Mideast Roundup

November 8, 2002

Afghanistan

Al-Qaeda kills five CIA agents

The missile delivered by a US Predator drone, that killed senior al Qaeda operative in Yemen, Salim Sinan al-Harethi, and five of his men, as they drove through Yemen's oil-rich province of Marib on Sunday, November 3, effected the first American targeted liquidation outside Afghanistan.

According to DEBKA-Net-Weekly's intelligence and military sources, it was above all a rapidly-assembled reprisal for a chilling event that Washington prefers to keep dark in its shadowy war with Osama bin Laden's network.

According to those sources, al Qaeda last week murdered seven CIA agents in a mountain cave near Pakistan. The agents, disguised as peddlers, had piled donkeys with wares and were traveling through the wild border area in search of al Qaeda lairs, when the hunters were caught. Local al Qaeda operatives identifying them as US agents tailed them to the outskirts of Shkin, then approached them. Promising them likely customers and hinting at a large group of the objects of their search, the terrorists lured the agents to a lonely spot out in the country.

The Americans were then bound and thrown into a cave, where they were killed.

The CIA is searching for the bodies but dares not send men into the lawless frontier villages.

However, their success in their death-from-the-sky revenge operation against the al Qaeda team in Yemen has encouraged the Americans, according to our sources, to revive this method of operation in Afghanistan too, particularly with conditions on the ground growing increasingly hazardous.

DEBKA-Net-Weekly's sources in Kabul report that the most striking development this week was a report published in a small local bi-weekly called Panjerer (Window) that claimed the fiery Islamic fundamentalist Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, who was deported from both Iran and Iraq, has wound up in Kunar Province in northeastern Afghanistan. Pentagon and State Department sources report him as having opened up a secret back door to enable Taliban fighters to move in and out of Pakistan. According to Panjerer, Hekmatyar, the Taliban's Mullah Omar and Osama bin Laden's top lieutenants are in the last stages of a three-way negotiation to create an alternative government that will seek to overthrow Hamid Karzai's regime in Kabul.

Our sources in Kabul add that this shadow government will also dedicate itself to evicting American forces from Afghanistan

So concerned was President Karzai when he learned of the plot, that he sent messengers speeding to Kunar Province with an offer of a cabinet post and other rewards for Hekmatyar if he would give up his plan and subversion in general.

Karzai also took action this week to shore up his failing authority outside the capital. He sacked 32 political, military and security officials around the country, including Mazar-e-Sharif and Kandahar, as well as the mayor of Jalalabad.

However, the head of security and intelligence in Kandahar Province, whose negligence was blamed for the unsuccessful assassination attempt against Karzai three months ago, defied the presidential order. On Tuesday, November 5, he said that, before stepping down, he must "confer with my commanders, soldiers and leaders of my tribe".

Warlords Cheat on US and Karzai

Many of the Afghan warlords and provincial chiefs who pledged loyalty to the Karzai presidency and promised to help the Americans hunt down the Taliban and al Qaeda, are proving treacherous.

After willingly accepting US weapons and military training for their men, they now have no qualms about exploiting two additional gold mines: Iran and al-Qaeda. Emissaries from both have been handing out handsome bribes in return for the warlords' pledges of cooperation in the campaign to lure US troops deep into a quagmire-like situation.

The other bad news for the United States is confirmation from various sources that Osama bin Laden is very much alive and to a significant extent in command of his forces in Afghanistan, the Middle East and the West. Some top CIA officials dismiss these reports as disinformation. But August Henning, chief of the German federal intelligence service, the BND, sent the CIA a secret report detailing why he believes bin Laden is hiding in the mountainous areas of the Afghan-Pakistani frontier.

(DEBKA-Net-Weekly first revealed that bin Laden was alive on October 18, in Issue No. 81. The al Qaeda leader was indeed in the Afghan-Pakistan frontier area at one time but later, according to our sources, reached Saudi Arabia where he is now, moving about through the Empty Quarter between Saudi Arabia, Oman and Yemen.)

Ismail Khan, the wily governor of the city of Herat, is a walking example of why the United States can trust almost no one in Afghanistan. An ethnic Tajik, Khan managed to get out of the Americans a haul of weapons and training for some of his 30,000 fighters. Extending the other hand, he also obtained several million dollars from Iran, together with generous supplies of weapons. DEBKA-Net-Weekly's sources say he still maintains his close ties with Tehran, from whose Khorazan province he trucks explosives and mines to Herat. Nothing loath, he also recently made contact with Taliban and al Qaeda senior officers and offered to work for them too.

Ismail Khan is not the only two-timer.

Another Afghan governor, Kandahar's Gol Agha Shirzay, toured the Iranian province of Baluchistan three weeks ago. He was afforded a royal welcome, wads of cash and arms for cooperating with the Islamic Republic. The official pretext for his Iran tour was to hold talks on sharing the waters of the Hirmand River that runs through his turf. He promised his hosts their fair share but, in secret, he also undertook to harass US forces on his land and help Iranian saboteurs and agents drag them into a war of attrition.

Kandahar, like Oruzgan province, is now home to fugitive Taliban and al Qaeda fighters. From their new hideouts, they are preparing terrorist attacks around the world and against US troops in Afghanistan. Shirzay obviously never intended living up to the promises he gave the Americans to eradicate these terrorist nests.

The United States has been warned that more complex strikes are being planned against its troops in Afghanistan, for which last weekend's sporadic attacks were the forertaste. In each of those incidents, only a single shell or rocket was launched, causing no casualties. But Washington was alarmed by the boldness and sophistication shown by the attackers.

The Taliban and al-Qaeda are particularly active in the eastern Afghan province of Paktia, where the village of Urgun and city of Gardez are two of their centers of operation. The US military command in Afghanistan is now considering whether a resumed offensive along the border with Pakistan might, if launched, become a death trap for American soldiers. President George W. Bush does want casualties on the Afghan front while he is busy planning war on Iraq.

The success of the Predator attack in Yemen has US military planners itching to use the drones again in Afghanistan. DEBKA-Net-Weekly's military sources say that US drone operation crews recently trained in Israel, which has gained experience in using pilot-less aircraft for "targeted killings" of Palestinian terrorists.

However, the Americans have not solved the problem of their intelligence blind spot in Afghanistan which makes the tracking and killing of al Qaeda men difficult.

The resources absent in Afghanistan are present in Yemen, where the United States set up an effective intelligence infrastructure after the October 2000 attack that killed 17 sailors on the USS Cole and the strike against a French supertanker more than a month ago, in which one crewman died.

Iran

Khatami's Head on the Block

Iran's hardline religious leaders have decided they have had enough of President Mohammad Khatami and his overly popular drive for political reforms. They have put out a contract on him in the form of a fatwa, a religious decree issued by the Council of Religious Sages which is dominated by Iran's implacable spiritual ruler, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

This is reported exclusively by DEBKA-Net-Weekly's sources in Tehran. In an atmosphere recalling medieval Inquisition tribunals, the dreaded Special Operations Committee was called into session this week in the holy city of Qom to determine Khatami's fate. The majority followed the lead of Ayatollah Mohammad Taghi Mesbah-Yazdi in approving Khatami's liquidation as quickly as possible. Their recommendation went up to the Spiritual Ruler for his final seal.

The only questions now are the timing and manner of his execution.

Khatami death sentence is the direct result of the legislative showdown he finally forced on the radicals in his second term in office on the reform ticket. One of the two bills he initiated, just tabled, would strip the "conservative" clerics of some of their powers. The 12-member Guardians Council would forfeit the right to veto election candidates, which they apply unrestrainedly against reformists. Another piece of legislation, due to come before parliamentary soon, would empower the president to suspend court rulings viewed as unconstitutional.

Of late, the courts have shut down dozens of liberal newspapers and imprisoned the reformist president's most zealous supporters. Those two bills, which would have sailed through the reformist-dominated parliament, the Majlis, threatened to put an end to the ayatollahs' grip on the country through their unbridled power to override the country's elected institutions.

In the event of a veto being applied to block the two bills, reformist office-holders threaten to resign and call a national referendum. DEBKA-Net-Weekly's Iranian experts believe any referendum would net 80 percent support, drawing curtains down on the Islamic Revolution founded by Ayatollah Khomeini in 1979.

The condemned president is aware of his danger. Inroads are being made on his immediate circle. Last week, some of his junior aides were arrested. DEBKA-Net-Weekly's sources have learned that one of Khatami's closest advisers, Mohammad Ali Abtahi, expects to be taken into custody shortly. Abtahi headed Khatami's staff for several years, and is now vice president in charge of political affairs.

Last week, Abbas Abdi, a leading reformist figure who advocates the resumption of dialogue with Washington, was detained, raising a political storm. The Ayandeh (The Future) research institute of which he is a director was shut down on charges that include publishing false opinion polls and taking money from a polling organization in the United States. The indictment refers to the poll Avandeh conducted last year on behalf of the Gallup institute to canvass Iranian attitudes toward the United States. A week earlier, the institute's director, Hossein Ghazian, a university professor, was arrested.

Abdi started out as one of the Khomeinist revolutionary students who stormed the U.S. embassy in Tehran on November 4, 1979, and kept 52 Americans hostage for 444 days. Ironically, his arrest Monday took place on the 22nd anniversary of the US embassy siege, underscoring his ideological conversion. Today, Abdi is in the forefront of the struggle for political reform in his country and the reversal of its anti-American policies. The charges against him have been formulated so as to make him liable to the death penalty if found guilty. They include contacts with a CIA agent through the director of a Dubai-based America-Pan Arab fund and accepting US intelligence funds for subversive operations against the Iranian regime. His accusers claim they have a letter he wrote and signed authorizing the distribution of 45 million Toman ($50,000) to Iranian dissidents.

Iran's judiciary contends its hands are clean. The judges never ordered Abdi's arrest and have no notion of his whereabouts. However, it is no secret in Tehran that Said Mortazani, a judge who has jailed many of Iran's most distinguished liberal writers and statesmen, is the live wire of the campaign of detentions which is seen as leading inexorably to Khatami's arrest or liquidation.

DEBKA-Net-Weekly's sources report that several more of Khatami's closest allies, such as Ahmad Bourghani, deputy speaker of the Majlis, and Alireza Atavi-Tabar, a journalist and leading reformist, expect knocks on their doors.

President Khatami may not be the first to pay dearly for fighting to open up his hidebound country. This week, two prominent Majlis deputies died in mysterious traffic accidents while driving north to investigate a corruption scandal involving the import of rotten meat. One of the victims was Alireza Nouri. His brother, former interior minister and reformist cleric Abdollah Nouri, had been languishing in prison after being sentenced to death by a special religious court for preaching religious moderation. Monday, after the accident, Nouri was released from jail and pardoned by Khamenei.

Murder in broad daylight disguised as a road accident is a favorite form of assassination in the Islamic Republic of Iran.

A week ago, the radical religious Kayhan newspaper predicted dramatic events for early January. The reference was almost certainly to the high noon fast approaching between religious hardliners and political reformers.

Turkey

Of Kerchiefs and Kurds

The leading candidate for prime minister in Turkey's post-election government is Abdullah Gul, Chairman Recep Tayyip Erdogan's number two at the top of the AKP, Justice and Development Party, that won a landslide victory in the November 3 elections. After sweeping out the political elite that misgoverned the country and led it into its worst economic crisis since World War II, the incoming party poses some enigmas:

One: How far will the next Turkish government support an American offensive against Iraq?

Two: Is the AKP an Islamic party masquerading as something else?

Three: Where does the army stand in the new regime?

Four: How does the next government propose to contain the rampant inflation, financial near-collapse and staggering unemployment it has inherited?

Five: How to provide for the Kurdish minority whose single party failed to win a place in the new parliament?

DEBKA-Net-Weekly's expert on Turkey clears up a few of these questions.

The Sunday vote was first and foremost a protest vote against the Ecevit government, a center-right/center-left coalition under an aging (77) and ailing PM, who refused to let go.

Past Islamic parties (MSP, RP, FP - all inspired by Necmettin Erbakan) never attracted more than around 20% of the voters. Most observers agree that the 34% AKP showing (which has given this new party nearly two-thirds of the new parliament) is not due to an upsurge in pro-Islamic sentiments, but rather to the strong desire to punish a discredited administration and move onto the next generation.

AKP leaders, especially the charismatic Erdogan, former mayor of Istanbul (1994-1998), skillfully packaged their party in pro-Western, democratic, free market and Kemalist-constitutional terms. They thus made it much easier for the non-Islamic majority to see AKP as a fresh, reasonably moderate alternative.

Is AKP an Islamic party in Kemalist clothing? An analysis of AKP leadership reveals that, unlike previous Islamic parties, it is in fact a mini-coalition of conservative politicians from various parties, including secular center-right ones (eg, DYP and ANAP). Erkan Mumcu, Koksal Toptan, and Bulent Arinc, to name just a few prominent examples, joined forces with progressive and moderate members of past Islamic parties, most notably Erdogan himself, his deputy Abdulah Gul, Abdulkadir Aksu, and Abdullatif Sener.

Kemalism or "Soft" Islam?

Both panel and platform convinced disgruntled secular voters to gamble on AKP's brand of Kemalism cum "soft Islam."

Who is likely to become PM? Due to his 1999 conviction for anti-constitutional conduct, Erdogan spent eight months in jail and has been barred from elective office. He has since publicly retracted his more objectionable statements, but is perhaps the biggest enigma of the new political order in Ankara. Even if his sincerity is questionable, the environment in which he and AKP will be operating makes this a much less important issue. Because Erdogan cannot serve as PM, it will be up to him and Turkey's President, Ahmet Necdet Sezer, a highly respected, popular former Chief Justice, to thrash out a compromise candidate.

Abdullah Gul leads the slate that also includes Vecdi Gonul and Abdulkadir Aksu.

It is also possible that AKP will seek to amend the constitution, for which 367 votes are needed, to enable Erdogan himself to serve as PM. A less likely course is a struggle among the AKP candidates, leading to a constitutional crisis and presidential intervention.

The candidate most widely tipped for prime minister, Abdullah Gul, said two years ago that Turkey's main problems are kerchiefs and Kurds. He comes from the reformist wing of the Islamist Virtue Party and publicly favors an open society and a democratic Turkey. All the new men may have Islamist roots but none disavow the secularism laid down by the republic's founder, Kemal Ataturk. However, Mrs. Gul wears a headscarf and never appears with her husband at public functions.

On the other hand, Gul, unlike Erdogan, speaks fluent English and is known for his financial experience and his familiar ties with the diplomatic and foreign investor communities of Ankara.

His main problem could be the popular party leader who, disqualified from the top slot, is likely to remain a leading force as the country's main power broker.

AKP leaders have promised to take care of the interests of the Kurdish minority of some 10-12 million, whose DEHAP party failed to pass the threshold to parliament. The main problem is Southeast Anatolia, 80 percent of whose population are Kurds. Under the Turkish electoral system, a party needs to ballot 10 percent nationwide to win a place in parliament. That is a sore point that bears watching.

AKP has already committed to EU admission and a IMF-brokered economic rescue package. These two policy pillars bind the new administration to a pro-Western, democratic, and free market agenda. All these are essential for an EU option (denied to the previous government), and any chance of economic recovery. AKP, even if insincere in its election platform, will have very little leeway on these crucial policy issues.

Army's Role is Crucial

Certain key issues will be left to the army, such as backing for America's war on Iraq, which is almost certain to be forthcoming. However, the new administration in Ankara may raise its price. Abdullah Gul pointed out in an interview after the election that Turkey suffered heavy financial losses during and after the first Gulf War, for which it still carries a heavy debt load.

DEBKA-Net-Weekly's Turkish expert predicts Ankara will insist on firm US commitments for financial support in advance of any action, including help for an IMF crisis package.

The chief of Turkey's powerful armed forces, Chief of General Staff, General Hilmi Ozkok, wasted no time in flying to Washington two days after the election, arriving Tuesday, November 5. He was there both to reassure the Americans that the army remained the guardian of Turkey's secular constitution and to wind up the details of the promised American aid package.

The ultimate check against possible AKP transgressions is the Turkish army, now commanded by the American-educated, pro-Europe General Ozkok.

Over the past two decades, the army's capacity to intervene directly in politics has diminished. A military coup can hardly be contemplated in today's Turkey, but indirect intercession to block any serious attempt to implement an Islamic agenda is not only possible, but virtually guaranteed. AKP leaders know that very well. The army draws up an annual list of some 100 Islamic-leaning officers to be discharged, which the PM has to endorse. Even the Islamist prime minister Erbakan did not dare withhold his signature in 1996/7, and it is highly unlikely that an AKP PM will either.

The army will continue to promote strong NATO membership, provide quiet support for a pending US intervention in Iraq, and maintain the special relationship with Israel, particularly on defense and intelligence matters.

The AKP leader Erdogen spoke from his Islamic roots when on November 6 he criticized Israeli policies towards the Palestinian as "terrorism". He declared that Ankara would not link its close economic relations with Israel to "popular anger", but did not rule out scaling back military ties. Turkey and Israel have held joint air force exercises together and they align their defense policies closely. Any new government in Ankara is not likely to change this.

In this regard, the Turkish Foreign Ministry on Wednesday, November 6, condemned the Palestinian suicide bombing at the Kfar Sava mall in Israel this week, urging the parties to explore all possible means to end the violence. Although still under the outgoing minister, no such statement would have been issued if there was even the slightest doubt that the new government might oppose it.

In the event of some AKP leaders and constituents resolving to promote Islamic issues under the new administration, the areas of potential challenge to the secular status quo are limited to the domestic. Temptation may lurk in such ministries and agencies as education, where the secular school system could be adjusted, support for the religious elementary schools, influence on state universities, extra funding for mosque construction and religious services and amending family laws.

However, failure to resist such temptations could lead to the rapid loss of support among the secular majority and elites.

The risks of Turkey "going Islamic" are therefore fairly low, given the hard choices facing the new AKP government. Turkey will continue to maintain its foreign alliances, and work to satisfy EU requirements on democracy, human rights, and the economy. Even in the lower ranks among new AKP members of parliament, non-Islamist opinion is well represented. Thus, for example, Egemen Bagis, who heads the US-Turkey Association, had lived 17 years in America, is not religious, admits to drinking alcohol occasionally, and seeks to "loosen up" Turkish politics along the American model. AKP leaders, especially Erdogan, are now using him as liaison and English translator in their post-election contacts with foreign officials.

Nonetheless, AKP performance should be continuously monitored, and risk assessment periodically re-evaluated.

Exporting Revolution

1. Saudis Trapped by Own State Religion - Wahhabism

Saudi Arabia's oil princes must feel like spectators at their own funeral when they watch the United States wage war against a global terrorism ignited by their own strict brand of Islam of Wahhabism, which is striking sparks at home and spreading like a prairie fire across the Muslim world.

The rulers of Riyadh find themselves trapped by domestic and external religious, social and political pressures that threaten to force open the cracks in the plinth supporting the royal edifice and bring their palaces crashing down over their heads.

Wahhabism, a fundamentalist branch of Islam - that former CIA director James Woolsey recently compared to the virulent German nationalism that brought Adolf Hitler to power - has historically lent religious legitimacy to the rule of the Saudi royal family and its custodianship over Islam's holiest sites, Mecca and Medina. It has also blessed the source of Saudi Arabia's great wealth, its oil fields, as Allah's boon to the faithful.

But like a bolt from the blue, Wahhabism and the Islamic radicals it has inspired have suddenly reared up and struck terror in the heart of the West. Its suicidal zealots toppled the World Trade Center in New York, crashed into the Pentagon in Washington and torpedoed the traditional friendship binding US and Saudi governments.

Some of the Islamic experts consulted by DEBKA-Net-Weekly see a superficial parallel between the newfound aspiration of Saudi Wahhabism to export its teachings in militant form, and Khomeini's drive to export his extremist Shiite revolution after overthrowing the Shah, grabbing Iran's oilfields and booting American influence out of the country.

At the time, Khomeini's ambitions inspired extreme trepidation - especially in the United States. As it turned out, revolutionary Shiite doctrine never took root outside Iran, except among the Shiites of south Lebanon. No other co-religionist community, whether in Africa, Central Asia, Pakistan, Iraq or Afghanistan joined the revolution. Tehran has succeeded at best in planting Iranian intelligence posts and agents in some of those world communities.

Today, experts on Islam have come to regard Wahhabism as far more dangerous than Khomeinism. Though still a fledgling militant movement overseas, it is already spreading much faster than radical Shiism ever did, inflaming Arab and Muslim masses in Asia, Europe, the Middle East, North and South America, China, India and Pakistan, with religious fervor.

The rapid spread of this puritanical brand of Islam is stoked by four prime assets:

1.
It is a simplified form of Sunni orthodoxy, instructing believers only to strictly abide by the teachings of the Koran. Since the late 19th century, followers of the creed - first established in the mid-18th century by the puritanical Muslim reformer Muhammad ibn Abd al- Wahhab and the founder of the House of Saud - have interpreted their holy scripture as ordering them to hate foreigners because they are infidels and therefore impure or depraved.
That pact was endorsed by Saud's descendant, King Abdul Aziz bin Abdul Rahman Al Saud (Ibn Saud), who founded the modern-day Saudi kingdom, with the descendants of al-Wahab, imposing on the oil kingdom this fundamentalist form of Sunni orthodoxy.

2.
More than 80 percent of the roughly 1 billion Muslims in the world are Sunnis. This majority provides the Sunni Wahhabist fundamentalists with a much larger potential reservoir of adherents than the Shiites control, in which to plant their philosophy.

3.
Established and private Saudi institutions are all instrumental in their different ways in spreading Wahhabism. Of high importance is the Dawa, which draws pious donations from Saudi Arabia's rich and poor to support the propagation of Islam; the Ulama, the kingdom's ruling clergy which keeps its finger on the country's pulse and is in close rapport with every part of the country's population of 22.5 million; and the Saudi General Intelligence Service, which runs overt and covert Wahhabi activists as agents, couriers and informants.

4.
Osama bin Laden and his al Qaeda terrorist network whose leaders, claiming to be the true messengers of the Wahhabi faith, invite fellow-believers to enlist to their cause. The large majority of Saudi Wahhabi adherents are not active in al Qaeda but accept its ideological message. The minority, whose number is unknown, join up to form terror cells and serve in its intelligence and logistical branches.

Faced with the spread of militant Wahhabism, the US government can no longer afford to use shared interests to grease its corroding relations with Riyadh - especially since after September 11, 2001, many Americans began to regard their former Saudi allies as enemies.

But in recent months, American officials past and present have tried to reverse the adverse Saudi image in America, arguing that US-Saudi relations have always had their ups and downs, but differences were always ironed out to the mutual benefit. This was the sense of a comment from former secretary of state Henry Kissinger when he was asked about an explosive briefing delivered by a Rand Corp. analyst last August to the US Council on Foreign Relations. Depicting Saudi Arabia as America's enemy, the analyst said, "The Saudis are active at every level of the terror chain· Saudi Arabia is the kernel of evil, the prime mover, the most dangerous opponent" in the Middle East."

The briefing advised US officials to give Riyadh an ultimatum to stop backing terrorism "or face seizure of its oil fields and financial assets invested in America."

This is not the tenor in Washington today. Mid-echelon US officials now say that cooperation with the Saudi leadership is good, an opinion echoed by US commanders and officers in daily contact in the field with Saudi counterparts and by operational elements in the Central Intelligence Agency.

Clearly, according to DEBKA-Net-Weekly's Saudi sources, the government in Riyadh is striving to be forthcoming on American requests regarding Iraq and preparations for military action. Clearly too, the Saudis are anxious to show Washington how hard they are trying to rein in the extremists in the face of internal strife and power struggles at court. The Saudis have launched a calculated charm offensive towards the American people. Washington public relations wizards are reinforced by American apologists and Saudi princes who are usually shy of the media, all of whom are working hard to repair the kingdom's negative image in the United States.

Saud al-Faisal Speaks out

The most recent case in point was the interview that Saudi foreign minister Saud al-Faisal gave to CNN's Christiane Amanpour on November 4. His comments, reflecting the consensual view in the royal family, touched on Saudi and US positions on Iraq. But what Prince Saud had to say about 9/11 was the most revealing, as will be seen from some quotes:

"Saudi Arabia did not suddenly emerge from a friend and ally to the kernel of all evil in the Middle East because of anything that Saudi Arabia did. It is because of what [Osama] bin Laden planned and his plan [of] diabolically including 15 Saudis in his attack on the United States."

"He knew full well that he had other foot soldiers to use in [the September 11 attacks], but he chose Saudis and he chose Saudis for an intent and the intent -- a self-professed intent -- is to get the United States out of here ... [to] make a gulf between the United States and Saudi Arabia that is unbridgeable."

The prince stressed that Saudi Arabia stripped bin Laden of his Saudi citizenship in 1994 and froze all assets he had in the country. He went on to say:

"Saudis were just as distraught as Americans when they learned that their fellow countrymen were responsible for hijacking the four airliners that crashed into the World Trade Center towers, the Pentagon, and a rural Pennsylvania field. That fourth plane was most likely intended to hit another target in Washington, D.C.

"The trauma of the act, the reaction of the American people, I can sympathize with. There was no less a traumatic experience for the Saudis after what happened on 9/11.

"It was such a shock, such an unbelievable circumstance, such an event that cannot enter the consciousness of the Saudi people that Saudis did this violence that we said it was impossible." Speaking emotionally, Saud declared:

"We even denied that Saudis were involved. Until today, you will find people who will tell you that it is impossible that Saudis were there ... but that has struck us deep. Never again," he declared "are we going to let our young men and women be deluded by anybody in the way that we allowed our young men to be deluded when they went to Afghanistan for a jihad against an occupier and then be used for this horrendous, horrendous act of mass murder."

The Saudi foreign minister's comments were the first time any member of the royal family or official spokesman had ever acknowledged that 15 of the 19 suicide terrorists who carried out the 9/11 attacks were Saudis. At the same time, he cushioned the revelation by presenting Saudi involvement in the terrorist attacks as the result of a clever ruse by bin Laden to drive a wedge between the United States and Saudi Arabia.

The Saudi foreign minister expressed his sympathy for the suffering of the American people and emphasized that the attacks had been traumatic for his fellow countrymen too. Similar sentiments have been voiced over the past several months inside Saudi Arabia itself. In contrite tones, he promised the American people that his government would never again allow its young men to be led astray, as thousands were when they joined the jihad in Afghanistan, but rejected the claims that Riyadh was turning a blind eye to fund-raising for extremists.

Whether the Saudi foreign minister's soft words were spin or represented actions is hard to determine. It has never been easy to plumb the Saudi government's web-like domestic policies or their implementation. The House of Saud may well order tough restraints for young men joining radical groups - religious or political - as well as tightening controls on the charities and foundations that, while administering much of the kingdom's social welfare needs, are useful for secretly bankrolling al Qaeda.

2. Radicals Capitalize on Royal Succession Feud

In implementing sensitive policies for curbing radical activity, the Saudi rulers will have to take into account - as always - the bonds of kinship that are the very fabric of Saudi society.

DEBKA-Net-Weekly's Saudi sources note that Washington is not taking promises from ranking Saudis at face value. Mid-level Saudi bureaucrats in charge of implementing princely policy are being watched to see how far they deliver.

These officials are finding themselves caught between demands from the royal family above and the dictates of religious and tribal elements below - and are hard put to strike a balance between the two. Sometimes, they surrender to the undertow rather than superior authority - especially when flare-ups in the royal house produce conflicting royal orders.

For the moment, therefore, our sources see no sign of Saud's promises to rein in militants and choke off their funding - issues that go to the heart of the US war against terrorism - being translated into action.

This is the current state of affairs as reported by DEBKA-Net-Weekly's counter-terror sources:

A.
Far from drying up, the flow of funds to Wahhabi terror cells around the world has increased by some 22 percent in the last three months. US and Western intelligence counter-terror officials estimate $250 million to $300 million has reached the hands of elements directly linked to al-Qaeda in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Bosnia, Macedonia, the Philippines, Singapore, Hong Kong, Chechnya, Lebanon, Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan - and that is only a partial list. Most of the money moves in suitcases full of cash from western Saudi Arabian locations, although funds are also transferred through bank accounts, some held in the United States and Europe.

B.
Western intelligence circles know of no official restrictions imposed on the thousands of Saudis who returned home from fighting in al-Qaeda and Taliban ranks in Afghanistan. Neither is there any discernible Saudi effort to curtail their trips abroad, meaning they are free to shuttle between al Qaeda bases in the Middle East, Asia and Europe.

C.
Saudi intelligence continues to hold back on cooperation with investigations the Americans are running on Saudi involvement in al Qaeda. There is no willingness on Riyadh's part to hand over data on the presence of al Qaeda operatives in the kingdom or anywhere else in the world, although Saudi intelligence is fully apprised of their activities in domestic terror groups.

D.
No action is reported by Saudi authorities against Wahhabi clerics or preachers with known links to Saudi al-Qaeda members inside the country or abroad.

E.
Saud may have told Americans through the CNN TV network what they wanted to hear; neither he nor any Saudi official has ever been as candid over Saudi media, which leaves them misreporting now, just as they did a year ago, that the identities of the 15 Saudis who took part in the September 11 attacks were in doubt. Many Saudis still believe this.

As DEBKA-Net-Weekly has reported in recent issues, the September 11 shock fueled the succession battle in the House of Saud. King Fahd has been out of action since his stroke in 1995; Crown Prince Abdullah, the de facto ruler, is pinned down by his feud with rival claimants from the Sudairi branch headed by the king and his full brothers, defense minister Sultan, interior minister Naif and Riyadh governor Salman. Abdullah's authority for making policy and deciding the succession issue is severely hobbled by the standoff.

The two factions are jousting for the high ground by installing their supporters in key governmental and provincial posts. Spokesmen for the feuding princes push their policies by issuing public statements. Both need to woo religious conservative groups and cannot afford to take hostile action against the Wahhabi clergy or the causes it espouses, however much Riyadh needs to mend its fences with its American ally.

Prince Naif, who has been particularly vocal, seems to be jockeying for the next-in-line position for crown prince after his older brother Sultan. To this end, DEBKA-Net-Weekly's sources took special note of the visit he paid last week to the headquarters of the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice, a police force empowered to enforce Islamic moral values in the kingdom.
Naif made a show of appealing to this powerful body to tone down its constraints on the public and respect the individual citizen's right to privacy. But he also made sure of impressing on the commission that he respected its work. As interior minister, he denied the government in Riyadh had plans to abolish the religious police by merging it into the general security services.

Saudi Arabia's religious police is a body of 10,000 officers who are notorious for their extreme intolerance and their brutal methods for "persuading" citizens to carry out their religious duties and respect Islamic tradition. By his visit, Prince Naif will not have expected to win an ally in the palace struggle, only to deny Abdullah and his conservative camp the Commission's automatic support. This was a bold move to cut some ground from under his rivals.

What worries the Americans most about Prince Naif is not his bid for radical allies but, DEBKA-Net-Weekly's sources report, his role as custodian of the multi-billion dollar Dawa ("Invitation to Islam" ie missionary) fund. This fund derives its income from donations from worthy Muslims intent on furthering the dissemination of Islam.

One senior Western intelligence source who keeps track of the Dawa money flow told DEBKA-Net-Weekly:

"Prince Naif is not involved in fund-raising. His people don't go out and collect donations. But he certainly knows where the money is spent. His staff may contend that the money is going on spreading the word of Islam, on such worthy activities as education, health and social welfare - but a certain amount most definitely reaches the war chests of terrorist cells and networks, who exploit those pious causes to disguise their own.

The source reiterated that terrorism is best fought by drying up its financial resources. "The Saudi royal house must be made to stop the outflow of donations and charitable funds which, whether directly or not, are most certainly creamed off by the terrorists."

There is no doubt in the minds of DEBKA-Net-Weekly's Saudi experts that as long as the princes squabble over the succession, no coherent policy for curbing radical religious and anti-Western activity in the kingdom will take shape in Riyadh. Like Princes Saud and Naif, the heads of both of the warring camps agree on the urgent necessity for mending Saudi Arabia's reputation in the United States and restoring friendly ties with Washington. But this united front cracks whenever the ruling princes try to agree on the distance they need to go to make their peace with the Americans. That jagged crack is the point of entry for the radical Wahhabis and al Qaeda terrorists.

HOT POINTS
(that you may have missed in DEBKAfile Round-the-Clock)
A Digest of the Week's Exclusives

4 November: This week, two Egyptian TV channels begin running an extravagantly-produced serial based on the notorious Protocols of the Elders of Zion, an anti-Jewish document judged a forgery by historians. It will be aired nightly during the peak viewing period of the Muslim Ramadan, by the Egyptian channels - Dream TV, a private satellite channel, and the state-run Channel 2.

DEBKAfile's Middle East sources report "The Horse without Horseman" was produced by Arab Radio and Television of Saudi Arabia as an epic that was written, directed and played by Egyptians. It portrays the fictional Elders, the purported blueprint for Jewish global domination, as historical fact, and also the guiding principle of Israeli policy. A director of the program says the series "is based on the history of Zionism".

Calls to cancel the Horse without Horseman, especially from the US government - on the grounds that it stokes hatred, bigotry and racism in a region that already suffers a surfeit of destructive emotions - were rebuffed by Cairo.

Egyptian information minister Safwat el-Sherif declared earlier he could not see what the fuss was about. "Our media policy," he says, "is to respect all monotheistic religions."

This righteous assertion might be taken at face value were it not for light shed by a publication that accompanied last month's seizure of 800 hostages at a Moscow theater by Chechen terrorists. DEBKAfile's counter-terror sources cite articles appearing in the Chechen separatists' Web site Qoqaz.com at the time of the siege crisis. The site is written in Arabic and preaches adherence to the Wahhabist Sunni doctrine, noting the stress it places on Tawhid, the principle of monotheism in its purest form. In the Middle Ages, the North African Muhaddin who came to the aid of Spain's Muslims in fending off European Christian assaults, fought under the battle cry of Tawhid.

One article, captioned: Guide to the Perplexed on the Killing of Captives, appears in a section called "Jihad News from Caucasian Land". According to the directives laid down for the treatment of captives, all based on Koranic exegesis, polytheists and People of the Book (Christians and Jews) must be killed out of hand; for them, no pardons or ransoms are tolerated. In Wahhabi eyes, Christians are no better than polytheists for believing in Jesus as the Son of God. Their refusal to recognize the People of the Book as monotheists is not explained. However, uncovering this Wahhabi definition of monotheism also bares the intolerance for non-Islamic faiths concealed behind the Egyptian information minister's sanctimonious declaration of respect for all "monotheistic" religions.

5 November: Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon announced Tuesday, November 5, he had opted for an early election in January 2003 - reluctantly as the lesser evil, rather than bow to "political extortion".

This decision touched off a whirlwind of political action before Tuesday afternoon. In a broadcast news conference mobbed by the media, he denounced Labor's walkout from the unity government last week - which left him with a minority government based on 55 out of 120 seats - as "politically capricious and irresponsible".

Former Likud prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu is Sharon's foremost challenger for the party leadership. The two will confront each other in the Likud primary whose date will be put forward in view of the early election. Tuesday, Sharon repeated his invitation to Netanyahu to join the government - but advised him to follow the example of Shaul Mofaz's acceptance of the defense ministry without posing pre-conditions. Netanyahu quickly announced he would serve as foreign minister under Sharon until the general election.

Sharon strongly reiterated his commitment to a national unity coalition government that represented the widest common consensus. He insisted he would not depart either from his government's basic guidelines, the profound strategic relations he established with Washington and the White House, or the framework of the 2003 budget (that passed its first reading last week).

At first light on Tuesday, Sharon obtained the president's consent to dissolve the Knesset. He did not resign, nor was he defeated in Monday's no confidence vote. The government will serve in office for the 90 days required by law until election-day. This Knesset, the 16th, will have seen two foreshortened administrations come and go: the first was led by Labor leader Ehud Barak, whose fall was succeeded by Sharon's election victory. One of the Likud leader's first legislative initiatives was to abrogate the law separating the votes for prime minister and party. Next January, the voter will mark a single party ballot. The prime minister will be selected by the party in advance of the election. However, any extreme war eruptions climaxing before election-day could lead to the postponement of the general election, according to the precedent of the 1973 Yom Kippur War.

6 November: Egypt, with quiet American encouragement, is engaged in a complicated diplomatic maneuver to persuade the Hamas to halt its suicide-murder attacks on Israelis by setting up meetings in Cairo between PLO representatives and the Damascus-based leaders of the Hamas: Khaled Mash'al and Abu Marzuk. This initiative comes from officials in the US State Department and European Union, led by Colin Powell and Javier Solana.

DEBKAfile's political analysts note that both these officials cling against all odds to their dream of persuading Yasser Arafat to one day give up terror. Their latest ploy addresses the Islamic extremes of the Palestinian movement, the Hamas and the Jihad Islami, the idea being that if they are induced to stop their suicidal terror practices, the Tanzim and al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades run by Arafat's Fatah will follow suit. All these parties are perfectly aware that it is an exercise in futility in the light of Yasser Arafat's latest pursuit in the privacy of his Ramallah headquarters.

According to DEBKAfile's Palestinian sources, while the Palestinian leader misses no opportunity of pointing to his "reforms", he is in fact deeply engaged in welding the two deadliest arms of his Fatah, along with the remnants of numerous disbanded security services, into a single force. On the face of it, he is meeting Washington's demand for a single security force.

But this force is not exactly what the Americans had in mind. Its backbone is composed, in fact, of the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, declared a terrorist organization last month by President George W. Bush, and the Tanzim militia. The purpose of the merger is to improve the efficiency of Arafat's mass-murder machine and tighten its links with the Iraqi military intelligence undercover base in Amman, as well as with Iraqi and Palestinian terror groups in Baghdad,

Some Palestinian leaders have taken fright from Arafat's army venture, fearing its repercussions for the Palestinian people. Those officials believe Arafat's expanded terror campaign in mid-war will land West Bank and Gaza Strip Palestinians on the wrong side of the US-Iraq conflict, destroying all their hopes of a future state.

DEBKAfile's Palestinian sources report the battle lines over the future of the al Aqsa Brigades are now drawn between two opposing camps:

1.
Arafat and his pro-Iraqi lieutenants who remain holed up in his Ramallah quarters since the Israeli siege earlier this year. The most important is Colonel Tawfik Tirawi, the intelligence chief who is the undeclared commander of the al-Aqsa brigades. Arafat is also supported by two ministers whom he named for his new government lineup last week, Samir Rocha, Minister for Jerusalem and Saddam's paymaster for the families of suicide killers, and Azzam al Ahmad, Housing Minister and Arafat's unofficial ambassador to Baghdad.

2.
Disapproval of Arafat's new military venture has made strange bedfellows. On the one hand, the radical Fatah leader and foreign minister, Farouk Kaddoumi, who never set foot in Palestinian areas in protest against the 1993 Oslo Accords; on the other, the moderate Mahmoud Abbas, known as Abu Mazen, who has found acceptance in Washington as a prospective Palestinian prime minister to rival Arafat. Both are furious with Arafat for flouting a decision reached by the Fatah Central Committee and its Revolutionary Council to disband the al Aqsa Brigades. Arafat has ignored the ruling bodies of his own organization and made a mockery of them.
Abu Mazen, a political wheeler and dealer rather than terrorist, privately predicts disaster for the Palestinian people if the Hamas and the al-Aqsa Brigades are not forcibly reined in. But this former official successor to Arafat lacks the muscle to put his wishes into effect and can do nothing, he has told his confidants, until Arafat ceases to be chairman of the Palestinian Authority. Abu Mazen is not prepared for a showdown with Arafat.

A third veteran and long time Arafat loyalist, Sahar Habash, also fears that the al-Aqsa Brigades' deeds and their manipulation by Iraqi intelligence will drag the Palestinians into the coming war.

For two years, Habash was Arafat's personal representative in the Intifada Committees that coordinated Fatah terrorist activities with Hamas and Islamic Jihad. Now, he has gone over to the anti-Arafat camp led by Kaddoumi and Abu Mazen.

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