The Al-Hilli Conundrum 6629


My post on the shootings in France has brought tens of thousands of people to this site – but not to read my dull contribution. People are coming to read the comments from other readers.

Today’s development of the bomb squad descending on the al-Hilli house does not in itself worry me enormously. You may recall the massive terror scare that was ramped up when some Muslim students in Manchester were found to own a bag of sugar.

In fact we have the opposite phenomenon today, with the spook-fed “security correspondents” on TV lining up to tell us it is probably just everyday household stuff. This deviation from the standard Islamophobic “Muslims = bombs” narrative is so startling it makes me wonder why the “move along, nothing to see here” line is being taken so quickly.

My own security services sources insist that al-Hilli was not a person of current interest to the UK intelligence agencies and was not involved in anything clandestine. I have no reason to disbelieve them. On the other hand, the limited and confusing information in the media is almost entirely from official sources. I find it very strange indeed how little attention has been paid to the murdered French cyclist, and how easily it is presumed he was just a passerby. Surely it is as likely he was the intended victim and the al-Hillis the accidental witnesses?

Please do read the comments on my first entry on the subject to see the debate unfettered by the censorship in the mainstream media. This is perhaps my favourite comment:

From Janesmith101

All comments regarding Sylvain, Al-Hilli and a possible nuclear link are being removed from sites I’ve posted on in The Guardian, Independent and Huffpo UK.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2012/sep/09/alps-killer-motive-baffles-police

Here was my comment, I added as a point of fact it was completely speculative and an unproven theory in a later comment, also removed.

Sylvain Mollier, the ‘passing’ cyclist, was in fact a nuclear metallurgist who worked for a french nuclear company called Cezus (a subsidiary of Areva). Cezus fabricates and processes zirconium into metal and nuclear grade zircoaloy for nuclear fuel assemblies – it also has other applications in aerospace such as components and ceramics for missiles and satellites. Mr Al-Hilli was also a skilled aerospace engineer, on what looks to be his first camping holiday.

What is the probability that two highly skilled engineers managed be at the same remote place, at the same time, yet still managed to end up dead as a result of what looks to be a military style assasination?

As someone else pointed out in The Independent comments, the deceased were found by a ‘retired’ RAF officer who, we assume, will recieve perpetual anonymity as a witness. If the police are looking for a motive, try an intercepted rendevous by a security service fixated on denying a hostile power illicit nuclear technology.

http://wrmea.org/component/content/article/162-1995-june/7823-israel-bombs-iraqs-osirak-nuclear-research-facility.html

The Huffington Post UK reports that this wasn’t the family’s first trip to the camp site. An earlier report had asked other camp site visitors whether they had seen the family before and they had replied they hadn’t. If this isn’t wasn’t the first visit by Al-Hilli, it might slightly increase the odds that he knew or had met Mollier before, this being the last in a series of rendevous of a transactional nature. Mollier lived and worked locally.

Again, I’m not sure of the truth of these reports, there is some very sloppy journalism, as there is always seems to be. I’ve read for example Mollier’s company Cevus descirbed as a steel firm something which it is patently not, but perhaps it may have been a detail lost in translation.

An interesting comment summing up some of the strange coincidences, at least, surrounding these murders. My other favourite comment calls me a “macchiavellian shill”.

I have only one thought of my own I want to add at the minute. Al-Hilli was a Shia muslim and had been on pilgrimage to Qoms in Iran. What if it is indeed true that he was in possession of no especial nuclear or defence secrets to pass on to the Iranians, but the Israelis thought that he was? The Israeli programme of assassination of scientists involved in Iran’s nuclear programme is a definite fact. It makes as much sense as anything else at the moment, as a possibility.

I am not saying that is what happened. But the directions in which the mainstream media is being so strenuously pointed by official sources, like the massacre of an entire family over an inheritance, are certainly no more inherently probable. Certainly as we are now told all the shots were from one gun, for the assassin to get each victim in the head with none of them being able to escape, indicates real proficiency with the weapon and a very high level of training.


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6,629 thoughts on “The Al-Hilli Conundrum

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  • P_

    The Al Hilli family were definitely the targets in the Chevaline killing, Mark Williams-Thomas revealed on Twitter three days ago. He went on to tweet “Exclusive: Considerable amount of evidence was removed from the Al Hilli family home which has provided a significant lead.”

    And in reply to a question about what’s happening, Mark Williams-Thomas says (enigmatically) “Police following up on certain elements – in particular a certain element.”

    #batedbreathsituation? Perhaps not.

  • anders7777

    Team leave with SAH and the ”roof-rack”
    This smells bad for D-notice and msm cover up.
    Smells as bad as Saville and Heath the morning
    after a trip to HLG on board ”Morning Sickness.

    =====
    Glad someone is paying attention! 🙂

    Sa-VILE 😉

    Stay tuned for his exposé on tee-vee

    Oct 3rd

    B there or B [ ]

  • Katie

    Ferret.

    Saad was a child when they left !
    His father fell foul of the Ba’ah party,slowly nearly all the Shia were squeezed out. I posted all the detail 2 days ago. Saddam killed nearly 200 hundred Shiites around that time.

  • Jon

    Orph3us/Anders:

    “The complete lack of speculation in the press points to a D Notice”

    Maybe, but I don’t find that watertight. The press are expected to deal in reportage, not guesswork – they have to worry about proof and libel, and sensitivity to living persons, amongst other things.

    Also, the press ultimately will carry a story if they think it will attract readers. Once a story “no longer has legs” they will drop it – it’s one of the great contradictions between a corporate press and the public interest. Does the British public care about this story? Probably not, on the whole – ordinary people have a lot of other things to worry about.

  • Ferret

    @Suhayl

    If I had to commit to just one line of thinking, I’d say at the moment the most likely culprit is Mossad.

    Perhaps they caught Sylvain Mollier handing over plans or sensitive documents taken from the R&D lab of the Cezus/Areva plant in Ugine, where Sylvain Mollier worked.

    (This plant in Ugine, incidentally, manufactured Zirconium and Hafnium, both of which are used in nuclear reactors, as well as in some advanced weapons systems.)

    This sensitive information could have helped Iran achieve its nuclear ambitions, or perhaps construct a hypothesised Hafnium weapon. Or both.

    Al Hilli was to check the information for accuracy before passing it on to his Mother-in-Law who was to act as the courier to Iran.

    Unfortunately, there was a leak and Mossad got wind of the exchange… and the hit went down.

    The children were spared as there was no need to kill them and even Mossad are not totally heartless b****rds.

    Al Hilli was on the radar of MI5/MI6 so they scrambled military intelligence (a contradiction in terms) as soon as they heard, and did their best to do a damage-limitation exercise by issuing a D notice to suppress the crucial elements of the story.

    However, it’s hard to fit Brett Martin into this story other than as an accidental witness, which I don’t think he is.

  • Ferret

    Katie

    Saad was a child when they left !

    What are your sources?

    According to the Daily Mail (ahem) we are both wrong: “Mr Al-Hilli came to Britain as a teenager…”

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2199513/Saad-Al-Hilli-shooting-French-Alps-Extraordinary-life-engineer-victim.html

    He is now 50 years old, and the family left Iraq in the late 70’s according to an unnamed “family friend”.

    (Goodness, there are a lot of unnamed “family friends” around, aren’t there!)

    So… does anyone have any concrete info on when he left Iraq? Or is it just based on rumour and heresay?

  • bluebird

    @katie

    Do you have a confirmed year about when they left?
    I somewhere read that it wad 1970. At that time there were no shias killed by saddam. In fact it was the time when saddam went to power in the baath party. His first war as a party leader was the war against the kurds starting in 1970.

    I understood that the family left because of troubles within tha baath party. That would fit inti the years 1968 and 1969 when saddam took the power frm ibrahim ad- da’ud and nyaf.

    Ad-da’ud emigrated to jordan while nayf lived in istanbul furtheron. Several 100 of their (very rich) party members had to leave iraq or to die. They had no choice. This was not sunnis vs shias but saddams (mafia) guys in the baath party versus moderate and law-believing baath party members who did suppor nyaf and ad-da’ud.

    However, this is only a matter of fact if they left iraq in 1970. If they left in 1978 or later then the reasons might be different. However in the early 1970tees many upper class iraqi baath party members had to leave iraq when they were politicians supporting nyaf and ad-daud. Saddam’s mafia, supported by CIA representing the usa, who took over the baath party and the government gave them no alternatives.

  • Ferret

    France shooting: was Saad Al-Hilli assassinated over secret defence contract?

    Telegraph, Sept 9

    Old news… and yet, after the downing of the satellite aka “comet”, strangely back in focus.

    I still can’t help feeling that this might have something to do with it all…

    Gary Aked, SAH’s long-time friend (apparently) works as Senior Engineer at ATK, who produce weapons and satellite services. http://www.atk.com

    SAH worked for SSTL (Surrey Satellite Technology Limited).

    Could SAH have had access to some of ATK’s technology?

    Could he have helped Iran to down the CIA’s drone late last year? The Iranians now say they have decoded it all and are going to build replicas. The USA must be doing their nut.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran%E2%80%93U.S._RQ-170_incident

  • Ferret

    @Katie

    “The question is, did Eric Maillaud have any view of the alleged crime scene before midnight 5 sept.”

    Yes it would seem so.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xr1a9QVLHrU

    Not according to that video. It just shows the ambulance leaving and Maillaud being interviewed in pitch blackness. How does this prove whether he’d been to the crime scene or not? Everything he says could have been told to him by someone else.

  • Ferret

    France shooting: was Saad Al-Hilli assassinated over secret defence contract?

    Telegraph, Sept 9

    Old news… and yet, after the downing of the satellite aka “comet”, strangely back in focus.

    I still can’t help feeling that this might have something to do with it all…

    Gary Aked, SAH’s long-time friend (apparently) works as Senior Engineer at ATK, who produce weapons and satellite services.

    SAH worked for SSTL (Surrey Satellite Technology Limited).

    Could SAH have had access to some of ATK’s technology?

    Could he have helped Iran to down the CIA’s drone late last year? The Iranians now say they have decoded it all and are going to build replicas. The USA must be doing their nut.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran%E2%80%93U.S._RQ-170_incident

  • Katie

    Bluebird/Ferret you will have to go back & search for all that info. It was the late 70’s.

    Saad went to a school in Pimlico so not a teenager.

    Sorry,but I’m off to bed.

  • Ferret

    @M69

    Re the paramilitary thing, I got the exact same feeling. They have that cold, hard look in their eyes, just like in the eyes of people who have killed.

    Seeing one is surprising… but every single man jack of them? (I couldn’t make out the eyes of the woman instructor, it’s from more of a distance and she’s looking down.)

    I keep questioning myself and asking if it’s just because they are bow-hunters and they kill animals, but I think that’s different.

    This is of course just my personal opinion.

    (For another example take a look at Sir John Sawyers of MI6 at http://www.sis.gov.uk.)

    What were your thoughts?

  • Ferret

    @Katie

    Bluebird/Ferret you will have to go back & search for all that info.

    Cheeky! I already did. I’m asking you for your source.

    It was the late 70′s.

    You don’t say, that’s exactly what I posted above.

    Saad went to a school in Pimlico so not a teenager.

    As usual, you ignore all evidence laid in front of you and insist you are right regardless.

    Head, brick wall, bash.

    Yes, he went to school in Pimlico, and yes, he came over as a teenager, both according to the article I sent the link to.

    I can read you know, and there’s no need to patronise me or insult my intelligence.

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2199513/Saad-Al-Hilli-shooting-French-Alps-Extraordinary-life-engineer-victim.html

  • Ferret

    And by the way, Katie, teenagers do also go to school you know.

    So saying he went to school in Pimilico doesn’t mean he didn’t come over as a teenager.

    Is it so hard for you to admit you were wrong?

  • dopey

    This DM article states the family came over in the late 1970’s.

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2199513/Saad-Al-Hilli-shooting-French-Alps-Extraordinary-life-engineer-victim.html

    A few things I noticed in this article I didn’t take note of before-

    Saad only became a British citizen in 2002 – normal? I don’t know anything about British citizenship to comment, other than it seems to have taken a long time for him to get it…unless he never applied for it till then.

    Back to the accountant – who says in this article he knew Saad AND his father well. They had weekly conversations and a longer conversation once a month – considering the father was retired and the lacklustre financial results of Saad’s company why on earth did they speak once a week?

    I kow I’ve said it before, but it seems to have been “all go” for the Al Hilli bunch in 2002/2003 – Saad gets British citizenship, he/the Al Hilli’s were being monitored, the father nashes off to Spain, signing the house over to the brothers and Saad gets married.

  • Marmo

    @Bluebird

    “It wss reported that SAH worked for rutherford labs in 1986. However, it was also reported that he worked for SSTL.
    SSTL works in all their projects with rutherford labs. They could not even control their satellites without the ground stations of rutherford labs. All their tests are done at rutherford labs, too.”

    Fair enough… but that still doesn’t mean that al-Hilli and Mollier were “colleagues”, does it? Is there any evidence at all that they ever worked together? Or even knew each other?

  • Ferret

    Mr Al-Hilli worked for Surrey Satellites Technology Limited (SSTL) near Guildford, and detectives are expected to ask colleagues about whether his work may have made him a target for assassination.

    Mr Al-Hilli was part of a team involved in an undisclosed project linked to European Aeronautic Defence and Space. The company designs and launches satellites for clients who want an “eye in the sky” for commercial, civil or security purposes.

    However, friends and colleagues said his work was routine and not secret.

    Shtech, the aeronautical business which he ran with his wife Iqbal and which had sub-contracted with SSTL, registered profits of just £8,330 last year. Derek Reed, who worked at SSTL, told The Sunday Times: “He would not have had to sign the Official Secrets Act for what he was doing.”

    It also reported that Mr Al-Hilli had worked at the internationally-renowned Rutherford Appleton research centre in the 1980s.

    According to an ex-colleague at the Rutherford lab in Didcot, Oxon, Saad worked on a giant particle accelerator which can make radioactive material, The People reported.

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/france/9531436/France-shooting-was-Saad-Al-Hilli-assassinated-over-secret-defence-contract.html

    Sept 9, 2012

    @Dopey

    I’m not sure if it’s odd that he would talk to his accountant weekly, even given the relative lack of business through Shtech… couldn’t it be explained by his being a family friend?

    It does seem odd though that SAH & family could live on so little money, though. (£8,330 last year.) I can only think he must have had another company, or perhaps as someone (you?) already suggested, he had a PAYE job as well as side-earnings through his company?

  • Thomas

    @Jon

    As all the larger printed Swedish newspaper ( and from the rest of Europe ) also are sold in UK, might be the reason why a British Court can ban certain information to be spread.

    I´m not sure how it works, the editor of Expressen didn´t even want to tell what courtit was that was issuing the injunction. But it is for sure in use, as the article I linked to explains. It´s a serious source.

    There is as well almost nothing in the French media written about monsieur Mollier.

  • Ferret

    As I was reading that article in the DM I wondered, perhaps it’s all just hidden in plain sight?

    Mr Al-Hilli worked for Surrey Satellites Technology Limited (SSTL)… Mr Al-Hilli was part of a team involved in an undisclosed project linked to European Aeronautic Defence and Space. The company designs and launches satellites for clients who want an “eye in the sky” for commercial, civil or security purposes.

    Daily Telegraph, Sept 9, 2012

    {http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/france/9531436/France-shooting-was-Saad-Al-Hilli-assassinated-over-secret-defence-contract.html}

    Strangely, this promising line of enquiry seems to drop without trace from the media until Sept 16, when it resurfaces but only in the Daily Mail:

    Meanwhile, it is understood that Mr Al-Hilli worked for a satellite company which is being investigated by MI5 over fears it has been targeted by foreign agencies that want to develop hostile spying operations.

    A cousin of Mr Al-Hilli, who was contacted in Baghdad but refused to be identified, said: ‘If you investigate and find out about Saad’s job, you will know who’s behind his killing.’
    The cousin, who lives in Istanbul but was on a business trip to Baghdad, added: ‘We have been told by the police not to say anything more.’

    It is believed that French police are examining Iraqi-born Mr Al-Hilli’s work with Surrey Satellite Technology Limited (SSTL).
    Intelligence sources said the company had ‘been of interest’ to MI5 for ten years during which time the security service had conducted surveillance operations on British-based individuals who had made contact with SSTL.

    It provides state-of-the-art equipment that, in the wrong hands, could be turned into spy satellites. It also stores huge amounts of data obtained from many different satellite missions that might be of interest to another state or competitor company.
    SSTL declined to discuss security surrounding the firm, but confirmed that Mr Al-Hilli had been working with it since November 2010 as part of a small team on an unnamed project.

    Daily Mail Sept 16, 2012

    {http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2203934/Did-gunman-trail-Alps-massacre-victims-way-home-Britain.html?ito=feeds-newsxml}

    Paints a pretty clear picture, doesn’t it… and perhaps the rest is all smokescreen?

  • dopey

    @ ferret

    Yes I did suggest he was on their normal payroll, but I since saw early news articles saying he worked there on a freelance basis.

    That accountant claims he was up front” and his accounts were “perfect”….so where was the money he earned getting filtered through? If that’s all he DID earn on SSTL work over the course of a year then he can’t have been doing many hours for them at all could he?

  • bluebird

    Could british forum users try to find some press reports about the assassination of an-naif in london in the 1980tees? The eeb is too young for finding something.

    All i found was that guardian article of 2005 mentioning the assassination and russian trained killer salem ahmed hassan. Hassan was sentenced to live imprisonment in london. When was he released or is he still in jail?

    http://m.guardian.co.uk/uk/2005/jun/09/iraq.world?cat=uk&type=article

    Btw. In iraq were already 203 scientists assassinated since the begin of the american occupation. The assassination of scoentists in iraq is quite common.

    I am wondering whether saad’s father/family had links to former prime minister an-naif who was assassinated in london with 3 bullets into his head. The time of their leaving iraq gives some likelyhood as they went to london approx. the same time as an-naif did emigrate to london.

    If you find press info about that assassination in the 1980tees please let us know. And what happened to the killer? Still in prison? Died in prison? Was he released? If so, when?

  • Ferret

    Hmmmm….

    SAH is listed as director of AMS 1087 Ltd, company number 04125692. Looks active as they’ve filed accounts every year. (Dormant companies don’t.)

    Safa Al Hilli is listed as director of Digi Smart Ltd, company number 05342554. Founded 2006. Looks active as they’ve filed accts every year.

    Digi Smart Ltd’s previous name? Digi Satellite Ltd!!!

    Ali Al Hilli is also a director of Digi Smart Ltd.

  • Ferret

    Shtech Ltd unsurprisingly lists Ikbal Al-Saffar as company secy and Saad Hilli as director, with Zaid Hilli as ex-company secy.

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