Two Israeli Bedouin brothers indicted as al Qaeda spies
The Shin Bet, assisted by the Israeli police and border guard, detained in late May two residents of the Bedouin town of Rahat in southern Israel, Omar and Taher Abu Sakhut, aged 20 and 21, on suspicion of joining al Qaeda through the Internet and passing classified information on Israeli targets for attack.
Wednesday, July 9, they were indicted at the Beersheba district court.
Taher Abu Skhut first contacted al Qaeda in early 2006 and started passing information on the locations and security of Israeli military camps, strategic installations and crowd centers – entirely through the Internet.
He was asked to describe access and security at Tel Aviv’s Azrieli Towers, one of the tallest and busiest high-rise commercial buildings in the country, and at Ben-Gurion international airport. His al Qaeda controllers also told him to go around the West Bank and fix on easy points of entry for infiltrating central Israel. The teams of terrorists planned to reach the West Bank from Saudi Arabia via Sinai and from Iraq via Jordan.
Taher, later joined by his brother Omar, proposed that al Qaeda put them in touch with the incoming terrorists to help them reach their Israeli targets.
debkafile‘s counter-terror experts note that several al Qaeda leaders have boasted in recent video and audio bulletins of cells they have planted in the Israeli Arab community. Among them were Osama bin Laden, Ayman al Zawahri and leaders of al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb.