Captured Mumbai Terrorist Says Plan Was To Kill 5,000 and Escape

This is the only surviving gunman of the massacre in Mumbai. Seconds after this picture was taken, 21-year-old Azam Amir Kasav began to kill.

He and the terror cell’s leader began their attacks at the city’s Chhatrapati Shivaji rail station.

They later hijacked two cars, before police caught them. During two days of questioning, Kashmiri-born Kasav, who used the alias Ajmal Kasab, told police: ‘I have no regrets’.

He is said to have told officers the cell was to seek out ‘white targets, preferably British and American’.

The terrorists thought they would come out alive and had an escape route, added Kasav.

He revealed that the ten terrorists, who were highly trained in marine assault and crept into the city by boat, had planned to blow up the Taj Mahal Palace hotel after first executing British and American tourists and then taking hostages. He then added that their intention was to kill 5,000 people.

Mercifully, the group, armed with plastic explosives, underestimated the strength of the 105-year-old building’s solid foundations.

As it is, their deadly attacks have left close to 200 confirmed dead, with the toll expected to rise to nearly 300 once the hotel has been fully searched by security forces.

Yesterday, Kasav chillingly went through details of Wednesday night’s killing spree across the city, which ended when he was cornered by police.

He pretended to be dead, which probably saved his life. It was only when he was being transferred to hospital by ambulance that his accompanying officer noticed he was still breathing.

Once inside Nair Hospital, Kasav, who suffered only minor injuries, told medical staff: ‘I do not want to die. Please put me on saline.’

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Smoke Bomb Goes Off in Phoenix Hotel – Weapons Found

This is an incident report and there is no information indicating that it is terrorism related. Additional details will be provided as they become available.

Update: Reports indicate the smoke bomb was military grade. Very little other information is being released.

Guests were evacuated Sunday night when a smoke bomb went off on the fourth floor of the Hilton Garden Inn, 1940 W. Pinnacle Peak Road in northwest Phoenix.

Officials found other weapons in the room where the bomb detonated, including guns and bullets, said Frank Salomon, deputy chief of public affairs for the Phoenix Fire Department.

Officials are still investigating who if anyone was in the room. The hotel evacuated about 35 rooms, containing roughly 60 people including guests and staff, said Salomon.

Phoenix Fire Department crews were on the scene. The call came in at about 7 p.m.

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Indira Gandhi Airport On High Alert After Email Threat

Security personnel at the Indira Gandhi International Airport IGI went on a high alert after an e-mail threat by the Deccan Mujahideen, the militant outfit that had claimed responsibility for the Mumbai terror attacks.

The email that was intercepted by the Gujarat Police threatened to blow up the Bombay Stock Exchange and the IGI airport.

There was an unprecedented security cover at both the terminals of the airport and security personnel were seen guarding the parking lots and patrolling the airport premises.

A senior Central Industrial Security Force CISF officer confirmed that they had increased security at the airport on specific directions.

Though the IGI airport already has a security mechanism in place, the vigil was mounted, especially on the city side.

“We in collaboration with the Delhi Police increased the security outside the airport as there is threat that terrorists could carry out an attack outside the airport,” said a CISF official. Intelligence Bureau officials examining the email said that there was a specific mention of the BSE and Delhi airport in it.

More dog squads had been pressed into action to check the baggage. Security at both the international and domestic terminals was stepped up several notches with anti-hijack and anti-sabotage measures put in place, police said. With security personnel taking no chances, frisking and manual checking of baggage had been intensified.

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President Briefed Over Severe, Widespread Attack On Defense Department Computers

Senior military leaders took the exceptional step of briefing President Bush this week on a severe and widespread electronic attack on Defense Department computers that may have originated in Russia — an incursion that posed unusual concern among commanders and raised potential implications for national security.

Defense officials would not describe the extent of damage inflicted on military networks. But they said that the attack struck hard at networks within U.S. Central Command, the headquarters that oversees U.S. involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan, and affected computers in combat zones. The attack also penetrated at least one highly protected classified network.

Military computers are regularly beset by outside hackers, computer viruses and worms. But defense officials said the most recent attack involved an intrusive piece of malicious software, or “malware,” apparently designed specifically to target military networks.

“This one was significant; this one got our attention,” said one defense official, speaking on condition of anonymity when discussing internal assessments.

Although officials are withholding many details, the attack underscores the increasing danger and potential significance of computer warfare, which defense experts say could one day be used by combatants to undermine even a militarily superior adversary.

Bush was briefed on the threat by Navy Adm. Michael G. Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Mullen also briefed Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates.

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Feds Warn Of Possible al Qaeda Terror Threat To New York Subway Trains

Feds Warn Of Possible NYC Terror Plot, FBI: “Plausible But Unsubstantiated” Report Of Al Qaeda Plans To Attack Subway System

The FBI has warned New York area law enforcement of a “plausible but unsubstantiated” al Qaeda suicide bomb attack against the area’s commuter rail systems over the holiday.

An internal memo obtained by The Associated Press says the FBI has received a “plausible but unsubstantiated” report that al Qaeda terrorists in late September may have discussed attacking the subway system.

Department of Homeland Security spokesman Russ Knocke said the warning was issued as a routine matter, but added that there may be an increased police presence in New York and other large metropolitan areas.

A US official said the FBI report had been issued “out of an abundance of caution” and that “there is nothing concrete to suggest the plot went beyond the talking stage.”

The report indicates that al Qaeda terrorists “in late September may have discussed targeting transit systems in and around New York City. These discussions reportedly involved the use of suicide bombers or explosives placed on subway/passenger rail systems,” according to the document.

“We have no specific details to confirm that this plot has developed beyond aspirational planning, but we are issuing this warning out of concern that such an attack could possibly be conducted during the forthcoming holiday season,” states the warning, which is dated Tuesday.

While federal agencies regularly issue all sorts of advisory warnings, the language of this one is particularly blunt.

Intelligence and homeland security officials are working with local authorities to try to corroborate the information “and will continue to investigate every possible lead,” the memo says.

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Report: al Qaeda Wants To Cripple Amtrak’s Northeast Corridor

The world’s economic fears were violently pushed aside on Wednesday by another global threat terrorism.

A massive coordinated attack was launched in Mumbai, India just hours after the FBI warned that Al Qaeda may be targeting New York’s subways and railroads.

If Al Qaeda terrorists have their way there will be chaos and mayhem here this holiday season, a mass transit bomb plot that would probably affect all the subway and train lines at Penn and Grand Central stations.

“The threat is serious, the threat is significant, and it is plausible,” said Congressman Peter King, R-Long Island, a member of the House Homeland Security Committee.

Uniformed officers, including NYPD Counter Terrorism Squad members and Amtrak cops with M-16s, flooded Penn Station Wednesday after the FBI said it had received a “plausible but unsubstantiated” report that Al Qaeda operatives discussed a plan two months ago to bomb New York City’s mass transit system.

The report said: “These discussions reportedly involved the use of suicide bombers or explosives placed on subway/passenger rail systems.”

Sources told CBS 2 HD the plot involved the Long Island Rail Road. If the explosion went off in Penn Station, the source said, it would affect transportation of Amtrak’s northeast corridor between Boston and Washington, LIRR service and New York City subway service.

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Mumbai Terror Continues

Update: The standoff in the Indian commercial capital of Mumbai narrowed to a final running battle between commandos and at least one gunman who was still roaming the charred corridors of a luxury hotel, the Taj Mahal, but the murderous assault on this city continued to shake the nation and ratcheted up tensions with neighboring Pakistan.

American intelligence and counterterrorism officials said Friday there was mounting evidence that a Pakistani militant group based in Kashmir, most likely Lashkar-e-Taiba, was responsible for the deadly attacks on Mumbai.

After two days of fighting, Indian security forces killed the attackers in one luxury hotel in the city known as the Oberoi Trident, freeing civilians trapped inside, as well as gunmen occupying the headquarters of an Orthodox Jewish organization nearby, ending the conflicts there.

All told, police said, more than 150 people, including at least 22 foreigners, were killed in the attacks across the city, which began on Wednesday night, as more bodies were carried out from the two hotels and the community center.

More…

DAY 3: TERROR AT THE TAJ…

Gunmen seemed to be sure of hotel terrain…

Staff emerge as heroes…

Troops battle to end Mumbai siege…

Explosives found at hotel…

Commandos storm Jewish Center…

Rabbi and wife killed…

‘Still not under control’…

India points the finger at Pakistan…

British citizens among killers?

TIMELINE…

New York guards against Mumbai-like attacks…

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Officials said as many as 30 people could still remain hostage in a luxury hotel tonight after terrorist attacks that have plunged the Indian financial capital of Mumbai into chaos.

Indian military commandos continued to exchange fire with an unknown number of militants one day after coordinated groups of gunmen shot and blasted their way through tourist sites around Mumbai on Wednesday night, apparently targeting American, Israeli and British citizens for use as hostages.

By late today, the toll had reached 125 dead and several hundred wounded. Among the dead were at least one Australian, a Japanese and a British national, officials say.

Indian officials say commandos are engaged in a fierce gunfight with terrorists holding an unknown number of hostages inside the luxury Oberoi-Trident hotel complex in Mumbai.

Police have taken at least seven people out of the two-hotel complex, one of three buildings where gunmen are still holding hostages in country’s financial capital.

The roof of the Oberoi hotel was ablaze as a result of explosions inside the building.

Commandos reportedly were sweeping through the adjoining Trident hotel, checking to see if terrorists were using it as an escape route.

There are reports that some of the terrorists may have fled Mumbai in stolen government Jeeps, and that police and military forces were setting up checkpoints and roadblocks around the city.

The Associated Press reports one of the rescued hostages told reporters he had seen many bodies inside the hotel. He did not give his name.

Indian TV, meanwhile, reports government officials fear the death toll at the Taj Mahal hotel could be high, with as many as 80-90 bodies inside. Some of the dead appear to have been killed by the gunmen, while others may have died in subsequent explosions and fires.

Reuters reports a militant at the Lubavitch Center phoned an Indian TV station with an offer to talk with government officials about the release of hostages.

The caller reportedly also complained about abuses in Indian Kashmir.

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Mumbai Under Terror Attack – Live Coverage

For live update please view the live video stream or follow us on Twitter. NTARC Twitter Mubai Stream

Mumbai Terror Attack: Hotels, hospital, bus stands, cinema halls attacked.

Top policie officials have been killed by terrorists in Mumbai. Taj Hotel reported on fire.

Attack is ongoing and can be seen live here

This is a major terror attack. Terrorists are reported to be moving through city in emergency vehicles and staging multiple attacks. Shootings, explosions and other attacks are taking place throughout the city.

There are reports of hostages being held at several locations. Americans and other westerners are reportedly being rounded up by terrorists in several hotels.

All security personal are being called up but are still overwhelmed by the scope of the terror attack.

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At least 15 people are reported to have been killed and more than 20 are reported injured as unidentified groups of gunmen opened fire in at least four places across south Mumbai on Wednesday night. Mumbai police confirm it is a terrorist attack. Two five-star hotels – Hotel Oberoi and Hotel Taj – are under siege and gunmen are reported to have held the occupants hostage. The Rapid Action Force is considering storming the hotels. A petrol pump has been blown up in Colaba by armed men and at least 10 people are reported to have been killed

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U.S. Will Ask Youth To Fight Crime and Terrorism Online

The US State Department announced plans on Monday to promote online youth groups as a new and powerful way to fight crime, political oppression and terrorism.

Drawing inspiration from a movement against FARC rebels in Colombia, the State Department is joining forces with Facebook, Google, MTV, Howcast and others in New York City next week to get the “ball rolling.”

It said 17 groups from South Africa, Britain and the Middle East which have an online presence like the “Million Voices Against the FARC” will attend a conference at Columbia University Law School from December 3-5.

Observers from seven organizations that do not have an online presence such as groups from Iraq and Afghanistan will attend. There will also be remote participants from Cuba.

They will forge an “Alliance of Youth Movement,” said James Glassman, under secretary of state for public diplomacy.

“The idea is put all these people together, share best practices, produce a manual that will be accessible online and in print to any group that wants to build a youth empowerment organization to push back against violence and oppression around the world,” he told reporters.

The conference will be streamed by MTV and Howcast, he said.

The list of organizations due to attend include the Burma Global Action Network, a human rights movement spurred into action by the ruling junta’s crackdown on monks and other pro-democracy protestors last year.

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DHS to Regulate Buying and Selling Ammonium Nitrate

In an effort to prevent future terrorist attacks, the Department of Homeland Security has announced new plans to regulate the selling and purchasing of ammonium nitrate. The widely used fertilizer was used in the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing that killed 186 people and was the subject of a 2006 ABC News investigative report that found lethal quantities of the fertilizer was frighteningly easy to obtain.

“Terrorist organizations have and will continue to use explosives, including [ammonium nitrate]-based explosive, in future terrorist attacks,” the amendment says, explaining that the availability of bags of the fertilizer around the country means the potentially deadly chemical could end up in the hands of terrorists.

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Fake Budweiser Van Was Carrying 13 Alleged Illegal Immigrants

Tucson Sector Border Patrol Agents seized a vehicle replicating a Budweiser delivery van smuggling thirteen illegal aliens near Three Points, Ariz.

Yesterday morning at 9:00am, Border Patrol agents assigned to the Tucson Station encountered a suspicious Budweiser Van traveling north from the border. Agents recognized this was abnormal and the vehicle appeared out of place. Agents were able to then successfully yield the van using emergency lights and sirens from their patrol cruiser. Inside the van agents discovered 13 illegal aliens of which eight were citizens of China, and the other five citizens of Mexico. All occupants were arrested and transported to the Tucson Border Patrol station.

Prosecution is being sought against the driver for the violation of alien smuggling.

Defending our borders against terrorists, illegal narcotics, and illegal aliens is priority ONE for the Tucson Sector Border Patrol. Networks of individuals exists who desire to bring chaos and suffering to our nation. Criminal elements are creative, ingenious, and persistent in their efforts to profit from illegal activity.

Holy Land Foundation Defendants Guilty On All Counts

After more than 15 years of investigation and two trials, the Holy Land Foundation and five of its former organizers were found guilty of illegally funneling more than $12 million to the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas.

The verdicts by a Dallas federal jury are a significant victory for the Justice Department, which streamlined its case after a mistrial last year and worked hard to carefully educate jurors on the complex evidence presented in the massive case.

Guilty verdicts were read on 108 separate charges.

The verdicts are a major triumph for the outgoing administration of President George W. Bush, whose efforts at fighting terrorism financing have been troubled. Two other similar high-profile prosecutions targeting supporters of Palestinian militants have ended in acquittals, deadlocked juries or convictions on lesser charges.

“Today’s verdicts are important milestones in America’s efforts against financiers of terrorism,” Patrick Rowan, assistant attorney general for national security, said in a prepared statement.

“This prosecution demonstrates our resolve to ensure that humanitarian relief efforts are not used as a mechanism to disguise and enable support for terrorist groups.”

Peter Margulies, a Roger Williams University law professor who studies terrorism financing cases, said, “The government showed in a streamlined case that where special assistance to the families of terrorists is concerned, cash is the moral equivalent of a car bomb.”

The jury also said Holy Land should forfeit $12.4 million because of several money-laundering convictions in the case. Prosecutors said the government probably will end up with about $5 million in Holy Land money frozen by federal authorities in 2001.

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Al-Qaeda Increases Efforts To Obtain Dirty Bomb

MI6 has issued a global priority warning to all security services that Islamic terrorists are now closer to obtaining material to create a “dirty bomb” to launch against Western targets.

Osama bin Laden has long made this a priority and reinforced it with regular messages from his mountain redoubt in the north-west province of Pakistan. He has repeatedly said every “true Muslim must make it his duty to assist in all ways possible to find the next powerful weapon to destroy our enemies”.

After the election of the new Pakistani president, the controversial Asif Ali Zardari, who has served a nine-year jail term on corruption charges he has strongly denied, MI6 fear there will be little ability to provide strong leadership against the new wave of Islamic extremism that al-Qaeda has launched across the country.

Groups such as the newly formed Pakistan Taliban have proclaimed it is focussing on creating a “dirty bomb”.

MI6 agents based in Islamabad fear the mounting instability in Pakistan will make it easier for them to do so.

While Pakistan is the only Muslim country with a nuclear arsenal, it has in the past provided its expertise to Iran.

Pakistan’s Islam bomb was developed in the 1990s by the rogue scientist, Dr Abdul Qadeer Khan. He sold them to pariah states like North Korea and Libya. He was placed under house arrest by Pervez Musharraf.

But since Musharraf was forced to resign, restrictions on Khan’s detention have been virtually lifted–a decision that has alarmed Western diplomats in Pakistan.

While Musharraf readily agreed for the US to place stringent security around Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal, there are serious concern that President Zardari will not be able to resist the rampant pressure al-Qaeda is mounting from its terrorist infrastructure base in Waziristan province in the north-west of the country.

A senior U.S. security official in Islamabad said: “Our concern is the sudden rise in intelligence which strongly indicates that al-Qaeda has renewed plans to gain access to nuclear material that could form a primitive nuclear device, one perhaps that a suicide truck bomber could use”.

In a “dirty bomb”, conventional explosives are surrounded with radioactive material.

The MI6 priority alert says such a device, while having a limited effect as a nuclear weapon, would create widespread panic.

An indication of how the threat has increased has been the number of terrorist-related websites which contain details of how to create a “dirty bomb”. As soon as the sites are discovered, they are e

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CIA Getting Closer To bin Laden

Osama bin Laden is no doubt feeling that his days of hiding may soon be coming to an abrubt end. Watching his al Qaeda leadership getting picked off by predator drones day after day, almost at will, he almost certainly has to believe that it’s just a matter of time.

Hopes of capturing Osama bin Laden rose sharply among terrorist hunters in Pakistan last night as details emerged of the targeted weekend attacks by unmanned CIA Predator drones that killed Rashid Rauf, the alleged mastermind of the 2006 plot to blow up transatlantic airliners.

Rauf, a British citizen linked to al-Qa’ida’s leadership, was killed when the compound where he was hiding in the heart of Pakistan’s tribal belt was bombarded by Hellfire missiles fired from the US drones, which are said to have killed at least four major militant operatives this month.

The targeted bungalow in Khaisoor, North Waziristan, belonged to Khaliq Noor, who locals say is not a Taliban figure but who rented it to the militants. The village is a Taliban stronghold – it was here that Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud and Pakistan government officials signed the 2005 peace agreement that the Americans regard as a surrender to terrorism.

Rauf, who was hunted by US, British and Pakistani intelligence agencies, was being protected by al-Qa’ida, intelligence sources in Islamabad said last night.

It was reported that Pakistani intelligence had tracked him down and passed on the co-ordinates of where he was staying to the CIA. It is claimed he was killed in the strike, as well as Abu al-Asr Misri, an al-Qa’ida bomb maker and operations expert.

The CIA is said to be operating under new rules, approved by US President George W.Bush, that reduce the “confidence threshold” for “high value” targets believed to be in a target zone from 90 per cent likely to between 50 and 60 per cent before a strike can be ordered.

“I guess it’s a long way between saying, ‘Look, we’ve got Rauf and a bunch of other major al-Qa’ida and Taliban figures in the past two or three months’, and saying that if we can get them there’s no reason why we can’t get Bin Laden and (Ayman) al-Zawahiri – but that’s the way it’s shaping up,” a senior Western intelligence source in Islamabad said yesterday. “I guess that after this and all that’s happened in the past few weeks as a result of the drones, Osama’s sleeping a little less easily in his bed at night.”

Retired Pakistani general and defence analyst Talat Masood was quoted as saying that the killing of Rauf, if confirmed, “goes to show US intelligence is improving”. He said: “The effects of Pakistan’s protests against such strikes will be minimal if there is convincing proof the missiles strikes are hitting senior al-Qa’ida figures, which Pakistan has been unable to do.”

In a US drone attack beyond Pakistan’s tribal areas last week, and for the first time against a target in a so-called settled area, a Saudi militant, Abdullah Azan al-Saudi, was killed as the Hellfire missiles ripped into a compound where he was staying in the town of Bannu. Al-Saudi was the main operational link between the al-Qa’ida and Taliban leaderships.

Earlier in the month, an Egyptian identified as al-Qa’ida’s Abu Jihad al-Misri was killed in another US drone attack in the North Waziristan Tribal Agency.

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