Jordanian authorities have thwarted a deadly terrorist attack aimed at three targets: the U.S. Embassy in Amman, the headquarters of Jordanian intelligence and the Jordanian prime minister's office. The confession of terrorist ringleader Azmi Jayyousi has been played on Jordanian state television. Jayyousi was taking orders from Abu Musab al Zarqawi, a suspected al Qaeda terrorist responsible for a string of suicide bombings in Iraq.
The planned attack in Amman was to begin with the bombing of Jordan's intelligence headquarters. The bomb was designed to release a large toxic cloud that might have killed as many as 80,000 people. Hussein Sharif was recruited for the operation as a suicide bomber. According to Sharif's testimony, the Amman attack was to be al Qaeda's first chemical strike.
If orders for the strike came from Zarqawi in Iraq, where did the operation's money, explosives and chemicals come from?
At least $170,000 came from operatives in Syria. According to Jordan's King Abdullah, five trucks filled with chemicals and explosives were intercepted 75 miles south of the Syrian border. Abdullah says the trucks came from Syria. (Perpetrator confessions indicate the operation was planned on Iraqi soil while Saddam was still in power, so the contents of the trucks probably came from hidden Iraqi WMD stockpiles in Syria or Lebanon.)
The Syrian regime was quick to establish an alibi in this affair. Within hours of the terrorist confessions on Jordanian television, the Syrian state media reported a gun battle in Damascus. Without rhyme or reason a terrorist band opened fire "indiscriminately" in the diplomatic quarter of the city. Smoke, ambulances and security forces were summoned. The area was promptly sealed off. Contradictory reports were quickly broadcast. A rocket-propelled grenade was allegedly fired at an unimportant building. One "terrorist" was killed and another captured.
Syria does not want to be blamed for the Amman bomb plot. That may explain the violence in Damascus and the closing of the American Embassy. For the moment, the intelligence flow between Damascus and Washington has been curtailed (if only as a temporary expedient). Consider the strategy at work: The Amman bomb plot was a planned decapitation strike. It aimed at the personnel of America's Embassy in Jordan. It aimed at top officials of the Jordanian government. It sought the liquidation of Jordan's intelligence capability. (If you kill a country's spymasters and level the building that houses the most sensitive intelligence files, you cripple that country's ability to track you.) The flow of information from Amman to Washington would have been brought to a standstill.
It should be remembered that the CIA's intelligence-gathering capability in the Middle East was similarly crippled after the 1983 bombing of the U.S. Embassy in Lebanon. This was a decapitation strike that not only killed the CIA station chief and his deputy, but the CIA's national intelligence officer for the Near East, Bob Ames. Afterwards the terrorists further demoralized the CIA by kidnapping the next CIA station chief in Lebanon, William Buckley, who died after 15 months of captivity (and torture). It appears that the Amman bomb plot had a similar objective in mind.
The role of Syria should not be ignored in this case. The 71 lethal chemicals used by the plotters in Amman came from Syria. Were these chemicals originally part of Saddam's arsenal? Are the Syrians hiding stockpiles of Iraqi WMDs on Syrian soil or in Lebanon? Is the Jordanian intelligence service a threat to Syria as well as to al Qaeda?
It has also been suggested that Saddam Hussein had a hand the Amman bomb plot. If the alleged link between Zarqawi and Jayyousi is confirmed, if linkages between Saddam and Zarqawi are confirmed, the justification for invading Iraq would be retroactively inarguable.
The Amman bomb plot, with 80,000 potential fatalities, was no small affair. It tells us that the enemies of the United States care nothing for human life. They do not care how many innocent Arabs die. They care nothing for the prosperity of Arab people. They do not care for individual rights or freedom.
As an example of al Qaeda's enmity for fellow-Arabs, Saudi Arabia has been under continuous attack. Saudi security headquarters recently suffered a bomb blast, with nine fatalities. Last month al Qaeda declared war on Saudi Arabia's police and security services, vowing to kill Saudi officials in their homes if necessary. The Saudi foreign minister offered his own analysis of al Qaeda's strategy. He said the main objective was to replace the kingdom with a theocracy. "People who attack [the intentions of] Saudi Arabia are unwittingly serving al Qaeda," said Foreign Minister Saud al-Faisal. "[In order to take over Saudi Arabia, al Qaeda] had first to drive a wedge between Saudi Arabia and the United States. And what better tool to utilize than the spectacular criminal act of 9/11?"
It is now clear that the War on Terror is a war of mass destruction. Jordan was lucky to evade the first WMD attack of the war. The Arab world needs to consider the significance of the Amman bomb plot. We hope and pray that the decent folk of the Middle East will wake up to the danger. This danger is not from the United States. The danger is from terrorists. Osama bin Laden is not a liberator. He is a destroyer. Terrorism does not bring freedom in its wake. It is America that promises peace and freedom for the Arab world.
