Terror attacks by Islamist groups

[Jezza]

^ It's not a slogan. A mass murderer can be a terrorist, but it will depend on their motive as to whether they're a terrorist or not.

Some mass murderers are not terrorists because their motive for killing people isn't underpinned by an ideology they follow and wish to expand.

Terrorism is defined as being "the unlawful use of violence and intimidation, especially against civilians, in the pursuit of political aims".

I don't know why you find this difficult to understand.

[watt price tully]

^ That's more of a slogan than an answer, isn't it?

Speaking philosophically, if someone intends to commit a solo mass murder, do they cease to be a mass murderer and become a terrorist because they claim particular allegiances or announce particular things?

Say, eg, it's a ratbag with a lot of weaponry in a hotel in Vegas - wants to kill a lot of people but not for any particular political reason. If the very same person does the very same thing, killing the very same number of people, but leaves a manifesto asserting that it was done in furtherance of shooter's rights or, say, a demand that Trump be installed as dictator or Supreme Leader , is that terrorism or just a delusional mass murderer?

He's come out of prison and was one of the reasons why I put the Guardian link there. The de-radicalization programmes aren't always working and there are continuing to be horrific consequences.

While the term terror can be seen as a slogan & used subjectively I have no issue with this type of murder or mass murder being described as terror given it's both. F*cked up religious fundamentalists in this case likely a religious Muslim with a limited & perverted sense of Islam.

[Pies4shaw]

When, though, is something genuinely able to be said to be "in the pursuit of political aims"? "Pursuit" connotes some kind of rational, goal-directed activity. Is it "pursuit'" of anything if there's just one bloke acting on his own with a lot of weaponry, a few tins of Jim Beam and Coke and bad breath who wants to shoot people to draw attention to his "plan" to install Trump as Supreme Leader? Is that a terrorist act or just mass murder? Is he in "pursuit" of anything, or just a nutter with a gun? Or one Libyan in a park with a knife and a bad attitude, maybe shouting a slogan or self-identifying with - what is it this week, are we back to Al-Qaeda, we don't seem to have any Isis anymore? If they're acting on their own, is there really any discernible "aim" that they are pursuing? Isn't is all a bit nebulous?

What's the purpose of making fine calculations about whether such events are or are not in "pursuit" of something when there's actually no-one else involved?

[Pies4shaw]

^ That's more of a slogan than an answer, isn't it?

Speaking philosophically, if someone intends to commit a solo mass murder, do they cease to be a mass murderer and become a terrorist because they claim particular allegiances or announce particular things?

Say, eg, it's a ratbag with a lot of weaponry in a hotel in Vegas - wants to kill a lot of people but not for any particular political reason. If the very same person does the very same thing, killing the very same number of people, but leaves a manifesto asserting that it was done in furtherance of shooter's rights or, say, a demand that Trump be installed as dictator or Supreme Leader , is that terrorism or just a delusional mass murderer?

He's come out of prison and was one of the reasons why I put the Guardian link there. The de-radicalization programmes aren't always working and there are continuing to be horrific consequences.

While the term terror can be seen as a slogan & used subjectively I have no issue with this type of murder or mass murder being described as terror given it's both. F*cked up religious fundamentalists in this case likely a religious Muslim with a limited & perverted sense of Islam.

But I thought they said he was in prison for a minor, non-terrorism-related offence? Is there something else I missed?

[watt price tully]

^ That's more of a slogan than an answer, isn't it?

Speaking philosophically, if someone intends to commit a solo mass murder, do they cease to be a mass murderer and become a terrorist because they claim particular allegiances or announce particular things?

Say, eg, it's a ratbag with a lot of weaponry in a hotel in Vegas - wants to kill a lot of people but not for any particular political reason. If the very same person does the very same thing, killing the very same number of people, but leaves a manifesto asserting that it was done in furtherance of shooter's rights or, say, a demand that Trump be installed as dictator or Supreme Leader , is that terrorism or just a delusional mass murderer?

He's come out of prison and was one of the reasons why I put the Guardian link there. The de-radicalization programmes aren't always working and there are continuing to be horrific consequences.

While the term terror can be seen as a slogan & used subjectively I have no issue with this type of murder or mass murder being described as terror given it's both. F*cked up religious fundamentalists in this case likely a religious Muslim with a limited & perverted sense of Islam.

But I thought they said he was in prison for a minor, non-terrorism-related offence? Is there something else I missed?

"...Sources have said he was known to officers and previously spent at least 12 months in prison for various assaults - he was jailed in December last year after assalting a Sainsbury's security guard....

It is thought he was being supervised by the National Probation Service, which monitors high risk offenders...."

https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/11916773/ ... s-confirm/

De-radicalization v radicalization in the prison system ??

[Pies4shaw]

^ Thanks. Here's another report indicating that he was known to the security services and on their radar as, it would seem, a terrorist sympathiser.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/202 ... ark-attack

The suspect in an alleged terror attack that left a teacher and two others dead was known to security services and other authorities, it emerged on Sunday.

Khairi Saadallah, the 25-year-old Libyan refugee held over the stabbings in a Reading park, was on the radar of MI5 in the middle of last year, sources told the Guardian.

He was under investigation as a person who might travel abroad “for extremist reasons”, but sources indicated that the inquiry was closed relatively quickly without any action taken as no genuine threat or immediate risk was identified. Intelligence agencies believe Saadallah had mental health problems, the sources said.

There was no immediate evidence that the Reading attack was underpinned by an allegiance to Islamic State or al-Qaida, although investigations are ongoing. Police said they believed the attacker was acting alone.

[Pies4shaw]

Here's a hint towards the reason I was asking about this, finally acknowledged:

Police face 'wicked problem' monitoring 40,000 potential terror suspects - ex-Met chief

Police and security services face a “wicked problem” deciding which of the 40,000 people known to them could launch a terror attack, a former head of UK counter-terrorism has said.

Sir Mark Rowley, former assistant commissioner for specialist operations in the Metropolitan police, told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “What you end up with operationally is about, I think, about 3,000 people under investigation at one stage. But there is 40,000 people … whose names have touched the system.

And in that 40,000 are lots of volatile people who dip in and out of interests in extreme ideology, and to spot one of those who is going to go from a casual interest into a determined attacker, which can happen in a matter of days, is the most wicked problem that the services face."

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/li ... 3f3513936a

We repeatedly see the security forces and police miss the ones who actually commit the crimes when they are acting alone. Of course, I assume that there are plenty of highly dangerous organised plots that they stop. But I wonder whether the "terrorism" focus in dealing with these sorts of issues prospectively means that the authorities tend to screen out the lone "fruit cakes". Maybe they should be screened out of a "terror plot" threat analysis but maybe the problem is that the very "aloneness" of blokes like this gets them relegated out of the "serious threat" pile, whereas assessing their psychology/psychiatry for the potential to commit mass murder according to a different frame of reference that ignores whether they might be "terrorists" might yield better results.

I just think this is worthy of consideration. In short, I'm asking whether assessing people just by reference to a set of "terrorist threat" criteria might be part of the problem, rather than the solution. If you have 40,000 threats and most of them are "low level" on the terrorist" ranking, what other frame of analysis can you apply to get better at predicting which of them is likely to act up in public with weaponry?

[pietillidie]

My part of the world. I've been to that park many a time. We took some flowers down to one of the memorials.

RIP.

[watt price tully]

The beheading of a teacher in Paris for discussing freedom of speech. He invited students to leave if they didn't want to participate. The murderer an 18 year old from Cechnya was aided and abetted by some [radical] Muslims including a preacher and others who paid some students in the class for information about the teacher.

https://www.timesofisrael.com/france-to ... islamists/

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-54598546

[stui magpie]

I saw about that case. That's the kind of garbage we're dealing with.

[watt price tully]

It’s not nice in Nice: Islamic terror kills three in knife attacks

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-54729957

[Jezza]

^ Shit. This is escalating in France.

I admire Macron's stance against Islamic extremism, despite the obvious backlash he's receiving.

[Jezza]

Strong words by the Mayor of Nice.

"Enough is enough.

"It's time now for France to exonerate itself from the laws of peace in order to definitively wipe out Islamo-fascism from our territory."

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-10-29/ ... d/12828942

[David]

It’s certainly worrying. Feels like we go through periods of lulls in terrorist activity but then attacks start cropping up together. These horrifying attacks seem very specifically aimed at France, but worth keeping an eye on.

[watt price tully]

Just shocking. Erdogan has a lot to answer for as well as the other hate mongers / islamic fudamentalists. At the same time Maron needs to finesse it better.

If I were he I would be side by side with the general Muslim Community in a regular public manner to as to wedge & isolalate the nutters and hate mongers