Loondon Bombers Accept Responsibility

2,645 · September 23, 2005

Sept. 21, 2005 - A new video message from Ayman al-Zawahiri represents a defiant poke-in-the-eye to U.S. intelligence and law-enforcement agencies and bolsters the case that the Al Qaeda terror network played a significant role in setting up a wave of deadly London Transport suicide bombings on July 7, according to U.S. and British counterterrorism officials and private experts.

The wide-ranging Zawahiri video, which depicts bin Laden?s principal deputy wearing a black turban in a nondescript, but apparently indoor setting, combines a rant against Americans and ?crusaders? with condemnations of recent election procedures in Afghanistan, prewar United Nations sanctions on Iraq, corruption in the U.N.-supervised oil-for-food program and alleged U.S. abuses of captured terrorist suspects.

The tape also includes surprising new claims by Zawahiri about the allegedly brutal treatment of senior Qaeda operative Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi?an awkward issue for Bush administration officials. The allegations of al-Libi?who ran Qaeda training camps and was captured during the fighting in Afghanistan?about ties between Saddam Hussein?s regime and bin Laden?s organization, apparently made to American and Egyptian interrogators under circumstances that have never been fully explained, were used by the administration to strengthen its case for the March 2003 invasion of Iraq. More than a year later, U.S. intelligence officials reluctantly conceded that al-Libi had recanted those claims.

As it originally surfaced on the Arabic satellite channel Al-Jazeera on Sept. 19, the latest Zawahiri tape also contains a relatively new production wrinkle: it comes with English-language subtitles covering parts of the Qaeda leader?s speech. A U.S counterterrorism official, who asked not to be identified because of the sensitivity of the matter, said the subtitles were further evidence of Al Qaeda?s increasingly sophisticated use of the media because they made it more likely their message will get airtime in target countries like the United States and Britain.

The most dramatic claim in the new Zawahiri tape is his assertion that Al Qaeda was behind the July 7 London suicide bombings, which killed more than 50 people.

?The blessed London raid is one of the raids that the Qaeda al-Jihad organization had the honor of carrying out against British Crusader arrogance, as well as ? the ongoing crimes of the English perpetrated against Muslims in Afghanistan and Iraq,? according to a translation supplied by a private U.S.-based group, the Middle East Media Research Institute.

In an earlier Zawahiri video three weeks ago, the Al Qaeda deputy leader had also praised the London bombings?and that tape was spliced together with an English-language ?martyrdom? speech by a man identified as Yorkshire-born Mohammed Siddique Khan, the eldest of the July 7 London bombers identified by British authorities. But in that message, Zawahiri?s reference to an Al Qaeda role in the London bombings was less explicit, stopping short of the direct claim of responsibility in the new tape.

A U.K. counterterrorism official said that British authorities regarded the latest Zawahiri tape as some of the strongest evidence to emerge to date of an apparently direct role by Al Qaeda?s central command in the July 7 London bombings. According to the official, British experts say that in the past, Al Qaeda has only explicitly claimed direct credit for terrorist attacks in which the central Qaeda command was involved. When referring to other attacks, such as the 2004 Madrid commuter-train bombings, which have been attributed to Al Qaeda spinoffs or sympathizers, messages from Al Qaeda leaders have praised such attacks but not claimed direct responsibility for carrying them out. Therefore, the British official said, the latest Zawahiri message is being taken as a strong indicator that what remains of the Al Qaeda high command is proclaiming some kind of direct sponsorship for the London attacks. The U.K. official said that the message did not, however, prove that Zawahiri or bin Laden participated in detailed planning for the attacks or were involved in selecting the July 7 bombers.

Earlier this week, Scotland Yard released video pictures from surveillance cameras showing three of the four July 7 bombers conducting what appeared to be an advance reconnaissance mission on June 28. The fact that the bombers? preparations were so elaborate also has bolstered the belief of investigators that Al Qaeda?s central organization played a role in organizing the attacks, since other Qaeda attacks, including the 1998 U.S. embassy bombings in Africa and the 9/11 hijackings, also involved elaborate preparations and surveillances by terror cell members.

Still, U.S. officials remain publicly agnostic as to whether the London attacks were the handiwork of Al Qaeda leaders or more loosely knit jihadis who may be inspired by bin Laden and Zawahiri but aren?t necessarily working under their direct command and control. ?I don?t think there?s a definitive answer as to what the ties were between the group that was responsible for either the July 7 or the July 21 attempted attacks and what?s left of the cadre of Al Qaeda leaders that may be in Pakistan or elsewhere,? said FBI Director Robert Mueller in a meeting with reporters today.

Mueller also said the Al Qaeda organization had been ?decimated? by the removal of Afghanistan as a sanctuary and the detention of many of its senior leaders, such as Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the architect of the September 11 terror attacks. These and other U.S. actions have ?undercut their ability to undertake coordinated attacks.? But Mueller pointedly declined to say that Al Qaeda itself had been eliminated even while stressing that the terror threat had evolved into smaller ?groupings of individuals? around the world who subscribe to ?radical Islamist ideology? and who may have ?one or two? members who have had associations with Al Qaeda central. Asked directly if Al Qaeda or its affiliates are currently able to attack inside the United States, Mueller responded: ?If you ask the question, ?Are there individuals who subscribe to the jihadist ideology out there who are capable of undertaking an attack against the United States? Yes.?

U.S. and UK officials said that while evidence was hardening that Al Qaeda?s central command was connected to the July 7 London bombings, little if any similar evidence had surfaced regarding a round of London Transport attacks on July 21 in which suspected would-be suicide bombers tried to blow up three subway trains and a bus?the same mix of vehicles blown up on July 7?but the attack ended without casualties when all of the bombs failed to explode.

Because of the timing of the second round of attempted attacks?precisely two weeks after the first attacks ? and because explosives used in the dud bombs were similar to those used on July 7, investigators initially concluded there almost certainly had to be some kind of connection between the successful and the failed attacks.

Al Qaeda messages have not referred to the failed July 21 attacks?for which five men were arrested and are now in U.K. custody?and investigators in the U.K. say they still are looking for convincing pieces of hard evidence which might connect the two waves of attacks. Because such evidence has been so difficult to find, two officials in London said, investigators are now leaning toward a belief that the failed July 21 attackers?who all came from East African ethnic backgrounds, in contrast to the July 7 attackers, who were of Pakistani or Caribbean extraction?were ?copycats? with no connections to Al Qaeda or the July 7 bombers.

In his latest video message, Zawahiri makes detailed references both to al-Libi's interrogation by U.S. authorities and to current British efforts to deport the fiery, Jordanian-born preacher Abu Qatada, described by U.S. authorities as bin Laden?s ?ambassador? in Europe. Zawahiri displays a detailed knowledge of very recent events, condemning the British for signing extradition treaties with Pakistan and Jordan, allowing Abu Qatada and other terror suspects living in Britain to be expelled to those places even though, Zawahiri asserts, U.K. officials know ?full well that members of Muslim factions extradited to these countries would be subject to torture or even death.?

Regarding al-Libi, Zawahiri cites him as one of a number of terror suspects transferred by U.S. authorities to countries such as Egypt or Jordan where ?they are tortured by the very regimes which America insists should respect human rights ?

?Brother Ibn Shaykh al-Libi was taken in a coffin and was transferred from Bagram [the U.S. air base in Afghanistan] to the National Security Department in Cairo, where he was severely tortured and held for one year, after which he was returned to Bagram,? said Zawahiri. ?This is one of thousands of examples.? A spokesman said the CIA would have no comment on the accusation, which Zawahiri or his minions may originally have learned about from an article in The American Prospect magazine that is available online.

According to former U.S. law-enforcement officials, al-Libi was transferred to Egypt after being captured by U.S. forces during the invasion of Afghanistan. Although al-Libi wasn?t mentioned by name at the time, Secretary of State Colin Powell later cited?during his February 2003 speech to the U.N. Security Council laying out the case for an invasion of Iraq?the assertions of a captured Al Qaeda leader that Saddam's regime had offered to provide the group with training in the manufacture of chemical and biological weapons. NEWSWEEK was the first publication to identify the Qaeda commander as al-Libi.

Earlier this week, Scotland Yard released video pictures from surveillance cameras showing three of the four July 7 bombers conducting what appeared to be an advance reconnaissance mission on June 28. The fact that the bombers? preparations were so elaborate also has bolstered the belief of investigators that Al Qaeda?s central organization played a role in organizing the attacks, since other Qaeda attacks, including the 1998 U.S. embassy bombings in Africa and the 9/11 hijackings, also involved elaborate preparations and surveillances by terror cell members.

Story continues below ↓ advertisement