Canada Plot Revives Concerns about Ties Between Iran and al-Qaeda

Should revive concerns about islam...

 

Said concerns should not need to be revived...

 

B

 

Canada Plot Revives Concerns about Ties Between Iran and al-Qaeda

http://defenddemocracy.org/media-hit/canada-plot-revives-concerns-about-ties-between-iran-and-al-qaeda/

 

 

 

Thomas Joscelyn

23rd April 2013 - FDD Policy Brief

 

The Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) announced on Monday that it

disrupted a plot to derail a VIA passenger train travelling from New York to

Toronto.  "Had this plot been carried out, it would have resulted in

innocent people being killed or seriously injured," said Assistant RCMP

Commissioner James Malizia.

 

Canadian officials added that the plotters had "direction and guidance" from

al Qaeda members in Iran. "This is the first known al Qaeda planned attack

that we've experienced in Canada," Superintendent Doug Best told reporters.

 

These revelations will undoubtedly raise questions about the relationship

between the Iranian regime and al Qaeda.  This relationship is not new, but

some basic points are worth reviewing:

 

    The U.S. government's first criminal indictments of al Qaeda in 1998

specifically alleged that the two were conspiring against their common

enemies as a result of an agreement they reached in the Sudan in the early

1990s.

    Two al Qaeda members who became key witnesses in the U.S. government's

investigation of the 1998 embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania revealed

that Iran and Hezbollah showed al Qaeda how to commit exactly that type of

attack. This was later confirmed by the 9/11 Commission.

    The 9/11 Commission's final report in 2004 discussed the ties between

Iran and al Qaeda at great length. One section of the report, "Assistance

from Hezbollah and Iran to al Qaeda," discussed evidence suggesting that the

Iranian regime may have even assisted the 9/11 hijackers in their travels.

    After the 9/11 attacks, the Iranian regime sheltered al Qaeda members,

including the families of Osama bin Laden and Ayman al Zawahiri. The Iranian

regime also allowed some members of al-Qaeda to operate on its soil.

    In 2003, after the U.S. invasion of neighboring Iraq, the Iranian regime

placed some senior al Qaeda leaders under a form of house arrest, but others

operatives in Iran continued to operate a facilitation network supporting al

Qaeda's operations in South Asia and the Middle East.

    The Obama administration has recognized al Qaeda's Iran-based

facilitation network in a series of Treasury designations. The designations

were released in July 2011, February 2012, and October 2012. Washington has

also offered rewards for information leading to the capture of key al Qaeda

members based in Iran.

    The leader of al Qaeda's network inside Iran today is a Kuwaiti named

Muhsin al Fadhli, who reportedly had foreknowledge of the 9/11 attacks and

was involved in the 2000 USS Cole bombing.

    Some al-Qaeda operatives slated to take part in an attack on European

cities in 2010 subsequently received safe haven inside Iran after their plot

was discovered.

 

The information provided by the RCMP and the FBI in the coming days may

contribute to our incomplete knowledge of the ties between Iran and

al-Qaeda. But even if it doesn't, the troubling questions about this

relationship begs for further analysis.

 

Thomas Joscelyn is a senior fellow at Foundation for Defense Democracies.

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