Former Guantanamo detainees fuel growing al-Qaeda cell

[TomCADem]

Source: Washington Post

SANAA, YEMEN -- Former detainees of the U.S. prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, have led and fueled the growing assertiveness of the al-Qaeda branch that claimed responsibility for the attempted Christmas Day bombing of a U.S. airliner, potentially complicating the Obama administration's efforts to shut down the facility.

They include two Saudi nationals: the deputy leader of al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, Said Ali al-Shihri, and the group's chief theological adviser, Ibrahim Suleiman al Rubaish. Months after their release to Saudi Arabia, both crossed the kingdom's porous border into Yemen and rejoined the terrorist network.

Shihri and Rubaish were released under the Bush administration, as was a Yemeni man killed in a government raid this month while allegedly plotting an attack on the British Embassy. A Yemeni official said Tuesday that the government thinks he is the first Yemeni to have joined al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula after being released from Guantanamo.

That a group partially led by former Guantanamo detainees may have equipped and trained Nigerian bombing suspect Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab is likely to raise more questions about plans to repatriate those prisoners to Yemen. Six were released last week; 80 Yemenis are now left at Guantanamo, nearly half the remaining detainee population. Many are heavily radicalized, with strong ties to extremist individuals or groups in Yemen, said U.S. officials and terrorism analysts.



Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/12/29/AR2009122902289.html

[EFerrari]

1. I'd like to see what Seton Hall says before I believe anything the WaHo puts out. n/t

[Solly Mack]

3. I'd like to see what they have to say as well.

[pundaint]

2. I have always been amazed that former Viet Nam POW's haven't blown some shit up over there.

It seems only to be expected that some Gitmo alumni might be radicalized.

[notadmblnd]

4. I wonder if that was their assignment when they were released?

hell, they tortured these people, who knows what other tricks they played with their minds.

[Peace Patriot]

5. The Washington Psst seems to be reprinting CIA emails verbatim, without even bothering

to say "according to officials in (name the agency--Pentagon? CIA? NSA?) who asked to remain anonymous because they are not authorized to speak for (name the agency)." There is NO attribution in the first three paragraphs up to the world "a Yemeni official." So WHO is saying that, "Former detainees of the U.S. prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, have led and fueled the growing assertiveness of the al-Qaeda branch...blah, blah, blah"???

I don't click on Washington Psst articles. So I don't know if they ever come up with a "spokesperson," anonymous or not. Paragraph 4 ends with "said U.S. officials and terrorism analysts." That's way late in the media psyops game, given all of the assertions above it. And it's also way vague. They could be "consulting" Donald Rumsfeld, for all we know.

Anybody who reads the rest and finds a name or more specific attribution, do tell. Meanwhile, I think we can be safe in assuming that this is utter crapola straight from "Operation Mind-Bend."

[damntexdem]

6. Yeah, Gitmo sure has made us safer, Dubya.

And it was your administration that released these guys.