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Wednesday, November 23, 2005

Bush wanted to attack al Jazeera

al Jazeera news online has in the past few years provided a fresh perspective of news and current affairs that have been different from those of western media, especially the American version. Recently it recruited a top media personality, David Frost, as part of it expanding plans and programme.

Al-Jazeera's reporting of the war in Iraq, including the publishing of captured or killed US soldiers, have greatly angered Washington. The station has also broadcast messages by Osama bin Laden and the beheadings of Western hostages by insurgents in Iraq, as well as Iraqi civilians killed by the US military.

There have been a US military ‘accidental’ attacks on its Kabul office. Now, revelations coming from London showed that that attack might not have been ‘accidental’ afterall.

The British Daily Mirror has come across a Downing Street Top Secret memo stating that US President George Bush had planned to launch a military strike on al-Jazeera station in Dona, Qatar, but was talked out of it by Britain’s PM Tony Blair.

The memo was a transcript of a Bush-Blair talks during Blair's visit to Washington in April last year. Blair feared such a strike, in the business district of Doha with all its collateral damage would definitely invite severe revenge attacks. Besides, Qatar is a key western ally in the Persian Gulf. The language in the memo showed that Bush was deadly serious, but so was Blair in persuading Bush not to launch the attacks.

Downing Street has refused to comment on the leaked memo.

The Daily Mirror said such a strike would have been "the most spectacular foreign policy disaster since the Iraq war itself".

The USA – paragon of press freedom!

2 comments:

  1. "but so was Blair in persuading Bush to launch the attacks."

    I guess you meant Blair persuading Bush NOT to launch the attacks?

    ReplyDelete