Obama leads 9/11 memorial as anniversary is marked worldwide with reflection
Former Malaysian premier says 9/11 was not the work of Arab Muslims
Ten years later: Paying tribute to the forgotten Arab victims of 9/11
9/11 a decade on: a time of reflection for the US, and the world
US wary of ‘credible but unconfirmed’ terrorism threat ahead of 9/11 anniversary
US searching for two Americans suspected of 9/11 anniversary attack plot
11 September 2011
Ten years later: Paying tribute to the forgotten Arab victims of 9/11
Throughout the 10 years that followed the September 11 attacks in New York and Washington hardly anyone heard about the Arab victims of that massive terrorist attack that claimed the lives of 3,000 civilians.
It is not clear why they have been neglected. Perhaps it is because there were few of them, and because marginalization has always been their destiny.
Regardless of the reason, the fact remains that not one single file contains information on all of the Arabs who were killed that day. This article documents these forgotten martyrs.
Very little was mentioned of the only Muslim among the Arab victim, a Yemeni named Abdul Salam al-Melahi, whose name was only mentioned once, in the February 10, 2002, issue of the New York Times.
According to the story, Melahi, who was 37 when he was killed in the attacks, was an audio-visual engineer at the Marriot located in the North Tower of the World Trade Center. He was working on bringing his wife and two children to live with him in New York when the attack took place.
A photograph of Melahi was posted on the image-hosting website Flickr, and 21 people, among them three Arabs, commented about his bravery and how he sacrificed his life to save others. They also wondered why he was not paid tribute to in Yemen or the United States.
One of the most moving comments was that of his son Malek and his cousin Jamila.
According to a former Lebanese Consul in New York, Hassan Nijm, whom I met 13 days after the attacks, four Lebanese who immigrated to the United States were killed in the attacks.
Boutros al-Hashem, known as Peter, immigrated at the age of five to the United States in 1969 with his parents and seven siblings.
Hashem was flying with his sister Rose from Boston, where he worked as production manager in Teradyne and where he lived with his wife and cousin, Rita al-Hashem, and his two sons. While he was at the airport waiting for the plane that would take him to Los Angeles, his sister called to say she was not joining him, so he flew on his own to his destiny.
On the same flight was Walid Iskander, another Lebanese, who did not know Hashem. He lived in London and was getting ready for his wedding, which was scheduled to take place in June 2002. He travelled to Boston with his South African fiancée to visit his sister who lived there.
In Boston, the couple decided to fly to Los Angeles to attend the wedding of a relative, but they agreed that he would go first and she would catch up with him in three days. Like Hashem, he flew alone to his death.
Iskander was born in 1967 in Beirut and was brought up in Kuwait. He obtained a degree in engineering from Harvard, then worked for a company called Monitor Consulting. He later became a partner in the company and oversaw its London office.
Joud Moussa worked as a bond trader at Cantor Fitzgerald, which had its offices on floors 101-105 of One World Trade Center. The company’s headquarters were very close to the impact point of one of the suicide planes, and all of the Cantor Fitzgerald employees are work that morning died, including Moussa, who was 35.
Moussa immigrated to the United States in 1984, and his family immigrated years later to the island of Guadalupe in the Caribbean. He used to call his mother every morning, and did the same on the day of the attacks, 15 minutes before his death. His mother and father went back to live in their village in Lebanon in 2008.
No pictures are available for the fourth Lebanese who died in the attacks and whose name was mentioned by the former American ambassador in Lebanon. His name was Robert Dirani and the information available about him does not exceed the fact that he was a 34-year-old lawyer and that he headed to the World Trade Center at 8 a.m. for an appointment in one of the companies in the building. His body has never been found.
Albert al-Alfi is the only Egyptian among the Arab victims. He was a Canadian citizen and lived in Toronto. After marrying an Egyptian he met in Cairo, he received an offer from Cantor Fitzgerald and the couple moved to New York.
Alfi, who was 30 years old at the time, died before his daughter was born.
Robert Elias Talhami, a Jordanian, was also killed in Cantor Fitzgerald, where he worked as a broker on the 104th floor.
Talhami was born in Pakistan, and his family immigrated to the United States when he was seven years old. They later moved to Venezuela, where his dad worked in an engineering projects company.
In Caracas, Robert finished his post-graduate studies then went returned to the United States. He worked in Tokyo from 1994 until 2001, then returned to work and live in New York, where he died, leaving a widow and two boys.
Another Jordanian was Ramzi Dowani, who was 35 years old when he died in his office at Marsh & McLennan on the 100th floor.
When Dowani, who worked as a financial auditor, arrived at his office on the morning of September 11, he wrote an email to his parents and some of his friends to tell them he was back to New York from a business trip.
Dowani was born in Amman to Palestinian parents. He finished boarding school in London, then immigrated to the United States, where he majored in business administration and graduated in 1992. He worked in several companies before ending up in the company where he met his death.
Dowani was known for his benevolence. He took care of a sick woman for a long time and hosted a family friend who was going through financial troubles in his apartment for two years. Dozens travelled to Amman to take part in his funeral in a church in Amman, but there was no burial ceremony, because his body was never found.
Four Americans of Lebanese origin died in the attacks and their names were released by the Lady of Lebanon Maronite Church in Brooklyn. Joudi Safi was a 24-year-old broker at Cantor Fitzgerald, and his paternal grandfather immigrated to the United States from the district of Keserwan in the Mount Lebanon Governorate.
Katherine Carmen Gharib, a 41-year-old marketing manager, was attending a conference in the World Trade Center. She was a single mother of one daughter.
Mark Hindi, who was 28, he worked as a broker for Cantor Fitzgerald, and Jacqueline Sayegh, who was 34, died on the 107th floor, where she was setting tables in the Windows on the World restaurant. Six months earlier she had married married an American co-worker.
In addition to these Arabs, the archives Al Arabiya checked show that a total of 32 Muslims were killed in the attacks: 26 men and six women. They came from Pakistan, Bangladesh, Guyana, Sri Lanka, Gambia, Ivory Coast, Iran, Turkey, Ethiopia, Trinidad and Tobago, Burma, Albania, Greece, and India.
http://english.alarabiya.net/articles/2011/09/11/166285.html
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Former Malaysian premier says 9/11 was not the work of Arab Muslims
The long-serving former Malaysian premier Mahathir Mohamad says Arab Muslims are incapable of carrying out the 9/11 attacks on the United States that killed nearly 3,000 people.
The ageing firebrand, who was in power in Malaysia at the time of the attacks and stepped down in 2003 after 22 years in power, slammed former US president George W. Bush ahead of the 10-year anniversary Sunday of 9/11.
Washington blames the attacks on al-Qaeda.
“Bush lied about Saddam’s weapons of mass destruction… If they can lie so as to kill Iraqis, Afghans and American soldiers, it is not unthinkable for Bush & Co. to lie about who was responsible for 9/11,” the 86-year-old wrote in his blog Friday.
Listing out reasons in line with a conspiracy theory that the US government was behind the attacks, he wrote the Twin Towers in New York “came down nicely upon themselves”.
“I believe Arab Muslims are angry enough to sacrifice their lives and become suicide bombers. But they or their handlers do not strike me as capable of planning and strategising such attacks so as to maximise the damage to the enemy,” he said.
Mahathir, a fierce critic of the West, is known for his anti-Jewish and anti-American statements in Muslim-majority Malaysia.
Last year, he said if the US could make the 3D science fiction film Avatar, “they can make anything”, adding there was strong evidence that the 9/11 attacks were staged.
He has also condemned Bush and then-British prime minister Tony Blair as “child killers” and “war criminals”, saying they should be put on trial for the military invasion of Iraq.
http://english.alarabiya.net/articles/2011/09/11/166314.html
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US President Barack Obama arrived in New York Sunday to take part in ceremonies marking the 10th anniversary of September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States.
Obama will visit the Ground Zero site of the felled World Trade Center towers to pay homage to about 3,000 people who perished in the attacks.
On Saturday, Obama vowed that the United States would never waver in its fight against terrorism.
“Ten years ago, ordinary Americans showed us the true meaning of courage when they rushed up those stairwells, into those flames, into that cockpit,” the president said in his radio and Internet address.
“We will protect the country we love and pass it safer, stronger and more prosperous to the next generation,” he added.
Worldwide reflection, prayers
A mother in Malaysia greeted her dead son. People in Manila left roses for the victim who helped give them homes. And mourners in Tokyo stood before a piece of steel from ground zero, remembering the 23 bank employees who never made it out alive.
A decade after 9/11, the day that changed so much for so many people, the world’s leaders and citizens paused to reflect Sunday. But there were also those ─ including a former Malaysian prime minister ─ who reiterated old claims that the US government itself was behind the attacks.
From Sydney to Spain, formal ceremonies paid tribute to the nearly 3,000 who perished from more than 90 countries. And, in a reminder that threats remain, Swedish police said four people were arrested Sunday on suspicion of preparing a terror attack, as authorities in Washington and New York beefed up security in response to intelligence about possible plans for a car bomb attack.
For some people, the pain never stops. In Malaysia, Pathmawathy Navaratnam woke up Sunday in her suburban Kuala Lumpur home and did what she’s done every day for the past decade: wish her son Vijayashanker Paramsothy “Good morning.”
The 23-year-old financial analyst was killed in the attacks on New York.
“He is my sunshine. He has lived life to the fullest, but I can’t accept that he is not here anymore,” said Navaratnam. “I am still living, but I am dead inside.”
In Manila, dozens of former shanty dwellers offered roses, balloons and prayers for another 9/11 victim, American citizen Marie Rose Abad. The neighborhood used to be a shantytown that reeked of garbage. But in 2004, Abad’s Filipino-American husband Rudy built 50 brightly colored homes, fulfilling his late wife’s wish to help impoverished Filipinos.
The village has since been named after her.
“It’s like a new life sprang from the death of Marie Rose and so many others,” said villager Nancy Waminal.
Players from the American Eagles rugby team were among the first to mark the anniversary at a memorial service in the town of New Plymouth in New Zealand. The players, who are participating in the Rugby World Cup tournament, listened to a speech by US ambassador David Huebner, whose brother Rick survived the attacks on the World Trade Center.
“We watched live on television the brutal murder of 3,000 individuals,” Huebner said. “We reacted with near unanimous horror and sadness.”
The Sept. 11 attacks spawned many conspiracy theories around the world, especially among Islamists who allege American or Israeli involvement.
Malaysia’s former Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad, a vitriolic critic of the West, wrote on his blog that Arab Muslims are incapable of “planning and strategizing” such attacks. He added “it is not unthinkable” for former President George W. Bush to have lied about who was responsible for 9/11.
He wrote that the World Trade Center twin towers “came down nicely upon themselves” and looked more like “planned demolition of buildings” than collapse, he wrote.
In Pakistan, supporters of an Islamist political party staged anti-US protests to mark the anniversary, holding up banners that repeated conspiracy theories. The protests by about 100 people were held in the capital Islamabad and Multan city.
But little attention was paid to such events and comments on a day dominated by sorrow and pain of the memories.
In Japan, families gathered in Tokyo to pay their respects to the 23 Fuji Bank employees who never made it out of their World Trade Center office. A dozen of the workers who died were Japanese.
One by one, family members laid flowers in front of an enclosed glass case containing a small section of steel retrieved from Ground Zero. They clasped their hands and bowed their heads. Some took pictures. Others simply stood in solemn silence. There were no tears, just reflection.
Sydney resident Rae Tompsett, 81, said she’s never felt angry over the murder of her son Stephen Tompsett, 39, a computer engineer who was on the 106th floor of the World Trade Center’s north tower when it was hit by a hijacked plane.
“No, not anger,” she said. “Sorrow. Sorrow that the people who did this believed they were doing something good.”
The retired school teacher and her husband Jack, 92, were among more than 1,000 people who packed Sydney’s Roman Catholic cathedral St. Marys for a special multi-faith service.
“It’s incredible that it is 10 years – it feels a bit like yesterday,” Tompsett said.
At a commemoration at The Grosvenor Chapel in London, Courtney Cowart, who was nearly buried alive when the north tower of the World Trade Center collapsed, described her fears when she returned to the site for a church service five days later.
“Entering the heart of darkness, I was terrified. We were dwarfed by immense wreckage looming around us. It was a landscape drained of all color,” she said.
Elsewhere in Europe, Pope Benedict XVI, at an outdoor Mass in Ancona, Italy, prayed for victims and urged the world to resist what he called the “temptation toward hatred” and instead work for solidarity, justice and peace.
In Paris, where an array of commemorations were planned, an association of French “friends” of America was preparing to unveil a temporary nine-story scaled-down replica of the Twin Towers bearing the victims’ names across.
About 150 people, some waving American flags, turned out in Madrid for a commemorative planting of 10 American oak trees in Juan Carlos I park by crown Prince Felipe, his wife Princess Letizia, and other dignitaries.
Rome was preparing to light up the Colosseum late Sunday in a show of solidarity, and special commemorations were planned at Paris’ Notre Dame Cathedral and London’s St. Paul’s Cathedral.
Meanwhile, authorities in New York and Washington are increasing security for their 9/11 memorial services after intelligence agents got a tip that three al-Qaida members could be planning to set off a car bomb in one of the cities. Officials have found no evidence any terrorists have sneaked into the country.
The Taliban marked the anniversary by vowing to keep fighting against US forces in Afghanistan and saying they had no role in the Sept. 11 attacks.
“Each year, 9/11 reminds the Afghans of an event in which they had no role whatsoever,” a statement e-mailed to news organizations said. “American colonialism shed the blood of tens of thousands of miserable and innocent Afghans.”
Hours later, a Taliban suicide bomber in a large truck blew it up at the gate of a NATO combat outpost in eastern Afghanistan, killing two civilians and injuring 77 US troops. None of the US injuries were life-threatening, the Atlantic alliance said.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, at his Cabinet’s weekly meeting on Sunday, said Islamic terrorism continued to threaten Israel and urged democracies to “act together against this blight.”
“It is clear that this threat will be incomparably larger if radical Islamic forces or regimes acquire the ultimate weapon ─ weapons of mass destruction ─ and then terrorists will stand together and will be able to act under the nuclear umbrella of a radical regime, or even with tools of mass destruction given to them,” Netanyahu said.
The US and its allies invaded Afghanistan on Oct. 7, 2001, after the Taliban who then ruled the country refused to hand over the Sept. 11 mastermind Osama bin Laden. The al-Qaeda leader was at the time living in Afghanistan, where the terror network retained training camps and planned attacks against the US and other countries. Bin Laden was killed four months ago at his Pakistan hideout by US forces.
“Now that Osama bin Laden is dead, my brother’s soul will finally rest in peace,” said Yambem Laba, whose younger brother Jupiter Yambem was among the victims.
Jupiter, an Indian, was manager at the “Roof of the World Restaurant in the World Trade Center.
About 100 family members and close friends gathered at his ancestral home in the northeastern state of Manipur for prayers Sunday.
“Osama is dead but the threat from al-Qaeda has not ended,” Laba said.
http://english.alarabiya.net/articles/2011/09/11/166372.html
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President Barack Obama on Thursday ordered a redoubling of US counter-terrorism efforts in the face of a “credible but unconfirmed” threat ahead of the 10th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks.
President Barack Obama on Thursday ordered a redoubling of US counter-terrorism efforts in the face of a “credible but unconfirmed” threat ahead of the 10th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks.
US officials, speaking to Reuters on condition of anonymity, said the threat involved Washington D.C. and New York City, which were targeted in al-Qaeda attacks a decade ago this Sunday that killed nearly 3,000 people.
A law enforcement source said a manhunt was underway for two or three suspects. One person familiar with the matter said they were suspected of having links to al-Qaeda.
But the officials used strong caveats when discussing the threat information privately, with a national security official cautioning that experts thought the threat would ultimately not check out.
New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg also stressed that the threat had not been corroborated, even as he announced heightened security measures “some of which you may notice, some of which you may not notice.”
“There is no reason for any of the rest of us to change anything in our daily routines,” he told a news conference.
Still, Bloomberg asked citizens to report suspicious or dangerous activity, adding: “Over the next three days we should all keep our eyes wide open.”
The White House said Obama was briefed on specific threat information on Thursday morning, and noted that the US government had already “enhanced its security posture” ahead of the anniversary.
“Nevertheless, the President directed the counterterrorism community to redouble its efforts in response to this credible but unconfirmed information,” a White House official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
“Hyper-vigilant”White House spokesman Jay Carney said “we’re hyper-vigilant to this specific report that’s just coming in.” He told MSNBC television that the US government was taking all necessary precautions, without offering details.
Documents discovered in Osama Bin Laden’s compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan, after he was killed in a raid in May by Navy SEALs, highlighted his persistent interest in attacking the United States around the anniversary of the 2001 attacks. But it is unclear if the plans ever evolved beyond aspiration.
“As we know from the intelligence gathered following the Osama Bin Laden raid, al-Qaeda has showed an interest in important dates and anniversaries, such as 9/11,” said Jan Fedarcyk with the FBI’s New York field office.
Bloomberg said he spoke with the head of New York’s public transportation authority, which was hiking security. He added: “For the record, I plan to take the subway tomorrow morning.”
New York City Police Commissioner Ray Kelly announced measures including more bag inspections on the subway, more bomb-sniffing dogs on patrol and increased deployment of radiation monitoring equipment.
“There will be increased focus on tunnels and bridges and infrastructure in general, as well as landmark locations, houses of worship and government buildings,” he said.
The US Department of Homeland Security, which said only last week that there was no credible information that al-Qaeda was plotting an attack around the Sept. 11 anniversary, declined to offer details on the threat.
It cautioned that there were always threat reports before important dates like the anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks.
“Sometimes this reporting is credible and warrants intense focus, other times it lacks credibility and is highly unlikely to be reflective of real plots under way,” spokesman Matt Chandler said.
“Regardless, we take all threat reporting seriously, and we have taken, and will continue to take all steps necessary to mitigate any threats that arise.”
A second law-enforcement source played down an ABC News report about missing rental trucks — saying the vehicles had been recovered and there was no connection to terrorism.
http://english.alarabiya.net/articles/2011/09/09/166018.html
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Current weather forecasts for New York are for a possible rainy start to the 9/11 weekend.
But for those who remember the morning of September 11, 2001, inclement weather might come as a welcome antidote to flashbacks of the glorious blue skies that brightened the city on a day that was about to become one of the nation’s darkest.
Whatever the weather, the 10th anniversary of the terror attacks that killed 2,977 will be a time of national and international reflection.
In New York, Washington and Shanksville, Pennsylvania, somber ceremonies will mark the sites where the four hijacked planes brought fiery deaths to so many.
At the World Trade Center site, there will be moments of silence to signal the times of impact of each plane: at 8:46 a.m, 9.03 a.m., 9.37 a.m. and 10.03 a.m.
Additional silences will be observed at 9.59 a.m. and 10.28 a.m, when the South and North Towers fell.
Families will read out the names of the victims, including the six who died in the 1993 attack on the towers. And when darkness falls, two beams of light will shine overnight as symbols of the fallen buildings.
Two new 9/11 memorials will open, too.
The National 9/11 Memorial, with waterfalls pouring into the footprints of the towers and with the names of the dead listed around the pools, will be shown to the families on the day of the anniversary and will open to the public on September 12.
In Shanksville, officials will dedicate the Flight 93 National Memorial, built to honor the hijacked passengers whose plane crashed into an open field there after they struggled with the hijackers.
The reading of names and the light beams will be familiar from earlier anniversary ceremonies. But the bustling construction site that the families see will be vastly different from the vacant pit in which they gathered the first year after the attacks.
After years of controversy over what, and even whether, to rebuild on the site, One World Trade Center has risen to become the tallest building in Lower Manhattan, at 961 feet above street level.
Below ground, work continues on the seven-story deep 9/11 Museum, due to open on the next 9/11 anniversary, in 2012.
The surrounding neighborhood on the southern tip of Manhattan is resurrecting itself, too. In spite of predictions that businesses and residents would desert what was seen as a toxic wasteland, downtown Manhattan has become a vibrant urban hotspot that no longer shuts down when Wall Street does.
Sunday, September 11 – an official national Day of Remembrance known as Patriot Day since December 2001 – will be a time to look back over a decade but also to look forward.
In the 10 years since the attacks, the world has changed immeasurably.
American-led forces ousted the Taliban government in Afghanistan and ended Saddam Hussein’s reign in Iraq. The ongoing wars recalibrated global geopolitics, with nations like Turkey and Pakistan taking on new strategic roles.
Travelers who once breezed through airport metal detectors have become accustomed to removing shoes, belts and liquids before boarding their flights.
Americans, largely isolated from the specter of terror attacks before 2001, have been forced to adapt to now-familiar subway searches, patdowns, security cameras and other erosions of cherished civil liberties.
What 9/11 has meant for the American mind-set a decade on could be glimpsed in the public celebrations that erupted in cities throughout the country late on the night of May 1, when President Barack Obama announced that American commandos had found and killed Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden in Pakistan.
Ceremonies marking the 10th anniversary might resurrect some of the post-attack trauma they felt a decade ago, but for most the pain will pass quickly, said Gary Alan Fine, a sociology professor at Chicago’s Northwestern University and an expert on collective memory.
“It will be sort of a psychic moment to take stock of where we are and where we’re going,” Fine said. “In a sense it will be a bookend, almost a moment of closure.”
http://english.alarabiya.net/articles/2011/09/03/165256.html
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US searching for two Americans suspected of 9/11 anniversary attack plot
Al-Qaeda may have sent American terrorists or men carrying US travel documents to launch an attack on Washington or New York to coincide with memorials marking the 10th anniversary of 9/11, government officials say.
One US official says al-Qaeda dispatched three men, at least two of whom could be US citizens, to detonate a car bomb in one of the cities. Should that mission prove impossible, the attackers have been told to simply cause as much destruction as they can.
Word that al-Qaeda had ordered the mission reached US officials midweek. A CIA informant who has proved reliable in the past approached intelligence officials overseas to say that the men had been ordered by newly minted al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahri to mark the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks Sunday by doing harm on US soil.
The tipster says the would-be attackers are of Arab descent and may speak Arabic as well as English. Counterterrorism officials were looking for certain names associated with the threat, but it was unclear whether the names were real or fake.
Counterterrorism officials have been working around the clock to determine whether the threat is accurate, but so far, have been unable to corroborate it, the officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss the investigation.
In the meantime, extra security was put in place to protect the people in the two cities that took the brunt of the jetliner attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people at the World Trade Center and the Pentagon a decade ago. It was the worst terror assault in US history, and al-Qaeda has long dreamed of striking again to mark the anniversary. But it could be weeks before the intelligence community can say whether this particular threat is real.
Undaunted by talk of a new terror threat, New Yorkers and Washingtonians wove among police armed with assault rifles and waited with varying degrees of patience at security checkpoints Friday.
Security worker Eric Martinez wore a pin depicting the twin towers on his lapel as he headed to work in lower Manhattan where he also worked 10 years ago when the towers came down. “If you’re going to be afraid, you’re just going to stay home,” he said.
Mayor Michael Bloomberg, too, made a point of taking the subway to City Hall.
Briefed on the threat Friday morning, President Barack Obama instructed his security team to take “all necessary precautions,” the White House said. Obama still planned to travel to New York on Sunday to mark the 10th anniversary with stops that day at the Pentagon and Shanksville, Pa.
The intelligence community regularly receives tips and information of this nature. But the timing of this particular threat had officials especially concerned, because it was the first “active plot” that came to light as the country marked the significant anniversary, a moment that was also significant to al-Qaeda, according to information gleaned in May from Osama bin Laden’s compound.
The US government has long known that terrorists see the 10th anniversary of 9/11 and other uniquely American dates as opportunities to strike. Officials have also been concerned that some may see this anniversary as an opportunity to avenge bin Laden’s death.
Britain, meanwhile, warned its citizens who are traveling to the US that there was a potential for new terror attacks that could include “places frequented by expatriates and foreign travelers.”
Acutely aware of these factors, law enforcement around the country had already increased security measures at airports, nuclear plants, train stations and more in the weeks leading up to Sept. 11. The latest threat, potentially targeting New York or Washington, prompted an even greater security surge in those cities. US embassies and consulates abroad had also boosted their vigilance in preparation for the anniversary.
At Penn Station in New York, transit authority police carried assault rifles and wore helmets and bullet proof vests as they watched crowds of commuters. Police searched passengers’ bags as they entered the subway, and National Guard troops in camouflage fatigues moved among riders, eyeing packages.
In Washington, Police Chief Cathy Lanier warned that unattended cars parked in suspicious locations or near critical buildings and structures would be towed.
Speaking in New York, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said there was “a specific, credible but unconfirmed report that al-Qaida, again, is seeking to harm Americans and in particular, to target New York and Washington.”
http://english.alarabiya.net/articles/2011/09/10/166214.html
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