The 28 Pages

“The 28 Pages” refers to a classified 28-page section of the joint congressional inquiry into 9/11 that examined potential connections between Saudi Arabia and the September 11 hijackers. The pages were redacted from the public version of the December 2002 report, fueling speculation about Saudi government involvement in the attacks and becoming a focus of victim families’ lawsuits and congressional pressure for declassification.

The classified section reportedly detailed contacts between Saudi officials and some of the 9/11 hijackers, including financial support provided by Saudi citizens living in the United States. Advocates for declassification, including former Senator Bob Graham who chaired the Senate Intelligence Committee during the investigation, argued that the pages contained evidence of Saudi government complicity that warranted public scrutiny and official accountability.

After years of political pressure from victim families and bipartisan congressional efforts, the pages were finally released in July 2016 under the Obama administration with some redactions. The declassified material revealed FBI investigations into potential Saudi connections, including contacts between hijackers and Saudi nationals in California, but did not provide definitive evidence of official Saudi government involvement in planning the attacks.

The released pages showed the FBI investigated Saudi diplomat Fahad al-Thumairy and Saudi intelligence officer Omar al-Bayoumi for possible connections to hijackers Nawaf al-Hazmi and Khalid al-Mihdhar in San Diego. While the documents revealed suspicious activities and contacts, they consisted largely of raw intelligence reports rather than conclusive findings about Saudi government complicity.

The declassification satisfied longstanding demands for transparency while demonstrating the complexity of intelligence assessment and the difference between investigative leads and proven connections.