SwiftVets.com

[SBD]

There's something more here than what is being portrayed. I tend to believe that Guiliana was never kidnapped in the first place and it was all staged for political reasons and the money.

Let's start with the group that kidnapped her. A new group that sprung up immediately following the Historic Iraqi Elections. What better way to cast doubt on the elections than to have a kidnapping.

On the day she was supposedly kidnapped, she had just called into her newspaper to let them know she was all right. Also reported is that a co-worker was speaking with Guilana when she was kidnapped and claimed to hear numerous gun shots.

Now lets move ahead to the video taped "plea for help" that the terrorist made. I am of Italian decent, so I can understand what she is saying in her plea until she repeats the entire plea in French just in case the Italian government is taken over by France I guess. Give me a break, her plea was without emotion and her idea to repeat it in French was more than obvious propaganda.

I hope someone follows the money because it did not go to Iraqi captors but instead is in the hands of Communist Terrorists.

Click Here to see the Video Plea

February 16, 2005
Italian Hostage Video Released (UPDATE)
http://mypetjawa.mu.nu/archives/067728.php

A new video has surfaced of Giuliana Sgrena. In the video she claims the only way her life will be saved is if the occupation of Iraq ends.

Sgrena pleas are heard in both Italian and French. The video also superimposes the Arabic words "Mujahadin Without Borders" on the video.

The Associated Press translates her pleas:

You must end the occupation, it's the only way we can get out of this situation...

I ask the Italian government, the Italian people struggling against the occupation, I ask my husband, 'Please, help me You must do all you can to end the occupation. I'm counting on you, you can help me'...

Show all the pictures I have taken of the Iraqis, of the children hit by the cluster bombs, of the women. I beg you. Help me, help me to demand the withdrawal of the troops, help me spare my life.

These people don't want foreigners here, nobody should come to Iraq at this time. Not even journalists. Nobody.

Thousands of people are in prison, children, the elderly, women are raped, people die because they have nothing to eat, no electricity, no water.

What is interesting about the plea is that Giuliana Sgrena was already trying to end the occupation before she was kidnapped. Further, the Mujahadin Without Borders group is previously unknown and is a different organization than the Islamic Jihad Organization that initially claimed her abduction. Moreover, her claim that the jihadis do not want foreigners in the country is simply empirically false. What the jihadis do not want is non-dhimmi infidels in the country. Foreigners who wish to fight the 'Zionist-Crusader Forces' are always welcome.

While Sgrena seems to be visibly shaken in the video, the fact that she believes exactly what the terrorists believe, namely that the US is an evil aggressor, makes it somewhat difficult to swallow that she would actually be killed. Unlike other hostages, Sgrena was in Iraq for the sole purpose of producing anti-American propaganda.

Still, the video does seem to be authentic. Our initial reaction that this possibly could be a hoax seems less plausible now. Even so, it seems unlikely that she will be killed. In any event, anti-American activist with an agenda or not, we pray for her safe return.

However, we would also remind readers that several Americans are still being held hostage in Iraq. They are: Roy Hallums, Dean Sadek, Tim Bell, and Bill Bradley.

Update: Confederate Yankee chimes in with this:

A vigorous anti-war protestor, Sgrena's video was shown just hours before Italy's Senate started voting on extending the nation's 3,000-member military mission in Iraq until June.
He also points out this MSNBC story and notes that Sgrena seems to be directing the video:
At one point, her eyes watering as she struggled to recite her message, she waved the camera to stop.
If the intent of the video was to influence today's vote in Italy, it failed. BBC:
The Italian Senate voted by 141 to 112 to extend the country's 3,000-strong military presence in Iraq until June.



SBD

[scotty61]

I think not letting the US know what was going on smells to high heaven. They are spining it as they were afraid that the US would veto it if they paid a ransom. It that was the case, once they had Sgrena they could have informed the US and got a clear pass to the airport. They also could have taken her and seen if she needed any medical attention. Instead they are speeding to the airport as if they had a small window to whisk her out of the country. But why? Me thinks that the Italians wanted her in Italy ASAP so the US would be unable to question her about her captors and glean information of their whereabouts and identification. I suspect that this was part of the deal as well as ransom.
_________________
John Kerry. A Neville Chamberlain for our times.

[Uisguex Jack]

[FreeFall]

According to the Northeast Intelligency network, her kidnapping was a sham.

http://www.homelandsecurityus.com/article.asp?id=112

3/9/2005 - Giuliana Sgrena - Communist Agent By Sean Osborne


9 March 2005: Juliana Sgrena, a virulently anti-American Italian Communist who happens to also be a writer for the Italian Communist daily newspaper Il Manifesto is reportedly taken "hostage" by Iraqi "insurgents" who in all of the actual ground combat in 2003 and ever since have never harmed a hair on the head of any Communist in Iraq.


((We immediately recall the panicked flight of the Russian Ambassador to Iraq in a convoy of 8 vehicles in early April 2003. The convoy was enroute from Baghdad to Damascus, Syria and emerged from a formation of Iraqi tanks and Armored Personnel Carriers directly in front of an element of the US 3rd Infantry Division, the 3/7 Cavalry, which was closing in on western Baghdad. The Russian convoy intentionally began moving at a high rate of speed towards the American blocking position. Remember - this is the same general area as the recent incident involving Giuliana Sgrena. Reportedly, and rightfully, US forces shot up the Russian convoy, but it managed to proceed through or around the American forces. The convoy finally stopped for the evening in a town west of Baghdad -- that town is now famous as al-Falluja. The Russian were welcomed, bandaged, fed, housed, refueled and sent on their way to Damascus. In all of that panicked rush to get out of Baghdad, the Russian ambassador returned to his embassy within days. We still do not know who or what was in that convoy, but it was urgent or serious enough to risk death in a combat zone for.))


Sgrena is released after her benefactors reportedly paid the "kidnappers" between 6 and 8 million dollar "ransom". Sgrena then goes on to relate how her "captors" told her words to the effect "keep your head down... the American don't want you to leave." Sgrena says she was not ill treated by her captors (the only truthful statement she has made to date!)


Then once emerged from the secret drop-off point and while on the Baghdad-Baghdad International Airport highway the pickup truck rented by Nicola Calipari approached the checkpoint manned by soldiers of the US 3rd Infantry Division in excess of 100 miles per hour!!! Giuliana Sgrena says they were not speeding? The truck was observed by US forces as hydroplaning twice and nearly losing control as it approached the American military checkpoint. Why hasn't anyone questioned the complete and total lack of coordination between the Italian Secret Service and the American CIA? Are we not allies in the same Coalition?


I believe Juliana Sgrena's "abduction" by "Iraqi insurgents" was a gambit and a total charade with at least four goals:


a) allows the Euro-Communists to directly aid and abet their Ba'athist allies b) provides the Ba'athists with several million dollars worth of needed cold cash c) causes an incident in an attempt to embarrass the US military in Iraq d) which in turn causes political damage to the Coalition by playing into the hands of Italian public sentiments, and mimics the political goals of the horrendous train bombing event of march 11, 2004 in Madrid, Spain.


This event in no way passes the "smell test"!

[shawa]

http://www.iht.com/articles/2005/03/15/news/baghdad.html

[Rdtf]

Shawa wrote:

[FreeFall]

Here are photos supposedly of her car. It doesn't look like she was fired on with 300-400 bullets either. She also claimed tanks were firing at her, but the car doesn't look like that's true either.

http://mypetjawa.mu.nu/archives/070580.php

[shawa]

FreeFall
Although those pictures are all over, that is apparently NOT the vehicle.
From the Washington Times article I posted on the previous page of this
thread:

[tony54]

Segrena Anti-American Communist reporter went to Iraq to get an Anti-American scoop.
When there was nothing drastic to report on, she created her own.
The hostage situation was fake, the release was fake and she made the driver go through a checkpoint without slowing down, knowing full well the American troops would shoot at the vehicle.
Too bad she didn't catch one between the eyes.
But she knew they would shoot so she propably ducked beforehand.

[Rdtf]

Re:

[quote="Rdtf"]
I'd be looking at this guy closer-

[Rdtf]