Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Politics : Stockman Scott's Political Debate Porch -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: jackielalanne who wrote (54897)	9/8/2004 12:40:13 AM
From: jackielalanne	Respond to of 89467

Senator accuses White House of 9/11 coverup By Toby Eckert COPLEY NEWS SERVICE 2:50 p.m. September 7, 2004 WASHINGTON – Reviving a controversy that has festered since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, the former chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee alleged Tuesday that the White House covered up possible Saudi Arabian government connections to two of the terrorists who lived in San Diego. The FBI was also acting at the direction of the Bush administration when it refused to let congressional investigators question an informant with whom the terrorists – Nawaf Alhazmi and Khalid al-Midhar – lived, Sen. Bob Graham, D-Fla., said. "I find that the actions in San Diego present a compelling case that there was Saudi assistance," Graham said in a conference call with reporters that coincided with the release of his book "Intelligence Matters," which concludes that President Bush directed the FBI "to restrain and obfuscate" the investigation, possibly to protect U.S.-Saudi relations. The charges have been injected into the presidential campaign, with Democratic candidate John Kerry calling for an investigation and Republicans accusing Graham of peddling "bizarre conspiracy theories." The conference call was facilitated by the Kerry campaign. Graham co-chaired the exhaustive congressional inquiry into the Sept. 11 attacks and is privy to still-classified information about the probe. His book is the latest in a string of examinations of alleged Saudi ties to the hijackers. Saudi officials denounced Graham's account, calling it baseless and irresponsible. At the center of Graham's allegations are two former San Diego men whom he identifies as Saudi intelligence agents – Omar al-Bayoumi and Osama Basnan. Graham describes a web of complex financial and personal relations between the two men and Alhazmi and al-Midhar, who, like 13 of the other hijackers, were Saudi nationals. Al-Bayoumi helped the future hijackers get settled in San Diego and, Graham says, his income from Saudi sources rose significantly during their stay in the area. "... That increase came from two sources, a Saudi government contractor and a member of the Saudi royal family. From these two sources, al-Bayoumi was funneled in excess of $40,000 above his usual salary – somewhere between one-sixth and one-twelfth the estimated total amount needed to fund the September 11 attacks," Graham wrote. He indicates that much more light would be shed on the matter if the Bush administration would agree to declassify 27 pages of the congressional report that remain secret. Releasing the information would do no harm to national security, Graham said. "Having spent a significant amount of time with those 27 pages, I can say unequivocally that the information they contain raises serious questions about Saudi Arabia's governmental support for at least some of the terrorists," he wrote. Graham also discusses at length the congressional investigators' unsuccessful attempts to question the FBI informant, identified as Abdussattar Shaikh, a retired professor and community leader from Lemon Grove. FBI officials would not deliver a congressional subpoena to Shaikh, with FBI Director Robert Mueller and Attorney General John Ashcroft arguing it would compromise the bureau's ability to cultivate sources in the Muslim community, according to Graham. The FBI also failed to give Shaikh, whom Graham says had been relocated by the FBI, a list of written questions from the investigators until he had hired a prominent attorney with ties to the Justice Department. The attorney demanded immunity from prosecution for Shaikh, which the congressional intelligence committees refused to grant so the questions went unanswered. "It was as if in an effort to protect their informant, the FBI had secured counsel for him," Graham wrote, adding that Shaikh was having financial difficulties at the time. Later, Graham said he and House Intelligence Committee Chairman Porter Goss, R-Fla., received a "candid letter" from a senior member of the FBI's congressional affairs staff that said "'the (Bush) administration would not sanction an interview with the source. Nor did the administration agree to allow the FBI to serve a subpoena or a notice of deposition on the source.'" FBI officials declined to respond to Graham's allegations. But they have said in the past that they do not believe al-Bayoumi or Basnan were Saudi agents or aided the Sept. 11 plot. An independent, bipartisan commission that studied the attacks after the congressional committees reached similar conclusions. The FBI also cleared Shaikh of any foreknowledge of the attacks. Shaikh has disputed his portrayal as an informant. Jim Dyke, communications director for the Republican National Committee, rebuked Graham, who earlier this year sought the Democratic presidential nomination. "As a presidential candidate, Senator Graham's bizarre conspiracy theories and calls for the president's impeachment so undermined his credibility it is difficult to understand why the Kerry campaign would now lend him a platform to launch his latest accusations – accusations already disproved by the 9/11 Commission," Dyke said. Graham said his book was not timed to coincide with the presidential campaign. As for the conference call, he said: "The Kerry campaign issued a statement about my book that apparently generated some press interest. Rather than having somebody else answer the questions, I said I would answer them." Find this article at: signonsandiego.com