An American from Pakistan arrested over Time Square bomb plot
DEBKAfile Special Report
May 4, 2010, 12:44 AM (GMT+02:00)
Faisal Shahzad, 30, a US citizen from Pakistan, was arrested at New York's JFK airport Monday night trying to board a flight to Dubai and will appear before a federal court Tuesday, May 4. He was identified as the buyer of the Nissan Pathfinder used to rig the failed car bomb. US Attorney General Eric Holder said that more than one person is sought in connection with the attempted terrorist plot.
Shahzad's information is vital for uncovering the extent of the conspiracy and its potential for more terrorist attacks in New York or other American cities.
US security officials began screening passengers boarding domestic and foreign flights out of Boston, New York and Philadelphia Monday night, May 3, hoping to snare a likely foreign terrorist or terrorists on the run after planting the Times Square car bomb. By then, US officials had come around to accepting that the failed car bomb attack was coordinated by more than one person - possibly even a foreign terrorist organization - and no longer cast doubt on the credibility of the Pakistani Taliban's claim of responsibility.
The investigation got off to a slow start due to the initial skepticism in the administration and New York City Hall to the possibility of a high-profile terrorist operation which called for immediate, comprehensive action.
Shortly after the car bomb parked near on Times Square was defused safely Saturday night, May 1, debkafile reported: Our terror experts doubt that he was a loner. Surveillance was needed to locate the bomb vehicle and possibly steal or buy it from the used car junkyard, several hands must have assembled the materials and prepared the explosive device, and his lightning disappearance indicates that a getaway car must have been on hand to whisk him away from the scene before the police arrived.
NY Police Commissioner Ray Kelly said the bomb made up of propane tanks, fertilizer and gasoline, which failed to detonate in the SUV, could have produced " significant fireball" in the heart of Midtown Manhattan Saturday night May 1 had it worked properly. It was detected when smoke billowed out of the parked vehicle near Time Square.
The next day, we headlined the Pakistani Taliban's claim of responsibility, taped in advance by its top bomb-maker, Qari Hussain Mehsud, and strengthened a few hours later by the release of a videotape allegedly made by Pakistani Taliban leader Hakimullah Mehsud on April 4, weeks after he was reported killed by a US missile strike in January, and ignored at the time.
On that nine-minute tape, he vowed retaliation for the killing of Islamist leaders: "The time is very near when our fedayeen will attack the American states in the major cities."
Shortly before he was killed by a US drone in Aug. 2009, his predecessor, Baitullah Mehsud, claimed his movement was now able to execute operations inside the United States.
US security officials did not take this claim seriously. However the evidence against Najibullah Zazi, the Detroit taxi driver charged in February with conspiring to attack the New York subway, reveals that al Qaeda in Pakistan recruited him when he arrived their to join Taliban. The two movements' campaign of violence against the United States and US targets in Pakistan is so closely coordinated as to be virtually interchangeable.
Therefore, when Qari Hussein claimed Taliban was avenging "martyred leaders," he included Abu Omar al Baghdadi, the al Qaeda commander in Iraq killed by a joint US-Iraqi intelligence team in mid-April.
He also warned NATO governments to denounce the US and apologize for "the massacres in Iraq, Yemen, Afghanistan, and Pakistani tribal areas - otherwise be prepared for the worst destruction and devastation in their own countries."
