[ISN] Al Qaeda Web Site Calls Israel New Target

From: InfoSec News (isnat_private)
Date: Thu Dec 05 2002 - 22:44:35 PST

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    http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A15913-2002Dec5.html
    
    By John Mintz
    Washington Post Staff Writer
    Friday, December 6, 2002; Page A36 
    
    An Internet site claiming to represent al Qaeda says the terrorist
    network has decided to launch suicide attacks against a new target,
    Israel, and says its goal is the destruction of the Jewish state.
    
    U.S. officials said they believe the Web site, www.mojahedoon.net,
    indeed speaks for al Qaeda, and that intelligence officers have been
    monitoring it for some time.
    
    News of al Qaeda's new anti-Israel focus comes a week after two
    terrorist attacks against Israeli interests in Kenya that U.S.  
    officials believe were carried out by al Qaeda. A suicide car bombing
    of an Israeli-owned hotel near Mombasa killed 10 Kenyans and three
    Israelis, along with three terrorists, Nov. 28. In a separate attack
    minutes earlier, several air-to-ground missiles were fired at an
    Israeli passenger jet flying from Kenya to Tel Aviv. No one was
    injured.
    
    Terrorism experts say al Qaeda's announced entry into the struggle
    between Palestinians and Israelis is a disturbing development that is
    likely to set off new violence.
    
    "The idea that al Qaeda is establishing a special cell to focus on
    Israelis is horrifying news," said Rachel Bronson, director of Middle
    East Studies for the private Council on Foreign Relations. Al Qaeda's
    role could be extremely destabilizing, she added, because "it will be
    weighing in on the side of Hamas," the Palestinian Islamic group that
    launches suicide bombings against Israeli civilians and has been
    deemed a terrorist organization by the U.S. government. Hamas
    staunchly opposes peace with Israel and declares its entire territory
    Muslim land.
    
    The group's announcement came shortly before President Bush, meeting
    at the White House with leaders of Kenya and Ethiopia, said that
    progress was being made against al Qaeda. "Slowly but surely, we're
    dismantling an al Qaeda network, and that inures to the benefit of all
    the countries of the world," Bush said.
    
    Earlier this week, the Palestinian Authority denied accusations by a
    top Israeli military official that al Qaeda already is operating in
    the West Bank and Gaza. "These are cheap and untrue allegations," the
    Palestinian Authority said in a statement released after a Cabinet
    meeting in Ramallah.
    
    The Web site announced formation of a new branch of Osama bin Laden's
    terror network, the Islamic al Qaeda Organization in Palestine, and
    said it will work to undermine any talks between Israel and the
    Palestinian Authority. The talks, now suspended, have been aimed at
    arranging an Israeli withdrawal from the Gaza Strip and the West Bank
    in exchange for an end to Palestinian suicide bombings in Israel. The
    al Qaeda Web site said it rejects this course.
    
    "Islamic al Qaeda in Palestine joins its voice with the voices of the
    mujaheddin in Palestine in its resistance to the partial and
    submissive solutions [land for peace], and will accept nothing but the
    full liberation of the Palestinian land," said the al Qaeda Web site,
    which was originally brought to light publicly and translated from the
    Arabic by the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI), a
    translation and research service.
    
    The new Palestinian arm of al Qaeda "will defeat the Zionist Jewish
    invaders [and] return them to the place . . . whence they came," the
    site said.
    
    The site also advises Hamas that it should stop engaging in shootouts
    with Palestinian security forces loyal to PLO leader Yasser Arafat, at
    least for now. The two groups of gunmen have been fighting
    sporadically for months over issues including turf control in Gaza and
    vengeance for past showdowns between the two sides.
    
    "We call to the mujaheddin in the al-Nusseirat camp in the Gaza Strip
    to immediately stop the fighting between Hamas and the people of the
    Palestinian Authority," the Web site says.
    
    Bronson said that while al Qaeda appears in this case to be mediating
    between the secular Palestinian Authority and the fundamentalist
    Muslim Hamas, bin Laden's true sympathies lie with Hamas.
    
    "This means that when the Palestinian Authority takes on Hamas, it
    will also be taking on bin Laden, which could be a problem" for
    Arafat, given the widespread admiration for bin Laden among many
    Palestinians, she said.
    
    For years bin Laden and al Qaeda spoke mostly of Muslims' obligation
    to oust U.S. military forces and the Saudi royal family from Saudi
    Arabia. In more recent years, bin Laden has begun mentioning the
    Palestinians' struggle in his list of perceived humiliations of
    Muslims worldwide, usually in the same breath with the plight of the
    Kashmiris, Bosnians, Afghanis and Iraqis.
    
    Bruce Hoffman, a terrorism expert with the Rand Corp. research group,
    said that al Qaeda's new attacks on Israel stem from "terrorists
    looking for work.
    
    "Al Qaeda . . . wants to appear relevant, to be a player in Middle
    Eastern politics," Hoffman said.
    
    Al Qaeda grew in the 1990s, during the period of the most promising
    Israeli-Palestinian negotiations, in part by fomenting rage among
    Muslim radicals against any peace with Israel, Hoffman said. This Web
    site builds on that agenda, he added, and "amounts to pure cynicism."
    
    
    
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