Terrorist Plot Foiled

[Morgeruat]

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/9501919/

Surpisingly enough in France of all places, very interesting article considering alot of people consider France "safe" because of their support for Palestine, their refusal to attempt to put Hizbullah on the EU's list of terrorist organizations, and their harsh criticism of the war on terror.

[shamrock_uk]

Well, good to know they're safely in the klink. And it's nice to see a government like Algeria's pulling their weight!

As for your observation, personally I think that anyone who said that France was safe from Islamic terrorism needs to get a better grasp of the situation there.

One only has to witness the ghetto-isation and abject poverty of Muslim communities (especially in the Paris suburbs) to suspect that there'll be a few disollusioned and angry young folk around.

I imagine based on past conversations that you and I would differ somewhat on the causes however [img]smile.gif[/img]

[ 09-29-2005, 06:54 AM: Message edited by: shamrock_uk ]

[Morgeruat]

heh you know the last time I mentioned ghettos in paris or anywhere in France I was told "you have no idea what you're talking about" by a member here who shall remain nameless, despite at the time reading numerous articles about how bad the situation is getting in muslim communities there.

As for them being safe, the only newsworthy (ie news that made CNN) terrorism France has had to deal with was the reporter held hostage, threatened with death over the headscarf ban, most events involving muslims over there (if it's not a bombing) are whitewashed with such language that it becomes nearly impossible to identify the source of the problem. Thank you political correctness.

[Davros]

Still a pretty closed mind on the subject of France eh Morgie. Perhaps it never occured to you that one of their objections to the war on Iraq (the part of the war that seems to have been blurred because apparently it was about WOMD and not about terror if you will remember) is that they held the belief that the evidence of WOMD looked pretty darn flimsy.

Know something ......... turns out they were right.

It seems to me that they have taken the same stance we all have against terror campaigns. You do realise that they support a peaceful solution to Palestine don't you, and that they believe this can only come through the recognition of Palestine's right to exist. I don't see too many news articles anywhere claiming any French support for terrorist acts. They condemn the violence from both sides (ie not from just one side). I wonder where you get many of your information sources on France because they all seem rather tainted against the country. I appreciate that there is an element amongst conservatives that continues to apply the perverse froncophobe reaction (LOL - freedom fries indeed) of the gungo neocons that got miffed when the French refused to believe Colins little show and tell to the UN on WOMD. I am glad to see you have some CNN in there because that shows balance against the blatant propganda put out by FOX or "Conservative Weekly".

As for France itself, Shamrock is right, there is a huge Muslim polulation that have emigrated from Northern Africa. As we all know, if you have a large enough congregation of poor and disaffected that decide they have an axe to grind - bingo - discontent aplenty.

[dplax]

Originally posted by shamrock_uk: As for your observation, personally I think that anyone who said that France was safe from Islamic terrorism needs to get a better grasp of the situation there.

Reminds me of the earlier topic (maybe half a year ago), when France banned headscarves (among other religious symbols like crosses and jewish kippas) in schools. That musn't have gone down too well with the muslim community there either...

[shamrock_uk]

Lol, I actually wrote to Al-Jazeera and had a go at them about their biased coverage of the French headscarf ban. Never got a reply though...gits [img]tongue.gif[/img]

Whilst there is no excuse for dodgy reporting, I will concede that when a cultural symbol like a headscarf has grown in importance within a community to such a point where an individuals self-confidence and decency depend upon it, this law does impact unequally. I would suggest that the Muslim girl no longer allowed to cover herself suffers far more than the Christian one who isn't allowed to wear (eg) a small crucifix round her neck.

Of course, if you believe that the attitudes of the Muslim girl should be changed, then that's a different matter entirely [img]smile.gif[/img]

[ 09-29-2005, 11:40 AM: Message edited by: shamrock_uk ]

[Morgeruat]

But is that any more than the orthodox Jew suffers for having to remove his yarmulka? I think not.

For the record, I never thought the Iraq war was about oil, or for that matter WoMD, I believed, and still do, that it was largely personal since So-Damned Insane sent hit squads after Bush Sr, Jr decided to remove him, using a feeble excuse to do so. (and once more for the record I only reference Fox News online, and only when I google a news article and it comes up as the most seemingly relevant bit, as for watching it, I look at it like Rush Limbaugh, it's entertaining, but there's no way I'm confusing it with news.

As for France itself, Shamrock is right, there is a huge Muslim polulation that have emigrated from Northern Africa. As we all know, if you have a large enough congregation of poor and disaffected that decide they have an axe to grind - bingo - discontent aplenty.

Which is in itself bad enough, but when combined with an ideology that makes violent warfare against non-believers a requirement of every man woman and child the situation gets 100 times worse.

I was reading something I forget where exactly that Muslims in America are leaving Islam in droves because of education opportunities and high paying jobs (which would not exist in most of the ME, especially paying what they can get in the US or Europe) US Latinos largely fill the bottom rung jobs that muslims in Europe typically end up with leaving the muslims with less to be discontent about. It's an interesting study if true that better opportunities make the rhetoric of victimization fall flat to muslim youth and encourages them to pull themselves up and become useful members of society.

they believe this can only come through the recognition of Palestine's right to exist.

Which is something that Israel is willing to do as well, in fact when they (post WW2) were diving up the land for Israel they also tried to establish a state of Palestine, but the proposal was rejected, not by Israel, but by the arabs themselves. In fact the problem seems to me, to be the Palestinians refusal to acknowledge Israels right to exist (except perhaps in the middle of Antarctica)

[ 09-29-2005, 02:08 PM: Message edited by: Morgeruat ]

[shamrock_uk]

You don't have a link handy about those hit squads do you Morgeruat? As you can imagine, googling words like "Saddam" and "Bush" in the same sentence isn't that fruitful No worries if you haven't anything to hand.

[ 09-29-2005, 02:44 PM: Message edited by: shamrock_uk ]

[Morgeruat]

found a couple of references buried deeply in news articles, after a quick google of "G. H. W. Bush assassination attempt"

He tried to assassinate Bush in 1993 when he travelled to Kuwait.

link
link

There are, of course, many repugnant dictators in the world; a dozen or so in the Middle East alone. But Saddam Hussein is a figure of singular repugnance, and singular danger. To review: There is no dictator in power anywhere in the world who has, so far in his career, invaded two neighboring countries; fired ballistic missiles at the civilians of two other neighboring countries; tried to have assassinated an ex-president of the United States; harbored al-Qaida fugitives (this is, by the way, beyond doubt, despite David Plotz's assertion to the contrary); attacked civilians with chemical weapons; attacked the soldiers of an enemy country with chemical weapons; conducted biological weapons experiments on human subjects; committed genocide; and then there is, of course, the matter of the weaponized aflatoxin, a tool of mass murder and nothing else.

[Davros]

So we are back on the misdirection bamdwagon then? We had this crap reason (well it sounded great at the time and fooled lots of people but it turns out it was crap because we found no WOMD) that we told you about to rally you all around to the cause, but oh - BTW, we had all these good reasons up our sleeve but for some reason at the time we thought they wouldn't be all that convincing so we didn;t use themback then.

Hey - I'll buy me some of that snake oil please - riiiiiiiiiiiiight (insert rolls eyes smiley here).