From: owner-promed@promed.isid.harvard.edu on behalf of ProMED-mail

[promed@promed.isid.harvard.edu]

Sent: Friday, July 02, 2004 5:38 PM

To: promed-edr@promedmail.org

Subject: PRO/EDR> Spotted fever - Brazil (Sao Paulo)

SPOTTED FEVER - BRAZIL (SAO PAULO)

**********************************

A ProMED-mail post <http://www.promedmail.org>

ProMED-mail is a program of the International Society for Infectious Diseases <http://www.isid.org>

Date: 2 Jul 2004

From: ProMED-mail <promed@promedmail.org>

Source: Estadao.com 29 Jun 2004 [accessed 2 Jul 2004, trans.from Portuguese

by Mod.MPP] [edited] <http://www.estadao.com.br/agestado/noticias/2004/jun/29/68.htm>

Deaths in Maua were due to spotted fever

----------------------------------------

Testing done by the Adolfo Lutz Institute of the State Secretariat of Health revealed that the cause of 3 deaths in Maua, Grande Sao Paulo, was fiebre maculosa [spotted fever], as announced by the Jornal SPTV of TV Globo. Transmission of spotted fever is through infected ticks, which live on wild birds, chickens, horses, and dogs. It is a notoriously difficult disease to diagnose (see earlier "Undiagnosed deaths" postings listed below).

The 3 people who died were in the same family and lived in the same house [multifamily] in Jardim Primavera, in Maua, a poor region that according to SPTV does not have basic sanitation. Animals are common there. Other individuals from the same neighborhood have been released from the hospital. The Secretariat of Health confirmed that there was no risk of spread.

[byline: Juliana Araujo]

--

ProMED-mail

<promed@promedmail.org>

[As mentioned in earlier ProMED-mail postings (listed below), the diagnosis of hantavirus infection was less likely in the absence of respiratory symptoms from descriptions of the illness. Fiebre maculosa (spotted fever) is another name for Rocky Mountain spotted fever (RMSF), caused by _Rickettsia rickettsii_. In Central and South America, the Cayenne tick (_Amblyomma cajennense_) is the most important vector for _R. rickettsii_. RMSF is endemic in Sao Paulo and Minas Gerais in Brazil. The area of residence of the cases in the report above is Maua, one of the municipalities in the Metropolitan Region of the state of Sao Paulo. The municipality is a small, somewhat underdeveloped area (according to information on the Sao Paulo State tourism website <http://www.turismopaulista.sp.gov.br/cidades/index_cidades2.asp>).

Cases and the epidemiology of RMSF in Sao Paulo are reviewed in a paper available online: DeLemos ERS, Alvarenga FBF, Cintra ML, Ramos MC, et al. Spotted fever in Brazil: a seroepidemiologic study and description of clinical cases in an endemic areas in the state of Sao Paulo. Am J Trop Med Hyg 2001; 65(4): 329-34. <http://www.ajtmh.org/cgi/reprint/65/4/329.pdf>.

More information on the ongoing epidemiologic investigation of this cluster, including information on other possible identified cases in the area from knowledgeable sources, would be appreciated. - Mod.MPP]

[see also:

Undiagnosed deaths - Brazil (Sao Paulo)(02): RFI     20040623.1673

Undiagnosed deaths - Brazil (Sao Paulo): RFI         20040622.1665

2003

---

Rocky mountain spotted fever - Brazil (Sao Paulo)    20030725.1814

1997

---

Rocky Mountain spotted fever - Brazil (Minas Gerais) 19970903.1886]

...................mpp/pg/sh

*##########################################################*

ProMED-mail makes every effort to  verify  the reports  that are  posted,  but  the  accuracy  and  completeness  of  the information,   and  of  any  statements  or  opinions  based thereon, are not guaranteed. The reader assumes all risks in using information posted or archived by  ProMED-mail.   ISID and  its  associated  service  providers  shall not be  held responsible for errors or omissions or  held liable for  any damages incurred as a result of use or reliance upon  posted or archived material.

************************************************************

Visit ProMED-mail's web site at <http://www.promedmail.org>.  Send  all  items  for   posting  to:   promed@promedmail.org (NOT to  an  individual moderator).  If you do not give your full name and  affiliation, it  may  not  be  posted.   Send commands  to  subscribe/unsubscribe,   get  archives,  help, etc. to: majordomo@promedmail.org.    For assistance  from a human  being  send  mail  to:   owner-promed@promedmail.org.

############################################################

############################################################

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Al Qaeda, Anthrax and Ayman

by Ross E. Getman Friday June 25, 2004 at 02:08 PM

ross_getman@hotmail.com

The group claiming responsibility for the Madrid bombings said that Operation "Winds of Black Death", involving a planned attack on the United States, was 90% complete. Attorney General Ashcroft has described the statement as coming from an Al Qaeda spokesman.

      "Dad," he whispered. His Dad could barely hear him. "'I've been arrested, I'm being taken, I don't know where or why." Moazzam Begg was in the trunk of a car being taken away from his apartment in Islamabad. He had been picked up by Pakistan and US agents. The Britoner had come to Pakistan with his wife and children after the US strikes began in Afghanistan.  It was February 2002. Months later, he would confess to being involved with an Al Qaeda plot to disperse weaponized anthrax using a remote-controlled airplane.  His name had been found on a money transfer in the one-room chemical bunker of Egyptian scientist Midhat Mursi (aka Abu Khabab) at a camp in Afghanistan.

   In early June 2003, a Central Intelligence Agency ("CIA") report publicly disclosed that the reason for Mohammed Atta's and Zacarias Moussaoui's inquiries into cropdusters was for the contemplated use in dispersing biological agents such as anthrax. An early September 2003 Newsweek article included a rumor by a Taliban source that at a meeting in April 2003 Bin Laden was planning an "unbelievable" biological attack, the plans for which had suffered a setback upon the arrest of Khalid Shaikh Mohammed ("KSM"). He had been captured the previous month in Rawalpindi, Pakistan. In November 2003, a report by a UN Panel of experts concluded that Al Qaeda is determined to use chemical and biological weapons and is restrained only by technical difficulties.  In a statement issued June 16, 2004, the 9/11 Commission Staff concluded that " Al Qaeda had an ambitious biological weapons program and was making advances in its ability to produce anthrax prior to September 11. According to Director of Central Intelligence George Tenet, al Qaeda’s ability to conduct an anthrax attack is one of the most immediate threats the United States is likely to face."   

   The CIA reportedly has been quietly building a case that the anthrax mailings were an international plot. This is old news. It's just no longer bureaucratically impolite to openly contest the FBI's (former) theory about a lone, American scientist. Many people have argued that a US-based Al Qaeda operative is behind the earlier Fall 2001 anthrax mailings in the US, and that the mailings served as a threat and warning. Princeton islamist scholar Bernard Lewis has explained that while islamists may disagree about whether killing innocents is sanctioned by the laws of jihad, extremists like Zawahiri agree that notice must be given before biochemical weapons are used. The anthrax mailings followed the pattern of letters they sent in January 1997 to newspaper branches in Washington, D.C. and New York City, as well as symbolic targets. The letter bombs were sent in connection with the detention of the blind sheikh Abdel Rahman and those responsible for the earlier World Trade Center bombing in 1993.

   Handwritten notes and files on a laptop seized upon the capture of KSM, Al Qaeda's #3, included a feasible anthrax production plan using a spray dryer and addressed the recruitment of necessary expertise. What your morning paper did not tell you, however, was that the CIA seized a similar disc from Ayman Zawahiri's right-hand, Ahmed Salama Mabruk, 5 years earlier. The computer disk was confiscated from him during his arrest by the CIA in Azerbaijan and handed over to the Egyptian authorities. Mabruk, at the time, was the head of Jihad's military operations. There is a risk that observers underestimate the time that Al Qaeda has had to make progress in such recruitment and research and development. 

   Some may still think that even in the final stages of the 9/11 plot, Zacarias Moussaoui was going to fly a 5th plane into the Capitol or White House. Others argue that he was to be part of a second wave of airliners directed to targets on the West Coast. There is an e-mail by Moussaoui, however, dated July 31, 2001 indicating that he sought to take a crop dusting course that was to last up to 6 months. In March 2003, Mohammed reportedly said that Moussaoui was not going to be part of 9/11 but was to be part of a "second wave." Although Ramzi Binalshibh provided him $14,000 in July, accused September 11 conspirator Zacarias Moussaoui told his trial judge that he had an al Qaeda mission that would have come after the terrorist attacks. KSM explained that his inquiries about crop dusters may have been related to the anthrax work being done by US-trained biochemist and Al Qaeda operative, Malaysian Yazid Sufaat. Al Qaeda's regional operative, Hambali, who was at a key January 2000 meeting and supervised Sufaat, has been captured. Hambali reportedly is cooperating to some degree. Zacarias Moussaoui, never the sharpest tool in the shed and thought by his superiors to be unreliable, has told the judge at his trial in a filing that he wants "anthrax for Jew sympathizer only."

    Sufaat, according to both KSM and Hambali, did not have the virulent US Army Ames strain that would be used. That would require someone who had access to the strain. But if experience is any guide, nothing would stand in the way of Dr. Ayman Zawahiri's decade-long quest to weaponize and use anthrax against US targets that was described by one confidante to an Egyptian newspaper reporter. The islamist had been released from Egyptian prison and had known Zawahiri well for many years.

   Zawahiri was associated with a faction of the Egyptian Islamic Jihad known as the Vanguards of Conquest. Zawahiri and the Vanguards of Conquest were seeking to recreate Mohammed's taking of mecca by a small band through violent attacks on Egyptian leaders. By 1998, Zawahiri had determined that the Egyptian Islamic Jihad should focus on its struggle against the United States and hold off on further attacks against the Egyptian regime.

   A key question is how they acquired the anthrax strain first isolated by the Texas Veterinary Medical Diagnostic Lab in 1980. According to senior counterterrorism officials, both here and abroad, among the supporters of these militant islamists were people who blended into society and were available to act when another part of the network requested it.    

    A few days before Christmas 2003, after a renewed audiotape threat by Zawahiri of attacks, to include in the US homeland, the threat level was raised to orange or "high." After the alert condition had long since returned to yellow, Zawahiri in late February issued another audiotape in which he urged the President that brigades and brigades would be coming under the banner of jihad carrying death and seeking paradise. Zawahiri said that the US should expect another 9/11 on US soil. According to some reports, Zawahiri is thought by intelligence to be somewhere near the border of Pakistan and Afghanistan. At one time, some thought he had been spotted in Iran. Wherever he is, authorities need to focus on the traceable connection between him and those he recruited.

    In October 2001, did the FBI profilers know of the draft message Khalid Mohammed had on the seized laptop (from 1995) that was signed "Khalid Sheikh Bojinka." The letter threatened to use biochemical weapons if the blind sheikh was not released. (Khalid Mohammed's involvement dates back to Bojinka, as does Hambali's). Use of biochemical weapons as blackmail and threatened retaliation for such detentions was an alternative scenario in the Bojinka planning.

       In May 2004, Patrick Hughes, Lieutenant General (Retired), Assistant Secretary for Information Analysis, Homeland Security Department he testified before the 9/11 Commission. He testified that interrogations and other evidence revealed that Al Qaeda wanted to strike the US with nonconventional weapon, most notably anthrax. The same week, the WTC head testified that while they had not received any briefing on the use of planes, they had taken steps to prepare for an attack using anthrax based on intelligence that had been received.    

       Al Qaeda has had anthrax, the raw seed product in its unweaponized form, since at least 1997, when it was purchased by Bin Laden through the Moro Islamic Liberation Front ("Moro Front" or "MILF"). Zawahiri, Al Qaeda's #2, is head of Al Qaeda's biochemical program. The CIA has known of Zawahiri's plans to use anthrax for a half decade. The confidante and right-hand man of Dr. Ayman Zawahiri admitted that Zawahiri succeeded in obtaining anthrax and intended to use it against US targets. Another senior Al Qaeda member (a shura or policy-making council member no less) was working for the Egyptian intelligence services and he confirmed the report in a sworn lengthy confession. Even Zawahiri's attorney in 1999 said that Bin Laden and Zawahiri were likely to resort to the biological and chemical agents they possessed given the extradition pressure senior Al Qaeda leaders faced. A recently released islamist who had been a close associate of Zawahiri said that Zawahiri spent a decade and had made 15 separate attempts to recruit the necessary expertise to weaponize anthrax in Russia and the Middle East. The US Army recipe was not used, and obtaining the unprocessed Ames strain of anthrax used does not warrant the weight given it by some press accounts. There was lax control over the distribution of the Ames strain that was used, especially in light of the fact that transfers were not even required to be recorded prior to 1997. Significantly, the individual who isolated it nearly a quarter century ago (now retired), upon being contacted, does not even report that he necessarily sent the only copy of the strain to Ft. Detrick.

    Al Qaeda's anthrax production plans on Khalid Mohammed's computer did not evidence knowledge of advanced techniques in the most efficient biological weapons. At least according to the public comments by bioweaponeer experts William Patrick and Kenneth Alibek, under the optimal method, there is no electrostatic charge. In the case of the anthrax used in the mailings, there was an electrostatic charge. Although there was a dominance of single spores and a trillion spore concentration, there were clumps as large as 40 - 100 microns. (Spores must be no bigger than 5 microns to be inhalable.) Many point to the trillion spore concentration as extraordinary. It is far simpler, however, to achieve a trillion spore concentration in the production of a few grams than in industrial processing typical of a state sponsored lab. The "trillion spore" issue was at the heart of a lot of mistaken theories of the matter concluding that state sponsorship was necessarily indicated. The reported finding at Dugway undermines the argument of both the "bomb Iraq" crowd and the liberals focused on Dr. Steve Hatfill who object to US biodefense research because they view it as being useful for offensive purposes.  

    USDA employee Johnelle Bryant first told us, in sensational detail, of Atta's inquiries about purchasing and retrofitting a cropduster. Khalid Mohammed then told interrogators that Zacarias Moussaoui's inquiries about crop dusting may have related to Yazid Sufaat's anthrax manufacturing plans. Although the details of the documents on Mohammed's computer may (or may not) point to possible difficulties in aerial dispersal, they are fully consistent with the product used in the anthrax mailings. Al Qaeda had both the means and opportunity.

    US-trained Malaysian biochemist Yazid Sufaat met with 9/11 plotters and two hijackers in January 2000. Sufaat was a member of Al Qaeda and a member of Jemaah Islamiah ("JI"). JI has ties with the Moro Front. Sufaat used his company called Green Laboratory Medicine to buy items useful to Al Qaeda. (Green symbolizes "Islam" and Prophet Mohammed's holy war). Zacarias Moussaoui, who had a crop dusting manual when he was arrested, stayed at Sufaat's condominium in 2000 when he was trying to arrange for flight lessons in Malaysia. Yazid Sufaat provided Moussaoui with a letter indicating that he was a marketing representative for Infocus Technologies and allegedly provided him $35,000. The crop dusters were to be part of a "second wave."

    After 9/11, Yazid Sufaat traveled to Afghanistan and Pakistan to work for the Taliban Medical Brigade and to continue his work with anthrax. As described in US News, a former reporter from the Kabul Times apparently actually met Sufaat, without realizing it, while traveling near Kabul in October 2001, perceiving him as Filipino. The fellow was carrying papers from Zawahiri and bragging about his ability to manipulate anthrax. Sufaat was arrested in December 2001 upon his return to Malaysia. Newsweek reported that a "second wave" involving biological attacks had been thwarted upon the arrest of Al Qaeda members who had been intended to provide logistical support.

    Various doctors, both foreign and American, are associated with Al Qaeda leaders or operatives, to include the doctors Abdul Qadoos Khan, a bacteriologist from Rawalpindi and Aafia Siddiqui, PhD, from Karachi. Microbiologist Abdul Qadoos Khan was charged along with his son, Ahmed, for harboring the fugitives. As of March 28, 2003, he was in a hospital for a cardiac problem and had been granted "pre-arrest bail." Yet all you read about at the time was the arrest of the son Ahmed Abdul Qadoos, who receives a stipend from the UN for being officially low-IQ due to lead poisoning.

    It was  Khalid Mohammed who told authorities about Aafia Siddiqui, who has a PhD from Brandeis in neurology. (Whether it was disinformation or not, we don't know). The Pakistani press reported that she was nabbed in Karachi after being spotted airport in late March or early April 2003. If mistaken, how did those reports first come about? Understandably, Amerithrax is a confidential investigation. The Pakistan ISI and CIA rarely grant press interviews in connection with an ongoing manhunt. The CIA did not even allow the FBI access to KSM for 10 days after his arrest. As agent Van Harp, then head of the Amerithrax investigation said, the information coming from Khalid Mohammed is classified with the authorities releasing only certain limited information. But, while it's not easy to separate fact from fiction -- Attorney General Ashcroft and Director Mueller have publicly confirmed Aafia is still being sought. They would know.

    Her mother Ismat last saw Aafia and her grandchildren before they left in a minicab at the end of March on her way with her children to visit and uncle and a friend in Islamabad. According to the Pakistan reports, Aafia Siddiqui was detained after being spotted at Karachi International airport (after she was followed to a relative's house). (Karachi is in the south). The reports say she is suspected of having been a member of Al Qaeda's "Chemical Wire Group." The family's lawyer advises me that Aafia did not have enough money to pay for airfare tickets for herself and the kids and called Ismat from the train station. That was the last Ismat heard from her. Aafia never reached the uncle's house. Perhaps something got lost in the translation, but the phrase "Chemical Wire Group" has appeared in all the english Pakistan and India papers. The family's attorney advises me that Aafia had no knowledge of chemicals (and that would not appear to be her training).  

     There still is a very hot pursuit of the "Atta-level" Floridian, Adnan El Shukrijumah, that Siddiqui is thought to have known and been assisting.  His nickname is "Jafar the Pilot." (A senior DOJ official recently said that Adnan has experience as a commercial pilot though previously it had not been clear whether that had just been his nickname; his family has said they were unaware of any pilot training). He is said by one FBI agent to be "very, very, very" dangerous. He may have been seen in Hamilton, Canada -- along with Egyptian al-Maati, who apparently also has received pilot training. The United States truly no longer has time for faulty analysis or politically-based preconceptions. In early June 2003, a CIA report concluded that the reason for Atta's and Zacarias Moussaoui's inquiries into cropdusters was in fact for the contemplated use in dispersing biological agents such as anthrax. It has long been known Osama Bin Laden was interested in using cropdusters to disperse biological agents (since the testimony of millennium bomber Ahmed Ressam).

    The hijacker Ahmed Alhaznawi appears to have contracted cutaneous anthrax in Afghanistan. It's reasonable to credit his statement that he got the lesion after bumping into a suitcase he was carrying at a camp in Afghanistan. The lesion is further evidence of Al Qaeda's anthrax production program at Kandahar.

    One potential lead concerned a Fort Lee New Jersey $100,000 processor possibly of a type that could have been used to weaponize the anthrax. The processor was paid for in cash after a check-kiting scheme. The processor was delivered to a business front in Ft. Lee at 215 Main St. The address was 1 mile from pilot Nawaf al-Hazmi at 96 Linwood Plaza, one of the two hijackers who had attended the January 2000 meeting with anthrax technician Yazid Sufaat. Nawaf Al-hamzi and Khalid Almidhar stayed at Yazid Sufaat's condominium outside Kuala Lumpur. It eventually was determined that these two were on a level comparable to Atta for planning purposes.

    The present evidence relating to Atta's travel to Prague does not warrant a conclusion that Al Qaeda obtained the Ames strain from Iraq. Iraq, however, remains a possible source of the Ames. Former Russian bioweaponeer Ken Alibek has said that a key Russian scientist assisted Iraq and that Russia had the Ames strain. (Though his conclusion may have been based on the fake mobile biolab plans foisted upon the US by the Chalabi associate "Curveball", which Alibek divined to be identical to Russian mobile lab design). Zawahiri did travel to Baghdad in 1998 with an entourage to attend the birthday party of Saddam's son. The papers found at headquarters of the Mukhabarat, Iraq's secret police, show that an entourage from Al Qaeda group was sent to the Iraqi capital in March 1998 from Sudan. According to at least some reports, Bin Laden rejected the suggestion of a closer alliance -- preferring to pursue his own concept of jihad. Two top Iraqi scientists, code named Charlie and Alpha, are helping the coalition to learn more about Iraqi's anthrax program, according to Dr. David Kay, head of the Iraq survey group in charge of the hunt for WMD. He has said that the Iraqis made surprising innovations in the milling and drying processes needed to weaponize anthrax.

    The media coverage has been seriously confused on the issue of motive and the reason Senators Daschle and Leahy would have been targeted -- tending to simplistically view them as "liberals." Zawahiri likely targeted Senators Daschle and Leahy to receive anthrax letters, in addition to various media outlets, because of the appropriations made pursuant to the "Leahy Law" to military and security forces. That money has prevented the militant islamists from achieving their goals. Al Qaeda members and sympathizers feel that the FBI's involvement in countries like Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Indonesia, and the Philippines interferes with the sovereignty of those countries.

    According to a post she made on the internet, Aafia Siddiqui expressed the same sentiment in connection with US appropriations sought in exchange for the extradition of WTC 1993 plotter Ramzi Yousef from Pakistan. Senator Leahy was Chairman of both the Judiciary Committee overseeing the FBI and Appropriations Subcommittee in charge of foreign aid to these countries. In late September 2001, it was announced that the President was seeking a blanket waiver that would lift all restrictions on aid to military and security units in connection with pursuing the militant islamists. This extradition and imprisonment of Al Qaeda leaders, along with US support for Israel and the Mubarak government in Egypt, remains foremost in the mind of Dr. Zawahiri. At the height of the development of his biological weapons program, his brother was extradited pursuant to a death sentence in the "Albanian returnees" case (now he faces retrial). It's hard to keep up with the stories about billion dollar appropriations, debt forgiveness, and loan guarantees to countries like Egypt and Israel and now even Pakistan -- and those appropriations pale in comparison to the many tens of billions in appropriations relating to the invasion of Iraq. Al Qaeda had a motive in mind.

    In his Fall 2001 book titled Knights under the Banner of the Prophet, Zawahiri argued that the secular press was telling "lies" about the militant islamists -- to include the suggestion that the militant islamists were somehow the creation of the United States in connection with expelling the Russians from Afghanistan. Zawahiri argued instead that they have been active since the assassination of Anwar Sadat in Egypt because of the treaty between the Camp David Accord and the resulting peace treaty between Egypt and Israel. The anthrax letters were sent on the date of the Camp David Accord and then the date Anwar Sadat was assassinated as if to underscore the point to anyone paying attention. Most of the "talking heads" on television, however, knew only that Daschle and Leahy were liberal democrats and did not know anything of Al Qaeda beyond what they read in the US newspapers. The FBI's profile includes a US-based supporter of the militant islamists. Attorney General Ashcroft has always said that an "either-or" approach is not useful. The media has tended to overlook the fact that when the FBI uses the word "domestic" the word includes a US-based, highly-educated supporter of the militant islamists.

    There is an emerging consensus that anthrax was contained in a letter to AMI, the publisher of the National Enquirer -- in a goofy love letter to Jennifer Lopez enclosing a Star of David and proposing marriage. A report by the Center for Disease Control of interviews with AMI employees (as well as detailed interviews by author Leonard Cole) supports the conclusion that there were not one, but two, such mailings containing anthrax. (The letters apparently were to different AMI publications -- for example, one may have been to the National Enquirer and another to The Sun). (News assistant Bobby Bender, according to Leonard Cole's book The Anthrax Letters: A Medical Detective Story, recalls the letter containing the items to have been addressed to The Sun.)

     This tactic of letters is not merely the modus operandi of these militant islamists inspired by Zawahiri, it is their signature. The islamists sent letter bombs in January 1997 to newspaper offices in New York City and Washington, D.C. in connection with the earlier bombing of the World Trade Center and the imprisonment of the blind sheik, Sheik Abdel Rahman. The former leader of the Egyptian Al-Gamaa al-Islamiya ("Islamic Group"), he was also a spiritual leader of Al Qaeda. The letter bombs were sent in connection with the treatment of the Egyptian islamists imprisoned for the earlier attack on the WTC and a related plot. The purpose of the letter bombs -- which resulted in minimal casualty -- was to send a message. (There initially was an outstanding $2 million reward -- under the rewards for justice program, the reward now is up to $5 million.). There was no claim of responsibility. There was no explanation. Once one had been received, the next ten, mailed on two separate dates, were easily collected. Sound familiar? Two bombs were also sent to Leavenworth, where a key WTC 1993 defendant was imprisoned, addressed to "Parole Officer" (a position that does not exist).

     Abdel Rahman's son was captured in Quetta, Pakistan in mid-February 2003. That arrest in turn led to the dramatic capture of Khalid Mohammed, Al Qaeda's #3. Mohammed allegedly was hiding in the home of the Pakistani bacteriologist Dr. Abdul Qadoos Khan. Along with Zawahiri, Abdel Rahman and his two sons have long had considerable influence over Bin Laden. He reportedly treated them like sons. Although while in jail in the early 1980s, Zawahiri caused considerable tension by challenging the blind sheik's ability to lead a coalition of the Egyptian Islamic Jihad and the Egyptian Islamic Group -- even citing the Koran -- Zawahiri and OBL are Rahman's friends. The imprisoned WTC 1993 plotter Yousef was KSM's nephew. Thus, the leaders in charge of Al Qaeda's anthrax production program had a close connection to those imprisoned in connection with the earlier bombing of the World Trade Center. According to the "Feith memo," Osama Bin Laden had asked Iraqi intelligence for technical assistance in sending letter bombs a half year before the Al Hayat letters were sent.

    Just because Al Qaeda likes its truck bombs and the like to be effective does not mean they don't see the value in a deadly missive. As Brian Jenkins once said, "terrorism is theater."A sender purporting to be islamist sent cyanide in both early 2002 and early 2003 in New Zealand and ingredients of nerve gas in Belgium in 2003. There's even a chapter titled "Poisonous Letter" in the Al Qaeda manual.

    The mailer's use of Greendale School is revealing. A May 2001 letter that Zawahiri sent to Egyptian Islamic Jihad members abroad establish that Zawahiri used "school" as a code word for Al Qaeda in his correspondence. Green symbolizes Islam and was the Prophet Mohammed's color. By Greendale School, the anthrax perp was being cute, just as Yazid Sufaat was being cute in naming his lab Green Laboratory Medicine. "Dale" means "river valley." Greendale likely refers to green river valley -- i.e., Cairo's Egyptian Islamic Jihad or the Islamic Group. The sender probably is announcing that he is of either Egyptian Islamic Jihad, Egyptian Islamic Group or Jihad-al Qaeda, which is actually the full name of the group after the 1998 merger of the Egyptian Islamic Jihad and al Qaeda. At the Darunta complex where jihadis trained, recruits would wear green uniforms, except for Friday when they were washed.

       As to opportunity, though seldom reported, there is a wealth of "open source" information about possible Al Qaeda or Egyptian Islamic Jihad or Islamic Group in the United States and Canada. The public information mostly relates to those suspected sleepers who have been detained or who are at large and are being sought. Zawahiri's mission in the United States in 1995 was to do spadework for terrorism, not fundraising for charitable causes. He traveled under an alias and was accompanied by a former US Army sergeant named Ali Mohammed. What mosques exactly did they visit and who did they meet?

     Whatever your political persuasion (mine is liberal), the FBI and CIA deserve our support. We are, after all, in this together. First, the nature of such an investigation is that we lack sufficient information to second-guess (or even know) what the FBI is doing. Media reports are a poor approximation of reality because of the lack of good sources. Second, hindsight is 20/20. Third, with the "new age" Efrem Zimbalist, Jr. in charge of the investigation, it is not likely we could do better in striking the appropriate balance between due process and national security.

     Finally, the "Hatfill theory" seems to have been exhausted or at least lost public favor. The "Hatfill theory" accusing Dr. Stephen Hatfill was always highly dubious. The suspicion was founded on many false premises, and there was no reliable publicly known evidence indicating his guilt. The FBI's fixation on Hatfill (at least as rumored by some reporters) may have stemmed from a warning by one Senator that careers hung in the balance. Leahy's chief of staff started with the strong predisposition that some right-winger was involved because two liberal democrats had been targeted. The Hatfill theory -- to include ongoing interviews and ongoing 7/24 surveillance by 8 surveillance specialists -- is now the subject of a pending civil rights claim of uncertain merit. The judge has agreed to delay the matter from proceeding until at least October 2004. The statute of limitation for the libel suit threatened against the New York Times expired in most jurisdictions the first week in July 2003. The Hatfill Theory ironically might best be understood as an Al Qaeda theory, with a coincidental Malaysian connection adding to the other circumstances. Given the regrettable leaks that he was under suspicion, it is only fair that the FBI leak with equal enthusiasm the fact that Dr. Hatfill has now been dropped as a suspect if and when that proves to be the case.

www.anthraxandalqaeda.com

add your comments

------------------

© 2000-2003 . Unless otherwise stated by the author, all content is free for non-commercial reuse, reprint, and rebroadcast, on the net and elsewhere. Opinions are those of the contributors and are not necessarily endorsed by the ESTRECHO IMC. Disclaimer | Privacy

Original article is at http://madiaq.indymedia.org/news/2004/06/8036.php

Source: http://madiaq.indymedia.org/news/2004/06/8036.php (June 25, 2004)

 7.) Outbreak of Anthrax in Cattle and Goats near border of Peru with Chile

------------

From:   owner-promed-ahead-edr@promed.isid.harvard.edu on behalf of ProMED-mail [promed@promed.isid.harvard.edu]

Sent:     Sunday, January 16tH, 2005 6:32 AM

To:       promed-ahead-edr@promedmail.org

Subject:            PRO/AH/EDR> Anthrax, bovine, caprine - Peru: OIE

ANTHRAX, BOVINE, CAPRINE - PERU: OIE

************************************

A ProMED-mail post http://www.promedmail.org ProMED-mail is a program of the International Society for Infectious Diseases <http://www.isid.org>

Date: 15 Jan 2005

From: Alfonso Rodriguez, MD <ajrm_msds@yahoo.es>

Source: OIE, Disease Information News 2005; 18(2), 14 Jan [edited] <http://www.oie.int/eng/info/hebdo/a_current.htm#Sec4>

Anthrax in Peru

---------------

This report is a translation of information received on 12 Jan 2005 (dated 11 Jan) from Dr Oscar Dominguez Falcon, director general for animal health, National Animal Health Service (SENASA), Ministry of Agriculture, Lima:

Reason for immediate notification: a sudden and unexpected increase in the distribution, incidence, morbidity or mortality of a listed disease prevalent within a country or zone/compartment.

Date of first confirmation of the event: 11 Jan 2005.

Date of start of the event: 27 Dec 2004.

Nature of diagnosis: postmortem.

First administrative division / species / new rate of disease incidence / new mortality rate

Pampa La Julia / bov / 20 per cent / 20 per cent

Pampa La Julia / cap / 12 per cent / 12 per cent

Description of affected population: the outbreak occurred in Sama Valley, Pampa La Julia division, in Tacna department, at the border with Chile. The outbreak area contains 55 head of cattle and 26 goats on a piece of land covering 36.8 hectares. In the perifocal area there are 2900 head of cattle. During the outbreak 11 cattle and 3 goats died.

Diagnosis:

Laboratory of diagnosis / Species examined / Diagnostic test used

SENASA Animal Health Laboratory / bov / culture on tryptone soya agar and blood agar; isolation of the bacterium

Date: 6 Jan 2005 / Results 11 Jan 2005

Source of outbreak: unknown or inconclusive.

Control measures undertaken:

-         quarantine;

-         movement control inside the country;

-         vaccination;

-         disinfection of infected premises / establishment(s).

Vaccination in response to the outbreak:

First administrative division / species / number of vaccinated animals / vaccine

Tacna district / bov / 1100 / attenuated live virus vaccine

Sama district / bov / 2685 / attenuated live virus vaccine

Treatment of affected animals: no.

Other details/comments:

Without first checking the accuracy of their information with SENASA, some of the media incorrectly reported this outbreak of anthrax to be foot and mouth disease. The national directorate of SENASA sent the media concerned an explanatory letter to ask them to rectify their mistake and accept responsibility for any consequences that may result (the last outbreak of foot and mouth disease in the country was reported in July 2004 after more than 44 months of remission (Disease Information 2004; 17(38): 268, 17 Sep)).

--

ProMED-mail<promed@promedmail.org>

[Thanks very much to Dr Rodriguez for sending in this report, which again confirms that the outbreak referred to below is indeed anthrax. It is not the 1st time outbreaks in animals have been misreported in the media.

One useful epidemiologic tool veterinarians have is the distribution of disease among species, which can sometimes be helpful in eliminating FMD as the cause of outbreaks, particularly vesicular ones. The key in this case is that humans, cattle, and goats are susceptible to anthrax, while humans are not (for all practical purposes) susceptible to FMD. - Mod.PC]

[see also:

Foot & mouth disease, bovine, human - Peru: not 20050111.0097

Foot & mouth disease, bovine, human - Peru: RFI 20050110.0080]

...................pc/pg/sh

*#######*

*****

ProMED-mail makes every effort to  verify  the reports  that are  posted,  but  the  accuracy  and  completeness  of  the information,   and  of  any  statements  or  opinions  based thereon, are not guaranteed. The reader assumes all risks in using information posted or archived by  ProMED-mail.   ISID and  its  associated  service  providers  shall not be  held responsible for errors or omissions or  held liable for  any damages incurred as a result of use or reliance upon  posted or archived material.

********

Visit ProMED-mail's web site at <http://www.promedmail.org>.  Send  all  items  for   posting  to:   promed@promedmail.org (NOT to  an  individual moderator).  If you do not give your full name and  affiliation, it  may  not  be  posted.   Send commands  to  subscribe/unsubscribe,   get  archives,  help, etc. to: majordomo@promedmail.org.    For assistance  from a human  being  send  mail  to:   owner-promed@promedmail.org.

#######

#######