WORLD TRADE CENTER BOMBING SUSPECTS (NEWS ARTICLE, WASHINGTON POST)

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: STARGATE
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP96-00789R003900260005-7
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: U
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: November 4, 2016
• Document Release Date: December 2, 2002
• Sequence Number: 5
• Publication Date: April 5, 1993
• Content Type: NSPR

'trade (enter Bo
eek `clarity of Motive'
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
)re. He asked for his $400 dam-
deposit, but was told he must
t file a police report.
;alameh's name was already in the
s files. In 1990 he had demon-
ited 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
ce prison in Attica, N.Y., where he
serving a sentence on lesser
.rges.
ialameh gave investigators a par-
ilar suspect to consider, and, as
)ortant, drew their attention to a
up of activists who orbited
ough the larger Islamic commu-
r in New York and New Jersey
I attended the Abu Bakr mosque
Brooklyn and the Al-Salam
sque in Jersey City. Rahman had
ached at both mosques.
1'he FBI had not previously con-
ered these activists to be terror-
merely passionate militants. Yet
FBI had access to intelligence
)rmation about them gathered as'
result of at least three occur-
.ces: the prosecution of Nosair;
emergence of Rahman as a pres-
;e in the New Jersey-New York
imic community; and the 1991
.rder of Mustafa Shalabi.
The Nosair trial was a watershed
ant among Middle Eastern mili-
ts in New York. Kahane, a hero to
ray Jewish radicals, was viewed as
ymbol of Zionist oppression to Is-
lic radicals. During the trial, the
al groups staged demonstrations,
nn nnnnite sies of the cort-
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.
lease 2003/01/17 RMI DID NTERE2(kMBINGi SUSPECTS__
Six suspects have been charged in connection with the World Trade Center bombing. Four were jointly
indicted in the bombing and remain in custody. One is being held on obstruction charges and the
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.
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.
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.
When Rahman arrived in the Unit- office, agents arrested him. In his Ayyad's office phone. Agents learned
ed States, Shalabi found him a res- pockets, they found the business card that Salameh and Ayyad had a joint
idence. Thereafter, they raised funds of Nidal Ayyad, 25, a chemical engi- account at a local bank. They discov-
for the Afghan resistance, but ulti- neer. ered that on Feb. 15 Ayyad had
mately had a falling out, according to Eventually, the FBI executed at rented from National Car Rental the
published statements by several as-
sociates. In March 1991, Shalabi was least 10 search warrants in New Jer- same type of car that Salameh ar-
Sey. rived in at the Ryder van rental of-
found dead in his Brooklyn home, Agents found evidence connecting fice. Moreover, "Salameh" was listed
arrests. knifed. There have been no Salameh to a rental unit at the Space as an additional driver on the rental
. Station Storage facility in Jersey car. A witness from the Ryder office
In addition,
rater bombing, months before th20 e City. Employees identified Salameh identified Ayyad as the same man
members eo of f center the two mosques m about out out who o
as the man who rented a shed in No- who accompanied Salameh when he attended Nosair's trial or visited him vember under the name "Kamal Ibra- rented the van.
at Attica were subpoenaed by a fed- ham." On March 10 agents descended on
eral grand jury, according to the Upon searching this unit March 5, Ayyad's first-floor apartment at 60
New York Times. Ahmed A. Satta, a agents discovered several hundred Boyden Ave., Maplewood, N.J. In-
postal worker, told the Times that pounds of chemicals that, if properly side, they found what a prosecutor
FBI agents grilled him about Nosair, combined and triggered with a small later described as a modified timing
Shalabi and Rahman. explosive, could produce a powerful mechanism that an explosives expert
To officials, then, the circumstan- blast. They also discovered that the described as a time delay firing sys-
tial clues being gathered by agents in chemicals-hundreds of pounds of tem. Ayyad was carrying an Amer-
New Tersev seemed to fit into a larv- urea and nitric acid-were purchased ican Express card in the name of Bilal
er context. For 3p veH2~ 1` el Wra X- PRe?-0 J` "a ffl ~AKma iLaccom-
New York state driver's license hste g
his residence as 57 Prospect Park, FBI that the day before the bombing panied Salameh to the storage shed
Rrooklvn-the home of Ibrahim they saw a man they believe was "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 terrors
ism because it lacked a political meet
sage. But on March 28 the New Yore
Times published a letter it received
four days after the bombing. Th4
Times quoted a law enforcement
1403,r(? tvhn said there wa. "incontrn-