Recently Senator Joseph Lieberman called on Google's YouTube to remove videos produced by al-Qaeda and other terrorist groups, showing attacks on U.S. soldiers and civilians. YouTube removed some videos, but refused to remove others, citing "free speech."
You can read about that here.
Today we see YouTube being used by al-Qaeda supporters for the very same purpose, which is to promote the Jihadists agenda and encourage attacks against "westerners".
Headlines soared about a new video of al-Qaeda calling for “biological, chemical and nuclear weapons to attack the West", yet intelligence agencies soon dismissed those stories because the video was not from al-Qaeda, it was produced by Jihadist wannabe
All four videos are much of the same and originally the word of these videos that were to be released caused the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation to send bulletins to 18,000 law enforcement agencies across the country as a precautionary measure.
Both the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security asserted that they had no specific evidence of an imminent threat.
ABC spoke to Ben Venzke who is the CEO of IntelCenter who said, "Supporter videos are made by fans or supporters who may not have ever had any contact with a real terrorist. These videos almost always are comprised of old video footage that is edited together to make a new video."
He explicitly states that these videos are not an official al-Qaeda video and adds, "Considering them so would be the equivalent of considering a 10-year-old's homemade fan video of his favorite sports team to be an official team message."
After watching the videos myself it seems his analysis is spot on. Perhaps not a ten year old, but definitely an al-Qaeda wannabe.
The chatter about the release of this video was given credence to begin with because there have been four releases of Bin Laden videos and/or audio messages this year and this comes on the heels of the last two.
Word of al-Qeada videos are usually released via private message boards and affiliated public sites and many different anti-terror organizations monitor these sites to gather intelligence of what al-Qaeda supporters are planning, what is being talked about and because the al-Qaeda network includes using those sites as a way to spread information to their supporters.
As FBI director Robert Mueller puts it, "there is a difference between al Qaeda's ability to communicate internally and al Qaeda's ability to post a message on the Internet. As we all know, the Internet is so broad. The access is absolutely open that just about anybody can post material on the Internet."
al-Qaeda and their supporters use of the Internet has been known for quite some time now, we have seen bomb making guides, guides posted online to train people on "How to Kidnap Americans", as well guides on how to use popular US web forums to foster anti-war sentiment.
"Raiding American Forums is Among the Most Important Means of Obtaining Victory in the Fierce Media War… and of Influencing the Views of the Weak-Minded American"
They understand that by using the media and Internet to spread their propaganda that they can influence people to think exactly what they want them to think. Our media knows this and continues to work with them.
If you doubt this, than try to explain CNN's use of a video that they admit they received from terrorists to be shown to the American people and CNN's complicity by airing that video exactly as instructed by those same terrorists, then to make matters worse, CNN then offered that sniper video on their on demand channel.
To top it off, the majority of these websites that offer these guides, videos and training manuals are hosted in the US and Canada.
The study said Islamic Jihad operates 15 websites in Arabic and English, hosted by both US and Canadian companies. Hamas operates 20 websites in eight languages, a portion of which are based in the US and Canada, while Hezbollah operates 20 websites, also hosted by companies in the US and Canada.
These findings were presented in Berlin to a closed audience of high-ranking NATO representatives in February.
Many have been shut down, but the nature of the Internet allows for them to spring right back up within minutes.
This now brings us full circle back to the question of whether al-Qeada videos or those of al-Qaeda supporters encouraging nuclear, WMD attacks upon westerners, should be considered "free speech" and offered on YouTube as these latest four have been allowed to be?
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