Deccan Mujahideen Debut In India While PAD Holds Thailand Hostage

BossKitty is relieved to announce that fellow Blogger, Political Wil of International Political Will, is safe in Mumbai!

“… we live about 10 km from the area – it’s primarily a tourist/rich area that has been attacked, though the main train station is used by everyone.”

This may be the terror event that describes the end of the Bush Era.  So far, there has been no obvious event on US soil.  But the impact of targeting westerners, specifically US and Britains, brings Bush policy back into play.  All we have heard from the White House is condemnation for the attacks.

Bush has conveniently packaged anyone who commits a terrorist act as people who “Hate America’s Freedom”.  How deceiving.  These are desperate people who think they have to kill and destroy to have their voices heard about some disparity or issue.

Unfortunately, political or religious movements hire and train criminals and thugs to do their dirty work.  Each act of terrorism has a motivation or message behind it.  Seldom is that motivation or message headlined, only the act of terror itself gets play. Such counterproductive results only frustrates the message and the messenger.  The victims have to invent a reason to justify their own retaliation.  Usually, the victims end up perpetrating their own terror. The ‘shotgun’ approach to retaliation only creates more reasons for some group to resort to terror acts. There are terror acts related to Kashmir in India and terror acts in Thailand related to removing the controversial government.

Mumbai: Hostages freed as PM blames ‘outsiders’

Mumbai’s night of terror

A previously unknown group calling itself the Deccan Mujahideen has claimed responsibility, but correspondents say this could be a hoax or an assumed name for another group.

CNN:

• Group calling itself the Deccan Mujahideen has claimed responsibility for attacks
  
• Analysts do not know who the Deccan Mujahideen are affiliated with
• India ranks among the countries where terrorism is most common
• Deccan Mujahideen took credit in e-mails sent to several Indian news outlets

CNN:

• “This is a global problem,” author Deepak Chopra says
• Barack Obama must use chance to get Muslims’ help, he says
• Officials must not go after the wrong people, Chopra says

Analysts do not know who the Deccan Mujahideen are affiliated with, whether they are new or the offshoot of an old group.

India ranks among the countries where terrorism is most common, according to the U.S. State Department. And cross-pollination among various terror groups in south Asia makes it difficult to separate them, they say.

Both the intelligence community in India and the United States think the Deccan Mujahideen may be affiliated with one of two organizations that have carried out attacks in India in the past: the Indian Mujahideen and Lashkar-e-Tayyiba.

Officially, the Indian authorities are saying no one has claimed responsibility for Wednesday’s attacks which killed at least 101 people, including foreigners. The Deccan Mujahideen took credit in e-mails sent to several Indian news outlets.

Deccan refers to the Deccan Plateau that makes up the majority of the southern part of the country. ‘Deccan’ is an Anglicized form of ‘dakkhin’ which means south.

Mujahideen translates into ‘those engaged in the struggle for Jihad.’ While ‘Jihad’ in Islam can mean any endeavor that requires dedication, the term has taken on a militant tone in recent years.

International hot lines

Australia: Department of Foreign Affairs offers these numbers: In Australia: 1-800-002 214. Australians overseas, call 61 2 6261-3305.

India: JJ Hospital, 91 22 2373-5555; St. George Hospital (Dr. Ashok Shinde), 91 98 6905-0622; Police control room, 91 22 2262-5020, 91 22 2262-1855

UK: The British Ministry of Foreign Affairs is directing concerned UK nationals to call 44 (0)20 7008-0000

U.S.: The State Department has established a Consular Call Center: The number is 888-407-4747.

Friends say rabbi, wife held hostage

A 29-year-old Brooklyn rabbi and his wife were believed to be among the foreigners held hostage by the terrorists that struck Mumbai, friends said early Thursday.

Gunmen seized the Mumbai headquarters of the Orthodox Jewish outreach group Chabad Lubavitch, run by Rabbi Gavriel Holtzberg and his wife, Rivka, according to media reports.

Shots were heard coming from the building.

“Our prayers are focused on Rabbi Holtzberg and all of those who are going through this ordeal,” said Chabad spokesman Rabbi Zalman Shmotkin. “They are extremely caring people, both of them,” he said of the Holtzbergs, who live in Crown Heights.

The New York-based group’s Web site said that Holtzberg had been in touch with the Israeli Consulate, but that the line was cut during the conversation and that “no further contact has since been established.”

India TV reported that the terrorists threw a grenade at a gas pump located in a station next to the synagogue. They then stormed the center and took people hostage.

A woman who ran out of the center said she was a cook at the synagogue and that five or six terrorists were still holding hostages.

“Far as we know, it is still under siege,” Shmotkin said.

India’s Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, “…the attacks as “well-planned and well-orchestrated… intended to create a sense of panic by choosing high profile targets and indiscriminately killing foreigners.”

Manmohan Singh blamed militant groups based in India’s neighbors — usually meaning Pakistan — raising fears of renewed tension between the nuclear-armed rivals.

At the same time … Thailand crashes and burns

BANGKOK – Thailand‘s political conflict reached a point of no return on late Tuesday when anti-government protesters, led by the Bangkok, Thailand, led by the People’s Alliance for Democracy (PAD), besieged and closed down Bangkok’s international airport. Flights were canceled, passengers stranded and the embattled and deeply divided nation is symbolically cut off from the outside world.

The protest group has vowed to maintain its position until Prime Minister Somchai Wongsawat, who was scheduled to land at the airport on his return from an international meeting in Peru, dissolved his People’s Power Party-led (PPP) government and stepped down from power.

Thai PM declares emergency at airports amid coup talk

– When Thailand’s Constitution Court finally rules on whether or not to dissolve the ruling People’s Power Party (PPP) and two of its junior coalition partners on electoral fraud charges, there is a chance that the long-awaited decision sets in motion a concatenation of court-endorsed events that overhauls the country’s politics and bids to bring its dangerously escalating political conflict to a conclusive end.

Thai ministers’ plane makes emergency landing: air force

BANGKOK – AN AIRCRAFT taking Thai ministers to a northern city for an urgent cabinet meeting Thursday made an emergency landing in Bangkok after developing a technical problem, the air force said.The ministers were flying to Chiang Mai to meet Prime Minister Somchai Wongsawat after anti-government protesters seized a second Bangkok airport, effectively isolating the capital from the rest of the world.

Today, it appears that anyone seeking revenge or retaliation for some disparity or ignored cause must get support, training and weapons from Al Qaeda.  It also appears that Al Qaeda has marketed itself to many different political groups as their corporate mentor, selling franchises.

Sophisticated Attacks, but Al Qaeda Link Disputed

Experts debate India attack al-Qaida link

The exchange of technology, weapons and structured planning has roots in the global weapons industry who profits from each terror event that occurs.  No longer happy to just start wars, weapons traders are discounting their wares to small factions, hoping to instigate larger conflicts.  Unfortunately, the USA and China top the list of weapons manufacturers and mercenary corporations (Blackwater, etc).  Hopefully, the new American President will put restrictions on the US black market trade in destruction and terror.  This may result in less backlash from global victims of this horrible business.  The US must remove it’s head from it’s butt and take responsibility for it’s weapons trade policies. Step ONE is acknowleging resposibility.