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CIA Suicide Bomber Vows Revenge In New Video
The man believed to be the suicide bomber who killed seven CIA employees and contractors last month appears in a newly released video, in which he vows revenge for the killing of a Taliban leader.
The video shows Humam Khalil Abu-Mulal al-Balawi, whom a former U.S. intelligence official identified as the suicide bomber. Al-Balawi's brother told CNN Senior International Correspondent Nic Robertson that the man in the video was his sibling.
In the tape, which aired Saturday on the Arabic satellite news channel Al-Jazeera, al-Balawi says his message is for the CIA and Jordanian intelligence.
The December 30 bombing at a U.S. base in Khost, in southeastern Afghanistan, killed seven CIA operatives and a Jordanian army captain.
Al-Balawi mentions Baitullah Mehsud, the leader of the Taliban in Pakistan who was killed in a missile strike last August.
"We will never forget the blood of our leader Baitullah Mehsud, may God have mercy on his soul," he says in Arabic, according to a CNN translation. "It will remain that we take revenge (for his death) in America and outside America. It is a trust on every person who left everything for the sake of God, whom Baitullah Mehsud supported."
Al Qaeda's commander of operations in Afghanistan, Mustafa Abu Yazid, said this week that the attack avenged Mehsud's death.
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Mehsud was the leader of Tehrik-i Taliban Pakistan (TTP). It was TTP that released the video, according to IntelCenter, a think thank that specializes in tracking terrorist groups.
At one point, the video shows the date of December 20, 2009. That is five days before Nigerian passenger Umar Farouk AbdulMutallab allegedly tried to blow up a Northwest Airlines flight to Detroit, Michigan.
The Yemen-based group al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula has claimed responsibility for the Christmas Day plot.
It is impossible to know whether the date on the video is accurate, or whether al-Balawi was aware of AbdulMutallab's alleged plans. If al-Balawi did know about the plot, it could indicate a greater degree of communication between TTP and al Qaeda than previously thought.
In an analysis of the video, IntelCenter said there is a connection between the two groups. But IntelCenter also pointed out al-Balawi appears in the video next to TTP leader Hakimullah Mehsud, and that it was TTP that released the video.
"The TTP and al Qaeda have a close relationship, and in all likelihood al Qaeda was involved at some level in the operation," IntelCenter said in an analysis of the video. "However, the release of the video with TTP Emir Hakimullah Mehsud firmly places the attack under the TTP banner."
Of the seven CIA operatives who were killed in the December 30 attack were two members of the private security firm Xe, formerly known as Blackwater. The Jordanian military officer who was killed was Army Capt. Sharif Ali bin Zeid, a cousin of Jordan's King Abdullah II.
It was one of the worst attacks ever on America's intelligence community.
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Sources: AP, CNN, MSNBC, Google Maps
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