Police cordon off German hospital

[rodbarnett]

Police in Germany have increased security at a military hospital near the city of Hamburg after a warning.
City police said they had received a tip suggesting that extremists were planning a car bomb attack.

"Those potentially involved are believed to come from an Islamic, terrorist background," police said in a statement quoted by the AP news agency.

Several streets around the hospital have been sealed off and will remain so until further notice, police said.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/3357553.stm

[aquart]

1. At a hospital?

Way to go for world sympathy, guys.

[liberalhistorian]

4. They aren't out for world sympathy,

all they care about is furthering their own goals regardless of how much innocent blood they have to violently shed to do it. Even if it were a nursing home or an orphanage, they wouldn't care.

[The Stranger]

5. How do you know all of this? Do you know who is involved?

Do you know this from a three paragraph article?

People, please, pull your heads out of the matrix.

[Shadder]

9. They?

Who is "they"?

[Malva Zebrina]

12. I wondered who you were talking about--Islamic terrorists or Bush

honest--how many children did he murder when he invaded Iraq on false pretenses. I am not excusing these terrorists, but it looks to me as a case of calling the kettle black.

[Fleshdancer]

2. why Germany?

I'm not ready for the tinfoil hat, but it does seem weird that French planes and German hospitals would be the target.

[Superfly]

6. Germany has (or had) its own brand of

terrorist groups like Bader Meinhof (Red Army Faction). Not everything is Al Qaida

[htuttle]

15. Bader Meinhof?

Jeez...that's about as relevant nowdays as the Weather Underground is in the US...I really doubt it's the old Red Army Faction...Most of them are really, really old now (if not dead).

[Superfly]

17. From FAS.org...

Link

"Bombings, assassinations, kidnappings, and robberies. Targets German Government and private sector and US interests. Among the latter, attempted assassination in Belgium of NATO Commander (1979); bombing of NATO Air Force headquarters in Ramstein (1981); rocket attack of USAREUR Commander in Heidelberg (1981); and bombing of Rhein-Main Air Force Base (1985). In February 1991, the RAF fired approximately 250 assault rifle rounds at the US Embassy in Bonn, and in April the group assassinated the German Trust Agency director, Detlev Karsten Rohwedder."



Still pretty recent.

[moroni]

24. Hmmmmm..... Was there a report of a parking lot bombing

in Giessen Germany in late 1981? A very large fire extinguisher filled with explosive was detonated under a car owned by an American soldier in the military housing area in Giessen before I ETS'd. It blew car parts in all directions some 300 meters, including through the walls of the multi-family dwellings surrounding the parking lot. A couple of dozen of cars owned by soldiers living in the housing area were destroyed. I saw an Audi in the back seat of a Buick when they hauled off the vehicles. These buildings had soldiers AND their young families living in them.

It sure gives you a different perspective when YOU are the target.
Two days before my family and I left country, the German Police and military authorities arrested an individual attempting to place a bomb in one of those buildings that housed up to twenty seven families. I had just finished clearing quarters the day before and the movers were coming the next day. We were glad to go after 4 years in Germany. Loved the food, hated the terrorists.

The building to be blown up was MINE!

[ze_dscherman]

25. Left wing terrorism targeting people is inexistent nowadays in Germany

Baader-Meinhof, Rote Armee Fraktion (RAF)and their fellow groups are out of business since a long time (20 years), many members have already been pardoned. Latest bombing threats usually came from neo-nazi groups. Leftists/anarchists usually just damage some property. No one would attack an army hospital.

Anyway, this discussion is futile, since German news reported the warning came from a CIA source that claimed the Ansar-al-Islami group were behind the planned attacks and had already sneaked in suicide bombers.

German spokespersons however said they were aware of an "unspecific threat". To me it looks like just another terror scare to keep us docile. But of course, the police needs to take precautions.

[OldEurope]

18. It´s a military hospital. German troops are in Afghanistan.

The terrorists are reported as members of " Ansar el Islam", an Islamic group that is considered to have connections to Al Quaida.

[The Stranger]

3. But did they find any ALMANACS?!?!

DID THEY!?!?

[TeeYiYi]

7. :-) *lol* . . .

But seriously, the true definition of who "they" is seems pretty blurred these days.

TYY

[Fovea]

19. And that is double plus GOOD!

Because when the whole world is a blur of fear, we
are not tempted to waste the time to look carefully at anything,
lest the act of looking somehow cause it to explode.

[revcarol]

8. This has got to be Landstuhl, where OUR military casualties from Iraq

are taken. 11,000 of them so far. This is a BIG DEAL. Targeting American wounded.

Thank God the Germans aren't as inept as the administration in preventing attacks and ignoring warnings.THEY take terrorism seriously, not just fake terror alerts and money spent for show.THANK YOU, GERMANY, for protecting our men and women.

[Superfly]

10. Landstuhl is nowhere near Hamburg

look at a map.

[The Stranger]

13. No, please, don't do it!

Maps are in ALMANACS!

[OldEurope]

11. No. Landstuhl is far away from Hamburg. nt

[revcarol]

14. Oops, my bad.

However, my admiration and thanks still go to Germany, for taking terrorism seriously.

"No man is an island." But Bush wants us to go it alone.

[Superfly]

16. They have 3 decades of practice...

they're pretty good at it.

[GermanDJ]

20. CIA gave a hint

Major german news magazine "Der Spiegel" has some facts on its website (unfortunately in German): http://www.spiegel.de/politik/deutschland/0,1518,280122,00.html

- According to TV station ARD the CIA informed the German secret service that militant Islamics were/are planning an suicide attack on the military hospital in Hamburg. According to the ARD it's not clear how serious the threat is.

- On 3.30 p.m. GMT police completely cordoned off the hospital. Massive police forces and armored vans were brought to the scene, parking cars are currently being searched by police forces.

- German police says that they have received names of suspected assailants. They belong the the militant Ansar-e Islam group.

- According to a police spokesman there are currently no US soldiers being treated in this hospital. But it might be that military servicemen who were wounded in Iraq were treated there. The hospital has capacities for 305 patients. A majority of the service personnel is trained for oral and maxillofacial surgery, urology and psychiatry. Medical services are not for military personnel only, also civilians can use this facility.

- Apparently a second or alternative attack was planned against a military airport in the Rhine-Main area.

[OldEurope]

21. Update from German news:

just a fake.
No real hints, just a politician who wanted to get his name into the media.

[Kellanved]

22. seems to be the case

Background info: the Hamburg state Parliament dissolved itself today, after a long series of scandals.

It is campaigning time in Hamburg and the politicians party is unlikely to be successful ever again.

[OldEurope]

23. kind regards

from Munich to Berlin!:hi:

[Kellanved]

26. Episode 2: today it's nuclear power plants

No English story yet...

[SwellGround]

27. Those darn freedom fighters are at it again

Maybe they chose a hopital to be kinder and gentler to the victims so they would have a shorter trip to medical care.