Research – Terrorisms New Target Is the Economy

Jihadist terror organizations have set economic terrorism as their new target, intending to harm and paralyze Western economies, the United Sates in particular, claims Prof. Gabriel Weimann, expert researcher of terrorism over the Internet at the University of Haifa. Prof. Weimann monitored websites hosted by terrorist and terrorism-supporting organizations and concludes: “For the Jihadists, the present economic crisis signifies an ideal opportunity and platform to leverage a economic terrorist campaign.”

In the course of a study that was carried out over a number of years, Prof. Weimann surveyed public and encoded websites run by Islamic terrorist organizations, forums, video clips, and practically all the information related to Islamic Jihad terrorism that is flowing through the network.

According to Prof. Weimann, the focus on economic terrorism was set in motion with the September 11 attack on the Twin Towers, when Osama bin Laden stated on the video tapes that he sent out that these attacks mostly damaged the United States’ economic base and that these attacks, which cost $500,000 to carry out, cost the U.S. $500 billion.

via newmedia-eng.haifa.ac.il »Read Full Article.

News Outlets Request Terror Plea Agreement Be Unsealed

The Associated Press and Newsday are asking a federal judge to make public a plea agreement between prosecutors and a man who says he was plotting to attack New York subways.

The news organizations argued in court papers that the public has a right to see the documents unless there’s an overriding reason to seal them.

Najibullah Zazi pled guilty earlier this week to terrorism charges and admitted plotting to bomb the New York City subways.

Source

Cops Track Woman Who Helped Terror Suspect Headley -India

The trail of the German Bakery blast in Pune has led investigators to West Bengal and to a woman who was recruited by a local terror cell to assist 26/11 accused and US national David Coleman Headley. Investigators have found a concrete link between Headley and the Pune blast.

According to officers, Amir Raza Khan, who has been blamed for a spate of serial explosions in the country over the past few years, had teamed up with Headley to engineer the blasts, including that in Pune.

Raza is a resident of Kolkata and founder of the Amir Raza Commando Force. While he is now believed to be in Pakistan, the police say his girlfriend helped Headley establish his terror network. An investigator said the woman is still in India and was seen only two weeks ago.

“We have got information that Raza not only met Headley but also Tahawwur Rana to finalise the strategies for creating terror in India,” an officer said.

According to investigators, Raza had deputed his girlfriend to assist Headley when he was conducting reconnaissance trips across India.

“The woman, too, is from Bengal and is about 26 years old. Over the past two years, she travelled with Headley whenever he visited various Indian cities to establish his terror network. We have information that she was the one who had arranged the accommodation for Headley when he visited Ajmer, Kanpur and Delhi. At all these places, Headley stayed at hotels near local Chabad houses. For instance, in Ajmer, he took a room that was facing the Chabad House there,” an investigator said.

via Cops track woman who helped Headley: India Today – Latest Breaking News from India, World, Business, Cricket, Sports, Bollywood..

Intel Chief – U.S. May Target Americans Involved in Terrorism

Director of National Intelligence Dennis C. Blair acknowledged Wednesday that government agencies may kill U.S. citizens abroad who are involved in terrorist activities if they are “taking action that threatens Americans.”

Blair told members of the House intelligence committee that he was speaking publicly about the issue to reassure Americans that intelligence agencies and the Department of Defense “follow a set of defined policy and legal procedures that are very carefully observed” in the use of lethal force against U.S. citizens.

Blair’s unusually frank remarks come as the issue of targeting Americans for lethal action has attracted more notice.

via Intelligence chief acknowledges U.S. may target Americans involved in terrorism – washingtonpost.com.

Man Claims Yemen Terror Ties in Little Rock Shooting

In a surprising twist, a Tennessee man accused of killing a soldier outside a Little Rock, Ark., military recruiting station last year has asked a judge to change his plea to guilty, claiming for the first time that he is affiliated with a Yemen-based affiliate of Al Qaeda.

In a letter to the judge presiding over his case, the accused killer, Abdulhakim Muhammad, calls himself a soldier in Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula and calls the shooting “a Jihadi Attack” in retribution for the killing of Muslims by American troops.

“I wasn’t insane or post traumatic nor was I forced to do this Act,” Mr. Muhammad said in a two-page, hand-printed note in pencil. The attack, which he said did not go as planned, was “justified according to Islamic Laws and the Islamic Religion. Jihad — to fight those who wage war on Islam and Muslims.”

via Man Claims Terror Ties in Little Rock Shooting – NYTimes.com.

Was Knoxville Store Operator Planning Shopping Mall Terror

This story may serve to  illustrate the question that was brought up in yesterday’s post, “Arrest Early Or Risk Potential Terror Attack“. From Knox News:Was a Northwest Knoxville convenience store operator joking around or a terrorist-in-waiting?  That was the question U.S. Magistrate Judge Bruce Guyton faced Monday as federal prosecutors Jeff Theodore and Will Mackie pushed for the detention pending trial of Hazam Ali Ahmed.

The 35-year-old Ahmed was charged with being a felon in possession of firearms after authorities last week found two guns inside the Central Convenience Store on Keith Avenue that he operated.

However, testimony at Monday’s hearing shows Ahmed has been on the radar screen of the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force since at least January 2006.

FBI Agent Mark D. Murphy testified that an informant clandestinely recorded chats with Ahmed in early 2006 during which Ahmed allegedly tried to recruit the informant into the terrorist network al-Qaeda.

“He referred to jihad,” Murphy said of Ahmed. “He asked the confidential source if he would be interested in joining jihad. He stated that he was connected to al- Qaeda, that he had worked for them for several years. He wanted the informant to join al-Qaeda. “

According to Murphy’s testimony, Ahmed told the informant, with whom he was acquainted, that he planned to wait “until his son reached the age of seven” before putting into action a plan to carry out a terrorist attack at a shopping mall.

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German Police Seek Terror Suspect In Afghanistan

Germany’s federal police are reported to have taken an unusual step of distributing posters in Afghanistan, warning of a German terrorism suspect thought to be hiding in one of the tribal areas.

Authorities have identified a 27-year-old German convert to Islam as the al-Qaida associate suspected of traveling to Afghanistan and planning to attack German targets

According to the report, red-framed posters have been placed in the capital Kabul and other Afghan cities, alerting people to the 27-year-old Muslim convert known as “Jan Sch.”, whom the poster describes as possibly “violent and armed”.

The Kazakhstan-born German from Saarland is believed to be hiding in the remote border region between Afghanistan and Pakistan and is suspected of having links to terror network Al-Qaida.

His targets could be German military bases or civilian reconstruction facilities, the report said.

The federal police (BKA) have aimed the posters at international forces in the war-torn country and have therefore put them up mostly at security checkpoints and facilities where foreigners work.

Jan Sch. is regarded by German anti-terrorism officials as part of the so-called “Sauerland group”, led by another convert, Fritz Gelowicz, who was caught along with three co-conspirators while planning a major terrorist attack in Germany in 2007.

via Sourcel.

Brother Defends Alleged Terror Suspect On Facebook

The family of alleged terror suspect Tarek Mehanna is proclaiming his innocence and turning to Facebook to get the family’s message out.

From WCVB TV 5 Boston

Tamer Mehanna said his brother, Tarek, was set-up by federal agents with false and ludicrous accusations because of his constant refusal to tell lies about the Muslim community as an FBI informant.

“Free Tarek Mehanna” is the official and public Facebook site for people who believe in his innocence.

His brother says Mehanna refused a year’s worth of FBI attempts to make the Massachusetts College of Pharmacy graduate a confidential informant.

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The Case Against Alleged Terror Suspect Tarek Mehanna

Alleged terror suspect Tarek Mehanna, arrested earlier this week, plotted to attack Americans at a shopping mall according to the FBI. Failing at that,it is alleged he turned to cyber attacks.

Frustrated at failing in his travels overseas to locate a terrorist training camp, a Massachusetts man returned home in 2003 to begin plotting a domestic terror attack. Thrilled by the 9/11 attacks and impressed by the success of the Washington, D.C., snipers in terrorizing the public in late 2002, Tarek Mehanna and several friends began planning an attack on a shopping mall, a Federal Bureau of Investigation complaint alleges.

In “multiple conversations, discussions, and preparation,” Tarek Mehanna, a student living at home with his parents in Sudbury, Mass., discussed with three other men how to “obtain automatic weapons, go to a shopping mall, and randomly shoot people,” according to the federal criminal complaint filed in a US district court Wednesday.

The trio – Mehanna, Ahmad Abousamra, and an unnamed informant – debated logistics, types of weapons needed, the number of attackers needed, how to coordinate the attack, and how to attack emergency responders, the FBI says.

via Read Full Article.

Najibullah Zazi, From Smiling Face at Coffee Cart to Terror Suspect

To many, Najibullah Zazi was a familiar face on Stone Street in Lower Manhattan, serving pastries and coffee to the morning rush hour crowd near Wall St. No one could have guessed that this was the same person who would one day be an alleged terror suspect in a plot that would possibly rival 9/11, if carried out.

The NY Times takes a look at the background and life of Najibullah Zazi

For many on Wall Street — young, old, all in a hurry, the charging bulls of Bowling Green — his was the first hello of the day. Affable and rooted, he lived for 10 years in the same apartment with his family in Flushing, Queens. His father drove a cab for more than 15 years.

He was, in other words, no brooding outcast, no sheltered, suggestible loner raised in a closed community.

He was the smiling man who remembered a customer liked his coffee large, light and sweet. He had a “God Bless America” sign on his cart. He was the doughnut man.

But prosecutors say Mr. Zazi, 24, who worked blocks from ground zero, was just as furtive an operative as the Sept. 11 hijackers when he traveled to Pakistan last year for terrorism training and returned to the United States with a plan to build bombs using beauty supplies and backpacks.

via Read Article – NYTimes.com.

Quantico Marine Base Targeted By Alleged Terror Suspects

Additional charges were filed today against alleged North Carolina terror suspects Daniel Patrick Boyd and Hysen Sherifi. Indictments were handed sown charging the two with allegedly plotting to kill U.S. Marines at the Quantico, Va., Military base.

DOJ Press Release

Today, a federal grand jury returned a superseding criminal indictment in the Daniel Patrick Boyd matter.

While the superseding indictment returned today includes all of the charges alleged in the original indictment of July 22, 2009, it also includes new charges against three defendants, Daniel Patrick Boyd, aka “Saifullah,” Hysen Sherifi, and Zakariya Boyd, aka “Zak.”

First, the superseding indictment charges Daniel Patrick Boyd, aka “Saifullah,” and Hysen Sherifi with conspiring to murder U.S. military personnel, in violation of Title 18, United States Code, Section 1117. The superseding indictment alleges, among other things, that in furtherance of this agreement, Boyd undertook reconnaissance of the Marine Corps Base located in Quantico, Va., and obtained maps of the base in order to plan an attack on Quantico. According to the superseding indictment, Boyd possessed armor piercing ammunition, stating it was “to attack the Americans.” A conviction for conspiring to violate Title 18, United States Code, Section 1117 has a maximum penalty of imprisonment for any term of years or life, and/or a $250,000 fine, followed by five years of supervised release.

Second, Boyd, Sherifi, and Zakariya Boyd, aka “Zak,” are also charged with possession of weapons in furtherance of a crime of violence, in violation of Title 18, United States Code, Section 924(c). These section 924(c) charges are separate from, and in addition to, the section 924(c) charges alleged in the original indictment. A violation of Title 18, United States Code, Section 924(c), carries a maximum penalty of no less than five years in prison nor more than life, a $250,000 fine or both fine and imprisonment, and up to five years of supervised release following imprisonment. If any of the defendants are convicted for more than one of the section 924(c) charges alleged by the grand jury, the minimum term of imprisonment rises to 25 years, to run consecutively to any other sentence.

Third, Daniel Boyd is also charged with the providing a Ruger mini 14 rifle and, on a separate date, .223 ammunition, to a convicted felon, each in violation of Title 18, United States Code, Section 922(d). If convicted, Boyd faces up to ten years in prison and a $250,000 fine, and three years supervised release on each of these charges.

U.S. Attorney George E.B. Holding commented: “These additional charges hammer home the grim reality that today’s homegrown terrorists are not limiting their violent plans to locations overseas, but instead are willing to set their sights on American citizens and American targets, right here at home.”

“The events over the course of the week should serve as a reminder that there are those at home and abroad who continue to plot to cause harm to U.S. citizens. The FBI, U.S. Attorney’s Office and our law enforcement and intelligence community partners will continue working tirelessly to prevent that from happening,” said Owen D. Harris, Special Agent in Charge of the Charlotte Division of the FBI.

“NCIS investigative efforts in support of the FBI’s investigation centered on protecting Marine Corps personnel assigned to MCB Quantico during Mr. Boyd’s alleged activities. These efforts were closely coordinated and supported by MCB Quantico Command to insure the safety of military and civilian personnel aboard the base. This case represents the close coordination between NCIS and FBI in addressing terrorism issues that may impact the operational readiness of the U.S. military.”

An indictment contains allegations that a defendant has committed a crime. Every defendant is presumed innocent until and unless proven guilty in court.

Terror Suspect Had Bomb Guide, Handwritten Notes

The central figure in what authorities describe as a widening inquiry into a possible plot to detonate explosives in the United States had been trained in weapons and explosives in Pakistan and, according to court papers released Sunday, had made nine pages of handwritten notes on how to make and handle bombs.

The court papers, released after the arrests in Colorado of Najibullah Zazi and his father, as well as that of an imam in Queens, showed that during a search in New York of the younger Mr. Zazi’s rental car on Sept. 11, agents found a laptop computer containing an image of the notes. According to a criminal complaint, the notes “contain formulations and instructions regarding the manufacture and handling of initiating explosives, main explosives charges, explosives detonators and components of a fusing system.”

Read Full Article – NYTimes.com.

Najibullah Zazi, Alleged Terror Plot Suspect Arrested By FBI

Fox31 reports an arrest has been made in the FBI terror case that involves Aurora resident Najibullah Zazi. At 9:30 p.m. 15 to 20 law enforcement cars swarmed into the parking lot of Zazi’s Aurora apartment near E. Smokey hill road and E-470.

Both Zazi and his father were removed from the apartment in handcuffs. Authorities have not indicated what the two men are being charged with. Earlier in the evening Zazi’s lawyer spokesperson Wendy Aiello told FOX 31 “we have not been contacted by the FBI.”

Najibullah Zazi was supposed to report to the Federal Building in Denver Saturday morning but opted not to for unclear reasons.

Read Full Article Fox31

From CNN Wire

CNN is reporting FBI agents late Saturday arrested Najibullah Zazi, a 24-year-old Colorado resident and Afghan national suspected in an alleged terrorist plot in the United States. The report says the arrest came as authorities raided Zazi’s home in Aurora Colorado

Source‘

9News In Colorado Reports:

The FBI has arrested Najibullah Zazi and his father at their apartment. The arrests happened at about 9:40 p.m. Saturday night. NBC justice correspondent Pete Williams tells 9NEWS that the charges will not likely be terrorism charges but may be a lesser charge that involves lying to a federal investigator.

Read Full Article at 9NEWS

Developing….

Terror Suspect’s Computer Shows Sports Stadiums, Fashion Sites

ABC News is reporting that law enforcement officials tell them a computer belonging to alleged al Qaeda suspect Najibullah Zazi showed he had researched baseball and football stadiums and sites used in the recent Fashion Week event in New York City.

ABC News reports officials said they aren’t sure what locations might have been targeted, but information found on Zazi’s computer may provide a window into what he might have been planning. They reportedly also found a text message that said “wedding cake is ready,” which may have been a signal about preparations for an attack.

Source – Fox News

Zazi, 24, had been scheduled to spend a fourth day today being questioned by the FBI but his lawyer, Arthur Folsom, canceled the session , according to the news report.

“He has taken the day to consult with his client,” said Wendy Aiello, a spokeswoman for the lawyer. Zazi is not in custody, she said.

While officials say they do not know the targets of the alleged plot, the contents of Zazi’s computer are considered a valuable insight into what he might have been planning.

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