More on Awlaki

Since my last post on the Anwar Al-Awlaki issue, there were a couple of attempts to keep the story going.

Tom Harris, MP for Glasgow South, posted up a number of comments that Awlaki made in the last year or so, and tried to make something of the fact I’ve only spoken up now against him.

Simple answer to this – unlike Harris, I’m not an Anwar Awlaki anorak. I blogged briefly back in 2006 that his detention in Yemen seemed wrong. It was in the context of a time when there was regular news of Muslims being incarcerated in 'black sites' without trial. Al-Awlaki was actually then subsequently released after around a year I believe. The US has not sought his extradition on this 9/11 link either.

Just because I posted something years ago doesn’t make me part of his fan club, and I admit to not keeping an index of my old blog posts with anyone I’ve ever mentioned crossreferenced with their future utterings across all media, blogs and YouTube to keep track of who I should be making a point of condemning.

It’s all pretty cheap stuff, but what we’ve come to expect from Labour in terms of attempted smears (see attacks on David Kerr for being in Opus Dei for example). My record on terrorism is that I’ve always condemned it. No one can say otherwise. I’ve organised demonstrations against it. Harris doesn’t really make any point countering this except hoping mud sticks through innuendo.

Maybe Harris feels the need to do this given his constituency party has received funds from the Muslim Friends of Labour, run by my opponent Mohammad Sarwar in Glasgow Central. Rather than blogging about me though and worrying about the position in the next constituency, I’d suggest Harris concentrate on my fellow SNP candidate Malcolm Fleming who is similarly in a good position to beat him in Glasgow South. The SNP gave Labour a good pasting in his constituency at the Euros in June.

Meanwhile, Alexander Meleagrou-Hitchens has now uncovered material from Al-Awlaki pre-2006 - before my comments. He says therefore at the very least my research is lousy. He gets paid to sit there all day every day digging up this kind of thing, yet he and his colleagues needed not one, not two, but three bites of the cherry in a week to uncover or be passed this information. It’s therefore not surprising I didn’t know about it three years ago. Maybe Hitchens should examine his own research methods, what with being a researcher and all.

He objects to being called a right-winger. Maybe he could clarify did he back the Iraq war which led to the deaths of over a million people, and the maiming and displacement of many more? Did he support the slaughter in Gaza this year? This is an important test for people who like to be pious about terrorism. Like his CSC director Baroness Cox, does he think that East Jerusalem is rightfully part of Israel, in contravention of international borders? And these guys want to lecture others about extremism.

Comments

[Sohaib]

Well said Osama. These guys use despicable tactics to try discredit and smear people.
Sorry guys, but our brains are still fully functional and our eyes are still working.

[joe90 kane]

Bomber Harris (of the New Labour Bomberatti) vented his spleen at young working class mothers when visiting his wife at a hospital maternity ward. He claimed these you mothers were basically parasites on the state -
http://www.tomharris.org.uk/2009/03/04/the-return-of-morality/>The return of morality
And Another Thing...
03 Mar 2009

This is the same Bomber Harris of the British Bomberatti, who claimed parliamentary expenses for his own baby -
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/8039273.stm#harris_tom>MPs' expenses in detail - Tom Harris
BBC Politics
29 June 2009

[Malky]

Barack Obama and Pastor Wright.

[joe90 kane]

By the way,
why no furore over Dr John Reid MP, who prefered to go to a football match instead of attending his local Remembrance Sunday Service -
http://www.wishawpress.co.uk/2009/11/11/mp-reid-misses-remembrance-service-but-goes-to-celtic-match-76495-25137167/>MP Reid misses Remembrance service but goes to Celtic match
Wishaw Press
11 Nov 2009

The last paragraph from the above article from my local paper is a real toe-curler -
A spokesperson for the Airdrie and Shotts MP said: "Dr Reid has traditionally attended the national service at the Cenotaph in London but this year was unable to do so as he was travelling. However, he always observes the Remembrance and broke his journey on Sunday to observe the two-minute silence at precisely 11am."

After all, Dr Read MP was actually responsible for telling a pack of lies in order to send British military personnel to an early grave in Iraq and Afghaistan. The least he could do was sacrifice going to a football match in order to pay tribute to those who made the ultimate sacrifice.

What an insult. Still, at least it wasn't a sweary word on a blog. Let's get or priorities in order here.

I can only imagine the reason for this story, about Dr Death's insult to British war dead, and its not being covered by the rest of the foreign-owned Scottish corporate news media, is becuase Dr Death MP isn't in the SNP.

all the best RuT

ps
I'm looking forward tonight to seeing how things go in the Scottish TUC and the Scottish PSC initiative of handing out 10,000 Palestinian flags to arriving supporters at the Celtic v Hapoel Tel Aviv game -

http://www.scottishpsc.org.uk/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=3002:291109-football-fans-to-fly-the-flag-for-palestine&catid=255&Itemid=100345>29/11/09: Football fans to fly the flag for Palestine
Scottish PSC
29 Nov 2009

http://www.stuc.org.uk/news/700/celtic-fans-palestinian-flags>STUC to ask Celtic fans to show Palestinian flags in solidarity with suffering Palestinians on December 2nd
Scottish Trades Union Council
27 Nov 2009