In the last week of January, a 200-strong group of Kurdish al Qaeda fighters reached the Afghan-Iranian frontier. Members of the Jund al-Islam, an extremist group, hailing from the Urman district of northern Iraq, they were destitute, without food or water, and on the point of turning themselves in to local tribes who would have handed them over to the authorities in Kabul. Iranian Revolutionary Guardsmen in the area offered them an alternative. The Kurdish militants would be given food, water, fresh ammo supplies, a few days rest and 500 dollars each, to be flown from Iran to Lebanon and join the Hizballah. They accepted and in early February, reached Hizballah and Iranian Revolutionary Guards training camps in the Beqaa Valley of east Lebanon. Within a week or two, US intelligence to expects to find them moving south to join the Abu Zubeidah contingent.
I don't usually quote Debka - they're not the most reliable of sources. But this is becoming a pretty interesting subject... |