Al Qaeda ‘9/11 the second’ plot foiled in Jordan
Terrorists are like roaches. Time for another round of pest control.
—
Announcing the foiled plot, government spokesman Sameeh Maaytah told an impromptu press conference that the suspects are all Jordanian and are in police custody. Jordan’s state TV broadcast headshots of the suspects — all in their 20s and 30s with most of them sporting long beards — identifying them as “militants.”
“They were plotting deadly terror attacks on vital institutions, shopping centers and diplomatic missions,” he said. “They sought to destabilize Jordan,” he said. “They plotted against Jordan’s national security.”
A statement by Jordanian intelligence said an investigation showed that the group “adopts the ideology of Al Qaeda” and that it nicknamed its terror plot as “9/11 the second.”
The militants sought to carry out their attacks in stages, it added, with initial attacks on shopping centers and foreigners in Jordanian hotels, followed by more deadly strikes with powerful explosives and chemicals on Western diplomatic missions and unspecified “vital national sites.”
One attack involved firing rockets at a district in the Jordanian capital that houses the U.S., British and other diplomatic missions as well as housing for expats and Western diplomats.