Free Republic

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The FBI agent who wrote a pre-Sept. 11 warning about Arab students at an Arizona flight school hoped his memo would lead to screenings of Middle Easterners who came to study U.S. airport operations, according to government officials familiar with his account. Agent Kenneth Williams testified behind closed doors Tuesday to lawmakers investigating what the government knew about terrorist threats before Sept. 11. Williams believed his information might provide a significant but prospective lead about Osama bin Laden's intentions, according to lawmakers and government officials familiar with his account. But Williams wrote his memo for terrorism experts...

AP: FBI Sent Hamas Money in Clinton Days JOHN SOLOMON Associated Press WASHINGTON - While President Clinton was trying to broker an elusive peace between Israelis and Palestinians, the FBI was secretly funneling money to suspected Hamas figures to see if the militant group would use it for terrorist attacks, according to interviews and court documents. The counterterrorism operation in 1998 and 1999 was run out of the FBI's Phoenix office in cooperation with Israeli intelligence and was approved by Attorney General Janet Reno, FBI officials told The Associated Press. Several thousand dollars in U.S. money was sent to suspected...

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Justice Department inspector general is investigating whether FBI agents involved in espionage and terrorism cases improperly used informants and subjects of investigation to benefit private businesses they were running on the side, according to officials and documents. The allegations, according to court documents reviewed by The Associated Press, include that agents' and intelligence assets' private companies were involved in business deals in China and the Middle East about the same time the FBI was investigating Chinese efforts to acquire sensitive technology. The FBI says it is cooperating with the investigation. "Any time there is a request...