The NSA Listens To Bin Laden & Al Qaeda

In November 1996, the FBI monitors the progress of Osama Bin Laden buying a new satellite phone and tracks the purchase to Ziyad Khaleel, a US citizen and radical militant living in Missouri. The phone is sent to Khalid al-Fawwaz, al-Qaeda’s unofficial press secretary in London, who ships it to Tora Bora, Afghanistan where it is then given to Osama Bin Laden. However, Khaleel was being closely investigated for an unrelated matter, the FBI informs the National Security Agency (NSA) to begin monitoring the satellite phone, in which Bin Laden uses till 1998. Hundreds of calls are made, however, one number keeps constantly popping up... 967–1–200578. It was traced back to a house located in Sana'a Yemen, which was owned by a man named Ahmed al-Hada, a long time associate to Bin Laden whom he knew from Afghanistan during the Soviet war.

The NSA began monitoring all calls made to and from the home. Soon the CIA became the lead agency in charge of the Sana'a Yemen hub operation by conducting round the clock surveillance, but wanted also all the signals data. The NSA refused to share the half of the data, which were on the receiving end. The CIA then put a listening device in the house, and heard half of the conversations from the phone. The NSA and now the CIA were monitoring two active lines used by the most wanted terrorist in the world, Osama Bin Laden, and his organization, Al Qaeda. The question is, what did they hear on the other end?