Rabei Osman was judged guilty in Italy on Monday and not guilty in
Spain on Wednesday. This based on nearly identical charges and on the same evidence, wiretapped
discussions in Arabic. How could this
happen?

The Spanish trial over the Madrid 2004 terror bombings ended today. Some of the accused were convicted, the alleged mastermind, Osman, was acquitted:

Rabei Osman, an Egyptian accused of helping orchestrate the attacks, was acquitted. Osman, who is in jail in Italy, had allegedly bragged in a wiretapped phone conversation that the massacre was his idea. But his defense attorneys argued successfully that the tapes were mistranslated.

Osman, a unskilled worker who had been living in Germany, Spain and Italy, was convicted to 10 years in an Italian court for ‘subversive association aimed at international terrorism’, a new charge introduced in Italy after 9/11. Two days ago an Italian appeal court upheld that conviction.

An report about the Spanish trial explains:

The testimony of two official Spanish translators, who transcriptions of an incriminating conversation between the accused Rabei Osman and his disciple Yehia Ragheh, points to the difficulties inherent in such a sprawling, complex investigation.

The translators claimed that the Italian translation (Rabei Osman and Yehia were based in Italy) of the conversation "has serious errors", and "that some phrases have been misinterpreted through ignorance of the cultural connotations of the Arabic language and of historical or cultural references or citations", going so far as to "furnish the discussion with a context that does not agree with the original".

Said with less demureness: The Italian translators were either completely incompetent idiots or they lied to get Osman convicted.

The only ‘evidence’ the Italian police has against Rabai Osman are the wiretapped phonecalls the Spanish court just found to be mistranslated and files he downloaded to his computer.

A 2005 NYT report describes this very scary stuff under the headline: From Tapes, a Chilling Voice of Islamic Radicalism in Europe

The indictment calls Mr. Ahmed an "organizer of the terrorist group responsible for the Madrid attacks," a "recruiter of numerous people ready to commit suicide attacks," and a "coordinator of terrorist cells" abroad. The police report charges that he used cassette tapes, cellphones, CD’s and computers as recruitment tools, highlighting how the Internet potentially can transform any living room into a radical madrasa.

The report says he downloaded hundreds of audio and video files of sermons, communiqués, poetry, songs, martyrs’ testimony, Koranic readings and scenes of battle and suicide bombings from Chechnya, Afghanistan, the Israeli-occupied territories, Lebanon, Bosnia, Kashmir and Iraq.

In a bit of involuntary irony the NYT has some of the ‘chilling’ pictures Osman was guilty of having downloaded to his computer on its website. When you click on the above NYT headline, your computer will download those too and will store them on your harddrive.

Except for maybe Kashmir, I have researched and written extensively about all the countries and issues mentioned in the NYT piece. My harddrive must be full of such files. I better don’t let the Italian police get their hands on it.

Rabai Osman will now appeal to the highest Italian court. With the backing of the Spanish judgment he may even get the court moved to find some better translators.

These thoughtcrime accusations, trials and convictions must stop.