GEO 436 WASHINGTON: An Internet video purportedly from a Pakistani Taliban group, Tehreek-e-Taliban, claimed responsibility for the car bomb attempt in Times Square in New York, the US monitoring service SITE said Sunday. Posted on YouTube, the video said the attempted bombing was in revenge for the recent killing of two top Al-Qaeda leaders in Iraq, US drone strikes in Pakistan and US treatment of a Pakistani neuroscientist, SITE said. “Congratulations to the Muslim Ummah on the jaw-breaking blow to Satan’’s USA. We, Tehreek-e-Taliban, with all the Pride and Bravery, TAKE full responsibility for the RECENT ATTACK IN THE USA,” an English message on the video said. AFP was unable to independently view the video on YouTube. The video apparently was posted on YouTube early Sunday by Taliban News, but a service message said it had been removed because of a “use violation.” SITE said the video contained an audio message from Qari Hussein Mehsud, a Tehreek-e-Taliban official, that was played over anti-American images with English subtitles. The group said the attempted attack was to avenge the killings of Abu Omar al-Baghdadi and Abu Ayub al-Masri, the top two leaders of Al-Qaeda in Iraq, in an air and ground assault last month near the city of Tikrit, SITE said. It also said it was in revenge for “the recent rain of drone attacks in the tribal areas and the abduction, torture and humiliation of our most respected innocent sister Dr. Aafia Siddiqui.” There are, however, “significant credibility questions as to authenticity of this video,” said IntelCenter’’s Ben Venzke, a private contractor working in support of the US and European intelligence communities. Saying the video needed to be investigated further, Venzke added that “if the claim is confirmed this would mark the first attack by the TTP (Tehreek-e-Taliban) against a target in the US, which the group has been threatening to do.”
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