Terrorism cannot be ruled out in the crash of Ethiopian Airlines Flight 409

The Lebanese French-language newspaper L'Orient Le Jour reports today that there were eyewitnesses to the crash of Ethiopian Airlines Flight 409. These eyewitnesses describe an explosion onboard the aircraft. Following the explosion the witnesses describe the aircraft breaking apart into four pieces which then transformed into a fireball that plunged into the Mediterranean Sea. The same report also speaks to strong indications that one passenger associated with the terrorist group Hezbollah was on board the aircraft. This passenger was identified as a member of "the Tajeddine family." There has been no official confirmation or denial of this passenger being on board the aircraft.

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25 January 2010: Coming out of Beirut's Rafic Hariri International Airport this morning and destined for Addis Ababa, Ethiopian Airlines Flight 409 is reported to have "caught fire" and crashed into the Mediterranean Sea with approximately 90 people on board. Ethiopian Airlines Flight 409 was a Boeing 737-800 aircraft, registered as ET-ANB, S/N 29935. It was also a leased aircraft from the American firm CIT Aerospace. In addition to this aircraft's links to the United States and an American aviation firm, the Ethiopian government has been waging a successful air and ground combat war against Al-Qaeda (al-Shabaab) in the Horn of Africa nation of Somalia. Lebanese President Michel Suleiman's comment denying that Islamic terrorism is involved in the crash of Flight 409 is premature and consistent with similar statements made by various governments concerning crashed commercial airliners prior to the initiation of an investigation to determine the actual cause of the disaster for at least the past 14 years.

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