Fox Re-Confirms that the Administration Knew the Benghazi Attack was Terrorism Within 24 Hours (Updated)

Fox’s story marks the second confirmation that the US knew what the Benghazi attack was within 24 hours. Eli Lake confirmed the same yesterday.

U.S. intelligence officials knew within 24 hours of the assault on the U.S. Consulate in Libya that it was a terrorist attack and suspected Al Qaeda-tied elements were involved, sources told Fox News — though it took the administration a week to acknowledge it.

The account conflicts with claims on the Sunday after the attack by U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice that the administration believed the strike was a “spontaneous” event triggered by protests in Egypt over an anti-Islam film.

Two senior U.S. officials said the Obama administration internally labeled the attack terrorism from the first day in order to unlock and mobilize certain resources to respond, and that officials were looking for one specific suspect.

In addition, sources confirm that FBI agents have not yet arrived in Benghazi in the aftermath of the attack. Four Americans including U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens were killed in the assault.

The president himself needs to conduct a press conference and explain his administration’s actions and multiple conflicting statements. Nothing less than an explanation from Obama himself will do at this point. His own credibility is on the line, and the campaign of misdirection has ruined Secretary of State Clinton’s and Ambassador Rice’s credibility.

Neither Rice nor Clinton can credibly claim that they were acting on bad information from subordinates. Their subordinates, according to both Eli Lake and Fox, were treating the attack as terrorism, and even hunting a specific suspect, while Rice, Clinton, and Jay Carney continued to blame the YouTube video. Obama blamed that video again in his UN address and even now refuses to call the attack an act of terrorism.

Obama’s Justice Department went as far as to stage a midnight knock raid to publicly show off and humiliate the filmmaker that they were blaming for causing the violence. By the time of that raid, the administration had been aware that Benghazi was a terrorist attack for three days. Who ordered that raid? What did the president know about it, and when did he know it?

Is Barack Obama just in denial that his personal charm has failed to end the war as he expected, or is he waging a misinformation campaign for political reasons? The American people have a right to know, and we have a right to hear from the president himself on this.

Update: John Nolte has posted video proof that President Obama himself knew Benghazi was a terrorist attack on Sept. 12. Yet he refuses to call it a terrorist attack now, and his administration waged a disinfo campaign to dub it a “spontaneous protest.”