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Last week, John Walker Lindh  petitioned the president to commute his 20-year sentence for fighting with the Taliban, imposed in 2002.  It’s a shame that this pampered child of Marin County is sitting in a cell for something as trivial as treason. Under a plea bargain, Walker Lindh (AKA: Abdul Hamid, AKA: Sulayman Al-Lindh) pleaded guilty to supplying services to the Taliban regime and carrying explosives for  Afghanistan’s former rulers.Which is like to saying that Benedict Arnold supplied services to George III. Johnny Jihad trained in an al-Qaeda camp – where he learned to fire an AK-47 and rubbed elbows...

"In August 1998, the detainee traveled to Pakistan with a member of Iraqi Intelligence for the purpose of blowing up the Pakistan, United States and British embassies with chemical mortars."  U.S. government "Summary of Evidence" for an Iraqi member of al Qaeda detained at Guantanamo Bay, CubaFOR MANY, the debate over the former Iraqi regime's ties to Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda network ended a year ago with the release of the 9/11 Commission report. Media outlets seized on a carefully worded summary that the commission had found no evidence "indicating that Iraq cooperated with al Qaeda in developing or...

FALLUJAH -- A Syrian found handcuffed in Fallujah and rescued by U.S. Marines was kidnapped with two French journalists in August, and has told authorities he last saw the Frenchmen a month ago -- the first confirmed word on the captives since they disappeared in August. Marines sweeping through Fallujah as part of a major U.S. offensive against insurgents located Mohammed al-Joundi, the U.S. military said, but there was no sign of journalists Christian Chesnot and Georges Malbrunot. The Marines said the Syrian, who was found late Thursday, told them he was separated from the journalists a month ago. The...

In a startling about face for U.S. intelligence officials, a bombshell memo released by the CIA on Saturday draws a direct link between Saddam Hussein and the 9/11 attacks, citing evidence that Iraqi intelligence bankrolled lead 9/11 hijacker Mohamed Atta in the months leading up to the worst terrorist attack ever on U.S. soil. The previously secret 16 page memo, released by the Senate Intelligence Committee Saturday morning, says Atta met at least three times in Prague with Iraqi intelligence agent Ahmed al Ani prior to the 9/11 attacks. In a staggering revelation that offers an overwhelming and compelling justification...

<p>LONDON &#8212; The heroes of Eastern Europe's anti-communist movement denounced Fidel Castro's "Stalinist" regime in Cuba yesterday and demanded action from the West to encourage its peaceful overthrow.</p> <p>Former Polish President Lech Walesa, former Czech President Vaclav Havel and former Hungarian President Arpad Goncz made their call in a letter to the Daily Telegraph and several other leading European newspapers.</p>

On the CBS Evening News a bit ago, reporter David Martin broke an exclusive that the Iraqi leader who may have met with Mohamed Atta in Prague prior to his terrorist attack on 9/11 has been caught. It will be interesting to see if he says anything.

<p>March 1, 2003 -- A Manhattan federal judge heard yesterday how Iraq had trained Islamic terrorists at a secret camp where simulated hijackings were carried out.</p> <p>Lawyers for families of two Sept. 11 victims suing Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden for more than $1 million said al Qaeda officials had meetings with Iraqis including Saddam.</p>

The new Nato allies of eastern Europe are lining up behind Washington in offering to join a war against Iraq with or without a UN mandate. More instinctively pro-American than the west Europeans, the new Nato members from Bulgaria in the south to Lithuania in the north are under US pressure to contribute to a war coalition, although militarily they have less to offer than the traditional Nato allies. "Romania does not want to go to war against Iraq, but it will do what America says," said a Romanian newspaper this week. A senior Czech official said that Romania and...

<p>The trans-Atlantic war of words over military action against Iraqi President Saddam Hussein has obscured substantial international support for the Bush administration's tough line.</p> <p>British and Australian forces have already been assembled to join U.S. forces now gathering on Iraq's borders, and despite the increasingly strident opposition of Germany and France, a number of Western and Central European states stand ready to assist the operation as well.</p>

Czechs lose key Al Qaida intelligence source The intelligence war against terrorism suffered a setback recently when a press disclosure in the Czech Republic led to the loss of an agent inside or close to the Al Qaida terrorist group, according to intelligence sources. As part of an investigation of corruption within the Czech military intelligence service, a list of agents was disclosed to the press in early September. One source attributed the leak to “sensationalistic” press outlets in Prague that published the list without regard for national security. The Czech military intelligence service had been successful in penetrating Al...

WASHINGTON (AP) - Suspected terrorist Mohammed Atta contacted an Iraqi agent with plans to blow up the Radio Free Europe building in Prague just before the terrorist attacks in the United States, Czech Prime Minister Milos Zeman told CNN. Zeman said Friday that Atta had met twice with the Iraqi agent, a diplomat, in the days before the Sept. 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon. The diplomat, Ahmad Khalil Ibrahim Samir Ani, was expelled from the country two weeks after the meeting. ``At first, Atta contacted some Iraq agent not to prepare the terroristic attack on'' the ...

<p>October 24, 2001 -- WASHINGTON - Terror master Osama bin Laden bought samples of anthrax by mail from shady laboratories in Eastern Europe and Asia for as little as $10,000, a former follower has told authorities in Egypt.</p> <p>The astonishing claim of how easily - and cheaply - the world's most wanted terrorist was able to acquire anthrax and other deadly germ agents was made in a 143-page confession of former extremist Ahmad Ibrahim al-Najjar at a recent trial of more than 100 members of the Egyptian Islamic Jihad.</p>

BERLIN, Oct 25 (Reuters) - Security experts in Germany are investigating whether hijack suspect Mohammed Atta carried anthrax spores allegedly obtained from Iraqi agents to the United States, a German newspaper reported on Thursday. Germany's Bild daily cited unnamed Israeli intelligence sources as saying Atta, who is suspected of flying a plane which crashed into the World Trade Center, received anthrax spores from Iraqi agents during two visits to the Czech Republic. The mass circulation newspaper cited investigators as saying they suspected Atta, who had lived in the northern German city of Hamburg, carried the spores to New York where ...