J7: The July 7th Truth Campaign
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J7 Vs Notes from the Borderland
The article below was written by J7 and sent to Notes from the Borderland (NFB) in September 2008, after having been advised that this was the publication deadline for issue 9. Over a year since NFB9's publication 'deadline' we were informed at the end of October 2009 that NFB9 has finally been printed. Efforts to purchase a copy of NFB9 from suppliers listed as having it in stock have proved fruitless. However, the front page, complete with its customary pejorative NFB headline, looks like this:
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J7 have not yet received review copies of NFB9 but may update this article when we have had a chance to read what has been written. In the interim, below is the article we delivered to NFB for their September 2008 deadline.
"Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty—power is ever stealing from the many to the few…. The hand entrusted with power becomes … the necessary enemy of the people. Only by continual oversight can the democrat in office be prevented from hardening into a despot: only by unintermitted Agitation can a people be kept sufficiently awake to principle not to let liberty be smothered in material prosperity."
Eternal vigilance might be the price of liberty but there are some that would rather we not be vigilant. Instead, they suggest, what is required is a good measure of blind faith and blind trust in institutions for which there exist countless examples of dishonesty and mendacity in almost all matters. This article exposes the flawed thinking and methodology that underlies Notes from the Borderland's fevered and almost obsessive attacks on those who are not convinced that the whole truth is being told about the events of 7 July 2005.
J7 Vs Notes from the Borderland: A response to articles published in issues 7 & 8
“To those who are afraid of the truth, I wish to offer a few scary truths; and to those who are not afraid of the truth, I wish to offer proof that the terrorism of truth is the only one that can be of benefit to the proletariat.”
Notes from the Borderland issues 7 and 8 contained articles which dealt loosely with the subject of the 7th July 2005 London Bombings. NFB's Larry O'Hara freely admits that “we haven't (yet) explored 7/7 in detail” yet, despite NFB’s own lack of analysis of the events that occurred on 7th July 2005, the NFB team and its associates are only too happy to heap insults and abuse on those who have taken the time to undertake such analysis. J7: The July 7th Truth Campaign have a number of observations in response to NFB's hitherto scant coverage of the London bombings.
On page 40 of NFB7, Larry O'Hara states: “The government's long-awaited 'narrative' of the 7/7 events has now materialised, as too the ISC take on the matter. They will be subject to scrutiny next NFB, and by then precise battle-lines between secret state disinformation peddlers and their counterpart conspiracy theorists on the other, will be fully drawn”. However, NFB8 failed to examine either of these reports, nor did it attempt to address the questions NFB itself posed under the heading: “7/7: What Still Needs to be Investigated.” Rather than the promised analysis, NFB8 contented itself with an examination of two DVDs, Mind the Gap and Ludicrous Diversion, along with various side-swipes and claims that both DVDs are “exemplars of the 7/7 cult, directly parallel to the 9/11 cult featured on our 911cultwatch.org.uk web site.” [NFB8, Page 44] Three years after the events of 7/7 it will be interesting to find out precisely what are the 'battle-lines' drawn by O'Hara, Stott et al. Perhaps NFB9 will enlighten us?
This lack of serious investigation and analysis from Britain's self-styled “premier parapolitical investigative magazine” into the official version of events in London on 7th July 2005, and its castigation of anyone who dares question the official narrative as a 'cultist' or 'conspiracy theorist' reflects the widespread reluctance of the so-called 'left' to examine any of the events that are fuelling the Neocon inspired and scripted 'War of Terror' and the increasing moves in the UK towards a police state. While the specifics of what happened on 7/7 receive precious little investigation or coverage three years on, the State has used the general notion, which itself is still unproven in a court of law, to justify the rapid and virtually unchecked imposition of Draconian legislation whose definition of terrorism is so broad that people who have committed no act of terrorism, have no means, method or intention to commit an act terrorism, can -- and have been -- successfully prosecuted as terrorists. A recent example is that of Khalid Khaliq, a father and sole carer for his three children who received a 16 month jail sentence for possession on CD of a document that is freely downloadable from the US Department of Justice web site, despite never having looked at the document that landed him his sentence.
Meanwhile, O'Hara and Stott are so busy chasing down what they refer to as 9/11 & 7/7 'cultists' that, five years after 9/11, NFB7 carried the extraordinary claim in its editorial that '9/11 itself will in due course come under our microscope, though we make no apologies for not scrutinising it yet'! [NFB8, Editorial]
It could be argued that the main reason that neither of these seminal events have been scrutinised by NFB is because the official versions of events, with minor tweaks here and there, are their accepted narrative. While "NFB does not accept the official account [of 7/7] is the 'whole truth'” [NFB8, Page 46], Paul Stott on his 9/11 CultWatch blog under the heading 'Why the left must ignore the 9/11 truth movement' makes his position very clear:
“A look at the UK 9/11 “Truth” Movement reveals an unholy alliance of ex-spooks, anti-semites, plus Muslims unable to accept the reality that there are some members of their community, influenced by Wahabbist ideology, who do indeed support, and in a few cases have carried out, bombings like 7/7 and 21/7, and the nuttier fringes of the green and New Age movements.”
With such blanket statements by NFB's contributors as to what the reality of 7/7 was, it becomes clear why NFB has largely ignored events such as 9/11 and 7/7. However, such simple and sweeping statements do nobody any favours and are partially responsible for the suspension of critical analysis and thinking with regard to serious events that beg in depth analysis by the politically astute.
On the other hand, and perhaps this is where the battle lines can really be drawn, J7 do not lay claim to some special inside knowledge about what happened, nor to know what the reality to accept actually is, particularly in the face of a paucity of evidence in support of official doctrine. J7 choose instead to examine these events in detail through our people's investigation forum, web site and blog, in the knowledge that the official version, to date, remains entirely unproven, unsupported by evidence, and perhaps most crucially, never tested in a court of law.
'The left' and 'Conspiracy Theories'
One might wonder why NFB has not seen fit to call on its readership and the left in general, to investigate further and to question the official narratives independently of any 'truth movement’. After all, history is littered with well documented cases of State-sponsored and false-flag terrorism, more often than not designed to frame and destroy support for left-wing organisations. To ignore or deny such lessons from history is at best na�ve, at worst deliberately disingenuous. That NFB instead devotes its time and effort to ridiculing those who are doing their utmost to hold the State to account, rather than challenging a provably mendacious State apparatus, is telling indeed.
Such attitudes are not specific to NFB or its CultWatch offshoot. In his article, September 11 as “Machiavellian State Terror”, Professor David MacGregor notes the general malaise with which the left is afflicted:
“The left abjures conspiracy theory (while accepting the official bin Laden story) but oppositional theorizing – questioning government and looking for connections between events, perceiving the world ‘‘to be organized beneath the surface’’ (Sturken, 1997, p. 77) – is a critical feature of what it means to be vitally active in the political universe.”
To confront ideas that radically alter our perception of the world and to realise that not everything is what it appears to be is without doubt an unsettling experience. However, both short and long term history clearly demonstrates that the State cannot and should not be trusted to tell the truth. Ironically, 'the left' should be aware of this fact better than most, but it has repeatedly failed to make the connections and challenge the official doctrines and narratives, especially in cases of so-called Islamist or Al Qaeda linked terrorism.
It is notable that following the 9/11 attacks Osama Bin Laden himself, in true Lee Harvey Oswald fashion, passed-up his moment of glory and said of the 9/11 attacks, “The U.S. government has consistently blamed me for being behind every occasion its enemies attack it. I would like to assure the world that I did not plan the recent attacks, which seems to have been planned by people for personal reasons." Bin Laden's statement, like Oswald's infamous “I'm just a patsy” claim not only slipped by almost unnoticed but was then consigned to the memory hole. Similarly, and related to 7/7, no left wing commentators picked up on the post Crevice trial statement on behalf of the defendants, given outside the Old Bailey by defence lawyer Imran Khan:
“This was a prosecution driven by the security services, able to hide behind a cloak of secrecy, and eager to obtain ever greater resources and power to encroach on individual rights. || Coached witnesses were brought forward. Forced confessions were gained through illegal detention, and torture abroad. Threats and intimidation was used to hamper the truth. All with the trial judge seemingly intent to assist the prosecution almost every step of the way. These were just some of the means used in the desperate effort to convict. Anyone looking impartially at the evidence would realise that there was no conspiracy to cause explosions in the UK, and that we did not pose any threat to the security of this country.”
NFB and 'the Left' in general would do well to remember and learn from history. To name a few examples: the Moscow Trials, the Reichstag Fire, Operation Himmler, Operation Gladio & the Bologna Station Bombing and, closer to home, British State complicity in atrocities and the running of agents within para-military groups in Eire and the Six Counties. Jonathan Evans the new head of MI5 is well-rehearsed and practiced in these tactics.
Alarm bells should be ringing amongst the 'Left' and to turn a deaf ear to them on the basis that to listen to these sounds and their reverberations from the past will result in being labelled a Conspiracy Theorist (now with the additional slur of 'holocaust deniers' thrown in for good measure). To do so is to do exactly what the State wants and provides willing and uncritical support of the Official Conspiracy Theory. Has it never occurred to NFB that this is maybe why “ex”-spooks such as David Shayler and Annie Machon have had such high-level involvement in the UK 9/11 Truth Movement? Yet perhaps all is not yet lost as far as 'the left' is concerned as, in July 2008, Socialist Worker noted, “There are serious questions over the use of confessions to convict five men over the “fertiliser bomb” plot.”
NFB's out-of-hand dismissal of anyone questioning the official narrative of 7/7 fails to take into account the fact that there are indeed many on the left who do challenge the official version of events. They may not be as loud or outspoken as the likes of Shayler and Machon, but that does not mean that they don't exist.
Indeed, the July 7th Truth Campaign has published several articles by Marxist academics (see also here) and left-wing writers which call into question the Official Conspiracy Theory of these events. All are well worth reading to advance the necessary debate and critical understanding of how the Left can analyse these events in their correct historical and political context with a view to understanding the situation we are all faced with and how we might incorporate this knowledge into the ongoing class struggle.
7/7 Three Years On, Where Now for NFB?
The July 7th Truth Campaign has serious and legitimate questions in regard to the events in London on 7th July 2005. We have serious and legitimate questions in regard to the recent 'show' trial and barbaric sentences meted out to 5 young men in the operation Crevice trial, not least of which is the use of torture in Pakistan to extract information from a suspect with the full knowledge and complicity of the British authorities, used in tandem with the tried and tested tactic of utilising 'Supergrasses' to secure convictions in cases where convictions might not otherwise be obtained.
The recent '7/7 helpers' trial (Note: As this article was written in September 2008, this is a reference to the first '7/7 helpers' trial at the conclusion of which the jury failed to reach a verdict; after a second trial the accused, Waheed Ali, Sadeer Saleem, and Mohammed Shakil, were found not guilty) presented no conclusive evidence to prove the guilt of the four men accused of perpetrating the London bombings. Quite the contrary in fact. Despite a trial lasting four months in which it could reasonably be argued that the defence acted more effectively for the prosecution and the relaxing by the trial judge of the requirement for unanimity in the jury’s verdict, offering to accept a verdict of 10-to-2, after 15 days deliberation the jury still failed to reach a verdict. Further, forensic evidence presented by the prosecution raised still even more questions.
Neil Flewitt, QC, prosecuting, speaking in court about identification documents found at the scenes of the explosions and citing information provided by forensic expert Clifford Todd, said: “Although they were damaged to some extent, they did not show the damage that would be expected if they were on the body of the bomber or in the rucksack, suggesting that in each case they had been deliberately separated by some distance from the actual explosion.” With this statement to the jury we now have a story in which the accused allegedly scattered their identity and bank cards around the Tube carriages before placing their rucksacks on the floor and setting off the explosives.
Given NFB's apparent recalcitrance in addressing the issues surrounding events such as 9/11 and 7/7, J7 would like to suggest a few avenues for investigation. There are of course plenty of others:
- The ex-Special Boat Services anti-terrorist operative Martin 'Abdullah' McDaid, who ordered encryption to be installed on computers at the Iqra bookshop in Beeston.
- The self publicist jihadist Hassan Butt who claims to have met with Mohammad Sidique Khan and who recently outed himself as a fantasist that had fabricated his well publicised tale of so-called Islamist extremism.
- The role of Junaid Babar, a supergrass of quite incredible provenance, who managed to return to the U.S. from Pakistan after threatening to kill U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan, simultaneously avoiding rendition by the CIA and a stretch in Guantanamo.
- The role of American 'convert' and Al-Qaeda video supremo, Adam 'Azzam the American' Gadahn, in the making of the Khan and Tanweer videos, a grandson of a committee member of the Anti Defamation League and whose local Imam was chosen by George Bush to lead the ceremony on behalf of Muslims just three days after 9/11.
- The so-called 'martyrdom videos' – If such videos are such a crucial part of the back story, where are the videos of Hasib Hussain and Germaine Lindsay? How was it known in September 2005 that Tanweer's video was awaiting release, ten months before its actual release. The Tanweer video was released to coincide with the 1st anniversary of 7/7, whereas Khan's was opportunistically released just as the mainstream media was beginning to ask serious questions about whether or not suicide bombers were responsible for the events of 7/7 and whether the four accused might have been duped.
By way of an end to this article, some thoughts of the Guatemalan Bishop Conedera as expressed in a speech given on 24th April 1998, one day before his own assassination. Amongst other things he said:
"To open ourselves to the truth and to bring ourselves face to face with our personal and collective reality is not an option that can be accepted or rejected. It is an undeniable requirement of all people and all societies that seek to humanize themselves and to be free....
Truth is the primary word, the serious and mature action that makes it possible for us to break the cycle of death and violence and open ourselves to a future of hope and light for all...
"Discovering the truth is painful, but it is without a doubt a healthy and liberating action.
Perhaps some of the many criticisms that NFB aims so carefully at so-called 'conspiracy theories' and 'conspiracy theorists' would be better levelled at that most vociferous of conspiracy theorists, the State itself.
