Madrid bombings. “11M” on Netflix, the documentary that looks back on “the day that shook Spain”

This Wednesday, February 23, Netflix released a documentary on the attacks perpetrated by Al-Qaida in the center of Madrid on March 11, 2004. For The country, the main Spanish daily, this film is “necessary”.

March 11, 2004 will remain as “the day that shook Spain”, valued The country. Around 7:40 a.m. that morning, bombs planted by Al-Qaeda-affiliated Islamist terrorists exploded in and around Atocha station in central Madrid. These attacks left 192 dead – a disastrous count updated after the death of a victim plunged into a coma for ten years – and several thousand injured.

The attacks in Madrid remain to this day the deadliest ever perpetrated on Spanish soil, and their toll exceeds that of November 13, 2015 in France. As the drama’s anniversary approaches, Netflix is ​​releasing the documentary this Wednesday, February 23 11M : the attacks in Madrid, “11M” being the name given by the Spaniards to this terrible day.

The Spanish director Jose Gomez first gives the floor to the victims and their loved ones, tells The country, a centre-left daily:

They parade in front of the camera on a stage stripped of all artifice. Their testimonies, but also their silences and their looks full of pain, irremediably tighten your throat.

In its analysis of the events, the documentary, described as “necessary” by The country, is inspired by the book 11-M. Al-Qaeda’s revenge, written by Spanish political scientist Fernando Reinares (“11-M. The revenge of Al-Qaeda”, not translated into French). The latter tried to understand why and how the Spanish authorities failed to thwart these attacks, while the intelligence services knew the protagonists of 11 M.

False accusations against AND

The attacks in Madrid took place almost two and a half years after those of September 11, 2001. The same year as the attacks on the World Trade Center in New York, a cell linked to Al-Qaida had been dismantled in Spain, specifies Óscar López-Fonseca, the journalist who wrote the review forThe country.

However, the conservative government at the time, led by Prime Minister José Maria Aznar, initially wrongly blamed the attacks on the Basque separatist group. ANDremember The country. Part of the press had also followed this lead.

The Aznar government is directly targeted by the documentary 11M. Director José Gómez thus endeavors to deconstruct the suspicions of conspiracy theory involving the former Basque separatist organization. These rumors have instilled “doubts among some of the victims and in society, which still persist” in the population, notes the Madrid daily.

11-M came three days before a general election in Spain. They were finally won to general surprise by the Socialists, after two successive mandates of the People’s Party (PPlaw).

Note: a docuseries on the attacks, entitled The challenge : 11M, will be released on March 11 on Amazon Prime.

Source

Founded in 1976, six months after Franco’s death, “Le Pays” is the most read newspaper in Spain. A centre-left daily, it belongs to the Spanish editorial group Prisa. At the end of 2013, elpais.com launched two new editions to

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