaretz 18.08.2010
anzi
Stel je eens voor, een soort Abu Ghraib maar dan gedoseerd generaties lang. In tegenstelling tot sommige Amerikanen vragen Israeli's zich niet af: waarom haten ze ons zo? Ik denk omdat ze het wel weten, maar het hen niets kan schelen.
re Riat Katz: Ik moet wel zeggen dat "de Irakezen" haar vader ophingen. Dat doet er wel toe. Maar ja, haar jaren in Israel, doen er ook toe.
eGast
Nieuw rechts troetelkind? Volgens mij niet nieuw en als Thomas beter had gekeken, ook niet speciaal 'rechts'.
De homo als nieuw rechts troetelkind
Thomas von der Dunk, 09-08-2010 11:47reageer 201 reacties
De afgelopen week in Amsterdam was in de ogen van veel orthodox-gelovigen ongetwijfeld de Week der Zonde.
In Nederland is de morele opwinding over de jaarlijkse Gay Pride weliswaar geluwd - in andere landen resulteert het organiseren ervan vaak in homofobe scheldpartijen, intimidatie, en soms zelfs openlijk geweld. En niet altijd staan dan de autoriteiten aan de zijde van de slachtoffers, zoals de ervaringen in Rusland leren.
Toch is ook in Nederland zeker niet alles koek en ei. Weliswaar geven een aantal seculiere politieke partijen een positief statement af, door bij de grachtenparade mee te varen, en heeft CDA-staatssecretaris Van Bijsterveld zich over Plasterks 'onderwijsboot' ontfermd.
zie VK 9-8-2010
Israel’s gay PR campaign
Israel has begun an aggressive public relations campaign to market itself as an oasis of gay tolerance and democracy in the Mideast, surrounded by “backward” countries where gays have no rights. The campaign is not about supporting queers in Palestine or elsewhere in the Mideast who are resisting homophobia. It is about using their experience of homophobia to promote hatred of Palestinians, Arabs, and Muslims – including queer Palestinians, Arabs, and Muslims. The campaign is designed to make people living in liberal democracies like Canada feel an affinity for Israel. The implication is that Israel needs to practice apartheid, colonialism, and violence in order to preserve the liberal freedoms it enjoys. It might be unpleasant, but surely we can understand the exceptional circumstances?
Queers against Israeli apartheid
anzi
Voor Wiesje de Lange. Netjes opgevoed
Published 15:56 19.08.10 Latest update 15:56 19.08.10 'I would gladly kill Arabs - even slaughter them'
In new bid to defend publishing controversial images, former IDF soldier Eden Abergil writes on Facebook 'In war there are no rules.'
By Haaretz Service
anzi
Wikipedia editing courses launched by Zionist groups
Two Israeli groups set up training courses in Wikipedia editing with aims to 'show the other side' over borders and culture
And on Wikipedia, they believe that there is much work to do.
Take the page on Israel, for a start: "The map of Israel is portrayed without the Golan heights or Judea and Samaria," said Bennett, referring to the annexed Syrian territory and the West Bank area occupied by Israel in 1967.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/aug/18/wikipedia-editing-zionist-groups
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