Slaughter in Madrid
Consolidating an Ally?
By JAMES HOLLANDER

A friend calls early this morning and tells me to turn on the TV. "What is it? What's going on?" "Just turn on the TV."

And there it was.

Scenes of panic, blood running down people's faces, medics giving people oxygen masks, trains with gaping holes, bodies strewn on the tracks, some covered with blankets and others not, constantly growing figures of dead and wounded given by TV news journalists, the tears and shell shock of eyewitnesses and endless speculation on who the culprits might be.

I leave the house and take a walk to see what's going on. I find hundreds of employees of a court house gathered on the street in silent protest at the massacre. In the central square Puerta del Sol, a spontaneous demonstration includes cries against war and violence together with desperate, enraged chanting against ETA, which is considered by most to be responsible. In the same square, a long line of people wait to donate blood for the victims.

The media are already calling it Spain's own September 11. As of this writing, some 186 people are said to have died in the coordinated bomb attacks on commuter trains this morning in Madrid, and some 1,000 have been wounded. Nothing on this scale has occurred in Spain since the Spanish Civil War and Counterrevolution of 1936-1939. And general elections are three days away.

No one has claimed responsibility as of yet, though the government and major media here insist that it must have been ETA, the Basque separatist group. Whoever did it decided to strike directly at a mass of working-class people on their way to work in the capital. The hospitals are overflowing, stories abound of how medics have run out of basic supplies in certain places and have had to use alcohol from bars to sterilize wounds. It's a crime against humanity.

My own feeling is that the attack, either deliberately or not, could end up making Spain a firmer ally of Washington in the "war on terror," regardless of who wins the elections this Sunday. Some 94% of the population opposed the invasion of Iraq and the Aznar government's unconditional support for it, and at least 10% of the population took to the streets against the war on February 15 last year. That is, the "war on terror" and the US/UK/Israel crusade aroused very little support among the populace.

As Spain's own 9/11, this attack might be the "blood bond," the tool for the Spanish political class to consolidate broader social support for coming imperial wars, restrictions of civil liberties and general social paranoia, phenomena from which Spain had been relatively exempt until today.

Those responsible for this must have known.

James Hollander is a translator living in Madrid. He can be contacted at antiwar@ya.com.

Spain is beginning three days of mourning for the deaths of at least 198 people in bomb attacks in Madrid.
More than 1,400 people were injured as 10 bombs ripped through commuter trains during Thursday morning's rush hour.

Schools, museums and the Central Bank will be shut, and huge crowds are expected throughout Spain for peaceful demonstrations.

Lines of investigation are being kept open after clues apparently implicated either Basque or Islamic militants.

In an address to the nation on Thursday, King Juan Carlos said "terrorist barbarity" had plunged Spain into the deepest grief.

Newspapers are describing the attacks as "Spain's 9/11" and parties have halted campaigning for Sunday's general election.

The harrowing task of identifying dozens bodies is continuing more than 24 hours after the blast.

Forty experts have drafted in and there has been a steady stream of grieving relatives at a large convention centre that is being used to house the dead.

Conflicting evidence

Spanish Foreign Minister Ana Palacio said everything appeared to implicate Eta in the attacks, with "very strong clues" and "very strong precedents" backing that view.

The group has previously targeted the Spanish railway system and two Eta suspects were arrested last month driving a truck loaded with more than 500kg of explosives headed for Madrid.

But Ms Palacio said other possibilities could not be ruled out. On Thursday the interior minister said a stolen van had been found near the route of the trains that contained seven detonators and a tape recording of Koranic verses.

A London-based Arabic newspaper, Al-Quds, said it received an e-mail in which a group linked to al-Qaeda claimed to have carried out the attacks.

The message purportedly from the Abu Hafs al-Masri Brigades said it had attacked "America's ally in its war against Islam" on behalf of al-Qaeda.

But American intelligence officials have cast doubt on the claim, saying al-Qaeda does not usually claim responsibility so early.

Officials said there were no plans to raise the colour-coded threat level of terror attacks in the US, which currently stands at yellow - an elevated state of alert.

Spanish editorial writers are demanding answers before voters go to the polls, because the culprits' identity might influence people's choice of party.

The ruling Popular Party campaigned on a hardline stance against Eta, but it also defied popular opposition by supporting the US-led war against Iraq - which may have triggered an attack by al-Qaeda.

Adding to fears that it may have been al-Qaeda, Madrid was struck exactly two and a half years, or 911 days, after the attacks in New York and Washington.

Pot-banging protests

Messages of solidarity have poured in from around the world with President Bush saying America "stood strong" with the people of Spain.

Russia's Vladimir Putin called for "the entire international community" to unite against terror.

HAVE YOUR SAY
There was a very big blast in the trains and everything that happened after that has been very confused

Ignacio, Madrid, Spain

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It was the worst terror attack in modern Spanish history and the deadliest in Europe since the Lockerbie airliner bomb killed 270 in 1988.

The main Basque city, Bilbao, saw a large rally led by nationalists to condemn the bombs.

There were pot-banging protests in Barcelona and candle-lit vigils in Madrid.

The government said Friday's nationwide rally, due to begin at 1900 (1800 GMT), would show solidarity "with the victims, with the constitution and for the defeat of terrorism".