Posted on 08/16/2003 9:25:16 AM PDT by joesnuffy
HOMELAND INSECURITY D.C. imam tied to hijackers subject of Green Quest probe Detained at JFK last Oct., but then released after State 'pulled' warrant
Posted: August 16, 2003 1:00 a.m. Eastern
By Paul Sperry © 2003 WorldNetDaily.com
WASHINGTON – A Muslim cleric who had closed-door meetings with two of the 9-11 hijackers was detained last October at a New York airport after federal authorities identified him as the subject of a post-9-11 terror money-laundering investigation, according to a U.S. Customs incident report obtained exclusively by WorldNetDaily.
But the cleric, Anwar Nasser Aulaqi, was released soon after being taken into custody, the report shows, and allowed to catch a connecting flight here, where he'd headed a large suburban mosque attended by two of the hijackers who helped crash an American Airlines jetliner into the Pentagon. He has since returned to Yemen, where he was born.
Aulaqi, along with his family, arrived Oct. 10 at JFK International Airport on Saudi Arabian Airlines.
After Customs agents identified him as a match in their anti-terrorist lookout database, they searched his bags and escorted him to a detention area. They notified the FBI, and the FBI informed them that "the warrant issued by the State Department had been pulled back" on the previous day, Oct. 9, according to the incident log.
Aulaqi and his family were then released after more than three hours in custody.
"Passengers released with thanks for their patience, and given the comment card," the log states. They were handed off to a Saudi Arabian Airlines representative "in order to continue with their flight to Washington, D.C."
It's not immediately clear why the warrant had been removed. Phone calls to the FBI and State were not returned.
As of June 2002, Aulaqi was the subject of a terrorism-related money-laundering probe called Operation Green Quest, WorldNetDaily has learned.
That operation, started when Customs was part of the Treasury Department, has been credited with seizing some $11 million from suspected terrorism-financing networks.
As of Nov. 25, 2002, more than a month after the warrant was pulled, Aulaqi was still "the subject of current investigation," according to Customs records.
Before the 9-11 attacks, when he was imam of a San Diego mosque attended by three of the Pentagon hijackers, all of whom were Saudi nationals, Aulaqi was the subject of a separate FBI counterterrorism investigation. The imam allegedly had ties to suspected terrorism groups, and contacts with other terrorist suspects. The case was closed before the 9-11 attacks, however.
"There's a lot of smoke there" regarding the imam's connections to the Saudi hijackers, an FBI agent on the 9-11 case was quoted as saying in the recently declassified 9-11 congressional report.
Aulaqi, 32, listed the address of his former employer, Dar al-Hijrah Islamic Center in Falls Church, Va., as his residence, according to the incident report.
The hard-line, pro-Hamas mosque, the largest in the Washington area, if not the country, figures prominently in the 9-11 plot. Two of the American Airlines Flight 77 hijackers, Nawaf Alhazmi and Hani Hanjour, the suspected pilot, followed Aulaqi there from San Diego. A member of the mosque helped them get fake IDs. A third Flight 77 hijacker, Khalid al-Midhar, had attended at least Aulaqi's San Diego mosque. And German authorities found the phone number to his Dar al-Hijrah mosque in the flat of a 9-11 plotter, Ramzi Binalshibh, who roomed with hijacking ringleader Mohamed Atta.
Aulaqi is described in the Customs report as standing 6-1 and weighing 160 pounds. He has black hair and black eyes. Though born in Aden, Yemen, as WorldNetDaily first reported, his race is described variably as "white" and "Hispanic."
He may be living in Saudi Arabia now, where he has weighed job offers to preach on Islam, according to a Dar al-Hijrah official.
The official, Johari Malik, says Aulaqi left the U.S. last year to escape what he felt was a growing anti-Muslim climate. He insists his friend, who originally came to the U.S. in 1990 on a J-1 visa to attend college, did not leave the country to escape federal investigators.
Malik says Aulaqi returned briefly in October to take care of personal business, such as liquidating assets.
Previous stories:
9-11 cleric born in Yemen, came to U.S. on J-1 visa
Imam tied to hijackers weighs Saudi job offer
FBI chokes on backlog of untranslated Arabic
FBI invites Muslim clerics to preach to agents
Paul Sperry is Washington bureau chief for WorldNetDaily.
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