The mainstream media for the most part has moved on. But there are a few more gleanings to be had, of perhaps the most interesting comes from the Daily Mirror, which labels al-Hilli an extremist on the grounds that he was against the war in Iraq, disapproved of the behaviour of Israel and had doubts over 9/11 – which makes a great deal of the population “extremist”. But the Mirror has the only mainstream mention I can find of the possibility that Mossad carried out the killings. Given Mr al-Hilli’s profession, the fact he is a Shia, the fact he had visited Iran, and the fact that Israel heas been assassinating scientists connected to Iran’s nuclear programme, this has to be a possibility. There are of course other possibilities, but to ignore that one is ludicrous.
Which leads me to the argument of Daily Mail crime reporter, Stephen Wright, that the French police should concentrate on the idea that this was a killing by a random Alpine madman or racist bigot. Perfectly possible, of course, and the anti-Muslim killings in Marseille might be as much a precedent as Mossad killings of scientists. But why the lone madman idea should be the preferred investigation, Mr Wright does not explain. What I did find interesting from a man who has visited many crime scenes are his repeated insinuations that the French authorities are not really trying very hard to find who the killers were, for example:
the crime scene would have been sealed off for a minimum of seven to ten days, to allow detailed forensic searches for DNA, fibres, tyre marks and shoe prints to take place.
Nearby bushes and vegetation would have been searched for any discarded food and cigarette butts left by the killer, not to mention the murder weapon.
But from what I saw at the end of last week, no such searches had taken place and potentially vital evidence could have been missed. House to house inquiries in the local area had yet to be completed and police had not made specific public appeals for information about the crime. No reward had been put up for information about the shootings.
Behind the scenes, what other short cuts have been taken? Have police seized data identifying all mobile phones being used in the vicinity of the murders that day?
The idea that the French authorities – who are quite as capable as any other of solving cases – are not really trying very hard is an interesting one.
Which leads me to this part of a remarkable article from the Daily Telegraph, which if true points us back towards a hit squad and discounts the ides that there was only one gun:
Claims that only one gun was used to kill everybody is likely to be disproved by full ballistics test results which are out in October.
While the 25 spent bullet cartridges found at the scene are all of the same kind, they could in fact have come from a number of weapons of the same make.
This throws up the possibility of a well-equipped, highly-trained gang circling the car and then opening fire.
Both children were left alive by the killers, who had clinically pumped bullets into everybody else, including five into Mr Mollier.
Zainab was found staggering around outside the car by Brett Martin, a British former RAF serviceman who cycled by moments after the attack, but he saw nobody except the schoolgirl.
Her sister, Zeena, was found unscathed and hiding in the car eight hours later.
Both sisters are now back in Britain, and are believed to have been reunited at a secret location near London.
There are of course a number of hit squad options, both governmental and private, which might well involve iraqi or Iranian interests – on both of which the mainstream media have been very happy to speculate while almost unanimously ignoring Israel.
But what interests me is why the Daily Telegraph choose, in the face of all the evidence, to minimise the horrific nature of the attack by stating that “Both children were left alive by the killers”? Zainab was not left alive by design, she was shot in the chest and her skull was stove in, which presumably was a pretty serious attempt to kill a seven year-old child. The other girl might very well have succeeded in hiding from the killers under her mother’s skirts, as she hid from the first rescuers, and then for eight hours from the police.
The Telegraph article claims to be informed by sources close to the investigation. So they believe it was a group of people, and feel motivated to absolve those people from child-killing. Now what could the Daily Telegraph be thinking?
Anything rather than talk about Aldermaston…
@ Big Daddy 1 Oct, 2012 – 3:38 pm
What is not being written about is often as illuminating as what is written about. And I do treat what is written about with a degree of scepticism.
One might pose a question: If pre-war UK/US intelligence was dependent on the connections of dispossessed Iraqi nationals, did the Iraqis just tell them what the intelligence services wanted to hear in order to regain family property and position in Iraq?
@ Ferret 1 Oct, 2012 – 3:45 pm: Anything rather than talk about Aldermaston…
Go ahead… although my personal opinion is that any nuke, sat., zirc. or other material connection is less important than the belief that SAH was up to no good – by which I mean the parties responsible did not require material proof in order to discharge their weapon(s).
ah well..its all anarchy innit? is there going to be a craigmurray thread about Sir Jimmy Fixit? Was he? wasnt he? Did he? Didnt he? Did he die of natural causes or was it a double tap to the head in Scarborough by a kidon team of 3 or 4? will anders now have to change his avatar on davidicke? Big questions..no answers…
“Saad Al Hilli was most likely independently wealthy thanks to his millionaire, property-owning father, and it’s highly unlikely he needed money for anything, certainly not to keep his own house.”
The house although large and in surrey was a bit rough, the BMW’s elderly, he goes on caravan holidays and the kids are at state school, plus he has a decent job but not a great one.
If he was minted he’d not be middlemanning nuclear secrets for a sideline.
@CD
That wasn’t aimed at you – and yes, you may have a point
Can anyone spot the logical fallacy in Dave’s argument?
Answers on a postcard, please…
“Go ahead… although my personal opinion is that any nuke, sat., zirc. or other material connection is less important than the belief that SAH was up to no good – by which I mean the parties responsible did not require material proof in order to discharge their weapon(s).”
Exactly, they didn’t hang around to look for anything, just got both parties together, and together long enough to shoot them.
@ dave brooker – 1 Oct, 2012 – 3:58 pm: If he was minted he’d not be middlemanning nuclear secrets for a sideline.
And the proof for this theory is?
It’s just as likely, theoretically, that he was moonlighting for SIS and something went horribly wrong.
All nuclear smugglers have Bentley motor cars…with the UK reg of “NUKE1” on them !
It’s big business this though.
I never knew so much of it is going on !
Thursday, Aug 16, 2012, 13:40 IST
German officials yesterday (Wednesday) broke up an alleged Iranian smuggling ring that was supplying key components to its nuclear programme, arresting four people accused of organising the illegal exports.
Three German-Iranians with dual citizenship and a German were picked up from homes in Hamburg, Oldenburg and Weimar on suspicion of exporting components for an Iranian heavy water reactor plant
“And the proof for this theory is?”
Meeting a Frenchman involved in the Nuclear industry at a remote carpark in the back and beyond and then getting topped by mossad.
Why did he meet nuclear Frenchman up a mountian other than to either do a trade or to make a new contact?
Why did they all get shot?
Because anyone connected with Iran’s nuclear programme is considered a target by Israel.
Why get involved in any of the above if you’re rich and lead a charmed life?
“It’s big business this though.
I never knew so much of it is going on !”
And the import hub for much of it is Dubai, where Al-hilli spent long enough to come home with a wife.
“The court also heard that Urs Tinner set up production sites in Dubai and Malaysia for producing centrifuge parts for enriching uranium”
I didn’t know the Tinner boys were in Dubai !
That Jebel Ali port must be glowing these days
http://www.standard.co.uk/news/world/an-alpine-murder-mystery–why-were-the-alhillis-shot-dead-8125292.html
Peter Allen 11th September 2012 “The cold facts of a meticulous ballistics report make chilling reading.”
So there has actually been a ballistics report then?
How do we get to have butchers in the same manner that Peter Allen suggests he has?
Buying cars for cash, and selling them on for cash could be a way of him laundering money?
Driving different cars frequently, especially if “change of ownership” details weren’t sent…or sent swiftly..to the DVLA would have its advantages where number plate recogition flags are concerned too.
“Buying cars for cash, and selling them on for cash could be a way of him laundering money?”
If you did that you’d end up with even more dirty money.
James 1 Oct, 2012 – 4:08 pm
Those “key components for Iran’s nuclear programme” were valves. Nice valves, made in Germany
http://www.mayer-spezialarmaturen.eu/index.html
… but still only valves.
This reminds me a little of the (true) story of the german wannabe terrorist who went to an AQ training camp in Afghanistan and then returned to Germany. At the time, Germany didn’t have any laws prohibiting participation in terrorist training programmes abroad – so they successfully prosecuted him for “illegally exporting” his radio-controlled wristwatch to Afghanistan.
@ Ro-Land ” ballistic report”
good find…. you think Peter Allen was just making it up, being vague?
@ those who believe everything they see and hear
some postman says he did BMW’s up so that’s a fact is it ?
Roland Teflon 1 Oct, 2012 – 4:25 pm
In the same article, the journo speculates about the type of gun used possibly the kind of Czech-made Skorpion vz.61 sub-machine gun used by Russians during the Cold War, which proves that, even if there had been a ballistics report at the time, he hasn’t been anywhere near it.
The trouble is, for the last few days now, there hasn’t even been this kind of made-up BS in the news anymore 🙁
@ dave brooker 1 Oct, 2012 – 4:12 pm
Dave, I’ve no problem with theories but no-one, myself included, can state theories resting on other theories as if they are matters of fact. So, Mossad? Possibly/probably the most likely candidates, but it is not proven that they did it.
If I manufactured bolts to a certain specification that are similar to, or the same as some bolts used in reactor construction it would be a bit of a logical jump to say I was involved in the Nuclear industry. All we can do is state some hypotheses and give them a range of probability while allowing that we may wrong.
The big question.
Who, apart from the security services, could have connected a burguny coloured BMW car dumped in an isolated car park up a French mountain with a Claygate accountant Julian Stedman, early in the morning of September 6 2012?
Stedman says French journalists tapped him up. How could they know?
He is at the centre of the web.
Additionally, where is the cottage of the Bewick family precisely in Chevaline?
Dopey, I was thinking more of buying secondhand quality cars & shipping them to Dubai,with or without smuggled items….mainly cash, cars get sold over there all monies banked in a Dubai account to be forwarded to ?
“some postman says he did BMW’s up so that’s a fact is it ?”
Big D.
The postman said that live on air, why would he lie , he’s been going to the house for 7 years I think he said & the Al Hillis lived there for the last three ?
Yes quite Felix, that’s been puzzling me too……. who did tell journalists of their connection ?
@ katie
I think they drive on the left in Dubai…so would there be much of a market for right hand drive cars over there?
@ felix
Stedman’s address is listed as the registered address for Saad’s company isn’t it? I’m guessing that’s why they flocked to his address.
@Katie 1 Oct, 2012 – 5:11 pm: I think he said & the Al Hillis lived there for the last three
If that is true, then where were the children born and, if they have their own separate passports (as is required now by many countries), what nationality are they?
@Felix 1 Oct, 2012 – 5:00 pm
There are a lot of questions arising from inconsistencies in the reports based on the first statements from the French police – as if they were based on information from ‘above’ rather than reports from officers at the scene. Similar to the queries you raise re Mr Stedman being contacted so quickly.
Thanks Dopey, so that shoots that theory down.
@dopey
Yes, but not early in the morning of Sept 6. It wasn’t even news then. When was the name of Saad released?
@Katie
I don’t find the postman on 192.com but he seems genuine and seems genuinely surprised and gives an off the cuff (unlike Stedman or Brett Martin) interview, so I guess he is not an operative in postal disguise. Obviously postmen get a good idea of activities at a house, which is why, as I said in a previous thread, they used to and perhaps still do , sign the OSA. They would also know if mail was being tapped at an address.
These are major conflicts of info – how long the family had lived there, and when they left the house for holiday.
CD.
They lived in Pimlico.
It was said the Al Hillis moved to Claygate because it was nearer the cycling club AH used….. again this was an early report.