7 September 2006

See related "CIA High Value Detainees Program:" http://cryptome.org/cia-hvdp.htm

http://www.dni.gov/announcements/content/DetaineeBiographies.pdf

[14 pages. Released on September 6, 2006.]

[Untitled; reported to be "High Value Detainee Biographies."]

NAME		'Ali 'Abd al-'Aziz 'Ali
PHONETICS		ah-Lee ahhd-al-ah-ZEEZ ah-LEE
KEY ALIAS(ES)		'Ammar al-Baluchi
AFFILIATION		Al-Qa'ida
NATIONALITY		Baluchi born and raised in Kuwait

Pakistan-based al-Qa'ida operative 'Ammar al-Baluchi is a member of an extended family of extremists that has spawned such notorious terrorists as his detained uncle and 11 September mastermind Khalid Shaykh Muhammad (KSM) and cousin and incarcerated World Trade Center bomber Ramzi Yousef. 'Ammar served as a key lieutenant for KSM during the operation on 11 September and subsequently assisted his uncle on various plots against the United States and United Kingdom.

'Ammar, who is 29 years old, spent most of his teen years in Iran before moving to the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to work as a computer programmer in Dubai in 1998, Even before this move, he was gradually being influenced by his extremist relatives to become involved in terrorism: his chief mentor was Ramzi Yousef, who taught him in the early 1990s in Iran about the importance of war against the West. 'Ammar volunteered his services to KSM in 1997, and during 2000-2001 played an important role helping facilitate the operation on 11 September by transferring money to US-based operatives and acting as a travel facilitator to hijackers transiting the UAE on their way from Pakistan to the United States.

After the collapse of the Taliban in Afghanistan in late 2001. 'Ammar assisted KSM in organizing the movement of al-Qa'ida operatives and their families to safehouses in Pakistan. KSM also directed him at the forefront of planning for a variety of terrorist plots against the West, including:

• In late 2001 in Afghanistan, KSM directed 'Ammar to be the communications intermediary between al-Qa'ida and "shoe bombers" Richard Reid and Saajid Badat, in early 2002 in Pakistan, 'Ammar helped KSM prepare operatives for travel to the United States, ostensibly to carry out attacks.

• During 2002-2003 'Ammar also worked with KSM to prepare Majid Khan and others for travel to the United States to conduct terrorist operations. 'Ammar also sent Khan in late 2002 to Thailand to deliver $50,000 to finance plotting by Jemaah Islamiya leader Hambali against US and Israeli targets in Southeast Asia.

• From late 2002, 'Ammar began plotting to carry out simultaneous attacks in Karachi against the US Consulate, Western residences, and Westerners at the local airport. After KSM's detention. 'Ammar assumed responsibility for the plot to carry out hijacking attacks from Heathrow Airport but decided to delay that plot until after the bombings in Karachi occurred. He was within days of completing preparations for the Karachi plot when he was captured.

• In 2002. 'Ammar directed Aafia Siddiqui -- a US-educated neuroscientist and al-Qa'ida facilitator -- to travel to the United States to prepare paperwork to ease Majid Khan's deployment to the United States. 'Ammar married Siddiqui shortly before his detention.

NAME		Ahmed Khalfan Ghailani
PHONETICS		geh-LAH-nee
KEY ALIAS(ES)		Haytham al-Kini
AFFILIATION		Al-Qa'ida
NATIONALITY		Tanzanian

An al-Qa'ida document forger and travel facilitator, Ahmed Khalfan Ghailani -- known in al-Qa'ida circles as Haytham al-Kini -- rose in stature after 11 September 2001 to become one of al-Qa'ida's top forgers. Although Ghailani was not directly involved in operational planning, he worked for the now-deceased Hamza Rabi'a -- then al-Qa'ida's chief of external operations -- and forged or altered passports for many al-Qa'ida members. Most of his work involved substituting photos in passports and modifying visa stamps.

• Ghailani lived at various houses in North and South Waziristan in 2003 and 2004, which in conjunction with his forgery work, allowed him to meet many high- and low-level al-Qa'ida operatives.

Ghailani, born around 1974 in Zanzibar, Tanzania.. is one of the FBI's Most Wanted terrorists and has been indicted for his role in the East Africa Embassy bombings on 7 August 1998. Ghailani, who knew many of the Africans involved in the attacks, originally met one of the operatives, Fahid Muhammad Ali Msalem, through a mutual friend; he later befriended the rest of the group after he began traveling between Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, and Mombasa, Kenya, transporting and selling various items and doing odd jobs. Msalem asked Ghailani at various times to help the group purchase a truck, gas cylinders, and TNT that would later be used to construct a car bomb, requests Ghailani fulfilled.

• Ghailani and several other operatives moved to Afghanistan -- which Ghailani had wanted to do for several years -- the day before the Embassy bombings.

• After arriving in Afghanistan, Ghailani attended regular training at one of al-Qa'ida's camps and served as a rank-and-file soldier. Ghailani eventually became a cook for Usama Bin Ladin before joining a group of fellow Africans in 2001 who ran al-Qa'ida's document forgery office in Kandahar, Afghanistan.

• Ghailani fled to Karachi, Pakistan, after the fall of the Taliban, but high-profile arrests in Karachi in April 2003 convinced him to move to South Waziristan.

NAME		Hambali
PHONETICS		HAM-bali
KEY ALIAS(ES)		Riduan bin Isomuddin (true name), Encep Nurjaman
AFFILIATION		Jemaah Islamiya and al-Qa'ida
NATIONALITY		Born in Indonesia, ethnically Sudanese

Indonesian-born Riduan bin Isomuddin -- best known among extremists as Hambali -- was an operational mastermind in the Southeast Asia-based Islamic extremist group Jemaah Islamiya (JI) and also served as the main interface between JI and al-Qa'ida from 2000 until his capture in 2003. Hambali helped plan the first Bali bombings in 2002 that killed more than 200 persons and facilitated al-Qa'ida financing for the Jakarta Marriott Hotel bombing the following year. In late 2002, he also directed his subordinates Lillie and Zubair to case the British High Commission in Phnom Penh, Cambodia. Hambali was previously involved in the attempted assassination of the Philippine Ambassador to Indonesia in August 2000 and the bombings on Christmas Eve that year of some 30 churches across the archipelago. Hambali had longstanding ties to al-Qa'ida external operations chief Khalid Shaykh Muhammad (KSM). Before returning to Southeast Asia in December 2001, Hambali discussed operations with senior al-Qa'ida leaders regarding post-11 September attacks against US interests.

Hambali in 1999 established a cell of young JI operatives in Karachi, Pakistan -- dubbed al-Ghuraba -- which provided its members with advanced doctrinal and operational training, including at al-Qa'ida training camps in Afghanistan. Hambali tapped his younger brother, Rusman "Gun Gun" Gunawan, as deputy Ghuraba cell leader.

Hambali was born on 4 April 1964 in Cianjur, West Java, and is the eldest male of 11 children. His great-grandfather founded a local Islamic school, which Hambali attended during his early adolescence. Hambali was a devout Muslim youth who, at age 20, left Indonesia for Malaysia. ostensibly to seek work. While there, he met JI co-founder Abdullah Sungkar and Abu Bakar Bashir -- fellow Indonesians who had fled the Suharto regime for Malaysia -- and through them was exposed to radical Islamic teachings. Hambali tried unsuccessfully to get a scholarship to an Islamic school in Malaysia, before traveling in the mid-1980s to Afghanistan, where he fought alongside many of al-Qa'ida's future leaders. During his three-year stint in Afghanistan, he forged strong ties to Usama Bin Ladin and KSM. After returning to Malaysia in the early I 990s, Hambali and JI spiritual leader Bashir further developed their relationship and became close friends.

NAME		Mustafa Ahmad al-Hawsawi
PHONETICS		moo-STAH-fah ahl-hah-SOW-ee
KEY ALIAS(ES)		Hashim 'Abd al-Rahman, Zahir, Ayyub, Muhammad Adnan
AFFILIATION		Al-Qa'ida
NATIONALITY		Saudi

Mustafa Ahmad al-Hawsawi was one of two key financial facilitators entrusted by 11 September mastermind Khalid Shaykh Muhammad (KSM) to manage the funding for the hijackings. As a trusted, respected financial facilitator known to the leadership, al-Hawsawi separately met with Usama Bin Ladin, his deputy Ayman al-Zawahiri. and al-Qa'ida spokesman Sulayman Bu Ghayth soon after the attacks on 11 September and had contact with many of al Qa'ida's most senior managers.

Various reports suggest that al-Hawsawi had direct ties to several of the hijackers and to other operatives, including Ramzi Bin al-Shibh -- who delivered some money from al-Hawsawi to the hijackers. In addition, al-Hawsawi and Bin al-Shibh served as a communications link between KSM and the hijackers. He shared a United Arab Emirates (UAE)-based financial account with one hijacker -- an account that funded the hijackers' activities in the month before the attacks on 11 September. Four hijackers returned money directly to al-Hawsawi in the week before the attacks, which al-Hawsawi then redeemed in the UAE. Al-Hawsawi also wired thousands of dollars to Bin al-Shibh in the summer of 2001, per KSM's instructions. KSM also maintained his own financial links to al-Hawsawi. In 2001, KSM held a supplemental credit card linked to an al-Hawsawi account based in the UAE.

• Al-Hawsawi worked in the al Qa'ida media center in Afghanistan from 2000 -- while it was under the direction of KSM -- until he departed for the UAE in early 2001.

After the attacks on 11 September, al-Hawsawi fled the UAE and traveled to Afghanistan and to Pakistan, where he hid until his capture in 2003. KSM reportedly had been providing a safehouse and other logistic support to guarantee al-Hawsawi's security after he arrived in Pakistan.

• Hawsawi facilitated other operatives' travel, including Muhammad al-Qahtani, who was denied entry into the United Slates in the summer of 2001.

• Hawsawi's close relationship with KSM and the latter's active participation in providing for his security following 11 September suggests Hawsawi was key to KSM's operational team.

NAME		Lillie
PHONETICS		LIL-lee
KEY ALIAS(ES)		Mohammed Nazir Bin Lep (true name), Bashir Bin Lep
AFFILIATION		Jemaah Islamiya and al-Qa'ida
NATIONALITY		Malaysian

Malaysian-born Mohammed Nazir Bin Lep (a.k.a. Bashir Bin Lep) -- better known as Lillie -- was one of Hambali's key lieutenants and had considerable operational experience. Lillie facilitated the transfer of al Qa'ida funds used for the Jakarta Marriott Hotel bombing in 2003 and knew of the Jemaah Islamiya's (JI) targets and plans to launch attacks elsewhere in Southeast Asia. He was involved in 2002 in the JI plot against the British High Commission in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, and in mid-2002 cased targets in Bangkok and Pattaya, Thailand. at Hambali's direction. Lillie was particularly interested in the ideas of martyrdom and was slated to be a suicide operative for an al-Qa'ida "second wave" attack targeting Los Angeles. Lillie also had links to now-deceased JI bombmaker Dr. Azahari bin Husin and in 2002 received bombmaking tutorials from Azahari. Lillie spent time in Kandahar, Afghanistan. in 2000, where he trained at al-Qa'ida's al-Faruq camp in weaponry and explosives. Lillie attended Polytechnic University Malaysia in the mid-1990s, where he earned a degree in architecture.

NAME		Majid Khan
PHONETICS		MAH-jid KAHN
KEY ALIAS(ES)		Yusif
AFFILIATION		Al-Qa'ida
NATIONALITY		Pakistani

Before his 2003 capture, Pakistani national Majid Khan was an al-Qa'ida operative with direct connections to the United States. In 1996. Khan moved to the United States with his family and settled in Baltimore, Maryland, but never obtained US citizenship. After graduating from high school in 1999, Khan became involved in a local Islamic organization and, in early 2002, returned to Pakistan. In Pakistan, Khan's uncle and cousin, who were al-Qa'ida operatives, introduced Khan to senior al-Qa'ida operational planner Khalid Shaykh Muhammad (KSM), who selected Khan as an operative for a possible attack inside the United States. KSM selected Khan because of his excellent English and extensive knowledge of the United States.

• During his stay in the United States, Khan worked at his family's gas station and was, therefore, able to assist KSM with his research into the feasibility of a plan to blow up gas stations in the United States. In support of this plot, Khan attended a training course at which he learned how to construct explosive timing devices.

• KSM further tasked Khan to conduct research on poisoning US water reservoirs and considered Khan for an operation to assassinate Pakistani President Musharraf. In addition, Khan passed a test that KSM orchestrated which showed that Khan was committed to being a suicide operative.

• In the fall of 2002 Khan also delivered money to Zubair, an operative who worked directly for Jemaah Islamiya (JI) leader and al-Qa'ida's South Asia representative Hambali. The money was to support terrorist attacks against Western targets.

Khan and detained al-Qa'ida operative and facilitator 'Ammar al-Baluchi discussed with Uzair Paracha's father, Saifullah, a plan to use the New York office of Saifullah's Karachi-based textile import/export business to smuggle explosives into the United States for use with various al-Qa'ida attacks. Khan also had links to al-Qa'ida operatives and facilitators, most notably, Aafia Siddique, a US-educated neuroscientist and al-Qa'ida facilitator, who assisted Majid with documents to hide his travel to Pakistan from US authorities to reenter the United Stales.

In early 1003, Khan tapped Uzair Paracha, a US permanent resident alien he met in Pakistan through 'Ammar, to impersonate Khan in the United States to make it appear as if Khan had never left the United States and obtain immigration documents that would enable Khan to illegally reenter. Uzair Paracha was convicted and recently sentenced to 30 years imprisonment in the United States for material support to terrorism.

Khan recommended to KSM that Iyman Faris, a naturalized US citizen, be tasked for an al-Qa'ida operation. In 2003, Faris was convicted and sentenced to 20 years imprisonment in the United States on two counts pertaining to material support to terrorism. In 2002. Faris researched, at KSM's request, suspension bridges in New York and looked into obtaining the tools that would be necessary to cut bridge suspension cables.

NAME		'Abd ai-Rahim al-Nashiri
PHONETICS		AHbd al-Rah-HEEM ah-NASH-er-REE
KEY ALIAS(ES)		Abd al-Rahim Hussein Muhammad Abdu (true name), Mullah Bilal, Bilal, Abu Bilal al-Makki, Khalid al-Safani, Amm Ahmad ("Uncle Ahmad")
AFFILIATION		Al-Qa'ida
NATIONALITY		Saudi National of Yemeni descent

'Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri was al-Qa'ida's operations chief in the Arabian Peninsula until his capture in 2002. Trained in explosives, Nashiri honed his expertise in suicide attacks and maritime operations. He led cells in Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Yemen, and he was the mastermind and local manager of the bombing in October 2000 of the USS Cole. The success of the USS Cole operation appeared to have propelled Nashiri into a role of greater responsibility.

Born in Mecca on 5 January 1965, Nashiri ended his formal education after intermediate school and eventually followed in the footsteps of his uncles and cousins to become an extremist. He participated in Ibn al-Khattab's Chechen and Tajik insurgencies and became a trainer at al-Qa'ida's Khaldan camp in Afghanistan in 1992. After returning from Tajikistan, Nashiri, accompanied by al-Qa'ida operative Khallad bin 'Altash, first met Usama Bin Ladin in 1994. In 1997, Nashiri fought with the Taliban in Kabul and Jalalabad. The following year, Nashiri and his cousin, Jihad Muhammad Abu Ali, were implicated in a Bin Ladin-sponsored operation to smuggle Sagger missiles into Saudi Arabia for use against an unspecified US military target. Nashiri was the leader of the plot and a major player in the Saudi cell at that time.

Nashiri was tasked by Bin Ladin in a private meeting in Afghanistan in 1998 to attack a US or Western oil tanker off the coast of Yemen. This original objective was subsequently modified by Bin Ladin in 1999 to target a US military ship in the Port of Aden. Nashiri's operatives' first attempt was unsuccessful when their boat laden with explosives sank in January 2000 -- they were probably targeting the USS The Sullivans. On Bin Ladin's instructions to try again, his suicide operatives successfully attacked the USS Cole in October; Nashiri was in Afghanistan at the time of the attack.

At the Lime of his arrest. Nashiri was arranging funding for a plot to crash a small airplane into the bridge of a Western navy vessel in Port Rashid, UAE. an operation he had hoped to execute in November or December 2002. He also was orchestrating additional attacks, one targeting a US housing compound in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, which he had planned for mid-2003. Nashiri abandoned a plot that he was involved in earlier in 2002 to attack warships in the Strait of Hormuz, but his operatives -- on orders from Bin Ladin -- in October 2002 rammed the French tanker MV Limburg off the coast of Yemen with a small boat. Other plots that Nashiri was involved in included a car bomb attack against a Saudi military installation at Tabuk aimed at killing US military personnel, attacks on oil tankers in the Strait of Gibraltar and Western warships passing through the Port of Dubai, and attacks against land-based targets in Morocco, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia. Nasihiri was convicted and sentenced to death by a Yemeni court, in absentia, for his part in the USS Cole bombing.

NAME		Abu Faraj al-Libi
PHONETICS		AH-boo FAH-raj ahl-LEE-bee
KEY ALIAS(ES)		Mustafa al-'Uzayti (probable true name), Mahfuz, 'Abd al-Hafiz, Abu Hamada. Tawfiq
AFFILIATION		Al-Qa'ida
NATIONALITY		Libyan

Veteran paramilitary commander and facilitator in the Pakistan-Afghanistan theater Abu Faraj took on more direct operational responsibilities following the arrest in 2003 of former al-Qa'ida external operations chief and 11 September mastermind Khalid Shaykh Muhammad (KSM). He was the organization's general manager subordinate only to Usama Bin Ladin and Ayman al-Zawahiri beginning in mid-2003, while being heavily involved in financing operatives and their families.

Abu Faraj was a communications conduit for al-Qa'ida managers to Bin Ladin from August 2003 until his capture in 2005. He was the recipient of couriered messages and public statements from Bin Ladin and passed messages to Bin Ladin from both senior lieutenants and rank-and-file members. Some of his work almost certainly required personal meetings with Bin Ladin or Zawahiri, a privilege reserved since 2002 for select members of the group.

Abu Faraj had frequent contact with now-deceased senior operational planner Hamza Rabi'a. and other senior managers involved with al-Qa'ida's external operations and paramilitary efforts. Abu Faraj searched for operatives on Rabi'a's behalf, including those who could travel to the United States for attacks, and he also asked now-deceased al-Qa'ida in Iraq leader Ahu Mus'ab al-Zarqawi to target US interests outside of Iraq.

• Abu Faraj was suspected of involvement in plots to assassinate Pakistani President Musharraf.

• Abu Faraj served as a trainer in the early 1990s and later helped to administer al-Qa'ida's training camps in Afghanistan.

NAME		Zayn al-'Abidin Abu Zubaydah
PHONETICS		AH-Boo Zoo-BAY-duh
KEY ALIAS(ES)		Hani, Tariq
AFFILIATION		Al-Qa'ida
NATIONALITY		Palestinian, raised in Saudi Arabia

Zayn al-'Abidin Abu Zubaydah was a leading extremist facilitator who operated in the Afghanistan-Pakistan region from the mid-1990s. Bin Ladin recruited him to be one of al-Qa'ida's senior travel facilitators following Abu Zubaydah's success in 1996 at securing safe passage of al-Qa'ida members returning from Sudan to Afghanistan. In November 2001, Abu Zubaydah helped smuggle now-deceased al-Qa'ida in Iraq leader Abu Mus'ab al-Zarqawi and some 70 Arab fighters out of Kandahar, Afghanistan, into Iran.

• At the time of his capture, Abu Zubaydah was trying tu organize a terrorist attack in Israel and he had enlisted the help of Zarqawi in finding a smuggling route into Israel for moving persons and materials.

• Although not believed to be directly linked to the attacks on 11 September 2001, the $50,000 that Abu Zubaydah received from Saudi donors and passed to al-Qa'ida's senior leadership for his Israel plot may have been used for the attacks. Moreover, three of the hijackers received basic training at al-Qa'ida's Khaldan camp in Afghanistan, which was part of the "Khaldan group" of camps and guesthouses that he oversaw between 1995 and 2000.

Abu Zubaydah's early work as an extremist facilitator in the mid-1990s focused on recruiting Arabs in Pakistan and arranging their travel for various training camps in Afghanistan and the frontlines of Bosnia and Chechnya. Between 1994 and early 2000, he often smuggled both persons and chemicals -- such as cyanide and nitrates for use by al-Qa'ida in making weapons -- from Pakistan into Afghanistan. He learned document forgery and trained in explosives at the Khaldan camp. where he advanced to become instructor and then administrative director. In his role as a senior mujahidin facilitator and Khaldan camp director, he assisted Western-based trained extremists, including Americans.

• Abu Zubaydah established a document forgery network in Pakistan that supported al-Qa'ida and other extremist groups. In the late 1990s, he procured funds from donors in Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates, which he doled out to various contacts in Pakistan-based extremist networks for their terrorist activities.

• Abu Zubaydah also assisted US Millennium Plot operative Ahmad Ressam to enter Afghanistan to attend a training camp in the late 1990s and to travel to Canada via the United States at the end of 1998. He facilitated the travel and training of the Jordanian cell that was involved in Jordan's Millennium Plot.

NAME		Ramzi Bin al-Shibh
PHONETICS		Rahm-zee bihn-uhl-SHEEB
KEY ALIAS(ES)		Abu Ubaydah, 'Umnr Muhammad 'Abdallah Ba' Amar
AFFILIATION		Al-Qa'ida
NATIONALITY		Yemeni

Ramzi Bin al-Shibh, a key facilitator for the attacks on 11 September 2001, was a lead operative -- until his capture in 2002 -- in the post-11 September plot conceived of by 11 September mastermind Khalid Shaykh Muhammad (KSM) to hijack aircraft and crash them into Heathrow Airport in the United Kingdom.

Bin al-Shibh was born in 1972 in southern Yemen. He noted that he was religious from the age of 12 and fought briefly in Yemen's civil war in 1994. After two attempts to immigrate to the United States failed, Bin al-Shibh traveled to Germany, where he applied for political asylum under an assumed name and as a Sudanese citizen. Denied his request for asylum in January 1996, he left Germany and returned to Yemen, where he applied for a visa in his true name. In December 1997, he returned to Germany, where he became a student. In Hamburg, he met hijackers Muhammad Atta, Marwan al-Shebhi, and Ziad Jarrah.

Bin al-Shibh, Atta, al-Shebhi, and Jarrah traveled to Afghanistan in 1999. In Afghanistan, the four men met Usama Bin Ladin, pledged their loyally to him, and readily accepted Bin Ladin's proposal to martyr themselves in an operation against the United States. Bin al-Shibh was slated to be one or the 11 September hijacker pilots. He and Atta traveled to Karachi, where they met with KSM.

• After returning to Germany in early 2000, Bin al-Shibh obtained a new passport but was unable to obtain a US visa, despite four attempts. Bin al-Shibh said that in late 2000 he tried to convince a US citizen in San Diego via e-mail to marry him to gain entry into the United States, but Atta convinced him to abandon the idea,

During the eight months before the attacks, Bin al-Shibh was the primary communications intermediary between the hijackers in the United States and al-Qa'ida's leadership in Afghanistan and Pakistan, He relayed orders from al-Qa'ida senior operatives to Atta via e-mail or phone, and he met with Atta in Germany in January 2001 and in Spain in July 2001 for in-depth briefings from Atta on the progress of the plot. He also made travel plans to the United States for some of the 11 September terrorists and facilitated the transfer of money to the 11 September terrorists, including convicted terrorist Zacharias Moussaoui. After learning from Atta in late August 2001 of the date of the hijacking attacks, Bin al Shibh passed the information to KSM.

• A week before the 11 September attacks, Bin al-Shibh left Germany and arrived in Afghanistan three or four days after the attacks. In late 2001, he fled Afghanistan after the collapse of the Taliban and began working with KSM in Karachi on follow-on plots against the West, particularly the Heathrow plot. He was tasked by KSM to recruit operatives in Saudi Arabia for an attack on Heathrow Airport, and, as of his capture. Bin al-Shibh had identified four operatives for the operation.

NAME		Zubair
PHONETICS		zoo-BEAR
KEY ALIAS(ES)		Mohd Farik bin Amin (true name), Zaid
AFFILIATION		Jemaah Islamiya and al-Qa'ida
NATIONALITY		Malaysian

Al-Qa'ida and Jemaah Islamiya (JI) member Mohd Farik Bin Amin -- best known as Zubair -- served directly under JI operational planner Hambali. As one of Hambali's trusted associates, Zubair assisted in Hambali's operations, which included casing targets for JI planned attacks, until his capture in 2003. Hambali in November 2001 tapped Zubair to be a suicide operative for an al-Qa'ida attack targeting Los Angeles. Zubair played a role in transferring funds used to finance terrorist attacks in Southeast Asia from al-Qa'ida operations chief Khalid Shaykh Muhammad to Hambali. Zubair received small arms and combat tactics training at al-Qa'ida's al-Faruq Camp in Afghanistan in 2000 and again in 2001. While earning his degree in electronics telecommunications in Malaysia, Zubair met fellow student Bashir Bin Lap (a.k.a. Lillie), who also later became one of Hambali's lieutenants and was captured with Hambali in 2003.

NAME		Walid Bin 'Attash
PHONETICS		wah-LEED bin AH-tush
KEY ALIAS(ES)		Khallad Bin 'Attash, Silver
AFFILIATION		Al-Qa'ida
NATIONALITY		Yemeni, born and raised in Saudi Arabia

Walid Bin 'Attash, best known as Khallad, was a key al-Qa'ida operative from 1998 until his capture in 2003. Khallad, who is 27, is the scion of a prominent terrorist family: his father, Muhammad, was close to Usama Bin Ladin. and several of Khallad's brothers went to Afghanistan to train and fight in the 1990s; two of these brothers were killed -- including one during US airstrikes in Afghanistan in late 2001 -- and another, Hassan, has been detained at Guantanamo Bay since 2004.

Khallad arrived in Afghanistan in about 1995 and trained al a number of camps. In 1996, after Bin Ladin's return to Afghanistan from Sudan, Khallad alternated between serving as a bodyguard for the al-Qa'ida leader and participating in combat against the Northern Alliance; he lost his right leg during a battlefield accident in 1997. In 1998, Bin Ladin began using Khallad operationally, first as the al-Qa'ida leader's intermediary to al-Qa'ida Arabian Peninsula network chief 'Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri; together during 1998 and 1999, Khallad and Nashiri worked together on the maritime plot that culminated in the bombing of the USS Cole in October 2000. In early 1999. Bin Ladin reportedly selected him to become a hijacker in the operation on 11 September 2001, but he was arrested in Yemen in April of that year while attempting to obtain a US visa because local authorities suspected he was a different extremist. Although his brief imprisonment blocked his travel to the United States, Khallad otherwise assisted in the operation. including helping Bin Ladin select additional hijackers and traveling to Kuala Lumpur and Bangkok during December 1999-January 2000 to meet with hijackers Nawaf al-Hazmi and Khalid al-Mihdhar and to take two flights on a US-flagged airliner to assess inflight security procedure.

• In late 1999, Bin Ladin asked him to help select about two-dozen experienced and reliable operatives for special training at the Mes Ainak camp in Afghanistan; Khallad supervised the training at the camp; many of these operatives went on to participate in prominent operations: one became a suicide bomber in the Cole operation; two were later 11 September hijackers; another was a cell leader who was killed during the suicide bombings in Riyadh in May 2003; and yet another gained renown for his involvement in the bombing of the Limburg in October 2002 and for his plot to assassinate the US Ambassador to Yemen.

After the attacks on 11 September, Khallad helped prepare al-Qa'ida's defenses around Tora Bora, then fled Afghanistan after the collapse of the Taliban in late 2001. In early January 2002, Khallad arrived in Karachi, where he served as a communications link between al-Qa'ida's senior leadership and the network in Saudi Arabia -- particularly after the detention of al-Nashiri in late 2002 -- and assisted in the movement of operatives from South and Southeast Asia to the Arabian Peninsula. He also aided efforts by Khalid Shaykh Muhammad (KSM) to recruit Saudi hijackers for the al-Qa'ida plot to hijack airliners to attack Heathrow Airport.

• In the months before his arrest, Khallad and KSM's nephew 'Ammar al-Baluchi were organizing a plot to carry out simultaneous attacks in Karachi against the US Consulate, Western travelers at the airport, and Westerners residing in the Karachi area. The plot was close to execution when he was detained.

NAME		Khalid Shaykh Muhammad
PHONETICS		HAH-lid SHAKE moo-HAH-mud
KEY ALIAS(ES)		Mukhtar
AFFILIATION		Al-Qa'ida
NATIONALITY		Baluchi born and raised in Kuwait

Khalid Shaykh Muhammad (KSM) is one of history's most infamous terrorists, and his capture in 2003 deprived al-Qa'ida of one of its most capable senior operatives. He devoted most of his adult life to terrorist plotting, specifically against the United States. and was the driving force behind the attacks on 11 September 2001 as well as several subsequent plots against US and Western targets worldwide.

After graduating from North Carolina A&T State University in 1986 with a degree in mechanical engineering, KSM traveled to Afghanistan to participate in the anti-Soviet fighting there. KSM joined Yousef in the Philippines in 1994 to plan the "Bojinka" plot -- the simultaneous bombings of a dozen US-flagged commercial airliners over the Pacific. After the plot was disrupted and Yousef was caught in early 1995, KSM was indicted for his role in the plot and went into hiding. By 1999, he convinced Usama Bin Ladin to provide him with operatives and funding for a new airliner plot, which culminated in the attacks on 11 September two years later.

• KSM headed al-Qa'ida's Media Committee from 2000 and he helped build close operational ties between al-Qa'ida and the Jemaah Islamiya (JI) terrorist group that was plotting against US and Israeli targets in Southeast Asia.

By late 2001, with the collapse of the Taliban regime and the dispersal of al-Qa'ida's leadership, the prestige associated with engineering the attacks on 11 September propelled KSM into the role of external operations chief for al-Qa'ida.

• In addition to plots targeting Britain, KSM launched several plots targeting the US Homeland, including a plot in late 2001 to have 11 suicide operatives hijack a plane over the Pacific and crash it into a skyscraper on the US West Coast; a plan in early 2002 to send al-Qa'ida operatives to conduct attacks in the U.S.; and a plot in early 2003 to employ a network of Pakistanis -- including Majid Khan -- to smuggle explosives into New York and to target gas stations, railroad tracks, and a bridge in New York.

NAME		Gouled Hassan Dourad
PHONETICS		Goo-LED HAH-san Door-AHD
KEY ALIAS(ES)		Guleed Hassan Ahmad, Hanad
AFFILIATION		al-Qa'ida, al-Ittihad al-Islami
NATIONALITY		Somali

Gouled Hassan Dourad was the head of a Mogadishu-based facilitation network of al-Ittihad al-Islami (AIAI) members that supported al-Qa'ida members in Somalia. Gouled was a member of a small, selective group of AIAI members who worked for the East African al-Qa'ida cell led by Abu Talha al-Sudani -- Gouled's responsibilities included locating safehouses, assisting in the transfer of funds, and procuring weapons, explosives, and other supplies.

• Reporting suggests that Gouled carried out one operational mission for Abu Talha: during September-October 2003, he cased the US military base in Djibouti -- Camp Lemonier -- as part of Abu Talha's plot to conduct a suicide truck-bombing attack. He also was tasked by Abu Talha to purchase two rocket-propelled grenades, five AK-47 assault rifles and four 9mm pistols, which he delivered to Abu Talha in mid-2003.

• Gouled was privy to several terrorist plots under consideration by his AIAI cell, including shooting down an Ethiopian jetliner landing at an airport in Somalia in 2003 and kidnapping Western workers of nongovernmental organizations in Hargeysa, Somalia, in 2002 as a means to raise money for future AIAI operations. Following Gouled's arrest, AIAI terrorists on 19 March 2004 tried unsuccessfully to kidnap a German aid worker and murdered a Kenyan contract employee in Hargeysa.

Gouled was born in Mogadishu in 1974; when the Somali civil war erupted in 1991, his parents sent him to Germany, where he lived in a refugee camp, He traveled to Sweden and gained asylum there in 1993. In 1994, he attempted travel to the United States but was turned back in Iceland because of his fraudulent passport.

• While in Sweden, Gouled attended a Somali mosque, whose imam arranged for Gouled and his friend, future AIAI bombmaker Qasim Mohamed, to train in Afghanistan before joining the Somali war effort. Gouled trained at Khaldan camp in weapons and explosives from January through October 1996 and at another camp in Khowst in assassination techniques for several months. By late 1996, he returned to Somalia.

Gouled became a member of AIAI in 1997 out of a commitment to support the Somali war against Ethiopia and to win the Ogaden region of Ethiopia back for Somalia. He fought against the Ethiopians in Ogaden off and on from 1997 to 2002 and trained AIAI fighters. He allegedly became associated with al-Qa'ida because its members were in Somalia and his AIAI cell supported al-Qa'ida.

• Gouled was introduced to Abu Talha al-Sudani -- who came to Mogadishu to hide following the Mombasa attacks in November 20002 -- in early 2003 by his AIAI cell leader. Gouled was recruited to work for Abu Talha, in part because he had trained in Afghanistan: spoke Arabic, English, some Swedish. and Somali; and had a high-school education.