Saddam gave 75 trained operatives new local identities
Posted: November 21, 2003
1:00 a.m. Eastern
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Arab diplomatic sources said al-Qaida began sending top operatives to Iraq in October 2002 as part of an agreement with then-President Saddam Hussein.
Interrogations of captured insurgents revealed that al-Qaida established its network in Iraq by sending five insurgency squads, each containing 15 trained combatants skilled in recruitment and explosives.
Saddam gave squad members new identities linking them with prominent Iraqi families. Over the last two months, Iraqi and U.S. intelligence agents have identified some of these operatives.
Among the senior al-Qaida operatives in Iraq are Othman Suleiman Daoud, an Afghan national. Daoud was believed based in the Sunni Triangle, north of Baghdad, the focus of the insurgency against the U.S. military.
Another al-Qaida leader in Iraq is Faraj Shaabi, a Libyan national. The sources said Shaabi spent most of the last decade in Sudan until he was ordered by Osama bin Laden to transfer to Iraq last year.
Estimates of al-Qaida's strength in Iraq vary. Diplomatic sources say the al-Qaida network controls up to 3,000 Islamic volunteers from such countries as Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Libya, Saudi Arabia, Sudan and Yemen.
Saddam loyalists have aided and financed the al-Qaida network.
Al-Qaida has also used operatives from satellite organizations for operations in Iraq. Two of the leading operatives are Amin Hadad, known as Baba al Nada, and Mohammed Talahi, known as Zakariya. The two men were believed to have helped recruit and train suicide bombers, including those who blew themselves up in four attacks in Baghdad on Monday.
Al-Qaida recruited the two operatives from the Salafist Brigade for Combat and Call, regarded as the leading subcontractor to al-Qaida. The Salafist group is based in Algeria but has agents in Europe and Iraq.
"Since mid-July we have seen the reconstitution of Ansar al Islam and Al-Qaida," said Paul Bremer, U.S. administrator in Iraq. "They are coming back into Iraq."
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