Category Archives: jihad

April 25, 2019 · 2:58 pm

Security and Governance Failures Everywhere: A Concise Review by Gus Mathews

EMAIL NOTE  from Gus Mathews in London, 25 March 2019 commending the Article by Rajeewa Jayaweera (see below)

Rajeewa,

Thank you for this incisive analysis. Irrespective of the atrocities committed on Easter Sunday I am afraid the blame lies entirely with the government of the day. This government is slipshod, non-functional and above all complacent. While many will indicate the toxic relationship between the President and PM as the main fault it is much more than this simple issue. The security apparatus has been run down deliberately since the end of the Eelam war to appease the minorities and the West. Is it any wonder that it took the horrific murder of 359 innocents and the wounding of over 500 for this government to come to its senses. When it came down to security the last regime was on the ball and the security services would have heeded not only the International warnings but acted on it swiftly.

in Feb 2019- AP Photo/Eranga Jayawardena

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April 23, 2019 · 2:07 pm

Security Failures and Security Implications from the Jihadist Terror in Sri Lanka, Easter Sunday 2019

Jeffrey Gettleman, Mujib Mashal and Dharisha Bastians, in New York Times, 22 April 2019, where  the title is  “Sri Lanka Was Warned of Possible Attacks. Why Didn’t It Stop Them?“

The confidential security memo laid it all out: names, addresses, phone numbers, even the times in the middle of the night that one suspect would visit his wife.In the days leading up to Easter Sunday’s devastating suicide bombings that killed at least 321 people in Sri Lanka, the country’s security agencies had been closely watching a secretive cell of the National Thowheeth Jama’ath, a little-known radical Islamist organization that security officials in Sri Lanka now say carried out the attacks and may have received help from abroad.

Arrests made

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April 22, 2019 · 8:54 am

Same ID utilized by Jihadist Outfit behind Hotel Terror Attacks in Colombo

Daily FT News Item, 22 April 2019, with this title “Guest checking in with same name and NIC number at three hotels”

The three hotels which were subject to the terror attack yesterday each had a guest with an identical name and National Identity Card number.  Daily FT learns this information had been revealed during a high level industry meeting with Tourism Minister John Amaratunga yesterday. The meeting also discussed other findings via CCTV in the respective hotels.  An AFP report quoted one of the hotels saying that a man by the name Mohamed Azzam Mohamed had registered.

hotels 113

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April 22, 2019 · 12:55 am

Ivan Amarasinghe slaps the BBC for Misleading Aspersions

21st April 2019

Director General, British Broadcasting Corporation,  BBC Broadcasting House, Portland Place, London W1A 1AA

cc. Rt Hon Theresa May MP, Prime Minister <mayt@parliament.uk> ………  Rt Hon Jeremy Corbyn MP, Leader of the Opposition ……..<jeremy.corbyn.mp@parliament.uk>………Rt Hon. the Lord Naseby <amnaseby@btinternet.com>

Dear Sir

Misleading information and racially biased innuendoes by the BBC on the Sri Lankan Bombing Incidents today

As a peace loving Sri Lankan Sinhala and a Buddhist domiciled in the United Kingdom, it was with great sadness and dismay that I listened to the surreptitious, covert and even overt underpinnings of implied accusations on the majority Sinhala Buddhist community by your BBC  news presenters and the reporters on the above subject.

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April 22, 2019 · 12:14 am

Katuwapitiya Church Scenes …. Easter Sunday aftermath

Daily Mirror Pictures, 22 April 2019 under title “Easter Sunday Terror”

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February 22, 2019 · 4:00 pm

Returning ISIS Fighters viewed as Threat to European Society

ONE =Kim Willsher, “Returning jihadists ‘threaten new wave of terror in Europe” 20 December 2018,  

Europe is facing a new wave of terrorism as radicalised individuals return and jihadists are released from jail, the general secretary of Interpol has warned. Jürgen Stock, Interpol’s chief, who is also a criminologist and law enforcement officer from Germany, said: “We could soon be facing a second wave of other Islamic State linked or radicalised individuals that you might call Isis 2.0.”

“A lot of these are suspected terrorists or those who are linked to terrorist groups as supporters who are facing maybe two to five years in jail. Because they were not convicted of a concrete terrorist attack but only support for terrorist activities, their sentences are perhaps not so heavy.  In many parts of the world, in Europe but also Asia, this generation of early supporters will be released in the next couple of years, and they may again be part of a terrorist group or those supporting terrorist activities.”

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February 22, 2019 · 2:13 pm

The Shamima Begum Dilemma: A Muslim Brit and Other Voices

ONE = Dr SLM Rifai: “The Dillemma a of British Muslims,” 21 February 2019

The primary objective of this short article is to examine and evaluate the social impacts and legal consequences of Shamima Begum’s case. It has been reported that Home Office has already sent a letter to the family of Shamima saying that it has decided to revoke British citizenship of Shamima. According to INDEPENDENT newspaper “The Government has deprived Shamima Begum of her British citizenship, allegedly making her stateless and violating international law” (19/2/19). Yet, her new born baby has been given every right to settle in the UK. However, the secretary for justice has said that Shamima Begum has right to return to UK, but she should face the court of law in this country. This contrasting view has created some legal debates in the UK about this issue.

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December 2, 2018 · 8:02 am

Suicide Missions as Witnessing: From Self-Immolation to Assassination and Mass Strike

Michael Roberts ….. This article appeared first in Studies in Conflict and Terrorism, 2007, vol. 30:  857-88.with the title “Suicide Missions as Witnessing: Expansions, Contrasts” and is reproduced here with its original American English spelling. The re-working of this article was seen to by Ms Nadeeka Paththuwaarachchi of Battaramulla. The pictorial images are embellishments that were not part of the original essay. I have also added highlighting emphasis in orange as well as a few hyperlinks to other standard sources of information. The bibliographical references are within the End Notes as in the original format.

ABSTRACT: Studies of suicide missions usually focus solely on attacks. They also have highlighted the performative character of suicide missions as acts of witness. By extending surveys to suicidal acts that embrace no-escape attacks, theatrical assassination, defensive suicide, and suicidal protest, one gains further insight into the motivations of individuals and organizations. Illustrative studies, notably the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi and Sadat as well as Tamil Tiger operations, generate a typology that underlines the benefits of such extensions. The Japanese and Tamil contexts reveal the profound differences in readings of sacrificial acts of atonement or punishment by local constituencies. Norman Morrison in Washington in 1965 and Jan Palach in Prague in 1969 did not have such beneficial settings and the immediate ramifications of their protest action were limited. Morrison’s story highlights the significance of a societal context of individuated rationalism as opposed, say, to the “pyramidical corporatism” encouraging martyrdom operations in the Islamic world.

Jan Palach…19 Jan. 1969 Nathuram Godse vs Mahatma Gandhi .. 30 Jan 1948

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November 24, 2018 · 1:32 pm

An Ode in the Face of The Terrorist Liberation-Fighter

  Jane Russell

“[This poem was presented] a small pamphlet called “Ganga” published in Colombo in 1978: it was aimed at the boasting men of violence everywhere – the Warriors of Terror whom in the guise of Freedom Fighters were inflicting further violence on already violated communities:

To Aloysius-Ludovico (The Terrorist)

I am tired of hearing you sing
the anthems of Freedom and War…
How joyously you crack the whip
and bellow out the tune above the drums!
But the faces of my friends haunt me
in the mornings when I see Death’s Armada
With its pirate’s flag of torture trailing….
what does it matter, your Freedom?
They are dying, my friends and their children…

Nalliah Thayabharan, thank you for reminding me of this poem written in despair in Colombo 30+ years ago. A whole generation has grown up since then but the same (better) poem is probably being written today in Syria by some unknown idealist…..as the song goes “When will we ever learn?”

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September 8, 2018 · 1:30 am

Remembering 9/11: Two Australian Tales in 2017

ONE = Mary Lloyd: “The Australian artist who captured the horror of 9/11 on film,” 11 September 2017

Chris Hopewell heard the sound of the first plane collide with the World Trade Centre on September 11, 2001, but it was his cats running in circles that tipped him off that something disastrous had happened. After the Australian artist opened his curtains and went onto the balcony of his Williamsburg apartment, he saw the damage that had been done to the tower, but had no idea what had caused it.

Pic by Reuters- Sara K Schwittek

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