Al-Qaida planned to attack Jordan's intelligence headquarters in Amman with chemical weapons and the U.S. embassy with poisonous gas, reports said. The Saudi daily al-Hayat, monitored in Beirut, Friday quoted official Jordanian sources as saying al-Qaida operative Abu Musaab al-Zarqawi, a Jordanian, sought to destroy the intelligence building with "a highly-destructive" chemical bomb that would have killed as many as 20,000 people.
The sources said Jordanian security arrested two al-Qaida members connected to al-Zirqawi and confiscated a car laden with explosives and arms which was smuggled into Jordan through the Syrian border. The car, intercepted some 120 kilometers (75 miles) from the Syrian border, carried explosives, a chemical bomb and poisonous gas. The sources said the terrorists planned to use the gas in attacks against the U.S. embassy in Amman and the seat of the Jordanian government. |