FBI knew about al-Qaida fundraisers

THE FBI knew about specific suspected al-Qaida fundraisers before the September 11 attacks but failed to tackle the problem, the September 11 Commission has said.

In a broad critique of the government’s surveillance of terrorist financing, the report said “gaps appear to remain in the intelligence community’s understanding of the issue”.

The report said the government should resist creating “a terrorist financing tsar” or some other specialized entity to focus on the problem. Instead, it backed an existing interagency committee led by the National Security Council.