A RUSSIAN AGENT AT THE RIGHT HAND OF BIN LADEN?

The Arabic television channel Al Jazeera broadcast an audiotape on December 19, 2003, that was said to be from Dr. Ayman al-Zawahiri, the right hand man of al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden. In it, Zawahiri claimed that his group was chasing Americans everywhere, including in the United States. This claim helped raise the terror threat level.

But where is Zawahiri, whose head now carries a price of US$25 million? Recent media reports have said that he is hiding in Iran, though Iranian authorities deny this. Yet it could be that Russian intelligence knows exactly where he is and may even have regular contact with the elusive Egyptian.

There are many accounts of Ayman al-Zawahiri published in the press. These stories cover Zawahiri's childhood and his relatives, his study of medicine, his connections to the Muslim Brotherhood, his involvement in the assassination of Egyptian President Anwar Sadat, his close relations with Osama bin Laden, and his role in major terrorist attacks against the United States. But there are few authors who mention that Zawahiri spent half a year in close contact with representatives of Russian intelligence while in their custody.

Significantly, these contacts led to a change in Zawahiri's political orientation. Long talks with Russian intelligence officers "forced a critical change in his lethal planning. ...America, not Egypt, became the target... Freed from Russian jail in May 1997, Dr. Zawahri found refuge in Afghanistan, yoking his fortunes to Mr. bin Laden. [Zawahiri's group] Egyptian Jihad, previously devoted to the narrow purpose of toppling secular rule in Egypt, became instead the biggest component of al Qaeda and a major agent of a global war against America. Dr. Zawahri became Mr. bin Laden's closest confidant and talent scout." [1]

The story of Zawahiri's Russian experience begins on December 1, 1996, when he was traveling under the alias "Mr. Amin" along with two of his officers--Ahmad Salama Mabruk, who ran Egyptian Jihad's cell in Azerbaijan under the cover of a trading firm called Bavari-C, and Mahmud Hisham al-Hennawi, a militant widely traveled in Asia. The group was accompanied by a Chechen guide. They were trying to enter Russia between the Caspian Sea and the Caucasus Mountains in an effort to discover whether Chechnya could become a base for training militants. It was here that the group was arrested by Russian police for a lack of visas. They were soon handed over to the Federal Security Service, the successor to the KGB.

When Zawahiri's computer was later discovered in Afghanistan by two journalists, it provided insight into Zawahiri's side of the story. In short, it goes as follows:

The Russians failed to: 1) find out Zawahiri's real identity and the goals of his visit to Chechnya; 2) read the Arabic texts in his laptop, which would have revealed the nature of his activities; and 3) read the coded messages that he sent from custody to his friends.

Yet based on my own twenty years' experience with Russian intelligence people involved in Arab affairs, these claims simply do not ring true. The Soviet KGB had good--albeit indirect--connections with Islamic fundamentalists, including the Muslim Brotherhood and the Egyptian Jihad. The curriculum of Arab terrorists who studied at Moscow International's Lenin School placed special emphasis on cooperation between Marxists and Islamists. Soviet instructors would encourage Arab terrorists to consider the Muslim Brothers and other Islamic extremists as "allies in class struggle."

Good contacts between the KGB and Islamic fundamentalists existed at the time of the Egyptian Jihad's 1981 assassination of Anwar Sadat, after which Zawahiri was jailed by Egyptian authorities. Since the KGB followed these events very closely and may have even been indirectly involved in the plot, the KGB would have put Zawahiri's name into its records at that time. Therefore, when Zawahiri crossed the KGB's path again, that organization likely would have soon discovered his real identity.

Additionally, local Islamic organizations flocked to Zawahiri's aid during his detention and trial in such large numbers that the Russians and even Zawahiri's own lawyer were puzzled by the outpouring. [2] This would have been another tip-off to the authorities that they had more than just a mere merchant (Zawahiri's reported claim) in custody. Also, the fact that he was arrested along with a Chechen should have raised additional suspicions.

Perhaps most difficult to believe from Zawahiri's version is that his captors would not have read the Arabic information contained within his laptop computer. Russian intelligence has probably the best Arabists in the world. One of them--Dr. Evgeny Primakov--headed the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service from December 1991 until January 1996 and made a considerable efforts to bring many talented Arabists into this service. These individuals would have been able not only to read Zawahiri's Arabic text, but also to decode his encrypted messages without any problem.

Thus, with Zawahiri's true identity and purpose uncovered by the Russians, these authorities would have been faced with several options. One would have been deportation to either Egypt or the United States, with gratitude from those governments for Russian President Yeltsin, burnishing his image as a fighter against terrorism. But apparently the Russians decided not to do this, believing perhaps that their national interest was better served by another alternative.

One should bear in mind that at the time of Zawahiri's capture, Chechnya was enjoying a period of actual independence from Moscow. The Kremlin was having great difficulty finding "agents of influence" among the Chechen people. At the same time, Moscow knew that representatives of al Qaeda and other foreign Islamic fundamentalists were present in Chechnya and exercised strong influence on the Chechen leaders, especially on the military commanders. It would have been logical, therefore, for the Russians to try to persuade Zawahiri to cooperate with them in directing the activities of Arabs in Chechnya, in getting information about the plans and activities of Chechen leaders, and in influencing the Chechen leadership.

It may not have been too difficult for Russian officers to persuade Zawahiri to go along with such a plan. The prisoner would have been very frightened by the prospect of being deported to Egypt or remaining jailed in Russia. Furthermore, methods of torture during interrogation used by KGB officers would have truly almost scared Zawahiri to death. Execution very likely was just one threat.

Once made aware that the KGB knew of his true identity, Zawahiri would have realized that it would be useless to lie further. At a minimum, Zawahiri would have had to agree to cooperation with Russian intelligence to save his life and to buy his freedom. It is possible that the Russians also offered some form of assistance to Zawahiri and al Qaeda. This could have been in the form of explosive technology or other weaponry.

It is notable that Taliban and al Qaeda militants in Afghanistan received regular re-supplies of Russian arms. The man responsible for these deliveries was Victor Anatolievich Bout, the son of a top KGB officer. His father's connections helped establish Bout in the arms trade, which is linked to the Russian government and particularly to its intelligence services. Bout and his family currently reside in the United Arab Emirates. [3]

It is also not difficult to imagine that the Russians managed to get some information from Zawahiri about his colleagues that could have been used to blackmail him if he tried to avoid cooperation after his release. With an agreement reached between Zawahiri and the Russians, the authorities would have taken steps to make the Egyptian look "clean" to his Arab comrades and the Chechens. It would not have been difficult for them to stage Zawahiri's trial, at which the judge gave him only a six months' sentence, much of which he had already served.

A final note: Arabs are still very active among the Chechen militants today, and yet the Russians appear to turn a blind eye toward their infiltration and do not hunt them particularly. Even the most influential among the Arabs, Khattab, may well have been killed by his own people. Arabs have also never been listed as POWs. Perhaps the Russian forces have an order to kill Arabs on the spot: Nobody wants them to reveal unwanted information during interrogations. Thus left alone, the Arabs exercise significant influence over the activities of Chechen commanders according to orders from Zawahiri. Presumably they do so without understanding that they could well be the Trojan horses who actually execute the Kremlin's orders. For example, the Arabs apparently do not encourage Chechen militants to direct any attacks against Russian leaders in Moscow. This could be accomplished simply by refusing to pay for such operations.

In contrast, the Arabs do seem to encourage the taking of hostages from among the common people, as in the Moscow youth club Nord-Ost incident, thus making it easier for the Kremlin to stoke public anger against "Chechen terrorists." This in turn helps Vladimir Putin garner popular support for his own authoritarian actions as well as those of his former KGB colleagues who now occupy 65 percent of top governmental positions. Dr. Zawahiri may thus be the queen in the Kremlin's chess game not only in Chechnya, but also in Russia's power struggle at the highest levels. If so, it is not likely that the Russians would surrender him merely to help win the global war on terror.

1. "Saga of Dr. Zawahri Sheds Light On the Roots of al Qaeda Terror;" Andrew Higgins and Alan Cullison; The Wall Street Journal, July 2, 2002. 2. Ibid. 3. "International Business of Russian Mafia," Sueddeutsche Zeitung, February 1, 2001.

Some more food for thought...

Terrorists in Muslim Disguise

Inside Story World Report, 1994

Now that the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) is beginning to defeat Israel, it is pulling out one of its most powerful terrorist weapons to finish the surrender process. That weapon is commonly known as "Islamic fundamentalism."

On Monday, July 18 [1994], a powerful car bomb exploded in downtown Buenos Aires, Argentina. The target, a seven-story Jewish community center, was completely destroyed, leaving nearly 100 dead and another 100 wounded.1

Eight days later, another car bomb was detonated—this time at the Israeli embassy in London, England. The embassy and other adjoining buildings suffered damage, and 14 people were injured.2

Authorities in Israel and elsewhere immediately blamed Muslim "extremists" for the terrorist attacks, and specifically named the group Hezballah (meaning "Party of G-d"). For the PLO, this was a convenient dodge allowing it to disclaim responsibility.

But more importantly, the PLO is now using these attacks as an excuse to accelerate the surrender of Israel. The logic is chillingly simple: according to news accounts of the second bombing, British authorities "presumed it to be an attempt to disrupt the peace process," and "Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin of Israel... said Islamic extremists were seeking to disrupt the Arab-Israeli reconciliation process."3 Thus peace on any terms must be made quickly with the PLO, lest the "extremists" succeed in stopping the "peace process." The PLO provides the carrot, while "Muslim fundamentalists" provide the stick.

A myth has been engineered in the last several years regarding "Islamic fundamentalism." According to this idea, the PLO and its main factions have become moderate, willing to recognize Israel and negotiate a compromise solution. However, radical Muslims, including Hezballah, Islamic Jihad, the Amal Militia, and Hamas, are said to oppose such compromises violently. Every time these extremists carry out another terrorist attack, Israel is pressured to make more concessions to the PLO.

In reality, this is a classic example of dialectical strategy at work. Writing in Commentary magazine, Jerusalem Post editor David Bar-Illan exposed the clever strategy: "[Israeli] government spokesmen prefer to pretend that the killers are not operatives of the 'moderate' Arafat, supporter of the peace talks, but 'enemies of the peace process,' such as Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and PLO radicals... The not unreasonable assumption behind this charade is that the public might resent continued talks with proxies of the 'mainstream' PLO in Washington while its gunmen are killing Israelis back home."4

Just as the PLO does not represent palestinian or Arab interests, the "Islamic fundamentalists" are not religious in nature. Rather, all these organizations have been created, supported, and directed by the Communists, operating on orders emanating from Moscow.

The terrorist group Hezballah, and its official sponsor, the government of Iran, provide a case in point.

Because of media distortion, the Ayatollah Khomeini was seen in the west as a fanatic religious leader. But the Iraqi family of the Grand Ayatollah Muhsen Hakim-Tabataba'i, which in the 1960s and 1970s exercised leadership over the Shi'ite movement of Islam, opposed Khomeini so thoroughly that they worked closely with the Shah of Iran. Saddam Hussein, the Soviet-backed dictator of Iraq, murdered the family at his first opportunity, thereby eliminating Shi'ite opposition to Khomeini.5

Khomeini's revolutionary movement was known as "Islamic Marxism," a movement begun from within the Russian Bolshevik Party in 1916.6 During the 1970s, the Soviet Union mobilized its resources to organize a revolution in Iran, with Khomeini as its official leader. Khomeini's brother was serving time in prison as a member of the Tudeh Party—the Communist Party of Iran; Khomeini's intimate advisor, Sadegh Ghothzadeh, was an affiliate of the French and Italian Communist Parties. Soon the Soviets were broadcasting pro-Khomeini propaganda into Iran, while they began publishing a well-funded revolutionary magazine entitled Navid, meaning "Good News." KGB agents working among the 4,000 Soviet personnel in Iran coordinated the protests and riots, and the Tudeh Party, acting on Soviet orders, openly backed the "Islamic" revolution and created a broad coalition of the Left to support Khomeini.7

Moscow also mobilized the PLO to back Khomeini. The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, led by self-proclaimed Marxist Leninist George Habash, supplied training and weapons to the Feda'iyin-e Khalq, the Iranian Islamic-Marxist terrorist group that began the revolution to overthrow the Shah. Meanwhile, Yasser Arafat's Fatah organization trained and armed the Mujahedin-e Khalq, another main pillar of Khomeini's revolution, and it trained future members of the Revolutionary Guards of Iran, including the Minister of the Guards later appointed by Khomeini.8

Once Khomeini seized power in Iran, Arafat brought a large delegation of PLO officials into the country, where "he was formally given the Israeli consulate building and, raising the Palestinian flag over it, opened the first PLO office, also appointing a PLO 'ambassador' to Iran."9 The Soviet Union and Communist China have since continued to arm Iran with weapons.

Khomeini immediately created Hezballah as an international terrorist wing of the PLO-trained Revolutionary Guards. Inside Iran, Hezbellah worked closely with Iranian Communist organizations in consolidating the regime's power. The terrorist training camps in Iran have been supervised by Mostafa Chamran Savehi, a follower of Trotskyite Communism who, as a student in Berkeley, California during the 1960s, founded such Islamic-Marxist groups as Red Shi'ism and the Muslim Students' Association of America. The instructors at the Iranian terrorist camps have been Communist experts from North Korea and Syria, as well as Iranians trained by the PLO and the Communist government of Iraq.10

The organizer of Hezballah in Pakistan and Lebanon, Abbas Zamani, was also trained by the PLO and has been identified as a probable agent of the KGB.11 In Lebanon, Hezballah's terrorist mastermind has been Immad Mugniyeh. For years Mugniyeh was a leading member of Yasser Arafat's Force 17, an arm of Fatah. When the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982 forced the PLO to leave, Arafat had Mugniyeh and other members of Force 17 switch over to Hezballah, allowing these terrorists to remain in Lebanon. Mugniyeh quickly became the effective head of Hezballah, and has coordinated Hezballah-PLO terrorism to this day. On Arafat's orders, the PLO transfers weapons, money, and terrorist units to Hezballah, while Hezballah has provided intelligence and other logistical support to the PLO—including helping PLO units infiltrate into Lebanon.12

In short, the "Islamic fundamentalists" are not religious at all, but are Communist fronts adopting a Muslim mask.

The "schism" between the PLO and "Islamic fundamentalists" has been staged as a clever ploy to force Israel into surrender. Now that Israel is indeed yielding to its implacable Communist enemies, it is only natural that terrorist attacks on Israeli and Jewish targets are being accelerated worldwide. By blaming the attacks on "extremists" who allegedly oppose the "peace process," the PLO can disavow the terror acts in which it participates, and can maintain an image of moderation for the West. In the face of this intensified pressure, Israel is likely to make concessions even faster than before. Watch for Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin to begin placing the remainder of the strategic West Bank, and even Jerusalem itself, on the bargaining table.

On the other hand, the financing and political pressure for the PLO takeover is coming almost entirely from the United States, and President Clinton is now accelerating the process. If Congress chose to stop the President, Israel could take back the West Bank and Gaza, and could soon destroy the PLO and its allies.

1 Parks, M., Los Angeles Times, "Rabin links Hezbollah to Argentine blast," SF Chronicle, 7-20-94, p. A10. 2 "Israeli embassy in London bombed," SF Chronicle, 7-27-94, pp. A1, A13. 3 Ibid. 4 Bar-Illan, D., "Israel's New Pollyannas," Commentary, Sept. 1993, p. 30. 5 Taheri, A., Holy Terror, Adler & Adler, Bethesda, MD, 1987, p. 163. 6 Ibid., p. 217. 7 Rees, J., "How Jimmy Carter betrayed the Shah," The Review of the News, 2-21-79, pp. 31-48. 8 Alexander, Y. and Sinai, J., Terrorism: The PLO Connection, Crane Russak, New York, 1989, pp. 72-73. 9 Ibid., p. 73. 10 Taheri, Op cit., pp. 77-79, 88-105. 11 Ibid., p. 177; Laffin, J., Holy War: Islam Fights, Grafton Books, London, 1988, p. 79. 12 Livingstone, N.C. and Halevy, D., Inside the PLO, William Morrow & Co., New York, 1990, pp. 267-275

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.