(5)Suspects Caught Crashes on Camera (They Watched Crashes & Celebrated, Also Some Suspects Abroad)
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Germany Detains Man, Probes Hamburg Link to Attack<> September 13, 2001 8:01 am EST
By Erik Kirschbaum
HAMBURG, Germany (Reuters) - Germany has detained an airport worker in connection with Tuesday's U.S. terror attacks and three of the suicide hijackers may have belonged to a Hamburg-based extremist group, authorities said on Thursday.
Police declined to identify the detained man and did not say what his job had been or where he worked. He was in investigative custody because he was in an apartment that was used by several suspects, they said.
The Federal Prosecution Office said it was investigating an extremist Islamic group that had been active in Hamburg since the start of the year. One suspect with Arab links was known to them but had not been detained yet.
"These people were of Arabic background and lived in Hamburg and were Islamic fundamentalists and they formed a terrorist organization with the aim of launching spectacular attacks on institutions of the United States," said Kay Nehm, Germany's Federal Prosecutor.
"They are being investigated on charges of belonging to a terrorist organization, murder and launching an attack on air traffic," he said. "We suspect that at least since the start of this year these people lived in Hamburg."
Nehm said no evidence had been found yet connecting the suspects with Saudi-born exile Osama bin Laden, who several western intelligence agencies believe may be behind the attacks. He is said to have denied any involvement.
LEADS FOR THE U.S.
The developments should provide important leads to U.S. authorities trying to identify the mastermind behind the hijacking of two planes into New York's World Trade Center and the Pentagon in Washington on Tuesday.
U.S. agents served warrants on homes and searched businesses in southern Florida on Wednesday. The passenger lists of the four hijacked jets included the names of at least four Florida residents suspected of being supporters of Bin Laden.
The northern port city of Hamburg is home to about 80,000 Muslims of various nationalities. Security experts say Germany is regarded as a safe haven for Islamic extremist groups.
Authorities said three of the suspected hijackers who had been on the passenger lists were members of the Hamburg-based group. Two of them and a further suspect had studied electronics at the Technical University in the city's Harburg district.
A Hamburg state police chief, Gerhard Mueller, said: "We have in the search for a suspect of Moroccan origin searched an apartment in Hamburg and provisionally detained one person, a man."
ON THE PASSENGER LISTS
He said it was too soon to say if the detained man would remain in custody. Mueller said the man had been living in Germany legally.
Hamburg's interior minister, Olaf Scholz, said police had searched four apartments on Wednesday night and questioned a number of people in the city after getting leads from media reports and the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Scholz said Mohammed Atta, 33, whose name had been cited in media reports as a suspect and who was on the passenger list of one of the hijacked planes used in the attack, had lived in Hamburg in one of the apartments that were searched.
He was registered as being from the United Arab Emirates, as was Marwan Yusef Mohammed Al-Shehhi, 23, who Scholz said was on one of the other attack planes.
Al-Shehhi had also lived in Germany, sometimes in the same apartment as Atta, Scholz said. He left Germany for the United States on May 2.
"It is evident that they avoided doing anything that would bring them to the attention of police or the immigration authorities," Scholz said. He said police had interviewed a number of people but made no arrests.
Scholz said police had checked eight apartments in the city and searched four.
"In one of the apartments, the people who were registered as living there were not found, but one woman was taken from the building to the police station as a witness."
Scholz said: "We have gathered a lot of information that will be very useful for the further investigation of the Federal Criminal Office but of course will also be of great significance for the FBI."
"Hopefully we have made a meaningful contribution to clearing up these dreadful attacks.
Anyone want to volunteer to do a non-intrusive search for their family's address?
Has anyone heard or reported the circumstances of the ''how's'' and the ''why's'' of the filming by the "Gamma Press" of the FIRST jet crashing into the WTC.
I just found it of interest..the first time I saw it..Then I read this article.
Best FRegards,
That's the scenario that would probably have occurred if Bush landed in the DC area earlier in the day.
Imagine the horrible feelings that Americans would go through watching their friends and family, on videotape that would have eventually been released by the terrorists, being shot down to save the President's life!!
Bush was RIGHT to stay away from DC for a while.
The Devil.
You may be a state trooper, you might be a young Turk,
You may be the head of some big TV network,
You may be rich or poor, you may be blind or lame,
You may be living in another country under another name
But you're gonna have to serve somebody, yes indeed
You're gonna have to serve somebody,
Well, it may be the devil or it may be the Lord
But you're gonna have to serve somebody.
- Bob Dylan
Men Spoke of Attack Before It Happened
Channel 9 Eyewitness News
Channel Nine Eyewitness News has learned new information about a possible local connection to the case of terrorism in the U.S.
The FBI has received over 2,000 phone calls. One case they are investigating involves comments made before the hijackings.
It appears from information obtained by Channel 9, there were several people in Daytona Beach who had prior knowledge of the attacks.
A local man says he was interviewed by FBI agents Wednesday afternoon, after three men of Arabic dissent came into his bar the night before the attacks, and bragged about what was going to happen.
The FBI's latest lead in tracking down those responsible for the attacks, could come from a bar and strip club, The Pink Pony, in Daytona Beach. It was there employees say the three spent several hours the night before attack, bragging to customers about bloodshed that would take place the next day.
"They basically said wait till tomorrow and you'll see what I'm talking about." Vice President John Kap says after news of the attack broke, he called the FBI and turned over items left behind by the men he describes as in their early 20's.
"We gave them three copies of credit cards and id's, we also gave them the Koran with the fingerprints on it and they were gonna take it back to the lab and analyze it and do their jobs from that."
The FBI wouldn't comment on the situation but did say special agents were still following up leads in Florida and agents in Daytona Beach could be seen working well into the night.
"People talk sports, religion, politics all the time and these guys were just a little adamant about it and I guess we saw that maybe they knew something that the rest of us didn't know."
An FBI spokesperson wouldn't confirm for us that they are working this lead, but Kap showed us parts of credit card receipts without identifying the men, as well as a business card left behind he says by the special agent he says he spoke with.
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Well, you hit the World Trade Center, but you missed America. You hit the Pentagon, but you missed America. You used helpless American bodies, to take out other American bodies, but like a poor marksman, you STILL missed America.
Why? Because of something you guys will never understand. America isn't about a building or two, not about financial centers, not about military centers, America isn't about a place, America isn't even about a bunch of bodies. America is about an IDEA. An idea, that you can go someplace where you can earn as much as you can figure out how to, live for the most part, like you envisioned living, and pursue Happiness. (No guarantees that you'll reach it, but you can sure try!)
Go ahead and whine your terrorist whine, and chant your terrorist litany: "If you can not see my point, then feel my pain." This concept is alien to Americans. We live in a country where we don't have to see your point. But you're free to have one. We don't have to listen to your speech. But you're free to say one. Don't know where you got the strange idea that everyone has to agree with you. We don't agree with each other in this country, almost as a matter of pride. We're a collection of guys that don't agree, called States. We united our individual states to protect ourselves from tyranny in the world. Another idea, we made up on the spot. You CAN make it up as you go, when it's your country.
If you're free enough.
Yeah, we're fat, sloppy, easy-going goofs most of the time. That's an unfortunate image to project to the world, but it comes of feeling free and easy about the world you live in. It's unfortunate too, because people start to forget that when you attack Americans, they tend to fight like a cornered badger. The first we knew of the War of 1812, was when England burned Washington D.C. to the ground. Didn't turn out like England thought it was going to, and it's not going to turn out like you think, either. Sorry, but you're not the first bully on our shores, just the most recent.
No Marquis of Queensbury rules for Americans, either. We were the FIRST and so far, only country in the world to use nuclear weapons in anger. Horrific idea, nowadays? News for you bucko, it was back then too, but we used it anyway. Only had two of them in the whole world and we used 'em both. Grandpa Jones worked on the Manhattan Project. Told me once, that right up until they threw the switch, the physicists were still arguing over whether the Uranium alone would fission, or whether it would start a fissioning chain reaction that would eat everything. But they threw the switch anyway, because we had a War to win. Does that tell you something about American Resolve?
So who just declared War on us? It would be nice to point to some real estate, like the good old days. Unfortunately, we're probably at war with random camps, in far-flung places. Who think they're safe. Just like the Barbary Pirates did. Better start sleeping with one eye open.
There's a spirit that tends to take over people who come to this country, looking for opportunity, looking for liberty, looking for freedom. Even if they misuse it. The Marielistas that Castro emptied out of his prisons, were overjoyed to find out how much freedom there was. First thing they did when they hit our shores, was run out and buy guns. The ones that didn't end up dead, ended up in prisons. It was a big PITA then (especially in south Florida), but you're only the newest PITA, not the first.
You guys seem to be incapable of understanding that we don't live in America, America lives in US! American Spirit is what it's called. And killing a few thousand of us, or a few million of us, won't change it. Most of the time, it's a pretty happy-go-lucky kind of Spirit. Until we're crossed in a cowardly manner, then it becomes an entirely different kind of Spirit.
Wait until you see what we do with that Spirit, this time. Sleep tight, if you can. We're coming.