Centanni, Wiig Alive - Ramattan: Kidnappers Demand Release of "Arabs" in "Guantanamo Prison"

Al Jazeera has aired a video made by the kidnappers of Fox News Channel's Steve Centanni and Olaf Wiig that was first obtained by the Palestinian news agency Ramattan. Ramattan is headquartered in Cairo and has production facilities in Gaza City, Ramallah and Jerusalem.

According to a copy of a statement released by the "Holy Jihad Brigades" and obtained by Fox News the previously unknown terror group demands the release of Muslim prisoners in U.S. jails within 72 hours.

However Ramattan is reporting the statement specifies "Arab prisoners from the US-run jails, namely Guantanamo Prison."

Gaza, August 23, 2006 (RNA) – In an exclusive video message dispatched to RNA, a previously unknown group calling itself the "Holy Jihad Brigades" claimed responsibility for kidnapping FOX News journalists in Gaza nine days ago.

The group demanded, in a statement attached to the video tape, the release of "Arab prisoners from the US-run jails, namely Guantanamo Prison," within 72 hours, in order to release FOX news reporter Steve Centanni, and his New Zealand cameraman Olaf Wiig.

A group of unknown gunmen kidnapped last week FOX News journalists in Gaza. It did not issue any public statement about their reasons for kidnapping the journalists nor did they demand anything for their release since then. This video-message dispatched exclusively to RNA is their first public statement about the kidnapped journalists.

To view the videotaped message, please click the following link:

http://www.ramattan.com/uploaded/Kidnaped.rar

Why is Fox News not reporting this?

Update at 3:15 pm EDT: Foget Fox News not covering this report, by the same news agency which first came into possession of the videotape and statement, of a more specific demand by the terrorists kidnappers. Not a single wire service or member of the broadcast and print media have anything on it.

I'm tempted to slap a MUST ATTRIBUTE ALPHABET CITY on this, but I'm much too classy for that.

Hang in there Steve and Olaf.

Update: 4:48 pm, EDT: There's no proof of any complicity between the two, and I'm certainly not suggesting it, but...how convenient for the terrorists and Ramattan: The tape was initially released to Ramattan Studios, a television production office in Gaza City, not far from where the journalists were seized.

Update at 5:30 pm, EDT: Don't know his sources but Ryan R. Jones, the Middle East Correspondent for All Headline News, is reporting that the Holy Jihad Brigades is deamanding "the US release all Muslim prisoners being held as part of its global war on terror in return for the freedom of two Fox News journalists they are holding."

So now we have three different takes on "Holy Jihad Brigades" demand: One, all Muslim prisoners in the US jails; Two, all Arabs (Muslims?) at Guantanamo; Three, all Muslim terrorists held by the US, presumably within the US and abroad.

I'm inclined to believe number two, simply because it is reported by Ramattan. Number one is too general to be taken seriously, amateurish even. Number three would make the most sense.

What's going on here? Mistranslation of the leaflet that was handed out by the group? The group is in contact with somebody? I have no idea.

In any case, whatever the exact demand may be the State Department categorically rejects it.

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Posted 12:31 PM by Robert

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