On February 26, 1993, at about 17 minutes past noon, a thunderous explosion rocked lower Manhattan. FBI

The epicenter was the parking garage beneath the World Trade Center, where a massive eruption carved out a nearly 100-foot crater several stories deep and several more high. Six people were killed almost instantly. Smoke and flames began filling the wound and streaming upward into the building. Those who weren’t trapped were soon pouring out of the building—many panic-stricken and covered in soot. More than a thousand people were hurt in some way, some badly, with crushed limbs.

Middle Eastern terrorism had arrived on American soil—with a bang.

As a small band of terrorists scurried away from the scene unnoticed, the FBI and its partners on the New York Joint Terrorism Task Force began staffing up a command center and preparing to send in a team to investigate. Their instincts told them that this was terrorism—they’d been tracking Islamic fundamentalists in the city for months and, they’d later learn, were tantalizingly close to encountering the planners of this attack. But hunches weren’t enough; what was needed was definitive proof.

They’d have it soon enough. The massive investigation that followed—led by the task force, with some 700 FBI agents worldwide ultimately joining in—quickly uncovered a key bit of evidence. In the rubble investigators uncovered a vehicle identification number on a piece of wreckage that seemed suspiciously obliterated. A search of our crime records returned a match: the number belonged to a rented van reported stolen the day before the attack. An Islamic fundamentalist named Mohammad Salameh had rented the vehicle, we learned, and on March 4, an FBI SWAT team arrested him as he tried in vain to get his $400 deposit back.

One clue led to another and we soon had in custody three more suspects—Nidal Ayyad, Mahmoud Abouhalima, and Ahmed Ajaj. We’d also found the apartment where the bomb was built and a storage locker containing dangerous chemicals, including enough cyanide gas to wipe out a town. All four men were tried, convicted, and sentenced to life.

Ramzi Yousef

The shockwave from the attack continued to reverberate. Following the unfolding connections, the task force soon uncovered a second terrorist plot to bomb a series of New York landmarks simultaneously, including the U.N. building, the Holland and Lincoln Tunnels, and the federal plaza where our office in New York is housed. On June 24, 1994, FBI agents stormed a warehouse in Queens and caught several members of a terrorist cell in the act of assembling bombs.

Meanwhile, the mastermind of the World Trade Center bombing was still on the run—and up to no good. We’d learned his name—Ramzi Yousef—within weeks after the attack and discovered he was planning more attacks, including the simultaneous bombing of a dozen U.S. international flights. Yousef was captured in Pakistan in February 1995, returned to America, and convicted along with the van driver, Eyad Ismoil. A seventh plotter, Abdul Yasin, remains at large.

We later learned from Yousef that his Trade Center plot was far more sinister. He wanted the bomb to topple one tower, with the collapsing debris knocking down the second. The attack turned out to be something of a deadly dress rehearsal for 9/11; with the help of Yousef’s uncle Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, al Qaeda would later return to realize Yousef’s nightmarish vision.

Rewards for Justice

Ramzi Ahmed Yousef

Convicted

Abdul Rahman Yasin

Up to $5 Million Reward

Abdul Rahman Yasin directly assisted terrorist mastermind Ramzi Ahmed Yousef in carrying out the February 1993 World Trade Center bombing in New York City. Yousef and Yasin drove a van full of explosives into the basement of the World Trade Center, killing six people and wounding over a thousand. Yasin fled the United States immediately after the bombing to avoid arrest.

After the bombing, law enforcement officials obtained evidence which led to the indictment and arrest of several suspected terrorists involved in the bombing, including Yasin.

Yasin was born in the United States, moved to Iraq during the 1960s, and returned to the U.S. in the fall of 1992. He possesses a U.S. passport.

The individual listed above has been indicted on the following charges:

Damage by means of fire or an explosive; damage by means of fire or an explosive to U.S. property; transport in interstate commerce an explosive; destruction of motor vehicles or motor vehicle facilities; conspiracy to commit offense or defraud the U.S.; aiding and abetting; penalty of death or life imprisonment when death results; assault of a federal officer in the line of duty; and commission of a crime of violence through the use of a deadly weapon or device.

Additional Images

Ramzi Ahmed Yousef was the terrorist mastermind responsible for the February 1993 World Trade Center bombing in New York City that killed six and wounded over a thousand. Yousef and his assistants drove a van full of explosives into the basement of the World Trade Center. Within hours of the bombing, Yousef escaped on a plane to Pakistan.

Yousef resurfaced in the Philippines where he was engaged in developing a complex terrorist plot. Yousef planned to assassinate Pope John Paul II on January 14, 1995 while he was touring the Philippines, and to blow up 12 U.S. airliners in Asia just a few days later. The overall plot was known as “Oplan Bojinka,” a term which, translated into Arabic slang, means “Operation Explosion” or “Operation Big Bang.” Yousef was the clear mastermind behind Oplan Bojinka, but other key players in Oplan Bojinka included Wali Khan Amin Shah, Abdul Hakim Murad, Khalid Shaikh Mohammad (Yousef’s uncle and mastermind of the September 11 attacks), and Hambali – all sworn al-Qaida members.

As part of the overall plot, on January 21 and 22, 1995, five terrorists would place explosives aboard 12 U.S. bound airliners with stopovers in East and Southeast Asia during the first leg of each flight and then disembark before the aircraft were simultaneously destroyed over the Pacific Ocean. Each of the five terrorists would be tasked with boarding a second or even a third flight until all 12 airliners had an assembled bomb placed onboard. The projected death toll for this phase of the plan was over 4,000 people.

Fortunately, Yousef and his associates became somewhat careless, which turned out to be their downfall. On January 6, 1995, Yousef and Murad were forced to flee their apartment in Manila when a chemical mixture created a cloud of smoke, which poured out of the apartment window. Yousef asked Murad to return to the apartment to retrieve a laptop computer and other incriminating evidence. When Murad got back to the apartment, however, he was confronted by police who had already arrived at the scene. Yousef, realizing that Murad must have been caught, fled to Pakistan.

In February 1995, an informant, seeing an RFJ matchbook and motivated by the reward, went to the U.S. Embassy in Islamabad, Pakistan and provided information leading to Yousef’s whereabouts. On February 7, 1995, Pakistani authorities, assisted by U.S. Department of State Diplomatic Security agents, arrested Yousef in Islamabad, Pakistan, and extradited him to the United States. Yousef is currently in prison in Colorado. The other four major operatives involved in Oplan Bojinka have also been arrested.