The Insider: Daily Terrorism Report

Nov. 19, 2003 -- — Turkish investigators have identified the remains of the two suicide bombers who carried out Saturday's deadly attacks in Istanbul. The Israeli parliament speaker says the two attackers were educated in Afghanistan and trained in Iran. Meanwhile, President Bush defends going to war in Iraq on the first full day of his state visit to Britain. Also, more on the U.S. Supreme Court and putting terror suspects on trial — what constitutes an 'enemy combatant?'

THE WAR ON TERROR

TURKISH BOMB INVESTIGATION

Istanbul Bombers Were Turks, Investigators SayThe two suicide bombers who carried out Saturday's attack on synagogues in Istanbul were Turks who sympathized with al Qaeda and may have been trained outside the country by the terrorist network, Turkish and Israeli officials said Tuesday. (LA Times)

The attackers were identified as Mesut Cabuk, 29, and Gokhan Elaltuntas, 22.

REGIONAL REPORTS

South KoreaSouth Korea Probes Al Qaeda Threat Reports South Korea's intelligence agency said on Wednesday it was investigating a case in which a suspected member of Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda network had entered and left the country earlier this year, undetected by authorities. (Reuters)

Police Chief Says Al Qaeda Rumors Not True The chief of the Korean National Police Agency, Choi Key-moon, said Wednesday that rumors that an al Qaeda terrorist entered, and left, Korea are "not true," as far as he knew. (The Chosun Ilbo)

IndonesiaNew Terror Chief Planning Attacks The purported new military chief of a Southeast Asian terror group is among a handful of Indonesians in direct contact with al Qaeda and is now considered the most lethal terrorist in Asia, plotting fresh attacks in the region, officials told The Associated Press. (AP)

United Kingdom Palace Security Review Announced David Blunkett announces a security review after a lapse at Buckingham Palace ahead of President Bush's visit. (BBC)

U.K. to Make MI5 Web Site Its Outlet for Terror Tips Britain will make the secretive counter-espionage agency MI5 its public face for terror alerts with the launch next year of a Web site dedicated to threats on U.K. soil, a home office official told Reuters on Tuesday. (Reuters)

AfghanistanLeader of Group Associated With Taliban: 'We Won't Hurt the Turkish Engineer'The head of a group called the Muslim's Army that is affiliated with Taliban, claimed he was behind the kidnapping of a Turkish engineer, promised they would not hurt him and asked for the release of prisoners held by the Afghan and U.S. forces. In the interview with Al Hayat reporter on the Afghan-Pakistani border, Akbar Agha warned that they would move the battle with the American forces to Kabul if the occupying forces remained in the country. He also justified the targeting of aid and relief organizations by saying that they are an extension of the occupation. (Al Hayat)

United StatesTop Justice Aide Approved Sending Suspect to SyriaA senior Justice Department official personally approved sending a Syrian-born Canadian citizen suspected of terrorist links to Syria last year after consulting with CIA officials, according to U.S. officials. (Washington Post)

U.S. Investigates Moscow Theater Siege, Seeking Qaeda LinkAmerican law enforcement officials are investigating the deadly takeover of a Moscow theater last year by Chechen rebels to determine whether Al Qaeda was involved and whether criminal charges should be brought in the United States, officials have said. (NY Times)

WMD West Too Slow to Counter WMD Terror Threat Western governments and Russia are moving far too slowly to stop terrorists acquiring deadly ingredients to build weapons of mass destruction, a major international report concluded Tuesday. (Reuters)

GUANTANAMO BAYGuantanamo Prisoners Speak OutA number of Pakistanis released from the US high-security prison in Cuba's Guantanamo Bay talk about their experiences. (BBC)

Editorial: Justice for the Guantanamo 600Last week, the Supreme Court took a step that, depending upon your point of view, severely limited the government's ability to protect its citizens against terrorism or struck a blow for civil liberties. (Philadelphia Inquirer)

ANALYSIS & OPINION

'Suicide Cars Were Al Zawahri's Idea,' Say Fundamentalists It was the leader of the Egyptian al Jihad movement Ayman Al Zawahri who first came up with the idea of suicide car attacks, fundamentalists in London told Asharq Al Awsat. They explained that suicide cars were first used by two members of al Jihad movement in the bombing of the Egyptian embassy in Pakistan in 1995. They also believe that the recent attacks in Riyadh and Istanbul have resulted in a loss of support for al Qaeda. An Egyptian fundamentalist meanwhile told the paper that the recent statements claiming responsibility for the attacks were not similar to those of al Qaeda, which he says are usually signed "The Political Office - Al Qaeda." (Asharq Al Awsat)

Experts See Major Shift in Al Qaeda's Strategy A spate of suicide bombings in several countries illustrates that Al Qaeda has survived by mutating into a more decentralized network relying on local allies to launch more frequent attacks on varied targets, experts say. (LA Times)

A Good Sign of Change The appearance on Saudi television of Sheikh Ali Al-Khudair, a hard-line religious scholar who encouraged uprisings against the government as well as attacks on non-Muslims, is the talk of the town. All major Saudi newspapers carried the story of how he had recanted his earlier beliefs and withdrawn his fatwas — religious edicts. (Arab News)

Editorial: 'Enemy Combatant' ShamOf all the post-Sept. 11 denials of civil liberties, the one that allows the president to lock up Americans at will is among the worst. (NY Times)

THE WAR IN IRAQ

U.S. to Make New Push For U.N. Support in IraqU.S. officials hope approval of latest plans could spark new aid pledges. (Washington Post)

Bush Mounts Strong Defense of Iraq WarGeorge W. Bush mounted a strong defense of the invasion of Iraq on the first full day of his state visit to Britain on Wednesday. (Financial Times)

Few Signs of Infiltration by Foreign Fighters in IraqThe commanding general of the United States Army division that patrols much of Iraq's western borders with Syria, Jordan and Saudi Arabia said Tuesday that his men had encountered only a handful of foreign fighters trying to sneak into the country to attack American and allied forces. (NY Times)

Government Official Assassinated in IraqGunmen assassinated a provincial Iraqi official in the southern town of Diwaniyah, authorities said Wednesday, while some Baghdad residents complained of punitive U.S. raids against suspected rebel hideouts. (AP)

'Mock Killing' by U.S. ColonelA U.S. lieutenant colonel went before a military hearing in Iraq yesterday charged with beating an Iraqi detainee and staging a mock execution to scare information out of him. (The Guardian)

Purported Baath Party StatementA purported statement from the former Iraqi Baath party warned that the resistance would continue and claimed that it includes 'Arab volunteers' in addition to former elements of the regime. The statement was emailed to Al Hayat newspaper yesterday. (Al Hayat)

Americans to Hand Over Key Town to Iraqi PoliceThe U.S. military is to pull its troops from a key town at the centre of Iraqi resistance because of improvements in local security, a senior general said yesterday. (The Guardian)

WAR IN IRAQ — ANALYSIS & OPINION

Safety FirstRecovery in Iraq cannot really begin until the country is secure, but getting there may not be as simple as it sounds. (NY Times)

If We Cut and RunSuppose President Bush — or for that matter a Democratic successor — were to decide that the project of reconstructing Iraq was impossible or too costly. What would cut-and-run look like, and what consequences would it have? (Washington Post)

Iraq: A Lost PeaceAs some people predicted even before it all started, America's war against Iraq proved so easy as to make one wonder why it had to be fought at all. (International Herald Tribune)

Job One: Solve the Sunni ProblemThe political problem the United States faces is simple: a significant element of Iraqi society fears that it will do badly in the new Iraq. (Newsweek)

The Congress Shares Responsibility for WarMembers knew enough to raise honest objections, but few did. (LA Times)

Not Too Late for the U.N. All those who have goodwill toward the United States and Iraq must be in utter despair at the coalition's refusal to countenance the far-reaching changes in policy that are needed to contain this internationally destabilizing crisis. (Washington Post)

The Insider Daily Terrorism Report (DTR) is a summary of major news articles and broadcasts relating to international terrorism and the war in Iraq. The DTR is edited from foreign and U.S. sources by Chris Isham, Hoda Osman, and Brinda Adhikari of the ABCNEWS Investigative Unit. The outside views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of ABCNEWS.