The bin Ladens who left

Published July 22, 2004 4:40PM (EDT)

Craig Unger on the Bin Laden flight manifests:

"For months we've known that approximately two dozen members of the bin Laden family were among the 142 passengers on the White House-approved Saudi evacuation, but exactly which members of the family were on the flights? This week, Senator Frank Lautenberg(D-NJ) released the passenger list for the September 19, 2001, Boston to Paris flight, showing who was on the flight for the first time. Two names in particular might be of interest to investigators. The documents show that Khalil Binladin boarded in Orlando. According to the German wire service Deutsche Presse-Agentur, Khalil, who had business interests in the Brazilian state of Minas Gerais, had won the attention of Brazilian investigators because of his visits to the Minas Gerais capital, Belo Horizonte, which was allegedly a Hezbollah training center. Another passenger, Omar Awad bin Laden, a nephew of Osama's, lived with his brother Abdullah, who was a key figure in forming the American branch of the World Assembly of Muslim Youth. Federal agents raided WAMY this spring. The FBI has described the group as a 'suspected terrorist organization.'" The documents are on Unger's site.


By Geraldine Sealey

Geraldine Sealey is senior news editor at Salon.com.

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