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event horizon · Mar 17, 2012

A North African gunman targets Christmas shoppers in Belgium in a gun and grenade attack, killing three others.

Surely the media and politicians described the incident a terrorist attack, right?

Let's see what they wrote:

"According to the information we have this is an isolated act, not a terrorist act, or an attack. The shock that the population feels is understandable and we share it," he said [Belgian prime minister Elio di Rupo].

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldne ... t-act.html

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldne ... ciety.html

So where are the rants complaining this attack wasn't labeled terrorism?

Do these rage writers only get on their soap box when an attacker is white and the media doesn't describe their attack "terrorism"?

shafique · Mar 17, 2012

Your fail is epic, eh.

The telegraph and other reputable papers have indeed reported the point made by Belgium authorities that this wasn't a terror attack. However, at the time the attack took place - the first reports did call it a terrorist attack.

eg - CNN's early report:

Terrorist attack in Liege ( Belgium) today (13 december 2011)

http://ireport.cnn.com/docs/DOC-717041? ... s%2Flatest

Credit is due to the Belgian authorities for quickly spelling out that it wasn't terrorism.

But anti-Muslim bloggers intentionally didn't listen:

Tuesday, December 13, 2011

Terror Attack in Liège
A gunman named Norodine Amrani staged a terror attack in the center of Liège today, killing four people (one of them himself) and wounding at least 75 others. According to Reuters, the attacker used a Kalashnikov and a revolver, and also threw grenades.

http://gatesofvienna.blogspot.com/2011/ ... liege.html

Your blogger friend was wrong.

As Danios rightly pointed out that by contrast, Bales massacring 16 civilians in Afghanistan - including women and children - isn't labelled as terrorism in any report.

Cheers,

Shafique

event horizon · Mar 17, 2012

Well, once it was learned the attacker was North African from a Muslim background, the media and politicians could be sure that attack wasn't linked to terrorism.

Before that, there was the slim possibility the attacker could have been white.

Nothing more.

But seriously, why did Belgium's prime minister deny the attack was terrorism?

Where are the rants by Leftist loons that a grenade and gun attack targeting Christmas shoppers be considered terrorism by the authorities?

shafique · Mar 18, 2012

event horizon wrote:Well, once it was learned the attacker was North African.. sure that attack wasn't linked to terrorism.

Stop with the fantasising and revisionism eh. When the Belgians announced who the attacker was, they made it clear it wasn't a terror attack. The CNN report has an excuse - they made an assumption that it was terror in the short window before the attacker was known (and made the mistake of thinking it was multiple terrorists).

However, your blogger friend chose to ignore facts and call it a terror attack AFTER the name and details of the attacker were made public:

Terror Attack in Liège
A gunman named Norodine Amrani staged a terror attack

The contrast with Bales' massacre of 16 civilians and the lack of any accusation of terrorism is stark.

Cheers,
Shafique

event horizon · Mar 18, 2012

The CNN report has an excuse - they made an assumption that it was terror in the short window before the attacker was known

The contrast with Bales' massacre of 16 civilians and the lack of any accusation of terrorism is stark.

The only thing to contrast is that the media knew the attack in Afghanistan was a soldier going postal by the time the attack was reported.

Thanks for proving my point.

You agree that if the media knew the attacker was a North African on a killing spree from the very beginning (as the case in Afghanistan where the perpetrator was already known by the time news of the massacre reached the media) the media would not have labeled the attack terrorism.

So, no. No "difference". The media, once the facts were in, did not label the North African attacker a terrorist. The facts were already in by the time the media broadcast news of the massacre in Afghanistan. Ergo, no mention of "terrorism".

shafique · Mar 18, 2012

Thanks - you've made my point exactly (and bizarely you seem to think the facts agree with your view!

)

Your blogger friend labelled Amrani's attack a terror attack despite knowing it wasn't. CNN assumed it was a terror attack, before the authorities corrected this assumption.

By contrast, there is no mention anywhere of Bales as terrorist - the 'facts' were that he had massacred 16 civilians and done so in cold blood. Contrast that with a Muslim soldier in America who killed other soldiers and note how many references to him being a terrorist are in the media!

Anyway - I'm sure you're going to remain in denial, so I bid you a good day. Should you come up with a new argument, let me know.

Cheers,
Shafique

event horizon · Mar 18, 2012

You just owned yourself, badly.

The CNN report labeling the attack in Belgium a terrorist attack was based on the assumption there were multiple attackers.

Ergo, it would likely be assumed to be a terrorist attack rather than a rampage.

By the time the Afghan attack was reported it was known that a lone soldier had carried out the attack.

Ergo, it would (and was) likely be assumed to be an attack by a soldier going postal.

Anyone with common sense would think "soldier going postal" over "terrorist attack" if they hear news of a soldier carrying out a shooting rampage, especially in this context.

Contrast that with a Muslim soldier in America who killed other soldiers and note how many references to him being a terrorist are in the media!

Sorry, I won't take your word for it just because you say so.

You were wrong in claiming the attack was initially linked to religion by the media.

You just proved my point earlier:

they made an assumption that it was terror in the short window before the attacker was known (and made the mistake of thinking it was multiple terrorists).

The contrast with Bales' massacre of 16 civilians and the lack of any accusation of terrorism is stark.

The media initially reporting that the attack in Belgium was a terrorist attack was based on the assumption that it was a conspiracy - a) multiple attackers b) killing people at random.

I've never heard of a non-terrorist attack with those two elements. Rampages are carried out by one individual (exception being Columbine). Multiple attackers who are not terrorists do not typically randomly kill civilians. In fact, I can't think of a recent incident with multiple attackers randomly killing civilians. They have all been terrorist attacks. If there is an attack with multiple assailants, then it's usually a bank robbery or some other criminal activity. But that wasn't the case where the media believed there were multiple assailants randomly killing civilians with guns and explosives; hence it was reasonable to assume the attack was a terror attack.

It was known by the time initial media reports came out that a lone soldier had carried out the attack in Afghanistan. When I hear "lone soldier going on rampage", I think soldier going postal, not soldier carrying out terrorist attack.

shafique · Mar 18, 2012

What were the initial reports of the lone soldier going postal in Fort Hood? Did they mention the word terrorist before all the details were known - i.e. when initially only information was that a soldier had killed other soldiers?

And why did your blogger friend continue to state that Amrani had carried out a terror attack when the facts had actually been made clear?

Stop Press - there was indeed a piece in the US media last week which did indeed call the massacre in Afghanistan an act of terrorism - and considers Bale and Hasan to be terrorists it seems:

How A U.S. Soldier In Afghanistan Became A Terrorist

It is hard to imagine any news more sickening than the reports of an American soldier who consciously, carefully, premeditatedly, shot and killed nine children and seven women in Afghanistan yesterday. As described in the New York Times,

Stalking from home to home, a United States Army sergeant methodically killed at least 16 civilians, 9 of them children, in a rural stretch of southern Afghanistan early on Sunday, igniting fears of a new wave of anti-American hostility, Afghan and American officials said.

Residents of three villages in the Panjwai district of Kandahar Province described a terrifying string of attacks in which the soldier, who had walked more than a mile from his base, tried door after door, eventually breaking in to kill within three separate houses. The man gathered 11 bodies, including those of 4 girls younger than 6, and set fire to them, villagers said.

Imagine the outrage should an Afghan man, after knocking on doors in a small town in Illinois, enter and shoot at the families who live there. Imagine the fury of Washington.

And to think that the women and children are the very people in Afghanistan we claim to be there to help.

It should go without saying, but it evidently doesn’t: something is very, very wrong. Something is deeply wrong with our military, and it needs to be addressed, immediately and with force. How does a man like this enter the US Army? How does he become a sergeant? Who wasn’t watching him? What cues did his superiors miss?

This is, after all, not the first time we have seen anything like this: Army Major Nidal Hasan entered a military readiness center in Fort Hood, Texas, and fired randomly, killing 13 soldiers in November, 2009. Only after the fact did anyone actually pay attention to the many alerts that had been passed around concerning Hasan’s ties to Islamic extremism. But what allowed him to become so violent, so enraged, to begin with? What is missing in our military training that makes such murders possible in the first place? How did Hasan go unremarked?

Ultimately, America is going to have to accept the truth about what happened yesterday in Panjwai: an act of terrorism, perpetrated by a member of the United States Armed Forces. Let’s call it what it was. And mourn.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/abigailesma ... terrorist/

Cheers,
Shafique

herve · Mar 18, 2012

The fort Hood soldier, killed the other soldiers shouting allahu akbar, hence justifying his attack on religious beleifs, which makes him qualify as a terrorist attack. the US soldier in Afghanistan, did not shout the prayer lord when he killed the innocent civilians, for what i know....

shafique · Mar 18, 2012

herve, the question was whether before all the details of the Fort Hood shooting was known (other than a soldier shooting up other soldiers) the media and bloggers etc called it a terrorist attack.

Whether you think Hood was an act of religious terrorism is not the question (you have weird views when anything concerning Muslims and Islam is concerned) - let's just stick to what was actually reported before the facts were known. The one report in Forbes above calls the massacre in Afghanistan a terrorist attack, but it was the only one I could find that said this.

herve wrote: the US soldier in Afghanistan, did not shout the prayer lord when he killed the innocent civilians

As you say, we don't know that he didn't..

As the article I linked to in the 'Missing thread' OP said:

Could he be one of the many Christian extremist nuts in the U.S. military? Where is the wild speculation by the American media about the looming threat of Christian radicalism and the danger it poses?

http://www.atheistrev.com/2010/05/us-mi ... stian.html
(Link is of a report of Christian extremist nuts in the US military)

Cheers,
Shafique

Bethsmum · Mar 18, 2012

shafique wrote:As you say, we don't know that he didn't..

There's no-one left to testify either way.

event horizon · Mar 18, 2012

I liked the response to the rant you posted:

Respectfully, I think this assessment simply adds biased speculation to a flawed logical premise. Certainly without any details regarding the Army Sergeant’s motivation for killing the 16 civilians, it’s impossible to equate this incident to the fort Hood shooting. Your judgment that this incident reveals a long-standing, endemic, and “sickening” flaw within the U.S. military therefore is invalid. The fort Hood shooter was not a symptom of any flawed U.S. Army business practice, save its unhealthy hypersensitivity against Islamic discrimination. The fort Hood shooter was an Islamist sympathizer who eventually followed the salafist jihadist preaching of Anwar al-Awlaqi. He was not an overworked, battle-fatigued soldier struggling to cope with the demands of multiple hazardous deployments. Certainly the Army should strive to identify any soldier who, for whatever reason and under whatever circumstance, could develop into a physical threat. However, at this point, you cannot categorize the recent incident with the Fort Hoot shooting with any analytic integrity.

Assuming this were a demonstrable trend, however, your analysis is little more than a prejudicial bias. Perhaps the U.S. postal service and Virginia Tech could answer your questions: How does a man like this enter the US Army? How does he become a sergeant? Both institutions include an application process and screening interviews, as well as mechanisms for monitoring progress and well being, yet both became the venue for tragic rampage-style violence. The bottom-line is the U.S. Army is an enormous institution with regular operating hazards second-to-none. That this hasn’t happened before indicates great work within the DoD to mitigate the physical and psychological toll soldiers, sailors, marines, and airmen perennially have endured since 2001.

Lastly, rather than imaging “the outrage should an Afghan man, after knocking on doors in a small town in Illinois, enter and shoot at the families who live there,” why not envision the U.S. outrage for an Afghan man or women who intentionally burns a bible? I am not a follower of yours, but if you didn’t publicize a position critical of the Afghan response to the Koran burnings, you probably should check for any mindsets and biases shaping your writing.

shafique · Mar 18, 2012

Excuses, excuses.

We haven't yet ruled out that Bales was a fellow Christian extremist, have we eh?

Could he be one of the many Christian extremist nuts in the U.S. military? Where is the wild speculation by the American media about the looming threat of Christian radicalism and the danger it poses?

http://www.atheistrev.com/2010/05/us-mi ... stian.html
(Link is of a report of Christian extremist nuts in the US military)

It's also interesting that you call Forbes reasoned article a 'rant'. Is this just because she explains why the slaughter should be considered an act of terrorism in the same way Hasan's killing of fellow soldiers was labelled as terrorism?

Cheers,

Shafique

event horizon · Mar 18, 2012

Why does the media label abortion clinic bombings / assassination of abortion doctors "terrorism" but a gun and grenade rampage by a North African targeting Christmas shoppers isn't?

shafique · Mar 19, 2012

It is the FBI who label your fellow Christian Extremists who blow up doctors as terrorists. It is you who refuse to say whether you agree with the FBI that they are terrorists. Indeed these 'domestic terrorists' carry out the vast majority of terrorist acts in the US - and when you exclude outliers like McVeigh and 9/11, they kill more and carry out over 90% of the terror attacks in the US.

The Belgian police said the attack in Liege was not terrorism. That explains that.

The media will have a hard time to deny that your fellow American Christian Extremists who blow up abortion clinics are terrorists, given that the government and law enforcement authorities clearly state they are terrorists - but you seem to not have this problem.

(So, the answer to your question is quite obvious - in Belgium, the authorities said it wasn't terrorism, in the USA the authorities called the Christian Extremists blowing up doctors and clinics terrorists. In these instances the media accurately reported what the authorities said.)

Will you now join me in condemning your fellow Christian Extremists who bomb abortion clinics and doctors as terrorists? Or will you continue to give them your silent support?

Cheers,

Shafique

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