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.
Presumably Philippe D. is not the photographer given credit on photo 8/13 on this page:
http://www.lexpress.fr/diaporama/diapo-photo/actualite/societe/chevaline-apres-le-quadruple-meurtre_1157997.html?p=8
@Vermillion: This really looks like a smoking gun, but I remember seeing some of the earliest reporting. I think it talked about three bodies in the car, a dead cyclist, and a dead girl. This complicated situation was reported simultaneously in so many places that I wouldn’t be surprised if the claim about the dead girl in the car was the end of a telephone game. (4 dead people in a car, and there was a girl too! Dead! And a dead cyclist! – You see what I mean?)
But it would certainly be worth analysing the reporting in the first three hours or so. To see where every bit of information came from and how it changed.
Jon
Before the BBC changed under Checkland and Birt, they were very critical of Israel. Now they’re pro Israel and collude in hiding its crimes.
Do you seriously believe that those journalists, and I mean journalists, don’t know what’s been going on?
Do you seriously believe that the Bowens and Geurins of this world don’t know that the BBC colludes in whitewashing Israel’s crimes?
How does the Propaganda Model work for the likes of them?
Dennehy
Can you think of a major recent crime, one the whole world is looking at, where witnesses were not interviewed on television, not even identified?
Suhayl Saadi – I’m a lurker here but have visited once before after the death of Katherine (known as Sian) Hurd – no idea re: Gareth Thomas, something highly suspicious going on there, but I know for fact that SH’s death was not anything over which to hold any conspiracy theories! We lived in Jordan 2000-2003 when they were there too and had kept in touch – all was not well BUT it is sadly just a tragic story, no more to it.
Re: this case I am fascinated; you lot have some very good brains! I have come here from another forum and am now convinced by some of your theories/ideas that I hadn’t even thought of previously. Keep it up!
HA at 2:43 pm
It sounds more likely to me that the killer who put two shots each into the heads of the adults in the car, also put two shots into the head of Sylvain Mollier. Otherwise, how many trained killers were meeting up there that day – accidentally or otherwise?
Sorry guys/gals – I now see you picked up that Philippe D connection already.
DavidLandy,
so then, would you buy me a beer if it was a Skorpion vz 61 7.65mm ?
I’ll buy you a beer if it wasn’t a Skorpion.
Deal?
http://i3.mirror.co.uk/incoming/article86912.ece/ALTERNATES/s615/colonel-gaddafi-pic-afp-philippe-desmazes-706376664.jpg
Another Philippe Desmazes famous image.
It’s worth making the point that it’s strange in itself that the French prosecutor would provide the information that the first witness was ex-RAF. Why would he do this?
He doesn’t intend to identify this witness, so why give any information as to his identity at all, that may assist in identifying him. As someone pointed out at an earlier stage, it wouldn’t be too difficult to track down an ex-RAF man living in the local area. But anyway, why would the prosecutor give even the smallest assistance in identifying him. He wouldn’t.
I think we can safely conclude that the first witness wasn’t ex-RAF at all.
The only question then is why did the prosecutor choose to identify him thus.
Why didn’t he simply say he was a retired teacher or plumber or whatever? What does it matter what he was, were he to be spirited away.
Why did he feel the need to identify him as an ex military figure, and indeed specify his military calling as RAF?
@Vague Hague, thanks. I don’t have specific knowledge about Checkland and Birt, but I can answer about my understanding of the model in relation to apparently synchronised changes of mind. It’s a very good point you raise, and the Model deals with it well, I think.
What I would guess in relation to coverage of Israel is that, across the West, coverage has been supportive in the Western media since its creation, with only small amounts of dissent*. Its coming into being was a British invention, and it has never been politically useful to demonise Israel. The US has supported them mainly to project power into the Middle East, and increasingly of course Israel has become a trading partner in a way that Palestine has never been allowed to develop. Today, Israel is a very useful technology/defence trader as well.
Where there are changes at the top of a news organisation, I can very well believe that there is a perceptible shift in how journalism works, yes. This happens without much in the way of specific instructions – although there are of course specific examples of where a proprietor has stood behind someone and dictated something – it is rare, since it offends the conscious principles of a journalist. But their subconscious approach, in the main, is to be +aware+ of the views of a owner/DG which are then introjected rather than deliberately inserted. Why do they do this? The reasons are many, but partly it is for career advancement, or to avoid causing undue fuss for the news outlet (see “flak”) etc. Also, to a degree, sympathy for the fine upstanding conviction politician (“Blair went to Fettes” etc).
Private Eye seems to be aware of this process – whilst The Sun is hardly a paragon of decent journalism, PE reports on how much more views from the top are trickling down to the pen-pushers below. This is, of course, because the octogenarian henchman has started Tweeting, and the reportage of “the correct view” is getting into print much more quickly.
* The Model was written in the late 1980s. I would surmise that whilst criticism of Israel has always been +relatively+ muted, it will have become more so at the start of the neoconservative project, which was around the same time (Reagan & Thatcher) and continues to the present. This is down to the concentrated power of the media, as well as the constantly reducing number of foreign correspondents.
HA
Except the article clearly refers to un jeune enfant in the car and une jeune fille outside so unlikely a mix up. It may be the “source” had knowledge of the Al-Hilli family (except for the mother in law) so interpreted the talk of 3 bodies in the car (with an injured girl outside) in light of this knowledge. It makes the failure to find the living child all the more disturbing.
VagueHague: “The only question then is why did the prosecutor choose to identify him thus”
Exactly – good point
I have been feeling a strong cognitive dissonance between the following:
(1) A completely harmless and innocuous family holiday, with a father who clearly loved his family, was communicative and popular with the neighbours and went as far as mentioning to them the trouble with his brother and that he was worried about documents he had hidden in his house.
(2) Some elements pointing to a flight. Saad was worried when he left. They left on short notice, and apparently they didn’t immediately get a spot in their usual camp, having to stay at another for the first two nights. Zainab’s school started on Monday, but the family was still in France on Wednesday.
(3) The family was killed in the kind of spot where you would not want to be under any circumstances if you are afraid of being pursued. Yet they seem to have driven there quite happily.
Under these circumstances I don’t believe in espionage. But I think it would more make sense if Saad wanted to meet a high-profile journalist (or two or three, maybe all in Philippe D.’s car). Maybe he was a whistleblower about to disclose details about Israel’s imminent action in Iran? In that case the journalists might be torn between trying to help the police with their enquiries in a way that nothing can be covered up, and making absolutely sure that they won’t be targeted next.
All this said, keep in mind that Philippe is a very common first name in France and D a very common first letter for a last name. Think of something like “John W.” in English. I think this could be cleared up rather easily by simply asking Philippe D. or Philippe Desmazes.
@RedHerring
Another attempt at a meetup?
Too cosy for me.
French news says “probably”, the sun exaggerates to “almost certainly”, and you exaggerate even further to “confirmed”.
So… why did you misinform us? I believe we are due an explanation, not a wager.
BUT, in any case…
This is still a red herring, as any agency could have used any weapon. (Duh).
MORE INTERESTINGLY, PERHAPS, TO SOME…
Does anyone have any more on Al Hilli’s links with SILEX, zironium cladding, and possibly selling that, and/or other top-secret technologies to Iran?
SILEX was so off my radar I hadn’t even heard of it until I read about it earlier on this thread…
Basic info about it here… http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silex_Process
The witness was tagged as ex-RAF as a way of saying he is beyond reproach, and will not be treated as a suspect.
Ex-Raf is a unique tag as it makes him instantly respectable, able to react in a military fashion to such a massacre, but without actually implicating any military involvement.
Even Ex-soldier doesn’t conjure the same air of security as the jolly good chaps at RAF.
It’s a classic way of masking the fact he was a spook, that he was able to deal with such a scene without panicking, safe the life of a girl with mutiple gun shot wounds, and yet be beyond the scope of the investigation.
wouldn’t you ascend for a better signal?
“It’s a classic way of masking the fact he was a spook, that he was able to deal with such a scene without panicking, safe the life of a girl with mutiple gun shot wounds, and yet be beyond the scope of the investigation.”
Well he didn’t do it without panicking did he. Not according to Philippe D.
Ex RAF is good First Aid.
Helps explain the blood.
Maybe at the time the French were….confused. So it was released.
And exRAF’s family seem quiet ?
Normal some cousin of nephew would be saying something about “He’s good under fire” or something at least ?
Jon
I think you underestimate the extent to which coverage of Israel has changed from the pre 1987 period to what it is today.
It might be best captured if I point out that pre 1987 the views of someone like Jenny Tonge, for example, were mainstream even on the BBC.
Now she is out on her ear, cast into the wilderness and treated as a terrorist apologist.
That’s the kind of change we’re dealing with.
The Bowens, Guerins, Snows and even Paxmans all know this.
I’m afraid the PM just doesn’t explain a state of affairs such as this, and much as I admire the work of Chomsky and Herman etc, it is rather old, and I think we need to think afresh about the forces that are at work in media today.
There may be benefits too in the state of media today. It doesn’t quite have the subtleties posited in the PM, and may therefore lend itself better to criticism from such as ourselves.
Perhapse the prosecutor wanted to send a signal to somebody – for instance the killer/s, UK-journalists or whatever) by naming/highligthing the first witness as an ex-RAF
I’m not convinced with the spoke-theory
Frenchmans story is looking “odd”.
Why not send the women for help…in the car ?
“I’ll drive, you try and call”
Why isn’t Mr Frenchman saying “We are lucky…as we were going to park there. It could have been us”
Now of course Philippe D says Ex-RAF man did panic. I think lots of people here spotted how odd it was when ex-RAF was described in such glowing terms at press conferences and now the story changes. From cool as a cucumber to acting like Jamie Lee Curtis in a horror movie.
Three people shot dead on French island Corsica….
http://news.sky.com/story/983759/three-people-found-shot-dead-on-french-island
bluebird
11 Sep, 2012 – 1:03 pm
“It’s said by a neighbour that she saw Saad wearing a bullet-proof vest in his home shortly before he left for France. She said that he was obviously scared of something and he said that someday somebody would perhaps come and shoot through his door right into his forehead.”
That woman, if she actually said that, was embroidering after the event. He WAS shot in the forehead. God knows what he really said to her back in the UK. Why wear a bullet proof vest and then say you’re afraid of being shot in the forehead? Unreliable story from a gossipy woman if you ask me.
Meanwhile, this guy who has been labelled “ex-RAF” is said to be terrified and unable to sleep since the killings, and has sought anonymity. Hasn’t he been allowed to return to Britain? Didn’t Maillaud say “if we need him he’ll come and talk to us” or something along those lines? Why let him go so early? It now emerges he was there alone, before Philippe D arrived on the scene, and hadn’t phoned emergency services. And they let this witness go out of the country?? All very odd.
Also “exRAF” says…
Mollier over took me.
Really ?
He could hardly arrive after the “exRAF”….and then get shot !
Ok so “Philippe D” meets ex-RAF guy covered in blood and running away from a mass shooting. PD isn’t worried about the obvious possibility that “ex-RAF” guy is the killer and they are about to be wiped out next?
It’s often the case that when people want to tell a lie about a detail, they make up somthing similar. It’s almost as if they’re protecting themselves in doing so. They feel that the lie is in such a similar class to the truth that they feel they won’t be caught out should other facts pointing to the detail come out. That any new facts will somehow fit the lie too, because it’s a member of the same class.
I think there may well have been something like this going on.
I think that this first witness, whilst not at all ex RAF, was military of some desscription.
@Straw44berry
wouldn’t you ascend for a better signal?
Not neccessarily, depends where the mobile phone masts are. Interesting that Phillipe D doesn’t appear to have had much trouble finding it though.
I am the same age as the late Mr. al-Hilli. I had/have friends of similar age and, from the Iran/Iraq area, who have lived in the UK since they were teenagers.
Back in the early 1970’s, The Vietnam War was happening. Along with the conscription of US teenagers and, its pursuant draft dodging. At that same time, the U.S. had for more presence and influence in both Iran and Iraq than they do today. Their 1970’s Soft Power was far more endemic within the then middle class Iranian/Iraqi peoples. One of the consequences of this was teenage sons – like my friends – being sent abroad, with the unstated aim of avoiding their own military service, due at age 18.
Since that time, The West and, the U.S. in particular has both sponsored and waged war against both nations. Firstly inciting Saddam to attack Iran. Then by “liberating” Kuwait and, finally by destroying Saddam’s regime. In each case, the price paid by those who resided in Iraq was horrendous. Not to mention Saddam’s persecution of the Shia – which the al-Hilli family is -, Marsh Arabs, etc. Presumably, those who presently own/run the former al-Hilli engineering business in Iraq would count themselves amongst the victims of this Western agression to some degree or another?
Meanwhile, the al-Hilli sons are living a comparitive Life of Riley in states which are actually contributing to the pain being inflicted upon ordinary Iraqi citizens. Not only that, but making an increasingly affluent living from industries connected to the ongoing US hegemony. All the while, allegedly professing a “hatred” of the U.S?
With the establishment of a relatively stable, Shia-friendly, Iraqi government and, the green shoots of a new civil society; al-Hilli becomes seduced by a romantic notion.
He has not seen the land of his birth for many years. He is proud of his Iraqiness. Many emigrants The World over feel similar emotional pulls.
He will pay a visit and, possibly dream of his own business in the UK becoming now part of a broader, intercontinental al-Hilli conglomerate. As the oldest al-Hilli son, staking legal claim to the economic birthright which he has convinced himself is rightfully his.
In Iraq, the government/courts receive representations on Mr al-Hilli’s behalf – as the oldest living son of the former owner of a business in Iraq – for the ceding of said enterprise to his hands. This desire, obviously, is communicated to those who currently own/run the former al-Hilli engineering factory. They are not best pleased. Having suffered all that other residents of Iraq have done over the past three decades and, having fought to gain an economic foothold in postwar Iraq; they are unwilling to participate in litigation which would in all likelihood result in their labours and suffering amounting to nothing.
So. With their own collective future in doubt. The current owners stall the legal process as much as possible, whilst they pay others to research their opponents in the litigation.
Simultaneously, other Iraqis working on behalf of the al-Hilli’s are making contact with those for whom they act. Maybe they are not only talking to the courts and the al-Hillis? Maybe, either with or without the al-Hillis’ knowledge, they are also negotiating with the current factory owners or their representatives?
As the Iraqi dream grows for the al-Hilli sons, a feud breaks between them. The brother leaves both the family home and the employ of the late Mr al-Hilli’s UK company. For all intents and purposes, it there is now only one al-Hilli brother pursuing a claim in the Iraqi courts. All facts that the agents of the current Iraqi owners of the factory are passing on to their paymasters.
Time progresses. The current owners/operators can no longer stall the legal process in Iraq. Their prospects of retaining their collective livelihood decreases by the day.
They hatch a plan. Via intermediaries, they will arrange a meeting with the egoist al-Hilli. On neutral ground. Purportedly, to either discuss the transfer of the business or some other understanding.
In fact; they arrange for a group of armed “negotiators” to meet with Mr al-Hilli. Bearing a document for the endorsement of Mr al-Hilli. A document withdrawing all legal claim to the former al-Hilli family factory in Iraq.
An eager Mr al-Hilli greedily seizes the opportunity to resolve what is becoming a prolonged matter, to his own great personal self satisfaction.
He quickly bundles his family into the car, for a camping holiday in France. After all. “The school holidays will soon be over!” and, “We could all do with a break!”
Several days later. An indignant and frightened Mr al-Hilli – along with his terrified family – meet Fate in a remote part of France.
Mr al-Hilli refuses to endorse the document. Even whilst his agonised wife and mother in law plead for him to do so. In order to spare his by now unconscious, tortured daughter any more suffering.
Finally. The “negotiators” come to the conclusion that the third path is the only one which remains. Knowing that a dead Mr al-Hilli cannot pursue a legal claim in Iraq. Knowing that Mr al-Hilli’s late father’s other son will “get the message too”. Knowing that Mr al-Hilli’s UK-born daughters are not only not Iraqi citizens, but also female minors. The adult members of the al-Hilli family meet their demise. As had the terrified cyclist, who had been unfortunate enough to stumble across a gang of men holding a family at gunpoint whilst a little girl was brutalised, sevreral minutes before……….