National Non Security -- Scary

If they're releasing these guys — to Algeria of all places — they'll release anyone [Andy McCarthy]

The Justice Department has announced the release from Gitmo of a terrorist who conspired to bomb Los Angeles International Airport in the 2000 Millennium plot. Hassan Zumiri, who was part of an al-Qaeda affiliated terror cell in Montreal, has been repatriated to his native Algeria — a country so rife with terrorists that it was recently placed on the list of 14 countries whose travelers warrant enhanced screening at airports. Worse, the Justice Department won't say whether the terrorist, Hassan Zumiri, and another Gitmo detainee who was also sent to Algeria will be in custody there. They may be free and clear.

Ahmed Ressam, the main culprit in the Millennium Plot who later cooperated in the investigation, told authorities that Zumiri "knew I was going to America to carry out a job." Zumiri, the Globe and Mail reports, helped Ressam in the bomb plot, "giving him $3,500 and offering a video camera to carry as 'camouflage.' Mr. Ressam also said he asked Mr. Zemiri to find him a pistol, silencer and grenades."

Zemiri later plotted against the U.S. from Afghanistan, where he was captured after 9/11 by the Northern Alliance, near Tora Bora. He'd been held at Gitmo since 2003.
At the Standard's blog, Tom Joscelyn has more on Zumiri and on the other Gitmo detainee transferred to Algeria, Adil Hadi al Jazairi Bin Hamlili. As Tom shows, relying on disclosures at Hamili's detention proceedings at Gitmo,

Hamlili is a particularly nasty takfiri, which means he is a hardcore ideologue who believes that not only Christians and Jews, but also most Muslims, are infidels. In fact, Hamlili allegedly killed Osama bin Laden's personal representative in Pakistan because Hamlili felt he had violated sharia law. Despite this incident, memos produced at Gitmo note that Hamlili worked for the Taliban, al Qaeda and a variety of other terrorist groups in Pakistan and Afghanistan.
The Gitmo disclosures implicate Hamlili in a Qaeda cell plotting IED attacks against Americans in 2002. Drawing on the reports, Tom notes:

[Hamlili] attended a three day training course in Improvised Explosive Devices held in Peshawar, Pakistan, in November 2002. The training was on improvised firing devices. The students learned how to use a digital alarm clock as an improvised firing device and were taught that cordless phones could also be used. The instructor discussed the use of poisons with explosives.... At the three day training course, an impromptu discussion took place on methods to attack United States forces stationed at Bagram Air Base, Afghanistan. One of the methods would involve poisoning the food destined for the base, while it was in the port of Karachi, Pakistan. The other method involved placing Improvised Explosive Devices on fuel trucks that supplied the bases. The Improvised Explosive Devices would be placed on the trucks while they were in Peshawar, Pakistan before they crossed in Afghanistan. The participants additionally discussed bomb attacks of United States forces in Konar Province, Afghanistan; Jalalabad, Afghanistan; and Nangarhar, Afghanistan.

Sure, why wouldn't we clear these two guys for release? And to Algeria!

Just as al Qaeda has an active hub in Yemen ("al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula"), it has one based in Algeria ("al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb"). In fact, the group traces back to the early 1990s, when Islamists nearly took over Algeria by democratic means. It was formerly known as the "Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat" (and more familiarly by its French initials, "GSPC" — see this entry from the Militant Islam Monitor). As the New York Times reported in July, it has stepped up attacks on Westerners, including Americans.

Good to see that, between Fort Hood and the Christmas day panty bomber, the Obama administration has really gotten serious about protecting our nation against further attacks by an enemy it won't name, motivated by an ideology it won't describe


Re: If they're releasing these guys — to Algeria of all places — they'll release anyone [Shannen Coffin]

Andy, The question that the recent news that the administration is culling out 110 of the 200 remaining GTMO detainees raises is: What is the standard that the administration is using to determine releasability? Under massive pressure from the international community as well as internal pressure from Condi Rice and her allies, President Bush already released more than 550 of the original detainees, and in doing so, made dozens of mistakes. Reports are that at least 60 (or more than 10%) of the detainees already released have returned to the fight. Thus, if there is a bias in decision-making, especially at this point, it should be in favor of detention. The 200 that have remained at the site are so hardened that even the Obama administration couldn't figure out what to do with them in its first year. So what is it that led the Justice Department to determine that they are suddenly no danger to society? And how much does political convenience weigh in the balance? There is simply no plausible reason to release Hassan Zumiri, and especially not to a country like Algeria, where all we can get are empty assurances. But according to the report in the New York Times, another 100 just like him are going to be on the terrorist street.


"The Pentagon’s Fort Hood investigation is a pathetic whitewash." [Andy McCarthy]

... so says Tom Joscelyn in the new issue of the Weekly Standard — and boy, is he ever right.

01/23 10:03


DNI Blair Admits We Have No High-Value Terrorist Interrogation Capability [Marc Thiessen]

Much overlooked last week was this shocking admission from Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair: One year after Obama eliminated the CIA’s terrorist interrogation program, the administration still has not activated its supposed replacement — the so-called High Value Interrogation Group (HIG). In hearings last week, Blair said that the HIG should have been called in to interrogate the Christmas Day bomber — apparently unaware that there was no HIG to call in. In a statement “clarifying” his testimony, Blair stated that the FBI questioned Abdulmutallab using its “expertise in interrogation that will be available in the HIG once it is fully operational.”

In other words, by Blair’s own admission, the United States at this moment does not have a high-value terrorist interrogation capability — at a time when our country has once again come under terrorist attack. Of course, the administration did not think they needed such a capability — because they have stopped trying to capture high-value terrorists alive and bring them in for questioning. So when one landed in their lap unexpectedly, they had no idea what to do with him.

As I explain in Courting Disaster, the HIG is a joke — because the administration has limited the techniques at its disposal to those in the Army Field Manual. Police detectives and district attorneys across the country use more aggressive techniques than the Army Field Manual every day. The irony is, Obama has so denuded our terrorist interrogation capability that the Detroit police department has more tools at its disposal to interrogate a terrorist than the still non-operational HIG.

That is pathetic — and dangerous for our country.