London: A plot to carry out car bomb attacks in the United States involving "45 doctors" has been uncovered by Scotland Yard. Police found details of the plan to use car bombs and rocket grenades to attack a naval base on an internet site run by a cyber-terrorist gang of three.
The group - led by an IT expert using the online name Irhaby007, Arabic for Terrorist007 - set up websites from their bedrooms in London and Kent to spread extremist propaganda. The details of the terror discussions were found at the Shepherd's Bush home of the gang's 23-year-old leader Younis Tsouli. One message read: "We are 45 doctors and we are determined to undertake jihad and take the battle inside America."
Direct ties
The note talked of targeting a naval base, believed to be in Florida, and blowing up petrol tanks with rocket-propelled grenades.
The three men, who have pleaded guilty to inciting terrorist murder and conspiracy to defraud, are to be sentenced today at Woolwich crown court.
The court heard how Tsouli and his friends Waseem Mughal, 24, and Tariq Al Daour, 21, had direct links to Al Qaida in Iraq led by Abu Musab Al Zarqawi. The trial, which is taking place at the high security court, is the first prosecution involving the online distribution of radical material.
The US car bomb plan, which emerged during the two-month trial, has similarities to the failed attacks in London and Glasgow but investigators say they have found no link between the two groups.
As the national terror threat level was reduced from critical to severe, details were uncovered yesterday of the links between last week's bombing suspects. Kafeel Ahmad, 27, who drove the jeep into Glasgow airport, is the brother of Sabeel Ahmad, 26, the doctor arrested in Liverpool. They are cousins of Mohammad Haneef, 27, the Indian doctor arrested in Australia.