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‘Soleimani will be avenged’: US air traffic controllers receive 9/11-style threat on Capitol

Air traffic controllers were told a plane will be sent into the Capitol building on Wednesday to avenge the death of Iranian general Soleimani.

By World Israel News Staff

The FBI is investigating after an anonymous broadcast on aviation frequencies that was heard by air traffic controllers threatening to fly a plane into the U.S. Capitol building in Washington, CBS News reported Tuesday.

A digitized voice told air traffic controllers in New York: “We are flying a plane into the Capitol on Wednesday. Soleimani will be avenged.”

The recording obtained by CBS came on the first anniversary of the American airstrike ordered by President Donald Trump that killed Iranian general Qassem Soleimani, Iran’s top military strategist who was involved in boosting Iranian-backed militias and regimes across the Middle East.

Iranian leaders vowed that they would avenge the killing, including threats to take out President Trump.

The government does not believe the attack warning to be credible, but is investigating the message as a breach of the use of aviation frequencies, CBS reported.

Sources told CBS News that the Pentagon and other agencies were briefed Tuesday about the recorded threat and said it suggests the Capitol would be attacked on the day that Congress is set officially confirm the Electoral College of the U.S. presidential election.

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Aviation experts said the intrusion into the airline frequencies is of serious concern because broadcasts could also be used to give false instructions to pilots.

A message sent to all air traffic controllers on Tuesday reminded them to immediately report any threat or indications of any plane deviating from its flight path.

In the terror attacks on September 11, 2001, members of the Al Qaeda Islamic terror group hijacked four passenger planes and killed or disabled the crews. It was the worst terrorist attack in American history, killing 2,977 people.

Two of the planes were flown into the twin towers of the World Trade Center in New York and a third hit the Pentagon. Passengers in the fourth plane that might have been targeting the White House managed to break into the cockpit to confront the hijackers, who crashed the airliner into an empty field in Pennsylvania killing all aboard.

The FBI told CBS it is not commenting but added that it takes “all threats of violence to public safety seriously.”