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by seemslikeadream » Sun Apr 10, 2016 4:36 pm
by Belligerent Savant » Sun Apr 10, 2016 4:43 pm
by seemslikeadream » Sun Apr 10, 2016 8:48 pm
by 82_28 » Sun Apr 10, 2016 10:35 pm
by seemslikeadream » Sun Apr 10, 2016 11:10 pm
by 8bitagent » Sat Sep 10, 2016 1:21 am
by Nordic » Sat Sep 10, 2016 1:45 am
by 8bitagent » Sat Sep 10, 2016 1:53 am
Nordic » Sat Sep 10, 2016 12:45 am wrote:Tomorrow is 9/11, yes, but also the opening of the official NFL football season.
by backtoiam » Sat Sep 10, 2016 2:02 am
by 8bitagent » Sat Sep 10, 2016 2:28 am
backtoiam » Sat Sep 10, 2016 1:02 am wrote:If it ever it ever comes to the point that they get backed into a corner sharp enough that they have to admit it was a demo job, they may admit it, but they will damn sure blame it on saudi or somebody.
by Belligerent Savant » Sat Sep 10, 2016 12:29 pm
by DrEvil » Sat Sep 10, 2016 4:14 pm
by 82_28 » Sat Sep 10, 2016 4:46 pm
by backtoiam » Sat Sep 10, 2016 5:35 pm
FBI Chief Raises New Doubts Over Hijackers' Identities
Inquiry: Mueller says several names 'are still in question.' Some of them match those of Saudi citizens who are alive.
September 21, 2001|LISA GETTER and ELIZABETH MEHREN and ERIC SLATER | TIMES STAFF WRITERS
WASHINGTON — FBI Director Robert Mueller acknowledged Thursday that investigators may not know the true identities of some of the 19 suspected airplane hijackers from last week's suicide attacks.
Mueller said last week that he had "a fairly high level of confidence" that the FBI knew the real names of the hijackers, based on flight manifests and follow-up interviews.
But while in Pennsylvania on Thursday for a tour of the crash site there, he raised fresh doubts about the accuracy of the identifications.
"We have several hijackers whose identities were those of the names on the manifests," Mueller said. "We have several others that are still in question. The investigation is ongoing, and I am not certain as to several of the others."
Officials refused to say how many hijackers may have used false identities, but officials of the Saudi Arabian government said Thursday that six of the men that the United States has named as hijackers killed in the attacks appear to be living in the Middle East.
Investigators believe that some of the 19 suspected hijackers may have stolen the identities of law-abiding Middle Easterners, further complicating the probe.
Confusion over the identities of some of the terrorists is one reason authorities have delayed putting out the photographs of the hijackers, as they had planned to do last week, Justice Department spokeswoman Mindy Tucker said.
The Saudi citizens who were mistakenly linked to last week's tragedy are horrified, said a diplomat at the Saudi Embassy here.
"You should see the hate mail we are getting," said Gaafar Allagany, head of the embassy's information center. "We think this was part of the plan."
The six Saudis are:
* Abdulaziz Alomari, a name used by one of the suspected hijackers on American Airlines Flight 11, the first plane that crashed into the World Trade Center.
A man with the same name is an electrical engineer in Saudi Arabia. He lived in Denver, where he got his degree from the University of Colorado, from 1993 until last year.
"In 1995, his apartment was broken into in Denver and his passport and other official documents were stolen," Allagany said.
* Salem Alhamzi, a name used by one of the suspected hijackers on American Airlines Flight 77, the plane that crashed into the Pentagon.
A man with the same name works for the Saudi Royal Commission in the Saudi city of Yanbu.
* Saeed Alghamdi, a name used by one of the alleged hijackers on United Airlines Flight 93, the plane that crashed in Pennsylvania.
A Saudi Arabian pilot, currently on a mission to Tunisia, has the same name.
* Ahmed Alnami, a name used by another suspected hijacker on Flight 93.
A 33-year-old Saudi Arabian pilot with the same name is alive in Riyadh.
* Wail Alshehri, a name used by one of the suspected hijackers on American Airlines Flight 11.
A man by the same name is a pilot whose father is a Saudi diplomat in Bombay. "I personally talked to both father and son today," Allagany said.
* Waleed M. Alshehri, a name used by another alleged hijacker on Flight 11, is the same name as the other son of the diplomat. Allagany said that man is living in Jidda.
"This is a respectable family. I know his sons, and they're both alive," he said.
In other developments Thursday, an FBI official in San Antonio discounted any ties between two Indian nationals arrested on an Amtrak train in Fort Worth last week and a San Antonio physician also being held for questioning following the terror attacks.
"There's no connection" between them "at this time," said special agent Rene Salinas, spokesman for the FBI's office in San Antonio.
Salinas also said federal agents found nothing suspicious in the purchase of airline tickets from San Antonio to San Diego for a scheduled flight Saturday by the physician, Al-Badr Al-Hazmi. The 34-year-old Saudi national is studying at the University of Texas Health Science Center.
The FBI list of people wanted for questioning included Al-Hazmi and four other people, three with the surname Al-Hazmi. According to the list, the five individuals were booked on the same flights leaving Saturday from San Antonio, going to Denver and on to San Diego, and then returning Oct. 20.
Also Thursday, a Muslim cleric questioned by prosecutors about last week's attacks called the suicide operations "vicious and cowardly acts of terror" and also protested his treatment by the FBI.
The clergyman, Moataz Al-Hallak, led a mosque in suburban Dallas, where suspected terrorist Osama bin Laden's former personal secretary prayed.
"We had a calamity," Al-Hallak said. "We don't want to add more innocent victims. It's been hard."
Bin Laden's former secretary was convicted in May of conspiring to kill Americans in the 1998 bombings of U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. Al-Hallak testified three times under a grant of immunity to the grand jury in that case.
Thirteen months ago, Al-Hallak moved to a suburb of Washington, where the five hijackers suspected of forcing a plane into the Pentagon apparently spent the week before the crash.
FBI agents in Dallas told reporters last week that they wanted to speak to Al-Hallak in connection with the attacks. His name, native land and birth date were entered on the agency's watch list.
Agents said Al-Hallak may have made statements predicting the attacks while he was visiting Texas, an assertion his lawyer denied.
On Wednesday, the clergyman spent three hours with federal prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald, who led the government's case in the embassy bombings trial. Al-Hallak said he answered every question.
"I don't know Bin Laden. I don't know what he did. I don't know what he did not do," Al-Hallak said at a Thursday news conference.
Bin Laden "has been accused of committing horrible crimes," Al-Hallak said. "These accusations need to be proved in a court of law, and justice needs to be established."
Given the confusion over suspects' identities, the FBI is moving carefully to determine whether a man arrested near Chicago late Wednesday--identified as Nabil Al-Marabh--is the man on a watch list of possible associates of the terrorists.
Kathleen McChesney of the Chicago FBI office said Al-Marabh's vehicle and residence were searched and that numerous law enforcement agencies, including a Chicago-based terrorism task force and the Immigration and Naturalization Service, are working together "so we know exactly who this person is."
Al-Marabh, a 34-year-old former cabdriver, was picked up in Burbank, Ill., at a convenience store where he had worked for several days.
Al-Marabh was being held on a warrant from Boston stemming from probation violations.
Property records indicate that in the mid-1990s he shared a Boston apartment with accused terrorist Raed Hijazi.
Hijazi is in jail in Jordan on charges that he planned to blow up a hotel during millennium celebrations. Both men drove taxis for the Boston Cab Co.
Federal officials believe Al-Marabh and Hijazi may have close ties to two of the suspected hijackers in last week's attack. They also have been linked with two men suspected of helping to plan last year's bombing of the U.S. destroyer Cole in Yemen.
Authorities last week scoured a series of residences in Boston where Al-Marabh lived over 10 years. On Monday, federal agents raided a Detroit residence with his name on the mailbox.
According to law enforcement documents, Al-Marabh was three hours away from Detroit at the time, obtaining a driver's license in Three Oaks, Mich., near the Indiana border.
Al-Marabh, a short, stocky native of Kuwait, pleaded guilty in Boston last December to stabbing his roommate. Witnesses said he yelled, "If this wasn't America, I'd kill you."
His court-appointed lawyer, Robert Menton, said Al-Marabh told him he stabbed Arafat Abuhejeb "because he deserved it." Menton said his client described himself as a holy man with a degree in international relations from a Middle Eastern university. He also told his lawyer he had a wife at home in Kuwait.
But Al-Marabh told at least one of his numerous Boston-area landlords that the Vietnamese woman he lived with was his wife.
Although a court file called him an indigent, Al-Marabh "always seemed to have money" and traveled often, his lawyer said. Menton said his client was concerned about being sentenced to jail for the stabbing "because he said he needed to get back to Kuwait."
He was given a six-month suspended sentence. But probation department records in Boston show that he never reported, as he was ordered to do, and an arrest warrant was issued for him in March.
In addition, records from the office of the Michigan secretary of state show that on Sept. 11, 2000, Al-Marabh obtained a license that permits him to drive semi-trucks containing hazardous materials, including explosives and caustic materials.
*
Times staff writers Ken Ellingwood, Scott Glover, Greg Krikorian, Matt Lait, H.G. Reza and Eric Lichtblau and researcher John Beckham contributed to this report.
http://articles.latimes.com/2001/sep/21/news/mn-48189/2
by backtoiam » Sat Sep 10, 2016 7:02 pm
Obama Faces Humiliation After House Unanimously Passes Bill Allowing Sept 11 Lawsuits Against Saudi Arabia
by Tyler Durden
Sep 9, 2016 12:12 PM
Two days before the 15 year anniversary of the September 11 attack, moments ago the House unanimously passed - to thunderous applause - legislation allowing the families of 9/11 victims to sue Saudi Arabia in U.S. courts, The bill, which passed the Senate unanimously in May, now heads to President Obama’s desk. And that's where things get tricky for Obama.
The White House has fiercely opposed the bill, arguing it could both strain relations with Saudi Arabia and also lead to retaliatory legislation overseas against U.S. citizens. Obama has lobbied fiercely against the bill, and has hinted strongly it will veto the measure.
He is not alone: the Saudi government has likewise led a vocal campaign in Washington to kill the legislation. Those efforts have been fruitless in Congress, however. Meanwhile, the legislation saw broad support from both parties, and Congress could override an Obama veto for the first time if he rejects the legislation. Such an outcome would undoubtedly embarrass Obama and divide Democrats ahead of the 2016 elections and a crucial lame-duck session of Congress.
For now, Obama is adamanat: "The Saudis will see this as a hostile act," said Dennis Ross, Obama’s former Middle East policy coordinator. "You’re bound to see the Obama administration do everything they can to sustain a veto."
How Obama will spin such a pro-Saudi, and anti-US decision, which may be overriden anyway, to the US population is unclear.
To an extent, Obama finds himself between a rock and a hard place. As we reported in April, Saudi officials threatened the enactment of the law could lead them to sell off the kingdom’s U.S. Treasury debt and other American assets, which the officials told lawmakers and U.S. officials totaled $750 billion, according to the New York Times. The Saudi government held $117 billion in U.S. Treasury debt in March, according to Treasury figures obtained by Bloomberg. The kingdom may have additional holdings not included in the data on deposit with the New York Federal Reserve Bank, in entities in third countries, or through positions in derivatives.
According to the Hill, lawmakers on Capitol Hill are unsure whether Obama will actually use his veto pen on the Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act. “I presume they would have to think very carefully about a veto because it might very well be overridden,” said Nadler.
To override the president, supporters would need a two-thirds majority in each chamber. “I think the votes will be there to override it,” said Rep. Pete King (R-N.Y.), who introduced the bill in the House.
As a result of potentially facing a lose-lose outcome, many on Capitol Hill do not believe that the veto is a done deal. The White House has not issued an official position on the bill and spokespeople have been careful with their language, stopping short of issuing a full veto threat. “We have serious concerns with the bill as written,” a White House official said Wednesday.
“We believe there needs to be more careful consideration of the potential unintended consequences of its enactment before the House considers the legislation,” the official said. “We would welcome opportunities to further engage with the Congress on that discussion.”
The president has 10 days to either sign or reject the legislation before it becomes law.
Meanwhile, supporters of the legislation see it as a moral imperative.
“The victims of 9-11 and other terrorist attacks on US soil have suffered much pain and heartache, but they should not be denied justice,” Schumer said in a statement Wednesday. Under current U.S. law, victims may sue a country designated as a state sponsor of terrorism, like Iran. The bill would allow citizens to sue countries without that designation — like Saudi Arabia.
Fifteen of the 19 hijackers on 9/11 hailed from Saudi Arabia. Critics have long suspected that the kingdom’s government may have either directly or indirectly supported the attacks.
Congress in July released 28 previously secret pages detailing suspicious Saudi ties to the 9/11 hijackers, which made it very clear - according to a closer read of the document - that Saudi officials did indeed help plan and organize the attacks, even as the White House downplayed their involvement.
Saudi officials have for years denied that their government had any role in plotting the attacks and the Saudi government has led a quiet campaign in Washington to kill the legislation.
Despite its popularity in Congress, some prominent national security advisors have also pilloried the bill.
Former United Nations Ambassador John Bolton and ex-Attorney General Michael Mukasey, both of whom served under President George W. Bush, this week warned that the legislation “is far more likely to harm the United States than bring justice against any sponsor of terrorism.”
* * *
The real question, however, is not so much what Obama - who could potentially be branded a traitor if he proceeds with a veto as suggested, against the wishes of every single member of Congress, and the US population - will do, but how the Saudis, some of the most generous donors of the Clinton Foundation, will respond if the law indeed passes. As a reminder, in an epic media blunder, in early June, the Saudi Crown Prince admitted that Saudi Arabia had funded 20% of Hillary's presidential campaign, and will surely demand a quid pro quo in exchange. What Saudi vengeance may look like, should the generous Clinton donor's will not be obeyed, will be something Hillary's campaign will surely be very interested in.
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-09-0 ... 11-lawsuit
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