Osama bin Laden 'Warned Of Attacks'

The London Times ^ | September 11, 2001 | staff

[Lady In Blue]

Followers of Osama bin Laden, the suspected Saudi terrorist, gave warning three weeks ago that they would carry out a "huge and unprecedented attack" on American. interests, a London-based Arab journalist said today.

Abdel-Bari Atwan, the editor of the Al-Quds al-Arabi newspaper, said that he received a warning from Islamic fundamentalists close to bin Laden, but did not take the threat seriously.

"They said it would be a huge and unprecedented attack but they did not specify," Mr Atwan said in a telephone interview.

"We usually receive this kind of thing. At the time we did not take the warnings seriously as they had happened several times in the past and nothing happened. This time it seems his people were accurate and meant every word they said."

Mr Atwan, who interviewed bin Laden in 1996 and has since maintained contacts with his followers, said he believed that the attack on the World Trade Center in New York was the work of "an Islamic fundamentalist group" very close to bin Laden.

The United States accuses bin Laden of operating a terrorist network from his bases in Afghanistan, and of blowing up two American embassies in East Africa in 1998. The Taleban, who have refused to hand him over, deny the charge.

Mr Atwan said he was surprised by the scale of the attack, but said it was merely a continuation of bin Laden’s "Fatwa" - religious edict - against America. He said that anti-American sentiment was running high in the Middle East because of perceived United States support for Israel.

[Lady In Blue]

FYI and DISCUSSION.

[SLB]

Nuke 'em till he glows in the dark of hades.

[mfulstone]

Time to make our own "statement"

[11th Earl of Mar]

He said that anti-American sentiment was running high in the Middle East because of perceived United States support for Israel.

And why do we support Israel?

Reasons number 1 throught 10- We know that Israel will not do this to the USA.

[SLB]

fyi

[KSREP]

That is enough for me. Let's get the bombers up in the air and turn them into powder.

[Aric2000]

It is TIME!! These terrorists need to be taken out!! PERIOD!!! Whatever it takes!!!

[Teacher317]

Tell that to the sailors on the USS Liberty

[celtic gal]

A prayer for the deceased: Eternal rest grant unto them, Oh Lord, and let your perpetual light shine upon them. My they and all the souls of the faithful departed rest in peace, Amen.

My God in His infinate mercy grant strength to the families of those who are lost. May God bless our leaders and guide them in the decisions ahead for out welfare and that of the world.

[Stavka2]

The palies are celebrating in the streets.

Cry havoc and let slip the dogs of war.

[pocat]

**Nuke 'em till he glows in the dark of hades.**

I'll second that, bro. Just got home. Just started posting. Saw the footage on TV for the first time. I got on my knees for the first time in a long time also...

[SLB]

We had a terrorist briefing this aftenoon. At the end of the briefing the Major asked for all that wished to do so to pray. A horrible tragedy and what might be a real turning point for this nation. Notice no reaction from thos wonderful fighters of liberty the ACLU or NOW?

[Henry F. Bowman]

On the local radio, there have been several reports based on listener calls and emails that military personnel overseas had received advance alerts before the hijackings.

[ScreamingFist]

Yesterday, a large defense contractor sent out email reiterating the Defcon stages. Today we are at Defcon Delta. Someone, somewhere, had warnings.

[RoarNLion]

There is something about all this that just don't add up. Everyone wants to immediately point the finger at islamic fundamentalism as the blame for these terrorist attacks, but I really wonder about that. Perhaps once the dust settles, some of our experts may be able to explain some things:

1. While it may be possible, I think its highly unlikely that any terrorist organization can pull off hijacking four airliners from three major airports at relatively the same time, given the type of controls that are in place at airports throughout the nation.

2. No single hijacker can take charge of an airliner and control the people in the coach and the pilot, second pilot and possibly the flight navigator, in the cockpit at the same time. And NO pilot will take an order from a hijacker to intentionally ram his plane into any building.

3. Being that all flights are tracked by radar from its point of origin to its desination, who sounded an alarm when either of these planes were found to be deviating from its assigned flight path?

There is something about this that smells to high heaven. I wonder what this distraction was created for?

[Diamond]

I would like to post the following, but am having trouble posting. Is there anyone who would be willing to post this:

Proposed PETITION to the CONGRESS of the United States: Whereas Hamas, Islamic Jihad, Islamic Jihad of Lebanon, and Taliban have declared war upon the United States, and

Whereas these groups have committed unprovoked acts of war against the Government and the people of the United States of America:

I therefore petition the Congress to recognize and formally delcare a state of war between the United States and Hamas, Islamic Jihad, Islamic Jihad of Lebanon, and Taliban,

and to authorize and direct the President to employ the entire naval and military forces of the United States and the resources of the Government to carry on war against Hamas, Islamic Jihad, Islamic Jihad of Lebanon, and Taliban, and upon any government that harbors, aids and abets same,

and, to pledge all of the resources of the country to bring the conflict to a victorious termination.

Signed

[drew]

And also, Israel can get away with far more than we can, as in 1982 when they discovered that the Iraquis were building a nuclear reactor, they sent in the jets and blew the shit out of it. I'm hoping we'll allow the Israelis greater latitude for reprisals in this case. They would serve us well as a pit bull against our enemies.

[pttttt]

All good questions.

One has to look at the attributes of the attack and what it would have taken to carry this out.

Somehow whatever hardware was used to "hijack" the planes would have had to have been gotten onto the planes past security. People are making a lot of assumptions about what this hardware was (guns in the hands of wild-eyed fanatical humans, where somehow the guns and the fanatical humans got on the planes past airport security) which haven't been backed up by anything yet reported. What if there was no human terrorist on the planes and they were commandeered by remote control? Crazy tin-hat idea, but it's been a crazy day.

And they would have needed someone who could fly the planes with some precision - whether on or off the plane - to be sure of success. A pilot isn't going to obligingly fly the plane into a large civilian target - especially when they know they're dead either way.

Whatever hypothesis you go with, there was a lot - a whole lot - of sophistication behind this one. Not your usual truck bomb. This was really slick, a lot slicker that anything else seen.

And who benefited from it?

We should all keep our eyes and minds open, and be slow to make assumptions. Very strange, this one.

Hopefully the crash investigators will be looking hard for the black boxes, weapons, etc.

[L`enn]

Reply to number one. Obviously an inside job.

Reply to number two. Research posts on here relating to Barbara Olsen

Reply to number three. This question holds some merit. One flight was commandeered over the Adirondacks which is 30 minutes air time from NYC. Details on reaction to this need to be found out.

[Mr. Logic]

There is something about all this that just don't add up. Everyone wants to immediately point the finger at islamic fundamentalism as the blame for these terrorist attacks, but I really wonder about that.

First of all, other than the honor/religion of the japanese in WWII, what other people or religion would ever consider kamikaze flights, more or less those hijacked with many passengers on board. If it were one plane only, perhaps you could say that person was just "crazy", but it was 4 planes. This points to a concentrated effort not anything "crazy", so what religion (the extreme part if it makes all you tolerance people feel better) believes that killing those not of your faith, especially those who are Christians or Jews (if in their minds considered a holy war "jihad") will send them to heaven? Only one, Islam. If you wanted to go to heaven bad enough, and you were brought up from childhood by Muslims (extremist though you may say) that told you that you could get to heaven by doing this, it begins to seem less heinous. Furthermore, they believe they obtain a better afterlife the more they have killed during "jihad". This is from commentaries on the Koran and the Koran itself. It is hard to imagine any other group willing to give their own lives to injure the United States. Terry Nichols and Timothy Mcvay didn't kill themselves in the Oklahoma City Bombing. Why not? No reward. They loved life and wanted to continue it as most other kinds of terrorists do. They love life more than they love the terror they inflict. That is why extremist muslims are the logical choice.

1. While it may be possible, I think its highly unlikely that any terrorist organization can pull off hijacking four airliners from three major airports at relatively the same time, given the type of controls that are in place at airports throughout the nation.

Are you watching the news? This has all been explained on every channel. The lax security at that time of morning due to the extreme traffic. Besides, it wasn't three major airports, only two. The weapons they used have been reported due to the last statements of Mrs. Nelson which confirmed that they used exacto knives and cardboard knives (the kind you use to cut open cardboard boxes with). I have carried knives like this onboard planes, often more dangerous ones that were even handed to the attendants and given back to me. I carried a small dagger I brought back from China as a souvenir back in my carry on luggage and a sword was kept by the stewardesses for me and I could have easily gotten it back from where they put it up. It is not that difficult. Luckily I am not an extremist islamic terrorist.

2. No single hijacker can take charge of an airliner and control the people in the coach and the pilot, second pilot and possibly the flight navigator, in the cockpit at the same time. And NO pilot will take an order from a hijacker to intentionally ram his plane into any building.

Absolutely true, but this was also explained on the news. There was more than one hijacker onboard the plane with Barbara Nelson, Ted Nelson's wife as she confirmed by phone. They attacked the sterwardesses with knives who tried to fight them. The pilot's were obviously killed and removed from the seats and replaced by these terrorists who were trained to fly these planes in one of the numerous training facilities from 757s & 767s (?not sure of that number) around the world. Ben Ladin could easily have procurred a flight simulator from a private company and he is known for his training facilities. You also see this in that the one plane went down in Pennsylvania, said to be because of the struggle the pilot put up with his attacker or attackers.

3. Being that all flights are tracked by radar from its point of origin to its desination, who sounded an alarm when either of these planes were found to be deviating from its assigned flight path?The FAA did as stated on the news, but they didn't have time to do anything due to the course being unknown and the constant deviation of the flight paths. One pilot (I think the one that went down in Penn) hit the button for a hijack, but they couldn't do anything in time and said they never thought they would ram it into anything, but would rather ask for demands as was the case in the past. I think more should have been done and that if something is being covered up, it is the failure of military protection from this kind of occurence. If the planes had of been shot down, the death toll would be much lower, though still a terrible loss. Also, according to ABC one of the hijackers actually spoke to the control tower, but they aren't releasing the info yet. I'll bet my bottom soon-to-be $3 gas dollar that the voice has an Arabian accent, not that they are all bad, but these guys were.

I wonder what this distraction was created for?

I agree with this point though. This is not the end in my mind, though in my heart I pray it is. What of the secretly treasonous among us. How many here have bombs waiting to go off? Not to scare people and I am not afraid because of my faith in a God that doesn't want me to kill anyone, but surely more could happen if their arms stretch this far, why not into the small towns where real rural America lives so no one can look and say, "That's terrible, but it doesn't really affect me." as many horrible people around me are saying here in Kentucky. THE END.

[SUSSA]

The hijackers used knives. Several threads exist on this subject. The Mohammedan sons of whores got on the planes with some sort of knives, not with guns or explosives.

There are plenty of plastic and ceramic knives on the market that will pass through almost any security. The problem is honest people are at a disadvantage even when facing cowardly bastards like these Mohammedans, because the honest people aren't carrying a knife too. (Most people don't know how to use a knife anyway.)

This wasn't a breakdown in security. There is no way to keep every potential weapon off a plane. Even if you strip search every passenger the bad guys will just train in martial arts and use more scum bags to hijack the plane.

We used to put U.S. Marshals on flights back before we got metal detectors and xray machines at airports. We should go back to the "Sky" Marshal idea. Train them in the use of edged weapons and arm them with knives and guns. It worked fine in the past. It would work again.

[Plummz]

A SkyNews (NewsCorp) reporter on FNC earlier said a "reporter for a London-based Middle East news organization" (didn't catch the name) met with Osama & his top lieuteneants in the last couple of months, and since Afghanistan does not allow Osama to give interviews, he just sat there and smiled and nodded as his lieutenants went on abot how they wood strike hard at the US soon. Maybe this ties in to the story posted. . .

[white rose]

Hmm. My mother lives near Edwards Air Force Base, and she told me today that for the past three weeks there has been a lot of unusual activity around there. A huge increase in traffic in the area, a lot of strange-looking planes flying around, etc. Doubt that's a coincidence.

[RoarNLion]

You wrote:

... Only one, Islam. ... Terry Nichols and Timothy Mcvay didn't kill themselves in the Oklahoma City Bombing. Why not? No reward. .... That is why extremist muslims are the logical choice.

Logic and truth don't always produce a homogeneous mixture, and therefore your logic is failing you, especially if you are relying on the TV talking heads to feed you truth.

Obviously, you are fairly new to the forum and were not present in that era, nor have you researched the archives in regard to the OKC bombing. The facts bare out that OKC was much larger than Nichols and McVeigh -- they are mere patsies in that case. The finger points stronger to our own government rather than those two. Their reward? Well, you should research the Crime Bill of '96.

Forget the logic, do some research into the facts.

[Mr. Logic]

Though I was very near that bombing at the time, I do not now nor ever have I believed no one else was involved other than the two I mentioned, but there is no record of anyone involved giving up their life in the bombing, as I said no dead terrorists. American terrorist like to live to kill again and most of all to glory in their conquests by watching the mass histeria. Logic is just fact in this case. Study American terrorist bombers yourself, such as the Unibomber, etc.. I know what I am talking about. Only Islamic extremists revel as a group in the moment of their own deaths. One isolated insane person might do the same, but not 8 or more (giving only 2 per plane though I'm sure there were more). If you want to attack screen names, you may be a roaring but your arguements have no teeth.

[First_Salute]

Bump.

[conservator]

eems like such a long time ago...going back through the archives certainly is some interesting reading. to bad we cannot post before 09/04/01 though.