Terorist bombings

November 10, 2005 7:35 AM

Explosions in three hotels in Amman, Jordan kill at least 57 people. Authorities suspect suicide bombers. The Grand Hyatt Hotel, the Radisson SAS Hotel, and the Days Inn were involved in the bombings; most of the deaths were focused at a wedding reception where a man allegedly entered into the crowd with eplosives strapped to his body. Arrests have been made, and the government is asking anyone who filmed the bombings to give the government a copy. An al-qaeda website has taken responsibility, stating "A group of our best lions launched a new attack on some dens ..."
posted by Dean Keaton (25 comments total)

Seems kind of stupid to use your "best lions" as suicide bombers.
posted by fenriq at 7:39 AM on November 10, 2005

I guess that terrorist breeding ground Bush established in Iraq "so we don't fight them here" is having some swamp overflow problems.
posted by nofundy at 7:42 AM on November 10, 2005

I think that is sort of a mistranslation. "Best lions" would be better translated as "bravest" but I think they were going for the verbatim rather than figurative.
posted by Pollomacho at 7:43 AM on November 10, 2005

What would happen if we pulled everybody out now nofundy?
posted by Dean Keaton at 7:46 AM on November 10, 2005

why do you think the only other option is pulling everyone out, Dean Keaton?
posted by NationalKato at 7:55 AM on November 10, 2005

"The political process in Iraq now moves forward," Bush said.
posted by matteo at 7:57 AM on November 10, 2005

A Hyatt, a Radisson, and... a Days Inn?

Hell, I've wanted to bomb a few Days Inns myself...
posted by wakko at 7:59 AM on November 10, 2005

What would happen if we pulled everybody out now nofundy?

That's totally irrelevant to his point, and you know it.
posted by rxrfrx at 8:12 AM on November 10, 2005

What would happen if we pulled everybody out now nofundy?

If the Americans pulled out now the Iraqis could settle their own affairs for themselves. The way it should be.
posted by soiled cowboy at 8:44 AM on November 10, 2005

soiled cowboy, you fell for it. unless you are being sarcastic
posted by Dean Keaton at 8:59 AM on November 10, 2005

Bush blaming on second comment. Nice.
posted by Krrrlson at 9:00 AM on November 10, 2005

Yeah fenriq totally missed the point.
posted by Joeforking at 9:13 AM on November 10, 2005

You expect we should praise him for this krrrlson? Or do you posit that there is no connection between these bombongs and Bush's war on Iraq?
posted by nofundy at 9:25 AM on November 10, 2005

Nice false dichotomy there. I envy you, sort of. Whatever "bombong" you are smoking, it must be good.
posted by Krrrlson at 9:33 AM on November 10, 2005

Zarqawi has been waiting for his chance to hit Jordan seriously for years. Jordan is his real goal, at least, to a greater degree than Iraq.

Near the end of 1993, the pair returned to Zarqa and began preaching a revolutionary creed against the Jordanian regime. A few months later, in March 1994, Zarqawi and Maqdisi were arrested and subsequently sentenced to 15 years in prison for creating a clandestine jihadist group called Bayaat al Imam (“Pledge of Alliance”).

That’s one reason why, contrary to popular belief, Zarqawi did not pledge allegiance to bin Laden at that meeting, despite being invited to join al Qaeda’s international terrorist network. Zarqawi’s horizon was limited to what he saw as corrupt Arab regimes, especially his native home of Jordan. Some experts have found it implausible that someone as junior as Zarqawi, who was without financial backing, would refuse bin Laden’s offer to join al Qaeda. But those who know the Jordanian radical say this kind of behavior is perfectly in line with his personality. “He never followed the orders of others,” says a former member of his camp in Herat. “I never heard him praise anyone apart from the Prophet [Muhammad], this was Abu Musab’s character. He never followed anyone.”

Zarqawi wanted the Herat camp to prepare people to go back to Jordan to carry out suicide missions. The camp was advertised by word of mouth. Many simply heard of it back in Jordan, met people who had known Zarqawi, and decided to join. In early 2002, after the fall of the Taliban regime at the hands of U.S. forces, Zarqawi fled to Iraqi Kurdistan, where he established additional camps. He was anticipating a U.S. invasion of Iraq. After putting a childhood friend in charge of his camps, he secretly went to Baghdad in the summer of 2002 and began preparing for battle.

Zarqawi’s list of crimes soon multiplied. In November 2001, joint U.S.-Jordan investigations accused Zarqawi of being part of the foiled al Qaeda plot in Jordan during the millennium celebrations in 2000. In February 2002, he was sentenced in absentia to 15 years in prison for his involvement in the thwarted attack. They also charged him with responsibility for the assassination of Yitzhak Snir, an Israeli citizen, in 2001 and of U.S. diplomat Laurence Foley, who was gunned down in Amman in 2002. When no hard evidence was produced to back up these charges, many Middle Eastern journalists and observers believed that Zarqawi was being framed as a new international terror leader. After all, all sides had much to gain from the myth of Zarqawi. The Kurds could use him to convince the United States to bomb jihadist camps in northern Iraq. The Jordanians could use him to solve the mystery of a series of terror attacks carried out by local militants. And the Americans, intent on building their case for attacking Iraq, could use the shadowy figure of Zarqawi to link Saddam’s regime to the threat posed by al Qaeda.
posted by loquax at 9:40 AM on November 10, 2005

The daily Iraq bomb killed 33.
posted by smackfu at 10:05 AM on November 10, 2005

Dean Keaton writes " What would happen if we pulled everybody out now nofundy?"


Good point Dean. It's such a shame that no one pointed out this war might be a mistake before it started.

We'll keep pissing and moaning during wars as long as administrations keep fucking up and starting them again.
posted by Deathalicious at 12:32 PM on November 10, 2005

Krrrlson writes " Bush blaming on second comment. Nice."

Be fair, though: only 'cuz it's his fault.
posted by Deathalicious at 12:33 PM on November 10, 2005

By the way, Dean, did you know that there a news sources other than Wikipedia and Al-Jazeera?

/just sayin'
posted by Deathalicious at 12:37 PM on November 10, 2005

And did you know that this happened, like, more than 24 hours ago behind when this post was made? Are your news networking in the US really that fucking slow with international news?
posted by Jimbob at 12:42 PM on November 10, 2005

No, JimBob...it's just the NewsFilter mefites who are 'really that fucking slow.' We get our news from much faster channels.
posted by NationalKato at 12:47 PM on November 10, 2005

First you didn't want them to go to war, now you want it to stop, make up your minds!

I'm really appalled at this. I don't recognize terrorism as a valid method of conducting a resistance. You cannot purposefully target innocents whether your position is right or wrong or you are oppressed or not. Even were it somehow necessary I would not compound it further by celebrating it.
Does anyone actually want to come to some sort of terms or are all sides pledged to endless war forever? Because this methodology isn't aimed at achieving victory.
posted by Smedleyman at 3:21 PM on November 10, 2005

It doesn't seem many people recognize that this terrorism is a direct natural progression in response to any country(in this case the US) possessing overwhelming force. This is where the arms race has ultimately taken us.

Bitching about the methods they use not being "valid" when they have no other choice but to use them(in so far as they believe in their reasons to be fighting), is counterproductive and tends to ignore the many-fold higher numbers of civilians that are knowingly killed with our "civilized" warfare.

Department of Peace, anyone?
After we kick the imperialists out, that is.
posted by a_green_man at 5:22 PM on November 10, 2005

By the way, Dean, did you know that there a news sources other than Wikipedia and Al-Jazeera?

Not to pull away from the severity of what happened but...

If there are, I don't wanna know about em'.
posted by Dean Keaton at 6:53 PM on November 10, 2005

By the way, this blast killed Syrian-American Arab director Mustafa Akkad, producer of all the Halloween films, along with his California-raised daughter.

More importantly, he is the director of the film The Message, which Muslims around the world regard as the best portrayal ever made of the life of the Prophet Muhammad. It will hopefully have a profound effect on those Muslims who have, until now, been indifferent to terrorism.
posted by zarex at 5:09 AM on November 11, 2005