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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...

ALBANY -- The spiritual leader of an Albany mosque repeatedly called a phone number in Syria that an FBI report indicates had been used to gather terrorist intelligence for Osama bin Laden, according to classified documents unsealed late Tuesday in U.S. District Court. The FBI report, which was based on information from a confidential informant, was among several once-secret documents that federal authorities say raise questions about Yassin Aref's connections to terrorist organizations across the Middle East. Aref, 35, a Kurdish refugee who moved to Albany with his family in 1999, is in jail without bond while awaiting trial on...

An imprisoned man known as the "20th hijacker" in the 9/11 terror attacks is asking a South Florida federal judge for a transfer to the military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. The request is part of a rambling, handwritten letter filed Wednesday in Miami federal court by Zacarias Moussaoui. He is serving a life prison sentence after pleading guilty in 2005 to conspiring with the Sept. 11 hijackers to kill Americans.

The Obama administration has lifted longtime restrictions on Libyans attending flight schools in the United States and training here in nuclear science, according to a final amendment of the ban recently approved by the Office of Management and Budget (OMB).

WASHINGTON - A British man whose behavior raised suspicions at a flight school in Georgia has been located in England, an FBI official said Friday. Zayead Christopher Hajaig, 35, was taking lessons at the same airport in suburban Atlanta where two of the Sept. 11 hijackers briefly trained, the official said on condition of anonymity because the matter is still under investigation. The Atlanta Joint Terrorism Task Force issued a special bulletin to law enforcement and flight schools this week after it received reports from the school that Hajaig became hostile while trying to upgrade his pilot's license, according to...

Thousands of foreign student pilots have been able to enroll and obtain pilot licenses from U.S. flight schools, despite tough laws passed in the wake of the 9/11 attacks, according to internal government documents obtained by ABC news. "Some of the very same conditions that allowed the 9/11 tragedy to happen in the first place are still very much in existence today," wrote one regional security official to his boss at the TSA, the Transportation Security Administration. "Thousands of aliens, some of whom may very well pose a threat to the country, are taking flight lessons, being granted FAA certifications...

Dozens of Foreign Pilots Training Illegally at US Flight Schools September 25, 2006 1:09 PM Brian Ross and Eric Longabardi Report: Apg_plane_060925_nr_1Dozens of foreign student pilots with questionable visas have been able to slip between the cracks and gain entry to American flight schools, federal officials tell ABC News. The FAA says it is conducting an investigation of a number of flight instructors and schools, including one school which was attended by 9-ll hijackers Mohammed Atta and Marwan al-Shehhi. An internal Homeland Security document obtained by ABC News, says the post 9-11 program to prevent terrorists from entering US flight...

The links between Nick Berg and Zacarias Moussaoui, once described as the 20th hijacker of 9/11, opened now room for new speculations, if there are deeper ties between the OKC Bombing'95 and 9/11, than thought before. Apparently Berg knew also Moussaoui's roomates. One of them was Mujahid Menepta, who is connected to both 1993 World Trade Center bombing and the 1995 OKC bombing. But Menepta wasn't arrested in Summer 2001, when Moussaoui got caught. The FBI waited until after Sep11th.Why?Berg, Moussaoui and the OK bombing tieshttp://inn.globalfreepress.com/modules/news/article.php?storyid=269 By Ewing20012004/5/24 On May 18th, 2004, according to Newsmax, Nick Berg's family insisted that...

Was executed American contractor Nicholas Berg's decision to share his computer password with alleged "20th hijacker" Zacarias Moussaoui during a 1999 encounter in Norman, Okla., just a coincidence, as Attorney General John Ashcroft assured the nation last week? Or was there more to this bizarre development than meets the eye? Oklahoma City bombing investigator, former NBC reporter Jayna Davis, has been exploring some of the more troubling aspects of the Berg-Moussaoui meeting, especially in light of the role the city of Norman played in events leading up to 9/11. First, says Davis, the official story which had Berg, then a...

Fifteen minutes after KLM Flight 685 took off from Amsterdam for Mexico City on April 8, Mexican authorities forwarded the names of all the passengers to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. The reason: the flight was scheduled to pass through U.S. airspace. by the time the Boeing 747 had finished its three-hour crossing of the Atlantic, Homeland Security screeners were on high alert. The names of two Saudi passengers aboard the KLM flight had begun producing "hits" on the screening center's lists of 70,000 suspect foreigners. The two Saudis, the database reported, were brothers and pilots who had attended...

A man trained as a pilot at a Lawrenceville airport three years ago raised an international terror alert this week. He was found in Britain on Friday, the FBI said. Zayead Christopher Hajaig, a 35-year-old British national, "remains a person of interest" although he has been located, said Steve Emmett, an FBI spokesman in Atlanta. FBI officials released little information about Hajaig on Friday. They would not say whether he had been detained or how he had been located. Earlier this week, authorities issued a "special alert bulletin" warning airports about Hajaig, who took flight lessons at Astron Enterprises at...

This is my first post so I hope I got it right. This is breaking here in San Anonio. A single engine plane has been forced down at Stenson Field south of San Antonio. Homeland Security, DPS and SAPD are on the scene. They are waiting for a Chinese tranlator but they have Chinese illegals in custody and said that the pilot was someone Homeland Security has been looking for. I'll post more as it comes available.

<p>April 7 - Within weeks of the September 11 terror attacks, security officers at the Fleet National Bank in Boston had identified “suspicious” wire transfers from the Saudi Embassy in Washington that eventually led to the discovery of an active Al Qaeda “sleeper cell” that may have been planning follow-up attacks inside the United States, according to documents obtained by NEWSWEEK.</p>

<p>Law-enforcement officials follow the money trail among suspected terrorists straight to the doors of the Saudi Embassy.</p> <p>April 7 - Within weeks of the September 11 terror attacks, security officers at the Fleet National Bank in Boston had identified “suspicious” wire transfers from the Saudi Embassy in Washington that eventually led to the discovery of an active Al Qaeda “sleeper cell” that may have been planning follow-up attacks inside the United States, according to documents obtained by NEWSWEEK.</p>

Hard Times Are Plaguing Flight Schools in Florida By ABBY GOODNOUGH EMBROKE PINES, Fla., Sept. 13 — Terry Fensome thought his flight school's fortunes had hit bottom in November 2001 when one of his planes was intercepted by fighter pilots who thought they were foiling a terrorist attack on Orlando. But the acute embarrassment of that incident — the student was forced to land, questioned and released — was nothing compared with the economic misery that has dogged the Pelican Flight Training Center since then, a result of the 2001 terrorist attacks. Mr. Fensome's school is one of dozens in...

CHARLOTTE COUNTY, July 23, 2002 — The Federal Aviation Administration has put out a new mandate that effectively grounds licensed pilots from other countries. The agency claims it is to enhance safety. Local flight schools are now getting the word, and they aren't taking it well. Effective immediately, the government is no longer issuing what are called ‘courtesy licenses.’ The FAA quickly and quietly issued a directive on July 16th that prohibits foreign pilots from flying in this country. They can't rent planes and they can't take lessons. Up until now, if a person from another country had a pilot's...

Owner of Flight School Barely Survives Fiery Crash9-11 Clean Up Crew At Work? July 4--Venice Florida The owner of one of the two Venice, FL. flight schools at which Mohamed Atta and his terrorist cadre learned to fly barely survived the crash of a private plane last Wednesday when it nose-dived to earth after taking off from the Venice Airport. The MadCowMorningNews has learned that subsequent events have left local aviation experts wondering if Arne Kruithof's near brush with death was just accident, or something more sinister. Arne Kruithof, owner of Florida Flight Training, was one of three men who...

HOMELAND INSECURITY FBI still careless on flight schools Arab student pilots, some from terror states, continued to stream into U.S. after Sept. 11 Posted: May 22, 2002 1:00 a.m. Eastern By Paul Sperry © 2002 WorldNetDaily.com WASHINGTON ? Even after Sept. 11, the FBI let young Middle-Eastern men from terrorist states train at U.S. flight schools ? some in President Bush's home state ? much to the dismay of immigration inspectors who wanted to bar them. The FBI is reeling from the recent embarrassing disclosure that a field agent in Phoenix warned headquarters a full two months before the attacks...