34 Reported Dead over 200 injured in Belgium Terror Attacks

[killer_carlson]

i'm starting a new thread on this rather than having it buried in the mega-thread (which is off the rails itself). The Guardian has the best coverage right now.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/brussel...orts-1.3501831

http://www.theguardian.com/world/liv...s-live-updates

Reports are a suicide bomb and potentially a suitcase bomb. Hit the airport and the Metro station.

A controlled explosion just done by the police bomb squad at the university.

Press being asked not to report on the location of police investigations

[killer_carlson]

No Canadians among the injured

[transplant99]

Its been speculated for a while now that a major attack would occur in Belgium.

Looks like the timing is such that it was planned for the busiest time of the day at both locations.

So stupid and tragic.

[LChoy]

My 2 cents

I think it is likely that these attacks were put together quite quickly in the aftermath of the capture of the suppose mastermind of the Paris attacks earlier this week. Especially since he was captured alive, and claimed he had recruited a new network, it stands that the remaining members of the cell would either go to ground, or execute their plan before the authorities closed in on them. Unfortunately for the people in Belgium, the extremist chose to attack today.

[shermanator]

Ugh, that's terrible. My thoughts on this can be summed up in the image below:

NSFW!

[Ozy_Flame]

Didn't they just capture the mastermind of the Paris attacks, Salah Abdeslam too? This is tragic.Thoughts and prayers.

[AcGold]

Islam is turning into some uncontrollable abomination. If you study psychology in depth there is such a thing as cluster b personality disorders where you act in rage and justify it by pointing at the wrongs others have done onto you. It's always associated with absolutely irrational reasoning and victimizing the self.

It's seriously out of control psychological illness, let's go kill those we think are bad us to make the world better. Doesn't work that way, I'm pro freedom of choice most of the time but holy crap when are people going to wake up to the sickness Islam is creating. It's creating a race of self pitying narcissists that don't care one bit about anyone but themselves.

[Regulator75]

Thoughts and prayers? That's what led to this religious mess...

[Yoho]

“Canada stands by Belgium in this difficult time and has offered all possible assistance." More from @JustinTrudeau:

[burn_this_city]

Originally Posted by AcGold

Islam is turning into some uncontrollable abomination. If you study psychology in depth there is such a thing as cluster b personality disorders where you act in rage and justify it by pointing at the wrongs others have done onto you. It's always associated with absolutely irrational reasoning and victimizing the self.

It's seriously out of control psychological illness, let's go kill those we think are bad us to make the world better. Doesn't work that way, I'm pro freedom of choice most of the time but holy crap when are people going to wake up to the sickness Islam is creating. It's creating a race of self pitying narcissists that don't care one bit about anyone but themselves.

This is just idiotic. First off they aren't some monolithic group of people, second you could replace Islam with any number of terms and come up with the same semi applicable crap. Replace Islam in your post with Donald Trump.

[nik-]

Originally Posted by burn_this_city

This is just idiotic. First off they aren't some monolithic group of people, second you could replace Islam with any number of terms and come up with the same semi applicable crap. Replace Islam in your post with Donald Trump.

False whataboutism.

[OMG!WTF!]

Originally Posted by Ozy_Flame

Didn't they just capture the mastermind of the Paris attacks, Salah Abdeslam too? This is tragic.Thoughts and prayers.

When they caught the guy there was a pretty big protest in one of the Muslim neighborhoods in Brussels. About a hundred and thirty people rioted because they arrested their brother...ie no shortage of kooks there.

I see they've pretty well shut down CNN for this one. The Ankara attack a couple weeks ago barely got a mention.

[burn_this_city]

Originally Posted by nik-

False whataboutism.

Not really. Do we draw the same parallels to other mainstream religions when their fringe cults do horrible things?

[nik-]

Originally Posted by burn_this_city

Not really. Do we draw the same parallels to other mainstream religions when their fringe cults do horrible things?

When?

In the 1500s? Or once every 3 or 4 years when some ####### shoots up an abortion clinic? People are actually very comfortable criticizing other religions. It's incredibly socially acceptable to criticize Christianity.

Get a grip. The first step to combating this is for apologists to accept that this is a problem. And it's not a miniscule minority, it's a significant minority.

[LChoy]

Further to what I was speculating earlier

Did militants attack over fears Abdeslam would blow their cover?

BBC Europe Correspondent Chris Morris writes... European security experts had been braced for another attack for months. But it is always a huge shock when it actually happens.
If this was "revenge" for the arrest of Salah Abdeslam on Friday, it will be a source of considerable concern that a functioning terrorist network was able to respond so quickly and with such devastating effect.
It is possible that a cell linked to Abdeslam brought forward the timing of a future attack because they thought he might blow their cover.
Either way, it shows how advanced the planning was in terms of logistics, explosives, weapons and people willing to carry out such attacks on civilian targets.
The priority now will be to ensure that anyone else who poses an imminent threat to the public is apprehended as soon as possible. But it is clear that there are still huge gaps in intelligence and Brussels is seen as a soft target.
In the words of France's President Hollande, the response from Europe will need to be "calm, lucid and determined" – and it will have to last for a long time.

[Enoch Root]

Originally Posted by burn_this_city

Not really. Do we draw the same parallels to other mainstream religions when their fringe cults do horrible things?

Please explain how this is happening with 'other mainstream religions'

[Flash Walken]

Maybe this time would be a good time to re-consider our ties with Saudi Arabia?

Maybe wait until the 4th devastating terrorist attack?

[nik-]

Originally Posted by Flash Walken

Maybe this time would be a good time to re-consider our ties with Saudi Arabia?

Maybe wait until the 4th devastating terrorist attack?

I get the reasons (aside from the obvious "oil" answer) that we as the west maintain a relationship with the Saudis, but god damn if they don't rub our noses in it constantly via their support of this ####.

I mean surely they realize if they didn't have western military support their heads would likely be on pikes?

I almost respect how brazen it is.

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

Originally Posted by burn_this_city

Not really. Do we draw the same parallels to other mainstream religions when their fringe cults do horrible things?

When the religion, as intepreted by millions of its followers, calls for the behaviour in question. In other words, we similarly draw parallels between the Christianity and witch burning, or the Spanish Inquisition, notwithstanding that there were other non-religious factors also in play in both cases...

[AltaGuy]

It is kind of interesting Saudi Arabia and Trump were brought up in this thread: was just thinking about how Trump-ism was born of a war on facts by the US right, and Islamic extremism stems from the backwards-ass extremism promoted for so many years by the Saudis. Both of which are now way out of the originators' control.

It's not Islam, but extremism is a problem in Islamic culture for sure.