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Up</title></head><body>
<div>All,</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>I had my doubts when the "terrorist plot" made
headlines this week, especially when it was announced that no guns or
explosives were found and that the "Al Quaeda" contact was
an FBI informant. Below is an analysis of the actual charges as filed
by the government in the indictment. Warning: the author is a liberal
leftie.</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>Mark S.</div>
<div><br></div>
<div><br></div>
<div><br></div>
<blockquote type="cite" cite><br></blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite><br></blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>By Bill Van Auken<br>
There are many incongruities surrounding the arrest of seven men
from<br>
the impoverished Liberty City neighborhood of Miami on charges of<br>
conspiracy to .wage war on the United States. that suggest it, like
so<br>
many previous .terrorist plots. announced by the Bush administration,
is<br>
a government-inspired provocation mounted for reactionary
political<br>
ends.<br>
<br>
None of the claims made by the government and repeated uncritically
by<br>
the media concerning the arrest of these young working-class men can
be<br>
accepted as good coin. Both the flimsiness of the criminal
indictment<br>
and the lurid headlines surrounding it mark this event as an
escalation<br>
in the anti-democratic conspiracies of the Bush administration.<br>
<br>
There is every indication that this latest purported terrorist<br>
threat.described by some media outlets as .even bigger than
September<br>
11..was manufactured by the FBI, which used an undercover agent
posing<br>
as a terrorist mastermind to entrap those targeted for arrest.<br>
<br>
While the Justice Department declared that the arrests had foiled a
plot<br>
to blow up the tallest building in the US, the Sears Tower in
Chicago,<br>
authorities in that city assured its residents that there had never
been<br>
any threat to the structure.<br>
<br>
The four-count indictment presented by the Justice Department in a
Miami<br>
federal court on Friday contains not a single indication of an
overt<br>
criminal act or even the means to carry one out. The brief 11-page<br>
document consists almost entirely of alleged statements made by
the<br>
defendants to the FBI informant, referred to in quotes throughout
the<br>
indictment as .the al Qaeda representative..<br>
<br>
The government chose to consummate its entrapment plan by
unleashing<br>
dozens of combat-equipped federal agents, dressed in olive drab
fatigues<br>
and carrying automatic weapons, on the predominantly
African-American<br>
Liberty City neighborhood, one of the poorest in the country.
Liberty<br>
City was the scene of riots that broke out in 1980 after the
acquittal<br>
of white police officers for the beating death of a black
motorist.<br>
<br>
On Thursday, the government.s paramilitary squads confronted
residents<br>
with pictures of the accused, demanding to know their whereabouts.
The<br>
seven defendants are representative of the impoverished working
class<br>
population of Miami, including Haitian immigrants.<br>
<br>
It appears they were targeted by the FBI because they had formed a<br>
religious group, calling themselves the .Seas of David,. which<br>
reportedly incorporated elements of Christianity and Islam. One of
their<br>
crimes, according to the FBI.s deputy director, John Pistole, was
that<br>
the Seas of David .did not believe the United States government
had<br>
legal authority over them..<br>
<br>
According to some residents of the neighborhood, the group lived<br>
together in the warehouse that was raided by the FBI, using it for<br>
religious worship and as a base of operations for a construction<br>
business.<br>
<br>
Elements of the federal indictment are so self-incriminating as to<br>
border on the ludicrous. Among the charges are that the defendants<br>
.swore an oath of loyalty to al Qaeda.. Who administered this oath?
The<br>
.al Qaeda representative,. AKA, the paid informant of the FBI.<br>
<br>
Aside from this .loyalty oath. solicited by the FBI, only one of
the<br>
seven defendants is accused of any overt act, outside of driving the
FBI<br>
informant to meetings.<br>
<br>
The only action with which this one individual is charged.all else
is<br>
words.is taking pictures of the FBI headquarters in Miami. Who
supplied</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>the camera? The .al Qaeda
representative..i.e., the FBI agent<br>
provocateur.<br>
<br>
The indictment further charges two of the accused with driving .with
the<br>
.al Qaeda representative.. to a store in Dade County, Florida
to</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>purchase a memory chip for a digital
camera to be used for taking<br>
reconnaissance photographs of the FBI building. The document does
not<br>
say who paid for the chip, but there is hardly room for doubt.<br>
<br>
In one of the more curious sections of the indictment, one of the<br>
accused, Narseal Batiste, is accused of asking the FBI informant
to<br>
provide various items for his group, including footwear, for which
he<br>
provided a .list of shoe sizes.. Apparently the FBI delivered the
shoes.<br>
<br>
Pistole, the FBI deputy director, admitted that the supposed plots
to<br>
blow up buildings had been .more aspirational than operational.. In
the<br>
raids carried out by the FBI squads, no weapons and no explosive<br>
substances were found.<br>
<br>
.We preempted their plot,. declared Pistole. But the indictment and
the<br>
facts of the case indicate that the alleged plot would never have<br>
existed had the government not planned and instigated it in the
first<br>
place.<br>
<br>
At a Washington press conference, US Attorney General Alberto
Gonzales<br>
acknowledged that the alleged plot had posed no actual danger. He<br>
claimed this was because the authorities had intervened .in its
earliest<br>
stages.<br>
.<br>
So .early. was the preemption that officials associated with the<br>
supposed targets of the plot dismissed the government.s
indictment.<br>
Barbara Carley, the managing director of the Sears Tower, told the<br>
press, .Federal and local authorities continue to tell us they.ve
never<br>
found evidence of a credible terrorism threat against Sears Tower
that.s<br>
ever gone beyond just talk..<br>
<br>
Her remarks were echoed by Chicago Police Superintendent Phil Cline,
who<br>
said, .There never was any credible threat to the Sears Tower at
all..<br>
<br>
In his press conference, Attorney General Gonzales asserted that
the<br>
Miami group represented a .new brand of terrorism. created by .the<br>
convergence of globalization and technology..<br>
<br>
What these words mean is anyone.s guess. There is no indication
that<br>
those charged, who were living in a warehouse in the poorest city
in<br>
America, had access to any technology, and their supposed contact to
the<br>
wider world was an informer planted by the FBI. The suggestion that
the<br>
seven men were a .home-grown. terrorist group inspired by contact
with<br>
Al Qaeda elements over the Internet is supported neither by evidence
nor<br>
the charges contained in the government.s own indictment.<br>
<br>
R. Alexander Acosta, the United States attorney in South Florida,
told<br>
the media that the defendants had .lived in the United States for
most<br>
of their lives, but developed a hatred of America.. This is presented
as<br>
though it constituted evidence of a crime.<br>
<br>
It is hardly surprising for someone living in Liberty City to hate
the<br>
poverty and oppression that prevail there, or for Haitian immigrants
to<br>
despise the imprisonment and repression that Washington metes out
to<br>
those attempting to escape the brutal conditions imposed by US<br>
imperialism upon their homeland.<br>
<br>
What is highly noteworthy is that the federal government decided
to<br>
intervene in this situation to concoct a phony Al Qaeda connection
and<br>
trumped up .terror plot..<br>
<br>
What is the government.s motive in manufacturing such a plot?
Whose<br>
interests are served? Under conditions in which the majority of
the<br>
American people have turned against the Iraq war and support the<br>
withdrawal of American troops, the Bush administration is
desperately<br>
attempting to once again link its neo-colonial venture in Iraq with
a<br>
supposed .global war on terror. waged to defend the American
people<br>
against another 9/11.<br>
<br>
To sustain such a fiction, fresh evidence of terrorist threats is<br>
periodically required. And it has been forthcoming on a regular
basis.<br>
Every several months another .conspiracy. is unveiled, invariably<br>
involving an FBI informant and hapless individuals ensnared in a
plot<br>
orchestrated by the government.<br>
<br>
Until now, these .sting. operations have been targeted at
Muslim</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>immigrants. Last month, for example,
Pakistani immigrant Shahawar Siraj<br>
in New York City was found guilty of plotting to blow up the
Herald<br>
Square subway station in a .plot. that the evidence indicated was
based<br>
entirely on suggestions from an FBI informant.</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite><br>
The FBI agent provocateur taunted the defendant with photographs of
Abu<br>
Ghraib torture victims and demanded to know how, as a Muslim, he
could<br>
fail to take action.<br>
<br>
Similarly, in Albany, New York two years ago, the FBI recruited a<br>
Pakistani immigrant, promising him leniency on minor fraud charges,
to<br>
ensnare two other immigrants in a fictitious scheme to help a<br>
non-existent person buy a weapon for a fake terrorist plot.<br>
These provocations and conspiracies are symptomatic of a government
that<br>
is both ruthless and desperate. Confronting a population that is<br>
increasingly hostile to its political agenda of reaction at home and
war<br>
abroad, it is driven to manufacture an endless series of terrorist<br>
threats aimed at disorienting and intimidating public
opinion.</blockquote>
<div><font face="Lucida Grande" size="+1"
color="#000000">********</font></div>
<div><font color="#000000">From Wikipedia, the free
encyclopedia</font></div>
<div><font color="#000000"><br></font></div>
<div><font color="#000000"><br></font></div>
<div><font color="#000000">Bill Van Auken (born 1950) was the
presidential candidate of the Socialist Equality Party in the U.S.
election of 2004, announcing his candidacy on January 27, 2004. His
running mate was Jim Lawrence. Van Auken is presently running for the
United States Senate seat currently held by Hillary
Clinton.[1]</font><br>
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