Dan's Winds of War: 2003-10-30

Welcome! Our goal is to give you one power-packed briefing of insights, news and trends from the global War on Terror that leaves you stimulated, informed, and occasionally amused every Monday & Thursday. In addition, we also have our in-depth Iraq Report. Today's briefings are brought to you by Dan Darling of Regnum Crucis.

Top Topics

• Most readers of my Winds of War by now are quite familiar with the antics of a certain Jordanian Palestinian named Ahmed al-Khalayeh, the real name of an al-Qaeda leader far better known as Abu Musab Zarqawi. Rewards for Justice has now placed a $25,000,000 reward, putting him in the same category as al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, second-in-command Ayman al-Zawahiri, unemployed potenate former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein, and al-Qaeda military commander Saif al-Adel.

• As my colleague Andrew Olmstead noted in his own Winds of War on Monday, suicide bombers in Baghdad celebrated the beginning of Ramadan with four simultaneous attacks on three Iraqi police stations and the headquarters of the International Red Cross. The death toll from those bombings now stands at 40, with 200 wounded. See more on this in today's Iraq Briefing.

Other Topics Today Include: Iran Reports; USA Homeland Security Briefing; al-Qaeda bases in the Sahara; GSPC plot against the US Embassy in Mali; Jemaah Islamiyyah training camps in Indonesia; a fresh round of violence in Sulawesi; Willie Brigitte Virgile's resume and arrest; Australia on alert; Bimbo's arrest in General Santos; US/Afghan troops vs. the Taliban in Afghanistan; support for the Taliban in northern Pakistan; the Saudi airline threat; Hizb-ut-Tahrir's global sha'riah plans; Mugabe has a stroke; and a Turkish brothel on wheels!

IRAN REPORTS

• The conservative Weekly Standard is claiming that al-Qaeda has a new home: eastern Iran.

• The Daily Telegraph is meanwhile reporting that up to 20 members of VEVAK have entered the UK to gather surveillance on Jewish targets for al-Qaeda to attack. Britain's Jewish community seems to be taking this report very seriously.

• Muhsin Mirdamadi, the head of Iran's National Security and Foreign Policy Commission in Damascus, pledging support for Syria in the event that it is hit by US sanctions.

• Iran has recently launched an international PR offensive against accusations that the IRGC and VEVAK are providing shelter for al-Qaeda, giving a list of 240 al-Qaeda operatives to the UN and claiming that it warned about al-Qaeda's fanatical disposition. From the looks of things, the US isn't impressed with the ayatollahs' latest charm offensive.

• Radio Free Europe summarizes the recent Iranian flip-flop regarding uranium enrichment as well as the international community's fears concerning the Iranian nuclear program.

U.S.A HOMELAND SECURITY BRIEFING

• UPI is reporting that Osama Kandil, the chairman of the Islamic Society of Boston, has been linked to the Safa Group that I noted in my last Winds of War. More discussion of the situation involving Kandil can be found here and here.

• Al-Qaeda sleeper Iyman Faris has been sentenced to 20 years for conspiracy and aiding and abetting terrorism.

THE WIDER WAR

• Al-Qaeda has reportedly established bases throughout the Sahara Desert in countries like Algeria, Libya, Mali, Niger, and Mauritania to serve the influx of al-Qaeda operatives arriving from Yemen, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and Pakistan. Given the past activities of al-Qaeda and the GSPC in West Africa, one can easily speculate that something big may be in the works.

• Jemaah Islamiyyah is regrouping in Indonesia and Indonesian Welfare Minister Jusuf Kalla is claiming that the organization has set up training camps in central Sulawesi, possibly reopening the 10 al-Qaeda training camps that were active between March and November of 2001.

• Sulawesi, meanwhile, has seen an upswing in violence recently with the discovery of 600 kilograms of explosives in Tailse. This comes after Jemaah Islamiyyah claimed responsibility for killing 11 Christians to mark the anniversary of the Bali bombings.

• Australian Al-Qaeda sleeper Willie Brigitte Virgile has been deported to his native France where he faces terrorism-related charges. Virgile appears to have quite a resume, as his Haldon Street Prayer Center cell included one of the Australia al-Qaeda fighters now in US custody at Guantanamo Bay and provided survival training courses to French Islamic extremists in the Fontainbleau forest just outside of Paris. Among other things, he is suspected of involvement in the al-Qaeda suicide bombing that killed Northern Alliance leader Ahmed Shah Masood two days before 9/11.

• But the story doesn't end with Virgile. While in Australia, he received orders from al-Qaeda leaders based in Pakistan that he was to provide shelter for an al-Qaeda explosives expert. That he may have successfully performed this task has placed Australian anti-terrorism police on high alert.

• MILF commander Guindatu Mamantal Dulang, who goes by the rather appropriate alias of "Bimbo," has been arrested by Filippino intelligence for involvement in a series of bombings in General Santos.

• The fighting continues in Afghanistan as US and Afghan forces killed 20 Taliban fighters along the Pakistani border over the weekend, while 2 State Department contact workers were killed in a raid on the Afghan border town of Shkin that ended in the death of 10 Taliban and al-Qaeda fighters. Another skirmish near Shkin left 18 Taliban and al-Qaeda fighters dead, as well as 2 CIA operatives.

• In Pakistan meanwhile, support for the Taliban is running strong in the Northwest Frontier Province and Baluchistan where the pro-Taliban Mutahidda Majlis-e-Amal holds power. And while you'd never know it from the body count, the Taliban and al-Qaeda fighters inside of Afghanistan are said to have reorganized into a more effective fighting force.

• The US sees a credible threat to airplanes in Saudi Arabia. One wonders if this isn't perhaps linked to this development.

• Hizb-ut-Tahrir, a Wahhabi political organization that among other things serves as the "legitimate" front for the al-Qaeda affiliate Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, tells Forum 18 what their Islamic utopia looks like. The funniest thing is that this is actually rather "moderate" given the worldviews of other al-Qaeda front organizations like the UK-based Khalifah and al-Muhajiroun movements.

• Zimbabwean dictator Robert Mugabe reportedly suffered a stroke but was either treated by Chinese or South African doctors.

• We try to end on a lighter note if possible. It appears that the first Turkish bus brothel is in trouble for its, um, unique take on Turkish law in regard to prostitution.