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Ecclesiastes 3
ABDEL RAHMAN: [Laughing] I saw the Hadith, ―Marry a stranger, don‘t get
weak,‖ marry a stranger....
Yousry: [As he writes] Marry a stranger-
ABDEL RAHMAN: Don‘t get weak.
Yousry: - don‘t get weak.
ABDEL RAHMAN: Meaning, the Prophet advises that we marry strangers,
.
1 The FBI still could not fathom this. Agent Samit, one of the FBI‘s best, was asked in Spring 2006,
Q. Al-Gama‘a al-Islamiyya, what was the relationship between that group and al- Qaeda?
A. Like EIJ, or Egyptian Islamic Jihad, el Gamaa also fell under the al-Qaeda umbrella.
Q. And Abdel Rahman was a spiritual leader of that group?
A. That's correct.
Q. What was his relationship with Bin Laden, and did he have a position within al Qaeda?
A. Well, I'm not sure if he personally had a position within al-Qaeda, but the group did.
2 . Other reports have him born in the village of al-Jamaliyah, in the province of al-Daqhaliyah, 120 miles from Cairo.
don‘t marry the daughter of your paternal uncle or aunt, your maternal
uncle or aunt or the daughter of eh, hah....
Yousry: Right, Sir.
ABDEL RAHMAN: So, you marry a stranger, don‘t get weak, in order not
weak.
Stewart: Ask the Sheikh, how old is his daughter?
Yousry: She is asking, Sir, how old is your daughter?
ABDEL RAHMAN: She is about eh, about twenty-five.
Yousry: About twenty-five.
Stewart: Mmm hmm.
ABDEL RAHMAN: You see?
Yousry: Yes, Sir.
ABDEL RAHMAN: The word means, ―so you don‘t get weak.‖
Yousry: [Repeating] In order not to get weak.
ABDEL RAHMAN: Yeah, because of the heredity factor. If the sense of
hearing in a family is fifty per cent...
Yousry: Yeah.
ABDEL RAHMAN: ...the hearing of the son they will have will be twenty-five
cent.
Yousry: Exactly, Sir.
ABDEL RAHMAN: If the sight is seventy-five percent, the son will be
twenty-per cent and so on. Sugar can also be passed through heredity, the
son will be diabetic. The Hadith says, ―Marry strangers, don‘t get weak.‖
Yousry: [Repeating] Marry strangers, don‘t get weak.
A. No.
6. http://www.alwasatparty.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=313
After receiving his PhD. in Qur‘anic exegesis and Islamic theology in
1977 the Blind Sheikh Rahman was appointed as an instructor in the
school of religious studies of the al-Azhar University branch in the province
of al-Fayyum, despite his Islamist views. He was also appointed as the
Imam of the mosque in the nearby village of Fidmin. He used the mosque
pulpit to continue to instigate against the ruling regime. In 1977 sensing
that another prison term was imminent Sheikh Rahman went to Saudi
Arabia where he taught at a girls‘ school (he was allowed to do so because
he was blind). In Saudi Arabia he made contact with other Islamists, as well
as wealthy Saudis who later provided the Islamist
movement with money. He traveled throughout the Middle
East, and met with other leading Islamist scholars and
politicians including the Sorbonne-educated scholar Dr.
Hassan Abdullah al-Turabi (left), leader of Sudan‘s
National Islamic Front (NIF). During his annual leave, he was always
invited to lecture at the camps and panel discussions of the Islamists.
These discussion groups were organized under the guise of "student
unions" that were under the control of Islamists. The Sheik subsequently
returned to Egypt in 1980 where he became a professor at the faculty of
Osoul al-Deen (Fundamentals of Islam) at the Asyut branch of Al-Azhar
University. After his return, he met with members of the Shura Council7 of
the Islamic Group in the town of al-Fayyum who asked him to be their
leader because they were determined to have a legitimate point of
reference. He declined the offer at first, but then accepted it and submitted
to their viewpoint. When the Al-Gama’a al-Islamiyya entered into an
alliance with an al-Jihad organization (that was then led by engineer
Muhammad Abdel Salam Faraj) the two sides accepted Abdel Rahman as
leader, emir, and mufti of the alliance that engineered the assassination of
Anwar al-Sadat.
7. Consultive Council. The Shura Counsel at Al-Gama‘a al-Islamiyya is not a Board of Directors or a war operations room. It is an
advisory board for Sheik Rahman unlike what you have in the West. For you ruling of votes at is by the majority. However, if the
Shurah council at Al-Gama‘a al-Islamiyya, the highest authority in the organization, had a majority of 98 percent on a resolution and
it is opposed by Rahman, he has the right to cancel the resolution, because it is only consultative to him and not binding.‖
he was a lieutenant in the Egyptian Army he was tried and imprisoned as
an Axis spy.8 Sadat continued to express his admiration for Hitler after the
war ended.9 Once in power Sadat encouraged King Faisal of Saudi Arabia
to finance a crusade against communism and atheism in Egypt. Faisal sent
more than $100 million to the Sheik Abdel Halim Mahmoud, the director of
Al-Azar University. Mahmoud ordered Sheik Rahman to head the
campaign in Upper Egypt and at the University of Asyut.
In 1982 Sheik Rahman was put on trial for having met with many of
the suspects in the months before the execution. Abud Zurnor testified
Rahman had given his approval in principle, but had never known about the
actual plan to murder the president. ―Rahman said it was right to shed
12. William E. Farrell ―Egypt Reports Plot to Kill Aides at Sadat‘s Funeral.‖ New York Times October 31, 1981 page 3, 1
Sadat's blood, unless he obeys God's law, but as regards the assassination
at the October 6th parade, the Sheik's advice was not asked. We had lost
touch with him.‖ When the Sheik testified he sermonized: ―Man-made laws
are complete infidelity. It‘s either Islam or the state of ignorance. It‘s either
faith or infidelity. Those who don't rule according to God‘s orders are kuffar,
oppressors, wrong doers.‖ Sheikh Omar defended himself before the court
for eight hours and he and a second defendant, Sayyid al-Salamuni, a
professor at the Faculty of Education, Ein Shams University, out of 24
defendants, were acquitted for lack of evidence.
13. The late Shaykh Salah Abu Ismail was elected to the Egyptian parliament circa 1976
was expected to be the death sentence -- by showing the justness of their
cause and their noble intention. Indeed, the judge did not issue any death
sentence in that case. He cited extenuating circumstances, such as the
defendants' just cause and noble intention. I cannot conclude the talk on
Rahman’s statements at the trial without mentioning some of them that
were strong in their justness and straightforwardness. This put him in a
very difficult position because the prosecutor could have used these
statements against him and demanded the death sentence for him. But he
was the scholar of the mujahideen and the mujahid of the scholars.‖
Rahman said this during the trial: ―The prosecutor's office has
defended the sulh (conciliation) treaty between Egypt and Israel. I will not
reply to the prosecutor's office. My reply to the committee formed by the
Shaykh of Al-Azhar is enough. I will reply to the great scholar (sarcastically)
-- the prosecutor who testified that the treaty is valid on the basis of God's
words: ‗As long as these stand true to you, stand ye to them, but if the
enemy incline towards peace, do thou (also) incline towards peace.‘
(Qur‘anic verses) Did the Jews stand true to us? Did they incline towards
peace? Is it not we who inclined and stood true? My crime is that I have
criticized the state and shown the corruption of the society and its hostility
to God's religion. I have stood up everywhere saying the words of truth,
which are the very basics of my religion and belief. My religion and
conscience prompt me to fight injustice and tyranny, refute misconceptions
and doubts, and expose the tyrants, even if this costs me my life and
possessions. I am not afraid of prison or execution. I am not happy if I am
pardoned or acquitted. I am not sad if I am sentenced to death -- it will be
martyrdom for the sake of God. Then I will say: I have won, Oh God of the
Kaaba. I am a Muslim who lives and dies for his religion. I cannot remain
silent while Islam is being attacked everywhere. Oh President of the Higher
State Security Court: I have made my argument and said the truth. You
must judge in accordance with the Shari'ah and you must apply the rules of
God. If you do not do this, you are an unbeliever, a wrongdoer, and a
rebel."
After the Sheik was freed from detention the CIA sponsored a two-
week trip he made to the United States to attend a 1986 Islamist
conference. He returned to the United States in 1987 for an additional two
weeks. Between 1986 and 1990 Sheik Rahman made seven applications
to enter the United States, all over which were reviewed by CIA Officers
under diplomatic cover. The Blind Sheik Rahman was turned-down only
once for security reasons, although on two other occasions he was refused
entry because he failed to purchase a round-trip ticket or refused to list the
name of his sponsor. Two of his visa applications were approved despite
the fact he was on the Watch List of 2.7 million foreigners. CIA officers
granted the Sheik a visa in Cairo in 1986 and 1987 and in the Sudan in
1990. In 1987 another visa application was approved in Cairo, but the State
14. The Egyptian Government often casts Islamists as insane - Copts who were present at the churches attacked in Alexandria,
Egypt on April 14, 2006 quickly poked holes in the version of events presented by the Interior Ministry and state media, which had
the perpetrator, Abd al-Raziq -- described as the ―mentally ill‖ and diagnosed with schizophrenia -- following his grim itinerary
unaided, using public transportation in Alexandria‘s dense traffic to reach churches miles apart within a span of two hours. Angry
Copts protested what they saw as a cover-up, casting doubt on the security services‘ assertion that the attacks had been the work of
a lone madman.
15. Esmat Salaheddin ―Militants reconsider truce‖ Middle East Times (Reuters).
http://www.metimes.com/2K/issue2000-25/eg/militants_reconsider_truce.htm
Department claimed it could not determine if the visa was actually issued.
In July 1987 he was turned down for one visa.16
The year 1987 was a slow one for the Sheik, ―We have found no one
who will listen or pay attention to us,‖ he said. One rival group in Fayoum,
led by Shawki al-Sheikh declared Sheik Rahman a kafir. Shawki was killed
in 1988. In September 1988 Rahman was placed under house arrest until
April 1988. After his release the Sheik was rearrested while he was
preaching at Masjid al-Rahman in the southern city of Aswan, when
security forces encircled the masjid, attacked and entered with automatic
rifles drawn and their boots on: ―The police in Aswan arrested me, because
I made a speech in the mosque. It was a religious speech. They arrested
about seventy persons. The police take me to Kina Prison. It's a district
near Aswan. I was brought before the justice in charge of aggrieved
persons, aggrieved because of the detention, and he decided that I should
be released. And the Minister of Interior objected to this decision. And the
judge again decided to release me. I was detained more than a month.‖
16. Classified Report from the Office of the Inspector General Sherman Funk, USDOS cited by Douglas Jehl, New York Times ―CIA
Officers Played Role in Sheik Visas‖ July 22, 1993 Funk would eventually determine that there was no CIA involvement, just
disorganization – Doug Jehl, ―Inspector Doubts CIA Role in Sheik‘s US Entry‖ New York Times April 28, 1993.
The Justice Department reported: ―Mahmud Abouhalima and other
men in the New York City area were then involved in military training
activities and were covertly involved in domestic terrorist activity including
several conspiracies to murder and attempted murders and bombings
which took place in the New York City area from 1988 to 1990. These
activities included the attempted murder of Mikhail Gorbachev in New York
in December 1988 which was frustrated by a grenade which failed to
explode, several surveillances of Rabbi Meyer Kahane in 1988 and 1989, a
failed effort to murder President Mubarak of Egypt during a visit to the
Waldorf Astoria hotel in 1989, and the planting of pipe bombs at a gay bar
in Greenwich Village on April 28, 1990, the Sheraton Hotel where Vice
President Dan Qualye was speaking on May 20, 1990 and the Hilton Hotel
where then-U.N. Ambassador Jeanne Kirkpatrick was speaking on May 23,
1990.‖17
While Gama‘a al-Islamiyya almost ―got away with murder‖ in the U.S.,
the story was much different in Egypt. In April 1989, Sheik Rahman was
placed under arrest then put on trial along with 59 other defendants after a
rebellion at El Shohada Mosque in Fayoum, where he was preaching
during regular Friday prayers. Sheik Rahman was accused of inciting the
17. Affidavit of FBI SA Daniel Coleman September 1998 Daniel J. Coleman changed his mind about his plan to work for the New
York Police Department's Intelligence Division after a meeting in December 2005 with several officials, including a Police
Department deputy commissioner, David Cohen. At the meeting, the F.B.I. and more particularly, one of its officials, a former boss
of Mr. Coleman's was criticized in ways that Mr. Coleman found offensive.
worshippers to commit sabotage and to demonstrate and attack the police.
This so-called riot involved 1,500 men.18 The Sheik: ―The police attacked
the house in Fayoum, raided the house in Fayoum. They then raided the
mosque after I delivered the Friday prayer speech and they threatened to
fire if I don't surrender. As I refused to go out they came in, shot some
people and arrested me. I was thrown on the ground and dragged quite
some distance to their truck. They took me to Alazab Prison in Fayoum
where I was kept locked in a cell that had no light or air. I was held four
months. I was charged with arranging a demonstration in the street. And
the court also ordered that the charges against me be dismissed. I left
Egypt before the judge ordered my release, my dismissal, sorry. Before the
judge ordered my dismissal.‖
18. Alan Cowell ―Egypt Seizes 1,500 In Crackdown on Fundamentalists‖ New York Times April 27, 1989 Page A3, 1
thought they were using the Sheikh, ultimately the opposite would prove
true.
The court ruled: ―Dr. Rahman confirmed that he gave the sermon of
Jumma prayer at Majid El Shohada on the day of the incident, and that he
followed it with a religious lecture, which is a legal act, and in accordance
with the nature of the religion Islam. That does not show any proof as to the
accusations against him. Defendants two to six did not confirm that the
others crowded and started throwing stones at the police so this doesn‘t
necessarily make them perpetrators…for it is possible that the stone
throwing was an act of self defense to deter the aggression that befell them
from the part of the police force. In addition none of these defendants
mentioned that Sheik Rahman was their organizer.‖19 He was acquitted
again but the military governor refused to ratify the court verdict of acquittal
based on the powers vested in him by the emergency law. This case was
then referred to another court.
In less than a month the Sheik was placed under house arrest. ―The
house arrest in this case started August or September 1988, until April
1989 and from August 1989, until April 1990. I cannot leave the house or
get out of the house and no relatives or friends can visit me. If a friend tried
to come to my house, he would be arrested and detained. Even those who
repair furniture or electricity cannot have access to me. Not even my
doctor. It must be by order of the Minister of Interior. Such matters do not
go according to written orders. But when I tried to leave the house, then the
police would prevent me from doing that by force. My lawyer tried to end it.
He submitted, he started a case, a lawsuit at the administrative court,
and an order was issued by the Minister of the Interior that nobody should
do me any harm, whether inside the country or outside the country. The
court issued its verdict, but this verdict was not carried out. The court
19. Translated by Sidig Ali Sidig Quick International Translators 2823 Kennedy Boulevard. Jersey City, NJ
20. lslamically deniable acts.
issued an order by the Minister of Interior that I should be allowed to move
freely inside Egypt and outside and during my travel. The Minister of
Interior acted against the court order and did not carry the court‘s order.
The court said I should not be placed under arrest. They said that about the
beginning of 1989, I presented to my lawyer a copy of that document. As
far as I remember, it was in February or March 1989.‖
Nosair: In New Jersey, the mosque board of Directors election is due. It will
be held on March 16, [1989]. We tried to talk to the Brothers to nominate
some of the Brothers who are in charge of the office, God willing. Yes, that
is necessary, God willing. God willing.
ABDEL RAHMAN: Yes, tell them to fear God and seek his help…the goal
of the election and the nomination should be God. So you select the most
qualified and the most useful for the Islamic Call. Of course, you have to
support the Jihad people, and those who are in charge of it. They are the
most deserving. No work will succeed without Jihad in God‘s ways. Jihad
should be implemented in its essence as well as in purpose towards this
subject. Therefore, the Jihad people are the most worthy of this.30
The mosque must function to further the work of the Islamist cell or
Islamist call. The leaders of the mosque must be militants. This was Sheik
Rahman’s message to El-Sayyid Nosair, who would become head of the
Jihad Organization of the Islamic Group at the Al-Salaam Mosque in Jersey
City, New Jersey.
31. Colin Miner New York Post August 3, 1993 page 1 ―Sheik Blessed Plot.‖ Also ―Nosair, I Secretly Met with Kahane.‖
32. USDC SDNY 92 Civil 8274 (JSM) Letter August 11, 1993.
DAN QUALYE & JEANNE KIRKPATRICK
No one was arrested for any of these activities, yet the FBI reported:
―Confidential Source Three (CS-3) is a person who was intimately familiar
with various persons involved in Jihad in the New York area in the period
from 1988 to 1990 and participated in criminal activity.‖33 The Intelligence
Community knew exactly what Gama‘a al-Islamiyya‘s Brooklyn / Jersey
City cell was up to but intentionally did nothing. The explanation for the
grant of immunity from criminal prosecution can be summed up in one word
- COMMUNISM. From its inception the CIA‘s main goal was to destroy the
Soviet Union. Sixty-percent of its budget was utilized for this purpose. This
was precisely what Gama‘a al-Islamiyya and al-Qaeda were doing at this
time with the hot war in Afghanistan. The CIA instructed the FBI not to
interfere with Islamist terrorists, and the FBI passed this information to the
New York City Police Department though the Joint Terrorism Task Force.
News of the assassination attempts were not made public by the law
enforcement community, who felt Islamist efforts would never amount to
more than a hill of hummus. Another reason al-Qaeda had immunity was
because the American government had men like Sergeant Ali-Mohamed
The Sheik wisely never mentioned his escape nor the fact that he
was a fugitive and the Egyptians were pressing for his extradition to the
INS: ―The applicant testified that he last departed from Egypt in April 1990,
by obtaining a visa to travel to Saudi Arabia for pilgrimage. Although he
stated that he was under house arrest at this time, the police allowed him to
leave for Saudi Arabia and he was escorted by four cars from his house to
the airport.‖ The Blind Sheikh Rahman was in Great Britain on May 1, 1990
because on that date he was granted a B-2 Tourist Visa to visit the United
States.34
In May 1990 the Sheik fled Egypt for the Sudan where he stayed for
one month. From there he went to Pakistan for one month and then to
Afghanistan where he preached the word of God, raised money for the war
against the Soviets and enthusiastically endorsed the merger of Gama‘a al-
Islamiyya with the International Alliance Against Christian and Jews which
came to be known as al-Qaeda. It was on to Saudi Arabia for ten days then
back to the Sudan and on to America! Judge Daniel Meisner, who presided
over the Sheik‘s immigration hearing, wrote: ―In addition to his testimony
regarding his six arrests, the applicant testified regarding his travel outside
of Egypt between 1970 and 1991. It appears that since 1970, applicant
traveled to Saudi Arabia, the United States, Denmark, London, Sudan and
Pakistan for ‗pilgrimage‘ and to attend conferences. The specific facts
How did Sheik Rahman go in and out of America like it was a revolving
door when his acquittal in a case of attempting to kill two policemen and
inciting violence during a protest outside a mosque in Fayoum, southwest
of Cairo had been overturned by the Mubarak regime? How did he enter a
Christian country after issuing a fatwa calling for the death of Christians?
With the help of Allah [subhanahu wa ta‘ala], he used America‘s hatred for
Soviet Communism as a means of manipulating the CIA and FBI into
allowing Islamists to gather in mosques and safehouses to plan anti-
35. Pilgrimage.
36. Military officers and members of the police forces have been appointed to governorships in the troubled regions, execution of
Islamists sentenced by special courts was commonplace and in March 2003 the state of emergency was extended for three more
years. This despite the fact that the Constitution approved by president Anwar Sadat in 1971 claimed Egypt is an Islamic state.
Communist activities, and drive the Reds from Afghanistan. There came a
point where those activities were also aimed at another enemy of Islam, the
United States. Once Islamists reached this stage we felt confident enough
to bring the Prince of Jihad into the heart of the beast.
To the CIA, which pumped more than $2 billion into the fourteen-year
Afghani resistance effort, Sheik Rahman was invaluable37 for Rahman was
one of the main operatives the CIA utilized in its proxy war against the
Soviets, although Rahman now must deny any such association. The Sheik
had established himself as an important U.S. ally by helping the CIA
channel money, weapons, and men to mujahedeen training centers in the
U.S. supported countries of Egypt and Pakistan. Peshawar, Pakistan,
nearby Afghanistan, became the staging area for tens of thousands of
37. Mary Ann Weaver ―Blowback‖ The Atlantic Monthly - May 1996.
radicals, many of whom went on to form smaller cells around the world,
including inside the U.S. and England.
This was why the CIA brought Sheik Rahman into the U.S. via Saudi
Arabia, Peshawar, and the Sudan on a tourist visa issued by an undercover
CIA agent using diplomatic cover.39 His followers were playing a major role
in defeating the Communists. The Sheik received his visa at the U.S.
Embassy in Khartoum, Sudan, even though his name appeared on the
State Department‘s official ―terrorist‖ list. The State Department said the
CIA officer approved the visa application after being assured incorrectly by
a Sudanese employee that Rahman was not on the ―undesirable‖ list.
However, three days after granting him the visa, the embassy informed the
State Department that it had made a grave error. The State Department,
however, at the request of the CIA refused to alert the INS, so the INS did
38. Caryle Murphy Passion for Islam Page 62 Scribner October 1, 2002.
39. Douglas Jehl ―CIA Officer Signed Visa For Sheik U.S. Says ‖New York Times July 14, 1993 Page B6, 1.
not place him on its Watch List of people to be turned back if they
attempted to enter the United States. During Sheik Rahman‘s Bridge and
Tunnel trial in early 1995 the Sheik‘s attorney sent this letter to the State
Department of the United States:
―Dr. Abdel Rahman received a visa to enter the United States in 1990
from the United States consular office in Khartoum, Sudan. Upon
information and belief there may have been correspondence surrounding
the issuance of this visa. One or more of the aforementioned agencies [the
CIA, the State Department] may have contacted the consulate in that
regard. To the extent that this correspondence, including but not limited to
written, telephonic, cybernating, is exculpatory, it must be produced…[as]
media reports have alleged that one of the defendants, Omar Ahmad Ali
Abdel Rahman, has close ties to the Central Intelligence Agency, may have
assisted the United States during the war in Afghanistan, and may have
been permitted to enter the United States with the assistance of State
Department employees…‖
The Assistant United States Attorney, knowing that the CIA would
never admit to aiding Dr. Rahman agreed to this request: ―Dr. Rahman
received a visa to enter the United States in July 1990 from the United
States consular office in Khartoum Sudan. Upon information and belief
there might have been correspondence surrounding the issuance of this
visa between one or more of the aforementioned agencies and intelligence
agencies referred to above. In light of this we would ask that you provide
any such foreign intelligence information to us, so that we may determine if
we are obligated to disclose any of it pursuant to Brady v. Maryland.‖
THE COURT: I should point out to him and to you, so that both of you can
take some comfort in this, that whatever knowledge he may have of his
own activities I don‘t think he can be barred from introducing based on its
being classified. Do you [Assistant U.S. Attorney] McCarthy?
McCarthy: I do your Honor. Well I think that at the very least if he is the
source of the classified information, I don‘t think we can prevent him from
testifying at trial… I think the public authority statute has a specific
provision in it saying that nothing in the statute should be construed as
barring the defendant from testifying at trial. The Classified Information
Procedure Act doesn‘t have a similar provision, so I don‘t want to be
deemed at this point to have waived any claim he can be barred from
testifying as to classified information.
During this trial Sheik Rahman pointedly asked: ―When I entered the
United States of America in July 1990, how come you did not arrest me
while I am the Prince of Jihad Organization in United States of America
from the beginning of the year 1989 and a principal leader in that
international Jihad Organization, from the beginning of the year 1980?
Yassir Arafat was forbidden from entering America at a time when he was
the chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization. What do you think of
me, then? And I am being a principal leader, and I am the Prince of the
Jihad Organization in America. Why was it not forbidden? Why was I not
forbidden? How did I get the entry visa at a time when I am principal leader
in this international organization of Jihad, and I am the Emir of Jihad in
America? How did I come to possess the Green Card within two or three
months‘ time, and the interview for possessing the green card was done
within two or three minutes? And even after the Green Card has been
taken away, the FBI agent did not tell me at the airport that the green card
is being taken away from you because you are the Emir of the Jihad
Organization in America. And the immigration judge even did not tell me
that, and he is one of the meanest judges on the surface of this earth. Then
how did I enter America? Isn‘t that a weakness in the system? Is it a
weakness in the computer system? Or is it a weakness in the minds, or the
brains? How could the Prince of the Jihad Organization in America come to
enter America and then exit America a number of times without somebody
stopping him? Then to Denmark, then to Saudi Arabia, and in every time I
return to America. How come I was not stopped from exiting so that I may
run away? And how come I was not arrested when I re-entered, so that I
may be right at a time when I am a principal leader in an international Jihad
Organization? Were the systems in America asleep? Or were they awake?
If they were asleep, then they should be fined, and if they were awake and I
have committed the crimes and they have not arrested me, they must be
stupid, they have no brains. Since nothing like that happened, therefore I
am innocent.‖
FBI snitch Emad Salem‘s FBI handler John Michael Anticev tried to
dissuade Salem from his belief that Sheik Rahman was a CIA asset:
Salem: Dr. Omar Rahman comes to Abu Bakr mosque and, you know, gets
his way. The new Imam is a balanced person he is not fundamental. So he
said, ―I am the Imam here. My word should be the first and the last. And I
want have the authority to say who will come to my mosque and who
shouldn't come.‖ So, of course, Omar Rahman's people heard that they
said ―No.‖ Because they know that the minute they will give him this
authority, and he wanted [it] on his contract. They heard that, they said no.
Because they know that the minute they will sign this contract with him, he
will refuse to let Omar Rahman to come. So, they fought each other, and
you know the Imam is going to Egypt on April 30th and from there he is
going to Hajj in Saudi Arabia. And the people in the mosque were just
waiting to see what the final decision would be. But he is not happy about
Dr. Rahman's thing. Dr. Rahman's lately getting [giving] the impression that
he is cooperating with the CIA.
Anticev: Hmm.
Salem: Do you think it's true that he have something to do with the CIA?
Anticev: No, I am telling you the truth, I have no information regarding that
and I really don't think so.
Salem: Yeah.
Anticev: I really don't think so. I think that was put, on uh, put together by
reporters.
Salem: No, that's his words. I mean, he said ―We'll how do you think I came
with Sudan?‖
Anticev: Yeah, but I thought, uh, we said, uh, in the beginning, when he
saw that article about the CIA connection, he rejected that.
Salem: ...confront.
Anticev: He wanted to show that he had connections to the FBI and the
CIA...
Salem: Right.
Anticev: It's just that he's playing a trick. To show that, uh, he's going along
with what the paper's saying.
Q. Okay. Now let me ask you this, do you collect money to send back to
Egypt for any particular cause or organization?
Q. All right. Let me ask you this, sir, did you recently send a total of
$140,000 in two checks to your wife in Egypt?
A. I tried to defend myself about these charges and the judge said no.
Q. You just said no. That's enough. Did your wife tell you that she received
two checks were confiscated by the Egyptian government? Yes or no, sir?
43. Douglas Jehl ―Flaws in the U.S. Visa System‖ New York Times, July 3, 1993 Page 1, 2.
44. Mary Ann Weaver ―Blowback‖ The Atlantic Online May 1996
http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/96may/blowback.htm
Despite the Sheik‘s absence from Egypt out activities were moving right
along - in 1991 thirty Coptic kuffar were killed there!
45. USA v Rahman Misc Files Transcript of Salem - Anticev page 3 and 4. Document in Authors possession.
businessmen in Egypt. According to Fahmy, the Gama‘a accused the
Coptic businessmen of ―sabotaging the Egyptian economy and fronting for
the CIA.‖46
Blessed must be Allah who caused the FBI to ignore this most
important information that was supplied by Salem. ―Abu Abdullah‖ was the
code name of Usama bin Laden47 and had the FBI and the CIA tracked him
down and put an agent close to him, the United States Government might
have been able to later arrest him or assassinate him after they concluded,
with good reason, that he was a grave threat to their National Security. It
was not until 1997 that the Americans appreciated that Usama bin Laden
was a planner not just a financier of Islamist terrorist activities.48 In the U.S.
Congress‘ September 11th Failure Report it was revealed: ―The CIA never
had anyone in position to tell us what was going to happen in advance, or
even where bin Laden was going to be in advance [deleted] we never knew
where he was going to be in advance, And usually we were only informed
about his – where he was after the fact…And [deleted] where they were
able to tell us where they thought he was at the moment, [deleted] the CIA
itself recommended against action, because they said their sources were
not very good, or not good enough to recommend military action.‖ Even the
American intelligence failed to appreciate the importance of this Muslim
military leader and his followers, in fact it was not until October 8, 1999, by
publication in the Federal Register, that the Secretary of State Madeleine
K. Albright designated al-Qaeda as a foreign terrorist organization pursuant
the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996. It was in 1996
that the FBI recognized the increased threat to the United States posed by
Usama bin Laden and created the Usama bin Laden Unit to handle al-
Qaeda-related matters. Michael Sheuer headed the Unit. Sheuer attended
Canisius College. U.S. News and World Report ranked Canisius as 22nd
among regional schools in its "North Region." He went on to earn an M.A.
from Niagara University in 1976 and another M.A. from Carleton University
in 1982. He also received a Ph.D. in British Empire-U.S.-Canada-U.K.
relations from the University of Manitoba in 1986. He was never the
46. http://www.ibnkhaldun.org/newsletter/1998/sep/civil.html
47. USAMA BIN LADEN, INDICTMENT a/k/a "Usamah Bin-Muhammad Bin-Ladin," a/k/a "Shaykh Usamah Bin-Ladin," a/k/a
"Mujahid Shaykh," a/k/a "Abu Abdullah" a/k/a "Qa Qa,"
48. http://news.findlaw.com/hdocs/docs/911rpt/32404intel.pdf
brightest light on the Christmas tree. Sheuer or ―Mohammed Al-Sheuer,‖ as
I prefer to call him, was, in my opinion, an Islamist ideological mole within
the CIA and a truly dangerous enemy of the United States. It is this authors‘
conclusion that Sheuer only pretended to go after Osama Bin Laden but
was in reality was protecting him. In order to hide this Sheuer blamed the
Clinton Administration for CIA‘s failure to kill Bin Laden, claiming that he
had the chance to do it numerous times but was prevented from doing so
by his superiors. He offers no evidence to back up these claims other than
his self serving statements based on his apparent bona fides while in the
CIA: Sheuer was in charge of the rendition program and was responsible
for numerous kidnappings, imprisonment and torture of 30 lower level
Islamists. I believe he carried out these operations successfully in order to
maintain his credibility so he could protect the big enchilada, Osama Bin
Laden, who he knew that if he remained on the loose, would soon carry out
an operation against the United States that would make the other jihadis
shenanigans look like greasy kids stuff. Sheuer never made clandestine
contact with Al-Qaeda so the CIA CI or Office of Security had no reason to
suspect him. In retrospect if Sheuer held the same views while he headed
the Bin Laden Desk that he expressed after he left it, then there is no other
explanation other than that he was an enemy ideological mole. In his book
Imperial Hubris Sheuer called Bin Laden a ―great man‖ and Bin Laden
spoke highly of al-Sheuer in a video Al Qaeda released and said, ―"If you
want to understand what's going on and if you would like to get to know
some of the reasons for your losing the war against us, then read the book
of Michael Scheuer in this regard." Additionally Al-Sheuer claimed that
repressive governments like Algeria, Egypt and especially Saudi Arabia are
responsible for the resurgence of Islamic jihadist fundamentalism in the
Moslem world and he wants to see these governments overthrown. Al-
Sheuer never states that if these governments are overthrown they will be
replaced with theocracies and Shar‘ia Law. Even if there was no Israel
these theocrats would still be intent on making the entire world Islamic,
starting with the Jews, who Mohammed failed to convert. But Sheuer
argues that it is not religious or cultural differences that have made Islam
regard America as the enemy. It is solely the result of America‘s support for
the State of Israel. Sheuer wants the Islamic world to focus its hatred on
Israel rather than the United States yet he says in the same breath that
Israel has a right to exist and possess nuclear weapons. I believe Sheuer
had a hidden agenda at CIA and secretly wants Israel and neighboring
states like Egypt and Saudi Arabia destroyed in a nuclear war in the Middle
East. In my opinion other CIA and FBI agents may have screwed up when
it came to 9/11 but their failure was unintentional while Scheuer‘s was
deliberate! He was transferred out of the UBL Unit in 1999 and he resigned
from the CIA in 2004. According to CIA, nine Counter Terrorism Center
analysts and eight analysts in the Directorate of Intelligence were assigned
to Usama bin Laden in 1999.49 After he left the Agency he became an
Adjunct Professor of Security Studies at Georgetown University, and was a
regular contributor to the Jamestown Foundations Terrorism Focus until he
was fired in 2009. Scheuer published two books blaming others for his
failure to kidnap or murder Usama bin Laden.
Al-Sheuer lashed out at the panel that investigated the Sept. 11,
2001, terrorist attacks. He called the panel and the CIA ―bureaucratic
cowards‖ for not holding an agency or individuals accountable for the
tragedy. His invective was particularly critical of former CIA director George
Tenet, saying he ―starved and is starving the [Osama] bin Laden unit of
officers while finding plenty of officers to staff his personal public relations
office, as well as the staffs that handled diversity, multiculturalism, and
employee newsletters.‖
49. Report of the Joint Inquiry into the Terrorist Attacks of September 11, 2001 – by the House Permanent Select Committee on
Intelligence and the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence.
50. http://www.lynnestewart.org/5201.pdf
Sheik Rahman‘s organization was not the only Islamist network
operating in America. Hamas had been doing so for many years. Of course
the Sheik had a very close association with this Palestinian Islamist group
and when the FBI searched the home of Mohamed Nabeel El-Masry, who
had been entrusted with Sheik Rahman‘s possessions after the Sheik‘s
arrest it found a tape of the Sheik speaking at a Hamas conference.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Andrew McCarthy, who prosecuted the Sheik,
threatened to introduce evidence that linked Rahman to Hamas.51
Some have said that Sheik Rahman is nothing more than an Islamist
Nazi preaching racial and religious hatred. To counter this his followers
have stated that the Sheik has never been censured or reprimanded by any
bona fide Islamic group for his sermons. Rabbi Meir Kahane was expelled
from the Israel‘s parliament for racism. Kahane, the founder of the Jewish
Defense League, was asked: ―Do you consider yourself a racist?‖ He
answered: ―I am a man of Halacha.52 If you want to call that racism, then I
am a racist. But labels are the last refuge of non-thinkers. To me, a racist is
someone that says, ‗I‘m better than you and you can never be as good as
me.‘ But an Arab, a goy, can become a Jew and become as good as Meir
Kahane. Are we better than the goyim? Yes, we are. Are we sanctified
above the Goyim? Yes we are. But Goyim can become Jews.‖
51. William Kleinknecht ―Bomb Suspect‘s Hamas Link Eyed‖ New York Daily News November 22, 1994.
52. Jewish law.
53. Praise Be to Allah
At the door, a 70-year-old Jew named Irving Franklin sought to impede
Nosair‘s flight. Nosair shot Franklin in the leg, and fled the room. Mahmud
Abouhalima was supposed to have driven the getaway car, a taxicab, but
parked it in the wrong spot, so the overexcited Nosair jumped in the wrong
cab, and when he became aware of what he had done, he put a gun to the
driver‘s head then got out. Rahman crew member Hampton-El told
Egyptian intelligence agent Abdo Haggag that Abouhalima was to be killed
for this mistake, until it was found out that it was an honest one.
During the trial of Sheik Rahman Hampton-El was asked about his
role in the Kahane assassination:
Q. Let me direct you attention ahead from 1989 to the day of November 5,
1990, the day Rabbi Meyer Kahane was killed. Do you recall that day?
A. The date no, but the day he was killed, yes, I recall.
A. Absolutely not.
Q. You told us the other day that on May 30, 1993, you were discussing
with Siddig Ali and Emad Salem how it was that you were supposed to be
there the night that Kahane was killed. Do you recall that?
A. Yes I do.
Q. You are telling us that the only time in your life that you that you ever
told anyone you were supposed to be outside the scene of the Kahane
homicide was May 30, 1993 when that tape was running?
Q. You told Siddig Ali and Emad Salem on that occasion that after Kahane
was killed Sheik Omar Abdul Rahman told you not to visit Nosair. You told
us that?
A. I also said that was not true.
Q. You told us on direct examination that the reason you told Emad Salem
and Siddig Ali that you were supposed to be outside the scene of the
Kahane homicide was that you were trying to impress them; was that your
testimony?
A. I said Siddig Ali thought the situation was good and he spoke about it
many times. So I said, at that time I said it, thinking it would impress them,
yes…
Q. You told this jury that you jumped out a window breaking a leg to save a
suicide victim? You told this jury that you stepped on a land mine in
Afghanistan in 1988? And you told this jury that you were invited down to
meet the prince in the Saudi Embassy, correct?
A. Yes.
Q. And the person you were trying to impress on May 30, 1993, Siddig Ali,
is a person you told us was screaming and crying in the room, ‗I can‘t take
it anymore‘ on a prior occasion, is that correct?
A. Yes he did. Then the man number one got shot by the postal police
officer. I saw a flash of light going out, and directly hitting man number one
which was the unarmed person.
A. The postal police officer. Man number two [the man with the yarmulke]
fired back. Man number one [Nosair] fell on the ground. The postal police
officer, he was also falling to the ground.
In early 1990 the FBI had a phone intercept of Sheik Abdel Omar
Rahman speaking to Brother Sayyid Nosair about ―attacking big buildings,
attack[ing] skyscrapers.‖ On November 5, 1990 the Bureau found these
words, amid photos of New York landmarks, including the World Trade
Center, written by Brother Sayyid A. Nosair while executing a search
warrant for his home: ―We must destroy tourist places that they are proud
about and their statues and their tall buildings that bring them pride, and
the buildings that their leaders meet at. We are as Muslims not to declare
any responsibility for these acts. By this the enemies of Allah will be busy in
rebuilding their civilization from the start and renewing their morals and we
will have the opportunity as Muslims to regain our holy lands from the
hands of Allah‘s enemies and traitors who will at that point be very weak
mentally after they see what is going on around them (the power they
depended on collapsed and suppressed).‖ The FBI also found a book that
day entitled, ―Method For Forcing An Entry Into An Airplane,‖ the World
Trade Center‘s Twin Towers would still be standing?59 Additionally, when
After the Kahane assassination Nosair‘s car and work lockers were
also searched. Among the items seized, other than what was previously
mentioned, was a handwritten notebook, in which Nosair stated that to
establish a Muslim state in the Muslim holy lands it would be necessary ―to
break and destroy the morale of the enemies of Allah… And therefore the
chance will be available for the Muslims to repossess their sacred lands
from the hands of the enemies of God, the traitors and hypocrites who will
be in this moment in a very psychological weakness from what they see
around them and this is because the forces on which they were depending
were crushed into pieces and are in tragic collapse.‖60
60. Cited at footnote USA v. Rahman Tr. 3962-63. Also Trial Transcript 19152
There was one typed document that read at the top ―In
the name of Allah the most Gracious, the most Merciful. It read
‗A communiqué regarding the attempted assassination of Zaki
Badr (left), the Interior Minister of Egypt.‘ The document is
signed at the bottom ‗The Brigade of Martyrs and Muslim
Egypt.‘‖ It read in part: ―The martyrs‘ battalion in Muslim Egypt
made an attempt at executing God‘s will, Egypt‘s arrogant tribunal. Zaki
Bada, who by exercising his inhumanity turned Egypt into a prison and a
big concentration camp. The man has killed and tortured and left homeless.
He made many mothers grieve when their children died, many women
widows, he caused many women to abort, turned many children to
orphans. Many peaceful villages were attacked an abused by him. He
humiliated many people. Even the unions, establishment judges and the
orders were not spared from his arm. Why not when he never heeds any of
God‘s laws? He went on spreading his corruption on earth without
accountability to conscious or law. Therefore, the martyr‘s battalion
declares that this attempt came as an answer after it was legitimatised by
religious jurors who cry from all the walks of Egyptian people and its
political powers. Take your hand off the Egyptian Muslims. This is an
apology and a warning. Unless you listen what happened will happen
again.‖61
The FBI also found ―One booklet written in part Arabic with some
diagrams of engineering sketches, some of the English in the booklet
pertaining to bases of fuels in organic substances, essential ingredients of
steel, rare earth metals, poisonous reactive gases in the degasification of
light allodes. Its cover has writings in Arabic.‖
There were several issues of the Pittsburgh Press pertaining to the
Sadat assassination along with the address of the Egyptian Embassy in
Washington and the U.N. Mission in New York City. The FBI also found a
piece of paper which read: ―Al-Kifah Refugee Center Inc. 2824 Kennedy
Boulevard, Suite Number 4, Jersey City, New Jersey.‖ A typed letter
addressed to the Ad Center North American Islamic Trust, 10900 W.
Washington Street, Indianapolis, Indiana dated September 22, 1983 and
signed by Nosair was found. The Islamic Trust is closely connected with
the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) perhaps the most respectable
Muslim Islamist support group in North America.
62. John L. Esposito Islam and Democracy Oxford University Press May 1966.
63. 100 Center Street, Criminal Court docket 90N-099-424-‖Nosir,‖ TT, Pages 2910 and 2911
extradite Sheik Abul Karim Obeid from Israel to the United States. Sheik
Obeid, a leader of the Hizb‘allah, had been kidnapped from his home in
Lebanon in retaliation for the death of Colonel Richard Higgins. Higgins,
United States Marine Corps, disappeared on February 17, 1988, while
serving as the Chief, Observer Group Lebanon and Senior Military
Observer, United States Military Observer Group, United Nations Truce
Supervision Organization. A newspaper article was found in Nosair‘s home
that attributed Obeid‘s attempted extradition to Congressman Ackerman.
64. In September 1970 the Jordanian Government killed thousands of Palestinians who threatened to overthrow the monarchy of
King Hussein. Black September‘s emergence was a direct result of this as the PLO wished to distance itself from so-called
terrorism.
65. The Father of Struggle
extradition from Venezuela was kosher. In October 1991, an Israeli court
found Atta guilty and sentenced him to life imprisonment.
Professor Howard Adelson who wrote a column for the Jewish Press
was on El-Sayyid Nosair‘s ―hit list.‖ Nosair‘s attorney explained his clients‘
interest in The Jewish Press: ―He was an avid reader of the Jewish Press
before he went to Attica.‖ In an intercepted telephone conversation with
Sheik Rahman he said: ―Talking about the Jewish migration, Sheik Omar,
according to a weekly newspaper called the Jewish Press, a minimum of
1,000 Russian Jews migrate daily from Russia to Israel…Meanwhile the
heads of our states are like sitting ducks…‖66 Adelson was targeted for
favorably covering the activities of the Jewish Defense Organization, a
group of dangerous Judaists that had organized demonstrations against
Sheik Rahman, when his eminence first arrived in America.
Dr. Adelson stated: ―All I know about Nosair is that he had my name
in his book. The FBI came to me and asked for a meeting with me. They
called me while I was lecturing. It was a Friday. Kahane was killed on a
Thursday night. They said they had to meet with me immediately. I told
them I couldn‘t meet with them immediately as I had a luncheon
appointment at Ratner‘s Restaurant. They told me they would meet me
there. I said ‗Okay‘ but I was suspicious. They only gave me a telephone
number for them to call me back, and that wasn‘t enough for me to know it
was the FBI. The FBI came to Ratner‘s and opened up a notebook and
asked: ‗Is this your name?‘ I looked at the handwritten entry and told them
it was. And they said ‗You are in great trouble, they want to shoot you.‘ And
I said, ‗I don‘t think they want to shoot me, I don‘t think they would
announce it if they were going to execute me.‘ There were four other
names in the book, including U.S. Representative Gary Ackerman. All of
these men were all given federal protection, because they still worked for
the federal government. I was not given any protection because while I was
a reserve officer I was not on active duty. They told me I should wear a
bulletproof vest. They said, ‗If I were you when I go to the university I would
wear one. You ought to wear a bulletproof vest if people know where you
are.‘ I said ‗I lecture and my lectures are posted and I have office hours. If
people want to find me they can find me easily enough.‘ I asked if they
could provide me with bulletproof vest? They said they would not because I
67. Tape Recorded conversation with author May 22, 2003. Doctor Adelson died in December 2003, may he rest in peace.
68. Newsday November 9, 1990 also Robert I. Friedman The Village Voice March 30, 1993 ―The CIA and the Sheik -The Agency
Coddled Omar Abdel Rahman, Allowing Him to Operate in the U.S. Now This Unholy Alliance Has Blown Up in Our Faces.‖
69. Alison Mitchell ―Islamic Sheik Says Mubarak Lie and Spies on Americans,‖ New York Times April 7, 1993 B5, 1
been checking to see if Nosair had any links to any anti-Jewish
organizations but haven‘t come up with anything yet.‖ Edward T. Norris,
now the Police Commissioner of Baltimore, Maryland, and then the former
New York City Police Department Deputy Commissioner of Operations,
was in charge of the Kahane investigation. He said that the detective who
searched Nosair‘s home found four file cabinets (47 boxes) of Arabic
documents then locked them up in the 17th Precinct at 4:00 a.m. When he
returned four hours later the FBI had taken possession of them.70 The
Bureau did not immediately translate papers found in Nosair‘s home.71
Later it would claim this was because the New York Field Office had no
Arabic translator available. When the FBI finally got around to translating
them, the name of al-Qaeda, which had been founded in 1989, was
mangled and mistranslated. When the case came to trial Assistant District
Attorney Greenberg was denied access to much of the evidence seized by
the FBI. Since neither Nosair‘s attorneys, nor the Manhattan District
Attorney‘s office wanted to make this into a political trial, there were no
motions filed to force the FBI to disclose this evidence.
Oliver ―Buck‖ Revell72 accused the New York City Police Department
of having blundered: ―The New York City Police Department carried out its
investigation of the assassination of Meir Kahane with the FBI looking over
their shoulder to see if there was anything of interest for the Bureau. I was
in charge of Bureau operations at the time and I never received any
information that El-Sayyid Nosair, the assassin of Meir Kahane, was
connected with any sort of organization that might have a terrorist agenda.‖
But the FBI should have developed this information on its on – FBI –
Famous But Incompetent. The FBI withheld information from NYPD - when
Norris‘ detectives located a shooting range in Naugatuck Connecticut
where Nosair had trained they found out the FBI had been there three
weeks ago and had not told them about it.73 On August 29, 1989, two
months before the Kahane assassination, the FBI had learned that the
Brooklyn / Jersey City cell had been using this range for training when
several Brothers were stopped by a Connecticut state trooper and were
70. http://www.homelandsecurity.org/journal/articles/displayArticle.asp?article=26
71. Now the FBI has instituted a rule where every suspected ―terrorist‖ communication must be translated within 12 hours.
72. Hart G. W. Lidov, M.D. and PhD. a medical researcher on the faculty of the Harvard School of Medicine whose girlfriend was
killed in the Lockerbie airline bombing made the absurd charge that Revell, then the FBI's counter-terrorism chief, failed to share a
prior warning of the bombing with the American public, but heeded it personally to get his son off the doomed flight.
http://www.dallasobserver.com/issues/2000-07-06/news.html
73. Ariel Cohen National Review September 24, 2001 ―Bureaucratic Failure How things went as wrong as they did.‖
http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/comment-cohen092401.shtml
discovered to be in possession of a small arsenal supplied to them by a
former Waterbury, Connecticut police officer named Raymond J. Murteza.74
Murteza, an Albanian Muslim whose brother Daniel had fought in the war in
Afghanistan, had been training dozens of men from the Sheik Rahman‘s
mosque in police combat tactics. During training, Siddig Ali reported to
Rahman, and Rahman offered his insights into the training. The FBI knew
Nosair was no loner! Nosair helped to plan an armed robbery – on the night
of Meir Kahane‘s assassination a diagram of a planned armored car
robbery bearing the fingerprints of Bilal Alkaisi and Mohammed Salameh
was entrusted to El-Sayyid Nosair‘s possession.
The FBI and NYPD did not want to interfere with a CIA-sponsored
operation – the covert support of Islamists in order to defeat the
Communists, the nuclear-equipped enemy who America had been fighting
since 1946. The CIA knew precisely what Sheik Rahman and his crew
were about but left them alone as it had a higher purpose in mind which
Rahman, the Prince of Jihad, could help bring about.
ROBERT I. FRIEDMAN
74. Steven Emerson American Jihad Free Press Page 24 February 2003.
75
. Mehdi Letter to Village Voice.
of California at Berkeley in 1948 on a full Iraqi government scholarship.
There he received a B.A. in 1952 and stayed on to earn an M.A. and a
Ph.D., all in political science, with a specialization in American
Constitutional law. Dr. Mehdi was the father of American Arab political
activism, and the first to print a newsletter in English condemning the
Zionist entity. Dr. Mehdi reported, ―I was under deportation for eight years
from 1964 to 1972. Under the pressure of intolerant politicians, including
the senators from New York, I was charged with having ‗engaged in
activities contrary to the best interests of the United States.‘‖76
Oliver ―Buck‖ Revell had to admit Friedman was correct: ―As it turns
out later, as we see after the World Trade Center, there was substantial
information available that if it had been properly translated, processed,
authenticated and analyzed, would have led to a direct association
between the assassin of Meir Kahane and the group that conspired and
eventually did bomb the World Trade Center, and was conspiring to carry
out a number of other heinous acts of terrorism. A proper analysis of the
Kahane assassination was not conducted. By-and-large the reason it didn‘t
get done was because of the political climate and the fact that FBI agents
were loathe to undertake anything that had any appearance of being
involved in the political process. That includes religious activity, free
76. Letter to Editor M.T. Mehdi ―Egypt of the West?‖ New York Times July 18, 1993.
speech, etc., that are obviously protected under our Constitution. It had
become very difficult to assess how to deal with those issues.‖77
77. Statement of Oliver ―Buck‖ Revell Former Associate Deputy Director for Investigations Federal Bureau of Investigation To the
Committee on International Relations, U. S. House of Representatives Washington, D.C. October 3, 2001.
78. Newsday October 8, 1990.
79. Jewish Press March 1, 1991 ―Mubarak Praises Killer of Kahane.‖
MONEY FOR JIHAD: NOSAIR’S DEFENSE FUND
A defense fund was set up for El-Sayyid Nosair, and three hundred
thousand dollars poured in from Islamist sources, such as Usama bin
Laden, who had been in communication with Ibrahim A. El-Gabrowny for
quite some time.81 Nosair would claim that he was indigent when he filed
his Notice of Appeal, so that the remainder of the defense fund money
could be used by his family and by the Islamist cell for jihadi purposes. In
late 1992 Nosair was recorded in Attica speaking angrily about the handling
of finances and complaining that his attorney, William Kunstler was
attempting to drain the funds.
WILLIAM KUNSTLER
William Moses Kunstler was born in New York City, the son of a
proctologist, Monroe Bradford Kunstler, and Frances Mandelbaum
Kunstler. He grew up on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. Kunstler
moved to Gay Street in Greenwich Village and defended Yippies Abbie
Hoffman and Jerry Rubin. He lived a hippie lifestyle ingesting LSD with
Jerry Garcia of the Grateful Dead and smoked marijuana, but often
followed the Communist Party line. Nonetheless he was one of the first
Jews to conclude that the Islamists of the 1990‘s were the most potent
enemy of the United States, an imperialist country Kunstler hated with a
passion, having witnessed numerous instances of racism during his career
as an attorney. Many of his clients were legally lynched by the justice
system, such as those involved in the case of the rape of the Central Park
jogger, whose convictions were vacated after a prisoner came forward and
confessed to the crime, coaxed to do so by Islamic Sister Lynne Stewart.
Kunstler shared Islamic hatred for Jews, despite the fact he himself was a
Jew.
Kunstler was not averse to taking part of the blame for the
unaccounted for money as long it was used against America. The Assistant
United States Attorney commented: ―The Nosair defense fund was a trove
which ultimately raised almost $300,000. As proof at trial will show, it was
used in furtherance of Jihad activities, it was administered by El-Gabrowny
largely at Nosair‘s direction, no accounting has ever been made of it, and
Nosair lied to the judge about it in a state court proceeding. The Kunstler
firm has contributed in no small part to the shadiness that surrounds a fund
which was intended to be murky because it was available for criminal
purposes, and therefore people like the firm‘s clients El-Gabrowny and
Nosair had good reason to want its existence, locations and size hidden.
The Kunstler firm‘s response was to joke that if the money was raised for
bombs but used to pay lawyers, ‗this in fact represents the triumph of
capitalism in American life and demonstrates the validity of the bedrock
conservative belief that the market, rather than the government, is the best
source of regulation.‘‖
There was one major problem for Kunstler during the trial. Usama bin
Laden had visited Sudan in 1984 when Dr. Hassan al-Turabi was adviser to
former President Ja'far Numayri. Since then, he came to know all the
leadership of the Islamist movement especially that this period witnessed
the rise of many Islamic financial and economic institutions in Sudan. In
December 1991, at the request of bin Laden, Sudan sent an emissary to
New York to monitor the Nosair trial. After a report was relayed to him
Usama bin Laden was so pleased with the work of Kunstler that he had this
man give him a cash bonus. A court officer saw him hand him this money
Q. Do you believe that people who do not follow Islamic law may be
allowed to live and work in Egypt?
A. He must be allowed to practice his Coptic religious laws. And the Qu‘ran
says no people, no person, should be forced against his religion.
Q. Then tell me, for example, what would happen if an unmarried Coptic
Christian man in Egypt committed adultery, what do you believe his penalty
should be?
Q. Well, suppose the Christian Coptic tradition says that that is a civil
matter and there is no punishment. Do you accept that?
A. No. No, he must be punished so that such a crime will not become
widespread. They must punish him or refer him to the Old Testament. The
Old Testament also provides for punishment for adulterers. He should be
lashed, beaten, and imprisoned, or something like that.
Q. The United States State Department says on June 20, 1992, Coptic
Christians were killed in Egypt by Islamic fundamentalists. Are you aware
of this?
A. No.
A. I hear this from the newspapers. The media usually does not reflect the
facts.
―Based on the law and the facts it is clear that the defense councils
have exercised their preemptory in a racially discriminatory manner. Indeed
they have used nine of ten preemptory challenges to completely bar whites
from serving on this jury. In his capacity as representative of the community
the District Attorney has a direct interest in protecting the citizens and
therefore a substantial relationship with the excluded jurors and should
vindicate their rights since the harmed jurors are unable to assert their own
rights. Accordingly the people move for a mistrial on the grounds that the
defense counsel has discriminated on the basis of race.‖ Judge
Schlesinger did not want to make it seem as if he believed that non-white
jurors could not be impartial, and denied the motion for a mistrial.
89. Chris Hedges ―U.S. Aides in Egypt Said to Have Met With Group Tied to New York Blast‖ New York Times April 12, 1993 Page
A3, 1.
followers and the rabbi‘s son to such an extent that the judge had to put a
cord up in the middle of the center aisle to prevent that from happening
again. I remember going under the table when that happened, and they
were stopped by court officers and that heightened our need, our feeling
that we needed plenty of security in the case. Everyday on the left side
were Islamic people, who were quiet and dignified. On the right hand side
was the Jewish Defense Organization and the Jewish Defense League,
who were pretty obstreperous during the trial, many of them were thrown
out. Those are two organizations. They hate each other for some reason,
and they have had a lot of problems that way. But they are, I would say,
very orthodox, very aggressive young Jewish organizations. They believe a
lot in the use of weapons, self-defense, offense and so on.‖
Sheik Rahman was never called to testify at the trial of Nosair for the
assassination of Kahane nor did he attend the trial. Evidence of El-Sayyid
Nosair‘s connection to Gama‘a al-Islamiyya‘s Brooklyn / Jersey City cell
was never presented to the jury. Kunstler made a motion to have it
excluded on the grounds that both the defense and the prosecution
contended that there was no conspiracy involved in the assassination and
that is was the work of a lone gunman. Kunstler, however, did suggest to
the jury that other JDL members killed Kahane over money missing from a
fund to support a Yeshiva: ―No one said, in spite of the tremendous
conflicts in their testimony, no one said that they ever saw Mr. Nosair shoot
Meir Kahane. We know that Izzy Katz was in charge of a yeshiva fund for
the yeshiva institution in Israel and we know that for whatever reasons, Izzy
Katz lost control of one of those bank accounts, was removed from being
an authorized signatory on that bank account in May 1991, approximately
six or seven months after Mr. Kahane‘s death. We also know that Izzy Katz
had a video camera and Izzy Katz was actively taking pictures of
everything [going on the night Kahane was killed but stopped just before
shots were fired].‖90
Dr. Abel Halim Mandour was a defense witness for Nosair. Mandour,
70, has been defending Egyptian Islamists for 25 years and is the Sheik of
Islamist lawyers: ―I did not start out defending the Islamic trend or
specializing in defending Islamists. In 1964, I defended the Muslim
Brotherhood. The [Islamic groups] want to apply Shari'ah law, but the
91. Richard Engel ―The Lawyers Who Plead for Islamic Militants‖ Middle East Times
http://www.metimes.com/issue45/eg/03lawyers.htm
92. Caryle Murphy ―Egypt Convicts 32 In Attacks on Tourists.‖The Washington Post April 23, 1993.
93. The Promise.
Nosair re-trial for the Kahane assassination in Federal District Court, Ari
Gottesman testified: ―I saw a man – I saw a gun, a chrome-colored silver-
colored gun in front of me highlighted by the white of Rabbi Kahane‘s shirt.
I saw and heard the gun go off.‖ Gottesman said it was Nosair who fired the
gun. Stephan Hoffman testified: ―He had a silver gun in his hand, and held
it up and pointed it at myself and the elderly man, and I saw him fire it. The
man is here in the courtroom today [points at Nosair].‖94
There were many racist blacks on the jury and they sympathized with
El-Sayyid Nosair. Kunstler had a winning hand when he played the race
card. An outraged Jewish Judge Schlesinger gave Nosair the maximum
sentence of twenty-two years on those lesser charges, and sent him to
Attica, where, after time served he would have been eligible for parole in
six years. Schlesinger: ―In my judgment the verdict was against the
overwhelming evidence and defied logic and common sense.‖ The Justice
Department never reviewed the case for a Civil Rights prosecution.
Kunstler protested this verdict: ―The evidence clearly showed that the
defendant was being chased by a bloodthirsty mob seeking to harm him.
Like Mr. Franklin, someone stood in the way of his escape, namely officer
Acosta, who according to the juries acquittal of murder in the first degree
was not believed by him to be a New York City Police Officer. If he was
found to be innocent of shooting both Rabbi Kahane and Postal Officer
Acosta then how can he be found to have possessed said weapon?
Moreover, if he did not possess the weapon in question, then as a legal
matter the assault verdicts cannot possibly stand.‖
The Judge responded: ―The jury could have concluded that the
evidence at the trial established that no witness saw Nosair shoot Rabbi
Kahane. That the bullet that killed Rabbi Kahane exited his body. That
there was one piece of ballistics evidence, a lead core recovered from the
Morgan B room that could not be matched to defendant‘s gun and that
another person in addition to the defendant [must have] had a gun in
Morgan B room on the night Rabbi Kahane was killed. Based on this
contrasting evidence the jury could have reasonably concluded there was
reasonable doubt that the defendant shot Rabbi Kahane but there was no
Nosair had shot three people without a gun! But where did the gun
come from? We do not know. What we do know is that the New York Police
Department found a federal firearms license issued to a former Raymond J.
Murteza.95
95. http://www.jrn.columbia.edu/studentwork/investigative2002/fancher-trials.asp
my brother was not home. So they could not find anybody except my
neighbor, that poor man. And he was the only man in the house. He lives
upstairs from me and they grabbed him, even though that he is not even a
Muslim. He is a Christian man and they just grabbed him. It was regular
procedures for them.‖ In 1979 to 1981, Sattar served in the Egyptian army.
He lived in Egypt until he came to New York on a tourist visa and settled in
Brooklyn in 1982. He thereafter met and married his wife Lisa, an American
citizen who was born and raised in the country she would help Gama‘a al-
Islamiyya to destroy. She grew up in a Catholic home. In 1993, she
converted to the Muslim faith. Sattar and his wife have four children who
live in Staten Island. In 1985, he received his U.S. residence card and in
1989 he became a United States citizen.
Before the Nosair trial ended, Salem was invited for dinner at El-
Gabrowny‘s home. During dinner, El-Gabrowny indicated he was
concerned about being bugged by the FBI, turned up the television, and
then discussed construction of high-powered explosives with Salem. Salem
testified that after this dinner at El-Gabrowny‘s house, bombing became a
frequent topic of conversation between them. By early 1992, Rahman had
also welcomed Salem into the group. Sheik Rahman specifically praised
Salem for attempting to restart paramilitary training with the group, noting
that there would come a day when the training would be needed. Salem
was soon able to become a bodyguard for Sheik Rahman.
Q. And all the things you reported from that first meeting with the beepers
and timers and the killing of Dov Hikind, you told it to FBI New York Office
Foreign Counter-intelligence Assistant Chief Carson Dunbar, when you
came back from Attica?
A. Yes.
Q. He did something that made you believe he didn‘t believe you – the
angry meeting?
A. Yes.
Q. He said, you are giving us very serious information about killing a judge,
killing one of the civilians, and we should like to verify this information?
A. They told me that if you take a tape and go to Sayyid Nosair in jail and
you record him, and you bring an admission that he killed Kahane that will
be entrapment. And then later they told me go take a wire and go tape him
in jail. That was a lot of confusion to me which I didn‘t understand.
The cell was also planning to attack the Jewish Defense Organization
training camp named after the Jewish hero, Zev Jabotinsky:
Siddig: In Upstate.
Siddig: There, they go there always, the information is not yet available to
me in the amount that I require. You see how, there are people who have
Siddig: No it‘s not necessary. Sting like a bee and run away like a butterfly.
And possibly hand held or we‘ll see what we can, we‘ll see. And if it is not
possible that we attack the compound (UI)105 it is possible that we can
―Treck Treck.‖
Salem: Sniper?
Siddig: Yes, but not there, no. In Manhattan, their head is Dov Hikind. This
is the desire of Sheik El-Sayyid, Dov Hikind.
Q. Do you recall having a conversation with Siddig Ali Siddig where Siddig
talked about moving the training camp upstate to the Catskills, up to the
mountains, the Catskills?
105
. Unintelligible.
106. USA v Rahman TT 15625 and 15754
A. I recall that he want to go up north to shoot – or to do something with the
Jewish training camps there. But I don‘t know moving the training camp
there, I don‘t recall.
A. Yes, he want to make the safe house away of the city, yes, that‘s true,
ma‘m.
Q. And he says: There are houses up there for rent, where there are hill
and rivers and lakes and full of trees. Do you remember that?
A. Yes, ma‘am.
Q. Isn‘t it a fact that he says: There is nobody besides you. The third thing
that we can bring dogs, dogs. You can put all your cameras and you can
have fun yourself. Do you recall that?
A. Yes. Cameras to monitor the FBI if they coming to the house, and bring
dogs to attack the FBI if they come to the house. Not to have fun by
playing; have fun to build bombs.107
When Dr. Mehdi tried to move the National Council on Islamic Affairs
to a new office the landlord Sol Goldman refused to rent to him. Mehdi filed
a lawsuit against Goldman that stated there had been no threat or danger
to the tenants in any of his previous locations. Mehdi argued that he was
indigent and had lost $100,000 a year since the Arab millionaires who
supported him had no address to send their funds to. In February 2000 the
National Council on Islamic Affairs merged with the American Muslim
Alliance, directed by Eric Irfan Vickers.110 Vickers was the incorporator and
long-time officer of the Islamic African Relief Agency, which has been
linked to attacks against U.S. interests in Africa. As a result of this link, the
organization lost its State Department accreditation in 2000 and had $4.5
million in government grants revoked.111
109. ―A Suspicious Blaze Burns Arab Office‖ New York Times June 4, 1974
110. http://www.amaweb.org/national/default.htm
111. Frank Gaffney, Jr. Fox News June 28, 2002 ―The Truth About the AMC.‖
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,56543,00.html
112. The Final Call January 13, 1998.
113. NY State Supreme Court Civil Division Case 1996-406023
investigating this trip and another journey he had taken to Libya. Dr.
Mehdi‘s passport was confiscated and was only returned after he made a
personal visit to American Secretary of State George Shultz. Mehdi was the
author of a book entitled Islam and Intolerance and although he said that
his scorn for the Satanic Verses by Salman Rushdie, a book that
blasphemed Islam, was axiomatic, he claimed censorship and the death
penalty were incompatible with Muslim tradition and that Rushdie‘s work
was best ignored. When a Brother from Egypt seized a Royal Dutch KLM
plane in August 1993 in a vain attempt to secure Sheik Rahman‘s freedom
Medhi, who was identified as President of the Islamic Council, reached the
Brother and told him Sheik Rahman ―would not approve of any violence
that might result from this hijacking.‖114
Doctor Mehdi attended the trial of El-Sayyid Nosair, which did not sit
well with Kahane‘s son, Binyamin, who wrote this in a letter to the judge: ―I
protest the fact that Dr. Mehdi and other Arab-Muslim agitators are
accorded privileged seating in your courtroom!‖115 After the Nosair trial a
note was sent by the JDL to a local New York City television station vowing
retaliation against Dr. Mehdi and Professor Rashid Khalid, who was a
Nosair supporter who later became a leader in the effort to stop America
from going to war with Iraq.116
In July 1995 Dr. Mehdi was a defense witness at the trial of Sheik
Rahman, El-Sayyid Nosair and many other jihadi. Dr. Mehdi was
questioned about his relationship with Kahane:
Q. Dr. Mehdi, you were a colleague and friend of Dr. Rabbi Meir Kahane?
A. I was. I don‘t know that the colleague is the word, but I knew Rabbi
Kahane very well and we were good friends of a kind.
A. I sure did on –
114. ―Hijacker Seized After Demanding Release of Jailed Muslim Preacher.‖ Washington Post August 16, 1993 page A 13
115. 100 Center Street Criminal Court docket 90N-099-424-‖Nosir‖
116. Newsday December 4, 1990.
Q. Did you have an occasion to meet the man known as Ibrahim El-
Gabrowny? Did you have diner with Mr. El-Gabrowny and Emad Salem at
Mr. El-Gabrowny‘s apartment in Brooklyn?
A. Yes sir.
Q. Can you tell the jury the circumstances in which you knew Rabbi
Kahane?
A. I believe the first time was a television station contacted me and the
rabbi to appear on the show, discussing, yes, Channel 7 ABC here, and
thereafter this was an historical occasion, the first time the Rabbi and
myself meeting. Then the news media contacted us many a time and we
appeared and we discussed the issues of the Middle East. I eulogized him
on television, because the Rabbi, even though we disagreed only 100%,
nevertheless, we had developed a feeling of comradeship, of, there was a
rapport between him and myself. I knew his jokes after twenty times
appearing on television, he knew my cracks. So we had developed a bit of
rapport, yes.
A. Yes, I have had the privilege. I did have his telephone number.
Q. Are you aware that there was a fund established for the purposes of
raising money for the Nosair defense?
Q. Were you the author of a letter to Judge Schlesinger, the judge in the
state court trial?
Mr. Ricco: Basically what he said to the judge was that both sides are
putting a lot of pressure on you to make a decision that is free of political
pressure. That‘s it.
A. He had called me and asked me to call the Sheik and tell him that Dov
Hikind, the assemblyman, is a threat to the Muslim world and that the Sheik
should be aware of how bad Dov Hikind is.
117. Dr. Mehdi had numerous meetings with Emad Salem and Salem had attended many of Mehdi‘s meetings. USA v Rahman TT
p5904
says to make votes, appeal to his constituency, he is no threat to the
Muslim world.
Q. Since you have known Mr. El-Gabrowny, have you had the occasion to
discuss his reputation for law abidingness and peaceful conduct with other
people in the community?
A. Yes, of course?
A. In defense of freedom.
A. In defense of freedom.
Q. Do you remember an occasion when you were running for the Senate
and you appeared at the Abu Bakr Mosque? Do you remember what the
Sheik said when he introduced you at the mosque?
Q. Mr. Mehdi, did you send a fax to Emad Salem on or around March 6,
1993?
A. I don‘t remember the date. If you give me something about the context –
Q. Did you send him a fax, a press release of a fax that was sent to you by
Al Gama‘a Islamiyya?
A. Yes, yes, during one of those conversations that he had taped, I told him
that I had received a fax from Cairo.
Q. Without telling us what was in the fax, did you send a copy of that to Mr.
Salem?
A. Yes, I told him that I have it and I will send it to him and I did…
A. Some of it is truth, and some of them I want to get closer to Dr. Mehdi by
telling him what he like to hear so he can tell me what‘s his connection with
the Al Gama‘a al-Islamiyya in Egypt, sir.
Q. OK. So you were telling Dr. Mehdi what you thought Dr. Mehdi wanted
to hear so you could get next to Dr. Mehdi?
Q. Do you remember you were called by Dr. Mehdi of New York, New York,
and told about a big meeting that was about to take place on the evening of
January 17,1992?
A. Yes, ma‘am.
Q. It was to involve the young Islamists, young Muslims, young men in this
city and it was a big meeting to decide about the Islamic future in America,
is that right?
The fact that Dr. Mehdi was a member of the Brooklyn / Jersey City
cell became apparent when the FBI seized Ibrahim El-Gabrowny‘s
address book that contained the telephone number of Brothers Ahmed
Abu Sattar, Ali Al Shinawy, the Attica Correctional Facility, Imam Nagy
Allah, Emad Salem, the Egyptian consulate, the Jihad Office, Hussein
Safan, John [Anticev] at the FBI, Mohammed El-Gabrowny, Mohammed
Moussa, Dr. Mohammed Mehdi, Nidal, Sheik Omar Rahman, Dr.
Rahman’s fax number and Dr. Ahmed Badawi.
Shortly after the September 11th Islamist Victory, Dr. Ahmed Badawi,
a business man from Egypt who became an American citizen many years
ago, was arrested as a material witness after fully cooperating with the FBI.
Without asking for a warrant, Badawi gave agents his business records and
three computers, and spoke with them for hours. He was allowed to contact
an attorney the morning after his arrest and as a result, only spent three
fear-filled nights in jail.
The Sheik arrived in the U.S. in July 1990. Shortly thereafter the
Egyptian Government began putting pressure on the United States to
extradite him back to the hell of an Egyptian prison, however, as
demonstarted, for several years the authorities encountered resistance in
prosecuting or deporting the Sheik because of his ties to the Mujahadeen,
and his ties to the CIA. On December 16, 1990 the Sheik returned from a
trip abroad and arrived in New York City on KLM airlines using the visa
issued in Great Britain in May 1990.
On April 8, 1991 Sheik Rahman was issued a visa that allowed him to
become a permanent resident of the United States on the basis of his
status as an Islamic Minister. Rahman was classified as a ―Special
Immigrant.‖ In June 1991, while the Sheik was on a pilgrimage to Mecca
the CIA began to have second thoughts about the Sheik. After returning
from a trip Denmark on July 31, 1991, the Sheik was readmitted to the
United States and paroled until July 2, 1993. While he was in Denmark he
gave this sermon to his followers: ―How ingenious (audience laughs). I
have never imagined such minds could exist in Denmark. Jihad is Jihad,
my Brothers, there is no such thing as commerce, industry and science in
Jihad. This is calling things with other than by its own names. If God, glory
be to him, says do Jihad, it means do Jihad with the sword, with the
cannon, with the grenades and with the missile; this is Jihad. Jihad against
God's enemies means for God's cause and his word. We can't say that
commerce, industry and science are Jihad, not at all. Every party that does
not employ the Islamic law as its method is what? Is definitely the party of
the devil. Are you familiar with that? Thus, we are in a weak, humiliating
and subservient position. Indeed, we need to understand our faith. Jihad is
the foundation and an obligation for spreading Islam. Indeed, indeed,
without hesitation or shame. Without hesitation, shame or mentality failure,
this faith was spread by the sword. Indeed, indeed we endorse
assassinations. We have to assassinate. Indeed, we are terrorists. Our
faith obligates us to be terrorists."
118. ―Sheik Dodged U.S. Immigration Check‖ New York Post April 24, 1993.
AUSA Bond: All right. Now at this point, the Government is going to give
back to you documents that were sent to your office pursuant to a request
of an asylum application by the alien. Said documents were received by
your office, were referred back to our office to handle for security purposes
because your office did not have any place to keep these documents.
Pursuant to the regulations and the statute, I'm now handing back to you
non-record matter...
On January 6, 1993 the Wall Street Journal119 ran a story that would
ensure Sheik Rahman would be deported. The piece claimed ―the FBI has
investigated him in connection with three murders‖ and quoted Sheik
Rahman as saying that a fatwa approving the assassination of Mubarak
was ―on the way.‖ During the Sheik‘s immigration proceedings, he
described a fatwa by stating: ―A person comes and asks questions on
religion and I answer...A certain person in a certain condition would
approach me and ask me about a certain subject... [For example], a person
would say, ‗I swore by divorce must I carry it out?‘...A fatwa concerns a
private or personal thing that happens to a person... it is not possible [for a
fatwa to be issued to the public at large].‖ The article also quoted
Montassar al-Zayyat who was busy defending some of the thousands of
terrorists arrested in Egypt in December 1993 for violence against tourists,
as saying ―Sheik Rahman is the emir, the leader [of Jihad].‖
Diab and Deek had hosted Abdel Rahman in their apartments during
his lecture tours of Orange County mosques in 1992 and 1993. Saraah
119. ―Egyptian Jihad Leader Preaches Holy War to Brooklyn Muslims‖ Wall Street Journal, January 6, 1993.
Olson, who divorced Diab in 1996, said she cooked dinner for the Egyptian
sheikh. A relative of Deek said Abdel Rahman stayed in Deek's apartment
for two days during one visit. According to Olson, Abdel Rahman would call
Diab and others in Orange County from prison on Sunday afternoon to
deliver fiery sermons that were recorded.120 Diab and Deek, who have
since left the U.S. were involved in a part of the Millennium Action that
entailed an attack on a Jordanian hotel and other sites frequented by
American tourists. Deek worked with Abu Zubaydah on this Operation.121
Deek was extradited from Peshawar, Pakistan to Jordan then released for
lack of evidence. FBI CI Agent Arthur M. Cummings II was in charge of the
Islamic Group case. He said that Sheikh Rahman ―had two main guys, one
is Los Angeles and one in San Diego. I was the case agent for the guy in
Los Angeles or in West Covina.‖
Judge Meisner did not rule on the request but stated: ‗What I am
going to do is place this document in the record of the proceeding file
without opening it or considering it. I do not have a government
classification, which would allow me to look at secret or classified
information, and therefore I am not in a position to open this envelope or
look at it. If you wish, I will put it in the file in case the case goes up on
appeal and then anyone who does have that type of classification may be
able to review the document. But while I‘ll put it in the record of the
proceeding file, it will not be considered by me and will not be part of the
evidence I consider in this case.‘‖ No decision was reached at that time.
120. http://www.jihadwatch.org/archives/004428.php
121. http://www.9-11commission.gov/report/911Report_Ch6.htm
State whether Department Of State has any basis and/or evidence for
connecting applicant to the Gama‘a al-Islamiyya statement of June 23,
1992.
123. On September 3, 1997, Mohammed Ahmed Shafi'i, was arrested by intelligence officials in Hamad town and was held
incommunicado at the al-Qal'a compound in Manama.
124. http://www.middleeastfacts.com/middle-east/palestinian-islamic-jihad-islami.php
State whether Department of State has any basis and/or evidence
connecting applicant to the riot of March 3, 1990.
125. The literal meaning of ―halal‖ is ―fair game.‖ Youssef M. Ibrahim ―Muslim‘s Fury Falls on Egypt‘s Christians‖ New York Times
March 15, 1993.
126. ―Muslim Militants are Seized in Egyptian Religious Strife‖ New York Times Associated Press Story March 13, 1990 Page A16,
1.
127. Mark Reibling Wedge – How the Secret War Between the CIA and FBI has Endangered National Security Touchstone Books,
November 2002.
other Islamists and then came to the United States in March 1991. As a
result of this and his travel, his name appeared on a Watch List but he
circumvented this by identifying himself as ―Kansi.‖ He asked for political
asylum and then settled in Virginia where another Watch List check missed
him when he applied for a driver‘s license.128 Mir Aimal Kasi was instructed
to seek employment as a driver for a local messenger service that
delivered to the CIA so that he might familiarize himself with the area
surrounding the CIA entrance, or might even enter one of the buildings, and
have a valid excuse for being there. He chose Excel Courier, which was
owned and managed by the sons of former CIA official Victor Marchetti.
Marchetti, who left the CIA and author a book exposing this agency,
edited the New American View newsletter, which was designed to
―document for patriotic Americans the excess of pro-Israelism, which warps
the news we see and hear from our media, cows our Congress into
submission, and has already cost us hundreds of innocent, young
Americans in Lebanon and elsewhere.‖ Marchetti described himself as a
person whose ―intelligence expertise and well-placed contacts have
provided me with a unique insight into the subversion of our democratic
process and foreign policy by those who would put the interests of Israel
above those of America and Americans.‖
128. Michael Fickes ―What‘s In a Name?‖ Access Control and Security Systems November 1, 2003.
129. The Institute is comprised of crypto-neo-Nazis pretending to be objective scholars dedicated to ―debunking the myth of the
holocaust.‖ In the early 1980‘s the Institute offered a $50,000 reward to anyone who could prove the existence of gas chambers. Mel
Mermelstein sued the Institute for refusing to pay the reward. Two weeks before the trial the Institute agreed to a settlement as the
judge had ruled that the existence of gas chambers was an indisputable fact. The Institute agreed to apologize in writing to
recruited into the Carto network through the late Haviv Schieber. Schieber
was an early supporter of the Jabotinsky Zionist movement. Schieber, who
had problems with mental illness, broke with Zionism believing that the
communists had seized it. Schreiber wrote for Willis Carto's Spotlight
newspaper, which referred to Schieber as ―an outspoken anti-communist
and critic of Israel.‖130 Writing in his book Plausible Denial, Lane contended
that ―I have never heard an anti-Semitic expression‖ from Carto.131
On January 15, 1993 Mir Aimal Kasi bought an assault rifle despite
federal law prohibiting sales to aliens lawfully admitted in non-immigrant
Mermelstein and other Auschwitz survivors for saying the Holocaust was a myth. The statement was signed and is part of the court
records. The Institute agreed to the judge‘s finding that the fact that Jews were gassed at Auschwitz was indisputable. After a defeat
of this nature most organizations would have folded, however, the membership of the Institute already knew that they were
propagating a lie, so the Institute remained in existence and prospered.
130. Spotlight, January 25, 1988, p. 9.
131. Mark Lane Plausible Denial, Thunder's Mouth Press, 1991, p. 124.
132. Tape Recorded telephone conversation with Jeff Marchetti January 20 2003.
status (i.e. aliens without permanent residence status)133 and despite the
fact he was on a BATF Watch List134 trading it in a week later for the AK-47
he would use in this mission for Al-Qaeda. It was at this time that he told
his roommate, Zahed Mir, that he was going to do something at the CIA or
Israeli Embassy.135 On January 25, 1993 Mir Aimal Kasi murdered two CIA
agents and permanently injured three others. He attacked without warning,
shooting his AK-47 assault rifle into cars waiting at a stoplight in front of
CIA headquarters, in Langley, Virginia. The attack occurred during morning
rush hour traffic.
This researcher spoke with Victor Marchetti about Kasi: ―We don‘t
know if he took the job to have access to the CIA. He came in out of the
blue. As I recall he came here and met somebody and said he was looking
for a job, very casual and vague and he ended up going to work there. He
was a very nice guy, very quiet around the office. Nobody ever had any
trouble with him; he was very friendly. One of the Pakistani drivers I got to
know fairly well, I kind of liked him, he got to know Kasi and he told me a lot
about him after this all happened. He would tell me things like, Kasi was
different - he had money. He wasn‘t a poor guy like most of the other
Pakistani drivers who were trying to keep body and soul together. There
was a place in Herndon, near my son‘s business, and there was one of
these storefront mosques, Muslim hangout, food store, and things like that,
where all these guys would meet and Kasi was there. He said he had some
money and he had some influence back home.‖
The most prominent Herndon Mosque was the 25,000 square foot All
Dulles Area Muslim Society located at 500 Grove Street not far from the
North American Islamic Trust at 555 Grove Street, the same institution El-
Sayyid Nosair had corresponded with.
Mir Aimal Kasi fled the United States for Pakistan immediately after
the attack. Zahed Mir reported to the police that Mir Aimal Kasi was a
―missing person.‖ On February 8, 1993, the police searched Mir's
apartment and discovered the AK-47. Mir Aimal Kasi traveled to
Afghanistan where members of al-Qaeda hid him. Had not Kasi had a
previous connection to the Islamist movement al-Qaeda would not have
133. Possession Or Receipt Of A Firearm Or Ammunition By A Prohibited Person18 U.S.C. § 922(g) & (n)
134. Michael Fickes ―What‘s In a Name?‖ Access Control and Security Systems November 1, 2003.
135. Ronald Kessler The CIA at War St. Martin‘s Press 2003.
helped him. Mir Aimal Kasi, however, steadfastly insisted that the shooting
was spontaneous and stated that ―several days before the shooting I
decided to do the shooting at the CIA or the Israeli Embassy but decided to
shoot at the CIA because it was easier because CIA officials are not
armed. I was upset because U.S. aircraft had attacked parts of Iraq, and
was upset with the CIA because of their involvement in Muslim countries,
and was concerned with killing of Pakistanians by U.S. components. I
stopped shooting because there wasn‘t anybody else left to shoot. I only
shot males because it would be against my religion to shoot females. The
attack on CIA was my idea alone.‖
At the end of March 1995, the FBI reclassified Mir Aimal Kasi as a
suspected international terrorist. This move allowed the use of the State
Department‘s Counter-Terrorism Rewards Program to raise the reward
offered for Kasi to $2 million. In late May 1997, an ethnic Baluchi man
entered the U.S. Consulate in Karachi, Pakistan with information on Kasi.
He was taken to a female CIA officer and he gave her Kasi‘s application for
a Pakistani driver's license filled out by Mir Aimal Kasi under an alias with a
photo and thumbprint.136 In June 1997 Kasi‘s bodyguards, who had been
hired by his family to protect him, gave Kasi‘s location to the FBI and Kasi
was kidnapped from the Shalimar hotel in Dera Ghazi Khan and brought to
the United States.137 The United States Government has a term for this:
―Rendition.‖ A ―rendition‖ takes place when ―escort agents‖ apprehend and
obtain custody of suspected terrorists without the formalities of an
extradition treaty. This occurs when the asylum nation agrees to render the
individual to the United States for trial or deports the individual out of the
country.
On November 10, 1997 Mir Aimal Kasi was convicted of the murder
of two agents of ―the black house‖ whose organization had double-crossed
Sheik Rahman. Two days later Islamists killed four American auditors and
their Pakistani driver in Karachi. The Islamist group focused on killing Shi‘ia
136. Steve Coll ―Secret Mission Unravels In Afghanistan‖ Washington Post February 22, 2004; Page A01
137. Ronald Kessler The CIA at War St. Martin‘s Press 2003. Kasi said that a close friend of his was responsible for his capture.
Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ) of which most of the Baluchi Clan, including
Ramzi Ahmed Yousef were members of, claimed responsibility for the
killings, as did a group called the Aimal Secret Committee. The group
threatened, ―If Aimal Kasi is martyred (given the death penalty), then we
will not spare any American Jews on Pakistani soil and we will destroy the
American Embassy in Pakistan. Allahu Akbar!‖138
During the penalty phase of Kasi‘s trial, he advised the court there
had been press reports that morning of the killing of four Americans in
Karachi, Pakistan the preceding evening. Mir Aimal Kasi was sentenced to
death. From his cell on death row Mir Aimal Kasi said: ―I‘m against attacks
on civilian Americans. They are not responsible for my execution. I‘m not
encouraging attacks against anybody. What I did was in retaliation against
the U.S. government. It had nothing to do with terrorism. The September
11th attacks on the World Trade Center were totally wrong. They were
attacks against civilian people. But the attack on the Pentagon was right
since the Pentagon is an agency involved in attacks against Muslim
countries. I‘m not sorry for attacking the CIA.‖ Mir Aimal Kasi was executed
by electric chair at the Greensville Correctional Center in Jarrat, Virginia, at
9:00 p.m. November 14, 2002. His last statement was: ―There is no God
but Allah.‖
On February 26, 1993 the World Trade Center was attacked. This
was the culmination of a plan that had been in place for months, and not as
a retribution for the CIA‘s abandonment of Sheik Rahman. On March 16,
1993 Judge Meisner ruled that Sheik Rahman should be deported from the
United States since he had not told INS officials that he was a polygamist
and that he had been convicted of falsifying a check while he was still living
in Egypt in 1987. INS records contained exculpatory evidence regarding
the polygamy charge: an Egyptian divorce decree dated September 5,
1990. An appellate court would later dismiss this charge. The polygamy
charge was parlayed into an accusation that the Sheik had declared he had
four children instead of ten. The appellate court would also throw this
charge out as the six ―children‖ were ―adults‖ and the fraud had no basis in
fact. As for the bounced check charge: The charge had been dismissed
after it was pointed out the Sheik was legally blind and therefore it was
impossible for him to forge any document, however another charge was
The full text of Judge Meisner‘s decision was not made public at the
request of Rahman‘s lawyer, Barbara Nelson, who stated, ―He has no
intention of leaving. He intends to stay and pursue his claim for permanent
residency‖139 however the JDO was able to obtain a copy: ―The court finds
that the applicant failed to establish persecution as defined by the Act. The
applicant has failed to establish a fear of past persecution or that his fear is
well founded. For example, the applicant fails to show that the Government
has the inclination to punish him. Under the Emergency Law that has been
in effect continuously since the assassination of president Anwar Sadat in
1981, a person may be held indefinitely without charge or due process
while an investigation is conducted…The applicant has also failed to
establish a fear of persecution. The applicant has not shown, through his
testimony or the documentary evidence of record, that a reasonable person
in his circumstances would fear persecution on the basis of one of the five
grounds found in the Act. Furthermore, the applicant does not establish that
circumstances have changed in Egypt since 1990 to justify a fear of future
persecution.‖
139. Fredric Dicker ―Radical Sheik Ordered Deported‖ New York Post, March 18, 1993.
persecution. Even assuming the arrest and imprisonment were a legitimate
exercise of sovereignty, the use of torture is not.‖ The Emergency Law was
first passed in 1981 in response to the assassination of Anwar el-Sadat,
and at its height was used to detain more than 30,000 prisoners indefinitely
without charge. In April 2006 Hosni Mubarak pushed through Parliament a
two-year extension of the Emergency Law despite opposition from 88
members (out of 454) of the Muslim Brotherhood who were elected as
independent members of the Egyptian Parliament in 2005.
Sheik Rahman then filed appeal, as the decision was based on secret
information his defense attorney could not see nor respond to. The Sheik‘s
attorney also found it hard to believe that the judge had read, but had not
taken into consideration, this classified information, when making his
decision denying the Sheik political asylum. As a result of the Sheik‘s
delaying tactics, unhappy FBI agents confessed to journalist Robert I.
Friedman that the Bureau had been forced to turn a blind eye to the Blind
Sheikh Rahman, and asked Friedman to turn up the heat on this holy man.
In early July 1993 the Egyptian Judge Ahmed Ashmawi ordered Sheik
Rahman‘s arrest and extradition. Abdel Mandour, the Sheik‘s attorney said
that Ashmawi should have been disqualified because of his prejudice
against Islamists.140 On July 22, 1993 Dr. Fawzi Mikhail, a Christian
gynecologist in his sixties, was shot dead in Manfalout, Egypt by Al-Gama‘a
al-Islamiyya. Sheik Rahman was behind this attack and was heard
discussing it with ―Mohammed‖ from Pakistan. On November 25, 1993 the
Al-Gama‘a al-Islamiyya in conjunction with Egyptian Islamic Jihad tried to
assassinate Egypt‘s Prime Minister Atef Sedki. The communiqué
concerning this action stated, ―We demand no harm come to our Muslim
scholars including Omar Abdel Rahman.‖141 Clearly the cell was engaged in
violence in Egypt, why not in the United States?
Emad Salem had been taken off the case by African-American FBI
Special Agent in Charge Carson Dunbar. Salem had convinced the
Rahman gang that he was an accomplished bomb maker and Sheik
Rahman was determined to replace him. He contacted bin Laden who in
turn ordered Khalid Shaikh Mohammed to contact his nephew Ramzi
Ahmed Yousef (real name Abd-al-Basit Balushi) who was an expert bomb
142. Steven Emerson American Jihad Free Press Page 53 February 2003.
143. Nonviolent mobilization achieved through charitable work.
came on behalf of Sheik Abdel Rahman, who was offering financial and
logistical support for Janjalani's movement.144
Yousef was in Afghanistan during the period when the CIA was
funding Islamists. Yousef‘s lawyer discussed this matter with Yousef‘s trial
judge:
MR. JACOBS: I believe the CIA subpoena generally provides for almost all
the same things, except for numbers 12 and 13, employment payment for
services -- we have some information that Yousef may have had some
contact with this government in some official capacity, or unofficial capacity.
After Yousef was arrested it was reported that he had previous CIA
contacts, that he was trained to work in Afghanistan, things like that.
The irony should not be lost upon America; it is likely that Ramzi
Yousef acquired his mastery of explosives indirectly at the hands of the
CIA. American support for the Mujahadeen was an integral element of the
last days of the Cold War under President Reagan, and the CIA was key in
effectuating this support, arming and training. Brother Ramzi Yousef‘s
lawyers inquired of the CIA as to whether Ramzi Yousef was known to
them, and the Agency, not surprisingly, denied any knowledge of Ramzi
Yousef, or any of his other aliases.
144. http://www.tkb.org/KeyLeader.jsp?memID=5632
When Iraqi President Saddam Hussein‘s army invaded Kuwait in
August 1990, Yousef was known as a collaborator. After disappearing in
Kuwait in 1991, he is next known to have reappeared in the Philippines in
December 1991 accompanied by a Libyan missionary named Abd al-
Mushin Al-Libi (a.k.a. Ibrahim Ali Muhammad Abu Bakr), who ran the
Pakistan office of the Revival of Islamic Heritage Society and managed the
Afghan Support Committee's office in Peshawar. He was also credited at
being the leader of ―the Mullah Forces in Libya‖ although this researcher
cannot locate any Mullah Force outside of Iran. Yousef stayed for three
months providing training to Abu Sayyaf guerrillas in the southern
Philippines. During the time Ramzi Yousef was in Afghanistan he became
acquainted with al-Fatah member Brother Ahmad Ajaj who had joined al-
Qaeda / Gama‘a al-Islamiyya / Islamic Jihad – whatever name you feel
most comfortable with.
The FBI reported: ―At one point in the interview, Ramzi Yousef was
asked whether he knew Sheik Rahman. He replied he became interested in
Rahman from hearing people speak about him. While residing with
Mohammad Salameh, Ramzi Yousef requested that Mohammad Salameh
introduce him to Rahman, as he was aware that Mohammad Salameh
was acquainted with Rahman. Salameh, thereafter, took Ramzi Yousef to
Rahman‘s residence in Jersey City, where they had dinner and visited for
about one hour. Ramzi Yousef claimed that he had no other contact with
Rahman, and also indicated that he never discussed with Rahman his
intentions to target U.S. interests.‖145 Judge Mukasey would not allow Sheik
Rahman to submit this portion of Ramzi Yousef‘s FBI interview in his
defense, holding that it was inherently unreliable.146 The intelligence
community knew it was a fabrication. ―The Fifth Liberation Army‖ the
imaginary group Yousef invented to take credit for the actions of his cell
was a combination of al-Gama‘a and al-Qaeda that looked to Sheik
Rahman as its Emir.147 Sheik Rahman had telephoned Ramzi Yousef in
1992 and 1993. Both men had called the same telephone number in
Pakistan many times, a number that was written on one of Ajaj‘s bomb
manuals.148 I n 1 9 9 2 S t a t e D e p a r t m e n t
s o u r c e s s a w s u s p i c i o u s l i n k s
w i t h Sheik Rahman i n t h e N e w Y o r k
a r e a , c o m m e n t i n g t h a t b i n
L a d i n s e e m e d " c o m m i t t e d t o
f i n a n c i n g J i h a d s a g a i n s t
a n t i - I s l a m i c r e g i m e s
w o r l d w i d e . " I n 1 9 9 3 , t h e C I A
n o t e d t h a t h e h a d p a i d f o r
t h e t r a i n i n g o f s o m e E g y p t i a n
149
B r o t h e r s i n S u d a n .
Usama bin Laden was asked by the news media if he knew Ramzi
Yousef: ―I do not know Ramzi Yousef. He did not stay in a house I funded
in Peshawar, Pakistan after the Trade Center attack. But I say that if the
American government is serious about avoiding the explosions inside the
U.S., then let it stop provoking the feelings of 1,250 million Muslims. Those
hundreds of thousands who have been killed or displaced in Iraq,
Palestine, Lebanon, do have brothers and relatives. They would make of
Ramzi Yousef a symbol and teacher. The U.S. will drive them to transfer
the battle into the United States. But I have no connection or relation with
Usama bin Laden had helped finance the first World Trade Center
Event. Ramzi Yousef hinted at this: ―Yousef stated the World Trade Center
bombing cost less than $20,000. Yousef declined to state who provided the
money but he stated the money partly came from friends in Pakistan. He
advised that the friends did not necessarily know the real use of the money
but was considered a loan.‖151 For many years Mohammed Jamal Khalifah
was Usama bin Laden‘s best friend and is now his brother-in-law.
Khalifah‘s business card was found in the dwelling of Ramzi Yousef.152
150. http://cryptome.quintessenz.at/mirror/usa-v-zm-030606-02.htm
Aside from books and videos on bomb-making and Jihad, Ajaj had
numerous pieces of false identification including a passport in the name of
Ayedh Alqahtani with a photograph of someone other than Ajaj, an altered
British passport in the name of Mohammad Azan with a photograph of
Ramzi Yousef, various identification cards in the names of Khurram Khan
and Mohammad Azan, each bearing photographs of Ajaj, along with two
prepared scripts, both in English, listing probable questions that Ajaj would
be asked by Customs or Immigration officials and specifying the answers
that should be given to those questions. He also had two ink stamps in a
foreign script, which appeared similar to those found on a Saudi passport
that was found among his possessions. There was a copy of Iraqi passport
#MO389922. There was a Jordanian passport in the name of Ahmad
Mohammed Ahmad Ajaj, which bore the photograph of Ajaj and did not
appear to be altered. There was a travel permit issued to Ajaj for travel to
America on August 17, 1992, although Ajaj told the immigration inspector
that he had attempted to obtain a transportation letter from the United
States Embassy in Pakistan but was refused.
Ajaj expected to easily enter the U.S with his Swedish passport. The
first INS Inspector that Ajaj encountered determined that Ajaj‘s passport
was suspicious, and directed him to the secondary inspection area. The
Inspector examined the passport and, upon discovering that it had been
altered, opened Ajaj‘s luggage and found the terrorist kit. After being asked
why he was carrying terrorist literature, Ajaj stated in substance, ―They
destroy our homes and kill our people.‖ In reference to a bullet wound on
his arm, Ajaj explained that the Zionist police had shot him. He said had
gone to Pakistan and lost all of his papers. Ajaj was detained as a danger
to the United States, and was later charged in the Eastern District of New
York with knowingly using a false passport, (Count One), and using the
passport of another person (Count Two).
Ajaj pled guilty in the United States District Court for the
Eastern District of New York to one count of passport fraud and
was sentenced to six months imprisonment by United States
District Judge Reena Raggi, a former United States Attorney
who once headed the Narcotics Division, and seemed to be more
interested in drugs than our activities. At an Organized Crime Drug
Enforcement Task Force meeting Raggi referred to drug defendants as
―punks‖ and offered prosecutors tips on how to deal with informers as well
as how to impress a jury. Raggi claimed her speech had not violated the
judicial code of conduct and she refused to recuse herself in a drug case
that was then being tried before her.154 Eric Bernstein, the prosecutor who
handled the Ajaj case told her: ―There is literature. The defendant had a
significant amount of literature concerning how — it was really manuals —
concerning how to make explosives and how to blow things up.‖ Judge
Raggi responded: ―We‘re not talking about contraband in the traditional
sense of drugs or weapons or anything like that?‖ Bernstein answered:
―We‘re only talking about literature.‖
The Islamist scum long for the pre-September 11th days of American
justice, where the constitutional rights of jihadi, even though they were not
American citizens, superceded the rights of Americans to protect
themselves against the actions of jihadists. Bernstein attempted to
persuade Judge Raggi to give Ajaj a harsh sentence, but she refused. This
is what transpired in her courtroom:
THE COURT: I would think that the most serious question presented
on sentencing is whether the Court would upwardly depart based on the
government‘s view that this case would come within guideline section
5K2.15, a guideline that talks about upward departure in cases where
there‘s reason to think that the violation, the crime of conviction, was
committed for a terrorist purpose. That‘s the real dispute between the
parties. Now, let me ask the Government a question with respect to its
position. Without finding anything at this point, let me assume I were
persuaded from the government‘s proffer that it could show that Mr. Ajaj
was associated with terrorist organizations and that the materials he was
carrying into the United States would indeed be useful to someone who
planned to engage in terrorist activities.
THE COURT: But that would prove, at most, that he is a terrorist. But what
makes you think that the crime was committed for a terrorist purpose?
THE COURT: Does the government have any information about where the
defendant was scheduled to go in the United States or what his plans were
here in this country?
MR. BERNSTEIN: No, other than that the defendant indicated that he was
headed to Houston. But what the government would argue is that
concealing one‘s identity and falsifying identification documents, including
passports and other things one must carry to cross international borders is
part and parcel of one‘s activities as a terrorist. It is an integral part of what
a terrorist must do in order to carry out his activities; that is, to travel and
meet with other terrorists and to conceal one‘s identify for the purpose of
avoiding detection. We had sent all the names on the various pieces of
identification that the defendant had in his possession and the dates of
birth, and we had gotten back a negative response from the Israeli National
Police.
There was not enough information for them to say exactly who the
defendant was. We have finally received the results of the Israeli National
Police‘s fingerprint check of the defendant‘s fingerprints, which were sent to
them by our agents. That report indicates that the defendant was in Israel
in 1990, he left Israel for Jordan and there joined the al-Fatah terrorist
organization, that he returned to Israel in 1991 and was arrested in 1991,
and at that time confessed that he was a member of the al-Fatah
organization, and also confessed that he had established contacts for
purchasing weapons and ammunitions, and that he was requested and was
granted permission to leave Israel after that arrest apparently on the
condition that he not return for five years.
So that there is now finally confirmation of who the defendant is, and I
think that this points up very substantially the fact that concealing one‘s
identity is an integral part of one‘s activities as a terrorist. The point is we
didn‘t know the defendant had in fact successfully concealed who he was
and successfully thwarted any efforts by law enforcement to positively and
with specificity identify who he was because -- for the precise reason that
he used these false names and this false documentation. Now, only by this
coincidence of timing have we received the fingerprint identification, do we
know whom the defendant is.
But you put that together with the fact that the defendant was
traveling with multiple false pieces of identification and the fact that we now
have in our possession instructions in Arabic that were right in there with all
the other instructions on how to carry out terrorist activities, that are
instructions on how to falsify documents. And so the very logical and fair
inference bears that falsifying documents and traveling under false names
and assumed names and concealing one‘s identity is absolutely a part of
what is necessary for a terrorist to do in order to continue his activities, to
avoid being detected.
I mean, the real question is can the defense credibly argue, or would
the Court find that it is a mere coincidence that the defendant is who he is
and was carrying the materials he was carrying and the fact that he was
traveling with these false documents? Or is the inference available and
logical that the defendant was traveling on these false documents for the
very reason that he is a terrorist and that he wanted to conceal that fact
and that that is -- and concealing that fact and using those documents is
part of one‘s operation of as a terrorist?
THE COURT: What‘s the terrorist activity that was being furthered by this
conduct, by this crime? What is the terrorist activity being furthered?
THE COURT: That involves travel and possession of literature. You know,
Mr. Morris, in his papers on the Constitutionality challenge, suggests that
perhaps the only legitimate definition that can be given to this is conduct
akin to the case that sparked, the amendment, in which defendant was
basically found in possession of those items that could be used to engage
in bombings. It‘s the Kikumura case, United States versus Kikumura. And
there was specific findings made there based on the defendant‘s
possession of three homemade bombs. That‘s very different from what is
going on here. What you‘re telling me is basically that if someone is
traveling and he‘s in possession of materials that relate to how to make a
bomb or how to kill people, none of which I am suggesting the Court finds
either enlightening or particularly appropriate types of material, but
nevertheless, that is not the issue before me, that anybody who travels with
chose kind of materials in his possession can possibly be seen as -- and
then enters falsely into the United States can be seen as entering falsely
for the purpose of engaging in terrorist activities. And I find that troubling.
THE COURT: But you have no idea what he was going to do in the United
States. I will assume for purposes of this proceeding that you‘ll prove
everything you‘ve said, that if there were a hearing you will prove
everything you have said. You have no idea whether the defendant ever
planned to discuss those documents with anyone in the United States or
whether his plans related to visits he would make to other countries or
whether they related to the activities he was engaged in Pakistan and had
completed that. You have no idea. You‘re asking me to speculate.
MR. BERNSTEIN: No, but the government doesn‘t see why it‘s necessary
to show that the defendant had a specific plan in the United States. What
the defendant was doing was bringing a lot of terrorist materials, and I
might add duplicate copies of some of those, duplicate Photostat copies of
some of those materials, into the United States.
THE COURT: Which is not the crime that brings him before the Court. That
is not the crime, correct?
MR. BERNSTEIN: That is right. You put that together with what we know
about the defendant‘s criminal record. Certainly the inference there is that
the defendant is a terrorist and that he is carrying these materials, and the
only purpose of these materials, Your Honor, and I don‘t know if it would be
necessary, but we could certainly put on testimony that the only purpose of
these materials is to train people to carry out terrorist activities –
THE COURT: You are, I assume, familiar with that body of case law that
does not permit it to be found to be a crime to be in possession, for
instance, of literature that tells you how to make an atomic bomb.
MR. BERNSTEIN: But if the evidence shows that the defendant is in fact
engaged in terrorist activities, was bringing these materials in, and was
concealing his identity, and especially in view of the materials the
defendant himself was carrying about the necessity for falsifying one‘s
identity and falsifying one‘s documents -- and again, I ask the Court to at
least let us, let us get those -- that document translated. That may shed
some light. That may shed some light on this proceeding, on some of the
issues that concern the Court.
Although he had no bombs with him Ajaj had an early edition of the
al-Qaeda training manual. If the pen is mightier than the sword, a book can
be mightier than a bomb. Ajaj was determined to kill as many Americans as
he could. Had he brought with him a book on the manufacture of heroin,
which might kill only a few, Judge Raggi would not have let him off so
easily. After the guilty plea, Judge Raggi ordered the government to return
Ajaj‟s belongings, including the bomb-making instructions, or to come
forward with a reason for failing to do so.
155. U.S. 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals USA v Salameh United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit August Term, 1997
(Argued: December 18 & 19, 1997 Decided: August 4, 1998) Docket Nos. 94-1312, -1313, -1314, -1315
Although federal prison phone calls are taped, no one monitored
Ajaj‘s twenty calls to Yousef and other Islamists - or tried to translate them
from Arabic - until long after the blast. Had the American authorities done
so after Ajaj was first arrested they would have discovered Ajaj‘s links to
Dr. Mehdi, Nosair and Sheik Rahman after they reviewed the translation of
the phone call:
Ajaj: I want. Do you know what? There is a big personality in New York.
The chairman of the Arab community [Dr. Mehdi] will collect bail for you,
help you. There is someone. God will bring us goodness if he is willing… In
one thing that I be able to find a telephone number of the Arab community
the chairman who defended Nosair.
Ajaj: The one who defended Nosair. Those would provide us, would
provide me with an attorney. I do have an attorney and the [Magistrate]
Judge is Jewish. And they might go back to my past history and you know
that my history, thank God, is honorable…So God willing, most importantly
I want to tell you something. Me up till now they haven‘t taken any
statement from me, in other words they‘re saying they haven‘t found
anyone who speaks Arabic well.
Ajaj: And you the very important thing it‘s necessary that you put together
and be able to send some papers [bomb making manuals] to complete your
studies over there.
Ajaj: God sends what is good. God disposes and we are consenting, we‘re
consenting to the rule of God no matter what and no matter what was
destined by God, I‘m not angry about anything but one thing…One, in other
words, every time he lucks out in a study, [is successful in an attack] in
U.M. Yes, because I want to give also to the Iman in New Jersey [Sheik
Rahman?] to help, he is an Iman a member of the committee responsible
for the holy land associations [Hamas]. And he is the chairman, and he
(U/I) he‘s an important chairman…To study God, (U/I) willing Sulaman I
must try to help study.
Ajaj: Yes, look I prefer that you let him enter with a major [attack]. I wish
you listen to me…What I am telling you is make him pursue a study as a
lathe operator, [as a bomb maker] look out for my major here in the field of
lathing.
Ajaj: You would have accomplished, you know what in other words,
secured his future? And you would have done him a great favor, in other
words, and from there I shall send him I mean to study in Pakistan the
specialization. The major of lathing in the hands of people I mean you have
lathe shops, and in other words? So I recommend one of the two studies,
either a major in printing [propaganda] or in lathe operating? Forget about
engineering [shooting] and all the empty talk. This specialization, this is the
finest specialization one has to take up.
Additionally, no one traced Ajaj‘s plane ticket until after the World
Trade Center blast to determine that he and Yousef had sat together on the
first leg of their journey to New York. Ajaj was released from prison three
days after the World Trade Center explosion and was free from March 1,
1993 to March 9, 1993 when he was rearrested and sentenced to more
than 100 years in prison for his role – from behind bars – in the attack.
The FBI and INS handled Ramzi Yousef even more ineptly than they
did Ajaj. Yousef disposed of his British passport upon entering America by
giving it to Ajaj, and used an Iraqi one to claim political asylum. He would
tell the FBI that he had attempted to obtain legitimate visas to enter the
U.S. from the U.S. Embassy in Islamabad on two occasions, but was
unsuccessful.
Yousef denied to the American Secret Service Agent Brian Parr that
the Iraqi intelligence agency had issued the passport to him. ―He told us
when he arrived in the U.S. he was using a genuine Iraqi passport in the
name of Ramzi Yousef. He came into immigration, presented his Iraqi
passport and requested political asylum. He said he had purchased it for
$100 in Peshawar, Pakistan, and that they were easily accessible. He
described to us how Iraqi rebels living in Northern Iraq would raid Iraqi
passport offices and steal these genuine documents, and then they would
be sold on the black market in Peshawar.‖157
After Emad Salem was withdrawn from infiltrating the Islamist cell the
FBI failed to send in another informer or recruit one of the members as
such, despite the fact that Salem had betrayed the cell‘s plans to place
bombs at various locations in New York City. Shortly after Yousef‘s arrival,
and five months before the first World Trade Center Event, the FBI
subpoenaed twenty of Sheik Rahman‘s followers. FBI Agent Anticev
questioned them about their activities and leaders. Mahmud Abouhalima
was asked if he knew El-Sayyid Nosair and he denied that he did. The FBI
possessed information to the contrary however, no arrests were made for
giving false information to a Federal Government employee,
no Grand Jury investigation was launched, and the FBI
chose to downgrade its scrutiny of Gama‘a al-Islamiyya‘s
Brooklyn / Jersey City cell just as plans were being finalized
for the World Trade Center bombing.162 Emad Salem
explained: ―It was decided to interview all of the people or
most of the people who visited Mr. Sayyid Nosair in jail, and
interview me among them, or subpoena me among them. I
contacted Mr. Ali Shinawy, Mr. Ahmed Abdel Sattar, Mr. Ibrahim El-
Gabrowny and everybody. We held a meeting in Abu Bakr Mosque
[concerning the fact] that the FBI has started to monitor Gama‘a al-
Islamiyya‘s Brooklyn / Jersey City cell closely, and we should go to the
meeting next morning at the 26 Federal Plaza. Where the subpoena want
us to go. Mr. Ibrahim El-Gabrowny, Mr. Ahmed Abdel Sattar, Mr. Emad
Abdou. It was around 20 individuals. We met in front of the Warren Street
Mosque in Manhattan. We walked to the federal building, and Mr. Ahmed
Abdel Sattar had a federal identification, since he is a postman, he get into
the building, called the agents, the agents came downstairs, they came and
they accompanied us to upstairs. The FBI agents started interviewing us.
They did not interview me, because we just sit and talk, and I did not get
interviewed. I told them, ‗Please take me through the steps among them
exactly, so they see me being treated the same way so they don‘t suspect
Aside from this tepid passive investigation, the FBI just left Gama‘a
al-Islamiyya Brooklyn / Jersey City cell to its own devices, and those
devices included detonators, timers, chemicals and the like. Assistant
United States Attorney Andrew McCarthy commented: ―These
disagreements culminated in September 1992, when the FBI and Salem
went their separate ways and the FBI obtained subpoenas for members of
the Nosair group in an effort to force them to abandon any ideas they had
of committing violent acts in this country. Tragically, Abouhalima and his
associates were not deterred and went on to murder six people in the
attack on the World Trade Center.‖163 It wasn‘t until 1996 that a special
federal grand jury convened in the Southern District of New York to
investigate what prosecutors called ―the structure, goals and operational
status of al-Qaeda worldwide; whether al-Qaeda was involved in planning
crimes against American interests and, if so, which ones.‖164
On February 26, 1993 the Rahman gang was able to bomb the World
Trade Center. On that day Eyad Ismoil and Mohammed Salemeh drove to
the Trade Center and parked in its basement. Salemeh drove even though
he had three accidents recently, one of which landed Ramzi Yousef a
hospital. They had planned to arrive there early in the morning, at about
9:30 a.m. but one of the Brothers had forgotten to give them a wake-up
call, and they overslept. Because of their tardiness, Mohammed Salemeh
was unable to park the truck next to a key column, which might have
resulted in toppling the Trade Center and killing at least 250,000 ―kuffar!”
Dr. Mehdi went to the west coast after the World Trade Center
explosion ostensibly to translate for Sheik Omar Rahman, who had gone
there to distance himself from the action. Before he left New York, Dr.
Mehdi was visited by one of the Abouhalima family. They said to him: Give
the Sheik a message. Tell him not to talk about knowing Mahmud
Abouhalima. Mahmud is in jail in Egypt. If the Egyptians found out about
this connection Mahmud Abouhalima would have been taken out to the
desert and left at the mercy of the scorpions and desert rats. Dr. Mehdi was
asked:
Q. Following the bombing of the World Trade Center did you issue a
verbatim quote from the Sheik?
McCarthy: Objection.
166. http://www.milnet.com/state/chrono93.htm
A. I do.
167. Elaine Sciolino New York Times April 5, 1993 ―Egypt Warned U.S. of Terror.‖
168. FD-302 on 3.24.93 Doc Number #736 USA v. Ramzi et. al.
him to come to Egypt in order to capitalize on what would happen after his
capture there. Abouhalima overheard his torturers talking about his saying
the things the Americans wanted him to say, and he heard them getting
information in English from someone and then using that information to
question him during the torture.
FUNDING: HAMAS
―Let‘s talk about Hamas. It‘s interesting, as you just heard the tape
CM 31 in English, where Emad Salem announces to the FBI that
Mohammed Saleh is a member of Hamas. You want to see how Salem
lied? Let‘s talk about what he and Siddig talked about minutes after that
occurred, what he tells the Bureau on one hand because he needs the
money, and what he tells Siddig. He tells the Bureau Mohammed Saleh is a
member of Hamas and of course Emad Salem is very interested to find out
if anybody has affiliations with overseas organizations because that‘s what
my client is charged with in the indictment, and he asks Siddig right up
front, is Mohammed Saleh a follower – not even a member, now we are
down to followers. But Siddig Ali says I don‘t know nine times. But our boy
he‘s looking for money so he tells the FBI he‘s a member of Hamas.‖169
FINANCING: IRAN
Siddig believed he could obtain money from Iran for his plan to blow
up the FBI Building or the United Nations:
Siddig: No, we will get it, no problem. I know few sources. I‘ll ask to give the
amounts to me in cash.
Salem: Where?
(A noise of a hammer)
Siddig: You will need money (IA). The weapons will cost about $1,500:
Three pistols and two machine guns. The powder is expensive. We need
3,000 pounds and each pound costs four or five dollars.
Siddig: It is possible you must use another passport. Get another passport
if you lost your passport.
Siddig: No, as a Sudanese you need them to help you in issuing a new
passport under another name. Even if the CIA have a list of all the
Sudanese who entered Tehran, they will not find out who you are.
Salem: Yeah.
171. Inaudible.
172. USA v Rahman Misc. Papers Cassette SN 38734 = 4
173. Uri Dan ―Kahane Killer Named by WTC Suspect‖ New York Post May 6, 1993.
were able to draw on funds collected by the Al-Gama‘a al-Islamiyya, which
received money from various sources, Islamic institutions in Saudi Arabia
and the German offices of the Muslim Brotherhood then added Iranian
businessmen and expatriates in Europe to the list of financiers. Abouhalima
told Egyptian interogators that the bombing plan was hatched in
Afghanistan among Arab veterans of the war, and that it was approved by
men describing themselves as Iranian intelligence agents and by Sheik
Omar Abdel Rahman. Two Iranians had appeared in the days before the
first World Trade Center bombing to help the cell with final details, then
disappeared shortly before the explosion. Sheik Rahman‘s followers in
Jersey City confirmed this.174 Another report in the Washington Post titled
―Egypt told US of ‗Iranian‘ Terrorist Link‖ seemingly based on the same
source quoted Abouhalima as saying that two Iraqis, one of them an Iraqi-
American, had arranged the money for the operation and recruited the
Brothers who carried it out from Mosques in the New York area.175 Harvard
educated Dr. Osama al-Baz, the director of President Mubarak‘s Office of
Political Affairs revealed this during a press conference with foreign
journalists. He told them that much of the confession had been verified by
Egyptian intelligence.176
Dr. Osama al-Baz stated that Egyptian authorities had informed the
United States in January 1993 that Egyptian intelligence had received
information from several reliable sources that ―certain terrorist groups‖
assisted by ―Iranian elements‖ were plotting an action against the United
States. The Egyptians could not determine for certain if the Iranians were
intelligence agents but knew they were plotting and training with Islamist
groups in Peshawar.177 In April 1993 a dispatch originating in Paris alleged
that Sheik Rahman received money from Iran‘s United Nations Mission.
The source of this information was the Arabic daily Asharq Al Awsat, which
claimed the FBI was looking for Mohammad Chalagian, the mission‘s
financial controller.178 During an interview with Reuters New Service on
March 30, 1993 the Sheik stated, ―I am challenging the media that accuses
me of receiving money from Iran to prove it. They said that I received
$50,000 from Iran. I am challenging them to prove it. I'm challenging the
martial court in Egypt that is saying that the Iranians are sending money to
174. Chris Hedges ―Egyptian Says Confession Links Iran to Bombing of Trade Center‖ New York Times July 16, 1993 Page A1, 2.
175. Caryle Murphy ―Egypt told US of Iranian Terrorist Link‖ Washington Post July 16, 1993 Pg A.14.
176. Chris Hedges ―Egyptian Says Confession Links Iran to Bombing of Trade Center‖ New York Times July 16, 1993 A1, 2.
177. Caryle Murphy ―Egypt told US of Iranian Terrorist Link‖ Washington Post July 16, 1993 Pg A.14.
178. ―Iran is Said to Give Money to Abdel Rahman‖ New York Times April 11, 1993.
my family in Egypt and then my family transfers the money here to me. I'm
challenging them to prove it. I'm also challenging that former CIA agent or
director who came on ABC and said he had proof that the sheik was
receiving money from Iran. I am challenging the media that is trying to link
me to the World Trade Center bombing to get proof or any evidence
whatsoever linking me to the World Trade Center bombing.‖ One of the
Sheik‘s sons, Abdullah Rahman, also denied that his father received
money from Iran that was laundered through one of the Sheik‘s wives,
―This is not true, we don‘t receive money from Iran.‖179
179. ―Iran Is Not Aiding Rahman, Son Says‖ New York Times March 15, 1993.
180. Ralph Blumenthal - New York Times April 25, 1993 Page 45, 1 - ―$100,000 From Abroad Linked to Trade Center Suspects‖ as
cited in Jim Dwyer Two Seconds Under the World : Terror Comes to America: The Conspiracy Behind the World Trade Center
Bombing - Crown Publishers1992.
181. CIA Report cited by William Gertz in Breakdown: How America‘s Intelligence Failures Led to September 11th. Regnery
Publishing 2002.
Sheik Rahman tried to determine the identity of the informant who
turned in Abouhalima and also made a number of media appearances,
including some broadcast on national television, in which he staunchly
denied knowing both Nosair and Abouhalima who had been his chauffeur
and had shared a bank account with him.
In March 1993 there was much unrest in Egypt. Three bombings took
place that month, at Assiut 2,500 Islamists demonstrated - at Manflout,
3000! Sheik Rahman had a premonition of doom and stated, ―I feel that my
meeting with God is nearing.‖184 He was right: Emad Salem asked to be put
back on the case in March 1993 and told Agent Anticev: ―I don‘t know, I
mean I didn‘t hear anything from the Bureau, John. I mean the only person
contacting me from the Bureau is you now. I mean even Nancy [S.A. Nancy
Floyd] stepped away. I feel that she‘s not calling me now for almost a week
or something. And I understand her position. But you are the only one who
is contacting me from the Bureau and you are not giving me any definite
answers…so that‘s why I said well I gotta better ease up my mind and stay
away, that‘s why I didn‘t go to the rally yesterday…I mean we, you, you‘re
not participating our things anymore…it takes forever for the, it takes about
another bomb until the Bureau will decide something. So wait until the
judge will be kidnapped, or one of the Jewish leaders with be bombed, or
another building like the World Trade Center will be bombed. I mean what
will the Bureau say. ‗Oh God that these people is really serious.‘ I mean the
Empire State or somebody else will be what ever and then the Bureau will
say, Oh God! That these people is really serious. But they didn‘t wake up
that way, they didn‘t feel that these people is serious yet. I spoke to
Dunbar. He was suspicious in me, and he put me on a polygraph exam,
and he didn't believe me and, uh, he waited until the bomb went off. It takes
a bomb to go off for him to believe that I was saying the truth.‖
183. Conference with Judge Duffy, Ayyad and Ahmed, page 506
184. Caryle Murphy ―Bomb Kills an Officer in Cairo‖ Washington Post March 28, 1993.
THE THIRD MUBARAK PLOT
Siddig: Only. Of course the man that we were going to obtain the weapons
from [Hampton-El].
Salem agreed to assist Siddig Ali in putting together the bombs but
stated that he would have no part in deploying them. After contemplating
bombing a U.S. armory, Siddig Ali proposed bombing the United Nations
complex. When initially discussing this plan with Salem, Siddig Ali stated
that Rahman had approved the attack on the United Nations, and had
called it not merely permissible, but a ―must‖ and a ―duty.‖187 After he
agreed to co-operate Siddig testified: ―I proposed to Salem that we change
our target from armories to the United Nations. I added to the list of targets
26 Federal Plaza.‖ Siddig and Salem discussed these targets in early May
1993. Siddig wished to kill as many FBI agents as possible and then take
hostages. But the FBI‘s offices at 26 Federal Plaza could only be
approached very early in the morning:
Siddig: Materialistic.
Salem: Materialistic. Yes, there will be financial loss but you will be the one
who blew up the FBI building but you are not going to kill agents because
they will be sleeping at home.
Siddig: Yes, unless we do it in the day time, but how we will get in?
Siddig confessed: ―The Holland and Lincoln tunnels and the George
Washington Bridge were also targets. In May 1993 Salem and I and
another individual visited Nosair in Attica. Salem spoke with Nosair
privately, as did I. In our private conversation we discussed…Salem‘s
reliability. Nosair advised me he was a good man, but to be careful. I told
Nosair about targeting the United Nations by placing a bomb in a car and
driving it into the United Nations garage. Nosair said it was not a good plan
because of the heightened security of the World Trade Center bombing. He
told me that instead I should consider kidnapping Mr. Nixon and Mr.
Kissinger…In connection with the plan to attack the United Nations I
received assistance from the representatives of a foreign government [the
Sudan] in connection with obtaining access to the United Nations garage,
surveillance of the garage and the use of diplomatic license plates. One of
the representatives introduced me to Mohammed Saleh as being a
representative of the Hamas who was raising money through people in the
Middle East…Saleh agreed to assist with the financing of the operation.188
In 2001, a Sudanese-born suspect arrested in a foiled plot to bomb the
U.S. Embassy in New Delhi told Indian investigators that Sudanese
diplomats had given him explosives and detonators.189
On the way home from a trip to Philadelphia Salem and Siddig Ali
had this conversation:
Siddig: Where did I get this information [regarding a van with diplomatic
plates that could be used to transport a bomb into the United Nations
garage] from? I get it from the highest level.
190. http://www.sudantribune.com/spip.php?article18681
Steve Paterno is a Sudanese residing in the U.S.A., and he can be reached at
stevepaterno@yahoo.com
Siddig: I am telling you there are people from inside the embassy, Brother.
Salem: Good.
Siddig: So these people know the details. It is not a game, they know the
details.
The van was to be delivered, along with a United Nations entry pass
on June 24, 1993 but our operation was shut down by then.191 Siddig Ali
invited Salem to discuss these matters directly with Sheikh Rahman, but
reminded him that because of the surveillance due to the World Trade
Center bombing, to use caution in so doing. Caution, as defined by Siddig
Ali, included phrasing statements in a broad and general manner, and
assuring that Rahman was insulated from active involvement in the plot.
Salem met with Siddig Ali again on May 12, 1993 pretending that he
had surveyed locations for use as a bomb-making safehouse and that he
had settled on a garage in Queens that was renting for $1,000 a month.
This safehouse was actually rented by the FBI, and the FBI installed video
cameras and surveillance equipment in the safehouse before members of
the group began using it.
By this time the FBI knew that Sheik Rahman had foreknowledge of
the first World Trade Center attack, but allowed him to remain free so that
they could spy on those who visited him. The U.S. issued a statement to
the effect that the jailing of the Sheik would be too costly. In a letter written
by an acting Attorney General, it was stated, ―In view of Rahman‘s poor
health and incidental requirements for medical attention, his confinement,
pending disposition of his appeal of the exclusion order would impose a
significant burden upon Government resources. In the absence of concrete
evidence that Rahman is participating in or involved in planning acts of
terrorism, the assumption of that burden is considered unwarranted.‖193
Rahman: No.
Rahman: Find a plan to inflict damage on the American Army because the
United Nations will damage Muslims.
Rahman: Yes, keep it, let us think, you all think of something else, because
basically, the United Nations, this, they will consider it to be a center of
peace and that Muslims are against peace, and will create a difficulty, and
will disturb the Muslims being.
Salem: Yes, but Siddig suggested the second target will be the FBI‘s
center, which is 26 Federal Plaza, what do you think of this one?
Salem: Emh, ok, fine, but we have prepared the thing now, Sheik.
Rahman: Slow down, slow down a little bit. The one who killed Kennedy
was trained for three years.194
The Sheik whispered this last line to Emad Salem for fear the FBI
was bugging his telephone and his apartment – which it was from February
1993 to June 1993, when the FBI ceased to do so after having searched it.
Long before the PATRIOT (Providing Appropriate Tools Required To
Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism) Act was enacted, the FBI also had a
―roving wiretap‖ on the Sheik and tapped the telephones that he used when
he traveled to cities like Seattle and Los Angeles.195 There were other
transcriptions of this last part of the tape: ―Salem then asked Rahman what
he thought of the plan to bomb the FBI at 26 Federal Plaza.‖ Rahman
responded, ―Well, uh, a little bit later. We‘ll talk about this.‖ When Salem
194. USA v Rahman Document 691 pgs. 4 and 5, Peter Waldman ―The Infiltrator: Ali-Mohamed served in the U.S. Army and bin-
Laden's circle‖ The Wall Street Journal Nov. 26, 2001.
195. New York Times April 23, 1993 - Lynne Stewart quoted.
indicated that the plan was currently in motion, Rahman responded, ―It
doesn‘t matter. Slow down. Slow down a bit. The one who killed Kennedy
was trained for three years.‖ When Sister Lynne Stewart was put on trial for
aiding al-Qaeda she remembered it this way, ―By God," the Sheikh
answered. "I mean, postpone it a little, slow down a little. May God make
things right for you.‖
McCarthy: No, you ruled that it wasn‘t to be mentioned in front of the jury
until you said one way or the other. It is our position, your Honor, that it is
relevant, probative evidence of Dr. Abdel Rahman‘s state of mind…The
whole case is about what he had on his mind, and it makes it much more
relevant that he‘s mentioned the name of a United States Government
official as opposed to another man.
THE COURT: No. All it does is call for all kinds of speculation that have not
a great deal to do with this case by a good number of years.
McCarthy: It‘s not the government‘s position that he actually had anything
to do with the Kennedy assassination. But it is extremely relevant, given the
fact that what was being proposed were attacks on American installations,
that what he is talking about is training for an attack on an American
government official in a case where he has contended that he‘s not
involved in any kind of Jihad other than Jihad overseas…
THE COURT: ―The person who carried out the Kennedy assassination
trained for three years,‖ is a point he could just as easily have been making
about a proposed act to take place overseas, as he could about a proposed
domestic act. For example, if he had said ―Have your escape plans ready,
because John Wilkes Booth has a horse waiting out in the alley…‖ But if he
is talking about an attack on American military installations, it will be
apparent without his reference to advice based on an earlier act. If he is
saying, ―Wait to attack American installations because after all the person
who attacked Kennedy trained for three years,‖ then the fact that he alludes
to the person who attacked Kennedy doesn‘t add anything. On the other
hand if he says wait to train to assassinate Mubarak because the person
who assassinated Kennedy trained for three years, that doesn‘t make a
proposed assassination of Mubarak somehow a more American act…
Defense Attorney Lynne Stewart: Could you read it aloud, Judge? I don‘t
have it in front of me, just as it would be without the word Kennedy, that
sentence.
THE COURT:
Rahman: The man who killed X was training for three years. We don‘t want
ah –
Rahman: OK
THE COURT: Let‘s take another step further. Instead of just blanking out
Kennedy, why not blank out kill also, and leave it as the man who was
redacted was training for three years.196
Rahman: The one who [redacted] [redacted] was training for three years,
we don‘t want uh.
Sirhan Sirhan was born in 1944 in al-Quds198 and in 1948, he and his
family moved to Old Jerusalem where they remained until coming to the
United States in 1956. Throughout his eight years in Old Jerusalem there
were intermittent bombings. Sirhan‘s family resided in a one-room
apartment with grossly inadequate toilet facilities. He often said ―the Jews
have kicked us out of our home‖ and was also told of the Deir Yassin
massacre in which the Jews slaughtered 250 people including women and
children. Sirhan elaborated, ―While living in Old Jerusalem I went to a well
for some water, and when the bucket came up it contained a hand and this
sickened me. On one occasion I saw the exploded remains of a grocer I
knew. Another time I came across the body of a neighbor hanging on the
barbed wire on the street in front of our home. Once a Zionist truck drove
through our street carrying a number of young Arab girls whose breasts
had been slashed. I was four years old at the time and I told my mother
‗Look at the blood, mommy!‘‖199 In 1956 he heard about the Arab-Israel war
involving the Suez Canal. In the 1960‘s Sirhan asserted that violence was
the only means by which the American Negroes would achieve their goals,
and that the State of Israel had taken his home, and that the Jewish people
were on top and directing the events in America.
198. Jerusalem.
199. Douglas Robinson ―Sirhan Tells Court He Killed Kennedy‖ New York Times March 4, 1969.
willing to fight for the Arab cause. I am willing to die for it.‖ On June 1, 1968
Ben Herrick, the owner of the Lock, Stock and Barrel Gun shop in San
Gabriel, California, sold Sirhan the ammunition he used to assassinate
Kennedy. Herrick stated that two Arab Brothers accompanied Sirhan.200
Larry K. Arnot, who worked at the store at the time refused to talk about the
incident.201 Sirhan repeatedly stated that he carried out this assassination
alone, however, a fellow inmate with Sirhan in San Quentin from 1972 to
1973 claimed that Sirhan was involved in the prison murder of inmate
Ronald Woods who had gone to the FBI and told agents there that Sirhan
had admitted to him that others were involved in the RFK assassination.202
200. ―Shell Purchase by Sirhan Noted: 2 Were With Accused Killer, Gunshop Owner Says,‖ New York Times June 16, 1968 Page
32, 1.
201. Larry K. Arnot 626-358-8787
202. Philip Melanson ―The RFK Assassination‖ Shapolsky Press 1991 page 117
203. Robert Kennedy FBI Files Part 1 of 9 FBI 77-51387 http://foia.fbi.gov/rfk/rfk1a.pdf
204. Conversation with Ghazi Khanken October 7, 2003.
Palestine to the Zionist Jewish voters.‖ When Sirhan was arrested, a
newspaper article that stated Senator Kennedy favored aid to Israel, with
arms if necessary, was found in his pocket.205 Dr. Mehdi visited with Sirhan
after Sirhan was incarcerated, under the pretext of writing a book on the
Robert Kennedy assassination that was printed by the New World Press in
1968 and titled Kennedy and Sirhan, Why? The New World Press was
located in Dr. Mehdi‘s apartment.
205. David Lawrence Pasadena Evening Star News - May 26, 1968.
other people, he should be equally accountable to these others…On the
question of prevention of greater evil, if the death of one person has
prevented the sending of Phantom jets which might kill and destroy the
lives of, say, fifteen thousand human beings, then possibly a greater evil
was prevented even though a great tragedy took place.‖
ISSA NAKHLEH
206. ―Arab Agency Orders Aid Offer to Sirhan‖ Associated Press June 23, 1968 published in New York Times.
the Palestine Bar. He represented the Arab Higher Committee for Palestine
(also known as the Palestinian Arab Delegation) a pro-PLO group in New
York from 1947 to 1948. He then became Representative of the League of
Arab States with the rank of Minister Plenipotentiary for Latin America with
an office in Buenos Aires, Argentina. For the last 32 years he had
represented the Arab Higher Committee for Palestine in New York. He
attended more than 15 Sessions of the United Nations General Assembly,
and made more than 50 speeches in the Special Political Committee on the
Problem of Palestine. The Justice Department reported that Palestinian
Arab Delegation is registered with the Foreign Agents Registration Board
as a representative of the Arab Higher Committee for Palestine: ―The
registrant engaged in meetings at the United Nations for the purpose of
winning support of the United Nations Delegations for the cause of the
Palestine Arab people.‖ The Delegation received $24,000.00 for the six-
month period ending June 26, 2001 from the Palestinian Authority.207 The
Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Amin el-Husseini, whose spirit guided Brother
Nakhleh, had originally formed the Palestinian Arab Delegation.
207
. http://www.usdoj.gov/criminal/fara/Fara1st01/COUNTRY/PALESTIN.HTM
208
. Letters to the Editor Washington Post September 14, 1947.
209
. Spotlight November 8, 1982 IHR Advertisement
210
. Simon and Schuster also had a subsidiary known as Intercontinental Books, but it only published children‘s titles. The Chinese
had a publishing house known as Intercontinental Press.
of the Palestine Problem. Nakhleh was a legal adviser of the Saudi Arabian Mission to
the United Nations before his death on March 29, 2003.211
SPEAR S. SAYEGH
―On July 8, 1968, FBI Agent Lloyd Johnson interviewed Spear Sayegh at his
place of business. Sayegh stated that he had never met Sirhan Sirhan and knew
nothing of him. He stated that he was acquainted with most Arabs in the Los Angeles
area and that he had met [Sirhan Sirhan‘s brother] Adel Sirhan when he had seen him
as a musician at the Shaker‘s Oasis Bar and The Fez Bar. Sayegh was president of the
American Jordanian Society that he formed, for two years. He was presently president
of the United States Organization of Medical and Educational Needs. The organizations
were both charitable and not political in nature.
―Sayegh stated that he and most Arabs of his acquaintance had warm feelings
for both John Kennedy and Robert Kennedy. He said that it was the opinion of many
Arabs that Zionists had induced Sirhan to assassinate Robert Kennedy. He personally
did not have evidence of this belief.
―Sayegh does not recall the specific conversation Mrs. Garner referred to but
stated that it could have been any number of people due to his involvement with
different organizations. He did recall several calls from John Lawrence requesting that
he (Sayegh) arrange a defense for Sirhan. Sayegh stated that he declined because he
thought that Sirhan was guilty and should be executed. Lawrence was identified as the
executive secretary of the ‗Organizing Committee for Clemency for Sirhan‘ in New York
City.
211
. Letters to the Editor ―Saudi Arabia: America's Friend‖Washington Post February 3, 2002.
Nevertheless, we thank Allah [subhanahu wa ta‘ala] for allowing us to raise funds
through organizations such as the United States Organization of Medical and
Educational Needs. Alfred Lilienthal, whose articles have appeared in the Revisionist
Journal of the Institute of Historical Review, spoke before the Organization of Medical
and Educational Needs.212 The Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee listed the
Organization of Medical and Educational Needs213 as being identical with the
Palestinian Refugee Fund.214 The Mercy Relief of Singapore supported the Palestinian
Refugee Fund. The Government of Kenya deregistered Mercy Relief International in
September 1998 as they had been found to be working against the interests of Kenyans
in terms of security according to the Non-Governmental Organizations (NGO)
Coordination Board, the government body that oversees the activities of locally
registered NGOs. No further details were given, although the Kenyan Police and the FBI
raided Mercy Relief International as part of their investigations into the August 7, 1998
bombing of the American spy-nests in Kenya and Tanzania. Documents were taken in
that raid, but no arrests were made, however, during the 2001 trial of the Brothers who
carried out these activities the traitor Jamal Ahmed Mohammed al-Fadl was asked:
Q. And during the time that you were in Nairobi were you familiar with a charity or relief
organization known as Mercy International Relief Organization?
A. Yes.
Q. And were there any al-Qaeda people affiliated with the Mercy International Relief
Organization?
A. Yes, the people of al-Qaeda they were dealing with the Mercy International.
Q. Who were those people? Which al-Qaeda people were dealing with Mercy
International?
Abu Jihad: My name is Abu Jihad and I am graduate student doing a PhD. thesis on
Sirhan Sirhan. I came across a document about someone having overheard a
telephone call you received at your pharmacy.
212
. Alfred Lilienthal Lecture Brochure 147 W 55 St New York, New York.
213
. United States Organization for Medical Educational Needs Attn. Az Nashashibi Tel. 415-665 0830 Fax. 415-284 3225 2 Plaza
Drive P.O. Box 16308 San Francisco, CA 94116
214
. http://groups.google.com/groups?q=United+States+Organization+of+Medical+and+Educational+Needs&hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-
8&safe=off&selm=8s60fp%241c3r%241%40pencil.math.missouri.edu&rnum=1
Abu Jihad: Who was this guy Lawrence you were talking with? Was he connected to Dr.
Mehdi?
Abu Jihad: The organization you were talking to regarding Sirhan was connected with
Dr. Mehdi?
Sayegh: Yes.
Abu Jihad: There was a friend of Sirhan who had the same last name as you. Was that
any relation?
Sayegh: No.
Abu Jihad: You were with the United States Organization of Medical and Educational
Needs? This foundation, was this similar to the Holy Land Foundation? I know that after
the bombings an affiliate in Kenya of the Organization of Medical and Educational
Needs was kicked out of that country.
Abu Jihad: The money you raised wasn‘t going to any militant organizations?
It was Brothers like Nakhleh and Sayegh, who hated the Zionist occupiers and
had connections, directly and indirectly, to organizations comprised of Nazi‘s posing as
historians, who provided support for Sirhan Sirhan‘s action.
215
. ―Sirhan Says No One Helped to Kill Kennedy‖ New York Times June 16, 1983 Page A18, 1.
asked him about Dr. Rahman‘s reference to killing Kennedy. ―What? That‘s very very
farfetched. Dr. Mehdi was only a translator for Sheik Rahman in a court situation. 216
Sirhan was a Christian he has nothing to do with any…Dr. Mehdi used to go there to
see to visit him in the jail to see…he was calling for his parole. Dr. Mehdi worked for the
League of Arab States. The Arab Information Center was not his. He was director for a
few years in the 1950‘s.‖217 The League of Arab states funded the Arab Information
Center.218
The Sheik was not the only figure in the Arab world to link the RFK assassination
to so-called ―organized Arab terrorism.‖ The Saudi Ambassador to the United Nations,
Jamil M. Baroody, in a speech to the Security Council hinted, ―When the Palestinians,
who have been robbed of their property, of their homeland, chased out of their country,
are desperate and try to express their despair by such acts as we hear of, whether it is
in the airport at Athens219 or elsewhere, or even in Los Angeles where one of the
leaders of this country was assassinated because he supported the Israeli cause for
political reasons, these people are called ‗murderers.‘‖220
On July 2, 1993 Sattar and Sheik Rahman barricaded themselves in the Abu
Bakr Mosque then surrendered following a tense 20-hour standoff with authorities that
suddenly had decided to revoke Rahman‘s parole on immigration charges, however the
Sheik was convinced he was being arrested on the same conspiracy that his followers
had been charged with the previous week and he told the crowd who formed a human
chain across the street from the Mosque, ―I might not stand in front of you again. We are
not conspiring against America even though we disagree with American policy.‖ 222
Mohammad T. Mehdi was present and reported that Sheik Rahman asked him, ―Is
America becoming another Egypt [complete with administrative detention]?‖ Sheik
Rahman, who was suffering from numerous illnesses, including a non-contagious form
of tuberculosis, was helicoptered to Otisville Federal Prison in upstate New York. There,
216
. The Washington Post of August 16, 1993 described Mehdi as ―a close advisor of the Sheik.‖
217
. Tape Recorded conversation with Ghazi Khankan October 14, 2003.
218
. Washingon Post February 20, 1976 ―Arab Center, Leader Named in US Suit.‖ The USDOJ filed suit against the Arab Information
Center for failing to file a Foreign Agents Registration Act Statement as the Center worked on behalf of the League of Arab States.
219
. On December 26, 1968 the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine killed on Israeli during an attack on El-Al Airlines at
Athens airport.
220
. ―Arab Envoy at UN Cites RFK Murder‖ Washington Post January 1, 1969 page A24
221
. Jim Hoagland ―Sudan Releases Envoy‘s Killers to PLO‖ Washington Post June 25, 1974.
222
. Allison Mitchell ―Sheik to be Held While Fighting Deportation‖ New York Times July 3, 1993 Page 1,2.
he was hospitalized after he began to suffer from higher than normal blood sugar levels
as his medication had been taken away from him for security reasons. 223 The warnings
to the Americans began, ―We have issued statements warning the Americans never to
touch Dr. Omar Abdel Rahman and now they will see our response.‖ Montassar al-
Zayyat added that the Sheik‘s extradition could ―set off a wave of violence.‖224
A. They will set up various charges against me in order that they may order me, remand
me in the prison or to kill me. When I was in the United States in November or
December 1991, I tried to return to Egypt, but the Minister of Interior sent me a
delegate, threatening me that if I returned then I will face the prison and detention or at
least house arrest. I gave my lawyer the name of the witness, if necessary.
A. A person whom I know that is acquainted with the Minister of Interior. His is Dr.
Mustafa Mouman. I prepared myself to return to Egypt and this Mustafa Mouman came
to New York and contacted me, and I went to him and he told me what Minister of
Interior said.
Q. How did-how did the Egyptian government know you were going to return to Egypt?
A. I didn't say that they Egyptian government knew that I was going to return. It was my
intention to return.
Q. Well, but why did the Egyptian government happen to send this delegate to you
coincidentally at the same time that you were planning to return?
A. I had no intention of returning at that particular date, but I was thinking of returning.
Q. Do you know if Dr. Mustafa Mouman he works for the Egyptian government?
223
. Joseph B. Treaster, ―Sheik Hospitalized at Federal Prison‖ New York Times July 7, 1993 Page A1, 3.
224
. Joseph B. Treaster ―Lawyer Says Sheik Plans Fight Against Extradition‖ New York Times July 6, 1993 Page B2, 1.
(Off the record. On the record.)
JUDGE FOR THE RECORD: The last answer was I don't think so.
On July 4, 1993, Amad Sattar told the media "we haven't decided the
time or place, but our Muslim community will definitely demonstrate its
outrage at the arrest of the Sheikh and that if anything happens to the
Sheikh, we will hold the American administration responsible. Something
very bad could happen." On July 10, 1993 the Immigration Board of
Appeals upheld Meisner‘s determination and rejected the Sheik‘s
application for asylum. Doctor Mehdi commented, ―The Sheik is
exceedingly disappointed. I understand that he is improving and taking
some of his medication but he is demoralized and this was before the
Board rejected his appeal.‖225 Sheik Rahman was offered asylum by the
Sudanese. Then Prime Minister Gulbuddin Hekmatyar of Afghanistan
stated, ―We are willing to give him refuge, it will not cause a problem.‖226
August 27, 1993 was a day that sealed the fate of the United States. The Islamist
scholar, Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman, whose only crime was having correctly interpreted
the Qu‘ran, was brought before a federal magistrate and charged with conspiring to
wage a holy war against America.
During his incarceration the Sheik took his immigration case to the United States
Appellate Court which ruled: ―Based on this court‘s review of the administrative record,
this court concludes that the Board of Immigration Appeals decision, as well as that of
the Immigration Judge, on the application for asylum and withholding of deportation is
supported by substantial evidence in the record. Fear of persecution, the basis for
asylum, is not to be equated with an expectation of prosecution. The latter is not a
ground for asylum. The unclassified summary opinion of the State Department Office of
Asylum Affairs, Bureau of Human Rights and Humanitarian Affairs, notes that: ‗We think
that his acquittal in Egypt [in the Anwar Sadat assassination trial] reflects the practice of
the Egyptian courts whose judges we respect and who enjoy a reputation for
independence in their wish to hold government to a high standard in bringing charges
against individuals for security breaches and for fomenting sectarian violence.‘ This
court also concludes that the Board of Immigration Appeals and the Immigration Judge
had reasonable grounds for regarding the Petitioner as a danger to the security of the
United States and therefore were required to deny his application for relief. Petitioner
next argues that he was deprived of his right to a full and fair hearing on the ground that
the Immigration Judge improperly considered ‗classified‘ information despite the Judge‘s
225
. Joseph B. Treaster ―Immigration Board Rejects Sheik‘s Plea for Asylum‖ New York Times July 10, 1993.
226
. ―Sheik Offered Refuge‖ New York Times, August 1, 1993 Page 39, 1.
representation on the record that he would not. Before reaching the merits of this
argument this Court notes that it has declined, for policy reasons noted below, to
receive the classified documents for in camera review [however] the undersigned
received Secret level security clearance and [now] has the authority to read such a
document. Although the undersigned has authority to base his decision on the classified
information contained in the advisory opinion, the undersigned has not considered the
classified information in reaching a decision in this case…The undersigned notes that
the information contained in the classified document is relevant to the case and is a
more detailed account of applicant‘s alleged activities that are set forth in the
unclassified U.S. Department of States advisory opinion, dated October 23, 1992…227 In
fact, the Board of Human Rights and Humanitarian Affairs advisory opinion noted that it
was accompanied by a classified letter ‗which summarizes information available to the
U.S. concerning the continuing involvement of [the applicant] in terrorist activities which
would have detrimental foreign policy and security consequences for the U.S.
Government.‘ The regulation specifies that the agency that provides the classified
information may provide an unclassified summary. The immigration judge found that the
Board of Human Rights and Humanitarian Affairs opinion did adequately summarize the
classified information and provide the applicant an opportunity to offer opposing
evidence.‖
Even at this early stage the milieu Hasan existed within was clearly
that of Imam jihadi terrorist support groups. While not performing jihad
themselves, these Imam‘s preach a brand of Islam that gives terrorist
violence a religious imprimatur as the ―neglected duty.‖ The seeds were
planted in Hasan’s feeble brain by radical clerics who all played down
Hasan‘s fanatical beliefs after the event.
229
http://northernvirginiastan.blogspot.com/2005/03/jawa-report-abu-ali-pleads-not-guilty.html
Imam Sirraj Wahhaj is the Vice president of the ISNA.
In 1991 Wahhaj recited an invocation in front of the United
States House of Representatives. He was the first Muslim to
do so. Wahhaj presides at the Al-Taqwah Mosque in Brooklyn
whose members provided security for the Islamist
sympathizers of Said Nosair during his trial for the Meyer
Kahane assassination. These men, all members of a Gama Al-Islamaya
cell, would later take part in the bombing of the WTC in 1994. Respectable
Imam Wahhaj had met often with Mayors Dinkins and Bloomberg of New
York City, however, he has called for replacing them with a caliphate where
Shar‘ia law would prevail. Imam Wahhaj served as a character witness for
Sheik Abdel Rahman and his crew member Hampton-El at their trial
during which they were accused of plotting to blow up the Bridges and
Tunnels leading to New York City. He also testified for the defense at the
African Embassy bombing trial.230 Islamic Society of North America
president Ingrid Mattson stated, "I don't understand why the Muslim-
American community has to take responsibility for Major Hasan. The Army
has had at least as much time and opportunity to form and shape this
person as the Muslim community." ISNA was named as an unindicted co-
conspirator in the Holy Land Foundation‘s terrorist support trial.
In Protecting the Force, Lessons from Fort Hood the DOD stated,
―Finding DoD standards for denying requests for recognition as an
ecclesiastical endorser of chaplains may be inadequate. Each religious
organization that provides military chaplains provides an endorsing agent to
serve as its representative to the Department of Defense. These endorsing
230. Daniel Pipes National Review February 21, 2000 ―In Muslim America: A Presence and a Challenge.‖
http://www.danielpipes.org/article/329
232. http://www.defense.gov/pubs/pdfs/DOD-ProtectingTheForce-Web_Security_HR_13Jan10.pdf
233. Phillip Kurata US DOS International Information Program October 16, 2001 ―U.S. Islamic Leaders Issue Fatwa on U.S. Muslim
Soldiers Fighting Terrorists.‖ http://usinfo.state.gov/topical/pol/terror/01101611.htm
Deanne Stillman ―What's the U.S. military doing about radical Muslim soldiers? Not enough.‖ Slate March 27, 2003,
http://slate.msn.com/id/2080770/
234. Mohammad al Hanooti Director Islamic Center of New Jersey 2780 Kennedy Boulevard New Jersey 07304
235. ―Religious Leader Tied To Terror,‖ Albany Times Union June 30, 2002 page A1.
Social Sciences searching for evidence of money laundering and tax
evasion as well as possible ties to a worldwide private financial empire that
Western governments have long suspected of funding Islamist activities.236
Anwar Nasser al-Awlaki was born in April 22, 1971, in Las Cruces,
New Mexico to Yemeni parents. At that time, Anwar's father, Dr Nasser al-
Awlaki, was studying agriculture at a US university. After completing his
studies, he returned to Yemen and assumed a number of administrative
and academic posts, until he became the president of Sanaa University,
which was then the only university in (North) Yemen. He then became
minister of agriculture. When Al-Awlaki's father returned to Yemen, Anwar
was 7 years old, and at that time could hardly speak Arabic. In Sanaa,
Anwar al-Awlaki attended the prestigious Azal private school, where his
peers included the sons of presidents, ministers, senior officials, and
businessmen. After that Anwar returned to the United States to study. He
graduated in 1994 from Colorado State University with a B.S. in Civil
Engineering, and then he obtained a M.A. in Education Leadership from
San Diego State University and studied for a PhD in Human Resource
236. Brooke A. Masters Washington Post, May 3, 2002; Page A09 ―Virginia Muslim Groups Want Property Back Evidence Also
Sought by Organizations, Individuals Raided in Terror Probe.‖
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn?pagename=article&node=&contentId=A24729-2002May2
Development at George Washington University, where he served as the
Muslim Chaplin237
9. http://www.usrah.co.uk/anwar_awlarki_profile.htm
Ahmed Ressam's efforts to smuggle explosives into the Seattle area. The
complaint against Meskini alleged that FBI agents learned from a
confidential source that between December 11, 1999 and December 16,
1999 Meskini traveled to and stayed in Seattle where he was to join
Ressam. The source said that Meskini had explained that Ahmed Ressam
was a member of a well-organized group that had assigned him to deliver
his rental car, loaded with explosives, to a parking lot in Seattle where
another group member would retrieve it.238 Meskini‘s arrest was a result of
FBI agents having found a piece of paper with his name and Brooklyn
phone number in Ressam‘s possession. After Ressam's arrest, Meskini
returned to his apartment and tried to destroy evidence of his trip to Seattle
to rendezvous with Ressam, including an airline ticket and withdrawal slips
from ATM machines in Seattle. The withdrawals were from a Brooklyn bank
account.
An FBI agent called Al-Jailani about this business card and Al-
Jailani invited the agent to his apartment and answered all questions in a
one-hour session. Al-Jailani said he distributed hundreds of business
cards when he first came to the United States in an attempt to get a job. At
a bail hearing for Al-Jailani Akron FBI agent Roger Charnesky testified that
after the September 11th Raids Al-Jailani said that he knew a brother of
one Shaheeds and approved of the action. Federal Immigration Judge Walt
Durling forced the hearing to make the FBI justify why they needed to
continue keeping Al-Jailani in a Berks County, Pennsylvania prison after
more than a year. Agent Charnesky said that when the FBI searched Al-
Jailani‘s apartment on October 23, 2002 Al-Jailani's Wisconsin ID card
had the same address as a ―Suspect B‖ whose address (Briarwood
Apartments 1826 Fordem Avenue, Madison, Wisconsin) was found in April
1999, along with Al-Jailani's business card, in the Chicago home of Ziyad
238. Meskini said that each person involved in the scheme would only know the tasks of two others so that in the event of an arrest,
no one could expose more than two other Jihadists. This tactic prevented cell member Mokhtar Haouari from being convicted of
providing material support to a terrorist group nonetheless; he was sentenced to 288 months for credit card fraud. The United States
Attorney was unhappy with this and complained to Haouari‘s judge that the jury could have reasonably inferred that Haouari
deliberately closed his eyes to the fact that Ressam intended to destroy property in the United States by explosion or fire. For
example, Ressam testified that: Ressam told Haouari that Ressam's training in Afghanistan included explosives training; In October
1999, when Ressam and Haouari discussed a past operation in France in which metro stations were bombed, Ressam said that it
would be good to do another such operation and Haouari agreed; At the same time, when Ressam and Haouari discussed the
bombings of the U.S. embassies in Africa, Ressam expressed the opinion that the bombings were a good thing but would have
been better if they had been done inside the United States, and Haouari agreed; When Haouari first told Ressam that Haouari had a
friend in the United States who could help Ressam, Ressam said, ―Mokhtar, I'm not going to America for tourism. I am going on
some very important and dangerous business.‖ When Haouari later confirmed to Ressam that Meskini was willing to assist Ressam,
Ressam asked if Haouari ―explain[ed] to him well the business,‖ and Haouari replied that he told Meskini that ―it is a business that
has shteah,‖ which is an Algerian word used to describe something that involves fear and danger. Reuters January 1, 2000; USDC
SDNY USA v. Haouari 1-CR-00015 JFK August 14, 2001 ―Memo of Law in Opposition for Judgement or Acquittal or New Trial.‖
Khaleel. Ziyad Khaleel and Tarik Hamdi delivered a satellite telephone
and battery pack to Usama bin Laden in Afghanistan in May 1998.239
Khaleel purchased the phone itself and Hamdi delivered it. Ziyad was a
Committee for the Defense of Legitimate Rights associate, an Al-Qaeda
front group operating out of England. The credit card used to purchase the
phone belonged to Said al-Fagih, also tied with the Committee for the
Defense of Legitimate Rights. This phone was used to co-ordinate the
attacks on the American Embassies in East Africa. An employee of O'Gara
Satellite Networks testified about the sale of an Inmarsat phone to Ziyad
Khaleel, who was a resident of Columbia, Missouri at the time. Khaleel
purchased additional phone accessories and asked that the equipment be
mailed to Tarik Hamdi, 933 Park Avenue, Herndon, Virginia. From 1989 to
1992 Tarik Hamdi, reared in Turkey and Iraq, lived in Tampa, Florida
where he worked as office manager for Muslim Brotherhood member Sami
Al-Arian‘s Islamic Committee for Palestine. In January 2000 Tarik Hamdi
joined the defense team of Mohamed Rashed Daoud Al-'Owhali.240 Tarik
Hamdi was familiar with bin Laden's senior military commander
Mohammed Atef, and a letter to Atef contained a line referring to previous
communication through ―Tarik Hamdi in Washington.‖ Tarik Hamdi sent a
fax from Pakistan to bin Laden aide Khalid al-Fawwaz. The fax read:
―Brother Khalid: Peace be upon you. We arrived safely and now we are in
the Marriott Hotel.‖241 In July 2005 Ahmed Ressam was sentenced to 22
years in prison when he is arrested in December 1999 he reportedly tells
the FBI crucial details about al-Qaeda operations in the US.
239. John Miller interviewed Usama Bin Laden in 1998. ―Tarik Hamdi took him to Bin Laden when he delivered this equipment.‖
240. Susan Aschoff ―Ex-Tampa resident's name surfaces in bombing trial.‖ St. Petersburg Times, June 3, 2001.
241. Steven Emerson The Avalon Project.
http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/sept_11/emerson_001.htm
―First of all, we stated our position clearly, and I even feel that it's
unfortunate that we have to state this position because no religion would
condone this, so it should be common knowledge. But we were in a
position where we had to say that Islam does not approve of this. There is
no way that the people who did this could be Muslim, and if they claim to be
Muslim, then they have perverted their religion. We encourage people to
participate in blood drives, we encourage them to donate, and then we
encourage the community to reach out…So actually, fighting is only a part
of the jihad, and it's considered to be a defensive force in order to protect
the religion. If somebody defends their life, their property or their family, this
is considered to be a jihad. I'll tell you the way that [the perpetrators] justify
them. That does not mean that scholars of the Muslim world approve, but
this is where they are coming from. They say that Muslim land is now
248. http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2001/09/0927_imampart1.html
249. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/02/26/AR2008022603267_3.html
After 9/11 FBI sources say agents observed the imam allegedly
taking Washington-area prostitutes into Virginia and contemplated using
the Mann Act against him. Based Al-Awlaki self-serving statements and on
information supplied to it by the intelligence community the September 11th
Commission wrongly concluded that Al-Awlaki had provided aid to the
terrorists but was aware of their intentions when in reality he was part of the
September 11th Islamist Conspiracy. The intelligence community believed
Khalid Shaikh Mohammed who told the CIA that there were no facilitators
in the US to help the two jihadi, ―I asked a great deal of al-Hamzi and al-
Midhar, whom I had only middling confidence, because of their lack of
English and exposure to the West. The only reason they were involved in
the 9/11 plot was because they had visas and because bin Laden told me
he wanted the two to go on the operation. Because of their deficiencies, I
permitted al-Hazmi and al-Midhar, unlike the other 9/11 Shaheeds to go to
the local mosque to request assistance and advice on functioning in
American society, and I allowed the two, unlike the others, to contact me on
urgent matters. It was my idea that Khalid al-Midhar and al-Hazmi should
reside in San Diego, California, after arriving in Los Angeles on January
2000. There was no al-Qaeda operative or facilitator in the United States to
help al-Midhar and al-Hazmi settle in the United States. Al-Midhar and al-
Hazmi were not engaged in casing activity while in San Diego, given that
they barely knew how to function in U.S. society.‖ This statement was
contradicted not only by looking at Al-Awlaki’s profile in retrospect but by
the fact that many of the Arab-Americans Al-Midhar and al-Hazmi came
into contact with had been looked at by the counter-terrorist community and
were al-Qaeda facilitators: Mohadar Mohamed Abdoulah who worshipped
at the Masjid Ar-Ribat Al-Islam or Base of Support for Jihadi Operations
provided help with air reservations and finding a flight training school for al-
Hazmi and Hani Hanjour.250 He was indicted for providing material aid to Al-
Qaeda.
250. James Sterngold ―Muslims in San Diego Waver on Bail Pledge‖ New York Times December 9, 2001
http://www.investigativeproject.org/documents/case_docs/827.pdf
issued a number to Al-Awlaki, and he used that number when he applied
for a passport in Colorado in 1993, while he was a Colorado State
University student. Fournier's allegation was that Al-Awlaki used false
information to obtain the Social Security number and then used that
number to obtain a passport, Gaouette said. A federal diplomatic special
agent in Colorado began investigating in preparation to take the case to a
grand jury in October 2002 and learned that Al-Awlaki corrected the place
of birth on his Social Security application to New Mexico. And as a U.S.
citizen, Al-Awlaki was entitled to a Social Security number so no charges
were filed. "We asked the court to dismiss the complaint and withdraw the
warrant in the interest of justice," Gaouette said. "There is no sense putting
a person through an indictment when the government knows all along that
we don't have evidence or that we can prove the violation beyond a
reasonable doubt."
―How can you dare say that you love the religion of Allah and you know well
that the enemy has desecrated the book of Allah and you do nothing?
When you know that they have flushed the Qur‘an down a toilet and you
don‘t pick up your weapon and fight for the sake of Allah? When you know
that they have insulted Rasoolullah (sallallahu ‗alayhe wassallam) through
In May 2007 three New Jersey Muslims plotted to attack the Fort Dix
Army base. They were inspired by one of Al-Awlaki’s Internet sermons, as
were some of the young Somali-American men who left Minneapolis to join
al-Qaida's widening jihad in West Africa. Court testimony revealed the Fort
Dix terrorists watched his "Constants of Jihad" lecture the day before they
finalized their plot, convinced that the cleric had given a fatwah, or blessing,
to strike military targets on American soil.254
Moazzam Begg: When were you arrested? On what grounds were you
held? Were there any charges made against you?
255. http://aawsat.com/english/news.asp?section=3&id=19547
256. http://www.cageprisoners.com/prisoners.php?id=2127
Anwar Al-Awlaki: In the Name of Allah, the Most Merciful, the Most
Beneficent. I was arrested in mid-2006. Initially I was held because I
entered as an arbitrator in a local issue here, a tribal issue. I was an
arbitrator in that issue and I was arrested until that issue… because the
government wanted to solve that issue rather than have it solved tribally.
Moazzam Begg: Glory be to Allah! Well, that‘s something that we can share
together. I‘ve also been held at the request of the Americans for quite some
time.
Moazzam Begg: The other question is that the media reported that your
incarceration was due to having some knowledge, or some people who
were involved in 9/11 at your sermons. Could you clarify any of this at all?
Anwar Al-Awlaki: That was one of the issues that the Americans asked
about but I don‘t know if I was held because of that, or because of the other
issues that they presented. But it was one of the issues that they enquired
about.
Moazzam Begg: Can you describe a little bit about what your prison
conditions were like? What was your individual cell was like?
Anwar Al-Awlaki: For the first nine months, I was in solitary confinement in
an underground cell. I would say that the cell was about 8 feet by 4. It was
about 12 feet high. It was clean. No interaction with any other prisoner was
allowed for the entire nine months. After that, they moved me to the upper
floor. The same thing, it was solitary confinement, although the restrictions
were less, and the room was larger, it was about, maybe three times the
size of the initial room, the initial cell. I spent there the remainder of my
period, which was one and a half a years. I was allowed for the last month
and a half… they moved another person into this room, for the last month
and a half. So for a year and a half, minus this month and a half, I was in
solitary confinement, with the exception of the last month and a half.
Moazzam Begg: Subhan Allah. Did they place any restrictions on you in
terms of what you were allowed to have in your cell, how you were allowed
to interact with other prisoners, or in any way, other than you have already
stated?
Moazzam Begg: That‘s one of the questions I was meant to ask you. You
were never charged with a crime, is that correct, and you were never put
through any legal system?
Moazzam Begg: Did any foreign interrogation take place? Did any
Americans or any other foreign nationals interrogate you?
Anwar Al-Awlaki: Yes, the US did interrogate me. Officials from the US.
Moazzam Begg: And do you know if that was the FBI? Did they identify
themselves as FBI, CIA, NSA or anything?
Moazzam Begg: Okay. And how was their attitude towards you… how did
they deal with you as a person, how did they regard you?
Anwar Al-Awlaki: There was some pressure, which I refused to accept and
that led to a conflict that occurred between me and them, because I felt that
it was improper behavior from their behalf. That led to an issue between me
and them during the interrogation. That was solved however, later on, and
they apologized.
Moazzam Begg: With the help of Allah. Were you able to have contact with
your family at all, during the imprisonment, of course you‘ve already said
that they restricted from your letters, phone calls, and so forth, for the first
nine months, I think you said. But afterwards, did they allow you this
contact?
Moazzam Begg: How often were you interrogated, by either local officials
or foreign officials? Was it something regular, or was it something
sporadic?
Moazzam Begg: Is there any truth in the rumor that you were placed under
house arrest prior to this and that you were banned from speaking in
public?
Anwar Al-Awlaki: No, no that‘s not true. I haven‘t been placed under house
arrest, nor have I been banned from speaking publicly.
Moazzam Begg: There was also something that said that you were being
punished in prison because you were teaching some of the other prisoners.
Is this true also, or could you elaborate on that?
Anwar Al-Awlaki: No, I didn‘t have a chance to deliver any lectures because
I was in solitary confinement for the entire period except the last month,
which was only me and another person, so I wasn‘t in touch with other
prisoners.
Moazzam Begg: Are you allowed to travel outside the Yemen? Obviously,
many people want you to come to the United Kingdom and elsewhere, to
come and give lectures and you‘ve only been out a few days! I think this is
based on a question from a lot of your supporters, subhan Allah. Are you
allowed to travel outside the Yemen to give lectures?
Anwar Al-Awlaki: Well, I would like to travel. However, not until the US
drops whatever unknown charges it has against me.
Moazzam Begg: Yes, and that would be my advice to anybody who would
be in that sort of situation is to be aware of that. Can you tell us any of the
lessons that you‘ve learnt from being incarcerated that you would like to
share?
Moazzam Begg: In sha‘Allah… and is that one of your plans for the future?
Do you have any other plans for the future that you‘d care to elaborate
upon, or is it something that you‘d wish to wait and see how time evolves?
Moazzam Begg: Lectures, and just life in general. Not just lectures but
generally, in the future – what does the future hold?
Moazzam Begg: What was your response to the outpouring of support and
concern, the campaigns, petitions, Facebook groups and the messages
that you‘ve received since your release – what was your response to this?
How do you feel?
Anwar Al-Awlaki: Praise to Allah, it was very moving to know that there
were brothers and sisters out there who were making du‘a[v] for me. All
praise to Allah Lord of the Worlds. I believe that I was released due to the
du‘a of a certain righteous person who was making prayer for me, because
The Messenger of Allah, the Prophet Muhammad, may the peace and
blessings of Allah be upon him. says that when a person makes du‘a for his
fellow brother, an angel makes du‘a for him, and RasulAllah (salla Allahu
alayhi was-salam) says that the du‘a for your brother Muslim is an accepted
du‘a. So I believe that it was due to these people, who were making dua for
me, that I have been released, and I would like to thank them very much
and say May Allah reward you with good.
Moazzam Begg: In sha‘Allah, and I pray that the du‘a that they made for
you is also made for all the other Muslim prisoners around the world, in
sha‘Allah, and that they will all be released.
Could you please give some words of advice, to the other prisoners and the
prisoners‘ families in terms of your experience, and how they might benefit
from your words?
Anwar Al-Awlaki: My advice to them is the saying of Allah, the Mighty and
Majestic ―You might dislike something but there is a lot of good in it for
you‖. And the hadith of RasulAllah (salla Allahu ‗alayhi was-salam),
Whatever decree Allah has decreed for the believer it is good for him. So if
Glory be to Him (Allah), may He be Exalted has decreed that a certain
person should be in prison, and that if Allah azza wa jall has decreed for a
certain family that one of their members is in prison, we, as believers
should believe that this decree is good and there is a hikmah, there is
wisdom in it, and we should all have the trust and faith in whatever Allah
azza wa jall has destined for us; because RasulAllah (salla Allahu ‗alayhi
was-salam) used to say, in the du‘a, ‗As‘aluka ridha fil-Qadhaa‘, I ask You
to make me satisfied and happy with what you have decreed for me. This is
the first word of advice. The second word of advice is this is a test for your
sabr, patience; and patience is the one deed in which Allah subhanahu wa
ta‘ala has promised an open reward. ―Only those who are patient shall
receive their reward in full, without reckoning.‖ There is no limit on their
reward that Allah subhanahu wa ta‘ala gives for the Sabireen, the patient.
Finally, one should always believe that the strongest weapon that they
have is du‘a. They should never underestimate the power of du‘a. ‗Umar
ibn Al-Khattab used to say, I‘m not worried about Allah not accepting my
prayers but I am worried about the way I pray to Allah azza wa jall. Allah
will accept the du‘a, Allah will respond to the it, it‘s just that we have to do it
properly, with sincerity.
Anwar Al-Awlaki: Well, the feeling I had when I was reading Qur‘an – every
surah, every ayah was totally different when I was reading it in the cell,
compared to when I was reading it when I was outside.
Anwar Al-Awlaki: That was particularly true with Surat Yusuf but I can say
that this has been the case with every single ayah and every surah in
Qur‘an. It was in a totally different light when I was reading it in prison.
Anwar Al-Awlaki: Subhan Allah, and because they took everything away
and gave the Qur‘an, that is why the Qur‘an had this different meaning.
‗Uthman ibn ‗Affan (Uthman ibn Affan, a companion of the Prophet
Muhammed, the third caliph of Islam and one of the ten promised Paradise)
used to say that if our hearts were clean and pure we would never satisfy
our thirst from Qur‘an. It is because of the distractions that are going
around us, that we don‘t get the most benefit from Qur‘an. But when a
person is in that solitary environment, all of the distractions are taken away
and his heart is fixed on the word of Allah azza wa jall, the ayaat of Qur‘an
open into a completely different – they give a completely different meaning.
Moazzam Begg: Absolutely. Do you have or have you had interaction with
people who have been in Guantanamo, in prison or after release, have you
been able to speak to them or see how they‘ve fared since their release at
all?
Anwar Al-Awlaki: There were some brothers who were brought from
Guantanamo and handed over to the Yemeni government and spent time
in the PSL prison where I was but I didn‘t have a chance to interact with
them. I heard that they passed through while I was there. However, I never
had a chance to interact with any of them yet.
Anwar Al-Awlaki: In sha‘Allah… I would really like to know how it was over
there.
In this interview with InFocus257 from September 2008, Imam Anwar spoke
from Yemen, reflecting on his past, and talking about the present and
future.
InFocus: It‘s been nearly a year now since you were released from custody.
Upon being released from custody, you called the time you spent in
detention a ―great blessing from Allah. Why do you feel that way?
257. http://www.infocusnews.net/content/view/25232/683/
Imam Anwar: It was a chance to review Qur‘an and to study and read in a
way that was impossible out of jail. My time in detention was a vacation
from this world.
InFocus: Have you taken a moment to reflect on that whole ordeal? What
did you take away from it?
InFocus: Do you have an even greater appreciation for things that we all
maybe take for granted?
Imam Anwar: Yes, everything is a blessing from Allah. For example I never
really liked beans. However in prison I would have beans for breakfast and
dinner and they just tasted wonderful. Another example, in my cell the light
was on 24 hours a day so when the light bulb went off it was such a
blessing to be in darkness for a few days until the bulb was fixed. Even
darkness is a blessing we take for granted.
InFocus: My understanding is that you were actually just being held during
the entire time in prison. You were never even charged with a crime, let
alone convicted of one, yet you still served time in prison. Is that accurate
and if so, do you even now wonder exactly why you were imprisoned?
Imam Anwar: Yes that is true. I was taken into custody without any
explanation and released without any explanation.
Imam Anwar: Yes, I believe that I was held at the request of the United
States government.
InFocus: You have said in your lectures that the U.S. government has
made false accusations against a number of Muslim leaders in America, so
you are not the only one. In your opinion, why does the U.S. feel
threatened by Muslim leaders?
Imam Anwar: The US has taken Islam as its enemy just like Abu Jahl did
and for the same reasons. I do not see much of a difference between the
US on one hand and Pharaoh, [the] Talmud, and the people of [Prophet]
Noah on the other. They are one and the same.
InFocus: One of your most recent lectures is titled a ―Battle of the Hearts &
Minds,‖ • in which you talk about lies and propaganda. Would you briefly
summarize the point of this lecture for our readers?
Imam Anwar: There has been a plethora of reports from governmental and
non-governmental sources on how to defeat what they perceive as the
Islamic danger. For example RAND Corporation, which is a think tank
affiliated to the Pentagon, has issued a couple of reports on this. They have
openly stated that they are unhappy with the way Islam is and want to
change it. They then proceed to delineate the characteristics of their
version of Islam and how to promote it. They also describe the type of
Muslims that they think might be willing to prescribe to this ―Rand Islam.‖
Because they understand that the masses in the Muslim world have lost
trust in the US, they state that the US hand in this effort should be hidden
and that their Muslim stooges should be in the forefront.
InFocus: What tips would you give to Muslims living in the U.S. to win this
battle of the hearts and minds?
Imam Anwar: Muslims need to be able to tell the difference between the
real Islam and the RAND Islam and they need to know who their enemy is.
Living in the West, they also have a responsibility of refuting such attempts
of changing the religion of Allah.
InFocus: Please talk about another recent lecture you delivered, ―The Dust
Will Never Settle Down.‖ Was it your response to all the recent attacks on
the character of Prophet Muhammad? It caused quite a bit of controversy
so much so that you had to address many questions about it on your blog.
Imam Anwar: Yes that lecture was in response to how the West has been
dealing with the great person of Muhammad lately. As you stated, it did
cause some controversy and a lot of responses. Some were staunchly in
support of what I have said, while others were angrily against. I have
backed up everything in there with solid evidence from Quran, Hadith and
statements of scholars and I stand behind every word in it.
InFocus: What can we look forward to from you in the near future, inshallah
(God-willing)?
InFocus: Are you allowed to travel outside of Yemen? If so, do you have
any intention to return to the U.S?
InFocus: You must know by now the outpouring of support during your
incarceration and since your release. How does that make you feel?
InFocus: Is there anything else you would like to share with our readers?
Imam Anwar: We need to take our religion more seriously. Islam is not
something that we use to fill in the spiritual compartment of our life while we
leave everything else to our whims and desires. Islam should rule over
every aspect of our life.
258. http://revolution.ansar1.net/?p=1601
The Washington Post reported that Rashad Mohammed al-Alimi,
Yemen's Deputy Prime Minister for defense and security affairs, said Al-
Awlaki was alive and that he met with Detroit Christmas Day would-be
shaheed Umar Abdulmutallab at a house in Shabwah in Southern
Yemen. He also said that the school he attended in August 2009 and
September 2009 was a cover. Anwar al-Awlaki was linked to Sheikh Abdul-
Majid al-Zindani, a well-known Yemeni Islamic caller and the president of
Al-Iman University, whom the US Administration accused of financing
terrorism, and who is on the UN list concerned with terrorist finance. Al-
Zindani denied the existence of any link between Al-Iman University and Al-
Awlaki, whether as a student or as a teacher. However it was a fact that
Anwar al-Awlaki delivered lectures at Al-Iman University about Islamic
history, the history of Andalusia, and other subjects.259
259. http://aawsat.com/english/news.asp?section=3&id=19547
their arms and sit down at the table of intellectual dialog, as it happened
some years ago through the intellectual dialog committee, which was
presided over by Judge Hamud al-Hattar, the current Yemeni minister of
Islamic trusts. The U.S. could have taken out al-Awlaki after his contacts
with Fort Hood shooter Major Nidal Hassan came to light in November,
missing the chance by not authorizing the strike. Perhaps al-Awlaki's U.S.
citizenship gave U.S. officials pause.
After 9/11, Abdussattar Shaikh told the FBI the two Brothers were
good, religious Muslims. They did not work, yet they always seemed to
have money. Although they did not fit the profile of rich Saudis,
Abdussattar Shaikh never questioned them about finances. They did not
act in a peculiar manner and did nothing to arouse his suspicions although
they often would go outside when using their cellular telephones. Shaikh
said he identified the two only by their first names to the FBI. Later he said
that he had not mentioned them at all. These Brothers living in
Abdussattar Shaikh's home were in a position to put Shaikh and the
information he supplied to the FBI in jeopardy. Therefore, prudence and
operational security would suggest that information about persons living
with the asset should have been sought by the FBI, at least to the extent of
learning and documenting their names, and perhaps running a records
check on them. This was not done.
260. http://www.sandiego-online.com/issues/september02/featured30902.shtml
for immunity from prosecution if he was called to testify under oath and
commented, ―I don‘t know why I have been accused. I think I‘m going to
ask them [the FBI].‖ Shaikh denied he was an FBI informant and said he
was shocked by the suggestion. Initially Shaikh was not paid. In July 2003,
Shaikh was given a $100,000 payment and closed as an asset.261 This
was not the first time the FBI and CIA were bamboozled by a triple agent.
The classic case was that of Sergeant Ali Mohamed which was covered
by Peter Lance to a far greater extent than me. Another triple agent case
surfaced recently in New York City, where jihadist insects planned to
detonate a series of bombs hidden in knapsacks on the New York City
Subway system.
There were other Al-Qaeda facilitators in the San Diego area. Edwar
Salamah, a Palestinian-born U.S. citizen and manager of Sam's Star Mart
gas station in La Mesa, who was at the time being investigated by the FBI,
hired Nawaf al-Hazmi to work for him briefly, after receiving a call from a
mutual friend at the Ar-Ribat al-Islami Mosque in La Mesa. In January
2000, before Nawaf al-Hazmi‘s employment at Sam's Star Mart gas
station, the FBI Los Angeles field office initiated an investigation of
Salamah after a person whom the FBI was surveilling entered Salamah‘s
car in a mosque parking lot. That person was the brother of a bin Laden
operative. Salamah was under FBI investigation when he hired Nawaf al-
Hazmi.
261. http://www.scribd.com/doc/15877639/911-Commission-MFR-for-FBI-Informer-Abdussattar-Shaikh
262. http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/nation/terror/20030725-9999_1n25report.html
Americans, and 11 people on the ground. Libya has taken responsibility for
this action. Mustafa also said that all Americans should be killed for what
they did to Iraqis. During the investigation, the FBI developed information
that Mustafa was associated with members of the Popular Front for the
Liberation of Palestine in San Diego and Chicago. In 1994, San Diego
police also received an anonymous call stating that Mustafa was a Popular
Front for the Liberation of Palestine member.263 The FBI received
information in 1994 that Mustafa had threatened to kill a former Israeli
intelligence officer who resided in San Diego. Mustafa informed the Israeli
that he was a member of the PLO and that the orders to kill him had come
from the PLO. The FBI closed its investigation of Mustafa, but reopened it
in 1997 when it received information tying him to a possible plot based in
North Carolina.
263. In 1967 Wadi Haddad formed the Marxist PFLP that advocated the liberation of Palestine by acts of violence against the Zionist
entity. The PFLP kidnapped OPEC leaders in Vienna in 1975 and also commandeered a Lufthansa airliner going to Mogadishu in
1977. ―Carlos the Jackal‖ carried out these attacks as a Haddad operative. The PFLP hijacked an Air France airliner enroute to
Entebbe in 1976 where they met a warm welcome from Idi Amin, a convert to Islam and a historical revisionist, who killed the Zionist
Dora Bloch, as she faked illness in a local hospital. Amin would be granted asylum in Saudi Arabia, where he died in August 2003.
In March 1978 Wadi Haddad, aged only forty-nine, died from suspected leukemia in an East German hospital – the same hospital
where Abu Nidal had been treated for leukemia. The Mossad was responsible for the leukemia that struck him down. In Baghdad of
1977, fine chocolates were rare. The Mossad, working with a Palestinian who had become close to Haddad, secretly gave him
Belgian chocolate laced with poison over six months, Mossad agent and Time Magazine Jerusalem correspondant Arron Klein told
the media in the course of promoting his book Striking Back. (http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/wire/sns-ap-israel-
killing-by-chocolate,1,4872993.story?coll=sns-ap-world-headlines). Haddad died in March 1978, showing only symptoms of
leukemia but no signs of poisoning. There are many well-documented cases of radiation-induced leukemia in humans. The early
scientists who worked with x-rays and radioactive substances did not realize the risk. Marie Curie who first isolated radium from
uranium ore died of leukemia, as did her daughter-assistant.
264. http://www.tobacco.org/news/96217.html
265. GAO Report ―Terrorist Financing‖ November 2003 http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d04163.pdf
February 28, 2003, he was sentenced to 155 years in prison. It is not clear
if this is the plot Mustafa was tied to. In February 2001, a stockbroker
called the FBI to say that Mustafa had closed his account, explaining that
he was sending the money to freedom fighters in Afghanistan. Mustafa
now resides in Riverside, California.
What do apes and pigs have to do with soldiers returning from Iraq
and Afghanistan who are suffering mental disorders? Hasan was telling his
colleagues that the Jews, the descendants of pigs and apes, should roast
again in the crematoriums. The Army psychiatrists just sat around and
listened. No one reported this Jew hater to his superiors. Hasan quoted
Qaseem Uqdah as having counted 15,000 Muslims in the American Armed
Forces. Qaseem was an official of the American Muslim Council, an
organization widely viewed as a front for the Muslim Brotherhood.
266. Sergeant Hasan Akbar, an Afro-American convert to Islam and a soldier in an engineering unit that participated in the second
invasion of Iraq, was accused of tossing a grenade in a tent filled with his superiors. Akbar followed this fatwa, and refused to
murder another Muslim. Akbar was named Mark Fidel Kools at his birth but his mother, Qu‘ran Bilal, changed his name to Hasan
Akbar after she converted to Islam. In 1988 he enrolled at the University of California at Davis and graduated nine years later with
degrees in aeronautical engineering and mechanical engineering. Akbar attended Masjid Bilal Islamic Center that was partially
funded by Saudi Arabia's Islamic Development Bank. He was not allowed to fight in the first Gulf War because he was a Muslim, but
this rule was changed. Two ―infidels,‖ Americans, died thanks to this scum.
injustices of the ―infidels‖ ie: enemies of Islam, then Muslims can become a
potent adversary ie suicide bombing etc. Osama Bin Laden, Taliban,
Suicide bombers, Iran. We love death more than you love life!‖ These were
the thoughts of an Islamist yet no investigation was initiated. Additionally
Hasan's military superiors repeatedly ignored or rebuffed his efforts to
open criminal prosecutions of soldiers he claimed had confessed to "war
crimes" during psychiatric counseling.267 As late as November 2, 2009 he
tried to convince at least two of his superior officers, Captain Naomi
Surman and Colonel Anthony Febbo, about the need legally to prosecute
the soldiers. Hasan was willing to violate doctor-patient privilege in order to
prosecute another American soldier. If had done this no soldier would have
trusted an Army psychiatrist with this thoughts and actions again. Suicide
rates, already high, would increase. Hasan was out to imprison or kill
American soldiers and demoralize Muslims within the US Armed Forces by
encouraging Muslim soldiers to feel guilty about fighting other Muslims, ―It
must be hard for you to balance Islamic beliefs that might be conflicting
with the current war; feelings of guilt; Is it what you expected‖ yet he
advised his fellow psychiatrists ―Don‘t doubt their loyalty to U.S. God vs
Country.‖ He would quote this Qu‘ranic passage, ―And whoever kills a
believer intentionally, his punishment is hell. He shall abide in it and Allah
will send his wrath upon him and curse him and prepare for him a painful
chastisement. Do not kill anyone whose killing Allah has forbidden, except
for a just cause.‖ Hasan did dawa (Islamic proselytizing) work among his
colleagues and openly expressed his opposition to America fighting
Muslims in Afghanistan and Iraq.
This was certain suspicious activity but the DoD reported, ―Suspicious
Activity Reporting or Force Protection Threat Information, as it is known to
Department of Defense, is now an FBI nationwide initiative. The
Department of Defense was using the Threat and Location Observation
Notice Program as its Suspicious Activity Reporting capability, but the
program was terminated in September 2007. This left the Department of
Defense without a Suspicious Activity Reporting system of its own.268
―The Faculty has serious concerns about CPT Hasan‘s professionalism and
work ethic. Clinically he is competent to deliver safe patient care. But he
demonstrates a pattern of poor judgment and a lack of professionalism. In
his PGY-2 year, he was counseled for inappropriately discussing religious
topics with his assigned patients. He also required a period of in-program
remediation when he was discovered to have not documented
appropriately an ER encounter with a homicidal patient who subsequently
eloped from the ER. He did successfully remediate this problem. At the end
of his PGY-2 year, he was placed on administrative probation by the NCC
GMEC for failure to take and pass USMLE Step 3 and to obtain an
unrestricted state medical license by the end of his PGY-2 year; as a result
he was not promoted to PGY-3 on time. He did eventually complete step 3
and get a license and was promoted to PGY-3. He was counseled for
having a poor record of attendance at didactics and lower than expected
PRITE scores. One year he failed to show for his PRITE examination at all.
During his PGY-3 year, he was counseled for being consistently late to
NNMC morning report. During his PGY-4 year, he was discovered to have
only seen 30 outpatients in 38 week of outpatient continuity clinic. He was
required to make this missed clinic time up using his elective. He failed his
HGT/WGT screening and was found to be out of standards with body fat %
and was counseled on that. Lastly, he missed a night of call for MGMC ER
and then did not respond to numerous pages by my office the next day.
Take together; these issues demonstrate a lack of professionalism and
work ethics. He is able to self-correct with supervision. However, at this
point he should not need so much supervision. In spite of all of this, I am
not able to say he is not competent to graduate nor do I think a period of
academic probation now at the end of his training will be beneficial. He
would be able to contain his behavior enough to complete any period of
probation successfully. My purpose in writing this letter is to give the
credentials committee the benefit of full disclosure and the opportunity to
modify CPT Hasan‘s plan of supervision following initial privileging. I did
discuss this memo with CPT Hasan and informed him I would be adding it
to his initial credentialing paperwork.‖
In the spring of 2008 when a group of key officials gathered for their
monthly meeting in a Bethesda, Md., office, they did not know what to do
about Hasan who had been trouble for six years. Both fellow students and
faculty were disturbed by Hasan's behavior — which they variously called
disconnected, aloof, paranoid, belligerent, and schizoid. The officials say
he antagonized some students and faculty by espousing what they
perceived to be extremist Islamic views. His supervisors at Walter Reed
had even reprimanded him for telling at least one patient that "Islam can
save your soul." One official involved in the conversations had reportedly
told colleagues that he worried that if Hasan deployed to Iraq or
Afghanistan, he might leak secret military information to Islamic extremists.
Another official reportedly wondered aloud to colleagues whether Hasan
might be capable of committing fratricide, like the Muslim U.S. Army
sergeant who, in 2003, killed two fellow soldiers and injured 14 others by
setting off grenades at a base in Kuwait. NPR reported, ―So why didn't
officials act on their concerns and seek to remove Hasan from his duties,
or at least order him to receive a mental health evaluation? Interviews with
these officials suggest that a chain of unrelated events and factors deterred
them. For one thing, Walter Reed and most medical institutions have a
cumbersome and lengthy process for expelling doctors, involving
hearings and potential legal battles. As a result, sources say, key
decision-makers decided it would be too difficult, if not unfeasible, to put
Hasan on probation and possibly expel him from the program. Second,
some of Hasan's supervisors and instructors had told colleagues that they
repeatedly bent over backward to support and encourage him, because
they didn't have clear evidence that he was unstable, and they worried they
might be "discriminating" against Hasan because of his seemingly
extremist Islamic beliefs.‖
By this time it was pretty obvious that Al-Awlaki was one of the
baddest jihadist Imams around! The fact that when Hasan contacted him
alarm bells did not go off in the intelligence community tells this researcher
that something went terribly wrong. Al-Awlaki said that Hasan first reached
out to him in an e-mail dated December 17, 2008. He described Hasan
introducing himself and writing: "Do you remember me? I used to pray with
you at the Virginia mosque." Initially, Al-Awlaki said he did not recall
Hasan and did not reply to the e-mail. But after Hasan sent two or three
more e-mails, Al-Awlaki said he "started to remember who he was," Al-
Awlaki said it was clear from his e-mails that Nidal trusted me. Nidal told
me: 'I speak with you about issues that I never speak with anyone else'"
Hasan informed him that he had become a devout Muslim around the time
Al-Awlaki was preaching at Dar al-Hijrah, in 2001 and 2002. "Maybe Nidal
was affected by one of my lectures?" Al-Awlaki said Hasan's alleged
269. http://www.defense.gov/pubs/pdfs/DOD-ProtectingTheForce-Web_Security_HR_13Jan10.pdf
shooting spree was allowed under Islam because it was a form of jihad.
"There are some people in the United States who said this shooting has
nothing to do with Islam, that it was not permissible under Islam but I would
say it is permissible…those people have let me down…America was the
one who first brought the battle to Muslim countries."
Beginning late December 2008270 the NSA and FBI reported Major
Hasan exchanged 20 e-mail messages with Al-Qaeda spiritual leader
Imam Anwar Al-Awlaki. The in early reports the FBI stated that the emails
were sent in the form of questions about the American Military and Islam,
seemingly for a project Hasan was working on regarding Muslims in the US
military. The FBI saw communications asking when is jihad appropriate,
and whether it is permissible if there are innocents killed in a suicide attack.
Hasan told Al-Awlaki he couldn't wait to join him in the discussions they
would having over wine in the afterlife. Going to Al-Awlaki who was a well
know Al-Qaeda spiritual leader meant that Hasan wanted his questions
about his upcoming mission answered affirmatively. Imam Al-Awlaki had
replaced ―His Eminence‖ Shayk Omar Abdel Rahman as the chief
Qu‘ranic authority of Al-Qaeda. Rahman preached that jihad is the sixth
pillar of Islam271 therefore it is the duty of every Muslim to kill the kuffar
infidels – every member of another religion with a focus on Christians, Jews
and Hindus.
On December 23, 2008, days after he said Hasan first e-mailed him
Al-Awlaki posted these words online "The bullets of the fighters of
Afghanistan and Iraq are a reflection of the feelings of the Muslims towards
America." In the e-mails Hasan questioned U.S. involvement in the wars in
Iraq and Afghanistan, and often used "evidence from sharia law that what
America was doing should be confronted."272 Al-Awlaki "They say
American soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan should be killed, so how can
they say the American soldier should not be killed at the moment they are
going to Iraq and Afghanistan?"
270. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/10/us/10inquire.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=hasan%20scott%20shane&st=cse
271. The other pillars include Salat, daily prayer, Zakat, annual charity, Saum, month long fasting Hajj, pilgrimage to Mecca, and
Shahadah, testifying allegiance to G-d.
272. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/11/15/AR2009111503160_2.html?sid=ST2009111503315
By contacting Imam Al-Awlaki Hasan demonstrated a proclivity for
violence just as he would have if he contacted Osama Bin Laden. None of
this, however, was taken seriously enough to follow him, interview him, tap
his phone, bug his conversations, and open an investigation into his good
buddy Duane Reasoner. Any intelligence analyst could see something was
amiss here especially since Al-Awlaki had been jailed by the Government
of Yemen. This should have set of alarm bells throughout the intelligence
community.
The first batch of Hasan's e-mails was sent by agents in San Diego,
to the bureau's Washington field office, where a terrorism task force began
to assess them in December 2008. But months later, additional messages
emerged. Those e-mails were reviewed only in San Diego, where
authorities determined they did not pose a national security risk. The FBI
said without going into details about the process, that "all of the e-mails
were known." The FBI dropped an inquiry into the matter after deciding that
the messages warranted no further action because they gave no indication
that he was likely to engage in violence273 and were protected by the right
to free speech.274 The FBI also claimed it was under the impression that
this contact was part of some academic research Hasan was doing; but no
research paper ever surfaced and the content of the emails belied this.
There are several possibilities to explain this incompetence; the FBI Agent
in charge of the investigation was a mole (unlikely), the FBI in San Diego
did not want to admit that they had been unable to snag Al-Awlaki in
relation to 9/11 even though it was investigating him during the time he was
working with two 9/11 shaheeds so it downplayed his importance, or the
FBI was trying to be politically correct and what happened to the
intelligence community was that it was progressively weakened by stealth
Islamist organizations such as CAIR and the American-Arab Anti-
Discrimination Committee. America has a tradition of at least trying to treat
all religious groups equally and these two subversive organizations along
with their Leftist America hating allies in the ACLU, the Center for
Constitutional Rights and the National Lawyers Guild play on this
constitutional tradition with the ultimate intent of destroying freedom of
273. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/10/us/10inquire.html?_r=1&pagewanted=print
274. http://blog.newsweek.com/blogs/declassified/archive/2009/11/09/fbi-counter-terror-officials-were-never-told-about-hasan-s-gun-
purchase.aspx
religion in America and imposing Shar‘ia Law, a system that would
exterminate the ACLU, Center for Constitutional Rights etc. The long term
pathological strategy of the terrorist support lobby in America had worked.
Because of ―political correctness‖ foisted on America by Islamists disguised
as Civil Rights advocates nothing was done about Hasan. Everyone was
afraid to be accused of profiling and discrimination, after all Hasan had a
right to his beliefs, so he was passed around like a hot falafel ball.
275. http://www.stripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=65920
Reasoner acted as an internet intermediary between Hasan and
domestic Islamist terrorists. Brian Ross of ABC News reported that in
March of 2007, Duane created a YouTube account under the name
"ooklepookle." He has used the handle on other accounts as well, but they
can always be traced back to Duane Reasoner Jr. On his YouTube
account, Reasoner chose as favorites 14 different videos by Anwar Al-
Awlaki along with videos featuring Osama Bin Laden, the Taliban, Shayk
Omar Abdul Rahman and Adam Gadahn; a once-Jewish member of Al
Qaeda. In December 2008, Reasoner created a profile on Stickam.com.
Under personal tags, he wrote "extremist, fundamentalist, mujahedeen,
Muslim." He posted a picture of the U.S. Capitol in ruins, as well as a
picture of a Muslim warrior on horseback and a rendering of the "Sword of
Tawheed."
276. http://www.defense.gov/pubs/pdfs/DOD-ProtectingTheForce-Web_Security_HR_13Jan10.pdf
is the name of the media company that produces al-Qaeda's videos.
Ooklepookle also visited anti-Israel websites and used proxy servers.
277. http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/hasans-friend-proclaimed-extremist/story?id=9100187&page=3
minded fool about how Hamas were "heroes for blowing Jews up in Israel"
sic and other pro-Hamas, pro-Arab terror statements that sunk into
Kaplan‘s easy to fill empty mind. Kaplan left Washington Heights for
Satmar Williamsburg, Brooklyn. It was no great leap from this traitor with a
yarmulke to out and out defection to Islam. Soon after he flew to Israel
converted and officially joined the Arab Nazis of Al Qaeda, all as part of his
goal to try and murder Jews! Yousef al-Khattab promotes violence and he
has advocated attacks on synagogues, throwing drain cleaner at Jews,
attacking Jewish social institutions and more. The way he gets away with it
is that he phrases everything as a prayer, ―Ya Allah (Oh God) I beseech
You to carry out your wrath on the Jewish occupiers of Palestine & their
supporters. Ya Allah (Oh God) please throw liquid drain cleaner in their
faces. Ya Allah (Oh God) burn their flammable sukkos while they sleep. Ya
Allah (Oh God),make rocks crash through their car windows as they drive
in Your land Bayit al Maqdes Ya Allah (Oh God), make their fingers and
brains stick on cafe walls from impact. Ya Allah (Oh God) answer my duaa
(prayer)‖ and his makes it fall under Freedom of Religion. As a result of
these threats he has received widespread media coverage.
278. http://www.terrorism-info.org.il/malam_multimedia/English/eng_n/html/gj_e003.htm
policy to ensure timely counterintelligence collection, investigations, and
operations in cyberspace for identifying potential threats to DoD personnel,
information, and facilities.‖279
Note the use of Servant of Allah and Subhan Allah. Hasan designed
green and white personal business cards that included his name, then
Behavior Heatlh [sic] Mental Health and Life Skills, a Maryland mobile
phone number, an AOL e-mail address, and "SoA (SWT)." SoA is the jihadi
abbreviation for Servant of Allah and SWT stands for Subhanahu wa-
Ta'ala, or Glory to Him, the Exalted.280 The guest poster used both these
words. This information was supplied by Rusty Shackleford of
http://mypetjawa.mu.nu. A jawa is a fictional character from Star Wars that
bears many similar characteristics to Islamists.
279. http://www.defense.gov/pubs/pdfs/DOD-ProtectingTheForce-Web_Security_HR_13Jan10.pdf
280. http://www.danielpipes.org/7763/major-nidal-hasan-islamist-life
July 2005 London subway bombings. El-Faisal went to
Africa, where after being sent back by Nigeria, he was arrested by Kenyan
authorities. Because of this rioting broke out in Nairobi, and at least five
people were confirmed dead and scores in critical condition. He is back in
Jamaica now.
What follows is a time line of Mr. Mehanna's and his group's alleged
actions from before the 9/11 attacks in 2001 up to 2008, according to the
FBI's complaint and an affidavit supporting a search warrant: 2000-2001 –
Tarek Mehanna, who has known as CW2 (a conspirator who in late 2006
agreed to cooperate with the FBI) for 15 to 20 years, introduced him to
Ahmad Abousamra, and the three men become close friends. Common
interests include talking about religion and Muslims' role in the United
States and justification for certain jihadist acts. Pre-Sept. 11, 2001
Mehanna, Abousamra, and CW2 talk about going to terrorist training
camps in Pakistan, searching the Internet for logistical information for
locations and travel, but no solid plans materialize. After Sept. 11, 2001
Mehanna, Abousamra, and CW2 express support for the attacks. April 4,
2002 – Abousamra traveled to Pakistan in search of terrorist training, but
apparently doesn't find it, returning home. Fall 2002, Mehanna meets
Daniel Maldonado through Abousamra. At Mehanna's home, they watch
jihadi videos showing pillaging of the Muslim world in Bosnia and the
Palestinian territories. Later, the video shows mujahideen victories and
footage of people being killed. Afterward, Mehanna, Abousamra, and
Maldonado talk about the glory of dying for Allah. Nov. 17, 2002,
Abousamra travels again to Pakistan, where he connects with a man who
helps him find a Taliban camp and another run by a Lashkar e Tayyiba
group. But, as he later tells CW2, he was rejected by the former for being
too inexperienced and by the latter for not being Pakistani. 2003,
Mehanna, Abousamra, and CW2 determine Pakistan is not a feasible
place to get terrorist training. Frustrated, they begin exploring other options,
including committing domestic terrorist acts. One topic of discussion: the
feasibility of shooting a member of the executive branch of government. In
another discussion, killing a second member of the executive branch is
debated. Second half of 2003, inspired by the 2002 sniper attacks in
Washington, D.C., Mehanna, Abousamra, and CW2 discuss a plan to get
automatic weapons, go to a shopping mall, and randomly shoot people.
Abousamra says civilians aren't innocent because they pay taxes to the
government and because they are Kufar (nonbelievers). October 2003,
Abousamra flies to California to meet with Individual A, who tells him
whom to see and where to go to find terrorist training camps in Yemen.
Late 2003, discussion of the mall attack plan continues, including types of
weapons needed, number of attackers involved, and coordinating the
attack across different entrances. Attacking emergency responders is
debated. CW2 travels to New Hampshire to meet with Maldonado, a former
gang member, who is believed to have access to automatic weapons. But
Maldonado says all he can get is handguns. Lacking firepower, the plan is
abandoned. Late 2003 Mehanna, Abousamra, and CW2 begin planning a
trip to Yemen to attend a jihadist training camp or training in southern
Jordan. Traveling to Iraq is discussed and of particular interest because of
the opportunity to fight US forces and because it is more accessible than
other jihad conflicts around the world. February 2004 CW2 hides video of
his actions that he expects to tell family about later by e-mail. Mehanna,
Abousamra, and CW2 debate the permissibility of suicide
bombings. Abousamra agrees. CW2 does not; he and
Mehanna want to be soldiers for jihad, not suicide
bombers.‖ Daniel Maldonado pleaded guilty before a
federal judge in Texas to receiving military training from
Islamic militants in Somalia. The Eagle Tribune on Line reported ―Yousef
al-Khattab, a New York City bicycle-taxi driver, said in a telephone
interview he believes the government trumped up the charges against
Maldonado. Al-Khattab said he never met Maldonado but has known him
for four or five years through the Internet and considers him a friend. Al-
Khattab described Maldonado as a mainstream Muslim who was going
through the typical stages of a convert. ‗Every new Muslim starts out like a
zealot," al-Khattab said. "Nobody sticks with it too long. Slowly, slowly, they
just become mainstream Muslim.‘" Al-Khattab received this letter from
Mehanna:
―26th of Dhu al-Qa'dah, 1430 / 14th of November, 2009. In the Name of
Allah, I praise Allah and invoke peace and blessings on the Messenger of
Allah. First of all, I would like to thank you all from the bottom of my heart
for your immense support. Each and every person who is praying for my
family and I, who has written a letter, and who attended a hearing or raised
general awareness of what is going is known to Allah, and I ask that they
each be rewarded with the good of this life and the next, and that Allah
relieves each of you of trials and calamities just as you have helped to
relieve my own...I cannot speak in detail about the charges and
accusations against me, but suffice to say that nobody who truly knows me
would for a second believe the utter lies and sensationalist garbage that
has been peddled around in the media since my arrest.‖
Duane Reasoner lost his job as a substitute teacher and has gone
into hiding. Without Hasan‘s testimony he will probably go free but will have
to be on the lookout for extra-judicial justice as this traitor should have his
ass kicked.
Since Hasan was making jihad he was exempt from Shar‘ia Law.
Women employed at a strip club Starz in Killeen, Texas, told ABC News
they remembered Hasan and that he visited the all-nude club at least three
times, bringing his own six pack of beer. According to the British Telegraph,
Mohamed Atta, the pilot of the first hijacked aircraft that crashed into the
281. http://www.defense.gov/pubs/pdfs/DOD-ProtectingTheForce-Web_Security_HR_13Jan10.pdf
World Trade Centre, and his fellow shaheeds spent some of their time in
Las Vegas at the Olympic Bar, a downtown strip club. Hasan was
videotaped dressed in white prior to the event282 the color traditionally worn
by the shaheed. He left his decrepit apartment complex to attend 6 a.m.
prayers at a mosque near Fort Hood, which was subsequently a garbology
target of the FBI. He said goodbye to fellow Muslims there and asked
forgiveness from one man for any past offenses. He went to a shooting
range and emptied out his safe deposit box. When he committed the act he
bowed his head for several seconds in prayer to Allah, stood up and drew a
high-powered pistol. "Allah Akbar," he said -- "G-D is great." Hasan
believed, ―Allah created life and death the He might put you to the test and
find out which of you acquitted himself best.‖
282. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z1ExEpi7f48
Cahill of Cameron, Texas. He was a civilian employee on Fort Hood. He
wounded another forty-three human beings.
Al-J: Sheikh Anwar, when did your relationship with this jihadist begin?
283. http://www.anwar-alawlaki.com/?p=228
.
284 http://www.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/1A211456-DCC6-40CC-BA76-F799B377FE74.htm
Al-Alwaki: Brother Nidal asked G-D to protect him when he was praying in
Mosques during the time I was an Imam who had just moved to Virginia.
Al-J: When was the first meeting between you and him?
Al-Alwaki: Some nine years ago when I preached at the Dar al-Hijrah
Mosque in Washington, D.C., one of the largest Islamic Centers in
America.
Al-J: There are reports that there was a closer relationship than that.
Al-Alwaki: Brother Nidal was also communicating with me via email in the
past year to mid year 2009.
Al-J: When did your contact with him about the Islamist struggle begin?
Al-Alwaki: The first message I received from this jihadi was on December
17, 2008.
Al-Alwaki: He was asking if the killing of American soldiers and officers was
legitimate or not?
Al-Alwaki: Of course, as I‘ve mentioned the first message was about fatwas
regarding the morality of killing another Muslim soldier while serving in the
United States military. And group of other emails explained his view that
making jihad while killing Israeli civilians had religious legitimacy and he
was in favor of this, those letters mentioned the legal and factual
justification for the targeting of Jews with rockets. Then there were some of
the letters requesting a way to transfer some funds to us to contribute to
the work of the ―charity.‖
Al-J: Were there other signs the indicated jihad? Did you bless the work of
jihad that he carried out three days later?
Al-Alwaki: I associate myself with the process that was done by the brother
that is the work of heroic jihad and I tried to articulate my opinion on what
happened because many of the Islamic organizations and preachers in the
West condemned the operation, and I had to be a voice to be linked to
Muslims in America and in the West who were independent of them. At the
same time it showed the truth in what Brother Nidal by his act of jihad did,
an act that the media especially tried to link to me since the beginning.
Al-J: Why do you bless the works of the jihadi and shaheeds?
Al-J: How can you support the fact that he committed treason against the
United States?
Al-Alwaki: It is more important not to betray the Islamic faith. To work in the
U.S. military to fight Muslims is a betrayal of Islam. America today is the
Pharaoh of yesterday. It is the enemy of Islam. It is not permissible for a
Muslim to be employed by the United States Army unless he intends to
follow in the footsteps of our brother Nidal. Allegiance in Islam is to Allah,
His Messenger and to the other believers and not to a handful of dust
which these traitors call home. A Muslim Americans loyalty is to the Muslim
Nation and not to America and the brother‘s jihad proved that through the
blessed struggle, and G-d will reward him richly for that.
Al-J: Are you directly related to the incident, did you have a hand in it?
Al-Alwaki: I did not cause him to perform blessed jihad, but what inspired
him was the United States and its crimes, the injustice it perpetuates and
this is what the United States is trying to hide and does
not want to be recognized. America does not want to
recognize what he had done and that the struggle by
thousands of Muslims fighting against America exists
because of the unfair policy of America when it comes
to the Islamic world. Nidal Hasan before being an
American is a Muslim from Palestine as well and he sees what the United
States is doing perpetuating the injustices of the Jews under the cover of
American support. Yes, I might have had a role in the intellectual guidance
of the jihad, but it is not beyond that. I am not trying to shirk from the link by
disassociating myself from jihad and with him but I am admitting I had a
bigger role than ever before!
Al-J: From what I can see from the emails you gave me Nidal trusts you
and respects you, and you still say that you did not have a hand in the
event?
Al-Alwaki: Talking to you about this, and I explained to you and I gave you
for publication the emails because the United States Administration
prevented their publication. So why do they not want them to exist? What is
the reason? Do they want coverage on the failure of security? Or do they
not want to admit that the jihadist struggle is the principle behind the event
and that he did what he did in the service of Islam? They wish to show it
was a sudden act of an individual not related to the war crimes of the
American military.
Al-Alwaki: This is likely in any case. We call upon him to prove Allah is the
right G-d and helps those who do good. I ask Allah to accept him as a
shaheed and when Allah sees his death certificate congratulate him.
285
http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/publications/id.5446/pub_detail.asp
In 1980, James Zogby286 joined with former Senator James
Abourezk to form the ADC. The ADC has 18,000 members and is the
largest grass roots Arab-American organization and claims that its mission
is defending the political rights and promoting the cultural heritage of the
more than three million Americans of Arab descent. Senator James
Abourezk is definitely a terrorist sympathizer – he was willing to testify for
Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman287 but was prevented from doing so. The
Senator served one term – 1973 to 1979 – in the Senate and one in the
House of Representatives from 1971 to 1973. The ADC is part of our
―Terror Lobby‖ and uses civil liberties issues to make it easier for Islamists
to operate by lobbying against ―anti-terror‖ legislation on the highest levels
of government. In order to do so they recruit the best Islamist subversive
minds in America. Sara Najjar-Wilson is the ADC‘s National Executive
Director. Sara is an experienced attorney with more than 30 years of
service in the Federal government, having served as a Trial Attorney with
the U.S. Department of Justice‘s Civil Division and as a Senior Attorney in
the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), Office of the
General Counsel. Among other leadership positions, she has served as
Chairperson of the Federal Litigation Section of the Federal Bar
Association (FBA) and as the Program Chairperson of the Washington
Foreign Law Society. Ms. Najjar-Wilson represented NASA in several
―high profile‖ activities, including the interests of the families of the late
286. In 1984, Zogby served as deputy campaign manager for fundraising for the Reverend Jesse
Jackson‘s presidential campaign and served as an advisor on Arab American issues to the Clinton
administration. In 1994, he was appointed to the Democratic National Committee‘s Resolutions
Committee. Zogby has come to the defense of the Muslim Brethren, Hamas, and Islamic Jihad, arguing
that these groups are merely ―politically‖ or ―religiously‖ opposed to the peace process. He defended the
American Muslim Council. James Zogby criticized President Clinton‘s January 1995 executive order
classifying a number of Islamist organizations as terrorist groups. Zogby rejected outright in the pages of
a pro-Hamas publication, that fundraising within the Arab-American and Muslim American community is in
any way connected to any Middle Eastern so-called terrorist groups. In 1984, Zogby served as deputy
campaign manager for fundraising for the Reverend Jesse Jackson‘s presidential campaign and served
as an advisor on Arab American issues to the Clinton administration. In 1994, he was appointed to the
Democratic National Committee‘s Resolutions Committee. Zogby is not an Arab Uncle Tom. He is a
Brother who has stated, ―Not enough has been done to explain Islam in the West and to deal with those
passages in the Qu‘ran that some in the West find troubling. One easy way to do this is to invite those
who ask the questions to read the entire Qu‘ran and read the entire Torah and then see which is the
bloodier scripture.‖
http://islamonline.net/livedialogue/english/Browse.asp?hGuestID=FfJa84;
Forward, May 10, 1996.
http://www.meforum.org/article/429
The Islamists will recruit fair minded liberals to participate in their own
self destruction. Heinz Kerry, "John will be committed to a strong America,
where our nation's laws are enforced without resorting to discrimination. He
has always supported strong hate crime laws, and he believes that the
practice of racial profiling should be prohibited."288 She had 57 Varieties of
stupidity. She had not the slightest idea that this politically correct thinking
was paving the way for Nidal Hasan to escape an FBI investigation. If
anyone messed with Nidal Hasan, a Major in the United States Army, the
ADC she and Hutchinson cozened up to would have attempted to destroy
them via its connections of through the justice system as it has aside from
its leadership it has numerous lawyers, including a few self-hating Jews, at
its disposal.
288. http://www.adc.org/index.php?id=2251
―It‘s frightening to think that an organization with clear-cut ties to terrorism
could have a hand in influencing policy, especially national security policy,
within our government. The investigations that we‘re asking for are simple,
and I‘m hopeful that they will bring to light any and all information regarding
the goals of CAIR.‖ – a statement by Rep. Sue Myrick Congresswoman
from North Carolina.
289. Council on American-Islamic Relations 453 New Jersey Avenue, SE. Washington, DC 20003 Tel: 202-488-8787 Fax: 202-488-
0833 http://www.cair.com mailto:info@cair.com
director of the FBI. In 2004, senior CAIR officials met with Cassie Chandler,
then Assistant Director for Public Affairs, and Gary Bald, then Assistant
Director for Counterterrorism, in the FBI‘s Washington, DC headquarters to
discuss ways to improve the working relationship between CAIR and the
FBI. In 2006, senior CAIR officials attended a meeting with FBI Deputy
Director John Pistole in the FBI‘s National Headquarters in Washington,
DC. Currently, CAIR officials are providing on-going diversity training about
Islam and Muslims to participants at the Counterterrorism Division of
Federal Law Enforcement Training and Education Center (FLETC) in
Glynco, GA. FLETC serves as an interagency law enforcement training
organization for more than 80 Federal agencies. Recently CAIR officials
gave seminars and lectures at The United States Army Central Command
in Tampa and at USMA in West Point.‖
During this time one FBI official gave CAIR a clean bill of health, ―In a
March 14, 2007 New York Times article, MichaeI RoIince, a retired F.B.I.
officiaI who directed counterterrorism in the Washington field office from
2002 to 2005, said, ‗Of aII the groups, there is probabIy more suspicion
about CAIR, but when you ask peopIe for coId hard facts, you get bIank
stares.‘‖ Rolince also gave Zacharias Moussaoui a clean bill of health:
Moussaoui‘s Defense attorney Edward B. MacMahon Jr. asked Michael E.
Rolince290 then the retired head of the FBI's International Terrorism
Operations Section, whether he knew that agent Harry Harry Samit had
warned in an August 18, 2001 memo to his office that Moussaoui was a
potential terrorist. "No," he answered at Moussaoui's death penalty trial.291
Rolince claimed to have never seen Samit‘s report and anyway believed
the report to be ―suppositions, hunches and suspicions.‖ Steven Pomerantz
290. Michael E. Rolince earned a B.A. in Mathematics from the State University of New York, and joined the FBI after he graduated
in 1974. He was assigned to a specialized surveillance component in the San Francisco office (counter-surveillance against the
Soviets) then was assigned to the New Orleans office where he worked Bank Robbery and Fugitive investigations. In August 1988
Rolince was designated as a Supervisory Special Agent within the Boston division, charged with managing a Russian
counterintelligence squad. In 1992 the FBI reported 4 ―terrorist‖ incidents within the United States. That figure rose to 12 in 1993. In
October 1993 Rolince was transferred to the Washington Field Office where he was specialized in Espionage and
Counterintelligence cases. When the incidents of ―terrorism‖ dropped to 0 in 1995 Rolince was promoted and assigned to the
National Security Division at FBI Headquarters. In February 1996 he was promoted to Assistant Special Agent in Charge of the
Counterintelligence and Counter terrorism programs.
291. Jerry Markon and Timothy Dwyer Moussaoui Memo Unseen, Court Told Ex-FBI Official Was Unaware of Agent's Warning
Washington Post Staff Writers Wednesday, March 22, 2006; A07
and Oliver ―Buck‖ Revell, both former FBI Agents, disagree with Rolince
and believe CAIR is a terrorist support group.292
292. http://www.cair.com/PDF/urbanlegends.pdf
continue to work with local law enforcement agencies and the FBI on
issues related to our core mission of defending the civil rights of all
Americans. Going forward, we will do our utmost to work with the new
administration to ensure that public officials and representatives of law
enforcement agencies hear the voices of American Muslims. We look
forward to returning to normal relations with law enforcement now that
there is a new administration.”
294. John Miller ―The Milan Connection‖ ABC News, November 1, 2002. On September 4, 2001, pictures of the World Trade Center
were saved as temporary files on one of the computers at the Via Quaranta Mosque in Milan. Alexandra Salomon ABC News, Rome
May 8, 2003.
295. A typographical error as there is no mail drop at that address.
Atriss‘ connection to what was left of the Gama‘a al-Islamiyya‘s Brooklyn /
Jersey City.
296. http://www.militantislammonitor.org/article/id/565
298. http://fl1.findlaw.com/news.findlaw.com/hdocs/docs/terrorism/usroyer603ind.pdf
299. Justin Bergman ―Three Men Sentenced In Jihad Paintball Case‖ Associated Press November 7, 2003
300. Editorial Jerusalem Post May 7, 2003.
301. Daniel Pipes ―Fixing Islam‘s Image Problem‖ New York Post July 29, 2003.
302. Daniel Pipes ―CAIR: 'Moderate' Friends of Terror.‖ New York Post April 22, 2002.
a lynch mob.‖ His speech at a fund-raiser in Virginia that October 2001 was
recorded: ―Why is it assumed that Muslims were behind the attack? We
know at least three people assumed to be hijackers who are still alive in the
Middle East. The question is, who is impersonating these Muslim names?
Who benefits from assuming Muslims are behind this tragedy and who
benefits from this tragedy?‖ That same month, Khankan gave Newsday his
view on who had really perpetrated the atrocities: ―What about the world
Zionist network? Why are you in the media not looking at them?‖303 In 1999
CAIR received $250,000 loan from the Saudi-run Wahhabist Islamic
Development Bank to buy land in Washington, D.C., construct a
headquarters facility.304 On September 9, 2001, at a rally to support Jamil
Al-Amin305, Sheik Hamza Yusuf Hanson, a convert to Islam and a
member of CAIR who is known as a moderate Muslim stated that ―America
faced a terrible fate‖ and that Sheik Rahman was unjustly tried and
condemned against any standards of justice in any legal system. The FBI
went to interview Yusuf to determine whether this statement meant that he
had prior knowledge of the September 11thEvent, which of course he said
he did not. When agents came to his San Francisco home on September
20, 2001, they learned he was meeting with President Bush. Later the
website of Yusuf‘s organization vowed to send part of any money it
collected to the Benevolence International Foundation, a front for jihadi.306
CAIR received $500,000 from Saudi prince Al-Waleed bin Talal, one of the
world's richest men.307 If not for this litigious group with unlimited resources
there would have been action taken against Major Hasan. They succeeded
in tying the hands of intelligence agencies via the justice system and their
goal of killing Americans was achieved. CAIR was forced to put out a page
303.
http://www.nypost.com/php/pfriendly/print.php?url=http://www.nypost.com/seven/10042006/postopinion/opedcolumnists/the_jihad_o
n_king_opedcolumnists_steven_emerson.htm
304. http://saudiembassy.net
cited by http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/comment-schwartz063003.asp
305. Jamil Abdullah Al-Amin (once known as H. Rap Brown) was another American Muslim Council leader. In 1968 Brown joined
the Black Panther Party. Associated with the rallying cry, ―Burn, Baby, Burn‖, Brown was arrested and charged with inciting people
to riot and committing arson. The law in America against crossing state lines to incite a riot is informally known as ―the H. Rap Brown
law.‖ He was also accused of importation of a weapon into Louisiana. Imprisoned several times between 1967 and 1970, Brown was
eventually shot and captured by New York City police during an armed robbery. Sentenced to a term of from five to fifteen years in
Attica Prison, Brown was paroled in 1976. Converting to Islam, he changed his name to Jamil Abdullah al-Amin. After his release in
March 2000, he was arrested and charged with killing a sheriff‘s deputy in Atlanta, Georgia. As he was taken from the courthouse he
told reporters: ―It‘s a government conspiracy, man,‖ however he was convicted and is now serving a life sentence. Daniel Pipes -
‖Mainstream Muslims?‖- New York Post June 18, 2002.
306. Hanna Rosin and John Mintz, "Muslim Leaders Struggle With Mixed Messages‖ Washington Post, October 2, 2001 also Frank
J. Gafney, ―A Troubling Influence‖ Frontpage Magazine December 9, 2003.
307. http://www.arabicnews.com/ansub/Daily/Day/021119/2002111910.html
dispelling all the rumors about it. CAIR is the subject of an excellent book
entitled The Muslim Mafia and several members of Congress have called
for an investigation of this terrorist support group. This book revealed that
CAIR's founder Omar M. Ahmad praised suicide bombers who "kill
themselves for Islam." He also hosted blind Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman at
his home not long before he was arrested and convicted of terrorism,
according to Ahmad's apartment manager at the time, who turned
photographs and other evidence over to the FBI's San Jose, California,
field office. While the Blind Sheik was plotting terrorism in New York, he
paid Ahmad a visit at his Villa Monroe apartment in Santa Clara, California,
says then-apartment manager Andy Hyslop. A few years later, a Santa
Clara mosque, which Ahmad helped found, hosted and raised thousands of
dollars for bin Laden deputy Ayman Al-Zawahiri.
PART THREE:
DR. AYMAN AL-ZAWAHIRI: Al-QAEDA LOUDMOUTH
Doctor Ayman Al-Zawahiri was born June 19, 1951 descendent
from a deep-rooted wealthy Egyptian family. His grandfather was one the
Imams at the Al-Azhar mosque, and his other grandfather from his mother‘s
side, Doctor Abdul Wahab Azzam was president of Cairo University then
was the ambassador of Egypt to Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Yemen. His
father was doctor Mohammad Rabi‘ Al-Zawahiri, a professor at the
medical school Ain Shams University, one of the most famous doctors
before he died in 1995. Ayman was a member and leader of the banned
Muslim Brotherhood starting at age fourteen, thanks to his great uncle
Mahfuz Azzam, who brought Ayman and his brother Muhammad in the
terrorist fold. Al-Zawahiri recalled, ―The purpose of this cell was to
establish an Islamic government …Jihad means removing the current
government through and changing the current regime to establish an
Islamic Government instead. This was to be done through a military coup.
We were convinced that civilians and the military should cooperate to
achieve this end.‖ Al-Zawahiri graduated from medical school in 1974,
then spent three years as a surgeon in the Egyptian Army.
308. In 2005 the Egyptian government permitted members of the Muslim Brotherhood to participate in the political arena but
Mubarak has continued the ban on the Gama‘a al-Islamiyya and Dr. al-Zawahiri‘s Egyptian Islamic Jihad Organization, athough
certain surrogate parties have been formed.
309. http://www.memri.org/bin/articles.cgi?Page=subjects&Area=jihad&ID=IA12703
Army will always be countered by purging operations. It is difficult for the
Islamic movement to recruit a large number of officers in the Army without
getting discovered, in view of the tight security measures within the ranks of
the Armed Forces.‖ Al-Qamari was a charismatic figure who organized and
led Islamist cells within Egypt's Tura Prison and it was during their
incarceration and interrogation in 1981-1982, that the idea occurred to
them of splitting from the Al-Gama’a al-Islamiyyah and forming Egyptian
Al-Jihad. Basically Al-Gama’a al-Islamiyyah would shoot infidels; Egyptian
Islamic Jihad would blow them up.
During his trial Al-Zawahiri pulled off his shoes and raised his robes
to expose the marks of torture while denouncing the torture that took place
in the "dirty Egyptian jails, where we suffered the severest inhuman
treatment. There they kicked us, they beat us, they whipped us with electric
cables they shocked us with electricity! They shocked us with electricity!
And they used the wild dogs! And they used the wild dogs! And they hung
us over the edges of the doors"— he bent over to demonstrate—"with our
hands tied at the back! They arrested the wives, the mothers, the fathers,
the sisters, and the sons!" The other defendants chanted, "The army of
Muhammad will return, and we will defeat the Jews!"
310. http://ikhwanweb.com/Home.asp?zPage=Systems&System=PressR&Press=Show&Lang=E&ID=5180
311. Al Sharqawi received a 7-year prison sentenced in connection with Anwar Sadat Al-Mujahideen's case then a 15-year term in
the case of Tala'i AlFath. He is still at the Al-Aqrab Prison in Egypt.
Essam and his companions climbed to the roof of the workshop and started
hailing the neighboring rooftops with bullets from their two machine guns,
which soon stopped working. But Essam and his companions did not stop.
They rained the force with 10 hand grenades, nine of which exploded. The
resistance by the force stopped, and here Essam realized that it had been
weakened. The brothers emerged from the workshop. They found a soldier
in front of them pointing his weapon at them. However, he turned his back
on them. Brother Nabil Na'im shot him in the head.
―Essam asked them to sit still and wait for him to throw a hand
grenade then start running in the direction of the grenade. The brothers
started running through the cordons of the siege. It was as if they were
running amidst dead people and ghosts. They continued to run until they
reached the neighboring hills of Al-Muqattam. From a distance, they sat
down to watch the badly hurt troops as they gathered their wounded men
and moved back to their vehicles. Ibrahim Salamah suggested that this was
the best opportunity to attack the battalion with what was left with the
brothers in terms of ammunition, but Essam decided it was enough. The
brothers continued to walk on the hills of Al-Muqattam. Ibrahim Salamah
had a hand grenade in his hand. He had removed the pin from it then
returned it again. However, it seemed that the pin shifted out of place when
he was running. The brothers stopped for a while near one of the caves.
312. The HUM changed its name to Harakat ul-Ansar in October 1993
313. http://www.au.af.mil/au/awc//awcgate/cpc-pubs/aboul-enein.pdf
314. The Road to al-Qaeda Montasser al-Zayyet London: Pluto Press, 2004, pp. 36-45
Tanzeem al-Jihad (Jihad Organization) and in 1988 merged it with Islamic
Jihad. Ayman Al-Zawahiri led the Egyptian Islamic Jihad throughout the
1990s and planned numerous attacks against Egyptian officials.
315. http://www.lawrencewright.com/art-zawahiri.html
317. Nato Headquarters, Brussels, December 19, 2001 statement by Serj Sargsyan Minister of Defense of the Republic of Armenia.
http://www.nato.int/docu/speech/2001/s011219u.htm
Because of his postings and his position he had sparked the interest
of the GID (Jordanian Intelligence). When Al-Balawi returned to Jordan
after studying medicine in Turkey he ran a clinic in a Palestinian refugee
camp near the town of Zarqa. Authorities in Jordan arrested Al-Balawi in
March 2009 after he signed up for a ―humanitarian‖ mission to the Gaza
Strip with a Jordanian field hospital in the wake of Israel's offensive there,
according to a Jordanian counterterrorism official. The GID took note of a
progression in the Al-Balawi‘s Islamism. He went from the Internet to a
refugee camp and finally he was planning to go to a battle area (Gaza). Al-
Balawi was jailed for three days. Nisreen el-Shamayleh, Al Jazeera's
correspondent in Amman added: "In the past Al-Balawi had been
imprisoned and tortured in Jordanian prisons for participating in al-Qaeda
meetings. That was way back in the past. After being released from prison,
he was summoned several times by Jordanian intelligence and it is
believed that during that period, and because of al-Balawi's valuable
knowledge of al-Qaeda, he may have then have been recruited by
Jordanian intelligence." There is reason to believe this is true. We are
dealing with intelligence community professionals here and Al-Balawi was
subjected to the Preliminary Credibility Assessment Screening System,
fluttered (polygraphed), then given computer voice stress analysis. Al-
Balawi was not an experienced double agent and in all probability he
would have failed this test had he not sincerely agreed to work for the
Jordanians and the CIA in return for millions of dollars and a new identity
should he collar the big falafel ball Zawahiri. A CIA source told the London
Sunday Times, ―Agents used polygraphs or lie-detectors to check al-
Balawi‘s sincerity.‖ His assignment was to travel to Pakistan and join Al-
Qaeda, posing as an Arab volunteer. Once infiltrated he would help CIA
agents in Afghanistan to track down Al-Qaeda‘s core leaders, including
Zawahiri. Jordanian intelligence had provided the information that led to
the assassination in 2006 of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the leader of Al-Qaeda
in Iraq so it was considered reliable. Al-Balawi linked up with members of
the Haqqani network run by Jalaluddin Haqqani, the Afghan warlord, and
his son Siraj. Based in North Waziristan, one of the tribal areas on the
Pakistan-Afghanistan border, the Haqqanis are close to Al-Qaeda and were
one of the main targets of the CIA agents based just over the border at
Chapman. A Jordanian intelligence official told CNN ―After (a) few months,
he got in touch with us through the Internet and sent us several e-mails that
included very important and rather dangerous information that might affect
the security and stability of the country. We kept in touch with him through
e-mails in order to get more information and also trying to bring him over to
be able to get more information. We shared and exchanged the information
he gave us with some other friendly countries that are involved in
countering terrorism.‖ The CIA claimed he provided critical information on
several Al-Qaeda targets, which were attacked by US forces, and was
―extremely well paid.‖ A ―former American intelligence official‖ claimed,
―Once in Afghanistan, Al-Balawi provided valuable intelligence information
that helped foil Al Qaeda terror plots on Jordan.‖ The former official said
that information led to drone-launched missile strikes that led the CIA to kill
a number of Al Qaeda leaders. That last remark strains credibility. The
records of who died in these attacks and who provided the intell that led to
them will never be made public. Did Al-Balawi collaborate with other
jihadists who were willing to sacrifice their lives to bolster Al-Balawi’s
credibility? The Ana Muslim (I am a Muslim) jihadist website reported,
―Every time that the reports which he gave proved accurate, their
confidence in Al-Balawi rose.‖ It is more likely that Al-Balawi gave the CIA
the locations of Al-Qaeda safehouses that was accurate however the
structures were either empty of the jihadists had a bomb shelter in the
basement that they hid out in when the drones attacked. Al-Balawi had to
be aware of when the attack was to take place so that he himself would not
be killed! The jihadists could have staged fake funerals for the Brothers
allegedly killed in the raid, and these men could have kept a low profile until
after Al-Balawi attacked. Were there other CIA snitches who confirmed
these deaths? Unlikely as Al-Balawi would have had to have known who
they were so they wouldn‘t become causality statistics. No matter how you
look at it, the CIA was spoon fed disinformation (good info combined with
lies) and has egg all over their shirts and blouses.
Q. Abu Dujanah is a figure known for his articles and discussions which are
published on the jihadi web forums. We would like to better familiarize our
kind readers with him, so who is he?
Q. The good omens are true, as Abu Dujanah al-Khurasani is actually now
inside Khorasan, and the decision to travel to the lands of jihad is a divine
blessing and a magnificent grace. So, what affected you and pushed you to
take up your weapon in this land?
A. Praise be to Allah for his blessing, and this is the blessing that I love
the most next to the blessing of Islam. Regarding your question dear
brother, the answer is comprised of two sections or two dimensions.
The first one is personal that is connected to my love of jihad and
martyrdom, and the second is general and relates to the present state of
the Islamic nation. First, I was raised to love jihad and martyrdom since
my youth, and I used to listen to the Holy Quran in piety and in hopes
of receiving the honor of jihad and martyrdom when I grew older and
became stronger. I used to wonder whether I would still love jihad and
seek martyrdom when I became a man, or whether I was going to
become like everyone else around me who considers jihad a
delusional thought and a sort of lunacy, may Allah protect us.
This love [of jihad and martyrdom] grew in me, although it faced some
downturns at various times of my life. He who does not know this kind of
love will ruin the life of who does not carry it and will corrupt his
pleasures, and only those who love it will understand my words.
When you ponder the verses and hadiths that speak about jihad and its
graciousness, and then you let your imagination run wild to fly with
what Allah has prepared for martyrs, your life becomes cheap when
spent in his cause, and the extravagant houses and expensive cars and
all the material wealth of life becomes very distasteful in your eyes... If
the love of jihad enters the heart of man, it will not leave him even if he
wished it to. The more he tries to forget about it, or attempt to disregard
it, the symptoms will multiply and the situation will become impossible
to bear—he will find himself surrounded with everything that reminds
him of it [jihad]. He will be reminded by every brief news segment that
speaks about a new message from Shaykh Usama, and he will even
be reminded of the places reserved for the martyrs in the highest
ranks of paradise when he sees extravagant palaces. If he looks upon
his wife, then he will only begin imagining the beauties who have been
waiting for their martyr husbands on silk furnishings... Every incomplete
pleasure in life will remind him with its perfect counterpart in the afterlife
of what Allah has prepared for his martyred servants. A person once
said, 'there is love that kills.' I only see the truth of this in my love for
jihad, as this love will either kill you with regret if you should choose to
stay away from jihad, or else you will die as a martyr for the cause of
Allah if you choose to go to jihad—and it is up to every human to choose
between these two fates.
Q. A person's situation changes when he dusts off the dirt accumulated from
staying away from Jihad and joins the lions on the battlefields. What
changed in you after you arrived in the land of jihad and training?
A. You should really ask what hasn't changed about me! Here, I was
newly born and I began counting my age when I saw the first man
carrying a weapon. Despite the hardships we live as mujahideen, I
nonetheless feel very happy like an innocent child playing with his friend,
and I feel weightless from dropping away all my worries like a butterfly
traveling between flowers in the garden... My grudge towards those who
320. Zawahiri: ―The martyr Shaykh Moulawi Abdullah, father of Shaykh Abdul Rashid Ghazi, martyr of Islamabad's Red Mosque,
may they both rest in peace. He visited us in Kandahar with his son and a delegation of his school's ulema and teachers and spent
a whole day with us. One of them read a poem in Arabic in praise of Shaykh Usama, may God preserve him. The martyr Moulawi
Abdullah loved and backed Shaykh Usama, who asked him to gather the ulema's signatures on a fatwa urging jihad against the
Americans to drive them out of the Land of the Two Mosques, Palestine, and the rest of the Muslim countries. Moulawi promised to
do that. I spoke to him about conditions in Egypt and the crimes that its regime was perpetrating against Islam and the Muslim
people. I remember that I presented him as a gift a copy of my book "The Black Book: The Story of Torturing Muslims in Husni
Mubarak's Era."
have turned away [from jihad] turned into pity, and praying for their
dismissal turned into prayers for them to be rightly guided, as Allah has
excluded them from a great grace. By Allah, if they would come here,
they would cry for their sins, and praise is due to Allah who kept us safe
from what others have come to bear. We have experienced Allah's
reward in our path to the mujahideen... nothing keeps our mind busy
except two matters: steadfastness and loyalty, and we ask assistance
from Allah.
Q. There are many hadiths that encourage jihad by word, and which state
that this act has a big impact in supporting Islam. So why wasn't Abu
Dujanah satisfied with this kind of jihad when he had an influential role in this
field?
A. How can I encourage people to join the jihad while I'm staying away
from it? How can I sell them on the virtues of the beautiful musk while
my smell is gross? How do I become a burning wick for others follow the
light of? Can any sane person accept that? Not me. Jihad by word is
needed, and jihad by wealth is needed, but neither of them can replace
jihad by self, and they aren't considered a replacement for participation
in jihad... Jihad in the cause of Allah is simply a good thing. Even if
were merely permissible, I would still do anything to seek it because of
the rewards—so imagine my situation when it is an obligation upon us?
Furthermore, for a Muslim, traveling to jihad in the cause of Allah does
not prevent one from also carrying out jihad by word, but rather, it
strengthens it. Nothing is more effective than achieving public
credibility through action, and if the Muslim pursues this logic, and his
words become action, and if he is slain in the cause of Allah, his words
will become immortal so that they can remain signs on the road leading
to jihad, Allah-willing.
Q. Then, after this, what advice do you have to the writers in the forums and
what do you say to them?
A. O' how wonderful they are, and Allah will reward them. I used to write
about them constantly and when I arrived here, the pen went silent.
Every day that passes, I speak less than the day before, as I have
learned from them that silence is clearer than speech. This is a group,
half of whom are in paradise and the other half is still on earth waiting. I
wonder about them... why do they not cry in front of me when they
mention their martyred brothers, and there is no law against crying? If I
should mention the name of a martyr before them; of those known to
them, you would find the tears frozen in their eyes like a drizzle on a
flower. You would see tears in their wondering eyes stronger than any
outcry. Sometimes I'm forced to be silent in sympathy of their
situation, despite my curiosity to listen to the biographies of these
heroes. If I see one of them slowing down in pace and seemingly the
fires of longing are increasing, I leave him and walk away, because if I
don't, then who will, and that is why you find most of their stories
incomplete.
There was a man here named 'Abdullah Azzam al-Azdi' who was
killed months ago—we ask Allah to accept him—but he is in every one
of them, and he left in each of them a piece of himself. I used to hear
about his morals and jihad and modesty, and I wish I came to jihad
before he died to meet him. When you listen to a brother who has
experience in jihad and who tells stories about jihad, he would say, 'with
me there was this person—may Allah have mercy on him—and this
other person, may Allah gather us with them, is in paradise.' You would
think that he was telling a story that occurred perhaps a few years ago,
or as if he was reading about the battle of Badr or al-Qadisiyya, and that
is why you find that every moment and second he spends on earth
away from his brothers is in loyal service to Allah. I ask Allah to reward
them with success.
Q. Is there anything that you would like to say to the patient lions in the
trench of jihadi media.
Thanks to Al-Balawi a few days later the chumped off agents at the
CIA Station Forward Base Chapman, located near the Pakistani Afghani
border not far from Khost thought it was about to take out Al-Zawahiri. Al-
Balawi had driven across the border from Pakistan where he had spent a
mere 9 months allegedly becoming close to Al-Zawahiri. There was no
way he would be trusted with this information so quickly but December
2009 Balawi had requested an urgent meeting with the CIA and Captain
Sharif Ali bin Zeid, his Jordanian handler. He had dangled a prearranged
code in front of his handler nose which meant he had located Zawahiri.
According to the guard before Al-Balawi reached the first gate, the
Afghan security guards in charge of the perimeter security were instructed
by US soldiers to go into their rooms. ―They did not want any Afghans to
see al-Balawi,‖ he said. A US army vehicle then led the car through the
next two gates, reaching the inside of the base before stopping outside a
block of buildings used by the CIA and military intelligence to debrief their
sources. As Al-Balawi stepped out of the car, seven CIA officers and a
handful of soldiers gathered around. According to the guard, it was then
that Al-Balawi detonated his bomb, killing eight and injuring six.
Arghawan, still sitting in the driver‘s seat, survived the initial blast but a US
soldier shot him in the head with his pistol, assuming that he was part of
the bomb plot. ―There were lots of body parts,‖ said the guard. ―The suicide
bomber‘s legs were all that was left of him. He had hidden the bomb
beneath his pattu.‖
KHOST TOASTIES
MOHAMMAD AL-SHEUER
321. http://www.ajc.com/news/atlanta/apd-officers-remember-colleague-267039.html
Chapman; Jeremy Jason Wise, 35, was a former Navy SEAL, with eight
years of service, who was serving with XE Security Company (Blackwater)
in support of Operation Enduring Freedom. He graduated from Westside
Christian School in El Dorado, Ark., and received a degree from Hendrix
University in Conway, Ark. He was a member of the Trinity Church in
Virginia Beach. During his service, the former petty officer was awarded
three Navy / Marine Corp achievement medals and a Joint Service
Achievement medal. He also was awarded an Iraq Campaign medal, two
Sea Service Deployment ribbons, a Rifle Marksmanship medal and a Pistol
Marksmanship medal. Jeremy left the Navy in September 2009.