Mi6 Asset & London Bombings: Interesting!!

[Larry O'Hara]

Yes, I noticed Loftus' shaky connection between Hamza & al Muhajaroun.

However, it is the case that if Aswat is MI6, then this story would not be widely followed up, & certainly not in the UK.

It is intriguing nonetheless that there is no campaign for his extradition.

Even if the story is 'disinformation' it was done for a reason: which might tell us something.

 

[TeeJay]

I suggest, before asking even more rhetorical questions, you look up

1) the Haroon thread alluded to by Bristle-KRS above

2) the Fox Report by John Loftus

Wow. I have just wasted maybe 30 minutes or more to discover:

1) there is no 'Haroon thread': he made some posts on a thread, all of which I had already read. I have now also read all of the links in those posts as well: http://www.urban75.net/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=3308178&postcount=984

2) there is no Fox Report by John Loftus available online. He was a guest on a show called 'The Heartland with John Kasich' on Saturday alongside a UK 'expert': http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,137768,00.html

Having read all the available information that you have alluded to, I haven't seen anything that makes me want to change anything I have said on this thread, and my questions still stand.

I am a bit mystified why you just sent me on a massive wild goose chase.

Any chance you can now address the points I have raised?

 

[DaveCinzano]

2) In my experience, stories that pop up in one major news outlet like this are and are not picked up - and a quick search reveals no other outlets picking it up - are frequently disinformation. They may be later reported under the "everyone is gossiping..." rubric.

the 'private eye' rule, surely - conduit for both disinfo and disclosed truth - ?

hmmm... need a think about that one, and to read the transcipt.

 

[Larry O'Hara]

Wow. I have just wasted maybe 15 minutes or more to discover:

1) there is no 'Haroon thread': he made some posts on a thread, all of which I had already read. I have now also read all of the links in those posts as well.

2) there is no Fox Report by John Loftus available online. He was a guest on a show called 'Heartland' on Saturday alongside a UK 'expert'

Having read all the available information that you have alluded to, I haven't seen anything that makes me want to change anything I have said on this thread, and my questions still stand.

I am a bit mystified why you just sent me on a massive wild goose chase.

Any chance you can now address the points I have raised?

1) Sorry re the word 'thread'--I meant contribution

2) the transcript of Loftus laptop has found.

3) I have addressed all your points, repeatedly, and you have not addressed mine. Is this your normal 'debating style' (rhetorical question).

Anyway, I'm now off to bed...

 

[DaveCinzano]

http://www.john-loftus.com

 

[laptop]

Now, it seems pointless to speculate too much on whose interests would be served by such disinformation. I do note from www.john-loftus.com that Loftus is a staunch defender of the State of Israel and a man very keen to come up with links between "Arabs" - including attempts to link Yassir Arafat and Saddam Hussein.

3) Loftus is no Rense. But he's keen to leap to conclusions:

[Aswat]'s on the watch list. The only reason he could get away with that was if he was working for British intelligence. He was a wanted man.

Er, no cock-up is possible?

4) Loftus says:

The Pakistanis arrest him. They jail him. He's released within 24 hours. Back to Southern Africa, goes to Zimbabwe and is arrested in Zambia.

Now, the Brits and the Pakistanis could be lying about the arrest being a case of mistaken identity. They could be lying about... anything. I cannot prove that Aswat was not an MI6 asset. But given this keenness to make links, leaping to the description "license" shows an even greater keenness to make links. Wild ones.

 

[TeeJay]

Sorry I didn't find that transcript Larry. You did say that

"...I have seen a clip from Fox TVs Security Correspondent John Loftus (30/7/05) arguing that Haroon Rashid Aswat named in the US (but not consistently here) as a key organiser in relation to the London bombings is in fact a protected MI6 asset..."

So naturally I looked for programmes dated 30th July, whereas laptops transcript is dated 29th July and has the interviewer named as Mike Jerrick, so obviously it was a different programme to the one I have mentioned above.

 

[TeeJay]

Apparently he entered through Felixstowe, stayed 2 weeks and left from Heathrow just before the 7/7 attacks.

(Somehow I doubt he was travelling on genuine documents)

 

[laptop]

Waa-hey!

Loftus touts himself as an ex-prosecutor of Nazi war criminals (complete with NATO Cosmic clearance). He reckons he should have had the chance to try Bush Sr & Jr and (posthumously? not checked dates) Joseph Kennedy for treason for their investments in Krupp, Thyssen und so weiter.

What's he got against the Brits, I wondered? The search engine on his site sucks. So I did

www.google.co.uk/search?q=site:www.john-loftus.com+british

and got this gem:

[Article by Sheikh Professor Abdul Hadi Palazzi on Loftus' site]

The main instrument for the "Wahhabisation" of Arab society was an organization called Ikhwan al-Muslimun (the Muslim Brotherhood). The Brotherhood's founder was Hasan al-Bannah, an elementary school teacher from Ismailiyyah who became one of the leaders of pro-British Masonry (United Lodge of England, Mother of the World) in Egypt.

http://www.john-loftus.com/palazzi.asp

Oooh. Perfidious Brits. Masons. Are you thinking what I'm thinking?

Yes! The editor of Lyndon Larouche's Executive Intelligence Review claims that Loftus's book The Secret War Against the Jews (the Joe Kennedy=Nazi one) plaigarised him.

And Anti-Defamation League director Abraham Foxman called Loftus' book "so exaggerated, so scantily documented, so overwrought and convoluted in its presentation, that Loftus and Aarons render laughable their claim to offer 'a glimpse of the world as it really is'."

Loftus is much, much more eloquent than your average fruitloop, but when the ADL condemn someone's "exposé" of a "conspiracy against the Jews" in those terms...

It's been a mildly entertaining excursion into new fields of conspiranoiditude. That's the only value of this thread. Larry, if you're so keen to make connections that you don't do this basic sceptical reasearch into sources, you are on the brink of losing it big time.

 

[DaveCinzano]

bit of an update on media reports on haroon:

ft (1/8/05) (peter spiegel & tony barber)

Although police would not say how far they had come to finding links to those higher up the chain, they sought to play down the role of Haroon Rashid Aswat, a Briton of Indian descent who was arrested last month in Zambia and once suspected of having a co-ordinating role. Zambian officials have agreed to extradite Mr Aswat, whose telephone reportedly received calls from the July 7 bombers, but British officials said they were no longer interested in interrogating him.

guardian (2/8/05) (richard norton-taylor)

Senior counter-terrorist officials insist there is no evidence of a single mastermind responsible for the July 7 bombings in London and July 21's failed attacks. They dismiss reports that Haroon Rashid Aswat, held in Zambia, was behind the attacks. Aswat grew up in Dewsbury, West Yorkshire, the home of Mohammad Sidique Khan, one of the July 7 bombers.

guardian (1/8/05) (duncan campbell & richard norton-taylor)

British officials said yesterday there was no evidence of a link between the man and the July 7 and 21 attacks, they do not want the US to remove him for questioning unless he is to stand trial for specific offences in America.

Haroon Rashid Aswat... was detained in Lusaka 10 days ago on the request of US authorities investigating an alleged al-Qaida training camp in Oregon. He has yet to see British officials, despite repeated requests.

...Counter-terrorism officials said Mr Aswat was "of interest" to them, but there was no evidence linking him either to the July 7 or July 21 attacks. They are irritated by repeated suggestions in the US that he was connected to the bombings. They described Mr Aswat as "a separate individual of interest in his own right".

Police sources have also played down suggestions that Mr Aswat was involved.

ft (1/8/05) (michael bleby & peter spiegel)

Peter Mumba, Zambia's permanent secretary for home affairs, said Mr Aswat, who is being held in Lusaka, has admitted ties to al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden under interrogation but has not acknowledged any links to the London bombings.

...British authorities have sought to play down Mr Aswat's links to the London bombings, which are reported to include calls from the July 7 bombers to a telephone registered in Mr Aswat's name. Like three of the bombers, Mr Aswat is from the Leeds area.

...US officials are believed to be more interested in talking to Mr Aswat, however.

...Mr Mumba would not say which countries aided in Mr Aswat's capture but local media quoted Zambian police as crediting the US Federal Bureau of Investigation and Central Intelligence Agency.

Officials at the US embassy in Lusaka declined to comment but any participation by the FBI and CIA would give further credence to British accounts that Mr Aswat is of more interest to US than UK authorities.

if nothing else it's all jolly confusing!

i mean, the americans are ramping him up like he's carlos the jackal, and connecting him in to abu hamza, yet all the reports seem to show the uk keen to brush him under the carpet.

who started mentioning him as the 'mastermind' of *deep breath* 7/7? and has anyone spotted whether he was 'named' initially as the mystery man in pakistan?

the ujaama/oregon stuff looks like it might be interesting to wade through, if anyone has the time - with a dab of the o'hara enthusiasm and a soupçon of laptopian caution

 

[TeeJay]

If someone enters the country under a false identity, quietly makes contact with people who are not suspected of having links or being any kind of serious threat and then leaves again, how does Loftus jump from this to saying 'he was on a watchlist so MI6 must have let him in' (paraphrased)?

Even if he doesn't have an agenda, doesn't he make his living off colourful speculation and repeating gossip fed to him from his 'inside sources'. Maybe he likes the income, attention and feeling like he is 'in the loop', but has to keep feeding people this 'juicy' stuff to maintain momentum? It doesn't look like the people who he feeds this stuff to bring him up short on the details of this stuff, but then again we are talking about FOX news here ffs!

edit: Hmmm, I really wish I hadn't just spent the last x hours pursuing this...

 

[DaveCinzano]

And Anti-Defamation League director Abraham Foxman called Loftus' book "so exaggerated, so scantily documented, so overwrought and convoluted in its presentation, that Loftus and Aarons render laughable their claim to offer 'a glimpse of the world as it really is'."

interesting that loftus donates money to b'nai b'rith

 

[DaveCinzano]

edit: Hmmm, I really wish I hadn't just spent the last x hours pursuing this...

well, the haroon story is interesting, regardless of the loftus version.

 

[DaveCinzano]

Loftus touts himself as an ex-prosecutor of Nazi war criminals...

a bit of idle googling shows that loftus is no stranger to tv camera-induced hyperbole - here's a snippet from a transcript of a 1987 appearance on a news piece on chicago's wmaq on links between the contras and fascists:

Backing the ABN is like hiring the Ku Klux Klan to be your consultant for school desegregation. Anyone who allows their name to be affiliated with the ABN...is going to be terribly embarrassed.

link ('abn' = 'anti-bolshevik bloc of nations')

in that transcript, loftus is described as "former investigator for the justice department. for two years he tracked down alleged nazis living in america."

bear in mind that the alex constantine site styles itself 'political conspiracy research bin'

 

[TeeJay]

Yeah true... I started off excited - its just that nasty feeling I get after looking at FOX news for even a short amount of time I suppose, combined with that feeling you get after reading some of Dr Jazzz's links and realising yet again that you should have trusted your better judgement and avoided clicking...

 

[DaveCinzano]

cnn is reporting that the zambian authorities have agree to extradite haroon rashid aswat to the u.k., but that they are delaying it to allow the f.b.i. to continue interrogating him.

the report also notes:

A spokesman for the British Foreign Ministry said British officials have not had consular access to Aswat to check his identity, his health, his conditions of incarceration, and whether he needs a lawyer.

The Foreign Ministry spokeswoman said if there were an interrogation ongoing in Zambia, British officials were not part of it.

 

[scalyboy]

well, infowars is run by alex jones, who broke into bohemian grove with jon ronson, who in the course of writing 'them' and making his tv series had a close relationship with abu hamza (iirc), who - if the oregon allegations are true - was involved with haroon...

small world innit!

AFAIK It wasn't Abu Hamza (the hook feller) who Jon Ronson interviewed for 'Them', it was Omar Bakri Mohammed, the 'Tottenham ayatollah'. He was connected with al-Muhajiroun, and had offices at the Finsbury Park mosque. Confusing, since Abu Hamza was also associated with the FP mosque...

 

[DaveCinzano]

AFAIK It wasn't Abu Hamza (the hook feller) who Jon Ronson interviewed for 'Them', it was Omar Bakri Mohammed, the 'Tottenham ayatollah'. He was connected with al-Muhajiroun, and had offices at the Finsbury Park mosque. Confusing, since Abu Hamza was also associated with the FP mosque...

phew, looks like jones is off the hook then

 

[rednblack]

AFAIK It wasn't Abu Hamza (the hook feller) who Jon Ronson interviewed for 'Them', it was Omar Bakri Mohammed, the 'Tottenham ayatollah'. He was connected with al-Muhajiroun, and had offices at the Finsbury Park mosque. Confusing, since Abu Hamza was also associated with the FP mosque...

not just connected, he was the leader - and he ordered the disbanding of al-muhj

 

[bigfish]

There's a good outline of all of this here: British government saves Briton from "extraordinary rendition" by the U.S..

Conclusions

The story of Haroon Rashid Aswat is certainly one to follow. Whether he is an al-Qaeda mastermind terrorist, as so many media accounts have urged, or a British agent, as the Times of London has ever so subtly suggested, will probably be known only by inferences we can make from the disposition of the case after Aswat has been returned to Britain.

The repeated British denials of the seriousness of Aswat's complicity in the bombings suggest that Aswat may be an agent. After all, if he is an agent, they can hardly put him away in Belmarsh Prison for the rest of his life, so he will have to be in some sense exonerated.

On the other hand, if Aswat is an agent, you have to wonder why the British didn't simply inform the Americans and ask them to back off, though there is an easy answer to that. British and American intelligence agencies have a long history of mistrust, and this may be just one more example.

Since the U.S. appears to have been the instigator of Aswat's arrest, it is not inconceivable that it has once again blown apart a British investigation.

 

[TeeJay]

I've read your link and it is pretty good. Although re. this point:

The repeated British denials of the seriousness of Aswat's complicity in the bombings suggest that Aswat may be an agent.

The repeated British denials of the seriousness of Aswat's complicity in the bombings may simply suggest that while Aswat may have 'connections' with people who have committed crimes he might not have actually been directly involved in anything himself and may not have actually committed any criminal acts. I can't see any concrete evidence being presented. Is it enough to accuse someone of being an MI6 asset and have it denied? Or to claim they were involved with the 7/7 and 21/7 (without actually providing any evidence of this) and have it denied? How does a denial 'suggest' anything at all?

 

[scalyboy]

His 28 days' remand period is due to elapse on 8th September
according to the BBC, so it might be worth keeping an eye on the news this Thursday/Friday to see what transpires.

 

[scalyboy]

BBC is today reporting that he remains on remand whilst the US extradition case is put together.

So, does this mean that the UK polices are satisfied he is not connected to the 7th July bombings? It was widely reported that he had left the UK on the 6th, and that 20 phone calls to 2 of the bombers were logged on his mobile, (see Wikipedia) - were these reports untrue to begin with, or has he provided them with a satisfactory explanation?

 

[TeeJay]

I think I read somewhere (sorry no links) that the calls logged were simply made to the same *areas* - ie Leeds and/or the other place - not actually to the specific phone numbers as first reported. If so this would be an *extremely* tenuous connection - maybe something that would make the intelligence services suspicious and probably enough to hold for questioning, but not enough to arrest/charge/prosecute etc.

edit: Just had a look to see if I could find this...

all I've got is:

"But British investigators, examining whether telephone calls were made between the London bombers and Aswat before the attacks of 7/7, caution that the calls may have been made to a phone linked to Aswat, rather than the man himself."

and

"This weekend it appears that several calls from Aswat’s mobile telephone were made to the bombers in the days before the attacks. It is likely that the American National Security Agency — which has a powerful eavesdropping network — was monitoring the calls. If contacts between the bombers and Aswat are proved, it could be a painful blow for British security officials."

from: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2087-1715122,00.html

I don't really have much to go on but this whole 'mobile phone' thing sounds a bit ... flakey.

For a start they can't seem to decide if the calls came *from* the phone or were made *to* the phone (although this might just be sloppy reporting). It is also not clear who exactly was monitoring these calls - was it phone records from the 7/7 bombers, Aswat's phone or both? Is it US or UK records, someone else (eg SA) - or all of them? Might the records consist of exactly the type of 'inadmissable' phone-tap evidence that Charles Clarke is arguing about with the intelligence services?