http://www.geostrategy-direct.com/
The new Al Qaida's standing orders: If it feels good, do it In April 2004 seven suspected Al Qaida operatives linked to the Madrid train bombings the previous month blew themselves up in an apartment building in Leganes, south of Madrid, during a battle with Spanish police. Just before the explosion, the operatives called Britain. Mohammed Al Karbuzi Age: 45 Position: Moroccan cleric Whereabouts: London British authorities are seeking to question Mohammed Al Karbuzi, a cleric sentenced by a Moroccan court to 20 years on charges of being linked to a 2003 Al Qaida suicide attacks in Casablanca in which 45 people were killed. Al Karbuzi (also known as Mohammed El Guerbouzi) is also suspected of being connected to the Madrid train bombings in March 2004. French intelligence has identified him as the founder and chief recruiter of the Al Qaida-aligned Moroccan Islamic Combatant Group. In 2003, Morocco issued an international warrant for Al Karbuzi's arrest. Britain ignored the warrant, with officials determining that Rabat had not provided sufficient evidence to take him into custody. Over the past year, Al Karbuzi reportedly left Britain for France and has not appeared in public. Al Karbuzi is not alone. Intelligence sources said Moroccans have played a central role in Al Qaida's new European network, believed to have turned operational in 2003. Al Qaida has benefited from support from a growing number of young Muslims, many of them converts from Christianity. Young European Muslims have also been recruited to fight the U.S.-led coalition in Iraq. "Within the European Union, United Kingdom appears to be a primary target for Al Qaida and/or its affiliates as demonstrated by the bomb attacks in Istanbul in November 2003 against the British Consulate and the HSBC bank which targeted United Kingdom interests in Turkey; and by the kidnapping and murder of a number of its nationals in Saudi Arabia and in Iraq," stated an October 2004 report, "Terrorist Activity in the European Union: Situation And Trends Report." The report was submitted to the European Parliament. "The disruption through law enforcement operations of terrorist cells has evidenced plans for large scale attacks within the United Kingdom." Born in the northern Moroccan city of Araish, Al Karbuzi left his native Morocco in 1974 at age 17. He was already then regarded as an Islamic operative linked to the Salafist movement. He became involved in Islamic crusades and by the late 1980s was helping recruit Muslims to prepare for the war in Bosnia. In 1986, he arrived in London. In 1991, Al Karbuzi, who received British nationality, volunteered for the Muslim Brotherhood in what he later said were relief efforts in Afghanistan. He also underwent training and indoctrination in Pakistan in the Islamic war against the Soviet Union. Islamic sources said the Saudi-trained Salafist Jihadiya movement financed Al Karbuzi. Salafist Jihadiya was identified as the architect of the suicide attacks in Casablanca in 2003. Al Karbuzi denied any involvement in the strikes and asserted that he was contacted by Moroccan intelligence in January 2002 in the presence of British intelligence officers. He refused to talk to the intelligence agents without an attorney. "I am not hiding and I am not a terrorist," Al Karbuzi told the Al- Jazeera satellite network from an unspecified location in London. "These are all lies. They have made up this story." Al Karbuzi was believed to have long lost contact with Osama Bin Laden. Indeed, according to Western intelligence sources, Bin Laden no longer commands operatives and doesn't even send money to his followers. But he does award franchises to the best-trained and indoctrinated Islamic terrorists. "According to Osama Bin Laden's thinking, there are no dormant cells," former Bin Laden bodyguard Abu Jandal said. "Every element of Al Qaida is self-activated. Whoever finds a chance to attack just goes ahead. The decision is theirs. This is regardless of whether they pledged allegiance to Sheik Osama Bin Laden or not." This year, Al Qaida's franchises have taken over. An estimated 75 people were killed in London's mass transit system on July 7 by a new Al Qaida network based in Western Europe that trained in such places as Afghanistan, Bosnia and Iraq. Three of the sophisticated bombs blew up in London's subway system during rush hour. Western intelligence sources said the group represented a new generation of Al Qaida operatives aided by at least two major organizations based in Algeria and Iraq. The attacks were carried out by young Muslims, some of them European Union nationals who combined deep hatred for the West with career ambitions. In Britain alone, up to 600 nationals had been trained in Al Qaida camps in Afghanistan until 2001. "The threat to the UK from international terrorism remains real and serious," the report to the European Parliament said. "Osama Bin Laden has repeatedly named the United States and Israel as the primary targets for Al Qaida. However, the threat to the West does not solely derive from Al Qaida. Osama Bin Laden intended his organization to be a vanguard for Islamist resurgence by inspiring other Islamist groups into a violent jihad against the United States and its allies. We have seen terror groups learn from, and be inspired by, the acts of Al Qaida and other extremists in the Middle East." U.S. sources said Bin Laden ordered the establishment of sleeper cells in Europe and the United States years before the 2001 suicide strikes in New York and Washington. The sleeper cell in Britain was believed to contain experts in bomb-production, surveillance and infiltration and was part of Bin Laden's plan to sustain war against the West for at least a decade. London has been the nerve center for Al Qaida cells in other European Union states. This was demonstrated in April 2004 when seven suspected Al Qaida operatives linked to the Madrid train bombings the previous month blew themselves up in a battle with Spanish police. Just before they killed themselves, the Islamic operatives called Britain. British intelligence has identified many Al Qaida supporters and interrogated them for information on rival insurgency groups and the situation in such countries as Saudi Arabia and Syria. The Al Qaida supporters have proved to be so valuable that the British government did not move against them despite Bin Laden's strikes against the United States in 2001. Today, some officials are recognizing that the British government made a mistake. At least 20 Al Qaida operatives maintained surveillance on London's mass transit network for at least six months to determine vulnerable points, Western intelligence sources said. The job wasn't easy. Since 2002, British authorities twice disrupted plans to attack the London subway system. In November 2004, British intelligence foiled a plan to attack passenger jets at London's Heathrow Airport. An Al Qaida plot to strike London's Canary Wharf financial district was also blocked. Meanwhile, the threats kept pouring in. "Here in London there is a very well-organized group, which calls itself Al-Qaida-Europe," Sheik Omar Bakri Mohammed, a Syrian national and head of the London-based Al Muhajiroun, told the Portuguese daily Publico in April 2004. "I know they are on the verge of launching a big operation." Months before the subway strikes obtained final approval, Al Qaida worked on psychological operations. The goal was to lull British and U.S. authorities into a false sense of security. This worked as well. Only last month, the British Joint Terrorist Analysis Centre reduced the threat level of an Al Qaida attack from "severe-general" to "substantial." The action was based on an assessment that Al Qaida remained incapable of mounting a coordinated attack in Britain. "It just came out of the blue," British Home Secretary Charles Clarke said. The aftermath of the bombings also appeared to represent the sophistication of the new Al Qaida. Several Al Qaida-aligned groups claimed responsibility. All of the groups appeared shadowy and intelligence sources were uncertain whether they actually existed. Al Qaida has maintained two key networks one in Iraq and the other in Algeria, the sources said. Over the past year Algeria's Salafist Brigade for Combat and Call and the Iraqi network led by Abu Mussib Al Zarqawi have been cooperating in operations in Europe. Another group with extensive connections in Europe is the Moroccan Islamic Combatant Group, also linked to Al Qaida. These groups don't recruit and often don't directly finance operations, but help in technical aspects. "Al Qaida is an ideological reference point, not a real articulated structure with a command chain," Spanish anti-terror judge Baltasar Garzon told a recent counter-terrorist conference in Italy. "These are individuals who comprise a sort of constellation." Islamic insurgents from Algeria began targeting European mass transit a decade ago. In 1995, operatives from the Armed Islamic Group, the parent organization of the Salafist Brigade, detonated several bombs in Paris that killed eight people and injured about 200. The report to the European Parliament said the North African terror network has been operating in Portugal. The report asserted that the network used Portugal to recruit and establish logistics for attacks throughout Europe. But London remains the preferred capital for Al Qaida. The city contains a mix of Islamic insurgents from Algeria, Egypt, Iran, Jordan, Morocco, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Sudan and Syria. Although they value the political asylum granted by Britain, these insurgents have come to believe that unless they were caught red-handed they could support Al Qaida-type operations against U.S.-aligned regimes in the Arab world. "There are many youths who dream of joining Al Qaida, but worse than that, there are many freelancers who are willing to launch operations similar to those by Al Qaida," Mohammed, regarded as a leading Al Qaida booster in Europe and who claims to have sent more than 700 people abroad for training, said in the April 2004 interview. "The attack in Madrid was carried out by one of those groups." It's unlikely Al Qaida will strike Europe again in the near future. But the London attacks will be felt for months if not years to come. Still, the next stop for Al Qaida could be the United States. The U.S. has raised the terrorism alert level for mass-transit systems to Code Orange following the British bombings. Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said authorities have not received credible intelligence on an imminent attack on U.S. mass transit. The analyst and former Indian Cabinet secretary, who is known simply as Raman, said Al Qaida has the upper hand because of the difficulties of intelligence agencies to penetrate Islamic insurgency groups and their supporters. The usefulness of technical intelligence to monitor Islamic operatives has eroded as the insurgents have bolstered communications security. Terrorists have also determined that the most cost-effective targets are land-based transport. "It is reasonably possible to provide effective physical security to air-borne and sea-borne transport," Raman said. "Physical security for land-based transport such as trains, the tube and buses is much more difficult. The only way of providing reasonable security is by having anti-explosive checks at every station and in every bus. The cost involved will be prohibitive and it will be difficult to implement." -------------------------- Want to discuss this topic? Head on over to our discussion list, [EMAIL PROTECTED] -------------------------- Brooks Isoldi, editor [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.intellnet.org Post message: [email protected] Subscribe: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe: [EMAIL PROTECTED] *** FAIR USE NOTICE. This message contains copyrighted material whose use has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. OSINT, as a part of The Intelligence Network, is making it available without profit to OSINT YahooGroups members who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information in their efforts to advance the understanding of intelligence and law enforcement organizations, their activities, methods, techniques, human rights, civil liberties, social justice and other intelligence related issues, for non-profit research and educational purposes only. We believe that this constitutes a 'fair use' of the copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the U.S. Copyright Law. If you wish to use this copyrighted material for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use,' you must obtain permission from the copyright owner. For more information go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/osint/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
