~ First Published @ European Tribune ~
Pakistani tribesmen dance as they gather for a tribal meeting at Shakai in South Waziristan, some 300 kilometres south west of Islamabad, where Pakistan has deployed more than 70,000 troops to hunt down hundreds of Al-Qaeda and Taliban militants.
The London bombings have thrown the terror spotlight back on Pakistan, where Islamic militants continue to thrive despite a massive crackdown on Osama bin Laden’s Al-Qaeda network.
(AFP/Pool/File/Farooq Naeem)
The British Media as well as London’s Metropolitan Police officials have been using rhetoric to speak of “suicide bombers” and the “Al Qaeda” link because of the TATP explosives. A common household mixture, any chemistry student can attempt to make into an explosive compound.
TATP, or triacetone triperoxide, is a highly unstable explosive made from commercially available chemicals.
Andy Oppenheimer, an explosives expert with Jane’s Information Group, said TATP is strong enough to have caused the damage wreaked by last week’s bombs. But he said making such a highly volatile explosive stable enough to carry out closely synchronized attacks would have required advanced knowledge of chemistry. Police say the three subway blasts happened within a minute.
More to follow below the fold »»
See yesterday’s diary –
Al Qaeda & Richard Reid Link ¶ London Explosives type TATP ¶ Updated!
MOHAMMAD SIDIQUE KHAN -30- from Dewsbury
Mohammad Sidique Khan had lived in the Beeston area of Leeds until recently, when he moved to Lees Holm in Dewsbury. Khan is married, newspapers naming his wife as teacher Hasina Khan, and has a very young daughter.
Mohammad Sidique Khan was
respected by pupils and parents
During its last Ofsted inspection in 2002, the school’s learning assistants had been singled out for special praise in dealing with a transient pupil population from a socially deprived area.
Mohammad Sidique Khan spoke about his work to the Times Educational Supplement at the time. “A lot of [the pupils] have said this is the best school they have been to,” he said.
Am I missing the clues? Radical muslims on a suicide mission leave behind their will or final testament, or carry a letter. The living environment and/or friends indicate radicalism. In Europe the experience with terrorists involved in attacks, have a history with the secret service. Once the first arrests or positive IDs are made the cells are quickly located and eradicated. This has been the case in Italy, France, Spain, Germany and the Netherlands.
All I read so far, the four persons involved are ordinary British citizens from the Muslim community, participating in or having a job and even parent with a young family. The evidence so far does not support the assumption four persons knowingly went on a bombing mission.
Teenager Hasib Mir Hussain had been known as a tearaway during his early teens. Newspapers reported how he would start fights with fellow pupils at the Matthew Murray Secondary school in Leeds.
He left school in July 2003 without attaining a single GCSE. Around this time, he was sent to Pakistan to visit relatives. He also went on the Hajj pilgrimage to Mecca, grew a beard and began to wear robes. Despite becoming devoutly religious, he was arrested for shoplifting during 2004.
Hasib Hussain had told his family he was going on a trip to London to visit friends. But when he failed to return on Thursday July 7th, his parents reported him as missing to police.
See yesterday’s diary with photo and information on Hasib Mir Hussain.
SHEHZAD TANWEER -22- from Leeds
Shehzad Tanweer was born in Bradford but lived most of his life in the Beeston area of Leeds – little over half a mile from his friend, Hasib Hussain. According to friends, Tanweer was quiet and very religious but did not express an interest in politics.
Shehzad Tanweer was ‘proud
to be British’ his uncle said
Tanweer was a sports science graduate whose interests included cricket and ju-jitsu. Neighbours described the graduate, who studied at Leeds Metropolitan University, as a “good Muslim”. Others said he was a “nice lad” who could “get on with anyone”.
In 2004, he was arrested for disorderly conduct and cautioned. His father, of Pakistani origin, owns a fish and chip shop near their home on Colwyn Road.
EXCLUSIVE: Indoctrination, Indoctrination, Indoctrination report by The Daily Mirror
Inside the Pakistan school where boys are
saved from life of poverty
The Daily Mail reported Tanweer had been to an Islamic study camp in Pakistan at the start of the year.
Watched by guards brandishing AK-47 rifles, yesterday a reporter visited the crowded Jamia Manzoorul Islamia religious school, known as a madrassa, where he fuelled his radical beliefs.
LINDSEY GERMAINE -19- from Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire
A Jamaican-born British resident who was a Muslim convert, newspapers reported. He has been living at a house in Northern Road, Aylesbury that police raided on Wednesday night.
Confirmation of his identity may depend on DNA analysis.
Germaine changed his surname to Jamal when he converted to Islam. It is also reported that he was married to a white woman named Samantha, also an Islamic convert, and that the couple had a young son.
Conservative MP for Aylesbury David Liddington said Germaine had attended the local mosque. “From my conversations with members of the Muslim community in the town, though he did go to the local mosque, he was not a regular attender.”
“He wasn’t seen as an integrated part of the Muslim community.”
Jamaican in London attacks had US links
ABC television said Germaine has a pregnant wife in Britain and a mother living in the United States. It quoted US officials as saying Germaine had been in the United States within the past two years and that contacts he made in Ohio and New Jersey are under investigation.
To Make Sense of Terror Is Difficult
.
In Madrid, breakthrough in forensics came when a backpack was found where timer was erroneously set for detonation – AM/PM switched as I recall.
Is there evidence found, that the four Britons left their respective homes with the backpack, or is a third party responsible that delivered the four backpacks with bombs at a meeting place en route to London?
IMO these bomb packs would be watched by a third party. Has forensics found the detonators or a timing mechanism? There are different timing methods for detonation. I will assume when the four met in front of King’s Cross station, let’s say at 08:30am, their mobile phone timers had been set for a 20 minutes delay – for detonation at 08:50am. The fourth bomb pack obviouslydidn’t detonate, third party could even known this fact by monitoring the breaking news stories on radio and TV.
As final detonation, the 4th bomb carrier’s mobile phone was dialed to set off the bus explosion. Highly volatile mixture TATP just needs a spark for detonation.
Teenager Hasib Mir Hussain -18- had heard of the explosions when he was at King’s Cross station, I too would become nervous carrying a backpack of a stranger.
Comment I received in another diary, explosions weren’t simultaneous – but separated within a 50 seconds interval. Also mentioned mobile traffic was jammed. However I understood, jamming was NOT implemented because of unpredictable consequences for 911 calls and the business community. The mobile communication was obvoiusly blocked due to heavy traffic after to bombings. Also to date I haven’t heard from forensic evidence whether a timer has been found, or that the carriers did detonate the bomb manually in the subway.
Egyptian biochemist Magdy Mahmoud el-Nashar
CAIRO, Egypt July 15, 2005 — A key suspect in the London bombings who was arrested in Cairo has no links to al Qaeda, Egypt’s Interior Minister claims. Habib al Adly said Egyptian citizen Magdy el Nashar, has no connection with Osama bin Laden’s terrorist network. The minister said media reports about Nashar, a chemist who studied at Leeds University, were unfounded and were only “hasty deductions”.
The Interior Ministry issued a statement saying Nashar had denied any involvement in the London bombings. It said he had gone to Britain to study and had lived there since 2000 until now to obtain his doctorate, which he did earlier this year.
In an interview with BBC radio, Blair said the inquiry was focusing on the organizers of the attacks and confirmed police were most interested in the Pakistan connection. Two senior Pakistani intelligence officials said that authorities in that country were looking into a possible connection between Tanweer and two al-Qaida-linked militant groups, and specifically a man arrested for a 2002 attack on a church near the U.S. Embassy in Islamabad.
Today, intelligence and school officials said Pakistani authorities questioned several students, teachers and administrators at one of two religious schools — or madrassas — believed visited by Tanweer. Asad Farooq, a spokesman for the Jamia Manzoorul Islam seminary in central Lahore, acknowledged in an interview that intelligence agents had been around, but denied Tanweer had ever been at the school.
An Egyptian government official said el-Nashar was arrested in Cairo after British officials informed Egypt of their interest in him. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was giving information not in the official ministry announcement.
The Egyptian Interior Minister said el-Nashar came to Egypt from London on vacation and had intended to go back to Britain. “He pointed out the press that all his belongings remained in his apartment in Britain.”
In Leeds, authorities searched el-Nashar’s town house in a complex of two-story brown brick apartments. The home was surrounded by blue and white police tape and covered in scaffolding draped in white plastic sheeting. Forensic teams in white coveralls carted out material.
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