The mainstream media for the most part has moved on. But there are a few more gleanings to be had, of perhaps the most interesting comes from the Daily Mirror, which labels al-Hilli an extremist on the grounds that he was against the war in Iraq, disapproved of the behaviour of Israel and had doubts over 9/11 – which makes a great deal of the population “extremist”. But the Mirror has the only mainstream mention I can find of the possibility that Mossad carried out the killings. Given Mr al-Hilli’s profession, the fact he is a Shia, the fact he had visited Iran, and the fact that Israel heas been assassinating scientists connected to Iran’s nuclear programme, this has to be a possibility. There are of course other possibilities, but to ignore that one is ludicrous.
Which leads me to the argument of Daily Mail crime reporter, Stephen Wright, that the French police should concentrate on the idea that this was a killing by a random Alpine madman or racist bigot. Perfectly possible, of course, and the anti-Muslim killings in Marseille might be as much a precedent as Mossad killings of scientists. But why the lone madman idea should be the preferred investigation, Mr Wright does not explain. What I did find interesting from a man who has visited many crime scenes are his repeated insinuations that the French authorities are not really trying very hard to find who the killers were, for example:
the crime scene would have been sealed off for a minimum of seven to ten days, to allow detailed forensic searches for DNA, fibres, tyre marks and shoe prints to take place.
Nearby bushes and vegetation would have been searched for any discarded food and cigarette butts left by the killer, not to mention the murder weapon.
But from what I saw at the end of last week, no such searches had taken place and potentially vital evidence could have been missed. House to house inquiries in the local area had yet to be completed and police had not made specific public appeals for information about the crime. No reward had been put up for information about the shootings.
Behind the scenes, what other short cuts have been taken? Have police seized data identifying all mobile phones being used in the vicinity of the murders that day?
The idea that the French authorities – who are quite as capable as any other of solving cases – are not really trying very hard is an interesting one.
Which leads me to this part of a remarkable article from the Daily Telegraph, which if true points us back towards a hit squad and discounts the ides that there was only one gun:
Claims that only one gun was used to kill everybody is likely to be disproved by full ballistics test results which are out in October.
While the 25 spent bullet cartridges found at the scene are all of the same kind, they could in fact have come from a number of weapons of the same make.
This throws up the possibility of a well-equipped, highly-trained gang circling the car and then opening fire.
Both children were left alive by the killers, who had clinically pumped bullets into everybody else, including five into Mr Mollier.
Zainab was found staggering around outside the car by Brett Martin, a British former RAF serviceman who cycled by moments after the attack, but he saw nobody except the schoolgirl.
Her sister, Zeena, was found unscathed and hiding in the car eight hours later.
Both sisters are now back in Britain, and are believed to have been reunited at a secret location near London.
There are of course a number of hit squad options, both governmental and private, which might well involve iraqi or Iranian interests – on both of which the mainstream media have been very happy to speculate while almost unanimously ignoring Israel.
But what interests me is why the Daily Telegraph choose, in the face of all the evidence, to minimise the horrific nature of the attack by stating that “Both children were left alive by the killers”? Zainab was not left alive by design, she was shot in the chest and her skull was stove in, which presumably was a pretty serious attempt to kill a seven year-old child. The other girl might very well have succeeded in hiding from the killers under her mother’s skirts, as she hid from the first rescuers, and then for eight hours from the police.
The Telegraph article claims to be informed by sources close to the investigation. So they believe it was a group of people, and feel motivated to absolve those people from child-killing. Now what could the Daily Telegraph be thinking?
I can see why Saddam’s daughter has cropped up, with her mother also being a primary school teacher as Suhaila was reported to have been, and the mother and daughter fleeing in 2003.
@Peter & Thomas:
I wonder about the family’s “missing years”, and also if the interest was due to Iqbal. Thank you both.
Thanks for your reply Peter, I find it surprising that this would happen on an island I know so well yet didn’t know about it.
Jersey has been much mentioned recently & none of it do I recognise, even though I lived there.
Well spotted Dopey, even if it isn’t the direct Saddam family there will be relatives of his in the UK , there has to be.
Sooooo….. as Raghad says many betrayed her father…….. there must be old scores to settle & those not settling old scores will have something to hide…….
I wonder if he was “big bad Barry” from Rich Mountain Aviation !
A bit of Dubai. A bit of dhow traffic across the straits. And a nice war.
Only they now don’t want a war (that was Mr Bush II).
And “big bad Barry” gets hit by some mad Iraqis, out to claim the “fortune”.
Did that happen too, to “big bad Barry”.
In a car. In a carpark.
They do like to keep things “the same”.
But I bet the Brit’s were really p*ssed off. Normally they arrest people.
I suppose it wouldn’t be good for him to be arrested.
Ah yes. It was the “cartels” that got Barry !!!!
Well at least via ‘sir’ (sic) jimmy savile they/we were being (well/badly) illustrated the essential bad faith of the british (empire) ‘ honours’ (sic) system
Pt
– & don’t you dare call me ‘anti-british’ &/or ‘anti-patriotic’
Iqbal was reported to have trained in various places as a dentist. What if she did, and the Sweden-Iraq-UK training was all true? She met her husband in the UAE, so perhaps she working as a dentist, or was in training there, too. Was she a highly qualified dentist, with expertise in forensics? Could she have identified an important person’s remains? Was she a prosthodontist? Did she administer dental procedures in Iraq, Sweden, the UK and UAE, which might have caused some health problems, such as zirconium dental implants?
Facts about her would be nice.
I suggest …
Adults were killed by british state (sanct.) As’sin …
+ kids ‘abused’ by same
(& who could argue after ‘sir’ sic jimmy savile that brit empire did not ‘honour’ (sic) child abusers …?)
Nonsense Phil.
At this point in time, my personal ranking of probabilities is as follows:
1. A lone, ex-iraqi killer, acting upon the instructions of Zaid AH, did it.
2. A local nutter, e. g., Jacques X “dit ‘Le Fou’,” well known in the neighbourhood for his violent temper as well as for his fine collection of pre-WWIII-firearms, did it.
3. Local Crips from Ugine did it, because SAH’s BMW was “the wrong colour” and SM kept “looking at them funny,” thereby failing to give them proper respect.
4. The Special Authors’ Service, a. k. a. the Armed Branch of the PEN Club, did it.
5. Anybody else.
🙂
@Q12 Oct, 2012 – 7:39 pm
Iqbal worked as a dentist in “the Middle East” according to the neighbour, when she meet al-Hilli on vacation in Dubai before they got married 2003.
The friend and dentist Dr Zaid Alabdi, who studied with Iqbal in Baghdad, is “Specialist in Oral Surgery
Special interest in bone augmentation and re-construction, dental implants, endodontics, restorative re-construction and Intra-venous sedation”
http://www.crossdeepdental.co.uk/dental-team-twickenham-dentist/team-twickenham-implants.php
Looks like a serious guy. He said it was more likely that Mollier was the victim.
“Zaid Alabdi, a London-based dentist, believes his friends were never the intended victims. He believes the French cyclist, 40-year-old Sylvan Mollier, who was also killed could have been the focus of the gunman.
Zaid, who was at dental school in Baghdad with Iqbal al-Hilli, believes the family were in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Mr Alabdi says he is the al-Hillis’ closest friend here in the UK.”
http://www.itv.com/news/2012-09-13/alps-family-friend-wrong-place-at-the-wrong-time/
Re Iqbals time as a student in Sweden, I can´t find any info.
Well it’s good to see youv’e narrowed it down then Peter !!!
🙂
I have seen nothing to make me believe anything different than I’ve already posted.
I’ll tell my BBC man next week & see if he’s willing to research it because as yet he admits no one has a clue. There’s not much hope of him cracking it though , he says he’s spoken to Gary Aked……..but didn’t even know how he & AH met !
@Peter.
Number One, might be right…but not by the brother at all !
From 4pm until 8am the scene is “frozen” ! Sixteen hours !
The 4yr old is “thrown in there” to make it look that there wasn’t anything going on.
And then it’s midnight, so the police don’t work on such a scene in the dark !
@Peter
12 Oct, 2012 – 8:35 pm
Re no 1, how was the “lone, ex-iraqi killer” able to know that al-Hilli was going to the out-of-the-way parkingplace? There was nobody following al-Hillis car.
The brother Zaid AH probably knows why he and his brother was under surveillance in March 2003. Then he also might have a clue why there was a killing of the family,and what kind of business they did, which was the reason for the surveillance.
Zaid AH then prefer to be described in the press all over the world, as the potential organizer if the crime, instead of revealing any other motives.
I find Zaid AH very weak in denying that he is innocent. If you are accused in the way he is by the press, normally you try to clean your name by contacting the media, but not Zaid AH.
Thomas, what if Zaid suspects who the killer is,but by speaking out puts himself in danger ?
I wouldn’t be at all surprised to hear in the coming months, that he has an accident.
Can anybody do a digital investigation of the BM “interview” video, if it was stitched together, being a series of orchestrated well rehearsed Q&As (prima facia) including the opening “spin” showing the interviewer leading a n unsuspecting viewer to think its a genuine interview. Then its the Special Authors Service with Savile’s men at the Beeb doing their bit for Queen & Country including our Mr Symonds.
Trying to inject some humour, Peter? Well done. Crips, now that’s one we hadn’t considered.
Or was it Crisps?
Of course there’s one Peter has included, a jealous gay/ lover. 😉
@Comesick
I think these two do it all. Is there any missing footage on other clips/site?
{http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-19593751}
from a little way in – the corridor introduction – and
http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/video/news/sky-news/4536804/Alps-Murders-Witness-describes-his-awful-dilemma.html
I bet BM was pushed into it – it all went wrong, you owe us this one…
Nice helpful neighbour, very un-nosey, not inquiring of Saad who his admirers were… Is this the same neighbour who knew who slept in which bedroom at no 26?? Or was that someone else?
Sorry,that should read ; there’s one Peter has NOT included.
Re the BM interview. Right at the beginning the interviewer starts a question with “you were quite tired”. This did not relate to anything said before and proves that the whole thing was either scripted or edited.
@Katie
12 Oct, 2012 – 9:27 pm
That could be one problem for Zaid, that it would put him and his family in danger. Onother reason for Zaid to be quiet, is that he might not like to discuss why his father was able to build up a fortune – without any substansial business as far as we know.
I think the investigators almost directly know the motives for the killing. The police knows for sure why SAH & ZAH was under surveillance in March 2003.
—-
That AREVA is mainly owned by the French State, might as well be a good reason for the pessimistic statements that this case will take several years to solve. It looks like too sensitive, for some reason.
Some says that Mollier was more into sales, than involved in research. Maybe that´s important.
Eagle, here are the BBC’s Tom Symonds, Tweets, go to halfway down the page.
https://twitter.com/tomsymonds
“She’s prone on the road”
“she looked like she was playing with her sibling”
Thomas.
I think it’s what Mollier had access to rather than his actual job. If Frederic Brun was partner in crime who knows what they could achieve.
As we don’t know if they were tracking sabotage or passing info, it’s all guess work.
I read that the relative in Baghdad who was quoted as saying “look at Sa’ad’s job and you will know who killed him” was also told not to give any details to the press. Probably Zaid has been similarly gagged.