The House Intelligence Committee on Friday released the long-sought 28 classified pages of the 9/11 report on “intelligence community activities before and after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001” which could implicate Saudi involvement in funding the Islamic terrorist hijackers.
A 2002 Joint Congressional inquiry produced the 9/11 report. The George W. Bush Administration deemed 28 pages of that report classified and withheld the information from public release citing that releasing the pages could compromise intelligence sources and methods.
Chunks of redactions remain in the 28 pages of the report. One section reads in part, “Prior to September 11th, the FBI apparently did not focus investigative resources on (redacted text) Saudi nationals in the United States due to Saudi Arabia’s status as an American ‘ally.’”
The 28-page release was anticipated based on a report from CNN that cited sources and a comment from Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) who said the release would come soon and that the House Intelligence Committee was to receive the pages on Thursday or Friday. Schiff warned that the committee would received a “redacted report” for release.
The first recommendation of the committee called for the establishment of a Director of National Intelligence (DNI) as expressed in a January 2003 letter to then-Director of Central Intelligence George J. Tenet and signed by Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Bob Graham, House Intelligence Committee Chairman Porter Goss, Senate Intelligence Committee Vice Chairman Richard Shelby, and House Intelligence Committee member Nancy Pelosi.
The letter to Tenet stated in part, “The Joint Inquiry found that prior to September 11 neither the U.S. Government as a whole nor the Intelligence Community had a comprehensive counterterrorist strategy.” The letter calls for the National Security council to establish such a strategy for the President to approve.
Former Sen. Bob Graham was chair of the committee that conducted the joint congressional inquiry and has suggested that the pages could reveal Saudi support of the 9/11 hijackers. He told CNN upon hearing of the impending release of the pages that the release will “increase the questioning of the Saudis’ role supporting the hijackers.”
As Breitbart News previously reported:
In June a group of family members and survivors wrote a letter urging President Barack Obama to declassify the pages. 9/11 victim families and survivors have been locked in a fight to sue Saudi Arabia. The lawsuit accuses that Kingdom of supporting al-Qaeda and its role in carrying out the terror attacks.
Politico noted that “Fifteen of the 19 hijackers on Sept. 11, 2001, were Saudi nationals.”
Some still opposed the release as seen when an effort was made on Tuesday in a meeting of the RNC Republican Platform Committee to include a call for release of the pages, but failed. A former Bush Administration advisor moved to strike the text that had been approved in a subcommittee from the proposed Republican Platform. The effort to include the text had been led by a delegate who worked with North Carolina congressman Walter Jones. Rep. Jones has criticized the relationship between the Bush Administration and the Saudis.
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