Post by Moses on Jul 17, 2005 4:57:47 GMT -5
July 17, 2005
Blair Says 'Evil Ideology' Must Be Faced Directly
By ALAN COWELL
LONDON, July 16 - In {b}a major speech drawing battle lines for the global response to terrorism[/b], Prime Minister Tony Blair said Saturday that its "evil ideology" could only be beaten by confronting its "symptoms and causes, head-on, without compromise or delusion."
Nine days after bombers struck in London, Mr. Blair told Labor Party supporters that security measures alone would not thwart attackers like those responsible for the attacks on three subway trains and a bus in London that claimed at least 55 lives.
"In the end it is by the power of argument, debate, true religious faith and true legitimate politics that we will defeat this threat," he said.
"What we are confronting here is an evil ideology. It is not a clash of civilizations - all civilized people, Muslim or other, feel revulsion at it. But it is a global struggle and it is a battle of ideas, hearts and minds, both within Islam and outside it.
"This is the battle that must be won, a battle not just about the terrorist methods, but their views. Not just about their barbaric acts, but their barbaric ideas. Not only what they do, but what they think and the thinking they would impose on others."
Mr. Blair's remarks offered the most extensive outline of his likely political response to the attacks, seeking to enlist British Muslim leaders to "take this common fight forward."
The government also plans new laws, outlined Friday, that would criminalize acts like "providing or receiving training in the use of hazardous substances" and indirectly inciting or preparing for terrorism.
Mr. Blair's speech came as Britain stepped up its global investigation into the bombings. In a statement published Saturday in the Cairo daily Al Gumhuriya, the Egyptian interior minister, Habib el-Adly, said news reports about Magdy Mahmoud Mustafa el-Nashar, a biochemist arrested in Cairo, were "unfounded and are only hasty deductions."
Mr. Adly said Mr. Nashar had "no links with the Al Qaeda network." In an earlier statement, the minister said Mr. Nashar "denied any involvement" in the bombings.
Mr. Nashar had studied for a doctorate at the University of Leeds, in the town where three of the four suspected London bombers lived.
In Leeds, the police raided a home on Saturday in the same area as earlier searches but did not say why.
The bombings stunned the families of several of the suspected bombers, two of whom left behind young children. Samantha Lewthwaite, the wife of a Jamaican-born Briton suspected of one of the subway bombings, insisted that "he wasn't the sort of person who'd do this."
"I won't believe it until I see proof," she told The Sun, referring to the allegations against her husband, Lindsey Germaine, whose name has been presented several ways by investigators. "I'm not going to accept it until they have his DNA."
The family of Hasib Mir Hussain, 18, who is believed responsible for the bombing aboard a bus, said in a statement on Friday: "We had no knowledge of his activities and, had we done, we would have done everything in our power to stop him."
On Saturday, the family of Mohammad Sidique Khan, at 30 the oldest of the suspected bombers, said in a statement, "We are devastated that our son may have been brainwashed into carrying out such an atrocity, since we know him as a kind and caring member of our family."
Mr. Blair has been eager to counter assertions that Britain was singled out for attack because of its military presence in Iraq and Afghanistan, its alliance with the United States or its Middle East policies. His speech came on a day when three British soldiers were killed in Iraq.
To bolster his argument that such attacks long preceded the Iraq war, he has posted on the 10 Downing Street Web site a list of attacks by Al Qaeda dating to the 1993 attack on the World Trade Center in New York. [this is right out of the right wing neocon talking points-- I heard Tony Blankley give the exact same schpiel a few days ago]
"If it is Iraq that motivates them, why is the same ideology killing Iraqis by terror in defiance of an elected Iraqi government?" he said in his speech on Saturday. [huh?-- is he really that stupid?]
"What was Sept. 11 the reprisal for? Why even after the first Madrid bomb and the election of a new Spanish government were they planning another atrocity when caught? Why if it is the cause of Muslims that concerns them do they kill so many with such callous indifference?"
"Their cause is not founded on an injustice," he said. "It is founded on a belief, one whose fanaticism is such it can't be moderated. It can't be remedied. It has to be stood up to."
Can anyone stand Blair's fay pomposity?
Neil MacFarquhar contributed reporting from Cairo for this article.
Copyright 2005 The New York Times Company Home Privacy Policy Search Corrections XML Help Contact Us Work for Us Back to Top