Master-Terrorist on the Prowl
In his speech on October 7 defining the Iraqi threat to the United States, President George W. Bush spoke of several al Qaeda leaders who fled Afghanistan and reached Baghdad, among them a commander who was given medical treatment and linked to the planning of chemical and biological warfare.
That man is reported by DEBKA-Net-Weekly‘s intelligence and counter-terror sources to have been seen the next day, October 8, walking rapidly across the central square of Brussels. Two days later, he was seen in Paris, hurrying from the Ritz Hotel towards the Place de La Opera.
Our sources name this al Qaeda commander as Abu Maswab Zarkawi, a man in his forties, who has been appointed his organization’s master planner for a series of terrorist attacks – possibly with chemical or biological weapons – in Europe’s main cities.
His estimated targets aside from Brussels and Paris are Rotterdam’s oil harbor, the City of London or Piccadilly Circus and a location in Frankfurt. The same sources suggest he may also be plotting mass terror strikes – again with the help of chemical and biological toxins – in Jordan and Israel, as well as Europe.
According to DEBKA-Net-Weekly‘s terror experts, Zarkawi is the hottest name in the international Islamic terror league and the target of every counter-terror force in the West. Although Bush held Zarkawi up as the personification of al Qaeda’s collaboration with Iraq, he is at present working on behalf of his network hand in glove with Tehran.
A Palestinian named for his place of birth, Zarka in Jordan, Zarkawi is an example of how al Qaeda compartmentalizes its operations. The regional tentacles and affiliates, be they in the Gulf, Europe, Middle East, Southeast Asia, or the Far East, operate autonomously and separately from one another. Zarkawi, after leaving Baghdad, moved into his next operational sphere, known only to a small group in Tehran and unbeknownst to Baghdad.
He was also provided with his own force of 20 or 30 terrorists, some whom are the very sleepers Osama bin Laden threatened to “wake up” in his last message. Most are already in position undercover in the vicinity of potential targets.
