1/4/2010, "Al Qaida double agent killed CIA officers," NBC News, by Robert Windrem and Richard Engel
"The suicide bombing on a CIA base in Afghanistan last week was
carried out by a Jordanian doctor who was an al-Qaida double-agent, Western intelligence officials told NBC News. Initial reports said that the attack, which killed seven CIA officers, was carried out by a member of the Afghan National Army.
According to Western intelligence officials, the perpetrator was Humam Khalil Abu-Mulal al-Balawi, 36, an al-Qaida sympathizer from Zarqa, which is also the hometown of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the Jordanian militant Islamist believed responsible for several devastating attacks in Iraq.
Al-Balawi was arrested by Jordanian intelligence more than a year ago. He had moderated the main al-Qaida chat forum before his arrest and was known online as Abu Dujanah al-Khurasani.
“Abu Dujanah was an active member of jihadi forums,” said Evan Kohlmann, who tracks jihadi Web sites for NBC News. “He was actually an administrator on the now-defunct Al-Hesbah forum, previously al-Qaida's main chat forum.”
The Jordanians believed that al-Balawi had been successfully reformed [or "de-radicalized"] and brought over to the American and Jordanian side. They set him up as an agent and sent him to Afghanistan and Pakistan to infiltrate al-Qaida.
His specific mission, according to officials, was to find and meet Ayman al Zawahiri, al-Qaida’s No. 2, also a physician.
However, a Taliban spokesman, quoted on the Al-Jazeera Web site, said al-Balawi misled Jordanian and U.S. intelligence services for a year. The spokesman, Al-Hajj Ya'qub, promised to release a video confirming his account of the Afghanistan attack.
On martyrdom
After he arrived in Afghanistan last year, al-Balawi was interviewed by one of al-Qaida’s main Internet sites, the Vanguards of Khurasan, on the subject of martyrdom.
“When you ponder the verses and hadiths that speak about jihad and its graciousness, and then you let your imagination run wild to fly with what Allah has prepared for martyrs, your life become cheap for its purpose, and the extravagant houses and expensive cars and all the decoration of life become very distasteful in your eyes,” he told the interviewer....
Last week, according to the Western officials, al-Balawi reportedly called his handler to say he needed to meet with the CIA’s team based in Khost, Afghanistan, because he said he had urgent information he needed to relay about Zawahiri.
Close relations with Jordanian intelligence
His handler was a senior intelligence official, identified in Jordanian press accounts as Sharif Ali bin Zeid.
But bin Zeid was not just a Jordanian intelligence officer; he was also a member of the Jordanian royal family and was a first cousin of the king and grandnephew of the first king Abdullah.
Bin Zeid’s prominent role offers rare insight into the close partnership between American and Jordanian intelligence officials and how crucial their relationship has become to the overall counterterrorism strategy.
"We have a close partnership with the Jordanians on counterterrorism matters," a U.S. official told The Washington Post. "Having suffered serious losses from terrorist attacks on their own soil, they are keenly aware of the significant threat posed by extremists."
Jordan's official news agency, Petra, said bin Zeid was killed "on Wednesday evening as a martyr while performing the sacred duty of the Jordanian forces in Afghanistan" and provided no further details about his death.
Meanwhile, Al-Jazeera reported that al-Balawi's family refused to speak to the media on instructions from Jordanian security services. Sources close to the family told Al-Jazeera's Web site that Jordanian Intelligence arrested the perpetrator's younger brother and ordered his father not to set up a condolence tent for his son so that it would not turn into a gathering place for jihadist sympathizers.
Key base for CIA
According to Western officials, bin Zeid, along with the seven CIA officers, were killed when al-Balawi, the formerly trusted informant turned double-agent, detonated his suicide belt at Camp Chapman.
The base was used to direct and coordinate CIA operations and intelligence gathering in Khost, a hotbed of insurgent activity because of its proximity to Pakistan's lawless tribal areas, former CIA officials said. Among the CIA officers killed was the chief of the operation [also "a mother of three"], they said. Video: Double agent
Six other people were wounded in what was one of the worst attacks in CIA history.
A senior U.S. intelligence official told NBC the CIA is "looking closely at every aspect of the Khost attack."
"The agency is determined to continue pursuing aggressive counterterrorism operations. Last week’s attack will be avenged. Some very bad people will eventually have a very bad day,” said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.
Qari Hussain, a top militant commander with the Pakistani Taliban who is believed to be a suicide bombing mastermind, said last week that militants had been searching for a way to damage the CIA's ability to launch missile strikes on the Pakistani side of the border.
Using remote-controlled aircraft, the U.S. has launched scores of such missile attacks in the tribal regions over the past year and a half, aiming for high-value al-Qaida and other militant targets. The most successful strike, in August, killed former Pakistani Taliban chief Baitullah Mehsud at his father-in-law's home.
The Washington Post reported Friday that the CIA base has been at the heart of overseeing this covert program. The newspaper cited two former intelligence officials who have visited Chapman as saying that U.S. personnel there are heavily involved in the selection of al-Qaida and Taliban targets for the drone aircraft strikes." CIA logo via nbc news
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1/4/2010, "'A Huge Screw-Up': CIA Attacker May Have Been Well-Known Al Qaeda Blogger," Newsweek, Michael Isikoff and Mark Hosenball
"The suicide bomber who penetrated a CIA base in Afghanistan last week and killed seven officers was not just any Al Qaeda double agent: he may have been a well-known Al Qaeda blogger who boasted of his “love of jihad and martyrdom” in a Taliban Web magazine just a few months ago.
The
new details emerging Monday about the Al Qaeda background of the
attacker have stunned former agency officials and intelligence experts
and raised the possibility of a major security lapse that permitted the
bomber access to the base.
“It’s a huge screw-up,” said one former senior CIA official who had worked with some of the CIA officers killed in the attack. “The question is, why did they think they could trust this guy? What was the level of confidence that would allow somebody like this access to a place where there were this many officers?”
Initial reports last week identified the suicide bomber who blew up the CIA team based in Khost, Afghanistan, as a member of the Afghan National Army. That appeared to explain how the attacker was able to get inside the base without being closely searched.
But NBC News and other outlets on Monday identified the bomber as a Jordanian physician who was working for Jordanian intelligence while secretly serving as an Al Qaeda double agent.
After being arrested by the Jordanians more than a year ago, the physician, identified as Humam Khalil Abu-Mulal al-Balawi, had reportedly promised Jordanian intelligence and the CIA that he would help U.S. officers find Ayman al-Zawahiri, Al Qaeda’s No. 2. (Among those killed in last week’s attack was a senior Jordanian intelligence officer who is a cousin of Jordan's King Abdullah.)
Al-Jazeera’s Arabic language Web site, citing unidentified sources as well as a Taliban spokesman, added what may be the most surprising wrinkle of all to the story: the Jordanian doctor is the same person known as “Abu Dujanah al-Khurasani”—a frequent contributor to jihadi Web sites who once served as the administrator for the Al Hesbah Forum, a major Al Qaeda Web site.
The Al-Jazeera story quotes the Taliban spokesman as saying that the blogger was able to “mislead U.S. and Jordanian intelligence for a whole year,” adding that the Taliban plans to release a video soon to confirm its account.
There is no way to independently confirm that Balawi and Abu Dujinah is the same person. But Evan Kohlmann, a U.S. government consultant who monitors jihadi Web forums, said that many of the details emerging about Balawi─including his age and background─seem to match comments that Abu Dujinah has made on various Web postings. There "are pretty compelling reasons to believe it's the same person," he said. Kohlmann also noted that, in a lengthy interview he gave to a Taliban magazine known as Vanguard of Khorasan last September, Abu Dujinah “essentially announced he was going to fight jihad in Afghanistan.”
The former CIA official─who requested anonymity because of the ongoing probe into the attack─said that even if some people at the CIA believed that the Jordanian jihadi could lead them to Zawahiri, it was puzzling that he would have had access to a base with multiple officers. “You never trust a person like that,” the former official said.
“This is something that is unprecedented,” said Ali Al-Ahmed, president of the Institute of Gulf Affairs, a Washington think tank that monitors Persian Gulf developments. “This is the first time a terrorist has managed to infiltrate the CIA and carry out an attack.”
The CIA declined to comment on the identity of the attacker of the Khost base."
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1/14/2010, "The last word: A jihadist hits America’s A-team," The Week
"“Several” of America’s top five experts on al Qaida were at the Khost base when al-Balawi arrived.
THE OUTER GATE at the Khost base is presumed to be closely watched by Taliban spies, so the car carrying al-Balawi to the base from Pakistan did not stop there. The driver of the red station wagon was directed to a relatively empty corner of the compound, away from the main CIA buildings, to a makeshift interrogation center. Outside stood the base chief, ready to greet the doctor. She expected to hear him describe a way to kill al-Zawahri.
Al-Balawi exited the car with one hand in his pocket, according to the accounts of several U.S. officials briefed on the incident. An American security guard approached him to conduct a pat-down search and asked him to remove his hand. Instead, al-Balawi triggered a switch....
Leading up to the Dec. 30 meeting, al-Balawi was considered by American spy agencies to be the most promising informant in years about the whereabouts of al Qaida’s top leaders. American intelligence officers say they were so hopeful about what the Jordanian might deliver to officers in Khost that top officials at the agency and the White House had been informed that the gathering would take place.
THE CIA BASE at Khost is one of two in Afghanistan that the agency controls directly."...
“It’s a huge screw-up,” said one former senior CIA official who had worked with some of the CIA officers killed in the attack. “The question is, why did they think they could trust this guy? What was the level of confidence that would allow somebody like this access to a place where there were this many officers?”
Initial reports last week identified the suicide bomber who blew up the CIA team based in Khost, Afghanistan, as a member of the Afghan National Army. That appeared to explain how the attacker was able to get inside the base without being closely searched.
But NBC News and other outlets on Monday identified the bomber as a Jordanian physician who was working for Jordanian intelligence while secretly serving as an Al Qaeda double agent.
After being arrested by the Jordanians more than a year ago, the physician, identified as Humam Khalil Abu-Mulal al-Balawi, had reportedly promised Jordanian intelligence and the CIA that he would help U.S. officers find Ayman al-Zawahiri, Al Qaeda’s No. 2. (Among those killed in last week’s attack was a senior Jordanian intelligence officer who is a cousin of Jordan's King Abdullah.)
Al-Jazeera’s Arabic language Web site, citing unidentified sources as well as a Taliban spokesman, added what may be the most surprising wrinkle of all to the story: the Jordanian doctor is the same person known as “Abu Dujanah al-Khurasani”—a frequent contributor to jihadi Web sites who once served as the administrator for the Al Hesbah Forum, a major Al Qaeda Web site.
The Al-Jazeera story quotes the Taliban spokesman as saying that the blogger was able to “mislead U.S. and Jordanian intelligence for a whole year,” adding that the Taliban plans to release a video soon to confirm its account.
There is no way to independently confirm that Balawi and Abu Dujinah is the same person. But Evan Kohlmann, a U.S. government consultant who monitors jihadi Web forums, said that many of the details emerging about Balawi─including his age and background─seem to match comments that Abu Dujinah has made on various Web postings. There "are pretty compelling reasons to believe it's the same person," he said. Kohlmann also noted that, in a lengthy interview he gave to a Taliban magazine known as Vanguard of Khorasan last September, Abu Dujinah “essentially announced he was going to fight jihad in Afghanistan.”
The former CIA official─who requested anonymity because of the ongoing probe into the attack─said that even if some people at the CIA believed that the Jordanian jihadi could lead them to Zawahiri, it was puzzling that he would have had access to a base with multiple officers. “You never trust a person like that,” the former official said.
“This is something that is unprecedented,” said Ali Al-Ahmed, president of the Institute of Gulf Affairs, a Washington think tank that monitors Persian Gulf developments. “This is the first time a terrorist has managed to infiltrate the CIA and carry out an attack.”
The CIA declined to comment on the identity of the attacker of the Khost base."
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1/14/2010, "The last word: A jihadist hits America’s A-team," The Week
"“Several” of America’s top five experts on al Qaida were at the Khost base when al-Balawi arrived.
THE OUTER GATE at the Khost base is presumed to be closely watched by Taliban spies, so the car carrying al-Balawi to the base from Pakistan did not stop there. The driver of the red station wagon was directed to a relatively empty corner of the compound, away from the main CIA buildings, to a makeshift interrogation center. Outside stood the base chief, ready to greet the doctor. She expected to hear him describe a way to kill al-Zawahri.
Al-Balawi exited the car with one hand in his pocket, according to the accounts of several U.S. officials briefed on the incident. An American security guard approached him to conduct a pat-down search and asked him to remove his hand. Instead, al-Balawi triggered a switch....
Leading up to the Dec. 30 meeting, al-Balawi was considered by American spy agencies to be the most promising informant in years about the whereabouts of al Qaida’s top leaders. American intelligence officers say they were so hopeful about what the Jordanian might deliver to officers in Khost that top officials at the agency and the White House had been informed that the gathering would take place.
THE CIA BASE at Khost is one of two in Afghanistan that the agency controls directly."...
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