London bombings tied
to Madrid attackers?

British intelligence officials believe today's bomb attacks on London's mass transit system might be tied to the North African-based terrorists who carried out the strikes in Madrid last year, according to a terrorism analyst.

Steven Emerson told MSNBC he spoke with an intelligence official who suspected "our North African boys."

"There is an interconnected network of Algerians, of Moroccans, of Saudis operating throughout Europe," said Emerson, according to an unofficial transcript posted by The Counterterrorism Blog.

Meanwhile, the Wall Street Journal is reporting that British police have asked their European counterparts for information on a Moroccan man, Mohamed Guerbouzi, in relation to the attacks. Guerbouzi has been under investigation in Britain in connection with the Spain bombings and a 2003 suicide attack in Morocco.

Yesterday, terrorists set off bombs on three London subway trains that killed more than 50 people and injured 700 in London's bloodiest day since World War II. The death toll is expected to rise, and police are warning that more attacks are possible.

Damage at the four blast sites is making it difficult to determine the number of deaths, according to Metropolitan Police Commissioner Ian Blair. He told reporters one train "still contains a number of bodies that have not been retrieved."

The police chief said the attacks had "all the hallmarks of al-Qaida," but he cautioned that there was "absolutely nothing to suggest" they were suicide bombings.

"It is the implacable resolve of the Met Police Service to track down those who are responsible for these terrible deaths," Blair said.

Emerson pointed out that the timing of the attack coincides with the opening of the trial of Abu Hamza al-Masri, a radical Islamic cleric in London charged with incitement. The cleric has been indicted in the U.S. on charges of trying to set up a jihad training camp in Oregon.

"The simultaneous nature of the bombings and the potential there was a suicide bomber suggests very strongly that was some type of al-Qaida offshoot of known radical Islamic groups or unknown groups, individuals at least, plotting this for a long time," Emerson said.

A group calling itself the Organization of al-Qaida Jihad in Europe claimed responsibility for the London bombings and threatened Italy, Denmark and other countries that have troops in Iraq and Afghanistan.

"Heroic mujahedeen carried out a sacred attack in London, and here is Britain burning in fear, terror, and fright in the north, south, east and west," said a statement posted on the jihadist website Al-Qal'ah (Fortress).

The group said the attacks were in response to "massacres" carried out in Iraq and Afghanistan.

"We have repeatedly warned the government and people of Britain, and we have now fulfilled our promise and have carried out a sacred military attack in Britain," the statement said. "We continue to warn the governments of Denmark, Italy and all the Crusaders that they will meet the same punishment if they do not withdraw their troops from Iraq and Afghanistan."

Analyst Zachary Abuza, in a post on the The Counterterrorism Blog, said that while the previously unknown group may have direct ties to al-Qaida, "what is more likely is to emerge from the investigations into the London bombings is a cell that is very similar to that which perpetrated the Madrid bombings."

He described it as a "fairly autonomous cell comprised of a marginalized diaspora that had some roots to extremists in their own country, but was really acting independently."

The good news, he said, is that these independent groups are probably too small and autonomous to launch a major catastrophic attack.

"The bad news is that these groups are difficult to penetrate, and their operations, though small are still large enough to cause an unacceptable loss of life and have adverse economic implications."

Abuza pointed out that many terrorism experts assert that al-Qaida, as an organization, is defunct, with its remaining leadership cowering in root cellars.

"I think they overstate al-Qaida's demise; but they do agree that the real threat that al-Qaida poses is less as an organization and more as an ideology and inspiration," Abuza said.

In Spain last year, officials initially blamed the Basque separatist group ETA for the massive ten-bomb attack on three Madrid train stations during the morning rush hour that killed at least 200 people and wounded 1,200 only three days before the countrys general election.

But later, a letter emerged from a group called Abu Hafs al-Masri Brigades, which claimed responsibility for the attack on behalf of al-Qaida. The letter, which called the plot "Operation Death Trains," said: "We have succeeded in infiltrating the heart of crusader Europe and struck one of the bases of the crusader alliance."

A document posted on an Internet message board just three months before the Madrid attacks said al-Qaida planned to carry out attacks to sever Madrid from the U.S. and its other allies in the war on terror.

"We think the Spanish government will not stand more than two blows, or three at the most, before it will be forced to withdraw because of the public pressure on it," the al-Qaida document said.

"If its forces remain after these blows, the victory of the Socialist Party will be almost guaranteed – and the withdrawal of Spanish forces will be on its campaign manifesto."

That prediction was fulfilled three days after the attacks when the Socialists overcame a late deficit in the polls and ousted Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar's Popular Party.

The new Prime Minister-elect Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero immediately vowed to pull out 1,300 Spanish troops in Iraq by June 30 if the United Nations "doesn't take control of Iraq."

Zapatero, who fulfilled his vow, called the Iraq war a mistake and said Spain's participation in it "has been a total error."

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