A freshly introduced movie and other paperwork are reviving issues about no matter if a Saudi nationwide who FBI officers consider worked for Saudi Arabia’s intelligence services performed a part in the 9/11 attacks.
The Saudi nationwide, Omar Al-Bayoumi, was the target of years of investigation by the FBI’s San Diego subject workplace mainly because of his association with two of the 9/11 hijackers, Khalid al-Mihdhar and Nawaf al-Hazmi, prior to the assault.
The video, which was unsealed in federal court last week, was a self-narrated video clip that demonstrates Al-Bayoumi offering a tour of landmarks in Washington, DC. The video clip was shot about quite a few times in 1999 and provided footage of entrances, exits and safety checkpoints in the U.S. Capitol.
Federal officials consider that 9/11 hijackers planned to crash one particular of the planes, United 93, into the U.S. Capitol right before passengers stormed the cockpit and compelled it to crash in rural Pennsylvania.
Bayomi’s online video of Washington was very first aired by CBS News very last 7 days. NBC Information and a San Diego region publication claimed the existence of the online video before long right after the 9/11 assaults.
The movie was just one of the goods investigators observed in Al-Bayoumi’s condominium in the United Kingdom soon after the 9/11 attack. They also found a notepad of mathematical calculations linked to flying an plane and a movie of a occasion in San Diego in which the two hijackers and Al-Bayoumi had been present.
The disclosures prompted some former regulation enforcement officials and the families of some 9/11 victims to phone for even more investigation.
“As a previous FBI Unique Agent who took section in the investigation of the 9-11 assaults (Flight 93), of which the the vast majority of the terrorists were being Saudi, I have so quite a few queries right here,” William Evanina, who was head of the National Counterintelligence and Safety Centre in the course of the Trump administration, posted on X this weekend. “Evidence is evidence. And it took a civil courtroom circumstance for the launch?””
Evanina was referring to a lawsuit introduced by the households of 9/11 victims right after hundreds of internet pages of FBI paperwork ended up declassified and released in 2022. Lawyers symbolizing the people submitted lawsuits requesting that some of the underlying evidence made use of to build people FBI studies be introduced as effectively.
Two FBI experiences that had been amongst the recently released paperwork say that Al Bayoumi was believed to perform for Saudi intelligence. “Reliable belongings and other members of the San Diego Muslim community believe that Al-Bayoumi functions for the Saudi intelligence service,” one particular of the paperwork claims.
A independent FBI report describes Al-Bayoumi as a paid out informant of the Saudi Common Intelligence Presidency, known by the acronym GIP, and was paid a regular monthly stipend from the late 1990s to Sept. 11, 2001. Al-Bayoumi is believed to be dwelling in Saudi Arabia.
A spokesperson for the Saudi Arabian Embassy in Washington explained it was reviewing NBC News’ inquiries about Al-Bayoumi and his ties to Saudi Intelligence.
In late September 2001, the Metropolitan Police Support in the U.K. searched Al-Bayoumi’s condominium north of London and found the handwritten document that contained mathematical calculations relevant to flying airplanes. The handwriting especially refers to planes and top.
In a report, FBI agents say they experienced a theory that the document and connected equations could be applied to “calculate the rate of decent when traveling a plane”
A pilot that FBI agents consulted in 2012 explained to them that the equations could be utilised to aid fly a airplane. “Given a distance from a concentrate on, the altitude at that spot, and the recent airspeed,” the pilot explained, “one could compute the level of good and plug it into the pc on the airplane in buy to initiate a good to that target.”
The pilot said he had uncertainties that someone with constrained teaching could determine the latitude and longitude and then use people calculations to fly a aircraft to a concentrate on from 35,000 toes. Provided the obvious weather on 9/11 and at an altitude of 8,000 to 10,000 toes, 1 could see for somewhere around 100 miles and use the waypoints on aviation maps and the plane’s autopilot to work out the distance to specified factors, the report claims.
The pilot evidently instructed the FBI that “when measuring the distance by hand among waypoints on these maps, 1 could be accurate” inside of half a nautical mile or greater.
The FBI report ends with: “REDACTED could not imagine of any other explanation for the equation presented the parameters set forth on the document than to calculate the decent rate from a offered altitude.”
Concerns about no matter if al-Mihdhar and al-Hamzi had been aided in San Diego have lingered for decades. Equally spoke minimal English and experienced no ties to the United States. Al-Bayoumi was viewed with them on quite a few occasions, according to the 9/11 Fee report and adhere to-up FBI experiences.
