Islamabad:
The suicide bomber who killed seven CIA officers and a Jordanian spy last week was a double agent who was taken onto the base in Afghanistan because the Americans hoped he might be able to deliver top members of the Qaida network, according to a Western official briefed on the matter.
The bomber had been a recruited by the Jordanian intelligence service and taken to Afghanistan weeks earlier to infiltrate al-Qaida by posing as a foreign jihadi, the official said.
But in a deadly turnabout, the supposed informant strapped explosives to his body and blew himself up at a meeting last Wednesday at the CIA's Forward Operating Base Chapman in the southeastern province of Khost. The attack at the CIA base dealt a devastating blow to the spy agency's operations against militants in the remote mountains of Afghanistan, eliminating an elite team using an informant with impeccable jihadi credentials. The attack further delayed hope of destroying al-Qaida, and also seemed potent evidence of the network's ability to strike back against its American pursuers.
It could also jeopardize relations between the CIA and the Jordanian spy service, which officials said had vouched for the would-be informant. The Jordanian service, called the General Intelligence Directorate, has for years been one of the CIA's closest and most useful allies in the Middle East.
In a telephone interview, a person associated with the Pakistani Taliban identified the bomber as Humam Khalil Mohammed, a Jordanian physician.
The bomber was able to elude base security and was not closely searched because of his perceived value as someone who could lead U.S. forces to senior Qaida leaders, and because the Jordanian intelligence officer had identified him as a potentially valuable informant, the Western official said.
Current and former U.S. officials said Monday that because of Mohammed's medical background, he might have been recruited to find the whereabouts of Ayman al Zawahiri, an Egyptian physician who is al-Qaida's second in command.
Top agency officers had traveled from Kabul to Khost for a meeting with the informant, a sign that the CIA had come to trust the informant and were eager to learn what he might have gleaned from operations in the field, according to a former CIA official with experience in Afghanistan.
The former official said the fact that militants could carry out a successful attack using a double agent showed their strength even after a steady barrage of missile strikes fired by CIA drone aircraft. "Double agent operations are really complex," he said. "The fact that they can pull this off shows that they are not really on the run. They have the ability to kick back and think about these things."
The Jordanian handler, Capt. Sharif Ali bin Zeid, was the eighth person killed in the blast. Zeid's death was reported in recent days by Jordanian officials, but they did not confirm where specifically he was killed or what he was doing in Afghanistan.
Jordanian intelligence officials were deeply embarrassed by the attacks because they had taken the informant to the Americans, said one Jordanian government official briefed on the events.
The official said that the Jordanians had such a good reputation with U.S. intelligence officials that the informant was not screened before entering the compound.
Jarret Brachman, author of "Global Jihadism: Theory and Practice" and a consultant to the U.S. government about terrorism, said in a telephone interview that Humam Khalil Muhammad used the online persona, Abu Dujana al-Khorasani, and was an influential jihadi voice on the Web.
"He's one of the most revered authors on the jihadists' forums," said Brachman. "He's in the top five jihadists. He's one of the biggest guns out there."
Brachman said that Al-Fajr Media, which is al-Qaida's official media distribution network, conducted an interview with Abu Dujana al-Khorasani published in al-Qaida's online magazine, Vanguards of Khorasan.
The name of the bomber was first reported by Al Jazeera, which identified him as Humam Khalil Abu-Mulal al-Balawi. The television network reported that al-Balawi was brought to Afghanistan to help track down Zawahiri.
The incident was also embarrassing for Jordanian officials who did not want the depths of their cooperation with the CIA revealed to their own citizens, or other Arabs in the region.
The bomber had been a recruited by the Jordanian intelligence service and taken to Afghanistan weeks earlier to infiltrate al-Qaida by posing as a foreign jihadi, the official said.
But in a deadly turnabout, the supposed informant strapped explosives to his body and blew himself up at a meeting last Wednesday at the CIA's Forward Operating Base Chapman in the southeastern province of Khost. The attack at the CIA base dealt a devastating blow to the spy agency's operations against militants in the remote mountains of Afghanistan, eliminating an elite team using an informant with impeccable jihadi credentials. The attack further delayed hope of destroying al-Qaida, and also seemed potent evidence of the network's ability to strike back against its American pursuers.
It could also jeopardize relations between the CIA and the Jordanian spy service, which officials said had vouched for the would-be informant. The Jordanian service, called the General Intelligence Directorate, has for years been one of the CIA's closest and most useful allies in the Middle East.
In a telephone interview, a person associated with the Pakistani Taliban identified the bomber as Humam Khalil Mohammed, a Jordanian physician.
The bomber was able to elude base security and was not closely searched because of his perceived value as someone who could lead U.S. forces to senior Qaida leaders, and because the Jordanian intelligence officer had identified him as a potentially valuable informant, the Western official said.
Current and former U.S. officials said Monday that because of Mohammed's medical background, he might have been recruited to find the whereabouts of Ayman al Zawahiri, an Egyptian physician who is al-Qaida's second in command.
Top agency officers had traveled from Kabul to Khost for a meeting with the informant, a sign that the CIA had come to trust the informant and were eager to learn what he might have gleaned from operations in the field, according to a former CIA official with experience in Afghanistan.
The former official said the fact that militants could carry out a successful attack using a double agent showed their strength even after a steady barrage of missile strikes fired by CIA drone aircraft. "Double agent operations are really complex," he said. "The fact that they can pull this off shows that they are not really on the run. They have the ability to kick back and think about these things."
The Jordanian handler, Capt. Sharif Ali bin Zeid, was the eighth person killed in the blast. Zeid's death was reported in recent days by Jordanian officials, but they did not confirm where specifically he was killed or what he was doing in Afghanistan.
Jordanian intelligence officials were deeply embarrassed by the attacks because they had taken the informant to the Americans, said one Jordanian government official briefed on the events.
The official said that the Jordanians had such a good reputation with U.S. intelligence officials that the informant was not screened before entering the compound.
Jarret Brachman, author of "Global Jihadism: Theory and Practice" and a consultant to the U.S. government about terrorism, said in a telephone interview that Humam Khalil Muhammad used the online persona, Abu Dujana al-Khorasani, and was an influential jihadi voice on the Web.
"He's one of the most revered authors on the jihadists' forums," said Brachman. "He's in the top five jihadists. He's one of the biggest guns out there."
Brachman said that Al-Fajr Media, which is al-Qaida's official media distribution network, conducted an interview with Abu Dujana al-Khorasani published in al-Qaida's online magazine, Vanguards of Khorasan.
The name of the bomber was first reported by Al Jazeera, which identified him as Humam Khalil Abu-Mulal al-Balawi. The television network reported that al-Balawi was brought to Afghanistan to help track down Zawahiri.
The incident was also embarrassing for Jordanian officials who did not want the depths of their cooperation with the CIA revealed to their own citizens, or other Arabs in the region.
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