Free Republic

<p>December 24, 2003 -- The feds said yesterday that up to 10 al Qaeda suspects have been stopped trying to enter the United States in the last month. An extensive "terror watch list" has helped snag potential troublemakers since Thanksgiving, sources said.</p>

ISTANBUL, Turkey - One of two synagogues bombed in Istanbul last month reopened Saturday for Sabbath prayers in a ceremony attended by the country's chief rabbi, a spokesman said. The reopening came four weeks after the nearly simultaneous suicide attacks on the Beth Israel and Neve Shalom synagogues during Sabbath prayers. The synagogue bombings were followed five days later by similar attacks on the British consulate in Istanbul and a London-based bank. Turkey's government suspects al-Qaida involvement in the string of attacks that killed 61 people. Jewish community spokesman Silvio Ovadya said Chief Rabbi Isak Haleva, who was among those...

Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz told the Economic and Industrial forum meeting in Tel Aviv Friday that 22 attempted suicide attacks were averted since the Maxim bombing in Haifa in October. He also described the Geneva Initiative as "a crack in Israeli society that must be severely dealt with, and told audience members that the security fence would be completed by 2004. Meanwhile, Palestinians fired two anti-tank missiles at an IDF patrol on the Karni – Netzarim route in the Gaza Strip, and An IDF post near Netzarim came under fire, slightly damaging the structure. Hundreds of people are expected to...

<p>During the muslim holy month of Ramadan, three senior Qaeda representatives allegedly held a secret meeting in Afghanistan with two top Taliban commanders.</p> <p>AT THAT MEETING, according to Taliban sources, Osama bin Laden’s men officially broke some bad news to emissaries from Mullah Mohammed Omar, the elusive leader of Afghanistan’s ousted fundamentalist regime. Their message: Al Qaeda would be diverting a large number of fighters from the anti-U.S. insurgency in Afghanistan to Iraq. Al Qaeda also planned to reduce by half its $3 million monthly contribution to Afghan jihadi outfits.</p>

Al-Qaida has launched a campaign designed to undermine the security and finances of the Saudi royal family. Western intelligence sources said the latest al-Qaida attacks indicate a campaign is underway to isolate the Saudi royal family and threaten its financial base. The campaign is based on intimidating leading Arab and Western advisers from remaining in the kingdom. The Nov. 9 attack on the Muhaya compound appeared to signal a shift in al-Qaida strategy. Until then, the sources said, al-Qaida targeted Western nationals in the kingdom who were not considered crucial to the regime's survival. But in the Muhaya suicide car...

Police detain a man suspected in Nov. 8 Riyadh suicide bombing, first arrest in connection to attack.

A new miracle baby has been born in Bethlehem. That's, at least, what many Palestinians in the birthplace of Jesus believe. Ala Ayyad was born two weeks ago, on the 27th day of Ramadan, known as Lailat al-Kader, the night the Koran was revealed to Muhammad by God. Thousands of Palestinians have been thronging the Aida refugee camp at the northern entrance to Bethlehem to pay their respects to the infant boy, who is being hailed as "the miracle baby of Bethlehem." The timing of his birth was auspicious enough, but his parents were amazed to discover a large birthmark...

No, this was not the way that Recep Tayyip Erdogan imagined the first anniversary of his party's historic electoral victory. Earlier this year, at a meeting with a group of journalists in Switzerland, the Turkish Prime Minister spoke of his hopes for "a year of positive change" in a country thirsting for reform. The idea, he explained, was to "speed up the process of restoring the armed forces to their proper role" and taking "the last big steps" towards Turkey's membership in the European Union while the economy, in the doldrums for a decade, would start showing signs of a...

<p>WASHINGTON — A top counterterrorism official says al-Qaeda operatives dropped plans this year for several small attacks in the USA to focus on plotting a "more spectacular" assault comparable to the Sept. 11 attacks. The U.S. counterterrorism official, who has access to all intelligence on the terrorist group, told USA TODAY this week that officials have no specific evidence to indicate how or when al-Qaeda might try to launch a massive strike on U.S. soil.</p>

AN AL-QAEDA plot to target GCHQ was last night suggested as the possible trigger for the arrest of a suspected terror agent in Gloucester. GCHQ - the Government Communications Headquarters - has been at the centre of the fight against terrorism, providing vital intelligence to authorities, particularly in the wake of the 11 September atrocities. GCHQ’s Cheltenham offices, which are about ten miles from yesterday’s first arrest, were created to streamline the task of monitoring countless phone calls and e-mails around the world to aid the fight against terrorists. Housed in an elaborate circular building, Britain’s £1.6 billion spying centre...

ISTANBUL, Nov 25 (Reuters) - Two young women sit side by side in the waiting room of Haydarpasa station in Istanbul, waiting for a train to take them home to celebrate the Eid al-Fitr holiday at the end of Ramadan with their families. One, a 24-year-old university student named Sibel Ates, wears jeans, ear-rings and make-up. The other wears an all-encompassing black chador covering her hair and body. These are the two faces of European Union-candidate Turkey -- an overwhelmingly Muslim country which has been a secular state for more than half a century and which gave the vote to...

Explosives 'found in suspect's home' From correspondents in London November 28, 2003 EXPLOSIVE material was found at the home of an al-Qaeda suspect being searched by police in central England and has been removed safely, British police said today. "We are confident that there is no longer a danger posed by explosives on the premises and work will begin to allow the local community to return to their homes as soon as is possible," a police spokesman said. Earlier, Home Secretary David Blunkett said the man posed "a very real threat to the life and liberty of our country". The...

RIYADH - Saudi Arabia's security forces have found a pick-up truck packed with more than a tonne of explosives after raiding a militant cell primed to launch a "terrorist operation" in Riyadh, officials say. State television showed footage of the truck, seized after a clash on Tuesday in which two wanted militants were killed, filled with the explosives, rocket-propelled grenades and gas cylinders to magnify the force of any explosion. Officials say Tuesday's raid by security forces thwarted an imminent attack during the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Fitr, less than three weeks after suspected al Qaeda bombers killed at least...

The world is on Al-Qaeda alert - and Israel has been the most recent to be targeted. It was reported today that on Friday night, the Jordanians thwarted an attempted Al-Qaeda terrorist infiltration into Israel. Israeli security personnel near Kibbutz Kfar Ruppin in the Beit She'an Valley heard gunshots, and upon arriving on the scene, learned that the fire was coming from the Jordanian side of the border. It was then learned that a terrorist had been trying to infiltrate into Israel, was shot at and arrested by Jordanian officials - and led his investigators to five other terrorists, members...

ISTANBUL, Turkey - Public prosecutors sought on Monday to charge 12 alleged accomplices of last week's Istanbul suicide bombers, amid signs of progress in the investigation into a suspected Islamic terror cell. Also, authorities using DNA samples have identified the man who rammed an explosive-packed pickup truck into the city's British Consulate, just minutes after the bombing of the London-based HSBC bank, Istanbul Governor Muammer Guler said. "We've identified the culprits who carried out the attack on the British Consulate," Guler said. "We have all the details and we know their connections." Guler would not name the man. However, the...

Al Qaeda: Countdown for “biggest operation yet inside America”. Monday, November 24, Al Qaeda marked Eid al Fitr, the festival closing the Muslim festival of Ramadan, with a dramatic warning. DEBKAfile’s counter-terror sources reports that a message published over al Qaeda’s electronic channels and websites declared that the countdown has begun for the biggest operation ever carried out in the United States. “The big blow will fall very shortly. It will consist of a series of surprise attacks that will cut America off from communication with its armies in Muslim countries.” The reference is clearly to US troops in Iraq...

November 24, 2003, 8:15 a.m.“Al Qaeda Dunnit!”Think again.By Laurie Mylroie “Al Qaeda is still everywhere and nowhere," or so opined a Columbia University professor after the double pair of car bombings in Istanbul. How can that be? For more than two years, the United States has led an international Coalition in a campaign that has succeeded in detaining or killing over half of al Qaeda's leadership, cut off a significant amount of its funding, and deprived it of its territorial base.Bombing attacks south of the Turkish-Iraqi border are regularly attributed to one party, Baathist stalwarts, while bombs north of...

BERLIN, Nov 24 (Reuters) - Emerging details of last week's Istanbul suicide bombings support the idea that al Qaeda is becoming more of a terror "consultancy" and less of a direct actor, security analysts say. Most see al Qaeda's hand behind the car bombs that blew up two synagogues, the British consulate and the offices of British-based banking group HSBC, even if Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan has cautioned that the link is not yet proven. The car bombers were all Turks from the small southeast town of Bingol, known as a fundamentalist centre, and Erdogan said they had global...

American reactions to the recent bombing of a foreign workers' compound in Riyadh reveal multiple misreadings of the Arab world and — more dangerously — of both al Qaeda and the Saudis. The media seem to equate Arab with Muslim and, along with some in the administration, think that al Qaeda's war is against Americans and Westerners per se, rather than against all "infidels," a group al Qaeda defines idiosyncratically and expansively as anyone who is not a strictly observant Muslim. Both mistakes are compounded by reliance on the Saudis' distorted account of the attack. The November 8 bombing took...

Turks blame US policy for blasts Istanbul November 23, 2003 Several thousand Turks gathered in Istanbul and other cities yesterday to condemn this week's suicide bombings, with many protesting against what they see as the root cause of the attacks - the United States. Police in riot gear looked on in Turkey's business capital as unions, political parties and community groups peacefully joined those affected by the blasts to share their sadness and anger at the four attacks, which killed more than 50 people. "Curse this terrorism, it killed my friend," said retired businessman Ismail Yildirim. "The imperialist powers are...