Attack on the Egyptian Embassy in Pakistan
Encyclopedia
Carried out by the Egyptian Islamic Jihad, the November 19 1995 attack on the Egyptian embassy in Islamabad, Pakistan was retaliation against the diplomatic staffers who were accused of gathering intelligence on Jihad
factions inside Pakistan. It was the deadliest attack against the Egyptian government, since it had been declared apostate three years earlier by Islamic militants.
planned the attack in 1994, shortly after aligning himself together with Osama bin Laden
, initially hoping to target the Khan el-Khalili
marketplace on the same day. Members such as Abu Hafs
claimed it was in response to Pakistan's extradition of several al-Jihad members to face imprisonment, torture and sexual abuse
in Egypt. Al-Zawahiri later said that the group had wanted to target the American embassy, but it was too heavily fortified.
Two men approached the embassy at approximately 9:30am and killed its security detail with their guns and grenades. A vehicle described alternately as either a pickup truck or a small car resembling a taxi
loaded with a 250-pound bomb then rushed into the compound. The driver set off the bomb, blowing apart the gates. Three minutes later, a Jeep
carrying a second, larger bomb also detonated and the side of the building crumbled. The Japanese and Indonesian embassies were also damaged, as was a nearby bank.
The two bombers, the Second Secretary for the embassy, three Egyptian security guards and 12 others including Pakistani security guards, civilians and as many as four other diplomats were killed in total, and approximately sixty were wounded. A 17th person died in hospital the following day.
It was the group's first success under Zawahiri's leadership, but Bin Laden had disapproved of the operation. The bombing alienated the host of the embassy, Pakistan
, and Pakistan was "the best route into Afghanistan
" Zawahiri later referred to the bombings in his autobiographical text.
Three groups had all simultaneously taken responsibility for the attack, including al-Jihad, the International Justice Group and the Islamic Holy War group.
Former CIA agent Robert Baer
claims that Imad Mughniyah "facilitated the travel" of somebody involved, and that one of his deputies had "provided a stolen Lebanese passport to one of the planners of the bombing".
intact, leading investigators to call on the last registered owner of the vehicle. He told authorities that he had sold the truck to two men, and drew a rough sketch of each of the individuals, who Pakistani authorities claimed to be able to identify; although they would not release their names. It was also noted that of five Afghans scheduled to be working in the Embassy at the time of the attack, only one was present and authorities were "looking for" the other four.
Within days of the bombing, Pakistan announced the arrests of six Egyptians, two Afghans and two Jordanians.
The Canadian Ahmed Khadr was arrested in January, after it was discovered that Khalid Abdullah
, believed to have purchased one of the vehicles used in the bombing, had been staying with the Khadr family
and was engaged to their eldest daughter Zaynab
. Khadr was released in March 1996 based on a lack of evidence indicating he had any involvement.
By December, 16 people had been arrested in connection with the bombing.
In January 1996, Pakistan announced they had arrested Sudanese men Syed Ahmad and Bashir Bahar Qadim in Faisalabad
in connection with the attacks.
In October 1998, Tareq Ali Mursi
, Jamal Shueib and Eid Abdul Samee Abdulsamee were all captured in South Africa
and were the subject of extraordinary rendition
s back to Egypt where they were accused of participating in the bombing.
In May 1999, Hasan Ahmed Rabi was arrested in Kuwait
, and extradited to Egypt where he was accused of involvement with the Embassy bombing.
In July 1999, 71 alleged militants, including Isam Shu'ayb and Id Abd al-Mun'im connected to the embassy bombing saw their cases transferred to a military court.
In 2001, Egyptian forces surrounded Khadr's house in Peshawar
, and requested that Pakistani ISI
forces offer assistance in capturing the man they still believed had knowledge of the Embassy bombing in Islamabad. Instead, the ISI contacted the Taliban, who sent a diplomatic car to pick up Khadr and bring him into Afghanistan.
In 2002, Abul-Dahab
confessed to Egyptian interrogators that he had funded the attack on orders from bin Laden, and had transferred money from a Californian bank account to Pakistan to finance the attack.
would later recall when the Afghan training camp
s heard the news of the attack, and Derunta
was filled with every kind of ammunition being fired in the air in celebration. Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto
stated that the attack was not meant to destabilise the country, but send a clear message of retribution for the extradition
of Ramzi Yousef
. Pakistan immediately expelled Maktab al-Khidamat from their borders, and clamped down on Islamist groups.
While Western diplomats originally warned Pakistan the event was because "they were not doing enough" to combat terrorism, Interior Minister Naseerullah Babar
rebuffed the claims pointing out that the attack had occurred because Egypt had extradited ten suspected terrorists.
In her 2004 trial in the United States, Lynne Stewart
saw the prosecution introduce newspaper clippings seized from her possession which spoke of the bombing.
Jihad
Jihad , an Islamic term, is a religious duty of Muslims. In Arabic, the word jihād translates as a noun meaning "struggle". Jihad appears 41 times in the Quran and frequently in the idiomatic expression "striving in the way of God ". A person engaged in jihad is called a mujahid; the plural is...
factions inside Pakistan. It was the deadliest attack against the Egyptian government, since it had been declared apostate three years earlier by Islamic militants.
Attack
Ayman al-ZawahiriAyman al-Zawahiri
Ayman Mohammed Rabie al-Zawahiri is an Egyptian physician, Islamic theologian and current leader of al-Qaeda. He was previously the second and last "emir" of the Egyptian Islamic Jihad, having succeeded Abbud al-Zumar in the latter role when Egyptian authorities sentenced al-Zumar to life...
planned the attack in 1994, shortly after aligning himself together with Osama bin Laden
Osama bin Laden
Osama bin Mohammed bin Awad bin Laden was the founder of the militant Islamist organization Al-Qaeda, the jihadist organization responsible for the September 11 attacks on the United States and numerous other mass-casualty attacks against civilian and military targets...
, initially hoping to target the Khan el-Khalili
Khan el-Khalili
thumb|200px|An old chandeliers shop at Khan el-KhaliliKhan el-Khalili is a major souk in the Islamic district of Cairo. The bazaar district is one of Cairo's main attractions for tourists and Egyptians alike.-History:...
marketplace on the same day. Members such as Abu Hafs
Mohammed Atef
Mohammed Atef was the alleged military chief of al-Qaida, although his role in the organization was not well known by intelligence agencies for years...
claimed it was in response to Pakistan's extradition of several al-Jihad members to face imprisonment, torture and sexual abuse
Sexual abuse
Sexual abuse, also referred to as molestation, is the forcing of undesired sexual behavior by one person upon another. When that force is immediate, of short duration, or infrequent, it is called sexual assault. The offender is referred to as a sexual abuser or molester...
in Egypt. Al-Zawahiri later said that the group had wanted to target the American embassy, but it was too heavily fortified.
Two men approached the embassy at approximately 9:30am and killed its security detail with their guns and grenades. A vehicle described alternately as either a pickup truck or a small car resembling a taxi
Taxicab
A taxicab, also taxi or cab, is a type of vehicle for hire with a driver, used by a single passenger or small group of passengers, often for a non-shared ride. A taxicab conveys passengers between locations of their choice...
loaded with a 250-pound bomb then rushed into the compound. The driver set off the bomb, blowing apart the gates. Three minutes later, a Jeep
Jeep
Jeep is an automobile marque of Chrysler . The first Willys Jeeps were produced in 1941 with the first civilian models in 1945, making it the oldest off-road vehicle and sport utility vehicle brand. It inspired a number of other light utility vehicles, such as the Land Rover which is the second...
carrying a second, larger bomb also detonated and the side of the building crumbled. The Japanese and Indonesian embassies were also damaged, as was a nearby bank.
The two bombers, the Second Secretary for the embassy, three Egyptian security guards and 12 others including Pakistani security guards, civilians and as many as four other diplomats were killed in total, and approximately sixty were wounded. A 17th person died in hospital the following day.
It was the group's first success under Zawahiri's leadership, but Bin Laden had disapproved of the operation. The bombing alienated the host of the embassy, Pakistan
Pakistan
Pakistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan is a sovereign state in South Asia. It has a coastline along the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Oman in the south and is bordered by Afghanistan and Iran in the west, India in the east and China in the far northeast. In the north, Tajikistan...
, and Pakistan was "the best route into Afghanistan
Afghanistan
Afghanistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, is a landlocked country located in the centre of Asia, forming South Asia, Central Asia and the Middle East. With a population of about 29 million, it has an area of , making it the 42nd most populous and 41st largest nation in the world...
" Zawahiri later referred to the bombings in his autobiographical text.
- "We had to react to the Egyptian government's expansion of its campaign against Egyptian fundamentalists outside the country. So we decided to target a painful goal for all the parties of this evil alliance. After studying the situation we decided to assign a group to react to this and we assigned their targets, first bombing the American embassy in Islamabad and if that wasn't easy, then one of the American targets in Islamabad. If that didn't work, then the target should be bombing a Western embassy famous for its historic hatred for Muslims, and if not that, then the Egyptian embassy. Our extensive and detailed surveillance found that targeting the American Embassy was beyond the abilities of the assigned group, so we decided to study one of the American targets in Islamabad, and we discovered it has few American employees and most of the victims would be Pakistani. We also discovered that targeting the other Western embassies was beyond the abilities of the assigned group, so we settled on targeting the Egyptian embassy in Islamabad, which was not only running a campaign for chasing Arabs in Pakistan but also spying on the Arab Mujahedeen…later, Pakistani security found in the ruins of the embassy evidence revealing the cooperation between India and Egypt in espionage."
- "A short time before the bombing of the embassy the assigned group asked our permission. They told us they could strike both the Egyptian and American Embassies if we gave them extra money. We had already provided them with all that we had and we couldn't collect more money. So the group focused on bombing the Egyptian embassy. The rubble of the embassy left a clear message to the Egyptian government."
- Al-Sharq Al-Awsat, December 3, 2001
Three groups had all simultaneously taken responsibility for the attack, including al-Jihad, the International Justice Group and the Islamic Holy War group.
Former CIA agent Robert Baer
Robert Baer
Robert "Bob" Booker Baer is an American author and a former CIA case officer assigned to the Middle East. He is TIME.com's intelligence columnist and has contributed to Vanity Fair, The Wall Street Journal, and The Washington Post. Baer is a frequent commentator and author about issues related to...
claims that Imad Mughniyah "facilitated the travel" of somebody involved, and that one of his deputies had "provided a stolen Lebanese passport to one of the planners of the bombing".
Investigation
The engine block of the truck used in the bombing was found, with its VINVin
Vin may refer to:*Voltage input, an alternative form for Vin-People:*Vin Diesel*Vin Scully*Vin Suprynowicz*Vin, the name of a character from the video games Jak II and Jak 3*a diminutive of the name "Vincent"...
intact, leading investigators to call on the last registered owner of the vehicle. He told authorities that he had sold the truck to two men, and drew a rough sketch of each of the individuals, who Pakistani authorities claimed to be able to identify; although they would not release their names. It was also noted that of five Afghans scheduled to be working in the Embassy at the time of the attack, only one was present and authorities were "looking for" the other four.
Within days of the bombing, Pakistan announced the arrests of six Egyptians, two Afghans and two Jordanians.
The Canadian Ahmed Khadr was arrested in January, after it was discovered that Khalid Abdullah
Khalid Abdullah (Egyptian)
Khalid Abdullah, a Sudanese-Egyptian, was the fiancee of Canadian Zaynab Khadr, and a suspect in the 1996 attack on the Egyptian Embassy in Pakistan.In July 1995, Ahmed Khadr arranged for his daughter Zaynab to marry Abdullah in December,...
, believed to have purchased one of the vehicles used in the bombing, had been staying with the Khadr family
Khadr family
The Khadr family is a Canadian family noted for their ties to Osama bin Laden and alleged connections to al Qaeda. The family maintains that they have not broken any Canadian laws, and they have never been charged with any crimes by Canadian authorities.The Khadr family comprises:*The father,...
and was engaged to their eldest daughter Zaynab
Zaynab Khadr
The eldest child of the Khadr family, Zaynab Khadr was born in Canada to Maha el-Samnah and Ahmed Khadr.Following the 1992 injury that left Ahmed disabled, Zaynab became a "second mother" to the younger children....
. Khadr was released in March 1996 based on a lack of evidence indicating he had any involvement.
By December, 16 people had been arrested in connection with the bombing.
In January 1996, Pakistan announced they had arrested Sudanese men Syed Ahmad and Bashir Bahar Qadim in Faisalabad
Faisalabad
Faisalabad , formerly known as Lyallpur, is the third largest metropolis in Pakistan, the second largest in the province of Punjab after Lahore, and a major industrial center in the heart of Pakistan. Before the foundation of the city in 1880, the area was very thinly populated. The population has...
in connection with the attacks.
In October 1998, Tareq Ali Mursi
Tareq Ali Mursi
Tareq Ali Mursi was an alleged member of al-Jihad. He was the subject of an extraordinary rendition from South Africa to face trial in Egypt.In November, lawyers Montasser al-Zayat and Mahmoud Abdul Shafi unsuccessfully argued that he should be released, as there had been no demonstration he had...
, Jamal Shueib and Eid Abdul Samee Abdulsamee were all captured in South Africa
South Africa
The Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...
and were the subject of extraordinary rendition
Extraordinary rendition
Extraordinary rendition is the abduction and illegal transfer of a person from one nation to another. "Torture by proxy" is used by some critics to describe situations in which the United States and the United Kingdom have transferred suspected terrorists to other countries in order to torture the...
s back to Egypt where they were accused of participating in the bombing.
In May 1999, Hasan Ahmed Rabi was arrested in Kuwait
Kuwait
The State of Kuwait is a sovereign Arab state situated in the north-east of the Arabian Peninsula in Western Asia. It is bordered by Saudi Arabia to the south at Khafji, and Iraq to the north at Basra. It lies on the north-western shore of the Persian Gulf. The name Kuwait is derived from the...
, and extradited to Egypt where he was accused of involvement with the Embassy bombing.
In July 1999, 71 alleged militants, including Isam Shu'ayb and Id Abd al-Mun'im connected to the embassy bombing saw their cases transferred to a military court.
In 2001, Egyptian forces surrounded Khadr's house in Peshawar
Peshawar
Peshawar is the capital of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa and the administrative center and central economic hub for the Federally Administered Tribal Areas of Pakistan....
, and requested that Pakistani ISI
Inter-Services Intelligence
The Directorate for Inter-Services Intelligence , is Pakistan's premier intelligence agency, responsible for providing critical national security intelligence assessment to the Government of Pakistan...
forces offer assistance in capturing the man they still believed had knowledge of the Embassy bombing in Islamabad. Instead, the ISI contacted the Taliban, who sent a diplomatic car to pick up Khadr and bring him into Afghanistan.
In 2002, Abul-Dahab
Khaled Abu el-Dahab
An Egyptian medical student, Khaled Abu el-Dahab was arrested and convicted of terrorism. He is alleged to have been a right-hand man to Ali Mohamed, who had been an American CIA agent and Special Forces soldier....
confessed to Egyptian interrogators that he had funded the attack on orders from bin Laden, and had transferred money from a Californian bank account to Pakistan to finance the attack.
Consequences
Omar NasiriOmar Nasiri
Omar Nasiri is the pseudonym of a Moroccan spy who infiltrated al-Qaeda, attending training camps in Afghanistan and passing information to the UK and French intelligence services...
would later recall when the Afghan training camp
Afghan training camp
An Afghan training camp is a camp or facility used for militant training located in pre-2002 Afghanistan. At the time of the September 11, 2001 attacks, Indian intelligence officials estimated that there were over 120 training camps operating in Afghanistan and Pakistan, run by a variety of...
s heard the news of the attack, and Derunta
Derunta training camp
The Derunta training camp was one of the most well-known of many military training camps that have been alleged to have been affiliated with al Qaeda.-Training with poisons:...
was filled with every kind of ammunition being fired in the air in celebration. Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto
Benazir Bhutto
Benazir Bhutto was a democratic socialist who served as the 11th Prime Minister of Pakistan in two non-consecutive terms from 1988 until 1990 and 1993 until 1996....
stated that the attack was not meant to destabilise the country, but send a clear message of retribution for the extradition
Extradition
Extradition is the official process whereby one nation or state surrenders a suspected or convicted criminal to another nation or state. Between nation states, extradition is regulated by treaties...
of Ramzi Yousef
Ramzi Yousef
Ramzi Yousef was one of the main perpetrators of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing and a co-conspirator in the Bojinka plot. In 1995, he was arrested at a guest house in Islamabad, by the Pakistani Inter-Services Intelligence and United States Diplomatic Security Service, then extradited to the...
. Pakistan immediately expelled Maktab al-Khidamat from their borders, and clamped down on Islamist groups.
While Western diplomats originally warned Pakistan the event was because "they were not doing enough" to combat terrorism, Interior Minister Naseerullah Babar
Naseerullah Babar
Major-General Naseerullah Khan Babar , SJ, HJ, was a retired 2-star rank general officer in the Pakistan Army, and later career military officer-turned statesman from the leftist democratic soclialist, the Pakistan Peoples Party...
rebuffed the claims pointing out that the attack had occurred because Egypt had extradited ten suspected terrorists.
In her 2004 trial in the United States, Lynne Stewart
Lynne Stewart
Lynne Irene Stewart is a former attorney who represented controversial, poor, and often unpopular defendants who was convicted on charges of conspiracy and providing material support to terrorists in 2005, and sentenced to 28 months in prison. Her felony conviction led to her being automatically...
saw the prosecution introduce newspaper clippings seized from her possession which spoke of the bombing.
External links
- Photograph of the aftermath of the bombing published by ReutersReutersReuters is a news agency headquartered in New York City. Until 2008 the Reuters news agency formed part of a British independent company, Reuters Group plc, which was also a provider of financial market data...