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Originally Posted by punky
Graham: You'll love this i'm sure and rip me apart with it, but I can't seem to find the direct quote i'm thinking of.
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Perhaps because it was *NEVER* a "direct quote".
People keep claiming that GG said British Troops should "disobey orders", but his *exact* words were that they should disobey
illegal orders, which is another matter entirely. Unfortunately most of our tabloid media decided not to make that crucial distinction in their headlinesand, regrettably, a lot of people didn't bother to check the details.
What he actually said about the Arab states was that Arab countries should deny American and British forces use of their land and air space and unite to repel any invasion force.
"Will they [the Arab states] send forces to defend Iraq this time in 2002 or will they allow the use of their forces, air space and land by the Crusaders and foreigners to attack Iraq and start a fire in an Arab, Muslim country that is part of their big entity?" Mr Galloway said on Al Jezeera, the Arab satellite broadcaster.
"Will they allow this entity to be torn and paralysed? If they do, then they deserve what is awaiting them in the next 100 years."
Now what it seems to me that he was saying is that the Arab states shouldn't collude with those in the West who want to re-shape the Middle East in *their* preferred image and who are quite content to do it with force.
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The most known one was the one that he was found guilty for and thrown out the Labour party (He was brought up on 5 charges of disrepute, he was found guilty of inciting Arabs to fight the coalition (Which in my mind did a lot of damage, he should of encouraged them to lay down their weapons and keep the body count down, or at least kept his mouth shut), and incitng the British troops to defy orders.
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So far as I can find, the charges were:
* he incited Arabs to fight British troops
* he incited British troops to defy orders
* he incited Plymouth voters to reject Labour MPs
* he threatened to stand against Labour
* he backed an anti-war candidate in Preston
and he was found guilty of all but the third charge by a three man committee of the Labour party.
Now, frankly, the last three are rather petty to say the least, the first and second are, as I've already pointed out, a distortion of what he said and that "committee" was a group picked by the leadership which sounds much more like a "kangaroo court".
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I think we are losing sight of the point. The one I made which started this, was that there are people out there who feel strong enough about the war, (like Galloway, Stop The War), who are extreme enough to go to extraordiary efforts to undermine the war. People like this would be likely candiates to concoct pictures to cause this much damage to the British army and inflame, incite the people in Iraq and surrounding area.
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Whilst there may be people who feel as strongly as you describe, to try to name names and ascribe these actions to people like George Galloway and Stop the War is verging on libellous, unless you have *very strong* proof (and not just supposition or innuendo) to back these claims up.