Posted on Mon, Nov. 09, 2009

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Congress to probe shooting

By ALLEN G. BREED

Associated Press

FORT HOOD, Texas — Sen. Joe Lieberman 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.

Lieberman, chairman of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, wants Congress to determine whether the shootings constitute a terrorist attack.

His comments came a day after classmates who participated in a program at a military college said they complained to superiors about Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan and what they considered his anti-American views. They included his giving a presentation that justified suicide bombing and telling classmates that Islamic law trumped the U.S. Constitution.

"If Hasan was showing signs, saying to people that he had become an Islamist extremist, the U.S. Army has to have zero tolerance," Lieberman, an independent from Connecticut, said on "Fox News Sunday." "He should have been gone."

Army Chief of Staff George Casey warned Sunday against reaching conclusions about the suspected shooter's motives until investigators have fully explored the attack. "I think the speculation (on Hasan's Islamic roots) could potentially heighten backlash against some of our Muslim soldiers," he said on ABC's "This Week."

Val Finnell told the Associated Press on Saturday that he and other classmates participating in a 2007-2008 master's program at the Uniformed Services University complained about Hasan's comments, including that the war on terrorism was "a war against Islam."

Another classmate told the AP on Sunday that 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 requested anonymity because the investigation is ongoing.

Meanwhile, the FBI will probably look into whether Hasan attended the same Virginia mosque as two Sept. 11 hijackers in 2001 at a time when a radical imam preached there, said a law enforcement official who spoke on condition of anonymity because the investigation is ongoing.

Imam Johari Abdul-Malik, outreach director at the Dar al Hijrah Islamic Center, confirmed Sunday Hasan's family participated in services at the mosque in Falls Church, Va.

Abdul-Malik said the Hasans were not leaders at the mosque and their attendance was utterly normal, and he did not know whether Hasan himself ever attended services there.

In 2001, Anwar Aulaqi was an imam, or spiritual leader, at the mosque. Aulaqi told the FBI in 2001 that before he moved to Virginia in early 2001, he met with Sept. 11 hijacker Nawaf al-Hazmi several times in San Diego. . Al-Hazmi and another hijacker, Hani Hanjour, attended the Dar al Hijrah mosque in early April 2001.

Many Muslims pray at the mosque multiple times a day, Abdul-Malik he said. "It's part of family life. It's like going out for ice cream after dinner."

Faizul Khan, former imam of the Muslim Community Center in nearby Silver Spring, Md., where Hasan also worshipped, said he was not aware that Hasan had attended services at Dar al Hijrah, but said it would not be unusual for Hasan to attend more than one mosque concurrently. Khan said he did not recall Hasan mentioning having been taught or preached to by Aulaqi.

Hasan's family has described him as a "peaceful, loving and compassionate person." His brother, Eyad Hasan, of Sterling, Va., said in a statement Saturday that Hasan has "never committed an act of violence and was always known to be a good, law-abiding citizen."

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