Atta, Mohammad (1968–2001)

Photos of a stone-faced Mohammad Atta are now emblematic of the 9/11 terrorist attacks on the Pentagon and the Twin Towers of the U.S. World Trade Center. As the eldest (age 33) and most educated (MA, 1999) of the 19 suicide bombers, Atta is credited with coordinating the attacks, which were conceived by Ramzi Binalshibh and Khalid Sheikh Muhammad on behalf of al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden (d. 2011). At 8:46 a.m., Atta flew the hijacked American Airlines Flight 11 into the North Tower of the World Trade Center, thereby awakening Americans to the specter of Islamic terrorism. The three other attacks followed within minutes. Thousands died.

Mohammad el-Amir Atta was born into comfortable circumstances. His father was an Egyptian lawyer committed to a superior education for his two daughters and one son. The daughters earned advanced degrees in the sciences from Cairo University, and Mohammad el-Amir earned a degree in architecture. When Atta was rejected for graduate study in Cairo, his father insisted he study for a doctorate in Germany, partly to distance Atta from his mother. His father arranged for him to stay with a German host family, who eventually asked Atta to leave because of his mounting discomfort with European social and religious liberalism.

Atta studied architecture at the Technical University of Harburg-Hamburg sporadically from 1992 to 1999 and also became immersed in jihadist ideology at al Quds mosque. Attractive to foreign students and Turkish immigrants, al-Quds sponsored taped sermons by, among others, the London-based Abu Qatada, who propagated The Neglected Duty of Abd al-Salam Faraj. Executed in 1982 for the assassination of the Egyptian president Anwar Sadat, Faraj had espoused the establishment of an Islamic caliphate in predominantly Muslim countries and eventually over the whole world. The insular group at al Quds, which produced three of the 9/11 pilots, argued together about jihadist ideals, some espousing a spiritual view—a duty to strive against personal obstacles to one's faith—and others embracing a war against a perceived Zionist-American coalition of Islam's enemies. Although Islam forbids suicide, the group debated circumstances that might permit it, namely, against fitna (“confusion,” “oppression”) and in defense of Islam. Traditional war songs and tales of glamorous fighting in Bosnia and Chechyna permeated the culture of al-Quds mosque.

During this period, Osama bin Laden's letters declaring war against “Americans in the holy lands” (1996) and “Jews and Crusaders” (1998) were circulated. Atta was late to commit to Osama bin Laden's war, but in December 1999 in Kandahar, Atta and others from the Hamburg group pledged loyalty to the man. Bin Laden is said to have chosen Atta personally to lead the group on a mission that required them to fly commercial airplanes into U.S. landmarks. From May 2000 until September 2001, Atta and accomplices trained in the United States to do just that, resulting in the terrorist acts of 9/11.

[Page 83]Along with Abdul Aziz al-Omari, Atta has been suggested as a possible author of the suicide bombers’ Final Instructions, which envisions the terrorist attacks as exalted replicas of the formative battles in early Islam.

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