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Wednesday January 7, 2009

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Hinch Blog: A new kind of terrorism

Posted by: By Derryn Hinch, 3AW Drive | 27 November, 2008 - 4:21 PM
The Tak Hotel being attended to by fire crews Sadly, an all too familiar event this century - shades of Bali and 9/11 - as Australians woke up today to news of another massive terrorist attack. This time in Mumbai. The former Bombay, the biggest, most populated, most visited, city in India.

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Another democracy under attack with terrorists  launching bombing and shooting attacks on 10 different locations  including famous hotels like the Taj Mahal Palace and the Oberoi, a women’s and children’s hospital, a tourist restaurant and the Central railway station.

The mid-afternoon toll was close to 100 people dead with more than 200 injured and an unknown number of hostages still being held at several hotels.

I mentioned shades of Bali and 9/11 because this was a calculated attack on westerners. Plus Mumbai is that country’s financial capital. The gateway to India. In a way, India’s New York.

Many survivors today talked of terrorists demanding passports and singling out American and British citizens.

It sounds brutal but terrorists know they get far bigger media coverage when victims are foreigners. In this case Americans, British, Australian, Japanese and French. More coverage than back in 2006 when 200 Indians died in a terrorist attack on a commuter train.

But today’s carnage was not restricted to symbols of so-called western decadence – like luxury hotels. There was the attack on the women’s and children’s hospital and on Mumbai Central station where gunmen opened fire with automatic weapons and grenades. Those victims would have been mainly locals.

That gives credence to the theory that, like some earlier attacks in India – the world’s largest democracy – such carnage is designed to turn the majority Hindu population against the smaller Muslim population and create national upheaval.

Instantly, people blame al-Qaeda but the mujahedeen group claiming responsibility is virtually unknown and there has been terrorist activity in (and out of) Pakistan and Kashmir. There was the bombing of the Marriott Hotel in Islamabad.

Probably the scariest thing about today’s carnage was the method. The upping of the ante. These weren’t terrorists planting car bombs to blow up Bali nightclubs. Or suicide pilots flying into the World Trade Centre towers to supposedly become martyrs. Or fanatics wrapping themselves in explosives to become walking bombs.

These were gunmen in ten separate attacks shooting it out with Police. As a morning newspaper headline said: It’s War on Mumbai.

It’s also war on our world. Or the world as we used to know it.

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