August 2001: Al-Qaeda Hamburg Cell Member Zammar Appears to Have Foreknowledge of 9/11 Attacks

Al-Qaeda Hamburg cell member Mohammed Haydar Zammar appears to have foreknowledge of the 9/11 attacks. Ibrahim Diab, a Lebanese national, has recently been recruited into the cell. Diab makes plans to attend an al-Qaeda training camp in Afghanistan, and Zammar pays for his travel expenses to the camp. Zammar is generally considered to be the main recruiter for the cell. Diab will later claim that Zammar warns him in August 2001 to leave for the camps as soon as possible because something big is about to happen. [Los Angeles Times, 1/30/2003] In 2002, the Los Angeles Times will report: “Zammar’s bluster matched his size. In almost any discussion, his was the loudest voice and most radical view.… In part because of Zammar’s outspokenness, authorities tend to discount his role in the Sept. 11 plot. They concluded no one would entrust information to a braggart like him.” [Los Angeles Times, 9/1/2002] Diab’s confession, made public in 2003, would seem to discredit the idea that Zammar was not trusted with knowledge of the 9/11 plot. And since Zammar is monitored for years before 9/11 (see March 1997-Early 2000), it also raises questions about what German intelligence might have learned from monitoring him. Diab will fly out of Germany on September 10, 2001, just one day before the 9/11 attacks (see September 10, 2001). He will attend an al-Qaeda training camp in Afghanistan, but be arrested in Pakistan in late October and quickly deported back to Germany. He will confess his activities to German intelligence shortly thereafter, and then be released without charge (see October 29, 2001). [Chicago Tribune, 2/23/2003]