The BBC, Trump and terror..

I went to BBC World TV News last week expecting to see our first spaceman arriving on station, which happened almost exactly at the same time.

 

Was it first up, being  the best ‘good news’ story for a long time?

 

Nope?

 

Was it second? Nope; this was reserved for a piece that was so instantly forgettable that I couldn’t remember it 5 minutes later.

 

It came up half-way through the broadcast as third item. So what came first?

 

It was the closure of 900 schools in Los Angeles, affecting 640,000 pupils. Apparently there was a threat from ISIS. Since nothing happened, the story was of minuscule interest to the British. Even then the Beeb didn’t get the real story; that it was all a hoax that the LAPD fell for, whereas the NYPD didn’t buy a similar ‘threat’.

 

But there is a dimension to this affair which has gone unremarked upon by both the media and the political classes.

 

This was staggering propaganda for ISIS. They now know that they can bring pretty well any major city in the US (and elsewhere) to a standstill with this kind of scam. They have no need to send in  the bombers. Or, indeed, to do anything other than issue the threats. In the course of time the security services will get the message and then ignore future threats.

 

That will be the opportunity for the real thing!

 

And with Trump as a leading GOP contender for POTUS, surely ISIS can scarcely believe their luck.

 

He advocates a total ban on Muslims from entering the USA. That’s 22% of the world’s population. He wants a register of all Muslims, the precedent being Adolf Hitler and the Jews.

 

His military solution is carpet-bombing of ISIS-held areas; too bad about collateral damage. He wants to take reprisals against Muslim families, obviously not being aware that this is a war-crime. He speaks of banning ISIS from the internet, a technical impossibility.

                                                                                                          

Trump has done ISIS’ business for it  by promoting fear amongst ordinary Americans, which, after all, is the primary purpose of terrorism.

 

And it has done a huge favour to ISIS by endorsing its main propaganda hook in Islamic countries. ‘ See how the Crusaders hate you’. ‘See how the Crusaders want to kill your women and children’. ‘See how the Crusaders aim to destroy your cities as they did in the days of our great saviour Saladin, peace and blessings be upon him’.

 

This is all nonsense. It is abundantly obvious that Trump has a single campaign strategy: to say something daily that will keep the other contenders off the front page, however moronic. And he is dragging the other contenders with him on the basis that to stay in the game you have to say something even more outrageous every day.

 

It is blindingly obvious that The Donald simply doesn’t care.

 

But then he never has.