Spain v. Jihad

By Lisa Abend

The Spanish National Court issued its verdicts in the 2004 Madrid bombing case on Oct. 31. By U.S. standards, the verdicts seemed light--many sentences ranged from 12 to 15 years, and seven of the 28 suspects were absolved of all crimes, including alleged mastermind Rabei Osman. The ruling put to rest a long-festering accusation lodged by conservatives that the Basque separatist group ETA, not Islamic terrorists, was behind the attacks that killed 191 people and injured nearly 2,000 more. But it raised many questions about Spain's ability to prosecute terrorism cases now that Islamic terrorists are as much a threat as members of ETA.

Fernando Reinares, director of the Program on Global Terrorism at Spain's Elcano Royal Institute, says he didn't expect the outcome. "The police and judicial investigations had gathered abundant evidence to condemn some of those, like Osman and [Hassan] el Haski, who were not convicted or who received light sentences," he says.

For Rogelio Alonso, terrorism expert at King Juan Carlos University, there was also sufficient evidence that "several members of the March 11 cell had very close links to al-Qaeda leaders." But the sentencing made no reference to al-Qaeda, arguing only that some of the accused constituted a "terrorist jihadist cell." Judges were clearly unswayed by the mountain of indirect evidence, the most common kind in international terrorism cases.

Spanish security forces have greatly reformed themselves in the past three years--increasing staffing and reorganizing in order to connect the disparate dots of jihadist conspiracies. Spain's judges would do well to learn those lessons.