Mohamed Atta
Atta was born on September 1, 1968, in Kafr el-Sheikh, located in Egypt's Nile Delta region. His father, Mohamed el-Amir Awad el-Sayed Atta, was a lawyer, educated in both sharia and civil law. His mother, Bouthayna Mohamed Mustapha Sheraqi, came from a wealthy farming and trading family and was also educated. Bouthayna and Mohamed married when she was 14, via an arranged marriage. The family had few relatives on the father's side and kept a distance from Bouthayna's family. In-laws characterized Atta's father as "austere, strict, and private," and neighbors considered the family reclusive. Atta was the only son; he had two older sisters who are both well-educated and successful in their careers — one as a medical doctor and the other as a professor.
Mohamed Gad-el-Hak
Mohamed Gad-el-Hak was born in 1945 in Tanta, Egypt. He grew up in Cairo, and received his B.Sc. (summa cum laude) in mechanical engineering from Ain Shams University in 1966, and his Ph.D. in fluid mechanics from the Johns Hopkins University in 1973, under the tutelage of Stanley Corrsin. Gad-el-Hak lived in the United States of America since 1968, and became a naturalized U.S. citizen in 1981.