Pakistani jihad group implicated in Mumbai attacks was gateway for Western converts turning to jihad

The "express lane" to jihad missions.

It is odd, and noteworthy, that this Wall Street Journal article would matter-of-factly use the word "jihad" to mean, quite obviously, the Islamic concept of warfare against unbelievers -- just days after the Journal's James Taranto sniffed at Geert Wilders as an "anti-Islamic provocateur" for reporting accurately about Islamic texts and teachings. You can see my comments on the Taranto piece here, and Julia Gorin adds her own here.

"Lashkar-e-Taiba Served as Gateway for Western Converts Turning to Jihad," by Susan Schmidt and Siobhan Gorman for the Wall Street Journal, December 4:

Lashkar-e-Taiba, the Pakistani group suspected in the Mumbai attacks, has a history of documented links to al Qaeda and has trained many of the militants who have landed in U.S. and British jails since 9/11.

The group is of particular concern to intelligence officials and terrorism experts because it has become a major gateway to jihad for some disaffected people in the West, including converts to Islam.

Lashkar has been enmeshed in Pakistan's long struggle with India over the disputed territory of Kashmir, but it has also been a training hub for militant Islamic fighters who joined conflicts in Afghanistan, Bosnia, Kosovo and Chechnya. The group has received funding from donors in Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, including from an al Qaeda financier, according to U.S. government testimony and Central Intelligence Agency records.

Westerners who have passed through Lashkar-e-Taiba's training camps include Australian al Qaeda operative David Hicks, convicted "shoe bomber" Richard Reid and Dhiren Barot, the mastermind of a failed gas-cylinder bombing plot in London who prepared detailed blueprints for al Qaeda of buildings in New York's financial district, according to information that emerged in legal proceedings. Mr. Barot, a British subject and a Hindu who converted to Islam, trained with Lashkar, then became an instructor at a mujahideen camp in Afghanistan and joined al Qaeda.

High-ranking al Qaeda operative Abu Zubayda was captured in late 2002 in a Lashkar safe house in Faisalabad, Pakistan. Al Qaeda recruits from Lashkar were among those killed when the U.S. carried out missile strikes against training camps in Afghanistan in the wake of the 1998 bombings of the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. [...]

The U.S. government has extensive evidence of Lashkar's efforts to kill Americans. Much of it is contained in court statements by U.S. officials in proceedings in courts in the U.S., France and the U.K.

In recent years, since al Qaeda has re-established its base of operations in Pakistan, some officials contend its ties with Lashkar and similar Pakistani militant groups have grown tighter. "We see the Pakistanization of al Qaeda," said Afghanistan's ambassador to the U.S., Said T. Jawad. "Pakistanis are moving higher up in al Qaeda, and more Pakistanis are getting recruited to carry out operations."

Lashkar-e-Taiba, whose name is translated as Army of the Good, was designated a terrorist organization by the U.S. in late 2001.

After involvement in the Soviet war in Afghanistan, it joined the dispute over Kashmir and received money, weapons and training from the Pakistani Inter-Services Intelligence agency, terrorism specialists say.

The U.S. pressured Pakistan to outlaw Lashkar and other militant groups in 2002, but the group retains a public presence under its parent organization Jamaat-ud-Daawa, an Islamic educational and charitable group. Foreigners who come to its camps are put on the "express lane" to jihad missions, said Evan Kohlmann, a terrorism specialist who has testified about the group in U.S. trials....

Posted by Robert at December 5, 2008 8:04 AM
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