Al-Qaeda Grows in Strength, U.S. Says

Al-Qaeda’s ability to strike the United States has grown in the past year and the organization has enlisted and prepared “dozens” of operatives to infiltrate Western nations to conduct possible attacks, a high-level U.S. terrorism expert said yesterday (see GSN, Aug. 11).

In addition, the terror group’s improving relationship with tribal militants in western Pakistan has made the region “a stronger, more comfortable safe haven than it was for them a year ago,” National Intelligence Officer Ted Gistaro said during a speech at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

The commentary by Gistaro, who oversees all U.S. terrorism intelligence, marks the highest-level intelligence analysis of al-Qaeda since the completion of a National Intelligence Estimate on the group more than a year ago, the New York Times reported (see GSN, July 26, 2007).

The terrorist network has “replenished its bench” with members drawn from northern Africa and western Asia, gradually replacing senior members traditionally from Egypt and Saudi Arabia.

The United States has not acquired indications of any “specific, credible plots” for attacks here, but al-Qaeda might strike close to the U.S. presidential election or inauguration to disrupt the transition between administrations.

“There is no intelligence that suggests to me that al-Qaeda has a preferred candidate in our upcoming election,” he said (Mark Mazzetti, New York Times, Aug. 13).

Meanwhile, the United States has seized communications between al-Qaeda operatives and a list of possible targets from a U.S.-educated Pakistani woman detained last month in Afghanistan, the New York Post reported (see GSN, Aug. 5).

Aafia Siddiqui, 36, was found with evidence of a potential plan to attack the Plum Island Animal Disease Center in New York and a list identifying the Statue of Liberty and Times Square as other possible targets, according to a government official with knowledge of the “treasure trove” of findings.

"She's really warped, but she's the real deal," the official said, adding that Siddiqui was a senior al-Qaeda member.

She is "brilliant (but) out of her mind,” the source said.  “Her hatred for the U.S. is visceral.  She drank the Kool-Aid.  She's a Pakistani religious zealot who hates America."

She was also carrying electronically stored data that contained e-mail messages between "what she described as 'units' and what we would call 'cells,'" one source told ABC.

"This is a major haul," former CIA agent John Kiriakou said.  "We knew that she had been planning, or at least involved in the planning, of a wide variety of different operations, whether they involved weapons of mass destruction or research into chemical or biological weapons, whether it was a possible attempt on the life of the president."

Officials added that she was carrying extensive details on chemical, biological and radiological weapons, and her hair, saliva and fingernails are being examined for WMD ingredient traces (Murray Weiss, New York Post, Aug. 13).

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