Terrorist Attacks in Europe Thwarted at last moment

It is a sad fact in our media driven culture that a story about a group of Islamic extremists who were rounded up last week and discovered to be on the verge of carrying out several terrorist attacks receives little or no coverage but that if they had been successful, their names and deeds would be on everyone's lips.

Successes like these should also be big stories:

The group intended to carry out three attacks in Spain and one each in Portugal, France and Germany, an unnamed man who infiltrated the group told top-selling daily El Pais.

The report comes one day after Spanish judicial sources said that three of the six members of the group, who allegedly planned to blow themselves up, were still at large.

The preferred targets were public transportation networks, especially metro systems because of the difficulty which emergency services would have in reaching the injured there, according to the newspaper.

The attacks would be claimed in the name of al-Qaeda by Islamist warlord Baitullah Mehsud from Pakistan's tribal region of South Waziristan.

Meshud is suspected by the Pakistani government and Scotland Yard of carrying out the assassination of Benazir Bhutto.

With three suspects still at large, the danger of a suicide attack still exists. But this terrorist cell is just another in a long line of cells that have been smashed by excellent cooperative work among European police and intelligence agencies.

Too bad not many people will hear about it and celebrate this success.