This morning I read that most Muslims believe that 9/11 was a conspiracy created by the US government to justify the invasion of Iraq. This worried me. How could the majority of Muslims be so wrong?
But then I thought that the US government and some EU countries did lie to invade Iraq. They lied about the weapons of mass destruction conspiracy and the connections between Saddam Hussein and 9/11.
So if I were debating with any of those Muslims who believe that 9/11 was an excuse to invade Iraq, I would have to say “9/11 was not a US/Israeli conspiracy, there is tremendous irrefutable evidence that it was a terrorist attack perpetrated by Saudi terrorists and led by Osama Bin Laden”. And that part is true.
But then I would have to explain other painful truths. I would have to admit that we invaded Iraq despite knowing that neither the 9/11 terrorists nor the WMD where there. That in our countries we created the false impression that Saddam was behind 9/11 and that many believe this lie now. And this is one weak side of the debate.
If we can create conspiracies about WMD and “muslim terrorism” as if all Muslims act together (Saddam=Osama=Ahmadinejad), attack and destroy the wrong country (Iraq), torture their citizens, post pictures of how we torture them in Abu Ghraib, take some to Guantanamo and approve their torture, share the blame in the killing of 25 times more innocent civilians than those who died in 9/11 and admit to use white phosphorous (chemical weapon) attacking Fallujah; if we can commit such human right atrocities, why is it so far fetched that most Muslims believe that 9/11 was perpetrated by US and Israel in order to invade Iraq and control the second largest oil reserves in the world?
Moreover, in this Wikipedia entry you will be surprised to find out that one third of Americans actually AGREE with the majority of Muslims. They also believe in 9/11 conspiracy theories even though 2% of Americans are Muslims.
Can our argument just be “yes, we do horrible things but not precisely the horrible things you believe we do”? My hope is that, during this decade, we will truly gain the high moral ground against terrorism and cooperate with moderate Muslims to erradicate Muslim extremism without violating human rights in the region. In the end, terrorism is an industry that feeds on angry young men. We have to make it much harder for Muslim terrorists to recruit. As we have been behaving over the last 10 years, it is not surprising that terrorism has greatly increased since 9/11.
Follow Martin Varsavsky on Twitter: twitter.com/martinvars
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Elias Davidsson on October 3, 2010 ·
The author is correct in pointing out the lack of a direct correlation between the lies on Iraqi WMD and the belief that the US government masterminded 9/11. Whether 9/11 was a government-orchestrated crime must be decided on the sole merits of this particular issue. Having said so, there exists voluminous evidence supporting the view that 9/11 was orchestrated by the US government and covered up by Congress, the media and substantial segments of academia. In addition, the US government would have far more motives for the crime than anyone involved with Islam. Finally, the means and opportunities available to the US military to engineer such a crime are far greater than any other entity in the world, let alone a phantom named Al Qaeda,
Hernan Galante on October 3, 2010 ·
Martin, you are a smart person, why do you think that 9/11 was a complete terrorist attack? There are evidence of a conspiracy and a gov connection in the events with a simple and logical explanation. For example, What happend at the Pentagon? Where is the plane wreckage? You are a pilot, please try to explain those photos taken after the plane crash. The scene is so clean and tiny to be a 757 plane crash. The photos showing some plane pieces and explanations are hard to believe. They could had been planted there.
You can pay an engineer, an expert in demolitions, he can explain to you why a plane can’t cause a perfect demolition assited in those building. There are metal columns that have to be melted down, and the fire caused by a plane crash just can’t cause that. In the video footage you can see explotions from inside the building, seconds before the collapse of it.
The USA army can’t catch a heroin farmer in Afghanisthan, but the Colombians can kill FARC’ bosses with the american technology and fire power. I think they’re chasing ghosts invented by CIA, while the CIA control the heroin market produced in a 70% in Afghanisthan. USA is a corrupt country like others, but with the biggest fire power and the biggest TV and movie industry to clean up the mess.
There are so many documentals and books with simple and logical conclusions that there was a local and gov connection to allow the events that day. If you don’t like the word conspiracy, change it to “local connection or gov connection”. Nothing new to us, we have known this kind of events in Buenos Aires in AMIA.
Regards,
Hernán.-
Avi on October 4, 2010 ·
How come that in so many different places in the world, completely different ethnic groups, languages, cultures, political systems – there is a violent conflict where one side (or both) is muslim? Is it due to US/Western crimes EVERY TIME? Or is it due to the fact that in its roots, Islam is a violent belief system that seeks expansion through warfare? (As clearly written in the Quran and repeated endless amount of times by muslim preachers).
Not every muslim is a terrorist of course, but unfortunately all of the following terrorist attacks have been carried out by muslims (and this is a very tiny sample of course):
26 February 1993 – World Trade Center bombing, New York City. 6 killed.
13 March 1993 – 1993 Bombay bombings. Mumbai, India. 250 dead, 700 injured.
28 July 1994 – Buenos Aires, Argentina. Vehicle suicide bombing attack against AMIA building, the local Jewish community representation. 85 dead, more than 300 injured.
24 December 1994 – Air France Flight 8969 hijacking in Algiers by 3 members of Armed Islamic Group of Algeria and another terrorist. 7 killed including 4 hijackers.
25 June 1996 – Khobar Towers bombing, 20 killed, 372 wounded.
17 November 1997 – Luxor attack, 6 armed Islamic terrorists attack tourists at Egypts famous Luxor Ruins. 68 foreign tourists killed.
14 February 1998 – Bombing in Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu, India. 13 bombs explode within a 12 km radius. 46 killed and over 200 injured.
7 August 1998 – 1998 United States embassy bombings in Tanzania and Kenya. 224 dead. 4000+ injured.
4 September 1999 – A series of bombing attacks in several cities of Russia, nearly 300 killed.
12 October 2000 – Attack on the USS cole in the Yemeni port of Aden.
11 September 2001 – 4 planes hijacked and crashed into World Trade Center and The Pentagon by 19 hijackers. Nearly 3000 dead.[210]
13 December 2001 – Suicide attack on Indian parliament in New Delhi by Pakistan-based Islamist terrorist organizations, Jaish-E-Mohammad and Lashkar-e-Toiba. Aimed at eliminating the top leadership of India and causing anarchy in the country. 7 dead, 12 injured.
27 March 2002 – Suicide bomb attack on a Passover Seder in a Hotel in Netanya, Israel. 30 dead, 133 injured.
30 March 2002 and 24 November 2002 – Attacks on the Hindu Raghunath temple, India. Total 25 dead.
7 May 2002 – Bombing in al-Arbaa, Algeria. 49 dead, 117 injured.
24 September 2002 – Machine Gun attack on Hindu temple in Ahmedabad, India. 31 dead, 86 injured.[211][212]
12 October 2002 – Bombing in Bali nightclub. 202 killed, 300 injured.[213]
16 May 2003 – Casablanca Attacks – 4 simultaneous attacks in Casablanca killing 33 civilians (mostly Moroccans) carried by Salafia Jihadia.
11 March 2004 – Multiple bombings on trains near Madrid, Spain. 191 killed, 1460 injured (alleged link to Al-Qaeda).
1 September 2004 – Beslan school hostage crisis, approximately 344 civilians including 186 children killed.[214][215]
2 November 2004 – The murder of Theo van Gogh (film director) by Amsterdam-born jihadist Mohammed Bouyeri.[216]
4 February 2005 – Muslim terrorists attacked the Christian community in Demsa, Nigeria, killing 36 people, destroying property and displacing an additional 3000 people.
5 July 2005 – Attack at the Hindu Ram temple at Ayodhya, India; one of the most holy sites of Hinduism. 6 dead.
7 July 2005 – Multiple bombings in London Underground. 53 killed by four suicide bombers. Nearly 700 injured.
23 July 2005 – Bomb attacks at Sharm el-Sheikh, an Egyptian resort city, at least 64 people killed.
29 October 2005 – 29 October 2005 Delhi bombings, India. Over 60 killed and over 180 injured in a series of three attacks in crowded markets and a bus, just 2 days before the Diwali festival.[217]
9 November 2005 – 2005 Amman bombings. a series of coordinated suicide attacks on hotels in Amman, Jordan. Over 60 killed and 115 injured.[218][219] Four attackers including a husband and wife team were involved.[220]
7 March 2006 – 2006 Varanasi bombings, India. A series of attacks in the Sankath Mochan Hanuman temple and Cantonment Railway Station in the Hindu holy city of Varanasi. 28 killed and over 100 injured.[221]
11 July 2006 – 11 July 2006 Mumbai train bombings, Mumbai, India; a series of seven bomb blasts that took place over a period of 11 minutes on the Suburban Railway in Mumbai. 209 killed and over 700 injured.
14 August 2007 – Qahtaniya bombings: Four suicide vehicle bombers massacred nearly 800 members of northern Iraq’s Yazidi sect in the deadliest Iraq war’s attack to date.
26 July 2008 – 2008 Ahmedabad bombings, India. Islamic terrorists detonate at least 21 explosive devices in the heart of this industrial capital, leaving at least 56 dead and 200 injured. A Muslim group calling itself the Indian Mujahideen claims responsibility. Indian authorities believe that extremists with ties to Pakistan and/or Bangladesh are likely responsible and are intent on inciting communal violence.[222] Investigation by Indian police led to the eventual arrest of a number of terrorists suspected of carrying out the blasts, most of whom belong to a well-known terrorist group, The Students Islamic Movement of India.[223]
13 September 2008 – Bombing series in Delhi, India. Pakistani extremist groups plant bombs at several places including India Gate, out of which the ones at Karol Bagh, Connaught Place and Greater Kailash explode leaving around 30 people dead and 130 injured, followed by another attack two weeks later at the congested Mehrauli area, leaving 3 people dead.
26 November 2008 – Muslim extremists kill at least 174 people and wound numerous others in a series of coordinated attacks on India’s largest city and financial capital, Mumbai. A group calling itself the Deccan Mujaheddin claims responsibility, however, the government of India suspects Islamic terrorists based in Pakistan are responsible. Ajmal Kasab, one of the terrorists, was caught alive.[224][225]
25 October 2009. Baghdad, Iraq. During a terrorist attack, two bomber vehicles detonated in the Green Zone, killing at least 155 people and injuring 520.
28 October 2009 – Peshawar, Pakistan. A car bomb is detonated in a woman exclusive shopping district, and over 110 killed and over 200 injured.
5 November 2009 – Fort Hood shooting, Texas, USA. U.S. Army Major Nidal Malik Hasan, an American Muslim of Palestinian descent, shot and killed 13 people and wounded 30 others at a U.S. Army base.
3 December 2009 – Mogadishu, Somalia. A male suicide bomber disguised as a woman detonates in a hotel meeting hall. The hotel was hosting a graduation ceremony for local medical students when the blast went off, killing four government ministers as well as other civilians.[226]
1 January 2010 – Lakki Marwat, Pakistan. A suicide car bomber drove his explosive-laden vehicle into a volleyball pitch as people gathered to watch a match killing more than 100 people.[227]
1 May 2010 – New York, New York, USA. Faisal Shahzad, an Islamic Pakistani American who received U.S. citizenship in December 2009, attempted to detonate a car bomb in Times Square working with the Pakistani Taliban or Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan.
28 May 2010 – Attacks on Ahmadi Mosques Lahore, Pakistan. Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan claimed attacks on two mosques simultaneously belonging to the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community, killing nearly 100 and injuring many others.
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Martin Varsavsky on October 4, 2010 ·
I am Jewish. I am for a two state solution. I am certainly in favor of the right of Israel to exist in peace. But saying that most terrorism nowadays is Muslim does not help. In Spain we have Basque terrorism. And it’s been bad. But we have been winning against it by aligning ourselves with moderates Basques and alienating extremists. And we know very well that while all terrorism except Atocha in Spain is done by Basque nobody in Spain says that Basques, as a group, are extremists or terrorists. We have to win over the moderate majority everywhere.
Avi on October 4, 2010 ·
There are some crucial differences between Basque terrorists and Muslim terrorists:
1. Basques demand recognition and independence of their region. They do not wish to expand their ideology to France or to the UK. Not even to Madrid.
2. Being Basque is not a religion. The conflict is for land, not for belief. Being a Basque moderate is possible, while being a Muslim moderate means that you betray the very foundations of your religion. If at one moment the religion will change and the violent parts of the Quran will be rejected – I will start believing in moderate Islam. Until that moment, if you’re a devoted Muslim – you MUST believe in violent expansion. I recommend reading “Religion of Peace? : Islam’s War Against the World” http://www.amazon.com/Religion-Peace-Islams-Against-World/dp/097789844X
3. AFAIK Basques do not see all civilians of the other side as enemies (please correct me if I’m wrong). Their targets are almost always official buildings and places of the Sanish government. Muslim terrorists target kids (suicide attack in a night club for teenagers in Tel Aviv, 2001), or just random civilians (most suicide attacks in Israel, Bali, Madrid, France, 9/11 etc). There is a basic cruelty that just cannot reasoned with in Islamist fundamentalism.
Elias Davidsson on October 4, 2010 ·
Bombings were indeed carried out in the dates named by “Avi”. But his claim that these bombings were carried out by Muslim terrorists cannot be sustained. I have personally investigated some of these bombings and found in each case either a governmental institution involved or a flawed investigation of the act. I will only mention the first case, the bombing of the WTC in 1993.
As everyone who studied the case knows, the FBI was involved in this bombing attack. It promised to the “bomber” to replace the explosives by innocuous materials but then did not stand to the promise. Wikipedia, far from a radical source, says under http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1993_World_Trade_Center_bombing:
“In the course of the trial it was revealed that the FBI had an informant, a former Egyptian army officer named Emad Salem. (…) Salem, initially believing that this was to be a sting operation, claimed that the FBI’s original plan was for Salem to supply the conspirators with a harmless powder instead of actual explosive to build their bomb, but that the FBI chose to use him for other purposes instead. He secretly recorded hundreds of hours of telephone conversations with his FBI handlers.” The source for this is an article in New York Times of Oct. 28, 1993:
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9F0CE6DF1138F93BA15753C1A965958260
A rebuttal of the claim that the above list of bombings were the work of fanatic Muslims is beyond the scope of this observation.
Avi on October 4, 2010 ·
Just to clarify – I do not, in any way, support Basque terrorist activities or any violent activity against civilians for that matter.
simon on October 5, 2010 ·
“there is tremendous irrefutable evidence that it was a terrorist attack perpetrated by Saudi terrorists and led by Osama bin Laden.”
Really?
As far I understand what you are saying (you provided no links or documentation), you refer to the 9/11 Commission Report. Which now stands fairly well discredited. Member of this commission have stated that they were deceived. That much of their evidence comes from the torture of KSM, one individual.
This is America. How about a grand jury with sworn, public testimony? Isn’t that how you do things in a nation of laws?
french philosopher on October 7, 2010 ·
Why is nobody talking about the growing closeness between Thierry Meyssan and Iran these days? Nine years after the publication of his seminal book, 9/11: the Big Lie, he now devotes his ti,e to defending Iran in a series of articles which accuse the Americans of posting disinformation about the country’s election on Twitter and of insisting that adulterous woman in Iran are no longer put to death by stoning.
One possible cause is that the super wealthy Iranian Revolutionary Guards, who control a third of the country’s economy, have just sponsored Monsieur Meyssan to the tune of one million dollars to produce a long overdue fresh literary masterpiece
The book – I know not the title but that it is to be published later this month – deals with the assassination of Lebanon’s former prime minister Rafiq Hariri back in 2005. Why such a historical event? Except to say that Meyssan claims his book will contain evidence that the state of Israel – the No.1 enemy of Iran – was behind the murder.
Exactly what this proof will be we await with interest – particularly as Hezbollah said a similar thing two months ago. In that case it produced aerial photographs it says it downloaded from an Israeli drone showing Israel had been tracking Mr Hariri long before his assassination. Sources say Meyssan will expand on that – though he will have not be testing this evidence with any form of independent verification.
Hezbollah has also been doing a good job of minding Meyssan from his new base in Beirut, in particular for his frequent forays, totalling six months, into Iran to write and research his book, as well as showing it chapter by chapter to his paymasters.
One feature which will remind those familiar with Meyssan style is that he will say the attack on the Lebanon prime minister as by a missile and not the car bomb which everyone else (excepting Hezbollah says). Mons Meyssan said that the Pentagon was hit by a missile and not by American Airlines 77 – this despite scores of witnesses to the crash.
Let us hope for Meyssan’s sake this account is not demolished in quite the same way that this last book was.
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AH on October 2, 2010 ·
I think not finding WMD was a surprise to the Bush Administration. Saddam’s actions in the 90’s (constantly blocking inspectors) and very faulty politically driven intelligence (from Chalabi and others) fueled a belief that WMD would be found after the invasion. That does not justify the poor intel and misinformation leading up to war, but I don’t think US went to war knowing with confidence that WMD did not exist.