one night at another New York hotel. He then joined the group of hijackers
in Paterson, reuniting with Nawaf al Hazmi after more than a year.With two
months remaining, all 19 hijackers were in the United States and ready to take
the final steps toward carrying out the attacks.
As we mentioned in chapter 2, while in Sudan, senior managers in al Qaeda
maintained contacts with Iran and the Iranian-supported worldwide terrorist
organization Hezbollah, which is based mainly in southern Lebanon and
Beirut. Al Qaeda members received advice and training from Hezbollah.
Khallad has said that Iran made a concerted effort to strengthen relations with
al Qaeda after the October 2000 attack on the USS Cole, but was rebuffed
because Bin Ladin did not want to alienate his supporters in Saudi Arabia. Khal-
lad and other detainees have described the willingness of Iranian officials to
facilitate the travel of al Qaeda members through Iran, on their way to and from
Afghanistan. For example, Iranian border inspectors would be told not to place
telltale stamps in the passports of these travelers. Such arrangements were par-
ticularly beneficial to Saudi members of al Qaeda.
dence suggesting that 8 to 10 of the 14 Saudi "muscle" operatives traveled into
or out of Iran between October 2000 and February 2001.
bia in traveling to Iran during November. A top Hezbollah commander and
Saudi Hezbollah contacts were involved.
apparently flew to Beirut, traveling--perhaps by coincidence--on the same
flight as a senior Hezbollah operative.Also in November, Salem al Hazmi appar-
ently flew from Saudi Arabia to Beirut.
U.S. visas in late October, traveled in a group from Saudi Arabia to Beirut and
then onward to Iran. An associate of a senior Hezbollah operative was on the
same flight that took the future hijackers to Iran. Hezbollah officials in Beirut
and Iran were expecting the arrival of a group during the same time period.
The travel of this group was important enough to merit the attention of sen-
ior figures in Hezbollah.