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Report: Al Qaeda fighters involved in Benghazi attack
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton testifies before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on the September 11, 2012 attack on the US mission in Benghazi, Libya, during a hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC, on January 23, 2013. Secy. Clinton warned of the challenges posed by rising militancy after the Arab Spring as she appeared before US lawmakers Wednesday to be grilled about a deadly attack.'Benghazi didn't happen in a vacuum,' Clinton said at the start of a Senate hearing into the September 11 assault on a US mission in eastern Libya. Credit: AFP/Getty Images

Report: Al Qaeda fighters involved in Benghazi attack

Were they on a specific mission or just "in the right place at the right time"? CNN reports that there's evidence that suggests the attack on U.S. diplomats in Benghazi was a coordinated attack, not a spontaneous event as the Obama administration originally insisted.

Several Yemeni men belonging to al Qaeda took part in the terrorist attack on the U.S. diplomatic compound in Benghazi last September, according to several sources who have spoken with CNN.

One senior U.S. law enforcement official told CNN that "three or four members of al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula," or AQAP, took part in the attack.

Another source briefed on the Benghazi investigation said Western intelligence services suspect the men may have been sent by the group specifically to carry out the attack. But it's not been ruled out that they were already in the city and participated as the opportunity arose. ...

If the AQAP members were dispatched to Benghazi, it would be further evidence of a new level of co-operation among jihadist groups throughout the Middle East and North Africa, counterterrorism analysts say.

According to one source, counterterrorism officials learned the identity of the men and established they had spent two nights in Benghazi after the attack. Western intelligence agencies began trying to track the men in the aftermath of the terrorist attack, but were always behind in their manhunt.

They were later traced to northern Mali, where they are believed to have connected with a fighting group commanded by Moktar Belmoktar, a prominent jihadist leader, according to a senior law enforcement source.

Gee, do you think the White House or State Department is ready to take back all that blame on a YouTube video yet?

 

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