EDL Dewsbury bombers: not warriors but pawns

BBC Radio Two news, on one occasion only, carried a reaction from a Muslim "community leader" to the guilty pleas of the would-be Dewsbury bombers:

If this had gone ahead, then I think we could have seen a serious massacre – lots of people could have been injured, possibly killed as well, with no discrimination. There could have been younger people, older people, black, white, Asian, etc. Anybody could have been affected by that.

I’ve a sneaking suspicion the soundbite was pulled because somebody realised it was substantially similar to a denunciation of the plot made by our own Tony Curtis at the Bristol demo in July 2012. Curtis added that the bomb could have killed not only so-called "antifascists", but also police officers when the terrorists’ car, impounded for not having insurance, was being driven to the station.

Some detest the EDL. That’s their right. We were in Dewsbury peacefully exercising our democratic right to protest not against Muslims but against Sharia and Jihad. These are in the news as seldom before, with a boy beaten by Palestinian "modesty police" for an "un-Islamic" hairstyle and Saudi Arabia’s first campaign (right) against the entrenched problem – justifiable by Sharia – of domestic violence.

The Dewsbury Six might style themselves warriors with their nail-bomb-carrying rocket, but in reality they are pawns near the bottom of the Jihadist food-chain. Their puppet-masters intended the atrocity to turn public opinion against Muslims so as to make younger co-religionists feel categorised and alienated, and therefore easier to radicalise.

As Henry Kissinger points out in Diplomacy, a government needs to defeat terrorists every time, while terrorists only need to get successful once. It is reassuring to know that 7/7-sized terror plots are being foiled every year, but the BBC asks a disturbing question about the Dewsbury bomb-plot: did police miss it?

Gerry Dorrian
300 words

Resources

Speeches from the Bristol 2012 rally Tony Curtis' is the second clip down. He speaks on the indiscriminatory effect of the Dewsbury bomb from 2:25-3:00

Steve Wright in the Afternoon, 30/4/13 news-clip featuring community leader on indiscriminatory effect of bomb, 2:01:30-2:02:14 - listen again until 6 May 2013

Terrorism plot size of 7/7 attacks 'foiled every year' - bbc.co.uk 21/4/13

EDL bomb plot: did the police miss it? - bbc.co.uk 30/4/13