Report: Qaida now Mossad's top priority
By DOUGLAS DAVIS
The Jerusalem Post
In addition to the joint Israeli Egyptian investigation into the Sinai suicide bombings that is underway, US, Saudia Arabia and Jordan are also participating in the probe and pooling resources in an effort to track down the route taken by the suicide bombers and nab the dispatchers and plotters of the attacks and those that may have fled Egypt after they were carried out.
A Beduin has confessed to selling explosives that might have been used in three car bombings targeting Israeli tourists in Sinai, Egypt, Friday that killed 33 people, among them 13 Israelis. Investigators were looking into Palestinian terrorist involvement, Egyptian security officials said Sunday.
The tribesman said the buyers, whom he couldn't identify, had told him the explosives would be used in the Palestinian territories, the Egyptian investigator said.
Al-Qaida terrorist network heads the list of suspected terror organizations responsible for the simultaneous attacks. According to a report in London's Sunday Times, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has directed the Mossad to look into links between Palestinian terror organizations and al-Qaida as a priority in its investigations of the brutal bombings.
"Al-Qaida network hit this time in our back yard. If we don't focus our efforts against al-Qaida, next time they will hit Tel-Aviv," the Sunday Times quoted a senior Israeli security official. "We cannot ignore them anymore."
"After four years of Intifada we've succeeded in containing the Palestinian terror, but now we're facing a much more ruthless enemy we can't ignore any more," he added.
"The type, the planning, the scope, the simultaneous attacks in a number of places, all this points to al-Qaida," Israeli Foreign Minister Silvan Shalon told Channel 2. US officials have also said al-Qaida likely played a role.
Abdel Rahim Ali, an Egyptian expert on Islamic radical groups, said whether the attackers came from Egypt or another country, al-Qaida's involvement was clear.
"Egyptian extremist groups can hardly execute such big operations," he said. "They lack expertise and potential. ... This looks like a new group of Islamic activists who have been sleeping for years and now found it appropriate to wake up."
The investigation
Egyptians Authorities have interrogated 150 people, 50 of which are still being detained for further questioning. In addition, Egypt has asked the Palestinian Authority for information on a number of Palestinians who crossed the border from the Gaza Strip into Egypt days before the attack, Israel Radio reported.
Israel's Channel 2 television reported that a total of 30 Beduin were arrested, two of which it said were "more serious suspects."
Among the suspects, Egyptian Authorities have detained the manager of a Ras a-Satan tourist resort and his son, after investigations found that one of the vehicles used as a car bomb in the attacks was registered to the son.
Authorities also reported that one of the cars used in the bombings carried Israeli plates.
On Sunday a leading newspaper in Egypt reported that the previously unknown organization that originally claimed responsibility for the attacks has retracted its claims, Army Radio reported.
Speaking on Army Radio, a terrorism expert said that it is impossible to know yet who is responsible for the bombings.
"We are very far from being able to point fingers, and identifying which terror organization actually carried out this attack."
He noted that although Israel has claimed al-Qaida affiliates as their prime suspect, in the past al-Qaida has taken responsibility for such attacks whereas in this case they have not yet come forward.
The Egyptian investigators are also leaning toward an al-Qaida connection, saying a local sleeper cell may have been awakened to carry out the attacks, Egypt's first terrorist strike in seven years.
Investigators lifted fingerprints, swabbed dust and collected tissue from the sites of three car bombings Saturday and detained dozens of Beduin tribesmen, including quarry workers who could have provided the explosives.
They also lifted fingerprints from the car in Taba that was believed to contain 200 kilograms (440 pounds) of explosives, and took DNA samples from nearby body parts in an effort to determine who the suicide bombers were, Egyptian security officials said on condition of anonymity.
Egyptian investigators said they suspect that a group of eight to 10 terrorists, some of which were suicide bombers, targeting Israelis carried out the Thursday night attacks, possibly slipping in from Saudi Arabia or Jordan on speed boats.
Speaking on condition of anonymity, Egyptian investigators said such a group would almost certainly be linked to Ayman al-Zawahri, who led the Egyptian Islamic Jihad before merging his group with al-Qaida in 1998. The Egypt-born Zawahri is now bin Laden's top deputy.
Investigators also were doing "dust analysis" around the explosion sites to determine the type of explosives used, according to an Egyptian investigator who also worked on the 1997 massacre of 58 foreign tourists in Luxor, Egypt's last terrorist strike.
Speaking on condition of anonymity, he said samples had been sent to Cairo for analysis.
A team of four Egyptian prosecutors visited Ras Shitan, followed minutes later by five Israeli investigators who emerged from a minivan. American diplomats also briefly visited the camps, and one investigator said they were checking on any American casualties.
A senior police official, also speaking on condition of anonymity, said 20 people were being held, some of them quarry workers who presumably had access to explosives. Those 20, some or all of them Beduin, apparently were among the dozens mentioned by the security officials.
Two Egyptian security officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said investigators believe that the attacks were carried out by eight to 10 men, some of which were suicide bombers.
They said at least one woman saw two men in the car believed used in the Taba attack before it exploded and was able to provide detailed descriptions.
"It was dark and she could not give 100 percent details, but the information she gave is good and provided some clues about how it all happened," one official said.
The officials said investigators were focusing on two possible scenarios, one involving foreign terrorists who slipped into Taba from Jordan or Saudi Arabia on speed boats, and another involving a sleeper cell in Egypt that was awakened for the attacks.
"It seemed to be planned and designed like the September 11 attacks so that the explosions would take place simultaneously," one of the officials said.
He said investigators were leaning toward the foreigners' scenario because of the sophistication of the coordinated attacks, describing the home-grown scenario as a 10% - 15%possibility.
"The whole operation should have been planned abroad, even if some Egyptians could be involved," the other official said.
