Recent Terrorism Articles

Operation Flex: the most incompetent FBI sting ever?

contribution by Tom Costello

When the FBI announces, as it has done numerous times in recent years, that it has thwarted a home-grown Islamist terror plot, the American media greets the announcement with hysteria.

But as radio documentary This American Life reveals, there is a side of the story that is rarely reported.

The juicy minutiae of the plot are pored over: in 2010, Mohamed Osman Mohamud planned to detonate a bomb at a crowded Christmas event; in 2009, Hosam Maher Husein Smadi plotted to bomb a Dallas skyscraper and Farooque Ahmed planned to bomb the Washington Metro.
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How the Olympics Pwned the Terrorists

A final thought on the Olympics – it was a giant middle-finger towards the terrorists, wasn’t it?

I remember that week in 2005 very well. As well as the announcement confirming we had won the Olympic bid, that week in July also saw the G8 protests at Gleneagles and Edinburgh, and the Make Poverty History events, also centred in Scotland, that culminated in the Live 8 concerts.

There was a real sense of political momentum, a feeling of people power, and for once, and absence of the usual cynicism associated with politics. And then four idiots spoiled everything. The constructive political ‘moment’ around G8 was destroyed by their actions, and the country and the government fell back into fear and reactionary politics.
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Syria is proof we need a global arms-trade treaty

contribution by Jack Barker

For over a year the ruthless Assad dictatorship in Syria has terrorised and murdered thousands of its own people. The bodies of adults and children have been burnt and destroyed by the Assad army.

The US government has alleged that Russia is sending attack helicopters to the regime and warned that Syria’s conflict could become even deadlier. Russia has continued to insist that any arms it supplies to the country are not being used to suppress anti-government dissent.

But Russia isn’t the only one responsible for the deadly but booming arms trade- $45-60 billion arms sales are agreed each year.
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Our student union was supposed to protect us, not spy on us

contribution by Sacha Hassan

As a young Muslim student I’ve been increasing aware of intimidation and harassment of British Muslims by the police seemingly for no other reason than our shared religion.

However, I’m now waking up to the cold reality that my student union, the organisation that I thought was fighting for me to end this harassment, has instead been helping the government program which is spying on me.

They have been handing over details of Muslim students’ political activities to the police to assess the “security risk.” Apparently they are a “sector leader” in engaging with the controversial Prevent programme.
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Abu Qatada deportation: what about our principles?

It seems only last month that we were discussing why Abu Qatada should or shouldn’t be deported.

The government of whichever hue convinced isd still trying to deport him back to Jordan, with those few on the other side quietly pointing out that we could have avoided all this palaver had we attempted to put him on trial here in the first place, rather than sending him back into the welcoming arms of the authoritarian state he fled from.

We did after all grant him asylum back in the care-free 90s, unconcerned as we were then of the phantom of exploding Muslims.
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Murdered scientist: blundering towards war with Iran

Tension is not reduced by murdering scientists.

A fourth Iranian scientist was killed yesterday. Tehran has been rocked by unexplained explosions. A cyber attack was conducted against Iran. War beckons.

The nobility of purpose of the West’s crusades for justice ends in the sordid abuse of laughing soldiers urinating on the bodies of dead warriors. Healthy brave young soldiers suffer fatal words or monstrous injuries to their bodies or mind.
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Don’t flatter yourself Melanie Phillips – it’s called a political debate

We already know that Melanie Phillips inhabits a weird parallel universe. Now she thinks I’m “obsessed” by her, merely I’ve pointed out the glaring holes in her recent articles.

Don’t flatter yourself Melanie. How about we stick to the politics instead of indulging your paranoia? Let’s ignore the delusional attempt at calling this some ‘obsession’. If Phillips dpesn’t like people highlighting her contradictions – she should stop writing about politics.

She blogs today in response to my piece yesterday:
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Was Anders Breivik a ‘fascist’ or something else?

I think the main problem with accurately labelling Breivik is that as yet we haven’t come up with a convincing catch-all term for the new far right, which on the surface eschews racism but which underneath is just as virulent in its hatred of those with brown skin as the fascists and neo-Nazis we’re all familiar with.

Unity has written an excellent post on Breivik and fascism – a lesson from George Orwell – and this is partly my reply.

Scratch beneath Breivik’s anti-racist façade and you find the same old tropes.
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The ‘madness’ of terrorism and other offensive terms

contribution by Nicky Clark

Without the slightest medical evidence to back up the claims the medical status of the Norwegian killer has been firmly established in all of our minds. He is depending or you choice of national newspaper, rolling news channel or twitter feed either a “Lunatic”, “nutter”, “psychopath”. “madman”, “deranged” or “unhinged”.

For the moment these terms are as wrong as they are offensive. If it transpires that Anders Breivik does in fact have a diagnosis then they will simply be offensive terms.
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What are people like Melanie Phillips calling for then?

Melanie Phillips and the gaggle of paranoids that make up the internet’s nutty ‘Counter-Jihad’ movement are loudly insisting that they don’t advocate acts of violence or terrorism.

For now, let’s assume that’s true and move on from there.

What, exactly, do they imagine it is that they are advocating?
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