The Associated Press
Tuesday, September 2, 2003; 8:09 PM

WASHINGTON - The FBI missed opportunities to thwart the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center by failing to heed an informant's warnings, a new book says.

Emad Salem, an ex-Egyptian army major recruited by the FBI, infiltrated a group led by blind Sheik Omar Abdel-Rahman as the conspirators planned the bombing.

But at a crucial point, Salem had a falling out with his FBI handlers and withdrew from the plot after agents told him he would have to testify in open court, according to the book, "1000 Years for Revenge: International Terrorism and the FBI: The Untold Story."

"Don't call me when the bombs go off," Salem is quoted as telling the FBI, according to author Peter Lance, a former ABC correspondent.

The Feb. 26, 1993, explosion in the trade center's underground garage killed six people, injured more than 1,000 others and caused half a billion dollars in damage.

After the bombing, Salem told the FBI the blast could have been prevented if agents had listened to his advice and placed two of the conspirators under surveillance, according to Lance's book.

The book also said law enforcement agencies overlooked evidence in 47 boxes seized three years before the bombing that would have alerted investigators to the terrorist threat Abdel-Rahman posed. The evidence included a bomb-making formula and threats by the sheik in Arabic writing that were not translated until after the blast. The boxes were seized in the murder of Rabbi Meir Kahane.

FBI officials had not read the book and could not immediately comment.