Huge explosion in Oslo

[stickdog99]

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/new ... 368917.cms

It took police SWAT units more than an hour to reach the camp, on Utoya Island, after reports of the shooting came in. Officers had to drive to the shore across from the site of the shooting attack and use boats to get to the island. A police helicopter was unable to get off the ground; news crews that reached the island by air could only watch as the gunman continued the massacre.

Anne Holt, Norway's former justice minister, told the BBC: "That makes him a person that killed one person every minute. If the police had actually been there just a half an hour earlier, then 30 young lives would have been saved."

[StarmanSkye]

Quoting from the Desk of Micheal Presley:

" I myself have indicated that continued violence is what we can likely expect, but to say so is simply recognizing the world for what it is, and what it is becoming — a collection of individuals forming groups with no clear cultural-social-political homogeneity or bond. And that is the most anyone here has ever stated.

Perhaps the greatest contribution of Western civilization to our present well-being is democratic institutions that allow for peaceful political expression. Clearly political action cannot be grounded upon violence. It is, instead, the anarchist, the anti-political nihilist who champions civil discord, and who then justifies his actions in the name of revolutionary progress. The Brussels Journal and its writers exist within and argue for our continued civilized Western political tradition. To attempt to associate the Journal and its contributors with anarchic criminals is despicable."

What utter tripe. Completely lacking in anything more than a superficial grasp of contemporary history, constrained to a narrow view of european and western political institutions self-evidently priveleged as the pinnacle of 'civilized' achievement. NO awareness at all of the centuries of western capitalist exploitation, espionage, intrigue, neocolonial conquest, cultrual subversion, neoliberal coercion, military exploits, etc.

IOW, enormously banal as from a cheerleader's program. Goes to show how deeply the global elite's program has been uncritically internalized.

From what I gather, it provides a sympathetic framework by which to validate Breviak's political philosophy.

[stickdog99]

http://www.upi.com/Top_News/World-News/ ... 311663600/

Norway's version of the FBI, the Police Security Service, was also questioned after the Norwegian daily Verdens Gang reported late Monday the service had put Breivik on a watch list in March but didn't investigate further after Breivik made a suspicious purchase of chemical fertilizer from a Polish company.

Janne Kristiansen, the chief of Norway's police security service, told the government-owned Norwegian Broadcasting Corp. the purchase had set off an alert, but since the transaction was legal, security police had no reason to investigate further.

[Peachtree Pam]

Here is more fuel for the fire in the discussion of the late arrival of police

Hero of Utoya island: German holidaymaker saved 20 youngsters from massacre using rented boat


http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... ivik.html#

German tourist Marcel Gleffe has been hailed a hero after reports emerged detailing how he rescued 20 teenagers from the horror shooting in Norway.

Gleffe was preparing to visit the island with his family when Anders Behring Breivik opened fire of the youngsters at the campsite.

Gleffe told German magazine Der Spiegel that many of the teenagers initially feared he was Breivik's accomplace: 'They were everywhere in the water. I threw lifejackets with a rope attached to them and pulled them aboard, they were all screaming and crying.

'Some of them were shouting, 'Keep away... Don't come any closer'. Others were even asking, "Are you going to kill us?".'

Gleffe revealed how he used his initiative after recognising the tragedy that was unfolding within miles of where he and his family were staying.

He said: 'I just did it on instinct. You don't get scared in a situation like that, you just do what it takes.

'I know the difference between fireworks and gunfire. I knew what it was about, and that it wasn't just nonsense.

'I recognised the sound of the automatic weapon straight away.

'Then I saw two youths who swam away from the island. Then smoke grenades came and several bursts from the automatic weapon.


'I saw through the binoculars that there were more people in the water.'

Gleffe returned to the water no fewer than four times before he was instructed to stop by the police amidst fears for his safety.

'I took between four and five trips. After that the police asked me to stop.

'The youths were good. They supported each other and were organised, and said who needed first aid and who had to be taken into the boat first.

'They were happy to get help, but they were unsure whom they could trust,' he told the local Dagbladet newspaper.

A minute's silence was held in Norway at noon today in honour of those killed in Friday's bombing and massacre.

More than 90 people were wounded in the attacks, and others remain missing at the scenes of each atrocity, together the worst attack on Norwegian soil since the Second World War.

Breivik appeared before a court today and had requested an open hearing for his first appearance so that he can explain his atrocities to the public. But he was denied the request.

Yesterday thousands gathered at Oslo cathedral for a memorial service dedicated to those killed and injured in the attacks.

Throughout the 90-minute service most of those assembled outside the cathedral stood with their heads bowed in silence.

[stickdog99]

US Diplomatic Assessment of Norway

3. (C) Norwegian society values dialogue above all. Talk, even without any expectation of results, is seen as valuable. Anyone who draws a line and refuses to talk to an opposing party is seen as a radical unilateralist. Conversely, Norwegians are extremely opposed to the use of military force to achieve goals, no matter how laudable.

4. (C) Compounding this aversion to force, Norwegians do not generally see any threats. For example, they do not see a danger from terrorism. (This attitude prevails in the MFA and other elites, despite FM Stoere´s hotel being attacked by suicide bombers in Kabul.) This societal attitude was demonstrated by Norway´s first terrorist case. Despite shooting at Oslo´s synagogue, planning to behead the Israeli ambassador and to attack the Israeli and U.S. embassies, the accused was convicted only of grave vandalism (although his strict sentence showed some understanding of the severity of the charges). ...

10. (C) This shift was so dramatic that a 2006 cartoon in a major newspaper depicted the PM of Israel as a concentration camp guard. During the 2006 war in Lebanon prominent author Jostein Gaarder made a statement saying ""I refuse to recognize the state of Israel"" and characterized Judaism as ""an archaic national and warlike religion."" (See septel and ref B for a detailed discussion of anti-Semitism in Norway.) By 2007, FM Stoere decided to recognize the Palestinian Unity Government, which included Hamas Ministers. Hamas´ vow to destroy Israel was ignored or characterized as only rhetoric by the Norwegians. Norway became the leading dissenter to international norms (only joined by Switzerland), willing to overlook Hamas´ stated aims in pursuit of dialogue at all costs. At this point, some Israeli officials began to characterize Norway as the most anti-Israel state in Europe.

(Note: Although the GON would deny it, there are clear signs that contacts with Hamas go beyond a tactical desire for dialogue to a level of sympathy for Hamas positions. The FM once told DCM for example that one could not expect Hamas to recognize Israel without knowing which borders Israel will have. While the FM expresses some sympathy for Hamas´ positions only in unguarded moments, other prominent Norwegians go further. End Note.)

11. (C) Norway´s growing minority population also plays a role in hardening public attitude toward Israel. The primary minority groups in Norway (25% of Oslo´s population) are Muslim and stem from Pakistan, Iraq, Somalia, and Afghanistan. They are interested in Middle East politics and not surprisingly very critical of Israel. (See reftel A.) ""Traditional"" Norwegians are independently quite critical of Israel as discussed above, but it is likely that this viewpoint will be re-enforced by the growing minority groups in Norway. ...

13. (C) Since the Gaza war, the question of whether anti-Semitism is on the increase became the subject of an intense public debate. Much of the debate centers on defining when comments by public figures are or are not anti-Semitic. Press coverage and public opinion of the Gaza war was overwhelmingly, and at times vehemently, anti-Israeli and pro-Palestinian (viewing Israeli tactics as brutal and Palestinians as innocent victims). Therefore the question of anti-Semitism has often been phrased in terms of when criticism of Israel crosses the line into anti-Semitism. (See septel for a detailed discussion of the strong comments that have been made by leading Norwegian politicians questioning the ability of Jewish members of the Obama government to give unbiased advice and outlining the sense of threat felt by the Norwegian Jewish community.)

14. (C) On the official level, Hamas´ rocket attacks against Israel received criticisms, but the clear focus of Norwegian diplomacy encouraged Israel to be restrained and to maintain dialogue. While FM Stoere has been careful to criticize both parties, Norway clearly places most of the blame for the conflict on Israel´s policies.

Israel´s Reaction
-----------------

15. (C) The Israel Government has chosen, according to an Embassy official, to take a very low key approach to Norway´s negative views towards Israel. They see no point in openly pressing the government. With GON Ministers and Vice Ministers having a track record of meeting with Hamas, calling for boycotts of Israel, and showing up at violent anti-Israeli riots, the Israel Embassy holds out very little hope that the current GON can ever act moderately towards Israel.

[stickdog99]

http://www.theblogismine.com/2011/07/25 ... -30-lives/

German tourist Marcel Gleffe and his family had been hoping for a week of relaxation at a Norwegian campground. But when gunfire started on an island across the water, Gleffe and several others raced to their boats and took to the water immediately after hearing the shots and seeing plumes of smoke on the horizon. Marcel stated: “It goes without saying.” ...

Unless, of course, you are a cop.

“Then smoke grenades came and several bursts from the automatic weapon. I saw through the binoculars that there were more people in the water.”

Smoke grenades? So the guy smuggled smoke grenades across the ferry as well?

http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/309531

The Telegraph reports Glaffe said, "Cooperation with the police and rescue crews afterwards was very good, but it all came too late. The first time I was out I was all alone."

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world ... 19894.html

Campers rescued 150 youngsters from lake

A party of campers emerged as heroes of the Norwegian massacre yesterday, when they told how they rescued more than 150 panic-stricken adolescents from the Tyrifjord lake as they struggled to escape the bloodbath on Utoya island.

While the gunman was still shooting, campers and caravanners at Utvika, on the mainland 600 yards across the water from Utoya, manned hired rowing boats and dinghies to pluck scores of terrified young people from the water and bring them to safety. ...

The campers' rescue was mounted hours before police arrived and while the gunman was stalking the island with automatic weapons. Mr Gleffe said he saw the attacker through his telescope.

http://www.spiegel.de/international/eur ... 87,00.html

The jetty is just 200 meters from where their RV was parked. Several boats are tied up there and the island is just 600 meters across the water. It's easy to see the rocks on the island's shore and the ferry bobbing in the water.

When they arrived at the jetty, the Gleffes could see a man fishing a girl out of the water, she must have been 16 or 17 years old, and she was clad only in her underwear. Immediately behind her was another girl, screaming as she swam. "She was yelling 'help, help,' she screamed 'shooting!' and that we should call the police, Heidrun says.

The family immediately jumped into action, as if by remote control, not wanting to lose a second. Heidrun wrapped the girl who had reached the shore into a blanket and brought her to their RV. She was freezing and in shock.

"In such a situation, you don't think at all," her son Marcel says. (Unless you are a cop, of course, in which case you take 17 minutes to ""prepare yourselves".) He took off and grabbed the key for the small red boat that they had rented for the week and quickly got the motor running. "I immediately suspected that there was a connection to the attack in Oslo," he says. ...

In total, the campers at Utvika managed to pull 150 people out of the water. "Still, many of them feel guilty," says psychiatrist Kirsti Oscarson. "They think only of the people they had to leave behind because they didn't fit in the boat and not about the ones whose lives they saved." Her job now is to reassure them that their thoughts in such a situation are completely normal, Oscarson says.

[MacCruiskeen]

Stickdog, thanks very much for sticking with the delayed response so persistently, despite vk's shameful and timewasting one-line disruption efforts, not to mention barracuda's Dorian-Grayish complaints of being "bored" and his stern headmasterly avowals that this is "not a productive line of inquiry".

Now there's this, from the Telegraph's rolling live coverage of the aftermath, on July 24th:

17.24 Jon Snow from Channel 4 News asks why police knew the killer's name by the time they had arrived on the island.

"...he surrendered the moment police called his name 3 minutes after they arrived. What we don't know is how the police knew the terrorist's name before they arrested him."


http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldne ... erage.html

(Jon Snow's message: https://twitter.com/#!/jonsnowC4/status ... 9032085504)

So the nameless hotshots of the Elite Specialist Anti-Terror Delta Force took 90 minutes to arrive at the scene of an ongoing massacre (despite the Prime Minister already having announced to journalists by 17:16 that the situation on the island was "very serious") and then they greeted the killer by name. Upon which, he stopped being a killer, instantly.

Was he greeted formally or informally, one wonders. Was it "Yo, Andy, ma maaan!" or "Mister Berwick, I presume?" or "Right, Breivik, you can stop now."? At any rate, as soon as the elite fellows greeted him (by name), Anders B. Breivik stopped slaughtering children instantly and was taken into police custody without the slightest struggle or the least bit of violence on either side.

One is surely entitled to wonder how the elite Delta Force chaps knew the killer's name at all, so very quickly.

Perhaps, just possibly, this was in fact a prime example of the kind of "elite" networked complicity with far-right sentiment (and action) that barracuda suggested we'd all do better to look into, rather than bothering our little heads with media reports, timelines, police response times, and "boring" stuff like that.

[stickdog99]

http://www.hs.fi/ulkomaat/artikkeli/San ... 5268014839

Hege Dalen and her partner, Toril Hansen were Utöyan dinner on the opposite shore of the campsite, when they began to hear gunfire and screaming on the island.

"The island floated ruudinhajua. Then the awful screaming. We saw how the young people ran in panic into the lake," says Dale HS in an interview.

The couple immediately took action and pushed the boat into Lake Tyrifjorden. ...

Dale Hansen, and drove the boat to the island, picked up from the water shock in the young and wounded, and transported them to the opposite shore to the mainland. Between the bullets hit the right beside the boat.

Since not all fit at once aboard, they returned to the island four times in the foreground.

They were able to rescue 40 young people from the clutches of the killer.

So a German tourist and lesbian couple made 4 boat trips apiece while the cops hung around the shore and "prepared themselves." Are all of you police apologists ashamed of yourselves yet, or do I need to keep piling it on?

[stickdog99]

http://news.yahoo.com/norway-rescuer-sh ... 20518.html

Otto Loevik had to decide who to pick up on his boat and who to leave behind as he came under fire trying to rescue teenagers fleeing a massacre in which 86 were killed by a far-right Norwegian gunman.

"He remembers the faces of the youths he left behind," Loevik's wife, Wenche, told Reuters.

He rescued some 40 to 50 terrified youths fleeing Anders Behring Breivik's killing spree on Utoeya island. He came under fire himself and saw the bodies of dead youths floating in the water, his wife said.

"He told me: 'I had to chose who to pick up on the boat and who to leave behind. Who do you choose?'," Wenche Loevik said. ...

Speaking on Sunday outside the family's tent, a stone's throw from Tyrifjorden lake with Utoeya island visible a few hundred metres away, Wenche Loevik said people on shore brought jumpers, blankets, anything to bring warmth or comfort.

"Maybe 200 to 300 children arrived at the camp," she said. "Most of them were terrified when they saw us. They did not know whether they could trust us. They were crying, trembling, hysterical."

[stickdog99]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... sland.html

A man who used his boat to rescue children at the Norwegian summer camp has told how he desperately tried get their attention by waving but soon realised many of them were dead. Kasper Ilaug had been sitting in his cabin on Norway's Storoya Island when a friend contacted him to say that something terrible had happened following the bomb blast in Oslo and that he must use a nearby boat to help rescue people from Utoeya. 'I thought he was joking with me,' he said.

But determined to do what he could, he grabbed his iPad, mobile and put on a bright yellow jacket with a red helmet and ran down to and 18ft fishing boat before heading off in the direction of Utoeya island, north west of Oslo. Within minutes he had reached the shore and spotted a number of children hiding behind the rocks and crouching behind trees.

'We saw some youngsters laying there and waving to us. They were terrified,' he said. Most of them, dressed in nothing but bathing suits, were shivering from the cold and quickly clambered into the boat.

'I then got this text message from one of my friends that said there's a lunatic out there shooting people,' he told CNN news.

Making three trips in total, at one point he spotted a group of youngsters behind some rocks. 'I tried to wave to them and to get their attention, but I didn't get a reponse. I thought maybe they are still in shock or laying behind that rock for shelter.'

However he soon realised they had been killed by the suspected gunman Anders Breivik, 32, who had been on a rampage, calling over his victims before opening fire on them.

'I think I made three trips, they were so grateful. One girl started crying. We're just 4.7 million people. Nothing much happens here. Even in catastrophic situation like this, we keep calm. I'm just an ordinary Norwegian people. I expect that other Norwegians would do the same thing for me in a similar situation.'

[tazmic]

Gleffe returned to the water no fewer than four times before he was instructed to stop by the police amidst fears for his safety.

'I took between four and five trips. After that the police asked me to stop.'

And then the police took over, right?

(I mean, I would expect them to put themselves in harms way. Isn't that their job?) But no, bloody health and saftey at work.

Mac, from the last page:

"Police sources said there had been much internal police debate over whether the first responders should have approached the island without waiting for the Oslo force."

Sounds like the cops were under orders to wait for the 'special' team.

[8bitagent]

Was he greeted formally or informally, one wonders. Was it "Yo, Andy, ma maaan!" or "Mister Berwick, I presume?" or "Right, Breivik, you can stop now."? At any rate, as soon as the elite fellows greeted him (by name), Anders B. Breivik stopped slaughtering children instantly and was taken into police custody without the slightest struggle or the least bit of violence on either side.

Sergeant Shaw.

Sergeant Raymond Shaw.

Raymond Prentiss Shaw?

... Listen.

[8bitagent]

So a German tourist and lesbian couple made 4 boat trips apiece while the cops hung around the shore and "prepared themselves." Are all of you police apologists ashamed of yourselves yet, or do I need to keep piling it on?

It's shameful, the contrast of true heroes vs ineptitude or whatever it is. Hundreds more would be dead without vigilant citizens. I read he actually had not ran out of ammo...strange he'd just give up and there was no firefight. Maybe like the Joker in The Dark Knight or John Doe in Se7en, he wanted to be caught alive.

[Pierre d'Achoppement]

Yeah he said so in his manifesto 8bit, wanted to be caught alive to continue the propaganda phase from prison, that's why he surrendered without a fight. At least that's the story/explanation!

edit: just a reminder of that previous record shooting spree by one individual (35) on another island (Tasmania):

[stickdog99]

Doesn't it occur to you that the existence of all these separate and different timelines means that no one is yet certain enough of the chronology of events for these exercises to have any meaning? But feel free to mix and match them, or ignore the ones which don't conform to your made up mind on the matter.

Here's the first thing that occurs to me. Well over a hundred kids texted their friends to call 911 within minutes of the first shot. There were 600 to 700 kids on the island. They were not all in fear of their lives at the exact same instant. A lone gunman cannot corner 700 people at once. How can you deny this? What makes you want to deny this?

Here's the second thing that occurs to me. Some people managed to get through to 911. Dozens of 911 operators did not simply ignore dozens of 911 calls about the same shooting spree for 20 minutes as the police and media would have everyone believe. How can you deny this? What makes you want to deny this?

Here's the third thing that occurs to me. The island was 600 meters from a campground where campers were actively rescuing dozens of kids trip after trip. One guy says he made 4 trips all the way to the other shore to rescue these kids. Yet the local police sit around for around 30 minutes and Contingency Platoon for at least 10 minutes claiming they can not find a boat while all these civilian boats are going back and forth multiple times doing their fucking jobs for them.

In the midst of all this, we have about a half dozen RIers defending the cops for letting more kids die and pretending the cops' excuses for taking 78 minutes to respond are perfectly reasonable. I am seriously wondering if we are on the same planet here.