Free Republic

Predator missile strike? Delta Force hit-and-run deep behind enemy lines? Nope. Better: The senior al Qaida operative who helped direct the 2005 London subway bombings and a plot to blow up commercial airliners over the Atlantic Ocean has died in Pakistan’s tribal region, U.S. counter terrorism officials said Tuesday.The senior militant, an Egyptian who used the nom de guerre Abu Ubaida al-Masri, recently succumbed to hepatitis, they said. Never heard of him? Most people haven’t. The Times devoted a few paragraphs to him in a story last May about the next generation of Al Qaeda leadership, but I can’t even...

The militant is known as Abu Ubaida al Masri, and charting his path reveals his vulnerabilities and those of the terrorist group. COPENHAGEN -- If Al Qaeda strikes the West in the coming months, it's likely the mastermind will be a stocky Egyptian explosives expert with two missing fingers. His alias is Abu Ubaida al Masri. Hardly anyone has heard of him outside a select circle of anti-terrorism officials and Islamic militants. He has overseen the major plots that the network needs to stay viable, investigators say: the London transportation bombings in 2005, a foiled transatlantic "spectacular" aimed at U.S.-bound...