Also Far East targets. We have seen such threats come to nothing in the past. We have also seen attacks. It would be unwise to dismiss such talk out of hand. From AFP, with thanks to Judy:
SEOUL: Al Qaeda has listed the United States and Australia as prime targets for attacks this year along with Britain, South Korea’s spy agency has reported, according to a lawmaker on Saturday.South Korea, Japan and the Philippines are secondary targets, South Korea’s National Intelligence Service (NIS) told parliament this week, quoting a “senior” Al Qaeda member arrested last month.
“According to NIS, this terrorist testified that South Korea, Japan and the Philippines are secondary targets, while the United States, Britain and Australia are the prime targets for this year,” a lawmaker told AFP. NIS did not reveal the name of the Al Qaeda member, where he was arrested or what country handed over the information, according to the lawmaker sitting on the National Assembly’s intelligence committee, who requested anonymity. The comments come after the Financial Times quoted French investigating magistrate Jean-Louis Bruguiere as saying that an Asia-Pacific financial centre such as Sydney, Tokyo or Singapore could be targeted by Al Qaeda extremists.
NIS told the committee that security officials were on alert for attacks in South Korea, which is hosting an Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit in the southern port of Busan in November.
South Korea, Japan and the Philippines have all contributed troops to the US-led war in Iraq. South Korea, which like Japan hosts US military bases, has 3,600 troops in Iraq, the third-largest contingent after the United States and Britain.
Gee..I wonder why all of the targets are democracy's. I wonder why China, N. Korea and all the other truely evil dictatorships are not targets. Aren't they infidels too?
Obviously Osama has been watching the BBC.
The little soirée he & those other "good moderate Muslims" carried out on the 7th & 21st have been overshadowed by the death of the poor, unfortunate, illegal immigrant & forged documentation carrying Mr De Menezes.
The ideology that infested the good Muslims of British birth (no, don't chuckle, its rude) just killed 52 infidels in their capital city - & yet the media & the pundits are only concentrating on poor Mr De Menezes, the Brazilian who had lived a while in San Paolo where no innocent civilians are ever, ever killed by the horrid fascist Police... (oh, sorry, they actually shot 612 civilians last year you say? Well, I am shocked.....)
OBL, like most English people, is probably wondering why we forgot the victims of the Islamofascists on the 7th so quickly, & obviously he needs to bring the focus of the western media back to the Homegrown Jihad of the good western born Muslims.
Yes, we will have to be hit again.
You see, the last time we killed an innocent man & have lost all our focus on you, Osama.
Whether or not this is a serious threat, I hope it will only strengthen Australia's resolve to fight radical Islamism both at home and abroad. The most recent developments on the security front provide grounds for optimism, but much, much more is needed.
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dolphin, CAGE co-founder.
http://www.acage.org
I sometimes get the sense that it would be welcomed if Islam were to somehow cause a catastrophic event that would as if by magic turn the world immediately against any further illusions of the peaceful intentions of Islam. It might happen that way, and if it does the suffering will be immense, more likely directed against the innocent than the guilty. If there is a catastrophic attack, all of our work will be redundant, swept away by mobs of frenzied vigilantes. Unless and until such ctastrophe happens it's important that we continue to teach and preach as we do, one person at a time, to ensure that the balance tips in our favor before the mob can rule in our stead.
To look toward some great horror in the hope that it will be a magic bullet in the heart of Islam is to neglect the real lives of Muslims across the world, people victimised by Islam, tortured and twisted into monsters by their own cultures. A moderate approach is better, one that relies on email and personal discussion with the bored and apathetic.
This brings me to the fire in Paris recently, something we haven't mentioned in these past pages. The fire was catastrophic, the victims were mostly children, and if we do nothing effective to stop Islam from creating unbearable social tensions in the West, then look at that fire as a harbinger of the future, intensify it, look at that hotel burning in Mecca, and look at all of Mecca as hundreds of fires at once. Who will be the victims of a provocation by Islam? We will be, and it will be the worse for us if we retaliate indiscriminately, killing the innocent along with a few guilty ones caught by chance.
Our own are more responsible for the coming castastrophe--if it comes-- than are those who might strike against us in the false hope that we will fall instead. It is the encouragement by appeasement that will turn the entire Muslim world into another Mogadishu.
We have to turn the tide of Western attitude toward Islam into something more reasonable than what we have today. If we continue to tolerate the intolerable much longer we will encounter the intolerable one day with an attitude that will cause suffering beyond all reason.
Will painfully contorted sentimentality on the part of the dhimmi Left cause a counter-reaction by extremists? We have to break the taboo here and stop the crazed philobarbarism before the politics of confrontation takes on a vigilante cloak and works evil that we have no need to tolerate from the start. But if we do nothing to stop the spread of Islam from the centres of politics we will find that the fringes rule instead. That must not be tolerable.
Kevin - the only reason for attacking the democracies is because of our PC reaction. The infidel Chinese will crush them like the worms they are. I doubt the Chinese would also give the Islamic prisoners Korans etc in jail.
We are weak in the West, through thought. The Chinese are strong, and are willing to use it.
sonofwalker - I agree, if only our pollies would admit the truth now, it would save so much bloodshed - on both sides later, maybe even cause some nominal muslims to leave their death cult if more spoke out. But alas - next to nothing
The eyes are not here
There are no eyes here
In this valley of dying stars
In this hollow valley
This broken jaw of our lost kingdoms
In this last of meeting places
We grope together
And avoid speech
Gathering on this beach of the tumid river
Sightless, unless
The eyes reappear
As the perpetual star
Multifoliate rose
Of death's twilight kingdom
The only hope
Of empty men
T.S. Eliot, "The Hollow Men"
I also quote Marat.
Often I prefer him. Yes, almost always.
The eyes are not here
There are no eyes here
In this valley of dying stars
In this hollow valley
This broken jaw of our lost kingdoms
In this last of meeting places
We grope together
And avoid speech
Gathering on this beach of the tumid river
Sightless, unless
The eyes reappear
As the perpetual star
Multifoliate rose
Of death's twilight kingdom
The only hope
Of empty men
T.S. Eliot, "The Hollow Men"
I also quote Marat.
Often I prefer him. Yes, almost always.
3rdtimelucky:
Let's write to Brownwyn Bishop to support the ban on headscarves in Australia!
Howard doesn't cut the mustard, as usual!
Susanp is waiting for your consent to be contacted by me, give her your e-mail and let's get a political movement going!
By the way: Do you remember when the Iraqi "insurgents" captured some 14 Chinese a while ago they let them go? The killed and chopped off the heads of 8 or 10 Nepalese, but I'm pretty sure they let the Chinese off the hook because they were afraid of the repercussion!
Perhaps the Chinese told them "you kill us and 10 000 Chinese Mohammedans will be roasted"
or:
" what if China sends 500 000 soldiers to "clean up" in Iraq?"
I think that is pretty much what happened, otherwise, why would the head-choppers let the Chinese walk?
What's to worry, Al Qaeda doesn't really exist, the great and venerable BBC said so. I believe the title of the show was "Are You Being Duped?"