Bush met with Bin Laden family??

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Bush met with Bin Laden family??
62
Sun, 06-27-2004 - 8:26pm
Someone on another board just posted that George HW. Bush met with Bin Laden family the day before 911 and the morning of 911?!?!?!! Why in the world would he have a meeting with them? What are his ties to them? I wonder if they warned him that Osama was planning something? I had heard in the past that Osama was estranged from his family. I wonder if he called and warned them that he was going to do something big or something??? I have always respected (although disagreed with) Bush Sr. and this sorta surprised me.................

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iVillage Member
Registered: 06-27-2004
Sun, 06-27-2004 - 8:30pm
The Bush family has billion dollar ties with the Bin Ladens. Also with the Sauds. He allowed many members of Saudi Arabian royalty to exit America after 9/11, while most other flights were grounded.
iVillage Member
Registered: 04-03-2003
Sun, 06-27-2004 - 9:23pm
The ties are understandable, and unsurprising. Oil families have relationships, it's no more complex or conspiratorial than that. OBL has a very wide, oil-interested extended family, and it was some of this extended family which is familiar with the Bush's. The Saudi royal family is much the same, as it also has a deep interest in oil. Why is it surprising that various families with long-term oil-interests are known to each other?

"He allowed many members of Saudi Arabian royalty to exit America after 9/11, while most other flights were grounded."

That's a fallacy. They left on September 13th, the day our airspace was reopened.

http://www.snopes.com/rumors/flight.htm

Additionally, the 9/11 Commission investigating the events of 9/11 and related issues found that there was "no credible evidence that any chartered flights of Saudi Arabian nationals departed the United States before the reopening of national airspace".


~mark~

iVillage Member
Registered: 05-11-2004
Sun, 06-27-2004 - 9:25pm
Yes it's true. The meeting was for the Carlyle Group, I believe or possibly one of the other groups the Bin Ladens were involved with.

iVillage Member
Registered: 04-03-2003
Sun, 06-27-2004 - 9:27pm
The FBI determined through interviews and questioning the bin Ladens here in the US that they had no knowledge of the events of 9/11, the location of OBL or of his involvement (if any) in the 9/11 attacks.

As for why Bush would meet with them, they're a relatively wealthy Saudi family, with oil interests much the same as the Saudi royal family. And it needs to be mentioned that we're talking about a very extended family here, not the brothers, etc. of OBL himself. It's also worth mentioning that they had formally disowned OBL before any of this occured.


~mark~

iVillage Member
Registered: 05-11-2004
Sun, 06-27-2004 - 9:39pm
"The FBI determined through interviews and questioning the bin Ladens here in the US that they had no knowledge of the events of 9/11, the location of OBL or of his involvement (if any) in the 9/11 attacks."

Just how thoroughly they were questioned is a matter of debate. 24 members of the Bin Laden family were questioned in less then 48 hours and put on planes out of the country. And keep in mind the Bin Ladens were scattered around the country and had to be collected in one place first.

"And it needs to be mentioned that we're talking about a very extended family here, not the brothers, etc. of OBL himself. It's also worth mentioning that they had formally disowned OBL before any of this occured."

And it needs to be mentioned that some of this "very extended" family was known to have been at the marriage of Bin Laden's son just a month prior to 9/11. To what degree the Bin Laden family had disowned and cut off contact with Osama is also a matter of debate.


Edited 6/27/2004 9:42 pm ET ET by dublingrl

iVillage Member
Registered: 04-03-2003
Sun, 06-27-2004 - 10:13pm
Fair enough I suppose. For the record, I wasn't saying that it was all thoroughly cut and dried, just that it wasn't necessarily as conspiratorial or questionable as many people have made it all out to be.

~mark~

iVillage Member
Registered: 05-11-2004
Sun, 06-27-2004 - 10:40pm
"Fair enough I suppose. For the record, I wasn't saying that it was all thoroughly cut and dried, just that it wasn't necessarily as conspiratorial or questionable as many people have made it all out to be."


I'll split a hair with ya ;)It may not have been conspiratorial but it was definitely questionable.

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Mon, 06-28-2004 - 6:55am
Thanks to both of you for filling in the blanks. Not quite sure where I was when all of this was revealed.
iVillage Member
Registered: 06-16-2004
Mon, 06-28-2004 - 11:01am
Correct. They did not leave during the grounding, but the day it was lifted. However the issue is that they were not properly questioned before leaving. That is troubling. And one of those was a brother of Bin Laden, not just extended family.


Edited 6/28/2004 11:04 am ET ET by nicecanadianlady
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-27-2003
Mon, 06-28-2004 - 2:03pm
This stuff has been discredited entirely. Richard Clark is as critical of the Bush administration as anyone can be and he is on record (in his book and to the 9/11 commission) that he personally was the one that gave clearance for the Bin Ladens to leave the country. M. Moore has claimed Bush had something to do with getting them out of the country, which in entirely untrue. Clark stated he had the authority to make this decision and made that decision himself without consulting anyone else within the administration. He said his only criteria for letting them leave (after normal air service resumed) was getting the “thumbs up” from the FBI that they had been questioned properly, which the FBI gave.

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