Explosion Norway

[Jan Klimkowski]

A deep political Nostradamus spake:

McVeigh did it.

Breaking news re the island attack:

Witnesses who have managed to escape from the island, says to NRK reporters on the spot that the perpetrator had a Norwegian look. He should be between 185 to 190 cm tall and have blond hair.

Source.

[Peter Lemkin]

Norwegian Police confirm the [or a] gunman who killed AT LEAST seven, likely more, students at the political camp on the island was wearing a Norwegian Police Uniform...much to their surprise and disgust. It is confirmed he was tall and blond and 'Norwegian looking and speaking'. He has been arrested and had a wide variety of weapons and one report states he stated the island also had bombs planted. Many of the other campers are still in hiding on the grass and trees of the island as sun sets. Special Operations squads are now being deployed on the island.

As a person who has lived in Norway, myself, and listening to the voices of Norwegians on the radio and TV via internet, it is hard to describe the shock THAT it happened THERE. Norway is a country in which one hardly sees police or the military, and police are unarmed on normal patrols. - homes outside of major cities left unlocked, etc.

It is a loss of political virginity say all the Norwegians, and by far the darkest day there since the Nazi invasion. This matter even seems to have its own new Quisling!!!! It is too early to say, but I'm aware of small groups of ultra-right Norwegians in the Police/Military....but again too early to say if the man in the police uniform was in fact a policeman or military. However this comes out in the wash, it is not going to be a pretty picture! The main hospital, near the site of the explosion, sites about 100 walking wounded treated.

[Peter Lemkin]

Several youths escaped from Utøya by throwing himself into the water and swim towards the mainland.

Witnesses who managed to get from the island alive, claiming that it was not just one but several assailants who shot wildly around on Utøya Friday night.

Read also: Witnesses tell of several dead

Other survivors believe that there must have been a number of perpetrators, as there are more people dead spread over a larger area.

NRK.no have not yet confirmed this information from the police.

Because of bomb fears, few police went to the island before the bomb teams had searched the area. They can not say how many people will be killed or injured.

Witnesses NRK.no've talked to says that there should be more people dead in the water.

- It's absolutely awful, it looks like a war zone, says André Skeie from Hole in Buskerud.

[Peter Lemkin]

The police just announced that while they don't know who the man on the island impersonating a policeman is, he had never been a policeman in Norway. They are convinced he is involved in some way with the downtown bombing, and that others are still at large. Very weird. While on BBC and MSM they are talking 'Al Quida', no one has retracted the description of the faux Norwegian 'policeman' as looking Norwegian - tall and blond, speaking fluent Norwegian, and having been seen in the central government district earlier in the day. If this man is 'Al Quida', he is certainly from the Ayrian branch. It is confirmed the police know who he is - though they are not yet releasing name nor details. Also confirmed is this same man, also dressed as a false policeman, was reported near the Oslo central bombing earlier in the day. Takes your pick...a Norwegian convert to Al Quida or a Norwegian false flag provocation from the Far Right.....it seems it must be one or the other.

Modern [Post WW II] political violence in Norway is all but unknown - until today. Apparently about 20 dead and rising. Some reports put the death toll closer to 30, maybe even more. Some dead are in the water around the island.

[Peter Lemkin]

The Prime Minister just made a formal speech to the Norwegian People. A very different kind of speech one would expect from the UK or USA in similar circumstances. He said [paraphrasing] 'no one will bomb Norway out of its democracy and open society; no one will kill Norway out of its democracy and open society. Norway will answer this with more democracy and open society, but that Norway will find and punish those involved.' No mention of violent revenge. Much talk of sorrow for the victims and their family/friends. Asking all Norwegians to talk to one another, be there for one another, be stronger together from here on out. He said Norway is a small, but proud nation and it won't be bowed by what has happened - in fact only made stronger. Etc.

[Ed Jewett]

Just catching up on this, late in a harried, hot, humid day, from way over on the other side of the pond.... but I will be sure to be on the lookout for a Nordic-appearing man in Norway. pinwheels: I will let you know Sven I spot him.

[Peter Lemkin]

The Island [Utoya; oya means island; Ut means outer] shooter is confirmed to be Norwegian and speak with an Eastern Norwegian accent - likely north and East of Oslo area. Police know more, but are not saying yet, as they fear there may be others at large. The death toll continues to rise. The comparison with the Oklahoma bombing was right on target, it seems. The center of Oslo remains shut down and cleared and likely will be over the weekend, as well. Norway is in profound shock. I've contacted a few friends there and incredulity reigns. In such a small and close-knit country, something like this is their own 7/7; 9-11; Oklahoma Bombing. Up until today, anyone could enter the Building that housed the Prime Minister's offices without even clearing any controls or showing ID. Sadly, that may change.

Too soon to say for certain, but there seems to be ZERO Islamic involvement, at all!

Quite the opposite.

[Magda Hassan]

Nicolas Sarkozy has now joined in the international indignation over the bombing, describing the events in Oslo as an "odious and unacceptable act". Unlike the bombing in Libya, which is a humanitarian act.

[Magda Hassan]

Glenn Greenwald is on to it.

The Oslo attacks

BY GLENN GREENWALD

• 
  

AP Photo/Fartein Rudjord

An official attempts to clear away spectators from buildings in the centre of Oslo, on Friday July 22, 2011.

(updated below)
A powerful bomb exploded in Oslo, Norway today near the office of that nation's Prime Minister, killing at least 7 people, and that was followed by a shooting attack at a camp of young leaders of the ruling Labour Party where the Prime Minister was scheduled to appear. It should go without saying that such violent attacks aimed at civilians are inherently unjustified, and the attack on the camp, which wounded several teenagers, is particularly vile and tragic. The perpetrators of these attacks are unknown, as is their motives, though one self-described "jihadi" group claimed responsibility.
It is, however, worth commenting on both the prevailing descriptions of Norway as well as the reaction to these attacks, as they reveal some important points. Most media accounts express bafflement that Norway would be the target of such an attack given how peaceful it is; The New York Times, for instance, said "the attacks appeared to be part of a coordinated assault on the ordinarily peaceful Scandinavian nation." This is simply inaccurate. Norway is a nation at war -- in more than just one country. For instance:

The NATO force of which Norway is a part has explicitly declared Libyan leader Moammar Gadaffi to be a "legitimate target" and has repeatedly attempted to kill him; one attempt on Gadaffi's life -- a bombing attack on his son's residence -- resulted in the death of the dictator's son and three grandchildren. In response, Gadaffi "vowed to attack 'homes, offices and families' in Europe in revenge for NATO airstrikes," adding that "your homes, your offices and your families, which will become military targets just as you have transformed our offices, headquarters, houses and children into what you regards as legitimate military targets." The semantic games of the Obama administration notwithstanding, that is not a "peaceful" situation; those are nations at war.
Then in Afghanistan, there is this (click on image to enlarge):

Again, nobody knows who perpetrated these attacks or why (though the self-described jihadi group claiming responsibility said, as the NYT put it, that it "was a response to Norwegian forces' presence in Afghanistan and to unspecified insults to the Prophet Muhammad"). But whether these attacks are related to those wars or not, I simply do not understand this bafflement being expressed that Norway -- of all countries -- would be targeted with violence.
Regardless of the justifications of these wars -- and Norway is in both countries as part of a U.N. action -- it is simply a fact that Norway has sent its military to two foreign countries where it is attacking people, dropping bombs, and killing civilians. Historically, one reason not to invade and attack other countries is because doing so often prompts one's own country to be attacked. Western nations typically only attack countries that are incapable of responding in kind, but those nations and their sympathizers are capable of perpetrating asymmetrical attacks of the sort that Oslo just suffered.
This has nothing to do with justification, as these kinds of civilian-targeting attacks are, as I said, inherently unjustifiable (though if NATO declares the leader of Libya a "legitimate military target" and air bombs his residence, what's the argument as to why the office of the Prime Minister whose country is at war with Libya is not a legitimate target?). The point is that it's completely unsurprising that a nation at war -- whether Norway or the U.S. -- is going to be targeted with violent attacks. That's what "being at war" means, and it's usually what it provokes. And the way this fact is suppressed ("a coordinated assault on the ordinarily peaceful Scandinavian nation" = the post-9/11 why do they hate us?) highlights how we view violence as something only those Others commit, but not we.
That relates to the second point I want to make: the reaction to the attacks in Oslo. Ever since news of the attacks emerged this morning (U.S. time), the interest in them has been intense, as has media coverage of them and the disgust expressed toward them. That's understandable: the destruction and carnage quickly visible from photographs online should make any decent person recoil in disgust.
Still, I can't help noticing, and being quite bothered by, the vast difference in reaction to the violence visited on Western nations such as Norway and the violence visited by Western nations (particularly our own) on non-Western nations. The violence and indiscriminate death brought today to Oslo is routinely and constantly imposed by the U.S. and its closest allies in a large and growing list of Muslim nations. On a weekly basis -- literally -- the U.S. and its Western allies explode homes,mangle children, extinguish the lives of innocent people, disrupt communities, kill community and government leaders, and bring violence and terror to large numbers of people -- those are just facts. And yet a tiny, tiny fraction of attention, interest and anger is generated by such violence as compared to that generated by the violence in Oslo today. What explains that mammoth discrepancy in interest, discussion, and media coverage?
Whatever accounts for it, the impact is to minimize and suppress the consequences of our own violence while focusing almost exclusively on the violence of others. The solution is not to dismiss or justify acts such as the Oslo bombing. It's to realize that our own country and those in alliance with it -- unintentionally or otherwise -- replicate the horror that took place in Oslo in countless places around the world with great regularity, and that requires at least as much attention and discussion as the Oslo attacks are sure to receive.

UPDATE: The New York Times headline was quick to suggest responsibility for these attacks:

Yet some reports now say that Norwegian police believe the perpetrator was a native Norwegian driven by domestic opposition to the government. As I wrote three different times here, both the perpetrators and their motives are unknown, and none of the points I made -- which relate exclusively to the reaction to these attacks -- are changed in any way based on the identity of the perpetrators. Except that I would add one point about Western reaction if indeed it turns out to be a domestic rather than "terrorist" (i.e., Muslim) attack: American interest in these attacks and the desire to be seen publicly denouncing them will quickly diminish -- almost to the point of non-existence -- if the perpetrators are not Muslim. Add that to the list of revealing aspects of the reaction to this story.

[Magda Hassan]

At Least 17 Dead in Homegrown Terror Attacks on Norway Capital, Youth Camp

A homegrown terrorist set off an explosion that ripped open buildings in the heart of Norway's government Friday, then went to a summer camp dressed as a police officer and gunned down youths as they ran and even swam for their lives, police said Friday.

The attacks killed at least 17 people in this peaceful nation's worst violence since World War II.

A police official said the 32-year-old ethnic Norwegian suspect arrested at the camp on Utoya island appears to have acted alone in both attacks, and that "it seems like that this is not linked to any international terrorist organizations at all." The official spoke on condition of anonymity because that information had not been officially released by Norway's police.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/world/2011/07/22/...z1St1OdMwU