CIA 's AL QAEDA capture has Israeli blood on hands

The War on Terror got a MAJOR boost today (no, its not that the Democratic leadership has decided to put love of country above staying in power). Today the CIA captured Osama bin Laden's handpicked "General" in charge of IRAQ, Abd al-Hadi al-Iraq. Apparently Abd was on his way back home (for Shavuot maybe?) and the CIA captured his ugly terrorist butt trying to cross the border. Usually when one of these Al Qaeda creeps get caught the CIA finds a way to get them to spill the beans (sorry ACLU) . Read the story below from the Weekly Standard--now if we can just convince the Democratic leadership to put patriotism over their political careers we would be all set.

Abd al Hadi Engineered First al Qaeda attacks in Israel and Britain

DEBKAfile Exclusive Report

	Omar Sharif, who disappeared after Mike's Place 2003 bombing

The CIA’s capture of one of Osama bin Laden’s most talented operations officers, Abd al Hadi al-Iraq, Abu Abdullah, 45, is a major American counter-terror coup which turns some hidden pages in al Qaeda’s arcane, bloodstained record.

Picked up last year, presumably while crossing from Iran into his native Iraq, he underwent exhaustive interrogation before being transferred to the Pentagon and the Guantanamo Bay interment center. A Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman refused to confirm when or where he was captured, only that he was tasked with managing al Qaeda’s affairs and possibly focus on operations outside Iraq against Western targets.

Under US interrogation, his rich experience in charting al Qaeda’s offensive in the West has come to light. Al Hadi is now credited with plotting the first direct al Qaeda suicide attack inside Israel on direct orders from Osama bin Laden.

Two British Muslims were sent to blow up the US embassy in Tel Aviv on April 30, 2003. Instead, they bombed a Tel Aviv seafront bar, Mike’s Place, killing three Israelis and injuring 60.

Al Hadi was quick to spot the potential of young British Muslims of Pakistani origin, who are English-speaking and carry EU passports. Their recruitment was a major feat of this Iraqi-born terrorist commander’s global strategy. Two years later (according to the Sunday Times), he is said to have masterminded the July 7 suicide bombings on the British tube and a bus, leaving 52 dead and hundreds injured..

Asif Muhammed Hanif and Omar Khan Sharif, the Mike’s Place bombers, were headhunted at the radical Finsbury Park mosque in London. So too was Richard Reid, the failed shoe bomber serving time in the United States for attempting to blow up an American Airlines plane bound for Miami from Paris in Dec. 2002.

Past investigations established that Hanif, Sharif and Reid all spent time at Hamas training camps in the Gaza Strip before they embarked on their missions.

The al Hadi case confirms once again the farsightedness and long preparations al Qaeda invests in operational planning. In each case, every effort is made to wipe clean any leads to the chain of command after the suicide bombers are dead; the planners have a preset escape route that leaves counter-terror agents very few clues to work with.

Despite the close cooperation between the Israeli, American and British secret services in probing the Mike’s Place attack in 2003, the full scope and depth of Al Qaeda’s mobilization drive in Britain were not appreciated in time to avert the 7/7 bombings on London transport two years later. To this day, no one knows who exactly prepared the explosives used in Tel Aviv and gave the two bombers their instructions.

Full details of the Mike’s Place bombing, the 4th anniversary of which falls in exactly two days, appeared in DEBKAfile on June 3, 2003. Click HERE

This attack was a flop for its planners in more ways than one, but it served as a useful dry run for the attacks which followed. Asif Hanif managed to detonate his bomb vest, but his partner did not. Omar Sharif escaped and two weeks later, a body identified by Israeli security services as his was washed up on the Jaffa coast.

Despite the expanded information-sharing arrangements allied counter-terror agencies, neither the British nor the Israeli secret services has been granted access to al Hadi to perhaps fill in some of the gaps in their investigations.

The optimistic assessments of some al Qaeda pundits in the West that Osama bin Laden is no more than an ideological figurehead of a fragmented terrorist organization was no doubt refuted by al Hadi. On April 25, Taiban commander Mullah Dadullah also asserted that bin Laden is still actively directing al Qaeda operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, as DEBKAfile’s terror experts have consistently reported.

Senior Al Qaeda operative Abd al-Hadi al-Iraqi captured

The United States has scored a major victory against al Qaeda's global network. Abd al-Hadi al-Iraqi, one of Osama bin Laden's senior deputies who was "personally chosen by bin Laden to monitor al Qaeda operations in Iraq," has been captured and transfered to the detention center at Guantanamo Bay. The U.S. government put a $1 million bounty out for Al-Hadi's capture. It is unknown who captured al-Hadi, or where or when he was captured. "'Abd al-Hadi was trying to return to his native country, Iraq, to manage al Qaeda's affairs and possibly focus on operations outside Iraq against Western targets," according to the Department of Defense. "'Abd al-Hadi also met with al Qaeda members in Iran and believed that they should be doing more with the fight, including supporting efforts in Iraq and causing problems within Iran." Last year, Coalition forces captured senior al Qaeda operative Omar Farouq in Basra after he left Afghanistan to plan operations inside Iraq. Al-Hadi was al Qaeda's Internal Operations Chief and served as an instructor as well as the commander of several al Qaeda training camps in Afghanistan. He was a major in Saddam Hussein's Army prior to going to Afghanistan to fight the Soviet Union in the 1980s. Al-Hadi also served on al Qaeda's "ruling Shura Council — a now-defunct 10-person advisory body to Osama Bin Ladin — as well as the group's Military Committee, which oversaw terrorist and guerrilla operations and paramilitary training." While in Pakistan, al-Hadi directed cross-border military operations against U.S. and Afghan forces in Afghanistan. Al-Hadi also served as a conduit between al Qaeda in Iraq, the Taliban and al Qaeda senior command operating inside Pakistan. He was behind the assassination attempts against Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf. "'Abd al-Hadi was known and trusted by Bin Ladin and Ayman al-Zawahiri," notes the Department of Defense. He was "in direct communication with both leaders and, at one point, was Zawahiri's caretaker. 'Abd al-Hadi also interacted with other senior al Qaeda planners and decision makers, such as Khalid Shaykh Muhammad and Abu Faraj al-Libi, and deceased al Qaeda members Hamza Rabi'a and 'Abd al-Rahman al-Muhajir." Al-Hadi's capture and subsequent interrogation will likely yield significant intelligence on al Qaeda's global operations, and specifically operations in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iraq and Iran. Al-Hadi was a vital link in al Qaeda's global network, who possesses knowledge on al Qaeda's training, communications, personal ties and operations in the critical theaters of Pakistan, Afghanistan and Iraq. Al-Hadi's knowledge of al Qaeda's command structure inside Pakistan will be of particular interest, as the U.S. believes Osama bin Laden, Ayman al Zawahiri and other al Qaeda senior leaders are operating from command centers in Waziristan and Bajaur.