What is is with George Galloway?

That's why Oona King Lost, it wasn't why Galloway won, what about the other, equally anti-war candidates. I have never made the suggestion that the muslim community are anti-semitic, I wouldn't dare try and speak for them.

There is no point dignifying the political aims of murderers by giving them the oxygen of recognition.

Total bollocks Momus, especially that last line. I suggest you visit Johann Hari’s blog and try answering some of his "15 questions to supporters of George Galloway”, I’ve yet to hear a convincing answer to any of them:

http://www.johannhari.com/archive/article.php?id=624

One can have opposed the war in Iraq and still find Galloway completely reprehensible.

Regarding the attacks as the result of British involvement in the war in Iraq, as GG suggests (and you seem to be suggesting) is naïve.

The first and the second attacks on the WTC; the embassy bombings in Dar-es-Salaam and Nairobi; the Bali bombings all predated the war in Iraq.

Were the Casablanca bombings in any way the fault of the Moroccan government for protecting its Jewish community and enjoying good relations with the US?

Were the attacks on the Riyadh compounds justifiable because non-Moslems have no right to reside in holy Islamic lands?

How far are you prepared to go in blaming Blair and co for psychopaths placing bombs in public transport Momus? I’d like to hear it.

BTW OBL’s response to the mass murder of predominantly Ozzie tourists in Bali : Australia deserved it for supporting independence for Catholic East Timor from Islamic Indonesia!

tariq ali on the cause of the bombings

x-post: oh, for a killfile on ILX.

Bin Laden, like most of the 9/11 hijackers, is a Saudi. He's known with some certainty to be hiding in Pakistan. But Saudi Arabia and Pakistan are US allies, so they invade Afghanistan and Iraq instead. Is that "fair nuff" or just really stupid and cynical?

Unfortunately, despite their "abilities" to do so, no one HAS taken apart a senate committee like that, neither American nor British. It is a shame that it took so long for such a confrontation to occur, and it is also a shame that it most likely won't happen again, and it is (maybe) also a shame that it's speaker has been successfully pegged as "traitor," "ba'athist," etc (truth of these allegations aside, I am talking PR effectiveness here)--he is easy to summarily dismiss. But you cannot dismiss the fact that he did it, and did it well.

Well, Paris suffered in 95' in the GIA bombing campaign (8 dead, 100+ injured) and the Metro was alleged to be a target of Osman Ahmed (Suspected Madrid bomber) last summer. Iraq has likely increased the threat but any city in any Western liberal democracy is at threat.

would it be fantastically simplistic to point out that if there wasn't an occupying force, there wouldn't be a resistance?

Jason Burke – “Al-Qaeda: The true story of radical Islam”

i think everyone here has a point and there seems to actually be more general agreement than momus seems willing to allow. it seems like you're picking fights! i think most people may agree with your thoughts about iraq and so forth, they just happen to think galloway is a jerk whose manner of relaying his opinions is opportunistic and unconstructive. do you disagree with that part of it? because i think that's where the real disagreement may be located.

anyway... i just want to point out that to my recollection the parisian police have happily thwarted several terrorist efforts in the past few years, and suspect numerous "cells" of being active there. so while i would agree that england's involvement in iraq has made them a more likely target for this sort of thing, i don't think france or germany's lack of involvement translates by any means into their not being a target.

this really threw a wrench in this thread. what has it to do with anything? galloway was compared to stalin, it was simply asserted that at some point he was a stalinist--not in a metaphorical sense but in a very real "follow the moscow line" sense. i don't know if this is true or not, but in any event the connection b/t blair and stalin seems like a red herring.

So if we're not with Galloway we're against him. Isn't this the sort of pointless binary politics that both Galloway and Bush pedal and what I am railing against. There are no binary issues because all issues are inter-linked. Life is too complicated to be reduce to soap-box sound bites.

I will get back to you on why Galloway is beyond contempt but I need to consult some people first.

heheh. if only the scottish parliament:

a) had powers to divorce itself from tony's foreign crusades, and
b) had the political will to do the same.

Ah, George Monbiot, a man who wrote after 9/11 "If Al Qaeda did not exist, it would be necessary to invent it".

Way to go with drumming up the moderate sensible support, Mr Galloway.

a bit, yeah, given the level of state violence in iraq before the invasion, and given that the resistance (i used the word, shd have done scare-quotes) is as concerned with murdering iraqis on sectarian grounds as it is with resisting occupation.

In short, his basic position - from the statement he uttered prompting this thread - is that the leaders of the US and UK are engaged in actions which wil result in increasing numbers of innocent civilians dying in Iraq and the industrialsied west, and that people who value human life should perhaps do something more positive that redouble their efforts to continue doing the thing which has helped create the situation and won't make it any better.

Galloway is personally a wanker, but there's nowt to dispute in what he said on Thursday really, aside from his iconoclastic desire to be the one who said it first.

There is truth in the position that our foreign policy since 9/11 has increased the risk of being targetted. So what follows from that truth?

That we should have done nothing about the Taliban? That we should have continued the embargo of Iraq indefinitely? That we should have done nothing to help the catholic population of East Timor, and then cross our fingers that the Bali bombing wouldn't have occurred?

What about the prominent posistion of jews and catholics and hindus and atheists and lesbians and musicians, to say nothing of moslems of all stripes, in our society?

These things make us a target. Does it then follow that we should take steps to obviating these irritants? That we should mourn the immigration that created such a multicultural society?

There is now, as there were during the second world war, a substantial number of people monomaniacally concerned with demonstrating the great evil of our elected leaders, to the point where they are utterly unable to know real fascism when when they see it.

Jamaar Islamir (sp?) have long hated Australia, there's a lot more to the Islamic cause that just the middle east and the current war. Jus' sayin.

this is the essential dichotomy of Gorgeous George. Unfortunately he happens to be the loudest voice saying a lot of things that need saying. However he is one for reducing what need saying to Tabloid headlines in a base reductionist way, and, like most politicians, lack the humility to recognise that he cannot have all the answers

would it be fantastically simplistic to point out that if there wasn't an occupying force, there wouldn't be a resistance?

-- grimly fiendish

This is an important point, and well put!

It doesn't make you a support of Baathism to say that the behaviour of the coalition is creating a well of hatred; as a friend has said elsewhere, we're creating a veneer of genuine grievances that provide support to the opportunists; they want to say 'kill the infidel' but that's a tougher sell than 'kill the bastards who murdered your family'. Until we stop killing their families, we're providing the easiest tools to the theocratic psycho nihilists to recruit.

The question of what we do now sidesteps responsibility. A group of people knew all of the above, and still did it anyway. They were supposed to keep us out of harms way, and they've placed us in it. And now they say that whatever the rights and wrongs, we're in there now and we can't just leave. That's a moot point, and an entirely separate one from the issue of the insane stupidity of the actions of the leaders of this 'coalition' and the point that the more they urge me to move on and ignore their incompetance, the more I'm determiend to hold onto that.

But it is equally obvious that the war is a huge factor in increased Muslim disaffection. Every journalistic investigation into how British Muslims actually feel makes this unmistakeably clear. It will have been the turning point or last straw for many Muslims; for some it will have made the difference between sullen alienation and the feeling that some gesture needs to be made. Even if it hasn't increased the likelihood of the arguably "inevitable" attack, it is likely to increase the probable frequency and ferocity of such attacks. It has increased the likelihood that ordinary people will be maimed or injured.

xpost

glad thats settled

nah, i'm just saying Galloway is a reprehensible human being, what else is there to add?

doesnt stop us all moaning about the daily mail

I suppose the american ilxors wont see it in here but maybe its best theyre unaware of george

George Galloway ‏@georgegalloway
@thomasmessenger an Israeli citizen could not by definition be my constituent.

o_0

i think he means he doesn't understand how electoral law works there, as well as being an anti-semite obviously

Was brian cox playing him for laughs on bbc4 last night

https://i.ibb.co/Wz4y0Xs/Screenshot-2023-04-12-at-09-47-33.png

George has uncovered a possible US regime change operation against Netanyahu

He should be all 'Simpsons characters betting on a monkey fight' about this, yeah?

George Galloway voted Tory in the last Scottish parliament elections and he should never be allowed to forget it.

The #Russian people are one, indivisible and unbeatable. The sooner western leaders accept that the better it will be for all of us. @MoatsTV https://t.co/r5jNgcGrKv

— George Galloway (@georgegalloway) June 26, 2023

George has discovered that the Russian people are one, indivisible and unbeatable., via his source Kim Dotcom

good to see the big man back saluting strength, courage and indefatigability once more

2/1 to win in Rochdale

me laughing my face off if he wins does not mean a personal endorsement

Labour is focusing resources elsewhere, after its candidate, the Lancashire county councillor Azhar Ali, was repeatedly abused by Deeplish locals. A video doing the rounds online shows him in a takeaway being called “Keir Starmer’s bum chum” while diners shout “free Palestine”.

The Labour candidate made some remarks about 7/10 being a Netanyahu inside job, it's surprising he hasn't been suspended. Grifter George has got the Nick Griffin endorsement. It's as ugly as it gets really, but still hope Labour lose.

the Green candidate has suspended his campaign after some islamophobic tweets resurfaced (but it's too late to take him off the ballot), plus Simon Danczuk is running for Reform UK so Rochdale voters who want to vote for a terrible candidate are spoiled for choice. There's a reverend running as independent focussing on environmental stuff who seems ok? (haven't done any detailed research, so don't hold me to that if he turns out to be an axe murderer or something)

This by-election is giving huge "microcosm of the state of politics in England" vibes

The Rochdale election was stolen. JD Vance is sane