Monday, May 2, 2011

Robert Fisk on Osama Bin Laden's death



Osama bin Laden was the founder of Al Qaeda, but to suggest that he was in command, sitting in some computer cave, is completely rubbish.

He spent most of his time hiding, most of his time running from the US authorities.

I never thought he would hang around long in Afghanistan but in Pakistan he had a soft spot. He felt safer in Pakistan than he did in Afghanistan, and I think that is correct.

You have to realise that Bin Laden is a very popular mind, even with the royalty.

He was saying things about the West, which their dictators wouldn't say, his condemnation of the West, and he had to say it from a cave.

He is a figure who would be reflected upon.

INTERVIEW IN AUSTRALIA BY RICHARD STUBBS 
OF 774 ABC 

Veteran journalist Robert Fisk, who interviewed Osama Bin Laden on three occasions, says news of Bin Laden's death is much less important than the popular uprisings happening in the Arab world.
"I've been saying for some time that I think whether he's dead or not is pretty irrelevent," says the Middle East correspondent for British newspaper The Independent.
"As far as he's concerned he founded Al Qaeda and that was in his eyes his achievement."
The award winning journalist says Osama Bin Laden was not in a position to actually direct Al Qaeda's operations.
"He didn't sit in a cave with computer knobs saying press button b, it's operation 52," says Robert Fisk.
Fisk, who most recently has been reporting on events in Syria, says the world has changed in more ways than one since 9-11.
"Over the last few months you've seen an Arab awakening in which millions of Arab muslims have overthown their own leaderships," he says.
"Bin Laden always wanted to get rid of Mubarek and Ben Ali and Gaddafi and so on claiming that they were all infidels working for America and in fact it was millions of ordinary people who peacefully, more or less - certainly in the case of Tunisia and Egypt - got rid of them."
"Bin Laden didn't, he failed to do that."
"You've got to remember these regimes have always been telling the Americans 'keep on supporting us because if you don't Al Qaeda will take over' - and in fact Al Qaeda did not take over."
It was interesting that after the Egyptian overthrow of Mubarek the first thing we heard from Al Qaeda a week later was a call for the overthrow of Mubarek, one week after he'd gone, it was pathetic."
He says the celebrations in the United States over Bin Laden's death are meaningless.
"I think [Osama Bin Laden] lost his relevancy a long time ago actually,"
"If they'd have killed Bin Laden a year or two after 9/11 some of the breast beating that's going on in the United States... might have been relevant.
"All this fists in the air of victory by the United States - it's good pictures but I don't think it means anything," he says.
"The fact of the matter is that what we have in the moment in the world, what is important is a mass uprising and awakening by millions of muslim Arabs to get rid of dictators."
Robert Fisk says these uprisings are 'much, much more important than a middle aged man being killed in Pakistan'.
Robert Fisk spoke to Richard Stubbs on 774 ABC Melbourne Afternoons.

4 comments:

M said...

But his death IS indeed meaningful, or people wouldn't be celebrating. It's meaningful to the many who lost friends, relatives and jobs in the September 11 attacks. It's meaningful because, like it or not, those attacks and Bin Laden's death are moments in US history that will remembered for a very long time.

It's rather silly for those lefties averse to displays of strength and success, and perhaps bitter about something, to dismiss this as 'meaningless', isn't it?

Anonymous said...

Dear M,

I lie to remind you something called controversial theory. Please go back and try to understand, what is really going on around the world by the seek of world politics. Hope you will understand.

Bee

M said...

In fact, Fisk's theory isn't really that controversial, and I do agree with him to the extent Osama's death won't make any strategic difference in the middle-east, or to the 'war on terror'.

However, Osama's death means something - President Obama will most likely be re-elected, and he has absoltely no intention of honouring his promise to end the attacks on Afghanistan.

Many of us spent years calling for an end to the occupation in Afghanistan. If we started calling Osama's death 'meaningless', it makes us look weak and defeatist compared to the war-mongering 'patriots' who can now use this as a propaganda tool.

Anonymous said...

BIN LADEN DEAD AGAIN AND AGAIN AND AGAIN

http://www.activistpost.com/2011/05/final-word-on-bin-laden-hoax.html

A Final Word on the Bin Laden Hoax

Tony Cartalucci, Contributing Writer
Activist Post

Bangkok, Thailand May 7, 2011 - The "Bin Laden" hoax is consuming our time and energy even as the global corporate-financier oligarchs flee forward cashing in on the political capital they presume they have gained by making this announcement. Even a superficial examination of mainstream media's headlines and interviews with the CIA director himself calls into question the official narrative with mind numbing contradictions and faulty logic even a child could spot.

The CIA itself is only 95% sure, based on facial recognition, that they bagged their rogue agent. A London Guardian report compounds this uncertainty stating that the CIA compared the alleged DNA of this man they claim to have shot dead in Pakistan, not with a previous sample from Osama Bin Laden, but against a Bin Laden family member. If we are to believe any of this at all, the CIA is not even saying they are 100% sure, so why should we be?


"We were never really certain about whether or not Bin Laden was there."

Stripping further credibility away, was CIA Director Leon Panetta's interview on PBS where he begins by saying the CIA had no evidence and were entirely uncertain Osama Bin Laden was even in the compound to begin with. According to a Washington Post article, the CIA claims to have had a nearby safe house from which they observed the alleged compound for months. They also confirm that not a single photo or shred of evidence was revealed throughout the course of this lengthy surveillance mission that the elusive, bearded mastermind was present.

But debating the minutiae is self-defeating. Bin Laden has been long dead, according to a myriad of government officials both in America and abroad. We must look at how this stunt is being exploited at home and abroad, rhetorically and geopolitically.