Breaking - explosions at Brussels Airport **Mod warning in post 1**

12Phase wrote: »

As far as I am aware at the height of the terrorist campaigns in Northern Ireland, it was fairly standard in Dublin Airport and elsewhere to be scanned with a hand-held metal detector at the door.

I'm not old enough to remember, but I know I read it somewhere.

It wouldn't be THAT difficult to implement large scale baggage scanning at doors. They do it in major Spanish railway stations and the X-ray machine are fast and big enough to process everything without much fuss at all. They're maybe 2 or 3X bigger than a standard machine.

I am old enough to remember this at Belfast, at least in a random serach, on the approach to the Airport by the Army, and again on the entry to an airport of both persons and luggage.

Unfortunately if this was to be introduced to our international airports, they would nearly only end up as places for arriving and departin passengers.

Imagine everyone being serched on entry and the massive delays. It would only end up having terrorist attacks at entry points and approaches.

Nodin wrote: »

Yep, and rather thankfully theres fuck all of them in that sect.

That's the kind of commentary that really doesn't help and has little relation to reality.

As the majority don't support IS or their agenda, it would seem to be others that are doing the ignoring.

Hey Nodin
Has your opinion of suicide bombers changed today ?

BTW you do know not every islamic fundamentalist terrorist is/was a member of ISIS/ISIl/daesh ?

Shurimgreat wrote: »

Oh yes we mustn't criticise religions because that only makes the problem worse. Like we are doing great already not criticising them.

For every terrorist atrocity like this, groups like IS win over new recruits eager to do a copycat. They also win over thousands of new western apologists who try to pin the blame on everyone and everything except the perpetrators and their religion.

All these suicide bombers come from one religion, Islam. No other.

At what stage do we call a spade a spade and say this is a murderous death cult which has no place in modern Europe?

I have no problem with religious criticism. This is Europe after all where we like to think we're a little more enlightened and can have these types of discussions. I do, however, have a problem with people who try to frame the problem entirely within the scope of religion and make it only about that, and completely ignore any social or political issues that contribute to the problem. These things feed one another and it's a three dimensional problem. It's like with the Troubles - you'll get people from abroad who only understand that conflict in terms of Catholicism vs Protestantism and therefore have a simplistic view, which we tend to balk at. We, as Irish people, tend to have a more nuanced insight, and while we recognise that religion had its part to play, there were issues of unemployment, political grievance and cultural division that also led to the problem. To say the problem of ISIS is entirely down to Islam is totally ignoring what would drive a young man from Britain or France towards Syria or Iraq. What factors give an in-road to indoctrination? Why don't 100 percent of all Muslims join ISIS? What stops some and compels others? Are there moderate Muslims? If there are, are they only pretending to be, and secretly plotting to join the fight when the time is right? Should we therefore start eyeing each one with suspicion, regardless of how peaceful they might seem?

Really, what is equally worrying to me about these attacks is the undercurrent of right wing fervour they create. You get enough of these attacks and it makes everyone afraid, understandably, but also the knee jerk stuff it gives rise to can be equally scary in itself. A couple more attacks, it's build a wall around Europe's eastern border, a few more it's blanket bomb the Middle East and ignore the massive humanitarian disaster that follows, another one and it's deport everyone non-white and non-secular. Home searches for all possible political enemies. One way or another, whether it be through attacks or the fear of them, I think the western world is going to become a s**tier place to live for the ordinary person, and governments will be happy enough to soak up the odd attack for the political ammo it gives them to put through more and more draconian legislation.

Station Hoofddorp evacuated some time after possible threat

http://www.nu.nl/algemeen/4234617/station-hoofddorp-tijd-ontruimd-mogelijke-dreiging.html

briany wrote: »

Really, what is equally worrying to me about these attacks is the undercurrent of right wing fervour they create. You get enough of these attacks and it makes everyone afraid, understandably, but also the knee jerk stuff it gives rise to can be equally scary in itself. A couple more attacks, it's build a wall around Europe's eastern border, a few more it's blanket bomb the Middle East and ignore the massive humanitarian disaster that follows, another one and it's deport everyone non-white and non-secular. Home searches for all possible political enemies. One way or another, whether it be through attacks or the fear of them, I think the western world is going to become a s**tier place to live for the ordinary person, and governments will be happy enough to soak up the odd attack for the political ammo it gives them to put through more and more draconian legislation.

I think it might help everyone in this discussion, if people using today's attacks by Islamist extremists seeking a fundamentalist caliphate as a segue for attacking the far right, were viewed as absurdly as those people using it as a segue for attacking the 'Remain EU' campaign.

Dutch school teacher:

https://twitter.com/IvarMol/status/712220187488083968

(Translation: How can you still teach when the attacks this morning are being applauded by muslim kids in class)

Followed by another tweet from the same guy a few hours later:

https://twitter.com/IvarMol/status/712281264519299073

(Tr: 3 police officers at my door. If i can stop tweeting messages like these (the one above)

Because of course that is what you do when a school teacher hasnt a clue anymore what to do with this. Sent some (thought) police to his address

Internet Ham wrote: »

Limiting the movements of the people who are most likely to cause these attacks is surely a more rational solution than giving free passage to floods of migrants whom are more than likely a perfect smokescreen for cells to gain access to European targets.

"limiting", "most likely". The problem is that we've been here before. It leads to irrational fears and 1984-esque paranoia & security, as occurred in the US during the era of McCarthyism.

They may get in illegally but denying them asylum greatly diminishes the chances of them getting to target destinations does it not?

No, I don't believe it does. Denying them asylum swells the ranks of their fighters overseas and creates a larger enemy. It also means that the ones most likely to get in legally are the ones who best know how to play the system.
"Knowing" that you have locked down your borders also causes complacency inside those borders. Far from having a ragtag bunch of loonies wielding AKs, like Brussels and Paris, you get a more sophisticated, more devastating attack, like New York.

The first step is recognising that the "them" and "us" is "IS" and "rest of the world", rather than "Islam" and "the west". Refugees fleeing IS-beseiged regions are "us" as well. If you treat them like the enemy, they will become the enemy.
Yes, we could very easily say, "This is not our problem. Go back and sort it out yourselves". But we all have to share a planet where distances have become increasingly shorter. Every problem eventually becomes "our" problem.

inforfun wrote: »

Dutch school teacher:

https://twitter.com/IvarMol/status/712220187488083968

(Translation: How can you still teach when the attacks this morning are being applauded by muslim kids in class)

Followed by another tweet from the same guy a few hours later:

https://twitter.com/IvarMol/status/712281264519299073

(Tr: 3 police officers at my door. If i can stop tweeting messages like these (the one above)

Because of course that is what you do when a school teacher hasnt a clue anymore what to do with this. Sent some (thought) police to his address

Is this guy even a school teacher ? How do we verify anything he has said.

Twitter is a hive of trolls im sure you are aware.

Sure Boards has them too.

listermint wrote: »

Is this guy even a school teacher ? How do we verify anything he has said.

Twitter is a hive of trolls im sure you are aware.

Sure Boards has them too.

He is legit.
Has been contacted by the Dutch press and believe me, if he had been trolling that would have been reported swiftly by them.
Going a bit through the guys profile, he is as touchy-feely as they come.
Far from a Wilders fan or extreme right supporters.

Now of course a profile is created quick enough but his was done in june 2009.
Not the first time i read stuff like this. Also not the first time police steps in to request deletion of similar or advising to stop it.

That seems...unlikely. Three police officers being sent to his address (and why his address, it was still class time when he tweeted that, why not his school if they were able to track him down within a few hours of his post) right then and there? Is he teaching from home or something? And what sort of damned fool makes his inability to control a pack of schoolkids -international news- anyway?

Not to mention the kids would, even if they were from pro-terrorist families (and if they are, one would EXPECT they would probably not be being indoctrinated in secularist or Christian schools, although one can argue hiding in plain sight), be warned not to make themselves so damned obvious or the parents will get arrested before they can do anything.

Sorry, this just isn't ringing true. It's a little too pat.

Edit: Interesting, people are confirming the guy. Well, if he's telling the truth he's a bit of a twit, but we'll see where it goes from there.