Posted on 07/09/2002 3:02:45 PM PDT by PatriotReporter
Hadayat met al-Qaida's No. 2 man twice
Airport terrorist linked to al-Zawahiri, Egyptian Islamic Jihad
While the FBI is still debating whether Hesham Mohamed Hadayet, the Egyptian who shot up an El Al ticket counter at Los Angeles International Airport, was a terrorist, an Arabic newspaper in London reports he met twice with Dr. Ayman al-Zawahiri, Osama bin Laden's top lieutenant and a leader of the Egyptian Jihad Islami terror group.
The Arabic London-based Al Hayat reported Sunday that Hadayat was a member of the Egyptian Jihad Islami and met al-Zawahiri twice in California – once in 1995 and again in 1998.
The Al Hayat report places al-Zawahiri in California less than three years before the Sept. 11 hijacking attacks and a year and a half before the EgyptAir disaster.
Meanwhile, Hadayet's wife tells the Associated Press her husband is innocent of gunning down five people July 4 – two of them fatally.
"My husband didn't do such a thing. This is nonsense," 41-year-old Hala Mohammed Sadeq El-Awadly told the Associated Press in Cairo.
"Hesham called on July 4, it was his birthday. His voice was very beautiful," she said. "He asked about the boys, asked me to take them out a lot and to review their lessons with them in order to be ready for next year."
According to the FBI, Hadayet went to the airport ticket counter of El Al, Israel's national airline, carrying two handguns and a hunting knife and opened fire. He killed two people and wounded three before he was killed by an El Al security guard.
El-Awadly said she did not believe her husband was responsible for the July 4 shooting. She offered no explanation for how he could be innocent when so many people saw him open fire, but said he was being blamed because he was Arab and Muslim.
"He is a victim of injustice," she said three times. "In America, they hate Islam and Arabs after Sept. 11."
The FBI said it could not rule out terrorism but also was investigating the possibility it was a hate crime. Authorities also were investigating whether Hadayet was despondent over his personal or business affairs.
His wife said he was not a violent man and had never expressed anger at Israel or at the recent Israeli-Palestinian violence that has sparked anti-Israeli protests across the Arab world.
"No, this wasn't an issue," El-Awadly said without elaborating.
Hadayet, 41, emigrated from Egypt to California 10 years ago with his family. His wife said the family had been happy in the United States, had good relations with their American neighbors and planned to settle there permanently. But she said the atmosphere had been tense since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, which were carried out by 19 Arabs.
"We became very cautious, and sometimes scared. Every Muslim became a suspect," El-Awadly said.
A spokesman for the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service had said Saturday that Hadayet's first petition for permanent residency, in 1996, had been denied for reasons that were unclear. The INS began deportation procedures, but in 1997 Hadayet was granted permanent residency through his wife, who received an immigration visa through the Department of States' Diversity Lottery Program.
El-Awadly and her sons have reservations to fly back to California on Aug. 20 and an appointment later that month to be interviewed by immigration authorities considering their citizenship request.
If true, easily explainable.
Two isolated incidents.
By the way, the El Al security had him tagged years ago, and spotted him as he came in the door.
I puzzled over why the FBI would want this to be an isolated shooting rather than a act of terrorism. Two reasons eventually came to mind.
1.)If it was terrorism they might be called to the carpet for missing critical clues that might have helped them prevent the terrorism. Perhaps they have information that they failed to act upon and would just as soon keep quiet about it.
2.)Turf wars. If it's just a random killing they can investigate without having to share information with Homeland Security.
We will never know for certain if he had met with Dr. Zawahiri or been a member of Egyptian Islamic Jihad. However, where there is smoke, there usually is fire.
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