Reports From Pakistan Say Rashid Rauf Has Been Killed In A US Airstrike

Pakistan's The News reports:

PESHAWAR: Al-Qaeda’s operatives Rashid Rauf and Abu Al-Asr Al Misri have been reportedly killed in suspected U.S. missiles strikes in North Waziristan on Saturday.

A U.S. spy plane fired two missiles early Saturday at the house of one Khaliq Noor in Alikhel area of North Waziristan, killing five people, including three foreigners, and injuring six others.

The attack came just two days after Pakistan lodged a strong protest with the U.S. ambassador over missile attacks on its territory.

The BBC reports it this way:

A fugitive British militant seen as a key link between al-Qaeda and a UK plot to blow up transatlantic airliners has been killed in Pakistan, reports say.

Pakistani media said Rashid Rauf, born in Birmingham, was killed in the strike in North-West Frontier Province.

Mr Rauf, on the run after escaping from a Pakistani jail, was considered a key planner in the 2006 liquid bomb plot.

Three men were convicted in the UK in September 2008 of conspiracy to murder, although several others were acquitted.

Crucially, no one was convicted of plotting to blow up airplanes.

That was the core charge; that was the crux of the case; that was the reason for all the airport security. British authorities, unwilling to allow their massive lies about this "plot" to remain exposed as such, plan to re-try the suspects, in a second bid to obtain their preferred verdict: "guilty as charged".

Several Pakistani TV channels reported that Mr Rauf was among five people killed by a suspected US missile strike in the country's remote north-western region.

Taleban fighters and al-Qaeda militants use the mountainous tribal areas along the border between Pakistan and Afghanistan as a safe haven for training and resupply.

The US regularly uses pilotless drones to attack militant targets in the region, a tactic that has caused growing resentment among Pakistan's leaders.

Killing a suspected terrorist with a drone is a lot sexier than seeing him get killed in a bus crash. Bravo!

When the alleged "liquid bombers" get their next "fair trial", their alleged al Qaeda contact still won't be there to testify.

The British authorities must be breathing a huge sigh of relief.

Another cutout has just been cut out; the trail just got a little bit colder; the perpetrators just got a little safer.

Oh well.

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thirty-seventh in a series

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