Talk:Waleed al-Shehri

One Waleed or two?

Hey rmhermen, it's Quadell. Thanks for the changes again; you've added a lot of good info. But there's an inaccuracy, I think, in one change you made, and it's a big one. You took out all caveats about Waleed possibly being alive. In particular, about the LA Times link, you said:

He was not the same individual as the hijacker who came from an impoverished border region of Saudi Arabia and had never finished college or attended flight school.

The trouble is, here's what the BBC says about the living Waleed al-Shehri:

His photograph was released. . . He acknowledges that he attended flight training school at Daytona Beach in the United States, and is indeed the same Waleed Al Shehri to whom the FBI has been referring.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/1559151.stm

The man whose picture is on this article, the man named Waleed al-Shehri, who lived in the U.S. and trained to fly planes in Daytona, who has a brother named Wail M. al-Shehri -- that man is alive. (Obviously, that man wasn't on Flight 11.) The picture, and some of the details (e.g. flight school, possibly the name), do not refer to the hijacker.

So it's very confusing. If we had the airport security photos it would help clear things up. Anyway, certainly the article needs to be accurate about all this. I'd like to work with you to iron it out.

Quadell (talk) 23:02, Jul 26, 2004 (UTC)

I did spot a problem where some of the life history of the second Waleed was claimed as the hijackers. I think I have correct it. Such initial confusion about details of the hijackers and even misidentification of some of them was common. We just didn't notice and update these facts.

I don't beleive any of the next three paragraphs is currently beleived to be true or at least not in reference to the hijacker.

Al-Shehri was living in Florida since 1995 at the latest. He trained at Daytona Beach flight school, in Daytona Beach, and received his pilot's license in 1997. Some sources claim he lived with fellow-hijacker Ahmed al-Ghamdi during this time.

[1] (http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/timeline/2001/telegraph092001.html) - (couldn't tell what this refered to unless it is the Washington Post article commented on below) [2] (http://www.sundayherald.com/18498) -(very early source which claims Waleed was using the alias Wail which is actually his brother's name) [3] (http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/timeline/2001/bostonglobe091401.html)

In 1999, al-Shehri and al-Ghamdi rented a house in Vienna, Virginia, just three blocks from a local CIA headquarters. Many of their neighbors called the CIA several times that year to report suspicious activity, but this was never acted on. The CIA is required to notify the FBI of this sort of domestic information, but this also was apparently not done.

[4] (http://www.amanaonline.com/Articles/art_122.htm) [5] (http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/timeline/2001/msnbc092301b.html) [6] (http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/timeline/2001/nydailynews091501.html) [7] (http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/timeline/2002/foxnews060602.html)

Some sources report that al-Shehri "at times" stayed at lead hijacker Mohammed Atta's apartment in Hamburg, Germany at some period 1998 and 2001.[8] (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/nation/graphics/attack/hijackers.html) (this source confuses three different people's detail as Waleed and has mistakes on other hijackers details as well.)

In many countries it is common for families to reuse names. I am would not be surprised to find dozens of men named Waleed al-Shehri. That doesn't mean that the hijacker wasn't also named that. From the third link in the section on the other Waleed

Washington Post (September 25, 2001)[9] (http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn?pagename=article&node=&contentId=A19549-2001Sep24&notFound=true) - "Among the alleged hijackers whose origins seem to be clear are:...Wael and Waleed M. Alshehri, brothers who were aboard American Airlines Flight 11, the plane that hit the World Trade Center's North Tower...The brothers' pictures matched those released by the FBI, the Arab News reported. Their father, Mohammed Ali Asgley Al Shehri, a businessman, told Al Watan that his son Wael, 25, had psychological problems and had gone to Medina in December with his brother Waleed, 21, to seek help from religious officials for this problem. He said that they did not return from the trip and that he had not heard from them since...The paper cited sources close to the family as saying that both men had become very religious before disappearing and had spoken of joining Muslim fighters in Chechnya. The sources said the brothers spoke limited English. Previous reports that Waleed Alshehri was the son of a Saudi diplomat have been denied."

What is the source of the second picture you added? Are you claiming that it is a second photo of the hijacker or a photo of a second Waleed? I have not seen any picture of this non-hijacker Waleed. Is there any reason to beleive that his is the picture released by the FBI? If the FBI picture really was the living Waleed I would expect some media to have shown the two pictures together so we all could see the mistake. Is there such an article? Didn't the FBI pictures come from passports and so it would have been difficult to get into the country using someone else's picture. I haven't seen any claim that the living Waleed has brother Wail, could you point me in the direction of one? Just because someone cliam that they are the one the FBI is refering to, doesn't mean they are correct. If someone with my name committed a crime and received publicity, I might find initially beleive that it refered to me but that doesn't mean that there isn't a different person with my name and a different life history out there. Rmhermen 19:41, Jul 27, 2004 (UTC)

My source for the second picture is here (http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/timeline.jsp?timeline=complete_911_timeline&startpos=150#a1999orrinstreet), at the Center for Cooperative Research (http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/index.jsp). Unfortunately, they don't credit the pic. They simply say the pic is of Waleed al-Shehri. (It looks like the same person to me.) It seems to have been taken before the attack.

I haven't seen a picture of the non-hijacker Waleed since the attacks, and I really wish I had one. That would clear this up.

I don't know if the famous pic, the one we have, is of the living or the dead Waleed. (The FBI released the pics early on, when much of the info they gave about "Waleed" was about the non-hijacker. So it's plausible that they got the photo wrong too.) I don't think the FBI said where the pictures came from, but they look like ID photos, which would strongly indicate the pic is of the hijacker.

But the BBC article (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/1559151.stm) seems say that the living Waleed was the guy in the pic. But they could be mistaken about that. Read the article and see what you think.

(I think that this administration's over-reliance on secrecy is just fanning the conspiracy flames. But that's just my opinion.) Quadell (talk) 14:33, Jul 28, 2004 (UTC)

That last is certainly not your oponion alone. I wish that they would address these issues more clearly. I think the FBI-released photos are supposed to have come from visa applications. Could that be correct? Ready other material it appears that at least two different families initially claimed that the photo was of their son. Rmhermen 16:28, Jul 28, 2004 (UTC)

Many conspiracy sites claim that some hijackers are still alive. Please note these articles

This has been refuted by many sources. For example the ABC story states that there is another Ahmed Alnami who is ten years younger, and appears to be dead, according to his father. [ABC News, 3/15/02] There is a second pair of Saudi brothers named Wail and Waleed M. Their father says they've been missing since December 2000. [ABC News, 3/15/02, Arab News, 9/17/01]

During the Dateline NBC Aug 25 article: They had an exclusive interview with brother of two hijackers Wail al Shahiri, and Waleed al Shahiri. NBC went to Saudi Arabia.

Also see this article regarding the BBC's incorrect information http://service.spiegel.de/cache/international/spiegel/0,1518,265160,00.html

The BBC (amd other reports) were based on articles in Arab newspapers, such as the Arab News, an English-language Saudi newspaper. Managing Editor John Bradley stated that the "reporters did not speak directly with the "survivors," and that the photographs quickly resolved the nonsense about surviving terrorists. Another reporter where these stories originated (Asharq Al-Awsat newspaper reporter named Mohammed Samman), confirms this. Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Organizers_of_the_September_11%2C_2001_attacks"