How Al-Qaeda Financed The 9/11 Hijackers Over Nearly 2 Years

The September 11, 2001, attacks on the twin towers in the United States were funded through a network of bank transfers, cash, cards and other financial channels used by the 19 hijackers and their facilitators.

The 9/11 plotters spent somewhere between $400,000 and $500,000 to plan and conduct their attack, according to the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States.

According to the CIA estimate, al-Qaeda needed about $30 million every year to run its activities before 9/11. Almost all of this money reportedly came from donations and fundraising networks.

One of the latest known transfers took place on September 6, 2001, just five days before the attacks. 

Fayez Rashid Ahmed Hassan al-Qadi Banihammad, who was involved in the hijacking of United Airlines Flight 175, sent $8,055 from his SunTrust account in Florida to a Standard Chartered Bank account in the United Arab Emirates, according to Newsweek.

The account belonged to Mustafa al Hawsawi, one of the main people who handled money for the al-Qaeda operation.

Hawsawi dealt with men who were assigned to help take control of the planes. Another financial facilitator, Ali Abdul Aziz Ali, mainly handled the three pilots, identified as Mohammed Atta, Marwan al-Shehhi and Ziad Jarrah.

Hawsawi had opened the Standard Chartered account in Sharjah in June 2001. He also got an ATM card and rented a post office box in the city. With money provided by al-Qaeda, he bought tickets for Banihammad and Saeed al Ghamdi to travel from Dubai to Orlando through London.

He also gave money and other help to several other hijackers as they travelled through the UAE before entering the US.

The money trail, however, goes back to 2000. On September 17, 2000, Atta, al-Shehhi and Jarrah received their biggest transfer from overseas. About $70,000 was sent to them from the UAE. Ali Abdul Aziz Ali, who used the name "Isam Mansur", arranged the transfer through the UAE Exchange Centre in Bur Dubai. 

The three pilots also continued to use their bank accounts in Germany.

On September 8, Atta sent $7,860 in two transfers to "Mustafa Ahmed", a name used by Hawsawi. These payments were part of more than two dozen transfers and mailed packages. The total amount was about $65,000.

Hawsawi was also involved in sending money to Zacarias Moussaoui while he was in the US. Moussaoui was arrested by the FBI on August 16, 2001, after instructors became suspicious of his interest in learning to fly a large aircraft but not becoming a pilot.

Another important clue emerged from a bank card application made by Hawsawi on August 25. He applied for a supplementary Standard Chartered Visa card in the name of Abdulrahman A. A. al-Ghamdi. 

The application included a photograph of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed as the supplementary applicant, who had previously appeared in connection with the 1995 Bojinka plot, which involved plans to bomb US civilian passenger planes flying across the Pacific.

But before 9/11, US authorities failed to connect the different pieces of information. They did not link the al-Ghamdi name with other intelligence references or with Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who was also known by the nickname "Mukhtar".

The financial records show that there was no single payment that funded the entire 9/11 operation, as the money was moved through different people, accounts and countries over time.