Posted on 11/11/2005 5:01:14 AM PST by CurlyBill
Amman, Jordan — Jordanian police said Friday they had rounded up 120 people, mainly Iraqis and Jordanians, in a nationwide hunt for those behind the triple Amman hotel bombings.
The toll rose to at least 60 on Friday with the death of Syrian-American filmmaker Mustapha Akkad, whose 34-year-old daughter was also killed in the bombings. Mr. Akkad, who was 75 and lived in Los Angeles, had suffered serious injuries and a heart attack in the attack. He was the producer of the Halloween horror movies.
The death toll included the three suicide bombers.
Al-Qaeda in Iraq, led by Jordanian-born Abu Musab al-Zarqawi claimed responsibility for Wednesday's suicide bombings.
A Web statement Friday in the name of al-Qaeda in Iraq claimed the bombings were carried out by four Iraqis, including a man and his wife.
"All of these are Iraqis from the land between the two rivers," the statement said, alluding to Iraq's ancient name, Mesopotamia. "They vowed to die and they chose the shortest route to receive the blessings of God."
The statement could not be authenticated, but it appeared on a site which has included past al-Qaeda statements and was signed in the name of the group's spokesman, Abu Maysara al-Iraqi.
Most of those detained on Friday were Iraqis and Jordanians, a senior police official said. At least one of the bombers spoke with an Iraqi accent and suspicion increasingly fell on the insurgents fighting U.S. and Iraqi forces across Jordan's eastern border.
"Scores have been rounded up in different parts of the country since the attacks," said the official who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media.
"They're of different nationalities, mainly Iraqis and Jordanians. The number of people interrogated now is 120."
"We don't know if any of them were involved in the attacks or assisted the suicide bombers," the official told the Associated Press. "Many may simply be innocent."
Investigators hunting for more clues also were piecing together the remains of the suicide bombers on Friday.
The hunt for suspects intensified a day after thousands rallied in the capital Amman and other cities to denounce the al-Qaeda in Iraq leader Mr. al-Zarqawi. The group claimed responsibility for the bombings in a statement posted on the Internet.
Thousands of Jordanians nationwide attended weekly Friday sermons in hundreds of mosques, which all performed special prayers "for the absent" to commemorate the bombing victims.
Larger, more emotional outpourings of anger at Islamic extremists were expected Friday after weekly midday mosque sermons in Amman and a mass funeral for bombing victims.
"Burn in hell, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi!" protesters shouted Thursday as they marched through the capital.
"So many of us lost friends but what is coming through the most is the outrage and the disbelief that any group could consider these kind of acts serve larger purposes," Jordan's Queen Noor told CNN in an interview.
UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan flew into Amman to meet Jordan's King Abdullah II and the foreign minister.
Mr. al-Zarqawi -- sentenced to death in absentia here for terror crimes -- is believed to have specially trained more than 100 Iraqi militants to carry out suicide bombing missions in Iraq and, possibly, elsewhere in the Middle East.
The three hotels targeted -- Grand Hyatt, the Radisson SAS and the Days Inn -- are frequented by Israelis and Americans among other foreign guests and have long been on al-Qaeda's hit list.
Stung by the Arab condemnations, al-Qaeda issued an Internet statement Thursday "to explain for Muslims" why they had targeted hotels in an Arab capital packed with other Muslims as well as western visitors.
More than half of those killed in the attacks were Jordanians. Six Iraqis, two Bahrainis and one Saudi Arabian were also among the dead.
"Let all know that we have struck only after becoming confident that they are centres for launching war on Islam and supporting the Crusaders' presence in Iraq and the Arab peninsula and the presence of the Jews on the land of Palestine," the purported al-Qaeda in Iraq statement said.
It said the hotels were "favourite places for the work of the intelligence organs, especially those of the Americans, the Israelis and some western European countries" for what the group called "invisible battles in the so-called war on terrorism."
The statement also said the hotels were used by NATO as a rear base "from which the convoys of the crusaders and the renegades head back and forth to the land of Iraq where Muslims are killed and their blood is shed."
Striking a moral tone, the al-Qaeda manifesto said the hotels were a "secure place for the filthy Israeli and Western tourists to spread corruption and adultery at the expense and suffering of the Muslims in these countries."
The statement promised "catastrophic" assaults in the future, warning that Wednesday's attacks would pale by comparison.
A senior Jordanian security official linked the bombings to Iraq, saying one militant wandered around the lobby of the Grand Hyatt Hotel and spoke to people in an Iraqi accent before blowing himself up.
"Indications and initial reports point to Iraqi involvement but we cannot be certain," the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to reporters.
Two other bombers attacked almost simultaneously, targeting the nearby Days Inn and Radisson SAS hotels. The Radisson bomber detonated explosives -- concealed under his clothing -- in a ballroom during a wedding party, killing at least 16 members of one Jordanian family with roots in the Palestinian West Bank.
Jordanian authorities have so far identified 33 Jordanians, many with families ties to the Palestinian West Bank. Six Iraqis, two Bahrainis, at least two Chinese, one Indonesian, and one Saudi also were killed. Fourteen of the dead have not been identified, according to Jordanian authorities.
Mr. Akkad's daughter Rima Akkad Monla, an American living in Beirut, had travelled to Amman for a wedding. She and her father were in the lobby of the Hyatt hotel when the bomber struck, Jordanian TV said Friday. Mr. Akkad's daughter died instantly.
Significantly, the 33 Jordanian victims included some two dozen Palestinians with roots in the West Bank. Among them was the West Bank's intelligence chief, Major General Bashir Nafeh, a diplomat and a prominent banker. Many Jordanians and Palestinians have supported the Iraqi insurgency, but the hotel bombings could tip Arab sentiment against Mr. al-Zarqawi.
Governments let in all sorts of people
who belong somewhere else. Pretty soon the country has so many that the
government comes to fear them. At that point the problem passes beyond easy
solution. So politicians paper over everything, and make concessions to buy
a year’s peace. The newcomers breed and increase. By and by the remaining
possibilities are civil war
And some folks try to tell us that God's judgement isn't accurate!
Play with fire......
Probably making them eat ice cream until they just can't eat anymore.
What's that supposed to mean?
Stop smoking crack dude. Halloween is a classic and Abu Musab al-Zarqawi is hardly the hand of God.
Sounds eerily similar to the rhetoric of those people who set off the bombs
You piece of *#%!
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