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Other updates to this LiveBlog are here and here.
Responses to intelligent comments on this LiveBlog are here.
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Accounts: Guardian | BBC | Reuters |
12:37: Blair repeatedly uses the words 'reasonably clear' that events in London are some sort of terrorist act. Lots of open ends there. Reasonably clear is not proof.
Charles Clarke to launch the biggest ID Card sales pitch yet from the commons at 12:50pm.
12:39: Channel 4 new announces an Islamic group claiming responsibility but this claim, at the time of announcement was unverified. Obviously, it must serve some purpose for the media to bandy about these unsubstantiated claims.
12:43: BBC - Blasts at a Glance.
12:45: Brian Paddick announces on Channel 4 that there have been a total of 3 incidents on the underground and one on a bus and that forensic evidence of explosives has not been found. The bus does look a bit of a state.
Paddick confirms no warnings have been given and that there have been no noted increases in presumed levels of terror in the run up to G8.
12:52: Paddick doing the rounds on ITV now... "not sure exactly of the cause of explosions". "Well planned, well rehearsed operation" - surely someone would have noticed Al Qaeda practicing and rehearsing such an operation in London?
12:54: Kennedy hits the screens reading a nice pre-written speech for the occasion, rather than the sort of bullet points and anecdotal evidence police chiefs and reporters have been providing thus far and that one might expect in a state of heightened alert. Clarke confirms Paddick's four explosions. The Antagonist agrees with Paddick, it's all very well practiced and rehearsed.
13:01: Terrorism is now the buzzword of the 1 o'clock news reports. Remember the police have yet to confirm forensic evidence of explosives as the well practiced and reheased London Emergency Plan kicks in.
13:08 BBC confirms deaths at Edgeware Road, no confirmation of number.
13:11: BBC Talking Point with public comments on events. All comments from tube travellers hint that any explosions were electrical explosions
13:14: Blair announces that terrorists have no respect for human lives. Ironically, he says this as he stands in front of the handful of men responsible for the biggest acts of terrorism our planet has ever seen. Terrorism is not a tool of the weak and poor, only the wealthy and powerful can conduct sustained campaigns of terrorism over numbers of years with any degree of success.
13:18: Ignoring for a minute the media hype, it seems what we have here is a power surge on the tube and a bus that has somehow exploded.
13:19: Tony Blair jumps in a Jag on his way to London and Jack Straw is left in charge of proceedings at G8 as the organ grinder flies south.
13:28 News reports are still saying 'terrorism' and 'al qaeda'. As yet no official confirmation of either of these things has been forthcoming. So the assumption now is that the power surges reported by a train operating company - the people who would know such things - are now terrorist attacks.
13:29: George Bush - the planet's chief bombdropper and terrorist extraordinaire - announces, "here we have people killing people". Yes, George, that's what your campaign of terror in the middle east is all about that has murdered hundreds of thousands. The first victim of terrorism is people, not the perpetrators.
13:34: Two confirmed dead at Aldgate.
13:46: BBC pundit - everyone's a pundit these days - says no official confirmation of terrorist activity. News headlines are reporting nothing other than terrorism.
13:49: BBC reporter confirms that COBRA operations have been well rehearsed over the last few weeks, in preparation for just such an incident.
Live8, G8/Just8, Olympic announcement and a power surge on the tube and a bus that goes bang, which none of the media reports seem to focusing on.
14:01: The Queen is 'deeply shocked'. Mobile phone networks still down.
14:08: BBC - Student Claims London Attacks
In the name of God, the merciful, the compassionate, may peace be upon the cheerful one and undaunted fighter, Prophet Muhammad, God's peace be upon him.
Nation of Islam and Arab nation: Rejoice for it is time to take revenge against the British Zionist Crusader government in retaliation for the massacres Britain is committing in Iraq and Afghanistan. The heroic mujahideen have carried out a blessed raid in London. Britain is now burning with fear, terror and panic in its northern, southern, eastern, and western quarters.
We have repeatedly warned the British Government and people. We have fulfilled our promise and carried out our blessed military raid in Britain after our mujahideen exerted strenuous efforts over a long period of time to ensure the success of the raid.
We continue to warn the governments of Denmark and Italy and all the Crusader governments that they will be punished in the same way if they do not withdraw their troops from Iraq and Afghanistan. He who warns is excused.
God says: "You who believe: If ye will aid (the cause of) Allah, He will aid you, and plant your feet firmly."Source: BBC News
Since when did Islamic extremists start replacing the word 'Allah' with 'God' in the opening line of their notes? And, Brian Paddick said there were no warnings so writing "He who warns is excused" makes no sense either.
14:13: Never one to miss an opportunity, Michael Howard makes an appearance on ITV to say nothing of any relevance because now the media is just grabbing soundbites rather than doing anything that might be considered responsible or investigative journalism.
News of controlled explosions keeps surfacing. ITV news has just screened an officer saying that no confirmation of controlled explosions can be given either. ITV then follow this up with a female journalist who says, "Police will be conducting controlled explosions on the underground".
Do we actually know anything more than a power surge on the trains and a bus that went bang?
14:24: ITV pundits talking about going back to the training camps of Afghanistan to understand the issues of today. Of course, we all know which leading superpower armed, funded and ran those training camps in the battle against the perceived Soviet threat of that era and as the leader of that country rattles around in Gleneagles, maybe we should take him to task about this sort of thing.
14:28: ITV. 10 confirmed dead at Kings Cross. BBC Eyewitness reports.
14:50: [sarcasm] News just in... The Antagonist has received an email from the French Olympic Committee claiming full responsibility for tampering with a fusebox at a London underground depot [/sarcasm]
15:12: Blair has arrived back at Downing Street.
15:24: Live Police conference. No claims of responsibility from any groups. Police Casualties Information Line: 0870 1566344.
15:27: Reports of bomb scares and bomb threats. 21 confirmed killed at Kings Cross.
15:30 Total of 31 confirmed dead.
The BBC screwed up and forgot to introduce their live broadcast delay until after the briefing had started. Who noticed?
15:47 Someone's got to Paddick, he's distinctly changed his tune about the type of incident that has occurred without being able to offer any further information than that which he did when interviewed by various TV channels earlier today.
Londoners have been advised that there will be no need to take the day off work tomorrow and that they should continue to try and lead a normal life in the world of terrorism their leaders have created around them.
16:00 The press conference has deteriorated into the fairy world of mythical terrorist activities so get your orders in now for Chemical and Biological Warfare suits, while stocks last.
Nobody much seems to be talking about the bus which is so far the only thing that has been shown to look like it blew up.
16:03 Any useful BBC web cameras are offline with the usual 'technical difficulties" (Hat-tip: The Gambler). No doubt the state's surveillance infrastructure is free from such technical difficulties and watching the rest of us in our panic as we are entirely unable to watch them via either traditional media or public web cameras.
16:30 Paddick seems to have become the face of "we have planned and rehearsed this sort of scenario for months and months and months" and is at it again on BBC1 outside the QE2 Centre. Exploding a bus in the middle of such a rehearsal to create something slightly more dramatic wouldn't take a whole lot of ingenuity.
16:40: Eye witness on Channel 4 reports a crowd of people running towards the site of the bus explosion that occurred near her earlier today, somewhat to her surprise.
16:47: No Fire Without Smoke
16:50: BBC News 24 - Still no confirmed claims of responsibility. Lots of media claims alleging otherwise.
16:53: BBC News 24 presenter asks, "I suppose the other question we should ask is who else has the sort of organisational capabilities to carry out such an attack?" A very pertinent question indeed.
18:10 BBC News. 33 total dead. Blair has spoken and said not very much but the implication is that Islamic terrorism is to blame. Still no confirmation of any 'bomb' details yet, or footage or photos of underground bomb damage. Interestingly, footage from Madrid was used in one news report, just to make the point.
Anyone have links to footage or photos of underground bomb damage?
18:41: BBC - In Pictures. Oh, and now's the time to invest in stocks and shares, folks. No, really! (via Bloggerheads).
18:47: Another eye-witness account of the Edgware Road incident citing electrical malfunction as the source of the explosions (via Nosemonkey):
The train left the tracks and started to rumble down the tunnel. It was incapable of stopping and just rolled on. A series of explosions followed as if tube electric motor after motor was exploding. Each explosion shook the train in the air and seems to make it land at a lower point.
I fell to the ground like most people, scrunched up in a ball in minimize injury. At this point I wondered if the train would ever stop, I thought "please make it stop", but it kept going. In the end I just wished that it didn't hit something and crush. It didn't.
When the train came to a standstill people were screaming, but mainly due to panic as the carriage was rapidly filling with smoke and the smell of burning motors was giving clear clues of fire.
21:00 Minor updates will continue here with anything major being posted back on the front page.
Might as well start things off with a bang.
21:55: 38 confirmed dead. Jack Straw points East.
23:02: Credit to Channel 4 News for interviewing an Iraqi dentist based not far from the site of the bus explosion who reminded us all of the "as many as 100,000 to 200,000 Iraqis" who have died at the hands of real terrorist atrocities.
23:57: Portillo on This Week making the point that London got off lightly compared to New York and Twin Tower events of 2001. Diane Abbott appears even further removed from the plot than usual after having become accustomed to life without bombs raining down on her head on a daily basis.
An American (Jamie Rubin?) is suggesting that Muslims are killing everyone which is a distinct case of the pot calling the kettle black given that, with regard to today and Iraq, the figures are stacked at somewhere in the region of 100,000 to 38 in favour of the Americans.
00:00: New BBC Mobile phone footage confirms blasts occurring 'almost simultaneously'.
Update: The Antagonist issued a response to the comments on this post (refers to the original Haloscan comments which magically disappeared for no apparent reason not long ago and about which Haloscan have yet to advise quite how this happened), entitled, "And on the seventh day, The Antagonist did not rest...."
2 comments:
It really does make people sick to see you use terrorist incidents this way. You are actually doing exactly what the terrorists want you to do.
There's nothing like taking advantage violent death to further your own political agenda is there? To make your own wild, unfounded claims? Then back them with lies about casualties! 100,000 is a made-up figure, far more than the real total, which is fewer than 20,000 as far as I can gather; many of those were not civilians, most were not killed by the Americans and British. Many have been killed by terrorists from the region, others in counter-insurgency operations by the legitimate Iraqi security forces. As opposed to the hundreds of thousands killed over the years by Saddam's security forces.
Think of the 300,000 Saddam killed in just a few months, and the two wars he started, one of which lasted IIRC around a decade. The every-day killings to keep him in power, and the deliberate starvation of populations for propoganda, propoganda that people like you validate by believing it, obviously don't mean anything to you, as you only dislike people being killed if they're killed by Americans, regardless of whether they might have been fighting for a viscious dictatorship or blowing up their neighbours to try and start a civil war, to gain their leaders power.
You have no reasoned arguments to make, nothing to report that is new. So instead, while complaining that journalists are just reporting soundbites, you have a whole commentary made only of soundbites, with no sense that you should actually justify your opinions. Sorry, for opinion read foaming rants.
You then somehow come from left field to suggest, with no justification, that the police might have caused the blasts! You are a man with issues, and really ought to sort some of them out with professional help.
Not sure how you can miss the difference between a duly elected leader of a democratic nation and someone who has decided for himself that he wants you to kill all homosexuals and women who are raped, and that you must pray whether you want to or not, and fast next month, but hey, they invented the expression "sharp as a balloon" for a reason, so people who would be unable to comprehend that must exist.
Ouch! Reason that.
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