Trio who tried to blow up US plane gets 15-year jail in Jordan

The State Security Court in Jordan on Wednesday handed over a 15-year imprisonment sentence along with hard labor to three terrorists who were convicted of plotting to carry out attacks and provide the funding for terror operations. The public hearing took place amid tight security measures.

According to the indictment, the General Intelligence Department managed to foil their plot to carry out a terror attack last July. The three planned to target a US plane in Marka Airport, a military bus, foreign tourists as well as a security checkpoint in the capital.

The Jordanian news agency Petra quoted the court as saying that the main suspect was in Yemen in 2012 and joined al-Qaeda. He was arrested in Yemen by the security services there and sent to a rehab center for two years. During his stay at the center, he was introduced to two Yemeni al-Qaeda members. Upon returning to Jordan, he kept in touch with the two al-Qaeda men and was introduced to a third one in Yemen.

In 2015, when the main convict was communicating with one of al-Qaeda members over the Telegram app, he informed the latter that he had seen a US plane at Marka airport. Consequently, he went along with the members of al-Qaeda in Yemen to target the plane with an RPG that would be sent to him from Syria. He was asked to wait, but the contact between him and al-Qaeda members was cut.

At the beginning of 2016, the main convict was seeking to go to Syria to join al-Qaeda there, but he could not find a way to do it. He then decided to carry out military operations on the Jordanian territories by targeting a military bus and killing foreign tourists who were passing near the Roman amphitheater, which was also near the Raghadan tourist complex. He kept in touch with the members of the organization in Yemen and offered to execute these operations. The latter suggested that their organization was ready to provide material support or consultation. They then linked him to the two other suspects to execute the operations.

When the two other suspects agreed to carry out these operations under the command of the main suspect, the latter got in touch with members of al-Qaeda in Yemen to plot for these operations. The main suspect monitored the schedule of the bus carrying soldiers and provided the organization with detailed reports. They told him that they would send him explosives and $6,000 with someone coming from Yemen in order to buy weapons and pay for the car used in the operation.

source: Alarabiya