A report is issued to Congress that warns of the danger Osama bin Laden poses to US interests and states that his al-Qaeda network “wants to strike within the United States.” [Guardian, 9/14/2001; News24, 9/18/2001; CNN, 9/28/2001] The report, titled “Terrorism: Near Eastern Groups and State Sponsors, 2001,” is “an annual analysis of Near Eastern terrorist groups and countries on the US ‘terrorism list’”—countries that the secretary of commerce and the secretary of state have determined “provide repeated support for international terrorism.”

Al-Qaeda 'Wants to Strike within the United States' - The report warns of the increasing threat posed by al-Qaeda. “Signs continue to point to… a rise in the scope of threat posed by the independent network of exiled Saudi dissident Osama bin Laden,” it states. It continues: “Osama bin Laden’s network, which is independently financed and enjoys safe haven in Afghanistan, poses an increasingly significant threat to US interests in the Near East and perhaps elsewhere. The primary goals of bin Laden and his cohort are to oust pro-US regimes in the Middle East and gain removal of US troops from the region.” Furthermore, the report warns, “US allegations of past plotting by the bin Laden network suggest that the network wants to strike within the United States itself.” [Katzman, 9/10/2001 ]

Al-Qaeda Has Been Looking for 'Ways to Attack US Interests' - The report was written by Kenneth Katzman, a former CIA analyst who is now the Congressional Research Service’s resident expert on Middle Eastern terrorism. [New York Times, 8/21/1998; CNN, 9/28/2001] It is based on information from numerous sources, including the State Department’s annual report on international terrorism, titled Patterns of Global Terrorism: 2000; press reports; and conversations with US counterterrorism officials, experts, investigative journalists, and foreign diplomats. [Katzman, 9/10/2001, pp. 1 ] Shortly after 9/11, Katzman will say his report’s conclusions about the danger al-Qaeda poses were based on “an assessment that they were continuing to plot against the United States and look for ways to attack US interests.” He will also say, “It was apparent in my research that there was a continued pattern of plotting, a continued pattern of looking for opportunities to hit the United States, either military forces or civilians.”

Author Is Like a 'Prophet Who Could Foretell the Future' - In light of what is written in the report, CNN news anchor Aaron Brown will comment that Katzman “may well be official Washington’s closest present-day parallel to an ancient prophet who could foretell the future.” [CNN, 9/28/2001] But the Congressional Research Service will state that the fact that his report was issued the day before 9/11 is merely a coincidence. [News24, 9/18/2001]