11:59 PM CST on Monday, November 9, 2009
By BROOKS EGERTON and JIM LANDERS / The Dallas Morning News
Army Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan sent repeated e-mails over the last year to a Muslim cleric known for extremist views, but federal terrorism investigators deemed the contact harmless and took no action.
The cleric, Anwar al-Awlaki, praised the Fort Hood massacre suspect on Monday as "a hero."
"He is a man of conscience who could not bear living the contradiction of being a Muslim and serving in an army that is fighting against his own people," al-Awlaki's blog said.
Hasan, who is recovering from gunshot wounds in a San Antonio military hospital, is believed to have met al-Awlaki as early as 2001, when the cleric led a large northern Virginia mosque where Hasan sometimes worshipped. At the time, the U.S.-born imam styled himself as a moderate who condemned the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
Rep. Peter Hoekstra of Michigan, the ranking Republican on the House Intelligence Committee, said U.S. intelligence agencies intercepted between 10 and 20 e-mails from Hasan to al-Awlaki beginning in late 2008. He said al-Awlaki – living in Yemen since 2002 – responded to Hasan at least twice.
The responses seemed "innocent," Hoekstra told The Washington Post. But "for me, the number of times that this guy tried to reach out to the imam was significant."
Hoekstra wrote FBI Director Robert Mueller and high-ranking government officials over the weekend to complain that "serious issues exist with respect to the performance of U.S. intelligence agencies in connection with what appears to have been a terrorism-related attack at Fort Hood."
The FBI acknowledged late Monday that Hasan came to the attention of one of its Joint Terrorism Task Forces in December as it pursued an unrelated investigation.
Agents who reviewed communications between Hasan and the unidentified subject of that investigation decided that they were "consistent with research being conducted by Maj. Hasan in his position as a psychiatrist" at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C., an FBI statement said.
"Because the content of the communications was explainable by his research and nothing else derogatory was found, the JTTF concluded that Major Hasan was not involved in terrorist activities or terrorist planning," the FBI said. "Other communications of which the FBI was aware were similar to the ones reviewed by the JTTF."
An Internet posting in May, by someone using the name Nidal Hasan, seemed to equate a suicide bomber with a U.S. soldier who throws himself on a grenade to save comrades. The FBI would not elaborate on what it meant by "other communications."
"To say that this soldier committed suicide is inappropriate," the posting said. "It's more appropriate to say he is a brave hero that sacrificed his life for a more noble cause."
Under federal law, Hasan's purchase of the handgun used in last week's attack triggered a criminal background check. But counterterrorism officials were not alerted to the purchase – made in August, shortly after Hasan moved to Texas – because federal law bars such information-sharing, investigators said.
A motive has yet to be determined for the Fort Hood shootings, which left 13 people dead and 29 wounded. But the FBI said, "The investigation to date indicates that the alleged gunman acted alone and was not part of a broader terrorist plot."
The FBI director ordered a review of whether investigators overlooked signs that Hasan, 39, might be a threat. Members of Congress were briefed on the investigation late Monday.
Praising al-Qaeda
Al-Awlaki, who is in his late 30s, was born in New Mexico to Yemeni parents. He served at mosques in Denver and San Diego before going to Dar Al-Hijrah mosque in Falls Church, Va., one of the nation's largest, where the Virginia-born Hasan sometimes worshipped.
Al-Awlaki – whose name is sometimes spelled al-Aulaqi in English – told The New York Times shortly after the 9/11 attacks that Muslim leaders in the U.S. had sometimes gone too far with their rhetoric.
"In the past we were oblivious," he was quoted as saying. "We didn't really care much because we never expected things to happen. Now I think things are different.
"There were some statements that were inflammatory, and were considered just talk, but now we realize that talk can be taken seriously and acted upon in a violent, radical way."
In spring 2002, al-Awlaki moved to his parents' Middle Eastern homeland, where he began praising al-Qaeda online.
He also blamed Israelis for the U.S. terror attacks and accused the FBI of fabricating evidence to implicate Muslims.
Detained, released
U.S. authorities ultimately concluded that three of the 9/11 hijackers had spent time at al-Awlaki's mosques. Yemeni authorities detained al-Awlaki in mid-2006 at the request of the U.S. government but released him in late 2007.
At the Falls Church mosque Monday, a spokesman condemned the Fort Hood massacre and al-Awlaki's blog comments.
"Mr. al-Awlaki has clearly set himself apart from this community," said Johari Abdul-Malik, who is an imam and outreach director.
He said al-Awlaki left the mosque because he felt the role of an American imam after 9/11 included too many extra duties, including dealing with the media. Al-Awlaki wanted to focus on teaching, Abdul-Malik said.
"To go from that individual we knew to one who is projecting these words from Yemen is a shock," Abdul-Malik said. "I don't think we read him wrong. I think something happened."
He said that to his staff's knowledge, Hasan worshipped at Dar Al-Hijrah only occasionally, when visiting relatives nearby, and was not close with al-Awlaki. After Hasan's mother died in 2001, Abdul-Malik said, the military psychiatrist "seemed more withdrawn, quiet, and to some staff members, disoriented."
Investigation begins
Senate Homeland Security Committee Chairman Joe Lieberman suggested that the attack on Fort Hood was part of a pattern of anti-military activity in the U.S.
Three men in North Carolina were accused in a September indictment of targeting the Marine Corps base at Quantico, Va. Five New Jersey men were convicted in December of conspiring to attack the Army's Fort Dix, in New Jersey. And in June, a recent Muslim convert was suspected of firing on two Army recruiters at a Little Rock, Ark., shopping mall, killing one and wounding the other.
Lieberman, a Connecticut independent, pointed to a bipartisan report the committee issued last year on the "homegrown terrorist threat."
It concluded, he noted, that "no longer is the threat just from abroad, as was the case with the attacks of September 11, 2001; the threat is now increasingly from within, from homegrown terrorists who are inspired by violent Islamist ideology to plan and execute attacks where they live."
The Fort Hood rampage "appears to be a further example of that threat," Lieberman said in a news release.
He said his committee would hold a public hearing next week to begin investigating Hasan's motives, "whether the government missed warning signs that should have led to expulsion, and what lessons we can learn to prevent such future attacks.
"As this investigation continues, we would do no favor to the thousands of Muslim Americans who are serving our military with honor and the millions of patriotic and law-abiding Muslim Americans by ignoring real evidence that an individual Muslim American soldier may have become a violent Islamist extremist."
Staff writers Tom Benning, Todd J. Gillman and Dave Michaels contributed to this report.
"He is a man of conscience who could not bear living the contradiction of being a Muslim and serving in an army that is fighting against his own people," al-Awlaki's blog said.
Hasan, who is recovering from gunshot wounds in a San Antonio military hospital, is believed to have met al-Awlaki as early as 2001, when the cleric led a large northern Virginia mosque where Hasan sometimes worshipped. At the time, the U.S.-born imam styled himself as a moderate who condemned the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
Rep. Peter Hoekstra of Michigan, the ranking Republican on the House Intelligence Committee, said U.S. intelligence agencies intercepted between 10 and 20 e-mails from Hasan to al-Awlaki beginning in late 2008. He said al-Awlaki – living in Yemen since 2002 – responded to Hasan at least twice.
The responses seemed "innocent," Hoekstra told The Washington Post. But "for me, the number of times that this guy tried to reach out to the imam was significant."
Hoekstra wrote FBI Director Robert Mueller and high-ranking government officials over the weekend to complain that "serious issues exist with respect to the performance of U.S. intelligence agencies in connection with what appears to have been a terrorism-related attack at Fort Hood."
The FBI acknowledged late Monday that Hasan came to the attention of one of its Joint Terrorism Task Forces in December as it pursued an unrelated investigation.
Agents who reviewed communications between Hasan and the unidentified subject of that investigation decided that they were "consistent with research being conducted by Maj. Hasan in his position as a psychiatrist" at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C., an FBI statement said.
"Because the content of the communications was explainable by his research and nothing else derogatory was found, the JTTF concluded that Major Hasan was not involved in terrorist activities or terrorist planning," the FBI said. "Other communications of which the FBI was aware were similar to the ones reviewed by the JTTF."
An Internet posting in May, by someone using the name Nidal Hasan, seemed to equate a suicide bomber with a U.S. soldier who throws himself on a grenade to save comrades. The FBI would not elaborate on what it meant by "other communications."
"To say that this soldier committed suicide is inappropriate," the posting said. "It's more appropriate to say he is a brave hero that sacrificed his life for a more noble cause."
Under federal law, Hasan's purchase of the handgun used in last week's attack triggered a criminal background check. But counterterrorism officials were not alerted to the purchase – made in August, shortly after Hasan moved to Texas – because federal law bars such information-sharing, investigators said.
A motive has yet to be determined for the Fort Hood shootings, which left 13 people dead and 29 wounded. But the FBI said, "The investigation to date indicates that the alleged gunman acted alone and was not part of a broader terrorist plot."
The FBI director ordered a review of whether investigators overlooked signs that Hasan, 39, might be a threat. Members of Congress were briefed on the investigation late Monday.
Praising al-Qaeda
Al-Awlaki, who is in his late 30s, was born in New Mexico to Yemeni parents. He served at mosques in Denver and San Diego before going to Dar Al-Hijrah mosque in Falls Church, Va., one of the nation's largest, where the Virginia-born Hasan sometimes worshipped.
Al-Awlaki – whose name is sometimes spelled al-Aulaqi in English – told The New York Times shortly after the 9/11 attacks that Muslim leaders in the U.S. had sometimes gone too far with their rhetoric.
"In the past we were oblivious," he was quoted as saying. "We didn't really care much because we never expected things to happen. Now I think things are different.
"There were some statements that were inflammatory, and were considered just talk, but now we realize that talk can be taken seriously and acted upon in a violent, radical way."
In spring 2002, al-Awlaki moved to his parents' Middle Eastern homeland, where he began praising al-Qaeda online.
He also blamed Israelis for the U.S. terror attacks and accused the FBI of fabricating evidence to implicate Muslims.
Detained, released
U.S. authorities ultimately concluded that three of the 9/11 hijackers had spent time at al-Awlaki's mosques. Yemeni authorities detained al-Awlaki in mid-2006 at the request of the U.S. government but released him in late 2007.
At the Falls Church mosque Monday, a spokesman condemned the Fort Hood massacre and al-Awlaki's blog comments.
"Mr. al-Awlaki has clearly set himself apart from this community," said Johari Abdul-Malik, who is an imam and outreach director.
He said al-Awlaki left the mosque because he felt the role of an American imam after 9/11 included too many extra duties, including dealing with the media. Al-Awlaki wanted to focus on teaching, Abdul-Malik said.
"To go from that individual we knew to one who is projecting these words from Yemen is a shock," Abdul-Malik said. "I don't think we read him wrong. I think something happened."
He said that to his staff's knowledge, Hasan worshipped at Dar Al-Hijrah only occasionally, when visiting relatives nearby, and was not close with al-Awlaki. After Hasan's mother died in 2001, Abdul-Malik said, the military psychiatrist "seemed more withdrawn, quiet, and to some staff members, disoriented."
Investigation begins
Senate Homeland Security Committee Chairman Joe Lieberman suggested that the attack on Fort Hood was part of a pattern of anti-military activity in the U.S.
Three men in North Carolina were accused in a September indictment of targeting the Marine Corps base at Quantico, Va. Five New Jersey men were convicted in December of conspiring to attack the Army's Fort Dix, in New Jersey. And in June, a recent Muslim convert was suspected of firing on two Army recruiters at a Little Rock, Ark., shopping mall, killing one and wounding the other.
Lieberman, a Connecticut independent, pointed to a bipartisan report the committee issued last year on the "homegrown terrorist threat."
It concluded, he noted, that "no longer is the threat just from abroad, as was the case with the attacks of September 11, 2001; the threat is now increasingly from within, from homegrown terrorists who are inspired by violent Islamist ideology to plan and execute attacks where they live."
The Fort Hood rampage "appears to be a further example of that threat," Lieberman said in a news release.
He said his committee would hold a public hearing next week to begin investigating Hasan's motives, "whether the government missed warning signs that should have led to expulsion, and what lessons we can learn to prevent such future attacks.
"As this investigation continues, we would do no favor to the thousands of Muslim Americans who are serving our military with honor and the millions of patriotic and law-abiding Muslim Americans by ignoring real evidence that an individual Muslim American soldier may have become a violent Islamist extremist."
Staff writers Tom Benning, Todd J. Gillman and Dave Michaels contributed to this report.
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