Hijack leader's father blames Israel for 9/11 attacks

The father of September 11 hijack leader Mohammed Atta has insisted his son did not carry out the 2001 attacks, blaming a “Jewish conspiracy” for the outrage.

Retired lawyer Mohammed al-Amir Atta says the attacks were carried out by the Israeli intelligence service, not Islamic extremists including his son.

Atta senior, speaking to The Associated Press in Cairo, Egypt, said the United States deserved the devastating result because of its anti-Arab policies.

But Atta is unwilling to answer direct questions about his son, as became apparent when he was asked about a large photograph on his living room wall showing his son relaxed, unlike the sombre passport photo broadcast around the world after September 11.

“Sons are dear,” was all he would say.

Atta no longer claims his son is still alive, even though he once said his son had called him the day after the attack from an undisclosed destination.

The younger Mohammed Atta was named in FBI and congressional reports as the suicide pilot of the first plane to crash into the World Trade Centre in New York and the leader of the 19 Arabs who carried out the September 11 attacks.

In a videotape months after the attacks, al-Qaida chief Osama bin Laden himself described the 33-year-old Atta as being “in charge of the group” that struck America.

The elder Atta places the blame for terrorism on what they say are the conditions that fuel militants’ anger, not on the militants themselves.

“No nation has done as much evil in the world as America did, and you do not expect God to punish it?” he asked.

“If a Palestinian flies a plane and strikes the White House and kills (US president George) Bush, his wife and his daughters, he will go to heaven,” Atta said. “So will any Muslim who defends his faith.”

Atta said the September 11 anniversary would be just another day for him. “If I am still alive I will pray and read the Koran like every day. It is not something special for me,” he said.

Egyptian security officials, who keep close tabs on anyone with extremist leanings because of Egypt’s experience with terrorism, said they were surprised when they first heard that the younger Atta was involved in the plot.

One official said he discovered in studying Atta’s life that when the future terrorist was studying engineering at Cairo University in the late 1980s, he was dating and drinking alcohol, activities devout Muslims avoid. The official said the younger Atta was either brainwashed later by bin Laden, or he pulled off an extraordinary deception.

Abdel Rahim Ali, an Egyptian expert on Islamic militant groups, said the younger Atta was among probably hundreds of operatives developed by al-Qaida years before the September 11 attacks to operate in Europe and the United States.

Ali, head of the Arab Centre for Studies, said small groups of young Muslims living in Europe were recruited by al-Qaida. The recruits, including Atta, were flown in the mid-1990s to Mecca, Islam’s most holy site, where they were asked to take an oath of allegiance to al Qaida and bin Laden, he said.

US officials believe Atta met bin Laden in Afghanistan in late 1999.

In Germany where Atta lived and studied at the Technical University of Hamburg-Harburg, people who knew him described him as an intelligent man with strong religious beliefs, an indication that he become more religious after joining what later became known as al-Qaida’s Hamburg cell. They spoke of his preoccupation with the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and anger at the United States for defending Israel.

Atta’s father refused to discuss his son’s background except to insist that he had raised him to be a good Muslim.

“Muslims should not accept injustice and half solutions,” he said. “Islam said, fight those who fight you.”