|
Webfairy posted this first, but it bears repeating: it's a bombshell. I'm still not sure what's going on here, or who is telling the truth. But it's difficult to see how Israel can benefit from getting into a bitter feud with the United States over this issue. What a mess... I am withholding any more strong opinions about who to blame for 911 until much more information comes to light. The picture is too murky to jump to conclusions. **************************************** Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon authorised the leak of sensitive documents which reveal America's spy agencies were warned about a terrorist strike weeks before September 11. The controversial move has now directly embroiled President George Bush in the 'how-much-did-he-know?' debate over the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.... The feeling in Tel Aviv is that Bush's much hyped war on terrorism does not actually fit into the aggressive policy Israel wants to pursue.... "Ariel Sharon is furious because he thinks Bush has not supported him as fully as he could. His coalition is falling apart, Netanyahu has sneaked ahead of him and the Israelis are generally fed up of living in fear. Sharon is quite clear where the blame lies - in the White House. "Now he has really stirred things up by putting Bush right at the centre of this storm by actively allowing these sensitive documents to be leaked to the world. He feels he needs to teach Bush a lesson and this will certainly complicate America's peace efforts in the region," he said.
****************************************
GLOBE-INTEL
EDITORS: GORDON THOMAS ***MARTIN DILLON***KEVIN DOWLING
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
NUMBER :- 104 DATE :-
21/05/02
BUSH: THE IGNORED WARNING THAT WILL COME TO HAUNT HIM
By
Gordon Thomas.
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon authorised the leak of sensitive
documents which reveal America's spy agencies were warned about a terrorist
strike weeks before September 11. The controversial move has now directly
embroiled President George Bush in the 'how-much-did-he-know?' debate over
the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.
Sharon's reaction is a calculated response to growing claims that Mossad
has been running spy operations within the United States and also reveals a
split in the special relationship between the two leaders.
Mossad chiefs insist the Israeli spy agency was tracking Osama Bin-Laden's
terrorists in America before September 11 and that that the information was
passed on to the CIA on Five separate occasions before the attacks on the WTC
and Pentagon. As late as August 24, less than two weeks before the attacks, a
Mossad warning, confirmed by German intelligence, BND, said that "terrorists
plan to hijack commercial aircraft to use as weapons to attack important symbols
of American and Israeli culture." The warning alert was passed to the CIA.
The warning was also passed to MI6. The agency made its own checks and also
informed the CIA. Frustrated by its inability to alert the CIA to an impending
attack, Mossad arranged on September 1, according to Tel Aviv sources last week,
for Russian intelligence to warn Washington "in the strongest possible terms of
imminent assaults on airports and government buildings." Mossad's fury at the
failure of the US intelligence community to act has been compounded by the
revelation that the Bush administration had ordered the FBI Only a Week Before
the September attacks to curtail investigations on two of Osama Bin-Laden's
close relatives living in the US state of Virginia at the time.
Sharon's decision to allow the story of Bush's prior knowledge of the
attack to be leaked comes at a time when Israel is smarting over what Sharon
sees as Bush pressurising the Jewish state into an accommodation with
Arafat.
The feeling in Tel Aviv is that Bush's much hyped war on terrorism does not
actually fit into the aggressive policy Israel wants to pursue.
Sharon has already suffered a humiliating defeat at the hands of his
archrival, former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, as the central committee of
their Likud Party ruled out the establishment of a Palestinian state last
Sunday.
The party's decision, formalized in a resolution backed by Netanyahu,
directly contradicted Sharon's own stated acceptance of a Palestinian state as
the eventual conclusion of Israeli-Palestinian negotiations. It came as Sharon
faces mounting domestic and international pressure to find a way to stop more
than 19 months of bloodshed and launch talks with the Palestinians.
The support he was expecting from America failed to materialise, said a
source close to Mossad. "Ariel Sharon is furious because he thinks Bush has not
supported him as fully as he could. His coalition is falling apart, Netanyahu
has sneaked ahead of him and the Israelis are generally fed up of living in
fear. Sharon is quite clear where the blame lies - in the White House.
"Now he has really stirred things up by putting Bush right at the centre of this
storm by actively allowing these sensitive documents to be leaked to the world.
He feels he needs to teach Bush a lesson and this will certainly complicate
America's peace efforts in the region," he said.
According to similar documents shown to the Sunday Express, Mossad was
running a round-the-clock surveillance operation on some of the September 11
hijackers.
The details, contained in classified papers, reveal that a senior Mossad
agent tipped off his counterpart in America's Central Intelligence Agency that a
massive terrorist hit was being planned in the US. A handful of the spies had
infiltrated the Al-Qaeda organisation while a staggering 120 others, posing as
overseas art students, launched massive undercover operations throughout
America.
Other documents leaked to the Sunday Express from several intelligence
agencies including the Drugs Enforcement Agency show that two Mossad cells of
six Egyptian and Yemeni born Jews, trained at a secret base in Israel's Negev
Desert on how to penetrate Osama bin Laden's Al-Qaeda network.
One team flew to Amsterdam and were under the control of Mossad's Europe
Station. This is based at Schipol Airport within the El Al complex. They later
made contact in Hamburg with Mohammed Atta, the lead hijacker on September 11.
The second group flew directly to New York. From there they travelled South to
Florida and infiltrated the Bin laden organisation. In August last year, the
Mossad team in Europe flew with some of the Hamburg terrorists into Boston, a
month before the attack on the twin towers.
By then the Mossad team had established an attack on the US was "imminent".
It reported this to its Tel Aviv controller through the Israeli Embassy in
Washington using a system of secure communications. In early September Mossad
Chief Efraim Halevy sent a warning to the CIA of the possibility of such an
attack. The warning was noted and acknowledged. But CIA chief George Tenet is
understood to have described it as "too non-specific." The FBI was also
informed. Halevy sent a second alert to the CIA that reached Washington on
or around September 7.
A spokesman for the FBI refused to discuss specific details of the Mossad
operation but said: "There are Congressional hearings with regard to possible
intelligence failures arising from September 11. We can't verify your
information because it is part of an ongoing investigation."
Neither the DEA or the CIA would comment on the record, but a senior US
intelligence source said: "Anyone can be wise after the event but it was
extremely difficult to act on a non specific threat given in a couple of tips
from Israeli intelligence. It would be interesting to know if they could have
been more specific with their information.
''Their surveillance teams must have observed Atta and his accomplices
going to flying schools. I guess we might never know the real truth."
The spying operations first came to the attention of the DEA in January
2001 according to a classified 90-page dossier which has been seen by the Sunday
Express. The names, passport details and other personal records of some of the
Israeli-born spies are also detailed in the dossier.
| Yahoo! Groups Sponsor |
ADVERTISEMENT
;) |
|
|
Please let us stay on topic and be civil.
To unsubscribe please go to http://groups.yahoo.com/group/cia-drugs
-Home Page- www.cia-drugs.org
OM
Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to the Yahoo! Terms of Service.
| 