Recent Appearances...

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Recent Appearances...

Nawaf al Hazmi	Nawaf al Hazmi	al-Qaeda	Home Front: Politix			20050830
Nawaf al-Hazmi	Nawaf al-Hazmi	al-Qaeda	Home Front: WoT	Deceased	Cannon Fodder	20030921
		One of the 9-11 killers

Home Front: WoT

9/11 Hijackers Given Bank Accounts, California Apartment at ‘Behest of the CIA' – FBI Investigator

2023-04-16

[SPUTNIKGLOBE]An extraordinary legal filing revealed two of the hijackers responsible for the September 11 terror attacks had a much more intimate relationship with the Central Intelligence Agency than previously known.

At least two of the 9/11 hijackers were being closely monitored by the CIA and may have even been recruited by the agency well before they helped fly a pair of Boeing 767s into the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, newly-released documents reveal.

The jaw-dropping court filing contains extensive testimony by multiple FBI investigators who maintain that the CIA obstructed official investigations into the notorious terrorist attack in order to conceal its connections to al-Qaeda*.

Perhaps even more shockingly, one FBI agent explained that American bank accounts were opened for the two hijackers — and a San Diego based apartment rented for them — "at the behest of the CIA."

Skeptics have long focused their attention on the extremely close relationship between 9/11 hijackers Nawaf al-Hazmi and Khalid al-Mihdhar and alleged Saudi intelligence agent Omar al-Bayoumi, who arranged a steady stipend as well as accommodations for the pair immediately after their arrival in the US. Al-Bayoumi has publicly maintained that his incredible generosity towards them was based on a mere ’chance encounter’ at a restaurant after they landed in California. According to one agent, who’s code-named "CS-23" in the documents, the CIA has long been working to stonewall the FBI’s investigation into the 2001 terrorist attack, in part by refusing to divulge information regarding the agency’s relationship with al-Bayoumi.

According to CS-23, when first asked, "CIA officials responded to the [FBI’S] San Diego field office and reported that the CIA held no files on al-Bayoumi," a claim which the agent said was "a falsehood," given "the CIA maintained ’operational files’ on Omar al-Bayoumi" and that their relationship had left a noticeable "paper trail."

Indeed, "information concerning al-Bayoumi was never passed to the FBI," the agent explained — likely because Omar al-Bayoumi was "an intelligence officer in [the] employ of the Saudi government," who was "directed to attempt to recruit Nawaf al-Hazmi and Khalid al-Mihdhar as intelligence sources while they were in San Diego."

Even more horrifying is the fact that "the attempt to recruit al-Hazmi and al-Mihdhar was an operation directed by the Central Intelligence Agency," CS-23 maintains.

According to that FBI agent, "the CIA used their liaison relationship with the Saudi intelligence services to conduct an operation on US soil," the legal filing reveals.

Such an arrangement would be necessary since "the CIA is forbidden by law to conduct intelligence operations within the US," the agent explained, noting that "the CIA has used its relationship with allied intelligence services to conduct operations inside the United States in the past."

For decades, much of the CIA’s dirty work was carried out by a secret international grouping of pro-US intelligence services which bore the name ’The Safari Club’ — and which included Saudi Arabia. The group’s existence didn’t become public knowledge until Egyptian journalist Mohamed Heikal was granted permission by Iran’s new revolutionary government to examine the Shah’s archives and discovered a document formalizing the agreement.

Likely seeking to avoid any similar disclosure, CS-23 explained, "when FBI officials in San Diego and at FBI headquarters became aware of both al-Bayoumi's affiliation with Saudi intelligence and subsequently the existence of the CIA's operation to recruit al-Harmi and al-Mihdhar through al-Bayoumi... senior FBI officials suppressed investigations into the above."

Furthermore, the FBI investigator revealed the CIA had effectively tainted the entire inquiry before it even got off the ground by tampering with witnesses.

"CS-23 also told me that FBI agents testifying before the Joint Inquiry into the 9/11 attacks were instructed not to reveal the full extent of Saudi involvement with Al-Oaeda," the report concludes.

Link

-Lurid Crime Tales-

The FBI is very good at woke politics, not so good at catching killers

2021-04-02

[NYPost] If you watch TV crime shows, you would think the Federal Bureau of Investigation works tirelessly to protect us from terrorists and criminals. But the real FBI is a much less impressive organization.

After the horrendous Colorado shooting last week, we learned that the alleged shooter, Ahmad Al Aliwi Alissa, had a record of violence and arrests. His brother described him as mentally ill, paranoid and "very anti-social." He was also on the FBI’s radar because of someone with whom he associated.

In this, Alissa joins a long list of "known-wolf" killers, including Nidal Hasan, the Fort Hood shooter; the Tsarnaev brothers, who conducted the Boston Marathon bombing; Omar Mateen, the Pulse nightclub shooter in Florida; and some of the 9/11 hijackers.

The FBI’s failure to catch that last set of perpetrators is especially enraging — and shows the agency has been atrophying for a long time. "For two and a half weeks before the attacks," as Slate noted, "the US government knew the names of two hijackers. It knew they were al-Qaeda killers and that they were already in the United States."

The two, Khalid al-Mihdhar and Nawaf al-Hazmi, lived under their real names, loud and proud. Per Slate: "They used those names for financial transactions, flight school, to earn frequent flier miles and to procure a California identity card." Nevertheless, the FBI failed to nab the pair until, on Sept. 11, 2001, they slammed an airliner into the Pentagon.

The bureau’s performance disappointed FBI agents themselves. Agents trying to get a warrant to search the laptop of 9/11’s "20th hijacker," Zacarias Moussaoui, joked that Osama bin Laden must have had a "mole" in the FBI’s DC headquarters because they were meeting with so much interference.

And as the Boston Herald’s Howie Carr reminds us: "Remember serial killer Gary Sampson? Before he murdered three innocent men in 2001, he called the FBI office in Boston from a pay phone in Abington and offered to turn himself in on some unsolved bank robberies." But the FBI apparently keeps banker’s hours, and the call came on a Friday afternoon; the bureau ignored the call. "The following day, Sampson started his two-state carjacking murder spree."

So what’s the FBI good for? The answer is, the kinds of things that wouldn’t make for flattering TV.

Some of it is humorous, as when the bureau sent no fewer than 15 agents to investigate a "noose" in race driver Bubba Wallace’s garage that turned out to be an innocent pull cord.

Most of it isn’t so funny.

Agents in the FBI’s Boston office, for example, protected notorious mobster James "Whitey" Bulger from law enforcement, while simultaneously accepting gifts from him. They may even have helped him in his efforts. Carr also notes that the bureau’s Boston office was guilty of "railroading four Boston men onto death row for a 1965 murder they did not commit, allowing them to rot in prison for 35 years while corrupt FBI agents protected the real murderers from justice."
Fire everyone G-12 and above

Link

Home Front: WoT

The Illegal CIA Operation That Brought Us 9/11

2019-01-28

[Truthdig] In the latest installment of "Scheer Intelligence," the journalists tell Truthdig Editor in Chief Robert Scheer how an interview with Richard Clarke, the counterterror adviser to Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, led them to a jaw-dropping revelation regarding two hijackers involved in the infamous attacks. As it turns out, Khalid Muhammad Abdallah al-Mihdhar

...who is in our archives in abbreviated form as Khalid al-Midhar

and Nawaf al-Hazmi, two men linked to al-Qaida, were staying at an FBI informant’s home in San Diego in 2000, and they were being tracked by the National Security Agency.

Despite knowledge of the men’s ties to the terrorist organization responsible for 9/11, neither was investigated by the FBI. Clarke and others believe that this may have had to do with a CIA attempt to turn the two men into agency informants.

Link

Home Front: WoT

9/11 report's classified '28 pages' about potential Saudi Arabia ties released

2016-07-16

BLUF: [Guardian] Perhaps most intriguingly, the 28 pages reveal that Osama Basnan, whom the documents describe as a supporter of two of the 9/11 hijackers in California, received a cheque from Prince Bandar, the former Saudi ambassador to the US.

"On at least one occasion, Bassnan received a check directly from Prince Bandar’s account," it says. "According to the FBI, on May 14, 1998, Bassnan cashed a check from Bandar in the amount of $15,000. Bassnan’s wife also received at least one check directly from Bandar."

Basnan lived across the street from two of the hijackers ‐ Khalid al-Midhar and Nawaf al-Hazmi ‐ in San Diego and told an FBI asset that he had helped them, according to the document. Basnan was allegedly a supporter of al-Qaida mastermind Osama bin Laden and spoke of him "as if he were a god".

Article fails to mention the Zacarias Moussaoui connection, nor does it mention Bandar's connection to the Saudi Intelligence Community.....or BAE.

Appears Mr. Bassnan (an import/export used car dealer in D.C.) was a bit confused about his contacts and knowledge of Messrs. al Midhar and al Hazmi.

Anguper Hupomosing9418 thoghtfully posted a downloadable PDF of the thing, which I moved here at 12:35 p.m. ET for ease of finding.
PDF: "28 pages" of formerly classified pages on Saudi 9/11 links

Link

Home Front: WoT

Movement pursues the 'real story' of '28 pages' and Saudi 9/11 involvement

2016-04-21

Excerpt from very lengthy Washington Times article:
As a Democratic senator from Florida, Bob Graham co-chaired the joint committee that wrote those 28 pages. He is one of the nation’s most outspoken critics of the commission’s Saudi conclusion and is convinced there is a direct link between the hijackers and Saudi officials.

His interest focuses on several figures, including Omar al Bayoumi, who assisted hijackers Nawaf al-Hazmi and Khalid Almihdhar after they arrived in Southern California in January 2000. Al-Hazmi and Almihdhar were sent to California by plot leader Khalid Sheikh Mohammed to learn English, then how to pilot an airliner for what he called the "Planes Operation."

Mr. Graham also concluded that Saudi diplomat Fahad al Thumairy, an official of the Islamic and Cultural Affairs section of the Saudi Arabian Consulate in Los Angeles, also helped the hijackers.

The U.S. pulled Mr. Thumairy's visa and banned him from the U.S.

Mr. Graham said in a sworn affidavit on Jan. 28, 2015, in a civil case: "Al Bayoumi met al Hazmi and al Mihdhar at a restaurant in Los Angeles in late January 2000, immediately following a meeting between al Bayoumi and al Thumairy at the Saudi consulate. Shortly thereafter, the two hijackers traveled to San Diego, where al Bayoumi held a dinner in their honor, helped them find an apartment, fronted the initial payments of that apartment, and provided them continuing financial assistance going forward. During the period that he supported the hijackers, al Bayoumi’s allowances from a ghost job with a Saudi private firm and contractor to the Saudi government increased eightfold. During that same period, al Bayoumi had an unusual number of telephone conversations with Saudi government officials in both Los Angeles and Washington."

Link

Southeast Asia

2 Malaysians Charged With Promoting Terrorism

2013-02-10

[Ynet] Malaysian prosecutors have charged an al-Qaeda-linked former army captain and a woman with inciting terrorist acts that could have involved violence in Syria.

Yazid Sufaat, who previously spent seven years in detention without trial, and Halimah Hussein face up to 30 years in prison if convicted.
Yazid's been romping around for awhile in Malaysia, one those connect the dots kind of guys. He was the host of a meeting attended by several al-Q bigs, including at least two of the 9-11 hijackers -- Khalid al-Midhar and Nawaf al-Hazmi. He helped provide cover for Zacarias Moussaoui in his wanderings. He was jugged in, I think, 2002, when he came back from Afghanistan. He's a biochemist by training and had been an instructor at al-Q's Derunta biowarfare training camp. He was held until November, 2008. He was released because he promised to be good:

"We released him as he had shown remorse and repentance after almost seven years of rehabilitation,"said Malaysian Inspector General of Police Tan Sri Musa Hassan.

He was one of the major links between al-Q and Jemaah Islamiyah, being BFFs with Hambali. Malaysia didn't take that sort of thing nearly as seriously as Indonesia ended up taking it after the Bali bombings. Had he been in Indonesia, he probably would have ended up with some serious jug time, if not a death penalty.

Link

Home Front: WoT

New Evidence Suggests Radical Cleric Anwar al-Awlaki Was an Overlooked Key Player in 9/11 Plot

2011-05-21

A year-long investigation by the Fox News' specials unit has uncovered new and overwhelming evidence that the American cleric, Anwar al-Awlaki, the first U.S. citizen on the CIA's kill or capture list, was an overlooked key player in the 9/11 plot.

In a new hour-long special, "Fox News Reporting: Secrets of 9/11," which debuts May 20 at 10 p.m. EDT, federal investigators go on the record for the first time about their painstaking work to investigate how Awlaki may have facilitated the hijackers in California and Virginia and possibly knew the details of the worst terrorist attack on U.S. soil.

"It was my feeling that they had to have a network," Criminal PENTTBOM (FBI's codename for the 9/11 case) investigator Jimmy Bush told Fox News in his first television interview. "There was a mosque and the imam of that mosque was Anwar al-Awlaki, which raised my suspicions."

Former FBI Agent Bob Bukowski said the evidence strongly suggested Awlaki and his mosques on the East and West coasts were at the center of a network of helpers that enabled the hijackers to find apartments and obtain fake ids. "The investigation at the time obviously was very suspicious," Bukowski said. "Knowing and proving are always two different things."

Fox News was told by multiple sources with first-hand knowledge of the 9/11 case -- including the former head of the joint congressional inquiry Sen. Bob Graham -- that the contact between Awlaki and hijackers Nawaf al-Hazmi and Khalid al-Mihdar and Hani Hanjour, three of the five hijackers who flew into the Pentagon, was not casual or coincidental but rather evidence of a purposeful relationship.
...
For the first time, Fox News reveals how those in the alleged 9/11 support network are still living in the U.S. Asked if he believes the network of helpers is still here, Graham told Fox News that the network was never disrupted -- so there is every reason to believe it remains in place. "I have no reason to believe it's not."

Also: Radical imam invited to speak about 'moderate Islam' at the Pentagon after 9/11 may have known about attacks in advance
Shortly after the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, radical American-born cleric Anwar al-Awlaki was invited to the Pentagon to speak about 'moderate Islam', after a flawed vetting process. New Mexico-born al-Awlaki was billed as the featured speaker on 'Islam and Middle Eastern Politics and Culture'.

According to Fox, the Defense Department lawyer who vetted al-Awlaki wrote that she 'had the privilege of hearing one of Mr. Awlaki's presentations in November and was impressed by both the extent of his knowledge and by how he communicated that information and handled a hostile element in the audience'.

The department was said to be interested in booking a 'moderate Muslim' to speak to the defense community in the aftermath of September 11.

However, it seems that the Department of Defense was unaware that Al-Awlaki had been interviewed at least four times by the FBI a few days after September 11, because of alleged ties to the hijackers Nawaf al-Hazmi, Khalid al-Mihdhar and Hani Hanjour. Those men are accused of being among the five hijackers of American Airlines Flight 77, which was flown into the Pentagon.

It is believed he may have been aware of the terrorist plot before September 11, 2001. According to Fox, the Pentagon also seemed unaware of al-Awlaki's alleged soliciting of prostitutes.

A former high-ranking FBI agent told Fox News that there was tremendous 'arrogance' about the vetting process at the Pentagon. 'They vetted people politically and showed indifference toward security and intelligence advice of others', the former agent said.

Link

Home Front: WoT

Awlaki lied to qualify for U.S.-funded college scholarship

2010-04-14

The American Muslim cleric Anwar al-Awlaki, considered by some to be one of the most wanted terrorists behind Usama bin Laden, was educated in the United States with taxpayers money, an ongoing Fox News investigation has found.

A former diplomatic security agent who was tasked with investigating Awlaki immediately after the Sept. 11 attacks told Fox News that the Yemeni-American national apparently lied on his visa application to attend Colorado State University, where he studied engineering. Rather than tell U.S. immigration officials that he was born in Las Cruces, N.M., in 1971, Awlaki stated that the was foreign born, the security agent, Ray Fournier, said.

Awlaki received $20,000 in scholarship money from a U.S. government program for his schooling in Fort Collins, Colo. When asked if Awlaki was eligible, Fournier said, No, he is absolutely forbidden to have it.' "That's the taxpayers' money," Fournier added, saying Awlaki knew that lying about his birthplace would help him get the scholarship money.

A spokesperson at Colorado State University confirmed that Awlaki listed himself as an international student during his years there. The school would not comment on his financial records citing privacy issues.

Fournier came across the scholarship information as part of a larger investigation by the Joint Terrorism Task Force, based in San Diego, in the months following 9/11. He says a large team of agents worked together tirelessly to find a reason to arrest or detain the American-born cleric because of his ties to at least two of the 9/11 hijackers, Nawaf al-Hazmi and Khalid al-Mihdhar. The task force was a robust group of individuals,' Fournier said. We had ATF, DEA, local and state organizations, California Department of Motor Vehicles, to the Social Security Administration, the INS and the FBIabout 70 people.'

Awlaki was of special interest to the task force because he was the iman at the Rabat mosque in San Diego from 1996 to 2000 where the two hijackers worshipped. He would meet with these two -- al-Hazmi and al Mihdihar -- in a small ante-room off the main floor,' Fournier told Fox News, adding that the contact was on a regular basis. The two terrorists had a special relationship with the imam where they met frequently, in private meetings, after Friday prayers.'

Fournier was asked to specially look into passport and visa fraud. The Diplomatic Service, where Fournier worked at the time, is the law enforcement branch of the State Department. I traveled to New Mexico. I went through the Bureau of Vital Statistics records and secured his birth certificate," Fournier told Fox News. Clearly he was born here. It (the birth certificate) looked valid to me. There was nothing out of the ordinary. His parents were here as graduate students at New Mexico State University at the time.'

Link

Home Front: WoT

Sharif Mobley Tied to Anwar al-Awlaki

2010-03-13

A New Jersey nuclear plant laborer arrested in Yemen with 10 other suspected al Qaeda members was in contact with the same radical Yemeni-American cleric tied to Fort Hood shooting suspect Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, federal law enforcement officials told ABC News.
Just more dot-connecting. Pay it no mind ...
The New Jersey man, Sharif Mobley, was detained by Yemeni security forces earlier this month and taken to a hospital for medical treatment. He allegedly tried to escape from the hospital over the past weekend by grabbing a security guard's gun and engaging in a gunfight that killed one of the guards.

Mohammed Albasha, a spokesman for the Yemeni embassy in Washington, told ABC News that details of Mobley's case "will be clearer in a couple of days."

Asked about Mobley's apparent connections with the cleric, Anwar al-Awlaki, Albasha said he was not surprised because radicals and extremists in Yemen seek Awlaki out. "He is a fixture in jihad 101," Albasha said of Awlaki.

Before fleeing the United States, Awlaki taught at a Virginia mosque visited by 9/11 hijackers Nawaf al-Hazmi and Hani Hanjour. Since then, Awlaki has become a prominent influence with al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula and is believed to be in Yemen.

He also was in contact with Hasan, accused of killing 13 people at Fort Hood in Texas in 2009.

Awlaki is believed to have survived a cruise missile strike on a meeting with al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula leaders in December that killed several other of the group's members.

Link

Southeast Asia

Malaysia: 9/11 terror suspect freed in north

2008-12-11

(AKI) - The Malaysian government has released five terror suspects, including Yazid Sufaat, who was accused of aiding terrorists during the 11 September 2001 attacks in the United States. Interior Minister Syed Hamid Albar said Sufaat, allegedly linked to the Jemaah Islamiyah militant group, was released from the Kamunting detention centre in the northern Malaysian state of Perak.

"He was considered a threat to public security in Malaysia because he was part of Jemaah Islamiyah, trying to establish an Islamic government within the region," said Albar. "Yazid Sufaat and four others were released on 4 December".

However, Malaysian Inspector General of Police Tan Sri Musa Hassan said Sufaat was released with another Malaysian on 24 November. "We released him as he had shown remorse and repentance after almost seven years of rehabilitation," said Hassan quoted by Malaysian English language daily The Star.
Oh. Well. I guess it's okay then.
"He was released on several conditions. He has to report to the police regularly and cannot leave Selangor without police permission. Our officers will also be monitoring him as well as several others who have been released over the past years to ensure they do not go back to their old ways,'' he said.
And let that be a lesson to ya, me boy. Get on home now...
Sufaat, arrested in December 2001, is accused of having housed several of the terrorists involved in the 9/11 attacks when he lived in the United States. The terrorists allegedly used his house as a meeting place for Al-Qaeda members. Among those who visited his house were 9/11 attackers Khalid al-Mihdhar and Nawaf al-Hazmi. Both were named by the American FBI as the hijackers of American Airlines Flight 77, which crashed into the Pentagon in Washington.

Sufaat was also accused by US authorities of helping convicted 9/11 conspirator Zacharias Moussaoui.

The other suspects that were released include two Thai separatists and two Malaysians suspected of aiding foreign intelligence groups.

Jemaah Islamiyah is widely considered South-East Asia's most dangerous terrorist organisation and responsible for the Bali bombings that killed 202 people in 2002.

Link

Terror Networks

Al-Qaeda kingpin: I trained 9/11 hijackers

2007-11-25

From his Turkish jail, a senior terrorist claims a key role in atrocities around the world.

IN a small windowless cell lit by a single light bulb, Louai al-Sakka sits isolated from the world and fellow inmates for 24 hours a day.

His concrete box is in the bowels of Kandira, a high-security F-type prison 60 miles east of Istanbul, which was built to house Turkeys most dangerous criminals.

[..]
Sakkas only visitor is Osman Karahan, a lawyer who shares his fervent support for militant Islamic jihad.
[..]

By his own account he is a senior Al-Qaeda operative who was at the forefront of the insurgency in Iraq, took part in the beheading of Briton Kenneth Bigley and helped train the 9/11 bombers. He has been jailed in connection with the bombing of the British consulate in Istanbul.

Certainly, the intelligence services have shown a keen interest in the 34-year-old Syrian who says he was in Iraq alongside Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the notorious insurgent who was killed last year in a United States air-strike.

But, as with many things in the world of Al-Qaeda, there might be smoke and mirrors. Some experts believe that Sakka could be overstating his importance to the group, possibly to lay a false track for western agencies investigating his terrorist colleagues.

[..]
Sakka had been planning to sink Israeli cruise ships off the Turkish coast using motorised dinghies. Despite having plastic surgery to disguise his face, he was easily identified by the Turkish authorities.

Police later discovered documents linking him to the Istanbul suicide bombings that killed at least 27 people after trucks exploded outside the British consulate, the HSBC bank and two synagogues. The court indictment described him as a senior member of the Al-Qaeda terrorist organisation tasked with special high-level missions. It said he had met Osama Bin Laden, who had told him to organise attacks in Turkey.

But was this all? Last week his lawyer claimed his scope was much wider. He was the nnumber one networker for Al-Qaeda in Europe, Iran, Turkey and Syria, Karahan said.

[..]

When the Bosnian war opened a new front for jihadists in the early 1990s, Sakka left his job and headed for the conflict. He stayed in Turkey initially and established the mujaheddin service office, which provided medical support for Bosnia and later the two Chechen wars.

It soon became clear that more than medical help was needed. Sakka set up intensive physical training programmes in the Yalova mountain resort area, near Istanbul, to prepare the scores of young men heading for the conflicts. The memoir claims the volunteers came from Europe, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, the Gulf, North Africa and South America.

The Chechens needed trained fighters. Sakka was telephoned by Ibn al-Khattab, the late militia leader controlling the foreign fighters against the Russians. Khattab requested that Sakkas trainees should be sent on to Afghanistan for military training because conditions are tough.

This brought Sakka into contact with Abu Zubaydah, a high-ranking Al-Qaeda member, who ran a large terrorist training camp near the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan. Sakka was later to be sentenced in ab-sentia for involvement in the foiled Jordanian millennium bomb attacks in 2000 along with Zubaydah.

One of Sakkas chief roles was to organise passports and visas for the volunteers to make their way to Afghanistan through Pakistan. His ability to keep providing high-quality forged papers made Turkey a main hub for Al-Qaeda movements, his lawyer says. The young men came to Turkey pretending to be on holiday and Sakkas false papers allowed them to disappear overseas.

Turkish intelligence were aware of unusual militant Islamic activity in the Yalova mountains, where Sakka had set up his camps. But they posed no threat to Turkey at the time.
But a bigger plot was developing. In late 1999, Karahan says,a group of four young Saudi students went to Turkey to prepare for fighting in Chechnya. They wanted to be good Muslims and join the jihad during their holidays, he said.

They had begun a path that was to end with the September 11 attacks on America in 2001. They were: Ahmed and Hamza al-Ghamdi who hijacked the plane that crashed into the south tower of the World Trade Center; their companion Saeed al-Ghamdi whose plane crashed in a Pennsylvanian field; and Nawaf al-Hazmi who died in the Pentagon crash.

They undertook Sakkas physical training programme in the mountains and later were joined by two of the other would-be hijackers: Majed Moqed, who also perished in the Pentagon crash, and Satam al-Suqami, who was in the first plane that hit the north tower.

Moqed and Suqami had been hand-picked by Al-Qaeda leaders in Saudi Arabia specifically for the twin towers operation, Sakka says, and were en route to Afghanistan. Sakka persuaded the other four to go to Afghanistan after plans to travel to Chechnya were aborted because of problems crossing the border. Sakka [told Zubaydah] he liked the four men and recommended them, said Karahan.

Before leaving, all six received intensive training together, forming a cell led by Suqami, which was similar to the Hamburg group run by Mohammed Atta, another ringleader in the 9/11 attacks.

At one point, Sakka claims the entire group were arrested by police in Yalova after their presence raised suspicions. They were interrogated for a day but eventually released because there was no evidence of wrongdoing.

Some of Sakkas account is corroborated by the US governments 9/11 Commission.

Go to the article and read the whole thing

Link

Home Front: WoT

Dupe entry: Guess who was at the 'Peace' rally in DC 3/17/07

2007-04-11

The Great Al-Qaeda "Patriot"

A man identified as "Esam Omesh" spoke just before Cindy Sheehan at last month's antiwar rally that Sheehan headlined in Washington.

Following chants of "Impeach Bush!" from shivering protesters, Omesh took the podium and exhorted "brothers and sisters" to condemn Bush for the deaths of "more than 650,000 Iraqi lives." He demanded the White House "pull our troops out of Iraq now" and "end the war today."

The speaker counted himself among the "great American patriots" who braved the cold to march on Washington and protest the war that day.

While there may have been legitimate voices there, this speaker decidedly was not one of them. Not because he's Muslim, but because he's an Islamist tied to an al-Qaida fund raiser and the spiritual adviser to the 9/11 hijackers.

Turns out it his real name is Esam S. Omeish, and he runs a nonprofit group in Washington called the Muslim American Society, which the FBI believes is the U.S. branch of the dangerous Muslim Brotherhood, a worldwide jihadist movement that operates like the mafia. The secret Islamist society counts Osama bin Laden, Ayman al-Zawahri, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and blind sheik Omar Abdel Rahman among its members. Its motto: "The Quran is our constitution, the prophet is our guide; Death for the glory of Allah is our greatest ambition."

His office is right next door to the old office of one of Al-Qaida's top fund raisers in America, Abdurahman Alamoudi, before he was jailed a few years ago. And it's located in the same Alexandria, Va., business park as the former office of Osama bin Laden's nephew, before he hightailed it back to Saudi Arabia after 9/11.

"Omesh" is not the legal spelling of his name. He may spell it that way for the media, but that's not how it's listed in court documents I've examined. The correct spelling is Omeish with an "i." Perhaps he leaves it out to avoid links to his brother, Mohamed S. Omeish.

As I first reported in my book, "Infiltration: How Muslim Spies and Subversives Have Penetrated Washington," Mohamed Omeish headed the U.S. branch of one of bin Laden's favorite Saudi charities, the International Islamic Relief Organization, which was raided after 9/11. Tax records I've obtained show Omeish shared an office with Alamoudi, the convicted al-Qaida-tied terrorist and godfather of the Muslim mafia in America. This is the same "moderate" Muslim leader who federal prosecutors caught on tape complaining bin Laden hadn't killed enough Americans.

It gets worse. Esam S. Omeish also sits on the board of the 9/11-tied mosque in Washington that helped the hijackers get licenses and housing, and whose imam prepared them for martyrdom operations in private closed-door sessions. Omeish personally hired the imam, Anwar Aulaqi, who fled the country on a Saudi jet about a year after 9/11 (the FBI now wants another crack at questioning him).

Dar al-Hijrah Islamic Center, which tax records show has received large donations from the Islamic Relief Organization, is a Muslim Brotherhood bastion. Another former imam and current prayer leader, for example, is an admitted Brotherhood member from the Sudan. The mosque's deed was signed by an Alamoudi crony who has admitted participating in the Brotherhood's "Ikhwan" movement in America.

Dar al-Hijrah is a turnstile for terrorists and terror suspects. A prayer leader, Sheikh Mohammed al-Hanooti, was named as an unindicted co-conspirator in the first World Trade Center bombing. Other dubious mosque members have included: Alamoudi, Abdullah bin Laden, Osama's nephew; Hamas leader and fugitive Mousa Abu Marzook and his partners Ismail Elbarasse and Abdelhaleem Ashqar, who was convicted of obstruction of justice in February; convicted Virginia Jihad Network leader Randall "Ismail" Royer, a former CAIR official; and Ahmed Omar Abu Ali, an al-Qaida operative recently convicted of plotting to assassinate President Bush.

Leaders of the mosque rallied around Ali, calling the trial a Zionist "witch hunt," even after it became obvious he was guilty.

What's more, the phone number to the mosque was found in the German apartment of Ramzi bin al-Shibh, roommate of 9/11 ringleader Mohamed Atta. Atta's deputy "emir" in the "raid" on America, Nawaf al-Hazmi, worshipped at Dar al-Hijrah, along with the pilot who crashed the plane into the Pentagon.

Back to mosque leader Esam Omeish, the "American patriot." Court records I've obtained show he put his home up for bond collateral in 2004 to help spring from jail a terrorist suspect who was caught allegedly casing the Chesapeake bridge for attack. His dubious pal Ismail Elbarasse is a founding member of Dar al-Hijrah.

Omeish's house is just down the road from the mosque in Falls Church, Va., and just a few blocks in the other direction from the Islamist business park in Alexandria. One of Omeish's neighbors on his cul-de-sac is the former bookkeeper for terror banker Soliman Biheiri. He started an Islamic investment bank that included Hamas leader Marzook and Abdullah bin Laden as major investors. Biheiri, a member of the Muslim Brotherhood, was recently convicted of lying about his connections to Marzook in an investigation into his terrorist ties.

It's one big happy Islamist family in Omeish's neck of the woods.

This is who is rallying opposition to the war. Omeish may claim to be an "American patriot," but even Cindy Sheehan should know better. The people she's consorting with would not have shed a tear had her son been beheaded in Iraq.

This article features:
Esam S. Omeish aka Esam Omesh
Mohamed S. Omeish
Abdurahman Alamoudi
Sheikh Mohammed al-Hanooti
Alamoudi, Abdullah bin Laden
Mousa Abu Marzook
Ismail Elbarasse
Abdelhaleem Ashqar
Randall "Ismail" Royer
Ahmed Omar Abu Ali
Ramzi bin al-Shibh
Nawaf al-Hazmi
Ismail Elbarasse
Soliman Biheiri
Cindy Sheehan

Dar al-Hijrah Islamic Center
International Islamic Relief Organization
Muslim American Society
Muslim Brotherhood
CAIR

Link

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