Assessment Services-Tuesday, January 5, 1998-Vol. 5, No. 005 TERRORISM/POLITICAL VIOLENCE
NEW YORK CITY (EmergencyNet News) - Newsweek magazine is reporting in its current edition that Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein is joining forces with Islamic fundamentalist Osama bin Laden to launch a joint terror counter- strike against the United States and Britain. Saddam is said to be reaching out to the terrorist mastermind hoping to tap into bin Laden's network of terrorists.
An Arab intelligence expert, reported to know Saddam personally, told the magazine that: "very soon, you will be witnessing large-scale terrorist activity by the Iraqis." The source claims that the joint attacks would be aimed primarily at U.S. and British targets in the Islamic world.
According to U.S. intelligence sources cited by the magazine, the contacts between Saddam and bin Laden have so far been limited to lower-level agents. An alliance would match Saddam's weapons - including easy-to-hide biological agents - and bin Laden's force of terrorists. Bin Laden is known to covet Iraq's alleged biological and chemical weapons.
ERRI analysts said on Tuesday that they believe that Iraq may attempt to justify the aforementioned terrorism campaign by continually provoking U.S. and British warplanes in confrontatations involving the so-called "no-fly" zones. At least one expert says that Mr. Hussein and his propaganda machine have been portraying recent air-defense engagements as "continued aggression" by the U.S. and telling the Iraqi people and potential Arab allies that they have continually been "at war" since Operation Desert Fox.