Feds Moved Mohammed Jamal Khalifa To High-Security Jail Within Hours Of OKC Bombing

By J.M. Berger
INTELWIRE.com


UPDATE: Jamal Khalifa Killed: His Life-and-Death Secrets

Within hours of the Oklahoma City bombing, the federal government quietly moved Osama bin Laden's brother-in-law out of a California county jail and into administrative detention, a classification often used for "extremely dangerous" inmates.

Mohammed Jamal Khalifa, an accused al Qaeda financier, was arrested near San Francisco in December 1994 on visa-related charges. He had been detained for four months at the Santa Rita jail, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.

At 7:05 p.m., Khalifa was transferred into the custody of the U.S. Bureau of Prisons FCI Dublin, in Dublin, Calif. The facility is a low-security prison for women with a special wing for male administrative detainees.

The prison transfer was documented in a Bureau of Prisons record obtained by INTELWIRE via the Freedom of Information Act.

According to a Bureau of Prisons spokeswoman, INS detainees are often held at county jails such as Santa Rita. According to the Chronicle, Khalifa was kept in solitary confinement in a maximum security cell.

Khalifa appeared in court on April 17, where he proclaimed his innocence of terrorist activity. At that time, Khalifa filed a motion opposing an INS attempt to deport him to Jordan, where he faced indictment on charges of assisting terrorists.

"There's no evidence against our client other than baseless charges from Jordan," his attorney said at that hearing, according to the San Francisco Examiner.

Around 9 a.m. on April 19, Timothy McVeigh detonated a truck bomb in front of the Alfred E. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City. (INTELWIRE special section: al Qaeda and the Oklahoma City Bombing)

Later that morning, an al Qaeda-linked terrorist told federal authorities that his terrorist cell had a role in the Oklahoma City bombing.

After hearing a radio report on the Oklahoma bombing, Abdul Hakim Murad confessed to a prison guard at a BOP facility in New York City, according to testimony presented at Murad's trial.

At 7:05 p.m., Khalifa was transferred to FCI Dublin, in Dublin, Calif. The time zone of the log entry was not clear from the record. FCI Dublin is a low-security federal prison for women with a special administrative facility for male detainees.

According to a report available on the Prison Bureau's Web site, "Administrative facilities are institutions with special missions, such as the detention of noncitizen or pretrial offenders, the treatment of inmates with serious or chronic medical problems, or the containment of extremely dangerous, violent, or escape prone inmates."

At the time of the Oklahoma attack, the FBI already believed Murad and Khalifa were connected.

When Khalifa was arrested, the FBI searched his belongings, which included an electronic organizer and phone book, according to a search warrant obtained by INTELWIRE.

Khalifa's organizer contained a phone number used by a Philippines-based terrorist cell which included Murad and Ramzi Yousef, the convicted bomber of the World Trade Center, according to an affadavit filed in April 2002 by FBI agent Robert Walker.

The U.S. and Philippines governments have repeatedly charged that Khalifa, who is married to one of bin Laden's sisters, was a major financier for al Qaeda during the 1990s. Khalifa allegedly ran several business and charity front operations which funneled money to al Qaeda, according to both governments and various media reports.

Khalifa currently lives in Saudi Arabia, where he runs a seafood restaurant. He denies all charges of terrorist activity. (related story)

Within days of the Oklahoma City bombing, Khalifa managed cut a deal with the INS in which he agreed to be deported to Jordan, and the INS agreed to strike the charges of terrorism from his immigration record.

The deportation deal was sanctioned before the end of April, and Khalifa was deported in early May, barely two weeks after the Oklahoma City attack.

In a separate deal approved weeks earlier, the U.S. attorney agreed to return the evidence it had seized from Khalifa at the time of his arrest, according to a letter from the U.S. Attorney's office obtained by INTELWIRE.

The returned property included documents and phone book entries which were relevant to ongoing trials for the 1993 World Trade Center bombing and a 1995 plot to bomb U.S. airliners over the Pacific, according to the 2002 FBI affadavit.

Khalifa's swift deportation is baffling in light of the situation at the time. Khalifa was, at the least, a material witness in two impending trials involving Yousef and other conspirators. (related story)

Furthermore, at the time the deportation deal was struck, Khalifa was -- by any measure -- a person of interest to the Oklahoma City bombing.

Khalifa, Yousef and Murad all had ties to Cebu City, where Terry Nichols had spent several months in late 1994. At the time of the deal, the investigation of Nichols had barely begun.

Nichols' ties to the Philippines were known to the public as early as April 23, when the Chicago Tribune printed a story on the connection. Khalifa's deal to be deported was cleared in open court on April 26, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.

Later investigation revealed that Yousef and Nichols were both on the campus of Southwestern University in Cebu during November 1994. (related story)

Murad also made phone calls to a college student in Cebu during the same period, a fact which was known to Philippines authorities months before Khalifa's deportation.

Khalifa was later tied to al Qaeda efforts to recruit Christians as converts to Islam and as potential terrorists. This recruitment effort took place in several Philippines locations including Cebu. (related story)

Labels: INTELWIRE-Exclusive

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Bin Laden Suicide Hoax Infects Computers With Trojan Horse

The following advisory was posted on Enterprise Security Today:

Anti-virus firm Sophos reports that hackers have posted messages on some 30,000 Internet message boards and usenet newsgroups declaring that photographs of the hanging suicide of Osama bin Laden could be found on certain Web sites. The links lead users to a Trojan horse.

For the full story, go to Enterprise Security Today.

Labels: INTELWIRE-Exclusive

Posted by J.M. Berger | Permalink

 

KSM Confession Contradicts Previous Intel On Abdul Hakim Murad Role In Bojinka Conspiracy

By J.M. Berger

INTELWIRE.com



The interrogation of Khalid Shaikh Mohammed has produced intelligence that appears to contradict previous U.S. government claims regarding a thwarted plot to bomb U.S. airliners over the Pacific Ocean.



The new intelligence relates to Abdul Hakim Murad, who was convicted of conspiring with Ramzi Yousef to bomb U.S. airliners over the Pacific Ocean in the plot, known as "Operation Bojinka."



A predecessor to the September 11 attacks, the Bojinka plot was constructed from November 1994 through January 1995, the exact period that convicted Oklahoma City bomber Terry Nichols took an unusual trip to Philippines.



Trial testimony and witness accounts have raised the possibility that Nichols may have been booked on one of the specific flights targeted by the Bojinka conspiracy.



According to a footnote in the final report of the 9/11 Commission, released Thursday, Khalid Shaikh told interrogators that Murad was not one of the operatives scheduled to take part in the Bojinka plot.



According to the 9/11 Commisison, "KSM has said that Murad's role was limited to carrying (a) $3,000 (payment to Yousef) from Dubai to Manila."



Murad was convicted for his role in the Bojinka conspiracy after a 1996 trial. Part of the evidence used against him in trial was a confession Murad made while in the custody of Philippines authorities. Murad argued in trial and on appeal that the confession was coerced by torture, and therefore inadmissable.



His attorneys argued that Murad was so psychologically scarred by the torture that he would confess to whatever his captors wanted, while in the custody of Filipino authorities and subsequently while in the custody of the FBI.



As an example of Murad's willingness to confess to anything, defense attorneys cited the defendant's confession that he and Yousef had been involved in the Oklahoma City bombing. That confession was made to the FBI shortly after the bombing, which occurred while Murad and Yousef were already in custody.



The appeals court ruled that there was no evidence to support the torture claim, and ruled that other evidence presented at trial was sufficient to convict even in the absence of the Philippines confession.



The new intelligence, which Khalid Shaikh provided under interrogation by U.S. authorities, contradicts the contents of the Philippines confession.



After the Manila plot was exposed, Murad was arrested, in January 1995. According to the 9/11 Commission:

Yousef managed to escape to Pakistan, but his accomplice, Murad -- whom KSM claims to have sent to Yousef with $3,000 to help fund the operation -- was arrested and disclosed details of the plot while under interrogation.



Contrary to Murad's confession, in which he described his intended role as one of the five operatives who would plant bombs on board the targeted aircraft, KSM has said that Murad's role was limited to carrying the $3,000 from Dubai to Manila.

There is no immediately apparent reason for Khalid to misrepresent this issue, since Murad is already serving a life sentence for the crime. The 9/11 Commission simply discounted KSM's confession in its report.

This aspect of KSM's account is not credible, as it conflicts not just with Murad's confession but also with physical evidence tying Murad to the very core of the plot, and with KSM's own statements elsewhere that Murad was involved in planning and executing the operation.

While the evidence does indeed strongly suggest that Murad was a central player in the Bojinka plot, the specific question of whether he was scheduled as one of the five bomber operatives is not merely academic.



For one thing, the information could form the basis for a new appeal of Murad's conviction, since the intelligence directly pertains to a key defense claim and appears to be exculpatory in nature.



The information is also important to efforts to reconstruct the Bojinka plot. Such efforts are important to the prevention of future terrorist attacks. In addition, the specifics of Bojinka may have a bearing on the investigation of possible al Qaeda links to the Oklahoma City bombing.



According to records found on Yousef's laptop computer, five terrorist operatives were scheduled to plant timer-controlled bombs on 11 different flights, disembarking from the flights before detonation during scheduled layovers.



The operatives were identified by code names on the computer, and there are conflicting accounts about which name was intended applied to which operative. Authorities have never conclusively identified all the operatives, even assuming Murad was scheduled to be one of them.



Murad's confession did not tally to the flights listed on Yousef's computer. Murad told the FBI that he had been scheduled to be on at least one flight with the final destination of San Francisco, which potentially corresponded with the operative code name Zyed or another code named Mirqas.



Zyed was scheduled to bomb Northwest Flight 30 from Manila to Los Angeles, with a layover in Seoul. Zyed was scheduled to disembark in Seoul, then bomb two more flights.



According to trial testimony, Terry Nichols left the U.S. for the Philippines on Nov. 22, 1994, on a standard 60-day visa which would have expired on Jan. 21, 1995, the same day Project Bojinka was scheduled to launch.



In November 1994, when boarding his flight for the Philippines, Nichols was almost stopped at the gate when U.S. airport security discovered he was carrying two stun guns on his person, according to an account by his ex-wife Lana Padilla.



In late 1994, Yousef and Khalid Shaikh flew several test runs in which they measured airline security by smuggling various Bojinka components onto plane, according to previously leaked accounts of Khalid's interrogations.



Nichols flew back to the U.S. on Northwest Airlines. INTELWIRE has not been able to confirm his flight number, but the flight arrived in the U.S. in Los Angeles, Calif., consistent with Bojinka's Flight 30, according to court testimony.



Nichols then took a connecting flight to Las Vegas, his final destination.

Labels: 9-11, INTELWIRE-Exclusive

Posted by J.M. Berger | Permalink

 

FBI Warning That Al Qaeda Is Recruiting Non-Arabs Comes 10 Years Too Late

By J.M. Berger

INTELWIRE.com



The FBI warned this week that al Qaeda may try to recruit non-Arabs for terrorist attacks in the United States. The warning comes more than 10 years after the terrorist network's first known efforts to recruit non-Arabs.



"Finding operatives with U.S. [citizenship or legal residency] status would greatly facilitate al Qaeda's ability to carry out an attack within the United States," CNN quoted from the weekly FBI bulletin to law enforcement. (external link)



The strategy is not surprising. What is shocking is how it took the FBI so long to assess this risk and notify law enforcement officials about it.

J.M. Berger is available to be interviewed on this topic. His e-mail address is printed at the end of this article.

al Qaeda has been targeting non-Arab U.S. citizens as potential terrorist recruits since no later than 1991, when a Saudi-linked program collected the names and addresses of Gulf War soldiers, who were later the subject of recruitment efforts, a plot reported exclusively by INTELWIRE. (related story)



Al Qaeda worked to recruit Gulf War vets and servicemen who were leaving the military. One of the recruiters was himself an African-American, Clement Rodney Hampton-El, who was convicted of a plot to blow up New York City landmarks in 1993.



Osama bin Laden and other top al Qaeda figures were unindicted co-conspirators in that plot, which was also tied to "the blind sheikh," Omar Abdel-Rahman, an Egyptian-born Islamic extremist.



There have been numerous examples of non-Arab figures apparently recruited by al Qaeda, including John Walker Lindh, a Caucasian who fought with the Taliban, and Jose Padilla, a Hispanic male whom the U.S. government accuses of being a top al Qaeda operative. (related story)



Padilla may have been recruited by al Qaeda as early as 1992. Federal prosecutors are reportedly seeking to link Padilla to the same terrorist cell to which Hampton-El belonged. (related story)



al Qaeda targeted U.S. citizens throughout the 1990s, and had several American citizens within its ranks even earlier, by the end of the 1980s. Among many others, this list included Hampton-El; Ali Mohammed, who served as a sergeant in the U.S. Army Special Forces; and Wadih El-Hage, later convicted of helping plan U.S. embassy bombings.



The FBI is currently searching for Adam Gadahn, an American-born Caucasian. Justice Department officials claim he is only wanted for questioning, but his name and photo were released in a very high-profile press conference targeting top-level al Qaeda suspects. (related story)



David Hicks, an Australian-born Caucasian, is accused by the U.S. of being an al Qaeda operative. Jack Roche, another Australian-born Caucasian, was recently convicted of having ties to al Qaeda's Southeast Asian affiliate, Jemaah Islamiah.



al Qaeda has also focused on recruiting converts from Christianity in other nations, such as the Philippines. (related story) That recruiting effort has been linked in media reports to Mohammed Jamal Khalifa, a brother-in-law of Osama bin Laden whom the U.S. government accuses of leading al Qaeda's operations in the Philippines. Khalifa was arrested in the U.S. in December 1994 and held for six months, before being deported to Jordan to face terrorism charges there.



Khalifa was subsequently released and today denies any past wrongdoing. When the U.S. government released him, they allowed him to remove items from the country that may have been evidence relevant to three terrorism investigations which were ongoing at that time. (related story)

Labels: INTELWIRE-Exclusive

Posted by J.M. Berger | Permalink