July 7th Alternative Hypotheses
5. The men thought they were going to strike a blow for Palestine, Afghanistan, Iraq, etc and go to Heaven as 'martyrs' because they had been groomed and encouraged and equipped by an al-Qa'ida mastermind who was actually working for one of the State agencies or a rogue network straddling one or more of them with their own agenda.
There is a long global history of state use of 'agent provocateurs' to achieve numerous geopolitical state agendas. In order to gain more control over the “War on terror”, for instance, the US Bush administration in 2002 planned the Proactive, Preemptive Operations Group (P2OG), which would execute secret missions designed to provoke terrorist groups into committing violent acts which would then require a 'counter-attack' by the US. A more subtle version of this concept has almost certainly been employed in the UK; a “British Oppression” protest ostensibly organised by Muslim groups which upon closer scrutiny turn out not to be Muslim groups at all being but one example. The P2OG group is discussed further in Hypothesis 8.
Just a few days before the London bombings, in 2005, an Italian investigation uncovered what it reportedly called an underground, parallel police network staffed by “Freemasons and shadowy CIA operatives”. The department, named the Department of Anti-terrorism Strategic Studies (DSSA), appeared to have been created using legitimate law enforcement personnel; up to 200 police and former intelligence officers were alleged by investigators to have been involved. Some reports appeared to suggest that the authorities who joined the network had been duped by two main suspects, both leaders of police trade unions, one of whom was a far-right Italian politician. However, one of the suspects stated that the Italian authorities were aware of the department's existence – and indeed the Italian government itself defended the DSSA,
Investigators are trying to determine what official support the organisation may have had. The Interior Minister, Giuseppe Pisanu, has suspended dozens of police officers who joined the network. But Carlo Taormina, an MP from Mr Berlusconi's Forza Italia party, insists Dssa was a bona fide security company with nothing to hide and "the high commands of the police and intelligence services were aware of its existence".
Source: The Independent
Whether the creation of the DSSA was a scam perpetrated by fascists in which hundreds of innocent state employees were duped, or whether it was a state-approved department, it demonstrated the lengths gone to and the strategies devised in the name of 'fighting terror', and those that will be taken up by 'terrorists' or 'radicals' to achieve their particular goals.
In a confidential letter, "Hearts and Minds and Muslims," from William Ehrman, Director-General (Defence & Intelligence), FCO, to Sir David Omand, Security & Intelligence Co-ordinator and Permanent Secretary, Cabinet Office, on 23 April 2004, Ehrman made the rather telling observation,
Seen from here, the potential for information operations backfiring on us is even greater than during the Cold War, when IRD and US counterparts had a mixed record. Dealing with Islamist extremism, the messages are more complex, the constituencies we would aim at are more difficult to identify, and greater damage could be done to the overall effort if links back to UK or US sources were revealed.
Source: Cryptome
The UK was heavily criticised after the London bombings for its 'covenant of security', which it was alleged created and maintained a refuge to terrorists. The name 'Londonistan' was coined by French security officials who believe that MI6 was tolerating London being used as a base for certain attacks in other countries in order to secure immunity from attacks in the UK. Such conditions, however, are favourable to security services infiltrators, such as Reda Hassaine – who stated after his cover was blown that his reports were disregarded by the authorities.
In September 2006, a curious incident occurred at an event which had not been publicised, at which the then Home Secretary John Reid was speaking. John Reid's speech was volubly interrupted by a heckling man in Muslim dress; Abu Izzadeen, also known as Omar Brooks, a convert to Islam who was previously known as Trevor Brooks. He had gained some media prominence after the London bombings after commending the alleged actions of the suspects. The heckling, which John Reid patiently allowed, along with one rather diminutive policeman who appeared to be the only police force representative at the event. Izzadeen was only ejected after his 'rant' had been allowed to continue for some minutes, prompting accusations that the entire event had been staged and an open letter from George Galloway to Dr. Reid in which he asked,
There are only two conceivable explanations as to how this man, at this sensitive time, was allowed to hijack your Potemkin Village performance today. Either our police and security services are so fantastically incompetent that Bin Laden himself might have slipped in to beard you at your podium. Or someone somewhere wanted to engineer precisely this confrontation to show you in a certain light and to portray the Muslims of Britain in the most aggressive violent and extreme way possible, as a justification for the utterly counter-productive policies you are following.
Which is it ?
There is compelling evidence that collusion can and does occur between 'rogue networks' and the state. In February 1989, successful human rights lawyer Patrick Finucane was shot dead at home in front of his family by loyalist paramilitaries. In 2003, the Stevens Report found that the army and police had colluded in the murder. After years of pressure from Finucane's family and human rights groups the government finally announced an inquiry into the murder but then shortly afterwards rushed through the Inquiries Act 2005 which severely limits the scope of public inquiries, making any kind of independent scrutiny of evidence impossible. The Finucane case was by no means an isolated example at the time.
The British media have a propensity to devote copious quantities of publicity to certain figures who claim involvement in extremism, terrorism or al-Qa'ida. Hassan Butt, mentioned in Hypothesis 1 and Hypothesis 3, was forced to admit his claims of being an al-Qai'da recruiter began and ended in falsehood. Butt had already previously been dismissed as a fantasist, but there are obvious questions to be asked regarding the motives of both Butt himself and those who publicised him.
Even think tanks that have been set up in the UK in order to 'combat extremism' have some dubious provenance. The Quilliam Foundation, described as “Britain's first counter-extremism thinktank” established by Ed Husain and Maajid Nawaz, ex-members of Hizb ut-Tahrir – a group which had been proscribed abroad but not in the UK despite the government's claimed commitment to do so.
Husain is another reformed 'Islamist' who has promulgated his particular brand of insider knowledge via the media and a self-penned book which despite its rather superficial account of his 'radicalisation' and involvement with the group was greeted enthusiastically by government officials and journalists. A spokesman for Hizb ut-Tahrir denied that Husain was ever a member.
The Quilliam Foundation is, ironically, named after a strong critic of Western Imperialist policies, the kind of criticism that would have him labelled a 'radical' these days – and indeed Quilliam was accused of treason for his continued opposition to the British war in Sudan. The think tank itself has drawn its own criticism from those who feel that the Foundation's conservative views – which include attacking multiculturalism, immigration policy and suggesting Muslims should “be more British” - are not representative of the majority of Muslims in the UK. In January 2009 the Quilliam Foundation was awarded £1million of government funding, which is interesting because self-confessed liar, Hassan Butt, claimed his plans for “deradicalising” extremists drew an offer of financial support from the Home Office. Are the motivations of such groups and individuals under the media spotlight as straightforward as they claim to be? Or are they serving a more sinister purpose in allowing certain memes to remove responsibility from the government for their oppressive actions?
Despite claims, such as that made by Nafeez Ahmed in his book “The London Bombings: An Independent Inquiry”, and by the Israeli Institute for Counter-Terrorism, that the deceased July 7th suspects had connections to 'radical' groups such as the now disbanded al-Mujahiroun, (of which Hassan Butt also claimed to be a member, as discussed in both Hypotheses 1 and Hypothesis 2) there is hardly a scrap of evidence to support this. These conclusions seem to rely on the claims of Butt, which are now meaningless by his own admission, and Mohammed Junaid Babar, who as previously mentioned, has an incredible provenance. The Official Report into the London bombings made no mention of such connections. As pointed out in Hypotheses 1 and 2, there is no evidence that al-Qa'ida – if such an organisation even exists – were involved or that the men were 'masterminded' or 'groomed'. Therefore, this theory only has speculation to rely on until such time concrete links between the July 7th suspects and terror networks are found.
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Alternative Hypotheses Navigation
1. al-Qa'ida mastermind recruited British Muslims as suicide bombers
3. Homegrown and autonomous action by four British Muslims with no mastermind.
5. The men thought they were going to strike a blow for Palestine, Afghanistan, Iraq, etc and go to Heaven as 'martyrs' because they had been groomed and encouraged and equipped by an al-Qa'ida mastermind who was actually working for one of the State agencies or a rogue network straddling one or more of them with their own agenda.
