Saudi Arabia Did 9/11
Strong evidence that Saudi intelligence participated in the most consequential event of our lifetime. Plus, new developments in the victims' families fight for justice.
This is my annual post laying out the evidence that Saudi Arabia is responsible for 9/11. When I first wrote it in 2023, I titled it Saudi Arabia (Likely) Did 9/11. At the time, the evidence pointed to Saudi participation, but it wasn’t conclusive. In 2024, new evidence came to light linking the hijackers’ handler to Saudi intelligence, leading me to drop the “likely” from last year’s title. This year has seen new developments in the ongoing legal fight brought by victims’ families to hold those responsible accountable. Although I expect new revelations to continue as the families fight for justice, even if there are no new developments, I’ll still republish this essay annually. Almost 3,000 innocent Americans were murdered on September 11th, 2001. Not only did our government conduct horrendous violations of human rights in its name, but it has also done everything in its power to prevent the guilty parties from being held to account. We should never forget this betrayal.
Today is the 24th anniversary of the September 11th, the deadliest modern terrorist attack on American soil. It’s a stoic day for our country. From classrooms to Thursday Night Football, Americans will bow their heads in a moment of national silence to commemorate the 2,977 Americans murdered over two decades ago. Though we’ll be asked to remember the victims of the most consequential event in living memory, there is one aspect of September 11th that Americans are encouraged to ignore: The mounting evidence that our ‘ally,’ Saudi Arabia, enabled, funded, and directed the al-Qaeda hijackers.
“The circumstantial evidence (of Saudi involvement in 9/11) has mounted. Given the lapse of time, I don’t know any reason why the truth should be kept from the American people.” — Richard Lambert, lead FBI investigator into 9/111
To be clear, what I’m proposing is a conspiracy theory. There is no smoking-gun evidence that King Abdullah directly ordered the attacks. But there is enough circumstantial evidence that points to significant participation from Saudi Arabia’s intelligence agency. What separates this conspiracy theory from the nutcases — ‘It was an inside job,’ ‘jet fuel can’t melt steel beams,’ etc., etc. — is that there is:
Proof of Saudi participation, and
An open, ongoing attempt by the United States government to shut down any inquiries into the matter.
In August 2002, less than a year after the attacks, survivors and family members of 9/11 victims sued Saudi Arabia and its officials, alleging that they had funded and aided the hijackers.2 Their suit was blocked by the 1976 Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act (FSIA), which prevented Americans from suing foreign governments in federal courts. Though they kept advocating for their cause, they were stonewalled until 2016, when Congress passed the Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act (JASTA). President Obama vetoed the act, but Congress overrode him for the only time in his presidency.3 The JASTA made an exception to the FSIA, saying Americans could sue foreign governments that enabled terrorism.
‘This legislation ensures that those who aid and abet terrorist attacks on U.S. soil are held accountable for their conduct, even if such offenders are foreign sovereigns or their agencies or instrumentalities. The JASTA does so through modest amendments to the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act (FSIA) and the Anti-Terrorism Act (ATA).’ — testimony of Congressional witness Jimmy Gurule4
Able to pursue legal action, the victims’ families asked the American government to declassify documents from the FBI’s Operation Encore, the Bureau’s investigation into potential Saudi involvement. Though President Trump promised the families he would release the name of the Saudi diplomat the FBI had linked to the attackers, he instructed his Attorney General, Bill Barr, to prevent the disclosure, claiming releasing the files would cause “significant harm to national security.”5 To his credit, President Biden declassified a sixteen-page report summarizing the FBI’s findings in 2021. Though partially redacted, the newly released documents confirmed suspicions about Saudi Arabian nationals collaborating with the hijackers. Congress’s 2004 9/11 Commission Report had thrown water on the claims that two Saudi men, diplomat Fahad al-Thumairy and Omar al-Bayoumi, aided the hijackers once they were in America. While Congress claimed there was ‘no evidence that Thumairy assisted the hijackers,’ the FBI found Thumairy had assigned an underling to help two hijackers a year before September 11th, calling them ‘two very significant people.’
It was previously known that Saudi national Omar al-Bayoumi had been in contact with two of the hijackers, Khalid al-Mihdhar and Nawaf al-Hazmi. However, those interactions were falsely categorized as random encounters in a close-knit Muslim immigrant community. Dismissing these connections, Congress dismissed al-Bayoumi as ‘an unlikely candidate for clandestine involvement with Islamic extremists.’ The FBI report refutes this claim, citing a witness who watched al-Bayoumi wait for the hijackers to arrive at a restaurant before having a lengthy conversation with them. Additionally, those close to al-Bayoumi told the FBI he spoke often about a need to ‘take action’ for ‘jihad.’6
While one might consider the Congressional and FBI reports to be equally trustworthy yet contradictory, other sources corroborate the Bureau’s account. As early as the 1990s, law enforcement suspected Al-Bayoumi was an informant for Saudi Arabia’s intelligence agency, the General Intelligence Presidency (GIP). He lived in San Diego, on a monthly stipend from the GPI. Payments stopped abruptly on — you guessed it — September 11th, 2001.7
Officially, Al-Bayoumi was a student at the time, though he seldom attended class. After 9/11, he fled to Saudi Arabia and started working in the Saudi government’s aviation department. (He is presumed to still live there, outside the reach of investigators.) It was later learned that hours before a meeting with al-Mihdhar and al-Hazm, al-Bayoumi visited the Saudi consulate in L.A. There he met with Fahad al-Thumairy. It’s unknown what the two discussed, but Occam’s Razor leads us to believe it was details about how to support the terrorists. al-Thumairy later had his diplomatic passport revoked by the State Department for suspicion of “terrorist activity.”
In June of 2024, the victim’s families pressed for more transparency, asking a federal court to unseal the FBI’s underlying evidence used to create some of the documents Biden declassified. The court released a self-taken video from al-Bayoumi recorded in 1999 and found by British police in al-Bayoumi’s U.K. apartment weeks after 9/11. The video is a narrated tour of landmarks around Washington D.C., in which al-Bayoumi details entrances, exits, and security checkpoints around the capital. He also explains the configuration of the Washington Monument to the Capitol Building, which could serve as an indicator for suicide pilots trying to locate high-value targets from the air. A portion of al-Bayoumi’s scouting video can be seen below.
Though this video was discovered by British police in al-Bayoumi’s U.K. apartment weeks after the attack, it was only disclosed last year. Given this, one has to wonder what other evidence is hidden from the public eye for “national security” concerns. At each step of their investigation into a possible Al-Qaeda—Saudi Arabia link, FBI agents were blocked by both Washington and Riyadh. They were seldom allowed to interview suspected contacts, and while the Bureau’s leaders publicly echoed Washington’s claim that there was no link between the Saudi government and the hijackers, those doing the investigation discovered the opposite. When retired FBI agent Kenneth Williams, who had warned his superiors about a possible hijacking in July of 2001, was asked to testify on behalf of the 9/11 families’ lawsuit, he was threatened by the FBI and the first Trump administration. According to Williams, he was told:
“There is other litigation involving the U.S. government going on, and any cooperation by you may negatively impact that case. The Trump Administration is trying to have good relations with Saudi Arabia, and they do not want you to give a deposition or cooperate with counsel for the families.”
Fearing for his pension, Williams declined to testify. There is good news, however. A few weeks ago, a federal judge in New York rejected Saudi Arabia’s effort to dismiss the latest victims’ families’ lawsuit. Currently, the case is free to advance to a civil trial, which would likely uncover more evidence and bring the plaintiffs closer to their goal. But if the past is prologue, we shouldn’t be surprised if President Donald Trump squashes it under the guise of national security, which he did in his first term.
There’s no mystery why the American government would want to protect Saudi Arabia from being held responsible for 9/11. First is the obvious reason: the Saudis have America, and more specifically, our politicians, over a barrel. Literally.
The Kingdom’s oil production heavily impacts global oil prices, which can sway elections. The Saudis are known to decrease or increase oil production to impact American gas prices to help their preferred candidate. In 2023, Saudi Arabia announced low oil production would continue, ensuring rising oil prices were an issue in the 2024 Presidential election — a clear sign the Kingdom preferred a Donald Trump presidency over a Democrat.8 In May of this year, the Saudis increased production to lower American prices, which Reuters described as an ‘unspoken gift to Trump.’9 With their political fortunes in the palm of the Crown Prince’s hand, it’s no wonder — but still not an excuse — why both parties have acted as the Kingdom’s lawyer.
Additionally, Washington sees Saudi Arabia as a key ally in the Middle East. Saudi Arabia is a long-time adversary of Iran, making them natural coalition partners for American politicians still begrudged by the 1979 Iranian Revolution. There are also five American military bases on Saudi soil, which were key staging points for the Iraq War.10 The Kingdom buys $10.7 billion worth of American armaments every year, making it one of the military industrial complex’s largest customers.11 If that relationship were to be cut off, as would likely happen if the government formally accused Saudi Arabia of a crime, politicians would see their donations from Raytheon and Lockheed Martin dry up and lose a key ally in a rapidly destabilizing region.
As goes without saying, the U.S. government’s refusal to declassify all related documents and let the lawsuits against Saudi Arabia proceed is a slap in the face to the 9/11 victims and their families. But that’s only part of the issue. Since September 11th, 2001, the American Empire has weaponized the lives lost as justification to launch illegal wars, disregard international law, suppress critical speech, attack civil liberties, and assassinate U.S. citizens. Given the government has spent a quarter-century stifling any real efforts to discover who ordered the attacks, it’s fair to say our leaders — both Democrat and Republican — are cynically using the 9/11 victims as propaganda for foreign military endeavors and further restrictions on our rights.
It’s no coincidence that modern America’s worst acts, from invading Iraq to the CIA’s ongoing torture program, were done under the pretext of “stopping the next 9/11.” If it were revealed that the attack was carried out by Saudi Arabia, a nation we have spent the last two decades cozying up to, it would be immediately clear to the American people that every act of “national security” conducted since 2001 wasn’t a well-intentioned attempt at protecting us, but a secondary criminal conspiracy to expand the American Empire. Hence their obstruction.
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In Solidarity — Joe
https://www.propublica.org/article/9-11-investigation-saudi-connections-operation-encore-fbi
https://www.motleyrice.com/anti-terrorism/september-11-litigation
https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/the-press-office/2016/09/23/veto-message-president-s2040
https://docs.house.gov/meetings/JU/JU10/20160714/105212/HHRG-114-JU10-Wstate-GuruleJ-20160714.pdf
https://www.propublica.org/article/attorney-general-barr-refuses-to-release-9-11-documents-to-families-of-the-victims
https://www.npr.org/2021/09/12/1036389448/biden-declassifies-secret-fbi-report-detailing-saudi-nationals-connections-to-9-
https://www.nbcnews.com/investigations/new-video-documents-revive-questions-saudi-role-911-attacks-rcna158768
https://www.axios.com/2023/09/06/oil-prices-saudi-production-elections
https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/saudi-price-war-looks-like-unspoken-gift-trump-bousso-2025-05-15/
https://products.kitsapsun.com/archive/2004/04-25/457408_saudis_secretly_helped_u_s__in_.html
https://www.brookings.edu/articles/its-time-to-stop-us-arms-sales-to-saudi-arabia/
Thanks for this. It was known to those of us watching on the day of 9/11/2001 that Saudi Arabia was likely behind the attacks. UBL was a Saudi, 15/19 hijackers were Saudis... this was all reported contemporaniously. It's literally the thesis of Fahrenheit 9/11 (2004). If you're interested in the topic, I recommend the book The Wahhabi Code.
very interesting! thanks Joe