This article is part of the
September 11 series.
Background history
Planning and execution
September 11
Rest of September
October
Aftermath

Table of contents
1 The conception
2 Students in Germany
3 Formation of the Hamburg Cell
4 2000 Al-Qaida Summit
5 Were plotters already in the United States?
6 Arrival to the United States
7 On the go
8 Final Preparations
9 External Links

The conception

The September 11, 2001 Terrorist Attacks originated with Operation Bojinka, which was conceived by Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and Ramzi Yousef. The first stage would be the assassination of Pope John Paul II and the bombing of eleven airplanes. The second and third stages called for small airplanes loaded with explosives to be crashed into the CIA headquarters and other targets. The plot was discovered by Manila police on January 6, 1995 and Abdul Hakim Murad was arrested. Ramzi Yousef was arrested in Pakistan in February 1995. Wali Khan Amin Shah escaped after his arrest, but was re-arrested in Malaysia in December 1995. Khalid Sheik Mohammed escaped, and Riduan Isamuddin, aka Hambali, was overlooked.

Mohammed moved to Qatar. Before the government there could arrest him (after a request by the United States), he fled to Afghanistan. The leaders of Al-Qaida liked the idea of the modified Phases II and III Mohammed presented to them. Instead of using small airplanes loaded with explosives, as Murad planned to do, Mohammed planned to use commercial airliners. Mohammed and Abu Zubaydah became the managers of the terrorist plot. During late 1996 and 1997, Khalid Sheik Mohammed stayed in the Czech Republic, as the Taliban would not approve of his womanising. German officials believe that the leaders of Al-Qaida planned almost the entire September 11 plot in Afghanistan. Six of the hijackers that got chosen later down the line would have some say in the plot.

Osama bin Laden himself decided to only use four airplanes in the plot. According to several captured Al-Qaida members, the leaders decided that World Trade Center, Pentagon, and the United States Capitol were the targets, and that leaders rejected the White House as it was too difficult to see from the air. According to captured member Abu Zubaydah, the White House was the intended target of United Airlines Flight 93.

The hijacking of Indian Airlines Flight 814 in 1999 only reassured the men back in Afghanistan that their plot was going to work. The plot became tightly controlled and ambitious. U.S. Intelligence officials say that Mohammed came back to Germany in 1999 to meet up with the new terrorist cell he formed out of men chosen for being cosmopolitan and technically proficient.

Students in Germany

The Hamburg, Germany cell was formed starting in 1998 shortly after Mohammed got approval by the top brass for his plot. Mohammed Atta, Marwan Al-Shehhi, Ziad Jarrah, Ramzi Binalshibh, Said Bahaji, Zakariyah Essabar, and fifteen others were all members. The cell was set in Germany as only one man in the German government had the part- time job of keeping tabs on radical Islam.

The men arrived in Germany over a course of five years, starting in 1992, when Mohammed Atta arrived from Egypt. A friend of Atta's recalled meeting him at the Al-Quds mosque in 1993; it is not known when he started going there. Atta had always lived as a strict Muslim. He studied architectural planning at the Technical University of Hamburg-Harburg.

Atta went to Mecca in 1995.

Ramzi Binalshibh went under the name "Ramzi Omar". He claimed to be a political refugee from Sudan. He asked for asylum in 1995. The judge refused the asylum request, and Binalshibh returned to the Hadramaut region of Yemen. Binalshibh later got a German visa under his real name.

Said Bahaji came over to Germany in 1995. he was born there, but moved to Morocco at age 9. In 1996, Said Bahaji enrolled in the electrical engineering program at the technical university. He spent weekdays at a student home and weekends at the home of his aunt, Barbara Arens. Arens, his "high tech aunt", kicked Bahaji out of the house when she saw his religious beliefs turn more radical.

In Spring 1996, Ziad Jarrah came to Greifswald from Lebanon. He met a female medical student named Aysel Senguen. She came over to live with him.

Al-Shehhi enrolled in a language institute in 1996 and boarded with a local family in Bonn. It took two years for him to learn enough of the German language to enroll.

Atta came to Hamburg around 1996 and 1997.

In 1997, Jarrah and Senguen moved to Hamburg, where Jarrah studied aeronautical engineering. In the summer of that year, he worked at a paint shop factory for Volkswagen in Wolfburg. In the fall of that year, Zakariya Essabar enrolled in an applied sciences course in Hamburg.

Also in Winter 1997, Mohammed Atta told roomate that he was going to Mecca, but he most likely instead went to Afghanistan. Atta had already taken his Mecca pilgrimage 18 months earlier. According to Al Jazeera journalist Yosri Fouda, Atta went to the mosque around this time period "not to pray but to sign his death will."

Formation of the Hamburg Cell

The recruitment of members in Germany began in 1998.

Investigators think that a postal worker named Mohammed bin Nasser Belfas first recruited members, either knowlingly or unknowingly, by "converting" them to radical Islam in his regularly held study meetings on Islam in his apartment. Mohammed Atta became a regular member, as did Marwan Al-Shehhi. Investigators say that an automobile mechanic named Mohammed Haydar Zammar acted as a "travel agent" to Afghanistan.

In 1998, Atta, Bahaji, and Binalshibh were living together when German police put them under "limited surveillance". But nothing came out of it and the surveillance ended. Later in 1998, Al-Shehhi spent several months trying to pass the language exams in Hamburg.

Atta returned to Germany in Spring 1998. Binalshibh left his container camp that spring and spent time with Belfas. In the summer, Atta, Binalshibh, Alshehhi, and Belfas worked in a computer warehouse together packing crates.

Al-Shehhi failed his language exams and went back to Bonn. Soon afterwards, a man named Atif bin Mansour arrived in Hamburg. He was a co-applicant with Atta for a room at the Islamic study group at the technical university. In the winter, Atta, Binalshibh, and Bahaji moved to an apartment at Marienstraße 54. Marienstraße 54 has been described by Yosri Fouda, an Al-Jazeera journalist, as the "kitchen" of the September 11, 2001 Terrorist Attacks.

When Mansour's brother, a member of the Pakistani armed forces, died in combat in 1999, Mansour went back to Pakistan for good. Al-Shehhi came back to Hamburg shortly afterwards.

Atta often attended Belfas' study group in 1999. A member named Volker Harum Bruhn told Atta to stay away from Islamic extremists, but this came in vain.

Atta got his master's degree in October and went back to Cairo for the last time. His aunt said that he asked his ill mother if he could remain in Egypt indefinitely. The mother told him to get an education.

German police said that they found data that Atta, Al-Shehhi, Jarrah, and Binalshibh flew to Pakistan. They then went to a training camp in Kandahar. Al-Shehhi, who was paid a 2,000 dollar stipend per month from the United Arab Emirates Army withdrew 6,000 dollars and paid for airline tickets for flights from Germany to Karachi via Istanbul.

After the Afghanistan visit, Mohammed Atta reported his passport stolen, probably to erase travel visas to Afghanistan.

By 1999, the members of the Hamburg cell were already committed to Al Qaida.

2000 Al-Qaida Summit

Main article: 2000 Al-Qaida Summit

Several Al-Qaida members are said to have attended a meeting in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia that regarded the USS Cole bombing and the September 11, 2001 Terrorist Attacks. Hambali, Ramzi Binalshibh, Nawaf Al-Hazmi, Khalid Almihdhar, and Tawfiq bin Attash attended the meeting, which lasted from January 5 to January 8, 2001. The men were also photographed when they came out of the meeting. U.S. investigators did not identify these men until much later. The meeting wasn't wiretapped, but it was videotaped.

Were plotters already in the United States?

Some of the men who would be involved in the September 11 plot may have already been to the United States on previous occasions during the mid-to-late 1990s.

Real estate records show that a man named Waleed al-Shehri lived in Daytona Beach, Florida during that time period, probably starting in 1993, since the spokeswoman for Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, the school which al-Shehri attended, said that it was a four year program; al-Shehri graduated in 1997. The manager of the Anatole Apartments nearby the airport of Daytona Beach, Florida says that Ahmed al-Ghamdi lived in the apartment complex in 1995, while Waleed al-Shehri lived there in 1997, from May to December. School officials say that Al-Ghamdi never came to the school. Federal Aviation Administration records show that Al-Shehri had a pilot's license.

In 1999, Al-Shehri rented a house on Orrin street in Vienna, Virginia and moved into Vienna from Florida. A woman named Diane Albritton, who lives across the street from the rental house, said, "There were always people coming and going. Arabic people. Some of them never uttered a word; I don't know if they spoke English. But they looked very focused. We thought they might be dealing drugs, or illegal immigrants." (quote from [1]). It is not clear when he moved out of the house.

The Waleed Al-Shehri that came to the U.S. in the mid to late 1990's may have been another man with the same name.

It is known that Hani Janjour had been to Arizona in the late 1990's before coming back in late 2000.

Arrival to the United States

Almidhar and Alhazmi arrived in Los Angeles on January 15, 2000. On January 18, Marwan Al-Shehhi applied for a visa into the United States while he was in the United Arab Emirates. He was the first member to apply for a visa in the Hamburg cell. In March, Mohammed Atta began e-mailing thirty flight schools in the United States.

By the end of June, Atta, Jarrah, and Al-Shehhi left for the United States. Binalshibh and Essabar wanted to join Atta, Al-Shehhi, and Jarrah, but they were denied U.S. Visas several times. Binalshibh's visa was denied since he was a citizen of Yemen. Binalshibh decided to support the cell by sending money to it. Mohammed was making repeated trips to Indonesia and the Philippines in Southeast Asia at the time.

A man named Omar Al-Bayoumi was in San Diego, California since 1995. He raised a family, and was unemployed. He said that he was a student of international business, and that he received a monthly stipend from his former employer, an aviation company in Saudi Arabia. He videotaped places all the time. Al-Bayoumi was quick to house immigrants who needed housing. In 2000, he settled in Nawaf Al-Hazmi and Khalid Almidhar. According to Al-Hazmi, Al-Bayoumi met him and Almidhar at a restaurant in Los Angeles. Al-Bayoumi offered a ride to San Diego after he heard the men speak Arabic. Al-Bayoumi threw the men a welcome party and Al-Hazmi, who said he was here to learn English, signed a six-month lease. He often surfed the internet from the San Diego State Library.

The first two months of the lease were paid for, yet the men complained that the lease was too expensive. In the Spring, Alhazmi told a friend that someone was going to wire $5000 to him, and that the money would come from Saudi Arabia. Alhazmi told his friend that he had no account. The friend agreed, and later found that the money came from a man named "Ali", and that it didn't originate from the United States. The two men wanted to take flight lessons, which is why they got the money. A friend took them to Montgomery Field and arranged lessons for them. They took one and quit. Fereidoun "Fred" Sorbi, the instructor, recalled, "The first day they came in here, they said they want to fly Boeings. We said you have to start slower. You can't just jump right into Boeings."

Alhazmi had season passes to the San Diego Zoo and SeaWorld. The men often hung at a men's club called Cheetah's, which is nearby the Islamic Center, which praised multiculturalism and openly attacked Islamism; men who were passing leaflets praising Osama Bin Laden found their leaflets taken and found themselves forced to leave. Almidhar and Alhazmi frequently drove to Las Vegas in the Toyota sedan they bought.

On the go

Almidhar left the United States in June 2000. Ramzi Binalshibh had wired $115,000 to a Suntrust bank account shortly after Atta and Alshehhi arrived in Florida. Mohammed Atta and Marwan Al-Shehhi started taking flight lessons at Huffman Aviation International in Venice, Florida. Atta claimed that he was of royal Saudi descent, and that Al-Shehhi was his bodyguard. The men may have received money financing the plot from Ali Abdul Aziz Ali and Mohammed Yousef Mohamed Alqusaidi, who may be Al-Shehhi's brother.

Meanwhile, Ziad Jarrah arrived in the United States in late June 2000. He left the country five times in the next thirteen months. Alhazmi took a job washing cars at a Texaco station that was owned by Palestinians. The gas station was a hangout for Arabs, who drank coffee as they sat at a picnic table outside. Alhazmi often rambled about how he feels that Muslims were discriminated against. According to his family, Alhazmi never told his friends that he fought in Chechnya three years earlier after leaving Saudi Arabia. Back in Europe, Said Bahaji told his employer and his family that he was quitting his job and was going to be an intern in Pakistan. His aunt, Barbara Arens, says that she was suspicious and that she went to the police and pleaded to them "to do something." She says that police took no action against Bahaji.

The men in the September 11 plot were always on the move, spending thousands of dollars on airline tickets and logging many miles into rental cars. They often stayed in Econo Lodges. The men often went to cities that had one or more Mail Boxes Etc stores. They obtained mail boxes there and used them as permanent addresses to get drivers licenses and admissions into flight schools.

On October 20, 2000, Atta's mentor, Mohammed Belfas, and an Indonesian architecture student that Belfas knew for years, named Agus Budiman, arrived in the suburbs of Washington, DC. Both men had been coming to the United States for many years. He said that he wanted to move to the United States for good, and that he had family in Northern Virginia. Belfas even had a Virginia driver's license. While in the United States, Belfas accompanied Budiman while he worked as his job as a driver for a Take-out-taxi restaurant delivery service. When Belfas offered to help Budiman if he got Belfas a U.S. driver's license, Budiman explained that he didn't need one. Belfas said that he wanted one for a souvenir. On November 4, they went to the first trip to the Department of Motor Vehicles office in Arlington, Virginia. They swore that Belfas lived in Arlington, so he got his Virginia Identification card. The men obtained his driver's license two days later using the ID. Within the week, Belfas went back to Germany.

Also in October, Zacarias Moussaoui allegedly received 35,000 U.S. dollars and travel documents from Yazid Sufaat, a cohort of Hambali, while Moussaoui was in Malaysia. Sudaat provided the money and documents on Hambali's orders.

In December, a man who Alhazmi called "Hani" arrived in San Diego. "Hani" was actually Hani Hanjour, who spent most of three years in the late 1990's in Arizona training to be a pilot. Every account of him stated that he was a bad student, but he got his license and returned to Saudi Arabia. He and Alhazmi then left San Diego and started training to be a pilot in Arizona.

Atta and Al-Shehhi practiced flying on a Boeing 727 flight simulator on December 29 and December 30. The simulator was at the SimCenter flight school in Opa-Locka, Florida. According to Henry George, the instructor, the men told him that they wanted to be commercial pilots back in their home countries. The instructor didn't think that they had skill to be real pilots. He commented, "All they were doing is making themselves both prepared for the task." During the three hours apiece training, the men made a lot of turns and manuevers. Although they could take off and land well, the instructor called the simulator, "a mini, mini introduction."

Shortly afterwards, Atta left for Germany. He then travelled to Spain, before going back to the United States.

Zacarias Moussaoui entered the United States in February 2001. Ramzi Binalshibh, who was in Germany, wired him $14,000. Binalshibh also wired money to Marwan Al-Shehhi and a soon-to-be hijacker named Fayez Banihammad.

Almidhar returned to the U.S. on July 4, 2001. By that time, twelve Saudi men and a man from the United Arab Emirates arrived in the East Coast. It is unknown how they were recruited. Many of the Saudis may have been chosen because it was very easy for Saudi citizens to get visass to the United States.

On July 8, 2001, Atta took his second trip to Spain, leaving from Miami to Madrid. He had already left for Spain another time since he first came to the U.S. Al-Shehhi also took two of his own trips across the Atlantic Ocean. Atta then rented a silver Hyundai and took an 8-hour drive to Tarragona. Ramzi Binalshibh was also in Spain at the time, staying at the Hotel Monica in Cambrils. Atta stayed at a hotel in Tarragona, which was fifteen minutes away. Atta spent 11 days in Spain. The following day, Binalshibh checked out without breakfast and vanished along with Atta. It is unknown why they came to Spain. They most likely came for a third party. Various theories include an operational commander or a courier relaying the final instructions of the plot. The meeting may have concerned Zacarias Moussaoui, a French Moroccan that spent time in Afghanistan and Chechnya and was supposedly on his way to the United States to fill the vaccum that Binalshibh left when he was denied a visa. Plans to include him in the plot were never finalized, as the leadership of the group questioned his competency. The meeting that Atta and Binalshibh possibly attended may have taken place at a safehouse. Binalshibh returned to Hamburg on July 20. On July 29, and August 2, Zacarias Moussaoui placed several calls to a telephone number in Dusseldorf. On July 30 and July 31 in Hamburg, Binalshibh received 15,000 dollars from the alleged paymaster in the United Arab Emirates. He wired 14,000 of the dollars to Moussaoui on August 1 and August 3.

Soon after Atta returned to the U.S., he set up a meeting in Las Vegas. Again, it is unknown why he set up the meeting. Alhazmi and Hanjour were living in an apartment in Paterson, New Jersey, close to where Atta bought a ticket for his second Spain trip.

On August 1, Hani Hanjour left the Paterson apartment.

On August 2, 2001, Salem Al-Hazmi, Abdulaziz Alomari, Majed Moqed, and two to four other of the hijackers visited the office in Arlington, Virginia to get IDs and drivers' licenses in the same manner as how Mohammed Belfas got them. They paid other men to sign for them on the paperwork. They used the IDs to make it simpler to purchase boarding tickets for airplanes.

Final Preparations

Hani Hanjour and Majed Moqed were photographed using an ATM in Maryland on August 5.

One week after he was given the money, Moussaoui came to Minnesota from Oklahoma. He paid $6,300 in cash to the Pan Am International Flight Academy on August 10. He was arrested for immigration violations on August 17. Some investigators think that this sparked the move to the attacks.

About three weeks prior to the attacks, the targets were assigned to four teams. The United States Capitol was called "The Faculty of Law". The Pentagon was dubbed "The Faculty of Fine Arts". Atta codenamed the World Trade Center as "The Faculty of Town Planning."

A conspirator named Abu Abdul Rahman sent a "love message" on an internet chat room to his "German girlfriend", who was really Ramzi Binalshibh. The message said... The first semester commences in three weeks. Two high schools and two universities. ... This summer will surely be hot ...19 [the eventual number of hijackers] certificates for private education and four exams. Regards to the professor. Goodbye.

Between August 25 and August 28, the hijackers had bought their tickets. Some September 11 hijackers bought their reservations over the internet on sites such as Travelocity, and some bought them in person at the airport.

Two of the United Airlines Flight 175 hijackers paid $44,500 for each of their tickets. Three of the other hijackers on that flight paid paid $1,600 and $1,760 for their tickets. Atta booked seat Seat 8D. Waleed Alshehri and Wail Alshehri, who sat in seats 2B and 2A, used the same Hollywood post-office-box address to buy their tickets. Satam al-Suqami would pay in cash and sit in seat 10B. Abdulaziz Al-Omari also was planned to be on this flight.

On August 28, Mohammed Atta bought his ticket with his VISA card at the American Airlines website by using addresses in Coral Springs, Florida and Hollywood, Florida. He established an AAdvantage frequent flyer miles account for this on August 25.

According to Ramzi Binalshibh, on August 29, Mohammed Atta notified Binalshibh after Moussaoui's capture in an early morning coded telephone message, "A mate of mine bothered me with this puzzle and I was hoping you would help me solve it. Two sticks, a dash and a cake with a stick down. What is it?"

"Did you wake me up to tell me this puzzle?" Ramzi Binalshibh replied. Atta meant that the attacks would be on September 11; he chose when the attack would happen.

Salem Al-Hazmi, Majed Moqed, and three other hijackers worked at a Greenbelt, Maryland Gold's Gym from September 2 to September 6. The men were purchasing air tickets around that time.

US investigators say that Atta sent a package to Mustafa Ahmed, the alleged al-Qaida paymaster on September 4. Mustafa Ahmed was in the United Arab Emirates at the time.

Said Bahaji left Germany and flew to Karachi via Istanbul on September 4. German police found that two other men on the flight stayed with Bahaji at the Embassy Hotel in Karachi. The men had false identification papers. Zakariya Essabar disappeared around the same time. Investigators think that he may have been one of the passengers on the plane.

Ramzi Binalshibh returned to Spain on September 5, flying from Dusseldorf. Investigators say that he stayed at his private home in the Madrid area, and he never used his return ticket. He instead headed for Afghanistan.

Around this time, the FBI had been unable to access Moussaoui's computer. Agents were notified by the CIA at this time that they needed to look for Khalid Almihdhar and Nawaf Al-Hazmi. It was far too late by then.

Ziad Jarrah wrote a letter to his girlfriend and sent it to her on September 10. He wrote "I have done what I had to do" and "You should be very proud, it is an honor, and you will see the result, and everyone will be happy." as well as "Hold on to what you have until we meet each other again." The letter was bounced back to the U.S., as Jarrah made an error in writing the address.

Mohammed Atta spent September 10 with Abdulaziz Alomari in South Portland, Maine and Scarborough, Maine. Atta called Khalid Sheik Mohammed that day. Intelligence officials think that Mohammed gave him a coded signal to proceed.

Overview -- Background history -- Planning and execution -- September 11 -- Rest of September -- October -- Aftermath

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