Qatari smoker sparks shoe bomb threat on air
In short, a Qatari diplomat on board a local flight within USA was mistook for a shoe bomber when he lit a ciggi in the aero-loo :P they are talking fighter jets mate!!!
read the full story here:
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010/04/07/national/main6373369.shtml
whats disturbing is his position as a diplomat as said in the report and why would he joke about lighting his shoe up in a terror paranoia filled nation... that too in a flight.
would he be able to keep his job when he returns :P
by the way he was flying in First Class :)
This is horrible PR for Qatar.
Hardly anyone in the US has heard of Qatar, and many, wrongly, lump all Arab countries as hotbeds of US-hating terrorists.
Now, thanks to this idiot diplomat, anyone who sees this story will associate Qatar with terrorism. Clearly, anyone who reads the story will see that this guy was simply arrogant and acted in poor taste, but most people do not read beyond the headline. Moreover, when people do read the whole story a point that jumps out at them is that the diplomatic was returning from visiting a genuine Qatari terrorist. Most Americans will not realize that such visits are routinely done as consular services of virtually every embassy around the world.
I have already received about a dozen email from people in the US and Canada asking about the safety situation here in response to this story.
It just takes a little story like this to derail years of progress towards a strong international standing--i.e. sadly this will get far more publicity in the general American press than anything like the Doha Debates or the good work being done by the people at Reach out to Asia.
I hope this guy is severely reprimanded by his superiors and learns his lesson.
The burgundy coloured passport will face tighter screening procedures now on.
fearphobia
@ john of arc: Unfortunately it is not only limited to the older Qataris, I know some of my own friends who got into top universities being rejected at some local companies for silly reasons, yet the same companies take Qataris from lower quality institutions because of their connections, these guys are all of the same age too. I guess they aren't motivated to hire quality as they are not accountable to shareholders or the government, they know they will be allocated a certain budget for the entire organization and figure why not help out friends and family.
@ Mandilulur: Aha, I knew it was highly unlikely he would have attended an ivy .
A joke in a very bad taste :P
Oh, yes, Al Jazeera reported the incident promptly - but the Gulf Times and the Peninsula did not. And BTW, George Washington IS a good university, but it is NOT Ivy League.
Mandi
lol funny guy
@ genesis : Are you sure about that? I highly doubt someone who is of ivy league material lacks the common sense to know that what he did was very foolish, especially someone holding a sensitive job such as this guy. This dude is almost 30 and behaves this way, even my kid brother who just entered secondary school knows better than to do what this guy did.
To me it just seems he got wasta in the MOFA, it is pretty rampant over there from what I've heard from people who work there.
It's all fun and games until someone gets detained by a sky marshal!
despite his age, he has a masters with honor from an ivy league university.
He should've curbed his bad nicotine habit, as this have apparently caused him a career suicide
the msnbc report says & i quote "the twenty something Qatari diplomat..." when you have a third secretary no less who is aged twenty something,what else do you expect?...i'm no foreign services expert but i'm pretty sure one don't get to third secretary level in one's twenties???...oh sorry,i was talking about the real world...my bad...it's typical for someone his age who's put into a position of power,the guy was being cocky,plain & simple,he had full diplomatic immunity & he knew it,might be why senior diplomatic staff have to actually put in a good few years of foreign service before rising to that level,so over the years in service,they become aware of the responsibility their position entails...he doesn't even have a very good sense of humour or a lot of common sense i dare say,this is the kind of comment one would LEAST expect from a diplomat...or am i asking too much?...
In the contrary , aljazeera & Qatar News Agency were updated regularly about the incident. So is, all Arab local press
Not to mention the ambassador had a press release just few hours later And Qatar recalled Al Ma'dadi last night.
There is no denial that what the diplomat did is complete arrogance And it's unexplainable. Specially since he was living in the US for the past 10 years. As a student first, then he joined the Embassy. That makes him even in a worse situation as he's expected to be well familiar with the laws of the land.
Well, Anderson Cooper did use the word "moron."
Mandi
the media in qatar trying to ignore the incident is quite obvious.... him trying joking about lighting his shoe :)))) i mean ciggis versus shoes is far out man... his was quickly made excuse... as the legend says "Haste is Waste"
I don't think they knew that at the time, Ex. The Ambassador later explained that he was on "official Embassy business."
Mandi
him going to visit a terrorist explains the fuss...
No, he has been recalled to Qatar. What is so funny is that although this was the lead story on TV, newspapers and radio in the US and the UK, the English-speaking press in Doha managed to ignore the episode for 36 hours before publishing a few remarks. And the fact that although he was not a terrorist, he was going to visit one.
Mandi