Witnesses testified on Wednesday that some of the men charged with firing rockets at two US warships docked in Aqaba were at the scene a day before the attacks. A Syrian accused of masterminding the Aug. 19 attacks, Mohammed Hassan Sahli, 53, visited the port four days before the rocket attacks and again the day before, according to testimony by his business partner, Jalal Darwish.Darwish told the State Security Court that he accompanied Sahli to the port four days before the attacks to collect some cars they imported from Korea. He said he met SahliÂ’s sons and three other people during the visit, and later recognised their photos on television after the attacks. Sahli told Darwish he returned to the port again the day before the attacks, he added.
Another witness said he was guarding a metal workshop the day before the attacks when three men approached with a long pipe and asked him to cut it into six pieces. “After the attack, when security officials came to the shop and showed me photos of some of the defendants, I recognised them immediately,” the unidentified witness said. Two other metal workers testified that three defendants came to their shops with similar requests. Of the 12 defendants charged with involvement in the attack, six pleaded not guilty last month. The other six remain at large and are being tried in absentia. The trial is scheduled to resume on May 17.