JERUSALEM POST: No increase in threats since Yassin’s death

There have been no signs of escalating terror threats against Israelis or Jews abroad since the killing of Hamas leader Sheikh Ahmed Yassin 10 days ago, a senior IDF officer said on Wednesday.

“Maybe it’s still too early,” the officer said, adding, “We constantly monitor world terrorism in order to refrain from being surprised as in Mombasa. Intelligence assessments relate to specific areas such as Thailand and parts of Africa, but we have not seen any changes in Hamas strategy; its recent statements also support that,” the officer said. “However, it is quite probable that the next al-Qaida attack, which is probably already in motion somewhere, will be named after Yassin. Had the terror attack in Madrid occurred after Yassin’s demise it would have probably been named after him.”

JERUSALEM POST: Add Hizbullah to terror list: Shalom to EU

Israel wants to see the EU place Hizbullah on its list of terror organizations, and wants to see individual European governments move faster in legislation outlawing Hamas, Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom said Wednesday.

Shalom’s comments came at a Jerusalem press conference with Dutch Foreign Minister Bernard Bot.

Shalom’s statement about placing Hizbullah on the EU’s list of terror organizations came in response to a question about what Europe can do to improve ties with Israel. Israeli government officials are increasingly pointing to links between Hizbullah and Palestinian terror groups in Gaza.

(Dutch Foreign Minister Bot today called the targeted strike on Yassin a violation of International law.)

CNN: Palestinian prime minister urges end to suicide attacks

Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Ahmed Qorei denounced suicide bombings as “morally wrong” and an “obstacle to peace” Wednesday in an address to the Palestinian parliament.

He warned Palestinians not to carry out suicide attacks in response to Israel’s March 22 killing of Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, leader of the Palestinian Islamic fundamentalist group Hamas.

“These bombings are used by the Israeli government as an excuse to continue its aggression and collective punishment against the Palestinian people,” Qorei said.

Winds of Change.NET Regional Briefings run on Tuesdays & Wednesdays, and sometimes Fridays too. This Regional Briefing focuses on Africa, courtesy of AfricaPundit.

TOP TOPICS

• The new African parliament (for what it’s worth) was inaugurated this month. Details over at Head Heeb and Mostly Africa.

• Yvette reports on more terrorist attacks against foreign aid workers in Somaliland. In a hopeful sign, Somalilanders responded to the attacks with a weekend full of anti-terrorism protests.

• German president Johannes Rau’s visit to Africa was followed by bombings in Tanzania and diverted by an assasination plot in Djibouti. Islamist terrorists are suspected of plotting both attacks. If only Germany hadn’t supported the war in Iraq….

Other Topics Today Include: Beaucoup de coups; trouble in Sudan; Blair and Qaddafi make up; War on terror news; Health and environment roundup; Mugabe’s condom problem.

Read The Rest…

There has been another explosion in northern Tashkent, the site of the recent shootout and series of suicide-bombings near the President’s residence.

Interfax news agency reported the blast hit the Sabir-Rakhimovski district, which is in northern Tashkent. Interior Ministry anti-terrorism department deputy chief Ilya Pyagay said that police were carrying out an operation in that neighborhood. He gave no further details.

That area is not far from the scene of fighting Tuesday that officials said left 23 people dead, including three police officers.

A Western security official also said he had been informed of a blast, and that people had seen fire trucks racing to the area. Witnesses also reported seeing police cars speeding through the city center toward the Sabir-Rakhimovski district.

There has also been an explosion in Andijon, in the Ferghana Valley:

Russia’s ITAR-Tass news agency earlier reported that a blast also struck a residential building in the Fergana Valley city of Andijan overnight, citing police sources. The explosion could have been an accident, but police weren’t ruling out terrorism. Officials declined to confirm the report.

It could get very nasty real quick.

From the ABC (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) :

Security forces in Thailand are on high alert after the theft of a huge amount of explosives and other bomb making materials.

The government says Islamic separatists are behind a recent upsurge in violence in the Muslim-dominated southern region of the country.

Ten armed men raided a quarry in the southern province of Yala, stealing more than 1,300 kilograms of ammonium nitrate, 58 sticks of dynamite and 170 blasting caps.

The fertiliser ammonium nitrate was the main explosive used in the Bali bombings.

The government fears a major bomb attack is being planned to coincide with a major public holiday in mid-April.

Let’s hope I’m not posting a follow-up anytime soon - except to say that it’s been recovered.

JERUSALEM POST: Hamas terrorist indicted for planing to kill MK

A Military Court in the West Bank on Tuesday indicted a Hamas terrorist who planned to assassinate “a senior Israeli public figure from Beit She’an”. The public figure is most probably Likud Mk David Levy, a Beit She’an resident.

Over a month ago, security forces arrested Hamas member Majdi Abu-Hamis, 24, from the Jenin area, who worked in a fish shop in Beit She’an.

Abu-Hamis was also indicted on a series of attempts to hurt civilian and military targets, including shooting attacks at passing cars along the security fence in the Jenin area.

JERUSALEM POST/AP: UK: Muslims urged to report terrorist activity

A leading British Muslim organization said Wednesday it is writing to mosques around the country asking clerics and community leaders to look out for possible terrorist activity.

The Muslim Council of Britain said it was sending a letter to 1,000 mosques urging the “utmost vigilance” in the war against terror.

The announcement came a day after police arrested eight men in London and surrounding towns and seized half a ton of ammonium nitrate, a frequently used bomb ingredient. The suspects were all British, but news reports said the suspects were of Pakistani descent and at least some were Muslims.

To update a previous post, more details on the fighting in Durmen, just north of Tashkent are coming out:

Government forces besieged an apartment building near the presidential residence in northern Tashkent for nearly five hours after confronting the suicide bombers. Gunfire and explosions were heard throughout the day.
…
The militants blew themselves up with homemade explosives while police tried to arrest them, the ministry said, without elaborating. It said the investigation was continuing.

Police stopped a small car and two alleged terrorists jumped out and detonated explosive-laden belts, killing themselves and three police officers and injuring five more policemen, said a National Security Service officer at the scene who declined to give his name.

In a separate nearby bombing, neighborhood resident Farida Raupkhajayeva said four women in a red car had driven up to a police checkpoint. One of the women, dressed entirely in black, got out of the car and approached a bus that was stopped there, Raupkhajayeva said.

When she ignored a police request to stop, they shot her in the legs, then she set off a bomb, said Raupkhajayeva, 50. The other three women then ran into an apartment building, where police began the nearly five-hour standoff with the suspects.
…
An AP reporter saw five corpses on a sidewalk outside the building. Police investigators and plainclothes security officers with Kalashnikov assault rifles milled about as a white-coated medical official put the bodies on stretchers.

Five men escaped, said a building resident who refused to give her name. She said the women in the car were wearing hijab veils, only revealing their eyes, which is rare in secular Uzbekistan. She said they were speaking another Central Asian language she could not understand.

A house several hundred yards away showed signs of heavy fighting, its walls blackened by fire and pocked by dozens of bullet holes. Neighbors who were cleaning up charred books and other debris said four young men had been killed inside the house and that none of its regular residents had been home at the time of the shootout.
…
Security was increased across the city, with soldiers on patrol and hotels deploying metal detectors and not allowing vehicles to approach. Soldiers with dogs patrolled the airport, but flights continued.

Several security operations were under way in Tashkent and the surrounding area Tuesday, said Svetlana Atikova, spokeswoman for the prosecutor-general’s office, without elaborating.

Authorities turned off water, gas and electricity in the district where Tuesday’s attacks occurred, and residents were forced to cook their evening meals over wood fires in the streets.

The lack of official information led to fear and confusion.

“I don’t understand who is killing whom. We learn about things only from rumors and we panic,” said Faya Vaganova, a 47-year-old resident.

The Washington Post has a good story as does EurasiaNet

This EurasiaNet correspondent monitored communications among police, utilizing the same type of Motorola walkie-talkie that is commonly used by security officials. Judging by the overheard comments, security forces struggled to contain the insurgents. One overheard comment – “We need black bags” – indicates that at least several security troops were killed. In addition, this EurasiaNet correspondent witnessed one wounded officer transported from the scene by an ambulance.

Officials later reported that a group of about nine insurgents had barricaded themselves in a house near the TTZ plant. After authorities determined that the insurgents did not have any hostages, they brought in an armored vehicle to open fire on the house, destroying the building and killing all those inside. Later police said they believed that at least three of the dead insurgents had participated in raids carried out in the same neighborhood on March 28. They based their conclusions on the fact that pistols found on or near the dead men apparently had been taken from police during the earlier confrontation.

Fighting was reported in a wide variety of other locations in the capital. On the outer edge of northeastern Tashkent, a suicide car bomber detonated at a police checkpoint at about 9 am. Insurgents also attacked a nearby police station. Witnesses reported seeing at least three bodies, including one police officer.
…
In the late afternoon, security forces cordoned off an area near the Druzhba Narodov metro station. They evacuated a 9-storey building and a 12-storey building and proceeded to search the buildings for explosives. Elsewhere in Tashkent, authorities were in full clampdown mode. Streets were largely deserted of civilians and police stood at myriad checkpoints, stopping and searching all vehicles. Train and bus transport in and out of Tashkent was halted.

The Chorvak Dam, north of Tashkent, may also have been targeted

Witnesses say that a van blew up in the Bostanlyk district near Tashkent when the run-in at the checkpoint in the Kibrai district was progressing. The explosion took place not far from the strategic Charvak dam. Had it been damaged, the so called Charvak Sea might have flooded the capital of Uzbekistan.

I’ll just add from my experience in the Tashkent area that yesterday’s bombings are very far (as in, all the way across the city) from today’s shootouts and bombings. The Kibray area, where Bo’stonlik is, is a reasonable distance out of the city as well.

CNN

A bomb threat prompted searches Tuesday of four Northwest Airlines planes at airports in Detroit, Los Angeles, Miami, and Memphis, Tennessee.

Government officials stressed the threat was not considered credible and the searches were done out of an abundance of caution.

“Any time we have this type of information we have to take it seriously,” Transportation Security Administration spokeswoman Amy von Walter said. She was not sure how the threat was conveyed.

Each plane was taken to a secure area to be checked.

JERUSALEM POST: Terrorists try to recruit child as suicide bomber

Palestinian terrorists tried to recruit a 15-year-old as a suicide bomber, at one point locking him in a dark room, but also luring him with clothes, a cell phone and promises of paradise, his family said Tuesday.

The story of ninth-grader Tamer Khweirah, who was extricated by an alert older brother, underscored the growing use of children by militant groups and stoked Palestinian debate over what is permissible in the fight with Israel.

Tamer is one of four teens arrested by the Israeli military in the West Bank city of Nablus in the past week on suspicion they were recruited by militants. One of the four, Hussam Abdo, 16, was caught at an Israeli checkpoint south of Nablus last week with eight kilograms (18 pounds) of explosives strapped to his body.

Read the rest of the article to see some of the methods and enticements the Islamic Jihad used to entice him.

[Previous comments on this story may be found here]

Breaking on CNN and FOX:

White House will allow Condoleezza Rice to testify publicly under oath before 9/11 commission, a senior administration official tells CNN.

Update (AP):

National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice will be allowed to testify in public under oath before the commission investigating the failure to prevent the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, an administration official said Tuesday.

The official said the decision is conditioned on the Bush administration receiving assurances in writing from the commission that such a step does not set a precedent, said the official speaking on condition of anonymity. It appeared the administration already had such assurances verbally in private and is confident it will get them in writing.

White House legal counsel Alberto Gonzales has sent a letter to the commission stating that Rice is prepared to testify publicly as long as the administration receives assurances from the panel that this is not precedent setting, the official said.

Update 2: Letter from White House Counsel to Commission

Update 3: It was all about a book deal! (satire)

From the AFP via the ABC (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) :

Spanish police have arrested three more people, including two Syrians, in connection with the March 11 Madrid train bombings, Spanish Interior Minister Angel Acebes said on Tuesday.

A total of 18 suspects are currently in detention, 14 of whom are facing provisional charges of murder and terrorism.

The remaining four include the latest three arrested and another suspect who has yet to come before a judge for questioning.

Another five people provisionally detained have since been released.

Updating a previous post, come news from the AFP via the ABC (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) :

Uzbek security forces killed 20 suspected militants on Tuesday in an operation near the Tashkent residence of President Islam Karimov, a security officer told AFP.

”We have eliminated 20 people,” said the officer, who was involved in the operation.

The operation came on a second day of violence in Uzbekistan, which was rocked on Monday by a series of blasts and police shootouts in Tashkent and the ancient city of Bukhara.

Interesting phraseology.

From Fox:

Police arrested eight men Tuesday and seized half a ton of ammonium nitrate, a fertilizer that can be used to make bombs, in anti-terror raids in and near London, the capital’s Metropolitan Police force said.

All the suspects were British and were arrested as part of an operation targeting alleged international terrorist activity, Deputy Assistant Commissioner Peter Clarke said.

He added that the operation was not connected to the Madrid train bombs earlier this month or Irish republican terrorism.

Full story….

Meanwhile, in the Philippines, police arrested four Abu Sayyaf members who were in possession of TNT.

The explosives were to have been used to bomb trains and shopping malls in Manila, President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo told a news conference.

“We have prevented a Madrid-level attack in the metropolis,” she said. blockquote>

Posted by Michele at 06:38 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

MAARIV: Palestinians introduce mortar launcher on wheels

Palestinian terror groups are constantly thinking up new ways to carry out “quality” operations against Israeli citizens and soldiers. The latest invention is a mortar launcher on wheels.

The new technique works as follows: The terrorists weld mortar launchers to the back of fast pick-up trucks. “Once the mortar is fired, the driver quickly flees so IDF helicopters would not be able to spot him”, an IDF official explained.

According to intelligence sources, the terrorists’ new “weapon system” makes them harder to spot. However, IDF officials say that the army has enough means to quickly identify the mortar launchers.

(Call the Nobel Physics Prize Committee, someone.)

JERUSALEM POST: MI: 16 attacks thwarted since January

Palestinian terror groups are currently experiencing “difficulties,” in carrying out attacks, which has led them to try to look for ideas to bypass the obstacles such as using children as suicide bombers, Brig.-Gen. Yossi Kupperwasser, who heads the intelligence branch’s research division said Monday.

Sixteen suicide attacks initiated from the West Bank have been foiled since January, Kupperwasser told members of the Knesset’s Defense and Foreign Affairs Committee.

In the past 10 days alone, three attacks were thwarted, including an attempt to carry out a car bombing with a sophisticated device, the official said in the committee.

How does TIME Magazine view Hamas?

TIME: Inside Hamas

They talked about hitting the Sears Tower and simultaneous attacks on each coast, aiming for both California and states on the Atlantic coast. They went over plans for hitting Heathrow airport.

Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the alleged leader of the 9/11 attacks who was captured in Pakistan, told investigators about the plans leading up to 9/11, including chilling accounts of what could have happened. Imagine it being worse than it was.

Bin Laden, who like Khalid had studied engineering, vetoed simultaneous coast-to-coast attacks, arguing that “it would be too difficult to synchronise”.

Khalid switched to two waves: hitting the east coast first and following up with a second attack. “Osama had said the second wave should focus on the west coast,” he said.

After 9/11, they wanted to put their second plan in action:

[bin Laden] instructed [Khalid] to continue operations - with Britain as the next target.

“It was at this time we discussed the Heathrow operation,” Khalid said. “Osama declared (British Prime Minister Tony) Blair our principal enemy and London a target.”

Read the whole story here.

More at The Age

Al-Qaeda may have developed a terrorist naval force of 15-30 vessels, a terrorism expert says.

Alexey Muraviev, co-ordinator of graduate studies in strategy and defence at Curtin University of Technology in Perth, told a maritime security conference in Sydney yesterday that there were signs a big terrorist strike might be planned.

An al-Qaeda intelligence chief was killed in Pakistan’s massive military sweep through western tribal areas to root out members of Osama bin Laden’s terror network and the Taliban, a military official said Sunday.
Army spokesman Maj. Gen. Shaukat Sultan identified the intelligence chief only as Abdullah. When pressed for details, including Abdullah’s full name and nationality, Sultan said he had no more information.

Update: Apparently, this incident took place some time last week.

Another senior al Qaeda member is on the run and wounded.

Updates forthcoming.

REUTERS: ‘We’re at Your Service,’ Hizbollah Tells Hamas

izbollah leader Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah told Hamas’s new leader on Saturday to consider the Lebanese guerrilla group under his command following the assassination of Sheikh Ahmed Yassin this week.

In a show of unity between the two Islamist groups, Hamas new chief Khaled Meshaal also addressed thousands of Hizbollah supporters at a memorial service for his predecessor Yassin, whom Israel assassinated this week.

Nasrallah told him: “Consider us in Hizbollah, from the secretary-general and leadership down to our fighters and women, members of Hamas, and soldiers under your command.”

HA‘ARETZ: Fatah confession sheds new light on Arafat’s terror links

A confession by a member of Fatah’s armed branch in Nablus has shed new light on the extent of Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat’s involvement in terror. The terror suspect told Shin Bet security service interrogators that money he received from Arafat was used to purchase weapons and to carry out shooting attacks in the West Bank.

Raaf Mansur, from the Nablus area, was detained by Israel Defense Forces soldiers last February. Mansur headed a wing of Fatah’s military branch, the Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades. His cell was responsible for attacks in the Nablus and Jenin areas.

Letters confiscated by Israeli security forces from Mansur’s home included pleas sent to Arafat for money to fund armed activities. Mansur told interrogators that his appeals to Arafat resulted in a monthly NIS 7,500 payment to him. The allocations continued up to the time of Mansur’s arrest.

Mansur explained that the money was delivered via Abed al-Fatah Hameil, who serves as a financial adviser to the PA chairman. Mansur and Hameil met several times in Nablus. Mansur presented a list of his cell members and, after reviewing the names, Arafat’s assistant delivered the funds.

From Reuters :

A bomb hidden in a motorcycle exploded outside a bar in Thailand’s largely Muslim south on Saturday, wounding about 30 people, including seven Malaysian tourists, a police spokesman said.

The bomb exploded outside a bar and hotel in Sunghai Golok district of Narathiwat province, which has been under martial law since an armed raid in January on an army camp in the region in which many weapons were stolen.

The wounded included seven male Malaysian tourists. Three of them were in critical condition, police spokesman Champol Chaiyadej said from the scene.

He said 29 people were taken to hospital, 11 men and 18 women, most of them bar girls and waitresses working at the Top Ten club, an open-air bar next to the Marina Hotel in a border town popular with Malaysian tourists.

Police said they suspected the bomb had been detonated remotely.

(Via LGF)

Earlier, Reuters reported that Israeli troops killed a Palestinian boy. After doing a little more checking, the real story is slowly coming out…

REUTERS: Six-Year-Old Palestinian Boy Killed in Nablus

A six-year-old Palestinian boy was shot dead when a Palestinian gunman opened fire at an Israeli military jeep during a raid in a West Bank refugee camp on Saturday, the Israeli army said.

Television footage taken of the incident by foreign television networks showed a gunshot ricocheting off an armored Israeli jeep toward an upper floor of an adjacent building.

Twenty seconds later women’s screams could be heard. Moments later, a Palestinian holding the limp body of a boy with blood on his face and neck is seen outside the building. A Palestinian gunman was filmed in an alley minutes before the incident.

Palestinian residents said the dead boy, Khalil Walwil, was killed either when soldiers on a nearby hill opened fire at the building while he stood by a window or when troops shot at Palestinians throwing stones at Israeli forces in the camp.

An Israeli military commander, who was in the jeep that came under fire, said the boy was killed when a Palestinian gunman in an alley shot at his jeep as forces left Balata camp. The commander said none of his troops returned fire. “I did not fire back at him (the gunman) because his fire was not accurate,” said the commander, who under military regulations could only be identified as Lieutenant Colonel Guy.

“About 10 seconds after that I heard from behind my jeep terrible screams from a Palestinian woman. I turned around and I saw a family with a few people screaming. The father held his son who was covered in blood and they ran to ambulances there.”

OTHER SOURCES:
Ha’aretz, JPost, CNN. (CNN tells the Palestinian “Witnesses” story first, no mention of the video)

The situation is reminiscent of the Mohammed Al-Dura fabrication, except Reuters didn’t get the film crew to ditch the tapes in time.

According to Reuters FAQ:

QUESTION:
Do Reuters journalists voice their own opinions?

ANSWER:
No, never. News stories are sourced very clearly and precisely to enable readers and viewers to form their own judgment. Our correspondents do not use unconfirmed reports as the basis of a story, nor do they offer subjective opinion.

How do you feel about it?

REUTERS: Pakistani Soldiers Executed in Al Qaeda Standoff

Al Qaeda-linked militants have executed eight Pakistani soldiers taken hostage in fighting near the Afghan border, officials said on Saturday, raising the temperature in an offensive on Islamic radicals.

President Pervez Musharraf said his government was determined to act strongly against al Qaeda fighters, blaming them for a spate of attacks across the country including two attempts on his life in December.

The soldiers, their hands tied behind their backs and shot in the head at point-blank range, were found in a ditch on Friday near Wana, the capital of the South Waziristan area in Pakistan’s semi-autonomous tribal territories.

“It was a cold-blooded murder,” said Major-General Shaukat Sultan, the army’s spokesman. “We have identified the local and foreign militants and now we are chasing them. It was the worst kind of terrorism.”

HA‘ARETZ: Germany to launch probe into activities of Hamas in country

Federal investigators are launching a wide-scale probe into covert activities in Germany of the Palestinian Hamas militant group, according to a published report.

The report in Focus news magazine, due to hit newsstands across Germany on Monday, quotes sources close to Chief Federal Prosecutor Kay Nehm as saying investigators are planning “a major operation” against Hamas in Germany.

Federal prosecutors anticipate “a number of proceedings” to result from the probe, according to Focus. A spokeswoman for Nehm declined to comment on the report.

Hamas is believed to have 300 active members in Germany, according to estimates by German intelligence agents.

An influential Shiite cleric in Iraq called Israel’s assassination of the spiritual leader of Hamas a “dirty crime against Islam” and the September 11, 2001, terror attacks “a miracle from God.”

Moqtada al-Sadr delivered a charged sermon at Friday prayers at a mosque near the holy city of Najaf, blasting Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon for the killing of Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, founder of Hamas.

Of course, no rant against the U.S. and Sharon would be complete without somehow tying the two together as partners in crime:

[al-Sadr] accused the United States of complicity in Yassin’s killing and said Iraqis should be react to the assassination “in the way that satisfies God.”

Al-Sadr led the worshippers in chants: “No, no Israel! No, no to the Jews! No, no America! No, no to terrorism!”

He also went on to condemn the U.S. occupation of Iraq.

Keep your on this guy.

JERUSALEM POST: High terror alet to last 40 days

The high terror alert put in place following the assassination of Sheikh Ahmed Yassin will last for at least 40 days, or until the end of Independence Day, Channel 1 reported Friday night.

The IDF’s targeted killings of Palestinian terror group leaders will continue. “These terror leaders have reason to worry,” the TV 1 reported senior defense officials as saying Friday.

Here is a quote from Condi Rice in October of 2000 [before the election]:

Osama bin Laden, do two things, the first is you really have to get the intelligence agencies better organized to deal with the terrorist threat to the United States itself. One of the problems that we have is a kind of split responsibility, of course, between the CIA in foreign intelligence and the FBI in domestic intelligence. There needs to be better cooperation because we don’t want to wake up one day and find out that Osama bin Laden has been successful on our own territory.

Here is the quote from Richard Clarke’s new book:

… as I briefed Rice on Al-Qaeda, her facial expression gave me the impression she had never heard of the term before. So I added, ‘Most people think of it as Osama bin Laden’s group, but it is much more than that, it’s a network of affiliated terrorist organizations with cells in over 50 countries, including the U.S.

Listen to the sound byte at Rush Limbaugh.

HA‘ARETZ: Wanted militant killed in van blast in West Bank camp of Balata

A wanted Palestinian militant was killed Friday when an explosion went off in the van he was driving in the West Bank refugee camp of Balata, witnesses said.

The militant was identified as Ahmed al-Abed from the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, which is linked to Yasser Arafat’s Fatah movement.

Palestinian sources confirmed Israel Defense Forces’ claims that the explosion was the result of a work accident, saying that the militant had an explosives belt at the time of the blast.

“This is another sure sign that Palestinian terrorists are busying themselves in building the next bomb, choosing the next target and perpetrating the next attack against Israelis in the hearts of our cities,” David Baker, an official at the Prime Minister’s Office told Haaretz. “Israel remains on guard to thwart such attacks and to stop Palestinian terror in its tracks,” he added.

UPDATE:
It was two dead militants. Adjust your boxscores accordingly.

REUTERS: Israeli Troops Kill Palestinian Frogmen in Gaza

Israeli soldiers killed two Palestinian militants in wetsuits who came ashore near the Jewish settlement of Tel Katifa in Gaza and fired at an army post, military sources said Friday.

Hamas’s armed wing, the Izz el-Deen al-Qassam Brigades, said two of its fighters carried out a “unique naval operation” and “ascended to heaven as martyrs” after battling Israeli troops.

“This attack is just a prelude to a series of earthquake-like operations,” the brigades said in a statement.

MAARIV: US refuses to guarantee Arafat’s well- being

The message sent by Israel with the elimination of Sheikh Ahmed Yassin along with hints from Chief of Staff Ya’alon, reverberated loud and clear in Yasser Arafat’s office. Fearing a similar fate for the Palestinian Authority Chairman, his men turned to the US, asking them to prevent Israel from killing Arafat.

The Chief of Staff’s threat to the effect that targets for elimination could include Arafat and Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah, is part of the policy of intentional vagueness decided upon by Israel. In the framework of this policy, Israel does not intend to specify which terror leaders are targeted for future elimination, with the exception of Yassin’s successor – Abdel Aziz al-Rantisi - whom it has been officially decided to eliminate.

Arafat’s men are taking this policy seriously. During the course of the week security measures for Arafat’s protection in the Muqata in Ramallah were beefed up. Fearing those measures inadequate, Palestinians requested help from the American Intelligence service – the CIA- to intervene for Arafat’s protection. Simultaneously, the Palestinians also pursued other avenues of assistance in the US. According to American sources, the US has refused to give a commitment to Arafat’s men that Israel would not eliminate him too.

The Associated Press reports that the United States vetoed a U.N. Security Council resolution condemning Israel’s killing of Hamas leader Ahmed Yassin:

The United States had demanded that the resolution also condemn violence by Hamas and other militant groups, and that it identify them by name. Algeria, the resolution’s sponsor, had resisted.

The resolution “is silent about the terrorist atrocities committed by Hamas,” U.S. Ambassador John Negroponte said before the vote. He called the measure “unbalanced, one-sided.”

The vote was 11 countries in favor, three countries abstaining and one country — the United States — against.

[. . .]

Hamas has claimed responsibility for dozens of bombings and shootings of Israelis during 3 1/2 years of violence. Israel says it is targeting the group’s leaders to stop such attacks, but critics say killing suspects without arresting or trying them violates international law.

The Financial Times reports that Libya has promised to join the ‘war on terror.’ According to the Times:

Although the Libyan leader appeared only briefly and did not speak to reporters, Abdulrahman Shalgam, his foreign minister, explained the country’s determination to fight al-Qaeda, now widely suspected to be responsible for the Madrid bombings, alongside the US and Britain.

“For us, they are a real obstacle against our progress, against our security, against women, against the new culture, against moderation and against any change in our region,” he said.

Colonel Gadaffi’s hatred of al-Qaeda dates back to an assassination attempt, for which he issued an international warrant for the arrest of Osama bin Laden in 1999.

The dictator has long been regarded as a target for Islamic extremists.

CNN and others are reporting a new al-Qaeda tape, voiced by the #2 CEO of al Qaeda, Ayman al-Zawahiri.

Al Jazeera (of course) broadcast the tape. The only part quoted so far is this:

pq. The tape calls Pakistan’s president, Pervez Musharraf, a “Muslim assassin” and urges the northwest border region’s largely autonomous tribes to fight government troops.

No absolute confirmation on whether it’s really al- Zawahiri yet.

Update: Fox has more.

“Musharraf seeks to stab the Islamic resistance in Afghanistan in the back,” the speaker said.

“Every Muslim in Pakistan should work hard to get rid of this agent government, which will continue to submit to America until it destroys Pakistan.”

…

The speaker appeared to be referring to the conflict in South Waziristan when he said, “I call on the Pakistani army: you, poor army, what a miserable state Musharraf has put you in … Musharraf ruins your natural fences — those tribes on the border — by engaging you in a fight with them. Then he removes your nuclear weapons. Will you stay silent until Pakistan is divided again?”

REUTERS: U.S. Places 2,000 More Marines Near Afghanistan

The United States has placed about 2,000 Marines with special operations training aboard Navy ships in the Gulf, poised for use in Afghanistan, where the hunt for al Qaeda and Taliban fugitives is intensifying, defense officials said on Thursday.

U.S. commanders have not yet decided how many of the Marines deployed with the seven-vessel naval Expeditionary Strike Group, led by the amphibious assault ship USS Wasp, will be sent into Afghanistan, officials said.

The Marines are from Camp Lejeune, North Carolina.

The Wasp strike group, carrying 2,000 to 2,200 Marines from the 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit, left North Carolina on Feb. 19 for a scheduled six-month deployment in the Gulf region and arrived in recent days, officials said.

“Some of the those Marines will participate in and support operations in Afghanistan,” said a defense official, speaking on condition of anonymity.

JERUSALEM POST: Amnesty to Palestinians: Denounce use of children

Amnesty International issued a report stating that “using children to carry out or assist in armed attacks of any kind is an abomination. We call on the Palestinian leadership to publicly denounce these practices.”

The report was published on Thursday in response to Wednesday’s foiled attack, in which a 14-year-old Palestinian, Husam Abdu Hawara, was discovered carrying an explosive’ belt while attempting to pass through Hawara checkpoint, near Nablus. According to the boy’s account, he received NIS 100 to blow himself up near the soldiers, with the additional promise of being awarded 72 virgins in heaven.

JERUSALEM POST: Gaza Psychiatrist: social anarchy produces child bombers

Dr. Eyad Sarraj, a human rights activist who heads up Gaza’s only psychiatric clinic, said that the case of Husam Abdu, 14, who was captured by the Israeli troops wearing a belt of explosives, is exceptional. He was apparently being exploited by parties still unidentified, Sarraj said, adding that perhaps even Israel is behind it.

“A group of Palestinians, or maybe one Palestinian, exploited this boy for certain purposes. However, as for Hamas and Islamic Jihad,” he said, “the two movements have repeatedly opposed the use of children in their operations.”

“Children do not understand the meaning of death, and that is why they are easily manipulated. This phenomenon characterizes a state of social anarchy. It is a product of families that do not protect themselves, and the father does not fulfil his role responsibly,” Dr. Sarraj said.

“It is worth mention that the Palestinian people magnify and exalt the topic of martyrdom. As for children, as shown in questionnaires they fill in, they see martyrdom as an honorable action and something to aspire towards,” Dr. Sarraj added.

(Never mind the propaganda on television, posters in their schools, and the trading cards.)

JERUSALEM POST: Muslim worshipers restricted at Temple Mount

Citing intelligence alerts over likely Palestinian disturbances at the Temple Mount after Friday Muslim prayers, Jerusalem police announced Thursday that they will be imposing restrictions on entrance to the holy site on Friday.

All Arab men under the age of 45 will be barred from entering the bitterly contested site for the mid-day prayers, police said.

The restrictions come days after Israel went on nationwide high alert following Monday’s killing of Hamas leader Sheikh Ahmed Yassin.

HA‘ARETZ: Blair and Gadhafi pledge to fight Al-Qaida

British Prime Minister Tony Blair sealed Libya’s return to the international fold on Thursday with an historic handshake with Muammar Gadhafi and an agreement to fight Al-Qaida together.

After more than an hour of talks, Blair said Libya’s rejection of banned weapons and rapprochement with the West could act as a template for other Arab nations to turn their back on Islamic extremism.

“We are showing by our engagement with Libya today that it is possible for countries in the Arab world to work with the United States and the U.K. to defeat the common enemy of extremist fanatical terrorism driven by Al-Qaida,” he told reporters.

“It is a very, very important signal for the whole of the Arab world.”

JERUSALEM POST: US to veto anti-Israel Security Council resolution

The United States is expected to veto a UN Security Council resolution Thursday night condemning Israel for killing Hamas leader Sheikh Ahmed Yassin.

The US, one of five nations with a veto power in the council, reiterated in the past week its refusal to condemn Israeli counter-terror actions without a condemnation of Palestinian terrorist groups.

On Tuesday, the council scheduled a debate to discuss Yassin’s assassination, after Algeria, the council’s only Arab member, failed to gain US support for council statement condemning Israel.

“Events must be considered in their context, and as we consider the killing of Sheikh Yassin, we must keep in mind the facts. Sheikh Yassin was the leader of a terrorist organization, which has proudly taken credit for attacks on innocent civilians,” said US ambassador John Negroponte.

JERUSALEM POST: Hamas arch-terrorist Muhammad Deif - an interview

Muhammad Deif, 42, commander of the Hamas military wing and the man who has topped Israel’s most-wanted list for years, granted an interview to the official website of Hamas military wing Izz al-Din al Qassam Brigades on March 8.

Deif, a resident of Khan Younis in the Gaza Strip, was appointed the new commander of the Hamas Izz al-Din al Qassam Brigades, following the killing of his predecessor, Salah Shehadeh, in an IAF bomb strike in July 2002.

Israel holds the master-bomber Muhammad Deif personally responsible for the deaths of dozens of people in multiple suicide bombings since 1996. He was seriously wounded in an attempted targeted killing while in his vehicle in the Gaza Strip in September 2002. Responsible for the murders of scores of Israelis, Deif plotted, planned, and dispatched terrorists to perpetrate numerous terrorist attacks. Israel has attempted to nab Deif several times since the PA freed him in October 2000.

Read the rest, and then wonder if Kofi Annan will condemn Israel when Deif kisses a Hellfire missile on the lips.

CNN is reporting that Condi Rice just held a press conference to release an unclassified portion of an email sent to her from Dick Clarke just after September 11 in which he states that he worries the Bush Administration might be accused of not doing enough to prevent September 11, and listing actions that the Administration had taken against terrorism and Al Qaeda to combat that perception.

6:04 update: CNN reports Rice says on July 5, 2001, she met with Clarke and instructed him to put all domestic agencies on a higher alert, because there was a chance of a domestic attack, even though the evidence principly indicated a foreign attack.

MAARIV: FM Shalom asks UN’s Annan to denounce terrorism

Foreign Minister Sylvan Shalom met tonight (Wednesday) in New York with UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan. Shalom said during the meeting that the UN must denounce the perpetrators of terror rather than Israel over its justified assassination of Hamas leader Ahmed Yasin. Annan offered that the UN would take part in maintaining order in the Gaza Strip after the planned withdrawal takes place.

(Because they’ve done such a great job with UNFIL and holding member-state Lebanon to their obligations.)

The 9-11 Commission’s testimony today is being live-blogged by the Belgravia Dispatch weblog.

Today’s testimony featured tense exchanges between Commission member John Lehman (former Secretary of the Navy), Commission member Fred Fielding (former White House counsel), and Richard A. Clarke (who recently wrote a book, “Against All Enemies,” criticizing the Bush Administration’s pre-9-11 counter-terrorism efforts):

Here’s how Fox News reported this portion of the testimony:

- - - - - - -

Several panelists said they were taken aback by the brouhaha surrounding Clarke’s book and his allegations in it, since his closed-door sessions with the commission panel were completely different in tone.

“You’ve got a real credibility problem,” John Lehman, former Navy secretary under President Reagan, told Clarke, calling the witness “an active partisan selling a book.”

- - - - - - -

Via Instapundit.

Out the door to a dinner, but here’s something to pass up the food chain.

Roadracing World, a motorcycle roadracing magazine and website I read regularly, intermittently publishes letters from riders and racers stationed over in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Here’s an excerpt from one published today:

“My former NCOIC was severely injured in a terrible roadside bomb yesterday. He was in a Bradley Fighting Vehicle commander’s hatch when it exploded and some shrapnel hit him in the back of the neck. Luckily the convoy he was in was right next to a U.S. base so they managed to air-evacuate him almost immediately. He spent about 6 hours in surgery and they almost declared him dead twice. They finally managed to stabilize him but they weren’t showing any brain activity. So basically they thought he had brain stem damage. But this morning he was doing better and they are putting him under observation for 2 days to see if the swelling in his brain goes down before they try to evacuate him to Germany. My soldiers are pretty upset. He is now the 3rd soldier that I personally know who has been killed or severely injured here. He had a month left to go—he has a wife and 3 kids back in Germany. We are all just praying for his recovery.

The other bad news is that for some reason the stupid idiots at the Corps level JAG are deciding to clean out the jails here in Iraq. Well, instead of letting out the low-level weapons violators they are letting out the terrorists that are involved in putting out these roadside bombs—because they claim that we don’t have enough evidence against them. In the last two weeks three major figures in the main bad guy group here have gotten out—and we have already seen the results as one of our unit’s informants has already been assassinated. So it seems like everything we have worked for for the last year and the 13 deaths our unit has sustained has been for nothing. We are all pretty discouraged.”

If the latter is true, than someone needs to get hammered. We’re still at war, and to the extent that the JAG staff is applying peacetime public-defender standards (and remember, I’m the pro-defense attorney liberal) there’s something seriously wrong.

If anyone knows more about this, I’d love to hear about it: armed [at] armedliberal {dot} com… or in the comments section over at the original Winds of Change.NET post.

In Dr. Evil Cornered, Robin Burke and Tom Roberts were talking about communications and U.S. forces, and how that affected our NATO allies in Afghanistan. That’s something’ve I covered before in U.S. Military — Back to the Future! Here’s Robin…

“US troops are begining to deploy some rather advanced technologies on the battlefield, plus fighting doctrines to leverage these technologies. The other NATO countries can’t begin to match these capabilities and integrating those troops with our forces that do use them is a recipe for real problems…. How on earth would you integrate large numbers of NATO forces into those scenarios, even if there weren’t the ego / geopolitical games about targetting and risk taking???”

…and Tom Roberts:

“Non US forces don’t even have digital communications for the most part. In many cases the Coalition forces have to be lent commo gear so that their HQs can talk with US forces. This creates a dichotomous pace of operations in any NATO command as well. Without heavy US liaison elements, the NATO forces don’t know what is going on. To a certain extent the Canadian friendly fire deaths by Kandahar two years ago were due to such issues (along with two US pilot’s very poor judgments), but you might notice that when US forces swing into an offensive situation either allies get totally integrated into the US force structure (like the Canadian snipers were at Tora Bora or the Aussie SAS is with us Spec Forces) or they get totally out of the way.”

Which brings up two things I talked about in my article clips:

Read the Rest…

In pdf format.

Staff Statement #7 - Intelligence Policy

Staff Statement #8 - National Policy Coordination

Consider this post an open forum for discussion on the 9/11 Hearings.

Yesterday’s statements are here.

This FOXNews item was just forwarded by reader Michael Georgis. Here’s the lead:

The following transcript documents a background briefing in early August 2002 by President Bush’s former counterterrorism coordinator Richard A. Clarke to a handful of reporters, including Fox News’ Jim Angle. In the conversation, cleared by the White House on Wednesday for distribution, Clarke describes the handover of intelligence from the Clinton administration to the Bush administration and the latter’s decision to revise the U.S. approach to Al Qaeda.

Here’s the pre-Q&A section of the transcript:

RICHARD CLARKE: Actually, I’ve got about seven points, let me just go through them quickly. Um, the first point, I think the overall point is, there was no plan on Al Qaeda that was passed from the Clinton administration to the Bush administration.

Second point is that the Clinton administration had a strategy in place, effectively dating from 1998. And there were a number of issues on the table since 1998. And they remained on the table when that administration went out of office — issues like aiding the Northern Alliance in Afghanistan, changing our Pakistan policy — uh, changing our policy toward Uzbekistan. And in January 2001, the incoming Bush administration was briefed on the existing strategy. They were also briefed on these series of issues that had not been decided on in a couple of years.

And the third point is the Bush administration decided then, you know, mid-January, to do two things. One, vigorously pursue the existing policy, including all of the lethal covert action findings, which we’ve now made public to some extent.

And the point is, while this big review was going on, there were still in effect, the lethal findings were still in effect. The second thing the administration decided to do is to initiate a process to look at those issues which had been on the table for a couple of years and get them decided.

So, point five, that process which was initiated in the first week in February, uh, decided in principle, uh in the spring to add to the existing Clinton strategy and to increase CIA resources, for example, for covert action, five-fold, to go after Al Qaeda.

The sixth point, the newly-appointed deputies — and you had to remember, the deputies didn’t get into office until late March, early April. The deputies then tasked the development of the implementation details, uh, of these new decisions that they were endorsing, and sending out to the principals.

Over the course of the summer — last point — they developed implementation details, the principals met at the end of the summer, approved them in their first meeting, changed the strategy by authorizing the increase in funding five-fold, changing the policy on Pakistan, changing the policy on Uzbekistan, changing the policy on the Northern Alliance assistance.

And then changed the strategy from one of rollback with Al Qaeda over the course [of] five years, which it had been, to a new strategy that called for the rapid elimination of al Qaeda. That is in fact the timeline.

This is getting interesting …

JERUSALEM POST: UK freezes Hamas leader’s funds

Britain’s treasury chief on Wednesday ordered the Bank of England to freeze any assets of five senior Hamas members, including Abdel Aziz Rantisi, the group’s new leader in Gaza.

Gordon Brown, the chancellor of the exchequer, said the government had reasonable grounds to suspect that Rantisi and four others - Musa Abu Marzouk, Imad Khalil Al-Alami, Usama Hamdan and Khalid Mishaal - may be involved in terrorism.

(They get to keep the free toasters, however.)

JERUSALEM POST: Mashal: Sharon in our sights

Earlier, IBA news reported that Abdel Aziz Rantissi’s appointment as the successor to assassinated leader Sheikh Ahmed Yassin was raising contention within the Hamas.

Rantissi announced his appointment at a mass rally on Tuesday in Gaza. Movement officials contend that the religious leaders committee should have first ratified the appointment, but they are afraid to convene.

Movement officials are describing Rantissi’s self-crowning as “rude”, claiming he did not even wait for Yassin’s “blood to cool” before announcing his own succession.

(Just in case you actually believed the crazy news stories about Hamas holding elections and understanding what the word “democracy” means.)

HA‘ARERZ: Soldiers catch Palestinian boy wearing explosive belt

Israel Defense Forces soldiers caught a Palestinian boy, aged about 8, wearing an explosive belt at the Hawara roadblock south of Nablus in the West Bank. Sappers detonated the device in a controlled explosion.

The boy has been taken in for questioning.

The army believes that the boy was meant to detonate the belt near the soldiers or near the nearby army base.

UPDATE:
In less than a day, he’s aged 6 years.

MAARIV: 14 year old Palestinian sent on suicide bombing mission

A 14 year-old Palestinian boy, with a bomb-belt strapped to his body, was caught Wednesday afternoon as he ran towards soldiers manning the Hawara roadblock near Nablus in the West Bank.

IDF sappers are currently attempting to carry out a controlled detonation of the belt.

During his initial interrogation the boy said he had been paid NIS 100 (about $20) to blow himself up among soldiers.

• “The embassy in Abu Dhabi and consulate in Dubai have temporarily suspended operation on Wednesday, March 24, in light of a specific threat to the embassy in Abu Dhabi,” [spokesperson for the U.S. Embassy Hilary] Olsin-Windecker said. The embassy received a “specific” threat on Monday.

Other U.S. embassies issuing their own warnings include those in Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria and Yemen.

• In Manama, Bahrain, demonstrators, mostly students, through rocks and chunks of cement at the walls of the U.S. Embassy, shouting “Death to America and Israel.”

“America is the root of all the problems, and we want this embassy in Bahrain to be shut down,” said a teenage student from a nearby school.

• German President Johannes Rau, on a tour in Africa visiting German naval troops - part of the U.S. led war on terror - canceled a trip to Djibouti yesterday.

German intelligence received specific threats that Islamic terrorists would try to assasinate Rau and advised him to cancel the rest of his trip.

• The U.S. warned Americans around the world of terror risks after the killing of Sheik Yassin of Hamas. There have been heightened threats of attacks against U.S. citizens and U.S. properties since Yassin was struck down on Monday. The most credible threats are against U.S. interests in West Asia and North Africa. The state department said that those threats could mean the use of chemical or biological agents. They also told Americans in the Gaza strip that they should leave the area.

[Other sources: AFP, AP, Reuters]

Uzbekistan seeks the extradition of terror leader

Uzbekistan will consider seeking the extradition of the leader of a terror group if he is caught among suspected Al Qaeda militants fighting Pakistani troops near the Afghan border, an official said on Monday.

“If Tahir Yuldash is captured, we will consider his extradition, since he has committed crimes on Uzbek territory and was one of the main founders of the terrorist group IMU,” the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, Foreign Ministry spokesman Ilkhom Zakirov said.

[This page will be updated as more statements become available.]

All links are PDF files.

• Staff Statement #5

• Staff Statement #6

• Colin Powell’s submitted statement

• Statement from former Secretary of Defense William S. Cohen

• Testimony of Donald Rumsfeld

HA‘ARETZ: IDF attacks cell in Lebanon preparing to fire rockets at Israel

Israel Defense Forces helicopters on Tuesday night attacked a terrorist cell in southern Lebanon, who the army said was preparing launchers to fire Katyush rockets at Israel.

The Reuters news agency reported that two Palestinians were killed in the attack.

The firing began at around 10 P.M. in the central sector of the border between Israel and Lebanon, close to Manara.

News Agencies reported Tuesday that shots were fired from Lebanon at Israel, but the IDF rejected these reports.

William Cohen:

I think that we have failed to fully comprehend the gathering storm, even now after September 11

Rumsfeld:

“If we’re to continue to live as free people we cannot go back to thinking the way the world thought on Sept. 10.”

* “I knew of no intelligence in the six-plus months leading up to Sept. 11 that indicated terrorists would hijack commercial airliners, use them as missiles to fly them into the pentagon or World Trade Center towers.”

From the commission’s preliminary rulings:

• “From the spring of 1997 to September 2001, the U.S. government tried to persuade the Taliban to expel bin Laden to a country where he could face justice. The efforts employed inducements, warnings and sanctions. All these efforts failed.”
• Defense Department employees testified that an invasion of Afghanistan before 9/11 would not have been supported by Congress or the public.

• Following the unsuccessful Aug. 20, 1998, missile strikes against bin Laden and other al-Qaida leaders, both senior military officials and policy-makers placed great emphasis on “actionable intelligence” as the key factor in recommending or deciding to launch military action against bin Laden and his organization.

• Policy-makers and military officials expressed frustration with the lack of actionable intelligence.

JERUSALEM POST: UN Council can’t agree on Yassin condemnation

The United States and Algeria could not agree Tuesday on a UN Security Council statement that would have condemned the killing of Hamas spiritual leader Sheik Ahmed Yassin, paving the way for an open UN Security Council meeting.

Delegations had been meeting Monday and Tuesday to discuss a proposed text circulated by Algeria, the only Arab nation on the council, that would have had the president of the Security Council condemn the killing.

But Algeria later withdrew the statement after the United States insisted on language in the document that would have condemned recent terrorist activities by Hamas, US Ambassador John Negroponte said.

“The essential point here was that the proponents of this statement did not want to refer to terrorism conducted by Hamas and that was the fundamental objection we had,” Negroponte said.

The Palestinians then called for an open meeting of the Security Council to discuss Yassin’s killing.

• Quotes from Colin Powell:

“We were well aware that no nation is immune to terrorism … we knew that its evil leaders and followers espouse many false causes but have one common purposes — to murder innocent people,” Powell told the bipartisan federal panel reviewing the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the United States.

“Mr. Bush and everyone on his team knew terrorism was going to be a big concern for us.”

“President Bush and the entire national security team understood that terrorism had to be our highest priority and it was,” Powell said, adding that, “President Bush was very concerned about Al Qaeda and the safe haven given to them by the Taliban.”

The agenda for the rest of the hearings (today and tomorrow)

1:30 - 2:00 PM
STAFF STATEMENT NO. 6
The Military

2:00 - 3:30 PM
The Honorable William S. Cohen
Former Secretary of Defense

3:30 - 5:00 PM
The Honorable Donald H. Rumsfeld
Secretary of Defense

Wednesday, March 24 2004
8:30 - 9:00 AM
STAFF STATEMENT NO. 7
Intelligence Policy

9:00 - 10:30 AM
The Honorable George J. Tenet
Director of Central Intelligence

10:30 - 11:00 AM
STAFF STATEMENT NO. 8
National Policy Coordination

11:00 - 12:30 PM
The Honorable Samuel R. Berger
Former Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs

12:30 - 1:30 PM
BREAK

1:30 - 4:00 PM
Mr. Richard A. Clarke
Former National Coordinator for Counterterrorism, National Security Council

4:00 - 5:30 PM
The Honorable Richard L. Armitage
Deputy Secretary of State

5:30 PM
Hearing concludes. Press Availability to follow.

• Update: The Staff Statement (#5) from this morning can be found in full (in PDF form) here.

• Update: Staff Statement #6 is now online pdf)

• Colin Powell’s submitted statement (pdf).

FOX

The Palestinian militant group Hamas has named Abdel Aziz Rantissi its new leader, following the killing of Hamas founder Ahmed Yassin, Fox News has confirmed.

The announcement was made over loudspeaker during a gathering of tens of thousands of Hamas supporters at a soccer stadium in Gaza City.

“After the assassination of the hero, the martyr Ahmed Yassin, a secret election was held … in which Dr. Abdel Aziz Rantisi was chosen as the new leader of the Islamic Resistance Movement,” a senior Hamas official, Ismail Hanieh, told the crowd.

Rantissi, who has been the group’s chief spokesman, will have oversight of the Gaza Strip. But he will not be in control of the West Bank, a Hamas official told Reuters.

al-Rantissi, in case you are wondering, is the co-founder of Hamas.

Want to know more?

Rantissi is fiercely against any kind of compromise with Israel. In 1999, when negotiations were underway to try for a cease-fire, Rantissi was vehemently opposed to any cease-fire and cessation of terrorist attacks inside Israel.

…[H]e has consistently argued that Palestinians have a right to resist Israel by any and all means, including the suicide bombing of civilians.

“They are not terrorism,” he told the Arabic newspaper Kut al-Arab in 1998.

“They are a response to Israeli terrorism, individuals and governmental, against Palestinian civilians.”

Vowing to keep fighting on till “our homeland is liberated”, Rantissi offered a reciprocal initiative, whereby “we will stop hunting for Israelis in return for allowing them to get out of our homeland safely”.

Correction: Rantissi has been named leader of Hamas in Gaza only. The new supreme leader of Hamas is Khaled Mashaal. [A. Pundit]

AP has compiled preliminary rulings of the 9/11 Commission:

• From the spring of 1997 to September 2001 the U.S. government tried to persuade the Taliban to expel Osama bin Laden from Afghanistan to a country where he could face justice and that would not be a sanctuary for his organization. The efforts employed inducements, warnings and sanctions. All these efforts failed.

• The U.S. government also pressed two successive Pakistani governments to demand that the Taliban cease providing a sanctuary for bin Laden and his organization and, failing that, to cut off their support for the Taliban. Before Sept. 11 the United States could not find a mix of incentives or pressure that would persuade Pakistan to reconsider its fundamental relationship with the Taliban.

• From 1999 through early 2001, the United States pressed the United Arab Emirates, one of the Taliban’s only travel and financial outlets to the outside world, to break off ties and enforce sanctions, especially related to air travel to Afghanistan. These efforts achieved little before Sept. 11.

• The government of Saudi Arabia worked closely with top U.S. officials in major initiatives to solve the bin Laden problem with diplomacy. On the other hand, before Sept. 11 the Saudi and U.S. governments did not achieve full sharing of important intelligence information or develop an adequate joint effort to track and disrupt the finances of the al-Qaida organization.

The 9/11 panel convened today, questioning Former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright. Secretary of State Colin Powell, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and former Defense Secretary William Cohen will all appear before the panel later today.

The Clinton administration had early indications of terrorist links to Osama bin Laden and future Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed as early as 1995, but let years pass as it pursued criminal indictments and diplomatic solutions to subduing them abroad, it found.

Bush officials, meanwhile, failed to act immediately on increasing intelligence chatter and urgent warnings in early 2001 by its counterterrorism adviser, Richard A. Clarke, to take out al-Qaida targets, according to preliminary findings by the commission reviewing the attacks.

Albright said:

“Each day brings with it the possibility of a terrorist strike,” she added, saying the recent Madrid bombings show that, “despite all that is being done, our enemies have a broad range of targets. We should all expect and prepare ourselves for the likelihood that attacks could happen on our own soil.”

More:

She described the 1998 attacks on the American embassies in Tanzania and Zambia as “my worst day as Secretary of State.”

Within a week, she added, “we had clear evidence that Osama bin Laden was responsible. The question for us was whether to rely on law enforcement or take military action. We decided to do both.”

More as it happens.

Winds of Change.NET Regional Briefings run on Tuesdays & Wednesdays, and sometimes Fridays too. This Regional Briefing focuses on Central Asia & the Caucasus, courtesy of Nathan Hamm of The Argus.

TOP TOPICS

• If you are reading this briefing, you’re probably the type of person who knows that, at the very least, a whole lot of something is happening in Pakistan and Afghanistan right now. It would be foolhardy for me to give a blow-by-blow here, but Operation Mountain Storm is well underway and is designed to capture, kill, or flush into Afghanistan the militants taking refuge in Pakistan’s tribal regions. For reports of various engagements over the past month, check out the Winds of War Archive at this very blog or Eye on the World’s brief report.

• Early speculation that Pakistani troops had cornered Ayman al-Zawahiri appears to be untrue. However, it looks like the group making its last stand near Wana, Pakistan is none other than the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU). The “high value target” is most likely Tohir Yo’ldosh, the co-founder of the IMU. Whoever was there may have escaped through a tunnel system and fled for Afghanistan.

• Civil war was narrowly averted in Georgia this month following a quickly-escalating crisis precipitated when officials in the semi-autonomous region of Ajaria barred President Saakashvili from entering the region.

• In the New Yorker, Seymour Hersh connects the dots between Libya, Pakistan’s nuclear arms market, and Operation Mountain Storm. The Agonist has more information, courtesy of Stratfor.

Other Topics Today Include: Major Afghsanistan briefing; More on Yo’ldosh & the IMU; Georgia’s Ajaria Problem; Uzbekistan, Human Right, and The West; Turkmenistan’s Continuing Slide Towards Absurdity; and, Much More.

Read The rest…

JERUSALEM POST: Mofaz: Israel to continue targeting terror leaders

Asked if Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat is on the list of terror leaders, Mofaz smiled and answered, “You should ask him (Arafat).”

MAARIV: Hamas official: US offered Yasin immunity if he stopped terror

Sheikh Said Siam, a senior functionary of Hamas, has given Maariv Online the first official confirmation for reports that appeared recently in the Arab press that the United States offered the organization’s leader Sheikh Ahmad Yasin immunity from attempts on his life in return for a stop to terrorist attacks.

This immunity, according to Sheikh Siam, would have applied only to the political wing of Hamas and not to its armed wing, the Iz a-Din el-Kassam Brigades. The offer was relayed to Yasin by intermediaries, but he rejected it saying “the blood of Hamas leaders is no dearer than that of a Palestinian child.”

Monday’s ceasefire didn’t last too long. al-Qaeda militants ambushed a Pakistani camp yesterday in Wana, firing rockets and then exhanging gunfire with the Pakistani troops.

AP reports:

The unidentified attackers fired rockets that hit at least six army trucks in the ambush near Sarwakai, about 50 kilometers east of Wana, the main town in the South Waziristan tribal region.

Some of the trucks were carrying gasoline and were destroyed by fire in the attack Monday, a government official in Sarwakai said on condition of anonymity. He said 12 soldiers were killed and 15 were injured.

Reuters

Spanish investigators questioned Arab suspects about Madrid train bombings in court on Monday (Tuesday in Manila) and police arrested four others in trying to break open a plot that killed 202 people and may be linked to al Qaeda.

Fourteen men are now being held in the simultaneous bombing of four commuter trains in the Spanish capital on March 11. Most of the suspects are Moroccans allegedly linked to Osama bin Laden’s al Qaeda network.

A letter supposedly from an al-Qaeda linked group urges Palestinians to seek revenge for Shiek Yassin’s death:

”We tell Palestinians that Sheikh Yassin’s blood was not spilt in vain and call on all legions of Abu Hafs al-Masri Brigades to avenge him by attacking the tyrant of the age, America, and its allies,” said the statement by Abu Hafs al-Masri Brigade carried by the al ansar forum website.

The letter’s authenticity has not been verified.

The top al Qaeda members that Pakistanis have been fighting to get to may be long gone.

Top Al-Qaeda terrorists may have escaped a siege involving thousands of Pakistani soldiers through several secret tunnels leading from mud fortresses to a dry mountain stream near the border with Afghanistan, a security chief said yesterday.

The longest tunnel found so far was more than one mile (two kilometers) long and led from the homes of two local men — Nek Mohammed and Sharif Khan — to a stream near the frontier, said Brig. Mahmood Shah, head of security for Pakistan’s tribal regions.

“There is a possibility that the tunnel may have been used at the start of the operation,” Shah told journalists in Peshawar, the provincial capital. He said the tunnels began at the homes in the village of Kaloosha and led in the direction of a mountain range that straddles the border.

JERUSALEM POST: Foreign Office issues talking points

• Yassin was at important link in international terror, and Hamas had connections with other terror groups around the world.

• Trying to characterize Yassin as a “spiritual leader” is similar to trying to characterize Osama bin Laden in the same vein. Yassin took advantage of his status as a spiritual leader to influence the carrying out of hundreds of murderous attacks, from the Dolphinarium attack in Tel Aviv in 2001 to the Passover eve attack in Netanya in 2002. He personally was responsible for the June 2002 attack on the Number 19 bus in Jerusalem at the Patt Junction, in which 19 people were murdered and 74 wounded.

• Yassin led for years a radical Islamic terror organization that carried out a long list of horrible attacks which killed and wounded hundreds of Israelis.

• Yassin was a chilling example of the cynical use of religion to send women and children to blow themselves up and kill hundreds of Israelis.

• The killing of Yassin is not an act of vengeance, but rather part of a continuous campaign against terrorists who have targeted Israelis, and whose final goal is the destruction of Israel.

• Those who deal in terrorism must know that Israel will not sit quietly and wait for the next suicide bomber to appear on the streets of Tel Aviv or Jerusalem. Israel’s government, like all governments around the world, has a basic responsibility to protect its citizens from terrorists.

• In parallel to the fight against the terror infrastructure and terrorist leaders, Israel will continue to try to reach a diplomatic arrangement with the Palestinians based on the road map. This arrangement will only be reached in the future if the Palestinians will both fight terror and abandon terror as a way of solving diplomatic disagreements.

• Israel offered the Palestinians hope based on reasonable compromise. It extended its hand in peace, but received in exchange a full portion of terror. Even now, Israel is being threatened by an increase in terror, and it will continue to defend itself against these threats.

It was only a matter of time before other countries tried to implicate the U.S.

The United States strongly denied any involvement in the assassination on Monday of Hamas leader Sheikh Ahmed Yassin and appealed for calm in the region following his death.

White House national security advisor Condoleezza Rice said in a round of interviews on U.S. television stations that the United States did not have advance warning of the assassination.

…

Pressed on whether the United States had played a role in Yassin’s death or whether Sharon had called President Bush to tell him that Israeli forces planned the assassination, Rice replied: “He did not.”

JERUSALEM POST: Sharon: Attack was originally planned for Sunday

Sharon told Likud members that he had personally called the chief of staff, the commander of the airforce and the head of the shin bet to congratulate them on the attack.

He said that the assassination of Yassin was in fact scheduled for Sunday, but was delayed for technical and operational reasons.

Had the attack taken place on Sunday, Sharon said, it would have been interpreted as a gesture to Likud ministers he met that day.

There are reports of coalition soldiers coming under fire in Iraq in response to killing of Yassin.

So far, the only thing I could dig up was this report at AJC.

Security fears have led to one world leader cancelling a trip, while a condemnation cancels the trip of another.

Romanian President Ion Iliescu has postponed a three-day official visit to Israel due to start on Monday because of fears about security after Israel’s assassination of Hamas leader Sheikh Ahmed Yassin.

Egypt’s President Hosni Mubaraka cancelled a visit by Egyptian legislators to Israel:

Mubarak termed the killing “regrettable and cowardly” when he spoke to reporters after meeting with U.S. Middle East envoy William Burns.

From Reuters via the ABC (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) :

Suspected Al Qaeda fighters are reported to have launched an attack just hours after the Pakistani military called for a ceasefire in its operations on the Afghan border.

Rockets have been fired at the army camp in the western town of Wana, which resulted in a gunfight between the army and the militants.

What will the death of Yassin bring? According to most observers, it will bring a wave of violence against Israel and the U.S. before it brings about the destruction of Hamas.

Hamas leaders and other Palestinian organizations, as well as citizens, have declared a jihad against Israel and, in particular, Ariel Sharon. Hamas leaders have vowed to “cut off the head” of Sharon.

The al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades (a terrorist group linked to Arafat) has declared war on Israel:
“War, war, war on the sons of Zion. An eye for an eye. There will be a response within hours, God willing,” the group said in a statement.

Israeli sources say the attack on Yassin was ordered directly by Sharon.

A warning from Mohammed Mahdi Akef the leader of Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood: There can be no life for the Americans and Zionists in the region. We will not rest until they (Israelis) are expelled from the region.

The Palestinian people themselves are vowing revenge:

Among the crowds gathered outside Yasin’s house were three women brandishing M-16 assault rifles. One of the women, who was in her 60s, said she was prepared to take part in an attack in retaliation.

“We are all fighters, all martyrs. We are all prepared to be martyrs,” she told AFP.

Leaders around the world condemned the killing of Hamas leader Yassin.

Jack Straw: It is unacceptable, it is unjustified and it is very unlikely to achieve its objective.

Dominique de Villepin, (France) Foreign Minister: [S]uch acts can only feed the spiral of violence

EU: This is very, very bad news for the peace process.

Japan: Our country strongly requests that the Israeli government exercise maximum self-restraint and seeks to calm the situation.

Hamas: Yassin is a man in a nation, and a nation in a man. And the retaliation of this nation will be of the size of this man.

U.S.: The United States urges all sides to remain calm and exercise restraint.

[various sources]

REUTERS: Palestinian Authority Condemns Yassin Killing

The Palestinian Authority condemned on Monday Israel’s killing of the spiritual leader of the Hamas Islamic militant group, Sheikh Ahmed Yassin.

“This is a crazy and very dangerous act. It opens the door wide to chaos. Yassin is known for his moderation and he was controlling Hamas and therefore this is a dangerous, cowardly act,” said Prime Minister Ahmed Qurie.

From The Australian :

Israeli forces killed Sheik Ahmed Yassin, the founder and spiritual leader of the violent Islamic Hamas movement early today, witnesses and Hamas leaders said.
[…]
Witnesses said Israeli helicopters fired three missiles at Yassin and two bodyguards as they left the mosque, killing them instantly. Hamas officials confirmed that he had been killed. Four people were killed and 12 wounded in the attack, witnesses said.

Yussef Haddad, 35, a taxi driver, said he saw the missiles hit and kill Yassin and the bodyguards. “Their bodies were shattered,” he said.
[…]
Outside the morgue at Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, Hamas official Ismail Haniyeh, a close associated of Yassin, had tears in his eyes as he confirmed Yassin’s death and pledged revenge.

“This is the moment Sheik Yassin dreamed about,” Haniyeh said. “Sheik Yassin lived and died and offered his life to Palestine. Sheik Yassin was a hero and a fighter and the leader of a nation, and (he) is in heaven now.”

Yassin, a quadriplegic, founded Hamas in 1987.

From Reuters/AFP via the ABC (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) :

[Witnesses]..say Sheikh Yassin was leaving a mosque in his wheelchair in the Sabra quarter of the Gaza Strip when three rockets fired by an Israeli helicopter hit nearby, killing him, two of his assitants[sic] and a passer-by.

Hamas has confirmed Sheikh Yassin was killed and an AFP correspondent saw his body at Gaza’s Shifa hospital.

“The sheikh is dead. The sheikh is dead,” sobbed gunmen and Hamas militants who gathered at the scene.

One witness who lives near the mosque told Reuters what happened moments after the first explosion.

“I looked to see where Sheikh Ahmed Yassin was,” he said. “He was lying on the ground and his chair was destroyed. People there darted left and right. Then another two missiles landed.”

At least 10 people were wounded in the attack, including Yassin’s two sons who were moderately hurt.

Israel has said it would step up operations to track and kill Islamic militants after a string of suicide bombings, including one at a strategic port last week in which 10 people were killed.
[…]
“Yassin and the others were behind the terror framework in the Gaza Strip,” Deputy Defence Minister Zeev Boim told Israel Radio.
[…]
Earlier this month, Sheikh Yassin justified as legitimate suicide bombings by two teenagers in the southern Israeli port of Ashdod which killed 10 civilians and wounded 20 other people.
[…]
Israel sentenced Yassin to a life term in 1989 for founding Hamas and inciting Palestinians to attack Israelis.

But Israel released him in 1997 as a goodwill gesture to Jordan’s King Hussein after an attempt to assassinate Hamas leader Khaled Mashal in Jordan failed.

Breaking news from various sources:

An Israeli airstrike just killed Sheikh Amhed Yassin of Hamas as he was leaving a mosque in his car.

Three missiles were used.

SOURCES:
CNN
AP
Ha’aretz

Ayman al-Zawahri, who is supposed to be hiding out in a remote area on the border of Pakistan, apparently sat for an interview to Pakistani journalist Hamid Mir for ABC (Australian Broadcasting Company), though it was not said when the interview actually took place.

Mir recalled telling al-Zawahri it was difficult to believe that al-Qaida had nuclear weapons when the terror network didn’t have the equipment to maintain or use them.

“Dr Ayman al-Zawahri laughed and he said ‘Mr. Mir, if you have $30 million, go to the black market in central Asia, contact any disgruntled Soviet scientist, and a lot of … smart briefcase bombs are available,’” Mir said in the interview.

“They have contacted us, we sent our people to Moscow, to Tashkent, to other central Asian states and they negotiated, and we purchased some suitcase bombs,” Mir quoted al-Zawahri as saying.

The interview will air tomorrow.

From the ABC (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) :

A major offensive against Al Qaeda suspects sheltering in villages in Pakistan’s tribal belt has been suspended while authorities negotiate with tribal leaders.

Al Qaeda’s number two, Ayman Al-Zawahiri, is nowhere in sight after earlier reports the was surrounded.

The Pakistan army says hundreds of Al Qaeda suspects and their Pakistani tribal allies are surrounded in the desolate mountains but added fighting had subsided on Sunday after a week of clashes.

If there is or ever was a high value target being protected in south Waziristan, the best guess now is that it may be a central Asian militant leader, perhaps leading a Taliban-loyal band of renegade Uzbeks and Chechens who have been hiding in Pakistan’s tribal belt since fleeing Afghanistan in 2001.

More than 100 suspected militants have been captured in South Waziristan since Tuesday and the army has thrown up a 60 kilometre cordon to box in rebels still at large.

Pakistani commanders say they suspect a Uzbek or Chechen militant leader is among those surrounded in a series of well-established and well-defended mud-walled compounds.

Last week officials said they thought Dr Al-Zawahri might be among those surrounded but the army has dismissed those reports as “conjecture”.

This terror warning went out late Friday from the State Department, but evidently was buried under other news:

U.S. citizens are cautioned to maintain a high level of vigilance, to remain alert and to take appropriate steps to increase their security awareness. We are seeing indications that Al-Qaida continues to prepare to strike U.S. interests abroad.

Al-Qaida and its associated organizations have most recently struck in the Middle East and in Europe but other geographic locations could also be venues for attacks. Future Al-Qaida attacks could possibly involve non-conventional weapons such as chemical or biological agents as well as conventional weapons of terror. We also cannot rule out that Al-Qaida will attempt a catastrophic attack within the U.S.

It’s more of the same that we’ve seen from State since 9/11, but the department evidently feels you can never repeat it often enough.

(Cross-posted at Late Final.)

The Telegraph is reporting that the “al Qaeda leader” holed up in a fortress near Wana is Tohir Yo’ldosh with his Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan:

officials in Pakistan and Afghanistan identified Tahir Yuldash, the leader of several hundred Central Asian Islamic fundamentalist fighters, as the key figure being protected by up to 400 al-Qa’eda militants.

Yuldash, a founder of the hardline Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, teamed up with bin Laden in Afghanistan but has been based in Pakistani tribal areas since the fall of the Taliban regime in late 2001. His cordon of bodyguards is fighting the Pakistani onslaught with mortars and rocket-propelled grenades.

The IMU, gathering strength in Wana after it was devestated by the war in Afghanistan, may be making its final stand.

JERUSALEM POST: Palestinian High Court unfreezes terror funds

he Palestinian High Court of Justice on Sunday unfroze the accounts of nine Palestinian charities that the United States and Israel suspect fund terror groups.

The Palestinian Authority froze the 39 bank accounts last August under pressure from U.S. President George W. Bush, who was reacting to a suicide bombing that killed 21 people in Jerusalem.

From The Australian :

The Afghan aviation minister has been assassinated, a presidential spokesman has confirmed.

No other details as yet.

UPDATE: The situation appears to be far more serious than initially appeared.
From the ABC (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) :

An Afghan cabinet minister has been killed in the western city of Herat, provoking ferocious tank and gun battles in which the city’s military commander said more than 100 people died.

There were conflicting accounts of the killing of Civil Aviation Minister Mirwais Sadiq, son of powerful Herat provincial governor Ismail Khan.

Mr Khan’s spokesman said he was ambushed but officials from both sides said he was killed trying to enter the house of a local government commander.

The fighting looked to be the worst between pro-government factions since President Hamid Karzai was installed after US-led forces ousted the Taliban in 2001 and comes as he struggles against resurgent Islamic militancy.

Reports from both factions suggested an intense struggle for control of Herat was underway between Khan’s forces and those of the central government in several areas of the city about 100 kilometres east of the Iranian border.

Residents reported heavy fighting late into the night.

“The fighting is still going on, they are using tanks and artillery,” said an Afghan aid worker who did not want to be identified.

“I’m taking cover in the basement with my family. The electricity’s just gone off. It’s very frightening.”

Mr Khan’s spokesman, Ghulam Mohammad Masoan, said Mr Sadiq died after a rocket-propelled grenade hit his car in the city centre and blamed forces of the city’s military commander, Zahir Nayebzada, who was recently appointed by Mr Karzai.

He said it was the result of “a personal rivalry”.

But Mr Nayebzada told Reuters he had acted in self-defence after Mr Khan tried to take control of his division and Mr Sadiq tried to enter his house.

“He broke into my house and started the fighting there,” he said.

“I did not kill Mr Sadiq in an ambush; he was killed in a clash afterwards.

“More than 100 people have been killed on both sides.”

As he spoke by telephone, automatic gunfire could be heard in the background.

Another Khan loyalist, who did not want to be identified, said Mr Sadiq was killed when he went to investigate an incorrect rumour that his father had been ambushed.

Mrl Khan, an Islamic hardliner, has been at odds with Mr Karzai’s US-backed Government for failing to hand over tens of millions of dollars of customs revenues from Herat, which controls the bulk of Afghanistan’s trade.

A veteran of the struggle against Soviet rule in the 1980s, Mr Khan professes loyalty to Mr Karzai but is often accused of running a personal fiefdom in the west.
[…]
A US embassy statement said the violence appeared to have begun as a traffic incident and then escalated.
[…]
The embassy statement said German diplomatic personnel in Herat had been evacuated to the PRT site along with the visiting Italian ambassador.

It said no US personnel had been hurt and a United Nations spokesman said its 48 staff in the city were safe.

CNN: Palestinians killed in Gaza raid

Four Palestinians were killed in the raid, the IDF said, including Kadah and two other Hamas militants.

Palestinian security sources differed in the death toll, reporting five Palestinians killed in Israeli gunfire. Victims included a Hamas operative and his wife, at least one other Hamas operative and two bystanders, the sources said.

Kadah tried to escape arrest while carrying a bag of explosives, the IDF said.

“As he was fleeing, the forces opened fire towards the terrorist causing the explosion of the explosives which were inside the bag,” the IDF said. “As a result of the powerful blast, Kadah and his wife, who had attempted to escape with him, were killed.”

Israeli forces destroyed a weapons workshop owned by Kadah, his house, and the structure in which he was hiding, the IDF said.

From Thursday 3/18:

The documents cover the period 3/11 to 3/14. They’re online here, however, they’re large PDFs and they’re in Spanish.

There’s also a chronology of events related to the bombing here. That too is in Spanish. It appears to be derived from the PDF chronology.

If someone wants to provide an English summary, that would be appreciated.

Yesterday, there were 200 Taliban fighters “holed up” in Pakistan. The numbers have risen today:

Lt.-Gen. Hussain said 400 to 500 militants are believed to still be fighting troops with mortars, AK-47s, rockets and hand-grenades

Which is interesting in that they couldn’t have gotten in, because the whole place is cordoned off. So did they underestimate the resistance from the start or are the numbers just being exagerrated?

Just a few hours ago, Pakistan officials were backtracking on their assertion that Ayman al-Zawahri was inside the fortress-of-not-quite-solitude on the Pakistan bordera, saying that they think it might be a Chechan rebel.

Yet, there’s this AP report, just a few minutes old: Senior al-Qaida target has not escaped, Pakistan military chief says

The same AP report also has clearer reports of what factions are doing the fighting agains the Pakistan troops:

Briefing reporters, Hussain said a Chechen fighter was arrested Friday with a book on chemistry and explosives. He said he suspected many of the militants were foreigners but others were members of the Pakistani Yargul Khel tribe.

…

Brig. Mahmood Shah, the chief of security for tribal areas in northwestern Pakistan, told AP that some of the prisoners had already been taken for questioning to Peshawar. Security officials said the men included Pakistanis, Arabs, Chechens, Uzbeks and ethnic Uighurs from China’s predominantly Muslim Xinjiang province, where a separatist movement is simmering. No senior al-Qaida leaders were believed to be among them, but authorities hoped they would provide a better picture of the terrorists’ heavily fortified lair.

From the Sydney Morning Herald :

Osama bin Laden has escaped capture in Afghanistan several times and may be linked in some way to the Madrid train attacks that killed 200 people, France’s chief of defence staff said.

General Henri Bentegeat said about 200 French troops were operating with US forces in south-eastern Afghanistan against the Taliban and bin Laden’s al-Qaeda. The Saudi-born militant is thought to be there or just across the border in Pakistan.

“Our men were not very far. On several occasions, I even think he slipped out of a net that was quite well closed,” he told Europe 1 radio yesterday. He did not specify a time frame.

General Bentegeat, who spoke as if he were sure bin Laden was in Afghanistan, said the country’s difficult terrain explained why it was so hard to catch the world’s most wanted man.

Hat Tip : The Rat Pack

Pakistani forces have captured and arrested more than 100 militants in the continuing fight at the Afghan border. However, all the reports of al-Qaeda’s number two man, Ayman al-Zawahri, being holed up in the “fortress” that the Taliban are protecting may turn out to be false:

…[I]ntercepted rebel radio communications suggested the mystery militant leader was an Uzbek or a Chechen. Zawahri is Egyptian.

“He is most probably a Chechen or Uzbek because all the intercepts we have been receiving have been in the Chechen or Uzbek language,” Lieutenant-General Safder Hussain told reporters visiting the western town of Wana, near the fighting.

Lt. General -General ‏Safder Hussain said that messages were intercepted last week that led them to believe Zawahri was in the area, and they were all in Chechen or Uzbek:

”[I]n Kaloosha a companion has been injured, for his rescue we need 4 persons and for his protection 12 more persons are needed.”

“When we came to know that for an injured person, four rescuers are needed ‏
‏and 12 for protection then we assessed that he is some of the key Al-Qaeda ‏
‏figure,” said Safder Hussain.‏

Meanwhile in Afghanistan, about two miles from the Pakistan border, U.S. and Afghan forces faced a Taliban attack.

Four hours of fighting left three Taliban dead and eight injured, with no casualties among the Afghan soldiers or Americans, [Paktika province intelligence chief Zakim] Khan said.

In Uruzgan, Afghanistan, an “unidentified local official” is claiming that a U.S. strike killed six civilians and wounded seven, most of them women and children. However, the official’s reports conflict with that of U.S. military spokesman Lieutenant-Colonel Bryan Hilferty.

“I have no knowledge of this,” he told Reuters. “We dropped some bombs on Taliban positions yesterday morning not last night.”

Hilferty said on Friday the air strikes against suspected Taliban positions were launched after two U.S. soldiers and at least five militants were killed in a clash the previous day.

He said U.S. and Afghan National Army soldiers came under fire on Thursday while on patrol in a village in Uruzgan’s Tarin Kot district.

From The Australian :

US and Afghan forces repelled a major attack on a base on the Afghan-Pakistan border, leaving at least three suspected Taliban or al-Qaeda fighters dead, an Afghan military commander said today.

Afghan Militia Force commander Zakim Khan said the militants had fled from the Pakistani tribal belt where the military has launched a major operation to hunt down al-Qaeda and Taliban fugitives, cornering up to 400 fighters.

“This group had came from Pakistan and fled back to Pakistan after the fighting,” he said.

“Three al-Qaeda fighters were killed and we believe seven to eight of them were wounded.”

The insurgents attacked the base with about 20 rockets and machine guns, Khan said, adding there were no coalition injuries.

From Reuters via the ABC (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) :

The US military has dropped all criminal charges against a Muslim Army chaplain who ministered to Guantanamo Bay prisoners in a deal with defence lawyers marking the final collapse of the espionage case against Captain James Yee.

Under the deal announced by the Pentagon, the Army agreed to abandon charges of mishandling classified information while Captain Yee worked at the US Naval base at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba.

It also dropped lesser charges of violating military law by committing adultery and storing pornographic images on a government computer.

As I commented in the original TCP article on his arrest:

Wait for more details: he may be a traitor, or he may be just a Chaplain doing what an Army Chaplain is supposed to do. Expect much uninformed speculation on what may be a major counter-espionage coup, or just a common-or-garden SNAFU.

Speaking by satellite phone from southern Afghanistan, [Taliban spokesperson] Abdul Samad dismissed speculation by Pakistani officials that Al Zawahiri could be surrounded in the Pakistan border district of South Waziristan, saying he was “100 per cent” sure the Al Qaeda number two was safe.

“Muslims of the world — don’t worry about them, these two guests, they are fine,” he said. “All these reports about Ayman Al Zawahiri being surrounded in Pakistan are not true, they are just propaganda by the US coalition and by the Pakistani army to weaken Taleban morale,” he said.

Word is that Britian has sent 100 commandos to the Afghanistan border to help with the hunt of al-Qaeda members. Mind you, this does not come from officials, but from an airport employee who says he saw British special forces “looking like SAS” on the tarmac.

U.S forces are still working only behind the scenes, providing intelligence using satellites and drones .

Read and digest with the usual Debka grain of salt. Or two.

DEBKAfile Reports Exclusively: Pakistan red-faced on discovering “high value” terrorist target its troops surrounded in Waziristan was not bin Laden’s No. 2 Zuwahiri but chief of Pushtun Ahmadi tribal federation. DEBKA sources estimate that any harm to Pushtun chief would spark wholesale tribal war offensive against Pakistan

[via A. Pundit]

Pakistani troops have closed in on the “fortress” where supposed key al-Qaida members are hiding out while 200 or more Taliban fighters put up fierce resistance.

CNN has this graphic, showing the exact area of confinemen, which is about 19 square miles.

“The mission is to get these people dead or alive,” Maj. Gen. Shaukat Sultan said.

It’s being reported that U.S. and British troops have joined the fight.

AFP

International peacekeepers in the Afghan capital have been warned of the risk of “magnetic bombs” being placed on their vehicles. .

An Afghan intelligence official said on Friday about 60 of these bombs have been made in Pakistan and smuggled into Afghanistan by Islamic fighters belonging to the Hezb-i Islami movement, the official said, requesting anonymity.

The bombs, which carry between 0.5 and 2 kilograms of explosives, can be detonated by remote control and are attached by a magnet to the body of a vehicle.

The sophisticated devices would be used to target vehicles belonging to the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force charged with maintaining security in Kabul, he added.

They could also be used against cars belonging to the United Nations and foreign organisations by militants loyal to the Hezb-i Islami movement of former Afghan premier, fugitive Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, or other insurgents, he warned.

HA‘ARETZ: Israeli man shot dead in French Hill neighborhood in Jerusalem

Unidentified assailants in a passing car shot and killed a man walking along a street in the French Hill neighborhood in Jerusalem on Friday evening. The Al Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades claimed responsibility for the shooting.

The 21-year-old man, who was shot in the head and critically wounded, was taken to Hadassah University Hospital, Ein Karem for treatment, and later died of his wounds.

Police are investigating the circumstances of the incident, and believe that the motive for the shooting was nationalistic. A large number of police officers, including Jerusalem Police Chief Mickey Levi arrived at the scene of the shooting.

A Taliban spokesman vowed on Friday the group would attack U.S. and Pakistan forces if they did not stop hunting Taliban and al Qaeda militants along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border.

“We will carry out more attacks against international coalition forces if they continue to chase us,” the spokesman said in taped comments translated into Arabic by Al Jazeera television.

Command Post contributor Dan Darling reports:

Pooled from the cable networks as well as what I can pry from people here on base.

• The fighting is occurring in South Waziristan in a 15-kilometer area from Zarian Noor to Azam Warsak between a combination of Pakistani federal troops and the tribal lashkars (a kind of ad-hoc tribal militia similar to a posse) on one hand and Pashtun tribesmen and al-Qaeda fighters on the other. The “high-profile target” itself is located in Kaloosha.

• The fighting in the area is occurring between Pakistan forces in the valley area and the al-Qaeda/Pashtuns in the mountains and has been raging since Tuesday. Other villagers are fleeing the area en masse to escape the fighting and there’s concern that al-Qaeda fighters may be amongst them.

• There are at least 200 al-Qaeda in the area, which fits with the estimated size of bin Laden and al-Zawahiri’s praetorian guard. Chechens and Arabs are amongst the dead jihadis and the rest are fighting much fiercer and with much better equipment than the usual cannon fodder. No word on the number of Pashtun tribesmen, though the al-Qaeda appear to be fairly well-entrenched. One captured Arab believed to be an Egyptian national told the Pakistani troops that al-Zawahiri had been injured in Kaloosha, though this is unconfirmed.

• The Pashtuns are holding 250 individuals, including a constable, the staff of a local political agent, and members of the Khasa Dar force hostage. This is why the Pakistanis are so hesitant to launch airstrikes, though airstrikes will come at dawn in roughly 4 hours when they have greater visibility.

UPDATE 1: I’m hearing rumors that CIA and US military advisors are accompanying the Pakistani troops involved in the operation, but that no US forces active in the operation.

UPDATE 2: 19 Pakistani troops have gone AWOL - the suspicion is that they were either al-Qaeda moles who have rejoined their following or are trying to engineer al-Zawahiri’s escape in some fashion.

UPDATE 3: Airstrikes have begun. There is evidently a cave complex leading through the mountains and possibly back into Afghanistan or into other parts of Pakistan. The officer I spoke with via telephone said “bin Laden built it” so I’m assuming all of this got constructed by the Saudi Bin Laden Group at some point after the Taliban captured Kabul.

UPDATE 4: Rumors swirling back and forth, but there are rumors there may be Special Ops or a CIA kill team on the ground with the Pakistani military. The tribal lashkars are also rumored to have gotten the shit torn out of them by their fellow Pashtuns.

UPDATE 5: Now there’s some whacky deadline in place for the al-Qaeda to surrender following an attack on the area with 3 Pakistani helicopter gunships. I don’t like this one bit, it has all the makings of that “cease-fire” that allowed bin Laden to get out of Tora Bora in one piece.

UPDATE 6: General Sultan is saying that the deadline is over and that the attack has resumed, no word on whether they’re actually bombing or not yet.

Apparently one of the intel clues that led the Pakistanis to conclude that al-Zawahiri was holed up down there had to do with several members of the Frontier Corps troops seeing a heavily-guarded foreigner flee the village of Kalushah on Tuesday in an armored land cruiser - they figured it was al-Zawahiri because of the size of the entourage and knew that it couldn’t be bin Laden because of the height differences (Osama is well over 6 feet tall). The al-Qaeda contingent then proceeded to decimate the Frontier Corps, leaving only a handful of survivors.

Is he or isn’t he? Pakistan still not sure if al Zawahri is surrounded. Well, maybe they are sure. Maybe they’re not. They’re just not saying either way. A Taliban spokesperson has said that al Zawahri is safe and sound, as is bin Laden. Whatever the Pakistan troops are after in that region, Interior Minister Faisal Saleh Hayyat wants the fighting wrapped up in 48 hours.

Apparently, he’s serious about that because about 1,000 more troops have been added to the fight. And those aren’t the only numbers rising; yesterday, it was believed that there were 200 “militants” holed up in the mountain region. Today, they are estimating there are 300-400.

U.S troops are still standing by in case Pakistan needs any help. Though, Pakistan might have bigger things to worry, what with India testing a nuke that is capable of reaching its capital.

AFP:

Officials said Al-Qaeda deputy leader Ayman Al-Zawahiri may have narrowly escaped the South Waziristan tribal village during heavy clashes three days ago which left at least 15 soldiers and 24 militants dead.

“He may have slipped the net,” the official, asking not to be named, told AFP.

AP

U.S. and Afghan troops have captured “semi-senior” terrorist leaders along the border with Pakistan, an Afghan government spokesman told The Associated Press on Friday.

The news came as border officials said Pakistan appeared to have blocked roads leading from the showdown in the South Waziristan tribal area, where Pakistani officials said forces had trapped al-Qaida No. 2 Ayman al-Zawahri in a massive four-day offensive.

The arrests were made somewhere in Afghanistan’s lawless border provinces, Jawed Ludin, a spokesman for President Hamid Karzai, said. He said it was unclear if those detained had fled the battle in Pakistan and declined to give any details of who might be in custody.

Dan Darling stitches together a rich variety of media and Internet sources (incl. at least one al-Qaeda-affiliated web site) to offer a very complete background covering the Madrid attacks, the origins of these techniques, who might be responsible, and the potential implications. It offers an excellent starting point for looking at the ongoing investigations, and is an excellent complement to Winds of Change.NET’s earlier 3/11 coverage that focused more on the details and modus operandi of the attacks.

Thanks to our very informative reader Jeff for these maps, which he made.

From Jeff: Wana is at top right, for distance scale it is about 15km from Wana to Kaloosha (or Kalusha, take your pick). Dashed red overlay is the Afghanistan-Pakistan border, solid red overlay is 4 wheel drive type road networks, and image color is falsely induced by NASA. Overlays are approximate.

[Images in extended entry so as not to anger dial-up users]

[clicking on images opens very large images]

FOX TV is reporting that three helicopters have attacked the area where the Taliban members have been cornered all day.

More as it comes in.

Upate: Reuters has the story:

Three Pakistani army helicopters attacked cornered militants near the border with Afghanistan on Friday, where troops may have trapped Osama bin Laden’s top strategist and second-in-command.
“There is powerful firing going on by three helicopters, said a resident in the town of Wana, near the scene of the battle.

“They are firing machineguns and have dropped a bomb too,” he said.

Pakistani troops were also firing artillery, he said.

From an interview with CNN national security analyst Ken Robinson:

ROBINSON: What’s interesting is speaking with senior Pakistani army officials. They were describing the tactics being used, which included very aggressive enforcement of homes that they had barricaded. They called them fortresses in this village.

They said that the enemy that they were up against was using very sophisticated mortar techniques, using mortaring shells against their forces and using target reference points that had been preregistered.

In other words, they had anticipated that at one point they would have to defend this location, and they had very significant defenses outlayed for them. That’s why the casualties were so high.

PHILLIPS: If indeed this is Ayman al-Zawahiri, who is in this area that is now surrounded? What are the rules of engagement? Is it to get in there and bring him out alive and take him into custody? Or is that necessarily not the objective?

ROBINSON: Well, one of the things that the generals, the Pakistani generals that we spoke to yesterday and today, stressed was that one of the things in this engagement that causes things to slow down was their concern for collateral damage on innocent civilians.

…

PHILLIPS: Well, what [do] you know about al Qaeda’s No. 2, Ayman al-Zawahiri? Is this somebody that would come out alive or die — as he would be believed to be — a martyr?

ROBINSON: I cannot believe that we would see al-Zawahari or Osama bin Laden captured alive. I believe they both would probably fight to the death. Ayman al-Zawahiri was the leader of Egyptian Islamic Jihad, a very lethal terrorist organization in Egypt, before he linked up with bin Laden. And he’s the guy who really took bin Laden over the edge in terms of getting more lethal in his own thought processes.

Read the full interview

Speaking of time, it is now 5:38 a.m. in Pakistan. Dawn commences at approximately 6:37 a.m.

All signs seem to point to a dawn air strike on the border of Pakistan and Afghanistan, where bin Laden’s deputy, Ayman al-Zawahri, is said to be surrounded.

Meanwhile, Pakistani intelligence reports that 18 suspects have been arrested and some are providing information.

Here’s a more detailed map of the area in which the fighting is taking place, and a sketch map of Waziristan.

No one knows for sure if ial-Zawahri is one of the “cornered” al-Qaeda members, though most news reports are writing as if the chances are better that is him than not.

“We have been receiving intelligence and information from our agents who are working in the tribal areas that al-Zawahri could be among the people hiding there,” said a military official. “All of our efforts are to capture him.”[emphasis added]

• bin Laden’s right hand man

• Believed to be the “brains” behind 9/11

• Controls finances of al-Qaeda

• Tried and convicted for taking part in Dr Zawahri was tried along with the 1981 assassination of President Anwar Sadat

• In 1999, was sentenced to death in absentia by an Egyptian court for his Islamic Jihad activities

• In the late 90’s, was leader of the Vanguards of Conquest group - a faction of Islamic Jihad

• Was one of the signers of bin Laden’s fatwa againt U.S. civilians in 1998

• Believed to have been part of the 1998 U.S. embassy bombings

… for if you find him and tie him, you too can turn in Osama bin Laden for $50 million (via news.com.au). (Hmmm … $50 million … that’s a lot of bandwidth. Hell, I could even release Michele from her indentured servitude …)

TIME Islamabad Bureau Chief Tim McGirk spoke with TIME.com from the Pakistani capital about this breaking story:

TIME.com: What’s the latest you’re hearing about the possibility that Pakistani forces may be about to snare a top al-Qaeda leader?

Tim McGirk: President Musharraf came out earlier Thursday and said he believes Pakistani forces have a “high-value” al-Qaeda leader surrounded. That’s the reason Pakistani authorities believe that the 8,000 troops currently hunting al-Qaeda fugitives in south Waziristan are encountering such ferocious resistance. Authorities believe that those who are fighting against the Pakistani military in the area are defending someone of considerable importance, and also that this person may have been wounded, which would explain why they’re fighting rather than running into the mountains, the way they usually do.

TIME.com: So is the intensity of the fighting the only reason they believe they’ve netted a big fish?

McGirk: There may be other reasons that we don’t know about. Unofficially, intelligence people and government officials in the region’s capital, Wana, are saying they think it’s Ayman al-Zawahiri.

….

TIME.com: If they do have Ayman al-Zawahiri, how far can bin Laden be?

McGirk: I think he’s very close. After all, in every al-Qaeda video, he’s right by bin Laden’s side. Even if they are hiding in different places, Zawahiri will have better idea than anyone else where bin Laden may be.

Read the whole interview

These two maps will give you an idea of where the U.S. troops are in relation to where the fighting is taking place (they are at the Afghanistan border).

Images from Fox and CNN, respectively

Both the U.S. and Pakistani forces have worked along the border of Pakistan. It is believed that U.S. fighter bombers will be called on at dawn.

Update [4:18 EST]
CNN reports:

The “pitched battle” has already claimed the lives of some Pakistani forces, he said. The fighters, believed to be with al Qaeda, are holed up in “mud forts,” he said.

One U.S. official who is in touch with Pakistani officials about the situation told CNN that Pakistani forces are “fighting like hell.”

The military asked locals to leave and is flying helicopters overhead, “pounding” the area with artillery, he said.

Reuters has more on the expected strike tomorrow:

The Pakistan government plans an airstrike on Friday at a group they believe to be cornered al Qaeda fighters, including No. 2 Ayman al-Zawahri, CNN said, citing Pakistani government sources.

“Sometime after light fall it sounds like they will go in with helicopter gunships and they may go in with fixed wing. … The plan is to go in by air tomorrow, or at least first light,” CNN correspondent Aaron Brown said, speaking from Pakistan.

AP is reporting that there is fierce resistance from the fighters surrounding the person who is purported to be Ayman al-Zawahri.

U.S forces, nearby at the Afghanistan border, are on alert should the Pakistani forces need them. Pakistan has insisted in taking on this operation alone, thus far.

More as we get it.

Pakistani sources said Thursday that 200 well-trained and well-equipped fighters are surrounded with the No. 2 leader of al-Qaida, Ayman al-Zawahri, in western Pakistan, the Cable News Network reported.

A CNN correspondent in Pakistan said Pakistani forces were planning to use helicopter gunships and perhaps fixed-wing aircraft at first light.

Earlier, Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf had told CNN the enemy fighters were putting up fierce resistance against Pakistani Army troops.

Some news reports are saying that the “high value” person cornered is al-Qaida No. 2 Ayman al-Zawahri. It’s been speculated all day that it was him, but now some officials are actually saying his name.

This from CNN:

Pakistani forces have surrounded what may be a “high-value” al Qaeda target in Pakistan near the border with Afghanistan, President Pervez Musharraf told CNN.

“We feel that there may be a high-value target,” Musharraf told CNN. “I can’t say who.”

The ferociousness of their resistance indicates that the al Qaeda fighters are protecting someone particularly significant, he said.

The military asked locals to leave and is flying helicopters overhead, “pounding” the area with artillery, he said.

UPDATE: CNN - “The Associated Press and Reuters reported officials believe it may be Osama bin Laden’s deputy, Ayman al-Zawahri.”

CNN Read Header reads: Pakistani president tells CNN he believes troops have surrounded al Qaeda fighters protecting “high-value target.” Details soon.

Oh please oh please oh please …

UDPATE: More from FOXNews, with an AP story:

In a report from Islamabad, an American news channel said Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf told them Pakistani forces had surrounded a “high-value target” that was being protected by Al Qaeda fighters. The news channel said the identity of the target was not known.

JERUSALEM POST: Tanzim cell planned to hijack 2 buses, attack nightclubs

A terrorist plan to hijack two buses in the Efrat area and drive them to the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem was foiled by Israeli security services earlier this month, the Shin Bet released for publication Thursday.

The hijackers, two senior employees of the Palestinian Authority, were to have been kitted out with explosives belts and would threaten to blow themselves up inside the buses. The cell planned to show the bus driver their explosives belts, and direct the driver to take the buses to the nativity church, where they planned to conduct negotiations with Isareli authorities.

The Israeli passengers were to be held hostage until Israeli authorities succumbed to the terrorists’ demand to release Palestinian security prisoners. According to the information released for publication, the terrorists also planned to attach a remote-controlled bomb to one passengers.

(Does the Church of the Nativity has an open-door policy for hostage-takers and terrorists?)

The terrorist group that claimed responsibility for the Madrid terror attacks has allegedly let known their plans for the future:

The London-based Al-Quds al-Arabi said on its Web site that it had received a statement from “The Brigade of Abu Hafs al-Masri (al-Qaida)”

…

Our brigades are getting ready now for the coming strike,” said the statement dated March 15. “Whose turn will it be next? Is it Japan, America, Italy, Britain, Saudi Arabia or Australia?”

The statement warned these countries that “the brigades of death are at your doors,” adding that they would strike “with an iron hand at the right time and place.”

Grain of salt alert: Abu Hafs lacks credibility and has been known to make false claims in the past.

Reuters

Spanish police have arrested four more suspects — at least two of them of Moroccan origin — in connection with the Madrid train bombings that killed 201 people, judicial sources say.

Three were detained around the commuter town of Alcala de Henares outside Madrid, where three of the four bombed trains originated, the sources said on Thursday.

The fourth new detainee was held in the north of Spain, believed to be the coastal city of Gijon, and was being transferred to Madrid, the sources said.

MANILA: Asian police officials agreed to boost information exchange on terrorism through the international police agency, Interpol, said as a two-day regional conference wrapped up in Manila.

The communique, issued after the Interpol conference ended late Tuesday, said delegates from 37 countries agreed to "participate in and contribute to these (Interpol) initiatives including the timely exchange of information about terrorists and terrorism".

The member countries of the France-based police group were encouraged to use Interpol's improved computer networks and databases in the fight against crime. This included Interpol's database on stolen travel documents, "recognized as a vital tool in counter-terrorist measures."

A group claiming to have links with al Qaeda said on Wednesday it was calling a truce in its Spanish operations to see if the new Madrid government would withdraw its troops from Iraq (news - web sites), a pan-Arab newspaper said.

In a statement sent to the Arabic language daily al-Hayat, the Abu Hafs al-Masri Brigades, which claimed responsibility for the Madrid bombings that killed 201 people, also urged its European units to stop all operations.

“Because of this decision, the leadership has decided to stop all operations within the Spanish territories… until we know the intentions of the new government that has promised to withdraw Spanish troops from Iraq,” the statement said.

“And we repeat this to all the brigades present in European lands: Stop all operations.”

Heavy doses of skepticism, please. But it sure wouldn’t be a surprise to many people if it turns out to be real.

JERUSALEM POST/AP: Frenchman tries to run over Bin Laden look-alike

A Frenchman was convicted for trying to run over a pedestrian he mistook for Osama bin Laden.

The 35-year-old, identified as a struggling artist named Pierre, was sentenced Tuesday by a court in this southern France city to a three-month suspended prison term and ordered to pay 500 (US$615) to the victim, who was unharmed.

The man’s lawyer, David Mendel, said his client was traumatized by last week’s terror attacks in Madrid and was temporarily the “victim of a hallucination,” while driving Monday through Montpellier’s historic center.

The victim, a man in his 30s, was able to run from the oncoming car, which crashed along the side of a street.

“It wasn’t bin Laden,” Mendel said. “If it was, we would have won US$5 million.”

MAARIV: Ashdod bombers may have infiltrated Israel in container

Israel’s General Security Service (GSS) is investigating whether the Palestinian suicide bombers who perpetrated Sunday’s attacks at the Ashdod Port, arrived in the container that left Gaza and was discovered today (Wednesday) featuring a hidden side panel stashed with grenades as well as food, water and personal gear. Another possibility being examined is that the terrorists intended to carry out an attack at the nearby navy base using the grenades.

The container, which was discovered at dock 12, was en route to deliver marble boards to Haifa. A senior defense official told Maariv Online that the sidewall has signs indicating people were hiding in it. He added that the current estimate is that the container arrived at the Port a short while before the attacks, which claimed the lives of 10 Israelis. Head of Israel Police, Chief Commissioner Shlomo Aharonishky, has arrived at the port and is taking part in the GSS investigation.

The explosives were discovered this morning after the container went through the Port’s multi-million dollar explosives detection system. A senior Southern District police officer said it had arrived from the Gaza Strip via the Karni terminal. Details of the investigation have otherwise been barred from publication.

A follow-up to the ten year-old with the bomb in a bag… or eleven… or twelve… his age isn’t important.

He’s claiming he didn’t know of the bomb… or that it wasn’t a bomb… or that he had a bomb… or…

JERUSALEM POST: Boy leads chorus of bomb denial

Abdallah Quran, the 11-year-old Palestinian boy who was caught Monday with a rucksack containing a 10-kg. bomb, said Tuesday he does not believe the IDF version that the bag he was carrying contained explosives.

“They are lying,” he said. “I never saw a bomb. If the bag really contained a bomb, why did they release me?”

Quran’s older brother, Muhammad, claimed that Israel staged the incident in an attempt to win the sympathy of international public opinion.

“We have been told many journalists were at the checkpoint before the alleged incident,” he said. “This shows that the whole thing was fabricated by Israel in order to defame the Palestinians. They used my brother as a tool in their propaganda machine.”

Read the rest.

Who do you believe?

CNN:

Pakistani paramilitary forces have been battling suspected terrorists along the rugged, lawless border with Afghanistan, killing 24 and capturing 18 while losing eight troops in battle, a military spokesman said.

The battle at a compound near the town of Wana ended with eight members of the paramilitary Frontier Constabulary dead and more than two dozen wounded, said Maj. Gen. Shaukat Sultan.

Intelligence sources said most of those killed or captured were foreign fighters, not Pakistanis

MAARIV: Gaza terror factions accept PA’s “day after” plan

A Gaza committee that represents all “nationalistic and Islamic forces” accepted a security plan proposed by the Palestinian Authority for the day after Israel withdraws from the Gaza Strip. The committee met with members of the Palestinian Authorities security mechanism on Tuesday. Following the meeting the committee said they will continue to carry out attacks against Israel and settlements and called on Palestinians to accept the Palestinian Authorities judicial system. They also called on armed Palestinian groups to cooperate with the Palestinian Authority when Israel withdraws.

The day after the day after will not be a pretty one.

HA‘ARETZ: IAF strikes in Gaza City; two Palestinians reported killed

Israel Air Force helicopters fired missiles at a building and two cars in Gaza City on Tuesday evening, killing at least two people believed to be Islamic Jihad operatives, just hours after the security cabinet approved an army plan to intensify targeted killings of Palestinian terror leaders and send more troops into the Gaza Strip for ground operations, according to a security official.

The Israel Defense Forces confirmed the bulding and cars hit by the missiles were Islamic Jihad targets.

Two were killed and at least 14 people were wounded, three critically, in the missile attack, hospital officials said. Among the badly injured was a two-year-old girl, they said.

The missiles destroyed the house and cars in the Nasser neighborhood in northern Gaza City and smoke was seen rising from the militant stronghold. It was not known who lived in the one-story house, and the Israel Defense Forces had no immediate comment.

Ambulances and Palestinian security forces raced to the scene and Israeli fighter planes were seen flying over Gaza City just after the air strike.

The War against Terror is being fought on many fronts, and not just against Islamists. Here’s one front where the enemy is doing far too well. From Reuters, via the ABC (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) :

Rebels killed at least 337 people last month in Uganda’s worst massacre in years, a United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) official says.
[…]
Local leaders have identified 237 of the dead.

Ms Symington says most were civilians living in the camp and the rest were local militiamen.

During the night attack, LRA rebels overpowered militiamen guarding the camp of 4,000 people before shooting, hacking and burning people alive in their huts.

Led by self-proclaimed mystic Joseph Kony, LRA rebels have abducted and brainwashed hundreds of children and forced them to fight for them, spreading fear throughout northern Uganda, paralysing economic activity and defying attempts to crush them.

AP

Saudi Arabia’s security forces have killed a man identified as Al Qaeda’s chief of operations on the Arabian Peninsula.

The man was killed with another alleged militant in a shootout Monday in the capital, U.S. and Saudi officials said.

The Saudi Interior Ministry identified the alleged chief of operations as Khaled Ali Haj, a Yemeni and the other militant as Ibrahim bin Abdul-Aziz bin Mohammed al-Mezeini, a Saudi.

Haj, who also uses the name Abu Hazim al-Sha’ir, was the “most dangerous” Al Qaeda operative in the region, a ministry official said, speaking on condition of anonymity. He once served as a body guard to Usama bin Laden, the leader of Al Qaeda

A U.S. counterterrorism official said Haj’s killing was a “major, very significant blow” to Al Qaeda.

AP

U.S.-led troops surprised eight enemy fighters in a cave complex in southeastern Afghanistan, prompting a gunbattle in which three militiamen were killed and five others were wounded, the American military said Monday.

The fighting was the first reported by the U.S. military since the March 7 start of a new sweep for insurgents and terror leaders, including Osama bin Laden and Taliban chief Mullah Mohammed Omar.

HA‘ARETZ: Arafat rejects his cabinet’s demand to act against terror

Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat on Monday refused his cabinet’s call to use the Palestinian security forces against terror organizations.

At a heated emergency meeting in Arafat’s Muqata compound in Ramallah - called in response to the suicide bombing in Ashdod Port two days ago, for which both Fatah and Hamas claimed responsibility - Interior Minister Hakem Balawi and the commander of the National Security forces, Haj Ismail Jabbar, both called upon Arafat to act against Hamas and Fatah’s military wing, the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades. Other ministers joined the call, warning Arafat of Israel’s expected harsh response to the attack and the international community’s reaction to the continuing chaos in the territories.

The ministers sought the authority to arrest Fatah activists acting independently and to apply all stages of a plan to restore control of the Palestinian street to the security forces. One Palestinian source in the cabinet said that some ministers even warned Arafat that Fatah members might be drafted into Hamas in Gaza. They also made it clear that the PA had lost control of Fatah’s military wing in some areas of both the West Bank and Gaza.

But according to the source, Arafat refused to allow arrests of Fatah activists and also turned down other aspects of the plan, such as the collection of illegal arms.

To get the Reuters Version, sprinkle the word “defiant” two or three times into each paragraph.

HA‘ARETZ: Mofaz to security chiefs: Step up offensive against Hamas

Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz on Monday night instructed security chiefs to step up the offensive against Palestinian militant group Hamas, which along with Fatah claimed responsibility for Sunday’s double suicide attack at the Ashdod port, which claimed the lives of 10 Israelis.

One of the suggestions raised was increasing targeted assassinations of the group’s leaders, in a similar manner to the one taken during the summer of 2003 after a wave of suicide attacks in Jerusalem, a method which the defense establishment believes proved successful.

In addition, it was decided that ground operations would be increased, following the example of a number of Israel Defense Forces operations during the past year and a half. Some of the proposals will be brought to the security cabinet’s approval. to be convened by Prime Minister Ariel Sharon on Tuesday.

MAARIV: 10 year-old Palestinian caught transporting bomb

A ten-year-old Palestinian child carrying a large explosive device likely designated for a terror attack inside Israel has been caught. The bomb was later detonated by IDF sappers.

The incident took place at a checkpoint near Nablus earlier today (Monday). A Border Guard policewoman at the checkpoint noticed the child and asked him to open the bag he was carrying. A short examination revealed that the bag contained a 6-kilogram (about 13 pounds) explosive device. The child, who is currently being questioned by security authorities, was apparently instructed to deliver the bomb to a Palestinian waiting at the other side of the checkpoint.

HA‘ARETZ: Al Aqsa Martyrs leader: Ashdod bombers planned mega attack

The bombers who carried out Sunday’s double suicide attack at the Ashdod port intended to blow up fuel storage tanks at the port, a senior militant leader in the Gaza Strip told the Associated Press on Monday.

The comments by the Al Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigade leader, who identified himself only as Abu Qusay, heighten Israeli concerns that militants are trying to carry out a “mega attack” with hundreds of casualties. The bombers of Sunday exploded several hundred meters from the fuel tanks, killing 10 people.

Abu Qusay told the AP in a telephone interview that “this is a message to the Israelis that all their walls and fences cannot prevent us from infiltrating Israel and doing whatever we want.”

He said the militant groups were trying to carry out more devastating attacks. “We planned this attack to be a major one, to target their infrastructure, to show them that not only can we kill you, but destroy your infrastructure as well, like you destroy ours,” he said.

Just a reminder… Yasser Arafat’s compound contained a large quantity of Bromine hidden in a workroom for no apparent reason.

CNN

U.S. forces have killed three anti-coalition fighters and captured 13 others in weekend raids in Afghanistan’s mountainous border region near Pakistan, a military spokesman said.

According to Lt. Col. Brian Hilferty, Saturday’s operation near Khalat in southeastern Afghanistan involved U.S. Special Forces, who staged a helicopter-based assault on a cave complex.

“We surprised them. We landed there,” he said.

The events of 311 in Madrid have marked another key event in the war on terror. And there will be political ramifications in both Spain and the US as a result. I discuss those implication here, here and here.

Further, I would argue that this event will sharpen the debate in the US over the war on terror itself, and on Iraq as a front in that war (also here) .

Reuters reports that Israeli attack helicopters fired at least five missiles into Gaza City early on Monday. The air strike came hours after two Gaza terrorists killed 10 people at Israel’s port of Ashdod.

Death toll reported so far is 9, dozens wounded.

Reports are that a large number of security personnel were not in place because of some exercise or conference or trip in Northern Israel.

Also…

MAARIV: Hezbollah TV: 2 Ashdod Suicide bombers from Jabalya in Gaza

The Hezbollah television network, Al-Manar, have reported that the two Palestinian suicide bombers who killed nine people when they blew themselves up at the port in Ashdod were from the Jabalya refugee camp in the Gaza Strip.

The network identified the two men as Mohammed Salem and Nabil Saod.

Erez’s checkpoint/crossing is the main target for Gazan groups right now. Keep hitting it or defeating its security, force a closure, and force locked-out Gazans to turn to Hamas “charities” for services and goods.

HA‘ARETZ: 8 killed in apparent suicide bombing in Ashdod port

Eight people were killed in two explosions Sunday afternoon at the Ashdod port, Israel Radio reported.

The blast was apparently caused by two suicide bombers.

Eight people were seriously wounded.

The explosions took place inside a warehouse. Eight teams of firefighters reached the scene, as did a number of police officers and Magen David Adom rescue workers.

Jerusalem Post relays that it may have been a gas tank exploding.
Maariv reports it may have been a suicide bombing based on shrapnel evidence.

Text of Alleged al-Qaida Tape:

We declare our responsibility for what happened in Madrid exactly 2.5 years after the attacks on New York and Washington. It is a response to your collaboration with the criminals Bush and his allies.

“This is a response to the crimes that you have caused in the world, and specifically in Iraq and Afghanistan, and there will be more, if God wills it.

“You love life and we love death, which gives an example of what the Prophet Muhammad said. If you don’t stop your injustices, more and more blood will flow and these attacks will seem very small compared to what can occur in what you call terrorism.

“This is a statement by the military spokesman for al-Qaida in Europe, Abu Dujan al Afghani.”

JERUSALEM POST: Three Palestinians killed by IDF in Gaza

IDF forces shot dead three Palestinians on Sunday near the Gaza Strip settlement of Netzarim, the army said.

Soldiers searching the area after the shooting discovered explosives on the men’s bodies, according to the army. Palestinian hospital officials said the bodies were riddled with bullets.

The soldiers spotted the three carrying an object that they suspected was a bomb.

IDF officials said the spot where the three were seen was the same area where a bomb was detonated near troops a week ago.

UPI:

A contingent of 600 Pakistani tribal fighters arrived in a remote area along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border Friday to join the hunt for Osama bin Laden.

The contingent that arrived in the remote tribal town of Azam Warsak includes troops from several ethnic Pashtun tribes living in the area, officials said.

“They are armed with modern weapons and fully equipped to confront the Taliban and al-Qaida,” said a tribal chief, Malik Anwar Khan.

Pakistani authorities have forced several powerful tribes in the South Waziristan belt to join the hunt for the al-Qaida leader believed to be hiding in the borderland.

Authorities say they do not expect the tribal fighters to catch Taliban and al-Qaida leaders but their participation in the search sends a signal to other tribesmen that their chiefs no longer support the fugitives.

This, they say, will allow U.S. and Pakistani troops deployed in the area to focus their attention on the hunt. Pakistan has deployed more than 35,000 troops in South Waziristan while an additional 50,000 are deployed in other tribal areas bordering Afghanistan.

They were probably feeling left out, anyhow.

Pakistan is very close to becoming a member of the US’ “axis of evil” club because of its involvement in encouraging cross-border terrorism in India and being “the headquarters of a global mail-order business in nuclear-bomb technology”, the Daily Times quoted an article in The Economist as saying.

Their application for the club is being reviewed and they will be notified shortly.

Spanish police have recovered a videotape claiming responsibility for the deadly Madrid rail bombings in the name of Islamic militant group al Qaeda, Interior Minister Angel Acebes said on Sunday.

“It’s a claim made by a man in Arabic with a Moroccan accent. He makes the declaration in the name of someone who says he is the military spokesman of al Qaeda in Europe,” he told reporters.

(Reuters)

CNN is now reporting on a new video tape delivered to local TV station — first clear claim of al Qaeda responsibility.

Fox News Network — Spanish Interior Ministry has authentic al Qaeda video tape claming responsibility.

The Associated Press:

Spain’s interior minister Saturday announced the arrest of five suspects in the Madrid bombings, including three Moroccans.

The other two are Spaniards of “Hindu” origin, minister Angel Acebes said.

The five were arrested in connection with a cell phone inside an explosives-packed gym bag found on one of the bombed commuter trains.

The suspects “could be related to Moroccan extremist groups,” the minister said. “But we should not rule out anything. Police are still investigating all avenues. This opens an important avenue.”

Breaking News from AP:

Two newspapers report arrests in Madrid bombings, including Arab suspects. Interior Ministry refuses to confirm or deny arrests.

Three out of the five are Moroccans.

I’m still so pissed about this I can hardly sit still. Via Reuters.

Spain’s intelligence service is “99 percent certain” that radical Muslims and not the Basque separatist group ETA are responsible for train bombings that killed 200 people, a Spanish radio station said on Saturday.

Private radio SER, whose owners have links to the opposition Socialist Party, said the National Intelligence Center (CNI) believes the evidence points to an Islamic group, and that 10 to 15 people left bombs on the trains and fled, the radio said.

Get the bastards. “You are either with us, or against us.”

HA‘ARETZ: IDF soldiers kill two Palestinians near Gaza fence

Israel Defense Forces soldiers shot and killed two Palestinians in an off-limits military zone between Israel and the Gaza Strip on Saturday, Palestinian security sources and the military said.

Soldiers guarding the militarized border zone shot two men crawling inside the prohibited area about 100 meters from the border fence which separates Gaza from the nearby Kibbutz of Nahal Oz, the army said.

The pair were carrying two Kalashnikov assault rifles, 10 hand grenades and a pipe bomb and apparently were attempting to cross the fence to attack the farming community, the military said.

The U.S. has begun a new phase in the hunt for bin Laden. It’s been named Operation Mountain Storm and was set into motion on March 7th.

“Mountain Storm” is actually several operations in one, designed to track down not only bin Laden, but other masterminds of al Qaida and the Taliban.

Also in Afghanistan, coalition forces have seized weapons that were to be smuggled out of the country. iThe weapons included grenades, tank ammunition, anti-aircraft artillery, rockets, AK-47s and machineguns.

Here we go again? Air France flights from Paris to Newark and to Washington, D.C. have been delayed “as a safety precaution.”

Flight 004, which was scheduled to leave at 10:20 a.m. this morning for Newark Liberty Airport, has been delayed, according to the airline’s information bulletin.

This morning’s flight from Paris to Dulles Airport, Flight 028, has also been delayed “as a safety precaution.”

British Airways, which reported security delays and cancellations with Air France over the Christmas-New Year’s season, is reporting no such delays or cancellations.

(Cross-posted at Late Final.)

The scale of its carnage in Madrid and the indiscriminate way in which innocent commuters were targeted may mark an alarming new trend in terrorism after 11 September 2001, experts said.

Despite the huge resources devoted to fighting the “war on terror”, bombers are still getting through and causing enormous loss of life by hitting soft targets. “Terrorists are becoming more indiscriminate and they are having a wider impact on communities,” said Tim Dunne, a Canadian military analyst and author of a study on terrorism.

“It looks as if terrorists are becoming more ambitious in their aims. They want to do more damage, inflict more harm and cause more shock - to grab the attention of their public and force governments to react.”

(UK Independent)

Bits of the al-Qaeda claim-letter continue to dribble loose.

Fox News ticker now reporting that the letter claims that “big attack on U.S. is ‘90 percent’ ready.”

Excerpt:

“When we attacked the Italian troops in Nassiriyah and sent you and America’s agents an ultimatum to withdraw from the anti-Islam alliance, you did not understand the the message. Now we have made it clear and hope that this time you will understand,” the statement said.

(AP)

The Arabic newspaper Al-Quds al-Arabi said Thursday it had received a claim of responsibility for the Madrid train bombings issued in the name of al-Qaida.

The five-page e-mail claim, signed by the shadowy Brigade of Abu Hafs al-Masri, was received at the paper’s London offices. It said the brigade’s “death squad” had penetrated “one of the pillars of the crusade alliance, Spain.”

“This is part of settling old accounts with Spain, the crusader, and America’s ally in its war against Islam,” the claim said.

Referring to Spain’s Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar, the statement asked: “Aznar, where is America? Who will protect you, Britain, Japan, Italy and others from us?”

The newspaper faxed the claim to The Associated Press office in Cairo.

(AP)

The newspaper (Al-Quds al-Arabi) says the claim of responsibility was issued by a group called The Brigade of Abu Hafs al-Masri, in the name of al-Qaida.

It said the brigade’s “death squad” had struck what it described as “one of the pillars of the crusade alliance.”

(AP)

From the ticker at Haaretz:

Al-Quds Al-Arabi daily: Al-Qaida letter claims Madrid train bombings that killed 190 and wounded over 1,240 (Reuters)

Christiane Amanpour now reporting Spanish Interior Ministry received “citizen’s tip” concerning the van in a “university town outside Madrid”, which included the tape with Koranic verses: a commercially-available tape “that contained no threats”. ETA remains prime suspect, but “new lines of inquiry” opened on this evidence.

Breaking News headline from AP:

Interior minister says police find van with detonators and Arabic-language tape of Koranic verses; says new lines of investigation open in train bombings.

MSNBC is now reporting that Spanish police have found a van with detonaters and Arabic langauge tapes of Koranic verse, strengthening conjecture of al-Qaida responsibility.

That’s all there is to a very brief and new report.

CNN now carrying similar report.

“Terrorism experts in Britain believe the deadly blasts in Madrid in Spain were well within the capabilities of Basque separatist group ETA, and they expressed surprise at the scale of the attack.

But some refused to rule out the possibility that Osama bin Laden’s Al Qaeda network might have been behind the coordinated explosions in and around the capital’s train stations at morning rush hour that has killed at least 186.

Meanwhile, US intelligence agencies believe it is too early to conclude who was behind the explosions, but also see the attack as bearing hallmarks of both the Basque separatist group ETA and Al Qaeda, an US official said.

‘It’s going to be muddy for a while until the Spanish authorities get in there and start doing some forensics,’ the US official said.”

(Reuters)

From UPI:

While all fingers in Spain are pointing at the Basque separatist movement ETA as the perpetrators of Thursday’s atrocious train bombings that left some 186 dead and 600 wounded, the attacks carry all the markings of al-Qaida and its jihadi affiliates.

For starters the Brussels-based World Observatory of Terrorism, an independent think tank affiliated with the European Strategic Intelligence and Security Center, points to five major reasons that cast doubt on the involvement of ETA.

First, ETA generally warns Spanish authorities moments before launching their attacks in which civilians are likely to be harmed. This, obviously, was not the case on Thursday.

Second, ETA traditionally targets representatives of the government or the administration, such as policemen, the military, magistrates or even journalists who oppose them.

Third, ETA customarily selects “symbolic” targets, such as military barracks and administrative buildings. Although ETA’s largest attack to date was in 1987 against a supermarket in Barcelona that killed 21 people, this was the exception rather than the norm.

Fourth, ETA always claims its attacks. Following any ETA bombing, ETA militants call in a claim to Spanish authorities. This failed to happen this time.

Fifth, ETA has never in the past carried out multiple attacks. According to some sources, at least 10 bombs were detonated almost simultaneously on Thursday.

On the other hand, these murderous attacks bear the traditional hallmark of al-Qaida: multiple bombs detonating a few seconds apart and programmed to cause the largest possible number of human casualties.

Welcome! Our goal at Wonds of Cjange.NET is to give you one power-packed briefing of insights, news and trends from the global War on Terror that leaves you stimulated, informed, and occasionally amused every Monday & Thursday. Today’s “Winds of War” is brought to you by Dan Darling of Regnum Crucis.

TOP TOPICS

• After much debate, Iraq has signed an interim constitution, the full text of which you can read here. This constitution is easily the most liberal document of its kind in the Arab world and represents the best hope for the Iraqi people after decades of Baathist tyranny.

• Coordinated bombings kill around 150 people in Madrid, Spain. MaderBlog points to some analysis and says this is the new pattern. More updates here as they come in, plus some background on the Basque ETA terrorists.

• Khalid al-Zawahiri, the son of al-Qaeda’s second of command, is said to be spilling the beans on al-Qaeda operations in Waziristan. Or is he? Unfortunately, these types of reports are issued frequently when large numbers of al-Qaeda operatives are arrested.

Other Topics Today Include: Iraq Briefing; Iran Reports; USA Homeland Security Briefing; Afghan clashes; Taliban rule 70% of Zabul; Pakistan arrests Waziri elders; bin Laden trying to slip the dragnet; KSM and Swisscom SIMs; JI arrests in Southeast Asia; JI out of explosives; Commander Robot on Abu Sayyaf; Qadaffi interview; GSPC on US radar; GSPC stepping up operations in Africa; Yemen arrests al-Qaeda members; Dutch detain Moroccan man; double suicide bombing in Istanbul; Russian victories in Chechnya; IMU back in action; Khadr clan admits al-Qaeda ties; and the most interesting alibi I’ve ever heard.

Read The Rest…

For worried relatives, according to the BBC
(+34) 900 200 222
(+34) 915 767 000

170 Dead at last report (BBC World TV Broadcast a few minutes ago), and still rising.

From The Australian :

More than 130 people have been killed and dozens injured after a string of powerful explosions rocked three train stations in central Madrid during the morning rush hour.

The capital’s regional government security affairs director, Pedro Calvo, confirmed the death toll had risen to 131.

“This is a massacre,” government spokesman Eduardo Zaplana said. ( Latest pictures)

In the first attack of the year blamed on ETA, bombs exploded around 7:30 a.m. (0630 GMT) in a commuter train arriving at Atocha station, a bustling hub for subway, commuter and long-distance trains in Spain’s capital.

Blasts also rocked trains or platforms at two stations on a commuter line leading to Atocha. The government said there were four blasts altogether.

Pictures show trains with great chunks blown out of them, evenly spaced in a well-planned and co-ordinated attack designed to maximise civilian casualties.

The banned “political” wing of the Basque separatist group ETA (equivalent of Sinn Fein to the IRA) has denied any responsibility, blaming Al Qaeda instead. Also from The Australian :

The leader of the banned Basque separatist party Batasuna denied a Spanish government claim that the armed Basque group ETA had carried out today’s train bombings in Madrid and blamed “the Arab resistance” instead.

Party leader Arnaldo Otegi said he “refused to believe” that ETA was responsible for the apparently coordinated bombs which killed at least 131 people and left hundreds wounded.

Earlier, Spanish Government spokesman Eduardo Zaplana condemned what he called “an attack on Spanish democracy” and dubbed ETA a “criminal gang of killers”.

But Otegi blamed “the Arab resistance”.

Spain was one of the strongest supporters of the US-led invasion of Iraq last year.

Given the size of Spain’s population ( 40 million), this is Spain’s Bali. This is Spain’s 9/11.

My sympathies, amigos.

UPDATE : More details, from the ABC (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) :

The trains - two suburban and a long-distance high-speed carrier - were near one of the capital’s two main railway stations, Atocha, and at two other stations in the suburbs when the blasts went off, police said.

No warning was given before any of the explosions, Spanish Interior Minister Angel Acebes said.

“A few minutes ago there was a fourth explosion… There have been four explosions in four different places,” said Acebes, who declined to give a precise deathtoll.

“We are still finding victims inside some of the carriages… There was no warning.”

Emilio Benito, a spokesman for ambulance service Samur told state radio that around 250 people were injured in a single blast at the Atocha train station in central Madrid.

UPDATE: From the BBC :

The authorities say that, so far, 173 people are known to have died.

At least 600 people have been injured and Madrid’s hospitals, swamped with casualties, have made an urgent appeal for blood donations.

Photo from BBC website

Although this attack is not ETA’s usual modus operandi, and is Al Qaeda’s, the Spanish Government’s top suspect is ETA. See post on Global Recon site for why.

JERUSALEM POST: Terrorist bomb plant blown up near Bethlehem

A security alert imposed on the Jerusalem district Wednesday night was lowered Thursday morning. Security officials did not rule out that this was due to arrests carried out in the West Wank overnight and in the early hours of the morning.

Security forces blew up a house used as a bomb factory this morning, located between the villages of Hussan and Wallajeh, near Bethlehem, according to Palestinian sources quoted on Israel Radio.

In the past fifteen minutes, multiple sources are reporting at least one explosion at the Atocha train station in Madrid, Spain.

AP (Tuscaloosa News) — Injuries, EMT’s on-scene, at least two blasts according to witnesses.

BBC — at least one blast.

news.com.au — possibly three explosions.

Sky News — five dead.

Winds of Change.NET Regional Briefings run on Tuesdays & Wednesdays, and sometimes Fridays too. This Regional Briefing focuses on South Asia, courtesy of Robi Sen.

NUKE GATE AND THE GLOBAL NUCLEAR WEAPONS MARKET

• More information keeps surfacing every day about the global nuclear weapons black market and Asian and South Asian countries central role in the dissemination of proscribed materials. Unbelievably, Buhary Syed Abu Tahir, who was revealed as the middleman representing Abdul Qadeer Khan, confessed but will be free to leave Malaysia since he has not actually broken any laws there! This is something that the US is not happy about. This does not guarantee though that other countries may not attempt to bring charges against him.

• The New Yorker this month offered the suggestion that the reason the US has not put more pressure on Mushraff to keep Khan in jail is that Pakistan is allowing the US to go after Osama Bin Laden. It’s hard to fathom the US would trade Osama Bin Laden and allow Pakistan to continue to let Khan deal in nuclear weapons technology. The Argus offers a great round up on what the New Yorker calls The Deal as well as some interesting analysis.

• Pakistan’s Nuke Gate has exposed a truly global black market in nuclear weapons with individuals and organizations from Switzerland, the UK, Germany, Turkey and even Israel! Interestingly enough Nigeria also made the list although Pakistan is denying any connections. Victor David Hanson has some insightful perspective on nuclear proliferation and if things are actually not better than they where.

Other Topics Today Include: A Trade For Osama; Powel Visits India and Pakistan; Israel-Indian Alliance; Terrorism in South Asia; and more.

Read The Rest…

More news in the front of the Global War on Terror. This time, Marwan Barghouti loses a few supporters…

JERUSALEM POST: IDF kills four Tanzim members in Jenin

Four Tanzim fugitives were killed Wednesday by security forces operating in the West Bank city of Jenin.

Undercover Border Police forces entered Jenin to nab Palestinian fugitives. While operating in the city, two vehicles drove up near the troops and opened fire. The four passengers of the vehicles were shot and killed.

Security forces left the city unharmed.

No word yet on what happened to the vehicles, but they’re probably under administrative detention udnergoing interrogation.

UPDATE:
Sources report five dead Tanzim/Fateh. It’s gone from Four-of-a-kind to a Straight flush.

JERUSALEM POST: Gaza-based Hizbullah cell planned flying bomb

Members of a terror cell operating in Khan Yunis in the Gaza Strip, activated by the Lebanese Hizbullah were recently arrested by Shin Bet, according to a report released Wednesday.

In 2002, the organization initiated a plan to create a flying bomb that would carry explosives to its target inside Israel.

Shadi Abu El-Hatzitz, 23, a Yemenite father of 2, is considered the mastermind behind the Kassam rocket-manufacturing infrastructure in the Gaza Strip, was arrested on December 15th. El Hatzitz moved with his mother and brothers to the Gaza Strip ten years ago from Lebanon.

He told investigators that his father – a Fedayun member in Lebanon – taught him how to strip and re-assemble weapons when he was still a boy.

CNN reports that bin Laden may be planning a move from Pakistan to Afghanistan. (Note to CIA: Track the yellow Ryder van making its way Northwest.)

JERUSALEM POST: Israeli Arab woman sentenced for aiding Islamic Jihad

An Israeli Arab woman, Lina Jarbuni, 29, of Arrabeh in the Galilee, was sentenced to 17 years in prison by the Haifa district court on Tuesday for helping members of the Islamic Jihad who had been planning to carry out terror attacks inside Israel.

Jarbuni helped one of them obtain an Israeli ID card, rented an apartment in Israel and also opened a bank account on behalf of the man and an accomplice.

She was convicted of conspiracy to commit murder, contact with a foreign agent and helping the enemy at a time of war.

From FOX News Live (paraphrased):

Abu Abas, organizer of the Achille Lauro hijacking, has died of natural causes while in United States custody in Iraq.

UPDATE:
Jerusalem Post report.

HA‘ARETZ: Hamas says it may stop attacks from Gaza if Israel quits Strip

Hamas may stop attacks from Gaza “for a certain time” if Israel withdraws from the Strip, but it would resume and intensify them if Israel still held onto the West Bank, the movement’s founder and spiritual leader Sheikh Ahmed Yassin said Tuesday.

Yassin stressed in an interview with Reuters that attacks in the West Bank itself would go on as long as it remained under Israel’s control.

“With regard to Gaza, resistance may stop for a certain time if all Israelis (settlers and soldiers) leave Gaza until we see what the fate of the West Bank, our refugees and Jerusalem will be,” the Hamas spiritual leader said.

JERUSALEM POST: Border Police nab Islamic Jihad chief in Jenin

Undercover Border Policemen arrested the head of the Islamic Jihad in the West Bank city of Jenin Anas Ansawi on Tuesday, Army Radio reported.

The officers arrested three other wanted fugitives during the operation to nab Ansawi.

HA‘ARETZ: Hamas to unveil its plan for Gaza after Israeli withdrawal

Hamas will soon unveil a plan to administer the Gaza Strip should Israel carry out its announced intention to withdraw, the movement’s founder and spiritual leader Sheikh Ahmed Yassin said Tuesday.

He told reporters the plan, currently being formulated, “includes political, administrative and social processes, as well as other fields that serve Palestinians”.

He added that while the plan has not yet been adopted by Hamas, it should be approved by all the other factions as well as the Palestinian Authority.

Yassin also refuted reports Hamas intends assuming control of Gaza once the Israelis leave, saying that “we have never had the intention of taking over security responsibilities in the Strip” but “we seek cooperation and partnership among all the Palestinian national and Islamic movements.”

TERRY BOYD visits the 10th Mountain Division at Firebase Purgatory, southeastern Afghanistan.

Go learn what it’s like to live in a former Taliban town.

JERUSALEM POST: Palestinian bomb factory destroyed in West Bank

IDF forces deployed in the village, Anza south of Jenin, blew up a bomb factory discovered by soldiers who were searching the area early Sunday morning.

Security officials said troops found empty mortar shells, pipes, gunpowder, fertilizer used to manufacture explosives and fuses inside the factory.

…But you can’t hide. From the ABC (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) :

A man has been arrested at Byron Bay on the New South Wales north coast over a grenade attack on an Israeli police station four years ago.

Twenty-three year old Hezl Bohadana was taken into custody last Monday after a major surveillance operation.

He is wanted in Israel for the attempted murder of Israeli police, illegal use of explosives and conspiracy to commit serious crimes.

Mr Bohadana appeared in a closed sitting of the Lismore Local Court court last week.

He was remanded in custody to appear in a Sydney Court on April 14, while a formal request is made from Israeli authorities for his extradition.

Just one more of the constant background skirmishes in the War against terror. The phrase “major surveillance operation” is a dead giveaway that there’s more here than meets the eye. Mostly, you don’t hear of these incidents, or they’re buried somewhere on page 147. But they’re there.

AP: U.S., Afghan Forces Kill Nine Militants, Capture 14

American and Afghan troops killed nine suspected Islamic militants during a gun battle in the eastern province of Paktika, the U.S. military said on Saturday, in one of the heaviest clashes reported in recent months.

In separate operations, 14 suspected rebels were detained in a U.S. air assault in the east on Thursday and two senior Taliban commanders were captured by Afghan forces on Friday after an attack on a post near the Pakistan border killed seven government soldiers.

The clash involving U.S. forces on Friday began when they opened fire on a group of 30 to 40 armed men apparently trying to move to the side of their sniper position east of Orgun-E, 170 km (106 miles) south of Kabul, in order to launch an attack.

“They were armed, they were acting in a hostile manner, so we fired on them and then we pursued them with the Afghan National Army,” U.S. military spokesman Lieutenant-Colonel Bryan Hilferty told a news briefing in Kabul. “Nine of them were killed in that battle, and there were no coalition casualties.”

KUALA LUMPUR (Reuters): Malaysia is holding in detention six Indonesians caught returning from a Jemaah Islamiah militant training camp in the southern Philippines, a senior security official said on Saturday.

Jemaah Islamiah (JI), a Southeast Asian offshoot of al-Qaeda, was behind the Bali bombings in late 2002 and the suicide bomb attack on the J.W. Marriott Hotel in Jakarta last year.

HA‘ARETZ: Police beef up presence in Jerusalem due to terror warning

Police beefed up presence in Jerusalem due to a terror warning Saturday, according to which terrorists were intending to carry out an attack in the capital, Israel Radio reported. Roadblocks were erected in the capital and police were examining suspicious vehicles, the radio said.

The road between Jerusalem and Givat Ze`ev was closed to traffic, and there were heavy traffic jams on the road between the capital and Ma`aleh Adumim, the radio said.

Security forces removed some roadblocks from the Sharon region midday Friday, but remained on alert and continued inspecting some vehicles in the wake of a terror threat in the area.

Police and the army have already been placed on “very high alert” for the Purim holiday weekend, amid threats from Hamas of vengeance for this week’s assassination of three Hamas activists, and a total closure was imposed on the territories.

HA‘ARETZ: Suicide attackers strike at Erez Crossing in Gaza Strip

A Palestinian suicide bomber and a gunman attacked the Erez crossing between the Gaza Strip and Israel on Saturday. Three Palestinians were killed and 15 were wounded in the attack, and no Israeli casualties were reported.

According to initial investigation, one of the assailants entered the Israeli side of the crossing terminal in a jeep and fired on soldiers who returned fire and killed him. The second attacker blew himself up inside a jeep on the Palestinian side of the crossing point.

According to an IDF investigation, the two vehicles ere altered to look like Israel Defense Forces jeeps.

The militant groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad, as well as Fatah claimed responsibility for the attack, calling it a joint “self-sacrifice operation” in a message posted on the Hamas Web site.

JERUSALEM POST: Poll: Mideast conflict increases world terrorism

A survey conducted amongst the citizens of eight American and European states shows a majority believes the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has increased the threat of international terrorism.

According to the poll, conducted by AP, 59 percent feel the situation between Israel and the Palestinians has given rise to the danger of world terror.

Conversely, only 38% view the war in Iraq as a contributing factor.

Some 31% of those asked said the Israeli-Palestinian conflict had no effect on the global situation, while only 5% said it actually decreased the threat of terrorism.

The AP polls were conducted by Ipsos, an international polling firm, in Britain, Canada, France, Italy, Germany, Mexico, Spain and the United States.

JERUSALEM POST: US university student charged with aiding Hamas

A graduate student from Saudi Arabia - already jailed on immigration charges - has been accused of helping to raise funds for the Hamas.

Sami Omar al-Hussayen was charged with conspiracy to provide material support to terrorism after US federal prosecutors said he helped run websites that urge people to contribute money to Hamas.

CNN reports:

Among the devices that will be in place within days are U-2 spy planes flying at 70,000 feet, taking pictures, using radar and intercepting communications.

Unmanned Predator drones, flying closer at 25,000 feet, are equipped with cameras that can spot vehicles and people and special radar that can operate through clouds. Some of the Predators may also carry Hellfire missiles.

Ground sensors may also be placed along mountain passes to listen for vehicles.

Data from the planes and sensors will be sent via satellite to analysts for quick action. The U.S. military has bought up satellite transmission capacity in the region, to ensure it can respond quickly.

Of course, there’s the obligatory disclaimer in the next paragraph:

But none of the measures are being acknowledged officially.

JERUSALEM POST: US court rejects PA attempt to throw out terror suit

A federal judge in New York shot down the Palestinian Authority’s legal defense strategy in a $500 million terrorism lawsuit, declaring that the Palestinian claim of sovereign immunity does not hold up in US court.

“The court is not prepared to find sovereign immunity where none exists,” wrote Judge Victor Marrero in a 62-page decision in which he denied a motion to dismiss the suit, which was brought by the family of Aharon Ellis against the PA, PLO, and a slew of top Palestinian officials accused of terrorist ties.

Defendants include PA chairman Yasser Arafat, Wast Bank Fatah leader Marwan Barghouti, and Nasser Awis, a Barghouti deputy and Tanzim leader from Nablus who was convicted last year in Israeli court of organizing the attack that killed Ellis.

MAARIV: Army to impose complete closure on territories for Purim holiday

The army has decided to impose a complete closure on the West Bank and Gaza Strip until Tuesday morning. The security forces recommended the closure to ensure safety during the Purim holiday, which begins on Saturday night and lasts through Monday. While the rest of the country celebrates Purim on Sunday, Jerusalemites will celebrate the holiday on Monday.

The FBI is warning that terrorists could potentially use pens filled with cartridges of poison as weapons, according to an FBI bulletin obtained by Fox News.

A pen gun is a small-caliber, single shot weapon that resembles a fountain pen.

In its weekly bulletin to law enforcement agencies throughout the country, the FBI said that bullet cavities of pen guns could be filled with poisonous chemicals or biological toxins, including cyanide, mercury, arsenic and ricin.

JERUSALEM POST: Palestinian wounded while preparing a car bomb

A Palestinian was wounded in a blast in the West Bank village of Kif al-Hareth Thursday.

The wounded man, together with another Palestinian who was not wounded in the blast, were trying to attach a bomb to a car, which was to be used for a terror attack.

Following the blast, security forces’ sappers arrived on the scene and dismantled the bomb.

The two men escaped to a nearby village. IDF forces are scanning the area.

From Maariv: same incident?

A German court Thursday overturned the world’s only conviction for the Sept. 11 attacks and ordered a retrial for a Moroccan found guilty last year of aiding the Hamburg cell of suicide hijackers.

Mounir el Motassadeq’s conviction on more than 3,000 counts of accessory to murder and membership in a terrorist organization was flawed because the lower court failed to properly consider the absence of evidence from a key witness who is in U.S. custody, the Federal Criminal Court ruled. The jailed 29-year-old’s case now returns to court in Hamburg.

From Reuters:

Witnesses in the Rafah refugee camp in southern Gaza said a blast tore through the home of a leading local militant killing him and wounding his wife, infant son and five neighbors.

The Israeli army did not immediately comment but there were no reports of Israeli forces in the area.

Scores of Palestinian bombmakers have been killed when their bombs have gone off prematurely.

(Girls, don’t you hate it when your husband brings his work home with him?)

HA‘ARETZ: Hamas vows revenge for Gaza strike; police raise alert

The Hamas spokesman in Gaza, Abd al-Aziz Rantissi, threatened that the militant organization would respond to an Israeli strike Wednesday in which three Hamas militants were killed near the settlement of Netzarim.

“Even if the Hamas members were on their way to carry out a legitimate attack on the settlement of Netzarim, a military response to the action will be forthcoming. Before [Prime Minister Ariel Sharon] withdraws from Gaza, he continues to carry out crimes against the Islamic movements in the Strip,” Rantissi said.

Meanwhile, police on Wednesday announced they were on a heightened terror alert ahead of the Purim holiday. Thousands of policemen, Border Police troops and civilian volunteers will patrol city centers and provide security during the holiday. A particular emphasis will be placed on securing Purim celebrations at Israeli schools.

MAARIV: One of the Hamas terrorists killed was responsible for Erez bombing

One of the three Hamas terrorists killed in Gaza today was Jamal Tarad, who was responsible for dispatching the female suicide bomber who blew herself up at the Erez crossing. Defense sources say that all three were senior level leaders of the Hamas terror organization.

NOTE: Also from Maariv, Prime Minister “Abu Ala” Queria condemns the strike:

The goal of the Israeli government is to annihilate every attempt to bring quiet and to revive peace talks.”

(Strange…. it appears to have annihilated three Hamas commanders according to my scorecard. Were they keeping Peace in the trunk or something?)

HA‘ARETZ: Court sentences Israeli Arabs who planned terror attacks

The Haifa District Court on Wednesday sentenced three Israeli-Arabs to long prison terms for planning to carry out terror attacks.

Two residents of the Lower Galilee village of Kafr Manda; Mahmoud al-Halim and Mahmad Abed al-Hamid, were sentenced to 20 years in prison, while the third resident, Ibrahim Abed al-Hamid, was sentenced to 14 years in prison.

According to the charge sheet, Halim met an Islamic Jihad member during a visit to Mecca in November 2002 and agreed to help carrying out terror attacks in Israel. Halim later contacted the other defendants, who agreed to join him in c