Al Qaeda again threatens New York, Washington and Los Angeles

A new message was posted in the last few hours by the Jeddah-based al-Qaeda-linked Al-Islah (Reform) society calling on Muslims to flee New York, Washington and Los Angeles in advance of major al Qaeda attacks in those cities. This is revealed by DEBKAfile.

The message accuses the United States of predetermining its end (doom) by its policies. ?The Jews rule the Pentagon by remote control and (are the cause) of Muslims being killed in every corner of the world. The United States should therefore expect more blows.?

The message is signed on behalf of the al Bayan (The Threat) movement by ?your warrior brother, Abul Hassan al Khadrami?.

Our Muslim expert identifies the name of the signatory as belonging to a Yemeni from Hadhrameuth, the Bin Ladens? place of origin where Osama enjoys substantial tribal support.

DEBKAfile?s counter-terror sources stress that warnings appearing on these forums are taken both very seriously and with caution by the intelligence services keeping track of the terrorist network?s electronic traffic.

Last November, Jeddah-based fundamentalist forums addressed a message to an Al Qaeda member, saying whoever understands ? understands; whoever knows, knows, but we are marching towards an operation that will take us to Paradise. Three days later, the Mombasa Paradise hotel was blown up killing 12 Kenyans and 3 Israelis and a failed shoulder-launched Strela anti-air missile missed an Israeli airliner at Mombasa airport.

he US government yesterday lowered the national terrorism threat level from "high," or orange, to "elevated," or yellow, except for four cities and at sites in critical industries, such as airports and nuclear facilities.

The Department of Homeland Security kept the cities of New York, Los Angeles, Las Vegas, and Washington on high alert. In Massachusetts, public safety officials said the state will maintain security at or near the orange level at Logan Airport and energy sector facilities in the state but decrease the attention at other locations.

It was the first time since the inception of the color-coded advisory system that the general threat level was lowered while specific geographic and industrial sites were kept on higher alert. Previously, the alert was lowered nationwide.

The terror level was raised to the system's second-highest level Dec. 21, when Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge warned that intelligence reports indicated the threat of holiday attacks was greater than at any time since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. It was the fifth time that the terror alert level has been raised from "elevated" to "high" since system was created in March 2002.

"With the passing of the holidays and many large gatherings that certainly occur during this time, we have made the decision to come down to yellow," Ridge said. "Yellow still means that we are [at] an elevated risk of attack. And we will maintain particular vigilance around some critical resources and locales."

The repeated adjustments to the national alert level have engendered criticism from security specialists that the alert system is ineffective -- raising public fears, they say, while wasting money to broadly ramp up security. During the most recent period of heightened alert, the US government relayed news of potential threats to airlines, causing the delay or cancellation of several international flights to the United States. Ridge said he did not know whether any specific plots were foiled.

He said airlines will remain at a higher state of alert, but cited security concerns in declining to specify which other sectors will do so. "We don't want to broadcast to everybody where we're going to be doing this," he said.

Certain airports will continue to have increased security, an unnamed Homeland Security official told the Associated Press. A few of the many hundreds of dams, bridges, and chemical plants that received heightened protection during the higher alert will continue to be treated with extra vigilance, the official said.

Nuclear facilities and ports also are expected to maintain higher vigilance.

http://www.usdoj.gov/opa/pr/2004/January/04_ag_012.htm

"FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE"
MONDAY, JANUARY 12, 2004
WWW.USDOJ.GOV

AG
(202) 514-2007
TDD (202) 514-1888

"STATEMENT OF ATTORNEY GENERAL JOHN ASHCROFT
REGARDING THE SUPREME COURT’S DECISION NOT TO HEAR
CENTER FOR NATIONAL SECURITY STUDIES V. DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE:"

"Time and time again, the courts have upheld the careful steps the Justice Department and federal government have taken since the devastating attacks of September 11, 2001 to both investigate that atrocity and prevent terrorists from striking again. The Supreme Court decision keeps in place the D.C. Circuit's decision upholding the Justice Department’s measured steps to safeguard sensitive information about our terrorism investigations as well as the privacy of individuals who chose not to make public their link to the probe. When the September 11 investigation led us to those who had violated our nation’s laws, we enforced those laws and detained those individuals. We are pleased the court let stand a decision that clearly outlined the danger of giving terrorists a virtual roadmap to our investigation that could have allowed them to chart a potentially deadly detour around our efforts.”

ADDITIONAL BACKGROUND INFORMATION:

In approving the government’s lawful, measured steps in the war on terrorism, the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals wrote on June 17, 2003, "America faces an enemy just as real as its former Cold War foes, with capabilities beyond the capacity of the judiciary to explore.... we hold that the government’s expectation that disclosure of the detainees’ names would enable al Qaeda or other terrorist groups to map the course of the investigation and thus develop the means to impede it is reasonable. A complete list of names informing terrorists of every suspect detained by the government at any point during the September 11 investigation would give terrorist organizations a composite picture of the government investigation, and since these organizations would generally know the activities and locations of its members on or about September 11, disclosure would inform terrorists of both the substantive and geographic focus of the investigation. Moreover, disclosure would inform terrorists which of their members were compromised by the investigation, and which were not. This information could allow terrorists to better evade the ongoing investigation and more easily formulate or revise counter-efforts.”

The court continued, “Knowing when and where each individual was arrested would provide a chronological and geographical picture of the government investigation. Terrorists could learn from this information not only where the government focused its investigation but how that investigation progressed step by step. Armed with that knowledge, they could then reach such conclusions as, for example, which cells had been compromised, and which individuals had been cooperative with the United States. They might well be able to derive conclusions as to how more adequately secure their clandestine operations in future terrorist undertakings."

###

04-012

Some interesting little tidbits from Cunards website:

Cunard Line’s spectacular Queen Mary 2 left Southampton today at around 6:30 pm (local time) on her Maiden Voyage amid fireworks, cheering well wishers and fireboats spewing water into the sky. The 14-day voyage to North America will call at Madeira, Tenerife and Las Palmas in the Canary Islands and Barbados and St. Thomas in the Caribbean before arriving at Fort Lauderdale, Florida, on January 26.

When will QM2 and QE2 be in Southampton at the same time? QM2 and QE2 will arrive together from New York on 1 May 2004. Both are scheduled to berth at 0700 hrs.

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