PART 2
When people heard about the public police killing of a suspected terrorist, they assumed that the victim had to be black and Muslim. A self-proclaimed eyewitness quickly came forward to say that the targeted man was wearing a “puffy jacket with wires hanging out” and had been chased by police into the Stockwell Subway station, a chase that sounded no more than a few minutes. Police claimed that the CCTV cameras were not operating. Unfortunately for them, this time they were.
There was shock as the news dribbled out that the victim had been a young white man who had been followed by elite units for half an hour, allegedly mistaking him for a North African. Police tried to smear him: he was an illegal; he looked suspicious. One after another, they turned out to be lies. A whistleblower released a photo of the dead De Menezes; he had been wearing a light denim jacket — not any “puffy jacket” with wires. She was quickly fired and harassed. The CCTVs showed him strolling leisurely into the subway; it had been the police leaping over barriers, not de Menezes. The police version was that an interminable number of miscommunications had occurred leading to the deadly mistake. If one believed that the Gold Team had been as incompetent as they claimed, the person in charge would have faced a career disaster. Instead, Cressida Dick was promoted to Deputy Assistant Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police; her associate was also rewarded with a promotion. No one was to be held accountable in any way for Jean Charles’ murder.
Slowly, over a period of years, the police lies were exposed despite their refusal to give their information to the IPCC. The truth came out as easily as the pulling of police teeth, painfully with small parts of the story being extracted with the various official inquiries. The most dramatic would be the 2008 inquest into Jean Charles de Menezes’ death, the first time witnesses would be heard.
Meanwhile, what had happened to the bodies of the accused?
By August, people started to ask questions about what had happened to the bodies of the accused. None of the families had been allowed to identify them; they had not even been given the bodies for burial. Khan’s family, suspicious, asked for an independent autopsy to be performed; it was not done. On August 24th, when the corpses would have been over six weeks old, The Guardian reported that the Metropolitan police claimed that they were holding the bodies of the accused to reassemble their body parts to analyse their positions on the bombs’ detonations. It would not be until the 2010 Hallett inquest that the shocking details would come out.
Of the accused, only Tanweer and Hussain had family burials. In both cases, the burials were accompanied by security personnel.
- At the end of October 2005, Tanweer’s body was taken to Pakistan for interment in a family grave; security personnel accompanied the body to Pakistan and guarded the site for days after the interment. The family never saw the remains.
- Six police oversaw the funeral of Hasib Hussain, “ensuring the service remained private.”
The Khan Tape (Sept. 1, 2005)British newspapers had been slowly coming out with stories that questioned whether the accused men thought they were going to die. All of the men had round-trip tickets and they had paid for their cars to be parked for the day. There were no suicide notes and their families all expected them home. And then there was the question of motive: there was none. The men were known to be secular and even apolitical. Khan and Tanweer were both known to be particularly patriotic; all were peace-loving.
Khan’s wife Hasina Patel said she had never heard “Sid” criticize the actions of the British government or its role in world events. In excerpts from an interview with Sky news, Patel said “… I kept thinking that something was wrong, I don’t know, that maybe it was a set up, … I didn’t even have any inkling towards his views even going in that direction … I could never have imagined in my wildest dreams, never.” (Sky, 2007)
On September 1st a short video surfaced showing Khan dressed up in red Palestinian-like scarf used as a head bandana. A crude, hand-woven rug was in the background and he was stabbing the air with a pen, complaining about British crimes towards Muslims. There was no mention of any action that would be taken. The tape, which included an edited-in clip of Al Qaeda’s al Zwahiri, was not shown in its entirety.
It was obvious that at least in some sections, Khan’s words did not match his lip movements. His friends noticed that judging by Khan’s appearance, the tape had to have been made in 2004, the year Khan and Tanweer were taped by police. They also claimed that the tape didn’t sound like Khan and was a fraud.
The government responsesThe government claimed that the four accused had worked alone, with Khan as the “ringleader”, and that the tape showed that Khan’s motive was to martyr himself for Islam. They also claimed that a tape of Tanweer existed. Their claims that the accused worked alone begged the question of who released the tape of Khan, how they knew of Tanweer’s tape and who controlled it.
The following May, two government reports confirmed their official version of the July 7th bombings and recommend a higher security budget.
The Tanweer tape (July 6, 2006)On July 5, 2006, a U.S. broadcaster with a reputation for security links claimed that a tape of Shezad Tanweer was expected to be shown the next day on Al Jazeera.
On July 6, 2006, the eve of the anniversary of the London bombings, al Jazeera showed part of a video of Tanweer. The shots, also taken in 2004, are strikingly similar to the one released the previous year of “Sid” Khan; Tanweer is wearing the identical Palestinian-like red scarf around his head, with the identical background rug and making the same strange stabbing movements with a pen. The video includes edited-in clips of the al Qaeda leader al Zwahiri as well as a self-proclaimed American member of al Qaeda, Adam Gadahn. (While Gadahn is also known to the FBI as “Abu Suhayb Al-Amriki, Abu Suhayb, Yihya Majadin Adams and Yayah”, he was born Adam Pearlman.) There were also silly shots meant to appear ominous such as a disembodied hand on maps, etc. Again, words do not match the lip movements. Shezad Tanweer’s family has not publicly commented on it.
Both the Khan and Tanweer tapes were released at politically opportune times for the British government. So while the tapes supposedly show Khan and Tanweer’s support for Al Qaeda, and perhaps Palestinians, the tapes’ origins and releases both implicate British security services.
The 2008 De Menezes’ inquestThe De Menezes’ family had kept up their pressure on the government for an inquest into their son’s murder; finally, in September, 2008, the inquest opened. The purpose of this inquest, presided over by Coroner Sir Michael Wright, was to allow jurors to decide whether or not the police had killed Jean Charles de Menezes lawfully. Previous inquests had established that no one, including DSO Cressida Dick, would be held personally responsible for Jean Charles’ death.
Sir Ian Blair, who had been hanging onto his job as Police Commissioner, toughing out troubling challenges to his integrity on this issue, finally quit at the start of that inquiry. He must have figured that the jig would be up when certain information came out — information that included his meeting with Tony Blair to give police legal protection for a killing, police perjury, police manipulation of events around the death and tampering with police records. It would be the first time that eye witnesses to this event were allowed to testify. Over fifty agents were given identity protection for testifying and the identity-protected killers were not allowed to be either seen or photographed at the site.
Despite the profoundly shocking information that came out at this inquest, Sir Michael Wright did his best to ensure jurors gave the police a favorable ruling. His actions included:
informing jurors that they would only be allowed to return a verdict either of lawful killing or an “open” verdict: they were not permitted to rule against the police;
warning jurors that they were not to attach criminal or civil fault to responsible individuals such as DSO Cressida Dick;
giving the jury secret advice and suggesting that police perjury might have been committed for selfless motives.
The De Menezes’ inquest resultsThe jury returned an “open” verdict, much to the relief of the police. Given the evidence, they had been prepared for an “unlawful” verdict, despite the Coroner’s charge to the jury. Despite the agents’ perjury and admitted destruction of evidence, they will not face charges.
The De Menezes’ family finally gave up their fight for justice on November 23, 2009 with a settlement with the Metropolitan police for one hundred thousand pounds plus legal expenses.
The Jean Charles de Menezes inquiry exposed the government betrayal of the public through manipulation of the police, of the justice system and the media:
The media obediently played along as the facts came out. While they did report the stories that showed that de Menezes had been the real target, that police perjured themselves, and that Tony Blair had apparently played a role, each article ended with the mantra that De Menezes’ killing had merely been the result of unfortunate mistakes. The story that the most elite security teams in Britain claimed that they thought a “North European” white male was a North African after a half hour surveillance was not challenged.
The papers never asked why Jean Charles had been targeted. Could a recent job have related to the July 7th “power surges”? No one knew where he had been working. The Guardian approached that subject obliquely in December, 2008, noting that de Menezes’ friends were “terrified”; they understood that the public killing of their friend was a warning not to talk.
The 2010 Hallett Inquest into the security servicesIn May 2010, Lady Justice Hallett called for an inquest into the activities of the British security services the year prior to the July 7th bombings. The inquest, which the security services warned would “encourage terrorists,” was held in the fall of 2010; the hearings were public but there was no jury. The families of 52 of the victims were allowed to take part; the families of the accused were barred from participating, and so unable to challenge any witnesses. Lady Hallett said she might consider a future inquest to include them. Lady Justice Hallett and QC Hugo Keith controlled the proceedings.
The inquest was expected to answer questions on the timing, the location and the makeup of the bombs; instead, it raised even more questions:
Since the discovery of the “homemade explosive”, the government had claimed that the London bombs had been homemade; in fact, the traces of TATP that should have been found if they had been homemade were not identified at the blast sites;
While the government produced some new CCTV evidence, investigators noticed suspicious cuts at key parts of much of it, especially when the accused were meeting other people;
The scope of the missing CCTV evidence was staggering, with none of dozens (if not hundreds!) of CCTV cameras allegedly functioning at any of the affected subway stations until after the bombings were over;
The government’s destruction of evidence and lack of documentation made it impossible to resolve discrepancies between the government’s claims of damage and witnesses’ accounts.
The absence of autopsies and documentation of injury made it difficult to confirm eyewitness accounts that the train explosions originated under the floors.
One investigator noticed that the Metropolitan Police diagrams reconstructing the subway explosions did not match the official Home Office description of those killed and injured. Taking the Liverpool/ Aldgate explosion as an example, he noted that the Met diagram only showed a total of 43 people in the carriage while the Home Office narrative claimed that “the blast killed 8 people, including Tanweer, with 171 injured.” According to the police diagram, the two standing on either side of Tanweer survived, one with only minor injuries. The investigator noted that if the blast killed 8 of the 43, that left only 35 potentially- injured in that carriage. The implication is that the other 136 injured at that site must have been occupants of another three cars in that train with a similar occupancy. “ (Investigating the terror, 2012)
Evidence pointed to more than three damaged subway cars; Did the government reduce the number of events to correspond to the number of Muslims that volunteered for this event?
While this inquest did produce stunning information about the death counts and the state of the corpses of some accused, it specifically excluded how police came to identify the accused.
On Hasib Hussain and the No. 30 bus The inquest was shown photos which were claimed to be of Hussain’s body separated from other bodies and under a blue blanket. No one knew who had identified him, who placed him there, or who put the special blanket on him. Or if his body was, in fact, under it.
Lisa French, a witness seated no further than five seats in front of the explosion, testified that when she was getting off the bus, police discouraged her from helping a “pile” of people, indicating that they were already dead. (Addley, 2011) Could these have been the extra bodies?
At the 2010 inquest, it was discovered that another Asian youth had been sitting at the back of the top deck at the time of the explosion.
On Khan and TanweerWitnesses testified that the initial death counts at the Edgware and Aldgate sites included only commuters, not the bodies of “suicide bombers”. Police added one to each of these tallies later that day so that the accused would be included in the count. A day or two after the bombings, body parts of the accused would be located at the private, off-limit subway sites.
“Sid” Khan’s remains at Edgware: A large part of Khan’s corpse –without hands, head, or even teeth– was found on 6 am July 8th; police turned over the remains at an unspecified date, identifying it when presented to the Home Office Forensic Science Service as belonging to Mohammed Sidique Khan, with a request to confirm the identification through DNA links his parents. (Police apparently were not aware that Khan’s father had married a woman with the same name as Khan’s biological mother.) The identification was not done using DNA known to be Khan’s. (J7 blogspot: Khan)
The Edgware death count confirms what had been published. Police had identified Khan as a “suicide bomber” on Tuesday, July 12 even though police then acknowledged that Khan’s body was missing from the Edgware site. (BBC, 7,2005)
Khan’s intact ID papers were apparently planted at Edgware, Aldgate and on the bus.
Shazad Tanweer’s remains at Aldgate: On Saturday, July 9th, only a 1.8 Kg spinal fragment allegedly belonging to Tanweer was found on the train; the DNA lab work, dated July 13 to 28th, included no indication of how police had already identified the remains as belonging to Tanweer; (J7 blogspot: Tanweer)
Note that Tanweer’s identification cards – found at both Aldgate and the No. 30 bus — survived the virtually total disintegration of his body.
The damage to Khan’s and Tanweer’s bodies was not consistent with the state of the other corpses. Despite the fact that others – the dead as well as survivors — had been close to the sources of the explosions, the bodies of all other victims had remained basically intact and easily identifiable. It was ironic that the police had initially implied that the bodies of Khan and Tanweer were easy to identify and did not require the assistance of DNA analysis. Could the state of their corpses be explained as efforts to hide bullet wounds the men might have sustained at Canary Wharf?
On Germaine/”Jamal” Lindsay
Interestingly, there was reportedly no “life extinct” count at Piccadilly taken on July 7th as there had been at the other sites; there had to have been a count of the dead at some point, why did it not made it to this inquest?
According to the original police story, the identification of Lindsay required DNA analysis. Although his wife understood that this analysis had confirmed Lindsay’s participation in the events of July 7th, a BBC article on July 14th, 2005, “Fourth bomber’s name disclosed” implied that police might not have had the DNA results that Samantha Lewthwaite thought they did.
The absence of similar DNA information that was provided for Khan and Tanweer appears to be significant, particularly because police admitted that they did not possess Lindsay’s body on July 12th (Bennetto, Herbert, 2005); and that police believed that Lindsay survived July 7th (Jones, 2005) and (Bucks Herald, 2005). Were police marksmen at Canary Wharf looking only for Pakistanis?
The Hallett verdict and outcomesIn May 2011 the Hallett Inquest determined that 52 of the 56 London deaths had been “unlawful”, the fault only of the “bombers” rather than of the hours-long medical response time or a lack of diligence of the security services. Hallett refused to hold any investigation for the families of the accused.
The Hallett Inquiry ultimately demonstrated pervasive government manipulation and/or mistreatment of the evidence. On August 2, 2011 a legal challenge by victims’ families to force the British government to hold a public inquiry into the July 7 attacks was abandoned “acknowledging that the proceedings would likely be unsuccessful.”
In 2012-2013, Jamal Lindsay’s wife Samantha Lewthwaite, now remarried and the mother of three (the father of her third child, born in 2009, was not identified), is described in the media as a major terrorist living in East Africa and is reportedly hunted – to be killed on sight — by dozens of MI5 and MI6, the CIA, police from Kenya and detectives from South Africa! This hunt appears to relate to the 7/7 bombings: police claim they found “key chemicals” [sic] related to the London bombings such as “acetone and hydrogen peroxide” at a raid on her home. Does she possess information that makes such a hunt worth the cost?
The evidence of responsibility points to the British governmentThere was a history of government-run terror exercises in London, including ones that closely mirrored the London bombings’ scenario;
There was extensive evidence of police foreknowledge, including Scotland Yard’s warning to the Israeli embassy before the blasts; the police allowed the London bombings to happen;
It was only “government scientists” that knew the recipe of the “unique” hydrogen-peroxide based “explosives” that were in the Luton car, the Leeds bathtub and the “copycat” “bombs;”
The government removed, destroyed and neglected to keep important evidence; evidence shown to the public has been shown to be falsified or tampered with;
The government has refused to hold any independent, public investigation into the bombings;
The government labelling of the London bombings as “suicide bombings” (and the accused, “homegrown suicide bombers”) with no evidence that there had been suicide bombs demonstrated the agenda that allowed Tony Blair to then follow through with his “anti-terror” legislation:
As a result of the July 7th London bombings, the British government eliminated traditional civil liberties and expanded its security services.
In 2007, the July 7th Truth Campaign described the post-7/7 state of British freedoms in “Capitalising on Terror”: In less than two years the UK has descended into a police state. Taking photographs of landmarks is now classified as ‘terrorist reconnaisance’, being caught in possession of a map has been prosecuted as ‘having information likely to be useful to a terrorist’. Protesting outside the people’s Parliament is now a crime unless the state has first granted permission and you can be arrested for wearing a t-shirt a policeman doesn’t like. Your DNA and fingerprints will be taken and stored indefinitely. Everyone from young children to old age pensioners are actively being targeted under anti-terrorist legislation and this legislation is being used to suppress dissent and opposition to the government, its policies and the way it enforces them. Blair has talked of implementing private police forces and police powers have been given to thousands of non-police entities including amongst others traffic wardens, landlords and council officials. …
Recently the Archbishop of York, Dr John Sentamu, suggested that modern day Britain is comparable to Idi Amin’s regime in Uganda. Around the same time the leader of Birmingham Central Mosque, Dr Mohammed Naseem, compared life for Muslims in the UK to that of the life of Jews in Nazi Germany. In among the furore that ensued among the liberal intelligentsia, the leader of the Conservative Party, David Cameron, gently reminded everyone that the laws don’t just apply to Muslims, or terrorists, the laws apply to everyone. If you are reading this in Britain, that means you. (J7,2007)
Notes:Addley, Esther. 2011. “7/7 bus bomber jostled passengers with deadly backpack, inquest told” The Guardian. January 12. Retrieved August 25, 2012 at:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/jan/12/77-july-7-bomber-inquest?INTCMP=SRCHAhmed, Nafeez Mosaddeq. 2006. The London Bombings, London: Duckworth p103/104/274
BBC, 7/2005. Police release bus bomber images. 14 July, 2005. BBC News. retrieved July 6, 2008 at:
Http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/4683555.stmAntagonist. 2005. London 7/7: Number 30 Bus Explosion – Photos & Questions. 1 September 2005. Anything that defies my sense of reason. , retrieved July 5, 2008 at:
Http://antagonise.blogspot.com/2005/09/london-77-number-30-bus-explosion.htmlBennetto, J, Herbert, I, 2005. The suicide bomb plot hatched in Yorkshire. 13 July. The Independent. Retrieved July 9, 2008 at:
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/the-suicide-bomb-plot-hatched-in-yorkshire-498616.htmlBucks Herald, The. 2005. Aylesbury was ’30 minutes from evacuation’. Tuesday, 25 October. The Bucks Herald. Retrieved July 28, 2011 at:
http://www.bucksherald.co.uk/news/aylesbury_was_30_minutes_from_evacuation_1_600516Casbolt, J. A Message of Love to my Asian Brothers and Sisters: The true inside facts about the 7/7 London bombings, February 18, 2007. Jamescasbolt. retrieved June 26, 2008 at:
Http://www.jamescasbolt.com/bombings.htmCasciani, Dominic, 2007. Was it linked to 7/7? Wednesday, 11 July 2007. Retrieved at:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/6249118.stm 21/7
Chossudovsky, Michel. 8/8 2005. 7/7 Mock Terror Drill: What Relationship to the Real Time Terror Attacks? 8 Aug. Centre for Research on Globalisation. Retrieved June 26, 2008 at:
Http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=20050808&articleId=821Televised interview “Peter Power 7/7 Terror Rehearsal” at:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JKvkhe3rqtcChossudovsky, 8/1 2005. Chossudovsky, M, London 7/7 Terror Suspect Linked to British Intelligence? August 1, Centre for Research on Globalisation. retrieved July 7, 2008 at:
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=CHO20050801&articleId=782J7 blogspot Khan. The identification of Mohammed Sidique Khan.:J7: The July 7th Truth Campaign. Tuesday, November 30, 2010. retrieved on July 4, 2013 at:
http://77inquests.blogspot.com/2010/11/identification-of-mohammed-sidique-khan.htmlJ7 blogspot Tanweer. 7/7 Inquests: The Disintegration of Shezad Tanweer. J7: The 7/7 Inquests Blog. Monday, Nov. 8, 2010. Accessed July 28, 2011 at:
Http://77inquests.blogspot.com/2010/11/77-inquests-disintegration-of-shehzad.htmlJuly 7th Truth Campaign. Capitalising on Terror: Who is Really Destroying our freedoms? Feb. 25, 2007. Retrieved on July 3, 2012 at:
http://julyseventh.co.uk/july-7-article-capitalising-on-terror.htmlJ7 Profile: Jamal/Germaine Lindsay. J7: The July 7th Truth Campaign, 2006 retrieved July 6, 2008 at:
Http://julyseventh.co.uk/7-7-profile-germaine-lindsay.htmlJones, Sam 2005. Aylesbury house is searched in effort to find associates. Thursday, July 14. The Guardian. Retreived on July 28, 2011 at
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2005/jul/14/july7.uksecurity11Kollerstrom, Nick. 2012. Terror on the Tube. Palm Desert, California. Progressive.
McGrory, D., and Evans, M. 2005. Hunt for the master of explosives. 13 July. The Times. retrieved June 26, 2008 at:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,22989-1692033,00.htmlMitchell, P. Police Chief “Cleared” of De Menezes Killing. February 26th, 2007. Ukwatch. retrieved June 26, 2008 at:
http://www.ukwatch.net/article/police_chief_%2526quot%3Bcleared%2526quot%3B_of_de_menezes_killingMorgan, Tom and Davis, Margaret, 2008. Pathologist given false details over Menezes death, inquest told. November 5. The Independent retrieved Nov. 6, 2008 at:
Http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/pathologist-given-false-details-over-menezes-death-inquest-told-993987.htmlNorton-Taylor, R. 2005. New special forces unit tailed Brazilian. August 4. The Guardian retrieved June 26, 2008 at:
Http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2005/aug/04/july7.menezesN Z Herald, 2005. ‘Police shot bombers’ reports New Zealander. July 9, 2005. New Zealand Herald. retrieved on July 7, 2008 at
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10334992Pallister, David 2005. UK-based dissident denies link to website that carried al-Qaida claim. The Guardian. Saturday July 9. Retrieved at July 28 at:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2005/jul/09/july7.uksecurity11Percival, Jenny and agencies, 11/2008. Orders given to police who shot Jean Charles de Menezes were ‘ambiguous’ November 5. The Guardian retrieved Nov. 7, 2008 at:
Http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2008/nov/05/de-menezes-pathologist-inquestRook, Katie, 2005. A massive rush of policemen. July 7. The Globe and Mail. Retrieved on July 7, 2008 at:
Http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20050707.wcanar0707/PPVStory?URL_Article_ID=RTGAM.20050707.wcanar0707&DENIED=1Sheva, Arutz. 2005. Report: Israel Was Warned Ahead of First Blast. 7 July 2005. Propaganda Matrix. retrieved July 2, 2013:
Http://www.propagandamatrix.com/articles/july2005/070705israelwarned.htmInvestigating the terror, 2012. ” 7/7: Seven Documents that Prove that the Official Story Cannot be True”.
www.investigatingtheterror.com. June 30 . Retrieved July 4, 2013 at:
www.investigatingtheterror.com/articles/7_7__seven__documents_that_prove_the_official_story_cannot_be_true.htmShortnews, 2005. ’Suicide Bomber Neutralized’ in Canary Wharf, London. July 10, 2005. Shortnews. retrieved June 25, 2008 at:
http://www.shortnews.com/start.cfm?id=49029Sky, 2007. Full Text Of July 7 Widow’s Interview With Sky: Here is the full transcript of Hasina Patel’s interview with Julie Etchingham. Friday July 27. Sky News. retrieved April 14, 2009 at
http://news.sky.com/skynews/Home/Full-Text-Of-July-7-Widows-Interview-With-Sky/Article/20070741277315Sparrow, Andrew. 2005. “New law to stop flow of volunteers to terror camps.” Sunday July 16, Daily Telegraph. Retrieved Sept. 10, 2012 at:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1494129/New-law-to-stop-flow-of-volunteers-to-terror-camps.htmlWoods, R, Leppard, D., Smith, M. 2005. Tangled web that still leaves worrying loose ends: The arrest of Haroon Rashid Aswat sets numerous questions. July 31. The Sunday Times. retrieved June 26, 2008:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article549996.ece)
Karin Brothers is a freelance writer who was in England throughout the events related to the London bombings.