Panel Left Out Hijacker Report
WASHINGTON — The Sept. 11 commission knew that military intelligence officials had identified lead hijacker Mohamed Atta as a member of Al Qaeda who might be part of a U.S.-based terrorist cell more than a year before the attacks, but it decided not to include that in its final report, a spokesman said Thursday.
Al Felzenberg, spokesman for the commission’s follow-up project, the 9/11 Public Discourse Project, had said earlier this week that the panel was unaware of intelligence specifically naming Atta. But subsequent information confirmed that the commission had been aware of the intelligence, he said.
The information did not make it into the final report because it was not consistent with what the commission knew about Atta’s whereabouts before the attacks on the Pentagon and New York, Felzenberg said.
The intelligence about Atta was recently disclosed by Rep. Curt Weldon (R-Pa.), who has expressed anger that it was never forwarded to the FBI.
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