Al Qaeda’s Syrian cell a ‘bigger threat to US’ than ISIL

According to US intelligence, the Khorasan group extremists in Syria is considered a more immediate threat to the US than ISIL.

WASHINGTON // While ISIL is getting the most attention now, another band of extremists in Syria – a mix of hardened militants from Afghanistan, Yemen, Syria and Europe – poses a more direct and imminent threat to the United States, working with Yemeni bomb-makers to target US aviation, American officials say.

At the centre is a cell known as the Khorasan group, a cadre of veteran Al Qaeda fighters from Afghanistan and Pakistan who travelled to Syria to link up with the Qaeda affiliate there, Jabhat Al Nusra.

But the Khorasan militants did not go to Syria principally to fight the government of Bashar Al Assad. Instead, they were sent by Al Qaeda leader Ayman Al Zawahiri to recruit Europeans and Americans whose passports allow them to board a US-bound airliner with less scrutiny from security officials.

In addition, according to classified US intelligence assessments, the Khorasan militants have been working with bomb-makers from Al Qaeda’s Yemen affiliate to test new ways to slip explosives past airport security. The fear is that the Khorasan militants will provide these sophisticated explosives to their Western recruits who could sneak them onto US-bound flights.

The Obama administration has said that ISIL, the target of more than 150 US airstrikes in recent weeks, does not pose an imminent threat to the continental US. The Khorasan group, which has not been subject to American military action, is considered the more immediate threat.

Because of intelligence about the collaboration among the Khorasan group, Al Qaeda’s Yemeni bomb-makers and western extremists, US officials say, the Transportation Security Administration in July decided to ban uncharged mobile phones and laptops from flights to the US that originated in Europe and the Middle East.

The Khorasan group’s plotting with Al Qaeda’s Yemen affiliate shows that, despite the damage that years of drone missile strikes, the movement still can threaten the West. It has been rejuvenated in the past year as Al Qaeda offshoots have grown in strength and numbers, bolstered by a flood of Western extremists to a new terrorist safe haven created by Syria’s civil war.

That Yemen affiliate, Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) has been able to place three bombs on US-bound airliners, though none has succeeded in downing the aircraft.

“The group’s repeated efforts to conceal explosive devices to destroy aircraft demonstrate its continued pursuit of high-profile attacks against the West, its increasing awareness of Western security procedures and its efforts to adapt to those procedures that we adopt,” Nicholas Rasmussen, deputy director of the National Counterterrorism Centre, recently told a Senate panel.

James Clapper, the director of national intelligence, first disclosed during a Senate hearing in January that a group of Al Qaeda militants from Afghanistan and Pakistan was plotting attacks against the West in Syria.

But the group’s name, Khorasan, or its links to Al Qaeda’s Yemen affiliate, which is considered the most dangerous terrorist threat to the US, have not previously been disclosed.

Khorasan refers to a province under the Islamic caliphate of old that included parts of Afghanistan.

Many US officials interviewed for this story would not be quoted by name talking about what they said was highly classified intelligence.

Adam Schiff, a member of the House of Representatives Intelligence Committee, declined to name the group. But he described concerns among intelligence officials about “an unholy mix of people in Iraq and Syria right now – some who come from AQAP, some who come from Afghanistan and Pakistan, others from the Maghreb”.

“They can combine in ways that could pose a greater threat than their individual pieces. And that’s something we worry about,” said Mr Schiff.

Intelligence officials have been deeply concerned about dozens of Americans and hundreds of Europeans who have gone to fight for various militant groups in Syria. Some of those Westerners’ identities are unknown and therefore they are less likely to draw the attention of intelligence officials when they purchase tickets and board a crowded jetliner heading for European and American cities.

AQAP’s master bomb-maker, Ibrahim Al Asiri, is believed to have built the underwear bomb that a Nigerian man, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, tried to detonate on a passenger jet over Detroit in December 2009.

Al Asiri is also believed to have built two bombs hidden in printer cartridges placed on US-bound cargo jets in 2010, and a body bomb that was acquired in a 2012 operation involving Saudi, British, and US intelligence agencies.

US intelligence suggests Al Asiri and his confederates are constantly trying to tweak their bomb designs so that the explosives can get past airport security and also detonate successfully.

The TSA ban on uncharged laptops and cellphones stemmed from information that Al Qaeda was working with the Khorasan group to pack those devices with hard-to-detect explosives, US official said.

* Associated Press