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Fbi informant had numerous contacts with hijackers Original Source Link: (May no longer be active)
http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2003-07-21-intel-usat_x.htmhttp://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2003-07-21-intel-usat_x.htm
9/11 panel blasts CIA, FBI's lapses in coming report
By Kevin Johnson, Toni Locy and Kathy Kiely, USA TODAY
WASHINGTON — More than a year before the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, an FBI informant in San Diego had "numerous" contacts with two of the suicide hijackers and gave their first names to his handler at the bureau, according to a congressional report on U.S. intelligence lapses that is scheduled to be released Thursday. (Related story: Report outlines rights violations)
Nevertheless, federal law enforcement officials said Monday that the FBI agent involved in the matter never pursued Khalid Al-Midhar and Nawaf Alhazmi or sought their full names because the pair did nothing to arouse suspicion. When a CIA warning to the FBI about a month before the attacks included the men's full names and said they were suspected terrorists who could be in the USA, FBI officials in Washington sent the names only to the bureau's counterterrorism offices in New York and Los Angeles.
The full names weren't passed on to agents in San Diego until the hijackers were identified from passenger manifests in the hours after the Sept. 11 attacks. Al-Midhar and Alhazmi were among five hijackers aboard the jet that crashed into the Pentagon.
The San Diego episode is among the most chilling examples of missed signals, communication breakdowns and investigative failures described in the 900-page report, which several government officials said is a blistering critique of U.S. intelligence efforts in the months before the attacks.
Despite the criticisms, the report of the Joint Intelligence Committee concludes that none of the major intelligence agencies, including the FBI and CIA, had information that "would have provided specific advance warning" of the assaults that killed more than 3,000 people.
"Nothing could be done to prevent the attacks," said one top FBI official who asked not to be identified.
Government officials familiar with the report said the examination of the FBI's handling of information about Al-Midhar and Alhazmi makes up more than 20 pages of the report.
The FBI also is faulted for not closely monitoring an alleged associate of the hijackers, Omar Al-Bayoumi, who is identified in the report as an agent of the Saudi Arabian government. Al-Bayoumi, who is back in Saudi Arabia, is alleged to have provided some housing assistance to the hijackers while they were in the USA.
FBI officials said Monday that Al-Bayoumi had attracted agents' interest because of his visa problems. But the officials said they have no evidence that Al-Bayoumi provided support for the attacks.
The FBI informant is well known in San Diego's Arab and Muslim community for helping newly arrived immigrants, the report says. He agreed to take a polygraph examination in which he was asked about his contacts with Al-Midhar, Alhazmi and a possible encounter in December 2000 with Hani Hanjour, another hijacker on the jet that hit the Pentagon.
Federal law enforcement officials said Monday that the results of the polygraph were inconclusive. But the officials said the exam did not suggest that the informant knew why the three men were in the USA. The Justice Department declined the committee's request to interview the informant, a top government official said.
The report is the result of a nine-month inquiry by the House and Senate Intelligence committees to try to determine why intelligence and law enforcement agencies failed to stop the 9/11 plot.
The report's release has been delayed by a dispute between the White House and Congress over how much information should be declassified.
An entire section of the report dealing with the role of foreign governments — including Saudi Arabia, a close U.S. ally that was home to 15 of the 19 hijackers — will not be made public despite objections by Sen. Bob Graham, a Florida Democrat and former Joint Committee co-chairman who is running for president.
When the Joint Committee was formed, government critics and some family members of 9/11 victims expressed concern that the report would whitewash any lapses by U.S. intelligence.
But the panel, led by Graham and House Intelligence Committee Chairman Porter Goss, a Florida Republican and former CIA officer, is drawing protests from the FBI and CIA because of its pointed criticisms.
The committee's report also criticizes the CIA for failing to establish a reliable pool of human sources within the al-Qaeda terrorist network, which was behind the attacks. Reliable advance warning of the attacks could only have come from human sources, the report says.
Tim Roemer, a retired House member who was on the chamber's Intelligence Committee, called the report "highly readable, very interesting and, at times, aggravating."
"Not one nuclear explosion," the Indiana Democrat said describing the report. "It's a series of hand grenades."
Contributing: John Diamond
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