Israeli Web Site Takes Center Stage In NYC Bomb Scare

JERUSALEM (JTA) -- An Israeli couple who blog about terrorism have achieved international fame -- and a bit of notoriety -- by setting off a "dirty bomb" scare in New York City.

The brouhaha began last week with a report on DEBKAfile -- the 7-year-old Web site operated from the
home of veteran journalists Giora Shamis and Diane Shalem -- asserting that al-Qaida had vowed on the Internet to plant a "dirty bomb" in New York.

It seemed like a standard posting for the site (debka.com), which claims to attract hundreds of thousands of daily users with its potpourri of Hebrew and English alerts, predictions and analyses focused mainly on potential Islamist threats and the West's military counter campaigns.

--
Prompted at least in part by the Debka report, New York City officials went on high alert, and the city's Police Department set up checkpoints around lower Manhattan and deployed radiological monitoring equipment on land vehicles, boats and helicopters

--
Mainstream media frequently write off Debka -- the word refers to an Arab folk dance -- as a fringe outfit catering to conspiracy theorists. But the recent episode marked the second time in recent months that the site caused a stir in more mainstream circles.

---EOE---

http://www.jta.org:80/cgi-bin/iowa/news/article/20070813debkadirtybomb.html

Didn't think so.

"I'm scared of Americans."

-David Bowie