International Christian Embassy Jerusalem, Dec. 3, 2002

A statement published Monday on a militant Islamic website seems to confirm investigators suspicions that Osama Bin Laden's al-Qaida network was responsible for last week's twin terror attacks in Mombasa.

The authenticity of the statement, in the name of the "Political Office of Qaida al-Jihad" could not be confirmed, but analysts have admitted that the formulaic language bears the distinctive hallmark of the global terror network.

"The fighters of al-Qaida return to the same place where the Crusader-Jewish coalition was hit four years ago," it said, in reference the 1998 US embassy bombings in Dar es-Salaam, Tanzania, and Nairobi, Kenya. The statement continued by declaring the group's goal was to "attack the Jews and to send them a message that their sins against the Palestinians will not go unpunished."

Although it has long been recognized that al-Qaida ranks Israel on its top list of targets, Thursday's attacks have prompted US fears that Prime Minister Ariel Sharon may use Israel's once-feared Mosad counter-intelligence agency to open up an independent front against the terror network, upsetting the current support America enjoys from its Arab-Muslim allies for President Bush's so-called "war on terror".

Speaking to the Knesset Foreign Affairs committee, on Monday, Israeli Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz revealed that al-Qaida had attempted to expand its operations by infiltrating into the Palestinian territories but its attempts had been foiled by Israel. Mofaz warned, however, that existing Palestinian terror organizations were competing with each other to carry out the next biggest attack, telling MKs that the current wave of terror is liable to "get worse in the next month".

At the scene of the bombed-out Paradise Hotel on the Kenyan coast, a diplomatic crisis was averted Monday afternoon when intensive talks between senior Israeli and Kenyan security officials produced agreement by which Kenya would allow Israel to access vital evidence. The Foreign Ministry reported that everything was now running smoothly despite earlier Israeli claims that the lack of Kenyan expertise was jeopardizing the inquiry. It is the believed that the United States may have intervened and both sides agreed to allow the CIA a role in handling the findings.