This PolicyWatch is the third in a three-part series examining the situation in Lebanon two years after the implementation of UN Security Council Resolution 1701. This series coincides with the twenty-fifth anniversary of the Marine barracks bombing in Lebanon on October 23, 1983, an attack that continues to inform U.S. policymaking in Lebanon and throughout the Middle East.
On October 3, the Department of Justice published the revised Attorney General Guidelines (AGG), which govern all Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) activities, including those involving international terrorism. The AGG comes into effect on December 1, 2008, and will consolidate procedures controlling the FBI's various investigative programs. Although members of Congress, civil rights groups, and the media have criticized the AGG, the revision is a necessary and important step for the FBI's counterterrorism investigations as well as all of the Bureau's investigative programs. Justice Department and FBI officials, however, will have to exert strong leadership to ensure the appropriate and effective implementation of the guidelines.
Although recognized as a political flashpoint, the Iraqi province of Kirkuk is suffering from a largely overlooked security crisis that has improved little since the beginning of the 2007 U.S. military "surge." The decline in reported insurgent attacks in Kirkuk has been relatively small, dropping from a monthly average of 169 violent incidents in 2007 to 122 in 2008. This 28 percent decline compares with 91 percent in Baghdad during the same period, and the per capita number of attacks in Kirkuk city is actually twice that of Baghdad. Considering these statistics, providing security support for the political process in the tense months and years to come has become a critical priority.
Nearly twenty years ago, on December 21, 1988, PanAm Flight 103 from London to New York exploded in midair over the Scottish town of Lockerbie, killing all 259 people on board. Last weekend, according to an unconfirmed report in the International Herald Tribune, Musa Kusa, the Libyan intelligence chief widely believed to have planned the terror attack, visited Washington for talks with intelligence and military officials. The same week saw a telephone conversation between President Bush and Libyan leader Muammar Qadhafi, a meeting at the State Department between Qadhafi's eldest son Saif al-Islam and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, and the Senate confirmation of the first American ambassador to Libya in thirty-six years. This new chapter offers areas of cooperation, but the United States must proceed with caution.
A handful of members and persons close to Jemaah Islamiyah (JI), Indonesia's most prominent extremist organisation, have developed a profitable publishing consortium in and around the pesantren (religious school) founded by Abu Bakar Ba'asyir and Abdullah Sungkar in Solo, Central Java. The consortium has become an important vehicle for the dissemination of jihadi thought, getting cheap and attractively printed books into mosques, bookstores and discussion groups. The publishing venture demonstrates JI's resilience and the extent to which radical ideology has developed roots in Indonesia. The Indonesian government should monitor these enterprises more closely, but they may be playing a useful role by channelling JI energies into waging jihad through the printed page rather than acts of violence.
American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research
Abstract:
The State Department is counseling Turkey to make political concessions to the Kurdistan Workers' Party, the terrorist organization that launched an attack in Turkey in October. Michael Rubin argues that this would be a mistake and urges the United States to stand by its long-time NATO ally in its fight against terrorism.
Alternatives: Turkish Journal of International Relations
Institution:
Center for International Conflict Resolution at Yalova University
Abstract:
The ranging balance of terror exercise across different segments of the global society at the turn of the 21st century, exemplify a seeming unequal relationship between the North and the South[1], which is nevertheless based on the formal socio-politico-economic inequality of the global system. The terrorist attacks are reflection of the changing clout of the various local and International actors, emanating out of our social life, political firmaments, economic sphere of different social classes and national states, and in our practice of democracy, rule of law, which underscores dangerous centrifugal trends and the deeply contradictions which global structural imbalance continue to prop up.
Madrid and London terrorist attacks in 2004 and 2005, European counterparts to those carried out in New York and Washington during 2001, have steadily increased EU institutions' concern about the phenomenon of violent radicalization, specially that of Islamist nature, as a possible previous step leading to Jihadist terrorism in a context of a continuous and even growing flow of immigration, namely from Muslim origins. The European Council deems paramount to achieve a deeper cooperation between civil society and authorities towards the prevention of these radicalization phenomena.
Bacillus anthracis, the etiological agent of anthrax, has been the main biological warfare agent studied and produced by countries that have historically retained biological weapons programmes. However, it has also been of interest to terrorist groups like al-Qaida and was the agent responsible for the Amerithrax crisis after the 11 September 2001 terrorist attacks. This paper aims at analysing all these facts with emphasis on the Amerithrax crisis, and the possibility that jihadist terrorism could use this biological agent in terrorist attacks. Bacillus anthracis, el agente etiológico del carbunco, ha sido el principal agente biológico estudiado y producido por los países que han contado con un programa de armas biológicas a lo largo de la historia. Sin embargo, también ha sido objeto de interés por parte de grupos terroristas como al-Qaida, y dio lugar a la denominada crisis del Amerithrax, también conocida como la «crisis del ántrax», tras los atentados del 11 de septiembre de 2001. Este trabajo analiza todos estos hechos haciendo especial hincapié en la crisis del Amerithrax y en la posibilidad de que el terrorismo yihadista pueda utilizar este agente biológico en atentados terroristas.
Manifestations of Islamic activism are abundant in Jordan. Traditional allies of the monarchy, the Muslim Brotherhood has participated in politics when the regime has opted for political openness. However, their moderation in domestic politics has been accompanied by a growing radicalisation with respect to foreign policy issues. In addition, Jordan has been a leading centre for Salafi intellectual output for decades. The emergence of a Jihadi current in the 1990s led to the creation of the first armed groups and Jihadi ideas have found favour with certain sectors of society in the country. Military intervention in Iraq and, in particular, the figure of Abu Musaf Al Zarqawi have resulted in Jordan becoming a favourite Al Qaeda target.