Explosions at Zaventem Airport (Brussels airport)/Brussels metro

[Martinus]

I wish someone shot up the editorial office of Slate.

[Martinus]

Belgium's security problem
No Poirots

Belgian police are flummoxed by IS
Apr 2nd 2016 | BRUSSELS AND PARIS | From the print edition
Timekeeper

THE response of the Belgian police to the terrorist attacks that claimed 32 lives in Brussels on March 22nd has displayed elements of farce. Two days after the bombings, officers arrested Fayçal Cheffou, a freelance journalist and Islamist agitator, as he loitered with several other men outside the federal prosecutor's office. He was identified as the "man in the hat" seen on security footage at Brussels' airport next to the two suicide-bombers. Four days later Mr Cheffou was released due to lack of evidence. Mobile-phone tracking placed him at home during the bombings, and his DNA was not found in the apartment where the bombs were made.

"Belgium is the weakest link in the European Union's [security] network," says one EU diplomat. Salah Abdeslam, a suspect in the attacks in Paris in November whose arrest seems to have triggered the Brussels bombings, evaded police for four months before he was arrested in Molenbeek, the Brussels suburb where he grew up. Raids leading to his arrest turned up components of explosives, yet security at vulnerable locations was not beefed up. The Belgians had even been warned by foreign intelligence agencies that leaders of Islamic State (IS) in Syria had sent instructions to bomb the airport and a metro station.

Meanwhile, Turkey said it had deported Ibrahim el-Bakraoui to Belgium in July 2015 and told the authorities that he was suspected of jihadist activity. Yet no criminal proceedings were opened. Mr el-Bakraoui is thought to have been one of the airport bombers. (The other, Najim Laachraoui, is suspected of making the bombs used in Paris and Brussels.) Khalid, his brother, is believed to have been responsible for the metro bombing.

One reason for the bumbling is poor co-ordination between government agencies. The Turkish warning was passed to Belgium's federal police, part of the interior ministry; the justice ministry's state prosecution office, which could have ordered criminal proceedings, was not notified. The federal police division responsible for counter-terrorism is set up mainly to fight organised crime, while the state security service concentrates on foiling spying by foreign states.

"Much of the information was there in advance, but the pipelines are clogged," says Jan Nolf, a legal journalist and former judge. "As a small country with limited resources, we simply can't deal with all the responsibilities of being the headquarters of the European institutions and of NATO."

French police seem to be doing better. Two days after the Brussels attacks they thwarted an "advanced" terrorist plot near Paris, arresting Reda Kriket, a French citizen, and seizing weapons and explosives in his flat. Three suspected accomplices were arrested in Belgium, and Dutch police arrested a fourth in Rotterdam.

Molenbeek, meanwhile, has been known to be a hotspot of IS activity ever since the Paris bombings. Yet security forces have failed to penetrate its jihadist networks. Molenbeek's mayor, Françoise Schepmans, blames laws barring raids on apartments at night and holding terror suspects without charge for over 24 hours, as well as local politics. "When radicals began preaching in the mosques here, it was convenient for local politicians to do nothing," Ms Schepmans says. "Even now, since the Paris attacks, when everyone realises that nothing can be the same again, wehaven't received more resources."

Sadly, I fear that combination like this of incompetence and multi-culti political correctness is what will spell the end of the Schengen and might even spell the end of the EU.

[Duque de Bragança]

Grallons everywhere agree

http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/2016/04/03/charlie_hebdo_acceptance_of_practicing_muslims_contributes_to_terrorism.html


Charlie Hebdo: Acceptance of Practicing Muslims in Society Contributes to Terrorism

So Grallon is some kind of far left/anarcho/'68er tard whatever type now? 

As for Tariq Ramadan, this al-master of Taqqiya was even exposed by Sarko once (moratorium for stoning cheating women: yes or no?).  So

[Archy]

fyi
after 12 days. Passenger part of the airport started again with extra controls. Before you were advised to be at the airport 2 hours in front now it changed to 3 hours. One of the new rules is that only passengers after control may go into the checkin area. Causing quees before the entrance of the checking area. If they wanted the target for the terrorists was just moved outside. This thanks to the police union, who asked for these measures since their members otherwise didn't feel save enough. Seems to only give a false sens of security to me.

[Tamas]

fyi
after 12 days. Passenger part of the airport started again with extra controls. Before you were advised to be at the airport 2 hours in front now it changed to 3 hours. One of the new rules is that only passengers after control may go into the checkin area. Causing quees before the entrance of the checking area. If they wanted the target for the terrorists was just moved outside. This thanks to the police union, who asked for these measures since their members otherwise didn't feel save enough. Seems to only give a false sens of security to me.

Well, if the police officers are inside, and the queue (to be targeted) is on the outside, it does make it safer for the officers.

[viper37]

Grallons everywhere agree

http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/2016/04/03/charlie_hebdo_acceptance_of_practicing_muslims_contributes_to_terrorism.html

Charlie Hebdo: Acceptance of Practicing Muslims in Society Contributes to Terrorism

By Daniel Politi

Satirical French publication Charlie Hebdo is coming under fire for an English-language editorial that seems to at least partly blame practicing, and peaceful, Muslims for terrorist attacks. A little more than a week after 35 people were killed in Brussels, the newspaper wonders, "How did we end up here?"* The newspaper that suffered a terrorist attack of its own last year says that "the attacks are merely the visible part of a very large iceberg indeed. They are the last phase of a process of cowing and silencing long in motion and on the widest possible scale."

To make its point, Charlie Hebdo uses three examples: Tariq Ramadan, an Islamic scholar, a nameless woman in a burqa, and a baker who is a Muslim. Ramadan, who, incidentally condemned the attack against Charlie, has devoted his life to defending Islam. "His task, under cover of debate, is to dissuade people criticizing his religion in any way," notes the editorial. He effectively makes "little dents" in secularism by imposing "a fear of criticising lest they appear Islamophobic." The editorial then goes on to sarcastically dismiss concerns that a woman wearing a burqa may be hiding a bomb. And finally there is the baker who stops selling ham, and everyone simply shrugs and accepts it because "there are plenty of other options on offer."

The editorial then goes on to mention the Brussels attackers, noting that while no one in the three examples really did anything wrong, the terrorist attack can't happen "without everyone's contribution." The enforced silence to not criticize someone who is different or holds different beliefs means that "it is secularism which is being forced into retreat." The editorial concludes:

The first task of the guilty is to blame the innocent. It's an almost perfect inversion of culpability. From the bakery that forbids you to eat what you like, to the woman who forbids you to admit that you are troubled by her veil, we are submerged in guilt for permitting ourselves such thoughts. And that is where and when fear has started its sapping, undermining work. And the way is marked for all that will follow.

Criticism of the editorial came fast and furious on Twitter.

[numerous tweets]
...

Writer Teju Cole took to Facebook to write what is perhaps the most extensive, and reasoned, criticism of the editorial, saying "the people of Charlie ... finally step away from the mask of 'it's satire and you don't get it' to state clearly that Muslims, all of them, no matter how integrated, are the enemy." Charlie seems to want to defend "the wish to discriminate freely against Muslims without having to be called out on it" and somehow characterizing the whole exercise as brave and speaking truth to power. "This is precisely the logic also of the masses who praise Trump for his 'honesty'—as though only ugliness could be honest, as though moral incontinence were any more noble than physical incontinence," writes Cole.

Charlie had already come under fire this past week for its front page about the Brussels attacks.

they are mostly right.  Secularims is being pushed back in many countries and it's a disturbing fact, to say the least.  As for Tariq Ramadan, well, he is a radical and he makes ample use of a double discourse, depending whom he talks to.  So yeah, people like him are part of the problem, not part of the solution.

However, I disagree that a single bakery should be forced to serve ham.  So long as there are no rule or undue pressure to prevent the sale of ham, if some choose not to carry a specific product, it ain't a problem to me.  If we see sharia police attacking muslim owned stores selling ham, it is a problem.  If we see increase social pressure against muslim commerce selling pork products, it is a problem.  One man refusing to serve ham is not, no more than my butcher not providing kosher meat.

[Martinus]

I am also against bakeries being required to sell ham - or in fact any meat.

[Martinus]

But in all seriousness - I agree, but we need to apply the principle equally to all faiths and world views. So if a Christian bakery refuses to prepare a wedding cake with figurines of two men on it, they should also have a right to do so. It seems Google, Coca Cola and Disney disagree.

[alfred russel]

But in all seriousness - I agree, but we need to apply the principle equally to all faiths and world views. So if a Christian bakery refuses to prepare a wedding cake with figurines of two men on it, they should also have a right to do so. It seems Google, Coca Cola and Disney disagree.

I could be wrong, but I don't think anyone is getting successfully sued because they won't put two men on a cake they are baking. Some have been successfully sued because they won't sell the same product to certain customers that they offer to the general public.

[Martinus]

But in all seriousness - I agree, but we need to apply the principle equally to all faiths and world views. So if a Christian bakery refuses to prepare a wedding cake with figurines of two men on it, they should also have a right to do so. It seems Google, Coca Cola and Disney disagree.

I could be wrong, but I don't think anyone is getting successfully sued because they won't put two men on a cake they are baking. Some have been successfully sued because they won't sell the same product to certain customers that they offer to the general public.

I think you are wrong - otherwise how would they even know they cater to a gay wedding?

[Zanza]

fyi
after 12 days. Passenger part of the airport started again with extra controls. Before you were advised to be at the airport 2 hours in front now it changed to 3 hours. One of the new rules is that only passengers after control may go into the checkin area. Causing quees before the entrance of the checking area. If they wanted the target for the terrorists was just moved outside. This thanks to the police union, who asked for these measures since their members otherwise didn't feel save enough. Seems to only give a false sens of security to me.

It seems like such a measure is just for show. You can't guard and protect every spot in a big city where a bomb could kill 20 people as there must be thousands of spots like this. If you increase security in one spot, a terrorist can just go for another area with lots of people. The only effective way is to stop the terrorists before they pull the trigger.

[viper37]

I am also against bakeries being required to sell ham - or in fact any meat.

croissant-jambon.

[viper37]

But in all seriousness - I agree, but we need to apply the principle equally to all faiths and world views. So if a Christian bakery refuses to prepare a wedding cake with figurines of two men on it, they should also have a right to do so. It seems Google, Coca Cola and Disney disagree.

The bakery with the wedding cake refuses to serve customers specifically for what they are, gays.  That is discrimination.
It's like a business that refuses to serve black people.  Or someone inventing a religious reason not to show black figurines on the cake.

A butchery that does not sell kosher meat and proposes various pork products is not anti-semitic by nature.  We do not ask GM dealers to carry Ford products.

A bakery that does not offer ham croissant, I don't see this as a big threat to secularism.  Said bakery refusing to serve non muslims, or requiring something that would make sure no Christians would buy there without officially discriminating against them, that would be a problem. 

But offering some products and not offering others is another thing.  Ideally, there wouldn't be cultural ghettos in big cities, but I suppose that can't be avoided.  You'd expect a muslim butcher in a muslim neighbourhood to not offer pork since there is so little demand for it.

[grumbler]

Suddenly Charlie Hebdo isn't a satire magazine, but a news magazine?

if they say these silly things, i suspect that they are not meaning to be taken seriously.

[Martinus]

Suddenly Charlie Hebdo isn't a satire magazine, but a news magazine?

if they say these silly things, i suspect that they are not meaning to be taken seriously.

I don't think you understand how such magazines work in France.