‘Al QAEDA MATERIAL’

Hamas Attacker Carried Chemical Weapons Manual, Israeli President Claims

The documents were allegedly found on a USB drive on a militant killed in a kibbutz.

Instructions for how to make a chemical weapon were found on the body of a Hamas fighter who attacked a kibbutz in Israel, Israeli President Isaac Herzog said. Speaking to Britain’s Sky News, Herzog claimed the information was “official al Qaeda material.” Sky, which could not independently verify the claims, said there is no suggestion that Hamas fighters possessed the components needed to make a chemical weapon. “This is how shocking the situation is where we’re looking at the instructions that are given on how to operate and how to create a kind of non-professional chemical weapon with cyanide,” Herzog said. His office later released a statement saying the al Qaeda manual was dated 2003 and was found on a USB drive on the body of a dead Hamas fighter in Kibbutz Be’eri, where about 20 percent of residents were kidnapped or killed in attacks earlier this month.