Legal Commentary

New Terror Threat: A FISA Related Coincidence?

By Jeralyn

As Congress haggles over a new FISA bill and President Bush has threatened a veto, here comes a new terror alert.

The FBI and Department of Homeland Security sent a bulletin Friday to state and local law enforcement authorities advising them to watch for potential retaliatory strikes by Hezbollah, one day after the Lebanese militia group vowed to avenge the death of a top commander by attacking Israeli and Jewish targets around the world.

Even though the bulletin says it's unlikely Hezbollah would attack in the U.S., the FBI told the 18,000 state and law enforcement agency recipients of its bulletin:

...it was intensifying its domestic intelligence-gathering efforts to identify any potential Hezbollah threats in the United States in the aftermath of Tuesday's car-bomb assassination of Imad Mughniyah in Syria.

The targets of the new activities:[More...]

The senior FBI counter- terrorism official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the bureau's efforts against Hezbollah, said the bureau was focusing its intelligence-gathering efforts on the Detroit-Dearborn area of Michigan, New York, California and several other U.S. locations with large populations of Lebanese and Muslims.

According to one former FBI agent,

"My understanding has always been that Hezbollah would never strike in the United States unless they believed that we participated in an operation against them," said Bob Pertuso, a former FBI special agent assigned to the Detroit Joint Terrorism Task Force from 2000 to 2004 who specialized in Hezbollah investigations. "So if they believed we assisted in the operation against Mughniyah, I would say they would strike in the United States."

Will this be a call to round up Lebanese in the U.S? Or is it just Bush trying to convince Americans his warrantless surveillance program is necessary?

Full post as published by TalkLeft on February 16, 2008 (boomark / email).