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Re: David Irving stories, the need of watertight facts and IR (answer by Khaldoun Samman 17 September 2002 20:53 UTC |
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Greetings,
Michael and others, please take the time to evaluate the source before you post it. It is interesting that you posted MEMRI. Look at its content and tell me in all honestly that it is a credible source. Take a look at the site and go to the "country" site. Compare the articles on Israel with those of the other countries. What do you see? Articles on the Arab world include these:
"French Legal Authorities Investigating Editor of Major Egyptian Daily for Antisemitism" [Egypt]
Arab-American: '"Osama Bin Laden is My Hero' [Egypt]
Saddam Hussein's Meetings with Nuclear Energy Agency [Iraq]
Now take a look at the essays on Israel. Do you see the difference?
Wafa Idris: The Celebration of the First Female Palestinian Suicide Bomber - Part II [Israel]
Israeli Author A.B. Yehoshua: I Hate Arafat From the Bottom of My Heart' [Israel]
Lets have some integrity and put things into perspective. Yes, antisemitism is real, and we should oppose it everywhere we see it. But I think at the present moment we just may be experiencing a large anti-Arab antisemtism as well, sometimes from people who think they are progressive and need to protect the Jews from antisemtism. Pointing to a study here and there looses legitimacy if it isn't couched in a critical manner.
Khaldoun
Michael Pugliese
http://memri.org/bin/latestnews.cgi?ID=SR702
September 13, 2002
No.7
The Events of September 11 and the Arab Media: The New Antisemitic
Myth
Introduction
In March 2002, MEMRI released a study of the Arab media's response
to the events of September 11, titled, "A New Antisemitic Myth in
the Middle East Media: The September 11 Attacks Were Perpetrated by
the Jews." The study, with a foreword by Congressman Tom Lantos, is
available online at http://www.memri.org/sr.html and as a PDF file
at: http:// www.memri.org/book/AntisemiticMythBook.pdf .
Since the release of MEMRI's study - and regardless of the
information accumulated about the identities of the perpetrators -
officials, journalists, and religious leaders throughout the Arab
and Muslim world have continued to claim that the perpetrators of
the attacks were not Arabs or Muslims. The claim that American and
or Jewish/Israeli elements carried out the attacks has become an
accepted, albeit false, and common myth in the Arab world, to the
point that U.S. President George W. Bush and Secretary of State
Colin Powell have been accused of masterminding the attacks.
This updated report, which is based on research compiled over the
past five months, reveals another trend that has emerged in the
Arab media whereby Arab writers have begun to base their fictitious
allegations on the widely discredited "research" of Western sources
such as former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke and Holocaust denier
Roger Garaudy. The apparent intent of the Arab writers is to add
credibility to their false allegations by relying on Western
sources whose claims they erroneously believe will be readily
accepted by a Western audience.
Senior Arab Sources
A. Israel/ Mossad/ the Jews are Involved in the Attacks
The Iraqi daily newspaper Babil - owned and edited by Saddam
Hussein's son, Uday - raised the assumption that "it is possible
that the Zionist entity will seek an opportunity to carry out a
terror attack inside the U.S. in order to push it to begin a war
against Baghdad? the Zionist entity has elements which allow it to
penetrate there [into the U.S.]." According to the newspaper, media
sources accept fabricated stories which are intended to cover up
Israeli involvement, "similar to what occurred during the first
hours following the events of September 11th [2001] [1]?" A similar
idea was also raised in an article in the Saudi daily Al-Watan and
in the Palestinian daily Al-Quds. [2]
In an interview with the Egyptian Islamist website
www.lailatalqadr.com, Egyptian Mufti Dr. Ahmad Al-Tayyeb mentioned,
a television report which, according to him, documented a group of
Israelis who were deported from the U.S. because they videotaped
the attack, "meaning they knew that it was about to happen. I am
not saying that the Jews, the Muslims, or others carried out the
attack; these are things that we don't know? [in the past] the U.S.
has used these events as an excuse to destroy the Muslim world and
to blame Islam for being the religion of terror and radicalism."
[3]
Deputy Chairman of the Egyptian People's Council Dr. Abdallah Omar
Nassif also speculated that the attacks were planned by Jews: "It
is possible that September 11th was planned by the Jews, who needed
an excuse to do whatever they wish so no one could compete with,
check, or stop them." [4]
Meanwhile, the Saudi Ambassador in Kuwait claims that Jews were
trying to distort the positive image of the Muslim religion and to
push away suspicions regarding their own involvement in the events
of September 11. [5]
B. The U.S. Was Involved in the Attacks
The senior Palestinian diplomat in Dubai, Salim Abu Sultan, said in
an exclusive interview with the Gulf News daily: "America is always
planning ahead [what it wants], as it planned the recent attacks on
September 11th, and blamed bin Laden and the Muslims. But not a
single Muslim was involved in this? if they [the Americans] will go
on with such behavior, they will suffer terribly in the future."
[6]
In his article in the United Arab Emirates daily Al-Bayan [7],
columnist Tal'at Shahin asserted that President Bush and Israel
profit from the events of September 11. Shahin notes three
potential American suspects who he claims would have profited:
First, the military clique surrounding President George Bush Jr.,
which as a result of the attacks would gain an increase in the
military budget from Congress. Second, the owners of the large
economic corporations who would profit from military contracts
likely to be signed with the U.S. government. Third, the oil and
energy corporations, which are likely to transport oil of the
Caspian Sea through Afghanistan into the Indian Ocean, and as a
result of such projects, the columnist claims, Bush's own family
will be the main profiteer, along with Israel or the entire Zionist
project, which could then destroy the Palestinian Authority.
An article appearing in Egyptian government newspaper Al Ahram Al-
masai that was authored by Morsi Attallah, stated: "Evidence
indicates that the executors of the attacks on New York's World
Trade Centre on September 11 obtained logistical support from
ground back- up teams who operated remote detonators and sounded
the alarm in the twin-towers so as to reduce human losses to a
minimum. Moreover, three buildings were blasted by using dynamite
in full view of the CIA without it lifting a finger. The fact is
known that the CIA occupied offices on the seventh and ninth floors
of the twin-towers. Given that the alarm was sounded, with the
purpose of reducing human losses, it would be obvious that the
target of the attack was the offices of the CIA on the seventh and
ninth floors. There might also have been other targets but not
among them the random killing of thousands of innocent people. The
question now is: can an operation of such magnitude have been
planned and managed so accurately from a cave in Afghanistan? And
can it have been actually mounted by an Islamist group?" [8]
'Reliable' Western Sources
A. Former German Minister Andreas Von Bülow
The views of former German state minister Andreas von Bülow, who
authored a book on German and American intelligence and security
agencies, were reported by the Saudi daily Al- Watan. [9] Von-Bülow
expanded on his opinions in a January 13, 2002 interview with the
German daily der Tagesspiegel. In the interview, von Bülow raised
several questions: why the identities of the perpetrators were
revealed immediately, as if prepared in advance; why seven of the
men whose names were announced as perpetrators were later found to
be alive; why an anonymous British flight engineer maintained that
the airplanes were crashed into the WTC by remote control [a claim
that von Bülow said should be examined]; why prior to the attack,
insurance deals totaling some $15 billion were carried out, from
which someone had to have profited [von Bülow indicated that this
point too needed to be clarified].
In general, von Bülow, like others before him, claimed that the
attack was in line with the ideological-political framework of the
East-West conflict cultivated by the likes of former U.S. national
security advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski and Professor Samuel
Huntington, so that the U.S. would be able to seize military bases
in the area [of Afghanistan] and control its natural gas and oil
reserves as well as the drug trade. Von Bülow added that from his
experience in service of the country he had learned, among other
things, that such an attack could not have been carried out without
the help of security apparatuses and a country's backing.
B. Western Media Report on Alleged Israeli Spy Ring
Many reports and articles in the Arab media relied on one report of
an alleged "arrest" of an Israeli spy ring in the U.S. [10]
The Saudi daily Al-Watan claimed that Fox News' anchor reported
that 60 of the arrested Israelis who are suspected of belonging to
the espionage ring were investigated with regards to the September
11 attacks, and that American investigators suspect that some of
these Israelis had prior knowledge of the planning of the attacks
and did not report it to the American authorities. [11]
According to many articles in the Arab media, "Israeli espionage in
the U.S." has become central evidence pointing to Israel's
involvement in the September 11 attacks. For example, Hassan
Suweilim, a retired Egyptian general known for his antisemitic
writings, wrote in the Emirates' daily Al-Bayan: "The American
investigative apparatuses announced that the spy ring [which was
arrested] - meaning the Israeli intelligence apparatus - has
concrete information that a large attack against vital American
strategic targets between [the dates of] September 9-11 was
imminent. Furthermore, eighteen hours prior to the occurrence of
the attacks [they had information] that New York's Twin Towers
would be that attack's main target. However, in accordance with the
orders of the intelligence commanders in Israel, they kept silent
and did not tell their American colleagues. The only thing they did
was to warn the Jewish community about what was going to happen -
which explains the absence of 1,478 Jews from work at the World
Trade Center on the day of the attack? the [female] reporter [sic]
Carl Cameron from the television network Fox News noted that: 'a
number of Israelis knew that the date of the attack was September
11 [but] didn't warn the American authorities' and that 'a group of
Israelis who are espionage experts in the Western world were [also]
uncovered in North Carolina?'" [12]
Muhammad Bakri, a columnist for the Egyptian opposition paper Al-
Usbu', claimed that the U.S.'s deportation of more than 120
Israelis charged with espionage indicates "the direct involvement
of these Israelis in the September 11 events." The goal of the
[espionage] ring was, he said, to direct the American reaction to
Iraq, Libya, and the Sudan. Later, it could utilize this
opportunity to strike at the Arab countries and to expel the rest
of the Palestinians. Bakri added, "The Israeli ring intended to
carry out its plan by means of 68 people working in American
airports, from whom it would obtain sensitive information about the
secret codes of the Pentagon computer, and by means of 22 American
Jews who believe that suicide was the basic way to be rid of the
torment of this world." [13]
The PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida reported what the Washington-based
Arab strategic expert Mundhir Suleiman said at a press conference
held at the Arab League's think tank the Zayid Center for
Coordination and Follow-Up in Abu Dhabi. Suleiman based his talk on
the "facts" about the Israeli espionage ring in the U.S. and its
connection to September 11, referring to alleged American
intelligence reports of espionage activity by Israeli art students
in the U.S., including, over 130 separate incidents. Suleiman
claimed that spies who had been arrested drew up detailed maps of
federal buildings and had in their possession pictures of top
federal officials. He added that there could be a connection
between Israeli intelligence and the events of September 11 because
a third of the Israeli students who belonged to the spy ring lived
in the same neighborhood as Muhammad Atta and three of his
assistants. [14]
Fringe Western Media Sources
A. Thierry Meyssan
The Arab papers reported broadly on the theory of French journalist
Thierry Meyssan. Meyssan is the author of L'effroyable Imposture
["The Frightening Deceit"], a book about the September 11 attacks.
Meyssan claims that the attacks were a ruse planned by the American
government. Meyssan's theory was based primarily on photos of the
damaged Pentagon, where, he said, no fragments of the crashed plane
were found.
Like Mundhir Suleiman, Meyssan also spoke at the Zayid Center for
Coordination and Follow- Up in Abu Dhabi. His talk, titled "Who
masterminded the attacks of September 11th?," was summarized by the
Center, which referred to him as "the famous French author and
writer," and was reported on by the Egyptian weekly October, the
Saudi Gazette, and the UAE daily Khaleej Times. In its summary, the
Zayid Center wrote, "The American military - to further its
interest and hegemony over the world - was responsible for the
attacks."
Meyssan claimed that the perpetrators of the September 11 operation
were American military men, and that the attacks were carried out
to support the "myth of Islamic terrorists." He said that a similar
operation had already been carried out in 1961, when the U.S. Joint
Chiefs of Staff planned attacks within the U.S. against Americans -
except that President Kennedy's immediate intervention had thwarted
its implementation.
As evidence that the perpetrators were from the American military,
Meyssan cited their ability to call the Pentagon en route using
codes known only to Pentagon staff.
Meyssan claimed that the U.S. was ruled by a shadow government that
was handling U.S. affairs and could easily replace the official
government.
"It was not logical," Meyssan claimed, "that a plane could enter
Pentagon airspace without being shot down. Moreover, a photo taken
a few minutes after the event showed no evidence of fire, and there
was also no hole in the building where the plane had allegedly
penetrated it." Meyssan depicted Osama bin Laden as a CIA agent who
had been treated in an American hospital in Dubai two months before
September 11. There, he said, bin Laden had been visited by a top
CIA official. [15]
Other newspapers also addressed Meyssan's theory. Among them were
the Palestinian weekly Al-Bayadir Al-Siyasi[16] and the Egyptian
weekly Akhir Sa'a.[17] Other papers actually interviewed Meyssan,
among them Al-Ahram Al-Arabi[18] and Al-Watan of Saudi Arabia. [19]
B. Jeffrey Steinberg
Jeffrey Steinberg, an editor of Lyndon H. LaRouche, Jr.'s Executive
Intelligence
Review,[20] who has appeared on Al-Jazeera and whose articles are
regularly translated into Arabic by the Saudi daily Al-Watan
claimed to be the one who uncovered the "Israeli spy ring" that was
later used by the Arab media. [21]
C. Gordon Thomas
Gordon Thomas, a newspaper correspondent and the author of dozens
of books, several of
them on intelligence, wrote an article that was translated in the
Saudi daily Al-Watan. In the article, Thomas said, "The Israeli
intelligence service chose to pass on its own intelligence to
Washington through its contacts in French and Egyptian intelligence
agencies because it did not believe its previous warnings of an
impending attack by the bin Laden network had been taken seriously
enough in Washington." [22]
D. Michael Collins Piper
An article by revisionist historian Michael Collins Piper, who
authored a book on president
Kennedy's assassination that claimed the Mossad played a key role
in the assassination, was translated in the Saudi English-language
daily Arab News. The article attempts to prove that Jews use
suicide in terror operations in order to support the conjecture
that they were involved in the September 11 suicide attacks. [23]
E. "Private Investigators" Joe Wallis and Korins Mey
According to the Israeli-Arab weekly Al-Senara,[24] American
private investigators Joe Wallis
[sic] and Korins Mey [sic] [25] claimed that "accusing Arab
terrorists" of perpetrating the September 11 events was a part of a
conspiracy. To substantiate their claim, the investigators said
that the attacks were carried out by remote control [using American
technology developed many years ago in order to prevent airliner
hijackings]. The paper added that the two said that no emergency
signals were sounded, the planes' black boxes were empty, and there
had been no Arab names on the planes' passenger lists. The
investigators were also reported by the paper to have said that the
towers' collapse could only have been caused by explosive devices
inside the buildings.
F. Holocaust Denier Roger Garaudy
The Saudi daily Al-Watan published an article by the Holocaust
denier Roger Garaudy, in
which he claimed that the September 11 attacks were an American
conspiracy involving the cooperation of extremist Islamic groups
formed in the days of the struggle against the Soviets. According
to Garaudy, the planes could have been directed by technological
means, with no real need for humans; the names that allegedly were
those of the perpetrators were names of Islamic extremists known to
the Americans who could easily be connected with the attacks.
Like others, Garaudy also claimed that the attacks corresponded
with the American strategy to take control of Central Asian oil
reserves - a strategy led by the largely Jewish Pentagon hawks.
Further proof, he said, was the absence of 4,000 Jews from their
place of work at the World Trade Center on that day, as well as the
Jews' profits from stock market deals made using their prior
information on the attacks. [26]
G. Former Ku Klux Klan Leader David Duke
The PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida published an article by white
supremacist David Duke, who
served as national director of the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan. In
his article, Duke claimed that "Israeli leaders have launched
terrorist attacks on America disguised as Arab attacks, because
they knew that any Arab terrorist attack on America advances their
own aims? the bigger the attack against America, the better it is
for Israel."
According to Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Duke said, "There are two solid
pieces of evidence indicating the Mossad's prior knowledge of the
September 11 attacks." He goes on to enumerate: "Having only one
Israeli casualty among the 4,500 dead at the WTC is simply a
statistical impossibility," and "The Israeli daily, Ha'aretz, also
confirmed the prior warnings to Israel? an Israeli communication
company, Odigo, with offices in both the World Trade Center and in
Israel, received a number of warnings just two hours before the
attack" [27]
[1] Al-Sharq Al-Awsat (London), September 4, 2002.
[2] An article by Jeff Steinberg appeared in the Saudi government
controlled daily Al-Watan which read: "there is an increasing
concern among intelligence experts in the U.S., in Europe and the
Western world, and even among the moderates within Israel, that
Sharon and his gang in the Israeli Mossad, Israeli military and the
Israeli Mafia will carry out a terror attack against American
targets in order that Iraq will be blamed for it? and then
President Bush will have to launch a senseless war against Iraq."
Al-Watan (Saudi- Arabia), September 6th, 2002. This article was
also published in the Palestinian daily Al-Quds on September 9,
2002.
[3] http://www.lailatalqadr.com/stories/p5150701.shtml July 15th,
2002
[4] Saudi Gazette, May 24, 2002.
[5] Asrar Al-Quds, Issue #34, April 2002. "An exceptional proof" to
the involvement in the attacks appeared in Letters to the Editor in
the London daily Al-Quds Al-Arabi, by Taha Muhammad Shawat. He
claimed that "[there is] a possibility that the Jews knew in
advance [about the attacks] through the use of Kabala and magic?"
along with intelligence penetration capabilities and since the
Afghans are Jews in origin. Al-Quds Al- Arabi, (London), May 25,
2002.
[6] http://www.gulf-news.com/articles/news.asp?ArticlesID=57273
[7] Al-Bayan, (UAE), April 26, 2002.
[8] Al Ahram Al-masai (Egypt), August 5, 2002.
[9] Al-Watan (Saudi Arabia), January 25, 2002. The paper also
claimed that von Bülow was profoundly impressed by the "theory and
the professional analysis of Dr. Muhammad Khalaf, a retired
Egyptian general who was a member of the Nasser Military Academy
and of the State College for Defense Studies in London, who gave a
lecture at the Asian Studies Department of Cairo University on
December 5, 2001. In the lecture, Khalaf provided detailed military
data "proving" that this kind of operation demanded high military
proficiency and secret infiltration of the American oversight and
control apparatuses ? something beyond the capability of bin Laden
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