Feds foil NYC bomb plot

BY TOM BRUNE AND J. JIONI PALMER
Newsday Washington Bureau

July 7, 2006, 12:39 PM EDT


WASHINGTON -- Federal authorities said today they have disrupted a terrorist plot to blow up parts of the New York transportation system and arrested a key suspect in Lebanon.

The alleged plot was monitored for much of the past year, reportedly on open Internet chat rooms, and never posed a serious threat to the New York City area, officials said.

"We have disrupted a terrorist network that was in the planning stages of an attack against the transportation system in the New York-New Jersey area," the FBI and Homeland Security said a joint statement this morning.

Despite a report in the New York Daily News that the Holland Tunnel was specifically in terrorists' crosshairs, a federal official with knowledge of the plot said, "There is no agreement on where the exact location of the target was."

The official said the Holland Tunnel was never specifically mentioned as a potential target and that all of the available intelligence suggested that terrorists were eyeing something "more mass transit."

"They feel [terrorists were looking] downtown in the vicinity of the World Trade Center," the federal official said.

A significant development in the case was the arrest by Lebanese authorities in Beruit of a suspected terrorist, the FBI statement said.

He was identified as Amir Andalousli, but his real name is Assem Hammoud, a Beirut native, according to the Associated Press, which cited an unnamed Lebanese official.

"We know al-Qa'ida continues to have an interest in attacking the United States," the statement said. "At this point in time, there is no specific or credible information that al-Qa'ida is planning an attack on US soil."

One former federal counterterrorism official raised questions about whether al Qaida was involved, saying the terrorist network would not discuss the operational details of a serious plot on an open website.

Rep. Peter King said he was first briefed of the plot shortly after becoming Homeland Security Chairman in September.

"I can confirm that for the last 9 to 10 months I have been aware of a plot to attack New York transit system and lower Manhattan," said King.

King said he could not discuss the plot further because the information was classified.

Word of the arrests became known on Capitol Hill Thursday evening. Staffers were told the Lebanese government planned to make a major announcement Friday, in part to trumpet their anti-terrorim efforts on the first anniversity of the London attacks, according to a Senate aide.

New York's Democrat Senators Charles Schumer and Hillary Clinton also said they were breifed last night by the FBI about the plot. The plot was first reported by the New York Daily News.

"This is one instance where intelligence was on top of its game and discovered the plot when it was just in the talking phase," Schumer said.