Senior Official: More Hasan Ties to People Under Investigation by FBI

A senior government official tells ABC News that investigators have found that alleged Fort Hood shooter Nidal Malik Hasan had “more unexplained connections to people being tracked by the FBI” than just radical cleric Anwar al Awlaki. The official declined to name the individuals but Congressional sources said their names and countries of origin were likely to emerge soon.

Questions already surround Major Hasan’s contact with Awlaki, a radical cleric based in Yemen whom authorities consider a recruiter for al Qaeda. U.S. officials now confirm Hasan sent as many as 20 e-mails to Awlaki. Authorities intercepted the e-mails but later deemed them innocent or protected by the first amendment.

The FBI said it turned over the information to the Army, but Defense Department officials today denied that. One military investigator on a joint terror task force with the FBI was shown the e-mails, but they were never forwarded in a formal way to more senior officials at the Pentagon, and the Army did not learn of the contacts until after the shootings.

In Texas, an hour before a memorial service for the Fort Hood victims, four FBI agents showed up at the Killeen mosque where Hasan prayed and searched a trash bin outside. The mosque president was clearly upset when he had to return from traveling to the service to sign a document handed to him by agents, apparently authorizing the search.

The FBI would not comment on what the agents were looking for at the mosque a full five days after the shooting, but motivation remains the focus.

http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/official-nidal-hasan-unexplained-connections/story?id=9048590

Army Wasn’t Told of Hasan’s Emails

The Pentagon said it was never notified by U.S. intelligence agencies that they had intercepted emails between the alleged Fort Hood shooter and an extremist imam until after last week’s bloody assaults, raising new questions about whether the government could have helped prevent the attack.

A top defense official said federal investigators didn’t tell the Pentagon they were looking into months of contacts between Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan and Anwar al-Awlaki. The imam knew three of the Sept. 11 hijackers and hailed Maj. Hasan as a “hero” after the shooting last week at Fort Hood that left 13 people dead.

“Based on what we know now, neither the United States Army nor any other organization within the Department of Defense knew of Maj. Hasan’s contacts with any Muslim extremists,” the official said.

The Pentagon comments fueled a growing dispute among various branches of the government about whether Maj. Hasan should have been more deeply investigated before he allegedly walked into a crowded soldier-readiness center at Fort Hood and opened fire.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125788890000142139.html?mod=WSJ_hpp_LEFTTopStories

Who knew of Fort Hood suspect’s radical contacts?

WASHINGTON (AP) – The mystery over whether the military knew Fort Hood shooting suspect Nidal Hasan was communicating with a radical Muslim imam lapsed into finger-pointing ahead of congressional investigations looking into the Army psychiatrist’s contacts with any extremists.

Even as President Barack Obama remembered those killed at the Texas Army post and condemned what he described as “the twisted logic that led to this tragedy,” federal agencies reacted to conflicting claims about whether a Defense Department terrorism investigator looked into Hasan’s contacts months ago with Anwar al-Awlaki. Awlaki, an imam who was released from a Yemeni jail last year, has used his personal Web site to encourage Muslims across the world to kill U.S. troops in Iraq. A military official Tuesday denied knowing Hasan had such contacts.

Two government officials, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the case on the record, said the Washington-based joint terrorism task force overseen by the FBI was notified of communications between Hasan and the imam overseas, and the information was turned over to a Defense Criminal Investigative Service employee assigned to the task force. The communications were gathered by investigators beginning in December 2008 and continuing into early this year.

http://apnews.myway.com/article/20091111/D9BTACM80.html

(CNN) — A terror plot that came to light this week following raids in New York may have been targeting a major transportation center, sources close to the investigation told CNN on Thursday.

There was planning and preparation for an attack, presumably in the New York area, where there would be a large number of people and where security screening is lax such as a large railroad or subway station, essentially where there is no airport-style screening, the sources said.

Authorities are taking the plot seriously, because, the sources said, they think it involves “real-deal terrorists” operating and planning an attack in America.

Because of that fear, an unprecedented level of resources is being devoted to the investigation, the sources said. That includes the placement of a hostage rescue team in New York for possible raids and the deployment of additional resources to the Denver area in Colorado, where another phase of the probe is taking place.

The federal terrorism probe emerged Monday with a series of raids in the New York borough of Queens.

A former counterterrorism official who has been briefed on the investigation said bomb instructions were found, but could not say where.

The former official said backpacks, computers and maps were found during the searches in New York, and field tests turned up positive for explosives. But initial tests often yield false positives, and the former official was unaware whether more definitive tests had been concluded.

The backpacks support a theory that an attack similar to the 2004 train bombings in Madrid, Spain, was being planned.

For the rest of this story please go here:

http://www.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/09/18/terror.raid/index.html?eref=rss_us

For the previous article on Face Forward go here:

Face Fwd Comments:

I am so glad that our FBI and CIA have continued to protect us. I do get the feeling sometimes that their arrest and high profile terorist news releases are publicised in a manor to say, “I told you so” to Obama. This one however looks real and Obama’s gang better pay attention and drop their curent agenda.

The agenda of the current administration is not to protect and serve but redistribute the wealth. In their rush to put the American public in  slavery through debt they have done nothing to support our intelligence services. And in spite of that (or maybe because of that), the FBI/CIA continues to deliver.

Since the term for our battle in Iraq and Afganastan, “War on Terror” has been changed to “Overseas Contingency Operation”, I am curious as to how Obama will change this to fit his “new speak” world. Whatever he does I am sure glad we are not at war with Islam or we might have been in real trouble.

The massive FBI probe that triggered raids in Queens is focused on a Denver-based terror cell plotting another attack on the scale of 9/11, the Daily News learned Tuesday.

Hundreds of FBI agents are on the ground in Colorado, conducting round-the-clock surveillance on five suspects – including a man who recently visited Queens, sources told The News.

New York authorities searched three Flushing apartments and detained several men – later released – after getting a warrant to look for bomb-making components, explosive powders and fuses.

“The FBI is seriously spooked about these guys planning another 9/11,” a former senior counterterrorism official told the News. “This is not some … FBI informant-driven case. This is the real thing.”

Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly told reporters it’s an ongoing investigation with plenty of “substance.”

Read the rest of the article here:

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/ny_crime/2009/09/15/2009-09-15_queens_terror_raids_part_of_fbi_probe_into_denverbased_cell_plotting_attack_on_9.html

Face Fwd Comments:

If Obama finds out the FBI has been using the “terrorism” word, he is going to be mad.  Do you think he knows or has he been too busy setting up his 7 television appearances that are scheduled over the next week.  Maybe he has been working on his “Top Ten” list for his David Letterman event.

All kidding aside, this is a serious development.  Thank God the FBI broke the plot up or we could be facing an even greater disater than 9/11.  Stay tuned this is a developing story.

By STEVEN R. HURST and DEVLIN BARRETT

Associated Press Writers

WASHINGTON (AP) – President Barack Obama has approved creation of a new, special terrorism-era interrogation unit to be supervised by the White House, a top aide said Monday, further distancing his administration from President George W. Bush’s detainee policies.

The administration has also decided that all U.S. interrogators will follow the rules for detainees laid out by the Army Field Manual, according to senior administration officials who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the decision. That decision aims to end years of fierce debate over how rough U.S. personnel can get with terror suspects in custody. The new unit does not mean the CIA is now out of the interrogation business, deputy White House press secretary Bill Burton told reporters covering the vacationing Obama at Oak Bluffs, Mass.

Burton said the unit will include “all these different elements under one group,” and it said that it will be situated at the FBI headquarters in Washington.  The unit would be led by an FBI official, with a deputy director from somewhere in the government’s vast intelligence apparatus, and members from across agencies. It will be directly supervised by the White House, but the senior administration officials insisted the unit’s agency bosses will make operational decisions, not the White House.

Face Fwd Comments:

Thank God he has taken on this on to fix.  No doubt he will be focusing on those that were turned in during his spy campaign.  Maybe the rats that were sending out those fishy emails and websites like facefwd.com can be interrogated properly and with all the respect that their ACORN interrogators will surely give.

Pictured below is he new interrogation team using some of their standard techniques and approved process.  Also included are the spiffy new uniforms to be worn by the interrogators.