February 1, 2008

Another Al-Qaeda operative Killed?  How do you know?

According to unnamed 'Western officials' someone by the name of Abu Laith al-Libi a supposed top Al-Qaeda commander has been killed, presumably by a predator missile fired into a compound somewhere in the northwest frontier of Pakistan. 

Really?  How exactly do they know this?  Has anyone examined the bodies of those killed?  Yeah, according to The Al-Fajr Information Centre website al-Libi was killed.  But how do they know?  Absent independent verification, no one really knows who gets killed in these air strikes.  The innocent and the guilty tend to get blown up when bombs are dropped on them.  It's just the nature of business in the Middle East.

The Pakistani government sure isn't saying if al-libi was killed.  They just don't know.  According to  Dawn, Pakistan's premier newspaper says this about the attack:  

 'The bodies from a missile strike that killed several militants have been buried and it was impossible to confirm or refute if a top Al-Qaeda operative was among them, the army said Friday. The Al-Fajr Information Centre website reported Thursday that Al-Qaeda commander Abu Laith al-Libi was killed in Pakistan, and a western official said there were “very strong indications” that he had been slain. “Our position is that who fired, who ordered, who removed the bodies etc is not known to us,” chief Pakistani military spokesman Major General Athar Abbas told AFP. “We cannot negate nor confirm because the moment it happened, they removed the bodies and buried them. So, how would anybody confirm who got killed?” Abbas added, without elaborating on who buried the bodies. A Pakistani interior ministry spokesman said late Thursday that he had “no information” on the reported death of the Libyan militant. However, intelligence sources said Friday they believed al-Libi was killed in a US missile strike on his hideout in the country's tribal belt. “Al-Libi was there at the time of the strike. No one survived, we believe he was killed,” one of the intelligence officials, based in Miranshah, told Dawn.'

Nobody has the faintest idea if al-Libi is dead or alive, but you can count on the Western intelligence "experts" to tell us anyway.  Where exactly, are thy getting their information?