Commitment of death
They were former classmates at a New York high school, both on a
mission to join the Taliban and fight US forces in Afghanistan.
But when Zarein Ahmedzay and Najibullah Zazi arrived in Pakistan in
the summer of 2008, two high-ranking al-Qaida operatives gave them
another set of marching orders.
“They told us we would be more useful if we returned to New York
City, to conduct operations,” Ahmedzay said Friday in a guilty plea that
offered more chilling details of a foiled plot attack on the New York
City subways last fall.
Asked by a judge in federal court in Brooklyn what kind of
operations, he responded: “Suicide-bombing operations.” The attacks were
to coincide with Ramadan and target landmarks, but the plan was scaled
back because the conspirators didn’t have enough homemade explosives.
The plea also marked the first time prosecutors named the al-Qaida
operatives involved in the high-profile case.
Assistant US Attorney Jeffrey Knox identified them as Saleh al-Somali
and Rashid Rauf, who were both killed in Pakistan. The US Justice
Department on Friday described al-Somali as the head of international
operations for al-Qaida.
Al-Somali was killed in a drone strike in December. Rauf, a British
militant linked to a jetliner bomb plot, was also killed in a Predator
strike in November 2008. Knox said Ahmedzay met with a third senior al-Qaida
operative in a training camp in northern Waziristan in Pakistan. He has
not been identified. Prosecutors say the 25-year-old Ahmedzay — who
pleaded guilty to conspiracy to use weapons of mass destruction and
other charges — joined Zazi and Adis Medunjanin, another friend from
their Queens high school, on the trip to Pakistan to seek terrorism
training.
Zazi, a Colorado airport van driver, admitted this year that he
tested bomb-making materials in a Denver suburb before traveling by car
to New York with the intent of attacking the subway system to avenge US
military involvement in Afghanistan.
Ahmedzay, who had been licensed to drive a taxi in New York, said
Friday that al-Qaida leadership encouraged the men to target “well-known
structures” in New York to cause “maximum casualties.” He said they also
decided that the attack should occur during the Muslim holy month of
Ramadan, between August 22 to September 20.
Ahmedzay quoted heavily from a jihad verse in the Quran and urged
Americans to “stop supporting the war against Islam.” “I’m thankful for
myself that I didn’t harm anyone, but I feel someone else will do the
same thing,” he said.
Prosecutors said the three settled on the subways after Zazi
determined he could only make enough explosives for a smaller attack in
time for Ramadan, and decided it would happen Sept. 14, 15 or 16.
Prosecutors say the attacks were modeled after the London transit system
bombings in July 2005, when four suicide bombers killed 52 people and
themselves in an attack on three subway trains and a bus.
The New York plot was disrupted in early September when police
officials stopped Zazi’s car as it entered New York. Last month, an
Afghanistan-born imam linked to the suspects pleaded guilty to lying to
the FBI when asked about the men. He was sentenced to time served and
ordered to leave the United States.
Attorney General Eric Holder said Friday that the plot “makes clear
we face a continued threat from al-Qaida and its affiliates overseas.”
“With three guilty pleas already and the investigation continuing,
this prosecution underscores the importance of using every tool we have
available to both disrupt plots against our nation and hold suspected
terrorists accountable,” he said.
Adam Goldman, AP |
