CIA bomber was a Jordanian doctor

The suicide bomber responsible for last week's deaths of seven CIA officers was a Jordanian doctor who had been recruited by Jordanian intelligence after his arrest last year.  From the AP:

The suicide bomber who killed eight people inside a CIA base in eastern Afghanistan last week was a Jordanian doctor recruited by Jordanian intelligence, a former senior U.S. intelligence official and a foreign government official confirmed Monday.



The bombing killed seven CIA employees_ four officers and three contracted security guards_ and a Jordanian intelligence officer, Ali bin Zaid, according to a second former U.S. intelligence official. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the incident.


The former senior intelligence official and the foreign official said the bomber was Humam Khalil Abu-Mulal al-Balawi, a 36-year old doctor from Zarqa, Jordan. NBC News first reported the bomber's identity.


He was arrested more than a year ago by Jordanian intelligence and was thought to have been persuaded to support U.S. and Jordanian efforts against al-Qaida, according to the NBC report. He was invited to Camp Chapman, a tightly secured CIA forward base in Khost province on the fractious Afghan-Pakistan frontier, because he was offering urgent information to track down Ayman al-Zawahiri, Osama bin Laden's right-hand man.

MSNBC reports that al-Balawi was interviewed on one of al-Qaeda's main internet sites last year.  Here's a partial transcript:

After he arrived in Afghanistan last year, al-Balawi was interviewed by one of al-Qaida’s main Internet sites, the Vanguards of Khurasan, on the subject of martyrdom.



“When you ponder the verses and hadiths that speak about jihad and its graciousness, and then you let your imagination run wild to fly with what Allah has prepared for martyrs, your life become cheap for its purpose, and the extravagant houses and expensive cars and all the decoration of life become very distasteful in your eyes,” he told the interviewer.


He added, “They say 'there's love that kills.' And I only see that as truthful in the love for jihad, as this love is either going to kill you in repentance should you choose to sit away from jihad, or will kill you as a martyr for the cause of Allah if you choose to go to Jihad, and the human must choose between these two deaths.”

Last week, according to the Western officials, al-Balawi reportedly called his handler to say he needed to meet with the CIA’s team based in Khost, Afghanistan, because he said he had urgent information he needed to relay about Zawahiri.

This mass murderer was a doctor.  He was arrested by the Jordanian government.  He proclaimed his life had become cheap, and suggested that his love would kill him as a martyr for the cause of Allah.  I am not an expert on intelligence, but what in God's name made them think he was a good candidate to reverse course and become an intelligence asset for the U.S.?

And why wasn't he searched?