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Chamale posted:I wouldn't dismiss this yet. The situation around these attacks remains unclear, and it may have been a coup attempt rather than an FSA bombing. Are there any photos of the bombed area? That video captured near the site really does look as though nothing happened. Fairly sure it was FSA given that it was timed with a major push into Damascus.
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# ? Jul 19, 2012 07:55 |
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# ? Jun 9, 2024 08:39 |
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Chamale posted:I wouldn't dismiss this yet. The situation around these attacks remains unclear, and it may have been a coup attempt rather than an FSA bombing. Are there any photos of the bombed area? That video captured near the site really does look as though nothing happened. If it's the one that killed Assad's brother in law, it was reported on Maddow tonight as having been inside the office during a meeting. I tried the Embed code and it would be a dick move to post it in here because it's a wall o' code, but here's the URL from the video popup for the segment: Violence escalates in Syria
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# ? Jul 19, 2012 09:15 |
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i poo poo trains posted:Why are you so incredulous to the notion that a members of a belligerent party to an extremely sectarian conflict may harbor sectarian views? There certainly are sectarian views on both sides now. But I've been following this from the very beginning, and I assert that the Syrian uprising started as a civil movement calling for democracy. The regime responded with sectarianism and brutality, and the uprising had no choice but to follow suit. The chant in question is testifies to this. There isn't a single video of it. The regime invented it to scare minorities into submission and it largely succeeded. EDIT: This video supposedly shows the scene of yesterday's bombing. You can hear a security guy calling for cordoning off the area and bringing ambulances. No idea how authentic it is: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qZhTPQB2cmM CoderCat fucked around with this message at 10:03 on Jul 19, 2012 |
# ? Jul 19, 2012 09:57 |
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Zeroisanumber posted:Fairly sure it was FSA given that it was timed with a major push into Damascus. Or they got Indira Ghandi'd. Some people when they are digusted at the regime they serve run to the hills to join the guerillas. Others stay put and wait for the chance to mow down some brass. Sometimes they do it of their own accord.
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# ? Jul 19, 2012 10:03 |
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Omar Suleiman Died. That's one less poo poo stain to worry about.
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# ? Jul 19, 2012 10:03 |
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Authorman posted:Or they got Indira Ghandi'd. Some people when they are digusted at the regime they serve run to the hills to join the guerillas. Others stay put and wait for the chance to mow down some brass. Sometimes they do it of their own accord. Pretty sure it had been reported earlier in the thread that it may have been the bodyguard of one of the dead minsters, but there were other reports saying it was hidden in a water cooler.
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# ? Jul 19, 2012 10:06 |
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Al-Saqr posted:Omar Suleiman Died. During a routine medical examination, must have been one hell of a prostate exam.
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# ? Jul 19, 2012 10:35 |
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Brown Moses posted:During a routine medical examination, must have been one hell of a prostate exam. Thinking assassination?
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# ? Jul 19, 2012 11:10 |
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Shadoer posted:Thinking assassination? Well, I am certain someone is thinking that.
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# ? Jul 19, 2012 11:16 |
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I'm pretty sure al-Jazeraa even wrote 'dies' in the tweet regarding it. By which I mean citation marks and all.
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# ? Jul 19, 2012 12:21 |
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This is not Syria, this is Moscow: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hne-ViGCl6Q
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# ? Jul 19, 2012 13:15 |
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Good job Dutch news for reporting the bombing on Syrian government officials as a "terror-attack". Jesus loving christ.
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# ? Jul 19, 2012 13:16 |
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Well, it is a terrorist attack, at least in the sense that it's a politically motivated act of violence upon the civilian regime of Syria. It's just that it's a perfectly legitimate terrorist attack carried out in the middle of a civil war.
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# ? Jul 19, 2012 13:21 |
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Orange Devil posted:Good job Dutch news for reporting the bombing on Syrian government officials as a "terror-attack". In what way was it not a terror attack? Is this more of the "We shouldn't call it terrorism if the Good Guys do it against the Bad Guys" thing?
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# ? Jul 19, 2012 13:24 |
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One mans terrorist...
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# ? Jul 19, 2012 13:25 |
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V. Illych L. posted:Well, it is a terrorist attack, at least in the sense that it's a politically motivated act of violence upon the civilian regime of Syria. It's just that it's a perfectly legitimate terrorist attack carried out in the middle of a civil war. I just fail to see how targetting high ranking members of an illegitimate, undemocratic and murderous regime during a state of civil war qualifies as terror. By that definition trying to bomb Hitler would've been a terrorattack.
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# ? Jul 19, 2012 13:26 |
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Yes, and by any reasonably objective measure the attempted assassinations of Hitler by Germans were terrorist attacks, and the resistance movements in various occupied countries were also heavily involved in terrorism.
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# ? Jul 19, 2012 13:28 |
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Orange Devil posted:I just fail to see how targetting high ranking members of an illegitimate, undemocratic and murderous regime during a state of civil war qualifies as terror. By that definition trying to bomb Hitler would've been a terrorattack. "Terrorism" doesn't mean "Bad thing done by bad people".
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# ? Jul 19, 2012 13:30 |
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Section 31 posted:This is not Syria, this is Moscow: I don't speak Russian or Syrian, so I don't know what's going on here. Is this a rally for Assad or a protest?
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# ? Jul 19, 2012 13:31 |
Young Freud posted:I don't speak Russian or Syrian, so I don't know what's going on here. Is this a rally for Assad or a protest? Pro-revolution, the flags give it away even if you don't speak Arabic.
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# ? Jul 19, 2012 13:32 |
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Augure posted:"Terrorism" doesn't mean "Bad thing done by bad people". Actually, it does. It does not have a definition anyone can agree upon. From that perspective the term is entirely meaningless. However we can still see that the term has gotten some meaning due to the context in which it is commonly used, especially recently. And it has precisely been used in Western media as something that is an inherently illegitimate thing to do. Terrorism is, according to our media and politicians, always bad. We've been told this for over a decade. So in that context, using this term is ridiculous. And there's not even a possibility to fall back on "yes but technically actually the term terrorism is defined as meaning such and so" because no such agreed upon technical definition exists. V. Illych L. posted:Yes, and by any reasonably objective measure the attempted assassinations of Hitler by Germans were terrorist attacks, and the resistance movements in various occupied countries were also heavily involved in terrorism. If I search for "20 july plot terror" the only hits I get that use the word terror do so in relation to Hitler's reign, or the reaction from the Nazi's to the plot. Not a single hit that links the word terror to the july 20th plot. From this I conclude that this is simply not the way the word terror is understood. Orange Devil fucked around with this message at 13:39 on Jul 19, 2012 |
# ? Jul 19, 2012 13:34 |
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Orange Devil posted:Actually, it does. It does not have a definition anyone can agree upon. From that perspective the term is entirely meaningless. However we can still see that the term has gotten some meaning due to the context in which it is commonly used, especially recently. And it has precisely been used in Western media as something that is an inherently illegitimate thing to do. Terrorism is, according to our media and politicians, always bad. We've been told this for over a decade. So in that context, using this term is ridiculous. And there's not even a possibility to fall back on "yes but technically actually the term terrorism is defined as meaning such and so" because no such agreed upon technical definition exists.
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# ? Jul 19, 2012 13:51 |
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Augure posted:Well, good point I guess - we should accept the Western media's propaganda and exclusively use "terrorism" to mean to "any act a Muslim takes against any citizen, property, or interest of the United States." This is definitely a better way to use the word than something crazy like "the use of violence against civilian targets to force political change." You've convinced me: this wasn't a terror attack because it wasn't perpetrated against the USA. I'm not quite sure its "terrorism" any more when its a full scale civil war with a standing rebel army and the purpose of the killing if you want those people dead instead of killing random civilians in order to terrify. In regards to WW2 I would see the firebombings far more as "terrorism" then killing the head of the enemy armed forces, or for that matter French resistance killing occupying German military.
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# ? Jul 19, 2012 14:02 |
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Augure posted:Well, good point I guess - we should accept the Western media's propaganda and exclusively use "terrorism" to mean to "any act a Muslim takes against any citizen, property, or interest of the United States." This is definitely a better way to use the word than something crazy like "the use of violence against civilian targets to force political change." You've convinced me: this wasn't a terror attack because it wasn't perpetrated against the USA. My point was that this wasn't a terrorist attack because the most common recent usage by far of the term does not apply to this situation and furthermore that the term lacks any kind of agreed upon meaning to the point of it being meaningless. The term is entirely a propaganda term, as you recognise. And the use of it is to put those it is directed at in a bad light. So why are you ok with the term being applied in this context, knowing full well the connotations that it carries, and thus how it is likely to be interpretted? For what it's worth, the only usage of the term terror in connection to the bombing in this thread yesterday was a quote from the Russian government demanding the terrorists brought to justice, which was then mocked. Either way, I think I've made my point here, so this'll be my last word on this issue.
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# ? Jul 19, 2012 14:03 |
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Jarmak posted:
Yeah, so would I, because the definition of terrorism is "Use of violence against civilians to force political change." Very good point, Jarmak. That's also why the US's use of predator drones to bomb random convoys in Afghanistan is terrorism, and Taliban attacks on US military bases are not.
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# ? Jul 19, 2012 14:05 |
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Augure posted:Yeah, so would I, because the definition of terrorism is "Use of violence against civilians to force political change." Very good point, Jarmak. That's also why the US's use of predator drones to bomb random convoys in Afghanistan is terrorism, and Taliban attacks on US military bases are not. Neither of those are terrorism, but since you're arguing from the point that predator strikes are simply "at random" I'm guessing you're not interested in arguing in good faith and/or on this plane of reality.
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# ? Jul 19, 2012 14:09 |
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V. Illych L. posted:Yes, and by any reasonably objective measure the attempted assassinations of Hitler by Germans were terrorist attacks, and the resistance movements in various occupied countries were also heavily involved in terrorism. Resistance movements, I'll give you, but I think the attempted assassinations were, in fact, assassination attempts, and not terrorism, as their intent was to kill the son of a bitch, not beget terror to all.
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# ? Jul 19, 2012 14:09 |
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az jan jananam posted:Pro-revolution, the flags give it away even if you don't speak Arabic. I figured it might be pro-revolution, but that's because of the lack of pictures of Assad. It's surprising that they've made themselves known in Russian, given the government's friendliness with Syria.
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# ? Jul 19, 2012 14:09 |
Augure posted:Yeah, so would I, because the definition of terrorism is "Use of violence against civilians to force political change." Very good point, Jarmak. That's also why the US's use of predator drones to bomb random convoys in Afghanistan is terrorism, and Taliban attacks on US military bases are not. Nope. Take your inflammatory derails elsewhere friend.
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# ? Jul 19, 2012 14:11 |
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Young Freud posted:I figured it might be pro-revolution, but that's because of the lack of pictures of Assad. It's surprising that they've made themselves known in Russian, given the government's friendliness with Syria. Yeah, the Russian at the top says "Meeting in Moscow against the criminal Bashar Assad".
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# ? Jul 19, 2012 14:14 |
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V. Illych L. posted:Well, it is a terrorist attack, at least in the sense that it's a politically motivated act of violence upon the civilian regime of Syria. It's just that it's a perfectly legitimate terrorist attack carried out in the middle of a civil war. Minister of Defense, Deputy Chief of Staff of Armed Forces, Minister of Interior. That's not the "civilian" regime of Syria. Those are military leaders.
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# ? Jul 19, 2012 14:15 |
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^^^^Ministerial positions are political, civilian positionsWarcabbit posted:Resistance movements, I'll give you, but I think the attempted assassinations were, in fact, assassination attempts, and not terrorism, as their intent was to kill the son of a bitch, not beget terror to all. Political assassinations have always been considered terrorism, though? My point isn't that "terrorism" as an expanded, subjective term doesn't have a bunch of connotations that would normally make it inapplicable here (whop triple negative), but if you're going to run with an attempt at making some objective criteria for the word then any reasonable run at that would make this sort of attack terrorism. Obviously, terrorism isn't generally used to refer to anything objective, so I'm being a bit pedantic and looking at my initial post it was a tad unclear, for which I do apologise.
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# ? Jul 19, 2012 14:19 |
The Security Council will be voting on the Syria resolution in about a half hour http://webtv.un.org/
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# ? Jul 19, 2012 14:25 |
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V. Illych L. posted:^^^^Ministerial positions are political, civilian positions They all hold military ranks, that's how it is for a lot of Arab nations, civilians never control the military. True, the position is political as well, but it's not really civilian. Ham fucked around with this message at 14:42 on Jul 19, 2012 |
# ? Jul 19, 2012 14:40 |
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az jan jananam posted:The Security Council will be voting on the Syria resolution in about a half hour http://webtv.un.org/ Does anyone even care anymore?
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# ? Jul 19, 2012 14:41 |
Ghetto Prince posted:Does anyone even care anymore? I care! The Russian MFA twitter feed is pre-emptively justifying its vote: https://twitter.com/MFA_Russia az jan jananam fucked around with this message at 14:53 on Jul 19, 2012 |
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# ? Jul 19, 2012 14:49 |
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Young Freud posted:I figured it might be pro-revolution, but that's because of the lack of pictures of Assad. It's surprising that they've made themselves known in Russian, given the government's friendliness with Syria. The shirts also say 'freedom to Syria' in Russian. Many westerners seem to have a wrong idea of what present day Russia is like. It's nowhere close to Iran or Syria, or Belarus, in terms of political repression. You can even set a demonstration against the Russian government and you probably won't get arrested, but your venues will be strictly limited (special occasions like May Day marches being an exception), and don't expect to make the evening news. Here's anti-Putin marchers on the Nevski Prospekt in St.Petersburg on May Day 2012. It does depend on region though - in Chechnya it can be very dangerous to show dissent because the place is run by several criminal organizations, the most powerful of which is Kadyrov's government but any of the others can take offense too. And in St.Petersburg promoting LGBT rights is forbidden by the local governor so LGBT protesters can be arrested. In the above photo you can see one of the many rainbow flags on that march, and the St.Pete police did arrest 17 marchers for waving LGBT flags. They also forced the LGBT marchers to leave all their signs requesting for sexual equality before the march took off, which the activists complied with. But anti-Putin signs were not touched. All in all, some folks demonstrating against the Syrian government is the least of concerns for Russian police.
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# ? Jul 19, 2012 14:50 |
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V. Illych L. posted:^^^^Ministerial positions are political, civilian positions Most defenitions regarding terrorism speak of politically motivated attacks against civilians with the purpose of causing fear (aka terror). So no, attacks against top ranking officials directly involved in armed conflict is not terrorism. In fact, if a rebel group assassinates a president it would not be terrorism since a president is the 'commander in chief' of the armed forces. The UN did not define terrorism though because parties couldn't agree on an objective criteria. Pretty much every state likes to call all their enemies terrorists because it helps to foster hatred towards them. Pieter Pan fucked around with this message at 15:02 on Jul 19, 2012 |
# ? Jul 19, 2012 14:59 |
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az jan jananam posted:I care! This sounds like a whole bunch of retweets. The situation's changed in the last day that I can't believe they're still thinking this.
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# ? Jul 19, 2012 15:06 |
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# ? Jun 9, 2024 08:39 |
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From Syrian State TV (via Reuters)quote:Syrian state television warned citizens on Thursday that gunmen were planning to attack people in the capital using military uniforms as disguises. Yeah... any uniformed military forces that tortured and killed your neighbor, totally had to be the rebels guys.
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# ? Jul 19, 2012 15:08 |