Posted on 11/01/2001 8:27:38 AM PST by Asmodeus
Thursday, November 01, 2001 Cheshvan 15, 5762
U.S. papers: FBI hunting suspected terrorists with Israeli passports
By Yossi Melman and Nathan Guttman
The FBI is conducting a manhunt for six men carrying Israeli passports who are suspected of plotting terror attacks in the United States - and who were released by the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service after having been under arrest, according to the Knight-Ridder news service.
The six were arrested over the weekend in a state in the Midwest while traveling in two cars, and were found to have photographs and information about a Florida nuclear reactor and the Alaska pipeline, the news agency reported. There are three nuclear reactors in Florida. They also had "suspicious equipment," including box-cutter knives similar to those used by the hijackers on September 11, Knight-Ridder said.
But the six, who were decribed as having Israeli passports and a "Middle Eastern look," were released after INS officials decided that their passports and visas were valid. According to the Miami Herald, the INS released the men without consulting the FBI - or reporting the arrests. When FBI director Robert Mueller heard about the incident, he was "furious."
However, the newspaper also quoted the INS as calling the report that it had allowed the release of the six "unconfirmed." And a spokesman for the company operating the Alaskan pipeline, which carries some 17 percent of all the oil in the U.S., said he did not know of any threat to the pipe.
An Israeli embassy spokesman in Washington said he knew about the affair from the newspaper, but American authorities had made no formal contact with the embassy about the matter.
But this..... the six, who were decribed as having Israeli passports and a "Middle Eastern look," were released after INS officials decided that their passports and visas were valid....
Points to the possibility that they are Israeli Arabs. IF it's true.
But it does bring up a good question. Can anybody recall when an unsubstantiated story like this has been published in so many places by legitimate news outlets? It's almost like an urban legend that becomes almost fact because of such frequent repetition.
It is back again for the fourth time :)
hehe
Ha.
Urban legend or not, it's a very good warning to the bad guys. Their travel will now be severely restricted.
I wonder how "the rumor" was started, and by whom.
It's not really rocket science, is it?
Because it was released by Knight-Ridder. The big story is how they let this little bogosity out there.
Nothing to see here, folks. Move along.
Notice all the earmarks of BS story. No specific Who, What, Where, When. Just generalities. The report wasn't of a 1998 white Ford Taurus with Michigan plates stopped by Officer Brown in Altoona on Sunday at 1:18 AM, containing pictures of the south gate of the Crystal River, Florida nuc power plant with a later complaint by Asst. Director Smith of the FBI.
It was some white car, stopped by somebody, somewhere, at some date and some time with plans to some nuc plant and the complaint comes from some official.
This is simply one lazy reporter repeating another reporter's rumor.
Or bitten by a mØØse while on the GrØunds of the nasti nuclear plant.
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