Posted on 09/18/2001 12:59:29 AM PDT by HAL9000
Hours after hijackers crashed commercial jets into targets in New York and Washington, D.C., last Tuesday, FBI agents swept into the Charlestown condominium complex where relatives of terrorist mastermind Osama bin Laden live, the Herald has learned.The FBI's investigation into the extended family of bin Laden living in the Hub is continuing, sources confirmed, as agents recently began combing Boston's trendy nightclubs and collecting credit card receipts left behind by the bin Laden clan.
Bin Laden's siblings in Boston have strongly disavowed their 44-year-old brother, who is now the chief suspect in last week's brutal terror attack, which killed thousands of Americans and wiped out the World Trade Center.
Word of the probe into bin Laden relatives follows the arrest of an unidentified man on Friday at John F. Kennedy Airport who reportedly knows one of Osama bin Laden's brothers. The man also reportedly gave authorities a Boston address linked to the hijackers.
Members of the massive FBI and police task force scouring the country for clues to the Sept. 11 terrorist attack have also spoken to people in Boston about a Newbury Street hotel and restaurant owner who sources said is close to certain bin Laden family members here.
About 10 p.m. on Sept. 11, two FBI agents arrived at the Flagship Wharf condominium complex on 8th St. and conducted a series of interviews with unit owners, according to Sherry Grancey, a longtime resident of the complex.
Grancey said she did not know who was interviewed, but records show at least two bin Laden relatives currently own units in the complex. Mohammed bin Laden owns four units and Nawaf bin Laden owns one, records show. ``We are doing everything possible to assist the local, state and federal authorities in their investigation of this American tragedy,'' Grancey said. In the week since the terror attack, residents of the 201-unit complex have been besieged by the media and many are fearful of possible reprisals aimed at their neighbors, the bin Ladens, Grancey said.
On Wednesday, Grancey contacted the Boston Police Department and asked for police protection for the residents. Uniformed officers have been patrolling the property ever since.
Attempts to reach bin Laden family members were unsuccessful yesterday.
``They're wonderful neighbors,'' said Grancey, a real estate broker who has lived at Flagship Wharf since 1995. ``They are very concerned with family and they are professional, educated, nice people.''
The two nightclubs visited by FBI agents last week were Venue, on Warrenton Street in the Theater District and Trio, on Lincoln Street in the Leather District. These are just two of the many local clubs and restaurants frequented by the younger bin Ladens, sources said.
Authorities in Boston have been aware for years of the extended bin Laden family living in the Boston area, and in 1998, after terrorists bombed U.S. embassies in Africa, they began monitoring the activities of several bin Laden relatives, according to one source familiar with that investigation.
Mohammed M. bin Laden, believed to be a younger brother of the terrorist leader, owns several properties in and around Boston, including luxury condos at Flagship Wharf. Sources said he moved back to Saudi Arabia with his wife and children several years ago.
Abdullah M. bin Laden, another younger brother, is a 1994 graduate of Harvard Law School and has offices in Cambridge.
Meanwhile, two sources confirmed that Mouldi Sayeh, owner of the Jewel of Newbury Hotel and restaurant at 254 Newbury St., is being scrutinized by the FBI.
Sayeh, 47, is a wealthy Algerian who several years ago opened the pricey boutique hotel located in a five-story brownstone near the corner of Newbury and Fairfield streets. The basement and courtyard house a restaurant by the same name.
Several merchants in that section of Newbury Street said it appears that very few people stay at the high-priced hotel, and the restaurant does not draw many patrons. A night in the hotel costs up to $2,000.
After the terrorist attack, Mouldi removed his menu display from the courtyard in front of the restaurant and closed for business, according to one merchant. More recently, the restaurant has opened sporadically.
One source who is familiar with the Jewel of Newbury said he discussed Sayeh and his involvement with the bin Laden family with an FBI agent on Friday.
That source described Sayeh as a ``broker'' for bin Laden family members in Boston.
On Sunday, two Herald reporters rang the buzzer next to the locked front door of the hotel and a man answered who identified himself as ``Mouldi.'' When asked if he would discuss the bin Laden family, he said, ``I don't know them,'' and closed and locked the door.
Public records, however, show that Sayeh has owned expensive condominiums in two complexes in which bin Laden relatives also owned units. Records also show he owns a Rolls Royce and a small fleet of Mercedes Benz vehicles.
In the mid-1990s, Mohammed bin Laden acquired four units at Flagship Wharf. Around the same time, other bin Laden relatives began moving in and out of nearby units.
Sayeh also bought a unit at Flagship Wharf in the mid-1990s valued at approximately $400,000. This year, in May, he sold it for more than $1 million.
Also in the 1990s, Mohammed bin Laden and Sayeh bought and sold units at Cambridge's ritzy Esplanade condominium project overlooking the Charles River. Sayeh bought an eighth-floor unit in 1995 which he sold for $1.3 million in May of last year.
In May 1997, Mohammed bin Laden sold a unit in the Esplanade for $830,000.
Both men own residences in Wayland. Mohammed bin Laden owns a 17-room, 10-bedroom mansion on Old Connecticut Road. Previously, he owned another home in the town, on Rice Road, which he sold for $575,000 in 1996. Sayeh bought a home on Glezen Street for $340,000 in 1993.
Mohammed bin Laden's holdings at Flagship Wharf are substantial. He bought a ninth-floor penthouse unit in 1995, which is now valued at $877,000, and he owns three other units with values that range from just under $300,000 to more than $750,000.
Other relatives have also owned apartments at Flagship Wharf.
Saad and Ahmed bin Laden each bought condos - both in the $500,000 range - there in the mid-1990s and later sold them. Nawaf bin Laden also bought into the luxury complex and is still listed there, according to city property records.
Many of the bin Ladens selected Boston as their American residence in part because of the large Middle Eastern population and the quality of its many colleges and universities. A family-owned corporation in Jidda, Saudi Arabia, funded two separate $1 million gifts to Harvard University. One was made to Harvard Law School to promote the study of Islamic law, and the other was given to the Harvard Graduate School of Design to endow students and professors to pursue the study of Islamic architecture and art.
The bin Laden family derives its billions from its Saudi Arabian construction company, which was favored by Saudi kings over the last 50 years and built most of the nation's airports and roadways, among other projects.
When the family patriarch and construction company founder, Sheik Mohammed bin Laden, died in 1968, the family fortune was divided among the more than 50 children he left behind - the offspring of multiple marriages to women in Saudi Arabia, Syria, Jordan and Lebanon. A group of the eldest bin Laden brothers now run the construction business.
Americans have paid for their own deaths in this mess!
Maybe we'll find out that the perps got food stamps and Medicaid during their years-long stays here!
Hybridon has or had contracts with the National Institutes of health!
Perhaps we'll come to learn, way too late, that our taxes paid for the biological weapons that will kill us!
While i wait for your answer,I will go to that.
I will come back and post the board of directors to you.
Did you read the names of the stockholders above, and see the bin Lladen of Switzerland?
How about the Camille guy,he manages the investments for Mahfouz, who is a funder of Binny!
James B. Wyngaarden
Youssef El Zein
Sudhir Agrawal
Arthur W. Berry
Camille Chebeir
Keith Hartly
As you see, a bin Lade is not in the board of directors
But as you see in the post up above, the Bin Laden in Switzerland owns ,I cant see as I type this)about 13 % of the stock.
The Camille Cherbeir director owns about that much.
Ann Archy, as you know, I'm sure, the dots are sometimes not easy to connect.
Cherbeir is the investment manager for the AlMahfouz family of Saudi,of YEMINVEST OF USS COLE fame.
To summarize, it is my allegation,so sue me if I am wrong,that Hybridon of Cambridge, Massachusetts is owned, controled,yada,yada, by the bin Laden terrorist group.
Again sue me if I am wrong,I alledge that bin Laden uses this company in his developing biological warfare campaign!
Do you have any of your money in the General Motors Employees Domestic Trust Group?
See that they own 19 % of the stock.
General Life Insurance Company of America owns 16.63% of the stock.
It is my thought that not only have we let them in the country,we have paid for them to kill us!
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