U.S. officials believe they have identified a young former bodyguard of Osama bin Laden as al-Qaida's new chief of terror operations in the Persian Gulf. Abu Hazim al-Shair, a 29-year-old Yemeni now believed to be living in Saudi Arabia, is one of a new crop of al-Qaida operatives who are trying to fill the roles of senior bin Laden lieutenants who have been captured or killed since Sept. 11, according to U.S. officials. "Capable replacements appear to be emerging, many of whom have demonstrated their ability to see previously planned operations through to fruition," according to one U.S. intelligence report. Abu Hazim is just one of the top al-Qaida leaders now at large, according to officials from U.S. counterterrorism agencies. Officials acknowledge there may be other emerging leaders they don't know about or leaders participating in terrorist planning they are unaware of. The CIA and FBI, for example, did not learn that Khalid Shaikh Mohammed was the mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks until well after they took place.
| On the other hand, they weren't following the terror machine with quite the minute degree of concentration they are now... |
Abu Hazim appears to be taking the place of Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, a key organizer of the USS Cole bombing and the 1998 East Africa embassy bombings, officials say. Al-Nashiri was detained in the United Arab Emirates in late 2002. Abu Hazim is on Saudi Arabia's list of 19 most-wanted al-Qaida operatives, listed under his real name of Khalid Ali Bin Ali Al-Hajj. He is believed to have trained in al-Qaida's Afghan camps in 1999 and later to have served in bin Laden's bodyguard. Before Sept. 11, he traveled frequently to the Arabian peninsula, to southeast Asia and to Afghanistan. U.S. counterterrorism officials also tie him to the May 12 bombings of residential complexes in Riyadh and possibly to some Saudi-based planning of operations targeting the United States directly. There isn't hard evidence tying him to ongoing attacks on U.S. forces in Iraq, however.
| Not that's public, anyway... |
Abu Hazim's emergence as a senior figure comes as al-Qaida is struggling to deal with the losses of many of its pre-Sept. 11 operational commanders, including Mohammed Atef, Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and Abu Zubaydah.
| And now it's Abu Hazim's turn in the barrel... |
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