melanie

August 01, 2005

The BBC gets something a bit right...

Peter TaylorÕs TV three-parter The New al Qaeda, being transmitted on BBC2. is laying out some useful material.

Personally, I find that the sensationalist presentation, tricksy camera work and scary music gets in the way of any profound analysis. But for those who believed the spin that al Qaeda was just a few assorted fanatics or indeed that it represented no threat at all, the programmes are helping dispel those particular myths.

Indeed, in tonightÕs programme Taylor made an oblique reference to the appalling Ñ but heavily garlanded Ñ Power of Nightmares (see previous posts), when he sardonically dismissed its ludicrous conspiracy theory that the terrorist threat had been dreamed up to keep the public in thrall to the politicians. If his trilogy does nothing else, it at least shows up the Power of Nightmares for the politicised drivel that it was Ñ while those who mindlessly parroted its argument were already exposed as fools in the most brutal way by the London bombings.

In TaylorÕs first episode last week, he conducted a chilling interview with Mohammed Al-Massari, who runs a jihadi website from his home in London and sees nothing wrong with using the images of beheadings and car bombs shown on his site to incite murderous hatred. People who saw this have told me they were profoundly shocked that such a man is allowed to do this. Welcome to Londonistan; where have you been all these years? It also dwelt upon the way the internet is used to recruit, train and motivate jihadis who were scattered after their infrastructure in Afghanistan was destroyed. Tonight, he amplified this further by revealing Ñ via an interview with the head of Moroccan intelligence Ñ that after the Afghan terror camps were destroyed the order went out to the mujahideen to Ôtake the jihad to their own countriesÕ.

So much for the claim that ÔitÕs all about IraqÕ.

Other useful details tonight included the fact that the three Madrid bombers completely concealed their fanaticism Ñ one was a drug-dealing playboy, the second was a phone technician and the third was an estate agent Ñ and that, as this Diary has noted before, although the Atocha station bombings toppled the government and brought Spanish troops out of Iraq, they were followed by another attack to blow up a railway line Ñ and plans were found on the bombersÕ computer to blow up yet more targets, including the Real Madrid football stadium.

So much, once again, for the claim that ÔitÕs all about IraqÕ.

Posted by melanie at August 1, 2005 11:10 PM