(BREAKING) ARABIC TAPE AND DETONATORS FOUND IN VAN IN MADRID - SPANISH MINISTER

Reuters ^ | 11 march, 2004 | Skynews

[Eurotwit]

Sky News just reported that a Spanish minister has just announced that an arabic tape (?) and detontator where found in a van in Madrid.

[Lonesome in Massachussets]

Shouldn't that stamp read "0 sense", not "0 cents"?

[Dog]

ETA never hits civilians....and they have never pulled off this size attack....EVER.

10 bombs went off and that isn't including the bomb the Spanish found... before they detonated.

[Petronski]

(Expect Reuters to run a story incorporating that theme before noon tomorrow.)

They have software that writes those stories automatically.

[Fedora]

Bin Laden's Terror Networks in Europe (Long but informative)

The Mackenzie Institute ^ | May 26, 2002 | Emerson Vermaat

[SNIP]

4. Spain, Italy and the Balkans

The closeness of Spain and Portugal to North Africa make them important targets for illegal migrants seeking entry into the European Union. Spain accuses the Moroccan police of cooperating with migrant traffickers who pay corrupt officials to turn a blind eye. Spanish authorities now speak of an invasion. [ 66 ] Moroccan criminal networks in Spain are involved in money-laundering, and trafficking in drugs and human beings.

Increasingly, Spain faces the problem of young North African and Arab immigrants using its territory as a meeting place for staging terrorist attacks elsewhere. Spain is considered a safe haven for terrorists where the risks of police interference are minimal. Spanish police estimate that about two hundred Islamic extremists with ties to eighteen terrorist groups entered Spain in 2000. [ 67 ] While French security and intelligence services have gathered detailed information on Islamist terrorist networks for more than two decades, the Spanish services are still poorly equipped to face a problem that is relatively new to them. For years, their focus has been on the homegrown terrorism of the Basque separatist movement ETA.

Spanish authorities now fear that the Islamist and Basque radicals have formed an alliance of sorts. Some ETA terrorists visited the same Middle Eastern training camps as a number of Islamic extremists. Representatives from ETA and Osama Bin Laden reportedly met in Brussels, but there were frictions after the Islamic fundamentalists refused to continue the meeting in the presence of a Basque woman who preferred to stay. Spanish sources claim that Mohammed Atta, the suicide pilot from Hamburg who was the first to fly into the World Trade Center in New York, also tried to forge links between al-Qaeda and ETA terrorists. [ 68 ] Just before Christmas 1999, ETA planned an attack on the Picasso Tower in Madrid. The American architect of the Picasso Tower was Minoru Yamasaki, who also designed the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in Manhattan; but it is not clear whether ETA got the idea from Muslim extremists. [ 69 ] What is known is that al-Qaeda cells in Europe, the United States and Canada planned terrorist attacks around Christmas 1999 and the subsequent Millennium celebrations.

Atta in Spain

[BIG SNIP--see original link for much more info on Al Qaeda in Spain]

[el_texicano]

Al Queda is really doing the Bush campaign a great service by pointing up the fallicies of Kerry's comments that the threat of terrorism has been "exaggerated"....

I just hope the Bush people will take this and literally hammer Kerry with it. It's long time past to get seriously negative with this pathetic lightweight gigilo...

[KQQL]

http://0cents.com

they have 10 more stamps of hanoi john..it's a neat site....they sell stamps

[Travis McGee]

An identical detonator (I read as blasting cap) would be a proof of authenticity for the Islamic letter claiming credit.

[BOBTHENAILER]

the 101'st is ready.

al Qaeda just claimed credit for the Madrid bombing in a London Arabic newspaper.

101st will visit them soon.

[Travis McGee]

ETA is a standalone organization that does not need resources from anyone. the ETA cause is independence for the Basque region of Spain, they have no religious issues.

This time, we agree 100%, amigo mio.

[ex 98C MI Dude]

As we suspected, terrorists of a feather flock together.

It is becoming more difficult for AQ to make hits on their chosen targets, so they convinced ETA to act out of character and hit civilian targets. The Basques had gotten hammered by the police of late, so they might have needed to import talent to pull this off.

Disturbing thought, that...

[Shermy]

How about some words about Spain (Andalusia) from Zawahiri himself:

"...In the face of this alliance, a fundamentalist coalition is taking shape. It is made up of the jihad movements in the various lands of Islam as well as the two countries that have been liberated in the name of jihad for the sake of God (Afghanistan and Chechnya).

If this coalition is still at an early stage, its growth is increasingly and steadily accelerating.

It represents a growing power that is rallying under the banner of jihad for the sake of God and operating outside the scope of the new world order. It is free of the servitude for the dominating western empire. It promises destruction and ruin for the new Crusades against the lands of Islam. It is ready for revenge against the heads of the world's gathering of infidels, the United States, Russia, and Israel. It is anxious to seek retribution for the blood of the martyrs, the grief of the mothers, the deprivation of the orphans, the suffering of the detainees, and the sores of the tortured people throughout the land of Islam, from Eastern Turkestan to Andalusia [Islamic state in Spain].

This age is witnessing a new phenomenon that continues to gain ground. It is the phenomenon of the mujahid youths who have abandoned their families, country, wealth, studies, and jobs in search of jihad arenas for the sake of God.

B. There is no solution without jihad: ..."

http://www.fas.org/irp/world/para/ayman_bk.html

[Diddle E. Squat]

So perhaps they got AQ assistance to pull off this scale attack?

Right now I'm not jumping to any conclusions one way or the other regarding ETA involvement. But I give very little credence to all these simplistic statements that 'The ETA denies responsibilities'(naw, murderers would never lie), 'The ETA doesn't target civilians, 'doesn't go after big targets', etc. The ETA WAS connected to 1000lbs of explosives the Spanish uncovered a month ago, they do have ties to all sorts of other terrorist organization, and like I said, there is no honor among thieves.

[Eurotwit]

ABDEL BARI ATWAN, editor of al Quds, saying that Al Qaeda letter states: We have infiltrated the heart of crusader Europe.

[xusafflyer]

Spain has supported the US when all the cowards of Europe (UK/Denmark exception of course) wanted to crawl on their knees to the terrorists.

Its time for the US to support Spain and help remove the animals responsible.

I have no doubt we will find the bomb trail. If ETA is involved, they better prepare for the butt kicking of their life.

If AlQaida is responsible, I think 2 more countries should return to the stone age for this attack. Syria and Iran, I'm looking your way.

[Eurotwit]

They refer to the bombings as OPERATION DEATH TRAIN

[Eurotwit]

They refer to the bombings as OPERATION DEATH TRAIN

[LdSentinal]

Don't forget.

Ho Chi Kerry called Spain part of the "fraudulent coalition."

[RUCKUS INC.]

What do you mean "return" to the stone age???

[Rockitz]

didn't think that "Basque" story was going to last very long

Agreed. The simultaneous orchestration just didn't argue for a Spanish source, albeit Basque. Things get done when they get done in Spain. Ask anyone who's visited.

[cyncooper]

Before the Iraq ground war started, it was Prime Minister Aznar of *Spain* who joined PM Blair and President Bush in the Azores.

They have been our true and loyal ally.

Perhaps you weren't aware.

And now they are victims of a horrendous attack by none other than Al Qaeda.