Profile: Aysel Senguen

Friends of Ziad Jarrah taken on April 1, 1999. Third from left in back row is Abdelghani Mzoudi; fifth is Mounir El Motassadeq; seventh is Ramzi bin al-Shibh; Mohamed Atta is on middle row far right; Atta rests his hands on Mohamed Rajih. [Source: DDP / AFP]9/11 hijacker Ziad Jarrah has an unofficial wedding with his girlfriend, Aysel Senguen, on or shortly before April 1, 1999. They have a wedding ceremony at the radical Al-Quds mosque, but they do not register the wedding with the German government, so it is not legally binding. [McDermott, 2005, pp. 78] A photo apparently taken by Jarrah at the wedding will be found by German intelligence in Senguen’s home several days after 9/11 (see Shortly After September 11, 2001). The photo will be studied to determine who was a member of or close to the al-Qaeda Hamburg cell in early 1999. German investigators are able to identify 18 out of 22 men in the photo. Those in the photo include 9/11 hijacker Atta, Abdelghani Mzoudi, Mounir El Motassadeq, Ramzi bin al-Shibh, Abderrasak Labied, and Mohammed Rajih. The LfV, the security service for the Hamburg region, will show such a surprising amount of knowledge of the people in the photo just days after 9/11 that it will later be suggested the LfV must have had an informant close to the Hamburg cell (see Shortly After September 11, 2001). [Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (Frankfurt), 2/2/2003]

Ziad Jarrah amd Aisel Senguen holidaying in Paris in the fall of 2000. [Source: McDermott]9/11 hijacker Ziad Jarrah flies from Atlanta to Dusseldorf, Germany, via Amsterdam, Netherlands. He then returns to Lebanon to see his father, who is ill. On his way back to the US, he stops in Bochum, Germany, to see his girlfriend and tells her he wants to have children soon. He is re-admitted to the US as a business visitor for three and a half months. [9/11 Commission, 8/21/2004, pp. 21 ; McDermott, 2005, pp. 213]

Hijacker Ziad Jarrah phones his girlfriend, Aysel Senguen, about an hour before he boards Flight 93, according to the Los Angeles Times. Senguen is currently recovering from a minor operation in a hospital in Germany, where she lives. [Los Angeles Times, 10/23/2001; Observer, 8/22/2004] Senguen will later recount: “[H]e was very brief. He said he loved me three times. I asked what was up. He hung up shortly afterwards.… It was so short and rather strange him saying that repeatedly.” [Reuters, 11/19/2002; Guardian, 11/20/2002] Some accounts will say Jarrah makes this call from his hotel, the Days Inn in Newark. Other accounts will claim he makes it from a payphone at Newark Airport, although he does not actually check in at the airport until later on, at 7:39 a.m. [PBS, 1/17/2002; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 532; Observer, 8/22/2004; Sunday Herald (Glasgow), 8/22/2004; 9/11 Commission, 8/26/2004, pp. 35]

The Bundeskriminalamt (BKA), Germany’s federal anticrime agency, obtains a DNA sample for one of the 9/11 hijackers, alleged Flight 93 pilot Ziad Jarrah, after a search of the home of his girlfriend, Aysel Senguen. After the BKA sends the sample to the FBI, the bureau matches it with the DNA profile of one of four sets of unknown human remains recovered from the site in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, where Flight 93 crashed. According to an FBI report provided to the 9/11 Commission, presumably sometime between 2003 and 2004, no relatives of the alleged 9/11 hijackers provide the bureau with DNA samples for comparison. [Federal Bureau of Investigation, 2003]

The LfV, the security service for the Hamburg region, shows a surprising amount of knowledge about the al-Qaeda Hamburg cell, suggesting that the agency may have had an informant close to the cell. In 2004, Manfred Murck, deputy director of the LfV, will claim that the LfV’s greatest regret is that it never monitored the Al-Quds mosque in Hamburg. [Vanity Fair, 11/2004] However, shortly after 9/11, a photograph is found in the house of 9/11 hijacker Ziad Jarrah’s girlfriend Aysel Senguen that was taken at Jarrah and Senguen’s non-legally binding wedding in April 1999 (see (April 1, 1999)).
Notes on the Photo - Eighteen out of 22 men in the picture are soon identified; many of them are members of the al-Qaeda Hamburg cell. Seven of the men are easily identified. Eleven more are identified by the LfV, and 10 of them by name, including 9/11 hijacker Mohamed Atta, and hijacker associates Ramzi bin al-Shibh, Abdelghani Mzoudi, and Mounir El Motassadeq. Investigators at other German intelligence agencies don’t know where the photo was taken, but the LfV reveals that it was taken inside the Al-Quds mosque. In 2003, the Frankfurt newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung will conclude that the LfV had an informant who knew details about the Al-Quds mosque and its attendees. The newspaper will base this on the LfV notes about the photo written just after 9/11. These notes show that not only does the LfV know that the picture was taken inside Al-Quds (when its agents were never supposed to go inside a mosque), but it knows the picture was taken in early 1999, because the carpet shown in the picture was changed shortly after that time. Furthermore, the LfV photo notes show knowledge of “even seemingly trivial details” about some of the people in the picture. For instance, the notes mention that hijacker associate Mzoudi “cleans and cooks together with Abderrasak Labied in the Al-Quds mosque.” [Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (Frankfurt), 2/2/2003] (Labied is another suspected member of the Hamburg cell.) [Washington Post, 9/11/2002] Some men in the photo left Hamburg later in 1999, but the LfV notes are still able to identify them.
Knowledge of Mohamed Atta's Group - The LfV also shows detailed knowledge about some of the 9/11 hijackers. For instance, starting in 1999, Atta led an Islamic study group at the Technical University Hamburg-Harburg known as “Islam AG.” The LfV is able to identify which of the men in the picture attended this study group. [Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (Frankfurt), 2/2/2003]
Informant or Some Other Source of Knowledge? - The LfV notes indicate that if the LfV did not have an informant involved with the Al-Quds mosque since 1999, at the very least it has a great deal of knowledge about the al-Qaeda Hamburg cell members.

Aysel Senguen. [Source: CBC]Authorities in the US discover a letter apparently written by Flight 93 hijacker Ziad Jarrah. It is believed the four-page letter, dated September 10, was written just hours before the 9/11 attacks. It is part of a package Jarrah mailed from the US to his Turkish girlfriend Aysel Senguen, a medical student living in the western German city of Bochum. The letter says, “I have done what I had to do.… You should be very proud, because it is an honor and in the end you will see that everyone will be happy.” It adds, “Hold on to what you have until we see each other again.” The package arrived in Germany shortly after September 11. However, due to Jarrah having made an error in writing the address, it was returned to the US and ended up in the hands of the FBI. Oddly, considering the letter is supposedly Jarrah’s farewell to Senguen, the rest of his package reportedly includes papers about his flight training and scuba-diving instructions. It is believed to also contain some small presents. Ziad’s uncle Jamal Jarrah says he thinks the letter is fabricated, and that it is suspicious that the address on it contained a mistake, as Ziad had known his girlfriend for five years and would not have made such an error. [Associated Press, 11/17/2001; Los Angeles Times, 11/18/2001; Observer, 11/18/2001; Daily Telegraph, 11/18/2001; BBC, 11/19/2001]