This man’s brain is a mystery…
As someone who wrote against the control order imposed on Abu Rideh it’s incumbent on me to acknowledge that he’s claimed to have died in Afghanistan while fighting with militants. I don’t really trust the chatter on “jihadi web forums” but it could be true and so it’s only fair for me to say that I regret those posts. Not because I’ve decided control orders are splendid things: no, they’re still unjust and sinister devices by which the state can evade the courts and any notion of due process. What I do regret is the melodramatic style and presumptive nature of the posts, which depicted a “shaken and bewildered” Rideh travelling to a “peaceful” life in Jordan. Innocence ’til proven guilty is a legal right but it doesn’t mean one must adopt the unshakeable view that all who’ve yet to be packed off to jail are blameless; still less good people. I shouldn’t have deigned to assume what passed through someone else’s head. My bad, in other words.
(H/t)
December 21, 2010 at 7:35 pm
[...] argue with it’s rarer to question the bases of news reports we’re offered. Yesterday I wrote of my regret for ill-considered pieces on the case of Mahmoud Abu Rideh. They were written to [...]
October 30, 2011 at 2:30 pm
[...] someone who wrote several posts in support of the man I really am disgusted by the failure of liberal – or, indeed, [...]