ABU ZUBAYDAH
Name: Abu Zubaydah
Born: 12 March 1971
Abu Zubaydah (born 12 March 1971 as Zayn al-Abidin Muhammad Husayn)
was, according to American authorities, a high-ranking member of al-Qaida
and close associate of Osama bin Laden. He is currently in U.S. custody in
Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Zubaydah's name is often transliterated as Abu Zubaidah,
Abu Zubeida, or Abu Zoubeida. Born Zein al-Abideen Mohamed Hussein ,
he is also known by over thirty-five aliases.
Born in Saudi Arabia, Abu Zubaydah has been close to al-Qaida since the group's
early years, helping to operate a popular terrorist training camp near the
border between Afghanistan and Pakistan in the early 1990s. He became an
associate of Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi, and served as a chief recruiter for al-Qaida.
In the late 1990s, Abu Zubaydah played a lead role in one of the 2000 millennium
attack plots, and a possible tangential role in a second. There were plans to
bomb a fully booked Radisson hotel in Amman, Jordan, and three other sites. This
targeted tourists from the United States and Israel. But on November 30, 1999,
Jordanian intelligence intercepted a call between Abu Zubaydah and Khadr Abu
Hoshar, a Palestinian militant, and determined that an attack was imminent.
Jordanian police arrested 22 conspirators and foiled the attack. Abu Zubaydah
was sentenced to death in absentia by a Jordanian court for his role. There is
also evidence that Abu Zubaydah approved the Los Angeles airport bomb plot in
2000. This plot was also foiled.
Abu Zubaydah's Combatant Status Review Tribunal convened on March 27, 2007. The
Department of Defense released verbatim transcript of the unclassified session
from his Tribunal, and his Summary of Evidence memo.
Zubaydah denied that he was an associate of Osama bin Laden and said he
disagreed with Al-Qaeda's philosophy of targeting civilians.[38] Abu Zubaydah
acknowledged facilitating the training of jihadists in Afghanistan to fight
invaders of Muslim lands, but said the Taliban shut his camp, the Khalden
training camp, down in 2000. He testified that his sole meeting with Bin Laden
was in 2000, to request that Bin Laden use his influence with the Taliban to get
them to reverse themselves, and reopen the Khalden camp. It was during this
meeting that he learned that the Taliban shut down his camp at Bin Laden's
request.
Name: Abu Zubaydah
Born: 12 March 1971
Abu Zubaydah (born 12 March 1971 as Zayn al-Abidin Muhammad Husayn)
was, according to American authorities, a high-ranking member of al-Qaida
and close associate of Osama bin Laden. He is currently in U.S. custody in
Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Zubaydah's name is often transliterated as Abu Zubaidah,
Abu Zubeida, or Abu Zoubeida. Born Zein al-Abideen Mohamed Hussein ,
he is also known by over thirty-five aliases.
Born in Saudi Arabia, Abu Zubaydah has been close to al-Qaida since the group's
early years, helping to operate a popular terrorist training camp near the
border between Afghanistan and Pakistan in the early 1990s. He became an
associate of Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi, and served as a chief recruiter for al-Qaida.
In the late 1990s, Abu Zubaydah played a lead role in one of the 2000 millennium
attack plots, and a possible tangential role in a second. There were plans to
bomb a fully booked Radisson hotel in Amman, Jordan, and three other sites. This
targeted tourists from the United States and Israel. But on November 30, 1999,
Jordanian intelligence intercepted a call between Abu Zubaydah and Khadr Abu
Hoshar, a Palestinian militant, and determined that an attack was imminent.
Jordanian police arrested 22 conspirators and foiled the attack. Abu Zubaydah
was sentenced to death in absentia by a Jordanian court for his role. There is
also evidence that Abu Zubaydah approved the Los Angeles airport bomb plot in
2000. This plot was also foiled.
Abu Zubaydah's Combatant Status Review Tribunal convened on March 27, 2007. The
Department of Defense released verbatim transcript of the unclassified session
from his Tribunal, and his Summary of Evidence memo.
Zubaydah denied that he was an associate of Osama bin Laden and said he
disagreed with Al-Qaeda's philosophy of targeting civilians.[38] Abu Zubaydah
acknowledged facilitating the training of jihadists in Afghanistan to fight
invaders of Muslim lands, but said the Taliban shut his camp, the Khalden
training camp, down in 2000. He testified that his sole meeting with Bin Laden
was in 2000, to request that Bin Laden use his influence with the Taliban to get
them to reverse themselves, and reopen the Khalden camp. It was during this
meeting that he learned that the Taliban shut down his camp at Bin Laden's
request.