WASHINGTON — An Islamic radical from Canada emerged Wednesday as a top suspect in Monday's terrorist attacks against Westerners in Saudi Arabia.
Intelligence sources and terrorism specialists said that Abdul Rahman Jabarah — an operative for Osama bin Laden who was born in Kuwait but raised in St. Catharines, Ontario — may have played an important role in coordinating the suicide bombings of three housing complexes for foreigners in Riyadh that killed 34 people. Eight Americans were among those killed, according to the U.S. State Department.
Meanwhile, as the Saudi foreign minister acknowledged gaps in security before the attacks, U.S. officials and security consultants said relatively little has been done to safeguard private U.S. citizens living overseas, although the government has spent billions of dollars in recent years to beef up security at embassies and other government facilities against potential terrorist attacks. Thousands of Americans living and working abroad are largely on their own or must rely on employers and host countries for security in the face of civil unrest, terrorism or other threats, they said.
The triple suicide car bombings in Saudi Arabia Monday were a deadly reminder that U.S. nationals who do not work for the U.S. government are highly vulnerable in countries where anti-American sentiment is high.
"The host government is always responsible," said Robert Ingram, deputy director of the Overseas Security Advisory Council, a State Department organization that provides U.S. firms that have foreign operations with up-to-date information about potential threats and that offers guidelines for U.S. citizens living abroad.
"We in the government can only do so much," Ingram said in an interview Tuesday.
Prime suspect
Saudi diplomats and Canadian intelligence officials were tight-lipped about Jabarah's suspected involvement in the attacks in Riyadh, which specialists say bore the classic hallmarks of an al-Qaida operation: careful planning, split-second timing and tight coordination by militants willing to sacrifice their own lives.
"We are cooperating in the campaign against terrorism with our international partners, including Saudi Arabia," said Nicole Currier, a spokeswoman for the Canadian Security and Intelligence Service. "We are aware of the Jabarah family and aware of the allegations" against Abdul Rahman, she said.
But other Western intelligence sources and specialists on international terrorism described Jabarah, who narrowly escaped a shootout with Saudi security officials in Riyadh last week, as a prime suspect in the attack. They pointed out that the 23-year-old militant has advanced rapidly in bin Laden's shadowy outfit, as more experienced hands have been captured or killed in the American-led campaign against terrorism.
"He would have been one of the key coordinators . . . a significant player in the Saudi bombings," said Rohan Gunaratna, a terrorism researcher at Singapore's Institute of Defense and Strategic Studies.
Saudi Arabia's ambassador to Britain, Prince Turki al-Faisal, told reporters in London Tuesday that the suicide bombings at the housing complexes appeared to be the work of an al-Qaida cell whose 19 members escaped a May 6 raid on a hideout in Riyadh that yielded five suitcases packed with high explosives, 55 grenades, assault rifles, ammunition, money, passports and computers.
Saudi authorities named Jabarah as one of the suspects in the weapons case and posted an $80,000 reward for information leading to his arrest.
Terrorism specialists said that it appeared that the cell regrouped and carried out the attacks against the Western housing compounds, a sign of the organization's flexibility and dedication.
Two brothers
Describing Jabarah as a plotter, not a foot soldier, analysts said it was doubtful that he was among the suicide bombers who died in their own blasts. They said he probably remains in hiding in Saudi Arabia, where bitter anti-American sentiment is strong among Muslim fundamentalists who resent the U.S. military presence in the birthplace of Islam.
Jabarah, the latest Canadian accused of involvement in bin Laden's bloody crusade against the United States, is the older brother of Mohamed Mansour Jabarah, arrested last year as a suspected ringleader of planned attacks against Western embassies in Singapore and the Philippines, according to the FBI and Canadian intelligence. The Jabarah family emigrated to Canada from Kuwait in the early 1990s.
The younger Jabarah was captured in Oman, quietly hustled back to Ontario by Canadian intelligence agents, and then transferred to U.S. custody in April 2002, in a secretive deal that infuriated civil liberties advocates and Muslim groups in the two countries.
Abdul Rahman Jabarah, regarded by terrorism specialists as more dangerous and more deeply committed to al-Qaida than his brother, is thought to have been lying low in Saudi Arabia for the past year.
High-risk locales
Despite several warnings this month about the potential for terrorist attacks, the Saudi government did not heed urgent U.S. requests to beef up security at gated communities where Americans live, Robert Jordan, the U.S. ambassador to Saudi Arabia, said in an interview with ABC News.
"The security is a factor that we have pointed out to the Saudi government," Jordan said. "I have communicated with them in recent days, in fact repeatedly, about concerns for an elevated threat level at Western compounds."
The Saudi government maintains it is doing everything possible to prevent terrorist attacks, particularly from Islamic fundamentalist groups such as al-Qaida.
"I vow to my fellow citizens and to the friends who reside among us that the state will be vigilant about their security and well-being," Crown Prince Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz, said in a speech Tuesday.
Still, some specialists say that Americans in Saudi Arabia are at higher risk than necessary because most Westerners there live in communities walled off from the rest of the population.
"They are more concentrated in Saudi Arabia, as opposed to Americans living in Egypt or Jordan, which tend to live among the locals," a senior U.S. counterterrorism official said Tuesday, speaking on condition of anonymity. "It makes it easier if you want to do that kind of massive-scale attack."
"At the end of the day you are in a foreign location, and you are at the mercy of the host government," said James R. Bucknam, president of the Security Services Group of Kroll Inc., a New York consulting firm that advises corporate clients on reducing risks at overseas facilities.
"There has to be increased awareness and a high level of confidence that the host government will protect you," he said.
But current and former government officials said that such trust can be misplaced in Saudi Arabia, where an estimated 30,000 U.S. citizens reside, as well as in other countries where Americans are targets of violence.
"I would not live there," said a former senior government official involved in the investigation of the 1996 Khobar Towers bombing in Saudi Arabia that killed 19 U.S. Air Force personnel. The former official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said that the Saudi government could do much more to protect foreign nationals.
Personal security
Ultimately, personal safety and security rests with Americans themselves. Many corporations turn to firms such as Kroll for advice on how to enhance security for employees, aware of the limitations of the U.S. government.
State Department spokesman Philip Reeker advised Americans Tuesday to "evaluate their own security situation and consider departing Saudi Arabia."
The senior U.S. counterterrorism official said, "We can't put police on every corner."
Few expect a larger role for the State Department's Diplomatic Security Service, which guards U.S. embassies and consulates worldwide. "They even have trouble manning the perimeter of embassies and coordinating with the host government," said Richard Murphy, former U.S. ambassador to Saudi Arabia.
The U.S. government provides its travel warnings and threat alerts through public announcements. "Our sole purpose is not about telling them what to do, but ensuring (that) every scrap of unclassified information is provided so they can Assess the information and make their own decisions," Ingram said.
But the U.S. government could do more, Ingram said. For example, his organization, while posting substantial amounts of information on its Website, acknowledges that many of the security guidelines have not been updated for more than 15 years.
"I complain about it myself," he said. "The guidelines are still relevant, but need to be updated."
In the end, top U.S. officials believe there is only one sure means for dealing with the terrorist threat: destroy it.
"There is no treaty that can solve this problem," Vice President Dick Cheney said Tuesday in a speech at the Hudson Institute in Washington. "There is no peace agreement, no policy of containment or deterrence that works."