Spain: Jihadist website threatens to repeat "if it's necessary" March 11th bombings

(Translation: T&P).

El Confidencial Digital:

Spanish police has received several complaints after a post in a Jihadist Website threatened directly Spain to "repeat, if necessary March 11th bombings". The author also remembers the Spanish troops' presence in Afghanistan and "Spanish occupation of Ceuta and Melilla".

"I am writing this letter to the Crusader Kingdom of Spain (the Middle Ages aren't over yet for these morons) 

This is for you, pigs: We are sending our greetings through the air, dipped in blood. Your blood, which we have savored before and which has a flavor we can't easily forget, specially because you haven't understood or simply because you have ignored us, and you continue with your war against Islam and Muslims, enrolling yourselves in NATO (Note: it looks like that Spain is a NATO member since March 11th 2004...) and taking part in the bloodshed of our brothers in Afghanistan".

Is this the next chapter of the Vampire Chronicles or a press release from a Jihadist? No, seriously, that line about savoring Spanish blood seems to be written by a very, very bad terror novels' author.
Read more »

Security Gaps?

From this source:

Counterterror staff falls to 62%

May 22, 2008

By Jerry Seper - More than one out of every three positions in an elite FBI division that tracks al Qaeda terrorists is vacant, according to an internal bureau document. Efforts are under way at the FBI to canvass for "volunteers" to fill what the agency said is a "critical" need in its counterterrorism efforts.

A senior bureau official said yesterday that because of significant staffing shortages and a lack of experienced managers, the FBI cannot properly defend the United States against "another catastrophic and direct attack by Middle Eastern terrorists."

Bassem Youssef, chief of the communications analysis unit of the FBI's counterterrorism division, said the bureau's International Terrorism Operations Sections (ITOS) — which include those that track al Qaeda terrorists — are "inexcusably understaffed."

[...]

Mr. Youssef, who was scheduled to testify during a subcommittee hearing on FBI whistleblowers, also said a bureau policy mandating that its agents, ITOS supervisors and counterterrorism managers do not need "subject matter expertise" in Middle Eastern counterterrorism is "indefensible and counterproductive."

He also said an FBI policy of promoting agents to its upper-management positions who have no "comprehension of the Arabic language" had resulted in the bureau's failure to have a management capable of responding to "real-time potential threats or opportunities." He said "an overdependency" of translators "can and does delay responses to situations that are time critical."

"Subtle messages and information not capable of ready translation or that which would be obvious to a native speaker who is simultaneously involved in operational activities are regularly lost," he said....

[...]

Mr. Youssef, who was born in Egypt, has accused the FBI of improperly denying him promotions in the counterterrorism division — an accusation denied by the bureau. In July 2006, the Justice Department's Office of Professional Responsibility concluded that the FBI had retaliated against Mr. Youssef because of disclosures he made to the agency's director and a member of Congress.

No trial date has been set.

Daniel Pipes's article on Bassem Youssef is HERE.

Top al-Qaeda leader reported dead in Afghanistan

BBC NEWS | South Asia | Top al-Qaeda leader reported dead:

"A senior al-Qaeda leader in Afghanistan, Abu Laith al-Libi, has been killed, Western counter-terrorism officials have told the BBC.

News of his death emerged on a website used by Islamist groups. Ekhlaas.org said he had 'fallen as a martyr'.

There is speculation that he was killed by a US missile strike in the North Waziristan area of Pakistan this week.

A dozen militants were reported killed in the attack. US intelligence agencies said they were checking the reports.

A Pakistani daily paper, the News, reported that the suspected US strike was aimed at Libi and another senior figure, Obaidah al-Masri.

Al-Qaeda spokesman

Libi has appeared in a number of al-Qaeda videos. In November he appeared alongside al-Qaeda second-in-command Ayman al-Zawahri.


He has acted as a spokesman for the group, announcing in 2002 that Osama Bin Laden and Taleban leader Mullah Omar had survived the US invasion of Afghanistan.

Libi was under US intelligence surveillance and most details about him are classified, says the BBC's security correspondent Frank Gardner."

ABU LAITH AL-LIBI
Born: Libya, around 1941
Description: 6'4' tall, solid build, dark hair and eyes, scars on back
Role: Senior operations commander; al-Qaeda spokesman
Source: Globalsecurity.org

Libi has appeared in a number of al Qaeda videos (Photo: US DIA)

March 11th bombings

Today the sentence to all the 28 accused of the bombings has been read.

The first thing I have to say is that I am perplexed, really surprised by the result. And that's why I'm surprised Zapatero is so happy about the sentence (or so he has said).

Three persons were considered as "masterminds" of the attacks: Mohammed the Egiptian (acquitted entirely), Youssef Belhadj (12 years for belonging to terrorist gang) and Hassan el Haski (15 years for being leader of a terrorist gang). None of them is considered to have taken part in the bombings.

Then Spanish schizophrenic and minor criminal Trashorras is considered as someone whose cooperation was needed for the bombings and is condemned to nearly 40.000 years in prison. Strickinly, he is, then, considered as an author of the bombings, according to Spanish penal code.

Only Jamal Zougam and Otman el Gnaoui are considered as "Jihadi" authors of the massacre and are condemned to the same amount of years as Trashorras.

Another stricking thing: Trashorras cousin's Toro, who was accused of being a police collaborator, has been acquitted, when it was nearly considered as the "clever" of the family and with direct implication in the traffic of explosives.

ETA, the Iraqi war and Bin Laden are not related with the bombings. But the sentence says:

Among the proved facts, the resolution underlines that these groups, "using the violence in any of its sides, pretend to destroy democratic regimes and eliminate the Christian-Western culture to substitute them with an Islamic State under the empire of the Islamic Law in its more radical, extreme and minoritary interpretation".

Well, the theory can be more or less well summarised. But how can we consider this as a Jihadi attack (according only to the sentence), when one out of three authors is non-Muslim, schizofrenic and haschich consumer with no relation with Jihadi networks and the three more important guys are acquitted of the massacre?

The rest of the people condemned are not authors nor collaborators of the massacre. They are condemned of belonging to terrorist Jihadi networks with no connection with the bombings, and of other minor crimes (falsification of public documents or having explosives).

It's curious to underline that, while Socialist Zapatero and Communist Llamazares have praised the sentence, the victims are all not very happy with it. The Spanish "Cindy Sheehan", Pilar Manjón, who has blamed directly Aznar and Bush of the bombings and has said the victims were killed because they were "workers" and not rich people "who go on their cars to work", has said she is appealing the sentence. Others have considered it to be very soft with the criminals.

But there are some problems: there is no data as to what the explosive was (there were no proofs...). Nothing about who was the leader. Nor even about who inspired the bombings. And only three people of all who were initially charged with the bombings did everything.

I don't think this sentence has solutioned anything. For me it has complicated it even more.

(Just in case: Schizophrenia, from the Greek roots schizein (σχίζειν, "to split") and phrēn, phren- (φρήν, φρεν-, "mind"), is a psychiatric diagnosis that describes a mental illness characterized by impairments in the perception or expression of reality, most commonly manifesting as auditory hallucinations, paranoid or bizarre delusions or disorganized speech and thinking in the context of significant social or occupational dysfunction. Do you really believe a man like that can be an author of a planned massacre like this? I do not).

Cyberwarfare

A prince should therefore have no other aim or thought, nor take up any other thing for his study but war and it organization and discipline, for that is the only art that is necessary to one who commands. Nichollo Machiavelli.

I don't really like Machiavelli, but some of his ideas make me think really. If our Armies are aimed at defending citizens against foreign dangers and police corps at defending them against interior/inner dangers, the Prince (nowadays the Government/politicians) should be modernizing it to achieve its goals.

The wars' circumstances are changing. Are we really prepared?

From Winds of Jihad:

Six people suspected of recruiting Islamic militants to send to Iraq have been arrested by Spanish police, the interior ministry said.
Paramilitary police were searching the homes of the suspects in the northern Burgos region, it said.
The cell is alleged to have operated through internet chat rooms and discussion groups.
‘The dismantled group was organising clandestine meetings, was gathering funds for imprisoned terrorists (and) was justifying terrorism,’ the ministry said.

Well, today we have known first that the prosecutor has asked for two out of six of them unconditional prison for recruiting on-line people to carry out jihadi acts on foreign places (mainly, Iraq) and secondly, that the cell had connection with another cell detained in Denmark and with Bouchaid Macher, the accused of the Casablanca bombings against Spanish interests in 2004, now detained in Morocco.

Continue reading here.

Al Qaeda calls for "the cleaning of the Islamic Maghreb of the sons of France and Spain" and the recovery of Al-Andalus

So three years after the shameful retreat from Iraq, Al-Zawahiri calls for

"the cleaning of the Islamic Maghreb of the sons of France and Spain". " The recovery of Al Andalus is a duty of the umma (Islamic nation) in general and for you in particular", demanded the Egyptian terrorist to the inhabitants of the Maghreb region.

as he did before.

While police detained two Pakistanis, accused of financing international Islamic terrorism nets, Zapatero says that "the menacing message from Al-Qaeda is not new". Yeah, that's true. But you assured every Spanish citizen that Al-Qaeda was interested in attacking Spain because we were in Iraq. Now we aren't. So what are we going to do now? What and who are we going to cave in this time....

Interview in Le Figaro.fr to an anonymous Frenchman living in Algeria:

Till now, the menaces were adressed mainly to the Americans. How can we explain that Al-Qaida targets now the Franch and Spanish in the Maghreb?

I don't know if there is a profound reason for this. All that we can say is that both French and Spanish people are very numerous in the region, specially in Morocco and Tunis, somewhat less in Algeria. It is true that some tourists come here for that not very recommendable sexual tourism. There are other behaviours which can be considered as ostentatious by the local population. And the people I have spoken with from Morocco have told me of a similar situation. For the fundamentalists, some practices made by the Europeans are perceived as a true provocation against Muslim lands. I think that the Islamists play that card with some categories of the population. Al Qaida is using that dimension.

See?? It's not the Islamist the ones who are the culprits. It's the Europeans who go there provoking the fundamentalists.... 

But not only Spain and France are targeted (or their citizens in the Maghreb). Pakistan and Sudan's Darfur region also are.

Original post.

2nd Bin Laden's video

The latest videotape, of the hijacker’s testament, had not yet been posted on extremist web sites. But IntelCenter, a monitoring group in suburban Washington, said it had obtained the 47-minute video and provided it to Associated Press Television News.

In the tape, bin Laden praised al-Shehri, saying he “recognized the truth” that Arab rulers were “vassals” of the West and had “abandoned the balance of (Islamic) revelation.”

“It is true that this young man was little in years, but the faith in his heart was big,” he said.

“So there is a huge difference between the path of the kings, presidents and hypocritical Ulama (Islamic scholars) and the path of these noble young men,” like al-Shehri, bin Laden said. “The formers’ lot is to spoil and enjoy themselves whereas the latters’ lot is to destroy themselves for Allah’s Word to be Supreme.”

“It remains for us to do our part. So I tell every young man among the youth of Islam: It is your duty to join the caravan (of martyrs) until the sufficiency is complete and the march to aid the High and Omnipotent continues,” he said.

Original post.

More on the German plot

According to today's report in German news, the plotters had orders to act on September 15th (that is, after everybody would be calm, saying, well, on September 11st, nothing has happened..).

Also the German police is worried about the characteristics of the plotters, as two of them are white converts. Guenther Bernstein, Interior Minister, said on Tuesday “Germans converting to Islam should be watched because they tend to show particular fanaticism in order to prove worthy of their new religion,”. (This is not new: the guards watching non-converts in the Middle Ages in Islamic prisons, were normally converts, who were specially cruel with them).

Specially dedicated to all those who are everyday groaning about Governments' intercepting communications, US intercepted key data related to the plot in Pakistan. Also Germany used sophisticated eavesdropping equipment for months till they were able to detain the suspects.

Original post.

Chertoff's Hunch

For some time, we've known that Secretary of Homeland Security is operating on hunch that, this summer, we're in greater danger of an attack, although with the caveat of "without a lot of specifics."

On August 1, 2007, along came this story:

A new al Qaeda propaganda ad, headlined "Wait for the Big Surprise" and featuring a digitally altered photograph of President George Bush and Pakistan's President Pervez Musharraf standing in front of a burning White House, was posted on the Internet today.

The brief clip from al Qaeda's "as Sahab" propaganda arm juxtaposes the doctored photo of Bush and Musharraf along with previously seen images of al Qaeda's top leadership -- Osama bin Laden, Ayman al Zawahri and Adam Gadahn -- as well as a photo of an SUV in a motorcade.

There is no additional information provided in the ad, and it closes with the words, "Soon -- God willing," written across the screen and repeated several times.

In addition, the amount of anti-terrorism dollars has just been increased for the D.C. area. From this August 1, 2007 story in the Washington Post:

The D.C. area will use a major anti-terrorism grant to upgrade its bomb squads and provide law enforcement with new intelligence analysts and computer systems -- including one dubbed "Google for cops," authorities said yesterday.

Those were among the details released by state and local officials, who met this week to carve up a recent $61.6 million grant from the Department of Homeland Security. The funds are a 30 percent increase over last year's award to the region...

On August 4, 2007, this story appeared in the Washington Post, on the front page, above the fold:

The Senate bowed to White House pressure last night and passed a Republican plan for overhauling the federal government's terrorist surveillance laws, approving changes that would temporarily give U.S. spy agencies expanded power to eavesdrop on foreign suspects without a court order.

The 60 to 28 vote, which was quickly denounced by civil rights and privacy advocates, came after Democrats in the House failed to win support for more modest changes that would have required closer court supervision of government surveillance. Earlier in the day, President Bush threatened to hold Congress in session into its scheduled summer recess if it did not approve the changes he wanted.

The legislation, which is expected to go before the House today [August 4], would expand the government's authority to intercept without a court order the phone calls and e-mails of people in the United States who are communicating with people overseas.

[...]

Sixteen Democrats and Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (I-Conn.) joined all 43 Republicans in supporting the measure, which is nearly identical to a proposal prepared by the Bush administration. "We're at war. The enemy wants to attack us," Lieberman said during the Senate debate....

A few weeks ago, the Washington Post carried an item from a local reader, who noted a lot of extra heliocopter activity in the airspace over his home, situated near Andrews Air Force Base. He emphasized that he had noticed such activity only twice before, each time prior to the U.S. invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq.

Locals in the D.C. area have also recently noted frequent testings of the Emergency Broadcast System.

Put together all the above. Your conclusions?