The Sunday Times [London], by James Clark, Tony Allen-Mills
SAS troops in Afghanistan have been fired upon by Taliban soldiers in the first clash of the campaign against global terrorism. Nobody was hurt, military sources said, adding that the gunfire had been "more symbolic than directed". They suggested that the small SAS team had "spooked" Taliban soldiers near Kabul, who had fired indiscriminately before fleeing. However, the incident marks an escalation in what has so far been only an intelligence war. The Taliban are in a high state of alert for coalition forces waiting to enter their country.
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09/23/2001 ||
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Houston Chronicle
And the longer it drags on, the closer you get to the nightmare scenario: entanglement in a guerrilla war. Army Maj. Charles Heyman, editor of Jane's World Armies, has warned that any indefinite base in Afghanistan is fraught with peril and that the window of opportunity before a decimating guerrilla action sets in may be as small as two months.
This article starring:
Charles Heyman
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09/23/2001 ||
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Houston Chronicle
"The more Americans learn about Afghanistan, the more frustrated they will become," said Joseph Dawson, former director of the Institute for Military Studies at Texas A&M University. "The typical military targets one expects are not there. The infrastructure is not there. Americans are going to have to go in with their own support. Even if only a few hundred Americans went in, how long could they stay with only the materiel they could carry on their back?"
This article starring:
Joseph Dawson
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09/23/2001 ||
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Natan Gutman, Ha'aretz
U.S. planes continue to be transferred to the Gulf area. The U.S. assault ship Essex left Sasebo naval base in Japan on Saturday and was expected to head for the Indian Ocean. The carrier USS Kitty Hawk, which carries about 70 aircraft, left its home port near Tokyo on Friday. Two carriers are already in the Gulf, and the carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt is making its way to the gulf.
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09/23/2001 ||
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The Observer
BRITISH troops will lead an international coalition alongside America to wage war on Afghanistan in the next 10 days as security and intelligence sources indicated last night that the net was tightening on Osama bin Laden, the prime suspect behind the terrorist attacks on America. With an attack now imminent and American warplanes arriving in neighbouring Uzbekistan ahead of the first wave of strikes, security sources in Britain and America said that they were now concentrating their investigation into bin Laden and the al-Qaeda terrorist organisation in the north and west of Afghanistan.
Five terrorist camps around Jalalabad will be the focus of the military campaign, which Ministry of Defence officials last night revealed was now in the 'final stages' of planning. Sources said that any action by ground troops would be preceded by bombing in the terrorist camps' region. There were unconfirmed reports last night that Special Air Service (SAS) troops were already in northern Afghanistan, working with the anti-Taliban alliance that controls the area.
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09/23/2001 ||
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FoxNews
The Taliban have threatened to execute any U.N. worker who uses computers and communications equipment in Afghanistan, forcing a near halt to the remaining relief work in the country, U.N. officials said Monday. The militia raided U.N. offices in Kabul, the capital, and Kandahar, where the Taliban leadership is based, during the weekend and sealed their satellite telephones, walkie-talkies, computers and vehicles to bar them from use, according to U.N. spokeswoman Stephanie Bunker.
Bunker said that without communications, relief operations would be impossible. "The U.N. has ordered its staff to obey the Taliban directive to avoid risking their lives," she said. "We have requested the Taliban to allow at least one high frequency radio transmitter" in cities with U.N. operations.
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09/23/2001 ||
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Washington Post
The alliance says it can field 15,000 trained troops, a polyglot blend of ethnic Uzbeks, Tajiks and Hazaras. The Taliban, by contrast, commands an estimated 45,000, mostly from the Pashtun ethnic group, which accounts for 40 percent of the country's 25 million people. The Taliban also counts on a large contingent of foreigners.
Though Russia, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, India and Iran have supplied political, financial and logistical assistance to the rebels, the level of that assistance has been limited by geography and regional politics. The alliance controls only one small airfield in the northern village of Faizabad, so moving supplies from Iran to rebel-held territory requires a circuitous route across five countries.
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09/23/2001 ||
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(Reuters)
Saudi-born Osama bin Laden, wanted by the United States as a prime suspect in last week's attacks in the United States, is missing, Abul Hai Mutmaen, spokesman for Taliban leader Mullah Mohammad Omar, told Reuters Sunday. Mullah Omar, spiritual leader of the purist Taliban movement that controls Afghanistan, had approved a decision last week by Afghanistan's most senior clerics to recommend that bin Laden be persuaded to leave the country, he said."We have still not been able to deliver the clerics' message to him because we could not find him," Mutmaen said by telephone from the southern Afghan city of Kandahar. Asked if the world's most wanted man was still in Afghanistan, he said: "I cannot say."
This article starring:
ABUL HAI MUTMAEN
Taliban
MULLAH MOHAMAD OMAR
Taliban
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09/23/2001 ||
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Dawn
The military leader of Afghanistan's Uzbek minority, General Rashid Dostum, whose forces have recently joined in the fight against the Taliban, appealed to the United States for logistical support. In comments reported by Turkey's Sabah newspaper, Dostum warned the United States against attempting any kind of ground action in Afghanistan. "The terrain in Afghanistan devours people," he said. "The U.S. and NATO have to work with us."
Registani said the Taliban, faced with impending attack by U.S. forces, were losing morale. "The Taliban's morale is more or less coming down after the possible attacks on them. Our morale is high, and now is higher," he said. He said the Alliance was recovering after the loss of its legendary military leader, Ahmad Shah Masood. "The Taliban thought that after the death of Ahmad Shah Masood we would be weakened. This is the answer to their wrong assumptions."
This article starring:
Ahmad Shah Masood
Rashid Dostum
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09/23/2001 ||
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The Guardian
Yesterday Bush chaired a National Security Council meeting to complete plans for military action, which could come as early as Thursday. Later today the President will join advisers from the special operations arm of the US Marines at the presidential retreat at Camp David.
It is believed that the coalition force will be led by America with military support and troops from specialist units in Britain and France. Russia will provide logistical support. Tony Blair is on the verge of signing the order agreeing to the use of British troops.
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09/23/2001 ||
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Dawn
The Northern Alliance said on Saturday that its forces had made progress against the Taliban, killing 50 of the ruling militia's soldiers in fighting in northern Afghanistan.
The Alliance made its claim of military victories as two of its senior leaders arrived in Dushanbe, capital of Tajikistan, for talks with Tajik officials.
"On the front line today we continued our operations in two provinces, in the south of Bakhr province and in the south of Samangan province," Soleh Muhammad Registani, the opposition's Moscow-based military attache who is acting as a spokesman, said. "We have made 15kms of progress in the last three days. Fifty Taliban have been killed and more than 300 have joined the Northern Alliance side as the Northern Alliance overran their lines," he said.
This article starring:
Soleh Muhammad Registani
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09/23/2001 ||
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FoxNews
"We are demonstrating because of the imminent danger of a wider war, one that could result in the deaths of tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands more people," said organizer Richard Becker of the New York-based International Action Center, an anti-globalization organization. Becker and his cohorts say they are planning to swarm in front of the White House on Sept. 29. He said the groups will be protesting the treatment of Arabs and Muslims in America and President Bush's move to "expand police powers" in response to the hijacking of four U.S. commercial airplanes and the deaths of thousands of civilians.
This article starring:
International Action Center
Richard Becker
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09/23/2001 ||
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FoxNews
American University History Professor Peter Kuznick said his classroom, along with others around the country, has seen what he describes as a
"Once they take to the streets of Washington they might be in for a surprise, all the flags and dime-store patriotism..."
groundswell of skepticism about military retaliation to the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. "There were protests on college campuses all over the country," he said. "They're questioning and debating about policy alternatives and approaches. Once they take to the streets of Washington they might be in for a surprise, all the flags and dime-store patriotism -- but I'm sure they are well aware of what they will encounter." He said students on campus are concerned that the need for military retaliation has reached a "feverish pitch" and are wary that the patriotism is a facade, "whipped up by President Bush," to justify war.
This article starring:
Peter Kuznick
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09/23/2001 ||
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CBS News Poll
Nearly two weeks after the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, 85 percent expect the United States will go to war; 10 days ago, 68 percent held that expectation. More than 9 in 10 Americans would support that: 92 percent now think the United States should take military action against whomever is responsible for the attacks. A week ago, 85 percent felt that way.
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09/23/2001 ||
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Chicago Tribune
Tracking down Osama bin Laden and breaking up his terrorist network may require the help of some "unsavory characters," the kind who violate human rights at one time or another. That's what Vice President Dick Cheney said in a recent interview on NBC's "Meet the Press." After all, he noted, sometimes espionage is "a mean, nasty, dangerous, dirty business."
Former President George Bush, who also was a former CIA director, and some other former insiders have attacked guidelines that regulate the recruitment of sources who have a history of criminal activity and human-rights violations.
Calling the guidelines, which were put into place in 1995, "ridiculous," former CIA chief James Woolsey said on CNN that the policies were "like telling the FBI to penetrate the mafia without putting any criminals on its payrolls."
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09/23/2001 ||
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Lucianne.com
These guys are criminals, but they are Americans, and they love their country."
— Burl N. Cain, warden of Louisiana State Penitentiary, on the inmates who gave $11,060 to the Red Cross for WTC relief.
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09/23/2001 ||
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Chicago Sun-Times, by PHIL ROSENTHAL
Stars who needed no introductions did without them as an industry known for its excesses stripped to its essence in an unprecedented telethon to console and inspire a nation still reeling from a sucker punch by terrorists 10 days earlier. A global television audience, estimated Saturday at 89.06 million viewers with an average of 59.3 million at any one time in the United States alone, tuned in Friday night as the world's best-known entertainers wove tastefully understated solicitations to aid victims of the Sept. 11 attacks in New York, Virginia and Pennsylvania with simple stories of courage and heroism. Other top movie and TV stars manned phones as leading recording artists on stark, dimly lit, candle-strewn stages played new songs and old favorites that resonated with new depth and meaning.
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09/23/2001 ||
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NY Times
Adrian Estala, 27, a risk-management consultant in Houston who is Hispanic, is struggling with the same emotions. Mr. Estala is "absolutely against" racial profiling, he said, because it is one of the most fundamental violations of liberty he can think of. But asked the same question about sharing an airplane flight with Arab-looking men, he said he would be anxious. "Absolutely I have to be honest," Mr. Estala said. "Yes, it would make me second-guess. Anybody that says no, they're a better man than I am, or a better woman. I would feel nervous. I mean, who wouldn't?"
On the other side of the divide, Arab-Americans are also feeling new discomfort about attitudes toward them. Nadeem Salem, head of the Association of Arab-Americans in Toledo, Ohio, said such views were extremely offensive. "Think what it really means," said Mr. Salem, a second-generation American-born citizen. "People's civil liberties are being tarnished, compromised. That's not what this country is all about."
For many Americans who say they have deeply believed that it was wrong for law enforcement officers to single out members of minorities for special interrogation or searches, the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11 have prompted a painful confrontation with the sudden anxieties they acknowledge feeling in the presence of one minority in particular. With all of the roughly 20 hijackers involved the attacks believed to have Arab backgrounds, these Americans say, the police and the Federal Bureau of Investigation have ample reason to zero in on that group. "It's not right," said Virginia Hawthorne, a retired accountant from Bremerton, Wash., "but it's justified."
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09/23/2001 ||
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WorldNet Daily
In the wake of last week's hijackings and terrorist attacks in New York City and at the Pentagon, Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas, has introduced a bill that would permanently allow commercial airline pilots to be armed. The bill, H.R. 2896, entitled, "The Anti-Terrorism Act of 2001," was introduced Sept. 14, just three days after terrorists slammed three fuel-laden airliners into both of the World Trade Center towers and the Pentagon. A fourth hijacked airliner, believed headed to Washington, D.C., crashed 80 miles southeast of Pittsburgh. Authorities have said there is evidence to believe that some of the passengers overpowered hijackers and forced the plane down.
The bill states, "Notwithstanding any other provision of law, no department or agency of the federal government shall prohibit any pilot, copilot, or navigator of an aircraft, or any law enforcement personnel specifically detailed for the protection of that aircraft, from carrying a firearm." It has no cosponsors. Currently, Federal Aviation Administration regulations permit pilots to be armed, provided they are properly authorized.
This article starring:
Ron Paul
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09/23/2001 ||
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Frank Schirrmacher Frankfurter Allegemeine
In other words, until the destruction of the World Trade Center, that is to say, for as long as the Islamist terrorists had the initiative, everything was running according to a Hollywood script. But only until that point. The Americans are putting an end to the movie. And they are also putting an end to any form of predictability, even by the notoriously anti-American groups in Europe. For the Islamic terrorists, nothing could be more disruptive to strategic planning than this change of script.
"It will be a showdown." These words were spoken yesterday not by Bush but by the Taleban's ambassador to Pakistan. This was the moment when the ambassador, deliberately speaking not in any Afghan language but in Arabic, used a piece of Wild West terminology in a renewed attempt to focus the Arab world on the comic-book version of America, which yesterday became history.
As the Arab world becomes unable to interpret the West, it would make sense for us to reassess our own comic-book versions of the attackers and their leaders. Those who attacked New York were not displaced, starving, misguided youths. The men who studied in Hamburg were all from middle-class backgrounds. Their parents appear to be enlightened, almost secularized citizens. The attackers were also far from ascetic. From the German girlfriend to the drinking bout before the attack, everything points to a type of global terrorist whose ideology consists essentially of nothing but murdering other people.
After Sept. 11, we know that in addition to this death wish, it also consists of planning and executing mass killings of civilians.
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09/23/2001 ||
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(AFP) - Arab League chief Amr Mussa warned here on Sunday after meeting with King Abdullah II that US strikes against any Arab states in retaliation for the September 11 terrorist attacks would be "unacceptable."
"There are different ways of fighting against terrorism and it must be the subject of consultations" among Arab countries, the head of the 22-country grouping told reporters. "Clearly, we would never accept a strike against an Arab country, no matter what the circumstances," he said.
Mussa said he had discussed with Abdullah, the current head of the Arab summit, "the possibility of holding very soon a meeting of Arab foreign ministers" to find a common Arab position on the terror attacks. Also asked whether he thought the increasing number of US troops in the Middle East was a prelude to a new attack on Iraq, Mussa said that "a strike against an Arab country would entirely destabilize the situation."
This article starring:
Amr Mussa
Arab League
King Abdullah II
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09/23/2001 ||
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Washington Times
The National Sunni Movement Bangladesh carried black flags as they marched through Dhaka's streets and said the Taliban, who are also Sunni Muslims, must be taken to task for acting against the principles of Islam. "The Taliban in Afghanistan, in the guise of Islam, are going against the basics of Islam," said movement leader Khwaja Najmudiin Rashed. "The actions of the Taliban are destructive for Islam; Islam is for peace, not for ruthless killing of innocent people."
Both men and women took part in the procession and also voiced concerns about the safety of "innocent civilian people of Afghanistan." The marchers also called for action to be taken against "terrorist Israel."
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09/23/2001 ||
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(AFP) -
President Hosni Mubarak embarked on a European tour Sunday as Egypt balks at joining a US-led coalition against terrorism over fears that the US "friend or foe" policy will backfire. Mubarak headed for a meeting in Paris on Monday with French President Jacques Chirac, who will brief him on his talks in Washington last week, before visiting Berlin and Rome on Tuesday, diplomats said. Mubarak is expected to discuss reservations he disclosed to French paper Le Figaro,
Mubarak said he had not seen any proof behind US claims that Saudi-born Islamic militant Osama bin Laden is the mastermind of the airborne suicide attacks on September 11 that killed thousands of people in the United States.
when he warned of the risks of an indiscriminate attack on Afghanistan and complained of Western double-standards in tackling terrorism.
Mubarak said he had not seen any proof behind US claims that Saudi-born Islamic militant Osama bin Laden is the mastermind of the airborne suicide attacks on September 11 that killed thousands of people in the United States. The Egyptian president's concerns were echoed in the Egyptian Gazette, an English-language government daily, which ran an editorial Sunday entitled "Foe or Friend policy: a divisive formula." In a speech to Americans, US President George W. Bush vowed to tap "every necessary weapon of war" in his anti-terrorism campaign and warned the world: "Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists." But the Gazette said such a call "smacks of misplaced unilateralism and arrogance." Many Egyptians and Arabs say the massive anti-US attacks were partly provoked by unilateral American policies in the Middle East.
"The US should manifest willingness to listen to others. But as things stand, the US is projecting itself as an unchallenged leader who will not tolerate views different from its own," it said.
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09/23/2001 ||
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(Reuters)
Sales of T-shirts bearing the picture of Osama bin Laden have surged in Indonesia, home of the world's largest Islamic population, since Washington named him as its chief suspect in last week's attacks. ``Today, we sold twice as many as usual. It has been like this since (the U.S. accused bin Laden),'' Andi Cut Muthia, a 30-year-old mother of three who prints and distributes the shirts, told Reuters on Friday. The $3 T-shirts come in three styles, one with the words ''Islam is my blood.''
Muthia said business had never been better given the growing number of protesters against the U.S. stand. ``With these shirts, we are also spreading the word. Osama is a hero...a defender of Islam and human rights. The world should not perceive Islam as a religion of terrorists,'' said the veiled businesswoman whose shop also sells Islamic books and tapes.
Indonesia's radical Islamic groups, which have small but very vocal support, have set the tone, vowing to declare a holy war on the United States if it attacks Afghanistan to demolish bin Laden's Al-Qaeda organization.
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09/23/2001 ||
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(AP) - Two explosions rocked a busy shopping district in east Jakarta on Sunday, police said. Details were sketchy and there were no immediate reports of deaths or injuries. Police were trying to establish if the explosions, on the second level of a multistory parking lot of the Atrium shopping mall, were the result of bombs or were accidental. Radio station, El Shinta, said at least 10 fire trucks had extinguished a fire started by the blasts.
The mall has been hit by bombings and other attacks in previous months. The motive for recent bombings remains unclear, but some of the suspects have been linked to a militant Muslim group in Malaysia and Islamic paramilitaries in the Maluku islands.
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09/23/2001 ||
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Afghan News Network
Fighters from a pro-Taliban Pakistan Islamic group have begun marching to the Afghan border to fend off a possible U.S. invasion, a local leader of the group, Jamiat Ulema i-Islam (JUI), said on Sunday. The hardline Sunni Muslim group, a member of the Pakistan-Afghan Defense Council that supports the Taliban, said its mujahideen, or holy warriors -- many believed to have trained in camps inside Afghanistan -- would also be sent to surround air bases to try to prevent U.S. military from using the facilities. "We are moving our mujahideen," Abdul Ghafoor, leader of the JUI in western Baluchistan province that borders Afghanistan, told a news conference. "They are marching toward the Pakistan-Afghan border," he said, adding that they aimed to fight on behalf of Afghanistan's ruling Taliban in case of U.S. attacks in the hunt for Osama bin Laden. "Our mujahideen will cordon off all air bases in Pakistan where the U.S. army operates," Ghafoor said.
The JUI is a pro-Taliban party with strong bases in western Baluchistan and in North West Frontier Province that also borders Afghanistan and runs several madrasses, or Islamic religious schools, where many of the Taliban were educated.
This article starring:
ABDUL GHAFUR
Jamiat Ulema i-Islam
Jamiat Ulema i-Islam
Pakistan-Afghan Defense Council
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09/23/2001 ||
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Afghan News Network
Four people died in protests in the southern port city of Karachi on Friday -- three shot dead in clashes with police and a another of a heart attack -- after a coalition of Muslim groups called a national strike and a day of demonstrations. Over 50 people were arrested, most of them Afghans, police said.
But as a fuller picture of Friday's protests emerged from across this county of 140 million, it was clear the turnout was low by Pakistani standards. Pakistani opinion has been divided over Musharraf's decision to help the United States in the wake of the attacks on the World Trade Center in New York and Washington's Pentagon that killed nearly 7,000 people. A snap poll by Gallup Pakistan last week showed 62 percent of those questioned opposed Musharraf's decision to stand by the United States.
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09/23/2001 ||
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Barry Schweid The Associated Press
President Bush lifted sanctions Saturday against India and Pakistan that were imposed after the two nations tested nuclear weapons in 1998. The move came as a U.S. military delegation headed to Pakistan this weekend for consultations on U.S. preparations for a military strike against Afghanistan. Maleeha Lodhi, Pakistan's ambassador to the United States, praised the move, saying it "will enable Pakistan to get economic aid and it's a very important development."
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09/23/2001 ||
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AP
Russian President Vladimir Putin met in Moscow with his top advisers and talked to Bush on the telephone amid the deliberations. "We have always been initiators of the effort to unite the forces of the international community in the battle with terror. If we want to win there is no other way," Putin said in comments shown on television. "We must unite forces of all civilized society."
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09/23/2001 ||
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AP
Saturday, the United Arab Emirates cut diplomatic relations with the Taliban for the leaders' refusals to surrender bin Laden. The move leaves only two countries that recognize the Taliban as Afghanistan's government - Pakistan and Saudi Arabia.
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09/23/2001 ||
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FoxNews
Saudi Arabia is resisting the United States' request to use a new command center on a Saudi military base in any air war against terrorists, forcing Pentagon planners to consider alternatives that could delay a campaign for weeks.
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09/23/2001 ||
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The Guardian
Clumsy reprisals will simply inflame Muslim opinion and that is bin Laden's objective. It is clear that his real aim is not the destruction of America but the eviction of the pro-Western regimes in Saudi Arabia and neighbouring countries.
It is not difficult to envisage a series of popular uprisings sweeping aside all moderate Muslim governments. Any attempt by the West to save, say, Saudi Arabia, might be greeted by terrorist reprisals that would make the World Trade Centre atrocity look like an aperitif.
It is not difficult to envisage a series of popular uprisings sweeping aside all moderate Muslim governments. Any attempt by the West to save, say, Saudi Arabia, might be greeted by terrorist reprisals that would make the World Trade Centre atrocity look like an aperitif.
The consequences of such a turn of events are far worse than oil at $100 a barrel and economic depression. A new Middle East power block would have emerged, allying twenty-first century technology with a medieval mind-set. It would have the wealth to buy nuclear weapons and delivery systems to go with them. A new Cold War would have started. But this time, the men with their fingers on the button would have a proven disregard for human life, including their own. This is one possible future if George Bush and Tony Blair miscalculate over the next days and weeks.
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09/23/2001 ||
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Jordan Times Ali Baghdadi
No one doubts that we are the most powerful nation in the history of the world. But terrorism cannot be eliminated through war. Certainly, we can overcome through justice, wisdom and passion. We must address the root problems. We must focus on the difficult issues. Half of our military budget can eradicate hunger and disease worldwide. It is a noble challenge! It has not been tried! But it can work!
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09/23/2001 ||
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AFP
There are growing signs that support in the Muslim world for the US-led war on terrorism is wavering in the absence of concrete proof of Osama bin Laden's complicity in the attacks on New York and Washington. Officials in Pakistan say the only information they have received from the United States on bin Laden's links to terrorism has been related to the 1998 bombings of the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. To date, nothing solid has been communicated regarding evidence collected on the attacks on the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon.
For their part, the Taliban regime in Afghanistan, who have sheltered bin Laden since 1996, have said they would be willing to consider putting the Saudi-born dissident on trial if the United States can provide convincing evidence of his guilt. Washington has firmly rejected the Taliban's stance, insisting that they hand bin Laden over into US custody immediately or face the consequences. At the same time, the US authorities have fended off the requests for evidence, citing the importance of discretion in conducting the investigation into the September 11 terrorist atrocities.
The initial outpouring of sympathy from the Muslim world for the victims of the attacks on the United States has in recent days been replaced by a concern bordering on hostility over the scope of the planned retaliation. Former Pakistan foreign minister Sartaj Aziz said Sunday the issue of evidence was crucial given US preparations for military action against Afghanistan and possible reprisals against targets in other Muslim countries. Given the religious sensitivities inherent in the current crisis, Aziz said the United States ought to present its findings to some international judicial body before unleashing its military machine.
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09/23/2001 ||
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(Reuters)
The United States has warned its allies of a possible second round of attacks by the end of this week following the deadly strikes on New York and Washington, Jiji news agency quoted Japanese government sources as saying. The next round of attacks could be on a greater scale than the assaults by hijacked aircraft on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, according to information provided to Japan by Washington, Jiji reported. The news agency quoted the sources as saying on Saturday that the ``means of terrorism'' would be ``more cruel and shocking'' than the September 11 carnage, which left more than 6,800 either dead or missing.
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09/23/2001 ||
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Newsweek
It is worth remembering that not a single Afghan has been directly tied to any terrorist attack against the West. This is a vast Arab operation that happens to be based in Afghanistan.
Saudi Arabia's connection to these terrorists is particularly illuminating. Embracing Wahhabism, a rigid, puritanical version of Islam, the Saudi regime has tried to bolster its faltering legitimacy in the past two decades by fueling a religious revival in the Arab world. It funds mosques, trains preachers and builds schools across the globe that teach its fiery interpretation of Islam, one that views the outside world and modernity with hostility. When the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan in 1979, the Saudis sent money to the mujahedin and glorified their cause. Tarek Masoud, a writer who grew up in Saudi Arabia, recalls that "my Islamic-studies teacher told me that the world's best Muslims were Afghans because they were fighting the unbelievers." The Saudi regime has tried to deflect questions about its management of the country, its alliance with America and its own corruption by supporting and spreading an uncompromising religious dogma.
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09/23/2001 ||
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Newsweek
The editor of the international Arabic paper Al-Hayat met Osama bin Laden six months ago and said that the aides and bodyguards who surrounded him, almost 200 people, were all Saudis. In an article in the current Spectator of London, Stephen Schwartz points out that every major terrorist attack against the West in recent years has been conducted by people who have embraced Wahhabism. "Bin Laden is a Wahhabi. So are the suicide bombers in Israel. So are his Egyptian allies, who exulted as they stabbed foreign tourists to death at Luxor... So are the Algerian terrorists... So are the Taliban-style guerrillas in Kashmir." It is clear that Saudi Arabia now exports two products around the globe—oil and religious fanaticism.
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09/23/2001 ||
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Jerusalem Post
The US government has frozen entry visas for Palestinians trying to enter the US. Dozens of Palestinians waiting for entry visas to the US were told by American officials their requests were being delayed for the time being until American security agencies examined each request, Palestinian sources told the Palestinian Gaza daily, Al-Hayat al-Jadida. The article said the UN was also holding up similar visa requests by Palestinian officials planning to travel to the states at the end of the month.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
09/23/2001 ||
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Bob Woodward and Walter Pincus Washington Post
Four to five al Qaeda groups have operated in the United States for the last several years, but investigators have not yet found any connection between them and any of the 19 hijackers responsible for the Sept. 11 attacks, according to government officials. The groups, called "cells" by the FBI, are under intensive government surveillance. The FBI has not made any arrests because the group members entered the country legally in recent years and have not been involved in illegal activities since they arrived, the officials said.
Government officials say they do not know why the cells are here, what their purpose is or whether their members are planning attacks. One official even described their presence as "possibly benign," though others have a more sinister interpretation and give assurances that measures are in place to protect the public.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
09/23/2001 ||
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(Reuters)
Federal agents were painstakingly working their way through nearly 150,000 leads generated by the investigation of last week's suicide attacks on New York and Washington, nearly half submitted to an FBI Internet Web site, the FBI said on Saturday.
Nearly two weeks after hijacked airliners crashed into the Pentagon, the World Trade Center and a Pennsylvania field, leaving more than 6,800 dead or missing, FBI agents were working virtually around the clock to piece together a conspiracy that has pushed the country to the brink of war. ``We are making headway. Now whether or not it's coming together and forming a bigger picture, I don't know,'' said an FBI special agent in a field office involved in the probe.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
09/23/2001 ||
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NY Post
Federal investigators believe that up to 20 of the people they now have in custody were "directly involved" with the Sept. 11 terror plot that left 6,966 presumed dead, The Post has learned. Law-enforcement sources said they believe they've gathered enough evidence to charge the alleged conspirators, who are among the 80 swept up across the country in the days following the attack and being held on material-witness warrants and immigration charges.
It's unclear when criminal charges could be filed - only some of the evidence has been presented to the grand jury investigating the case, and probers would likely seek to "turn" some of the suspects into giving more evidence and testimony against their comrades.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
09/23/2001 ||
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NY Post
Time magazine reports in this week's editions that law-enforcement officials found a manual on crop-dusting equipment while searching suspected terrorist hideouts, adding to fears about a plot to spread chemical or biological agents via tiny crop-dusting planes. Investigators said they don't have any other evidence to corroborate such a plan, but the discovery of the manual resulted in crop-dusters being grounded briefly on Sept. 16, the report said. The FBI has asked members of a crop-dusters' trade group to "be vigilant" to any suspicious activity.
The hunt for other suspects is still in full swing, with the Coast Guard checking all lists of crew and passengers on cruise ships and vessels entering the U.S., said Cmdr. Jim McPherson. The new practice has already been successful, leading to the arrest last week of a man wanted in connection with terrorist acts unrelated to the Sept. 11 hijackings.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
09/23/2001 ||
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(Reuters) - U.S. securities regulators said Wednesday they were ``vigorously pursuing'' leads related to financial trading possibly linked to last week's attacks on New York's World Trade Center and the Pentagon by hijacked jetliners. ``We have received reports that those associated with the terrorist activities of last week may have sought to exploit our securities markets to profit from those activities,'' said Stephen Cutler, acting top enforcement officer at the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, in a statement. ``We are vigorously pursuing all credible leads, but at this time, we have drawn no conclusions,'' he said.
The SEC investigation involves other federal agencies and has reached deep into Wall Street. Several companies contacted about the probe Wednesday either declined comment or referred questions to the SEC and the FBI. JPMorgan Chase & Co Inc. said it was cooperating with the probe along with other leading U.S. investment banks.
Cutler, the SEC's top cop, said there was ``no foundation in fact'' in speculation about what the agency was looking into. He added that the agency was working closely with other law enforcement agencies and regulatory counterparts overseas. Regulators in Europe, Japan and the United States have indicated in recent days that they were looking into unusual trading activity following reports that Osama bin Laden and associates may have tried to profit from their inside knowledge of the Sept. 11 attack by playing the markets in advance.
This article starring:
Stephen Cutler
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
09/23/2001 ||
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Chicago Sun-Times
Our spies can't speak their languages. Our satellites don't track their movements. Our intelligence chiefs, in many cases, have never set foot in the Middle East. Put it all together, and you get an outdated, fragmented U.S. intelligence system--one that opened the floodgates for the worst terrorist attacks in American history. "Because of our ineffective response, now 6,000 Americans have been killed," said U.S. Rep. Mark Steven Kirk (R-Ill.), who is an intelligence officer in the naval reserves.
Many of Kirk's fellow congressmen, political scientists and even former CIA agents agree with him. The consensus is that America's spy network is caught in a time warp, designed to eavesdrop on the Russians and Chinese but lacking the manpower and street smarts to track terrorists such as Osama bin Laden.
Bin Laden is the United States' No. 1 suspect in the coordinated airline hijackings that leveled the World Trade Center towers and part of the Pentagon. Our government has been trying to catch him for years. We have failed time and again. "Senior U.S. officials boldly claim . . . that the Central Intelligence Agency and Federal Bureau of Investigation are clandestinely picking apart [bin Laden's] organization 'limb by limb,' " former CIA operative Reuel Marc Gerecht wrote in the July-August edition of the Atlantic Monthly. "But having worked for the CIA for nearly nine years on Middle Eastern matters . . . I would argue that America's counterterrorism program in the Middle East and its environs is a myth."
This article starring:
Mark Steven Kirk
Reuel Marc Gerecht
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
09/23/2001 ||
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Slate Papers
The NYT reports that investigators in the U.S. and abroad have identified more components of bin Laden's terrorist network, including a top lieutenant operating in Europe. (The Times doesn't mention the groups the WP cites in its lead.) Lest anybody think investigators are close to catching all of bin Laden's minion, the Times also notes that investigators believe that he has trained more than 11,000 supporters in just the past five years. Many of these men are members of Islamic separatist movements around the world. But the paper says officials believe that at least 3,000 are "hard-core terrorists."
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
09/23/2001 ||
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Washington Post
The "watch list" didn't work. Khalid Al-Midhar and Nawaq Alhazmi, flagged by the CIA as potential terrorists, identified by immigration agents as having already entered the country and pursued on two coasts by the FBI, avoided capture before they climbed aboard American Airlines Flight 77 and flew it into the Pentagon on Sept. 11. Federal law enforcement sources said later that they had only a few weeks to scour a big country for the pair and that "every attempt was made" to find them. But it was not nearly enough. The FBI's failure to stop Al-Midhar and Alhazmi underscores the shortcomings of a flawed system for screening and finding suspected terrorists.
This article starring:
KHALID AL MIDHAR
al-Qaeda
NAWAQ ALHAZMI
al-Qaeda
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
09/23/2001 ||
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Newsweek
Investigators believe they have spotted the operation's paymaster, also possibly a key figure in the funding of Osama bin Laden's Al Qaeda terror network. He has been identified to Newsweek as Mustafa Ahmed, in the United Arab Emirates. On September 4, Atta sent a package from a Kinko's in Hollywood, Florida to Ahmed. ``We don't know for sure what was in the package,'' a senior U.S. official tells Newsweek. ``But Mustafa could be the key to bin Laden's finances. We're taking a hard look at him.'' (Several of the hijackers also wired money to Ahmed.)
But it wasn't only Atta who was sending back money. According to the October 1 Newsweek cover story, ``Trail of Terror'' (on newsstands Monday, September 24), investigators learned that in the week before the September 11 attack, the hijackers began sending small amounts of money back to their paymasters in the Middle East. ``They were sending in their change,'' an intelligence source tells Newsweek. ``They were going to a place where they wouldn't need money.'' The hijackers apparently didn't need all that much to begin with: law enforcement estimates that the entire plot, flight lessons and all, cost as little as $200,000. That is ten times more than the first World Trade Center bombing, but still a small enough sum so the money could be moved in small denominations among trusted agents, report Assistant Managing Editor Evan Thomas, Investigative Correspondents Michael Isikoff and Mark Hosenball and Washington Bureau Chief Daniel Klaidman.
This article starring:
Daniel Klaidman
Evan Thomas
Michael Isikoff
MUSTAFA AHMED
al-Qaeda
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
09/23/2001 ||
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In an interview with Newsweek, Mohammad Atta's father refuses to accept his son's role as a suicide bomber. "It's impossible my son would participate in this attack," he says, claiming that he was a victim of a plot by Israeli intelligence to provoke the United States against Islam. "The Mossad kidnapped my son," says Atta senior. "He is the easiest person to kidnap, very surrendering, no physical power, no money for bodyguards. They used his name and identity ... Then they killed him. This was done by the Mossad, using American pilots."
This article starring:
MOHAMAD ATTA
al-Qaeda
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
09/23/2001 ||
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Newsweek
It now appears that the same men who masterminded the bombing of the USS Cole in October 2000 may be tied to the attacks. Since January 2000, the CIA had been aware of a man named Tawfiq bin Atash, better known in terrorist circles as "Khallad." A Yemeni-born former freedom fighter in Afghanistan, Khallad assumed control of bin Laden's bodyguards and became a kind of capo in Al Qaeda. According to intelligence sources, Khallad helped coordinate the attack on the Cole. These same sources tell Newsweek that in December 1999, Khallad was photographed by the Malaysian security service (which was working with the CIA to track terrorists) at a hotel in Kuala Lumpur. There, Khallad met with several bin Laden operatives. One was Fahad al Quso, who, it later turned out, was assigned to videotape the suicide attack on the Cole. Another was Khalid al-Midhar, who was traveling with an associate, Nawaf al-Hazmi, on a trip arranged by an organization known to U.S. intelligence as a "logistical center" and "base of support" for Al Qaeda. Those two men -- al-Midhar and al-Hazmi -- were listed among the hijackers of American Airlines Flight 77, the airliner that dive bombed into the Pentagon.
This article starring:
FAHAD AL QUSO
al-Qaeda
KHALID AL MIDHAR
al-Qaeda
KHALLAD
al-Qaeda
NAWAF AL HAZMI
al-Qaeda
TAWFIQ BIN ATASH
al-Qaeda
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
09/23/2001 ||
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Newsweek
As the investigation spread across the world last week, gumshoes swept up pieces of chilling evidence. In Boston, there were threats of an attack last Saturday. An Arab in a bar was overheard to say that blood would flow in Boston on September 22, and U.S. intelligence intercepted a conversation between Algerian diplomats talking about "the upcoming Boston tea party on September 22." It turned out that some ladies really were holding a tea party on that day. Some federal officials were spooked when manuals describing crop duster equipment -- to spray deadly germs? -- were found among the possessions of Zacarias Moussaoui, who was arrested in mid-August in Minnesota on charges that his visa expired. He was later found to be an associate of Osama bin Laden. But a top FBI official told Newsweek, "I'm not getting into the bunker and putting on a gas mask. We're used to seeing these threats." (Nonetheless, crop dusters were barred from flying near cities.)
Posted by: Fred Pruitt ||
09/23/2001 ||
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A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
