Posted on 06/04/2002 7:20:42 PM PDT by The Raven
ASHINGTON, June 4 — United States intelligence officials said today that they had concluded that a possible relative of Ramzi Ahmed Yousef, who coordinated the bombing of the World Trade Center in 1993 and a later unsuccessful plot to bomb American airliners over the Pacific, played a pivotal role in planning the Sept. 11 attacks on New York and Washington.
The man described as a possible relative, Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, 37, a Kuwaiti, is now believed to have been a leading figure in Osama bin Laden's Qaeda network who helped plan the attacks, officials said.
The assessment that Mr. Mohammed played a significant role in the attacks provides a new and direct link between the hijackings last year and the failed airline plot by Mr. Yousef's group in 1995. The estimate also suggests a connection between the first attack on the World Trade Center and its destruction.
Mr. Mohammed has been indicted in the United States on charges that he was involved in the January 1995 plot, led by Mr. Yousef, to bomb American planes flying between Southeast Asia and the United States. The F.B.I. has placed him on its list of most wanted terrorists. Officials said he was believed to be in Afghanistan or living nearby.
Since Sept. 11, many American experts have pointed out the parallels between the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon and the "Manila plot," Mr. Yousef's plan to bomb up to 12 planes. An alternative plot considered by Mr. Yousef's group was to hijack the planes, instead of bombing them, and crash them into prominent American buildings, including the headquarters of the Central Intelligence Agency in Langley, Va.
The plot was foiled after Philippine authorities arrested accomplices and found Mr. Yousef's laptop computer, which had information about his plans. Mr. Yousef escaped. He was tracked down and arrested in Pakistan and returned to the United States, where he was tried and convicted in the Manila plot and the first attack on the trade center.
For many years, the C.I.A. and Federal Bureau of Investigation were not certain that there was a direct connection between Mr. Yousef and Al Qaeda. They had a shared radical Islamic ideology and used similar terrorist tactics.
But the trade center bombing in 1993 occurred before American investigators began to see signs that Al Qaeda was emerging as a major threat. The Manila conspiracy was also not believed to be an operation of Al Qaeda.
United States intelligence officials said today that Mr. Mohammed seemed to have had a significant operational role in planning the attacks on Sept. 11, perhaps just below Mr. bin Laden and his three top lieutenants. But officials did not provide details about his involvement in planning Sept. 11 or how they had determined his role.
The new evidence of Mr. Mohammed's role in the attacks is certain to prompt a reassessment of the connections between Mr. Yousef and Mr. bin Laden.
The evidence could also help explain why Al Qaeda decided to attack the trade center again, to try to finish the job that Mr. Yousef started nearly nine years earlier.
In recent months, American counterintelligence officials have identified a small group of other Al Qaeda lieutenants as the crucial figures behind the Sept. 11 attacks. They include Mohammed Atef, the military chief of Al Qaeda, who died in November in an American bombing raid in Afghanistan; Abu Zubaydah, 30, a Palestinian held by the United States; and Ayman al-Zawahiri, an Egyptian radical and Mr. bin Laden's top deputy.
It is also unclear how close a relative Mr. Mohammed is of Mr. Yousef, who is in the federal penitentiary in Florence, Colo.
In 1995, American authorities first accused Mr. Mohammed of working with Mr. Yousef in the 1993 bombing. In 1998, Mr. Mohammed was indicted by a federal grand jury in Manhattan in connection with the Manila plot.
Mr. Mohammed has been described by authorities as often wearing a beard and glasses, as well as being slightly overweight.
The authorities have also accused him of taking part in a test run of the Pacific bombing plot on a flight from the Philippines to Tokyo. An explosion on that flight killed a Japanese executive.
this would also suggest a direct connection to murrah.
And a credit to you good sir. May God bless you!
Deport them all!
Hmmmm....
Calling Condi....Condiiii,Condiiii Rice!
AL-Hussian Hussaini.....who after OKC Murrah went on to work at LOGAN AIRPORT in Boston.
These guys do get around, don't they?
Thank you for this important information.
Are there any dates available for when Khalid Mohammed worked for Khalil in OKC?
I think it is likely the feds are aware of the Samir Khalil - Khalid Mohammed connection. If so, the only logical conclusion to draw from this information is mind boggling for me.
Do you know of a thread that records what is known of the Samir Khalil - OKC bombing connection?
Assistant US Attorney Murdered or Suicided For Investigating Federal Cover-up of OKC Bombing?
This link provides more information on Samir Khalil, for anyone interested. It is another great example of the fine work OKCSubmariner has shared on the FreeRepublic.
In 1997, Assistant Us Attorney, Ted Richardson, was found dead near his church in OKC with a shotgun wound to his chest. He was married, was a sports hunter and active with his sons in the Boys Scouts and his church. The US Attorney, Patrick Ryan returned to OKC from Denver during the McVeigh trial to the OKC office of the US Attorney, once he learned of his assistant’s death.
Richardson had been investigating a Middle Eastern man, Samir Khalil, in OKC for income tax evasion and HUD property scams. Khalil has a Jordanian passport. Richardson was abruptly taken off the investigation of Khalil just before the results of his investigation was to be submitted to a grand jury and just after Khalil’s name came up in the news media in connection with the OKC bombing in May 1995.
Khalil was divorced from his wife, Carol Khalil, who was killed in the Murrah Building. Khalil is alleged to have had a large life insurance policy on his wife. And it is believed that Carol Khalil had keys and other access to the Murrah Building which could have been obtained husband.
My question is, how long is it going to take before somebody on Capitol Hill, or at the FBI, is going to go public with the Yousef/OKC connection?
Is there still lots more we don't know about this, OKCsubmariner?
It seems to me, with all the breast beating and mea culpas floating around Washington, something relatively significant is still being held back. The media recounts just about every terrorist event that has taken places from the early 90s on except one, when they discuss the intelligence hearings now underway.
What about Robert Wright?
And just, for clarification, has Burton officially announced hearings in the fall?
Just kind of weird. Anybody willing to hazard a guess on which, if any, "major news organization" is finally going to give this story credibility?
Think about that!
Two presidnts have known that Islamic Terrorists were involved in OKC and continued to lie to the public.
One of them went to "WORK" at Logan Airport in Boston!
Remember who left from the Boston Logan on September 11,2001 ?
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