Capture of Bin Laden deputy could destroy Al-Qaida
The capture of Abu Zubaydah, al-Qaida’s most senior commander, is one of the most significant developments in the war on terrorism, experts said.
Zubaydah knows the names, faces and locations of numerous al-Qaida operatives all over the world, US officials said.
He may also know the hiding place of Osama bin Laden.
‘‘It is a major, major victory, if not the biggest victory so far,’’ said Stan Bedlington, a former senior terrorism analyst with the CIA. ‘‘He is the biggest fish that we have caught.’’
Pakistani authorities, helped by the CIA and FBI, caught Zubaydah at a compound in Faisalabad, far from the Afghan border, US officials said.
He was shot three times trying to escape - in the stomach, groin and leg - but was expected to survive, said one official.
He is in US custody, but it was unclear if he remains in Pakistan, is among the 20 al-Qaida suspects to be sent to the US naval station at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, or whether he will be transported to a separate location.
Zubaydah acknowledged his identity, Pakistani officials said. Other former associates have also identified him, US officials said.
Only bin Laden, Ayman al-Zawahri and Mohammed Atef ranked higher in the terrorist network. Atef was killed by US air strikes in November.
Zubaydah has been linked by intelligence and police officials to at least five al-Qaida terrorist plots, including the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Centre and Pentagon. The extent of his role, however, has not been fully determined.
Captured al-Qaida operatives said he organised the millennium plots to blow up Los Angeles International Airport and the Radisson SAS Hotel in Amman. Both were thwarted.
In 2000, a Jordanian military court found him guilty in absentia of conspiracy to carry out terrorist attacks and he was sentenced to death in absentia.
Zubaydah, a 31-year-old Palestinian who was born in Saudi Arabia, was also tied to thwarted plots to blow up the US embassies in Paris and in Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina, after September 11.
US officials said they were investigating his links to the attacks on the USS Cole and the bombings of the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania.
‘‘We have followed him for a very long time - a very dangerous character,’’ National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice said.
Since the United States attacked Afghanistan, Zubaydah has led an effort to reorganise al-Qaida in Pakistan. Financial transfers and intercepted communications suggested he was directing attempts to conduct new terrorist attacks against US interests, US officials said.
Officials cautioned that Zubaydah’s arrest, while a major blow to al-Qaida, does not end the group’s threat. Cells are still operating, and the group has several other leaders capable of organising them.
Bedlington suggested Zubaydah’s high position in al-Qaida may have given him access to bin Laden’s post-September 11 plans - including his hideouts and how to contact him. That is information US intelligence can exploit, if Zubaydah talks, Bedlington said.
