Happy New Year, Everyone!
I made a new year's resolution to sit "idly by", reading these threads,but not posting. Move along, folks, because it turns out there is nothing to see here,
except an expose on a bit of amateurish, winger propaganda.
Ustwo, I read your new "sig", and I have to conclude that your authorship of this thread belies your admitted "agenda" here.
The poorly researched, inaccurate, and misleading premise and evidence posted in the thread starter, prompted me to break my resolution. There is is no accurate rationale for this thread to exist:
<b>(1)</b>"powerline" (and Ustwo) don't tell you that the allegedly "ignored" story, is nearly identical, down to the arrest of one of the same three Algerians, as a Nov. 17, 2005 "story" that was well reported in the U.S. press.
It is obvious that editors, if they caught the subtle difference, at all, would decide that the American public did not have the span of attention neccessary to sort out that one of the same three Algerians, and two new names, were again arrested in Italy in a similar, but different "sketchy" terrorist investigation....so they didn't cover it again on Dec. 23......
The Origin of the Argument Was Highlighted by the Propaganda Site:
Quote:
http://powerlineblog.com/archives/012808.php
January 11, 2006
Meanwhile, There's A War On
We noted here the mysteriously under-covered story of the three would-be terrorists who were arrested in Italy after vowing to launch an attack on America that would dwarf September 11. A reader sent us a link to this article, which has more:
The mainstream U.S. media outlets have failed to report a major terrorist plot against the U.S. - because it would tend to support President Bush's use of NSA domestic surveillance, according to media watchdog groups.
News of a planned attack masterminded by three Algerians operating out of Italy was widely reported outside the U.S., but went virtually unreported in the American media.
Italian authorities recently announced that they had used wiretaps to uncover the conspiracy to conduct a series of major attacks inside the U.S. Italian Interior Minister Giuseppe Pisanu said the planned attacks would have targeted stadiums, ships and railway stations, and the terrorists' goal, he said, was to exceed the devastation caused by 9/11.
Italian authorities stepped up their internal surveillance programs after July's terrorist bombings in London. Their domestic wiretaps picked up phone conversations by Algerian Yamine Bouhrama that discussed terrorist attacks in Italy and abroad.
<b>Italian authorities arrested Bouhrama on November 15 and he remains in prison. Authorities later arrested two other men, Achour Rabah and Tartaq Sami, who are believed to be Bouhrama's chief aides in planning the attacks.</b> The arrests were a major coup for Italian anti-terror forces, and the story was carried in most major newspapers from Europe to China.
"U.S. terror attacks foiled," read the headline in England's Sunday Times. In France, a headline from Agence France Presse proclaimed, "Three Algerians arrested in Italy over plot targeting U.S."
<b>Curiously, what was deemed worthy of a worldwide media blitz abroad was virtually ignored by the U.S. media, and conservative media watchdog groups are saying that is no accident.</b>
"My impression is that the major media want to use the NSA story to try and impeach the president," says Cliff Kincaid, editor of the Accuracy in Media Report published by the grassroots Accuracy in Media organization.
"If you remind people that terrorists actually are planning to kill us, that tends to support the case made by President Bush. They will ignore any issue that shows that this kind of [wiretapping] tactic can work in the war on terror."
The Associated Press version of the story did not disclose that the men planned to target the U.S. Nor did it report that the evidence against the suspects was gathered via a wiretapping surveillance operation.
<b>Furthermore, only one American newspaper, the Philadelphia Inquirer, is known to have published the story that the AP distributed.</b> It ran on page A-6 under the headline "Italy Charges 3 Algerians." The Inquirer report also made no mention of the plot to target the U.S. - although foreign publications included this information in the headlines and lead sentences of their stories. Nor did it advise readers that domestic wiretaps played a key role in nabbing the suspected terrorists.
One obvious question media critics are now raising: Did the American media intentionally ignore an important story because it didn't fit into their agenda of attacking President George Bush for using wiretapping to spy on potential terrorists in the U.S.?.......
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<b>(2)</b> Some falsehoods that formed the basis for the "powerline hit piece", excerpted above, are highlighted in bold type.
The "story" in the thread starter, is dated Dec. 23, 2005, from a South African source. <b>"powerline" ignores another possibility.....the "story" that they accuse the U.S. press of ignoring or suppressing, is too similar to the Nov. 17, 2005 "story", that was well reported, and included the name of one of the same three Algerians as the Dec. 23, story reports.</b>
<b>(3)</b>The truth, backed by the following links and excerpts, demonstrates that the nearly identical "story" was reasonably well covered in the American press and news wire services, when it was first reported, on November 17, 2005....and, to a lesser extent, again....on Dec. 23, 2005:
Quote:
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/...d/3545741.html
Dec. 23, 2005, 8:27PM
Italian Police Arrest Three Algerians
© 2005 The Associated Press
ROME — Police in southern Italy arrested three Algerians Friday on international terrorism charges and accused them of planning attacks in Iraq and Italy, police and the Interior Ministry said.....
Italian Police Arrest Three Algerians
ROME -- Police in southern Italy arrested three Algerians Friday on international
terrorism charges and accused ... Italian Police Arrest Three Algerians ...
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...122301575.html
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Quote:
http://msnbc.msn.com/id/10080870/
Updated: 10:13 a.m. ET Nov. 17, 2005
Italy arrests Algerians suspected of terror links
Police believe three men were planning attack outside Italy.....
....Italy on raised alert
The news agencies ANSA and Apcom <b>identified the three as Yamine Bouhrama, Khaled Serai and Mohamed Larbi.</b> ANSA said Bouhrama and Serai had lived in Norway with false documents obtained in France.....
.......<b>Italian authorities have arrested many suspects on the international terrorism charge since it was introduced.
Most suspects have been acquitted, or convicted on lesser charges such as assisting illegal immigration and dealing in false documents.</b>
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Quote:
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/...8DU8I500.shtml
Italy Arrests 3 Algerian Terror Suspects....
ROME, Nov. 17, 2005
(AP) Authorities have arrested three Algerians believed to have links to an Algerian militant group that has allied itself with Osama bin Laden, police said Thursday.
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Quote:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...1702044_2.html
NAPLES -- Italian police arrested three Algerians suspected of being Islamic extremists with links to international terrorism. Police said the three men, identified as Yamine Bouhrama, Khaled Serai and Mohamed Larbi, were believed to be "potentially operative" and ready to carry out a strike.
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Quote:
http://www.boston.com/news/world/eur...pects_sources/
Italy arrests 3 Algerian terror suspects: sources
By Laura Viggiano | November 17, 2005
NAPLES, Italy (Reuters) - Italian police have arrested three Algerians suspected of being Islamic extremists with links to international terrorism, but a government source said on Thursday no attack was planned in Italy.
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Quote:
<b>CNN, on Nov., 17, 2005:</b>
http://edition.cnn.com/2005/US/11/17...day/index.html
Italy detains 3 Algerians on terrorism charges
ROME (CNN) -- Italy's military police have detained three Algerian nationals believed to be connected to a militant group with ties to al Qaeda, authorities said.
The three suspects -- Yamine Bouhrama, Kalhed Serai and Mohamed Larbi -- are in their early 30s, police said. Bouhrama is being detained in Naples, while Serai and Larbi are detained in Brescia. Italian media reported the three were "potential operatives ready to carry out (suicide) attacks." When asked by CNN to confirm the reports, authorities would not. The Italian daily La Republica said the planned attack was outside Italy.
The men are being held on suspicion of association with the aim of international terrorism -- charges put in place after the terrorist attacks on the United States on Sept. 11, 2001. The commander told CNN that a judge is expected to confirm...
<b>CNN on Dec. 23, 2005:</b>
http://edition.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/eu....arrests.reut/
Italy arrests suspected extremists
Friday, December 23, 2005 Posted: 1219 GMT (2019 HKT)
ROME, Italy (Reuters) -- Italian police arrested three Algerians on Friday who are suspected of being members of an extremist group with links to al Qaeda, a police spokesman said.
The men are being held in the southern port city of Naples on suspicion of breaching international terrorism laws and carrying false documents, the spokesman said.
He added that magistrates believed they were part of a cell set up by the Algerian Salafist movement, which has links with Osama bin Laden's Al Qaeda group.
<b>Friday's arrests followed the detention last month of three other Algerians suspected of contact with the Salafist movement.</b>
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Quote:
http://www.salon.com/wire/ap/archive...D8DU68OG0.html
Italy Arrests Three Terror Suspects
- - - - - - - - - - - -
By AIDAN LEWIS Associated Press Writer
November 17,2005 | ROME --
Authorities have arrested three Algerians believed to have links to an Algerian militant group that has allied itself with Osama bin Laden, police said Thursday.
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<b>....and....here's a third, Dec, 2005 article, reporting on an entirely different set of three Algerians. All three groups are linked to the "Salafist Group". I submit that these reports end up being treated as "noise", not news.</b>
Quote:
http://www.wpmi.com/news/world/story...6-D8B7536EF6EC
Spanish judge charges three Algerians with collaborating with Islamic extremists
Last Update: 12/13/2005 8:50:22 PM
MADRID, Spain (AP) - A Spanish judge filed charges against three men suspected of financing and providing logistical support for an Algerian Islamic extremist group with suspected links to al-Qaida, court officials said Tuesday.
The three Algerians, among seven people arrested last week in Spain's Costa del Sol region, were charged with collaborating with an armed group and ordered them jailed, the court said.
An Algerian woman was released without charge. The three other suspects - an ethnic Albanian from Kosovo, an Algerian man and a Spanish woman - are still being questioned, officials said.
Authorities believe the suspects aided an Algerian-based Islamic extremist organization, the Salafist Group for Call and Combat, which has declared allegiance to al-Qaida. The insurgent group has battled Algeria's government since 1992, when the military canceled legislative elections that religious parties appeared set to win....
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