Britain discovers secret army of well-trained jihadi terrorists
Pastor Dale Morgan
Britain discovers secret army of well-trained jihadi terrorists*
Intelligence services, police stunned by sweep of schools, mosques in
wake of foiled bomb plot
Posted: September 6, 2006
1:00 a.m. Eastern
* A massive MI5 anti-terrorism operation discovers Britain's first
Islamic "school for terror."
* Al-Qaida has supplied its estimated 2,000 sleeper agents in Britain
with what MI5 Director Eliza Manningham-Buller tells Home Secretary John
Reid is "the most sophisticated terror manual ever found in this country."
* MI5 is checking all Britain's universities and technical schools for
Middle East students with a qualification in thermochemistry – the
science that includes creating liquid explosives.
* MI6, Britain's secret intelligence service, has established that
Continuity-IRA, the extreme Irish terror group, is providing Hezbollah
and Iran's Revolutionary Guard with expertise on how to make
ultra-sophisticated roadside bombs.
No matter how you slice it, London is daily looking more like
"Londonistan." Or perhaps more precisely, as Peter Clarke, head of
Scotland Yard's anti-terrorist squad puts it, Britain has become
al-Qaida's European headquarters "housing a secret army of thousands of
well-trained guerrilla fighters ready to kill in the name of religion."
The discovery of the school for terror reveals how extensive is
al-Qaida's influence within Britain's Muslim community.
It follows the arrests across London and the Home Counties of 14 radical
Muslim extremists. They include Abu Abdullah, who was born in Britain,
but, just before he was detained, preached at a London mosque that he
would "love to see our jihadists go to Iraq to kill British and American
soldiers."
Abdullah had been a regular visitor to the Jemaah Islamiyah Faith
School. The tall, Gothic building stands in 54 acres on the edge of a
beautiful English village that has long been a brooding presence even in
its days as a Roman Catholic seminary.
It was to the school that Abu Hamsa, the hook-handed extremist preacher,
"brought young Muslims to be indoctrinated in jihad," confirmed a senior
MI5 officer.
Hamsa is currently serving seven years for incitement to murder. After
he finishes his sentence in the high-security jail Belmarsh in south
London, he will be deported to the United States to face charges of
inciting to murder American citizens in Yemen.
Meanwhile, the terror manual discovered by MI5 is said to provide
unprecedented details on how to create liquid explosives far more
powerful than those planned to be used to destroy 10 passenger planes
over the Atlantic. The precise steps to produce the bombs are set out in
chilling details on an al-Qaida DVD. On one part of the disc are
instructions that mimic the style of a celebrity cookbook – only it is a
recipe for unparalleled carnage.
In Tel Aviv, Ehud Keinan, a world-ranking authority on liquid explosives
and whose expertise is invaluable to Mossad, confirmed the details
discovered on the al-Qaida DVD was of major importance in the fight
against terrorism.
"It is very easy to produce such explosives once the know-how is
explained," he said. "The raw materials are readily available in
unlimited quantities in the High Street."
The DVD was discovered during the climax of an MI5 surveillance
operation that had begun in Dublin and ended last month on the road to
Chester. It was a busy month for MI5.
The search continues for Middle East students with expertise in
thermochemistry. The hunt also extends, to all firms in the chemical
industry.
A senior intelligence officer confirmed MI5 fears a student has been
recruited by al-Qaida to prepare the explosives at the center of the
biggest terrorist alert in Britain.
Liquid oxygen explosives, or LOX, are considered to have been the weapon
of choice for the alleged planned attacks on transatlantic planes.
One possibility being urgently investigated by scientists at Britain's
chemical-biological defense establishment at Porton Down is that
terrorists could have perfected not only hiding the explosive in fizzy
drinks bottles, but placing it in perfume bottles or after-shave sprays.
"The pipe which allows the liquid to be dispersed through the spray
nozzle acts as the timer," said a Porton Down source. "It would be
activated by pressing the spray nozzle to cause an instant explosion."
He confirmed a perfume bottle sold in any High Street store could be
filled with sufficient liquid explosive capable of blowing a sizable
hole in the side of a jumbo jet.
"Inside the cabin the explosion would create an air vacuum, killing
those in the vicinity by crushing their lungs," explained the source.
"Other passengers would be sucked out of the hole. The impact of the
explosion would also cause the aircraft to break up."
Known as "the Lockerbie Effect," the terrorist bomb that destroyed a
PanAm flight over the Scottish town has been studied by explosive
experts. They have concluded liquid explosive would achieve the same
carnage.
Lastly, a link has been found between an IRA splinter group and Iran's
Hezbollah terrorist organization. MI6 – supported by U.S. satellite
surveillance and undercover agents in Iran from Israel's vaunted spy
agency, Mossad – have tracked Irish bomb makers to three factories in
the Lavizan surburb in northern Tehran.
Earlier this year, the six-man Continuity-IRA team traveled from Dublin
to Frankfurt and onward to Damascus. From there they were brought in an
Iranian military aircraft to Tehran, G2 Bulletin reports.
"Their arrival marked an axis of evil we most feared," said a senior MI6
officer. "This brings global terrorism to a new level."
In Washington, Alireza Jafarzadah, a former member of the
Washington-based Iran Policy Committee, said the Tehran workshops where
the six Irish bombers are working are "highly sophisticated." The Irish
are primarily providing their expertise in how to make and disguise
infrared triggering devices.
During the conflict in Northern Ireland, the success of roadside bombs
left dozens of British soldiers dead or injured. The bombs were also
used to topple buildings and bring terror to the streets of Belfast and
other cities in the province.
More recently the black art of the bomb makers became an effective
weapon for Hezbollah fighting Israeli armor. Adapted to be fired from
anti-tank missiles, the bombs created fireballs when shot, often with
unerring aim, at advancing Israeli tanks.
By the time a ceasefire finally came in the Middle East conflict,
Hezbollah claimed it had "several hundred" more of the missiles stored
in the Bekaa Valley.
The bombs are made from concave steel or copper plate. When fired they
travel at 2,000 meters per second and can penetrate 10cm of armor at a
distance of 100 meters.
British scientists have established the mines are precision-made weapons
turned on a lathe by craftsmen trained in the manufacture of munitions.
These are attached to explosively formed projectiles, or EFPs. The
weapons have pierced the armor of British and American tanks in Iraq and
demolished Land Rovers in Afghanistan.