Sword of Allah

Central Intelligence Agency, Australia bureau, US Embassy, Canberra

The report came to Ferallo over the intranet, the secure feed. Originally written in Hebrew, it had gone through CIA translators in Tel Aviv and the Shin Bet had costamped the translation, meaning they were okay with its accuracy. She flicked through it first with her finger on the ‘page down’ key, stopping occasionally for more detail. But the more she took in, the more Ferallo became both intrigued and disturbed, emotions that seemed to the assistant deputy director to go hand in hand too often in this business. She decided to print it off, all one hundred and sixty-seven pages. It was the IDF report from the operation Atticus and Tom Wilkes had recently been involved in. Too many Israeli soldiers had died, and Atticus was lucky not to have been counted amongst them. According to the report, Atticus had Tom to thank for that.

The IDF wrap-up included a detailed coronial report and identified by their remains the men Kadar Al-Jahani had been meeting with. They were mostly members of Hamas and Hezbollah, along with several others the Israelis believed to be financiers. Their various names were provided in the report, as were photographs. They looked familiar. Ferallo sat back and stared at the photos, and wondered why. And then she realised. She called up on screen the photographs taken at Kadar’s meeting with several unknowns in Rome. Yep, it was the same men. So they were financiers. Ferallo was fleetingly annoyed that their identities and involvement in the scheme of things had only come to light by their deaths. Terrorists with money. Rarely was there a more lethal combination. Money gave terrorists the financial freedom to recruit, train, plot and scheme. The template example was 9/11. Sure, the men who took the planes in that instance did so with threedollar box cutters, but it took millions to put them in those aircraft at the right time with the right skills, in a coordinated attack timed to perfection. The collective intuition was that Kadar Al-Jahani and his South East Asian connection, Duat, were up to something major. Now, as far as Ferallo was concerned, it was fact. And yes, the bombing of the embassy was just the entree. Still the big question remained: what?