Regards, Ivan
Posted on 07/02/2004 4:57:16 PM PDT by MadIvan
The Anglo-Spanish Brains nursery and primary school looked an unlikely al-Qa'eda target yesterday, yet Spanish police said it had been marked for destruction by the terrorist cell responsible for the Madrid commuter train atrocity.
Only the squad's collective suicide as police closed in may have prevented an outrage at Brains. Thousands of children attend British schools throughout Europe but the Foreign Office said yesterday its advice for pupils and parents had not changed.
Yesterday, a few children were running around the elaborate climbing frame and play house in the sand-filled courtyard at Brains. The building offers a pathetically soft target. Brains, which teaches half its classes in English, is in the smart Madrid suburb of La Moraleja. The area is a wealthy cluster of large homes, well served by private schools and expensive shops. Residents include several Real Madrid footballers and David Beckham looked for a house there when he arrived last year.
In documents delivered to parliament on Wednesday Spanish investigators said the names of Brains, a Jewish children's camp and a Jewish Hotel were found among papers at a flat used by the terrorists who bombed four commuter trains in Madrid on March 11, killing 190 people.
There are several schools on the same street as Brains. Summer term ended last week but the school stays open throughout July as a service to its busy parents. During term time the street is choked twice a day with school buses and parents dropping off their children.
The investigators described Brains as a "British nursery school", which is slightly misleading. It is one of a new wave of bilingual Spanish-run schools popular among wealthy Madrilenos.
Children are taught in English only from 18 months to five years old and then in Spanish and English after that. Nearly all Brains's pupils are Spanish.
The British embassy in Madrid has not issued any warnings to expatriates.
"It's nothing to do with living in Britain or in Madrid," said Izabella Hearn, 52, a writer of English textbooks for Spanish children, whose three children all attended a British school in Madrid. "It's the times we live in."
According to the police report, the train explosions were part of a planned series of attacks that might have culminated in an explosion at the wedding of Crown Prince Felipe two months ago.
Parliament is to open an investigation of the attacks and their aftermath. The Socialists, who won a general election three days afterwards, accuse their predecessors, the conservative Popular Party, of failing to take appreciate the al-Qa'eda threat.
For two days after the attacks, Popular Party ministers blamed Basque terrorists. Their opponents say this was a calculated attempt to misinform the public, who were largely opposed to Spain's decision to send 1,300 troops to Iraq. The Popular Party was swept from power, with many voters blaming it for provoking the Madrid bombings.
Regards, Ivan
Ping!
I don't know why this columnist calls this target "unlikely." These terrorists have a long history of killing children.
That's what "terror" means. The more horrible and inhuman, the better.
But then there is no connection at all between al qaeda, iraq, and other terror groups.......
We need to kill them faster than they can reproduce.
Tony Blair stands shoulder to shoulder on the path of good.
The people he commands follow him in that path.
We will not be shaken from the path of truth.
Evil will loose.
Good will see through.
God bless those on the side of good.
Blowing up little school children. 9/11 had child victims, but they weren't the focus. I suppose we have Bush to thank for the fact it hasn't happened here. Yet.
Why do these nutters so love to kill children? The Palestinians love killing children...including their own,too.
I have no clue, so I can not do anything but offer an opinion, and say that evil is a mystery, no one can really understand it. What these terrorists do understand, however, is multiple gun shot wounds. Terrorists need to be filled with them.
I concure with the last 2/3s of your post.Since they want to die,I think we should help them. :-)
HOLY COW...
These animals need to be stopped...
That is just scary!
I remember one of the earliest Palestinian raids involved a man who entered an Israeli home, stole a baby, and knocked its brains out on a rock as he was being pursued.
No milk of human kindness in these people. It amazes me that the peaceniks cozy up to them as they do.
Amen to that.
:-)
The woman lost her husband and her children that day.
I have family living in Madrid, whose children attend English schools. This is worrying.
Why do these nutters so love to kiil children?
Because children are easy targets. Remember there is nothing more gutless on the face of this Earth than a terrorist.
Maybe that is why I jump for joy, when we send them on their merry way to Hell.
That's what terrorism is all about, right? And this is why these monsters should be shown no mercy whatsoever. Only a fool would negotiate with a rabid animal. Only the leftists fail to understand this (for their own reasons, to be sure). At any rate, let's hope that the adults will remain in charge in the USA after the November elections, and that the European nations come to their senses before it's too late.
The fact that they are evil might have something to do with it...
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