In a news conference today, Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan claims that he warned Belgium and the Netherlands that one of the suicide bombers in this week’s attacks in Belgium was a foreign terrorist fighter.
In a separate story, the Israeli newspaper Haaretz claims the Belgian authorities had “precise” warnings about the bombings.
Turkey Blames the West
The Middleeast Observer reports Turkey Blames the West, Erdogan says Belgium Failed to Detect Attacker’s Terror Links.
Addressing a joint press conference with Romanian President Klaus Iohannis in Ankara Wednesday, Erdogan said Belgium was warned that the attacker captured in Turkey’s southeastern Gaziantep province in 2015 was a foreign militant.
“However, despite our warnings that this person is a foreign terrorist fighter, Belgium failed to detect the terrorist links of this person,” the Turkish president said.
Turkish premier said the Syrian tragedy had now reached European shores. “It is now essential for Europe to go towards a very serious policy change,” he said.
He also said “To ensure the safety of the region, there is no other partner than Turkey for Europe,”. He urged Europe to see the unchangeable truth and act accordingly.
A MorningNewsHeadline version of the story states Belgium Released Brussels Attacker Deported from Turkey, Erdogan Reveals.
Turkey deported one of the Brussels attackers and alerted the Belgian authorities about him last year, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has said.
However, Belgium had found no links with terorism of the deportee and released him, Erdogan said at a joint news conference with Romanian President Klaus Iohannis in Ankara, Turkish news daily Sabah reported on Wednesday.
”The Belgian embassy was notified on July 14, 2015 about the deportation of the attacker, who was later released in Belgium,” Erdogan said, according to dailysabah.com.
Erdogan said Belgium had been warned that the attacker caught in Turkey’s southeastern Gaziantep province in 2015 was a foreign fighter.
“However, despite our warnings that this person is a foreign terrorist fighter, Belgium failed to detect the terrorist links of this person,” the Turkish president said, according to Anadolu Agency.
Precise Warnings
The Israeli newspaper Haaretz claims Belgian Intelligence Had Precise Warning That Airport Targeted for Bombing.
The Belgian security services, as well as other Western intelligence agencies, had advance and precise intelligence warnings regarding the terrorist attacks in Belgium on Tuesday, Haaretz has learned.
The security services knew, with a high degree of certainty, that attacks were planned in the very near future for the airport and, apparently, for the subway as well.
That information does not sound all that precise to me.
What was Belgium supposed to do, shutdown the airport and subway? Precise should mean a specific name or date, not a threat that something will happen at the airport “soon”.
This report from Haaretz, like the articles at the top is precise: Belgium Ignored Turkish Warning About Brussels Attacker, Erdogan Says.
REUTERS – One of the attackers in the Brussels suicide bombings was deported last year from Turkey, and Belgium subsequently ignored a warning that the man was a militant, Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan said on Wednesday.
Erdogan’s office later identified the man as Ibrahim El Bakraoui, one of the two brothers named by Belgium as responsible for the attacks that killed at least 31 people in Brussels on Tuesday and were claimed by ISIS.
Speaking at a news conference, Erdogan said Bakraoui was detained in the southern Turkish province of Gaziantep near the Syrian border and was later deported to the Netherlands. Turkey also notified Dutch authorities, Erdogan said.
Turkey Deports Terrorists to the Netherlands
Turkey deports suspected terrorists to the EU and those countries accept them.
What a deal!
Background Checks, Who Needs Em?
Meanwhile, back in Obamaland, please recall that President Obama does not want background checks on refugees.
In November of 2015, Obama said he would Veto Bill Requiring Background Checks On Syrian Refugees.
According to Obama, background checks on Syrian refugees would introduce “unnecessary and impractical requirements”.
Apparently it’s unnecessary as well as too much of an inconvenience to weed out terrorists.
States were forced to take matters into their own hands.
31 States Will Not Take Syrian Refugees
In response to Obama’s welcoming of potential terrorists, CNN reported More than Half the Nation’s Governors say Syrian Refugees Not Welcome.
What would that number be today?
Mike “Mish” Shedlock
Mish: word of caution. Stay away from the geopolitical smoke and mirrors that are pre-planned and orchestrated by Western intelligence agencies. Stick to finance where you are the bomb!
Andy: can you say more about your reasoning? I do share your thinking that it is unlikely that much is printed of offered is not pre-planned and orchestrated. However, the same can be said of our pre-planned and orchestrated USA economy.
First of all, research Operation Gladio that was false flag terrorism in Europe, planned and operated by Western Intelligence. The same group created, armed and assisted Al Quaeda, which morphed into ISIS. The Mossad, CIA and MI5, together with the Saudis have been filmed dropping supplies to. ISIS and the Israeli’s have been filmed providing medical care. It took only a few months for the Russians to accomplish what the US and its “freedom fighters” couldn’t do in 3 years. The whole Syrian conflict is about preferred oil and gas pipelines to eliminate the Russian ones supplying Europe. Just like Libya was all about Ghaddaffi’s plan to eliminate the French Franc and the USD and create a gold backed Dinar for a new African Union. The bankster cartel, and the US State Dept, weren’t too happy about that.
We don’t want muslims and their 7th century culture in the USA. That is with or without considering Brussels.
How about you STFU AndyB?
Turkey deported Ibrahim Bakraoui to Belgium because of his Belgian nationality.Nothing to do with refugees, he was visiting Syria. Belgium released him, then later pursued him. Instead of being caught and imprisoned, he decided to release himself completely before being imprisoned, and thanked Belgium for its attitude in the act.
Thanks. Makes a lot more sense than Turkey capturing some random Syrian dude fighting for Isis, sending him to Belgium with a “terrorist” tag on him, and still have the Belgian government release him for some reason. The Belgians aren’t likely that stupid.
Another issue with Erdogan’s gloating: It’s lots easier to run an effective intelligence apparatus, when you don’t even have to pay lip service to trivialities like “due process.” Belgium may have been “safer” from these kinds of attacks as well, if anyone even looking a bit unusual, gets shipped off to pound sand indefinitely in some Turkish hellhole of a prison.
True. It is an inconvenient reality that the main actors in both France and Belgium were French and Belgian nationals . Abrahim was born in Brussels , his brothers also I think . In France there is current policy debate over removing French nationality from those convicted to whatever degree , and that is fraught with the concept of creating a two tier citizenship as far as it only being applicable to those who hold another nationality .
The UK has been ahead in that sense by trying and jailing citizens who have participated or participate in/with censored organizations abroad .
I know people like those involved – but not radicalized , some from very well off families , others living much more precarious lives , born in EU , some Belgium, some nationalized , others without papers . Europe is a difficult, unfriendly and confusing place for them in many ways , ways a local would not start to understand , so of course they often live on the margin and are susceptible to something which will bring some esteem . I don’t care for the hate , that is part of what drives this sort of response – a very desperate one which personally I find very saddening in its entirety , including western delusions, and antagonisms abroad .
Some will read excuses in these words , but I am looking instead at responsibilities . A human life is a human life , and though I do not agree with the idea of any sort of tally in terms that insinuate that events should be regarded as some form of competition or tit for tat , it is not a bad exercise in perspective to consider how many thousands of tonnes of ordnance has been sold to or dropped by western countries in the middle east , what this has cost the local people , and what their reply has been – refugees, a few clips of ammo and a few kilos of fertilizer and nails . Brevik detonated more than the rest combined probably .
As Per Desteen notes below, the real change is demographic and political , I guess people get what they vote for , mostly either political cowards or the ultra manipulative variety whose speciality is keeping everything so nicely stirred that only they seem to ever hold an answer .
“This, in truth, is a problem from hell.
The certainties that informed policy throughout the Cold War and that appeared to triumph at its close are no more.
What governments now face is a Rubik’s Cube of problems.
Twist the faces of the cube as much as you like, but you will never align foreign policy, security, immigration, domestic political trends or whatever.
There are just too many moving parts.”
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-35883464
They were not belgians and french. They were muslim immigrants who had legal residency in those countries
No Bob, of ten, eight or so were French and Belgian nationals, some born and raised in those countries, others nationalized when young. I’ll post some links for you.
http://www.france24.com/en/20160323-paris-attacks-fugitive-laachraoui-named-third-brussels-bomber
http://heavy.com/news/2016/03/najim-laachraoui-soufiane-kayal-brussels-belgium-terror-attack-airport-bombing-suspect-photos-isis-paris/
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/france/11996120/Paris-attack-what-we-know-about-the-suspects.html
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/brussels-attacks-what-happened-everything-we-know-on-wednesday-a6947346.html
Damn we’re stupid.
Sent from Yahoo Mail on Android
That number today would be, 57, 58, or 59? 😉
There must have been a typo on the teleprompter.
No pres has relied as much on a teleprompter as The Obummer.
I would like to know who is writing what he is reading.
Obama might be right. Online the Merriam-Webster Dictionary in its definition of state: “a politically organized body of people usually occupying a definite territory; especially: one that is sovereign.” Technically none of the 50 USA states is sovereign, though the Navajo reservation within Arizona is considered sovereign. If you count Puerto Rico, the American Virgin Islands, American Samoa, Guam, the Marshall Islands, etc., Obama could have easily visited 57 USA states. I haven’t followed Obama’s travels, but likely his staff speech writers counted right; and consulted their dictionaries.
No doubt the statement was deliberately included for its effect, as it is initially puzzling; since we are all taught that there are 50 USA states, as if these other conquests of Empire did not exist. This criticism of him on YouTube would work to his advantage; as he could point to it as an example of how wrongheaded his critics are, going after every little thing, and by association exonerate other real fibs and falsehoods. The guy is a clever politician, and benefits from the rush to judgment. I give his speech writers an A+ in political astuteness and geographic knowledge for counting 57 states.
Yeah you go with that 57 states thing Joe.
Now I want to hear your argument that the earth is flat.
Technically, there are 50 states. Thanks for the humorous response however.
“No doubt the statement was deliberately included for its effect, as it is initially puzzling; since we are all taught that there are 50 USA states, as if these other conquests of Empire did not exist.”
There are only 50 states. The Louisiana Purchase was not a state, nor were the western territories. They were later divided up into states.
It is not initially puzzling, it is puzzling, period, if Obama was deliberately including territories as states.
1. The Haaretz is like the NY Times. Don’t expect too much of it.
2. There was a lot that could have been done even if the warning was not specific. For example increase security personnel presence and checks on suspicious people. These terrorist morons didn’t even have plane tickets so would have been enough to ask for id and ticket to catch them.
With the above comments in mind, perhaps the only rational course is to re-institute significant border controls, do some serious deporting, and truly consider that perhaps Islam is not a religion as we think of it, but instead a government, code of laws, culture, and way of life wrapped in the shroud of religion. Anyone that accepts its basic precepts can be radicalized.
It’s not just the short term spectacular violence, it’s also the long term breeding. 25% of all people under 25 in France are Muslim. In another 20 years, it’s going to be 40%. Demographics are the real killers.
Check out Grey Dawn, a book written back in the late 1990’s about this subject.
Mish,
Sounds a lot like the Russians warning us about the Boston bombers. History always repeats itself.
Thanks,
Rick Sandberg
“31 States Will Not Take Syrian Refugees”
“What would that number be today?”
I don’t know. Governor Brown still wants them. Even after 14 government employees murdered in San Bernardino.