Airport gunman on mission to kill - FBI

The heavily-armed Egyptian immigrant who gunned down two people at the EL Al ticket counter of Los Angeles International Airport went there with a mission to kill, the FBI said.

‘‘Why he did that is what we are still trying to determine,’’ FBI special agent Richard Garcia said.

Hesham Mohamed Hadayet was the fourth person in line at the El Al counter when he opened fire on Thursday. He fired 10 or 11 bullets before he was shot dead by an security guard who worked for Israel’s national airline, as hundreds of people dived for cover.

Three other people were wounded, including a guard who was stabbed by Hadayet as he fought with the wounded gunman.

The shooting could have been a random act of violence or a hate crime, Garcia said. He said authorities also had not ruled out a number of potential motives, including terrorism, though Hadayet, 41, was not on any FBI or federal aviation ‘‘watch’’ lists.

Israeli officials, however, said they would consider the attack an act of terror unless it was proven otherwise. A source close to Israeli foreign minister Shimon Peres said Peres’ granddaughter was in the terminal at the time of the attack.

Hadayet was armed with a .45-calibre semi-automatic Glock pistol, a 9mm handgun and a 6-inch knife, authorities said. The FBI said it wasn’t clear whether he acted alone or why he had drivers’ licences with two last names - Hadayet and Ali.

The California licences also had two birth dates - July 4, 1961 and April 7, 1961. Authorities believe the discrepancy was caused when he filled out his application and wrote 4-7-61, as is the style in a number of countries including Egypt, instead of 7-4-61.

Relatives said Hadayet was a Cairo-born accountant who ran a limousine company out of his Irvine apartment. Hassan Mostafa Mahfouz, who is married to Hadayet’s aunt, said Hadayet had studied commerce at Ain Shams University in Cairo, and had worked as an accountant in a bank before he left for the United States in 1992.

‘‘He is a very, very tender person and close to his family,’’ Mahfouz said in Cairo. He confirmed that Thursday was his nephew’s birthday.

Hadayet, his wife Hala and two sons, aged eight and 14, lived in a small apartment building in a middle-class section of Orange County. His family had left for Egypt about a week ago.

Neighbours said Hadayet was quiet, but became angry when an upstairs neighbour hung large American and Marine Corps flags from a balcony above his front door after the September 11 attacks.

‘‘He complained about it to the apartment manager. He thought it was being thrown in his face,’’ neighbour Steve Thompson said.

There was no record of such a complaint, said Rich Elbaum, a spokesman for The Irvine Co, which owns and manages the apartment complex.

The flags were there the day of the shooting. A bumper sticker on Hadayet’s front door that read:

'‘Read the Koran’’ was removed by authorities.

A man who said he worked for Hadayet until he was sacked two years ago, Abdul Zahav, said Hadayet once told him he hated all Israelis.

‘‘He kept all his anger inside him. So he can’t hold it any more, he can’t hold it any more,’’ Zahav told reporters Friday at the apartment complex.

But neighbour Dan Danilewicz said Hadayet ‘‘was never hateful or belligerent’’. Danilewicz said his 17-year-old son was friends with the Hadayet family.

‘‘Nothing anti-American or anti-Semitic ever came out of their mouths,’’ Danilewicz said.

The FBI searched Hadayet’s apartment on Thursday night, impounding a Toyota Camry car and carrying away a computer, books, binders and other material. They refused to say what else the search turned up.

Hadayet’s state limousine permit, issued in August 1997, was revoked last November when he failed to maintain insurance papers on file with the state, the Public Utilities Commission said. Irvine Police Lt Dave Freedland said Hadayet had three contacts with the department since 1996 - all of them ‘‘unremarkable’’.

While authorities tried to piece together the motive for the killings, families of the victims mourned their loss.

Ticket agent Victoria Hen, 25, and Yaakov Aminov, 46, a jeweller and father of eight who was dropping off a friend, were shot in the attack.

Hen, who was born in Israel, moved to the US in 1990 and planned to marry soon. She started work for El Al about a month ago, family friend Joe Knoller said.

Aminov, an orthodox Jew who had taken a friend to the airport, emigrated from Israel 13 years ago.