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June 5, 2006

Canada: Mosque Had Been Warned About Terror Suspect

Following the arrests of 17 Muslims, comprising 12 adults and 5 under-eighteen year olds on Friday June 2 in southern Ontario, more revelations have surfaced about the suspected terrorists and their intentions.

The Globe & Mail reported that the oldest man to be arrested, 43-year old Qayyum Abdul Jamal, had used a small mosque in a strip mall in Mississauga, Toronto, to recruit young and impressionable Muslims into his brand of extremism. This mosque was the Al-Rahman Islamic Centre for Islamic Education.

The director of the Mississauga Muslim Community Centre, Fahim Bukhari, said that Jamal was only a volunteer there, who did cleaning and occasionally ran errands. Bukhari said that various individuals had warned the management of the mosque about Jamal's views. One of these was the local Liberal MP, who often prayed at the mosque because his uncle had founded the establishment.

Bukhari added that five of the young suspects also prayed at the mosque. He said of Jamal: "He spends too much time with the youth. He's 43 years old and he goes bowling with them. He goes to barbecues. He plays soccer with them...I'm not surprised by the raids. I knew his views."

However, according to Associated Press via wral.com, Jamal often led prayers at the Al-Rahman mosque, which is situated between the The Cafe Khan kebab shop and a convenience store.

Qamrul Khanson, imam of the one-room mosque said that Jamal's Friday night prayer sessions were "more aggressive" than those of other prayer leaders, but insisted that Jamal never invoked hostility or terrorism. Khanson said of the arrested suspects: "I will say that they were steadfast, religious people. There's no doubt about it. But here we always preach peace and moderation."

He said that the 40 to 50 Muslim families who worshipped at the mosque were astonished when they heard of Friday night's arrest.

One of Jamal's neighbours, Kim Bastarache had noticed that a month after 9/11, 2001, she had watched a curious display in the rainy road outside. Jamal was holding a video camera, apparently filming two men who appeared to be acting. One individual was holding a briefcase, when he was snatched by the other 'actor" and dragged in to the garage.

Other neighbours described Jamal as taciturn and unsmiling. His wife, who is a light-skinned woman from Halifax, Nova Scotia, always wears a burka. She acts as an advocate for a group called Toronto District Muslim Education Assembly which promotes Islam in education.

Jamal wears a muslim cap at all times. The family home has three stickers on the front door, two in Arabic and one in English, which reads: "In the name of Allah we enter, and in the name of Allah we leave and upon our Lord we place our trust."

Jerry Tavares, a neighbour who described Jamal as "weird", said: "There was one time I said, 'Hi', and he just looked at me. That was it."

Neighbours spoke of a succession of young men always entering the house, aged from late teens to early twenties.

According to a report from the Toronto Star, the suspects obtained three tons of ammonium nitrate from undercover officers from the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. The Star also stated that the monitoring of the suspects had commenced in 2004 when internet chat room activities were being observed.

The adult suspects come from different backgrounds. The Trinidad Express states that Ahmad Mustafa Ghany, aged 21, is the son of a Trinidadian doctor who emigrated to Canada, while others are originally from Somalia, Egypt and Jamaica, with others of Trinidadian origin.

Police recovered and displayed a device which appeared to be a detonation instrument (pictured above), involving a cellular phone connected by a wire to a detonatpr, within a black toolbox.

The Natiional Post reports the views of various imams and Muslim community leaders, who distanced themselves from the extremism said to motivate the suspects. Ahmed Amiruddan, chairman on of the Ahlus Sunnahh Foundation of Canada, at least acknowledged that such extremism existed.

He said: "So many people in our community think it is not here, that it is nothing to worry about. I keep saying, you have to be careful of extremist ideology. It is in our community. More than 80 per cent of our mosques are being penetrated by these guys."

The director of the Islamic Foundation of Toronto, Salman Hasan, said yesterday that he has encountered extremist youth, but stated: "They were just like other confused young minds that needed love and guidance."

On Saturday, the suspects appeared in Brampton court, charged with participating in the acts of a terrorist group, including training and recruitment, firearms and explosives offenses for the purposes of terrorism and providing property for terrorist purposes.

Inside the court, states the Globe & Mail two young women wearing burkas, apparently wives of suspects, were being comforted by Zaynab Khadr (pictured, above right).

Ms Khadr is no stranger to terrorism cases. Her brother, 25-year old Abdullah Khadr, is wanted in the US on suspicion of "possession and use of a destructive device in furtherance of a crime of violence that is conspiracy to murder a U.S. national outside of the U.S." He is currently in custody in Canada.

On December 23 we gave a brief portrait of Khadr's family. Dad Ahmed Siad Khadr who emigrated to Canada in 1997, was killed in Pakistan in 2003. He had been a suspected financier for Al Qaeda and was in an AL Qaeda house when it was blasted by a helicopter gunship. His young son Abdul Karim Khadr was in the house at the time and was paralysed from the waist down. He returned to Canada in April 2004.

Zaynab's brother Abdurahman was interned in Guantanamo in 2003 before being released. Her younger brother, 17-year old Omar Khadr still resides in Guantanamo Bay detention facility. Arrested in Khost, Afghanistan in July 2002 when he was only 14, he was accused of killing a US serviceman.

Zaynab herself, who watched Saturday's proceedings from the court gallery, dressed in her burka, has her own history. She was still in Pakistan in April this year, before moving back to Canada. There are allegations that she and Abdullah Khadr ran an Al Qaeda terrorist training camp in the 1990s.

The judge ordered that all the suspects should be given a Koran, in accordance with the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

On her way out of the court, Zaynab Khadr was barraged by reporters, as she walked with a friend. She called to the brother of one suspect: "Don't talk", and then got into her Green 1997 Pontiac minivan and drove off.

Posted by Giraldus Cambrensis at June 5, 2006 6:18 PM

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