Courage, France

[Oscar]

Courage, France

[ http://ottawacitizen.com/news/world/edi ... age-france ]

Ottawa Citizen Editorial Board Published on: January 7, 2015 Last Updated: January 7, 2015 6:07 PM EST

The murders of 12 people — including four of France’s most famous cartoonists — in Paris Wednesday were not justified or righteous, and the terrorists who committed them while believing otherwise have accomplished little more than to strengthen the resolve of the segments of society that have rejected barbarism in favour of things like a free press, freedom of expression and freedom of religion.

It was a cowardly attack on unarmed human beings who did nothing more than draw and print a few caricatures — regardless of what you thought about the controversial images — which is in and of itself so ridiculous it defies logical explanation. It was an attack on the principles listed above, too. But despite the pseudo-religious undertones, it was an attack on Muslims as well. It was an attack on those who’ve embraced Islam — a faith that underpins some of humanity’s greatest scientific and social advances — as a way to better their lives and the world, because with each absurd crime based on a perversion of that great religion, more people turn a skeptical eye toward even those who practice it peacefully. It’s wrong, it’s unfair and it’ll happen, regardless.

And it won’t go much further than that. Each attack on representations of the principles that we — including many Muslims — hold dear, whether it be a media office in Paris or a war memorial and parliament building here in Ottawa, is a reminder that liberty, once achieved, can withstand a great many strikes. There will be no death by a thousand cuts, which seems to be the only strategy groups like Al-Qaeda and ISIS have come up with. Not even death by a hundred thousand cuts, or a million.

The most fearsome thing about Islamist extremists is that they don’t fear death, which should be to their advantage. But the worldwide disgust and condemnation of the latest attack, the alliance between France’s major broadcasters and publishers to keep the Charlie Hebdo publication alive “pour préserver les principes d’indépendance et de liberté de pensée et d’expression, garants de notre démocratie,” the thousands who gathered in France’s streets Wednesday night to protest a gutless act … they all show that there are many more people in this world who would face the threat of death, or even death itself, before submitting to the dystopia championed by a relative handful of murderous ideologues.

As Stéphane “Charb” Charbonnier, one of the editors gunned down in Paris, put it in a widely circulated quote Wednesday: “It perhaps sounds a bit pompous, but I prefer to die standing than living on my knees.”

Courage, France.

[Oscar]

A Timeline: Where did the Paris Shooters Get Their Weapons?

[ http://www.globalresearch.ca/a-timeline ... ns/5423445 ]

By Tony Cartalucci Global Research, January 08, 2015

Heavily armed, well-trained gunmen executed what appears to be a well-planned attack in Paris, France, killing 12, including 2 police officers. Where did these terrorists get their weapons, training, political backing, funds, and inspiration? A short timeline featuring news stories from 2011 to 2014 helps explain how France’s recent national tragedy could have been the direct result of its own insidious, callous, terroristic foreign policy that has visited this very same carnage seen in Paris, upon the people of Libya and Syria, a thousand fold. [ . . . ]

[Oscar]

Is the Charlie Hebdo attack a threat to democracy?

[ http://www.cbc.ca/thesundayedition/feat ... democracy/ ]

Sunday, January 11, 2015 |

One blood-soaked year ended a week and a half ago, and a fledgling new year opened with carnage in France. A massacre at the Paris office of the satirical magazine, Charlie Hebdo, left a dozen people dead on Wednesday. Two days later, three terrorists, four hostages and a police officer were dead in the aftermath of hostage-takings carried out by the perpetrators of Wednesday's attack and their apparent accomplices.

The vicious attack on a satirical magazine - one that's made a point of mocking Islam and other religions - could hardly have been more potently targeted or symbolic in the country of Voltaire, where nothing seems quite so sacred as freedom of expression and the right to hold nothing sacred. The French condemned the massacre as not simply an attempt to put a country on edge and terrorize its citizens, but as an attack on the country's core democratic values.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper was echoing the sentiments of the world's political leaders in saying, "When a trio of hooded men struck at some of our most cherished democratic principles... they assaulted democracy everywhere."

- - -

Paul Rogers is Professor of Peace Studies at the University of Bradford in the United Kingdom, and the author of A War on Terror, Afghanistan and After. He's also the international security editor of the website, openDemocracy. Professor Rogers is a regular guest on The Sunday Edition; he helps us make sense of the events of the past week and their implications for Western democracies and their Muslim citizens.

[Oscar]

Mourning Charlie Hebdo Journalists, While Ignoring that US-NATO State-Sponsored Terrorism is the “Number One Killer” of Journalists

[ http://www.globalresearch.ca/mourning-c ... ts/5423920 ]

By Julie Lévesque Global Research, January 10, 2015

In the wake of the terrorist attack by self-proclaimed Al-Qaeda operatives killing 12 people including 8 journalists from the French satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo, the Western elite and mainstream media display of compassion and indignation highlights their complaisance towards Western and Israeli state terrorism.

Before exploring the broader issue, it should be noted that while the Paris attacks bear the hallmarks of a possible false flag, such as the ID card left in the car by one terrorist, an examination of the false flag hypothesis is excluded outright, completely ignored by the mainstream media. Moreover, one of the alleged terrorists, Cherif Kouachi told a French news outlet he had been financed by former Al Qaeda leader Anwar Al Awlaki, an American cleric who dined at the Pentagon a few months after 9/11 and «worked as a triple agent and an FBI asset well before 9/11», according to U.S. Lt.Col. Anthony Shaffer. (Kurt Nimmo, FBI Admits Pentagon Dinner Guest Al-Awlaki Worked for Them, Infowars, August 2, 2012) [ http://www.infowars.com/fbi-admits-pent ... -for-them/ ]

Since the deadly attacks on January 7, 2015, the Western media, especially the French Canadian media, claim in a very ethnocentric manner that “the planet is mourning” the death of the French journalists. This tragic event which needs to be condemned must be examined in an appropriate context. People in countries where France has been bombing civilians, through NATO and U.S.-led military invasions, and where Western-backed terrorists kill innocent civilians (Libya, Syria) are routinely mourning the death of their own people. These deaths remain unreported. The Western world is not “the planet” and not “everyone is Charlie”, contrary to what the media leads us to believe.

During the latest assault on Gaza, 13 Palestinian journalists were killed by the Israeli army. These journalists were killed to suppress the truth pertaining to Israeli atrocities. Western journalists holding signs of solidarity were nowhere to be found.

Before the James Foley and Steven Sotloff beheadings dozens of journalists were killed in Syria by terrorists armed, trained and financed by NATO countries and their antidemocratic allies such as Saudi Arabia. Hundreds of civilians had also been beheaded long before them, around 200 in one single village, according to a Human Rights Watch report. (See Julie Lévesque, The History of ISIS Beheadings: Part of the “Training Manual” of US Sponsored Syria “Pro-Democracy” Terrorists, Global Research, September 19, 2014) [ http://www.globalresearch.ca/the-histor ... ts/5402566 ]

The outrage and indignation, however, was reserved for the Western beheaded journalists. The war in Syria has been deadly for journalists, with 153 killed according to some estimates, thanks to NATO-sponsored terrorism. No Western journalist holding signs of compassion for Syrian journalists has been seen.

But the deadliest country in the world for journalists has been Iraq during the US occupation. According to the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ):

MORE:

[ http://www.globalresearch.ca/mourning-c ... ts/5423920 ]