 
FBI TERROR WATCH LIST AND CALIFORNIA CONNECTIONS BY JIM CROGAN © 2001 A confidential FBI watch list of 14 terrorist groups and 367 people suspected of aiding Osama Bin Laden’s al-Qa’eda network, includes at least one alleged hijacker and five other individuals, who either lived for a time in Los Angeles and surrounding communities or still do. The 22-page document includes names, dates of births, social security numbers, addresses and alleged aliases. The list, which was put together by the FBI and European counter terrorism agencies, indicates that a total of 21 individuals, including several San Diego residents arrested as material witnesses, have connections to California. Saeed Al-Ghamdi, whose nationality and route of entry into the U.S. remain unknown, was one of four terrorists who hijacked United Airlines Flight 93 shortly after it left Newark bound for San Francisco. The plane, which crashed near Shanksville, PA, killing all 44 people onboard, was the only flight marked by a passenger revolt to retake the plane. According to the FBI document, Al-Ghamdi may have used as many as five additional aliases, four different birth dates and over his years in the U.S., lived at eight different addresses in six different states: New Jersey, Virginia, Florida, Texas, Arizona and California. The FBI reports that as late as December 1996 Al-Ghamdi lived at a 176-unit apartment house on Bedford Lane in the Orange County community of Chino Hills. The building has since been converted to condominiums and the phone numbers for the building’s previous owners, an Arizona property company, are not in service. The FBI declined comment on Al-Ghamdi’s Golden State connections, work or activities. Living in this rundown, white stucco, four-story apartment building on Kenmore Street in a mostly Latino neighborhood in L.A.’s Wilshire District, 40-year-old, Saudi Arabian, Ali Abusharifah, stuck out. “I remember him because the building has mostly Latinos living here. So it was strange that he was here,” explains Vivian Williams, a longtime resident, who also worked as the building’s manager for about six months. Williams described Abusharifah as “short, kind of chubby and very quiet.” She says he lived there for several months, some four or five years ago. “I saw him a few times. He was always alone, but he seemed okay,” she says. Williams says her only real contact with him came when he had a plumbing problem. “I had to go into his apartment, and I remember he had a lot of Arabic language magazines lying around his living room.” Williams says that Abusharifah told her he was moving out to live with his elderly mother. “He said she was moving, and he wanted to help her out.” She also says that he still gets mail at the building. The former manager also says the FBI came to the apartment house and talked to some of the tenants several weeks ago. “They spoke to my husband, but he doesn’t speak English that well,’ she says. The apartment house manager, who declined to be identified, also confirmed the FBI had been there. The FBI declined to explain why Abusharifah was put on the list. The Islamic Center of Southern California, which houses the nearest mosque, lies east of the Kenmore apartments, near Abusharifah’s former apartment. Sarah Eltantawi, communications director for the Muslim Public Affairs Council and a spokesperson for the Islamic Center, says she didn’t recognize his name. “The FBI came and talked to us. But they didn’t ask about him or anyone else. They just wanted to know if they could help us with any hate crime problems,” she says. The FBI document indicates that Abusharifah allegedly had four aliases. From Kenmore Ave., their records indicate he moved to Santa Ana, in Orange County, and then to Vero Beach, Florida. His current whereabouts are unknown and all his numbers in Florida have been disconnected. The FBI declined to explain why his name appears on their list. 36-year-old Malek Mohamed Seif, who was also known as Malek Mohammed Abdallah, was born in Djibouti, Africa and now holds French citizenship. He lived in a well-kept white stucco house/guest house combination on Franklin Street, a quiet tree-lined neighborhood in Santa Monica. According to public records, Seif, who allegedly used four aliases and two different social security numbers, lived in Santa Monica as late as April 2000. A tenant, who declined to be identified, says the FBI came out and spoke to the owner. However, landlord Maria Perez refused comment about her former tenant or the FBI’s visit. From Santa Monica, Seif moved to Arizona where he took flight school training in Phoenix at the same school as Lofti Raissi, an Algerian arrested in September by London police after it was learned he helped train four of the suspected hijackers. Raissi was indicted in Arizona for allegedly lying on FAA and immigration papers. Seif also knew terrorist Hani Hanjour, one of the 19 hijackers. Seif had left Arizona on a flight to France in October. In Paris, he was detained by French police at the request of the FBI, says his court appointed attorney Thomas Hoidal. The FBI, says Hoidal, tricked Seif into coming back to the U.S., saying he was not under investigation. “They told him they wanted to interview him about Raissi and Hanjour and they needed to do it in Phoenix,” explained the lawyer. Once Seif returned, the FBI arrested him. Unbeknownst to Seif, he had already been indicted by an Arizona Grand Jury on 41 counts of making false statements, Social Security fraud and mail fraud. He was later indicted in California on two counts that included using a fictitious identity as part of a successful request for asylum in 1998. Hoidal said Seif went to the same school as Raissi but at different times. He also knew Hanjour socially, but their only conversations were about flying. Hoidal says Seif knew nothing about the hijackings or any other terrorist operations and cooperated with the FBI in their interviews. The problem with his name, the attorney adds, resulted from “cultural differences. His full name is Malek Mohammed Seif Abdallah, and the asylum application listed part of his name, not an alias.” Seif, Hoidal insists, was a victim of bad advice, not a perpetrator of fraud. “He went to an individual and paid him to prepare his asylum papers. That person used the name Abdallah and listed his birthplace as Somalia,” says Hoidal. “When Seif got his papers back from the INS, he saw the mistakes and wanted to correct them, but the document prepared told him that he would be arrested for fraud and have his application denied if he made the changes. So he let it stand.” Then Seif applied for a new Social Security number as instructed on the documents and never told the INS in California that he already had an earlier number. Hoidal says it was a mistake, but still a violation of the law. And for that reason his client, who had been on a hunger strike, protesting his arrest, agreed to a plea bargain. Under that agreement, expected to be approved by a federal judge on April 22, Seif plead guilty to one count of the Arizona indictment and one count of the California indictment, charges that include Social Security fraud and lying on an application for political asylum. Seif will then be sentenced to time serve and voluntarily agree to leave the country. “He plans on flying back to France to live and get married,” says Hoidal. “I don’t think he wants to come back to the U.S. at this point.” Safia Shaikha is currently living in Culver City, reportedly with her son, Asif. Safia. According to published reports, she is estranged from her husband Abdussattar, who still lives in Lemon Grove in San Diego County. Neither Safia nor her son responded to calls for comment. Like the other non-hijackers, the FBI refused to comment on why Safia and her son are named. However, it appears that the Shaikhas inclusion on the list stems from the fact that Abdussattar, a retired professor, rented rooms in his house to two of the alleged hijackers, who crashed the jet into the Pentagon – Khalid Al-Midhar and Salem Alhamzi- and four people arrested as material witnesses. Abdussatar Shaikha reportedly knew nothing of their backgrounds and has cooperated with the FBI’s investigation. The final L.A.-area connection is Yunis Ben Mohammed Ben Jannet. Ben Jannet, who reportedly used three variations on this name, previously lived at an apartment house on Canyon Crest in Riverside. The FBI document states that Ben Jannet, a native of Tunisia, has reportedly moved back to homeland. Nationwide, federal agents have reportedly rounded up more than 700 people in connection with their ongoing terrorism investigation. Although the FBI refuses to divulge the current number of arrestees or their charges, published reports indicate the charges include alleged immigration violations, sales of phony IDs and material witness warrants. Presumably, some of those arrested number among the names on the watch list. |