Al-Qaida claims Jordan suicide blasts
(AP)
Updated: 2005-11-10 21:31

But outside Iraq, and especially in Jordan, he has been equally active.

He was sentenced to death in absentia by a Jordanian military court for the October 2002 assassination of a U.S. diplomat, Laurence Foley, in Amman.

His group also is accused of previously trying to blow up the Radisson SAS in Amman as part of the so-called Millennium plot in 1999 and of an attack this August on a U.S. Navy ship in the Jordanian port of Aqaba that killed one Jordanian soldier.

In Amman, a security official said authorities had tips on suspects who are being hunted down, including possible sleeper cells or individuals who may have assisted the attackers and later fled in a vehicle bearing Iraqi license plates.

The official, insisting on anonymity because he is not allowed to speak to reporters, said DNA tests were being carried out to determine the identity of the perpetrators, including two suicide bombers who blew themselves up in two of the separate hotel attacks. A third suicide attacker used a car to attack.

Maj. Gen. Bashir Nafeh, the head of military intelligence in the West Bank, and Col. Abed Allun, a high-ranking Preventive Security forces official, were killed in the attack at the Grand Hyatt Hotel, the Palestinian envoy to Amman, Ambassador Attala Kheri, told The AP in a telephone interview.

Israel's Foreign Ministry confirmed that an Israeli was killed in the bombings, but had no other details. The Army Radio said that the man was living at one of the hotels, but declined to say which.

The state Jordan Television showed Abdullah inspecting the sites of the blasts after returning home early Thursday, cutting short an official visit to Kazakhstan. He later presided over a meeting of his security chiefs, including police and intelligence.

The hotels, frequented by Israelis and Americans among other foreign guests, have long been on al-Qaida's hit list.