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Ziad Jarrah

Ziad Samir Jarrah, also known as Ziad al-Jarrah, was a Lebanese terrorist who was a member of al-Qaeda. During the September 11 attacks in 2001, he was one of 19 al-Qaeda members who hijacked four American commercial flights in an attempt to crash them into national landmarks in the country. Jarrah's group hijacked United Airlines Flight 93, departing Newark, New Jersey, for San Francisco, but they failed to reach their target when the plane crashed.

Early life
Ziad Samir Jarrah was born on 11 May 1975, in the Mazraa neighborhood of Beirut, Lebanon. He was raised by a wealthy and respected Arab family at an apartment in Beirut's working class neighborhood of Tanak, and a house with a 25-acre farm in the rural town of Marj. He went to school in the city. Jarrah's father Samir worked for the Lebanese government as a social service inspector, while his mother Nafissa was a principal at an elementary school. His uncle Jamal later became a banker, a campaigner for Lebanese prime minister Rafik Hariri and a member of the Parliament of Lebanon. In his youth, Jarrah played football and trained in martial arts. He also expressed a strong interest in pursuing aviation, the latter of which his family opposed. His father later recalled: "I stopped him from being a pilot. I only have one son and I was afraid that he would crash." == Education ==
Education
Sources disagree on Jarrah's level of intelligence and success in schooling across his life. According to one of his teachers in Beirut, he had below-average grades. However, he might have been lying to people about the extent of his English skills. Jarrah then planned to study dentistry as well. == Radicalization ==
Radicalization
Şengün later recalled that after Jarrah returned to Greifswald from a trip to Beirut in winter 1996, "he seemed changed". He was more sombre, and started reading al-Jihad, a radical Islamist publication. He also started visiting Greifswald's mosque, becoming friends with the proprietor, Abdul Rahman al-Makhadi. He was a Yemeni man who enforced behavior compliant with Islamic morality among the visitors, and became a local "spokesman for radical Islam". He was also being surveilled by German intelligence for giving money to Hamas. He and Jarrah traveled across Germany, and he introduced Jarrah to his Muslim friends. One of them, a man known as Marcel "Hussein" K., was the vice president of the Münster Islamic Centre in North Rhine-Westphalia, and he became Jarrah's confidant for the rest of Jarrah's life. In 2000 and 2001, he would often call Marcel for advice right before he made important decisions. Jarrah started visiting the al-Quds Mosque, which preached Salafi Islam. There, he met a group of friends who also enforced Islamic morality among the visitors. Jarrah himself started enforcing it with Şengün, criticizing her friends and clothes. He made her wear a veil, demanded she cover her hands, and did not let her meet any of his friends. Their arguments caused them to separate, but they later got back together. In early 1999, Jarrah told her there was no greater honor in life than dying for Allah, and that he was going to wage jihad, which scared her. Jarrah's extremist behavior concerned his family, who sent "emissaries" to his location to plead with him to return to Beirut. His father also threatened to cut off his monthly allowance of $2000. == Hamburg cell ==
Hamburg cell
By meeting people at the mosque, Jarrah joined the Hamburg cell, a clandestine cell system of Islamist terrorists whose members eventually committed or planned al-Qaeda's 11 September 2001 terrorist attacks against the United States. 19 men, including Jarrah, hijacked four American commercial flights in an attempt to crash them into important landmarks in the country. American Airlines Flight 11 and United Airlines Flight 175 were flown into the North and South Towers of the World Trade Center in New York City, and American Airlines Flight 77 into the Pentagon near Washington D.C. Jarrah piloted the fourth plane, United Airlines Flight 93, which crashed in a field after his group failed to reach their target. 2,977 people were killed as a result of the attacks. The plan for the attack was formulated by Osama bin Laden and Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. The cell's leader was Mohamed Atta, who moved to Hamburg for education, just like Jarrah and members Marwan al-Shehhi and Zakariya Essabar. Atta was the eventual hijacker-pilot of Flight 11, and al-Shehhi, the hijacker-pilot of Flight 175. The other members were Ramzi bin al-Shibh, Abdelghani Mzoudi, Ahmed Taleb, Mamoun Darkazanli, Mohammed Haydar Zammar, Mounir el-Motassadeq, Naamen Meziche, and Said Bahaji. Jarrah's closest friend in the group was bin al-Shibh. In late 1999, the cell decided to travel to Chechnya, to help jihadist rebels fight Russia's forces in the Second Chechen War. Right before they went, however, Khalid al-Masri and Mohamedou Ould Slahi persuaded them to instead travel to Afghanistan. Jarrah called Marcel K. before going. Şengün did not completely know about Jarrah's trip, but told his family that she feared he had gone to Afghanistan. == Planning of the September 11 attacks ==
Planning of the September 11 attacks
in Atta's apartment on Marienstraße (Marien Street) in Hamburg|left Return to Hamburg The Hamburg cell members who visited Afghanistan eventually returned to Hamburg to start working on the hijacking plan. It is debatable if Jarrah lived there as well. The cell attempted to hide their extremism and blend in with the population; according to Şengün, Jarrah shaved his beard, and began to act in a more secular manner. To hide his time in Afghanistan from security officials at international airports, in February 2000, he reported his passport as stolen and received a blank duplicate—just as Atta and al-Shehhi had done the previous month. All the members stopped contacting their families, except Jarrah, who may have had doubts about participating in the attack. Jarrah, al-Shehhi, and Atta then went to Florida, where they enrolled full-time at Huffman Aviation in Venice. Jarrah did not subsequently exchange his tourist visa for a student visa, thus violating his immigration status. He obtained his license to fly small aircraft in August 2000, and began training to fly large jets later that year. In Venice, he lived with a fellow student pilot named Thorsten Biermann, who did not have any confirmed connection to al-Qaeda, but was put on the FBI's watchlist after the attacks, as he arrived in the U.S. from Hamburg around the same time as the hijackers. Jarrah called Marcel K. at the start of and during his training. Ziad Touba said that on one of Jarrah's Lebanon visits, Jarrah told him that he was moving to the U.S., and that he gained a new passion for aviation. Touba later recalled: "What struck me most was the change in his demeanor. He was calmer. He seemed happy and content, not aggressive and stubborn as he had been." In the interview, he allegedly admitted to having been to Afghanistan and Pakistan. The CIA denies that he said this, and the 9/11 Commission Report does not mention the moment. On the 6th, they and Marwan al-Shehhi registered for a two-month membership at the US1 Fitness Center gym in Dania Beach. Before the membership ran out, they renewed it for another two months, and eventually had lessons in close-quarters combat. Jarrah's eventual partner on the United Airlines Flight 93 hijacking, Ahmed al-Haznawi, arrived in Florida on June 8. He moved in with Jarrah, probably later that month. Sometime after, Jarrah rented a new apartment in Lauderdale-by-the-Sea, Florida, and the two men gave the landlord photocopies of their German passports; the landlord turned these over to the FBI after the September attacks. Last Germany trip and brief exit from the plan At some point in the months before the attacks, Jarrah decided to leave al-Qaeda's plan, but then rejoined soon after; he might have done this twice. A staffer on the 9/11 Commission, Dietrich Snell, later said Jarrah was "the last best opportunity the U.S. intelligence community had to avert 11 September", as he was "the most susceptible to turn" out of all the hijackers. Jarrah called Marcel K. around this time. For a few nights around late August and early September, he rented a room at the Pin-Del Motel in Laurel, Maryland; at the same time, Flight 77 hijacker Nawaf al-Hazmi rented a separate room, having booked his independently from Jarrah. They were only a mile away from the Valencia Motel, where four other hijackers stayed. Jarrah returned to Florida by 7 September. Jarrah cryptically wrote that "I did what I had to", and that "it is a great honour and you will see the result, and everyone will be celebrating." == September 11 attacks==
September 11 attacks
Early morning |270x270px On the morning of 11 September 2001, Jarrah, Saeed al-Ghamdi, Ahmed al-Haznawi, and Ahmed al-Nami were in New Jersey to board United Airlines Flight 93, scheduled to depart Newark International Airport for San Francisco International Airport. They likely planned to crash the plane into either the U.S. Capitol Building or the White House in Washington, D.C. He made a similar call to Atta, planning to board American Airlines Flight 11—but not to the other hijacker-pilot, American Airlines Flight 77's Hani Hanjour, who was in Virginia. Jarrah also called Şengün, and told her he loved her three times. She asked what was up with him, and he hung up soon after. Around 9:28, 46 minutes after take off, Jarrah's group hijacked the plane, and he took over its controls. They tied red scarves around their heads. At 9:31, Jarrah spoke in English into a voice recorder in the cockpit, attempting to message the cabin: "Ladies and gentlemen: here the captain. [sic] Please sit down, keep remaining seating. [sic] We have a bomb on board. So sit." However, the recorder was for the plane's airband radio frequency, meaning his audio instead went to the air traffic controllers at Cleveland ARTCC. He or the other hijackers continued sounding on the frequency. At 9:34, a warning bell was heard, indicating Jarrah was trying to disconnect the plane's autopilot to change the plane's destination. He instead reset the autopilot so he could tell it to turn Flight 93 east to Washington, D.C. At 9:42 a.m., in response to the hijackings of Flights 11, 77, and 175, the Federal Aviation Administration ordered a ground stop on almost all planes nationwide, and for flights in progress to land at the closest available airport. Those in the air were monitored for suspicious activity. At the start of the hijacking, Jarrah had turned off the plane's transponder, thinking it would stop air traffic control from monitoring his turn towards Washington D.C. However, he left on other devices that broadcast the plane's flight path and altitude, so Cleveland noticed Flight 93's turn, and started tracking it. Meanwhile, at 9:37, Flight 77 crashed into the Pentagon near Washington, D.C. Flight 93 then descended 20,000 feet (from a peak of 40,700 feet) until stabilizing at 9:46. Apparently worried it was losing altitude too quickly, Jarrah jerked the plane's nose upward, then began another gradual descent. At 9:45, another hijacker asked him whether to open the cockpit door to the other two hijackers; Jarrah replied: "Inform them, and tell him to talk to the pilot; bring the pilot back". The hijackers began preparing for the revolt, either overhearing the plan or sensing it. At 9:57, some passengers started trying to break into the cockpit, but had trouble getting through the door; for the next six minutes, they fought some of the hijackers, excluding at least Jarrah, who stayed inside. He started rolling the plane left and right to knock the passengers and crew off balance, causing the plane to leave its Washington, D.C. course. The revolt nonetheless continued. Jarrah then learned how many people were involved in it, exclaiming, "there are some guys; all those guys"; he instead decided to pitch the plane's nose up and down. Inside, the passengers and crew started using a food cart as a battering ram against the door. A minute later, the pitching stopped, and Jarrah yelled at him to cut off the oxygen in the cabin. Jarrah then repeated "give it to me!" in Arabic, possibly referring to the plane's yoke. Moments later, at 10:03, the plane crashed at into a field in Stonycreek Township in Somerset County, Pennsylvania. All the people onboard who were still alive died instantly. It is likely that the hijackers intentionally crashed the plane into the ground as a response to the revolt. == Aftermath ==
Aftermath
Shortly after 11 September, Şengün filed a missing persons report for Jarrah in Bochum, Germany. Over in the U.S., he became a suspect in Flight 93's hijacking when FBI agents found a "Ziad Jarrahi" on the flight manifest. On 6 October, The Dallas Morning News reporter Tod Robberson visited the home of Jarrah's family in Mazraa, and recalled the scene in 2011: Innocence claims Starting in late September 2001, Jarrah's family members either claimed he was an innocent passenger on Flight 93, rather than a hijacker—or was not present on the plane at all, and that the hijackers stole his identity. Further doubt was cast on his family's claims in 2006, when U.S. authorities released the videos of him and Atta in Afghanistan in January 2000. == In popular culture ==
In popular culture
Jarrah has been portrayed in multiple films about the 11 September attacks: by Karim Saleh in The Hamburg Cell (2004), Pej Vahdat in The Flight That Fought Back (2005), Dominic Rains in Flight 93 (2006), and Khalid Abdalla in United 93 (2006). The 2021 film Copilot is based on Jarrah's relationship with Şengün prior to the attack. He is portrayed by Roger Azar. The 2016 album Media in the Service of Terror by Vatican Shadow opens with the track "Ziad Jarrah Studied Mathematics". == Notes ==
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