Hasan Tied to Mosque of 9/11 Hijackers

A key U.S. senator said Sunday he would begin an investigation into whether the Army missed signs that the man accused of opening fire at Fort Hood had embraced an increasingly extremist view of Islamic ideology.

Sen. Joe Lieberman’s call for the investigation came as word surfaced that Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan apparently attended the same Virginia mosque as two Sept. 11 hijackers in 2001, at a time when a radical imam preached there. Whether Hasan, an Army psychiatrist, associated with the hijackers is something the FBI will probably look into, according to a law enforcement official who spoke on condition of anonymity because the investigation is ongoing.

Days after a gunman killed 13 people at Fort Hood military base in Texas, information surfaced that the suspect, Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, attended the same mosque as two Sept. 11 hijackers in 2001. Hasan held his mother’s funeral at the mosque in Falls Church, Va., that year. He remains hospitalized after the Nov. 5 attack in which 29 others were wounded.

‘A Horrific Outburst’

The man who allegedly killed 13 people and wounded 29 others at the Fort Hood military base in Texas apparently attended the same mosque as two Sept. 11 hijackers in 2001. Army psychiatrist Nidal Malik Hasan held his mother’s funeral at the mosque in Falls Church, Va. Hasan, who was born in Virginia to Palestinian parents, remains in intensive care after the Nov. 5 killing spree.

Classmates participating in a 2007-2008 master’s program at a military college complained repeatedly to superiors about what they considered Hasan’s anti-American views. Dr. Val Finnell said Hasan gave a presentation at the Uniformed Services University that justified suicide bombing and told classmates that Islamic law trumped the U.S. Constitution.

Another classmate said he complained to five officers and two civilian faculty members at the university. He wrote in a command climate survey sent to Pentagon officials that fear in the military of being seen as politically incorrect prevented an “intellectually honest discussion of Islamic ideology” in the ranks. The classmate also requested anonymity because the investigation is ongoing.

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