25-Mar-10: A note on the difference between terrorism and anti-terrorism

Douglas Murray, writing in the UK Telegraph, asks a question that is on our minds too.

An Israeli diplomat expelled? But look who the British government won't get rid of…

By Douglas Murray
Last updated: March 23rd, 2010

So the British government has decided to expel an Israeli diplomat over the alleged forging of British passports relating to the assassination of a Hamas terrorist in Dubai on January 20. We are told that the British government believes British passport holders would be at risk as a result of the assassination of the Hamas terrorist.

So it is interesting to record just some of the people whom the British government will not expel and who it must therefore believe pose no threat whatsoever to British passport holders.

Abu Qatada: Known as Osama bin Laden’s ambassador to Europe. He has been in London since 1993. He came here on a forged UAE passport. In 1999 he was convicted in absentia in Jordan for conspiracy to cause explosions, relating to an attempted bomb attack on an American school and a car bomb explosion outside an Amman hotel that was frequented by tourists in 1998. He was also convicted in absentia of conspiracy to cause explosions at Western and Israeli targets in Jordan, to coincide with the millennium New Year celebrations.

Farj Hassan al-Saadi: entered the UK illegally in March 2002. He was added to the United Nations Sanctions Committee’s permanent register of al-Qaeda and Taliban members in November 2003. The Special Immigration Appeals Commission ruled that his cell ‘clearly was a group of men with extremist Islamist views supportive of violence against the West which had been acting together for some time in the ways we have set out including recruiting for Al Qaeda, raising money for terrorist activities and obtaining false documents for that purpose. This group can properly be regarded as a serious terrorist group’ and al-Saadi was ‘a highly respected member of the group and that he may well have been its leader for a while’. On 7 February 2008, he was found guilty in absentia in Italy of belonging to a terrorist group and being part of a terrorism plot in 2002. At the trial, he was described as the ‘European envoy’ of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the head of al-Qaeda in Iraq.

Ismail Kamoka: a member of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group who arrived in the UK in November 1994 from Saudi Arabia, claiming asylum. His claim was based on the fact that he could not return to Libya because he belonged to a group there which aimed to overthrow the government and replace it with an Islamist one. When attempting to claim asylum in the UK he said he had been to Pakistan in 1992 to take part in jihad against communists in Afghanistan. Despite having his asylum claim refused, he was not removed from the UK as it was deemed unsafe for him to return to Libya. He was granted leave to remain in the UK in November 1999. On 21 November 2002 Kamoka was arrested while trying to travel to Iran from London Heathrow. On 23 November he was detained under Section 21 of the Anti-Terrorism Crime and Security Act 2001 and was recommended for deportation. He successfully appealed this to the SIAC in 8 March 2004, as they were unconvinced that Kamoka was linked to al-Qaeda and had knowingly supported extremists linked to al-Qaeda. He was released on 18 March 2004 following a failed government appeal against the decision. In June 2007, he was convicted in the UK of terrorist offences.

I for one am deeply grateful to the UK government for their sudden concern for the sanctity of UK passports and the security of UK passport holders. Though it may be a little late in the day, has the Government thought about turning this concern towards people who actually are terrorists?

A few additional words now from us.

Mahmoud al-Mabhouh, a notorious agent and weapons dealer for the blood-drenched Hamas terror organization with a good deal of blood on his own two personal hands, led a nasty and brutish life up until its untimely end. Wikipedia has some of the highlights of his brilliant career in the murder of innocents here.

None of this, sadly but predictably, stops the late thuggish murderer being described variously as "a top official in Hamas" by TIME Magazine, as "a senior Palestinian political figure" by this Irish newspaper, as a "Palestinian activist" in this American article that pontificates about "the sanctity of life" (his life), and sickeningly as a"courageous military commander" by "the world's premier pan-Arab daily newspaper" Asharq Al-Awsat, published from Arab Press House, 184 High Holborn, London WC1V 7AP.

Feh.