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Trade Center
eek ‘Clarity of Motive
Release 2003/01/1
SUSPECTS
to Ryder employees, had arrived
ick up the van in a red GM sedan
accompanied
by
a
companion,
ler officials said that roughly two
rs
after the
explosion, Salameh
eared
at the
office and claimed
van had been
stolen
the
night
ire. He asked for his $400 dam-
deposit,
but was
told he must
t file a police report,
lalameh’s name was already in the
i’s
files. In 1990 he had demon-
lted publicly on behalf of El-Say-
Nosair, an Islamic firebrand who
been charged with, and acquitted
the 1991
slaying
of Jewish De-
se League founder Meir Kahane.
ameh had
visited Nosair
at
the
:e prison in Attica, N.Y., where he
?
serving
a
sentence on
lesser
rges.
ialameh gave investigators a par-
ilar suspect to consider, and, as
jortant, drew their attention to a
up
of
activists
who
orbited
ough the larger Islamic commu-
t
in New York and New Jersey
1 attended the Abu Bakr mosque
Brooklyn
and
the
Al-Salam
sque in Jersey City. Rahman had
ached at both mosques.
The FBI had not previously con-
ered these activists to be terror-
;, merely passionate militants. Yet
. FBI had access
to
intelligence
mmation about them gathered as'
result
of
at
least
three
occur-
i.ces:
the
prosecution
of
Nosair;
emergence of Rahman as a pres-
to
in the New Jersey-New York
imic
community;
and
the
1991
rder of Mustafa Shalabi.
The Nosair trial was a watershed
:nt among
Middle
Eastern
mbi-
ts in New York. Kahane, a hero to
ny Jewish radicals, was viewed as
ymbol of Zionist oppression to Is-
lic radicals. During the
trial, the
al groups staged demonstrations,
nn
nrvnnQifp
nf tbp
rmirt-
ment blames the Islamic Group for a
series
of
bombings
and
murders,
most especially the assassination of
Egyptian President Anwar Sadat
in
1981.
Egyptian security forces are
en-
gaged
in
a
massive,
nationwide
crackdown aimed
at fundamentalist
militants, including members of the
Islamic Group. The government has
jailed 700
suspected
extremists
in
response to a wave of violence that
has
left nearly 150 people dead, at
the hands of either police or extrem-
ists.
Before he emigrated to the United
States, Rahman was acquitted of in-
volvement
in Sadat’s death, but an
FBI intelligence briefing during the
Persian Gulf War persuaded at least
one senior official to believe that he
posed
a
potentially
serious
threat
from his new base in New Jersey.
When Rahman arrived in the Unit-
ed States, Shalabi found him a res-
idence. Thereafter, they raised funds
for the Afghan resistance, but
ulti-
mately had a falling out, according to
published statements by several as-
sociates. In March 1991, Shalabi was
found dead
in
his
Brooklyn home,
shot and knifed. There have been no
arrests.
In addition, five months before the
trade
center
bombing,
about
members of the two mosques who
attended Nosair’s trial or visited him
at Attica were subpoenaed by a fed-
eral
grand
jury,
according
to
the
New York Times. Ahmed A. Satta, a
postal worker, told the Times that
FBI agents grilled him about Nosair,
Shalabi and Rahman.
To officials, then, the circumstan-
tial clues being gathered by agents in
New Jersey seemed to fit into a larg-
er context. For
New York state drivers license listed
his residence as 57 Prospect
Park,
S.W. Rrooklvn—the home of Ibrahim
: connection with the World Trade Center bombing. Four were jointly
ix suspects have been charged in c
indicted in the bombing and remain in custody. One is being held on obstruction charges and t!
sixth reportedly has fled the country.
MOHAMMAD
SALAMEH, 25
Jordanian.
Jersey City, N.J.,
handyman
arrested March
4. Indicted in the
bombing.
BILAL ALKAISI, 26
Jordanian.
New York area
resident arrested
March 25.
Charged with
aiding and
abetting the
bombing.
SOURCE: News services and staff reports
office,
agents
arrested
him.
In
his
pockets, they found the business card
of Nidal Ayyad, 25, a chemical engi-
neer.
Eventually,
the FBI
executed
at
least 10 search warrants in New Jer-
sey.
NIDAL AYYAD, 25
Kuwaiti.
Maplewood, N.J.,
chemical engineer
arrested
March 10.
Indicted in the
bombing.
IBRAHIM
ELGABROWNY, 42
Held Iraqi pass-
port. Brooklyn
contractor ar-
rested March 4.
Charged with
obstruction and
possessing fraud-
ulent passports.
Agents found evidence connecting
Salameh to a rental unit at the Space
Station
Storage
facility
in
jersey
City. Employees
identified Salameh
as the man who rented a shed in No-
vember under the name “Kamal Ibra-
ham.”
Upon searching this unit March 5,
agents
discovered
several
hundred
pounds of chemicals that,
if properly
combined and triggered with a small
explosive, could produce a powerful
blast. They also discovered that the
chemicals—hundreds
of
pounds
of
urea and nitric acid—were purchased
iw
MAHMUD
ABOUHALIMA, 33
Egyptian. Wood-
bridge, N.J., cab
driver arrested in
Egypt and brought
to the U.S. March
24. Indicted in
the bombing.
RAMZI AHMED
YOUSEF, 25
Jersey City, N.J.,
resident who
reportedly fled the
country. Indicted
in the bombing.
-Compiled by Barbara J. Saffir
THE WASHINGTON POST
FBI that the day before the bombing
they saw
a man
they
believe
was
Ayyad’s office phone. Agents learned
that Salameh and Ayyad had a joint
account at a local bank. They discov-
ered
that
on
Feb.
Ayyad
had
rented from National Car Rental the
same type
of car
that Salameh
ar-
rived
in at the Ryder van rental
of-
fice. Moreover, "Salameh” was listed
as an additional driver on the rental
car. A witness from the Ryder office
identified Ayyad
as
the same man
who accompanied Salameh when he
rented the van.
On March 10 agents descended on
Ayyad’s
first-floor apartment
at 60
Boyden
Ave.,
Maplewood,
N.J.
In-
side, they found what a prosecutor
later described as a modified timing
mechanism that an explosives expert
described as a time delay firing sys-
tem. Ayyad was carrying an Amer-
ican Express card in the name of Bilal
, told the
i accom-
panied Salameh to the storage shed
“on several occasions.”
purported involvement with the Af-
ghan
resistance.
Associates
said
Abouhalima traveled to Pakistan for
military training and
that he was a
follower
of Rahman and sometimes
served as his driver. Rahman has dis-
puted
this
claim
and
publicly
de-
nounced the bombing.)
Aside from these characterizations
of Abouhalima—which
will
likely be
contested
in court—there has been
no
public
disclosure
of what
direct
evidence,
if any, connects him to the
bombing. He was eventually returned
to New York. U.S.
officials have re-
fused to discuss their knowledge of
the
arrest
or
treatment
of Abou-
halima.
For weeks, the trade center bomb-
ing was an incomplete act of terror
ism because it lacked a political mesS
sage. But on March 28 the New Yor|
Times published a letter
it received
four
days
after
the
bombing. Th§
Times
quoted
a
law
enforcement
Honrrp who said there was "inconfro-