The Looming Tower - Lawrence Wright [211]
IN MARCH 2002 AL-QAEDA REGROUPED in the mountains near Khost, close to the Lion’s Den. Predator drones were circling the skies and American and Afghan troops, along with soldiers from Canada, Australia, Denmark, France, Germany, and Norway, were sweeping through the mountains in an operation called Anaconda. The fighting had narrowed down to the Shah-e-Kot valley on the ragged eastern edge of Afghanistan. Regional warlords had been bought off, the borders supposedly sealed, and the al-Qaeda fighters were under constant bombardment. And yet a band of horsemen rode unhindered to Pakistan.
They came to the village of a local militia leader named Gula Jan, whose long beard and black turban might have signaled that he was a Taliban sympathizer. “I saw a heavy, older man, an Arab, who wore dark glasses and had a white turban,” Jan said four days later. “He was dressed like an Afghan, but he had a beautiful coat, and he was with two other Arabs who had masks on.” The man in the beautiful coat dismounted and began talking in a polite and humorous manner. He asked Jan and an Afghan companion about the location of American and Northern Alliance troops. “We are afraid we will encounter them,” he said. “Show us the right way.”
While the men were talking, Jan slipped off to examine a flyer that had been dropped into the area by American airplanes. It showed a photograph of a man in a white turban and glasses. His face was broad and meaty, with a strong, prominent nose and full lips. His untrimmed beard was gray at the temples and ran in milky streaks below his chin. On his high forehead, framed by the swaths of his turban, was a darkened callus formed by many hours of prayerful prostration. His eyes reflected the sort of decisiveness one might expect in a medical man, but they also showed a measure of serenity that seemed oddly out of place in a Wanted poster. The flyer noted that Zawahiri had a price of $25 million on his head.
Jan returned to the conversation. The man he now believed to be Zawahiri said to him, “May God bless you and keep you from the enemies of Islam. Try not to tell them where we came from and where we are going.”
There was a telephone number on the Wanted poster, but Gula Jan did not have a phone. Zawahiri and the masked Arabs disappeared into the mountains.
PRINCIPAL CHARACTERS
Abu Hafs al-Masri: Former Egyptian policeman and member of al-Jihad who was al-Qaeda’s military commander after the death of Abu Ubaydah. His real name is Mohammed Atef. One of bin Laden’s closest advisors, he was killed by an American air strike in November 2001.
Abu Hajer al-Iraqi: Former Iraqi military officer and electrical engineer who joined the jihad in Afghanistan and became a close advisor of bin Laden’s in Sudan. Although not theologically trained, he was head of the al-Qaeda fatwa committee and rendered two opinions that justified violence against American forces and the killing of innocents. Currently in an American prison after stabbing a prison guard with a sharpened comb. His real name is Mamdouh Mahmoud Salem.
Abu Jandal: Like bin Laden, Abu Jandal is a Saudi citizen of Yemeni extraction. In 2000, he became bin Laden’s chief bodyguard in Afghanistan. Delivered the bride price to Yemen to secure bin Laden’s fifth wife. Captured by Yemeni authorities after the USS Cole bombing, he became a significant source for the FBI. Currently free from custody, he lives in Yemen.
Abu Rida al-Suri: Businessman from Damascus who immigrated to Kansas City, then joined the jihad in Afghanistan in 1985. He is allegedly the author of the handwritten notes of the August 11, 1988, meeting in which the organization of al-Qaeda is first openly discussed. Later, he became bin Laden’s friend and business advisor in Khartoum, where he still lives and operates a candy factory. His real name is Mohammed Loay Baizid.
Abu Ubaydah