Via NY Transfer News * All the News That Doesn't Fit
This report and the two following, from the Sept 18 Chicago Tribune, are loaded with the latest
breathless leaks from Law Enforcement and those they are questioning. Everyone seems to be talking
to reporters on background and requesting anonymity -- the cops, the Canadian mounties, the FBI,
and even the Jersey City landlord of some of the detainees. So much for Mr. Ashcroft's crackdown on
leaks.
Everyone is blabbing to everyone else, even those close to an investigation that was supposed to be
so zip-lipped. We haven't seen such a torrent of contradictory instantly appearing evidence since
November 22, 1963. Much of it is horse-shit, so take it all with a large grain of salt.
Most amusing is the FBI's reported linguistic inadequacy. Things are supposedly so bad that the
G-men can't even get enough help from the CIA or the NSA and according to the Chicago Trib, they've
issued a public appeal for help from anyone who is fluent in Farsi or Arabic! Twenty-one years
after the Iranian Revolution, when the CIA got caught short with too few Farsi speakers, it seems
nothing has changed. (Maybe someone should point out that there are universities in this country,
with academics, and Arabic speakers. )
If true, this is an appalling statement about the intellectual and capacity of the US Government.
If true, it's hard to believe they plan to wage any kind of war east of the Hudson River, much less
mount a Crusade of Terror against "evil-doers."
The Chicago Tribune - September 18, 2001
FBI probes 5th flight for hijackers Plane grounded on day of attack
By Stephen J. Hedges and Naftali Bendavid
Washington Bureau
WASHINGTON -- The FBI is investigating the possibility that suicide hijackers were on board a fifth
transcontinental airline flight last Tuesday, one that was cancelled just minutes before its
scheduled 8:10 a.m. departure from Boston due to a mechanical problem, according to sources
familiar with the investigation.
Federal agents are searching for an undetermined number of passengers who were on board American
Airlines Flight 43, according to one source familiar with the passenger manifest. The flight was to
have departed Boston 25 minutes after American Flight 11, which struck New York's World Trade
Center, this source said.
In addition, one of the sources said that the FBI was "very interested" in passengers whose names
appeared on the manifests of "several" other American flights that were in the air when the first
attacks occurred. Those planes landed prematurely when air traffic controllers, responding to the
attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, ordered all flights in the U.S. to touch down
as soon as possible.
None of the passengers in whom the FBI has expressed interest reappeared to continue their journeys
after commercial flights resumed late last week, one of the sources said.
On Thursday, the FBI sent a list of several dozen Arabic-sounding names to state and local police
with the request that those on the list be located for questioning. At least some of the passengers
being sought are believed to be among those listed, according to one of the sources. An American
Airlines spokesman said he was not immediately able to confirm the sources' accounts.
About 35 minutes after Flight 43 was due to depart, American Flight 11, which was bound for Los
Angeles, struck the Trade Center's north tower. A hijacked United flight from Boston hit the
center's south tower about 20 minutes later. A third American flight that left Washington's Dulles
International Airport struck the Pentagon at 9:39 a.m. A fourth plane, United Flight 93, crashed in
a field southeast of Pittsburgh at 10:10 a.m.
Urgent request for help
Federal authorities were holding 49 individuals in connection with last week's terrorist attacks,
nearly twice as many as two days ago, and the FBI sent out an urgent request Monday for Arabic and
Farsi speakers to help with its investigation of the hijackings.
French government officials confirmed Monday that one of the people being held by the FBI for
questioning in connection with last week's attack is considered a dangerous, well-known militant
associate of Osama bin Laden.
Habib Zacarias Moussaoui, a dual French-Algerian national, was detained last month after
instructors at a flight school he attended in Minnesota grew suspicious that Moussaoui, an
inexperienced pilot, wanted to learn only how to steer and turn passenger jets, not take off or
land.
Sen. Bob Graham (D-Fla.), chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said the hijackings were
intended by their perpetrators to be the first in a multiday series of attacks. That suggests that
other would-be perpetrators remain at large, and the FBI continued its massive effort Monday to
track them down.
The FBI has 4,000 agents and 3,000 support personnel working on the case, making it the largest FBI
investigation ever, but Atty. Gen. John Ashcroft assigned 300 deputy U.S. marshals to help. The
investigation has reached a fever pitch, with 500 people from 32 agencies working at the FBI's
special investigation center around the clock in 12-hour shifts.
Authorities have taken databases from various government agencies, such as the Immigration and
Naturalization Service and Customs Service, into the FBI center in New York to speed up their
work.
But FBI officials acknowledged that the bureau is being hampered by a severe shortage of
investigators fluent in Arabic or Farsi, which is spoken in Iran. "This has been a perpetual
problem for everybody," said FBI spokesman John Collingwood.
Although no one has yet been charged in last week's attacks, FBI Director Robert Mueller said some
of those being detained are helping the investigation. "There are individuals cooperating," Mueller
said. "There are a number of individuals that are not cooperating."
While the FBI is seeking anyone who aided the hijackers, agents are even more urgently hunting for
anyone who might still be planning other attacks. Graham suggested the nation may have been
fortunate to avoid further tragedies last week.
"There has been credible evidence gathered since Tuesday that Tuesday's attacks were not designed
to be a one-day event," Graham told the Orlando Sentinel. "There were other acts of terrorism in
the United States and elsewhere that were part of this plan."
That does not mean the seizure of more airplanes, Graham added. "Not necessarily hijacking another
airliner, but maybe putting a chemical in a city's water system, or blowing up a bridge in a major
urban center," he said.
Barry Mawn, assistant FBI director in charge of the New York office, said there is "no specific
proof" that there were more terrorist teams in place. But "all of us are looking at that as the
potential," he said, and finding any such teams is the investigation's highest priority.
Pressing for clues
The investigation moved forward Monday on various fronts. Evidence recovery teams have found a
passport for one of the hijackers amid the rubble at the World Trade Center, which investigators
consider a major find.
Several people were being held Monday as material witnesses in the attack, meaning they may have
important information. Among them is one of the two men who were seized from an Amtrak train in
Texas, Aybub Ali Khan and Mohammed Jaweed Azmath, though it is unclear which one. Khan and Azmath
took a flight Tuesday from Newark, N.J., to St. Louis, and then boarded a train for San Antonio,
Texas.
The pair lived in an apartment in Jersey City, N.J., that is just steps away from the Masjid
As-Salaam Mosque, one of two New York-area mosques affiliated with radical Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman,
who is in prison.
Mawn said he expects more arrests of material witnesses in coming days. "Material witness warrants
are a key grand jury tool," Mawn said. "I think that will continue."
Khan and Azmath rented the apartment for the last six years. Their landlord said in an interview
Monday that FBI agents have asked him to secure all records and correspondence related to the two
tenants. The landlord, who spoke only on the condition of anonymity, said the men did not list any
references or previous addresses on their application, which he was expected to turn over to the
FBI Monday night.
The landlord said they were initially referred by another tenant in the building who at the time
described them as "very good guys," the landlord recalled, adding, "That was good enough for me."
He said he also has been asked by the FBI to turn over every canceled check received from the men,
which the landlord said he has saved. He said the pair paid rent even for this month.
FBI agents in Chicago spent a significant part of Monday trying to determine whether Khan ever
lived in the city. A commercial database indicated Khan listed an address in Rogers Park as
recently as last June. Shown photos of the two men by the Tribune, tenants could not say with
certainty that they had seen either of them.
A man traveling on one of the U.S. flights that was diverted into Canada last Tuesday was detained
in the Toronto airport by immigration officials. The man, whom authorities would not identify, was
turned over to the FBI for questioning, according to Greg Peters, a spokesman for Canada's national
police force.
"He had in his possession material of interest, given the situation that occurred in the U.S.,"
Peters said in an interview. "Specifically, photos." He declined to elaborate.
Across the U.S. border in Mexico, authorities detained and questioned a man with a Brazilian
passport who said he had family ties to Jordan. Imad Mohammed Jaber, 26, was detained for
immigration violations in Piedras Negras, across the border from Eagle Pass, Texas. Mexican
officials said he had traveled recently to Germany and said he wanted to travel to the United
States. A U.S. immigration official also questioned him.
New details
As the investigation entered its second week, more details of the lives of the suicide hijackers
have begun to emerge. One of the most intriguing is Mohamed Atta, a hijacker on American Airlines
Flight 11, which crashed into the World Trade Center. Atta, a self-described urban planner, was
known to U.S. authorities long before the hijacking for possible ties to terrorist groups, and had
spent time in Germany and Egypt. He may have played a leadership role among the hijackers, based on
the records of his travels and his interaction with several of them.
New, albeit sparse, details about Atta's life in the Egyptian Delta emerged Monday. Ralph
Bodenstein, a German researcher who does urban studies work in the Arab world, said he spent many
hours with Atta in 1995, when Atta was part of a three-man team from a Hamburg university studying
ways to ease Cairo's traffic woes.
Atta's father was a professional living in Cairo, Bodenstein said, and during this period Atta
lived with his middle-class family in that city. Atta's anti-American views were pronounced, he
added, though such opinions are not uncommon in the Arab world.
"He didn't give a positive judgment on U.S. politics," Bodenstein said. "But there was nothing to
indicate he would go to the lengths of such terror."
The issue of the hijackers' nationalities is explosive, and Egyptian officials continued to insist
Atta was born in the United Arab Emirates. Although he lived in the Egyptian delta at one point,
investigators said there was no trace of any family there.
Still, Egyptian security forces have sealed off the region, about an hour from Cairo, as they look
for information.
One key unanswered question remains how the hijackers communicated with each other or with anyone
who may have been giving them orders. There was some suggestion that they used computers and the
Internet.
Computer proficiency
Clearly some of the hijackers were proficient on the Internet. Atta had his own Web site when he
lived in Hamburg, Germany, describing his interest in architecture and other matters, according to
German authorities.
FBI officials say they have seized numerous computers in connection with the investigation. For
example, agents came into the apartment of Omar Hady, an Arkansas resident authorities questioned
regarding the attacks, and confiscated the computer he used to send e-mails.
In other cases, the hijackers may have used the computers available in public libraries, which
would have made their e-mail traffic harder to trace. After reports emerged that the FBI was
investigating whether the hijackers used the library in Fairfax County, Va., in this way, a
librarian and a motel operator in Florida both told authorities over the weekend they may have had
similar experiences.
At Delray Beach's small public library, research librarian Katherine Hensman said she saw two men,
whom she said matched descriptions of the hijackers who stayed at the nearby Homing Inn, using the
library's Internet access one afternoon within the past six weeks.
The men used one of the 12 computers for about an hour, then left when a third man arrived and
greeted them, she said, adding that she took note of the pair because they "kept staring over at
me" while using a machine on the far side of the room.
Hensman did say she could not be sure whether the men were among those pictured in newspapers over
the past few days as hijackers. Delray Beach police interviewed Hensman on Saturday, but so far,
FBI agents have not visited.
Farther south, in Hollywood, Longshore Motel operator Paul Dragomir said Monday that two of his
customers on Aug. 30 left after a dispute over the motel's Internet access. He, too, said he was
uncertain whether the pair had any connection to the Sept. 11 events, except for general physical
descriptions.
After the men got into the room, they asked for Internet lines to their room. Dragomir initially
agreed to bring an office phone line into the room, where he saw two laptop computers and several
CDs. The pair got in an argument when it became clear the guests wanted to use the phone line all
night.
The men grew angry, Dragomir said. They told him, "We're on a mission."
Tribune staff reporters Cam Simpson in New York, Monica Davey and
Geoff Dougherty in Florida, Todd Lighty in Boston, E.A. Torriero in
Cairo contributed to this report.
Copyright © 2001, Chicago Tribune
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0109180341sep18.story?coll=chi%2Dnews%2Dhed
***************************NEW YORK: Syed Gul Mohammad Shah, an Indian formerly suspected in the US government's terrorism investigation, has been sentenced to one year and one day in prison for credit card fraud. Shah, 35, pleaded guilty in June. He was sentenced on Thursday in US District Court in Manhattan and ordered to pay restitution of about $415,000. Shah, who is from Hyderabad, admitted selling 15 fraudulent credit cards for up to $2,000 each in the black market. He and Mohammed Azmath, 37, were arrested on a train in Texas on September 12 after law enforcement authorities found two box cutters, hair dye, a knife and several thousand dollars among their belongings. Azmath also pleaded guilty and is expected to be sentenced next month. The circumstances surrounding their arrests made them suspects in the government's terrorism probe. But investigators later concluded that Shah and Azmath were not linked to terrorism.
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http://web.archive.org/web/20011021110242/www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0109180341sep18.story?coll=chi-news-hed
Air Traffic Control Center Ronkonkoma- Red Herring or Cover-up?
In early 2003, Azmath's family confirmed to AP, that Ali Khan and Azmath were on the plane with Flight No.43, which was grounded in St. Louis: "His family in Hyderabad saw his picture on television. They had been worried that he might have been a victim of the Sept. 11 terror attacks because he was supposed to fly that day from Newark, N.J. to his new job in Texas." Interestingly, another detail seems not to fit either. Azmath's family claim, he departed from Newark, but the FBI claimed, the plane departed from Boston. What was the correct version? It looks, like Newark was the correct airport. A check in the BTS Departure Statistics of AA/Sep11th doesn't show Flight 43 departing from Boston. Search results in Newark show Flight43 with the tail number N635AA LAX, scheduled for 8:10 AM. The departure time fits. The Actual Departure Time was 8:10 AM, too. What exactly did the FBI know about Flight43 and at which time? Who told them to look for Flight43? 11 Minutes earlier, Flight 11 took off from Boston's Logan Airport, 14 minutes after scheduled departure. (7:45 was actually the scheduled time) According to the timeline, officially on that plane (but not on the passenger list) was Mohammad Atta.