The FBI claims that Army Major Nidal Hasan, the accused gunman behind the Ft. Hood shootings, communicated with an Islamic radical who has ties to al Qaeda.
Alleged Fort Hood Shooter Tied to Mosque of 9/11 Hijackers
FOX News
The family of the alleged Fort Hood shooter held his mother’s funeral at the same Virginia mosque that two Sept. 11 hijackers attended in 2001, at a time when a radical imam preached there.
The family of Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, the Army psychiatrist who killed 13 and wounded 29 at the Texas military base, held his mother’s funeral at the Dar al Hijrah Islamic Center in Falls Church, Va., on May 31, 2001, according to her obituary in the Roanoke Times newspaper.
In 2001, Anwar Aulaqi was an imam, or spiritual leader, at the Washington-area mosque. Aulaqi told the FBI in 2001 that, before he moved to Virginia in early 2001, he met with 9/11 hijacker Nawaf al-Hazmi several times in San Diego. Al-Hazmi was at the time living with Khalid al-Mihdhar, another hijacker. Al-Hazmi and another hijacker, Hani Hanjour, attended the Dar al Hijrah mosque in Virginia in early April 2001.
In his FBI interview, Aulaqi denied ever meeting with al-Hazmi and Hanjour while in Virginia.
Aulaqi, a native-born U.S. citizen, left the United States in 2002, eventually traveling to Yemen. He was investigated by the FBI in 1999 and 2000 after it was learned that he may have been contacted by a possible procurement agent for Osama bin Laden. During this investigation, the FBI learned that Aulaqi knew people involved in raising money for Hamas, a Palestinian group on the U.S. State Department’s terrorist list.
Warning Signs From Fort Hood Shooter, Former Classmate Says
FOX News
The warning signs were all there: the justification of homicide bombings; the spewing of anti-American hatred; the efforts to reach Al Qaeda .
“There were definitely clear indications that Hasan’s loyalties were not with America,” Lt. Col. Val Finnell, Hasan’s classmate at the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences in Bethesda, Md., told FoxNews.com in an exclusive interview. He and Hasan were students in the school’s public health master’s degree program from 2007-2008.
“There were all sorts of … comments made throughout the year that made me question his loyalty to the United States, but nothing was done,” said Finnell, who recalled one class during which Hasan gave a presentation justifying homicide bombings.
“The issue here is that there’s a political correctness climate in the military. They don’t want to say anything because it would be considered questioning somebody’s religious belief, or they’re afraid of an equal opportunity lawsuit.
“I want to be clear that this wasn’t about anyone questioning his religious views. It is different when you are a civilian than when you are a military officer,” said Finnell, who is a physician at the Los Angeles Air Force Base.
“When you are in the military and you start making comments that are seditious, when you say you believe something other than your oath of office — someone needed to say why is this guy saying this stuff.
“He was a lightning rod. He made his views known and he was very vocal, he had extremely radical jihadist views,” Finnell said. “When you’re a military officer you take an oath to defend against all enemies foreign and domestic.
“They should’ve confronted him — our professors, officers — but they were too concerned about being politically correct.”
Finnell said the warning signs were clear to many, not just classmates. Faculty members, including many high-ranking military officers, witnessed firsthand his anti-Americanism, he said.
Finnell recalled Hasan telling his classmates and professors, “I’m a Muslim first and I hold the Shariah, the Islamic Law, before the United States Constitution.”
He recalled one time when his classmates were giving presentations in an environmental health class on topics like soil and water contamination and the effects of mold. When it was Hasan’s turn, he said, he got up in front of the class and began to speak about his chosen topic, “Is the War on Terror a war on Islam?”
Finnell says he raised his hand. “I asked the professor, “What does this topic have to do with environmental health?”
“When he was challenged on his views, Hasan became visibly upset. He became sweaty, he was emotional.”
But despite questioning from the other students, Finnell said, the professor allowed Hasan to continue. He said Hasan’s anti-American vitriol continued for two years as he worked toward his degree in public health.
There were even more warning signs that might have alerted the Army in recent months:
— In the days and weeks before the shooting, Hasan voiced his objections to Muslims fighting the war on terror to members of his mosque, the Islamic Community of Greater Killeen. Congregants at the mosque said he voiced his objections to Muslims serving in the U.S. military and to his impending deployment to Afghanistan.
— Over the summer, Hasan’s comments led Osman Danquah, co-founder of the mosque, to recommend that it deny Hasan’s request to become a lay Muslim leader at Fort Hood, the Associated Press reported.
— In the months before Thursday’s shooting Hasan tried reaching out to people associated with Al Qaeda — and did so under the watchful eye of at least one U.S. intelligence agency. An intelligence official told FOXNews.com that “Hasan was on our radar for months.”
On Sunday Sen. Joe Lieberman announced his intention to lead a congressional investigation into the Fort Hood murders, saying there were “strong warning signs” that Hasan was an “Islamic extremist.”
“The U.S. Army has to have zero tolerance. He should have been gone,” said Lieberman, who is chairman of the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs.
In interviews Sunday, Army Chief of Staff Gen. George Casey stressed that it was too early in the investigation to know whether these warnings signs could have spared the lives of the 13 killed, dismissing earlier reports about such signs as “speculation” based on anecdotes. “I don’t want to say that we missed it,” he said.
Finnell said that once Hasan was identified as the suspect in Thursday’s massacre, he reached out to the Army to tell them about his experiences with Hasan.
This time, he said, “They listened.”
Wild Thing’s comment………
WTH are the using the word ” Alleged ” for!!??????
This incident will create more unrest in the military if they continue to whitewash it. And what the hell must this man have been saying to the combat veteran soldiers he was supposed to be “counseling”?
….Thank you Mark for sending this to me.
Mark
3rd Mar.Div. 1st Battalion 9th Marine Regiment
1/9 Marines aka The Walking Dead
VN 66-67
What was he saying to our soldiers under his care? (You’re right to be concerned.) Counter-tranference, more than payback, is a motherf*cker. Don’t be surprised if his PTSD patients didn’t become better or just became worse. And, we’re not talking “go ahead, worthless infidel, off yourself,” more like loading on the pity and “help” until they give up and quit on themselves… which, with patients who are possibly self-medicating and/or self-destructive already, is lethal enough.
P.S.
Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transference):
“Countertransference is defined as redirection of a therapist’s feelings toward a client, or more generally as a therapist’s emotional entanglement with a client. … For the therapist, any signs of counter-transference would suggest that his own personal training analysis needed to be continued to overcome these tendencies.”
Not cool. Again, don’t be suprised if his patients failed to improve or got worse.
DING. DING. DING. DING. How MANY bells have to go off before SOMEONE does something?! HOLY CRAP, the abject FAILUR$E to heed DOZENS of warning signs. The government had ‘checked’ him out before, and deemed he was NOT a threat. HIGH time to change the criteria. The mosque connections/Imam spew just blows me away….effing PC B.S……………………………………… REST IN PEACE…
Anonymous,thank you so much. I was
thinking about his patients and thought
of the damage he would have done with
them.
Alex, me too. It is shocking how much
there has been on this terrorist and
nothing was done about it.