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accountability that we will eventually need to give way to governance and
control. 49 Others agree with Tenet’s assessment. In the near future there may be
real tension between those advocating freedom of speech and those who want
more restrictions on the net.
In the age of the new persuaders, through the use of cell phones, the
Internet, and alternate news sources, transnational groups are empowered by
media outlets that present their position unaltered and unfiltered by
governments or communication laws. This is the soft side of a terrorist
influence operation, where bin Laden or al Zarqawi come into your home on
the evening news. They plead with their “brothers” to rid the country of the
hated “infidels,” and under such pretenses, bin Laden doesn’t look that vile to
some audiences. He does not worry about lying or about altering facts. There is
no interview with him, and impartial audiences ask no questions. Such people
do not exist in his circle. US audiences, on the other hand, are predisposed to
listen to all sides of a story, and many give bin Laden a chance to explain
himself. Islamic extremists are not so congenial. For them there is only one
story and that is theirs.
The TV station al Manar is another good example of a terrorist
organization using the media for its purposes. Based in Lebanon, it is the
official station of Hezbollah, an Islamic terrorist group. US State Department
spokesman Richard Boucher noted that a group could be placed on a terrorist
list if it “commits or incites to commit any terrorist activity.” The al Manar
station has been charged with doing just this type of activity. The station, for
example, has urged attacks against US forces in Iraq. This is not freedom of
speech, Boucher added, but “a question of incitement to violence.” 50 Terrorists
have also used the Internet to chastise clerics for not supporting their
“resistance movements.” One audiotape played on the Internet noted that Sunni
Muslim clerics had “let us down in the darkest circumstances and handed us
over to the enemy…Hundreds of thousands of the nation’s sons are being
slaughtered at the hands of the infidels because of your silence.” 51 The tape was
posted on an Islamic website known as al Qala’a. The site has been a mailbox
for Islamic militant groups. 52
49 Chris Strohm, “Tenet Warns of Terrorists Combining Physical, Telecommunications
Attacks,” VEXEC.com, 1 December 2004 as downloaded from
http://www.govexec.com.
50 “Hezbollah’s Terrorist TV Station,” 21 December 2004 as downloaded from
http://www1.voanews.com.
51 John F. Burns, “Tape Condemns Sunni Muslim Clerics for Abandoning Iraqi
Resistance,” The New York Times, 25 November 2004, p. A22.
52 Ibid.
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